A fantastic gem from 1969 finally remastered and issued on cd

Era il 1969 quando Julie Driscoll, cantante inglese nota per la sua collaborazione con Brian Auger e I Trinity, prendeva la difficile decisione di abbandonare la band che l’aveva resa celebre.
Dalla voglia di riscattarsi, di gettare nuovi ponti per il futuro, di farsi apprezzare ed amare come artista solista nacque il suo disco di debutto, semplicemente intitolato 1969, e oggi finalmente stampato su cd dall’etichetta inglese Eclectic. E’ una perla di rara bellezza e intensità, scritto bene e suonato bene, in cui la bellezza delle composizioni si fonde perfettamente con quella dell’esecuzione e degli arrangiamenti. I musicisti, tra cui spiccano nomi come Chris Spedding (chitarra), Elton Dean (sax), Keith Tippet (pianoforte), Carl Jenkins (oboe), suonano con straordinaria creatività ed energia, come se fossero animati da una volontà comune o come se, più semplicemente, si trovassero tutti allo stesso momento nello stesso “state of mind”.
Ad arrangiare il disco c’è Keith Tippet, pianista di free jazz, grande sperimentatore e futuro marito della Driscoll, e la sua mano si sente nel momento in cui al cantautorato si fondono rock, jazz, free jazz, intriganti arrangiamenti per fiati ( oltre ad Elton Dean nel gruppo ci sono anche Nick Evans e Mark Charig, tutti membri dei Soft Machine e già con Tippet nel Keith Tippet Group).
La Driscoll conobbe Tippet nel momento in cui il produttore Giorgio Gomelsky le fece sentire estratti da “You are here…I am there”, l’album di Tippet che stava producendo in quel momento. Julie rimase folgorata, e Gomelsky suggerì un incontro tra i due perché Tippet scrivesse gli arrangiamenti per 1969.
L’album vale la pena non solo perché è un assoluto capolavoro, ma anche perché l’etichetta Eclectic ha fatto un eccezionale lavoro di rimasterizzazione, che pur senza alterarne le caratteristiche lo fa suonare nitido come se fosse un album registrato oggi in quello stile. Da non perdere.


Giulia Nuti

Julie Driscoll interview

EdP - what was 1969 to you? what was like that? what was happening? you had just left the Brian Auger’s Trinity...
JD - I left them after,some people said during,but l left after a tour of America and l spent a lots of time writing new material and 1969 is it out come.

EdP - and which were the motivation behind that ? music was developing and discovering a new ground. So,it looks like you were searching for something new, something different from the past and say ” hello ” to the past and moving forward .
JD - in a way ,but l think if you don’t put it in a show like that it’s a little bit misleading.I didn’t really turn my back on music that l was doing at that time. It was just an extension in a different way. I was just writing not with a band in view but for my own solo work and working with my guitar and there was no plan behind it back the way they came out. it was a kind of: ” oh, right, ok, l’m making a break here and now l’m gonna write a new staff “. l was always listening and open to many, many, many different kind of music. Always !

EdP - was there something than more than the rest influenced you at the time? You just say that you were in a middle of U.S. tour. Did you listen at something that really moved you at the time?
JD - no,l didn’t. no, sorry.
JD - we had no time at that time to listen at anything really, because we were working all the time.I worked constantly for 4 years with Brian. And l guess l really needed a break.

EdP - yes,l understand.Italy was a place where you came often, l recall...
JD - yes,Italy is one of our favourite places. Keith ( Tippett, her husband ) and me, we love Italy. And we have many wonderful, wonderful friends in Italy.

EdP - wWhen you start recording the album and you were looking for musicians one more the other. How did you put ‘em together? how did you assembly the line up , the personels, to help youwith the album?
JD - generally the pieces that Keith arranged for me,you know, for the album, he chosen musicians obviously after speaking to me and most of musicians were friends.l mean we had a whole pool, a whole circle of friends, who were musicians, so the obvious thing was to advance them to participate.

EdP - ... this comes very easy upfront when you listen to the album.Even today there is the impression that there is a bunch of friends trying to think in the same direction.
JD - It just seems amazing, Ernesto.That’s all these years have gone by!!!!… it’s a long time now.

EdP - The good fact is that the music stands the time. It stands because it has an uncommon freshness and naturality. And it all comes so good maybe because you were not thinking of making an album as we said before ....maybe because it was just getting together the songs ,getting in the right tracks together.
JD - l think so ,and also, Ernesto, it’s probably becuase l consider myself not a bullshit musician. l think ,well l know, l’m honest and sincere in all projects that l take part in, and particularly on my own. And l put so much time and trouble and care that l would hope that they would live on because l don’t look on them as a fashion group.

EdP - l understand that those days were sparkling days, the atmosphere and the circuit of friends were just all a bunch of people searching for new things,which is interesting. Because it is not so natural, today it’s all more squared than everything is, so…
JD - Everything is put much in boxes, today. There are very many restrictions also, particularly in England: what’s played on the radio and on the television too .they seem to be particular types of music,that are played over and over again. Well, anything a little bit different is overlooked completely pushed off the side. And that happens today, yes. And at that time - l think - people were ,they seemed to be much more open to many, many, many different influences. Everybody was getting influenced by music from Africa,Japan, China, India. You know, all these things were full modern technology, which were coming through to us. And it was all very inspiring!

EdP - For a moment you were side by side with a circuit of rock music of the period. I mention participating for your husband to King Crimson as on a side project. But than you decided to step forward. You were a bunch of brave people. How did you see it ? was it a hard life to make it real day by day, daily bread ?
JD - l think so . it was getting very radical. Absolutely, l think the thing was against come to it, and total dedication and we didn’t really look at it. It has been something that was gonna be a hard life.We believed so much and still do in what we were doing, what we were discovering and what we discovered and experienced in our music. We really believe passionately that is true and sincere music, that has a purpose; other that just kind of listening to and entertaining. But it became hard because, l suppose, it became difficult for outlet before ,l suppose. But yes we put our head on the copping-block, because we believed in it so much, we knew it was radical. We didn’t think of it at the time. It has been a difficult quest. It was what we believed in.

EdP - it looks like you put very much even your physical-self into the music...
JD - everything!!!

EdP - to put the music on....
JD – everything!. If you are a true musician you live and breathe it. It becomes a reflection of who and what you are.

EdP - these are fantastic words for the new generation. Thank you very much for these words, Julie.
Let’s go back to the album, ok?
A certain point the album was an album, no longer a collection of songs. So, did you released at that moment that you had a chance to put it together and pack it as an album and go forward. You said: ”ok, maybe it’s time to put it out and that’s it and then l’m doing something else”. How did you make it ? how did you move from the songs to the album?
JD - it was Giorgio, really, Giorgio Gomelsky, our manager. He was still managing me at the time . He managed me for many years. A wonderful soul ! I’m very fouled of Giorgio. It was a matter of , he kind of,…he organised that and he suggested me to meet Keith and have a listen to his band. He had a tape at that time of Keith ‘s band and ha said ” look ,l think this guy will be a good guy for the arrangement for your album”. And l went listening to him and it was like a breath of fresh air. Wonderful! I think really from that moment on Keith and me have hardly been apart.

EdP - so let’s just try to make clear the moment: for Keith was between his first album and “Dedicate you, but you were listening”(on Vertigo) because 1969 is right in the middle of the two. And were the people around you supporting? Because it was such an unique project. the bands, the friends, were they supportive… How about the other musicians...?
JD - no, l don’t think there was no pushing anywhere, just support around!. l think the whole thing was a natural process and once it was completed and once the album was done, it was a documentation that was there. It was something that l wasn’t gonna take on to the road. Do you see what l mean? that was a complete singing itself and l just kept writing, l kept be involved in different kinds of music. There was Centipede ,there was, you know, Ovary Lodge, there were all the things that came after, and all the time it’s been like waves of progression.

EdP - From a career move is a very brave move: you do an album, you don’t go on the road . At the same - more or less, or a few months after - you get into a band of 50 people all together like Centipede. Weird!. Did never cross your mind that could have been done in another way? It was like always have the word “ go “ on!!!!.
JD -absolutely, it’s a matter of follow your heart....

EdP - ...there is a freedom of…
JD - ....it’s a freedom but is also ,if you believe that your journey in life is intended and is meant to be ,that you follow your feelings and you follow what your feelings ‘s in your heart. And that’s what l’ve always done. l can’t function in any other way. It something, that’s a built inside. There is no other way.

EdP -How did you keep it together? have you a recipe?
JD - no, l do not…l’m sorry ( laughing ).

EdP – today, what’s actually happening is that you’ve might come back to the album, or listen to it again now, and it sounds like you’re gonna have it a certain responses from it as in the last weeks or so, or in the last month. The rerelease of 1969 comes in at a very right moment . Amazing?
JD - oh,that’s nice. It just amazed me. Well, as l say it’s a long time since it has made and it’s wonderful if people hear a fresh. But it’s so long time ago, it’s like …,it’s a distant memory for me, really. l’ve to say that my son Luke he loves this album and for many years copies that we have had here in the house ,he has played them. He has played this album more than anything that l’ve done . He loved it! And you know , if you read the lines note for the song ”Walk down” that is a track that our daughter when she married her now husband Miles, they played it at their wedding. And “ To walk up the hill”, which for me was such a huge, huge honour. l had no idea when l made that ,the album ,or wrote that song that our daughter would actually wants to play that ”to walk up the hill”.

EdP – So, what did happen immediately after the album? Because your husband went doing into his second album “Dedicated to you but you weren’t listening” ( vertigo) and then you joined the Centipede ( Neon ). l think that was in 1970...
JD - that was the year that we got married as well.

EdP - 1970?
JD - yes

EdP - let me ask you about Centipede because the ensemble was always considered in a kind of legendary way. Having 50 people in the room is like a classroom , more than a classroom!!!...
JD - it was an amazing band!

EdP - was it a kind of organized , chaotic chaos get these people all together? how was it?
JD - it was Keith, it was all Keith. l don’t know how he did, he was absolutely phenomenal . He was amazing, and he’s still today, you know, when he puts together a big band, the last band was called Tapestry. He just put things together and he inspires that. The people in Centipede were people from many different kind of music brought together, but it didn’t sound like a bit of this-a bit of that. His made them jelling and his putting together of music is just so organic and so passionate, and so, you know .....way beautifully innocent, because it was not like a contriving thing, it was organic, absolutely true and when he had said to me what he was gonna do,and he said he was gonna get 50, you know a 100 legs together, 50 people to do this,l just thought “it’s impossible!”, but he did it. He spent 10 months working trough the night, writing, composing and all by hand all hisself, and then all his coping, l think trombonist Nick Evans helped for a period doing some coping. It was absolutely a labour of love and all l could say is that was Keit. He got it together . .

EdP - Could have been possible to do it today?
JD -...with the money yes...but it would be a big project. Over the years they have been talked to outer people and have try to say ” listen we must put it together” and it hasn’t’ happened because you can easily think of the expenses.

EdP -...but there is a new scene. And this is an important question related to that: do you think there would be a new scene that could be as fresh, as free as you were to participate to a project like that ? If your husband would say: ”ok let me do it again ,let me do it with all new people”. Could it be possible or not?
JD - l don’t think it would be impossible, l think he would…because you see l have seen him and worked with him so many years that l know how he works. and he works in such a fantastic way with lots of musicians ,that l just… , of course it wouldn’t be any longer a young man doing what he was doing at that time, but l can assure you that he is alway “on” in any projects that Keith is involved in.There is always a flavour of the magic of Centipede in any Big bands he works with or in. As example: we both teach to international summer school every years - You know l’ve done it for 15 years and Keith is done it l think 20. The students that l take in there are not professional musicians, ok? And sometimes we had 60 people in the band ,which is bigger then Centipede; there is the incredible sound and flavour and the original music that Keith produces and the way that he blends and brings those people together, the different instruments.... l can assure you it’s something that Keith just to this day does amazingly well.

Ernesto de Pascale