Soft Machine – Facelift France & Holland 3xCD

Description

Newly-remastered footage of pioneering British psych outfit Soft Machine is headed for release as Facelift France and Holland. The three-CD/DVD set will arrive on March 25th via Cuneiform Records and showcases the earliest known footage of the 1960s Canterbury group.

After emerging as forefathers of the 60s psychedelic movement across the pond in 1966sharing the stage with Pink Floyd, Jimi Hendrix, and moreSoft Machine reached the dawn of a new decade in 1970. The band moved toward a more eclectic jazz-rock sound and also scaled back personnel to a modest quintet of Mike Ratledge (keyboards, flute), Robert Wyatt (drums, vocals), Hugh Hopper (bass, guitar, alto sax), and Elton Dean (alto saxophone, saxello, flute, keyboards), with contributions from Lyn Dobson (soprano saxophone, flute, harmonica, vocals). With this lineupwhich would last from January to March 1970the band performed at Paris Thtre de la Musique on March 2nd, footage of which comprises the meat of the release.

Facelift France and Holland contains the only known video of the five-piece lineup. Though bits and pieces of the set exist on YouTube, this will mark the first official release of the entire show, originally broadcast by Frances Pop 2. Footage of the concert was also previously released in 2008 on Live In Paris 1970, but archivists have gone through the original footage once again to improve video quality as well as remove soundtrack issues including fake applause and hard edits.

The new release includes the only professionally-recorded performance of Out-Bloody-Rageous with Dobson on second saxophone. It also contains the only professionally-recorded performance by the quintet of Facelift, with the second appearing on the groups breakthrough album Third, released in June 1970. In addition to the March 1970 concert in Paris, Facelift France and Holland also hosts a previously-unreleased performance at Amsterdams Concertgebouw on January 17th. Cuneiform

Facelift France And Holland – SOFT MACHINE