Here's the only web
site I've found so far - HULLODER:
The Soft Machine Pages. It contains a good
amount of material, including an exhaustive listing of recording
sessions.
The Soft Machine were the first group to emerge out of The Wilde
Flowers, a Canterbury band who practically produced the whole
Canterbury subset of art-rock (the remainder of the band coalesced
into Caravan in 1968). The Soft Machine formed in 1966 out of
musicians that were or had been in the Wilde Flowers. A set of
demos recorded the next year show an intriguing direction - a
collection of jazz-pop songs that are faintly reminiscent of the
Zombies - but with more rock and focus on the drums as the real lead
instrument (vs. the Zombies' vocal and keyboard base).
Guitarist Daevid Allen contributed little, but it was apparent that
Robert Wyatt was a top-notch drummer among the likes of Michael Giles
of King Crimson. Allen left before the first album Soft
Machine was recorded, and Kevin Ayers departed afterwards for an
eclectic solo career. He was replaced by Hugh Hopper, another
Wilde Flowers alum. At this point their music was a mixture of
psychedelia, avant-garde, jazz and rock. Got that? Not to
mention the goofy (some would say dadist) sense of humor present
through all of their work. Their Third album was the
last with vocals (limited to one side of a double album), and Wyatt
departed after their Fourth. He soon established
Matching Mole and then went onto an interesting solo career, which
was sadly limited by an accident which left him paralyzed from the
legs down. From then on Soft Machine was fusion group with
various people coming in and out and soldiered on until the early
1980s. So here's the deal - Wyatt is awesome, both as a singer and a
drummer. Ratledge coaxes unusual sounds out of his organ (even
approaching Keith Emerson territory) and Hopper plays a mean fuzz
bass. When Elton Dean joined the group their sound went heavily
towards traditional jazz, and I mean heavily. I'm not the
greatest fan of Dean's playing, but he impressed Reg Dwight enough to
change his first name to Elton. I have Matching Mole's (a
phrase close to the French translation of Soft Machine) first album
as well as a Caravan album. In brief, both group expanded on early
Soft Machine, with Caravan being more pop oriented, and both group
tend to get dragged down by overlong jams.
Recently there have been an awful lot of live albums, and other
odd stuff concerning this period of Soft Machine coming out on CD.
I haven't really had the opportunity to hear any of it, as it hasn't
shown up used around here. Investigate elsewhere.
Original Personnel: Robert Wyatt (drums, vocals)
Daevid Allen (guitar) Mike Ratledge (piano and
organ) Kevin Ayers (bass)
Allen left the group due to visa problems before their
first proper album and went off to helm Gong in its various forms.
Ayers left after Soft Machine and was replaced by Hugh
Hopper (bass, occasional sax). The Third lineup
included: Elton Dean (alto sax), Lyn Dobson
(flute, sop. sax), Nick Evans (trombone), Jimmy Hastings
(flute, bass clarinet), of which only Dean was the only one to
stay on.
Soft Machine: Jet
Propelled Photographs (rec. Apr 1967), ***1/2 An interesting
session probably intended as a demo. If
you are looking for something like Pink Floyd's debut, or even Third,
this isn't it. It is a collection of flawed jazz-pop songs
enthusiastically performed. The album's sound and
production is slightly rough (backing vocals on "Save
Yourself"), and Wyatt's voice sounds a touch haggard. This
is the only work that Allen plays a major role on, and he tends to
stay in the background, or play unhelpful bluesy lines (his "Town
Without a Pity"-like intro to "Memories").
Still, you can hear the basis for their future sound in Wyatt's
drumming ("I Should've Known" where he drowns out Allen)
and Ratledge's keyboard parts (the piano and vocal "That's How
Much I Need You Now"). Wyatt also has some great skat
vocals throughout (example: title track). Fans of the early
Soft Machine will love this, and many of these songs appeared amidst
Wyatt's side of Third. Produced by Giorglio Gomelsky, who is
known for his work with the Rolling Stones and Yardbirds.
Soft
Machine (1968), *** Jazz-rock with
experimental tendencies. The coherent songs have instrumental
passages in the middle or connecting them ("Hope For
Happiness"), but many songs are ciphers. The serene "A
Certain Kind" is not only beautiful, it is coherent. The
groups humor is in good taste with songs such as "Why Am I So
Short?" Ayers' "We Did It Again" may be
avant-garde, but it is boring to listen to, and "Why Are We
Sleeping?" also wears out it's welcome. Overall, Wyatt is
the star here. His voice and drumming are prominent in the mix
for a good reason - they're excellent. Ratledge also
shows off his chops on the instrumental passages ("So Boot If At
All"), Ayers to a lesser extent. It's takes a couple of
tries to get used to the sound of the album since it lacks guitar,
but Wyatt's drums fill out the sound to an extent. Fortunately
they didn't succumb to massive amounts of studio trickery in the wake
of Sgt. Pepper's, limited only to bouncing the drums around.
Produced by Chas Chandler (Jimi Hendrix's manager and producer) and
Tom Wilson.
Soft
Machine: Volume Two (1969), ****1/2 More
controlled and the band's sound has filled out. In keeping with
the time, each side of Volume Two is a group of interconnected
songs. Thanks to new member Hugh Hopper's fuzzy bass tone,
Ratledge's use of both piano and organ on tracks, and occasional sax
parts from Hopper and his brother, Soft Machine's sound is immensely
more encompassing, and better. The humor is everywhere (the
bizarre "Hulloder", the Jimi Hendrix Experience tribute
"Have You Ever Bean Green?", "Pig", etc.)
Occasionally they succumb to nonsense ("Out of Tunes" with
its 5/8 bass line, the experimental "Fire Engine Passing With
Bells Clanging"). But even the more complete songs are
excellent - the stunning acoustic "Dedicated to You But You
Weren't Listening", "Hibou, Anemone and Bear".
Energetic, amusing and, above all, fun. Produced by the band.
During 1969
Soft Machine backed Syd
Barrett on a few
songs on his album The Madcap Laughs.
Soft
Machine: Third (1970), ****1/2 Two LPs and
four tracks. Soft Machine turned to traditional jazz for three sides
of this album, with the remaining side an amalgamation of older
material from the Jet Propelled Photographs era. With a
new seven(!) man lineup, Soft Machine had plenty of soloists for the
time being, although only Elton Dean was retained afterwards.
Hopper's "Facelift" is experimental - a blending of two
live recordings with lots of aimless wailing horns, and organ oddness
in the first 5-1/2 minutes, before breaking into a regular song.
"Slightly All The Time" is straight tasteful jazz focused
on Dean's saxophone. "Out-Bloody-Rageous" veers
between jazz and Terry Riley based electronic minimalism. Much
more relaxed and less experimental than its predecessor, with a
majority of the emphasis on the horns. Only Wyatt's "Moon
In June" is more in line with their previous work.
Essentially a solo track, with Wyatt playing drums, organ, piano,
bass and singing (the group's last vocal track) it is a strange
collection of early Soft Machine songs that trail off into
skat-vocals or other songs. Fascinating. Almost a perfect
album, except for some dry spots here and there, and the potential
off-puttingness of "Facelift". Self-produced.
Soft
Machine: Fourth (1971), **1/2 Goodbye
vocals, hello not so exciting jazz compositions. Whereas Third
was mostly a rock album (even ignoring "Moon in June"),
parts of Fourth are indistinguishable from a "real jazz"
group. This is mainly due to Hopper's occasiona use of string
bass, and Dean's sonic escapades. In itself those is perfectly
acceptable. Fourth's problem lies in the group's
writing, and their over-reliance on atmosphere, as opposed to real
content. The best example is Dean's "Fletcher's Blemish",
which opens with the sounds of Hopper's string bass dying, and then
acts like the soundtrack to a film of atrocities. In other
words, the majority of the track is a collection of "Oh No!"
moments translated into music, without making a song. Hopper
wrote most of the album, but he relied on Dean to supplement his
rather basic musical ideas (the moody "Kings and Queens"
where Dean's soprano sax helps drain any life out of the track).
The second half is suite entitled "Virtually", which runs
the entertainment gamut. The dark "Virtually Part 1"
is really the only interesting part of the suite, including a nice
bare bass and drums section. The third section opens with some
backward noises (nothing new there) and features Dean making
avant-garde noises on his horn throughout. This also does not
make a song. The other two sections ("Part 2" and
"Part 4" for those keeping score) are frankly tepid and
lethargic. The only real winner on the album is the opening
track, Ratledge's "Teeth", which is a fully realized
multi-part composition. It does rely on Dean too much, Ratledge
plays some solos, and it keeps moving. Oh well, at least
Wyatt's drumming is always a treat.
Soft Machine: Fifth (1972)
Matching
Mole (1972), **** A
continuation of Wyatt's more pop sensibilities and experimentalism,
after Soft Machine junked them. Fans of the Canterbury scene or
Wyatt's work with Soft Machine will love Matching Mole, but
others may find too abstract. The
rest of the band are not the sort of jazz-focused players that the
Soft Machine bunch had become, and the album is far more about
texture and atmosphere than soloing. Sure, Wyatt added
a great deal of mellotron to the album, but he used it more as a lead
instrument. Guitarist Phil Miller added little fuzzed bluesy
parts, Dave Sinclair also distorted his organ beyond recognition,
both styles grounding the album in more traditional rock. The
songs are generally focused around one musical phrase, and then
loosely improvise with it, sometimes fall apart into noise, only to
recover. The album is put together well also also as each side
flows.
Matching
Mole opens up normally enough with "O Caroline," a
heartbreakingly sincere piano ballad with Wyatt's tender vocals.
If Matching Mole were to be remembered for one thing, it would be
this beautiful track. Wyatt's vocals turn more idiosyncratic as
it evolves into the next track "Instant Pussy," with Wyatt
doing scat while the band does their thing. This then turns
into "Signed Curtain", another piano song, but in true
Canterbury style, it only has placeholder lyrics. Thus, the
first verse mainly consists of Wyatt singing "This is the first
verse." Clever, and a good tune besides. In the end,
it is like "O Caroline" - a self-conscious effort by Wyatt
to reach out.
The balance of
the album is instrumental, and moves from structured phrases to noisy
disarray with humorous titles ("Instant Kitten", "Beer
as in Braindeer"). This can be challenging stuff, and not
for not everyone. The side opens up with overlapping mellotron
sounds, evoking Soft Machine's "Out-Bloody-Rageous" and, by
extension, Terry Riley. In other places, it sounds like nothing
is going on, and that the group has let themselves go too much. But
then they turn around and deliver another quirky irresistible riff
amidst madness ("Dedicated to Hugh"). The entire
album ends in one fantastic creepy mellotron track, "Immediate
Curtain," which is the epitome of the group's focus on creating
a feeling, not a fixed tune. It has the same eerie qualities as
incidental music from 2001: A Space Odyssey. Those who
like their music with both humor and a bit of instrumental madness,
will enjoy it. Produced by the group, with Wyatt writing
everything except Miller's "Part of the Dance". The
band was mainly Canterbury folk - Sinclair was from Caravan, and
bassist Bill MacCormick was in Quiet Sun with Phil Manzanera.
Sinclair actually left during recording to go back to Caravan, and
was replaced by electric pianist Dave McRae, also a distorter.
Hard to tell who plays on which track, what with all the altered
noises around.
Soft Machine: Six
(1973)
Matching Mole's Little Red
Record (1973) Produced
by Robert Fripp, and Eno pops up here. Their last album.
Soon afterwards Wyatt fell and became partially paralyzed. Miller
later formed Hatfield and the North with Sinclair.
Soft Machine: Seven
(1973)
Soft Machine: Bundles
(1975)
Soft Machine: Softs
(1976)
They released many
more albums, plus tons of solo albums. But that's it for now
here.
Soft
Machine (1968), ***
Soft
Machine: Volume Two (1969), ****1/2
Soft
Machine: Third (1970), ****1/2
Soft
Machine: Fourth (1971), **1/2
Matching
Mole (1972), ****