This week I've decided to highlight the 1990, Kip Hanrahan release on American Clave, Tenderness. Originally, what attracted me to this album was that Sting had sung (or actually spoken) on the track titled, "She Turned So That Maybe A Third Of Her Face Was In This Fuckin' Beautiful Half-Light". However, this album was not what I expected. In fact, if not for the Sting appearance, I probably would have never discovered Kip Hanrahan.Thank God I did!
Kip Hanrahan, for all those that do no know, is an Avant Garde percussionist, who labels himself a producer / conductor/ guy who brings people together. Born to a Jewish family in Brooklyn, Kip apparently grew up loving the sounds of Puerto Rican and Cuban Afro music. Tenderness, was a concept album in which Latin Jazz music met metro cosmopolitan Avant Garde society spoken word / first person signing (It's not going to make any sense until you listen to it).
So why would a kid who liked Grunge music, ever listen to some pretension spoken word jazz stuff. Well to be completely truthful.....it appeared at the time very sexy and 20 years later, it is still very sexy music. The spoken word and poetry is very well arraigned as well as the multiple layers of beat driven congas and bongo's. Don Pullen, who is very accomplished pianist, also provides some very skillful Avant Garde Piano work.
This album is very much a necessity to any collection. Unfortunietly, nothing on the American Clave label has been released on vinyl yet but I imagine that it's only a matter of time. According to the record labels web page (http://www.americanclave.com/1-kip.html), Kip has another album due out this year. For a taste of Kip, the website has a music stream of a Hanrahan produced track titled, "In a War Such Things Can Happen." This free music stream can give you a hint of what Kip's music sounds like. This particular song is obviously a protest song, but it is interesting to me, as there are two dueling fret-less bass's throughout the song.
Enjoy!
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