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The Mirror Man Sessions
 
 
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The Mirror Man Sessions

~ Captain Beefheart
4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
Price: £4.98 & this item Delivered FREE in the UK with Super Saver Delivery. See details and conditions
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The Mirror Man Sessions + Safe as Milk + Strictly Personal
Price For All Three: £13.94

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  • This item: The Mirror Man Sessions ~ Captain Beefheart

    In stock.
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    This item Delivered FREE in the UK with Super Saver Delivery. See details and conditions

  • Safe as Milk ~ Captain Beefheart

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  • Strictly Personal ~ Captain Beefheart

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Product details

  • Audio CD (4 Sep 1999)
  • Number of Discs: 1
  • Label: Buddha
  • ASIN: B00002DF8E
  • Other Editions: Audio CD  |  Vinyl
  • Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 6,415 in Music (See Bestsellers in Music)

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1. Tarotplane
2. 25th Century Quaker
3. Mirror Man
4. Kandy Korn
5. Trust Us
6. Safe As Milk
7. Beatle Bones 'n' Smokin' Stones
8. Moody Liz
9. Gimme Dat Harp Boy

Product Description

Amazon.co.uk Review

There are times when a set of recordings begs not only to be re-mastered and reissued, but restored according to the artist's original intent. Mirror Man Sessions is an unqualified success of this sort. It's a re-sequenced approximation of the planned, half-live-in-the-studio/half-studio double album It Comes to You in a Plain Brown Wrapper, which Beefheart and band started on several months after the release of their debut, Safe as Milk. Most importantly, the disc includes many of the songs off the botched Strictly Personal album (the tapes of which were maliciously slathered with heavy echo and phasing effects by producer Bob Krasnow, without Beefheart's approval) in blissful clarity. The sound throughout is vibrant, with all the sparks of the dual-guitar interplay and massive slide sound that would typify the Magic Band in years to come. The album has far fewer tempo changes than Milk or the records that follow it; the band for the most part digs deep blues-based grooves and stays within their confines. But there are lengthy, monochromatic stomp-trance workouts, such as "Tarotplane" and "Gimme Dat Harp Boy", which stretch out and explore John French's jagged drumming, the guitarists' uniquely deft, pan-tonal playing, and Beefheart's harp playing, gruff vocal style, and impressionistic lyrics. Note: Seven more tracks from this session are included on the reissue of Safe as Milk. --Mike McGonigal


CD Description

More than 30 years after these tracks were recorded, the MIRROR MAN SESSIONS are finally being released in the manner of Don Van Vliet's original vision. Captain Beefheart and HisMagic Band were always going through personnel changes, butthe group was especially in flux during 1967. SAFE AS MILK had just been issued, and the band began recording a follow-up, planned as a double-album. But the following year saw the Captain and his Band dropped by their label (Buddah).
Some of the slated songs (supplemented with electronic effects) became STRICTLY PERSONAL, released by Blue Thumb Records.Buddah followed suit, venturing into its vaults, choosing four extended songs, and packaging them as MIRROR MAN-obscuring facts by billing the album as "live recordings from 1965". This reissue adds five additional numbers, all of which show the band at an evolutionary point midway between the delta blues of its first recordings and the layered rhythmic stew of TROUT MASK REPLICA. THE MIRROR MAN SESSIONS is an essential document of an important ensemble.

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Customer Reviews

9 Reviews
5 star:
 (3)
4 star:
 (5)
3 star:
 (1)
2 star:    (0)
1 star:    (0)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
4.2 out of 5 stars (9 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

 
14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars The same only more so, 29 Mar 2004
This album (or at least the original vinyl LP) was my introduction to Cpt Beefheart. My chum Paul Rossetti said "turn the bass up full" so I did. Until I discovered reggae a few years later, it was the only music that made sub-woofers worthwhile.

This CD contains the vinyl's original 4 tracks, plus more from the same recording sessions. The jazz & blues progressions intertwine mischievously, sometimes luminous and sometimes impenetrable. As opposed to the shorter compositions on virtually all their other official releases, live and studio, these are rare examples of how the Magic Band could stretch and compress, fall apart and coalesce, explode and repress, focus and digress.

But are they really jamming? As with all Beefheart, you never know how much was actually improvisation, because the maestro was known to encourage and persuade his musicians to rehearse the most astonishingly adventurous lines until the most unlikely of musical structures could be repeated note-for-note over and over again. "Tarotplane" and "Mirror Man" SOUND improvised in places, so that's good enough for me.

If you don't relish the tightly-crafted song packages that make up Troutmask Replica, the illusory freeform of Mirror Man could be your introduction to the amazing world of Don Van Vliet.

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14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Blues in its beefiest form, 11 Sep 2001
Worth it for the first four tracks which are quite unlike anything before or after. The first track "Tarotplane" is 20 minutes plus and has moments that will make your hairs stand on end. It is worth the price of the cd just for this so along. Listen to it my words cannot do it justice. The next three are als excellent with two extended versions of Kandy Korn and Mirror Man and Twenty Fifth Century Quaker. These tracks are the bulk of the album and how the album was originally released. Of the rest, most are already available on "Safe as Milk" of the ones that aren't there is a version of "Beatle bones and Smoking Stones" but it is still worth buying Strictly Personal as a companion piece to this awesome album.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Sometimes I think I don't know what to think; what do you think?, 3 Oct 2007
I've given this a little time to sink in, but I'm afraid I'm still unsure of what to think about it. I'm really only starting out on my discovery of the works of Captain Beefheart, so my review isn't going to be informed by a knowledge of all his work, but I will try my best to give you my impressions. And I'm not going to give you the brief history of the record. All the other reviewers seem to have done that already, and I'm sure anyone interested in the Captain already knows. I did.

This record is er... extremely percussive. To listen to it feels almost like being punched repeatedly on both temples at the same time. And it is sonically very flat. That isn't a complaint - I actually love the scope of sound and the music Beefheart gets from his guitar players without using fancy effects.

On the first 3 (and very long) tracks the guitars drone and tinker in spite of each other, the bass booms and bounces and the drums trip and tap and roll (and are too quiet in the mix)... with little approaching a recognisable structure in sight. I've heard this record described as the Captain's bluesiest. I'm not so sure. Safe As Milk seems more influenced by the groove and swing of the blues to me. Sure, there are blues elements here, but this music is just SO complex! It doesn't create a trance-like effect by the use of repeated figures, it does it by playing slightly different figures for 15-20 minutes. It's so difficult to absorb!

I do find it quite fascinating though. It's such a departure from it's predecessor (Safe As Milk). On Safe As Milk every note, every sound was absolutely necessary, was absolutely perfect in composition and placement. There was nothing in any of those songs that wasn't needed. In contrast, Mirror Man makes me wonder. These songs must have been hell to learn. Did the Captain REALLY make his band learn these songs note for note? Tarotplane? 20+ minutes of music that is constantly changing, but only slightly?! I just wonder... why?

Now, I'm sure he had a reason. I don't doubt for a moment that Beefheart is a genius. He just decided to go in the complete opposite direction to what he went in on Safe As Milk. I'm just not sure it makes for a great listening experience. It takes a little too much hard work. Sure, I know I'll hear something different in these tunes every time I listen to them... but part of that will only because there's so damn much to notice!

In case you're confused, I've only discussed the first 3 tracks so far. I'll just finish this section by saying that in amongst these long pieces there are a few moments of absolute genius - usually in the Captain's vocal performance.

And so onto the rest of the tracks. The rest of the tracks are easier to appreciate. They don't swing like the Safe As Milk album, but they are just as imaginative. And if you think the Safe As Milk album is too weird... these will be way too weird for you.

Kandy Korn is terrific, and good fun. The extended instrumental section at the end is fascinating. The version of Trust Us isn't quite as good as the one on the extended edition of Safe As Milk, but it's very good nonetheless. Conversely, the version of Safe As Milk is better than the one that is a bonus track on the album of the same name.

I don't have anything specific to say about Beatle Bones or Moody Liz, but nevertheless, they are pretty impressive, and again, fascinating examples of music the like of which I've never heard before. Gimme Dat Harp Boy is good too, however the first half of it's bluesy riff is very similar to Spoonful, a song covered by Cream. That pales it a little for me. Gimme Dat Harp Boy is better though.

Additional: I've had a lot more chance to absorb this record now, and would just like to add a couple of things. I still pretty much stand by what I've said about it, but I do have to say that I appreciate this record more the more I listen to it. It's radical departure from the music of Safe As Milk makes more sense to me since I've become familiar with Trout Mask Replica. I do find however, that The Mirror Man Sessions works best when playing it on random. Since the album was never actually conceived in this particular form, I can only conclude that the tracks have been sequenced in the wrong order. I find that having to listen to the 18 minute "Tarotplane" first often puts me off - it seems to dominate the whole record - and I get a much better feeling as a whole when I can listen to the songs in a context divorced from this sequencing.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars Did I really say that?
To my old chum Paul Harisson, when we started to discover the pure music that is Captain beefheart? Not as arhythmic as Troutmask or as overproduced as the still-wonderful... Read more
Published 14 months ago by Paul Rossetti

5.0 out of 5 stars Never to be repeated
This music comes from another world when looked at from today's overdone and sterotypical viewpoint. Read more
Published 23 months ago by C. Muscillo

4.0 out of 5 stars Seriously, run out of titles
Captains Beefheart's Mirror Man is a long album that contains some of the heaviest and most blues orientated songs he ever wrote. Read more
Published on 8 Aug 2007 by A. Weaver

5.0 out of 5 stars More magic
From 1967 to 1972 Captain Beefheart released what is, to my mind, the greatest run of releases by any artist ever. Read more
Published on 24 Jun 2007 by degrant

4.0 out of 5 stars Buy this instead of Strictly Personal
Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band recorded the songs from this album to be released on a double album, to compete with contemporary recordings by his good friend Frank Zappa... Read more
Published on 8 Feb 2006 by Joseph Henderson

3.0 out of 5 stars This star never got out of obscurity
Im kinda undesided on this one , in some places you get brilliant captain songs in others you get weird Zappaesque stuff that I feel Captain Beefheart should have avoided . Read more
Published on 19 May 2003 by Mr. D. Mccluskey

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