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Leo Kottke - Instrumentals: The Best of the Capitol Years Audio CD

A fair review of the Leo Kottke "Instrumentals: The Best of the Capitol Years" Audio CD. Please note that the below review is the views of the authors, and authors only. You can get a complete list of all Leo Kottke reviews here, or go back to the Leo Kottke tabs.

Leo Kottke Band: Leo Kottke
Title: Instrumentals: The Best of the Capitol Years
Rating:
Release Date: 2003-02-11
Media: Audio CD

Tracks: 1: June Bug 2: Ice Miner 3: Poor Boy 4: Machine #2 5: Bean Time 6: In Christ There Is No East or West 7: Owls 8: Lost John 9: Blue Dot 10: Egg Tooth 11: Crow River Waltz / Jesu, Joy Of Man's Desiring / Jack Fig 12: Mona Ray 13: Twilight Property 14: Taking a Sandwich to a Feast 15: A Good Egg 16: A Child Should Be a Fish 17: The Scarlatti Rip-Off 18: Grim to the Brim

Kotte's non-vocal best from the Capitol label...
I kind of miss his gravel voice, however, and I think the disc would have been improved with a vocal or two, especially his version of "Pamela Brown. This is a wonderful hour of vintage Leo, on different kinds of guitars, varying styles of song, with and without the company of others. " However, if you love the guitar, you can't avoid having some Kottke on the shelf, especially these recordings from the 1970's, when his fingers were uninjured and he did a great many uptempo tunes. Also nice is the CD known as "The Essential Leo Kottke---The Chrysalis Years" which preserves tracks laid down on his next label after Capitol. .


Early Work from a Master
This collection presents the best instrumentals of his earlier Capitol years (and in my opinion, all his albums up through the live "My Feet Are Smiling" are true classics). Leo Kottke is to the acoustic guitar what Hendrix was to the electric: when he burst on the scene with his debut Takoma album, "Six- and Twelve-String Guitar" in 1969, he redefined both instruments. Omitted is his notorious "geese-fart" singing voice, a foghorn baritone that I didn't find as bad as reputed, though I still have always been partial to the instrumentals. This, and the companion "Chrysalis Years" volume, have been released by his current label, Blue Note, and they are both essential, especially if you don't have any Kottke in your collection. If you don't mind the geese farts (and he did record some pretty good songs with vocals, too), you may want to check out "Essential Leo Kottke" on Chrysalis (there are only a few common tracks with the new "Instrumentals" CD), or the excellent 2-disc Rhino collection, "Leo Kottke Anthology". Only the last one, by the way, contains any material from his Takoma debut.


Kottke at the Top of His Game
While they are all instrumentals, they are not solo in that Kottke works with other musicians on about half of these tracks. The 18 tracks on this hour-long CD are taken from the six albums Leo Kottke recorded for Capitol from 1971 to 1975, arguably the most productive five years of his career. It does not, however, detract from his guitar playing being prominently featured.

Kottke pays homage to John Fahey on a couple tracks: "Poor Boy" and "In Christ There Is No East Or West," which are the only two non-originals on the album. The latter is a special favorite of mine. Other standout tracks are the gogeous "Owls," the live "Medley" which concludes with the furiously-paced "Jack Fig," and perhaps one of Kottke's loveliest melodies, "Mona Ray," where Kottke is accompnaied by Michael Johnson.

While I have long been a fan of Kottke's rich baritone voice, it's nice to have this collection of instrumentals. And unlike the Chrysalis collection, there is no new material here. Just Kottke playing the hell out of his guitar. And when you stop to think about it, isn't that enough? It is for me. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.


One of our greatest instrumentalist doing what he does best.
The album became know as the armadillo album because of the cover art and put both Kottke and his label, Tacoma, on the map. Leo Kottke's "6 and 12 String guitar" fell to earth in 1969 and some of us have never been the same. In the liner notes on the album, Kottke describes his voice as being similar to "geese farts on a muggy day". After the armadillo album, Kottke would for the most part ignore his own advice and feature vocals on most of his songs. The compilation of instrumentals from 1970 -1975 when Kottke was recording on Capitol is the brainchild of Jerry Roche who apparently agrees with Kottke's original evaluation as do I. These are tracks compiled from Kottke's Mudlark, Greenhouse, My Feet Are Smiling, Dreams and All The Stuff, Ice Water and Chewing Pines albums. It show off Kottke in a fair number of settings including solo, accompanied only by dobro, pedal steel, bass or guitar. It also has him in trio and quartets settings. For my ears, the fewer players the better. The sound of what Kottke is doing with his six and twelve strings, with his flatpicking, fingerpicking and slide is all I really want to hear. The man is an orchestra unto himself.
He is also a wonderful writer who has created almost his own genre of music, a personal blend of country, folk, jazz, blues and classical.
If you have never heard of Kottke, please go directly to the armadillo album. You will name children after me, I promise. If you already have that then this CD and the second volume are a great addition to your collection.


You can see a complete list of all Leo Kottke discography, or go back to the Leo Kottke tabs. There is also a good guide on how to read guitar tabs here.

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