Boscoe

My family has this ongoing "keeping it positive" text message thread that buzzes at me a couple times a week.  I like my family.  They mean well.  Kind liberals, most of them, except for the ones who aren't and who I just don't talk to.  The rest of them do because family, you know, they don't believe in letting _politics_ get in the way of family.

Today I'm listening to this record, like, I'm doing deep dives on genres I ain't heard much of lately.  Earlier this week it was no wave, you saw my post on no wave, right?

So this week I'm listening to this record by Boscoe from '73.  This got reissued in '07 by Numero, and I mean, I know Numero's stuff reasonably well, but this one somehow passed me by.  Probably I wasn't ready to hear it at the time.

here's the record streaming on Bandcamp:

https://1200line.bandcamp.com/album/boscoe

User soulmakossa reviewed this record in 2008 on rateyourmusic.  I found their review interesting.

"This truly is one of the darkest, most unpleasant albums I have ever heard. Unpleasant atmospherically, for the music and lyrics are superb.

...

Simply put: there's no joy here. The fact that the two tunes opening the disc are low-key, meandering (in a good way) and downbeat only add to that sentiment. PS: "Writin' on the Wall" ends in a cacophony of sounds, and one can hear eerie sirens in the distance bringing this 'get ready for (social? racial? civil?) war' warning to a disturbing close."

Song titles include "He Keeps You, "We Ain't Free", and "Money Won't Save You".

I can't find much to disagree with on this record.  Musically it's excellent, and pretty much everything they have to say I am 100% on board with.

If there's a disturbing part, it's the ending.  It's a ten minute spiritual jazz thing, obviously informed by Pharaoh's "The Creator Has A Master Plan" talking about how "the creator wants peace", but then goes on to repeat, over and over again, that "we must go to war, for war is the precedent of peace".

Well, this isn't a message for me.  Not just because I'm white, but because I'm a woman.  "As a race, we must go to war.  A man goes to war."

Listen to Boscoe.  Definitely listen to Boscoe.  But listen to women of color too.  That's my recommendation.  That's where I'm at on this record.

Anyway, my family ignored my message and kept on talking about Hildegard von Bingen's ideas about spelt.