2LP with insert
First time release of an Arthur Russell live performance from late 1985 that would provide a key part in the formulation of the seismically monumental World of Echo album that followed not too long after. It's more than feasible that such a recording could have easily been lost to time, meaning it's nothing short of a privilege to be afforded such an insight into both the practice and thinking of one of the key voices of the 20th century avant garde (and far beyond that in all truth). Russell's entire oeuvre is perhaps defined by two characteristics - range and process. There are many different versions of Arthur Russell, and there are many different means of accessing and understanding the transitions that such a myriad creative enterprise requires - with World of Echo we've already had the supplementary texts of Picture of Bunny Rabbit and the tape release of the 1984 performance, Live at EI. Open Vocal Phrases, Where Songs Come In and Out, an instructive title if I've ever heard one, is a kind of addendum to the latter and another foothold in understanding, which is especially useful for an album famously initially evaluated as 'unintelligible'. Russell's eternal appeal is that it's never exactly clear just how he did it - you can hear the process, but the inspiration remains harder to rationalise. Some of the music performed here would later be edited to form part of the recording of World of Echo, and as such scans as somewhat familiar to anyone acquainted with the sister album. It's therefore the live context of Open Vocal Phrases that marks it out as special: imagine those people stood in a room with someone performing these alien sounds right in front of them, Russell seemingly divining something hitherto unknown from the vibrating air of cello and voice. To be taken back to that moment removes none of the inherent mystery attached to these sounds. Still, if the presentation is undeniably sui generis, the message they carry feels a little more universal, suffused with an inescapable romanticism that regardless of how its framed, is highly relatable - love and longing and all its good and bad. So yes, the music of Arthur Russell is characterised by range and process. But the unadorned nature of Open Vocal Phrases shows it's also one of eternal truths. These are impressive songs. They are also inescapably beautiful ones too. Master of the head and heart.
