Les Rallizes Dénudés - Live 1973 (1977)

| Avant-Garde | Noise Rock | Psychedelic Rock |
| Experimental Rock |

Not for the faint of heart or the squeamish minded. Les Rallizes Denudes at their most extreme, supposedly recorded sometime in 1973 and supposedly released sometime in 1977, although I doubt it seriously. Like most of Les Rallizes Denudes' music, impossible to find in any legitimate pressing so you might as well download it from the internet. It Consists on a 4 Tracks, with a total of 30min.

Since Mizutani Takashi (who essentially was Les Rallizes) rejected any idea of standard studio recording or marketing, it's hard to tell if this is actually a "bootleg" or not. Mizutani was reportedly connected with many underground political movements, and one of his former bass players was a convicted member of the Japanese Red Army (Nihon Sekigun), who staged a number of terrorist attacks and bombings in Japan in the 1970s. Mizutani may or may not have been an active member, but his sympathies did extend to a number of leftist organizations, which explains somewhat why there are no studio recordings of Les Rallizes Desnudes. The combination of their absolute uncommerciality and their leftist political stance insured that Japanese recording studios and record companies wanted nothing to do with them.

The music is flat-out, feedback-ridden rock and roll at its most extreme. Comparisons to the Velvet Underground at their most freakish are fairly valid, but not quite on the mark. Les Rallizes is too demented and too individual to be a Velvets cover band. The music can be described as deliberately simplistic rock structures overlaid with thoroughly demented noise guitar. Takashi Mizutani was at this long before Fushitsusha or any of the other Japanese noise rock bands were on the scene, and was a definite influence on all of them.

The album follows suit. It can be invigorating or numbing depending on your taste and mood, but in all, Live 1973 definitely deserves to be heard.

Catalog: No Label
Review By happydog
On Last.fm
Download