Soft Machine - Live At The Paradiso - Vinyl (Limited Edition)

Limited purple colored vinyl LP pressing. Soft Machine was one of the first prog-rock bands, but if your vision of prog-rock consists of musicians wreathed in pot smoke airily singing of fairies and wizards, it will be summarily dispelled by this fantastic quot;authorized bootleg,quot; which captures the band in March 1969 at the Paradiso in Amsterdam, playing material that was to be released six months later on Soft Machine: Volume Two. The trio of Robert Wyatt on drums and vocals, Mike Ratledge on organ and Hugh Hopper on bass launch what can only be called a high-decibel, jazz-rock sonic assault; quot;Like vindaloo for the earsquot; is how Hopper puts it on the accompanying notes on the inner sleeve, adding, quot;I do remember playing incredibly loud, Mike on fuzz organ and me on fuzz bass, both through hundred-watt Marshall stacks.quot; Some of the frenzied instrumental passages might recall Miles Davis' Agharta-era band, but remember, this is a trio making all this racket (in 1969, no less); Soft Machine at this point in time were on a journey all their own.