Barre Phillips, Three Day Moon (ECM 1123, 1978)

An all time favorite with some of Terje Rypdal's best guitar work. I vaguely remember reading an interview with Barre Phillips where he said this recording didn't come out the way he expected. Terje Rypdal had just been loaned one of Roland's new guitar synthesizers, and he was keen to play it on every track, so it came out a bit more electronic and spacey that Phillips might have intended. The last track "S C & W" (I'm guessing "Space, Country & Western") has got to be one of the most amazing tracks ever. Barre does a convincing job fiddling his bass as if he were playing bluegrass, while Trilok Gurtu is keeping the beat using Indian Tala rhytmic patterns and Rypdal and Feichtner are, well, out in electronic space. I was surprised at the dearth of reviews, this is from Craig LeHoullier at amazon.com "I suppose that the recordings of Barre Phillips will never be widely available or popular. They are odd, challenging, and sometimes quite scary. The sounds that he evokes from his bass are remarkable. He is truly an artist - not just a musician, but a painter of images."
Personnel:
Barre Phillips - bass
Terje Rypdal - guitar, guitar synthesizer, organ
Dieter Feichtner - synthesizer
Trilok Gurtu - tabla, percussion

Long out of print, this is from the briefly available Japanese CD edition which is now impossible to find and currently selling for silly money.