DAWN

DON ROBERTSON may be best known for his landmark album DAWN which appeared in 1969 and cited by many as one of the very first examples of new age music. ROBERTSON was born in Denver, Colorado in 1942 and was already collecting records at the age of 6 and created his own neighborhood radio station at the age 10. Wait, whaaat???!!!!! He also did a stint in the U.S. Navy where he taught himself jazz guitar and after living in Los Angeles for a few years ended up at the University of Colorado in Boulder to study music where he met the musicologist and pianist Leonard Stein and other world ethnic musicians such as Chinese pipa player Lui Tsun-Yen and sitar player Ravi Shankar.

He then relocated to New York City and worked as a studio musician as well as performing on TV commercials and then more education at the Juilliard School of Music where he worked with Morton Feldman and another Indian classical musician Ustad Ali Akbar Khan. ROBERTSON's biggest claim was to discover the reality of two qualitative polarities of positive and negative music and that the basis of the style of 20th century classical music based in the language of musical disharmony was had a negative effective on the human condition. If that's not far out enough ROBERTSON also claimed that with his debut release DAWN that he created the very first new age music on the one hand and the first death metal on the other. Ok, i think someone was hittin' the reefer a tad too hard during those heady years of "enlightenment"!

ROBERTSON was a gifted genius in many ways though. He wrote the first American instruction manual for the Indian tabla in 1968 and even got it published. In 1969 he moved to San Francisco where he recorded DAWN, an album that mixed the sounds of raga rock with various experimental electronic sounds, nature recordings, sound collages and various vocalizations provided by ROBERTSON's wife Suzie Robertson. ROBERTSON himself was a talented multi-instrumentalist and on this album he covers the 80-string guitar-zither, organ, piano, celesta, harp, tabla, bells, claves and jaltarang. Guest musicians provide flute, tambura, harp, bass guitar, drums including hand drum, steel drum, gong, chimes, hand bells and vocals by various others.

It's a rather short album with eight tracks that barely exceed the 32-minute mark but the album showcases an interesting mix of psychedelic-to-the-max escapism, exotic journeys into foreign lands through ethnic influences ("Belief") as well as rapid fire collage effects ("When?") that offer some interesting contrast. Interspersed throughout the album are intermittent nature sounds such as bird calls mixed with sampling effects of trains and other field recordings. The begins and ends with the album's longest tracks. The title track opens and at 9 1/2 minutes long and features the most new agy sounds that clearly display that ROBERTSON indeed prognosticated many of the strands and techniques that would coalesce into the new age sounds that emerged in the 1970s. This is probably the most uplifting and "hippie dippy" sounding of the tracks. It also showcases a cool way of implanting the sounds of the zither into the context of extreme psychedelia.

The closing "Belief" is a journey through many soundscapes ranging from ethnic encounters to droning repetitive sound loops with field recording sampling. In many ways this reminds me of some of Godspeed You! Black Emperor's finest moments. It's a dark journey through many motifs but generally stabilized by a monotonous atmosphere. The middle tracks are shorter and to the point. "Why?" is a short recording of bird sounds and chaotic ambient sounds while "Contemplation" throws a curveball with a heady organ drone accompanied by energetic drumming and a few bass guitar licks. It sort of reminds me of something Silver Apples would dream up. "Where?" is another short connective track that features a sitar and chime that lasts less than a minute. "The Candle" continues the raga rock with a sitar and some chiming however this time Robertson's wife offers a poetic recital. This track reminds me of many of the poetry based electronic soundscapes COIL would eventually conjure up. "Gateless Gate" is another dark sounding track that sounds like a drum circle with many percussionists at a drug fueled party.

DAWN found a released on Quincy Jones' Limelight Label and although some of ROBERTSON's claims about the his erudite theories may sound farfetched and hard to swallow, one thing is for sure and that is that he knew how to craft a very interesting album that featured many facets of world music, psychedelia and experimental recording techniques. For anyone familiar with many of the experimental artists that followed throughout the 70s, 80s and 90s and beyond, it's obvious that many of them (COIL, Godspeed, Codona etc) most likely encountered this fascinating album that takes you on a mystical journey through various sound effects, musical scales and collection of rhythmic contributions. The album flows quite nicely with each track standing out without ever losing the overall psychedelic detachment. While lumped into the world of raga rock, this album provides much more than some blissed out guru simply noodling away on the sitar for a half an hour's time. This is brilliantly composed music that is top notch and easy to hear how the world of new age followed in its footsteps. Excellent!