Legendary actor, musician, and everlasting cool man Jeff Bridges has introduced an album of archival recordings from the late Nineteen Seventies. Gradual Magic, 1977-1978 is a set of never-before-heard music by the actor, which he wrote and recorded with a band of his closest associates. Gentle within the Attic is releasing the album digitally and on clear blue vinyl for this yr’s version of File Retailer Day, which takes place on Saturday, April 12. Right this moment, Bridges has shared “Obnoxious,” the primary providing from Gradual Magic. Test it out beneath.
The songs on Gradual Magic, 1977-1978 have been salvaged from a single decaying cassette labeled “July 1978.” “Obnoxious” was written throughout a sequence of jam periods that occurred after Bridges completed filming the 1976 remake of King Kong. He and some associates rented a warehouse in Venice, California, the place additionally they recorded the gathering’s title monitor, “Gradual Magic.” The periods have been overseen by songwriter and orchestrator Ken Lauber.
“Fairly wild that this factor that occurred round 50 years in the past desires to bloom,” Bridges stated of the gathering in press supplies. “I assume weirdness is what’s taking place as of late. You by no means can inform what’s gonna occur.”
Bodily editions of Gradual Magic, 1977-1978 will embrace liner notes by creator Sam Candy, together with a brand new interview with Bridges and never-before-seen archival images courtesy of photographers Loretta Ayeroff and Sweet Clark. The album contains 11 beforehand unreleased tracks, newly mastered by engineer John Baldwin. The LP version additionally encompasses a 20-page booklet.
Bridges jammed and recorded with a rotating forged of shut associates and visitor musicians within the Nineteen Seventies, together with Stan Ayeroff and David Greenwalt on guitar, Matthew Shiny on bass, and Steve Baim on drums. (Lots of them went on to have profitable careers in movie and tv.) The gang would meet up at Bridges’ Malibu residence or Baim’s Culver Metropolis artwork studio, taking part in loosely for hours. Extra gamers, comparable to horn gamers Sam “Sluggo” Phipps and Billy Superball, would additionally cease by the periods.
Along with releasing Gradual Magic, 1977-1978, filmmakers Isaac Gale, Paul Lovelace, and Ben Wu (the staff behind the documentary Swamp Dogg Will get His Pool Painted) have produced a sequence of quick documentariess surrounding Bridges’ venture, slated for launch this spring.
Learn Philip Sherburne’s overview of Jeff Bridges’ 2015 album, Sleeping Tapes.
