Kaoru Abe - 彗星 Partitas - Unfinished

White-hot and affectingly lyrical double album by Kaoru Abe, one of the greatest free-jazz saxophone players who ever lived. The overwhelming intensity of his solo scorch is the precursor to artists like Borbetomagus, Tamio Shiraishi, Thomas Ankersmit, Masayoshi Urabe, and basically anyone who ever decided to pick up a saxophone and blow the living hell out of it. In the jazz world, he's in a class with Albert Ayler, Masayuki Takayanagi, and Peter Brotzmann, though his influence extends beyond jazz. The ghost of Abe's passionate shriek can be heard in the work of outsiders such as Hijokaidan, Otomo Yoshihide, Lethe, Keiji Haino, and Antoine Chessex, to name only a few. Unfortunately, Abe's tumultuous life ended too early; he died of drug overdose in 1978 when he was just 29 years old. 

"Paritas" was recorded in 1973 and released after his death as a 2xLP in 1981. It's had a few 2xCD reissues over the years, all of which are currently out of print, scarce, and (as you might expect) pricey. I'm still not sure what about this is "unfinished". The liner notes are written in Japanese (a language which neither Mr. Inside nor I can read) and not much information is available online. If you can read Japanese and can help explain what about this is unfinished, please leave a comment here. 

disc 1
disc 2