i take no credit whatsoever for this find, but you've got to check out the Steely Dan bootlegs on offer here, as alley-ooped to me by John, who's been producing a typically eclectic and insightful stream of texts over at yon Green Lodge.
i'd heard that first 1974 boot but it had never excited me all that much. now revisiting that era, i've become pretty damn transfixed with the London 1974 Dan show, which you can download via this link. the banter is intensely sardonic (you can see why these dudes quit performing after a while--they seem to have no interest in "entertaining" anyone) but the performances are, like, possessed. my picks on there are "King of the World"--definitely a sleeper Dan track; the bridge in particular is a godsend; and check out the weird Fagen intro to this version: "This is a scary song" or somesuch--and "Brooklyn," a beautiful and somewhat creepy soul number from "Can't Buy a Thrill," given an intense upbeat reading here and sung by an unfamiliar singer whose name is escaping me.
i really dig the 1993 show as well, especially (who knew?) the Walter Becker-sung track "Book of Liars"--an intensely soulful ballad. and once you get used to his voice not being Fagen's, it's got some real charm to it. (anyone spent any real time w/ the Becker solo effort "11 Tracks of Whack"?)
*****
continuing Cecil research as well. been doing some hard listening to "Unit Structures" and i must say, the record continues to elude me in some respects. i find "Conquistador" (from just a few months later in '66) to be a much more cohesive and "together"-sounding session.
in a way, i think "Unit Structures" has kind of a handicap b/c the first track, "Steps" is not the greatest. the thematic material at the beginning just sounds underrehearsed--the saxes, Jimmy Lyons and Ken McIntyre, play in this sort of raggedy unison, and the solos have a lot of energy but very little sense of form. one thing i keep wondering is who solos first? both players are on alto so it's really, really hard to tell. can anyone clear this up?
the rest of the record is stronger, although it's not till the third track, "Unit Structure/As of a Now/Section" that things really begin to cook. the band sounds really on top of the material on that track--none of that tentative, half-baked togetherness, and McIntyre sounds really gritty and vicious on bass clarinet. the second track, "Enter Evening" (weirdly anthologized on the Smithsonian collection) is a strange bird. i'm not a fan of the sort of dated-exotica sound of McIntyre's oboe, but i do really admire the patient, spacious improv happening during the solo sections. drummer Andrew Cyrille plays with brushes and just sort of whispers commentary under the horns and the basses, Henry Grimes and Alan Silva (depicted above), keep up this otherwordly atmosphere (i'm pretty sure Silva's the one doing most of the arco stuff; whichever player it is, though, is absolutely masterful at those high-pitched sliding textures). i need to spend some more time with "Tales (8 Whisps)," the trio track.
don't have the firmest grasp on "Conquistador" yet, but the record really hangs together for me. the self-titled track in particular has a lot of drive and really memorable themes, and Bill Dixon takes a showstopping solo where you can really hear his later concepts in embryonic form. it's weird that "Unit Structures" seems to be so much more famous, i.e., it's the Cecil record everyone's heard of. i think it makes for kind of a questionable entry point into his work and that "Conquistador" functions much better in that regard. both records are strange though in that they're not really about Cecil's playing so much as his group concept--the piano sound is kind of thin and in general the horns seem to get the prime-time solo space.
again though this is all a work in progress/first impressions, etc. it's not like i haven't heard these records before, but i'm trying to get a new grasp on them and document my reactions. anyway, more soon i hope...
ANNWN is surely the record of the winter, no? [gotta love that commemorative mug, too, of which i am a proud though totally nerdy-feeling owner.] the space-tech guitar webs looked and felt exactly like falling snowfields on the walk to the train this evening.
*****
there has been no listening constant more, uh, constant for me over the past decade or so besides Cecil Taylor. every time i hear him live (as i did a few weeks back), there's this flurry of listening after. it's like brain food or something. i've got nearly a whole CD book thingie full of his music and i just pick and choose. with him or Bill Dixon (have been really digging on the "Odyssey" box as well), it feels like communion to just LISTEN over and over and over.
anyway, was checking out the awesome 1981 solo concert "Garden" last night and was really feeling plugged into it. noticed many small things: for one, i love the quick spoken intro: "About the thrash-uh ["thrasher"?] ... And they go / into / the / fields / to / plow"--is the piece a meditation on slavery or somesuch?
anyway, i listened deeply to the first long piece on the record, "Elell," and it made me think about Taylor's signature sounds, his tics if you will. i remember reading somewhere--it may have been in a Gary Giddins piece--the notion that Cecil had been playing the same ONE piece of music for the past several decades. i think the writer was mentioning that that monotony had been brought up as a criticism but then proceeded to defend the unity of Taylor's work.
the thing is i can totally see how someone could say that (i.e., that he always plays the same piece of music) because he has these sort of signature moves that seem to define the arc of much of his music. i.e., has anyone noticed how when Eric Dolphy solos he has this one pet lick that he uses in literally every single solo? wish i could transcribe it, but it's like "bah-BLEEP-boo-ba-doo-ba-doo-ba." that "BLEEP" being the key--it's a really honking, sour note that he sort of leaps up to.
well, i've noticed these similar sort of patterns in Cecil. i've often thought how he has these several different modes (i'm using that word in the non-musicological sense, i.e., "types") to his playing, and they seem to be sequential. i.e., when he's playing a longform piece, he always seems to start out in one mode of playing and work his way to another.
it's tough to get specific but i'll try. in "Elell," as in so many other of his long pieces, he starts slow and builds up to a dazzling, hectic climax. in the slow intro section to this piece, he worries over this pattern which i like to think of as "The Lick"--it's like Taylor's pet melodic cell. he tends to always play The Lick, and its attendant variations in this sort of locked-hand pattern, i.e., his two hands play in rhythmic unison. The Lick is this bluesy little figure that's like "boo-ba-doo-ba DWEN-ga DWEEEEN-ga" or "boo-ba-da DWEN-ga DWEEN-ga." it's sort of an infinitely variable pattern (sometimes the "boo-ba-doo-ba" or the "DWEN-ga DWEEEEEN-ga" are extended), but The Lick acts like this center of gravity--in "Garden" and so many other performances, Taylor uses it to build momentum. those "DWEN-ga DWEEEEN-ga" sections are the real signature accents.
gradually he works up to what i call his Flurry playing, those stabbing torrents of notes that he plays with his index fingers perpendicular to the keyboard. this mode of playing almost invariably comes at the climax of a piece, i.e., after he's worried over The Lick for several minutes. he usually alternates those single-note Flurries with grand, pounding chords and little interludes of The Lick, usually played more rapidly and elaborately than in the intro sections.
it sounds simple, but this is one way i make sense of Cecil's work--i hear The Lick, worried over, caressed, messed with building gradually into the Flurries, interspersed with The Lick, and so forth.
i imagine everyone wraps their brain around Cecil in a different way, one reason i'm psyched to check out Howard Mandel's new book on Miles, Ornette and Cecil, which includes a section on "strategies for listening to and enjoying Cecil Taylor."
have been checking out a few other Cecil discs from various periods, including "The Eighth" a nice cataclysmic quartet disc feat. the incredible Jimmy Lyons from only eight days before "Garden"; "Winged Serpent (Sliding Quadrant)," a prismatic and raucous big band session from 1984; and the unbelievable sextet session "The Cecil Taylor Unit" from 1978.
i guess it goes without saying that that late-'70s band (Lyons on alto, Raphe Malik on trumpet, Ramsey Ameen on violin, Sirone on bass and Ronald Shannon Jackson on drums) is Cecil's best group ever, but goddamn that shit is just nasty. the first track on "Unit" is totally revelatory--it's as though the whole band is inhabiting Cecil's brain and sort of acting under his spell, while at the same time making totally spontaneous and incisive gestures of their own.
right at the beginning of that track, the whole band just gets into this jagged, staggered sputtering thing that strongly suggests (to me at least)... The Lick! now maybe it's b/c i threw this on right after "Garden" last night, but it sounded to me like the entire sextet was rendering this sort of 3-D version of The Lick by way of an intro, sawing away at it, worrying over it the way Cecil would.
it's very interesting the way the piece is structured. it sort of toggles between these sparse sections where Cecil is featured, to a horn fanfare, usually begun by Lyons (who seems to lead the charge here and tons of other places, including on "Winged Serpent," where his voice is the most confident) and echoed by the other players.
also: i've pointed out a few times on here how drummer Pheeroan akLaff has been playing this barely sublimated sort of funk under Cecil. well Ronald Shannon Jackson was the original badass who brought that sort of fury to the Maestro's attention. on this piece he's playing this insanely hip syncopated tom-tom stuff and then at various points just breaks into a sick backbeat shuffle. it's very fragmentary, but it's there, and it's so goddamn potent.
this band was just so kinetic. Cecil's discs from the '90s and aughts have so often suffered from either a haphazard, sloppy feeling (e.g., 1996's "Almeda") or a feeling of too much tentativeness, which i felt was often the case with the Dominic Duval and Jackson Krall trio. the trick is to play inside Cecil's concept, but to also--and this is crucial--not be constrained by it and to blow wild and free and to feel the confidence to throw curveballs. that '70s sextet feels like they're really playing the music--you have a very palpable sense of WRITTEN/UNISON music that you hear on "Unit Structures" and on other records like "Dark to Themselves" but is unfortunately sometimes absent from Taylor's group work--but also like they're just exploding as improvisers. brave, brave stuff.
as a postscript, i'm just remembering now another session i checked out recently, which was "Riobec," one of the many duets Taylor recorded w/ drummers as part of his Berlin blowout in 1988. this one is with Gunter "Baby" Sommer and it's a total gas, one of the most exuberant, fun-loving Taylor discs i've heard. Sommer is sort of--for lack of a better word--a card, always changing directions and yelling with joy while he plays and sort of mugging in his improvisations. he throws Taylor a lot of curveballs and eventually you feel Taylor sort of opening up to the glee of the whole thing and finally just jumping in headfirst. you feel Taylor listening and reacting more in this performance more than you often do in his late work. at one point the two are vocalizing together, just jabbering insanely, and you really feel like Cecil has found a kindred spirit. too bad they never got together with a bass player--that woulda been a sick trio.
anyway, i'm really into exploring this Lick thing further, and also investigating the really biggie small-group works more, i.e. Unit Structures, Conquistador, plus the other stuff by the great sextet discussed above. and then there's that crazy "Fly! Fly! Fly! Fly! Fly! Fly!" record--which as far as i know is Cecil's only solo date that wasn't recorded live in front of an audience. this Cecilphilia is a lifelong thing, i tell you...
ps: finishing up writing this, i'm skimming over a really cool Gary Giddins-on-Cecil Taylor piece, which you can check out here.
the following quote seems to sorta jibe w/ what i was saying about about The Lick and the Flurries, just the general idea of signature motifs or tendencies in Taylor:
"I find that [Taylor's] fifty-minute pieces fly by, and I look forward to them. I understand how they work. There are certain technical things that he does on the piano that I just wait for in the same way that when I listen to Roy Eldridge, at some point I know he is going to start playing amazing high note passages, and I wait for them."
word.
also, check this very cool recent Taylor interview/profile by Patrick Ambrose, who really gives you a feel for what it's like to hang out w/ the Maestro.
caught the Paul Motian Octet on Friday at Birdland and i was sort of simultaneously blown away by the music and perplexed about the ghettoization that plagues jazz. basically i tend to be drawn to jazz that's known as "avant-garde," either b/c it presents itself that way or b/c it tends to get framed that way. Cecil Taylor, whom i caught the night before, obviously would fall into that category, whereas in most people's eyes, Motian wouldn't.
it's weird, though, because in all honesty i was a hell of a lot more surprised, and maybe even impressed, by Motian's set. i'm not sure that i've ever seen a set of jazz that was more simultaneously accessible and traditionally beautiful but at the same time extremely challenging and eccentric.
the set was a mix of standards (including, i believe, a Bird tune i couldn't place; "Goodbye Pork Pie Hat"--thanks to Joe for IDing that one; Monk's "Introspection"--a fave from Steve Lacy's "Straight Horn" album) and originals encompassing all different tempos and moods. the band was absolutely killer: Tony Malaby and Chris Cheek on sax, Ben Monder and Steve Cardenas on guitar, Mat Maneri on viola, Thomas Morgan on double bass, Jerome Harris on acoustic bass guitar, and Motian on drums. the pairs of instruments were pretty crucial to the sound--most tunes featured one particular team, who would sort of trade fours throughout the solo sections.
the soloists were outstanding, especially Malaby, Maneri and Monder, but then again, those were the players who got me out to the gig in the first place. i guess what impressed me most (besides the intense together-ness of the arrangements) was the FEEL of the music. looking back over my notes from the performance, i consistently jotted down words like "woozy" or "liquid" or "flowing." that sort of approximates the rhythmic feel that was happening, especially on the really luminous slow numbers. if anyone has heard "Karyobin" by the Spontaneous Music Ensemble, that might give you an idea of the kind of molten free time this band was getting into. this one ballad in particular--think it was a Motian original, but i'm not sure--just had this amazing free-floating feel to it, with all the instruments sort of bubbling up and smearing all over each other.
a lot of this has to do with Motian's drumming, which is SO STRANGE, not to mention mercurial. on uptempo stuff he sounds simply like a pretty wicked bebopper, who occasionally plays too loud in a way that's actually kind of awesome. when he's in ballad mode, though, things start to get really interesting. he gives up the time keeping role and just sort of bats at the rhythm, sculpting it abstractly. i was thinking how his playing on slow stuff isn't that terribly removed from early Sunny Murray in a weird way, but while Murray gives off this feeling of ghostly agitation, you get a feeling of ultrasubtle romance from Motian.
Malaby and Maneri in particular were perfect sidemen, b/c they both have really grainy, hoarse tones that blended perfectly with the kind of blurry, polyphonous feel of the band. Malaby got off a few deep, romantic solos and Maneri had one really intense exchange w/ Motian when they were sort of trading fours, except they were playing OVER one another instead of taking turns, making for a really brutal and chaotic sound. Monder got a few chances to bust out his insanely technical sci-fi runs; he made an interesting contrast with the more conventionally jazzy Cardenas.
overall, i was just sort of thinking that i need to be checking out more of what i typically think of as mainstream jazz. true that clubs like Birdland are prohibitively expensive, and maybe there aren't too many bands out there as sick as Motian's. but i just wish there were more cross-pollination w/ this stuff. like wouldn't it be amazing to see this Octet at the Vision Festival billed next to a William Parker band or something? Malaby actually plays with both musicians (as i discussed in my recent Time Out review of his great new disc, Tamarindo), so maybe the idea isn't so far-fetched. basically what i'm trying to say is that there are other places in town besides overtly experimental settings (the Stone, etc.) to hear intensely challenging jazz, and folks should try to look past the whole "mainstream"/"avant-garde" divide b/c this set spun me around more than anything i've heard in those more wild milieus for the past few years.
(p.s. - this made me really wanna investigate Motian's discography. i know i've gotta check out the Frisell/Lovano trio, but does anyone know the old or recent ECM stuff or the Soul Note stuff? some intrepid blogger needs to guide us through his recorded history post-Bill Evans.)
*****
p.p.s. - "Skullgrid," the debut full-length from Behold... the Arctopus, continues to amaze. this might be one of the most coherent and enjoyable--not to mention insanely brutal and technical--metal albums i've ever heard. shred with PURPOSE. music you REMEMBER, not just marvel at.
have never much gone in for that whole "A String Tribute To..." business, but i'm pretty charmed by this cellist Gordon Withers, who has recorded an entire album of tunes by the outstanding '90s post-hardcore group Jawbox. is this necessary? no, but the cool thing is that it's a benefit for ex-JB frontman J. Robbins's son, Callum, who was born with a very serious spinal ailment. it also serves as a reminder of the solidity and grace of Jawbox's music. checking out "Static" in this format reminds what a strong song it is, just one of tons in their catalog. not a Jawbox enthusiast? i'm obsessed with "For Your Own Special Sweetheart," from 1994, which captures everything awesome about that period: muscle, dissonance, the occasional anguished shriek and sweet, sweet hooks.
*****
caught Cecil Taylor again last night, which--to quote one of his album titles--is always a pleasure. in a kinda cool coincidence, i realized that the first post i ever wrote on this here site involved a solo Cecil show i saw at Merkin Hall in October of '06 (read my ramblings here). i totally forgot until just now that i had actually caught the maestro only a few weeks later at Iridium (thoughts are here). that latter gig was the debut of his new trio with Henry Grimes on bass and Pheeroan akLaff on drums, and at the time, it was definitely the strongest time i'd ever heard Cecil live with a band. last night's show at the Blue Note had its ups and downs, but i'd say it rivaled that 10/06 gig for sure.
main difference was that William Parker (who happens to have a swanky new website) was in for Grimes on bass, which was sort of the main attraction for me. no disrespect to Mr. Grimes, but i'd always wanted to check out the Parker/Taylor connection b/c i'm a big fan of the Feel Trio stuff they had going with Tony Oxley back in the late '80s and early '90s. truly the bass/piano action was absolutely incredible last night.
the trio played two long pieces (maybe 30-40 mins apiece?). the first one took a while to ramp up, while the second one was pretty much balls out from the start. i was really impressed with the dynamics in the first piece. i remember distinct moments where all three were playing pretty furiously, but at a reasonable volume--there was a real sense of listening happening. whether or not the music was jelling at any one time had a lot to do with akLaff, who has an outstanding ability to bring a lot of heat but keep the volume in a reasonable place. when he stuck to this sort of abstracted groove thing that he does so well, using mainly bass drum, snare and hi-hat, the music really cooked. at times, though, he got carried away and was playing way, way too loud. he was beaming the whole time, clearly completely psyched to be there, and throughout the set there was this sense that he'd just sort of forget to listen at times. sorta unfortunate, but again, i really admire his subtle almost-but-never-quite-literal suggestions of the beat and i think that approach unlocks a hidden funkiness in Taylor's playing.
the one cool thing about those moments where akLaff was drowning Cecil out was that when he would finally let up, it threw the Taylor/Parker connection into stark relief. whenever that space opened, you could hear how gloriously in sync they were. not to dis Taylor's skills of listening and interaction but i credit this more to Parker--he just seemed to be working so hard to make his parts interlock w/ the piano. sometimes he was overtly playing off of what Cecil had just played, but other times it was almost as if he was playing the mirror image of the piano part. the two instruments were just incredibly fused and locked in; i'd say for certain that this was by far the strongest, most fruitful interaction between Cecil and another player that i've ever witnessed live. (btw, Parker was playing mostly pizzicato, but he let fly with some gorgeous bow stuff too from time to time.)
the first piece overall was much stronger and well-paced than the second. there were definitely a few times in the second piece when Parker and akLaff--and everyone else in the room--seemed to think it had come to an end, but Cecil would just start back up again. and also it's mighty tough, with a place like the Blue Note, to stay focused on the music when the waitresses are coming around with the checks near the end of the set. it just sort of deflates the experience. but the second set had moments of extreme fury, with Cecil doing those torrential stabbing runs he loves so much. also akLaff was playing on hand drums for awhile, which sounded excellent and opened up a lot of space in the music.
man, how could i forget the opening invocation/poem? Cecil always makes these dramatic entrances and this one was no exception. Parker and akLaff were alone onstage during the announcement of the band and they were laying down this subtle meditative thing. finally, after kind of an uncomfortably long time, Cecil comes padding down from upstairs in this insane red-and-black-striped get-up that had a strong pajama vibe with, as far as i could tell, no socks. he gets onstage and goes into one of his patented croaky-voiced poems, which took on this extra level of surreality given the commercial setting of the club. this verse was extra-scientific. it started off with (i think i'm remembering this right): "Music... is... about... weight distriBUtion." then the dude started riffing on trigonometry and whatnot! i distinctly remember a mention of "the hypotenuse." (now that i'm thinking about it, that could've been some deep abstract riff on the dynamics of a piano trio.) anyway, you gotta love this shit--epic eccentricity and always worth checking out.
since i feel as though i neglected his own performance in favor of the sidemen above, i'll just say that Cecil sounded excellent. he seems to take longer to warm up these days, but there are these tender, reflective moments, especially at the ends of the pieces, that i was really savoring.
someone needs to hurry the hell up and do a Cecil festival in NYC like the one they staged in Berlin in '88. i want to hear this guy for like two weeks straight, with all sorts of different bands, solo, etc. anyway, this was another awesome show. thanks, dude...
*****
lastly, please dig this excellent live version of Elvis Costello's "(I Don't Want to Go to) Chelsea," featuring a spot-on version of what might be the greatest single drum intro ever performed, courtesy of Attractions percussion demon Pete Thomas (this is indeed him in this clip, no?):
caught some interesting shows this weekend, which i will run down for you in speed-demonly manner...
Miracle Condition, whom i previewed for Time Out, sounded pretty suave at Union Pool this night. this unit includes two guys--guitarist Mark Shippy and drummer Pat Samson--who used to play together in the admirably fucked U.S. Maple. tonight's show was supposed to be a collaboration between MC, plus this "sound artist" (cough) Jeffrey R. Robinson and one David Yow. crazily, though, we were told before the gig that Yow was hospitalized with a collapsed lung. was pretty bummed about that, though the Miracles hit a nice stride in their first two songs--expansive, droney two-guitars-and-drums pieces, driven by Samson's absolutely sick/slick swinging pocket. the dude's playing was just hugely funky and molten. Shippy and the other guitarist had some nice atmospherics happening too--almost reminded me of a more abstract Battles at times. things got a little "eh" once some video projections started and Robinson joined in tho. didn't have the stamina for the whole set, but i'm really psyched i got to hear Samson.
*****
speaking of Battles (as i did above), i was reminded o' them during Saturday's Cornelius show at Webster too. (i knew nothing of Cornelius going in; it might be helpful to think of him as something like a Japanese cross between Bjork and Moby) my bud Tony had heard that his new Sensuous Synchronized Show tour was something to see and so we checked it out. it was definitely Sensuous, with huge video projections, seizure-ish LEDs streaming across the stage and the music itself, which was like state-of-the-art Muzak or something. really sort of dancey, broadly enjoyable pieces ranging from an electronica sort of vibe to playful thrash metal, reggae and funk. the musicianship was pretty much astonishing. live, a four piece band was recreating all the stuff that 'Nelius had done via samplers and synths and stuff on the record and it was amazingly robotic--they were playing these art-funk sort of pieces that were way, way complex, like "Discipline"-era King Crimson or something like that. really funky too, though. the band was just insanely locked in. was pretty psyched on the pot fumes in Webster Hall and the general vibe of fun and enjoyment. it's good to be reminded every once in a while that not everyone goes to shows to be Challenged (as i often do for sure). fun stuff and the new record, "Sensuous," is definitely worth checking out.
*****
hit up Benjamin Britten's Peter Grimes opera on Friday at this beautiful church in Brooklyn Heights. a strange experience--it was "semi-staged," which meant that the actor/singers were sort of wedged in between the orchestra and the audience, with no stage to speak of. overall, the effect was sort of noncommital, i.e., i wish i had seen a fuller production. the opera was strange--it's basically about a British fishing village turning against this fisherman for his brutish ways. you sympathize with this dude being persecuted even though he's kind of a monster in a sense. anyway, i had read about this one in Alex Ross's "The Rest Is Noise" and had been very psyched to check it out, but in some ways i enjoyed reading about it more than hearing it. there were definitely some wrenching and beautiful moments, but i find it pretty hard to reckon with bel canto, honestly. sometimes i wish that opera didn't have to be sung like opera--like i have no problem with the narrative aspect, but it seems to me that you're sacrificing so much grit and emotion by restricting vocals to these incredibly pure and vibrato-laden deliveries. anyway, i saw past that at times and enjoyed the work's complexities--esp. these sort of virtuoso choral passages where the town's beration of Grimes took on an elaborate grandness--but overall, the whole thing felt a bit too long to me and again, i just had trouble FEELING the story. maybe me and opera have a future, but i'm not so sure...
*****
lastly, the new Mick Barr album (Ocrilim - ANNWN) is fucking astonishing. his most majestic, heartwrenching work yet. i definitely FEEL more for this one than any other--very vibrant and emotional. preview it here. comes out early February on Hydra Head.
Laal and i caught Mastodon and Neurosis at Brooklyn Masonic last night. a fun and happy if rather boomy show. hung out with many cool folks, including dudes from the awesome Warmth, the ever-awesome Emily K and an old friend from far back whom i sort of never thought i'd see again.
anyway, the show! it was absolutely freezing out and due to some crowd-control mishap, we had to stand outside for a good while even though the show had already started and we already had tickets. i hadn't brought my jacket, so that ended up being really, really fun.
so we missed a bit of the Mastodon set, arriving just as they were ripping into "The Wolf Is Loose." it was jam-packed and really shitty sounding on the floor, so we made our way up to the balcony where there were these awesome bleacher-type seats that were excellent for mosh-pit gawking. the hall was large, old and pretty gorgeous--it had kind of a grittiness to it, kind of like a VFW hall or like Warsaw if you've ever been there. nothing too ornate, but it was elegant nonetheless.
Mastodon live pretty much does what they do. i'd say their last show i saw (at Webster Hall w/ Converge right around the time "Blood Mountain" came out) was a bit better in terms of energy and vibe--and certainly overall sound--but they are always really fun to watch. they're pretty workmanlike, just churning out songs--the sound was so boomy it was almost like they were playing in the next room. the overall effect of checking out their set for me was like a parade of familiar awesome riffs. i know ALL Mastodon's riffs from the past few albums, but i'm always at a loss to ID which ones come from which songs and in what order they appear. maybe that's a knock on their songwriting cohesiveness, but it also makes for a fun, surprising time seeing them live b/c all of a sudden one of your favorite riffs will pop out of nowhere and you'll be like "hell yeah!" (setlist-wise, i heard no new stuff, as was rumored; just favorites from all three recent albums. no "Colony of Birchmen" or "Bladecatcher," unless they played them before i got there, which was a bummer...)
only caught a bit of Neurosis. have never been a huge fan and have always sorta felt that they're a band people like to namedrop more than listen to. plus, the bands they're said to have influenced (Isis, etc.), i'm really not into at all. that said, what i saw of their set i thought was really solid. first off, the sound was 100 times better for them than for Mastodon. the music was pretty much what i expected: dire, abrasive doom sprinkled with atmospheric passages, but they sounded pretty goddamn massive. i was pretty blown away by the power of Scott Kelly's vocals--really soulful and gritty bellowing. the vox and the overall sound reminded me a lot of this incredible band Stay Fucked played w/ on tour: The Felon Wind, from Atlanta. (i actually like the Felon Wind a lot better than Neurosis! one reason being that their drummer swings like hell...) anyway, Neurosis took forever to set up, but i guess it was worth it since they had this big-ass projection screen behind them--videos of flowers blooming, wolves running, etc. etc. pretty standard-issue "avant-metal" visuals, but it was easy on the eyes.
on the way out, i beheld an amazing sight: the Masonic Temple's calendar of events for January, which listed "NEUROSIS/MASTODON" amid members' birthday parties and baby showers!
*****
must say i'm pretty thrilled with the Mosaic solo Andrew Hill set i ordered. i was starting to get scared that i'd never listen to a jazz CD that wasn't Tyshawn Sorey's "that/not" (man, that's a sick record), but these discs quickly supplanted that.
Hill solo is such a complete trip. this stuff feels really sumptuous and even wistful at times, but there's this extremely strange sense of choppiness at play too. Hill's movement across the keys can feel extremely smooth one second and then halting and almost unsure the next. he demands total engagement. his dynamics are very strange too, like sometimes he'll be playing extremely softly and this just bash out these big blocky chords. there's a kind of cubist feeling of constantly changing directions, but it always feels completely intutive.
the experience of checking this stuff out is totally different than group Hill, b/c with nothing tying him down, he sounds so much more intensely abstract, but also so much more romantic. some of this stuff has a sense of swooning. all the titles describe California cities, and you get the feeling that he's very taken with the sunlight and such. three CDs worth of pieces that all kind of sound the same--reflective, eccentric, balladlike, fractured--and it's such a treasure, just constant surprise. btw, 2/3 of this stuff is previously unreleased. pick it up--it's a great way to remember the master.
had a good time at last night's Wordless Music Series concert, despite being sort of skeptical about the idea of the series in the past. from what i gather, WMS has been all about trying to expand the classical audience by booking classical music alongside rock acts, or classical pieces with rock appeal. from what i've seen of the lineups, the endeavor feels a little self-congratulatory and NPRish--the rock bands that have been chosen (Beirut, Grizzly Bear, etc.) are all pretty colossal in the indie world, and they seem more chosen for their ability to pack a room with hipsters than to actually stimulate an audience.
Radiohead is even more of a sure sell, of course, so last night's show--featuring the premier of 'Head ax-guy Jonny Greenwood's orchestral piece from "There Will Be Blood"--was jammed. it was a good piece. i enjoyed it more live than i did in the movie: lots of weird fluttering dissonance and primitive string-thumping. it was very well-paced and clocked in at a nice, manageable 20 minutes or so. in the movie, the "modern dissonant drone" thing felt gimmicky to me just b/c it was so anachronistic vis a vis the setting of the film, but live it came across as really logical and coherent and even subtle.
i also dug the Gavin Bryars piece that opened the show. it was a longish musical depiction of the sinking of the Titanic. i'm really wary of such literal-minded stuff--and there was a fair amount of beat-you-over-the-head programmatic material like taped excerpts of interviews w/ Titanic survivors and whatnot--but this piece managed to break free from all that, mainly by being just flat out gorgeous. it didn't really have sections; it was just this kind of sumptuous, wistful melodic haze, hanging in the air. Bryars said he was trying to simulate the effect of music in water, how it would just dissipate and dissipate. there was definitely that diffusion effect: it was very dreamy and unabashedly gorgeous, and reminded me--and this is going to sound ridiculous--of how beautiful classical music can be. especially live and especially in such an intense cathedral-like space. there wasn't really an element of challenge in listening to this piece. it just sounded beautiful.
i was really bummed by the short John Adams piece in the middle, "Christian Zeal and Activity." i really can't even remember what the music sounded like, only that, a few minutes in, a tape recording of a preacher came on: "Jesus is in the Holy Spirit, Satan blah blah blah." in a fraction of a millisecond, you were like, "Oh, wow, another unsophisticated critique of evangelical furor." and it just kept going and going, drowning out the music. not only is it a really obvious and played-out topic, it just felt insulting to have him lay the theme on so thick. it's like, "Isn't the title enough of an indication of where you're coming from?"
it made me think about this whole modern classical convention of the use of "tapes," like pieces scored "for orchestra and tapes" or "for clarinet and tapes," which always seems to confer like an avant-garde mystique on the proceedings. the thing nobody wants to mention is that "tapes" almost always means "heavy-handed extramusical garbage whose only purpose is to spell out for you EXACTLY how you're supposed to be interpreting whatever you're hearing or EXACTLY what political or psychological message the composer is otherwise failing to convey." program notes describing programmatic intent are one thing (Bryars's were really well-written), but do we really need the imaginative assistance of extramusical chatter and sound effects? i don't like it on "Dark Side of the Moon" and i don't need to hear it in classical music.
anyway, interesting concert. i don't see enough classical. if you ever have a chance to get up to this church for a show, you gotta; it's breathtaking. 60th and Columbus.
*****
have been on this Tyshawn Sorey kick that seems never to exhaust itself, but i'm feeling drawn to solo Andrew Hill, i.e., "Verona Rag" and that Mosaic Select box of '70s stuff that came out recently. was reminded of the fact that i haven't dug this stuff enough when i read/played along with the pianist Vijay Iyer's awesome blindfold test from the Jazztimes website. it's really amazing b/c the way they have it set up, you can take the test along with the artist by listening to mystery mp3s and forming your own opinions before hearing theirs. and there's a ton of these archived on there! really great site. i'm very into Vijay's commentary too--he's got great taste. need to check out his music more. now that i've gotten so into Tyshawn, i'm really psyched about the forthcoming Fieldwork record (Iyer and Sorey and saxist Steve Lehman). that band plays this sort of ultracomplex math-jazz--really advanced and NOW.
my favorite recordings right now are ones that don't seem to give up their mystery.
have been spinning Tyshawn Sorey's that/not nonstop recently and i feel constantly magnetized by it, though i never really feel like i'm exhausting any of its weirdness. such a strange record, really. i put it on my top ten of 2007 for Time Out NY at the last minute and i'm really glad i did.
Sorey is a young drummer-pianist-composer from NYC. he talks in the liner notes of that/not about how he wants to defy the expectation that his record will feature his drumming in particular. instead he goes way, way in the opposite direction. it's a mood record; if it's about anything, it's about staying still, holding back, etc. most of the two-disc is scored for trombone, piano, bass and drums and Sorey includes all these really slow, enigmatic pieces that just sort of drift along. they're beautiful, but also unsettling. the music is so subtle that it just completely slips by if you don't listen close. it's jazz-related, but strikes me more as some really eccentric sort of chamber-pop at times: stately, ominous, grand in a really muted way.
themes flow in and out of improv. the record can seem static and then comes some moment of brilliant architecture. Sorey's incredibly patient drumming steers the whole thing with unfathomable calm, often w/ just one dry ride cymbal tracing a super intricate arc. the stillness of this thing is just so luxurious and unusual. you imagine score sheets that are miles long, the entire band playing in a trance, in a black room, the lights dim. space-trance-slow-prog-jazz-pop with a strange, untraceable flavor of moody electronica; somber yet droll and stylized and futuristic. it's a new thing entirely, i think.
*****
Carbonized is that super strange and eclectic Swedish avant-metal band i mentioned a while back. finally got a track uploaded here:
this is from the Disharmonization album, another disc that doesn't stop not making sense. in this track, crunchy, ham-fisted death-thrash moves into lo-fi prog like Voivod meets SST, which then meets otherworldly lounge music and bare-bones psych. intensely eclectic, but not at all "clever" or gimmicky. it's a logical composition and just a really purely experimental document. whole album is sick if you can find it.
*****
i also wanna say that great things are afoot w/ two of my friends' bands. Yukon has just closed a chapter, documenting the last insanely intricate and gorgeous math-world-prog-pop songs penned w/ sadly departed guitarist Denny Bowen, and Dysrhythmia--Stay Fucked's billmates at Cake Shop th'other night—- has written some blast-off new stuff. vanguard progressive heaviness. please support both organizations.
*****
also Veedon Fleece by Van continues to amaze. have relished sharing that w/ Laal...
in my haste to recap the tour on here, i made a major omission. i guess it makes sense that i would leave out the most significant musico-emotional discovery of the experience--maybe subconsciously i knew that it merited its own entry.
driving down Sunset in early December, it came on the radio. placid, jazzy, almost Yacht Rock-ish, but with deeply yearning, almost Peter Cetera-esque hooks that instantly seemed familiar. "I am the eye in the sky / Looking at you / I can read your mind." what the hell was it, all in the car wondered? i quickly jotted down all the lyrics i could make out.
googling around at our destination, i quickly nailed it: "Eye in the Sky" by the Alan Parsons Project. shortly afterward, i found the band's greatest hits on the budget tape wall at Amoeba, and we were equipped. no single song received more play in the van.
it was everything i remembered. a slow, gently trippy first verse with squarely "hip" jazz chords. a presumably cuckolded man telling off his mate for the last time:
"Don't think sorry's easily said Don't try turning tables instead You've taken lots of chances before But I'm not gonna give anymore"
there's a calm, almost nerdy resolve in the delivery--the "I'm fed up" doesn't bite as much as it should. after another verse, though, the tension bursts, and you didn't even realize how much had built up. the harmonies soar, cold light rushes in:
"I am the eye in the sky Looking at you I can read your mind
I am the maker of rules Dealing with fools I can cheat you blind"
even if you've heard that last stanza a million times, nothing prepares you for its sheer vicious egoism. it's a totally creepy, godplaying statement; it's not an exaggeration to say that it sounds like the outburst of an insane person. it's one thing to tell your woman you've had enough, but it's quite another to cast yourself as a kind of unmerciful god, capable of "cheating [her] blind."
there's something very special about a pop song that goes to these sorts of scary emotional lengths. the extremity of the sentiment, its power to shock, reminds me of the rawness and emotional desperation that Steely Dan can touch on, but this Parsons tune doesn't give you the comfort of irony. it creeps along and then it bites. its placid resolve is terrifying.
we would play this tape in the van after shows. in a way i felt like i was unwinding, but i don't know if that's what it was--i just craved the weird mindset of this song. i remember one night drive down a misty highway in Houston. i was going faster than i was comfortable with, trying to keep up with the guy who was leading us to where we were going to crash. the drive had a Michael Mann feeling--that on-the-outskirts-of-the-city brooding--with hazy lights and speed and soft, spare, overproduced music that spelled "cool," or some mythological version of cool, and made you feel like you were in some kind of urban cocoon. the drive was key, but i think the song alone can get you most of the way to that place of sublime postmodern solitude:
thick with inertia over here. back from tour. a million thoughts and experiences to process and a million more to prepare for as i prepare to resume life as it was.
since i've been back, everybody asks me how this experience was. have lamented to my girlfriend that each time i've been cut off soon after i've begun to answer. no one seems to want to hear more than one anecdote, more than one impression or angle. but really, it was a month's worth of experiences, with all the ups and downs that that would entail.
i can tell you the greatest feeling easily. sometime earlyish in '07, my bandmate Joe and i stood by the stoop of his Greenpoint apartment discussing the idea of getting serious about Stay Fucked, pushing it further, allowing ourselves to own up to what we really wanted it to be. our goals were pretty modest, but not simple by any means. we wanted a record out on a label and we wanted to really head out on the road, to capitalize on all the contacts we'd made, to test out an idea we suspected was true--namely that our band did in fact measure up.
returning from the tour last Saturday, after an absolutely hellish drive from D.C. during which we averaged about 15mph, we were unloading Joe's stuff from the van onto the very same stoop. i felt totally exhausted, residually ill--i was sick with flu-like symptoms for the majority of the tour and still haven't fully recovered--just completely zonked, but i was able to relish the moment for a second. there we were, back in the same place, having simply done what it was we said we were going to do: 26 shows coast-to-coast in 29 days; released an awesome-sounding, awesome-looking CD via a cool label that sold pretty damn well on the road; hell, we even made our own T-shirts. it is weird that it's so hard, but it is, to simply come up with an idea and do it.
i have no idea how to summarize this experience. some observations:
1) Myspace makes booking a fun and even solvent tour really, really easy. I mean sure we had to bother people over and over again and sure some of those people totally flaked on us, but for the most part it was a breeze. all you have to do is find bands you'd like to play with in whatever city and just ask nicely for a show.
2) You can get a lot more for your money in other cities. The awesome John Delzoppo, of the killer Cleveland-based avant-shred duo Clan of the Cave Bear, is proof of this. For less than i pay for my tiny Greenpoint bedroom, he inhabits a palatial loft complete with practice space, recording studio and a totally sweet Guitar Hero rig. We spent two of the funnest days of the tour hanging at--and envying the shit out of--Chez John.
3) Waffle House is quite good! The waffles themselves are kind of average and sub-Eggo, but you can't beat those hashbrown options such as Scattered, Smothered (w/ onions), Covered (w/ cheese), Peppered (w/, uh, peppers), etc. Has anyone noticed that the veteran noise-rock Unsane has an album ("Scattered, Smothered and Covered") that was very likely named after this exact menu quirk?
4) If you ever go on the road for a long time, you should bring a lot of stand-up comedy. All Stay Fucked members have a nearly limitless and omnivorous appetite for tons of different music (i personally tripped hard over late Zeppelin on this trip--big ups to "Presence," like our old bassist Andres said), but after a while, you just long for words and sentences, especially of the absurd variety. a book on tape might be hard to concentrate on, but the bite-sized format of stand-up really did the trick. We got some serious mileage out of Daniel Tosh's "True Stories I Made Up." Imagine the even more super-sarcastic and cutting offspring of Seann William Scott (Steve Stifler of "American Pie" fame) and Ryan Reynolds ("Waiting," anyone?) and you'll get an idea of where this guy is coming from.
5) Every truckstop tape rack contains two or three incredible oddball selections. Always buy them. An '06 Big A little a tour yielded a selection from the illustrious discography of everyone's favorite lovably tame African-American comedian, Sinbad. This time, we had a few outstanding finds, including the ripping King Crimson live record "USA"; Shudder to Think's way-underrated second major label effort, "50,000 BC"; "SST Acoustic," a totally improbable compilation featuring unplugged tracks from SST groups like the Minutemen and Saccharine Trust; an album of Dudley Moore's New Age piano music (!?!?); and last but not least, the true find of the trip: "Disharmonization" by Carbonized, a Swedish avant-death-metal group that sounds like a combination of Voivod, late Black Flag and primitive grindcore. truly out there stuff; am trying to find some tracks to post...
6) Tallahassee, Florida, has an incredibly advanced and fertile music scene. we played an intensely fun show at a cavernous yet awesome-sounding venue called the Beta Bar with four very diverse bands including the powerful, Isis-esque trio the Western Hold and the riotously awesome math-rock&roll outfit Spike Mott and the Blackest Knights of the Darkest Apocalypse. then we hung deep w/ members of the latter band and talked prog and jazz till dawn and marveled at the seething eccentric creativity of these dudes, all of whom were in like six other bands, including the UNREAL tech-metal quartet Spiketrain and the gorgeous post-rock group Dead Legs. go there and play if you are a weird band.
7) two best sandwiches of tour were at Kevino's Hot Dogs and Sandwiches in Atlanta and Primanti Brothers in Pittsburgh. the former was a very unassuming looking spot in a strip mall right near Lenny's Bar, where we played. the cuisine was advertised as Chicago-style, which was odd, considering that we were in the south. this place totally came out of left field with a crushing onslaught of flavor. Joe scored a tilapia bite, Tony a bulbous cheesesteak and me a glorious "Chicago style beef" number, dripping with jus and seasoned with an amazing concoction of pickled peppers and carrots. total sumptuousness. Primanti's meanwhile, is more of a known city landmark in Pittsburgh. pretty basic hot deli-ish sandwiches served on thick white bread, but with the added awesomeness of FRENCH FRIES mixed into the sandwich itself. definitely a trip.
8) coolest venue of tour may have been Detroit's Big Gray Shack. imagine a punk house combined with a ski lodge and you'll start to get an idea of the cozy electricity of this joint. incredibly nice people too. check out the totally brutal avant-grind band Letters in Binary; they slayed and were some of the warmest folks we encountered.
9) it was a huge personal thrill for me to play in front of a few of my musical heroes on this tour, including Will Scharf and Joe McTighe of Craw, Nick Sakes of Dazzling Killmen and Thymme Jones of Cheer-Accident. these dudes are all sine qua nons of the music i play now. though some of them are more modest than others, they're all geniuses and pillars of American underground awesomeness.
10) biggest mindblowing laffs were courtesy of the Crazy Dave Tape II and the "Office Hours" cartoon by Brad Neely. the former was a DVD handed off to us by a disturbed-seeming indie-scene guru in Cleveland. we laughed it off until we popped it in on a lark and were blown away by its hysterical barrage of skillfully segued gore and porn clips interlaced with weirdo cartoons and intensely unlikely celebrity clips from the netherreaches of pop culture. a truly committed artwork that we must've watched ten or more times over various tour stops. "Office Hours" is simply a masterpiece of freeform comedy. it simultaneously makes no sense and some deep form of unprecedented sense. please watch it here (note: my browser doesn't seem to like to play videos from this site, Super Deluxe; let me know if it plays okay when you click it):
i'm going to let all that suffice for now. so much more experienced, so much more to say. thanks to all dear friends for housing, support, company on the road, help with T-shirts including: Laal, Russ, Anna, Tom and Abby, Eli, all my family and friends in KC/Lawrence, Maya and her family in L.A., my aunt Sandy and Uncle Jon, my cousin Casey, the astoundingly nice and hospitable Dave Erb and his band the Yoleus of St. Paul, Tin "Above and beyond" Cagayat of San Diego, Shane Perlowin, Gideon, Sean, Craig/This Is My Condition, Eric in Madison, Sammy and Burgers of Lubbock, the dudes and dudettes of the Yukon, Calabi Yau and The Felon Wind and Muscle Brain and Lemp and Motion Turns It On and I, Octopus and A. Armada and Thrips and Capillary Action and Robots vs. Villages and Barkitecture and Flesh Epic and Thy Mighty Contract and Agape and Pincer and Good for Cows and entourages and all the other incredible bands we played with and Vanessa from War zine for interviewing us and the good folks at KFJC radio in Los Altos Hills and all photographers (pic above is from Chicago by Nick Shamblott) and anyone i'm forgetting. whew!
*****
for the curious, here is where we went and who we played with:
Friday, 11/23 BALTIMORE, MD - Ottobar w/ Yukon + Monarch + Jason Dove and the Magic Whip
Sunday, 11/25 CLEVELAND, OH – Now That’s Class w/ Pincer + Clan of the Cave Bear + Defeatist + Black Ladies
Monday, 11/26 DETROIT, MI – Big Gray Shack w/ Slicer Dicer + Letters in Binary + Dean Machine
Tuesday, 11/27 MADISON, WI – Cafe Montmartre Eric’s U. Wisconson art studio w/ Capillary Action + Bastard Trio
Wednesday, 11/28 ST. LOUIS, MO – Lemp Neighborhood Arts Center w/ Muscle Brain + The Sacoth + Waxwork of a Dynasty
Thursday, 11/29 CHICAGO, IL – The Mutiny w/ Behold! + Goodbye Satellites
Friday, 11/30 ST. PAUL, MN – Big V’s w/ The Yoleus + Kontrol Panel + Arctic Universe
Saturday, 12/1 LAWRENCE, KS – The Replay Lounge w/ This Is My Condition and Dan Kozak + Cave + Monobrau
Sunday, 12/2 DENVER, CO – Rhinoceropolis w/ They Will Use Your Bones for Tools + Spellcaster + Kitchclub
Monday, 12/3 SALT LAKE CITY, UT – Red Light Books w/ Agape + Cathexes
Wednesday, 12/5 SAN FRANCISCO, CA – Thee Parkside w/ Hammer Horror Classics + Thrips
Thursday, 12/6 OAKLAND, CA – 21 Grand w/ The Devin Hoff Platform + Weasel Walter/Kyle Bruckmann/Moe! Staiano Trio
Friday, 12/7 SAN DIEGO, CA – Scolari’s Office w/ Fkenal + Secret Fun Club + Hialeah
Saturday, 12/8 LOS ANGELES, CA – The Smell w/ Good for Cows + Grandpire
Sunday, 12/9 LONG BEACH, CA – The Que Sera w/ National Sunday Law + Cossack
Monday, 12/10 PHOENIX, AZ – Trunkspace w/ Harlequin Babies + James Fella
Wednesday, 12/12 LUBBOCK, TX – La Panza’s house Jessica’s house w/ La Panza + The Numerators
Thursday, 12/13 HOUSTON, TX – Super Happy Fun Land w/ Stove Blow + Thread Atlas + Motion Turns It On
Friday, 12/14 NEW ORLEANS, LA – Hi-Ho Lounge w/ I, Octopus + Tchoupchoupacabra
Saturday, 12/15 ATHENS, GA – Caledonia Lounge w/ Caledonia Social Club + A. Armada
Monday, 12/17 ATLANTA, GA – Lenny’s Bar w/ Thy Mighty Contract + The Lasch + Ski Club
Tuesday, 12/18 TALLAHASSEE, FL – Beta Bar w/ Spike Mott and the Blackest Knights of the Darkest Apocalypse + Tron + The Western Hold + Thank You Kindly
Wednesday, 12/19 ASHEVILLE, NC – New French Bar w/ Robots vs. Villages + Doom Ribbons + Flesh Epic
Thursday, 12/20 CHARLOTTE, NC – Yauhaus w/ Calabi Yau + The Felon Wind + The St. Peter Pocket Veto
Friday, 12/21 WASHINGTON, D.C. – The Lighthouse w/ Barkitecture + Double Dutch + Hindges + Stymphalian Birds and White Stags
