Time machine and namesake: Dazzling Killmen, live '93

I've often pondered the ever-fun "time machine" query, i.e., what one band or artist whom I never got to witness live would I go back and catch if I had the chance. John Bonham and Walt Dickerson are both near the top of the list, but neck and neck are Dazzling Killmen, one of my most treasured musical entities.

Above is the next best thing. In a fortunate turn of events, a pristine Killmen bootleg vid that I've had on my hard drive for ages has recently found its way to YouTube. This to me is the ideal of rock music. Better than metal, better than prog, better than hardcore -- internalizing the lessons of all while avoiding their pitfalls.

This is probably my favorite Killmen track ("In the Face of Collapse," which starts at about 9:15 in the video above), the epic centerpiece of their 1994 desert-island masterpiece, Face of Collapse, which I was unlucky enough to discover just after the band had broken up. Now is as good a time as any to reveal that this song, "In the Face of Collapse," is the namesake of my blog. "Dark forces swing blind punches" is simply a misheard lyric from this song (listen closely around 13:10), which I liked enough to let stick. For the record, the line is actually "Don't force it / Swing blind punches," as verified by frontman Nick Sakes, currently living in Brooklyn and prepping his latest project, Xaddax. (Guitarist Tim Garrigan now works as a rootsy solo artist; bassist Darin Gray plays in On Fillmore and various other projects; and drummer Blake Fleming can be heard in Future by Now.)

Anyway, listen, watch and marvel, and as a bonus track, here's another recently surfaced Killmen vid from an earlier vintage, crazy cable-access style:

Richard Davis at 80, part II: The archive

[Update, August 2018: Please go here to download the Jazz Profiles episode mentioned below, and please contact me if you would like access to the rest.]

I'm very pleased to announce that the aforementioned Richard Davis 80th-birthday radio tribute, which aired on WKCR on May 9, is now available for download, in a tidied and considerably spruced-up version. What you'll find below: the three-hour original program (featuring various clips from my recent interview with Mr. Davis), my colleague Russell Baker's three-hour preview show--an entirely different set of music--and a selection of bonus tracks and interview clips that were intended for airplay but omitted due to time constraints.

As you can see from the track list that follows this post, we played a few well-known classics, but overall, our focus was on some of the more obscure entries in Davis's vast discography. Even with over seven hours of music, we barely scratched the surface. Any hidden RD gems that I missed? Post them in the comments. Also, NYC readers, don't forget that RD plays live at Symphony Space with Lisle Atkinson's Neo Bass Ensemble on Friday, June 11.

First, the links:

Richard Davis - Jazz Profiles - WKCR - 5.9.10, hosted by Hank Shteamer and Russell Baker:

Part I

Part II

Part III

Richard Davis - Out to Lunch (preview show) - WKCR - 5.5.10, hosted by Russell Baker:

Part I

Part II

Richard Davis - Outtakes:

Bonus tracks

*****

A few quick notes:

1) The main tribute show ("Jazz Profiles") is presented podcast-style, as several lengthy MP3s, while the preview show ("Out to Lunch") and bonus tracks are split up into individual tracks. For these latter programs, I did my best to format everything for optimum iTunes use, but there may be some inconsistencies. Check the track list below for the intended running order.

2) Richard Davis and several of the other featured musicians participated in the making of these programs. (Thanks to L.D. Levy, A. Spencer Barefield, Barbara Barefield, Joel Futterman and Frank Hiehle for their assistance.) Thus, it seems fully kosher to post all of this material for archival review. If anyone feels differently, please drop me a line.

3) These files should be available for a month, i.e, through June 17, 2010. If you find your way to this post and the links are broken, contact me and I'll try to re-upload.

4) Some of the discographical info below is sketchy or incomplete. Let me know if you can fill in any blanks or if you see anything amiss.

*****

The tracks:

Jazz Profiles: Richard Davis

Part I

- Walt Dickerson and Richard Davis - "Always Positive"
Divine Gemini, 2.9.77
RD (b), Dickerson (vb)

- RD on Walt Dickerson

- [Announcement]

- RD on Sarah Vaughn

- Sarah Vaughn - "Stairway to the Stars"
At Mister Kelly's, 8.6-8.57
RD (b), Vaughn (v), Jimmy Jones (p), Roy Haynes (d)

- Ronnell Bright - "The Champ"
The Ronnell Bright Trio, 6.5.58
RD (b), Bright (p), Art Morgan (d)

- Ronnell Bright - "Easy Listening Blues"
[Same as above]

- [Announcement]

- RD on Alan Dawson

- Booker Ervin - "Number Two"
The Space Book, 10.2.64
RD (b), Ervin (ts), Jaki Byard (p), Alan Dawson (d)

- Jaki Byard - "Hazy Eve"
The Jaki Byard Experience, 9.17.68
RD (b), Byard (p)

- [Announcement]

- Eric Dolphy and Richard Davis - "Come Sunday"
Iron Man, 7.1.63
RD (b), Dolphy (b-cl)

- RD on Eric Dolphy

- Andrew Hill - "Premonition"
Compulsion, 10.8.65
RD (b), John Gilmore (b-cl), Freddie Hubbard (tp), Hill (p), Joe Chambers (d), Nadi Qamar (thumb piano), Renaud Simmons (percussion)

- RD on Andrew Hill and Dolphy's encouragement of his arco playing

- [Announcement]

- RD on Heavy Sounds

- Elvin Jones and Richard Davis - "Summertime"
Heavy Sounds, 6.19.67
RD (b), Jones (d)

- [Announcement]

- RD on Astral Weeks

Part II

- Van Morrison - "Sweet Thing"
Astral Weeks, 10.15.68
RD (b), Van Morrison (g, v), John Payne (flute), Jay Berliner (g), Connie Kay (d), Larry Fallon (string arrangements)

- RD on Bruce Springsteen

- Bruce Springsteen - "Meeting Across the River"
Born to Run, ??.??.75
RD (b), Springsteen (v), Randy Brecker (tp), Roy Bittan (p)

- [Announcement]

- RD on L.D. Levy

- Richard Davis and L.D. Levy - "Little She-Bear"
Cauldron, 1.13.79
RD (b), Levy (flute)

- Andrew Hill - "Blue Black"
Nefertiti, 1.25.76
RD (b), Hill (p), Roger Blank (d)

- [Announcement]

- RD on David Young

- David Young - "Pisces on the Cusp"
David Young, ??.??.71?
RD (b), Young (ts), Sonny Fortune (flute), Virgil Jones (tp), Harold Mabern Jr. (p), Idris Muhammad (d)

- RD on John Lewis

- John Lewis - "Games"
P.O.V., ??.??.75?
RD (b), Lewis (p), Mel Lewis (d)

- [Announcement]

- RD on Song for Wounded Knee

- The Richard Davis Trio - "America the Beautiful?"
Song for Wounded Knee, ??.??.73?
RD (b), Joe Beck (g)

- The Richard Davis Trio - "The Rise and Fall of Tricky Dick"
[Same as above]
RD (b), Beck (g), Jack DeJohnette (d)

- Richard Davis - "Fancy Free"
Fancy Free, 6.30/7.1.77
RD (b), Joe Henderson (ts), Eddie Henderson (tp), Stanley Cowell (electric piano), Billy Cobham (d)

- [Announcement]

Part III

- Richard Davis and Joe Henderson - "On the Trail"
Way Out West, 6.30/7.1.77
RD (b), Henderson (ts)

- Richard Davis - "Oh My God"
The Philosophy of the Spiritual, ??.??.71?
RD (b), Chick Corea (p), Sam Brown (g), Bill Lee (b), Sonny Brown (d), Frankie Dunlop (percussion)

- [Announcement]

- Richard Davis and Tine Asmundsen - "R&T"
Madison, 10.20-21.07
RD (b), Asmundsen (b)

- Richard Davis and John Hicks - "Skylark"
The Bassist: Homage to Diversity, ??.??.01?
RD (b), Hicks (p)

*****

Preview show

Part I

1. Don Friedman - "Wakin' Up"
Metamorphosis, 2.22.66
RD (b), Friedman (p), Attila Zoller (g), Joe Chambers (d)

2. Don Friedman - "Spring Sign"
[Same as above]

3. Don Friedman - "Troubadours Groovedour"
[Same as above]

4. [Announcement]

5. Charles Lloyd - "Sweet Georgia Bright"
Discovery!, ??.??.65?
RD (b), Lloyd (ts), Friedman (p), J.C. Moses (d)

6. Charles Lloyd - "How Can I Tell You"
[Same as above]

7. [Announcement]

8. Clifford Jordan - "Dick's Holler"
These Are My Roots, 2.1,17.65
RD (b), Jordan (ts), Roy Burrowes (tp), Julian Priester (tb), Cedar Walton (p), Chuck Wayne (g), Albert "Tootie" Heath (d)

9. Clifford Jordan - "Take This Hammer"
[Same as above]
add Sandra Douglass (v); omit Wayne; omit Walton

10. Clifford Jordan - "Goodnight Irene"
[Same as "Dick's Holler"]
omit Burrowes; omit Walton

11. [Announcement]

12. Ricky Ford - "Loxodonta Africana"
Loxodonta Africana, 6.?.1977
RD (b), Ford (ts), James Spaulding (as), Oliver Beener (tp), Charles Sullivan (tp), Janice Robinson (tb), Jonathan Dorn (tb), Bob Neloms (p), Dannie Richmond (d)

13. Ricky Ford - "Blues Peru"
[Same as above]

14. Ricky Ford - "My Romance"
[Same as above]

15. [Announcement]

16. Eddie Harrs - "Smoke Signals"
Silver Cycles, ??.??.68
[Personnel announced after the tracks]

17. Eddie Harris - "I'm Gonna Leave You All by Yourself"
[Same as above]

18. Eddie Harris - "Little Bit"
[Same as above]

19. [Announcement]


Part II


20. Earl Hines - "Bye Bye Baby"
Spontaneous Explorations, 1.17.66
RD (b), Hines (p), Elvin Jones (d)

21. Earl Hines - "Smoke Rings"
[Same as above]

22. Earl Hines - "Shoeshine Boy"
[Same as above]

23. Earl Hines - "Bernie's Tune"
[Same as above]

24. [Announcement]

25. Ben Webster and Joe Zawinul - "Too Late Now"
Soulmates, ??.??.63
RD (b), Webster (ts), Zawinul (p), Philly Joe Jones (d)

26. Ben Webster and Joe Zawinul - "Come Sunday"
[Same as above]

27. [Announcement]

28. Eric Kloss - "Softly as in a Morning Sunrise"
Grits & Gravy, ??.??.66
RD (b), Kloss (as), Jaki Byard (p), Alan Dawson (d)

29. Eric Kloss - "You Don't Know What Love Is"
[Same as above]

30. Eric Kloss - "Milestones"
[Same as above]

31. [Announcement]

32. Andrew Hill - "Two Lullabies"
Lift Every Voice, ??.??.69
RD (b), Hill (p), Carlos Garnett (ts), Woody Shaw (tp), Freddie Waits (d) + vocal choir conducted by Lawrence Marshall

33. Andrew Hill - "Love Chant"
[Same as above]

34. Andrew Hill - "Ghetto Lights"
[Same as above]

*****

Bonus tracks

1. Elvin Jones - "Everything Happens to Me"
Dear John C., 2.23.65
RD (b), Jones (d), Charlie Mariano (as)

2. Dizzy Gillespie - "Birk's Works"
Live at the Village Vanguard, 10.1.67
RD (b), Gillespie (tp), Pepper Adams (bs), Ray Nance (violin), Chick Corea (p), Elvin Jones (d)

3. Thad Jones/Mel Lewis - "The Waltz You Swang for Me"
Monday Night, ??.??.68
RD (b), Jones (flugelhorn), Lewis (d) + full personnel here

4. Richard Davis and Freddie Hubbard - "Muses for Richard Davis"
Muses for Richard Davis, ??.??.69?
RD (b), Hubbard (tp)

5. Richard Davis - "Softly as in a Morning Sunrise"
[Same as above]
add Roland Hanna (p), Louis Hayes (d); omit Hubbard

6. Richard Davis - "Julie's Rag Doll"
Dealin', 9.14.73
RD (b), David Spinozza (g), Paul Griffin (organ), Freddie Waits (d)

7. Phil Woods - "Samba du Bois"
Musique du Bois, 4.14.74
RD (b), Woods (as), Jaki Byard (p), Alan Dawson (d)

8. Richard Davis - "Take the A Train"
Harvest, 5.3,16.77
RD (b), James Spaulding (as), Marvin Hannibal Peterson (tp), Ted Dunbar (g), Bill Lee (b), Billy Hart (d)

9. David Murray - "Santa Barbara and Crenshaw Follies"
The Hill, 11.29.86
RD (b), David Murray (ts), Joe Chambers (d)

10. A. Spencer Barefield - "Raise Four"
After the End, ??.??.87
RD (b), Barefield (guitar), Oliver Lake (as), Hugh Ragin (tp), Andrew Cyrille (d)

11. Joel Futterman - "I Never Knew Her Name"
Vision in Time, ??.??.88
RD (b), Futterman (p), Joseph Jarman (ts), Robert Adkins (d)

12. RD on Booker Little

13. RD on Coltrane, Ayler

14. RD on Stravinsky

15. RD on the Retention Action Project

Now's the Time: Richard Davis at 80 [revised]

[Below is an expanded version of the original Richard Davis post of Thursday, May 6.]

I couldn't be more excited to announce that my friend Russell Baker and I will spin five straight hours of Richard Davis recordings on WKCR, this coming Sunday, 5/9, from 2pm to 7pm EST. [UPDATE--Sunday, 5/9: The first portion of the broadcast has been preempted by a Columbia University baseball game; we should be underway by 3:30 or 4pm EST. If you tune in and hear play-by-play instead of Richard Davis, please check back soon afterward.] Listen at 89.9 FM in NYC, or tune in online here. We'll hit Out to Lunch!, Astral Weeks and as many points in between as we can. Plus, we'll play excerpts from an interview I conducted with Mr. Davis on April 25.

A preview is up now at Destination: Out, featuring rare tracks from Davis's 1973 curio classic Song for Wounded Knee and a clip of him discussing the session.

For the record, Richard Davis is one of my very favorite musicians. I've been a Davis fanatic since college, when I discovered his beautiful mind-meld with Andrew Hill during the '60s, a partnership that yielded a run of some of the most distinctive jazz albums I know: seven full-lengths in all, from '63's Black Fire to '65's Compulsion. Learning to love Astral Weeks around the same time, and realizing what a crucial role Davis also played on that holy record--this is not received knowledge; get past the "iconic rock album"-ness and try develop a personal relationship with this inexhaustible document--upped my fascination exponentially.

Who was this rare bassist, I remember thinking to myself over the years, who always seemed to leave a mark on the proceedings? In my mind, I have called him Spider-Hands, for the way he weaves these thick, sticky, creepily intricate webs of notes when playing pizzicato. It was almost as if the instrument were smaller, more pliable in his hands, something to be manhandled rather than merely tamed. And then the arco work of unthinkable solemn dignity and depth, and also bow-hair-shredding grit. ("Wailing Wall" from Hill's Smokestack was the kicker there.)

And the discography, shockingly vast. It's been a joyously Sisyphean task trying to make sense of it all, but Russell and I have been trying our best. You could do five days' worth of Richard Davis rather than five hours and never get bored, but we'll try to make our show worthwhile and fitting. You'll hear some of the Davis you know and love, and (hopefully) some you never knew existed. Happy 80th birthday, sir, and thank you for transcending style for so many years, for being yourself and simply playing.

/////

Some great Davis reading and watching:

*A recent and very lengthy Davis video interview from Wisconsin public TV

*A nice 2005 Davis profile/interview by Andrey Henkin, via All About Jazz

*A comprehensive Jazz Times piece from right around the same time

*And lastly, probably the greatest thing on YouTube: 1, 2, 3, 4 videos of Richard Davis and Elvin Jones live in Japan in (I'm educated-guessing) the deep '70s

/////

One question that keeps coming to mind as I research RD: Are there any recorded documents of his classical work, e.g., perhaps this Stravinsky Conducts Stravinsky set? Dying to hear what he sounds like in that context, but I imagine it would be hard to pick him out of an orchestra.

The fine art of saying no: A glorious new Rush documentary

Beyond the Lighted Stage, the new documentary about Rush that premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival this weekend, is a near-perfect film that answers one simple question: Why is this band different from all other bands? As someone who's loved Rush for going on 15 years, it was thrilling and vindicating to see someone plead their case so lovingly.

Thematically, the doc focuses on the notion that Rush's sustained success throughout four decades boils down to the band's shrewd instinct, both as a trio and as individuals, for knowing when to say no:

*Alex Lifeson saying no to making his parents proud by getting a "real" job

*Neil Peart saying no to suppressing his bookish tendencies in the name of rock & roll, and later to the idea that he ought to make himself unduly available to obsessive fans

*Rush as a whole saying no to debauchery on the road (as no less a debauchery authority than Gene Simmons of Kiss, who toured with Rush in the early days, attests in the film)

*...saying no to the record label's demand for more concise, accessible material after the failure of Caress of Steel (Rush's middle-finger answer? a little album called 21-frickin'-12)

*...saying no to letting the band overwhelm the members' family lives

*...saying no to continuing as an epic-prog band after they'd outgrown that sound in the early '80s

*...saying no to continuing as a keyboard-drenched pop-rock band after they'd outgrown that sound in the late-'80s

*...saying no to hurrying back into working mode after Peart suffered the loss of his daughter and wife in rapid succession in 1997

There are many more examples, but you get the idea. And in case you don't, the film offers a parade of talking-head rock experts to hammer home its theses: Trent Reznor, Billy Corgan (who blew me away with his quiet poise and articulateness), Kirk Hammett, Rage Against the Machine's Tim Commerford, Tool's Danny Carey, Primus's Les Claypool, the aforementioned Simmons, Skid Row's Sebastian Bach (utterly hilarious), Pantera's Vinnie Paul (yes!) and many more, including a hammy but still sincere Jack Black. Counterbalancing these celebs are major behind-the-scenes players (longtime producer Terry Brown, Rush's early label and radio champions Donna Halper and Cliff Burnstein, etc.) as well as each member's loving parents and a few handpicked fans, who offer a crucial perspective re: how Rush speaks to the alienated teen in all of us.

And then there's the footage. Oh, the glorious footage. A vintage version of "Xanadu" (one of my most treasured Rush songs) that gave me chills; Rush's first-album lineup performing in a school auditorium; the band members warming up backstage; Lifeson and Geddy Lee scarfing sandwiches and signing autographs in a restaurant. And tons more gems.

I honestly have no idea how this will play to the non Rush fan. My love of the band is so deeply ingrained that it's impossible for me to take an objective view. (Though a sympathetic yet nonfanatical friend who accompanied me to the screening was riveted.) But I will say that I don't think this film could have been done better and that Rush geeks the world over are going to go wild. I'd enjoyed codirector Sam Dunn's previous feature, Metal: A Headbanger's Journey (great metal 101 doc), but this is a much richer, warmer film, a beautifully wrought summation of a truly singular career. And the best part is, it isn't an epitaph. Rush is touring this summer and they've got new material on the way. Bring it on, I say. (Seeing the doc sent me immediately back to 2002's Vapor Trails, which is rapidly ascending the ranks of my favorite Rush albums.)

For more info on Rush: Beyond the Lighted Stage, check out my TONY colleague Joshua Rothkopf's recent Q&A with Lifeson.

Like a prayer: What "metal" can and should learn from Ludicra

Just returned from seeing Ludicra at Club Europa, a show I previewed for TONY. Late on a Sunday, feeling fried, but I'm so glad I went. I think I can say definitively that Ludicra's set was the most organically heavy performance I've ever witnessed by a metal band.

Too often, metal as it exists in my mind is not how it exists in the world. If you keep up with the genre, you know that over the past two decades, a sonic revolution has taken place, namely an abhorrent artificiality that sucks all the life out of the genre. Drum triggers, Pro Tools, noise gates -- it all adds up to fake, inanimate music. It might be a hackneyed argument, but it bears repeating over and over and over. Metal should be heavy. More and more, all this airless-sounding nonsense sends me screaming to my Zeppelin and Sabbath records, craving that fix of warm realness.

Ludicra's set was like a time machine to an era before all this nonsense. I encouraged my bandmate Joe to check out the band's magnificent new album, The Tenant (album cover above), and today he told me that it made him think of Kill 'Em All. I definitely agree that it takes you back via its holy rough fullness, its primal, thudding grace. The revelation that drums ought to sound like drums, the courage to have everything come at you in a real way.

I had a feeling they'd open their set with "Stagnant Pond," the lead track from The Tenant, and they did, and thus began 50 minutes or so of shock and rapture. I guess being a drummer myself I'm always going to fixate on the drummer, but I will tell you that Ludicra's percussionist, Aesop Dekker, is a master, worthy of any accolade. He drove the band with an unholy snare thwack which cut through the guitars like a gun shot, crystal-clear bell-of-the-ride accents placed with poetic accuracy, and a true patience and love of groove, whether that meant a speed-freak blast beat or a half-time trudge.

Bassist Ross Sewage alternately zoning out on the music's epic architecture and regarding the crowd with an unsettling scowl. Guitarist Christy Cather, a true metal hero with her curly blonde mane, Flying V axe and leather vest. The other six-stringer, John Cobbett, running his dancing fingers through their paces. And vocalist Laurie Sue Shanaman... I don't even know how to describe it. You won't do better than Laal did, pegging her movements as theatrical and goblinlike. Her vocals convey genuine horror and despair. Not that generic black-metal, screaming-for-the-sake-of-screaming crap. There's no word for what comes out of her throat other than DIRE. She stomps around, contorts her body and face. It's almost but not quite cartoonish, a pantomime of evil, a stylized sort of possession.

The band charges as a team, headbanging in furious unison. Cather and Sewage shared one of those classic leaning-back-to-back guitar-tandem moments. The quintet had such a chemistry, such an effortless group choreography. I'm not sure exactly how long this lineup has been together, but you really got the vibe of a crew, of an "on-and-off-the-court" camaraderie.

And all in the service of maximum epic grimness, the epitome of what all metal really aspires to. This set was like a master class in the history of the genre, cherry-picking the awesomest aspects of all the various substyles. The neck-snapping groove of '80s thrash, as heard on The Tenant's "In Stable," which embodies the midtempo assault of Megadeth at their best. Holy, hymnlike interludes touching on the gothy beauty of bands like My Dying Bride. Hailstorm blast sections that could stand up against any of the Norwegian luminaries. Crawling-through-a-snowstorm-and-finally-glimpsing-the-sun, dark-yet-luminous doom metal. It sounds like a prayer.

I only know the new album so there were a few songs I didn't recognize, including a long, glorious encore. The crowd was so there, so present. I saw so much dancing, so much convulsing, so much screaming at the sky in response to the expertly orchestrated evil-ness of it all, and I was right there. Couldn't have sat down if I'd tried. Eyes closed, grimacing privately.

It was all poetry, all a reminder of why I'd had this music in my blood since my teens. You won't get this reassured feeling from very many bands. The genre is in vogue and it's overrun with... with itself really. With bands that hew closely to convention as if to a buoy in the sea. I say let it all go, unless it's something like this, that sums up the swelling emotion, the vastness, the power, the sorrow -- and served raw, please, without the spit-and-polish nonsense that passes for production, not to mention live sound, these days. Black Sabbath deserves a better legacy. Any band calling itself metal needs to provide maximum mood and maximum chops all filtered through a huge, gut-punching, organic sound. It should feel like getting flattened by a baroquely adorned tank and Ludicra did. Shock and awe indeed.

Peter Steele, sardonic goth-metal genius, has died

I read the news today, oh boy. Peter Steele, frontman of Type O Negative, has passed away. I've loved his music since my teens. My friends and I once stood outside Type O's tour bus, waiting patiently for autographs, which each member kindly granted. I saw the above video on Headbanger's Ball in the early '90s and it spun me around. I had no idea what "goth" was or any of that. I only knew that I loved the sumptuousness of the sound, the combination of steely metal and deep-voiced, almost choral crooning. I loved the perversity of the lyrics (see: "Christian Woman," one of the most potent statements I know re: the carnality at the heart of Christianity), and as I investigated further, I came to understand that here was a man (Steele) who not only got the dark and gloom; he also got the hilarity of it all.

You wouldn't find that in, say, Nine Inch Nails, or any of the other well-known angst purveyors of the time. You had to go to Type O Negative to get a song called "Unsuccessfully Coping with the Natural Beauty of Infidelity (I Know You're Fucking Someone Else)" or to get an absolutely brilliant faux live album wherein the band sparred with merciless imaginary hecklers. (Hunt down the original cover art for that one, and you'll get a nasty treat.) Or to find out that your tortured hero had posed for Playgirl.

After losing track of Type O for a few years, I was thrilled to find that the band's most recent album, Dead Again, was every bit as sick and satisfying as their vintage work. I hadn't seen them play live since that show way back when (I think they were opening for Danzig), and I was really looking forward to checking them out next time around. Since there won't be a next time, please understand that this man was a genius. For a lot of reasons, but chiefly because he was brave enough to push buttons, to mix the dark and the light in utterly perverse and fucked-up ways that made you feel baffled and challenged and enthralled and spooked. And I haven't even touched on Carnivore...

We will miss you, Mr. Steele.

In full: Xiu Xiu's Jamie Stewart

Very happy to be able to link to my hot-off-the-press profile of Xiu Xiu on the TONY site, as well as the full transcript of my conversation with bandleader Jamie Stewart on the Volume. Re: the former link, don't miss the list Stewart compiled at the end of five albums that scare him: a classic assortment of the perverse and/or extreme, with records by Cecil Taylor, Diamanda Galás and more. Speaking of Taylor, jazz heads might be interested to hear Stewart's further thoughts on the maestro, which come right at the end of the unedited Q&A.

If you haven't heard Xiu Xiu, I'd probably recommend The Air Force, which landed on my 2006 top ten list. Imagine an almost surreally perverse Casio-fueled version of Scott Walker, only with much catchier choruses, and you'll get some idea of the strangeness and intensity of this project. The new album (Dear God, I Hate Myself) is outstanding, and you can hear it via that first TONY link above. For the totally uninitiated, The Air Force's "Boy Soprano" is probably my favorite Xiu Xiu 101 track.

Six songs

Offered without comment. Just really been wanting to share these recent obsessions. Wish I had web storage space, but for the moment, I don't, so video embeds will have to do. The artists are, respectively, Chatmonchy, Death (Detroit, not Florida), Xiu Xiu, Cynic, the Outfield and Looker.

Maynard James Keenan's Puscifer at the Grand Ballroom: The curveball that could

Photo: Isaac Brekken

I've been a fan of Tool for a really long time. Like most, I came on board in '93, when "Sober" hit Headbanger's Ball. I lost track of the band for a while during college, but when I checked back in with them in the early aughts, I was pretty blown away by what had emerged in the interim, specifically Lateralus, an absolute classic of the dark-and-epic-rock mode. I grappled with 10,000 Days when it first came out, but I've since come to accept it as mostly awesome, and I can't wait till the band reactivates.

It almost goes without saying that Maynard James Keenan's voice is one of Tool's key features for me. I'm sure this is true for the great majority of fans. There's just something alchemical in the way his sinuous chant mingles with the band's crisp roboprog riffs.

Even so, I cannot say I had terribly high hopes for last night's Grand Ballroom show by Keenan's latest side project, Puscifer. (Check out my friend and colleague David Fear's excellent Q&A with Keenan to get up to speed, and note also that Puscifer performs again on Saturday at the Apollo.) Prior to the gig, my exposure to Puscifer was minimal, just a few press releases over the past few years and some promo CDs that I'd never brought myself to engage with. Why? Simply, it was the humor that did it. As any music fan knows, humor can be the ultimate moodkiller. It's not that humor doesn't belong in music; it's that when humor exists as part of whatever artist's palette, it too often overwhelms any other element that might be present. It's alienating, mainly because if you don't happen to find a particular artist's brand of humor funny, you're likely to be turned off the entire endeavor. Everyone has an example of this. For me it's Zappa. I know there's some substance there, but I find his pervasive comedic element completely insufferable: smug and cheesy and dated and just the ultimate turn-off. Maybe one day I'll go there, but so far, the funny-stuff armor has kept me far away. (It goes both ways, of course: Such accusations could certainly be leveled at two of my favorite bands, Ween and Cheer-Accident, but the difference for me in both cases is the almost sadistic mingling of light and dark.)

Anyway, so in sum, I heard some years back that Keenan had a side project called Puscifer; I learned that the band's debut album was entitled "V" Is for Vagina; and I checked out the asinine cartoon cover art. In short, I snap-judged the hell out of the thing, deciding that this sort of goofing off was just not what I wanted from Keenan. After all, don't we, as fans, have the right to decide what to consume and what to pass on? Sure, perhaps I had typecast Keenan, deciding that I'd turn to him for dark and sumptuous, not silly and irreverent, but this is not an uncommon move. We all do the same thing: We want X mood or vibe from X artist and we don't want curveballs, even if said artist is "challenging" or whatever. I believe I'd be just as initially dismissive of the idea of a comedic project from, say, Cecil Taylor. (Or, for that matter, a dramatic project from, say, Aziz Ansari.)

As for last night's show, let me say two things definitively.

One: The humor aspect was indeed pervasive and often unfunny. The entire performance, a sort of multimedia revue complete with costumes, video interludes and dramatic "business," was structured around a fictional airline called Vagina Air, a conceit that provided a platform for all sorts of stale jokes about post-9/11 air-travel paranoia and the like.

Two: The music was so fantastically cool that it was nearly impossible to care. In other words, I really underestimated Keenan. Amid all the silliness, there were these incredible songs: jauntier, groovier, hammier, simpler and in many ways catchier than Tool--I'd describe it industrial-, cabaret- and metal-tinged art pop--but still very driving and still perfect vehicles for Keenan's voice. And oh, that voice... Like the rest of the cast (there were seven or so people onstage), Keenan spent the entire show in a pilot's outfit, complete with shades. He sang mostly from behind a video screen--see above--which projected his face as a sort of fish-eye caricature. But none of this detracted from his performance. I'm not kidding: He sounded absolutely stunning, yielding perhaps the most just-like-the-record live vocal sound I've ever heard in my life. I'd seen Tool a few years back but the mix was terrible and Keenan was largely inaudible. At this Puscifer show, the sound was PERFECT and you could hear every contour, every warble, that haunting sing-song you'd heard so many times on albums. Laal (also a huge Tool fan) and I kept turning to each other with mouths agape, one or the other of us exclaiming, "I seriously cannot believe how good he sounds."

And the material, though unfamiliar, was an excellent vehicle for Keenan's gifts. Most of it was swaggery and driving, pitched right between the sinister and the playful. But some of it was downright balladic, with a distinctly loungey feel, with Keenan coming off like a histrionic though entirely sincere Vegas crooner. The music and the presentation had a gimmicky element, but crucially, Keenan played it straight and sang his ass off. (To be fair, the band ruled, especially the really solid, crushing drummer and an excellent female vocalist--Carina Round--who served as an excellent foil for Maynard.)

The stunning quality of his performance had the really remarkable effect of legitimizing everything around it. Gradually, all the cheesy video interludes came to seem delightful; the theatrical hubbub going on simultaneous to the music began to come off like a charming complement to the already vaguely Broadway-ish material. (Former Primus drummer Tim Alexander played the role of a flight attendant, while opening acts Neil Hamburger (!) and Uncle Scratch's Gospel Revival sat in faux airplane seats at center stage, chatting, drinking and reading the paper during the majority of the performance.) Overall it was like watching a performer jump the shark, but doing so in such a professional and expertly choreographed fashion that the joke was on you for trying to put them in an aesthetic box in the first place. You actually felt like you were being forced to accept an aspect of Maynard James Keenan that you weren't ready for and you couldn't help but be won over.

Think about this for a second: When was the last time an artist actually won you over with a complete curveball? That's a mixed metaphor, but you know what I'm saying: It's a pretty profound thing when you see something so cool that you lay down your bias then and there, conceding, "You know what, you're right. This is in fact awesome." Again, as I said above, an unfunny attempt at humor may be the most profound turn-off in art, but I left this show completely convinced that Puscifer is every bit as legitimate an outlet for Keenan's singular gifts as Tool. Strong words, but I'm serious.

It seems like such a simple concept, this notion of being challenged, but I really don't think it is. Even with dark or abrasive art, we usually want a certain thing and we get that certain thing and we're happy. We say we want a challenge, but we want it on our terms, deciding when we want it and from whom. Whatever your feelings on Puscifer, the project poses an aesthetic challenge to Keenan die-hards (and there are many far more rabid than myself), and moreover, it actually rewards the effort. It's not a curveball for curveball's sake--it's a very fruitful outlet for a guy who just happens to display really schizophrenic artistic tendencies.

Now I'm going to have to dive into Keenan's other other band, A Perfect Circle, which I've barely heard. I can only hope I'm initially completely repelled by what I discover.

The point

A phenomenon I treasure, experienced twice this weekend: when a piece of writing about music sends me scurrying, more or less frantically, to listen. It's like a command. Two CDs I'd had for ages, lying amid the innumerable stacks in my room, and to which I'd never paid ample attention. Two writers, persuading and prepping me. Thanks to Alex Ross, I dug into the stark but inviting Xenakis Percussion Works, and thanks to Howard Mandel, I spun Ornette's fantastically exuberant Friends and Neighbors. Reminders that, yes, there is a point to this endeavor, and the point is to point, to make a case for why, even in the midst of info overload, you should really take a minute to check this here thing out. Ross puts it as succinctly as it could be put when he titles his forthcoming book Listen to This.