Howlin' Wuelf Howls

Frenchman Street Blues

2012-01-18T05:56:00.000-08:00

One night we were watching some episode of season 2 of HBO's "Treme;" the episode ends, credits roll, someone counts off "1-2, 1-2-3-4!" and an incredibly infectious brass-driven groove kicks in - easily one of the most exciting pieces of music I'd heard in quite a while. After checking with the "Treme Explained" blog at NOLA.com I discover that the performance is of "Knock With Me Rock With Me" by the Lil Rascals Brass Band, vocals provided by one Glen David Andrews (I highly recommend you buy a download of this track at your earliest convenience).

As the weeks roll by and I read over more installments of "TE" I note his name popping up kinda regularly, often referring to the fact that he'd turned from habitually hanging with the more criminal elements around town to becoming more socially conscious and trying to discourage inter-clique violence and the like. He was one of the key speakers at the march against violent crime that ended up at New Orleans city hall where many voiced dissatisfaction with the police departments apparent disinterest and ineffectiveness at maintaining the peace as well as acknowledging that communities needed do what they could within their own neighborhoods to discourage and not condone, tolerate or glorify violent crime.

Suddenly I had credit for a free download from Amazon.com and purchased "Knock With Me..." and wound up playing it incessantly for a good week, and then purchased a copy of the full album "Buck It Like A Horse." While the rest of the album doesn't quite measure up to the "Knock With Me..." and most other tracks are instrumentals it is high spirited, motorvating stuff throughout. I really don't regret the purchase.

But I was left jonesing for more of Andrews and eventually wound up buying downloads of "Walking Through Heaven's Gate" - a gospel album - and "Dumaine Street Blues" - relaxed Hot Jazz i.e. brass, banjo and vocals. The former was fine stuff -- full choir backed by full electric band and Glen's powerful, raw voice shines throughout. But it was all a bit too pat. No surprises, no twists. Honestly, any able singer could have turned in the same effort. "Dumaine Street Blues" - also very able, but also pat -- really sounded like Andrews trying to fill the shoes that Kermit Ruffins appears to be vacating as starts cashing in on his national visibility via "Treme," playing more and more out of town dates, abandoning his residency at Vaughn's, etc (and no shame in trying to spread his down and dirty, good time trad jazz around the country -- and THIS is the time, not in 5 years when "Treme"'s history).

Still -- that voice! The fire he brought to "Knock With Me..." couldn't be a fluke. So as we started planning our most recent jaunt to NOLA we were hoping he'd be playing, and indeed he was - Monday night at DBA, last night of our stay. We started the evening with excellent FREE red beans and rice at Tujacuqes on Decatur street with our friends Tom and Arion, then dropped in on Jan and Claudia who brought us up to date on their tussling with insurance agents and various government officials to be able to finally start repairing fire damage to their house in the Vieux Carre, then on to DBA.

We arrived a little late but still early in Glen David Andrews and company's set. He was backed by tuba, guitar, drums and sax if I recall; he was singing and occasionally blowing some trombone.

The place was packed, spirits were high and Glen obviously was aiming to please.

The set was loaded with tried and true New Orleans crowd-pleasers, songs made popular by Louis Armstrong, Fats Domino, Professor Longhair, John Boute's "Treme" theme song, gospel, Dr. John. It was the New Orleans greatest hits set-list that anyone who'd gone to a Fat Tuesday party anywhere in the country would feel right at home with. As the set proceeded, Glen regularly touted his "Live At The Three Muses" (this being a club/restaurant a block or so down Frenchman Street) and both he and another band member walked through the crowd while the rest of the band vamped on selling the CD (and how could I not under the circumstances?)

One also began to note that he spent more time dancing (quite agiley and athletically!), kibitzing with the band, exhorting the audience to dance, twirl hankies in the air (a Second Line tradition), leading them in "Who dat" chants, and so on than he did singing per se or playing trombone. A lot of songs went on a LONG time without very much happening except the band vamping while he capered.

In the final analysis, Glen's talent as a singer and frontman were firmly established but as a band leader, it seems he's got some growing to do. Or not. Not to sound too presumptuous but if you were a "Treme" devotee making your first trip to New Orleans and caught this set, you'd likely think you could check a dozen musical must-dos off your list. True dat. This is the perfect Cliff Notes version of the contemporary trad-based New Orleans music scene. A fine starting place.

If you've already done a bit more delving however it'd come off as a bit shallow, lacking in following the various genres and traditions touched on into their deeper and more distinctive/eccentric recesses.

I STILL think Glen David Andrews is a massive talent and if he were willing and able to apply himself to any one of the stylistic areas he's able to reference glibly and really put his heart into the music, instead of into pleasing as big an audience as possible I think he'd make some incredible, mind-blowing music.

"Live At the Three Muses" basically documents the sort of set we saw that night at DBA. So, if you've got a "Treme" loving friend who bought the soundtrack albums and wants just a little bit more, this would be a nice gift for 'em. Or yourself if you're looking to put your second toe into the water.

Consuming Passion

2012-01-17T07:42:00.000-08:00

We went to New Orleans in December. Had a great time. Visited with dear friends, ate good food and bought up a buncha good stuff.

"Lives Interrupted" by Keith Spera - an account of several iconic New Orleans performers who've faced various trials in recent years including Fats Domino during the Federal Flood (what the rest of us call "Hurricane Katrina") and Mystikal doing time in the stir - got it signed by Keith and gave it as an Xmas present.

"Daisy Buchanan's Daughter" by Tom Carson - a work of sarky fiction by GQ movie critic - a sequel to The Great Gatsby. Purchased at the mighty Faulkner House book shop - got it signed and gave as an Xmas present as well.

A book on Storyville (tome's downstairs so I can't give you title or author). But an interesting batch of essays on various aspects of the establishment and functioning of the U.S.'s original almost legal red light district. There's chapters on the early history of vice in New Orleans (that mentions that the French emptied a couple prisons and transported the inmates to their American colony to provide wives for the settlers - THANKS!), on music in Storyville, on the entrepeneurs who profitted from the enterprise (and beyond the Madams there were lotsa "respectable" citizens bankrolling the houses and benefitting from their operation). Also includes a number of previously published photos by EJ Bellocq and some that were previously unpublished. And I came across this book looking for a copy of "Storyville Portraits" - originally a catalogue published by the MET in NYC in conjunction with the first exhibition of these beautiful and thought provoking photographs. No one in NOLA had it in stock and apparently they go for a pretty penny when they do come in (I got one for $50 from Abebooks when I got home).

AND THEN -- I'd planned on doing some intensive shopping at New Orleans Music Factory on Decatur street and when I saw that Keith Spera was doing a book signing there on Saturday scheduled my visit around that. And let me tell ya -- that was a scene you'd only find in New Orleans! During Keith's signing Ellis Marsalis - Wynton's pop - was performing on the store's tiny stage, promoting his own Christmas CD. He was followed by Chris Thomas - the gent who played the Robert Johnson character in the Coen Bros. "O Brother Where Art Thou". Yeah, all in one afternoon, all free.

Louisiana Music Factory is your standard, comfortably lived in old school record store. Decent sized but not huge. The fittings could have been installed anytime from 1960 onwards. It's one of those places that looks and feels like a haven for music FREAKS. And infamous for the amount of New Orleans related recordings they keep in stock which is likely about 90% of the stock. So the mind is summarily boggled. In fact, it's taken 10 years of visiting and two years of actually doing some serious study of NOLA music history to be able to navigate it meaningfully.

Even in this age of iTunes and Amazon.com there's STILL stuff you'll ONLY find here (at least at a reasonable price). I'll expound on these in the future but for now just listing:

Treme Brass Band "Gimme My Money Back" - an old school brass band as opposed to the the relatively younger breed ala Rebirth or Soul Rebels and this line up features Kermit Ruffins and James Andrews

Various Artists "Ace Story Volume 1" - Ace was the label run by former Specialty Records A&R man Johnny Vincent - lotta virulent, greasy, downhome R&B, rock 'n' roll and swamp pop all unmistakably flavored with that distinctive NOLA tinge - even if was recorded elsewhere in the South

Ernie K. Doe "Here Come the Girls" - 2 CD retrospective on UK Charlie label - and I knew from reading Offbeat that it was on sale for the month of December for $15.99. These are all Toussaint produced and (largely) composed and cover both Toussaint's rollicking R&B style (i.e. "Mother In Law") as well as the distinctive funk style he developed when the Meters became his house band.

Wardell Quezerque "Sixty Smokin Soul Senders" - Quezerque, as I've mentioned before, is not nearly as well known as his rival songwriter/producer Allen Toussaint outside of NOLA but at home he was held in high esteem indeed by the local musicians of note including Toussaint who called him "the Black Bach" and the "Creole Beethoven." This 2 CD set indeed collects 60 of his 60's soul sides cut with a variety of singers, most of whom only had local success. But throughout this is raw, funky and heartfelt. And if a lot of tracks clearly are trying to appropriate contemporary stylistic vocabularies from Memphis, Detroit and Muscle Shoals, no question but that Wardell did in fact master them all and with the right distribution could have been a major hitmaker on a national level.

ALSO - we ended our visit at DBA on Monday night (after chowing down on free red beans and rice at Tujacques) where Glen David Andrews was playing. This is something I couldn't miss as his performance with the Lil Rascals Brass Band on "Knock With Me, Rock With Me" is one of the most startling, powerful and original musical performances I've heard in the past 5 years. And he was hawking a "Live At the Three Muses" CD at the show -- how could I pass that up?

MORE ON ALL OF THESE SOME OTHER DAY.

the RILLY rill thang

2011-12-28T05:55:00.000-08:00

Repeated contemplation of the "Cosimo Matassa Story" box set (incidentally, Matassa is STILL alive and well and apparently holds court at Matassa's Market,1001 Dauphine St., NOLA) led me to go on a Little Richard jag (as his biggest hits were recorded at Matassa's J&M Studios) and buy (and read) Charles White's biography as well as the ultra cheap 5 CD "5 Classic Albums" set...the latter being indispensible for the faithful as it collects all his pre-hit recordings, all the work from his most successful period, and then the gospel he devoted himself to immediately after his retirement from pop; admittedly casual fans will probably find all but except the Specialty recordings pretty dispensable.

For months, I toyed with dipping into Richard's early 70's oeuvre especially "The Rill Thing" cut at Muscle Shoals with the house band -- then some of the savviest, funkiest players on the planet. There were lots of ecstatic reviews posted at Amazon and the circumstances surrounding this project certainly SHOULD have yielded a smokin' album.

On the evidence of his live performances (witness the festival film "Let The Good Times Roll" or the DVD of his set from the Toronto Peace Festival) he clearly was in fine voice. Moreover this inarguably was an apt backing crew who could channel the home-cooked blues and gospel that had originally formed Richard's musical persona (check out the Muscle Shoal production on the Staple Singers' "Be Altitude") and frame that as FM radio-friendly post-rock 'n' roll.

I finally broke down and ordered the $7 Collector's Choice reissue of "The Rill Thing" (rather than the MUCH pricier the Rhino Handmade box set of ALL his Reprise recordings, the others being usually described as non-essential), it arrived and I gave it a batch of eager listens, eventually concluding that it was creditable but ultimately disappointing.

As I'd speculated, Richard's vocal performances are exemplary - raw, powerful, emotionally galvanizing. It's the repertoire that underwhelms, being largely bland and pro forma...even the Muscle Shoal Swampers could only inject so much sass and character. And not quite enough to redeem most of the material.

There are some exceptions. "Dew Drop Inn" is a paean to the legendary Rampart Street venue that nurtured many of NOLA's great R&B and rock 'n' roll performers It was co-written with Esquerita, one of Richard's early influences, and reprises the structure of his seminal NOLA-recorded sides while updating the basic sonic vocabulary, but strategically, selecting contemporary elements of style most solidly connected to seminal rock 'n' roll. Interestingly enough, the one hit this album yielded "Freedom Blues" is another co-write with Esquerita, and while this one is framed more substantially as current "rock" it's still smartly flavored with vintage touches. Another highlight is his take on "Greenwood, Mississippi" written by Travis Wammack who also contributes blazing guitar here. Once more, the song is an obvious descendant of music Richard loved as a youngster; it's a bit more Country than the rest of the album, but classic Country & Western music was essentially blues performed by white artists who added the influence of the English ballads that'd been passed down in their families for generations. So Richard's performance plugs C&W back into its blues roots with explosive results that presage the sound of the nascent Southern Rock movement.

The rest of the material is afflicted that going-thru-the-motions feel endemic to much of the music from this time period. Rock had become big business, a profession, and musicians who'd started out with something vital to say about the wonder, the mystery, the challenge of living, had said it all -- but had to keep saying SOMETHING to keep earning a livelihood. They had the knowledge and skills to to keep producing conventionally accomplished material but very little of it was exciting, revelatory or the even vaguely necessary. Sadly, "The Rill Thing" by and large was no exception.

HooDoo U Think U R?

2011-11-24T04:26:00.000-08:00

I was recently reading Offbeat, the monthly arts & culture magazine outta New Orleans (yes! I've gotten that silly that I paid for a subscription to keep up with the goings on half a continent away!)and came upon an extended obituary for Wardell Quezerque. His is a name that I'd never encountered till I start regularly reading Offbeat but looking over the testimonials included here from the likes of Dr. John (who's musical career started as guitar player in Wardell's band), and seeing his various accomplishments over a long and distinguished career, it became immediately clear that he was a major player on the NOLA music scene -- apparently in a league with the likes of Allen Toussaint when it came to writing, arranging and producing amazing, distinctive and often highly successful tracks.

Going over his discography, one that stood out immediately was Jean Knight, who's "Mr. Big Stuff" was a national pop hit that I remember from my college days -- funky as shizzle! With it's cannily syncopated bass, chicken scratch guitar and high steppin' drums it registered as archetypal "funk" in my teenaged brain. Having attained some little grasp of its place in the overall context of Afro American musical stylings passed it's obviously rooted in New Orleans' unmistakable rhythmic traditions (I'd like to say "unique" but as those traditions have been so influential, elements of that sound in fact permeate American musical culture).

Doing a little searching I found a couple Jean Knight titles that covered this period, covering a wide range of prices - from $4.83 to $30+. On further study it turned out that this was the same repertoire issued at various times with various cover art in various countries. As usual I opted for the bargain price (leaving me with more money to buy more music with!)

A few weeks later my "Mr. Big Stuff" CD arrived and I eagerly popped it on, being instantly entranced by the title track - every bit as spikily beat-driven and stark as I remembered. As the album proceeded...well, I found a mixed bag, at least for my tastes. A fair amount of weepy soul ballads, a number of songs that basically were "Mr. Big Stuff" knock offs and...some more sharp and spicy stunners!

I do understand that this sorta programming makes perfect sense for long playing product of the time -- you wanna make an album that takes you on a trip and moves from style to style with plenty of variety, changing tempos and moods and this does that quite nicely. As per the soundalikes -- well, pop music and R&B was a very singles-driven business, most especially on the indie label level. An artist started by cutting tracks for singles, that'd be released in succession with the hope of achieving a national or at least regional hit by the 3rd or 4th, at which point the label would compile the singles sides and record enough additional tracks to fill out an album. In the pop world the policy of biting the style is a time honored business strategm, in fact major labels have made fortunes following such policy - witness Columbia cloning the Snap! sound via C + C Music Factory and Whitney Houston via Mariah Carey in quick succession... and so on. SO...it was established policy to follow up a hit with a nominal rewrite of same -- and usually with great success. This is a strategm that DOES work well in the single market, on mainstream radio (again, MANY a superstar career is predicated on copying a preceding star's successes) -- but as part of an album, not so much.

Ultimately, if you're a funk fan, "Mr. Big Stuff" is something you'd likely wanna cherry pick via iTunes or Amazon digital or whatever other download service you favor. If you just dig vintage soul and treat this as a compilation -- either "Mr. Big Stuff" you'll find is the original album with bonus tracks (but the initial release was in fact a couple singles collected and supplemented with tracks recorded to flesh out a full album) -- you'll prolly enjoy the mix of booty shakers and ballans and find the copycat numbers as amusing and instructive.

Once I'd listened to this it made me pull out "The Best of Ann Peebles" and "The Best of Betty Wright" and I must say -- while I do dig the high points of Ms. Knight's album -- both of the former make for far more consistent listening. Peebles stays with mid-tempo material pretty much throughout -- always staying at a slow boil rather than kicking into heavier jams. But this is super soul-stirring with grooves provided by the same incredible house band and producer that created Al Green's classic material. Betty Wright is much more high octane, dirty-assed and rambunctious. Betty, infamously, was little sister of "Little Beaver," guitarist for the Florida-based studio musicians who eventually started recording and touring in their own right as KC and The Sunshine band. I also pulled out my copy of Betty's debut album -- and must report that it's less consistently pleasing.

Earlier this week I was blabbing with my dear old pal Glenn Morrow (Bar/None Records) talking about "Treme" and NOLA music and wound up talking about Jean Knight and Wardell Quezerque, and he mentioned that he'd snagged some great vintage NOLA soul and funk jams from an indie label called Tuff City. And checking that site (http://www.tuffcity.com) clicked on "New Orleans" and saw that the first item listed is "Various Artists / Wardell Quezerque: Sixty Smokin' Soul Senders" which appears to be filled with amazing tracks! So you KNOW what I'm picking up next!

They make me SMiLE

2011-11-07T05:27:00.000-08:00

In my mind - saying anything about this official release of a substantial block of sessions for the legendary "lost" Beach Boys' album "SMiLE" is pure punditry. Fans already bought it, or DIDN'T buy this particular assemblage of "SMiLE" material, and it's simply not relevant to many other folks. And pop critics around the world have made their declarations, marked by varying degrees of critical acumen and historical perspective.

I've got at least 4 different bootleg verions of this material and I know that are MANY more extant. And then there's Brian Wilson's reconstruction of it, recorded with his regular touring ensemble.

Nonetheless, just before release date I was poking around online, and noticing write ups in print. I glanced at the Deluxe version - 5 CDs of session recordings, 2 vinyl LPs and 2 7" singles for about $140 and while I mighta ponied up a nice chunk of change for all the CDs -- to HAVE TO also pay for the various vinyl artifacts seemed like an egregious means of pumping up the price. I dig that this package was aimed as super service to the stone-fans and can respect its creation utterly; but I couldn't buy in.

So, day before in-store date I called my local record store to see if they'd be carrying the two CD package and was told that in fact they were selling it that very day already - so's I hopped in the wheels and whizzed out there and back and started listening on the drive home and then played it repeatedly for the next few days.

So...well the current recension of structure of "SMiLE" proper is familiar from Brian's recreation which the producers of this set admit to using as their basic template. Moreover, a significant number of these actual performances (or minor variations thereon) have been issued previously on "Smiley Smile" (a lot of "SMiLE" repertoire recast in minimalist settings, entirely apposite of the grand originals Brian had been working on so feverishly) "20/20" "Surf's Up" and as part of the "Good Vibrations" box set. So...

I was STILL thrilled to hear something akin to what the Beach Boy's "SMiLE" ought to have been trumpeting from my big old component speaker. The proper songs here are among the more sophisticated and melodically gorgeous Brian has ever written. The instrumental backing by the Wrecking Crew is confident, full blooded and a visionary recasting of the Wall of Sound they erected in so many Phil Spector sessions. The other Beach Boys' singing and harmonizing is intoxicatingly tuneful, emotive and determinedly ambitious -- which kinda gives the lie to the myth that they were in any way hestitant about their participation. No doubt they had SOME misgivings and Brian took those as rejection per se - but NO WAY could they have turned in the performances documented here unless they were committed to making this project work.

All that being said -- in some ways, to hear this is a bit of anti-climax. "SMiLE" of course was the follow up to the brilliant "Pet Sounds," but in one important respect they are entirely different projects. "PS" is a song cycle with each number being among the most brilliantly written pop-rock ever, all given lush yet restrained orchestral treatments. Famously, "SMiLE" was described by Brian as a "Teenage Symphony To God" and indeed a lot of its structuring follows the convention of symphonic composition rather than pop song writing.

"SMiLE" does have some incredible songs per se - but then there're a goodly amount passages that are instrumental, or with wordless vocals and many of these pick up melodic themes from the proper songs and develop/treat them in various ways. So to pop-trained ears, it seems at times that "SMiLE" is cluttered with filler - endlessly repeated restatements of different passages from "Heroes And Villains" -- because it IS constructed that way; in fact to ears who's basic vocabulary is the pop song that description would apply to the works of Beethoven, Bach, et al. Not being trained in this tradition, I did run my theory by a concert pianist pal and he concurred that the conventions Wilson applies here qualify as symphonic composition per se. And as Classical composers in turn did pinch melodic materials from the popular songs of their day, Brian's basic intent here would appear entirely plausible.

Whether you'll dig it or not, finally, will be a matter of individual taste, but hopefully the above makes it make SOME sense.

But this brings us to another issue -- why the project was shelved in the first place.

The liner-notes to the double CD set argue -- convincingly -- that it was, ultimately, down to shortcomings in recording technology at the time. Before undertaking "SMiLE" Brian had taken MONTHS to create "Good Vibrations" which yielded the Beach Boys' first (and I believe, only ) million selling single. First he recorded a wealth component parts - multi versions of each potential component. Then he had to piece it all together - literally. His writing and recording was conceived of as creating discrete modules which were then spliced together "exquisite corpse" making for some startling, artistically brilliant juxtapositions of timbre, tonal density and melodic themes. And it was done by slicing up 2" tape with hand held razors and then sticking it back together. The end results were, of course, phenomenal and encouraged him to attempt a whole album done in this pointillistic and painstaking manner.

The release of the Beach Boys' "SMiLE" sessions show that Brian had been entirely successful in completing phase one of the project - creating all the individual components, 'cause HERE THEY ARE and they sound incredible. But when it came to piecing it all together - conceptually, not to mention physically - the task proved too much for him. He was not merely arranging these compositions from this dizzying array of ingredients - he was actually WRITING the songs as he went along via his assemblages. Instead of banging out a series of ideas on, say, piano, and then developing them in a finished score and THEN working on the arrangements, he was banging out his ideas with a series of ensemble recordings and then developing song structure by sequencing those group recordings.

The history of these sessions is pretty infamous: Brian's mental state had never been entirely stable and his drug use during this period destabilized it further still. Meanwhile, when the rest of the band began their work on the sessions it'd appear that they were not entirely supportive -- that they at least questioned Brian's intents and motives ALL THOUGH they gave their all to turning in the best work they were capable of -- the proof is in this pudding!

The task that Brian was facing would have been daunting to someone under the best of conditions -- remember, he was not merely assembling these components according to pre-arranged plans - he was writing the overall songs through this process. And having to keep track of all the different versions of each different component he'd recorded! And his were NOT optimal conditions.

So it's only know with digital editing technology like Pro-Tools that it becomes feasible to first of all categorize all these components in a systematic manner and to be able to call up any one instantly - stick passage Q, after passage see - listen to how that sounds and then try passage M and so on. Imagine what it was like doing this by digging thru reels of 2" tape, duping the passage in question, making your splice, rolling tape -- and then to go back to piles of tapes searching for a different variation, duping that... Geez, that'd drive anyone batty!

Meanwhile as to the second disc of material included in this set -- honestly, with all the odds and ends and alternate takes from these sessions that have been issued over the years, I didn't really need 'em. Having a good attempt at "SMiLE" per se was more than enough and having listened thru the second disc a couple times, I doubt I'll return to it. This makes me especially glad I didn't plunk down the $140 for the BIG box -- not that I don't understand the fanatic doing just that.

One final note: I was overjoyed at Brian recording "SMiLE" himself some seven years ago. As an act of personal closure it was clearly a profound moment for Wilson. And it seemed in harmony with a society-wide tide reviving idealism and visionary culture of the 1960's that appeared on the brink of toppling the stony, entropic, poisonous edifice that the Republican Party and its confederates amongst the ultra rich had inexorably created from the Reagon administration onwards. Well, we all know how the latter turned out...

But as masterful a piece of work as the reconstructed "SMiLE" was, it was hard to ignore Brian's diminished capacities on several fronts. So this "SMiLE" was quite an an achievement, but somewhat bittersweet. Now, to hear him and the rest of the band performing this transcendent material of their youthful powers and ambition...is just sorta prodigious.

Louis Jordan

2011-10-26T09:03:00.000-07:00

I'm not gonna front -- there's tons of people intimately familiar with the life, career and musical output of Louis Jordan. Hitherto, I was NOT amongst them. I KNEW the name but it registered as "old swing dude." And nothing more, shamefully.

But as I was reading the Little Richard biography I came across a segment where Richard mentions his early repertoire once he started gigging in earnest and he mentions Louis Jordan's "Caledonia" a song that currently rings a bell owing to the Rebirth Brass Band's rambunctious version. So I start poking around online, note that he was also responsible for "I'll Be Glad When You're Dead" that I know as well via Rebirth and much effusive praise being tossed his way.

So I order up the JSP box "Louis Jordan And His Tymany Five" - $22 + $3 shipping, wait a couple weeks and it appears in the mailbox this past Monday afternoon. And I must report that as Harry Smith (Anthology of American Folk Music) said of the Magickal Childe edition of the Necronomicon - "This is something you'll like; if you like that kind of thing." Though I must admit that this cat was unusually influential.

This collects his work from 1938 - 1950: 131 selections. There's a lot of great lively, big band numbers that swing like a garden gate in a hurricane, full of the joie de vivre that premium dance music ought to and of course that WAS the primary intent of this much. Lively, upbeat, punchy. So if ya dig pre-bop jazz standards (as does Mrs. W.) you'll find plenty to please ya here.

Then you come across a selection of songs that provide obvious templates for the earliest R&B and rock 'n' roll. Songs like "Caledonia" whose piano parts and sax riffing wound up as essential parts of the rock vocabulary. Here's a video link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OCH_n9CTTbA 1947's "Early In the Morning" marries boogie woogie piano with loping Calypso-flavored bass resulting in an ensemble sound that Professor Longhair would eventually adapt as his signature piano style (playing the bass parts with his left hand). You'll also find songs like "I Hear You Knockin' But You Can't Come In" and "Let The Good Times Roll" (here's a video link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YdQJ3Q0uhYE) that were covered or borrowed from to create some of the most iconic songs in the rock 'n' roll canon

Jordan also cut a dizzying amount of songs in a novelty vein that attained such popularity that they became basic parts of popular American culture - songs like "Open the Door Richard" that my often kinda racist old man still will start singing spontaneously - 60 years later. Songs that showed up on popular 50/60's children's show - Captain Kanagaroo, "The Green Grass Grows All Around."

It's really kinda shocking and humbling to realize how pervasive Jordan's influence has been on a wide spectrum of music over a protracted period of time.

I realize that most folks out there already knew that and that I'm late to the party. But I'm glad I finally got here!

Directly From My Heart To You

2011-10-15T08:10:00.000-07:00

"Little Richard 5 Classic Albums Plus Bonus Singles" has arrived and it's certainly worth the $7.50 + $2.98 shipping. There are four CDs here
The first comprises Little Richard's first two album for Specialty
The second contains his third and final album for the label + tracks from compilations, film and live cuts from his Australian comeback tour.
Third disc features his first two gospel albums
Fourth disc is all single sides
There are NO liner notes - just a track listing on the back that does let you know what album the various tracks stem from.

The first two discs -- well I'm glad to have ALL the Specialty material instead of a just a greatest hits. I don't think there's anything left to say about the these performances -- this is a feral yet stylish as rock n roll ever got. I've said this before and I'll stand by it: everything important about rock n roll TO ME is contained in these performances. I'd trade the entire subsequent history of rock music for this in a heartbeat. Nothing that came after added anything but veneer and froufrou. Period.

Disc three had me really intrigued as the idea of Little Richard performing gospel -- as if blues and R&B aren't essentially secular lyrics set to gospel jams in the first place -- was highly appealing. But as I listened through these...it appears that Richard felt the need to change his singing voice as well as his lifestyle and message in embracing a sacral path. His singing is nothing but fine, but it's more plummy, restrained and polite. Meanwhile, he's joined, and often overwhelmed, by a full choir on the majority of tracks. So while "Pray Along With" are fine gospel albums per se, they do NOT feature Little Richard bringing his signature incendiary voice and ecstatic singing style to the gospel genre. Which is sorta strange as his "rock" style is so clearly influenced by the most extremely expressive and inspired gospel performance style in the first place. So this disc winds up being primarily of educational value. But important in that this is what Richard gave up his burgeoning pop career to pursue -- so it's fascinating to hear what he had in mind when he made that move.

Finally, the last disc is mysteriously labelled "singles, A & B's" Some titles overlap with the repertoire of his first two albums. Slapping that on, ya note very quickly that none of this is rock 'n' roll. There're blues, jump blues, early R&B etc. And Richard's not quite sounding himself, singing a bit higher pitched, somewhat smoother. So I grabbed the Richard biography, look up the discography and lo and behold these are all his pre-Specialty! All well and good and creditable performance in already popular styles -- but all pre-dating his stylistic quantum leap into the wild, wooly and shockingly fresh style he'd go on to do.

SO...for $7.50 (+ shipping) this set gathers together practically all the material from the start of Little Richard's career -- his first three precedent-setting albums, the single sides he cut before them, the gospel he abandoned rock to pursue and a few tastes of his first comeback. Some of this stuff is GREAT and the rest is wonderfully instructive.

What costume shall the poor girl wear...

2011-10-02T04:42:00.000-07:00

I've wistfully read about the All Tomorrow's Parties festivals for many year as it's never been especially convenient to attend; this series was inaugurated in the UK and recently introduced an U.S. based edition, but put on in the Catskills. So I was excited by the announcement of the US version moving to Asbury Park, NJ. And at the same time apprehensive. Memories of attending Lollapaloozas at various sites around the country, Woodstock II, Smokin' Grooves, etc. still sting. Parking a township away, slogging thru mud, bad food abounding etc...oy! And mind you, I've usually attended in an official capacity so had backstage access, VIP parking and all those amenities -- and I still dread the basic experience. My ideal of a great concert venue crystallized at the OLD 9:30 Club in Washington DC - good sound, nicely designed and relatively intimate space, dance/standing room in the main room, a long hallway with plenty of seating opening off to one side where you could rest your legs as necessary, and a back bar where you could escape all together IF YOU FELT LIKE IT.

I figured poor, little Asbury Park would be utterly swamped by the influx of music freak hepsters: nowhere to park, nowhere to grab a quick bite. Long lines everywhere. But in fact it was as idyllic as can be. We parked a block and half from the main drag - metered street parking (which was electronic so we could just put in for 6 hours then and there and not have to feed the meter). Ticket pick-up was calm and orderly. Once we had tickets we met a friend at the Convention Center which housed two of the venues, walked outside and had drinks on the veranda overlooking the beach and ocean and despite somewhat hiked prices -- still kinda lovely. Between acts we grabbed a bite at the venue at Aqua, an indoor restaurant and the chicken salad wrap was quite nice if -- again, somewhat overpriced ($14 for a wrap? but, hell, this is a resort town, this is what they do! Yr paying for proximity to the ocean and whatnot.)

I realize all the above gives my age away, that I'm focussed on the creature comforts. Well, ya know, I seed a couple shows in my time. Lotta great music. And at a certain point the contexts become a significant factor in rating a night out!

We saw two acts - The Pop Group and Swans - both recently reformed.

The Pop Group put on a good show. They played all the key tunes in their back catalogue, opening with "We Are All Prostitutes", including "She Is Beyond Good & Evil" in the set list and hitting all the key points in between. They threw in a Subway Sect cover (which unfortunately I couldn't identify). And put on a good show. Mark Stewart was in good voice, fierce, feral and sounding slightly unhinged singing his fiery songs of Marxist anguish -- all as relevant now as in Thatcherite England (if only the world had made any progress since then in terms of socio-economic justice and this had seemed quaint, instead of spot on). And the band was biting, spikey, playing their terse, twisted funked riffs.

But, I sensed that the wife and my journalist friend were less than impressed coz they sounded -- well, kinda normal. Coz the fact is that they wound up being mightily influential being one of the first acts to create reckless, high energy, punk-edged funk. And influence a buncha punky art funkers like the minutemen who in turn inspired folks like the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Sublime and...The Rapture...etc.

I fear lotsa folks saw The Pop Group as a buncha overwrought middle aged guys playing pro forma rock-funk...not realizing they created the forma!

While I was as eager as the next to hear their classic repertoire it would have been nice to see them produce a body of new work based on their original stylistic innovations with 30 years of added innovation, wisdom and skill added.

And that's what we did get from Swans. Now, I work with these guys so my opinions SHOULD be suspect. But I'll state this -- their nearly two hours long show (normally 2 1/2 hours when they're headlining in their own right instead of being part of a festival program) was either unrecorded new songs, tunes from last year's new album release + one old song - a radically retooled "I Crawled." It saw bandleader M. Gira pushing his musicians and listeners into new territory once again. Very loud (tho I didn't need earplugs and was quite comfy) in order to create particular acoustic phenomena you get with particular levels of volume and sonic density ala LaMonte Young, Glenn Branca. Sometimes very slow with bone crushing salvos by the massed ensemble being separated by a good 15 seconds silence(slap yr desk - count 15 seconds on a watch and slap it again to get a sense of what that feels like); tho those spaces are far from silent, being filled by the mass chords resounding, the different instruments resonating with each other, the overall sound slowly disintegrating -- and thru lengthy repetition the listener is effectively re-educated to actually hear every bit of it where normally, done for a few seconds at the end of a Metallica song it'd just register as "grandiose ending."

And other songs quicker, shapelier with wonderful layering of askew, cantileverd riffs building these monstrous, forbidding sonic edifices. Really a fascinating concert experience that is - perhaps - aimed at deprogramming listeners from their normal listening habits, getting them to just suspend all expectations and fully immerse themselves in the sound as music eddies back and forth from these deep static pools of sound-as-dark-matter to waves of concussive force. It starts out sounding monstrous and forceful, then seems to grow boring from the repetition and then suddenly transforms into being fully mesmerizing and delivering you into a delicious trance state.

The Beauty's STILL on duty

2011-10-01T05:33:00.000-07:00

When I was wallowing in the "Cosmino Matassa Story" - 4 CD set (absolutely stunning - if you wanna hear the language of vintage rock and roll being wrought - here it is!) the Little Richard tracks included got me contemplating the wonder of this man and his importance to modern music - which is, frankly, incalculable. I had a single disc Specialty collection which is largely sublime already. Bought the Charlie Gillett biography -- which Richard did extensive interviews for and which COULDA been issued as an autobiography "as told to." Wuddever. And that's as trippy and outrageous as I'd've hoped and that I remember reviewers noting.

This leads me to keep contemplating picking up his Reprise recordings, already owning "King of Rock N Roll" on vinyl. Rhino has a box with all three recordings that's a bit pricey - but you can also score each separately for about $7 -- so price wise that's more attractive a proposition.

BUT every time I'm grazing Amazon's listings I kept stopping at "Little Richard: 5 Great Albums +" = "Import-only four CD set containing six of the Rock 'n' Roll pioneer's album plus bonus tracks. Includes the albums Here's Little Richard, Little Richard Vol. 2, The Fabulous Little Richard, Pray Along Vol. 1, and Pray Along Vol. 2." and THAT sells for $7.50 NEW. And considering that used copies of his first two albums sell for about that APIECE -- hard to beat this deal - not with a stick! So I put in my order yesterday. Of course the mastering could suck - any accompanying artwork could blow -- tho in this pure content culture that's not so hard to deal with (esp. once you've learned to accepted the JSP Jelly Roll Morton box - I think the liner notes are literally written in 3 point type! and there's no sorta design consistency between each piece in the set - but - for $15 -- ya get a lotta insanely wonderful music)

"Bobby Charles" has arrived

2011-09-23T11:33:00.000-07:00

The "Bobby Charles" CD arrived yesterday and I was aching to bust it out the second it showed, but I knew it wouldn't function as background whilst I was working. So waited till dinner time and...initial impression that this is as prime as folks like Andy from Vetiver have been saying all along. On the surface -- it could be a buncha outtakes from "The Band." Charles sounds a lot like Rick Danko vocally if you're not listening to closely. The phrasing, the timbre. And the backing is provided by...The Band and their Woodstock running buddies who would go on to form Hungry Chuck. And then the writing...but on reflection -- there's the basis of The Band and their manager Albert Grossman (whose Bearsville label released this album) attraction to this cat which otherwise might seem odd and arbitrary.
This record was recorded in the earlier 70's and Charles' career started in the 50's and pretty much peaked by 1960, having scored hits with Fats Domino and Bill Haley both covering his songs, "Walking To New Orleans" and "See You Later, Alligator" respectively. 10+ years is always an eternity in the world of pop music. But right from the start, Charles was notable for mixing elements of downhome R&B, country, New Orleans funk and traditional Cajun music -- pretty much the same blend that The Band would utilize and strike paydirt with.
So there's an element of tribute to an inspiration or longtime hero here (and with Levon being a native of Arkansas and the rest of the band being buffs of rockabilly and other vintage music it's understandable that they'd have known his music both the hit covers and his own recordings). Often that leads to unsatisfactory results -- putting a vintage artist in a contemporary setting; it can sound a little desperate and a little pathetic. But in this case, these songs and these instrumental settings seem like a perfectly natural evolution of Bobby's fundamental artistic impulses and predilections. It'd be interesting to research whether he'd arrived at this on his own over the years, or whether on encountering The Band's ouevre he understood its relation to his previous work and comfortably made the leap then and there. It hardly matters.
"Bobby Charles" is an utterly effortless, wholly graceful and thankfully unpretentious and unselfconscious fusion of peculiarly American music styles that is as comfy and elusive as the perfectly worn pair of jeans.
PS I popped for an import copy for $5 + $3 postage rather than the Rhino boxed set. That third disc of interview material...+ single edits, etc. seemed more appropriate for a lifelong fan that had ALL his other work.

G'D.A.y

2011-09-17T08:06:00.000-07:00

One of the more intriguing figures on the New Orleans music scene is one Glen David Andrews. Trumpet player, vocalist, member of a number of different brass bands over the years.

Andrews had been a popular figure on the thug scene having written one of its anthems "Knock With Me" (with the Lil Rascals Brass Band). Like many he was shocked by the shooting of Hot 8 Brass Band drummer Dinerral Shavers, at the time of his death also a teacher working to get kids into marching bands and off the streets: Shavers was shot by an acquaintance of his stepson's, most likely targeting the latter and not Dinerral. Galvanized by Shaver's senseless slaying, Andrews was a key voice in the march on City Hall to protest escalating street violence that made New Orleans the murder capital of the U.S. for a while with "a per capita rate in 2006 of anywhere from 63.5 to 72.6 per 100,000 residents" (Times Picayune).

Having scored a scored a used copy of Lil Rascals "Buck It Like A Horse" I found myself oddly dissatisfied - there's certainly a lot of raucous, high spirited brass band instrumentals here -- definitely prime stuff -- but it's all overshadowed by the lead off track, the notorious "Knock With Me, Rock With Me" which is mainly group call-and-response over driving hand-percussion. Andrews has a great, gruff voice and the raw energy and excitement of the performance is thoroughly exhilerating. The lyrics meanwhile are a captivating patchwork of street slang catch-phrases like "Gimme a dime; I only got 8" that are baffling to an outsider but nonethless cause instant ear worms.

So I've been left hungry for more for a while now. Finally took a look around Amazon and the site of Louisiana Music Factory for work under his own name and grabbed the download of "Walking Through Heavens Gate" - used copies are $15, then you added $3 shipping. The other release posted at Amazon is "Dumaine Street Blues" - physical copies are $50.

"Walking Through Heavens Gate" is a total joy. With a little academic study, or just listening and paying attention you gotta know that gospel, blues, early jazz and brass band music have been inextricably interwoven all along. They each borrowed melodies, lyrics, rhythms and such from each other right from the start and throughout their history. On "Walking Through Heavens Gate" Andrews pointedly puts it ALL together in one beautifully potent, percolating package - putting his gritty, blues-drenched leads in front of a gospel choir who are in turn supported with a high stepping brass band featuring a full complement of inspired and passionate soloists, then flavoring that with hot blues guitar.

And OF COURSE it works, as any brass band worth its salt knows the hymns that are played in the funeral procession headed towards the cemetery, while the jazz tradition emerges from the lamination of ragtime playing strategies and use of layered rhythms with plangent blues tunes, which in many cases were simplifications of sacred songs. So all the relationships between these styles are spelled out, fully developed creating for an entirely explosive fusion that will kick your spirits into high gear no matter how blue or blase you might feel. If what Kanye West said about George W. Bush is true - the music on offer here would be his worst nightmare given musical form.

PS if you go to Andrews' own site - "Dumaine Street Blues" is available as a $10 download.

Lee Dorsey most surely can!

2011-09-16T10:29:00.000-07:00

Earlier this year I'd went and purchased an Australian twofer of Lee Dorsey's "Yes We Can" and "Night People" album. Having devoured an Arista greatest hits that'd been languishing in my collection till the "Treme" fever was on me, I was hungry for more, and some quick online reading led me to believe "Yes We Can" would be a good choice, teaming Lee with Allen Toussaint and The Meters. The least expensive way to snag with was in this pairing with "Night People." Now, written accounts heap high praise on "Yes We Can" as an epitome of prime New Orleans funk and denigrate "Night People" as an overproduced disco sellout. And honestly I find both judgements highly misleading.

"Night People" is indeed light on patented NOLA rhythmic strategms and distinctive brand of funkiness. But rather than slick, disco what's on offer is still distinctly Southern-fried and soulful stylings, but Memphis' variants ala vintage Al Green. Lee of course acquits himself admirably as ever in the vocal department. And backing musicians include the Queen of New Orleans soul Irma Thomas on backing vocals and idiosyncratic keyboard wizard James Booker. You can hear an awareness of disco convention on "Night People" but Toussaint's strategy is more to focus on the immediate precursors to disco rather than employ the robotic beats, glossy orchestral arrangements etc. So you sense he was making overtures to the market without submitting to disco orthodoxy per se.

"Yes We Can" is a still more perplexing project. Coz, rather than the streamlined yet straightahead funk work-outs of Dorsey's hit singles Toussaint had written and produced he and the Meters created an album of unabashed art music - based in funk and other New Orleans tradition but taking it into very ambitious and, I daresay, visionary directions. The title song kicks things off merely with lethal funkitude -- establishing the mastery of the genre by those involved. And then with "Riverboat" they take it off into the great beyond. Syncopations here don't just limn out a hip shaking beat, they expand, convolute, turn in on themselves and then out again, directing the overall architecture of most songs' composition out into demanding and exotic shapes. It's not for nothing that Van Dyke Parks covered this song as well as "Occapella" on his uber-arty homage to indigenous American eccentricity - "Discover America."

Finally, "Yes We Can" emerges as one of the great American art music records right up there a "Pet Sounds" "Oar" or "Sister Lovers" only funk based.

And here's a quick list of funky art music
Shuggie Otis "Freedom Suite"
D'Angeleo "Voodoo"
Terrence Trent Darby "Neither Fish Nor Flesh" (and big hunks of everything he released afterwards)
and y'all know 'bout Prince...tho I will state that any of his albums - listened to 10 years after their initial release (and thus all media brouhaha and personal expectations have burned off) sound mighty fine.

Howchie's Muso-Nerd Record Club: #1

2011-09-09T11:40:00.000-07:00

Bobby Charles - eponymous
As obscurities go, this one's pretty well known. It's a 1970 effort cut in Woodstock around 1970 with The Band and other habitues of the area. I may have owned it once but sold it in a great 80's vinyl sell off prompted by wife #2 aka The Junkie. I dumped lots I regret in those heady post punk days.
"Bobby Charles" has a fiercesome rep for (white) funky, swamptastic lassitude. Rhino Handmade is selling some fancy expensive version but you can get straight versions NEW for $5 and change. At some point I think Andy Cabic from Vetiver -- a BIG fan -- was going to pen liner notes for an indie re-issue a couple years back and was super stoked. But clearly WEA thought better of licensing it.
While knowing about this record, vaguely, since release, I've never had a super yen for it. But when I got the "Cosimo Matassa Story" box (a GREAT deal - TONS of superb, dirty-ass music for super CHEAP -- see earlier blog entry), Bobby got some major shout outs in the liner notes. And the man DID have some impressive credits i.e. writing "Walking To New Orleans" for Fats Domino and some other early R&B hits. So my curiousity was picqued and as I like to start at the beginning grabbed "After A While, Crocodile -- The 50's Anthology."
So this comprises Bobby's own recordings for Chess and Imperial (two major boosters of New Orleans music back in the 50's) and it's pretty prime stuff. Bobby's an incisive writer, effortlessly knocking out instantly catchy riffs and catch-phrases. His vocals tuneful but with a nice raw edge (you can understand why Leonard Chess was shocked, upon meeting him, to find out he wasn't African American). And most of these sides were cut at Cosimo Matassa's with the top players from Paul Gayten and Dave Bartholemew's bands backing him up. So you shouldn't be shocked that this sounds like archetypal R&B and early rock 'n' roll coz these musicians in fact MINTED the archetypes as they worked out the arrangements and delivered the solos and riffs for Fats Domino, Little Richard, Professor Longhair as well as for local heroes and heroines who may not have got heard far outside of their home turf but the artists who did hear em grabbed onto that vocabulary and spread it far and wide.

I know that "Bobby Charles" WON'T sound like THAT but I'm betting his talent was equally applicable to other stylistic conventions and supporting casts. We'll see in a week or two!

Enjoying Macho (and fey) Gay hip hop from NOLA

2011-06-15T05:18:00.000-07:00

I'd love to see some brainy critic deal with the issues of having a transgendered performer e.g. NOLA's Katey Red appropriating the basic rap format and having it be a celebration of a dance primarily performed by women, consisting of an incredibly athletic orbiting of da booty. I'm kinda happy to have lived along to see such a sex-political mash up!
http://www.dlisted.com/2011/06/09/hot-slut-day

And further up the battle lines - here's a video from fellow Sissy Bounce superstar (and I don't use the term lightly) Big Freedia
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-cT6SwFIHA&feature=fvsr

Big Freedia's sound is clearly much more macho - macho, gay, rap?

JUST ENJOY IT

X-Treme-ists

2011-06-15T05:14:00.000-07:00

We watch "Treme" every Sunday night. Read this blog http://www.nola.com/treme-hbo every Monday morning and the re-watch the episode Monday night. Great fun.
To supplement the excellent commentary:
for those who might want to grab some of these experiences for home enjoyment:

*"(Every Time I Hear) That Mellow Saxophone" - performed by Cyril Neville in this episode - you can find Roy Montrell's original on the excellent - "The Cosimo Matassa Story" a four CD set with a good 120 songs that you can purchase for as little as $13 new if you look around.
http://www.amazon.com/Cosimo-Matassa-Story-Various-Artists/dp/B000QCQG28/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1308140131&sr=1-1

You'll find ALOT of the original versions of songs you've heard on the series on this collection and a good number of these songs appear playing on jukeboxes, or on car radios, etc.

*in one of the scenes at the Cajun Mardi Gras celebrations - they perform and there's a short sermon spoken at the grave of Dennis McGee, one of the fathers of Cajun music. Recently Tompkins Square records released a 2 CD set by Amede Ardoin, "Mama, I'll Be Long Gone" with the vast majority of songs featuring Amede AND Dennis McGee.
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_2_88?url=search-alias%3Dpopular&field-keywords=amede+ardoin+-+mama.+i%27ll+be+long+gone+the+complete+recordings+of+amede+ardoin+1929-1934&sprefix=amede+ardoin+-+mama.+i%27ll+be+long+gone+the+complete+recordings+of+amede+ardoin+1929-1934

Amede is credited as one of the fathers of Zydeco - performing and recording from the late 1920's to the mid 30's. Legendarily he accepted a handerchief from a white woman to wipe sweat off his face at a performance and thereafter was beaten so severely he was committed to a mental institution where he remained till his death, not long after. SO... even around 1930 one of the most influential area musical units was racially intergrated.

Collectin' Dust

2011-05-16T06:46:00.000-07:00

"Hello, my name's Howard and I'm a record collector."

As absurd as acquiring material possessions ultimately is...it still can bring much cheesey pleasure. I still derive much pleasure and shallow satisfaction from acquiring musical recordings via the most convenient and practical formats possible. Having piled up a buncha CDs -- I'm stickin' with that format as much as possible. I've allotted "X" amount of living space to my "working collection" which boxes stack up in the basement (up on bricks to clear the annual basement flooding). I periodically purge, but carefully as I always feel the fool when rebuying CDs for whatever reason -- when I realize that I actually WANT that music after all having discarded the disc previously -- or because (shamefully) I forgot I already had it.

All those disclaimers being stated -- one of the major impetuses to acquiring music I've come across lately is the HBO series "Treme" which I do enjoy immensely as previously stated. Their use of music is adroit, their taste and knowledge of the singular current state and DEEP history of it is intoxicating and, to me, addictive.

I've had a lotta fun hunting up the music I've been exposed to thru the show and spent TOO MUCH time recently in such searching. So, I'm sharing my homework with you based on the latest "Treme Explained" column from the New Orleans Times Picayune - you can read the column here:
http://www.nola.com/treme-hbo/index.ssf/2011/05/treme_explained_santa_claus_do.html

I will state that, to date, you can often find great bargains buying things used or new from the discounters trading at Amazon Marketplace. If you've got the time I'm sure you can find other outlets to get this stuff from. And let us not forget the mighty Louisiana Music Factory on Decatur Street in NOLA. Who also sell online via http://www.louisianamusicfactory.com/

So here's some relevant passages and then links to the shizz:

"Delmond drops the needle on "Tom Cat Blues," a Jelly Roll Morton and Joe "King" Oliver duet recorded in 1924. Bach. Stravinsky. Brothers totin' barges and liftin' bales. Pops. "
(He's playing the Milestone, 2 LP vinyl release which is currently available on CD)

http://www.amazon.com/1923-24-Jelly-Roll-Morton/dp/B000000XW2/ref=sr_1_3?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1305553031&sr=1-3

"Raymond Weber has a steady gig with Dumpstaphunk, which conflicted with his shooting schedule on "Treme." "
(this is an AMAZING band led by Ivan Neville - Aaron's son; this link is to their first EP which is 100% guaranteed great from start to finish - This coulda been the follow up to Fishbone's "The Reality of My Surroundings.")

http://www.amazon.com/Listen-Hear-Dumpstaphunk/dp/B000V7KH28/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1305553084&sr=1-2

""Les Ognons" by the Baby Dodds Trio, a cut on the "Jazz a la Creole" album Antoine attempted to save before evacuating in season's one's finale flashback, plays as the filmmaker (played by Yolonda Ross) tours the Backstreet Cultural Museum with Albert and Sylvester Francis"
(originally I bought this for the version of "Indian Red" - allegedly one of the first adaptations of Mardi Gras Indian chants to pop format but DAMN this whole thing is so utterly seductive, from the Hot Jazz [I actually prefer their version of Jelly Roll Morton's "Wolverine Blues" to any of his I've heard] that opens it to the rollicking vocal Jazz tunes sung in French to the 4 high-stepping Indian numbers that finish the set -- the best make-out music since Edith Piaf)

http://www.amazon.com/Jazz-Creole-Baby-Dodds-Trio/dp/B000056O0S/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1305553155&sr=1-1

"While he sews, Delmond listens to a 1938 recording by (Alan Lomax for the Library of Congress) of Jelly Roll Morton describing Mardi Gras Indians traditions."
(since Delmond is spinning vinyl I'd imagine this is from the 12 LP series released decades ago; but all that material and more remastered for this CD box that also includes Lomax's oral history on Morton, much material taken from Jelly Roll's remembrances recorded here -- If there ever was a "mind movie" worth experiencing this box is THAT. To hear Morton's living testimony to life in the 19th century is an extraordinary experience; his story-telling is incredibly vivid and rich in small details, depicting a way of life that is long departed and wonderfully exotic. AND YET, many elements have survived to this day in popular culture -- just not recognized as stemming from sources over a century old. I can think of no more lovely experience than sitting on the back porch on a hot day, listening to this from start to finish sipping cold wine or beer).

http://www.amazon.com/Complete-Library-Congress-Recordings-Morton/dp/B000GFLE36/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1305553202&sr=1-3

In the studio, Aunt Mimi does that bounce dance while Katey Red prepares to record. Katey and "the rappers you see in episode two (Big Freedia and Sissy Nobby) are the three most prominent 'sissy bounce,' or openly gay, MCs on the scene,"
(it's shocking how expensive CDs of this are! $30, $60! AND MORE. As much as I love physical product the price differential between this download-only compilation and buying CDs is just TOO huge. This "Bounce Essentials" is pretty prime stuff. Immediately appealing, highly distinctive. Unique to New Orleans. It's fast paced, relentless and the rhythmic invention in the rapping (often with multiple rappers creating nicely complex cross rhythms) makes this -- to my ears -- some of the most refreshing music coming out of the hip hop tradition in a long time.)

http://www.amazon.com/New-Orleans-Bounce-Essentials-Explicit/dp/B003YBW6AO/ref=pd_sim_dmusic_a_1

(and here's a best of from Big Freedia -- if you think you can predict what one of the top "Sissy" MCs is gonna sound like and what he'll rap about, prepare to be shocked)
http://www.amazon.com/Big-Freedia-Hitz-Vol-1/dp/B00354V99O/ref=sr_1_cc_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1305553279&sr=1-1-catcorr

(And there's nothing in this episode that comes from this set but alot of the vintage [50's, early 60's] R&B and rock 'n' roll [the kinda stuff that would one day inspire Elvis Presley and a generation of white rock 'n' roll tributists] and music of that ilk is contained on this 4 CD box set that you can still find NEW for $13 + shipping - "Cosimo Matassa Story")

http://www.amazon.com/Cosimo-Matassa-Story-Various-Artists/dp/B000QCQG28/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1305553372&sr=1-1

Under Heavy Southern Manners

2011-05-03T05:53:00.000-07:00

Besides deriving a great deal of entertainment and musicological information from the HBO series "Treme," I find myself learning manners and unlearning various cultural prejudices.

On a trip to New Orleans that happened immediately before we started watching the series, we walked into Louisiana Music Factory -- a brick and mortar record retail store on the notorious tourist strip, Decatur Street, that prides itself on a very extensive collection of music by New Orleans and Louisana related artists. I was a little buzzed and feeling a bit on the arrogant side as a long time student of non mainstream musics. I walk up the counter asking for a recommendation for local funk. The man pulls out the latest Galactic CD and I turn up my nose, saying: "Ya got anything that I wouldn't find Amazon that I wouldn't have heard of?" To which he testily replied: "There hasn't been a good local funk band since the Meters broke up!" And then pulled out the first Dumpstaphunk CD. This in fact wound up be a major find in my mind -- a rip snortin', butt shakin', hard edged EP - very funky, very hooky. Great stuff.

Eventually we see the episode where Elvis Costello is recording with Allen Toussaint and as the session breaks up, the horn section invites Elvis to the Spotted Cat (I thinks) to see Galactic and the latter responds "That's white guys playing funk?" Everyone in the room including Touissant -- all African-American -- immediately starts heaping the kudos on Galactic and Costello half heartedly agrees to make the scene; which he never does. The scene shifts to the gig and Galactic in fact sound amazing, playing to a very racially mixed crowd all getting down. And it hits me -- I had been just as much a biased twerp as Elvis friggin' Costello - OUCH!

Another case in point -- we've been visiting New Orleans about yearly since about 1996. Clearly we love the place. But had pointedly been dreading and avoiding the "Dixieland Band" scene -- live gigs, recordings etc. IF we went to shows it was more the Alt Rock outfits like James Hall's Pleasure Club. The brass band and "Hot Jazz" just seemed too hambone and contrived to pander to corny tourists' expectations. But when the first "Treme" opened with Rebirth Brass Band leading a second line...my head nearly exploded! What an incredible and, to my virgin ears, unique rhythm! The rowdy but expert interplay between the brass instruments was utterly intoxicating. A couple weeks after watching that episode, I'd forgotten exactly what music had appeared but just recalled there was something unusual and insanely insinuating...which led me to a bit of exploring into the brass band tradition, current and going as far back as I readily could. I dug thru my collection and found a collection of country brass bands recorded for the Smithsonian Institute, a Dirty Dozen Brass Band collection and made various strategic purchases online and on a return trip to New Orleans. Last trip thru I couldn't believe our luck when we stopped at Cafe Du Monde and one day found the Tornado Brass band playing for tips out front and another day discovering an outfit of adolescents taking their first tentative stab at this.

In the opening episode of the second season of "Treme" the character Delmond Lambreaux is hanging with a buncha New York jazz hepsters after performing at some snazzy club high in a NYC skyscraper. Talk turns to New Orleans and they wind up congratulating him on NOT sounding like he's from New Orleans and avoiding the "minstrel show" influence of a music scene that consciously panders to the tourist trade (as if NYC and its jazz clubs could survive two weeks without its tourist trade!) Up to now, Delmond has pointedly been trying to, at least outwardly, deny his roots, but suddenly he comes out swinging, talking about Hot Jazz being, in fact a living tradition. And quickly the scene cuts to Bonearama performing at Tipitina's to a packed crowd, playing music that sounds nothing like post-bop jazz abstraction or like anyone's idea of "Dixieland." The music is funky, swinging, original and PEOPLE ARE DANCING TO IT. When is the last time anyone danced to jazz in NYC outside of a big band revival show at Roseland (can't say if those even happen anymore)? And yet jazz WAS dance music! In fact it was sexing music created to accompany the shennanigans in the brothels of Storyville, the otherside of Rampart Street from the French Quarter. SO -- again I realize, in these Northern hepsters, what a tool I'VE been for many a year.

And no doubt i'm still a tool. But I'm being learned.

Treme DVD review

2011-04-26T04:03:00.001-07:00

I really should be doing a video rant ala Crayton but...I ADORE this series. Brilliant writing, it's flaunting conventional wisdom of narrative flow and pacing makes for a uniquely immersive viewing experience. And its richness of obscure, yet accurate details of the history and experience of living in New Orleans invites a level of active participation that proves highly addictive. BUT...

The DVDs screen DISTINCTLY DARK - appreciably darker than the original broadcasts. So are simply technologically flawed -- and there's no reason for this other than HBO's lack of quality control.

As per the extras:
"The Music of Treme" in-episode viewing mode - perfunctory and ultimately pathetic. The pop up boxes list song title and the person performing it on screen, no mention of the writer or the performer that the song is most closely associated with or any of their history.

For instance, in the scene where Annie is accompanying pianist Tom McDermott at a private party and they're playing "New Orleans Bump" (could be titled, "New Orleans Blues" - I'm writing this in a rush early Saturday morning) - the pop up window says: "New Orleans Bump" Tom McDermott. There's no mention that it was written, originally performed and recorded by Jelly Roll Morton and as Morton is one of the originators of Jazz and inarguably one of the seminal figures in New Orleans music history that information might have also been useful.

Moreover, a lot of music is not thus notated at all -- the Mardi Gras Indian chants, songs playing on the radio or jukeboxes, etc.

The audio Music Commentaries are also shockingly lame. In the scene noted above the commentators say "That's Jelly Roll Morton." No explanation whatsoever of who he was, no mention of his musical achievements and place in New Orleans music history.

What really makes all this especially irritating is that a number of folks have pointedly offered up highly detailed and fairly engrossing commentary on the series that does all the things you'd hope you were getting in purchasing this DVD set for instance, the Times Picayune's "Treme Explained" column:
[...]

NPR also provided a useful line of commentary.

So - the "Treme" series itself is one of my favorite television viewing experiences in DECADES. Engrossing, revelatory and educational (my music collection devoted to NOLA based music went from a couple Meters' albums, Lee Dorsey and Fats Domino to -- well a HEALTHY selection going from Jelly Roll to Mystikal and many points in between. But this DVD set is technologically inadequate and the extras I mention -- seem like a grudging after thought. In all fairness, we're still digesting all the extras and thus can't say anything about the documentaries included as of yet. Hopefully they'll be meatier.

Notwithstanding, I am eagerly looking forward to season 2. During a visit to NOLA December 2010, as we were leaving our hotel in the financial district, heading for the airport we happened upon the "Treme" crew filming a scene in the hotel restaurant, which was being used to portray chef Jeanette in NYC -- "cooking her way back to New Orleans" as a PA told us. YAY.

PS for folks who do get involved in deeper study on the people/culture/music of New Orleans there's an amazing free archive of video footage shot in 1982 by famed folklorist Alan Lomax here: [...]

Jeff Buckley alternate history

2011-04-11T13:52:00.000-07:00

“I’ve always played in bands – always. I only go out and play solo to make money to pay the phone bill and the rent.” - Jeff Buckley, 1994

Twenty-six year old Jeff Buckley signed to Columbia Records on October 29, 1992. He would record two solo shows the following July and August for his first release, Live At Sin-e, named for the East Village coffee house where these performances were captured and soon after set off for Woodstock, NY to record Grace, his full-length studio debut.

In between, Jeff gigged tirelessly around his adopted hometown of New York City, playing small out-of-the-way bars and coffee shops like Bang On, First Street Café, Tilt, Cornelia Street Café among others. Jeff hoped to make himself visible to other musicians, seeking to attract players who would appreciate what he was doing and want to be part of it.

As he once explained, “I got out of the loop by putting myself in a situation where only musicians who came to my shows and saw me for what I was would approach me.”

Bassist Mick Grondahl was the first to be drawn in. “During the show I noticed the interesting choice of cover songs he was playing,” Mick recalls, “and he played a lot of complex chords, and of course he had that great voice. I was quite impressed and we got to talk later at a party about music. He left an impression.

“In July [1993] he was playing the New Music Seminar at Fez, and I went and stood in line – I didn’t even have any money to get in. Luckily I saw Jeff coming out from behind the curtain while we were waiting to pay. He was singing ‘L.A. Woman’ and I sang the next line. We exchanged numbers, and I went in to see the show and he had evolved even more. He came out and did Nina Simone ‘Be Your Husband.’ We got together at Nightingale’s, played pool, and then jammed back at his apartment.

“About two weeks after he and I started playing together, [drummer] Matt Johnson was the first guy we auditioned and we hit it off really well. Matt remembers Jeff looking at him and smiling and just feeling a connection between all of us. And that first night we played together, within an hour, we wrote ‘Dream Brother.’”

Matt looks back and reflects, “It may be true that few people have the talent that he did, but he didn't seem to believe in any cult of genius or special club for entering the musical space. I think he wanted to see what someone, or anyone, could make.”

“Every guitar idea I put out they would close in on as the music happened,” Jeff recalled about the first time the three made music together.

Grace would be recorded by this trio. After Live At Sin-e was released December ‘93, Jeff toured North American solo for the next two months to support it; he sorely missed his band. When Jeff returned to the East Village that March, they reconvened and added a fourth band member, a good friend, actor and budding guitarist Michael Tighe.

“Michael had never played in a group,” Mick points out. “We auditioned people who played a lot longer, people who had played very complex music, but to Jeff it was more about enthusiasm and potential. We wanted to recruit people who were almost disciples to Jeff’s music. If people were too set in what they were doing there wasn’t this chance to instill the new music that could come from the way that Jeff worked.”

Road Manager Gene Bowen recalls, “Jeff used to call Michael “Chico” and I used to envision Jeff as an old man at the end of his life, just sitting on his back porch with Michael, because they were just so close. There was just such a connection there.”

“First impression?” recounts Tighe, “A cartoon wolf. Playful and silly with eyes of pain and wildness.”

On June 1, the quartet plus Gene clambered aboard an Econoline van packed with instruments and amps and the great adventure began. Tighe remembers, “When I first came up to the Econoline van I felt like I was joining the circus.”

“We loved the van!” reminisces Grondahl. “It was difficult to have six people in there with all the gear, but we were together and we shared the time very intimately: a little too intimately sometimes! We listened to music during the long stretches of driving.”

“The guys all got creative – about halfway through the tour they figured out a way to suspend hammocks from the ceiling of the van over the bench seats,” recounts Bowen. “So one person could lay on the bench seat and another person could lay in the hammock because there was no room in the van at all.”

Their first date was three days later at the Stone Pony in Asbury Park, New Jersey. “They were in the rehearsal space for weeks, and the guy from the studio told me that he hadn’t heard them play a single note off of Grace, “ Bowen remembers. “They were in there just jamming, playing the same riff for hours. Management rented out the club so they could get the feeling of playing on stage – but the club was empty - to get ready for the tour. After the Stone Pony, we played the Red Creek Inn in Rochester and the tickets were $5 each and 32 tickets were sold.”

Of the Rochester show Tighe remarks: “I was so nervous and made some mistakes. I felt like I was giving birth or being born or something like that.”

Mick continues, “I remember thinking that for people seeing us for the first time, it might be a bit off-putting. It was so different; Jeff’s voice, the style, the way the shows were organized… because we didn’t have a set list, we worked on the spot. We were asking something of the audience, which was patience because we wanted to make each show unique. They were intrigued of course by Jeff’s humor and the mystique that he could project, but mainly his voice and guitar were so stunning.”

Once these U.S. dates ended, the group went immediately to Europe for a month-long tour which kicked off in Dublin on the day Grace was released, August 23. Weeks after these shows were finished, the band toured America again. “There was a real momentum after that first U.S. tour,” Bowen recollects. “When we got to Europe we were in an actual tour bus.”

They spent the rest of the year on this American tour and were filmed performing “Lover You Should Have Come Over” for Chicago’s JBTV and “Dream Brother” at New Orleans’ Howlin’ Wolf club.
By the time they got back to Europe, Grace had achieved significant success and there were TV appearances to attend to on top of touring. The band filmed a potent “Grace” for The BBC’s “The Late Show” in London shortly after arriving. They performed “So Real,” “Mojo Pin,” and “What Will You Say” in Frankfurt, Germany on the “Aus Dem Sudbahnof” program a month later.
In between, they’d flown to Japan to do club dates and Jeff turned in a stunning solo rendition of “Hallelujah” for MTV Japan. Before heading home, they appeared on England’s “MTV’s Most Wanted” playing “Eternal Life,” “Last Goodbye” and “Vancouver.”
“Traditionally, I think European audiences are more forgiving and more open,” Mick muses. “It doesn’t need to be the buzz of the week to give it a chance. I personally felt like there was more acceptance. By that point, we had started to come together more as a band, so we had more to offer the audience. They were much more keen on us being on TV in Europe than in America. They wanted to capture it even through there wasn’t a lot of hype behind it – they recognized it as something important.”

That Spring, the band headlined over Soul Coughing, then opened for Juliana Hatfield across North America, and spent Summer appeared at a series of European festivals including Glastonbury, Roskilde and Eurockeenes in France, where a tender version “Lilac Wine” was lensed. The Grace World Tour ended in September in Australia and the group settled down to write material for their next album collaboratively.
Buckley’s connection to his bandmates had become so strong that he thought of working under a band name. Mick states, “I proposed the name ‘Two Ninas’ and Jeff liked it a lot, but people were against using another name because the ‘Jeff Buckley’ name was so well known. Jeff liked the idea of band name and that was the closest we ever came.”
Looking back on their time together, Mick says, “Jeff was just a great guy and we all just loved spending time with him. He was really there for us as a leader.”

The band played a final Australian tour early the following year in Australia, after which Matt Johnson left the group. With Parker Kindred on drums they gave one last performance February 11, 1997 in New York, after which Jeff moved to Memphis, TN. Having tried his best to write songs as collaborations with the rest of the band, he decided to go it alone to polish the songs he’d be writing himself since recording Grace.

Jeff Buckley died in Memphis on the evening of May 29, 1997 of an accidental drowning.

“Artists just need to shut the fuck up and listen to what exactly is coming from inside. You just have to find exactly what you should be doing, and if you didn’t have that thing, you would die. Perish, slowly or quickly, violently or like a chump. And every choice is made from that. I have to do this, I’m made to do this. I can’t do anything else. I tried. I don’t really feel fulfilled any other way. Maybe when I get older, it will change. I’m sure it will.” - Jeff Buckley, 1994

- Howard Wuelfing , with Amy Yates Wuelfing

(Jeff Buckley quotes from previously unpublished interview material from February 24, 1994 by Amy Yates Wuelfing.)

Gene Bowen: Founded Road Recovery, dedicated to helping young people battle addiction by harnessing the influence of entertainment industry professionals who have confronted similar crises and now wish to share their experience and knowledge.

Mick Grondahl: Lives in Copenhagen, Sweden with his wife and daughter and continues to play music.

Matt Johnson: Plays music both as a solo artist and with other artists such as Rufus Wainwright.

Parker Kindred: Continues to play music working with numerous artists, including Antony and the Johnsons.

Michael Tighe: Lives in New York City and is currently working with a New York band, "The Tiggers."

interviews conducted by Amy Wuelfing; narrative written by Howard Wuelfing, editted by Amy Wuelfing

Jeff Buckley oral history

2011-04-11T13:50:00.000-07:00

Jeff Buckley: I’ve always played in bands – always. I only go out and play solo to make money to pay the phone bill and the rent.

After releasing the Live at Sin-e EP, Jeff played a series of solo acoustic shows around New York City in early 1993, looking to attract musicians to form a band with through his live performances.

Mick Grondahl (bassist): …I was backstage hanging out and I noticed Jeff, and he was definitely someone who made me curious. Backstage, he was very focused on tuning his guitar and cleaning it, and preparing his set. During the show I noticed the interesting choice of cover songs he was playing and he played a lot of complex chords, and of course he had that great voice. I was quite impressed and we got to talk later at a party, and we talked about music. He left an impression.

Later that year, he was playing the New Music Seminar at the Fez, and I went and stood in line – I didn’t even have any money to get in. Luckily I saw Jeff coming out from behind the curtain while we were waiting to pay, and he was singing “L.A. Woman” by the Doors and I sang the next part, and he remembered me. We exchanged numbers and I went in to see the show and he had evolved even more. He came out and did Nina Simone “Be Your Husband.” We got together at Nightingale’s, played pool, and then jammed back at his apartment.

Jeff Buckley: Micky and I sat down at my place. It was late in the evening so we had to play quietly …

Mick Grondahl: About two weeks after he and I started playing together we auditioned Matt [Johnson - drummer]. He was the first guy we auditioned and we hit it off really well. Matt remembers Jeff looking at him and smiling and just feeling a connection between us. And that first night we played together, within an hour, we wrote” Dream Brother.”

Jeff Buckley: Every guitar idea I put out they would close in on as the music happened.

Gene Bowen (road manager): He toured overseas for a couple weeks to support Live at Sin-e and he was describing how it was great and he loved it, but the absence of a band was really apparent to him. He always wanted to have a band and then he finally got the band, but then he had to tour solo to support the Sin-e EP. He missed the band and couldn’t wait to get back. He was really about the band and the personal connection that he had with each of them.

Mick Grondahl: Michael [Tighe] joined when Grace was pretty much wrapped up. He had never played in a group. He knew some blues stuff and few riffs here and there. We auditioned people who played a lot longer in New York, people who had played very complex music, but it was more about enthusiasm and potential. We wanted to recruit people who were almost disciples to Jeff’s music. If people were too set in what they were doing then there wasn’t this chance to instill the new music that could come from the way that Jeff worked.

Michael Tighe (guitarist): He knew that I played guitar but we never got around to playing together until he asked me to audition for his band. It clicked. I felt honored, excited and a little afraid to be playing with these older musicians who had been living in a world of gigs, touring, jamming, writing, recording. A world I wanted to live in.

Gene Bowen: Jeff used to call Michael “Chico” and I used to envision Jeff as an old man at the end of his life, just sitting on his back porch with Michael, because they were just so close. There was just such a connection there.

Michael Tighe: First impression? A cartoon wolf. Playful and silly with eyes of pain and wildness.

Mick Grondahl: We were in many ways four parts of the group, and it felt like a band and Jeff accepted us as having equal say. It was very much a democracy – he was the leader but he also listened to us and thought about what we had to say. The relationships that band members have between each other are more important than ability.

Jeff Buckley: They’ve become my family.

Gene Bowen: I remember he talked about trying to come up with a name for the band, so that it wouldn’t just be “Jeff Buckley.”

Mick Grondahl: I proposed the name “Two Ninas” and Jeff liked it a lot, and we all liked it. But the record company was against using another name because the “Jeff Buckley” name was so well known.

June 1st, 1994, the band plus Gene Bowen and a soundman set out in a 15-passenger Econoline Van on their first extended tour.

Michael Tighe: When I first came up to the Econoline van I felt like I was joining the circus. Because of our childhood and our upbringing, both Jeff and I really liked the nomadic lifestyle of touring. In a lot ways, I think Jeff was most comfortable when he was on tour.

Gene Bowen: It was all of us and the equipment in the van and about halfway through the tour, they figured out a way to suspend hammocks from the ceiling of the van over the bench seats. So one person could lay on the bench seat and another person could lay in the hammock, because there was no room in the van at all.

Mick Grondahl: We loved the van! We liked being on the road and partying - we didn’t have a lot of groupies or anything like that. We really enjoyed just hanging out with each other and playing music. We were all learning a lot about what music each person liked and we would play it all on the CD player.

Michael Tighe: Mostly Mick played music – he kind of hogged the stereo. He was the coolest one in the band and had the “coolest” music. We were all interested in what Mick was listening to, so he was the DJ of the van. Jeff played James Brown Live at the Olympia a lot on all the tours. People who had been around on different tours would be like, “Oh my God, you’re still listening to this?”

Mick Grondahl: Jeff could listen to a song a couple times and then he would be playing it onstage the next night. He could remember the lyrics, the chord changes, the arrangement and then sometimes come up with a new arrangement.

And he would do that with is own songs, just do a new arrangement and I would walk the wire with him and follow along, not knowing exactly how we were going to play chorus now that we just did the verse in a whole different way. It was exciting and most of the time we would land on our feet. It built great confidence between us. We never played the songs the same way. Each night was different.

Gene Bowen: The band had been rehearsing for the tour, but they weren’t rehearsing the songs from the record. The guy from the studio told me that he hadn’t heard them play a single note off of Grace. They were in there just jamming, playing the same riff for hours. Management had them play the Stone Pony in Asbury Park, NJ. They rented out the club so they could get the feeling of playing on stage – but the club was empty. Since they weren’t rehearsing the album, the thought was that getting them on a stage and rehearsing would help them get ready for the tour.

Michael Tighe: At the dress rehearsal at the Stone Pony, that was day we realized that we had spent too much time just jamming and we needed to get the set a little tighter. We were very ill-prepared, actually.

Gene Bowen: After the Stone Pony, we played the Red Creek Inn in Rochester and the tickets were $5 each and 32 tickets were sold. That’s the first show the band ever played together. So we went from playing an empty club to a 32-paid club.

Michael Tighe: I was so nervous and made some mistakes. I felt like I was giving birth or being born or something like that.

Mick Grondahl: I remember thinking that for people seeing us for the first time, it might be a bit off-putting. It was so different; Jeff’s voice, the style, the way the shows were organized… because we didn’t have a set list, we worked on the spot. We were asking something of the audience, which was patience because we wanted to make each show unique. They were intrigued of course by Jeff’s humor and the mystique that he could project, but mainly his voice and guitar were so stunning.

It took time for the set to get up to speed, but we wanted it start slow and build from nothing. Not just bowl people over and play the catchiest song at the very beginning.

We felt excited about the music, so if no one really showed up to the shows, we were at least doing something that appealed to us.

Michael Tighe: The first time I really remember the band coming together and gelling was a show in Woodstock, which was fitting since Grace was recorded there.

Gene Bowen: There was a real momentum after that U.S. tour. When we got to Europe we were in an actual tour bus. And we figured out that we could do a tour bus for the US when we got back. From that point on, it was a bus and it made the grind that much easier.

Mick Grondahl: It was trade off – when we had the van we could stay in hotels, but when got the bus we just stayed on that the whole time. It was the moving hotel. And we didn’t have the same intimacy we did before.

Michael Tighe: That was when famous musicians started to come see us and it was almost too much to handle – I couldn’t believe that it was happening. Maybe it was because I was very naïve – but I thought that superstars only mingled with other superstars. To me, we were this alternative band that was really popular in Europe and Australia but we hadn’t really broken in the U.S., but here we had Paul McCartney and Jimmy Page coming to see us.

Jack Bookbinder: There were far more promotional opportunities in Europe for Jeff, just because of the way that Live at Sin-e was promoted from the beginning. In France, Jeff was one of the top pop artists in the country and you couldn’t say that in America. He just had something that people there connected to.

Michael Tighe: I don't remember anything about the television tapings except that I would always think about Hendrix on the BBC to get me fired up.

Mick Grondahl: Traditionally, I think European audiences are more forgiving and more open. It doesn’t need to be the buzz of the week to give it a chance. I personally felt like there was more acceptance and more of a feeling of security. By that point, we had started to come together more as a band so we had more to offer the audience. They were much more keen on us being on TV in Europe than in America. They wanted to capture it even through there wasn’t a lot of hype behind it – the recognized it as something important.

Michael Tighe: I really loved Japan because I have a really romantic relationship with Asia – but I remember that Jeff didn’t like it. The audiences were so, so well behaved it was almost frightening. There was dead silence before every song, and after a song there was a swell of loud applause. Then as soon as he touched his guitar or cleared his throat, it would go dead silent again. Playing in Japan was like going to another planet.

The band would continue to tour the U.S., Europe, Japan and Australia until September 1995. Afterwards they took time off to try and write collaboratively.
They played its last show with drummer Matt Johnson on March 15th 1995 in Sydney, Australia.

Jeff Buckley died in Memphis on the evening of May 29, 1997 of an accidental drowning.

Jeff Buckley: Artists just need to shut the fuck up and listen to what exactly is coming from inside. You just have to find exactly what you should be doing, and if you didn’t have that thing, you would die. Perish, slowly or quickly, violently or like a chump. And every choice is made from that. I have to do this, I’m made to do this. I can’t do anything else. I tried. I don’t really feel fulfilled any other way. Maybe when I get older, it will change. I’m sure it will.

Gene Bowen: Founded Road Recovery, dedicated to helping young people battle addiction by harnessing the influence of entertainment industry professionals who have confronted similar crises and now wish to share their experience and knowledge.

Mick Grondahl: Lives in Copenhagen, Sweden with his wife and daughter and continues to play music.

Matt Johnson: Plays music both as a solo artist and with other artists such as Rufus Wainwright.

Parker Kindred: Continues to play music working with numerous artists, including Antony and the Johnsons.

Michael Tieghe: Lives in New York City and is currently working with a New York band, "The Tiggers."

interviews conducted by Amy Wuelfing, editted by Amy and Howard Wuelfing

totally wire-d

2011-04-09T05:53:00.000-07:00

We dragged azz up to NYC on Wed. to see Wire at the Bowery Ballroom coz, as is too often the case, the tour skipped over Philly. Having asked around I realize that this is often because local promoters -- primarily meaning the local operatives of Live Nation -- weren't willing to pay their going guarantee. Sigh. (and yet, friggin' Cut Copy sold out the Trocadero!)

Anyway we get there early as venue site said doors open at 8PM, tix said 8:30PM - so who knew when they'd go on. Texted around and old DC punkcrony Don Fleming had locked down a table and seats - WHOOPPEE! (at my age getting to sit rather than stand for a couple hours, definitely considered a positive.

The set commenced with the pulsing electronic instrumental piece "99.9" from "Send" played back via recording or pre-programmed synth, empty stage. As it ended, the group matter-of-factly walked on stage, plugged in and burst into "Comet," a little artpunk masterstroke from "Send," next quickly shifting gears into the musically more nonchalant but lyrically vitriolic "Please Take" ("fuck off out of my face, you take up too much space" - HAR!) And onwards they went.

By the end of the third encore they'd played nearly two hours. Happily they played the bulk of the new album "Red Barked Tree" -- and that was essential. I like to hear my favorite songs by any given band as much as the next couch potato, but watching a veteran band do that actually depresses me as it feels like a capitulation, an admission that their glory days are behind them and that they can't come up with anything new that matches their best old stuff. In effect, they shift from being a working band to an act. Not that the results of that are bad, just different, and to me, sad.

In Wire's case they put their latest work front and center, but with two hours at their disposal offered up a tasteful, interesting selection of material from their back catalogue, pulling selections from throughout their career, all three main phases with lots of numbers from the first three album -- "Map Ref"! -- but a healthy dose from their "pop" period: "Kidney Bingoes," "Silk Paws," et cetera -- one of the encores was a relaxed re-reading of "Drill." Great programming. Entertaining, instructive, lots of variety. A lot of great songs with clever if simple arrangements.

And that's what you come to see -- coz this is not a theatrical band, not flamboyant or visually exciting. Neither is technical prowess especially important to what they do. Most of the songs are constructed out of exceedingly simple riffs and rhythms. But they're all a bit off kilter, sometimes subtley, sometimes quite grandly and then overlaid with strong but straightforward melodic hooks. This is stuff that just about any decent musician could play -- indeed, they took the NJ Wire tribute band Ex Lion Tamers out with them in the 80's to play a greatest hits set drawn from their first three albums -- and anyone COULD write. But Wire were the first to consciously develop early punk's minimalist program and apply that to deconstructing the idea of rock song and reconstruct it as something more like sonic sculpture (I'm stealing an old idea I stuck in my review of "Pink Flag" for the Unicorn Times in DC) and then maintain that agenda in varying degrees on successive albums - even as they added more and more elements of more orthodox pop songwriting and execution.

April laundry list

2011-04-06T07:26:00.000-07:00

Sunday, March 27
attend closing day of "Silk Road" exhibit at University of Pennsylvania Museum of Anthropology and Archaeology.
This exhibit was cut short because of controversy over exhibiting natural mummies buried some 4000 years ago in the Tarim Basin of China who were obviously not of Far East Asian stock and accompanied by distinctly European artifacts. This fuels calls for autonomy by the ethnic groups currently occupying the area.
In fact Chinese authorities were looking to recall the exhibit before it hit Philly but as it had been organized by a U. of PA faculty member in the first place, that member got them to allow it to reach Philly, tho only for a severely abbreviated run.
As the exhibit mainly consisted of grave goods - clothing and some figurines - it was visually striking but not too instructive. I did get a hoot out of the grave markers which were labelled: phalluses and vulvas - the "vulvas" looking like huge boat paddles. Hmmm

Thursday, March 31
Cut Copy at the Trocadero.
Amy loves this Australian band. Catchy, stroppy dance rock ala vintage mersh New Order et al. The show was sold out -- giving the lie to OMD who passed over Philly saying it was "Dead, like Detroit." Well I guess dead to old has-beens! HAR.
The audience went wild and the dance floor was packed and in furious motion. Reading the "Dance of Days" book I think this is what Ian MacKaye was hoping to see at Fugazi shows.

Saturday, April 2
meeting with Shayna and the Catch at Yaffa Cafe, East Village, NYC
Very cool, eclectic Brooklyn based band. Perhaps a 21st century analogue to Edie Brickell and the New Bohemians. Catchy, smart, with a swinging, acoustic sound inculcating influences from jazz, folk, pop. Lead singer Shayna Zaid has a great dusky voice and amazing stage presence. Really knows how to sell a song. Was a child star in Thailand.
meeting with Mia Doi Todd at 7A. But that was packed so we went over to Tompkins Square Park, watched the inhabitants barfing and peeing in garbage cans. Went to some coffee shop on St. Marks that mixed Nutella into the hot chocolate. Of course I LOVE Mia. One of the finest, most sensually pleasing writers and performers I've ever encountered. her last record "pop" record, Gea, opened with a song that evoked Nick Drake like NOTHING I've ever heard before. The new one "Cosmic Ocean Ship" really sounds like some long lost gem produced by Joe Boyd in 1968. Just breathtaking.
mike watt at the NorthStar Bar, Philly
watt is easily the most respected and beloved figure in American punk. Well, Ian MacKaye's up there too! He's out touring his third opera "hypenated-man" with a great band comprising ex Slovenly guitarist Tom Watson and local Pedro drummer Raul Morales. Fierce but sweet shit. watt allowed his writing to be informed by the example of his old group the minutemen on this one. Short, pithy but oddly catchy little songs. All referencing particular figures in the paintings of Hieronymous Bosch! That's watt for ye.

Sunday April 3
Reunion of my old college band, Bad Taste and the Crabs (sounded cool in 1973!) in Maplewood NY. The drummer's day gig is at Harvard; the lead singer's a lefty union lawyer. We caught up on 35 years' worth of old times, had some lovely cold "sloppy joe" sandwiches (beef, turkey, cold slaw and Russian dressing - with crust cut off the bread) and then tried to make some music. We largely played around with the singer's repertoire -- and he still performs at rallies, strikes etc with his Solidarity Singers. So lotsa Joe Hill and old school labor rally songs and some Dylan. Started out tentative but when he lit into "Halleluja I'm a Bum" it got me to test out the pipes and add a harmony and honestly, it started to catch fire at that point.

Monday April 4
starting watching DVD set of "Treme." I love this series and note more and more places depicted we've hung out at (the Bacchanal!). Still love it but LORDY the Special Features pretty thin. The textual "Music Commentary" basically is a pop up box that lists song titles SOMETIMES and then one of the artists who'd recorded said song in the past. So some cat plays a Jelly Roll Morton song and the screen lists "New Orleans Blues" and "Tom McDermott", the cat performing; no mention of Jelly Roll. Then the audio commentary -- for that seen they say, "Yeah, Jelly Roll Morton." As if folks these days know who exactly that is, or what his importance is to New Orleans music and the initiation of the jazz process. OY! If you're looking for great commentary than NOLA.com has posted DETAILED running commentary on the music, locales and historical figures alluded to in the series.

Wednesday, April 6
meeting singer Arrica Rose at the Vig on Spring Street, NYC for drinks
meeting Don Fleming (producer, Velvet Monkey, Gumball mainstay, label owner, staffer at Alan Lomax Archives) at Bowery Ballroom where WIRE are performing. OH YEAH!

and it only gets busier.

David Byrne guests with If By Yes @ Le Poisson Rouge

2011-03-15T16:05:00.001-07:00

Last night, If By Yes played the second of three March NYC shows (the last is 3/25 at Mercury Lounge) with the core line up of Petra Haden (vocals), Yuka Honda (keyboards), Yuko Araki (drums), Hirotaka “Shimmy” Shimizu (guitar) being supplemented with guitarist Nels Cline (Wilco) and bassist Trevor Dunn (Mr. Bungle). They were also joined by David Byrne who duetted with Petra on "Eliza," a song on their debut album, "Salt on Sea Glass" that he co-wrote and duetted with Petra on. The expanded line-up will also play Elysium in Austin TX 3/19 during SxSW and Largo in Los Angeles 3/22 - the date of the album's release on Chimera Records.

Sean Lennon of Chimera has stated:

Way back in the 20th century, Petra Haden and Yuka Honda first crossed paths when they were members of That Dog and Cibo Matto (respectively). Since then they’ve each had one foot in pop music and one foot in the avant garde. Petra has released groundbreaking vocal projects Imaginaryland and Petra Haden Sings The Who Sell Out, while also singing and composing TV commercials for Toyota Prius. Yuka has released 3 experimental electronic albums on John Zorn’s Tzadik label, while also producing Japanese pop artists,including Miu Sakamoto and Maki Nomiya.

The two started writing songs together in 2002, but it was a slow, long distance project. They live 3000 miles apart (NYC / LA) and would collaborate intermittently, using frequent flier miles...
As IF BY YES, they are joined by guitarist Hirotaka “Shimmy” Shimizu and drummer Yuko Araki, both long time members of the Japanese band Cornelius, and on their debut album, Salt On Sea Glass, special guests include David Byrne (vocals & lyrics) on “Eliza”, guitarist Nels Cline, and remixes by Keigo “Cornelius” Oyamada.
Sail away on scintillating solar winds. If By Yes is guaranteed to seduce you with their utterly exquisite and playful sensibilities,
futuristic rhythms, and other-worldly sounds.

http://www.myspace.com/ifbyyesmusic
http://www.ifbyyes.com/

Joe Boyd goes Soft (BOY!)

2011-03-15T07:23:00.000-07:00

This is being dashed off as I'm in the thick of prepping to go off to Austin, TX for the SxSW Music Conference tomorrow, but wanted to spiel a bit about this performance...

'twas Joe Boyd talking about about his experiences in music in the 60's, reading from his "White Bicycles" book as well as reminiscing extemporaneously. Meanwhile unapologetic psychedelic revivalist Robyn Hitchcock performed songs by some of the artists Boyd mentioned on acoustic guitar:
"Back In The 1960's" Incredible String Band
"I Can Hear The Grass Grow" The Move
"It's All Over Now" Bob Dylan
"Closer to The Aisle" Cleftones (I think)
?? Fairport Convention
"Arnold Layne" Pink Floyd
"Riverman" Nick Drake
"The Yellow Snake" Incredible String Band
and there could have been others

Hitchcock also kibbitzed occasionally during Boyd's segments.

Joe Boyd has one of the most amazing resumes in modern music history:
Having been sensitized to Afro-American pop in the 50's by the pre-Dick Clark American Bandstand television broadcasts outta Philly he became obsessed with folk blues and jazz, eventually landing a job as tour manager for a blues and gospel package tour of Europe boasting artists like Reverend Gary Davis and Sister Rosetta Tharpe. This turned into a gig as production manager for the Newport Jazz festival and then Folk festival -- rubbing elbows with musical giants like Skip James, Son House, Mississippi John Hurt, Howlin' Wolf as well as Joan Baez, Bob Dylan etc.

Eventually Joe bolted for England where he arrived when the British folk revival was hitting its stride with clubs like Le Cousins being thick with seminal musicians like Bert Jansch, John Renborn, Ralph McTell, Sandy Denny. He'd managed to wangle the position of running the London office of Elektra Records -- then the preeminent (meaning the most visible to mainstream audiences) American folkie label. While trying to launch his career as a producer and sign acts to Elektra Boyd wound up helping found the UFO Club, the crucible in which London's psychedelic scene was formented. He soon wound up producing: the first Pink Floyd single, the Incredible String Band, Fairport Convention, Soft Machine, Shirley Collins, Vashti Bunyan, John Martyn, Nick Drake - most of these folks being signed to his Witchseason production company.

Eventually he was lured back to the U.S. in the '70's taking a job in the film music divion of Warner Bros., reputedly WB top exec Mo Ostin's means of taking revenge on Island Records' Chris Blackwell for backing out of a distribution deal -- Boyd being one of Island's main A&R resources. While at Warner Bros. he produced a hit album for a former folk crony Maria Muldaur (originally outta the Jim Kweskin Jug Band), discovered and produced the McGarrigle Sisters; he also helmed the sessions for "Duelling Banjos" though he eschewed taking credit, feeling it was just too damned corny. After his label stint, Joe would start his own labels in the 1980s, Hannibal and Carthage which re-issued many of his classic 60's productions ala Nick Drake, Fairport Convention etc -- the original office was in Rocky Hill, NJ close by his native Princeton. He'd eventually produce commercially successful albums for R.E.M. and 10,000 Maniacs. He also pursued a growing interest in the indigenous folk musics of other countries and began releasing titles by Trio Bulgarkas, Ali Farka Toure, and Martya Sebestyen -- this last artist scoring a freak hit when "En Csak Azt Csodalom" was featured prominently in the film "The English Patient."

In recent years, Boyd has been primarily producing tribute concerts celebrating the music of deceased former associates like Nick Drake, Syd Barrett and most recently Kate McGarrigle...

So he's got a lot to talk about!

The show was about 2 hours in all -- not nearly enough to really give a thorough review of his escapades over the decades and he very wisely cherry picked some key events to talk about, a somewhat surprising selection if truth be known:
* the sacking of original American Bandstand host Bill Moore on trumped up moral's charges (of which he was eventually formally acquitted -- by which time Dick Clark was firmly enscounced in the gig and Black artists had been largely replaced by the likes of Fabian)
* Dylan going electric at Newport in '65 -- a very different account than the popular legend, with most of the attendees expecting SOMETHING big happening at that show, but not really knowing what; this marking the death of the American folk revival as a popular music movement...for better or worse
* seeing The Move when they were the house band at the Marquee
* The Incredible String Band being introduced to former Kweskin Jug Band members David Simons, who in turn introduced them to Scientology (marking the beginning of their artistic decline)

For someone who was an impressionable teenager in the 60's, it was a thrill hearing these stories recounted -- even though a lot of them were read straight from his book -- and by the man who was instrumental in so much of this music happening and being recorded, and recorded so masterfully. There were a lot of interesting insights shared.

As per Mr. Hitchcock -- his love of these songs was powerfully apparent and it was great fun to hear some of these tunes dusted off and played publicly. What was most striking at times was -- how much of the power of some songs were totally due to the power of the original musicians, their arrangements and the overall production of the recorded versions. Dazzled by all those factors I'd never noted how simple and stupid the lyrics of the Move's "I Can Hear The Grass Grow" actually were! In other cases, hearing Drake's "Riverman" stripped of his breathy, jazzified voice and masterful picking left you truly confronting the spectral, otherworldly lyrics. Likewise the Fairport song (wish I had time to look up which one it was). As you'd imagine his performance of "Arnold Layne" was utterly masterful with his voice and unashamedly thick British accent being the perfect evocation of Syd.

If you have a chance to catch this revue I'd highly recommend it!

Chris Whitley

2011-01-29T05:53:00.000-08:00

One of my favorite acts of self-indulgence is to head up to Princeton Record Exchange and graze the trash wall i.e. all the $1.99 titles. It's seldom I don't grab a handful of stuff that's pretty damned cool and often enough I find things I've REALLY wanted and never picked up before. Sometimes I find things I didn't know exist but am intrigued by and fall in love with.

A couple weeks ago I was grazing and it was clear that a particular person's collection was dispersed into the stacks -- I found a whole pile of mint conditions releases by one Chris Whitley. I'm guessing y'all know this guy all too well and, as usual, I'm years behind the curve...as long as I keep busy with SOME great music while I'm missing out on OTHER great music I'm cool with that. Ya know there's always something wonderful to discover and since I find so few critical voices I trust I'm happy exploring at my own pace.

I actually worked at Columbia Records when his first album came out. Seemed pleasant enough -- earnest, gruff voiced singer/songwriter with good chops on guitar. That debut was produced by the then hot Malcom Burn who'd been Daniel Lanois' chief engineer and then moved out on his own. The effort was pleasant, but a little predictable and kinda mersh.

I got dragooned into a co. dinner with Whitley and wound up sitting with him. Even at that point he seemed uncomfortable with the position the label was putting him in and seemed to me that he'd be happier being a bit more underground and working with folks with a more counter-cultural sensibility. Honestly, I think a LOT of artists would be happier if they were teamed with folks in actual harmony with their artistic/philosophical perspective...but that don't happen 'cause label people need to LIE about their feelings in order to keep their jobs. Everything put before them by their superiors is proclaimed "AMAZING" whatever their true feelings are. I suspect that a lot of acts of artistic willfulness could be avoided if the talent were happy with their workmates and not feeling like they had to rebel against the system. But Whitley was not so lucky and made a wonderfully petulant album called "Din Of Ecstasy" which effectively ended his career at Columbia. Great album tho -- coulda been the launch pad to introduce him to an entirely different audience. But the label just viewed this as him abandoning the audience they'd already pre-ordained for him.

ANYWAY...over the years I noted the adulatory reviews his subsequent releases on a series of different labels got. Not trusting critics tho I was not moved to run out and pick 'em up at the time.

So here's this stack of 4 Whitley titles, $1.99 each -- grabbed em all.

Next day I filled up the changer and...lotta nice stuff. Great singing, powerful songs, gutsy guitar work overall. One of these was solo acoustic -- good morning music. Two were able enough efforts with full instrumentation. And then there was
"Hotel Vast Horizon." Basically this has all the positive elements of the others BUT is performed by a brilliant trio featuring a bass player that chords his way through most of the songs. So everything has a deep, sad undertow, a foot-dragging rhythm that compliments Whitley's high lonesome moaning vocalese, cross-cutting guitar lines and bluesy writing perfectly. For some reason it occurs to me that if Nirvana had been treated right after "Nevermind" and got to work with T-Bone Burnette on "In Utero" it'd've sounded like this. This is a KILLER Record.

2010-12-31T04:10:00.000-08:00

I was given the paperback version of Patti Smith's "Just Kids" by my wife for Xmas was instantly drawn to reading it (as opposed to putting it on the pile till Summer as usual). And I am loving it!

Most of all I'm in love with the language which hits me like Leonard Cohen's -- obviously coming from the perception of and expressed via the verbal prerogatives of a poet. I don't mean that everything is expressed in overwrought poesy, but that many things viewed from that skewed, penetrative perspective that belongs to the poet.

But I'm happily wallowing in her her chronicling of the 60/70's boho culture in NYC -- when it was significantly populated by working and lower middle class kids with artistic ambitions taking advantage of cheap rents in crappy apartments and plenty of menial jobs to pursue their dreams of becoming vital artists, rather than a buncha
trustafarians. The sense of style also highly beguiling -- when "style" just meant applying artistic ambitions to your basic living enviroment, dress sense etc. utilizing thrift store finds and the basic precept that every moment of your life should be lived as excitingly as you can manage.

Being a consumerist swine this is leading me to inventory my Patti swap: alla albums in the most updated versions I could manage, vintage vinyl bootlegs. 12" singles with non-LP B-sides, "Piss Factory" single (but the Sire re-issue, not the original on MER), Lenny's release of Patti and he in '71 and an autographed copy of her "Witt" book of po'ms that Jim Testa found cut-out at Strand Books. A signed David Gahr print of her and Sam Sheppard posing on a balcony at the Chelsea Hotel.

I recall the first time I saw her -- Spring '75, playing George Street Playhouse in New Brunswick, a "hometown" gig for Lenny Kaye who's from North Brunswick (I'm pretty sure). This is just before they had a drummer and right after they'd released "Piss Factory" on their own MER label. Still one of the best gigs I've ever seen. They manifested the aura that ANYTHING was artistically possible at any moment -- in the best sense there was no rhyme or reason to the set, nothing was pro forma or predictable. Patti and co. flowed like Mercury from sweet and sassy Ronette street pop to Keef Richards toughiness to mad poetess and traced the line of ecstatic visionary that slithered through all of those. I've still got a handbill from that show with biographical notes that someone had scribbled on the back to prep me to interview her. And THAT'S a whole other story.

The New Brunswick connection was a funny thing. Years later Ivan Kral and his wife ran a video store in New Brunswick, Tony Shannahan, Patti's regular bassist once she came back from Detroit, lived around there and used to run the "Slaves of New Brunswick" revue on Tuesday nights at the Melody Bar (the house DJ was a cat named Matt Pinfield) -- he'd play a set and then back all comers. Every so often we'd be walking down Route 27 and Lenny Kaye would come running up to say "hi."

The pic this is illustrated with is by Robert Maplethorpe. It's pretty close to the Witt cover. if you can afford it you should buy some Maplethorpe art.

full circle line

2010-12-16T08:34:00.000-08:00

Monday morning we were up early, packed, made bad coffee with the "pod" coffee maker provided by the hotel. Then Amy decided to go out for oatmeal from the Starbucks at the Sheraton on Canal Street. We bundle up, head out and notice lots of trucks on St. Charles with side doors opened. You could see drawers fulla stuff. We figured that this was a service getting ready to decorate the streets, hotel fronts etc. Or someone filming something or other. New Orleans has a municipal department whose main job is to encourage film industry work here and they're notably successful. Lotsa things shot here. Damn "Salt" a film obstensibly about dirty business in the CIA and revolving aroudn their HQ in Langley managed to work in a segment in New Orleans - on Royal Street at Ursulines!

We go to Starbucks, get our stuff, head back to hotel and as we get to that block note a dolly filled with director's chairs. We take a peak: "Simon," "Zahn"... Man with a clip board comes up and says "We're filming for a TV show called 'Treme'." Turns out they filmed a sequence at the hotel's restaurant, Luke. The scene is actually set in NYC where the character based on Susan Spicer has relocated and is in the process of "cooking her way back to New Orleans."

As we entered the lobby we noted lotsa folks with garment backs ducking out doors, jumping on elevators...

And next thing ya know we're in a cab headed to Louis Armstrong Airport.

BuhBye! Sigh!!

Louche dei

2010-12-16T04:52:00.000-08:00

Sunday of this trip was pretty laid back. Went to choich. Lollygagged around the hotel a bit, walked down Decatur Street, stopping at Louisiana Music Factory to pick up a second Eureka Brass Band CD and swing by Faulkner House book store to see if there were any tomes that gave any in depth look at the etymology of Mardi Gras Indian chants (there weren't! - in fact, on returning home I reached out to someone cited as an authority on Caribbean culture and he affirmed that such work doesn't exist to date) and then down to the end of the French Quarter and Coops.

Years ago, on one of our first trips to NOLA we were wandering haplessly down Royal or Chartres and stumbled into a very downhome eatery whose name now escapes me. Looked VERY dicey but we really didn't know WHERE to stop so gave it a shot. And they had some amazing fried chicken. After The Flood it closed and we've been searching out for comparable experiences. One local guided us to Fiorello's, also down at the end of Decatur. And this was a worse dive than the first. Dirty, in attentive staff. There were roaches crawling around on the walls. And they took their sweet time in delivering the chow -- but it was all pretty much worth it. Great chicken, served up hot, freshly made. Last time we went there, ordered up the grub asked for wine and were told by the waiter -- "there's nothing here you'd wanna drink!" But we insisted. And he insisted! He finally gave in and brought some nasty chablis -- can't say he was steering us wrong! But the food's the point. Haven't been back since. (I should point out that Willie Mae's is very neat and clean and if the staff seems overwhelmed they are always polite and make you feel at home - hell, one year a waitress pinched me for putting my elbows on the table!)

Meanwhile the Wall Street Journal (which Mrs. W. reads religiously) had mentioned Coops as one of the great foodie bargains in the French Quarter. So we tried it last year and it's OK so that's where we wound up that Sunday afternoon, Saints game on the telly. I gotta say the chicken -- to my taste -- is nowhere near Willie Mae's. The breading is much thinner and nowhere near as crunchy and flakey. Smaller portions too. But the coleslaw it's served with is fresh and spicey and refreshing. The rabbit and sausage with rice was filling and occasionally tasty but kinda bland.

On the way back to the hotel Amy decided to try Cafe Beignet on Royal Street instead of Cafe Du Monde on our friend Joy's recommendation. We'd eaten there in years passed but didn't think too hard on the experience. The big difference is that Cafe Beignet is indoors, intimate and far more civilized that Cafe Du Monde. In warm weather (the temperature dropped into the 50's this day), there's a sweet little garden area immediately abutting the police station. So there's less waiting for a server to find you -- or to find a single clean table than at Cafe Du Monde. Otherwise, the victuals are comparable.

We napped again and pondered dinner. We lamed out and opted for the Gumbo shop in the French Quarter. Nice enough atmosphere - kinda downhome touristy. But peronable wait staff, good service. Food was all on the bland side tho. I got blackened chicken and expected a bit of heat coming off 'em but the spices mainly made the chicken taste like beef. OK but. WTF.

Big Chief 3

2010-12-15T05:42:00.000-08:00

Tom and Arion had told us that there'd be a Second Line on Saturday and agreed to meet us and be part of it. We walked down Bourbon Street at about 11AM -- probably the only time to do with without drama. It's shocking how much is going on even at this hour! There's even a few dudes staggering around still nursing last night's bender. But overall it's pretty civilized.

Considering the national image of Bourbon Street as one continuous bacchanal going 24-7, the reality is decidedly different. As you enter from Canal Street, things start out decisively classy with big fancy hotels, expensive restaurants and the first of Larry Flynt's Hustler clubs. As you proceed things get more down home and rambunctious with more and more dacquiri and hurricane bars (basically a wall full of churning clear plastic vats filled with various colors/kinds of high test booze-slushee), some are basically just a kiosk right on the street, no seating - you takes yr plastic alien fulla frozen hooch and stagger on), cheapie souvenir shops and the like. Eventually you come to the residential zone which is shockingly, quiet, sedate and frankly quite beautiful. Lotta little homes, fronting right on the sidewalk, no front lawns. Remember, these were literally "town houses" - the real home was in the country, on the plantation. These places were essentially a parlor for entertaining and a place to crash out when you'd eaten and drunken your fill either at home or at another town house.

Passing out the end of the Quarter we walked West to Arion and Tom's apartment - a charming little place in a larger subdivided house. High ceilings, aged, planked flooring. Tiny kitchen. Kinda Manhattan style - basically it's a clothes closet and place to flop because - the city is your living room, kitchen, dining room etc. We ambled down Esplanade and then crossed on Decatur to Elysian Fields.

The Second-Line was sponsored by WWOZ-FM featured the Treme Brass Band leading the parade, then the New Wave Brass Band sitting in the center, and a third (didn't catch the name) bringing up the rear. Most of those participating were on the bourgie side (like us!) and the parade route was thoroughly tourist friendly - up Decatur, West on Esplanade, South on Royal, across to Decatur and then North to the end of the French Market. Nonetheless -- a LOVELY experience. It took a minute to find a groove for dancing while walking, especially to a brass band beat -- frankly this is one of the great, unique beats going; easily as attention grabbing and addictive as classic DC GoGo or Mississippi Hill Country blues if ya ask me -- but finally got it and just had a merry old time along with everyone else second-lining.

Amy appears at 1:33 on right hand side
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bt26yZXqlB4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8uQDxoNQzmg

we're at 1:08 to the far side, boogying
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uPNe72OnOeM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lBkY1O3SISU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3vhQxERT6Fg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ByiKzsXVcIw

There were moments when it seemed pretty surreal - a big old second-line of largely middle-aged white folks being cheered, photographed and filmed by their peers but also a significant number of black folks. Dunno what they made of it. They could have thought it was pretty funny, but then again I saw folks coming out of restaurant kitchens having a look and then start dancing along and shouting encouragement.

I'd like to think that this is part of a strange kind of transition. It's no big secret that the Louisiana State gov't was all to happy to see large swathes of New Orleans poorest neighhoods depopulated by The Flood and made no effort to try and repatriate those residents to their home. As people move back into New Orleans and more and more white, middle class bohemian types. Which of course aids the evisceration of the indigenous culture. EXCEPT for the fact that many of these immigrants hold that vanishing culture in high regard and would appear ready to do whatever's in their power to help perpetuate it. I'd speculate that this is not lost on the original inhabitants of New Orleans that remain or have managed to make it back and I'd like to think that they see that there're alliances to be made to everyone's advantage. Some of these white invaders are those people who'd most support initiatives to restore historically black neighborhoods like the 9th Ward, Treme, etc. That's an outsider's perspective. I could be wrong; undoubtedly I'm oversimplifying. Mea culpa. I hope y'all can see some positive intent beneath it all.

All that being said -- it was a GAS to be sashaying 2 miles sandwiched between two great bands. I could mainly hear the New Wave Brass Band and they were kicking it, hard! I'm surprised at how many selections I recognized.

When we finished all four of us retreated to the Market Cafe in the French Market. I think the ladies had fish and Tom and I split a Muffaletta. This of course is one of the signature dishes in New Orleans. The night before J.R. had mentioned that it was originally known as the "wop" sandwich - oh boy! But eventually Italians came to be treated more respectfully and they came up with Muffaletta. Basically this is a hoagie, sub, etc. but served on a big round loaf of crusty bread - basically a whole one would cover a small dinner plate. The key ingredient is a slightly, spicey, vinegary relish made with various pickled vegetables - the components vary from place to place. Green olives are a main ingredient in some places. Here it was carrots, peppers, cauliflower. In Philly the big downhome food controversy centers on who originated and who now makes the best cheese steak - Pat's on Passyunk has the best claim to originating it but there's a passionate division between folks who favor Pat's as opposed to Jim's (on South Street) or Geno's (near Pat's actually). In New Orleans there's various places claiming to make the best Muffaletta tho most agree that Central Market on Decatur is the originator -- tho I recently had a friend claim that Central Market is owned and operated by the same folks as own Frank's - a short distance down Decatur and thus their muffaletta is just as good though not commonly given the same glory.

Afterwards, we sauntered down Decatur to Cafe Du Monde for the usual. Today entertainment was provided by a brass band of 12 year olds. The performance was not great and it seemed that they floundered about trying to catch a groove. Nonetheless, very cool to see a buncha pre-teens working to master actual instruments, let alone brass (as opposed to sitting at home playing Guitar Hero) and learning a repertoire whose roots could likely be tracked back a century or more. And here's strange facet of New Orleans culture in full effect -- kids could be doing ANYTHING on their day off. There's certainly other part time jobs to be had that take a lot less training and discipline and are a lot more contemporary. That anyone chooses this option is kinda extraordinary.

Then it was back to the hotel for another nap until we headed off into the Arts District to do unspeakable things. After that...
Some friends took us deep into the Bywater to Bacchanal. This is a place that could ONLY exist in New Orleans. The main building seems like it was a garage or storage shed; it's just two big, low ceilinged rooms (painted concrete, plaster?). Decisively ramshackle. Rudimentary kitchen in the back room, front room covered in raw wooden racks full of wine bottles, one wall covered in second hand refrigerator cases, the last wall being a crude bar. Out back there's a buncha beat up looking tables and white resin chairs strewn around. Two piece band playing on a rickety wooden platform in one corner. Pretty humble looking.

ONLY - the wine selection is extensive, canny, adventurous and eminently affordable (Amy got a glass of dry Spanish sparkling wine - a wineglass full, not a flute - for $4.50). Meanwhile, if you walked out back, and hung a right you found a tent rigged up where you could order up entrees of beef shoulder with fingerling potatoes and seasonal vegetables or a roasted quarter chicken with braised greens and rice - $12 a plate! And granted, it was served on a paper plate but -- frankly this is fine cuisine on a par with any place with a maitre d up front and linen on the table. Teh cheese platters were impressive too -- nice selection of distinctive cheeses served with a variety of breads and crackers -- enough to fill up the kinda serving platter you'd bring out a turkey on.

We spent some quality time here, then got a ride home.

In the Land of Fleur di Leis 2

2010-12-15T04:28:00.000-08:00

Blundered through this day thru the mist of hangover. No doubt y'all no what that's all about so won't tediously belabor the point...
We caught a taxi out to Willie Mae’s Scotch House, on St. Ann in the Treme. Noted that the levelled projects are starting to be replaced by "mixed" income housing. That means developments built at one time by one developer but comprising a mix of building styles, serving different sized families. But all built from the same basic materials. So essentially an obvious simulation of an organically growing neighborhood with naturally occurring varied architecture. Still, I'm sure they're nice and if the gov't pointedly brings back the original inhabitants of the neighborhood it'll be all good.

Arriving at Willie Mae's we see that they've now installed a velvet rope outside to form a line; once you get in, you then get on the second line inside in the back room. We lucked out and proceeded directly to the second line and were seated in about 15 minutes. Lunch was as spectacular as we'd hoped - a big old platter of piping hot,crunchy,heavily crusted (distinctly salty but not obnoxiously so) Southern fried chicken, done to perfection as well as platter swimming in creamy butter bean puree. Yeah, easily the best fried chicken we eat all year tho it could be that what my pops used to whip up in his younger days might prove competition -- tho he didn't achieve the thickness and tastiness of coating that seems de rigeur here.

We taxied to the corner of St. Ann's and Rampart with the intention of visiting Congo Square -- where enslaved people's were allowed to meet, dance and recreate back in the bad old days. Yes, we should have done this 10 years ago but frankly, the richness of New Orleans culture, history and experiences on offer make it tough to really get to everything quick -- it takes time. Turns out that Louis Armstrong Park - wherein Congo Square resides, a little ways South of the main entrance - is closed for renovations; it'll re-open around the time of Jazz Fest. One of our local friends told us that it's been getting renovated for years now, being closed then opened then closed on an ongoing basis. I'll note that the temperature was in the low 70's F -- a delight for someone coming from the mid-Atlantic states where the temperatures had plummetted the day we took off for New Orleans.

Since we were already on Rampart Street it seemed a convenient opportunity to walk over to St. Louis Cemetery #1 off Basin Street. This is one of the old cemeteries in town and notorious for the acid trip scene shot for "Easy Rider" there -- which cause the immediate and eternal ban on further filming there by the Catholic Church which owns it. It's also the reputed final resting place of Marie LaVeux. Her name doesn't appear on the crypt in question but every tour guide and would be hoodoo practicioner obviously recognizes it as such. The crypt is covered in "XXX" and offerings of bottles of rum, wine, coins, beads etc. litter the ground in front. As we wandered about -- always a somber, calming experience -- came across another crypt that was even MORE heavily "XXX"ed than LaVeaux's with offerings of full glasses of wine, coins, beads and electronic hotel room keys piled up. As hoodoo practice is about practical, tangible results you hadda wonder who was interred here and what service the worshippers were hoping for: hotel keys?

Leaving St. Louis we walked across the French Quarter to Decatur Street and Café Du Monde. Yes, it's another touristy cliche -- but like many things like this there's a reason for it. Their coffee (with chicory) is simply my favorite; when I have a supply at home this is my weekend morning treat. Dark, distinctive, with a bit of acidic bite, but a lot of body. And the beignet's – as Amy says "Deep fried dough and powdered sugar; what's not to like?" The effect is like fresh zepoles or funnel cakes but lighter and somehow really not greasy - the accounts of Krispy Creme's history hold that their doughnuts are made with a beignet recipe acquired in New Orleans. The location is prime: it's beginning of the French Market, across the street from Jackson Square and St. Louis Cathedral with the Mississippi River behind it. People watching the folks streaming down Decatur Street (not to mention IN CDM itself) is always prime. The downside is that the place is pretty much packed 24-7; literally. The place is crowded, the ground (the bulk of the seating is outside on a huge covered patio)is covered in powdered sugar, spilled coffee and beignet scraps and usually thronged with pigeons looking for a meal. So...ya toughen up and enjoy.

Today, the Tornado Brass Band was playing out front to my great delight. Now I'll admit something right here; no doubt there's been brass bands outside Cafe Du Monde, or in Jackson Square or on Royal Street I've just passed by and ignored in years passed. Previously this all seemed a bit hokey and utterly contrived to appeal to tourists' sense of nostalgia. One of the gifts of "Treme" has been to give us some insight into the cultural engines that drive and have driven New Orleans. Of course the brass bands DO appear cute and old-timey and suggestive of simpler times to the out of towners (like me!) At the same time the urge to honor and preserve and make dynamic use of traditions like brass bands, Mardi Gras and such is a basic principle of local culture and has been for the odd century or so.

SO...the Tornado Brass Band played an estimable set, playing the modern standards of the genre (which I can now recognize from Rebirth Brass Band albums), as well as their adaptations of more pop tunes to this artistic mode -- following in the footsteps of Jelly Roll Morton and the like who likewise "jazzed up" church music, French dance tunes and blues and established the process we've called "Jazz" ever since.

Warm weather, live brass band music, warm doughnuts -- a nice trifecta of humble creature comforts.

After walking back to our hotel in the Business District we took a long nap. Upon waking we grabbed up cab up Magazine Street to Truckstop, a vintage men's clothes store run by J.R., former frontman for the late great Blackfire Revelation (imagine Blue Cheer playing MC5 songs -- yep, they were that good!) He's got a nice stock of vintage flannel and western shirts (I bought one embroidered with playing cards on front and with three desperadoes playing poker on the back), Frye boots and some new stock (the problem with vintage is -- most pieces are one of a kind and you never get one style/color in a selection of sizes). Cool place. All raw, red brick inside, decorated with vintage metal gas station signs, pinball machine and suchlike. Mecca to Southern boho types.

When the store closed we met up with J.R.s lady, Candice, who is the mastermind behind the Trashy Diva empire (multiple stores and locations in town, different store with different specialties - undies/corsets for instance) and their lovely little boy, Jackson. Drove over to Garden District Books which is located in a little mall on Prystania (Anne Rice used to have a shop in here) for a book signing by Sean Ysseult, former bassist of White Zombie/current leader of Rock City Morgue. She explained her raison d'etre for creating the book (basically, she pulled all her diaries and photo albums and such from storage to contribute to the book accompanying a White Zombie box set -- then Geffen did the most bare bones packaging possible), read some passages from the book (all very funny or poignant), and then signed anything anyone waved in front of her. In typical New Orleans style, there was a nice turn out from members of the community: club owners, folks from myriad local bands including Pepper Keenan late of Corrosion of Conformity, currently with Down.

Next we drove to MidCity for chow at Venezia. This is a big, noisey, family-style restaurant done up in a very 60's style of modern, ergo quaint. Decent prices, decent food (admittedly living across the Delaware from Trenton and 30 minutes North of Philly we're pretty blase about getting good Italian cuisine). Most fun was ordering a bottle of wine and some glasses at the bar and taking that out on the street to drink while we're waiting for our table -- drinking openly on city streets remains a source of ongoing amusement for us!

itselfbought coffee and beignet mix, bought a Saints at at Jackson Brewery. TGhere was a brass band playing in front of Café Du Monde while we were eating – bought their CD
Dinner with John and Candice – took taxi to John’s store Truckstop – which looked very cool – yakked a while, bought a western shirt from him.
Candice, John and Jackson drove to to Garden Book store – the mini mall that Anne Rice store used to be at for Sean Ysseult book signing – she talked a bit, read from the book and signed books.
Met Rik from Phantoms, owner of One Eyed Jacks and Pepper from COC
Then drove to Venezia in mid City on Canal Street – waited there a fairly long time – ok chow. Nice time talking. Candice thinking of opening a Trashy Diva in Austin. Her clothes are going to be used in True Blood again
They say to check out Tracey’s on Magazine Street - the original owners of Parasols (Parasols now owned and operated by folks from Florida)

Louisianna Bound pt 1

2010-12-08T07:26:00.000-08:00

I've spent this year obsessing over New Orleans - went in April and then "Treme" commenced at the same time so it was like not really leaving for a LONG time. The experience is hard enough to let go of normally, but being reimmersed on a weekly basis made it much much worse. Leading me to do some pointed investigating of NOLA music and culture starting with finally listening to the Jelly Roll Morton interviews recorded at the Library of Congress in the lat 30's. And with his powers as a raconteur, his utterly delectable voice and sultry piano playing underneath it all equalled FURTHER immersion - and this leading to some small appreciation of how a love of continuity and tradition flavors the local culture. If I might be so bold to venture -- one of the few places where the folks at the bottom of the capitalist economic strata have a genuine appreciation and love of their history and a will to propagate it. Once Republican administrations took music lessons out of public school (and the classical programs in public schools were THE breeding pools for just about all the greats of modern jazz; so what's the result of ELIMINATING those programs?...)

So I spent a lot of daydream time on the streets of New Orleans this year and finally, here we were.

Thursday, December 2
Arrived at Louis Armstrong Airport mid afternoon. It was largely deserted. I think ours was the only plane debarking at the time. So perhaps spooky, perhaps comforting as its a lot more tranquil than say Philly's airport.
Taxied to the Hilton on St. Charles which used to be The Monaco under the Kimpton aegis pre-Flood. And it's still much the same. Perhaps could be touched up here and there and it'd be nice to get HOT water, but overall, nice.
Then we walked over to the French Quarter and up Chartres Street to Napoleon House. This place was built in the 1700's, was intended as the hiding place for Napoleon if they coulda snuck him outta Europe but that never happened. As it noted in many places, not much has been done to update or upgrade the facilities in the centuries since. This is no re-creation of 18th century environs -- it's the real thang with things like electric lights and electric heaters basically added on as an afterthought as time's passed.
This is a ritual moment for us. Sit down, order a glass of wine and Pimm's Cup (for Amy) and a cheese board. Take a sip and just LET GO OF EVERYTHING ELSE in our lives. Here we are. The New Orleans charm and identity is as in your face as possible here. And all talk shifts to what we'll do in the days to come.
We walk out of here slightly buzzed (when I gave up regular boozing my tolerance plummetted - 2 glasses and I'm honestly good for the night!) and headed East to Decatur Street and Louisiana Music Factory. This is a great, beat up mom and pop record store that specializes in Louisana music (not that there's not other stuff as well). It's NOT the place to find Mystikal or any other No Limit releases but it's the only place I know of where you'll find SECTIONS devoted to Mardi Gras Indian chanting, New Orleans brass bands, and bin cards for the likes of Jelly Roll Morton and Kid Ory. After consultation with a friendly staffer we picked up

Jelly Roll Morton "Last Sessions"
Eureka Brass Band "In Rehearsal 1956"
Flaming Arrows "Here Come the Indians Now"
Storyville: The Naked Dance DVD

Now most of these you COULD find online, or via Amazon - the Morton is on UMG, the Storyville on Shanachie. Though at the same time, I've found stuff at this store's website that appeared no where else online - not even a mention at AllMusic. MORE IMPORTANTLY -- it's simply easier to DISCOVER music unknown to ye when you're digging through physical piles of records, especially when you've got knowledgeable record store staff there to advise you. There's certainly enough Jelly Roll Morton records available online but not easy to discern which one has the most vocal performances. Or brass bands...not only is the online selection spotty but not easy to figure out the BEST and EARLIEST recorded examples available via the Internet.
And frankly, I never would have thought to look for documentaries on the infamous NOLA red light district spontaneously but here we were looking for the music and there's the documentary on display. A neat way to make additional connections for the non scholars among us.

Swag in hand we sauntered over to Tom and Arion’s on Esplanade at the end of Quarter. These are folks we'd met online and had some mutual interests, or had known professionally for years, and only found out by accident that they'd moved to NOLA 6 weeks earlier. We got off Esplanade and into the nicely quiet streets of the Marigny and made our way to Frenchman Street, looking to chow at Adolfo's. Putting our name on de list we proceeded to have a jolly olde time just jawing away on the little bench outside the restaurant, sipping wine (no open container laws in New Orleans so easy enough to get a drink at a bar and take it outside). We were having such a good time that we didn't hear them call our names (if in fact they did!) so after about 1 1/2 hours we went next door to Yuki. Had more wine, some Japanese appetizers and then grabbed a taxi to Vaughan's which is deep in the Bywater (area North of the Marigny, which in turn in North of the French Quarter), almost in the 9th Ward. Thursdays are the night of trumpeter Kermit Ruffin's regular gig. Got there, settled in, more wine (generous portions to boot) and the band soon appeared and announced that Kermit was in NYC with Trombone Shorty (turns out this was a Red Hot AIDS benefit concert devoted to NOLA music), so we (ill advisedly in my case) quaffed our drinks and got another cab to a spot called Loveless. And here my memories fail me. No need to recount this -- y'all know what it's liked being trashed, kinda weaving while walking and speech slurred to the max. OY! But made it home all right and frankly the good fellowship and neighborhood cruising were well worth next day's hangover.

base consumerism

2010-11-27T05:05:00.000-08:00

I'll confess, for all my transcendental affectations, I'm still a creature of American consumer-culture. Ergo, I do occasionally derive overmuch pleasure and sense of accomplishment from just buying stuff. Sigh. Maybe I'll get in right in my next incarnation!

The place I indulge in this most exultantly is Positively Records in Levittown, PA. This is about a 15 ride away. It's tucked in a seedy little strip mall, and one that runs down a side street off New Falls Road. So as non-prime or hip a spot as you could imagine. But this place is heaven! Kind of beat up, rough around the edges and a tiny bit grimey. CDs and DVDs stacked and packed as tight as possible. The front counter is 6inches deep in DVD - so the counter surface is all DVD case spines. CD's are arrayed in a couple rows of bins and then a couple shelves about the bins and 3-4 rows BENEATH the bins. The selection is great if kinda erratic. If you're looking for any of the dozens of albums Fairport Convention have released since the 60's they're ALL here -- sometimes in pirated editions of things that are out of print. If you're looking for obscure death metal, garage rock, that's all here. No dance music, small reggae and hip hop sections. BIG used section (lotta current extreme metal in here as well loads of U2, etc.) But my favorite section is the cheapie bins - $2.99 titles. ANd there's a HUGE section and it does my corrupted heart much good just to go digging thru this. It's a wonderful opportunity to muse over the rise and fall of careers in the mad mad world of "pop" music and even of au courant underground music -- you'll find just about every Britney Spears record in here, NSync, etc. as well as stuff like Collective Soul, Hootie And the Blowfish, Semisonic and such. AND THEN...
*Screeching Weasel "Emo" - only given this a cursory listen so far but it's tuneful, noisey, spirited and I warrant every bit of rockin' fun as what's being written about in Alternative Press this month -- only these guys are 20 years or so older than what media pays attention to.
*Ashley Hutchings "The Guv'nor" Volumes 1 & 4 - of course this guy was a founding member of Fairport Convention and jumped ship when they got too rock and formed Steeleye Span and has kept leaving and forming bands on a regular basis; this series anthologizes work from throughout his career.
I grabbed these to hear his work with the Albion Band as that discography is a bit too daunting to want to tackle head on. I figured that the Fairport tracks I'd have -- but in fact as soon as "Some Sweet Day" kicked in it was noticeably NOT the version I already had on the Fairports BBC box - so I grabbed my other albums and - damn! - these are all previously unreleased recordings! So worth the price of the admission right there. Then I note that the Etchingham Steam Packet (his band with Shirley Collins) track is another unreleased gem. The bulk of the other cuts are all pretty prime whether they're unreleased or not. Clearly this guy is an auteur of the most puissant sort and galvanizes whoever falls into his clutches.
*J. Henry Burnett "The B-52 Band" - haven't cracked this yet but J. Henry's better known these days as T-Bone. This recording is from '72
*Godflesh "Pure" - I had something by these guys back in the day but dismissed 'em as Swans wannabees and occasionally do regret dumping the stuff that came into my paws when Earrache Records was being distributed by Columbia Records for a few years. Listening to the first few tracks -- I'll need more time. Big thumping beat, noisy guitars. Seems fine enough, but...
*Jesu "Silver" EP - more recent work by Justin Broadrick of Godflesh. Most folks have pegged that as ponderously slow, monumentally heavy slunge -- more Swans wannabee-ism? But this knocked me out. It's much more like shoegazery but with an admittedly HUGE, megalithic bass underpinning. Up top - there's a thick porridge of multiple guitars, keyboards and restrained vocals all doing their best to have THEIR melodic content be heard above the rest of the din. And no one wins that battle! Making the resultant stew all the more intoxicating.
*Ministry "Anomositisomina" - I know that conventional wisdom is that Al lost it after the album with the indecipherable title that starts with "NWO" but lemme tell ya my brothers -- t'ain't so. The brother's kept making distinctive, ass-kicking records subsequently -- the last few lovely in their bold-faced frontal attacks on George Bush Jr. And if the shock of innovation has worn off over the years...well, time to grow up and get over needing that as an essential part of your listening experience. Music's just music and context, expectation, career trajectory are just bullshit metrics made up by folks who don't have ears so they can say SOMETHING that makes 'em seem niscient without having to listen too close or too long.
GETTING TIRED so here's just a list
*Sinead O'Connor "The Lion & The Cobra" -- the introduction of weirdie war-whooping to pop vocabulary, or perhaps the reintroduction after Kate Bush backed out her careering and decided to make art at her own pace.
* Rolling Stones "Voodoo Lounge" - this is one I've owned and dumped. So the secret is -- EVERY Stones album that followed "Goat's Head Soup" has been touted as a "return" to a more ballsy, basic, rockin' Stones. Which seems strange. That implies that the preceding album, in turn was NOT ballsy, etc. So how can each be a return to something that they all seem to be embraced as? The answer is -- they're all pretty solid, ballsy, basic, rockin' -- it's just that NONE of them engender that initial shock of discovery that Stones albums had up to "Exile On Mainstreet" Largely because the generation that came of age with the Stones just grew out of that phase where this band crystalized their hopes, fears and sense of solidifying self.
*Al Anderson "Pay Before You Pump" - solo album from NRBQ's lead guitarist of yore. As you'd expect, great peppy, tuneful, rockin' songs -- but vocals are serviceable in a strained, shaggy dog kinda way.

THEN TWO I PAID FULL PRICE FOR
*Joanna Newsom "Have One On Me" - just curious. I loved her debut (which bespoke her inspiration by she-who's-name-cannot-be-spoken-by-hipsters -- MELANIE), Vs. just seemed rambley...so this is a triple CD for $20. what the hey.
PS now that I've listened - can't say there's anything here you can't find on a Kate Bush album. Nothing wrong with that. If you need a faux Kate Bush album.
*Metallica "Live At Grimeys" - 2008 live performance they're only selling through indie record stores. $9.99 (and I'm sure bigger indies sell it cheaper). Canny move by canny band/mgt. team. This is from one live show so they only had to pay for recording stuff for one show -- and being as this record store's in Nashville ya figger it wasn't an effort to find reasonable studio rentals. The booklet lists the albums that the studio versions appeared on -- so it's a nice retail sampler. They got the front page of Billboard Magazine without it being an advertisement. Probably boosting their street cred. And let's face it -- there's still a good million hardcore Metallica fans who's buy anything they put out. So chances are their net will be quite respectable as well.
PS this sounds fine. If you like Metallica you'll like this. I don't know that I'd trade it for "Binge And Purge" tho.

Mr. Cohen BACK in the day

2010-11-25T07:28:00.000-08:00

I've been watching "Bird On A Wire" Tony Palmer's film on Leonard Cohen's '72 tour. And I LOVE the music of course, but equally mesmerizing are the offstage moments - Leonard being interviewed, talking to band members, female admirers etc. - because his perspective and handling of EVERYTHING is couched in poetry.It's not pretentious at all and his language is not high falutin,' it's obviously geniunely the way he looks and deals with the world and that perspective is shocking in its beauty, wisdom, humility and perceptiveness. But actually you encounter that in ANY of the films made on Leonard ALL of which I'd recommend are worth viewing. And "Bird On A Wire" captures him being amazingly FUNNY - mocking his own image, making up songs onstage about the "tragic poet" and "skulls" being lowered from the rafters as stage props and so on.

Neville Alert

2010-11-20T06:47:00.000-08:00

I've written about Ivan Neville before, mainly in conjunction with his band Dumpstaphunk. I was touted their "Listen Hear" EP at the Louisiana Music Factory in April and was utterly, immediately smitten [check out this link of them playing there - CRUCIAL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zu_7d2fnPWk]. I've seen them twice since - both times at free festivals. There's no questioning the chops this band has or the passion they bring to their playing, but I must admit that the newer material they play live and recorded for their full length debut "Everybody Wants Sum" is not overly exciting to me -- a lot of it's expertly played jazz-funk, technically amazing but not especially engaging 'lessen yr drunk and dancing with a topless lady in the mud somewhere methinks.

Now I've picked up a couple live sets from past performances at Jazz Fest [which you can find here: https://www.munckmusic.com/wms/jazzfest/index.html] and noted that there were a number of songs they played in the past that have not turned up on either Dumpstaphunk release. Checking Amazon for Ivan Neville releases I noted that he recorded and released several solo albums before forming Dumpstaphunk. I've since picked up "Saturday Morning Music" a 2002 release and lo and behold the first two songs wound up as part of the early Dumpstaphunk repertoire - the very soulfully funky "What Do You Want From Me" and then "Ugly Truth" which is another soulfunk gem that presaged the best tracks on "Listen Hear." The latter has a great crunchy guitar hook that coulda come from a vintage Family Stone album or the Fishbone record that coulda followed "Reality of My Surroundings" if Kendall (the original guitar player and a key writer for the band) hadn't left the band for his dad's Jesus-cult. The track is almost worth the price of admission alone and if you can stand MP3 fidelity I'd advise ya buy a download immediately.

Tin Angels with Wings

2010-11-20T06:29:00.000-08:00

The last time the Chapin Sisters played Philly it was at the Green Line Cafe in West Philly. Small crowd, rudimentary sound system. Very intimate and DIY. It was Lily and Abigail's first touring and done without half sister Jessica who had recently left the group amicably to better focus on her roles as wife and mother. In the time since, the ladies have toured extensively, working as backing singers on tour with Harper Simon at the beginning of this year and then with She & Him throughout the Spring and Summer.

They've been touring as headliners since September and the release of their album "Two" - a reference to this being their sophomore release and their now being a duo.

As they took the stage at the Tin Angel (with mom and dad [Tom] Chapin in the house -- they'd driven down from Piermont NY to lend them a car to drive to East Coast dates with) it was clearly a much more seasoned Chapin Sisters. While they had not in any way becomed slicker or pat, they'd clearly picked up a lot experience and stage craft.

Abigail and her sister were obviously at home stage, joking between songs to cover tune-up time, sharing tidbits about their year of living on the road and otherwise engaging the audience's attention and never letting it slacken.

Their singing was powerful throughout with their harmonies being flawless and often quite daring. Rather than harmonies with simple, obvious intervals most often Lily would stake out the lower registers and sing in obvious counterpoint to Abigail's high flying vocals -- letting them pretty much cover the same amount of vocal territory as they had as a trio.

As usual one is struck by their writing - lots of catchy tunes but the lyrics consistently, dark, rueful, ironically witty. So you get a nice balance between the sweet and bitter as opposed to most other latterday Ladies of the Canyon who basically are spinning cotton candy through and through.

Pee? Oui!

2010-11-20T05:59:00.000-08:00

We went to the first night of preview performances of Pee Wee's Playhouse on Broadway at the Stephen Sondheim Theater. Mrs. W. is a BIG, longtime fan, owns the complete set of TV shows on VHS, has watched the original HBO special dozens of times (our personal dialect is richly seasoned with one liners taken therefrom), seen all the movies and have a respectable, not-quite-disturbing amount of merch on display or stuffed in crystallite tubs in the basement. There really was never a question of whether we'd go to this or not.

The production was a comfy mixture of elements from the HBO special with characters and bits from the TV mixed in as well as a certain amount of new material. There was a respectable amount of original actors returning to recreate their roles (Miss Yvonne! -- most lately seen as Charlie's dissolute mom in Every Day's Sunny in Philadelphia -- Jhombi, Mailman Mike)and the Playhouse set was likewise based on the original Groundling Theater set up but with the fuller realization that those visuals got on the network morning show.

From the moment Paul Reubens stepped on stage as Pee Wee it was clear that he was playing to the converted as the audience immediately broke out in frenzied applause. And in fact throughout the evening every time a familiar character made their first appearance the crowd went wild. Every familiar bit or verbal trope evoked tumultuous laughter. Lotta nostalgia involved and the production clearly was designed to speak to that. As the original stage show never played outside of L.A. it certainly was legitimate for an East Coast audience to be thrilled to actually be seeing this in the flesh. Still -- the L.A. production and the morning kids' show were genuinely innovative, cutting edge artistic statements, it was a little disappointing to see this work presented a comfy walk down memory lane, albeit a cool and definitely surreal memory lane.

Happily the new material that was worked into the show was strong and genuinely funny especially the sequence wherein Pee Wee gets online for the first time quickly becomes obsessed with acquiring as many Facebook Friends as possible.

What also kept the show lively and engaging was the minor slips and problems occurring as this was the first ever performance in front of a live audience at the Sondheim theater: at a point where Conky was supposed to hand Pee Wee the card with the Secret Word it, it'd slipped from the actor's hand and lay on the floor behind him, but Reubens noticed it on the floor, scooped it up and ad libbed without missing a beat. At another point the under skirt of Miss Yvonne's dress came loose and she deftly just tore it off and gaily tossed it away, again, without losing the rhythm of the show. Seeing the actors coping with these minor technical problems and thinking on their feet brought an added air of spontaneity to the production and a little edge of aesthetic danger that was one of my favorite parts of the show.

I did note that Reubens wasn't quite able to voice the Pee Wee character with all the high notes he was able to hit decades ago, but honestly, I think that once he's had a chance to live in the character a while that he'll adapt to his middle aged vocal cords and make appropriate adjustments with fine results.

Word is that after the month or so this production is slated to run on Broadway that Reubens starts production on a new Pee Wee film and on the basis of this show, I must say that my hopes are high.

Dulli Impressed

2010-11-20T05:37:00.000-08:00

Johnny Brenda's is the nicest place I've ever seen Greg Dulli play in Philly. Good sound, nice sight lines all around. Decent red wine at the bar. What more could you want? Absolutely NOTHING.

'cause Dulli's always got game no matter what format he presents himself in and honestly they're all pretty consistent in sound and concept and the variations hsbr little bearing on the final affect. You start with that sandblasted voice of his -- not the most tuneful out there but no worse than Dylan's or Hendrix's and he's always been canny enough to be able to coax something moving and memorable from it.

This was touted as a solo acoustic tour and indeed instrumentation tonight was himself and Craig Rosser on acoustic guitars, Rick Nelson on violin and cello and a percussionist. But both guitars were plugged into FX boxes so you got the full rockin' assault Twilighters and Whigs fans are accustomed to with acoustic textures broken out when appropriate. Additionally, one of Dulli's trademarks is to construct a wall of sound wherein the end product is somehow bigger and grander than the sum of its parts and tonight's set was no exception. By the time they hit
"Bonnie Brae" your brain had adjusted to the smaller line-up and the overall effect didn't really seem significantly different from what he would have whipped up with a 5 or 6 or 8 piece ensemble.

Nice set list - drawing from Twilight Singers and Gutter Twins albums as well as the Afghan Whigs including covers from the "She Loves You" set and more recent additions.

This definitely whetted my appetite for the new Twilight Singers album due out next year!

Swans stuff

2010-10-13T14:41:00.001-07:00

Swans' Michael Gira meets Steve Buscemi backstage at Brooklyn Masonic Temple
and there's a buncha killer new live videos from the just completed US tour you'll find at http://www.youtube.com/user/howlinwuelf in the Swans playlist
this one's my favorite!
http://www.youtube.com/user/howlinwuelf?feature=mhum#p/c/9C200FC7C253B12F/21/wXTvsSR5_r0

random dithering

2010-10-08T06:42:00.000-07:00

1) I'm sitting here listening to Robbie Basho's "Venus In Cancer" for the first time and am powerfully struck by how much Antony Hegarty of Antony and the Johnsons resembles Basho vocally -- the selfsame soaring, tremelo heavy choir boy voice. And no shame in that. Not like Antony was copping from Nick Lachey

2) RL Burnside -- I am SUCH a bandwagon jumper on this one. It was only when I was working a project or two for Fat Possum and they sent me a care package that I was hipped to their roster of Mississippi Hill Country worthies including the late Mr. Burnside. I contented myself with "Burnside On Burnside" and "First Recordings" for a long while -- and those are both PRIME! Eventually I purchased "Ass Pocket Of Whiskey" and all too soon found the obtrusive presence of Jon Spencer (whose Blues Explosion provided backing here) a bit too much to take and moved that down to the basement archives. I picked up "Too Bad Jim" and that was another great one! Recently found used copies of "Come Right In" and "A Bothered Mind" and both wound up being frustrated listening. Each has a couple great tracks of RL solo or with a band throwing down, but the majority of tracks feature "remixes" with various folks taking stabs of creating tracks using the odd Burnside sample.

In the documentary "You Don't Know My Mind" Fat Possum owner Matt Johnson counters complaints from Blues "purists" about these efforts of updating RL for the wider marketplace - saying there's not enough Blues purists to support releases like that. And I do believe there was intent to raise RL's earning power (there's a great sequence where Johnson advise RL to contact social services and have them stop sending benefits checks as he was earning much too much from record sales and performances to qualify -- but RL ain't having none of that!) but -- jeez, these experiments just stink! Neither fish nor fowl and they totally dilute the power of the essence of Burnside's art, the hypnotic/obsessive riffing, that strange, rolling Hill Country beat - that whiskey-scorched voice!

Swans songs Philadelphia 9/29/2010

2010-09-29T09:38:00.000-07:00

Swans' set list from opening date of U.S. tour, the Trocadero, Philadelphia, PA 9/28/2010

No Words/No Thoughts (from My Father Will Guide Me Up A Rope To the Sky)
Your Property (from Cop)
Sex God Sex (from Children Of God)
Jim (from My Father Will Guide Me Up A Rope To the Sky)
I Crawled (from I Crawled 12")
My Birth (from My Father Will Guide Me Up A Rope To the Sky)
Beautiful Child (from Children Of God)
Eden Prison (from My Father Will Guide Me Up A Rope To the Sky)

This set list perhaps explains my shock and delight at this first Swans performance in some 13 years at Philadelphia's Trocadero. A nice chunk of their excellent new album and a healthy helping of earlier songs from their distinguished canon. When I saw them at The Ritz at the time "Greed" came out, and then at the Mercury Lounge touring behind "Soundtracks For The Blind" my experiences (no doubt clouded by alcohol!) were that Swans tours were to showcase live recasting of their current body of work. So this set was a surprise, and one I'm certainly not complaining about! I honestly didn't expect to see the magnificent "Sex God Sex" performed live again in my lifetime (been experiencing a lot of reverse deja vu these days!)

The reactivated Swans consists of:
Michael Gira / guitar / voice
Norman Westberg - guitar
Christoph Hahn - lap steel guitar
Phil Puleo - drums, percussion
Chris Pravdica - bass
Thor Harris - drums, percussion, vibes, curios, etc etc...

...and they made a mighty noise! It wasn't the monolithic, impossibly dense, impossibly loud SLAB of legend... it was leaner, more economical and more focussed. And STILL accomplished what the mightiest Swans live performances also have -- creating an immersive sonic enviroment that can allow the audience to encounter trance states, hopefully tending towards the ecstatic. A number of songs might remind one of Gira's participation in some of Glenn Branca's early guitar symphonies (and Michael played on his "Symphony no. 3")but more powerfully recalled the live versions of the repertoire from "Soundtracks For the Blind" - the Swans at their most symphonic.

Other songs traded heavily in crushing beats driven home by Harris and Puleo smashing into their kits double-fisted and in tandem buttressed by throbbing bass guitar chords voicing primal, jagged riffs. Yes, it was heavy. Yes, heads were banged.

I came to this show not knowing what to expect but honestly it wasn't what I encountered -- which was far better than anything I could have dreamed up!

Phunkin in Camden NJ

2010-09-29T09:21:00.000-07:00

So yes, I have an unhealthy obsession with New Orleans' Dumpstaphunk. Got both their regular released records, some of the downloads of live sets from Jazz Fest (I likes 2008 and 2006 especially well) and such. And yes, I've complained on numerous occasions about the lack of opportunities to see them 'round these parts (how killer would it be for them to play John & Peter's in New Hope - you KNOWS Dean Ween would be sitting in on that shit!) And yes, I likes 'em enough to actually check their website every couple weeks (fug, I don't even check my own website that often!) So I go on the website -- note that they haven't changed anything on it since April 2010 and proceed to the one area they do update - the tours. As usual, no Philly date but...they're playing the Camden Backyard BBQ, on Labor Day weekend, for FREE! Their site says they go on at 6PM, the festival's site says the thing starts at 2PM.

To make a long story short, we drive down and get there at 5PM, find a schedule taped to the sound booth and discover they're on at 9PM (making us glad that we didn't take the Light Rail from Trenton as originally planned as the last train North leaves at 9:01PM - OY!) We thought to bring lawn chairs not knowing what seating arrangements would be (good thing too as there were some bleachers kinda far back and everyone else was flopped on the grass -- and 5 hours of sitting on the ground ain't kind to my back no more). But didn't think we could sneak in wine...tho obviously the cannier folks attending were hip to that fact and enjoying a bit of tippling while they sat through acts like The Radiators (yawn), Marcia Ball (good pipes, clearly loves what she's doing but I don't know that white ladies oughta be singing about chawing watermelon in Camden) and enjoying the view: the festival was right on the banks of the Delaware River with a gorgeous view of the Philly cityscape. Perfect weather too - balmy.

We killed some time by trying to get some chow. We waited on line at the one BBQ kiosk (tho festival organizers had advertised food vendorS, and it was a BBQ... the alternatives were a hot dog/hamburger stand and a funnel cake/french fries stand) for an hour -- and having reached the counter were told that chicken wouldn't be ready for another 20 minutes and to come back to the front of the line then. The wait wound up being another hour! And that chicken WAS good -- just not that good.

Finally Dumpstaphunk hit the stage and pretty much reprised their set in DC. Clearly the "Listen Hear" repertoire has been retired from the live set which is kinda disappointing but then again I shoulda been paying attention to these guys in 2007!

Cooked power

2010-09-29T08:45:00.000-07:00

I seen Iggy & The Stooges at Max's Kansas City back in the 70's. A mighty fine show and one that's one of my golden standards for a great gig.

The second version of the reborn Stooges - with James Williamson stepping in on guitar since Ron Asheton's untimely death a few years ago - started playing big festivals abroad at the beginning of this year (maybe late last year) and this Summer began playing headlining shows in the U.S. I was thinking of seeing them at ATP over Labor Day weekend, tho dreading the festival-goer traffic compounded by the holiday weekend traffic. So I was exceedingly relieved to find them gigging in Atlantic City - a scant hour and a half from the greater Trenton area we call home.

The show being on a Friday in late August, we left mid afternoon to avoid weekend shore traffic and made good time. We checked into the Sheraton there (even buying the hotel room thru Priceline.com it was NOT cheap and it's easy to see why AC's tourist business ain't thriving during this recession -- TOO EXPENSIVE), crashed for a while, then walked through the phalanx of name brand outlet stores that line the route from the Convention Center to the boardwalk; as Stooges bass player mike watt might opine: BOUJ!

After winding our way thru the strategically designed maze of some casino (they're MEANT to keep you walking in circles from slot machine to gaming table and back of course) to the beach and strolled to the House of Blues which is at the far Northern end of the boardwalk. It's a trippy little trip with your typical slightly seedy South Jersey shore shops and pizza joints interspersed between the huge facades of the various themed casinos. Being accustomed to the Northern beaches -- and Wildwood which invests considerable resources in maintaining their beachfront -- ACs is kind of a shock -- a TINY sliver of sand; standing on the boards you could chuck a nerf ball into the ocean.

The House of Blues is your typical establishment swimming in faux culture -- made to look elegantly run down and funky; why not. I've seen gigs in far worst places.

So the Stooges take the stage and immediately start kicking serious ass pulling out the classic tunes from "Raw Power" - one of the great rock (as opposed to rock 'n' roll) albums ever in my book (and I know this is not an esp. unique or novel position). I've seen Iggy a number of times over the year and listened to the bulk of his solo work...one of the most immediately striking things about this performance is that he's obviously authentically invested in it, feeling it and believing in what he's doing. And when Iggy's into it, he's one of the greatest rockers out there. There were times when he appeared to be consciously "performing," doing his Iggy act, pulling the poses and routines that the audience came expecting/hoping to see. But there were as many times when he was clearly grooving on his bandmates, inhabiting the truth of the lyrics he was singing and basically being the primal gas-gas-gas his legend is based on.

No doubt having this band to work with makes this task viable. Scott Asheton remains one of the definitive drummers of the Detroit high energy school of rock. James Williamson's guitar was concise and explosive. By leaving music and carving out a successful job in the square-john world (something to do with Sony's computer shit), has allowed him to avoid the ennui and cynicism that he might have developed if he'd spent that time going to thru the motions trying to eke out a career in music with ever diminishing returns. mike watt -- to my mind -- is the perfect bassist to complete the equation. Technically dazzling -- one of those guys who can translate what's in his head directly to his fingers -- his love and reverence for the Stooges's legacy channels all that expertise into playing what those songs need i.e. some of the greatest hard rock riffing the world's ever known (courtesy of the late great Ron Asheton who played bass on the "Raw Power" songs) delivered in a state of utter ecstasy. Watching watt playing, clearly entranced by Iggy, then Scott, then James was a lovely treat. Oh yeah, Steve Mckay, saxist from Fun House was present and accounted for too.

Besides playing the "Raw Power" repertoire, they played songs from the first two albums (Ronnie refused to play the "Raw Power" stuff -- STILL miffed at being demoted to bassist, tho honestly - he was far more proficient on the 4 strings in my opinion) as well as songs written before, during and after the "Raw Power" sessions like "Johanna" which was especially thrilling to me as I never expected to hear any of those songs played live during my lifetime, ESPECIALLY not by the Stooges themselves. (yes, I know Iggy's played "I Gotta Right" as a solo artist over the years)

All in all -- a great night!

phunkin in DC

2010-09-29T07:30:00.000-07:00

I've spent much of the Summer obsessing over New Orleans music, FINALLY gaining some small appreciation for its diversity and also the interrelationship between the various indigenous styles that've coexisted there over the past century or so. One of it's aspects that emerged as key and quite unique to this musical history is a continued respect for tradition and a desire to preserve and cultivate it -- while also innovating within it -- and that goes right back to Jelly Roll Morton and contemporaries like Buddy Bolden, Sidney Bechet, and then continues on thru the likes of Rebirth Brass Band, DJ Jubilee et al.

I've majorly obsessed over Dumpstaphunk, a band led by Aaron Neville's son Ivan Neville - whose played keyboards with an interesting range of people including Keith Richards and of course the Neville Brothers. Checking on their website: http://www.dumpstaphunk.com/ (you should visit - once you enter it automatically plays a series of great live recordings -- I love the fact that the top item on their news board reads: "The newest feature of our message board is that it is now 100% pornography free!!") I bemoaned the apparent lack of regular touring that'd bring 'em close to Trenton or Philadelphia (my primary stomping grounds nowadays).

I was preparing for a trip to Baltimore and a visit to young Wuelf in Rockville, MD and trying to work the day job double-hard so I could afford the day off this would entail. It was BLAZING hot and I succumbed to turning on the air conditioner in my office, which only is effective if I shut the room's door- cutting me off from the stereo in the next room. So's I visit http://www.dumpstaphunk.com/ to use their sound feed for background music, casually look at their tour dates - and see they're playing a free show at the Museum of the American Indian in DC the same weekend we were planning on visiting!

That weekend, we planned too busy an itinerary leaving minutes to spare to go from city to city, event to event. And to make an overlong story slightly shorter -- we got stuck on the dreaded Metro waiting at Woodley Park station for 20 minutes with no indication that we'd ever start moving again. So at the time Dumpstaphunk were scheduled to start playing, we bolted out of the subway, hailed and taxi, burned rubber and arrived about 30 minutes late. The area looked utterly deserted and I feared we'd missed their set, but as we neared the Museum, funky sounds started slipping around its corner and as we closed in we could see the overflow of crowd spilling out onto the street.

It was a glorious set up - a lovely late afternoon in late Summer in the courtyard of the Museum, fountain bubbling off to one side of the stage helping to cool the breezes blowing over the audience, lovely golden glow bathing the stage. And Dumpstaphunk throwing down in fine style!

They concentrated on tunes from their new album "Everybody's Wants Sum" which tend to be jazzy instrumentals or more straightforward soul as opposed to the rock inflected P-Funk of their debut EP "Listen Hear." These guys are all world class players -- but who evince that not by instrumental pyrotechnics per se (tho there was some of that at some points) but by the effortless grace of their playing; they were clearly totally engaged with the meaning and feeling of their music, not having to give conscious thought to their playing. Hard to ignore that they're Ivan and the two bassists are also powerful and distinctive vocalists and no slouches at tight, soulful harmony singing.

They closed the show with a hot ready of Sly's "I Want to Take You Higher" joined by all the Native American performers they'd shared the bill with and then of the Rolling Stones' "Miss You" - frankly the best version I've heard live or on record. This show was video'ed and you can view it here:
http://wn.com/2010_Living_Earth_Festival_Concert__Bill_Miller,_Stevie_Salas,_Murray_Porter_Dumpstaphunk

Chapin Sisters at the Living Room

2010-08-03T05:43:00.000-07:00

There were a lot of comments about the heat and humidity at the Living Room last night - but hell, it's Summer! And the Living Room, is a comfy, lived-in kinda venue and you expect it not to be a highly artificial, climate-controlled enviroment. Honestly, I prefer situations that are what they is and is in synch with the seasons and the time of day etc rather than some abstracted, homogenized version of "ideal conditions."And oddly enough, last time I saw the Chapin Sisters at the Living Room it was back in early Spring during a freak heat wave, so the temperature thing seems like a tradition already!

Since that last show, Lily and Abigail have logged in MANY woman-hours singing on big stages as backing singers for She & Him. And the road work has paid off handsomely. They had lovely, expert voices to begin with - developed from years of singing together, and that within the context of a highly musical family of jazz players and folk revival singer/players including their Grammy Award winning pops, Tom, and their late uncle, Harry. Pretty much constant gigging with She & Him and then opening for them in their own right, playing their own headlining dates etc. has honed their vocal abilities to awesome levels of expertise.

In the Chapin Sisters, Abigail and Lily (and their half sister Jessica early on), tended towards the ambitious in structuring their vocal harmonies; their command of the basics is authoritative and this leaves them hungry for challenge. Their melody lines start standard and sweet then swing to more daring territory - high, wild and free. Last night they attempted a lot of pretty nervy singing, jumping octaves, running thru all sorts of tricksy harmonic intervals and nailing each and every one with stunning power.

They begin with a very cool combination of Abigail's higher, brighter voice and Lily's lower and duskier - so they cover a lot of melodic and timbral ground even with just two voices. They introduce further variety by starting out a capella on "Sweet Light" (from the upcoming album "Two"), both picking up acoustic guitars (which they tend to pick rather than strum -- owing to the old folkie traditions they grew up saturated in), Lily occasionally putting down her guitar to wield a tambourine or banjo.

After rendering songs from their debut "Lake Bottom LP" they did up their bravura acoustic reading of the Britney Spears' hit "Toxic" -- Abigail mightily impressive with purty courageous vocal acrobatics -- followed by Doc Watson's "Long Journey." This is the firt time I'd seen 'em tackle, "Toxic" -- originally recorded at the urging of their brother Jonathan Craven as a lark -- won them the attention of KCRW and other radio programmers right at the outset of their career and it was a treat.

Eventually they brought out a rhythm section including Gang Gang Dance drummer Jesse Lee who co-produced "Two" and a stand up bassist -- a nice complement to their sound.

The Chapins ended the set with "Digging A Hole," a stand out track from "Two" that is typical of their ouevre -- minor key melody, mid-tempo beat -- lyrics that evince romantic fatalism, but from the viewpoint of women who don't fear being alone rather than putting up with an unsatisfactory relationship. Some of their songs are forthright kiss offs, bidding their guy to leave and find someone who'll love 'em. Others document indulgence in a temporary fling owing to a little too much booze, or a brief respite from isolation or even just caprice. You sense these ladies are fans of love and romance but not at the expense of other matters as or more important to them.

This could have been more detailed but after the show we headed around the corner to San Loco and had some great chow and I had one of their lethal sangria's -- clearly red wine, fruit and some serious LIQUOR.

Channelling Chilton set list

2010-07-31T05:20:00.000-07:00

Glenn Morrow, who curated the Channelling Chilton tribute show and benefit for Gulf Coast Recovery along with Stephanie Chernikowski, has valiantly offered to supplement my swiss-cheese-like recall by sending a detailed set list:

Kangaroo- Chris Stamey, Sondre lerche, Laura Chilton, Jeremy Chatzky, Anton Fier, Elenore(?)

Yo La Tengo (Ira, Georgia, James)
Take Care Yo la tengo
Windows Hotel-Yo La Tengo
My Baby Just Cares For Me-Yo la Tengo
Bangkok-Jon Spencer w/Yo la tengo
Rock Hard-Jon Spencer w/Yo la tengo
Rubber Room-Alan Vega w/ Yo la tengo
Dreambaby Dream-Alan Vega w/Yo la Tengo

Boxtops (Bill Cuningham, gary talley w/Terry manning and Richard Dworkin
Free Again-Bill
Choo Choo Train-Terry Soul Deep
Neon Rainbow Gary
Cry Like A Baby- Gary
The Letter- gary

Doug Garrison and Rene Coman (with Gary and Fran)
Walking In The Rain Ronnie Spector and a cast of thousands
Baby You're Okay Ronnie Spector Fran Kowalski et al.
Guantanamerika with Marshall Crenshaw
Dalai Lama-Marshall Crenshaw
Little GTO- Marshall Chrenshaw
Tinaninanoo- Danny Kroha of the Gories
Downs-Lesa Aldridge Chris Stamey
Jesus Christ Lesa Aldridge Chris Stamey

Big Star (Jon Auer, Jody Stephens, Chris Stamey, Gene Holder, Terry Manning)

In The Street-Chris Stamey
When My Baby's Beside Me- Terry Manning Back of A Car-Jon
Way out West--Jody
Night time- Evan

Thirteen-Jon and Bill (bass) terry
Ballad of El Goodo Sondre Lerche w/Jon
Blue Moon-Jody
September Gurls Jon Auer
Alex Chilton-Jesse Malin

Channelling Chilton

2010-07-29T07:42:00.000-07:00

I might well have devoted a decade to two to abject worship of the works of Alex Chilton. I actively pursued serious TMI about LX at a time before computers, cell phones etc. So this was a community effort that functioned via letters written on paper and sent via USPS, strategically placed "long distance" phone calls and the like. And it was a nice community wherein most folks shared a taste for music that was economical, tuneful yet spiked subtley ambitious rhythmic or melodic ploys and knowing lyrics. Through this I got to know a bit about the odd and persistently rebellious arts community that's persisted in Memphis for decades and made various levels of acquaintance with some of the people involved - The Grifters, Gus "Tav Falco" Miller, Elizabeth Hoehn nee Leesa Auldredge, Randall Lyon, Jody Stephens and yes, Mr. Chilton. I highly recommend you try and research the "Dream Carnival." A wonderful point of entree into the saga of Memphis underground art scene.

I did see Big Star at Max's Kansas City in the early 70's (I know that if EVERYONE that's claimed to be at those shows had been the place woulda been packed instead of empty), saw the reformed Big Star play at the Austin Music Hall a couple years ago. When I lived in DC and was playing in Half Japanese we (the rhythm section) got a call at home asking if Panther Burns could crash at our apartment and after ascertaining that Alex WAS in the line-up of course we welcomed them. It wound up being a short visit tho in that after a short while, Alex asked if anyone had any pot -- we didn't, but a mutual friend who was hanging out with us was more than glad to drive Alex someplace where they could obtain it -- and that's the last we saw of him until Panther Burns hit the stage the following night.

This is all offered to put the following in context.

We attended the Channelling Chilton concert benefitting Gulf Coast recovery last night at City Winery (as Mrs. W. sez -- a rock club DESIGNED for old people! -- that meant approvingly!).

Glenn Morrow (owner of Bar None Records and an intergral part of the NY/NJ avant pop scene for some 3 decades now) and photographer Stephanie Chernikowski (noted NYC photog who'd snapped some highly iconic shots of LX back when he was mingling in the early NYC "punk" scene) company did themselves proud. We didn't really know what to expect from this -- my expectations were not high actually, but...

The show was very cleverly arranged in segments, each broadly addressing different distinct phases in Chilton's musical career and each featuring a different house band augmented by other singers and musicians. I gotta say upfront that I didn't try to keep track of all the players so can only indicate personnel very spottily.

The opening segment was devoted to Alex's most overtly avant-garde phase -- the work he did with his NYC band The Cossacks, other work from that time, and work done with friends made during that time. Performances and backing were provided by Yo La Tengo who's lead singer Ira Kaplan had been witness to Cossacks performances back when he was writing for the East Village Eye and other publications. They rendered a properly heavy hitting version of Alex's abstract-garage rock masterpiece "Bangkok" with Blues Explosion's Jon Spencer singing lead, the unreleased Cossacks' gem "Windows Hotel" among others. Then Alan Vega came out to render Porter Wagoner's "Rubber Room" (which LX had recorded for Black List -- I think) and Suicide's "Dream Baby Dream" (which the pair recorded with Ben Vaughn).

The following section looked at this works with the Box Tops and featured BT bassist Bill Cunningham and Terry Manning, a veteran Memphis musician who'd known Alex from childhood among others. With lots of wry remembrances of the the comments Chilton made during Box Tops performance during the 60's and then during more recent times, all present acquitted themselves quite nicely on chestnuts like "The Letter," "Cry Like A Baby," "Soul Deep" and lesser known numbers like "Neon Rainbow" ("our psychedelic pop hit") Lotta warmth, lotta love in evidence throughout the performance.

Chris Stamey and keyboardist Fran Kowalski (from Trenton!) among others addressed songs from Big Star's noir-classic "Third" aka "Sister Lovers" with Leesa Auldredge (one of the sisters referred to in the album title) guesting on vocals on "Downs" (not included on the original album, but cut from the same cloth) and "Jessus Christ."

...this is where things get a little fuzzy thanks to back to back glasses of an indifferent Malbec and the house Pinot Noir...

Then a big old batch of folks came out to address the notorious Feudalist Tarts/No Sex/High Priest phase -- blues covers, jokey loose-limbed R&B flavored groaners like Slim Harpo's "Ti Na Nee Na Noo," the original "Dalai Lama" and then a 50's style ballad, an otherwise undocumented (even in the bootlegs) Cossacks' song "Baby You're Okay" which eventually morphed into "Like Flies On Sherbet" The lyrics are supposedly about Lux Interior - sez Glenn)with Ronnie Spector guesting on vocals alongside Kowalski.

The show ended with the classic Big Star repertoire rendered by Jon Auer (of the Posies and reformed Big Star), Jody Stephens, Chris Stamey, Gene Holder (Stamey's mate in the dBs) and Kowalski along with Terry Manning. Sondra Lerche guested on lead vocals on a number or two (I wasn't taking notes -- damned if I can remember which ones!)

I must admit that this is the part where I got the goosebumps and started to choke up especially when Jody mentioned the recent death of Big Star's original bassist Andy Hummel, a lifelong friend, and then did Andy's composition "Way Out West." Another stand out of this mini set was Jody's poignant lead vocal on "Blue Moon" from "Sister Lovers."

The show ended with Jesse malin performing the Replacements' paen to Alex "Big Star." A perfect touch with it's ironic refrain "children by the millions think of Alex Chilton" - IF ONLY.

I've skipped a buncha stuff (Ronnie doing "Walking In The Rain," The Gories' Danny Kroha covering "Little GTO," Evan Dando doing a solo spot, but hopefully you get the gist. (PS - I've updated this according to info from Glenn and then checking out the Billboard review)

Stooges at Max's Kansas City

2010-07-07T05:56:00.000-07:00

...they started out loud and fast and thick and visceral. The point was the group sound and it's cumulative emotional wallop more so than the playing or parts of any given player. And still -- Ron Asheton's bass playing was phenomenal - it came forth as rolling thunder, like a tank's treads forcibly chewing through or over any and all terrain. Ron was fast but focussed. Fit a lot of notes in but fit 'em into densely compacted riffage that could carry a song all by itself. In fact on the live disc of the new Stooges box set it practically does that -- being the highest thing in the mix next to Iggy's vocal. Having heard how Ronnie hated playing second fiddle to Williamson I'm suring he's smiling at the irony of Williamson's reuniting with the Stooges being heralded by -- a testament to his bass playing!
James Williamson's guitar work - especially the rhythm playing - was gutteral but wonderfully articulated. Thinking back on it you, can see what ideas came outta The Who and Rolling Stones but were ingeniously refined, retaining the essence of the blues and R&B in shaping and beat but trying to move beyond obvious reference points.
That Rock Action was able to effectively anchor this electronic stringed maelstrom was an achievement any drummer should be in awe of.
And Iggy...it actually took a couple years of listening to his "5'1" before it dawned on me that the dude's a midge. That night he appeared enormous, lithe, primal. Someone experiencing the electrocutional thrill of the life force raging through his corporeal self 100%.
He sang he heart out. He walked thru the crowd balancing on the backs of the folding chairs we were seated in. He leaned right on down into folks' faces howling "penetraaaaaaaate me!" (my friend, the late, great gay essayist Ted Witomski tried oblige by putting a cigarette out on his torso but I dissuaded him).
I must admit -- they didn't quite look right. Iggy was fine shirtless, black Speedos, thigh high boots and Ronnie fit in with his WWII outfit, but James' glitter-tat (no doubt bought by a Mainman stylist at some pricey London boutique) was a bit too precious for the sound they was puttin' down.
Fair to say, this sticks in my mind as one of the great shows I've seen in my lifetime (other would be Ramones at CBs in 75, Big Star at Max's in 73/74, Jeff Buckley at T-Bird cafe in Red Bank, Minor Threat at the 9:30Club in '81...I could go on: PS if any of these years are wrong, I'm sorry about that. Too hot to go and research)

my9:30space

2010-06-09T06:10:00.000-07:00

Washington D.C.'s 9:30 Club must mean many things to many people. It's existed in two different incarnations since its inception. Currently it's a well respected venue-brand, located at "U" Street NW with good sound sytem, nicely appointed and with wise booking policies.

Before that...best to set the scene...

When I moved to DC in 1975 I was kinda heart broken. I was born and raised across the Hudson River from Manhattan in Jersey City. Throughout my youth I took the subway under the river to NYC to buy records (at EJ Korvette's at Herald Square), help produce a radio show (on WBAI-FM, called "Watkin's Rock," an hour long trifle hosted by a hi school chum who's dad taught me to work the turntables and tape machines), and just bum around 14th Street. But it'd never seemed that cool. But in 1974 rumblings of the "loft scene" started showing up in the Village Voice - shows put on outside of the club circuit by exotic sounding artists like Television and Patti Smith. Then this place called "CBGB's" opened up and that sounded even cooler. All this seemed like a the realization of the rocktopian vision promulgated by Creem magazine, then the Bible for troublemaking music upstarts the world over; aka "punk." So NOW I gotta move hundreds of miles to this pretty but dead-assed town! It really did irk me.

The short version of what I found is -- cover band clubs that'd tolerate punk rockers on an off night that'd be dubbed "punk night" (ala The Keg), original music clubs that you could book into occasionally (The Childe Harold, Psychedelly) and various one-off gigs -- either test runs for some down-at-the-heels bar considering instituting a "punk night" (sigh), or someone would get ambitious and set up a show at a Knights of Columbus Hall or high school gym.

The shows were always exciting to play and attend, to see a community starting to crystallize was heartening...but it was always so draining to have to constantly be hustling, and then have to function within a cultural context that was tolerant at best and often mildly inimicable.

In the mid 1970's, the 900 block of "F" Street NW was decisively on the seedy side. Further up the street you had a few big, fancy department stores that'd survived the flight of many retail businesses to the suburbs (following the white middle class population), probably by virtue of custom -- they were where you HADDA shop for special occasions like Christmas, wedding anniversary etc. At the far northern end of the street you had the Treasury building. But around 930 "F" street you had a number of small, not especially reputable looking businesses. Ergo, real estate was cheap. So some old cat (his name escapes me now) took over the Atlantic Building and started running a restaurant in it, focusing on the lunch business -- FBI HQ was a block or two away as was one of the big art galleries, the Treasury etc.

Somehow, one of the local underground musicians met up with this gent and inveigled him to let the band he was developing practice in the basement in return for them performing occasional shows in the restaurant area in hopes of attracting some music lovers into making the trip down to "F" Street and drumming up some additional bar business. The price was right!

This was the Atlantis Club and while there were eventually some cool shows there (Pere Ubu, Cramps, Real Kids), there was always a level of tension between the venue management and the patrons -- management really didn't understand the cultural matrix that was trying to gel and didn't really like us overmuch. At times it got outright ugly. But that's a whole other story. Leave it suffice -- the underground music scene was still being tolerated for what revenue it could produce.

Then the Atlantic Building got sold and the Atlantis Club closed. Word was that it was being remodeled...

What Raw Power meant to me

2010-05-26T06:30:00.001-07:00

Having acquired and then begun listening repeatedly and regularly to "Raw Power" I began to do what research I could on this band and their frontman. I read about him in that acme of great rock 'zines Creem Magazine (who's function as an engine of positive societal/cultural change has yet to be approximated, let alone matched). I joined the fan club (I still have the materials I rec'd in the mail - some postcards: Iggy with his dick out I thinks; a xeroxed newsletter). I sought out and purchased copies of the first two Stooges album; in '73 these had already become relatively collectible -- I think I bought "The Stooges" and "Fun House" on different occasions at Cheap Thrills in New Brunswick, NJ for about $10 each -- very price for a broke ass college student. But a sound investment nonetheless.

Suddenly it was announced that the Stooges would play a week's residency Upstairs at Max's Kansas City. Those being kinder, gentler times, even the arts editor of a college paper could get on the Columbia Records guest list (+1 no less! thank you Arnie Handwerger!), getting to attend on one of the last day or two of the residency.

I dunno how many folks remember that club -- I'll tell ya, it was pretty neat (for a corndog from NJ at least). The upstairs club was a separate entity from the notorious scenester hang out situated on the first floor (where folks from Warhol's Factory, situated nearby, would hold court along with folks like the immortal Danny Fields, visiting hep dignitaries of the day like Lou Reed, Bowie, etc.) You went up a long, narrow staircase to the second floor and there was some open space, then a narrow hallway to the stage area where there was enough room for 10 rows of folding chairs, 10 to a row (as I remember it -- mighta been a few more per row, but not many).
For some reason the club was also very generous towards college paper arts editors and comped me to many a great show (Howlin' Wolf, Charles Mingus, Manhattan Transfer, Fanny, Richie Havens performing with his a capella doo wop group, John Martyn, OY!). It was a pretty cozy and very friendly atmosphere.

The night of this Stooges show was a bit different. There was a BIG ASS line out front of the club, winding down Lexington Ave. -- a couple hundred folks waiting were clearly not going to get in. I had some nervous moments until a lady from Columbia Records (it might have been Marilyn Laverty) walked down the line asking after people on the label guest list and in we went (I was in the company of a high school chum, the great Gay essayist Ted Witomski -- RIP, bro).

The place was buzzing with anticipation and some morbid curiousity. A day or two into the residency, Iggy, famously, rolled around the stage atop glass shards from a broken bottle and gashed himself up pretty good and was taken to the hospital to be stitched up; at the time this was unheard of and deemed fairly extreme. So the last few dates including this one had been postponed a bit.

We took our seats toward the back (i.e. 7 rows from the front of the tiny stage). I started looking around and started to sense a disparity in the demographics represented here. Plenty of rock intelligentsia and downtown hipsters present, but -- on overhearing some conversations -- evidently significantly less sophisticated folks, some kinda desperate kids who appeared to be operating on a heightened/lowered level of consciousness, likely accessed via some kinda nasty street drugs. Some of these folks who not make it to the end of the concert, suddenly erupting in a blind frenzy out of their seat, charging the stage and quickly being subdued and tossed out the door by the club staff.

And out came the Stooges...

Roar Power - ruminations on the Stooges

2010-05-22T07:56:00.000-07:00

This one's going to take a while and multiple posts. So, Columbia Legacy has released a Deluxe version of Iggy & The Stooges "Raw Power." There are several editions available. They all feature a remastered version of David Bowie's mix on one disc, a live show from Atlanta on another, as well as two studio outtakes. The super deluxe version which you can only buy off some Stooges' website also includes a third CD of more outtakes and several alternate mixes, two of which are from Iggy's '96 remix of "Raw Power." And this special edition also features a documentary DVD with a buncha recent interviews and one recent performance by the current Stooges line-up: Iggy, James Williamson on guitar, Scott Asheton on drums, mike watt on bass (he's been in the Stooge's line up since 2003) and Steve Mackay (who played on FunHouse). And there's a booklet full of vintage pix and recent short essays and testimonial quotes from the likes of Henry Rollins, Marky Ramone, etc. AND a little envelope of facsimiles of vintage photographs AND a 7" single - a facsimile of a Japanese release. The package is 7" x 7" and reproduces a worn copy of the vinyl album cover.

It's all very nicely done, lots of attention to detail. SO... this is music that's been part of my life almost 40 years now. I do own a small stack of Bomp! and Skydog releases revolving around it - rehearsal tapes, live recordings, alternate mixes, radio airchecks of still more alternative mixes etc...

It all started at Rutgers College where I was the Arts Editor of the daily student paper, The Targum (fellow staffers included Larry Sutton who's bounced from the NY Daily News to People Magazine to the NY Post, and Jim Testa, the editor of venerable NY/NJ underground music journal Jersey Beat -- STILL going strong 30 years later!). Some guy walks in, asks for me, and hands me a typewritten review; his dad was a music critic for some local paper and he regularly grabbed the rock albums from pop's stacks. He was reviewing something called "Raw Power" by "Iggy & The Stooges." I'd never heard of 'em. But, man, his review made this sound like something else! Primal, explosive; maybe as rocking as Led Zeppelin! So I called up my contact at Columbia Records and asked them send me a copy.

It arrived about a week later and I probably rushed back to the group house I lived in then, right after dinner (I'm postulating - don't actually remember). I do remember plopping it on my roommate's stereo, sitting back on my mattress and... OUT BLASTS "SEARCH & DESTROY." And I underwent a paradigm shift -- I understood that this was the most vital music I'd ever heard (and it'd turn out to be amongst the most vital I'd EVER hear). It felt like a pure expression of the life force pulsing thru flesh, animating it, moving it to quest, search, strive, seek experience.

And like taking drugs...it opened a door that couldn't be closed. It changed my experience of being alive, made me aware of levels of intensity of experience that were not the norm but were attainable if you knew what to look for, were willing to make the effort to attain it and to pay the price for having such experience.

The rest of the songs were amazing as well...they seemed to examine and reveal different realms of existence and experience that all seemed novel and exotic to a lower middle class kid from Jersey City; utterly tantalizing, powerfully seductive. And now my life was changed in oh so many ways...
(a lot more to come)

record geek ruminations

2010-05-22T05:05:00.000-07:00

I had a note from Melora Creager, the founder and leader of cello-driven art rockers Rasputina in which she made a querulous reference to the term "record" regarding Rasputina's upcoming 7th full length release "Sister Kinderhook" which sparked me to respond with the following, which I now share with you for no esp. good reason!

"record" is still a valid term for what a full length release

it still is a "recording" of sound events

and a permanent "record" of those sound events

"album" is still valid too.

people forget the genesis of the term

sound recordings were initially cylinders that captured one performance

then flat platters that had one performance per side

in order to capture longer pieces of music - symphonies and the like

you'd use multiple flat discs that would be gathered in a booklet - basically they adapted the format use for PHOTO ALBUMS - hence the name

so it still betokens a collection of recordings of multiple sound events

CD = Compact disc - it's the medium

LP, hmmm that's "Long playing" so actually that could apply to something that appears on CD

12" LP album would be the most accurate terminology

awww

2010-05-04T09:42:00.000-07:00

We have predators as part of our household. In the past, dogs, currently, cats. And they do get to prowl outside, at least the backyard. And every now and then they will do what comes naturally and leave the evidence around to help us to learn to hunt.

To me it's always sad to find the remains of some little being dispatched from manifestation by members of our household, but such is the way of the world.

Today, I hear a squirrel giving the squirrel alert outside my upstairs window. Usually meaning they've spied one of our cats. Which is no big deal. But I decide to take a peak and see which cat it is. I see Stella, who's all black, on the ground with something large and grey in her mouth. I pause, take another look - it's moving!

I give a shout and tap on the glass to startle Stella - breaking the glass in the process. That gets her attention and she drops what she's got in her mouth. I go tearing down stairs and out side expecting the worst.

I find a baby bunny rabbit - lying still but not bloody. After a few second it gives a kick and opens its eyes. Tries to hop off but sorta fumbles around. I run back inside, pick up a USPO bin and gloves and gather up the rabbit. It gives a squeak of distress. I place it in the bin on a wash cloth (for traction). It's still sort of flopping but no blood at all. Eyes wide open. Sits up. One paw is flopping out to the side. I call our vet to see if he'll just examine the bunny as I know he won't treat feral animals and he won't.

Meanwhile the bunny is getting more alert, more active and moving around the bin. It seems like the shock is wearing off. It's keeping all four paws under itself.

Consulting with the missus, we guess that the rabbit's nest is in hole in the garden shed in the next yard. I take the bin out, prise up the fence so there's a clear path to the hole, slowly tilt over the bin and the bunny goes scurrying out, over to and down the hole, taking a quick peek backwards before disappearing.

This is the ending to this sort of encounter that ya pray for!

video mother lode!

2010-05-01T05:15:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, hopefully, I "bottomed" on my current NOLA obsession. I went searching for a capella Mardi Gras Indian recordings (as noted in my preceding post) and found them scarce as hens teeth. Having downloaded the only thing readily available, the bee was buzzing in my bonnet so I started bugging friends who are involved with releasing music of the general exotic/archival sort. My goal was to get someone down to NOLA with field recording equipment asap as it does seem that this particular tradition is in a relatively perilous position -- not distinctly poised for inevitable quick extinction but dicey enough that documenting it soon seemed important.

One friend, who works at the Association For Cultural Equity - the organization (a grand term considering the reality -- seedy offices behind the Port Authority with a handful of staffers, most of whom are part time at this juncture I believe -- clearly they don't spend the grant money they get on their own comforts!) who do a grand job of curating the archives amassed by the legendary folklorist Alan Lomax.

From the 1930's onwards John Lomax, followed by his son Alan were among the foremost documenters of "folk" musics in the world. They paid especial attention to American musical culture, MOST especially (but not exclusively) African American. To crudely sum up some of their central theses -- which were declared preposterous by their colleagues when first stated (!!!!) -- 1) that African American folk music had in fact evolved from African forms rather than being merely "degenerate" forms of European music (John had to leave the American Folk Music Society -- which he'd founded -- over this "heresy") 2) that the hopes, dreams, fears of African American peoples -- all the things that spoke so eloquently of their travails AND common humanity with European derived peoples -- were powerfully present in their music AND if that music were to confront the whites of America that they'd inevitably come to fully accept blacks as their equals and fight to make sure that their civil and human rights were established and zealously supported. Hard to understand how radical these thoughts were back then, but they, sadly, were.

Eventually Lomax's dreams came to fruition. Clearly not fully yet, but...times have changed somewhat from days when he was chased from Memphis side streets by the police for having a casual conversation with black citizens till today when we have a black President.

So that's who he was (ever so briefly).

But what he'd done that's pertinent to the opening discussion, was to visit New Orleans in 1982 and make extensive video tapes of musical performances by Mardi Gras Indian krewes, R&B performers (Ernie K-Doe!), brass bands, etc., interviews with these folks among others and much much more. And it's all accessible FOR FREE here:

http://research.culturalequity.org/get-video-ix.do?ix=session&id=1&idType=collectionId&sortBy=abc

There's TONS of other materials accessible here (15,000 songs!). but this is a cool place to start.

ENJOY!

I lied

2010-04-30T07:10:00.000-07:00

I realize I said I was done with talking New Orleans...then the missus decided we should watch the third episode of "Treme" last night which set me off again...

So, I am a dilletante. I do have an inordinate love of being surprised, hearing new stuff and tend to disappear down these rabbit holes of music discovery, never becoming an expert, but grabbing enough to have a decent sketch on hand.

"Treme" is the most music-centered dramatic series I've ever watched (tho not watching much TV overall I could be wrong) and in dealing with New Orleans and various aspects of it's culture naturally music should be an important part of it. But DAMN, there's a lot of performing going on and many that are fairly at length. I applaud Dave Simon for having the nerve to pace the show thusly and to make the viewers stew in the sounds presented. If you dig it, or can acclimate, I think you'll find it an unusual and most worthwhile experience.

Three episodes in, and having started watching after a couple days in New Orleans, this is pushing me to investigate in an ongoing fashion.

1) I've been digging thru the overall collection and seeing what I've already acquired over the years - actually a decent sampling for not having tried
2) picking up obvious items, mainly from Amazon -- if I had the patience I could hit stores but the chances I'd find what I'm looking for locally are pretty dismal
3) listening and realizing I haven't quite gotten what's intriguing me most

The result is a kind of quicklist that affects a reasonable TINY overview -- one that could serve the purposes of casual fans of the show that'd like to work the music into their day. You could probably cite hundreds of recordings you should own to have a decent collection, but times are tough and I think this list gives you some basics you can live with and decide what works for you and build on the stuff you dig most.

1. The Meters - Look-Ka Py Py - this quartet were one of the premimum session bands in the 60's and created their own unique brand of (mainly instrumental) funk influenced by indigenous rhythmic traditions and influencing in turn folks like Parliament (Mothership Connection esp.) Any of the re-issues of their Josie releases will do you nice - the Warner Bros. records are fine as well.
2. Kermit Ruffins - Putumayo Presents - a collection of his pre 2005 solo efforts. This cost $1.75 in mint condition. Nuff said. Ruffins plays straight up good timey traditional horn-driven jazz. He's a prominent figure on the show and looks to be presented accurately. On "Treme" he has a regularly weekly gig at Vaugn's and indeed the liner notes here refer to that ongoing residency and a live album he cut there. And mention his habit of cooking up barbeque outside of gigs, putting his rig on the back of his pick up.
3. Rebirth Brass Band - Kickin' It Live - Kermit went solo after having co-founded the Rebirth Brass Band. Rebirth are younger guys who are maintaining and the marching band tradition and keeping it alive and vital in the 21st century. "Folk" music forms are never pristine. Its practicioners have always incorporated what they'd liked and heard no matter what the source. They were the blog aggregators for their community in their day. So in a way, they're all the MORE authentic for continuing the process rather than just rehashing past repertoire as faithfully as possible.
So here the instrumentation is brass and horns driven by parade style drumming and punctuated by group chanting and/or call and response vocal interplay.
This is what's killing me today coz that drumming has got that loose limbed "rolling" feel that is the mark of my favorite rhythm things which include DC style "go go," fife and drum music and the Mississippi "hill" style blues (the late R.L. Burnside being the best known proponent thereof).
4. Professor Longhair "Fess" - yes, shame on me for knowing the legend and not previously owning any of the music (of course I own a tiny of fraction of all the amazing recorded music that actually exists in this world). He's a key transition point between the barrel-house and early jazz players and New Orleans' peculiar style of R&B. But you didn't need me to tell ya that. This collection gathers up his Atlantic singles and other session tracks (that were collected on LP a couple decades later, helping restart his career), some other singles releases and then material stemming from his revived career in the 70s. All funky, idiosyncratic, high spirited.
5. Lee Dorsey "Wheelin' And Dealin" - a greatest hits collection on Arista (?!) Dorsey was one of the exemplars of New Orleans' R&B that evolved from the music of Fess and others of his generation. Grittily soulful and marked by the offbeat rhythms peculiar to New Orleans...tho these rhythms travelled via trade routes and airwaves, took root in Jamaica and had enormous influence on the evolution of ska, rock steady and eventually reggae. Yep, there are plenty of other folks like Ernie K-Doe and other you want to, but this is a great start.
6.Various Artists - Cajun Early Recordings 4 CD set. One of those JSP collections that sell for $25-30. Non existent packaging but tons of music dirt cheap. Over 100 songs here. YIPES. So here's what the white folks outside New Orleans were up to at the beginning of the 20th century. Very influenced by French street music but more raw, faster paced and adapted to drive high spirited dancing.
7. Wild Tchoupitoulas - Mardi Gras Indians' street chants with musical backing by the Meters.
Mardi Gras Indian traditions are an important part of "Treme." The culture is a fascinating and complex one. These are working class African Americans who create elaborate and expensive costumes - a new one every year! - and they need to be hand sewn. Quick research indicates the tradition goes back over a 100 years and that it's possible that it arose as a response to poor black people being shut out of the parades held by well to do white people. In effect each "Indian" functions as his/her own float. It's hard to ignore the very African roots exposed through their chants, the drumming and other percussion that accompanies them etc. Backed by the Meters' signature eccentric funk this is essential listening.
8. The Golden Eagles Featuring Monk Boudreaux "Lightning & Thunder" (Amazon sells a CDR or download). And this is a recording of The Golden Eagles "krewe" caught au naturel with no amplified accompaniment. An initial search shows that most of the recordings by Mardi Gras Indians feature backing musicians. This release is one of the few that doesn't, though the Louisiana Music Factory offers 2-3 more (currently out of stock, probably due to their overall stock being raided by Jazz Fest attendees).
9. Various Artists "No Limit Records Greatest Hits" a handy document of the indigenous rap culture which has certainly had a good amount of success over the years though there doesn't always seem like overmuch influence from local musical traditions. Yet the lyric concerns are pure New Orleans and when you get to Mystikal -- not only is he one of the fleetest, most technically technically gifted rappers I've ever heard (spoken like a true middle aged white guy, eh?) but his open throated singing style is classic New Orleans very much in line with what you'll hear on modern brass band recordings (esp. New Birth Brass Band).

Right now my floor is littered with a buncha other releases I should mention, the Wild Magnolias, DJ Jubille, Fats Domino, Louis Armstrong The Complete Hot Five and Hot Seven Recordings, Dr. John, Los Hombres Calientes. And I KNOW all this is NOT EVEN SCRATCHING THE SURFACE. But really tackling this subject is a gargantuan and frankly daunting prospect and for those who just wanna grab a Paul Prodhumme cookbook, whip up some red beans and rice, crack a Budweiser and have a few things on hand to play beyond a Meters' greatest hits and Fats Domino I offer these few suggestions.

NOLA finale

2010-04-28T04:45:00.000-07:00

There's a great line in Henry Miller's "Sexus" or "Plexus" (one of those), where he comments on standing in an open field in high Summer, his experience being his thoughts on how he'll write about it and that this in an of itself alienated him from actually experiencing the enviroment per se - rather than the artistic process he'd apply to it. As soon as I read that I promised myself to avoid living life that way, at a remove or too. And yet...

I was watching episode 2 of "Treme," there's a neat scene where you've got a pair of street musicians (most likely transplants to NOLA) playing for some Midwestern kids who were in town with their church group participating in a rebuilding project. The male musician starts giving the kids a hard time for suddenly becoming interested in NOLA only post-Katrina -- rather ungraciously (we'd gone back a couple months after the flood and all the natives we ran into were nothing but gracious and thrilled that visitors were already starting to come back). And when they request an "authentic" song, he really gets snarky - says he'll play "When The Saints Go Marching In," demanding $20 for condescending to play it. And suddenly I flash back to being at Louisiana Music Factory, asking for "funk" and turning my nose up at the Galactic CD offered. Galactic ARE from NOLA, are respectful of the traditions of the music that they're playing and funky white guys just ARE accepted as part of the overall musical community once they've paid their dues. So, mea culpa.

In fact, I spent 2 days digging thru boxes of CDs in the basement (the overflow collection) searching for my Mystical CDs and found those, a Dirty Dozen Brass Band collection and a Galactic CD and the diversity and excellence of all this stuff shook me summarily out of my neat little NOLA funk and Cajun music rut. OY, do I feel silly!

I also went on a mini buying spree and found a Kermit Ruffins collection put out by Putamaya for $1.75 (OY!) and a double Professor Longhair collection for $13 -- something around 40 tracks. While I do prefer digging around actual stores (Positively Records in Levittown is my very favorite followed by Princeton Record Exchange), sometimes it just is cheaper and more expedient to use Amazon esp. for somewhat odd selections (i.e. used Kermit Ruffins CDs).

my find in New Orleans

2010-04-22T07:21:00.000-07:00

On our last full day in New Orleans, I got slightly loaded at Stanley's (on Jackson Square) and commenced the only real shopping we did. Braved the long take out line at Cafe Du Monde and bought a couple cans of their Coffee & Chicory blend -- my favorite coffee in the world (no knock against NOLA's Community Coffee; but I likes this better). Then I wound up at Louisana Music Factory. Not really having a lot of time I availed myself of the advice of the gents behind the counter. "Can you recommend any homegrown funk?" The man hands me a Galactic CD. Hmmm. "Sir, I appreciate this recommendation but might there be anything that I wouldn't know about and be able to readily snag off Amazon?" I'm advised that there hasn't been much NOLA funk come down the pike since the glory days of the Meters BUT he hands me the Dumpstaphunk "Listen Hear" EP - PAYDIRT!

To my jaded old ears this seems like a nice end result of the evolutionary line from the Meters to Parliament's "Mothership Connection" (their most NOLA sounding joint methinks) to Fishbone's "The Reality Of My Surroundings" (which I like better than their earlier ska offerings) and now to this. Heavy guitar delivering wonderfully syncopated lines that highlight the "blues" in Rhythm & Blues, killer rhythm section: solid, chunky, swinging. Coarsely handsome vocals.

These guys are fronted by Ivan Neville of that legendary NOLA musical dynasty -- also a veteran of Keith Richard's side projects.

This has got to be one of my favorite records of the year to date!

New Orleans

2010-04-21T17:25:00.000-07:00

I'm just back two full days from a trip to New Orleans it and missing it bad already ! I held off on watching "Treme" till we'd actually been back (it's been over 2 years now) as it'd have been too weird to watch the show and THEN be back there.

As soon as we landed and unpacked I was itching to run down Chartres to the venerable Napoleon House, our customary first stop. This inn was posited as a hiding place for Napoleon Boneparte, once he'd be snuck out of Europe -- but he wouldn't have it. It doesn't seem to have been painted since then, is always rocking stately Classical music. The victuals are so-so but the atmosphere is priceless. We walked off the wine and cheese plate strolling down to the North end of the French Quarter and looked for Coop's (the missus had pulled an article from the NY Times about offbeat places to chow in NOLA and was eager to visit places we'd never been to). Coop's was comfortably grubby in the way that charms folks who don't put too much store on hygiene (me!), the staff were friendly and attentive, the wine, serviceable and the friend chicken pretty damned good. A tad oily, but they managed to get the skin crisp to the point of tasting like bacon - oh yeah! The coleslaw somehow managed to taste of potato salad (a good thing!) and the sausage and rabbit jambalya was pretty damned reet. Afterwards we traipsed into the Marigny to see the "R" Bar which is owned by an acquaintance. A righteous bar. Dark, sorta cluttered but actually very spacious as NOLA dives go. A place you wanna spend hours at. Had a nice glass of red zinfandel there and drunk-texted the owner before walking back to our Canal Street hotel. A healthy walk and good way to burn off all the drinks!

I visited the Bywater for the first time (had breakfast at Satsuma and then walked back to the French Quarter) ; it was one of those sweet neighborhoods that was fully broken in and fulla people that seemed very happy to be there. Every couple blocks you'd spy another funky coffee house or thrift store-decored bistro peopled with lotsa relaxed patrons. Out on the street it was pretty quiet at noon time, most folks away at work. It was sunny and just a might hot which was a treat for an East Coaster still waiting for Spring to finally settle in.

We had fine lunch (really a day's feeding!) at Willie Mae's Scotch House in the Treme: Southern fried chicken with rice and a butter bean puree - heavenly. Low income housing in the surrounding neighborhood been torn down since our last visit and construction crews were running pile drivers putting big ol' beams into the ground for house foundations. On the drive back to the Quarter we were told they were working towards putting up new cottage style low income housing.

More on this stuff later