Month of July , 2007
Dusty Groove, a Chicago record store of the highest caliber specializing in rare grooves from the US and abroad, has now spawned a label focusing on Essential Reissues (their name)that haven't seen the light of day in many years for one reason or another. Their first batch of reissues includes Brazilian legend Jorge Ben's Forca Bruta, brilliant jazz harpists Dorothy Ashby's The Rubaiyat of Dorothy Ashby, and last but not least, Melvin Jackson, bassist of Eddie Harris fame, and his Funky Skull. I've picked up all of them and they're three for three in my opinion. Here's my take on the Melvin Jackson entry in the series.
The opening title track Funky Skull features the first of two lineups that appear on the album, with Melvin Jackson playing upright bass, heavily filtered through a Maestro G2 box, boomerang, and echo-plex, Phil Upchurch on Fender bass (he also plays guitar on a later track), Morris Jennings on drums, Bobby Pittman and James Tatu on tenor, Donald Towns and Tom Hall on trumpet, Pete Cosey on guitar and Tobie Wynn on baritone. It's a rollicking funky groove akin to Cold Duck Time later on the album (which has the same lineup), with the distinguishing feature that sets it apart from similar recordings in the idiom being Melvin Jackson taking the lead on his affected upright that comes out sounding like a duck that smokes 3 packs a day.
If the rest of the album followed in this vein, it would be a solid, if not revolutionary funk record released in 1969. However, the second track, Ma She's Makin' Eyes At Me makes it clear that things are headed in a different direction. Once again featuring Mr. Jackson's bass quackery playing a melody over some heavily reverberated drums for a short 0:51, it acts a segue to the other world explored on the album, which has a large part to do with the other lineup.
Bold & Black brings a new band to the table, with Melvin again on acoustic bass, augmented by AACM stalwarts Jodie Christian on piano/hammond/echo-plex, Lester Bowie on trumpet/flugelhorn, Roscoe Mitchell on alto/baritone/flute, Leo Smith on trumpet/flugelhorn, and in addition Byron Bowie on tenor sax/flute, Steve Galloway on trombone, Maurice Miller on voices, and Billy Hart (!) on drums.
Now this is getting interesting.
Bold & Black is an Eddie Harris tune, one of a few that Jackson plays on the album. This one has a real laid back easy groove with tight horn backgrounds from the horn section, with each player taking some creative deviations from from the part, keeping their AACM street cred. Melvin Jackson improvises over almost the entire tune alongside Maurice Miller's passionate cries and singing, which help place the time of the recording with its pleas for Black pride and identity.
Now that the album's off the beaten track bona fides are certified, the second lineup takes on a Ken Chaney (of Young Holt Unlimited fame) tune called Dance of the Dervish that opens with Melvin Jackson's heavily echo-plexed bass, piano, drums, and some sublime backup singing to some uncredited female singers. With muted trumpets and the distant mixing of the piano to create some serious depth, there's an eerie quality early on in the track that gives way to some free improv with Melvin Jackson's echoey bass and some serious echo on some background vocals. Definitely in the space-dub-free-jazz realm, with the band eventually coming around and back to the melody.
Cold Duck Time is another funky workout with the first lineup, followed by three more tracks with the AACM heavy grouping. Say What features Mr. Jackson for much of the tune, and a nice Roscoe Mitchell blowing session over the laid back groove from the band. Funky Doo follows the same basic format that has now been established, which is Melvin Jackson being featured with tight horn arrangements accompanying him, with some vocal calls to do the funky doo.
This is a great album and certainly a recording that could have only happened at the unique time and place that was Chicago in 1969, with the AACM in bloom and the Cadet sound of Ramsey Lewis and Earth, Wind and Fire laying the grooves down in another part of town. This meeting of the two worlds through the work of Melvin Jackson is truly a treat. If Dusty Groove keeps unearthing gems like this, we have some great sounds to look (hear?) forward to.
DiggWhat would one day be called ‘the modern’ was, at least as far as its sharpest and most hidden point is concerned, a legacy of the Buddha. Seeing things as so many aggregates and dismantling them. Then dismantling the elements split off from the aggregates, insofar as they too are aggregates. And so on and on in dizzying succession. An arid, ferocious scholasticism. A taste for repetition, as agent provocateur of inanity. Vocation for monotony. Total lack of respect for any prohibition, any authority. Emptying of every substance from within. Only husks left intact. The quiet conviction that all play occurs where phantoms ceaselessly substitute one for another. Allowing the natural algebra of the mind to operate out in the open. Seeing the world as a landscape of interlocking cogs. Observing it from a certain and constant distance. But what distance exactly? No question could be more contentious. Adding this last doubt, then, to a trail of other gnawing uncertainties. - Roberto Calasso, Ka: Stories of the Mind and Gods of India
I thought this quote, culled from Robert Calasso's masterful tapestry of Indian mythology, might be pertinent to some recent discussions going on about the issue/concept of post-modernism in music. I don't have much to add to the conversation, because post-modernism has always struck me as be little more than a conceptual dead end, and ultimately it has proven itself of little use to my own thoughts and writings. I think, like many other theories, if taken to an extreme it is definitely a dead end, but it can be of use conceptually as an ingredient rather than a main course.
The issue of quality as it relates to post-modernism reminded me of another quote, this one from Robert Pirsig's Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, page 290:
"When you're not dominated by feelings of separateness from what you're working on, then you can be said to 'care' about what you're doing. That is what caring really is: 'a feeling of identification with what one's doing.' When one has this feeling then you also see the inverse side of caring, quality itself."
David Murray has reunited his Black Saint Quartet, sans earthly departed pianist John Hicks, whose shoes are filled by the able Lafayette Gilchrist. Along with Ray Drummond on bass and Andrew Cyrille on drums, it's a fantastic lineup that on this album is also aided by the presence of Cassandra Wilson.
Ms. Wilson acts as the album's bookends, performing the opener and closer, singing words penned by the prolific Ishmael Reed. Reed also wrote the liner notes, and admits that upon being asked to write lyrics for Cassandra Wilson, at the ripe age of 68 and in awe of Ms. Wilson, all he could think was Wow! "Like some zit afflicted adolescent" (his words).
Sacred Ground sets a hushed backdrop for Wilson's sensuous vocal stylings. Along with her gorgeous voice, the message is at the forefront: "We've come back to claim our dearest legacy/we've come back to claim our very own/to you they're just a box full of bones/but to us they're our loved ones who shouldn't be left alone." Reed drew his inspiration for Sacred Ground from a film about the banishment of thousands of American blacks from their homes between 1890 and 1930 in the South and Midwest; the instrumental track 4, Banished, is based upon the same source.
The sensitive balladry accompaniment that floats behind Wilsons lyrics during the verses morphs into a loose, freer mid section of the piece with Murray on bass clarinet. Lafayette Gilchrist is phenomenal on this track and throughout the album; it makes me wonder why his solo efforts haven't clicked more for me, as I've also enjoyed his playing on the other recent David Murray Quartet with strings album that was released a while back. Furthermore, when I saw the Murray Quartet here in Chicago a while back, Gilchrist was a highlight of what I otherwise found to be a quite lackluster show. But I digress....
Wilsons vocals re-enter for a refrain that continues the upward trajectory of the piece, which ultimately coming to a peak before sliding back down to the song's original restrained dynamic, with a final verse by Cassandra. The band really nails the ballad feel and mood, which in a jazz setting is like nothing else in the world for me.
Certainly a bold scene setter for the remainder of the album.
Transitions is a solid piece that typifies what I've come to expect of David Murray (which isn't necessarily a bad thing): a solid instrumental piece with a nice head, and then a form over which Murray blows with his liberal sense of time, phrasing, and singular approach to the horn. Like him or not, as has been said in previous discussions about the merits of David Murray, he has certainly created his own bag on the horn that is instantly identifiable.
This is as good a time as any to mention the fact that I love Andrew Cyrille's drumming. His feel, use of space, and sense of swing all really do it for me and I find myself honing in on his playing throughout the album. He plays an excellent solo in this track that lays bare his sense of melodicism on the drums.
Pierce City is a stand out track on the album, featuring Murray at his best, one of best solos I've heard form him on record; intense playing without sacrificing some dynamic interplay with the ensemble.
Utilizing the Greek mythological Cassandra as an inspiration for the lyrics, Ishmael Reed wrote the final track, The Prophet of Doom, which features Ms. Wilson singing over a straight blues form. It's a laid back feel that even features some finger snapping as Cassandra sings about her mythological namesake.
I think this is a great modern jazz album. It's not revolutionary in terms of innovation, but it's a fantastic recording in the idiom that has a strong message to go along with the great playing by the whole band. It will get a lot more mileage in my collection than Murray's previous release, Waltz Again, which was perhaps more novel but to my ears lacked some essential element that fuels longevity in listening.
David Murray on MySpace has some tracks up for your previewing pleasure, and there are two videos up on YouTube that show David Murray and Cassandra Wilson in the studio, here and here.
The Nels Clines Singers, an instrumental trio with no vocal singers in sight led by guitar hero Nels Cline, recently released an excellent disc by the name of Draw Breath on the LA based cryptogramophone.
His band features Scott Amendola on drums and Devin hoff on bass. This release is higher profile for Nels if only because of his relatively new association with the rock band Wilco, who are based here in Chicago and recently released their first disc with Mr. Cline on guitar, making Nels somewhat of a local celebrity on the indie scene (Wilco's drummer, Glenn Kotche appears as a special guest on Squirrel of God). He played a stirring set with other local guitar hero Jeff Parker last year at the indie-Pitchfork Music Fest and has a high visibility amongst the young crowd due to his relationship with Wilco.
A quote from Mr. Cline: “I like to joke—and it’s not really a joke—that all my records tend to include the same ingredients. There’s free improvisation along with structured composition, investigation of sound along with traditional harmony, and subtlety along with bombast.”
Draw Breath opens with Caved-in Heart Blues, a piece that is more on the subtle end of the subtlety-bombast axis, consisting of one extended trip through a I-IV-V-I blues form that takes the entire song to complete. Dirge like in tempo and mood, the song features Mr. Cline's baritone guitar and Scott Amendola's drums to create the heavy feel of the piece, up until about 3/4 of the way through when the V chord peaks with a brief psychedelic excursion with electronics and lap steel. For the final trip through the I chord he returns to baritone guitar and drums to end up back where he started. It's an intriguing pick for the album opener, and after several listens to the whole album I'm still trying to decide what effect Nels was going for by putting it up front.
Attempted is a more jazz oriented tune with a head that is played by the entire trio, with Scott Amendola contributing punctuated drum accents that really bring out the melody. The solos are really group oriented with lots of interaction that makes you forget that it's a guitar trio with a guitar out front, eliminating any tendency to associate the format with the rock sounds of bands like Cream or The Jimi Hendrix Experience.
A word about Nels Cline's tone: it's certainly rock influenced, especially his distorted town that is more distortion and less overdrive, and there are hints of the Frisellian influence both in terms of tone and approach to the music. However, for all the looping and penchant for guitar stomp boxes that Bill Frisell has, I think Nels out-effects him.
Nels in response to a question about his use of effects pedals: "I just hear lots of sounds and colors. These sounds and colors in my head are compelling to me both emotionally and intellectually. Besides, I learned long ago that I seem to have a weird aptitude for using them. And yes, they do mess up one's sound. But then again, I just started equating tone and the proper equipment a few years ago! Before that i was just trying to play notes I liked, I had virtually no scientific "tonemeister" mentality. Being allowed to age and grow is indeed a blessing!"
I suppose influence is the wrong word to use in discussing Frisell and Cline considering the two guitarists emerged at the same time, both making their recorded debuts in 1979; it's more that I tend to associate some of his musical devices and tones in the instrumental music/jazz context with Mr. Frisell, but that's probably due to the fact that I was exposed to him before I heard Nels Cline.
Confection is by Nels' own admission, a "bit of a trifle" that reflects his penchant for writing an "instrumental hit." I love it. I'm never one to shy away from guitar pyrotechnics and Nels provides it in spades. It's a rocker with a loose punk vibe and intensity that often pervades Nels' playing regardless of context. It's interesting to frame this track alongside such delicately beautiful acoustic musings as Recognize I and II and the electronic textural sound odyssey of An Evening At Pops or Squirrel of God, all of it coming from Nels Cline and his musically malleable trio. Then again, I listen to and make all kinds of music myself, so I don't find it particularly odd, and I personally enjoy the aesthetic he's woven together.
From Mr. Cline himself: "Increasingly over the years I’ve lived what is essentially a double life—to such an extent in the earlier days that I almost quit playing, because I couldn’t reconcile my impulses to make huge amounts of sound playing rock with my desire to play music of great sophistication and subtlety in the classic jazz way."
Reconciling musical impulses is an interesting way of framing an approach to musical creativity. I don't know why anyone needs to pick sides.
The guitar is such a loaded instrument whenever anyone picks it up. The phallic rock associations are impossible to escape, and in the jazz world the tone-rolled-off lack of treble sound is cliche to the point of absurdity. Then come along musical polymaths like Nels Cline who absorb and process all musical influences in a way that makes it all uniquely Clinesian when it comes out of his guitar.
Draw Breath is the kind of record that makes you wonder if you're still listening to the same album from track to track due to the diversity of musical material approached by the trio. Eclecticism like that can sometimes result in a lack of flow for the album listening experience, but I find the variety on this album to be refreshing rather than jarring. This is an excellent disc that I can see I will continue to get a lot of mileage from in the future. As always with musicians who crossover into the popular realm, I hold out hope that a Wilco fan might pick up this disc and be tempted to delve into the rest of Mr. Cline's music, in the process discovering the rich musical world that awaits them in the realm of improvisational music.
Bill Dixon's recent Chicago performance is reviewed by John Litweiler:
"This concert was mostly quiet, dark, slowly moving, yet it teemed with irrepressible life. The three compositions he offered were devoted to pure sound, texture and shape, for Dixon's music is now a wholly abstract art. Each piece was a subtle, meticulously sculpted setting for improvisation. Again and again his long trumpet tones, somber and brooding, hovered above his mates.
[...]
The flowing textures were so finely balanced that insensitive choices by anyone could have destroyed these pieces. Instead, the changing ensemble weights sustained an almost miraculous tension."
There are some upcoming releases in the jazz book world that I thought might interest some Soundslope readers. All of these are not yet on the shelves so the links are to Amazon for informational purposes - feel free to support your local book stores and order through them instead.
A Power Stronger Than Itself: The AACM and American Experimental Music by George E. Lewis
Official release date is November 15th, but it's available for pre-order. Sure to be a page turner, 672 pages of AACM history, by far the most thorough and in depth piece of literature on the organization to date from its resident historian and scholar George Lewis. I'm looking forward to it.
Miles Davis: Miles Smiles, and the Invention of Post Bop by Jeremy Yudkin
This release examines Miles' music of the mid-1960s and the evolution of the "post-bop" style.
Ask Me Now: Conversations on Jazz and Literature edited by Sascha Feinstein
Interviews with Amiri Baraka, Jayne Cortez, Haki R. Madhubuti, Sonia Sanchez, Gary Giddins, Dan Morgenstern, Yusef Komunyakaa, Fred Hersch, Hayden Carruth, John Sinclair and others, focusing on the relationship between jazz and literature.
Jazzwomen: Conversations with Twenty-One Musicians by Wayne Enstice and Janis Stockhouse
A much needed anthology of interviews with the women of jazz, including talks with Jane Ira Bloom, Terri Lynne Carrington, Regina Carter, Marilyn Crispell, and Shirley Horn, amongst others.
Last night at Ganz Hall, a quintet of fine musicians led by Bill Dixon played what was billed as Mr. Dixon's first appearance in our fine city. In some after show remarks, he clarified that it was his first "official musical" appearance, hinting that he might have played here earlier in a different context but offering no details as to when and in what circumstances that might have been.
The venue was a nice hall that seated about 200 people. I'd say it was around 2/3 full, a great crowd, and very diverse in age range. I was glad to see the turn out: many more people in the audience than on the stage.
Speaking of the stage, the lineup: Bill Dixon, trumpet, Ken Vandermark, bass clarinet and baritone sax, Nate McBride and Josh Abrams, bass, and Michael Zerang drums.
My pre-concert impressions of the lineup were a mixture of skepticism and intrigue.
I was skeptical because I had no idea how the lineup was put together: by the promoter, by Mr. Dixon, or some combination of both. I had no sense of why these particular musicians in this particular lineup were chosen for the event. Also, I had some reservations about Mr. Vandermark's participation if only because I saw his personal aesthetic as radically different from what I knew about Mr. Dixon's approach to music.
I was intrigued because I knew all of the musicians are capable of sensitive accompaniment, engrossing improvisations, and dizzying musical heights. Not to resort to hyperbole....
Anyway, the show began with Michael Zerang on stage scratching his snare drum with a stick with little fingers on it - it kind of looks like a back scratcher. He uses it to bring really interesting tones out of his drum, and he played the whole drum, plucking the snare underneath with his hand as he drew these tones out of his set.
After a brief solo by Mr. Zerang, the two bassists joined him on stage and played their own duo improvisation with Mr. Zerang watching along. Similar to Mr. Zerang's improvisation, there was en exploration of sound as much as pitch, a recurring theme throughout the concert. Their duo was brief as well, an invocation or warm up, and then Ken Vandermark walked on stage.
My apprehensions about Ken's place in the group was mostly due to his tendency for musical bombast in comparison with Dixon's restrained intensity. Vandermark is more likely to open the floodgates while Mr. Dixon opens holes in the dam. He did his solo improvisation on the bass clarinet, combining sputters and breathy textures with long tones and bends.
Soon, Ken ended his opening solo, and while his applause began Bill Dixon walked on stage, and the applause grew to welcome him.
Bill had four microphones set up, and to the best of my knowledge and attention he only used 3 of them. One had a heavy delay, and the other two had subtly different reverbs.
He began his solo utilizing his delay microphone. I really enjoyed his use of delay, and you can immediately tell that it's not merely an effect that is used as an enhancer, utilizing it as a musical device that he interacts with in order to produce the sound he has in mind. His solo delay trumpet excursions came across as some kind of avant-space-dub-trumpet otherworldly journey, at times going places that were dark and nightmarish, and other times floating in a more ethereal airy realm. To be perfectly honest, I could have listened to him play solo for the entire set and I would have gone home happy.
Of course that was not to be since there were four other musicians standing on stage. They soon joined in and it was clear that they all had a reverent attitude towards Bill deferring to him musically in terms of the direction and aesthetic of the music. There were times when I felt there was maybe a bit too much restraint, but their close attention to Mr. Dixon's playing allowed the music to unfold very patiently and clearly. They were all free improvisations as far as I could tell, and I'd be interested to know what, if any, discussions were had between Bill and the musicians about their approach to the music for the evening.
To the best of my recollection there were two long improvisations (might have been three...they all blended together in my mind), both of them defying any compelling verbal descriptions on my part. The music went by extremely quickly, totaling over an hour from beginning to end when all was said and done.
I enjoyed the concert thoroughly, even if I was not particularly moved or stirred by the sounds coming off the stage. I make this distinction only because the music that I often see in Chicago is in the more ecstatic vain, which doesn't necessarily make it better, just different. It certainly made me want to delve into Mr. Dixon's catalog to hear his development as a musician and trumpeter. I can definitely see why he is such an influential and revolutionary figure, and also why some people might hold strong opinions about his musical aesthetic, both good and bad.
My patented out of focus pictures from the show will be available soon.
Coming up: I've got a bunch of recordings that I'm going to be writing about in the coming days and weeks, and I also have a longer, more philosophical post brewing. Stay tuned....
That's right, Bill Dixon is coming to Chicago this Wednesday. Hard to believe this will be the first time, but that's what I've been told. I'll be in attendance and will be sure to report back.
Details for those in town:
click thumbnail for full size
Chicago City Arts and 5 Percent Sessions present a very special night of jazz music. Playing for the first time in Chicago with an all star Chicago lineup:
Bill Dixon - trumpet, flugelhorn, and piano
Ken Vandermark - saxophone and reeds
Josh Abrams - bass
Nate McBride - bass
Micheal Zerang - percussion
Concert Date: July 11, 2007 at 7:30 p.m.
Concert Venue: Ganz Hall, Roosevelt University, 430 S. Michigan Ave.
Pre-concert Reception: 4:30 p.m. - 7:00 p.m.
Reception Venue: Chicago City Arts Gallery, 410 S. Michigan Ave., 6th floor.
This special show will be held in Ganz Hall, which is a small venue on the
7th floor above the Auditorium Theater at 430 South Michigan Avenue.
Join us before the concert at Chicago City Arts Gallery (next door to Ganz
Hall) for a glass of wine and an opportunity to see Bill Dixon's visual art.
Bill is an accomplished visual artist. Experience both sides of his creative
personality.
Tickets are $25.00 and available online.
Tickets at the door will be cash only.
Public parking is available at the Grant Park South Garage one block north of the Auditorium Building off of Michigan Avenue.
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