Category: Field Recordings of the Future

How the World Sounds

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To The Beach

Neil Young On The Beach
Neil Young On The Beach

Our cat has taken to sprawling out on the linoleum tile. Ninety degrees are too many for furry little things. But man does Neil Young’s “On THe Beach” sound good in this weather. I never had this lp but Neil called it one of his favorite in his autobiography so I picked up a used copy at the Bop Shop. It has John Lundquist’s name on it so I have to thank him for trading it in.

On The Beach has knockout cover art, (the inside of the lp jacket is printed to match the upholstery on the front cover) and the sound is so languid it completely swept me away, that is until I had to get up, blow the dust ball off the needle and flip the record over. To the beach.

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Documented In My Mind

Terry Adams of NRBQ performing at the Geaorge Eastman House in Rochester, New York
Terry Adams of NRBQ performing at the Geaorge Eastman House in Rochester, New York

Terry Adams, with his new band, sounded better than ever last night at the George Eastman House garden. He is the Thelonious Monk of rock n’ roll. If fact he puts more roll in rock than anyone out there. Bernie Hirsch turned me on to them in his dorm room in 1969 and we’ve seen them a dozen times since and we always get as close to the band as possible, behind the PA, and always on Terry’s side.

NRBQ plays without a set list and covers ground from a Tijuana Brass song they had heard on the radio on the way to the gig to George Jones’ White Lightning and Tonight You Belong to Me. Last night they did a Chuck Berry meets Herman’s Hermits version of Something Tells Me I’m In To Something Good and a rousing Cielito Lindo. They’re own material is just as rich, Flat Foot Floozie and Howard Johnson from their second lp and Drivin’ In My Car.

Terry cannot sit still. He darts from one keyboard to the next even reaching over one from behind to play it upside down but he would prefer his antics not be documented. He told me to “document it in my mind” when I took this shot. Great advice. Long live Terry Adams!

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Day 9 Day-O

Festival Promoter John Nugent pulled a rabbit out of his hat by scheduling Monty Alexander’s Harlem-Kingston Express on one of the big East Avenues stages going head to head with Trombone Shorty to close out the 12th annual Rochester International Jazz Festival.

Monty was our festival favorite from a few years ago and this setting – Monty sitting amidst two bands, his jazz trio with drums and double bass on the left and his reggae heavy Jamaican band on the right – was nothing short of magical. Each band was featured and they traded portions of songs and all played at once while Monty winged it in true jazz master fashion. A seasoned performer and top shelf entertainer, Monty easily handled two electrical outages in the middle of the set by picking up his melodica and getting the crowd to sing along on the Banana Boat song.

It’s going to be so nice to stay home tonight and watch Spain vs. Brazil on the small screen.

Jazz Fest 2013 Notes

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Minus The Blues

Phronesis, a bass player led trio with a lyrical piano player and frenetic drummer, were last night’s hit for us. So much music and action packed dialog. They made the cavernous Christ Church sound good.

Youn Sun Nah & Ulf Wakenius came on like a morphine drip at the Lutheran Church opening with a slow, minimal thumb piano and voice version of “My Favorite Things.” Pristine and somehow detached from their material they managed to take the hurt out of “Hurt,” the NIN’s song that Johnny Cash killed before he died but Youn Sun Nah has an absolutely amazing voice and she delivered a completely unique take on Nat King Cole’s “Calypso Blues” and brought the house down. Her YouTube video of the song has twice as many views as Nat’s.

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I 2 Heart Barcelona

Barcelona Group playing on the street at the Rochester International Jazz Festival
Barcelona Group playing on the street at the Rochester International Jazz Festival

Certainly one viable option to purchasing a Club Pass for the Rochester International Jazz Fest would be to just hang out on the streets for nine. The outliers surround the official sites and are scattered about between venues. I loved this group that was just getting going on East Avenue as we scurried by to our next event.

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Spoiled

Miniature moss on fence at the pool
Miniature moss on fence at the pool

Peggi was chatting in the back of Xerox Auditorium while I held her seat. A big guy, who was breathing heavily after climbing the stairs, started to sit in Peggi’s spot so I told him it was taken. He said I looked quieter than the people on the other side of the aisle and then he proceeded to talk my ear off. He said he had taken online harmonica lessons from Howard Levy, the piano player in the group we were about to hear, Trio Globo. Levy used to play with Bela Fleck and the other two parts of the trio played with Paul winter Consort.

According to my new friend Levy plays chromatically and can play any note in any key on any harmonica where most players have harmonicas for each key. He does all this by “overblowing and underblowing” to bend the notes. “Howard is the show,” he said emphatically. And then added, Don’t worry about me. I’ll shut up as soon as the band starts.”

Anat Cohen, the night before in this same room, had incorporated world music into a jazz setting with such remarkable sophistication I found it hard to sit through Trio Globo so I left. That’s why they call it a “Jazz Pass.“

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No Complaints

Mens Fashion House Sign on East Main Street in Rochester, New York
Mens Fashion House Sign on East Main Street in Rochester, New York

If you’ve been around as long as we have you know you can always find a free parking space in downtown Rochester regardless if a festival is going on. We usually find one near the Mens Fashion House on East Main.

We helped ourselves to three full sets of jazz last night, all performers we had never heard of and all sensational.

To cleanse the palette we’ve been listening to our nephew‘s new mixtape. Got his “Ridin” track stuck in my head.

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Google Is Listening

Rochester Welding Supply on Lake Avenue in Rochester, NY
Rochester Welding Supply on Lake Avenue in Rochester, NY

I put a short video online of our nephew on his skateboard. It was taken a while ago but I sent him the link when he graduated from High School last week. He is more of a Warp Fest kinda guy but I dropped an obscure Archie Shepp track on the one minute video without giving credit to Mr. Shepp and got a warning from YouTube within minutes that my video would not be available in Germany because of copyright on “The Magic of JuJu” track. Next time I’ll drop a Margaret Explosion track.

I’ve been taking notes on the Jazz Fest

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Dream Baby Dream

I got frantic call from Duane yesterday. He was trying to work with a batch of videos that were sent to him on a pc formatted hard drive and he couldn’t change the permissions on the files to move them to his Mac. While we tried a few work arounds he mentioned that was going to be having dinner with Alan Vega that night when they celebrated Howard Thompson‘s birthday.

I started thinking about the time Peggi and I drove down to NYC after work to see them perform. We were just outside the city at about 10 pm when we stopped for gas. Jimmy Carter was president and the gas crisis was in full swing so we had a hard time finding a gas station that was open. We eventually ran out of gas and slept in our car in a gas station parking lot missing the show. Six months or so later we caught them at Max’s and it was unforgettable. They were so cool, so thrilling and dangerous sounding, they blew us away. We were sitting in one of those little tables up front and I was worried that Alan would pick our table to include in his menacing performance.

Duane posted this video of Suicide to his YouTube channel.

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Long Live Colorblind

The Center for Youth Services on Monroe Avenue provides counseling, shelter and education to homeless kids in the Rochester area. The late Chuck Cuminale (aka Colorblind James) worked there and it is only fitting that a tradition Chuck started twenty seven years ago would be now be a benefit for the Center. Hunu, with core members of the Colorblind James Experience hosts guests performing Bob Dylan songs on or near Bob Dylan’s birthday which was cosmically near Dylan-soul-mate Chuck’s own birthday. I had the pleasure of accompanying Peggi Fournier last night on a rousing version of “She Belongs To Me.” Russ Lunn caught the performance on his cellphone.

June 3rd Correction: I just learned that Saturday’s show was not a benefit. The proceeds from this show pay Hunu’s studio rental for the whole year and allows them to do the big benefit they do at Christmas for the Center.

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Be Here Now

Building on Mohawk River shot from Amtrak train
Building on Mohawk River shot from Amtrak train

There are always high hopes for a Margaret Explosion performance but so much of it is in the cards, the work day, the crowd, the mood. Many factors are beyond our control and improvisation by it’s very nature is hit or miss. We try to stay open and explore the possibilities but you can’t beat a good melody to hang the song on and sometimes that don’t show up.

As a rule we sound best earlier in the evening on a night when very few people are there, we are all fresh and more receptive to each others parts, but the last three months have all been bonus nights (more money if the cash register total exceeds X amount). The crowd noise is an integral part of our sound and we’re happy to provide a soundtrack for stimulating conversations but when the place is full and the crowd noise infringes on the band (remember Ken’s stand-up bass has no amplification) we have learned a pretty cool trick. It doesn’t always work but we pull back the volume. I might leave the snare and just play hi-hat and Peggi or Bob will stop playing. The crowd immediately dials back the din knob and the music comes into focus.

Tonight is our last Little Theater show until September.

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Always Something

"Model From Crime Page" drawing in progess in Fred Lipp's painting class.
“Model From Crime Page” drawing in progess in Fred Lipp’s painting class.

With lots of trial and error in my attempt to get the lines right in the bottom half of the enlargement of the drawing above I wound up with heavy handed clunkers. I played them down and had them thin but too much the same. My third attempt got them right on (as seen in the enlargement) but my painting teacher called me out on them again. I had focused so much on only the bottom half of the drawing that the lines were great but out of touch with the rest of the piece. They “had too much zip.” So I roughed them up to suit the gruff nature of this young lady.

I like this song because you can hear me setting up my drums while Peggi, Bob and Ken played most of the first number without me.

Listen to Sax Object by Margaret Explosion
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Springtime And A Change In The Weather

Jet streaks in the sky over Rochester, New York
Jet streaks in the sky over Rochester, New York

So it used to be sort-of-safe to plant your garden around Memorial Day and now it’s closer to Mother’s Day so we waited for it to warm up a bit and then pounced. We planted tomatoes, spinach, eggplant, red peppers, jalapeños, zucchini, parsley, oregano and basil in our neighbor’s garden. He has all the sun and a big fence to keep the deer out. Plus, he’s an expert on everything.

Who the heck booked the Lilac Festival bands? Dreadful. Speaking of dread and warm weather, Kevin Patrick has a perfectly timed reggae post on his site. And the Big O has a James Brown show from ’73.

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Shut The Fuck Up

Wreckless Eric & Amy Rigby at Lovin Cup in Rochester, New York 2013
Wreckless Eric & Amy Rigby at Lovin Cup in Rochester, New York 2013

Wednesday was a funny night. People expected a big band version of Margaret Explosion but Pete was the only special guest able to make the gig. His piano playing was great and worth the free admission. We packed up quickly and drove out to the Lovin’ Cup in Henrietta to catch the the tail end of Wreckless Eric and Amy Rigby’s set. Eric seemed out of sorts and off his between song, free-association game. He kept looking over to the noisy crowd gathered around the bar. Twice he asked if they could turn the tv off. “You don’t go out to watch tv.” The edge added to the excitement for me and musically they sounded better than ever. I love how they trade songs and support one anothers’. I love it when Eric sings high harmonies to Amy’s voice and I loved it when they smiled at each other and kissed in the encore. This is way post punk stuff.

Peggi talked to Amy after the show and Amy told her they felt like they had to do some different material because they’ve played here so often. How many times has it been, six or seven? We’ve been to them all. Eric even did his “Men In Sandals” fashion send up even though Tom Kohn, the one that brought him here, was sitting at the merchandise table in open toe footwear. Their three song encore included a beautiful version of Tom Petty’s “Walls Fall Down.” We learned that before we got the club the bar had a beer tasting and some those idiots stuck around for the show. Eric told them to “shut the fuck up” and someone who had come to the show chimed in only to get thrown out by the club owner.

Watch their brilliant video and see them next time at a better venue.

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Wong Orchestra

Clear View dumpster in Rochester, New York
Clear View dumpster in Rochester, New York

Pete LaBonne emailed that he would be in town this week which means he’ll be behind the grand piano at the Little Theater Café when Margaret Explosion performs tonight. Jack Schaefer sat in on bass clarinet and addition guitar last week and he said he would probably stop by this week as well and then Peggi talked to Rick McRae and invited him to play trombone with us. None of these parties know the others will be there so the whole thing will be really wong, the future or past participle of wing(ing it).

This song was recorded a few years ago. Bob was out of town so there is no guitar. Pete LaBonne played piano and Jack Schaefer played bass clarinet.

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Treehugger

Turkey vulture cleaning up dead ground hog
Turkey vulture cleaning up dead ground hog

We smelled the dead groundhog before we saw it laying upside down in the creek covered in flies and we stayed away from it yesterday by crossing the creek at different point. Today we figured it would be all cleaned up, nature is pretty efficient that way, but instead we found turkey vultures in the trees surrounding what was left of the carcass.

I was wearing my Treehugger shirt and when we got up to the park and someone said, “Oh I see you’re a treehugger” and I wanted to say “Whatever gave you that idea?” but I said, “Someone gave me this shirt.” He said, “I’m a treehugger too.”

We caught Bobby Henrie & The Goners’s at Abilene over the weekend and I was thinking how good they sounded, a three piece with all the essentials in just the right place. Bobby sang two George Jones songs, we danced and we headed home and then we heard the next band, a thirteen piece with Eastman students called “Bitchin’ Kitchen” killed. But they couldn’t have been as good as The Goners.

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Good Cry

In my little book the Rolling Stones are the best rock and roll group, Sun Ra is the best jazz artist, James Brown is the best R&B artist, Bob Marley is the best reggae artist, The Beach Boys are the best pop group and George Jones is the best country singer. His recordings will live on. Goodbye George.

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White Light

Lights in the dentist office
Lights in the dentist office

I guess the Robert Irwin book has gotten under my skin. I was mesmerized by the overhead light in the dentist’s office.

When I die I want to go out as a Ukrainian. The funeral service for Olga’s father at Saint Mary’s on Saint Paul Boulevard was stunning. The church is gorgeous with white walls, stained glass and a heavy helping of gold-leafed Eastern iconography. We were given a tall, lit candle on the way in and we stood with it through the hour long service while heavenly voices surrounded us, no organ, no sermon, just lots of incense offerings to the icons and this beautiful chanting. What a send off!

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Beautiful Iraq

Cover for Margaret Explosion Beautiful Iraq mp3
Cover for Margaret Explosion Beautiful Iraq mp3

“You can’t reheat a soufflé.” I’ve always liked this quote. It is attributed to Paul McCartney responding to a request for the Beatles to reunite. It is the same reason Neil Young uses first takes on his records. It is never as good as the first time.

Margaret Explosion takes it further than most bands. Every song we do is a first and only take. There is no going back unless someone requests something we’ve done before. Although there are the themes that just keep popping up. Bug Jar Shooting is one. Prom Night keeps coming back when Jack sits in. And then there’s “Beautiful Iraq”, a song from our “Live Dive “cd.

Listen to Bug Jar Shooting by Margaret Explosion
Listen to Prom Night by Margaret Explosion
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Just The Melody

University of Rochester Quad
University of Rochester Quad

Who else would show up for a 2pm talk at the University of Rochester’s Strong Auditorium to hear a talk by the drummer of the Doors but tired bikers and students of “Pop Music of The Sixties?” Both of these groups were well represented but a surprising amount of really young kids got in line at the mics, one stationed in each aisle, to say “I’m a big fan of the Doors” and then ask questions about the lyrics of a particular song.

The UofR’s Junior Ivy League campus is an idyllic oasis on the banks of the Genesee near where the Eire Canal crosses the river. You can just imagine how you could get your life in order if you just buckled down and studied. I was never able to pull that last part off. I did take 8 hours of photography classes here from a great teacher, William Jenkins, and I hung around in Joe Barrett‘s dorm room.

John Densmore had a great, light touch and talked about those magic moments when the band would “just vamp on a drone chord” while Jim conjured spirits. I loved it when he explained how as drummer he was responsible for starting songs but when he couldn’t remember how a song went he would just ask for the melody to be sung to him. Not the tempo or pattern. That is good drumming in a nutshell.

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