Friday, November 10th, 2006 ... 3:00 p.m. - 6:00 p.m. ... KZSU, 90.1 FM

Tons of interesting local shows coming up this weekend, so I tried to cram in as many of those artists as possible -- pretty much everybody listed below who's not in rotation. The big event was John Zorn and Ikue Mori doing a duet improv performance at the Jazzschool in Berkeley. Also made special note of the SFSound concert on Monday night (the same night Zorn gives a talk for the Improv: 21 series). Quarterly, SFSound puts together performances of new classical music, incluing new stuff from local composers.

For me, the weekend of this show was saturated with music: Joelle Leandre and India Cooke duo on Thursday; Exene Cervenka and the Original Sinners on Saturday (because yes, I do need to rock out sometimes); and the Zorn/Mori performance Saturday. Whew.

Format:
ARTIST -- "TRACK TITLE" -- ALBUM TITLE (LABEL, YEAR)
Horizontal lines denote microphone breaks.

* Pete McCann -- "Yes, My Friend" -- Most Folks (OmniTone, 2006)

Previously noted here.

Another nice modern set from saxophonist Mahanthappa, with frequent cohort Vijay Iyer on piano. Very cool stuff, with complex but accessible leads, some nice ferocity (this track opens the CD with a flurry of sax), and the steely "21st-century" feel that I've attributed to their stuff before; see here and also a KZSU review of Iyer's work here.

There's a numbers/codes theme here -- the track "Further in Between" is apparently based around the number 142857, for instance. And the CD comes with a code wheel for translating a cipher written in the liner notes -- Ooooo.

Previously noted here. Did the trick of splitting a 20-minute song by talking over the halfway point, in this case waiting for a trumpet solo to end and then doing a mic break over the first part of Mike Osborne's sax solo. Sorry, Mike.

(Letting the track play out to its conclusion.)

Local math-rock stuff. Or, near-punkish guitar music that happens to have some odd time signatures. High energy (as if the song title couldn't tell you that). I missed this one as it went through rotation earlier this year, which was my loss.

Previously noted here.

Previously noted here.

John Bischoff -- "Override" -- Aperture (23 Five, 2003)

Starting off a little electronics set to preview the upcoming SFSound performance that will include debut pieces from Bischoff and Ingalls. This track shows some nice variety and is a good length for radio; in hindsight I wonder if I should have grabbed something more melodic (he's got some of that on an older CD, The Glass Hand) to try to suck listeners in.

Previously noted here. This one is an all-electronics piece, very academic sounding. I almost played the John Cage-inspired "Discrepancy in Flow," but it was too chaotic a transition from the Bischoff and Ingalls pieces. Next time.

Previously noted here. This is one of the slower tracks in the program, which was a nice change of pace from the fast, blurry ones I've been airing.

Previously noted here.

Previously noted here.

Previously noted here.

With Les Claypool on bass. This is the third of a trilogy of trio material Belew has been working on, playing most of the instruments himself. And he's touring in power-trio format that apparently includes a very young (maybe 20?) brother/sister duo on bass/drums. Wanted very much to see them, as Belew doesn't swing through town often, but couldn't squeeze it in.

To be honest, I've always had mixed opinions of Belew's solo stuff (non-solo would involve not just King Crimson, but The Bears). He's a great guitarist and a good songwriter, but the lyrics lose something for me when they get into social-issue monologues like on "Incompetence/Indifference" on this CD. I don't mind the message; it's the musicality of the words that falls a bit flat. Just my opinion; in all, Adrian Belew rocks, and I'm hoping to get another chance to see him in trio format someday.

! Beth Custer Ensemble -- "The Empire of the United States" -- Respect as a Religion" (BC, 2005)

Another artist in a spot conflicting with Zorn, although Custer has a good local following, many of whom aren't necessarily interested in Zorn's work. This is the first of four songs on this EP, a coolly quiet funky bit about America's addiction to oil. Has a catchy chorus and an appropriately greasy feel inside a mellow groove. Great stuff.

Previously noted here and here.

Solo project for the drummer who's worked with Secret Chiefs 3, Good for Cows, Mr. Bungle, and a host of local jazz projects. I stumbled onto this CD, a solo percussion effort, at target="new">Streetlight Records the other day and picked it up on a whim ... turns out "Congs for Brums" is one of the opening acts for Xiu Xiu this weekend (see below).

Opens with a dour, jazzy blast of horns, which makes it a surprisingly good fit into this show/set. Then gets into that rending-apart quaver of Jamie Stewart.

While I like the fact that Stewart primes his music with orchestral/jazz elements, and I appreciate the scope of what he's doing with the music ... I just can't get into it. Part of it is his voice, which is just too drama- laden for me. Part of it is just taste; I like to think that I like serious pop, but what I've heard of Xiu Xiu hasn't done it for me.

Mori was the drummer for DNA back in the no-wave days, and lately she's been using drum machines and laptop computers as her medium. This is a catchy drum-machine piece, lots of machine-gun clicks and clatters.

A few years ago, I celebrated Zorn's birthday with the John Zorn Blowout, an hour of various Zorn phases (Masada, improv, classical, game pieces, whatever) punctuated by one-minute punk/horror blasts of Torture Garden inserted after every song. In one case, a CD malfunctioned, so I stopped it early -- but only after cueing up a Torture Garden song, because that had to come next. That show was a blast, and I considered doing the same thing here but decided I didn't have the time.

A 40-minute piece, repetitious in a minimalist way, with gradual changes. I used a fragment of it during the John Zorn Blowout as well; it's got an evenness that's good for getting across the point that Zorn does classical stuff too.

I seem to recall someone saying on the John Zorn mailing list that this piece scared the hell out of them. It's kind of slow and pretty, so that sounds odd ... but then again, if you're listening to it alone late at night, the tension of the relentlessly slow tempo and the chiming, creepy strings could start adding up after a while.

By far the most popular track on this album, among KZSU DJs. This was the encore piece for their live set (all the "50th Birthday" CDs come from the month-long Zorn party at Tonic), a nicely compact five- minute burst of free-jazz energy. Great stuff. Fellow KZSU'er Dr. D had telephone during the show to request some Susie Ibarra; I didn't have the time for one of Susie's disks proper, but it triggered my memory to toss this one on.

Happily incongruous closer. Previously noted here.

* = Item in KZSU rotation
! = Pop anomaly
? = Item not in KZSU library

-- Go back to Memory Select playlists.
-- Bay Area free/improv music calendar: http://www.bayimproviser.com.