|
| John Zorn: Electric Masada |
|
 |
Author: Ben Pomeroy
Posted on: Thursday, February 27, 2003
John Zorn’s Electric Masada: Tonic 1/29/03
By Ben Pomeroy
Tonic’s stage was lit up when I entered the main space on the night of January 29th. The overheads illuminated what seemed at first glance a chaotic mess of amps, cables, and instruments, the collective whole striking me as reminiscent of a downstairs suburban rec. room that had been co-opted by a high school rock band. This scene of informality and deceptive disorganization fits appropriately to the character of Electric Masada. This is a band that engages listeners, pulls them in, turns them upside down and the rights them up again, leaving listeners deliciously shook up.
That night Electric Masada was beginning the first evening of a four-night stand of shows at Tonic. Electric Masada’s founder and head composer, the experimental alto player John Zorn has adopted Tonic as his home to deliver his vision of Klezmer-jazz fusion. Zorn blends Klezmer melodies with challenging composition while incorporating backbeat rhythm, virtuoso guitar and bluesy organ work. This unprecedented musical brew has given Zorn a patent on a genre of his own. Zorn is able to make this path of music work because of the cerebral and skilled musicians he has to accompany him. One of the prominent musicians on stage is Hammond B3 Organ maestro, John Medeski, popularly known from his successful funk groove trio Medeski, Martin and Wood. Medeski has defined his playing through a watery bluesy tone and filthy chops. On the guitar is Downtown hero, Marc Ribot, whose distinct raspy tone and streaming leads give the band a sharp bite. Also providing flavor is Cyro Baptista, a groundbreaking percussion player, bandleader and composer in his own right. Baptista brings both vibrant texture and trans-cultural polyrhythm to the music. Keeping the band grounded is drummer Kenny Wollesen, bass player Trevor Dunn and keyboard player Jamie Saft.
The first piece began with Wollesen and Baptista exploding almost chaotically while Zorn burst out with a rapid-fire stream of notes. The rest of the band waited and absorbed the cycle of mounting percussion and saxophone. Zorn signaled Medeski to join in and the organ player did so with a jittery dissonance. Just as it reached a point of cacophony, Zorn silenced the drums, but kept Medeski soloing, hereby isolating and enhancing the theme he was developing. With another quick gesture the bass and drums dropped into a catchy groove, pulling the sound together and presenting Ribot with a thick fabric to attack with his guitar like a needle weaving a crazy design. His lead line was marked with holds and releases with a hint of Latin flavor that drifted into the Klezmer/Masada head which Ribot, Zorn and Medeski all played simultaneously. It was right then that the first instance of Electric Masada’s unique character manifested itself. The three disparate tones of musky organ, distorted guitar, and shrill alto sax, layered themselves in the same melody, producing a multicolored and textured chorus of sound. Like a creative and excited child coloring an outlined scene in a coloring book with a handful of crayon pencils, the three musicians harmonized succinctly but the different tones of the instruments produced a sound that bled at the edges and thickened at the center. After a succession of arching melodies, the pressure dropped and Jamie Saft took over cooling things off with a loungy groove. Zorn let the piece settle for several bars and then summonsed up the tempo again and with it a cycle of solos from each musician. All of the soloists played the melody and made statements of their own. Zorn was sure to allow for space for each musician to stretch and contract as they pleased. Just as the last crescendo of Marc Ribot’s solo climaxed Zorn closed the box of musical fury with a turn of a key just as if nothing happened.
The second composition opened with strong phrasing and bluesy bends from Marc Ribot’s guitar. An ambient background soon slipped into a satin swing that echoed a bit of Steely Dan. This groundwork allowed for an interesting contrast between Saft’s refined Wurlitzer piano sound, Ribot’s scratchy guitar and Medeski’s thick and dirty tone that was busy coating the melody. Once again Electric Masada’s musical effect was conveyed through unconventionality and juxtaposition within a defined structure. In that opening musical passage, sudden mood changes and seemingly out of context coarseness and loose playing meld seamlessly together in calculated composition. Just as in the last tune when the momentum of the primary virtuoso players came to an apex, Zorn who is conscious of redundancy cooled the band down so as not to overkill the statements that had been made. In this transition period, Baptista used a wind powered keyed instrument to make his first melodic statement. The result was an eerie sound that signaled the beginning of the second act of this composition. Baptista’s exploration of this quirky wind instrument ushered in a series of robotic chatter between the organ and keyboard. Medeski and Saft flirted with overindulgence as they spared in squelching keyed hammering. Although an interesting change of mood, I was glad that Baptista brought things back to a more earthy level with a samba-esque beat and simple flowing melody from the rest of the band. Just when things seemed to be resolving themselves, Ribot throws on the echo effect on his guitar and screams up to the top of his instrument’s neck building a sheet of sound. Zorn maintained this elevation of pace and then dropped it down to close with Medeski followed by the rest of the band playing the head.
The final two songs of the set took unexpected turns as well. Zorn faced his band in almost a pit conductor format for what seemed to be a thematic piece suited for the stage or a film score. Electric Masada swept into an immediate epic sounding rock overture where thrusts of dramatic pull and push among the horn and organ, ushered in an opera sensation to the composition. With over the top crescendos and pulses, I listened not knowing whether there was an ironic design to this work or not. It was compact yet boastful and meteoric like a dramatized scene of a spaceship launch. This song lacked the nuance and sophistication of the other works, and for that reason turned me off.
The final piece departed from its packaged predecessor. Medeski opened with a slippery head that danced through the chorus of choppy and earthy percussion. Zorn played an exotic solo that also had hints of blues. Ribot vamped a rusty refrain and Saft glided over the keys teasing the melody and taking it out. The caliber of musicianship and composition glowed at that moment. All seven musicians played at once yet the sound did not seem crowded as it could easily have been. Zorn signaled another pressure drop and the bass and drums coaxed a funky groove which Ribot took advantage of by utilizing a slide on the neck of his guitar. Ribot made the final statement of the set through his solo. Characteristic of his playing, he created strong tension and picked a recognizable yet “out” lead line, and then wretched the guts out of the whole thing and then put them back together to close with the melody.
It is clear that John Zorn has been on to something with his Electric Masada. What Electric Masada offers is powerful and compelling music. It is these two things because the band aggressively breaks format and cliché yet remains compelling because they don’t choose the easier and more obvious “anti-structuralist” routes that avant-garde music is sometimes victim to. They remain respectful to ordered composition and what the ear can tolerate, yet they open you up to a new level of what music can feel, taste and sound like. |
|
|
|
|
|
