Author Archives: mmwshackproject
FAITU#7
FRIDAY AFTERNOON IN THE UNIVERSE
(FAITU#7)
2000-10-23
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Billy Martin c.2000
Source info:
2000-10-23.fob.b+k4022.28543.t-flac16
– SET I (tracks 1-8) –
– SET II (tracks 9-19) –
– SHACK THOUGHTS — The Shack Project celebrates MMW @25 years!
FRIDAY AFTERNOON IN THE UNIVERSE (FAITU#7)
This gig is MMW’s first trio show after their Hendrix tributes a couple of days earlier on 10/20-21 (see 2000-10-21 Stream) — and they are retaining both the vibe from the gigs and a few of the tunes, in addition to the Hendrix tunes they already had in their repertoire (Crosstown Traffic & Hey Joe).
MMW c.2000
– SET I –
The Improv to start the evening is broad in scope — it sounds like it’s trying to fill large space and after a couple of minutes an angular melody jumps in from Medeski, briefly, more sounds in and from space, more melody … settling a bit after this into more of a groove. illyB kicks in a solid beat and Chris grabs hold under Medeski’s atmosphere, and then the keys start to join the groove a bit more. John drops out for the last minute or so, and we get a Bass’n’Drums breakdown, that eventually breaks down to just the drum beat with Billy solo. Full stop.
John kicks in the gospel organ squonks, Chris and Billy sporadically join, until they all lock in to serve us a delicious Philly Cheese Blunt. This song is always playful, if not too short, and gives way to another and more developed Drum Solo, sticking on the kit, and then the driving beat kicks in, drops, kicks in, and WE ARE ROLLING! I have never had the pleasure of catching We Are Rolling live, but would love to as I just really dig that heavy vibe and the off kilter reggae jam it opens up to … this version is a complete performance where the reggae jam is contained and leads back to the tune’s head, unlike it’s often veering off into another tune or improvisation, but it’s cool to hear it close up nicely (and actually, it might not be until into 2001 or so before we start hearing We Are Rolling often performed unfinished).
Billy Martin @Berkshire Music Festival, Butternut Ski Area, Great Barrington, MA 2000-08-13
We have a curious start down Ray Charles’ Lonely Avenue — in a good way! — that kinda colours the opening groove of the song. VERY cool mid-tune bass solo with some percussion accompaniment that also drops, and it’s just a nice quiet feel. That quiet vibe moves ever so smoothly into the opening notes of Nostalgia In Times Square, which quickly picks up the pace and we’re off dancing in the square — no sign of Angel Race (I’ll Wait For You), which is most often used with Nostalgia to create a medley. Whether or not the lack of medley is the reason, Nostalgia is cut a wee short as we drift into an illyB Drum Solo. The Solo begins with a steady beat that picks up tempo after not too long and gradually Billy starts colouring the beat with fills and we’re suddenly morphing into something other, and something other, and … slam! John drops the opening notes to Hermeto’s Daydream and we are in dreamland — this is a wild tune that’s never been played all that much, at least not in MMW’s recorded history, but when it is played it’s always a treat.
The set closes with our first Hendrix taste of the evening giving us Manic Depression, and it is scrumptuous. This is a tune I’d love to hear in rotation today, but it didn’t stick long beyond this fall 2000 tour (only one known 2001 performance, and that’s it, I think). It rivals 3rd Stone for my favourite Hendrix cover MMW have performed — I’d rather hear this than Crosstown Traffic any night! HA! Anyway, first trio-only version of Manic Depression is solidly transformed into an MMW tune. End set.
– SET II –
Again, fresh off the Hendrix tribute gig, Third Stone From the Sun quickly enters MMW’s repertoire and sticks hard for a while — and that’s good news for our ears! Beginning out of a noisy rumble that finally gushes forth that opening refrain, and we’re off into outer space. The band is clearly having a good time with this song. This gig on 10/23 is really the first time the guys let loose on the tune by themselves, and I think it kinda becomes the tune for Fall 2000 — I mean, they played it alot! HA! They played this tune at EVERY show we have copies of from this gig until the final gig of 2000 on 12/16! And it’s *real* fun to listen along as they get more and more comfortable with the tune … this performance opens into some cool open exploration mid-tune, coming back around to the melody, and then breaking down into a Drums’n’Bass jam that leads us into the dark territory of Shacklyn Knights. This is a murky groove that to me always sounds like I’m heading down an alley … Shacklyn is the name of the studio MMW have used in NYC, and they are its Knights.
Chris Wood @Berkshire Music Festival, Butternut Ski Area, Great Barrington, MA 2000-08-13
Brigas Nunca Mais chimes in to relieve any tension and just help us feel good in its Latin beauty, and as its easy vibe breaks down we are met by a sister groove in Partido Alto, but the groove intensifies — that’s the deal with Partido Alto! Love how playful MMW are with this tune, and fall 2000 so LOTS of that. The beat leads us to another illyB solo, again carrying the beat out and then colouring it away from itself, which brings us some Mercy Mercy Mercy! John starts out an odd melody right off the bat, different than I’ve heard in the other few takes MMW have done of this Joe Zawinul tune, and it kind of bleeds into this take making it a little different than usual — we like that. Here’s a nice live version of the tune I found within it’s original context, performed by the Cannonball Adderly Quintet – Zawinul wrote the tune while a member of the group:
Big Time drops, and my head bops. Everytime.
The slinkyness of Jelly Belly slides in, and John is doing something in that first minute that almost makes me nauseated when I focus on it (NOT nauseous! His playing is nauseous making me nauseated). The opening is dark to my ears and I don’t know if it’s the recording affecting my listening, but the rest of this version carries that too. As the Jelly often does, we are taken into a Drum Solo, but it only lasts a couple of minutes before Chris joins back for some Drums’n’Bass improvisation — and this opens into some really interesting exploration that leads to the hauntingly beautiful Afrique. Afrique too has a dark edge, which the tune just exudes anyway, and when it wraps we get the opening soothing notes of Note Bleu. Nice to hear this breath of groove so deep in the 2nd set actually.
So, the mood is mellow and relaxed now and Chris starts in with a slow brooding Bass Solo, lasting a nice lengthy time, building, and picks up into the Chubb Sub groove just around 4min, with the other guys starting to join in and Billy playing along more than John who’s tinkering with space sounds which then prompts Chris to toy around the bass a bit — illyB holding the building groove — and things sound like they’re almost falling apart just over 6min when the groove stabilizes in a very relaxed way and we’re off and running with the Chubb, which gradually builds more into its usually full large feeling groove. And we’re out – boom.
MMW @Berkshire Music Festival, Butternut Ski Area, Great Barrington, MA
2000-08-13
A rocking Crosstown Traffic gives us another nod to Jimi, which we’ll hear throughout fall 2000 (more so than usual!), and that ends this killer gig.
What’s cool about this gig and the early November 2000 shows, for me, is it’s just the trio. No other guests, no guitar, etc. I love me some full on trio, and hearing them bust out the Hendrix is rockin’ to my ears.
enjoy the grooves,
dug
THE SHACK STREAM
LISTEN/DOWNLOAD ANOTHER SHOW!
FAITU#6
FRIDAY AFTERNOON IN THE UNIVERSE
(FAITU#6)
1995-10-22
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Billy Martin c. 1995/96
Source info:
1995-10-22.dsbd+akg451.matrix.32330.t-flac16 [TSP1995#10]
– SET I (tracks 1-9) –
– SET II (tracks 10-19) –
– SHACK THOUGHTS –
FRIDAY AFTERNOON IN THE UNIVERSE (FAITU#6)
The Shack Project celebrates MMW @25 years!
From the Oxford English Dictionary’s entry on the word “Oscillation”:
Etymology: A borrowing from Latin. Etymons: Latin ōscillātiōn-, ōscillātiō.
< classical Latin ōscillātiōn-, ōscillātiō the action of oscillating < ōscillāt- , past participial stem of ōscillāre oscillate v. + -iō -ion suffix1. Compare French oscillation (1605)1.
a. The action of oscillating; movement to and fro; periodic motion about a position of equilibrium, as the swinging of a pendulum.
b. Chiefly Science. A single movement to and fro; a vibration.
c. Music = beat (n.1 8a.)
1890 Cent. Dict. (at cited word), Oscillation… In music, same as beat..or beating.
… and then there’s a footnote to the n.1 8a. definition for “beat” in the OED:
A throbbing or undulating effect taking place in rapid succession when two notes not quite of the same pitch are sounded together; the combined note alternates rapidly between the minimum of sound produced by the mutual interference of their vibrations, and the full effect produced by the coincidence of their vibrations.
And then back to the further definitions for “oscillation”:
2.
a. fig. Vacillation, fluctuation, or wavering between two states, opinions, principles, purposes, etc.; an instance of this.
b. Psychol. (disused). Fluctuation of attention or mental efficiency.3. Electronics. A rapid alternation in the direction of flow of a current; the state of a circuit in which this is occurring. Also: an electromagnetic wave produced by such a current.
4. Math.
a. The difference between the greatest and the least values of a function in a given interval.
b. Variation consisting of alternate increase and decrease without convergence to a limit or divergence. Cf.
… I find it interesting how all the various definitions pertaining to particular areas of study are actually all very similar in what they are meaning, that attempt at describing a repetitive fluctuating vibration that is not quite just a repetitive fluctuating vibration. In slighly more user-friendly terms Wikipedia states:
“Oscillation is the repetitive variation, typically in time, of some measure about a central value (often a point of equilibrium) or between two or more different states. The term ‘vibration’ is precisely used to describe mechanical oscillation but used as a synonym of ‘oscillation’ too.”
– SET I –
MMW’s Oscillation moves back and forth from chaos-to-groove, a common pattern for MMW tunes in some sense so the tune could be see as a microcosm of MMW’s entire creative output and intent, but the tune is unique in itself — and I do love that groove John plays on the Wurlitzer (?). There is some splendidly struck stand-up bass notes throughout — like, Chris is gonna break one of those fat strings! Deep digging.
(Much of the rest of this set and show will showcase tunes that end up on the next year’s album release of Shackman, a landmark album for the band in many ways.)
Love when the band drifts into Lifeblood … a relatively new tune to the repertoire at this point, the opening is not as drawn out as it gets so illyB kicks in with his shuffle pretty quick, John is tinkering along with jabs and runs while Chris keeps things creeking as he bows his bass — drops the bow just before 2min and now we’re hoppin’ with that plunk/slide bassline as John comes in and Billy keeps us cooking. Nice young energy in this early Lifeblood.
MMW 1995-10-03 @Georgia Theater, Athens, GA
Last Chance To Dance Trance (Perhaps) has become an elusive treat in recent years, but back in ’95 the band played the hell out of this tune and often. The song has a very grand feel to it, almost strangely so in an epic way. It has tiny moments of what Oscillation milked to the extreme, these tiny unravelling moments that seem to slingshot the trio back into main LCTDT(P) theme. Around 5min John’s tone gets real nasty — in a good way! — and illyB is beating those toms while Chris holds it all down, moving nicely back into building up the theme as we approach 7min with John’s organ just swirling my head! This all leads to the usual mid-tune Drum Solo from Billy — again, never cared much for drum solos before I started listening to MMW, but now I dig ’em and the journey they explore (last MMW gig I caught Billy closed the show with a KILLER solo!). When John slides back in with that organ and the band finishes this out, it’s always BIG!
After a brief pause, we get Sequel with what sounds like a tribal-ish beat of some kind; tiny high-end plunks from the bass; then some Clav mashes as the bass bites in a bit more — that beat is still driving us, a swirl of keys and smatter of bass, and we’re into the Sequel groove. The title being a reference to the fact that this a “sequel” to (i.e. reworking of) an earlier tune called It’s A Jungle In Here — a curious reworking and re-titling. In some sense it just sounds like they solidified what they felt was a better arrangement of IAJIH, but then gave it a whole new title as well — which might be driven more by the appearance of each tune on successive album releases. Regardless, once Sequel made an appearance we were never welcomed to the Jungle again until a surprise appearance in a 3-set one-off gig in NYC from May 2012 when It’s A Jungle In Here closed the first, and MMW-only, set of the night — and it rocks as it’s own arrangement after all these years! Anyway, Sequel swirls us around and around it’s dark-ish vibe, building and building up and up until the release back to the light Sequel bounce that wraps us back around to moments reminiscent of the start of the tune. Done.
The band toys with some open space leading us into the Belly of the Jelly groove. Jelly Belly is still young at this point and the band is still carving out their approach to the tune, but they aren’t shy about ripping this up until it ends and slams into the start of Is There Anybody Here That Love My Jesus, a nice pairing. ITAHTLMJ is one of the eariliest MMW tunes I remember hearing as I got into the band over ’95-’96, and I just love the opening notes. John grinds out some nice work deep in the tune eliciting some vocal calls from Billy – fun! A classic MMW take on Duke Ellington’s classic Chinoiserie closes out the set in high energy fashion.
Many of the tunes really are just passing the solo-hat around — this is early MMW, and the group-mind/interplay develops more and more over time, at least to my ears, where the idea of one of them “soloing” is often masked in the communication between the 3. It’s certainly there in the mid-90s — that’s why we all loved listening even then! — but this develops over the years, and for me the guys are never tighter than their last gig. I mean, listen to those Jamaican gigs from Jan ’16 where they haven’t played together since an MSMW gig in summer ’15, and before that it was 2 gigs with the Alarm Will Sound Orchestra in Feb ’15, but still the trio is locked-in and just grooving. Yes, they mostly relied on older tunes they’ve known for years, but they rocked and their improvisation was fresh and exploratory — what more can you ask for 25 years into a band? HA! Anyway, ’95 is a young version of that but the 3 have certainly always seemed to have a special connection …
– SET II –
We get some thumping from Billy; then some organ work from John; followed by some thumping from Chris this time — then the trio bounces this around a bit, taking turns exploring sound-in-the-round (not that they’re playing in-the-round, but that they are passing the sound around), so to speak. Sometimes the fill is chaotic, sometimes melodic, or a bit of both. This all eventually mashes into a caucophony of chaos (?) and suddenly Billy is riding that opening jingle that builds some tension before — BOOM!
Billy Martin c. 1995/96
The Lover burts into the scene, getting everyone’s butts movin’ with a groove. As The Lover dissolves into the bass bowing as usual from Chris it doesn’t last long before John starts sprinkling in some spooky intro sounds accompanied by illyB shaking some toys and we’re actually making our way through an opening lead into Dracula! Dracula begins a run of newer (at that time) songs, with it debuting roughly midway through ’95 (7/5 is the earliest known recording). Nice Dracula, as usual, and it adjoins nicely with Henduck as the two tunes share similar structures with the open-space-sounding starts/ends to each tune — similar to their eventual Shackman album mate, Lifeblood, also a ’95 debut. Henduck wraps up after some particularly meaty plucking from Chris throughout, and the 3rd and oldest of these run of newer tunes, Think, pops up and I *think* you can tell it’s been around a little more. Having debuted near the end of ’94, Think has gotten some considerable attention since then, with some larger versions in the spring of ’95 and seemingly settling into the structure of the tune as most of us would know it now. Think starts with illyB kickin’ in the beat and slowly builds — loving John’s tone at this time!
Worms is, to my ears, silly fun. It’s intense, sorta, but when I just step back and listen — all the while with “worms” floating through my brain in some way — I just laugh. I dig that. Nice illyB solo in here before the concluding Worms march.
MMW c.1995
’95 is a good sounding year for Ray Charles’ Lonely Avenue — I mean, all 3 of the guys are so young and their sound is so raw at this point. Again, John is so raunchy at times, like the opening of the tune, it’s great. This moves swiftly onto Chubb Sub, no solo to intro the tune, and it hops along quite briskly. Billy back introduces the tune mentioning how it’s on the soundtrack for the album Get Shorty. Another MMW classic, their cover of the Hendrix tune Crosstown Traffic, wraps up this set on a high energy note. The encore takes us down into a more mellow vibe …
As Bemsha begins John is playing a curious melody … unusual placement but a nice start to the tune! Tune plunks along on at a fairly lazy pace, just hangin’ out … this is a wonderful merger of two great songs, Bemsha Swing/Lively Up Yourself, that I can’t hear them without the other now, even in other contexts. This is a real sweet way to close out the night …
That wraps up another Friday Afternoon In The Universe, unfortunately a day late this week — I was outta town catching a show and got back too late to post! This gig was worth the delay though …
enjoy the grooves,
dug
THE SHACK STREAM
LISTEN/DOWNLOAD ANOTHER SHOW!
FAITU#5
FRIDAY AFTERNOON IN THE UNIVERSE
(FAITU#5)
2005-10-23
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Billy Martin c.2005
Source info:
2005-10-23.s1-at943c+s2-akg-c1000.87712.t-flac16
– SET I (tracks 1-3) –
– SET II (tracks 6-9) –
– SHACK THOUGHTS –
FRIDAY AFTERNOON IN THE UNIVERSE (FAITU#5)
The Shack Project celebrates MMW @25 years!
Does anyone else remember how strangely awesome it was to start getting access to shows the day after or shortly after a gig? From 2003-2005 I remember this becoming more common place, certainly some bands are covered more by tapers, but those capturing MMW’s grooves in certain regions became quick to share too — as always, we owe HUGE THANKS TO ANY/ALL TAPERS!!! LOVE YOU GUYS! And so I remember this fall ’05 tour, the last really big tour MMW have played, really, as us getting to hear shows pretty quickly. This particular source didn’t come out at that time, but this is a better capture of the evening thanks to JAZ and Steve!
2005 retained much of the ’04 improvisational spirit, taking us even further at times. LOTS of Improv to soak up from ’05 too and this week’s show gives us a nice taste of that in the 1st set.
Billy Martin @The Garden Theatre/Villa Montalvo, Saratoga, CA 2005-08-25
– SET I –
The opening 3min or so find the band in an Open Improv exploring the sound space of the room, searching for a groove which begins to build just around half past 3min, but really kicks in when John introduces some crazy melodies around the 5min mark — he has a wild sounding keyboard arsenal at this time — where do these melodies come from?? How can he and Chris have this endless source to tap into? In a radio interview a few days before this gig John talks a bit about that seemingly endless supply of grooves they seem to have access to, shrugging off he how he doesn’t know where it comes from but they’ve been given this gift so they explore it. Anyway, back to the gig … as this improvisation develops it’s become a full fledged spontaneous composition by the time the first track hits 10min, just building on the open base they started with and creating a purposeful improvisation. Listening to MMW is kind of a religious experience for me when they’re really open and out there, and this gig has that vibe, especially this opening … which climaxes and then disolves into more open space — I find these sections tickle me sometimes, making me giggle or chuckle out loud, like the opening, but this one is a little more methodic as John comes in with the piano leading us into Ray Charles’ What’d I Say, a fun romping blues tune. Love hearing Medeski rock the piano! He’s spoiled me for listening to other players … the blues take us into some Drums’n’Bass and eventual Drums-only action where Billy makes his way to a hand drum to work the transition into Toy Dancing — I love this move! Billy often finds his way to the hand drum to start the “bloops” that signal the Toy Dancing beat, John sounds out that siren-ish call and we’re dancing with toys …
Post-Toy Improv moves into a thumping tribal-ish plomp … Medeski playing this pretty-but-edges-broken melody on the Rhodes, and jabbing with (what I think is??) the Wurlitzer — maybe it’s the Clavinet? Anyway, that builds to John moving to the Organ as the tribal beat grows intensity with Billy just going crazy by the time the last track of Set I peaks over the 12min point — YEAH!!! Then things get really quiet until, BOOM around 15min! This maniacal “groove” erupts — and is this like an early raw version of Miles Behind?? … the band was debuting some tunes this fall that would end up on the Out Louder release with Sco in ’06 — just in time to take us to set’s end where it just seems to bubble over, like it can’t be contained … set break.
MMW @Montreux Jazz Festival, Montreux, Switzerland 2005-07-08
– SET II –
Shackman kicks off the 2nd set, and this was a brand new tune having debuted earlier in the week during the radio spot mentioned above. It didn’t have a title at the time, was dubbed a few different temp names before Billy called it “After the Onsen” during the Dec ’05 Japan run. Then the track was released in 2011 as part of the 20 singles the band produced, and the title on the track’s release was Shackman. 15 years after the album Shackman, we have a song titled Shackman. Makes sense … this tune just dies down at the end and …
Sugar Craft’s call echoes out and the groove kicks in. I dig this tune without Logic because I like what John fills in for some of the sounds … the energy on this version is nice and full with Billy just giving it — pretty heavy!
Shine It’s bass kicks in as the Sugar melts — kind of abruptly, but we’re off in the happy Shiney groove now — John’s on piano! Tune doesn’t differ a whole lot each time, but this is a tight performance. They’re playing the song a lot at this time, so no wonder … playful throughout.
Sasa is always cool, although no other performance has hit the heights the 2/28/04 version w/Ribot hit — transcendent around 6min in on that one! But, this one, as usual, bites nicely into the groove.
The move from Sasa > End Of The World Party is crunchy in a good way! Listen to those sounds morph out of the Sasa groove into the haunting opening of EOTWP — love this shit! If this is the end of the world, these are the tunes for me.
John Medeski @Toronto Jazz Festival, Toronto, ON 2005-06-27
We get some playful tinkering and jabs from Billy and John as Chris really sets up to take us into the main melody of: NOCTURNE! I REALLY LOVE THIS TUNE! And I most especially dug it’s resurgence around the 2005-2007 time period, and this gig is actually the first performance of the song since ’99. Not that it wasn’t great when it debuted in ’98, but John has some new sounds by this time, Chris’ tone is a wee different and I think Billy’s toolkit is expanded as well. Anyway, I can bop my head to this groove for hours — sometimes I’ll just put on a playlist of a bunch Nocturne performances and listen through … love when Billy finally gets to the kit and kicks in a beat as John fills in his end a bit more, all while Chris keeps plucking that beautifully agonized bassline …
Following the drift out of Nocturne with the pumpin’ pluckin’ of Who the Fuck? is a SUPER SWEET pairing. This PJ Harvey tune had been around for almost a year by this point, played at probably over half the band’s shows since that time (if not more!), I remember hearing folks wanting more variety in the setlists, but where the fuck is Who the Fuck? now? Huh?! Enjoy these tunes while they’re in rotation, I say! MMW have often made large shifts in their repertoire and seemingly milked certain tunes for concentrated periods of time, but then those songs can suddenly disappear from rotation and that’s that. This tune simply rocks. HARD. I dig it.
The set wraps up with a common closer for this era, Bass Solo > Queen Bee — love this slinky groove! My wife and I love dancing to this tune, and it reminds me of her groove — I like it! Think I’ll put the tune on when we get home and crack a couple beers …
The evening’s encore is Olde Wyne — love that old school spelling! I always knew the song was a cover, but just looked it up and discovered the original artist to be Afo Executives & Tammy Lynn – who knew? This is not an unusual spot to find some Olde Wyne, and it sooths us nicely as the gig winds to a close.
And that’s another groovy Friday Afternoon In the Universe …
enjoy the grooves,
dug
THE SHACK STREAM
LISTEN/DOWNLOAD ANOTHER SHOW!
FAITU#4
FRIDAY AFTERNOON IN THE UNIVERSE
(FAITU#4)
1997-04-11
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MMW c. 1997
Source info:
1997-04-11.octava-012.78853.t-flac16
– SET I (tracks 1-6) –
– SET II (tracks 7-12) –
– SHACK THOUGHTS –
FRIDAY AFTERNOON IN THE UNIVERSE (FAITU#4)
The Shack Project celebrates MMW @25 years!
One of the reasons I LOVE listening to MMW is that I wholeheartedly trust their musical exploration — really, they can do no wrong for me because they embrace the music in a way that no other group does for me. There is no “scene”, no gimmicks, no characters to fall in love with from the songs, no real stage production — just the music and how they approach making it and what that results in. That has always been refreshing to me and part of what appeals to me about them as a band. In 1997 MMW made quite a shift in their sound, so much so that when I finally got to see them live in the spring of ’98, having heard nothing from ’97, I was astounded by the soundscape they were creating as it was NOTHING like I’d heard from them having only heard tapes from ’95-’96 over the previous couple years — it took a while for music to reach Atlantic Canada in the mid-’90s! Anyway, that shift in MMW’s sound began in ’97 when they debuted a bunch of new tunes and covers. The new MMW songs, at least most of them, would end up on the ’98 release Combustication, but for this guy who’d just gotten into the ’95-’96 sound, ’98 really threw me for a loop. It wasn’t until years later that I finally got my ears on some ’97 recordings and started to bridge the gap between ’96 and ’98 … and so, this week’s pick comes right at the beginning of the ’97 development.
MMW promo c.1996/97
– Set I –
The presence of this embryonic Down On Me melody is a wild way to open the show! Things start slow and easy with Chris establishing his bassline and Billy locking down a beat with some piano sprinkles and around 1min John starts to loosely introduce the melody to what became known as Down On Me — it wasn’t until 2003 that the band took this old traditional melody and really established a tune, but not before toying around with the melody again in spring 2000 which found the melody paired with Tsukemono’s bassline and beat — clearly the guys have dug the Down On Me melody for a while! Since this “version” of the tune only happened once (that we know of) it’s unclear whether this arrangement was established or if John just started dropping the melody into the opening improvisation … eventually the groove moves away from Down On Me, becoming its own thing, getting heavier as the track plays on.
Early performances of Combustication tunes, some others we never hear again, a couple covers and a few Shackman tunes populate the rest of the show.
After some monitor requests to the soundman and a note that they’ll be trying out some new music tonight, the wonderfully slinky groove of Start/Stop comes next and this would be like the 3rd time the tune was played — debuted on April 8th, we don’t have a recording of the 9th but it’s safe to assume it was played, making this show on the 11th most likely the 3rd performance. Just noting that this is an EARLY rendering of this tune and it’s already just busting out into some nice space. They aren’t pushing the “Stop” moments as far into space as they eventually will but the hints are there. As the tune fizzles out we enter into some Open Improvisation, just as wacky as ever! Bird calls from illyB, bowed bass from Chris, some dancing piano on top of that from John which are leading us to the night’s first cover, and a new addition to the MMW repertoire on this tour …
Hip Chops, a Roland Kirk tune new to the live repertoire, is a nice influx from a more traditional “jazz” sound while still retaining some oddities — it’s a weird tune, I think! But I dig it.
MMW c. late ’97
Fast Clicks pops in with a breaking illyBeat and a super poppin’ bassline from Chris while John colours the upper spectrum using a few of his different toys. This tune is SO GOOD! WHY DON’T THEY PLAY THIS! Well, I can ask that about lots of their tunes … the answer is that they’re always moving forward. Just makes me wonder what makes a tune stick for them? They have a high turnover from tour to tour as they tend to focus more on new music when they’ve got some, but those new tunes eventually become older tunes and some stick while others don’t. Always interesting what an artist digs vs. what the fans might dig. Anyway, Fast Clicks would have been cool to hear over the years moving through the band’s various palettes of sound, but alas, all we get is the ’97 treatment — so, I listen to these old gigs to get my fill. The song pumps along and then they bring it down to this nice little soft vamp around the middle of the track and that continues to get tighter as the track nears its conclusion with a nice explosion of keys from John (not sure what board it is??).
Just Like I Pictured It bloops out as Fast Clicks finishes and finds some odd-to-my-ears key work from John — not the usual clean sound we know from the album version and subsequent performances. He’s using a muddy sound in the start and then moves to organ, and I’m digging it as it makes the tune a little less smooth. A nice early take on this MMW classic.
The lovely Latin Shuffle (what a title, eh? HA!) takes us to set break, and again, this is a brand new tune at the time but the guys are all over it! Chris is back on upright bass and this line just gets my head boppin’! Billy is well locked into the Latin shuffle and once John hops in on piano we are off and running, smiling, and just enjoying the groove … breaks down to just bass’n’drums at the end before we reach the end of the set — this will later become a place where Chris often takes us out into a larger solo, but they’re still feeling their way around these tunes at this time.
– SET II –
With a Latin beat (no shuffle) the 2nd set gets going with the debut of something I’ve dubbed “Dysfunctional Ash Groove“, after the venue name — it is wacked! Wish both this and Fast Clicks would pop to the band’s attention now to revisit … so the groove is SOLID but something sounds a wee dysfunctional to me, like I can’t quite dance to it but wanna – HA! My body keeps jerking in different ways — picture Elaine from Seinfeld … if you know how she dances, that’s kinda how I feel this tune makes me move. The groove gets more intensified as we approach 5min, and John is just swirling away, Billy crashing, while Chris holds the groove. This all dissolves into a short illyB solo leading into …
Disrobe was great to hear again in recent years (2010-11), with its slinky groove (much of MMW is “slinky” to me, I guess), and back in ’97 it was real nice too as the band’s sound was morphing yet again, while still retaining that MMW vibe … the tune was part of a soundtrack for the film End of Violence (never saw it, myself) and the studio track is sweet too. This tune is simply KILLER. Period. I REALLY LOVE IT! When it resurfaced in 2010 I was stoked, but didn’t catch it in the shows I saw … then it came back in 2011 in the all requests first sets they were playing, with Billy even noting they hadn’t played it in forever … well, it had only been a year at that point, but I think he forgot that they, the band, dug the tune out on their own back in 2010.
Next up, a little Everyday People, MMW-style — can you even recognize this as the Sly and The Family Stone tune? This cover kinda introduces MMW’s gospel-treatment of certain cover tunes, i.e. Hey Joe, Julia, etc. This is a nice mid-set meditation, which is also messing a bit with what had been the usual construction of an MMW set of music. Up until this point the band’s “slower” tunes were still intense in some way and not really bringing the mood down like these tunes do, in my opinion.
MMW 1997-09-06 @Gallup Park, Ann Arbor, MI
Well, we’re not down for long and now things are bubbling up in the Bubblehouse! Everyone’s favourite song, right? HA! I mean, I love the tune, like really dig its groove and release but why is this the tune that most folks seem to call for? During the all request first sets in 2011 this tune was played almost every night, either in that set or in the encore slot due to it being requested by folks online before the tour began. I found it hilarious! There were SO MANY other songs I would have wanted to ask for since the band already plays this tune with regularity, but … I digress … nonetheless, the groove gets you moving and this performance is no different. It’s interesting for the ’97 sound to it. When it drops to John skittering along just before 5min and Chris starts dropping bombs before the half-time beat kicks in — well, that’s cool to my ears every time!
After a short pause, John gives us some nice organ swirls before Chris kicks in the bassline, which starts cooking along as Billy smatters some percussive interjections, with the tension building as we wait for the groove proper to kick in, which ain’t too long in ’97 but eventually they can really milk this opening! At this time they’ve played the hell out of the tune over the previous couple of years so they are rocking it hard. Nice moves with John on the piano mid-tune, and then exploding into the Jelly Belly again before illyB busts out with a little solo before John and Chris jump in to finish it out. It becomes common for Billy to bust out the end of this tune with a solo, as we’ll hear in shows to come.
For the encore Billy ponders aloud what they should play, with the audience shouting out a garble of suggestions. They “THINK” about it a bit and then, well, they Think us right to the end of the show. The opening features stellar tambourine work from Billy before he hops on the kit when John busts into the main melody. I’d say this is a fairly reserved rendering of the tune, but it still makes you Think!
enjoy the grooves,
dug
THE SHACK STREAM
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FAITU#3
FRIDAY AFTERNOON IN THE UNIVERSE
(FAITU#3)
2009-11-12
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Chris Wood @Mass MoCA, North Adams, MA
2009-11-12
Source info:
2009-11-12.schoeps-mk22.102558.t-flac16
– SET I (tracks 1-7) –
– SET II (tracks 8-16) –
– SHACK THOUGHTS –
FRIDAY AFTERNOON IN THE UNIVERSE (FAITU#3)
The Shack Project celebrates MMW @25 years!
John gets the evening hopping on the Clav and we are in full-on dance mode — my feet won’t stop moving while I sit here! This is quite a developed piece of Improvisation, or an unknown one-off tune … either way, it’s incredible. At the end the band moves into what I can only describe as robot-like bleeps and bloops with percussive accompaniment, and this gives way into more open and darker space that grows over the next 4min (start of track 3) to create a brooding slow pulse led melodically by Chris on stand-up bass and Billy’s tom work while Medeski’s keys balance between filling out that slow pulse and colouring it with zaps. I’m swaying side to side in my seat now with John coming in with a new melody around 7min (track 3) on one of his organs, coloured by an electric piano (Wurlitzer?), while that slow pulse gets deeper and deeper. This is mesmerizing … my state of mind might be helping that, but nonetheless, deep haunting groove — ooh! Billy kicks the beat up just before 9min and this slow pulse has intensified into a skittering groove with Billy’s fills almost busting it apart, but then he locks the shuffle beat back down and we’re off!
MMW @Mass MoCA, North Adams, MA
2009-11-12
The fourth track carries out into the explosion brought on by the build over track 3, but this settles down a bit around 3.5min with some low key piano work from John, broken bowing sounds from Chris, and Billy’s toolbox getting a bit of play time before he returns to the kit as John’s piano work gets a little more involved — Chris is still heaving away on that bow. This is some wacked and beautiful shit. In a similar pattern to the last Improvisation, this one makes it’s way back into some chaotic space before dissipating around 10min down to a rumbling piano solo from John and leads into …
An incredible piano-based spontaneous composition – wow (we’re on track 5 now). This is some down right astounding on-the-spot-composing, folks. It erupts into MMW-esque chaos over the final couple of minutes that lingers into a hanging silence …
Resolving down to Chris picking up his electric bass on track 6 and giving us a *nasty* biting solo that Billy jumps into on one of his hand drums (the Talking Drum, I think?). Around 4min Billy kicks in a bass drum a bit, Chris starts to lay down more of a line and John jumps in with some space keys — it’s light and floating. The illyB begins what I consider what of his specialties: he starts driving the groove with a GODDAMN TAMBOURINE! He’s incredible on this thing! Once Billy moves to the kit the band is driving a full on groove to take us *almost* to set break and it is nice! Like, SUPER nice! Damn, these guys are good, eh?
The groove dissolves, and illyB takes us out … I used to not really dig or “get” drum solos, until I started listening to Billy …
Billy’s Toolbox @Mass MoCA, North Adams, MA
2009-11-12
– SET BREAK –
2nd set … RADIOLARIANS! 2009 was the year after the Radioalarians creations and the band was steeped in the music of these three albums BIG TIME, along with some new music from the recently released children’s album and Zorn Book of Angels disc, with the odd older tunes popping up here and there, but mostly it’s the Radiolarians songs that carried shows from 2008-2010.
John Medeski @Mass MoCA, North Adams, MA
2009-11-12
We’re on the Scene with Jean, and this is tune is all about Medeski tickling those ivories – sweet sounds! I mean, I love Chris and Billy holding it down here, but Jean’s Scene is all about John and he gets the set hopping! This is a tune from Radioalarians 3, the fall batch of tunes from the ’08 series of Radiolarians tours. Anyway, the Scene carries on with some tension and release tinkering out of the piano … man, I love John on the piano — any other player is ruined for me now due to the talents in Medeski’s fingers … well, body, the guy plays full-body on his keys. I still dig lots of other piano and keys players, but nobody makes ’em sound like John. Stellar upright bass work from Chris over the tune as well, with Billy keeping it tight.
Next up, Amish Pintxos — aka “Stabs“! That was the temp title given to the tune during the Radiolarians tour in ’08 before we knew the name (I think that temp name came from, Randy B?). I always thought “Stabs” was appropriate when you hear Medeski’s key jabs that get the tune rolling and carry on under his melody on the melodica — this is a nasty tune and I love it! There are 3 distinct section to the tune and each interplay so well together. Some fun picking from Chris on electic during this tune, and Billy is rocking the shakers as the tune winds down … listent to that raunchy sound John gets outta the melodica!
A brief pause before we Walk Back, which is like an echo of some old school ’70s funk in the MMW flavour — tune would have fit nicely in the Shackman era, really.
MMW @Mass MoCA, North Adams, MA
2009-11-12
Then Chris treats us to an upright bass solo, which basically stands alone even though it is a lead-in to the following tune we drop to silence at the solo’s end for a little longer than usual in such cases before …
Padrecito’s bassline begins and we drift into this lullaby … that’s how it feels to me, I just love getting lost in this tune … I often listen to the Radiolarians 2 album version as I begin my evening slumber … again, like the opening tune of the set, John is tickling the ivories but we aren’t hopping here … just drifting along …
Wonton gets our hearts pumping again and asses shaking — another tune that would jive with the Shackman era groove … love Billy’s tom work in this tune.
MMW @Mass MoCA, North Adams, MA
2009-11-12
And the set ends with Undone, a common spot for this tune to pop up and it’s more than welcome — I F#CKIN’ LOVE THIS TUNE! I feel this tune and Amber Gris, the encore, really took lessons from the PJ Harvey cover tunes the guys were playing in the few years leading up to Radiolarians. Both Undone and Amber Gris are like epic pop tunes … like GOOD epic pop tunes. I REALLY dig both of them, so to end the set with Undone is music to my ears (literally and figuratively!), and then an Amber Gris encore is just icing on this groovy cake — take a BIG bite, you won’t be disappointed!
enjoy the grooves,
dug
THE SHACK STREAM
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The Shack Project 