chicagocinema.net

Things Falling Apart (a full Arkestra for this one night). Photo by Miranda Barnes.

Please join me for a Pompous, Long Winded Digression:

I’ve seen many things in my day… ATTACK SHIPS ON FIRE OFF THE SHOULDER OF ORION!

Oops, sorry. Just a brief, “Rutger Hauer in Blade Runner” moment there.

What I meant is that I have seen many live concerts, shows and performances of all types, genres, subgenres, and subgenretypes (yes the Word Collider is up and running) in my many years of seeking out new and bizarre forms of expression (pretty much since birth).

From shows in people’s garages and basements to the arenas, concert halls, gin joints, art galleries, theaters and outdoor music sheds of the Midwest; I’ve wandered, searched and even lurked in order satisfy my jones for those events which blur the boundaries created by all these illusory and arbitrary distinctions placed between forms of artistic expression and provide a transcendent improvised live experience.

Gil-Scott Heron in a tiny elementary school auditorium, the Art Ensemble of Chicago at the UW-M Student Union, a collective from Kansas City called BCR (formed many years ago by a bunch of brilliant music students who hung out with Sun Ra and Arkestra for a life changing week) at some KC art gallery, Magic Slim and the Teardrops at a club in Madison whose name escapes me, Tom Waits at the Chicago Theater, Johnny Griffin at the Jazz Showcase; I could name check/drop forever about all the performances I’ve seen (not that I’m alone in this sort of thing, I’m just giving you a baseline here) where, for a brief moment, a level of perceptive transcendence was achieved by all parties (audience and performers alike) and time seemed to stop as everyone was inexorably drawn into the moment.

I’ve also spent much effort throughout my life seeking out musical groups who do not concern themselves with adhering to conventions about genre or style; any musical instrument may be used and any musical style can be employed to achieve the specific sonic landscape desired. If that means mixing electronic samples with doumbek, tabla, cello, bassoon, and slide guitar (or some other equally unconventional assemblage) in a stylistic bouillabaisse, so be it.

It used to be much harder for me to find bands like that (at least ones that were really excellent). But with the continued globalization of musical styles, plus a few generations who were raised on the infinite cultural/musical/artistic buffet that is the internet and trained in the myriad of art and music schools and conservatories throughout the land; eclectic and well executed improvised music is almost ridiculously simple to find. Especially in Chicago, which has become a global hotbed of it in recent years.

It’s gotten so easy, in fact, that one can find three incredibly adept improvised avant garde music ensembles in one place on the same night; not to mention two ass kicking art rock bands.

Now I’ll admit that I’m hardly coming from an objective place, having been a participant in the proceedings and counting several of the musicians as my friend, but I would never give praise I felt wasn’t deserved.

So with that caveat, I’ll just come out and say it: I saw the future of music on that Saturday night (during the anniversary of Woodstock, no less), and the future is in great hands. I also saw that the true values of Woodstock (peace, love, community, and infinite creativity) are still alive and well and being advanced with much greater care and understanding than they were by the original Woodstock Generation. [OH, shut your overbearing whiny pie holes, you smug self-satisfied Baby Boomers!!! I'm not saying that anyone played geetar as great as Hendrix or was as groovy as Country Joe and the Fish or anything like that, I'm just saying that these kids are more committed to the actual values (in a "how you live your life" kind of way) espoused during the Almighty 60's, and are also conducting themselves in a slightly more sensible fashion. OK? Now take your Cialis and get back in the bathtubs!]

Now that I’ve gone on a self-aggrandizing tangent, thrown down a generational gauntlet, and hyped things up to a fever pitch; let us return to my account of the proceedings (the lineup was slightly different than the poster due to cancellations and replacements), since in 20 years you’re all going to pretend you were there anyway (Yeah, I said it!):

I really wish I’d been able to see more of the set by Origin of Animal, a constantly fluctuating collective of musicians dedicated to unique sound craft. Unfortunately, I was getting wound up for my own show and couldn’t allow myself to get sucked into their performance, as much as I would have liked to. The small portion viewed (with the rest heard through open windows) was astounding, a large group of musicians with a dazzling variety of instruments artfully improvising to create a unique musical experience, and succeeding extremely well. Just the sort of thing that gets my mojo flowing. I need to see them again real soon in a situation where I can really let go and lose myself in their music.

I also missed much of the set of my good friends Cousin Bones, a crazy blues poetry roadhouse punk ensemble, who were bringing it in a way that I hadn’t seen before. Dropping the ironic distance that occasionally hampers their work and kicking out the jams in a fierce fashion, front man Wes Heine and his posse blew the roof off the joint and brought the already overheated crowd to a fever pitch. So much so that I was wondering how the hell I was going to follow that rock and roll asswhuppin’ with my puny little words.

But I did my thing and folks seemed to dig it (see previous posting).

Then it was time for Things Falling Apart. First, some background info generously provided to me by the band’s founder, Bob Aspatore. Things Falling Apart began about 7 years ago as Bob’s solo project, for which he brought in Brandon Welch as a collaborator. Things went very well and the duo expanded the lineup to six musicians and began in earnest as a musical assemblage. The lineup changed a little over the next several years, but they remained a six piece until last November, when a bit of “intraband turmoil” resulted in the number dropping to a core of four musicians.

Further turmoil at a show later that month caused the remaining members to go on “indefinite hiatus,” and the future of Things Falling Apart looked dim [In Bob's words, "I say 'indefinite hiatus' because we were all too passive-aggressive to say 'the band broke up'."].

The quartet resumed communication early this summer, however, and began to mend some fences all around. “Then this show was offered to us and we decided to say yes. It felt right.” Bob and company then sent out an invitation to all the members who had ever played with the group to join them for this show, plus some invitations to several people who had become “honorary members” over the years. This brought the lineup for the August 15, 2009 show to a whopping nine musicians, all in the mood for reconciliation and reunion, and with the goal of creating a one time only musical event.

And what an event it was. Concerned mainly with their own artistic goals, the musicians took up residence on the stage (which had seemed pretty big until that point) in a configuration which almost resembled that of a traditional Irish séssion (where the players all sit facing each other in a circle with their backs to the audience) and settled in.

If you’ve never experienced improvised instrumental music of this strain (bands like Tortoise, La Makita Soma, Mono, Explosions In The Sky, Electralane, Canyon, etc. etc.– there are several who till this fertile soil); it usually starts a bit soft and mellow as a few players begin to play a simple melody and/or chord progression, then gets more complex and involved as more of the musicians weave their way into the tapestry, eventually building to a series of crescendos which can last for an extremely long time, depending on the inventiveness of the ensemble.

This particular conglomeration of players was particularly inventive and in an especially intense place, so the audience was taken on an incredible ride. This trip was made even more surreal by an atmospheric fog machine and the mind blowing graphic designs of video artist Matt Jensen, which were being projected onto various surfaces throughout the space. Time seemed to slow to a crawl as the nonet of improvisers brought everyone along with them into a sublime state of sonic inundation, one as powerful as any I have ever experienced (not like the Art Ensemble of Chicago show at UW-M, where I started hallucinating when I wasn’t even on anything, but even they were never able to do that again for me).

Yes, I was very receptive to a musical epiphany, having just had my own great performance experience and being more than a little bit buzzed by that point; but I could have walked into that room off the street sober as a judge and still been blown away by the improvisational skills and musicianship of that particular aggregation of troubadours. Things Falling Apart rocked my world that evening. I also got a copy of their 2005 album, As Above-So Below, which I’ve been listening to constantly for the past several days, so it wasn’t just a one time thing. [It's almost embarrassing to rave about something this much, but I've got to call it like I feel it.]

Fortunately, the End of Times show felt so good for them that Things Falling Apart will be returning to regular playing/recording as a four piece, with an open invitation to the rest of the former and honorary members who can make it for live shows. “Thus, a new line-up with every show, a unique performance of every song. All the wonderful sweaty nervous moments that come with the unpredictability of live shows and not really knowing how to get to the end, just that you need to get to the end.”

Hooray, Hooray.

Matrameru was more than up to the task of following Things Fall Apart, being of the same eclectic improvisational ilk with the added aspects of intense visionary spoken word coupled with electronic/hip hop influences. Leader Georg Garret really knows how to bring the shamanism and the lilting cadence of his powerful voice glides above the mellifluous roar of the instrumental/electronic soundscapes created by his talented cohorts, most notably multi-instrumentalist Luc Sequiera, who at one point even hopped over to the enormous pipe organ and started working it like Sun Ra meets Captain Nemo, the whole ensemble incorporating it into the piece as if they always dragged a two ton Christ Calliope around with them to gigs.

The night was closed out by Donoma, who I’d seen before and are one of my favorite young bands (and not just because I know and really dig them all). If I were going to glibly describe them as a drink (which it seems that I am), the recipe would be- One Part Flaming Lips, One Part PJ Harvey, with a splash of Portishead and a twist of Cocteau Twins. They are still growing and gelling as a creative unit, and I really like the brand of shamanistic swampfunk progpunk (there goes that Word Collider again!) that these kids are brewing. They had been busting their asses all night making the event flow smoothly and still managed to summon up the mojo to bring the rock and roll with authority, overcoming distractions and technical difficulties to kick out some serious jams and end the night with a bang.

The show was followed by an open jam that was extremely freewheeling and fun; there was even a point where Wes dragged me up to the mic just as the musicians were launching into an intense bluesy jam. Several sheets to the wind, I started some improvised growling which quickly evolved into this Memphis style song cycle featuring some concepts that had been bouncing around my head for several years as a sort of philosophical treatise, but were now flowing out in a Tom Waits meets Thomas Berry meets David Bohm meets Arthur Conley torrent. At least that’s what it felt like to me, other people may have just seen a weird drunken old guy barking out a bunch of crazy crap. Although a few folks seemed to dig it, perhaps even the two slightly sarcastic Chicago Police officers who rolled in a few minutes later to shut things down for the night (my apologies to the good citizens of Wicker Park if I disturbed their slumber).

So there it was, all over but for the tear down and clean up. A wonderful night of artistic rebirth and musical enjoyment for me, one I’m still a bit jazzed by (if you couldn’t tell that already by my rhetorical “flights of frenzy”). I met scads of talented artists and musicians whom I hope to be privileged enough to work with again in the future, perhaps even collaborate on some sound/word fusion pieces.

Wes and Israel (who I’ll be eternally grateful to for the opportunity to return to spoken word) are already working on putting together another event, so keep an eye on this site for more info on that and several other endeavors that will be coming to fruition in the coming months.

Particularly the launch party for Hollywood On Lake Michigan, 2nd Edition; which could turn out to be a pretty big shindig. [That's all I can say for now.]

Donoma closed the show with authority.

I thought I might provide a breakdown of my experiences at the End of Times event on August 15, both as a participant and spectator.

Since it’s my blog (and I’m so all about me anyway), we shall start with my return to the Spoken Word Performance Art world after a several year hiatus.

It was hotter than all get out both inside and outside of the venue, so it wasn’t difficult to warm up and get that whole “sweat lodge” experience going. Any nervousness about my rustiness was quelled by the warm and accommodating nature of all the performers in the impromptu “green room” (literally, for once) that was the garden area behind the converted church where the event was held. Knowing that these people were all the kind of folks who would be into the sort of thing I was planning to do (I almost don’t care how the audience responds just as long as the other performers respect me, probably a throwback to my stand-up days), I was able to concentrate on getting my shaman on and really focus and emotionally prepare.

This revamped church was the perfect venue for this event and this particular performance of mine; with the curved wooden pews, the lovely giant mural of the Ascending Christ on the back wall, and a still nicely working pipe organ (they even had a tall pulpit stage right). Israel Alpizar (one of the event organizers and member of the art rock assault force that is Donoma) brought me up and I settled in with a few blathering opening remarks and the set up for the first poem I read, one I wrote several years ago, called Johnny Griffin (about seeing the legendary jazz tenor player for the first time). Here it is:

Johnny Griffin
By Michael Corcoran

I’m sitting at the tiny table like a kid at Christmas
Waiting to open presents
I want to turn around and scream
At the old man in the back of the club
Who stands there like some living diorama
History embodied in stooped shoulders
And a laugh like sandpaper rubbing wax
He’s talking with friends he hasn’t seen in a year
It’s just another show for him
A day in his life
But it’s Church/the Grand Canyon/Stonehenge/Voodoo
and the Art Institute to me
And I want the priest/professor/shaman to get his ass onstage
To recreate that missed moment in time I mourn for
Finally he looks up as if suddenly noticing the stage
And remembering who he is
He sidles towards it and the musicians suddenly materialize
Like flickering ghosts called forth
The ceremony’s about to begin
Set the Way Back Machine for 52nd Street!

The sax is a bolt of captured lightning in his hands
That throws off sparks of incandescent joy
Contorting sorties of psychedelic hummingbirds
Weave around our bobbing heads and twitching legs
The barrier’s eroded between heaven and earth
Spirit/Man/Horn now one circuit
A transistor radio picking up the Music of the Spheres
A Pentecostal Reverend speaking tongues of golden fire
Drums beat waves of thunder like echoes of Krakatoa
The throbbing pulse of quasars at the edge of infinity
Sometimes he pulls the horn from his mouth
And gasps in a hoarse orgasmic rasping growl
Like the mating cry of galaxies
The rumble of drifting continents
The universe awakening from a dream

It’s probably the best poem I’ve ever written (not that I’m Milton or anything), and (despite my rust) it turns out that I’m still able to bring it as an orator; so the already warm and receptive crowd was now really on board as I segued into the second piece (which I wrote especially for this show). It is a lyric visionary performance poem that dealt with several of the themes of the event, is untitled for now (just realized I never got past Sacred Geometry Performance Piece.doc- I’ll have to think up a title), and at least for the moment shall only be orally disseminated (that means I ain’t going to print it out here).

That second piece went extremely well (no matter how many times you recite something in your dining room you can never tell how it’s going to actually work onstage), and I really wanted to focus and bear down for the narrative storytelling piece that closed my show.

I explained that it was a segment taken from a much larger solo show I had created as a school project years before, entitled Thirty Circles (pretty much the oral narrative of the first thirty years of my life), then provided some background to make up for the forty five minutes of exposition that precedes this particular story in Thirty Circles.

I intoned an ancient Irish storyteller’s incantation to bring back the sacred story circle vibe that had been broken by all my ’splaining of stuff and launched into it. The tale seems a bit sordid and loses its effect if I just dryly synopsize it (besides, you folks gotta come see it live sometime), so I’ll forgo any play by play; but it lasted about 12 minutes or so, I really got into the telling, everyone seemed to enjoy it, and it proved to be a very nice cap on what was an incredible performance experience for me and a perfect return to my roots (the rebirth of my artist within- if you will).

I headed to the back garden green room and took a moment to come down from the powerful emotions that are brought up when one does a performance of that sort, then headed back inside to see the next band, Things Falling Apart.

I was going to make this just one big monster post, but it looks as it would be best split it up into two sections to save everyone (especially myself) some eye strain. Next post will be about the 5 incredible bands that were also there that night.

Have a great weekend, ya’all!!!

I just wanted to plug an event that some good friends of mine are putting on this Saturday in Wicker Park.

It shall feature some very inventive young bands, experimental video and graphics, and even yours truly (under my performing pseudonym). I’ll be doing a narrative story piece or two (something I haven’t done in a few years) and a lyric visionary poem (something I haven’t done in a few decades). It’s going to be a little harrowing for me since I’m a bit out of practice, but it will be quite nice to knock the dust off my shamanism (as it were).

The whole event promises to be very arty, free-wheeling, and more than a tad wacky (in a Flaming Lips kind of way); not to mention rather loud, intense, and raucous at times. So leave your bourgeois sensibilities at home and don’t forget your earplugs (unless you’re used to that sort of thing).

Come on down, it’s gonna be a lot of fun!

The Company is an interesting film that was poorly received when it was released in 2003, mostly because it didn’t conform to certain expectations that film goers had about it. It was marketed as “a Robert Altman film,” and while Altman was the director, he was basically a hired gun and not as intimately involved in the entire process as he was with his other films. Therefore, audiences went to it expecting to see a Robert Altman film when The Company was, for all intents and purposes, actually a Neve Campbell film. Allow me to explain.

When Neve Campbell was nine years old, she entered residence at Canada’s prestigious National School of Ballet, training full time and performing in numerous productions. Dance was her first love and the focal point of her life until her late teens, when she transitioned into acting.

Throughout the first several years of her acting career (first gaining fame in the television series Party Of Five and continuing through the Scream franchise and other films) she dreamed of mounting a project that would be her homage to the world of the dance. A film that would illustrate both the artistry and intense athleticism involved in the form, and the complete emotional, physical, and spiritual commitment required by it.

After an abortive attempt to produce this project through a major studio, she found a home for it with an independent production company. She and collaborator Barbara Turner spent four years visiting Chicago and interviewing members of the city’s renowned Joffrey Ballet Company in order to glean enough narrative material for Turner to fashion a script. Campbell also took classes with the Joffrey during that period (between her acting gigs).

Once the project became a go, Campbell then began the laborious process of returning to world class dancing form after an absence of almost ten years. She trained over eight hours a day for four months on her own, then spent another month and a half training eight plus hours a day with the Joffrey itself to learn the dances required. To further complicate this already near impossible feat (imagine an NBA player trying to return after a nine year hiatus), she broke a rib just four days before she began the Joffrey training period and was in constant pain throughout the rest of the preparation for and shooting of the film.

Because the film had multiple characters and involved large amounts of naturalistic improvisation (it would have been impossible to get a troupe of dancers who weren’t actors to sufficiently master large amounts of dialogue), Campbell knew the film would be “Altmanesque” in many respects and would require a director with a similar toolkit to Altman’s. But much to her amazement, Turner (who was an old friend of his) and Campbell were able to get The Master himself to consent to direct the film.

This turned out to be a blessing and a curse for the project, because while they were blessed with Altman’s considerable genius, they were cursed with an audience who expected the biting satire and brilliant ensemble acting of Mash or Nashville or Short Cuts. And although The Company is many things, it is certainly not a biting satire or expose of the world of dance, and while it features several fine actors (including Malcolm McDowell and Neve herself) it isn’t the full on thespian onslaught that is Short Cuts, The Player, or any of your prototypical Altman films.

The plot of The Company is very simple, it highlights a year in the Joffrey Ballet Company, focusing on Campbell’s character, an ensemble dancer who has a chance to take on a featured role. The film follows the trials and tribulations of the dancers, with an emphasis on the challenges of being both a committed artist and world class athlete. Most of the cast is comprised of the “real” dancers of the Joffrey, and the movie contains several of the company’s actual dances in their entirety.

Many people who saw this film when it was released (myself included) were put off by the fact that it doesn’t contain much in terms of dramatic arc or character development (again expecting an Altman experience), but this is also true to the realities of being a dancer in a top tier ensemble. When you spend 8 1/2 hours a day in a grueling training regimen (one you’ve adhered to since your were nine or ten years old), there really isn’t a lot of time left over for anything else. To inject artificial drama or action into the film would have betrayed the truth of the material and rung very false.

It is also unfair to compare The Company to other Altman films in terms of acting because he was mostly working with a group of dancers, instead of several dozen of the best actors in the business. Even Neve Campbell isn’t really the star of the film, the Joffrey Ballet (really the Art Form Of The Dance) is the star of this picture. It was only after seeing this film on DVD years after its theatrical release (and reading more about the project) that I was able to appreciate these distinctions.

So if you enjoy the dance, particularly the Joffrey’s wonderful brand of it; The Company could be a very entertaining and satisfying rental for you. Just don’t go into it thinking “Robert Altman Film.”

You can learn much more about the making of The Company here and here.

And after you’ve watched the movie itself, check out the bonus feature on the DVD entitled “Play All Dance Sequences From The Film” and be blown away by the artistry of the Joffrey Ballet.

While I have been and will continue to be an advocate for films unjustly given short shrift by the Hollywood distribution system; I am the first to admit that there are many movies which fail to get released in theaters simply because they are completely and unrelentingly awful.

Such is the case with Baby On Board, which was shot in Chicago in 2008 and unceremoniously released straight to video in June of 2009. I can’t even begin to explain how terrible [I feel] that this movie is, how painfully unfunny and wrong on several levels, but I’ll try.

The emotions I felt watching this film were similar to those experienced when seeing a really really terrible amateur comic perform on an open mic night; it’s uncomfortable on one level just because they’re not funny, but the true awkwardness springs from the realization that this person actually thinks the things they are saying are humorous. The scorn almost turns to pity as you start to meditate on what their life must have been like for them to be so emotionally and culturally retarded that they would actually write down and memorize this material and present in public as a comedy act. “What happened?” becomes the primary thought in your mind.

Here is what I think can be the only sane explanation for how this script came into existence: The two guys who wrote Baby On Board (yes there were two of them, and I’m not going to provide their names because this crime must have been committed while they were juveniles) did so when they were both 9 years old. After having skimmed through some older relative’s stack of Hustler and Penthouse magazines, they became inspired to write a romantic comedy. A few hours later when the script was completed, the boys made a blood oath with each other. “We will never change a word of this script. No matter how much we learn about men, women, dating, sex, biology, marriage, or the realities of day to day existence; as Satan as our witness, someday we shall get this script made into a movie with every letter and comma intact.” And then perhaps they killed a puppy to consummate their nefarious pact.

Since we live in an unjust and sometimes cruel world, not only did they manage to get this script made, but they persuaded some fine actors to participate in this abomination it. It’s especially painful to see the wondrous Heather Graham (whom I’ve adored since Drugstore Cowboy) vainly laboring away in an attempt to animate this befuddlingly puerile and dull witted material.

Now I could really tee off on this piece of cinematic goat vomit film and continue on indefinitely about how much I hated it, but I will lay off at this point. I just don’t want any of you good people to be in a video store, see this movie on the shelf and think, “Hey! Heather Graham, Jerry O’Connell, John Corbett, and Lara Flynn Boyle; how bad could it be?”

Very Very VERY bad, my friends.

NOTE: After reading Roger Ebert’s do’s/don’ts of film criticism (although I don’t consider myself a film critic- and for the love of god neither should you all), I’ve been shamed into making a few changes and adding this post script:

Heather Graham and Jerry O’Connell play an ad executive and divorce lawyer (respectively) whose lives are thrown into turmoil when she unexpectedly becomes pregnant. John Corbett plays O’Connell’s best friend, Lara Flynn Boyle is Graham’s boss.

If you are under the age of 15 and/or think that There’s Something About Mary and American Pie were the greatest films ever made (I mean in a literal Citizen Kane, The Godfather 1 and 2 kind of way), you may very well enjoy this movie.

My apologies to all the good and talented people who were involved in making this film for my extreme snarkyness. I know you have families to feed and can’t always choose the work you do. But my emotions run pretty high when I see what I consider bad comedy (10 years as a stand-up comic will do that to you).

The IMDB says that the movie was taken away from the director by the producers and drastically reedited, which may have contributed to the problem a little (but not much).