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DownerMan Revival
by Alek Grabinski - alek@best.com
Satisfaction Through Structure
It's been a productive month for me, musically - I've had the good fortune to see KVHW at the Fillmore, moe. at the Fillmore, moe. at the Crystal Ballroom, and my first experience of the Disco Biscuits live, at the seedy Mt. Tabor Theater and Pub in Portland. Opening for the Biscuits was a Portland-area band called the Jive-Talking Robots, who reminded me a whole lot of Galactic (a taper told me that the Robots' sax player sometimes sits in with Galactic when they're in town) - an unexpected treat. I traded for my first Greyboy Allstars live tape, after seeing Carl Densen's Tiny Universe project in front of forty people a month ago. All in all, not a bad month for a guy who bemoaned the death of "good music" ten years ago.
All this musical exposure has brought on unintended but not unwelcome thoughts. First, good jamband music builds stamina in the legs; you can't properly enjoy it if you're sitting down, and even if you're standing dead still, you're still standing. Second, California's stringent anti-smoking laws make you appreciate zealotry in the name of public health - curiously (or perhaps not) the bluecoats at local shows will bust you for smoking a cigarette indoors but completely ignore dank clouds emanating from the anointed (though I once recall a rasta-aryan getting busted for chuffing like a locomotive - I thought of it more like an intervention on behalf of the Humboldt that was being wasted on a brain that couldn't soak up any more THC). The Oregon crowds skulk around in bathrooms and cobwebby corners to catch their buzz, but they inhale and outspew King Tobacco like another flavor of oxygen.
Third, the world is full of musicians whose technical and creative musical expertise I will never reach, no matter how much time I devote to practicing. I stand in awe of them, these titans. I have little enthusiasm for those who distinguish themselves solely by blistering chops or technical pizzazz - I could give a crap about an Alan Holdsworth diminished minor 13th Hungarian gypsy chord that takes an octopus-like hand to finger (only to sound like something only a mother could love), or an Yngwie Malmsteen guitar solo consisting of 512th notes and a throw-the-guitar-around-your-back finish (and to think I once paid good money once to see that...). No, as I continue to swim laps around Lake Jamband and I hear more purveyors of the genre, what distinguishes the great from the noodlers, and thus defines my pantheon, is structure - specifically, the construction of the songs and the people who assemble them.
I'll make no apologies for being a fan of prog rock. What appeals to me is the combination of complex time signatures and classical themes, played on contemporary electrical instruments with sound effects, with an air of pomposity that goes well with my occasional bouts of misanthropy. A prog rock song stands at the opposite end of the spectrum from the n-chord songs - the 50's-era 3-chord Louie Louie, the "Carlos Santana secret two-chord progression" (as Frank Zappa once put it), and the one-chord noodlefest that you're guaranteed to hear over and over onstage at any of the festival stages you'll attend this year. A prog rock song is a pleasure to hear precisely not because it's spontaneous, but because it's almost entirely scripted, and the challenge and enjoyment comes in being able to play it from front to back with no mistakes. Phish's Divided Sky is an excellent example. If memory serves, this song has either 8 or 16 bars where deviation is allowed, in the form of a short guitar solo near the end of the piece. If the song has been played flawlessly up until this point, the solo is the icing on an already satisfying cake; if there have been errors, the solo may redeem, but only to a point. Phish's repertoire is full of such songs: Fluffhead, You Enjoy Myself, Reba, Guyute, The Asse Festival. (As I sit and write this, it dawns on me that part of the reason why I fell out of the Phishy stream was because they stopped writing these magnum opera; I can only take well-intentioned "phishy phunk" for so long. Was that a good Moma Dance? Dunno - pass the glass and let's see if it sinks in any deeper.) Phish's music is built on the foundation borne of Trey Anastasio's prog rock roots; the genius is the musicianship they layer over it.
Between songs at the KVHW show I saw a couple of weeks ago, I overheard this: "These guys aren't at all like the Grateful Dead; this is jazz!" (that last word spoken as if it were laden with cooties). My personal definition of jazz (and I'm not a jazzbo, so you purists leave me the hell alone) is that it's characterized by a memorable riff, a melody, around which the members solo. The greater this creamy center, the structure which carries it, the greater the song. I contend that the fundamental reason why KVHW are as great as they are is because their song structures are excellent. The hooks are unbelievable; some of their songs are a repetition of the same riff, over and over, but they never get tired because the riffs are so well crafted. The real magic is when this hook is presented to someone as talented as Steve Kimock, to repeat and then to mutate, slowly, into an unpredictable thing of beauty. But without the structure of the riff, it's merely talented, but ultimately pointless, noodling.
I believe that it's structure that separates the great jambands from the also-rans. While the transcendent jam is what sends you into orbit, the structure of the song is the rocket that propels you and pulls against the gravity of the mundane. There are plenty of bottle rocket bands who, on a good night, can fool you into thinking that you've been transported... but when the veil drops, as it might when the guitarist is having an off night or the keyboardist is all thumbs, and the solo doesn't work, the structure is all that remains. There are plenty of bands out there who can get up on stage and play weedly-weedly-weedly and cause your feet to move and your ass to shake. It's the great ones who can plant a seed in your brain and give you something to whistle as you walk to your car after the show.
DM
DownerMan has had it with The Man harshing his mellow.
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