Worlds Between Songs

Some breakfast lounge, Hampton Inn
Worcester, Massachusetts

One last frizzled attempt at grace before I turn in for a while. It's 2001. Can you believe that shit? I mean really. There have always been two milestones set by visionary science fiction that the rest of the world recognizes: for the narcissistic, there's Orwell's 1984; for the optimistic Clarke and Kubrick's 2001 always sufficed. I was thinking about the ending to "2001" during the Biscuits' show tonight. People I talk to generally have one of two reactions: the first is that of confusion, the other is general letdown.

When it comes down to it, who can blame them? After a film like "2001", it feels like the only option for the film's ending is for a portal to be ripped right there in the fabric of the screen, the monolith to stand there humming, and the audience to evolve to some higher plane of existence where they're nothing more than glowing orbs floating gently across the sullen Earthscape. How can anything else possibly live up to the promise? The solution that Kubrick opted for was an attempt at Zen-like grace and the sparse wisdom of a haiku. Or something.

After the triumph of "the Hot Air Balloon" in 1998 and the other worldly beauty of "Akira" in 1999, the Disco Biscuits had set a pretty high standard for themselves. In moments of pure B'gock/Gonzo blathering, as is the native tongue of many Biscuits' converts, the Disco Biscuits are "next level". If ever there were a time and place for any of this, the New Year's on the dawn of 2001 would be it. But, like Kubrick, the bar was pretty goddamn high. The only thing that might well have sufficed to top "Akira" would be for some kind of physical transcendence to occur, something that would pierce right through the weird heart of the strange loops that the band produces and leave the band a mere physical shell on the stage.

Didn't happen.

But the show was really fucking good. I dunno where exactly to begin with all of this. It's the end of the year and I'm coming down off of the last Biscuits' show of 2000, sitting in the deserted second floor breakfast lounge of a Hampton Inn in Worcester, Massachusetts. How am I supposed to reconstruct what happened? What would you do? A setlist won't do. Not this time. We tried that. Didn't work. There were some song titles on a page in my notebook, which could act as some kind of guideposts to the night, but not much more than that.

I've always had a hard time trying to describe what the Disco Biscuits do and why it's so damn good. As such, I'm having a really hard time trying to come up with ways to express that whatever it is that they do, this was better. At the peak of Crickets, though, which hovered luminously across the beginning of the second set, I came to a realization about the Disco Biscuits' music, which may or may not hold up beyond this article. Stated as a kernel: once improvisation begins the identity of a Disco Biscuits' song - at least so far as a specific sequence of chords goes - is no more important than any four instrumental parts being played at a given moment in a jam. That may sound like the oversimplified ravings of a stoned fool, but hear me out.

For me, without too much formal training in music, I can't really describe what any given band member is doing at a certain point. Occasionally, I stumble on something that sounds good, that sounds like some concept I was taught somewhere along the line. To try to describe a moment in improvisation, the easiest thing for me to do is to relate it to the song it originated from (or something else that it sounds like): so-and-so are playing the changes in relation to so-and-so doing some kinda extrapolation of the melody... blah, blah, blah.

At the opening moment of a Biscuits' jam, the chords of the song lose their value. The song itself is not sacred. Musically, the Biscuits' don't get sentimental in their jamming, lingering on the changes of the song because it's the right thing to do. Each part begins to carry on. Yet, somehow the identity remains. What is it about what they're doing, then, that retains the song? The easiest thing to ascribe it to is some sort of attitude or general intent, but that doesn't get one very far. What it all boils down to is the question of what makes a song.

Where does a song end? Is a song simply made up of chords (and maybe lyrics)? Or is there some kind of essential song-soul that exists beyond that? Goddamit, I'm against this pseudo-spiritual mumbo jumbo, but I feel like - with the Disco Biscuits, at the very least - it's something along those lines. One can listen to a bit of a Mindless Dribble jam and not be able to pin down anything specific, but still identify at as fundamentally Dribble. But at what point does Dribble become not Dribble?

One upshot of this is that it allows for great flexibility in the Biscuits' music. They can play a song over the course of a show (or another song) without ever literally playing the song. For example, a jam inside Basis For A Day can "be" the Very Moon without the band ever explicitly stating the Very Moon's melody. Because of this, it's also easy for pieces of Biscuits' improvisation to be something else entirely, something that doesn't belong to anything else. There are entire worlds to be explored between songs. Or, for that matter, they can play a song for a damn long time without ever repeating themselves.

All of this is not to say that the Disco Biscuits' music exists outside the realm of conventional tonality. It doesn't. Their approach, though, I think represents a new method of exploration. The way their material is structured, and the way their improvisation is structured, allows for nearly infinite variation. It's systematic variation, though.

Deep breath. Fresh start. Who? What? Why? Where? When?

WHO: The Disco Biscuits.
WHAT: Their New Year's Eve performance.
WHERE: The Palladium in Worcester, Massachusetts.
WHEN: December 31 , 2000.
WHY: Golly... I dunno.

I had an awfully hard time getting into the first set, though the music was sufficiently huge. The Biscuits' filled the room nicely. The Palladium is an old theater -- Vaudeville, I suspect, though perhaps an old movie house (or maybe even both). Sound escapes quickly to the top of the room. Of note was the return of the much maligned Frog Legs after an extended absence. Like the other legendary version of the song - from April 10, 1999 at the Recher Theater - the song morphed into the ending of the band's deep-thump rendition of Pink Floyd's Run Like Hell.

Also contained in Frog Legs was the first of two mock New Year's Eve countdowns (the other came during the second set Magellan) where the band integrated a countdown into the final chorus of the song... nowhere near close to midnight of course. In some ways, it seemed a humorous nod to their countdown last year, where they built up to it during a section of House Dog Party Favor where the band adds beats every cycle through. During the final chorus of Frog Legs, the band sang: "JACKPOT! I got ten... JACKPOT! I got nine..." eventually building down to the usual "one".

The normally soaring Magellan had troubles getting off the ground, though that could've easily had something to do with the shoddy acoustics of the room. While the place may be quite fit for bulbous dance grooves, its sensitivity towards anything quieter than a full-tilt ripsnorter is comparable to a pervert in a porn shop. At any rate, the peak of Magellan pulled a similar trick to Frog Legs.

All week long, people have been speculating as to what the New Year's song might be. For the past two years, the band has chosen the song that has most represented their improvisation in the preceding months. In 1998, it was Helicopters. In 1999, it was House Dog. People's guesses this year ran between Crickets and the Munchkin Invasion. During the run up to New Year's, not wanting to jinx it, the unspoken warning among the kids was "beware the Munchkins". On New Year's, it began to be said aloud. It was just a matter of when and how.

Where we were least expecting it, of course.

If any song in the Biscuits' repertoire is untouchable, it's Magellan -- and even that's not saying a helluva lot. Still, it's the exception and not the rule. One doesn't expect much variation within the composed parts. Yet, just as the band was slipping into the gentle swell of the final verse, drummer Sam Altman began to subtly hammer out the oddly timed introduction to the Munchkin Invasion. One by one, his bandmates joined him. Finally, lighting designed Matt Iarrabino nailed the lights in synch and the invasion was on.

I lost it somewhere in there. There really is a lapse in my brain as to what happened at midnight. The last thing I remember is the band counting down somewhere in there -- maybe they were singing the Munchkin Invasion, maybe they were singing it over the ending to Hope. Then there were some explosions. And then we were getting minied. At my high school, there was a time honored tradition of minnying: that is, purchasing a box or five of Dunkin' Donuts munchkins and throwing them at a specific target. At midnight, the Disco Biscuits (or, more specifically, members of the crew), minied us. Then the band was playing Helicopters.

I dunno, dude. I just don't know.

The rest of the night is just fragments. After the band finished their third set, the venue threw the houselights and house music on. Fans stayed and cheered. From up front, it looked as if security was preventing the band from returning to the stage. Finally, to the boos and jeers, the beef walked on stage and began hauling off the band's equipment -- apparently against the will of the band's crew. About 15 minutes later, cops were in the venue, herding people out. Not a very good ending to the show. I'm still waiting for the Magellan reprise.

Now, it's approaching dawn. Soon, the breakfast lounge will be in use. Actually, it already is. About 15 minutes ago, a woman came in here and began opening cabinets, removing dishes, and getting things set up. A bunch of partying heads stumbled in with beers and generally made themselves a nuisance, bugging the woman for food. At one point, the elevator door opened to reveal a stack of couch cushions piled high in the compartment. I'm going to shut down and go to bed.

Good night.

s Jesse Jarnow can be reached at jesse.jarnow@oberlin.edu or by his homepage. Previous tour journals are located here.