Live shot #94!

 

Jazz guitarist, Settlers West Galleries, Tucson AZ 9/7/23.

Las Mordidas-Ex-Voto; L.G. Records, LG-6; 2023

 

It was a tremendous pleasure to have recently scrolled over to Dischord Records and seen that Ex-Voto, an archival release from Las Mordidas being served up. To paraphrase Ian Mackaye, D.C. bands have always seen the album as the menu and the show as the meal, but Disaster Amnesiac was not anywhere near the District when Las Mordidas were being plated live. Hence I have had to enjoy their lone 7" for many years as the best example of what was clearly an ass kicking band. No cool memories of seeing them in flesh for this listener, but I recall making the purchase of that 7" at the legendary Epicenter Records on Valencia St. in 'frisco (yes, I'm calling it that now). Surrounded sounded so great at that time (1996? 97?), and it's only ever sounded better to me over the years. I'd go so far as to say that it's one of the best songs of that decade. Good for you, the listener (and Disaster Amnesiac, too), it is included on Ex-Voto. It's so cool that Surrounded is now buttressed by nine other tracks of groove and rage from this quartet of Dischord schooled players. Las Mordidas pumped out a chunky, funky fusion that was rooted in the Hardcore Punk Rock aesthetics of that long running successful label but had moved horizontally away from them in solidly Rock-ist ways. Jerry Busher was one of the best drummers that I've ever seen play live, and those skills can be heard all over the LP, for example on Surprise Goodbye with its solid groove-centered traps playing. When Dug E. Bird is playing the bass, the Funk of D.C. is going to be present, and indeed it is. Oh, to have heard this rhythm section live! Their sets must have moved some butts! Dig on Solar System and Just About Buried for evidence of that potentiality. Guitarist John K. seems not afraid to make heroic moves worthy of the six string electric tradition on Bad Man and the snappy instrumental Ransom. Big riffs and sweet melodic runs can be heard all over the guitar parts from Ex-Voto. And then, there's Chris Thomson. Chris evolved into perhaps the Top Punk Rock Singer of the post-Nirvana era in Monorchid and Skull Kontrol, in vocal timbre and lyrical astuteness. It's quite fascinating to hear these qualities in their primal state within the Las Mordidas matrix. He'd clearly already envisioned and developed an absolutely singular delivery therein, a delivery that only got better over time. Rock 'n Roll singers must have a cool, individual style, unique to themselves and rooted within their decisions about, as Joe Carducci noted, what will and also won't work. Thomson had that shit nailed for years, and the documentary evidence on Ex-Voto evinces it in ways that will make fans of his art very happy. Slight critical thoughts have arisen from the kind of tossed off sounding Not Again and a few moments where then-current musical influences/trends poked out with a bit of glare, but, on the whole, this album, so lovingly packaged and produced by a top flight team, is very worth seeking out and digging into. It they did a reunion show, Disaster Amnesiac would try really hard to make it out to D.C. to hear them. Maybe get Hammered Hulls on the bill? Hell, if they did that, maybe re-form Ignition as the show opener? You guys have almost a year to get if happening at Fort Reno.........

Live shot(s) #93!

 

All shots taken at 191 Toole, Tucson AZ 9/2/23 at Celestial Fest 2023.

Below: In Lessons. Dramatic twin guitar emotional Rock with good stage presence and thick bass lines. Cool stuff. 

 

Below: Rat Trap. Blending of Hip Hop and Metal for the sake of fun.

 

Below: Non Grata. Lemmy once said something like "somewhere in the world right now, the best band in the world is playing", and for this listener on this night that band was Non Grata. They do it RIGHT. 

 

Below: Of the Lost. Technical overdrive pushed through the house speakers for streamlined mix, and interesting thing to see no amps and speakers on the stage. 

I think that one band was missed, sorry, I had to eat dinner before heading downtown.

Live shot(s) #92!

 

Organist and composer Pamela Decker with composer Ken Yukl as page-turner.  Holsclaw Hall, Universtiy of Arizona, Tucson 9/1/23. A recital featuring 20th-21st Century pieces by Decker, Yukl, Calvin Hampton, Herbert Bielawa, Charles Villiers Stanford, Gerald Near. Organ by Schoenstein & Co., San Francisco. Full spectrum sounds!

How 'come Disaster Amnesiac was the last to find out?

 

Steve Miller Band's The Stake and Joe Walsh's Rocky Mountain Way are the same song? Wish you guys would have told me. These were the tunes that made the Punkers do it themselves. These were the tunes that young 'uns listened to as they were schlepped to the grocery store by mom and sometimes dad. I guess it's a zeitgeist type of issue? 

Well, time keeps on slippin' into the future. The culture was so much different than as compared to now, but Disaster Amnesiac guesses that each and every era has that characteristic. Probably each and every minute does for that matter. I read about the suicide of Frank Kozik recently. His art was very popular within cultural strains that Disaster Amnesiac was aware of and inspired by. He had just turned, or was about to turn, sixty years old when he went through with his decision. I can't help but ponder what factors they were that made him decide to end it once and for all. In terms of "the average American male", whatever the hell that is, Kozik was nearing some major endings. Perhaps he'd already began having some of them. Who can say, and that's really not my business anyway, but it has given food for thought. 

The presence of human death is one to be so engaged with for a person as their later years envelop them with tremendous quickness. It would be so nice to be able to phrase that into some kind of "rage, rage" line, but, honestly Disaster Amnesiac can be a pretty Steve Miller Band type of guy, and I fear that an attempt to do so would emerge dorky at best. Instead I'll just try to focus on these moments that are left for me with some kind of presence, worthy of their gifts.

Rent Romus-PKD Vortex Project (A Tribute to the Dark Master of Pulp Fiction); Edgetone Records, 2001

 

This CD has been in and nearby any player within mi casita for a number of weeks. Furthermore, Disaster Amnesiac would challenge any listener of outside-styled music to not have a similar response to its killer sounds. PDK Vortex Project was recorded in 1998 by five musicians that are just very damn good at what they do: Rent Romus (woodwinds), Doug Carroll (electric cello), Joel Harrison (electric guitar), Dave Mihaly (percussion), Tom Nunn (electro-acoustic inventions). The interactions that these five have with each other was justifiably dubbed "Vortex Music" by Romus, and repeated listening has proven why to this listener.  The group sound whirl and spin as such. And so many spirited interactions on these eight tracks,  and such depth of focus each one of them shows toward the overall sound matrix! Quite pleasing to these ears. I'll recommend March of the 80 Foot Phils as the prime exemplar of such. The ensemble (in the truest sense of the term) achieves a zen atmosphere of magical suspension there that is just so lovely for its delicacy. Really, though, just play the entire disc, as it is filled chock-a-block with the best sounds on offer from the Free Improvised scene of that or any other time. As Phil stated in his Exegesis papers: "[I] was so clear in my mind as to what to the exact point in this drama at which we stood". It's like that for over an hour, and that is time well spent. 

PS-very nice, luminescent cover art by CJ Borosque too.

John Krausbauer & David Maranha-Briging it Back b/w Round and Round and Round; Public Eyesore Records #154, 2023

 

Fascinating format fuckery here, as John Krausbauer and David Maranha, men of lengthy resumes opt for a relatively short 7 inch that showcases music most often featured on long playing LPs or even longer CDs. Two sides of Drone from amplified violin and amplified organ to be exact. And drone they do. The listener is essentially dropped into what sounds like an already-established action as soon as the needle hits the vinyl. Maranha has set up a pulsing ostinato pattern that bubbles and wobbles. Krausbauer solos with abandon atop of that. The musical action really hits when their notes converge within the wildness of their duo sounds. Disaster Amnesiac has heard it as a thick band of dark color and also as a quickly flowing ribbon of water. It's clear that they caught a moment of peak mind-meld on some day back in 2020. Lovely Minimalist cover art from Sarah La Puerta to boot. A fine little document from an obviously inspired session. When does the full length LP come out?