Marvin Pontiac is a famous unknown, one of those odd blues guys whose reputation is as much talent as it is mystique to the few who know of him. Pontiac was born in 1932, from a Malian father and an Amercian Jewish mother. His mother was institutionalised when he was two, and his father took him to Bamako. When he was fifteen, already a musician in Mali, Pontiac fled back to Chicago where he started the oddest of blues carreers, his music a blend of downhome blues and African rhythms and harmonies. Pontiac was a strange man: for example, he would never let anyone photograph him for fear it would rob him of his soul and was once arrested riding down a bicyle naked in Louisiana. He died in 1977, hit by a bus, and The Legendary Marvin Pontiac collects his musical legacy, from his 1952 hit I'm a Doggy to some of his early hits in Bamako like Pancakes.
In fact, Marvin Pontiac is a fictitious character designed by the addled brain of musician and performance artist John Lurie, but the fictitious thread contributes immensely to the enjoyment of this record. While Lurie didn't push versimilitude to the point of making I'm a Doggy sound like a 1952 recording (the sound quality is way too good for that) there's real enjoyment in linking the fake biography to the tunes and themes, increasingly crazy as the record moves on. Besides the opening title, which sounds like a dirty old blues full of meaningless innuendo, the genre really is a blend of blues and African music, with a little jazz and funky guitar here and there. Lurie's deep velvet voice is a real treat and the sparse afro-blues arrangements are clever and driving. Imagine Fela Kuti arrangements sung by Barrie White and you won't be too far off...
Check it out if you like musical experiences that are also artistic statements, or just for the fun of it!
OK, so maybe some of the tracks drag on for a little too long, and the instrumental version of BB King's The Thrill is Gone is really missing the lyrics (and the point), but still, it's about the best groove this side of the Greyboys Allstars, and 25 years earlier too!
Taratata is a French music show on TV that has been gowing strong for over 15 years every week (more or less). There's a lot of pop, but Nagui, the presenter and producer of the show has a genuine love of music and will occasionally go out of his way to feature blues, jazz, folk or some weird stuff.
I recently noticed that a lot of taratata videos on Youtube had been removed, and I now know why. They opened a website www.mytaratata.com which compiles (as far as I can say) all the videos from all the shows. Or at least a ton of them.
If you don't speak French, just click on Tous les Artistes (all the artists) to access a listing of all the featured artists, and browse away! To celebrate its opening, here's one I found last night, reminds me of my misspent youth...
Listen to this stuff !
It's stunningly cool !
This is Jefferson Steelflex and his Neptune Society, feat. amongst others, Marc Ford (of Black Crowes fame) and Bill Barrett, my favourite shit hot harp player this side of the pacific ocean (barely).
STUN-NING...
I've been a fan of Bob Brozman's ever since I saw him on TV (yes, there used to be a blues show on French TV, sadly it didn't last...) in 1997. Since then, I saw him live once in 1998 solo in Roubaix and once in Paris with Djeli Moussa Diawara and Takashi Hirayasu in late 2000. Ever since, I've looked around for Brozman gigs near Paris but sadly they are few and far between.
As you know, I'm still preparing the next podcast, which will be about New Orleans and Katrina. A few weeks back I found Bob's latest record, Post-Industrial Blues, and I purchased it. There's a song on it about Katrina, so I wrote to Bob to see if I could use the song in the podcast. That was on Saturday afternoon, two weeks ago. While I was at it, I asked him if and when he was playing in France. About five seconds later, an answer comes, not only allowing me to use the track, but saying
I play tonight in Beauvais at Blues Zinc festival !!!
Beauvais is about an hour's drive from where I live, so fairly reasonable. I drove up there, and enjoyed Moriarty, as I've already described in Saturday Night (Part I): Moriarty. Then Bob quickly set up his numerous stringed instruments (no less than six, which must make traveling awkward to say the least!) and we were on to the second part of an evening of great music.
The set started with what is perhaps Bob's greatest "classic", his Down the Road which is part Trinidad and part plain-crazy. It's both a stunning moment for those who have never seen him play it, and an exhilarating moment for all. The early set continued with a few more Bob Brozman "classics" including Hawaiian Heat Waves and Debussy at La Réunion (which, I think, Bob dubbed Debussy en Vacances à Madagascar.) There seemed to be quite a few people from Reunion Island in the audience, so his frequent use of sega rhythmic patterns (even over "traditional" blues material) found appreciative ears. Not that you have to be from La Réunion to appreciate it, obviously, but I guess it had more effect on the "natives".The great thing about Bob Brozman concerts is that even if you've seen him several times and even if he plays roughly the same material you've seen him play the previous times, the execution is such that it's simply impossible not to enjoy. Bob's reputation for musical eccentricity is clearly deserved and it's a large part of the enjoyment. He's like a live battery, seemingly never out of juice.
What I found interesting and refreshing about this concert, however, is the deeper tone to his material and commentary. I've always known (well, ever since Youtube, I guess) that Bob was this rare breed of American whose heart is further left than many Europeans'. It was never openly expressed in his music, however, and in a way that only left the mad eccentricity on his solo records, enjoyable as it was. I felt a change with Blues Reflex, which had the gripping Rattlesnake Blues and the very somber Death Come Creepin'. As I said when I reviewed it at the time, [Blues Reflex is] more focused and [...] more sober than most of his earlier stuff, and [...] if it’s an indication of the directions Bob Brozman is steering towards, it’s also a great omen of things to come.
As was made evident at this concert, Bob has now taken it one step further. He no longer shies away from being overtly political, and whether you agree with him or not (I tend to, although I think his admiration for European social models may be a little idealistic) there's a sincerity there which is evident and magnifies the music. When he played Look at New Orleans that night - the song I contacted him about using for the podcast - my throat was actually tight. It was moving and true.
From this point on in the concert, I felt that depth everywhere,even in material I'd heard him play previously, and even in material that is more light-hearted. But when Bob closed by playing Love in Vain, which is a chestnut of his and many others' repertoire, I was strongly moved again. His interpretation that night was truly deep, heartfelt, powerful.
A musician who can marry virtuosity, emotional depth, eccentricity and strong positions is a rare thing indeed. Bob Brozman has become that musician. If you have not yet seen him live, you owe it to yourself to make the effort to go whenever he comes near you. You will not regret it one second. I came out of that concert exhilerated and moved, a strange combination for sure, but with enough adrenaline to drive home safely.Ah, the miracles of the iPod shuffle function...
The other day, I was walking down a London street listening to my iPod. I don't know how the shuffle function works (and sometimes I think it's a little strange, with the same artist recurring several times over the course of 10 tracks played) but on that day it produced a little miracle for me. It played Moanin', by Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers, followed a few tracks later by Moanin', by Charles Mingus.
Now you would be forgiven for thinkin that these are two versions of the same tune. After all, reinterpretation has always been a staple of jazz exploration. But youd be wrong. They are just two tunes from the same era, and both are masterpieces.
The Jazz Messengers have precedence of age. Moanin' was composed by Bobby Timmons (the Messenger's pianist) and recorded in 1958, it was released on the album Moanin' and became the Messengers' first ever hit. Unsurprisingly for a track written by a pianist, the backbone of the harmony of this tune is laid by the piano, as evident from the very beginning of the theme. The theme is very characteristic of the two elements that make this tune memorable. It starts with a soulful vibe, low key saxophone, but the phrase evolves into something harder, more driven, in the second part. As the theme fades, Lee Morgan's trumpet soars into a wonderful solo, with Blakey's drumming hard and steady, very much at the front. Tenor sax Benny Golson then picks up the last phrase from Morgan's chorus and builds on it. This is typical hard bop sax, not focused on fast, but rather on deep and hard. There are some fast passages, but they are there more to build the tension that gradually increases towards the end of the chorus and then suddently drops when Timmons produces his rather subdued, soulful solo. Bassist Jymie Merrit picks it up from there with minimal accompaniment by Blakey, and his deep solo segues back into the theme, subdued, then hard, and into a rousing finale.
Mingus' Moanin' is a whole 'nother kettle of fish, although it also swings hard, even harder than Blakey's. It's also a more intricate, composed affair, in the manner of Mingus. It was released on Blues & Roots, an album that Mingus designed as a challenge to the jazz critics who dismissed him as being unable to swing. It opens with a strange, wonderful and deep barytone sax hook played by Pepper Adams, and gradually a somber trombone backline adds a layer of harmony (and sometimes disharmony) as the rhythm section swings harder and harder. The saxes add a second voice to the barytone theme, then suddenly, the harmony shifts and for a short moment you think it's going to get mellower, but no, the swing builds up again until Pepper's catchy barytone brings the theme back to its completion. There follows a fairly classic alto sax solo followed by a more out there tenor sax solo that ends sans backing for a good while. At the end of that solo section, the rhythm section goes mad with double time until the chord sequence resumes, the solo ends and Pepper Adams' hook comes back again to reenter the theme. The buildup this time is even harder than the first time, and the ending is simply wild.
I like these little miracles of life. Moanin' and Moanin', two monuments of jazz, same title, in sequence, all by the randomness of the shuffle function...
