art of the jam
so impulse of will has a gig coming up, besides the wednesday night wreck room invitational jam. we'll be playing fred's fest to fill the slot vacated by another band. jam-meister lee allen sez the jamcats will play at 4pm on sunday, 5.6.2007, in the slot right after stoogeaphilia, which is convenient for me, at least. he was actually making up a setlist for this last night.
this week's event was a li'l different than others. for one thing, we were back in the big room for the first time in eons, with the great tyrant/stoogeaphilia drummer jon teague (who informed my daughter, to her great delight, that he has me listening to lotsa japanese hard rock bands) running sound (andre edmonson having long ago devoted this night to sleeplab's embargo gig, which on this particular night was a mashup with top secret, which meant no john shook, no josh clark, no lucas white. we'd invited me-thinks drummer trucker jon to drum with the jamcats this week, but he was only good till midnight, and this week, jam night was graced by two, count 'em, _two_ bands playing before impulse: tongue and merkin. i'm hoping next week to get trucker out to play, as well as tahiti from ppt, who's gonna flow rhyme over some p-funk toonage, and cynthia foster to sing "helter skelter." also, i do believe i've managed to persuade ex-yeti guitarist eric harris to join his former bandmate jon, the jam-meister, and yr humble chronicler o' events for a special space-rawk jamarama immediately following the stoogeband's wreck room performance on 4.25.2007. yeah!
tongue dudes danny ferry (gtr/voxxx), carlos amparan (bass/voxxx), and jesse garcia (black-gloved drums), play a heavily nirvana-influenced brand o' rawk with some occasional flashes of reggae flava. when ex-woodeye frontguy carey wolff, fresh from a 6th street live gig with amy royer, fell by the wreck for a minute, danny greeted him with, "hey, didn't you used to play bass in dead king's pillow?" and remembered seeing the pillow musos picketing their own show at the aardvark back in those hazy early '90s daze. "honchie wants to be dead kings pillow, but they're not," quoth carey, whose "nineteen years" is my early pick for song o' the yr and the best thing he's written yet.
the merkin boyzzz (those whom we shall call joe, chris, and cameron), purveyors of more '90s seattle-influenced sounds, love them some wreck room; they're playing there again tonight with their buds addnerim, whose formidable new cd the potential threat i just reviewed for i love fort worth. they dig them some wednesday jam, too, so much that they (and addnerim, and a coupla other cats) kept the jam going last week when the reg'lars stayed away. bless them. their drummer cameron made a flyer for this night's jam featuring the jam-meister as uncle sam, complete with extra-long beard. 'twas a hoot.
besides lee 'n' me, this night's crew of jamcats included slumming jazzbo dave karnaggio on drumaggio ("i call this '12 o'clock aerobics'") and ron "the velvet hammer" geida, who's juggling more gigs than the average muso of late, altho not all of them pay well and some of them cancel. we ran through what could be the fred's fest set -- "maggot brain," "ghostmaker," "you know what i mean," "tomorrow never knows," "daylight," "cissy strut," "standing on the verge" -- before teague replaced karnes on drums for what started out as a spacey krautrock jam (as ww2 buff jon sez, "the axis has psychedelia _down_") but inevitably morphed into "war pigs" and thence into "dazed and confused" (i tried to resist, jon, i swear). then my middle dtr's new housemates trey and amanda took the stage on drums (he playeth with titan moon) 'n' voxxx respectively and we finished the night off with a nicely rough-around-the-edges version of "ain't no sunshine."
a bittersweet thought: last friday was graham richardson's last night at el wreck. he's now at finn maccool's pub on 8th ave. i need to make an occasion to go see him there. jam godfather carl pack was tending bar in his stead, with a new pic of his little girl stormie, who just had her first b-day, at the japanese gardens on display behind the bar. poet-drummer-fredneck william bryan massey III stopped by just long enough to give me the poem he promised me for the wreck room book (the full handle of which, i should tell you, is wreck room stories: true stories of the home of rock 'n' roll in fort worth as told by the people who were there. it's got cover art by ray liberio, a foreword by tcu sociology prof jeff ferrell (crimes of style, tearing down the streets, empire of scrounge), photos by my sweetie, and interviews/reminiscences from musos, bar staff, and hangers-out at my fave rawk dump of all time. it's the indie equivalent of a quickie exploitation paperback and my way of doing something productive with my sadness at the j'int's passing. if allah is merciful and fortune smiles, will have copies available for a ten spot at the woodeye reunion show 4.21.2007.
this week's event was a li'l different than others. for one thing, we were back in the big room for the first time in eons, with the great tyrant/stoogeaphilia drummer jon teague (who informed my daughter, to her great delight, that he has me listening to lotsa japanese hard rock bands) running sound (andre edmonson having long ago devoted this night to sleeplab's embargo gig, which on this particular night was a mashup with top secret, which meant no john shook, no josh clark, no lucas white. we'd invited me-thinks drummer trucker jon to drum with the jamcats this week, but he was only good till midnight, and this week, jam night was graced by two, count 'em, _two_ bands playing before impulse: tongue and merkin. i'm hoping next week to get trucker out to play, as well as tahiti from ppt, who's gonna flow rhyme over some p-funk toonage, and cynthia foster to sing "helter skelter." also, i do believe i've managed to persuade ex-yeti guitarist eric harris to join his former bandmate jon, the jam-meister, and yr humble chronicler o' events for a special space-rawk jamarama immediately following the stoogeband's wreck room performance on 4.25.2007. yeah!
tongue dudes danny ferry (gtr/voxxx), carlos amparan (bass/voxxx), and jesse garcia (black-gloved drums), play a heavily nirvana-influenced brand o' rawk with some occasional flashes of reggae flava. when ex-woodeye frontguy carey wolff, fresh from a 6th street live gig with amy royer, fell by the wreck for a minute, danny greeted him with, "hey, didn't you used to play bass in dead king's pillow?" and remembered seeing the pillow musos picketing their own show at the aardvark back in those hazy early '90s daze. "honchie wants to be dead kings pillow, but they're not," quoth carey, whose "nineteen years" is my early pick for song o' the yr and the best thing he's written yet.
the merkin boyzzz (those whom we shall call joe, chris, and cameron), purveyors of more '90s seattle-influenced sounds, love them some wreck room; they're playing there again tonight with their buds addnerim, whose formidable new cd the potential threat i just reviewed for i love fort worth. they dig them some wednesday jam, too, so much that they (and addnerim, and a coupla other cats) kept the jam going last week when the reg'lars stayed away. bless them. their drummer cameron made a flyer for this night's jam featuring the jam-meister as uncle sam, complete with extra-long beard. 'twas a hoot.
besides lee 'n' me, this night's crew of jamcats included slumming jazzbo dave karnaggio on drumaggio ("i call this '12 o'clock aerobics'") and ron "the velvet hammer" geida, who's juggling more gigs than the average muso of late, altho not all of them pay well and some of them cancel. we ran through what could be the fred's fest set -- "maggot brain," "ghostmaker," "you know what i mean," "tomorrow never knows," "daylight," "cissy strut," "standing on the verge" -- before teague replaced karnes on drums for what started out as a spacey krautrock jam (as ww2 buff jon sez, "the axis has psychedelia _down_") but inevitably morphed into "war pigs" and thence into "dazed and confused" (i tried to resist, jon, i swear). then my middle dtr's new housemates trey and amanda took the stage on drums (he playeth with titan moon) 'n' voxxx respectively and we finished the night off with a nicely rough-around-the-edges version of "ain't no sunshine."
a bittersweet thought: last friday was graham richardson's last night at el wreck. he's now at finn maccool's pub on 8th ave. i need to make an occasion to go see him there. jam godfather carl pack was tending bar in his stead, with a new pic of his little girl stormie, who just had her first b-day, at the japanese gardens on display behind the bar. poet-drummer-fredneck william bryan massey III stopped by just long enough to give me the poem he promised me for the wreck room book (the full handle of which, i should tell you, is wreck room stories: true stories of the home of rock 'n' roll in fort worth as told by the people who were there. it's got cover art by ray liberio, a foreword by tcu sociology prof jeff ferrell (crimes of style, tearing down the streets, empire of scrounge), photos by my sweetie, and interviews/reminiscences from musos, bar staff, and hangers-out at my fave rawk dump of all time. it's the indie equivalent of a quickie exploitation paperback and my way of doing something productive with my sadness at the j'int's passing. if allah is merciful and fortune smiles, will have copies available for a ten spot at the woodeye reunion show 4.21.2007.
posted by stashdauber at 11:29 AM
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