From: wildman@athena.mit.edu (Timothy Worsley)
Subject: FRED FRITH at the Knitting Factory
Reply-To: eprice@sql.sybase.com
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Date: Wed, 7 Oct 1992 11:13:13 GMT

I was in NYC last weekend, just got back yesterday.  Although I didn't
make it to Paul Motian's Electric Bebop Band on Friday (did anyone see
them???) I did go to Fred Frith on Sunday.  Now, my main knowledge of
Frith is as the bass player for Naked City.  I saw him play with Zorn
and Eye once in a more improvisatory vein, but although I enjoyed it I
wasn't real excited about the music.  But *this*!  Fuck it:

FRED FRITH IS A GOD!!!!  HE IS ABSOLUTELY FUCKING AMAZING!!!!  HE GOES
INSTANTLY INTO MY JAZZ-BLUES-AND-CREATIVE-MUSIC PANTHEON OF IDOLS!!!

Sorry.  OK, I'll attempt to describe some of this (I never can do that
but I'll try).  It was Frith alone with his guitar, his electric
violin, his table o' homemade stringed instruments and another tabl of
random objects (sticks, chains, metal things).  Unfortunately my
brother couldn't go on Sunday cuz of a barbecue he had to attend; but
he told me that he would go on Monday if I honestly thought he would
like it.  I would not have recommended the Frith/Zorn/Eye gig to him,
but as soon as I showed up after Sunday's performance, I was babbling
and raving about it to him.  I went with him again on Monday (my
"weekends" in NY always end up ending like this...) and it was just as
good if not better than I remembered.

Some cool things I remember:

At one point on Sunday Fred was playing these screeching chords on the
violin with the guitar laying on a little platform with some objects
on the strings making a lot of noise and it sounded just like the
music during the opening credits of SUSPIRIA (Dario Argento
soundtracks have always been on my "mandatory-for-Naked-City-to-cover"
list -- but now I realize that FF could do it all by himself, he's a
genuine one-man band!).  He does a lot of stuff with the tuning knobs
(whatever those are called) on the guitar, changing the notes as he's
playing.  In fact, on Monday, he did this great thing that sounded
almost exactly like part of Branca's Symphony #6 -- he was strumming
the guitar, started it out not too loud, and he gradually adjusted the
tuning, string by string, and increased the volume, and when he
finally finished he was playing a very cool chord and very loud, and
he put the guitar on its platform and got out some of those sticks and
started beating on the strings like it was a percussion instrument and
he started screaming into the mic, but not Zorn- or Eye-style, it was
a "joyous" scream I would say, and quite simply a beatiful ending to
the piece!  TRULY AWESOME.

Also on Sunday, he did a nice piece (maybe this was the encore, I
can't remember -- he played encores both nights, but only after much
thunderous applause which simply ceased to diminish with time) where
he placed this weird rectangle metal thing on the guitar (on its
platform, which kept vibrating (feedback I guess) and he played along
with this sound on the electric violin.  Anyway, the guitar was sloped
slightly downward, so the metal thing was very slowly sliding down the
neck, lowering the chord.  I'm not sure when he started doing it but
eventually Fred was enthusiastically executing some sort of "reel" or
"jig" or whatever they're called on the violin along with this weird
sliding chord, and when the metal thing finally reached the end of the
guitar, it had resolved perfectly to the key of the "jig"!  A nice
piece!

My only regret is NOT SEEING THE OTHER TWO SHOWS!!!  There was a guy
there at all four and he said the second one on Sunday was even better
than the first (which I saw).  He also taped all of them...  There was
a guy sitting in front of me Monday who videotaped the whole thing --
which makes a lot of sense for this kind of performnace, because
listening to it on tape one would have no idea what was going on (like
when Fred twirled a little leather string around making a slight
wind-noise and then snapped it down, whipping the neck of the guitar,
or the weird homemade instruments).  Ohhh, WHY aren't there psychos
with 35mm cameras and DAT-decks who follow Frith around???  Wouldn't
that be a better use for, say, Spielberg's $$$ than filming lame
Michael Crichton novels???

One more amusing thing (well, I think it's amusing -- others are more
jaded about this I'm sure) -- when I bought my ticket Monday I walked
right by Frith and Zorn (and two other people I didn't recognize).
Frith was holding something open and he and Zorn were examining it and
talking about it, "it" being a composition of some kind I guess.  As I
walked by, Frith was saying something like "See, there are these
overlapping patterns, in 6/9..." and Zorn was asking something about
when the "breaks" happened or something.  After the show, Zorn & Frith
were hanging around and my brother wanted to get their autographs,
which I thought was kind of goofy; unless maybe if he brought his
guitar and had Fred carve his name in it with a butcher knife...

Well, that's enough for now.  I hope I have given some impression of
what the show was like for anyone who cares, and I hope those of you
who are experienced with this kind of thing will forgive my glaringly
obvious naivete and ignorance, etc.  Just wanted to share my enthusiasm...

My next Cadence order is gonna be heavy on the Frith material!  Anyone
care to give me recommendations?

Minor but fun observation: background music at the Knitting Factyory
on Monday was Hendrix (some live concert) followed by Frisell (Where
in the World).  Nice combination.  But you know, as much as I like
Hendirx, JIMI WOULD HAVE FLED IN TERROR FROM FRED FRITH!!!  OK, maybe
not, but still, it's an interesting comparison.  Oh yeah, Frith had
some good more "mellow" moments too, where he sounded a little like
Frisell.  And he also had some moments where he was definitely playing
both "bass and guitar" on the same instrument at the same time.  (Guy
Van Duser might want to investigate this...  [cf Stride Guitar,
Rounder])

Recent listening: LAST EXIT in Tokyo (with Herbie Hancock!).  I'd
never heard them before, bought this CD just for the hell of it (I was
really looking for Brotzman/Laswell's "Low Life") but I like it.
Also, Seigen Ono's COMME DES GARCONS vol. 1 & 2, this is *great*.
Very diverse.  With Zorn et al.  And naturally I've been listening to
"Step Across the Border" since returning from NYC!  Does anyone know
if the *film* is available on VIDEO?!?  How about "Put the blood in
the music"?  Where does one go for this kind of thing??  Other new
CDs: Keith playing Shostakovich: Very good; Bley/Frisell/Surnam/Motian
(I picked it up just before the thread started too) -- I like it,
although I've only heard it once so far.  Since Bley is supposedly a
big influence on Keith Jarrett (my pianistic hero) I've always wanted
to get into his playing.  So I've got this and some very early stuff
too ("Introducing Paul Bley").  On this album (ECM) he does sound a
bit like Jarrett, in particular I could swear they're both playing
something very similar on one tune from this and one of the Standards
Trio albums...  Film at 11...

OK, now this time I really will shut up!

-Ed (not Tim), eprice@sql.sybase.com (not wildman@...)
[Note: if sql.sybase.com doesn't work, try sybase.com, or send mail to
wildman@athena.mit.edu with something saying "For Ed" in the Subject
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