About Flagpole. (Athens, Ga.) 1987-current | View Entire Issue (July 27, 2011)
JONATHAN WEINER PHOTOGRAPHY I MUSIC NEWS AND GOSSIP Quiet in Front: Andrew Rieger and Laura Carter, each of Elf Power, will join Scott Spillane (The Gerbils) as an acoustic trio for a handful of dates next month opening for Jeff Mangum (Neutral Milk Hotel). The trio is performing Elf Power and Gerbils songs on these dates, which are among the most highly anticipated shows of the past decade. They'll play Vermont, Montreal and two shows in Toronto—all in early August—and then Elf Power will join the Elephant 6 Holiday Surprise at the Jeff Mangum-curated All Tomorrow's Parties in Minehead, Somerset, England in December. For more information, please see www.elfpower.com. I Only Came Here to Eat Grapefruit: The Olivia Tremor Control dusted off several years of semi-retirement a couple of weeks ago when it was announced the psychedelic-pop masters were not only working on material for a new album but also touring. The 16-date tour runs from Aug. 29-September and will hit New Orleans, Austin, San Francisco, Los Angeles (FYF Festival), Portland, Seattle, Columbus, Pittsburgh, Minneapolis, Chicago, Toronto, Philadelphia, Allston, MA and Durham, NC. All dates except New Orleans are with The Music Tapes. Both The Olivia Tremor Control and Music Tapes will be onstage at the afore mentioned, and jaw-dropping, All Tomorrow's Parties with Elf Power and the rest of the Elephant 6 gang. If you need to remember when these tour dates are, you can head to www.oliviatremorcontrol.com and see a list of them, and only them, there. Sunday Booking Sunday: Patrick Morales (The Viking Progress) is in charge of booking Sunday night shows at the Highwire Lounge (269 N Hull St.), and he has dubbed these events "The Evening Service" which, I think, is a pretty good name. Anyway, this is a new thing happening at Highwire and it seems to be going swimmingly. Thus far, all shows have been free, but this may change in the future. The space features a small, seven-channel PA system and three vocal mics. but the room also doesn't require very much power, so that's not a bad thing. Sunday nights are fairly bare- bones in Athens for live music-, so put this on your radar. If you're a performer or a band looking to play out and this sounds right for you, drop a line to Morales via highwirebook- ing@gmail.com. Keep in mind that not every type of band will be appropriate for this type of place (i.e., pretty clean and newly built) and this size room (i.e., pretty small and oddly shaped). How about walking down there and taking a look at it? Sounds like a good idea, right? Right. Y Keeping the Hate Flame Burning: Longtime Athens barnburners Music Hates You have signed with Los Angeles label Crowded Head Records. The band has a new album coming out Aug. 9 titled Where Did All This Dirt Come From—that's right, no question mark—and you can preview a bit of it, and preorder it, too, over at www.crowdedhead- records.com. There are also songs, videos and more info covering the recording sessions over at www.face- book.com/MusicHatesYou. This band has gone through at least one major lineup change over the past several years, managed to reorganize itself into a pretty equally powerful band and has, seemingly, come out on top. Go give 'em a listen. Go to the Head of the Class: The Young Alumni Board of the Terry College of Business will host a ben efit concert for The Music Business Program at UGA at Atlanta's Buckhead Theatre Friday, Aug. 5. Featured acts are Athens' Southern rockers John King Band and Nashville's super famous Diamond Rio. This is the first concert under taking by the Young Alumni Board, and they hope that future events will incorporate help from students of the music business program itself. Regular tickets are $25 and VIP tickets—which include a recep tion before the show, cocktails and food, a meet-'n'-greet with Diamond Rio (!) and exclusive VIP seating— are $100. Tickets are available through the Buckhead Theatre box office, Ticketmaster and at www.terry.uga.edu/alumni/terryrocks. Listen Closer: Athens musician Joe Kubler has completed his mini-album of what he describes as "experimental electronic ambi ence" and, actually, that's right on the mark. Significantly, though, the record (titled Loose Muse and credited to Sleeping Friends Present: Elan Vital) isn't simply a wash of sound that necessarily settles immediately in the background. Allowing that ambient sounds are not automatically quiet or simple, Kubler uses loops, field recordings, found sounds, muffled, barely audible vocals and more on this record. I'd recommend first listening to this alone at home, then taking it in the car, and then putting it in the stereo or your por table player. See how many different ways you can hear these sounds. I'm still trying them on, myself. You can, too, over at www.sleep- ingfriends.bandcamp.com. The whole album is streaming there and can be purchased for a mere $4. Gordon Lamb threatsandpromises@flagpole com Music Hates You en Vandermark and Chicago are very much two of a kind. The city itself is both historically tough and musically historic; Vandermark, for his part, speaks knowledgeably regarding all strains of sound with the calm severity of an off-duty drill sergeant. His music is no less deliberate. Since the early '90s, the composer/saxophon ist/clarinetist has been forcibly melding all manners of jazz, modern classical and funk, all with an attitude and precision that might typically be associated with the post-punks Chicago is also known for. When Flagpole contacted Vandermark, he'd just wrapped up a week of work on the sound track to the forthcoming film Parallax Sounds, a love letter to the Chicago music community by Italian director Augusto Contento. Asked about a specific "Chicago sound" and whether or not improvisers of a single community work within a singular style, he says, "I think there's some validity to that idea, because the people working in a certain city are going to run into each other and play with each other and be influenced by each other. But I would also say that things are defined more by indi viduals. So, I don't think there's a Chicago sound so to speak; there's too much diversity." The twin themes of individuality and diver sity run thick through Vandermark's catalogue. Even within a single album—for instance, Clements of Style... Exercises in Surprise, his 2004 release with his epochal group the Vandermark Five—his compositions, while always tight and utterly controlled, careen between JB's-style groove, confident post bop and alternately spasmodic/grim extended technique, often within the same number. It's not even that limited in scope, but it is all significantly unique: each song is an instant announcement of Vandermark's presence. For this relatively intimate appearance in Athens, Vandermark will be joined by the drummer featured on that aforementioned album, Tim Daisy. Like one of his heroes, Sonny Rollins, Vandermark emphasizes rhyth mic inventiveness and, thus, highly values the role of a drummer in any scenario. "The drummer in a group is the pivotal figure in the band for me, whether it's in a duo context or a 10-piece ensemble," he says. A fellow Chicagoan, Daisy's individualistic approach has led to an extensive running col laboration between the two. "Because he has a very personal way of playing the drums, [that] helps define the choices I make when we've improvising together," Vandermark says. "And because we know each other really well, communication is at a very high level. So, once we arrive at things that work, we tend to push them really far and try to take chances with it and push things to an edge. Sometimes they fail because we push them so hard, but that's what the music's about: taking chances, deal ing with the issues of risk and surprise. And Tim gets that 100 percent." As a fellow composer with a background that focuses on both traditional and "out" jazz as well as the more radical ideas represented in contemporary classical music, Daisy is well- paired with Vandermark's aesthetic. The two-week tour that brings Vandermark and Daisy to Athens is a rare set of dates, in that they all remain within the same national borders; his more typical workweek keeps him in far-flung territory. "I'm probably on tour seven months a year, maybe more," Vandermark says. "I'm not 100 percent sure because I don't really keep track of it specifi cally, but I'm in Europe probably seven months out of the year, and I work in the States as well. And things are just constantly overlap ping and piling up." Just last month, for example, Vandermark went from touring in Portugal with artists from all over the world, then back to Chicago to briefly work on the soundtrack—all before a European tour with Dutch punk act The Ex. "There is stuff going on all the time, so it's pretty hard for me to keep track of exactly how many concerts or exactly [what consti tutes] the typical thing. The typical thing is hyper-busy," he says. "Which is great—it's a fantastic thing to be able to work in a field of music and art that is uncommercial and is based on trying to do creative work, and to make a living at it is unbelievably fortunate. I work hard, but all the people I know work really hard, too, so the fact that I can pay my rent and do the work I really want to do and nothing else is unbelievable. I'm always very thankful for it." Jeff Tobias ( V WHO: Ken Vandermark Duo, Pocketful of Claptonite WHERE: Cine WHEN: Friday, July 29,8:30 p.m. HOW MUCH: $7 V. ) 12 FLAGPOLE.COM-JULY 27. 2011 BETTINA ESCAURIZA
