4WALLS
Which Side Are You On?
Red Note
11
POIZRE Z + PHIL MINTON
q
For4Ears
CD 1551
Of all the weird and wonderful vocalists -- note not singers -- associated
with Free Music, Britain's Phil Minton, 64, probably has the most legitimacy,
not to mention longevity.
Someone who started off as a trumpeter and vocalist with Mike Westbrook's
Orchestra in the mid-1960s, he's long since abandoned the horn, along
with most conventional songs. His usual output is a cornucopia of yowls,
grunts, shrills, retches and gargles. Meanwhile his associations have
expanded from the cream of BritImprov, including drummer Roger Turner,
reedist John Butcher and -- regularly since 1987 -- pianist Veryan Weston,
to interested players from the Continent, North America and Japan.
WHICH SIDE ARE YOU ON? and the enigmatically titled Q are equally memorable
because they show two little exposed sides of Minton's art. The former,
recorded by the co-op band 4Walls -- Minton, Weston, Dutch bassist Luc
Ex and American drummer Michael Vatcher -- is a extraordinary disc where
the vocalist actually sings words -- and it includes a lyrics sheet so
you can follow them.
As should be obvious from the title, this is a rare piece of agit-prop
from the FreeImprov world, dedicated to, and featuring on four out of
the 11 tracks, musical settings of the words of the late Paul Haines.
As a salute to the poet who lived near Toronto and is described by Minton
as one of "the secret carnival workers" it works spectacularly
well.
Single letter Q is a different matter. Recorded at a French festival,
Minton's vocal onomatopoeia is added to the cascading computer and machine
manipulation of the Poire_Z quartet.
Consisting of long-time electronic explorers, Günter Müller
on ipod, minidisks, selected percussion and electronics and Norbert Möslang
and Andy Guhl on cracked everyday-electronics -- all Swiss-based -- and
Frenchman ErikM on 3k_pad.system, the band textures so overwhelm Minton's
contributions that he's usually buried beneath the hardware and software.
Starting with the superior product, 4Walls adds music to an astonishing
collection of lyrics. They range from the near-Dadaistic lyrics of Haines
and Brit Lou Ganfield to the serious poetics of the late Vietnamese leader
Ho Chi Mihn, plus songs by Jacques Brel, Robert Schumann -- in German
[!] -- and the American folksong that gives the CD its title.
Perhaps it's a nationalist tendency, but to be honest, Minton sounds most
comfortable singing Ganfield's "The skunk hath farted" [sic]
and "Class Struggle". Both feature a musical hall lilt, with
Weston chiming in on the choruses, making the two appear like a couple
of George Formby Sr. clones. The later is taken at a breakneck speed,
while the former -- actually an anti-Ku Klux Klan mockery -- includes
an outright swing section from the pianist, a walking bass line and balanced
flams and bounces from the drummer.
Often sounding as if their incongruous imagery comes from an unholy collaboration
between Ogden Nash and Louis-Ferdinand Céline, Haines' four pieces
can also be performed in vaudevillian fashion. His bizarre wordplay meshes
with the band's natural musical anarchism. "Not all olives have pits:
An under funded sense of wonderment", for instance, is treated as
a parlor ballad with Minton whispering the lyrics, that are amplified
with sympathetic vibrations from Weston. Additionally, the wordplay on
"If there are individuals you can tell from a distance don't like
garlic" causes the vocalist to not only use his natural and falsetto
voices, but to indulge in a few cackles and gargles at the end, as the
band plays jazz-inflected accompaniment.
Even more remarkable are the Ho pieces. "On reading, 'Anthology of
1000 poets'" features strummed bass guitar chords and flashing octaves
from the piano, while Minton proves his natural tenor is quiet pleasant.
On the other hand, "A milestone" almost turns into rock music
complete with drum backbeat and simple strumming from the bassist, as
Minton exposes his inner Ozzy Osbourne.
The other three performances are less appealing. Schumann's "Im Rhein"
features the most extensive instrumental work with thundering drums and
overactive piano. A deconstructed, metallic guitar run and pumping piano
cadenzas detract from the title tune and Minton's delivery appears a bit
too plumy and properly British to bring gravitates to lyrics written for
the Kentucky miners' union in 1931. Finally, when dealing with "Ces
gens-la" written by an astute song genius like Brel, Minton reduces
the portraits to a series of grotesques as he sing-talks the lyrics accompanied
by near anthematic playing from Weston.
If WHICH SIDE has a few missteps, Q may be mistaken journey. Salvageable
is "q oder z", which at fewer than five minutes gives Minton
appropriate space in which to burble, buzz and whoop vocal tones on top
of textures that range from the quivering sound of cicadas to the rhythmic
drone of a car motor turning over on a damp day.
Most of the time, though, it's difficult to find Minton among the liquid
swizzles, oscillating highs and fluttering lows that make up the more
than 39-minute "w oder q". Oh you can hear some dark barks,
strangled, drowning cries, guttural growls, stentorian mutterings, demonic
laughs and his ever-popular duck quacking from time to time. But with
four electro-acoustians going full blast, his vocals are an afterthought
or an add-on.
Throughout, the timbres heard include vinyl record hisses, wiggling electronic
buzzes, air raid siren explosions and turntable movements. The four instrumentalists
are capable of coming up with the most hushed and delicate tones that
can resemble a jew's harp being vibrated, computer and turntable surfaces
being scratched and crystal glasses sliding along a shiny surface. But
they can also produce intermittent rhythmic sine wave patterns and buzzing,
sped-up slinky loops, not to mention whistles that are mechanized, motorized
and carefully modulated.
When in the final few minutes the scraped, bell-like resonation turns
louder with splayed tones and shooting star echoes, Minton's verbal response
sounds alternately like an old man muttering to himself and an infant
crying. His final exhaled choke, which suggests a man being slowly squeezed
within a cybernetic vise, may be as symbolic as it is metaphoric.
Poire_Z may rate an A or B+ for its work on Q, but Minton can only received
a T for Trying, with cumulative realization closer to a C or D+. Meanwhile
WHICH SIDE is not only a fine side of coated plastic, but a fitting vocal
memorial to Haines, the lyricist of Carla Bley's ESCALATOR OVER THE HILL
among other major projects.
-- Ken Waxman
Track Listing: q: 1. w oder q 2. q oder Z
Track Listing: Which: 1. Airport insecurity 2. On reading, 'Anthology
of 1000 poets' 3. Ces gens-la 4. Tales from the Hindu Tush 5. The skunk
hath farted 6. If there are individuals you can tell from a distance don't
like garlic 7. 8. Class Struggle 9. Not all olives have pits: An under
funded sense of wonderment 10. A milestone 11. In Rhein
Personnel: q: Günter Müller (ipod, minidisks, selected percussion
and electronics); ErikM (3k_pad.system); Norbert Möslang and Andy
Guhl (cracked everyday-electronics); Phil Minton (voice)
Personnel: Which: Phil Minton (voice); Veryan Weston (piano and voice);
Luc Ex (bass); Michael Vatcher (percussion)