October, 2009

Fast Citizens Two Cities

The second Fast Citizens album, Two Cities,  has been released by Delmark.  The Fast Citizens are the Chicago based sextet of Aram Shelton, Keefe Jackson, Josh Berman, Fred Lonberg-Holm, Anton Hatwich and Frank Rosaly. Formed in 2002 by Jackson, the Fast Citizens have decided upon a rotating leader chair and for their sophomore release Shelton has taken the reins as main composer. The title Two Cities reflects the geographic locale of Shelton, (currently based in Oakland, California), and his continued relationship with the active music scene in Chicago. Focusing on orchestration and structural variety, the Fast Citizens present a stylistically diverse album that includes hard swing, lush ballads, high-energy free improvisation, modern composition and Sun-Ra inspired grooves.

Fast Citizens at aramshelton.com

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Frank Rosaly was in town! Part of a multiple week solo tour that stretched from Chicago through the southwest and out to the west coast.  Supporting his new solo album milkwork.  It was great to see Frank play solo – he’s such a great drummer and percussionist. A great feel in many different styles – in Milkwork he uses electronics that are really integrated into his kit. Using contact mics to get the sound in, the electronics utilize the feedback in a way that emphasizes the tones of the drums. A very sophisticated integration with seemingly basic tools. too short of a set Frankie – you should’ve played longer!

Ton Trio hasn’t played in a bit – Sam has moved back from Paris, so this should start happening more often… instead of a bass, I asked Gene Baker to fill in on organ. It worked out well – he’s able to support as both a bassist and keyboardist, which makes his role very flexible. Also, he and Sam have together a good deal in the past – so they have a solid relationship as a rhythm section. Our set was satisfying and there was a good turnout that night.

Frank and Renee stayed at my place in Oakland that night, but we unfortunately didn’t have too much time to hang the next day, I was doing sound at a concert at CNMAT that night, so had to be there early, and of course they had to drive back to Chicago…..

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Played with Trevor Healy at Tom Duff’s house in Berkeley – a nice spot for playing. It was two duos that night, the first being Jacob Zimmerman, an alto player at Mills right now and Mike Carreira, a drummer. Their set was first, Mike played a very stripped down set of small bass drum, snare and small cymbal. Spare sounds – worked well with the composed music that I think was written by Jacob. The music focused on distinct aspects of playing by Jacob – trills, high tones, etc. Mike has definitely explored the smaller sounds of drums -he used tiny scrapes and movements to good effect. A short break and Trevor and I played – the last time was back in early August (on another duo bill with James Fei and Kyle Bruckman) and we fell back into our style – which has developed over time to be a process of building up thick affected drone sounds with interspersed field recordings and ghostly melodies. Meditative. This was a good set and Tom recorded it with a nice pair of overheads. Hopefully that will be unearthed before too long….

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There’s a monthly series happening at the Makeout Room in SF – first mondays of the month – the bay area is all about mondays – or so it seems sometimes….
So, Marches played our 3rd show – so far Cory, Jordan and I have been at all three – our bass / organ position has been moving around a bit, thankfully there’s good players out here that fit well into the music we’re playing. This night we had Eric Perney join us on bass, and he did a great job of interpreting the music. He’s a strong player, particularly when playing arco. We played a five song set, starting with the through composed ballad “the Walk”. On “Turning”, a kind of slow moving power waltz that disintegrates in an Aylerian way, my mouth completely dried out. It’s very hard to blow alot of air through a horn when you’ve got no more moisture…..Cory played some great tenor & baritone solos. Jordan took a drum solo that really changed the mood of the set ….KFJC came and documented the night with video and audio.
The first set was played by Nathan Clevengers sextet. In it I played tenor, alto and clarinet; Kasey Knudsen played alto & tenor; Sylvan Carton baritone & tenor; Sam Bevan bass; Eric Garland, drums; and Clevenger on the guitar. Nice tunes – interesting writing with independent parts for the different voices. We didn’t have a rehearsal – so I was pretty green on some of the arrangements… I also played mostly free solos, as specified by Nathan’s arrangements – these were good sections, Garland said it was the most interactive he’s felt while playing free. But, I did ask Nathan for some solos on changes the next time around.
Lords of the Outland played the middle set – alot of energy by that quartet of Rent Romus, CJ “Reaven” Borosque, Ray Scheaffer & Philip Everett. The crowd at Makeout was pretty talkative. The effect of having shows in bars that have happy hour until 10. Though, when you’re playing you don’t notice it quite as much as when you’re trying to listen.

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