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At 5:16 PM -0700 4/10/06, loop.pool wrote: >David wrote: >"I had a nasty and humiliating experience in Berkeley a few years ago >when Henry Kaiser and John Oswald invited me to participate in a >noise-type event. my guitar playing was way too pretty and >conventional for the context, and I wound up feeling kinda stupid by >the time it was over." > >I know the feeling, although in recent years I have really gotten >more into being a complete chameleon, >stylistically.................so that if it's a noise event, I just >go for it in that context. I tried, believe me. But I just wasn't weird enough. I'm a good deal more confident today than I was when this happened, but I think at this point I'm much more likely to say "no thanks" to such an offer. I am almost always up for a challenge, but I also think it's good to know one's limits. I knew when I got there that I didn't really belong, but it wouldn't have been appropriate to split so I stayed and gave it my best shot. >I've found that it has helped my musicianship to put myself into >scary, uncomfortable positions, stylistically. Yes! That's why I went in the first place. >When my DSP unit completely failed during the Dark Elektronix >festival and I was left with only non-reberbed found sound looping >in the middle of all of this extremely intense and loud dark techno, >drum and bass and experimental music I had the worst shame attack on >stage. And yet, a young woman came up to me afterwards and said >that she had been to all three nights of the festival and that what >I did was the best thing she saw in the three days and that it >totally inspired her. I was glad I risked it after that one >response. Nice! >the cool thing is that I"m really into relatively conventional pop >music with vocals and chord progressions these days but all of the >aspects of these styles that I've given myself to can sneak into the >songs that I'm writing. That's the ticket. As I've said before, I am a pretty straightforward singer-songwriter type with a passion for loop improv. I'm better off slipping my weirdness into straighter gigs than vice versa. BTW, I played a gig with Joe Rut a couple of months ago. He left all his gear at home and delivered a set of great solo acoustic songs. >But, back to your comment , David, you certainly must know that >Henry Kaiser is an amazingly versatile musician who plays a lot of >pop as well as his avante garde stuff. did you ever find out what >he thought of your playing? I only ask because I've discovered >that frequently the way we feel about our playing is not necessarily >how we are percieved. I've been playing with Henry off and on since 1988. The last time we played together, on March 9, the set list included Richard Thompson, the Grateful Dead, Bob Dylan, "Spill the Wine" (Eric Burdon and War), and other pop classics. There was a gig in 1993 (I think) in which I found myself on stage between Henry and the saxophonist David Murray - two veritable fire hydrants of music - hanging on for dear life. That was a blast! >But I too, feel that I like conventional music too much for the >avante garde scene and am too 'out' for the conventional pop world We need to find a scene that supports precisely our weirdness quotient! -- David Gans - david@trufun.com or david@gdhour.com Truth and Fun, Inc., 484 Lake Park Ave. #102, Oakland CA 94610-2730 Blog: http://playback.trufun.com