Re: Frisell & Naked City

[dtapia@unoco.edu (Douglas Tapia)]

>"Zorn Naked City stuff?" Can you be more specific, I am a bit of a Frisell
>fan, and I'm not familiar with this.....
>
Ah yes, Naked City.  I'd love to tell you more, Marshall:

John Zorn:  Alto Sax
Bill Frisell:  Guitar
Wayne Horwitz:  Keyboards (Wayne produced some earily Frisell Albums,
                most notably, IMHO, _Is That You_)
Fred Firth:  Bass (Quite a guitar inovator himself)
Joey (is there anything this man can't do) Barron:  Drums
Y. Eye:  Vocals

A good starting place is the first album, aptly named _Naked City_.  This
is a good overview of what this band did.  Cut and paste, at time
"cartoonish", short improvisitions.  Zorn was heavily influnced by
Japaneese S&M films at the time and some of that leaks through.  This music
spans a number of styles, from straight-ahead jazz, to punk, country swing,
and film noir music.  (Usually in the same tune)

This is unlike anything you've ever heard Frisell play on.

Other albums include:

_Torture Garden_ (very short pieces, very punkish)
_Radio_
_Absenth_ (nearly ambient, Laswellish sounding)
_Grand Guignol_ (long group improv, 5 classical pieces- Ives, Scriabin, 
Lassus,
                Debussy, Messaien) and most of the material from Torture 
Garden
_Heretic_ (Music for a French Erotic film, featuring smaller subgroups of 
the
                ensemble)
_Leng T'che_ (A Japan only release; fairly ambient w/ short bursts of 
madness.
                The inspiration for this piece was an old Japaneese form of
                execution--(Leng T'che translates to English as "100 
pieces"))
_Black Box_ (A recent re-release of _Torture Garden_ and _Leng T'che_ 
together
                in one box, with the original artwork reproduced in the 
booklet,
                not on the cover, so as not to offend record store 
customers)

Make no mistake, many people hate this stuff.  It took me a few years to
get to were I could really appricaiate it, and I still wouldn't listen to
most of it for pure pleasure, though it is quite stimulating and forces the
audience to explore a different set of very intense emotions with which
most other music can't or won't deal.  _Naked City_ (the album) is fairly
easy to find at larger stores like Tower filed under Zorn in the Jazz
section.  Do check this one out first.  If you like it you will probably
like the others, if not, you WILL hate the others.

Happy listening,

Doug Tapia