Ottawa funks out

Sean Silcoff (ssilcoff@ccs.carleton.ca)
Sun, 23 Jul 95 16:41:22 EDT


Believe or not, Ottawa, Ontario, the placid capital of Canada, was THE
place to be this weekend.
Thursday offered the opportunity to see the incredible Medeski Martin and
Wood outdoors at the Ottawa Jazz Festival main stage. Unfortunately, the
weather sucked and the crowd was worse. Plus, all these dourfaced old
people kept picking up their chairs and leaving...likely to escape to the
comfort of a Kenny G record. MMW fried the town up. My favorite was the
tune "Last Chance to Dance Trance, Perhaps" (do I have the title right?).
Friday was an off-day for tunes, but I went out to see "Crumb". Freaky
comic strip artist and his whacked out family make for a mesmerizingly
grotesque documentary.
Saturday was the Ottawa debut of Toronto-based sextet One Step Beyond, a
band all of you would love. The acidyjazzyfunky group features a
completely insane keyboardist (ever heard a Moog Prodigy stretched
to its funky limits?) and a virtuoso guitar player. The band cut some of
the chunkiest motherfunk I've ever heard in Ottawa (that wouldn't be hard,
really). The show was great. They play twice a week in Toronto at the
Rivoli and are one of the opening bands for Omar in Montreal next week.

By the way, the much celebrated Cornwall Jazz Festival is dead meat.

Brother Sean