[acid-jazz] Beleza: Weirdos making me happy

From: 99 (beleza_at_speakeasy.net)
Date: 2005-05-20 22:04:02

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    Oooh, it's a big day. No playlists and no self-promotion. Honestly,
    I'm kinda sick of hearing myself talk. Just slightly off the beaten
    hipster Straight No Chaser we're-so-cool brukbeat path, all worn and
    grassless, a couple random things making me smile, and I hope that one
    or more will do the same for you:

    Cyro Baptista
    Nobody does weirdo like Brazilians do weirdo. What a fun show!
    Somehow I managed to sleep on this guy for years and last night saw his
    band of merry noisemakers. Originally from Brazil and now living in
    NYC, Cyro's Beat the Donkey project is like part Tom Ze, part
    Parliament, part Timbalada, and part Konoko n.1. I hate to even invoke
    such a lame comparison, but they are kinda like what Stomp would like
    to be when it grows up. I found myself going WOWOWOW when Cyro came
    out dressed in a big blue nasa suit and a fuzzy russian hat, standing
    next to an instrument made of PVC pipes and played with flip flops,
    making whirry noises with toys, then going into a drum and bassy kinda
    thing on some really bassy drums. Really super fun. There was tap
    dance and bodies-as-percussion, a respectable stab at some martial art
    with a sword, and even a bit of gamelon, woohoo! There were also nods
    to the afoxe stilo, you know putting drums in the air and all, plus
    forro, bumba meu boi, maracatu, samba/bossa, a berimbau solo in a cool
    time sig, some fancy pandeiro playing, and classic rock...!!! Mostly
    it was about making noise on anything and everything, and by the end
    I'll have to admit I was a little weary of the performance which, while
    bombastic till the end (and generously including Philly experimental
    woodwind royalty Elliot Levin on sax whose playing is amazing but whose
    3-foot poop-dread I simply can't condone), seemed to kind of devolve
    into a lot of great musicians in silly costumes (fuzzy blue and pink
    polka dot halter top, pope outfit with a name tag saying "Sex
    Instructor", and so forth) making noise on everything around them. But
    that's kinda cool in its own right--actually, it's really really cool,
    and refreshing among all the slick laptops and knobby boxes buzzing
    around lately. (Speaking of which, Autechre sucked live.) I give it a
    thumbs up. Check out the madness:
    http://www.cyrobaptista.com

    ==================================================

    DJ Kiva
    Lemme say that again.... DJ Kiva DJ Kiva
    DJ Kiva DJ Kiva DJ Kiva v DJ Kiva DJ Kiva DJ Kiva DJ Kiva DJ Kiva DJ
    Kiva DJ Kiva DJ Kiva DJ Kiva DJ Kiva
    DJ Kiva DJ Kiva DJ Kiva DJ Kiva DJ Kiva DJ Kiva DJ Kiva DJ Kiva DJ
    Kiva DJ Kiva
    DJ Kiva DJ Kiva DJ Kiva DJ Kiva DJ KivaDJ KivaDJ Kiva DJ Kiva DJ Kiva
    DJ Kiva
    YAY!!!!! <3 <3 <3
    Kiva is a classic Brooklyn-style weirdo, making celestial-sounding
    sounds with roots in earthy things like, well, the earth, and cuban
    drums and cartoons and stuff. I met him b/c I happened to play a
    Troubleman track in 3/4 at a party a few months back and he lost his
    $h1+ because lo and behold, that's his specialty...broken, bassy,
    spacey stuff in non-4/4 time signatures. *GUSH GUSH GUSH* But then he
    dropped me some stuff off his hard drive, from brand new and unfinished
    all the way back to several years old, and the range and diversity
    combined with a consistency of overall mood (playful, pensive, detailed
    and slammin) is just so impressive. Everything from plaintive
    meditiations on the human condition over tight, urgent jazz drums with
    brushes, to ruff dancehall tings with serious MC work, to a silly,
    strong, and really fun theme song for a cartoon about futuristic Latino
    robots in outerspace, ese. He makes the music that's been rattling
    around my brain, and is currently my biggest inspiration. Also,
    watching him work is great fun. He beatboxed some crazy complex riddim
    into the mic, and over the next 2 minutes there were strange and
    beautiful sounds bouncing all through wonderful machines and around the
    living room. Additionally, he has film festivals in his back yard and
    does precolumbian-inspired graf. Like wow, Scooby. Also, he's playing
    at Kingsize in NYC tonight as part of Andrew Edward Brown's Building
    Bridges party whihc looks to be a weekly killer in its own right. If I
    were 20% less geeky I would be there. If I were 20% more ballsy, I'd
    actually have bells on. SOMEBODY SIGN THIS GUY!!!!! Diaspora? Omoa?
    Loungin'? Are you listening???
    www.adiosbabylon.com

    ==================================================

    Gloria Justen, Tim Motzer, and VJ Kaboom
    I am really lucky to have access to this kind of talent. Gloria is a
    violinist with the Phl orchestra, a composer, and sometimes-member of
    various experimental bands. Tim is a guitarist who did that riff on
    "Change For Me" and is all over the experimental set, and worked on
    King Britt's fabulous new project with recordings of Sister Gertrude
    Morgan
    (http://www.artnet.com/Magazine/features/karlins/karlins4-9-04.asp).
    He also looks just like my Uncle Michael when he used to play drums and
    do sound. VJ Kaboom (Ricardo Rivera) is one damn impressive
    videologist who I first met when he was doing video projections at
    raves and stuff. Now he is all big time and does installations all
    over the country. The three of them plus a bunch of other talented
    mofos (including dj Crasta, whom I have never seen so motivated,
    positive, and on-it!! Yeah!!!) put on this amazing show under the Arts
    in Motion org to augment the ooh-la-la Salvador Dali exhibit here at
    the Phila Museum of Art. Check out the show at
    http://www.artsinmotion.org/dali_setlist.html. This performance was so
    good! The hall that it was in made you feel like you were in the
    shallow end of a pool looking into the deep end, and the video
    projections were monstrous and enveloping. They may be re-performing
    chunks of it, so keep an eye out. Also check out Kaboom and the Klip
    Collective at http://www.klip.tv/

    Well, last weekend Gloria did a recital
    (http://www.peabody.jhu.edu/index.php?pageID=1895), most of which I
    missed b/c I am a schmuck, but I did catch some Bartok. Other pieces
    included one she composed using spoken word and recordings of birds she
    collected in Australia. Gloria also re-performed a part of a piece she
    wrote with Tim for the Dali thing called Ants in my Trance (!!!). She
    has promised me recordings, so if I get them, I'll do my best to pass
    them on.

    Kaboom is going to be part of a thing I just found out about over
    memorial day weekend that looks really cool:
    Next Weekend, Thursday May 26- Sunday May 29

    Kate wawa will be premiering THE MENTALIST in Old City (phl)

    Q: What is THE MENTALIST? you ask...

    A: a hybrid performance installation
    part dance performance
    part grafitti writing
    part fashion and hair show
    part music installation
    part video animation
    part punk poetry

    Join a kick-ass crew of dancers:
    Devynn Emory
    Bethany Formica
    Meg Foley
    Olase Freeman
    Alex Holmes
    Kate Wawa

    and 2 punk poets:
    Adiel Reckly
    Shaun Walker

    as they transform an empty room on-site, blasting the
    space with acrobatics, sound bites, video paintings,
    live grafitto, and breath taking dancing...

    THE MENTALIST: a performance installation
    choreography: kate watson-wallace
    grafitto: carrie powell
    poetry: shaun walker
    music: daud sturdivant
    video: ricardo rivera
    costumes: linda smyth
    hair design: tracey olkus

    THURS MAY 26 8PM
    FRI MAY 27 8PM
    SAT MAY 28 9PM
    SUN MAY 29 2PM

    @ Samuel Machinery Company
    135-37 North 3rd Street (between Arch & Race)

    Admission: $10.

    4 NIGHTS ONLY. SEATING ID LIMITED SO ARRIVE EARLY.
    RESERVATIONS: katewawa_at_yahoo.com

    ==================================================
    Tied and Tickled
    Next, how did I sleep on Tied and Tickled Trio???? Yeesh!!! I think I
    heard a blip or 2 on NPR or something and I honestly meant to
    investigate, but then a birdie dropped some things on my hard drive and
    now I will have to drop some cash to fill in the discog. Is it jazz?
    Is it spacey-soulful stuff like Radiohead and Suba? "All of these
    things, and more, and more, we are."

    ==================================================
    Video game music
    Have you caught onto the latest thing that the kids are doing, making
    music on Gameboys and Playstations? I'm fascinated by examples of
    technology being hacked to make music. So I saw a show of it here a
    couple months ago, and you'd be surprised the kind of bass you can get
    out of a Game Boy! Also love the sort of seat-of-our-pants, punk rock
    aesthetic that necessarily comes with doing a show on devices that
    randomly crash and stop making noise. I got a kick out of the guy who
    niced up the dance by yelling, "All the muhfukkas in the house who
    program in assembly code say HOOOOOO!!!!! Hack the bootprom!!!!" But
    he was a little cocky, as boys tend to be, so when his game boy
    crashed, I took maybe a little too much pleasure in yelling back,
    "Where's your eprom now, beeotch?" I wonder if I can make a midi drum
    out of an etch-a-sketch. There are surely kids doing something like
    this in your town, so keep an eye out. I have only started to touch on
    this world so I don't have a lot of names to drop, but look me up on
    myspace, click on Advanced Idea Mechanics, Retrigger, Geoff, or any
    "friend" who looks odd, and begin stumbling down the path.
    To seed your search, here's the first useful article that came up in
    google. No idea if it's any good:
    http://www.mp3.com/story/feature_gameboy.html

    ==================================================
    Pink hair!
    I gotta give major, major props to my Hair Grrrl, Leslie at American
    Mortals at 7th and Walnut, Philadelphia. This girl is a frickin'
    genius and it gives me such intense pleasure to go in with a head full
    of floppy over-growth and say, "Do WHATEVER you want." This time I
    came out with little spindly icicles of curls emerging randomly and
    chunks of blond and flamingo pink!!! YES! Never before has pink hair
    been so classy. Book a cut there!
    http://philadelphia.citysearch.com/profile/11482780/?
    cslink=cs_boc_ew_3_4

    ==================================================
    Whimsy
    Last weekend after the sun came up, my friend D spotted these things
    wistfully painted on a building that I think is probably an abandoned
    cheesesteak joint:
    http://www.beleza-music.org/photos/toofast.jpg
    http://www.beleza-music.org/photos/whizz.jpg
    Then we found a little crown made of tin foil and foam stars hanging on
    a nail in the door.

    ==================================================
    Linky dinks
    Have you seen www.ubercoolische.com? It's hilarious. Time and place
    exist in blurry indistinct partnership!!!! www.overheardinnewyork.com
    is also internet crack, ranking up there with
    www.ratemykitten/puppy/bunny.com. Also, I can't stand Bright Eyes,
    like really *can't stand* but his performance on Jay Leno a couple
    weeks back was pretty impressive. More impressive is that he wasn't
    ripped limb from limb right on stage. Thanks to Sirka for making me
    watch this.
    http://www.prefixmag.com/Bright_Eyes_(Leno)(05.02.05)_(high).php

    ==================================================
    Grrrr
    In other news, the US government still sucks, and the astoundingly
    broad diversity of its suckiness only continues to grow. I don't even
    want to go into it. Feh. If you find yourself in a position to do
    something about it, I encourage you to do so. International friends,
    please send help. Oh and um, "love it or leave it" is wrong. What
    they mean is "love it or FIX it." Screw the whales, save the
    democracy! And what is up with that pope???? Hi Vatican, ever heard
    of Africa and Latin America? Apparently, they are small islands off
    the coast of Your Ego. And a (luke?)warm re-welcome to the UK Labour
    party. You know, maybe you could win by more than a milimeter next
    time if you go from poodle to pitbull. Or at least german shepherd.
    Something. The pound is smashing all other currency, man! You run
    tings, do whatcha want!

    ==================================================

    "And finally, fully sated and purged of enthusiasm, our hero
    contentedly settled back into the daily routine, an empty vessel
    awaiting new (and old) things to be excited about and share the next
    time, with anyone who cares to tune in."

    Yours in all that makes us daydreamy and starry-eyed,
    99
    P.S. - Bjork says, "When in doubt, give."

    dj 99
    www.beleza-music.org
    P.O. Box 5457
    Philadelphia, PA 19143
    aim: grokgrrrl

    ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
    In the Northeast, rhythm is God dehydrated. - Tom Zé
    Quem te mostrou a beleza / De dançar dentro da briga?
    Who taught you the beauty / Of dancing within the fight?
    ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++