Ditto on the farce of rock and "psychedelia" that goes by Acid Mothers Temple.
However, I don't know what context you saw Rhodri Davies play in, but when I was in London for some extended months in 2000 I saw the guy whip and coax that harp into some real drama.

Arboretums and gardens would certainly be great places for improvised and otherwise musics - if only they weren't so unnecessairly regulated in the states, and it didn't feel so weird to ask people to pay money to spend time inside one.

MAP: "self-consciously creative and underwhelming harpists I've seen over the years like Rhodri Davies"

Sorry, Mike, but you must have caught Rhodri at an uncharacteristic ebb, he's usually a vibrant, highly imaginative player, and not at all "self-consciously creative" (by which I assume you mean contrived and pretentious). In fact, I'd say he's the most interesting harpist playing today on the improv 'scene'. If you don't believe me, check out his solo CD, Trem, on Confront.

Michael lives in "bizarro improv" world, Brian, that's how he can continually make random and extreme quality assessments that bear no relation to what the bulk of the rest of the world seems to hear. I'm finding it mildly interesting to watch him try to establish his alternate hierarchies, but he's lost all credibility with me in terms of individual talent assessment, with that statement about Rhodri being a great example.

What's interesting to me about Michael's pronouncements is that he veers between extreme hyperbolic praise for some musicians whom I find mildly interesting at best (the Maneris come to mind) and shockingly dismissive of others whom I feel have developed a highly personal and engaging style, Rhodri being the obvious example here.
MAP - want to make a chart for us of those whom you think would fit into either of these categories for the rest of us?

"What's interesting to me about Michael's pronouncements is that he veers between extreme hyperbolic praise for some musicians whom I find mildly interesting at best (the Maneris come to mind) and shockingly dismissive of others whom I feel have developed a highly personal and engaging style, Rhodri being the obvious example here."

What's interesting to me is that you find this difference of opinion remarkable (indeed "shocking"). Are you in comparative lockstep with most other listeners whose views you're familiar with?

E.g., I like both Davies and the Maneris quite a bit. So what?

Hey you guys, don't read too much into an offhand comment. I'm not dismissing Rhodri Davies and I totally trust the opinion of the many folks who vouch for his work based on greater familiarity. I just saw one performance and I thought he was doing nothing more than demonstrating novel techniques, to the point where it's stuck in mind as a key example of the common "engagement with the physicality of performance and lack of engagement with the music" prototype I'm sure we can all cite examples of. Given the interest in the topic here, I'll elaborate briefly. A good few years back I saw the Davies/Fell/Wastell trio at Tonic (I know this trio has a special name and I think I've even listened to and rather enjoyed one of the albums, but I can't recall the name offhand). I thought that Fell was brilliant and that Wastell was even better than brilliant (mind-blowing subtlety and riveting focus), whereas Davies was hacking away seemingly oblivious to the profound and gripping music Fell and Wastell were crafting. All told, it was a wonderful set, but I found the bulk of Davies' playing tasteless. He was also way too loud compared to the other two. That's just my honest opinion about one specific performance and nothing else. Now, Davies with John Butcher—that's a combination I can easily imagine working fabulously! (I'm thinking in terms of narrative sensibility and density.) But I also think it's reasonable to conclude a lot about a musician based on just one performance, because I can think of improvisors who seem to be "on" 100% of the time and I'd rather pay more attention to them since there are too many musicians for any one listener to really pay attention to in the first place.

Brian, I definitely don't mean "contrived and pretentious" at all! By saying "self-consciously experimental" I was only trying to neutrally describe (in the manner of a technical term) a methodological disposition not shared by the guy I saw (P.G. Six). In other words, this guy was just playing straight up simple melody without any intention or aesthetic disposition to locate his playing in our familiar sphere of experimentalism. I just wanted to capture that distinction and acknowledge how his music could be deeply felt despite an ostensibly passe methodology. To clarify even further, I would use the description "self-consciously experimental" for the vast majority of of my favorite musicians! There are no negative connotations to that phrase for me. I chose the word "underwhelming" to express that I basically have a positive feeling about the various avant-garde harpists I've seen (two random examples cited, maybe four or five altogether), but no special enthusiasm. It's a mistake to read that as a dismissive attitude!

Yikes, Jon, you have a rough time accepting that someone can have different taste than you! We all know I'm an admirer of most, if not all, of the musicians you promote (note I say "promote", but if I were to follow your terminological lead I suppose I should say "hierarchicalize")—I've never hidden my praises for your main man Keith Rowe—but surely you can acknowledge that there are highly developed aesthetics any one given listener (e.g. you) will fail to register while others tune into them as if they're pots of gold. As I've often expressed in the past, I'm an advocate of radical relativism and subjectivity, so I don't even accept the underlying premise of your remarks (here and in the past) that refer to consensus and hierarchy. The notion that I'm constructing an "alternate [sic, I think you mean alternative] hierarchy" is vacuous, because it presumes there can be a consensual hierarchy to deviate from, when in fact every possible hierarchy can only be taken as a formalization of an individual's taste and hence be an alternative to every other hierarchy witnessed (in the mathematical sense) by some other experiencer (in the Braxtonian sense). I've never pretended to be doing anything other than expressing my personal experience. It's puzzling that you're so hung up on the fact that my little sphere of listening activity and attendant enthusiasms are slightly (and no more than that) different than yours and others! In any case, Jon, don't lose sight of the fact that our exchanges are always such a pleasure because of the simple fact our tastes are actually not that different, and the fine differentiations are where the real insight lies.

I challenge anyone to give an example of an improvisor I've been shockingly dismissive towards! If anything, I'm the kind of listener who errs on the side of always finding the good in everything and everyone and very rarely says anything outright negative in public.

In any case, I promise to listen to some Rhodri Davies recordings at my earliest opportunity for the sake of joining the chorus of praise and downgrading the afore-belabored experience to an insignificant singularity.

Actually, Mike, the phrase you used was "self-consciously creative" not, as you later write, "self-consciously experimental". These are very different points, but I don't wish to pursue you on either one of them, life's too short (and we're all going to die within three months anyw . . . oh, sorry, that was a different thread).

Oops, thanks, Brian, I missed that! I guess for my purposes there I could use them interchangeably, but certainly not in general. Probably when I was writing the piece I vacillated between them... :-) I think there certainly is a distinction between music made with the intention of creating something and music made simply for the sake of enjoying something previously created. Here we profit by confronting the vagueness of our theoretical conceits. I'm glad to have these occasional non-avant-garde music experiences to get a fresh angle of possible escape from these conceptual ruts, though I won't deny my wheels continue to spin pitiably.

Sorry to hear about all the impending doom in the UK... :-)

"Jon, you have a rough time accepting that someone can have different taste than you!"

no, not at all, I just don't understand yours at all, and the intensity of your statements tends to make your buddy Bruce Gallanter, the previous record-holder for hyperbole in this field, look calm and restrained.

I was at that Tonic concert also (the trio's name is I.S.T., short for Improvising String Trio, I believe now defunct), and have no idea what you're talking about in singling out Rhodri. that was the second time I'd seen that trio, and I thought both performances were quite good, the musicians (at that time) were very well balanced. I've seen Rhodri in a few other contexts, and he's never less than superb, especially given the difficulty of using a harp to create abstract music.

and our taste is far more than "a little different" from my perspective, the bulk of what you rave about I find close to unlistenable and much of what I admire you seem to preface with phrases like "this isn't an area I enjoy much", so again I really don't know what you're talking about.

Well, so much of the appeal of difficult improvised music is how much it demands we invest extreme aesthetic biases in it, focusing in on totally different layers of structure on so on than the next person. That's why I enjoy discussing this kind of music so much; it invites a very simple "report your honest personal experience" criterion for discourse, by which we assemble intricate data about the possible relationships between external and internal sound events that can exist for our species. This in contrast to music where there really is a consensus. I mean, when it comes to great 60s pop albums and the like, it's really hard to get beyond "yeah, that album is a MONSTER!!" with everyone nodding their head...

As far as "unlistenable", my understanding is that you've had your own passions for my favored music (old-school EFI, Braxton, avant-jazz, etc) when you were younger, and even if your tastes have shifted, I assume you retain the relevant cognitive grammars as part of your inactive repertoire. "Unlistenable" is rather strong word; perhaps you're referring to my Partridge Family fixation...

"E.g., I like both Davies and the Maneris quite a bit. So what?"

-You're obviously out of your mind. So what?

"Are you in comparative lockstep with most other listeners whose views you're familiar with?"
- Yes. Of all the listeners whose views I am familiar with, I am in lockstep. I also feel the same way about horseshoes as anyone who has ever played horseshoes.
[]
I actually enjoy when Mike doesn't like someone's playing, because he is so regularly lavish in his praise that I can't tell what the gradations below AMAZING! are.

As far as judging someone on one performance - perfectly fine by me. I will say that I went out of my way to Nels Cline in LA (yes I live in an ultra-shit town for improv) for a long time and was always underwhelmed. But I recently saw the ROVA Electric Ascension thing and he blew me away, often shouldering the load of keeping the music truly ascending and inspiring the others to maintain creative intensity. And yet the previous 10 times I saw the guy I had gotten bored. So opinions and attitudes about the presence of certain musicians in an ensemble obviously change.

What kind of sucks about writing publicly about this music is that almost every improvisor/ etc. is struggling, so it's easy to understand the reluctance to call crappy improv crap, even if it's just an opinion, and even when you're dismissing a specific set of music, not a musician. (In my opinion The Wire recognizes this lack of criticiality, but too-often misfires when they try to fill this void)

Andrew, that's a great example, the Nels thing. I've never heard or seen Nels less than 100%; I feel like my brain is wired up to his fingers at all times. For those missing the back-context here: I'd recently done my ballistic-hype about Nels to Andrew, who shockingly (!) had seen Sir Nels that many times without "converting"... It's all about taste...

Unwrinkled: "(yes I live in an ultra-shit town for improv)"

Do you live in LA or did you travel here to see Nels? 'Cuz there are a lot worse places than LA for improv! We kinda have a scene... kinda... a little bit...

"What kind of sucks about writing publicly about this music is that almost every improvisor/ etc. is struggling, so it's easy to understand the reluctance to call crappy improv crap, even if it's just an opinion, and even when you're dismissing a specific set of music, not a musician. (In my opinion The Wire recognizes this lack of criticiality, but too-often misfires when they try to fill this void)"
Good points - Wire very rarely posts negative improv reviews (Clive Bell's usually the man who gets to do the hatchet jobs - I remember great putdowns of Spring Heel Jack, Joelle Leandre, Hubbub and, in the new issue, Fredy Studer and Ami Yoshida - Fredy more than Ami btw), for the simple reason - correct me if I'm wrong Brian M - that we usually pitch to review albums we like and want to promote.
I could post a list here of at least a dozen improv albums I've received in the past month or two, including some big names on big (well, small - haha Mark) labels, that I consider "crappy". But what good would that do? Make me look politically hip (negativity = polemic = critical acuity = integrity : the Ben Watson syndrome)? I'd just have to spend ten hours a day battling with you lot.

Actually, Dan, I usually take what The Wire offers me (unless its by an artist whose work I can't abide - the list of which grows daily), and I pitch on average only one item per month that I'm keen on. Hence, I receive a pot-luck selection of new releases to write about, some of which are bound not to please. Like Clive, I drub a few here and there, and sometimes the makers of the drubbed item write letters of complaint. Fair enough. I think it's fair to say that because The Wire can review only a small percentage of the CDs they're sent, they do what we'd all do - quickly play them through and select the ones they like the sound of. That's not to say that the reviewers who then receive the selected items will like them, drubbings may still transpire. But it's a winnowing process, of sorts. The quality items get featured, the out-and-out rubbish gets ignored, and this is perhaps the way things should be, though one or two of the thread-weavers here may think otherwise. Fair enough.

Hi Brian M.
So, you're a big fan of Rhodri then?
Now I see.............
Cor

>I usually take what The Wire offers me

The Wire assigns reviews to critics? News to me - everything I write up for them is something I've pitched.

I am, Cor, but I didn't give a positive review to your recent Cortet disc simply because I like what Rhodri does on it. :-)

William Huston asked "Do you live in LA or did you travel here to see Nels? 'Cuz there are a lot worse places than LA for improv! We kinda have a scene... kinda... a little bit..."

Well - I've lived here for 4 years and this is the worst town I've ever lived in for improv. Maybe unfair comparisons with Chicago and London (other places I've spent significant time) but not with Columbia, SC, where the audiences were rowdily enthusiastic and 100 people to see Fred van hove or DKV trio or han and eugene were not uncommon.

The only "scene" i know here is linespaceline or noise stuff like at il corral or smell - anything better?
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As far as what the point of being critical (negative if necessary) is - I think it's important and that musicians would actually grow if people would be more willing to 'call out' bad records or bad playing. Mediocre (often neophyte) artists would be more reluctant to release their material if they knew that marginal efforts would be recognized.
There is no standard of objectivity by which these things are judged, but I think willingness to address poor experiments/sessions is often hard to come by from those of us that love this music because a) we can almost always find something good in stuff and b) it seems nasty to be painfully honest when there is already so little incentive (socially, financially) to make
uncompromising work.
Too much championing, largely to the converted, distorts the full picture of what people are actually doing.

Admittedly, I should actually write something specifically doing this. And the first thing I would write would probably be about the vast quality differences I see in Mats Gustafsson's work (and I pick him because he is in the top 5 of my favorite all-time musicians so I think he can handle the heat. Shit, I flew to Wels from LA on two weeks notice to attend the festival he curated in 2003, and I DO NOT have the $$ to do that kind of shit.)
My argument would go something like this: because of the incredibly high qulaity of most of his playing, I cut him less slack for mediocre projects and hold him more accountable when he plays with people that I consider to bring his playing down.

And I believe that if this kind of writing were more common it would produce better future music.

"As far as what the point of being critical (negative if necessary) is - I think it's important and that musicians would actually grow if people would be more willing to 'call out' bad records or bad playing. Mediocre (often neophyte) artists would be more reluctant to release their material if they knew that marginal efforts would be recognized.
There is no standard of objectivity by which these things are judged, but I think willingness to address poor experiments/sessions is often hard to come by from those of us that love this music because a) we can almost always find something good in stuff and b) it seems nasty to be painfully honest when there is already so little incentive (socially, financially) to make
uncompromising work.
Too much championing, largely to the converted, distorts the full picture of what people are actually doing."

I completely agree with that (but as I'm out of my mind, this assent probably isn't worth too much).

Unwrinkled: "[...]where the audiences were rowdily enthusiastic and 100 people to see Fred van hove or DKV trio or han and eugene were not uncommon."

Oh-- no scene in terms of audiences, you mean? Well yes. That's very very true.

In terms of musicians, four or five of my all-time favs are LA players.

Well, I've seen a hundred or so people show up to see Nels...

"The Wire assigns reviews to critics? News to me - everything I write up for them is something I've pitched."
Yeah, me too Phil - but remember we live far away from dear old London Town..

Bear in mind, Dan, that I live in Brighton, not London, and even when I lived in London I never visited the Wire office, not once.

Surely it's easier for you to pitch things because you receive a ton (I'm guessing) of CDs in connection with ParisTransatlantic, whereas I receive no more than 30-40 discs per annum, and out of that lot I'm likely to rave, MAP-style, about only 15 at best. So if The Wire crew want me to keep on writing for them - which I'm glad to say they seem to do - they're obliged to shunt some things my way.

Right, and it's easier to shunt 'em down the road to Brighton than across the pond to wherever Phil lives or through the Chunnel to Gay Paree, where the postal service is about as aléatoire as late 50s Boulez :) Not always to pitch for the Wire, though, because I get the impression we're all slavering after the same bone. ("Who's doing the new Erstwhiles this month, Dave..?) But can't complain!
Dunno about a ton, but I can tell you that this year so far I've received upwards of 400. And it's scary. I wonder how many other Wire scribblers get, notably David Keenan, Edwin Pouncey (who seems to have the complete Merzbow and Grateful Dead discogs for starters..). Still, we love records - if we didn't we wouldn't be doing this.

Dan: ("Who's doing the new Erstwhiles this month, Dave..?)

4G? - me, actually. Done, actually. Should be in the December issue.

Haha! Well there you are - actually I didn't pitch for that one (arrived too late), so I got Mattin & Goldie, Frank Denyer & Sean Meehan instead!

I didn't know there was a new Frank Denyer CD, but I really like his music, so I'll be looking forward to what you have to say about it.

>I get the impression we're all slavering after the same bone.

Really? Sorry to undercut your Atheist and Asguard pitches, man.

Unwrinkled: "[...]where the audiences were rowdily enthusiastic and 100 people to see Fred van hove or DKV trio or han and eugene were not uncommon."

Wiliiam Hutson: "Oh-- no scene in terms of audiences, you mean? Well yes. That's very very true.

In terms of musicians, four or five of my all-time favs are LA players."

I think a scene is two things: audiences + musicians. As far as me denying an LA scene, let me just say that I have no idea who your 5 favorite players are that live here. No idea.

and walto: I don't know how I can tell what is in and out of mind because I have a large stack of Yo mtv raps baseball-like cards piled on my desk that I just can't seem to get rid of, and they've been there for 3 weeks.

"Well, I've seen a hundred or so people show up to see Nels..."

You can thank Wilco for that.

"Sorry to undercut your Atheist and Asguard pitches, man"
Well, you've got a corner on that market. You and Pouncey are the only Metalheads. Like his Earth piece, Phil?

BEFORE wilco, thank you.

>Like his Earth piece, Phil?

Haven't read it yet; the mag takes an extra week or two to reach NYC. I'm gonna pick one up next week, I think.

"I think a scene is two things: audiences + musicians. As far as me denying an LA scene, let me just say that I have no idea who your 5 favorite players are that live here. No idea."

If you go to DKV Trio shows, these guys may not be your cup of tea, but:

Jeremy Drake, Mitchell Brown, Jessica Catron, David Rothbaum, Albert Ortega... Until a few months ago, we also had Rachel Thompson and Jonathan Zorn (btw: great review of Rachel's solo violin disc on Paris Transatlantic, Mr. Warburton). Tucker Dulin lives in San Diego, but he's a great trombone player.

hutson: are you insinuating that people that enjoy DKV don't like electronic music? or that they wouldn't like micro-improv or something? I think you made a weird leap separating the worlds, but I think you make an even bigger leap calling these people your favorite musicians. I mean - are these five people really in your top ten, twenty or fifty of favorite musicians playing right now? I love albert as a friend and have met and seen all of these other folks play to various extents, but they are far from my favorite. favorite musicians that live in LA? sure. cuz there's nothing else.
(i have to admit that i was bored every time i saw jonathan z. play. and ive never heard jeremy or jessica do something that another guitarist or cellist hasn't done better. they are perfectly capable musicians and i have enjoyed a couple of night porter gigs, but these guys have never done anything musically that has whizzed my brain and made me raise my whiskers.)
if you're really deep into the LA scene, check out my radio show from a couple weeks ago with david kendall, http://www.radio4all.net/index.php?op=program-info&program_id=14621&nav=&
he actually really whooped some shit up IMO

>Jeremy Drake, Mitchell Brown, Jessica Catron, David Rothbaum, Albert Ortega... Until a few months ago, we also had Rachel Thompson and Jonathan Zorn (btw: great review of Rachel's solo violin disc on Paris Transatlantic, Mr. Warburton). Tucker Dulin lives in San Diego, but he's a great trombone player.

William, that is a good list, but I'd also include Joseph Hammer, probably first and foremost amont those plaers, as well as Davids Rothbaum and Kendal. I recorded with a good chunk of that list (hammer, brown, kendall, rothbaum) recently and was generally impressed by all of them. I recorded with drake & kendall last year too (also with serge baghdassarians & boris baltschun) and though I never heard the result, the rigor with which they approached their gestures was certainly not suspect in the least.

While I won't be making any "top 5" of anything statements today, I'll say that that list holds up pretty strong against other cities in the US, and it's not even dipping a toe in LA's world-class noise scene. Of course I have a great soft spot for Portland's (amazing, thriving, unheralded) music community, and the bay and seattle have some great players, boston of course everyone knows about, but in my exp., LA hangs with them all in terms of dedication and quality. I've also had some great audiences there (not this recent trip, sadly, partly because of some scheduling fuckups between me/organizers but hey).

I thought Jonathan Z lived in Conn., though?

We'll just have to agree to disagree jf - I don't think that list of LA musicians holds up with improvisors in other cities, even though I do like the people very much.

As far as Jospeh Hammer goes, I like the guy personally and from what I've heard of his history he has been an important part of the scene in LA for a longtime. But his musicmaking has gone from unimpressive to downright embarassingly repetitive and unimaginative. I can't tell the differnece between what he does by himself vs. with other people, or from performance to performance. I think I just don't have the ears for it because friends and others that I respect laud him fully. I keep seeing him perform hoping that something will turn for me, but as it is I find his musicmaking literally boring. I just don't get it. (I'll take V/VM's selections from the haunted ballroom instead anyday)