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A
Beautiful Corpse
By
Bill Ketzer
Death
by a Thousand Cuts/Travis Ryan
Untitled
(Chromepeeler)
Now here’s an interesting thing. A split CD featuring the
latest Chromepeeler Records acquisition, Death by a Thousand
Cuts, and Travis Ryan, better known as the lead goat throat
for Relapse Records’ death-metal cavalcade of putridity, Cattle
Decapitation. This stuff is largely experimental, produced
by shock therapy, alcohol withdrawal and the persistent late-night
hum of the plastics plant outside suburban proper that you
try to ignore. Ryan, best known for his 100-percent effects-free
growl, reveals a not-so-surprisingly moribund sedated side
here with interstellar traffic jams like “The Watertower,”
but his piece de résistance is clearly “It’s a Miserable Life,”
which juxtaposes various electronic media with death-scene
confessionals, dentist drills and dissimulation of the crisp,
unsettling sort. It’s the soundtrack to the ride you take
to identify the body of a loved one.
Then enter DBTC’s Tommy Blast and Tara Struck with their toe-curling,
mordant emissions that strangely mimic the psychotic dreamscapes
of a beer-can dad’s forbidden, Nabokovian obsessions as he
labors restlessly through sleep with a noisy test pattern
on the TV. It’s like being trapped in an autoclave and force-fed
the frequencies of some blessed but awful periodic table of
the sacraments. Or excrements, take your pick. Much of this
will be deemed obnoxious and overindulgent and will grate
on the nerves of the middle class. But that’s kind of the
point. For me, it’s about thresholds and tolerances. Weights
and measures. Fight or flight. You can say what you want,
but I can tell you that this isn’t about what it is, it’s
about what it does. It’s hard to listen to any of this alone
with the lights out. “I Walk Through Walls” and the reticulating
“Some Motherfuckers Only Understand Hot Lead” will only continue
to evolve, which is the beautiful, ephemeral thing about this
body of deliciously perverse research. You can smell the death
of natural selection. God has his mouth on their luxurious
holes.
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Reggie’s
Red Hot Feetwarmers
Saratoga
Souvenir (DDE)
In the midst of the rollicking circus known as the Saratoga
Racetrack in August rises a jaunty swirl of music, trumpet
and banjo and the happy shriek of a clarinet the first sounds
you identify. And then you find them: Reggie’s Red Hot Feetwarmers,
a throwback quintet in the shade of one of the big old trees,
giving new voice to old standards.
They’ve been a summer racetrack fixture for more than 20 years,
as well as a hugely popular ensemble in and outside the Capital
Region. For this summer’s performances—and this latest CD
release—they’ve added clarinetist Dan Levinson, an internationally
renowned player because of his ability to excel in any jazz
styling he chooses.
You’ll even hear him as a vocalist on “Kids,” the Bye-Bye
Birdie tune that is anachronistically (but somehow appropriately)
included on the CD—but there’s also a scintillating performance
of “Istanbul, Not Constantinople” (popularized by They Might
Be Giants) and a stylish original by the group’s banjo player,
Peter Davis, titled “Saratoga.”
The bulk of the disc comprises songs written between 1917
and 1938, chestnuts like “Tiger Rag,” “China Boy,” James P.
Johnson’s “Old-Fashioned Love” and even Clyde McCoy’s cloying
“Sugar Blues,” which gets a more dignified treatment from
this group.
The bass is usually the bulwark, and here it’s Reggie himself,
Reggie Scanlon, who knows how to slap that thing in trad jazz
style and also supplies vocals for several numbers. Trombonist
Tom Shields and trumpeter Mike Canonico have absorbed the
legacies of Teagarden, Beiderbecke and company.
Although the arrangements sometimes seem formulaic, it’s a
formula that evolved early in the era of these songs, and
it’s really just a reliable framework from which to hang the
fascinating solos and byplay of the players. With the inspired
clarinet work of Levinson soaring and weaving through the
songs, it feels like a happy trip back in time, but one that’s
fresh and eager and—well, just plain happy throughout. This
CD is not only a great souvenir of the racetrack, it’s also
a fantastic souvenir of the earlier roots of jazz.
—B.A.
Nilsson
 The
Beau Brummels
Magic
Hollow (Rhino Handmade)
This four-disc set covers the entire arc of the career of
one of the great American bands from the ’60s. The Beau Brummels
started out sounding like a stateside response to the Beatles,
but were eclipsed by the Byrds in that role. Their two hits,
“Laugh, Laugh” and “Just a Little” (produced by a young Sly
Stewart), put them on the map, but with no subsequent ascents
up the charts, their window on a large audience closed. However,
their growth as an ensemble continued at a furious pace and
mirrors the explorations of many of their contemporaries,
with them charting a course that others followed to greater
success. They went from a catchy beat band into the realm
of gentle psychedelic folk and ultimately to Nashville and
what was later to be called country-rock.
Based around the songwriting of Ron Elliott and the singing
of Sal Valentino, the Beau Brummels remained identifiable
throughout their stylistic evolution. While based in San Francisco
during the ballroom heyday, their adherence to songcraft set
them apart from their local peers. They eschewed soloing for
careful arrangements, and indeed, the solos that do occasionally
appear bear the stamp of honoring the underlying identity
of the song, rather than any sort of flip-the-switch-and-out-pours-the-improv
riffing. Forty-two of the set’s 108 songs are previously unissued,
and this labor of love continues through the writing and design
of the accompanying booklet. There are only 2,500 of these
made, so if you already know the joys of this band, don’t
delay, and if you’re not familiar, then don’t spend the rest
of your life missing out.
—David
Greenberger
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