Leap In The Dark

I'm not a religious person, but I've always understood how a person's faith can inspire them to produce great art. One only needs look at the religious paintings produced throughout the centuries by artists of all faiths for proof of just how many have looked to the divine as their muse. However, no matter how beautiful a painting or inspiring a sculpture might be, it never seems to be able to match the way music is able to communicate an artist's beliefs. Perhaps it's because we experience music on a much more visceral level than the visual arts, its a living, breathing, thing after all while the visual arts are static, its able to elicit the greater emotional reaction. As a test, compare the way you feel while listening to Beethoven's "Ode To Joy" from his Ninth Symphony to the way you react while looking at pictures of Micelangelo's painting of the Sistine Chapel, there's sure to be quite a difference.

Even non-religious people like me can't be failed to move while listening to faith based music. As I have the same reaction listening to traditional Sufi poetry from the middle ages as I do listening to European classical work, Native American pow-wow singers, and Jewish cantors, in my case it has nothing to do with being moved by the power of the message that the artist is delivering, but the way in which they are making the delivery. While there are some, there aren't many contemporary musicians who are able to bring that level of passion to their music.

So when I learned that the gospel group The Blind Boys Of Alabama were releasing a collection of recordings they had made with contemporary musicians, I was intrigued. What kind of impact would playing with a gospel group, singing gospel songs, have on popular musicians? Would they be able to rise to the occasion, or would the music sound forced, or, even worse, insincere? I don't know if it's the power of the music, the passion of The Blind Boys, the talent of the performers who have joined them, or a combination of all of the above, but each of the fourteen tracks on the CD Duets, on Saguaro Road Records is not only a pleasure to listen to, but far more sincere than just about anything you're liable to hear on pop radio these days.

Now, on the whole the performers who join The Blind Boys on this disc are pretty much the type you'd expect to have the ability to make a success of playing gospel music. However there are a couple of real surprises on this disc, performers who I know I considered the least likely ever to perform a gospel tune. I mean it's no surprise to hear blues players like Charlie Musselwhite ("I Had Trouble"), Bonnie Raitt ("When The Spell Is Broken"), Susan Tedeschi ("Magnificent Sanctuary Band"), and John Hammond ("One Kind Favour") sound just as at home singing gospel tunes as they do their normal fare. Blues, especially traditional acoustic blues, is only a small step removed from the church in the first place. When performed by players as steeped in the blues and its history as those four are, who feel each and every note they play or sing as if its being wrung from their hearts, that step is almost non-existent.

Although country gospel doesn't normally move me in the same way as other forms, there's no denying the relationship between the two genres either. So folk like Randy Travis and bands like Asleep At The Wheel ("The Devil Ain't Lazy"), are just as at home playing gospel tunes as blues players. Of all the mainstream country singers that sprung up in the 1980's, Travis was one of the few whose sincerity you could never question. Maybe it was just because his voice poured out like molasses, but it always sounded like he was singing directly from his heart. So there's no real surprise that his contribution ("Up Above My Head (I Hear Music In The Air)") is just as impressive as anyone else.

Although Ben Harper is best known for his rock playing, anybody who saw his contribution to the benefit for New Orleans, From The Big Apple To The Big Easy, a few years back won't be surprised at his soulful performance of "Take My Hand". There will be a similar lack of surprise I'm sure that both Marva Wright ("How I Got Over") and Solomon Burke ("None Of Us Are Free") do equally magnificent jobs on their contributions. However there were two names in the credits that might raise some eyebrows. Both are men whose work I admire, but who I really never would have associated with gospel music: Lou Reed and Toots Hibbert.

Toots Hibbert, lead singer of Toots And The Maytals, first came to international attention with the song "Sweet And Dandy" when it was included in the soundtrack for the movie The Harder They Come starring Jimmy Cliff. Hibbert's long association with reggae, his 1968 recording "Do The Reggay" is credited with being the originator of the genre's name, makes him seem an unlikely candidate for singing gospel. However listening to him singing "Perfect Peace" along with the Blind Boys, reminds you that reggae was more than just another form of pop music. It too was born out of the passion of belief, either for the Rastafarian faith or for the fight for civil rights in Jamaica. His voice cracks with soulful energy and you can't help but feel his passion for the material.

However hard it might be to picture the man who gave the world "Walk On The Wild Side", "Heroin", "Sweet Jane", and other classics of the seamier side of life in New York City, signing a tune called "Jesus", it's a far better fit than you'd expect. His almost matter of fact delivery when he sings has always belied the passion in his music and that swirls beneath the cool exterior of his stage persona. You can't sing about AIDS ("Halloween Parade") or any of the other social and political issues Reed has tackled in recent years with the amount of intensity he's shown without there being a well of passion to draw upon. Don't look for any histrionics, or anything else out of character for him in his performance of "Jesus", but listen to the subtle changes in his voice and you'll hear the depths beneath that still exterior.

While the performances on Duets are uniformly excellent, even better is the fact that the songs included in the collection aren't the typical ones you'd expect to hear under the circumstances. To be honest I don't remember hearing any of them before. Perhaps to people more familiar with gospel music than me these titles are well known, but I was pleased to be hearing material that was new to me. While the majority of the performances on this disc are much like you'd expect, there are also a couple of excellent surprises as well. It just goes to prove that passion comes in all shapes and forms, but it ends up sounding just about the same no matter what fuels it. This is great music sung by great performers, what more could you want.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 07:19 AM | Permalink

Most adventure stories for young adults don't go much below the surface of the story. Oh sure there will be some sort of morale or lesson to be learned in some of them, but on the whole the action is what matters. The stories themselves aren't bad, but the books always seem to lack something in sophistication and too often have little or nothing to do with most young people's reality. Oddly enough the books that do the best jobs of dealing with subjects that are pertinent to young people are usually fantasy books set outside are everyday world. It's as if the story doesn't take place on earth or in our time period the author has licence to mention the subjects because he or she aren't dealing with reality.

So when I discovered South American author Isabel Allende, best known for her novels The House Of Spirits and Zorro had written a series of books for young adults I was intrigued as to what she would do with the genre. Allende usually does a remarkable job of mixing contemporary political and social issues into her novels without ever losing track of her responsibilities as a story teller. With Harper Collins Canada issuing new editions of her trio of young adult titles under their Perennial Editions it seemed like as good as chance as any to check out if she was able to have the same success with this genre as she's had with other titles.

City Of The Beasts, first published in 2002, is the first of three books (the other two being Kingdom Of The Golden Dragon and Forest Of The Pygmies) that see teenaged Alexander Cold flying halfway around the world with his grandmother Kate. Kate is anything but your average grandmother being a writer for naturalist magazines whose assignments invariably take her well off the beaten path to check out rumours of various exotic and dangerous creatures. At fifteen Alex's world is being turned upside down by his mother's battle with cancer. When his father decides that she will be better off be taken for treatment in a hospital in Texas, Alex and his two sisters are sent off to live with their grandparents.

While he would have gladly joined his sisters in going to stay with his maternal grandmother, he's less than thrilled to be told he'll be spending the duration of his time with his dad's mom. When his father casually mentions for him to make sure to take his passport with him because it looks like he'll be going into the heart of the Amazon rain forest with Kate, he's heart sinks even further. When he finds out that he'll be joining an expedition searching for a mythological Yeti like creature, simply referred to as The Beast, who is said to release a scent that paralyses its victims before it cuts them open with huge claws, his only consolation is since nobody has ever found the Yeti, the chances of them finding The Beast will be pretty slim.

However he can't deny that he's not excited about the trip as well. He's been learning in school about the effects of civilization encroaching on the rain forest and the damage being caused to both its human and non-human inhabitants. As he's about to discover the reality of the situation is a lot more deadly and shameful than anything he's read or studied in school. He first hears rumours of it when he and his grandmother reach the small village that serves as their staging post for their exploration. Santa Maria de la Lluvia is considered the last outpost of civilization, and its dominated by the compound of a South American businessman Mauro Carias, who is always accompanied by the commander of the local army barracks, Captain Ariosto. While the army is nominally supposed to be there to protect the indigenous peoples on behalf of the government, the reality is that many of the local officers are in the pay of businessmen like Carias, and act as their personal armies.

Alex is soon taken under the wing of their guide's daughter, Nadia, who is about two years younger, but far more experienced in the ways of the jungle and its people. Shortly after he arrives she introduces him to one of her friends, Walimai, a shaman from one of the local tribes. When she tells Alex that he is accompanied by the spirit of his late wife he doesn't know whether she's teasing him, or simply deluded for believing such nonsense. However shortly before they are to leave he has an experience that forces him to change his attitude somewhat. Carias takes them on a tour of his compound where he has caged a magnificent black jaguar. Standing outside the wire fence looking in at the animal Alex experiences an out of body event where he feels like he becomes one with jaguar. When he explains what happened afterwards to Nadia she tells him that he has discovered his animal totem, and the jaguar will always be part of him.

As they journey deeper into the jungle and Alex and Nadia encounter more of the people who live there, including a tribe who have had little previous contact with outsiders. The People of the Mist, so named for their ability to seemingly materialize and vanish into thin air, have managed to avoid contact with others until now because of the remote location of their village. However, Carias and Captain Ariosto have plans to exploit their land, and have developed the foolproof means of removing them as an obstacle. It's up to the two young people to come up with a way to foil them, and in the process they discover the secret of the mysterious Beast and other secretes of the Amazon basin.

Allende has done a remarkable job of not only writing an adventure story that will capture the imaginations of young people, but will also introduce them to the plight of the indigenous peoples of the Amazon basin and the threat they face from the exploitation of their environment. At the same time she opens their eyes to the possibility there is more to the world than what meets their eyes. Both Alex and Nadia experience events that can't be explained away by logic or other rational means, yet at the same time everything that happens to them takes place in what is obviously our modern world not some fantastical creation of the author. However, the most important message that she's able to convey, and all this without once preaching or distracting from the quality of her story, is no one people have the answer as to what is civilization. While the ways of The People of the Mist are obviously completely unsuited for life in a city, that doesn't make them any better or worse than we are, just different.

Travelling around the world with Alex Cold, his grandmother Kate, and his new friend Nadia, will introduce readers to the amazing diversity of life that exists in the world around us. Whether it's on the physical plane experiencing the wonders, both beautiful and frightening, of nature and the importance of learning to co-exist with whatever environment you find yourself in, or the possibility of things existing that defy explanation, Allende opens your eyes to the fact that the world is quite a bit different from what we see every day. With so many amazing things to discover here on earth you may just find yourself wondering who needs fantasy or science fiction after all.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 02:01 AM | Permalink

When I was young I was fascinated with European history, especially the Napoleonic wars that changed the shape of Europe from 1798 to his final defeat at Waterloo in 1815. Aside from the fact that he conquered most of Europe he was also responsible for the rise of nationalism among countries that had been former subjects of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Many of those countries he occupied actually looked to him as an example until his troops showed up on their doorstep. However that was knowledge I only came by later when studying the era in school. As a kid I garnered my history lessons from the books of two British authors, Ronald Welsh and C. S Forester. Welsh's books followed the fortunes of the Carey family in war from the Crusades to WWI, while Forester's books traced the career of British naval officer Horatio Hornblower from Midshipman to Admiral.

It's been a long time since I read any books of that type, and to be honest, I didn't really think there was anyway an author could come up with an original enough way of presenting the same history over again to make it interesting enough to read. Well, I have to tell you that when I'm wrong I'm wrong. As I'm sure many of you have already discovered American author Naomi Novik not only created the means to do just that, but has done so in a manner which recreates everything that made those original books so wonderful to read at the same time. If you're like me and had never read any of her Temeraire series, Random House Inc is releasing the perfect answer on October 27th/09, In His Majesty's Service, an omnibus collection of the first three of the five books so far published; His Majesty's Dragon, Throne Of Jade, and Black Powder War. As a bonus they've also thrown in a previously unpublished short story set in the world she has created "In Autumn A White Dragon Looks Over The Wide River"

In the world that Novik has created dragons exist and have the ability to communicate with humans. Not all dragons are fire breathers, some are prized for their weight, some for their manoeuvrability, while others for their ability to spit acid. However, no matter how valuable a resource they might be considered in times of war, in British society it's not the done thing for a gentleman to become an aviator. Buying a commission in the navy, the cavalry, or even the infantry is an acceptable occupation for a younger son of a good family, but Captain William Laurence of the Royal Navy knows just what his father's reaction will be when through sheer chance he ends up bonding with a dragon.

It matters little that his dragon, whom he names Temeraire after the first ship he served on, turns out to be an exceedingly rare dragon of Chinese breeding, a Celestial, he knows his father will look on it as a stain on the family's good name. However he soon discovers that he neither cares, or has time for his father's, or anybody else's, prejudices. For one thing he is astounded at Temeraire's capacity for learning and intelligence. However what amazes him most of all is the emotional bond that develops between him and Temeraire. He soon discovers he prefers his company over that of most humans. While the first book in the omnibus, His Majesty's Dragon is mainly concerned with developing the characters of both Temeraire and Laurence and establishing the world they live in, we do find out pieces of information which will bear significantly on the duos future adventures. Laurence had captured Temeraire's egg from a French vessel that it attacked as it would normally during the course of battle. However what they didn't know at the time was that the egg was meant to be a present for Napoleon from the Chinese Emperor.

So even though Temeraire almost single handed (winged) managed to repulse Napoleon's invasion fleet off the coast of Britain, the British government seriously considers sending him back to the Chinese when the emperor's second son shows up demanding he be handed over. In Throne Of Jade we follow Laurence and Temeraire as they travel to China in an attempt to plead their case. It's while in China that the two come face to face with how unfairly dragons are treated in the West. In European countries dragons are kept at a far remove from humans, and treated with only a little more courtesy than other domesticated animals. However in China they discover the society is set up to accommodate both species, from city streets being wide enough for dragons to stroll through them freely, dragons being paid for their services, knowing how to read and write, to having positions of authority both in the military and civilian life.

While Black Powder War details their return to Great Britain, we also learn that as a result of their activities in China they have made for themselves, and Britain, a deadly enemy. Lien is a giant albino dragon who holds a personal grudge against them for their role in the death of her rider. That he was trying to kill Laurence and overthrow his father the emperor of China is irrelevant, and now she has offered her services to Napoleon in order to see Britain overthrown and Temeraire dead. What can one dragon do you might wonder? Well plenty once she's able to convince Napoleon to start using dragons the way the Chinese do and teaching them the battle plans she studied in China.

While all dragons carry a certain number of crew, nobody had thought to use them to act as troop and supply transports until Lien suggested it to Napoleon. Laurence and Temeraire witness the success of her new tactics first hand as they barely escape from the debacle of the defeat of the Prussian army at the hands of Napoleon while making their way home from China. For using dragons to increase their mobility the French army is able to advance so fast that they take the Prussians by surprise and cut off their planned retreat through Poland to join up with the Russian army. Even though our heroes manage to escape from Europe they are returning to an England totally bereft of allies and faced with the unenviable task of trying to convince the British high command to change their means of employing dragons or fall to Napoleon as surely as Europe did.

What's amazing about these books is how well Novik has managed to not only bring 19th century Europe to life, both in the attitudes of her characters and her descriptions of society, but how seamlessly she has integrated dragons into the mix. As we get to know dragons through the eyes of Laurence, as his awareness of their capabilities and sentience grows, so does ours. Like most people of his class and generation he never had considered dragons beyond their uses in war. Now that his eyes have been opened to the their place in society in China, he knows that things will have to change, We watch with astonishment as Temeraire learns to not only speak Chinese but to write its characters first using a claw. In many ways Temeraire is like an exceptionally bright teenager who is only now beginning to realize just how curtailed his activities have been by the adult world.

At the same time Novik has done an equally credible job of bringing aerial combat with dragons alive. Similar to naval engagements with boarding parties and rifle fire, there's the added thrill of the dragons assaulting each other, and of course the dangers involved with fighting pitched battles on the back of a bucking, twisting, weaving, and roaring dragon. If your guy wire holding you onto your ride is somehow cut, you could very well find yourself tumbling thousands of feet to your death. Like navy crews who spend days on end in the rigging of their ships with the deck seemingly miles away, those wishing to crew a dragon need a good head for heights.

Obviously Novik has taken some liberties with history - there were no dragons present at the battle of Trafalgar as far as I know, but she has done much to bring new life into what had become a moribund and predictable genre. I've never been a fan of alternate history, but instead of floating some what if premise about the course of history, Novik has merely added another ingredient to the mix to make historical fiction that much more interesting and exciting. If you've not read any of her Temeraire series yet, I not only recommend it highly, but can think of no better introduction then the omnibus In His Majesty's Service containing its first three books. The Napoleonic Wars, and historical fiction, will never be the same again.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 08:07 PM | Permalink

In the 1930's Woody Guthrie wrote a song about the plight of the Mexican migrant workers who picked fruit and vegetables in California. "Deportees" detailed how these workers were treated little better than slaves and their status as illegal workers exploited by the folk who hired them. As long as there was fruit that needed picking they were allowed to stay, but the second there was no work - presto they became deportees - illegal immigrants - to be shipped back where they came from post haste.

Now a days things aren't really much different save for the work that's being performed by the so called "illegals". The wealthy hire them to clean their houses, they clean the dishes in our restaurants, and scrub the toilets in our office towers for less money then most people would accept for opening their eyes every morning. Cynical and unscrupulous employers hire them knowing they can do what they want with them and also secure in the knowledge that while their employees will be deported if caught, there will always be more to replace them. It's not only in North America where you'll find migrant workers; all over the world men and women leave their homes to find work in an effort to feed their families. Not everyone guards their borders and their shit jobs as jealously as we do in North America, but what kind of world is this that we make people leave their homes behind them in order to eat.

Este Mundo (this world), the new CD from Rupa & The April Fishes being released on the Cumbancha label October 27th/09 explores the kind of world this is through their songs. There are songs about love, about trying to find one's way in this world, about people who are lost, and the frontiers we all have to cross - whether they're the ones that separate countries or the ones we build up between ourselves and others. Full of unexpected joys and infectious rhythms, nonetheless there are as many songs tinged with the sorrow for the world as there are once that celebrate it. Maybe that's what Rupa and company want us to know though, that for every sorrow, there's a joy and if we keep travelling along we will find them in equal measure.

Based out of San Francisco California, Rupa & The Fishes are familiar with the problems of migrant workers and frontier. Lead signer Rupa Marya is no stranger to moving either having lived in India and the south of France with her parents before the finally settled in the Bay area. She's even experienced what economic hardship can do to a family, for as a child her parents were forced to send her off to live with family in India when they were unable to provide for her properly themselves. So when she sings about the difficulties faced by families and individuals in this world, she speaks with the voice of experience.

The songs on Este Mundo reflect Rupa's polyglot background as the lyrics are in French, Spanish, and even the occasional one in English. While that may make it a little more difficult for some of us to understand the lyrics, the languages work with their respective songs as they sound like they fit the music. For us uni-lingual types the CD comes with a booklet that provides the lyrics in their original language and a translation into English. Anyway, doesn't it seem appropriate to be singing a song like "Por La Frontera" (Along The Border) in Spanish when it talks about a line that's worth more then life, an obvious reference to the American Mexican border? How can a line be worth more then life? When people die crossing it on an almost daily basis is how.

Although some of the songs are definitely political in nature, that doesn't stop Rupa and The Fishes from including ones that are pure poetry as well. "Neruda", lists the poet Pablo Neruda as its author, with additional lyrics by Marya, and although I'm only slightly familiar with his work, it has the same feel to it as any of his poetry that I've read. To my mind its something he shares with the great American poet e.e. cummings; an ability to express gratitude for the various wonders that you can find in life. "thank you violins/for this day/of four chords/pure is the sound/of the sky/the blue voice/of the air". When I read that I can't help but think of the soft blue skies of spring, full of promise for new life.

Musically the disc is as diverse as the topics covered by the lyrics as one song will have a hint of reggae, another will see Marya delivering her lyrics in a rap, another will sound like its from the streets of Paris, and yet another could be from Seville, home of Flamenco. What's amazing about this, is that instead of sounding like some God-awful mess when you listen to it, it's more like somebody has figured out how to put together a jigsaw puzzle with pieces that you don't think should fit together, but the final picture makes perfect sense. It helps that "The Fishes"; Aaron Kierbel (drums, percussion) Isabel Douglass (accordion and bandoneon), Safa Shokrai (acoustic and electric bass), Ed Baskerville (cello), Marucs Cohen (trumpet), and Rupa (glockenspiel, guitar, vocals, and wineglass), play instruments that are suited for working with others to create an overall sound instead of the normal popular music instruments which are geared towards individual creation. Therefore, they are more adept at finding a way of pulling diverse elements together to make a whole.

There are two instrumental tracks on this disc, the first song "La Frontera", and the ninth song "El Camino Del Diablo (The Devil's Highway). The second title refers to a stretch of treacherous land in Arizona's Sonoran desert full of ancient trails that run through the badlands. Most of the 1,000 people who died between 1995 and 2000 trying to get into the US did so in this region, and most of them died of thirst and exposure. The song is a mournful trumpet being played over the sound a desolate wind blowing. "La Frontera" is equally sad, however the trumpet is replaced by cello and the mournful cry of someone calling out. As there are no lyrics, the band has included a dedication for the disc in their place. To the memory of those "migrantes" who have lost their lives making the perilous journeys around the world looking for work and a better life for their families. The band also offers their best wishes and respect to those making the journey and welcomes them.

Like Woody Guthrie seventy years ago, Rupa & The Fishes make it pretty clear which side they are on in the whole illegal immigrant argument. Unlike Woody though their music doesn't necessarily speak to the specific issue, but instead addresses the band's overall concern for the human condition, and through that they find their way to the Mexican American border. Although there's a spring in the step of this music, it's not the most cheerful. You can still dance to it like you could the Fishes' previous disc, but it will also make you think a lot more than you'd expect. Read the lyrics if you don't speak French and Spanish, listen to the music, and feel what it is they are talking about - it makes a lot more sense than anything any politician has to say on the subject of immigration.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 03:43 PM | Permalink

Everybody has probably heard the expression, "history is written by the winners" in reference to the tendency of history to be told from only one side and to represent a particular point of view. While reading history text books which misrepresent events that happened a hundred years ago is upsetting if you know the truth of what happened, can you imagine what it would be like to live through hearing your own history re-written? Even more disturbing would be to find the re-writes based on innuendo, hearsay, and outright lies.

In the late 1940's, and through the 1950's, many citizens of the United States of America discovered their lives had been ruined by others inventing malicious gossip or making false accussations, about them and their histories. If you were named by a friendly witness to the House Committee on Un American Activities as being either a member of, or a former member of, the Communist party, you could easily find yourself facing social ostracism if not jail time. You weren't tried in a court of law, given a chance to defend yourself in front of an impartial judge, or presumed innocent. In fact if you showed up in front of the House Committee on Un-American Activities it was generally presumed you were guilty and it was only a matter of figuring out how guilty you were.

Barbara Kingsolver, has never been an author to shy away from controversial subject matter in either her fiction or non-fiction. Her latest novel, The Lacuna published by Harper Collins Canada, is no exception, as she not only takes us behind the scenes of history, she shows us how quickly and easily the truth of events can disappear and lies become reality. Cleverly mixing fictional characters with historical figures and events Kingsolver takes us on a journey that encompasses both Mexico and the United States from the 1930's through the 1950's.

Lacuna is literally the Spanish word meaning hole, or the space between two objects. However it can also be used to refer to a cave or any other sort of gap; like the gap between truth and what the public perceives to be the truth. In The Lacuna Kingsolver traces the history of Harrison Shepherd, the child of a Mexican mother and American father, from his early days living with his mother in Mexico as she's supported by a series of boyfriends, and then back and forth between the United States and Mexico as the winds of history blow him hither and yonder. For once he is set up on his own - after a brief sojourn in an American military as a teenager which ended under a cloud of suspicion - he enters into service as the cook to the mercurial Mexican painter Frida Khalo and her sometime husband, painter Diego Rivera.

The Riveras aren't just artists, they are political artists, and very Communist. We learn about Shepherd's history via the journals he started keeping when he was young living with his mother. At first the Riveras wonder about their young cook, has he been sent to spy on them? What are all these notes he's making to himself? However when Frida finds out he's merely keeping a diary of events for his own amusement and because he loves to write she encourages him to keep at it. That is until they are to play host to a very special and important guest - the exiled Lev Trotsky. One of the original leaders of the Russian revolution along with Stalin and Lenin, Trotsky had been anointed by Lenin to be his successor. However, Stalin, through lies and quick action, was able to not only supplant Trotsky but also to cast him in the role of traitor to Russia.

Through Shepherd's journals we learn how Trosky comes to live in Mexico with the Riveras and how Shepherd eventually ends up working for Trotsky as cook and translator; a position that will come back to haunt him in later years, and one that puts his life in real danger. For Stalin has ordered that Trotsky be killed, and Communists around the world are eager to carry out his request. Ironically the newspapers in Mexico and the United States refuse to believe that Trotsky is under threat. When his house is machine gunned he is accused of setting it up himself in order to garner sympathy, even when it's proved that the leader in the Communist party of Mexico had been behind the attack. When Trotsky is finally assassinated, it's Frida who arranges the means for Shepherd to leave the country by having him shepherd some of her artwork from Mexico to New York for an exhibit. As he holds dual citizenship she tells him to stay in America until it is safe. Unfortunately America doesn't turn out to be the safe haven they hoped it to be.

For although he initially enjoys some moderate success as a writer, the America depicted is one scared of its own shadow. First is the round-up of "enemy aliens" - Japanese Americans - during WWII, and then it's the turn of anyone ever suspected of being a Communist, or other sort of un-American activity. Through Shepherd's journals Kingsolver shows how innuendo, hearsay, and lies are used to bring about his downfall, as he details how public opinion is turned against him by the way the hole between the truth and lies is filled in. It's alarming how quickly we see Shepherd go from being a novelist admired by critics and fans alike, to being public enemy number one in the press. People who one moment were fawning over him, can't push him away quick enough.

It's always a dangerous thing for a novelist to bring real people into a story because you can't create them from scratch. They have their own histories and personalities already, and trying to fit them into a work of fiction can rapidly become quite convoluted. However, Kingsolver has handled the inclusion of real people into Shepherd's story beautifully by casting him in the role of historian. Instead of Frida Kahlo, Diego Rivera, and Lev Trotsky trying to fit into his fictional life, he finds a place in their history which is not only plausible, but also allows us to see them as real people not just as figures in history. Not only does this bring them to life, but it brings history to life, and fills in the holes - the lacuna - that most history books don't answer. We see how Trotsky was allowed to be made a villain because the West needed Stalin, and in turn how Stalin became the villain when he was no longer needed. The only way that can be accomplished is to ignore history, and according to Kingsolver in this book the United States is a past master at doing just that.

The Lacuna is the story of one man caught up in the tides of history, and the story of how history is created. While beautifully written, with characters who jump off the page they are so alive, it is filled with unpleasant truths about our society. Kingsolver is an intelligent and compassionate writer which allows her to create a story that works both as social commentary and an excellent work of fiction without the former interfering with the latter. You may not like what she has to say, but you can never deny that she says it well and with authority. After reading The Lacuna you may never look at a history book or a newspaper story in quite the same way again, and that's a good thing.

The Lacuna can be purchased either directly from Harper Collins Canada or from Amazon.ca or other on line retailers.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 11:19 AM | Permalink

Of the many things about the 1970's that I really disliked living through, cop shows and movies that glorified police violence and disrespect for the law were pretty high up on the list. Starskey & Hutch, Dirty Harry, and Serpico all depicted police officers who worked on the premise that the ends justified the means. Who cares if you had to beat the crap out of a suspect, lie to, or threaten them in order to obtain a conviction; as long as you got the bad guy in the end that made it all right. I couldn't help wondering then, and now, what kind of example those shows were giving when their message was it was okay to break the law as long as you were doing it for the right reasons.

Needless to say I don't share any of the nostalgia for the 1970's or early 1980's that has fuelled movie versions of Starsky & Hutch or Miami Vice. All of which might make it seem odd that I would have been interested in checking out a police procedural that was set back in those dark days. However, all you have to do is watch the first of eight episodes in the four DVD pack Life On Mars: Series One put out by Acorn Media earlier this year, to know this is going to be a completely different take on 1970's policing.

The premise of the show might sound a bit far fetched, a modern day British cop falls into a coma in 2005 and wakes up to find himself having been transported back to the mean streets of Manchester England in 1973, but the result is some of the most brilliant television that I've seen. Not only does it depict the tension you would expect between cops of the two eras, it does a credible job of having them conduct investigations into crimes, all the while sustaining the question as to what the hell is going on with the central character. Is Sam Tyler (John Simm), the cop from the future, lying in a coma thirty odd years in the future and is all this is a figment of his imagination?Or maybe he has somehow fallen through some chink in time that has allowed him to travel into the past? On the other hand he could be an officer from the 1970's who has suffered a head injury which has left him delusional. For although episode one opens in modern day Manchester with him going about his duties as a Detective Chief Inspector (DCI) in the Criminal Investigation Division (CID), by the time it ends his new reality as a Detective Inspector (DI) thirty years back in time, is every bit as convincing as the former.

Part of what makes 1973 so believable are the people populating it. Chief among them are Tyler's new boss DCI Gene Hunt (Philip Glenister). On the surface Gene appears to be your stereotypical 1970's copper, leading with his fists and filled with every racial and gender bias in the book. Gene isn't above planting evidence on somebody in order to get a collar -"Anybody I stitch up deserves it". Needless to say twenty-first century, scientific, and very clean Sam Tyler doesn't see exactly see eye to eye with Gene about his methodology which leads to quite a bit of yelling and the occasional punch up.

However, while Gene's bluff exterior isn't hiding a sensitive soul underneath, we soon discover appearances are not only deceiving, there's a bloody good reason for them. First of all Gene doesn't have any of the technology at his disposal that Sam or today's cops have. Forensic science that we take for granted like lifting finger prints from skin don't exist. Gene and his cops have to rely on what their "snouts" (informers) can tell them, their instincts honed from years working among the criminal classes of Manchester, and catching the guilty party either red handed or getting them to confess.

While both Sam and us are appalled by some of Gene's methodology, we gradually begin to understand him more with each episode and see what drives him so relentlessly. He takes any crime committed upon his streets personally and desperately wants to clean them up. Although he gets royally pissed off with Sam, he appreciates what he stands for and his abilities as a cop. There's one brilliant scene between the two of them where Gene talks about how he came to start accepting "backhanders" (bribes). When Sam asks him how it makes it feel inside he replies "like there's a creature inside eating away at me", and is happy to kill the creature when Sam gives him the opportunity by bringing down a local gangster.

While Sam and Gene are the leads, the supporting cast, Police woman Anne Cartwright (Liz White) Detective Sergeant Ray Carling (Dean Andrews) and Detective Constable Chris Skelton (Marshall Lancaster) are equally important to the series. Carling thinks he knows what his "guvnor" DCI Hunt is all about, but only sees the rough and tumble exterior and not the brain and heart at work underneath, which leads him into making a horrible mistake. Skelton is torn between being interested in the new ideas Sam is suggesting about police work and not wanting to risk alienating his mates by chumming up to the new boss and doing anything that might look different from the way everyone else acts.

Anne Cartwright could be a love interest, but more importantly she's a friend and acts as Sam's conscience by forcing him to consider what's more important to him - his procedures and "how things should be done" or his friends and the consequences of his actions. However, unlike the rest of the men she works with, Sam doesn't treat her walking into the room as an excuse for making dirty jokes, and doesn't think her gender makes her less intelligent then the rest of them. So although she treads carefully, over the course of the first series we begin to see her come out of her shell and taking a more active role in investigations.

As he's conducting investigations into murders and robberies Sam Tyler is also continually dealing with coming face to face with his "past". In various episodes over this first season he meets his mom, hears the voice of his younger self once or twice, and, finally, his father is a suspect in the final episode of the year. Sam "remembers" his dad mysteriously vanishing when he was young, and as the episode unfolds he realizes that he is not only going to be solving a crime but is about to discover what happened to his father all those years ago. Near the beginning of the case he latches on to the hope that maybe this is the reason he's been sent back into the past - to prevent his dad from leaving - and perhaps if he can do that he'll be able to go home. Back to the present.

Each of the fours discs are in widescreen format and come with optional cast and crew commentary. There are also various special features scattered throughout the four disc set including a very good two part documentary about the making of the series that includes interviews with the writers, producers, and cast members. I'd advise not watching it until after you've watched the series so as not to ruin any of the surprises in store during the show.

Life On Mars does an amazing job of weaving together the three story lines; the clash of police techniques, the actual investigations themselves, and Sam's quest to understand just what the hell is going on with him. A combination of great writing, even better acting, and a refusal to either glamourize the violence of the 1970's coppers or make Sam's character a saint, make it not only a great police procedural show that's surprisingly funny, but also amazingly credible. With the action being so believable, it becomes even more difficult to understand what Sam is actually going through and by the end of Series One we aren't that much the wiser. Life On Mars: Series One is as marvellously produced piece of television as you're going to see in a long time and leaves you definitely wanting more.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 12:52 PM | Permalink

It was sometime in the early 1980's when I first started to realize there was far more to film than what was produced in North America. One of the first foreign films I saw was by the great French film director Jean Luc Godard. I could probably figure out the title of the movie through a process of elimination by looking him and his movies up on the web, but that's not the point. The point was that after watching it my whole perspective on what constituted a movie changed. This wasn't some great intellectual epiphany or any such bullshit, it was just a matter of my eyes being opened to the fact there were more ways to tell a story cinematically then I had been aware of.

After that I started seeking out other movies by European directors. Now I wasn't a movie snob like some people I knew who would refuse to see anything made in North America, that was as bigoted and close minded as refusing to see a movie because it had sub-titles, but I did make an effort to seek out movies by Europeans over North Americans. It was sort of a personal affirmative action plan - if there was a choice between two movies on a certain night I would watch the European one instead of the North American. In the process I discovered that European directors could make crap movies the same as anyone else, if not worse for the intellectual pretensions they carried with them. However, when they were good, they were really good and far better than anything I had seen before.

At the time a trio of German film makers were making the biggest impression, Wim Wenders, Werner Herzog, and Rainer Werner Fassbinder on most people. However there was also a French director, Jean-Jacques Beineix whose name was being mentioned in the same breath as those others, primarily as a result of his first feature length movie, Diva, released in 1981. Two years later he released La Lune Dans Le Caniveau, The Moon In The Gutter, which will be available for the first time on DVD in North American October 20th thanks to Cinema Libre studios.

Staring Gerard Depardieu and Nastassja Kinski The Moon In The Gutter is set in a French port town with most of the action taking place in a seedy neighbourhood full of tired whores, failures, and petty criminals. Depardieu's character, Gerard, is an emotional wreck following the rape and subsequent suicide of his sister. We discover as the movie opens that he is obsessed with catching the man who raped her and spends a great deal of time haunting the spot where she took her own life with his razor. Although he makes decent money working as a stevedore, loading and unloading ships, he hangs out in the run down bars of his neighbourhood in the hopes of finding the culprit. It's in that bar he meets an elegant and jaded young man who has travelled from the wealthy parts of the city looking for thrills, and through him his beautiful and enigmatic sister, Loretta, played by Kinski.

From their first meeting it's obvious that Loretta is attracted to Gerard, but is the attraction her merely looking for "a bit of rough" before returning to her real life and her own kind, or does she genuinely love him. As for Gerard, could Loretta be his way out of his obsession over the death of his sister as well as his way out of the sordid world of the dock yards? As the movie unfolds we're never quite sure as to either of their intentions, and even when it looks like they have committed to each other - Gerard wakes up alone back in his old house in the slums.

Depardieu and Kinski both give superlative performances in the movie, with Depardieu's being the most surprising. In North America we've not seen him when he was in his prime, a young man with enormous physical presence on the screen. However it's how he undercuts that, how he shows how his character's fear and insecurities turn him into a small boy afraid that the gift he's being offered will be snatched away because he's done something wrong that makes his performance so compelling. Kinski could have done nothing but stand there for her scenes and Loretta would have been alluring enough for most men. However she takes her character much further than that and we not only see what attracts Gerard to her, but what's in her that causes so much confusion for Gerard.

In North America it seems like movies are all about the actors - the stars - while the director and whatever vision he may or may not have had for the movie is lost in the background. That's not the case in a Beineix movie as the actor's performance is merely one part of the production, just as the script and the camera work are. In The Moon In The Gutter Beineix has created an almost surreal world that exists after dark on the coast of France. Colours - like the red of the blood stain on the sidewalk where Gerard's sister was murdered, glow from the inside as well as reflecting the light of the overlarge moon. The moon is much lower in the sky here than it ever is in real life. It's so low you half expect one of the characters to reach up and pluck it from the sky like an apple.

That's not all that gives the movie an unrealistic cast, the street where most of the exterior action in the slums takes place looks a little bit off - something about it looks wrong. For when the camera shoots down the street we can tell its obviously a set, which gives you an odd sense of displacement. For while the action and the emotional intensity between the characters is very real, this doesn't let us forget that we are watching a movie.

<.i>The Moon In The Gutter is not a realistic movie, and if you watch it expecting to see something along the lines of what you see everyday in the cinema or on a DVD, you'll probably come away disappointed. It doesn't really have a plot per se, but it does tell a story, the story of the emotional turmoil one man suffers through because of the death of his sister. The director, Jean-Jacques Beineix, has used everything at his disposal to tell us this story; actors, sets, lighting, and sound, much like a painter uses paint on a canvass to elicit a response from the viewer.

The original movie was made in 1983 so don't expect anything like 5.1 surround sound, but the picture and the sound are surprisingly clean and clear in spite of its age. The DVD also includes a very interesting interview with the director in which they discuss the movie in detail, and he explains a little bit about his approach to movie making. Although there are some spoilers in it, watching the interview prior to the movie might actually help you understand and appreciate the movie.

The Moon In The Gutter may not be to everyone's liking, but if you have an eye for something a little different from the norm when it comes to movies, this is definitely not to be missed. Not only are you going to be able to buy the DVD when it comes out on October 20th/09, Cinema Libre are going to be releasing a box set, The Jean-Jaques Beineix Collection of Beineix's work on December 1st/09 that will include The Moon In The Gutter and more of his best works, some of which have never been released in the United States before. This is a great chance to own some of the most provocative and compelling film made by one of the more extraordinary directors of the 1980's. It may not be what you're used to, but that doesn't mean it's not worth watching. Take a chance on something different - you won't regret it.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 09:20 PM | Permalink

When 600,000 people showed up for the third annual Isle of Wight music festival in 1970, things quickly got out of hand. The tiny island off the east coast of Great Britain in the English Channel was overwhelmed by this invading army. Compounding matters were the huge number of people who showed up at the concert without tickets in the hopes of a repeat of what happened at Woodstock the year prior. Organizers there had thrown open the gates and declared it a free concert when countless numbers showed up without tickets ensuring that trouble was kept to a minimum.

Unfortunately those behind the Isle of Wight festival were less understanding and the event disintegrated into an ongoing battle between the people outside the fence squatting on the hill they called Desolation Row after the Dylan song of the same name, and those running the show. Acts who they had supposedly come to see were booed off the stage, Kris Kristofferson can be heard saying they look like they're going to shoot us. It was into this seemingly unsalvageable mess, after five days of insanity, that Leonard Cohen made his way onto stage. During the set that preceded him, Jimi Hendrix, someone had set the stage on fire, (not Hendrix), and although the fire didn't faze Cohen, the fact that the keyboards had been destroyed did. He refused to go on stage unless another piano could be found so his producer and band leader Bob Johnson could accompany him and the rest of the band.

In the end, it wasn't until something like two in the morning when he made his way onto stage, and in spite of the crowd's ire and impatience he didn't rush. Watching him stare out into the darkness, unshaven, and baggy eyed from lack of sleep at the beginning of Murray Lerner's film of the event, part of the two disc DVD/CD package Leonard Cohen Live At The Isle Of Wight 1970 being released on October 20th/09 by Legacy Recordings and Columbia Records, you feel a moment of fear that the crowd will tear him to pieces. Then he launches into "Bird On The Wire" and you can almost hear them settling into the palm of his hand.

The DVD is an amazing record of the power of Leonard Cohen as a performer. The cameras never leave the stage, except for a couple of moments when they shoot the darkness to show people lighting matches at Cohen's request -"Can everyone light a match so I can see where your are"? - and that makes you feel as if Cohen and his band are a pocket of light and power within a sea of darkness. If you didn't know about the events leading up to his performance you wouldn't be able to guess that any of it had occurred as you can barely even tell that the crowd is out there. It's only after each song is played and the cheering begins that we are even aware of them. Even when Cohen is simply speaking there's not a sound to be heard, as if no one dares to interrupt him.

Interspersed through out the original film are present day interviews with Kristofferson, Joan Baez, Judy Collins, and Bob Johnson, offering their perspective on both the festival and Cohen. Often times I find interjections like that to be annoying and tend to distract from the original film, but on this occasion the producers have done a very clean job of interjecting the present day material into the original footage. They serve as interesting footnotes to what is happening on stage, and help us develop a clearer picture of what we're on the screen.

Musically Cohen is at the peak of his prowess, he was about thirty-five years old, and his record. Songs From A Romm, had just hit number two on the British pop charts. The concert at Isle of Wight was just one stop on his very successful European tour that year and he was accompanied by a band that included Charlie Daniels on fiddle and bass. In spite of the fact that they are all obviously feeling the strain of the weekend's events and the lateness of the hour, the band never once flagged and played beautifully. There's a great moment during "Tonight Will Be Fine" when Charlie Daniels gets up from his chair and joins Cohen centre stage for a fiddle solo. The juxtaposition of the two men is extraordinary and has to be seen to be believed, as Daniels looks like a hulking bear next to Cohen and far too big to be playing anything so small as a violin. Yet there they are sharing a microphone playing and singing their hearts out respectively.

While the DVD doesn't include all the music from the concert Leonard gave that night, in fact it doesn't even present the songs in their right order, it's still one of the best concert recordings I've seen for how it captures the spirit and intensity of a Cohen performance. The CD half of this two disc set contains the complete concert performed in the exact order as Cohen played that night in August of 1970. Here again the producers have done a great job in capturing the energy of the live performance by not attempting to make the sound quality perfect. By leaving in a great many of the glitches that used to be standard in the days of analog recording of live concerts they have made it possible for the listener to gain a more complete experience of what it must have been like to be at that concert.

While a lot of fuss has been made about Cohen's current tour and what an amazing performer he is today, the slick and sophisticated performance captured on the Leonard Cohen Live In London DVD pales in comparison to the raw passion and intensity revealed on both the CD and DVD parts of Live At The Isle Of Wight 1970. This is a raw and intense vision of a poet at work wooing his audience with words, music, passion, and intellect. Like those in attendance that night you're pulled into Cohen's vision of the world from his first word and only as the music fades away over the credits of the DVD or the last track on the CD do you find yourself re-surfacing. This is an opportunity to experience Leonard Cohen in a way that you've never experienced him before and its not to be missed.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 09:54 AM | Permalink

There's a tendency these days to forget that rock and roll music can be fun and doesn't have to be about "serious" matters. Us critics can be the worst for that with our penchant for doing in depth analysis of lyrics and looking for hidden meanings under every bass line and chord progression. I dread to think how much all that is us trying to make our subject sound more important then it really is to inflate our own importance. I mean we're not taking about high art here folks, we're talking about down and dirty rock and roll - stuff that smells of sweat, cigarette smoke, and whisky.

All we have to do is think back to the early days of the music and lyrics like "Be bop be lula", "Whole lotta shakin' going on", or "Tutti Frutti - all rutti" to remember it was fun and nonsense first and foremost. Of course that made it dangerous to the establishment because it encouraged abandonment and frivolous behaviour, although I'm sure most people's objections to it in the 1950's was the sexual innuendo inherent in its name. Anyway, it's always good to be reminded that rock and roll is fun and doesn't need any other justification for its existence than to ensure that we'll have a good time listening to it.

Victor Wainwright And The WildRoots' new release, Beale Street To The Bayou, is just such a creature, as the fourteen tracks on the disc capture that spirit of abandonment and fun quite unlike other recordings that I've heard in a while. Not only that, they don't just stick to playing one style of rock and roll either, for as the title suggests they've latched on to various inspirations for these songs. One song might have some gospel flavour, while another you can hear rock and roll's country roots shining through, and yet another smacks strongly of the Mississippi Delta. What's even better is that none of the songs sound like any of those influences were pre-meditated. If there's a gospel flavour to a tune its only because that's what worked with the lyrics, not because somebody said we should write a gospel tune.

What's great about this band is not only are they completely comfortable playing any of the styles above, but they do so without making any sort of big deal out of it. They play this music because they enjoy and love doing so and its bloody obvious when you listen to them. While the core of the group is composed of only four members; Victor Wainwright (Vocals, keyboards, harmonica), Stephen Dees (Bass, acoustic and electric guitars, vocals, and percussion), Greg Gumpel (Lead guitar, mandolin, and banjo), and Brian Kelly on drums, they not only extend the line up to include a couple of saxophones and extra percussion on a couple of tracks, they haul in a whole bunch of special guests to fill out the sound on individual tracks with everything from trombones to cellos.

One of the great things musically about these guys is how they are able to sound loose in their playing while being really tight. It feels like at any minute the music could disintegrate into a mishmash of sound, but the reality is everything is played for a reason and every note is in the exact right place all the way through. Dees, who used to play extensively with Pat Travers, appears to be the musical director of the band as he's either written or had a hand in the writing of the fourteen original tunes on the disc. It's also his responsibility, along with drummer Gumpel as the bass player on most tracks, to hold the band together no matter what song they are playing. His bass is not only the heart beating at the centre of each track, its also the pulse the band adheres to that ensures they stay on track and never lose sight of what they're playing.

If Dees is the glue holding the band together, Victor Wainwright is the ball of energy that threatens to periodically send them off into orbit. As keyboardist and lead vocalist he's the voice of the band, and he loves to sink his teeth into anything he sings. He throws everything he's got into every song in terms of passion and enthusiasm. Now that doesn't mean he goes over the top, or sound like he's too much on a softer number, as he always manages to never cross the line into excess. He's also got one of those great rock and roll and voices that sound like its been soaked in whisky since birth and then hung out to dry in a smoke filled room every night. Rough as it is though he is surprisingly versatile and his range is much greater than you'd expect.

While it might sound like an odd thing to say, but the fact that I hardly noticed guitar player Gumpel's contribution is probably one of the best compliments I can give him. That means his guitar playing is exemplary as far as I'm concerned as he never once puts himself above the needs of the song or the band. It doesn't mean he never takes a solo, or that his solos aren't really good, but he makes sure that its never just about him, but about how he can serve the song with his leads. He also does some really wonderful banjo and mandolin work, something not all guitar players can handle. As for the fourth member of the band, drummer Brian Kelly, there's a real case of not noticing him because he's done his job so well. I mean lets be real, the only time most of us notice a drummer - unless he does one of those really boring drum solos I've learned to dread since the 1970's - is when they screw up. Kelly is back there on the drums for the whole disc keeping them steady and helping Dees hold it all together.

While The WildRoots are primarily a good time, boogie-woogie band who would sound right at home being the house band for a bordello - and I mean that as a compliment - they do have their surprises as well. The second song of the disc, "Planet Earth", is a beautiful gospel tinged number reminding us that we'd better take care of where we're living or we might just find ourselves homeless in the middle of the solar system. However, what really distinguishes these guys in my eyes from so much of what I've been listening to recently is they are having so much fun doing what they do that you can't help get caught up in it. For those of you who miss the days when rock and roll was about having a good time, or have never really known what's it like to simply enjoy music, this CD is a timely reminder of just how much fun there can be had listening to rock and roll.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 05:22 PM | Permalink

To most of us the desert looks to be an inhospitable land, devoid of life. You wouldn't think to look at it that anything could survive out there let alone humans and their herds of goats and camels. Yet for generations that's exactly what the Tuareg people have done in the Northern Sahara desert. In a territory that stretches from present day Algeria in the north to what is now Niger in the south they have moved with their flocks from watering hole to watering hole, and followed the changing of the seasons in search of grazing land for their herds.

It was the coming of the colonial masters that began the troubles for the Tuareg. They created the borders that divided the desert into artificial segments. However the end of colonial rule in the early 1960's didn't do anything to improve their lot and 1963 saw the first of the Tuareg uprisings. The government of Niger began a systematic campaign of terror and persecution against the Tuareg, and they responded by taking up arms against them. However they were ill equipped to combat a modern army, and many were forced to flee to the north. Among those refugees was a young Ibrahim Ag Ahabib, whose memories of the trek include his grandfather dying on the forced march.

Like many young Tuareg of that generation, Ahabib, were involved in the next Tuareg uprising in the 1980's. However it wasn't only a gun he learned how to use in the training camps of Libya where the Tuareg received their training. He, and others, began to play guitar, and give voice to the dreams and aspirations of the rebellion through songs. Mixing popular music from the west, specifically the guitar driven music of Jimi Hendrix and Carlos Santana, with their people's traditional sound, they recorded cassettes of music that were distributed throughout the Tuareg territories. While the governments of Niger and Mali quickly made their music illegal, it didn't stop the messages of hope and pride from being spread among the people. While he has long since put down his gun to focus on his music, Ahabib and the band he leads, Tinariwen, continue to sing about the life of the Tuareg, only now their audience has expanded to include the rest of the world.

On their latest release, Imidiwan: Companions on the World Village out October 13th/09, they have also included a DVD containing a documentary about the making of the recording directed by Jessy Nottola. Up until now Tinariwen have had to travel to Europe in order to make their CDs, but this time they were able to ensure that the recording studio came to them. As a result the film isn't just of musicians setting up in some arid studio to record tracks, it follows the band to some of their favourite places in the Malian part of the Sahara desert. These are places where they have sat, played and sung to the desert and the stars throughout the night in the past. The places where the heart and soul of not only the music, but also, the Tuareg, reside.

While six of the fourteen songs on the disc are composed by Ibrahim Ag Ahabib, song writing duties are now split up amongst more members of the band then they seem to have been in the past. Yet no matter who writes, or for that matter performs, a song, they are all equally powerful in the emotional pull they are able to exert upon us while we listen. The guitars are the focal point, whether acoustic or electric, as they provide the energy that fuels a song. They are an insistent thrum of sound which increases and decreases in volume through out the course of a song creating peaks and valleys much like the desert itself is crested with dunes and dotted with hidden bowls excavated by ages of wind eroding rock.

It's in one of these bowls, surrounded by walls of rock, that we watch the band set up to record on the DVD. A lone figure swathed in blue robes, head wrapped to protect the face and skull from the heat and sand, sets down a stone and carefully counts off paces in four directions placing another stone at the terminus of each count. He then gradually forms a large circle out of rocks in amongst the boulders strewn on the canyon floor. Gradually, on camel, and in four wheel drive vehicles, the rest of the band and the equipment arrive and are established within the circle. As the day loses its heat and light, the band begin to play, and the setting sun paints the rocks around them orange to match the fires they will soon light to keep off the cool of a desert night.

The lyrics they sing are in the language of their people, Tamashek, and although we can't understand what they are saying, their sound combined with the guitar and the steady beat of the drum and bass, are quickly mesmerizing. You can't help but be caught up in the wash of sound, but at the same time there's an urgency to the sound of their vocals that makes you strain to understand on any level what it is they're saying. Interspersed through the song is the occasional sound of the women background singers creating the undulating sound the women of the desert have used to denote moments of high emotion for centuries. I defy anyone not to feel a chill run up your spin upon hearing the trembling high pitched voices raised as a kind of exclamation point to the lyrics that proceeded them.

The booklet accompanying the disc has the lyrics for each song written out in both Tamashek, transcribed into our alphabet, and English. While we can hunt among the lyrics for some clues as to what the songs are about and for insights into the people who are singing them, even in English the meanings can be oblique. For the songs talk about matters that are specific to the people of the desert. However there are still nuggets of information the translations provide us with. For example Imazeghen (pronounced Im-Az-Arr-En) is the collective noun the Tuareg use to refer to themselves, as Tuareg is an Arabic word imposed on them by outsiders. So the song titled "Imazeghen N Adagh" (pronounced Ad-Arr) is about the people from the region in Mali, Adagh, where Tinariwen come from. It's a simple call to stand up and be recognized. To look around themselves and instead of being confused and overwhelmed, to remember who they are. "You don't understand the confidence you possess/Once you rode upon the camel's saddle".

There has been a disturbing tendency to romanticize the Imazeghen of the Sahara which does them a horrible disservice. As recently as a few months ago armed rebellion had broken out again in both Niger and Mali as they continue to fight to preserve their way of life and be given the freedom to chose how to live. Territory that was given them by treaty is being taken away as uranium deposits are discovered under the sands of the desert in Niger. Newspapers writing articles supportive of their plight are closed down by the government while activists and sympathizers are arrested on charges of sedition and terrorism. Tinariwen's songs aren't about something that happened to the people in the past, they are about a people's fight for survival in the face of a world that doesn't look like it has room for them anymore.

Listening to Imidiwan- Companions one can't help feel the world would be a lot emptier without people who feel as deeply about their way of life and their land as these people do. Is our need for uranium that great that we need to destroy a civilization that can produce music like this? It would be a great pity if we let the answer be yes.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 09:20 AM | Permalink

The human voice has the potential to be one of the most expressive musical instruments around. Yet you couldn't tell that by listening to the majority of women on the pop charts these days. Sometimes it seems like they're equally divided between those sounding like squeaky dolls and those who equate volume with emotion. It certainly makes you wonder what's going through the minds of those behind the scenes in the pop music industry that would inspire them to keep foisting one or the other on us year after year.

It's especially galling putting up with either of this type when you know there are singers like Zora Young out there who sings circles around anybody you hear on radio today. Nominally a blues singer, one only need listen to Young's newest release, The French Connection, on to hear not only how good she is, but how her talent extends far beyond the one genre. The fourteen tracks on Young's latest recording range from a cover of a Dylan tune to her renditions of classic blues songs and everything in between.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 05:02 PM | Permalink

Jazz musicians must really love what they do. How else can you explain spending a lifetime playing music and rarely receiving the recognition your talent deserves. Occasionally, for one reason or another, a jazz musician's name will somehow manage to come to the attention of more than just those who are aficionados of the genre, but unfortunately it's not usually until after their dead. Which means that some of the most innovative and brilliant musicians of our generation are working in relative obscurity and creating music that the majority of us will never hear. Unfortunately we're the ones who are the real losers, because we miss out on some truly awe inspiring music.

Now it's true that the strain of jazz known as avant-garde can be a little inaccessible at times to some people, but that's primarily because they have very little exposure to it. Like any art form to properly appreciate it one needs to have an understanding of what's going on, and the only way that can be achieved is by listening to it. Out of what at first might sound like so much noise, patterns and motifs begin to appear and are then replayed with parts removed, added or changed in some manner, that gives new emphasis to the music. Much like abstract art there is no specific object for the listener to hang on to, rather they have to find their won way into the music via some less concrete path like emotions.

The other thing that listeners have to be aware of is how much of what they are listening to is being created in front of them and that pieces will change each time they are played and depending on who is playing them. You have to surrender any conceptions you might have held about "songs", and start thinking of a tune as a collection of notes to be used as inspiration, not an end in itself. So while you might hear something akin to what you think of as a melody at some point, those notes will be folded, bent, mutilated, and spindled in any manner of ways over the course of a performance.

Formed in 1965 the Association For The Advancement Of Creative Musicians (AACM) of Chicago has been the breeding ground for some of the most innovative and creative voices in modern African American music and most specifically jazz. Tenor saxophone player Fred Anderson was one of the founding members of the AACM and has been a key figure in the reinterpretation of classic be-bop standards from the forties in the new style. So it's only fitting that for his eightieth birthday bash at the club he has operated for years, the Velvet Lounge, one set was devoted to re-workings of Dextor Gordon and Wardell Gray's "The Chase" from 1947. It's only appropriate that Delmark Records, one of the first labels to record members of the AACM, were there for that gig in March 2009 and have now released it as the CD, 21st. Century Chase: 80th Birthday Bash, Live At The Velvet Lounge. On that night Anderson was joined by his long time collaborator and fellow tenor saxophone player Kidd Jordan, plus a backing band made up of Jeff Parker on guitar, Harrison Bankhead on bass, and Chad Taylor on drums.

"The Chase" was written for two saxophones, one of many pieces from the early days of jazz that deliberately included two tenor saxophone parts so as to encourage "competition" between players. On 21st Century Chase Anderson and Jordan have taken two cracks at the tune, with "21st Century Chase Pt. l" checking in at thirty-five minutes long and "21st Century Chase Pt. ll" coming in at a much brisker fourteen minutes. I think what amazed me the most about listening to "Part l" is not once was I aware of its length. I have to admit to being a bit daunted at the prospect of listening to a jazz piece over a half-hour in length. However once you become immersed in the music time becomes irrelevant.

Anderson and Jordan don't make any concessions to their listeners either. There's no gentle easing into the track with the playing of a melody that will lay the foundation for improvising. Instead the song begins with the saxophone issuing a challenge to the listeners that they are in for anything but an easy ride. Yet, there's something compelling about its near dissonance that grabs you attention and pulls you into the song. From the initial opening the piece then continues on as the two saxophone players chase each other up one side of the music and down the other, While I guess someone more familiar with the playing styles of each man would be able to discern who is playing when, their playing was so seamlessly intertwined it was nearly impossible for me to tell when one man left off and the other began.

While "Chase Parts l & ll" featured the two saxophones predominately, the final cut on the CD, "Ode To Alvin Fielder" allows the rest of the band to shine as well. In fact guitar player Jeff Parker, is front and centre for a good deal of the cut and shows that jazz guitar can be every bit as inventive and exciting as a horn any day of the week. Not content to be merely fast and play plenty of notes, he's also able to take the themes he is expressing and bend them into various shapes and sizes. He manipulates the music in such a way that you can almost see taking form in front of you.

Avant-garde, improvised, or new jazz, whatever you want to call it, is an acquired taste. It requires patience and a willingness to listen and learn on the part of the audience. Those who are willing to make the effort to appreciate this music will find themselves entering into a world where music comes to life in a way they've never experienced before. As one of the founders of the AACM Fred Anderson has been in forefront of this musical exploration for more then forty years. Listening to his latest recording, 21st Century Chase: 80th Birthday Bash At The Velvet Lounge, is an opportunity to hear him apply his years of experience and expertise as an improviser and creative force and revel in the results. This is music at its freest and most abandoned, and while it may not be the most accessible genre in the world, its definitely one of the most exciting, and this chance to hear it played by one of the masters shouldn't be missed.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 10:59 AM | Permalink