Month: August 2007 Page 1 of 2

Some groups have such an effortless way with a breezy pop song that you‘re completely dumbfounded as to why they’re not yet household names. Then you realize that they’re far too eclectic, and esoteric, to fit into neat little pop boxes. The Mabuses is certainly a better band for it. Enigmatic group leader Kim Fahy has returned from the elysian fields of masters degree pursuing to reconvene this oddball, category-defying group after 13 years of relative silence (side-projects notwithstanding).

While Fahy & Co.’s genial, lilting, big-hearted pop songs are occasionally hijacked by flights of absurdist whimsy, they’re ultimately grounded by the richness of their lyrical conceits. They always end on exactly the right note, no matter how many styles this restless, musically omnivorous group may flit through along the way.

I first discovered them via Lida Husik, who collaborated with Mabuses percussionist Jamie Harley on her Kramer-produced albums Your Bag and Return of Red Emma. (The first Mabuses record came out in 1991 on Kramer’s label Shimmy Disc; Lida covered their song “Bustop” on Red Emma.)

At any rate, Lida credited Jamie with much awesomeness, so I had to give the Mabuses a try. And, lo, I was not disappointed. Their new album is SO good that I’m having a hard time choosing tracks to post. I’ll leave it at the dreamy and bittersweet “Sugarland” and the jaunty instrumental ditty “Tiger Lilies.”

“Mabused” is the group’s first album in 13 (or so) years, and they’re playing a (very rare) live show at NYC’s Knitting Factory on September 22nd. I wouldn’t miss it if I were you.

A Mabuses fan page on MySpace | Official Site | Stream the album in full over at Stereogum

The Mabuses, “Sugarland”

The Mabuses, “Tiger Lilies”

IMAGE: “MEMENTO WREATH” BY JULIANNA SWANEY AT OH MY CAVALIER

Belgian singer Catherine Jauniaux’s fascinating vocalizations run the stylistic gamut from traditional French chansons to breathy folk to Dadaistic glossolalia. Music for the Merzbau, her colorful Cabaret Voltaire sensibility is fearlessly expressionistic, melding avant-garde techniques and lyrical inventiveness with a robust (and Surreal) sense of humor. Well known for her work with her late husband Tom Cora (she appeared with the Ex on their 1991 album Scrabbling at the Lock) and collaborations with Fred Frith and Tim Hodgkinson, she’s playing a rare NYC show tonight at 8PM. It’s at the Issue Project Room ’s new(ish) space in the OA Can Factory, 3rd Street, Brooklyn.

I’ll be there in spirit, if not in actuality.

There will be two sets: 1st set at 8PM with Hahn Rowe (Hugo Largo) and Ned Rothenberg on guitar, electronics, and reeds; 2nd with Marc Ribot and David Linton, again mixing guitar, electronics, and projections.

“A Divine Image” is from Jauniaux and Hodgkinson’s 1983 collaboration Fluvial. “Naiwabi” was originally released on Hodgkinson and Bill Gilonis’s own Woof imprint; both albums have been re-issued by ReRUSA subsidiary Ad Hoc.

Friday August 24th 2007
Issue Project Room
The (OA) Can Factory
232 3rd Street, 3rd Floor
Brooklyn, NY 11215

8pm | $15 both shows

Issue Project Room Events Calendar | Buy Catherine Jauniaux at the Downtown Music Gallery | BuyFluvial via Ad Hoc/ReRUSA

Catherine Jauniaux, “A Divine Image”

The Lowest Note, “Naiwabi”

L-R: PETER SAVILLE, TONY WILSON, ALAN ERASMUS

Anthony H. Wilson
1950-2007

Tony Wilson was a divisive, Jeckyll-and-Hyde sort of character. There were so many different Tony Wilsons: preening, occasionally buffoonish public figure, arch commentator, egomaniacal blowhard, canny marketer of unlikely pop music, tireless booster of Manchester’s fortunes, prophetic club impresario —the list could go on and on. However improbably, each of these personae (some more dominant than others at any one time) strengthened, rather than weakened, him. He was like Antaeus, and Manchester was undoubtedly the place from which he drew his considerable strength.

Did his unerring talent for sniffing out genius make him one by proxy? Hardly. But it certainly wasn’t a skill to be taken lightly. While he was often derided for being a terrible businessman —as if cold, hard profit was the only value worth aspiring to— his goals were more complicated than that.

We prefer our indie heroes to be slightly awkward outsiders —slouched, aloof, and hardly camera-ready. If anything, Wilson was too camera-ready, and it made us wonder about him. His televisual flair —honed by years as a Granada TV presenter— gave him a Teflon-coated, slightly oily aura. It was all a bit too used-car-salesman for some: the toxic pairing of Armani flash with the occasional overreaching reference point —Boethius, praxis, any Latin quote— made Wilson immediately, eye-rollingly suspect. (Paul Morley once described him as “so full of life, and so full of himself.”) Equally suspect, too, was his quick-change double life: television presenter by day and punk iconoclast by night. (Bastion of the square establishment on one side, anarchist intellectual on the other.) As a career strategy it seemed not only audacious but downright impossible —how could anyone possibly play both sides of the fence like that? Even a world-class bullshitter like Anthony H. Wilson?

And yet, he did it, and he thrived on the challenge. He drew fire and admiration in equal measure through the years, but forged his path to spite everyone. He was a catalyst of the first order —someone who challenged people and sparked their best work, often through his own bloody-mindedness and sheer force of will. To paraphrase Factory partner and artistic director Peter Saville, “To make the analogy of the solar system, [Tony was] the bundle of energy that fed the whole thing. Without Tony’s energy, commitment, love and passion, you couldn’t have fuelled it.”

Interview with Tony Wilson | Factory Records Catalogue | Cerysmatic Factory [Tribute Site]

Joy Division, “Decades”

New Order, “Mesh” “Cries & Whispers” [Thanks for the correction, aTom Ten!]