Gogol Bordello With Bombino At The Pabst Theater | A Bit Of World and Gypsy Punk Music At Its Finest

What can I say about Gogol Bordello that hasn't already been said. Are they a Gypsy, punk, reggae-dub band? Yes, the band is a mix of all three. One thing that they certainly convey is pure musical energy. Just when you think that you have the band pegged, they riff in a direction that you just didn't expect. Last Saturday was my first time seeing the band, and I was not disappointed. I can appreciate them on so many levels. Let me take the next few paragraphs to describe that in better detail.

It's fitting that the band formed on the East Coast.  I'm certain that it helped. With NYC hosting a large Ukrainian and Russian population, it's not hard to fathom that there were plenty of musicians to choose from. If you watch an early Gogol Bordello documentary, you can see that the band was first made up of Russians and other so called "immigrants" who played a rough version of Gypsy pop/punk with Ukrainian twists. As the years have passed, it seems that the sound has become more polished, but still has a driving edge that maintains the punk and Gypsy origins.

I can also appreciate the fact that the band has members from many parts of the world.  Starting with Elizabeth Sun, who is of Chinese descent, but raised in Scotland.  Sun sings, dances, and plays the bass drum. Sergey Ryabtsev is a key member of the band, providing violin and vocals.  He's quite the Russian performer. Add performers from Ethiopia, The United States, and Ecuador, and you have a true melting pot of musicians.

Last but not least, these musicians are truly talented.  They dance and sing at the same time. That can't be said for modern pop stars who just dance to a prerecorded vocal track. Does that mean the vocals are a bit sloppy at times? Yes, it does.  Does that matter to the fans? Not at all.  When you watch them perform, it's like the wheels are just a few mistakes away from coming off, but the group has been through that so many times before.  The wheels managed to stay on at the Pabst last weekend.

If I was to say anything about the founding member Eugine Hutz, I would say that he seems like a man who's always looking to the horizon, while standing right in front of you. He has a pure energy about himself. It comes across in the way that he performs on stage. He might riff off the members playing right next to him, but it surely seems that he's in his own world. If I learned anything from reading about Hutz, it's that he's turned his travels into an opportunity to bring odd music to the masses. Some folks might not understand or appreciate those odd sounds. He once said in an interview that Americans tend to have an "imaginary barrier" to being open minded about all forms of music.  If Gogol Bordello continues to perform here, that barrier will be broken down.

Bombino opened the show.  Bombino is well known in his country, and his world music album has touched the hearts of many. The volume for Bombino's show was too low.  He has a way with the guitar, but next time they have to turn up the volume!

 

David Bowie Top Ten Singles And A Bit Of History

David Bowie surprised his fans with the release of The Next Day. It had been ten years since they had seen any new material and the recording process for this disk was done quietly over three years time. What I found to be unusual was that the song he released early was the mellowest on the disk. Still, it is a great song, and I can’t think that anyone would have been put off enough by the nature of that song to write off the entire disk before they had the chance to hear it.
Looking back at his 40+ years, Bowie’s highest chart topping album was Station to Station. It reached the top five. He’s never and an album hit number one, but many of his singles have reached the top spot. At the time of this posting, his new album is charting at 35.
The song Space Oddity hit number one in November of 1975.  Ashes to Ashes made the top spot five years later.  Under Pressure was also a number one song, along with Let’s Dance, and Dancing in the Street. He’s had 23 top ten hit songs, if you include Where Are We Now. 
Bowie had over ten years of solid tours, and hit songs before musical tastes had changed.  Dancing in the Street was his last top ten hit song for many years to follow. He released three truly bad albums between the years 1986 and 1988, and acted in three just as awful movies in that same time period.
When he created the band Tin Machine in the late 1980’s, those of us who find every Bowie effort a “must listen,” would have to agree that this was not one of those times where the project clicked in like a puzzle piece. Personally, I had completely forgotten about the Tin Machine years. When I watch those old Tin Machine videos, it looks as if he’s trying to capture a bit of that late 1980’s punk momentum. You just can’t “un-class” a guy like Bowie. It didn’t work.   
His 1993 release of Black Tie White Noise was hailed as his glorious return to the music that he’s best known for. While I agree that songs such as Night Flights and You’ve Been Around certainly sound like the old Bowie, it’s hard for me to say that the album was any better than some of his marginal works.

Nine Inch Nails And David Bowie

He tried his hand at appealing to a younger audience when he hooked up with Nine Inch Nails in 1995.  That tour failed to bring new listeners to Bowie’s music.  Fans of Nine Inch Nails just didn’t get it.  In fact, there was a bit of backlash from those who felt that he was trying to wedge his way into a fully matured musical culture that had no need for old farts like David. It’s funny to see that Trent Reznor’s fans love Gary Numan, a band that came to fame 15 years before Reznor became a household name, but they passed on Mr. Bowie outright. But then, Reznor owes his musical career to guys like Numan.
If I’m allowed to fast forward to his 2003 release of Reality, I would say that the first song on the disk is quite strong, but the remaining songs seem to drift. David Bowie had a serious heart issue while supporting that disk, and it was scary enough to force him to retreat from the stage. Bowie took a ten year break, but the wait was worth it. The Next Day is a strong effort, and I find nary a “clunker” on the CD.  I hope he doesn’t take another ten year break. If he tours to support the new album, I’m certainly going to check him out.

Bikini Kill Had Something To Say Back In 1990 | It Still Rings True In 2013

I stumbled upon an old Bikini Kill video the other day.  They were performing live outside some state capitol building.  If they weren’t dressed in 1990’s clothing, I would have guessed by the musical style that it was a recording from 1979.  Was this a band that had been playing these songs for a dozen years? No, they were too young to have played back when so many other bands played this same style.  So why did this band gain the attention that they did?  This version of stripped down, repetitive, less musically inclined style of music has been done so many times before.   

So I took a look at the lyrics.  Maybe that’s where I would find the lure of this band. Yep, that’s where the band hits a nerve. They speak of being a strong woman, being yourself, feminism, and so much more. They might have sounded like old school punk rockers, but their lyrics were “new school.”   

Bikini Kill’s second album contains the song Alien She.  The words that ring out in that song speak of someone who is two women.  One is pulled towards the stereotypical way “girls” are supposed to be. The other tries to understand that other side. What I pull from that song is that it’s about someone who struggles to be herself.  Someone is trying to understand why they think the way that they do.

The band wrote more focused lyrics as they gained a better knowledge of song writing.  Take the song Double Dare Ya.  The song challenges women to speak out, to fight for their rights, to stand up for themselves. The song Feels Blind starts off slow, and almost melodic.  Is it an anthem? It could be. It has one great line, but the words leading up to it are very important. “As a woman I was taught to always be hungry. Women are well acquainted with thirst. Yeah, we could eat just about anything. We'd even eat your hate up like love.” 

Give Bikini Kill a try.  You might enjoy the mix of old school punk music set to lyrics that are so important, even 23 years after they first came out.  Keep in mind that the members of the band went on to work on women’s rights.  That’s more punk rock than so many other musicians who talked the talk, but never walked the walk.

   

Drumming For Profit | Being A Hired Hand In A Band

My last band was led by one person.  She named the band after herself.  She did all the promotion, the booking, and the hard work that it takes to get people in the bar. Sure, the other members of the band had to play well enough to keep people from leaving, but she had no problem with replacing you if you couldn’t make a show. As I recall, she went through some 19 bass players over ten years. One of them was nick-named “T3” because he was the third bass player that was named Tom.  Not just the third guy in the band named Tom, but the third bass player named Tom.    

When you joined her band, you were welcome to play the hell out of your instrument, but you weren’t allowed to bring your own songs into the band.  On more than one occasion, I heard her say to other members “That’s a great song you just showed us.  Now go and start your own band if you feel like playing it.  This is my band.” What’s funny is that I heard her say that at least three times over the years.  It was somewhat amusing; because she would let the musician play the entire song first, then give her speech.  She didn’t bother telling new members in advance that they weren’t allowed to write their own material. If you didn’t like what she had put together you were free to leave.  On the other hand, we were free to add whatever we liked to the songs that she wrote.  In fact, she felt that I never over played my drums on her songs. If she had it her way, I would be going ape behind the kit on every number.

Hitting The Road As A Hired Hand

In 1998, a band that hired me for a tour gave me their disks, told me to learn the music, and instructed me on just where I could add my own creative ideas. (See photo above.) There weren’t many spaces for me to break out on my own musically, but I knew what I was getting into.  When those moments in the song came up, I took full advantage of the opportunity. No, it wasn’t very much fun playing those somewhat rudimentary drum parts that someone else had written, night after night, city after city. But I was the hired help.  That was my job. What was my incentive? Getting paid a per diem, part of the net profits, and getting a cut of the merchandise. There had to be a guarantee for me. After all, I was the hired help.  I wasn't going to see any profits from record sales.  I would receive no income from royalties.  The drummer who made the album, the guy sitting back at home was getting paid for my hard work. The more shows we played, the more disks we sold, the more money he made. At the very least, I knew what base rate I was guaranteed, before I got on the plane for Europe. 

By the end of that tour, we were all pretty sick of each other.   It was nothing personal, you just can't look at the same faces day after day without feeling like you need to get away from it all. The combination of being cooped up together for weeks at a time, and playing the same songs every night made for a long tour. It didn’t affect my performances, but it certainly kept me from going “all in” with that group.  Perhaps it was the sleep deprivation, but I lost my mind on that tour. I met up with some friends in Amsterdam just after the tour ended. One of them told me the only way I was truly going to be happy was when I started my own band. I knew that I wasn't "band leader" material, but it was a nice compliment.

What I miss when I join groups like that is the feeling that I was part of something creative.  I came along after these bands had already built up a following.  It didn’t matter if I received a compliment, or praise.  Those bands would go on without me.  I had to understand that.     

I was called back for a second tour, and took the job. They kept me on as a regular member, and that’s when things started to change, albeit slowly. It took another year for the band to start listening to my ideas, and allow me to be part of the creative process. By year number three, we had written an entire album’s worth of material. The record label wasn’t interested in keeping us on, so we had to decide whether to shop our sound around, or go it alone, or break up. The band called it quits, or at least that’s what I did.  I quit, and the rest of the band took a long break.  Two years later they resurfaced with their old drummer, but those songs that I helped to write stayed with the band.  In fact, they went on to record those songs with their original drummer.  It’s very hard for me to listen to that recording.  With all due respect, that drummer was not interested in playing what I had written. I found out later that he couldn’t replicate my style. It was too different. After being in a band for three years, then leaving, it’s an odd experience to then go and watch that band play live. I didn’t feel comfortable with going back stage to say hello.

It’s so different when you aren’t behind the drums.  As an audience member, I was more forgiving of their mistakes.  It made me wonder if I was too uptight when I was in the group. Those little miscues were actually enjoyable. They looked like tiny mistakes when I wasn’t playing, but huge mistakes when I was part of the band. I learned that I should let those little things go. As for now, I don’t know if I would ever go back to being a hired hand in a band, unless the reward was significant.   

Road Trips For The Somewhat Aged Musician In Me

Looks A Lot Like Our Tour Van

Band road trips are getting harder and harder for me. I hate to admit it, but I just can’t bounce back like I used to.  I have long stopped sleeping on floors. My days of rolling out a camping mat are also behind me.  Does that mean that I should retire from playing out of town shows?  I don’t think so, but there are some changes that I have to make if I want to keep on drumming. 

There are pressures I feel from other band mates when it comes to saving money on the road.  If we have a show that is a couple hours from our home town, I’m sure to hear the usual “We can take turns driving back the same night.” Yep, two hours of driving sure doesn’t seem like a long ride when you are heading out of town.  But after I have moved my drum kit six times in one night, and played a show, the two hour ride home feels more like six.  It’s torture. 

We rolled back to Milwaukee around 4am last weekend.  We unloaded our gear, and said our goodbyes.  I still had another 30 minute drive to my house.  When I finally turned in around five am, in a bedroom with makeshift black window shades, I really hoped to get six or seven hours of sleep.  It’s really hard to do that when your body is used to getting up at five a.m. I managed to get about five hours of fitful sleep before giving up.  The rest of my weekend was ruined. The main reason we drive home after an out of town show is to save $100 on hotel rooms.  There is a value to my off days, and it’s much higher than $100.

So what’s an aging drummer to do?  I’m going to foot the bill for my own post-show motel room from now on.  The band can keep their money, and if they want to drive home the same night, so be it.  I’m tired of loading up on caffeine at two in the morning, rolling out of some town soaking wet from my own show sweat, while hoping to avoid the deputies that have nothing better to do than pull over suspicious looking rock and roll vans.  I’m tired of wondering if our singer or guitar player is going to stay awake during their driving shift.  That keeps me up too.  I just can’t sleep in the van, when I’m too busy worrying that one of us is going to drive off the road into a cornfield.

Save A Life And Get A Room

For those of you in working bands, I know what you are going to say. “So Wisconsin Music Man, you are going to make the rest of the band unload all of the gear, while you sleep it off in a comfy motel room?” Not exactly.  I’ll be happy to take my gear to the motel.  I’ll roll all that crap into the room with me.  The band won’t be cursing my name when they get home, because the van will be half empty.  They might be cursing my name when it’s 3:30 am, and they are somewhere outside of Manitowoc, with another 75 miles to drive before they get to Milwaukee.  Instead of cursing my name, they should just admit that after a show they would love to take a ten minute drive to a hotel bed too.  If each band member put up $50, we could all get a solid night’s sleep, free breakfast, and be back in Milwaukee by noon the next day. I will leave that up to them.  From now on, I’m playing the rock star and getting a room. That’s what old guys do.  They get smart, and sleep well.