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Pork,
Cheese and Punch Progressive music, that "progression" of rock music to match the sophistication of jazz or classical compositions, arose in the late 1960s, primarily in England. Some early punk music across the pond was a visceral reaction to these grandiose, 20-minute epics.
A few notable bands combined the ethos of both prog and punk; Primus may have been the most competent. The band doesn't call themselves prog, preferring "psychedelic polka." Bassist Les Claypool kept the intricacy and manic time changes that were the hallmarks of prog while taking the energy of punk almost to the point of metallic frenzy. In fact, Primus guitarist Larry LaLonde was a death metal guitarist who released his first album with Possessed, Seven Churches, in 1985. This former student of Joe Satriani was the perfect foil for Claypool's bubbly fretless bass and brought a razor edge to the band that moody prog by itself could never provide. There was yet another element in Primus' musical stew that made them unique. In California, where the band was born, a handful of bands — namely Faith No More and Red Hot Chili Peppers — merged funk's hard driving rhythms with rap-style singing. Claypool stocked up on funk as well, and added to this his insane, inane wordplay and cartoonish humor. Primus was born. Before long, they attracted the attention of major labels and were signed by Interscope. They became household names, yadda yadda yadda, and are now releasing a retrospective and charging $40 for tickets. If you care anything at all about the band's Hult Center show, no doubt you already know this. Primus is returning to the road to support their new best-of CD, They Can't All Be Zingers: The Best of Primus, and a new DVD, Blame It On The Fish: An Abstract Look at the 2003 Primus Tour De Fromage. Long time cheeseheads won't need this, but if you want all the goodies in one place, like "Wynona's Big Brown Beaver," "Shake Hands With Beef" (the extended version!) and "Jerry Was a Race Car Driver," then get your hands on it. This career-spanning musical summary is a pretty good representation of Primus' best. Most of them are zingers, but fans might swap out a couple of the songs for some of their wittier covers, such as Sabbath's "N.I.B." or XTC's "Making Plans For Nigel," both concert faves that are missing from this remastered recording. If you go, and you know you will, don't forget to chant "Primus sucks!" before the band takes the stage. PRIMUS WITH MIKE DILLON'S GO-GO JUNGLE 8 pm Tue., Nov. 28 Hult Center • $37.50
Main
Lining Mass Line
Debuting at number two on CMJ's Hip Hop Chart is no small feat. While the gravity and validity of college radio's answer to Billboard magazine is debatable in this day of CDR-only releases, private pressings and MySpace band pages — it's difficult to chart with CMJ without an aggressive and decisive marketing campaign — jump-starting an album's release with a number two position is an amazing thing, reflective of many years of hard work and grass-roots efforts. It's even more remarkable when the group in question is one of the Northwest's very own. For Seattle's Common Market, the years of toil were definitely a part of the equation. However, right on the coattails of the group's self-titled debut, Common Market's successes seem like a near overnight phenomenon. While Seattle is no stranger to the hip hop community at large, its underground hip hop scene up until now has been anchored by artists such as the Oldominion crew, Boom Bap Project and renowned producer Jake One. Although everyone is still alive and kicking, the Seattle scene has grown to include a new generation of torchbearers, most notably Common Market (aka DJ Sabzi and MC RA Scion) and Blue Scholars (aka Sabzi and MC Geologic). Holding double duty as producer and DJ for both groups, Sabzi also manages the creative end of the groups' new cooperative record label Mass Line. His first big moves on the scene happened early in 2002 when he teamed up with Geologic over a few ciphers in a makeshift bedroom studio in Seattle's University District. Shortly after the release of Blue Scholars' 2004 self-titled debut, Sabzi crossed paths with another local MC, RA Scion, through their shared Baha'i faith. Released nationally on Mass Line this past October, the duo's self-titled debut has been met with nothing but praise from both critics and industry veterans, including the Teacher himself, KRS-One. With RA Scion's flow recalling the smooth cadence and political sensibilities of Talib Kweli and Sabzi's beats harkening back to the best Kanye and Pete Rock productions, Common Market straddles both the socially conscious side of hip hop and the "throw your hands in the air" house party side. Common Market's regional success was clearly evidenced by their recent sold-out CD release party at Seattle's Showbox, and they now stand poised to conquer the national scene as they embark on their first West Coast tour. COMMON MARKET, BLUE SCHOLARS, GABRIEL TEODROS. 8 pm Sat., Nov. 25. John Henry's • 21+ show • $5
It's
No Hoax
Successful acting career aside, Birdie Jo singer Pedro Shanahan makes time to travel from L.A. — where he's lived since 1998 to pursue acting — to visit his friends and family in Eugene come Thanksgiving time. When he does, he and his former Birdie Jo bandmates play at least one show, and their reunions aren't always public events. This one is, however, and the band will be joined by another popular local act with a common member. Mood Area 52 accordionist Michael Roderick also played drums, coronet and accordion for Birdie Jo, which disbanded in 1998. They get together "one way or another" each year for at least one show, he says. Roderick played in Blind Lemon Pledge at the same time and describes both bands as "a nexus of connections" in Eugene's music community. Other Birdie Jo members enjoy wild popularity in different bands. Guitarist Scott K. rules Pass Out Kings, Amy Danziger also plays cello with Mood Area 52, and in L.A., Shanahan plays in Drugstore Cowgirls and is one of the vocalists for The Rondo Brothers. Roderick describes Birdie Jo as "semi-acoustic, kind of an early Minutemen-esque band, with short songs, humorous lyrics and expressive vocals." Birdie Jo, Mood Area 52, Tom Heinl and Peter Wilde play at 9 pm Saturday, Nov. 25 at Sam Bond's Garage. 21+ show. $5.
Swing
Swing Swing When clarinetist Benny Goodman and his band strolled onto the stage at Carnegie Hall and launched into "Don't Be That Way" on January 16, 1938, it marked a sea change in American music. Jazz had been all the rage in American popular music for a generation — the previous decade was even nicknamed the Jazz Age — but the real thing had resolutely been excluded from the august halls of high culture. Even the celebrated Aeolian Hall concert 14 years earlier that had introduced George Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue" featured little improvisation, and, just as importantly, no African-Americans, who had only invented jazz, after all. To some squares of the time, swing stank of danger, sex, racial mingling — just as rock and rap would later. Goodman's mid-'30s shows excited young dancers to near riotous behavior.
But by 1938, popular music's inventiveness and power could no longer be denied even by the elitist guardians of high culture, so the Goodman ensemble's landmark appearance at 57th Street and 7th Avenue really signified not so much the start of a revolution but rather the triumph of one: the accession to power of an irresistibly compelling musical style that was already conquering the world. Goodman's band was the first significant racially mixed ensemble, and the presence of vibraphonist Lionel Hampton and pianist Teddy Wilson, plus a jam session featuring members of Duke Ellington and Count Basie's bands — years before Jackie Robinson integrated pro sports — made another powerful statement. Symbolic importance aside, the sold-out concert also offered some magnificent music, as the players rose to the occasion; the incendiary climactic number, "Sing, Sing, Sing," had the audience dancing in the aisles and is instantly familiar even today from movies and commercials, Krupa's tom toms and the blistering brass making an ideal vehicle to convey excitement. The LP issued years later became one of the most essential American recordings. As his previous Eugene appearances have demonstrated, Goodman's protege, the great clarinetist Ken Peplowski, has proved more than capable of assuming his mentor's mantle. On Dec. 1, Peplowski will lead members of the Emerald City Jazz Kings, Portland-based jazz piano master Dave Frishberg and other swing masters in a recreation of one of the most important concerts in history at the Shedd. The night before, the Shedd hosts a new annual holiday concert featuring OFAM regulars such as pianist Vicki Brabham, singers Bill Hulings and Shirley Andress and more in seasonal songs. That same evening, the UO features a choral holiday concert at Beall Concert Hall in which various vocal ensembles perform less familiar but more substantial fare, including Mozart's magnificent Coronation Mass, music by Veljo Tormis and other seasonal songs. More choral and instrumental music will ring out at Beall on Nov. 28, when the UO Chamber Choir and Collegium Musicum perform too seldom heard French Baroque music by Lully, Corrette, Mondonville and others. And on Sunday afternoon, Dec. 3, the Oregon Percussion Ensemble's always-fascinating end of term concert will go from silent (John Cage's 20th century landmark 4'33") to seat-rattling, in Noyes Bartholomew's massive, three movement anti-war statement for symphonic percussion, "Like Wind on the Buffalo Grass." The concert also includes a piece based on Emily Dickinson's poetry and Steve Reich's mesmerizing "Music for Pieces of Wood." This may be the only local performance honoring the world's greatest living composer in his 70th birthday year. In New York, it was celebrated by simultaneous festivals at Lincoln Center, the Brooklyn Academy of Music and Carnegie Hall, and it's disgraceful that Oregon music institutions have done so little this year to celebrate a composer who not only helped reinvent music in the 1960s and '70s, but also attracted millions of fans from beyond narrow academic circles. Reich's revolution may have gotten its equivalent of Goodman's Carnegie moment earlier this year at the L.A. Philharmonic's wonderful weeklong Minimalist Jukebox Festival, but I wish the revolution could be enjoyed here, too. Other countries are kinder to their musical heritages. Sweden, for example, has designated Erik Ask-Upmark and Anna Rynefors "Official Master Musicians of the Realm." The pair, known as Dråm, is playing an unlikely venue on Dec. 5: the Eugene Hotel. The downtown retirement tower has been hosting monthly gatherings of the Eugene Harp Circle, and one of its members, the valuable local musician David Helfand, has organized a concert open to the public featuring the Swedish folk duo, who play Celtic harp, the lovely Swedish nyckelharpa (keyed fiddle), flute (Härjedalspipa) and säckpipa (medieval bagpipes) in gossamer, wistful music that should appeal to fans of world music, Celtic music and even so-called new age sounds. This could be one of those unusual, intimate shows that linger longer in the memory than traditional concert hall fare.
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