What can be said about the music John Paul Jones played with Sonic Youth and musical director Takehisa Kosugi at performances of "Nearly Ninety" earlier this month?
It's tough to ask someone who wasn't there, especially considering the use of recording devices was strictly prohibited. Still, the rule didn't stop one YouTube user from making "A Ravels in Motion Production" video documenting the April 18 performance. In under two minutes, we get brief glimpses of the event with some audio. Listen for Jones on bass and make up your own mind about the music.
Another fair question to ask, now that the production is set to resume in Madrid, Spain. Will the music played at today's performance, or any of the others through May 3, be anything like what was heard between April 16 and 19 in Brooklyn?
In a newly published review for the Wall Street Journal, dance writer Robert Greskovic listed off the musicians by name and then posited, "The combined effect of this mix is a maelstrom of amplified metallic sounds that fades in and out and sometimes subsides to a complete silence that resonates with the rhythmic footfalls of the dancers."
The first performance took place April 16, on the 90th birthday of choreographer Merce Cunningham. Reviewing that show for The Moment, a New York Times blog, Jordan Hruska focuses less on the sound and more on the improvisational qualities of the performance. He said the music "began and ended in medias res, with the sinewy discord of Sonic Youth’s guitar strings. According to the band member Thurston Moore, the most structured part of the whole performance was the group bow that ended the show."
Hruska also provides some insight as to the structure on which the musicians stood to play for 90 minutes (with an intermission) each show: It was "a three-level cantilevered form that at once resembled a bionic heart and a pirate ship."
Jason Bonham
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Thursday, April 30, 2009
John Paul Jones and Sonic Youth to extend collaborative performances in Spain
About the author
Steve "The Lemon" Sauer is a writer and musician based in Boca Raton, Fla., who has dedicated a portion of his life researching the history of rock group Led Zeppelin and monitoring the ongoing careers of the band's surviving members. Although he was barely a year old when Led Zeppelin broke up and it took him until his teen years to appreciate the music, it didn't take long to make up for it.
In 2007, Steve launched Lemon Squeezings: Led Zeppelin News to cover the lead-up to the band's reunion concert at the end of that year. Since then, he has closely examined every rumor of a followup tour since then, often dispelling or clarifying misinformation perpetrated by the mainstream media. Using his journalistic training, Steve has also uncovered some facts and accounts previously unreported elsewhere.
At age 18, he began publishing On This Day In Led Zeppelin History, a daily newsletter detailing the interactions of members Jimmy Page, Robert Plant, John Bonham, John Paul Jones, and their manager, Peter Grant. The newsletter is located at www.OnThisDayInLedZeppelinHistory.com.
He enjoys uncovering stories and has employed various methods to communicate those stories to Led Zeppelin's vast fan base, utilizing terrestrial radio and the many facets of the Internet: from Usenet newsgroups to plain e-mail and now Facebook and Twitter. Steve also connects with live audiences when performing as a backup vocalist and keyboard player with various bands, including past onstage appearances with three cover or tribute acts performing the music of Led Zeppelin.
Do you have a news tip to share with Steve? Do you have something you would like him to write about? Would you like to book him for a speaking engagement? He can be contacted by e-mail at Steve at LedZeppelinNews.com.
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