Beefheart
may
be a recluse, but his Magic Band is back
On February
8,
in the tiny Paradox recording studio in the desert town of
Palmdale, about
sixty miles north of Los Angeles, I found myself hunched down
on the floor
between bass player Mark Boston and guitarist Denny Walley,
while a few
feet away John French pounded the drums and Gary Lucas clawed
his guitar
through an astonishingly precise version of Captain
Beefheart's My
Human Gets Me Blues. If you're a sentimental
fool like me, you'll
understand why, even though my ears felt like they were
bleeding from the
excessive volume, I had tears of joy in my eyes.
This song took me back to 1969, when
all
my teenage weirdo buddies and I were in thrall to everything
that pushed
beyond the flower-power culture then in full bloom: we dug
[....], and
what we considered, and still consider, the greatest
avant-garde rock album
of all time: Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band's Trout Mask
Replica.
Casual listeners might hear it as a lot of clatter and wailing
(which is
how it struck me on first hearing), but once you get past the
audacious
unfamiliarity of Trout Mask Replica, you realise that this was
not just
some big improvised mess, but in fact the most tightly
composed polyrhythmic
rock'n'roll ever written.
Don Van Vliet, aka Captain
Beefheart, created
an entirely original music [....]. He delivered an eccentric
alternative
to the rhythmically repetitious pop music of the day, and he
did it with
passion, virtuosity and deadpan surrealistic brilliance. (I
once asked
Zappa if Don's whole Beefheart persona was a put-on, an act,
and he said:
'No, Don was just as strange in high school. Stranger.')
I saw Captain Beefheart and His
Magic Band
perform in assorted line-ups over the following decade, and
each time was
floored by the intricacies of the songs and the almost
hive-mind precision
of the band, who nailed the rhythms and changes with the
perfection of
a classical chamber ensemble and yet still rocked out. My
first Beefheart
show, the greatest concert I've ever witnessed, was in
Portland, Oregon,
in 1970, and it has ruined most of the rest of rock 'n' roll
for me ever
since.
These days Van Vliet is a recluse in
northern
California, where he continues his second career as a
successful painter.
But his disappearance from the public scene has merely fuelled
the folk
myth. The record bins are full of Beefheart reissues, outtake
collections
and bootlegs, and the internet is alive with fans trading
tapes and speculating
on rumours about their beloved Captain. I have heard amazing
unreleased
Beefheart performances from Zappa's legendary basement vaults,
so I know
the legends will continue.
And in response to the folk myths,
after
more than twenty years of dormancy, the Magic Band has
reunited in tribute
to their leader. This incarnation
of
the band consists of MARK 'rockette
morton' BOSTON
on bass, GARY LUCAS and DENNY
'feeler's rebo' WALLEY on guitars, and JOHN
'drumbo' FRENCH on drums, harmonica
and vocals. Their repertoire extends from the
early Dropout
Boogie to the late The
Floppy Boot
Stomp, with John French stepping up to the
microphone to provide
a surprisingly authentic and exuberant replacement for the
missing Van
Vliet.
ROBERT
'wait for
me' WILLIAMS, the Magic Band's drummer
in the late 1970s and early '80s, will sit in for French during
the songs with vocals and harmonica. To
celebrate their reunion, the
Magic Band has recorded BACK
TO THE FRONT, an informal, live-to-tape ceedee
on
the All Tomorrow's Parties label. And they will be performing
live [...].
For those who have yet to experience the Magic Band's truly
ambitious weirdness,
these shows will astonish you. And for tried and true
Beefheart fans like
me, these are deliriously momentous occasions with maybe a
nostalgic, avant-garde
sniffle or two.
'Spencer'
explained:
> I would like to see them. [Earlier] I was just saying
my old
friend would prefer to remember them as they were in '66-'72
than risk
a big disappointment. [He thinks] There is no chance of
getting that Magik
back. It died in 1973. <
I disagree.
All of the musicians
involved in this reunion have actually improved their playing
skills since
1973. That's what's wrong with the music industry now more
than ever. Record
companies are overly concerned with the age and appearance of
the bands.
[...] Most musicians from the seventies that really had it
going on back
then gave it up because they couldn't make a living at it.
That's sad because
I'll bet lots of them would be really good now and probably
write some
great music.
John French is
playing
drums as good or better than ever and sounds a lot like Don on
the songs
he'll be singing. Denny Walley is playing slide just like he
always had
with Don and Zappa, amazingly. Gary Lucas [...] is a learned
student of
the Beefheart style of guitar playing. Mark Boston is playing
a five string
bass and is as solid as a rock. He still does that same dance
while playing
as he used to. I have been playing drums nearly every day and
in rehearsal
with the Magic Band it felt just as it did when I last
toured with
Don.
All I can say is
that
any Beefheart fan that misses this opportunity to see that
great music
brought back to life by the guys that originally played it are
sure to
regret it. If I weren't a part of it I'd still be in the
audience cheering
them on. There is no risk of being disappointed unless your
only concern
is the physical appearance of the musicians. As time goes on
we all get
and look older with the exception of Dick Clark [whó? i only
know
michael jackson!... - teejo].
