NYC 6/8/96: Lamonte Young and the Forever Bad Blues Band

David Beardsley earlier posted a review of Lamonte Young's 6/7-8 show at the
Knitting Factory, but here's a second one ...

The performance space in the Knitting Factory (in Manhattan, on Leonard and
Broadway) has only recently come to my attention as a place for innovative
music. In April I saw a performance of "Li Po" by Harry Partch, and on
Saturday I was fortunate to see Lamonte Young and The Forever Bad Blues Band
perform. The Knitting Factory have their own web page:
www.knittingfactory.com and are well known around here as being the home
base for John Zorn.

I was properly prepared for the trip by having received my Neil Haverstick
tape "The Gate" that afternoon in the mail, so the 40 minute trip from my NJ
home ended up with some rolling 19tone guitar as I parked at the curb 20
feet from the Knitting Factory. (For area locals, plenty of free parking on
the streets.) (Here's a quote an earlier post by Neil: "And, may I humbly
state, I myself have a project available (cassette only at this point)' "The
Gate", which features six 19 tone pieces among others...it is very loud and
heavy guitar music...great for microtonal parties and driving fast. For
tuning forum members I'll let it go for a mere $5.00...write to Box 150271,
Lakewood Colo. 80215...hope to hear from some of you...Hstick")

Lamonte's band included Jon Catler on fretless and alternate tuning guitar,
a custom-built Schechter stratocaster clone with replaceable fretboard and a
Mesa Boogie amp, Brad Catler on fretless bass, and Jonathon Kane playing a
Pearl drum kit. Lamonte used a JI-tuned Korg M1.

Lamonte started out with an extended keyboard part, using what I guess in
General Midi would be a "celeste" or maybe "detuned guitar" sound that was
percussive enough to shake the room yet had clean decay that allowed the
beat interactions between the notes to come through. I'm not sure what key
or specific tuning system he was using, but the minor third that dominated
the first 20 minutes of the 2:45 set seemed to be "flat" compared to 12tet.
After another 20 minutes or so of densely packed notes, perhaps best
described as frantic arpeggios, the bass joined in and some time later the
guitar and drummer joined the flight.

Earlier I'd read about "Just Stompin'", a Lamonte Young album that took an
hour to unravel before the first chord change! Based on this description, I
somehow expected a long droning buildup of tones and was prepared for an
evening of intellectually compelling but perhaps unpleasant and inacessible
music.

Instead got a performance that would have done justice to John McLaughlin if
he'd continued looking forward rather than retreating to jazz cliches, or
perhaps something Jimi Hendrix would be playing today if he were alive. The
guitar solos dominated the remainder of the show, as Jon showed an amazing
talent for the traditional rock guitarist arts of controlled feedback and
tone control with the subtler arts of a violonist. Overall, the music had a
distinct 2-bar pattern similar to The Cream's "Sunshine Of Your Love"
(forgive the comparison), with a very strong beat. The guitar-heavy nature
of the last 2/3 of the piece were acknowledge by Lamonte by letting Jon's
guitar, rather than the keyboard, have the final notes before fadeout.

Being the FBBB's first set of gigs in two years, the performers after the
show were swamped with well-wishers and fellow musicians trading information
and tips. Despite the distractions, Jon Catler took some time to explain
the guitar setup and let me know that he, his brother Brad, and the drummer
Jonathon Kane have just released their own CD entitled "Crash Landing." Jon
knows Neil Haverstick, and will be attending the Microstock Festival. I
should have been more alert and more persistent in getting a description of
Jon's fretted setup and tuning -- perhaps Neil Haverstick could provide a
paragraph or two or track Jon down and get a description posted? The frets
were not straight across in a standard N-tone tet.

Based on this performance, I'm moving Lamonte's "Just Stompin'" from my
"weird alternate tuning album I might buy because I suppose I should" to a
"must buy and play on a regular basis" and adding "Crash Landing" to my
must-buy list as well.


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