Portland experimental musician Jason Urick has taken listeners on sonic adventures into extraterrestrial space and beyond on such albums as 2009’s Husbands, 2010’s Fussing & Fighting, and 2011’s Title King collaboration with Cex, citing such wide-ranging influences as John Cassavetes, Pavement, Marco Ferreri, Sebadoh, John Lennon and Yoko Ono, the Bee Gees, and Jah Shaka. On his latest album, I Love You (Thrill Jockey, January 2012), he continues his exploration of ambient sound on five tracks ultimately put together on his laptop. “I began to use the phrase ‘I Love You’ as a mantra of sorts while working on this material,” Urick says about the album. “Running the phrase over and over in my head until the words started to break down and render the phrase foreign again. In these meditations I became more at peace with the music making process and more unsure/unfamiliar with it at the same time. This feeling spilled over into my understanding of myself going from feeling very in tune in body and mind to completely adrift in a large universe, again in very rapid succession until all that remained was a vibration.” Consisting of “Don’t Digital,” “Ageless Isms,” “The Crying Song,” “Syndromes,” and the title track, the album imbues the technology with an emotional resonance that results in hypnotic multilayered sonic excursions with a heartbeat all their own. Urick will be featuring songs from the new album at Cameo Gallery on May 8 on a bill with Doe Paoro, Future Shuttle, and a DJ set by Ital.
this week in music
JOHN CHAMBERLAIN: CHOICES
John Chamberlain, “SPHINXGRIN TWO,” aluminum, 2010 (photo by twi-ny/mdr)
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
1071 Fifth Ave. at 89th St.
Friday – Wednesday through May 13, $18 (pay-what-you-wish Saturday 5:45-7:45)
212-423-3587
www.guggenheim.org
It is a shame that Indiana-born, Chicago-raised sculptor John Chamberlain didn’t live long enough to see the revelatory career retrospective at the Guggenheim, on view through May 13. While working with the museum on the exhibition, Chamberlain passed away in December at the age of eighty-four, but he left behind a legacy that flourishes at this outstanding show. Chamberlain’s most familiar oeuvre, twisted metal sculptures made from car parts, along with splendid works made from other materials, are laid out chronologically through Frank Lloyd Wright’s twisting passageway, with the first thing that jumps out at visitors being the color. Chamberlain’s automobile sculptures are like three-dimensional Abstract Expressionist and Pop paintings that have jumped off the canvas, breathing with an inner life that is intoxicating. The works, lush with blues, greens, yellows, and reds, are not mere mash-ups of fenders and front quarter panels but are carefully constructed and painted steel sculptures with such playful names as “Lord Suckfist,” “Miss Lucy Pink,” “Hatband,” “Sugar Tit,” and “Rooster Starfoot.” Chamberlain said, “It’s all in the fit,” and the works at the Guggenheim fit together extremely well. “The Devil and the Deep Blue Sea” resembles a quartet of Balzac-like figures. A series of untitled square collages from the early 1960s hang on the walls like oil canvases, except their various elements jut out into space.
John Chamberlain takes a seat in his studio (photo by Robert McKeever, courtesy Gagosian Gallery)
In the mid-1960s, Chamberlain began experimenting with lacquer, Formica, and foam, resulting in such works as “Untitled #7,” a sculpture of fruit made from urethane foam, cord, cloth, paint, and wooden beads, and “Couch,” a foam installation on which visitors can take a seat or lie down. Chamberlain continued working through to the very end, using materials from vintage cars to create such pieces as “HAWKFLIESAGAIN” and “PEAUDESOIEMUSIC” over the last two years, in addition to the twisted aluminum “SPHINXGRIN TWO,” which stands in the museum’s rotunda, and the steel “C’ESTZESTY” that rises outside on Fifth Ave. In some ways Chamberlain can also be seen as an early recycler, his works reusing materials that were not merely found objects but specifically chosen, now gathered at the Guggenheim in a dazzling display that justly celebrates this great American artist. In conjunction with “John Chamberlain: Choices,” on May 8 artist Amy Sillman will lead an Eye to Eye private gallery tour of the show, on May 10 the Divine Ricochet Music Series concludes with a performance in the rotunda by Zola Jesus with JG Thirlwell, and on May 12 artist and conservator Corey D’Augustine will teach the all-day workshop “AbEx3D: Abstract Expressionism in Sculpture.”
FIRST SATURDAYS: CONNECTING CULTURES
Brooklyn Museum director Arnold Lehman mans the staff desk at new long-term “Connecting Cultures” installation
Brooklyn Museum
200 Eastern Parkway at Washington St.
Saturday, May 5, free, 5:00 – 11:00 (some events require free tickets distributed in advance at the Visitor Center)
212-864-5400
www.brooklynmuseum.org
The Brooklyn Museum will celebrate the opening of its latest long-term installation, “Connecting Cultures: A World in Brooklyn,” at this month’s First Saturdays program. The exhibit juxtaposes works in three sections, “Connecting Places,” “Connecting People,” and “Connecting Things,” with a desk where people can interact with a museum staffer. Saturday night features live performances by Los Colombian Roots, Forces of Nature Dance Theatre, Brown Rice Family, and Stone Forest Ensemble. Ann Agee will discuss her period room in “Playing House,” chief curator Kevin Stayton will give a talk on “Connecting Cultures,” and visitors can climb the rooftop of Heather Hart’s “Raw/Cooked” installation “The Eastern Oracle: We Will Tear the Roof Off the Mother.” (Be sure to wear flat, rubber-soled shoes.) Haley Tanner will read from and sign copies of her debut novel, Vaclav & Lena, and DJ Spooky will lead the traditional dance party. As always, the galleries will be open late, giving visitors plenty of opportunity to check out “Keith Haring: 1978-1982,” “Playing House,” “Rachel Kneebone: Regarding Rodin,” “Raw/Cooked: Heather Hart,” “Newspaper Fiction: The New York Journalism of Djuna Barnes, 1913–1919,” “Question Bridge: Black Males,” and “Body Parts: Ancient Egyptian Fragments and Amulets.”
CINCO DE DERBY
New York City farm band will lead the festivities at Cinco de Mayo / Kentucky Derby party at Pine Box Rock Shop
Pine Box Rock Shop
12 Grattan St., Bushwick
Saturday, May 5, free, 2:00
718-366-6311
www.pineboxrockshop.com
Mint juleps and margaritas converge this weekend as the 138th Kentucky Derby takes place on May 5, Cinco de Mayo, which celebrates the outmanned Mexican army’s heroic stand against the French in the 1862 Battle of Puebla. Twenty horses will be running for the Roses, including the aptly named I’ll Have Another, with Mario Gutierrez aboard, and you can catch all the action at the Pine Box Rock Shop in Brooklyn, which is hosting Cinco de Derby beginning at 2:00. The festivities will feature such specialty drinks as the Pine Box Derby, Thriller Jesus, Kentucky Cough Syrup, and Louisville Lemonade in addition to flights of tequila and bourbon and vegan snacks from Champs Family Bakery. While Kentucky natives will be spinning such tunes as “My Old Kentucky Home,” “Eight More Miles to Louisville,” and “Blue Moon of Kentucky” as well as “Tequila,” “Banditos,” and “La Bamba” in the front, there will be live music in the back room, highlighted by New York City’s own metrobilly farm band, 2/3 Goat. Consisting of Kentucky native Annalyse McCoy on lead vocals and mandolin, Ryan Dunn on vocals and guitar, Ryan Guerra on fiddle, Jon Cavendish on bass, and Andy Wilmoth on drums, 2/3 Goat has several songs that would fit in nicely during Cinco de Derby: “Band of Gold,” “Ride On,” and “Lay It on the Line” from their 2011 EP, Stream of Conscience. There will also be a Derby hat contest, and a portion of the day’s proceeds will go to the Thoroughbred Retirement Foundation. Post time is 6:24. Good luck!
SONG OF THE DAY — PARALLELS: “MOONLIGHT DESIRES”
On June 26, Toronto electro-pop dance band Parallels will release its new album, XII, the follow-up to 2010’s Visionaries. The group is promising a brighter sound on the summer disc, as evidenced by the first single, “Moonlight Desires,” which can be dowloaded for free here or above. Vocalist Holly Dodson, keyboardist Artem Galperine, and drummer Nick Dodson will be at Public Assembly in Brooklyn on May 4, with Win Win opening and a DJ set by former LCD Soundsystem member Matt Thornley, who is currently in the Crystal Ark. Be sure to get there at 9:00 for the Asahi beer open bar.
RICHARD BARONE: COOL BLUE HALO 25th ANNIVERSARY CONCERT
Richard Barone will re-create his classic COOL BLUE HALO album at City Winery on May 4
City Winery
155 Varick St.
Friday, May 4, $25-$45, 8:00
212-608-0555
www.citywinery.com
www.richardbarone.com
On May 31, 1987, Richard Barone gathered a group of his friends at the Bottom Line and recorded the instant downtown classic Cool Blue Halo. The Tampa-born Barone, a longtime Greenwich Village resident, will be re-creating that amazing performance on May 4 at City Winery when he and the same musicians, in addition to special guests, will celebrate the album’s twenty-fifth anniversary by playing it in full one night only. Barone will reunite with Jane Scarpantoni on cello, Nick Celeste on guitar, and Valerie Naranjo on percussion and keyboard, with such special guests as Fred Schneider, Tony Visconti, Garth Hudson, the Bongos’ Rob Norris on bass, Deni Bonet on violin, Richard Kerris on drums, and Candy John Carr on bongos. A mix of old and new songs and a few covers, Cool Blue Halo features eleven tracks filled with gorgeous melodies, beautiful harmonies, and lush arrangements. Barone kicks things off with the Bongos’ “The Bulrushes” and his own mesmerizing “I Belong to Me”: “I am a face in the window / passing through another day,” he sings, continuing, “I’ve heard the cool cool music of Mingus and Miles in the afternoon / in the afternoon / I’ve felt the cold blue halo / gotten by an angel in my room / in my room.” Barone delivers lovely renditions of the Beatles’ “Cry Baby Cry” and David Bowie’s “The Man Who Sold the World” along with such other originals as the yearning “Flew a Falcon” and the lilting “Love Is a Wind That Screams” before concluding with the Bongos favorite “Numbers with Wings.” Barone is putting together a limited edition box set that will include a remastered version of the original album, a live DVD of the May 4 concert, and never-before-released bonus material that you can preorder here to help fund the project’s completion; various deluxe packages also come with tickets to the concert, handwritten lyrics, signed CDs, and other paraphernalia. Barone will be back at City Winery on May 8 for the fundraiser “Occupy This Album: a compilation of music by, for and inspired by the Occupy Wall Street movement and the 99%,” for which Barone contributed “Hey, Can I Sleep on Your Futon?”
CROSSING BROOKLYN FERRY
Brothers Bryce and Aaron Dessner have put together quite a multimedia festival at BAM (photo by David Kressler)
BAM Howard Gilman Opera House, Bam Rose Cinemas, BAMcafe
30 Lafayette Ave. between Ashland Pl. & St. Felix St.
May 3-5, $45
718-636-4100
www.crossingbrooklynferry.com
www.bam.org
In his poem “Crossing Brooklyn Ferry” from Leaves of Grass, Walt Whitman wrote, “Cross from shore to shore, countless crowds of passengers! / Stand up, tall masts of Mannahatta! — stand up, beautiful hills of Brooklyn! / Throb, baffled and curious brain! throw out questions and answers! / Suspend here and everywhere, eternal float of solution! / Gaze, loving and thirsting eyes, in the house, or street, or public assembly!” BAM is now inviting Manhattanites — and everyone else — to once again dare to venture across the river for “Crossing Brooklyn Ferry,” a three-day film and music festival curated by Bryce and Aaron Dessner of the National. The festivities begin May 3 with live performances by the Walkmen, Sharon Van Etten, Twin Shadow, Jherek Bischoff, ZS, Callers, People Get Ready, yMusic, JACK Quartet, Heather Broderick, and Yellowbirds, with nine short films (which will be screened each night) by Poppy de Villeneuve & Missy Mazzoli; Jonas Mekas, Dalius Naujo, and friends; Michael Brown & Glenn Kotche; Bill Morrison & William Basinski; Justin Davis Anderson & Juan Comas; Tunde Adebimpe & Ohal Grietzer; Matthew Ritchie & Bryce Dessner; Su Friedrich; and Joseph Gordon-Levitt & wirrow. On May 4, the musical lineup features St. Vincent, the Antlers, Tyondai Braxton, Sō Percussion, Buke and Gase, Sinkane, Ava Luna, Missy Mazzoli and Victoire, NOW Ensemble, Hubble, and Nadia Sirota, followed by DJ sets by Chris Keating and Joakim. The May 5 show is sold out, but in case you can still score a ticket somehow, it includes Beirut, Atlas Sound, My Brightest Diamond + yMusic, Caveman, Oneohtrix Point Never, Janka Nabay & the Bubu Gang, Skeletons, the Brooklyn Youth Chorus, the Yehudim, Benjamin Lanz, and Thieving Irons, with late-night / early-morning DJ sets by Pat Mahoney and Nancy Whang.