Jazzy Jay and other esoteria
Filed under: A New Reality, General, History and Culture, Music, Pop Culture
Just because the Israeli concert-going market can’t support more than one or two performances from A-list-ers like Paul McCartney each summer, doesn’t mean that we need to deal with washed-up international talents like Deep Purple the rest of the time.
The best of the not-quite-mainstream pop talent whose art is uncompromised, esoteric and less disposable have been entertaining us here more and more often, whether it’s Devendra Bernhardt, Low, Blonde Redhead, Lee “Scratch” Perry or Morrissey. Thankfully, more and more performers along these lines have been making their way to Israeli stages in recent years.
And despite the ongoing violence in the south of the country in recent weeks, the show must go on. No notices announcing a cancellation of this Friday’s Urbanology Festival have reached this cultural correspondent’s desk so far, which means that old-school talent DJ Jazzy Jay is still expected to hit the decks this weekend at the Cult Club at Herzl St. 154, Tel Aviv (tickets available at 057-777-4422).
Jazzy Jay is one of the founding fathers of hip hop. A scratch turntablism pioneer, he spun at street parties in the Bronx in the late Seventies and in downtown Manhattan clubs in the early Eighties. Part of Afrika Bambaataa’s Universal Zulu Nation collective, Jay was also a co-founder of the influential Def Jam Recordings. His “It’s Yours” single was the label’s first-ever release, and he helped broker the partnership between notorious trailblazing rap moguls Rick Rubin and Russell Simmons. His own Jazzy Jay’s Studio was an early home to luminaries like A Tribe Called Quest Brand Nubian.
Jay comes to Israel for the Cult Club’s Urbanology party, branded as a celebration of everything associated with old-school hip hop culture – rap, breakdancing, graffiti and more. Events like these have been taking place at venues across Israel for years, but none with a marquee performer of this stature. Other participants include local talents like the disco funk-fixated DJ Alarm, DJ Mesh, local old-schoolers Quami and Kottage, the Tachlis Band and alt-rappers Peled and Ortega.
Experiments of acoustic whimsy
Filed under: Art, General, Israeliness, Music, Pop Culture
Possibly the closest thing Israel has to a bona fide guitar rock god, Berry Sakharof is also a man of many collaborations. His chameleon-like changeovers have included forays into alt-industrial Euro new wave, folk-ethnic Eastern spiritual poetry songs and club rhythm-infused pop-metal. It’s all kind, and it’s all worth catching.
A few years ago, Sakharof explored his intimate side with a special mini-tour of acoustic gigs – many cuts from which made up the meat of the bonus acoustic disc from 2003′s In Concert boxed set. On this tour, he was accompanied almost exclusively by Zohar Fresco (check out his official site as well as his Myspace profile for great samples of his work that showcase his amazing talents), an extraordinary hand-percussionist. As Sakharof has been known to do every now and then, he has recently rekindled this collaboration, appearing on stage this past weekend at Jerusalem’s Ma’abada Theater.
The planners at the Ma’abada clearly were once again caught off-guard by the logistics of this event. Although the sound was well-mixed and clear, the venue unfortunately over-sold beyond capacity. Most rock shows held here involve a large open floor for bouncing revelers, but the laid-back nature of the acoustic format justified setting up rows of chairs across the entire floor, and when the crowds piled in close to the gig’s opening number, passageway aisles disappeared as more chairs were thrown down haphazardly, and some people were suddenly told that certain seats needed to remain empty in order to facilitate the movements of the performers.
But once the vibes settled down, the beauty of the music took over. Sakharof’s songs are simply great, and their flavors were accentuated by the bandless format. Less coordinated accompaniment means more room for drama and improvisation, and Sakharof and Fresco were clearly relishing in this dynamic, approaching the sings with whimsy and not hiding their smiles to each other.
Highlights from the set included classic Sakharof love songs like “Chaval She’at Lo” and “Basof Shel Yom,” experimental numbers like “Ra’ash Lavan” and covers of folk song standards.
Berry stuck to his guitar mostly, but he played with chords emanating from a pedal-triggered synthesizer as well, and the show opened with just him at the piano doing crowd favorites “Kama Yossi” and “Haolam Ha’amiti.” For the duration of the concert, the band grew in tiers – first with Fresco joining in, then a pianist/wind player, and finally with surprise guest Daniel Zamir, the Tzadik Records-affiliated post-klez alt-jazz sax player.
Berry needs to come to town more often.
Fusion and ethno-preservation at the International Oud Festival
Jerusalem’s annual International Oud Festival is undoubtedly one of the highlights on the country’s cultural calendar. When it comes to Israeli performance art, often, the name of the game is “East meets West” (largely thanks to our country’s location and international alignments), and the Oud Festival is perhaps the finest example of what this theme has to offer.
Over the years, the festival has presented amazing fusion experiments, with elements thrown into the mix including the cantorial music of Syria, ancient Persian folk sounds, the contemporary folk-rock of Meir Banai, the para-liturgical poetry of the Ben Ish Chai, Egyptian post-war pop songs, Orphaned Land’s acoustic metal, the Greek blues, medieval Moroccan Sabbath table hymns, Dutchmen with laptops outputting layers of white noise, the sublime rhythmic textures of Zohar Fresco and guitar heroics courtesy of Turkish-bred rock god Berry Sakharof. The shows don’t always directly include the music of the Arabian fat-bellied lute we love to call the oud, but they are always spiritually grounded in an artistic landscape embodied symbolically by the namesake instrument.
In a trajectory that is arguably parallel to the growing popularity of ethnic music and para-liturgical poetry traditions (known collectively as the canon of piyut), over the past nine years, the Oud Festival has grown from a modest few shows held in a small auditorium each fall into a major two-week event, drawing sell-out crowds from all over the country, from all ages and from all walks of life.
This year, the festival was slightly less experimental and fusion-oriented, with an emphasis placed more on covering authentic ethnic territories new to the proceedings. This trend culminated at the end of last week with a performance by Divana (pictured), an ensemble hailing from the northwestern Indian state of Rajasthan.
Divana draws from the ancient traditions of the Manghaniyar and Langa tribes, who historically served as bards to the local Rajasthani Brahmin and Rajput aristocracy, purveying sublime chants on the subjects of love, war and mysticism. The contemporary ensemble is among the last remaining descendents of this tradition, and hearing them play was a major treat. The six-piece included two string players, two vocalists and two percussionists one of whom flailed his arms about wildly while rapidly flicking mini wooden planks together with his fingers (the outcome more than slightly reminiscent of the old-time spoonmen.
The Divana show served as the closing performance of the 2008 Oud Festival, an ecstatic and poignant summing up of Israel’s status in the international cultural scene. Festival Artistic Director Effie Benaya was visibly moved as spoke about the bureaucratic struggles to obtain visas for the band’s personnel just days after the terror attacks in Bombay, and he apologized to the audience for the absence of Navtej Singh Sarna, the Indian ambassador to Israel, who had planned on attending but was regrettably stuck in traffic.
Time for Mincha, Paul
Filed under: General, History and Culture, Israeliness, Life, Music, Pop Culture, Religion
Paul McCartney’s played all around the world, with The Beatles, with Wings, and on his own. I’m sure he’s encountered some strange sights and situations (among them spending a few days in a Japanese jail for pot possession), but his historic performance Thursday night in Israel likely presented a first at a McCartney show – its very own Chabad mitzvah booth.
As the near 50,000 concertgoers of all ages rambled through the grassy Ganei Yehoshua on the way to the show, they passed the usual beer and hot dog vendors, and McCartney memorabilia like ‘Paul in Israel’ t-shirt and button hawkers. But, right in line with the path was a booth set up by Chabad, offering literature, the mitzvah of laying tefillin, and some good yiddishkeit.
I didn’t see many takers in the brief moments I was in view of the booth, as it seemed that most fans were eager to stake their claim on a piece of earth as close to the stage as possible. But the Chabad guys were in good cheer, singing songs (not Beatles) and joining in the revelry.
The audience at the concert was a typically mixed cross section of the usual concert-going teens and 20-somethings, a good representation of parents with young kids, and a lot of aging baby boomers like me. There were plenty kippas generously sprinkled throughout the audience, and all in all, it was a mellow crowd.
A friend who I ran into at the show commented that Israeli rock audiences are so different from American ones, where ‘getting wasted’ is almost part of the DNA for concert-goers. Here, it was a family atmosphere, with the occasional waft of marijuana smoke in the air being the exception and not the norm.
Much ado was made about the NIS 5,000 VIP seating, and the less expensive but still expensive reserved seating area. I didn’t sit in either one, but my impression is that the reserved seating folks, who forked over NIS 1,500 for their seats got the short end of the stick.Their ‘seats’ were the equivalent of the bleachers in a baseball games, pretty far back, and somewhat detached from the excitement of the show.
The VIP stands were a bit closer, but those people were probably in a stupor the whole show from the gourmet buffet and open bar they enjoyed in the huge food tent built just for them on the side. That might explain why it looked like they were sitting throughout the show, while the plebes on the grass were up and dancing and moving the whole time.
When I floated out of the show after over two hours of Beatles magic, the Chabad booth had been dismantled and the staff long gone. Maybe they thought Paul was singing about that other ‘Mary’ when he sang ‘Mother Mary’ in “Let it Be” and not his own mother. Or maybe they just couldn’t compete with the near religious experience that so many people seemed to have at the concert.
Better than Paul?
With Beatlemania belatedly in full swing in these parts, ahead of the September 25 appearance in Tel Aviv of Paul McCartney, the $130 tickets are being gobbled up at a rapid pace.
I’ve been underwhelmed at the prospects of seeing Sir Paul with 69,999 other aging Beatles fans. Sure, if I was presented a ticket on a silver platter, I’d be there without a moment’s hesitation. But aside from hearing maybe 8 or 10 Beatles classics, one of them probably being “Michelle”, the only clunker on Rubber Soul, the rest of the show is going to be… well, Paul’s solo career.
Let’s face it, the legends that claim an imposter took over after Paul was killed in that 1966 car crash, may not be too far from accurate. Sure the fake Paul mustered on with stellar work through the White Album and Let It Be, but by the time his solo career was launched, he was plumb out of ideas. There have been occasional moments of that old Beatles magic in “Band on The Run”, and, uh… er.., well, some of those songs with Elvis Costello in the late 80s like “My Brave Face” were pretty punchy. But is anyone going to be happy listening to his latest offerings off Memory Almost Full, albeit his critically lauded latest album?
Pondering these issues, I took the wife and younger kids to see a Beatles tribute band on Thursday night in Jerusalem’s Safra Square at an end of summer free show for the city’s residents.
The Magical Mystery Tour Band has been together for seven years, and man, are they good! Not only do they sound as close to The Beatles classic sound as is humanly possible, they also play with the enthusiasm of the Fab Four on The Ed Sullivan Show.
It was one classic after another non-stop, from “I Wanna Hold Your Hand” and “All My Loving” to “And Your Bird Can Sing” and “Back in the USSR”. Even though these guys are native Hebrew speakers, their vocals are dead on, and their harmonies were fantastic.
As much as seeing Paul McCartney up on stage, even if he looked like a postage stamp in size, would be a once-in-a-lifetime thrill, for reliving the magic and wonder that was The Beatles, the Magical Mystery Tour did just fine.
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