Showing posts with label radiohead. Show all posts
Showing posts with label radiohead. Show all posts
Thursday, July 13, 2006
Just 'Cuz You Feel It Doesn't Mean It's There
Yesterday I heard a good interview with Thom Yorke on Fresh Air. It's aimed more at Radiohead neophytes than fans, but is still well-done. They cover topics like Thom's depression, the musical history of the band, their influences and their increasing use of electronic music. The interview runs about 40 minutes.
Wednesday, June 28, 2006
Everyone Around... Here. Everyone Is So... Clear
Pictures here.
Last weekend I finally got a chance to see Radiohead in concert. Shorter version: it was awesome. Longer version follows.
Radiohead is big enough to be in a "we do what we feel like" phase, much like REM has been in since their Monster tour. That means that, while they do occasionally tour, it tends to be just a few major cities over a shorter period of time. I was sorely tempted to go to each of their two Chicago-area shows on their last two tours; the first one (under a big tent near Lake Michigan) has been described by some as the best concert ever, and the second (actually held in Wisconsin) also sounded wonderful. Both times the logistics of getting there from Missouri, to say nothing of somehow finding a ticket, thwarted my dreams.
Let me back up a bit: I really, really like Radiohead. I don't like picking favorites, but they're probably my second-favorite active band, just a bit behind REM and a bit ahead of Massive Attack (if we treat MA as still being active). The story of how I first got into Radiohead is actually kind of random. I didn't listen to the radio much so I never heard "Creep" or any of their early singles. Starting my junior year of high school, I worked in the Periodicals Department at Wheaton Public Library. In addition to magazines we also handled audiobooks and music CDs, and I took advantage of my privileges as an employee to check out a wide variety of music at no charge. (During the time I was working there, it cost twenty-five cents to check out a CD.) This led to a huge development in my musical tastes, as well as the start of an impressive mp3 collection.
Someone might have recommended Radiohead to me, but if so I don't remember. I just remember that the OK Computer CD got circulated a lot, so I spent a lot of time looking at the jacket while cleaning the CD. I was fascinated by the design of the cover and the song titles, including "Paranoid Android," which made me immediately think of Marvin from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. At some point I checked it out, and I was just mesmerized. I listened to it over and over again, just blown away by the incredible sound. It was filled with delightfully weird, bizarre sounds and compositions, while still sounding incredibly good and accessible. It was one of those albums where I would listen to it five times, then a sixth on headphones, and be amazed at all the stuff I had missed before. (For example, it wasn't until a month or so later that I really caught the second vocal track that plays under Paranoid Android.)
After arriving at college, I picked up exactly two music posters to decorate my dorm. One was REM's "Monster" tour poster (my least favorite album of theirs, but an excellent poster); the second was a sublime Radiohead poster containing the entire lyrics to "Fitter Happier," which, as odd as it sounds, seems to me like the anchor of the album.
While in college, Radiohead released Kid A, their long-awaited follow-up album. After my very first listen, I concluded that I no longer could call OK Computer "Strange"; it now seemed positively traditional compared to the revolutionary electronic, distorted sounds of Kid A. Once again, though, they managed to push the envelope without being alienating; or, perhaps, they invite you to join in their alienation. As an example, The National Anthem sounded unlike anything else I had ever heard, but at the same time its incredible bass line also made it one of the catchiest songs ever.
Radiohead is one of those bands that makes me feel briefly optimistic about the world. Despite producing such challenging and hard-to-categorize music, they have been remarkably popular. Kid A opened at #1 on the US charts, even though they didn't initially release any singles for it. All their stuff sells well, and their concerts are extremely popular; they could fill stadiums if they wanted to. Anyways, it's good to see my fellow citizens enthusiastically embracing a good band.
Their later releases have also been great. Amnesiac wasn't the promised return to "the guitar sound," but it was a delightfully chilling and remote album. Hail to the Thief bumped the paranoia up to a whole new level, exulting in its exuberantly creepy sound. I have also dug around to find their non-album songs, most of which (True Love Waits, The Amazing Sounds of Orgy, Talk Show Host) are definitely good enough to have made the cut. At the same time, a parallel industry has sprung up to analyze and engage Radiohead. I've written before here about Christopher O'Reilly's work, which seems to be in the vanguard of the classical music world's endorsement of Radiohead's music.
So, yeah, I really like the band. I was delighted to read that their current US tour would include two nights in Berkeley. The venue sounded really good too: The Greek Amphitheater, which is on the university campus, is a bowl-shaped design that seemed fairly intimate with good sight lines. Tickets were also very reasonable at under $50 a head, but I knew I would need to act quickly: an act this big in a venue this small was begging to be sold out.
I asked around at work to see who else was interested, and got a lot of tentative replies. I eventually said, "Well, it's all general admission, so let's have everyone who wants to go get their own tickets."
It turned out that when the tickets went on sale at 10AM on a Sunday, which was when I would be flying over the Rocky Mountains on my way back from a family wedding. Fortunately, my brother Pat rode in to the rescue, and secured two tickets for me - amazingly enough, he even picked the right day, which I had forgotten to tell him. Thanks, Pat!
I later learned that nobody else had managed to get tickets, which were sold out a few minutes after going on sale. Tom, who was one of the guys who interviewed me way back last year, was the first person to bring it up, so I offered him the extra ticket. Tom digs Radiohead, but was especially interested in the opening act, a local band named Deerhoof. I'd checked some of their music before hand and enjoyed it. Their lead vocalist is a Japanese woman, and they have a really interesting sound.
Tom lives in San Francisco, so we had to figure out the best way to handle transit. I was originally planning on driving to Fremont and then taking BART to Berkeley; he ended up driving up to the station with me and we rode in the rest of the way together. We made pretty good time, but had trouble finding parking after we got to the campus. We finally found an open garage and trekked up a long hill to the Greek.
We could hear music when we approached, and I realized we were missing the opening act, which frankly amazed me. I've never been to a concert that has started on time, and judging from when they finished, they probably started exactly at 7:30. As it was, we just had time to grab some food and find a seat (on the lawn - the bowl was packt like sardines in a crushd tin box) right before their set finished. The audience responded warmly.
It's always interesting to listen to the recorded music that plays before a band takes the stage. Obviously, they want something that will occupy people while roadies are wrangling their equipment. It would be crass to play your own stuff; at the same time, you don't want to freak people out by getting too far outside your own sound, like playing bluegrass music at a heavy metal concert. With a band as hard to classify as Radiohead, though, I had wondered what they would choose. It turns out that they felt like they were an electronic band now, because almost all of the songs that played were of that genre. All of it sounded really good, but I only recognized one song, which was in Lost in Translation. The song right after that, though, was a mystery to me. In a good way. It started off with a recorded interview between two pundits discussing Hillary Clinton's political career. "Is she liked by the public, and is she a viable candidate?" "Well, she is liked, but she's not viable." Then it started splicing up the conversation, garbling the words as they were twisted into a new dialog, then the curtain fell down revealing several oddly-shaped screens and the members of Radiohead walked onto the stage to thunderous applause and jumped right into "You and Whose Army."
Despite being quite far from the stage, I enjoyed a good view for most of the night; even when sitting down I could usually make out Yorke and the rest of the crew, thanks to the steep incline on the slope. I kept thinking of "Sit Down, Stand Up," which they never played... the lawn had a very varied structure, where in some spots people in front would stand up and everyone behind them would stand as well, while in other areas nobody would stand at all. The people in front of us stood for the first few songs, forcing us to stand to see, then later sat down, which we did as well out of respect for those behind us. There was one guy in particular in front of us who I was a little worried about. Most of the people there were excited about the show, but he seemed particularly twitchy and unbalanced. At one point he left and came back with two glasses of beer. "Oh," I thought. "He came here with a friend." Nope. He two-fisted both of them down. A couple of times I saw him taking hits off a pipe; I'm not sure what was in it, but judging from his behavior, I doubt it was a depressant.
Back to the music! The acoustics were excellent, even this far from the stage, and I didn't get any of the annoying layered sound that I'm used to in larger venues. Their playing was just superb. For me, it's almost a definition of a good band that they can play something differently and have it sound just as good as what's on the album. They did this not by radically re-engineering the favorites, but by tinkering with them. Where a song once had a string of random electronic sounds, it would now have a string of different electronic sounds, generated live by Yorke or someone else. The instrumental parts were largely intact but they would occasionally embellish a guitar line or something. No new verses, but a different sound anyways.
Probably the biggest surprise for me was the quantity of new material in here; I'd guess that probably one out of every three songs was totally new to me. Radiohead's great strength is its resilience and the rewards it gives for repeated listening, so I can't claim to fully "get" the new songs after just one listen, but they generally sounded good, nothing sounding like it needed a lot more work. I'm guessing some of these will appear on their new album, whenever that might come out, and look forward to hearing them again.
Those oddly-shaped screens were put to interesting use. For most of the concert, each would show a live image of a focused part of the act: a closeup of Johnny Greenwood's hand strumming the guitar, or a top-down shot of Selway's drum kit, or Yorke's face. The images were muted, perhaps black and white, more impressionist than vivid. I thought this was a really interesting departure from the large-venue practice of having giant video screens that show and blow up the action on the stage so people standing much farther back can see it. That practice has always kind of bothered me, incidentally. When you start watching the screen instead of the stage, you're essentially watching a video, which makes you start to wonder why instead of paying $12 for a DVD you're paying $50 for a ticket that gives you the privilege of buying really expensive hot dogs and watching a movie outside. Anyways: the giant screens weren't really necessary here, and the shattered screens they used felt more like a commentary on the stage action than a substitute for it.
One thing I usually enjoy in concerts is hearing the band chatter. Some are good, some are bad, some just bizarre. Thom Yorke definitely tended towards the silent, only speaking a handful of times. After the first few songs he said, "Berkeley, California!", notably omitting any verbs and, much better, using the proper, English pronunciation ("Barklee.") Later on he said "This fog is strange," and indeed it was: one of the coolest parts of the evening was the way the fog would occasionally roll in, be illuminated in crazy ways by the stage lights, then dissipate. His other words of wisdom included, "It's cold out!" and something like "Here's some more new songs, as if you didn't already have enough." While he didn't speak a lot, he was a very visible presence on the stage. I just love, love, love watching Thom dance. It's a curiously spastic yet purposeful movement that, like his music, is unlike anything else.
They played for nearly ninety minutes, closing out the set with a phenomenal version of Idioteque. Incidentally, Kid A and Amnesiac seemed to be the best represented in this show; I don't think they played any Pablo Honey (frankly fine by me), and just a smattering from their other three albums. This show demonstrated the blessing and the curse of having such a solid catalog. On the one hand, there were a lot of songs I would have loved to hear that they didn't do, including Airbag, Fake Plastic Trees, and Talk Show Host. Still, I can't point to any of the songs that they did play and say, "Oh, they should have left that one out." Even Morning Bell, which in all honesty is my least favorite track on both Kid A and Amnesiac, got a performance here that was much more interesting and dark than what I was expecting. I suppose the best solution would have been to buy tickets for both nights; I just now went online and found that Saturday's setlist was almost completely different.
The crowd was aggressively enthusiastic after Radiohead left the stage, and they eventually returned for two encore sets, including still more new material. I had been terrified that they wouldn't get around to playing Everything In Its Right Place, but they ended up closing the night with it, in an unforgettably talented and trippy performance. I'd heard before about how they do it live but it was still amazing to watch: Selway, Yorke and O'Brien perform as usual while the Greenwood brothers take samples from their live feeds in little boxes, which they then mix, loop, and replay. The whole time they were playing, thicker and thicker fog fell over the theater, which the lights ghostily penetrated as the music turned more and more otherworldly. One by one the members walked off the stage (guided by a green flashlight probably brought out to assist with the fog), while their looped samples continued to whirl behind them. Gradually the sound and the lights grew dimmer, until all that was left behind were the screens which were endlessly cycling the letters "EVERAND" - as in, "ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and..." It was a beautiful ending.
Tom and I walked through the center of campus, then split up, him to his car and me to BART. This was my first time ever in Berkeley but I just followed the crowd and they led me right to it. (I've been reading a lot about the decline of Berkeley, particularly around Telegraph Avenue, but the little bit I saw near the campus looked pretty good. I keep meaning to visit my cousin Paul who lives in Berkeley.) I'd forgotten that Friday had been declared a Spare the Air day in the Bay Area, which meant that ridership was free for the day on all public transit, including BART.
The platform was crowded with other concertgoers, but we all managed to squeeze on to the next train, a six-car train to Fremont. It's the first time I've ever been crowded on a BART train; I'm guessing that's much more common during commuting hours into the city than the nights and weekends when I ride it. Still, everyone was good-natured and squeezed in to make room. A few stops later was a transfer station for the San Francisco lines, where most of the train emptied and I took a seat. The rest of my ride back felt dreamy, the music not pounding in my head but flowing through it, suffusing even the darkened outline of the Diablo range with hints of a greater reality.
Last weekend I finally got a chance to see Radiohead in concert. Shorter version: it was awesome. Longer version follows.
Radiohead is big enough to be in a "we do what we feel like" phase, much like REM has been in since their Monster tour. That means that, while they do occasionally tour, it tends to be just a few major cities over a shorter period of time. I was sorely tempted to go to each of their two Chicago-area shows on their last two tours; the first one (under a big tent near Lake Michigan) has been described by some as the best concert ever, and the second (actually held in Wisconsin) also sounded wonderful. Both times the logistics of getting there from Missouri, to say nothing of somehow finding a ticket, thwarted my dreams.
Let me back up a bit: I really, really like Radiohead. I don't like picking favorites, but they're probably my second-favorite active band, just a bit behind REM and a bit ahead of Massive Attack (if we treat MA as still being active). The story of how I first got into Radiohead is actually kind of random. I didn't listen to the radio much so I never heard "Creep" or any of their early singles. Starting my junior year of high school, I worked in the Periodicals Department at Wheaton Public Library. In addition to magazines we also handled audiobooks and music CDs, and I took advantage of my privileges as an employee to check out a wide variety of music at no charge. (During the time I was working there, it cost twenty-five cents to check out a CD.) This led to a huge development in my musical tastes, as well as the start of an impressive mp3 collection.
Someone might have recommended Radiohead to me, but if so I don't remember. I just remember that the OK Computer CD got circulated a lot, so I spent a lot of time looking at the jacket while cleaning the CD. I was fascinated by the design of the cover and the song titles, including "Paranoid Android," which made me immediately think of Marvin from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. At some point I checked it out, and I was just mesmerized. I listened to it over and over again, just blown away by the incredible sound. It was filled with delightfully weird, bizarre sounds and compositions, while still sounding incredibly good and accessible. It was one of those albums where I would listen to it five times, then a sixth on headphones, and be amazed at all the stuff I had missed before. (For example, it wasn't until a month or so later that I really caught the second vocal track that plays under Paranoid Android.)
After arriving at college, I picked up exactly two music posters to decorate my dorm. One was REM's "Monster" tour poster (my least favorite album of theirs, but an excellent poster); the second was a sublime Radiohead poster containing the entire lyrics to "Fitter Happier," which, as odd as it sounds, seems to me like the anchor of the album.
While in college, Radiohead released Kid A, their long-awaited follow-up album. After my very first listen, I concluded that I no longer could call OK Computer "Strange"; it now seemed positively traditional compared to the revolutionary electronic, distorted sounds of Kid A. Once again, though, they managed to push the envelope without being alienating; or, perhaps, they invite you to join in their alienation. As an example, The National Anthem sounded unlike anything else I had ever heard, but at the same time its incredible bass line also made it one of the catchiest songs ever.
Radiohead is one of those bands that makes me feel briefly optimistic about the world. Despite producing such challenging and hard-to-categorize music, they have been remarkably popular. Kid A opened at #1 on the US charts, even though they didn't initially release any singles for it. All their stuff sells well, and their concerts are extremely popular; they could fill stadiums if they wanted to. Anyways, it's good to see my fellow citizens enthusiastically embracing a good band.
Their later releases have also been great. Amnesiac wasn't the promised return to "the guitar sound," but it was a delightfully chilling and remote album. Hail to the Thief bumped the paranoia up to a whole new level, exulting in its exuberantly creepy sound. I have also dug around to find their non-album songs, most of which (True Love Waits, The Amazing Sounds of Orgy, Talk Show Host) are definitely good enough to have made the cut. At the same time, a parallel industry has sprung up to analyze and engage Radiohead. I've written before here about Christopher O'Reilly's work, which seems to be in the vanguard of the classical music world's endorsement of Radiohead's music.
So, yeah, I really like the band. I was delighted to read that their current US tour would include two nights in Berkeley. The venue sounded really good too: The Greek Amphitheater, which is on the university campus, is a bowl-shaped design that seemed fairly intimate with good sight lines. Tickets were also very reasonable at under $50 a head, but I knew I would need to act quickly: an act this big in a venue this small was begging to be sold out.
I asked around at work to see who else was interested, and got a lot of tentative replies. I eventually said, "Well, it's all general admission, so let's have everyone who wants to go get their own tickets."
It turned out that when the tickets went on sale at 10AM on a Sunday, which was when I would be flying over the Rocky Mountains on my way back from a family wedding. Fortunately, my brother Pat rode in to the rescue, and secured two tickets for me - amazingly enough, he even picked the right day, which I had forgotten to tell him. Thanks, Pat!
I later learned that nobody else had managed to get tickets, which were sold out a few minutes after going on sale. Tom, who was one of the guys who interviewed me way back last year, was the first person to bring it up, so I offered him the extra ticket. Tom digs Radiohead, but was especially interested in the opening act, a local band named Deerhoof. I'd checked some of their music before hand and enjoyed it. Their lead vocalist is a Japanese woman, and they have a really interesting sound.
Tom lives in San Francisco, so we had to figure out the best way to handle transit. I was originally planning on driving to Fremont and then taking BART to Berkeley; he ended up driving up to the station with me and we rode in the rest of the way together. We made pretty good time, but had trouble finding parking after we got to the campus. We finally found an open garage and trekked up a long hill to the Greek.
We could hear music when we approached, and I realized we were missing the opening act, which frankly amazed me. I've never been to a concert that has started on time, and judging from when they finished, they probably started exactly at 7:30. As it was, we just had time to grab some food and find a seat (on the lawn - the bowl was packt like sardines in a crushd tin box) right before their set finished. The audience responded warmly.
It's always interesting to listen to the recorded music that plays before a band takes the stage. Obviously, they want something that will occupy people while roadies are wrangling their equipment. It would be crass to play your own stuff; at the same time, you don't want to freak people out by getting too far outside your own sound, like playing bluegrass music at a heavy metal concert. With a band as hard to classify as Radiohead, though, I had wondered what they would choose. It turns out that they felt like they were an electronic band now, because almost all of the songs that played were of that genre. All of it sounded really good, but I only recognized one song, which was in Lost in Translation. The song right after that, though, was a mystery to me. In a good way. It started off with a recorded interview between two pundits discussing Hillary Clinton's political career. "Is she liked by the public, and is she a viable candidate?" "Well, she is liked, but she's not viable." Then it started splicing up the conversation, garbling the words as they were twisted into a new dialog, then the curtain fell down revealing several oddly-shaped screens and the members of Radiohead walked onto the stage to thunderous applause and jumped right into "You and Whose Army."
Despite being quite far from the stage, I enjoyed a good view for most of the night; even when sitting down I could usually make out Yorke and the rest of the crew, thanks to the steep incline on the slope. I kept thinking of "Sit Down, Stand Up," which they never played... the lawn had a very varied structure, where in some spots people in front would stand up and everyone behind them would stand as well, while in other areas nobody would stand at all. The people in front of us stood for the first few songs, forcing us to stand to see, then later sat down, which we did as well out of respect for those behind us. There was one guy in particular in front of us who I was a little worried about. Most of the people there were excited about the show, but he seemed particularly twitchy and unbalanced. At one point he left and came back with two glasses of beer. "Oh," I thought. "He came here with a friend." Nope. He two-fisted both of them down. A couple of times I saw him taking hits off a pipe; I'm not sure what was in it, but judging from his behavior, I doubt it was a depressant.
Back to the music! The acoustics were excellent, even this far from the stage, and I didn't get any of the annoying layered sound that I'm used to in larger venues. Their playing was just superb. For me, it's almost a definition of a good band that they can play something differently and have it sound just as good as what's on the album. They did this not by radically re-engineering the favorites, but by tinkering with them. Where a song once had a string of random electronic sounds, it would now have a string of different electronic sounds, generated live by Yorke or someone else. The instrumental parts were largely intact but they would occasionally embellish a guitar line or something. No new verses, but a different sound anyways.
Probably the biggest surprise for me was the quantity of new material in here; I'd guess that probably one out of every three songs was totally new to me. Radiohead's great strength is its resilience and the rewards it gives for repeated listening, so I can't claim to fully "get" the new songs after just one listen, but they generally sounded good, nothing sounding like it needed a lot more work. I'm guessing some of these will appear on their new album, whenever that might come out, and look forward to hearing them again.
Those oddly-shaped screens were put to interesting use. For most of the concert, each would show a live image of a focused part of the act: a closeup of Johnny Greenwood's hand strumming the guitar, or a top-down shot of Selway's drum kit, or Yorke's face. The images were muted, perhaps black and white, more impressionist than vivid. I thought this was a really interesting departure from the large-venue practice of having giant video screens that show and blow up the action on the stage so people standing much farther back can see it. That practice has always kind of bothered me, incidentally. When you start watching the screen instead of the stage, you're essentially watching a video, which makes you start to wonder why instead of paying $12 for a DVD you're paying $50 for a ticket that gives you the privilege of buying really expensive hot dogs and watching a movie outside. Anyways: the giant screens weren't really necessary here, and the shattered screens they used felt more like a commentary on the stage action than a substitute for it.
One thing I usually enjoy in concerts is hearing the band chatter. Some are good, some are bad, some just bizarre. Thom Yorke definitely tended towards the silent, only speaking a handful of times. After the first few songs he said, "Berkeley, California!", notably omitting any verbs and, much better, using the proper, English pronunciation ("Barklee.") Later on he said "This fog is strange," and indeed it was: one of the coolest parts of the evening was the way the fog would occasionally roll in, be illuminated in crazy ways by the stage lights, then dissipate. His other words of wisdom included, "It's cold out!" and something like "Here's some more new songs, as if you didn't already have enough." While he didn't speak a lot, he was a very visible presence on the stage. I just love, love, love watching Thom dance. It's a curiously spastic yet purposeful movement that, like his music, is unlike anything else.
They played for nearly ninety minutes, closing out the set with a phenomenal version of Idioteque. Incidentally, Kid A and Amnesiac seemed to be the best represented in this show; I don't think they played any Pablo Honey (frankly fine by me), and just a smattering from their other three albums. This show demonstrated the blessing and the curse of having such a solid catalog. On the one hand, there were a lot of songs I would have loved to hear that they didn't do, including Airbag, Fake Plastic Trees, and Talk Show Host. Still, I can't point to any of the songs that they did play and say, "Oh, they should have left that one out." Even Morning Bell, which in all honesty is my least favorite track on both Kid A and Amnesiac, got a performance here that was much more interesting and dark than what I was expecting. I suppose the best solution would have been to buy tickets for both nights; I just now went online and found that Saturday's setlist was almost completely different.
The crowd was aggressively enthusiastic after Radiohead left the stage, and they eventually returned for two encore sets, including still more new material. I had been terrified that they wouldn't get around to playing Everything In Its Right Place, but they ended up closing the night with it, in an unforgettably talented and trippy performance. I'd heard before about how they do it live but it was still amazing to watch: Selway, Yorke and O'Brien perform as usual while the Greenwood brothers take samples from their live feeds in little boxes, which they then mix, loop, and replay. The whole time they were playing, thicker and thicker fog fell over the theater, which the lights ghostily penetrated as the music turned more and more otherworldly. One by one the members walked off the stage (guided by a green flashlight probably brought out to assist with the fog), while their looped samples continued to whirl behind them. Gradually the sound and the lights grew dimmer, until all that was left behind were the screens which were endlessly cycling the letters "EVERAND" - as in, "ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and..." It was a beautiful ending.
Tom and I walked through the center of campus, then split up, him to his car and me to BART. This was my first time ever in Berkeley but I just followed the crowd and they led me right to it. (I've been reading a lot about the decline of Berkeley, particularly around Telegraph Avenue, but the little bit I saw near the campus looked pretty good. I keep meaning to visit my cousin Paul who lives in Berkeley.) I'd forgotten that Friday had been declared a Spare the Air day in the Bay Area, which meant that ridership was free for the day on all public transit, including BART.
The platform was crowded with other concertgoers, but we all managed to squeeze on to the next train, a six-car train to Fremont. It's the first time I've ever been crowded on a BART train; I'm guessing that's much more common during commuting hours into the city than the nights and weekends when I ride it. Still, everyone was good-natured and squeezed in to make room. A few stops later was a transfer station for the San Francisco lines, where most of the train emptied and I took a seat. The rest of my ride back felt dreamy, the music not pounding in my head but flowing through it, suffusing even the darkened outline of the Diablo range with hints of a greater reality.
Monday, September 26, 2005
True Love Waits
As I mentioned earlier, I was really excited by the chance to hear Christopher O'Riley in concert. It was held in the recital hall on the campus of the University of California, Santa Cruz. I decided to head down early because I haven't spent any time in Santa Cruz before and wanted to see what it was like.
Answer: it's all right. First I checked out the downtown. This is one of those long and narrow affairs, basically a stretch of Pacific Avenue. I don't know what I was hoping for; it ended up being like any other trendy retail area. There are two museums in the area, which were both closed, and besides that it was a mixture of shops. I'm always able to spend an indefinite amount of time in places like this, because invariably I'll find a music store and/or bookstore. In this occasion I wandered into a good used music store with a larger-than-normal collection of electronic music. I picked up a new (for me) Future Sounds of London album and Up, one of a few holes in my REM collection. Besides that I wandered Pacific, feeling like I'd been here dozens of times before.
I broke away and next headed to Neary Lagoon. This was better; the lagoon is surprisingly quiet and peaceful considering that it is (1) in the heart of Santa Cruz and (2) immediately next to a wastewater treatment facility. There was a good collection of wildlife and a few families with small children. All in all it was pleasant, although I wouldn't come back over the mountains just for it.
Unfortunately, a section of the boardwalk was closed for construction. Ever adventurous (and ever foolish), I decided to exit the park at the nearest exit rather than backtracking. (Backtracking is one of my absolute most hated activities, and I will go to unreasonable lengths to avoid it.)
I eventually got back to my car, although for the last twenty minutes or so I was beginning to doubt my navigational aptitude. All ended well, and I shot up to the campus.
Campus was odd. I've grown accustomed to tight, integrated college campuses. You've got your quad, you've got the cluster of engineering buildings, you have the pretty administration buildings up front and the uglier political science building tucked away in back. Student housing might be more spread out. Well, UCSC is a big campus, but more than that, it's a very spread-out campus. Extremely spread out. It took me nearly ten minutes, driving between 40 and 50, to get from the entrance to the music school. Along the way I drove through deserted sagebrush, grazing horses, forests, a plethora of campus bus stops, and the occasional cluster of university buildings. I eventually arrived at the music school, still about an hour early. I took advantage of the time to wander through the nearby buildings, housing the departments of music, art, and theater. It looked like they were constructed in the 70's, featuring lots of concrete, aggressively odd architecture, and few windows. They still looked better than Elliot at Wash U, though.
At 6:30 I finally headed in and took my seat. I was the second person in the auditorium. In all, it probably seated around 500, and it completely filled up over the next 40 minutes. It looked like roughly 3/5 of the audience were students (or perhaps, like me, young adults deliberately trying to look like students). Most of the other people were distinguished-looking ladies and gentlemen in their forties or older. From catching snatches of conversation, I could tell that at least some of the people here were already familiar with O'Riley's work, which was encouraging.
There was the usual chain of introductions. First on the stage was the head of the "Arts & Lectures" program, a yearlong series of which this concert was the first event. She mentioned some of the upcoming highlights, including an address by Robert Kennedy Jr. and some relatively famous musical groups whose names escape me at the moment. She also mentioned that this year they were starting a rush tickets program, where students could grab open seats for $5 before the show.
She then introduced the chancellor, who was a shockingly poor speaker. Fortunately she was also brief; she mumbled her introduction in a monotone while leaning back and forth before saying, "Without further delay, it's my pleasure to welcome Christopher O'Riley to our stage."
Thunderous applause as Christopher took the stage. He took a microphone near the piano and gave several minutes of introductory remarks. It's the first time I've ever seen or heard him; I know he has a popular classical music program called "From the Top" but have never caught it (at least not that I know of - I think it might not be carried on the stations I've listened to the last few years). So it was pleasant to hear him and find what an easy and engaging speaker he is. His whole attitude was very open, self-deprecating and anecdotal. He's also very young-looking. From where I was sitting he looked a great deal like Bob Hubbard, my last manager at Cerner, especially when he smiled.
His introductory remarks mainly concerned the classical portion of his performance. He talked a bit about the fugue as a music form and why it's the most challenging style to create. He mentioned the history of the fugue, from Bach up through Shostakovich, and told some funny stories about performers and composers showing off with fugues. He closed with a lengthly and touching account of his acquaintance with a great, little old Russian lady who was a virtuoso pianist (and whose name I cannot remember); it was obvious that their brief contact had a profound impact on him, and he spoke regretfully about all the knowledge that was lost with her passing. "I know every note of Bach," she told him once, and he had seen for himself how true that was.
He then launched into the program. It was as follows:
The printed program was slightly different. As he explained before the program, while he was on tour he was constantly working on new material and adding or dropping items as new pieces became ready. The original program would have had "Talk Show Host" in place of "Like Spinning Plates", and "Gagging Order" (a live, unrecorded song) in place of "Punchdrunk Lovesick Singalong."
The concert was, of course, amazing. The variety of music within the program was incredible - not simply the contrast between the two artists, of course, but also the difference between pieces from the same source. The first Prelude & Fugue came out to a powerful, roaring start that commanded attention; E-flat Major was very intricate and pensive. He was a delight to watch as well, becoming incredibly contorted as he pounded through the most complex portions of the arrangements.
As I knew I would, I found the Shostakovich pieces extremely rewarding and stirring. Some of the Radiohead arrangements, though, brought lumps to my throat. His live performance of "No Surprises" was even more starkly beautiful than the version on the album, the stunning clarity of the right hand's endlessly repeated notes only growing more pure the more involved the left hand's part became. Paranoid Android, besides being a wonderful arrangement was one of the most driving, adrenaline-rushing performances I've seen and brought the audience to their feet in a roar at its abrupt conclusion.
The mood of the concert goers was buoyant during intermission, with clusters of people excitedly praising what they'd heard. I wandered outside, passed through the smokers, and stared out into the cool dim night sky, gradually seeing more of the sage as my eyes adjusted to the light.
Back inside, the second half went just as well as the first. I had not previously heard any of the arrangements on this side (other than Let Down) and it was a pleasant surprise to hear for the first time how he was approaching them. Elliot Smith was an interesting addition as well. Before the show he had repeated a statement I'd previously heard him make on NPR, claiming that Smith was the most important American songwriter of the past fifty years. The two songs of his included in this performance definitely held their own with Shostakovich and Radiohead.
I'm sure it was a function of my tiredness, but as the second half went on I felt like the walls between the composers were beginning to dissolve. I was no longer looking at my program, and increasingly I found that it would take me until well into a Radiohead piece before I recalled the original song's name, and the Shostakovich would sound incredibly familiar to me. It was all good music, and it washed over me.
O'Riley got two standing ovations after the concert and added "Exit Music for a Film," to the vocal delight of a particular female in attendance. He was gracious enough to stay afterwards for a lengthy question and answer session, and probably 2/3 of the people stayed for this. The first question was the one I'm sure everyone was anticipating: "Have you ever met any members of Radiohead, and do you know what they thought of your music?" He described going backstage after one of their New York concerts shortly after "True Love Waits" was released, and meeting with Ed O'Brien. He had a brief conversation with Ed, who knew of the album and was very curious what kind of reception it had gotten from classical music fans. Next he spoke with Jonny Greenwood, who has a strong classical background, and they talked shop for a while about the process of arranging. He then met Thom. Hearing Chris talk about this was wonderful, he played up his reaction as an adoring fan finally meeting his idol. He told Thom how much he loved "Gagging Order," and Thom's eyes bugged out. "Nobody's talking about that song!" he said. "Oh, you should check the message board online," Christopher replied. "People are saying it's your best song since 'Let Down.'" Thom was rushed off to a birthday party but seemed pleased to have made that connection.
To Chris's surprise, later that night Thom came back and sought him out. They conversed at length, and Chris says that in person Thom is one of the most self-deprecating, ego-less people imaginable. For example, Chris mentioned he thought "Pyramid Song" would be a great candidate for a piano arrangement, but he couldn't imagine a version of that song without Thom's vocals. "Oh, you mean without me screwing it up?" Thom asked.
Someone asked about what it was like to adapt the extremely electronic songs that are prominent on Radiohead's most recent albums. O'Riley described how he loved "Like Spinning Plates," but knew that it was impossible to adapt because of the electronics. Then he heard a live performance that included Thom Yorke doing a version of "Like Spinning Plates" on, well, the piano. "Oh, I can do that!" O'Riley thought, and using that as his inspiration he set about doing it. He says that he doesn't try to approximate the sound of the electronic elements; rather, he pays attention to the function that the electronic sounds perform. Are they building up tension? Are they establishing a rhythm? Do they contrast with the melody? Using the tools available to him, of harmony and texture, O'Riley will then attempt to find another way to produce that same sort of effect. I say he did a phenomenal job.
(I'm reminded of my anticipation of watching Radiohead perform on Saturday Night Live shortly after the release of Kid A. I was sitting in our common dorm room before the show, chatting with roommates and speculating about what the live performance would be like. "The problem is that so much on this album is impossible outside a studio," I said. "I mean, they could do 'Optimistic,' or maybe 'Morning Bell.' But there's no way they can possibly do 'The National Anthem.'" The show started, and Radiohead came out and did a version of The National Anthem that blew the album's version out of the water. Listening to Christopher O'Riley, I revisit that blend of humility, awe and delight.)
Someone asked about how long it takes him to transcribe a piece and get it ready for performance. On some songs, he said, he can get it down in a few days. When he first started he improvised; since he got serious about doing an album, though, he's written down all his arrangements. He'll put the music directly into Finale because it's easier to tweak and modify that way than doing it all in longhand. Even when a piece is quick to adapt, though, it takes him months and months to get it performance-ready, simply because they're so incredibly challenging. He's done some pieces which are just unplayable, though he's getting better. Every new adaptation he does is the hardest one yet; at the same time, he's also constantly revisiting and revising his earlier ones, adding to the complexity as he becomes able to play them.
He's excited about the Elliot Smith project. He laid down the tracks this summer and the disc should be out in the spring. He still loves Radiohead and will do new tracks if they grab him, but he thinks he won't release a third album of Radiohead tracks. He's been working with whatever interests him, which currently includes Tears For Fears, Nick Drake, George Harrison, Cocteau Twins, R.E.M. (Yay!), and more.
Christopher spoke a bit about Radiohead's musical background. They're really all over the map. Thom Yorke doesn't read a note of music. Jonny Greenwood is well versed in classical music and served for a year as "Composer in Residence" at the BBC. Colin Greenwood's background is in jazz. Ed O'Brien's background is more in dub and electronica. So there's a wide range in there, and that all contributes to the strength of the band. O'Riley said that, as a pianist, the two things that he finds most important in music are harmony and texture. He thinks that it is the unique composition of Radiohead, with five very talented persons each contributing a thread under the vision of Yorke, that gives it such an interesting sense of texture without being arty.
All of these questions (and more that I don't recall) were asked by individuals between the ages of 18 and 25. A grey-haired gentleman said, "Just to bring Shostakovich back into this, I found that the Radiohead pieces you played seemed very bright, while I think of Shostakovich as a very harsh composer. And yet, when you put these together, they sounded great together. Why do you think that is?" O'Riley said that he believes one thing both composers have in common is a certain sense of distance. With Radiohead, Yorke always has a strong sense of ironic detachment. The lyrics aren't a part of this performance, of course, but his lyrics tend to be in the form of conversations overheard, of sights seen far-off. For example, a song will tell the story of a broken-hearted love affair; but it won't be told from the perspective of the woman, it's from a person who's overhearing the woman talk about it on a bus. Likewise, because of the political conditions he was working under, Shostakovich had to use subtext and indirection to communicate his messages; O'Riley said Shostakovich was the first classical composer to use subtext in his music. This, he thinks is the trait they have in common, and it informs their music.
So, that was my Sunday evening. I got home pretty late, around 11, but it was certainly well worth it. I had high expectations going in and was pleased to have them met.
Answer: it's all right. First I checked out the downtown. This is one of those long and narrow affairs, basically a stretch of Pacific Avenue. I don't know what I was hoping for; it ended up being like any other trendy retail area. There are two museums in the area, which were both closed, and besides that it was a mixture of shops. I'm always able to spend an indefinite amount of time in places like this, because invariably I'll find a music store and/or bookstore. In this occasion I wandered into a good used music store with a larger-than-normal collection of electronic music. I picked up a new (for me) Future Sounds of London album and Up, one of a few holes in my REM collection. Besides that I wandered Pacific, feeling like I'd been here dozens of times before.
I broke away and next headed to Neary Lagoon. This was better; the lagoon is surprisingly quiet and peaceful considering that it is (1) in the heart of Santa Cruz and (2) immediately next to a wastewater treatment facility. There was a good collection of wildlife and a few families with small children. All in all it was pleasant, although I wouldn't come back over the mountains just for it.
Unfortunately, a section of the boardwalk was closed for construction. Ever adventurous (and ever foolish), I decided to exit the park at the nearest exit rather than backtracking. (Backtracking is one of my absolute most hated activities, and I will go to unreasonable lengths to avoid it.)
I eventually got back to my car, although for the last twenty minutes or so I was beginning to doubt my navigational aptitude. All ended well, and I shot up to the campus.
Campus was odd. I've grown accustomed to tight, integrated college campuses. You've got your quad, you've got the cluster of engineering buildings, you have the pretty administration buildings up front and the uglier political science building tucked away in back. Student housing might be more spread out. Well, UCSC is a big campus, but more than that, it's a very spread-out campus. Extremely spread out. It took me nearly ten minutes, driving between 40 and 50, to get from the entrance to the music school. Along the way I drove through deserted sagebrush, grazing horses, forests, a plethora of campus bus stops, and the occasional cluster of university buildings. I eventually arrived at the music school, still about an hour early. I took advantage of the time to wander through the nearby buildings, housing the departments of music, art, and theater. It looked like they were constructed in the 70's, featuring lots of concrete, aggressively odd architecture, and few windows. They still looked better than Elliot at Wash U, though.
At 6:30 I finally headed in and took my seat. I was the second person in the auditorium. In all, it probably seated around 500, and it completely filled up over the next 40 minutes. It looked like roughly 3/5 of the audience were students (or perhaps, like me, young adults deliberately trying to look like students). Most of the other people were distinguished-looking ladies and gentlemen in their forties or older. From catching snatches of conversation, I could tell that at least some of the people here were already familiar with O'Riley's work, which was encouraging.
There was the usual chain of introductions. First on the stage was the head of the "Arts & Lectures" program, a yearlong series of which this concert was the first event. She mentioned some of the upcoming highlights, including an address by Robert Kennedy Jr. and some relatively famous musical groups whose names escape me at the moment. She also mentioned that this year they were starting a rush tickets program, where students could grab open seats for $5 before the show.
She then introduced the chancellor, who was a shockingly poor speaker. Fortunately she was also brief; she mumbled her introduction in a monotone while leaning back and forth before saying, "Without further delay, it's my pleasure to welcome Christopher O'Riley to our stage."
Thunderous applause as Christopher took the stage. He took a microphone near the piano and gave several minutes of introductory remarks. It's the first time I've ever seen or heard him; I know he has a popular classical music program called "From the Top" but have never caught it (at least not that I know of - I think it might not be carried on the stations I've listened to the last few years). So it was pleasant to hear him and find what an easy and engaging speaker he is. His whole attitude was very open, self-deprecating and anecdotal. He's also very young-looking. From where I was sitting he looked a great deal like Bob Hubbard, my last manager at Cerner, especially when he smiled.
His introductory remarks mainly concerned the classical portion of his performance. He talked a bit about the fugue as a music form and why it's the most challenging style to create. He mentioned the history of the fugue, from Bach up through Shostakovich, and told some funny stories about performers and composers showing off with fugues. He closed with a lengthly and touching account of his acquaintance with a great, little old Russian lady who was a virtuoso pianist (and whose name I cannot remember); it was obvious that their brief contact had a profound impact on him, and he spoke regretfully about all the knowledge that was lost with her passing. "I know every note of Bach," she told him once, and he had seen for himself how true that was.
He then launched into the program. It was as follows:
- Prelude & Fugue in F minor, Op. 87, No. 18
- No Surprises
- Prelude & Fugue in E-flat Major Op. 87, No. 19
- (Some song by Elliot Smith)
- Like Spinning Plates
- Prelude & Fugue in C minor, Op. 87, No. 20
- Paranoid Android
- (Intermission)
- Prelude & Fugue in B-flat Major, Op. 87, No. 21
- Punchdrunk Lovesick Singalong (this is a B-side, get it if you haven't heard it)
- Knives Out
- Prelude & Fugue in G minor, Op. 87 No. 22
- Not Half Right (Elliot Smith)
- Let Down
- Prelude & Fugue in F Major, Op. 87, No. 23
- 2+2=5
- Prelude & Fugue in D minor. Op. 87, No. 24
The printed program was slightly different. As he explained before the program, while he was on tour he was constantly working on new material and adding or dropping items as new pieces became ready. The original program would have had "Talk Show Host" in place of "Like Spinning Plates", and "Gagging Order" (a live, unrecorded song) in place of "Punchdrunk Lovesick Singalong."
The concert was, of course, amazing. The variety of music within the program was incredible - not simply the contrast between the two artists, of course, but also the difference between pieces from the same source. The first Prelude & Fugue came out to a powerful, roaring start that commanded attention; E-flat Major was very intricate and pensive. He was a delight to watch as well, becoming incredibly contorted as he pounded through the most complex portions of the arrangements.
As I knew I would, I found the Shostakovich pieces extremely rewarding and stirring. Some of the Radiohead arrangements, though, brought lumps to my throat. His live performance of "No Surprises" was even more starkly beautiful than the version on the album, the stunning clarity of the right hand's endlessly repeated notes only growing more pure the more involved the left hand's part became. Paranoid Android, besides being a wonderful arrangement was one of the most driving, adrenaline-rushing performances I've seen and brought the audience to their feet in a roar at its abrupt conclusion.
The mood of the concert goers was buoyant during intermission, with clusters of people excitedly praising what they'd heard. I wandered outside, passed through the smokers, and stared out into the cool dim night sky, gradually seeing more of the sage as my eyes adjusted to the light.
Back inside, the second half went just as well as the first. I had not previously heard any of the arrangements on this side (other than Let Down) and it was a pleasant surprise to hear for the first time how he was approaching them. Elliot Smith was an interesting addition as well. Before the show he had repeated a statement I'd previously heard him make on NPR, claiming that Smith was the most important American songwriter of the past fifty years. The two songs of his included in this performance definitely held their own with Shostakovich and Radiohead.
I'm sure it was a function of my tiredness, but as the second half went on I felt like the walls between the composers were beginning to dissolve. I was no longer looking at my program, and increasingly I found that it would take me until well into a Radiohead piece before I recalled the original song's name, and the Shostakovich would sound incredibly familiar to me. It was all good music, and it washed over me.
O'Riley got two standing ovations after the concert and added "Exit Music for a Film," to the vocal delight of a particular female in attendance. He was gracious enough to stay afterwards for a lengthy question and answer session, and probably 2/3 of the people stayed for this. The first question was the one I'm sure everyone was anticipating: "Have you ever met any members of Radiohead, and do you know what they thought of your music?" He described going backstage after one of their New York concerts shortly after "True Love Waits" was released, and meeting with Ed O'Brien. He had a brief conversation with Ed, who knew of the album and was very curious what kind of reception it had gotten from classical music fans. Next he spoke with Jonny Greenwood, who has a strong classical background, and they talked shop for a while about the process of arranging. He then met Thom. Hearing Chris talk about this was wonderful, he played up his reaction as an adoring fan finally meeting his idol. He told Thom how much he loved "Gagging Order," and Thom's eyes bugged out. "Nobody's talking about that song!" he said. "Oh, you should check the message board online," Christopher replied. "People are saying it's your best song since 'Let Down.'" Thom was rushed off to a birthday party but seemed pleased to have made that connection.
To Chris's surprise, later that night Thom came back and sought him out. They conversed at length, and Chris says that in person Thom is one of the most self-deprecating, ego-less people imaginable. For example, Chris mentioned he thought "Pyramid Song" would be a great candidate for a piano arrangement, but he couldn't imagine a version of that song without Thom's vocals. "Oh, you mean without me screwing it up?" Thom asked.
Someone asked about what it was like to adapt the extremely electronic songs that are prominent on Radiohead's most recent albums. O'Riley described how he loved "Like Spinning Plates," but knew that it was impossible to adapt because of the electronics. Then he heard a live performance that included Thom Yorke doing a version of "Like Spinning Plates" on, well, the piano. "Oh, I can do that!" O'Riley thought, and using that as his inspiration he set about doing it. He says that he doesn't try to approximate the sound of the electronic elements; rather, he pays attention to the function that the electronic sounds perform. Are they building up tension? Are they establishing a rhythm? Do they contrast with the melody? Using the tools available to him, of harmony and texture, O'Riley will then attempt to find another way to produce that same sort of effect. I say he did a phenomenal job.
(I'm reminded of my anticipation of watching Radiohead perform on Saturday Night Live shortly after the release of Kid A. I was sitting in our common dorm room before the show, chatting with roommates and speculating about what the live performance would be like. "The problem is that so much on this album is impossible outside a studio," I said. "I mean, they could do 'Optimistic,' or maybe 'Morning Bell.' But there's no way they can possibly do 'The National Anthem.'" The show started, and Radiohead came out and did a version of The National Anthem that blew the album's version out of the water. Listening to Christopher O'Riley, I revisit that blend of humility, awe and delight.)
Someone asked about how long it takes him to transcribe a piece and get it ready for performance. On some songs, he said, he can get it down in a few days. When he first started he improvised; since he got serious about doing an album, though, he's written down all his arrangements. He'll put the music directly into Finale because it's easier to tweak and modify that way than doing it all in longhand. Even when a piece is quick to adapt, though, it takes him months and months to get it performance-ready, simply because they're so incredibly challenging. He's done some pieces which are just unplayable, though he's getting better. Every new adaptation he does is the hardest one yet; at the same time, he's also constantly revisiting and revising his earlier ones, adding to the complexity as he becomes able to play them.
He's excited about the Elliot Smith project. He laid down the tracks this summer and the disc should be out in the spring. He still loves Radiohead and will do new tracks if they grab him, but he thinks he won't release a third album of Radiohead tracks. He's been working with whatever interests him, which currently includes Tears For Fears, Nick Drake, George Harrison, Cocteau Twins, R.E.M. (Yay!), and more.
Christopher spoke a bit about Radiohead's musical background. They're really all over the map. Thom Yorke doesn't read a note of music. Jonny Greenwood is well versed in classical music and served for a year as "Composer in Residence" at the BBC. Colin Greenwood's background is in jazz. Ed O'Brien's background is more in dub and electronica. So there's a wide range in there, and that all contributes to the strength of the band. O'Riley said that, as a pianist, the two things that he finds most important in music are harmony and texture. He thinks that it is the unique composition of Radiohead, with five very talented persons each contributing a thread under the vision of Yorke, that gives it such an interesting sense of texture without being arty.
All of these questions (and more that I don't recall) were asked by individuals between the ages of 18 and 25. A grey-haired gentleman said, "Just to bring Shostakovich back into this, I found that the Radiohead pieces you played seemed very bright, while I think of Shostakovich as a very harsh composer. And yet, when you put these together, they sounded great together. Why do you think that is?" O'Riley said that he believes one thing both composers have in common is a certain sense of distance. With Radiohead, Yorke always has a strong sense of ironic detachment. The lyrics aren't a part of this performance, of course, but his lyrics tend to be in the form of conversations overheard, of sights seen far-off. For example, a song will tell the story of a broken-hearted love affair; but it won't be told from the perspective of the woman, it's from a person who's overhearing the woman talk about it on a bus. Likewise, because of the political conditions he was working under, Shostakovich had to use subtext and indirection to communicate his messages; O'Riley said Shostakovich was the first classical composer to use subtext in his music. This, he thinks is the trait they have in common, and it informs their music.
So, that was my Sunday evening. I got home pretty late, around 11, but it was certainly well worth it. I had high expectations going in and was pleased to have them met.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)