19
Dec
2007
Kim
Wiseman & Mark A. Johnson, Visiting
Old Friends at Christmas
If your Mondays are anything like ours here at the River Cities' Reader, they're probably not the cheeriest days of the week. But I think I can speak for everyone here in saying that the next couple of 'em might not be so bad. Work on Monday, December 24, and then - blam! Day off, baby! Work on Monday, December 31, and then - blam! Really lethargic and cranky day off, baby!
The
Chicago Afrobeat Project could not have a more plainly descriptive
name, yet the band's new CD transcends the ordinary. The group,
which returns to the Quad Cities with a show on Friday at the
Redstone Room, does its fair share of aimless jamming - all
pleasant - but on several occasions it reaches highs that lift up
the whole endeavor.
It's
1927, the jazz age, with poet Carl Sandburg toting a funny little
guitar and strumming carelessly to the old tunes: "Whisky Johnny,"
"Where O Where Is Old Elijah?" The Galesburger/Chicagoan
published his wildly popular American
Song Bag with 280 songs
from sailors, cowboys, railroad hands, pioneers, prisoners, and
preachers. Sandburg, motivated by
The People, Yes, finds
democratic merit in these common songs.
In every concert performed by Rockapella, the a cappella quintet that first garnered fame with its appearances (and title-song crooning) on PBS's long-running children's game show Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?, a segment is devoted to a solo by the group's vocal percussionist, Jeff Thacher.
When
you look at publicity photos of the band on its Web site and
elsewhere, stereotypes about hippies come to mind. There are rural
settings, and some long hair, and some naughty bits - yes, a pair
of breasts, pubic hair, and even a penis or two.
Describing the music that he's spent more than half of his 38 years learning to master, blues guitarist Nick Moss states, "There's a lot of nuance that people don't realize," and underscores his point with an unusual - but apt - analogy.
Listening
to Will Destroy You,
Driver of the Year's release from earlier this year, the first
thing that popped into my head was Flight of the Conchords, the
comedy folk duo from New Zealand that scored an HBO series on which
the band's fan base never grew much larger than one.
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