Concert For Japan Benefits w/ Yoko Ono, Lou Reed & More (March/2011)

An astonishing couple of days that I’m still in total disbelief that even happened let alone twice and the fact that I got to attend both is nothing short of a miracle so I am so grateful for. Sad for the reasons behind the events but something wonderful truly came out of it.

Concert for Japan w/ John Zorn, Mike Patton, Sonic Youth and the return of Cibo Matto & more –
Miller Theater at Columbia University – March 27th – New York, NY

This was an event that was put together in just a matter of days and look at what these amazing people were able to accomplish in that short amount of  time. Sadly, what necessitated the event, Tohoku, the devastating earthquake & tsunami that devastated Japan a few days earlier, what heartbreaking and tragic, however after hearing of this benefit concert I couldn’t have been more excited and it was for such a great cause, and inspiring how quickly they took action.
It was organized by the legendary saxophonist and composer John Zorn, who has lived and performed in Japan and for decades has collaborated with, promoted and released albums by Japanese musicians.
The program, rounded out by Yoko Ono and Sonic Youth, reaffirmed longstanding ties between what were (in the 1970s and ’80s) known as New York’s downtown improvisers and their Japanese counterparts and co-conspirators. Sold out in two hours, the concert was also broadcast on Japanese television and to Columbia students. It raised $34,000 for Japan Society’s Earthquake Relief Fund.

The musicians have stationed themselves where genres blur: noise, jazz, rock, funk, electronics. The program juxtaposed straightforward songs with open-ended improvisations. And, from Sonic Youth, an amalgam of both, as terse, punky verses dissolved into scrabbling, squalling, ringing guitar passages, cataclysmic and monumental.

The show fittingly started with Zorn and a trumpet player, introducing the event and playing an incredible but brief set. That’s what made this so cool, was their were no egos, no silly headliners or bullshit, just great music for a great cause, each playing brief sets. It was amazing to see not only the camaraderie between them all, but you could detect long establishing relationships, personally, professionally, musically, etc.
So much so that alot of the acts were very incestuous, using each other’s members, or whoever was available to get this done.

Next up was something that outside of the reasons we were all here, was something I had completely different (and admittedly selfish) reasons for being so excited for – the return of Cibo Matto.
One of favorite bands of the last 15 years and perhaps ever, who broke up over 10 years ago, and I never got a chance to see them.
I have been fortunate to see their two core members Miho Hatori and Yuka Honda perform separately in different projects (of course never breaching the Matto catalog) and it was kinda understood that their was some bitterness that would prevent them from ever reforming as Cibo Matto. Their was so hope on the horizon however last Fall, when for Honda’s 50th birthday they played a brief set at a private party. So when something this tragic happens, it puts things into perspective of what truly matters. Motivated by the cause and surely wanted to represent Japan as they are both Japanese obviously and having just played together a few months prior, the choice to play publicly though for the first time in over 10 years was an easy choice I’m sure. And boy was I happy they did.

Though the set was only three songs, it was three songs more than I had ever seen live, and I had been waiting soooo long for this.

Setlist:

Birthday Cake
Le Pain Perdu
Aguas de Marco

They were keeping it tight at this place, as their was a strict understanding of no pictures/cell-phones, that when I went to move my phone from one pocket to the other for comfort reasons, their were two ushers on me like stink on shit, really intense.

Up next was Mephista — Sylvie Courvoisier on piano, Susie Ibarra on drums and Ikue Mori on laptop (who’s in a legendary band with Mike Patton and John Zorn called Hemophiliac) — played the concert’s most abstract set. Their intent improvisations had  Courvoisier plucking inside the piano when she wasn’t’t riffling impressionistic chords and ostinatos against the whistles, clanks, rustles and crackles from Ibarra and Mori. Their pieces had a moment-by-moment suspense; each plunk counted.

Speaking of Patton (and if you know anything about me, I’m totally one of those Patton is God dudes haha)  was backed by the redoubtable pianist Uri Caine in old Italian pop tunes — sung with tongue-in-cheek melodrama — like those on Patton’s 2010 album, Mondo Cane. Caine’s opening solo took Honeysuckle Rose through kaleidoscopic transformations, from ragtime to free-jazz clusters.

The guitarist Marc Ribot accompanied Akiko Yano, one of Japan’s best-known rock and jazz singers. With Yano on piano, they performed a playfully splintered version of the Gershwins’ Our Love Is Here to Stay. But their second song was serious: Funamachi (Waiting for the Ship), which is based on a folk song from the region of Japan hit hardest by the tsunami. It had a sea-chantey-like drive and a chorus that was a fervent exhortation: to persevere.

Probably the act people seemed to be most familiar with (besides Yoko Ono of course) were NYC noise legends Sonic Youth. One of my all-time favorite bands, and again I know what we were here for, and I’ve seen this band all over the world, but their is just something about seeing them in NYC that is always so special.

Setlist:

The Sprawl (Daydream Nation)
The World Looks Red (Confusion is Sex)
Hey Joni (Daydream Nation)
Shaking Hell (Confusion is Sex)

Zorn returned,  and unexpectedly, gave one of the concert’s least noisy performances. His Aleph Trio — with Trevor Dunn (from Mr. Bungle) on bass and Kenny Wollesen on drums — delivered a Latin-flavored, two-chord vamp as Zorn revealed his melodic side: bluesy, agile, genial, dramatic and thoroughly swinging.

If their was a headliner, it would be the final act Yoko Ono, and whatever your opinions of her might be, it did feel appropriate. I don’t necessarily have a negative preconception of her and if fact think its pretty cool that at her age she is still getting up there and doing it.
However the results are certainly left up to interpretation.

Starting with this totally weird song, seemingly called It Happened, I was a bit put off as it seemed the first thing out of her mouth was not the current tragedy and why we are all here, but the tragedy she is known for, the death of John Lennon. Think about it, everything you have ever heard or seen her do as long as you have been alive, all seems to stem from that and her perpetuation of it is what defines her and her in her first song, was she really recounting the death of John Lennon? here?? – I don’t know, it was totally weird. She was flashing peace signs as she entered and exited.
Seemingly fragile at first, she was anything but as she strutted across the stage and turned into an electronically looped banshee, and was in a world totally only known to her.