Search This Blog

Saturday 13 September 2014

Apres Le Guerra

I went to a gig last night that managed to be both very good and a bit disappointing at the same time. Billed as a "performance" John Cale and Liam Young, the gimmick was the use of drones (the flying ones) as part of the act.

All the advance billing went on about it being an "experiment in sound" and that sort of thing, so we went along expecting the drones to be an integral part of the performance, transmitting or distorting the sound in some way. In fact they were just for decorative purposes. John Cale and his band played a normal set while the drones drifted prettily but irrelevantly overhead.

That said, judging it purely as a normal gig, it was great. I don't think Mr Cale is capable of being anything other than interesting, and he certainly delivered his part of the evening's entertainment, a 15 minutes long Hi-NRG version of "Sister Ray" being a particular highlight.

Having got that off my chest, let's turn to today's music. It comes from the Dominican Republic, courtesy of Juan Luis Guerra. Very jolly it is too.

"La Bilirrubina" - Juan Luis Guerra y 440

"
El Costo De La Vida" - Juan Luis Guerra y 440

As it happens, Mr Guerra can also teach John Cale a thing or two about how to integrate modern forms of transportation into your live act effectively.


No comments:

Post a Comment