From: owner-trajectory-digest@smoe.org (trajectory-digest) To: trajectory-digest@smoe.org Subject: trajectory-digest V1 #23 Reply-To: trajectory@smoe.org Sender: owner-trajectory-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-trajectory-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk trajectory-digest Monday, October 6 1997 Volume 01 : Number 023 Today's Subjects: ----------------- scrappy! [dee zed stroke zero one five ] scrappy bitches do noho [meredith ] valley advocate article [meredith ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 5 Oct 1997 21:30:21 -0400 From: dee zed stroke zero one five Subject: scrappy! tuesday night was actually the second scrappy show night in a row for meredith and me. she already posted about the monday night show at the mercury lounge in nyc, so i guess i'll give y'all the rundown on the tuesday night shindig. foolish humans that we are (not that there's anything wrong with that), we drove up to northampton, massachusetts to see their show at the iron horse. it was a long night (longest for me -- i got home at 3am!), but (as i said) i'm foolish and like doing this kind of stuff. after the lil'scrappy skit, kinnie starr started the show. having skipped her set the night before, i was pretty curious about what she'd be like. turned out to be pretty good. i'd picked up her album, _tidy_, last week so i knew what to expect -- a mix of electric guitar song-writer type stuff, spoken word and a wee bit o'rap -- but i wasn't sure how well it would map to a one-woman performance. turns out to work well live, especially the spoken word stuff. a sorta hybrid between maggie estep and ani difranco, with all the implications that entails, if that helps people to place kinnie on the musical map. liked her live stuff enough to want to go back to the record, so i guess it worked well enough. veda was up next and she was brilliant. a mostly-different set from the night before -- only two songs in common ("slumber queen" and "bellyfishing" if i remember correctly). she played the group of seven song - -- the piano part of which is just plain heartacheingly gorgeous -- from the emily carr cycle. it was the first night on the tour she played on a real piano (the iron horse's steinway, or "cadillac" as she called it), so she was having lots of fun. it's really amazing to watch her play because her songs are so effortless, so beautiful, so lyrical. her music is really something special. oh susanna finished up this evening. i imagine that i'll be losing ecto-cred by saying so, but i liked her set too. her doom and gloom country folk may not be an appropriate closer and her guitar skills may be lacking but, for some reason, i like what she does. the combination of her powerful voice and stark, simple guitar playing gets under my skin. plus, i have to admire someone who has the gall to follow kinnie and veda, knowing full well that most of the people she is playing to are not going to react favorably and not giving a flying fuck. eat your heart out johnny rotten -- oh susanna is way more punk than thou! woj ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 05 Oct 1997 22:11:21 -0400 From: meredith Subject: scrappy bitches do noho Hi! I have a few things to add to woj's description of the Iron Horse show. Kinnie Starr was entertaining, but I don't think I'll feel the need to see her again. She was funny, but came across as quite immature. She was a hit with the (sparse) crowd, though. Warmed 'em up nicely for Veda. >veda was up next and she was brilliant. a mostly-different set from the >night before -- only two songs in common ("slumber queen" and >"bellyfishing" if i remember correctly). Yep -- the set consisted of, in no particular order, "Slumber Queen", "Sweet", "Seasoned", "Song For Snake", "26 Years", "Driven", "Bellyfish", and "The Group of Seven". I'm thinking she did "One Hot Summer" again too, but I can't remember exactly. (She told me afterwards that she had deliberately planned a set with minimal overlap from the previous evening because she knew we would be there again, and I think I almost believe her. :) >it's really amazing to watch her play because >her songs are so effortless, so beautiful, so lyrical. her music is really >something special. Amen. She definitely got the biggest applause of the night, too. I wouldn't be surprised to see her with a gig of her own at the Iron Horse soon -- she said she wants to work something out for when she's back this way in November. I know the owner was totally besotted with her music before she even got into town, and seeing her live will definitely finish off even the most cynical of listeners, so I'm keeping my eye on their calendar. >oh susanna finished up this evening. i imagine that i'll be losing >ecto-cred by saying so, but i liked her set too. her doom and gloom country >folk may not be an appropriate closer and her guitar skills may be lacking >but, for some reason, i like what she does. Okay, whatever. I was glad she came on after Veda, because otherwise there wouldn't have been much of an audience left. (She got to go last that night in honor of the fact that she was born in Northampton, whee.) I still maintain that the only thing she's got going for her is her voice. All in all, Veda's incredible performances made the whole ordeal well worth the trips. Which is what I put in the scrapbook. :) Oh yeah, and I did buy the t-shirt. It's pretty cool. While I'm here, thanks to Kat for forwarding that Ottawa Sun story! I found a story in the Valley Advocate, the free arts/entertainment/alternative newsweekly in the Northampton area. I'll post it here after I'm done with this. Jeff posted: > Am I posting to the correct address?...let me know... Yep. :) > Hi Meredith: I was in the audience last night as well... Sorry we missed you! We need nametags or something. "Hi. I'm an Internet Geek." ;> > "Pause" *IS* the song about the birds, isn't it? Which means the > other one is ? I thought the song about the birds is "She Found Birds", or something, but I'm totally blanking on what the other song she played was about, because my ears are currently filled with the achingly beautiful sounds of Loreena McKennitt's latest album. Help me out here -- there was the birds song, then what was the other one? Argh! > Cannot express enough how fucking raw and edgy "bellyfish" came out at > the end of veda's set! It literally clawed at you...jangly and > jarring and wacked with the just-offness of veda vs. susanna's vocals. I thought it worked much better at The Iron Horse, actually -- at the Mercury Lounge, I thought that song was the one thing that didn't quite do it for me. In Noho Kinnie Starr did some interesting things with her backing vocals that did the trick, and caused me to react pretty much the way you did. > Really the highlight of the evening for me. I'd been aching for her > to get back on the guitar, since she'd spent a LOT of time down at the > low end of the keyboard (which was wonderful, but it left me feeling > awfully dark and low) That's why Oh Susanna was there "to cheer you up". ;> > My one gripe was the sound problem--when she started my Big Fave > "strange, sad" there was some serious short-in-the-mic-somewhere. They > accomodated for it eventually, but it kind of spoiled the mood, > y'know? Yep. Fortunately, the sound was great at the Iron Horse -- and Veda had a Steinway, which she was really excited about. She remarked that she had an urge to run her scales for us, but decided to refrain. :) > Was reminded of having seen Holly Cole have similar problems > once (at Fez, a place I would LOVE veda to play) Yes! Fez would be perfect. (Hmmm... I actually don't think that's out of the realm of possibility. Susan McKeown, who routinely sells out multiple-night engagements at Fez is a big fan of Veda's, and I could see Veda opening for her. That would be amazing.) > Agree nearly completely with your assessment of Oh Susanna's set--does > she ever play with a band? Yes -- apparently they're pretty country-twangy. I'd imagine they'd be much better than her solo. Michael confirmed: >You certainly did! Argh! I knew we should've stuck around! The encore in Noho was a Rolling Stones song, and while it was good, it wasn't nearly as fun as the pastiche thing from the previous night. >the "Saviour Bitch" (Veda referred to herself as the "Filler Bitch") to >do a poem while she tuned her guitar -- Veda did that poem about "My >Man" and made it sound completely extemporaneous, while drinking >Kinnie's scotch. I'm *really* sorry I missed that. That's such a powerful piece. >since he left the company almost immediately after that, and moved to >North Carolina, where he now manufactures theremins (if you don't know >what a theremin is, think "Good Vibrations" or Lothar and the Hand >People). Theremins! Wow. Have you heard of Clara, um, what's her name, she was profiled in the Theremin documentary. Strathmore? Something like that (sorry, blanking again). She's supposedly the best theremin player ever. I've heard a bit of one of her performances, and it's really, really cool what she can make one of those things do. >Dot had to go to statistics class, so I invited Bob to >accompany me to the Merc. I _knew_ he would be impressed by Veda, and >sure enough he was! That is just *too* cool. :) >What was even more impressive was Veda's reaction when I introduced them >-- she gasped, threw her arms around his neck and gave him a big hug, >prattling on about how she _loved_ the Theremin movie (by the "other" >Steve Martin, and featuring Bob) and that she used a musical saw on >"Sweet" because she couldn't get a theremin, and that she was getting >more into electronics these days... I was just glowing. Y'know, I'd been wondering about that saw sound in "Sweet", because my first thought was that she'd managed to find a theremin. Now we know. :) >That is one of my greatest pleasures in life -- >introducing people I know to the wonderful artists like Veda It's one of the greatest pleasures in my life, too. It's almost like religion. Kat posted: >Oh Susanna is just soo... bleh... like a depressed and suicidal untalented >Gillian Welch. You mean Gillian Welch isn't depressed and suicidal herself? >What I like most about Kinnie Star is that she does poetry in a good way.... >Her spoken word stuff is by far my favorite and I like the fact that she >likes to get into the middle of a crowd to do it. She also comes across as >unpretentious which I really like. I agree about the unpretentious comment, but I also think she crossed over into immature a bit in Noho. She was wearing a dress, which apparently happens about as often as Ani wearing a dress, and she couldn't stop whining about it. It was funny to start with, but got old real quick. (I was amused to note that she changed into camouflage pants and combat boots the minute her set was over. :) >reminiscent in the sense that ani's attitude is now about how much she hates >her fans? oh, but I digress. I'm not going to go into it here, but I am going to reply that I don't think that's her whole attitude now at all. (Speaking as someone who has pretty much decided not to go to any more Ani shows because of the very type of over-the-top, totally disrespectful fans that Ani has been speaking about lately...) +==========================================================================+ | Meredith Tarr meth@smoe.org | | Boonton, NJ USA http://www.smoe.org/~meth | +==========================================================================+ | "things are more beautiful when they're obscure" -- veda hille | |***TRAJECTORY, the Veda Hille mailing list: trajectory-request@smoe.org***| +==========================================================================+ ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 05 Oct 1997 22:16:40 -0400 From: meredith Subject: valley advocate article Hi! As promised, here is the article from the 9/25/97 edition of the Valley Advocate weekly newspaper, published in the Springfield/Northampton, MA area. I read it and go, "huh?", but here it is anyway... AFTER THE RIOT Scrappy Bitch Tour: hipper than Lilith Fair and full of fighting spirit By Michael Strohl Speaking about the status of riot grrrl in last year's anthology _Angry Women In Rock_, K Records co-owner Candice Pederson said: "Actually, maybe what happens after a riot is what's most important to look at. Because a riot blows everything up -- but who's there picking up all the pieces?" Indeed, Pederson's comment cuts right to the heart of the current debate surrounding music made by women in today's girl-friendly pop milieu. While Meredith Brooks' summer hit "Bitch" proved that the revolution will be commodified, today's pop landscape is richer than ever with scrappy young women breaking through cages of convention, pushing past the limits of proscribed femininity and finding new possibilities in riot grrrl's model of rowdy feminism. There's Sleater-Kinney singing about musical and actual agency, carving out a sound as awesome and overwhelming as the desire it seeks to map; Helium's Mary Timony musing "Do you see your outline in the sky", her mammoth desire clearing away inner vistas as vast and unfathomable as the universe itself; Juliana Hatfield tapping into the monstrous force that is rock'n'roll to free the wild woman within, reveling in its ability to transform, make her want to go and fuck shit up. Despite its name, the Scrappy Bitch Tour, which comes to the Iron Horse Music Hall next Tuesday, has little to do with fucking shit up or getting rowdy. It's not about liberation through noise. Indebted to the huge success of this past summer's Lilith Fair, which laid claim to no other agenda than the celebration of women's voices, Scrappy Bitch promises to be more of a forum for sharing stories and trading thoughts, a dialogue between artist and audience mediated by songs. Ultimately, it's how a defiant spirit can reside in even the most familiar sounds. Of course, while there are obvious similarities between this tour and Lilith -- it's emphasis on the singer-songwriter style, for one -- the artists who will be performing as part of Scrappy Bitch are quick to point out that their tour is not simply a little sister version of Sarah McLachlan's festival: "The name is not a direct critique of Lilith, but how it was marketed," said Veda Hille, speaking via telephone from Toronto. "It was very flowery and airy. That's not what I identify with as a woman." "It was kind of a joke to be so over-the-top with the name," added Suzie Ungerlieder, who performs as Oh Susanna. "We wanted to wear our bitchiness on our sleeves, exploit the way people always calling strong women bitches. So there is a kind of tongue-in-cheek political statement to the name as well." Featuring Canadians Hille, Oh Susanna and Kinnie Starr, the idea for the tour "came out of the ether," Ungerlieder explained. "We heard a rumor that we were going to tour together, so we decided to make it come true." Asked if they were happy with the line-up, Hille responded: "I think we have a complete and diverse bill. We all have totally different tastes and totally different styles, but I think what links us is strong lyrics. We're all very serious about that." They're also linked by Canada's strong tradition of singer-songwriters, which includes Joni Mitchell, Neal Young, Leonard Cohen, Jane Siberry and Hayden. Musically, Hille and Oh Susanna represent the folkiest edge of the singer-songwriter spectrum; one can detect elements of Ani DiFranco, Tori Amos and Siberry in Hille, while Ungerlieder cultivates a new-country twang. Starr is the most sonically and lyrically inventive of the three, conjuring PJ Harvey as a poetry slammer backed by hip-hop beats and spacey ambient effects. "Canada is more spacious, and I think you can hear that in the music," Starr pointed out, explaining why the land seems to breed such talented songsmiths. "The people who are quintessentially Canadian have found a way to embody the landscape." When the name of another famous Canadian singer-songwriter comes up, the three use it as an opportunity to exchange their divergent views on the current status of women in the industry. "There's always been women making art at an underground level," Hille argued. "It's just that now the industry realizes that they can sell records. As far as making headway and gaining power, I just don't think there is any political weight to what has transpired." And what about that aforementioned artist? "I have respect for Alanis," said Ungerlieder. "Whether or not her music appeals to me, I've heard that she's very funny and down to earth. And I think that she is perceived as a hero to younger girls. Her aim was to make a mainstream album, and while the sexual politics are not necessarily great, I think that girls are getting a good example of someone who has an independent attitude, someone who's saying 'fuck you'." (The Scrappy Bitch Tour, featuring Oh Susann, Veda Hille and Kinnie Starr, comes to the Iron Horse on Sept. 30.) [Photo --> One Scrappy Bitch: Canada's Kinnie Starr] +==========================================================================+ | Meredith Tarr meth@smoe.org | | Boonton, NJ USA http://www.smoe.org/~meth | +==========================================================================+ | "things are more beautiful when they're obscure" -- veda hille | |***TRAJECTORY, the Veda Hille mailing list: trajectory-request@smoe.org***| +==========================================================================+ ------------------------------ End of trajectory-digest V1 #23 *******************************