Wimps

If there’s one thing that I regret about the 13 Most Beautiful concert on the NZ International Arts Festival is that I wasn’t prepared for it. I don’t mean prepared on a “I read a bit about the concert and I know what it is about”. I mean on a “I know the universe around it quite well” way.

The 13 Most Beautiful is a concert prepared by the Kiwi Dean Wareham and his wife Britta Phillips. The band plays while Andy Warhol’s screen tests show on the background. Those amazing, black and white silent (and sometimes awkward in a way) screen tests, that Andy shot with a bunch of nice looking crazy people in The Factory on the 60’s.

It’s really had to have a opinion of the whole concept. The band was good (not awesome, but good enough) and the matching with the people on each screen test was probably the best part of it. Before each song Dean or Britta would give us a brief history of the person who was going to be on the next test, and that’s what helped me connect the ideas and enjoy it for a bit. And they made a nice job writing and choosing the write music to match to each of those 13 tests.

The screen tests are nothing more than a camera set on a persons face for around four minutes. After stare at the person’s face for a while you can’t help but wondering about their history, what they are thinking about and how their life was. And that is what was really beautiful. Legend tells that Andy Warhol shot more than 500 screen tests on The Factory, and I really would love to have a glance on some of the most famous ones (such as Dali’s and Bob Dylan’s).

I’ve got a mixed review from some friends that went to the concert. Some of them loved it, some of them were bored. On my vision the whole idea wasn’t more interesting because of my complete ignorance about Andy Warhol and the Pop Art universe. But I’m not sure that it would’ve been a awesome concert even if I knew all of that.

Since then, I’m trying to catch up with the movement and that’s where my regret is coming from. How all this cool stuff slipped through my radar for this long?

So I bought an amazing drum kit some months ago and, for many reasons, it is sitting on my bedroom inside its bags. This really drives me crazy. On the best “I neeeeeed something going on” fashion I decided to make some other trials and see how it goes.

At the moment I’m taking singing and theory/piano classes. It’s been a month now and I couldn’t have made a better choice. My mind is stretching and I’m starting to see things differently. My music taste used to be based on rhythmic stuff with elaborated drums. All of the sudden I’m starting to appreciate other stuff on music construction such as harmonies and melodies and a lot of stuff is starting to make sense on music construction and progression. I’m really happy with it but already can see the no-turning-back path that I’m walking to.

Apart from that I’ve doing a lot of reading on pop and contemporary music. That actually was one of the main reasons to get back to the theory studies. I hope to have something to share here soon.

A coisa é infindável e é por isso que eu a amo.

Esse fim de semana pela primeira vez tive oportunidade de ver coisas que eu nunca tinha ouvido nem visto ao vivo. Só nos discos e shows. Vi Big Band de Jazz de Nova York. Vi bluezistas com toda aquela pinta fodona. Vi cubano tocando Afro-Cuban Jazz a torto e qualquer direito. Vi gente cantando com uma voz que nunca tinha visto. Vi quinze músicos no palco dos mais variados países tocando o verdadeiro free-style jazz. Tive a oportunidade de sentar numa roda de Jazz com metalera, contra-baixo e bateria e ficar até de manhã ouvindo um monte de gente falando com sotaque de New Orleans e trocando as mais maravilhosas idéias com seus instrumentos, sem nenhuma sofisticação comercial.

É lá que eu quero chegar.

Eu tenho saudade porque músico bom é músico inteligente o suficiente pra fuder com gente burra. Tudo bem quem não é difícil. Mas ter peito pra fazer isso com a imprenssa imprensa, sem medo, é outra história.

E porque acabou, afinal?

Que me desculpem os adaptos do tal do samba, que tentando virar jazz vira bossa-jazz. E me desculpe os sambistas que gostam dos sambas comerciais, que acabam virando pagode. Podem falar o que quiser, mas cara de Brasil mesmo é Frevo. Até quando o troço é enjazzado dá vontade de sair pulando por aí.

Caramba, como isso é bom!

E quando mistura com Xote, com Sivuca e com Clara Nunes, dá nisso:

Love Brasil Profundo! Me divertindo horrores!

Há muito tempo eu não tinha essa vontade de “Cancela tudo que hoje eu fico em casa conhecendo música!”. Cinematic Orchestra, Esbjörn Svensson Trio e Bach tão me prendendo fazendo querer resolver tudo horrores pra ficar quietinhos, por conta deles!

Eu quero ser amigo do André Abujamra, do Dave Grohl e do Jack Black, não necessariamente nessa ordem.