Venue: Klub Cankarjevega Doma / Ljubljana / Slovenia
Concert date: November 22, 2006
Attendance: 30
Ticket price: 3,500.00 SIT
“A squid eating dough in a polyethylen bag is fast and bulbous, got me?!” Those were the words that carried us into an almost two-hour, half-frenzied musical revelation last Thursday, courtesy of Fast N’ Bulbous, a band that draws straight from the incredibly rich and surely one-of-a-kind musical treasure trove of all time, the treasure trove of the eclectic Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band!
Fast N’ Bulbous and The Magic Band are the only two groups keeping the music of that eccentric genius, Captain Beefheart, a.k.a. Don Van Vliet, alive on stage and not just on record. And those albums, especially the ones from the first half of the ’70s that came out on Reprise, are extremely hard to track down and badly in need of remastering. Not long ago Virgin decided to do just that and reissued the albums released between 1974 and 1982 in sonically much improved versions.
Besides the music, the two bands also share guitarist Gary Lucas, who played on the last two studio albums by Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band (“Doc At The Radar Station”, 1980, and “Ice Cream For Crow”, 1982). The difference is that nearly all the members of The Magic Band were once part of the original Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band lineup. Not all at the same time, mind you, since the lineup changed often, but they carry on the band’s musical legacy, just without its central figure, Don Van Vliet, who has long since traded music for painting and is happily making art in the blissful seclusion of his home somewhere in the Mojave Desert. Fast N’ Bulbous, on the other hand, is basically a project of the aforementioned Lucas and saxophonist Phillip Johnston, who, with the help of their fellow musicians, brought a bit more jazz into the music and, in a way, made this very demanding and idiosyncratic music more appealing and accessible to a wider audience.
It was a pleasant evening in Klub Cankarjevega Doma. The club felt incredibly calm, and as it turned out later, they’d forgotten about the music, which only filled the room a few minutes before nine. The crowd matched the room, too: only about thirty people, but just right to fill every table.
Looking at the lit stage, the euphoria slowly started to build, and even more so when the melody of Albert Ayler’s Ghosts, played on sax, rang out clearly from backstage. That was followed by some indistinct chatter and laughter, which hinted that the band was in great spirits. And they were, because a few moments later they were already up on stage, ready to hand out some of that magic we normally know only from studio or live albums.
They kicked off with Pachuco Cadaver, from the unique avant-garde masterpiece “Trout Mask Replice” (1969), which was brilliantly played and of course drew a wave of enthusiasm and applause. It also set a high standard, which they admirably held to, or even surpassed, with everything that followed. Between songs there were a few words revealing something about the history of a particular tune or, even better, some anecdote about Captain Beefheart and his work habits, which among other things explained why his Magic Band was truly magical.
The rumors are well known: Don composed many of his pieces on the piano, which he wasn’t exactly great at playing, but he always had top-notch musicians around him who somehow turned those creative outpourings into the desired form. Usually the two guitarists would each focus on one of the two different melodies he was playing, one per hand, with all ten fingers! A tape recorder was also essential for every member of the band, so they could follow and record Don as he walked around the studio whistling melodies that could have been the soundtrack to that literary masterpiece, Ulysses.
Next came Abba Zaba, which officially appears on the debut album “Safe As Milk” (1967) and is considered something of an anomaly in the band’s catalog because it sounds almost normal. Well, normal as far as Beefheart goes, anyway! In its new “outfit” it blended in nicely with the rest, proving how masterfully Fast N’ Bulbous handled their job as arrangers.
After that, Lucas turned into an interpreter of Beefheart’s poetry. He tackled an untitled text from the album “Lick My Decals Off, Baby” (1970) with such fervor that he could have shared a literary evening with the late beatnik icon William S. Burroughs.
The full lineup returned to the stage and moved the music forward a few years, to 1978 to be exact, with an excellent rendition of When I See Mommy I Feel Like A Mummy from the album “Shiny Beast (Bat Chain Puller)”, which marked the captain’s return to top form. Before that album came out there were a few rough and unpleasant years, and some albums to match, which Fast N’ Bulbous wisely steered clear of.
Musically, the band kept moving through time throughout the whole show, in both directions. The two albums mentioned above got special attention, each marking one of the band’s many creative peaks in its own era: “Trout Mask Replica” and “Shiny Beast (Bat Chain Puller)”.
Then came a short break, when the musicians mingled with the audience and turned out to be incredibly down-to-earth, unpretentious and super approachable people. You could chat with Gary Lucas almost as if he were an old friend, totally relaxed and easygoing. He even received a gift, a portrait drawn during the show by a young artist, and thanked her with a kiss. Unbelievable and unforgettable, just like the whole show.
The second half also started with a song from “Trout Mask Replica”, When Big Joan Sets Up, a somewhat faster and quite jazzy version that at moments even recalled the music Archie Shepp was making in the mid-’60s. The songs that followed were charged with similar energy. There was time for poetry again in between, with Burroughs making a comeback, this time with a recitation of Hollow Smoke, which doesn’t appear on any album but was published in Conjuctions Magazine in 1982. One of the standout moments came with a masterful take on The Blimp, with Phillip Johnston on convincing, similarly hysterical vocals, just like on the original recording.
Throughout the show we got to know all the band members well, as they presented themselves as soloists, like bassist Jesse Krakow in A Carrot Is As Close As A Rabbit Gets To A Diamond. He had probably only just learned to walk when Beefheart was wrapping up his musical career, yet he carries these songs inside him as if they’d raised him! There was also the horn section alone with Dali’s Car, and of course the “Gary Lucas Trio”, guitar, bass and drums, who “wove” together a medley of two songs from “Clear Spot” (1972) and “Ice Cream For Crow” (1982). It’s obvious that equality and extraordinary dedication, both to the music and to the band, rule in this septet.
Slowly the program neared its end, and the closing song was supposed to be Kandy Korn, which appears on the album “Strictly Personal” (1968) as well as on the compilation “Mirror Man” (1970), but here it sounded like neither of them. Of course, an encore was a must, and it was in fact planned, as the original setlist shows. And they really did wrap up the night with Tropical Hot Dog Night, which, amazingly, came across as an almost perfectly decent honeymoon song! Fast N’ Bulbous Wedding Band?! Well, it was a fitting choice for a night that was anything but warm.
An incredible, unforgettable evening of music, which, if anything, only made us want it more: for Captain Beefheart himself to return to the stage one day. Until then, this band is doing a more than excellent job of keeping that priceless musical legacy alive and kicking. Well done.
Setlist
—Part 1—
01.Pachuco Cadaver
02.Abba Zaba
03.-poem- (Untitled)
04.When I See Mommy I Feel Like A Mummy
05.A Carrot Is As Close As A Rabbit Gets To A Diamond
06.Sugar ‘n’ Spikes
07.Click Clack
08.Evening Bell
09.Dali’s Car
10.Suction Prints
—Part 2—
11.When Big Joan Sets Up
12.When It Blows It Stacks
13.-poem- (Hollow Smoke)
14.The Blimp (mousetrapreplica)
15.Flavour Bud Living
16.Veteran Day Poppy
17.Blabber & Smoke
18.You Know You’re A Man
19.Kandy Korn
—Encore—
20.Tropical Hot Dog Night
Lineup:
Gary Lucas – Guitar
Phillip Johnston – Alto sax, arrangements
Richard Dworkin – Drums
Joseph Fiedler – Trombone, arrangements
Robert Henke – Trumpet
David Allen – Baritone sax
Jesse Krakow – Bass
