Timing is everything, according to John Medeski
Sunday, August 12th, 2007
There’s an awful lot of cynicism floating around the music business these days. As the labels are taking their customers to court, the fans laugh it off and keep looking for the “next big thing.” Meanwhile, radio discovers that next big thing and proceeds to feed us countless variants on it. Strangely enough, artists who are hot one day can find themselves orphaned the next. It’s enough to make a person wonder: Does anybody care about music anymore?
To be fair, I’m not so cynical to actually think that the music industry is devoid of music lovers (that’s why the indie world exists). Just the same, it was nothing short of refreshing to speak to Medeski, Martin, & Wood keyboardist John Medeski about this issue. In the middle of our discussion we hit on the idea that certain technical elements in a recording, say, the use of turntables, can result in drawing fans who may not normally listen to jazz or any kind of instrumental music.
John Medeski: That’s one of the things that’s important to us, definitely, that we can be a bridge to other music. It’s great.
You need something like that. That’s one of my beefs with the people who want to keep jazz in a certain time period, you know? Stylistically. Especially rhythmically, because rhythm is time and rhythm represents time. It’s a delineation of time and also it relates time. That’s why my parents can’t listen to any rock and roll. They say it all sounds the same.
Any style can sound the same. It has to do with rhythm. If you don’t feel the rhythm. If you can’t get into it. If it doesn’t enter your body and you [don’t] have a relationship with it, then it’s hard to hear what’s going on. And I think that people relate to the rhythm that they grew up with in their time…unless they can break out of that, it’s sort of difficult to get into anything that is good.
Amplifier: That’s right. There are some people who listen to music in high school and on into college, and then they become “adults” and stop listening.
JM: That’s why this country is fucked [laughs]…plain and simple [more laughs]. Music has been around before language…before anything, people have been making music.
Now there’s a man who truly cares about music. If you’d like some aural proof, Medeski Martin & Wood’s End Of The World Party (Just In Case) is the place to go. Dust Brother John King (Beck, Beastie Boys) was brought in as producer and, as a team, they have managed to bring forth music that shines a light on both Medeski Martin & Wood’s beginnings (a jazz trio of sorts with piano, Chris Wood on bass and Billy Marin on drums) and their eclecticism (funks, blues, soul, skronk).
Packed with deep grooves, End Of The World Party’s funk is sprinkled liberally with “modern” elements: the spooky wordless vocal samples used on opener “Anonymous Skulls” and the ominous title track, the heavily processed and reverb-drenched mellotron popping up during “Bloody Oil” and the groove-as-soundscape of “Ice.” Maximum ass shaking is achieved during “Sasa,” a bluesy workout featuring guests Marc Ribot on guitar and Steven Bernstein (Sex Mob) on slide trumpet. Perhaps the best example of MM&W’s extensive range is the track “Reflector,” which starts off building a Headhunters-style groove with Ribot tossing in noirish guitar licks; shortly following, a break teeming with African vocals; before the finish, some Latin piano that wouldn’t be out of place on an Eddie Palmieri record. After hearing that tune, one begins to wonder if MM&W hadn’t found their “perfect” producer.
A: Very often an artist can tell when a producer has “big ears.”JM: Yeah…oh he [John King] does, and you know he really spent a lot of time listening to everything we did…being very thorough. He really got inside our music, and went and did his own thing with it. What was amazing was that he really…we expected..I don’t know…I expected something more drastically looped and, you know…sort of whatever it is that they do. And it is in some ways, but John ended up really getting inside what we do; and finding his relationship to our music.
Finding a relationship to the music. Now if that’s not an antidote to music industry cynicism, I don’t know what is.
Originally published in December, 2004. Copyright © 2004 Amplifier Magazine. All rights reserved.