Screaming Headless Torsos - Live!
Screaming Headless Torsos - Live!
Videoarts Music/Discovery 1996 (Japan Only)
Fuzelicious Morsels 2001 (Reissue with exact same track listing except tracks 1 and 3 are swapped in order)
Personnel:
Dave "Fuze" Fiuczynski - fretted and fretless guitars
Deam Bowman - vox populi (vocals)
Fima Ephron - Bass
Gene Lake - drums
Daniel Sadownick - Percussion
Produced by Fuze and Chris Kelly
SHT are one of the most badass motherfunking bands you have never heard. Well, almost never. Their debut album from 1995 appeared initially to critical acclaim for its seemingly unorthodox blend of P-Funk groove, Zappa level anarchy, and King Crimson styled improvisations mixing the pathologically complex with atonal rampages and a beat section that could level whole city blocks to rubble in a few measures. Throw in a vocalist who was traversing blues growling with scatting and yodelling, and you had something definately off the beaten path. Hell, there was no path to be found.
Because of this, they were obviously destined for obscurity. No band this good gets big on its own, especially if it is clear its participants have absolutely no intention of deviating from their own program to cater to the masses.
I had initially picked them up because of their connection to another NY outfit, Lost Tribe, which was a jazz fusion powerhouse that brought the genre closer to its roots in experimentation and ballsy performance instead of soft-focus missing-a-pair elevator music. Fima Ephrom was doubling up in SHT and I had heard of JoJo and Fuze through their work on Lunar Crush with John Medeski of Medeski, Martin and Wood (yes, I know, they sound more like an accounting form than a jazz organ trio) and Fuze had also sessioned on the debut Me'Shell N'degeocello album.
I figured when no other material seemed forthcoming that the band had called it a day. Then a few years back I found the Japanese release of this album in a used bin for less than 20 bucks. I was completely floored. Here was a band that sounded quite good on a studio album but was damn frightening on stage. JoJo had given way to Gene Lake (also a long time Me'Shell alum and whose adherents include Carter Beauford of Dave Matthews Band), who had just the same level of technical aplomb but added a heft akin to switching from a Humvee to a Peterbilt. If you like really original music that grows on you over repeat listens, you must go buy this.
Here is a band that pokes fun of the music industry in songs like Vinnie , covers -with volcanic power- Miles Davis's Blue In Green and Jazz is the Teacher, Funk is the Preacher by James 'Blood' Ulmer, composes out-there funk jams about basketball star Darryl Dawkins (a player noted for his own eccentricities)* and does shift-on-a-dime alternating current freakdown on Kermes Macabre.
They have a barroom brawl beating of a rhythm section and Fuze revels in throwing curve balls almost every chance he gets; chugging wah-wah rhythm work gives in to gargantuan riffs and into jarring solos and delicate segues. Sadownick fills out the sound with a panoply of percussion noises, and Bowman just does what he does. He is arguably the most difficult to get but you eventually do get him (For those that don't like vocals, there is a instrumental version of this band that has released one album -also on Fuzelicious Morsels- called...surprisingly....The Headless Torsos).
You might like this if you like:
Parliament - Maggot Brain
Frank Zappa - Joe's Garage
Led Zeppelin - Physical Graffitti
Yohimbe Bros - Front End Lifter
Primus - Frizzle Fry
* Dawkins liked to blast into his slam dunks and destroy backboards, he named his dunks, and he claimed to be from the panet Lovetron but still has the NBA record for number of personal fouls. He was nicknamed Chocolate Thunder. beats the hell out of me...I like Soccer anyway.
Videoarts Music/Discovery 1996 (Japan Only)
Fuzelicious Morsels 2001 (Reissue with exact same track listing except tracks 1 and 3 are swapped in order)
Personnel:
Dave "Fuze" Fiuczynski - fretted and fretless guitars
Deam Bowman - vox populi (vocals)
Fima Ephron - Bass
Gene Lake - drums
Daniel Sadownick - Percussion
Produced by Fuze and Chris Kelly
SHT are one of the most badass motherfunking bands you have never heard. Well, almost never. Their debut album from 1995 appeared initially to critical acclaim for its seemingly unorthodox blend of P-Funk groove, Zappa level anarchy, and King Crimson styled improvisations mixing the pathologically complex with atonal rampages and a beat section that could level whole city blocks to rubble in a few measures. Throw in a vocalist who was traversing blues growling with scatting and yodelling, and you had something definately off the beaten path. Hell, there was no path to be found.
Because of this, they were obviously destined for obscurity. No band this good gets big on its own, especially if it is clear its participants have absolutely no intention of deviating from their own program to cater to the masses.
I had initially picked them up because of their connection to another NY outfit, Lost Tribe, which was a jazz fusion powerhouse that brought the genre closer to its roots in experimentation and ballsy performance instead of soft-focus missing-a-pair elevator music. Fima Ephrom was doubling up in SHT and I had heard of JoJo and Fuze through their work on Lunar Crush with John Medeski of Medeski, Martin and Wood (yes, I know, they sound more like an accounting form than a jazz organ trio) and Fuze had also sessioned on the debut Me'Shell N'degeocello album.
I figured when no other material seemed forthcoming that the band had called it a day. Then a few years back I found the Japanese release of this album in a used bin for less than 20 bucks. I was completely floored. Here was a band that sounded quite good on a studio album but was damn frightening on stage. JoJo had given way to Gene Lake (also a long time Me'Shell alum and whose adherents include Carter Beauford of Dave Matthews Band), who had just the same level of technical aplomb but added a heft akin to switching from a Humvee to a Peterbilt. If you like really original music that grows on you over repeat listens, you must go buy this.
Here is a band that pokes fun of the music industry in songs like Vinnie , covers -with volcanic power- Miles Davis's Blue In Green and Jazz is the Teacher, Funk is the Preacher by James 'Blood' Ulmer, composes out-there funk jams about basketball star Darryl Dawkins (a player noted for his own eccentricities)* and does shift-on-a-dime alternating current freakdown on Kermes Macabre.
They have a barroom brawl beating of a rhythm section and Fuze revels in throwing curve balls almost every chance he gets; chugging wah-wah rhythm work gives in to gargantuan riffs and into jarring solos and delicate segues. Sadownick fills out the sound with a panoply of percussion noises, and Bowman just does what he does. He is arguably the most difficult to get but you eventually do get him (For those that don't like vocals, there is a instrumental version of this band that has released one album -also on Fuzelicious Morsels- called...surprisingly....The Headless Torsos).
You might like this if you like:
Parliament - Maggot Brain
Frank Zappa - Joe's Garage
Led Zeppelin - Physical Graffitti
Yohimbe Bros - Front End Lifter
Primus - Frizzle Fry
* Dawkins liked to blast into his slam dunks and destroy backboards, he named his dunks, and he claimed to be from the panet Lovetron but still has the NBA record for number of personal fouls. He was nicknamed Chocolate Thunder. beats the hell out of me...I like Soccer anyway.
posted by theloniusfunk at 8:30 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home