Stephen Moses of Alice Donut Interview

VP: How did you first become aware that you wanted to be a musician?

SM: I grew up in a musical family. Mostly brass. My father plays trombone, brother and uncle play trumpet. Dave Taylor (bass trombone extraordinaire) is my second cousin. Those that didn't play music made/make visual art. My father's dad played tuba, mother's dad played violin. Jazz on my father's side, classical on my mom's.

I sucked in school being somewhat dyslexic so basically, I had no choice.

I always played trombone but when I was 11 I told my folks I wanted to play drums, so they got me a guitar (not wanting to deal with the noise) but eventually they gave in and I got my first set when I was 14.

VP: So you where exposed to a lot of different music and art from and early age. Do you feel that it was natural for you to take musical experimentation as a given or where you interested in a more rooted approach?

SM: As a kid I started taking regular ol Trombone lessons, at the time I liked big band jazz, Blood Sweat and Tears & Chicago (the band) but soon after I was rocking out on drums with records & headphones (self taught).

I was also plagued with problems with my teeth: first losing the front 2 on a trampoline when I was around 11 (after years of getting them "straightened out") then when I was 18 and going to Berklee for trombone, I had my then newly capped teeth punched out by a passing stranger which also cut deep into my bottom lip. This severely fucked my trombone playing. Luckily I had the drums to maintain some semblance of sanity.

VP: Quite possibly the most bizarre reason for switching instruments I’ve ever heard! It seams to have worked out well in the end! So did you stay at Berklee or did you venture out on your own?

SM: I always wanted to play drums (and trombone) but the punch in the mouth helped seal the deal and I put the bone down for a few years.

I went to Berklee for 3 semesters and just kinda hung out there for the 4th, not enrolled in school. At that point my musical interests had little to do with what was going on there.

I had my drums set up in a rented space in an indoor garage near Berklee and I was jamming with my friend Peter Borno who introduced me to a lot of cool music. We played together for many years in NYC.

VP: How did you meet the members of Alice Donut?

SM: An ad in the Village Voice: "Rock band seeks drummer. We have gigs." Sounded good to me so I went. They liked me, I liked them. They had a band called The Seabeasts. I was in "Giant Metal Insects" but the gigs were too few. After my second audition I lit a bone when we were packing up. This may have helped them with their decision... The name Alice Donut came later.

VP: Your still with them to this day. Most bands don’t last two years, what’s the reason behind the longevity?

I guess it's cause we love what we're doing and care about each other. There are no big ego trips or drug issues to get in the way. We're like a family together and it's been that way from the start. We're supportive of each other and know our individual strengths and weaknesses and understand that we all have both.

VP: What bands are you into right now? What is keeping your interest in music alive?

SM: Sleepytime Gorilla Museum completely blows my mind. I listen to them all the time and continue to hear new stuff [in the music] that knocks me out.

I also listen to a lot of 60's + jazz... Miles, Trane etc.

My interest in music is still alive because I still haven't gotten it where I want it. I'm still reaching for it.

VP: I guess that’s always the goal, isn’t it. Trane himself always claimed to be searching for something. What’s in the future for you now?

SM: Alice Donut continues to write new stuff. Michael and Dave (the guitars) and I get together every week to play and write, while Tom and Sissi (singer and bass player) who live in N.C. do the same and mail ideas back 'n forth. That's how we wrote and recorded the last album Ten Glorious Animals.

I have a trio called Lambic Jones playing gigs around N.Y. (Percy Jones on bass)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N9QikJahe54

There’s one or two groups I play with once in a while and I'm working on my solo thing DRUMBONE. I do some gigs here and there and I've got a bunch of stuff "in the can" but it seems to be taking WAY longer than I'd hoped to finish the CD. Oh well.

Solar Skeletons

VP: The Solar Skeletons are a duo combination of RIPIT and TZII yet sounds completely different from your individual solo works. How has working together compiled this genre defying sound?

SS: We both have, for sure a different background: TZII, after drumming in his teenage years in a rock band, was more into the Free Tekno scene, while RIPIT started as a Black Metal guitarist then experimenting with cheap drum machines and FX. But both of us were playing different genres, with each time our personal touch, of course. We both met in the underground Parisian scene, where we both found a mutual accomplishment. Before establishing SOLAR SKELETONS, we did some collaboration, where our own styles had their places and functions: RIPIT banging beats and TZII laying down huge maps. We did tours together and on our USA one, in January 2006, at DC9, Washington DC, we performed together and found out a new way to do it: we wanted to start a project where we could play any genre of music we liked and further beyond. That's the prime idea about SOLAR SKELETONS, any genre, and any technique... but of course, you can still hear both of our personal touch in any of our recordings. As we know each other since a long time now, personally and musically, we are very fast to write music, as somehow we use the same language.

VP: You are both multi instrumentalists as well, applying bass, guitar, and trumpet to the Solar Skeleton Sounds. Do you find it easier to write music out before hand, or do you jam and experiment to work out your songs?

SS: Basically, Eric is playing the bass, trumpet, drums, percussions, synthesizers, and vocals; Nyko is playing guitars, synths, vocals, and both of us having also our noisy tools of our own.

We don't really have a proper technique of writing our music; the common point is that all happens in studio. For example there's the improvisation way, where we plug the gears we want to use in purpose to give a certain atmosphere to a track (all acoustic, all electronic or both); or the pre writing one, where there's a composition step before execution, but this composition is mainly talking and drawing of a time line. We record our part and there is, depending of the track, quiet a lot of post editing and mixing. So the whole process of composition is really a studio thing. And we also often collaborate with other musicians, or guesting them on some songs. We both don't really know how to write music on paper in the classical way, we prefer recording straight, which is faster as we skip a step. For the composition, it often happens like one of us as an idea, like a guitar riff or a synth sound, and the other one will come on top of it.

Our ideas also often comes from random discussions, where a vision of a track appears, like we would say "let's do a dubby track with the stuffs we recorded last time to test this gear", then both of us will think about it on his own and we will confront our thoughts after few days and start recording. But some other times, we will jam on stage and will come back in the studio trying to reproduce this jam (our at least its prime ideas) in order to construct it as several tracks.

So as you see, there are no rules or technique, everything is permitted and that's what is exalting in this project.

VP: Do you have a concept behind your album: “Scavengers Ov Beliefs”?

SS: "Scavengers Ov Belief" is a collection of 4 tracks exploring 4 facets of musical heaviness: from fast stoner with martial crooning, to bluesy sludge, from gospel black metal power noise, to synthetic drone core.

For this record, each songs can be taken as a musical concept: dedication to the soul-passing bird, the vulture, with some Sun worshipping blasphemy thru a heathen gospel telling the story of a disabused Christian who will turn his belief into Lucifer and will finally realize that none but the Sun has the power on us all. You can also find the French Magick sound: “La Baguette!” and also a Jarmusch's Dead Man reference, with a sample of Nobody himself: "stupid fuckin' white men!”

This LP is some kind of an absurd kaleidoscopic vision of humanity, in this sense it reflects the Solar Skeletons philosophy: we feed with the non-sense of human's beliefs and regurgitate it in an even more idiotic way.

VP: Do you believe humanity needs to be destroyed in order to be reborn?

SS: Well, not so simply (even if you can build beautiful things from ashes), the main problem with humanity is that most of people's beliefs are dead-ends! All obey the sun, if the sun explodes everything is finished, it's as simple as that!! So people should understand that they have to follow the sun archangels, the solar skeletons, if they want to be reborned. Otherwise they will be doomed to roam forever into the purulent ashes of their gone civilization.

VP: Is Music, Drugs, Love and/or Violence the new religion of the world and how can we gain enlightenment from this?

SS: These elements are double-sided... they can help to enlighten, but also can enblind your soul. They are all strong propaganda weapons. The mission of the Solar Skeletons is to use them as far as possible to enlighten human race until blindness, therefore they use those artifacts to establish the asservissement to the Law of the Sun. Human race is already a servant of this Law, but is too wrongly focused to other non-sense beliefs since too long.

VP: What would you like on your tombstone?

SS: We are sons of the big bang so our death should coincide with the end of our solar system!!! But there is billions of suns in the universe to establish new colonies and accomplish our crusade. So in some sense we are eternal.

Dig some tracks from the band and save your soul:

http://www.archive.org/download/SolarSkeletons-Necroethyl/SolarSkeletons-Necroethyl.zip

Andrew Barker

VP: When did you first pick up the drums and how did you become interested in Jazz as an art form?

AB: I got my first drum in 1981 when I was 10. My dad had a few Art Blakey records, and my Grandfather gave me some Buddy Rich and Gene Krupa records, so I was aware of it early on. But my first gigs were in church, and my dad taking me to fish frys to play with a local country band. Later I played in high school bands, and in rock and punk bands. But it was really from listening to records like Miles Davis' "Four and More" with Tony Williams, or any of the classic Coltrane quartet with Elvin Jones that really informed me of the possibilities of the drums, and seemed like a departure from the often corny elements of jazz that I had heard before. Hearing records by people like Sun Ra, Albert Ayler, or Art Ensemble of Chicago really opened my eyes to a new spectrum of music.

VP: Do you find that you’re free to apply elements of punk and rock style drumming into avant-garde jazz technique?

AB: Absolutely. We're all free to apply elements of any form into any music. Who's going to stop us? The music police? Wire magazine? Wynton Marsalis? But really, when people get trapped into tiny, carefully labeled music boxes...that's when the trouble starts. It's one thing to learn and appreciate traditional elements, but when the curiosity stops there, things can get boring. In fact, I don't like to present myself as a "jazz" drummer. I'm just as much of a county, rock, experimental, or metal drummer as I am a jazzer.

I've done recordings and countless gigs with vocalists like Kelly Hogan, Chris Lee, Faith Kleppinger, and groups like Melts, Delarosa, and The Holy Childhood...so when I hear "oh yeah, Andrew is a free jazz guy"...it's annoying. I pride myself on playing in a wide variety of situations -- I can enjoy playing brushes on a standard like "Satin Doll" just as much as playing completely freeform improvisation, or a rock tune. Ultimately, it's more about how the music sounds, not prescribed genre specifications.

VP: The Music Police will try to stop you, but it's our job as musicians to destroy all concepts! More and more people with backgrounds in Metal, Punk, Rock, and Noise are playing Jazz or experimenting with elements of it in their own music. (Example: Zu or Mats Gustafsson's work) With this some of the older Jazz musicians like Daniel Carter are working with Noise Artists (Ghost Moth). Is any of this music being produced really Jazz or is it a new direction in music, yet to be labeled?

AB: I think it's up to the artists themselves to classify what they do...or not. Ultimately, those labels have little to do with music. Back in the 60's, certain jazz critics classified John Coltrane as "anti-jazz," and that was the so-called classic quartet with Elvin Jones, McCoy Tyner, and Jimmy Garrison! Not even the really far out stuff with Rashied Ali, they were calling his music "anti-jazz"... music that is now considered "classic"! If musicians and listeners were to let feeble-minded critics decide how to classify their music, we'd all be doomed to a life of reruns and leftovers. Hopefully, there will always be music that defies classification.

VP: What's some of your favorite music to listen to right now? What bands are you interested in?

I listen to all kinds of music constantly, especially now with all the diverse content online. I'm still an avid record collector, and I just picked up some great LPs in Atlanta, GA while visiting my folks...records by Sun Ra, The Fall, Tiroro and his Voodoo drums, Wanda Jackson, George Jones, Cecil Taylor, Jimmy McGriff, and Lefty Frisell. In the last few years I've been getting back to much of the heavy music that I was into in my teens and 20's...like Melvins, Jesus Lizard, Slayer, and EyeHateGod. I just saw EHG on a boat in NYC! It was part of the Rocksoff boat cruise concert series. They played with Pig Destroyer and Goatwhore. It was kinda surreal listening to tunes like "Sisterfucker" while the boat floated around the Statue of Liberty. It was an insane show, a boat full of stoned metalheads and no one went overboard (that I know of), and it was the most fun I've had at a show in years!

VP: What are some of the projects your working on now?

One of my current projects is my trio called ACID BIRDS, an electro-acoustic group with Jaime Fennelly (The Peeessye) on electronics and harmonium, Charles Waters (Gold Sparkle, Go: Organic orchestra) on woodwinds, and myself on percussion. It's largely improvised music, with some of my graphic scores as a launching point.

I'm also involved in a group called "Light in August," with Ryan Ingebritsen from Chicago. He puts contact mics on my drums, and manipulates the sounds through his laptop, triggers loops, and creates textures and soundscapes that fuel the improvisations. I'll be performing with both of these groups on Feb. 26th at the Issue Project Room in Gowanus Brooklyn.

I also have a new quartet with Tanya Kalmanovitch (viola), Hill Greene (double bass), and Daniel Carter (woodwinds, trumpet). So far we've done one recording session, and one gig. I hope to do more with them in 2010.

Gold Sparkle still does gigs occasionally. We just played on December 20th; a memorial concert for our late friend Thomas Peake who was heavily involved in the Atlanta music scene as a writer, and music director of WREK in the 90's. He was an early champion of our music back in the day, and an all-around great person who will be sorely missed. There were a lot of great bands on the bill, including DQE, FLAP, The Purkinje Shift, San Augustin, and the Fourth Ward Afro-Klezmer ensemble. The concert raised a good amount of money for Thomas' favorite charity, the East Atlanta Kids' club.

The project that I have been most involved with over the last year is my slow metal band, HALLUX. It's been a great change of pace for me, as I'm playing guitar and writing all the music. I had been making demos of the songs by myself over the last couple of years, and then hooked up with my friend from the Atlanta days Hans Chew (D. Charles Speer) on drums to flesh them out. Later, we were joined by artist Jake Klotz on vocals, and the great Jason LaFarge (Pineal Ventana, Seizure's Palace recording) on bass. Since then, we've been doing about a gig a month, and just finished mixing our debut record. We plan to release a limited vinyl LP in 2010. I think I really needed a break from the preciousness and self-importance of the so-called avant garde in NY. Though I've played guitar a bit over the years, this is my first real band on the instrument.

HALLUX's music is decidedly simple, noisy, and heavy on the riffage. It's great fun, and a much-needed respite from the things I’ve been doing over my last 12 years in NY.

VP: A career full of diversity indeed. What final words do you have for our readers?

AB: Since I was a kid I've been very lucky to be surrounded by great musicians, and most of what I've been able to accomplish has a lot to do with what I've learned from them. I can't imagine my life without music in some form. I believe that music is in everyone, and it's a component of human existence that separates us from the beasts. People who spend their time denigrating or categorizing other people's music are just missing the point. People hear and relate to music in so many different ways that music criticism becomes a pointless endeavor. So many Frank Zappa quotes come to mind...so I'm gonna shut up and play my guitar now.

Jason LaFarge

VP: When did you first get into recording and what was your first set up? Did you start lo-fi with the old cassette decks or was it better gear?

JLF: Well, my fascination for recording definitely came from my dad, who always had the best home audio gear. And as he would upgrade his stereo components, he would hand the old ones down to me. We're talking old McIntosh tube amps and his old Tandberg and Teac reel to reels (which I still have).

He mostly used it to record broadcasts off of FM radio, or to make backups of rare recordings on LP (always classical or jazz). He was never much into live recording, but his love of fine audio gear definitely had an effect on me. I remember trying to get more punch out of LP recordings I had by running them kind of hot to a high-bias cassette with Dolby on and then playing them back with it off.

Later, when I was in high school and started playing in rock bands (mid-'80s), dad bought me a Tascam Porta05 for Christmas. A somewhat shitty 4-track cassette recorder, but it put me in the frame of mind for multi-track recording. I used that recorder for years, off and on until I "upgraded" to a black-faced ADAT and then a 20-bit ADAT set up. Although I’d worked with 2" tape and DAW systems at other studio set-ups, I didn't upgrade to my Otari MTR-90 and ProTools rig until I relocated Seizures Palace to Brooklyn.

VP: So recording was a passion for you young. What prompted you to open your own studio?

JLF: Seizures Palace had existed as the project studio for Pineal Ventana (in a rehearsal space at Black Box and then later in the basement of Danette and Mitch's house in East Atlanta). We had recorded 2 records with Martin Bisi in the late '90s and I became friends with him during that stretch. After Pineal Ventana's demise (in 2001), Victory Girls was formed and Seizures Palace continued in Danette's basement.

Just prior to a planned vacation in NYC, I got an e-mail from Bisi stating that he never got a copy of the last PV album we had recorded with him. So during our vacation, we came out to visit Martin and gave him a copy of Axes to Ice.

It was then that he brought up the idea of another studio moving in to the space to keep overhead costs down (there had been several live-in tenants in the non-studio parts of the space for years, but NYC was cracking down on people living in industrial-zoned areas, so Bisi was looking for a business to move in). I didn't give much thought to it at the time, but when I got back to Atlanta, I went back to my retail job at Tower Records (at the beginning of the holiday season) and realized I hated it (as I had been there for 10 years -far too long).

Then, Victory Girls had a show at the Earl and just prior to going on; I found out that Danette was pregnant. Immediately I knew there was no way I could keep a studio running in the basement with a baby upstairs. During the entire show, I was consumed with thoughts of relocating to Brooklyn and running a full-time professional studio. I e-mailed Martin that night for details. That was the end of November 2001. We moved to Brooklyn on March 1st, 2002.

VP: Now you’re situated in one of the underground's most historic recording studios. Can you give a brief history of the studio prior to your arrival?

JLF: The studio is located in an old Civil War-era munitions warehouse (later a tin can factory) on the Gowanus Canal. In 1979 a very young Martin Bisi and some cohorts from high school (Fred Maher, Nicky Skopelitis) took over the space as a living space/rehearsal space. Maher and Skopelitis had an older friend who played bass (Bill Laswell) and he soon moved in. This was the beginning of Material. As I understand it, Martin was their road manager/sound guy in those days. At some point early on, Martin inherited some money and purchased the board still used at BC Studio - an old MCI board from Sigma Sound in Philadelphia (used on the old Philly Sound stuff like O'Jays, Spinners and Stylistics, as well as Bowie's Young Americans). He had spent all of his inheritance on this board and a 1-inch 16-track machine and had no money left over for cabling/mics/outboard gear, and caught all kinds of shit from the Material guys for not spending his money more wisely. Luckily, Brian Eno had heard Material and decided he wanted to work with them.

He came out and saw the space and what he had to work with, and realized that despite the nice gear, it was an incomplete studio. He ended up giving Martin a large sum of money to finish the studio and the first time Bisi ever hit record on a tape machine, it was for Eno's On Land record. He was 19.

So, in the early years of the studio, it was called OAO Studio and was a collaborative studio between Laswell and Bisi. During this period, they were involved in recording some of the early New York hip-hop albums and part of the seminal Future Shock by Herbie Hancock (including the famous scratching on Rockit). At some point there was a falling out between the two, and Laswell moved out, starting his own studio in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. Martin renamed the studio BC Studio and ended up recording countless classic records there (Sonic Youth, Swans, Naked City, Cop Shoot Cop, Boredoms, Alice Donut, the list goes on and on and on...).

Despite their earlier falling out, Bisi and Laswell continued to occasionally collaborate there on studio projects including records by Iggy Pop, The Ramones and White Zombie. They no longer work togetherin the studio, but last year they did a show with John Zorn. Martin is now in semi-retirement, mostly working on his own musical output.

Check out www.martinbisi.com for details of what he is up to...

VP: Your building quite a reputation yourself, working with Michael Gira's Angels of Light, Khanate,

and Akron/Family. Who else have you been working with recently and how have these experiences shaped your vision of sound to recorded medium?

JLF: In the last couple of years I've had some very diverse music come through the doors. Some of my favorites have been Chicha Libre, Bad Girlfriend, and OvO . As far as shaping my vision of sound to recorded medium, I'm not sure exactly what you mean. I guess something like Chicha Libre presents a challenge for me in that they use instruments I'm not used to recording.

Getting the best sound out of an acoustic instrument is almost always more difficult thanmicing an amp.

VP: I mean your approach to production and the over all sound of a recording. Production value can "date" a record some what, like the over reverbered sound of the '80's, with no bass frequency at all. Some engineers like Steve Albini have a sound you can hear if you know his work. Do you have a particular approach recording or is it just the room sound that makes it distinct?

JLF: In general, my philosophy is to capture the sound of the artist. I'm not trying to put my "Signature sound" all over the recording. For example, the room certainly has a distinct sound for drums, but not all bands require a big drum sound with lots of ambient room mics mixed in. Some bands require a nice tight drum sound. You can pull that off in that room because the room sound doesn't get in the close mics. Sometimes bands need that "dated" sound. There have been more than a couple of records I've done that were soaked in reverb because that's what the music called for. I'm just trying to dowhat's best for the music.

VP: Besides recording at Seizure's Palace, your working with Andrew Barker in the Doom Band Hallux. What's the philosophy of the project and are you working on an album?

JLF: Well, Andrew first approached me after the Blue Prostitutes show that he curated at Union Pool and asked me if was interested in playing in a drop-C slow metal band. Apparently he has always wanted to play guitar in a metal band (he is mostly known for his jazz drumming). I was intrigued and we got together with another fellow-Atlantan, Hans Chew on drums. It kind of clicked from the get-go. After a couple of rehearsals, we brought in Jake Klotz to do vocals. One of the things I really like about this project is the diverse backgrounds of the musicians in the band. Andrew is a free-jazz drummer, Hans is a great honky tonk piano player (he has a solo record coming out soon - www.hanschew.com), Jake is a guitarist/vocalist in La Lus, and I've played in a few odd bands myself. I think I'm the only one who has played metal in a band before (Deity 5000) but it was nothing like this. I don't know that there is necessarily a philosophy to Hallux other than "low and slow." We have a record almost completed that we are very happy with. We are currently mulling over our options as far as getting it out. We will certainly press it to vinyl. I'm sure we'll be posting a release date in the near future on www.myspace.com/halluxmusic.

VP: Anything else you'd like to ad?

JLF: In this day and age, if you are not making music for yourself (primarily), then you are in it for the wrong reasons. That's it. Enjoy what you do and you will always have a certain level of accomplishment...

Elliot Levin

For a really brief but informative Bio for Elliot Levin, please check out Eugene Chadbourne's Post From

All Music Guide.

VP: I've seen you perform several times through out the years, usually just jumping up on stage and diving right into the groups performing.

Is improv your primary mode of playing music?

EL: Improvisation is spontaneous composition.

is the way we all learn to play I believe- at least at first. I was drawn into playing by the pleasure and the power derived from the consciousness which is opened and developed through this process of tuning in to this creative force- through the disciplines of practice, meditation, magic, and other devices of trance attainment.

Sometimes it's for a moment, sometimes for hours. I remember very clearly one of the first times I experienced this on a higher level when "jamming" with some close friends with whom I was undergoing shamanic rituals and training. There was a point where we clearly and openly found ourselves reading each other's minds...our souls! It was at the same time frightening, awe-inspiring, humbling, and joyful. There were many various lesser incidents leading up to this over the early years. It is a continual process to keep finding that space in different contexts with different individuals. But practicing and creating through "classical" forms has always been an interesting way for me to fine tune a pathway to this state.

There were several key "teachers" who led me to these paths, but ultimately the greatest lesson they all taught was that you can only learn it by yourself...but draw profoundly from "inspiration". I have worked with many ensembles, but mostly with a nucleus (though expanding) of people I have played with over a number of years. Although I enjoy the practice of performing with no specific rehearsals, the truth is we rehearse all our lives., and when we understand that, we are always practicing at any given time, whether through an instrument- or as Sun Ra said- "people are the instruments".

But using preconceived compositional vehicles is a good way for many of these collaborations to find "focus" and "intonation" among the players.

Within the context of a continuous ensemble, this can grow very complex and powerful; but there is always an excitement and beauty to the sound that occurs from new, unplanned, and even chance encounters with other artists.

VP: So within certain constructs, it's OK to start with a preconceived notion to develop the inspiration within an improvised piece of music to attain "Entrainment" or what the old jazz improvisers called "crossing the bridge"?

EL: I guess in any situation- with known or unknown musicians, there are some preconceived notions- whether verbalized or not. Totally spontaneous "unplanned" improvisation is something I have always enjoyed. I have noticed this is common with European free-improvisors...also with musicians who come from "classical European" educational backgrounds, and who have expanded or redirected their performance into the improvisational realm.

This is a beautiful form I think, but the most intense improvisational experiences I have had have been with musicians with whom I've worked many hours on predetermined structures- even if loose or more conceptual than standard "music staff/score" notation...and then using that as a focal point, finding ways to diverge and stretch into far-reaching tangents.

Cecil Taylor is one of the great masters of this form. I have spent many long hours (at least 4-6 hours a day, for periods sometimes of many weeks or months) practicing specific -though constantly changing- preconceived melodies and rhythms with his ensembles, preparing for a concert. But when we do get to the stage, the structures are so internalized, the performers are free to interpret them as literally- or not- as they both personally and collectively choose. It's a system of constant personal choice and aesthetic going through changes- which is the heart and soul of improvised music...to me. And certainly what I have come to know and love as "jazz".

VP: Cecil Taylor is known for his percussive playing style, odd time signatures, and his approach to the avant-garde. How has performing with him changed your approach to music?

EL: Meeting and playing and being friends with Cecil Taylor has changed- or helped direct- my music, and my life.

Cecil is a master musician- one of the world's greats of our time, He is also a great shaman, or teacher...mystic, guru...all terms I don't use often, but in his case they are valid. I met him in 1973- when I was just turning 20. I was also just starting to take music seriously, and considering it to be the major force in my life. This was after just going through my adolescence - in that incredible time of the 1960's when attaining higher consciousness became a major driving force in many of our lives- and for me has remained so to this day.

Cecil Taylor was a great affirmation in what I was doing, and where I was headed- certainly musically, but in many aspects of life as well. Even though I was very limited in my music training (1 year of music studies at a university, and maybe a couple more of private study- coming out of many years of listening and jamming), after just a few months of sitting in on his residency classes (and ensemble) at Glassboro (now Rowan) Univ., he invited me to be part of his Orchestra in NYC in 1974, which contained many of my musical idols, along with contemporaries, who have since become mainstays on the modern ("jazz:) music scene.

This alone was a great lesson, in that he could have chosen any number of musicians with greater knowledge experience and reputation, but knew that from me he would get an abundance of enthusiasm, dedication and energy that maybe wouldn't have been offered by a more "seasoned" musician. Even though probably most- if not all- of the musicians involved were ahead of me in terms of study and experience- when he asked me if I thought I was ready to hang with this group, I never hesitated for a second. I have always felt totally comfortable, and at home in the society and context of this part of the music world... I will clarify this and say- more at home there...because anywhere in the world among human beings, there is always some conflict and division. But to this day, I have found it is where I am at my best, and where I most want to be.

VP: Please tell me about what your working on now and your ESP release.

EL: The ESP release came about through my old friend Michael Anderson- who is a drummer, and used to play with The Sun Ra Arkestra, when he lived in Phila. He came to my house one day and asked me to hear any recordings I had that I would like to release. This was difficult because I have 30 years of (at least to me) very interesting music on recordings, varying from cassettes, 1/4", 1/2", 1", 2"- reels, DATs, CDs, etc.

I played him quite a few, and one of the ones he took with him was NEW GHOST. This is a band that guitarist Rick Iannacone and I started with his 2 twin-brother cousins Steve & John Testa (bass & drums). They at the time lived together, and Rick and I shared a house for 15 years, so it was like a family band. We rehearsed for many, many months- recording jams, and constructing "songs" out of the playbacks, often adding my poetry as lyrics. It was a phenomenal experience.

I love the music , and we got to do a few tours in Europe, but mostly played in Phila/NY. But the cousins got married, moved away, it became difficult to travel. Thurston Moore, John Zorn, and others asked me for tapes- they all heard it and said it was incredible, but didn't know what to do with it(?!)...Bernard Stollman heard it, and immediately said he wanted to record it.

I had met Stollman when he came to record Cecil Taylor's ensemble at The Iridium ( I am on 2 of CT's FMP Releases - "Light of Corona" and "Almeda"). CT let him record us, but not release it (yet, anyway)...I found a lot of people didn't trust Stollman, but Mike Anderson insisted he pay me up front before I gave him the CD. It wasn't the greatest business deal in the world, but Bernard heard I was playing one night at The Stone- shortly after this- and he came over with a "wad of cash as a down-payment".

I wasn't getting rich, but it was equal to what any of the other independent "free jazz" labels have been offering. Plus, regardless of what people may think about the business, it was an honor for me to be on ESP- which produced many of the records I "grew up" listening to.

I also have a record out on PORTER Records- INTERPLAY- another band Rick and I have played with for many years- with 3 great percussionists: ED WATKINS, RON HOWERTON, AND KENO SPELLER. This was another live recording (as was NEW GHOST)...from TRITONE in PHILA. NEW GHOST was live UPSTAIRS AT NICK'S also in Phila. Both clubs were run by Rick D. (a punk/hard-core producer WHO ALSO LOVED FREE-JAZZ...HE PASSED AWAY LAST YEAR). Luke Mosling of PORTER sent me out to San Diego last year to record with drummer DAVID HURL'S band: ELLIOTT LEVIN MEETS SEESAW.

I have done several poetry CDs- one with guitarist/producer TIM MOTZER, and one for Paul Green's School of Rock label. I have done quite a bit of playing with MARSHALL ALLEN over the last few years- both live and in the Studio- usually with a band UB-313 (with keyboardist BRIAN MARSELLA,and drummer ED WATKINS). I play often with a great Gypsy/Balkan/jazz band called- The West Philadelphia Orchestra. We went to the Ollin Kan Festival this year in Mexico City. I went there earlier in the year to play with drummer GABRIEL LAUBER'S group.

I toured Europe several times this year- with bassist JAIR-ROHM PARKER WELLS, also various drummers- Klaus Kugel, Tony Bianco, Peter Uskylaa, and we recorded a CD with drummer ERIC SLICK(On AYLER Records). I also did tours with SIMONE WEISSENFELS a pianist from Leipzig.

I have 2 CDS out on drummer WEASEL WALTER's label- one with MARSHALL ALLEN, and bassist DAMON SMITH , the other with SCOTT LOONEY. We hope to record again next month with drummer MARC EDWARDS.

I play with ODEON POPE'S SAX CHOIR whenever they work over the last few years, and I am on his last CD LOCKED & LOADED Live at The Blue Note in NYC. Man...I guess a lot has been happening...but I certainly look forward to much more.

Post Script at press time:

For now we are doing a Sun. Jazz series at JC Dobbs in Phila. Tonight was INTERPLAY with Jamaaladeen Tacuma. Next Sun. I play with Calvin Weston & Waill which includes Yanni & Alexi Pappodopolous (from Stinking Lizaveta). The Sun. after is gypsy Balkan music with West Philadelphia Orchestra, and Nov. 1st is Robert Kenyatta's LA TUMBA (Afro-Caribbean jazz); then Nov 8th is Dan Peterson's BOTTOM FEEDERS where I have a chance to play baritone- which I rarely get to do, but love it. Also my Friend -poet John Sinclair will do a set with us. On Nov. 15th I believe I will be collaborating with bassist Warren Oree...and will see what happens after that. You can always check out my schedule, plus some of my music and poetry at: www.myspace.com/elliottlevin. Thanks. Elliott