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Hammering and Monk
Hi,
I'm responding to several messages here, so please excuse the scattershot
nature of this email.
Tom wrote:
> My friend Amy just told me I bitched out a former Over The Rhine saint.
> ... Sorry Don, you're free to like whatever you want obviously. Didn't mean
> to pick a fight in my first post.
Well, heck, I don't think of myself as any particular saint. I'm not
thin-skinned, and I'm always happy to explain or defend my position. I have no
qualms about explaining or defending my position, and nothing you said in any
way makes me inclined *not* to like whatever I want. I did find the snide
remarks about digital delays with relation to my education/intelligence to be
rather uncalled for; it wasn't the fact of the digital delay that impressed me,
it was that Ric was able to use it to create this intricate sonic sculpture
that maintained a discrete integrity while going four levels deep. I.e., it
did not dissolve into chaotic noise.
> I couldn't stop thinking during the show how glad I was that these guys were
> no longer playing in Over The Rhine.
Funny, I was thinking the same thing, but for different reasons. :-) I was
thinking I was glad that they (of course, Josh never played with OtR, as far
as I know) were out of Over the Rhine so that they could be free to pursue
this kind of musicianship, which was not welcome in what OtR became. I am
not trying to imply that Monk is "better" than OtR, or vice versa. I like
both bands for different reasons, and I listen to them to have different
experiences.
> So Don, i don't know what Over The Rhine was or is to you,
What got me into OtR was their ability to create a musical landscape that
I could get lost in. It was the versitility that allowed both HDIF and
its reprise. It was the power and intricacy of the instrumental work
in the live If I'm Drowning. It was the combination of Karin's etherial
voice and Ric's evocative guitar work. It was the creative tension between
tight control and free-wheeling grace.
Tina wrote:
> i guess my only thought is i can't get use to a white man taking the name of
> a black jazz legend for his band. that just doesn't seem cool to me.
Um, I don't know where you are getting your information, but the origin of the
band name doesn't have anything to do with any Jazz legend of any race.
Although Ric does like Thelonius Monk, that's not where his band name came
from. Here's a quote from Ric's FAQ, from www.monkmusic.com:
"there is really no heavy significance to the name "monk". we did sort jokingly
play shows as "the art monke trio" (but only when we were a quartet....) Arthur
is my "given" first name and i liked the idea of being an Art Monk... or
someone who secluded himself to concentrate on beauty. but later i was told
that there was (is?) a famous sports person named something like Art
Monke....so we shortened the name to Monk a year or so before quiver came out.
i do like the mental image that "monk" projects... either monasteries or
Thelonius (whose compositions i love, incidentally.)"
> did brian kelley really start monk with rich while they were both still in
> otr?
Yes.
--
Don Smith Robotic Optical Transient Search Experiment
dasmith at rotse2_physics.lsa.umich.edu http://xte.mit.edu/~dasmith/
"The art of filmmaking is the art of regret." -- Ang Lee
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