On 7/1/03 10:52 PM, "alastair@pretentious.co.uk" <alastair@pretentious.co.uk> wrote:
Andrew Mortensen:
TOSHIMARU NAKAMURA
Sound student of the mixing board- Toyko improviser finds the best instrument to mix is the mixer itself. Interview with William Meyer.
## SAW HIM LIVE & IT BORED THE SHIT OUR OF ME.... ##
Well, it's not Morbid Angel or Hate Eternal seeing who can be the fastest drummer or anything, but some of us folks here happen to think he's fascinating live. Definitely in the top five of my favourite musicians of the last five years, should I ever be so silly as to make such a list.
I shouldn't join the Electroacoustic list if I were you ;)
Well, he's certainly entitled to that opinion, if that's how he really felt. Nakamura certainly wouldn't be for everybody. But I wonder in what context he was seen. Many don't care for his solo discs but love him in pairs or groups. His work with Keith Rowe is stellar, but I've really been enjoying his Temporary Contemporary under the moniker "Repeat" with Jason Kahn. That's a great disc. As for the live bit, yes, Nakamura is a bit boring to "watch" live. You can't really see anything. But that's really the point. With a lot of this kind of music, Anthony Braxton's "sweat factor" doesn't apply. Or as Kim Cascone would say, the need to see "causality" in a musical setting is a function of our conditioning to "gestural theatre" coming from a century of pop culture. You're not going to get much "theatre" at an EAI live set, so it's pretty silly to expect it. Better to set those expectations aside and try to listen carefully to what's going on.