Going to see Medeski Martin & Wood tonight!

[NewImprov]

Had a last minute inspiration and decided I'd go see them in Eugene at the McDonald Theater tonight. I'm a huge fan, but have never managed to catch them live yet, so I'm looking forward to the show!

[Musicale]

It's a nice show.

 

Regards,

 

Musicale

[MAJUSCULE]

Lucky!

[Ian Benhamou]

MMW rulz!!!

 

Enjoy!

[yannis D]

I travelled to Paris and London to see them and did not regret a penny. A fantastic show and interplay on stage. Have fun!

[RichieP_MechE]

Awesome! I regrettably missed the opportunity to see them when they performed at the Pittsburgh Arts Festival last summer.

[NewImprov]

Awesome show, so glad I went! Medeski had a killer setup (and the roadies to make it happen). His keyboard cubicle consisted of a Hammond A100, with some sort of Wurlitzer divide-down string/organ synth on top, a Wurly with a Clav on top to the left of the organ, a mellotron(!) with a Minimoog Voyager on top, and a grand piano in back. He had an interesting approach to amplification, each instrument ran through it's own amp. Seriously, behind the mellotron was a wall of Fender Twins with a little Fender Junior on top. Sounded awesome, but seemed like a lot of work just to avoid a keyboard mixer. The Mini saw the least use, mostly used for a bass drone on one piece and some special effects. The Mellotron saw a lot of playtime, including a surprisingly realistic bass clarinet sound, I'd heard that sound on their records recently and wondered where it came from.

 

As I said, I've been a fan for years, but never seen them live. I love the fact that Medeski's setup is completely non-MIDI, if he wants to layer 2 sounds, he plays them in real time. His hand independence is amazing, there were a number of times where he played a funky comp on the organ with his right hand while soloing with his left on the clav or wurly. Definitely inspired me to work on that stuff. He played a fair amount of piano, and sounded awesome, channeling McCoy Tyner sometimes, Professor Longhair others.

 

They played 2 sets, each over an hour and 20 minutes, plus a shortish encore. Sound at the McDonald was excellent, and thankfully not too loud. I did wear earplugs, but I probably could have semi-saefly listened without them. I watched most of the first set from a 5th row seat, then moved to the balcony for the 2nd, which, while further away, offered a better view of what Medeski was doing. I may start another thread on some thoughts about staging keyboards based on some thoughts the show gave me.

 

The show was pretty well attended, though not sold out. The Boneless Hippy Dancers were out in force, I heard one say to his date before the show, "I hope they don't play all that weird plinky plonky stuff, I want to groove." Fortunately, for me at least, there was a lot of "plinky plonky stuff" including some near Cecil Taylor moments on piano. But there was plenty of Billy Martin's trademark swung 16-note bouncy groove stuff. I get a little tired of Martin's main feel, though it certainly gets people dancing, I like his Sunny Murray mode better.

 

Material was mostly from the 3 Radiolarians discs, with a few tunes from their album of John Zorn's Masada tunes. Each set only had about 6 or 7 tunes, they really stretched out on stuff, but it never seemed gratuitous or like they were coasting. really high-level improvising, and the fact that it got a whole crowd moving was pretty inspiring.

[Jim Alfredson]

Haven't seen them in a long time; I need to remedy that.

 

Medeski has the Rig of the Gods, the rig I would have if I had roadies and an actual budget!

 

Well, I'd also have a CS-80 in there, just for good measure.

[NewImprov]

Oh yeah, there was a leslie at the back of the stage, with plexiglass baffles on 3 sides.

 

I do feel like Medeski's rig covers all the bases I'd want to cover, maybe add a polysynth in there. Screw romplers!

 

It did get me thinking on now to make a big keyboard setup more inviting from the audience perspective. Basically, even from right up front, you couldn't see what Medeski was doing. The Wurly/clav setup pretty much blocked the view. In my most keyboard-centric band, I use 4 keyboards (XK-1, Minimoog, 88 and 61 key controllers) and a rack, and take the cubicle approach with 2 2-tier stands in an L, but I am rethinking this setup. we usually set up with me and the drummer at opposite ends of the stage, facing each other, profile to the audience. I'm thinking of making a triple stack, 88 controller/XK/61 controller, with the Mini at an angle off to the right. I'm not Keith Emerson or anything, but I feel like it might engage the audience more if they could see what I'm doing. Not that MMW had any problem engaging the audience, though...