BILL LASWELL'S WORLDLY HIGH (PART 4)
by S.H. Fernando Jr.
"We're gonna blow some eardrums tonight," says a noticeably amped Laswell before he, John Zorn and Mick Harris, a drummer for Napalm Death and Scorn, take the tiny stage of the Knitting Factory in downtown Manhatten. Zorn smacks his lips, contorts his face and breathes life into a slightly beatup sax with some warm-up chops. A tattoed Harris, who arrived just yesterday from Birmingham, England, shakes of jet-lag like a dog drying himself before hitting the skins. Strapped to his implement of torture - an all black Gibson Thunderbird bass that matches his outfit - Laswell kindly asks for some power. The first time he heard this instrument through an amp was at soundcheck. Now, plucking some chords, he coaxes a crunching wave of feedback out of the intimidating Marshall stacks behind him. From stage left, this unhurried preparation looks like the beginning of a rehearsal session, and it may well be considering the last time the trio played together as Painkiller was ten months ago.
Silence prevails. It's a cool June Friday, but sticky inside the crowded club. Some old hands think they know exactly what to expect, but even they are mistaken: dealing with improvisation and spontaneity is never predictable.
Without warning, drums, bass and sax blast in unison for a split second, followed by momentary silence. Then, on cue another lightning blast of noise. Silence. The tension-building stop/start eventually launches full throttle into a meandering jam. Each musician goes off on his own thing, still aware of what the others are playing and knowing intuitively when to solo or ease up. The whole experience recalls the early days of "punk-jazz" in the early '80s, when Laswell was playing with his band Massacre and people like saxophonist Henry Threadgill and James 'Blood' Ulmer at CBGB's and Max's. This time, Painkiller plows through power country/western, dub, straight up hardcore, and whatever else strikes their fancy at that particular moment.
Wearing a Hebrew-inscribed T-shirt and camouflage fatigues the youngish Zorn looks like a wayward reject from the Israeli army, his sax screaming with dementia. Laswell, meanwhile, thrashes the Gibson with his hands, sometimes so hard that he must shake out his fingers every once in a while. At times they move up and down the neck of his bass with the speed and skill of an Eddie Van Halen. Other times, he plucks a single note or phrase, putting it through various sonic transformations as he stoops down to manipulate the four effects pedals at his feet. The crowning moment, however, comes at the end of the second set when Harris, clenching the mic in his teeth, screams at the top of his lungs while pounding out a machine-gun solo on drums. Umar Bin Hassan of The Last Poets, a friend of Laswell's, watches from backstage, and his wide-eyed expression says it all:
This Is Madness!
This Is Madness!
This Is Madness!
The stuff Bill Laswell thrives on.