petebrunelli

The duo-project with Peter Riccio, known by various names but most recently Journey to the Twin Planet, played a spooky little gig on April 1.  That is, coincidentally, the same day I had the first back problem in about 4 years.  And what a pain in the back it was.  Aside from the minor victory of not puking on stage from pain, and the minor defeat of having to call 1-800-MOTRIN to gut my way through it, it was a fun time.  I hope to take some lessons from these gigs and come back with a tighter and better act the next time around.

One big upside was that I was able to road test Animoog on he iPad as a performance instrument and the verdict is: we have a winner.  This app is everything I ever wanted in a synth, and is so much deeper than I expected.  The good news is that you can call up a preset and get right down to playing music on it.  Pick a keyboard layout you like and let it rip.  Beyond that you have a level of control over synthesis that is unbelievable.  Everythig from initial parameters, evolution, multitouch and extended-touch gestures, delay settings, built-in looper…. daummmmmmmmmm.

That also means that Moog, Inc. is doing something that was by no means a fait accompli: They managed to take a company that could have fallen over a cliff after Robert Moog’s passing, or worse been sold to some crap-factory like Korg*, and is now making a fantastic line of real tools for real musicians.  The analog synths they are making now are among the best they have ever created, and are probably just flat-out The Best.  They have a range from entry the level Phatty to the Voyager XL.  All the while making MoogerFooger modules and Moog Theremins.  Oh, and they make a couple of killer iOS apps, and have very nice merch. Pay them a visit.  Warms my heart, it does.

I’ll revisit this soon, and be posting links to some JttTP audio real soon now.  There are a few clips up at my Soundcloud.

* I own Korg gear, and it is not crap, but it is not Moog either…

…and the Zappa Family Trust appears to be at the center of a galactic stupidity-aggregation-nexus.

They want Gail Zappa, Dweezil Zappa, and Joe Travers to be the sole custodians of the legacy of Frank Zappa?  Really?  The “Three Stooges” are getting their way lately thanks to some witless co-conspirators.

There are real questions about what is and is not appropriate when it comes to performance rights.  We have seen the ZFT attempt to treat the FZ catalog as theater, so performing any piece would be like playing an excerpt from CATS.  They have also claimed to be unaffiliated with any of the performance-royalty agencies like BMI or ASCAP.  But missing is the fact that BMI and ASCAP are private enterprises and separate from actual copyright law.  They aren’t like the IRS, a government agency created to manage tax law enforcement.  Meaning: even if you are not under agreement with ASCAp or BMI you still have to play by the rules.  As I have said before, this means that you cannot say “no” to a performance.  Compulsory licensing and fair-use issues don’t evaporate because you claim to be self-published.  By the same token the ZFT can send cease-desist orders just like anyone else.  The band RUSH recently sent a letter asking walking-human-excrement Rush Limbaugh to cease using their music on his show.  That specific complaint involves the use of a RUSH recording, an actual published piece of recorded music.  If it was the use of a cover-version, or thematic material, they would be on shakier ground because there would be issues of substantiality, but if the version was clearly based on the original it would be a simple process to continue the C&D beyond the original injunction. The ZFT wants a level of control that goes beyond fair use, and into “no use”, which is monopolistic and not supported by US Copyright law.  They also will not engage in actual legal action because they don’t have the desire to lose in court again.  I’ll leave the details to the actual copyright lawyers, but I feel very strongly that the legal onus has to be on the ZFT at some point.  They have made many claims on a personal/subjective basis.  That is definitely not supported by the law.

I write this as I listen to Dutch guitarist Corrie van Binsbergen, who has never made any bones about being a student of Zappa.  Her music is strikingly original, but she also works within the Zappa oeuvre.  When she plays an homage like Zoot Suite, is it “good”? Is it “sincere”? Is it “disrespectful”? Is it legal?  …and the list of what it is or is not goes on to the horizon. When Terry Bozzio gets paid handsomely to perform a 45 minute drum clinic at a festival, and performs The Black Page as a *solo*, just as he did with Zappa Plays Zappa, is he breaking the law?  Was he breaking the law when he played it with ZPZ?  Is the ZFT breaking the law by allowing Dweezil to perform Zappa music for free, while preventing others from playing his music *at all*?

Most artists avoid this quagmire by just acknowledging that their music was performed and broadcast to a huge number of humans over a period of decades, and other people learned to play those songs and might play them in live performance.  Nobody is out there claiming to have written Zappa’s music… claiming his compositions as their own.  Similarly, Zappa did not claim to have written Whipping Post, or Stairway to Heaven, etc… which he performed with his band in 1988. Subjective as well is the possible decision by an artist that the world is better off with the music in the public eye, and if the cover version is horrible then it just makes the original that much more valuable/desirable.

YouTube presents a very interesting case in “fair use”, because they don’t stop anyone from posting anything up front.  You want to put up a video of a still image of a goat with a rip of an album cut playing in the background?  Go for it.  Prove that it isn’t a post modern artistic commentary on the vapid nature of popular music and the media. Unless someone complains… which is kinda weird, really.  YouTube bears no burden in this process?  Where they facilitating the infraction?  That would require a legal decision, and legal costs.  As it stands they operate in a gray area.  What makes them any different than thepiratebay?

Notice here that we aren’t talking about using original recordings as backgrounds in a beer commercial.  Rarely does a corporation appropriate content without the consent of the owner.  That may seem like an issue of scale, but it really is an issue of intent and fair-use.  Mos of the ZFT issue revolves around musicians who have performed music which is based on a Zappa composition, or purports to be derived from a Zappa recording.  Since nobody can replicate the recording exactly, it is an artistic interpretation.  Is it substantially derived from the original?  Again, that is for lawyers to decide.  And to date the ZFT has received zero legal judgements in their favor on this issue.

If I am on stage in mid performance and quote a Lennon/McCartney composition, was I supposed to corral the instinct, even though it was rooted in a memory of hearing it in 1968?

This could go on ad-infinitum, but I believe that the overarching issue is not purely legal, or purely objective.  The issue at hand is one of an emotional turf-war.  After a career that began over 45 years ago, involving about 80 official audio releases, many video releases, public speaking appearances, collaborations with other artists, and thousands upon thousands of live performances, is the public supposed to sit on its collective hands and let one person decide how they will be influenced by that legacy?  Is one person allowed to dictate the actions of others to that degree?  As I stated in the previous post, this is the kind of control that was attempted under some of the most oppressive political regimes the world has ever known.  These regimes hoped to exact a level of social control so absolute that only their words were allowed to be considered “truth”.  All those who disagreed were punished, silenced, and worse.  Right now we are seeing a silencing of those with the audacity to perform this forbidden music.  Look ahead, if you can, into a future where this approach has been completely successful, and think about that landscape.

Earlier today I received notice that a video of my band “DOOT” received a takedown notice on YouTube.  The requester was Zappa Family Trust.  I don’t even remember if the video had any Zappa content, but it was a performance at the Zappanale festival, and Andre Cholmondeley was part of the band for that gig.  Andre is the guy behind the band project/object, and his “project” has been a consistent “object” of scorn from Gail Zappa.  Gail is of the opinion that nobody gets to perform, interpret, or reference any of Frank Zappa’s compositions without her express authorization.  I have expressed my opinion on this subject before… it’s archived here somewhere.  I believe that while the Zappa Family Trust can protect Zappa’s actual works, and the products that they have released since Zappa’s death, they can not enforce a selective moratorium on his influence on contemporary music.  Zappa himself “cut his teeth” covering popular popular music, orchestral music, experimental music… all written by someone else… and specifically rubbed the music industry’s nose in it by pointing out that by changing one note in “Louie Louie” it was now an original composition (Plastic People, YCDTOSA 1).

The past week or so has seen an uptick in the ZFT’s takedown notice activity.  To be clear, the media in question were not Zappa recordings, videos or performances.  They were live performances that involved thematic material from the Zappa catalog, references to the composer, homages to the composer, and lyrics based on Zappa’s lyrical concepts.  Gutless organizations like YouTube know it is far less expensive and less involved to take down videos at the drop of a hat and let the account owner and the takedown notifier deal with the particulars in a court of law.  So the ZFT gets what they want up front.  Gail couldn’t ask for more.  I have been witness to a decade where the ZFT went from non-participant in the Zappa legacy, to employing anti-democratic tactics that would make Goerbels blush.  The ZFT’s hypothesis that they can stuff Frank Zappa’s music legacy back into the bottle and dispense it on an ad-hoc basis MUST be challenged in a court of law, and challenged successfully.  Until then the musical world will be a poorer place, and the freedom of expression that Zappa himself enjoyed will be denied to generation after generation of artists and the public at large.

This is my immediate reaction to the recent events:

nobody can take away the importance that the man and his music have had on my life, but equally, i can not be compelled to participate in what his legacy has become. everything that has been done in his name since december of 1993 has been less than what the man himself did. no musician or composer has effectively enhanced the legacy that zappa created during his life. homage has been paid, some fine music has been made, souls have been stirred…. but none of it has moved the needle in comparison to the actual works that zappa oversaw during his lifetime. nothing that the zft ever does will enhance his legacy. nothing that his lox of a son tries to do with his cute little cover band. and frankly, nothing that *any* of the people playing zappa’s music since his death will *ever* do will matter one iota in comparison to the actual legacy of zappa’s own work. i’m content with that, and content with taking the odds that there is a chance that i might live to see zappa’s music set free to inspire the world in an active way. but ironically, in the 21st century, his widow has forced musicians around the world into the same situation endured by those living under the communist regimes of the soviet union, china, czechoslovakia, east germany, and other oppressive regimes where zappa’s music was spoken of in hushed tones and played out of earshot in secret locations. it is officially ILLEGAL to perform certain music without a dispensation from the authorities.

After composing the previous post I opened up a Cecil Taylor CD (Trance), lent to me by my friend Peter Riccio.  I read the liner notes, written by Erik Wiedemann in 1963… As I got to the end I could not help but laugh:

“If a man plays for a certain amount of time – scales, licks, what have you – eventually a kind of order asserts itself.  Whether he chooses to notate that personal order or engage in polemics about it, it’s there.  That is, if he is saying anything in his music.  There is no music without order – if that music comes from a man’s innards.  But that order is not necessarily related to any single criterion of what order should be as imposed by the outside.  Whether that criterion is the song form or what some critic thinks jazz should be.  This is not a question, then, of” freedom” as opposed to “non-freedom” but is rather a question of recognizing different ideas and expressions of order” – Cecil Taylor to Nat Hentoff, Downbeat magazine, February 25, 1965