THE BEAT
Brooks Williams, Gideon Freudmann, U2
by Seth Rogovoy(WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass., June 26, 1997) --
Brooks Williams: Six Strings + ``Seven Sisters" = Perfection
Brooks Williams is that rare bird on the contemporary folk scene: like a Bill Morrissey or a Greg Brown, he is an utter original with an instantly identifiable sound. For over a decade, the Northampton-based singer-songwriter has been cranking out songs and albums brimming with hauntingly memorable images and melodies, and his nimble guitar work -- particularly his slide-playing -- has garnered him considerable fame as an axe-head. His compositions draw from a wide-ranging palette of influences, including Celtic folk, jazz and rock and the Delta blues of his native deep South, all together filtered through his unique sensibility to create a contemporary yet timeless brand of new acoustic music with his singular stamp.Williams's last album, 1995's "Knife Edge," was a stark, stunning piece of work that made this critic's year-end Top 10 list that year. His next album, "Seven Sisters" -- named after the chain of mountains surrounding the Pioneer Valley -- is due out on Green Linnet's Redbird imprint in August. An advance listen to it makes instantly clear that "Seven Sisters" is Williams's most mature, accomplished, striking effort to date. More than just his voice and guitar, Williams's entire persona is up front where it belongs on this raw, stripped-down, intimate production, which features just bass, drums and occasional violin behind Williams. Williams never sounded as good as he does on these 11 new songs that instantly grab a listener on both a superficial and a deeper level, and considering how good he's sounded in the past, that's saying an awful lot.
Don't wait until August to hear his new songs, however. Catch Williams this Sunday, June 29, at the Stone Chapel Concert Series at St. Andrew's Chapel on Washington Mountain Road in the town of Washington at 4, and ask him to preview some of his new material. Singer-songwriter Pierce Campbell warms up the crowd for Williams. For more information call 413- 623-5438 or E-mail darkmoon@vgernet.net.
Gideon Freudmann: Not a novelty
When Gideon Freudmann first inflicted his delightfully unique style of "Cellobop" on audiences about a decade ago, it might have been received predominantly as a one-joke novelty with a short shelf-life. Here was a cello player passing himself off as a troubadour playing whimsical, original tunes owing their influence to folk, blues, bluegrass and jazz tradition. Funny how the passage of time and context can change the way you hear things. Today Freudmann -- still doing basically the same act, although with a lot more variation and finesse -- sounds like nothing less than a cutting-edge, avant-garde musician, whose genre-bending exploits combine aspects of performance art, new-classical, psychedelia and comedy, a sort of cross between Kronos Quartet and Leo Kottke. You have to be a virtuoso to be able to get away with this sort of thing, and Freudmann, who has just released his eighth album, "Adobe Dog House" (Gadfly) fits the bill. Catch him doing it live at Milltown Studios in North Adams this Saturday, June 28, at 8:30. Call 413-662-2725 for more info.U2's Global PopMart
By the time U2 winds down the first leg of its international "PopMart" tour next Tuesday and Wednesday, July 1-2, at Foxboro Stadium in Foxboro, the mega-star band will have played two-dozen shows in nearly as many cities across the U.S. But this is just the beginning of a nearly year-long venture which will eventually take the Irish supergroup to stadiums in 62 cities in 20 countries, including Poland, Israel and the Czech Republic. Then, after an end-of-the year hiatus, the band will hit the road again in 1998, celebrating its 20th anniversary, with shows in places as far-flung as Argentina, New Zealand, South Africa, Southeast Asia and Sarajevo.These sort of stadium mega-tours are a dying breed. U2's "PopMart" tour is the only stadium show of the summer. The economics alone make such endeavors prohibitively expensive. "PopMart" is said to boast the world's largest video screen, with 22 miles of cable, 21,000 circuit boards, 120,000 connectors, and 150,000 pixels made up of 1,000,000 LEDs. Wouldn't you hate to be the one who had to plug all that stuff in or change the light bulbs?
Critic's Picks
The hot and sassy Amy Fairchild Band from Northampton is back at the Old Egremont Club in South Egremont on Saturday, June 28, at 9....The Newport Jazz Festival -- Saratoga is at the Saratoga (N.Y.) Performing Arts Center this weekend. Saturday's program includes Ray Charles, McCoy Tyner and John McLaughlin. Sunday's features George Benson, Zawinul Syndicate, Roy Hargrove, Nicholas Payton and jazz- funksters Medeski, Martin and Wood....
Lollapalooza '97, nicknamed the "Forgotten Festival" by some, comes to SPAC on Tuesday, July 1. This year's lineup features Korn, Tool, Tricky, Snoop Doggy Dogg and Jon Spencer's Blues Explosion, among others....
Keyboardist Terry Adams and drummer Tom Ardolino, better known as the weirder half of NRBQ, team up for "The Self Evident Truths of Terry Adams and Tom Ardolino" at the Van Dyck in Schenectady, N.Y., on Saturday, June 28, at 8 and 10. The "Terry and Tom Show," as it has been called, is a free-wheeling romp that has in the past incorporated aspects of ventriloquism, karaoke, pantomime and dramatic readings. Bassist Pete Toigo and saxophonist Marshall Allen of the Sun Ra Arkestra will join the dysfunctional duo. For info call 518-381-1111....
Add Philadelphia singer-songwriter Peter Stone Brown (Thursday, Aug. 7) to the growing lineup of top acoustic music talent from across America coming to Milltown Studios in North Adams this summer. Brown's CD, "Up Against It" (Tangible Music), released last fall, contains a dozen original songs that rank with the best of contemporary and classic folk-rockers like the Byrds, Dire Straits and the Wallflowers....
[This column originally appeared in the Berkshire Eagle on June 26, 1997. Copyright Seth Rogovoy 1997. All rights reserved.]
Seth Rogovoy
rogovoy@berkshire.net
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