Dancing About Architecture, Vol. X

Tonight’s Episode: Zap Mama with Deep Rooted and someone we missed

August 26, 2007, The Belly Up, Solana Beach, CA

Back in college, I had this a capella quartet, The Suspenders. I don’t sing, mind you, outside of the confines of my car or shower, but nonetheless I supported this conceit because I had friends who could sing. This was the early ‘90s, when it seemed every decent college or university had at least three student a capella groups, whereas ours had none, and these groups at these other places clearly played an important role in student life, of which our place also had none. So I convinced four of my talented pals to be in this group where I would arrange the music and they would do the real work and perform wearing suspenders. They also wore other clothes. We had a great time at it, played around campus and had a few local “hits”, so to speak; they even sang at my first wedding. It continued for a while after we graduated with some new blood, Menudo-style, and eventually faded away, Menudo-style.

The irony of all this is that in general, a capella music does little for me, and in many cases is irksome. In part, my tastes have changed since then (or congealed, I’m never quite sure), and the novelty of translating pop tunes, jazz standards and silly joke songs into this format has dissipated. In another part, I have difficulty appreciating the nuances of musicality in human voices, as compared to other instruments, because I am an instrumentalist and not a singer. A friend recently remarked that she feels “vicarious embarrassment” when witnessing a soloist in an a capella outfit step out and try to imitate another instrument. I had to agree, and also grimace a little remembering that at one time I had made my good friend Jon (who’s having a baby! Yay!) bust out with a “harmonica” solo, although to be fair he did it so well that many people noted at the time that they thought he was actually playing a harmonica inside his cupped hands. In any case, a capella music rarely enters into my musical experience these days. But when Zap Mama was coming to town, inspiration was renewed in me, and I made short work of convincing Art and Vera to join me to see them perform the all-female world-beat a capella stylings for which they have garnered so much acclaim.

After the requisite pre-show dinner and delicious pitcher of micro-brew at the particularly and wonderfully Southern Californian establishment Pizza Port, we sauntered towards the club. On the way, we passed a group consisting of several middle-aged couples, from whence the word “botox” was clearly spoken. As we passed, we all heard one woman plainly tell the others, “My doctor told me I wouldn’t be happy unless I did my whole forehead.” OK! I don’t know if they went to the show, but when we walked in the crowd was of a composition I wasn’t quite expecting. There was a noticeable concentration of middle-aged, wealthy-looking, Del Mar-ish khaki pants- and Hawaiian shirt-wearing, putative KCRW subscribers. KCRW, perhaps the only truly honest thing ever produced in Los Angeles, sponsored the show, so I might have altered my expectations had I considered this fact. I’d say the three of us instantly appreciated the change of pace, as we often end up at shows with a lot of black-clads, so it was a nice break to be in a more diverse audience. The peculiar juxtaposition stood out nonetheless, when a straight-up hip-hop group (local, I think) called Deep Rooted (I think) took the stage. The turntablist/computer operator was followed by a man and then a woman with the biggest ‘fro I’d seen in some time, and they both started undulating to the sparse clap-beat the computer got going. They were soon joined by a strikingly tall and thin woman in suspenders and a fedora, and two male MCs. The first two after the turntablist danced around the stage for the entire set, which consisted principally of the tall woman singing alternately between the energetic rapping of the two MCs, over the nearly empty and infectious beat. Each song ended with the rhythm fading out and the woman’s voice trailing off later, which was about the only time when we could hear that the voice was rather a powerful, soulful one. There were to be sound problems all night. For this reason, I guess, it was impossible to discern the rapper’s words, which is most frustrating since the force of rap is, above all else, to be found in the actual words. And they were trying so hard, too. What we did hear was something this rare listener of hip-hop has noticed lately in some of those rare listenings: namely, the beat was so syncopated that the actual beat disappeared beneath the syncopation. The singer did this a lot, going, “eh, eh, eh” to an angular melody and punctuated with a shoulder strut, such that each utterance fell just slightly after the downbeat. It’s like hearing the second clop of the horse’s hoof and only barely catching the first one. This technique always holds my attention because I have to struggle to keep the beat in register. We were standing towards the back at this point, and mostly it was fun watching people in the crowd try to dance to this.

During the break we found our way up to the right side of the stage, finally planting ourselves just so, within a few feet of the right edge of the stage, next to the sound board. A drummer (dude) took the stage, and a bass player (chick) and a guitarist (dude again) and a turntablist/percussionist (dude once more), all clad in stark white but each to their own style. We wondered who this other opening band was, as their dress and demeanor suggested they were quite comfortable playing for medium-large crowds. Presently two tall women took the stage, each in white, and each to a standing microphone on either side of center stage. The band kicked up a tight Afro-pop rhythm section, and the two singers got things going with some back-up vocals. But back-up to what? Then, then we heard the cheering. The Del Mar-ites saw something emerge stage left that was somehow exciting! What could it be? Is this band another local favorite that we might see every Saturday at Croce’s downtown after the lobster bisque? Suddenly the mystery was resolved: it was none other than Marie Daulne herself, the queen bee of Zap Mama, making the slow, self-assured entrance befitting a true queen. Against the backdrop of the band dressed in only white, Daulne was resplendent in a flowing, layered red dress, her ears, wrists, ankles and forehead bejeweled. She soaked up the adoration of the crowd like potato bread in so much chowder. With her arms up and hands rotating figure-eights, hips meaning business and bare feet stomping, she was radiant as ever enjoying the spoils of fifteen years of leading this group. From stage right we had a good view of the crowd up front, and one could almost see Daulne’s smile reflecting in each of their own. There was a lot of love flowing back and forth.

But…it wasn’t a capella! It was capella! We came to hear all-female world beat a capella, not another pop group! Well, what could we do? They’ll do some a capella somewhere, I’m sure. Let’s just wait it out.

These thoughts took about 17 seconds to run through my brain before I drank them down with the last of my drink. For an a capella group with instruments, this band was great! We stood just next to the bass player, which was a lucky break because I thoroughly enjoyed watching her fingers glide over the strings like the ribbon of an old dot-matrix printer, only smoother. The guitarist at the other end looked not unlike a young Bootsy Collins, and I’ll be damned if he didn’t play like him, too. This analogy led me next to think of the bass player as a female Catfish Collins, and I realized then that this band was incredibly tight. Everyone in it was top-flight, and the funk just rolled out like a lazy ocean wave. To put that in your ear, they played an extended mid-set tune which could best be described as a funkier, Afro-popier, Zap Mama gumbo-ier, less stupid version of “Hot, Hot, Hot!” This is not to say that Zap Mama had some loftier goal in this performance than Buster Poindexter ever did; tonight was all about smilin’ and havin’ fun! And they certainly gave that to us, enhanced with some minimalist but still joyful choreography. Oh, and there was actually a keyboard player right behind the bass player that had heretofore gone un-noticed, whose fingers were moving fast but to little effect, since the monitors kept clipping and the sound guy kept potchky-ing with the sound board and the musicians kept getting his attention to point to each other and then either up or down and we couldn’t really hear the keyboards or the two other singers and this was not great.

The encore/second set did feature a few seconds of a capella (the bass player sang, too, making it a quartet), which was fun while it lasted. They sang a major chord, and then the root moved up to the seventh, and then the third moved up to the ninth, and then the fifth up to the eleventh, resulting in the creation of a new chord (e.g. a D chord sung over a C chord). These sorts of gimmicks always sound better when done with human voices, perhaps because we are tuned that way, but in any event these singers have good ears. They added some rhythmic counterpoint (it’s world beat! Whateverthehell that is) and I liked it. Then the band kicked in again and I liked that, too. After all, Zap Mama is on David Byrne’s Luaka Bop label, so they best be good. I was remiss, though, at feeling a little cheated from what I came for, even if the ensemble was so solid. The crowd seemed to love every bit of it.

We left, and I still don’t have any Zap Mama albums. A capella recordings usually are unable to provide that magical sound given by live human voices braiding together, so what’s the use? We didn’t get that this evening, but we got our world-beat funk on and got to see Daulne do a backflip. What more could we ask for? Thanks, KCRW!