by Andrew Frisicano

Marc Ribot & Caged Funk plays at Rose Live Music tonight (June 17th). For that Marc joins keyboardist Bernie Worrell (ex-Parliament Funkadelic, Talking Heads), guitarist Marco Cappelli, bass player Brad Jones, drummer JT Lewis, and DJ Logic on turntables for a set of "John Cage looped, hi-jacked, detourned, and scratch mixed." Some background...

In rehearsing for a performance of John Cage's 'Sonata for Two Voices' (1933) at Issue Project Room last winter, guitarist Marco Cappelli and Marc Ribot made a strange discovery. The two guitarists overcame the gap between the rhythmic complexity of the piece and Mr. Ribot's somewhat limited sight reading skills by 'looping' measures: constantly repeating each difficult passage until it became easier. It was in this way they became aware of a strange fact about John Cage's music that would have probably surprised (and possibly dismayed) the composer himself: John Cage was one funky dude. The resulting project, "Caged Funk", is a further exploration of this little known aspect the late composer's work. Tonight's performance is an open rehearsal. This work was commissioned by and will be premiered July 8,2010 at the Ludwigsburg Festival 2010 in Germany.

On June 26th, Marc plays with another super-improv group at (Le) Poisson Rouge - a quintet with guitarist Leonid Fedorov, bassist Vladimir Volkov, John Medeski on keys, and percussionist Ches Smith. Tickets are on sale.

Marc Ribot goes on to play at The Stone on June 29th with bassist Greg Cohen, and for free at the Stuy Town Oval on June 30th with Marc Ribot y Los Cubanos Postizos and La Cumbiamba eNeYe. After that, dates in Canada and Europe.

Videos and all dates are below...

Continue reading "Marc Ribot @ Rose Live Music w/ Bernie Worrell & other dates "

by Andrew Frisicano

"Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Marc Ribot (but were afraid to ask)" is the first of the Stone's new Monday night seminar series and, as previously mentioned, it happens tonight (1/4). The first 13 of those events, which the venue describes as "a special series of workshops, lectures, seminars and Q&As on a variety of fascinating subjects by some of the world's most unique, cutting edge musical thinkers," are laid out below and cover a huge spectrum of musicians and topics.

Ribot will be performing as part of the NY Guitar Festival on January 14th (doing a live improvised score to Charlie Chaplin's "The Kid") and playing with his stellar group Ceramic Dog on February 2nd at (Le) Poisson Rouge (with Skeletons, who played NYE and New Year's Day shows at Zebulon, opening). Tickets for the LPR show, which is also part of the NY Guitar Fest (more on that later), are on sale.

Another interesting, very different Q&A event is also coming up. On February 23rd, Santos Party House will host "Ask Andrew W.K. Anything: An intimate evening of unpredictable performance." Presumably the event is being held to further address the internet rumor that Andrew W.K. is an actor who plays the part of Andrew WK. Tickets are on sale. In other news, he's re-releasing his formerly-import-only-record Close Calls With Brick Walls with a new "lost" disc Mother of Mankind on February 23rd, and he's on this year's Warped Tour.

More info on the Andrew W.K. event and the Stone's seminar series are below...

Continue reading "Marc Ribot & Andrew W.K. answer your questions and other upcoming events (The Stone, Santos, LPR & more)"

Marianne Faithfull @ City Winery (more by Lori Baily)

Marianne Faithfull is performing at NYC's Town Hall on Thursday, September 24th. Tickets ($86 / $51 / $31) go on AmEx presale starting Wednesday, April 15th at 11 AM. General sale begins Friday, April 17th at noon.

We also have a pair of front row tickets to giveaway. Details on how to with them below.

For the show, Faithfull will be accompanied by a band consisting of Greg Cohen, Marc Ribot, Rob Burger, Joey Baron, Ryan Scott, Christina Courtin, Christopher Hoffman, Lenny Pickett and Marty Elrich. Much, if not all, of that cast contribute to her new album and/or were spotted playing with Faithfull at her City Winery gigs, and on Letterman, in late March.

Marc Ribot, who definitely played at the City Winery shows and on Letterman, has his own week of shows planned for early May, to celebrate his 55th birthday.

Faithfull's newest disc Easy Come, Easy Go, which consists of 12 covers from Neko Case to Billie Holiday, is out now on Decca Records.

Faithfull was recently interviewed by the newly married Ryan Adams.

Marianne Faithfull: And I'll be doing a couple of gigs with the original band on the record. I'm sure you know all those guys as well.

Ryan Adams: Tell me about why you chose to cover the Decemberists' "The Crane Wife 3."

MF: Hal [Willner] found that song, and what I love about "The Crane Wife" is that it's a folk tale. It's about a man who falls in love with and marries a swan. The only real concept for this record was to work with great songs, and these were the ones that happened to be chosen from the modern idiom. I could have easily taken one of yours, and maybe I will one day. [Black Book Mag]

Awkward? All dates, pro-shot video from one of the City Winery shows, and contest details below...

Continue reading "Marianne Faithfull playing NYC's Town Hall - win (or buy) tix "