Crossbeat, Jan. 95

By Goro Nakagawa
Submitted by Sai
Translated by Tutu Fujimoto

It was by a mini album called "Live at Sin-E” released in late 1993 that I made sure myself a rumor that Jeff Buckley's live show was amazing.  This small piece, just under 27 minutes long and containing only four songs, was recorded live for two days in August 1993 at Sin-E,  a cafe on St. Mark's Place, where Jeff is based in New York.  It is said that it was Colombia Records (or rather, A&R Man, Steve Berkowitz), who finally struck a deal because of a reputation for his great live performances, he came up with this live recording that he sang on a single guitar in order to relieve the pressure put on the artists to make their first album.  Then only four songs were selected from among the five and a half hours of total performances for two days, and they were released in the style of Jeff Buckley's unveiling.  It's only four songs, but it's not hard to learn about Jeff's charms and the greatness of his live show.  His representative original songs, “Mojo Pin” and “Eternal Life”, and two cover songs, Édith Piaf’s “Je Ne Connais Pas La Fin” and Van Morrison’s “The Way Young Lovers Do” are included in it.  Especially in the latter part of the cover song, which was played for more than 10 minutes, we were able to confirm the greatness of Jeff's performance as the song unfolded and swept freely along with the singer's own soul.  Jeff Buckley's "Live At Sin-E" was a small piece, a so called mini-album, but the worth of listening was just like an epic work.  About six months later, in the early summer of 1994, Jeff's solo debut album “Grace” advance cassette was delivered to a Japanese record company.  This time, it was with the band, recorded in a way that was inevitably close to live performances.  I was more and more overwhelmed by his freewheeling music when I listened to it.  And then finally in August, I was able to watch my long-awaited live show in New York.  I was finally able to see with my own eyes how amazing Jeff Buckley’s live show was.  On August 12th, I saw Jeff Buckley at a special gig called "The Best Of Sin-E" at Wetlands in Tribeca.  Jeff and the rest of Sin-E's regular artists, like Cattel Canek and Talking To The Animals, played in different locations that evening.  Jeff, who made his last appearance with three band members, has spent more than two hours for his tremendous show, either finishing the U.S. tour ahead of the release of the album or giving a warm thanks to Sin-E, where he made his name.  Almost all of the songs in debut album “Grace” have appeared, including cover songs such as "Hallelujah" and "Lilac Wine”.  On the second or third encore, Alex Chilton’s "Kangaroo" played for nearly half an hour on end.  (It had much more time and power than the performance of the 14 minutes contained in the mini CD “Peyote Radio Theater” which was released for demonstration.)  Anyway, once the performance starts, it's full of dangers and thrills and you don't know where he’s going depending on his mood.  Especially his changing vocals that followed by his sensitivity, moved me so violently that I could not stop shivering.  Jeff on the stage, who sang with a shouting of love, farewell, pain, and joy, looked strangely divine.  And almost three months later, in early November, I was able to see Jeff's live show in St. Louis, which resumed its U.S. tour after the release of the album.  My everyday actions are not good however, and I don't meet the deadline at all. However, I was so lucky to see my dreaming, Jeff’s show twice in short time.  Besides in St. Louis, I was able to interview him fully for an hour the day before his show.  Below is the part of the St. Louis's interview I did in room 305 of a hotel, like an old English house, called Cheshire Lodge in Clayton, which he talked especially about his live shows and the band among other things.  Incidentally, the stage of the Jeff Buckley band at Sheldon Ballroom in downtown St. Louis the next night wasn't nearly two and a half hours as it had been seen three months ago in New York, but about an hour .  But the performance of a band in which music is "alive" as if members, including Jeff, are trying to see how each other breathes...and his free-flying vocal...I've seen his show a number of times (although I've seen it only twice), and it's all nothing but fabulous.

In August, I saw your live show in Wetlands for the first time, and I got the impression that you are doing it very freely, whether it be playing or staging.  I'm sure your every live shows will change a lot from time to time, right?

Well, it would be great if it changed thoroughly.  But yeah, it’s certainly different every night.  There is a lot of room left for improvisation in the performance, so it becomes different every night.  I don't force myself to play the same performance, and the band members know that.

Do you decide the order of the songs in advance before going on stage?  Or something like “take it as it comes”?

Not like that.  There’s more rigorous side.  But I've never made a set list.  I know what song I should play next though.  When I'm playing the intro of the song, I can hear two songs that I'm going to do next from those that I haven't played yet.  And also what's the best way to finish the song that night.

Even if you play the same song, it will change a lot depending on the stage, right?

It may change a lot, but I don’t mean to aim for it.  If everyone in the band has a different idea, it will happen naturally.  In other words, even if it's the same song, all the members will feel different depending on the day.  It may appear in tempo or become another melody or improvisation.  Sometimes we throw guitars on the ground?  But we’re not trying to do that.  It's about enriching experience.  If we don't let go of the song somewhere, we'll never lose our groove.

You are playing in a band now. When you were playing solo, were you free to play?

That's why I formed a band.  It's like a Japanese ink painting.  It is very delicate and the ink always oozes out because it is drawn on very thin paper.  It’s going to make one picture by blotting the lines like that.  Even with music, I sometimes think it would be better to do it like that.  Making a set list may be a good thing sometimes in terms of that you can see the whole picture.  But as far as I am concerned, I hope that doing things freely will produce a different kind of force.

About the member of your band, are they coming together naturally?  Or you recruited them?

A good question.  “Grace” was to be recorded in September 1993.  Was that it?  Yeah, that was it.  Before that, I was still playing solo, but I wanted to organize my own band.  I was hoping I could find a cool member to suit for that.  And then I made it.  I was very lucky.  At first, Mickey.  Bass player, Mick Grondahl.  And Matt was next.  Somebody recommended him to me, and on the first night I met him, we made music together, and made a song called "Dream Brother”.  The band is a good match, and the fit has always been there from the start.  So, I went on as a trio for quite a while.  Then my friend and guitarist, Michael Tighe joined last. Because I wanted a fourth member.  I tried with all sorts of guys, and Michael was the best for us.  And I'd known him for a few years.  The band was formed that way.  It was so natural.  And yet it must have been an exceedingly hurried event for them, as they might have been carried away by a whirlwind, I guess.  Because I set up the trio three weeks before we went into Woodstock and started recording.  So first of all, what I did was I rented a context, which is an extremely cheap rehearsal studio on the Lower East Side, and we all shut ourselves up there and made music together.  Then I booked as many small gigs as I could and tried to do live shows.  And then we went to Woodstock together.  We can say that we are still developing.  There is a great power in the band to go farther ahead.

Did you want to create a different sound from the live show compared to the recording?

I didn’t mean that.  If the sound of the album is different from the live one, it is a result of natural evolution and change.  But at the recording, it raised new problems about the volume of the instruments.  For example, about the volume of the amp, if you want to record with a beautiful sound, you have to drop it.  To do it that way, the noise will disappear.  But live concerts, as I always say, are more direct and closer to the truth.  If you watch a live show, you can get a better idea of what kind of music they’re playing and how much more accurate it is.  You can change the tempo as you like when you play live.  And also you don’t need to think about recording time.  I know that would happen without bothering to think of what I want to play differently from the album.  I think other people's albums are not very different to their live concerts.  It’s not too difficult to do.  Ray Charles is exactly the same as the album.

But in a way, your music seems to be the most contradictory to the act of recording.  The most attractive thing about your music is that it doesn't become fixed in one form.

That's right.  Suppose we started playing and someone did something unusual and special.  But I wouldn’t ever say, like, 'What on earth are you doing? You're gonna blow it up!'.  Never.  Of course as long as we play in a band, there are rules.  But there is a rule just about how to play it, and not much about what each person does.  We should listen carefully to other members’ sounds and be aware of them.  And I'm going to express exactly what I feel.  In order to do so, we must always have our heart open, and we must being ready to be able to accept everything.  That's how you get into people's minds deeply.  But it's important to be aware of it.  Well, depending on my mood, things are often staggering and shrunken.

In a 15-minute little documentary video called "Grace" made by Colombia for promotion, you emphasized, "Processes are important”.  Could you elaborate a little bit more on what you mean?

Oh, that one.  I think the question was something like, "What kind of result do you expect when you make something?”.  And so I told him to fool your expectations always.  When you're making things just for the sake of what the results will be, you have to make things harder by fooling them.  The results are spontaneously produced in the process.  So you should take care of each and every little thing you usually do.  I think artists know all about it.  But it's hard to keep that in mind because there are deadlines, things don't go well by the deadlines, or you’re inclined to something else.  All the songs that I wrote, when I thought of how strange they all started, then went straight on and on as the way they are.  That's exactly how it was when it was written.  Men often say, "I'll make this song a lot more rocky" or something like that.  But they can’t do that.  Women can do it better than men.  I agree with PJ Harvey who said that women place importance on the process.  Women are more involved with this earth and the process.  I’ve been doing my best though.

Cesena

By Federico Guglielmi

From his blog, lultimathule.wordpress.com

Translated by me

  Jeff Buckley is a son of art, but on this subject he prefers not to mince words: not because he wishes to erase his kinship ties with the late Buckley Sr. (how could he, with that face and voice?), but because his relationship with his father Tim-known only by hearsay and hearsay(?), because he disappeared when he was still a child-have been too brief and too fleeting to influence him. Chromosomes, however, do not lie, as attested by the beauty and personality of Jeff's songs: intense and insinuating music, reaching into the deepest and most hidden recesses of the mind and heart, ranging from folk to avant-garde, from free-jazz to quasi-psychedelia, from intimate ballad to rock. It is no coincidence, then, that young Buckley has already won a place of honor among the stars of the 1990s, thanks to his two splendid records-the 1993 mini-CD Live At Sin-é and the 1994 album Grace-and to his charisma in holding the stage: a quality, the latter, also amply brought out in his Cesena concert last February 17, which captivated the large audience and offered the writer the long-awaited opportunity to meet and converse with him. Albeit for less than half an hour, and as part of a press conference made quite chaotic by the noise of soundcheck and the rumblings of a Vidia still being set up.

Is this your first time on a challenging tour like this?

No, the second one. In fact, the third, if you also consider the solo concerts of the first half of last year.

Hot comments?

It was outstanding in France, and it went very well in Germany as well. In Britain, however, it was harder, too much pressure...I mean because of the attitude of the press, the public had nothing to do with it.

Anyway, are you satisfied? 

Apart from a few setbacks, I am really enjoying myself. I enjoy playing, and besides, having to focus on the tour keeps me from dealing with other problems: for example, what I will have to do when I return home, or prospects for the future.

Is that what you've wanted since you were a child?

No, not at all. I never thought of anything like that as a child.

 
How is it, then, that you find yourself in this situation?

I honestly don't know. It happened like that, without deciding anything at the table. It has always been a definite choice of mine not to plan my life more.

Do you feel more comfortable as a soloist or a band leader? 

Almost all the music I like best is by bands. The soloist, however capable and eclectic, precludes himself a lot of possibilities, and is too limited by the obligation of having to hold up the entire show. It is good to experiment together with others, to expand the instrument-park and to be free to indulge in one's own sonic whims while the group thinks of everything else...provided, of course, that the companions are the right ones.

What, in your case, are the differences between recording in the studio and performing live?

Working in the recording room is very similar to composing: you go step by step, adding or removing something until you arrive at a synthesis. On the stage we let go, and the changes depend more on the feeling of the moment than on reflection. My concerts are very improvised, although song structures and setlists do not undergo major changes.

Have you already started writing for the new album?

Not yet. I take a lot of notes, but the actual songs have yet to come. As I mentioned to you earlier, life "on the road" gives no respite, and allows no room for anything else.

In your opinion, is Jeff Buckley's music of joy or melancholy?

It depends on the piece, and the mood of the listener...but, at the end of the day, I'm not sure that's really the case. Agreed, some things suggest sad images, but often even happiness can hurt someone.

Your opinion on success?

I am happy with my business and the reception it has received, but I am also concerned: in such situations it is all too easy to lose your mind and become something different, and worse, than what you were before you achieved notoriety. I am flattered and surprised by all these endorsements, but success-at least in the most common meaning of the term-doesn't interest me that much: playing and telling what my heart tells me is much, much more important.

How do you deal with what's written about you?

I generally try not to read it. I believe that music is something highly personal, and I don't like anyone taking it upon themselves to explain to others the merits or demerits of my songs, or to tell them whether or not they are worth listening to. The intent of every artist is to make works that will be remembered in time, that will somehow remain in history; magazines, on the other hand, are meant for quick consumption, cannot rise above the subjects they cover and make assertions and judgments that are too categorical.

What about video clips? Do you also consider them a "necessary evil", the price you pay to be known?

No, I'm not that extreme. The problem with videos lies in the fact that, since they are mostly a kind of "visual translation" of the song, they kill the imagination and hinder freedom of interpretation; this does not mean, however, that a clip cannot be ingenious-just think of those by the Residents-or that it must necessarily show off dozens of beautiful girls and who knows how many expensive special effects. As far as I was concerned, I wanted something simple and atmospheric, in tune with the way I understand music.

 With his air somewhere between the vanished and the maudit, which the malignant will deem a bit constructed but which to yours truly seemed entirely sincere, Jeff Buckley bids farewell to the platoon of journalists just when his passionate flirtation with a bottle of red wine had begun to make him less wary and more talkative. A couple of hours later, in front of an ecstatic audience, he will immolate all of himself in the cathartic ritual of the live show, parading with authentic, infectious emotional transport an intense and seductive repertoire like few others. Auteur rock imbued with flair and poetry, mostly subdued and enigmatic but also ignited by sudden bursts of vivacity, over which Jeff's singing twirls like an unattainable phoenix evoking ghosts of the past - a Song To The Siren almost on par with his parent's, as well as the now classic Hallelujah by master Leonard Cohen - and scattering around him new gems of dazzling splendor (Mojo Pin, Eternal Life, Last Goodbye). He's already great, Jeff Buckley. So great that more than one, mesmerized by the solemn mysticism of his Grace, has already elevated him to the rank of Messiah. Who knows if Our Lord would be satisfied with the role, or if he would reluctantly accept it like the protagonist in that old Richard Bach novel.

Taken from Audio Review n.149 of May, 1995

Vidia, Cesena, 17 February 1995

There were quite a few of us, and certainly not out of mere curiosity, eagerly awaiting the only Italian date of Jeff Buckley's European tour; young and old, arriving at the Vidia with the notes of the splendid Grace echoing in our hearts and with the certainty that we were about to witness something different, and bigger, than the usual rock concert. What was immortalized in Live At Sin-é, the splendid debut mini-CD of Our Lord, could not, after all, have been a joke of chance. 

They vibrated almost to the point of breaking, the strings of the soul, on the evening of Feb. 17: not only because of Jeff's velvety charisma, the extraordinary intensity of the repertoire and the reckless balancing acts of a voice that almost fears no comparison with the mythical and unforgettable one of the never-too-missed Buckley Sr, but also for the joy of verifying-no small feat-how this cynical and plasticized world is still capable of conceiving true artists, and how music-biz still has the ability to recognize them and the desire to promote them despite their absolute refractoriness to the games of calculation and fashion: pure and brilliant artists like Jeff Buckley, who turn performance into a catharsis with a mystical flavor, and songs-however nervous, melancholy or pained-into touching hymns to joy and life. As also in the case of Song To The Siren "stolen" from that father known only by heard and hearsay(?), which proposed as a surprise in that of Cesena even tore us a few tears of emotion.

Taken from Noise No. 39 of April, 1995

Finding his way in the city

The Record, December 16, 1994

By Arthur Staple

Submitted by Sai

Music Preview: Jeff Buckley performs with Brenda Kahn at 9 p.m. Saturday at Irving Plaza, 17 Irving Place, Manhattan, (212) 777-6800. $12. Also 9 p.m. Sunday at Maxwell's, 1039 Washington St., Hoboken. Sold out.

Jeff Buckley was kicking around his native Southern California a few years ago, playing in a variety of nands just to make music and money, an aimless lost soul in Hollywood. He longed to be in more creative, more sensual surroundings. He thought of New York.

  "California was a lot of time for reflection, to the point where it becomes a self-devouring thing," said Buckley, who arrived in New York in 1990. "I was too much in my head. I came to New York so I could live in my body.

  "It's lonley to only find magic in my private places. So I fought my way out by coming here."

  Fought his way up to playing solo shows at Cafe Sin-e, an East Village folk-rock hub. Fought his way to a record deal with Columbia, which released "Grace" in August. And fought to make his own way in the downtown music world that had once embraced his father, Sixties folk singer Tim Buckley, who killed himself when Jeff was a boy.

  Judging by the overwhelming buzz that's been droning since a packed show at The Supper Club during September's CMJ Music Marathon, the younger Buckley is no longer standing in shadows. "This guy is something special," CMJ president Bobby Haber said when asked to name the artist to watch there. "He's extremely gifted."

  "Grace" is quite a piece of work. "Mojo Pin" opens the album with a slowly building guitar intro-this song and the title track were co-written by Captain Beefheart guitarist Gary Lucas, who also contributes guitar to the two songs-before you hear Buckley’s voice.

  It's a caressing sound, high, soft, warm-Buckley rarely dips into any low registers, instead using a powerful falsetto on several tracks. His voice drips emotion, wrapping around lines like this one from "The Last Goodbye": "Kiss me, please, kiss me/Kiss me out of desire, not consolation..."
  That song and a stirring solo cover of Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" are among the album's best. Buckley and his band also show they can step out of the folk-rock mode with "Eternal Life," which grabs a thick bass groove and gives the song a little grunge tinge. Not bad for a group thrown together three weeks before the album was recorded.
  "We really became a band during the album," said Buckley. "Even now, we're evolving, working into a common thread."
  Touring, which Buckley was doing for a few months before the album came out, has also sharpened the group, which added guitarist Michael Tighe for live shows.
  "The biggest shock we got was in Amsterdam, about a week before CMJ. The response there...we were just flabbergasted. It hasn't been like that yet here, thankfully. We don't want to be some big sensation that's forgotten quickly. Besides, you could tell the industry types that some opera singer who eats dirt is the next punk rock, and they'd believe it."
  But Buckley hasn't bristled at the corporate side of music-besides the weekend shows, he's playing a free midnight gig at Tower Records (Broadway and Fourth Street) tonight. Being hot has its price, but Buckley said he won't give in to fame.
  "I want to do something vastly different the next time around," he announced. "Then we'll see how disposable I am."