Baby Gramps Saved My Eternal Soul!

T/F '07 is happening... now! All of Columbia trembles with nervous anticipation. I got the chance to check out of two of the opening night events, and must say that if these were the appetizer... bring on the pot roast.

First up was filmmaker Peter Gerard submitting clips of his current production "Tomorrow, I'll Eat My Music" to an audience critique at Ragtag Cinemacafe. It ain't easy for an artist to put his work out there, unfinished, for the masses to tee off on, but this documentarian seemed undaunted. The film started off as a simple journal of one man's journey back to his native Ghana to record an album of authentic African material (all of the white musicians in Scotland were too stiff for his taste's).

But thing quickly careen off the tracks, and suddenly Gerard gets absorbed into the proceedings, suddenly rendered a character in his own documentary. The audience was on point with a variety of probing questions, and Gerard fielded their inquiries honestly, and not without charm. Rarely does one see collaboration such as this in the cinema today - usually it's gigantic studios telling viewers what they want to see - inevitably some combination of CGI mutants and desperately unfunny jokes by former SNL writers.

So yeah, I hope this type of creative brainstorming environment returns to future T/F festivals - as long as there are filmmakers out there brave enough to put their work under the microscope.

Oh yeah... and about this post's title...

Having been to my fair share of concerts, I know it's pretty common practice for an act to just mail in a performance and force the audience to pick up the postage. Doesn't matter the genre, the artist's age, or how well known they are. Humdrum Performance Syndrome is universal.

But damn, this Baby Gramps cat? Imagine Captain Beefheart wrung through a didgeridoo, with a thousand volts of electricity shot through him. Playing his self-identified "epileptic swamp music," Baby Gramps cut through his set with a madcap charisma that won the crowd at the Artisan over from the first note. Anyone else doing a eight to ten minute version of "The Big Rock Candy Mountain" is going to get a lethal dose of apathy from a crowd, but Gramps worked the crowd like a sly old miracle tonic salesman, getting an unprecedented response for the song's refrain.

Every song seemed to willingly veer in a thousand different detours, whether they be an unexpected guitar break, a humorous aside, or at one point, a damned impressive Bob Dylan impersonation. Gramps' rickety fingers shot up and down his vintage guitar in an impressive display of dexterity. With his creepy vocal tics, slithering guitar, and pounding boot, Gramps kept the audience rapt for the duration of his set, and even had a demanded encore, which he could sadly not deliver. Plus, he's a looker too. See above.

In short - pretty staggering stuff. I had been hotly anticipating acts like the Apples In Stereo and Mucca Pazza, but this madman came out of nowhere. Certainly bodes well for the rest of the festival! Discoveries abound when T/F is in town!

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You kinda have to be there for the impact to hit you full in the face, but check out the man's audio samples page. May I recommed "Teddy Bears' Picnic?" Goofy good stuff.

Got photos from the performance or anything else from Thursday night's weirdness? That's what Flickr is for!