FraKctured - live performances - audient reports
1/11/00
- Chicago
It made my day to see your website.
No one seemed to have mentioned yet that KC opened the November 1st, 2000 show in Chicago
with Fraktcured. It kind of surprised me, I thought of this as a piece that they'd build
up toward. Amazing to me, that this could actually be done live by human hands.
As far as comparing Fracture and Frakctured: at first I thought of the newer one as a
reworking of the underlying theme of the older one. More recently, I've begun to think
that it's origin may have been more of an outgrowth of Larks' Tongues Part IV. Regardless,
both are awesome.
I'd love to hear bands (with the finesse to do it well) play covers of them, if
imaginatively done: Frakctured arranged for assorted brass, flute, piccolo, saxes and a
plethora of percussives, for instance, has been going through my head the last few days.
I'm excited about the prospect of a real discussion of practical tips on the substantial
technical challenges of playing either of these monsters live, and will be coming back to
this site regularly in anticipation of that. I'll start off with a humble contribution : I
think that the similarity in tone color between the guitar and violin on Fracture was
quite intentional, and greatly adds to the cohesion of the parts where they play in
unison. I could name other pieces in the KC catalog where the guitar and another,
non-guitar instrument used similar tone color to good effect, but I respect the defined
focus of this site.
Finally, a tip: don't listen to either of these pieces while chopping vegetables. (Ouch!!)
One
of the most amazing guitar compostions! I witnessed the Halloween show at the
Park West with my two boys (ages 17 & 15 ) and saw the June 14th show at
12th & Porter with my wife. it ( FraKctured ) was one of the"stand
outs" that everybody remembered.
Michael Waugh
From Robert Fripp's diary at DGM
Wednesday 1st. November, 2000
23.50
A very generous audience. My comment to the team afterwards: "I don't know if we were good, but we were popular". A generous sprinkling of Clams Crimsonique. Tonight was the dangerous set list: beginning with "FraKctured". At the beginning of the set I have no idea of the sound, the audience, the sense of the performance - this establishes itself during the first 3-4 pieces. The group sets this up ahead of time. Then, after that point, the performance may begin to take on a life of its own. Whether it does or not, depends significantly on the audience - if it "hears" the performance or not, and to what degree. If the music is heard & accepted, then the show takes on a life of its own. Otherwise, it moves through linear time towards the finish. Nothing of value has happened.
From Trey Gunn's diary at www.treygunn.com
November 1, 2000 -- Park West, show #3 / Chicago, IL
I really enjoyed tonight's show. There seemed to be disagreement, within the band, about which of the three shows was the best. But, I would definitely go with the third one. And I spoke to several reliable sources in the audience who said the same thing.
It was a very unusual set. Robert wrote up two 'dangerous' sets. One being just 'dangerous' and the other being 'very dangerous.' We opted for the 'very dangerous' one, but with making one small change in it near the end. It began with FraKctured! How about that as dangerous? We had three different improv segments with Siezure being a predetermined 'piece' (and I use that term extremely loosely.) We made some very nice segues out of the improvs into several of the next pieces. I suppose this interests me the most with the improvisations -- that we can get to the place where we seamlessly shift in and out of them from the composed pieces. Robert also put Thrush and Three of a Perfect Pair in the middle of the set. As opposed to where we have previously had them as encore material. And for the first encore we played Cage and Sex, Sleep, Eat, Drink, Dream.
I came off of the stage feeling really good about this show