To celebrate her 82nd birthday, Yoko Ono has released two collaborative tracks, one with Antony Hegarty, of Antony and the Johnson's, and John Zorn, prolific avant-garde composer.
I'm quite the Yoko Ono fan. I think she's a brilliant conceptualist with a brilliant energy and that makes up for more than her lack of musicality.
I think she's at her most interesting when she is paired with excellent musicians, that way her avant-garde actions are tempered with a strength of sound. That's why that Yoko Ono/Plastic Ono Band album was so fantastic.
I'm quite the Yoko Ono fan. I think she's a brilliant conceptualist with a brilliant energy and that makes up for more than her lack of musicality.
I think she's at her most interesting when she is paired with excellent musicians, that way her avant-garde actions are tempered with a strength of sound. That's why that Yoko Ono/Plastic Ono Band album was so fantastic.
I don't think she could have chosen better co-conspirators for these collaborations. Antony Hegarty is an art-pop genius with a crystaline voice and Zorn bleeds the New York school of avant-garde with nearly every note, the scene that Yoko herself helped develop.
Her collaboration with Zorn is one, three-minute track containing Yoko's primal-screaming and Zorn's honking, skrnoking, screaming Kaoru Abe-esque saxaphone. The audio is taken from a 2012 live show at the Greene Space.
Her collaboration with Zorn is one, three-minute track containing Yoko's primal-screaming and Zorn's honking, skrnoking, screaming Kaoru Abe-esque saxaphone. The audio is taken from a 2012 live show at the Greene Space.
The Ono/Hegarty collaboration is two tracks. One is a duet of Ono's 1985 track "I Love You Earth," while the other is Antony's solo rendition of Ono's "I'm Going Away Smiling."
Their rendition of "I Love you Earth" is a starkly beautiful, wistful piece. Antony plays a booming, opulent piano lead while trading off verses with Yoko. The lyrics are particularly beautiful, describing a person so in love with Earth and infinity that they "have to scream about it."
"I'm Going Away Smiling" sounds like an epitaph and, with Yoko's advancing age, it very well might be. Antony plays a stark, cinematic piano part. It's very, very emotional stuff. A perfect tribute for Yoko and her life and accomplishments.
I'm hoping that isn't true, because, love her or despise her, Yoko Ono is a beacon for women in the avant-garde and I don't think the world would be the same without her.
No comments:
Post a Comment