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"New New England"
Horses in the Sky -- A Silver Mt. Zion
Bostonist had the opportunity to catch A Silver Mt. Zion and the Black Ox Orkestar at the Middle East last Wednesday night. It was an amazing show and a great night.
If you don't know, A Silver Mt. Zion was formed by Godspeed You! Black Emperor's Efrim Menuck, Sophie Trudeau and Thierry Amar. The seven piece collective (drums, bass, two guitars, cello and two violins) plays contemporary chamber music of the post-rock variety. Although their sprawling music has a lot in common with GSYBE, A Silver Mt. Zion was formed out of a desire to compose a more lyrical, song-based music (with vocals) in order to "harness the protest song traditions of folk, punk, and avant rock."
Bostonist must confess that, as much as we love Mt. Zion's music (not to mention that of GSYBE), We've never been a big fan of Efrim's vocals (that's to say his strained, thin singing voice, not the lyrics). But it really didn't matter seeing the group perform live. The music was so powerful, the band's interaction so precise and charming, and Sophie's vocals so strong that it was easy for Bostonist to overlook (or forget) Efrim's yelp-sing.
The collective kicked off the show with "God Bless Our Dead Marines" from their most recent album Horses in the Sky. The piece started with a mournful, simple melody, driven by a steady pulse of plucked strings before slowly exploding into a whirling two-step Roma stomp propelled by frenetic percussion, handclaps and thundering drumbeats. Then the track settled back into another simple melody ("the vulgar kings on their dirty thrones"), which slowly built again GSYBE style. The composition ended with a painfully beautiful vocal chorus, sung initially by Efrim, Sophie and Becky as a round, with most everyone else joining in by the end: "When the world is sick, can no one be well? But I dreamt we were all beautiful and strong." Phenomenal. Exhilarating. A bit draining. But incredibly moving.
And the show had just begun. The group then launched into two new numbers, "Blind, Blind, Blind" and "A Million Died to Make This Sound." Both pieces were just as impressive as "Dead Marines," particularly "A Million Died," during which each member of the group sat down in succession (and continued playing their instruments sitting or kneeling on the floor) as the piece wound down to its somber conclusion.
Silver Mt. Zion ended with "The Triumph of Our Tired Eyes" from 2001's Born Into Trouble As the Sparks Fly Upward. Those pressed close to the stage alongside Bostonist were quite familiar with this track, as well as most of the material the collective played last week. And we all loved the show. Hopefully some of those at the Middle East hearing A Silver Mt. Zion for the first time were touched by the power of the group's sweeping, somber chamber rock.
Bostonist was also very excited to hear Mt. Zion's Thierry Amar and Jessica Moss' Black Ox Orkestar project -- which opened the show. The four members (violin, bass, drums, guitar and clarinet) of Black Ox bring politically-charged Yiddish texts to traditional Eastern and Southern European Jewish folk music that is sometimes played with the ferocity of as punk, the jazz-kick of klezmer, and the gut-punch of avant-rock and anti-folk. Bringing a little bit of John Zorn's Radical Jewish Culture series to Constellation Records."
Several of the few tracks the group played were, to Bostonist's delight, surprisingly traditional. Including the interpretation of "Golem," the group's final song and the highlight of the set. The implications and overtones to today's political climate (be it in Iraq or Lebanon) inherent in the band's explanation of the Golem metaphor were not lost on (most of) the audience. And it provided a good introduction to A Silver Mt. Zion's political message.
purchase A Silver Mt. Zion | purchase Black Ox Orkestar
Post contributed by Matt Durutti. More of Matt's photos of the show may be seen here (Silver Mt. Zion) and here (Black Ox Orkestar).
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I think that the girl singing very beautifully (and loud) must be Jessica and not Sophie...
And Black Ox Orkestar is led by Scott, Silver Mt Zion's drummer.
Seems to be very strange the new way they play "one million died to make this sound"...