Sonic Youth, Tortoise, Godspeed Folk on Chatham Set
Plus: Final Fantasy, Tony Conrad, Lichens, members of Hüsker Dü, U.S. Maple, Fog
One man, one chord, and a pretty enviable list of collaborators:
Guitar Trio, perhaps
Rhys Chatham's trademark piece, is minimal music deployed on a maximal scale.
Chatham celebrated the iconic composition's 30th birthday early last year by
taking it on tour across North America with members of Sonic Youth, Tortoise, Godspeed You! Black Emperor/A Silver Mt. Zion, Hüsker Dü, Fog, Final Fantasy, and more joining in at various stops. Most performances stretched the
Trio to include upwards of seven or eight guitarists-- one (Toronto) even featured a six-piece string section-- and by all accounts "epic" was the word.
Those who missed out and those who long to relive the experience alike, you're in luck. On March 4,
Table of the Elements will issue
"GUITAR TRIO IS MY LIFE!" from Rhys Chatham & His Guitar Trio All-Stars, a massive three-disc set collecting performances of the famed piece from across last year's tour. The set draws its name from an exclamation made by a particularly zealous fan during a previous
Guitar Trio performance.
Featured on the release: Thurston Moore, Kim Gordon, and Lee Ranaldo of Sonic Youth (in Brooklyn), John McEntire, Jeff Parker, and Doug McCombs of Tortoise (Chicago), Efrim Menuck and Thierry Amar of Godspeed You! Black Emperor/A Silver Mt. Zion (Montreal), Owen Pallett of Final Fantasy (Toronto), Rob Lowe of Lichens (Chicago, Milwaukee, Minneapolis), Andrew Broder of Fog (Minneapolis), Greg Norton of Hüsker Dü (Minneapolis), and tons more. Check out the city-by-city breakdown
here, and while you're at it, have a look at
the score. Not so simple after all, eh?
"GUITAR TRIO IS MY LIFE!":
Disc one:
01 Guitar Trio Pt. 1, Brooklyn
02 Guitar Trio Pt. 2, Chicago
03 Guitar Trio Pt. 1, Buffalo
Disc two:
01 Guitar Trio Pt. 2, Toronto
02 Guitar Trio Pt. 1, Montreal
03 Guitar Trio Pt. 2, Cleveland
04 Guitar Trio Pt. 1, Minneapolis
Disc three:
01 Guitar Trio Pt. 2, Milwaukee
02 Guitar Trio Pt. 1, Chicago
03 Guitar Trio Pt. 2, Brookyn