Culture Shock 03.12.15: 'Whiplash' is a horror story

A famous tale in jazz circles involves a young Charlie Parker screwing up during a performance with Count Basie Orchestra drummer Jo Jones and Jones becoming so incensed he throws a cymbal at him. In the more flamboyant versions of the story, Jones "nearly decapitates" the young saxophonist.

It is a transformative moment for Parker. Afterward, he practices. He hones his skills. A few years later, the legend of Charlie "Bird" Parker, one of the greatest sax players ever, is born.

It's a good, strong story, and one we hear repeated throughout writer/director Damien Chazelle's "Whiplash." Yet even within jazz, Bird's story is an outlier, a kind of origin myth.

Bird's story isn't Thelonious Monk's story nor John Coltrane's story nor Miles Davis' story.

Before long, we realize Bird's is the only story Chazelle knows, and "Whiplash," for all its virtuosity, is simply variations on a theme. Chazelle turns it into a campfire tale to frighten children.

One supposes Chazelle thinks he's making a movie about music, drive and the correct ratio of inspiration to perspiration needed to create an artistic genius. What he has made is something more primal — a monster movie for performing arts school students.

Watching "Whiplash" is an intense, even harrowing experience, insofar as watching any movie can be said to be "harrowing." It's an experience I'm happy to have had but not one I'm eager to repeat, and it all comes down to the monster that Chazelle and J.K. Simmons create, for which Simmons claimed a deserved Best Supporting Actor Oscar.

And there is no doubt Simmons' jazz instructor Terence Fletcher is a monster. He stalks his prey like a vampire, seduces with manufactured charm and sweet lies, then destroys. To say Simmons delivers a literally mesmerizing performance is only a minor abuse of the world "literally." There is a bit of Svengali here in both the Fletcher character and Simmons' portrayal.

Seen another way, Fletcher is an abusive spouse, although he never claims he will change or do better. He is too subtle for that. With a smile, a laugh and that Charlie Parker story, he lures his victims into giving him just one more chance without ever asking for it. It's seduction at its most insidious.

Fletcher's perfect mark arrives in the form of first-year student Andrew Neimann (Miles Teller), a green recruit with more ambition than sense, aspiring to be the next Buddy Rich and to avoid the fate of his father (Paul Reiser), a failed writer who has settled into a life of domesticated mediocrity.

Neimann's instrument of choice is the drums, and his quest to master jazz drumming reduces to more speed and greater technique. You can't get soul out of the drums the way a talented musician conjures the soul of a trumpet or sax or piano. The drums seem like a lark, or, at most, Neimann's all-too-blunt method of taking out his frustrations. That makes it all the more difficult to believe Neimann's motives are pure. Does he want to be a great drummer, or does he want just not to be his father? Fletcher probably senses what we do when he quizzes Neimann early on and learns no one else in Neimann's family has any musical inclinations. But for Fletcher's purposes, any motivation will do as long as it becomes an obsession. Taunting Neimann about his dad is just one of Fletcher's strategies. Fletcher doles out psychological and physical abuse so extreme it's impossible to believe it could fly under the radar today at any real fine arts school.

But we must remember: "Whiplash" is a fantasy, and the school is the monster's hunting ground.

One can't overstate what an imposing presence Simmons is. The 60-year-old actor makes Fletcher  all muscle and sinew, powered by rage. Neimann never stands a chance. Each time he seems to take initiative or notch a victory, Fletcher is there to end it. Even when we finally reach the Screenwriting 101 happy ending, we can't take it at face value.

Thanks to Simmons, Chazelle has made a great if hard-to-watch movie, just probably not the one he thought he was making. If there were still video stores, "Whiplash" would belong in the horror aisle.

Al Di Meola turns 57

Legendary jazz/fusion guitarist Al Di Meola turns 57 today. That's a good enough excuse to post this:

Blue Note jazz album covers in live action

Hi-Fi from bante on Vimeo.


[Via Open Culture.]

Friday Night Videos

The best of my playlist

Chick Corea, Stanley Clarke and Lenny White, Forever

Al Di Meola, Pursuit of Radical Rhapsody

Hiromi, Voice

Culture Shock 02.17.11: Angry Bieber fans strike back after Grammys

The Internet contracted an acute case of Tourette syndrome Sunday night as fans of Justin Bieber — more than 7 million of them, based on his number of Twitter followers, and mostly 12-year-olds, judging by their spelling and grammar — tweeted their outrage after their Canadian idol lost the best new artist Grammy award.

Not only did the world's most annoying pop star go home empty-handed, but his even-more-annoying fans — called, more annoying still, "Beliebers" — took it really, really hard. Best of all, Bieber lost to a relatively unknown jazz performer, Esperanza Spalding, whose self-titled CD was on my iPod long before the true Beliebers were shouting, "Who is Esperanza Spalding?"

Who is Esperanza Spalding? She's the woman who stopped the motor of Bieber's world. A talented vocalist, bassist and composer, she's the first jazz artist ever to win the best new artist Grammy.

So, an artist I like, who performs my favorite style of music, emerged to beat Bieber and become the walking nightmare for daydream Beliebers everywhere.

That's what I call schadenfreude.

Your word of the day: Schadenfreude, noun: from the German, meaning enjoyment obtained from the misfortunes of others.

And, man, the Bieber fans were troubled. Their rage-filled, all-caps tweets made news nationwide.

They tried to deface Spalding's Wikipedia page. And 24 hours after the Grammys ended, "Esperanza Spalding" was still a trending topic on Twitter as Bieber fans still pretended not to know who she was.

Grammy voters are often quick to snub a popular but overrated artist in favor of rewarding a performer with real talent. This year, bless their hearts, they did it twice.

For the third time, Eminem was up for album of the year. And for the third time, someone totally unexpected snatched it away from him. In 2001, it was old-timers Steely Dan. In 2003, it was newcomer Norah Jones. And this year it was the Canadian indie rock band Arcade Fire.

Although lacking the passion of the Bieber brigades, the Twitter hacks were back at it, this time tweeting, "Arcade who???"

I realize musical audiences are more fragmented than ever. I'd never heard of Lady Antebellum until Sunday. But Arcade Fire isn't that obscure.

Yet even Twitter's semi-famous were perplexed.

"OK, Im not THAT old but whos Arcade Fire?" tweeted Tawny Kitaen, best known for appearing in music videos for the band Whitesnake in the 1980s and appearing on "Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew" a few years ago.

Tweeted Rosie O'Donnell: "album of the year? never heard of them ever."

Oh, if only I could say the same of you, Rosie.

Even A&E "reality" star Duane "Dog the Bounty Hunter" Chapman — apparently a closet Belieber, too — weighed in with his ignorance, which I imagine happens a lot.

This makes three times the Grammys have rewarded performers I love — especially Steely Dan — while denying Eminem. Each time, the rest of the world has run around screaming "Eminem was robbed!" This time, it was instantly, and ungrammatically, on Twitter.

Meanwhile, I just sit back and listen to the new Esperanza Spalding CD, "Chamber Music Society."

Now that's worth writing about.

After 25 years, Return to Forever returns for more

They’ve gotten the band back together.

Twenty-five years after their first, brief reunion and 32 years after their last album, Return to Forever’s classic lineup is back and touring the country.

The revived jazz fusion band performed Saturday in front of a capacity crowd of about 2,750 at Atlanta’s plush Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre, which opened last fall. It was the 50th stop on the Return to Forever summer reunion tour.

Now, I’ve been to my fair share of concerts, but I’d never before been to one where every song earned a standing ovation. (Standing-room-only shows don’t count.) The years since Return to Forever’s break-up have only increased fans’ enthusiasm. Some on the front row handed their old, vinyl RTF albums to the roadies for the band to sign. Others paid hundreds of dollars extra for VIP packages that included meeting the band backstage.

Led by keyboardist Chick Corea and featuring guitarist Al Di Meola, bassist Stanley Clarke and drummer Lenny White, Return to Forever was one of three bands during the 1970s that defined jazz fusion. Along with Weather Report and guitarist John McLaughlin’s Mahavishnu Orchestra, Return to Forever mixed jazz improvisation with electric instruments and Motown-inspired rhythms, creating a sound that has influenced a generation of both jazz and rock artists.

Jazz fusion was the flipside of progressive rock, which saw bands like Pink Floyd and Yes blend rock music with elements of jazz and classical.

In conjunction with the tour, Return to Forever has released “The Anthology,” a two-disc set featuring remastered tracks from the group’s four best albums: “Hymn of the Seventh Galaxy,” “Where Have I Known You Before,” “No Mystery” and “Romantic Warrior.”

In the years following RTF’s breakup, Di Meola and Clarke launched successful solo careers. Di Meola’s lightning-paced, “shred” guitar style probably influenced even more heavy metal guitarists than jazz players. Clarke, meanwhile, divided his efforts between solo albums and scoring Hollywood movies, including “Boyz n the Hood”(cq)  and “The Transporter.”

Throughout the ’80s and ’90s, Corea continued with both solo projects and his new group, the Chick Corea Elektric Band.

But to see and hear Return to Forever on Saturday, you’d think the quartet had never been apart. With Clarke taking center stage, the four launched into their classic catalog, deftly trading solos and playfully trying to one-up one another.

The first set featured the group’s spacey, sci-fi influenced tracks like “Hymn of the Seventh Galaxy,” “Vulcan Worlds” and “The Sorceress.”

But RTF really shined in the second set, with Di Meola and Clarke switching to acoustic. Di Meola launched into a medley of his solo pieces, including covers of Argentine tango master Astor Piazzolla’s compositions and his signature song, “Mediterranean Sundance,” which elicited an enthusiastic response from the audience.

Di Meola may not be as fast as the 19-year-old prodigy who wowed critics and audiences alike in the ’70s, but he makes up for it with even better technique and the sort of emotional depth that comes with time. And he’s still plenty fast with his fingers.

Corea followed with a keyboard solo, setting up Clarke, whose virtuoso, marathon solo on upright bass had people in the balcony calling out, “I love you, Stanley!”

For the encore, RTF returned to its electric bread and butter for one of my favorite of the band’s tunes, “Duel of the Jester and the Tyrant.”

Three decades may have passed since RTF’s last recording, but those old songs seem timeless. But what else should you expect from a band named Return to Forever?