Orcutt Breaks It Down

I caught the great Bill Orcutt last night, opening for Thinking Fellers Union Local 282 at the Great American Music Hall here in San Francisco, and he was incredible. There is, as I discussed with my friend I attended with, something at once chaotic and dependable about what Orcutt does solo, and something interesting in the tension between those two aspects — how piece after piece, he breaks things down while still pushing forward. There’s an incredible pleasure not just to the whole that is his energetic, analytical viewpoint, but also to how various earlier guitarists can be heard in the mix — John Fahey, of course, with that art brut falling-apart quality, with Captain Beefheart and Marc Ribot as additional reference points, and Jimi Hendrix and Jimmy Page in there, as well. The echoes of Page, in particular reminded me, in turn, of a concert I saw last year of Fred Frith solo. It’s fantastic when the avant-garde shows its rock’n’roll roots.