Secret Past
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Brotzmann began art school in his hometown of Wuppertal in the late 50s, and he was heavily involved in the Fluxus movement in the early 60s; for several years he worked with Korean-born artist Nam June Paik. But by the mid-60s art had taken a backseat to music. “It was a question of time, and I’m not Superman,” he says. This decision would have a huge impact on jazz history–his earliest recordings ushered in a new tradition, as he and a handful of others combined the searing yet soulful approach of Albert Ayler and Archie Shepp with the harsh, cerebral tendencies of the European avant-garde. He never stopped producing visual art–in fact, he designed the block lettering used on the majority of his albums and posters. But he did stop showing it, limiting himself to occasional exhibits in Germany before fading from the gallery scene altogether in the mid-80s.
By coincidence, Chicagoan John Corbett, a friend of the saxophonist since presenting him in concert at Brown University in the 80s, was visiting shortly after the discovery. Corbett, who’s reissued some of the German’s most important early work on his Unheard Music Series label, had wanted for years to mount a show of Brotzmann’s art in the U.S., but the costs of shipping large works on canvas and wood were prohibitive. There was no such problem transporting this lightweight collection–Brotzmann created this work during lean times, and some of the paintings are on typing paper with binder holes. After seeing the Swedish retrospective, Corbett made the arrangements for a show here.
On April 28 Wire will release Send, their first new full-length album in a dozen years, on their Pink Flag label. Six of the album’s eleven tracks are taken from the two excellent EPs they released last year, Read & Burn 01 and Read & Burn 02, so they’re tossing in a free live CD recorded at Metro last September to customers who order the album over their Web site,
