Wednesday, July 18, 2012

A SHORT CHAT WITH GARY LUCAS

Gary Lucas will be at Zappanale. He will be bringing his Captain Beefheart Symposium, he will be doing a solo concert, performing with his Fast 'n' Bulbous Captain Beefheart Project, and he will be guesting with other bands.
Gary was also present at the 2011 edition of the Zappanale festival. The audience had a great time, and it looked like Gary had a good time as well.


UniMuta : From my personal point of view, last year's edition of Zappanale was a real treat: both the music and the atmosphere were great. How do you look back on it?


Gary Lucas : One of the best festivals I have ever played! The sense of community was awe-inspiring, and the music sublime. The people who showed up had such great energy ad a anifest love of music. And what a trip to find old fans and friends of mine who had traveled all the way from far-flung places (I ran into people I knew from Sweden, Prague, the US etc.) to commune in Bad Doberan over a love of Frank Zappa's music and adventurous music in general!


UniMuta : Last year, you performed with Co de Kloet, did a solo concert, played with The Plastic People Of The Universe, guested with Essra Mohawk,... Are these all different aspects of your musical mind? It's all so different. How do you prepare?


Gary Lucas : I love all sorts of music and do all sorts of different musical projects continuously--it enables me to keep working full time as a musician and it keeps me from getting bored. I am not sure how I manage it except to say I am a double Gemini and have lots of different musical personas inside me. Like Walt Whitman once said: "I contain multitudes".


UniMuta : I'm glad to hear that you will be bringing your Captain Beefheart Symposium to Bad Doberan. You will also be performing with Doctor Dark, a Beefheart tribute band, and with your fabulous Fast 'n' Bulbous project. It's good to see that there will be a fine dose of Beefheart at Zappanale. How have the reactions been towards the Captain Beefheart Symposium so far? Is this something that you would like to do more often?


Gary Lucas : Yes I would. The world needs to know what a giant once walked the earth, and it saddens me when I draw a blank mentioning his name to so many people. But this was also the case when Don Van Vliet was alive...so I aim to change things and try and raise people's consciousness regarding Beefheart's art in all its variegated splendor.


UniMuta : I have always been fascinated by the variety of your various projects and musical interests. Can you already tell us what your next project will be about?

Gary
Lucas : I have been working on an album "Gary Lucas' Cinefantastique" which will contain solo guitar arrangements of famous film music by Nino Rota, Bernard Herrmann, et al., plus some of my own, including music I composed for "Lalee's Kin", a documentary by Maysles Films ("Gimme Shelter", "Grey Gardens") that was nominated for an Academy Award.  I love film music ever since I was a little boy, there is something haunting about a good film theme that stays with you and acts to trigger memories of the whole film when you hear it. They are like classic pop songs in miniature, albeit instrumental.

UniMuta : Another fascinating side of Gary Lucas. Sounds great.

Thank you & see you in a couple of weeks in Bad Doberan.


Gary Lucas : LOOKING FORWARD




www.zappanale.de
Zappanale
August 1 - 4, 2012
Bad Doberan
Germany

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