RON ANDERSON
"A Stranger in a Strange Earth"
Have not probably heard speak of
Ron Anderson. Well, don't feel
bad for it.
He is not in fact the artist
with but promotion inside the
progressive... It is more, your
work is only known by some few
ones fortunate, that which
represents a true injustice.
But, Who is this intelligent and
innovative musician, creator of
anarchical and complex sound
worlds?
Nucleus delights in presenting
it to you.
By Sergio
Vilar
Ron,
Could you speak to me of your
beginnings in music?
My very first instrument was the
piano. My family had one, I
guess my brother tried it before
I was born. So, I used to bang
on it when I was very young,
three or four. I took formal
lessons when I was about ten.
That lasted maybe one year, then
I picked up
the electric bass guitar when I
was 14 or 15. My first guitar
was an acoustic I was about 17.
The first electric guitar (a
Gibson) I bought at 19.
I started on bass because there
was a band in my high school
whose bass player had just quit.
So I bought a bass, practiced
for a week, and than told the
guitar player of the band that I
could play. As you can imagine
- we were
quite bad. But in about one year
and half we went from doing
covers of Led Zeppelin,
Black Sabbath, and
Cream to free improvisation.
This is about 1975 or 76.
Who would you say that
influenced your musical style
the most?
This is a pretty long list that
is always changing. Many things
and not just things musical
influence me. Frank Zappa
was a very big influence.
Fred Frith, Charles
Mingus, Sun Ra,
Miles Davis, Cecil Taylor,
20th century
composers, this is just an
endless list; writers, film
makers, travel, New York City,
the Subway is an influence. I’m
influenced by the people the
around me, I’m influenced by
things that I have not even seen
or experienced yet. Time does
not travel in a straight line,
but in circles. Most recently I
have been listening a lot to
music from North Africa, Middle
East and India and Pakistan. I
purchased an Oud while traveling
in Turkey in last October, so I
have been listening to the great
Iraqi Oud player Munir Bashir.
But I’m always listening to many
different things; I have also
fallen in love with Olivier
Messiaen’s music -
"Vingt
Regards sur L, Enfant Jesus",
very incredible piano music.
Besides those influences, what
did it take you to compose this
difficult music style?
I enjoy difficult music, or at
least music that in some way is
challenging, this does not mean
necessarily technically
difficult.
Simply put, I’m just trying to
make music that I enjoy
listening to and that is fun for
me to play. It is very important
for me to enjoy what I’m working
on.
Could you describe each one of
your projects and what they mean
for you?
I have a pretty long history at
this point so I will just touch
on a few projects.
PAK is my full
time “rock band” which takes up
most of my time, I compose most
of the music and we have
rehearsal about twice a week.
RonRuins is a collaboration
with the Tokyo duet Ruins
who I have know for many years
and have done a lot of touring
with. There are two RonRuins
CDs and also two CDs of duets
with Tatsuya Yoshida (the
drummer of Ruins) and
myself. RonRuins is my
chance to play with two of the
finest musicians in the world.
The Infusion is an improvisation
ensemble that I have with two
French musicians Camel Zekri
and Olivier Paquotte. We
have just put out a CD and will
perform in May at the
Festival
International de Musque Actuelle
de Victoriaville in
Quebec, Canada.
Camel Zekri is a descendent
from generations of Algerian
musicians and this brings a new
dimension to this “free
improvisation” project. The
Molecules was my band that I
had while I was living in
Oakland, Ca in the 1990’s. It
was a band that tried to do
everything at the same time with
as much energy as possible.
Playing in The Molecules
was always great fun. I also
have a few solo CDs out,
Pak Small Are Half Inch
and Anything Is
Possible which gave me
the chance to be completely self
indulgent, lots of insane edits
and using any sort of sound that
felt right during the recording
of those projects.
How do you construct the
compositions?
Most of my compositional ideas
come from just improvising on
the guitar (sometimes I use
instruments other
than guitar) and hearing
an Idea that I like. After that
I just try and develop it in
some way. I
also like to edit tape and build
compositions that way, by
cutting up different sections,
then overdubbing other parts on
top. I now have a computer for
music editing so I will see how
that works in place of a razor
blade.
Do you think that you
are arriving to a more personal
and original sound?
I think that every musician is
trying to find their sound, of
course I’m no
exception, I
think I have found a sound, a
way of playing that is mine. But
I really do not think about that
kind of thing much anymore,
other people can decided if I
have found my own voice or not,
at this moment I just want to
create when I get the
inspiration. And of course One’s
sound is always changing, new
interests are always unfolding.
I have been composing some
“non-rock” music that is
completely written out in music
notation. I’m starting to become
interested in more melodic
playing, for
example, on
the last RonRuins CD the
track called Sunset
Through The Trees.
How did it affect you
in your musical conception to
reside you in Japan? How was
your first time there?
I never actually lived in Japan,
but I have been there twice on
tour. The
first time for ten days with
The Molecules, the second
time for three weeks on tour
with RonRuins for ten
concerts.
My first trip to Japan was just
too quick, not many days off to
see Japan. My second trip I had
much more time just to travel,
walk around Tokyo, get a better
feel for the place.
I’m not sure what effect
going to Japan had on my
playing, by the time I went
there I had already had my music
developed, I already knew many
of the musicians who playing in
the underground music scene. Of
course all of my travels have
some kind of effect on the music
that I make (I’m sure that if I
traveled to Argentina, that
experience would also have it’s
effect) but it’s hard to
pinpoint it. I do think that I
have similar ideas to many
Japanese groups, and they have
been an
influence. I think that I have
also influenced some Japanese
musicians, or at least I know
that we enjoy each other’s
music.
Would you say that the
progressive rock that they have
in Japan differs of the one that
we have in the west?
I would not call the music that
I know from Japan as just
“progressive rock”, there are
other influences as well, Punk
Rock, Noise, No Wave, Free
Improvisation. I think that at
least the musicians that I’m
familiar with are able to take
many different influences and
use them equally. I find the
musicians there very well
trained musically, of course
there is nothing unique about
that, but what is uncommon is
that these same musicians will
also let go of their technique
and are able to just have some
fun with their music.
What is Progressive Rock for
you? Does a scene of progressive
rock exist?
I know from surfing though the
web that a Progressive Rock
scene does exist, although I
find that it mostly a scene of
purists and does not interest me
that much. I forgot to mention
in one of the early questions
that the original Progressive
Rock was big influence on me;
Jethro Tull, King Crimson,
ect., to the more obscure;
Henry Cow, Magma.
What I like about most of these
groups is that they tried to be
different from each other or
that they where open to try new
Ideas. For myself I’m not a
purist, I’m trying to make an
exciting kind of music, in a
different way, take some
chances, not copy a sound that
was right for 1973, if that
makes my music progressive to
some people then that’s great.
What are you listening to these
days?
Here are ten CDs that are lying
next to my CD player at the
present moment.
1.
Olivier Messiaen "Vingt
Regards sur l’ Enfant Jesus"
(playing now while I type this)
2.
Ustad Hafeez Khan and Neela
Bahgwat
"North Indian Vocal Music"
3.
Bela
Bartok
"Sonata for 2 Pianos and
Percussion"
4.
Cecil
Taylor
"Jazz Advance"
5.
Sun
Ra
"Black Myth/Out In Space "
6.
Ali
Akbar Moradi
"Fire Of Passion" (Kurdish
Tanbur Music Of Iran)
7.
Munir Bashir
"The Art Of The Oud"
8.
Masada
"Live at Tonic"
9.
Sun
Ra
(The Sensational Guitars Of Dan
and Dale) – "Batman and Robin"
10.Magma
"Mekamk Kammamdoh"
The Japanese scene is generally
not very well known in this part
of the
world. From
your recent experience, what
artists from Japan would you
recommend to attention to?
Another list:
1.
Ruins
(and related projects)
2.
Boredoms
(and related projects)
3.
Haco
4.
Melt Banana
5.
Hoppy Kamiyama
6.
Otomo Yoshide
Immediate Plans
Tour with
The Infusion
in May in Canada and East Coast
of the USA.
PAK
will record a new CD this summer
and then tour.
I think I will do some
concerts in Europe this July and
August. I’m
planning to do some recording
very soon for
Paul
Lemos’
who you might remember from
Controlled Bleeding,
he has a new project call
Breast Fed Yak.
Hoping to find time to edit some
video from
PAK’s
European tour from October 02. I
hope to put out a CD of field
recordings from my travels.
Would you like to add something
more Ron?
I just would like people who do
not live in the USA to know that
there are many people living in
this country who are opposed to
the war in Afghanistan and Iraq,
opposed to the Bush
administration and their
hyper-capitalist war insanity.
I’m hoping that we can get rid
of Bush and all his asshole
corporate friends as soon as
possible. I hope that some day
they are tried as war criminals.
It has been amazing to hear the
lies and half-truths that come
out of their mouths. Bush will
say that it was unfortunate that
thousands of Iraqis where killed
(we never know how many) during
the war but it was necessary for
the “freedom” of Iraqi.
I guess one could give the
argument that when you are dead
you are free, but I think that
the freedom that the Bush
administration will be talking
about, is the freedom for the
USA to control the price of Oil
and the freedom to choose the
people it wants to run the new
Iraqi “democracy”.
