Jimmie Corrieri was one of a kind, and he helped found a
one-of-a-kind band. He died last
night. Like too many musicians and
composers (sung and relatively unsung), he left us too soon, perhaps in his
prime, but we still have the sui generis
songs (integrations of learned lyrics and infectious rhythms) that he composed
and impeccably performed.
A few
decades ago (around the time that the vinyl age ebbed and the digital age
flowed), at New York University, the young guitarist and composer met the
incomparable vocalist and lyricist (and actor) Steven Schub. I was not fortunate enough to witness this
monumental meeting of the minds (a fellow actor of Schub’s of some renown
apparently was), but I would imagine their paring and partnership was as
ineluctable as hydrogen and oxygen atoms combining to form water molecules. It is incontestable that, soon enough, the two
had formed The Fenwicks [“the world’s greatest (albeit only)
Afro-Celtic-Yiddish ska band”]). Within
a few years (i.e., in 1994), with the support of Lynyrd Skynrd’s Artimus Pyle
and other impressed industry luminaries, The Fenwicks released a debut disc, Member of No Tribe, on Guitar Acoustics
(the label imprint of Guitar, a.k.a. Guitar for the Practicing Musician
magazine). It the title were not a dead
giveaway, quotes from Ayn Rand and Victor Hugo adorned the disc’s liner notes,
as well as this mission statement:
“The Fenwicks are an idea … hopefully its time has
come. The idea is basically this—The Fenwicks
are an acoustic duo, expanded into a 6-man ska-funk-folk-punk amalgamation,
with a self-imposed mission. The
mission? To create a sound as of yet unheard, one that can provoke the primal
in you as well as the intellectual, to actually make you think and dance simultaneously, to put a
thought in your head and a fire in your loins in one auditory swop. To that end and for that purpose, here are a
collection of songs that should keep you fueled and fighting for a
lifetime. Ultimately and obviously
though, the songs have to speak for themselves, so we’ll just hush up now and
let ‘em speak, shriek, scream and squeal….
“Obsessively and compulsively, in blood and fire,
“Steven Schub Jimmie
Corrieri
“p/k/a The Fenwicks”
The duo’s
notes speak for themselves, but to expound: The Fenwicks and their
boisterous-but-serious songs are equal parts erudition and ecstasy, profundity
and physicality, mind and body. The band
hypostasizes the integration of mind and body in a culture in which they are
nearly universally sundered (as much as it is possible to flout a law of
metaphysics). While both songwriting
partners necessarily embodied (and emminded) both halves of their mind-body
whole, Corrieri’s deft-but-often-understated, puissant open chords often served
as the organic, accessible “body” to Schub’s “mind.” His propulsive, sometimes percussive,
rhythmic acoustic attack (he often did attack those strings on stage, where
they were often electric) was the galvanizing get-up-and-go that undoubtedly
went a long way in rousing the less inhibited Fenwicks fans to dance, “skank,”
and shimmy. Corrieri rarely took a solo,
but, with his adroit, complex approach to rhythms and chord progressions, he
turned the dying art of rhythm guitar into a form of soloing.
Due the
busy schedules of the various members (and, likely, other factors), it took seven
years to follow up Member of No Tribe. I wasn’t there, either, but I’m sure the
shibboleth about “being worth the wait” applies. Eudamonia
(Flip-Dog Discs) is named after Aristotle’s conception of integrated mental and
physical health (or, happiness on Earth—as opposed to happiness postponed and
tailored for his mentor Plato’s World of Forms). It lives up to its name. One of the reasons it lives up to its name is
Jimmie Corrieri. This time, he wrote
lyrics to and sang a song: “Your Life.”
(His recorded voice has a direct and gentle quality. This Fenwicks aficionado hopes to hear a live
recording of the song someday.)
Eudamonia is all well and good, but eudemonia
(at least as a Fenwicks fan) is not attained without live Fenwicks. I had the privilege to see them live (and
heard their music for the very first time) at Hollywood’s Club Lingerie ten
years ago.
In these years of monotony (and
worse), most rock bands have degenerated into such facelessness and homogeneity
that the individual members of Pink Floyd seem like paragons of personality and
uniqueness. Normally, Steven Schub would
provide enough for an entire band, but The Fenwicks (not a normal band) didn’t
need him for that. Jimmie Corrieri’s
typical (for him) suit and tie and constant, infectious smile were enough. Jettisoning his studio acoustic for a
gorgeous electric Rickenbacker (see the video below), he helped bring many of
the songs from Eudamonia to more
vivid life with the same enthusiastic
physicality (palpable on stage) that is almost visible on the recordings: a
meta-eudamonia. Corrieri’s dulcet,
ringing use of all six strings provided a more musical sound that many of today’s
“nü metal” and grunge bands bludgeon out of their own cacophonous, droning,
enervating racket. But Corrieri’s axe,
by contrast, was always colorful. The
sonic palette was broadened by the propulsive polyrhythms of the rhythm section
(bassist Ed Richardson and drummer Ken Nasta) and the horn section (“The Horn
Dogs”). As I have noted before, I try to
avoid the personal pratfalls of subjectivity when writing about live music, but,
sometimes, nothing else quite substitutes.
I walked into Club Lingerie that
night my usual isolated, taciturn, morose, glowering self. By the time the frontman extracted his bright
orange radiation helmet at the dawn of "My Luck," I was grinning like an Eloi philistine on his way to a
new Wes Anderson film. ("My Luck" has a haunting, bittersweet punchline that should be saved for another day.) By (the epistemological) “Desert Rat,”
I think I was even dancing (by my definition, anyway). When the lights came up, I was talking
again. (Actually, I was asking manager
Jonathan Boyer for the setlist below.) I
was a fan for life. If anyone in the
audience wasn’t, I would have checked his pulse. And for those who were not there (or never
saw them), they were selling their then-new live album Truth & Memory (Flip Dog Discs: recorded the previous year, 2002, at Arlene
Grocery in New York). I promptly bought
one from Jonathan Boyer. (Alas: seven more years would pass before I would make the acquaintance of one of the performers.)
Jimmie Corrieri and The Fenwicks
never received anywhere near the respect and approbation they earned and
commanded (he and they are, in many ways, a ska analogue of a certain melodiousmetal band with a monumental guitarist and composer who also died far too soon). But they did attract a devoted
following of discerning music fans. And
their work survives, and you should obtain it and listen to it (and, if you are
so inclined, dance) if you have not already.
On those three albums (and especially on Truth & Memory), Jimmie Corrieri lives.
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