For a number of years, Milwaukee was lucky enough to get to know multi-instrumentalist -- and writer -- John Kruth up close and personal. But, despite having returned to his native New York area many years ago, Kruth still has close ties to Brew City, where he was a fixture on the music scene from 1986 until 1995.
In addition to penning award-winning biographies of Rahsaan Roland Kirk and Townes Van Zandt, Kruth is an active -- one might say hyper-active -- musician and one of his projects, the Downtown-based TriBeCaStan has just issued its second disc. Like its acclaimed predecessor, "5 Star Cave," is all over the musical map and boasts a bevy of amazing guest musicians.
But most of those guests are different from the ones who populated 2009 "Strange Cousin" and the result is a much different -- but equally engaging and satisfying -- tour through the music of world, through the eyes of Kruth and his bandmate Jeff Greene.
As Kruth and Greene prepare to launch the new nine-piece TriBeCaStani Folklorkestrae, we asked Kruth about the group -- named, of course, for the downtown Manhattan neighborhood defined as the triangle below Canal Street -- and "5 Star Cave."
OnMilwaukee.com: For those of us who missed out on the first record, can you tell us about TriBeCaStan?
John Kruth: TriBeCaStan is located between the fringe of the cultural wasteland of New JerSiberia and the Downtown Scene.
OMC: Introduce us to the main players.
JK: TriBeCaStan is essentially a partnership between a pair of multi-instrumental musical misfits -- we have no sponsorship from 3M by the way -- Jeff Greene is a collector of musical instruments from all corners of the globe. In the last six months he's been to Uzbekistan and Taiwan where he performed with a theater group. He's really into learning all of these unusual scales and rhythms.
Inspired by (the Rolling Stones') Brian Jones, (jazz musicians) Don Cherry (and) Rahsaan Roland Kirk, I've been playing a handful or two of mostly western instruments since I'm a teenager -- mandolin, banjo, guitar, flute, harmonica and, most recently, Portuguese guitar and an electric Indian zither called the royal benju.
With the second album, the group, which will be appearing at New York City's Joe's Pub on Saturday, May 8, has expanded to nine pieces -- congas, drums, bass, guitar, trumpet, bari sax and accordion -- including members of Ween, Cracker and James Brown's band.
OMC: The record's got a great mix of genres. Was that a conscious effort to make it wide-ranging or just the result of the musical personalities involved?
JK: The first album was essientally a collaboration between me and Jeff with Dave Dreiwitz on bass, a Moroccan drummer named Brahim Fribgane, the great trombone / shell master Steve Turre, Jolie Holland on voice and fiddle and Matt Darriau on various reeds to add color.
The new album, which features the great violinist Charlie Burnham (James Blood Ulmer), vocalists Dean Bowman and Samantha Parton (formerly of Be Good Tanyas), Steve Turre again, the great tabla master Badal Roy (Miles Davis, John McLaughlin) and Al Kooper, is more ensemble and jam-oriented.
Yes, it's all a conscious effort. Jeff and I dig a lot of the same music but have very different orientations. While he dresses western he mostly plays instruments from the Mid-East, India and China. While I wear clothes from that part of the world, I play mostly western instruments. We're on the same road, but coming from opposite directions. He'll be into some obscure music from the rainforest while I'll be blasting "Led Zeppelin III" or Ornette Coleman.
OMC: How did the guest appearances come about?
JK: I've been lucky to play with a lot of different people in New York City over the last 10 years -- from being the only American in a Moroccan band called Jeel Salaam (Tribe of Peace) to backing Allen Ginsberg and Laurie Anderson at Hal Willner shows, to working with Sam Shepard and Peter Stampfel in a hillbilly band.
At a recent Willner event I got to share the bill with Lou Reed, Laurie Anderson, John Zorn, Sonic Youth and The Fugs. I played with -- and am in the new -- King Missile (which features Billy Ficca of Television) as well as one of my favorite guitarists Lenny Kaye. And sometimes I meet musicians when I'm in journalist mode, like Ornette Coleman who I recently have jammed with with over at his loft. He's a mandolin fan. So is Al Kooper, who plays it on his albums.
OMC: How was it working with someone like Kooper?
JK: Al Kooper was a hero of mine growing up in New JerSiberia, and listening to everything he did since playing with Dylan and the Blues Project to the early Blood, Sweat & Tears. Having Al on one of my records was a dream come true, are you kidding? And his wife, Susan is a peach.
OMC: Does TriBeCaStan tour? Will we see the band in Milwaukee?
JK: So far we've just been playing in TriBeCaStan and select neighborhoods of New York City. Of course, we hope to tour. Don't know if we'll be able to take the full tribe with us -- that unfortunately is purely a financial consideration. We'd be happy to jam "where the waters meet." Anyone in Milwaukee interested in having us can contact www.evergreenemusic.com.
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
