fR321 PAGE 65_Layout 1 29/01/2010 18:18 Page 1
65 f
achieved enduring global popularity largely neys he takes in search of less well-known
without the concerted media, marketing, musical and literary characters. Into East LA
financial, and military subsidies enjoyed by with author and poet Luis Rodriguez where,
US imperial jazz. For good measure, Brennan driving through Watts, he is inspired to seek
throws down the gauntlet in a chapter dedi- out soul bluesman Charles Wright. On it goes,
cated to world music: “If the exoticism of into Arizona to meet Radmilla Cody, Native
early colonial travel narratives was erotic, American singer, activist, and as an aside, for-
that of world music is aesthetic, expressed in
mer beauty queen; then into New Mexico for
the suggestive titles and opulent CD covers of
a meeting with poet Kell Robertson and a nar-
boutique collections… World music is not
row escape for Cartwright and a new-found
simply appropriative, though; it demon-
travelling partner from having serious vio-
strates an escape from the [imperial] self.”
lence inflicted on them. The scene of this
For Brennan, popular neo-African musics escape is vividly described by Cartwright, in
represent for Western audiences “a mission the sort of bar only the brave or foolhardy
and a strategy of recovery with deep theoret- would enter. And one of his strengths is that
Secular Devotion: Afro-
ical roots that extend far into the past, he only needs a few paragraphs to enable the
Latin Music And
[entailing] nothing less than an alternative reader to uncomfortably share his experience.
history of Western civilization.” And that his-
Imperial Jazz
Some of the musical characters
tory was written not exclusively in such iconic
Cartwright uses to put his story together are
Timothy Brennan Verso ISBN 13: 978-1-
jazz locales as New Orleans, Memphis, Kansas
of similar persuasion. Alejandro Escovedo,
84467-290-5 & 978-1-84467-2901-2
City, Chicago, and New York, but also – and
Dale Watson and Billy Joe Shaver are much
more profoundly – in Havana, Port-au-Prince,
too far to the left side of country music to be
Timothy Brennan teaches English and com-
Santo Domingo, San Juan, Kingston, Port of
welcomed by the establishment, and possibly
parative literature at the University of Min-
Spain, Veracruz, Bahia, Rio, Cartagena,
wouldn’t want to make the trip if they were.
nesota. He edited the first English-language
Buenos Aires, Montevideo and beyond.
When the three major musical tourist cities,
edition of Alejo Carpentier’s ground-break-
Michael Stone Memphis, Nashville and Chicago are visited,
ing Music In Cuba, and is thus equipped to
the musical subjects are Sam The Sham, an
peruse the dense cultural, historical and polit-
exiled Texan in Memphis famous for his
ical relationship between US jazz and
More Miles Than Money –
recording of Wooly Bully, with a fascinating
African-Latin musics. Brennan holds that neo-
African musics play a paradoxical role in the
Journeys Through
account of someone I had assumed lost in
action; Diana Jones, met in Nashville before
West, assuming predominance in popular
American Music she became fashionable; and in Chicago the
entertainment while also sustaining a potent
if veiled spiritual stance, one founded upon a
Garth Cartwright Serpent’s Tail ISBN 978 1
Dells, a classic quartet with hit recordings in
religious worldview characteristically West
84668 687 0 £12.99
their own right as well as vocal backing for
Ray Charles, Dinah Washington and others.
African in nature.
Seeing the topic; Brit, or in this case exiled
In Mississippi in search of blues,
Noting “the massive African subtext to New Zealander, travels America in search of
Cartwright attends a festival where Bobby
American everyday life and leisure,” Brennan lost music, I winced. Searching America for
Bland and Bobby Rush are headlining. Rush is
holds that “New World African music extend- music can be like trying to boil the ocean,
your archetypal blues-for-his-own-people
ing from northern Brazil to the southern particularly when, as with Cartwright, there is
artist, the so-called chittlin’ circuit, more
United States is hostile to the dominant reli- no particular generic musical focus. I winced
famous for his elevated role in Scorsese’s
gious impulses of modern life, to forms of again several times whilst reading the book,
blues film project than any of his own work;
Western labour, and to the commercial but this was wincing as I was caught up in the
for a definitive account of the genre, and
assault on demotic traditions and other types trip as Cartwright proves a captivating tour
Bland in particular, I still turn to Charles Keil’s
of unscripted human contact.” Indeed, neo- guide as you join him on his journey.
Urban Blues. However, Garth Cartwright is
African “popular music offers its listeners a
The journey takes in three of the major
not looking to achieve musical definition, nor
coded revenge on the modern… this is why it
recording cities, Memphis, Nashville and
wisely does he make any sweeping conclu-
is popular” [Brennan’s emphasis].
Chicago, two festivals, and a series of musical
sion, often the final nail in the coffin of many
Brennan’s core concept, secular devo- and personal encounters along the way.
similar books. As a travel book with musical
tion, is an expression of “the resilience in con- Whilst it may sound an ideal musical pilgrim-
interludes it is a compelling read, and
temporary popular music of African religious age, this was not at all the sort of tour most
although I may disagree with some of his
elements that are not perceived by listeners people would wish to take. Undertaking part
qualitative musical assessments, I admire his
religiously, but to which [listeners] are, often of the journey by Greyhound Bus would per-
style and certainly his spirit in making and so
unconsciously, devoted.” Politically speaking, suade many to quickly look for the next flight
ably chronicling what for many would have
the African continent is both a geographical home, but undaunted, Cartwright wisely
been the tour from hell.
location of great complexity and an idea with keeps his distance from the more menacing
immense ethical and ideological appeal for characters he encounters. His Greyhound Bus
www.serpentstail.com
those who seek, through music, to disassoci-
escapades are matched by some of the jour- John Atkins
ate themselves from the association with
African bondage, fundamental as slavery was Radmilla Cody: American Music
to Western economic development and the
colonial adventure.
A notable caveat is Brennan’s rather
sweeping use of the term ‘African’, which
quality he says produced a “manageably
similar” worldview largely based upon Yoru-
ba traditions as manifest in Cuba and Brazil,
and Fon and Yoruba influences in Haiti. This
is a huge leap, because the historical flow of
peoples from West, Central, and East Africa
to the New World was considerably more
complex and layered over time than Bren-
nan suggests. Yet Brennan’s core argument
holds: “Afro-Latin and African-American
music are to a substantial degree part of a
single complex” that expresses a culturally
unifying sensibility wherein art and social
commentary stand as one, cultivating a com-
munal vision antithetical to the Western ide-
ology of atomised individualism.
Space prevents fuller elaboration of
Brennan’s informed, provocative, wide-rang-
ing, and nuanced work. At heart is the view
that African-Latin musics invoke a compelling
structure of feeling, reflecting a coherent,
highly elaborated worldview – sensual, fun-
loving, anti-capitalist, ethically and spiritually
engaged. As such, these genres have
Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60  |  Page 61  |  Page 62  |  Page 63  |  Page 64  |  Page 65  |  Page 66  |  Page 67  |  Page 68  |  Page 69  |  Page 70  |  Page 71  |  Page 72  |  Page 73  |  Page 74  |  Page 75  |  Page 76  |  Page 77  |  Page 78  |  Page 79  |  Page 80  |  Page 81  |  Page 82  |  Page 83  |  Page 84