For the love of Ava. No better way to salute the new album from Ava Mendoza than paraphrasing the immortal Jeffrey Lee Pierce and his “For the love of Ivy,” penned as homage to Poison Ivy Rorschach, the mighty Cramps’ Guitar Majesty. If you’re a wandering pilgrim on the forum’s treks, you should be pretty aware of such an irrepressible and indispensable musician Ms. Mendoza is: from Bill Orcutt to Matana Roberts, from Negativland to William Parker, from Violent Femmes to Nate Wooley and many others, her six strings accompanied and enriched a wide spectrum of sounds. An amazing hyper modern player that, at the same time, could be easily imagined in the Flesheaters line-up or jamming with Kid Congo Powers, just to stay in the early 80s Los Angeles scene.
As it was said in the Watergate affair “Follow the money”, let’s say now “Follow the Fender Jazzmaster,” we won’t go wrong. And we were not wrong with Mama Killa, her brand new project that sees Mendoza sharing the duties, on a perfectly mutual collaboration (let’s give credit where credit is due) along with two outstanding partners: violinist gabby fluke-mogul, with whom she played as AM/FM, and drummer Carolina Perez. Gabby is a Brooklyn based composer, educator and organizer who, among others, played with Fred Frith, Luke Stewart, Tcheser Holmes, Dave Rempis, Nate Wooley, Lester St. Louis. William Parker and Pauline Oliveros; “she curates concerts and workshop, programming, fostering non-profit partnership and supporting diverse voices in the continuum of creative music,” official bio notes say.
Musical engagement and social commitment: chapeau, Gabby, we say. Carolina, born in Columbia but New York based, brings to the project not only a peculiar South American flavor but, above all, a massive transfusion of beautifully malevolent metal blood, thanks to her attendance in a couple of death metal bands (Hypoxia and Castrator, nomen omen…) where her fast double bass skills and fast blast are a trademark. Buddy Rich, Mickey Dee and Lars Ulrich the declared influences. We became aware of Mama Killa, the name of the Andean goddess of the moon, when, at the end of May, we had the chance to listen, as a previe to “We will be millions”, dropped on the forum as Sunday morning solace (thank you, Paul). In a few seconds, a quiet, late spring pond turned into the Indian Ocean’s roaring 40s with 100 knots winds, when a mega wave of noise and feedback capsized our boat. Whaddafuck…we just left Ava playing “Irene, goodnight” some months ago and now this monster hardcore, sludge, grind blast??? Oh yesss and this was just a song, figure out the album, freshly issued by the not-enough-blessed Burning Ambulance.
Something that, after zillions of listenings, never stops leaving us stunned and off guard is when different musicians’ backgrounds, experiences and sensibilities melt down together, keeping their own identity but at the same time able to generate something totally new: call it labour of genius. It’s exactly what happens with Mama Killa. You could surely recognize the recipe’s ingredients: Slayer and Pantera’s feral assault, Down’s swampy, sick atmosphere, drones’ twisters, blues, psychedelia, folk, free noise but as soon as you believe to be able to target one, the waves drag you elsewhere. Should you maybe think about Painkiller, you wouldn’t be totally off the tracks, we were smelling it at the very beginning but after some rotations we could affirm that here we have a sort of more tribal, even voodoo (if you allow it us) nuances, representing one of the key fascinations of the record, while Zorn’s combo is driving the listeners to urban, electro-dystopian, post apocalypse landscapes. The work of Wolf Eyes with Anthony Braxton or “Boris meets Sunn O)))” could give you a clue as well but perhaps a title like “Trichocereus Pachanoi”, scientific name of Cactus San Pedro, the one containing mescalina, used in Peru during religious ceremonies by the ancient Chavin culture, says finally all about this record: a primordial, psychotrope, sonic journey. Get a ticket!
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