When humans experience a Johanna Went performance, they smile like a toddler who just trashed the Xmas tree. A smile of destruction. A smile of release.
That innocently evil smile was repeated many times at the January 25 opening of Went's "Passion Container" exhibit at The Box. Video projections gave newcomers a strong idea of the 1978-onward Went club blast, even if they weren't splattered with the traditional buckets of stage blood. Went's surreal self-made costumes invited an appreciation of texture and detail never available during her explosive stage shows. And we got to examine the finely executed black-and-white drawings that served as sparks for many of Went's floorboard productions.
And more: Let's think about Johanna Went the musician. Though Went doesn't imagine herself in exactly that way, her microphone babble is a major facet of her ungeometric onslaught. Part melodic improvisation, part stream of consciousness, part scream/wail, part messaging, part speaking in tongues, her vocalizations add dimensions all over the place. We understand a word here and there, but mostly we get raw emotions, straight from the gut, much in the same note-defying mode Albert Ayler applied to the sax. And Went always used musicians to stoke the onstage fire when she was away from the microphone tearing up icons.
Went considered her sound important enough to make audio-only documents, including the 1982 LP "Hyena," just reissued with bonus tracks on blood-red vinyl. Damn, it's an exciting record.
Because I knew Went's music director, Mark Wheaton, I was lucky enough to play woodwinds (often through a guitar amp with effects boxes) behind her many times onstage and on most of her studio tracks. The musicians rarely rehearsed, only receiving a series of cues that helped us follow her dramatic arc. So after a 25-minute nonstop orgy, we ended up almost as sweaty, blood-soaked and exhausted as Johanna. Glorious.
Translating Johanna Went to audiotape was risky business, but Went's co-producer, Wheaton, greased the tracks like a bear. The rockier "Hyena" songs rode a tribal drumbeat from Mark's brother, Brock Wheaton (Juju Hounds), with heavy bass from Dream Syndicate guitarist Karl Precoda. The jazzier tunes whisked along with the drums of Keith Mitchell (later of Mazzy Star) and crisp bass lines from co-engineer Jeff McLane on the Chapman Stick, one of those 8-stringed beasts favored by fusion guys and played by tapping with both hands.
On alto sax and clarinet, I jammed along with Johanna while she did her vocals over the backing track, so we were able to play off each other -- I sometimes echoed her phrases and vice-versa. Johanna has a gift for scatting and a three-octave range, but she isn't one of those bippity-doo-wah vocalists. Sometimes she had something to say ("Goodbye, bebbee," "My hair's on fire!"), and sometimes she just needed syllable fodder, which she acquired by reading at random from a pulp paperback and distorting the words.
"Hyena" benefited greatly from Mark & Jeff's mixing, a real treat on headphones, which spread Mark's tape loops, plus his burbles, noises & riffs on the rarely heard Steiner-Parker Synthacon, across the sound field for a stormy oceanic ride. The listener gets dub ("No Legs"), urban-jazz hotcha ("Digital Parting"), punk rage ("Mosquito"), dark moodiness ("Ella") and even quirk-pop ("Mound Builders"), but it all feels like a common aesthetic. It feels like a band.
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"Passion Container" remains at The Box, 805 Traction Ave., downtown 90013, Wed.-Sat. noon-6pm, through March 14; www.theboxla.com; (213) 615-1747. "Hyena" is available for purchase there (as LP with download card); the album will also receive wider distribution soon. Went's historic "Club Years" DVD is also highly recommended.
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Rest in peace: Brock Wheaton and Keith Mitchell, two very sweet dudes.
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1978 PHOTO BY ALAN PEAK.