Austin’s Wayne Hancock
plays John Henry’s
on Wednesday.
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BE A PART OF…
MTV Real World Road Rules…
MTV Stars Abe and Jeremy will judge for a
Beauty contest of sorts.
Butt-Ugly contest and Hot Butt contest…
$500 in Cash prizes.
Friday, August 20…8:00
Sign-ups all week long
and nite of contest
A chance for your butt
to be on MTV.
I-5 Coburg Exit ★ 686-8686
Prodigal Sons
Eugene jazzers come home.
O
ne of the frustrations — and pleas-
ures — in covering the rapidly de-
veloping Eugene music scene is
watching promising young local musicians
— many from the UO — take their talents to
larger ponds. It’s a natural migration, I sup-
pose: artists on the make usually wind up in
New York, San Francisco, LA or wherever,
and we feel a surge of pride when we hear
about Oregonians we knew back in the day
making it big in the big city. So it’s always re-
freshing to see homegrown talents returning
home to show what they’ve learned since
they left.
so the great singer-songwriter chose to raise
his family in the calmer, safer environment of
Eugene. He tours the world much of the year,
occasionally returning to Zimbabwe for per-
formances that often draw tens of thousands
of listeners. When his band (keyboards, bass,
drums, guitar, amplified mbiras, harmony vo-
cals, sometimes dancers) settles into a groove
worthy of James Brown, Mapfumo’s songs
can transport audiences into dancing ecstacy.
In the history of so-called “world” music (as
if there’s any other kind), Mapfumo will in-
habit the pantheon along with Fela, Marley,
Sunny Ade, and the other demigods. So we in
Austin’s Wayne Hancock channels
THE GHOST OF HANK WILLIAMS
MONKEE TORTURE
©2004 Pabst Brewing Company
enefit
Dirk
Fund
BY BRETT CAMPBELL
Your McKenzie River
Constantly rocking crowds around the Northwest with their self-
deprecating humor and raucous live shows, this Eugene punk-metal
band is definitely a hometown favorite. Monkee Torture pulls its
inspiration from old, unruly, authentic punk rock and heavy metal
bands like the Ramones, Twisted Sister, Iron Maiden and Motorhead.
With one full-length album released in 2003, Monkee Torture is at it
again with another CD on the way. Make sure you see them live this
Saturday night. Check out Eugene Weekly’s clubs page for details.
30 AUGUST 19, 2004
Toby Koenigsberg grew up in Eugene
with a jazz pedigree — his dad Larry is a for-
mer (and much missed) KLCC jazz DJ — got
his bachelor’s degree at the UO, then studied
at the Peabody Conservatory before obtain-
ing a master’s degree at New York’s presti-
gious Eastman School of Music. Last year,
the UO brought Toby back to town when it
hired him as a music professor, which means
we’ll probably get to hear a lot from this
young Downbeat award-winning composer/
arranger/ performer.
At Luna, Koenigsberg leads his trio in jazz
standards and classics along with original
compositions and compositions by modern
jazz composers. He’ll be joined by New York
City jazz bassist Chris Higgins and probably
a few other guests. You can read about another
prodigal jazzer returning home for a visit,
James Zeller, on page 26. What I’ve heard
of his music on CD reveals a solid, stylish
mainstream performer whose music will ap-
peal to fans of classic late-1950s and ‘60s jazz
as well as contemporary neoclassicists.
Thomas Mapfumo re-balances the mu-
sical migration equation in Eugene’s favor. A
resident here for the last few years, Mapfumo
won fame in his native Zimbabwe in the
1970s for his anti-apartheid anthems, then
gained worldwide acclaim as one of Africa’s
greatest musicians for his irresistibly dance-
able fusion of Shona mbira music with
Western soul and pop. But his criticism of
Zimbabwean dictator Robert Mugabe’s cor-
ruption and economic mismanagement re-
sulted in government threats and harassment,
Eugene can count ourselves amazingly fortu-
nate to be able to hear one of the world’s
greatest musical performers in relatively inti-
mate settings here. The next opportunity is at
Cozmic Pizza on Saturday, Aug. 21.
The rootsy banjoist/guitarist Tony
Furtado has played here often enough to al-
most count as an adopted son, and he’ll be
performing material from his new album,
These Chains, as well as some older songs in
a solo acoustic gig at the McDonald Theatre
on Saturday. Furtado’s music draws on folk,
bluegrass, blues, and rock, and the new disk
showcases his singing and songwriting abili-
ties, which are sometimes overshadowed by
his instrumental prowess. Another fine roots-
oriented picker, Austin’s Wayne Hancock,
channels the ghost of Hank Williams and has
been finding his own voice lately. He’s at
John Henry’s on Wednesday, Aug. 25.
Finally, speaking of talents moving on, I’d
like to extend muchisimas gracias to the EW
editor who, among her many other duties at
the paper, supervised this column for the last
few years. The editor-writer relationship can
sometimes make Itchy and Scratchy look like
the Blues Brothers, but Aria Seligmann
caught most of my gaffes, accommodated oc-
casional deadline delinquencies and word-
count excesses, and frequently made my oft-
meandering musings more intelligible, if not
always palatable (editors can only do so
much), to EW’s readers. She’s contributed a
lot to the paper and the community, and we
wish her the best as she moves on to new ad-
ventures.
ew