JOMF 2014

    



TOM GREENWOOD guitare, voix
ALAN ZIGNOTO basse, percussion
DAVE SEIBERT violon
DAVE EASLICK batterie
JEFFREY ALEXANDER synthé
MICHAEL WHITTAKER saxophone

                      



BIOGRAPHIES

JACKIE-O MOTHERFUCKER ▲▲▲▲▲ 

"Inspiration is drawn from an impossibly diverse array of sound and vision: free jazz, noise rock, graffiti, space rock, folk music, Xeroxed art, the list goes on. It's safe to say, however, that the underground experiments of the 60s are a key touchstone — musically, especially the NY loft avant-garde; visually, including Harry Smith's film loops; socially, in their grubby, seat-of-the-pants approach to life and personal politics. The amazing quality of Jackie-O Motherfucker is their ability to color experimental music and noise with more candor and emotional sophistication than most turtlenecked troubadours. The fresh creative input and enthusiasm for experimentation and sound exploration combined with strong roots in Americana has created vital records." 

(Textile/France)

"It’s been just over twenty years since Tom Greenwood founded Jackie O Motherfucker, making it a band name almost old enough to drink legally in its native America. (It’s long since been swearing in public.) From Portland to France, Montreal to Baltimore and now based in the San Francisco Bay Area, Greenwood and a rotating collective of accomplished performers continue to write, record and perform as the mood strikes. Currently featuring musicians from bands such as Sapat and Black Forest/Black Sea, earlier incarnations of the group have toured widely, played a huge number of festivals and appeared as a featured cover artist on The Wire in 2002. In a recent issue of that magazine, Byron Coley said their newest release “reminds me of one of those 'lost' German things that has surfaced over the last decade. Same sorta post-fusion/get-groovy feel to this. Which is cool.” But it’s not the only thing that they do by any means, and from the early nineties to now, Jackie O Motherfucker remain dedicated to the idea of improvisation and spontaneous creativity." 
(Ned Raggett, 2014)



Born in 1966, a child of the high Dakota plains, Tom Greenwood showed inter-media tendencies early on. While in high school he divided his time between visual arts (winning a scholarship from Kodak for his photographic work) and sonic arts (playing Purple Haze at biker rallies). He bounced around art schools of the frozen north before ending up on the streets of Minneapolis, where he took his degree in Media Arts.

After spending the end of the 80′s immersed in the aesthetic milieu of rural scum rock, creating the splendid Project A-Bomb record label in the process, Greenwood drifted into the open bowels of Manhattan’s Lower East Side. Tom found work as an art director and participated in the Maynard Monroe-curated group show, URBAN ANALYSIS (with Nan Goldin, Rene Ricard, Lady Pink, etc).
Greenwood ended up in Portland, Oregon in the mid 90′s, where he head birthed the seriously disturbed musical project that continues to this day – Jackie O Motherfucker. An extraordinarily mutable feast, Jackie O’s music encompasses everything from industrial ho-hum to acid-volk ready-mades, and has included hundreds of participants over its lifespan. Under the influence of mysterious Northwest bohemians (often associated to some degree with The Holy Modal Rounders), Greenwood studied how to spin garbage into garlands. This technique proved invaluable when he drifted back to New York City, where he connected with Thurston Moore, who encouraged his conceptual moves.

In the 21st Century, Greenwood has created dual vistas of strangeness, all of them whistling like the rings around the o-mind. The musical projects – Jackie O, the U-SOUND series, various shows and galleries – have blended into the visual ones, and splattered in a million unexpected directions."

(Byron Coley, Deerfield, MA, March 2008)

RECENT REVIEWS

"Sextet version of this long lived West Coast organization (basically Tom Greenwood plus whoever) returns with two longish tracks of proggy float and clutter. There's flute on one side, clarinet on the other, and the whole thing reminds me of one of those 'lost' German things that has surfaced over the last decade. Same sorta post-fusion/get-groovy feel to this. Which is cool."  

(Byron Coley, The Wire, November 2013)

"A joyous caress of ghostly melodies from what must be a pan flute being played through an angel’s anus. More synth than I remember, with a core of percussive grit that slyly sustains the entire compositions with its random interjections. Also: clarinet, improv-style, and so much more I won’t spoil it for you. “Bumblebee” bursts with the ripeness, also without introducing too many elements into the mix. Sax, synth, guitar, more of those temperamental drum flare-ups that punch like that beefneck’d, dress shirt-wearing, red-faced guy at the bar who thinks I picked up his beer." 

(Tiny Mix Tapes, Aug 20 2013)