OMNI SONIC Presents:
Another Curiosity Piece
A CD of Improvised Music by
Dan Plonsey * John Hinds * Peter Hinds * Mantra Ben-Ya'akova
Dan Plonsey met the Hinds Brothers at a Sun Ra concert in the mid-80s.
John and Peter were making video and audio tapes of all of the Arkestra's
appearances in the Bay area, compiling a massive library of documentation
on the work of Sun Ra and the Arkestra. Dan kept running into them
at one show after another,
a friendship developed, and
in March 1992, they began to make music together.
This recording documents a series of improvisation sessions
from the period of
March 28, 1992 through July 28, 1993. Mantra Ben-Ya'akova, a wonderful singer,
was present at the first recording, which was made in a
bunker at the Devil's Slide.
All other recordings were made at the Hinds' studio, the majority going
direct to DAT, the remainder
to analog 8-track. The recordings were engineered by John Hinds and edited by
Peter Hinds. The accompanying booklet of cartoons is by Dan Plonsey.
About this music John Hinds writes:
Our purpose is to ``make it,'' make music, that is, since we are not concerned
with ``making it,'' $$,
although we all have to pay the bills. I'm sure you'll
agree that what we produce is honest music: music like life and nature that can
only happen once, and is in tune with that once.
Also, I want to say how lucky we are to have Dan Plonsey in there on this album!
John Hinds
began playing guitar in the mid-60s, influenced by
B. B. King, Jimi Hendrix and many others. Hearing the musical productions of
Phil Spector and George Martin, John turned to the studio as his primary musical
working environment. The music of Coltrane, John Gilmore, Marshall Allen,
Ayler, Shepp, members of the AACM and Coleman Hawkins,
inspired John to take up the saxophone in 1970.
By 1975, he'd acquired keyboards, various saxophones (including the bass),
bass clarinet, and many other instruments. In 1984, he began to release cassettes
of his music on the OMNI SONIC label: Omni Sonic Environment, John
Hinds 84, Continuous Thread, Black Window, Contrasts, Open Door, John Hinds 85,
Don't Stop the Noise, and Outward Bound. In early 1995, he released
his first CD, Connections, in which he plays guitar, sax, bass, bass
clarinet, percussion, voice and other things. Most of the compositions are
multi-tracked, and some feature guest appearances by Peter Hinds, Dan Plonsey, and
Mantra Ben-Ya'akova. Another Curiosity Piece documents some of John'
amazing keyboard work.
Dan Plonsey
began playing clarinet and saxophone in the mid-60s in
Cleveland, Ohio. He studied composition at Yale University, the University of
Toronto and Mills College, with teachers
Martin Bresnick and Anthony Braxton being especially
influential on his compositional development.
He plays reeds with
The Manufacturing of Humidifiers
(improvised and
occasionally composed music), tenor sax in the sax quartet Great Circle
Saxophone Quartet,
bass and saxophone with
Dreamland
(an ultra-pretentious art-rock band)
and he writes music and libretti for his own ensemble,
Disaster Opera Theatre,
a group of fluctuating membership, dedicated to the presentation of
semi-improvisational absurdist/political theatrical} music. He also books the
Beanbender's
``Creative Music'' series at the Berkeley Store Gallery.
He can be heard on The Manufacturing of Humidifiers'
Dire Images of Beauty, Rastascan's (Y)earbook Vol. 1
and with Gamelan Sekar Jaya on both their New World recording and
on Rastascan's Sun Ra tribute compilation, Wavelength Infinity.
Peter Hinds
first read about Sun Ra in 1965 on the back of an ESP Fugs
album. In August of 69, he first heard
Sun Ra's music, on KSAM (free-form radio at the time), and listened intently with
a pencil in hand, waiting to hear who the music was by. ``We'd been looking for
that kind of music for years, we knew it had to exist,
and then: `There it is!' Knocked rock 'n' roll right
out of the box!'' That month Peter bought records by Sun Ra, Coltrane, Ayler
and many others. In the following April, he walked out of a Grateful Dead show,
and he hasn't looked back. Peter is known for having assembled and
printed - at Sun Ra's
request - the final several editions of The Immeasurable Equation
(collections of poetry and prose by Sun Ra).
This past year, Peter has begun editing a journal called Sun Ra Research
in which he publishes interviews with Sun Ra, rare photos, and other
material (contact Omni Sonic for more information).
Mantra Ben-Ya'akova
appears on two tracks of Another Curiosity
Piece. She is a gifted and eclectic vocalist, having performed with Kitka
and The Enormous Ensemble
(women's choirs devoted to Balkan music), new music ensembles, improvisational
groups, and various rock bands including her own band, Dreamland, whose
CD God's Fools is available from Caliban Records