The 22 Magazine

Vocalist and performer Laurie Amat of San Francisco performed at The Super Coda at Vaudeville Park on April 5, 2012. The show was constructed so that Ms. Amat, along with a standard solo set, improvised with 5 different performers whom she had no previous knowledge of until directly before show.

The performance is described below in degrees.

Degree 1 “The Spark” : Laurie performs Bernd Klug with Prehistoric Horse

This is a quartet. Cello (Valerie Kuehne), guitar (Lucio Menegon), snare drum (David Grollman), and Laurie on vocals. She is jolly. Dressed in black, petite, with close-cropped hair she organizes the stage to her liking. Drums here, no, there, and performers enclosing here. It is the quintessential fire build. The sticks laid, not to many attendees yet but that will change as the fire grows. The show begins with a vocal pieces, somewhat randomly dedicated to the next performer Bernd Klug (an ideal name no doubt for Laurie’s often nonsensical phrasing) and is quickly developed into the in-depth story of THE BERND KLUG. After a few minutes of soft, warming experimentation’s on guitar, drum, and cello, Grollman strikes the match of BERND KLUG. First Bernd is a superhero with a beautiful cape-the flame jumps-now he is a demon, now a battleship steaming against the ecstatic fusion of guitar and cello. Laurie in the center vocally counterpoints Grollman’s tale. Most of her vocals sound like operatic exercises. Her words, though often simply gibberish, are gripping and always slightly on the edge of breaking from beauty to destruction. Now the fire is caught. Bernd Klug is coming, he’s going, he’s hurling fireballs, he’s sinking us all. BERND KLUG is HERE.

(more…)