Z'EV
Encyclopedia
Z'EV is an American
poet
, percussionist, and sound artist. After studying various world music
traditions at CalArts, he began creating his own percussion sounds out of industrial materials for a variety of record label
s. He is regarded as a pioneer of industrial music
.
In 1983, critic Roy Sablosky wrote : “Z’EV doesn’t just break the rules, he changes them.” Journalist Louis Morra wrote in 1983: “Z’EV is a consummate example of contemporary
performance art
, as well as modern composition and theater.” and, “Z’EV realizes many of modernist
art’s ultimate goals: primitivism
, improvisation
, multi-media
/conjunction of art forms, the artist as direct creator.”
His work with text and sound has been influenced by Kabbalah
, as well as African, Afro-Caribbean and Indonesian music and culture. He has studied Ewe (Ghana) music
, Balinese gamelan
, and Indian tala
.
and then Art Anton at Drum City in Van Nuys
CA.
In 1963 he abandoned Judaism
and began his life-long relationship with World religions and esoteric systems
.
From 1966-9 he formed a band with Carl Stone
and James Stewart, performing Jazz Rock. After auditioning for Frank Zappa
's Bizarre Records
the band ceased activities and both he and Carl went on to attend CalArts.
After studying at CalArts from 1969-70 with poets Emmett Williams
and Michael S. Bell and writer/critic Sue-Ellen Case
, he began producing works using the name S. Weisser, primarily concentrating on visual
and sound poetries
.
In 1975, he was included in the "Second Generation" show at the Museum of Conceptual Art in San Francisco.
In 1976 he moved from Los Angeles to the Bay Area. A primary reason for this move was his association with the San Francisco Alternative exhibition space
La Mamelle, run by Carl Loeffler and Nancy Evans.
In 1977 he presented his first solo percussion performance at La Mamelle under the project title 'Sound of Wind and Limb'.
In 1978 he began developing an idiosyncratic performance technique utilizing self-developed instruments formed from industrial materials such as stainless steel, titanium
, and PVC
plastics. Initially these instruments were assemblages of these materials, used with a movement-based performance style that was a form of marionette
, although with the performer visible. He has since come to refer to this performance mode as 'wild-style', a term originally related to graffiti. Critic John Buckley described his performances in this era:
At this time he first began to perform outside of the Fine Art context initially at the Mabuhay Gardens
in San Francisco. In the fall of 1978 he began performing under the name Z'EV, which comes from the Jewish name his parents gave him at birth (Sh'aul Z'ev bn Yakov bn Moshe bn Sha'ul).
In November and December 1980, Z'EV opened a series of UK and European concerts in the first headlining tour of the British group Bauhaus
.
On that tour and his first solo tour of Europe immediately afterwards, Z'EV introduced intense metal based percussion musics to the UK and Europe. Critic Jason Pettigrew (current editor-in-chief of Alternative Press Magazine) attests to Z'EV's pioneering use of metal found object
as percussion, writing: "Consider your music collection. Neubauten
? Test Department? Z’EV’s been there first.’
While but one of the progenitors of the "industrial movement", he was also fairly responsible, along with Neil Megson
, for delivering the ‘tribal’ impulse and esthetic into the Western/European cultural milieu developing between the years 1978-1984.
In 1981, 'Shake Rattle & Roll', a VHS video documenting his first wild-style performance on the East coast (produced by video artist John Childs), was released by Fetish Records in the UK and was the first ‘music’ / art video to be commercially released.
Since 1984, he has been concentrating on performing in a more traditional mallet-percussion style, albeit with highly idiosyncratic and "extended
" mallet percussion techniques and his self-made or adapted instruments.
Both performance modes, (wild-style and mallet percussion), have been described as cacophonous when considered in traditional Western musical terms, because of the dense elemental acoustic phenomena Z'EV's instruments produce. In point of fact, Z'EV doesn't actually consider the results as "music" per se, but more as orchestrations of highly rhythmic acoustic phenomena.
It is also worth noting that Z'EV does not consider his performances as solos, but rather as the unique inter-reactions between himself and his instruments; the particular physical space of the performance; the particular time and geographic location of the performance; and the energies of the audience. While the first two traits will of course remain the same, a change in any of the last three will result in a totally different performance.
From 1986-90 he was a Guest Teacher in Composition and Improvisation at the Theater School for New Dance Development in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Together with dancer Ria Higler he mentored a year group through their entire four year course of study. The German dancer Thomas Lehmen is perhaps the most currently active of his students, and they are still friends.
In 1990 he began working with Amsterdam House Musician, DJ Dano. Their work, also in conjunction with Austrian media artist Konrad Becker
, was instrumental in the emergence of the genres known as Gabber and Hard Core.
His recordings have been released by labels such as C.I.P.
, Cold Spring
, Die Stadt, Soleilmoon
, Tzadik Records
, Subterranean
and Touch
.
Based on Shakespeare’s
King Lear
, #1 is a monologue version written for Gylan Kain
and #2 is a Quartet version using Gloucester [as a woman], her two sons Edmund and Edgar and Regan, one of Lear’s daughters.
Published in 'Ratio:3 volume 2 Trans:Mediators' By Temple Press 1992.
This is a book on numerology
and music published in 1992 by Temple Press Ltd., Brighton, UK, ISBN 978-1-871744-40-8. In a blurb provided for the first edition, Murray Hope wrote: "In RHYTHMAJIK, Z'EV presents an original approach to the energies released via the rhythmic process, including the healing potential of correctly structured rhythms, and their possible value as access codes to those frequencies unbound by the space-time continuum."
Is a musical work inspired by opera and includes a vocal narrative. Face the Wound was released on CD by Soleilmoon
in 2001.
Consists of translations of the mystical text known as the ‘Sefer Yetzirah
’ or ‘Book of Formation.' Published in PDF format on the CD ‘The Sapphire Nature’ was released May 2002 by Tzadik
.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
poet
Poet
A poet is a person who writes poetry. A poet's work can be literal, meaning that his work is derived from a specific event, or metaphorical, meaning that his work can take on many meanings and forms. Poets have existed since antiquity, in nearly all languages, and have produced works that vary...
, percussionist, and sound artist. After studying various world music
World music
World music is a term with widely varying definitions, often encompassing music which is primarily identified as another genre. This is evidenced by world music definitions such as "all of the music in the world" or "somebody else's local music"...
traditions at CalArts, he began creating his own percussion sounds out of industrial materials for a variety of record label
Independent record label
An independent record label is a record label operating without the funding of or outside the organizations of the major record labels. A great number of bands and musical acts begin on independent labels.-Overview:...
s. He is regarded as a pioneer of industrial music
Industrial music
Industrial music is a style of experimental music that draws on transgressive and provocative themes. The term was coined in the mid-1970s with the founding of Industrial Records by the band Throbbing Gristle, and the creation of the slogan "industrial music for industrial people". In general, the...
.
In 1983, critic Roy Sablosky wrote : “Z’EV doesn’t just break the rules, he changes them.” Journalist Louis Morra wrote in 1983: “Z’EV is a consummate example of contemporary
Contemporary art
Contemporary art can be defined variously as art produced at this present point in time or art produced since World War II. The definition of the word contemporary would support the first view, but museums of contemporary art commonly define their collections as consisting of art produced...
performance art
Performance art
In art, performance art is a performance presented to an audience, traditionally interdisciplinary. Performance may be either scripted or unscripted, random or carefully orchestrated; spontaneous or otherwise carefully planned with or without audience participation. The performance can be live or...
, as well as modern composition and theater.” and, “Z’EV realizes many of modernist
Modernism
Modernism, in its broadest definition, is modern thought, character, or practice. More specifically, the term describes the modernist movement, its set of cultural tendencies and array of associated cultural movements, originally arising from wide-scale and far-reaching changes to Western society...
art’s ultimate goals: primitivism
Primitivism
Primitivism is a Western art movement that borrows visual forms from non-Western or prehistoric peoples, such as Paul Gauguin's inclusion of Tahitian motifs in paintings and ceramics...
, improvisation
Improvisation
Improvisation is the practice of acting, singing, talking and reacting, of making and creating, in the moment and in response to the stimulus of one's immediate environment and inner feelings. This can result in the invention of new thought patterns, new practices, new structures or symbols, and/or...
, multi-media
Multimedia
Multimedia is media and content that uses a combination of different content forms. The term can be used as a noun or as an adjective describing a medium as having multiple content forms. The term is used in contrast to media which use only rudimentary computer display such as text-only, or...
/conjunction of art forms, the artist as direct creator.”
His work with text and sound has been influenced by Kabbalah
Kabbalah
Kabbalah/Kabala is a discipline and school of thought concerned with the esoteric aspect of Rabbinic Judaism. It was systematized in 11th-13th century Hachmei Provence and Spain, and again after the Expulsion from Spain, in 16th century Ottoman Palestine...
, as well as African, Afro-Caribbean and Indonesian music and culture. He has studied Ewe (Ghana) music
Ewe music
Ewe music is the music of the Ewe people of West Africa. Instrumentation is primarily percussive and rhythmically the music features great metrical complexity. Its highest form is in dance music including a drum orchestra, but there are also work, play, and other songs. Despite his title Ewe music...
, Balinese gamelan
Gamelan
A gamelan is a musical ensemble from Indonesia, typically from the islands of Bali or Java, featuring a variety of instruments such as metallophones, xylophones, drums and gongs; bamboo flutes, bowed and plucked strings. Vocalists may also be included....
, and Indian tala
Tala (music)
Tāla, Taal or Tal is the term used in Indian classical music for the rhythmic pattern of any composition and for the entire subject of rhythm, roughly corresponding to metre in Western music, though closer conceptual equivalents are to be found in other Asian classical systems such as the notion...
.
Life and works
From 1959-65 he studied drumming with Arnie Frank, then Chuck FloresChuck Flores
Chuck Flores is an American jazz drummer. One of the relatively small number of musicians associated with West Coast jazz who are actually from the West Coast, Flores was born Charles Walter Flores in Orange, California, and grew up in Santa Ana...
and then Art Anton at Drum City in Van Nuys
Van Nuys High School
Van Nuys High School established in 1914, is a high school in the Van Nuys area of Los Angeles, California, belonging to the Los Angeles Unified School District: District 2...
CA.
In 1963 he abandoned Judaism
Judaism
Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...
and began his life-long relationship with World religions and esoteric systems
Esotericism
Esotericism or Esoterism signifies the holding of esoteric opinions or beliefs, that is, ideas preserved or understood by a small group or those specially initiated, or of rare or unusual interest. The term derives from the Greek , a compound of : "within", thus "pertaining to the more inward",...
.
From 1966-9 he formed a band with Carl Stone
Carl Stone
Carl Stone is an American composer, primarily working in the field of live electronic music. His works have been performed in the United States, Canada, Europe, Asia, Australia, South America, and the Near East.Stone studied composition at the California Institute of the Arts with Morton...
and James Stewart, performing Jazz Rock. After auditioning for Frank Zappa
Frank Zappa
Frank Vincent Zappa was an American composer, singer-songwriter, electric guitarist, record producer and film director. In a career spanning more than 30 years, Zappa wrote rock, jazz, orchestral and musique concrète works. He also directed feature-length films and music videos, and designed...
's Bizarre Records
Bizarre Records
Bizarre Records was a record label formed for artists discovered by rock musician Frank Zappa and his business partner/manager Herb Cohen.Bizarre was originally formed as a production company...
the band ceased activities and both he and Carl went on to attend CalArts.
After studying at CalArts from 1969-70 with poets Emmett Williams
Emmett Williams
Emmett Williams was an American poet and visual artist.Williams was born in Greenville, South Carolina, and grew up in Virginia, and lived in Europe from 1949 to 1966...
and Michael S. Bell and writer/critic Sue-Ellen Case
Sue-Ellen Case
Sue-Ellen Case is Professor and Chair of Critical Studies in the Theatre Department in the School of Theater Film and Television at the University of California, Los Angeles....
, he began producing works using the name S. Weisser, primarily concentrating on visual
Visual poetry
Visual poetry is poetry or art in which the visual arrangement of text, images and symbols is important in conveying the intended effect of the work. It is sometimes referred to as concrete poetry, a term that predates visual poetry, and at one time was synonymous with it.Visual poetry was heavily...
and sound poetries
Sound poetry
Sound poetry is an artistic form bridging between literary and musical composition, in which the phonetic aspects of human speech are foregrounded instead of more conventional semantic and syntactic values; "verse without words"...
.
In 1975, he was included in the "Second Generation" show at the Museum of Conceptual Art in San Francisco.
In 1976 he moved from Los Angeles to the Bay Area. A primary reason for this move was his association with the San Francisco Alternative exhibition space
Alternative exhibition space
An alternative exhibition space is a location, et al. other than the normal professional venues, for the exhibition of artwork to the public. Located in places which have been converted, such as a store front empty space into an exhibit space, for an organized assembly of artworks from an...
La Mamelle, run by Carl Loeffler and Nancy Evans.
In 1977 he presented his first solo percussion performance at La Mamelle under the project title 'Sound of Wind and Limb'.
In 1978 he began developing an idiosyncratic performance technique utilizing self-developed instruments formed from industrial materials such as stainless steel, titanium
Titanium
Titanium is a chemical element with the symbol Ti and atomic number 22. It has a low density and is a strong, lustrous, corrosion-resistant transition metal with a silver color....
, and PVC
Polyvinyl chloride
Polyvinyl chloride, commonly abbreviated PVC, is a thermoplastic polymer. It is a vinyl polymer constructed of repeating vinyl groups having one hydrogen replaced by chloride. Polyvinyl chloride is the third most widely produced plastic, after polyethylene and polypropylene. PVC is widely used in...
plastics. Initially these instruments were assemblages of these materials, used with a movement-based performance style that was a form of marionette
Marionette
A marionette is a puppet controlled from above using wires or strings depending on regional variations. A marionette's puppeteer is called a manipulator. Marionettes are operated with the puppeteer hidden or revealed to an audience by using a vertical or horizontal control bar in different forms...
, although with the performer visible. He has since come to refer to this performance mode as 'wild-style', a term originally related to graffiti. Critic John Buckley described his performances in this era:
- The instruments are collections of objects ... strung together with ropes and swung at varying speeds and directions to produce a fairly astonishing range of pitches and timbres. And the moves the guy goes through to manipulate these instruments are, for grace and athleticism, strong stuff. Z'EV is also interesting for the close correlation of visual and musical aspects, since the physical vibrations of the objects you see are the same as those picked up by the ears as sound. Also, since the rhythms of the work are dictated by the performer's every and any movement, an inevitable integrity unifies the act.
At this time he first began to perform outside of the Fine Art context initially at the Mabuhay Gardens
Mabuhay Gardens
The Mabuhay Gardens was a San Francisco nightclub located at , on the Broadway strip of North Beach, an area best known for its strip clubs....
in San Francisco. In the fall of 1978 he began performing under the name Z'EV, which comes from the Jewish name his parents gave him at birth (Sh'aul Z'ev bn Yakov bn Moshe bn Sha'ul).
In November and December 1980, Z'EV opened a series of UK and European concerts in the first headlining tour of the British group Bauhaus
Bauhaus (band)
Bauhaus was an English rock band formed in Northampton in 1978. The group consisted of Peter Murphy , Daniel Ash , Kevin Haskins and David J . The band was originally Bauhaus 1919 before they dropped the numerical portion within a year of formation...
.
On that tour and his first solo tour of Europe immediately afterwards, Z'EV introduced intense metal based percussion musics to the UK and Europe. Critic Jason Pettigrew (current editor-in-chief of Alternative Press Magazine) attests to Z'EV's pioneering use of metal found object
Found object
A found object, in an artistic sense, indicates the use of an object which has not been designed for an artistic purpose, but which exists for another purpose already. Found objects may exist either as utilitarian, manufactured items, or things which occur in nature...
as percussion, writing: "Consider your music collection. Neubauten
Einstürzende Neubauten
Einstürzende Neubauten is a German post-industrial band, originally from West Berlin, formed in 1980. The group currently comprises Blixa Bargeld , Alexander Hacke , N.U...
? Test Department? Z’EV’s been there first.’
While but one of the progenitors of the "industrial movement", he was also fairly responsible, along with Neil Megson
Genesis P-Orridge
Genesis Breyer P-Orridge is an English singer-songwriter, musician, writer and artist. P-Orridge's early confrontational performance work in COUM Transmissions in the late 1960s and early 1970s along with the industrial band Throbbing Gristle, which dealt with subjects such as prostitution,...
, for delivering the ‘tribal’ impulse and esthetic into the Western/European cultural milieu developing between the years 1978-1984.
In 1981, 'Shake Rattle & Roll', a VHS video documenting his first wild-style performance on the East coast (produced by video artist John Childs), was released by Fetish Records in the UK and was the first ‘music’ / art video to be commercially released.
Since 1984, he has been concentrating on performing in a more traditional mallet-percussion style, albeit with highly idiosyncratic and "extended
Extended technique
Extended techniques are performance techniques used in music to describe unconventional, unorthodox, or non-traditional techniques of singing, or of playing musical instruments to obtain unusual sounds or instrumental timbres....
" mallet percussion techniques and his self-made or adapted instruments.
Both performance modes, (wild-style and mallet percussion), have been described as cacophonous when considered in traditional Western musical terms, because of the dense elemental acoustic phenomena Z'EV's instruments produce. In point of fact, Z'EV doesn't actually consider the results as "music" per se, but more as orchestrations of highly rhythmic acoustic phenomena.
It is also worth noting that Z'EV does not consider his performances as solos, but rather as the unique inter-reactions between himself and his instruments; the particular physical space of the performance; the particular time and geographic location of the performance; and the energies of the audience. While the first two traits will of course remain the same, a change in any of the last three will result in a totally different performance.
From 1986-90 he was a Guest Teacher in Composition and Improvisation at the Theater School for New Dance Development in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Together with dancer Ria Higler he mentored a year group through their entire four year course of study. The German dancer Thomas Lehmen is perhaps the most currently active of his students, and they are still friends.
In 1990 he began working with Amsterdam House Musician, DJ Dano. Their work, also in conjunction with Austrian media artist Konrad Becker
Konrad Becker
Konrad Becker is a hypermedia researcher and interdisciplinary content developer, Director of the Institute for New Culture Technologies/t0 and initiator of Public Netbase and...
, was instrumental in the emergence of the genres known as Gabber and Hard Core.
His recordings have been released by labels such as C.I.P.
Crippled Intellect Publications
Crippled Intellect Productions, better known as C.I.P., is a record label for experimental music based in Chicago, IL, and run by the sound artist Blake Edwards. Edwards performs and records under the name Vertonen, and is a member of Anatomy of Habit, Startless, Burrow, and sseepage...
, Cold Spring
Cold Spring (label)
Cold Spring is an independent record label based in Northamptonshire, England, specialising in "all forms of extreme media, but particularly: black/dark Ambient, Neo-classical/Neo-folk, Orchestral, Power Electronics/Noise, Japanese Noise, Minimal, Death Industrial, Dark Soundtracks, Experimental,...
, Die Stadt, Soleilmoon
Soleilmoon
Soleilmoon Recordings is an American record label that began in 1987 as a cassette label, operating from the back of a record shop called the Ooze in Portland, Oregon, USA. The first releases were by Smegma, Muslimgauze, Coil, and Nocturnal Emissions. Compact discs releases soon followed in...
, Tzadik Records
Tzadik Records
Tzadik Records is a record label based in New York City specialising in avant-garde and experimental music. The label was established by the eclectic composer and saxophonist John Zorn in 1995; Zorn is the executive producer of all Tzadik releases...
, Subterranean
Subterranean Records
Subterranean Records is an independent record label based in San Francisco, California. Founded by Steve Tupper and a then partner, Michael Fox in 1979, it focused on that city's underground punk and industrial music scene....
and Touch
Touch Music
Touch is a British audio-visual organisation, operating the Touch label. It is the main arm of the London-based multimedia publishing company Touch, established in 1982...
.
Published works
- Wheels On Fire #’s 1 And 2
Based on Shakespeare’s
William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...
King Lear
King Lear
King Lear is a tragedy by William Shakespeare. The title character descends into madness after foolishly disposing of his estate between two of his three daughters based on their flattery, bringing tragic consequences for all. The play is based on the legend of Leir of Britain, a mythological...
, #1 is a monologue version written for Gylan Kain
Gylan Kain
Gylan Kain is an American poet and playwright. He was a founding member, in 1968, of the Original Last Poets...
and #2 is a Quartet version using Gloucester [as a woman], her two sons Edmund and Edgar and Regan, one of Lear’s daughters.
Published in 'Ratio:3 volume 2 Trans:Mediators' By Temple Press 1992.
- Rhythmajik, Practical Uses of Number, Rhythm and Sound
This is a book on numerology
Numerology
Numerology is any study of the purported mystical relationship between a count or measurement and life. It has many systems and traditions and beliefs...
and music published in 1992 by Temple Press Ltd., Brighton, UK, ISBN 978-1-871744-40-8. In a blurb provided for the first edition, Murray Hope wrote: "In RHYTHMAJIK, Z'EV presents an original approach to the energies released via the rhythmic process, including the healing potential of correctly structured rhythms, and their possible value as access codes to those frequencies unbound by the space-time continuum."
- Face the Wound
Is a musical work inspired by opera and includes a vocal narrative. Face the Wound was released on CD by Soleilmoon
Soleilmoon
Soleilmoon Recordings is an American record label that began in 1987 as a cassette label, operating from the back of a record shop called the Ooze in Portland, Oregon, USA. The first releases were by Smegma, Muslimgauze, Coil, and Nocturnal Emissions. Compact discs releases soon followed in...
in 2001.
- The Sapphire Nature
Consists of translations of the mystical text known as the ‘Sefer Yetzirah
Sefer Yetzirah
Sefer Yetzirah is the title of the earliest extant book on Jewish esotericism, although some early commentators treated it as a treatise on mathematical and linguistic theory as opposed to Kabbalah...
’ or ‘Book of Formation.' Published in PDF format on the CD ‘The Sapphire Nature’ was released May 2002 by Tzadik
Tzadik Records
Tzadik Records is a record label based in New York City specialising in avant-garde and experimental music. The label was established by the eclectic composer and saxophonist John Zorn in 1995; Zorn is the executive producer of all Tzadik releases...
.
Books
- Wozencroft, Jon, ed. (1991). Z’EV 1968-1990: One Foot In The Grave, booklet released together with the double CD as a boxed set. TouchTouch MusicTouch is a British audio-visual organisation, operating the Touch label. It is the main arm of the London-based multimedia publishing company Touch, established in 1982...
- Z'EV (1992). Rhythmajik, Practical Uses of Number, Rhythm and Sound. Temple Press. ISBN 978-1-871744-40-8
- Zorn, John, ed. (2000). Arcana: Musicians on Music. New York: Granary Books/Hips Road. ISBN 978-1-887123-27-3.
- RE/Search (1983). RE/Search No. 6/7: Industrial Culture Handbook, RE/Search PublicationsRE/SearchRE/Search Publications is an American magazine and book publisher, based in San Francisco, founded and edited by Andrea Juno and V. Vale in 1980. It was the successor to Vale's earlier punk rock fanzine Search & Destroy , and was started with $100 from Allen Ginsberg and Lawrence Ferlinghetti...
ISBN 978-0-940642-07-2 - RE/Search (2006). RE/Search No. 6/7: Industrial Culture Handbook, Limited Hardback Edition, RE/Search PublicationsRE/SearchRE/Search Publications is an American magazine and book publisher, based in San Francisco, founded and edited by Andrea Juno and V. Vale in 1980. It was the successor to Vale's earlier punk rock fanzine Search & Destroy , and was started with $100 from Allen Ginsberg and Lawrence Ferlinghetti...
ISBN 978-1-889307-16-9