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Pavees Dance: There’s Always the Night, is composer, drummer, storyteller, and producer Sean Noonan's latest endeavor to cook up a distinctive brew of original compositions with a selection of lyrics by Noonan and the infamous singer, poet and visual artist Malcolm Mooney, who draws from his earlier years with Can to the present.

Noonan describes himself as an "Irish griot,’ one who collects tales, legends, and life stories over the course of his journeys and transforms them into the raw material that informs not only his drumming, but the entirety of the music he creates; as if Samuel Beckett played the drums.

Joining Noonan and Mooney are Aram Bajakian, Lou Reed's last guitarist, and Jamaaladeen Tacuma, the free funk prophet/bassist from Ornette Coleman's Primetime. Noonan has joined forces with Mooney, the original singer for the late 60s /early 70’s German rock band Can, who is known for his striking vocal style, half soul, half psychedelic, which served to define the sound of what has been cited as one of the more influential experimental rock bands of all time. Since leaving the band in 1970, Mooney has primarily devoted himself to poetry, sculpture and teaching. His return to music is one of many beautiful gifts the "Irish griot" brings to listeners.

On June 3, Noonan will release Pavees Dance: There’s Always the Night, his 19th release since 1999. Featuring six tracks of inspired spoken word performances layered over and entwined amongst the band’s intricate instrumentals, the album is both an acknowledgment of the past and a bold foray into the future.

The very nature of the musicians on the Pavees Dance lineup is testament to that melding of past and present into an inventive multi-generational experience. Tacuma and Mooney still embody the spirit of unbridled creativity that marked the late 1960s and early 1970s; Noonan and Bajakian, who are two generations younger and share a common place of inspiration (both grew up in 80's in Massachusetts, listening to Mozart, Beastie Boys and Michael Jackson), in partsculpted from the rough material created by their predecessors two decades earlier.

Noonan says, “Pavees Dance in some regards is a continuation of what Can was doing, incorporating strong minimalist, psychedelic, and world music elements, but instead this album wanders towards something like Ornette Coleman’s Primetime dancing to Jimmy Hendrix dancing to Bartok dancing to Sun Ra.”

lyrics

Noonan began composing all the Pavees Dance pieces soon after returning from his journey and shared only song titles and general themes with Mooney, who he still had not meet. “We communicated through exchanging poems and artwork that we were inspired by. For me the compositional process was a synesthesia-like experience where this effect, along with extended metaphors, was a large part of the foundation for the intricate harmonic forms.” Noonan shaped melodies and adapted lyrics from Mooney’s poems, a different approach from how he engaged with vocalists Abdoulaye Diabate and Susan McKeown on his 2007 and 2008 Songlines releases, Stories to Tell and Boxing Dreams, where the musicians communally created or improvised their own lyrics off specific themes.

credits

from Sean Noonan Pavees Dance feat. Malcolm Mooney, released June 3, 2014
Album from Vanguard Composer, Storyteller, and Drummer, Sean Noonan Featuring Legendary Bassist Jamaaladeen Tacuma and Shooting-Star Guitarist Aram Bajakian with Original Can Vocalist Mooney

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Sean Noonan | drummer, composer, storyteller

Drummer and composer prefers the term “Rhythmic Storyteller” to describe his audacious, genre-defiant artistry. As a modern- day sonic griot he combines the most ancient of traditions with forward-seeking experimentation; as a kind of post-modern wandering minstrel he gathers irreverent folk tales and offbeat inspirations from various cultures and translates them through his own singular worldview ... more

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