John Zorn was named a MacArthur Fellow in 2006 – a recipient of the so-called “genius grant”. As near as I can tell, about 15 other people have been named Fellows in the area of Music and Composition. Though I wonder how many, if any, have the words “grindcore” and “avant-garde metal” listed as genres in their Wikipedia bios.
I knew nothing of Zorn prior to picking up a copy the Naked City album Torture Garden a few months back at a record fair in Brooklyn1. The cover gave off industrial vibes, but that’s really not what’s happening here at all. Avant-garde free jazz meets hardcore, maybe. And it’s every bit as bizarre as that description sounds. It’s got forty tracks, only three of which last longer than one minute, a full-on aural assault with just a second or two between each during which you can catch your breat.
According to Zorn their label at the time, Nonesuch, weren’t interested, but agreed to bankroll the recording. Zorn and the group then licensed it to another label for no money and no royalties… which feels like they made nothing on this thing. I can see a bit where Nonesuch was coming from – Torture Garden seems to have a very small market. A few of the tracks are interesting to be sure, and the entirety has a certain foundational undercurrent about it, though I can see it being a risk for a label that’s trying to at least break even.
- This was the second time I’ve been to this record fair, which takes place outdoors down along the water. And just as was true when I attended in 2019, it was hot. Crazy hot. New York City hot, with the tables and tents sitting on a huge concrete slab. With the angle of the sun, some dealers’ boxes were directly in the sunlight, and I could almost feel the wax melting as I looked at it, so I made a point of only looking at stuff that was in the shade. ↩︎