I had a most curious evening last night, courtesy of Thor. I got to go to the Brooklyn Academy of Music to see The Plastic Ono Band perform a pre-birthday tribute to its founder and namesake.
What can I say about the show? First of all it was Yoko-Fucking-Ono, so really that should be good enough for me. She has practically trademarked peace and screaming, and is the most famous widow on the planet, a mantle she assumed with the death of Jackie O. She’s also a 77 year old lady, so the fact that she bothers to go out and perform at all is impressive and moving. I can barely get it together to make anything, and she’s a quarter of a century older than me.
But for all of her cultural impact, Yoko as a performer is pretty elusive. She’s not really a front man, or a song stylist; she made a life out of answering questions with questions, even when those seem to take the form of statements. So to sit through an evening that was mostly geared to telling us how great she was made me antsy. It started off with a tribute film, the kind of greatest hits montage you associate with award shows. But did anyone in the audience need to be reminded of who Yoko Ono was or what was cool about her? Then came the first act: a selection of her songs played by the current Plastic Ono Band, under the musical direction of Sean Lennon. Here’s where I had the most trouble: it was all pretty pedestrian musically. The band played well, but the arrangements weren’t much. It made me wonder about how much Yoko’s songs need really good producers. “Walking on Thin Ice” in particular became a soupy disco rave-up, shorn of any of the itchy fuzz that makes it so gripping. Near the end of the set I started wondering how folks would be reacting if the evening had been served up by say, Stevie Nicks. I think the term “vanity project” would have been tossed around more.
After intermission we got a series of guest performers doing Yoko songs, and how I felt from moment to moment became much more about what those performers brought. Sorry, my Scissor Sisters loving friends, but Jake and Ana turned in a bland “The Sun is Down”. Justin Bond did fine with “What A bastard the World Is”, mining the twisted sexual politics for all of their soap opera value. He also cracked one of the best jokes of the evening, talking about following Yoko in Twitter and doing what ever she says. Bette Midler is a reach over the footlights, take the audience on a journey kind of performer, really the opposite of Yoko in that sense. It was interesting to see her perform “Yes, I’m Your Angel” and revealing to hear Sean say that she was responsible for the arrangement, which while a little too jokey, still was more lively than any of his. Paul Simon and his son struggled with the harmonies of “Oh Yoko”. There were two highlights: First was Kim Gordon and Thurston Moore joining with Yoko to do “Mulberry” one of the noisier songs, and the first time that there was some genuine sonic interest. When they finished making their guitars squeal and the last of the ringing overtones died out I thought “That’s what I come to see Yoko Ono for.” The second was a version of “Don’t Worry Kyoko” with Eric Clapton that approached the woozy, psychedelic majesty of those early Plastic Ono Band records. The lowlight for me was a flaccid version of “Yer Blues” with Sean singing lead. I am really really happy that I am not the bearer of any Beatle DNA, because how can you live with the unending expectations of pop music fans that you will somehow be able to redeem their lives for them? Sean does a good job of just referring to his “dad” in a tone that diffuses much of the holy aura people bring to anything having to do with John Lennon, but even so, I think he’d do better to just steer clear of performing anything thing like this.
Finally, of course, everyone was brought back on stage and we were all cajoled to sing “Give Peace A Chance”, which was really an unearned moment for me. Yoko’s example of using her power, imagination and wealth to try to improve the lot of humanity may have been present in our minds for the whole evening, but the performance had done nothing to bring us to a point of action. The gesture felt particularly empty; “All we are Saying…” saying to whom? and is that really all we’re saying, even now?
Filing out onto the slushy streets I felt grateful for the chance to see the show, but saddened by how much seemed to have come up short.
Tags: music, performance, Yoko Ono