Lophae and the Creative Impulse

This column is a reprint from Unwinnable Monthly #184. If you like what you see, grab the magazine for less than ten dollars, or subscribe and get all future magazines for half price.

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Wide but shallow.

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With no disrespect to the dead, I think often of a story told to myself and a group of MFA creative writing students about the mostly renowned literary critic Helen Vendler. If your collegiate life touched English and analysis in any way (an increasing rarity from what I understand) you probably read an essay or two of Vendler’s, because it couldn’t be all Harold Bloom all the time I suppose.

My memories are muddled with my own half-brewed notions, assumptions and opinions, and I recall this story through a haze of cheese and wine, before or after a reading or a craft class. A writer slash teacher of some sort, aged to hip or stalwart in their scarf usage, was regaling us with insider gossip, the real education not covered by our absurd tuition.

Anyways, my memory of the story goes: there was a party on a boat, with Helen Vendler and many poets and authors with their many wits and moods. Vendler was reportedly having a wonderful time crossing over into the other side, violating the sacrosanct barrier between creator and critic (at least according to Robert Christgau, I think?) and partying amongst those she usually studied from afar, having a delightful time. As the evening wore on, she couldn’t help but exclaim that she wished she had the time, the energy, the desire to write for herself the way these poets did. To which they laughed, loudly and with a knowing glance bouncing around like radio signals between stations, which Vendler couldn’t help but notice.

What’s so funny, she asks? And one of the writers responds that for all them on this boat, it’s not a matter of time, energy, or desire: they simply must write. It is necessary for them to write in order to live, there’s no choice in the matter. For these authors to not write would be to die, or at least fundamentally metamorphose into another being altogether.

All of which is to say, what a cold freezer this writer’s life can be. If you’re scratching out for anyone other than yourself good luck, that sounds like a job. But for many creative people, the expression is the juice – it has to be. Because if you’re waiting for flowers it’s going to be a long winter.

And yet – a few weeks ago I got a very kind letter from Greg Sanders, guitarist of the instrumental jazz quartet Lophae (“lo-fi”) operating out of England. Sanders flattered some of my work, which is of course appreciated, and sent me a download for Lophae’s then-upcoming album world-psych-jazz album Perfect Strangers, which came out at the end of January. I was content to receive the message and check out the record with no real expectation, just glad to have threaded a little bit of appreciation across the pond and the void, and let that be the end of it if that was our fate.

But Perfect Strangers is just what I need in my jazz and my life: breezy lazer plucks, thumpin and skronks, wrists kept busy and warm behind the kit. As I confessed to Sanders, my knowledge of jazz is spotty and shallow – I like what I like, which is largely Davis going nuts for 13 minutes in Japan, both Coltranes and their classic astral epiphanies, James Brown squeezing blood from a single chord. A lot of freakouts go too far me though I like where Brötzmann’s reed is at, and anyone else with a big horn and bass up in the mix.

Which isn’t exactly what Lophae is up to here, even if the roots wind through it all. Perfect Strangers carries a lot of contemporary energy through the likes of Jaga Jazzist, Jeff Parker, even some of the current Scandinavian scene with their frosty melodies melting as they waft through the air. There’s plenty to hang your hat on, with steady rhythms carrying a lot of polished tones that nonetheless get electronically sculpted on occasion, twisted out of classical expectations only to drop back into a familiar headspace a little later. The guitars hover between planes with just enough effect to let every note blossom, while the bass vines up and around and everywhere in between. There’s a breeziness to it all, gliding in and out of pocket as need and mood dictate. Never rushing but always charged, Lophae feel tight without being over-written or rehearsed. They’re building the road as they drive, but it’s a beautiful Sunday for that swing.

I imagine Lophae plays for the same reason as the rest of us: the music needs must escape, the words can’t help but flow. Maybe Vendler didn’t understand that demand, but it’s ok – the writers needed her on that boat just as much as she needed them.

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Levi Rubeck is a critic and poet currently living in the Boston area. Check his links at levirubeck.com.