4/8/00 - The Maui Project - Wetlands Preserve, New York, NY

Exactly four weeks after the Disco Triscuits had debuted there, Marc Brownstein’s Maui Project made its debut at the Wetlands Preserve. A stylistic mish-mash, the Maui Project was made up of musicians from bands that Marc had met while touring with the Biscuits, such as Ulu, Uncle Sammy and the New Deal. The full lineup:

Marc Brownstein (The Disco Biscuits) - Bass

Jamie Shields (The New Deal) - Keys

DJ Stitch - Turntables

Max Delaney (Uncle Sammy) - Guitar

Dave Hoffman (Ulu) - Drums

Pauly Herron - Percussion

Pepper Swinson & Laurita - Backing Vocals

Not only was the Maui Project an important creative outlet for Marc, it was the beginning of a bridge between the rift that had formed within the Disco Biscuits

📷: Adam Foley

If the Disco Triscuits’ performance at the Wetlands Preserve a month earlier had been creative experimentation, then Brownstein’s Maui Project was perhaps even more so. In addition to the bass, guitar, keys and drums, the Project also featured an additional percussionist, a turntables and samples player, and backup vocalists. The music is multifaceted and complex, sometimes straight up rock and roll, sometimes funk, and sometimes experimental electronica.

The opening Tension is aptly named; it’s an almost Primus-esque instrumental with tight, precise riffs. Like Tension, the rest of the set consists entirely of Brownstein originals, many of which were later played with the Biscuits after Marc rejoined the band. If you listen to this show expecting to hear the Biscuits versions you are obviously going to be disappointed. The first Grass is Green (whose lyrical content almost certainly deals with Marc’s forced departure from the Disco Biscuits) is moody and atmospheric, and somewhat uninteresting. It was greatly improved with the added “oomph” that the rest of the Biscuits (and especially Barber) gave it. The Triumph composition is a little weird. The riffs are slower and the verses faster, and the chorus is sung entirely by the backup vocalists. Despite this, it’s a pretty mature song, and the jam section is very interesting. Brownie’s bass line hangs in the back, giving a tense underlying feel to the mostly mellow jam. It segues butter-smoothly into Home, a song played only once with the Biscuits. Stylistically, it’s basically a Home Again reprise (Home Again Again?), which might explain why it didn’t stick around. The jam is very short and very type one but it finally sees Jamie Shields show off his chops, and the guitar riff at the end survived onto the studio version of Home Again from They Missed the Perfume. No Matter follows, and while I always knew that Sister Judy’s Soul Shack derived from this tune, I was blown away by the naked honesty of the lyrics. Like Grass is Green, No Matter also seems to reference, in rather blunt terms, Marc’s dishonorable discharge from the Biscuits. In spite of the lyrical differences, the composition is nearly identical to Sister Judy’s, minus a few guitar riffs here and there that were likely added by Barber. The jam is excellent, very guitar heavy and lively, interspersed with occasional “want” and “need” from the backup singers. After No Matter, Brownstein announces a five minute intermission.

📷: Adam Foley

After the intermission, the Project plays a tune called Freedom, which also seems to reference his departure from the Biscuits. The jam is very funky and builds up to a really cool crescendo in the final minutes. It’s kind of surprising the Biscuits never picked this one up, as it’s definitely my highlight so far. Humu follows, and the jam is about as type one as it gets. Very pretty but certainly not worth hearing more than once. Same deal with Home Again, which comes next. Ulua follows, and unlike the other songs that entered the Biscuits catalog later in the year, Ulua sat on the shelf for two years before the Biscuits played it. It doesn’t have any of the verses, but the chorus is largely the same as it would be in the 2002 versions. The jam is refreshingly exploratory, beginning as synth-heavy funk and settling into a type two groove that resolves smoothly back into the chorus. The final song of the set is Kamaole Sands, which has a ripping guitar solo pre-jam. Like Humu and Home Again the main jam is pretty straightforward, but a little more enjoyable to me than either. It feels like a very fleshed out exploration of a theme. After Kamaole the band leaves for a full setbreak.

At the beginning of set (two? three?) Brownie invites Carol Wade up to the stage to do a pretty solid Mike D on Gratitude. Four weeks earlier, Carol had shared the stage with the rest of the Disco Biscuits, playing bass on Mindless Dribble. The jam out is groovy and rocking, and settles into M.E.M.P.H.I.S. grooves. Brownie welcomes Magner to the stage and gets a considerable cheer. The crowd cheers again when the band finally drops into M.E.M.P.H.I.S. Brownie is playing with Magner! And they’re playing a Biscuits song! The first jam doesn’t hold up to the best versions played by the Biscuits the previous year, but it’s still energetic and exploratory, and oh how excited must the crowd have been to hear that. The outro jam has Brownstein on a kind of distorted synth bass; the jam breaks down to almost nothing and then picks up to a much faster tempo. Brownie invites “another friend” to the stage, and suddenly, three quarters of the Disco Biscuits are playing music together. The jam takes on a blissful quality as it begins to move towards Lai. The Lai jam is very loose and mellow, and after an extended exploratory jam begins to leisurely make its way back into type one. After Lai, Brownie brings up the sax player from Foxtrot Zulu for a rendition of The Chicken by Jaco Pastorius, a song the Biscuits would cover but not played by them since 5/26/99. The saxophone lends this version a bit of gravitas, and it’s nicely jammed out as well, with multiple sections of type one improv. The encore is a song from South Park, and it’s probably funny if you watch that show, but it’s certainly not very good.

A month ago, I posited that Biscuits fans probably felt at least a little disappointed leaving the Wetlands Triscuits show, not because the music was necessarily bad, but just because it was so different (and as we all know, Biscuits fans do not do well with change). I have to think that they would have left the Maui Project show in much higher spirits, simply because of the fact that Barber and Magner had played with Brownie. Musically, the show does not offer much (although there are moments of excellence), but beyond the fact that it is interesting to hear so many future Biscuits staples in raw form, it is tempting to think of it as the beginning of the process that culminated in Marc rejoining the band on 7/12/00.

Highlights:

No Matter:

Jamie Shields adds a little sauce to the verses, and the jam, though raw, is certainly fun.

Freedom:

The jam goes from super weird to absolutely triumphant. Great shredding in the peak.

M.E.M.P.H.I.S. > Lai:

Besides the fact that it’s awesome to hear old Biscuits classics, these are both pretty good versions

Stray Observations:

After the first intermission, Brownie lists the names of the songs played. He mentions that he wrote Triumph “four years ago,” and that he couldn’t figure out how to sing it.

After Humuhumunukunukuapua’a, Brownie tells the crowd the name of the song and, helpfully, spells it for them. “It’s like Mississippi.”

https://archive.org/details/maui2000-04-08.flac16