Joe Baiza - Matt Crane - Damon Smith Trio

Joe Baiza is truly one of the great guitarists to come out of  the so-called punk rock scene of southern California, "so called" because most of Baiza's music fits more into the  category of free jazz or jazz-rock. He has often been ahead of the curve with his musical thinking, playing intense instrumental jams a few years before his audience would be eager for them, and bringing together the creative anarchy of improvised music with the independent attitude of the  punk scene at a time when the two philosophies seemed mutually exclusive, at least to people whose brains were  fuzzy from falling into the mosh pit.

Guitar nuts first picked up on Baiza in the context of his band Saccharine Trust, one of the mid-'80s groups that made the SST label so interesting, at least for a short time. Fellow band member Jack Brewer and Baiza revived this band in 2001 and recorded a new album in Germany. Universal Congress Of was at first just the title of a Baiza solo album in 1987, but evolved into a group whose three original releases became favorites of the electric jazz audience. Universal Congress Of toured frequently in both Europe and the United States. - Artist bio by Eugene Chadbourne.

Damon Smith studied double bass with Lisle Ellis and has  had lessons with Bertram Turezky, Joëlle Leandré, John  Lindberg, Mark Dresser and others. Damon’s explorations  into the sonic palette of the double bass have resulted in a  personal, flexible improvisational language based in the  American jazz avant-garde movement and European non idiomatic free improvisation. Visual art, film and dance  heavily influence his music, as evidenced by his CAMH  performance of Ben Patterson’s Variations for Double Bass,  collaborations with director Werner Herzog on soundtracks  for Grizzly Man and Encounters at the End of the World,  and an early performance with the Merce Cunningham  Dance Company.

Born and raised in Los Angeles, Matt Crane has been playing percussion since before he was in school. From  playing in a fourth grade band on a drum set fabricated out  of ice cream bins, to playing punk rock in the early eighties,  to discovering jazz and playing with Ornette Coleman, his  musical development has been continual and exponential.  Focusing on pure improvisation since the early nineties, he  currently lives and works in Rhode Island and continues to  collaborate, perform, and record widely.

babybaby_explores (the Reasons Why that Gum is Still on the Sidewalk), is a pseudo concept, garage-pop, art-rock project made of three fweaky BFFS  from the ghost town clam chowder suburbia Warwick, RI. Utilizing obsolete and low-tech gear, the band makes simple structured danceable songs that pay homage to: musique concrète, European underground synth punk of the late 70’s through the 80's, anthem music, dada, and the Providence DIY & noise scene. They’re new album Food Near Me, Weather Tomorrow was released on March 3, 2023 via No Gold.