Sumer Is I’Cumin In

Sumer Is I’cumin In

Sumer Is I-Cumin In is the oldest surviving English-language song. Medieval Brits happily sang this upon spotting cuckoos, harbingers of warmer weather.

It was the Big Green Bus with the California plates parked on Bloor Street that caught my attention, and led to one of the strangest - and most satisfying - musical experiences of the summer thus far. Just when I had an evening clear to catch up on some UrbanFlute postings, this bizzare concert jumped in the way, in the name of SleepyTime Gorilla Museum!

I’m not sure what connection there might be between Toronto’s storied Lee’s Palace and the Bay Area, but the only two concerts that I’ve been to here have featured musicians from San Francisco and environs. Tonite’s ‘mock-olyptic messengers’ were a far cry from last year when I was caught off-guard by Mark Kozelek, the lead singer of Red House Painters. Both bands are spreading the same anti-rock gospel, just in different ways!

In this regard, SleepyTime Gorilla Museum fight fire with fire - Chili Peppers meet Zappa meet Zorn meets, well, Tom Waits - although you wouldn’t guess this in how they kicked off their show! I happened to be out on the street with them - a disarmingly friendly bunch, despite menacing moments in their music - as they gathered beside their bus and began a processional pageant. I shadowed them as they were greeted inside by a bemused heavy metal audience, and as they slowly circled in the crowd’s midsts, intoning the perennial classic: Sumer Is I’Cumin In.

For some added Medieval ‘bonus tracks’, check out Fresca , as well as a slightly less polished (?) Cantatrix. And I don’t know about you, but I can’t get enough of the Peppers, especially of the homegrown variety!