Why Love Thy Will Be Done Rules by Joseph Shabason (2015)
Love Thy Will Be Done
It took me a few years to really understand just how great of a musician Thom Gill is. When I first met him I thought that he was a musical wank. Twenty two year old me felt that he wasn’t a serious enough jazz musician – that his playing was too unrestrained and that he wasn’t even making an effort to really “play the changes.” A few other serious jazz musicians at the University of Toronto and I felt that Thom’s wild and unconventional guitar style was just his way of covering up the fact that he couldn’t really play bebop. I was certain (as 22-year olds often are) that Thom was a wank and that I was really playing meaningful jazz.
I didn’t realize that I was wrong all at once. There was no aha moment that caused me to come to the sudden realization that Thom Gill is in fact one of the most incredible musicians that I’ve ever met. It was more of a slow burn – a combination of me deprogramming years of jazz brainwashing and Thom continuing to do what he had been doing all along: Making music that did the opposite of what you expected; Music that felt familiar but somehow undermined that familiarity at the same time. The reason I thought that Thom was a musical dilettante was because he was doing something with music that I just didn’t understand. Instead of playing jazz standards like everyone else played jazz standards Thom was trying to play them in a way that felt fresh and interesting. So many of us at school were just regurgitating the same tired shit that had been done to death, but Thom really rose above all of that and found his own voice that was (and continues to be) so interesting and unique.
I never knew it when we were in school together, but buddy’s got a voice like a silk waterfall. He’s also an unbelievable songwriter. Go figure. Watching him perform with Love Thy Will Be Done at Kazoo! Fest will be a lot like watching him perform at U of T. You’re gonna see someone doing something weird and beautiful, and someone who is trying and succeeding to make music that is completely his own.
Joseph Shabason is a member of DIANA who has been known to record and tour the globe with Destroyer.
