THE HUB RETURNS
Think Magazine,Prague, Czech Rep,May 2, 2001

By Jeremy Hurewitz

On May 2nd and 3rd THE HUB returns to Prague to play two highly anticipated shows at Jazz Club Zelezna. Previous shows in Prague and around the continent have left audiences with reactions from bewilderment, offence, curiosity, fright, admiration and loathing.

One of the more cacophonous and adventurous acts that will come through Prague this year, THE HUB is set to light up Zelezna once again when it comes through Prague on it’s “Jacked Up” tour.

What is THE HUB? Why are they so weird? Some say bassist Tim Dahl was dropped on his head when he was a baby. Others say it happened on numerous occasions. Regardless he is composing some truly original and exciting music. Part of the NY underground “Dirty Jazz” scene, THE HUB is a truly modern hybrid of Jazz, Metal, Hip-Hop and Punk. The band skips between these diverse genres with stunning speed and fluidity never once sounding like a fusion act. These are three studious musicians who are bent on speaking that language of music that they have internalized in all its beautiful and craziness.

I caught up with the band when I was in New York recently and was especially taken with Dan Magay’s continuing evolution on alto saxophone. The native Californian has recently moved to New York but the pace of the city hasn’t changed his laid back persona. The vitality and exhilaration of New York, however, has brought out more or the daring Eric Dolphy-like riffs he tears out, red-faced and on the verge of exploding. He was experimenting with a wah-pedal and other effects, which promise to further aggrandize and color the band’s music.

When THE HUB passed through Prague six months ago on their “Vandalism” tour the drummer Sean Noonan had a broken right hand from a fistfight. He had to play all the shows one-handed further baffling incredulous audiences. Hopefully, if he curbs his pugilist Irish instincts, we’ll see him unbound and bashing, in his preferred state where he doesn’t so much play the drums as much as he becomes one with them, sweating and breathing the beats.

Prague’s integration into the west is slowly bringing more and more music to the city but it’s still the too frequent pit-stop for a whole range of dinosaur 70’s schlock-rock and awful death-metal bands. Posters for Marilyn Manson and AC/DC all over Prague 1 tell the story. Those hungry for something more innovative should check out THE HUB at Zelezna.

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