A fan of certain strains of New Zealand music, Franco first visited our shores in 2004, when he teamed up with Robert Scott and David Kilgour, of Dunedin band The Clean, and recorded an album, Southpawwest, under the name Greg Franco and Wandering Bear.
Rough Church has just released a new album on New Zealand label Powertool Records. Titled 46 Missed Calls: Live at KPFK, it features a number of lyrics penned by New Zealand poet David Eggleton, a friend of Franco's.
''After 30 years of writing music, I got sick of my lyrics and I became friends with David Eggleton, who began writing songs for me,'' Franco explains.
Performing a mix of post-punk, psych-pop and progressive rock, Rough Church's music focuses on ''a helter-skelter energy with percussion breakdowns and guitar solos'' and showcases the talents of Kaitlin Wolfberg on violin and keyboards and Andy Sykora on drums/percussion.
Rough Church also has a local connection. For its New Zealand tour, it will be joined by Wellington bass player Kedron Parker, who performed regularly with Franco before she moved from Los Angeles.
As a DJ during the mid-1980s, Franco interviewed bands such as the Violent Femmes, Camper Van Beethoven and Mojo Nixon, which helped fuel his passion for music.
After finishing college, Franco began a 20-year career at Universal Pictures, while continuing to make music with his band Ferdinand, opening for acts such as Lutefisk, Rilo Kiley, Possum Dixon, Mike Watt and The Clean (at the Knitting Factory, Hollywood, in 2001).
Mind your ears
Avant-garde German saxophonist Peter Brötzmann is bringing his pioneering, ear-blistering technique to New Zealand, his first solo tour here including a performance at The Anteroom, Port Chalmers, next Friday.
Best-known for his classic 1968 album Machine Gun, which offered a high-decibel, politically charged approach to free jazz and improvised music, Brötzmann boasts a long and productive career spanning nearly five decades.
He has played with pivotal figures such as Cecil Taylor, Don Cherry, Keijii Haino, John Zorn, Derek Bailey, Bill Laswell and others, regularly headlining festival appearances around the world.
A recent New York Times review offered the following: ''Trying to describe it sends you grasping for overheated metaphors: blowtorches, hellfires, certain Congressional libidos ... he recently turned 70, and he sounds almost invincible.''
Although Brötzmann is regarded as an important European representative of contemporary improvised music, he is also an accomplished visual artist.
Consistently active in the field since the late 1950s, his work ranges from drawings, prints, watercolours and oil paintings to graphic design (including record sleeves and posters).
See them
Rough Church performs at Chick's Hotel, Port Chalmers, tonight, supported by Robert Scott and the Shifting Sands.
Peter Brötzmann (with Hermione Johnson and John Glasgow) performs at The Anteroom, 29 Wickliffe Tce, Port Chalmers, on Friday, May 9.
