Mysterious Bladerunner Revealed At Reggie's Saturday

By Casey Moffitt in Arts & Entertainment on Apr 30, 2014 4:00PM

John Zorn, Dave Lombardo and Bill Laswell form Bladerunner.

John Zorn, Dave Lombardo and Bill Laswell literally have hundreds of albums to their collective credit, but what they will produce when they come together as Bladerunner at Reggie's Saturday night is anyone's guess.

Bladerunner has no formal recordings. The group has played just a handful of shows, with Saturday marking their American debut. The band has no web page, Facebook page or even a promotional photograph that we can run along with this post. It is nearly a complete mystery.

Here's what we do know: three highly accomplished and skilled musicians will perform an improvisational set Saturday night. We might have some kind of clue as to what ride they'll provide if their individual resumes weren't so eclectic.

Zorn, a truly innovative saxophonist and composer, has worked on such a wide variety of projects one wonders if he sleeps. Lombardo is obviously best known for his skins work in Slayer, but he, too, has experience playing jazz and even classical music on his resume. Laswell, who will play bass, is one of the most prolific of modern musicians best known for his funk projects. However, he too has performed on produced albums in the realms of jazz, world music, dub, reggae, progressive rock and punk.

So the common denominator is that they have experience in a dizzying array of genres. So we still have few clues as to what Bladerunner is all about.

However, Zorn is also well known for bringing musicians together and putting them in settings that allow them to use the most of their abilities and strengths. He has worked with both these men in the past—Lombardo in Fantomas and Laswell in Painkiller —and has brought them together in this project for a reason.

Bladerunner has been playing intermittently since 2000 with a just a handful of shows during each run. They mainly have played in Europe and most recently performed a 35-minute set at the Adelaide Festival in Australia in March. Bladerunner has booked shows here and in New York City for this brief tour and that's it.

Although we have very little information as to what's in store, it's too intriguing to let it go without any acknowledgement that it could be a completely mind-blowing show. But really who knows for sure?

Bladerunner performs two shows at Reggie's Rock Club, 2105 S. State St., at 7 p.m. and 10 p.m. Saturday May 3. The 7 p.m. show is all ages, the 10 p.m. show is 17 and older. $60 - $125.