July 31, 2007
YAHRZEIT
last night I enjoyed a rare evening out...went to see a fellow named Andy Statman, who performs regularly at a synagogue on Charles Street.
It is difficult to master any musical instrument. Anyone who flirts with the descriptor of "virtuoso" has indeed put in many hours of work, which in turn prepares the sinews for the audible expression of something inside, the inner song--enabling music to flow like language. Not everyone who puts in the work gets the flowing language. I'm still not convinced if I've reached that point, nor will I ever. But Mr. Statman seems to not only have attained that level of mastery, but he's done something I'd never heard before--seemingly attained a mastery and a voice on two different instruments--the clarinet and the mandolin. He's more well-known for his playing on the latter, but I found his clarinet playing to be very moving, and evocative of not just jewish folk melodies, klezmer, etc. but also echoes of rodrigo (I swear at one point they were playing changes from "concierto de aranjuez"), lester young, ben webster and coltrane--I wouldn't be at all surprised to learn that his drummer was a fan of elvin jones. In fact, the musical stew was informed by all sorts of music, very American, very improvisational...right before they began, he dedicated the set to his father, as they were performing on the anniversary of his passing. Said something in Hebrew I didn't understand, I'm assuming a prayer or blessing, and then off they went...the inner song flowing over the drone of a bowed bass, propogating paragraphs of musical sentences, haunting modal structures adorned with legato bursts--lifting and landing, in a darkened airless room in mid-summer, bearing witness to the inner song of this serious man, this serious musician. very inspiring.
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July 30, 2007
CONSTANT READER
...Jennifer Jason Leigh as Dorothy Parker...
over the weekend I happened to watch the 1994 film "Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle," a well-done period piece which depicts Dorothy Parker's life and various romances, along with a breezy depiction of the members of the Algonquin Round Table. I enjoyed it.
Here's my review of the film: were I an actor, I'd want to be just like Jennifer Jason Leigh.
Razors pain you; Rivers are damp;
Acids stain you; And drugs cause cramp.
Guns aren't lawful; Nooses give;
Gas smells awful; You might as well live.
--Dorothy Parker (1893-1967)
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If it's true what they say and people really do die in three's, then today was a doozy of a trifecta--Ingmar Bergman, Tom Snyder and Bill Walsh...
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July 26, 2007
FRISELL
...he knows what to do...
we threw a dinner party recently, your basic outdoor summer bbq foodlaunch (sweet/spicy shrimp and mideast spicy marinade swordfish thingy went over like gangbusters), and just as folks started showing up, I opened up ms media player on the laptop with the fancy bose speakers, and threw on a recent download--most of bill frisell's post-2000 albums, on shuffle. he's a former ECM jazzbo who's taken to a whole 'nother polyglot brew of jazz reinterprets (his recent trio joint with ron carter and paul motian is a sonic treat), americana pedal steel & guitar atmo, and his specialty--the now-omnipresent looping which he was a pioneer of dating back a few decades, at a time when all anyone ever mumbled about this particular discipline was "frippertronics"...all of the above was in the mix, and once I got going with beverage dispensing, meat on fire, and miscellaneous howdy-do's, I completely forgot about the background noise. mr. frisell's recordings single-handedly soundtracked our little soiree for about five hours, by my estimation...and it was spot-on perfect. not that this is a bona fide recommend on the face--I remember my dear old mom asking me nightly to put on some dinner music, which usually meant to find something pleasant and bland, but this was a banging summer evening, with a warm and waning sun, a light breeze, and a whole lot of laughter and good vibes. to single-handedly accompany an event that festive speaks well, I think. and I'll add an additional hooray to any musician who can emerge from the modern jazz scene (he was a berklee cat way back when) and instead of hewing to the marsalis line of trad trad trad, come up with something new...I don't think he ever wanted to ape horn lines. the man goes for sound. and no matter if he's playing along to a sampler, or to miles davis' bass player, or to slide wunderkind greg leisz, he's putting something out that's unique, and just so musical. best of all, he just seems to get better and better. and whaddya know--he strums the occasional telecaster. add a star...
I've mentioned bill frisell before. I'll probably do so again sometime. check him out...
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July 25, 2007
THEY MADE YOU MISS EVERYTHING
an animated piece from those south park guys, using text by alan watts...
the basic sentiment is something I'd hoped my generation would have, at long last, finally gotten a handle on, being the one that followed the idealism of the 60s and the self-explorations of the 70s and the unbelievably bad haircuts of the 80s, that perhaps we'd finally reject all the profane consumerism, violence, and crass manipulations of each other...but it turns out we've been just as one-dimensional and delusional and adrift as any other generation...
ok. back to my dancing and singing...
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July 24, 2007
THE ETERNAL REWARD
...all the way to the bank...
back in the 1980s, when I was a college student living in western new york, and an "all-nighter" was required, the darkest stay-awake hours were always between 4am and 6am, right before the sun came back around. and in the days before cable (or at least until I could work full-time and afford it) or internet, there was one station that reached my hovel in lowly Dunkirk New York--Buffalo's WGR-TV. Between 11:30pm-4am, "Barry's Cat's Pajamas" provided a utilitarian drone of bad old movie dialogue, something to keep the brain alert--with the ever-jolly Barry Lillis grinning his electronic energies across the vast murk of grey night...but alas even the jovial Mr. Lillis could not stick it out with me until dawn. that task was left to the only tv show left on the air, on the only available channel--the very last one of the broadcast day--Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker's PTL Club.
We now know what they were doing. We know what kind of guy Jim Bakker was, and we have an inkling as to the extent, or limits, of Tammy Faye's role in that vile organization, the blithe enabler. However, we've also learned not to underestimate the seeming benign harmlessness of those ultra-coiffed hi-y'all gals...just as the sequins and wigs and surgery holding together Dolly Parton festoon a ferocious force of feminine capitalism, I don't doubt for a second that Tammy Faye didn't look around and see the ridiculous opulence which God Hath Wrought, and if she wasn't privy to the methods by which it was begotten (which I don't believe for an instant), she surely must have, at some point, wondered how, and why...or maybe not. this was a woman who had an air-conditioned doghouse...and let's not forget that neither she nor Jim were required to pay income taxes...
Even up until a few days ago, appearing bone thin and cancer-ridden on Larry King (taking uncontested honors for gross-out of the year), it was quite obvious to me that Tammy's true religion has always been the attention--the lights and the cameras and her precious microphone. she was indeed the ultimate church lady. if only she had voice left inside her sufficient to carry one last, final encore, just one more pitchy "gospel" tune...
and alas, that cruel irony would not spare the gaudiest of the godly: where was Jim? I can't say whether or not he tried, but her faith healer ex-husband was ultimately neither healer nor savior to PTL's greatest star attraction, even as he had done so many times before for the great unwashed, pointing to his studio audience and describing how one of his PTL'ers had just overcome a brain tumor, or how the healing power of the PTL ministry had cured an old woman's glaucoma, etc. etc. ad nauseum...where was the laying on of hands for Tammy Faye? She who had helped "heal" so many before, now left to the cold mercies of secular science...such a pity.
I'll admit that I found their little show quite horrid, but Tammy Faye just kept on beaming that smile, and the checks kept rolling in, and I kept typing and typing, hopped up on coffee, no-doz and various other "stimulants." and as I struggled to expound upon some great work of English literature, so my night was extended into daytime by Jim and Tammy Faye, two capricious charlatans grinning like hyenas on my tiny black & white...certainly there were thousands who fell for their ruse, buying in, literally, to the notion of the "prosperity gospel"-- that one could donate one's way into paradise... and unfortunately there isn't a Hell for Tammy to go explain herself to, but then again, when you've devoted your life to the Great Lie, perhaps it's enough to end up as worm food, just like the rest of naive, rose-colored humanity.
goodbye Tammy Faye. thanks for keeping my energy up, with your loud enthusiasm, your eager fortune-hording, and of course those enormous eyelashes. when Jesus needed a theme park, you got it done. if it matters, I always wondered what you were doing with that creep. and whaddya know--those all-nighters were 100% effective at producing "A" grades...praise the lord! farewell to the mists of history. I will not think of you again.
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In related news, a journalist writes a story about a spiritual journey quite similar to mine (except for the born again part of course)....just click on the link below...
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July 19, 2007
A FAILURE PILE IN A SADNESS BOWL
...see? my loudmouth douchebaggery has once again kept the rape goblins at bay!...
all this week my stereo ipod headspace has been soaking up two things--the new buffalo tom record and patton oswalt's 'werewolves and lollipops'...the former, one of my all-time favorite bands, had been my main focus..but I keep returning to the latter...those of you who have managed to preserve a sparkle of mirth amidst the soul-crushing exigencies of suburban adulthood might enjoy it too...
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July 18, 2007
BUY THE TICKET, TAKE THE RIDE
"The Edge... there is no honest way to explain it because the only people who really know where it is are the ones who have gone over. "
--Hunter S. Thompson
Today would have been his 70th birthday.
so many candles. fuck it. let 'em burn...
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July 14, 2007
RE-ORG / REUNION
carpeting: huzzah!
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it's caroline's big day...the happiest of days to the happiest of girls...
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July 13, 2007
RUDY THE TERRIBLE
His political career has been based on a pattern of preying on the weak--kicking people out of their homes, bulldozing community gardens, and of course the ingenious racist code word he invented (beware the evil "squeegee men!") to get into office...followed by a similarly fictitious ruse about "crips and bloods" running amok in the subways right before his re-election.
I've heard lots of astonishingly positive opinions about Giuliani during the years since, but nobody I know--NOBODY--who was actually here, living in New York City at the time, has any illusions about the man who thinks he's fit to be president of the usa. the embedded video above is a "swift boating", for sure, but I don't hear anything on there that doesn't ring true. the essence of Rudy's whole profile is a media creation--his actual record is abysmal. his great luck during the awful days of 9/11 was to be juxtaposed beside the least charismatic politician of modern times, George Pataki. next to Pataki, anyone with a pulse and opposable thumbs would sound Churchillian.
So why is it that the great savior of NYC is now so hated by New York's Bravest? Perhaps, as specialists in this area, they have noticed that his pants are on fire...
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July 11, 2007
UNEARTHED
after a 26-year layoff, I'm taking lessons again. my teacher is the guy pictured above. I know, I know: he's dead. so, not so much q&a, but that's more than made up for by the copious information readily available on the intertubes...
and if I ever get really stuck on something, there's always this guy...
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July 10, 2007
A DECLAMATION FOR THE DISCONNECTED
Alone
by Edgar Allan Poe
From childhood's hour I have not been
As others were--I have not seen
As others saw--I could not bring
My passions from a common spring--
From the same source I have not taken
My sorrow--I could not awaken
My heart to joy at the same tone--
And all I lov'd--I lov'd alone--
Then--in my childhood--in the dawn
Of a most stormy life--was drawn
From ev'ry depth of good and ill
The mystery which binds me still--
From the torrent, or the fountain--
From the red cliff of the mountain--
From the sun that 'round me roll'd
In its autumn tint of gold--
From the lightning in the sky
As it pass'd me flying by--
From the thunder, and the storm--
And the cloud that took the form
(When the rest of Heaven was blue)
Of a demon in my view--
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July 09, 2007
A SONG FOR THE SELF-RIGHTEOUS
The High-Toned Old Christian Woman
by Wallace Stevens
Poetry is the supreme fiction, madame.
Take the moral law and make a nave of it
And from the nave build haunted heaven. Thus,
The conscience is converted into palms,
Like windy citherns hankering for hymns.
We agree in principle. That's clear. But take
The opposing law and make a peristyle,
And from the peristyle project a masque
Beyond the planets. Thus, our bawdiness,
Unpurged by epitaph, indulged at last,
Is equally converted into palms,
Squiggling like saxophones. And palm for palm,
Madame, we are where we began. Allow,
Therefore, that in the planetary scene
Your disaffected flagellants, well-stuffed,
Smacking their muzzy bellies in parade,
Proud of such novelties of the sublime,
Such tink and tank and tunk-a-tunk-tunk,
May, merely may, madame, whip from themselves
A jovial hullabaloo among the spheres.
This will make widows wince. But fictive things
Wink as they will. Wink most when widows wince.
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