we love you, get out

it's four in the morning...

ya, fully just got kicked from the after emp party at a&e, baby time. weird and mysterious things have happened here, some good and some bad. too little time, mostly, lots learned. mostly it means i want to go back to provi and read 1) cavicchi's book again 2) love saves the day, because tim is truly one of the most intense, self-posessed humans i have ever been too afraid to talk to, and bc i bet his take on the implications of nyc dance culture in the 70s are well worth the word time, and 3) the woman, who's name escapes me right now, who writes about the sinister implications of 'cute'. right?

the hip hop writers ruled the roost. the dynamic and presentation is different than that of punk and rock writers, one of ownership and complicite knowlege of field - yes, this writing is part of the dialogue.

other highlights - tim quirk's paper on the spiritual implications of pete townsend's windmills, namely, reclaiming the right to be within the moment and to do something, through ritual, that feels automatic and pleases the audience, instead of the usual 'gesture is tradition is rendered meaningless;' karyn brooks' paper (in fact, the whole dixie chicks panel) on how the chicks and liz phair's movement towards mid-career style/political change lost/won audiences and symbolically freed them from genre constraints suchs as, for the chix, conservativism and xtianity, and for liz, the a-word aka indie cred + singer songwriter closeness; daphne brooks' 'critical karaoke' about journey's 'lights in the city' song, in which she strung together the most beautiful set of postcard memories of childhood, curtain gauze dreams of california and car trips to the south with her family, her dad in control of the radio, her dad now missing from her life. ya - it fully made me cry.

re: my panel. greil marcus came in mid-session and sat directly and completely in front of the podium, where i was up last with powerpoint nervous shaking not-really-stumbling but unposessed of my language which i believed but couldn't speak, and here was this icon, this figurehead and really, if you're going to be someone who does social/intellectual history of pop music, who else do you look to? reading and looking up to the twenty something plus sea of do you hate this nine a.m. listeners. it went well, people said they liked it, and those people also reported that other people liked it. i felt that i had narrowed myself enough to really, really understand some small idea of what i was thinking about - the word noise in providence - and that i did it with clarity. what more? what was the outcome, i'm not sure.