am here at work finishing up a book of info about the history of new wave, and looking through these pictures is making me excited about the prospect of making music again. tomorrow caleb and get on the road back to the east coast, stopping in ohio for the historic canfield fair, unfortunately too early to see the mangled-mind of Bill Cosby or the truck and tractor pull, both of which will fuel the imaginations of my hometown to, I'm sure, constructive thoughts in these pressing pre-election days.
i've fallen deeply in love with seattle in these two months, although the torment of rain and miserable fast rolling clouds of the last four days have given me some idea of what the 'rest of the year' must be like here. apparently it was named the city where you get the least value for your money, but this does not take into account the vistas, the innumerable parks, well-planned roads and sidewalks, wealth of interesting new architecture and other apparently valueless things that make walking around on the streets here so humane and charming.
that said, the seattle central library should be on every book and design lovers to visit list - we went there yesterday (yes, on my birthday...) and wandered through the flourescent escalators, the downward spiral of books and soft, rubbery plus chairs that make the library every northern europrean aesthete's eyes tear. by that i mean it's totally ikea plus, not very practical i imagine for hard wear, not meant for sitting (?). maybe i'm wrong. c and i bought matching 'i read a book in a koolhaus' t-shirts. Clement Greenberg be damned.
8.25.2004
8.24.2004
borges, huguenots, and me
in addition to the massacre of 70,000 French Protestants in 1572, this day has the honor of being my birthday. i'm closer to 50 than unborn, icck! to celebrate this day, am listening to Alter Bridge, quite possibly the most uninspired open contraction of two bland religious symbols ever to enter the market. later, i am going to drag the beau on the EMP roller coaster and then we'll go to the top of the space needle to look out into the pre-night haze that is seattle on this rainy day. i had key lime cheesecake for breakfast, and got my pretzels stuck in the curly-que end of the vending machine a few hours ago, so all is about even in my mental state. listened to the ballad of john and yoko and toxic this morning to put me in the perfect birthday mood.
8.23.2004
the retrofuture
for a while, that's what i wanted to have as my url. the site there is pretty cool although i could do without the ubiquitous church of bob heads on any type of website ever again. there's just so much kitsch of this nature existing in the world, it's hard to schelp thru it all.
that said, i attended, gave a paper at and was the snack goddess for the Society for Commercial Archeology's Seattle Conference. There was a serious 'I've found my people' vibe to the three-day event, where I could hear thoughts I'd only had buried in my head voiced articulately by those dear to preservation, photography, and idle worship of design and architecture of the American roadside. my paper, naturally, was on the Wildwoods and how demolition is changing the density of neon signage along the roadside, and thus the character of the town. among the many great folks i met were Laura Russell, an amazing photographer dedicated to neon, amusement parks and 'ghost dogs,' or the brick-painted signs that become ghosts over time/wear; Carol Ahlgren of 2020 Omaha, a great preservation group with a dada-esque approach to getting their buildings landmarked (they made mustaches to wear to a hearing for a neon sign boasting a Mexican character named "pepe"), and Richard Gilbert, who along with Leonard Garfield of the Museum of History and Industry, gave a fabu tour of the old rt. 99, including the gun shop where St. Cobain's death wish was purchased. Fun!
that said, i attended, gave a paper at and was the snack goddess for the Society for Commercial Archeology's Seattle Conference. There was a serious 'I've found my people' vibe to the three-day event, where I could hear thoughts I'd only had buried in my head voiced articulately by those dear to preservation, photography, and idle worship of design and architecture of the American roadside. my paper, naturally, was on the Wildwoods and how demolition is changing the density of neon signage along the roadside, and thus the character of the town. among the many great folks i met were Laura Russell, an amazing photographer dedicated to neon, amusement parks and 'ghost dogs,' or the brick-painted signs that become ghosts over time/wear; Carol Ahlgren of 2020 Omaha, a great preservation group with a dada-esque approach to getting their buildings landmarked (they made mustaches to wear to a hearing for a neon sign boasting a Mexican character named "pepe"), and Richard Gilbert, who along with Leonard Garfield of the Museum of History and Industry, gave a fabu tour of the old rt. 99, including the gun shop where St. Cobain's death wish was purchased. Fun!
8.19.2004
a sight to behold
devendra banhart's 'rejoincing in the hands' has become something of a warm blanket for me, and when he says "my flesh sings out, it sings come pour me out' on the song "the body breaks" i always think he's saying 'my flesh sings cole porter songs,' which i wish were the lyrics. would it be that my flesh sung such things. other than irving berlin's "blue skies," i think my favorite standard of the moment isNight and Day. i love the false front of a song like this, 'the beat beat beat of the tom-tom'
8.14.2004
master musicians
today i interviewed dave meinert, who part-owns the Mirabeau Room here in beautiful Seattle. Who cares, you say? Because after the requisite trade pub chit chat we got to talking about how he manages bands, and I had read online that he was the manager of the master musicians of the jajouka, and that he'd been to the small town of Jajouka where they, the royal court musicians of Morocco, lived. When I was there I had wanted desperately to go to Jajouka but couldn't convince my San Fran runaway french-speaking crustie backpack pal to accompany me through the rough times out to the village. Meinart said that the town can't really accomidate tourists, and that the hippie types that end up out there can't support themselves which must make it hard for the prestige-rich and materially poor musicians.
His talk reminded me of the Ted Levin book The Hundred Thousand Fools of God, which charts the problems of being a traditional musician and Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. Should there be schools set up in Morocco to teach this art form, traditionally passed down from father to son by repetition, a music with no prescriptive notation? Should such musicians' futures lie in ethno-tourism? In boho retreat accomidations for the romantically minded American eco-tourist type? well, you know my answer to this, and yet what of it that there are resources that could sustain these musicians, but that these resources are exchanged for an invitation into the private world of another? blah blah commerce and tradition, culture in change...
am listening to Linda Perhacs "Parellograms" which is a throwback to my psych-folk days but sounds like Blue-era Joni Mitchell than I remembered, with the arrangements and the way the voice is recorded - so far up. Am I the only one suspicious of vibrato? Maybe if I notice that it's 'vibrato' rolling off hackneyed then yes...still, as a string player I know that it is a choice, and that choice is towards smooth, warm, nostalgic fermatas.
His talk reminded me of the Ted Levin book The Hundred Thousand Fools of God, which charts the problems of being a traditional musician and Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. Should there be schools set up in Morocco to teach this art form, traditionally passed down from father to son by repetition, a music with no prescriptive notation? Should such musicians' futures lie in ethno-tourism? In boho retreat accomidations for the romantically minded American eco-tourist type? well, you know my answer to this, and yet what of it that there are resources that could sustain these musicians, but that these resources are exchanged for an invitation into the private world of another? blah blah commerce and tradition, culture in change...
am listening to Linda Perhacs "Parellograms" which is a throwback to my psych-folk days but sounds like Blue-era Joni Mitchell than I remembered, with the arrangements and the way the voice is recorded - so far up. Am I the only one suspicious of vibrato? Maybe if I notice that it's 'vibrato' rolling off hackneyed then yes...still, as a string player I know that it is a choice, and that choice is towards smooth, warm, nostalgic fermatas.
8.08.2004
the gay parade
Homo A Go Go didn't levitate, it didn't even get off the ground for me. Standing outside the Capitol Theater, I was amid a closed-off street full of high fashion queers, a sea of turned backs and brushed elbows to get inside, get outside, get by. Joy came from the stage, but not always, as people like Tracy (+ the Plastics) were hellbent on division - seeing her for the second time this year convinces me that her act tires even her and it should cancelled, and when she told a man he was 'taking up too much space with his…man' after he made some dumb audience comment, it was as if the open arms of the whole show quietly folded over in defense. Even the high and positive aggro-punk of Team Dresch seemed anachronistic in those final moments of the week which should have felt like a tired happy ending release instead feeling like thank god! it's over. To me, of course. I am not a dyke or a gay man, not from Olympia, not part of the scene, and so outside of the desired audience, but I felt it and wondered why.
And as always, my questions about dread identity politics rose to the fore. This was not a place for audience generated criticism - such spaces make themselves beyond critique in a way because they are organized not for aesthetics but for politics and networks, which is fine, but difficult when the performers do not share that inclusive community feeling. My friend Kate and I agreed that Olympia seems to exist by the sheer power of its own will, which is burning strong and amazing, but that for an outsider the city does not reveal itself – antithesis of the tourist town, the ugly small town stripmall with something magical underneath (itself the antithesis of the worn out boho loft haven with freak flags, our mid-century vision gone Pottery Barn under our not-so-Day-Glo noses)
My highlight was the SF band Willpower, starring Will from Imperial Teen as the post-toilet George Michael shaking serious vocoder-ass over beats and synths by a spry little guy named Tomo. And backup dancers, one of whom was half Robert Palmer's "Simply Irresistible" and half diner server bitch goddess. Have to go back and listen to Imperial Teen, I think I might have missed something there.
And as always, my questions about dread identity politics rose to the fore. This was not a place for audience generated criticism - such spaces make themselves beyond critique in a way because they are organized not for aesthetics but for politics and networks, which is fine, but difficult when the performers do not share that inclusive community feeling. My friend Kate and I agreed that Olympia seems to exist by the sheer power of its own will, which is burning strong and amazing, but that for an outsider the city does not reveal itself – antithesis of the tourist town, the ugly small town stripmall with something magical underneath (itself the antithesis of the worn out boho loft haven with freak flags, our mid-century vision gone Pottery Barn under our not-so-Day-Glo noses)
My highlight was the SF band Willpower, starring Will from Imperial Teen as the post-toilet George Michael shaking serious vocoder-ass over beats and synths by a spry little guy named Tomo. And backup dancers, one of whom was half Robert Palmer's "Simply Irresistible" and half diner server bitch goddess. Have to go back and listen to Imperial Teen, I think I might have missed something there.
8.06.2004
sick stricken emo afternoon
reverse of matos' recent post, i had the 'radio releases your inner demons' afternoon drive to work. shitty traffic, more than yr average very well dressed homeless sign-touters and the disturbing wash of fear that very soon i will have no where to live and what comes on but everybody hurts, prompting me to not only go further into my funk but feel the weird duel guilt of knowing what i feel has been refected well in someone's art. no, actually, having michael stipe tell me i'm not alone doesn't make me any better, but it does make me feel sort of numb.
the internet is full of music
so today was the day that i really got hooked on rhapsody. i spent four hours with his enormous spreadsheet full of new wave, post punk, early hip hop, AOR, and assorted early '80s genres (tu-tone, rockabilly revival, industrial, early goth, baggy?), which I was trying to create a timeline from, and just kept running into roadblocks. what DOES style council sound like? why does everyone love paul weller, he's such a Who ass kissing louse it seems (and hey, I like the Jam and the mod revival in general) and well, why didn't Daniel Miller do more with the Normal? Not everything was answered, but my spiffy and great subscription to Rhapsody kept the tunes flowing all day ...
(early Simple Minds, not that interesting; Thin Lizzy, god i love them; Killing Joke, why didn't i hear this before?; the Undertones, still can't dig their last record; Nick Lowe, weirdly before his time and overshadowed by Costello who dammit, I just can't dig wholly)
...and you know what? ya, you know this, but it is easy and painless to toss out the album format altogether. the whole concept of association and networking information is vastly different (and yes, partially controlled by jackass administrative/marketing/evil barons) and less constraining than the horrific record shop experience (I wonder what the gender breakdown is of who prefers shopping online/listening online to buying in stores...anyone know?)...
then there's AMG, who ya, dude, FUCKED UP with their redesign, but not just for the heavy interface - who searches under such ideas as 'mood' there are moods like 'at work' which isn't a mood at all, and 'driving at night' which probably doesn't mean that you're using AMG . not only is it presumptious, but it's wrong-headed in its entire anticipation of why people use the site. the network paths are unsystematic and it seems that the back end of it is a mystery (and i write for them no less), making the wise and wonderful dozen or so full-timers strange overlords not only of reference information but emotional flow of music, which seems like a lofty and absurd thing to take upon yrself (or rather, have some dumb marketing execs tell you is 'the way of the future' to quote My Life With the Thrill Kill...). apparently there are endless blog entries about their misstep so i'll stop.
(early Simple Minds, not that interesting; Thin Lizzy, god i love them; Killing Joke, why didn't i hear this before?; the Undertones, still can't dig their last record; Nick Lowe, weirdly before his time and overshadowed by Costello who dammit, I just can't dig wholly)
...and you know what? ya, you know this, but it is easy and painless to toss out the album format altogether. the whole concept of association and networking information is vastly different (and yes, partially controlled by jackass administrative/marketing/evil barons) and less constraining than the horrific record shop experience (I wonder what the gender breakdown is of who prefers shopping online/listening online to buying in stores...anyone know?)...
then there's AMG, who ya, dude, FUCKED UP with their redesign, but not just for the heavy interface - who searches under such ideas as 'mood' there are moods like 'at work' which isn't a mood at all, and 'driving at night' which probably doesn't mean that you're using AMG . not only is it presumptious, but it's wrong-headed in its entire anticipation of why people use the site. the network paths are unsystematic and it seems that the back end of it is a mystery (and i write for them no less), making the wise and wonderful dozen or so full-timers strange overlords not only of reference information but emotional flow of music, which seems like a lofty and absurd thing to take upon yrself (or rather, have some dumb marketing execs tell you is 'the way of the future' to quote My Life With the Thrill Kill...). apparently there are endless blog entries about their misstep so i'll stop.
8.04.2004
8.03.2004
in the audience
okay- i'm back on the front row center tip, so any stragglers who want to write 350 words-ish on their most intense live show (seen or played, or imagined) please do so in the next week and send me yr story....(pinkgerl@yahoo.com)
PORTLAND ROX! it really is a crazy liberal paradise, tho i found the downtown to be somewhat oppressive in its late 60s style attempts at intimate urban architecture. everyone is silly in portland! i saw an entire buscar full of people wearing balloon hats. kate said that this is the sort of low level insanity that invades. coupled with having browsed past a 10:30 devo soundcheck (that Run Hit Wonder thing) after seeing Oregon's own Beavers play ball, it was enough to charm me. there's a whole block of alternative publication stores, including the IPRC, a non-prof zine library and self-publishing resource that has ancient typesetting machines for member use. my undergraduate thesis heaven, and I don't mean that in a bad way.
Also got to see Lucky Dragons and Y.A.C.H.T., and I have to say - Luke is tearing it up these days. The make-out club was out in full effect and they vibed to his just cause they're smarty don't mean the pants aren't dancing style laptop love. Also, I have a platonic crush on Y.A.C.H.T. because he is actually one of the nicest people I've ever met and has a room-infecting smile.
PORTLAND ROX! it really is a crazy liberal paradise, tho i found the downtown to be somewhat oppressive in its late 60s style attempts at intimate urban architecture. everyone is silly in portland! i saw an entire buscar full of people wearing balloon hats. kate said that this is the sort of low level insanity that invades. coupled with having browsed past a 10:30 devo soundcheck (that Run Hit Wonder thing) after seeing Oregon's own Beavers play ball, it was enough to charm me. there's a whole block of alternative publication stores, including the IPRC, a non-prof zine library and self-publishing resource that has ancient typesetting machines for member use. my undergraduate thesis heaven, and I don't mean that in a bad way.
Also got to see Lucky Dragons and Y.A.C.H.T., and I have to say - Luke is tearing it up these days. The make-out club was out in full effect and they vibed to his just cause they're smarty don't mean the pants aren't dancing style laptop love. Also, I have a platonic crush on Y.A.C.H.T. because he is actually one of the nicest people I've ever met and has a room-infecting smile.
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