Today (or maybe it was yesterday) in exciting musical news, the Alan Lomax archives are being digitized. Music, film, photos and manuscripts will be available online. And that is pretty amazing. There have been CD releases of some of the material. Maybe even a lot of the material. I'm not sure -- it's not like I'm a Lomax scholar or anything. But I know I've played stuff from CDs that said they were Alan Lomax recordings and I even reviewed a couple of Caribbean collections. Anyway, well looking forward to being able to check more of it out. Coming online later this month, according to that link.
Driving home the other night, listening to the radio and they cut to a commercial break. I was about to switch to another station when I hear "this is Mal Sharpe for U.S. Cellular." My first thought was that I recognized the voice. Then I realized what he'd said and realized that, yes, it was Mal Sharpe of Coyle and Sharpe. I was gonna say fame but I'm not sure if they count as famous. But they should be famous. Early 60s street interview prank humorist. I'm cracking myself just thinking about their stuff. Oh look, here's a transcript of Airport Fishing Rod. Brilliancy! So anyway I had no idea that Mal Sharpe was still alive. Sorry to see he's doing radio spots but on the other hand, glad he's getting work. Also, the spot was formatted as a street interview even though I can't imagine anyone much listening to the ad would actually get why. I guess someone at the ad agency is a fan.
"Be the second clerical personality to try this. Please."
There's just too much stupid in it to unpack (we'd be here all fuckin' week) but I am beyond thrilled to hear that Snowflake Snooki has taken to claiming that folks should vote for Newtonian Gingrich because it would annoy lib'ruls. I mean, I just don't even...
Do it!
I've been known to say, when faced with some example of stupid-or-evil from the right, that their problem is that they haven't lost enough yet to have any sense knocked into them. Well, Newt might just be able to take care of that.
Meanwhile, Charlie Pierce goes after David Brooks with the pliers AND the blow torch. It's a thorough trashing and a joy to behold. Well played, sir.
And today's headline of the day is "London Olympics travel plan: be patient, drink beer."
Meanwhile, it was Sarah's birthday over the weekend. Festivities included dinner and drinks with a small party of favorites at Geer Street, home-made Chinese-style spareribs, Daisy Cakes lemon cake, and "the Rat Pack is Back" at the Carolina. Fun times galore. This was actually the fourth time we've seen a Rat Pack tribute show. What can I say? We're music geeks. Here's Sarah's review of a 2009 performance we saw in Raleigh. I think the Carolina was a better space for the show. The audience was closer to the stage and that gave "Joey Bishop" (there was no program for the show but I'm pretty sure he was played by Sandy Hackett) a chance to interact with the audience a lot more than in Raleigh. The band, while smaller, was cooking. This time out, the best performer was "Frank" (altho he took a while to click for me cos he looked nothing like Sinatra but he really had the voice and, especially, the phrasing nailed). Once again, they take pains to set up the show as in the spirit of the early 60s and then include later material like "My Way" and "New York, New York." Which, once again, is only gonna bother geeks like me. The one thing I didn't like this time was this out-of-left-field musical number where "Frank" is in silhouette at the piano and a woman comes out and belts out some song I've never heard before. People seemed to like it, unless they were just applauding because a song just ended and that's when you're supposed to applaud. I thought it was like someone auditioning for "American Idol" singing a third-rate Andrew Lloyd Weber knockoff. Protip: if you're doing a Rat Pack tribute show, five minutes spent w/ no members of the Rat Pack performing is 5 minutes wasted. On the other hand, they did "In the Wee Small Hours" which I've never seen at one of these shows. And they did "Sam's Song," which I haven't seen since the very first show like this we saw, back in 2001 at the now-closed Sahara.
Finally, here's an important message from Kermit the Frog and Miss Piggy:
Following up on my last post about that Cure show (from back in the early Pleistocene), here's thesetlist. Before looking at that, I'd have been able to tell you a few songs that I remember them doing that night. Looking at it now, a bunch more come back to mind. But there's still a couple that I look at and have no memory of at all. Oh well, I'm sure those brain cells are being used for something more important, like where I put my keys last night when I got home.
Sunday seems like a good day for some random linkage so please enjoy these LIFE Magazine photos of Des Moines teenagers in 1947. And this spiffy shot of Godzilla.
Have spent the evening avoiding most of my usual blog-reading since I really feel like I need a break from the clown maglev. The stupid, it burns. So I've been whiling away the last few hours (aka, wasting) surfing concert videos on youtube. I'm doing one of those "song challenge" meme things on fbook and I'm on the day where I'm supposed to pick a song from the best concert I ever saw. Of course, I can't pick one "best concert." Hell, I try to do a top 10 list of music and end up with 3 CDs. I'm up to 4 so far but there's about a half-dozen other great shows I'll probably include. Assuming I can find decent live footage on youtube. A couple of (theoretically) interesting things have come up while messing around with this.
For one, I've found three clips so far from shows that I was at. Big Black at CBGB in 1986, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan in Central Park in 1993, and Hot Club of Cowtown at Casbah here in Durham last year. I'm actually surprised I haven't found more footage of recent shows. Phones keep getting smaller and the picture quality they can capture keeps getting better and better. I guess I understand why performers and venue issue no recording policies and statements but I kinda wonder why they bother. I went looking to see if there was any footage from this Cure show I saw back in 1984 at the Beacon. There wasn't but there are 20+ pages of videos from Cure shows at the Beacon in November 2011.
So that's another thing I learned -- that the Cure did a (not quite a) farewell tour last year which included three nights at the Beacon in NYC, playing their first three albums in their entirety. Wow. If you'd told me back when I was waiting on line to buy Cure tix in '84 that they'd be playing the same theater 27 years later, I'm sure I wouldn't have believed it. In a way, I'm kinda glad I never heard anything about those shows. Cos they were over Thanksgiving weekend so it is actually imaginable that we could've gotten up there for one of them. On the other hand, tix were anywhere from 60$ to 100$.
And thinking about that Cure show and "best concerts" in general got me to wondering about how many of what I think of as "best" shows were also the first time I'd seen the band. I used to think that was always true, that the first time was always the best. But I've modified that over time. Some bands just get better. Either the material is better or the players or they just do better in a different space (maybe bigger, maybe smaller). The first Cure show I saw was amazing and new and it knocked me on my ass but if I had to pick the best Cure show I saw it'd probably be Radio City. Maybe MSG but the sound there wasn't nearly as good as at the Music Hall. For me, the 80s versions of the Cure got better as they got into bigger and bigger halls. Unlike, say, Psychedelic Furs who were never better than the first time I saw them (in DC on the Forever Now tour). As they got bigger, they got slicker and lost most of their edge and sense of danger. Some bands are just better in an intimate setting. Like Hot Club of Cowtown. Altho I can't decide whether the house concert we saw them do back about 10 years ago was better than their gig at Casbah. The house concert was amazing but I do think they picked up energy from the crowd and especially the dancers at Casbah.
Well, I'm not sure what my point was anymore. So, goodnight.
I really need to get out more or something. It's not even February yet and already I'm writing about almost nothing but politics. But how can one resist? I mean, we're well past clown car time. It's like a clown shinkansen over in GOP land these days. It's so crazy that the news that Herman Cain, who has dropped out of the race but was still on the ballot in SC (and in fact had been off the campaign trail the longest), got more votes in the primary than the other five no-longer-campaigning candidates combined (something like 1.2%)... that barely makes the top 10 in crazy-ass-shit that's going on. My personal fave from today is that the Newtron Bomb has announced that not letting audiences whoop and holler for his crazy bullshit is a violation of their (or his... who can tell?) first amendment rights. WTF? Seriously, for a bunch of self-declared Constitution fetishists I swear it's like they've never even read about the damn thing, let alone actually read the document itself. But, anyway, Gingrich says that he won't participate in any future debates in which the audience is not allowed to applaud, chant, or otherwise rowdy up the joint. To which I can only say, do it! I really really want to see some media organization call his (ridiculously obvious) bluff. The idea that Gingrich would pass up a chance to stand in front of cameras and bloviate is beyond absurd. They could hold the damn thing in a bathysphere at the bottom of the Marianas Trench and he'd be there. Alas, I know that won't happen. CNN or whoever's running the damn thing will cave. Because they're spineless. It's long been obvious that Our Professional Media(tm) lack the intestinal fortitude of a dyspeptic tree sloth.
Still, if you don't have a dream how you gonna have a dream come true?
I suppose I could rant about Newt Gingrich but smarter people than me all over the internets have already said pretty much everything I've thought of ranting. So instead, some random thoughts and questions. It's hard for me to believe Gingrich will actually end up being the nominee. With such high unfavorables, low favorables and almost no one not having an opinion about him already, just how is that supposed to work out? I've heard people saying that the GOP powers-that-be (whoever they are... speaking of things that are hard to believe, are there actually any adults left in the room at GOP-land?) will figure out a way to keep Gingrich from getting the nomination. And the response to that seems to fall into two parts: first, who are these people (see earlier question about adults in metaphorical room)? and second, we've already seen all the dirt and no one cared. I don't know the answer to the first question, exactly. Basically, though, go turn on Fox and see who's talking shit about Newt. So far I've seen everyone from Rudy Guiliani to Tom Coburn to John (swear to Grom I thought he was dead) Sununu. But as for part two. I can only say "haha." I have no idea what else might be out there. The ethics report from his Speaker days is public record. But no one has really started picking thru it for the juicy bits. And there's no telling what kinds of things never made it to the public record. As an opening salvo though, here's Chris "dammit, I'm not running for President" Cnristie
"We all know the record," Christie said. "He was run out of the speakership by his own party. He was fined $300,000 for ethics violations. This is a guy who has had a very difficult political career at times and has been an embarrassment to the party ... I don't need to regale the country with that entire list again except to say this: I'm not saying he will do it again in the future, but sometimes past is prologue"
I'm conflicted. The longer Gingrich stays in, the worse things get for the GOP. And the weaker the GOP brand is, the better the chances that President Obama gets re-elected. So long-term positive. But in the short-term I think it's really bad for the country to have Gingrich fanning the flames and stirring up people in such baldly racist ways. So I wanna get the popcorn out but I feel bad about wanting that.
From the dept. of things you might (or might not) want going down yr neck:
I'm not (y'all might have noticed) not from Texas and so hadn't ever heard of it but apparently there was a small Dr. Pepper plant there that was still bottling Dr. Pepper made with sugar. It was known as Dublin Dr. Pepper (cos it was made in Dublin, TX). And now it's closing. I think it's mostly a story of big company bringing the hammer down with no concern for the amount of harm done to a small community where a whole bunch of jobs are about to disappear. Altho from reading a bit online, it seems like there's maybe a side-bar story of a bit of over-reach -- maybe not much in the grand scheme and completely understandable (if you've got something that becomes a hot commodity/trendy product, you want to seize the chance to move more units, even if there's an agreement in place restricting where you can sell and you have to get a little grey market) but enough to give the big money boys an excuse to drop the aforementioned hammer.
So I've been hearing these really obnoxious ads on the radio for Dr. Pepper 10 (and when I say "hearing" I mean the first few seconds before I change the station). And I've read a lot of internet scorn about the DP10 campaign, which is basically a loud, dumb "ooh, our diet soda isn't for the ladies but only for manly men like you." Srsly? I mean, do I even have to get into the myriad ways that's offensive and stupid? No, I didn't think so. And, besides, if I did, I'd be here all night writing. Anyway, apparently there are also TV ads cos one aired when we were watching 30 Rock on-demand (and thus no fast-forwarding). I was out of the room but Sarah confirmed that it is, in fact, incredibly stupid and offensive. So it's not just me, then. And, no, I'm not linking to that crap.
Let's wrap up on a much more positive note: earlier this week I went to Drinks with Fullsteam. Sadly, they were brewing in the back so we couldn't meet in the production area, which was the original plan. Still, it was super fun and interesting. Small group (15 or so folks, I think) and the guys from Fullsteam were there to talk about what they were doing and answer questions. I'm sure nothing they told us was confidential but I didn't take notes so I won't go into specifics cos I don't want to get anything wrong. But they talked about stuff like how they decide what kind of R&D projects to work on, how they scale up from test batches, what kind of things they're working on, the 300 mile project, issues with sourcing ingredients. One interesting thing discussed was how they can brew something exactly the same from one run to the next and yet have people say it tastes completely different, often in ways that contradict each other (oh, it was darker last year... no, it's darker this year). Not that I'd know anything about that...
First the serious stuff: internet blackout tomorrow to protest SOPA. Let's see if I'm able to figure out how to get House of Dioxin to go dark for the day. I'd say it's even money that I can't. I would also note that (no surprise), claims by congressional clown car commander Eric "respect my authoriteh" Cantor to the contrary, whichever GOP dumbass is pushing SOPA is planning to continue trying to move the bill forward. Like I've said before, these clowns were elected because they don't take government seriously. So why should we expect them to listen to their so-called leaders? They don't know what they're talking about. And seem to think there's something wrong with you if you DO know what you're talking about. Blinkered pig-ignorance. It's not a bug, it's a feature. Gingrich 2012!
Enough of that.
Here's a bit o' fun: alternate reality movie posters. I am legitimately in awe. I think my favorite is Fritz Lang's Inception.
This week's Sunday NYTimes Magazine cover story was about Stephen Colbert. Good stuff and worth checking out. Note: I'm not actually sure that link will work, what with the NYTimes being pay-walled, but it might and if it doesn't, maybe y'all can use some google-fu to snazz yr way in there somehow.
But even tho the story is overall pretty glowing, there's this one weird section towards the middle where the author mentions Colbert's gig at the White House Correspondent's Dinner back in 2006. The author correctly, I think, notes that it was one of the early defining moments for Colbert, that the video was a viral sensation and that there were pro-Colbert websites up and running by the next day. He also quotes not just one of Colbert's best lines but what's got to be one of the gutsiest things ever said by someone standing mere feet from a POTUS:
"I stand by this man because he stands for things. Not only for things. He stands on things. Things like aircraft carriers and rubble and recently flooded city squares."
Fucking brilliant. But around that in those three 'graphs he's saying things like "awkward" and "lame" and "it wasn't, in truth, [his] funniest hour." There's just a pinched, churlish tone to that passage that's at odds with the overall tone of the article. So much so that I wondered if the writer (Charles McGrath) had been part of the DC press corps at the time. But from what I can figure out, he's an arts guy and was probably working on the NYTimes Book Review. Could be that he's spent so much time in journalism and/or at NYTimes that he's internalized the "Village" over-seriousness about what they do and didn't like Colbert poking badgers with spoons. Or maybe it's an age thing. Again from what I could figure out online, McGrath seems to be in his mid-60s now so maybe he's one of those people who think you have to respect the office of POTUS even if you don't like the current occupant. My mom used to say stuff like that to me back in the 80s when I'd get a bit over-zealous with my Reagan bashing. I think I mostly managed to keep any observations about logical consistency to myself later when she'd start in on Bill Clinton. But I digress. McGrath might be one of those types. I'd say he might just be a humorless churl with a stick up his butt except he generally seems to "get" Colbert and enjoy and appreciate what he does for most of the article. So I don't know why he's still bugged by something that happened almost six years ago and which, to me, seems right in line with the rest of the Colbert oeuvre.
Could it be perhaps that his shoes are too tight?
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