Live in El Centro

Where Have I Been?

Well, as I scan "Live in El Centro," I realize it's been four months since I've posted anything. I suppose the pressures of an increased workload have caught up to me and I've been unable to do much more than read other people's blogs, rather than contributing to my own. But it's summer now, I've just returned from a vacation to the United Kingdom, I'm rested and, although still working this summer, am nevertheless free to do a little more writing.

First up: my trip to the UK. It was great, but rather than boring you with the details, why don't you just check out the photo album I've created. Enjoy!

More coming soon...including my thoughts on English pub cuisine.

Anxiety of Proximity

You can go to iTunes right now and download the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra's performance of Arvo P�rt's "Tabula Rasa" and Louis Andriessen's "Racconto Dall'Inferno" and "de Staat." It's a live recording from their Minimalist Jukebox series, a real landmark series of performances featuring works by all the major minimalist artists of the past four decades (including Steve Reich, Philip Glass, John Adams, and even The Orb). What's great about this recording is the fact that it came out less than a week after the performance (the concert was on Saturday, March 25, and the recording was on iTunes Wednesday, March 29). This is what the Internet can do for music--instant recordings, immediate feedback, and access to great performances wherever you might live. And trust me when I say that there were a lot of jealous people out there--people who didn't live in Southern California and, hence, couldn't make it to these concerts.

Now, I bring all this up in part to advertise this great concert series and the recording. Really, though I'm just bragging: my wife and I attended this concert. I don't normally attend Philharmonic performances, but "Tabula Rasa" is one of my favorite modern compositions--ethereal, pristine, delicate, and totally overwhelming. I listen to it all the time, and when I heard that the Minimalist Jukebox series would feature this work, I jumped at the chance to go. I found the experience to be very interesting and very rewarding. The Walt Disney Music Hall (despite the name) is an incredible building, beautifully designed (by Gehry) and perfectly condusive to music. I find most classical music-goers to be pretentious assholes (like the hybrid car people South Park parodied this week and about half of the people I knew in grad school), but I ignored them and focused on the music. I knew the concert was being recorded--they mentioned it in the beginning and there were signs posted all over the place to remind people to shut up and not make noise during the concert--and I was excited by the prospect of being able to hear the concert live and then listen to it at home.

And that's the rub. The concert itself was great--phenomenal performances for both the P�rt and the Andriessen (an artist I'm not too familiar with but was impressed by, especially his ability to translate literary works like Dante's Inferno and Plato's Republic into music). However, as I listen to the concert live, I keep hearing people coughing and even wheezing (there was someone wheezing--I don't know who but it happened). I figured the recording wouldn't pick up on that stuff, but it does--especially on "Tabula Rasa," which is as much about silence as it is about music. On the recording, I can hear every single cough and burp and other noise that I remembered hearing (and being pissed off about) at the concert (despite the signs). Now, I can't listen to the recording without focusing on those noises.

Now, my inner John Cage tells me that this coughing and wheezing in a concert hall is part of the music--it's all music, and a performance with those other noises is far richer and more rewarding than a performance without that additional sound. I actually believe that, to an extent. If I hadn't been at the concert, I probably wouldn't even notice those other sounds; I'd just attribute them to the recording space. If someone brought them up, I'd say something like, "Hey, that's a moment in time captured for all eternity. Awesome." Actually, if I did say that, I'd be one of those pretentious assholes, and I know myself well enough to know that I wouldn't say that (it would be too self-conscous of me), but I'm sure I'd come up with some slightly less assholish comment about how great the music is.

But the problem is that I was there and I did hear the sounds and when I listen to the recording, I can't help but hear those sounds (both my memory of the sounds and their repetition via the recording) over and above the music. There's the music and there's the noise--and they are separated in my ears and in my mind.

I guess this is how musicians must feel when listening to their own recordings--especially the live recordings. They must hear every tiny imperfection, every place where the sound isn't quite right, every moment where, in their mind, the music was supposed to sound one way but it came out in a different way. No wonder so many artists have entire storerooms full of unreleased material; it's stuff that other people would probably LOVE but that they themselves can't imaging releasing because of its tiny imperfections.

In some ways, I think that's how I feel about the concert recording. I didn't perform, but I was in the audience, and as a microphone merely picks up sound, everyone and everything that made sound in that studio space (the concert hall) performed on that recording. I tried to "perform" as little as possible (kept still, didn't even move my hands to scratch my nose), but I'm sure some vague fluttering of my breath filtered into those microphones at one point in the recording, and if we could examine the recording down to the nano, you'd be able to decipher my breath from everyone else's.

So it's partly my fault--and I apologize. I'll do better next time. But, still, ignore my rants and get the recording--it's fantastic music. Heck, despite what I just said, I am still listening to this recording every day (as I said, I love my P�rt). I'm working to John Nash my way out of obsessing over the coughs (they're there, but I choose to ignore them).

Yep, I'm well on my way to dementia. It should be fun!

Big Central Asia Music News

Big, BIG news from the Central Asian music front, courtesy of Rock Paper Scissors: a concert series in the USA and (drum roll) the first three volumes of a new 10-volume series on Central Asian music coming out on Smithsonian-Folkways. I'm digging around the net to learn more about this new series, and I'll post more information once I find it. Until then, here are the first two paragraphs from the Rock Paper Scissors article announcing both of these things:

The March 2006 USA tour of Music and Voices of Central Asia
features an epic reciter who channels the voice of a warrior in a thousand-year-old Kyrgyz poem thirty times longer than the Iliad (often recited from memory for eight hours or more); a komuz virtuoso whose instrumental acrobatics make Jimi Hendrix look like a lightweight; an ensemble that has resurrected the Sufi-inspired court music of Samarkand and Bukhara; and the most celebrated Afghan rub�b player of his generation, who fled his country after the Soviet invasion, developed a new musical style while living in exile in Peshawar, Pakistan, and now makes his home in Fremont, California.
The tour—presented and curated by the Aga Khan Music Initiative in Central Asia—features three groups of performers: Tengir-Too, from Kyrgyzstan, The Academy of Shashmaq�m, from Tajikistan, and Homayun Sakhi and Taryalai Hashimi, from Afghanistan (via California). All of these performers are featured on Music of Central Asia, volumes 1-3, to be released by Smithsonian Folkways in March 2006. The innovative series, which will eventually comprise 10 volumes, includes a DVD as a part of each release with a documentary film on the featured musicians as well as interactive instrument glossaries and maps.

Read the entire press release at Rock Paper Scissors

RT: The Life and Music of Richard Thompson

Richard Thompson is one of the great musicians and songwriters of the last 40 years. He's not nearly as well-known and as popular as many of his contemporaries (who include everyone from Eric Clapton and Neil Young to Beck and Jack White--yes, he has longevity on his side), but his influence on other musicians and on contemporary folk and rock music is immeasurable. He may not be a big mainstream hit, but every musician and critic worth his or her weight owns at least a half-dozen RT works and relishes a chance to see RT perform live (a great experience, by the way--highly recommended). He's an incredible songwriter, able to craft characters and phrases almost effortlessly; he's also one of the best guitarist you're likely to hear, with a keen ear for adapting his guitar prowess to the tone and theme of each song he performs. While much has been made of his dark, often morbid lyrics and his penchant for dwelling on the bitterness of love and loss, his music is equally about hope and survival and the very real balance that we must all negotiate between good times and bad. His oeuvre is indeed a rich, complex tapestry of emotions, characters, stories, and passions.

Back in 1993, the 3-CD retrospective Watching the Dark was released. It was a wonderful release, filled both with Thompson's major works (many in alternate or live form) and tons of unreleased or rare recordings. It told RT's story with all its complexity--his early years with Fairport Convention, the seminal British folk rock act (where he wrote some of his greatest songs, like "Genesis Hall," "Tale in Hard Time," and "Now Be Thankful"); his collaboration with then-wife Linda Thompson (including Shoot Out the Lights, one of the great albums of all time); his major-label works from the 80s and 90s (which feature some of his greatest songs, like "1952 Vincent Black Lightning," "Hand of Kindness," "I Feel So Good," and "I Misunderstood"); and it showcased RT's storytelling ability ("Al Bowlly's in Heaven"), his love songs ("Valerie"), and his awesome live performances (highlights are "Can't Win" and "The Calvary Cross"). And I haven't even mentioned the great essay by Greil Marcus in the liner notes, where he crystallizes RT's music and legacy in a way no one else ever has! In sum, Watching the Dark is a great set--and I recommend that you get it (in case you don't have it yet).

But guess what? It's nothing compared to RT: The Life and Music of Richard Thompson, a mammoth 5-CD boxed set just released on Free Reed Records. While initiates to Thompson might be advised to get Watching first, the rest of us--those of you out there who didn't need me to explain RT's impact and influence on music because you already knew it--will be listening to and studying and celebrating RT for years to come with the same ferocity and intensity that Joyceans (like myself) study and celebrate and dissect Ulysses (or, if you want a more popular analogy, the way Trekkies study every scene in every Star Trek episode/film ever made).

This collection has just about anything you can imagine: five disks of unreleased tracks, alternate takes, covers, or live performances of RT's greatest works, grouped thematically (more on this later); a mammoth, 150-plus page booklet that includes a complete biography, an interview with Thompson, and track-by-track annotations; a postcard to send in for a free bonus disk of RT music; and an extra-liner note booklet about the 1952 Vincent Black Lightning motorcycle. There are few boxed sets that are so thorough with their subjects, and the care and planning that went into this set are evident in every little detail.

Disk one in the set is entitled "Walking the Long Miles Home--Muswell Hill to L.A." It's meant to be a sort-of musical biography of Thompson's life. Really, though, the title is deceptive, as the focus for most of these songs is not on Thompson himself but rather on Thompson's perspective of the world around him ("The world according to Thompson," as the liner notes explain). Among the many wry observations found on this disk are some of Thompson's greatest songs, like "Genesis Hall" (about a conflict between squatters and policemen, one of whom was Thompson's father), "Shoot Out the Lights" (written specifically about the Russian invasion of Afghanistan, but so universal in its treatment of pain and death that it has been interpreted in numerous ways), and "Walking on a Wire" (a heart-wrenching song about the pain of separation, written while Thompson himself was going through a divorce with his wife and musical partner, Linda Thompson). Thompson's lyrics are (as I said before) often tinged with bitterness, and a lot of this bitterness is on display here; he's also very funny, however, as indicated by songs like "Madonna's Wedding," which is a tongue-in-cheek dig at Madonna's marriage to Guy Ritchie and her attempts to become English. In short, the first disk presents a pretty interesting look into Thompson's worldview, a view that is far more complex and interesting than casual listeners are likely to realize.

Disk two is entitled "Finding Better Words--The Essential Richard Thompson." This list was actually compiled by RT fans and colleagues, who were asked to list three songs they would use to introduce a novice fan to Thompson's music. [Personally, my choices would be "1952 Vincent Black Lightning," "Just the Motion," and "Can't Win."] What's interesting about this list is the fact that there are songs from every single part of the artist's career--from his 1960s work with Fairport Convention ("Meet on the Ledge") to his 2003 release, The Old Kit Bag ("Gethsemane"). In fact, unlike a lot of artists who emerged in the 60s, much of Thompson's greatest music has been released in the last 10-15 years, including nearly half of the songs on this disk. To me, that's what makes Thompson such an incredible artist--his music continues to improve. Every song on here is presented in an alternate form from the studio release (a mixture of live, demo, and alternate takes). In some cases, these alternate versions are superior to the original ("I Feel So Good" and "Wall of Death," for example); in other cases, I prefer the original (or an alternate live take from a different disk, as in the case of "Tear Stained Letter," which features RT whistling a few lines and rather annoying audience participation). Another thing to watch out for is sound quality--some of these recordings are a few decades old, meaning that there's background tape hiss and occasional distortion. These problems don't really detract from the overall experience of the album, however, as the music's greatness overcomes the "fuzzy" sounds. And, for the record, the top 5 Thompson songs are: "1952 Vincent Black Lightning," "From Galway to Graceland," "Crazy Man Michael," "Dimming of the Day," and "Beeswing." For those of you counting, three of those songs were created and released in the 1990s, including #1.

Disk three is entitled "Shine in the Dark: Epic Live Workouts." This is a collection of live recordings of popular Thompson songs that, when played live, often outstrip their studio counterparts in length, passion, intensity, and sheer musicality. A song like "Calvary Cross" is a perfect example. It first appears on 1972's I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight as a tentative, delicate song rampant with what seemed like too-overt symbolism. In concert, however, this song is transformed into a battle between light and darkness, Thompson's guitar navigating a way through the chaos. The song often stretches to 10 or 12 minutes in length, a real journey and a great experience if you happen to see him perform it live. There's a great version of "Calvary Cross" on Watching the Dark, and there's another one on this disk. I'm not sure which one is better, but they both offer very distinct interpretations of the song. The one here features a much larger backing band, complete with an unusual organ melody that is pretty unusual for Thompson's music. In fact, what makes all eleven tracks on this disk memorable is the fact that they are all major or minor reworkings of the original works. Some reworkings are more dramatic than others (like "For Shame of Doing Wrong," which has an awesome guitar riff towards the end that is nowhere near anything I've heard from RT on this or any other song--it might be my favorite track in this entire collection), while others are simply extensions of the basic song. All are fascinating, though, and reveal a lot about Thompson as an improvizational artist of the highest order. What's more, the sound quality here is almost uniformly excellent.

Disk four is called "The Songs Pour Down Like Sugar--The Covers & Sessions." This is probably the most unusual disk in the set, as Thompson has an amazingly eclectic taste in covers, which are represented here by such diverse songs as The Who's "Substitute," "Danny Boy," Squeeze's "Tempted," "You'll Never Walk Alone," Buddy Holly's "Not Fade Away," the French punk song "CA Plane Pour Moi," and (of all things) Britney Spears' "Oops, I Did It Again." The last two were actually performed as part of Thompson's "1,000 Years of Pop Music" concert series, which included everything from Medieval dance songs to Italian troubadour songs to 20th century pop. Every one of the works here demonstrate what an amazing artist Thompson is, managing to make even Britney Spears sound interesting when the material is placed in the right hands. More than this, however: the covers reveal Thompson as an artist able to root himself in just about any tradition, genre, or musical culture that he wants--and perform spectacularly in each. Along with the many great covers, there are a few Thompson originals performed by other artists and featuring RT as a backup (or session) musician. Among these, the standouts are "The Angels Took My Racehorse Away" by Dave Burland and "Poseidon" by Judith Owen (which is basically a duet with RT). This isn't my favorite of the five disks, but it does a great job of presenting a side of Thompson's career that is almost wholly undocumented.

Finally, disk five is called "Something Here Worth More than Gold--Real Rarities." This is the real treasure for die-hard Thompson fans, as it collects fifteen brand new, unreleased songs from the artist's vast collection of unreleased work. The songs range from a 1971 demo of "Albion Sunrise," a work originally written for The Albion Band (which featured many of RT's friends from Fairport Convention); to "How Many Times Do You Have to Fall," a song recorded by Fairport in 1985 but originally recorded (but not released) by Thompson in 1980; to his fun (and historically accurate) tribute to the great Scottish-American inventor, "Alexander Graham Bell"; all the way to 2004's brilliant throwaway "Dear Janet Jackson," a song about...well, here's the chorus: "if you must shove your titty in somebody's face / then shove it in a baby's." There's some really amazing music on this disk (especially that last song--really!), stuff that is equal to anything that is on the other four.

In all, this is a monumental release, certain to broaden Thompson's musical legacy--and, considering that Thompson has never gotten his due (Aerosmith is in the rock & roll hall of fame but not RT?!), anything that will broaden his appeal is a good thing. But the real question is: should you buy it? Well, that depends upon who you are. If this article is your introduction to Richard Thompson, then hold off on getting this until you buy Shoot Out the Lights and Rumor and Sigh. If you have those works and are eager for more but you're wary of the "alternate take" or "live" label, then you might consider getting Watching the Dark, if only because it features a lot more album tracks and fewer demos and live thing (even if the demos and live work is actually superior to the album stuff). However, if you want to hear Thompson at his best, most complete, then RT is the choice for you. Every great Thompson song is here, along with tons of undiscovered gems that reveal this artist as far more interesting and complex and nuanced than most people (even critics and fans) realize. This is, in other words, a career retrospective that actually reveals Richard Thompson as a musician who has had about seven or eight different types of careers--each of them wildly successful. If the point of a boxed set is to provide a broad context for an artist's importance, then RT: The Life and Music of Richard Thompson is about as successful as a boxed set can possibly be.

Well

The super bowl is over and the Seahawks lost. I can live with that--I just wanted them to make it; winning it would have been great, but it's not the end of the world or anything.

The Hawks had their chances and blew them, but there were some pretty idiotic ref calls, too.

So now it's off to baseball--go Angels!

Ask a Republican

Over the years, Patton Oswalt has done a fine job helping me to waste time at work. Here"s an example:

Patton Oswalt | Let's Avoid Life!

Random Thoughts

Once again, I just have to say it: The White Stripes are incredible. Why even bother listening to anyone else? I've been listening to "Take Take Take" all day long, and it doesn't get any better--even compelling me to find photos of Rita Hayworth (and, after checking out her bio on IMDB, realizing I can't name a single film of hers that I've seen. I'll have to rectify that).
As my "Bittersweet Triumph" post makes abundantly clear, I'm a big Seattle Seahawks fan. Their first Super Bowl is only days away, and it's in Detroit--a fact that has been ridiculed to no end by the media. I agree about holding a big event in a cold weather city like Detroit isn't the smartest idea in the world, but I want to stand up for Detroit as a city for a second. I've only been there once, and that was only for a few days, but I actually liked both Detroit and the surrounding areas. It's a huge city, sprawling all over the place, and like every city it has its good areas and bad areas. Frankly, however, the good areas are stellar, and it's close to lots of interesting sites (Chicago's a few hours away, Canada is a bridge away, the great outdoors of upper Michigan is just out of town, great university towns like Ann Arbor less than an hour away, and places like Greenfield Village and Frankenmuth are just a hell of a lot of fun). So what if their sports teams (aside from the Red Wings) suck? It's a great city with a fascinating history. If only it was a little warmer in February for the game, huh?
So far in 2006, I've been to the doctor for a broken wrist and a dentist for a broken tooth--and it's only February 1. What's next--amputation?
Well, it's been one year exactly since my dad died. Please check out the web page I created to honor his memory.
Well, I didn't mean to end this on such a down note. I've never been one for wallowing in nostalgia (or even nostalghia--joke for you Tarkovsky fans out there), and my dad was a huge fan of The Simpsons, so here's a great quote just for him:

Homer: From now on, there are three ways to do things: the right way, the wrong way, and the Max Power way.
Bart: Isn't that just the wrong way?
Homer: Yeah, but faster!

SIQ--Yuck!

I haven't posted any SIQ updates in quite a while, largely because it hasn't been necessary. But today? Yikes--burning rubber and manure. I'll give it an 81, Dick. Where's my gas mask?

Bittersweet Triumph: Seahawks in the Super Bowl

I grew up in Southern California, near the desert. It was hot and dry and brown in my home town. I hated it. I liked cold and wet and green. My dream home was Seattle. I loved visiting the city as a kid, and I wanted my parents to move us there. Well, that didn't happen, so I did the next best thing and became a Seattle Seahawks fan.

Now, this was 1976, the Hawks' expansion year. I was eight years old. I had just been introduced to sports by my dad. He had played football in high school, and he was thrilled that I wanted to watch sports with him (no one else in the family ever would). So when I became a Seahawks fan, he became a Seahawks fan, too. This was a pretty miserable team that first year; they won only twice (once to the other expansion team Tampa Bay and once to Atlanta). But they had two future stars on that team--quarterback Jim Zorn and wide receiver (and future hall of famer) Steve Largent. Over the next decade, these two and the other members of the Seahawks would have plenty of downs but also a lot of ups. They had a winning record in only their third season, going 9-7. That season was special for me because I got to see a Seahawks game in person when the team played in San Diego. My dad and I drove down there and had a great time. I even got to insult the drunken Charger fans sitting right behind us (with their gigantic tubs of beer). Seattle lost that game and didn't make the playoffs, but it was a special memory all the same. It's the only pro football game I've ever attended, actually.

The Seahawks would make the playoffs in the early 80s, when I was in high school. I remember the 1983 season well, when the Seahawks made it all the way to the AFC championship game. I was so excited and nervous before that game that I could hardly sleep. The game was in Los Angeles, and I remember that it was special because the game was a sellout, meaning I'd be able to watch it on local TV (most Raider games were not sellouts, so no local TV coverage). However, the Seahawks and then-quarterback David Krieg (along with rookie of the year Curt Warner) were overmatched and lost big, 30-14. I was so depressed after that game that I actually got sick and stayed home from school for a week.

Still, big things were expected of the Seahawks in 1984, and those big things were almost dashed in the first game of the season when Curt Warner suffered a season-ending injury. The team would recover, post a 12-4 record, and make the playoffs for the second-straight season. But then they would lose to Miami in the second round of the playoffs.

I didn't know it then, but that was as good as it would get for Seahawk fans for the next 20 years. Sure, there were some good moments now and again--even a few division titles. But there were no playoff victories and no standout seasons (just lots of 7-9 and 9-7 seasons, with an occasional 2-14 disasters thrown into the mix). Plus, there were the gutbusters--moments when the team would somehow manage to take an easy victory and turn it into an embarassing and humiliating defeat (against Green Bay in the playoffs a few years back, against St. Louis on three occasions last year). I continued to cheer for the team, but as losing season followed losing season, it became more and more difficult to find any hope. Even Mike Holmgren's talents and gravitas couldn't push the team out of the doldrums in the late 90s and early 2000s.

Through it all, however, I stuck with the Seahawks. In part, this was because I'm a loyal person who abhors bandwagoners. If I'm going to root for a team, I'm going to root for them and no one else. But the real reason was for my dad. Football was his sport and it always had been. As I grew up, I gravitated towards other sports, like basketball and later baseball and soccer. However, I never stopped caring about the Seahawks or following football becaue it was the one thing that my dad and I could really discuss with frankness and openness (well, that and The Simpsons). I probably stuck with the Seahawks for my dad as much as for myself--which is odd since he only started cheering for the team because I cheered for them. I guess I never wanted to let him down, to dismiss the team and (by extension) dismiss his love and committment to me. See, cheering for the Seahawks and talking to me about the Seahawks was his way of telling me how much he loved me, how much seeing me happy meant to him.

I remember in 2002, moments after the Angels (my baseball team) won the World Series for the first time ever, my dad called me. The first words out of his mouth (or almost the first words) were, "Now we just have to get the Seahawks to the Super Bowl." I thought of those words tonight, watching the Seahawks beat the Carolina Panthers to reach their first Super Bowl. It's been 30 years since my dad and I started rooting for this team.

Sadly, my dad could only make it through 29 of those years. He died last February, just missing out on the greatest season in Seahawks history, the one that has wiped away 30 years of frustration and mediocrity. When I called my mom and told her that the Seahawks were going to the Super Bowl, she paused, then said, "Oh, your father would have loved that." Yes, he would have. But he would have really loved to watch me, with my arms in the air as the seconds tick down to zero, waiting for the moment when the game would end and the dream would become a reality. He would have loved the game, especially the way the Seattle defense just dominated an overmatched and overhyped Panthers offense, but I know he would have loved talking about the game with me even more.

So, here's to you, Dad. I wish you were here, but I'll do my best to cheer for both of us on February 5.

New year's resolutions

Lose weight
Create more songs and post them on this site for all to enjoy
Read all the books I got for Xmas
Fine tune this site somehow
Go to Europe with my mom and in-laws and live to tell about it!

Happy 2006!

SIQ Update

49

Pretty stinky today--garbage mixed with sulphur. Luckily, we couldn't smell it from our house--it was more potent a few miles away, near the shopping centers. Perhaps the stench was the smell of a thousand WalMart shoppers gobbling up an endless supply of crap.

2005 Wrap-Up

I broke my wrist a few weeks ago--hence my non-posting here. But I wanted to share some of my thoughts with you about 2005. It'll be short but slightly sweet (and sour. probably).

Personally, 2005 was the ultimate Dickens year for me. On the best of times side, I got a new job teaching English full time, my wife and I bought our first house, and, in December, I got yet another new job coordinating the distance education program at my college. All this was overshadowed, however, by the death of my father in February, which was devastating for my family. I'm heartened, however, by the fact that my dad would have been proud of my accomplishments this year. I just wish he'd been around to see my new house--he would have loved it.
Another thing my dad would have loved would have been the Seattle Seahawks' season so far; they're the best team in the NFL right now, and my dad and I were big fans. In fact, when the Angels won the world series in 2002, the first thing my dad said to me was, "Now we just have to get one for the Seahawks." So, hopefully, this will be the year--too bad he couldn't be here to enjoy it.
My dad was never as big a baseball fan as I am, but he still would have enjoyed the Angels beating up the Yankees this year in the first round of the playoffs. He hated the Yankees, as do I, though the Red Sox and their incredibly annoying fans are a VERY close second. I'm a huge Angels fan, so the loss to the white sox this year was depressing, but at least the team won its second straight AL West crown--something the Angels have never done before. Even better, the future for the team is as bright as it's ever been.
Because of my dad's death and my new job and move, I scaled back my music reviewing here and at Stylus. I don't know how many reviews I'll be doing in the future, but I will continue to write review whenever I can, and when I can't, I'll at least post recommendations here for all to check out.

To that end, here are a few recommendations for all of you--music, TV, DVD, and technology.

Music

The White Stripes, Get Behind Me Satan--best album of the year from the best rock band anywhere
Sigur R�s, Takk...--Another great work by a great band. Once again, haunting, original, and utterly beautiful, just like Iceland.
William Basinski, The Garden of Brokenness--see my review below
Boards of Canada, The Campfire Headphase--fantastic work
Seu Jorge, The Life Aquatic - Studio Sessions--Wonderful Bowie covers in Portugese by great Brazilian singer. The movie is really underappreciated, too.

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart--If you're not a fan, then just leave this site right now. Best thing on TV.
Arrested Development--Five years from now, people will be talking about this show as the Seinfeld of the 00s.
Battlestar Galactica--Surprisingly intelligent scifi.
Lost--Caught up with this show thanks to iTunes. Good stuff.
South Park--As usual.
Rome--"Who doesn't appreciate a large penis?"
Full Metal Alchemist--How many other shows out there are about alchemy?

DVDs (my favorite purchases of the year)

Werner Herzog boxed sets--one of his films with Klaus Kinski, the other a collection of his other greats. Amazing stuff, especially Aguirre, the Wrath of God and Fata Morgana.
All three original Star Trek seasons--what I did while recovering from my broken bones.
All sorts of Ray Harryhausen DVDs, including a collection of his early work and Jason and The Argonauts, still the best special effects film I've ever seen. I got to see Harryhausen in person this year at Comicon.

Technology

iPod video--got it a few weeks ago (my third ipod). Great tool--will change movies and tv the way the first ipod changed music.
PSP--also changing video as well as gaming, but still waiting to see if better games will emerge on the system before pronouncing it a true success.
TabletPC--my school gave me one this year; has the potential to transform computers, provided they become easier to use.

Bottom Line
Personally, 2005 was a mixed year. For the world, however, the year just plain sucked. Bush & Co. continued to make everything worse, from Iraq to global warming to Katrina to breaking the law in a myriad of ways. The silver lining is that at least people in the US are starting to notice and get as pissed off as the rest of the world. Here's hoping that anger continues and grows in 2006!

Happy Holidays, everyone!!!

William Basinski, The Garden of Brokenness

I first heard about The Garden of Brokenness in the liner notes to Basinski’s collaboration with Richard Chartier (William Basinski + Richard Chartier, Spekk 2004), where the artists mentioned taking two works—Basinski’s Garden and another work by Chartier—and fusing them into something totally new, a truly creepy mixture of Chartier’s experimental drones and silences and Basinski’s subtle, esoteric beauty.

The Garden of Brokenness is certainly different from that otherwork. It’s neither creepy nor complex. In fact, this might be the simplest work Basinski has ever released. However, buried in this simplicity is a universe of fascinating aberrations, and it is the aberrations that really make this piece memorable.

The work consists of two parts that blend together over the course of fifty minutes. The first part is a tranquil piano melody that is played over and over again, in fits and starts, throughout. The second is an echoing, feedback-laden wall of noise that reflects the piano melody back on itself like a room of mirrors, turning the initial melody into a self- replicating monster at one moment (repeating itself over and over in sharper intensity) and dissolving into a gigantic chasm of noise at another moment. The work, then, is a series of waves of differing intensities crashing against the reader’s ears.

At times, the waves are utterly tranquil—the wall of noise barely penetrating the melody. At other times, the melody itself barely penetrates the noise. At still other times, the two sounds fight for bragging rights, slugging it out between our ears. And then there are times when Basinski organizes the two parts of his creation so that they remain separate from one another—the beautiful melody in the foreground, the wave of noise building and humming and breathing in the background.

Taken together, the work is a little like walking through a cave with a boom box in your hand. In smaller spaces, the boom box’s speakers dominate; in larger spaces, the reflection of the speakers dominate, bouncing off the cave walls and echoing in all directions until there are hundreds of different variations on the same sound all blurring together in a haze of noise. Since Basinski himself refers to this music as “dark” and “swampy,” I guess you could say that the cave metaphor might be an apt description of this music—provided that the cave in question is the one you float through on the “Pirates of the Caribbean” ride at Disneyland!

Basinski also refers to this music as “sad” and “elegiac,” and I suppose those two words are appropriate ones to use for this music, given how the end result of many of these loops is a disintegration of a basic melody into a rumbling noise. However, I see more hope in this work than in, say, Basinski’s epic Disintegration Loops. There, the music falls apart, and he records the dying. Here, the music doesn’t really die; rather, it grows and expands and reverberates in the same way the sounds of nature can echo and expand across a landscape. Natural sounds die out, too, of course, but there’s no sadness in it—it’s just the temporal nature of sound. And that, I think, is what Basinski has created here, an illustration of the true beauty and frailty of sound itself, both as it exists in our world and as it exists in our imaginations.

SIQ Update

SIQ now is 63 (heavy tar and manure--bitter and nasty). I'm staying inside!

What the hell? Cold?

Yep, the high was 69 degrees Fahrenheit yesterday and about the same today. And, yes, that's cold for El Centro, even though it sounds like a nice warm day for November in most parts of the country--including most desert areas, which are actually rather chilly during the winter (especially at night). El Centro is in what is called the "low desert" in California, meaning that we're at or below sea level and, hence, don't get the really cold temperatures that folks in the "high desert" get on a regular basis. A friend of mine works in Barstow (between San Bernardino and Las Vegas) and regularly runs into snow and ice during the winter--even though the temperatures in the summer there are easily the equivalent of El Centro's 110-115 degrees.

Oh, and the SIQ has hovered around the 20s lately--some manure smells and other nasty odors, but always faint and easy to ignore. That's another benefit of the cold weather!

More thoughts (since I haven't posted for a while):

I've been admiring The White Stripes from afar for a while now, liking their music but not entirely being sure as to why. Then I bought Get Behind Me Satan and it clicked: they are the garage rock equivalent of a 12k/Line artist like Richard Chartier, Taylor Deupree, or Christopher Willits. They are minimalist--that is assured: two people, plays drums and the other plays the guitar (mostly) and sings. No bass or other accoutrements are allowed (though, as with all great artists, they know when to break their own rules). The difference between the Stripes and the 12k guys is simply that the Stripes choose to center their music in and around the blues tradition, whereas the 12k guys are working from a more abstract, academic tradition. Both rock in their own ways and both are experimental minimalists, but people pay to see the Stripes because Meg White keeps a funky beat and Taylor Deupree doesn't.
I have a new job--I'm the Distance Education Coordinator for Imperial Valley College. That means I don't teach as much and I oversee all matters concerning online education at the school. The program is just beginning, so there's lots to do, and I'm eager to make the program a success. It's a bit scary to leave my first tenure-track job, but I feel comfortable doing it now (rather than later) because I'm not actually leaving the school where I'm working and because I will be able to return to that job in a few years (if all goes well).
Hope all Americans had a happy thanksgiving. This holiday is one of the few things the US ever got right, I think--a day of reflection and celebration and massive quantities of food. It's fun! I think that's why many of my students tell me that they celebrate Thanksgiving by having a turkey dinner at their relatives' houses in Mexico--even though it's not a holiday in Mexico! My theory is: if the holiday is fun, it works! Hell, if Islam had a holiday half as fun as Thanksgiving or Christmas, people would be jumping off the Christian bandwagon left and right. And, yes, that's the problem with atheism: no fun holidays. Atheists and pagans should get together and figure out a holiday they can share--and it's not Halloween (atheists don't believe in Halloween).

Numbers Station Signal

Here's the link to the Numbers Station signal I recorded a few days ago. Let me know what you think. By the way, the snapping sound is me (accident).

Worth every penny

On November 18, 2005, 1000 GMT, on 7887 of the shortwave band, I finally heard a perfectly audible, perfectly tuned numbers station broadcast. Now, I have written about numbers stations on many occasions, and on one of those occasions I wrote that I had actually heard a numbers station recording and had recorded it. However, that recording was woefully weak, more noise than signal. I was using a Grundig YB-400PE, and while it is a good little machine, it's woefully inadequate when it comes to weak signals like most numbers station broadcasts.

However, today, I finally received my Grundig Satellit 800, the mother of all portatop shortwave receivers, the monster I'd wanted to get ever since I first heard The Conet Project (but didn't get because I didn't want to shell out the cash and because, when my wife and I were living in an apartment, the reception for shortwave was so low that I just didn't think it was worth it). Now we have a house, however, so I figured I'd indulge myself and get one. So, right away, I set it up in one of our spare rooms, flipped it on, and was instantly struck by the amazing variety of signals I was able to receive--despite having no antenna other than the whip comes with the device. I was able to pick up BBC broadcasts from Asia, the news from Austrailia, the German DeutscheWelle news broadcast, a Japanese broadcast of some sort, and, mother of 'em all, a Cuban numbers station signal. I'm guessing it is Cuban because it was in Spanish. It was simply a female voice reading off a list of numbers (what else did you expect from a numbers station broadcast?); it's nothing new for shortwave and DX fans, but it's a milestone for me--and, of course, I recorded it. I want to clean the recording up a bit (remove some of the noise and make it clearer and sharper), and then I'm posting it right here--so stay tuned, all one of you out there who actually care or even understand what I'm talking about.

"God? He is ze biggest bitch of them all."
--The Mole

Jarhead

SIQ: 49 (lots of smoke smells from fireplaces--I hope--and some alfalfa wafting around in the breeze)

I saw Jarhead last night in El Centro. It's a HUGE movie around here because it was filmed in and around the area. The cast and crew stayed at a hotel about two blocks away from me (though I didn't pay much attention to it at the time). Jamie Foxx apparently worked out at the same gym my brother goes to, which meant that, when my mom told the story, it became, "Doug worked out with Jamie Foxx." A lot of my students were extras in the movie, which meant that all of a sudden one day last February all the guys in my classes came in with shaved heads (you know--jarheads). Also, one of the closing scenes in the film--the parade when they come home--was filmed on Main Street in El Centro. So it's a big film here for lots of reasons.

Anyways, I came into the film not expecting much--the reviews were mediocre at best. I expected it to no match for the other Gulf War film, Three Kings. That film was inventive, clever, intelligent, and pointed in its commentary on the war. Jarhead was different, certainly. It's not really a commentary on the war at all; if anything, it's a commentary on a single person's experience in the war. And, as a commentary on a single person's experience in the war, it's damn good. It has a singular vision that is rare in war films--it doesn't cover the war as much as it covers the actions of one person trying not to go crazy with boredom and loneliness during a situation that eventually turned into a very, very brief war.

Most critics, I think, wanted a critique on the war--they wanted an Apocalypse Now moment that revealed the futility of war and all that it destroys. My wife and I call that a "Where is your god now?" ending, after The Mole's wonderful line at the end of South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut. It's a moment that usually reveals the epiphany of the main character as he/she recognizes the universe (embodied in warfare) as the unfair, bitter, pointless place it obviously is. Most critics didn't see this sort of moment in Jarhead--but it's there, only it's not the moment they wanted. It's the moment at the end of the film, when the war has just ended and our heros have just come across their comrades dancing around a fire (like the pagans in The Wicker Man). Our heros are pissed off because they went through the entire war without firing a single shot (even though they were sharpshooters). Everyone is dancing and singing and laughing around them; they look at each other, and then they get their guns out and fire round after round into the air. It's a moment where they characters say, "We didn't kill anyone, but we did survive, so screw it--let's just shoot." It's not the greatest "Where is your god now?" moment in the world, and it says nothing whatsoever about the war's futility--but it does give the characters a certain distance from their own experiences and it gives them the release they need at that point.

And that's the key: the moment is specifically tied to these characters. It's their story, not the country's story or the world's story. They live it and experience it and survive it--and that's it.

As I said before, the movie this film is going to be linked with is David O. Russell's Three Kings, a great film with some great acting, great dialogue, and a significant message behind it. What this movie also has, however, is a contrived plot device--some mystery gold the heros want to steal. That device lowers the movie to the level of a caper--and, to its credit, manages to make the caper elements within the movie resonate far beyond the boundaries of a typical war or caper film. Still, it IS contrived. Jarhead, on the other hand, is about as original a narrative (at least for a war movie) as you're likely to experience. It's about (basically) young, dumb guys being trained to kill and then waiting and waiting for their chance to kill, only to not even get a chance to fire a weapon because the war is over so quickly. It's a minimalist narrative, with no contrivance or any other cloud to dissipate the central focus.

Jarhead doesn't have the depth and the creativity of Three Kings, but it has an honest, piercing narrative that really gets to the heart of the war experience. For this reason, I think the movie will be around for a very long time.

Boards of Canada, The Campfire Headphase

I know I said I wasn't going to write more reviews for a while, but I got Boards of Canada's latest, The Campfire Headphase , and I have to say something about it. I thought their previous work, Geogaddi, was a lot of fun to listen to...for about a week. Then it bored me. That wasn't the case with Music Has the Right to Children, which, although it does now seem slightly dated (the beats sound a bit too circa 1998), is still a fixture on my ipod and something I still hearken back to when I'm in a certain mood (read: when I'm sleepy and want to think at the same time).

I think the difference between Geogaddi and Music Has the Right to Children is a bit like the difference between Richard Rodriguez's El Mariachi and Desperado. They're both basically the same movie, but El Mariachi was made for about $50 and Desperado was made for millions. The differences in story and characters were negligible, but El Mariachi was rough and unpolished and (therefore) lots of fun while Desperado was expensive and glossy and (therefore) boring. Yes, that's it: the more money you throw at something, the more the money becomes the point of the work. Do something on a shoestring budget and you can sometimes (not always) achieve something truly unique because you (as an artist) are forced to economize and come up with new and unique ways to create a work of art (like the way Rodriguez used a shopping cart for tracking shots).

I don't know if Boards of Canada were working on a shoestring budget for their first work, but I'm willing to guess that they had new equipment for Geogaddi--and that equipment ended up being the point of Geogaddi. The music was basically the same, but it was more clever, more about the twiddling effects and fun little asides than about creating memorable melodies and striking evocative moods. It was dull.

So now there's The Campfire Headphase, and I think it owes much more to Music Has the Right to Children than to Geogaddi, if only because it sounds rougher, more unpolished, and more atmospherics than its predecessor. There's a decided thematic link to the sounds and memories of childhood, just as on the earlier works, and in that respect the work is a bit repetitive. But repetition is not really a huge problem--heck, most artists only create one or two unique ideas and then continually refine and revise those ideas in all subsequent works (I'm looking at you, Bruce Springsteen). B of C are just learning from past mistakes, focusing on what they do best, and churning out new works that play on and improve upon what they've done before. It's a fun work, and I encourage all of you to check it out.