Bad Chemistry!

Thinking of chemistry. Not in the scientific sense, more in the sense of "the elements that make up something," or "interaction of one personality with another."

Sometimes chemistry is almost invisible, especially when it's working well. You really notice "bad" chemistry, when things aren't working, or when an element sort of "poisons the well." I recently had a deadly encounter with a certain personality. One brief, off the cuff conversation was like "death on a stick." I couldn't extricate myself fast enough.

And that "badness" hung over me like a black cloud for days afterward. There is a real, deadly, overwhelming power there, almost unacknowledged. They used to say... "better living with chemistry," and then there's the other kind... when bad chemistry makes living a little bit harder.

The Noble Honor of Being A Slob on TV!

I do not watch Network TV very often anymore. So it's rare for me to witness the barrage of commercials that are the primary point of it's existence. I mean, maybe there's a football game crammed in between all the commercials, but the amount of money, creativity and energy devoted to selling things to us, is quite impressive. I think if you see this barrage often, maybe it just sort of washes over your eyeballs, but if your eyeballs don't usually experience this kind of assault, it really does make an profound impression. And that impression is this: Advertisers have concluded that the people watching TV are total slobs, and these slobs enjoy watching people just like them - people who are slobs, happy and proud of being slobs - fat, dim & slow-witted, folks who like to sit and watch lots of TV, and who like to eat lots of really crappy food items, drink lots of really crappy beer,  and like to drive around in really big trucks. And enjoy watching themselves, or people just like themselves, looking stupid and slobbery on TV.  People watching people. Slobs watching other slobs just like them. And maybe those Advertisers are right, I'm sure they have the demographic data to back them up. To be a slob on TV seems to be a noble honor!

Isn't It Strange?

I once wrote a song called "Isn't It Strange." My brother tells me it is one of his favorite songs. Not many people have heard it. I play it very rarely. It's maybe a little too close to home.

The opening line: "Isn't it strange how success can seem like failure, how love can seem like hate..."

Yes, well, isn't it?

Tribute Bands are Weird, Creepy and Pathetic!

"Yes, but you don't want to be a "tribute band." That's weird and creepy and kind of pathetic. All those Elvis impersonators, and Beatles clones, it's kind of a sad phenomenon, even if they're good.  You know what I mean? There's something really sad about trying to "be" someone else. It's one thing to do a "cover song" but it's another thing entirely, when you put on the costume, bring out the wig, work out those solos note by note by note. Sorry, it's just too creepy..."

Lennon in a "Girl Group"

Reading "Tune In," has opened my mind about being a "Covers Band." It has changed my thoughts about one of the great bands, The Beatles. I was always a little dismissive when it came to the very early Beatles' records. I didn't want to hear the Beatles do cover songs, I wanted to hear them do their own songs.  I was always of the mind that they really hit their creative stride around "Rubber Soul," and "Revolver" and it's true, you can see their songwriting take amazing, creative leaps with each record, and the middle to late period Beatles songs are really very, very impressive and took the band to another level.

But the book has propelled me back to their first record, "Please Please Me," and to the first volume of "Live at the BBC", and on these records, it's the covers that really knock your head sideways. The "live, in the studio," nature of the recordings is edgy and refreshing too. The Beatles really were one of the absolutely great covers bands. And their song choices are eye-opening, ear-opening, wide-ranging, and inspiring.  I've been playing "Please Please Me," obsessively, as I've been reading the book, and I'm listening with new eyes and ears. And all the song choices are instructive and revealing.

The Beatles played songs they loved and they put all their heart and soul into them. And transformed them. Especially songs like "Baby It's You," or "Twist and Shout," or "Money," or that Ann Margaret, yes that's right, Ann Margaret cover "I Just Don't Understand." My favorite Beatles cover songs are the girl group songs (the Marvelettes, the Shirelles) that John Lennon sings. And you realize that they are some of the best vocal performances Lennon ever committed to tape.

Lennon was a tough character, with a brutally biting wit, he had lost lots of people very dear to him, at a very young age, and there is a hurt, a vulnerability, a subtle rage and loss buried deep in his psyche, that is alive in his voice.  And it's on those girl group songs where Lennon really lets it all go. He puts everything he has into some of the great Goffin & King, or Bacharach & David & Luther Dixon songs.  Really listen to Lennon's voice on these, it's all there, the best of Lennon.

And by doing songs written for a "girl group" Lennon gets to drop the mask, (Or, maybe it's that he puts on another mask?),  he totally commits, he opens himself, he isn't afraid to be soft, or vulnerable, he inhabits the song, takes it in, and then, let's it fly. The beauty, the brilliance of Lennon, was to take that raw emotion, and to channel it into raucous R&R, and beautiful, soulful Pop and R&B.

And then of course there are all the Chuck Berry covers (Lennon always sang them, he loved Berry's inventive, witty and sophisticated word-play) or Little Richard (McCartney sang those to throat-clearing heights) or Carl Perkins (that would be George, he liked the funny, witty and off the wall tunes) and then everything else under the sun too.  The Beatles grabbed songs from every quarter, and made them work for a 4 piece band, a really tight, no-nonsense 4 piece band that could sing and harmonize and own songs at will.  

Kind of makes the whole "covers" vs. "originals" thing irrelevant. Listen to the songs.  It's all there. And those covers happen to be some of the best songs ever written, and they come from everywhere. Pop, Soul, R&R, Country, Rockabilly, Show Tunes - little shining gems put through the Beatles sensibility. 

Songwriters Not from the Great American Songbook!

Our band, whitewolfsonicprincess will be doing a set of Rolling Stones songs this Saturday at the Open Door Repertory - Songwriters NOT from the Great American Songbook.  It's a special "sit-down" performance.  The Hannah Frank Group opens with a set of Dylan.  So a pretty nice double-bill.  Great songs on all fronts. We are working a couple of our own songs into the set too.

We have been accused of being a little "Stonesy," and there is no doubt that some of our music has been influenced by Jagger and Richards' songwriting.  We have experience in a theatrical setting, so this won't be totally intimidating, still it's all a little more "formal" than playing a bar, and we chose some really beautiful, and delicate, Stones songs ("As Tears Go By," "Wild Horses") and we want to do them justice, and make them our own.

We ran through the set-list last night with the band. The order  needs a little adjustment, starting with "As Tears Go By" is not really a good idea, it's so quiet and delicate, it might be better to start with something a little looser - maybe "Dead Flowers." But the set really heats up as we go along.  Some songs really came together quickly, especially "Sweet Black Angel," it's a little song nestled in the middle of "Exile on Main Street," - Jagger's ode to Angela Davis, and it sounds so natural and effortless with our band.

We feel really good about "Sister Morhpine," it's moody and dynamic, a little piece of r&r theater, and our version of "Play with Fire" is edgy and a little weird. One of Jagger's great dark "put-down" songs. A few of these songs we know very, very well, "Dead Flowers," "You Can't Always Get What You Want," and our version of "Jumping Jack Flash" is so gloriously and messily "garage-band!"  Would like to think Keef would be proud!

What About Volume Two?

"They'd lucked into the only Producer in London who shared their resistance to convention, the only man with a reputation for sound experimentation and a strong knack for the unusual... and he'd lucked into the Beatles." - Mark Lewisohn

How do I know that I'm sold on Mark Lewisohn's concept of a three volume biography of the Beatles? I'm already wondering when the next volume drops.  I find myself checking out Lewisohn's website. Looks like I will have to wait for awhile, he's still writing.

I am still working on volume one, just got to the part where the Beatles meet George Martin for the first time, and record some songs for him.  Martin wasn't very impressed with the music, but loved the personalities of the band. It was their humor, and charisma that kind of cinched the deal.

So entertaining. Part of the pleasure is that you know the broad outlines of the story. So when you meet interesting characters like Brian Epstein and George Martin, you get a little kick, because you know what they don't know yet.

And there are so many interesting characters that play major parts in the story, Stu Sutcliffe, Epstein, Martin, Horst Fascher, Tony Sheridan, Klaus Voorman, Astrid Kirchnerr, Alan Williams, Bob Wooler, and oh yeah, those four tough little Liverpool musicians.

And there's weird stuff too. Early name for a Lennon and McCartney band - Los Paranoias. These guys had an abundant appetite for booze and amphetamines. McCartney got the "heebie jebbies" the first time he tried to play lead guitar onstage, he performed badly, and decided then and there that he was not a lead guitarist. Lennon had a brutal sense of humor and loved to make fun of cripples - he was constantly doing his "cripple act." McCartney very much disliked Stu Suttcliffe, and helped hound him out of the band. No one in the band wanted to be the bass player. McCartney thought the bass player was always "the fat guy in the back." It's funny how McCartney's bass playing became a secret weapon, and a strength of the band.  Harrison might have been the funniest, the toughest, and the most determined of them all - his tenacity carried them along in some crucial scenes. Ringo was a very sickly child, almost died a couple times, and then emerged as the best and most highly-sought drummer in Liverpool. He had offers from all quarters.

So many things had to go right for these guys, and so many things had to go wrong too for the story to unfold the way it unfolded. Good luck, bad luck - who's to say? It's an astonishing, and unbelievable story. 

Renews Your Faith in the Power of Film!

How about a story, a screenplay, a film, about a "good man," adrift in a world of cynicism, nihilism, of sex, of drugs, of r&r? That's radical. And make that man a Catholic Priest? OK, now you've really gone off the deep-end. And cast Brendan Gleeson in the lead role? Brilliant! That's my reaction to "Calvary," .  It's really an overpowering film. Written and Directed by John Michael McDonagh, the older brother of Martin McDonagh, one of Ireland's and frankly, the world's, great playwrights and filmmakers (see "In Bruges").

"Calvary" is an immersive experience. I mean, we sunk into it completely. Perfectly realized, beautifully done. We went thru the full spectrum of emotion - from tears to laughter. It is darkly funny, it's deeply profound, and it will make you think. Renews your faith in film. This is a great one...

"Oh Yeah, this is What Art Can Do..."

We went to the MCA over the weekend. We decided to soak up some "art." I was sort of a reluctant participant, thinking museums are such dead places.  We stumbled through a couple of galleries. I kept asking myself, "Why these paintings?" And, "Is this all just a sideshow?"

Then we walked into Simon Starling's "Metamorphology." And it blew us away. It's conceptual. There's a narrative. This is a coherent, stirring, and enlightening body of work. Profound and funny too. My favorite "piece" was "Project for a Masquerade (Hiroshima)." It's an installation, a sculpture, an environment, a film, a sacred space. It ties together many strands - a story of ancient Japan and the modern world, nuclear energy and sculpture, secret doings and spies. It's a work of History, of Myth and Pop Culture. And real and fictional characters such as James Bond, Anthony Blunt, Henry Moore, Colonel Sanders and Odd Job figure in the story.

We walked through the sculpture, participated in it. We tried on the masks and became part of the piece. It's alive, and it changes as people interact with it. Then we sat on black Japanese-style prayer mats, and watched a little film that related an amazing, looping and loopy narrative. We listened to the narrator tell this magnificent tale and watched a master mask-maker make masks from little blocks of wood. It was amazing, exciting, inspiring. Art.

We walked out of the gallery transformed.  I thought, "Oh yeah, this is what art can do... "

Photos by The Lovely Carla 

Mystery of Identity

This is going to be one of those "what if" kind of posts...

What if you found out you weren't who you thought you were? That the story of your life, and your family history was incorrect? And all the people who could "clarify" the situation, who could trace, and tell you how events actually rolled out, what actually happened, are now long gone?

And the stories, the "truths" that you grew up with, and lived with, aren't really what you thought they were? And the actual fabric of your being, the building blocks, the deep in the bone elements are actually quite different than what you had been told, and what you believe? And you don't know why the story was told in an altered way, you don't know if there was some dark secret, or embarrassing reality, and what seemed so important way back in the distant past, is now just an interesting fact, but that fact is now blurred, erased, altered, and impossible to bring to the light of day.

And who knows, maybe it was all just a misunderstanding, or a little "white lie" that buried an inconvenient truth, but then there is cold science, and there is biology, and there are some realities that are stubborn and persistent, and will emerge, no matter how the original story was told.

And maybe this doesn't really feel like a "betrayal," maybe it's just another mystery, and you've grown used to all the mysteries that pile up around you, and really it's just a surprise, a surprise that something as specific and "tangible" as your own identity, could be complicated, and contrary, and oddly at odds with so much of who and what you thought you were and are.

And in a way, maybe this changes everything, but then again, maybe it really changes nothing, but instead just opens up another door that leads to a certain foggy darkness, leaves another cloud in your head, and well, it's pretty cloudy in there already, and well, what can you do, that's just the way the story goes.

Writer's Head, Writer's Eyes

If you think you are writer, I mean if you write, and look at the world with the head and eyes of a writer, you see the world through a unique perspective. The events of a life, the things that happen in a life, the feelings, the thoughts, the emotions, the coming and goings of people, and things, are just raw material for the writer.

This puts the writer in a writerly mode - a step back from the hustle and bustle, the hurly burly. If you keep your writer's eyes, your writer's head, you are always observing, looking for things that you can "use," that you can put down in words on a page.

There is a little arrogance, or maybe self-centeredness about the process. Not only is the writer experiencing the world, but he or she is already thinking how this all can be rendered into sentences and paragraphs. And how this can be explained, or depicted for others. It's a way of imposing a narrative, a line of thought on an endless stream of events.

Are there some things the writer shouldn't write about? It's up to the writer.

What is important? What stands out? What is interesting? What is extraordinary? It's up to the writer. If the writer is good, this can be astonishing, revealing, enlightening. Or it can be deadening, concealing, dumb-making.  It's up to the writer. And the reader too.

Oh yeah, the writer imagines the reader too. It's kind of a self-enlcosed universe...

Beatles vs. Stones

I have a good friend who insists that you have to choose, that you can't really like both the Beatles and the Rolling Stones, that the Beatles vs. Stones is one of those deep existential questions that needs to be resolved, and if it isn't, you betray some fundamental character flaw, that you're a weak-kneed, flip-flopper.

I embrace my inner flip-flopper.

Even as I'm right now submerging myself knee-deep in Beatlemania via "Tune-In," and re-listening to their amazing early work, I am working on Rolling Stones songs for a show with our band whitewolfsonicprincess on September 6th.

I see the Beatles as a technicolor dream, and the Rolling Stones as a dream in rich black & white. If I had to choose, I'd say the Beatles were the greatest band, because they were there first, and they had a wider range of influences and styles. But although the Stones had a little narrower scope, in the course of their career they absorbed and reimagined Blues, R&B, Rock and Country just as successfully as any other band in the world.

And because the Rolling Stones had a little bit narrower focus, some of their records seem to me to be absolutely flawless. And this particular string of records seems unbeatable: Beggars Banquet, Let It Bleed, Sticky Fingers, Exile on Main Street.

Still the first long-playing record I ever owned was The Beatles "White Album," (A double album!) and their impact on me is pretty much incalculable. But I never saw them live, like I have the Rolling Stones, and if you pressed me, it would probably be "Exile on Main Street" that I'd say is the greatest r&r record. But "Revolver" would be close second and maybe some days "Revolver" would be #1. And really I think musically the Beatles were the more inventive and creative unit (plus all 4 sang), but the Stones didn't do "granny music" and although sometimes the Stones were badly out of tune live, and in the studio, they didn't record a song as gratingly insipid as "Maxwell's Silver Hammer." That song drives me up the freaking wall! And McCartney's love of schmaltzy songs kind of taints some of the Beatles records for me... but hell, Sir Paul is a force of nature and a musical genius, so what do I know?

Joyous, Enthusiastic, Inspired!

I'm now about 500 pages into Mark Lewisohn's "Tune In." I wonder if the other volumes will be "Turn On," and "Drop Out." But that's probably a little too Leary...

Alterante title: "In Tune" - it seems like these guys always played in tune and on pitch, voices and guitars... amazing.

I have been driven back to my copy of the Beatles "Live at the BBC" two cd set (Volume Two is on my wish list!).   It's probably the closest you can get to what it was like to hear the Beatles in the glory days of Hamburg and Liverpool - recorded for the BBC from 1962-1965. A live 4-piece r&r group without all the hysterical screaming. Perfect soundtrack for the book. Except of course, Stu Sutcliffe played bass and Pete Best played drums in the early versions of the group. On these sessions you have Paul McCartney on bass (showing that it's not an instrument for the "fat guy in the back") and Ringo Starr on drums.

So yes, "Live at the BBC" is the lineup that we all know and love. Cleaned up and lots more disciplined on stage.  Lots of covers of all the music the Beatles loved.  I have been listening with new ears. This is some of the best music the Beatles ever played, these were the songs where they found their own sound. They were more than an amazing covers band. They listened, absorbed, embodied and reconstituted these cover songs. They learned 100's of these songs, early rock & roll, Chuck Berry, Carl Perkins, Goffin & King, the Shirelles, the Marvellettes.  They loved the Tamla/Motown Girl Groups, and they weren't afraid to tackle any song that appealed to them.

There are some hokey show tunes and schmaltzy things too.  You realize the Beatles really loved music and their tastes and appetites were voracious. Probably wider and greater than your own.  Listen to "To Know Him is to Love Him," or "Baby It's You," and it's all there - the stunning harmonies, tight arrangements, and then there's that special, secret sauce, the "It Factor" (see previous post). Four voices. Joyous, enthusiastic. Inspired. And a source of much Mania!

Is "It" Real?

This article about the "It Factor," from Grantland is good. Funny too.  It's about NFL quarterbacks, but can probably be extended into other realms. The "It Factor:" What is It? Does It exist? Does It come and go? Who has It? Who had It, and who doesn't have It anymore? Can you lose It? Or did we all just misread It? How do you get It? Who can recognize It? Is It real?

We think we know what the "It Factor" is, we can name people who have It. There are intangibles,  qualities, that we believe make up the "It." We think we know those qualities, (leadership, bravery, work ethic, charisma) and we swear we can see them embodied, see them in action. 

This is important in the NFL. Big dollars are attached to the question of "It." Every team is looking for that "franchise QB," there are scouts, and databases, and "evaluators," all trying to scope out that special secret sauce called, "It!"

How to explain a Tom Brady or Russell Wilson? How to explain that these two premier, Super Bowl winning QB's were passed up by every NFL team when they were available in the draft? How could all those experts miss the "It?" Maybe Brady and Wilson had "It" already, in spades, but nobody knew "It" yet, nobody saw "It," until, well, until they showed they had "It!" And then, well, of course, everyone decided that they had "It!"

Update: And what if underestimating someone's "It Factor," actually increases it? So in that case it wouldn't be surprising that Brady and Wilson were under-appreciated coming out of the draft, the under-appreciating was actually another element added to the mix of "It!" And maybe that under-appreciation will always be part of the elixir of "It," an element of under-appreciation adds an extra "chip on the shoulder," a little more "fire in the belly," which is then used as another motivator to show everyone that they were wrong about "It!"

Microbiome - I didn't know that!

You could go through life exclaiming, "I didn't know that!" It's probably/maybe wiser to do that, as opposed to going around exclaiming "I knew that!"

We don't know what we don't know...

This little primer on the microbiome from Vox  gets you thinking about your body in a new way. Think: thriving, seething little ecosystem. At least that's the new paradigm science wants you to try on for size. 

Is it bad to have trillions of microbes living in and on you? No. It might be a very good thing!

We Sit, Shop, Grow Fat!

I listened to a great and enlightening conversation with Evolutionary Biologist Daniel Lieberman yesterday. The gist: our human bodies have evolved much slower than our human cultures. Our bodies are stuck in the Stone-Age, and we are "mismatched" with our current culture/society. Revelatory!

We were made to run, to hunt, to gather. And instead we sit, shop, and grow fat. Really, really super-sized fat. And most of our diseases are the result of this evolutionary mismatch. We are in conflict with our bodies. If we do what comes naturally - maximize calories, maximize and store fat, to be used later in times of crisis or need, well... just look around folks!

We must be very discriminating when it comes to the "modern world." It's a killer. We have built a world of comfort and plenty. We are not equipped biologically to live in the land of plenty, the land of fast food and cheap calories. We come from another world entirely. Our bodies are still stuck in a Paleolithic (early Stone Age) mode. Our bodies are of the past, alive in a present that over-rewards us in every way.

All of this makes so much sense. That dangerous Darwinian ideas resonates across the ages. What a conundrum. Our culture is in a turbo-speed evolutionary mode, and our bodies are still intimately connected to that long line of folks taking one little step at a time.

The Deadly Stuff!

Yes, well, as they say, "pick your poison carefully." You will embody that poison. If it doesn't kill you immediately. And really, the poison that doesn't kill you at first taste, or kills you slowly, over time, is just as deadly as the stuff that drops you down dead on the spot.

The definition of poison - "a substance with an inherent property that tends to destroy life or impair health."  And "something harmful, or pernicious, as to happiness or well-being."

Yes, much of our "nourishment" and "entertainment," and human company is a certain kind of poison too. So you must tread carefully. I don't mean you that you should be timid, or fearful; just on guard, careful, and vigilant.

Yesterday I saw the effects of a slow-motion poisoning, of the head, of the body, of the spirit. It's a sad, debilitating thing. And it's happening all around us, all the time. And we are all subject to the effects. You can get a "contact" poisoning too. And it's easy to over-look, or down-play, or outright ignore.  Denial is such a powerful tool and poison too.

Best to keep your eyes peeled. And be sort of stingy on the things you take into yourself.

Punk Band Before Punk!

"Performing blotto and belching, farting, chewing, swearing, smoking, drinking and making lewd signs fast became the norm, the way to do it, done six long nights every week. Rapidly, all the stage time they'd ever had was matched and multiplied..."

"They did the first Carl Perkins LP, the whole first Johnny Burnette LP, the whole first Buddy Holly LP, as well as Elvis' Golden Hits, the whole first Gene Vincent LP..."

"In seven extraordinary weeks at the Kaiserkeller the Beatles had doubled the vast amount of stage time already accrued at the Indra. In total, inside just fourteen weeks, they'd rocked Hamburg for about 415 hours - like 276 ninety minute shows or 830 half-hours - and every night tried not to repeat themselves. No one stopped to realize it, and there was no way of knowing anyway, but the Beatles had to be the most experienced rock group in the world, not just Liverpool. And Hamburg didn't only multiply their repertoire, it toughened their voices, seasoned their characters, enriched their personalities, and strengthened their stamina."  - Excerpts from Mark Lewisohn's "Tune In."

I'm about 400 pages into "Tune In," Mark Lewisohn's amazing book on the Beatles early years. It's a story that has been told many times, but not quite this way, not quite with this detail, so, in that way, the story is new and astonishing.  In Pop Culture terms this is ancient history, I mean what happened last week is already "old news," but this story is rendered so vividly, it's like you are along for the ride in Hamburg and Liverpool in those early, early days (1960, 1961) of the band.

The Beatles were a punk band before punk. They were the Ramones & Sex Pistols and a harmonizing Girl Group like the Shirelles too. They were loud, and wild and they wore leather, and smoked on stage, and stomped around in boots doing their best to  bring the rickety stage in the Kaiserkeller crashing to the ground.

They made friends with a group of German art students, one of them named Jurgen Volmer and another Astrid Kircherr who took some gorgeous b&w photos of these rock & rollers...

To Seize and Be Seized!

Yes, well, Linklater's movie is still kicking around in my head. My initial post about it is here. So many great scenes and lines. It's an experience, like any other significant experience. That's the power of well-realized art. This sequence of dialogue has been rattling around inside me the last few days.

"You know how everyone's always saying seize the moment? I don't know, I'm kind of thinking it's the other way around, you know, like the moment seizes us."

Maybe sometimes we do the seizing, or maybe we are seized. Or maybe we just meet the moment halfway?

The Crooked Ladder

Have the Cops gotten too good at busting people? Interesting question.  The crooked ladder  is a way to transcend humble beginnings. But if we bust and incarcerate a whole generation of people, that ladder will never be available to lots of young males.  Our drug laws have criminalized way too many people. And the laws have not been applied equally.  Maybe a little bit of tolerance of non-violent "crime" can actually be a social good? Maybe lots of those young "street dealers" are just social strivers, street-level entrepreneurs, maybe we'd all be better off if some of these "crimes" were de-crimilized? Maybe busting poor people for jay-walking is total bullshit! Turns out court fees for low level stuff - traffic stops and jaywalking, is a major cash cow for Municipal Government in Ferguson MI. Malcolm Gladwell reviews the history and shows us that America was built by immigrant gangsters. Maybe we shouldn't just pull the ladder up and away, maybe we want people to climb the ladder? Maybe assimilating the "street smart" is good for society. I guess that sounds like a Liberal argument. But maybe it's just common sense?