Off Whitening

I love the titles of spam messages. I don't read them, although I feel a little guilty about that. That's someone's livelihood I am disrespecting! Etc.

Here are some titles from today's treasure trove of unsolicited email:

-- Pull of Huge Jackpot
What does that mean? Are they trying to convince me that their online gambling establishment is exerting some kind of force drawing me to them? I just don't feel it.

-- Watch the lust in her eyes when you whip out your 9 inch monster
It sounds like I am about to unleash a devil puppy on a perversely motivated woman who's into bestiality. I know I am something of a prude, but good lord, why would it be attractive to describe your thingie as a "monster"? Aren't monsters supposed to be scary, or, like the Elephant Man, distorted or horrible examples of humans?

-- Small |nstrumment is not a problem.
Oh, wait. Actually, I think this is an email from my girlfriend trying to make me feel better after last night. Not spam at all. Never mind.

- Buy Must Have medications at Canada based pharmacy.
"Canada based"? & why must I have them? Do Canadian pharmacies sell ecstasy? No? Then I am fine. Canadians! Feh!

- Those locker room stares will be for the right reason...
Oh, back to this. Wouldn't the "wrong reason" depend upon one's sexual orientation? Is the right reason mentioned above envy? Really?

- You can listen to last week's Self Help Radio up now at selfhelpradio.net...
I hate these worst of all. God damn radio show people pimping their second-rate non-commercial garbage. Grrrr. & this show is about "butchers"! Why not do what The Retarded Bob Dylan is doing with his show & pick simple subjects like love, hair, rain, & interns? I can abide most spam but the spam I send to myself I just loathe.

I subbed the jazz show Non-Breaking Space yesterday & should also have that show up soonish. Then I'll spam myself again. Because if I don't, who will? Me. That's who.

11 Shows To Go!

Ah, the good eleven. It never gave me any trouble until after nine.

Before anything is signed or notarized in today's self-serving blog entry, can I ask you: will you ever forgive me for forgetting you on Valentine's Day? I didn't give you hearts or candy or syphillis or even a lousy blog entry. It's not that I don't love you, baby. It's just that I am forgetful. I'm like a child, you know, before they learn spatial recognition or some such - I just don't think you exist if I can't see you. Not all the time, of course. Just when you expect something from me.

And. Now. Eleven more shows on KOOP. What can you expect? I promise you the same quality of programming you have come to expect from the Self Help Radio family of programs. I mean, I don't really imagine it could get much worse, could it? If there is a jump in quality (as if), you may attribute it to my desire to make the last programs I do for you on KOOP the best programs in the universe. But you know as well as I do that'll be a fluke.

Hey! Speaking of flukes! If you want to hear me get all jazzy like I did back in December, you can hear me sitting on the show Non-Breaking Space on Sunday at 5pm. Listen in!

& also listen today at 4:30 pm Central Standard Tamale live on the 91.7 fm frequency & on the interwebs at koop.org. A show about butchers by an ardent vegetarian. What could possibly be better?

Whither Butchers?

It is not well-known how the themes get chosen for the Self Help Radio. Since the Self Help Radio is owned by the same mega-corporation which owns the Council on Foreign Relations Gift Shop, Illuminati-Masonry & Sons, & the Church Of Scientology (Reformed), I can't really tell you or I will have broken my non-disclosure agreement & some goons would come along & beat up my bicycle, but I can tell you that I got the order to - er, I mean, I conceived the idea of a show about butchers back in the carefree days of not long ago, when all the men were slightly surreptitious & all the women were harmonizing.

That is a long & confusing way of saying this: I had no idea that my show would coincide with the sad news of the death of the most famous butcher of my generation, Sam the Butcher from The Brady Bunch, whose occupation may have rattled his senses enough for him to be attracted to the disturbingly mannish maid Alice. The actor - who appeared all over the place on the television of my childhood - was named Allan Melvin & he died last month at the young age of 84.

I'm not sure if he alone would be enough to inspire a show. What did inspire the show? What moved me, a vegetarian for over twenty years, to devote ninety precious minutes to an occupation I find abhorrent? The answer may surprise you.

It was 1947, & I was a dashing young Lieutenant in His Majesty's Iraqi Occupation Army. You were the twinkie in your daddy's lunchbox. I had fallen asleep during the fifth siege of Basra that month & I had forgotten that Charlie was thick in the Bush. (Neil Bush, at that time.) Three or four members of the Greatest Generation were playing punkies off the side of the small wading pool &, with the DVD player not working, we used the discs to absent-mindedly chop tobacco & opium left outside by the Dutch Police who had visited the night before. Distracted, I almost met my end by friendly fire from an unfriendly woman who had neither asked nor told in That Man's Army. What saved me? Why did I not die?

A butcher was hacking away at some mystery meat in the shape of Dick Cheney when, due to the way Dick Cheney makes everyone's stomach churn, the butcher suddenly hurled, & his cleaver flew between me & the soldier, deflecting the bullet & making her (for whatever reason) believe that violence was not the answer. I think she decided that breakfast tacos were the answer. & I thank my lucky stars that, that day, I didn't die & I have a butcher to thank. Do you know when that happened? Or rather, when it will happen? That's right. February 15, 2143.

I celebrate that fateful day! Even if I loathe the practice! Now you know! Aren't you a nosy bastard!

Preface To Butchers: Flank Is A Funny Word

Actually, all the butcher-related words are pretty funny. "Meat." It even looks funny. How about "loin"? "Chop"? "Rashers" of "Bacon"? "Rack" of lamb? Just repeat after me: rump, round, brisket, poll, hock, ham, rump, belly & jowl. Har har har! Them's funny motherfucking words!

& everyone - except obese people - think the word "fat" is funny. Not phat, but funny.

Dude, you just ate a rump when you could've had a rack. Har har har!

I also totally love diagrams like this one - especially when they're in weird discotheque colors - which describe the names of the "parts" of the animal (in this case, the cow) that can be eaten. I guess meat-eaters will eat pretty much everything, so diagrams like this are for finicky western eyes only. Bon appetit!

Do you know if someone has done the same thing for humans? Any cannibals out there want to show us something similar? Damn! I wish I had the time to make one. Rats. I spent the day getting yelled at instead of being creative.

Why does a licensed vegetarian like myself want to do a show about butchers? Hey! Ask me tomorrow!

Love Is In The Erred

BOY what a dumbass I am. I conducted what I thought was a sweetly romantic version of KOOP's perennial favorite, the Lounge Show, this past Saturday, but due to user error (meaning ME), I screwed up the recording of it. What a maroon!

However, I have made a CD-length mix of a majority of the songs I played Saturday (no, I didn't recreate my oafish airbreaks) which is available as my Self Help Radio Extra for February. Go! Go young lovers! There is grooviness waiting for your untainted hearts!

But if you're bitter & wounded & frankly hate the whole fucking idea of Valentine's Day, you can listen to my Self Help Radio show about jealousy over at selfhelpradio.net. You can even listen to it without me. Do you think I care?

No, I'm too busy beating myself up about my stupidity.

12 Shows To Go!

What a bummer. Twelve more Self Help Radio shows on KOOP. How should I end my run in three months? I'm plum clean out of idears.

Surely you can tune in today at 4:30 as we start to nibble down the last dozen shows. Mmm, nibble. It's on the air in Austin town on the 91.7 frequency from 4:30 to 6pm, & on the online line at the same time at koop.org. You can listen all the KOOP shows that way, not just mine. Thanks to Thomas Alva Edison.

Speaking of Menlo Park, I'll be subbing the Lounge Show tomorrow morning, too. Self Help Radio will be about jealousy today, but the Lounge Show will be more romantic. It'll be about nibbling. That's not true. It'll be about romance. Because I may have only a broken heart, but I still believe in love. Or eating. Eating crumbly stuff. & love. Mmm, love.

Listen! Listen! Listen!

Laetrile For Fun & Profit

I found out but decided not to mention that I am "subbing" (which is a word we radio types use to describe what happens when a show's regular deejay asks an irregular deejay {c'est moi} to "substitute" deejay while the regular deejay is away) (look, I know you're not a moron, but I am going to add that "subbing" is short for "substituting," & not short for something like "submarine") (I tell you this in case you weren't paying much attention, & also because I just totally got this condescending email from someone I'm working with on a project & he obviously thinks I'm as smart as a half-opened bag of twizzlers & needs to spell out basic English grammar to me) (which isn't, I know, at all fair, since, again, I don't think you're a moron but think you're actually quite bright, if sometimes a little too self-involved to be continually quick on the uptake) (& you know me, I am passive aggressive & I keep this shit to myself - which is a good idea, because if this self-important douche knew what I really fucking thought about his going all special education on me, it would mean more trouble at work) (Jesus, did you really need to make such a big deal about this, because now this is all parenthetical asides to you & not at all information to the general reader of my blog, who is, you know, not nearly as sensitive as you are & is actually quite amused by me in ways you could never be because of the way we have always been competitive about being "clever" & "funny" & "one-upping" each other) (that wasn't intended to be a dig, & what's wrong, anyway, with the sort of friendly competition we have? have you been keeping track? do you imagine that one of us is winning? & if you think that, is the "winner" the one who has a radio show or the one who doesn't?) (oh did I hurt you poor little feelings? you always pull this on Thursdays, when I just want to convey some information on my little radio show blog, you want to make some big production & it's only a little annoying - what? are you just logging ou...








& you came back. what a baby! & me with no parentheses left. Well, let me just say: I am subbing the Lounge Show on Saturday morning. That's the news. That's all. Wanna go get a beer or something?

Whither Jealousy?

Here are what some of the finest minds living today all alone have to say about the subject of this year's Self Help Radio Valentine's Day show, which is "jealousy":

"Jealousy contains more of self-love than of love" - François de La Rochefoucauld. Actually, he's one of the finest minds living today who's been dead for hundreds of years.

"To jealousy, nothing is more frightful than laughter." Francoise Sagan. What? He died in 2004? Hunh.

"Plain women are always jealous of their husbands. Beautiful women never are. They are always so occupied with being jealous of other women's husbands." Oscar Wilde. Also dead. Apparently none of the finest minds living today are alive anymore.

“Love sees sharply, hatred sees even more sharp, but Jealousy sees the sharpest for it is love and hate at the same time.” I don't really know who said this, but whoever the person is, I'm sure he or she is still alive, therefore one of the finest minds living today.

“Jealousy is all the fun you think they had.” Erica Jong. Who is still fucking alive, ha!

“A competent and self-confident person is incapable of jealousy in anything. Jealousy is invariably a symptom of neurotic insecurity.” Robert A. Heinlein. Famous dead pervert & sci-fi writer. Who I think was actually quite jealous of Arthur C Clarke's success. Heinlein, dude! You just called yourself incompetent & needy!

“Jealousy is the tribute mediocrity pays to genius.” Fulton J. Sheen. He's a dead Catholic dude, so was never even a finest mind, but it's a weird quote from a priest. So I like it.

As you can see, the topic is very appropriate to Valentine's Day, when we buy things for people we love or people we want to love or people we're supposed to love because we bought a marriage certificate & also made a "vow" before "God." As we look at the gifts - candies, flowers, hot oil, fruit, gift certificates, noodles, candleabras, hastily-scrawled poems - surely we feel jealousy for those who are lucky enough not to be in a relationship. & jealousy for the Hallmark corporation & the National Association of Florists, who make a killing that day.

Jealousy! It makes the day go round! Or something like that.

Preface To Jealousy: You Listen To OTHER Radio Shows?

I can't believe you. I thought we had something. Something real, between us, just us. I thought you were my listener & I was your deejay. I just thought... Now I guess you've proven me wrong. Now I guess I was just... Just...

Don't you turn this around on me! Of course I made radio shows before we met! I was on the radio, how could I not be making other radio shows? But all the listeners before you - they might have said they were listening - I might even have believed them - might have talked to them on the phone, taken a request once in a while - but it was never serious. They didn't listen every week. They were fickle, flip, inconsistent. They hurt me! You know when we met I was damaged!

But you - you told me you really listened. You said - I remember your exact words - you said, "I listen every week!" Do you remember the first time you tuned in? I knew you were listening. I was nervous, I tripped over my words more than I usually do. & then the phone rang & you called - & you won tickets to something! You weren't even expecting it! It's like fate wanted you to be my listener & me to be your deejay.

I wish I knew where it all went wrong. You can't tell me you're able to appreciate my show if you're listening to other radio shows. I bet you're even listening to online radio shows. I knew it! You're downloading podcasts!?! What sort of listener are you, anyway? Is there a loyal bone in your ear? How can you even tell the shows apart? See, that's where you protest too much! You're not a dedicated listener, you're a dilettante! I can't believe I once dedicated a show to you!

What are the other shows you listen to? You have to tell me! How can I know what I'm up against? How can I know what stole your attention away from me? Why won't you tell me? Of course it matters! God, it turns out you've kept secrets from me this entire time & you're still keeping secrets? Tell me now! Tell me everything! I can handle it!

I can't handle it. Just go. Just go. But. Can you listen Friday? It's a show about jealousy. Please? Please?

How The Mighty Have Been Grown!

As a child, I shunned exclamation points - found them too ostentatious, too obvious, too emotive, ultimately too phony. But not anymore! I think the exclamation point, once in its infancy, has finally grown up! Yes, it's the puberty of the exclamation point & be careful not to get any on you!

How do punctuations age? I hear you ask, & when you ask, you ask perhaps the middle-agest of the punctuations, which is the question mark. The question mark? The question mark.

By the way, many think the oldest of the world's punctuation is the period. The period. The period? No, it isn't! & it isn't our friend the comma, the comma, whose rhythm has echoed ours - the comma is in fact the only one of the punctuations that breathes as we do - or seems to.

No, the oldest of the punctuations is the apostrophe. The apostrophe's been around long because not only have humans been needing to ram words together as long as they've been needing to use words - 'tis no argument, don't insult me, you can't know, I won't have this, y'all - but they've also always been covetous & needed desperately to tell others what belongs to them. So the apostrophe's role is older than the stopping of a declaration.

As for the youngest of them all - those deformed freaks, the colon, the semicolon - well, no one believes they'll ever grow up. Leave them in their cribs.

So let's celebrate the terrible teens of the exclamation point! Let's be ridiculous & gay! For soon enough, the world will be quiet, & excitement will wane, & there will be no more shouts & hurrahs, & we will be energetic no more... But not today! Fuck you, future! I got me an exclamation point!

Hey! Here's something exciting! Last week's show about beatboxing is available now for your listening pleasure! You know you want to! It's really loud! Here's where it is! selfhelpradio.net! See you there!

13 Shows To Go!

Ach! Thirteen shows on KOOP radio left! That means it's roughly three months. I am sad. But I know what can cheer me up! Beatboxing!

One of the great things about Self Help Radio today is that NOT ONLY will you get to hear the great old & new beatboxers (DOug E Fresh to Rahzel), & NOT ONLY will you hear some songs that cleverly incorporate beatboxing, but AS AN ADDED BONUS AT NO COST TO YOU you'll get to hear my visit with MC Beat Daddy, where he teaches me the basics of beatboxing AND THAT'S NOT ALL I'll also be giving away beatboxing CD collections. Wow! Hey! Super! Freaky! Mommy!

So while it's sad for me to wind down my time on KOOP, it's glad for me to be able to have as much fun as I am planning to have for the next three months. Don't miss it! Today at 4:30 pm Texas time, live on the 91.7 frequency, & on the web at koop.org!

Eh Speak Up Sonny

Were I the more dynamic of the Self Help Radio sisters, I'd be announcing something new every day on this blog. I already try to follow something like a formula (not a baby formula) which not only helps me think of dumb stuff to write here, but also helps me organize my brain & remind me what day it is. Do you know the formula? Or would you rather play a game where you have to name television theme songs?

The formula, then:

MONDAY: Remind everyone that my show from Friday is available to be downloaded on the Self Help Radio website.
TUESDAY: Write something ridiculous as a "preface" to my next post "explaining" my theme.
WEDNESDAY: "Explain" my theme of the week.
FRIDAY: Countdown the shows left until I leave KOOP.

THURSDAY has no real purpose. I can maybe mention something like adding a new mix to the Self Help Radio Extra page, or link to something, but in general, this is Thursday: me saying not much.

Why can't I be the more dynamic of the Self Help Radio sisters? All the boys like her better, too. & if she did a radio show - well, you'd like it more. & Thursday would be "how to please your man in bed" day. I bet she has more then 52 ways to please her man. I should say "her men." She's a slut!

Instead, all I can say is I met MC Beat Daddy from Plano, Texas, & he taught me to beatbox. Results on the show tomorrow. Also I ate bad hummus last night. Oh, & I got three Enrico Caruso CDs on a whim. It's so fucking Thursday in here.

Whither Beatboxing?

Beatboxing! How ridiculous is that?

Not so ridiculous, my friend. There's a webpage out there which has been, it says, "representing & promoting the worldwide beatbox community since 1998." Beatboxers make records & people who make neat noises with their mouths star in "Police Academy" movies, if they're still being made & WHY AREN'T THEY STILL BEING MADE? Shouldn't someone be monitoring the whereabouts of Michael Winslow? Christ! Do I have to do everything myself?

I know, beatboxing is at best a fringe element of the hiphop community & at worst an annoying novelty, but my fascination with it resurfaced at some point last year - maybe I heard some beatboxing on a cut, or I was simply transported back to a time of childlike wonder at things like a fellow making simultaneous sounds with his mouth. & by the way, I am totally not being sexist here - I have no come across any female beatboxers. There are of course jazz women (like Ella Fitzgerald) who can scat, & scat is an obvious precursor to beatboxing, but I'm not doing a show about scat. I have only ninety minutes! I can't go back that far!

In any event, I decided someone should be paying attention to beatboxing. So I began to delve into the beatboxing world. Someone had to do it, & I have discovered that, because you're so damn lazy, I have to do everything myself.

I am not necessarily going to have only songs with prominent beatboxing, but also some beatboxing-related musics. Initially, I thought I might have to cut corners & play songs like Big Audio Dynamite's "C'mon Every Beatbox," to fill up space (& I love that song), but I have more than enough beatboxing to fill two hours if I had to. You know it.

Beatboxing! How awesome is that?!

Preface To Beatboxing: Hip Hop Dreams

I used to be more quick tongued than I currently am - I am older, obviously - much of my brain has been slowed by time & probably whiskey (mmm, whiskey) - but I remember when I was a teenager, as my little brother became an aficionado of the new "rap" scene (as he called it), I could make fun of MCs with dumb lyrics & even tried basic beatboxing. It was easy enough for me to "rap" stupid for enough time that my friend Russ told me I was a closet MC. That became my fake hiphop moniker: Closet MC.

I couldn't do it now. Tongue-twister lyrics that I sing to myself in the shower are hopelessly garbled. I find myself singing certain songs more slowly so I can wrap my teeth around them. I am a decrepit old bastard.

My little brother actually wanted to be an MC, though. To me, at the time, especially as I was starting to get into postpunk like Joy Division & the Smiths, hiphop seemed alien & dumb. All that bragging, all the overt sexuality, it was so unseemly, especially when Morrissey was being so humbly self-deprecating & the most songs I liked were about begging for a kiss you could never get, not dancing, sweating & having sex. What a naif I was!

I teased my brother about his ambitions, which is the nice way of saying I gave him a lot of shit. It didn't matter - we weren't very close by that point, & didn't want to be. He was out of high school & his posse was a bunch of neighborhood kids barely out of ninth grade. I once found a lyric sheet he had written - boy I wish I could remember his rap alias! - & it was boilerplate self-aggrandizement. I do wish he had recorded something. Maybe he did. But I never heard it.

I did record stuff, although it's mostly lost now, in a "band" which was my friend Russell on guitar (he'd add other instruments alone, later) & whomever we could shanghai into hanging out with us. All the lyrics I yelped were made up on the spot, usually to crack up Russell. He would sometimes suggest titles, & we'd go from there. One suggestion of his was a mocking bluesy tune called "Battering Ram" in which I, of course still a virgin, sang about my carnal prowess. If I remember the chorus right, it went something like:

I'm a battering ram,
I'm a battering ram,
I turn girls into spam,
Cause I'm a battering ram
I'm a battering ram,
I'm a battering ram,
I wonder who the hell I think I am

My favorite part was when, at the end, Russell interjected "His bedroom is an obstacle course," & I sang,

Watch it jump through the hoops
Do loop-de-loops
Battering, battering ram

In addition to a very insulting cover of "Sharp Dressed Man" & a shabby cover of "I Will Follow" (which I somehow made as creepy as possible by adding, "I'll follow you to your house - to your grandmother's house - I'll sneak in the bathroom"), we had songs with lovely titles like "Vandal With Me," "Officer Burrell Has Some Documents For You To Sign" & "Teenage Zombie."

None of this really has anything to do with hiphop of course. But what if I *had* pursued my hiphop dreams? Where were my friends who could beatbox? Alas, not in white Garland Texas in the mid-80s!

The Arsonist Is Caught!

In case you haven't heard, a former KOOP volunteer & programmer has been caught & confessed to starting the fire. I must admit, I am surprised it was that particular person, although his name was tossed around as a suspect.

The penalty for destroying what was the work of dozens of dedicated volunteers - him among them! - may be as little as two years in prison. I suppose I am admitting I am a bad person, but I wish he'd get the maximum - twenty years. He knew what he was doing when he set fire to KOOP - he knew he was spitting in the face of the sweat & toil of people with whom he was friends & colleagues. He knew he was destroying work that *none of them* got paid for. It seems like that should be taken into account when they sentence him.

I also hope he is not a little angry that his work was for naught - KOOP is still here, & a stronger station without him.

Enough of this! There are three things you can do to enjoy Gary's KOOP! All are available as we speak at selfhelpradio.net.

1) Listen to my subbing of Justin's excellent show The House Call. I hope I did it justice.

2) Listen to my subbing of Ear Candy, featuring a special guest appearance by a spaz named Leah.

3) Listen to last week's Self Help Radio, which was all about my anger about the person who started the fire... & look how much that show accomplished!

That's four hours of Gary. Please consult with your physician before listening to more than one show at a time.

14 Shows To Go!

That's right - KOOP is back on the air! & with it, the Self Help Radio countdown continues. Only fourteen more shows! Gasp! I'd better tidy up a bit!

The "fourteen shows" thing is a bit disingenuous, because there may be only fourteen Self Help Radios on KOOP left, but Self Help Radio is like a rash that cannot be treated with anything resembling powders or pharmaceuticals. You can't get rid of it. So it shall continue, either as a podcast or as some radio show somewhere else. May God have mercy on our souls.

As well, there's no law that says I can't sit in on other folks' shows when they are otherwise unavailable. So, today, you'll hear my indie rock it up on Justin's excellent The House Call, & I always hope I do him justice. Justin justice. Then, tomorrow, I'll indie pop it up on Ear Candy. So what should have been just ninety minutes of Gary on the radio has suddenly, inexplicably, unconscionably turned into four long hours. Think I'll crack? Think someone will need an EMT? Then tune the fuck in, yo.

Remember to maintain the rage at asshole arsonists by tuning in today either live on the 91.7 fm frequency or live online at koop.org. KOOP has been through another trial by fire & emerged more powerful. & we do it for our community. That includes you!

KOOP comes back, baby!

That's right, tomorrow - January 25, 2007 - KOOP will return to the air. Oh yes. Just in time for you to hear the last Self Help Radios you'll hear on KOOP. I'm sure that's why they chose Friday!

Here's a nice article about how much KOOP loves KVRX & vice versa. Those kids did a damned good job. I'm so proud of them! Now if they'd just learn to clean up after themselves... Kids today I swear.

So you'll get to hear Self Help Radio - & maybe Gary on other places on the station over the weekend. I'll let you know.

Meanwhile, if you'd prefer to listen to music NOW rather than reading a dumbass blog or waiting for tomorrow, you can visit the Self Help Radio Extra page because my January Extra Mix is up. I do this for you. Please don't make me feel weird about it.

Tomorrow - KOOP - the Return!

Whither Anger?

It's a strange, crippling condition, is anger, & I have probably been angry a lot of my life, borne of the helplessness of basic existence in a complex world.. A friend once told me she saw me as a lone soldier fighting a fight against pretty much everything, & although the image is interesting, surely she must have known that I'd get shot by friendly fire right away - even if I were the only person in the company.

I've been angry the last few weeks because of the stupid fucking person - the selfish or hateful or deluded or fucked-up or spiteful or whatever the hell he/she/they was/were - who burned down my dear community radio station. I don't believe in nonsense like karma & I don't believe in a hell, so I naturally want them to get a taste of justice while we can all be around to enjoy it. I think that, once they're caught, the Austin Fire Department & the Police should leave the person or persons responsible in a room with every KOOP volunteer allowed a few seconds with them. I would emerge with bruised knuckles.

Fuckers! Of course I'm angry! So the show this week will be soul-searching - songs about anger, with me talking about my anger. It'll be one of those occasions where Self Help Radio gets to be Gary Therapy. Maybe it'll help you, too.

Preface To The Angry Show: Is There A Place For Emotion In Music?

Music is, of course, first & foremost a cerebral pursuit, as we have always acknowledged, from the first writings of Professor Elvis Presley to the most recent - &, some say, the most difficult, as he invented a whole new scholastic language to dealing with music criticism - works of Dr. Shawn Carter. But recently, as the fourth deconstruction of popular music resulted in the demise of three record labels & the mass suicide of the Harvard Music School faculty, some people have begun to ask: but what if we made music with our hearts rather than our minds?

It is terribly easy to dismiss this as some kind of science fiction nonsense, but a small group of younger students has begun suggesting that the way a singer sings & perhaps the sound of the music might actually echo & create emotions in the listener. Appearing in smaller journals & also in unofficial publications called "fanzines," these "punks" (as they call themselves) have turned off their minds & started dancing (!) & singing along (!!) to the music. Some have also asked that the music be performed live (!!!) by groups of people who stand in front of them.

It hasn't taken too long for this strange, nearly heretical thinking to find its way to the establishment. Some of the old guard - the songwriters whose music could never be accused of have emotion in it - like Sir Paul McCartney & Brian Wilson - have waved the stories away as fabrication. Others, however, seem intrigued -& have in fact found themselves in places called "clubs" where there are actual "bands" playing music on stages. A few of those have managed to stay through the entire "show" without needing medical assistance.

It may be too early to tell if this is in fact some strange derangement caused by the intense intellectual experience of music - there are those who rue the day music was allowed to be shared with everyone, when it was freed from the academies, churches & halls of power - or if this is truly some revolution in the way human beings interact with & enjoy music. Only time will tell.

Be My Guest

It's a nasty day in Austin - not cold, but rainy & icky. I hope this isn't a premonition about my fortieth year! I can make one prediction - there will be good news soon about KOOP's return to the airwaves. I will tell you as soon as I know something.

Meanwhile, I am sitting in my slightly cold house & daydreaming today that it's now 1997 & I have decided that I want YOU to sign my guestbook. It's a guestbook! Do you remember when everyone had a guestbook! It's over a decade later & now I have one! Oh boy!

Go leave a message about Self Help Radio. Or about something else. Here's the link. I expect your eloquence will knock me out.