What the word that means before the thing that is before the thing that is last? Like, the last thing is the ultimate thing, which always amuses me when I see a Steely Dan "greatest hits" record which says "The ULTIMATE Collection," as if (oh, if only God were good) it was going to be the very last Steely Dan collection ever. Alas, it won't be. "Ultimate" has become a word that just sounds good so it must be cool. Anyway, before ultimate is penultimate, which means, basically, next to last. As in, "I was the penultimate pick by the popular kids for the dodgeball team. But Gary was their ultimate choice." (They used to say that to make me feel better. Twelve seconds later, I was the first kids "out" by getting beaned by a filthy, smelly, sweaty ball to the groin.) But there is no word, as far as I know, for "next to next to last." But if there was one...
My show is the [insert nonexistent word meaning "next to next to last" here] show of KOOP's Fall Membership Drive, & boy am I nervous about it. It starts in about two hours, &, while I am convinced it's an excellent show, of the nerdy & drooly quality that I love in all music shows, I know how fickle radio listeners are, & I know that some people just can't afford it. It still makes me nervous. I love KOOP like I love cheese, so you can imagine how high the stakes are for me.
& thusly. I present, for one last time, the link to the page on the KOOP web site where you can make a pledge & become a member of KOOP. I hope you listen, I hope you like, & I hope I move some people enough to help out a unique & utterly wonderful experiment in community-run radio like KOOP.
But ugh. My stomach is killing me.
Friday, October 13, 2006
Thursday, October 12, 2006
I Am Daydreaming About Law & Order
You think I am kidding, but I'm not.
A few years ago, maybe half my life ago, I was in love & there were bunnies who held my held my hand & I sang each morning when I woke, & it was special song, not unlike those cell phone rings that only young people can hear, except my songs were beautiful to people who were in love, & to those who weren't, it induced fits of nausea & vomiting which are more common to those who have radiation poisoning.
Anyway, it ended (as it does), & I was a broken person. While I have always been a hungry-to-voracious reader, I found that people were constantly writing about relationships. Either the beginning or the ending, but any talk of relationships in any form - poetry, plays, novels - it made me physically ill & plunged me more deeply into unhappiness than before. (Also, the products were misleading. I tried to learn what we talk about when we talk about love in Raymond Carver's book, "What We Talk About When We Talk About Love," but I could never figure out what exactly he was talking about, & I realized that I just want to hear any more damn talk about love, goddamnit!)
So, visiting my moms, I picked up a Sherlock Holmes collection by Conan Doyle, &, reading through it, I realized, "Hey! Sherlock never talks about love! He fucking hates it!" So I began to devour detective literature in earnest. Because there, even if love somehow plays a part in the murder/crime/whatever, it's the crime that counts. You can ignore the syrupy lovers. (& in the hard-boiled stuff, like Spillane, it's more about sex than love.)
I was so happy when, about seven or eight years ago, I discovered Law & Order on TV. I liked the fact that the shows were plot-driven, that a lot of the "crime solving" was in the police procedural vein, & especially that, like in real life, you found out details of the lives of the main characters incidentally. (Incidentally, I love Vincent D'Onofio's character in the the L&O: Criminal Intent show mainly because of his Sherlock Holmesian qualities, which some people don't like.) (Also, I rediscovered the brilliance of Columbo & appreciate it on a very similar level.)
I am a much happier person now, though I never quite regained the big heart I had in that early relationship that went bad, but I more than ever love mystery stories & good tv crime drama. That's not why I was daydreaming about Law & Order today, though. It's even more sinister.
I was thinking how much I truly like the characters, how sad I am when they "die" or "move on," & how sometimes the fate of these fictional folks moves me much more than people in my real life. If I "knew" the fictional characters in their fictional worlds, I'm not sure they'd like me very much, but that's also true about a lot of the musicians I deeply admire. (I have a feeling I'd spend most of my time with Dylan restraining myself from punching him. & I think John Lennon would think I was a douche.) What all this means is that I spent some time today, usually on smoke breaks, thinking about people who aren't real & comparing them to people who are, but whom I don't generally care about as much as the made-up characters on the tv.
This has nothing whatsoever to do with Self Help Radio, of course. It's just a thought I am having, a snapshot of my day. But it might be an insight into my obsessive nature with regards to music - because there are songs that have moved me more powerfully than events "in real life." I feel a fundamental truth in human creation - even if I don't get that a lot from regular ol' humans.
Did I mention KOOP's Fall 2006 Membership Drive? We have two more days to go. Please think about giving something to the station - also a creation - that I dearly love. As well, if you can do it during my show from 4:30 to 6:00pm CST tomorrow, it would be cool. The toll free number is 1-888-917-5667.
A few years ago, maybe half my life ago, I was in love & there were bunnies who held my held my hand & I sang each morning when I woke, & it was special song, not unlike those cell phone rings that only young people can hear, except my songs were beautiful to people who were in love, & to those who weren't, it induced fits of nausea & vomiting which are more common to those who have radiation poisoning.
Anyway, it ended (as it does), & I was a broken person. While I have always been a hungry-to-voracious reader, I found that people were constantly writing about relationships. Either the beginning or the ending, but any talk of relationships in any form - poetry, plays, novels - it made me physically ill & plunged me more deeply into unhappiness than before. (Also, the products were misleading. I tried to learn what we talk about when we talk about love in Raymond Carver's book, "What We Talk About When We Talk About Love," but I could never figure out what exactly he was talking about, & I realized that I just want to hear any more damn talk about love, goddamnit!)
So, visiting my moms, I picked up a Sherlock Holmes collection by Conan Doyle, &, reading through it, I realized, "Hey! Sherlock never talks about love! He fucking hates it!" So I began to devour detective literature in earnest. Because there, even if love somehow plays a part in the murder/crime/whatever, it's the crime that counts. You can ignore the syrupy lovers. (& in the hard-boiled stuff, like Spillane, it's more about sex than love.)
I was so happy when, about seven or eight years ago, I discovered Law & Order on TV. I liked the fact that the shows were plot-driven, that a lot of the "crime solving" was in the police procedural vein, & especially that, like in real life, you found out details of the lives of the main characters incidentally. (Incidentally, I love Vincent D'Onofio's character in the the L&O: Criminal Intent show mainly because of his Sherlock Holmesian qualities, which some people don't like.) (Also, I rediscovered the brilliance of Columbo & appreciate it on a very similar level.)
I am a much happier person now, though I never quite regained the big heart I had in that early relationship that went bad, but I more than ever love mystery stories & good tv crime drama. That's not why I was daydreaming about Law & Order today, though. It's even more sinister.
I was thinking how much I truly like the characters, how sad I am when they "die" or "move on," & how sometimes the fate of these fictional folks moves me much more than people in my real life. If I "knew" the fictional characters in their fictional worlds, I'm not sure they'd like me very much, but that's also true about a lot of the musicians I deeply admire. (I have a feeling I'd spend most of my time with Dylan restraining myself from punching him. & I think John Lennon would think I was a douche.) What all this means is that I spent some time today, usually on smoke breaks, thinking about people who aren't real & comparing them to people who are, but whom I don't generally care about as much as the made-up characters on the tv.
This has nothing whatsoever to do with Self Help Radio, of course. It's just a thought I am having, a snapshot of my day. But it might be an insight into my obsessive nature with regards to music - because there are songs that have moved me more powerfully than events "in real life." I feel a fundamental truth in human creation - even if I don't get that a lot from regular ol' humans.
Did I mention KOOP's Fall 2006 Membership Drive? We have two more days to go. Please think about giving something to the station - also a creation - that I dearly love. As well, if you can do it during my show from 4:30 to 6:00pm CST tomorrow, it would be cool. The toll free number is 1-888-917-5667.
Wednesday, October 11, 2006
Whither Sampling?
Oh, really, why the hell not? The idea of extremely catchy tunes - some with the music itself sampled - with silly samples - from old movies, from old instructional records, from other songs, from unknown obscure sources - & sometimes with some cool-ass turntablism skills - that idea, played on the radio, should be very fun. Shouldn't it?
Well, I think so. & it's my show.
The first time I heard a sampled tune was probably the eminently ridiculous "Mr Jaws," which, it turns out, was made by the same folks who created a sampled tune from the fifties called "Flying Saucer" (which I will in fact play on Friday). As a kid about three years away from discovering Dr. Demento, I was charmed. I tried to do the same thing myself - writing fake questions for songs I owned to insert into. Not so easy! & a little time consuming. & I soon gave it up to play with my Star Wars figures. But a seed was planted.
When I started to become interested in music that somehow spoke to me (as opposed to music that made me laugh) (look, I was a sullen teenager who identified with Robert Smith & Morrissey far more than Barnes & Barnes or Weird Al) (besides, there was smarter music that was funny & yet actually meant something in my future), I forget about the whole "sampling" thing. Until, of course, my sorry little white boy ass was exposed for the first time to hip hop.
What! These guys aren't playing anything! They're using drum machines & sampling songs by James Brown. Never mind that I, a person naturally geared toward the verbal, completely missed the rapping element of the MC, or even the delivery - the moment that turned me around was hearing the Bomb Squad's production on Public Enemy records. Sampled sounds, meticulously crafted, making them more than the sum of their (borrowed) parts. True musical collage. Extraordinary. & funky.
(I won't be playing any PE Friday, though. Why? Because:)
Then came "Pump Up The Volume." The lyrics are all samples! Listen to that! & for a little while, until money entered the picture, there was some neat stuff coming out. Nowadays, it's harder to do that, since you have to clear samples, & some people want lots of money for the little pieces of the songs artists might want to use.
I probably don't own a lot of it, but the stuff I like - from Coldcut to the Avalanches, from the Books to David Byrne & Brian Eno's work in the early 80's - will be stuff I play this Friday. I am calling it "A Brief History Of Sampling," because it'll be ninety minutes long & I don't feel I have an exhaustive collection. But it should be fun fun fun. & also you can dance. & do that thing you do when you hear a sampled sound & you're like, "Christ, what movie/song/TV show/other did that sample come from?"
I should also mention that show will be on the very last day of KOOP's Fall Membership Drive. So if you listen & like, please give.
Well, I think so. & it's my show.
The first time I heard a sampled tune was probably the eminently ridiculous "Mr Jaws," which, it turns out, was made by the same folks who created a sampled tune from the fifties called "Flying Saucer" (which I will in fact play on Friday). As a kid about three years away from discovering Dr. Demento, I was charmed. I tried to do the same thing myself - writing fake questions for songs I owned to insert into. Not so easy! & a little time consuming. & I soon gave it up to play with my Star Wars figures. But a seed was planted.
When I started to become interested in music that somehow spoke to me (as opposed to music that made me laugh) (look, I was a sullen teenager who identified with Robert Smith & Morrissey far more than Barnes & Barnes or Weird Al) (besides, there was smarter music that was funny & yet actually meant something in my future), I forget about the whole "sampling" thing. Until, of course, my sorry little white boy ass was exposed for the first time to hip hop.
What! These guys aren't playing anything! They're using drum machines & sampling songs by James Brown. Never mind that I, a person naturally geared toward the verbal, completely missed the rapping element of the MC, or even the delivery - the moment that turned me around was hearing the Bomb Squad's production on Public Enemy records. Sampled sounds, meticulously crafted, making them more than the sum of their (borrowed) parts. True musical collage. Extraordinary. & funky.
(I won't be playing any PE Friday, though. Why? Because:)
Then came "Pump Up The Volume." The lyrics are all samples! Listen to that! & for a little while, until money entered the picture, there was some neat stuff coming out. Nowadays, it's harder to do that, since you have to clear samples, & some people want lots of money for the little pieces of the songs artists might want to use.
I probably don't own a lot of it, but the stuff I like - from Coldcut to the Avalanches, from the Books to David Byrne & Brian Eno's work in the early 80's - will be stuff I play this Friday. I am calling it "A Brief History Of Sampling," because it'll be ninety minutes long & I don't feel I have an exhaustive collection. But it should be fun fun fun. & also you can dance. & do that thing you do when you hear a sampled sound & you're like, "Christ, what movie/song/TV show/other did that sample come from?"
I should also mention that show will be on the very last day of KOOP's Fall Membership Drive. So if you listen & like, please give.
Tuesday, October 10, 2006
Preface To A Brief History Of Sampling: I Stole All The Letters I Use In This Blog
Do I have to tell you over & over? KOOP is having its Fall Membership Drive right now. Go support KOOP!
This Friday, for my second & final Membership Drive show of the year, I am going to play lots of silly songs that have either samples of people talking, samples of music, samples of samples, or all of the above. I'll have a couple of songs that predate the year of my birth, but most of them will come from the last twenty-five years or so. Why is that? Because the first digital sampler was released in 1975. That's essential. Before that, it was a lot of cutting up & pasting of tape.
I myself was sampled once, & this is definitely not the beginning of a story about some sex shop I visited in Copenhagen, nor is it a story of being cannibalized. Actually, I think I've been sampled more than once. I guess that comes with being on the radio. People can tape you, they can edit you, they can mix you up. I fully expect one day, with all the talking I do, to hear myself talking very audaciously about something terribly disgusting. That would rule.
I'm a little tired & so can't think of any funny lies about sampling. I guess sampling applies mainly to the music/sound world, so if I "sampled" anything in print, it'd just be plagiarism. A lot of the problems people have with sampling is related to the concept of claiming someone else's writing is your own - surely it's the same with music!
& so it is. But the truth is, the stuff I'll play interests me because it's creative, not derivative. Nowadays, a lot of musical artists will basically sample an entire song, usually a popular song, even if they sing or rap something different over it. Far more difficult is to do something truly creative, like what Danger Mouse did with Jay Z & the Beatles. I can't play any of that, though - that's illegal!
I am very amused & excited by songs in which the normal verbal parts are replaced with samples. That's a lot of what I'll play Friday. But why a show called "A Brief History Of Sampling"? Ask me tomorrow.
This Friday, for my second & final Membership Drive show of the year, I am going to play lots of silly songs that have either samples of people talking, samples of music, samples of samples, or all of the above. I'll have a couple of songs that predate the year of my birth, but most of them will come from the last twenty-five years or so. Why is that? Because the first digital sampler was released in 1975. That's essential. Before that, it was a lot of cutting up & pasting of tape.
I myself was sampled once, & this is definitely not the beginning of a story about some sex shop I visited in Copenhagen, nor is it a story of being cannibalized. Actually, I think I've been sampled more than once. I guess that comes with being on the radio. People can tape you, they can edit you, they can mix you up. I fully expect one day, with all the talking I do, to hear myself talking very audaciously about something terribly disgusting. That would rule.
I'm a little tired & so can't think of any funny lies about sampling. I guess sampling applies mainly to the music/sound world, so if I "sampled" anything in print, it'd just be plagiarism. A lot of the problems people have with sampling is related to the concept of claiming someone else's writing is your own - surely it's the same with music!
& so it is. But the truth is, the stuff I'll play interests me because it's creative, not derivative. Nowadays, a lot of musical artists will basically sample an entire song, usually a popular song, even if they sing or rap something different over it. Far more difficult is to do something truly creative, like what Danger Mouse did with Jay Z & the Beatles. I can't play any of that, though - that's illegal!
I am very amused & excited by songs in which the normal verbal parts are replaced with samples. That's a lot of what I'll play Friday. But why a show called "A Brief History Of Sampling"? Ask me tomorrow.
Monday, October 09, 2006
Velvet Underground Haiku Wrap-Up
I must apologize, because in the heat of the Membership Drive, where it's important to get as much information about supporting the station as possible, along with the regular stellar mix of music, I forget, this past Friday, to read your haikus. I am so sorry.
But wait! Did someone say Membership Drive? That's right, KOOP's Fall Membership Drive continues. Please give something to the greatest radio station ever in the history of radio I kid you not baby.
& thank you to those who pledged their support to my show Friday.
Now, the unannounced winners:
FOURTH PLACE: Daisy
Please tell me, Lou Reed
What’s that John Cale fellow like?
He is so dreamy.
THIRD PLACE: Bill
Give me sex & drugs
Help me to understand them
Like the Velvets did
SECOND PLACE: Lou
When I am hurting
When I’m lonesome, need a fix,
I know who to call
FIRST PLACE: Sally
Behind ev’ry door
People do desperate things
Velvet Underground
This week I'll be sampling (ha ha) a few musics that are important in the history of sampling. You can always write a haiku about it. If you want.
But wait! Did someone say Membership Drive? That's right, KOOP's Fall Membership Drive continues. Please give something to the greatest radio station ever in the history of radio I kid you not baby.
& thank you to those who pledged their support to my show Friday.
Now, the unannounced winners:
FOURTH PLACE: Daisy
Please tell me, Lou Reed
What’s that John Cale fellow like?
He is so dreamy.
THIRD PLACE: Bill
Give me sex & drugs
Help me to understand them
Like the Velvets did
SECOND PLACE: Lou
When I am hurting
When I’m lonesome, need a fix,
I know who to call
FIRST PLACE: Sally
Behind ev’ry door
People do desperate things
Velvet Underground
This week I'll be sampling (ha ha) a few musics that are important in the history of sampling. You can always write a haiku about it. If you want.
Friday, October 06, 2006
Fear Of Membership Drive
I know, I'm repeating myself - also, I'm repeating myself - but I can't keep from saying that KOOP, the bestest radio station in Austin & one of the last truly independent radio stations in the United States, is having its Fall Membership Drive right now. Please think about contributing. Because once you think about it, you'll want to contribute.
I am writing this mere hours (less than four) before my first Membership Drive show of the season. The title of this post doesn't mean "fear of those long, chatty weeks when a listener-sponsored radio station begs for cash." Oh no. It means "fear on the part of the programmer who has to beg their dear listeners for cash." Because it scares the bejeebies out of me. My stomach is twisting into slow knots & I occasionally feel like sitting down & catching my breath - especially when I am sitting down & breathing normally.
Oh boo hoo! you say. The dude who's got his own radio show is worried that no one will support it! Well I wish I had your problems, brother.
Boy, you're unsympathetic. The reason that I am nervous may well be based somewhat on my own ego - I do want you to love my show more than you love your pets - but more than that, I love the radio station my show is on. Not the least for being a place where a completely obsessive & utterly mush-brained fellow like myself can have a radio show.
KOOP (pronounced, in case you didn't know, either with the letters spelled out - K-O-O-P - or as an alternate spelling for "cooperative" shortened - KO-OP) (& not like "coop," although sometimes one can feel mighty cooped up in there behind the mic) is a small affair, subsisting on an annual budget which is the equivalent of the same budget a commercial radio station has for booze & floozies for its Board of Directors. We broadcast at 3000 watts & over the Internet, & we compete in the Austin market & with every other Internet radio station in the world. We get some money from underwriting by local businesses, & some from grants, but the majority of the day-to-day expenses we have are paid by the two Membership Drives we have per year.
My show is ninety minutes long. That's a small fraction of the time we're on the air - KOOP has some seventy programs - but I want to be able to pull my own weight financially. That's a lot of pressure for a guy who's probably already in the short queue for "Young Heart Attack &/or Stroke."
In addition, I confess I am a terrible salesperson. I always have been. Willy Loman could run circles around me. I've known this since middle school when, in 8th grade, for a National Honor Club type of organization, I refused to sell M&M's to raise money for the organization. Which took a lot of stones for my 13 year old self. I was a shy kid, mostly terrified of the world, but knew deep in my heart that I couldn't sell drugs to a junkie, & stood up for myself. The teacher sponsors, of course, beat me up & took my lunch money as payment.
But it should be easier - shouldn't it? - since I'll be doing what I'm always doing - playing great music & blabbing on the radio. I'm still nervous before a show - 12 years on - anyway. But it somehow isn't. No, I'm not crying. Shut up.
Don't feel sorry for me, laying out my insecurities on my obscure blog. I'm just letting you know: it may be tough for you, with your budget & the number of non-profits vying for your support, to decide to give money to a tiny radio station. I appreciate that. But since the programmers at stations like KOOP are real human beings, not Clear Channel-brand corporate music robots, we have some jitters too. Do with that knowledge what you will.
I'm going to go throw up now.
I am writing this mere hours (less than four) before my first Membership Drive show of the season. The title of this post doesn't mean "fear of those long, chatty weeks when a listener-sponsored radio station begs for cash." Oh no. It means "fear on the part of the programmer who has to beg their dear listeners for cash." Because it scares the bejeebies out of me. My stomach is twisting into slow knots & I occasionally feel like sitting down & catching my breath - especially when I am sitting down & breathing normally.
Oh boo hoo! you say. The dude who's got his own radio show is worried that no one will support it! Well I wish I had your problems, brother.
Boy, you're unsympathetic. The reason that I am nervous may well be based somewhat on my own ego - I do want you to love my show more than you love your pets - but more than that, I love the radio station my show is on. Not the least for being a place where a completely obsessive & utterly mush-brained fellow like myself can have a radio show.
KOOP (pronounced, in case you didn't know, either with the letters spelled out - K-O-O-P - or as an alternate spelling for "cooperative" shortened - KO-OP) (& not like "coop," although sometimes one can feel mighty cooped up in there behind the mic) is a small affair, subsisting on an annual budget which is the equivalent of the same budget a commercial radio station has for booze & floozies for its Board of Directors. We broadcast at 3000 watts & over the Internet, & we compete in the Austin market & with every other Internet radio station in the world. We get some money from underwriting by local businesses, & some from grants, but the majority of the day-to-day expenses we have are paid by the two Membership Drives we have per year.
My show is ninety minutes long. That's a small fraction of the time we're on the air - KOOP has some seventy programs - but I want to be able to pull my own weight financially. That's a lot of pressure for a guy who's probably already in the short queue for "Young Heart Attack &/or Stroke."
In addition, I confess I am a terrible salesperson. I always have been. Willy Loman could run circles around me. I've known this since middle school when, in 8th grade, for a National Honor Club type of organization, I refused to sell M&M's to raise money for the organization. Which took a lot of stones for my 13 year old self. I was a shy kid, mostly terrified of the world, but knew deep in my heart that I couldn't sell drugs to a junkie, & stood up for myself. The teacher sponsors, of course, beat me up & took my lunch money as payment.
But it should be easier - shouldn't it? - since I'll be doing what I'm always doing - playing great music & blabbing on the radio. I'm still nervous before a show - 12 years on - anyway. But it somehow isn't. No, I'm not crying. Shut up.
Don't feel sorry for me, laying out my insecurities on my obscure blog. I'm just letting you know: it may be tough for you, with your budget & the number of non-profits vying for your support, to decide to give money to a tiny radio station. I appreciate that. But since the programmers at stations like KOOP are real human beings, not Clear Channel-brand corporate music robots, we have some jitters too. Do with that knowledge what you will.
I'm going to go throw up now.
Wednesday, October 04, 2006
Whither The Velvet Underground?
Hey! There's a Membership Drive going on at Austin's best radio station! You need to be involved! You need to contribute! If only because they're the sort of station that puts Self Help Radio on the air.
Speaking of Membership Drives, I recall one time when I asked a former KOOP programmer if he were going to do anything special for the Drive. He did a show that claimed to feature "one hundred years of African-American music," but mainly he spun funk & hip-hop. His response was, "Nah. During the Pledge Drive, I just give the listeners the gravy." Meaning he played the popular stuff to encourage people to pledge.
It seems a good idea - but my show isn't really about a specific genre or time period or something like that. It's a freeform show with boundaries - & those boundaries happen to be the themes I (or sometimes a listener) come up with. I do it for a lot of reasons - to keep myself guessing, to keep myself amused, to keep you amused, to take advantage of my unruly record collection. After all, if you just want the popular stuff, you know where to go: commercial, satellite or internet radio will give you 80's stations, classic rock stations, cool jazz stations, whatever. They generally (but not always) are programmed by someone other than the person talking on the air - if there's a person talking at all. I think they lack heart, they lack soul, they lack something human - but you might not be looking for that, so I respect your choice.
But I do want to make my Membership Drive shows special, so recently I've been trying to give listeners "the gravy," but with something of a twist (twisted gravy? Jesus, Gary, your metaphors!). Last spring, I presented a tribute to David Bowie containing not a single David Bowie recording - but instead with his songs covered by others (to show how his own work is absorbed & translated) & songs either mimicking him or celebrating him. It seemed to go over well. (By the way, you can listen to that show here.)
This time around, I tried to think about an artist beloved in the same way Bowie is. Some artists, of course, are a little too easy - Dylan & the Beatles come to mind - & some are painfully hard - I love Elvis Costello, but good covers of Elvis Costello songs are harder to find that someone who can pass a lie detector test in the current administration. Asking people informally, I found there was one group that seemed to have a devoted listener base, a group of discriminating music lovers who held them in very high esteem indeed. That group was, of course, the Velvet Underground.
After several weeks of listening to a lot of VU covers, I am impressed how far & wide the echoes of that band, which seemed to struggle so during its lifetime, have spread. Someone once said, "Not a lot of people bought the Velvet Underground's first album, but the ones who did formed a band." I would also add, "The bands who bought & paid attention to all the albums of the Velvet Underground learned everything they needed to know about writing good songs."
& here I am, giving it a go. Ninety minutes (minus the obligatory airbreaks asking for your cash to help the station) of bands singing VU songs the way they sung them in the shower, with tracks covered from the first album to the last, & a couple of songs about the band & its members in-between. How can it go wrong?
We'll see you Friday as I pay tribute to one of America's greatest bands, the Velvet Underground. Please listen & please think about helping KOOP out with your support.
Speaking of Membership Drives, I recall one time when I asked a former KOOP programmer if he were going to do anything special for the Drive. He did a show that claimed to feature "one hundred years of African-American music," but mainly he spun funk & hip-hop. His response was, "Nah. During the Pledge Drive, I just give the listeners the gravy." Meaning he played the popular stuff to encourage people to pledge.
It seems a good idea - but my show isn't really about a specific genre or time period or something like that. It's a freeform show with boundaries - & those boundaries happen to be the themes I (or sometimes a listener) come up with. I do it for a lot of reasons - to keep myself guessing, to keep myself amused, to keep you amused, to take advantage of my unruly record collection. After all, if you just want the popular stuff, you know where to go: commercial, satellite or internet radio will give you 80's stations, classic rock stations, cool jazz stations, whatever. They generally (but not always) are programmed by someone other than the person talking on the air - if there's a person talking at all. I think they lack heart, they lack soul, they lack something human - but you might not be looking for that, so I respect your choice.
But I do want to make my Membership Drive shows special, so recently I've been trying to give listeners "the gravy," but with something of a twist (twisted gravy? Jesus, Gary, your metaphors!). Last spring, I presented a tribute to David Bowie containing not a single David Bowie recording - but instead with his songs covered by others (to show how his own work is absorbed & translated) & songs either mimicking him or celebrating him. It seemed to go over well. (By the way, you can listen to that show here.)
This time around, I tried to think about an artist beloved in the same way Bowie is. Some artists, of course, are a little too easy - Dylan & the Beatles come to mind - & some are painfully hard - I love Elvis Costello, but good covers of Elvis Costello songs are harder to find that someone who can pass a lie detector test in the current administration. Asking people informally, I found there was one group that seemed to have a devoted listener base, a group of discriminating music lovers who held them in very high esteem indeed. That group was, of course, the Velvet Underground.
After several weeks of listening to a lot of VU covers, I am impressed how far & wide the echoes of that band, which seemed to struggle so during its lifetime, have spread. Someone once said, "Not a lot of people bought the Velvet Underground's first album, but the ones who did formed a band." I would also add, "The bands who bought & paid attention to all the albums of the Velvet Underground learned everything they needed to know about writing good songs."
& here I am, giving it a go. Ninety minutes (minus the obligatory airbreaks asking for your cash to help the station) of bands singing VU songs the way they sung them in the shower, with tracks covered from the first album to the last, & a couple of songs about the band & its members in-between. How can it go wrong?
We'll see you Friday as I pay tribute to one of America's greatest bands, the Velvet Underground. Please listen & please think about helping KOOP out with your support.
Tuesday, October 03, 2006
Preface to the Velvet Underground Tribute Show: The Time I Met John Cale, Lou Reed Watched Scornfully
Before I begin another story full of lies, I want to say again: The KOOP Membership Drive is happening now. Please give generously. Please give painfully. Please give thoughtlessly. Just please give.
What can I say about the Velvet Underground that hasn't already been written about by self-important critics & fans for over thirty years now? Really, nothing. They're great. They're influential. They looked amazing in black. They took more drugs & had more sleazy lifestyles than your average congressional intern. But more than anything else, what affects me most about them are two things I really appreciate about unbelievably great music:
1) It's timeless. You can play a Velvet Underground song to someone from age ten to age ten-squared, & it sounds as if it were made yesterday.
2) It has an emotional center. This may seem weird description of a song's character, but so much music may be emotive, or may have sparks of the things that makes rock & roll great (sex & death, desire & pain) but it might just be an outburst rather than a sustained emotional experience. Think of "Pale Blue Eyes." It's certainly lovely, with a catchy melody, but deep down the song is about longing, gratitude & guilt. How many songs that you love feel & seem so three-dimensional?
Also, though there are some gaping holes in "Loaded," the four albums always seem more than the sum of their parts, & until John Cale left, you couldn't really tell where Lou Reed left off & John Cale began, & among the majority of their oeuvre, you can never get rid of the beating joy of Moe Tucker or the sturdy backbone of Sterling Morrison. (& later, of course, you find it wearying to scratch the bugbite itch of Doug Yule.)
But now: the lies.
So I met John Cale in a bar in Barbados (he was working out with barbells, & I had been barred from my favorite honky tonk on the island, the Bar None) &, since I was a fresh-faced nineteen-year-old who knew all the words to "Fear Is A Man's Best Friend," we got very friendly & started discussing the merits of Welshmen & homosexuality. I myself was starstruck, & also John Cale had banged my knee with a barbell, so you could say I was Calestruck as well.
John Cale - & maybe no one knows this - is a master hypnotist who can put you under faster than you can recite the story behind "The Gift." After seventeen "Island Specials" - basically just rum drunk from a hollowed-out grapefruit - he began to tell me what he called "the secret" - the secret, I supposed, to success, to rock genius, to being tall with a cool Welsh accent. I must admit I wasn't much of a drinker back then, so either I was hypnotized or I was trying desperately to keep the world from spinning me like a top, because, while I listened intently & deeply wanted to know "the secret," I was easily distracted by a disapproving grunt from the back of the bar.
Omigod! It was Lou Reed! He was dressed all in black, with big black sunglasses covering his chiseled, Muppet-off-the-junk face. John Cale looked a little surprised, then turned back to me. "He's always around," he told me cheerfully, "he doesn't want anyone else to know 'the secret.'"
Lou Reed came at John Cale slowly, a chain of some kind produced quickly from a pocket in his black leather jacket. John Cale simply stood up, revealing a sturdy, well-worn snooker cue. It looked as if things would be bad. Through my fuzzy head I could hear words & phrases muttered by both, angry, bloodthirsty: "Traitor!" "Producer!" "Junkie!" "Robot!" "Andy always liked me better!" "Nico always hated you!"
I confess, I tried to stand & say, "Gentlemen, please. You are giants in the world of music. Your influence continues, ripples you started in the late sixties overturn entire genres to this day. Please don't fight! Please, for the love of all that is good & pure, put down your weapons & put away your differences. The world needs you!"
As I say, I tried to stand, but instead I fell, & my speech came out like a gurgle (along with two of my teeth) as I landed face-first on the wooden floor.
I didn't get a chance to see what happened next, as I woke up the next day, back in my lonesome bedroom in Austin. How I got home I don't know, but I was relieved to learn that neither Lou Reed nor John Cale lost their lives that night. Instead, within a year, the two had begun working together, recording "Songs For Drella" &, for a short time, reuniting the Velvets to tour. & I'd like to think maybe I had a hand in it.
What can I say about the Velvet Underground that hasn't already been written about by self-important critics & fans for over thirty years now? Really, nothing. They're great. They're influential. They looked amazing in black. They took more drugs & had more sleazy lifestyles than your average congressional intern. But more than anything else, what affects me most about them are two things I really appreciate about unbelievably great music:
1) It's timeless. You can play a Velvet Underground song to someone from age ten to age ten-squared, & it sounds as if it were made yesterday.
2) It has an emotional center. This may seem weird description of a song's character, but so much music may be emotive, or may have sparks of the things that makes rock & roll great (sex & death, desire & pain) but it might just be an outburst rather than a sustained emotional experience. Think of "Pale Blue Eyes." It's certainly lovely, with a catchy melody, but deep down the song is about longing, gratitude & guilt. How many songs that you love feel & seem so three-dimensional?
Also, though there are some gaping holes in "Loaded," the four albums always seem more than the sum of their parts, & until John Cale left, you couldn't really tell where Lou Reed left off & John Cale began, & among the majority of their oeuvre, you can never get rid of the beating joy of Moe Tucker or the sturdy backbone of Sterling Morrison. (& later, of course, you find it wearying to scratch the bugbite itch of Doug Yule.)
But now: the lies.
So I met John Cale in a bar in Barbados (he was working out with barbells, & I had been barred from my favorite honky tonk on the island, the Bar None) &, since I was a fresh-faced nineteen-year-old who knew all the words to "Fear Is A Man's Best Friend," we got very friendly & started discussing the merits of Welshmen & homosexuality. I myself was starstruck, & also John Cale had banged my knee with a barbell, so you could say I was Calestruck as well.
John Cale - & maybe no one knows this - is a master hypnotist who can put you under faster than you can recite the story behind "The Gift." After seventeen "Island Specials" - basically just rum drunk from a hollowed-out grapefruit - he began to tell me what he called "the secret" - the secret, I supposed, to success, to rock genius, to being tall with a cool Welsh accent. I must admit I wasn't much of a drinker back then, so either I was hypnotized or I was trying desperately to keep the world from spinning me like a top, because, while I listened intently & deeply wanted to know "the secret," I was easily distracted by a disapproving grunt from the back of the bar.
Omigod! It was Lou Reed! He was dressed all in black, with big black sunglasses covering his chiseled, Muppet-off-the-junk face. John Cale looked a little surprised, then turned back to me. "He's always around," he told me cheerfully, "he doesn't want anyone else to know 'the secret.'"
Lou Reed came at John Cale slowly, a chain of some kind produced quickly from a pocket in his black leather jacket. John Cale simply stood up, revealing a sturdy, well-worn snooker cue. It looked as if things would be bad. Through my fuzzy head I could hear words & phrases muttered by both, angry, bloodthirsty: "Traitor!" "Producer!" "Junkie!" "Robot!" "Andy always liked me better!" "Nico always hated you!"
I confess, I tried to stand & say, "Gentlemen, please. You are giants in the world of music. Your influence continues, ripples you started in the late sixties overturn entire genres to this day. Please don't fight! Please, for the love of all that is good & pure, put down your weapons & put away your differences. The world needs you!"
As I say, I tried to stand, but instead I fell, & my speech came out like a gurgle (along with two of my teeth) as I landed face-first on the wooden floor.
I didn't get a chance to see what happened next, as I woke up the next day, back in my lonesome bedroom in Austin. How I got home I don't know, but I was relieved to learn that neither Lou Reed nor John Cale lost their lives that night. Instead, within a year, the two had begun working together, recording "Songs For Drella" &, for a short time, reuniting the Velvets to tour. & I'd like to think maybe I had a hand in it.
Monday, October 02, 2006
KOOP's Fall Membership Drive
As I've mentioned before, in case you didn't notice, I am a deejay at a commercial radio station in Austin, Texas. If you're reading this blog, you might have actually listened to the station (although I do get a lot of creepy emails that seem to think this blog, & by extension the show, is really about self help & could they talk to me about aromatherapy curing obsessive-compulsive disorder for only 59.99?), & if you have, you have doubtless heard what a vital, original, oddball station we are, a very oasis in the commercial wasteland of FM radio, 75% of which is owned by own company.
KOOP's runs on very little money. So we need to ask our listeners for help. We do this twice a year. This time of year is when we are doing it right now. Man, that's an awkward sentence. I'm not good at begging unless you're wearing a leather mask & making me like something disgusting off the floor. Excuse the clumsiness of this.
I must keep reminding you, though, & would be very grateful if you chose to help KOOP out with whatever you can spare cash-wise. It would be much appreciated. You can do it two ways:
1) Call during my show (I'd like that!) which is on Fridays from 4:30 to 6pm CST. The toll free number is 1-88-917-5667. The toll unfree number (whatever that means) is 512 472 5667.
or
2) Pledge online by clicking here or above.
Thank you for thinking about it! Now, as Yoda Spock once said, "There is no think, only do, live long & prosper."
KOOP's runs on very little money. So we need to ask our listeners for help. We do this twice a year. This time of year is when we are doing it right now. Man, that's an awkward sentence. I'm not good at begging unless you're wearing a leather mask & making me like something disgusting off the floor. Excuse the clumsiness of this.
I must keep reminding you, though, & would be very grateful if you chose to help KOOP out with whatever you can spare cash-wise. It would be much appreciated. You can do it two ways:
1) Call during my show (I'd like that!) which is on Fridays from 4:30 to 6pm CST. The toll free number is 1-88-917-5667. The toll unfree number (whatever that means) is 512 472 5667.
or
2) Pledge online by clicking here or above.
Thank you for thinking about it! Now, as Yoda Spock once said, "There is no think, only do, live long & prosper."
Sleepy Haiku Wrap-Up
Amazingly, a great many people were able to stay awake during my show on Friday, which was about sleepiness. But what truly made them sleepy were the following winning haikus. Remember, you can always write a haiku if you visit the Self Help Radio Haiku Contest Page. Boo-ya!
Big ups to the winners:
FOURTH PLACE: Mindy
Selfish sleep junkie
Look at her doze standing up
Hey! Make her wake up!
THIRD PLACE: Arturo
Yes, it’s important
For you & me to talk now
I just can’t stay zzzzzzzzz
SECOND PLACE; Mitch
Stupid alarm clock
I’m too sleepy to wake up
Five more minutes!
FIRST PLACE: Magda
Eyelids close tonight
New novel line completed
Drool drips on pillow
This week's show is a tribute to the Velvet Underground, so if you've ever wanted to write a haiku for or about Lou Reed, John Cale, Sterling Morrison, Maureen Tucker or (it's a weird world, so why not) Doug Yule, please send a haiku to me.
Big ups to the winners:
FOURTH PLACE: Mindy
Selfish sleep junkie
Look at her doze standing up
Hey! Make her wake up!
THIRD PLACE: Arturo
Yes, it’s important
For you & me to talk now
I just can’t stay zzzzzzzzz
SECOND PLACE; Mitch
Stupid alarm clock
I’m too sleepy to wake up
Five more minutes!
FIRST PLACE: Magda
Eyelids close tonight
New novel line completed
Drool drips on pillow
This week's show is a tribute to the Velvet Underground, so if you've ever wanted to write a haiku for or about Lou Reed, John Cale, Sterling Morrison, Maureen Tucker or (it's a weird world, so why not) Doug Yule, please send a haiku to me.
Thursday, September 28, 2006
Upcoming Show Ideas: Halloween!
Halloween approaches, with barely enough time to dig up the candy corn, which you use to keep away moths in your closet, to give to the unsuspecting kids who will never know nor experience the great Halloweens of our childhood, with the cool razors in the apples & the glass in the chocolate. Ah, Mr. Evans from down the way. How were we to know he was part of the team that invented LSD? He made our Halloweens truly a trick and a treat.
Too bad he had to die in prison.
Speaking of monsters, my Halloween show this year will be all about those lovable, misunderstood killing machines who range from the smallish - think Gremlins - to the famous human-sized-ish - think Frankenstein's monster - to the largish - think Mothra. In addition, I plan to play songs in which we describe others as "monsters," usually because they treat us mean. Like that woman you broke up with - she took your heart & threw it in the lake!
Ideally, I'd love songs about the crazy sort of monsters that Jack Kirby drew for Marvel Comics in the late 50s/early 60s. Like Gruto. Or Monstrollo. Or Fin Fang Foom. But chances are no musician is hip enough to write songs about those kinds of monsters.
(By the way, all those links above are from a very cool site called Monster Blog. I am in love.)
If you have idears for monster songs, do please start throwing them at me, either here on the blog, or mailing them to me. Halloween is about a month away! I want to be armed with all the coolest, deadliest, goofiest, stinkiest monsters I can find.
Thank you.
Too bad he had to die in prison.
Speaking of monsters, my Halloween show this year will be all about those lovable, misunderstood killing machines who range from the smallish - think Gremlins - to the famous human-sized-ish - think Frankenstein's monster - to the largish - think Mothra. In addition, I plan to play songs in which we describe others as "monsters," usually because they treat us mean. Like that woman you broke up with - she took your heart & threw it in the lake!
Ideally, I'd love songs about the crazy sort of monsters that Jack Kirby drew for Marvel Comics in the late 50s/early 60s. Like Gruto. Or Monstrollo. Or Fin Fang Foom. But chances are no musician is hip enough to write songs about those kinds of monsters.
(By the way, all those links above are from a very cool site called Monster Blog. I am in love.)
If you have idears for monster songs, do please start throwing them at me, either here on the blog, or mailing them to me. Halloween is about a month away! I want to be armed with all the coolest, deadliest, goofiest, stinkiest monsters I can find.
Thank you.
Wednesday, September 27, 2006
Whither Sleepy?
Why, in the name of all that's wakeful, would I want to do a show about being sleepy? (This is the sort of argument I have in my head all the time.) (I lose those arguments more than I win them.) (Which doesn't say a whole lot about my sense of self.) (I get a little carried away when I use parentheses for asides.) I mean, for Peter & Paul's sake, isn't my show on a Friday afternoon? Aren't people getting ready for a long, conscious, alert, drug-filled weekend? Why would anyone coming home from work after an exhausting week want to listen to songs about being sleepy?
Very good questions from my head. I have no very good answers. My show ideas come to me like spitballs from my enemies in 7th grade. (You guys know who you are.) I let them smack me in the head & sometimes they stick. A few weeks ago, while sitting at work & being astonishingly groggy for no good reason, I thought to myself, "What is this thing called tiredness? Do people really write songs about it?"
Sleepy can happen when you've just awoken or for a while before you go to sleep. But sleepy seems so innocuous compared to tired - tired is what you are after a long meeting, or after mowing your lawn, or after a conversation with your significant other about "where this relationship is going." Tired is sleepy times ten, & sometimes can't be helped with sleep. Sometimes a pint of whiskey will drive tired down to sleepy. But tired is nothing compared to exhausted.
Exhausted is one of those words that sounds like it feels. Exhaustion makes you thinks of the exhaust that comes out of tailpipes - you're so exhausted, you might have just been broken down to your component chemicals in a hot, nasty internal combustion engine & all that's left is the smokey, polluting haze of what you once were. Exhaustion isn't cured by sleep, but by your body completely, utterly shutting itself down. Exhaustion makes you put yourself into a coma. Hell, when I'm exhausted, tired seems like a vacation in San Francisco.
Of course, there's good exhaustion, when you choose to push yourself to your limit, or when you're having too good a time dancing to care about your fuel gauge. But even then - exhaustion > tired > sleepy (the > means "greater than" here, you algebra dropout), with each "greater than" an exponential factor rather than a geometric gradient.
Don't those words just make you want to nap? Sleepy, tired, exhausted. Whew.
I can promise you, however, that Friday's show will be full of information & energy, not a show celebrating the state of sleepiness but a wide-awake examination from an afternoon point of view. So don't be afraid my show will put you to sleep - any more than normal, that is - but instead tune in to find out, musically & in my airbreaks, what this sleepy feeling is all about. Hopefully it'll give you a virtual rest so you'll be able to stay up later for the weekend.
Very good questions from my head. I have no very good answers. My show ideas come to me like spitballs from my enemies in 7th grade. (You guys know who you are.) I let them smack me in the head & sometimes they stick. A few weeks ago, while sitting at work & being astonishingly groggy for no good reason, I thought to myself, "What is this thing called tiredness? Do people really write songs about it?"
Sleepy can happen when you've just awoken or for a while before you go to sleep. But sleepy seems so innocuous compared to tired - tired is what you are after a long meeting, or after mowing your lawn, or after a conversation with your significant other about "where this relationship is going." Tired is sleepy times ten, & sometimes can't be helped with sleep. Sometimes a pint of whiskey will drive tired down to sleepy. But tired is nothing compared to exhausted.
Exhausted is one of those words that sounds like it feels. Exhaustion makes you thinks of the exhaust that comes out of tailpipes - you're so exhausted, you might have just been broken down to your component chemicals in a hot, nasty internal combustion engine & all that's left is the smokey, polluting haze of what you once were. Exhaustion isn't cured by sleep, but by your body completely, utterly shutting itself down. Exhaustion makes you put yourself into a coma. Hell, when I'm exhausted, tired seems like a vacation in San Francisco.
Of course, there's good exhaustion, when you choose to push yourself to your limit, or when you're having too good a time dancing to care about your fuel gauge. But even then - exhaustion > tired > sleepy (the > means "greater than" here, you algebra dropout), with each "greater than" an exponential factor rather than a geometric gradient.
Don't those words just make you want to nap? Sleepy, tired, exhausted. Whew.
I can promise you, however, that Friday's show will be full of information & energy, not a show celebrating the state of sleepiness but a wide-awake examination from an afternoon point of view. So don't be afraid my show will put you to sleep - any more than normal, that is - but instead tune in to find out, musically & in my airbreaks, what this sleepy feeling is all about. Hopefully it'll give you a virtual rest so you'll be able to stay up later for the weekend.
Tuesday, September 26, 2006
Preface to Sleepy: Am I Boring You?
We spend our days, for whatever reason, in a perpetual state between moderate alertness (you never know when the boss is going to be coming around the corner) & a half-doze. I myself am tired more often than not, & am usually only not tired when I am distracted. Why is that? Are we not engaged enough in our jobs, our lives? Do we simply not get enough sleep? & what is enough sleep? Is there too much sleep? Does that make us sleepy?
Sleepy as a physical condition was first identified by the great Egyptian/Greek scholar Lethargicos after what many archaeologists consider the first sleep study (& what many naughty sociologists consider the first sleep over) during "scroll rebinding night" at the great Library of Alexandria in the second century AD. Or CE. Whatever. While spending a long day dusting & tightly wrapping the library's immense collection of scrolls, Lethargicos noticed that many of the volunteers for the project yawned, nodded off, chewed an extraordinary amount of betel leaves, &, on one interesting occasion, one particular volunteer, who was covering his eyes while closely examining one apparently engaging papyrus scroll, actually fell face-first into the pages, smearing drool everywhere.
Lethargicos decided to try to quantify his observations by keeping the workers around as long as possible, thereby beginning the long-standing social scientist tradition of ordering out for pizza to prolong a study. He asked increasingly surreptitious questions about the mental state of his subjects, from the obvious "Did you get enough sleep last night?" & "Are you simply bored by this?" to such trickery as "Do you think adding more ostrich feathers to my bed will make it softer & comfier?" & stretching his arms out & emitting a long, drawn-out, overwrought yawn.
Though his landmark study, "Oh My Drowsy Colleagues" was lost in the great fire that destroyed the library some centuries later, his work was carried on by the Arabic scholar Hassin Al-Somnol, who was the first scientist to categorize the seventeen stages from wakefulness to sleep. As children, we learned them by heart in elementary school, but it surprises many westerners that they weren't, after all, invented by the British in the 18th century as crucial elements of the new "novel" form, but instead the result of a lifetime of scientific rigor & toil by Al-Somnol & his team at the Moroccan Sleep Number Center. Al-Somnol could be a stern taskmaster, especially when a subject fell asleep too quickly, without properly noting the stages; testees who failed to follow protocol were often engaged in what sociologists now call "pillow fights."
His landmark work, "Sleepiness & The Modern Moor," found its way to Medieval Europe & was Christianized so as not to draw attention to it. Despite references to it in Dante, Boccaccio, Chaucer, Cervantes & the forgotten Scottish poet Fred Hirmsch, it took several centuries (& a bitter dispute between Isaac Newton & Samuel Pepys) to thrust it into the English limelight. British people found themselves utterly exhausted by all the annoying posturing going around, & it became amusing to refer to royals, politicians & military men by the level of tiredness they aroused in the populace. Thus, though he thought it a worthy epithet, "Stupefying" John Locke was actually being made fun of by the people of England.
In our modern world, computers enable us to monitor our state of sleepiness, usually with downloaded porn &/or annoying screen savers. Yet many researchers think that the human being's ability to function in a kind of zombie-like state between actual repose & willful alertness remains a mystery, & studies are planned well into the 21st century, much of it involving television & recordings by Yanni. So the questions asked at the beginning of this essay are certainly as fresh & unanswered as they were to the ancients.
Perhaps this Friday, you can find illumination on Self Help Radio.
& if you're interested, last Friday's show is now available to listen to at the Self Help Radio web site.
Sleepy as a physical condition was first identified by the great Egyptian/Greek scholar Lethargicos after what many archaeologists consider the first sleep study (& what many naughty sociologists consider the first sleep over) during "scroll rebinding night" at the great Library of Alexandria in the second century AD. Or CE. Whatever. While spending a long day dusting & tightly wrapping the library's immense collection of scrolls, Lethargicos noticed that many of the volunteers for the project yawned, nodded off, chewed an extraordinary amount of betel leaves, &, on one interesting occasion, one particular volunteer, who was covering his eyes while closely examining one apparently engaging papyrus scroll, actually fell face-first into the pages, smearing drool everywhere.
Lethargicos decided to try to quantify his observations by keeping the workers around as long as possible, thereby beginning the long-standing social scientist tradition of ordering out for pizza to prolong a study. He asked increasingly surreptitious questions about the mental state of his subjects, from the obvious "Did you get enough sleep last night?" & "Are you simply bored by this?" to such trickery as "Do you think adding more ostrich feathers to my bed will make it softer & comfier?" & stretching his arms out & emitting a long, drawn-out, overwrought yawn.
Though his landmark study, "Oh My Drowsy Colleagues" was lost in the great fire that destroyed the library some centuries later, his work was carried on by the Arabic scholar Hassin Al-Somnol, who was the first scientist to categorize the seventeen stages from wakefulness to sleep. As children, we learned them by heart in elementary school, but it surprises many westerners that they weren't, after all, invented by the British in the 18th century as crucial elements of the new "novel" form, but instead the result of a lifetime of scientific rigor & toil by Al-Somnol & his team at the Moroccan Sleep Number Center. Al-Somnol could be a stern taskmaster, especially when a subject fell asleep too quickly, without properly noting the stages; testees who failed to follow protocol were often engaged in what sociologists now call "pillow fights."
His landmark work, "Sleepiness & The Modern Moor," found its way to Medieval Europe & was Christianized so as not to draw attention to it. Despite references to it in Dante, Boccaccio, Chaucer, Cervantes & the forgotten Scottish poet Fred Hirmsch, it took several centuries (& a bitter dispute between Isaac Newton & Samuel Pepys) to thrust it into the English limelight. British people found themselves utterly exhausted by all the annoying posturing going around, & it became amusing to refer to royals, politicians & military men by the level of tiredness they aroused in the populace. Thus, though he thought it a worthy epithet, "Stupefying" John Locke was actually being made fun of by the people of England.
In our modern world, computers enable us to monitor our state of sleepiness, usually with downloaded porn &/or annoying screen savers. Yet many researchers think that the human being's ability to function in a kind of zombie-like state between actual repose & willful alertness remains a mystery, & studies are planned well into the 21st century, much of it involving television & recordings by Yanni. So the questions asked at the beginning of this essay are certainly as fresh & unanswered as they were to the ancients.
Perhaps this Friday, you can find illumination on Self Help Radio.
& if you're interested, last Friday's show is now available to listen to at the Self Help Radio web site.
Monday, September 25, 2006
Yellow Haiku Wrap-Up
I just got a strange email from a strange young lady who (not so strangely) likes Self Help Radio, & in particular has a fondness for the haiku. In case you haven't heard the show (& if so, why are you reading this?) (not to be a freak about it or anything), I read listener-submitted haikus at the end of each show, & there's more info about the haiku submission process over on http://www.selfhelpradio.net/haiku.html.
This email I just received, though, basically said this (I shall paraphrase): You just started doing this blog, dude, so why don't post haiku there? Sometimes you read them too fast! Sometimes I'm like late & miss a couple! Take advantage of the web, man. Post haiku!
So I shall. However, I won't post the writers' full names, as I do on the air, just because. If they want to google themselves, they need to do what I do: make my own web pages.
So, without any further folderol, are the winners of last Friday's Self Help Radio Yellow Haiku contest. I print them from the fourth place winner, up, although I got a last minute haiku right before the contest, so I gave it an Honorable Mention. It comes first:
Honorable Mention: David's haiku
Cowardly faded
The color of piss & pus
It's my favorite
Now, the winners:
FOURTH PLACE: George
Hey! I ain’t yella!
I could beat up all o’ y’all!
I just ain’t gonna.
THIRD PLACE: Amber
Jaundice is my skin
Wet yellow are my sclera
Hepatitis B
SECOND PLACE; Mario
I will fall in love
With she whose eyes are yellow
As Data’s eyes are
FIRST PLACE: Florida
Yellow helps me breathe
& to photosynthesize
I’m a sunflower.
I'll try to make this a regular feature on this blog, if I can remember & when I'm not ashamed of your haiku submissions.
This email I just received, though, basically said this (I shall paraphrase): You just started doing this blog, dude, so why don't post haiku there? Sometimes you read them too fast! Sometimes I'm like late & miss a couple! Take advantage of the web, man. Post haiku!
So I shall. However, I won't post the writers' full names, as I do on the air, just because. If they want to google themselves, they need to do what I do: make my own web pages.
So, without any further folderol, are the winners of last Friday's Self Help Radio Yellow Haiku contest. I print them from the fourth place winner, up, although I got a last minute haiku right before the contest, so I gave it an Honorable Mention. It comes first:
Honorable Mention: David's haiku
Cowardly faded
The color of piss & pus
It's my favorite
Now, the winners:
FOURTH PLACE: George
Hey! I ain’t yella!
I could beat up all o’ y’all!
I just ain’t gonna.
THIRD PLACE: Amber
Jaundice is my skin
Wet yellow are my sclera
Hepatitis B
SECOND PLACE; Mario
I will fall in love
With she whose eyes are yellow
As Data’s eyes are
FIRST PLACE: Florida
Yellow helps me breathe
& to photosynthesize
I’m a sunflower.
I'll try to make this a regular feature on this blog, if I can remember & when I'm not ashamed of your haiku submissions.
Friday, September 22, 2006
If Life Weren't Already Yellow Enough...
In less than two hours, Self Help Radio goes all yellow. But it don't mean I'm afeared of ya! Because yellow is the color of Emperors in China. It's the color of all kinds of penalties in sports. & it's the color of safety vehicles, since it's widely believed that yellow is the color most easily seen from a distance.
(But also, I'll admit, I am a coward.)
I'm pleased to say the show will have unique contributions from local Austin crackpot & part-time butler CJ Buchanan as well as a lovely cover of a Tahiti 80 song by Dallas Renaissance Woman Tania Ion - which was recorded today (how does she do it?). As well, I steal a "Yellow" song from a CD by a former Self Help Radio guest of honor, Laura Freeman. If she notices it missing, I will take back what I said about her fixation with the color teal.
There will be much music, much discussion of things yellowy, & of course haikus. I hope you'll listen.
(But also, I'll admit, I am a coward.)
I'm pleased to say the show will have unique contributions from local Austin crackpot & part-time butler CJ Buchanan as well as a lovely cover of a Tahiti 80 song by Dallas Renaissance Woman Tania Ion - which was recorded today (how does she do it?). As well, I steal a "Yellow" song from a CD by a former Self Help Radio guest of honor, Laura Freeman. If she notices it missing, I will take back what I said about her fixation with the color teal.
There will be much music, much discussion of things yellowy, & of course haikus. I hope you'll listen.
Thursday, September 21, 2006
Telling The Future
I apologize for not blogging today - yesterday - Thursday. It was a busy day for work & for KOOP, which is a mostly all-volunteer organization & with which I am intimately involved. I'm not just some dork with a crazy fabulous radio show, I am a dork with a crazy fabulous radio show who is deeply devoted to the idea of cooperatively-run community radio. Maybe I'll talk more about KOOP hereabouts some time, but the idea here is to talk here about the crazy fabulous radio show which I do. You know, the one where modesty takes a backseat to hyperbole.
I'd like to let you know up & coming themes, & I confess I try to think of them (or be inspired by the Muse of the Moment, who is a perverse little bastard) weeks in advance, so that I can ruminate & gather & take input from you, listener, reader, if you so choose. Mainly because I am insecure & always feel I'm going to forget something sometime somewhere. & I always do.
So here's what's coming up after we tackle the difficult subject of the color yellow tomorrow - today - Friday. The two shows following the next one are what we in the noncommercial radio world call "Membership Drive Shows." This means a chance for listeners to show support for the sort of radio that is built from the guts & brains of the programmers, not the computerized corporate decisions made by a dude in Los Angeles who really needs to recoup the money his label put into Mariah Carey's new record. You can contribute to KOOP any time by going to the KOOP home page & becoming a member with a financial gift. It's money we sorely need, & maybe if enough of you help us & stop paying the corporations, we might not ever have to hear another new record from Mariah Carey.
I'll do more of the begging here later, so bear with me. Remember, this money ain't for me; it's for an idea made audible, free speech as pure as possible in the loud "global economy" run by five or six megacorporations. But I wanted to talk about the future themes... So here they are.
Next week, to underscore my natural state, & to give everyone a rest before the Membership Drive starts, I'll be playing songs about being sleepy, drowsy, tired. Hopefully it'll be at least little peppy, or you might crash your car trying to suppress a yawn.
Then, on October 6th, my first Membership Drive show will be a tribute to the Velvet Underground. I am collecting my favorite covers of the esteemed band to show their immense influence, as well as a song or two about them.
On October 13th, I am going to indulge my love of cobbled together music by presenting a wholly incomplete Brief History Of Sampling. I love songs with goofy sound clips & snatched dialogue. They make me happy. I hope they affect you the same way.
On the 20th, I will be celebrating the fourth anniversary of the month I started Self Help Radio with a theme revisited - sort of. My first show, before I even had a name for the show, was on a Friday, so I played an hour of songs about Friday. Except. I wasn't prepared enough to have enough songs about Friday, so I cheated & played a few songs about the weekend. The show will therefore celebrate the weekend. As an idea. As a place of respite. As a place for drinking, loving & resting.
On the 27th, I will make & play my annual Halloween show, which a special emphasis on "monsters" - human & otherwise - from Frankenstein to the baddies in Greek myth, to the monstrous people who terrorize our real lives. If you know a good song about a Gorgon or about Mothra, point me in that direction please!
Tomorrow - today - later on today - Friday - I'll hopefully speak a little more about what you'll hear on the show at 4:30pm. But that's for tomorrow. I should go to bed, & try to dream of songs to fill the themes I have above.
I'd like to let you know up & coming themes, & I confess I try to think of them (or be inspired by the Muse of the Moment, who is a perverse little bastard) weeks in advance, so that I can ruminate & gather & take input from you, listener, reader, if you so choose. Mainly because I am insecure & always feel I'm going to forget something sometime somewhere. & I always do.
So here's what's coming up after we tackle the difficult subject of the color yellow tomorrow - today - Friday. The two shows following the next one are what we in the noncommercial radio world call "Membership Drive Shows." This means a chance for listeners to show support for the sort of radio that is built from the guts & brains of the programmers, not the computerized corporate decisions made by a dude in Los Angeles who really needs to recoup the money his label put into Mariah Carey's new record. You can contribute to KOOP any time by going to the KOOP home page & becoming a member with a financial gift. It's money we sorely need, & maybe if enough of you help us & stop paying the corporations, we might not ever have to hear another new record from Mariah Carey.
I'll do more of the begging here later, so bear with me. Remember, this money ain't for me; it's for an idea made audible, free speech as pure as possible in the loud "global economy" run by five or six megacorporations. But I wanted to talk about the future themes... So here they are.
Next week, to underscore my natural state, & to give everyone a rest before the Membership Drive starts, I'll be playing songs about being sleepy, drowsy, tired. Hopefully it'll be at least little peppy, or you might crash your car trying to suppress a yawn.
Then, on October 6th, my first Membership Drive show will be a tribute to the Velvet Underground. I am collecting my favorite covers of the esteemed band to show their immense influence, as well as a song or two about them.
On October 13th, I am going to indulge my love of cobbled together music by presenting a wholly incomplete Brief History Of Sampling. I love songs with goofy sound clips & snatched dialogue. They make me happy. I hope they affect you the same way.
On the 20th, I will be celebrating the fourth anniversary of the month I started Self Help Radio with a theme revisited - sort of. My first show, before I even had a name for the show, was on a Friday, so I played an hour of songs about Friday. Except. I wasn't prepared enough to have enough songs about Friday, so I cheated & played a few songs about the weekend. The show will therefore celebrate the weekend. As an idea. As a place of respite. As a place for drinking, loving & resting.
On the 27th, I will make & play my annual Halloween show, which a special emphasis on "monsters" - human & otherwise - from Frankenstein to the baddies in Greek myth, to the monstrous people who terrorize our real lives. If you know a good song about a Gorgon or about Mothra, point me in that direction please!
Tomorrow - today - later on today - Friday - I'll hopefully speak a little more about what you'll hear on the show at 4:30pm. But that's for tomorrow. I should go to bed, & try to dream of songs to fill the themes I have above.
Wednesday, September 20, 2006
Whither Yellow?
This week's show will feature songs about the color yellow, as well as songs about yellow things. Unfortunately, no one has written a song (that I am aware of) about yellow burnies, yellow discipline, yellow coffee makers, or the Yellow Sea, but we'll have all other improbably yellow things. Trust me.
But why yellow? It hardly seems the season! Why such a springtime color as summer ends? Because I am not moved, sir, by the vagaries of seasonal fashion. I live in Austin, Texas, sir, where we are lucky to have two seasons: "summer" & "thank God it's not summer." The vegetative world is equally confused - the two trees in my backyard have been losing leaves all summer long.
No, I answer to a completely different muse. The Muse of the Moment. (Which was also, I believe, a totally rad metal song by 80's superstars Asia.) A Muse that has no problem with kneecapping me when I least expect it (which makes this Muse a little like my high school Algebra teacher). So.
I was indulging myself in the wonderful world of song-poems a few weeks back - & if you don't know what song-poems are, you may certainly find out at the American Song Poem Music Archives - although they apparently don't host mp3s there anymore - &, like with brilliant poetry & strange bumps on your skin, I always find something new & strange & wonderful when I revisit song-poems. This time, it was a weird recitation of yellow things called, aptly enough, "I Like Yellow Things."
(You can find the mp3 for this down the page here, if you want a preview before Friday.)
I was interested in all the yellow things the singer Bobbi Blake lists, & then thought, "What other songs are about yellow things?" In particular, I decided that, despite being able to round up a multitude of songs about lemons or the sun or traffic lights, I'd focus on the weirder, more poetical stuff - yellow as descriptive metaphor rather than a list of yellow stuff (like I did here yesterday).
So Friday, you'll hear songs about yellow brick roads (with different permutations), as well as yellow rainbows (what?), yellow guns (hunh?!), & maybe even yellow forests (eh?!?). I'll concede some obvious ones - the sun, taxis, the obligatory submarine - but mainly I am looking for the counterintuitive yellow. Hopefully I will succeed.
As always, you can email me with requests for yellow songs. (& no, I won't play that annoying Coldplay song, sorry). & even if you can't think of a yellow song, how about putting your pencap where your brain is & writing a haiku?
Is this over? Can I take a day without talking about the color yellow? Good.
But why yellow? It hardly seems the season! Why such a springtime color as summer ends? Because I am not moved, sir, by the vagaries of seasonal fashion. I live in Austin, Texas, sir, where we are lucky to have two seasons: "summer" & "thank God it's not summer." The vegetative world is equally confused - the two trees in my backyard have been losing leaves all summer long.
No, I answer to a completely different muse. The Muse of the Moment. (Which was also, I believe, a totally rad metal song by 80's superstars Asia.) A Muse that has no problem with kneecapping me when I least expect it (which makes this Muse a little like my high school Algebra teacher). So.
I was indulging myself in the wonderful world of song-poems a few weeks back - & if you don't know what song-poems are, you may certainly find out at the American Song Poem Music Archives - although they apparently don't host mp3s there anymore - &, like with brilliant poetry & strange bumps on your skin, I always find something new & strange & wonderful when I revisit song-poems. This time, it was a weird recitation of yellow things called, aptly enough, "I Like Yellow Things."
(You can find the mp3 for this down the page here, if you want a preview before Friday.)
I was interested in all the yellow things the singer Bobbi Blake lists, & then thought, "What other songs are about yellow things?" In particular, I decided that, despite being able to round up a multitude of songs about lemons or the sun or traffic lights, I'd focus on the weirder, more poetical stuff - yellow as descriptive metaphor rather than a list of yellow stuff (like I did here yesterday).
So Friday, you'll hear songs about yellow brick roads (with different permutations), as well as yellow rainbows (what?), yellow guns (hunh?!), & maybe even yellow forests (eh?!?). I'll concede some obvious ones - the sun, taxis, the obligatory submarine - but mainly I am looking for the counterintuitive yellow. Hopefully I will succeed.
As always, you can email me with requests for yellow songs. (& no, I won't play that annoying Coldplay song, sorry). & even if you can't think of a yellow song, how about putting your pencap where your brain is & writing a haiku?
Is this over? Can I take a day without talking about the color yellow? Good.
Tuesday, September 19, 2006
Preface to yellow: what's the difference between gangrene & jaundice?
Quick! Think of twenty yellow things!
Pie crust. Cheese. Number 2 pencils. Post-it notes. The W on Wonder Woman's bodice. The outermost light of something on fire. Sickly apples. Highlighters. That long line down the coward's back in old cartoons. Betty Cooper's hair. My voter registration card. Sickly sweet soda pop. Nancy Drew book spines. Day-old pus. The light that's supposed to mean "slow" but really means "speed up." Corn (boring). Corns (you mean, like on your feet? better). Sickly people. Middle-aged, middle-of-the-road stars like our sun. &, er, Yellow No. 5.
The color yellow is, of course, the next-stinkiest color on the spectrum, after brown, & not including black, which is not a color but the absence of color (duh). When asked why white, which is all colors to all people (including color-blind people), is not as stinky as two of the stinky colors that make it up, white has been known to respond by pointing out that red, blue & purple are very sweet smelling colors & cancel the stinkiness of brown & yellow. Red & blue, as well, are colors that grow to enormous sizes, while yellow in particular can be a strangely runty color. It takes billions of yellow to make sunlight, for example, while a comparatively small amount of blue can make an entire sky. & the entire amount of blood in any animal's body (once exsanguinated, of course) is usually only one or two red.
Yellow was most probably invented shortly after an organ that did something somewhat different was conscripted by natural selection into being an eye. Even if that eye originally didn't see colors, yellow was pretty much in the bag & would only suffer a real crisis in its long existence when forced to deal with the Fauvists in the late 19th century. It took a mean-spirited old bruiser the likes of Piet Mondrian to restore yellow's good name just in time for it to be used for warning signs & fruity alcohol beverages designed to get sorority girls drunk.
I myself first met the color yellow when, in the early 1970s, I visited a schoolmate's house & saw my first color TV. I don't remember what was on, but I did take with me a sense of the grayness of my seven-year-old life & the need to pay a little more attention to the outside world. A group of angry sunflowers assaulted me on the way home, but their bellicose petulance did little to move me, since it wasn't long before I retreated into my own head again & yellow became just another word, like bellow, hello, mellow, cello, & Ernest & Julio Gallo (an early experiment in near rhyme) which I could use to help finish my first epic poem, "This Gary person is a really fine fellow." (It's still unpublished, although it may be ironic to note that the manuscript has yellowed with age.)
Yellow, being yellow, can't be said to have "yellowed," since that would be like saying "black has blackened" or "blue has the blues" (er, something like that), & I must admit, it's doing very well for its age. While a little disconcerted about what it calls "the upstarts" (especially infrared light, which really ticks yellow off), it's glad it has a place in everyone's life, every if it's mainly in advertisements & the aforementioned warning signs. (Yellow admits to being very fond of the signs that indicate an upcoming road crosses a railroad track. "That blows my mind!" says yellow.)
Yellow warns us, as Self Help Radio plans a "yellow show" this Friday, to not dwell on the negative - yellow as cowardice, yellow as urine, yellow as synonym for sensational journalism - but to concentrate on the good stuff - yellow in lemonade (which will cause copious urination), yellow in sunlight (which can cause skin cancer, lack of ozone layer permitting), yellow in good-for-you fruits & vegetables (now genetically altered so the yellow gleams like the hood of a car).
So Self Help Radio shall not. Because, despite some qualms about the color yellow - mainly its stinkiness - Self Help Radio is celebrating yellow this Friday.
& tomorrow I'll tell you why.
Pie crust. Cheese. Number 2 pencils. Post-it notes. The W on Wonder Woman's bodice. The outermost light of something on fire. Sickly apples. Highlighters. That long line down the coward's back in old cartoons. Betty Cooper's hair. My voter registration card. Sickly sweet soda pop. Nancy Drew book spines. Day-old pus. The light that's supposed to mean "slow" but really means "speed up." Corn (boring). Corns (you mean, like on your feet? better). Sickly people. Middle-aged, middle-of-the-road stars like our sun. &, er, Yellow No. 5.
The color yellow is, of course, the next-stinkiest color on the spectrum, after brown, & not including black, which is not a color but the absence of color (duh). When asked why white, which is all colors to all people (including color-blind people), is not as stinky as two of the stinky colors that make it up, white has been known to respond by pointing out that red, blue & purple are very sweet smelling colors & cancel the stinkiness of brown & yellow. Red & blue, as well, are colors that grow to enormous sizes, while yellow in particular can be a strangely runty color. It takes billions of yellow to make sunlight, for example, while a comparatively small amount of blue can make an entire sky. & the entire amount of blood in any animal's body (once exsanguinated, of course) is usually only one or two red.
Yellow was most probably invented shortly after an organ that did something somewhat different was conscripted by natural selection into being an eye. Even if that eye originally didn't see colors, yellow was pretty much in the bag & would only suffer a real crisis in its long existence when forced to deal with the Fauvists in the late 19th century. It took a mean-spirited old bruiser the likes of Piet Mondrian to restore yellow's good name just in time for it to be used for warning signs & fruity alcohol beverages designed to get sorority girls drunk.
I myself first met the color yellow when, in the early 1970s, I visited a schoolmate's house & saw my first color TV. I don't remember what was on, but I did take with me a sense of the grayness of my seven-year-old life & the need to pay a little more attention to the outside world. A group of angry sunflowers assaulted me on the way home, but their bellicose petulance did little to move me, since it wasn't long before I retreated into my own head again & yellow became just another word, like bellow, hello, mellow, cello, & Ernest & Julio Gallo (an early experiment in near rhyme) which I could use to help finish my first epic poem, "This Gary person is a really fine fellow." (It's still unpublished, although it may be ironic to note that the manuscript has yellowed with age.)
Yellow, being yellow, can't be said to have "yellowed," since that would be like saying "black has blackened" or "blue has the blues" (er, something like that), & I must admit, it's doing very well for its age. While a little disconcerted about what it calls "the upstarts" (especially infrared light, which really ticks yellow off), it's glad it has a place in everyone's life, every if it's mainly in advertisements & the aforementioned warning signs. (Yellow admits to being very fond of the signs that indicate an upcoming road crosses a railroad track. "That blows my mind!" says yellow.)
Yellow warns us, as Self Help Radio plans a "yellow show" this Friday, to not dwell on the negative - yellow as cowardice, yellow as urine, yellow as synonym for sensational journalism - but to concentrate on the good stuff - yellow in lemonade (which will cause copious urination), yellow in sunlight (which can cause skin cancer, lack of ozone layer permitting), yellow in good-for-you fruits & vegetables (now genetically altered so the yellow gleams like the hood of a car).
So Self Help Radio shall not. Because, despite some qualms about the color yellow - mainly its stinkiness - Self Help Radio is celebrating yellow this Friday.
& tomorrow I'll tell you why.
Monday, September 18, 2006
At the beginning of the week, I have nothing to say
But I can completely fill a few paragraphs saying it.
I didn't do anything for the Austin City Limits festival that happened this past weekend in Austin, unless you count giving up the guest room (which is what it's there for) to someone going to the festival. That means I didn't stand in the heat behind smelly people to see a band that I've seen in more intimate settings before, nor did I find myself at some bar afterward discovering that some cool indie dude is deejaying there, nor did I wander past a hotel only to see [insert some cool musician whom I probably wouldn't recognize anyway] enter & follow him/her/it into the lobby to try to get invited to a party upstairs.
I also didn't drive drunk, throw up on a stranger's shoes, wait in long lines to go to an overheated (& therefore delicious-smelling) port-o-potty, wait in the extremely humid Austin afternoon for a band to show up & discover I was at the wrong "stage," or spend too much money on beer & water & the obligatory paramedic's visit.
I might be a bit antisocial, but it's by choice, not necessarily because I don't like people or am agoraphobic or am prone to LSD flashbacks when the light hits me just right. But I just can't bring myself to become excited by these big-name festivals which try to be all things to all people (Tom Petty and TV On The Radio! Guy Clark and Stars!), because, while it might be fun for the bands (is it?) to play to people who wouldn't normally hear them, surely we as human beings have naturally more discriminating taste, & I for one would hate to be enjoying a set by Stars, for example, & have to hear, rumbling over the speakers on the other side of the park, the dreadful artificial alternative radio dredge that is the Raconteurs.
Some people love this sort of thing, though, & I don't mean to disrespect their enthusiasm for events like this. I was just saying that I didn't go, I didn't even consider going, & I did see the long lines on I-35 when I drove over & I thanked my lucky stars that I didn't see anything at the festival that made me desperately wish I were there. If you had fun, it's because we're wired differently. Or are we weird differently?
So you see? I really have nothing to say. Why say anything, then? Because this blog is anorexic! I need to fatten it up! Almost a week old & I got nothing here!
I can also tell you that Friday's show (about sugar) is now up. You can just click here to go to the archive page where you can listen to it. I don't rant at all during that show, mainly because my mouth was full of sugar the entire time.
I didn't do anything for the Austin City Limits festival that happened this past weekend in Austin, unless you count giving up the guest room (which is what it's there for) to someone going to the festival. That means I didn't stand in the heat behind smelly people to see a band that I've seen in more intimate settings before, nor did I find myself at some bar afterward discovering that some cool indie dude is deejaying there, nor did I wander past a hotel only to see [insert some cool musician whom I probably wouldn't recognize anyway] enter & follow him/her/it into the lobby to try to get invited to a party upstairs.
I also didn't drive drunk, throw up on a stranger's shoes, wait in long lines to go to an overheated (& therefore delicious-smelling) port-o-potty, wait in the extremely humid Austin afternoon for a band to show up & discover I was at the wrong "stage," or spend too much money on beer & water & the obligatory paramedic's visit.
I might be a bit antisocial, but it's by choice, not necessarily because I don't like people or am agoraphobic or am prone to LSD flashbacks when the light hits me just right. But I just can't bring myself to become excited by these big-name festivals which try to be all things to all people (Tom Petty and TV On The Radio! Guy Clark and Stars!), because, while it might be fun for the bands (is it?) to play to people who wouldn't normally hear them, surely we as human beings have naturally more discriminating taste, & I for one would hate to be enjoying a set by Stars, for example, & have to hear, rumbling over the speakers on the other side of the park, the dreadful artificial alternative radio dredge that is the Raconteurs.
Some people love this sort of thing, though, & I don't mean to disrespect their enthusiasm for events like this. I was just saying that I didn't go, I didn't even consider going, & I did see the long lines on I-35 when I drove over & I thanked my lucky stars that I didn't see anything at the festival that made me desperately wish I were there. If you had fun, it's because we're wired differently. Or are we weird differently?
So you see? I really have nothing to say. Why say anything, then? Because this blog is anorexic! I need to fatten it up! Almost a week old & I got nothing here!
I can also tell you that Friday's show (about sugar) is now up. You can just click here to go to the archive page where you can listen to it. I don't rant at all during that show, mainly because my mouth was full of sugar the entire time.
Friday, September 15, 2006
On The Radio Today: Sugar Songs Freshly Made
Here's what to expect if you listen to Self Help Radio today: the same old thing. Wait! That's not true! In addition to the regular stuff - many different genres of music expertly mixed together in such a masterfully way you'd never know the guy doing it can't even tie his shoes - as well the lively, witty banter in-between that has been called by the ghost of Dorothy Parker, "A piss-poor attempt at humor that would have been utterly crushed at the Algonquin Round Table" - there are three pieces of music - nay, Art - that were specifically created by people for Self Help Radio.
Since the beginning of the summer, local avant-garde musician, soccer fan & alcoholic CJ Buchanan has been creating sound collage "intros" for my show. Today will be no different. I've never met CJ Buchanan, although he did tell me I once saw him in a police line-up & picked the wrong guy, but word on the street is that he collects sounds the way others gather aluminum cans, & although he hasn't yet found a way to recycle the sounds for money, he does send the audio files to me on recycled mp3s. His "Sugar" intro was accompanied by obvious forgeries from major music magazines calling it, "the best Radiohead record yet," "incontrovertible proof that Elvis is indeed the King" &, mysteriously, "four bassists lost in exploding van/coal fire incident." His official bio, written on the back of a cereal box & left slightly smoking on my doorstep, reminds everyone that, "The world has taken a restraining order out against CJ Buchanan, so everyone must stay 200 yards away from him."
Two first-time contributors to the show will also have songs for you to hear:
Local artists The Licorice Whips are a husband & wife team who distinguish themselves from the growing "married couple pop" field by actually liking each other. Frankly it shocks me every time. In their Playboy centerfold, they list their likes as "Good music, good friends, good grub, cold hands, warm heart." Interestingly, they list their main dislike as, "People on community radio stations who make stuff up about us on their blog." I'm not sure what that might mean. In any event, their song "Sugar Substitute" is one minute, forty-five seconds of delicious confection. I'd floss after you listen. & yes, I mean, floss your brain.
Dallas artists the Ramonalisas also contribute a song, "Raw Sugar Elements," which you will hear today. I've known the lead singer of the Ramonalisas for over three lifetimes now, & it's a wonder her voice hasn't propelled her out of the Metroplex, which is famously tone deaf, & into some other scene - possibly Australia? - where she would get the candy apples & radio station attention she deserves. You can start the revolution by listening today.
If I sound too much like a publicist out to make a buck, that's my fault. I am overwhelmed when talented people contribute to my show & I am completely grateful to them for sharing with KOOP & its listeners. It's just that I've grown up, like the rest of you, learning how to compliment people by listening to superlatives thrown at me by television advertisements. I am trying to fight it. For example, I managed to leave the following adjectives & phrases out of this essay so far: juicy, tempting, healthy, low fat, bouncy, fuel-efficient, gay, straight, bi, worry-free, little purple pill, where's the beef?, Jesus, "if you lived here, you'd be home now," killer, awesome, edgy, claustrophobic, possible side effects include, side-saddle, thick, rich, flavorful, jabbing index finger, real & artificial.
That is indeed a wonder, seeing as how I can recite, word for word, a "My Little Pony" commercial I saw on Saturday Morning Television in the late 70's.
I hope you listen today!
Since the beginning of the summer, local avant-garde musician, soccer fan & alcoholic CJ Buchanan has been creating sound collage "intros" for my show. Today will be no different. I've never met CJ Buchanan, although he did tell me I once saw him in a police line-up & picked the wrong guy, but word on the street is that he collects sounds the way others gather aluminum cans, & although he hasn't yet found a way to recycle the sounds for money, he does send the audio files to me on recycled mp3s. His "Sugar" intro was accompanied by obvious forgeries from major music magazines calling it, "the best Radiohead record yet," "incontrovertible proof that Elvis is indeed the King" &, mysteriously, "four bassists lost in exploding van/coal fire incident." His official bio, written on the back of a cereal box & left slightly smoking on my doorstep, reminds everyone that, "The world has taken a restraining order out against CJ Buchanan, so everyone must stay 200 yards away from him."
Two first-time contributors to the show will also have songs for you to hear:
Local artists The Licorice Whips are a husband & wife team who distinguish themselves from the growing "married couple pop" field by actually liking each other. Frankly it shocks me every time. In their Playboy centerfold, they list their likes as "Good music, good friends, good grub, cold hands, warm heart." Interestingly, they list their main dislike as, "People on community radio stations who make stuff up about us on their blog." I'm not sure what that might mean. In any event, their song "Sugar Substitute" is one minute, forty-five seconds of delicious confection. I'd floss after you listen. & yes, I mean, floss your brain.
Dallas artists the Ramonalisas also contribute a song, "Raw Sugar Elements," which you will hear today. I've known the lead singer of the Ramonalisas for over three lifetimes now, & it's a wonder her voice hasn't propelled her out of the Metroplex, which is famously tone deaf, & into some other scene - possibly Australia? - where she would get the candy apples & radio station attention she deserves. You can start the revolution by listening today.
If I sound too much like a publicist out to make a buck, that's my fault. I am overwhelmed when talented people contribute to my show & I am completely grateful to them for sharing with KOOP & its listeners. It's just that I've grown up, like the rest of you, learning how to compliment people by listening to superlatives thrown at me by television advertisements. I am trying to fight it. For example, I managed to leave the following adjectives & phrases out of this essay so far: juicy, tempting, healthy, low fat, bouncy, fuel-efficient, gay, straight, bi, worry-free, little purple pill, where's the beef?, Jesus, "if you lived here, you'd be home now," killer, awesome, edgy, claustrophobic, possible side effects include, side-saddle, thick, rich, flavorful, jabbing index finger, real & artificial.
That is indeed a wonder, seeing as how I can recite, word for word, a "My Little Pony" commercial I saw on Saturday Morning Television in the late 70's.
I hope you listen today!