Rhythm & Blogs

If a Man Posts to a Blog but No One Reads It . . .

2009-11-23T00:57:39Z

. . . does it make a sound?

No.

Unless you count the cacophonous army of voices in my head telling me that I have nothing to offer the world and that - try as I might - I will never manage to convince people that what I have to say should be of any interest to them.

Don't feel guilty though. Those voices always find something to complain about. If it weren't my lack of readership they'd be reaming me out over not doing all that I could be to make things right in the world, letting my laundry pile up, pairing shirts and pants that don't match, not changing the Britta filter etc.

No people, I'm not looking for pity. At this point I'm just looking for a reader or two. And if there are voices keeping you up at night you might just manage to silence them by helping a brother out.

So now that I have your attention . . . uh. Jeez I forgot what it was that I was going to say. . . something more about my upcoming web comic series "Drawn Out Therapy". I'm still not certain how to start it up. It's important to me that it's something people can relate to and actually want to read. It seems that entertainment media is clogged with the voices of 20- to 30-something-year-old men who are finding themselves a bit lost in life, trying to make sense of it all and spinning it into some sort of art as a way of convincing themselves that it's not all for nought, that this is the stuff of life from whence great art springs.

So I don't really want to add to this mix. One way I am conceiving of this project is like a reverse 'Dear Abby' where I draw comics about the things I am struggling with, readers write back with suggestions and then I work those suggestions into the drawings. I'm excited about that approach and the idea of making this all a bit more interactive.

Anyhow, stay tuned for more news on that as well as the imminent launch of the new website.

Until then, cheers.

Drawn Out Therapy

2009-11-19T18:03:10Z

Hello again world,

While navigating the turbid waters of the World Wide Web it's easy to find yourself lost, helplessly paddling through dozens of cross currents, each steering you with equal strength towards buying one brand of male enhancement pill or another.

Every so often, if you let go, however, you find yourself somewhere nice for a change. In May of this year I launched www.davidostow.com my own little cabin along one of the Web's more peacefully flowing tributaries. If you found yourself there in the past few months, it's either because I told you to go or - as in the scenario described above - your travels somehow brought you there for better or for worse.

Well, let me assure you that, should you find yourself by my way again sometime soon, it will likely be for the better. You see, I'm refurbishing. With the help of the talented Little Willow (for whom I don't have a link but I should) this process should take only a few more weeks. This is all to say that if you've visited my site more than once within the past 3 months and noticed there have been no updates, news items, postings etc., please forgive and forget. And have faith. A more dynamic more regularly maintained site is in the works.

I'd also like to announce a new series I'm hoping to feature either here at the blog or at the new site itself, tentatively titled 'Drawn Out Therapy'. This year has been tough for all of us but particularly so for the neurotic. Whether it be a career-related issue, a matter having to do with my social life, a romantic problem, a health issue or - most often- a combination of all of the above, I've seen my share of emotionally trying situations these past few months. And as stressful as they can be I often find myself, amidst one or the other of these trials or tribulations, thinking "There's something really funny about this. I have to work this into a comic or something."

I've found the notion that each one of these emotional sore spots holds within it a potential treasure trove of humor in a way therapeutic. When the heat is on high and I feel too depressed to work I fall further and further inward. But - and I'm told that all of the greatest artists have done this so don't think I fancy myself original - if I use this dark stuff that sometimes seems to be oozing through the pores of my existence, if I swim through it and find among it fodder for something humorous to draw, something people can relate to, well, maybe that alone will be enough to make me feel better. And it should be substantially cheaper than actually seeing a therapist. I'm already in the red there.

So please, continue to read the blog, leave comments. I'll let you know when the new site is up and running and
when I launch the first installment of Drawn Out Therapy.

Hope eveyone's doing fine, d

Getting back on the horse

2009-11-08T14:57:37Z

So, as I mentioned last time I'm looking to post these entries with more and more frequency. I've sat by and watched the world waiting on bated breath too long.

A lot of these posts will be links to other sites, most often admittedly, to self-promotional online content. For example, I learned about this yesterday:

http://www.booklistonline.com/default.aspx?page=show_product&pid=3824072

(You'll have to scroll down to see why I'm excited)

It's not a huge huge huge honor but it's an honor nonetheless, an affirmation to my eternally self-doubting ego that people are responding to my drawings. You like me! You really really like me.

On an unrelated note I just finished Margaret Atwood's Year of the Flood recently and I believe it's essential to anyone who either loves beautiful writing and amazing storytelling and / or anyone who gives two cents for the state of our planet. The book, which is a companion piece to Atwood's 200(2?) novel Oryx and Crake has a wonderful interactive website, www.year of the flood.com. There you can read interviews with the author, learn how to reduce your carbon footprint and so much more which it would be difficult to explain to someone who has not read the book yet.

That's all for now.
Stay tuned for updates on the website!

cheers, d

Um . . . remember me?

2009-11-05T15:34:52Z

Hello audience! audience! dience! ience! ence!

That's the sound of my voice echoing through the empty chambers of cyberspace as I can only imagine that the small readership it took me months to accrue have all packed up and left by now.   For anyone still out there, I'm sorry for the long hiatus. After winding down promotion for So Punk Rock, I came back to the once tightly knit fabric of my life - responsibilities, professional and otherwise, friendships, dry cleaning etc. - to find it splayed out like the torn-up guts of a stuffed animal that's been pelted mercilessly by paintballs.

So much for waxing poetic about my laziness. I'm posting today to get the ball rolling again.   Two items of note:

1) I have been working on updating my website with the aid of the very talented Little Willow.   No definite launch date yet but once that's in place I'm hoping it will give me a better framework for keeping me-related news fresh and relevant on the web.

2) I'm working on a comic short that will appear in its entiretu at the website http://www.myjewishlearning.com/
For the time being the first two pages are posted as an entry in the Jewish Authors Blog. Please check it out at

http://www.myjewishlearning.com/blog/texts/david-ostow-punk-rock-visits-the-holy-temple/

My sister Micol, my mentor and collaborator on So Punk Rock is also contributing some work to the blog this week. Go and check out what she has to say!

More news to come on the website as it gets closer to completion.

To anyone who's still reading I thank you. And I will try not to let you down in the future!

So Punk Rock Launch Party A Success (I think. . .)

2009-07-18T10:05:11Z

I was pretty preoccupied, trying to make sure everything went off as well as possible. The problem is, the more preoccupied you allow yourself to be, the less you can really take in the vibe yourself and experience the party for the good time it is. But even through the fretful haze produced by the overly analytical machinery of my mind, I could see that people appeared to be having a good time. Thanks to all my friends who came out to support me, all Micol's friends who came out to support her, and everybody in between who came out to support us both and to have a great time.

Special thanks to the Kimballs for two great sets of live music. I couldn't think of a more punk rock soundtrack for the night.

Thanks also to Nicole Emmons for taking some great pictures.

Thanks to Dan Salomon for all his help putting this thing together and for the SPR trailer.

Pictures below:

Best Friend, roommate and producer of the SPR book trailer, Dan Salomon and me showing the camera some love

Supportive coworkers, each and every one more talented than me.

My friend Kristy, one of the only people who can put something approaching a smile on my face while being photographed.

My mom and dad who seemed equal parts proud and exhausted.

The beautiful women of UVA architecture with some dudes in the background

The Kimballs: The Original Dropouts

Tom Kimball: Rock God

Alan and Mike Kimball working the groove

Nicole, newly sworn in 33-year-old and taker of many of these photographs (the better ones)

My first night ever of signing books

closeup

The little book we are celebrating

Thoughts on Cat Food

2009-07-04T01:12:28Z

We ran out of the cat's standard, veterinarian-recommended diet food a few days ago. We probably should have been more responsible about picking up some more but . . . meh.

Anyhow, we have been feeding her Science Diet which, by all indications, is a lot tastier than this other stuff. Ever since we made the switch the cat just sits by her bowl and meows every time we pass by, like a junky begging on a busy corner.

My favorite thing about Science Diet is how they advertise that their formula is made with real science or something like that. I suppose this is to distinguish it from the multitude of cat foods on the market that are produced via some combination of alchemy and sorcerer's magic. (If there were such a cat food, that is the one I would surely be buying, if only for curiosity's sake). Science Diet also offers a money back guarantee which applies if you OR your cat are dissatisfied. If all the cats who eat this stuff become as addicted as ours, I can understand how they stand so firmly behind their product . But I do wonder what they're putting in there.

Who You Calling a Mensch?

2009-06-25T04:41:22Z

Go to www.fluxnow.com! They are running a So Punk Rock related contest. First prize, a copy of the book, the latest cd by up-and-coming Atlanta-based JEWISH punk band Can!!!Can, and original art by your's truly! Awesome runner up prizes too!

Go now! Fluxnow!

iRant

2009-06-22T12:23:20Z

Hi loyal readers,

I'm sorry my posts have been so few and far between lately. With Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, not to mention my own website to focus on in the name of publicity for the book (LESS THAN A MONTH NOW!) blogging has fallen somewhat by the wayside.

This posting comes after about 2 weeks of attempting to troubleshoot some quirks on davidostow.com. iWeb, which seemed like a godsend when I first discovered it has taken to playing such pranks on me as rendering all hyperlinked text invisible and rendering all hyperlinked images non-functioning. I visited the Apple Store on 14th Street the other day (which feels more like a cult headquarters than a store. Does anyone else remember the days when you could recognize a store as a room with walls plastered with merchandise and a salesman who greeted customers with a hearty if not always sincere "Hi there, is there something I can I help you with?")

The 14th Street Apple Store occupies 3 vast floors of a refurbished industrial building. To get from one floor to the next you walk up a wide circular acrylic staircase (one of Apple's cool shticks is that their retail environment and their product are both clear and minimal). The stair is a study in form saying 'to hell with function, we've got an image to uphold". With risers maybe 5" tall instead of the standard 7" and treads over a foot deep as opposed to say the 11" accepted norm, this funhouse-refugee of a circulation device promises a clunky and self-conscious ascent to the sanctified elevated abode of that modern oracle, the Genius Bar. Luckily, the landings are wide enough that if you need to stop and camp on your journey there is plenty of room for you and your Sherpa to sprawl out.

Once you exit the staircase don't expect to find a room full of merchandise ripe for hours of browsing. Instead, walk (again self-consciously) through a "sales floor" containing nothing but minimal-modern wood tabletops with laptops set up presumably for demos or other interactive experiences. You'll never find out exactly what they're for because these computers are constantly occupied by iEnthusiasts who don't seem to have jobs. Anyhow, pass through this strange experiment in the retail-as-product to find a small swath of wall surface, maybe 40% of which has actual product on display. If you want to know more about any of this product, don't wait for an employee to register the look of confused helplessness on your face. Instead approach the duo of red tee shirted young men with the signature backstage pass-looking thingies dangling from their necks that mark them as employees of the Mac machine. They may resent your interrupting their conversation but once they realize that ignoring you isn't work they'll be forced to look down their noses at you just long enough to let you know that if you have a technical question you'd do best to solicit the advice of a similar bevy of men in blue tees ( I guess blue trumps red - at least we know where Steve Jobs falls in the debate over Picasso's early career.)

The blue-shirted chaps will let you stammer for about half a minute before they tell you that the only way to know exactly what is wrong with your computer is to make an appointment at the 'Genius Bar.' Thanks a mil.

I had never intended for this posting to turn into a diatribe on the Mac shopping experience. I guess it simply tapped into the designer / consumer within me that is leery of retail environments (or 'stores' for the lay person) that pretend to be anything but what they are. Yes, we live in a fast-paced world where the process of globalization as well as the rapid progress of technology promise to break boundaries that were for millennia taken for granted and to transform our environments (both real and virtual) in ways we can't predict. But business is still business, a store is still a store (be it online or existing in the concrete material world) and I know a marketing ploy when I see one.

But, oh yeah, the real point of this email. davidostow.com is up but there are glitches and I am also having trouble uploading new files to replace the old as new news comes in and old news recedes into the past. So please bear with me as I work on these problems and check this here blog for news and other rants similar to the above.

Until next time. . .

dko

A Quick One (While He's Away)

2009-06-10T11:29:42Z

I know the title of this posting doesn't make sense. This will be a quick one but I only added the parenthetic text because I like it when I can use musical references in my posting titles and I was so close on this one from the Who that I threw caution to the wind and just went forward with it.

I have been away though, preparing for the release of So Punk Rock, working on my own website and doing a million other little things to promote this labor of love.

I come back to LiveJournal a Prodigal Son of sorts. While making my own website I thought - wouldn't it be great to condense my entire web-presence? It was then that I got the idea to use iWeb's blog template. Only now do I realize the value of site like LiveJournal. Setting up a blog that's worth a dang proved difficult (for me) using the otherwise very simple and elegant web design software that came with my Mac. The biggest problem was figuring out how to allow guests to comment (This is for the one or two of you who have been loyal commentators for some time (thanks Steve and Micol).

That is the latest. I'll be linking my website to this blog and continuing on as if I'd never left. Call it a new beginning.

DO

It's April what now?

2009-04-29T12:00:45Z

Actually, today is an easy one for me. Growing up I was aware of two dates: March 30th, my own birthday, the date on which I received a great amount of attention and affection, and April 29th, my sister's birthday, the date on which all attempts to call attention to myself floundered. I didn't know my parents' birthdays (now I do), nor - being Jewish - did I know Jesus' birthday (Although I was aware that if I was patient enough the holiday season would roll around at some point in the winter. To this day, however, I still can't remember if it was the 25th or the 26th when your savior was born on a snowy and blustery day in Roman Palestine).

Anyhow, as the highly mushy and confidential ecard I sent Micol this morning attests to, a lot has changed. Somewhere along the line we both turned into grownups (for me it was about 1998, for Micol, maybe like mid-last year. Her birthday is now cause for celebration and celebrate I will in my own way, from the warmh and safety of my cubicle.

More on MIcol later. She deserves more than I can put down here in the tiny window I have before it's time to make the donuts.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MIC!

xo, d

Oh, did I mention I'm 30?

2009-04-07T12:02:38Z

Whether it's a testament to how busy my life has been lately or simply another example of my laziness the fact is that I never posted an entry about the big 'Three Oh' and the accompanying festivities. This is a shame, not only because this rite of passage into a kind of adulthood ante chamber is as relevant as anything else one could blog on but more because of the efforts of a number of people in my life who put everything they possibly could have into making this occasion special and the credit that is due to all of them.

It has to begin with my very loving Tracy who was at the very heart of the joyous raucousness which took place on Saturday March 28th (My actual birthday was Monday the 30th but who throws a party on Monday, especially with a Tuesday night deadline at the office?). Tracy's contribution was less a matter of overwhelming "wow" and more of loving attention to detail. She knew I wanted a surprise of some sort and though I knew about the party at large, she kept from me plans for a mellow pre-party at Micol and Noah's place where I was kept company by a select group of people whose place in my life is second to none currently: My parents (who will always be second to none) Tom and Katherine and Mike of the Kimballs crew, whose collective contribution to my rediscovery of the joy of playing and appreciating music has been truly transformative over the last year or so, of course Tracy herself and the Master and Mistress of the house, soon to be Bro-In-Law Noah (Where was this larger than life bodyguard of an older brother when I was being bullied by Evan Linkowsky in the 2nd grade?) and Micol (who once did smack Evan across the face, watched as he tumbled down the hillside into which our school was built, was sent to the principle's office where the 'threat' of a call to my parents backfired on the school administrators as my father congratulated my sister for finally giving this kid the dose of Ostow whoopass he had coming. That's what you call family).

My thanks have to extend to the reassuringly large and enthusiastic bunch that showed up at the part proper (which began around 9:30 at Dove in the West Village) and if I could right now I would name them all as each one of them contributed uniquely to my overwhelmingly good spirits that evening. They will each get their due in a follow-up post but it is 8:02 in the morning and time to make the donuts . . .

It's Been So Long /

2009-03-28T17:46:19Z

Since you've heard from me . . .

. . . to quote the Wrens. And while I wasn't planning on writing a Wrens-related post it does come to mind that I saw them in their first New York performance in over two years at the Bowery Ballroom last weekend.

It had been so long since I'd heard from them. They live by their words.

I have always loved the Wrens (as musicians and as people) and I shudder to write anything negative about them. But I would be undermining the principles of good blogmanship (as I understand it) if I were to be anything less than honest in my assessment of their performance.

It was well-played. It was loud. It was energetic.

It was short. It was not as loud as their shows used to be nor anywhere near as energetic. It was the same show I had seen a handful of times before but with less gusto.

I never saw the Wrens live pre-Meadowlands. But in my opinion the show that they crafted in the wake of Meadowlands' release was as close to small club (read: not arena) rock & roll perfection as I had ever seen. Songs were reinvented dynamically and sonically, dressed up for the stage in a way that rendered them just this side of recognizable as kin to their studio counterparts.
The line between band and audience was blurred, not just on account of the energy that buzzed in both directions, but more literally as Kevin would freely throw the Mic out into the crowd and Jerry would hand out dozens of drumsticks and pull what sometimes seemed like a third of the crowd up on stage to tap out the staccato rhythm of "Boys You Won't", an army of makeshift drummers beating the stage, the walls, any surface available. This was energy, creativity and love.

Last week's performance felt like the fast food equivalent of the wonderful experience described above, like the band got on stage and hit defrost. What saddens me is that - knowing what I know of the band - their response to a review like this would be a soft spoken, self-conscious acknowledgment that, yes, time has done its work on them and really what are a bunch of 40 year old guys doing trying to rock out anyway?  Didn't we tell you five years ago how exhausted these boys are?

The truth is that the Wrens have gotten a lot of mileage out of their myth, a myth that they earned and that has rendered them heroes in the eyes of fans. In the mid nineties fame knocked on their door but fame had a lot of baggage with it. The band saw this and made the torturous decision to pass this opportunity by. And in an ironic way this made them stronger. A decade later, still living and recording together, still holding down whatever jobs they could to make ends meet, they released 'Meadowlands', a musical crystallization of all they had been through, all the disappointment, all the hard work, the self-doubt, the regret and ultimately the coming-to-peace with all the decisions they had made.

Still harking back to the influences that colored their previous albums, the Meadowlands offered something newer and more personal - something more authentically Wrens. The band took a big gamble and managed successfully to trade in Rock Stardom for a rare and legendary sort of Indie credibility. It is that display of unshakeable artistic integrity mixed with great musical talent that make the Wrens such a mythical phenomenon in the world of Indie Rock.  And I commend them.

It just seems lately that the band has forgotten that before there was the myth there was the music. At age 15 or so, I was given a copy of 'Secaucus' (the album prior to 'Meadowlands' that was supposed to be their 'breakthrough') by a friend.  I didn't know anything about these guys but from the first minute of the album as the choreographed chaos of "Yellow Number Three" tumbled and glided gracefully into the confident rock beat of "Built In Girls" I was hooked. What I heard was the rawness of the Pixies combined with a Beatles-like approach to harmony combined with I don't know what but whatever it was it was like a drug. And this was coming out of Jersey of all places! Like me! Jersey! Didn't Indie Rock come from Seattle or California?  This was the best Indie rock I had ever heard and it was coming from a few exits down the Turnpike.

So when the Wrens get on stage and play a truncated and tired version of their once magnificent 'Meadowlands' set, slipping in jokes about being as old as the Eisenhower administration and taking advantage of every opportunity to demonstrate their bewilderment about how the kids do these days (Is iPhone a noun or a verb?) I feel they're losing the point. Yes, they have persevered, and yes it's hard to grow up, raise a family, and continue the rock thing and we fans love the Wrens for fighting the obstacles life has put in front of them and it gives us hope. But where is the music?

Anyhow, older rock musicians abound today as 40 becomes the new 30 becomes the new 20 and people in urban areas across the country are figuring out ways to prolong a youth-like energy even while responding to the demands of work and family life. Bands like the Hold Steady captivate kids a generation or even more younger than them with powerful music that tells the story of their own experiences growing up.   And then there are the real old timers. I once saw an old interview with a young Mick Jagger who didn't flinch for a moment when asked if he saw himself doing the same thing 50 years on. Arguably, music was different back then and the Stones had the type of commercial success that the Wrens passed up and that enabled them to trade in the workaday pursuit of steady income for a lifetime of full on rocking. But the point is that the real professionals don't really seem to be thinking about age.

With all that out of my system I want to make it clear that I still love the Wrens. These days they may be playing too much into their own myth, but no one can take away the risks they took, no one can take away their talent and no one can deny that at the end of the day they are great guys with an affection for their fans the likes of which I've never witnessed. In a promo video I saw their PR guy saying "They brought danger back into music". That's just a silly sound bite. I'd say they did just the opposite. They brought the music down to us, they showed us that rock did not have to be about selling out, that it can wear the face of the really nice guy who sits a few cubicles down from you. They even mailed us free CDR's of 'Secaucus' when it was out of print. "Energy" yes. "Danger" no.

To the Wrens: We love you for who you are and what you do. If you quit now we would be disappointed but we would understand that you have families and personal lives that need your focus and attention. But if you choose to keep going, give it your best. Be the Wrens again.

word?

2009-03-14T23:10:57Z

Take note: Livejournal's spell checker does not recognize the word "blog". It's down with 'bog', 'log', even 'blag' (all of which were presented to me as words I had potentially intended to spell) . . . but not blog.

I'm totally looking under D in my dictionary tonight.

Oh Yeah, The Lists

2009-03-10T12:07:09Z

I did mention something about lists. I'm compiling a list for myself of things we don't need more of. This is just a little exercise in snarkiness on my part but to say it's all phony irony and no sincerity would be a big stinking lie. The list is not a countdown, just a list in which items fall randomly as they come to me. Feel free to send me your own items and I'll start posting a contribution list next to my own, along with any commentary by you or by me regarding your entry (don't worry, nothing judgmental - this will be a safe and trusting circle of complainers).

So the first few items on my list, the ones that got me thinking about the list project to begin with are:

THINGS WE DON'T NEED MORE OF:

1 - Anthologies of short works by Michael Chabon, Dave Eggers, A.M. Homes, Zadie Smith, Jonathan Safran Foer, Nick Hornby, Jonathan Ames, Jonathan Lethem etc.

All of the above authors and many of their notable peers are all incredibly talented, but the rate at which they seem to band together to produce these collections is -at least to me- distressing. Flooding the walls and tables of B&N (B&N being one of the few retailers still bragging walls and tables) and immediately recognizable by the bold graphic quality of their covers (often featuring campy images of turn of the 20th century Americanna), these volumes' ubiquity would suggest that the only good literature these days is coming from the minds of 30-40ish Jewish and British hipsters who can't stop analyzing the absurdity of their own lives. If one good thing has come of this trend, its that it's firmly plugged the literary hole through which McCourt family memoirs spouted endlessly for about a decade.

2- Maureen Dowd Columns

Apologies and Lists

2009-03-10T11:48:04Z

Fire the apologies. I apologize first for abandoning my post here for so long. Stuff's been busy believe it or not. Even with the economy deeply frozen by now in a slab of carbonite and ready for delivery to Jabba's palace (China?) I've still been busy. Not engaged in anything lucrative but busy. Then again maybe everyone is. Armageddon does appear nigh at hand and in movies this is always when the important people start making plans and the rabble start looting. I haven't started looting yet but since I can't see myself as the guy who keeps his s**t together and makes it to the refugee camp it's only a matter of time (Guitar Bar in Hoboken keeps all their vintage stock hanging right in the storefront. That means all I need is a metal garbage bin off the street, someone strong to lift it for me and I'm good. No need to even go inside!). Second, I apologize for not reading the blogs of others of late. Steve Brezenoff (http://stevebrezenoff.blogspot.com/) in particular has always been very good about supporting his local blogosphere and I haven't read his column in ages. The man deserves props. Micol as well has resumed posting personal (read: not Bradford related - oh wait, I just read it and it is Bradford related - but still personal)) pieces and not only do I owe it to her to read what she has to say but I - like thousands of others who read on a 12th-grade level - love her writing. Check it for yourself at http://micolz.livejournal.com/. Or for that matter, if you want to sample her writing, get yourself a copy of Golden Girl, the first in the Bradford series which has serious potential to be one of the next REALLY big teen series (that doesn't feature vampires thank god) . And then there's the up-and-coming film editor (andmyahemroommate) Dan Salomon. If you're interested in film-making and or the TV series Lost, Dan is your man for conversation. He's been busy working on the So Punk Rock book trailer which is, itself, so punk rock and hopefully he'll have some teasers or something soon. You can find him here: http://burnafterblogging.blogspot.com/ I shouldn't leave out my wonderful chanteuse of a girlfriend Tracy Eisenberg who writes eloquently if a little too modestly at http://tracyeisenberg.blogspot.com. Find her there and ask her the tough questions. What's new in the world of dance Tracy? What's the latest on the Possessions? What's the minor 3rd of G- flat?! Looks like I've managed to spare myself the burden of coming up with content by deflecting it onto those individuals situated most closely to me in the blogosphere (shoot me if I use that word a third time in this posting).

'Rainy Day / Nothing to say'

2009-02-26T14:50:05Z

So go the first two uninspired lines written by Ari Abramson, protagonist of the forthcoming So Punk Rock (And Other Ways to Disappoint Your Mother, in his 'band notebook.' And while it's not raining yet this Thursday morning the 26th of February, Year of Their Lord 2009, it certainly looks like it will start coming down shortly. And while I could have more accurately titles this posting 'Plenty to say', plenty in this case is so much, and it would take such a great deal of time to put it all down on 'paper' and so for now it may as well be 'nothing to say' becayse I am not going to open that can of worms, not here, not now, when I just got to work. In any event, while I could wish that anything I write here would be of some significance or interest to someone other than myself there's the possiblity that while there's plenty on my mind there's 'Nothing (worthwhile)to Say".

But because I have not posted in quite some time, here's a quick list of things I'd like to write about in more depth and will hopefully have the opportunity to do so in the near future:

1 - I got the galley for SPR in the mail last night. Both thrilling and incredibly terrifying. To hold the artifact that will actually go out into the world with your name on. Something so tangible. I imagine all artists who find a way to distribute or publish their work go through this. Maybe it gets less intense the more you do it.

2 - Working diligently on promotion for the book. If you are in my life and I have your email address, phone number, home address, or if you belong to any of the numerous online organizations from which I regularly buy IP addresses (just kidding about that one) expect a lot of promotional crap to come flying at your wall sometime soon. Some of it should hopefully stick.

3 - My birthday is approaching and I can't decide whether to go 'understated' or 'overdone.' 30 calls for 'overdone' but I'm more familiar with 'understated' which is easy to fall back on when you have as limited a social life as I do. Maybe I'll just sit back and let fate do it's thing and if I am unsatisfied with the celebration I will simply make those closest to me feel as guilty as I possibly can and reap the benefits in favors. I guess it's a win / win.

Did I miss anything? Probably. Is there more to come. For sure!

Masters of the Universe (Or at least of Central Vermont)

2009-01-23T13:14:01Z

Congratulations to my sister Micol who - along with a mere 5 classmates - graduated from Vermont College this weekend with a Master of Fine Arts degree in children's and young adult literature.

It's funny because Micol has been writing for years now and so much of her work has been published. Many would say the MFA is entirely unnecessary for one who has already made a name for herself in the industry. I would argue those who would say such a thing mistake professional success for personal fulfillment. In the Vermont program, Micol found an opportunity to pull away from the hubbub of the New York literary scene, to find an intimate circle of like-minded people with whom to explore their shared passion and to examine their work with a lovingly critical eye that the fast paced world of publishing doesn't necessarily allow for.

To me, Micol's MFA represents her love of writing for its own sake and a milestone in her pursuit of a passion that goes back to her days in grammer school.

Micol has always been the real deal and she never needed a degree to prove it. But now she has it. And that's pretty kicka**.

Interviews With Famous Artists And Musicians, Dead and Alive. Part I: Pablo Picasso

2009-01-11T18:51:41Z

DKO: Thanks for taking the time to talk to me Pablo. Let me ask you Pablo, have you read 'So Punk Rock' yet?

PP: Yes, thanks for the free copy. I've actually read it twice since it arrived. The story is great and brings me back to my days as a schoolboy somewhere in Spain when I was struggling to find my own artistic voice. Like the main character in the book, Ari, I too played music before I recognized my potential as a visual artist. And like Ari, I thought it would bring me social stature and lots of women. The irony is, I was pretty bad and it wasn't until I achieved world-wide success as a painter / sculpture / collagist that the women started paying attention.

DKO: That's interesting in light of all the fragmented images of guitars one finds in your early Cubist work.

PP: Yes, well, I had this guitar lying around and I figured if I couldn't play it I would paint it. And I would paint it like it had never been painted. I felt in some ways like the guitar had let me down and I think that had a lot to do with my approach to painting it and to the birth of Cubism in general. I wanted to expose the guitar, to strip it down and leave it naked at all angles to the world. It had left me feeling vulnerable and so I wanted to do likewise to it.

DKO: That's incredibly deep.

PP: Thanks.

DKO: What did you think of my artwork in 'So Punk Rock'.

PP: You remind me of a young me!

DKO: Really? How young?

PP: Six.

DKO: What do you think of the current art scene?

PP: I haven't really paid attention to art since, like, 1960. After the Americans started splattering paint on canvas and calling it brilliant I just kind of zoned out. Now it seems like all art is just too much thinking. 'Conceptual' they call it. I say to hell with 'conceptual.' Art is about leading a boozed up, drugged out life surrounded by thugs, pimps and prostitutes and then painting some colorful f**ked up s**t.

DKO: I sort of feel the same way about rock music. I came of age in a much more sheltered environment than you presumably did. I can't say I've spent a lot of time with the underbelly of society but it seems natural that this is where our artists should be coming from. Nowadays, you have all this college kids with their Fender guitars and their 70's record collections. The music they produce on the whole is fairly uninspiring.

PP: I know, what was up with the last Interpol? It's like they just stopped trying.

DKO: Ok, we're running out of time. A few rapid fire questions to end on. How old are you?

PP: I don't know.

DKO: When and where were you born?

PP: In the 19th century in Spain

DKO: Favorite Artist

PP: Oh, that's a hard one. Michelangelo?

DKO: Really?

PP: Yeah.

DKO: Favorite color?

PP: Rose. No Blue. No, I don't know!!

DKO: Favorite band.

PP: The Modern Lovers.

DKO: If you could have dinner with anyone, dead or alive, who would it be?

PP: Abraham Lincoln.

DKO: Thanks for your time.

Pablo and Me, circa 1960

A Difficult Matter (to say the least)

2008-12-29T13:36:36Z

I don't normally venture into the realm of international politics on this blog (let's face it, I never have) but as the death toll rises and slews of people are put in harm's way in the Middle East on this 3rd day of Israeli air strikes it would seem downright shallow to do another piece on my Fender Telecaster.

I have difficulty writing about this, first and foremost because I can only respond to what I hear on the news. I hate admitting how frequently I fall into a pattern of not following what's going on in the world. I try to keep abreast of it all but I fall short of being able to form solid opinions of my own as facts and figures come in at all angles and always couched in the context of someone's agenda. I sit out political conversations, always listening however, hoping I'll learn something. Ultimately I blame no one, no news organization, no media conspiracy for my ignorance. Sometimes, though, I feel that my intelligence only manifests itself in certain ways, and I have no knack for dissecting and analyzing the myriad components of world affairs.

The issue of Israel's current air strike is both difficult to discuss because of sensitivity levels and yet simple in that these violent conflicts have been going on for decades (though they say this is the worst in a long time) and most people have situated themselves on one or the other side of the fence long ago.

I can't speak for all American Jews but for me the phenomenon of Israel is like an exposed nerve in my sense of identity. I stand behind the state of Israel. I've been taught and I believe that it was founded on progressive principles and that its existence is seminal to the survival of the Jewish people in the modern world. I also believe that these progressive principles have been to a greater and greater extent compromised as Israel continues to mature from an outpost of hope for the generations of Jews escaping the Holocaust and countless European pogroms before it, into a political entity with a complex and not always squeaky clean political history and I believe that this has happened in spite of the efforts and ideas of many Israeli idealists for reasons that are complicated and manifold.

A conspicuously large cross section of today's Jews, both in this country and in Israel, are secular in outlook and yet have adopted the progressive values that the greatest of their ancestors culled from the religious literature that they revered and that continues to be of value to many of us today whether or not we believe in a notion of "God" entirely in keeping with traditional Mosaic law. Judaism, even for those Jews who approach it with a post-modern sense of doubt, is a religion of life, the primary concern of which is the relationships among people and between people and their environments, physical, social, political, spiritual and psychological.

As I shudder to imagine the devastation currently taking place in Gaza, and as I pray (in my own way) for those innocents who are now fearing for their lives and well-being with every breath, it cuts me deeply to hear talk of human rights violations on the part of the state of Israel. I write with my own bias, but I cannot be convinced that the Israeli government as a whole - and certainly not the military personnel acting on the government's orders (many of them idealistic young men and women serving mandatory military terms) - are anything but sickened by the devastation that comes hand in hand with the exercise of their right to defend themselves. Were there a way to isolate the terrorist forces that continue to launch rockets into Israel from Gaza I firmly believe that doing so would be Israel's first priority.

As regards the term Human Rights Violations - Can the world really make no distinction between the sadistic genocidal practices of power-hungry dictators that have marred the recent histories of so many developing nations and the casualties inflicted when a modern democratic state takes action to protect its citizens? Do U.N. officials believe that the Israeli people lull themselves to sleep at night with images of burning schools, families torn apart, wives made widows and children made orphans? I can't force myself to believe that these bombardments are simply crude demonstrations of power by brute force. To say that Israel is not interested in sending a tactical message to those who would do it harm would be naive. But I'll reiterate that if this message could be sent through the isolated destruction of terrorist headquarters and infrastructure and not at the expense of Gazans whose only wish is to live and raise their children in peace then I believe that this would be the course of action Israel would take.

I also feel nothing but heartache for those on either side of the border who are forced repeatedly to live through this unending nightmare . I speak as a Jew who believes that Jewish values are not dead and that the State of Israel is not numb to the cycle of violence from which it cannot extricate itself. I believe that the Jewish people as a whole stand behind the notion of Tikkun Olam ('mending the world') and that an enriched Gaza with functioning schools, modern infrastructure a healthy economy and leadership with peaceful intentions is an ideal that shouldn't be given up on.
Sadly, the current leadership in Gaza seems more interested in investing their resources in a perpetual and futile war than in enriching the lives of the disenfranchised Gazan masses who must bear the brunt of Israeli retaliation.

Will this always be the case? I hate admitting that I think the answer is yes. And as long as it is, I stand behind the State of Israel as it refuses to apologize to the world for its right to defend itself.

My New Guitar and Name that Band!

2008-12-28T17:54:56Z

First thing's first: This is the guitar I just bought!

It's an American Standard Fender Telecaster and it is the most beautiful thing I own. Tracy has always insisted that guitars must have female names so just to get her goat I named my acoustic guitar some time back Jasper. I was going to do the same with the Telecaster but in the end decided Tillie the Tele can't really be beat and so I guess this guitar is a woman.

Incidentally, Ari, the main character in 'So Punk Rock' plays a Telecaster. Micol and I were going to make it a Stratocaster since that is probably the most ubiquitous model of electric guitar out there (especially among suburban garage rocking teens) but when I started drawing Ari I always drew him with a Telecaster because I just think the it's a more attractive guitar. So we changed it. Ari bought his Telecaster off of Craig's List and in celebration of the book I attempted to do the same. But life shouldn't always imitate art and I decided the offers on Craig's List I found were too shady. There was no way to really know what you were getting and while maybe it's worth the gamble when you're looking for, say, an ottoman, the same can't be said for purchasing a high quality instrument. So my good friend Tom Burns took me out on the town for an afternoon of guitar shopping. Now, I will apparently be playing rhythm guitar on one track on the forthcoming Possessions album which is the first of what I hope will be many studio and live gigs (thanks Frank!).

NAME THAT BAND:

A new competition on this blog! I don't know what the prizes will be, for now maybe just an honorable mention and a beer on me if you live in the greater metropolitan region.

I give you the first image in the new weekly competition, Name that Band:

And the competition begins!

Why iHate Music Downloads

2008-12-26T16:39:50Z

I know there are a number of you who are still expecting 'So Punk Rock' companion cds from me. Rest assured you will get them. There is one hitch though. Apparently iTunes will let you burn songs purchased at the iTunes store only so many times before it is assumed that you are some sort of bootlegger making money at the expense of Apple.

I'm taking this unfortunate situation as an opportunity to switch up the playlist. The cd inserts have all been printed with the old track list but those of you who receive the new compilations will be supplied with a supplementary insert with the updated track list. I may actually have fun with this and do several different versions. Think of it this way - I get famous off of this book: You have a collector's item that much more unique. If not, then. . . well, maybe you'll at least enjoy the music.

I'll also take this opportunity to voice my opinion that buying cds is better than downloading music. This is a belief I had even before the unfortunate iTunes situation. Here is a list of reasons - none of them incredibly original -why:

1) THE LOOK
Call me materialistic but owning a cd feels somehow more . . . well. . . tangible than owning computer data. There is nothing more satisfying than looking at a wall full of cds collected over the years (except maybe looking at a wall full books collected over the years): The different colors, the different fonts along the spines, the varying textures, the fat cardboard box set next to the skinny jewel case, the cheap used cds with scratched cases, the prize deluxe special edition multi-packs. The jazz, the rock, the random mariachi disc your grandparents brought home from a trip to Mexico.

A wall of cds is like a collage. Like any other decoration or piece of furniture it adds life and warmth to your living space. Unlike any other decoration or piece of furniture it is idiosyncratic. It is different from anyone else's collection. It is changing, both in the long run as you acquire more and in the short as you pull this disc or that one to listen to. The gaps become part of the collage. Even a gap where there was once a prized cd now unfortunately lost is somehow more satisfying than a playlist on your laptop screen.

2) THE SOUND
We took a step back in sound quality when we went from vinyl to cassette. We took a step forward with the compact disc. Sure, the compact disc lacks the warmth and immediacy of a vinyl recording but the sound is crystal clear, and on a well produced compact disc one can discern layer upon layer upon layer of sound. There are cds I've been listening to for ages and I still hear new things with every listen.

We've taken another step back with the MP3. Sure, you could fit about a gazillion of them on your iPOD but that's because MP3s are compressed. The range of sounds one hears on a cd are flattened and the listening experience becomes that much duller. It's not the worst thing in the world. MP3s still sound better than cassettes. But I think it's telling of the way we think nowadays that people will gladly trade in the quality of a cd for the convenience of an MP3. Convenience has been trumping quality since the industrial revolution and I think the popularity of the MP3 is no exception to this rule.

3) The Culture
In the pre-Napster days, when you bought music you were more often than not investing in an album, a body of work that an artist conceived of as a unit. You may have bought the album for one song you really liked. You may have hated the rest of it. You may have grown to appreciate the songs you hated or you may have decided, after a few listens, that you had wasted your money.

The trend with online MP3 purchases seems to be to buy single songs (don't ask me for any supporting statistics this is just personal observation). The unit of production is still the album but the unit of consumption is the single song. This isn't the most terrible tragedy in the world but I think the facility with which we can pick and choose what we want tends to denigrate the artistry inherent in the process of making pop music.

To use the example of a favorite band: When you buy The Who's 'Who's Next' you are buying the outcome of Pete Townshends struggle to write the rock opera to trump all rock operas, the ironically beautiful remains of his failed efforts and the series of songs that represent the last significant transformation of the The Who from proto-punk Mods, to concept-driven composers, to eardrum- splitting stadium rockers.

Contrarily, when you download 'Baba O'Riley' you are buying 'that really catchy song with the awesome synthesizer intro that Spike Lee used in "Summer of Sam".' Still a good purchase and a great song unto its own. But I believe that in most cases, when a song is plucked from the context of its album it is stripped to a greater or lesser extent of its meaning and value. And you've downloaded the MP3 so the sound quality is that much worse to boot.

I'm not the snob that I'm probably coming off as in this posting. Lord knows I have downloaded plenty of music in my time and will probably continue to do so. Sometimes the temptation is just too great, the urge to listen to that song too strong, the record store too far away. There is something to be said for the benefits of the world wide web which is incidentally where I am reaching you from now.

But let's take a moment to remember when the world was about ideas and the products they engendered. Let's think about how the mechanisms that make it more and more convenient to navigate the world have compromised the quality of our experience of the world. I often think of the highway as the ultimate example. The highway gets us from point A to point B fast. However, the highway itself has destroyed everything between point A and point B, replacing it with . . . well . . . the highway. Where the highway now stands there used to be points A and B add infinitum. The world was comprised of points, some nice, some not so nice, some boring, some exciting, some safe, some dangerous. But they were all points, places to be.

The highway turned the world of points into a world of lines. Are we more interested in being somewhere or getting somewhere? The easier we make it to get somewhere the less places worth visiting there are.

The same can be said for music. We may pluck songs one by one off the internet, but what are doing if not leaving holes in the overall tapestry of pop music culture?

Pretentiously Yours, d

A CountryHoppin' IndieRockin' BassistSwappin' DstringPoppin Happy Birthday to Frank: VOL II

2008-12-25T19:02:47Z

VOLUME II (with Pictures!)

Lemonade out of Trevor. . . I mean, 'Lemons':

Possessions bassist flakes (for the last time, mind you). Superhero Kimballs www.thekimballsrock.com bassist Alan Tepper agrees to fill in last minute. Even superheroes aren't perfect and Alan can't learn the entire set list in 24 hours. So as a sort of prelude to the Possessions set, Frank does an acoustic mini-set with Glen the peddle steel guy and Dave (newly anointed Possessions drummer). It's a quiet and thoughtful set, but with enough playful banter from the crowd (mostly the Dirt Floor Review guys whose set ended hours ago and who are now properly drunk and bawdy) to keep the mood casual.

After a few songs Frank calls Tracy and Alan up. Alan is amazingly ON for a guy who's never so much as practiced with the Possessions (or, um, met the other member of the band's rhythm section). Tracy, sufficiently broken in from her guest appearance with the Kimballs earlier in the evening, and loaded to the point that all inhibitions are gone, rocks better than I have ever seen her rock. For about a half hour I worry about losing my girlfriend to one of several dozen drunk and drooling men in the crowd (normally I'd say I have an edge over the drunk and drooling set but it's been a long night and I'm no great shakes myself at this point). Frank, too - while not having quite the same effect on my libido - is ON. Granted I've never seen this guy off, but he's been playing all night, he has a few drinks in him, he's playing to a huge crowd of friends and at this point his playing is plain seamless.

Minor Glitch: Frank introduces what he refers to as the Possession's "hit" by which he means the song that would most likely become a "hit" if an A&R man were in the crowd. Problem is, Frank forgot to email said "hit" in the form of an MP3 to Alan. So after building the song up Frank realizes they have to move on to another one, one that Alan knows.

Another glitch: Frank's D-string pops (luckily his g-string remains intact - sorry, if I didn't write it you would have thought it anyway). Quick decision: Alan and Dave leave the stage, Frank grabs his acoustic and viola, the remainder of the set is an encore-like unplugged segment with Tracy and Frank. They now play an acoustic version of their "hit" ('Putty in Your Trembling Hands'). The highlight comes towards the end of Putty when Frank lets go of the guitar, puts his hands over his head and starts clapping, calling on the audience to do likewise: And we all do! It is a stadium rock moment in a tiny dingy country bar. This is the best Possessions show I have ever seen.

There was one more act after the Possessions. With breathy siren-like vocals, well-known local Singer Carin Gorrell led her band through a soulful set that conjured in my mind images of the rolling hills of Appalachia on a sunny day (which is no small feat if you consider I was in a stinking bar in the middle of Brooklyn on a cold winter night). I'm loathe to give Carin the short end of the stick but I'll admit that by the time this final set began I was tired and worn out - as I think more than a few people were. Frank was the author of the evening's lineup and maybe he assumed - rightly I think - that Gorrell and her band would provide a nice cool down for the tired fans. Alas, by dispatching of this duty like professionals, Carin's band seemed to seal their set's fate as "background music" to the end of a long and rocking night. NOTE THAT THIS WAS ONLY MY EXPERIENCE. THERE WERE PLENTY OF PEOPLE STILL RIGHT UP AGAINST THE STAGE WHO WERE COMPLETELY CAUGHT UP IN THE MUSIC.

Ok, still with me? Here's your treat for sticking it out to the end. PICTURES!!!!

Birthday Boy Closeup

The Kimballs Cut It Up!

The Kimballs With Guest Stars

Somehow I roped her in

Frank and Dave of the Possessions

The Possessions with Alan of the Kimballs

Carin Gorrell

Didn't Get An Autograph But I Did Get a Smooch

A CountryHoppin' IndieRockin' BassistSwappin' DstringPoppin Happy Birthday to Frank: VOL I

2008-12-24T12:48:48Z

NOTE: I HAVE BEEN WORKING ON THE FOLLOWING ENTRY REGARDING FRANK SCHIAZZA'S RECENT 30TH BIRTHDAY PARTY FOR QUITE A WHILE AND I'M STILL NOT DONE WITH MY ACCOUNT OF THE EVENING. THIS PROBABLY MEANS I AM WRITING TOO MUCH BUT WHAT CAN I SAY? IT WAS A GOOD TIME AND SOME OF MY FAVORITE BANDS AND PEOPLE WERE THERE THAT NIGHT. SO CONSIDER THIS A VOLUME I. THE FORTHCOMING VOLUME II WILL INCLUDE AN ACCOUNT OF THE SECOND HALF OF THE EVENING AS WELL AS LOTS OF PHOTOGRAPHS. HOPE YOU ARE INCLINED TO READ ALL THE WAY THROUGH. HAPPY HOLIDAYS EVERYONE!

This entry is a tribute to Frank Schiazza, a talented (to say the least) musician and a top notch human being: A mensch as we Jews would say.

I had intended to write a review of sorts of the mini-music festival Frank put together on the occasion of his 30th birthday but it's now been about a week since it happened, and as I was there to enjoy myself rather than take notes I can no longer comment on the particulars. I am also too lazy right now to make this into any sort of structured account of the evening so what you'll find below if you continue to read might well be a fairly random string of memories, impressions and commentaries on the evening. Maybe it'll be more cohesive than I am anticipating (I am literally writing as fast as I am thinking) but don't count on it.

-Basic Info:
Where: Hank's Rootin' Tootin' Saloon, Pacific Street, Downtown Brooklyn, New York City
When: December 13th, 2008
What: A showcase of several bands all of whom Frank has connections to in honor of Frank's 30th birthday

-First impression:
I have never seen anyone work as hard on the occasion of his or her birthday celebration than Frank did that Saturday night. The first band up was Scott Dennis and the Dirt Floor Review, a rough and tumble country outfit specializing in covers, both obscure and well-known, with a penchant for highly entertaining on- stage, between-songs banter. People were only beginning to filter in throughout this group's set but everyone who arrived seemed to have the same question for those already present: Where's Frank? It turns out that if you looked long enough at the onstage magic-eye collage of equipment, instruments, people, and memorabilia popping off the walls, you'd see Frank - wedged between the drum set and the lead guitarist - with a bass in his hands. Two points here: A) as brilliant a writer, guitarist, singer and frontman as Frank is, he never hesitates to blend on into the rhythm section for friends in need of some onstage help. Music is music to Frank, playing is a joy and it's all about community. B) Frank is a pretty competent bassist despite the fact that this is not his main instrument.

-The Kimballs Take Brooklyn:
I take a sort of yente-like satisfaction in knowing that I've enriched the careers of two very different bands by introducing them to one another and setting off an unlikely but extremely rich and productive relationship between them. The Kimballs have been borrowing Possessions vocalist Tracy Eisenberg (aka my talented sexy girlfriend) since I invited Tom Burns (aka Papa Kimball) to see Tracy and Frank at Pete's Candy Store several months ago. Tracy's performed with Tom and his Kimballs (Michael Mark on drums, Alan Tepper on Bass) several times since that meeting and every time she sounds better. She couldn't have sounded any better than she did Saturday night when the Kimballs blew a country-luvvin' audience away with their signature blend of tongue-in-cheek over the top showmanship, gracefully violent stage antics and clockwork-tight musicianship. This was 3 men all in black and sporting matching silver ties following a band with a peddle steel guitar. A 'Blues Brothers' scenario as Tom himself would point out.

I don't know what the rest of the audience thought but - as much as I enjoyed the Dirt Floor Review - this is when my night really began. A jeans-clad Tracy took her cue from the boys in black, excused herself and emerged a moment later in badass black miniskirt and boots ready to kick it rock&roll. She sat in on her usual Kimballs numbers, '1933' and 'Brenda' as well as 'Father Christmas' the catchy punked-out Kinks piece reinvented by Tom and the boys (and Tracy) several weeks ago in the studio (and now available on cd and probably downloadable on myspace). The real treat was when Birthday Boy Frank made his way onto the stage for 'Brenda', giving the song the Steely Dan-esque guitar solo that I never knew it was calling for. Judging by the smile on Tom's face - a face famous for an exaggerated stolidness during performances - he too was pleased by the results of this rock-speriment.

More props to Frank: This is a man who wears a cowboy hat, plays a Gretch semi-acoustic and is ensconced in a scene, the key players of which never stray more than a few notes from straight-up country. Even the down-home sound of the Possessions is a departure from the local norm but Frank's taste for the Kimballs is downright heroic given the arguably conservative tenor of the Brooklyn Country Scene (which I love lest anyone get the wrong idea here). Serious props to Frank for inviting the Kimballs onto a country stage, serious props to them for accepting and for an unapologetically 'Kimballs' performance.

Next Up, The Possessions . . . Sort Of
The Possessions can typically warm up a stage in under a minute. On this particular night, due to the very unprofessional behavior of one unnamed bassist (formerly of the Possessions), things were complicated a bit. Finding themselves without a bassist less than 48 hours before show time, Frank and Tracy had to formulate a plan and fast. The performance engendered by this plan - though conceived in an atmosphere of confusion and doubt - was arguably one of the best I've seen the Possessions pull off to date.

Thoughts Which Surfaced While I Was Trying to Write a Simple Response to Another Blogger's Comment

2008-12-12T18:58:09Z

Yes, well it's not easy to have anything intelligent to say about indie rock these days because indie rock hasn't been an intelligent genre in a while. There are a few bands who still manage to put out unique music. But it seems like some time back indie rock hit its irony saturation point. For example, the xylophone. It was quirky and fun for a little while (and thank you Wes Anderson for introducing us to the canon of bands who use xylophones and bells) but seriously we are not 7-year-olds anymore no matter what we'd hope to convey about ourselves to the world with our faux-vintage t-shirts featuring Captain Crunch and Rainbow Brite (and truthfully I don't even know what the intended message is anymore). There is a decidedly Romper Room flavor to much that is being produced now, both with respect to music and indie culture in general and I think this is a reflection of the stubborness of today's generation of urban adults to abandon their childhoods.

If nostalgia for our own childhood is coloring the music we make and listen to, the clothes we wear, the ways we choose to spen our time, there also seems to be a good deal of nostalgia for the childhoods of others. My conclusion after a few good years of listening is that bands like Interpol and Walkmen (I'm probably dating my own knowledge of the indie scene by citing these two groups but what can I do?) aren't much more than respectable contemporary stand-ins for the post-punk bands of the seventies and eighties.

I'm curious to know if other people sense that there is more regurgitation out there than innovation. It's hard to evaluate your own scene as its happening. The 90's 'proper' happened more than a decade ago and I still can't decide whether it produced anything as iconic as Elvis or the free love culture of the late 60's.

I suppose being critical is also fashionable these days and I won't deny that I'm as much a product of this environment as anyone else. I can scoff at the kid in the faded Super Mario Brothers t-shirt but in my own way I fetishize aspects of the past, hand picking from among bygone trends that seem somehow to work for me. So I'm pointing the accusatory finger at myself as well.

The question is am I being too hard on us (you, me, hipsters everywhere)? Are we in fact somehow innovating in our fetishizing of the past or simply clogging the arteries of cultural progress?

It's a complicated thing.

Crash Course in Music with as Much Crashing as Music, and Bruises to Show for It

2008-12-07T17:41:15Z

The last two weeks at work have been a whirlwind and the next one promises to be the same. In fact, it's Sunday morning, but as I write I should really be getting ready to leave for the office where a colleague of mine is waiting for my help on a deadline.

But more than ever this is a whirlwind I'm really enjoying being swept up in. My responsibilities at work have become more numerous and more complex. This has been as source of anxiety (as is, like, everything in my life) but there are signs that I'm handling it well and nothing has ever been more encouraging.

Another great thing about going to work: when I'm not doing anything too complex, when all I am doing is drawing up plans and such on the computer I have the opportunity to listen to MUSIC! This may not sound like such a big deal but there are few other such opportunities for me nowadays. I found out several months ago that iPods don't take well to being put through a wash cycle. So there is no music during the commute anymore which is just as well considering eventually I would have been run over or mugged while rocking out. I constantly listened to music while working on "SPR" but now that I'm not at my drafting table for hours on end I no longer have that opportunity. So basically work is where it's at. Sometimes it seems like working is just a good excuse to listen to music.

Which brings me back to 'Rhythm and Blogs'. In a recent post I alluded to the Replacements (or 'Mats' as bona fide fans such as Steve Brezenoff would refer to them) and my waning interest in their music. Again, I have nothing but love for the band (as individuals they are all drunk d**chebags but they're the band that's proved more than any that drunken lousy behavior can increase the rock & roll factor of music that is already rock & roll). But in the last year there has been so much music in my life (for several reasons) that I feel like I'm living the history of rock at 100 x the speed it actually happened and completely out of chronological order. The 'Mats' are then a speck in the the tapestry of rock, albeit a beautiful shimmering glowing speck.

It was in grad school that I was first introduced to Yo La Tengo and my love affair with indie rock really began. Then, while working on 'SPR' I started to think about what kinds of bands a true music aficionado (or elitist depending on your point of view) like Ari would listen to. I knew about the Velvet Underground and that all alternative or indie bands cited them as a major influence so I started getting more into them. I also began listening to the Stooges and from there tried to make several inroads into early punk but didn't get too far. Bands like Dead Boys and The Damned - well, I guess they have their place in history, but after a while loud fast loud fast just leaves me cold. Even if they were the first to do it.

Now the MC5, there was a band I could hold onto for a little while. Punk spirit mixed with passion for music means hard hitting rock with wailing guitar solos. Their politics which I won't discuss began getting on my nerves and I had to move on. But here was a band which, more than the Stooges even, seemed to prove that the chaotic punk spirit is not mutually exclusive from musical virtuosity but that the two can marry quite well.

The contemporary band The Hold Steady is a far cry from the now defunct (I think) MC5, but for me their music seemed to make the same point. Many pass this band off as derivative but
A) How can a band NOT be derivative especially these days when rock has moved well into or even beyond its post modern phase? and
B) To be derivative of the Stooges and Springsteen at the same time is just kind of brilliant if you can pull it off and these guys do just that like champs.

Maybe I'm not the only urban white hipster going through this change right now but more and more it seems alright to enjoy Springsteen as the self-involved overly book smart indie rock of the turn of the 21st century grows stale. The Hold Steady I think is proof positive that this is a general trend. I listened to a podcast of this indie-gone-heartland-rock outfit live from DC's Black Cat and at the end of the set the crowd's shouts for an encore evolved into a steady 'USA, USA, USA' chant. Now this was over a year before Obama sparked the interest of youth and made patriotism hip again. The kids at this show seemed to be caught up in the thrill of enjoying American rock & roll in a way that has been anathema ever since the video for Smells Like Teen Spirit first aired on MTV about a decade and half ago.

But my path to this new and liberating relationship to music has a personal side to it too. Almost a year ago I began dating my wonderful girlfriend Tracy, an extremely gifted singer with a soulful voice and a love for the music of yesterday, from Aretha to Stevie Wonder, to Delaney and Bonnie to you name it. When we started dating she had just hooked up with Brooklyn-based songwriter and performer, Frank Schiazza, a kindred spirit and a committed life-long fan of Greg Allman. Also a f**king wicked guitarist.

I was an indie snob when I met Tracy. But I have been to so many of hers and Frank's performances over the past year and I say with complete honesty that I have come to love this music, the passion with which it is performed, the free-spirited manner in which members of this musical community hook up for a gig or two, go separate ways, come back together etc.) I love the spontaneity, the looseness, the unpredictability.

You know, I was going somewhere. I was hoping to somehow bring it on back to the title of the blog but lord has free-association writing taken hold and I think I have to stop right now because as I mentioned earlier my presence is requested at the office.

I will get back to this subject. In the meantime I hope those of you who read this post had the patience to read it all the way through and have thoughts of your own about today's musical trends that you'd like to share. This blog thing is always more fun when it becomes a dialogue.

Thanks for reading. d