Thursday, July 31, 2008
Marty and the Stones
I missed Martin Scorsese's concert film of The Rolling Stones, Shine A Light when it had a limited run in IMAX last Spring. I wonder if my reaction to it might have been a bit different than my DVD viewing with the size and sound many times larger than life. But the concert film I saw didn't include much to leave a major impresion with me.
My biggest issue: Basically, I don't dig the Stones. The rooster posing of Jagger, Woods and Richards really has never done anything for me and the advance of age makes it even more ridiculous. The Stones as an institution plus the length of their legacy makes them stand out and seems to make everyone giddy. Even Hillary Clinton's mother goes kind of weak in the knees when she meets them in the film's prologue. Frankly, I don't really get it.
I do get the band. Charlie Watts is by sure one of the finest time keepers in the world. I've been a big Darryl Jones fan ever since I saw him with Miles Davis. Chuck Leavell brought a lyrical fluidity to Allman Brothers tracks like Jessica. Bernard Fowler is a great R and B vocalist. I guess I'm weird, but I would be more excited to see the Rolling Stones band than the three who take up the spotlight.
The prologue of the film feigns mass chaos and confusion in preparation of the filmed concert at the beginning of the film. What is the set list? Where is the set? What is the first song? To where Scorsese supposedly receives the set list at the last moment. The featurette on the DVD betrays the charade of Shine A Light's pre-concert preface. There is industry to the rehearsals and the filmmaking preparations.
There were a few minutes in the film I quite enjoyed. The breaks on the end of Just My Imagination were quite soulful. And Buddy Guy continues his reign as being one the coolest individuals left on the planet. Also, the vintage film clip interviews that Scorsese used as bumpers between numbers were entertaining and, of course, culled from the best stockpile possible. But mediocre tunes like She Was Hot and eh gads, wretched vocals from Keith Richards on You Got the Silver and Connection, which was mercifully cut off early did not enhance or expand their legacy, at least in my view.
With the Scorsese pedigree and his success in music related films like The Last Waltz and Bob Dylan: No Direction Home, I had hoped for something extraordinary. Perhaps a bigger than life and nearly as big as the Beacon Theater itself presentation in IMAX would have made this a different experience. But not being a fan of the band certainly is a factor. No form or presentation medium can ultimately transfrom the material if one can't really relate to it, I suppose.
posted by well-executed buffet at 10:10 PM
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Wednesday, July 30, 2008
Herzog does Buddhism
I conclude that Werner Herzog can't make enough documentaries. His sonorous voiceover could give a certain gravitas to footage of a family picnic, or a trip to the bank or grocery store. the But Herzog's documentaries are filled with subjects and topics that are not so mundane and often exotic and extreme.
Wheel of Time follows three Buddhist pilgrimages in 2002. Central to the film is a Kalachakra Initiation in Bodh Gaya India, the location where the Buddha found enlightenment. This is also known as the Wheel of Time festival where monks create a highly intricate sand mandala that is wiped away at the end of the celebration. Herzog's cameras and narration observe the pilgrims, their teaching and prayers as well as the the creation of the mandala. It very much reminded me of Louis Malle's 1970s Phantom India.
The Bodh Gaya Kalachakra Initiation is cut short because of an illness of Dalai Lama's. The scene where he announces this mid-ceremony is highly dramatic, the intensity of his folowers palpable. The film then jumps to another Kalachakra Initiation some months later held in Ganz, Austria. This also diversifies the view of who the followers of Buddhism are.
There is also a delightful interview with Dalai Lama and Werner Herzog. If I had a a party where I could invite anyone living, I think the two of those folks would definitley be on the guest list.
Why isn't there an equivalent phrase to "man of letters" to filmmakers whose vision and work stretches between fiction, non-fiction and maybe everything in between?(commercials, short personal films, music videos) "Man of film" just doesn't seem right. A new coinage is needed, I believe. How about "total cinemest?" Regardless, there should be a way to identify folks like Herzog, Wim Wenders, and Martin Scorsese whose contribution to film consist of far more than storied dramas.
posted by well-executed buffet at 10:18 AM
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Tuesday, July 29, 2008
Claudine
I saw about half of this film in the summer of 1977. It was made three years earlier, but was programmed on a double bill with Car Wash. I remember only saw about half of it. This week I saw the whole thing. The world's hippest garbage man, James Earl Jones hooks up with Diahann Carroll as Claudine, the welfare mother doing what she can to make it despite her six children.
Some films are successful because of one or two elements. Claudine is a good little movie that makes it due to great acting and a lot of heart. When Laurence Fishburne recently appeared on the Elvis Mitchell interview program, Under the Influence, he listed James Earl Jones' performance as an example of "swinging," which I interpret to mean as when an actor is in a zone where all cylinders and moving parts both external and internal lead to a most memorable performance. He certainly is one of the hippest garbage men to be depicted on film. The welfare system makes his life hell putting him between rock and hard place and James eloquently states his case several times during the film.
The soundtrack truly stands out here as well. Curtis Mayfield composed the music which was performed by Gladys Knight and the Pips. Although, the director's choice to cue in the song Mr. Welfare Man every time the case worker came to call on Claudine and her brood is less than subtle. Regardless, Claudine was certainly sought as anecdote to the years of violent blaxploitation that preceded it and still stands as a pleasant film experience.
posted by well-executed buffet at 12:33 AM
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Monday, July 28, 2008
Hidden treasure in Special Features menu: Jammin' the Blues
I was hoping that Pete Kelley's Blues with Jack Webb and Ella Fitzgerald was going to be next disc sent in the latest round of Netflix roulette, but I ended up instead with Blues in the Night (1941). It turned out to be quite a strange little film, a fusion of a standard B movie gangster film, a musical where a ragtag group of musicians rode box cars and effusively expressed their desire to keep true to their musical vision, and an early excursion into psychological themes for forties director Anatole Litvak. Litvak went on to direct The Snake Pit and Sorry. Wrong Number, two of the most noted of noirs with women as central characters. But in 1941, the dark side had to be expressed in very strange dream sequences (credited to Don Siegel, no less) where lab overprinting and high key light out are given a work out.
Priscilla Lane plays Character, the effervescent good girl singer who always looks great even when she is traveling in a boxcar. Betty Field is Kay Grant, the bad girl, parasitically preying on the weaknesses of men to get her through. Kind of in the middle is the sensitive artistic genius, Jigger Lane, played by Robert Whorf, Jigger's patron is Del Davis, (Lloyd Nolan, many years before he was Dr. Chegley) who has the band booked at the Jungle, his New Jersey road house and gambling operation. Davis wants nothing to do with Kay after he was double-crossed by her. This gives her the opportunity to get her meathooks into Jigger, causing him to go to a mental hospital for "Psychiatric Neurosis" which means having a bunch of weird montage sequences to describe his mental state during treatment treatment. Hopefully, he will get well enough to play more of those Harold Arlen and Johnny Mercer songs he supposedly wrote...
Blues in the Night wasn't terrible. It was a fun little trifle for a hot summer day in the basement. But the best thing about this DVD release were the extras--two Porky Pig cartoons, a vintage featurette with the excellent showmanship of the Jimmy Lunceford Band, who were also featured in Blues in the Night. .
But most notable is the inclusion of Jammin' the Blues, maybe the most important Hollywood jazz film of the forties. Lester Young, Philly Jo Jones, Illinois Jacquet, Sweets Edison and others, perform in a staged jam session with lovely direction and lighting, I have only seen bootleg 16mm copies in the past, so to see a digitally enhanced version was ten minutes of jazz bliss. Here, check it out for yourself...
posted by well-executed buffet at 11:11 PM
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Sunday, July 27, 2008
The Hold Steady at Crystal Ballroom 7.27.08
I filled my headphones with the first three Hold Steady recordings shortly before I saw them in a too-short early afternoon set at Sasquatch 2007. I missed their November swing through Portland, but encouraged by separate groups of friends I went to their performance at the Crystal in support of their new album, Stay Positive.
The Hold Steady's front man is Craig Finn, nerdy, a bit round and balding with glasses. His stage presence is rather dervish-like and seems like he is in the midst of some kind of purgative exorcism at times, particular when be is blurting out a rash of polysyallabic lyrics. Seldom could you say Finn is singing, in a traditional way, except sometimes on the slower tunes and chorus sing alongs. His energy and presence dominate the scene when The Hold Steady performs, although Franz Nicolay, the little mustached man on keyboards acts as a kind of visual counterpoint to Finn's energy. His appearance is disarming. One would expect him to be playing organ at a pizza restaurant.
The lyrics are what is central to The Hold Steady when on listens to their albums. They are full of arresting imagery and can be dense and intense. In the first albums, Finn creates a Nelson Algren, John Rechy, Hubert Selby kind of world of backstreets and religiosity. The latest two are more varied song cycles, but there is still a thematic signficance that makes them feel not just like collections of songs for download, but well-ordered experiences with forethought and architecture that were the hallmark of albums, back in the day when one purchased 12 inch platters that required a turntable and stylus.
Old school classic rock is very present in The Hold Steady. There are hooks and dramatic keyboard flourishes and lead guitar solos before the last chorus. You can't help but think Springsteen when you hear this, but it is more of the Springsteen of the pre-Born to Run era, than Born in the USA, especially when talk of women is concerned. The fourth song on Stay Positive is Lord I'm Discouraged, where a lover in waltz tempo bemoans the object of his affection as "coming up with excuses and half-truths and fortified wine" And one could envision a lost tape from Asbury Park sessions with a song that had a chorus like:
Magazines and daddy issues
I know you're pretty pissed
I hope you'll still let me kiss you
I'm glad I saw The Hold Steady this time through, even though the dead sound of the ballroom absorbed the more subtle aspects of the lyrics that Finn delivered. But going to a rock concert is more about getting impressed with the band's intent and impact, especially when the classic rock sounding anthems are driving the first third of the crowd standing in front into a frenzy, as in the opening number of the show (also the first track on the newly released Stay Positive) called Constructive Summer:
Raise a toast to St Joe Strummer
Think he might've been our only decent teacher
Getting older only makes it harder to remember
We are our only saviours
We're gonna build something this summer
Certainly The Hold Steady is building on their fan base this summer with a stand out album and high energy shows executed with both intensity and a sense of purpose.
posted by well-executed buffet at 11:00 PM
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Saturday, July 26, 2008
PDX is a beer town, baby!
The Portland Brewer's Festival takes place the last full weekend in July each year. This year was the 21st such fete. I have not been for many, many years: not since Dave Frishbergused to amass a septet or sextet and would play pre-WWII whorehouse soundtrack jazz. The only music I heard this year sounded like a Rush tribute band.
If you truly are crowd-phobic, stay away from this event, especially on the weekend afternoons and evenings where it seems there must be close to ten thousand folks wandering around with their plastic mugs. Brewfest is really about lines. There was the line for the ID check, the line for mugs and tokens, the lines for beer, and, in natural cause and effect, the line for the comfort stations. You ask yourself, all of this for a glass of beer, but after you get the hang of the place and a couple glasses to numb the absurdity, it is actually okay.
The craft beer tradition in Portland is one of this city's great legacies. It seems like there is some kind of microbrewery or brewery-related pub on most corners of most of the trendy neighborhoods (Alberta, NW, Hawthorne, et al.) Brewfest is actually a chance to have PDX name small breweries (Widmer, Bridgeport, etc) measure up alongside other craft and micro breweries, primarily those from the West California, but a few midwest and eastern offerings find their way into the tap lines as well.
The cup and token system, and even the crowd size tends to create an equation for the event to stay under control. There are significantly more men than women, and the guys all seem ready to get into some beer talk, especially where brew style details are concerned. It was pretty much a very cheery scene where seemingly most folks wore beer t-shirts although it was damned crowded. My out of town relation seemed to dig it very much and I was more than glad to show how Portlanders event style party. The lines were too long to indulge in one or two token tasters, so I had full glasses. Therefore, my selections were limited to three mugs: An overly fizzy Kolsch from Hales Brewing of Seattle. A wonderful Almond Brown Ale from Standing Stone Brewery in Ashland. And Love Fish Abbey Dubbel from Flying Fish Brewing of Cherry Hill NJ, of all places was a very nice beer indeed and deserved of importation to the fest.
I don't think I would be likely to go to a Portland Brewfest again except maybe during its opening hours on Thursday or Friday. I understand Portland's new mayor-elect (Sam Adams his name, by beer golly!) taped the fist keg poured up the first beer of the festival at the end of a parade that began on 11am on Thursday. Ya just gotta love this town!
posted by well-executed buffet at 11:05 PM
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Friday, July 25, 2008
Mr. Freedom and Mr. Klein
A few weeks back on this bitstream, I explored A Perfect Couple one of the of the new Criterion DVD set higlighting the films of American expatriate filmmaker and photgrapher, William Klein. I have just finished a second film in the series, Mr. Freedom.
Mr. Freedom (William Abbey) is sent by Dr. Freedom (Donald Pleasance) to France to investigate another Freedom agent, Captain Formidable's capture and demise by MoujickMan and Red Chinaman and to free France of Reds. Mr Freedom is a foreign policy caricature in superhero garb and is simplistic, dogmatic and racist. He murders his perceived enemies without hesitation as he talks in an over-the-top cowboy cadence blended in with akind of commercial voice over delivery. His love interest and femme fatale, double agen, Marie Magdalene, played by Delphine Seyrig revives him with a monster size serving of Kellogg's Cornflakes. Seyrig is not the only noted French actor in the film. Those with a taste in international cinema will recognize appearances by Phillipe Noiret, Sammy Frey, and Serge Gainsbourg in small parts and cameos.
Mr. Freedom is satire bright, shiny and audacious. His red white and blue uniform is an hysterical combination of football, hockey and motorcycle sportswear. He is over the top Buckaroo Bonzai in a world that feels like it was created by Robert Downey Sr., Little Murders era Jules Feifer and reminds me a little bit in tone of the late seventies political farce, Winter Kills. The gags are broad and goofy for the most part, but almost always with the ragged blade of a hunting knife.
Oh my, does this film feel prescient at times. At one point Mr. Freedom is asking an inflatable French super hero if he is for us or against us. The last encounter Mr Freedom has with Dr. Freedom (the paternalism is hinted at indirectly) after long newsreel footage of 1968 Marxist demonstrations in Paris results in Dr. Freedom telling the hero not to worry about the French because they will come groveling back to Freedom after Red Chinaman gets through with them. Yet Mr. Freedom seems not to be able to get rid of his vitriol: "They are bastards, ungrateful, different."
I found a couple good short web articles about Klein and Mr. Freedom: An article by Jonathan Rosenblum about his reviving Mr. Freedom at a recent Chicago class and film seriesand
An introductory article about Klein's box set on the IFC website.
posted by well-executed buffet at 11:58 PM
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Thursday, July 24, 2008
Impressions of Obama in Berlin
It was a big day for workmen on the remodel so I got the opportunity to see Barak Obama's Berlin speech in real time on CNN 10am PST, 7.24.08. The last time I watched a real time event related to the campaign was on the last primary when Obama secured the nomination. I was amused that one of the commentators prior to the speech mentioned Portland as being Obama's other most notable sized audience. It was great to be a part of the crowd and having visited Berlin felt a further sense of place with this speech.
I can't see an image of the Victory Column in the Tiergarten without thinking about Bruno Ganz and his angel colleagues in Wim Wenders' Himmel uber Berlin aka Wings of Desire or the horrendous rainstorm PDR and I got caught up, the result of which was a memorable picture of her wringing her pants out in the tub once we got to the hotel.
The weather and probably the angels were in Barak Obama's favor on this Thursday evening. I conclude that sometimes symbolism is of highest signficance. For Obama to come to Berlin and use all of his rhetorical splendor as a citizen of the world is quite significant, I believe. And I imagine that most of the 200,000 curious Germans felt that way as well in addtition to millions of other Europeans who saw it on television.
The energy of the crowd was very impressive. He made a joke about not looking like other Americans who have come to Berlin and quickly told the story of his father, coming to the US from Kenya, which gave that story a kind of credence in this setting. And the setting was Obama's next major emphasis. He took us back 60 years to explore the significance of the Berlin Air Lift. This was the emblematic moment Obama used as a point of example, departure and exploration for the rest of his speech. "Burdens of global citizenship continues to bind us together. Cooperation between nations is not a choice."
Obama does not have to go far to find a metaphor in this city: New walls can not divide us... Walls between Christians and Muslims and Jews these are the walls we must tear down. And he moved on to other global issues: nuclear weapons, Afghanistan, and the environment. His plea for a worldwide effort to save the planet received the loudest and most exuberant response on the crowd reaching almost all the way back to the Brandenburg Gate.
He had to walk a careful line during his speech. Obama needed to strike the chord of being a world citizen, not candidate or presumed US President. "America and Europe can not turn inward. America has no better partner than Europe. Now is the time to build new bridges across the globe." Is this the kind of thing we want our world leaders to believe in and promote? Yes please. After Altamont, the Grateful Dead sang "One Way or another, This darkness got to give." In July of 2008 after a disgraceful presidency and sad excuse for foreign war, a bit of light peaks out of the darkness with remarks like
I know my country has not perfected itself. At times, we’ve struggled to keep the promise of liberty and equality for all of our people. We’ve made our share of mistakes, and there are times when our actions around the world have not lived up to our best intentions.
But I also know how much I love America. I know that for more than two centuries, we have strived, at great cost and great sacrifice, to form a more perfect union, to seek, with other nations, a more hopeful world.
Television got even better that day. John McCain's response to Obama took place at a German Restaurant in Columbus, Ohio because the planned Mission Accomplished style photo op on an off share oil derrick was cancelled due to Hurricane Dolly. He looks rattled and defensive, but most telling is the campaign's attempt to connect their candidate with "Well, I'd love to give a speech in Germany to - a political speech - or a speech that maybe the German people would be interested in...But I would much prefer to do it as president of the United States rather than as a candidate for the office of the presidency." In the back of McCain's head, was a sign that read Der Fudge Haus. Could there be a vaster contrast in this imagery? It was like a huge multi-million dollar epic alongside a cable access broadcast.
posted by well-executed buffet at 9:28 PM
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Wednesday, July 23, 2008
Sigur Ros: Heima, Sweet Heima
Sigur Ros has had a great deal of International success with their atmospheric, moody, and captivating sound. Their songs were picked up in Vanilla Sky and The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou They are a band of Icelandic musicians who are dedicated to music making. I predict that the biggest spike in their musical popularity will be due to a striking film, Heima, documenting their 2006 summer return to Iceland, playing a series of free, virtually unanounced concerts across their home country.
Musically and visually,Heima is a exceptional and striking experience. The DVD set includes a 90 minute documentary of the tour. The second disc, which I first saw, due to Netflix cue demands featuring lots more concert footage and unique locations across Iceland. I watched sections of this second disc repeatedly for most of this month with much less context than the complted film provided.
In Heima, the documentary proper, director Dean DeBlois, who is mostly associated with animated films like Lilo and Stitch, rescues th film after the original summer shoot with a fine job of weaving together environmental concert footage, the audiences, and beguiling Icelandic landscape into a really wonderful experience. There are local guest artists that collaborate with the returning popstars: a brass band, an artist who makes stone xylophones, a local choirs and a Icelandic rhyme expert. This is not your typical concert documentary
The music of Sigur Ros is described on their Wikipedia entry as "Post-rock, Dream pop
Ambient. and Shoegazing." Simply hearing it via the net did not connect with me. A colleague compelled me to take a closer look. After hours of their music in the mancave this summer, its hard to believe that anyone couldn't find this music compelling and intriguing, but I grant you I took some time and energy to connect with it here.
As I mentioned in my first post about this band a few weeks ago, I started at a YouTube delivered clip of the film's finale, a song eventually given the title Pop Song that was mainly filmed at their Reykjavík concert which was broadcast live over Europe with a crowd estimated at 10% of the entire population of Iceland. It is a major event and you sense the band is pulling out all the stops for this number that starts out lyrical and ends intensely.
Heima is the type of film or video experience that makes one want to know more about it. The audio commentator by the band's manager, John Best was actually pretty instructive about the band, the film, and the tour. One of the most interesting comments for me regards the background inspriations for the film. Best says there were three major inspirations they "nicked." To show the relationship between audience ,band and enviroment, they were inspired by Bert Stern's Jazz on a Summer Day. Nicholas Roeg's Walkabout provided the inspiration for the way the Iceland's landscape would be presented. And they used the slow tracking and well framed performance photography of Pink Floyd Live at Pompei as a template on how to display Sigur Ros' music visually.
This example of inspirations provides for me evidence about how well envisioned this band's tour and film were for this project. I hope it serves its purpose in passing along the wonders of this band its heima.
posted by well-executed buffet at 11:07 PM
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Tuesday, July 22, 2008
Emmylou Harris at Oregon Zoo 7.22.08
Long waits, sand chairs, obnoxious west side Portland drinking and talking people. These are annoyances that come with the territory at a zoo show. But when Emmylou takes the stage all this nonsense fades away (even the obnoxious drunk people more or less quit talking) and one is treated to Americana's most prominent and diverse diva.
But as my concert partner for the evening (my mother, Priscilla) asked: "Why did she have to sing so many sad songs?" The answer: because she likes them. One gets a sense that Emmylou draws from what she likes and admires from her more than thirty years of performing whether it be an original, Buck Owen's Together Again or a song by Steve Earle. ("We are luck to have him back" she said.)
Portland loves Emmylou and she digs Portland, showing off her leopard print scarf acquired that day from the Nordstrom Half-Yearly sale. And although it is a lot of work and requires patience, the zoo has its charms, especially the sky turning into night and cloudscapes over the ridge above the highway that can take you to the coast.
posted by well-executed buffet at 11:51 PM
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Monday, July 21, 2008
Caught in a Digital World Stuck in Boxes
René Besson's 2000 film Boxes has tagged onto it the supposed distinction of only costing 300 to produce. That is a dubious claim in my book because of the size of the cast and the sophistication of the piece. If this is true at all, then Mr. Besson was able to get a lot of starving actors to give their time and starved them so more.
The flag of this claim might be important, however, it attracted my attention. What Boxes is certainly is a creative work that explores and utilizes the unique capabilities and possibilites of Digital Video hardware and software as a medium of its own. One could create a lineage of these works that Boxes would be a part. The list would include David Blair's Wax, or the Discovery of Television Among the Bees , Darren Aronofsky's Pi and Requiem for a Dream as well as the more experimental films of Hal Hartley, Stephen Soderbergh and Mike Figgis.
DV's possibilities of color manipulation, portability, depth of field to near infinity, and ability to spot color and utilize split screen and other kinds of effects are pushed and explored in this story of shallow late 20 somethings at turn of the century Los Angeles. Cubicle dwellers Wren and Madison are young roosters on the make who somehow are able to pull Eden Salenger into accompanying their ventures into single bars at night. Wren and Madison don't refer to their carnal pursuits and fellow office dwellers not by real names but by identifiers like Concerned Office Guy, Ms. Iran, and Eager Office Girl.
Eager Office Girl is one of two random deaths in the film. These events help add to the off-kilteredness of Boxes which is kind of like Neil La Bute's early films (Your Friends & Neighbors and In the Company of Men gene spliced with the work of an experimental video artist. In that I am interested in how light, time, space, and film chemistry limitations can be twisted and transformed with DV, I found Boxes moderately intriguing, but most I know would probably see it as mostly tedious in form and boorish in content because of the protagonists behavior. I am likely more forgiving to those who try to pursue the new, particularly in experiments of form and technology.
posted by well-executed buffet at 11:55 PM
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Sunday, July 20, 2008
Cathedral Park 2008 Day 2
Portland and bicycles. It has been a couple tough week with the drunk attacking the guy with bike incident and the bike on the car hood incident, but most of the time there is a gentle ubiquitous presence of bicycles in this city.
My Arthur Miller Shot of Cathedral Park Jazz 2008
(i.e. A View From the Bridge) Notice how most the crowd chases the shade from the shadow of the St Johns Bridge.
The Portland Jazz Orchestra
Yes, we have no Fajitas, we only have Gyros today
"One chicken fajita please. Hey, aren't you the Gyro guy from Cathedral Park"
posted by well-executed buffet at 4:36 AM
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Saturday, July 19, 2008
Summer at its midpoint: Cathedral Park Jazz Festival 2008
For 28 years, on the third weekend in July, North Portland residents and jazz fans come hangout under the St Johns bridge for one of the best of all free admission jazz fests in the free world.
Drummer Towner Galaher comes home and lead a group through some very fine medium to hard bop sounds. Galaher is on the New York scene after getting his years of formidable training from Portland's bop drumming master, Mel Brown.
Andre St James is one of those stalwart musicians who helped out with Galaher's set. Over the years I have seen him play in a number of musical settings in PDX.
Portland pianist Randy Porter finished day one of this year's CPJ Fest. His touch is light and fluid. and although it was a bit sedate for my tastes, the crowd responded well.
posted by well-executed buffet at 2:42 PM
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Friday, July 18, 2008
Post-posting in the Summer of 08
I was going to go ahead and leave some days unrepresented, but I had a troubling sense of disorder for not having a post assigned to each 24 hour unit (I hear wife say, why don't you worry about important stuff?) But this is obviously place holder.
It has been a strange summer. PDR is up at the writer's retreat and I am watching or hearing subcontractors come through Casa del Pam and Bob with our bathroom and kitchen ceiling remodel. It is kind of interesting. I have a great deal of respect for these trades folks and it has been cool talking to them. Yet I will be glad when it is over.
Wow, this kind of is a routine everyday mundane post for the buffet blog. A lapse. Coming soon once more: obscure accounts of obscure Euroflix, music hardly anyone knows anything about, or soon, I hope, impressions of the four books all at various stages of reader's completion. Peace Out.
posted by well-executed buffet at 7:52 PM
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Thursday, July 17, 2008
1985 George Clinton Rockpalast Extravaganza
Hey digital cable subscribers. You have until the end of July to check out a classic 1985 German broadcast of George Clinton and Funkadelic on concert_tv. It is under the heading "Never Before Seen"
I sure have heck never have seen this. It is the best live footage I have ever seen of George Clinton in person. It was recorded at an outdoor festival and features some wild encore jam sessions with Funkadelic and Red Hot Chili Peppers, Untouchables, and Killing Joke.
It begins with a cherry picker and Gary Shider way up in the sky, singing Cosmic Slop, playing the 'which one is George Clinton?" intro. He lays down the "I can hear my mother call" choru. And then the master guitar army of Blackbyrd McKnight, Michael Hampton, and the great late Eddie Hazel frying, sizzling, and acting as the grand executioners of funk with a capitol F. Meanwhile the cherry picker has landed and George takes the stage garbed a bit alike Shider was in the picker, but up close we see he is doing the pimp fur coat thing with lots of big white (maybe faux?) minks hanging from arms and shoulders.
In 1985 it is a far different looking George than at present. In the late eighties he transformed physically, like Garcia becoming a white bearded old man in the mid sevenites. But he's pretty skinny here, in a white outfit that I believe was used for laser tag, reminiscent of Elvis at the first Las Vegas comeback engagement. But there is no way George is going to sing American Trilogy. He is in top form here, cajoling, funkleading, mugging from the camera, rolling on the floor and even humping the monitors once or twice. Gary "diaper man" Shider is in prime form as well.
This is an interesting time capsule document for Clinton. It is definitely Funkadelic, not the PFunk All Stars. Does it really matter. Like Sun Ra, the name will change but the band and experience is much the same (the Sun Ra short list on Wikipedia:" "The Solar Myth Arkestra", "His Cosmo Discipline Arkestra", the "Blue Universe Arkestra", "The Jet Set Omniverse Arkestra") Yet in this show, there is definitely a sense of all cylinders firing as Funkadelic, usually a more rock based attack to the funk, draws on the book of 15 years or so of various George Clinton lead projects
I remember a Rolling Stone profile of D'Angelo several year's ago where he was smoking blunts with his crew. It went something like this.
D'Angelo: Remember that George Clinton bootleg video, what was that worth?
Acoloyte: Everything
I'm not saying that this video is the Rosetta stone, holy grail or lost ark, but I'm sure considering that this is finally the motivation to get some research done and purchase a DVD recorder at long last. Here is an excerpt illustrating my reason why:
posted by well-executed buffet at 9:18 PM
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Wednesday, July 16, 2008
Godard: "The Kids Were Mostly Alright" (67)
Jean Luc Godard's La Chinoise feels like a logical transitional point between A Woman is a Woman (1961) or Bande à partt (1964) and Weekend (1968.) La Chinoise will always be looked upon as being pop prophetic because it was done a year prior to the French student uprisings of 1968. Most of the action in the film takes place in an apartment over a summer when the parents are away. Five students turn a bourgeois flat into their version of what they think a Communist cell is. They hold seminars for each other and decorate the place with images and slogans. One of these: " We need to confront vague ideas with clear images," seems like one of the goals that Godard is exploring throughout the film
It was strange to watch this film on the heels of de Antonio's Underground. The documentary of Weather Underground cell that Emilie de Antonio, Mary Lampson, and Haskell Wexler filmed in the high Marxist and waning days of those former student radicals. There is one point in Undeground where Billy Ayers propels vitriol at de Antonio that is very reminiscent of some of Jean Pierre Leaud's moments in La Chinoise. The idealism of Godard's kids goes violent and awry and as for the former SDS Undergound: well... . A more interesting comparison would be to see this film alongside Bertolucci's The Dreamers. Kids trying to be grown up take over an apartment once more, but this time in a 2003 rearview mirror of the 1968 revolution days.
Godard in the mid to late sixties was all about taking the audience for a ride. And this ride is. of course, was filled with the politics and visual experimentation that was Godard at this time: intertitles, quick black out sketch like scenes, even a precursor (the Mao Mao song) to modern music videos. But to me, La Chinoise is most significant at this time because it shows his fascination with Anne Wiazemsky, the woman-child obsession that he stole from the master Robert Bresson. Wiazemsky was the muse and focus of Au hasard Balthazar a poetic and beautiful film that I am finding myself needing to return to (note to self: put this back in the que) that is probably Bresson's most significant masterpiece. Wiazemsky is someone to behold and it is more than just her beauty that is captivating. She is at that stage in life where you get a sense that this is someone evolving, transforming.
All Godard films have one or more scenes that stick to you like an iconic photographic image or a great meal. The dance scene in Bande à part or the exceptionally long tracking shot in Weekend connect with the viewer and are with them for a lifetime. In La Chinoise there is a scene where Wiazemsky is smoking and studying (not a little red book, of which there are hundreds in the apartment) but a larger tome. She is almost absently toying with a stereo as well. Jean Pierre Leaud, Truffaut's alter-ego and cinematic muse essentially makes an accusation about her multitasking. What follows is unforgettable. She uses the turntable and her powers as his lover (presumably) and melts him to a kind of putty, and it is also a kind of lesson from Godard about the power of music and of media. One might find most of the 90 minutes of the actions of these politically charged child to adult changelings tedious, but this exchange is one of those moments that rises and qualifies as great cinema and something that will get glued to you.
La Chinoise ends violently, but in a kind of broad garish, cartoonish way. Perhaps this is where Godard feels that this is the conclusion that playing with the box of matches known as Revolution inevitably leads. The kids are alright, but there are yellow diamond caution signs are along the side of this road.
posted by well-executed buffet at 11:18 PM
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Tuesday, July 15, 2008
Mr. Millhouse and Mr. de Antonio
Millhouse: A White Comedy was the last of Emile de Antonios's films I viewed from the Films of the Radical Saint box set. It was made at the peak of Richard Nixon's power towards the end of his first term in 1971.
The film is pretty much the greatest hits (or follies) of pre-Watergate Nixon. It begins with the 1962 press conference where he utters "You won't have Dick Nixon to kick around anymore" and also features most of the Checkers speech from ten years earlier. With material like this and clips from a preview of a Bob Hope USO show at the White House, de Antonio didn't really have to work too hard here.
In retrospect, Millhouse is a kind of precursor counterpart to Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11. In a perfect world where film could make a difference, both of these films should have helped turn the tide for a second disastrous term in office. (Cue in Beach Boys' Wouldn't It Be Nice, from Moore's Roger and Me) But, alas, although documentary film can have impact, it doesn't have that kind of power.
Millhouse like de Antonio's other films does not have voice over narration. It lets the clips and the likes of Jules Whitcover, Jack Anderson, and former Congressman Jerry Voorhis, one of the first victims of Tricky Dick style politics, give color commentary to the 20th century phenomenon that was Richard Nixon.
Viewing Millhouse today is an interesting experience. We know how the story ends after this 1971 document concludes, just as we know what happened to Vietnam in the years after 1968 when de Antonio's In the Year of the Pig was made. But in both cases I had the same reactions. First, there seems to be something exceptionally contemporaneous about the tone and experience of these films. And again, I wish these films had been able to find an audience (what degree the smear and shut down by powerful forces were successful in assuring they weren't seen is not really conclusive) back then and, maybe, just maybe, they could have helped a few more folks realize what a damned mess we were in.
posted by well-executed buffet at 9:47 AM
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Monday, July 14, 2008
Stevie Wonder at White River Amphitheater 7.11.08
The evening began with Wonder being escorted to the stage by his daughter ("Get out of the Water, baby") Aisha. We all know how lovely and how old she is. Anyway Stevie's entry was almost that of a saintly holy man. Wonder has been of stoutish build for sometime. The white with black abstract pattern on his loose garment seemed to be designed for the stage and elevated his presence. He talked briefly about how great it was to return to Seattle. He dedicated the show to Quincy Jones, one of the Puget Sound's finest. And said something about what a great year it was. Stevie returned to touring about a year ago after the death of his mother. He made a surprise swing through the NW in August 2007 of smaller venues and another trek through the country I believe in the Winter.
In the group's opener of four songs seamlessly from Hotter Than July, Wonder and his group of 12 or so musicians feels like a fully throttled and ready for its forthcoming European tour. This truly is a band hand crafted to deliver a legacy of music. And for two and a half hours that is what the audience received.
Knock Me Off My Feet first tune on acoustic and the first not to be at a kickass tempo by the band. The music that came at the formal conclusion of the tune was a hard kind of blues. He got the crowd to count off a couple times and what followed was a a voice synthesized version of the Stylistics' People Make the World Go Round. "Trash man's not picking up the trash today...---one of the finest of hot summer songs perfect for a July night.
This excursion into non-Wonder penned music continued after the Stylistics cover. With one of the keyboards, he played harmonica to the main theme of Rodrigo's Concierto du Aranjuez which segued perfectly into Chick Corea's Spain which also provided a musical introduction to each of the musicians on stage.
Most of the rest of the evening was an almost seamless exploration of Wonder's best music from the seventies, Don't Worry 'Bout a Thing went into a full salsa breakdown until recovering with a very moving version of Visions with a long Stevie rap towards the end of the tune (when the music is playing, Stevie talking at you is a sublime experience, without it, the stuff of seventies standup comics) that ended with a plea to the crowd to not be undecided about positivity, "because it can only move us forward."
The great transitional pair of Living in the City and Golden Lady from Innervisions came next followed by Creepin'. If there was to be a highlight reel of the seventies, this show could be the soundtrack. Have Mercy.
There was some new material, a couple of guest vocalists, (the guy with the long hair Sajaiya? who was an early 08 American Idol favorite, and the winner of a local Sing with Stevie concert with an egregious introduction by a local deejay) and an evening closer of almost perfunctory oldies medley of My Cherie Amour, Signed Sealed and Delivered, Sir Duke, and Superstition. But for me, it was Wonder's ability to take the audience into a world of his music and unique way of interpreting it and the music of others that did what a concert is supposed to do: both transport the audience and leave its impression on one.
posted by well-executed buffet at 9:40 PM
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Sunday, July 13, 2008
de Antonio Goes Underground
In May 1975 Emile de Antonio, Haskell Wexler, and Mary Lampson filmed interviews with five leaders of the Weather Underground. They were filmed in such a way for the faces of their fugitive subjects were not shown. The film later became a significant test of the First Amendment, and perhaps that is of more importance now than the film itself.
Thirty three years later, viewing Underground is a strange and somewhat quaint experience. This film truly is a product of its time. Wexler is seen filming into a mirror between Lampson and de Antonio while the backs of the five Underground members tell their story and speak their politics. Their conversations took place immediately took place after the fall of Saigon. They see it as a great victory and feel the validation of those events.
In an interview shortly before de Antonio's death that accompanies the new DVD release of the film he clearly states he makes films, not bombs. There is something undeniably profound about the scroll of all of the bombing actions attributed to the Weather Underground, which although did not lead to injury or death are significant actions against US infrastructure. De Antonio has a great talent for finding and utilizing film clips, most of which are from other political documentaries, that are very illustrative of time and place. The intercutting of footage from the Pentagon march, from the Attica riots and speeches from political leaders of the time, including the subjects of the film themselves help bring context to the statements and passions of the interview.
I was surprised to find Bernadette Dohrn, Bill Ayers and the others in the film say things sometimes quite profound, sometimes sensible, and reasonable. I believe it was the motivation of the filmmakers to give them an opportunity to have a forum to express who their subjects are. De Antonio and the others could be interpreted as being sympathetic, especially in the way the Weather Underground's views on class struggle are depicted--There is a longish segment of vintage footage of union violence set to a Pete Seeger song. But the mission of the film seems to be to let the Underground tell their own story beginning with the student movement, more male and posturing at first, through the Days of Rage demonstrations of the Democratic Convention, through their support of various revolutionary causes throughout the world and in the US, to a more Marxist grass-roots propaganda machine putting out the tract Prairie Fire and other publications.
Undeground is a time capsule curiosity. It is important that it is included in the de Antonio Radical Saint DVD collection as representative of one of his important works, but ultimately Siegel and Green's film Weather Underground will prove to be the document that best serves this topic in the future. After viewing this de Antonio's strangely staged forum for these radicals, I am finding a desire to go back and view that as well.
posted by well-executed buffet at 9:22 PM
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Saturday, July 12, 2008
Images of Auburn
The Green River Valley and Auburn provide some very fine views of Mt Rainier, albeit those which are not necessarily unfettered with objects residential or industrial.
Imagine my disappointment in exploring further to find that the these objects were not associated with spaceships, but simply ornamentation for the Auburn 17 multiplex.
Beware of bigass bugs in downtown Auburn
Big Daddy's has seen bigger cars and better days
I found my first experience at a race track filled with lots of stimuli.
posted by well-executed buffet at 11:38 PM
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Friday, July 11, 2008
A Strange Little Post Holder
The rules of the well-executed buffet are that there should really not be any rules, but there has certainly been a spirited set of self-imposed guidelines. One has been to strive for each day being represented, even if the post itself is not posted on the exact day of that representation. Time is fluid on the well-executed buffet.
The guideline of content is that it not just be about my head or my doings, but a part of a moveable feast of experience that our modern age can provide--so many choices, options, opportunities. And the buffet might take the opportunity to pull some of that together and go aha! or oh yeah! through digital word or image or Internet gleaning.
Anyway, this summer has been one of different rhythm and somehow the essence of daily blog entry, either real or representational has become slightly derailed once or twice. An example is this entry. This was going to be the late night or next morning ramblings from the 7.11 Stevie Wonder show -- that account will have appeared for one of the days of the week of 7.12. This post for representation on 7.11 only this cul du sac of ramble written much later in the week. But, hey. I never required this buffet to be really linear.
posted by well-executed buffet at 11:59 PM
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Thursday, July 10, 2008
A Personal Revelation: My Big Four
In anticipation of Friday's Stevie Wonder show, I've been thinking about the musical artists that have probably made the biggest impacts in the past three and a half decades or so of listening closely and in term of my view of music and the world. Here is the Pantheon short list, my gang of four and it might surprise some folks: Herbie Hancock, Miles Davis, Quincy Jones and Stevie Wonder.
Why these folks and not James Brown, Ray Charles, George Clinton, Joe Strummer, The Beatles, Gil Scott Heron, Roy Ayers, Rickie Lee Jones, et al.? I think it has to do with the the fact that the artists listed above made contributions with significant shifts in style and exploration they made in developing their art form more frequently than some of the other artists I mention here.
And a listener, if they are really listening, can't help but make that shift with them that transformation with them. Are you really a Miles fan if you only play Kind of Blue? Can you dig Herbie both funketeer and classic jazz pianist accompanying the likes of Miles and Wayne Shorter. And Q deserves respect even if some of his enterprises cloy of self-conscious pop juggernaut: I say they are always worth checking out. Stevie Wonder's personal transformation from precocious baby Ray novelty to major artist is one of the great stories of our time. Lots of us feel we made the journey with him somehow.,
In all four of these artists I am finding I have a personal story and layers of appreciation of their artform over the years. I am collecting my anecdotes and critical journeys of this time and relationship. This may be a part of a long project or simply will only turn into some pools and wells that will surface from time to time in this buffet. Who knows? But the discovery of this pattern and the level of significance of my personal relationship with these folks will be something I am going to take some time and energy to explore.
posted by well-executed buffet at 11:03 PM
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Wednesday, July 9, 2008
Patti Smith Goes Under Review
The Under Review series of DVDs focuses and creates a portrait of a rock and roll artist and using clips, interviews with critics and some direct participants in the artist's life. If one is a fan or has an interest in the subject of the DVD, and enjoys delving into rock criticism or analysis, it isn't a bad way to spend time at all. The drawback is that the primarily British rock critics are given equal or more than equal measure to the clips of the artist in performance or in music videos. With this new edition on Patti Smith, I found myself almost shouting "More Patti. Less Patter."
But there was still something substantial about the eleven interwoven discussions of in this ninety minute chronological exploration of Smith's art and career. The video begins with a good illustration of what the state of Rock and Roll was like in the early seventies by contrasting a very menacing Rolling Stones (a model for Smith's art and music) doing Sympathy for the Devil from Rock and Roll Circus to their early music video of doing It's only Rock and Roll while adorned with with sailor suits. My favorite critic in Under Review Anthony De Curtis said that music meant less in the early seventies. Writer Mark Paytress stated that Patti wanted to reactivate the dormant heart of Rock and Roll. Victor Brockis, laid back on a couch in a punk basement with his cigarette and Guinness talked about how Smith linked into the beat style of Burroughs and Ginsberg. He also makes a point that there is a direct lineage between beats to hippies and from hippies to punk, despite the punk hyperbole stating otherwise.
The video does a good job of covering the "Rock and Rimbaud" period where Patti's collaborations with Lenny Kaye lead to the Patti Smith Group. Brockis also talks about how Smith created a personality by appropriating from a group of influences (Bob Dylan, Edith Piaf, Arthur Rimbaud, etc.) and created he own persona from them. The June 1974 release of Hey Joe/Piss Factorybenefited by the timing of the Patti Hearst kidnapping and Patti's splicing of her Patti Smith poem at the lead of her cover of Hey Joe! Patti Smith posed for pictures at the microphone and with her guitar as Patti Hearst was published in newspapers with her Symbionese Liberation Army rifle. It was a Patti revolution in America on multiple fronts.
Horses is depicted by our commentators as being a really important social and musical force in America. And one of the take aways from this video for me is to now think about its impact on a par with say, Rite of Spring or Citizen Kane. Major tracks of the album are analyzed in close detail. De Curtis, for instance, comments the the opening of Gloria ("Jesus died for somebody's sins, but not mine") as a bold announcement, almost a founding of a new religion.
The critics talked about how adding her own lyrics to covers was a kind of sampling and how putting her own content on an existing framework, like Redondo Beach lyrics being fused on a straight up reggae tune was a forerunner of mashups. Indeed the revolutionary aspects of Smith's art is the heart and soul of this critical exploration.
The clips tease, but they are so strong one can't complain too much. And you know they will surface in full somewhere, someday. There is stuff from the Easter tour from Rockpalast in Germany and their content has been playing on concert.tv on demand cable recently. The Wave Tour is represented on a WDR concert tape from 1979 and is quite tasty, But my favorite are excerpts from the 2000 Experience Music Project Grand opening at the Seattle Center Mural Amphitheater that I and some likely readers of the Buffet attended.
I think the critics were a little unfair on Wave and also on the cover of So You Want to Be a Rock and Roll Star. But hey, they are wanky critics, that's what they do. Since I field some of those same tendencies, its okay I guess. Yet I do agree with most of their assessments on the post-wave era: the stuff can be good, but it just ain't the same. Although Robert Christgau from the Village Voice complements Patti's transformation into an overt and articulate political presence. He says he just wouldn't have expected that of someone so ingrained with her Bohemian art roots.
There is lots I'm missing here. Under Review videos are tightly paced affairs. Sometimes there are quips that are so right on target such as Victor Brockis when he talks about Patti and Fred Sonic Smith's retreat to Detroit. He claims they weren't necessarily intending to disappear and raise a family, although that, more or less, is what happened. He says Patti had a vision of them becoming the Yoko and John of punk. Alas, a road not taken. But who can complain really about the last 14 years or so of Patti coming back into the public eye, active, on the road with Jay Dee, Oliver, Lenny and her son still standing for something important independent and quite significant?
posted by well-executed buffet at 5:36 PM
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Tuesday, July 8, 2008
Mr. Hoover and Mr. de Antonio
Emile de Antonio's 1989 film Mr Hoover and I is a highly personal one. All of de Antonio's documentaries are filled with personal conviction. Yet this one feels like a last opportunity of a seventy year old man in late Winter to talk about issues which are most important to him: his life experience, the constitution, free speech, and the likes of those who trod on the constitution and ignore its rights--Richard Nixon, Senator Joseph McCarthy, and, most of all, J. Edgar Hoover.
The FBI amassed a 10,000 page dossier on de Antonio because he was a radical who spoke out both voice and film. He talked about how his file treated him as if he was a spy. He says he couldn't be a very good spy. "I talk too much, drink too much and was married six times." True, he joined the Communist Society and John Birch Society at 16 years old when he went to Harvard. But more threatening to Hoover it seems is that he was a radical. De Antonio's scathing indictments of the McCarthy hearings Point of Order, his reportage on the Weather Underground and 1968 indictment of the the Vietnam War, In the Year of the Pig, were passionate with a strong point of view anathema to the man he calls the biggest villain in our country's history, J Edgar Hoover.
In the many stand up head on sections of the film where de Antonio lambastes Hoover he explores his duplicity, treachery, and contradictions of the head of what he calls our secret police. One of the key ways he did this was by his bureaucratic genius for changing and blunting the language of what he was up to. Early files on those Hoover determined as detrimental to the US were known as "Custodial Detention" files. When these were outed by Congress, the files became "Security Matters." And when that operation was uncovered the information was placed in "Do Not File" files.
"I am the ultimate document and the ultimate test for the Constitution of the United States." says de Antonio of this files and the harassment he faced over the years. He talks about how In the Year of the Pig was the subject of bomb threats and theater vandalism, painting Traitor in tar across the theater screen when the film was to premiere in San Diego. He states they tried anything short of killing him.
Besides de Antonio's talking head there are a couple of contrasting sequences that are intercut throughout. One is him getting his hair cut by his last wife. ("Short or a trim?" she acts. "Short. No, just a trim. I just changed my mind.") Even sweeter is a sequence where he watches his friend, Avant-garde composer John Cage bake bread in his kitchen. He credits Cage with giving him "his education" including a zen koan he tells that changed his life and attitude. I have always enjoyed listening and watching Cage speak. There is such a lovely childish and gentle aspect to him that I find fascinating and kind of relaxing.
De Antonio was obviously weak when the film was made. There are times his voice is slight and wavering. He was able to do something with this film that maybe everyone should be able to do: leave a document of their passion, their intelligence and their life. Included are the sometime random asides about his own life such as his discovery of the artists who were in the fifties the new American cinema: Robert Frank, Jonas Mekas, Alfred Leslie and others. He talked about how he was impacted by Pull My Daisy, a piece of film art made by artists of the likes of Frank and Jack Kerouac. "I didn't know what to do with it." But somehow you know it impacted the evolution of his own work.
Mr. Hoover and I's current role is as one of the films in the box set Emile de Antonio: Films of a Radical Saint. In the final months of the last eight years of a regime where many of our essential constitutional rights have been trod-down with obfuscatory slight of hand, his tales of Nixon, McCarthy, and Hoover as well as observations of Oliver North and Reagan seem eerily contemporary indeed. Bless you Dee.
posted by well-executed buffet at 3:41 AM
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Monday, July 7, 2008
Jay Bakker: A Punk Under God
I have found myself surprisingly involved in One Punk Under God, reruns of the Sundance Channel's reality show following Jay Bakker, He is an Atlanta (now New York) based punk rock appearing preacher whose church meets in a bar. He is the son of Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker. Jay Bakker at the time of this program had been involved in the ministry for several years.
Jay Bakker partied hard before finding the Lord. He is covered with tattoos, and seems quite sincere about his ministerial work. His wife Amanda, also well adorned with body art works is a health/social care worker. Her support for her husband is also seems genuine and sincere, but she is not afraid to speak her misgivings or concerns, particularly where his attempts to connect with this infamous father are concerned.
I remember seeing the round faced son of the pastoral couple a year or two before the Jim and Tammy Fay Bakker scandals of the late eighties. (Isn't "Who is Jessica Hahn?" a great trivia question of the eighties--almost as good as "Who was on the good ship Monkey Business?) I was only watching because a friend was trying to explain the trauma he was going through after finding his family fully committed to televangelist driven Christianity after coming back from the service. Anyway, the episode of PTL we encountered was sans Tammy Fay. It was announced she was in "the hospital" and little Jamie was on the show with his Dad telling her to get well and come home soon. I'm sure I only remember this because I was overall dumbfounded and shocked by the shilling and conspicuous prosperity of Heritage USA. I also genuinely felt bad for this friend whose family had drank this KoolAid.
Twenty years later I'm watching footage of a thirty-something getting read from a bible and express his support of gays in the church and the institution of marriage. The congregation is not pleased, and he is struggling with his words and energy to explain how he came with this conclusion. Obviously Jay Bakker is not your routine Christian pastor. And his financial support for his ministry Revolution is greatly impacted because of the conclusion of his spiritual search regarding this issue.
I have seen three of the six episodes of One Punk Under God. All include some pretty engaging moments such as Jay's visit to an uncared for Heritage USA overgrown with weeds and structurally in decline. He also visits his ailing mother and father still back in the television ministry, this time broadcasting from Branson, Mo.
There are lots of little moments that carry a lot of heart. He is nervous during preparations for a trip to see his father trying to get his travel bags together. "I'm carrying way too many bibles" he exclaims worried that he will meet the carry on restrictions of the airline. Amanda also is featured in a sequence most of us will be able to relate to where she is waiting to the last possible moment to meet the deadline for completing an admission packet to NYU, even driving up to the Fed Ex station and handing it off to the driver within a minute or two of the 8pm cutoff.
My major beef with this series is that it contains all of the editing and conventions that have become standard with reality television series ever since Real World first became vogue. The cheesy music, the sometimes predictable talking head off camera interviews recapping how the participant felt at that moment etc. are less important here because this is not Anna Nicole Smith or Flava Fav. These people are genuinely interesting for the most part and a single ninety minute or two hour film would probably met the material better than two-three hours of episodic structure. Regardless, the series was an interesting and odd surprise and I look forward the remaining three episodes.
posted by well-executed buffet at 9:30 PM
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Sunday, July 6, 2008
Do You Really Know the Prince-like prodigy of Endicott?
Early in the documentary You Really Think You Know Me : The Gary Wilson Story, Adrian Milan of Motel Records talked about the first time he heard Wilson's Record Do you Really Know Me: " I just imagined James Brown meets David Lynch's Eraserhead, you know. And the backing band just sounded like Steely Dan on crack. It was just crazy. It was like this incredible ghetto sounding demented blue eyed soul record."
With that enthusiastic description I was hooked as Adrian and his partner Christina Bates were. They had a mission to find Gary Wilson, one of those classsic American oddballs. He was a musical prodigy and one of those geeky kids who never fit in. He and his buddies would do this weird fusion of film and music reminiscent of John Waters in Baltimore or Wayne Coyne (of Flaming Lips in Oklahoma City)
Milan and his partner Bates were turned on to Wilson's album by Ross Harris, a child actor in Airplane! who is also a record collector (Harris gives a quick anecdote that Peter Graves made a pass at him, oh no say it isn't so, Mr Phelps!) He also later hung out with Beck and did the photos for the Mellow Gold album and turned him on to Wilson. As a result, Odelay was definitely influenced by Wilson, and a a shout out to Wilson was located on Where Its At.
Gary left Endicott in 1977. Milan and Bates wanted to re-release Do Your Really Know Who I Am and had to do quite an exhaustive search for him. He eventually surfaced as the night manager in a porno store in San Diego also working as a lounge musician and living for several decades with a video artist.
The bright keyboards in Wilson's music sound to my ears a lot like early to mid seventies Zappa. This music has a sheen to it, a funky kind of rock white boy soul fusion that feels like the seventies contra-disco but still with some of the timbre of disco. His album, Do Your Really Know Me was Home recorded on a TEAC 2430 in the mid seventies by a bunch of former high school outcast nerd friends in Endicott, New York. Bates calls this a music both innocent and disturbing. But several folks interviewed agreed that it is an album that sounds better than a basement effort.
One gets the sense that Wilson is no more or less tweaked than he was when he lived in Endicott in his teens and early twenties. He seems to enjoy getting his old bandmates together and doing concerts in NYC and and a two night homecoming in Endicott at the theater that he saw horror films such as Carnival of Souls and the Mask back in the sixties. His concerts are events with costumes made of bandages, flour dousing on band members and other kinds of macabre zaniness, Director Michael Wolk does a good job painting a portrait of this artist.
Gary's father and John Cage come off as being two significant influences. His father was a stand up bass player in combos and a teen encounter with Cage, who gave him some scores also seemed to be an indelible influence. Wilson's music is available through EMusic. A browsing of the samples will give one the idea of what his unique sound is like. I don't know if one can give it the title of genius, but the pop synth sounds of a musical prodigy defining and describing his disenfranchised youth in a failing manufacturing town and his crushes on girls may connect. And if you perked up when you read Adrian Milan's description of James Brown meets Eraserhead, you know who you are. Here's the trailer:
posted by well-executed buffet at 9:20 PM
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Saturday, July 5, 2008
Those Magnificent Mad Men (and their Women)
This post is specifically for those who were trying to decide if whether or not they wanted to take the time and indulgence to watch, and therefore get involved in the latest long form dramatic television series that took critics and basic cable televison by storm in the last year or so. I recovered from the first week of Summer quarter and a couple big nights out in a row by feasting on the first season of Mad Men. My conclusion is that if you enjoyed Sopranos or the other big dramatic serials of recent years, Mad Men is worth your time and attention.
We have had cop shows, gangster shows, so why not an advertising executive show? Why not indeed? Especially when you have the quaint time setting of nearly half a century ago at the beginning of the Kennedy era complete with mores, fashions and habits that help enfold this series into a world of its own.
There is drinking and smoking in darn near every scene of the first thirteen hours of this series. The first articles I read about Mad Men last summer when it premiered stressed its authenticity. The IBM Selectric typewriter was cutting edge technologyfor 1960 but the series producers apparently had a difficult time rounding up enough to outfit the office set of Sterling Cooper, the ficticious Madison Avenue advertising agency that is the setting and can also be considered a character in Mad Men.
I was a pre-schooler in 1960. The relative authenticity of the lives and trappings of the adult couples and ad men offices would be lost me, but I can speak to the feelings of going back in time in one short scene that takes place in a supermarket. The salmon walls, the displays, and the way the shelves were built took me back to the view from the front of the basket.
The NY Times Magazine recently ran a feature about the shows creator Matthew Wiener. In the article they spoke to veterans of Madison Avenue from that era. As to the shows authenticity, the jury was split. Some say it hit the mark. Others say they were way too busy working to indulge in the kind of hedonism and excess that is in the series.
The Times article by Alex Witchell is called Mad Men's Moment. And in a way it is. The second season is launching at the end of the month. The first series is available on cable On Demand and on DVD. The series has become a phenomenon, in part because it showed up in the unlikely location of the AMC, American Movie Classics basic cable station. And it was there becuase the big premium cable networks decided to pass on Weiner's series.
Mad Men has a morally disrupted but likable lead character, Creative Director Don Draper played by Jon Hamm. The scenes where Draper uses raw creativity and mental prowess to come up with just the right solution for the client's dilemma are a joy to watch. He is the center of the series, its Tony Soprano with his co-workers, mistresses, secretaries, and wife orbiting about him. I wasn't entirely engaged in the flashback backstory that is threaded throughout the series, but as a lead and central character, both content and delivery work quite well.
My favorite character is Peggy Olson, Draper's secretary, played by Elisabeth Moss. She begins her job at Sterling Cooper at the beginning of the series. The audience gets to learn about the characters and this world they inhabit at the same time Peggy does. As the series progresses, it appears that there is something unique about this woman that sets her apart from the rest of the company. One of my favorite scenes is the total abandon she puts into dancing the Cha Cha Cha and the Peppermint Twist with her office mates at a celebratory party.
The men of Mad Men seem very similar to each other in many ways, but the women show a greater diversity. Draper's child ex-model wife, their neighbors, and those he has affairs with provide a kind of prism and range relective of era and the changes the world was about to go through.
One of my colleagues once made the observation that the long form high quality dramatic series (ala Sopranos, Weeds, The Wire, etc.) seem to be the equivalent of our Dickens or big bestsellers of the 20th century like Gone With the Wind. I think there is something true and significant to that observation. We no longer read, buy the same records or go to the movies except for effects and events pictures. Have the role of film directors and novelists of years past been handed over to that of the "Created Bys?" Folks like Matthew Wiener and his former boss, The Sopranos' David Cross? Perhaps it has.
posted by well-executed buffet at 7:33 PM
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Friday, July 4, 2008
Blues on the Water & the Waterfront
One of the most established of Portland traditions is the four day blues festival held at Tom McCall Waterfront park each year as a fund raiser for the Oregon Food Bank. i have watched this event evolve and grow over the past 21 years. If I am in town, I'll closely look at the line up and pick one or two days to go down and check out the tunes. When the names are highly recognizable and the weather is excellent, Portlanders can love this event to death with crowds exceeding the capacity of the park's main bowl.
But there were no such issues on my expedition to the fest and also its sponsored Voodoo Blues Cruise on the Portland Spirit on Thursday, July 3, the opening day of this year's event. It turned out to be one of the best evenings of music I have ever had in this area.
We went down to the festival during the seven o'clock hour where local musicians were wrapping up a program of Memphis R and B favorites. This was followed up by Joe Bonamassa a thirty year old guitar slinger who feels like he is following in the wake of Stevie Ray Vaughn. Unless one has a true feeling for this music especially the rock drenched high pitched form of vocals, a little bit can kind of go a long ways. But still, his craft and intent were strongly executed, especially with the acoustic sequence about that led off the last third of his hour set.
One of the strengths of the Waterfront Blues Fest is that it is structured to have two stages on opposite ends of the bowl that alternate from one to another leaving little or no time for set up. This works well most of the time, but it did not come headliner time on Thursday. From what we could glean from KINK's Les Sarnoff punting Isaac Hayes and his folks did not approve of the drums on stage and another set was going to brought onstage. This took nearly half an hour.
Hayes band included three keyboardists, four vocalists as well as standard soul rhythm sessions as well as Black Moses himself on keyboards isolated to the right side of the stage. No wonder they needed a bigger bass drum. The set began with Don't Let Go, then the underrated Joy a gem from 1973 that grows better with age. At that point things broke down a little bit. Isaac hit some pretty clamish notes during By the Time I Get to Phoenix and Walk On By. But the soul was still there, but most importantly the symphonic funk arrangements were handled quite well by the back up vocalists and the fleet of keyboards. The horn line with its resolution of being bound to the road at the end of Phoenix and the background vocal of "Walk On..." with strong emphasis on the W and k are more essential to the Hayes sound and attitude than a vocal that flounders a tad. And let's face it, after suffering a stroke of two years ago, we are just glad to have him play our party.
And speaking of parties, it was time to move on to another one. Boarding time for the Hoodoo cruise on the Portland Spirit was coming on, but not til we got to see a couple numbers by the great Fred Wesley, trombonist of the Horny Horns and along with Bootsy Collins, Pee Wee Ellis, Maceo Parker, and Bobby Byrd, one of the most recognizable of the James Brown alumni. The main tune we got to hear was Bop to the Boogie, an infectious bit of groove and word play that had the the crowd at the A&E stage on the other side of the Hawthorne Bridge responding most ebulliently. Fred was the guest of Groovesect, a group of young musicians from New Orleans who were collaborating with this master in fine form indeed.
We boarded the Spirit for the three hour tour (just like Gilligan, I thought) The first half of the trip was spent checking out what its like to go under most of the Willamette River's key Portland bridges and make our way towards St Johns. The three decks of the Spirit each featured a stage and a bar. I didn't get too much of an impression on Alex Weed, Carolyn Wonderland, and the Joe McMurrian Quartet because I was so involved with digging the scene and the scenery, especially the imposing view of the Fremont Bridge from below and the extensive dry dock operation south of St Johns. But the second half of the trip, spent mainly in big loops between the Hawthorne and Burnside bridges was another story all together.
I began by watching the beginning of the mid deck show by Canned Heat, boogie blues veterans of the sixties. I can do a pretty good imitation of "Goin' Up Country, Got to Get Away..." And yes, it felt like a bar party at the White Eagle, but downstairs felt like going to the Maple Leaf in crosstown New Orleans.
I wasn't prepared for the fire, intensity or showmanship of Troy "Trombone Shorty" Andrews, 22 year old funk party grand master. His five piece band played incredible groove filled versions of GAP band's Shake Your Booty, and the Meters' Cissy Strut that were as high an energy experience as I have had at a concert since seeing Ivan Neville's band a year ago at High Sierra. Trombone Shorty played this year's High Sierra and I left phone message for a pal taking that festival on this year not to miss this act. In the video clip profile that follow he refers to it as Super Funk Rock--sounds like a good description of it to me. It had been a long time since total strangers are shouting at each other between songs about how incredible the music was. And when the Spirit docked no one left the boat until every note from Shorty and his band was over for sure. We walked over the Morrison Bridge back to our car at 1:30 or so on the Fourth of July feeling that this year, there was no way the fourth could out do the third.
posted by well-executed buffet at 8:04 PM
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Thursday, July 3, 2008
Free Nelson Mandela From His Birthday Party
I watched a packaged presentation of the Nelson Mandela Birthday concert broadcast this week on VH1 and VH1 Soul. A few months ago, VH1 showed the Rock 'n Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony basically in real time as though you would be there. This program by contrast was a weird hash up of clips from the recent concert in London's Hyde Park, which was also a benefit for the Mandela sponsored AIDS charity which features his prison number 46664 for its name.
The Well-Executed Buffet does not frequently slag and bash, but I am hard pressed to find much of anything redeeming about the concert or its television presentation.
The hosts for the audience are Will and Jada Smith. Are they really that well loved in Britain? When he performed one of his G-rated raps, he had thousands of Londoners totally pumped up and a great many in the audience knew his lyrics. Jada came out on the catwalk to join him about half way through with this really obnoxious spastic dance. I'm not one to make fun of how folks dance, but goodness, if anyone other than wife of Will had come out there, she would have been squashed by big black t-shirt guys who should have turned her over to authorities to charge her with bad taste.
British broadcaster Dave Barry mentioned on one of his stand ups that Bill and Hillary Clinton, Sheryl Crowe, and Sharon Osborne all had sent Nelson birthday cards. Sharon Osborne?
Most all of the music on this program sucked. Leona Lewis, as disposable as just about everything that was every released by Mariah Carey. And Josh Groban is a pretty sorry case fora pop singer as well. There was the one of the few programmatic moments in the show where they teamed him up with a South African popstar for a banal anthem.
Amy Winehouse was there and actually performed. They showed the rehab song and another number and she lead the vocals on the Free Nelson Mandela opener. Who thought any of this was a very good idea? Apparently Eminem was to appear on this show as well. It is a strange world we live in.
Or then there was the combination of Freddie Mercury's bandmates (Brian May with his quintessential white guy blown out Afro) with Paul Rogers. Why didn't they just come out and call this pairing what it obviously is--Bad Queen. After a couple a Queen covers (or would they be half covers with another vocalist) it was Bad Co time for All Right Now. Please. Is my radio stuck on KGON?
Even the eighties were represented. Simple Minds performed. Jim Kerr, the former Mr. Chrissie Hynde did his Breakfast Club song. This dude is in his forties and he looks now much like a lot of us do with a high thirties inch waist line. Still it was slightly stirring to see the intensity of this crowd screaming on how one should not forget about me.
U2 didn't perform, but Bono and Edge sent a tape of them performing Stevie Wonder's Happy Birthday, the song he wrote to try to get the King holiday passed. They looked like they were in someone's guest bedroom. Bono's arena voice and the Edge on acoustic seemingly out of place. And at the end Bono tried to do a bit of word play on Happy Birthday to you too from U2.
Mandela is a great and important figure of the past century. It seems disrespectful to me for Will Smith to call him out as the Birthday Boy on his 90th. Or that Smith's timing on this show seemed too well synchronized with product promotional placement for his new movie Hancock. I am glad for the fact that this concert may have raised some money and maybe some consciousness but there at the cost of some respect and dignity. But if this is the way the English want to party, who am I to stop them.
posted by well-executed buffet at 11:47 PM
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Wednesday, July 2, 2008
Wynton Marsalis & the LCJO at the Schnitz
The lobby of the Schnitzer seemed more casual for sure than it does during many other Oregon Symphony sponsored events. There certainly more middle aged and elder men who looked like they had all spent significant amounts on vinyl phonograph records back when they were the medium of the groove.
It would be unjustified and untrue to downplay the roll that Wynton Marsalis and the Lincoln play in maintaining and being a standard bearer for a very important part of this country's musical and cultural history. I get damned tired of Stanley Crouch but whatever Falstaffian or Socratic impact he had on WM during the first transition of doing so-called "serious" works of jazz. If I recall this all started to change when the album with the Matisse cover, The Majesty of the Blues came out.
A fourth of the July 2 concert at the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall in Portland Ore. was devoted to the originals from Wynton and saxophonist Ted Nash that were a part of big commissions with sounds gospel, Brazilian, Spanish and experimental thrash that still swings. The latter a good way to describe Nash's portrait of Salvador Dali with angular contrasting horn battles and odd rhythms (Marsalis: "I think its in 13/8, how do you count that? You don't. You feel it.") I wasn't necessarily overwhelmed with the composition, but my reaction was not the high creased nose wrinkle that was on my mother's face when the house lights came on. "I didn't like tht one."
JLCO enshrines all kinds of American jazz and world music, but it seems to always have taken a special charge with the music of Duke Ellington. Weds. saw two excursions to Dukeville. One was Braggin' in Brass, an Ellington chart recorded in the late thirties and basically not played again. In the intro, Marsalis commented how difficult the triple tonguing parts were for trombone and trumpet. Afterwards, he said he thought that was the best trombone playing he had ever heard on that tune. The other major Ellington work was a feature for the bass clarinet playing of 78 year old Joe Temperley who dueted with pianist Dan Nimmer. A Rose with a Single Thorn from the Queen Elizabeth Suite is a performance I don't think my mother or I are likely to forget, nor would any of the rest of that audience. It talked to the listener with a saunter with the rolling brook motion of a deep wind instrument. In his introduction Wynton gave very high props to Temperley and his contribution to jazz. He even played with Ellington's band.
Besides Duke and the Wynton commissions, this orchestra played a variety arrangers and styles, from the fifties and sixties. The evening began with Appointment in Ghana by sixties Mingus contemporary and sometimes partner Jackie McLean. It opener that was able to introduce a lot of what the audience is in for, swing, a ferocious rhythm section and, of course, some of the most intense brass work you can imagine. Oliver Nelson was also evident with his swinging hard arrangement of Down By the Riverside. This and to some degree the C-Jam Blues that featured some local musicians were the closest the band came to a mor Basie-like swing. Trombonist Chris Crenshaw's chart of Wayne Shorter's House of Jade had such a feeling of Shorter although the tune was unfamiliar to me. The highlight of these tunes for me LCJO drummer Ali Jackson's arrangement of Gigi Gryce's Hymn of the Earth and the encore of Horace Silver's Cape Verdun Blues.
McLean, Nelson, Shorter, Gryce and Silver as well as Ellington! Wynton and his men are both spreading class and holding it. I had seen the orchestra back in 1999, the year of the Ellington centennial. Even though they had two full sets, I felt both concerts went by too darned fast. Wouldn't be great if the Orchestra could park itself a few days and pull a bunch more extraordinary tunes from their book of the greatest music America produced.