Frivolous Posting

Gargantuan clouds of slush are rolling in this evening, according to the forecast. Here is the younger urchin, bravely fending them off:



And here's the older, ready for the ringette tournament that was:



Ringette season is over. Now if only the weather will co-operate.

Romantic Songs, Verging on Pertinence

DarkoV links to a survey of jazz musicians' "four or five most romantic songs". Then he opens the floor for the rest of us to suggest our five romantic faves, any genre. I've dropped mine. What are yours?

New York Doll

Who's up for a rock show? Sylvain, Johansen, Kane: The New York Dolls reunite, 2004.



In a couple of weeks my village arena will be playing host to one of Canada's stadium-filling rock acts from the 1970s. In contrast to the stadiums of old, the local venue has a capacity difference of several thousand, and I doubt this quartet of men who are all 10-plus years my senior are going to get a capacity crowd. I could be wrong, though: everyone I've talked to is thrilled to host them.

I've puzzled over this spectacle with a local musician friend. On some level we just don't understand why 50 year old men who lived the highest of the high life 30 years ago would keep picking up their instruments and play to an ever diminishing audience. On the other hand, the band and the audience are doing each other a favour. It's a courtship of sorts, where both parties remind each other of their vitality.

The equation seems wildly out of hand when it comes to the Rolling Stones, but at least that's a band that looks like they're having fun (except for Charlie Watts, of course). I'm not sure I could say as much for The (remaining) Who. If this latest album is any indication, the fun's been over for a while. Townshend's fills and embellishments are still fluid, and somewhere in the music there's a theme of sorts. Don't ask me to identify it, because I haven't yet been able to sit through the entire disc. Bono says when Townshend and Daltry take the stage, it's like they've “got an iron bar in their back pocket” — and he's being adulatory. I don't understand. You've already made your mark in rock & roll history, the bills are all paid, and you're not having any fun — what's the motivation for dragging your ass on stage?

For that matter, what's the audience's motivation for showing up to watch? Near the end of the documentary New York Doll, just after the three surviving members of The New York Dolls wrap up their first on-stage reunion in 30 years, Bob Geldof sheepishly admits that when he offered his kids tickets to the show, they turned him down without a second thought, even though they were die-hard fans. “They're listening to the records, and looking at the old posters.”

I'm not surprised. That's my typical response whenever I hear of some geezer band hitting the road for yet another reunion tour. But I put down the money for this documentary because (A) I didn't know the first thing about the Dolls, except that (B) it's been 30 years and they still have an undeniable influence on every single act that's followed. As it is, the documentary gives us precious little footage of the concert in question, and it's just as well. The fans (including Geldof) give glowing reports at concert's end, but concert footage could never capture what has made this a great moment. On the other hand, the story backstage and among the fans is entirely different matter. Thanks to the gentle discretion and observant eye of director Greg Whiteley, this documentary explores and captures the magic of this reunion.

It could be that, as Bob Seger once sang, rock & roll never forgets; more likely, it just has an extremely selective memory. This is clearly the case for Dolls' bassist Arthur “Killer” Kane. The camera follows this strange-looking man and records his recollections and impressions as he adjusts his necktie on a white shirt with sleeves an inch too short for his arms. He boards the bus that takes him to his job at the Latter Day Saints' Family History Center. “I've been demoted from rock star to schlep on the bus," says Kane. "I'm spoiled from the past. It's hard to put those memories ... it's hard to put them away. They're my fondest memories." It quickly becomes clear that Kane's capacity for processing his environment is markedly different from most people's.

Is it arrested, dwarfed in adolescence by the rock and roll lifestyle? The case could be made. Certainly Kane partook prodigiously of the poisoned cornucopia of 70s excess, and he frankly admits he maintained a drunken state for several decades. Somewhere in the haze Kane developed a paranoid theory that his former bandmate David Johansen (whom I only ever knew as Buster Poindexter) was stealing money, fame and glory that should have been his. Even after Kane converts to Mormonism and has been sober for 15 years, this mental impediment is the largest roadblock to a band reunion.

Whiteley keeps the camera and boom mic at a respectful distance as the reunion takes place, staying out of the way while paying attention to telling details. When Johansen finally appears for rehearsals, there are not-so-subtle signs of Kane's anxiety. The two make a point of hugging, but the tension only begins to melt from Kane's face when Johansen starts singing into the mic.

Johansen: “We kind of picked up where we left off. And that's good, that's the way it should be.”

Whiteley: “Well, my impression is that you left off in a trailer court in Florida, screaming at each other. So I'd say you kind of picked up in a better place.”

Johansen: (laughs) “Yeah. I guess so.”

The subtle potential of these scenes suggests a third reason for geezer band reunions: redemption. The concert is clearly a success in the eyes of the fans and Kane. The blue-haired folks back home at the library congratulate him on his triumph. He tells them the real triumph was these three survivors becoming friends again. And I believe him.

This film moved me in ways I did not anticipate. The last thirty years have produced such a marked distance from the lurid, sneering menace the Dolls once embodied. When the band's biographer Nina Antonia recollects how she first heard the news of drummer Billy Murcia's death (the first of three Dolls to die young), she has to take a moment to compose herself. That moment is a revelation: either the kids watching these guys were not expecting the casualties to mount the way they did, or the adult now fully understands what a tragedy it was for this musician — this kid — to die like that. That, right there, is the rock & roll compact of naivete between performer and audience.

That Kane made it to 55 and managed this reunion, that the reunion turned out as sweetly as it did, that a New York Dolls reunion could ever be called “sweet” — none of these are small miracles. What a strange, sad, life-affirming trip this film is.

Some Movie Linkage

My sister came down for a visit this weekend. Last night we watched Babel, a movie that presents four distinct catastrophic narratives that are linked via the slenderest means (and most indulgent of conceits). It was certainly a disturbing and provocative experience, however: this morning we all admitted to difficulties falling asleep. Despite the movie's considerable flaws, all of us wished the movie had somehow delivered more, because what was there had significant promise. The stories took pains to prey upon very primal fears, including the fear that everything we do is causally linked.

Also, children are deliberately put in harm's way, and the adults find themselves bereft of their childrens' love. I don't much like having my chain yanked in that fashion, but there's no denying it's an effective tack to take with viewers. There'd just damn well better be something worth savouring at the end of the cruelty, and Babel had precious little to offer. My sister and my wife thought the Mexican sequences were circling around something of significance; I was drawn toward the Japanese narrative. There were scenes and details that lingered, but felt empty when considered within the contrivance of the whole.

That's as much as I'll say. Besides, David Denby got it right, here.

*****

I recently viewed Flags Of Our Fathers, and thought it was a worthwhile addition to the new line of World War II epics that began with Spielberg's Saving Private Ryan. Eastwood's achilles heel as a director seems to be his pacing: his movies lull in the strangest places, and just when you think they're going to end, something happens that requires another 10 to 20 minutes to explain. Be that as it may, he also has a knack for giving actors a chance to surprise an audience. This time around the spotlight was stolen by Adam Beach, a man with an impossibly sweet smile that can grow distressingly dark in a heartbeat. Readers curious about this Native Canadian have five more days to check out this portrait of Beach here, before the Globe & Mail's shortsighted on-line policy takes effect.

*****

When Roger Ebert hailed Luis Bunuel's Belle de Jour as a "Great Movie", I dutifully rented it and gave it my attention. What I saw left me scratching my head. Ebert says this is "possibly the best-known erotic film of modern times, perhaps the best"? I dunno: when it comes to erotic heat, this flick generates about as much as you might find in an episode of Spongebob Squarepants.

Now, I don't mind admitting Catherine Deneuve is a pretty woman, or even a breath-taking beauty. But sexy, sultry, seductive she ain't: certainly not in the way Rita Hayworth is in Gilda, or, as Germain Greer pointedly reminds us, Lauren Bacall is in To Have And Have Not.

*****

One final comment about Babel: when the tourists on the fateful bus in Morrocco start whining like a bunch of babies, my wife (who knows a thing or two about travelling through desolate, potentially dangerous landscapes) blurted out, "That's ridiculous! No-one who signs up for a tour like that would act like that." To add to the incredulity of the scene, the most unapologetically selfish of the whiners is an Australian man. Think about that for a second: a beautiful blonde is dying from a gunshot wound and the Australian man just wants to go home? Uh-uh, Charlie. He's the bloke who put together the posse that just collared the two punks who fired the gun. And what really ticked him off was he wasn't the intended target.

Now if you'll excuse me, I believe I'll go practise my whistle.

Engines Doth Make Fools Of Us All

Is anyone happy with the results of the Amazon recommendation engine? Every time I visit their site I hope to be greeted by Ian McKellen’s dulcet declaration, “Finally, a man of quality!” Instead I’m confronted with collateral evidence of my mediocrity.

Albeit of an eclectic variety.

For months, the engine was sure I’d enjoy David Cronenberg’s A History of Violence. As a matter of fact I did not enjoy A History of Violence, but no matter how I varied my Amazon purchases (kidlit, rock & roll, comparative religion, shore-up-the-fences religion, existentialism, absurdism, smutty limericks, 1001 Crafts With Cheesies & Lint) the engine remained adamant: YOU MIGHT ENJOY A HISTORY OF VIOLENCE.

Fed up, I finally cut-and-pasted my blog review to Amazon and awarded this trifling film a single star out of a possible five. A day later I checked to see if my review had been posted. It had, and already “0 out of 1 customers” found my review to be “helpful”. Then I spotted another button: see all my reviews. Was there more than one? I clicked and re-discovered that some years back I’d actually written two others, and that one of those was yet another one-star stinker. This time the product in question was a CD by a group of young rockers. I now regret that nasty review. If I were to dish out solitary stars for every callow act that didn’t scratch my rock itch, I’d be throwing them about like confetti at a wedding.

Intent on bringing a measure of considered yin to balance my injudicious yang, I quickly awarded five stars to Tommy Womack’s There, I Said It! and Peter DeVries’ Blood of the Lamb. I haven’t checked to see if either of my raves have proven any more “helpful” than my pans, but the act served to salve my tender conscience.

It also got me wondering where the status of the Official Review is headed. My guess, based on a conversation about newspapers with my aunt, is: into the tar pits. We were lamenting the overall decline of newspaper columnists, and tried to name the ones we kept track of. She, a lifelong and spirited arts buff, said the only columnists she made a point of reading any more were in the finance pages. I’ve mulled this over and compared it to my own newspaper habits, and I have to submit to the logic of her choice. The columnists in the arts and culture and even the politics pages no longer seem to matter. The finance pages, on the other hand, clearly do. Is this good? Bad? Irrelevant? All of the above? Perhaps a little parsing is in order.

Good: a friend of mine used to be the dance & theatre critic for the city’s pre-eminent newspaper. We’d meet over dinner and have lengthy conversations about his role as critic. His biggest beef, he said, was with readers who wrote in and decried his reviews as “just one man’s opinion.” He held to a Platonic ideal toward which every artist and critic mutually aspired.

I could see how this premise helped him with his job, but I had my doubts. Also, I had friends in the theater world who were bending my other ear. They attested to just how nerve-wracking an opening night could be when he was spotted in the audience. A bad review had a direct effect on ticket-sales, and the season's budget allowed for only so much wiggle-room. i.e., one too many bad reviews could sink the ship.

That seemed like too much power for my friend to be wielding, particularly as he and I sparred over a given project. Why should one person hold so much sway? Why not open up the field and hear/read what other articulate people think?

Amazon has made it so. Contrast my customer review of A History of Violence with the others on the same page and decide for yourself where the truth of the film’s experience lies. There are a few well-spoken people who think the world of A History of Violence, yet there I am resolutely standing by my one star. Now compare that one star with some of my raves. I hate, hate, hate A History of Violence, yet love, love, love Gidget — sorta tells you something, dunnit? You now have two points in a matrix of information you can use to make an emotionally rewarding choice.

Back when my friend reigned as critic, I often wished our cultural discussions were public discussions. These days there are well-designed websites that perform that very function by taking the condescending sound and fury of individual critics and putting them in some context: metacritic and rottentomatoes being two of the better examples. That covers movies, television, books, rock music and video games. Now, how about similar forums for architecture and urban development?

Bad: when my friend the critic made a compelling case for his opinion, it was truly eye-opening. What the rest of us were vaguely groping for was now suddenly explicit. It was a revelation — almost a religious experience, the way the best art can be. Criticism can and should be an art, and an ideal society would give both art and criticism its proper place. We’re all seeking transformation, aren’t we? Aren’t we?

Whether or not we’re actively pursuing it, transformation in cultural terms is certainly taking place, and for those of us who remember the world before the web it’s hard not to get just a little worried about the overall direction. Overwhelmingly, the web’s chief byproduct is distraction: outside of porno, the most-viewed production of this past winter was a staged clip of a bride who shaved her head in a fit of pique. And what eventually usurped this video’s popularity? Footage of a troubled celebrity doing the same.

The Cultural Middle in America isn’t “disappearing”: as its prolonged adolescence grows ever longer in the tooth, it’s sinking, and it’s taking High Culture with it. There was something rather comforting about our sturdy Reviewers and their smarter, wealthier progenitors The Critics defending the cultural ramparts from uppity barbarian newcomers. One had to be incredibly vigorous and attentive to make it over the top; often the artist's only hope was in some sort of recognition taking place after death. How noble! How romantic! How deluded!! These days if you want “in” all you’ve got to do is make sure the handy-cam is on, then lose your knickers and get on with it.

There are crucial moments in a person’s life when high, middle and low are useful distinctions to make; I’m at the point where I’m sorely missing the first two categories.

Irrelevant: human beings produce. Human beings parse. It happens, and if you’re after the artistic Big Moment, you will find it. You just will.

I’ve invested energy in all these answers. On any given day you can expect me to fall into any one of these camps. I’m young enough to think a general leveling of the critical playing field is a good thing. But I’m also old enough to be increasingly concerned over our culture’s ... oh, I’ll go on and make it universal: humanity’s appetite for distraction.

Did fine art ever make us better people? It’s a difficult case to make, but I doubt I’d have trouble arguing that too much distraction makes us worse. At some point I hope I and the rest of my species can roll up our collective sleeves and do what needs to be done to pay back not just the interest but the principle of the future we’ve “borrowed” from our children. If nothing else, artistic expression and experience returns us to the common concern of our mortality — a point of view that I, for one, find “helpful”.

The Del Fuegos

Caught a touch of the "Where Are They Now?" bug after that last posting, particularly with regards to The Del Fuegos. By the time I caught up with their music (early 90s), they'd already broken up. Bummer. If 1985 produced a lonelier song than I Still Want You, I never heard it.

The All Music entry for them is typically succinct and informative. I'm particularly amused to see The Del Fuegos categorized as "Roots Rock / College Rock / Heartland Rock" The poor sods never had a chance! Wikipedia adds that drummer Woody Giessmann went on to found Right Turn, "a program offering assistance to artists recovering from drug addiction and other mental health issues" (you can't have too many of those) and that guitarist Warren Zanes is "Vice President of Education" at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame (sounds like a thankless posting, but good on 'im).

Furthermore, frontman Dan Zanes seems to have launched a rewarding second career as children's entertainer. My daughters may be too old to willingly catch the infectious enthusiasm of Dan Zanes & Friends (the girls have moved on to the infectious enthusiasm of High School Musical), but I'm not. This guy cooks! Amazon here; eMusic here.

Your iPod: The New "Magic 8 Ball"

Cadged this idea from Scott, using my computer's file player (Amarok, set on "random") for the "answers". Doesn't say much for my future, but it gives a person a slim picture of what's tucked away on my hard-drive. For your amusement, then:

1. How am I feeling today? (like a) Fool In The Rain - Led Zeppelin

2. Will I get far in life? Mirror In The Bathroom - English Beat

3. How do my friends see me? Shut It Tight - T Bone Burnett
"I don't care what you think
And I hope that you approve
I am just an ordinary man"

4. When will I get married? Foxglove - Steve Bell (originally by BC)

5. What is my best friend's theme song? The Boston Rag - Steely Dan (I have my doubts)

6. What is the story of my life? Psalm 63 - John Michael Talbot

7. What was high school like? Absolutely Sweet Marie - Jason & The Scorchers ("To live outside the law you must be honest, darlin'.")

8. How am I going to get ahead in life? Shower The People - James Taylor (I don't know what's creepier: the "answer", or the inexplicable presence of a James Taylor song)

9. What is the best song about me? Building A Mystery - Sarah McLachlan (Alright: "inexplicable" is wrong - these are both from my wife's side of the hard-drive)

10. How is today going to be? The Shape of Air - DA

11. What is in store for the weekend? St Mary of the Woods - James McMurtry & The Heartless Bastards ("Where ya going with yer head hung down?")

12. What song describes my parents? Southland of the Heart - Bruce Cockburn (I'd go with my friend's choice: Sunday Clothes by Charlie Sexton & James McMurtry)

13. How is my life going? Widows of the Revolution - Joe Henry ("We'll tell this story later on / And tell of how it made us strong")

14. What song will be played at my funeral? It Doesn't Have To Be - Erasure (I hope not!)

15. How does the world see me? Friends Again - Del Fuegos

16. Will I have a happy life? Hey Nineteen - Steely Dan ("It's hard times befallen the sole survivors")

17. What do my friends think of me? The Lone Ranger - TV Toons (The silver bullets are nice, but where are Tonto and Trigger?)

18. How can I make myself happy? Image - T Bone Burnett
i had this image of you
and you had this image of me
and your image would talk to my image
and my image would talk to your image
and somewhere along the way
our images sort of let each other down (that's it, the whole song)

19. What should I do with my life? Wondering Where The Lions Are - Bruce Cockburn

20. Will I have children? Detroit City - Alice Cooper (ask a silly question...)

21. Got any good advice for me? (I'm Too) Busy Being Blue - k.d. lang

22. What is my signature song? Keep Your Lamp Trimmed & Burnin' - Blind Willie Johnson

23. What do I think my current theme song is? So Far So Good - Daniel Amos

24. What does everyone else think my themesong is? The Christmas Song - Vince Guaraldi Trio

25. What's my style? Song For A Small Circle of Friends - Larry Norman

26. What kind of lover am I? Once In A Lifetime - Talking Heads (ha!)

27. Where do I see myself in 10 years? Art Carney's Dream - The Swirling Eddies

Conclusions: you'd think Bruce Cockburn was wallowing in disc-drive memory, but in fact he accounts for three albums, right on par with Jane's Addiction who don't show up at all; Steely Dan receive representative treatment, but Jason & The Scorchers do not; the randomizer seems particularly drawn to the religious material; and how'd it manage to completely skirt the metal?