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5/2/2002

OR IS IT MEMOREX?
If you surfed over to www.kysaonline.com a while back when we pointed out the site and were moved by her life story and subsequent death maybe you should think again. She may not have existed at all:
http://www.ratatak.com/mod.php?mod=userpage&menu=1100&page_id=5
And probably the most telling clues:
http://www.ratatak.com/forum/viewtopic.php?topic=61&forum=1&17
http://www.ratatak.com/forum/viewtopic.php?topic=61&forum=1&start=15&17
I was saddened by the announcement of her death for a day or so, but now I'm amused that I may have fallen prey to a very interesting experiment. (I'm just glad I never had any money to send when "she" "needed" it!) The more I've thought about it the more impressed I've become. I doubt everything I read on the web so that I bought into this without a doubt shows the author really can write a convincing character. So while I may feel a bit duped, I did enjoy reading the "fictional novel", basically what he's created. I only wish I'd thought of it first...

EAR PLUGS
Last night was degenerate JH's 40th birthday so we gathered at Smiths Olde Bar, by his request, and had cake and a few overpriced beers before heading upstairs to catch the show. I handed the doorman a 20.
"Is that for one or two?" he asked.
"Two" I replied.
"Then I need four more dollars."
Cough - "What?"
"The cover is $12 each."
Grumble.
But things went from irritation to horror when we stepped through the door and the sounds of noodly jazz filled the room. Really obnoxious noodly jazz, the kind where each player takes a turn and tries to fill his 10 minute groove with as many notes as possible, even if they are atonal at some point, the kind of music that... well... I'll just let this quote say it for me:

Wow. One thing I hear a lot is, people say, "Bruce, what's this with you and Jazz? What's the beef with you and Jazz music?"
I say, "Well, I really hate Jazz."
They say, "What do you hate about poor old Jazz?"
I say, "The sound. The sound that Jazz instruments make when they're being manipulated by Jazz players to the delight of Jazz respondents. I think of it as musical barf."
They say, "I don't think you've given Jazz a chance."
Well, I maintain, I haven't given suicide a chance, but. . .Well, I did give suicide a chance, but that was only because I was threatened with Jazz. You know. Jazz music.
One thing I hate--One thing I hate is being woken up in the middle of the night, when I'm dreaming about, say, promiscuity with dignity, by a rap-tap-tappin' on my window by those guys with goatee things on their faces, saying, "Hey. Can we come in? Beano's clarinet's gettin' wet." And then they go into this sorta Gene Krupa trance. Jazz schmazz. I'm sorry; I've got to go that far. Jazz schmazz.
You know what? I'd like to declare this a Jazz-free zone, about forty miles as far as the Jazz-hatin' crow flies in any direction. Just paradise. Those guys would go to work, and it wouldn't be there.
I'm gonna ask a question. What sort of music do you think there is in hell? You know, H-E-double hockey sticks? Well, I think it's probably hateful, free-form Jazz. And in heaven? Country and Western music. The choice is pretty obvious. It's not Jazz. It's not bop-a-dop bop-be-bop-bo Jazz. [to flutist:] What's that? A recorder or something? I'm not into it. Fuzz pedal, that's what I'm into. You know?
From THE KIDS IN THE HALL

Squat, gratefully free of berets but, of course, sporting goatees, noodled around the entire scale of notes for about half an hour before coming to something mildly interesting with actually lyrics and a chorus. Of course, the jazzholes around us, JH included, turned their noses up and said that was their worst number yet. But soon the jazzholes were mollified as Squat went back to wandering around the musical scales at random, each taking turns to show off their musical prowess to the delight of the jazz respondents in the room.
I don't think of jazz as "musical barf."
I think of it as "musical masturbation." Guys sitting around going "Wow, wonder what I can do with this?" then playing with themselves, hoping something orgasmic happens, and maybe it does, for THEM. But for those of us who have never picked up an instrument it's next to impossible to identify with their enjoyment at accidentally finding a few notes that sound ok when strung together. Nor do I get the feeling of "Wow, can you believe he dared do that?"

"You've got to listen to the notes she's NOT playing." Lisa Simpson
"Pshaw. I could do that at home." Patron
From THE SIMPSONS

The rest of us need form, a chorus we can cling to and sing along with. Jazz is like a brilliant lecture on fluid dynamics - marvelous if you understand it, hellishly dull and frustrating if you don't.

In other news, it's Music Midtown this weekend. Every paper in town is giving you a "preview" so here's our version.
Imagine you're standing. Hours later, you're still standing. Your feet ache. You're thirsty, but you've already spent the $30 you had on two bottled waters. Now look in front of you and you see a sea of the backs of people's heads. Look to your left and you see a sea of the sides of people's faces. To your right is more of the same. Off in the distance you can see a stage and maybe the tiny figures moving around on it are people, maybe even musicians. Unfortunately you're not sure because though there is music coming from that direction, there is also different music coming from another direction, and still other music coming from another, and so on until the cacophony of varied music and inane conversation around you has taken on the sound of white noise (or noodly jazz.) Now imagine doing this for three days straight, in glaring sun and pouring rain, and paying a month's rent for the "pleasure."
Have fun!

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