Sunday, March 31, 2002
Someone's Rocking My Dreamboat: Last week was unusually busy, which is why I didn't post much news to The Dawn Patrol. I had two job interviews (for different jobs), two seders, one sister in town, one witty newspaper headline, and one play--"War Music," for which I did publicity--in its final week of production. Okay, I know you're wondering about the headline. It was for an item about a study which showed that drinking two cups of coffee a day did not cause a serious increase in blood pressure: "Coffee doesn't do latte harm".
I did find time to dream this past week, and my dreams were pretty strange. Thursday night, just after the second seder (with its three glasses of wine), I dreamed that I was hanging out in some anonymous New York City nightclub with Lenny Kaye. Now, I did notice the Patti-Smith-guitarist/record-producer/influential-rock-historian's photo in The New Yorkera couple of months back, and I remember seeing him MC a Cavestomp show a year or two ago, but, with all due respect, he hasn't entered my mind other than those times. Even more strangely, an hour after waking, I got a call out of the blue from New York Post theater critic Donald Lyons, asking about "War Music". He asked me what I did besides theater publicity [a reasonable question, since he probably knows all the theater publicists in town and had never heard of me]. When I told him I wrote liner notes for reissues, he said, "Really? I have a good friend who does that—Lenny Kaye..."
This week, I'm finishing liner notes for a Sundazed reissue about which I am very excited. I'll save the details until the notes are finished, but it's for the first-ever U.S. reissue of an album by someone with an innocent face...
1:39 PM
Friday, March 29, 2002
If It Ain't Stiff, It Ain't Worth a Tribute: While I prepare an update for The Dawn Patrol, please allow me to direct you to my main page, Gaits of Eden, which I've just updated with an item on Groove Disques' upcoming Stiff Records tribute, The Stiff Generation. The collection includes tracks by Matthew Sweet, Amy Rigby, Bill Lloyd, Ian Gomm, and yours truly. Within the Gaits, you'll find a sample of my contribution, a version of Kirsty MacColl's "They Don't Know," on which I'm backed by the Anderson Council.
2:10 PM
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Sunday, March 24, 2002
A Trivial Matter: When I wrote about last week's trivia contest at Pete's Candy Store, I forgot to mention something about the team that was next to us, some of whom were loud and annoying. One of them, very drunk, was shouting things like "I love everybody". (As my teammate Jon Blackwell accurately observed, he was in the "I love everybody" stage of drunkenness.)
When it came time to grade one another's answers, my team was given our neighbors' answer sheet, which was when we learned their team's name: You Suck My Battleship. While we wished they would suck more softly, we did get a good laugh when we read their attempt to name the last 10 confirmed Supreme Court justices. They got a few—Kennedy, O'Connor, Ginsberg—but, when they ran out of names, they wrote, "Emmanuel Lewis".
11:57 PM
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The Funniest Verbal Exchange I've Experienced So Far This Week:Me (talking about Vince Vance & The Valiants' 1980 hit "Bomb Iran"): That was back when I was living in Texas.
James: What do you do there now?
11:43 PM
Friday, March 22, 2002
Useless Information: Yesterday, I went to my first Pete's Candy Store trivia night, an event the super-trendy Williamsburg bar hosts every Wednesday. On my team were my former coworker at the Hudson Reporter Newspaper Group, Caren Lissner (who's now editor-in-chief); my fellow copy-editor/headline-writer, Jon Blackwell; and, just in time for the second half of the contest, Jon's girlfriend: posh-voiced, British-born corporate lawyer Jennifer Dover Clarke.
I'm afraid I initially came off as terribly snobbish to Jennifer because I couldn't believe that she, being English, didn't recognize the image of Peter Cook on a button I was wearing. It was a Peter Cook Appreciation Society badge with a photo of him as E.L. Wisty, head of the World Domination Society. The caption was "I Will Dominate You".
I apologized to Jennifer for going off half-Cooked, and, to her credit, she didn't hold it against me. In conversation, I learned that she had a family connection to another of the British Isles' great wits. Her great or great-great uncle was Sir Edward Clarke, Oscar Wilde's lawyer. She said she didn't know it until she told her mother what she had chosen as her profession, to which her mother replied, "You won't be the first lawyer in the family..."
I am very happy to report that my team—which Caren named Three Mile Island—won first prize in the contest, beating out some 30 others. The credit went mostly to Jon, who scored a tremendous coup when he was able to name the last 10 confirmed Supreme Court appointees—in order. He even got the name of the one who's no longer on the court: Powell.
Jon did get some help on the Supreme Court question from Jennifer, who also was able to answer a question about the U.S. Mint. Caren's greatest achievement, besides wearing a very cool baseball cap with the legend "will write for food", was guessing correctly what was the original name of Donkey Kong: Monkey Kong. It was a brilliantly intuitive assumption.
As for me, I'm sorry to say that I performed miserably in the one area where my teammates had hoped I'd shine, the audio part of the competition. They played snippets of songs, and we had to identify the albums from which they came. Only one of the songs they played was from the 1960s—the Beatles' "I Want to Tell You"—and the rest were more recent, so I was out of my range. The only point I scored outright was on one of the miscellaneous questions, when I correctly answered the question, "What does the kind of sushi known as uni come from?" (Friends of mine will probably be surprised that I didn't plant that one.)
First prize was a $25.00 bar tab, which pleased me no end, as it gave me the opportunity to see if, having recently returned to mudslides (after a twelve-year absence), I could tolerate two of them in rapid succession with no ill effects. (Answer: I can't, but I didn't realize it until the next morning...and I've been realizing it ever since.) Caren was actually disappointed with our first-place standing, as she would have preferred third prize: a voucher good for a free sandwich (Pete's has great toasted sandwiches). Amazingly, the third-prize winner, a team called the Orangutangs or something like that, approached her and asked her to take their sandwich voucher. (I didn't witness this event, but heard about it when I walked back over from the bar.) They were leaving, and they wanted us to have their sandwich because we were Number One. Apparently, they were especially impressed because, having graded our answer sheet (the teams have to do that for one another), they saw that we had gotten Powell right.
1:03 AM
Wednesday, March 20, 2002
Encouraging Thoughts From Mom (#2 in a series): My mother suggested the title for this intermittent Dawn Patrol feature (herethe first of which appeared last month). Today's installment came during a discussion of her posterior and mine, which bear a strong family resemblance:"Don't forget, a lot of what a big butt is, is muscle."
4:57 PM
Friday, March 15, 2002
Lauren Piece: My soul sister Lauren Agnelli, a.k.a. Laurenelli, is performing this Thursday, March 21, 8 p.m., at the Sidewalk Cafe (Ave. A & 6th St.). If I can make it back to New York with my dignity intact after picking up the acid-tongued "War Music" author (and former Private Eyewriter) Christopher Logue from Newark Airport, I'll be there. I raved of Laurenelli in Offoffoff.com, "She is known for her exquisite voice, delicate pop songwriting, and musical abilities (bass, guitar, accordion) that make her far more than your garden variety 'chick singer'."
1:58 AM
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Sympathy for the Devil: When I worked at the paper (where I'm a freelance copy editor) last Sunday, I heard some great Allan Whitney stories from my editor there. One of them was about how Whitney used to show up at his job in costume. One day, he was sitting at his desk, dressed as the Devil, when a pair of FBI agents showed up, looking to question an editor about a story that had run. When the agents asked, "Who's in charge here?" Whitney obligingly stood up and said, "I am!"
1:44 AM
Tuesday, March 12, 2002
The PATH Not Taken: The chimes finally sounded in the crowded PATH train I was standing in this morning, and the doors closed, but the train stayed still. The conductor's voice reverberated: "We now take a moment to remember those who died..."
I have to admit, my first reaction was annoyance. I was running late. It makes me uncomfortable to be inside a train when the doors are closed and we're going nowhere. But the conductor's next words were, "It's 8:46..." The reminder of the time that the first plane hit was enough to take me back to the morning of September 11. If I had been on the PATH train on that same track—which used to be the WTC one—on that morning, I might not be alive, let alone have an appointment to which I could be late.
I thought about where I was on that September morning—fast asleep in bed. It was two weeks since my job at the World Trade Center (publicizing its Tuesday afternoon concert series) had ended, so I had no job to commute to on that day.
I also thought about the PATH's operating agency, the Port Authority, which sponsored those concerts. Thirty-seven of their police officers and their entire executive board, as well as scores of other employees, died in the attacks. My friend Al Geddes was the conductor on the last PATH train to leave the World Trade Center. He told me that, after his train left, a work train managed to get out. Before that train left, its personnel rounded up people who were caught in the stifling smoke. One bum sleeping on the platform didn't want to be moved. The PA workers grabbed him, threw him onto the work train, and tossed him onto the platform on the next station, Exchange Place.
Today, work (doing publicity for the play "War Music") and play (attending a meeting of The New York City Chesterton Society) resulted into two hours' walking around Manhattan. Sentimentality overpowered me as I felt so glad that the city I loved was still there. On Lafayette Street, I bought a bedraggled copy of Jay & The American's Sunday and Me album (mono) from a junk shop for $3—$2 more than it was worth—just because I was so happy that there still was a junk shop there that would sell such an esoteric article of pop culture.
Later, on Ninth Avenue, across the street from the Port Authority, I spotted a stall called "Just Pickles". Reminded of the Lower East Side pickle vendors who were a familiar sight in my grandparents' day, I stopped inside and bought a couple. I asked the vendor how long he'd been open and he said only four months. I thought about how incredibly resillient this city is. And it stillhas the best half-sours...
12:04 AM
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Sunday, March 10, 2002
What CantThey Do at the Paper: Last night, I saw an editor friend, Jon Lafayette, who got his start at the newspaper where I work as an on-call (freelance) copy editor at that fine institution. When the subject of Jon's former employer came up, he asked me, "Do they still sing the headlines?"
Observing my puzzlement, he explained that there used to be an assistant managing editor there named Allan Whitney who, whenever he had to call out a headline to someone, would singit. Actually, the way Jon demonstrated it, it wasn't so much singing as chanting, like a cross between a cantor and a courtroom bailiff. (Picture the tone in which the latter calls, "Oyez, oyez...") So the guy would sing "Head-less bod-y in top-less ba-ar" and the like. After a while, Jon says, it caught on, and others at the copy desk got into the habit of singing the headlines. I was surprised to hear about it, as they don't do it anymore. When I go into the office later today, I'll have to sing a headline or two and see if it stirs up any memories.
1:47 AM
Thursday, March 7, 2002
SEPARATED AT BIRTH? Brian King (left) and Michael Lynch.  | Life of Brian: In this age of political correctness, drummers are one of the last unprotected groups. They are the butt of innumerable jokes, such as, "How can you tell a drummer's at the door? The knocking speeds up."
I can also testify, from personal experience, that drummers are the easiest rock band members to chat up, the reason being that they are unused to getting respect. Here's a surefire conversation starter: If the drummer holds his sticks with his fingertips, say to him admiringly, "I see you use match grip." But be forewarned: Once he thinks you're interested in his craft, the floodgates are opened. I said a few innocent words to Mitch Ryder's touring drummer in appreciation of his added cymbal crashes on "Devil With a Blue Dress On" and was rewarded with a 15-minute exposition about his Berklee professor's research into how the brain processes rhythm.
Even as one who genuinely admires great drumming and knows that drummers have higher IQ's than they're given credit, I still found Anderson Council stickman Brian King's new Website highly impressive. First of all, it looks great, with quick-loading dollops of Java. Secondly, besides containing information about the Anderson Council and the other bands he's had over the years, Brian's included an engaging bio which would, on its own, make a pop music lover want to hear him play. I mean, how can you not like a drummer who writes, "I've been referred to as a 'song drummer' by my peers and fellow drummers (a drummer who plays tastefully within a song)"? (That "song drummer" quote is accurate, by the way; I heard Freedy Johnston/They Might Be Giants drummer Alan Bezozi say it of Brian when the Anderson Council last played Maxwell's.)
Another cool thing about Brian King is that he could be a stunt double for another friend of mine, garage-pop singer and songwriter Michael Lynch. Michael's Website includes several groovy tunes from his album, Twelve Things to Like About Michael Lynch, such as the Dick Dale-influenced surf raga "Bombay Beach Party" (a favorite of WFMU DJ Bill Kelly).
4:21 AM
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Saturday, March 2, 2002
Cocktail Caravan Captures Chinatown: Last night, I went to Richard Ryan's Cocktail Caravan, an informal salon he holds every so often. This one was at a new Chinatown bar called Happy Endings, which is located in a former massage parlor. Sorry to say that no one gave me a much-needed shoulder rub (OK, I didn't ask), but I did enjoy a Blood Orange Gimlet (a delicious blend of blood orange juice, fresh lime juice, and, well, you know).
Among my fellow Caravan travelers were two whom I'd seen a few days earlier at Mediabistro's Blue Party, Jonathan Leaf and a lovely woman named Lesley [or Leslie?] whose last name escapes me. At the Blue Party, Richard had playfully baited me into sparring with Lesley over "Beach Baby," a song that she abhors and I adore. As a result, I was surprised and pleased last night when she confessed a love of power pop a la Alex Chilton and Teenage Fanclub.
JAMES AND THE GIANT TEETH: The handsome Mr. Taranto and the glowing
gimlet guzzler listen to the warm. | While I was chatting with Lesley, James Taranto made the best joke of the evening, but it was so subtle that nobody—including me—got it. I was telling Lesley that, if she wrote a personal ad and left out her gender, I would assume she were my soulmate. (I mean, how many people do you know who dig the Kinks and 12th-century literature, or Richard Lester's "The Knack—and How to Get It" and Beethoven?) James then deadpanned that he'd gone on one date with someone he'd met through a personal ad "and it was terrible." "By the end of the date," he continued, "we realized that the only thing we had in common was that we were both warm."
That is actually very funny. If you have trouble with it, as I did, drop me a line and I'll explain.
1:58 AM
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