Rainy Day In Denver

Getting a job without getting a job

2011-10-19T20:28:00.001-06:00

This is a rant about certain recent events in my career.

Back in August, I applied for a promising contract as a revenue accountant for the Bureau Of Land management. I interviewed one weekend late in the month with a panel of six women. Yikes!

Actually, it went well. My natural charm and command of details gave me the appearance of enthusiasm, and I won their hearts. Then that weekend I received the rejection letter. I was disappointed with how things worked out, but moved on.

The following Monday I was off work. I woke up late to a phone call telling me to ignore the rejection letter. The cobwebs cleared from my head. The contractor decided to hire me, pending a standard background check. I let out an audible whoop after I hung up. This was good news! Pending the background check of course.

Pending.

I complied with all paperwork requirements the next day. I was fingerprinted in an office in Lakewood. I filled out the long questionaire, and complied with all required disclosures. I was a bit concerned that it took them two weeks after being hired to take my fingerprints. Then I had to wait.

I began to hear from people I had listed as references that they had received questionaires about me in the mail. All for what I was told was a low-level security clearance. It seemed a bit much.

A few weeks later I received a phone call in which I was told I was clear to give notice to my current employer. Which I almost did. Thankfully I decided to check my personal email that morning. An email from another bureaucrat told me I hadn’t completed the information and so-and-so was on vacation until next Monday. What information was incomplete was not specified, until the next Monday. That same day I provided the information and faxed it again. Later that week I confirmed that the OPM had received it. Then, nothing.

After inquiries for a couple weeks, I was forwarded an internal email chain between the contractor, the BLM and the Office Of Personnel Management. Someone I had never met or seen said about me and my background check, “He doesn’t want to quit his current job until he knows it’s good.” Something about this phrasing still nags at me... perhaps because it did not describe reality. In fact I wanted to quit badly, but had explicitly been told not to quit until the background check was complete.

I wasn’t worried about passing the background check. I was becoming worried that someone wasn’t telling me the truth, intentionally or not.

Finally, last week I received a call. The BLM “decided to go in another direction” because your background check is taking too long.” The people at the contracting office “feel terrible” about this. I did make a mild protest that I didn’t think this was fair, since I had complied with everything as timely as possible. They explained to me that since nearly two months had passed already, only 10 months remained on the contract and the BLM had decided to promote from within.

I was actually excited to have found this job. It sounded like great accounting experience. I would have been helping to implement a new billing system for well inspection fees. Losing this opportunity was a big blow, in several ways. My job search was delayed by more than six weeks. It’s dejecting to be strung along in that way.

I do feel like someone is not telling me the truth, or at least that I don’t know the whole truth. It’s a somewhat bitter irony, as I was completely honest in my disclosures.

Finding a new job in this horrible economy is neither easy, nor fun.

"Poem" of the day #4

2011-10-08T18:09:00.001-06:00

I wrote this in memory of Wendi’s brother, who died under tragic circumstances in 2008. I didn’t know him well, but his death affected Wendi greatly, not least because they had not been very close for a long time but she had recently spent some time with him and had been trying to reach out to him towards the end. With reverence and respect...

“In Johnny’s Room”

we struggle to find a name for it

as we are overwhelmed

stare into the abysmal black mirror

as if we are compelled

what is rising to swallow you

try to lose what follows you

in the end to just lie down

oh in happier times he was not happy

in bleaker times lost his way

now there is nothing left

now to clean up the wreck

she reached out her hand and was bitten

but still worried for him

when the news came she cried quietly

mourning the memories so dim

and nothing would fill in the gaps

a life with no strength left to sap

waiting for the end

your daughter

like her son

cannot say

how must they feel

now you’ve gone away

without a word to them

they are your next of kin

look what you did to them

now there is nothing left

now to clean up the wreck

while they are living still

life will do that, man

you could’ve used that, man

but the light was too dim

can’t see the bottom from here

Your humble blogger has been scribbling words of varying degrees of coherence in countless spiral-bound notebooks for many years. This is one small sample of them.

Apologies again

2011-10-08T15:38:00.000-06:00

Well I was going pretty good there for a while, only to drop out of sight for 8 months or so. No promises this time. But I am going to try harder.

I guess I just haven't had much to say. But I have been thinking a lot. More soon.

An artist statement

2011-02-08T22:31:00.004-07:00

"I find artist statements to be tiresome, so I limit myself to the following: yes, your kid could do this." -Inept, 1992

While shopping among the scratched records and random detritus at Goodwill sometime in the early-to-mid 1990s I found a tape by a “band” called Inept. It was a hand-dubbed Memorex with a photocopied cover, and contained10 or 12 songs of stumbling, out-of-time rhythms, mangled guitar chords and funny, self deprecating lyrics. Though nobody would claim (including the band) that the album contained great music, the “musicians” obviously had made it with much love and had fun doing it. It had a certain homemade charm, and it still holds a warm place in my heart. I think the band was from Montana somewhere, though I know nothing else about them.

The above quote comes from a short, spoken intro to one of their songs. The only reason I mention it here is that it has stuck with me to this day. An artist statement usually accompanies an exhibition or commission and is intended to provide some insight into the artists thought process or inspiration. Wendi has had to write a number of them in her college career, being one of them hoity toity art majors (in a fairness, she just now walked in as I was writing this and told me I was a “podunk philistine”).

I won’t argue. I love and appreciate art, but I do find much of the theorizing and philosophizing of the academic art world to be ponderous and wordy… tiresome, even. Hence, the above quote.

I’m not a visual artist. I can’t really draw or paint and the few times I’ve tried are better forgotten. But I have been playing and practicing music now for more than 20 years, writing and recording songs and absorbing lessons from the music that inspires me. I’ve been posting some of my random scribblings lately… some of the better ones anyway.

So, whatever the quality of my output, I guess I qualify as a creative person. I’m a fairly skilled songwriter and guitarist and have made plenty of efforts to study music theory and formal songwriting, in my own slacker way and time. But I also listen to and have made music in my time that was deliberately primitive, unskilled and… well, inept, and that is another reason that the above quote has always stuck with me. I’ve always said that making great music has little to do with how well you can play your instrument, and I still believe it.

Anyway all of this is just to give a bit of background to my own artist statement, and my thought process when writing music or words. I really don’t take myself too seriously, whatever the tone of the following; having said that, creativity and expression is pretty central to who I am. As I continue to post various poems, and as people hear the music I make, if anybody has questions about what they “mean” or how I come up with this shit, this is as good a place to start as any.

Narrative. What is it?

Narrative is the human compass. Texts are the expressions of the collective consciousness. The human capacity for forging narratives and myths is very nearly infinite. The peculiar and paradoxical features of narratives are that they are both universal and strictly individual, collective and differentiated, simultaneously. Every person is therefore both a repository for and manufacturer of stories.

But narratives are more than stories. They are ways of making sense of the world, understanding the associations we experience, the subconscious reactions and conscious reflections our minds’ eyes. The self both authors and experiences narratives, interpreting the manifold symbols and never ending chaos of life. The simultaneous objective and subjective nature of narratives’ relationship to our consciousness is, I believe, unique to human beings.

This dual nature of the power of narratives is what the best art strives to nurture. The experience of the viewer/listener/reader is an integral part of a work of art, in some cases more so than the contributions of the artist. The artist/audience dynamic and dialectic are essential to art.

In my work (if you want to call it that), I have tried to nurture and encourage this dialectic between the listener and this humble artist. The lyrical content of my songs has become more important as I have progressed as a songwriter and musician.

In the songs by other artists that I appreciate most, the deepest feelings and most unvoiceable thoughts were caused in me by their ability to foster this dialectic. Therefore, I try to encourage the listener to make up his or her own narratives or story. While I generally have a specific idea in mind, I consciously attempt to avoid specificity in voice or causality, but trying to leave enough significant signposts and monuments upon the convoluted path that (I hope) the listener will appreciate as their own the view to which it as brought them on the journey. I believe it to be ultimately more meaningful this way. I just hope the view is scenic enough to make them want to continue the dialectic.

What does it “mean”? Exactly what it says. Exactly what it sounds like.

I hope that clears things up a bit.

"Poem" of the day #3

2011-01-30T12:21:00.000-07:00

"Reign O'er"

The terrible tyrant trots out another excuse

Tries to rescue himself from the swing of the noose

"And the statues they build of me
must surely reflect my nobility
of blood, most goodly bred."

The armies clash in the streets outside

Even unto the fall of night

Black treason in the air

Hear the oaths the generals swear:

"This day we stand together,
if for no other
than each other."

Now, as the thunderclouds roll over the sun

Behold the chosen one

White trash son-of-a-gun

As the stars fortold

So done

The armies dash like water off his flanks

Victorious sign with a roar from the ranks

A forest of spears in the sky

The cries of hawks upon high

"Let the glory of this noon
be remembered.
Let each man to fight
choose his own legend."

Thus was the kingdom established

And prosperity reigned

Until the pestilence threatened

In the year of the plague

Thirty years yonder

Very few remained

Your humble blogger has been scribbling words of varying degrees of coherence in countless spiral-bound notebooks for many years. This is one small sample of them.

I am so tired

2011-01-29T23:29:00.004-07:00

Oy, I am so tired of living from paycheck to paycheck. It's been like this for years, but in the turmoil of the past year has been the worst ever. There have been times when I literally couldn't have bought a pack of chewing gum. You can imagine how this makes me feel about my ability to support my wife and son. I generally live from day to day, just hoping I can buy groceries to feed Simon or eat lunch at work.

But this week I was finally given a significant raise at the job I've had for 8 months. We're not on easy street now, but at least I hopefully won't have to go begging for handouts from family members so I can buy enough gas to get to work for the next couple of days. Yes, it was getting that bad. Humiliating at best, desperate at worst.

My employer does seem to value me to some degree, and I like my immediate bosses. But I don't care about wacky things like having a jazz band playing live in the office (yes, that actually happened last month), or having no dress code, or praise. I need money, badly.

I'm glad they stepped up to the plate, but I've been dissatisfied with quite a few things at my job lately, and I'm not the only one. There has been a lot of grumbling around there, and in the past few weeks a number of people have quit. Just last week, a guy in my work group went to lunch and didn't come back. I can't say I blame him.

The upshot is that I've been looking for another job for a few weeks. This raise has diminished my dissatisfaction somewhat, but lo and behold this week I managed to get two interviews for jobs next week. Real employers, not the usual shady recruiters that flock around you like vultures when you post your resume on Monster.com. This is a much better success rate than when I was unemployed last year; back then, I sent out over 200 resumes over the course of a few months and got only 5 or 6 interviews. This time, I applied for about 12 jobs over a few weeks and already have 2. Maybe the economy is improving? What other opportunities are out there...?

So I'm conflicted. On the one hand I would really love a satisfying job that doesn't require me to donate 10 pints of blood a month. On the other hand, I absolutely hate looking for a job and the whole interview/hiring process, and I feel I have some more potential for advancement at my current job, and they did give me a pretty fat raise. So I am going to check out these two opportunities next week and see if they lead anywhere.

They are going to have to offer me some serious $ incentive though, if they go so far as to make offers. That is my number one concern! You might not understand if you haven't been through the sort of financial trauma my little family has been through. We have been barely holding our shit together.

The other thing: my band had a pretty good rehearsal this evening. But I apparently blew a speaker in my amplifier, my beloved 1976 Fender Twin Reverb. It sounds like bacon frying when I hit the low notes. Oh well... they are the original speakers and are nearly as old as I am, so something had to give, sooner or later.

I don't really have much more to say right now. Time has just been so short lately. My job is working me an average of 10-12 hours per day, plus weekends too... it's hard to find the energy to say something worthwhile. But I will persist in my attempts!

Maybe some more "poetry" tomorrow, if I get a chance. People seemed to dig it... to my surprise. I only posted it to fill a bit of space. Anyway, that's all for this evening.

Have I mentioned that I like bourbon? Jim Beam is calling me. Bye.

"Poem" of the day #2

2011-01-16T20:44:00.005-07:00

"Object Lesson"

it's a plush chair to sit in

the comfy spot under the bridge

the paperbacks you'll never read

they are all you'll ever need

it's a dirty coin to pick up

if someone will make change

collecting the odds and ends

dissecting the fads and trends

it's a plastic toy dump truck

the child would never grow up

a sad reminder of the past

but happy days are here at last

it's a ticket stub from a show

back when the band played cheap

wrote your name with your young blood

before you saw the grave was dug

a soiled scrap of twisted paper

the thoughts that came and went

the missing moments that didn't come back

from the void where they were sent

a rusty can, a ripped-up shirt

a soiled mattress in the dirt

a pickle jar and broken sticks

the thoughts you lost and found again

now you forget what they meant

Your humble blogger has been scribbling words of varying degrees of coherence in countless spiral-bound notebooks for many years. This is one small sample of them.

Guitarists I admire: Tony Iommi brings the thunder

2011-01-09T00:37:00.002-07:00

This is the second of a series of posts I have planned for years, but rarely gotten around to writing... until now! These are guitarists who have been greatly influential on my style of playing. Part one, about Jimi Hendrix, is here.

Black Sabbath, though they were not the only band emerging in the late 1960s to play the style of rock that would eventually become known as heavy metal, were undoubtedly they heaviest in their heyday. Their sound was generally despised by the critics of the time, and yet more than four decades later their early music, specifically their first 6 albums, is among the most influential and revered of any rock band before or since. Each non-guitarist in the band – Bill Ward’s amazing sludgy backbeats and whirlwind fills, Geezer Butler’s throbbing, flailing and deceptively simple bass llines, and Ozzys wailing, sometimes-slightly-out-of tune vocals – contributed massive amounts of talent and drug-infused inspiration to the band.

But it was Tony Iommi’s sledgehammer guitar riffs and bluesy soloing that was the keystone of the band. Without Iommi, there simply would have been no Black Sabbath. It was Iommi who wrote most of the riffs and songs, with Butler writing most of the dark lyrics. His talent is all the more amazing because he lost the tips of two of his fingers back in the mid 1960s in a machinery accident in the metal shop where he worked before Sabbath blew up big (all of the members came from working-class backgrounds).

Just to get it out of the way, contrary to the popular beliefs of the ignorant, the band did not worship Satan. Their songs did often dabble in dark, occult or druggy waters, as well as science fiction. These themes suited their doom-laden, downcast music, which generally merely commented on the dark side of life with an old-testament vibe of retribution and punishment for sins, rather than a celebration of them. They also had a strong anti-war streak, with a number of songs decrying the destruction and death of war.

Though I hate ranking my favorites, Tony Iommi is near the top of the guitarists at whose pantheon I worship. The riffs and songs of Black Sabbath’s early “Ozzy” era were generally recorded quickly and cheaply in-between tours, but are among the classic albums that to this day I do not tire of hearing…. as seems to be true with a lot of bands that recorded classic albums in the late 60s and early 70s. And I generally bore pretty easily.

There’s something about those sludgy, overdriven, precisely loose riffs, dripping with the smooth blast of Marshall amplification that made a boy of 15 want to play guitar like that. Heck, I still do! I play a lot of Sabbathy solos in my current band, and that’s ok with me. He could play so soulfully, those fat, pentatonic runs, his impeccable sloppiness (just enough behind the beat and accented to let you know he knew wtf he was doing) and his howling, moaning vibrato. I would say that, by default if not by design, my current soloing style owes a lot to this guy.

Iommi’s signature guitar was a Gibson SG, which, after many years of fudging around with other kinds of guitars, your humble author/guitarist finally settled on as having the ideal blend of fat tone, lovely sustain and affordability. Iommi’s guitar tone, generally amplified to earsplitting levels through stacks of amplifiers, was also a thing to behold. I have played an SG as my main electric guitar for more than a decade now and though it is beat to shit and showing its age, to this day I still love it’s tone. I owe it to Tony!

More about tone and why Iommi’s is so special… back in the day, heavy guitarists used much less distortion than most metal bands today… and yet they recorded music that was both groundbreaking and timeless. This lesson in tone has stuck with me. As the years went by and heavy metal developed as a style, the guitars became much more extreme, overdriven and distorted, sometimes sounding like swarm of killer bees at 110 decibels, or in the worst cases, like a thundering dentist’s drill.

As Black Sabbath lost and gained new members (eventually only Iommi remained) Iommi’s tone became more processed and distorted, his style less bluesy and more conventionally metal, and his music less inspired. He recorded a few dreadful albums in the 1980s that are better forgotten, believe me. He seems to have, anyway. In the past decade his bread and butter has been touring with various lineups of members from Sabbath’s classic era. This is as it should be!

So it’s really in Black Sabbath’s early era that you will find the good stuff. Specifically, the band’s eponymous debut, Paranoid, Master Of Reality, Volume IV, Sabbath Bloody Sabbath, and Sabotage. Every one of these albums is a classic from beginning to end, and I continue to throw one of them into heavy rotation every few months or so.

So, here’s a few examples. First up is their classic ode to marijuana, “Sweet Leaf”:

I often describe this riff as one of the stupidest (and most awesome), ever written. Basically, it's a three-chord, repetitive slog that that begins to really get under your skin by the second verse. This song’s famous riff (which is one of the first any metal kid learns), though indisputably great, is like a teaser, deceiving you into thinking the band is a bunch of unsophisticated galoots incapable of playing any more than these three notes.

Many aspiring guitarists have been lulled into a sense of complacency by this awesome and easy-to-play riff, including yours truly. This song is actually very difficult to play, because of the speedy middle section. The band speeds up, building to a crescendo as Iommi whips out a major-key lick that splits the sky with lightning. There is then a tornado of virtuosic double soloing backed with the band whipping itself into a wind-lashed frenzy before the main riff comes crashing back in at the original tempo. This song also features one of the first uses of sound sampling in popular song – the dry hack of Butler coughing is looped into an instantly recognizable intro to the song. I speak from experience: cover this song at your peril!

Next song. “Wheels Of Confusion” is probably my favorite Sabbath tune, though again, I hate to pick favorites.

The introduction is a slow, mournful blues that collapses into a droning one-chord riff. Again, deceptively simple. There is a short turnaround at the end of each section that I have never been able to master. This song again follows the tried-and-true template, first pioneered by Sabbath, of a sludgy verse section followed by a speedy middle only to slow down again for the climax. Hey, it works! This is a great example of a song that just draws you in with its hypnotic groove only to explode with fury in the middle section with a strangely beautiful guitar lick in the middle that sounds like a shooting star. There is also a great coda to the song with a very nice solo… for some reason they titled it “The Straightener”. The lyrics are some of their best, about a dark night of the soul or depression or something, but they fit the song perfectly. It’s a masterpiece of rock dynamics and the band plays like a single instrument, each member’s simple part contributing to create a mighty mountain of stark, hard rock beauty. It’s the perfect example of why they were one of the great classic rock bands.

Finally, anyone who doubts Sabbath’s greatness needs to watch this awesome performance of the band’s anti-war anthem “War Pigs” from 1970, by a young and hungry Sabbath with something to prove.

Just look at the way Ozzy wails, Butler flails, Ward beats his drums to death…. and Iommi actually moves around a little! Sabbath cut its teeth in the days before MTV, and Iommi’s stage presence was usually not very rock star-ish. He generally just stood there on stage right, whipping out these amazing riffs and solos. But here he is clearly rocking even more than usual. What I like most about this video is that this was filmed before the whole “arena rock” conceit. There are no stage props, no pyrotechnics, no fancy lighting. Heck, there ain’t even a riser for Ward’s drums! Just a ripping band at the peak of their powers, clearly enjoying themselves and rocking out... and I love the size of Ward's bass drum, which is much bigger than on the average modern trap set.

Sabbath will never go out of style. All hail Sabbath!

"Poem" of the day #1

2011-01-04T23:13:00.001-07:00

"Progression"

The must-have purchase of the year

Converts easily into a toaster or a bed

Well-received in savvy circles

You must strip out the gizzard and other viscera

Complete with personalized, airbrushed logo of your choice

Be specific about the order of events

A few of my favorite things

The antibiotics are having limited and diminishing effects

Some may yet survive the depopulation

The merger was planned for years to be the largest in history

In retrospect, public opinion did not conform to reality

A face above the dais commands, scowling

Hunched columns, distant gunshots

Deep orange sunset

Fade out

Your humble blogger has been scribbling words of varying degrees of coherence in countless spiral-bound notebooks for many years. This is one small sample of them.

The new look

2011-01-03T23:17:00.002-07:00

So I finally upgraded to Blogger's new template editor. I hope everybody likes the new look. Not that it matters much.

But I did take the narcissistic step of Googling the name of this blog, and it came up on the 2nd page of results. Today, the 2nd page of Google results... tomorrow, the world! Or maybe later than that. Oh well.

A year of storms

2011-01-01T15:25:00.007-07:00

Not to be trite or exhaust my metaphor, but this blog is called what it is for good reasons.

I can’t say there is any particular reason why I haven’t blogged in over a year. I’ve been busy, for sure. I also began finding my political leanings somewhat tiresome to write about. There was all the chaos and desperation of my personal life, most of which I didn’t feel like writing about. I have to live it, every day after all. Writing about it just makes it that much more inescapable, to some degree at least. In many ways, I’m glad I never bothered to update this blog with that stuff. Talk about a drag to read!

But the number one reason I’ve been so inactive: Facebook. I’ve been more active there in the past year than at any time since I started an account a few years ago. It’s great for keeping up to date with the lives of lots of people, and for wasting time on stupid surveys, playing games, and sharing links about things that interest me.

But Facebook has some downsides to it. For one thing, Facebook is insidious and opaque about the way it collects and shares personal information. Its interface can be clunky, counterintuitive, far too complex, and often changes without warning. People’s posts seem to pop up on my feed at random, with no rhyme or reason with respect to how close I am to them. And, most of all, it is not very good for blogging about things that interest me. It’s just not very good for writing more than three or four sentences at a time.

With that in mind, my New Year’s Resolution is to keep this blog updated at least twice a week. I can’t guarantee that I’ll be able to hold to that, or that all of the posts will be worth reading. But I’ll at least try to make it interesting, even if it’s just short thought/link/youtube video/whatever.

So…. by now you may be wondering, what have you been doing for the past year, Matt? Well, it’s been an “interesting” year, in the ancient Chinese sense, and not in a good way. In fact, 2010 more or less sucked for my little family and me.

Well, probably the worst thing that happened was that I lost my job back in February. It’s still painful to me and I’m fairly bitter about it. I won’t go into details, but I don’t feel what happened was warranted or very fair, and I still have some pretty hostile feelings towards TransMontaigne. I was unemployed for about 3 1/2 months until I found my current job (at a slightly higher yearly salary) at Rivet Software.

You might say I have first-hand experience with The Great Recession. I lived through it. Heck, I’m still living through it. Some people might not understand why I feel so strongly about the things I do, or why I can’t be so detached from social issues as people who haven’t had to go through what me and my family have been living through and dealing with every day of our lives recently.

I know I sound negative sometimes. It’s not because I’m a particularly negative person. It’s because I’ve come very close to losing what little I have, and I am still scared to death of losing it all. We are still living a day-to-day existence, forget about the future. And I perhaps am more aware than most of issues that are larger than myself. And for all our travails, I know that my family is one of the luckier stories to come out of the Great Recession.

About the only other thing I have to say about that is that I certainly appreciate Unemployment Insurance. UI, and the kind assistance from my extended family, was my little family’s lifeline. We would’ve been sunk without it. We still haven’t recovered financially.

So it galls me to see politicians playing political games with UI, making things up about how people collecting unemployment don’t want to work or that they are lazy. During those 3 1/2 months, I applied for more than 200 jobs throughout Denver, nearly any opening in my field for which I was remotely qualified. I accepted the first offer I was given, because I was pretty desperate. Yet apparently Republicans think I should have been looking for jobs at Taco Bell (which, btw I am overqualified for and may not have been able to get hired for anyway, which would have resulted in my family becoming homeless even if I did get a job as a fry cook). But I digress….

Other stuff... after a 6 1/2 year-long slog, in May of last year I finally graduated cum laude from Metropolitan State College of Denver with a BS in accounting. While I am happy that I finally crossed the finish line, I crossed it more at a staggering limp than a triumphant dash. I am so utterly sick of school, and then there is the matter of tens of thousands of dollars in student loans that I have no idea how I’m going to pay back. I never want to go back to school again. Wendi wants me to consider going for a CPA certification. Though I am considering it, I am also dubious, for career based reasons as well as “school fatigue.”

For Wendi’s part, she is nearing the finish line of her own long slog through college. She’s on track to graduate next May and has worked hard all this year to make sure that happens. I’m very proud of her. She’s done some of her best photographic work ever this year. She doesn’t like to “toot her own horn” but rest assured she is very talented and her photos are artistic and of fine quality.

She’s done it all while taking care of Simon too, as well as looking high and low for a job. This means she is pretty exhausted most of the time. She can tell you her own stories about what The Great Recession means to her.

Speaking of Sy, he turned 3 years old in 2010. He’s the babble of every brook these days. In the past six months his vocabulary has exploded exponentially, with a corresponding increase in potty humor. He thinks a poop joke is the funniest thing in the world… “I pooped on the ceiling! Poop jokes go bleeaaaghh!!!!” That’s is a typical line of comedy from him, followed by lots of giggling.

He started preschool in August, which we struggle to afford but is providing him with some much needed social interaction with other kids his age. He of course has all the wild mood swings and crazed behavior that any 3-year-old does, but he is also a sweet little boy full of love and affection…. when he’s not beating the crap out of his Mom or Dad.

After 7 years in the corporate world, I am less than enthralled with it, especially given my recent experience at TransMontaigne, which ended so bitterly after more than 5 1/2 years and stellar performance reviews all the way. At some point, I have realized that I just don’t fit into that world very well. I don’t really have the temperament to reach for that corporate brass ring, and I am certainly not executive management material. I am good at what I do though, and I’m currently trying to figure out where I want to go with my skills and experience.

My band, Governors, played 5 shows last year. We really tightened up and I have to say we sound gooood! In August we lost our awesome bassist, Ross, who moved to Utah to accept a music teaching position at Utah Valley University. After trying out a few more people we found our current bassist Abe Willock, who is another veteran of the local music scene. We played one show with him in October and are planning to ramp up our activity significantly in 2011.

This band is the most musically adept bunch of dudes I’ve ever had the fortune to play music with, and is devoid of the personality conflicts and petty stupidity that seem to plague most bands. I don’t think it’s because we’re all older (in our 30s), because all 3 of us generally have the maturity levels of teenagers.

I think it’s because we’ve just been around the block in other bands, and would rather shut up and play music than argue or get mad at each other. Don’t’ get me wrong, there’s plenty in the world that I’m angry about, but it’s all there in the music, baby. That’s how it should be.

I hope 2011 is a better year. I’m tired of treading water in life. So, I’m going to be tentatively optimistic. And I hope at least a few people will forgive my inactive period, and check out my blog from time to time as 2011 rolls on by.

Merry Christmas from the official Laziest Family On Earth

2009-12-24T18:05:00.007-07:00

Many thanks to all who helped us in the last few, chaotic weeks! We won't forget it. As you can see, we've been taking it easy lately.

Hardwood heaven

2009-11-06T19:29:00.011-07:00

The past few weeks have been a flurry of home improvement activity. We are frantically trying to get ready for the move next week!

A thousand million thanks to Drew and Mark for helping me rip out the carpet at our new house a couple weeks ago! Wendi and I have spent a lot of time since then yanking out exactly 896,722,933 staples from the floors. We also ripped out the ugly wallpapered paneling that covered up the natural wood walls in the living room... let's just say that the prybar that Mark left behind got a lot of use. Thanks again Mark, you can have your prybar back anytime you want.

There was about two decades' worth of dirt underneath the carpet. In places it was a quarter inch deep, and it reinforced my vow to never live with carpet again! We have lived in too many apartments with ugly, worn-out, filthy carpet to ever live that way again if we can help it. It doesn't matter how much you vacuum it, dirt builds up under the padding and just stays there. Who knows what kind of vermin thrive in places like that, inches away from you! I hate carpet.

But lovely floors and walls were revealed after all this hard work.... behold!

The living room with real wood paneling.

The living room again.

Who is that scary man with the wild hair at the end of the hall? Notice the dirt worn into the otherwise lovely hardwood :-(

This is the "master bedroom" which is not really so huge. We really hate this color blue and plan to paint it a nice earth tone at some point.

We are tentatively planning to use this bedroom as a study.

In places the dirt was too worn into the finish to be removed, so we are having them refinished and are crossing our fingers in hopes the job will be done by the time we move next Saturday. Once you have hardwood floors, you never go back, man.

Finally, a lovely sunset turned the sky bubblegum pink and gossamer orange. Really spectacular sunset. Love that air pollution.

I take it all back. Not.

2009-10-30T22:28:00.006-06:00

Sorry, not to harp on this. Am I being too harsh in saying the GOP and its leader & figurehead, Rush Limbaugh have racist tendencies? Did I make it up?

Maybe I should reconsider. I suppose that some people would find nothing racist about this picture which appeared on the official GOP Facebook page for about a week...

...but you know what? Those people are stupid. And I didn't make it up.

Regardless of what the GOP thinks,I really don't think this photo represents "American values" at all. Not the ones we should admire anyway. Rush Limbaugh and the GOP can keep them to themselves.

Sorry, racism irritates me. I don't feel sorry for or apologize for mocking and ridiculing the people who practice it. Why should people like that be respected?

I'll shut up now... no more political posts for a while :-)

UPDATE 11/5/09: here's a photo from the teabagger "protests" today in DC:

Modest moves toward universal health care are will result in a new holocaust. Makes sense to me, I've been persuaded.

This kind of idiocy cannot be brushed off as being the work of a few crazies on the fringe of the GOP. The Obama photo above was on the GOP's official Facebook page and the awful banner above was proudly hoisted at a rally today sponsered by the GOP congressional leadership.

Truth is out of style

2009-10-15T10:19:00.003-06:00

When I read about the right wing freakout over the torpedoing of Rush Limbaugh’s attempt to buy the St. Louis Rams today, I thought of this snarky song from two decades ago.

It’s like the GOP has adopted it as its theme song. Seriously, what is wrong with these people? I would be more disturbed by their whining and paranoia if they weren’t being taken less seriously every time they start frothing about how oppressed, misunderstood and wronged they are. Think about it: wealthy multi-multimillionaire, lying, thrice-divorced, whore chasing, “family values voter” like Limbaugh is soooooo oppressed.

Boo hoo you big fat baby. Nobody’s trying to take away his freedom of speech. In fact, I hope he keeps it up, so he can show everybody everybody who doesn’t know already what a hateful, hypocritical, creep he is.

Lest someone doesn’t think he deserve the backlash against him, please see this list for why some black football players aren’t very appreciative of his race-baiting, reactionary right-wing cluelessness. He says he’s “color blind” when it comes to race. I can actually find common ground; I agree he’s blind to a lot of things!

About the song: yes some of the cultural references in it are dated, but the sarcastic satire is more biting and relevant as ever in this era of what is misleadingly known as “cable news” and wingnut wackiness. Turn off the TV!

No peace, no prize

2009-10-09T10:59:00.002-06:00

Well I haven't posted anything political for a while, so I thought I'd fix the situation.

I did a double take when I read this morning that Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize. I thought it was a joke at first… I’m sure most people did.

Let’s leave aside the fact that this administration has been in office for only about 9 months or so and hasn’t had time to accomplish much. That’s not the heart of the matter.

Do we really need to be reminded that we are in the midst of an indefinite military occupation and insurgency in Iraq, with no end in sight? When Obama makes a decisive move to end this occupation, then he might deserve a Peace Prize. That is not what is happening. In fact even after withdrawal the USA is likely to have a significant military presence in Iraq.

Do we really need to be reminded that our country is fighting another endless war in Afghanistan? That we are slaughtering civilians there by the dozens every week? When Obama takes significant steps to end this war, then he might deserve a Peace Prize. But that is not what is happening. In fact, the Obama administration is planning on escalating that conflict.

Do we really need to be reminded that in the name of freedom and liberty and America, our country tortured and killed completely innocent people on the most dubious of charges? That the criminals who ordered and perpetrated these crimes are still free? When President Obama decides that these crimes should be prosecuted and these people brought to justice, then he might deserve a Peace Prize. But that is not what is happening. The administration has declined to take any substantive steps because they want to “move forward”. And then it has the gall to lecture Iran about torturing its own people?

Do we really need to be reminded that the Obama administration has not taken any substantive steps to repeal the Patriot Act? That it reserves the right to detain any US citizen indefinitely, without charges? That even if the prison at Guantanamo Bay is closed, the USA reserves the right to hold people without charges in other places? If Obama had taken steps to reverse all this, he might deserve a Peace Prize. But the Obama administration has actually embraced and reinforced most of the powers that the executive branch gave itself during the Bush years.

Do we need to be reminded that the government is at the beck and call of the military-industrial-corporate complex? That we are becoming a country eternally at war in part due to the profitability of our wars to our private sector? If Obama had taken steps to dismantle corporate control of the government’s military procurement system, he might deserve a peace prize. But that is not what is happening. Instead, the government has reinforced its ties with murderous mercenary companies like Blackwater (now Xe... nothing like the slaughter of women and children to affect your company's brand image), while at the first hint of a scandal rushing to strip a scapegoat organization like ACORN of any chance of getting grants from the government. How many people did ACORN machine gun?

I don’t know what the Nobel people were thinking, they are making a mockery of themselves and the Peace Prize. Glenn Greenwald had a good piece up today about this… his thinking mirrors my own. But then, his thinking often does.

This is absurd.

First show - make it rain

2009-09-19T10:50:00.006-06:00

Tonight is the first show for my new band Governors. It just kind of fell into my lap a few days ago and we decided to go for it. We hope to blow the doors off of Bar Bar.

Business not casual. It's how we roll.

My first live performance in nearly 5 years. We gonna make it rain!

I came across this awesome performance and just felt like he was singing to me, is all, ha! Tom Waits is a treasure.... and it's a first-rate song, too. We'll probably never perform so well, but we'll try.

Oh and the guitar solo in the middle is phat.

Don't apologize

2009-08-29T15:11:00.006-06:00

I just discovered this powerful new song by Lou Barlow and have to share it. It's from his forthcoming album Goodnight Unknown.

For those of you that are unfamiliar with Barlow, he was bassist in the legendary band Dinosaur Jr. in the late 1980s and later led his own bands Sebadoh and Folk Implosion... you may vaguely remember Folk Implosion's big hit in the mid 1990s, "Natural One".

Barlow left Dinosaur Jr. under bitter circumstances and was very public in bashing the singer, J. Mascis -- who is a formidible indie rock legend in his own right. So, it was pretty unexpected when the old Dino Jr. lineup reunited a few years ago and played a very successful tour. I was lucky enough to see them myself back in 2007 at the Westword Music Showcase downtown.

Lou Barlow's music is usually pretty melancholy but there's something anthemic and profound about it that makes it better than your average indie rock. Sebadoh's 6th album, 1994's Bakesale was part of the soundtrack of my early 20s. It ages so well 15 years later. I'm happy to see that Lou's still going strong and still making great music! I think I'm going to go and listen to Bakesale now...

Hey Gandalf.... nice dress!

2009-08-19T19:12:00.003-06:00

Great video by Red Fang that I came across today. It's got swords, wizards, violence, beer and rock n' roll. And it's funny!

All kidding aside, this band really rocks and I'm going to have to check out more of their stuff. I'm posting this video because their sound is close to the aesthetic to which I aspire for my own band... more about that soon!

Monkey chant! Wow!

2009-06-12T22:47:00.008-06:00

I have been playing and listening to a lot of music lately, so in keeping with this theme...

Glenn Kotche is the drummer for Wilco, a band I have followed and loved for many years now. I saw them live once. But I didn't know until a few days ago just what a virtuoso their drummer is. He has a percussion performance degree from University of Kentucky... and it shows.

It's long, but this performance is worth checking out to see the just what amazing things a master percussionist can do. You will notice that his kit is heavily modified, with all manner of springs, boxes, soundmakers, a thumb piano, bells and other odd little devices... with which he makes some astounding music!

The piece is not just a drum solo, but composed the whole way through with (I think) a few improvisatory sections. You will notice he returns to the same melodic theme on the thumb piano and bells multiple times.

No, the crickets aren't real... but I have no idea what the heck is up with them! Ask Kotche.

Hat tip to Will for enlightening me with this a few days ago. Turn it up loud.

Guitarists I Admire: Jimi Hendrix

2009-05-30T17:38:00.004-06:00

I imagine that most of the small crowd that reads this blog knows that I play guitar. It’s the great pleasure of my life, and “musician” is a key part of my identity. I’ve been playing guitar for about 20 or so years now, and I’ve come a long way in terms of ability. While I don’t consider myself anywhere close to being a virtuoso or even an expert, I’m pretty comfortable with my instrument and can play pretty much anything I hear in my head, electric or acoustic.

Part of being a serious musician is having and acknowledging your musical influences. I am no exception. Certain guitarists have influenced and inspired me since I was a kid of 14 just learning to plink out a few hesitant chords on my mom’s nylon string guitar. I can’t say that all of what I liked when I was a kid has stood the test of time (Mark loves to give me crap for liking crap like Whitesnake and Britney Fox in the 1980s), but over the past two decades, there are certain artists/bands/guitarists whose influence upon my style and taste in music has proven durable and deeply influential to me. And, given the fact I am a total music nerd who can talk for days about music that I dig, I feel like sharing what inspires me.

So, this is Part One of what I plan to be a occasional, long series on guitarists I admire. I’ve been drawn to loud rock n’ roll from a pretty young age, so it shouldn’t be surprising that most of the guitar gods you’ll read about in this series come from that tradition. It’s not that there aren’t fantastic guitarists that I like in other genres such as jazz (Django Reinhart, Pat Metheny, Stanley Jordan) or classical (John Williams, Andre Segovia), etc., it’s just that rock n’ roll is the family of music that has left a lasting mark on my musical personality.

As I’ve often said, my tongue only half in my cheek, “I was born to rock!”

First up in the series of Guitarists I Admire: Jimi Hendrix

This is kind of a no-brainer. A cliché too. I mean, what fan of rock music doesn’t consider him among the greats? But I have to weigh in, because Jimi Hendrix’ music was very important to me as a formative musical influence.

I think I first heard Hendrix on a tape that my friend Nat gave to me when I was a sophomore in high skool. The first song? “Are You Experienced?” It was mind blowing for my 15 year old adolescent brain, that thick, hypnotic, incredibly complex, sidewinding electric guitar figure that comes in over the trippy backwards drums, and a guitar solo recorded backwards in the middle, too. I listened to that tape over and over again… I think I actually still have it somewhere.

Hendrix was a man of many and immense talents. To this day he is primarily known for his guitar solo pyrotechnics (literally… at one famous show he set his guitar on fire before smashing it to bits) and his liberal, revolutionary use of fuzz tone. And it’s true that his abilities in this arena have rarely been equaled, before or since. He had a naturally flowing, lyrical style to playing guitar solos that made them seem effortless. His vibrato technique was among the most expressive and instantly recognizable anywhere. And he pioneered guitar sounds that are still admired all these years later, even though the technology for producing them was quite crude by today’s standards (slashing speaker cones to make them sound “dirty”, first generation fuzz boxes, arcane guitar effects like the Echoplex and Univibe).

The band he became famous for fronting, the Jimi Hendrix Experience, consisted of himself and two seasoned jazzmen, Mitch Mitchell on drums and Noel Redding on bass. Indeed, it’s difficult to separate his own talent from that of the phenomenal talents of his “sidemen”, both of whom, while being slightly lesser known than Hendrix, have nearly equal status in musician’s circles. Mitchell, in particular, is considered to be one of the greatest of all rock drummers and is certainly responsible for much of the magic of Hendrix’ early albums. Prime examples of this band firing on all cylinders are “Manic Depression”, “Red House” and of course his first big hit “Hey Joe”. None of these are particularly musically complex (“Red House” is in a standard 12 bar blues form), but they are prime examples of what master musicians can do with simple ideas.

These guys were so talented that they would record entire albums with minimal rehearsals, sometimes recording tunes that Hendrix had written the same day. That is a significantly different aesthetic than modern recording techniques, which are far more sophisticated and time consuming. The primitive techniques they used resulted in some timeless music, and didn’t rely on technological gimmickry to sweeten them up.

But to label Hendrix as merely a great guitar player does not really do justice to his multifaceted talents. He was also a first rate songwriter. “Castles Made Of Sand” is a melancholy, somewhat simple song that nonetheless shows of some tastefully understated guitar chops. The chord progression to “Little Wing” is a beautiful example of the ideas that sprang from him, lilting and longing. Though his voice was not particularly good by traditional standards and he used a sort of “speak/sing” technique on most of his work, it was nonetheless expressive and well suited to his compositional ideas.

On later albums such as Electric Ladyland, he toned down the flashy guitar solos and focused more on songwriting and use of recording techniques; although this being Hendrix, flashy guitar work is in abundance.. The result was, predictably, great music. Psychedelia just doesn’t get much better than a song like “In 1983 A Merman I Should Turn To Be”

Hendrix eventually parted ways with Mitchell and Redding and formed a new band, the Band Of Gypsys. While not quite as legendary as the Experience, they were more than capable of backing Hendrix and his music. And my favorite Hendrix tune of all, “Machine Gun”, dates from this era. The song was recorded live and is famous for both its politics (a Vietnam War protest song) and the stuttering palm-muted guitar technique that Hendrix used at the beginning to imitate the rat-tat-tat of a machine gun.

But what really makes it stand out is the guitar solo in the middle. Beginning with a single, sustained note that he holds for a ridiculous length to build suspense, it then carpet bombs everything in its path for the next couple of minutes with liquid napalm. All other electric guitarists before and since are felled by this solo. I hereby proclaim it The Greatest Electric Guitar Solo Of All Time!

You think I’m kidding? No. That’s not hyperbole at all. Okay, maybe the caps were a bit much. But if you really want to know why Hendrix is worshipped by musicians to this day with such reverence, listen to this song and your question will be answered. I get goosebumps just remembering it in my head now. Also, "Machine Gun" is an excellent example of what the aforementioned Univibe effect sounds like.

I still like to pull out some Hendrix once in a while, even though his music, particularly his big hits like “Purple Haze” and “Crosstown Traffic”, has been nearly over played to death on classic rock radio. But he was a genuine rock and roll pioneer. His huge impact on later generations of musicians, including myself, means that it makes no sense to write about great rock guitarists without a hat tip to Hendrix. RIP Jimi.

Wendi's stone update

2009-05-21T10:58:00.005-06:00

Quick blurb to update everyone about Wendi's salivary gland stone problems. Her surgery was yesterday. Here is what they pulled out of her...

I have read and heard from the medical professionals in our family that most salivary gland stones are about the size of a grain of sand. Wendi has had this one for more than 20 years and it grew to the size of a pea. In Mark's words, "That's a big honkin' stone!"

Though the surgery itself went well, she is having a difficult time swallowing, is in a lot of pain and is rather loopy from the pain meds. I feel bad for her. We are watching her condition closely.

So, I'm at home today again helping with Simon, who is blissfully oblivious to most of this, though I do think he understands that mommy isn't feeling very well. Oh well at least I got off work again.

Get well soon, hon.

Professional sports: parasites of the public

2009-05-03T22:11:00.005-06:00

This post started as a response to Mark’s latest post rhapsodizing about the Nuggets. It’s nice that the Nuggs have finally overcome their jinx. They do seem to be playing better than at any time in their history and Denver is really rallying behind them. Awesome!

I’m being sarcastic. Now I’ll turn on the charm.

I don’t have the obsession that most people have with professional sports. In fact, I hate professional sports, almost without exception. And college sports are nearly as bad. If the Nuggs, Broncos and Avs left town never to return, not only would I not miss them, but I would cheer and openly celebrate.

Why, you ask? What did the Nuggets or the Broncos ever do to Matt?

But that’s the wrong question. My question is, “What have the Nuggets or Broncos ever done for me?” I understand the appeal of watching a game. What I don’t understand is the sentimental attachment. The Nuggets are not our friends. Most are not from Denver. They are millionaires, hired mercenaries, paid to use their athletic talents to fool you into thinking we have some kind of stake in their success, that their triumph is ours. We have no stake, and their triumph is not ours. They do not care for us, they do not love us, and they have no loyalty to Denver.

Neither do any of the other major professional sports teams have any particular loyalty to any location. They are notorious for pulling up stakes as soon as they find they can make more money elsewhere. It’s not surprising. Any business would do the same.

What is surprising is the adoration and love that sports fans shower upon their “heroes”. It is completely one-sided – we can read in sports magazines about the sadness sports fans every time their idols do not live up to their perceived status as “role models”. Which is quite often, though the reality never seems to sink in to the fans. Sports stars are generally egomaniacal prima donnas, jerks who relish their status and care what the fans think only so far as it affects their abilities to sign fat endorsement contracts.

And why would they? To be a sports star in America is to be the closest thing to royalty we have in this country, and rare is the scandal that ends one’s career. The worst forms of behavior are winked at. The reality is that the culture of sports encourages it. And people expect these overgrown babies to be role models?

But sports star culture is not even close to being the worst thing about professional sports. Far worse is the parasitic nature of the industry on the economy. Most sports teams could not survive economically without public subsidy of their enterprises, through public financing of stadiums, special laws granting them the ability to effectively operate as monopolies, etc. If the public balks at providing subsidies for the multimillionaire owners, the owners threaten to move to a town more favorable to their public extortion scheme. And they do not hesitate to follow through on these threats if their bluff is called.

Here in Denver, the public provided nearly 70% of the financing for the Bronco’s home, Invesco Field at Mile High, nearly $250,000,000, through a special metro-area sales tax levy.

The rationale behind this public “investment” is a supposed benefit to the economy at large. In reality, the positive effects on the economy are dubious at best, non-existent or negative at worst.

But certainly, some people do benefit economically – the wealthy owners and athletes. They are lucky to have such a deep reservoir of public goodwill and trust, which never seems to deplete, no matter how badly they misuse and abuse it.

It’s true that, in Denver’s case at least, the tax increase in question passed by a wide margin of a popular vote, so clearly the public believes it derives some form of value from the Broncos et al. My question is therefore, what value? The right to purchase overpriced tickets and merchandise? $8 beers and $5 hot dogs, while being prohibited from bringing your own food into a facility that your tax dollars paid for?

Of course not. The “value” to the public is what they perceive to be the “team spirit”, the loyalty to the hometown, the vicarious thrill of victory when the “hometown boys”, who are neither boys or in most cases from the hometown, defeat the enemy. But as I have shown, that is manufactured, not genuine, the result of successful branding campaigns and gigantic marketing budgets. The reality is precisely the opposite. It is cynical exploitation of mass delusion, and very, very lucrative. Every time you buy something in the Denver area, you are paying the interest on the bonds that were issued to pay for Mile High Stadium.

If you feel good about that, consider this: perhaps the worst thing about the public subsidy of pro sports is what economists call “opportunity cost”. An opportunity cost is the result of choosing one economic option over another. How much affordable housing could have been built for that $250 million? How many schools built and funded? How many public works like parks and infrastructure could have been paid for? Don’t ask the owners of the Broncos. They’re too busy putting that new wing on the mansion or vacationing in Bermuda.

I am under no illusion that professional sports are going away any time soon, or that they don’t command significant popularity. I just think that people should try to be a little more aware of the realities of the world of pro sports before they go painting their faces orange, or arguing about statistics in some bar. Professional sports teams are not your friends.

Wake up. Class dismissed.

Slack and a salivary stone scare

2009-05-01T20:43:00.006-06:00

For the record, today was a classic rainy day in Denver. So, I thought I would write a short post, just to show I haven't disappeared or anything.

Y’all don’t have to tell me what a slacker I am. I will just say that there are 2 reasons I haven’t posted anything for more than 2 months.

The first: school. Or “skool” as I like to spell it. I am taking a really hard tax class this semester and I’m in skool 2 nights out of the week. Wendi is of course back in skool too. From Monday to Thursday, it seems we barely see each other. So when I’m not at work or at skool, I’m at home taking care of Simon. And when he goes to bed, I usually don’t have the energy to write much. Sorry. Plus, this tax class I'm taking is really difficult.

The second reason: music. I have finally found a good drummer to work with. I have been playing with Will for about 2 months now, and am looking forward to summer when I will have more time to devote to creating loud, obnoxious music that will frighten decent people, disgust upstanding citizens and make children cry. That’s really what I live for, after all. Plus, a very good situation has come my way recently that I think will give me a great foundation to network and play with even more musicians. More about that later.

For now, we had a bit of a scare this evening. Wendi has had sporadic problems with a salivary gland stone since she was 17. Her stone had been hurting her for a couple days but this afternoon it really started to hurt and swell. A conference with Dr. Mark and internet research revealed that an abscessed salivary gland stone can be very serious. We made the decision to take her to the ER at Swedish Medical Center, where she spent a good portion of the evening.

Don't worry, everything is more or less OK. I picked her up a few minutes ago from the ER. She will probably need surgery for it. Bummer, but at least she won't have any more stone problems. Geez, it seems Wendi and I are on track for having an average of one surgery each per year. As Wendi is fond of saying, "Ain't nobody getting any younger."

Anyway, I plan on posting again soon. From famine to feast and all that…

Say it ain't so, Rocky!

2009-02-27T13:16:00.002-07:00

By now I’m sure you’ve heard. I bought my last-ever copy of the Rocky Mountain News today. No I’m not going to have it framed. But this is definitely a very sad day.

Most people know that I am a voracious consumer of news. I’ve long been in the habit of reading an actual newspaper several times a week at the very least. Since I’ve been taking mass transit the past few years, the Rocky has been an indispensable companion on the way to work. Reading the paper is one of those little morning rituals that helps me wake and mentally gear up for my day.

I’ve lived in Colorado for 20 years now and though I sometimes read the Post, the Rocky has always been my favorite. I’m not sure why. Even though its editorial page was much more conservative than my general views, I think the reporting and overall quality of the paper was more consistent.

I do feel that the quality of the Rocky went steeply downhill the past 2 or 3 years though. The past few months, it seems they’ve been focusing on reporting on what the TV news stations are too – crime, puff personality pieces, sensationalism. I hate TV news and never watch it anymore so I was disappointed in this turn of events. I’ve barely even bought a paper in the last month. The sports section was still robust and they seemed to be pouring their limited resources into it, but I care nothing for professional sports. The rest was all national AP/wire stories that you can read anywhere online.

However they still did a great job of covering the state legislature, and though their business section was pretty stripped down, they still had some great journalists like David Milstead and good business reporting. Plus they have won several Pulitzers in the past 7 or 8 years. It wasn’t all bad, and will be sorely missed. It was the oldest operating business in Colorado… less than 2 months shy of being 150.

I am very sad today. I will remember the Rocky like an old friend with whom I didn’t always agree, but whose absence leaves me wondering what will fill the void.

I've added to my blogroll

2009-01-31T16:53:00.004-07:00

This week it occurred to me how thankful I am for what has become known as the blogosphere. 5 or 6 years ago, blogs were still relatively new and unknown. Look how much has changed!

I believe that with the rise of the blogosphere, the Web has finally begun to fulfill the potential that I remember being hyped so much in the early 1990s. I'm still relatively new to this and I am not good at html, but am thankful to have the blogosphere to make my workdays spectacularly unproductive ;-)

So, I've now added some links to a number of blogs that I follow nearly every day. To your right you will find a section titled, "some other blogs I read." Clever, no? They mostly deal with economics or politics, but I will add others soon. Check them out... they are all very intelligent, informative and some are very, very funny... particularly Sadly No and Jon Swift. It's a brave new world, baby.

Don't spare the change

2009-01-23T13:13:00.001-07:00

Well yet another eon has passed since my last post. It occurs to me that I would probably be better off posting lots of little posts rather than these mega-screeds that nobody wants to read anyway. Mea culpa..

Now, to bizness. I am of course thrilled that President Obama was elected by such a landslide, as you could probably guess from my last post. Heck it just feels so good to put the word “president” in front of his name and not Bush’s for a change. It has been a long 8 years and it seems like the world has really entered a new age since January 2001 when Bush took office. The sense of transition is more pronounced than I can ever remember in my lifetime.

There is no other politician that I can remember who brought tears to my eyes with such a wonderful inauguration speech, anyway. It was profoundly moving, and unlike most political speeches actually contained substance – acknowledgement of the troubles we face and a rejection of the direction we are going. I’m cynical, but I also long for reasons to be proud of my country. Men like Obama make me proud.

He seems to have hit the ground running, with a flurry of activity. We’re only 4 days into Obama’s administration and it really seems like they are trying to make a legitimate break from Bush, at least so far. I could not be happier. There has been a lot of speculation among we flaming, pinko, godless, America-hating, liberals since the election about whether Obama really intends to shake things up as was promised during the election. In particular a lot of his cabinet appointments of people from the Clinton years have drawn cries of alarm.

I’ll admit I was nervous too, as I never liked Clinton much. At times during the latest campaign, the thought of Hillary Clinton as president sent shivers of horror up my spine. Do we Americans need two decades of control of the most powerful office of the most powerful country in the world by only two families? The prospect is awful on both symbolic and functional terms. Ugh.

However, I give Prez O credit He has demonstrated time and again that he is a master of political strategy. He has been building a political juggernaut that might well be unstoppable. He has a mandate, momentum and vision. I just hope he uses these for things I want to see happen.

So the first week looks like a great start. I am a big fan of Obama and am inclined to trust his instincts. There will be mistakes and slips on the way I’m sure. But after 8 years in the Bush, I will be overjoyed if on balance things change marginally for the better. I don’t expect that I will agree with 100% of what they do.

But I am also going to hold his administration to a high standard. If it doesn’t perform, you can bet I will say something about it, and I won’t be nice. Mark my words. I have enough problems with Democrats already. If I am forced to say “et tu, Barry?” I may never vote for another Democrat again.

This is the day

2008-11-04T21:39:00.007-07:00

This is MY flag, OUR flag...

I am proud to be an American today. Very, very proud. And happy.

Now if I can just stop that tear in my eye from welling up...

Bubba: a retrospective

2008-10-25T15:56:00.022-06:00

This week it occurred to me that I have not posted any photos of my family for a while… in fact since Simon was born last year. It’s time for a retrospective of Du Bubs, as Wendi affectionately calls him. I tend to call him Bubba. Whatever you call him, he’s a great guy and so much fun to be around! Usually, anyway ;-)

In December of last year, Don Vito Corleone made us an offer we couldn't refuse.

"Daddy, your fly is down." I have had this problem most of my life, but now I have this little guy to help me out.

This is how Wendi looks at me if I forget to take out the trash. Truly, he is his mother's son. Great.

Next are a few pics from his first birthday party at Mark's house. Those of you who were there probably remember that it didn't go to well. It started out happily enough...

"I want a cool slide like this of my own, Dad!" "Kid, we live in an apartment... sorry."

Simon and Justin, buddies (except if Sy has one of Justin's toys).

Ask not for whom the baby comes... he comes for Daddy.

All dads know that a major portion of their duties involves imitating a jungle gym.

I have my revenge!

Well, shortly after dinner, Simon fell off his chair and landed squarely on his forehead with a resonant *THWACK*. No real harm done, but he wasn't too happy even when we sang "Happy Birthday" to him later:

Poor little guy. We all felt bad for him. He cheered up a little when it was time for cake...

More or less, ha ha! He even shared some cake with his mommy...

Wendi finds the fingers and toes of young children to be tender and delicious -- and even more delectable with some frosting on top.

Well, the birthday party wasn't the best of times for our little guy. I guess birthday parties aren't really his idea of a good time right now. He does seem to enjoy beeing outside though. A few weeks later we went for a short hike near Kenosha pass:

The crisp autumn mountain air and peaceful stillness of the wilderness... rudely interrupted by the continual shrieking and jabbering in my ear of the little boy on my back!

Finally, Wendi's mom was in town to help after Wendi's surgery last week, which went perfectly BTW. We strolled around downtown Littleton and snapped a few pictures in the park:

I believe this is the most recent photo I have of our bubba at the moment.

Being a parent is demanding, tiring and expensive. It is also a lot of fun! I am learning more about how to do it every day. Simon is an intelligent, good natured kid, somewhat cautious in nature -- though he loves all kinds of foods, even broccoli! We have enjoyed getting to know him and watching his personality develop over the past year. I think I can safely speak for Wendi also when I say that we wouldn't trade this sweet little boy for anything in the world.

And the wheels came off

2008-09-26T11:23:00.006-06:00

Some are already calling it "Black September".

If you’ve been following what’s been happening in the economy and markets, as I have, you are probably shaking your head in dismay. Even I, the eternal doom-and-gloom pessimist, didn’t expect that what happened over the past 3 weeks would snowball so quickly.

Events in the markets and the financial sector are moving faster than the reactions from the government and public can keep up. There doesn’t seem to be any real leadership about how to deal with multiple converging crises either. That light at the end of the tunnel is looking more and more like a train. Insert your own disastrous metaphor or cliché here.

To recap: the worlds largest mortgage insurers and buyers, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, have been effectively nationalized. One of the biggest and oldest investment banks, Lehman Bros., went belly up. Another, Merrill Lynch, would have too had it not been swallowed at the last second by the Death Star, otherwise known as Bank Of America. The only remaining Wall Street investment banks, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, had to desperately change their business model and get permission to reorganize as commercial banks. Washington Mutual collapsed last night and is now the largest bank failure in American history. Other banks such as Wachovia are looking increasingly fragile. Credit markets have frozen.

AIG was bailed out at the last minute by the government after agreeing to giving the government an equity stake. It was the first-ever government bailout of an insurance company. Wendi’s mom works for AIG, but now she effectively works for Uncle Sam.

Some of you may recall that I work for a wholly-owned subsidiary of Morgan Stanley. I do not know what the future holds, only that I have a personal stake now in what is happening. This week Morgan Stanley was courting the sickly Wachovia for a potential marriage. This did not make me feel good inside, but I laughed anyway when I heard it. This is getting more and more absurd by the day.

And, biggest of all, our fine, upstanding elected leaders are furiously debating how to force the rest of us to pay for the mistakes of guys who make more in a week than I do in a year, by throwing $700 billion of new debt into their begging hands. After basically denying for almost a year that there was any systemic problem, Secretary of the Treasury Hank “the shank” Paulson now says that financial catastrophe is imminent unless we do whatever he says. This is such a repulsive idea to some Republicans that even they balked at the price tag – and they have never been shy about spending money that they didn’t have.

Yes that’s right. Socialism, economic disaster, higher taxes and big government brought to you on a platter by the party of small government, low taxes and business. Wow. Choke it down and like it, it’s for your own good, they say.

Hypocrites, liars and thieves – are those words too strong? I don’t think so.

Not that the Democrats are much better – in many ways I have more problems with them than I do the GOP. The point is that the old paradigms are useless and the failure of leadership, laziness and corruption of our corporate-controlled government, combined with the unsustainable and fantasy-based economic model that it promoted, have brought us to this point. History is being made these past few days, keep watch on what happens next because it's going to be interesting... in the ancient Chinese sense.

I do not have the answers, just a few ideas that maybe I’ll write about some other time. For now, one of my favorite blogs about economics says it much better than I can.

New linkz, peeps!

2008-09-06T15:02:00.004-06:00

I have posted new links to other pages I have been maintaining. Check them out and let me know what you think!

I finally got a MySpace music page up and running for some of my older tunes. So now you can listen to my music any time you want! Isn't that awesome? The page only holds 6 songs but you can download any of them you want. This newfangled Internet thing is da bomb, yo.

Because my Flashback: 1980s series last year ended up being much longer than I meant it to be, and I love writing about music but don't feel like cluttering up this blog with every thought about music that pops into my head, I have begun posting some music reveiws on my Amazon profile. Amazon is nice that way because they let anyone post reviews of music or whatever, and the interface is pretty easy to use. It's almost like a blog in that you can network with people and join discussions about anything on their site -- which, as everyone knows, is a lot of stuff.

So if you are interested in what I have to say about this or that album or artist or what makes me tick musically (and who isn't interested, really?), take a peek.

The eternal student

2008-08-31T12:47:00.002-06:00

Skool is back in season. We started a week early this year, but had this pre-Labor Day week off, due to the DNC.

I am enjoying my new classes much more this semester than last. While my finance class was great (I really dig business classes involving number-crunching), the Organizational Management class which I took last semester really sucked. One would imagine from the name of the class that one would learn things about managing a business in a dynamic, globalized, competitive environment.

No. I spent $185 on the textbook and the teacher did not crack the book for three weeks. He instead used his own text in that time. We had to write papers about the merits of capitalism vs. communism. He reveled in repeating standard, tired right-wing talking points in nearly every class: “Reagan defeated communism”, “the most evil words ever written was the communist creed ‘from each according to his ability, to each according to his need’” with zero context or historical exposition. He never wrote a single note on the dry erase board, and when he did get around to using the textbook, he merely used key topics as jumping-off points for aimless and rather dumb class discussions.

Towards the end of the semester, I hadn’t been staying current on the text (didn’t relate much to the essay tests he gave!) so one evening I made a halfhearted attempt to catch up on about 4 chapters of reading, each chapter about 30 or so pages of dense text. After about half an your I threw the textbook down in disgust. I just didn’t care, and reading the text was a waste of time for the class. I got an A, but felt like I had wasted my time and money. I have little enough of either!

I am happy to report that this semester is looking much better on the teacher front. I am taking Cost Accounting and Business Ethics.

Cost accounting is another of these number-crunching classes that I enjoy. Most people who do not work in accounting or are not accounting majors would find the subject hideously boring, so I will spare you the details. Suffice it to say, do you ever wonder how companies can keep track of how much it costs to produce a single item or service? Do you ever wonder how they calculate what profit margin they need to have on said item or service in order to stay in business?

That’s cost accounting, and it is distinct from financial accounting in that it is not required to conform to Generally Accepted Accounting Principles, or GAAP as we call them (pronounced “gap). It has wide implications in the fields of marketing and finance as well. I’m pretty interested in this class, not least because we will be doing quite a bit of pretty advanced stuff with Excel. I happen to love working with Excel (unusually good for Microsoft software, they got it right for once), and it is pretty much the standard spreadsheet software for business, and accounting in particular. My teacher seems pretty knowledgeable too, which is a nice change of pace from that egotistical Reaganite last semester.

The other class is Business Ethics. This class is a required one but actually falls into the category of philosophy at Metro State. The running joke about Business Ethics is that the term is itself an oxymoron. Whether or not that’s true, I am very interested in this class. It’s another subject that is very important in this day and age, with the accounting scandals that seem to still be surfacing in the business world with depressing regularity, the current economic downturn caused by reckless financial speculation that I have extensively written about elsewhere, the sometimes exploitative economics of globalization, and so forth. This teacher as well seems to know his stuff and he is very good at leading focused classroom discussions about various topics.

The only problem is that because I’ve had this week off, I have been ultra lazy and haven’t studied at all! I’m planning to do some tomorrow since I have the day off from work. It’s good that I have some interesting looking classes this semester because it keeps me motivated.

I am no longer as gung-ho about finishing my degree ASAP, as I was a couple years back. I am nearing the end and therefore would rather have the least stressful time of it as possible. To put it in perspective, if I graduate as planned in Spring of 2010, I will have spent nearly 8 years on a 4 year degree. Sometimes I feel like an eternal student but the end is in sight...

God bless America!

2008-07-06T15:04:00.005-06:00

Wow. Nearly nine months since my last post. This blog really keeps you on the edge of your seat, huh? This time lag was indeed an egregious violation of my numerous, previous pledges to keep the dang thing timely. So what happened, you ask?

I think the biggest reason is that I was discouraged by the somewhat ugly direction the discussion in the comments went. I didn’t mean for things to get so heated. I blame myself.

In retrospect, it probably wasn’t a good idea to link to the inflammatory video. Though I still agree with every word of James McMurtry’s powerful protest song and the sentiments it conveys, I intended it as a kind of punctuation, like an exclamation point on the end of a sentence, to drive home the points made by the linked articles and blogs that I posted.

As it turned out, seems like most of the people who read the post didn’t pay too much attention to the links. Some (one of whom will remain nameless, Dad) got the impression I was cackling maniacally as I gleefully set fire to Old Glory, and cheering for a Communist overthrow of the US government as I congratulated Osama Bin Laden for his efforts over the phone.

That was not quite the case.

It was a stimulating discussion, but an exhausting one. I guess I deserve it for bringing up politics and economics in the first place. I mean, really what did I expect would happen? It’s now been the better part of a year since that controversial post. My interest in the issues I wrote about and linked too has only grown since then – I just haven’t blogged about it.

If you check out the first link in the last post (the official White House “Jobs & Economic Growth” page), you may notice a change from last year. Last October, it was trumpeting the strong economy, proclaiming a new era of prosperity and opportunity and thanking George W. Bush’s economic genius at every opportunity; now we get a fact sheet “Charting A Clear Course For The Economy”.

It’s pretty funny. Here we have a great example of your tax dollars at work to bamboozle you with cherry-picked statistics and economic initiatives of dubious merit, but what is really striking is how the narrative has changed since last year. Exactly what happened to that strong economy? Gotta love propaganda.

The reality is that since last year events have moved on. Nobody can predict the future but it ain’t looking too bright to me. I think what really disturbs me is that we seem to have lost what once made us great as a nation: the ability to govern ourselves. This is the country that once produced great leaders such as Jefferson, Lincoln, FDR and MLK. We saved the world from the Nazis and American ideas of freedom enraptured the world. What happened?

As a nation, we have never before seen such confluence of political decay, erosion of freedoms, corporatism and economic exploitation. Our country has been sold off to the highest bidder, and democracy is now considered more or less an obstacle to the global flow of capital and corresponding transfer of wealth from the lower to the upper classes.

This is happening via a number of conduits, lax government monetary policy and the globalization of the flow of capital without regard to the needs of human beings being two of them. Overshadowing everything like the Sword of Damocles is the looming specter of peak oil, which I am personally more and more convinced will be the number one nightmare for humanity for the foreseeable future. Oil hit $145 a barrel yesterday, and the national average price for a gallon of regular 87 octane gasoline was at $4.10.

That sucks huh? Well, you ain’t seen nothing yet. There may be temporary drops here and there in prices, but the overall trend line is clear. Gasoline prices will never again be $1.15 a gallon. They won’t even be double that. I personally think that by the end of the year, the price will be around $5. If we go to war with Iran, double that.

Sounds pretty bleak huh? I don’t have any surefire solutions. I think there can only be treatments to mitigate the pain, not a cure for the disease. Unfortunately, I think that our culture, economy and government are incapable at this time of doing even the minimum necessary, thereby ensuring even greater pain down the road. This is a second reason I feel so pessimistic about our future. Believe me, nobody would be happier than myself if I was wrong.

So, I'll bet you're thinking: "Wow, what a crank Matt is! Why does he rant like that? How did it come to this?" Two books I have read over the past few months have profoundly influenced my thinking about these issues. They make me look like Pollyanna by comparison, but they make their cases more solidly than my "ranting" ever will. If you are at all interested in issues like peak oil or problems with globalization and the capitalist model to which we are accustomed, please check them out.

Jim Kunstler’s book The Long Emergency makes some dire predictions about our prospects for grappling with converging crises such as peak oil, global warming, and their effects on the economies of not just the United States’, but that of the world. The central thesis is that we are woefully unprepared to live in a world whose entire economy rests upon the premise of cheap fossil fuels. Simply put, in Kunstler’s view there is no possible way to avert the coming catastrophe.

Kunstler is a longtime critic of the post-war suburban housing pattern that now is the dominant form of development in the US, which he calls the greatest misallocation of resources in the history of the world. He predicts (and I am inclined to agree) that this pattern of development, with its big box stores, shopping malls, freeways and parking lots has no future in a world of scarce oil.

Though the amount of investment in mass transit over the past fifty years has varied greatly from place to place, most places in the United States have given little thought to the long term and in some areas such as the deep South, there is next to no chance that any kind of mass transit will realistically come on line.

He is also dismisses the idea that renewable energy has any chance of preserving the post-war suburban lifestyle, and examines various schemes in detail to determine why exactly they cannot replace fossil fuels – solar, hydroelectric, nuclear, hydrogen, and even drilling for more oil are all looked at. Moreover, we are woefully unprepared for the coming shock.

This book was published in 2005, at the height of the last economic bubble when things were looking rosy, so to read it to day in the light of $145 per barrel oil is pretty scary. He goes so far as to doubt our ability to survive as a nation – “the long emergency” as he describes it a rather apocalyptic vision.

While even I am not quite so negative about the future as Kunstler, this book is a must read for anyone trying to understand the current economic gloom and the reasons why gasoline prices keep going through the roof. And don’t dismiss him as some radical leftist either – he supports drilling for oil in ANWR, investment in nuclear energy, and though he didn’t really support the second Iraq war, he regards it as having been pretty much inevitable.

Even if you don’t agree (as I don’t) with all of his predictions, this is an excellent resource that pulls a lot of loose threads together. Kunstler is also an engaging, witty writer – his gift for a pithy turn of phrase is on full display here, with a good dose of black humor. He also has a blog that he updates weekly here. In my opinion he’s one of the sharpest writers today covering this subject. Check it out if you’re interested in learning more.

The other book that has heavily influenced my thinking lately is The Shock Doctrine: The Rise Of Disaster Capitalism by Naomi Klein. This is a detailed account of how the so-called “Chicago school” of economics (the dominant school of economics worldwide since the late 1960s), with the late Milton Friedman as its champion and figurehead, came to preside over a series of economic disasters in dozens of countries around the world.

The Chicago School is known for its embrace of extreme principles of free markets without regard to the short-term human costs involved. And though we have been lead by the corporate media and various leaders to embrace so-called free markets as being synonymous with democracy, in most cases these “free market principles” have been imposed on other countries by force, with the explicit aim of causing such dire economic consequences that all resistance is rendered impotent by the sudden shock. Hence, the title of the book.

The Shock Doctrine describes in great detail events that took place in Chile, Bolivia, Argentina, the Maldives, Poland, Russia, China, Mexico, Sri Lanka and other places when, after some kind of shock natural (the 2004 tsunami), man made (the collapse of the Soviet Union, Pinochet’s coup and dictatorship in 1970s Chile) or economic (the so-called “Asian Contagion” currency crisis of 1997, the free-market ideologues in various governments and institutions such as the World Bank or IMF sought to impose radical free-market reforms in very anti-Democratic ways.

In Chile’s case, this took the form of University of Chicago educated bureaucrats advising and abetting a brutal dictatorship that overthrew a left-leaning but democratically elected government. In the case of Russia, the collapse of the Soviet Union led to a fire sale of state assets to the many of the high-ranking officials of that oppressive state and created a new class of oligarchs, along with nearly a decade of spiraling organized crime and economic chaos.

And so on, with depressing regularity. None of these shocks were accidental, but rather were explicitly called for by the adherents of this “neoliberalism” (as it is known in the rest of the world). They sought a proverbial “clean slate” in which to impose their ideology, and to bring it about they advocated exploiting these kind of shocks, and in some cases actually brought them about through shady speculative practices.

This book pulls together a lot of threads and paints a very big canvas. What is really striking is the similarity of neoliberalism to Leninism, its diametric opposite and mortal enemy. Both systems explicitly advocated advancing their economic philosophies by use of anti-democratic means. Both systems sought to shape the world according to their ideological visions. And though both of them never succeeded in doing what they claimed to do, their adherents only redoubled their efforts to remake the world in their image -- even though in most cases what came about was economic hardship and oppressive government. Makes you think, hmmm?

I recommend this book to anyone who is trying to understand why many of the events since the end of the Soviet Union transpired as they did. It’s thoroughly researched, and a damning portrait of what capitalism has become under the radical philosophy of neoliberalism.

Sorry to ruin your day with my blog. I'm really not that unpleasant to be around. I just think that people aren't realizing the great danger we as a nation (and the planet too) are facing. I would just like to see people be more informed about what is going on in the world so that we at least don't make things worse than they already are. The past 40 or 50 years were a gilded age. It's time we realized that things are going to change and the old models won't get us very far. But the world won't end. At least, I hope not -- for all it's flaws, I'm pretty fond of it.

Ok, that’s probably enough about this stuff. I promise not to bore you with politics and economics so much anymore. Gotta start keeping people up to date on my boring life. I know you’ll want to read about that. Stay tuned... more soon.

UPDATE 7/9/08:

Not to beat a dead horse, but Naomi Klein has a very timely column on disaster capitalism's influence on current events. This is why I roll my eyes when I hear people bleat about “free markets”, which too often really means "free for multinational capital, expensive for regular people -- suck on it."

Point, counterpoint

2007-10-11T21:50:00.001-06:00

An attempt to stimulate debate and thoughtful contemplation re: the state of the U.S. economy, utilizing the power and promise of the Internet for said purpose. And if someone has better sources than me, then use them for Pete's sake.

Point: Don't worry, everything is fine. Really. Would the government lie? Go and buy something.

Jobs and prosperity! Yay!

A strong, strong economy.

Did we mention that this is a strong economy?

Wow, things are looking great! I guess things are looking up and there's no need to fret about the future as long as W's crew are writing the economic "analysis."

In an attempt to support our noble president, I tried to pluck similar, upbeat opinions from the vast universe of business/financial/economic commentary that is available on the Internet, I really, really tried, please believe me.... you think I want to quote the government in my blog?

Hmmm... not much positive stuff out there. Instead, I found a lot of arguments along these lines... and there are tens of thousands more.

Counterpoint: what has the President been smoking?

Make your minimum payments, and we might extend your line of credit! Wouldn't you like that? Aren't we generous?

Be happy, be productive.

Work for a living but can't seem to get ahead? Screw you, it's your own fault.

Pay it forward.

The American dream, or hamster wheel?

The Consumer Price Index: a lie?

Yes.

Well, that's just how free markets work, slacker! Oh, wait a minute...

What do I think?

James McMurtry is no newcomer -- he's been recording and touring for nearly 20 years. The following song is from his excellent album from last year, Childish Things.

I believe this video is unofficial, but it pretty much summed up how I feel about the state of this land when I came across it a couple of months ago. It's a powerful, moving song, simply stated in terms anyone can understand.

But why listen to James McMurtry, or to me for that matter, when W is so clearly on top of the game, and Bernanke and the Fed are just waiting to bail out the billionaires from their bad bets? Isn't that good for us all?

If you're not angry or worried, I'd like to move to your planet. The weather must be nice there.

I would love to be able to tell my son that the USA will be a free, prosperous and shining beacon of democracy when he is older. I'm not optimistic. Now, discuss...

Behold my boy!

2007-10-02T21:31:00.000-06:00

Okay, I know it's been nearly a month, but those of you with little kids can probably understand why Wendi and I have been a little distracted lately.

Simon was born September 7th after what we believe to be a particularly grueling labor. He was a week overdue and labor was induced by Wendi's fantastic and compassionate doctor, Dr. Wester. Wendi's water broke on its own (she was quite proud of this) and after about 12 hours of labor was ready to push.

And push she did, for nearly three hours. At first things were progressing nicely, but about halfway through the second hour she tired considerably. Eventually things stopped progressing and Wendi made the decision to have a cesarean section.

Dr. Wester earned his money! I will never be able to thank him enough. As it turned out, Wendi made the right decision because Simon came into this world a big boy -- 9 pounds 11 ounces. We heard that if they had tried to go ahead and deliver him with forceps, the results would have been pretty bad for both mommy and the boy. NO!

Wendi was very, very strong and this fact was remarked upon by all attending medical staff. She kept her composure better than me, because I kind of um, broke down at one point when I saw her in tremendous pain. My hat is off to her.

We were in the hospital together for the better part of a week, both because of Wendi's recovery and Simon's developing a bit of jaundice, which thankfully cleared up nicely after a day strapped to a glowing, comfy looking UV device. We jokingly called him "UFO baby" after seeing him like that.

I took off a week of work, most of which was spent in the hospital with my wife and boy. Wendi's mother, Shirl, flew in from NC and spent the second weekend with us, and we have had many meals and good wishes thanks to her, my own family and friends. The past few weeks we have spent enjoying and consolidating our bonds as a family unit.

Simon is generally a mellow guy and though caring for him can be a strain, as with every baby ever born, I think Wendi and I both agree that he is the best thing that has happened to us. We love him intensely.

At long last, some photos to show you what I mean.... we think he's probably going to have blue eyes, and that seems to be the consensus among others who have met him.

Whatever his eyes' color, one thing is certain: he's going to be a handsome guy, even better looking than me ;-)

We three, in the hospital tired but happy.

Simon himself, resting on my hairy leg about an hour ago.

Daddy loves his boy!

Hurry up and wait

2007-09-01T22:04:00.000-06:00

Here's some general news about what's happening in my life. There will be no encyclopedic treatises on musicology this time. I know I've written about music a lot, and will again in the future. It is after all a major presence in my life.

I'm taking a short break from writing about music. I'm glad most of you seemed to enjoy my epic breakdown of 1980s music, and thanks for your own insights.

It sure beats writing about my other professional field, accounting! Would anybody like to know about how pipeline inventory accounting works. Anybody?

I hear crickets chirping.

What follows is just general stuff:

In case you didn't know (how could you not?), Wendi and I are expecting a baby boy. Soon. Thursday was the due date. Both of us, especially Wendi, are beyond ready for Simon's arrival.

But the kid is stubborn, just like his parents. Wendi has been having increasingly intense and frequent Braxton-Hicks contractions for some time now, but there has not been any definitive sign that labor is imminent. The irony is that we've educated ourselves thoroughly on the ins and outs of child birth attended many hours of childbirth classes, consulted several doctors, talked to numerous experienced mothers and read half a dozen or so books; we still don't have a clue as to what is happening! Heck, Wendi knows better than I do what's happening in her own body. A lot of times she describes some-or-other sensation she's having and I can only mumble in agreement, because I'm not female and have no idea what she's talking about.

I think we both feel it's time for this ripe bean to come O.U.T. Wendi is increasingly miserable. Particularly in the past month, aches, pains and cramps have multiplied exponentially. Poor girl! I am doing what I can by giving her lotion rubs and massages daily, as well as moral support, but of course it's not enough. Only popping that kid out will bring any real relief.

Yesterday evening we thought Simon was on his way! We dined at a little Vietnamese restaurant up the road that we discovered shortly after moving to our new neighborhood a couple of months ago. We had almost made it through a plate of egg rolls when Wendi's face scrunched up, her eyes widened and she said "oooooo!"

As I said before, I'm not female. I can't tell what she's feeling. I must rely on her descriptions of what she's feeling, and her body language. "This feels different," she said, slightly out of breath -- meaning it wasn't a typical, common Braxton-Hicks. I hated to see her in pain, but I think that we were both excited that it might actually be happening.

The contraction faded after a few minutes, but by the time the waiter had brought Wendi her plate of pepper shrimp, she had already had another. Which was followed by another. By this time she had lost her appetite (which was a shame -- the shrimp was very tasty) and left the restaurant to wait in the car while I hurredly scooped our food into boxes and settled the check.

We kept joking with each other that it was the spicy food that caused it. If palates really do develop somewhat in utero based on the food choices of the mother, as I've read, then Simon will definitely crave hot peppers, green Tabasco sauce, curry, Mexican food, Vietnamese food and Thai food. We definitely like some kick to our meals.

Sadly, no baby last night. The four or five regular contractions ended almost as soon as we arrived home. So now it's back to playing the waiting game. The past three weeks, since Sy has been officially full term, has seemed to last almost as long as the entire preceeding eight months.

This won't go on much longer, though. Wendi's next doctor's appointment is Tuesday. If the baby hasn't come by Thursday, she will be scheduled for an induction next weekend. We hope it doesn't come to that, but either way this means that there will be pictures of Simon posted on this blog within a week or so. So stay tuned!

My job at TransMontaigne is so-so. I've gained a lot of invaluable knowledge and experience at my new position for the last ten months, and I am very glad that I work with the accounting group that I do -- my boss Nick is a genuinely nice guy and he's very smart and good at what he does. Most of the problems I have with the company are with the organization itself, or lack thereof as it were. The corporate culture is of a notoriously chauvanist, good-ol' boy sort. Fiefdoms and petty rivalries abound there.

And the stories I could tell you about our trading group, the type-A personalities who trade petroleum futures and contracts all day on the NYMEX exchange! These guys think the that the company exists for them, and them alone... which I guess it kind of is. See what I mean? Jerks, all of them... as I am fond of saying, they are not paid for their kind dispositions and sunny personalities. They are paid as they are because they make money.

On to music. I haven't really recorded any music or done much writing at all for nearly three years, for various reasons -- college, estrangement from/reconciliation with my beautiful wife, financial difficulties, all too many moves, and now an imminent baby. Entire seasons have gone by with me barely touching my guitar.

After we moved to Englewood, I decided that I really need to accomplish something musical this year. I forced myself to start playing regularly again, and we bought a 12-string guitar recently on a whim. In short order I found some inspiration coming back... it's funny how the muse never really goes away and can be awakened again with a little bit of effort.

There were times in the past couple years when I felt like I just couldn't write music anymore. Ideas would be tossed aside, forgotten or half-baked and left for dead. Sometimes I didn't have much focus and when I did try to concentrate I often was stymied by a lack of ideas and frustrated that I couldn't finish the ones I had. Most of all, I often just couldn't work up the motivation to sit down and write something.

It's funny how it works. I've always thought that anybody can write a song. They do take effort, concentration and willpower to create, but some of the best ones I've ever written have just popped into my head out of nowhere -- a fragment of melody, a chord change, a chorus, a line of lyrics or sometimes just a song title -- while I was hiking, or doing the dishes, or something equally unrelated to music.

I don't know where this stuff comes from, nor do think that I'm specially blessed. Long years of appreciation, practice and love of music have just allowed me to listen to and follow my ideas where they lead... sometimes. On a good day. I'm nobody special and I've had my own fallow times and failed experiments with music.

Anyway, I've now written about twelve songs for what I'm planning to be a full length "album" of almost completely acoustic music... just me and my guitar for the most part. The songs are mostly introspective and more than a third are purely instrumental. Sometimes a piece of music just doesn't need words to make a statement, and I've really enjoyed having a 12-string guitar for the first time in my life. I want to show it off, as well as my new set of bongos.

This is an ambitious project, given the limited amount of time I have. Heck, I will have a new son to take care of, and my job ain't getting any easier. But I need to do this, and I think people might even enjoy listening to it. I don't record songs that I don't want to enjoy listening to. I've got all the gear and software I nead, and recording will allow me to learn Sonar (my exceedingly, indimidatingly complex recording/mastering software) the way I've been telling myself I will for the past two years, since I've had my computer.

I'm not doing this for money. I don't care about being famous anymore. That stuff is all a racket, anyway. I'm doing this because... well, music is what I do! If that's tautological, so be it. Music is a passion in my life. I will never, ever give it up for any reason, as long as I draw breath (and as long as I have fingers to play).

And now, movies. Since we moved, we've been going to see a movie every other weekend or so, among them Sunshine (an intense science fiction thriller), The Simpsons Movie (very, very funny and just as bitingly satirical as the TV show, though I utterly tired of the marketing campaign behind it), and today we saw Sicko.

Uh oh.

I know what you might be thinking: "Here goes Matt again on one of his political tirades." No, no. I'll save that for later. Sicko is a documentary made by Michael Moore about the U.S. health care industry. Whether you love Michael Moore (he's one of my personal heroes) or hate him should not prevent you from seeing this movie, which I believe to be his best.

Michael Moore has an undeserved reptutation as an America-hating, left wing extremist. He's been painted that way for a long time by the right, and though I thought Farenheit 9/11 was rather shrill in a preaching-to-the-choir sort of way, I was happy that he had the guts to make that movie.

I don't think Michael Moore hates America at all. I think he wants to see it become a better place. What could be more patriotic? He's only anti-American if you consider dissenting from the Bush administration/neoconservative agenda to be equivalent, which I don't. Watch his conversations with average Americans in his movies and then tell me how much he hates America.

One quality that makes Sicko so powerful is that the stories it tells are mostly not of people without health insurance, but of people who had health insurance that failed them spectacularly. I think most Americans would agree that our current health care "system" is headed for a train wreck in the near future, or at least that the system as it exists now is grossly ineffecient, unfair and wasteful. For all the talk of a market-based system being the most inherently effficient one, we have tens of millions of people with no health care at all, and large corporations with a manifest interest in providing less health care to control costs.

These are fundamental flaws in the capitalistic, corporate model we currently use to provide healthcare to Americans, and other countries do it better and more cheaply. The current system cannot continue for much longer. America is losing its competitive edge to the rest of the world. No amount of flag waving and singing of anthems will change that. You want America to be the best country in the world? Listen to people like Moore. And me, of course.

But don't take my word for it. See Sicko for yourself. It is Moore's most compassionate and least shrill movie -- though there is plenty of sarcasm and more than a few of his trademark absurd moments -- and at the very least it will make you think, even if you disagree with some or all of it. Check out his website here.

See? He's not some raving monster after all! He's a very funny and compassionate guy. There should be more patriotic Americans like him :-p

That's all for now. Look for baby pictures soon :-)

Flashback: 1980s, Part III

2007-08-04T23:39:00.000-06:00

OK. This is it. I promise that this will be the last time I write about 1980s bands for the foreseeable future. I know it’s rough knowing a longwinded music nerd who thinks anybody cares about this stuff, but hey, in the end I think that I wrote these posts mostly for myself anyway, just because I enjoy listening to, and thinking and writing about music.

So, now for Part III… lets start with a couple of legendary bands I didn’t mention in the last two posts…

The Pixies

After my last post, Wendi and I were discussing this list. We realized with a shock that, once again, I had left out yet another fantastic 1980s band, The Pixies… which is even more unforgivable considering that Pixies are one of my favorite bands of all time – not just the 1980s – as well as one of the most influential of the past 20 years.

This band predated the 1990s so-called “alternative rock” (I have always loathed that term!) movement by a few years, but Pixies’ deep influence upon thousands of bands in the years since then belies their short lifespan – really only four years (1987 – 1991), four albums (Surfer Rosa, Doolittle, Bossanova, and Trompe Le Monde), plus a debut EP that was really their demo tape remastered for commercial release.

Singer Black Francis (who now goes by the handle Frank Black – get it?) was the major creative brain behind Pixies, though bassist Kim Deal also contributed, particularly to their first bona fide album, 1988’s Surfer Rosa, which was produced by über-indie producer Steve Albini and sports his immediate and unpolished studio sound – the band in a room, playing their songs… loudly.

That album sounds fresh to this day -- Pixies took the standard pop/rock band lineup of guitars/bass/drums and turned it upside down; their model for writing songs became known as “loud quiet loud” to reflect their unique fusion of pop with punk rock dynamics, which has been borrowed by countless bands since then. The formula: build the tension in melodic, subdued verses only to explode with unleashed energy during the choruses. Pixies songs have no flashy guitar leads, can go from melodic crooning to crazed screaming in a manner of seconds, and usually employ remarkably unusual, taut song structures that still manage to sound like pop songs… most of the time.

The first thing you notice is Frank Black’s voice -- it’s a crazed, unhinged yet surprisingly melodic thing that grabs your attention if it doesn’t make you recoil in fright. Frank sounds wild and dangerous, which compliments his screwy lyrics, most of which have an internal “logic” of their own – sometimes he even sings in Spanish for no particular reason (he holds a college minor degree in Spanish).

The lyrics deal with things like old art movies (the immortal “Debaser”), sea monkeys (“Shrine Of The Sea Monkeys”), the planet Mars (“Bird Dream Of The Olympus Mons”), traveling through time and space with one’s sweetheart (“Velouria”, a song with extremely bizarre chord changes), sarcastic mockery of higher education (“U Mass”, with a sneering refrain of “it’s educational!!” after describing various college debaucheries), and the pleasures of driving one’s car into the ocean (“Wave Of Mutilation”). They also covered a Jesus And Mary Chain Song, “Head On.”

Sounds weird, I know… and Pixies were definitely weird – heck, they even had a song called “Is She Weird?” I don’t really know what most of their songs were about, to tell you the truth, but I can tell you that all of them will smack you sweetly upside the head the way that great rock music is supposed to. They were yet another band with no bad albums. Their musical arrangements were as tight as the songs, never overplayed but musically compelling.

The tension between Black (who has since released a slew of excellent solo albums) and Deal (whose band the Breeders found quite a bit of commercial success in the 1990s) proved too much for the band, which split up in 1992. The irony is that, since they broke up, the Pixies have become more popular, more influential, and sold many more albums than when they were together.

This led to a reunion tour in 2004/2005, which Wendi and I were privileged to see down at Richie Center on the DU campus. It was a packed house, and I was amused to notice that Wendi and I were of approximately the same age group as the rest of the crowd. We are used to being older than most people at rock shows these days. I guess Pixies must be a Generation X thing.

Are you listening, you little whippersnappers?!??! We’re cooler than you!

The Police

Everybody knows the Police, so I won’t spend too much time on them. But it should be noted that, in addition to being one of the biggest pop bands of the 1980s, they were also one of the most interesting. The Police’s unique blend of reggae, rock, jazz and pop influences set the template for the New Wave sound, still sounds original today, and has inspired countless, mostly inferior imitators.

Singer/bassist Sting, guitarist Andy Summers and drummer Stewart Copeland were all excellent musicians, and though their chops are apparent on all five proper Police albums, they went out of their way to keep things simple. There’s hardly a guitar solo to be found in any of their songs.

From their first album, Outlandos d’Amour, the band clearly had reggae on the brain – they mixed reggae beats with punk attitude, plus fantastic songwriting courtesy of Sting. Much more than a cheesy pop songster, Sting’s songs brimmed with clever wordplay, compelling storytelling, social consciousness and sarcastic attitude.

Copeland also happens to have one of the more recognizable drum sounds in rock music. The guy’s beats and fills were both minimalist and unique, always throwing in a fill here a snare crack there, or a backbeat where you least expected it, never flashy, but jaw-droppingly proficient. Plus, he just smacks the skins so hard and precisely…. few rock drummers have ever equaled his creativity and talent.

The Police’s biggest hit was the deceptively tender ballad “Every Breath You Take,” from their best selling album , 1983’s Synchronicity, which if you listen closely to the lyrics not only never utilizes the word “love”, but is in fact a dark tale of obsession and jealousy, set to a nearly perfect pop accompaniment.

Personally though, my favorite record is 1981’s Ghost In The Machine. It has a dark and spacious sound throughout that compliments the introspective but energetic songs such as “Spirits In The Material World”, “Invisible Sun” and the upbeat “Rehumanize Yourself”. It also contains the ferocious masterpiece “Demolition Man” which manages to sound totally punk rock without actually being punk rock at all… this song in particular will prove to you that Copeland is one of the greatest rock drummers ever, and it even has cyberpunk horn chart stylings to give it lift.

You really can’t go wrong with any of the Police’s albums, or their songs for that matter – even though they are vastly overplayed on the radio to this day. Amazingly, for a band that broke up acrimoniously in 1984, they even reunited for a tour this year. Too rich for my blood – the cheapest tickets to the Denver show were over $100.00. It’s hard to have much respect for gouging people like that. But that’s OK I guess… I can still listen to Ghost In The Machine for free.

Squeeze

Yet another British band.... I’m starting to think that the early 1980s could almost be considered the 2nd British Invasion. Another preeminent band of so-called the New Wave, Squeeze’s three massive hits, “Tempted,” “Pulling Mussels From A Shell” and “Coffee In Bed”, were soulful exhibitions of superb songwriting, with a focus on the complexities of relationships. “Coffee In Bed,” in particular, is one of the bitterest breakup songs I know of, inspired by a coffee mug stain on an old notebook. And all three of these songs enjoy heavy rotation on classic rock radio to this day.

Indeed, Squeeze in the early 1980s was a worthy successor to the Beatles. Their soul-inflected melodies and clever, infectious songwriting gave Squeeze quite a bit of success backing the day. But they were much more than the sum of their hits – as far as I know, there’s not a bad song on any of their albums.

Talking Heads

Among the greatest – and most artistically complex – of the New Wave bands, Talking Heads enjoyed more success than almost any other band of the 1980s except for perhaps the Police. Talking Heads was essentially David Byrne’s vehicle. This band is too well known for me to comment extensively here… I imagine that every American has a favorite Talking Heads song at this point. But no mention of great 1980s rock music would be complete without Talking Heads.

Listen to the lyrics of now-overplayed rock classics like “Once In A Lifetime”, “Burning Down The House,” “And She Was,” “Life During Wartime,” “Nothing But Flowers” or their first hit, “Psycho Killer.” Byrne’s sardonic humor, absurdity and storytelling ability shine through every one. One of Wendi’s favorite TH songs, “Up All Night”, was written by Byrne about babysitting his infant nephew. “Once In A Lifetime” is about a midlife crisis/breakdown. And of course, the music was a groovy mix of rock, pop and world rhythms that the band exploited to great effect on albums such as Fear Of Music and Remain In Light.

Paradoxically elliptical and immediate, Talking Heads songs always made you think. And I can’t think of one that I don’t mind hearing to this day, even though the radio plays them to death. Talking Heads is another band that really doesn’t have any weak songs or filler material, except for maybe their last album Naked… which still contains several bright moments.

This band will probably never play together again, because their breakup was particularly bitter. Byrne later disavowed all the other members’ contributions, even though keyboardist Jerry Harrison had made his own mark with Johnathan Richman the proto-punk/indie band Modern Lovers in the 1970s, and bassist Tina Weymouth with drummer Chris Frantz had several hits as Tom Tom Club, including the quirky hit “Genius Of Love “

Lest you think that Byrne was an egomaniac, Harrison, Weymouth and Frantz released a terrible album in 1996, called No Talking, Just Head, that proved the band was nothing without Byrne’s talents. Oh well… as John Lennon once said of his own band, which likewise disbanded in acrimony and infighting, “you can always go back and listen to the records, even if the band isn’t around anymore.” Amen to that.

That’s a paraphrase… you get the point.

Tears For Fears

Another band that probably doesn’t need much explanation, but they need a mention too. The hits from their 1985 album Songs From The Big Chair are almost synonymous with the decade. Anybody reading this who hasn’t heard “Shout”, “Everybody Wants To Rule The World,” “Head Over Heels,” or their later hit “Seeds Of Love” from the album of the same name, either wasn’t born at the time, or needs to go back and determine why exactly they apparently were hiding in a deep, dark cave in the deserts of Mongolia.

But this band was pretty deep – I believe their name comes from an interest in “primal scream” therapy. Their songs are personal, well-written and cathartic, and hold up surprisingly well after twenty years.

The The

The The was the brainchild of British songwriter Matt Johnson, and his dark, introspective songs were melodic, disarmingly catchy, and, as in the case with so many great British bands of the era much more popular overseas than in the U.S. I’m not sure why this band isn’t better remembered today, as The The’s brooding songs have an intensity and staying power moreso than most bands of the era.

Nevertheless, The The made a lasting mark on the American and British “alternative” scenes. Johnson fused electronic drums and synths with guitars and acoustic instruments in a manner that sounded natural and effortless, which is probably a big reason The The’s music doesn’t sound dated now, even though the records definitely have an 80’s sound. They recorded about 7 or 8 albums over 12 years or so, of which the best are 1983’s Soul Mining, 1989’s Mind Bomb, and 1993’s Dusk, the last of which mostly abandoned the synths in favor of a more organic, bluesy sound.

As far as I know, there’s not a bad song on any of them. “This Is The Day” (from Soul Mining had the good fortune to be featured in a car commercial some years back… which was an odd choice because the song is actually more about despair. The lyrics, if taken at face value, might seem optimistic – if Johnson didn’t sing them so desparately…

“Well you didn’t wake up this morning / ‘cause you didn’t go to bed / you were watching the whites of your eyes turn red / the calendar on your wall / is ticking the days off / you’ve been reading some old letters / you smile and think / how much you’ve changed / all the money in the world / couldn’t buy back those days / you paw back your hands / and the sun burns into your eyes / you watch a plane flying / across a clear blue sky / this is the day your life will surely change / this is the day when things fall into place”

Catch the darkness in there? It sounds like a man who’s watching his hopes slowly crushed in an orgy of self-loathing, sung desperately… but set to a very nice melody, of course. I guess that’s why somebody thought it could sell cars. Matt Johnson’s lyrics are personal but they don’t hit you over the head – they are open to interpretation, as the best lyrics usually are.

Another melancholy, but paradoxically hopeful song is “Uncertain Smile”, from the same album, which is to me sounds like a love letter from one separated, scarred lover to another… it’s a song that just, well, sounds like new love and radiates a kind of heartbreaking, guarded optimism despite the vague lyrics… in this song the mood of the song and the vague lyrics compliment each other. Does that make sense? I would quote the lyrics here, but I like this song so much that I plan to record my own version of it. So there.

U2

What can one say about U2 that hasn’t been said before?

They were the superstars of the 1980s, and one of the few bands whose popularity has barely diminished since. In my opinion their best era was their first five albums, of which the first, Boy, and the fifth, The Joshua Tree are the best – nice bookends to their most creative and passionate work.

1980’s Boy is an often-overlooked masterpiece of early, punky New-Wave stylings, every song bursting with energy and passion. The highlights are the heart-on-sleeve, soaring “I Will Follow,” the driving “Into The Heart”, and my personal favorite, the full-on guitar rave-up “Electric Co.” – though my favorite version of that song can be found on the 1983 live album Under A Blood Red Sky, which incidentally was recorded here in Colorado, at Red Rocks Amphitheater, just outside Denver, in Morrison.

However, my favorite U2 album (and I think there is a consensus that it is their best), is 1987’s The Joshua Tree. In addition to spawning several massive radio hits like “With Or Without You,” “Where The Streets Have No Name,” and “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For,” there are also great songs like “Red Hill Mining Town” (about the economic/social death of a small Welsh mining town), “Bullet The Blue Sky” (about the Vietnam War… I think), “Mothers Of The Disappeared” (about the thousands of “disappeared” victims of the Pinochet dictatorship in 1970s Chile), “Running To Stand Still” (about a heroin addict), and the weirdest U2 song of all time, “Exit”… ok, I have no idea what that tune is about, but it’s full of tension and darker than almost anything they’ve ever done, before or since.

U2’s previous album rivals The Joshua Tree in excellence – The Unforgettable Fire is Wendi’s favorite U2 album, and includes their tribute to Martin Luther King “Pride (In The Name Of Love)” (which was a massively popular single), and expansive and heartfelt classics like the twisted “Wire” and desperate love song “Bad”. The album was titled after a book of the same name, The Unforgettable Fire referring to the sight of the first atomic bomb detonating over Hiroshima in 1945.

Let’s just say U2 never knew of A Weighty Topic Of Great Social And Political Importance that they didn’t attempt to tackle in some way. Eventually, U2’s weightiness began to sag. On the successor to The Joshua Tree, Rattle And Hum, their pretentious righteousness began to bore a lot of people.

Seeking higher ground, they reinvented themselves in 1991 with Achtung, Baby an album of songs that dripped with sarcasm and winked at their reputation as earnest prophets of righteous passion. On songs like “The Real Thing” (a sarcastic ode to slick advertising campaigns), they managed an ironic grin while staying musically potent (or trying to, anyway). But this new, self conscious U2 always seemed a bit too calculated to me… though they cranked out records throughout the 1990s, they steadily strayed from what once made them great. Irony and sarcasm can be powerful, but when combined with a rampaging, narcissistic personality like Bono it can get old – really fast.

By the 21st century they apparently realized that their era of jeering at commercialism – while reaping its benefits at the same time – had become transparent and ugly. Once again they attempted to change their attitude on the albums All That You Can’t Leave Behind and How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb, returning to the earnestness that had once been their trademark on songs like ATYCLB’s “It’s A Beautiful Day”.

I’m glad that they’ve matured, and given up the sneering commercialism… their release party for the album Pop from 1997 was held in K-Mart! That’s a bit too ironic, even for my taste… heck, it borders on hypocritical. But its hard to take seriously anymore a rich rock star like Bono, who these days campaigns for impoverished countries while setting up shelters to avoid taxes in his native Ireland. Plus, he apparently thinks he’s Jesus. U2’s glory days have long passed, but their best era – the 1980s – will always be near my heart.

“Weird Al” Yankovic

Rather than spend a thousand or more keystrokes explaining to you the genius of Weird Al, I ask you to see for yourself, if you don’t know already. He is known for his hilarious parodies of pop songs, of which there were many. But he could also be very funny with his own tunes. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you “Dare To Be Stupid” It’s a loose parody of Devo, but stands proudly on its own. Wallow in its greatness.

XTC

Where does one begin with XTC? They were one of those bands that never really went away… their music is that timeless. They are remembered as purveyors of intelligent, masterfully written pop songs, yet they never achieved massive success in the USA – though they have always had a devoted cult following.

There are a few reasons for this lack of mainstream success, none of them convincing. In a perfect world XTC would’ve been showered with as much or more praise as the Beatles for their mastery of songcraft. Every single one of XTC albums is worth hearing, and most of them are classics from beginning to end – the best are 1979’s Drums And Wires, 1986’s Skylarking, and 1992’s Nonsuch -- but interspersed with these there are a half-dozen others that are all excellent listens..

Their first two albums harped on a sort-of proto-New Wave, herky-jerkyness (their first record is great, but Partridge’s yelping can get a little tiring, lost amongst the manic music. Their 2nd album Go 2 has one of the best and most bitingly sarcastic album covers ever, composed entirely of text, as well as containing the immortal song “I Am The Audience”), and though they are both quite good, the band really hit it s stride with Drums And Wires. Not really a pop album in the usual sense of XTC, Drums And Wires is nonetheless a great example of how pop music mutations can achieve new heights of inventiveness. XTC hit it big with the song “Making Plans For Nigel” from that album – a thudding, sarcastic song about an upper-class boy whose life is planned to the second by his overbearing parents.

That they never achived superstardom can be chalked up to several factors. The band never played live after 1982, due to panic attacks suffered by singer Andy Partridge onstage because of a murderous touring schedule, into which they were forced for several years by their record label. Though Partridge and bassist Colin Moulding were always the heart of the band, in the 1990s, the band was forced into semi-retirement by departures of other members and a dispute with their record label (a different one) which prevented them from releasing any music at all for more than seven years. And really in the end, the rather dumpy Partridge and bandmates didn’t really look like rock stars anyway, which is a mortal blow to any hopes of stratospheric sales in the MTV age.

Despite all this, their records are gems, and there are many of them. Skylarking alone rivals the Beatles’ best work, and even trumps it a bit, being more topical and jaded. For instance, the working-class anthem “Earn Enough For Us” tells the story of a poor young couple on the edge: “I can take humiliation / and hurtful comments from the boss / I’m just praying by the weekend / I can earn enough for us”. It’s not a whiny song, but its definitely cathartic to hear for anybody whose ever lived from paycheck to paycheck with little idea of how to plan beyond the next one. “That’s Really Super, Supergirl” is a bitter relationship song, “Ballet For A Rainy Day” is a gorgeous exercise of melody and impressionistic poetry, and “Dear God” became a surprise hit in America – in fact their only real hit here, I think.

Clever lyrics and topics abound in XTC’s music. Drums And Wires is an earlier album with an almost punk-rock edge to it that helped set the template for the New Wave sound – but holds up after 27 years on its own. Other 1980s albums like Black Sea tackle topics like militarism (“Generals And Majors”), thuggery (“No Thugs In Our House”), and English Settlement’s rollicking, sarcastic “Respectable Street” gives a thorough whipping to classism by describing a suburban couple who can’t believe what’s going on their street.

XTC’s instrumental prowess should not be taken lightly – they were among the most inventive of pop groups, using unusual chord changes, melodies and instrumentation on songs like Skylarking’s “Another Satellite”, at other times going for utter simplicity as on the later song “Stupidly Happy” (from 2000’s Wasp Star) which consists almost entirely of a single chord. Partridge is an excellent guitar player – listen to the finger-picked chord changes to “Knights In Shining Karma”, from 1999’s Apple Venus to see what I mean.

These days, XTC is pretty much done for… Partridge and Moulding are nearing retirement and are pretty sick of each other. Who wouldn’t be, after 25 or 30 years of making music together? But what a legacy!

Ok, I proclaim this list to be at an end. But there are literally dozens of other bands & artists from the 1980s that deserve to be mentioned, like The Smiths, Jane’s Addiction, Prince, Lords Of The New Church, 45 Grave, The Clash, Simple Minds, Cocteau Twins, The Knack, Dead Can Dance, They Might Be Giants, The Alarm, Missing Persons, Nina Hagen, Kate Bush, The Cramps, The Cult, Men Without Hats, The Teardrop Explodes, Bauhaus, The Fixx, Dire Straits, Peter Gabriel, Peter Murphy’s solo work, Genesis, Yaz, Pigface, Blondie, Cabaret Voltaire, Throbbing Gristle, Beastie Boys, Red Hot Chili Peppers…. but I have to stop somewhere unless I’m going to write an encyclopedia.

Sheesh, maybe I already have!

If y'all are really, really nice to me, and if you ask in advance, I may have a compilation CD of some of these bands to give out next time I see you. This stuff is just too good to ignore or forget.

Flashback: 1980s!!! Part II

2007-07-20T18:42:00.000-06:00

Wow... I had originally planned this thread to only include 8 or 10 great bands of the 1980s, but it quickly spiraled out of control. Not because I am particularly opinionated or loquacious (who, moi?), but because the more I thought about the subject, the more great bands came to mind.

So, here is part II... please don't take my word for any of this. Check these bands out and see if you agree in the end... the 1980s were not at all a fallow period for rock music. First, a mea culpa & update to my last post, a band I should not have neglected in the way I did...

Devo

I am embarrassed and ashamed that in Part I, I did not include Devo, one of the greatest bands of the late 70s/ early 80s. My only excuse is that the hot weather of late made my brain short-circuit – and that’s not a very good excuse, because Devo was one of the defining bands of the era, as well as one of my favorites.

Devo’s best, and first, album Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo was actually released in 1978, so maybe technically they aren’t a 1980s band. But their big hits “Whip It” and “Freedom Of Choice” came with the release of the album Freedom Of Choice in 1980. It’s hard to think of another band that so perfectly captured the 1980s synthesizer sound, so I feel duty-bound to include them on this list.

Though Devo scored quite a few pop hits in their time, they were so far ahead of the era that you get the feeling that most people who bought their records didn’t understand what their songs were really saying. The band’s name came from leader Mark Mothersbaugh’s pet theory that the human race is not evolving, but “de-evolving” backwards as a result of the pressures of technology, consumerism and apathy. It’s hard to think of a more cynical and sarcastic band of the time than Devo. They used synthesizers and electronics to express a robotic, mechanical and frankly depressing vision of society as a homogenous mass of consumers with few individual thoughts among them.

Their videos reflected this too; my favorite video (as well as one of their best songs) is “It’s A Beautiful World”. In case you didn’t guess, Mark Mothersbaugh really thinks the world is anything but beautiful. The video makes this quite clear – and it’s a great example of early music video editing using stock images for ironic effect.

Devo had a unique image too: contrary to the usual image of rock bands as long-haired freaks, the guys of Devo looked like fascists out of a George Orwell novel. This was of course meant to be ironic, as Devo was an intellectual, subversive band whose true beliefs couldn’t be further from fascist ones. But the image stuck.

Depressing? Sure. But their music was groovy, if somewhat mechanical by design… particularly as the years wore on. The title track to Devo's third album, Freedom Of Choice, is a groovy denunciation of mindless consumerism and insulting marketing techniques: “In ancient Rome/There was a poem/About a dog/Who found two bones/He licked the one/And picked the other/He went in circles until he dropped dead/Freedom of choice/Is what you got/ Freedom from choice/ Is what you want” Devo’s synth-pop surface belied its subversive undercurrent.

Devo later went downhill, focusing more and more on synthesizers until they eventually sounded like every other generic synth-pop group of the time. But even pure synth albums like Oh No, It’s Devo! had great songs ridiculing mindless consumer behavior, like “That’s Good” and the sinister “Peek-A-Boo” (chorus: I can see you / I know what you do / Cuz’ I do it too / HA HA HA HA!!!).

But Devo’s debut album is their most guitar-oriented and still my favorite. “Jocko Homo” could serve as Devo’s manifesto, and a spazzed, polyrhythmic and thoroughly reworked version of the Rolling Stones’ “Satisfaction” still gets the most play of any Devo song on rock radio to this day. It’s still worth a listen to me, because I have never been able to figure out where the 1-count of the beat on “Satisfaction” comes in. Try it sometime – you’ll see what I mean.

Freedom Of Choice is only slightly less good, meaning… it’s pretty dang fantastic by any standard, herky-jerky electro pop music with a bite. Tight!

The Minutemen

No relation to the modern-day anti-illegal-immigrant militia! Another prime example of a first-wave punk rock band that could really play their instruments, the Minutemen lived up to their name – they specialized in short songs, most of which hovered somewhere between a minute or two in length But their music was anything but slight. They were probably the most startlingly original and diverse of any punk band before or since. And as their name also might imply, they were among the most political of American punk bands – just behind the Dead Kennedys though not nearly as sarcastic.

Their early albums hewed close to the traditional punk rock template of bar chords, shouted lyrics and speed, but by the time the double album Double Nickels On The Dime came out in 1984, their sound had expanded to include tangents of jazz, funk and neck-snapping instrumental prowess. On that masterpiece, D. Boon’s Telecaster guitar throws out minimalist but unbelievably complex funk chops, stabs and rhythms, bassist Mike Watt beats and snaps his bass into submission with some of the most complex lines ever laid on tape, and drummer George Hurley keeps it all down with great funkitude when he’s not propelling everybody to greater heights of creative frenzy.

In spite of their virtuosic sound, they never sounded long-winded or tired – true to form, Double Nickels On The Dime contains a whopping 44 songs, all of them clocking in at under 3 minutes each – and most are significantly shorter than that.

The Minutemenwere overtly leftist politically, but their often strident lyrics denouncing big business, the Reagan era (“Jesus & Tequila), war and imperialism (“Vietnam”), and working dead-end jobs (“This Ain’t No Picnic”) were tempered with a sense of humor and a sort of punk sentimentalism on songs like “History Lesson Parts 1 & 2”, in which singer/guitarist D. Boon explains the story of how “Punk rock changed our lives.” It’s all set to music of great diversity, creativity, virtuosity and tightly controlled experimentation. The Minutemen, particularly on Double Nickels On The Dime sounded like a band that could play anything, and often did.

This band ended tragically in 1986 when Boon was killed in a car accident. Watt and Hurley considered quitting music altogether for a while (I have heard Watt describe Boon as his best friend), but ended up soldiering on as fIREHOSE with superfan Ed Crawford (who reportedly showed up on Watt’s doorstep unannounced, guitar in hand) and recorded a number of awesome albums under that name for the next 7 or 8 years.

Watt, in particular, has become somewhat of a grandpa/father figure to the whole underground scene in the past 20 years. Though he’s never been showered with filthy lucre, he’s released a number of solo albums in addition to his work with fIREHOSE, and played/recorded/toured with plenty of indie music luminaries such as avant/jazz guitarist Nels Cline, the reformed mega-band Jane’s Addiction, and in J Mascis’s (of Dinosaur Jr.) band The Fog a couple years back.

I’ve had the pleasure of seeing Watt live twice some years back – never have I seen anybody play bass like that. He smacks the snot out of his “thunderstick” (his term for it) seemingly randomly, fingers flailing, arms pumping – but then you listen to what he’s actually playing. He’s astoundingly precise and musical. He’s melodic and complex, but never overplays.

Picture a graying, average-looking guy with facial hair (he sported a long, bushy beard both times I saw him), wearing a flannel and jeans, playing bass like nobody else can. If you were to meet him on the street you might think he wanted some spare change. That’s Mike Watt, but don’t worry, he won’t ask for change -- and doesn’t need your money anyway. Long may he live!

Oingo Boingo

The began their career as The Mystic Knights Of Oingo Boingo, in the 1970s, and as the 80s went on they became one of the premier, so-called New Wave bands along with Devo and Talking Heads.

They gained the reputation of a party band, mainly because of their biggest hit, the title track to their 1985 album Dead Man’s Party. But their eclectic style had a darker side as evidenced by the early MTV hit “Nothing Bad Ever Happens”, as well as their swan song, 1993’s album Boingo.

That final album is a writhing mass of tension that includes denunciations of the first Gulf War, an energetic cover of “I Am The Walrus”, and the epic 16-minute closer “Changes”, a reflection on the ups and downs of life that is a fitting end to an under-appreciated band of the 1980s.

Oingo Boingo’s leader, Danny Elfman, has since the mid-1980s become an accomplished composer of film and television scores, to this day. He has contributed to a number of Tim Burton movies, and composed the theme song to The Simpsons. Didn’t you know that?

The Pogues

Shane MacGowan, lead singer of the Pogues, has about three teeth in his head, all of them crooked. It’s the logical end-result of decades of alcohol abuse and bar brawls. Which is fitting, because that’s what the Pogues music sounds like. This “Irish” band (MacGowan was Irish but the band was based in London) became known for its perfect melding of traditional Irish bar music and punk rock, all vomited forth with plenty of working-class attitude. Their 1985 album Rum, Sodomy And The Lash drips with attitude, beer and knuckles. The song “Dirty Old Town” pretty much encapsulates their appeal: “I kissed my love / by the factory wall / dirty old town /dirty old town”. Music to kiss your girl or start a fight to, take your pick.

The Replacements

This band was a preeminent American underground rock band of the 1980s. Singer/guitarist/songwriter Paul Westerberg wrote some of the most memorable and unapologetic rock songs of the era. They never became more than a mid-level band but are remembered to this day for their spirited songs and notoriously drunken performances – their unprofessionalism was probably a big reason they never broke really big.

But then, they never took themselves too seriously anyway, near as I can tell. They changed their name to Replacements from the Impediments after being banned from a club for disorderly behavior in their hometown of Mineapolis. The band’s early sound was brash punk rock, but later on they became just a damn good rock n’ roll band without apologies. Their defining work is their third album Let It Be, a record whose sound is nothing like the Beatles album of the same name. It’s a howling blast of pure rock n’ roll adrenaline with enough diversity to keep it from being monotonous.

They really didn’t care – I remember that one of their videos consisted entirely of a single shot: a guy putting a record on the turntable, then kicking back and smoking a cigarette as the camera focused on the twitching speaker. Such attitude admirably forced the viewer to focus on the music rather than the visuals. But their reputation as drunken curmudgeons doomed them – they were never able to shake their image as unreliable hooligans. Bythe time they cleaned up their act in the late 1980s it was too late – their chance had passed and the band broke up. Westerberg has put out sporadic solo albums every few years since.

REM

Oh yeah, and speaking of preeminent American underground rock bands – except REM went from the underground to being superstars in a few short years at the end of the 1980s. Their last six or seven albums haven’t been very good; the album Monster from 1994 was their last decent record I think. However their 1980s work (basically, their first five or six albums) still sounds as good today as it did then, and they deserve a mention on my list.

REM is too well known now for me to spend much time remarking on them here, but I will mention a few things. Michael Stipe’s obtuse and poetic lyrics always appealed to me, and Peter Buck’s guitar sound launched a thousand jangle-pop ships. I think their best album is their fifth, Document, even if “The One I Love” and “The End Of The World As We Know It” are way, way, way overplayed on classic rock radio these days. But Life’s Rich Pageant is a melodic, fuzzed out masterpiece too, and their least popular album, Fables Of The Reconstruction, contains some of the band’s most creative work.

I’m sorry to report that this band became too big for its britches in the 1990s. I saw them live in 1995 and was disappointed – they were lifeless on stage, played the songs at flaccid tempos, and bassist Mike Mills wore a ridiculous suit of mirrored sequins. The no-frills passion of their early days was long gone by then. None of this prevented Stipe from preening and constantly mumbling witless banter into the microphone, that day at Fiddler’s Green amphitheater in Denver. A travesty!

I pretty much wrote them off as a disappointment after that, but in their 1980s heyday, REM was a fantastic band with an arty mystique. What a shame.

The Specials

Another British ska band of the early 1980s, their eponymous first album actually came out in 1979, but hey… close enough. With a slightly more traditional ska sound and more biting lyrics than fellow scenesters, Madness, the Specials’ first album is a classic from beginning to end. Their most famous song is a cover, the ska standard “A Message To You Rudy”, which takes the form of a sobering lecture to Rudy (this the short form of the slang term “rude boy” – which in Jamaican street terms means gangster): “Stop ya messin’ around / better think of your future / time you straighten right out / or you’ll wind up in jail”.

Their originals were just as good, and it’s hard to pick a favorite, though “Stupid Marriage” (with the immortal line “naked woman / naked man / where did you get that nice suntan?”) and “Nite Klub” (a disdainful view of night club life) both rank highly.

I admit: The Specials/ is the only album that I’m really familiar with, but it’s so good! The Specials are also notable for being one of the few racially integrated second-wave ska bands, with both black and white members. Though ska was originally a Jamaican style, most second-wave ska bands were white as a generation of working-class British youths adopted the sound as their own. The Specials appropriated the Two-Tone graphic pattern of a black and white checkerboard on their albums to reflect their belief in racial integration.

Once again, I must stop for now... if anybody else is a fan of any of these bands, or even if you absolutely can't stand them, I would love to hear about your opinion. I live for this stuff. So many bands, so little time and space...

Flashback: 1980s!!!!

2007-07-04T22:31:00.000-06:00

Music of my flaming youth -- in the 1980s, I was force-fed a steady diet of early MTV and hair-metal bands infused with a terrible mix of pop artists that exemplify all that went wrong with popular music in the 1980s. Examples, of which there are unfortunately many: Belinda Carlisle, Lionel Richie, Motley Crue, Chicago, Billy Ocean, Debbie Gibson, Deff Leppard, Hall & Oates, Whitesnake, the Footloose and Flashdance soundtracks, as well as any number of formerly vital artists who lost their way in that time -- such as David Bowie, Rod Stewart, Eric Clapton... you get the idea. C.R.A.P!! The sort of stuff you can hear in any supermarket these days, modern-day Muzak, only more annoying.

Wendi and I grew up in the 1970s and 1980s. We were talking one day and realized that, though most music fans consider the 1980s to be a lost decade in terms of musical quality, there were actually quite a few artists/bands that we still love, whose music has withstood the test of time. Which, when you get to be our ages, is really the only test that matters.

So, for the music geek in you, I submit the following for your consideration: a few bands/artists, from the 1980s that not only didn’t suck, but made a lasting impression on your humble author. My list is not exhaustive and consists of artists commonly considered to be in the category of rock music; for instance, I excluded heavy metal and rap music (which I happen to love, but space and time precludes their inclusion -- they're subjects in and of themselves). The list is in alphabetical order, as I really don’t care for “best-of” or “top pick-a-number” lists.

Unfortunately, as often happens when I get to writing, this list rapidly spiraled out of control; not only is it not exhaustive or complete, but I have to go to bed and only got to the letter M. Oh well, here we go!!

Camper Van Beethoven

Good ol’ Camper Van, the band that virtually defined the term “college rock” in the 1980s. They had a melodic, rather folksy sound augmented by a fiddle player, which was a great contrast to their sarcastic, goofy and often surreal lyrics on songs like “Take The Skinheads Bowling” from their first album, Telephone Free Landslide Victory, and the spoken narrative “Peace & Love” from their eponymous third album. They scored a minor MTV hit in 1988 with “Eye Of Fatima”, a song about a burned-out hippie drug dealer, but they are probably best remembered for a violin-flecked cover of Status Quo’s psychedelic 1960s anthem “Pictures Of Matchstick Men.”

The band disintegrated acrimoniously in 1989, and singer David Lowry went on to form Cracker, which became one of the biggest (and most overrated) bands of the early 1990s that never approached the wry Camper Van Beethoven in wry creativity and cleverness. I mean, this is a band that recorded a version of the ENTIRETY of Fleetwood Mac’s album Tusk on a whim!

A lot of longtime fans were surprised and pleased when they reunited in 2004 for a tour and new album, New Roman Times.

The Cure

I’ve never been a huge fan of the Cure, but their contribution to the 1980’s canon of good music cannot be overlooked. Wendi is a massive Cure fan and no doubt could write a lot more than I can about their merits. Gloomy, yet surprisingly pretty songs on albums like Pornography and Disintegration cemented their reputation as torch carriers for the goth and alternative scenes.

Personally, my favorite song of theirs is the fever dream nightmare of “Lullaby”, in which Robert Smith whisper-sings over a minor key, yet surprisingly gentle accompaniment, about being eaten alive in bed by a giant spider. The video is a little lost gem from that long-ago time when MTV didn’t completely suck.

Echo And The Bunnymen

Often overlooked, EATB were always much more popular overseas, especially in their native Britain. In the USA, they are mostly known for their dreamy, yet propulsively danceable single “Lips Like Sugar” which is from their self-titled 5th album from 1987. It’s a great song, with an immortal, simple and perfect guitar riff, but this band was much deeper than their rather silly name and single-hit status in the States might imply.

For me, their song “Rescue” from EATB's first album, Crocodiles epitomizes what made them great – the lyrics “things are going wrong / won’t you come on down to my rescue?” are belted out in a strangled moan by Ian McCulloch – it’s so arresting because it’s so simple and universal… anybody who has ever felt trapped and helpless can immediately relate.

Another melodic gem, and probably their second most famous song, is “Killing Moon” which was later covered by Pavement, among others.

Gang Of Four

Progenitors of what later would become known as the genre of post-punk, Gang Of Four meshed angular, throbbing, often atonal guitar riffs with scathing, anti-capitalist lyrics. Their minimalist approach and pervasive influence can be heard in countless later bands such as Fugazi & Shellac. Unlike the bands I’ve described so far, there was very little pop music in Gang Of Four, except for the occasional disco-esque beat such as in an otherwise virulently anti-military song “I Love A Man In A Uniform”.

The band was named after the four Chinese politicos who were blamed by the Communists for the worst excesses of China’s Cultural Revolution of the late 1960s, tried and convicted in a face-saving attempt by the state. The band was not Communist, but lyrics like “the problem of leisure / what to do for pleasure / ideal of a new purchase / a market of the senses … this heaven gives me migraine” from the song “Natural’s Not In It” leave little doubt that they didn’t care to conceal their contempt for capitalism, materialism, consumerist society and the corrupt structures of contemporary power.

Their overt politics would seem didactic and pretentious if it weren’t for their inventive instrumental prowess – spiky guitars and beats propelled by a relentless, almost danceable groove that perfectly complemented their biting lyrics on songs like “A Hole In The Wallet.” Heady stuff.

Hüsker Dü

Ok let’s get this out of the way first -- Hüsker Dü was named after a Danish board game (don’t ask me why) and means “do you remember”. They were one of the most beloved American punk bands of the 1980s, and in my opinion one of the best. Their early albums are a bit unfocused, but the in-your-face angst and breakneck speed of albums like Zen Arcade (a double album recorded in just three days) are among the purest examples of indie gold.

And, unlike many punk bands, Hüsker Dü were excellent musicians – singer/shouter Bob Mould has a ringing, slashing guitar attack that is instantly recognizable, drummer/singer Grant Hart was one of the best underground drummers of his time – have one listen to Zen Arcade's epic, 14-minute closing instrumental “Reoccurring Dreams” to see what I mean.

Their final album, Warehouse: Songs & Stories, suffers from overproduction (a victim, like so many bands, of that reverbed-out 80s production) and a thin drum sound, but is their most melodic and heart-wrenchingly personal.

Sadly, this band also suffered a bitter breakup – to this day, Bob Mould and Grant Hart have barely spoken, and then mostly by slamming each other in the press. Mould found quite a bit of commercial success both with his subsequent solo albums and with Sugar, a band that recorded a few albums in the early 1990s and sounded much like the direction Hüsker Dü was going when they broke up.

Madness

A band at the forefront of the so-called 2nd wave of ska that took Britain by storm in the late 70s and early 80s, their biggest hit, “Our House” was ironically nearly free of ska influence except for the horn charts – but nevertheless a great song. These guys had a sense of humor with musical chops and respect for ska music to match.

Ministry

A lot of bands begin with a high degree of musical inventiveness. As commercial success beckons, they just can’t sustain the juice as they try to appeal to broader audiences with watered-down music that doesn’t have the same edge that made them worth listening to in the first place. Not so with Ministry – with Ministry, the conventional narrative is almost completely inverted.

Their first album, 1983’s With Sympathy, was a danceable, electro-poppy, if slightly dark affair that gave no hint that by the 21st century they would be known as the elder statesman of industrial-strength heavy metal. Quite a journey – but mid-period Ministry set the standard not for heavy metal as it is known today, but for industrial music of a particularly influential kind.

Ministry's 1988 album, The Land Of Rape & Honey, , is widely considered their best and is an ingenious fusion of the sequenced, pounding rhythms of industrial music with squalling guitars. It’s also infectious as hell – the grating but precisely processed guitar riffs and sequenced drums of “Stigmata” and “The Diety” will burn into your brain and scar you for twenty years (they did for me, anyway!). There are also all-electronic, heavy but danceable electro-industrial workouts like “Golden Dawn” and “The Abortive”.

In later years, Ministry had a long creative dry spell, particularly in the late 1990s when I pretty much wrote them off as washed up, later to recover (in fine form, although with much greater focus on heavy metal) with blistering speed metal albums like last year’s Rio Grande Blood. But they never topped The Land Of Rape & Honey, one of the definitive recordings in industrial music – a musical genre that can be surprisingly conservative and boring. Not in this case.

Whew!! And you thought the 1980s consisted entirely of disposable pop and cheesy synthesizers. I love this was just the 1st half of the alphabet! Check back again for Part II… this was 1st just the 1st half (?) of my personal, beloved alphabet of great music from the 80s. If anyone has anything to add, I would love to hear it… no matter how cheesy it is. Just don’t get mad when I roll my eyes ;-)

Stay tuned. If you dare ;-P

Everywhere, anywhere... nowhere, USA

2007-05-28T15:21:00.000-06:00

I have a few thoughts (well, an essay, really) regarding some of the comments people made regarding my last post, which I was originally going to post as a comment on my blog. But posting on one’s own blog comments is kind of tacky, don’t you think? And anyway, a few themes that were touched on deserve a little more space… ok, make that a lot more.

First of all, regarding living downtown being a “choice”: yes, I chose to live here nearly ten years ago (if you count Wheat Ridge as downtown – which it is, as far as you guys might be concerned). Then I moved to Jefferson Park (in Denver) for about 4 years, a neighborhood overlooking downtown, and finally Capitol Hill, 3 years ago.

But it’s not as much of a choice as you might think. In Wheat Ridge, the area in which I lived bordered Denver and Edgewater, another, itty bitty ‘burb of Denver only about 8 blocks wide. While not a ghetto, the area is definitely of lower middle-class character with tiny, aging houses. Jefferson Park is now a mostly Hispanic area where you will hear more Spanish than English spoken at the local Safeway. The houses have more character but most are older and crumbling. What do these areas have in common? Cheap rent.

My “choice” was whether I wanted to live in older, poorer but lively neighborhoods with some character versus living in newer, poorer neighborhoods thrown up by some big corporation without regard to the future. I would’ve had to commute twice as far to my job, and probably lived in run-down 1970s era apartment complexes nestled amongst sun-blasted asphalt parking lots and dying retail businesses. So yes, it was a choice. A real no-brainer for me.

Then Wendi and I moved to Capitol Hill. We’ve always loved this area of town. The housing is more expensive, yes. That was also a choice, but there was also added value. You can walk anywhere you need to go in Capitol Hill, and there are bus lines that run every few blocks. You guys may remember that I was without a car for more than two years, starting when Wendi and I separated in 2005. I couldn't have made it in the suburbs that way. I work downtown and commuting by bus would’ve been prohibitive – but that’s would’ve been the least of my problems. Just getting groceries would’ve consumed entire evenings, to say nothing of doing the laundry.

Plus, Wendi and I separated but we stayed in the same neighborhood – her apartment was a 10 minute walk away, so we never really lost touch. This was a major factor in saving our marriage, I think. Had she moved to Westminster or out to Lakewood or Littleton, I think we would’ve seldom seen each other, and there would be no Simon in her belly today :-)

In Capitol Hill, everything is within walking distance – heck, I can even walk to work. This factor is important in understanding why housing is so much cheaper in the 'burbs... these days – fewer people want to commute two hours a day just so they can have another flimsy, poorly built box with a patch of chemically treated, water sucking grass.

Ask anybody who works in housing construction – anymore, big development companies come in and throw as many houses up as they can – shoddy, cheap, chipboard boxes that will fall apart within 30 years. Most housing today is not built to stand the test of time. To house people is not even its primary purpose. It is built to extract maximum profit in the shortest possible amount of time, often for a large corporation based out of state that does not concern itself with trivialities like building sustainable, affordable communities for the future.

This trend has particularly accelerated in the last 15 years or so, with few people seeming to notice, but it’s becoming harder and harder to ignore. Don’t get me wrong – construction of the past was also built for profit, but they also built stuff to last, as a lasting legacy to posterity. Do you think Wal-Mart cares what the areas around their giant, thrown-up, warehouse-style boxes surrounded by acres and acres of parking lots will look like in 30 years, or even 5 years? Of course not.

This philosophy can be seen in old neighborhoods in Denver, most of which have nice parks, great architecture and thoughtful urban design. Civic Center Park downtown, or Cheeseman Park near our apartment are great examples of this, and are big reasons why so many people want to live here. These are public works of lasting value that are cared for down through the generations.

Everyone who lives in this area is reaping the benefits of decisions made more than 100 years ago, just like people who live in the decaying “inner suburbs” of Denver are now suffering the consequences of bad decisions in decades past. Even the bad parts of Denver often have character, they are victims of forces beyond their control. I'm thinking of Globeville, a North Denver neighborhood that has managed to retain some character despite being surrounded by heavy industry, bisected by railroad tracks and I-70, and chronic poverty.

You guys all make the 'burbs sound like such a paradise. Sure, the wealthier ones where you can just wall off yourself from the poor people (except when they come to clean) are great! But things are not so rosy all over -- many older suburbs of Denver are borderline ghettos today.

I'm thinking specifically of parts of Aurora, Northglenn and Westminster. When was the last time one of you guys drove up Federal Boulevard north of I-70? There you can see the results of bad planning from 40 years ago. And the lovely stretch of sprawling asphalt parking lots lined with big box stores just down the road from your neighborhood, surrounded by “luxury” apartment complexes? It’s next in line. Just give it time.

I am hoping that our new apartment works out, but you should know that the area is far from being some suburban paradise. There are parks, just not very nice ones. We will live right next to several major thoroughfares, and crime is by no means unknown there. I'm just hoping for the best. It's not a nicer area than Capitol Hill, it's just farther from downtown and cheaper.

I suppose some people will say that most of these problems are simply examples of free markets at work; that if people didn’t want to live in these places, they wouldn’t. My response is this: while there are markets involved, they are certainly not free!

Retailers such as Wal-Mart are notorious for extracting fat tax incentives from municipalities by threatening to simply build their store the next suburb over. Consolidation in the housing industry means that public works such as parks, roads and infrastructure are now designed and built by private corporations, while being effectively financed by public dollars. When one of these big housing developments gets thrown up, often at a net tax loss to the municipality, the municipality has to provide things like traffic signals, schools, police and fire protection, water and sewer, and so on. Guess who foots the bill?

It’s more than a local issue too. Not to slag on AZ, Jeff, but you guys in Phoenix are basically living off Colorado water. All that sprawl in Phoenix is possible because of an archaic legal framework between CO, AZ, UT, NV and CA called the Colorado River Compact. This was drawn up in the early 20th century as a way for the states to share water, but the hydrological science was poorly understood at the time. It effectively says that Colorado must deliver a certain amount of water to the states downstream no matter what. All is fine and dandy as long as water consumption stays the same and there is plenty of water.

So what happened? Water consumption has spiked due to sprawling development in all the states affected by the Compact, and there is a severe drought in CO, where all that water comes from. Colorado has to tighten its water consumption to water the golf courses and the swimming pools in seemingly every back yard in Phoenix. Colorado water is fueling the development that big corporations use to make a profit. That is not free enterprise. That is exploitation of a public, limited resource for private gain. And his doesn't even consider the vast environmental impacts.

There are other examples, not just retail and water. Returning to housing for a moment: for the past 15 years, the housing bubble (oh man… haven’t even gotten started on the bubble… some other time) has been fueled by cheap money provided by the policies of the Federal Bank, and quasi-government, corruption plagued entities such as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (two years ago an audit discovered that Freddie Mac improperly booked billions in revenue over the past 5 or so years). Real estate has always been a shady industry, but never more so in the past ten to 15 years. Effectively, big companies have been skimming the cream off the top of a deep well of public resources. Your tax dollars at work… for big business!

Tyler said something with which I agree (wow!): this is not sustainable. The peace, quiet and serenity that are so prized in the suburbs is similar to the peace, quiet and serenity of an ostrich with its head in the sand. Our kids will be paying the price for the sprawling suburbs of today, which will eventually be where all the poor people, crime and drugs are. Why do we as a society allow ourselves to pass all our problems on to our children because of short-term "wants"?

I suppose it would be best if everyone could move to a small town, “Anurbia” like Worland, WY with no crime, drugs, traffic, etc… except that by doing so, Worland wouldn’t be small anymore and all those problems would suddenly pop up. Not every place can be a rural paradise like Worland apparently is. In fact, many older neighborhoods in big cities have characters much like that of a small town like Worland. Would Worland be so nice with miles of strip malls and cheap, mass produced housing? Probably not.

And it’s not simply a matter of “choice” either. Americans’ delusions and ignorance about the true costs of their “choices” are what got us into this mess in the first place.

It’s a big picture and a long story. To understand it requires a lot of explanation, so I'm sorry if I’ve been a little long winded about this. But this is why I simply can’t get with the idea that suburbs are the fulfillment of the “American Dream”.

Of Capitol Hill, moving.... and guitars

2007-05-26T22:49:00.000-06:00

Life rolls on. Wendi and I are moving in two weeks to a larger apartment in Englewood. We are crossing our fingers and hoping that it works out; neither of us wants to move again for a considerable amount of time. In the past 4 years for one reason or another, we have moved 5 or 6 times, depending on how you calculate it… needless to say, we are sick of it.

So we are making the long anticipated move to respectability and middle class (ha!) suburban boringness, to a slightly larger apartment in beautiful Englewood, CO. The time has come for this era to end.

Don’t get me wrong – Capitol Hill is still the best, funkiest and prettiest neighborhood in Denver, in my opinion. The problem is that it’s a neighborhood that is friendly mostly to the very rich or very young – a diverse mix of big apartment buildings and VERY expensive houses.

We will miss the trees, the people, the parks, the nightlife, the bands and the friends we have here – we won’t miss some of the shady characters, the petty crimes such theft and random vandalism, and most of all the rich people who have pumped up the price of real estate to the point where it’s all but impossible to own a house here without making more than $200,000 a year.

We simply can’t afford the space we will need when Simon (that’s our unborn boy’s name, in case you didn’t know already) comes along in a few months. My only consolation is that all of the people in this area who tried to get rich from flipping one-bedroom condos for $250,000 are now losing their shirts. Ahhh… schadenfreude can be very soothing!

Capitol Hill is generally a safe neighborhood, although being an urban, inner city area it is home to some amount of crime. It is thick with bars and nightclubs – though these are part of the neighborhood’s character, you can meet messed-up people at anytime of day, and especially when the bars close at 2:00 a.m.

There are also a fair number of weirdos and people wigging out on any number of substances. These people are mostly harmless, though it’s advisable not to talk to them, or shake their hands, which they will sometimes offer to you in hopes of gaining an opening to hit you up for a cigarette or for money. Just say no and ignore them or you'll have a new, needy and unpleasant friend.

The down-n-outers are a species of human life common to the inner city, to even a gentrified, upscale neighborhood such as this. I learned long ago to be very cool towards anybody who approaches me out of the blue trying to be friendly – it doesn’t mean they like you for your charming personality, it means they WANT something. I’m not mean – I just won’t give anybody any money, no matter how heart-wrenching their sob story is. And people do tell some whoppers.

I remember one freakazoid who approached me in front of a rather notorious 7 Eleven on Colfax and York a couple of years ago. He galloped up to me, bobbing, weaving and gasping in what I suppose was intended as a desperate genuflection. “Oh please sir,” he sobbed, “I just need a dollar so I can get across town to see my baby daughter who’s in the hospital. Can’t you help me out?” I was amused by his bizarre behavior, but not impressed. “No, man,” I said flatly as I got into the car and drove off.

Later that week, in front of another store on Colfax, the same guy came up to me with the same weird attempt at eliciting sympathy. This time I was less than amused but I laughed in his face as I was taking my keys from my pocket. A quarter fell out and clinked on the ground. The guy didn’t remember me, misread my actions and thought I was being friendly because I’d laughed. “Oh, thank you sir!” he gasped at me as he watched the quarter roll away. I said, “Dude, I just saw you two days ago up the street. Still haven’t made it across town, huh? Well there’s your quarter!” This guy had absolutely no pride -- he dropped down on all fours groping for the quarter on the asphalt.

I wasn’t trying to be mean, but I do not appreciate it when wastoids like that try to hustle me. Trust me, the guy had no sick daughter. This happened in front of a liquor store. Coincidence?

Some of you may remember that Wendi was mugged about a year and a half ago, while she and I were living apart. Her apartment building itself was very nice, but it happened to be just around the block from a rather notorious, four-block stretch of Colfax between Logan and Washington, which for a while was an open-air drug market. A lot of shady characters aimlessly circling the block and saying “Yo. Yo. Yo. Yo!” when you walk by.

The police have thankfully cracked down on that area in the past year or so – I personally can’t figure out why any street dealer would frequent the area, because you can’t go five minutes without a cop cruising by, but nobody ever said that street criminals are gifted with high intelligence. Anyway, that was a very traumatic experience for her (and me!), but thankfully they didn’t hurt her – just knocked her down and took her wallet.

Since living in Capitol Hill, we have been subject to more petty crimes than I can remember – a car window busted for no apparent reason, our locked bicycles stripped, Wendi’s scooter tipped over, etc. But our last straw with petty crime happened a few weeks ago, when Wendi’s scooter was clean stolen from behind our building.

Our downstairs neighbor saw it happen. Three guys and a truck came and just picked it up and took it away. He doesn’t know us (and even if he had, I certainly wouldn’t have expected him to intervene), but did his utmost by contacting the building manager Steve, who knew whose scooter it was and tried to call us – we weren’t at home.

The scooter theft was a big blow to us, because we were planning to sell it and hoped to get around $750 for it. Wendi filed a police report but because it had no registration (under 50ccs and you don’t have to register a scooter in Colorado), we of course know that we’ll never get it back.

It was terribly ironic. We’ve lived in Capitol Hill for a long time and both of us have parked that scooter all over the place for days at a time without incident, and just as we were about to sell it… gah!!!! C’est la vie, I guess.

I am really hoping that our shiny new Elantra won’t be subject to such indignities when we move to our new apartment in a couple weeks, but I can’t be too optimistic. Englewood is a suburb of Denver, but that doesn’t mean it’s free of crime. We are moving to a fairly nice apartment complex. But it’s large, which means that there’s an uncomfortable degree of anonymity, and in fact the nice lady who leased it to us said there has been some “recent activity.” We’re crossing our fingers.

Having said all of this, I will reiterate that Wendi and I both adore Capitol Hill. It is a truly beautiful urban neighborhood, warts and all. We simply can’t afford to live here and get the space we want and need for our screaming bundle of joy – who will be arriving in probably less than 3 months.

Housing prices in Capitol Hill ridiculous. Our two-bedroom apartment, with its tiny bathroom and lack of air conditioning, is priced as it is because of its location, not because it is so luxurious. A family of three simply cannot live in this neighborhood on $40,000 a year.

This is a symptom of the currently imploding housing bubble… which is a subject I have been following with great interest for a long time. But I’ll save my strong opinions on that phenomenon of mass psychology for another blog post in the future ;-)

And now for something COMPLETELY different!!!

My last post was about Led Zeppelin’s glorious “Rain Song”. Yeah I know it’s been a long time since I posted – sue me! Anyway, I thought I would make a few comments about alternate tunings, for those guitar players out there who are bored enough to actually spare a couple seconds to read this.

As mentioned previously, this song is played using a quite different tuning (DGCGCD) from the standard tuning (EADGBE) that we guitar playas know and love and on which we probably learned how to play. While it is possible to play this song in the standard tuning, it doesn’t sound nearly as good and is much more difficult to play that way.

Since my last post (was it really 5 months ago? Wow!), I have had one of our guitars tuned his way, to what I call “D Modal” tuning, and it has been a wonderful, refreshing experience for me. I’ve written a couple of new songs in the “Rain Song” tuning that sound nothing like “Rain Song,” and plan to record them as soon as I can, after we get settled in our new apartment. This tuning has a lovely, melancholy ambiguity, due to its being so friendly to suspended 2nd and 4th intervals. And it's great for getting a nice drone going.

I recommend alternative tunings to any guitar player who happens to find themselves stuck in a rut. All those classic chord shapes you learned by rote get thrown out the window, and you are forced to relearn your instrument. New chord voicings, progressions and harmonic possibilities will open up like a secret garden before your ears. You’ll be exploring the musical wilderness like a newborn wolf cub. It’s just plain fun! Plus, there are literally hundreds of other tunings of one variety or another that you can use to spice things up.

Try one or more of them. I guarantee you won’t be disappointed.

Song du jour: "Rain Song" by Led Zeppelin

2007-01-09T20:49:00.000-07:00

I have been playing a bit o’ guitar lately. A couple different finger-pickings, a few more progressions the could be songs, and “Rain Song.”

This has been my favorite Led Zeppelin song since I first heard it. I was sixteen. Time has never diminished my admiration of it. It is a sublimely-written, extended (exhausted?) metaphor of love and the four seasons. The hammer of the gods bombast is there too. Jimmy Page used an unusual modal tuning, DGCGCD, to great droning and dynamic effect – this is an electric guitar showcase for the ages. There is Tabulature notation for it here.

The sparkling riffs unfold like a psychedelic thundercloud, a storm on a languid, late-summer afternoon. When John Paul Jones’ misty Mellotron comes in at the second verse, a fever dream of drowsiness will rush over you. You will cease to know the flow of time and shape of space. As the titanic climax erupts you will know that you have scaled the Mount Olympus of rock music. The gods gather here in Corinthian-columned pavilions to play favorites to certain mortals like the lads in Zep, tossing down the occasional lightning bolt or guitar lick to keep the game interesting. Or is it just me? It doesn’t get much more R.O.C.K. than “Rain Song”.

Or pompous, either. Yes, the Zep could be, um, pretentious. Their biggest weak spot was always Robert Plant’s lyrics. The pantheon of rock n’ roll has already a great, bejeweled and expensive temple to Jimmy, Robert, John and John, far be it from me to befoul it -- I myself have worshiped there for years.

But let me say it plainly – the lyrics to most Led Zeppelin songs suck. Far too many songs about swords, magic, loose women, deserts, oceans, and awkward references to The Lord Of The Rings. The lyrics to “Rain Song” could’ve been written by a 10th grader for an English poetry class project to post in the hall for the school creative writing contest, in which it might have had a chance of an honorable mention:

It is the springtime of my loving
The second season I am to know
Your are the sunlight in my growing
So little warmth I felt before
It isn’t hard to feel me glowing
I watched the fire that grew so low

It is the summer of my smiles
Flee from me, keepers of the gloom
Speak to me only with your eyes
It is to you I give this tune
It isn’t hard to recognize
These things are clear to all from time to time
I felt the coldness of my winter
I never thought it would ever go
I cursed the gloom that set upon us
But I know that I love you so

These are the seasons of emotion
And like the winds they rise and fall
This is the wonder of devotion
I see the torch we all must hold
This is the mystery of the quotient
Upon us all a little rain must fall
Just a little rain

C’mon – I mean, seriously, people.... “Flee from me, keepers of the gloom”???? Whew. OK. Percy, read something besides Tolkien for a change.

But you know what? I’m ok with that. Plant's talent was always in his voice, not verbalization, and in "Rain Song" the words perfectly compliment the instrumental wizardry of the band. For Zeppelin was a tight band above all else and sweeping dynamics their specialty. Some selections from their catalog approach “Rain Song” in epic, majestic grandeur, but none better it. The baroque, vague lyrics compliment the ambitious, dreamy mood of the chords perfectly… and you can chuckle at the subtle comedy of the lyrics, as well.

I used to believe this was a hard song to play on guitar– I still do – but when using the above tuning it falls on the neck quite naturally. It’s a great song to get lost in while playing – the chords and voiceings just seem so exotic, but right somehow. When I play it I see forested glens and maidens in white robes on unicorns. Is that weird?

A note on timeliness: a post that I put up on 11/14 vanished some time back when I got too enthusiastic tinkering with my template’s html. It was brilliant – I just wish I could remember what it was about.

Finally, if you have talked to me in the last two weeks, you know my lovely wife, Wendi, is preggers. We are very happy about this bean , and thank you all for your kindness. I’m still in awe of the idea of being a father, let alone the reality.

Five words... and quite a few more

2006-11-09T23:26:00.000-07:00

The crux of what I wish to say to all Republicans in this late, great nation of ours can be summed up in five words:

You. Lose. Told. You. So!

I know I shouldn’t be bitter, but forgive me. Being called an America-hating, cut-and-run, tax-and-spend, namby-pamby, troop-despising, terrorist-loving liberal for the past six years will do that to anybody. You have squandered what little sympathy or respect I may ever have had for you in a river of blood, shrapnel, dead bodies and budget deficits.

So please, I ask you to choke on the defeat you have suffered this week with all due humility, and think about how this man, this arrogant, corrupt, incompetent administration and your (YOUR!) Congress has brought your party and MY country to its present state.

It’s no good blaming the liberal media, the liberals’ political establishment, or liberal latte-sipping effeminate metrosexuals for our plight – you’ve controlled Congress for more than a decade and the presidency for more than half this one. The entire Federal government! I’m sure you’ll try to find somebody else to blame for your woes, but maybe you should think about the damage you’ve done for a change -- instead of you neo-cons' typical paranoid victimology.

Save that stuff for the presidential race and Rush Limbaugh – unless you’ve got Parkinson’s disease, in which case we will all know you are faking it.

I’ve never voted for a Republican, but even after the 2000 election, in my wildest nightmares I never suspected your party of being capable of what it has done to our country’s reputation in the world – and to the world, for that matter. To say nothing about the other issues facing us – which include health care costs, social security, the runaway budget deficit, governmental corruption, global warming, pollution, nuclear proliferation, terrorism and a growing worldwide backlash against the good ol’ US of A, etc, etc, etc.

I won’t repeat what I said three-and-a-half years ago, but will reiterate that I predicted what is happening now, in Iraq and elsewhere. Unfortunately, this fact brings me very little pleasure.

Yes. We are a country, one of many in the world. We don’t control it, though you may think it’s our divine right. And thanks to the man you have voted for twice, we have lost almost as much influence in the world in the past five years as we gained in the previous fifty. And all the while you derided any disagreement, any voice of dissent, any hint that you might be mistaken, as anti-American, freedom-hating and pro-terrorist. We hate freedom. And we want nothing more than to cut and run and leave Iraq in a much worse place than when we invaded.

I’m sorry, but you neo-conservatives have done so much better living up to these lofty goals than any liberal could ever conceive. I mean it takes not just casual incompetence or benign neglect but active arrogance and willful corruption to achieve these things. Ask Halliburton. Ask the guys who have to guard empty trucks against suicide bombers. Ask Iraqis. The only people blind to the situation are yourselves. Congratulations – you have exceeded my wildest imaginings of the depths to which an American government can sink.

You say you want victory. What is victory? Total cessation of insurgent activities? A mild reduction? Ten thousand more dead people? A hundred-thousand? You never defined victory in the first place except as a buzzword for political gain, and now that it’s unattainable you are scrambling to redefine it.

The fact is that, for “victory”, you will have to kill millions of people, level every Iraqi city and eradicate entire culture – but you will never admit it, because it would affect your re-election chances. It must be nice to know that 130,000 troops are over there defending your party while you fetishize, romanticize and exploit for political power the blood and lives they have sacrificed, in the name of an unwinnable war that your own party started. Give yourselves a big, fat American pat on the back.

It must make your lying and political pandering, piffle and puffery of “freedom”, “democracy”, and “liberty” that much easier. Perhaps you even believe these things are actually being brought about in Iraq, though your government’s actions have instead brought freedom, democracy, and liberty’s opposites: anarchy, mob rule, chaos, and indiscriminate violence. It must be nice to be so paranoid and divorced from reality.

Oh, I know what you will say – the liberal media isn’t reporting the good things happening in Iraq, it’s due to their lies and omnipresent manipulation that people voted this way. I only hope you continue to think this way, as it will ensure that your party remains out of power for the foreseeable future. Sensible people disagree. Repeat that to yourselves when you find yourselves falling into that little mental trap. It will save you some anguish.

I’ll also admit that I’m not confident about the Democrats making things right. I have plenty of bad things to say about them, believe it or not. But it’s inconceivable that a Democrat-controlled government could be worse than the den of thieves, liars, idiots and arrogant ignoramuses we have now. They make Nixon look like a saint. Your party has lost my vote for the rest of my life, unless they put a gun to my head – which I wouldn’t put past them. They are THAT bad. Witness the crowd of Republican party operatives that crashed the entirely legal vote recount in late 2000 in order to stop it. They succeeded. Hitler would smile in approval.

I hope you will think about the things I’ve said, but based upon the past 12 years, I’m not optimistic. Many of you, such as George Will (also an opponent of the Iraq war!) are already saying that your party lost this election because you weren’t conservative enough. I hope you continue to believe this for my own selfish reasons, because it will ensure that your party continues to lose more elections.

I happen to love America but am ashamed and frightened of what this government has done. If we didn’t get rid of W this year, at least we gave him a “thumpin’”. He can’t do much more damage than he’s already done. Unfortunately, that is a very cold comfort. I wish I could take more pleasure at the Republicans’ loss on Tuesday, but I will settle for a small measure of relief, as well as a bit of juvenile gloating...

NYAH NYAH NYAH!!!!!!

My nemeses!

2006-10-29T18:09:00.000-07:00

Wendi likes to tease me about people I look like. Hence, I cannot claim full responsibility for this particular post.

Everybody looks like somebody else, don't they? I have my own lookalikes. I'm kind of superstitious -- I have this paranoid feeling that, were one of them and I to meet, we would have to fight to the death.

Anyway... I'm like, so proud that I look like Shaun White. Once upon a time, I had hair as long as he. Of course, it didn't nearly as good as his....

"'ello Guvvna!!!!!"

Dick Van Dyke is warmly remembered by all for his chinmney sweep in Mary Poppins. At least I don't talk like that... most of the time. Handsome cuss he is. I'm not ashamed to look like Dick Van Dyke.

I'm also flattered to look like Dan Marino as a tough, young and handsome football player - though I can't claim to play football like him -- or at all. In fact, the guy would surely kill me in a fight.

I begin to be uncomfortable when Wendi tells me I look like John Heder -- Napoleon Dynamite, specifically. I don't know what to say... GOD!!!

What I really can't stand though is my final, and most hated nemesis. I will not speak his name -- please do not, in my presence. Should I ever meet this man in person, surely I should go into ninja mode, ready to defend myself from his deadly prop-comedy. No. There is no love lost between me and...

CARROTTOP

Enemy. Mine.

I shall eat his still-beating heart, and bathe in his blood.

The retarded language of love

2006-10-03T23:20:00.000-06:00

Most married couples can probably relate to this: sometime after we got married, my wife & I developed our own language -- and I don't mean an intelligent language full of flowery Shakespearean metaphors in iambic pentameter, full of wit and vigorous wordplay. No, I mean a language that may as well be spoken by two-year-olds, or perhaps some of the more developed species of Australopithecus.

I remember my own mom and dad talking this way occasionally when I was a kid. "Hi?" with a sharply rising inflection expressed a certain dismay. My dad used to call my mom a variety of weird names such as "littles." And everyone in my family can recall times when their mutual laughter veered disturbingly into a strange chain reaction of hysterical, uncontrollable and crazed laughter that ended with my mom weeping and my dad red as a beet.

I used to think this weirdness was just my mom and dad... oh no. I give you our marital dictionary, which is much larger, but even more incomprehensible...

M&W's Dorky Dictionary

Alright. - said with a downward and final-sounding inflection, this is a joking way we agree with each other while joking that we are arguing. If it sounds too complex, it's because it is.

Barg! - angry frustration

Bleh. - want to go back to bed

Blobbus, boo or beau - our cat Malmo

Doof - what she calls me when I do or say something dumb, which is unfair of her because I never have. Never!

Eeb - I'm hurting

Fine! - much like "alright." except that this means that we are joking that we are arguing while actually agreeing. Don't ask.

Fleeb (aka Fleebus - from Fleabag) - our fat cat Michelle

Gack! - disgust, physical or mental

Garg - why me?

Gooba gooba gooba - this must be sung to a silly faux-lounge scat melody that Wendi made up.

Gorb - tired

Gorbus - boredom

Gorg - exhaustion

Gubzub - i'm sleepy

Holla! - alright!

Honeyplop or sweetypoo or baybee - what I call Wendi

Hubba or gubbahubba or lovablebubble - what Wendi calls me

Mafoo - Wendi's affectionate name for me. Aw!

Oog - Wendi's term for "I want you to rub me.... NOW!

Pleeb? - please

Punk out - what she says I do when I get mad

uh-Vootoo - you suck

Woman! - what I say when she gets on my nerves

Yebbis - yes. This comes from Mushmouth on the 70s cartoon Cosby Kids. I think/

Yumb - very tasty! (we have taken to adding a 'b' to almost any word that ends in an 'm' or an 'n' (dumb, gum, home, exam, etc.). This comes from an painting we saw hanging in a restauraunt someime back. It has proved a virulent meme that is spreading to more words -- we have recently begun overemphasizising our trailing plosives, as in the words 'pop' or 'mop'... things are spiraling out of control!)

And of course there are uncountably many more little idiosyncratic expressions, gestures and silly in-jokes that make absolutely no sense to anyone else... or to us, for that matter. I guess it's a cute enough aspect of our marriage, but I don't like to think of where we'll be many years from now, gibbering buffoons with zero comprehensiblity or social graces... much like Dad ;-)

Oh well, as a married person once said when I received blank looks from some other, unmarried people after relating some dumb antidote like this.... it's a marriage thing, you wouldn't understand.

Who would? A retarded chimpanzee, that's who.

Bak 2 skool, yo...

2006-09-19T22:26:00.000-06:00

I know, I know -- 3 1/2 months? 3 1/2 months since my last post and I have the audacity to call this a blog?!?!?

I'm not making excuses, but there are reasons, not least of which being that I haven't really had much to say. I can hear my family guffawing in disbelief, but no, really it's the truth. When I have more time and energy you can be certain that I will intrigue you with my incisive analysis of current events and politics, inspire you with my philosophical musings, infuriate you with my angry leftist rants and raves, expand your musical knowledge with insightful commentary on whatever music happens to infatuate me on a given day, and bewilder you with non-sequiturs and strange tangents of thought. You'll just have to wait. For now, this post will be a relatively brief summation of my life right now.

Of course you know that Wendi and I have been living together again for about three months now, that we took a vacation last month to Valley View Hot Springs in Colorado's beautiful San Luis valley, and that school has started again, all of which can be gleaned from Wendi's much more timely blog. She's no slacker when it comes to blogging, my wife, which is more than I can say for many members of my family, myself included.

Anyway, school started a month ago. I'm trying something new this semester -- these newfangled online courses that are supposedly the wave of the future. For the past two semesters I've been in class four out of five weekdays, and though I prefer to have a real live teacher for the interaction and feedback, the schedule exhausted me. It's an understatement to say that working a full day and going to class for 2 to three hours can be draining... perhaps "life-sapping" is a better adjective.

I'm taking the usual nine credits (3 classes) this semester, but two of them are entirely online, except for the exams. While it's nice to not have to be on campus four days of the week, the amount of homework and studying that need to be done seems to have increased exponentially.

Last semester I could go to class, listen to the lecture and come away reasonably educated, which negated me having to do anything else after I got home, apart from the odd bit of writing or calculating. Weekends I would use to get the big stuff done, and I could usually do that in one of the two days.

Not so this semester! This semester, I don't get no stinkin' edu-ma-cational lectures. No, I get to figure it all out my own dang self, be it chi-square tests of independence or an accounting schedule of disposition of assets (bankruptcy). It's actually consuming more time than last semester. It doesn't help that the two online classes I'm taking are Advanced Business Statistics and Advanced Accounting, which are junior and senior level classes, respectively.

Heck, Biz Stats was hard enough the first time around, and I had a good teacher. I even knew what he looked like. And that's on top of my regular class, another junior-level, Accounting Information Systems. My nose is deep in a thick, arcane text 6 to 7 days of the week lately, just so I can stay on top of things -- to the chagrin of my wife who thinks I'm being kind of obsessive.

Not to complain too much. I'm learning a lot and that's what counts. I even enjoy it (sort of) -- but I'll be glad when it's over!

Last Saturday, my wife and I had a nice date. We went to PF Chang's for a yummy, spicy and rather expensive dinner of scallops and a couple of mojitos to wash them down, after which we planned to catch Andrew Bird -- who, coincidentally, was the subject of my last post -- at the Bluebird Theater. I had been looking forward to this show since I found out about it (courtesy of Wendi) last week. His album "The Mysterious Production Of Eggs" has been growing on me, even moreso since my last post. A one-of-a-kind, introspective and thoroughly original talent is A.B.

But it was not to be. There was no joy in Denver that night -- Andrew Bird was sold out! I was surprised -- I saw him in 2000 at the same venue. He barely filled half the joint! Oh well, I've got the records to listen to, as John Lennon might say...

Wendi and I have been bewitched by the monstrously, horrifyingly, agonizingly cute pictures of our newest nephews, Maxwell and Cal, that have been circulating. Please you guys, keep them coming! I have a picture of young Cal as wallpaper on my computer and my cellphone right now, and as many times as I see his face, the little rugrat never fails to make me all soppy stupid.

Finally, a word of advice to everyone who has bicycle -- if you live in an urban area, lock the wheels with a cable! Someone stole both wheels off my bike this week. I can't imagine why, but they did. Curse you, bicycle-wheel-thieves!!! May my wheels bring you no joy and somehow bring you grievous bodily harm!!!

Undiscovered gem song of the week: "Opposite Day"

2006-05-31T23:26:00.000-06:00

I got home this morning with the sun right in my eyes
There was no warning as it took me by surprise
Hit me like an act of god causing my alarm
That I’d not become a cephalopod
I still had legs and arms
Still had legs and arms

And today was supposed to be the day
Molecules decided to change their form
The laws of physics lose their sway
Youthful indiscretion is
Suddenly the norm with the good kids sprouting horns

And today was supposed to be
Not just another day
Today was supposed to be
Opposite day

And those who can’t quite function in society at large
Are gonna wake up on this morning
And find that they’re in charge
While those the world is set up for who are really doing quite well
Gonna wake up in institutions in prison or in hell
And today was supposed to be
Opposite day

But if you think there’s something else…
well you’re right there is something else
But if you think I’m gonna tell you
Think again, why should I think of telling you what there is?
Because silence is knowledge and knowledge is power
I’m under explicit orders to dare not speak its name

No I dare not speak its name
Listen!
I just work here
No I dare not speak its name

“Opposite Day”
by Andrew Bird 2005

This is a wry, sarcastic song about the absurdity of life, or something like that. Get the clever Kafka reference in the first verse? Andrew Bird has come a very long way from Squirrel Nut Zippers. This song is from his lovely latest record "The Mysterious Production of Eggs". The odd melody breaks into a uniquely Bird-ian chorus. His expressively virtuosic fiddle playing is in abundance. His melancholy, yet witty and comforting voice seems to ponder the words as he sings them. The album is his strongest and most unique yet -- I think he's found his voice.

It's real

2006-05-26T21:26:00.000-06:00

We move on. By now, if you've read Wendi's blog you know that we've decided to live together again. I think I can speak for us both when I say thank you all for the love all of yo have shown us for the past difficult year.

We are hoping to learn to live together again and be happy like we used to be. That we love each other has never really been in doubt over the past year. Right honey? ;-)

We've leased a two bedroom apartment, one whole block (9th and Corona) from my current place, from the same company that I rent from now. It was the only way that I could get out of my current lease with a minimum of pain, and it's not like I'm crazy about my current apartment.

The blinds are cheap and fall apart at the slightest touch. The kitchen is cheap and small. The management company is run by incompetent airheads and overbearing husky men. Neither of us are crazy about Cornerstoned Apartments. The new apartment does not have A/C. So, this move is not without its dark corners. But the upshot is that we signed the lease today and it is a done deal

We do like the new apartment. It has a large kitchen and dining area, hardwood floors and several closets. Closets are good. So is having a dishwasher for the first time in a year :-) And the blinds, while no less cheap, are somewhat sturdier.

I am typing this from Wendi's place. We have been spending almost every night together since skool ended two weeks ago. Our new apartment will be more convenient for both of us, but the move is coming suddenly. We have to move in two weeks (June 10th). Mark, who is facing a move of his own at the end of next month, has graciously agreed to help with ours. Can you guess why?

We have also enlisted a couple of friends with promises of pizza and beer afterwards. Really good pizza.

I'm listening to a 40 year old ska song right now called "It's Real" by the Silvertones. This is vintage, first-wave ska of the first order -- like most of the Jamaican ska "groups" of the early/mid 1960's it consists of an anonymous studio band and some soulful singers. It's got some of the most insanely infectious interplay between the lead and backing vocals I've ever head. It sounds joyous and makes me feel good.

I danced to "It's Real" a moment ago and made Wendi laugh. Hopefully not only at me. She has a nice laugh. Love you girl...

Maxwell's little family

2006-05-10T21:20:00.000-06:00

Salutations and congratulations to Tylee-Mike and Danalin on their new progeny, Maxwell! May all of you live long and Foster!

That was bad I know. Just being dumb and happy 'cuz I am overjoyed with the little bundle, and I haven't even met him yet.

And to claim my throne: I have been checking the fosterblogs for nearly 2 days and have not seen anyone else offer many happy returns... am I the first? So be it.

Of course, I know -- new parents. They've got enough to worry about up Seattle way -- without making a fuss in the electroether. Just wanted to offer my good vibes :-)

Kool song of the week: Einsturzende Neubauten

2006-05-09T18:32:00.000-06:00

You will find me if you want me
In the garden
Unless it's pouring down with rain...

You will find me waiting for the spring and summer
You will find me waiting for the fall
You will find me waiting for the apples to ripen
You will find me waiting for them to fall
You will find me waiting by the banks of all four rivers
You will find me by the spring of consciousness

You will find me if you want me
In the garden
Unless it's pouring down with rain...

"The Garden"
Einsturzende Neubauten - 1996

This eerie song is from their 1996 album Ende Neu. These are the lyrics in their entirety... excluding the many times he repeats the title phrase. Which Blixa supposedly wrote after over hearing a conversation between elderly women in a supermarket. An insistant glissando bass thumps in time with a single note on an electric piano flows into a cascade of descending strings like cobwebs in in the full moonlight. Einsturzende Neubauten is best when they go for atmosphere like this --some of their songs are full of bellowing Germans and crashing trashcan lids. Hey you know, if yer into that sorta thing.

Trouble, trouble, oil and trouble...

2006-05-09T09:56:00.000-06:00

Yes, the price of oil keeps going up, gas is at about $3 a gallon and the politicians are afraid. They're in a tizzy because they think they'll be next as the bloodthirsty cries of the unwashed masses echo to the sky ever louder in a rising chorus of outrage and despair: "Bring us the head of ExxonMobil!!!!!!!"

But it may surprise you that the big oil companies are not laughing all the way to the bank.... ok, well maybe they're chuckling a little, but there are dark clouds on the horizon for Big Oil. I came across this article on BusinessWeek's website which explains it pretty well.

These problems are well known in the industry, and those of us who work in it are bemused when politicians and refuseniks blame fuzzy concepts like "greed" and "price gouging" for the price of oil. Yes, both of these reprehensible things exist, but it all depends on the thresholds that we're willing as a society to tolerate. Nobody was calling for oil executives' heads when gas was $.89 a gallon in 1991, were they?

Trust me, as an unashamed enviromental conservationist liberal, I am no fan of Big Oil or our country's addiction to it (even though I work in the industry :-) How's that for 'perspective'). The BusinessWeek article's boo-hoo tone is fairly sympathetic to the industry -- no surprise there, though from my perspective they are crocodile tears. It's par for the course -- the article's in a business magazine after all. And as a business major I like to read about issues such as this one from a business perspective, expecially since the issue of oil dependence is so divisive right now. I just can't feel sorry for ExxonMobil, whatever troubles they may have in the future. Among oil companies they in particular have been instrumental in blocking progress re: CO2 emissions and regulations to protect the environment, as well as stumping hard for opening ANWR to exploitation. Cry us a river, ExxonMobil.

But people who blame the oil companies miss the point -- the problem is built-in, systemic greed in petroleum markets, the world's escalating demand, diminishing supplies, flat refining capacity, and certain cartels and unsavory countries which have found our Achilles heel and are using it to their advantage. I could go on to say that the root of the problem is a blind adherence to a free-market, capitalist ideology that is inappropriate and destructive for an irreplacable and finite resource such as petroleum/fossil fuels, but I think you get my point.

I admit I do take a certain bitter pleasure in watching the Republicans try to squirm out of this, because there is nothing they can do about it. NOTHING. And they're the ones who are supposed to understand the underlying principles of free markets so well. The "solutions" they've proposed would be ineffectual at best and more likely will only exacerbate the problem in one way or another.

$100 one-time tax rebates? *guffaw* That was pretty funny. Hooboy... who says Republicans don't have a sense of humor?

Suspend the national gas tax? Nice try. They (or the Democrats) may even try it for short-term political gain, but it doesn't matter -- any price reduction will be temporary if it happens at all. Suspending the gas tax would also cut off a vital source of funding that governments use to maintain their highways and infrastructure, and that would cause its own problems.

Drill in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge? That won't work either except to temporarily alleviate some of Big Oil's worries (elucidated in the article) about replenishing their proven reserves. Drilling in ANWR won't reduce the price of gas, no matter how much the Republicans talk of "secure oil supplies."

Even the Democrats' idea of a "windfall tax" on oil companies, while slightly more rational from a macroeconomic viewpoint, will indeed decrease investment in oil exploration and production (known as 'E&P' in the industry) -- just as the oil companies say. And E&P is about the only segment of the industry enjoying fat profit margins these days. As the petroleum supply moves "downstream" the margin gets as thin as a razor, especially at the wholesale level -- my company TransMontaigne's segment.

So go ahead Republicrats -- try all of the above! Knock us all out. Keep the half-baked schemes coming! None of them will work and some of these options will cause shortages in supply, which will make the pain even worse. Face it people, we are in for prolonged economic pain and it is directly due to the lack of attention that has been paid to reducing our oil dependence for the past 30 -40 years.

There is no easy solution to this one and the problem goes deep -- far beyond one focus-grouped, sound-bitten, negative-ad, god-fearing election cycle. Our elected leaders' inability to speak the truth about our country's long-term problems represents a profound failure in our democracy.

Anybody have an opinion on this that is not totally clouded by rigid free-market ideology? Let me know.

Suckcess can be yours :-)

2006-05-01T21:23:00.000-06:00

Finally, I have it!!!!!!!

The time is close to finals, attention to which consumes a lot of my time. Many of you have discovered this truth when I've buttonholed and bored you with arcane arcane accounting concepts. To avoid my responsibilities, I made a list while procrastinating my studies tonight.

Matt's 5-Step Formula to College Suckcess

1. Resign yourself to having no life for several months. Repeat next semester.

You don't need friends when you're trying to get a problem right involving the "Percentage-completion Revenue Recognition Method" and attempting to complete an income statement. You think those T-accounts will just analyze themselves?!? Make some time during the weekends to have fun. Don't blow that precious 15 minutes between getting off 8 hours' work and opening the squeaky classroom door. You might be able to... I dunno, sleep on the bus or something. Slacker!!!!!

2. Talk negatively about the teacher behind his/her back.

Admit it -- skool sucks, and the last thing you need is somebody imposing arbitrary rules on crap on which you spent your best effort. Students know a good teacher when they have one, and will go out of their way to kick ass. Students with a bad teacher will talk and gossip. If you are unfortunate enough to have a bad teacher, go out of your way to seek out other students of similar mind. I guarantee you that you are not alone. Gossip! Slander! Let the obscenities fly! It won't improve your grade, but it might give you some fleeting satisfaction. And fleeting satisfaction is all you will get by passing the class, anyway :-)

3. Shameless groveling is a virtue.

OK, you just put it off and didn't think about the assignment until it was far too late. You lost it and your dog ate it. These things happen, don't you understand? Your spleen had to be removed from your nose, or perhaps you secretly nurse a grudge against a teammate from that dumb group project. Get over it and eat crow like a... um, crow. Your goal is to maximize the extenuating circumstances that prevented you from using maximum effort while simultaneously minimizing the effort it was possible for you to give. This is circular logic, but we're all adults here, aren't we?

4. Classroom "participation"

The class is boring, the teacher obtuse and the material is impenetrable by both. Why not go with the flow? The teacher probably knows little more than yourself, so feel free to expound upon his/her thoughts while subtly undermining them, and even boldly point out some logical errors. At the very least the teacher will remember you as being absent far less than you actually were. If you're in a bad mood, don't be afraid to get mean. Take the teacher's side when delivering withering criticism against a fellow student. It never fails to satisfy, and might endear you to this "teacher" also. A possible bump to the next letter-grade?

5. Attitude, attitude, attitude

Don't think of a college degree as the key to success, or as an indicator of your intelligence. It are not. Only your own ruthless attention to your GPA and mastering the subject of the next test will make any difference in your grades. Even in the end, if you put them on your resume, potential employers won't check them for veracity. I'm sorry, but there are plenty of people out there who can calculate a statement of cash flows from an income statment and information changes in balance sheet accounts. You think you're so special.

Something good

2006-04-22T01:12:00.000-06:00

Yo peoples!

U wanna mess wit' me? Bring it on, muv!

More soon. Until then,

Peace,
M@TT