Cody Chestnutt has released a new song!
And it’s for Obama!
And it’s afro-beat(-ish)!
And it’s called “Afrobama”!
Seriously, it’s called “Afrobama”!
And you can download it here!
Hooray!
(I have other updates to come shortly and it feels like I’m ready to make a Headphone Masterpiece rant too. Stay tuned)
So last night we saw the first Jon Brion show at the Coronet Theater. Despite a few familiar flourishes, this venue is no Largo redux. I came craving honey chicken and ended up with some pre-show Vito’s (which I think will be a necessary pre-show ritual from now on).
I’ve seen Jon’s shows fairly regularly for the past six years; I can comfortably say I’ve probably sat through no less than 50 of his shows (a modest estimate, truthfully). I’ve seen him at his worst and I’ve seen him at his best (and, in the case of the Thursday after Elliott Smith’s death, both his best and worst simultaneously). Last night was an appropriate, middle of the road Jon show – his usual mind blowing bas of musical genius in full display.
I’m sure there will be numerous accounts of last night’s show, so just a few thoughts:
– I’ve made official Largo at the Coronet History: I had the first Jon Brion request at his new venue. Granted his version of Baba O’Riley started our as a silly ragtime medley before launching into piano-mad vivaciousness, but it’s always fun to see him try a new and unexpected approach to the song’s electronic arpeggios.
– I then made even more official history: I had the last request of Jon’s first set. Again, I wasn’t expecting him to turn “Don’t Think Twice” into his Les Paul ditty, but there’s never a bad way to hear Dylan at his best. (Similarly, two requests out of the four means I easily glided into the record books for most requests in his first show – I know these are ridiculous records, but they are my ridiculous records!)
– Speaking of requests, people need to know the protocol for them. It’s pretty simple, actually: when Jon says “Any requests” or “Let’s have a request” or something like that, you yell out your request. Conversely, when Jon doesn’t ask for requests, you don’t yell for them. You definitely don’t yell for them throughout the entire show.
– I had come to terms with a new venue and more people and a different atmosphere. However, as we were waiting for the curtains to part, I had a sinking terror about what the stage would look like. What if the piano wasn’t stage right? What if there was a ridiculous backdrop? Rest assured the stage was a familiar sight for Largo regulars (Viking helmet and all). Only a few (positive) tweaks: the drum area no longer looks like a death trap and is properly illuminated, and the stage is a bit larger which means Jon can jump around a bit more and also has to move a bit faster during his transition from drums to piano.
– Largo’s cell phone policy: exactly the same. God bless.
“Here’s the important thing to remember: people throw around the term pop music and it has various meanings now. I think it’s really a misnomer. It’s a critical trap. Pop music, is from the term popular music and the term came up in what was called the golden era of songwriting, which was Gershwin and Berlin and Porter and those people. And that was extraordinarily popular music – they were writing the hit songs of the day. It was also acknowledged that the best songwriters were writing the best songs of the day. Everyone knew this. George Gershwin was as gifted a musician as has ever walked the earth and as good a songwriter as has ever walked the earth. So that was popular music. It got shortened to pop in the ‘60s with the whole quote unquote pop art revolution and the Beatles being the ultimate expression of what was popular and also clearly considered one of the great artistic events of the last half of the twentieth century. So fine, you’ve got this melding of things and things like Motown – these guys were sitting around trying to write hits. The Beatles were trying to outdo each other to see who would have the single. There was infighting about this stuff. And the winner would get something like “ We Can Work It Out” in the process. It’s kind of amazing, and the song is unlike anything made before or since, in truth. Think about what an odd piece of unique business that is. And it was hugely successful. So that’s what it was and then it became pop music. But then ever since the punk movement, with power pop – those bands weren’t necessarily popular but they were all sort of blown out of the Beatles mode but some sort of modification of that – in that case it was amped up tempo-wise, people started, within the underground music community, referring to pop as anything that had the ‘60s brightness and attention to melody. And that’s now what it means when people say things like, “Oh, it’s sort of a pop band.” It means it’s melodic and upbeat. And that is not pop music currently. Pop music right now would be Britney Spears. That’s popular music. Now to what extent that music actually has great melodies… not too much. I think her records … the song “Toxic” has a very very clear melodic hook and to me that’s good pop music, it’s good ear candy – it super glossy but it’s glossy that pays off. They’re being creative in their glossiness. It’s like the top of the Chrysler building – very bright. It is a glittery object and it works. The other popular music I’m not hearing a lot. It’s great when I hear something like the White Stripes kicking through, I’m happy for the humanity it represents. There’s not a lot to admire on the charts currently. And I’m a total lover of popular music and popular culture and soak it all up and think there’s interesting stuff to be had in our time that wasn’t possible before. But I don’t think it’s a good time for melody or song craft. And also records increasingly became just about a drum loop and nothing else. And to me, if the drum loop is always two bars and is always just loosely to some extent based on the great discovery that James Brown made 40 years ago, I don’t know… I’d rather listen tot that moment of invention. And it’s still, generally at least, funk as the modern thing that’s doing that. If not more so. So I see this as a quagmire…we could go further and further. Is it a good moment for melody? No. Is it a good moment for song structure? No. Does that mean it’s dead? No. When you hear a record that’s really something different – a lot of those things that the Neptunes have done – there’s some real inventiveness there and they’re also popular. To me that’s like a good version of, ‘Hey, we’re trying to make a version of This Year’s Model. We’re trying to make something slick that pays off.’ Hip-hop’s been the most interesting thing to watch for 20 years. It’s not a new phenomenon. Since the ‘80s, overground popular music has been pretty shitty except for that moment in the early ’90s when the gatekeepers let a few people through. And hip-hop has at least had various eras of amazing invention. If you take all the great Run DMC records with all the great juxtapositions there. It’s hard and it was funny and it was pure hip-hop and also rock and it was underground and popular. There was so much duality running through that. Same with the moment that Public Enemy arrived and it was like, ‘This is the motherfucking future. Rock!’ Chuck D was so on his game so on point and so fucking smart. Hip-hop has offered the most invention although I actually feel in the past decade it was really lumbering in its own clichés to the extent that I was disappointed heartily and that’s part of the reason why I feel Outkast is such a blessing. To come out and go, ‘Guess what? Our attitude is so completely different and we don’t care if you agree with it.’ It’s all great, the whole history of that band is just great, and the fact that somebody like Andre is a hip-hop icon but, in truth, is just this crazed creative pop musician… Outkast represent very much what I love each guy has their own thing is both a totally beautiful respected cool individualist thing and it’s widely popular. To me that’s just the coolest that the song ‘Hey Ya’ is this weird creative burst of energy that it is and that it was the hugest song of the year… To me, I feel like when I hear that, I hear the great feeling of when you hear the early Beck stuff being successful and think that he can be on the radio or the great moment in the ‘80s when everything was sucking and suddenly Prince becomes massively successful and a song like ‘When the Doves Cry’ was the inescapable song of the year but you look at it and go, ‘Wait a minute, this song has no bass on it, he is singing like a complete madman, there’s these weird electronic noises…’ There was a period of four or five Prince records in a row that were the most artistic records being made at the moment and the most popular. The fact that that is a complete circuit is bewilderingly beautiful to me.”
-Jon Brion on the current use of the word “pop”
Note: the exact date I conducted this interview isn’t entirely clear. However, based on the recent references, I suspect this was from 4 or 5 years ago, pre-shaved head/nutso Britney.
I’ve been struggling for some time, trying to come up with a more elegant way of presenting this argument. I don’t think I’ll be finding one anytime soon. In any case the revelations here are neither of the shocking nor groundbreaking variety so I’ll be taking a steadfast out-out-damned-spot, full-steam-ahead, approach:
Since really focusing on my professional practice, I’ve spent a disproportionate amount of my time thinking about literacy (access to, and change in, etc, etc). This post serves as a critical inspection of some of the literacy skills I’ve cultivated of late.
Specifically, I wanted to talk about (flaunt?) the lowbrow literacy skills I’ve been mastering.
A Disclaimer
Before really launching into a real description of what I mean, I need to address the concerns with the naming problem here. I am again at a loss as to the original text I encountered that explained the history between “lowbrow” and “highbrow.” However, a quick google confirms my understanding of the terms coming out of phrenology. As such, the history of “lowbrow” and those individuals with said lower brows is one of racial undertones. As the word is part of our common vernacular today emphasizes the miscegenated journey of the lowbrow/highbrow binary.
What is Lowbrow Literacy?
As much as I enjoy pretentious literature, art gallery soirees, and excursions to the the-a-tre (to be spoken in a thick, British accent – three syllables oh-so-necessary), I pride myself on the breadth of bottom-of-the-barrel cultural knowledge. Forget The Simpsons and forget secretly smart commentary from the likes of the Daily Show – that stuff’s for the birds. I’m referring to My Super Sweet 16, Justin Timblake, and American Idol. You know, rubbish. As much as I enjoy top-tier art, I frequently revel in the kinds drivel that make grandparents call the TV the “idiot box.” Comic Books. Entertainment Weekly. The Soup. Bad ‘80s Sex Comedies. Florida. VH1’s Top 50 Insufferably Unnecessary Lists of All Time. Like I said, not only do I subject myself to this stuff, but I love it. I study it, I read about it online, I stay awake thinking about it.
There was a time when I was a qualified music snob: I could identify what borough of New York an indie band hailed from, even though I had yet to actually visit the city. Similarly, I would casually ask about someone’s musical taste at a college party. After hearing a few artists, I could/would immediately judge and (more importantly) hold disdain for this person based solely on their taste. I am not proud of this cheap parlor trick (I kind of think of it now like tarot reading – but that’s another story for another day) – but it shows the kind of interwoven connections I’m partially trying to illustrate. On the other hand it also shows a major shortcoming of mine: I wasn’t willing to embrace the lowbrow at the time – I was afraid to publicize my adoration for Prince, Michael Jackson, Whitney Houston, radio friendly pop-punk, and the commercially besmirched failures of Robin Williams’ ‘90s catalog (see Toys & Jack as prime examples). To the shock of many close friends, I’ve come to publicly embrace and celebrate the aforementioned artists.
As such, the same way I’m able to traverse a conversation about Frankfurt School philosophical implications in classroom pedagogy, I’m similarly able to question Chef Gordon Ramsey’s attitude and Paula Abdul’s commenting faux pas and the general ripples such behaviors will cast on the web of network television. This too is a literacy; it’s just not one that’s especially appreciated or valued by the people that bother to write about or place value on things like literacy (and yes, I’m fully aware that I’m included in the elitist population).
Reality Television: A Case Study in L.L.
Maybe it’s best to briefly look at one case study of lowbrow literacy in action, a personal favorite of mine: reality television. I’m a sucker for it. From the Bravo channel’s ([only] slightly) more sophisticated stew of the now to the pure crockery of current iterations of the Real World to the rather bizarre incarnations in the outer regions of cable television (really, did anyone else see the elimination show for motivational speakers??), I’ve waded through it all. Not only am I wading through it, but I am confident that other reality TV junkies like myself are able to enjoy these shows even more because we are more acclimated to the reality TV grammar that has been prescribed for these shows. It’s worth looking at the first season of the Real World (and yes, I was hooked from day one – confused that Beavis and Butthead had been ousted from its 4 p.m. time slot) – the show didn’t know what it was doing. The drama was missing. A single heated argument about race is the only real highlight most viewers can recall. Similarly, look at the casts of these early seasons – many “characters” are simply not in a bunch of episodes – it was too real. Take the doctor in the San Francisco season – she was busy being a doctor and didn’t have time for this MTV crap. On the same season we also get our quintessential reality TV rabble-rouser: Puck – the kind of house villain that nearly every show has attempted to replicate (on an interesting side note, I think the Shakespearean connection in Puck’s name was both an intentional inclusion for the show and something that was lost on most viewers).
You’ll see similar growth in shows like Survivor and Big Brother (thought he fact that the house in Big Brother was constantly being monitored online detracted from the general storyline’s pacing). Ultimately, through understanding this television grammer, we’ve gotten some elegant by products. A personal favorite, for example, would be the Joe Schmo show. A meta-reality show in which everything is staged by professional actors except for one of the game’s contestants. A brilliant and underappreciated work, the Joe Schmo Show reads (yes, “reads”) like a Reality Television 101 course and is required viewing (reading) for anyone looking to appreciate the genre/medium.
What’s the Point?
And while I realize much of this description comes as jest and lighthearted endorsement of musical rubbish and televised pap, I do believe there are real implications in analyzing this kind of literacy. For one, this is precisely the kind of literacy skill that is typically mined in the culturally relevant curriculum wars being waged in LAUSD in the name of “equity.” I’ve stated before that I don’t think our school system’s been getting this right and that the approach is all wrong. However, if we’re not able to read and participate in the literacy practices that our students are fluent in, it seems unlikely that they’ll be willing to compromise in valuing an esoteric literacy practice like engaging with a 5 paragraph essay. Similarly, there’s real value in recognizing the conventions of lowbrow sub-genres: looking back on the middle portion of this rant reminds me about how I’ll be able to play with reality TV grammatical pacing in structuring the tension and dynamics of the Black Cloud game.
At the same time, folks like Henry Jenkins place a tremendous amount of value on things like “mash ups” and “participatory media.” Daye and I had a brief conversation about her distaste for all things mash-up. I think I’ll tip that iceberg at a later date.
A condensed version of this entry was posted on the Manual Arts blog…
During a recent road trip, among other miscellany, I listened through a handful of older This American Life episodes. As any longstanding fan of the show will tell you, nothing passes the time on the 5 freeway quite like the nasally storytelling of Ira Glass and Co. (for full geeked out discussion of the This American Life TV series, look no further). Most prescient of the episodes listened to was “Two Steps Back,” a frustrating look at school reform in Chicago. Following the transformations of Washington Irving Elementary, the story starts with the exuberant sense of positive change in 1994. The later half of the episode checks back in with the school and – diggy-doo – 10 years later things have done gone and changed for the worse. Though the marked pessimism and frustration that is captured in this episode is something all too familiar to me, if anything the episode serves as a hint of the possibilities that are being offered under the Innovation Division, should Manual Arts enter the new LAUSD division next year. In many ways, I can imagine the story being enacted in reverse for our school: the negative and constant upsets that our students and staff face could be upended by the reinvigorating changes of the iDivision. I’m hoping that other teachers, staff members, and potential network partners find an hour of their time to listen to the episode here (it’s free after all!). There is a valuable dialogue to be had.
Bonus points go to those TAL freaks that can identify the “diggy-doo” reference.
And though this has nothing to do with the above, the following is certainly at least two steps forward:
If you’re reading this site for the first time, it’s likely due to the new linkage from the LA Times Homeroom blog (if you’re not, go check out my other digital home, the Homeroom – now with beautiful picture and bio of yours truly).
Here you’ll find more education discussion as well as related projects I’m involved in. I also occasionally write about music, film, and literature (oh my!). Assuming you’re local, maybe you like reading books too. Consider being a part of the Beyond Pedagogy reading group (and yes, Gloria, once I figure out how I’ll be adding the books and dates for the group to the sidebar).
Speaking of music, Laurie Anderson’s performance last night at UCLA was a revelation. Though the middle of the show dragged slightly, the storytelling rhetoric and eerie, sardonic monotone that Anderson relies upon are still refreshing today. Hers is less a concert than an extended sneak preview of the impending apocalypse (for the view pleasure of an upperclass WASP-y audience).
Driving back to the east side after the show, Rhea and I discussed the speech-song format that Anderson has used throughout her career. The parallels to the recent acclaim of the Obama “Yes We Can Song” are clear and probably written about in a more informed manner elsewhere on the Internet. Reflecting on the form these compositions take, however, I see some clear instructional opportunities that could be adapted from the kind of work that Anderson produces. I’ll jot out some initial thoughts about this later (there’s a grant application that’s awaiting my flourishing touches).
The obvious highlight of the evening was the pop-laden “Only an Expert can Deal with a Problem.” Though a much fuller sound than the version below, the lyrics and delivery are worth your time.
Though I have apparently lost the link, I read the other day about a study demonstrating that listening to music helps some students learn. No real surprise there, I know. However, this is the kind of quantitative data that I need to help validate the allowance of music in an otherwise electronically intolerant campus. Now if only I can locate the study … I’ve yet to pin it down for myself, but I’ve been thinking about this electronics policy in terms of Henry Jenkin’s definition of the Participation Gap. As the Black Cloud has had me thinking about online literacy in the past few months, I’ve been meaning to get something more concrete up here, to least help me sift through the pedagogical flotsam I keep thinking about (there have been a couple mentions at the Homeroom, but not in the depth I want to explore).
As I’ve been experimenting with Twitter, I like the musical idea of the Lyric of the Day twitter. I even felt foolhardy enough to throw out the song I was listening to earlier (and the song you should be listening to immediately, if you haven’t heard it).
In related news, on Sunday Rhea and I saw the first Los Angeles performance of the New Orleans group the Hot 8 Brass Band at the REDCAT. If you’ve listened to samples of the group’s sound you get an accurate picture of the general vivacious tone of the evening; as with most concerts the effervescent (dare I say more-than-human?) bigness of live music made the show that much more compelling. Shuffling along the dance floor, I started thinking about the communal cultural practices typically invoked in concerts. In some sense, the call-and-response vernacular of the show suggests the kinds of developmental un-blank slate behavior that Steven Pinker is pointing to in the opening chapters of the current reading group book.
The other big (non-music) news of the evening is that Manual will be getting its official iDivision vote in May. This has been a very long struggle, and while the vote is anything but certain, I’m enthused that it will be happening. I’ll be writing about this both here and at the Manual Arts blog.
If I had a dollar for every time I was handed a book on how to teach or incorporate hip-hop in my classroom – at least looking at my bookshelf – I’d have seven dollars. And I realize that seven texts around creating culturally relevant curricula through the use of hip-hop isn’t all that excessive, but lately it’s had me thinking.
First, I’ll provide a bit of seemingly frivolous back-story: I grew up immersed in music. I listened broadly and made pointed personal connections in the myriad genres that now fill the cluttered CD shelves throughout my abode. I listened to hip-hop, Appalachian folk, and 20th century classical indiscriminately. I feel that, like many other teachers, I “get” hip-hop (though a case could be made that it cannot be “gotten”).
The problem isn’t hip-hop. The problem is that there is an unspoken assumption that hip-hop is the answer (the unspoken problem thus being how to get students engaged). Before student teaching, I’d been immersed in the tropes of the feel good teacher films. I still watch them if only because the formula is so pristine in its execution and pacing from one film to another: Stand and Deliver, Dangerous Minds, Freedom Writers, Sister Act 2 (you didn’t know that was a teacher movie??), Half Nelson, etc. Watching enough of these I knew that to be a good teacher in an urban high school meant playing socially conscious hip-hop and watching the “urban-ness” of the surroundings melt away from the angels that my students have become. Many of the books I’ve looked through appear to offer this kind of quick fix solution. Hip-hop, as a result has become a veritable panacea to our literacy problem. Hallelujah!
The only problem is that it’s not. Hip-hop isn’t the solution. I question how many teachers are grabbing their IMA funded Tupac CD and playing a single song and feeling like they’ve connected for the day. How many hip-hop fans have brought in that sole Mos Def CD or Dead Prez album (you know which one I’m talking about), and felt like they were authentically culturally responsive?
The vast majority of my students today do not listen to hip-hop. Have no interest in it. If I were not paying close attention, I wouldn’t know the differences between reggaeton and hip-hop. Even if I did, it wouldn’t be the solution either.
Ultimately, this isn’t a diatribe for or against hip-hop. It’s a long-winded attempt to point to the fact that what our schools (and the texts that our district and our BTSA induction programs provide) are claiming as culturally responsive is limited, debilitating in vision. We can’t give people the direct tools for this kind of curriculum in the classroom; we don’t know a given teacher’s students or those students’ experiences. What can be changed is how to provide teachers with an understanding of recognizing the cultural and community experiences that need to be reflected upon and utilized within a class. There are some great texts around this issue, but most of the ones I’ve been given are of the play-this-Nas-track-and-read-Prufrock variety.
The hip-hop as panacea trend is an extension of the kinds of caged-in institutionalized practice that traps students into class structures. Cultural responsiveness should be an innate part of one’s teaching practice. It cannot be scripted, it cannot be found by reading up on the latest teen trends online and it definitely cannot be found in the appendix of the latest instructional book you’ve just been handed.
The first day of my vacation that I haven’t actually gone to work! Instead, I … worked at home! Listening through a handful of older CDs, I was reminded of the review I’d written a while ago for the defunct Synergy Magazine. Yes, it is a cheap Calvino ripoff. I’m okay with that.
Of Montreal
Satanic Panic in the Attic
Polyvinyl
By Antero Garcia
You’ve just gotten back from the store, anxious to put in the record you’ve just bought, giddy and without any concerns other than this troubling plastic wrapper and sticker on the spine of the jewel case. Why do they make these things so difficult, you mutter to yourself. You’ve heard good things about this new Of Montreal CD, and that the group recently reissued some of it’s older catalog, you said to yourself, why not? You’ve been looking for a change, and the group is (somehow, but you’re not exactly sure how) connected to bands like Neutral Milk Hotel, Elf Power, Olivia Tremor Control… something about 6 Elephants or something, but the lip piercing and Yo La Tengo 1994 tour t-shirt of the salesman at the record store told you that you we’re an idiot if you had to ask. You make your purchase and find yourself in the quandary you are currently in, fighting with plastic to open up and hear the magic The intricate art promises psychedelia. Something warm, comforting and (hold the applause please) “enlightening.”
But when the CD is finally wrenched from its case and cradled in the player, the sound the speakers coo is not sunny. It’s icy, almost insincere. It’s synthesizers it feels like unfriendly disco and this Rundgren-esque voice is saying something about “poppet,” that stupid phrase brits use endearingly. You hate it. It’s inane and elementary and you’re impatient for the record to proceed, move on from this unfortunate mishap. You admit that in another setting, this would be something you could possibly see yourself enjoying. You think all of this and the song feels too long. It won’t end and you resort to thinking ill thoughts toward the CD, another wasted purchase.
You check the CD player and you’ve somehow bled into the second track, the world is different now, somehow change yet suggesting an immutability a permanence. Yeah, this is more like it. This is something you’d like to listen to, now we’re talking. This is the pop playground you believed always existed, what Of Montreal would always sound like… This is pure pop bliss, the kind of verse and delivery you could – and want to – listen to all day. Goddamn, listen to that! You want it to never stop. And all too suddenly, and exactly when, in your mind, you uttered that last syllable, “stop,” it falls dead, a deflated balloon animal, lampooning all you ever wanted in music. You curse yourself for even thinking, “stop,” for even mentioning the idea to whatever deity that is pulling the levers behind this album. There must be some mistake, there could be a defect or – … – no, you check the CD player, track two is still ticking through but now it’s all weird noodling, a completely different song in the same track. It’s a so-so song, but you sure wish you could go back to the one that was there a moment ago. Why can’t you hold onto a good thing when you find it? C’est La Vie, you reassure yourself, and continue to work your way through the sloppy mess of an album this is turning out to be.
For a while nothing is turning out any better. One moment it’s absolute brilliance, only to be discarded like a worthless, unwanted trinket. Listen to that “Climb the Ladder” song! You want it to last, you love it, maybe it’s even better than that song that started track two – you’re not sure, so much has happened since then, so many songs come and gone.
And it’s all moving too fast for you. So many great ideas are whizzing by and recirculating. The transcircularities of harmony and dissonance lunging – no, nagging – in your ears. Two divorced parents pulling you in opposite directions.
You scream stop and this time it doesn’t happen. The Satanic Panic has taken hold of you, and all you want is to go back…. You want the kind of CD that has been lining your shelves for years. 12 songs played straight, some pretty good, some you always skip. You wish critics didn’t so easily dupe you, and you wish this CD wasn’t so … so … different, so schizophrenic, so manic in execution.
There are only a couple of tracks left. You play with the idea of turning it off and catching up on the latest TV game show, but you decide to wait out the auditory pestilence that plagues your stereo. The music doesn’t change, yet there’s something different. Some sort of sense of puzzle pieces coming together, as if each diffracted moment of the record is some part of the larger picture. Perhaps.
Finally, you arrive at an end: a realization that the chase is what you wanted all along, not actually arriving at the song. You have ventured far, several lifetimes at least, have become wiser by your journey’s course, and you realize now that it was the sites along the way – those momentary glimpses – that were what you were reaching for. Nothing more than fleeting beauty, just a half second of it to change your life.
Love is a pursuit. Once you are nestled close enough to grasp it, love is banal. You close your eyes. You’ll press play again in the morning. You smile, satisfied, and wonder where you’ll wander tomorrow.
First, I think that this . . . well, frankly I don’t know what to think. I’ve been looking at it on amazon for the better part of a week now and just can’t decide how to feel about it. Obviously this is a giant leap in the advancement of human development. Don’t get me wrong, I am completely repulsed by this, but its sheer existence says something. I’m not sure what. I’m tempted to click “buy” out of spite but don’t think I’d be able to watch it to make a more formative analysis. This really is a case for someone like Chuck Klosterman (and I grew out of my need to ape his writing quirks a couple years ago… at least I hope I did).
Next, as I mentioned yesterday, this week’s book club was of the usual mind blowing variety. A smaller crowd than usual, but I have a feeling the book pushed back against many of our usual attendees. If anything, I’m now left with a feeling of envy that us western folk are relegated to kick around phrases “magic” and “spirits” simply because we need to label that which isn’t natural to us. That is, concepts of spirituality and spells and magic are foreign to commofidied, “proper” Yanks. We give these concepts fancy terms to show we don’t believe they happen, even though Taussig argues they not only happen but they essentially help run or propel the happenings of the ever ubiquitous and undefined “state.” I’d have more to say on this except for the fact that I’m reluctant to say I fully understood the text…which I also suspect was intentional on the author’s part.
Spent a good deal of my afternoon watching this and the other linked exhibits. Just great.
Spent a good deal of the morning subjecting my students to the new Saul Williams album. While I’m not as smitten with it as Ms. Rogers, it is a remarkable album. Wish the album had more Thavius and less Trent…sacrilegious? Probably.