From: owner-loud-fans-digest@smoe.org (loud-fans-digest) To: loud-fans-digest@smoe.org Subject: loud-fans-digest V2 #41 Reply-To: loud-fans@smoe.org Sender: owner-loud-fans-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-loud-fans-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk loud-fans-digest Monday, January 28 2002 Volume 02 : Number 041 Today's Subjects: ----------------- RE: [loud-fans] Very funny URL... (Houston Hotel Horrors) ["Keegstra, Rus] [loud-fans] Primitives ["Kunkel, Mark" ] [loud-fans] more poor scott miller [dana-boy@juno.com] Re: [loud-fans] more poor scott miller [Matthew Weber ] Re: [loud-fans] more poor scott miller [Matthew Weber ] [loud-fans] Counting Cheryl Crow ["O Geier" ] Re: [loud-fans] Counting Cheryl Crow ["Joseph M. Mallon" ] [loud-fans] Brendan Benson is back! ["Douglas Stanley" ] Re: [loud-fans] Brendan Benson is back! [Bill Silvers ] Re: [loud-fans] Halstead and Merritt, or, Notes toward a syntactical deconstruction of inflated authorial ego ["Dennis M] Re: [loud-fans] Halstead and Merritt, or, Notes toward a syntactical deconstruction of inflated authorial ego [] Re: [loud-fans] Halstead and Merritt, or, Notes toward a syntactical deconstruction of inflated authorial ego [] Re: [loud-fans] more poor scott miller [Sue Trowbridge Subject: RE: [loud-fans] Very funny URL... (Houston Hotel Horrors) Me/Andy: >>TeeHee - my wife (who is once again temporarily in Houston) >>has her own horror stories about this particular hotel, as >>do many of her coworkers. It's about a block from where we >>lived in Houston last year. > >Ooh, dish, dish! Something of a story, I guess: she had no heat in her room, as she discovered the first morning she was there (in January of last year, 29 degrees outside). She gets in the shower, dumps shampoo on her head and the water immediately goes cold. Not the slow fade from warm to cold but a skin numbing sudden dump of ice water. She got out of the shower, wrapped herself in a towel and scraped the shampoo off her head. They at least moved her to a room that had heat three days later, but hot water was always a problem - even really early in the morning. She stuck it out for the full week, and never went back. And a series of images: A cafeteria that she describes as a soup kitchen. Useless, inefficient staff. Elevators that smell. >Jandek, DJ Screw, Andrea Yates, J. Clifford Baxter...is it something >in the water down there? It's a big town, ya know? Russ ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 09:18:42 -0600 From: "Kunkel, Mark" Subject: [loud-fans] Primitives Sorry, I just have to get this off my chest: I love the Primities! I love "All the Way Down"! I love both versions of that song! Whew. I feel better now. Thanks for listening. _____________________________________________________ Mark D. Kunkel Legislative Attorney Legislative Reference Bureau (608) 266-0131 ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 10:53:49 -0500 From: dana-boy@juno.com Subject: [loud-fans] more poor scott miller Whew, I was worried for a while there that Scott had decided to put an end to what has become his weekly existential whine in the Ask Scott column. Luckily, it looks like he plans to continue with what has evolved into a delightful ongoing parade of ego masturbation etc. masquerading as philosophical commentary. The rules seem to be that we write in and tell him that he's wonderful and he replies "thank you" and then adds a new reason why he just can't bring himself to release new music. Oh, the tortures of the artist. What I especially like is the way the entire column is starting to resemble "Zooey" by J.D. Salinger, with Scott lying on the couch in the living room, unable to deal with the horrors of engaging with the world for fear that his ego is at the heart of his desire to write pop songs, and that true artistic expression is impossible in a music world dominated by goons. He's even started italicizing like Salinger. Maybe someone can write in and tell Scott that he needs to release more music, if only for the fat pizza delivery boy. - --dana ________________________________________________________________ GET INTERNET ACCESS FROM JUNO! Juno offers FREE or PREMIUM Internet access for less! Join Juno today! For your FREE software, visit: http://dl.www.juno.com/get/web/. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 08:29:46 -0800 From: Matthew Weber Subject: Re: [loud-fans] more poor scott miller At 10:53 AM 1/28/02 -0500, dana-boy@juno.com wrote: >Whew, I was worried for a while there that Scott had decided to put an >end to what has become his weekly existential whine in the Ask Scott >column. Luckily, it looks like he plans to continue with what has >evolved into a delightful ongoing parade of ego masturbation etc. >masquerading as philosophical commentary. The rules seem to be that we >write in and tell him that he's wonderful and he replies "thank you" and >then adds a new reason why he just can't bring himself to release new >music. Oh, the tortures of the artist. [snip] Jesus. Is this necessary? Matthew Weber Curatorial Assistant Music Library University of California, Berkeley Darkness which may be felt. _The Holy Bible: The Old Testament_, The Second Book of Moses, Called Exodus, chapter 10, verse 21 ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 11:41:24 -0500 From: dana-boy@juno.com Subject: Re: [loud-fans] more poor scott miller > Jesus. Is this necessary? >>>>>>>>>>>> No, Scott's whining isn't really necessary, but I thought that it might be of interest to those who don't normally check Ask Scott. - --dana ________________________________________________________________ GET INTERNET ACCESS FROM JUNO! Juno offers FREE or PREMIUM Internet access for less! Join Juno today! For your FREE software, visit: http://dl.www.juno.com/get/web/. ------------------------------ Date: 28 Jan 2002 11:50:30 -0500 From: Dan Schmidt Subject: Re: [loud-fans] just how much sexiness can that frog tolerate? (swap rev 2) Stewart Mason writes: | At 02:11 AM 1/26/02 -0600, Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey wrote: | | >Primitives "All the Way Down": Which "Primitives" is this? The | >agitated guitar and steady Velvets-y beat, and something about the | >production, sound almost early '80s...and so I'm thikning maybe NZ | >- but it's maybe too muddy for that era, and the organ solo sounds | >pretty vintage - enough so that this could be considerably | >older. Wait a minute...I just remembered something...Nah | | This is the Primitives from Coventry who had the enormous 1988 hit | single "Crash." This is from their second album, PURE, which I love | nearly as much as the first, LOVELY, which I think is one of the | all-time great albums. What might be puzzling you is that it's one | of the handful of songs sung by the songwriter, Paul Court, instead | of the euphoniously-named lead singer Tracy Tracy. Oh please yes everybody get these two albums if you can find them. Perfect chuggy chuggy four chord pop. Kind of a simplified Darling Buds. There was a third (UK-only?) album that I heard once and found really disappointing. - -- http://www.dfan.org ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 09:57:17 -0700 From: "Roger Winston" Subject: Re: [loud-fans] more poor scott miller Matthew Weber on 1/28/2002 9:29:46 AM wrote: > Jesus. Is this necessary? Matt, please be patient with Dana. He is obviously suffering from a severe case of constipation. Hopefully that extra fiber will take effect soon. Later. --Rog ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 12:15:31 -0500 From: "Chris Murtland" Subject: RE: [loud-fans] more poor scott miller "Hype and prestige mediate 99% of every artistic experience, and of the unmediated communication going on in the remaining 1%, 99% of that is not really the artist expressing anything, but the artist soliciting your approval -- maybe with the goal of actually expressing some second thing in a way that will catch you unawares, maybe just to profit from your approval and to leave it at that." I didn't know that was just art--I thought that was the human experience in general. It seems to me going down this path far enough would exclude all human behavior from being worth doing (a tempting line of thought, to be sure). So, while I have to agree somewhat that Scott should get over it and make more records, I also appreciate the opportunity to read the thoughts of one of my favorite artists and the reasoning behind his actions. Plus, I think he is right to ask these questions of his audience, the culture and himself. And age does play a factor. I'm a decade younger than Scott, but I already have serious doubts about the usefulness of rock music as an activity I want to spend a great deal of time pursuing. Of course, I'm not Scott Miller, and I can hardly bear the thought of no more Loud Family albums, but I can understand the feeling. And there are other great musicians who are in the same boat. Each of them has some threshold where trying is not still its own reward. Here is an interesting article by Brian Eno dealing with some of the same questions, albeit in a seemingly more constructive spirit: http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/eno/eno_p2.html ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 12:24:01 -0500 (EST) From: Subject: Re: [loud-fans] more poor scott miller On Mon, 28 Jan 2002 dana-boy@juno.com wrote: > > Jesus. Is this necessary? > >>>>>>>>>>>> > > No, Scott's whining isn't really necessary, but I thought that it might > be of interest to those who don't normally check Ask Scott. Dana, please try to be more sycophantic. If I read any more unkind words about Our Scott I shall simply turn to dandelion spores and be lost to the next breeze. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 09:34:02 -0800 From: Matthew Weber Subject: Re: [loud-fans] more poor scott miller At 12:24 PM 1/28/02 -0500, jsharple@bls.brooklaw.edu wrote: >On Mon, 28 Jan 2002 dana-boy@juno.com wrote: > > > > Jesus. Is this necessary? > > >>>>>>>>>>>> > > > > No, Scott's whining isn't really necessary, but I thought that it might > > be of interest to those who don't normally check Ask Scott. > > >Dana, please try to be more sycophantic. If I read any more unkind words >about Our Scott I shall simply turn to dandelion spores and be lost to the >next breeze. I think there's a middle ground between sycophancy and gleeful mean-spiritedness. Matthew Weber Curatorial Assistant Music Library University of California, Berkeley Darkness which may be felt. _The Holy Bible: The Old Testament_, The Second Book of Moses, Called Exodus, chapter 10, verse 21 ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 12:47:53 -0500 From: dana-boy@juno.com Subject: Re: [loud-fans] more poor scott miller I think there's a middle ground between sycophancy and gleeful mean-spiritedness. >>>>>>>>> Oh, lord, it wasn't that gleeful and it's not like he reads this list. If I ever met him, I'd say something much more polite, like "Get your head out of your ass, you!!" or something like that. The only thing that makes me gleeful is watch my little kitten play with string. Have I ever mentioned how cute that is!! Yesterday he even fetched the little puffy thing!! And the only thing that makes me mean-spirited is my stupid laundromat who have a "Last Wash: 7:00" sign in the window, but close at 7:30. And now my clothes are all wrinkled and damp. Bastards!! - --dana ________________________________________________________________ GET INTERNET ACCESS FROM JUNO! Juno offers FREE or PREMIUM Internet access for less! Join Juno today! For your FREE software, visit: http://dl.www.juno.com/get/web/. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 13:25:31 -0500 (EST) From: dmw Subject: Re: [loud-fans] more poor scott miller On Mon, 28 Jan 2002 dana-boy@juno.com wrote: > I think there's a middle ground between sycophancy and gleeful > mean-spiritedness. dana is obviously playing agent provacateur to a degree here, but i kinda think there is a point buried in the flame bait. it is odd and disconcerting to me that Scott's (stated, at least) reasons for "retiring," at least for a while, from the record-producing part of being a musician have more to do with his concerns about perceptions of his work and its public viability (both economic and otherwise) rather than a sentiment like, say, "i just haven't been writing any good songs lately." odd because if that is really the concern, it is obvious that there is a market/auidence for Scott's work (even if it is small/non-mainstream) and odd because in 2002, the means to carry on with the production/distribution of work at a small scale don't require the resources of a record company. the last coupla records were mostly done in Scott's living room anyway, right? if i can scrape up the dough to go track drums for a couple of days, i bet he can too. but: a lot of artists, of many different stripes, have taken a few years off, and returned to their art rejuvenated by the time away. & we're still figuring out how to reconcile "rock star" and "advancing middle age," societally speaking -- mr. young seems to be doing more-ro-less okay, but a lot of others are struggling with what we're trained to think of as inherent contradictionss. it hasn't been two years since the last full record and a tour that seems (reading into it a little bit) to have been a demoralizing, draining and painful experience. i don't think Scott is laying the blame for that experience where it really ought to go (the toy record company) but that's somewhat irrelevant. it still seems like the sort of thing that legitimately takes some time to work through. i have a degree of faith the creative people stay that way, and that moreover creativity must ultimately find expression, somehow. and i don't think the urge to share creativity with the world would be likely to go away. encouragement might help, carping/snarkiness probably won't. but time might be what's really needed. muddled and semi-contradictory as usual, huh? well. - -- d. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 18:41:57 +0000 From: "O Geier" Subject: [loud-fans] Counting Cheryl Crow I don't understand the purpose of having Cheryl Crow lip-sync her new song during half time at the AFC title game yesterday. Is this new to football broadcasts?? Support anti-Spam legislation. Join the fight http://www.cauce.org/ - ------------------------------------------------------------------------ MSN Photos is the easiest way to share and print your photos: Click Here ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 10:47:30 -0800 (PST) From: "Joseph M. Mallon" Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Counting Cheryl Crow On Mon, 28 Jan 2002, O Geier wrote: > I don't understand the purpose of having Cheryl Crow lip-sync her new > song during half time at the AFC title game yesterday. Is this new to > football broadcasts?? Sheryl Crow? Maybe. Lip-synching? No. Whitney Houston's rendition of "The Star-Spangled Banner" in '91 or so was lip-synched. It's necessary, because of the dubious acoustics and electronics associated with sports stadia and having to set up a sound system in 15-20 min. What was the deal with her hat? Go Rams, J. Mallon ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 12:51:51 -0600 (CST) From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: Re: [loud-fans] more poor scott miller On Mon, 28 Jan 2002, Matthew Weber wrote: > At 12:24 PM 1/28/02 -0500, jsharple@bls.brooklaw.edu wrote: > >Dana, please try to be more sycophantic. If I read any more unkind words > >about Our Scott I shall simply turn to dandelion spores and be lost to the > >next breeze. > > I think there's a middle ground between sycophancy and gleeful > mean-spiritedness. You just take the I-1 southbound about 40 miles, exit at Critical Vista, and continue in a southerly direction for 10 miles until the Sarcasm Highway runs out, then there you are: Reasonable Criticism Estates. Sadly, it's like a ghost town. - --Jeff J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society www.uwm.edu/~jenor/ADS.html ::the popularity of the gruesome FACES OF DEATH video series is ::apparently so great that a children's version is in production, ::to be called FACES OF OWIES. np: Windy & Carl _Consciousness_ ps to dmw: If I ever start a record company (yeah, right), I think I'll call it The Toy Record Company... 'Course, there was a local label here for a few years, named after the inevitable response the founders got whenever they asked people who'd know about starting up a record company: Don't. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 18:53:00 +0000 From: "O Geier" Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Counting Cheryl Crow I meant in general having pop or rock acts perform at half time. I know ratings are crapping on football, and my 73 dad doesn't give a hoot about Cheryl Crow, so I take it to be an attempt to attract younger viewers to see the Ameritrade ads running at every break. The hat?? Mmmmm, don't know. She probably asked it 'Are you hat enough to be my hat?' Support anti-Spam legislation. Join the fight http://www.cauce.org/ - ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Chat with friends online, try MSN Messenger: Click Here ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 11:20:08 -0800 From: "Douglas Stanley" Subject: [loud-fans] Brendan Benson is back! I'm sure there's some BB fans around here somewhere... http://www.startimeintl.com/benson.html Finally, after all these years, Brendan looks to be coming out with the follow-up to what I felt was one of the finest discs of the '90's. From the MP3's I've heard, it should be right up our collective alley. Doug ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 12:15:59 -0800 From: John Cooper Subject: [loud-fans] Ad question Who did the music to the wordless Nike commercials featuring the jerky editing? ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 14:51:54 -0600 From: Bill Silvers Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Brendan Benson is back! Doug Stanley wrote: >I'm sure there's some BB fans around here somewhere... > >http://www.startimeintl.com/benson.html > >Finally, after all these years, Brendan looks to be coming out with the >follow-up to what I felt was one of the finest discs of the '90's. From the >MP3's I've heard, it should be right up our collective alley. In similar news, the latest Parasol update brought mention of a new Beatifics record, the first that I'm aware of from Chris Dorn since the wonderful HOW I LEARNED TO STOP WORRYING in 1996 (just about exactly as long as it's been since ONE MISSISSIPPI). It's just an EP, but at this point I'll take it as it comes. The clip at the Parasol site was promising. b.s. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 13:17:02 -0800 From: John Cooper Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Ad question On 1/28/02, John Cooper wrote: >Who did the music to the wordless Nike commercials featuring the >jerky editing? Jo reminds me that I'm confusing two sets of athletic shoe ads--the "jerky editing" is in the ads for a maker of wet/dry athletic shoes featuring Derek Jeter in one series and, in the other, a boxer in a pool. The Nike ads show apparently non-famous people, such as a skateboarder who repeatedly takes tumbles while trying to perfect a high-flying maneuver. It's the Nike ads for which we'd like to identify the music. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 16:53:13 -0600 From: "Dennis McGreevy" Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Halstead and Merritt, or, Notes toward a syntactical deconstruction of inflated authorial ego So I sez: > "verse / chorus / verse / chorus / bridge / verse / chorus" > > That's a template. So then Jeff sez: Yes - but not all pop songs, not even all popular pop songs, not even all extremely popular pop songs, fit into this template. Some might run two verses before the chorus, some mix put the bridge elsewhere, etc. That is, the organization isn't quite so rigid as "template" implies. My example will be, say, the songs on _Beatles 1_ - hard to argue that these aren't quintessential pop-rock songs. And Dennis, I also am very, very certain that you were not so foolish as to be putting down "MacArthur Park." A word to the wise, they say. <><><><><><><><><><><><> I am not saying that "vcvcbvc" is the only template. But it is perhaps the ur-template, from which others were derived, for reasons which include expression, simple variety, and much in between. I'd even go so far as to hypothesize the existence of a sort of deep grammar, according to whose syntax certain variations or structural inversions are more immediately comprehensible, while others seem awkward or jarring. Some songs may have introductions, codas, bits of connective tissue between the verses and choruses, prehensile tails, gills, oddly dyed hair, or what have you. Most of them will not fit precisely to the template I listed above (although a remarkable number will fit that one exactly). But that, and other very similar patterns are at the core of the majority of pop songs. Did the Beatles deviate? Hell yes - the Beatles stand apart in all sorts of ways, that among them. One could easily make a compelling case for the Beatles deviations from set form as being the spark that ignited the modernist concept of "progress" which later became lengthened to simply "prog". As to "MacArthur Park", I've already had it pointed out that the song does have a sort of verse-chorus structure, so I will defend my citation of it, after first saying that I do in fact like the song, for reasons which include not leastly its cultural position as a sort of model of the dead-end nature of certain vectors within psychedelia. And I say this reverently; I consider Jim Webb to be brilliant. However, Mr. Webb, from what I have read on the guy, was apparently frequently guilty of submitting barely finished material for artists and producers to work with, leaving a lot of the final structuring and sequencing of parts to be done at the level of arranging. So when we hear verses and choruses repeating like they usually do, that's not necessarily because that's how they emerged from the author's head, hand, etc. What I find particularly interesting about "MacArthur Park", and why I used it as the example I did, is that the epic tragedy discussed by the borderline incoherent lyrics accompanying the emotionally "epic" music involves the narrator's ongoing loss of ability to keep in place a consistent internal reality set through which to interpret the incoming visual data of something green which seems to be dissolving. Is it a park landscape? Is it a cake? At any given moment, the narrator does not seem to recall what he thought it was mere seconds before. This dilemma verbalizing seems within the song to have a dialogical relationship to the structure of the song. The initial chord progression is both harmonically rich, and ambiguous in its suggestions of where it might lead. When our narrator finally seems to settle on the notion that the melting thing is a cake, the music builds drama by going up for a while, both tonally and dynamically. But his verbal lament culminates in his explicit statement that he has lost the recipe, which in context can hardly be read as simply a set of procedures by which one can bake a simple, non-metacake, the tragedy of such loss being worsened by its apparent permanence. So, uh, yeah, I like this song. But in lesser hands than those of the obviously maestro-ful Jim Webb, this is a formula for disaster, one of a very specific sort, whose defining characteristics include structural incoherence verging on pointlessness, and which might be remedied by a careful eye on the notion of the importance of the sort of simple, meaningful structure which this post, for example, lacks altogether. dogshit in the park, cupid's arrow, - --Dennis ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 14:56:00 -0800 (PST) From: Jon Gabriel Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Halstead and Merritt, or, Notes toward a syntactical deconstruction of inflated authorial ego > But his verbal lament culminates in > his explicit statement that he > has lost the recipe, which in context can hardly be > read as simply a set of > procedures by which one can bake a simple, > non-metacake, the tragedy of such > loss being worsened by its apparent permanence. If anyone's interested, I can post my doctoral dissertation, "This Bundt's a Hit: The Non-Metacake as Metaphor" Jon ===== 777777777777777777777777777777 JON GABRIEL mesa, arizona usa inkling communication + design 777777777777777777777777777777 Great stuff seeking new owners in Yahoo! Auctions! http://auctions.yahoo.com ------------------------------ Date: 28 Jan 2002 18:02:24 -0500 From: Dan Schmidt Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Halstead and Merritt, or, Notes toward a syntactical deconstruction of inflated authorial ego "Dennis McGreevy" writes: | I am not saying that "vcvcbvc" is the only template. But it is | perhaps the ur-template, from which others were derived, for reasons | which include expression, simple variety, and much in between. I'd | even go so far as to hypothesize the existence of a sort of deep | grammar, according to whose syntax certain variations or structural | inversions are more immediately comprehensible, while others seem | awkward or jarring. It's worth pointing out that Verse Chorus Verse Chorus Bridge Verse Chorus is very similar to sonata form, the analogous ur-template for much classical music, with the important difference that pop songs generally do not modulate to a different key when they transition from the verse to the chorus. Here's a over-simplified form of the analogy: SONATA FORM "POP FORM" Exposition, part 1: the opening theme is stated verse transition, in which the key changes Exposition, part 2: the closing theme is stated chorus The entire exposition is repeated verbatim verse chorus Development: a section of heightened tension bridge Recapitulation, part 1: opening theme verse transition in which the key stays the same Recapitulation, part 2: closing theme chorus Coda tag / repeat and fade / etc It's over-simplified largely because the main "point" of sonata form is the harmonic movement from key 1 to key 2 (twice) and then back again, which usually doesn't exist in pop songs, but there is a definite correlation. - -- http://www.dfan.org ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 19:03:43 -0500 (EST) From: Sue Trowbridge Subject: Re: [loud-fans] more poor scott miller As LF.com webmaster, I see every e-mail that comes in to the Ask Scott mailbox, and I can assure all of you that there are lots, LOTS more "Dear Scott, we love you, please reconsider retiring from music" letters in the Ask Scott queue. I urge any contrarians to e-mail askscott@loudfamily.com and offer up a different (or, to paraphrase Matt Weber, less sycophantic) point of view. - --Sue ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 18:57:38 -0600 (CST) From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Halstead and Merritt, or, Notes toward a syntactical deconstruction of inflated authorial ego On Mon, 28 Jan 2002, Jon Gabriel wrote: > > But his verbal lament culminates in > > his explicit statement that he > > has lost the recipe, which in context can hardly be > > read as simply a set of > > procedures by which one can bake a simple, > > non-metacake, the tragedy of such > > loss being worsened by its apparent permanence. > > If anyone's interested, I can post my doctoral > dissertation, "This Bundt's a Hit: The Non-Metacake as > Metaphor" Metacake, metacake, maker's plan Mix me a metaphor, fast as you can - --Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society www.uwm.edu/~jenor/ADS.html ::"Shut up, you truculent lout, and let the cute little pixie sing!":: ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 20:05:53 -0500 From: "Chris Murtland" Subject: RE: [loud-fans] Halstead and Merritt, or, Notes toward a syntactical deconstruction of inflated authorial ego It is also worth pointing out that the coefficient of oscillating discrete entropy is at work in the I-IV-V progression. If we assume the G-C-D/truth constant (first explored in print by J.W. Floyd, et al.) is the underpinning structural isotope of a rather asymptotic manifestation of cultural Twin Reverb property creep (and I am not the first to make such an assumption), it is obvious to even the layman that the output of Franzhaufeffener's inverse logic gate will be meta-farcical remnants of the archetypal Groove Differential SpaceAge Love Machine. Here is where our collective unconscious may let forth an unanimous gasp. That the floating point manifestations of Mozart's "Ugly Orgy" effect would seem to point to a sub-quantum mink Cartesian parametric EQ of narrow wavelength begs the question, "where are the chicks?" As intriguing as this question is, however, it is beyond the scope of this paper to delve into matters of aesthetic topology. For a complete exploration of these anomalies, "Fender, Elvis and The Ascent of Man," by J. Edward Gogolonomonorokov is a worthy treatise. In our investigations, we determined that F# was generally the baseline for constrained parser boundary loops. Gender determinism and semiotic Fibonacci tree-models notwithstanding, the decoded, implicit signal of nearly all rock music since 1986 has followed Mergarel's theory of upswept soiree melee -- that is to say, the weighted value of "verse/chorus/bridge," when taken as the dividend of the transactional series compiled by the plectrum-string resitance ratio (adjusted over time for the effects of external agents such as nicotine), is the uber-metaphor for the Sumerian culture war that still rages in the intellectual enclaves of the modern world. We are confident that a thorough, formal and explicit examination of the supergroup Pablo Cruise will continue to reveal residual semantic networks supporting our findings. Nonnel Nhoj is really just "John Lennon" spelled backwards, after all. Each terminal node is a Sprinkenhauer's Dilemma, the ramifications of which are of unprecedented import to the emerging field of "rock criticism" [Note: 87% of the Usage Panel approved the use of the 'k' in roc.] Further investigation into the sub-occultic convex function of 3.14 snare drums is our immediate goal. Finest regards, Dr. Murt, Ph.D. University of Daedsiluap All right--I'm glad we found it out detective fashion; I wouldn't give shucks for any other way. --Tom Sawyer ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 19:08:29 -0600 (CST) From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: Re: [loud-fans] more poor scott miller On Mon, 28 Jan 2002, Sue Trowbridge wrote: > As LF.com webmaster, I see every e-mail that comes in to the Ask Scott > mailbox, and I can assure all of you that there are lots, LOTS more "Dear > Scott, we love you, please reconsider retiring from music" letters in the > Ask Scott queue. I urge any contrarians to e-mail askscott@loudfamily.com > and offer up a different (or, to paraphrase Matt Weber, less sycophantic) > point of view. "Dear Scott: "Please never ever make that awful noise you call 'music' ever again. No one bought it because it makes people's heads hurt. Your voice makes children cry. Your songs are structured like a bowl of spaghetti in an earthquake. Your lyrics are a farrago of monkey-typed philosophy, dull accounts of people nobody knows, and an explosion at a typesetting factory. You masturbate into a thesaurus. The ghosts of T.S. Eliot and James Joyce are laughing behind your back. Your records sound like they were recorded inside a ringing bell and mixed by a beached whale thrashing about on the mixing desk. Your hair is silly. Your nose is too big. You are dumb. Please bring back the babes in rubber dresses, but this time cover all your instruments and amplifiers in a six-inch thick layer of lead. "Sincerely, "J.Q. Public and Ima Bigg-Meany" There. *That* oughta get him recording again. - --Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society www.uwm.edu/~jenor/ADS.html ::Being young, carefree, having your whole life ahead of you, ::dancing the night away to celebrate... ::oh, and the untimely death of Jackson Pollock. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 19:10:52 -0600 (CST) From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: RE: [loud-fans] Halstead and Merritt, or, Notes toward a syntactical deconstruction of inflated authorial ego I hate to break it to you, Chris - but everything you said can be said in six words: "Louie, Louie - me gotta go." - --Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society www.uwm.edu/~jenor/ADS.html ::Being young, carefree, having your whole life ahead of you, ::dancing the night away to celebrate... ::oh, and the untimely death of Jackson Pollock. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 20:14:39 -0500 From: "Chris Murtland" Subject: RE: [loud-fans] Halstead and Merritt, or, Notes toward a syntactical deconstruction of inflated authorial ego DUDE! Where did you find the lyrics for that??? |I hate to break it to you, Chris - but everything you said can |be said in six words: "Louie, Louie - me gotta go." | |--Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 19:28:17 -0600 (CST) From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Halstead and Merritt, or, Notes toward a syntactical deconstruction of inflated authorial ego On Mon, 28 Jan 2002, Dennis McGreevy wrote: > What I find particularly interesting about "MacArthur Park", and why I used it > as the example I did, is that the epic tragedy discussed by the borderline > incoherent lyrics accompanying the emotionally "epic" music involves the > narrator's ongoing loss of ability to keep in place a consistent internal > reality set through which to interpret the incoming visual data of something > green which seems to be dissolving. Is it a park landscape? Is it a cake? At > any given moment, the narrator does not seem to recall what he thought it was > mere seconds before. He's crawled so far up his own asshole that his head is coming out his own mouth. The guy in the song, I mean - not Dennis. > This dilemma verbalizing seems within the song to have a dialogical relationship > to the structure of the song. The initial chord progression is both > harmonically rich, and ambiguous in its suggestions of where it might lead. > When our narrator finally seems to settle on the notion that the melting thing > is a cake, the music builds drama by going up for a while, both tonally and > dynamically. But his verbal lament culminates in his explicit statement that he > has lost the recipe, which in context can hardly be read as simply a set of > procedures by which one can bake a simple, non-metacake, the tragedy of such > loss being worsened by its apparent permanence. I don't think he's confused about the cake qua cake - I think the incoherence of the song's metaphoricity reflects on a verbal level the elevation of effect, of drama, over sense/reality: *his* loss, *his* love, must be so much grander & greater than anyone else's; he's in love with the romantic tragedy of not being loved as deeply as he loves himself. THus, his martyrdom...drinking crappy, warm wine; telling his auditor that he'll be staring at the sun, under the guise of claiming she'll never catch him doing it ("I promise you I'll never let you know the depths of misery you've caused me - I'd never want to make you feel as bad as I, in my infinite sensitivity, just know that would make you feel"). If the song weren't overblown, outsized, ill-structured, and (even in 1968) desperately unhip (the twistin' frug a-go-go middle section), it would be untrue to the narrator. > So, uh, yeah, I like this song. But in lesser hands than those of the obviously > maestro-ful Jim Webb, this is a formula for disaster, one of a very specific > sort, whose defining characteristics include structural incoherence verging on > pointlessness, and which might be remedied by a careful eye on the notion of the > importance of the sort of simple, meaningful structure which this post, for > example, lacks altogether. Which, of course, isn't Jim Webb's fault: that his followers were unable to keep to the trail he blazed says nothing about that trail, or where it led Webb. I view "MacArthur Park" as a sequel of sorts to "By the Time I Get to Phoenix" - one of the creepiest songs ever to hit the top 40. Most people think it's about a guy mourning the way his girlfriend must feel now that he's left her (presumably because he's a ramblin' kinda guy, and she just was too square to deal...'60s macho crap): no, it's about a guy *imagining*, in excruciating detail, how awful his girlfriend *would* feel *if* he leaves her. As someone once wrote, he's the kind of guy for whom the main benefit of an afterlife would be that he could eavesdrop on his own funeral, to see how broken up all his friends and family are that he's gone. The only real question about "MacArthur Park" is: presumably, the cake in the rain is literal - a wedding cake, a rainstorm - and we're to assume she left him standing at the altar. But who the hell would be foolish enough to even *think* of marrying such a jerk? I think the whole scenario unfolds in his head, as he's (again) imagining the high drama of being abandoned at the altar, being a lifelong martyr to this maimed and crippled love, etc. etc. etc. - --Jeff J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society www.uwm.edu/~jenor/ADS.html ::I suspect that the first dictator of this country will be called "Coach":: __William Gass__ ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 19:30:06 -0600 (CST) From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: RE: [loud-fans] Halstead and Merritt, or, Notes toward a syntactical deconstruction of inflated authorial ego On Mon, 28 Jan 2002, Chris Murtland wrote: > DUDE! Where did you find the lyrics for that??? The FBI? Nah, they're pretty easy to find, I'd imagine. For giggles, though, find the whole "Louie Louie" story at thesmokinggun.com... I think the real lyrics are there as well. Question: which came first: Richard Berry's "Louie Louie," or Chuck Berry's "Havana Moon"? > > |I hate to break it to you, Chris - but everything you said can > |be said in six words: "Louie, Louie - me gotta go." > | > |--Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 17:29:35 -0800 From: Tim_Walters@digidesign.com Subject: RE: [loud-fans] Halstead and Merritt, or, Notes toward a syntactical deconstruction of inflated authorial ego Up till now, I wasn't too fond of this thread--nit-picking a non-professional writer who probably had about thirty seconds to come up with something more interesting than "dude, it rocks", and with whom, as a pretentious and less-than-grammatical person, I identified deeply--but Chris' post just made it all worth while, and then some. Thank you, sir! ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 17:42:09 -0800 From: Elizabeth Setler Subject: [loud-fans] My favorite moment of 2001 We were on a summer vacation in Las Vegas, and we went to see Wayne Newton. Well, really, how could you not? The poor guy's voice is completely shot, but it was still one of the most purely entertaining evenings in my recent memory. When Wayne came out and greeted every single member of the audience individually while the band vamped for 20 minutes or so - well, I knew then what showmanship was all about. But that's beside the point. My favorite moment took place after Wayne gave a heartfelt speech about the people who have fought for this country, or any country, and affirmed his vow never to let the brave people of our military be forgotten as long as he has a public platform. He then played a special song in honor of the veterans in the crowd: Yes, "MacArthur Park." Let's just say we were pretty happy not to be within sight of the stage... - -- Elizabeth ------------------------------ End of loud-fans-digest V2 #41 ******************************