From: owner-precious-things-digest@smoe.org (precious-things-digest) To: precious-things-digest@smoe.org Subject: precious-things-digest V12 #96 Reply-To: precious-things@smoe.org Sender: owner-precious-things-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-precious-things-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk X-To-Unsubscribe: Send mail to "precious-things-digest-request@smoe.org" X-To-Unsubscribe: with "unsubscribe" as the body. precious-things-digest Saturday, November 10 2007 Volume 12 : Number 096 Today's Subjects: ----------------- Re: [pt] pip and a gun [handal@r2d2.reverse.net (Richard Handal)] Re: [pt] pip and a gun ["Cyndi S Crawford" ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 9 Nov 2007 02:58:33 -0600 (CST) From: handal@r2d2.reverse.net (Richard Handal) Subject: Re: [pt] pip and a gun woj allowed: > http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uy3tZkvzAZE > > pip. > > me and a gun. > > with the band. > > with a knife. > > with a gun. > > discuss? Well *yeah*, now that I've managed to look and listen closely to the thing a couple times, and I'm not spending all day and night preparing for and going to a three-hour concert with Dweezil Zappa performing his late father's music, as I was on Wednesday. Dweezil is doing an excellent job of carrying on Frank's musical legacy, and he deserves to be proud of himself. He's clearly worked and studied hard, and I hope anybody who cares anything about FZ's music manages to see this incredibly talented and versatile band do this show. Big joy and celebration are in this show. Although he's extremely talented and a ready guitar hero, who, early on, studied his instrument with Steve Vai, Dweeze is no musical genius the way Ravi Shankar's daughter Anoushka is, but Frank's legacy is in excellent hands with Dweezil, as Ravi's will be in the hands of Anoushka when he's gone. And despite Tori's protests concerning growing old and not feeling that she can keep the quality of her concerts where she wants it, Ravi is still touring at 87 1/2 years of age. I saw Ravi and Anoushka on 13th October at the Kennedy Center, and even though it's clear he's not quite his formerly spry self onstage, he still taps into the place where the music is and allows it express itself through him, and there's plenty of value in his performances to this day. I would hope that Tori finds such inspiration in herself for many more years. To Chicago and the Vic. One must have some understanding of the archetype that Athena manifests, to be able to look deep into this performance. Jean Bolen's Goddesses in Everywoman serves as the best possible Rosetta Stone for decoding this album, so let's see what she says in her section on Athena (Roman equivalent Minerva). This will barely scratch the surface of the 30-some pages in Bolen's Athena chapter, but enough can be quickly touched upon to provide the tools to be able to drill down into what's going on in this performance. Athena was traditionally portrayed wearing armor, and was the only Olympian goddess so outfitted. She typically wore a helmet "pushed back to reveal her beauty," had a shield on her arm, and carried a spear. http://goddess-athena.org/Museum/Sculptures/Alone/Athena_from_Aegina_x.htm http://goddess-athena.org/Museum/Sculptures/Alone/Athena_bronze_statue_600_BCE_x.htm http://goddess-athena.org/Museum/Sculptures/Alone/Minerva_Etruscan_bronze_x.htm http://goddess-athena.org/Museum/Sculptures/Alone/Athena_Promachos_bronze_x.htm http://goddess-athena.org/Museum/Sculptures/Alone/Lemnia/index.htm http://goddess-athena.org/Museum/Sculptures/Alone/Lemnia/Lemnia_Dresden_rec_right.html http://goddess-athena.org/Museum/Sculptures/Alone/Athena_Giustiniani_x.htm http://goddess-athena.org/Museum/Sculptures/Alone/Athena_bronze_candelabrum_x.htm http://goddess-athena.org/Museum/Sculptures/Alone/Athena_Casa_Pilatos_Seville_Spain_x.htm http://www.caspercomsci.com/images/greece/athens07.jpg Athena was "the father's daughter," and drawn to men with great power and authority. One can even say that she was a defender of the patriarchy. She was a virgin goddess, and wanted to remain so. In wartime, she presided over battle strategy, and in peacetime, over domestic arts. Very Martha Stewart. Not given to emotion, but as Goddess of Wisdom, Athena was more interested in "winning strategies and practical solutions." Athena could intimidate people into inaction, which Bolen calls "the Medusa effect." Tori's Pip represents Athena's armor and shield with her leather outfit, the helmet with the way she has her hair, and she's an intimidating character. The large knife Pip pulled out during Me and a Gun in Chicago has its equivalent in Athena's spear. So that gets us to a starting point to talk about this Chicago Gun with the band on Tuesday. The arrangement seemed entirely appropriate and expressive of the essence of the song: the constant squeal and the increasingly dissonant drone of the guitar, punctuated with full body shots from Jon on the bass. An extremely tense and foreboding space is created. The most startling aspect of this version surely would have been the mere fact of instruments being involved--let alone in this manner--were not all of this overshadowed by the use of the weapons. When she sings "I must get out of this" for the first time, she then pulls the knife out from the piano. [at 3:12] Before she's done with the knife, she's held it up to herself, she's wiped both sides of the blade on her pantleg, and she's brought it up to her crotch. Powerful stuff. Surely all of this will tend to invoke the memory of being held at the point of a weapon for anyone who's been in that situation. As much as Gun has served over the years to trigger emotional flashbacks for many people who have been in the circumstances the song recreates, this further upped the ante. Tori is meaning to startle people into strong emotional resonances on this tour and with this album, and this Gun seems to have struck quite a nerve with some. But then she raises the stakes higher still, for after the second "must get out of this," she pulls out a gun from the piano. She proceeds to point the thing at herself. She had been targeting *herself* with the knife, and now she does it with the pistol. [4:27] I can't imagine the emotional response through a sense of recognition that some people who've been through anything similar are having at this, especially those who are in the room, and in combination with that opening salvo of Cruel . As Athena would protect the patriarchy, Pip is now doing so, and at her own peril and diminution. She's using her innate Athena aspects *on* herself. Finally, after the last time of "I must get out of this," Pip pulls the gun away from aiming it at herself and aims it outward, *away* from herself. [5:02] She has decided to stop blaming and hurting herself, and she found the strength deep inside to defend herself from being attacked, rather than being complicit with the attack and the attacker. Having realized own strength, she can now overturn the Stockholm Syndrome. She's renounced her domination by the patriarchy, and she has come at last to look to herself for her own security: this performance of Me and a Gun has turned into an act of personal acceptance and redemption. End of Pip's set. These little plays in the opening sets won't be winning any acting awards, but this is also by design. They seem by-the-numbers; actions are carried out in exaggerated ways, as if they were going on in a dream. This is entirely appropriate. Her aim is to portray psychological structures in a symbolic way which encourages the mind to respond to their familiarity. Those who don't perceive why Picasso is painting people with polygon punim instead of going for high realism won't get this, and it will seem to be a child playing with crayons rather than a talented artist and her palette. I doubt Tori minds, as she must know that some people are being affected--even transformed--by this art. Be seeing you, Richard Handal, H.G. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 9 Nov 2007 19:40:53 GMT From: "Cyndi S Crawford" Subject: Re: [pt] pip and a gun Richard, you have given us a LOT of stuff to soak in and ponder over. VERY insightful stuff, I might add. I can say that I was quite pleased (once I got past the shock of it all) with how this arrangement turned out, but then I AM someone who likes to see people try new things with old songs. :) but it really did shock the hell out of me. I could not BELIEVE what I was seeing. the way she stood, all the way down to the props.. seemed to drip with seething, raging anger. I mean, DAMN. (been VERY busy with school lately--hence my semi-lurkdom...) - -- Cyndi S. Crawford ------------------------------ End of precious-things-digest V12 #96 *************************************