Pazz Jop, Part Twa: Friendly Critics, Critical Friends

You can rely on your own tribe for only so long.

I could get the Jerry Garcia and Bob Weir solo albums because I was already a Deadhead, but maybe I should have stopped before getting to Mickey Hart - a great drummer, but maybe I didn’t need to have yet another version of “Playing in the Band”.

And known territory was by definite safe.  Too safe.

I forayed into singer-songwriter territory via Jackson Browne, scoring a win with Warren Zevon, and what seemed like a win at the time with Dan Fogelberg (it was good to get that off my chest). I barely missed the rest, thank god.

But this was just making me more knowledgeable about the types of music I already liked. I sensed there was more, and so began to check out some of the popular rock magazines of the day.

I’d like to say that I only got the coolest ones, but there were more than a few “16” magazines lying around from my Monkees days. (I didn’t know "16" was meant for girls, I swear!)

I had to be careful which magazines I brought home because some had dirty words in them. Plus they cost money.

First there was Circus, which was full of puff pieces on whoever was “in” at the time. You know, kind of like how Rolling Stone is now.  But they did have a decent review section.

Then there was Rolling Stone, Creem and Crawdaddy. They were less juvenile, which is what I wanted, even if I was still one myself.

I’d notice the ads for records. There would be quotes that sometimes caught my attention, like "Springsteen is a truly great songwriter", "Little Feat are the best band in America" or Elliot Murphy's Aquashow being compared to Blonde on Blonde.

And I'd read reviews, which, at the time, I took at face value. As dumb as it is to say now, I assumed that one review would be the same as another - that there was a universal standard being applying to the music, instead of the reviewer's subjective taste.

So I’d get some records that would annoy people, and take heat for “listening to critics” - unfairly, I think, since I never “decided to like something” because of a review I read.

Advice, whether it comes from a friend or a critic, may get you to buy a record, but it won’t get you to like it. So is reading a critic any worse than listening to a friend’s advice?  Admit it, it’s usually better.

Were those critics “reliable”? It depends what you expect to get. If you think reading someone’s opinion of a record is going to infallibly predict your own reaction to it, then no. But if you read one looking for evidence that the person listened to the record more than a couple of times, thought about it, and formed coherent thoughts about it, then yes, you can find someone “reliable”, assuming you understand that there’s ultimately no accounting for taste. But if you look for a way of thinking that rings true to you, then you’re on safer ground.

And if you aren’t into opera, but find yourself reading Opera Digest (Why? I don’t know.  You tell me. But hey man, hat's off to you.) don’t buy the record that is “the best opera record of the year”. Get the “ideal introduction to opera” instead.

If anything, I was more likely to fool myself into liking something because I liked that artist’s previous work. Like most young people, I was looking for heroes, and tried to convince myself that everything they did was “great”.

Another viewpoint is valuable to shake you out of such thinking. Maybe the best thing is to find a critic who will tell you that everything you thought before was wrong.

Next: Hearing Voices

Pazz, Jop, Spreadsheet, Etc: Part Duh - Get a Job!

When I turned sixteen, I finally broke down and got a job, like my Mom wanted.

She’d been pestering me for so long that it never occurred to me what I'd do with the money once I made it. If she'd have thought of the music angle I would have dropped out of kindergarten. 

At the time, my brother and I had, at most, 40 albums, so getting a new one every couple of weeks would be. Just. Awesome. (In the pre 21st century - and as such, undiluted - version of the word. And I'm a prime diluter - nowadays I'll call a halfway cold beer awesome.)

I could more or less buy whatever records I wanted so long as I didn’t go off the deep end. I didn’t want another comic purge.

But which ones did I want? It was getting harder to find out.

When you bought a single you knew exactly what you were getting. With an LP who really knew?  How to find out?

Should I have counted on friends to point me to certain bands? I guess so, if I ended up liking the music. And that if was getting bigger all the time because everyone was breaking up into their own different musical tribes (Led Zeppelin, Allman Brothers, 70s Soul, etc.) and it didn’t look like we’d all be reuniting any time soon.

Next: Frying, Fires, or Good-Bye Mom, Hello Robert Christgau

Pazz and Jop Made Me Do It!, or The Spreadsheet: Part One

In between beers the other night, Nutboy and I were talking about how we go about deciding what records to buy. As I’ve said before, Nutboy is a jump-right-in kind of guy, so he gets what he feels like when he feels like it.

“What about you?” he asked.

I was doing some hemming and hawing when he helped me to the end of my thought.

“Oh, you do your research.” And left it at that.

He was being kind. Totally non-judgmental. But even without any sarcasm attached to it, the word was loaded with negative connotations. You could almost hear someone say “Research?”Really, Jaybee? It’s only pop music, for God’s sake!

Now those are fighting words, but since they were only taking place in my head, I kept my cool. Besides, Nutboy might not understand why I was suddenly punching myself in the face, even if Bob Dylan and Jane’s Addiction recommended it.

I quickly changed the subject (How about those Beatles, eh?) and we ended up having a fine old time. But afterwards, over a breakfast beer, I realized that I had to face this dark secret of mine and come clean.

It's something I've very vaguely alluded to a while back.  But now it’s time for me to confess - to explain how I buy records. This will be painful for me - possibly worse for you.

It's about the spreadsheet.


Radio, Radio:

Let's start back before the Stone Age, when I was a child.

From about 1965 to 1969, you could count on the local AM pop stations to play great music, so there was no effort involved in finding it. All you did was turn on the radio.

I don't remember hearing a bad song on the radio until at least 1970. “For the Love of Him” by Bobbi Martin, comes to mind. Hearing it now, it’s really not so bad, even if it has the distinction of being like the first rat signaling the start of the bubonic plague.

And soon there were more, and more. Bad records were crowding out good ones. If I wanted to hear good music, I’d have to actively seek it out. I started impatiently switching back and forth between those two pop stations, trying to find something I liked. I was doing it so much that I didn't even have to look at the dial anymore.

By now I was thirteen, and if I heard a song I really loved and had some spending money – two big ifs at the time - I could buy a single.

Finally, the Partridge Family and Osmond Brothers - clans that have wreaked more havoc than the Corleones - chased me from the AM dial altogether. I’d been checking out FM by then anyway, and was hearing more album oriented music, which was, almost by definition, more hit or miss. (Or maybe my tastes were becoming more rigid. Ask Bobbi Martin.)

And LPs cost more, so I’d really have to save up if I wanted one. It was getting harder to hear something I liked and harder to buy it when I did.


Cliffhanger alert:

Voice of the Narrator (Me): With good music and money in short supply what will our hero do? What will he do!?!

Voice of Jaybee’s Mom, circa 1973: Get a job, that’s what he’ll do, if I have any say in the matter!

Jaybee: Aw Ma, you ruined the cliffhanger ending!

Jaybee’s Mom: So it that what you’re doing while I’m here working my fingers to the bone? Hangin’ off cliffs? You have a fine head on you for that now, don’t you? And how much do they pay you for that anyhow? When I was your age….

Jaybee: CUT!!!!

Coming up: Jobs, Quotes, Critics, Friends and Hearing Voices
That is, if it’s okay with my mom.

Harper's Bizarro

It was only March of 2011 and there was Deerhunter’s Halcyon Digest already in the used CD bin at Other Music. How did that happen? It had done so well in the 2010 year-end polls! I ended up loving it, too.

But someone's loss is my gain. And while that’s the principal behind Used CD Bins, you usually have to do some digging to get any gold.  Not so this time, but that’s Other Music for you.

My local music store - no longer in business – had a huge selection, so you had to do a lot of digging. And even so, most of the time you wouldn’t find anything. Their batting average was, at best,.215. After a while, I decided that it wasn’t worth it.

Mostly because I didn’t want to be the guy (even though I already know I am the guy) that you can see through the store window as you pass by on a sunny day, on your way to having a life, while he’s/I’m going through those cruddy bins. You want to scream “Get a life (you cheap bastard)!” at him/me. But I’m there anyway.

On the other hand, Other Music’s selection is smaller, and yet its batting average is at least .400. Win, win, right? Well, no. Other Music has its own set of issues.

When you really think about it, what does it mean that I end up buying so many used CDs from Other Music?  Basically, what they – those hip young customers of Other Music – are saying to me is Old man, your music is lame. That’s why we get rid of it. Which means that I’m lame because I buy it. I mean, is it ever cool to take other people’s rejects? Of anything?

So let me offer my rationale/defense for this pathetic pastime, disguised as a Theory:

The Bizarro Theory:

In a nutshell, it’s this: Used CD bins serve as portals to the Bizarro world.

I admit it’s a stretch but hear me out. What do you usually find in the typical bin anyway?

• Obvious Crap makes up the vast majority of the CDs. You have to wonder why people bought them to begin with. Mundane Theory: They were gifts, from people who didn’t like them. The music sucked. It got returned. Weird Theory: These people really don’t like music, and they hadn’t yet accepted this about themselves. (Who can blame them?) So they bought a random CD to find out. And they found out. My advice? Treat them like lepers. (Trust me. Jesus was wrong on this one.) Anyway, these CDs don’t get to the portal. They don’t go anywhere. They just sit there forever until another gift giver/music hater comes along.
• Popular -and thus less obvious - Crap makes up another significant chunk. The buyer wised up a little too late.  My advice: Laugh at them for believing the hype, just to show off how cool you are. But first try to con them out of some of their obviously disposable income. These CDs don’t get to the portal either. They actually get bought by other morons. Take their money, too.
• CDs I Already Own. These CDs do go through the portal. It’s just that I’m a schmuck for not waiting little longer for them to show up. I end up paying good money where, if I just waited a bit, I could have gotten them cheaper. Or, I can blame it on Bizarro Jaybee. Did I not mention Bizarro Jaybee? Well if there’s a Bizarro world, there’s got to be a Bizarro Jaybee, right? Come on! Try to keep up. Anyway, Bizarro Jaybee showed up a little late on these.
• The Ones I Buy.  Bizarro Jaybee – stupid and not very good looking, but somehow successful with women – buys CDs, hates them and returns them to Other Music, where they slip through the portal. I go there and buy them. Ipso Facto. Case Closed. E pluribus unum!

I suppose that I should be holding up my end of the bargain and selling the records I hate, so that Bizarro Jaybee can have something to listen to, but it takes me way too long to hate something.  (Not an issue with people, though.) 

But when I really really think about it, I realize that Bizarro Jaybee hates music!

You know what they call people in the Bizarro World who hate music?

Saints.

Time for My New Years Resolutions!

Now that it's almost April, it’s probably safe to publish my New Year’s Resolutions. I’ve come a long way – I used to do this in December.

Which is still how I handle Lent, by the way.  While all my relatives are bragging about what they’re giving up, and making everyone else miserable in the process, I am silent.

It’s not that I’m not giving anything up. It’s just that I won’t know what it is until Lent is over. So I wait until Easter Sunday, and then look back on how I spent Lent, trying to think of all the things I apparently gave up by not doing.

I compile this list that looks something like this:

Going to Mass

Eating caviar

Helping with the dishes

Drinking Pabst Blue Ribbon

Skydiving

Eating fruits and vegetables

I could go on, but you get the idea. I find my list far more impressive than those who go into Lent merely giving up alcohol, caffeine or sex.  One thing. Big deal!

But when it comes to something as important as music, I'm willing to be more proactive, and share my goals a little earlier. In that spirit, here’s my New Year's resolutions, along with how I'm doing with them:

More Downloads, Fewer CDs: It’s been hard for me to make the transition from actual solid CDs to virtual music. But a lack of actual space and a need to feel less than ninety years old has prompted me to download more.

Status: Going like a mofo! No problem here at all.  I watch the monthly Amazon “100 $5 downloads” like a hawk on the first of every month. Of 7 actual albums I've gotten, 3 were downloaded.  If you count it by CDs, it’s 6 out of ten. A-

This, in turn, will enable with this, my other resolution, which is to:

Get More Current Music: I must say I really do miss those times when I was at one with the zeitgeist – working at the college radio station, hearing all the new releases before everyone else did. Or in 1981 when love was in the air, Elvis C was putting out a record every other month and I would actually go to shows.

Status: I’ve been really falling down on the job here, and Nutboy is all over me about it. So far, of those six records, NONE are from this year, and a grand total of ONE was from last year. The rest? 2002, 1977, 1969, 1935 and, uh, 1923. So I’m kind of sucking at this. But, unlike me, the year is still young. 

The same for books, by the way – more current stuff.  I won’t go into my "Western Civilization Project" here, except to say that it works against this resolution. But just like music, it would be nice to be more in touch with the culture by reading the newer books.  Like music, it’s riskier - none of the current stuff has really stood the test of time yet. But I’ve gotten uncomfortable with the old fogey-ish habits I’ve fallen into. 

Status: C, but working on it. Maybe that’s the difference between the old fogey and the geezer.  The geezer’s trying.

And that’s it. 

You want more?  Oh, I would have included things like being a better person and all that, but my wife and kids are about ready to kill me in my sleep anyway, so, really, why bother?

And besides, look how well I do with Lent?

Joe Versus the Volcano

With Jaybee in the role of the volcano.

A while back, Flavorwire recently ran a fun article about famous feuds between journalist and musicians.

I tend to side with the musicians in these things because, well, without the music, what would anyone be writing about and thus, feuding over?

Voice of my conscience: Oh, really Jaybee? Aren’t you forgetting something???

Oh yeah, there was that time Joe Jackson and I had some words…

VOMC: Words, Jaybee? Words?

Well, yeah. It was like this…

It was 1979 and I’m with my friends at a local club to hear the then hot-new-wave singer-songwriter-angry-young-man-kind-of-like-Elvis-Costello Joe Jackson. You know Joe. He’s the guy who did “Is She Really Going Out with Him?” (I loved “Sunday Papers” myself.) He’d just come out with his second album I’m The Man and was touring the States when he came to my town. I was more of an Elvis fan, but when my friends suggested going I was in.

Now Joe had this song on his first album called “Fools in Love”, whose reggae-ish arrangement really reminded me (and some other people) of Elvis’s “Watching the Detectives”. But, hey no one’s perfect.

In retrospect, I was just a dumb kid who noticed one obvious similarity between two songs, and acted as if I found the cure for polio. Ironically, if I knew a little more about reggae at the time, I would have noted this as, at most, a minor stylistic similarity and moved on.

But I didn’t.

We miraculously got seats right near the front and were enjoying the first part of the set, when I heard the band tuning up for “Fools in Love”. So I figured it was time for someone to be an asshole, and that it might as well be me. So I called out for “Watching the Detectives”.

I got a good laugh from the crowd, if I do say so myself. And Joe knew I got him pretty good. But these show biz types didn’t get to where they were without knowing how to deal with hecklers. Joe’s reply? He said, “In every bed of roses, there’s always got to be one prick.” And he got an even bigger laugh. As they say, Oh snap!

I didn’t mind. I had just rubbed shoulders with a famous person, and like Mark David Chapman, I figured any kind of shoulder-rubbing was good. (Too soon?)

And that’s it.

So, okay, it doesn’t quite qualify as a feud, and hence didn’t make the article.

But I’m certain that I’ve had a profound impact on Joe’s life – after all he sounds nothing like Elvis now. So I hope that on balance, he feels he’s done as well by me as I’ve done by him, and that he’s gotten past any hard feelings he may have had. Ain’t no thang, as Omar might say.

And me? I’m doing fine. While no one’s stopped me on the street to ask if I’m the guy who said that thing to Joe Jackson, it only has been thirty years.

R.I.P. Davey Jones

I prefer to not repeat myself, but the death of Davey Jones's death warrants it.

Suffice to say that the Monkees had a huge impact on my childhood, and the music turned out to be far more durable that I ever would have thought.

This was brought home to me over the summer, when I was lucky enough to see them play one last time. Putting aside the fact that I was surrounded by a bunch of old people, it was a wonderful show, and I had a great time.

So I'll simply pay homage to the Monkees, and Davey in particular, by repeating an earlier post and pointing you to what I think are Davey's best performances with them.

First, an obvious one:
"A Little Bit Me, A Little Bit You"

Then a Neil Diamond song to which Davey unexpectedly brings the necessary testicular fortitude:
"Look Out Here Comes Tomorrow"

And my personal favorite, something that's sweet, but not sickly so:
"When Love Comes Knocking at Your Door"

RIP Davey.   For a while there, along with the Beatles, you made us all wish we were British.