Two Miles Past Nowhere

making magic outta dogfood

Mon, 17 Dec 2012 23:26:24 -0600

So what that I started with jar of Trader Joe’s pesto and gluten free fusselli or fussili or fusillli…. that pasta that ooops, Seinfeld or someone accidentally fell on with his butt. yeah, right? anyway, after a slash of Tuscan extra virgin olive oil, some recently discovered but tough as leather sundried tomatoes, a diced up slice of fresh vine ripened tomater, then some minced up slices of fresh jalapeno all on top of some rinsed cannelloni beans… yummy. fibrous and hearty. but something’s missing. hazelnut oil! shhhh, my secret. of course pesto always had nuts in it… why not amp that up with some hazelnut oil? oooo, that’s what makes all of those pedestrian ingredients turn sparklingly… . . delish. mmmmmmmm

malcolmrattray: Chinese Whispers - Southern Roots in the...

Fri, 10 Aug 2012 00:45:04 -0500

malcolmrattray:

Chinese Whispers - Southern Roots in the Australian Swampy Sound

I just love that my film is out there and that I get to reblog it here! Thank you Malcolm Crowder-Rattray!

Elvis "Suspicious Minds" gone skronk

Fri, 11 May 2012 00:44:18 -0500

Elvis "Suspicious Minds" gone skronk:

Last month The Happy Valley Band tore apart and pasted back together a smattering of American pop classics on WFMU’s Miniature Minotaurs - among them Elvis P, the object of my thesis. First I sniggered. None of the musicians seem to be playing the same song, yet upon closer listen it works. I can’t explain concept any better than MM host Kurt Gottschalk:

“The Happy Valley Band is what happens when a computer discovers the Great American Songbook, tries its best to pick out the tunes by ear, then writes down what it hears and demands that human performers try to play it. Bandleader David Kant uses and abuses machine hearing technology and automated music transcription software to re-contextualize the voices of such American pop icons as Elvis Presley, Patsy Cline, and James Brown with full band accompaniment.”

so be brave… click that link!

Lent my support to the local music community

Mon, 19 Mar 2012 08:00:03 -0500

Lent my support to the local music community

How fans are killing music writing.

Sun, 19 Feb 2012 04:52:20 -0600

I don’t know why, six months after the fact, I’m thinking about an internship for which I interviewed but didn’t get. I’d much rather munch on this fiery plate of pad bin gagao… The truth is that I’m glad I took the class I would’ve dropped had I scored the position. Also, I’m glad I didn’t wind up writing for an editor who didn’t choose me because I’m not as big a fan as the other candidate. Yup, a fan. Never mind writing skills. Never mind a broad musical knowledge. Never mind a discerning ear. I lost out because I wasn’t as big a fan, and that right there could be why music journalism is become the arena for rah-rah milquetoast that it is.

If this is the prevailing attitude among editors, then is it any wonder that music mags that I once devoured have become regurgitation of hype sheets? Only on a one sheet does the artist’s shit never stink, but fewer mags are publishing content that wades into the sewery muck that characterizes classic music criticism. I can only imagine Lester Bangs issuing forth on today’s writers, “Cocksuckers!! The lot of them!”

As legendarily uncharming as Bangs could be, his prose endures. Psychotic Reactions and Carburetor Dung remains a classic collection of robo and amphetamine fueled reasoning and rants about the best and the worst of rock n’ roll. It wasn’t pretty, but damn, was it ever fun!

Even more ugly were the surgically snarly blurbs in David T. Lindsay’s Music Menu column that ran in Atlanta’s Creative Loafing during the 80s and 90s. From where I am on the other side of the world firm sweet Georgia, I can’t dish up examples, but far more often than not, if he hated the band, I hated it, too. His taste was so totally discerning, even if he expressed it it such a manner as to incur a weekly barrage of death threats on his answering machine. The thing is that I knew what he liked and what he didn’t like, and this was all I needed to decide on who to go see each weekend. He had a point of view, a commodity too damn rare in modern music writing.

Nearly twenty years after David T left that gig, I find myself losing out on another because I’m not a fan. What a cancerous quality to require of a writer. Fans love blindly. Fans cannot except that their idols can make a bad record. Fans shiver in excitement over the most mediocre efforts because they are star struck. That, my friends, is anathema to substantive critical thought. If this is the criteria that editors use to evaluate new writers, the music press has just stabbed the likes of Lester Bangs right through the heart.

Fans are kiss ass. Fans are pushovers. And fans are killing music journalism.

So…. anyone out there looking for cranky prose? I’m yer gal!

If I’ve been a little quiet lately, it’s because I...

Tue, 07 Feb 2012 08:17:46 -0600

If I’ve been a little quiet lately, it’s because I have lost my voice. If you happen to find it, please return post haste… har dee har har, right? Not so funny though. Becoming mute has eliminated my ability to conduct interviews. I can produce hardly a rasp. My vox is gone daddy gone. This loud mouthed broad’s silent to the core… until late this afternoon when I acquainted myself with senega and ammonia, a horrid home remedy. Going down, it has a somewhat tolerable bitter licorice flavor, but that ammonia finish is just putrid. Probably something like that rotting shark Icelandic folks like to snack on. I’m facing another dose, cringing over the expected flavors, but the stuff works. My voice is returning! And tons of gunk is moving around. I’m making the most unsociable noises, too, but the short version is that soonest I will have some fun stuff to report! So bottoms up!

Rolling out Parkes tomorrow thoroughly exhausted but deeply...

Wed, 18 Jan 2012 07:01:33 -0600

Rolling out Parkes tomorrow thoroughly exhausted but deeply touched by all of the hospitality. Yeah, sure the festival’s image of Elvis is strictly positive, the rockabilly outfits costumey, the fans mostly getting on up in years, but the earnest fun, the baby boomer giddiness, the silly joy is palpable out on Clarinda St, on the grass in Cooke Park, in pubs like the Broadeay Hotel, or on the sidewalk with buskers like Big Al. The festival is quirky, sermingly misplaced, a cultural non-sequitur, but the community’s collective effort to pull off an event that consumes pretty much the whole town. Even the very serious science minds CSIRO radio telescope 14 km north of town get in on the fun with a summer intern who’s jumpsuited like Elvis and greeting visitors and a float in the annual Elvis parade. The weekend smacks of Mayberry-esque innocence, and yet it seeps in past my city cynicism to leave me feeling rosy for having having made the trek. Parkes is a quiffy haven where fans indulge in nostalgia while they build real relationships built on the foundations from sharing their Elvis fandom.

Elvis and MLK Jr.

Mon, 16 Jan 2012 18:37:51 -0600

On MLK’s birthday here in Australia, I’m interviewing the people of Parkes about Elvis, and I’m fascinated by how many folks cite some Elvis relationship with MLK as evidence of how much Elvis did “for the races.” This narrative is a bit contrary to what I know. Must research… Thinking that I need to comb through Taylor Branch and Peter Guralnick, and especially Michael Bertrand. Meanwhile, does anyone have any insights?

A wee Elvis rips it out on the sidewalk at the Parkes Elvis...

Sun, 15 Jan 2012 14:07:04 -0600

A wee Elvis rips it out on the sidewalk at the Parkes Elvis Fest.

among the stampede of photogs getting snaps of Elvis acolytes...

Sat, 14 Jan 2012 23:33:45 -0600

among the stampede of photogs getting snaps of Elvis acolytes renewing their marriage vows.

Decaying Amusement Park

Sat, 14 Jan 2012 23:07:02 -0600

Decaying Amusement Park:

After playing around at 100 year old Luna Park in Melbourne, I started thinking how well that seaside amusement park had endured while the Six Flags down in Louisiana still sits fallow six years after Katrina’s rampage. The images are arresting….

with any luck...

Sat, 14 Jan 2012 02:56:55 -0600

with any luck...:

….will get to speak to the club president tonight.

Elvii do good works

Sat, 14 Jan 2012 00:10:12 -0600

Elvii do good works:

An Elvette hipped me to this campaign…

Parkes is not your average Elvis Fest!

Fri, 13 Jan 2012 23:08:01 -0600

Parkes is not your average Elvis Fest!

A little conversation, a little more action… All aboard...

Fri, 13 Jan 2012 00:31:17 -0600

A little conversation, a little more action… All aboard the Elvis Express!

Hunting up Elvis in the Australian Outback

Thu, 12 Jan 2012 02:46:09 -0600

So what’s a little Dixie miss doing so far south of the equator in Sydney, Orstraylia? It’s not like I got the Mason-Dixon confused with the zero latitudes. Instead, the King of Rock n’ Roll beckons. I’m headed to the Parkes Elvis Festival deep in New South Wales.

Tomorrow morning I’ll hop the CountryLink Elvis Express train at Sydney Central Station and immerse myself in a weekend of full on Elvisiana brimming with look-a-like contests, sound-a-like contests, an Elvis parade, buskers all over town, performers in parks, in pubs, on more formal stages all to celebrate Mississippi’s most famous son in a country where he never set foot.

Parkes leaders constructed the festival twenty years ago to boost the town’s’ rural economy. Attaching Elvis to the town’s place identity is sizable leap from its other claim to fame, the Dish. The subject of a quirky Australian rom com released in 2000, some local folk preferred to identify their home with the dignified and crucial role this radio receiving antenna played in televising the Apollo 11 moon landing. Some feel like Elvis does not represent Parkes in the best light while others revel in this annual gathering of Elvii. How the good people of Parkes currently feel about this weekend’s invasion of Elvis fans remains to be seen.

This is but one issue that merits examination. How fans interpret the image of Elvis, what kind of daily role Elvis plays in their lives, whether they identify him as an American Southerner or not are all among the questions for which I’ll be seeking answers. By comparing what I find in Parkes with scholarship about Ametican Elvis fans, I hope to draw some conclusions about how culture born in the American
South travels elsewhere, in this case, Australia.

After months of preparation, I am thrilled that tomorrow is the day I finally get a look. Hang tight! I promise to dish the deets as I take care of business in a flash!

gorgeous luk chup

Thu, 12 Jan 2012 02:11:05 -0600

gorgeous luk chup

Photo

Wed, 30 Nov 2011 14:53:24 -0600