Meanwhile... Pt. 1

[Lone Ranger]

So...I'm in the hospital right now. My second baby daughter was born yesterday. Lucky we have an off-topic thread where I can share such news :)

Wonderful news - congratulations!

[dan bailey]

I didn't realize the significance of "Meanwhile ...", having been away from comics during Giordano's reign.

Now, if you'd used "Stan's Soapbox" or "Bulletin Bulletins" or "Direct Currents" ...

[The Confessor]

It's probably best if I steer clear of that conversation. If you think politics and religion present a potential minefield, just wait til dan and I get started. The man badmouths the Eagles, fer gosh sakes! How can I possibly address that level of irrationality???

Believe me, you've never really heard me badmouth the Eagles ... you just think you have. What you've seen from me here amounts to mash notes to those purveyors of puked-up pablum.

The thing is, as a lover of pretty much everything West Coast, early '70s and countrty-rock flavoured, I rather unsurprisingly like The Eagles. However, I can also totally understand what people dislike about them; The accusations of playing watered down, over produced, slick and soulless country-rock for the AOR masses are all justified, but they do it sooooooo well. Sure, there were other country-rock bands of the same era that arguably did it better and with more authenticity (Poco and Pure Praire League, I'm looking at you) but nonetheless, The Eagles' were no slouches: they were a formidable live act and their own, self-penned material was undeniably strong.

I would qualify the above by adding that for me, the essential Eagles is to be found on those first four albums (The Eagles, Desperado, On The Border and One Of These Nights), when Bernie Leadon was still in the band. As a former member of country-rock pioneers The Flying Burrito Brothers and Dillard & Clark, Leadon helped to keep the country/bluegrass influences to the fore during the early part of The Eagles' career...something that they sadly lacked after he left IMO.

However, knowing what I do about Mr. Dan Bailey's musical tastes, it's not too surprising to find that he's not an Eagles fan. But I would just say that although The Eagles are about as far away from the raucous rock 'n' roll spirit of punk rock as you can get, I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing in and of itself. Personally, I can really appreciate the technical excellence of their ensemble playing, their harmony singing and the immaculate production on their records in exactly the same way as I can appreciate the full-bore rock 'n' roll attitude and snotty-nosed arrogance of The Stooges or the Sex Pistols.

[dan bailey]

Being from Idaho I have a lot of interest in the Wobblies. Spent a lot of time studying the Stuenenberg murder trial.

Note to self: Pick Big Trouble back up & finish it, already. Though since it's been more than a decade since I gave out halfway through, something tells me I'll have to start back at the beginning.

[The Confessor]

So...I'm in the hospital right now. My second baby daughter was born yesterday. Lucky we have an off-topic thread where I can share such news :)

Great news, shaxper! Congratulations on the new arrival. All the best to you and yours.

[Slam_Bradley]

Note to self: Pick Big Trouble back up & finish it, already. Though since it's been more than a decade since I gave out halfway through, something tells me I'll have to start back at the beginning.

It's a very dense and comprehensive book. But it's generally a good read and it's as complete and readable a book as you'll find on the subject.

[dan bailey]

However, knowing what I do about Mr. Dan Bailey's musical tastes, it's not too surprising to find that he's not an Eagles fan. But I would just say that although The Eagles are about as far away from the raucous rock 'n' roll spirit of punk rock as you can get, I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing in and of itself. Personally, I can really appreciate the technical excellence of their ensemble playing, their harmony singing and the immaculate production on their records in exactly the same way as I can appreciate the full-bore rock 'n' roll attitude and snotty-nosed arrogance of The Stooges or the Sex Pistols.

Actually, I like loads of stuff that's probably "about as far away from the raucous rock 'n' roll spirit of punk rock as you can get" -- see my previous aside about having cut my teeth on radio r&b as much as anything when I was 10-13 or so -- but ... nope. Not the Eagles.

Maybe if I hadn't been around during their reign of error (which of course is attributable entirely to the brainless drugged-up automatons who were running radio), when they were pretty much exemplifying the "poor poor pitiful millionaire me" "I'm a tortured artiste" "pass the cocaine, why don'tcha?" school of West Coast navel-gazing back then ... but I was, & they were.

Anything's possible, I suppose. I mean, about 12 years ago I would've said much the same about Meatwood Flack (minus the West Coast-isms, for the most part), but ... heck ... Rumours wasn't godawful, after all. Even though Doug Moench's inability to write a single issue of MOKF back in the day without mooning over the lyrics still strikes me as absolutely cringeworthy. (I like to think I'd be saying the same if his object of obsession had been Pink Flag or Crossing the Red Sea with the Adverts instead ... probably not, though.)

The Eagles, though? Pretty sure it's not gonna happen. Though I do own a used 7" of Don Henley's "All She Wants to Do is Dance." Good song.

[dan bailey]

Is that some sort of sweet wine?

I'd say so. It's probably a couple of steps up (along, I suppose, with the similarly intentioned Mogen David) from the out-&-out "pop wines" of my youth (that I never sampled, purely for lack of opportunity) like Boone's Farm or Annie Green Springs.

[The Confessor]

Maybe if I hadn't been around during their reign of error (which of course is attributable entirely to the brainless drugged-up automatons who were running radio), when they were pretty much exemplifying the "poor poor pitiful millionaire me" "I'm a tortured artiste" "pass the cocaine, why don'tcha?" school of West Coast navel-gazing back then ... but I was, & they were.

Yeah, I can totally see that, but then there were a lot of those naval-gazing, singer-songwriter bands/artists around back then. As an outgrowth of the whole West Coast psychedelic scene (which I love), I think it was OK up to a point (see early Crosby, Stills & Nash or Joni Mitchell albums) but it all started to wear a bit thin and become a bit annoying at the '70s progressed. As an aside Dan, do you like any of the bands or artists from that confessional singer-songwriter era at all?

Anything's possible, I suppose. I mean, about 12 years ago I would've said much the same about Meatwood Flack (minus the West Coast-isms, for the most part), but ... heck ... Rumours wasn't godawful, after all.

Yeah, I love the fact that my musical tastes have changed over the years. It's a revelatory experience when you suddenly start to hear acts that you may've totally dismissed in the past in a completely new light. Just lately, I've been really enjoying **gulp** UB40's first album Signing Off, which is an absolute gem. However, if you'd have mentioned UB40 to me just 6 months ago, I would've launched into an angry rant about how they represent the worst kind of light-weight, karaoke-style reggae. To be honest, I'd probably still give you the same rant today but with the caveat that their first couple of albums are really worth checking out because they capture the band while they were still a pretty authentic sounding, angry young reggae band.

Fleetwood Mac's Rumours on the other hand...I never could get into that I'm afraid. For me, Fleetwood Mac begins and ends with Peter Green.

Though I do own a used 7" of Don Henley's "All She Wants to Do is Dance." Good song.

Yeah, it is a good song. The whole Building The Perfect Beast album (from which that single is drawn) is well worth checking out actually.

[dan bailey]

As an aside Dan, do you like any of the bands or artists from that confessional singer-songwriter era at all?

Certainly none I can think of. I'm pretty sure Excitable Boy-era Warren Zevon doesn't count.

Yeah, I love the fact that my musical tastes have changed over the years. It's a revelatory experience when you suddenly start to hear acts that you may've totally dismissed in the past in a completely new light. Just lately, I've been really enjoying **gulp** UB40's first album Signing Off, which is an absolute gem. However, if you'd have mentioned UB40 to me just 6 months ago, I would've launched into an angry rant about how they represent the worst kind of light-weight, karaoke-style reggae. To be honest, I'd probably still give you the same rant today but with the caveat that their first couple of albums are really worth checking out because they capture the band while they were still a pretty authentic sounding, angry young reggae band.

I remember liking Signing Off OK (not sure I know their 2nd album), not that reggae by & large is really my cup of tea (& not, as you allude to, that UB40 is necessarily reggae by & large ...), after a friend dubbed the then-newish vinyl for me back in ... '81, probably. Can't remember offhand what was on the LP proper vs. what was on the U.S. bonus 12" (which tracks are also included on the CD, I'm pretty sure; I ended up picking it up used a couple of decades later), but I know that at least a couple of tracks really resonated with me -- "Madame Medusa" comes immediately.

Also, anyone who records a track called "The Earth Dies Screaming" (which is how I first encountered the band, in the form of the UK singles listings in Billboard, which I used to devour every week at the little record store in my podunk college town) is going to get the benefit of the doubt from me, given the relative excellence of that little movie (not that I ever saw it till I obtained a bootleg VHS about 7 years ago).

(See also: Dead Cowboys' title track, I believe, from Twin Evil Stars, almost certainly my favorite album of the last decade [& highly, highly recommended to any fans of alt-country, along with their first album, Comings & Goings], with the great line "I used to dream of flying/But now the Earth dies screaming" ... "Dream of Flying" was the B-side of the 3rd single by the band's original incarnation-of-sorts, The Room; the A-side, of course, was "Things Have Learnt to Walk That Ought to Crawl," taken straight from one of my favorite early Lovecraft short stores, "The Festival.")

(But I digress far more than usual, even ...)

Fleetwood Mac's Rumours on the other hand...I never could get into that I'm afraid. For me, Fleetwood Mac begins and ends with Peter Green.

Only thing I know earlier FM by is the extraordinarily atypical B-side "Somebody's Gonna Kick Their Head Kicked In Tonight," which of course I assumed for decades was an original by Scotland's Rezillos.

[Simon Garth]

Aches and pains of increasing age: after 3 or 4 years of achilles troubles, now my knee is playing up again (there seems to be a theme here) - I really need to get that looked at while I've still got private medical

Booze: Very limited consumption for about 20 years now. A (British) gallon of lager once a month with old friends, and the occasional bottle of Brahma at home, that's about it

Tattoos: No thanks, horrid things. I'd rather listen to the Eagles and Fleetwood Mac. Which brings me to...

Music for pleasure: Somewhat to my surprise, at the moment I'm rediscovering the joys of Pink Floyd (Meddle to Animals era), though my faves are still the mighty Dead Kennedys. Love me some Blues, lots of "alternative rock", lots of African and Indian music, and, oh, just loads of bands, maaaan.

Shaxper: Congratulations, dude!

[dan bailey]

[my faves are still the mighty Dead Kennedys.

I've mentioned before, have I not, that when they played Phoenix for the first time at a mariachi bar in 8/82, yours truly took a stage-diving Jello Biafra's knee upside the head?

Saw 'em again about a year later at the semi-fabled Mad Gardens (Madison Square Garden, normally a wrestling arena in the really bad part of town; the bands set up & played in the middle of the ring, & after a couple of years chainlink fences were erected from floor to ceiling the keep the more energetic fans out), & then again about a year after that in Dallas as the "Rock Against Reagan" tour headliners, playing a blistering set outside the venue at which the Republicans were buy inaugurated the old fraud (Reagan, not Biafra) for a 2nd term.

Got a load of photos from their set & its immediate predecessors & taped them as well (Cause for Alarm & BGK, anyway ... unfortunately, I had the settings wrong & didn't get a single note by Reagan Youth before them).

Wish I'd done the same during the afternoon's initial act, some little folkie no one paid any attention to, because a few years later I put 2+2 together & realized it was almost certainly Michelle Shocked ... as she confirmed when I asked her about it after her Little Rock show about a dozen years later. I could've come out with The Texas Campfire Capes a couple of years before the fact & become some sort of music-biz parasite!

Good times, as the kids say.

[adam_warlock_2099]

Prince had quite a run, from roughly 1980-1990, I guess. Hearing his single "Controversy" on the "urban" AM station (along with not having a/c, my '73 Corolla also didn't have FM) shortly after I moved to Phoenix in late summer of '81 was singlehandedly responsible for reviving my interest in soul, funk etc. (I'd listened to loads of r&b on the radio as a kid in the late '60s & early '70s) after 3-plus years of complete immersion in punk, postpunk & New Wave.

I've enjoyed everything from Prince to Crystal Ball. While Crystal Ball wasn't anything chronological but a lot of unreleased and B side and alternate version of already released songs, it was good. "The Truth" the four disc in the collection was fair, but started to show his colors about his immersion in his new religion. WHile "Old Friends 4 Sale" was strong, it again had a twinge of his religious ambitions in it, but still had a lot of the heavily sexualized glam rock that he was so good at. I enjoyed 2 songs on "The Rainbow Children" but after that album, it slipped surprisingly fast. To the point that the concert of "Rave Un2 The Joy Fantastic" my wife bought me on DVD he dudded "the Christ" for the "the Cross" in "The Cross" furthering his religious ambitions with his music. Though I admit I was surprised I enjoyed his remake of Tommy James & THe Shondels' "Crimson and Clover" on his album "Lotus Flower".

At any rate, for about 2 1/2 decades, I consumed music like I do comics these days. Since late '04, more or less, I've probably spent less time listening (& fewer dollars obtaining) music in the intervening 6 1/2 years than I used to in, probably, a month. Depression almost certainly played a part in that, especially since loss of interest in something that previously gave one pleasure is a tell-tale sign of the syndrome, though part of it might be that at some point I had to stop serving two masters, as it were, & chose to give in to comics instead for the first time in ... 2 1/2 decades. At any rate, I've compared it before to probably almost being tantamount to losing one of one's senses ... The last few weeks, though, I've begun bouncing back somewhat as far as taking an interest in new (to me, anyway) stuff, so we'll see.

Oh, yeah -- iPod shuffle? You kids & your silly gadgets. I'm as interested in listening to music on anything but my stereo or ghetto blaster as I am in reading comics on a computer screen -- not at all.

I certainly understand that...money is limited.

I bought it for my wife two years ago. It convient to take with me and drowned out the sound of the drones in WalMart when I have to go. I really need to buy me a turntable, I still have a lot of 45 that my mother gave me when I moved out.

I've definitely got an addictive personality -- my house is filled very nearly to capacity with the evidence of that -- but for some reason it's never extended to anything ingestible. Luck of the draw, I guess.

(And in recounting above what I used to drink, I see I neglected to cite hard cider. It's sort of like beer, if beer were palatable.)

I do too, and part of the reason I don't seek out trying other drugs. I kicked tobacco about a year ago on a can a day habit of snuff. While beer is still my master, I have no idiot thoughts that I can handle addiction to another drug. Both physically and financially.

As far as other things, I do obsess and get addictive. At one time inside of two months or so I got obsessed with shoes and bought my wife about 40 pairs. She has more colors of nail paint bought by me then herself. I get weird about things for a while and then it cools of whether it does on it's own or is forced to for one reason or another.

Looks like I've got a strained or partially torn MCL in Ye Olde Left Knee.

Can't really pinpoint what happened - just constantly up and down off the floor with the kids.

It's not the end of the world - just a drag.

I was hoping to work out a lot through the summer to offset the amount of beer I plan on drinking.

Glad to see it wasn't something worse than it is. There is the common misconception that people get old, but it's the kids that age you. Mine are doing the same to me.

My responses to the various topics raised so far:

Musical tastes It's probably best if I steer clear of that conversation. If you think politics and religion present a potential minefield, just wait til dan and I get started. The man badmouths the Eagles, fer gosh sakes! How can I possibly address that level of irrationality???

Cei-U!
I summon the smorgasbord of commentary!

I don't dislike the Eagles, but I don't also go out of my way to listen to them or own any of their music.

So...I'm in the hospital right now. My second baby daughter was born yesterday. Lucky we have an off-topic thread where I can share such news :)

Awesome news, sir. I wanted a baby girl but I got two boys.

[Aaron King]

Shax: Congratulations. I look forward to her reviews of Batman: Brave & the Bold.

Alcohol, owwies, misc: I currently have a pain in my side from a drunken basement boxing match a week ago. I'm on the northern Minnesota plains, housesitting, bumming around, and being an irresponsible drifter for the summer before I start grad school in August (library sciences, which will, I believe, put me in good company in the Classics crowd).

When I'm not drinking beer (mostly those produced in my native southlands: Shiner, Dos Equis, Negra Modelo), I'm taking care of one dying dog (blind, deaf, incontinent, paralyzed in one leg), one sick dog (seizures, eye ulcers), and a number of animals spread across three houses.

Tattoos: I've always wanted to get a big Herriman mesa on my back, a lone brick flying across it, with Krazy on the back of one of my arms and Ignatz on the other. Those back-of-arm areas are prone to... changes in size and shape, though.

[adam_warlock_2099]

Oh and the reason I logged on and came here ... had an interview this morning that I feel really strongly about. A vendor I knew from my last job called me this morning and asked me to come in for an interview. I had sent him an email on Tuesday, the day I was let go, and he called me today and said that he had been on vacation last week and did indeed have an opening he was looking to fill. This would be the job to get, I have some knowledge in what they do and would give me an upper hand in getting the job. Plus it might get me better pay too.