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Tony Adams
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Mon, 21 Nov 2005
The 30th anniversary of the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald was last week. NPR did a largish piece on it. Of course they played bits of the song throughout the piece.
I never realized it before, but that song was about an event which had *just* happened. A top forty song which told the epic story of a contemporary catastrophe. There was actual storytelling in a song that became a huge hit. It is unimaginable today.
Of course there are countless examples in the tiny niche markets of folk or alt-college-whatever and I suppose a decipherable story graces the occasional hip-hop song, but who ever hears the story? Who will still be talking about any of them in 30 years?
club €uro
For years now I've wondered about this place. I seem to ride past it several times a week. I figured it was some big dumb euro disco, so checking it out was not high on my priority list.
Last night whilst riding on the Irving Park sidewalk east from St. Pascal's I have to stop when I get to Club €uro. Their empty sidewalk beer garden and a large row of motorcycles were blocking all but about six inches of the sidewalk. Slightly drunk, I raised the issue with the doorman in a polite, but still somewhat obnoxious manner.
He said I could "go around" all the obstacles. Technically of course, this was true. I'm just glad I was not in a wheelchair.
Instead of raising a fuss about it I locked up my bike and went in. I was intrigued by the motorcycles anyway. There was a beautiful Indian and a really cool rat bike with a steel mesh seat. Most of the bikes appeared to be customized metric cruisers. Not stupid choppers, but tasteful and functional bikes.
The interior decor was surprisingly cool. It was a bit busy, but there was nothing gaudy about it.
The loud euro dance videos were also surprisingly non-suck. (I did have the beerphones on by then of course so YMMV.)
I still don't know if they have any good beer. The fifteen or so people who were at the bar were all drinking Becks and Corona (yuk). I asked about cheap beer and after a bit of back and forth the bartender suggested the Becks on tap. A half liter mug of that was only $3!
So a bit after 10 pm I'm sitting there nursing the half liter and I see a couple of guys move a keg out the entryway. Did I mention the keg? No? That was a bit odd. There was a keg with a tap and air pump sitting in a tub of ice by the door. I didn't ask. So anyway I see these guys moving the keg and then immediately thereafter four people on motorcycles ride *in through the front door* of the club. They swing around the bar and park their bikes on the dance floor. It was truly awesome. No one acted like this was anything unusual.
Carne
The band last night at the St. Pascal's Parish Carnival was "Network". They are not my new favorite band. They had a horn section, which was pretty cool. They played
covers. The singer resembled Mike Ditka. Old white guys. Their best tune
was their version of Springsteen's "Rosalita". It was almost
embarrassing - the enormous gulf between that band of old white guys
playing tired old music being watched and absurdly danced to by tired
old white people - and most of the people at the carnival - kids who had
less than zero interest in such a spectacle. But perhaps that is the
traditional function of the beer tent at such an event? To entertain the
parents?
There was one exceptionally thoughtful moment. Three children - very young - like between 2 and 6 years old plopped down right in front of one of the PA stacks. The bass player noticed this and convinced them to move somewhere safer for their little ears.
Sun, 17 Apr 2005
Seven Shows in Four Days
thursday:
Wooden Leg at the Hideout - fantastic as usual. We really have a
treasure in Kelly Hogan. We are lucky to be alive in Chicago at this
moment in musical history.
friday:
1. Rizwan-Muazzam - (Quawwali) at the OTS of Folk Music - amazing.
2. Hardscrabble at the Horseshoe (They have cans of PBR for $2, so they are officially ok by me, despite the disney-texas schtick.)
Hardscrabble was fun. They call themselves a "jug band without a jug"
which is better than anything I could come up with.
saturday:
1. Andrew Bird, Archer Prewitt and Clyde Federal at the Metro. Bird was
boring and I left after about three songs. The opening acts were both
pretty great. Clyde Federal finally found a really good bass player.
2. Blind Robin at the Horseshoe - I really enjoyed them. I can barely
remember what they sound like, I was pretty drunk by then, but it was
countryish rock I think. Perhaps Americana? I dunno.
3. The house "band" at Serbian place on Montrose. I'm still amazed at
how non-western that music is. It freaks me out a little. If I just
heard it and did not know what it was I would think that it was arabic.
(it might have been four! but there was no band at The Fantasy Lounge)
tonight:
volunteering at the OTS for Robbie Folks' "Secret Country" series.
Seven shows in four days. It is time to give mr liver and mr and mrs eardrum a break.
Wed, 13 Apr 2005 Thu, 17 Feb 2005
Left Luggage
1998
Left Luggage directed by Jeroen Krabbé is one of my Add It to Your Netflix Queue recomendations. Sweet and sad, it is also a rare sympathetic treatment of the Hasidim in film.
[Bloggy Note: My intention was to focus this blog on my production of art (or whatever) rather than consumption or criticism of it, but this year, I've decided to expand that, partially to share my humble brilliance with my huge audience, but also to perhaps serve as a art log so that I won't accidentally get a film or a book from the library (or whatever) which I had already consumed.]
Wed, 19 Jan 2005
For a long time now I've been thinking that I'd blown a speaker. I was
hearing a bit of distortion. Too lazy to investigate, I just ignored it
to the best of my ability.
Today I couldn't take it any longer. I removed the grill from the
speaker. It looked fine.
Then I remembered that I had turned on the iTunes equalizer a while ago.
I looked at it and saw that for some insane reason, I had the pre-amp
turned up. I pushed that back down to below 0 and now everything sounds
great. I just need to turn up the output device a bit.
d'oh
Art Department
I got another job with the above mentioned movie. I've been helping out the Art Department mostly in the capacity of Set Dresser. Much of the stuff I've been doing has been as much about UNdressing the sets as dressing them.
This week we've been shooting up at Waukeegan High School, so in order to dress the sets for a film set in 1977, we have to first remove anything that would be anachronistic - the phones, computers, fax machines, much of the lighting and other fixtures. Then we replace all that stuff with vintage stuff, or with nothing at all in the case of most of the computers.
Perhaps all films work this way, but I'm really impressed with the way that everyone's opinion in the Art Department is considered and valued. We are often not just told what to do, but rather, what needs to get done and the details are up to us. As someone who was actually alive in 1977, my opinions seem to be especially valued. It is pretty cool to be more or less the lowest people in the pecking order, and yet we are still making artistic contributions to the project - not just hauling stuff around and following orders. (of course we do a lot of that also :) )
It has been a great deal of fun - mostly. The most fun I've had so far has been running a smoke machine for a School Is On Fire shot. In a big budget film a task like might have been done by some kind of specialist? I dunno.
Thu, 29 Apr 2004
The Western Swing
A couple of nights ago I attended a Western Swing ensemble class at The Old Town School of Folk Music. It was a blast. I'm playing bass. There are two mandolins, two fiddles, a guitar and a drummer in the class (with people playing them of course). There are two instructors who play fiddle guitar or mandolin as necessary. A cynic could say, "Hey tony - you are PAYING to be in a band." She would be correct. However, I'm paying to be in a band with a lot of guidance from people who are really really good at it. The instructors pick the music, provide sheet music and recordings and do a great job of leading the band. It is totally worth it. I get to play music I've never played before with new people. It is both fun and a tiny bit intimidating. One the less obvious benefits is that I get all the fun of playing in a band without any commitment at all beyond showing up for the eight weeks of the class.
A confluence of influences rapidly led me from thinking about doing this to actually doing it. Julia and Patrick, both pillars of the local music scene, live in the Old Town School neighborhood and became members a year or two ago. As a result they have been kind enough to drag me to some great shows there that I otherwise would not have been able to see. In turn, this led me to join the school as a member myself. Meanwhile my friend Andy has been encouraging me to take a class there. He met his current Gypsy Jazz partner in a class at the Old Town School. Andy's amazing progress on the guitar is mostly the result of being brilliant and actually practicing his instrument, but be credits the school for getting him on the right path and hooking him up. Then a few weeks ago my friend Lisa mentioned that she was deeply impressed with her mandolin teacher at the school, Colby Maddox, and that he was anxious to find a bass player for his upcoming Western Swing ensemble class.
While I'm not the biggest Western Swing fan on the planet, I've always thought the music was fun to listen to. It turns out that it is _totally_ fun to play. So, I'm learning new stuff, meeting new people and having a great time - the story of my life in a nutshell.
Sun, 14 Mar 2004
Extra Extra Read All About It
Yesterday I "worked" as an extra for a motion picture which is being shot now in Chicago, The Weather Man. It involved, as you might expect, a lot of sitting around doing nothing, but overall it was an exciting experience. It was particulary funny that after a couple minutes of filling out a form I did nothing but hang around until the lunch break.
I was used in four shots, all for one scene which, if it survives the editing process, might run for a minute or so.
In one shot I walk past Michael Cain and Nicholas Cage having a conversation on the sidewalk outside city hall, the locale of which was dressed up to appear as Park Avenue at 48th street in NYC. It was quite a hoot to see light-pole banners for the Museum of City of New York hanging on the poles outside city hall, a New York city bus out front and a block full of cars with New York license plates. Even the street sign on the corner of LaSalle and Washington was changed. It was the cheapest trip to NYC I've ever taken.
Mon, 23 Feb 2004
Smithwicks
We were told that it was a historic occasion. Apparently, we were in attendence at the first serving of Smithwick's Irish Ale on tap in the USA last Saturday night at Fast Eddie's (5943 Northwest Highway, Chicago).
The ale was pretty unremarkable in the way that I find all ales from the british isles unremarkable. We must thank the UK and her colonies for such awesome inspirations such as India Pale Ale and of course, Guinness, the blood of the gods, but with the exception of Guinness, it seems that the American microbrewers have left the Irish and the British in the dust.
Michael Jackson (no, the other Michael Jackson) explains that hops were a late addition to ale brewing. By implication he seems to suggest that perhaps the british isles should be excused for not using enough of them. I don't buy it. If they can manage to import enough hops to make Guinness the entirely hoppy bucket of joy that it is, why can't they do the same for the rest of the ales?
Fri, 13 Feb 2004
Why I Had to Go to Harlem to Become an Outkast Fan
So there I am, sitting in the most awesome Hide-A-Way Lounge on Broadway in Harlem, gulping down Beam and colas and I hear this... music. Both "Heyya" and "The Way You Move" by Outkast are in heavy rotation on the juke box. I love this stuff!
My new friends Judy and Evelyn (the entirely gracious barkeep) are both fans and hinted at the fact that being an Outkast fan is somewhat controversial in their neck of the proverbial woods. But they not apologetic about it in the least. Nor am I. All I have for my snap judgement is two songs, so my glimpse of the Outkast ouvre is perhaps non-representative, but from what I've heard, Outkast could be my new favorite band.
So why did I have to go to Harlem to discover this? I suspect it has something to do with the balkanization of the music scene. Forty years ago we all would have heard this music on Top Forty am radio, and even if we were too cool to listen to Top Forty on purpose, it was pervasive enough to be unavoidable.
Now radio is essentially a wasteland which we can easily avoid, but the price we pay is a loss of a common ground. We can go through life without hearing any of the today's version of the Top Forty. Mostly this is a good thing - since the great majority of what occupies the Top Forty is sheer crap, but even so, we risk missing out on some great stuff.
I just got lucky. I was in Harlem to see the The Classical Theatre of Harlem's production of Brecht's "Mother Courage and Her Children" at the Harlem School of the Arts. My plan for my African American History Afternoon was somewhat haphazard, and as a result I found myself in the neighborhood of the theater (645 St. Nicholas Ave) about two hours early. So I wandered around, shot some pics of the brown and greystones in Sugar Hill and Hamilton Heights, wandered around some more, shot some pics of Yankee Stadium from the hill overlooking Jackie Robinson Park, wandered around some more and finally realized that if I did not find a warm place to sit down that I might end up exhausted before I got to the show. I hid away in the Hide-A-Way Lounge. I don't plan to come out of hiding any time soon.
Thu, 01 Jan 2004
about the Arts Category
The Arts category will be crammed full of film, teevee, music and book reviews. Sort of. Probably more likely full of lamenting about how I am too lazy to read anything besides the Sunday New York Times.
I may also post updates about my ever blossoming music career, but don't hold your breath.
Photography? Sure. I have little galleries spread all over tarnation. I don't anticipate moving them all here, but I might at least put up a link to a central location for the mega-gallery, once I consolidate it - if I ever get around to it.
The screenplay? mebbe. I shoud probably start writing it first. In the meantime I may utter some confessions here about how I can't seem to get started on actually writing it, even though the whole idea is full-blown in my head.
You get the idea anyway. For now, this category is intended to be a place to lump thoughts about the arts, as both a consumer and producer thereof. Uh, except for software,which is part art, part craft and part science. It may get its own category.