Thursday, September 25, 2003

Bottom Line to Remain Open

Music Wonkery

The Bottom Line will remain open, at least for now. Good news!

Comments from my previous posting to Blogcritics had argued that the club’s booking and management have gone downhill in the last decade, and that closing wouldn’t be such a shame. Based on the postings on the marquee back when I lived in New York, that’s fair enough. The club should be booking Jason Mraz and Josh Rouse instead of faded older stars. In their defense, both Ute Lemper (!) and Odetta are in town soon, and, c’mon folks. Those ladies kick much ass.

Well, maybe a near-death experience will help re-invigorate the club and return it to prominence and quality. It will never be the Mercury Lounge, booking-wise, but at least it can compete with the Village Underground, Town Hall, and maybe even Tonic (if they’re smart) in the boutique music niche.


Posted by Johno on 09/25/03 at 02:18 PM
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Wednesday, September 24, 2003

The Bastards and the Beancounters

Music Wonkery

Bill Hobbs links to a sordid little story from the music industry’s past, in which a young country singer was shot before he could reveal to the world that the industry-rag “Cashbox” was a corrupt piece of shit.

See folks, those are the cats that presided over the “golden age” of rock and country. Old-school song pluggers, gangsters, and used-car salesmen with a little extra capital who would think nothing of dangling you off a building, breaking your legs, signing you to a contract so crooked that your corpse is scheduled to do live appearances, or in the case of George Jones, kidnapping your family every time you try to kick cocaine, because your management are also your dealers. What they did NOT do was scrutinize quarterly balance sheets, worry about balanced budgets and projections, manipulate share prices, or employ teams of lawyers analysts to defend “their” intellectual property from Benelux to Boise. That all happened when the neighborhood gentrifed and the beancounters took over.

So ask yourself: who’s better-- the bastards or the beancounters?

(Extended parenthetical statement: I’ve worked in the music industry, and I know this for a fact: the beancounters are firmly in charge almost everywhere. Leaving aside the legions of noble-minded smaller labels whose numbers are tiny compared to the whole, the music industry has shifted emphasis far away from “music” and placed the emphasis squarely on “industry.”

Granted, A&R guys are still allowed to be hairy and weird, and artists are still coddled while being bled white, but the focus is almost totally on the health of the parent company’s bottom line. Accounting & control run the joint, while Legal Affairs runs interference. While this means that people don’t get dangled out of windows anymore-- except in the rap world-- the music is now subjected to microscopic scrutiny and its sales potential projected out for years to come. Ears are secondary now, and demographics and marketing are king.

All this is by way of saying that the music industry has always been a filth-pit, and even though the means may change, the criminals remain the same. )

(Second parenthetical note: I’m not pleading for sympathy for the RIAA. Buncha vampires.)

(Third parenthetical note: Read ”Hit Men“ for the story of how the bastards and
beancounters came to work together.)

(also posted to blogcritics.)


Posted by Johno on 09/24/03 at 05:21 PM
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Babs Bored by Her Own Songs

Lead Pipe Cruelty

Barbra Streisand says she finds listening to her own songs is so boring that it was one of the reasons she gave up public performing three years ago.

Well, that makes two of us.


Posted by Buckethead on 09/24/03 at 02:18 PM
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The natural disaster is over

Just So You Know

Late last night, power was finally restored to the Buckethead Mansion in Lower Alexandria.  The linemen, a team from Georgia, were highly competent and helpful, even fixing some problems left by the electrician who “upgraded” the electrical system in the house.  Thanks to Lowell and Champ and their team good work.  Hopefully, they will be able to take a break and see their families soon. 

And keep in your thoughts the linemen have died in the process of restoring power to the states hit by Isabel.


Posted by Buckethead on 09/24/03 at 02:11 PM
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Tuesday, September 23, 2003

Electioneering

Partisan Politics

Last night the Goodwife and I caught a rerun of John Edwards announcing his candidacy on the Daily Show With Jon Stewart (hey… he promised he would!!).*

Observations. Edwards is at ease with himself, and understands that building the longterm goodwill of young voters is crucial. After all, he’s like nineteen years old himself and can run for President like ten more times if he doesn’t make it in ‘04. Those young voters will someday be old and responsible voters, and may think better of him due to this dimly remembered moment.

He has a great PR team, but he’s not a naturally hilarious or charming guy. That’s fine. Bill Clinton could charm the pants off William F. Buckley and get him to pose for photographs. I don’t want that again.

Smaaaaart.

But do I want him for President? I’m not so sure. First, he’s practically invisible. Second, a quick look at his website finds him pushing for a new federal law for every ostensibly “liberal” cause under the sun-- pay inequity between the sexes, affirmative action, racial profiling, one year of free college tuition for all eligible comers, etc. etc., all of which are really nice ideas (and he does have some good ones), but right now he’s coming across as a carefully-calibrated pleasantly liberal bleeding-heart.

Part of the reason Howard Dean is doing so well is that he has rage, which sets him apart from the rest of the pack. Only Joe Lieberman, who rather unexpectedly growing in my esteem, has the stones to stand toe to toe with him. But Dean has made some missteps recently that make me less confident that I want him to be President. He’s still the best of a runty litter, but I need to reserve my judgement for when the fight gets ugly early next year.

* Of course, Edwards than repeated his announcement last week in his home state of North Carolina. He’s a lawyer.


Posted by Johno on 09/23/03 at 07:54 PM
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Quicksilver out today

Entertainment

Get your copy here, and expect lower productivity from certain ministers in the days to come. Neal Stephenson is the voice of my generation, if by generation you mean my narrowly defined psychotopographical coordinate.

Other readings of Minister Johno of late:

Wow… America, America, America. Even when I’m reading a French writer she’s writing about America. Ah, what the hell. Other countries are dirty and they talk funny and they don’t have the right kind of coffee-- it’s too thick and bitter-- and the beer’s warm or it’s too cold and the clothes fit funny and what’s with their money and why can’t they just speak english like normal people?
Posted by Johno on 09/23/03 at 07:40 PM
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Not so gay after all… not that there’s anything wrong with that

Perfidy Responds

Eugene Volokh, who now works a mere stone’s throw up the river from my worker-pod, reminds us to “Repeat after me: I will not believe generalizations from on-line self-selected surveys. I will not believe generalizations from on-line self-selected surveys. I will not believe generalizations from on-line self-selected surveys. . . .”


Posted by Johno on 09/23/03 at 07:08 PM
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Rejected Recall Reinstated

Partisan Politics

AP is reporting that an 11-judge panel has unanimously overturned the decision to postpone the California recall election. 

This leaves the door open for the ACLU to appeal the decision to the Supreme Court, which would have to then revisit the Bush v. Gore decision of a few years back.  Hopefully, this will not happen.  If you’re going to have a recall, do it an be done with it, don’t let it drag on in a nightmare of partisan legal and judicial wrangling.  I had enough of that back in 2000.

Btw, the 9th circuit is notoriously liberal, so put your tin foil hats away.

[Update] The ACLU has decided not to appeal the decision.  It is to be noted that the panel’s decision did not rule out the possibility of post election shenanigans.  So if there are more hanging chads and disenfranchised confused old Jewish women, we can still see a replay in miniature of the post-2000 fracas.

In the meantime, however, we have avoided a potentially very harmful constitutional issue, which Johno so astutely noticed the potential for in the comments.  The problem of Court intervention in elections is indeed a big bag of stinking poo looking for a home.  Nevertheless, we should remember that the alternative is worse.  The last seriously contested election was resolved by a smoky room bargain - you can have the presidency if you end reconstruction.  What similar bargains can we imagine today?  The mind quails in fear.

An extra, double-plus evil possibility (though unlikely in the extreme) is total disgust in elections, leading to assumption of power or voter repudiation of the results.  Court action, however distasteful, is still within the bounds of the system.  We all think or even scream out load the Shakespeare quote, “First thing, we’ll kill all the lawyers,” but I believe that they save us from worse.

[Moreover] the Supreme Court action in Bush v. Gore merely ended the endless recounting, and restored the intent of the Florida Legislature.  And Bush won every recount that was made.  You can’t, in a moderately honest republic, continue counting untill you get the result you want.

While the case in California was expected to result in a test of Bush v. Gore, I think it is a very different situation.  Preventing a election mandated by the CA Constitution on the mere possibility of ambiguity in the election results is different than arguing over the results of an election that was actually held.


Posted by Buckethead on 09/23/03 at 04:16 PM
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Great headlines

Entertainment

Australia is the “world’s gayest country”.

and from Drudge (who has a knack for good headlines) “Mutant Rats on Rampage in Central Asia” and “House of Filth.”

[Update]“Student cuts off penis and tongue after drinking hallucinogenic tea.”


Posted by Buckethead on 09/23/03 at 02:24 PM
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Still a natural disaster

Just So You Know

Still no power in casa de Buckethead.  Four and one half days without electricity gets tiresome.  The first two days were fun, like camping.  But you go camping with the reassuring knowledge that you can go back to civilization once you’ve had your fill of primitive living.  It seems that we do not have that option.

Nevertheless, there is hope.  A crack power company recon team examined our situation, and said that a repair crew should arrive sometime today.  And our excellent neighbor Dave ran an extension cord over, so at least we have power for our refrigerator.  Of all the electrical gadgets, that is the one I have missed most.


Posted by Buckethead on 09/23/03 at 02:14 PM
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Monday, September 22, 2003

OCLC sues The Library Hotel

Darwin Award Contender

The Online Computer Library Center are suing the Library Hotel in New York City for copyright infrigement. OCLC, the owners of the copyright for the Dewey Decimal System, are suing the hotel for unauthorized use because the hotel, which overlooks the main branch of the New York Public Library, organizes its rooms according to Dewey and puts appropriate reading materials in each (cool!!). CNN reports.

God. I am married to a librarian, and I tell you this: when we visit New York, it is our dream to stay in that perfidous, copyright-infringing criminal institution known as the Library Hotel. The OCLC represent the interests of libraries and librarians much the same way that the RIAA represents the interests of independent music labels. Got it? There’s a lot of confusing the forest with the trees here, or more properly confusing the mouthpiece with the horn. 


Posted by Johno on 09/22/03 at 08:12 PM
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Murphy’s Law

That Buck Rogers Stuff

Go read the history of Murphy’s Law.  I insist.


Posted by Buckethead on 09/22/03 at 07:49 PM
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Vaccine for Cancer

The Miracle of Science

This is London is reporting that a US research team has made some serious progress in developing a Vaccine for Cancer .  The vaccines have produced dramatic results against the most virulent of cancers, such as pancreatic and kidney cancer.  Typically, there is a 95% mortality rate over two years for those diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, over a third of those receiving the treatment were alive after three years, and one was disease free after five.

The new treatments are tailor made for each patient, using materials from the patient’s own body to create the vaccine.  Researchers also have reason to believe that the technique might also make possible vaccines against other infectious diseases as well.

Given cancer’s place on the list of leading causes of death, this is promising news indeed.


Posted by Buckethead on 09/22/03 at 07:28 PM
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First They Came For The Hardcore Pornographers….

It'll Be a Cold Day in Hell

Hey, everybody! Good news!

WE’VE WON THE WAR ON TERROR!!!!

Want proof? The Department of Justice has time to do this (thanks to Arthur Silber for the link)!!!

the Bush administration is launching a massive crackdown on porn. Late last month, John Ashcroft’s Justice Department brought the nation’s first case against pornographers under federal obscenity laws in a decade. Two movie producers from the porn capital, California’s San Fernando Valley, were arrested Aug. 27 on 10 counts of producing and distributing obscene movies. Each man faces 50 years in prison and a $2.5-million fine.

49 more indictments are expected in the coming months, and Attorney General Ashcroft has directed the DoJ to keep it up, targeting hardcore weirdo sex stuff as well as more “mainstream” fare.

According to the [Chicago] Tribune, the [DoJ’s] letter to the outside indicated “that by focusing first on the most extreme material, the department can build a record of successful prosecutions, emboldening prosecutors and setting precedent for additional cases.” The New York Sun reports Oosterbaan’s chilling references to “states that pander ‘mainstream’ videos” and “tremendous and historical progress” in combating “the scourge of obscenity.”

Well, I feel safer. You?

[moreover] I wanna hear you say it, Buckethead. I wanna hear you say you’re going to vote for Bush again, when he won’t even rein in his raving moralistic whackjob of an Atty. Gen. from riding roughshod over the Bill of Rights. Say it.


Posted by Johno on 09/22/03 at 06:34 PM
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It’s still a natural disaster

Just So You Know

As of 9:00 this morning when I left for work, still no power.  At this point, not having power is substantially more frustrating, because everyone else on my street has had their power restored.  The power company won’t give me an estimate on when, either.  At least, now that my neighbors have power, they aren’t running their generators, and I my neighborhood doesn’t sound like the middle of a tractor pull.

Thanks to Ross for allowing us to come over last night and pretend that we still live in a technologically advanced civilization, and watch DVDs, order carryout and gaze at the pretty electrical lights.


Posted by Buckethead on 09/22/03 at 02:54 PM
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