If You Were Scoring My Life

There's a scene in the movie The Lake House where Sandra Bullock and Keanu Reeves characters actually meet and exist in the same time (like that ever happens and maybe just maybe why this movie has to be filed in the "fantasy" category). They are strangers, having met at Bullock character's surprise birthday party. They are alone, underneath the stars and they hear music coming from the house so they begin slow dancing.

The song playing is Paul McCartney's "This Never Happened Before" and it's the perfect song to capture the mood of the moment. (Yet since McCartney released the song in 2005 and this meeting moment is supposed to be occurring in 2004- there seems to be a time/space problem with the song choice that only enhances the movie's message).

Usually I'm not too big a fan of movie and TV scenes where the dialogue ceases and the music swells and we get a montage backed by a song. Often this is a sign of poor writing as if the writer of the scene couldn't find a way to express the emotion necessary so the director uses music- the best emotion expressing art form that exists - to get across what written words and actors acting their hearts out can't. But this particular scene works. It's great to hear McCartney's voice struggling to hit the higher notes. This imperfection underscores the uncertainty the characters are facing- trusting a complete stranger in a random romantic moment.

The mood of the scene reminded me of one of the beginning moments with my favorite person in the world. She told me she used to have a theme song. That song was "I Can See Clearly Now." Once she told me that there was little else I needed to know about her. If you're going to pick a theme song for your life that one might as well be it. It seemed like a far better choice than what was the theme song of my life at that time, Michael Jackson's "Man in the Mirror."

There are other movie and TV musical moments that have over the years stuck inside me like a bad burrito. Remember the scene from the TV show Buffy the Vampire Slayer where the lesbian couple Tara and Willow break up and other characters in the show have personal crisis' going on leaving much of the cast in a sad place? What did Joss Whedon choose to well up the emotion of the places his characters found themselves in? Michelle Branch's "Goodbye to You."

Now I'm not the biggest Michelle Branch fan in the world. Maybe I should be but I just haven't had the time. But her performance at the Bronze in this Buffy episode makes me cry every time I see it.

"It feels like I'm starting all over again/The last three years were just pretend/And I said goodbye to you/Goodbye to everything that I knew/You were the one I loved/The one thing I tried to hold on to..."

If someone out there was kind enough to put together a soundtrack for my life this song would surely have to be on it. It's time to move on.

Then there's the scene from the movie I've seen more times than any other- The Karate Kid. Daniel finds himself a stranger in a strange place and he's blaming his mom because she didn't exactly give him a choice on whether he wanted to uproot himself from New Jersey to move out west and start all over again. As he struggles to make friends there's a montage where Bananarama's "Cruel Summer" plays in the background. Is there a better song that's ever been sung? A better song that could say all that needs to be said about being lost and alone?

Listening now "Cruel Summer" takes me all the way back to 1984. I'm soaking my hands in pickle juice to make them tougher for all the karate chops that are needed. Of course I couldn't soak my head in the same juice and it would be a long time before I could pickle my heart leaving me to ask a question I'm still asking. Where do I go from here?

2005 Top Ten

Here are ten things that made it through the muck of 2005 (they are in particular order):

10) The Rock n Roll Hall of Fame/British Museum- Usually when I visit another city I don't care much if I see the obvious tourist attractions. I'm just as happy to find some out of the way place restaurant or CD store or something that is somehow uniquely that city. That said, I must say I loved visiting the RnR Hall of Fame in Cleveland. I was highly amused to see how tiny the Rolling Stones outfits were and it was a quite a kick reading Leadbelly's correspondence. Equally impressive was the British Museum in London that was almost too huge to comprehend. Pottery from ancient Persia? Cool. Kitty artifacts from various cultures? Neato.

9) Paul McCartney "Too Many People" "I'll Follow the Sun" at the Xcel Energy Center- I guess my Paul McCartney nostalgia differs from most people. I didn't care much for the umpteenth versions of "Get Back," "Back in the U.S.S.R.," or "Yesterday." What I was glad to hear, smile from ear to ear glad, was the snarling "Too Many People" from 1971's Ram where Paul chides John Lennon about preaching practices. Equally enjoyable was the version of 1965's "I'll Follow the Sun," one of those catchy McCartney tunes that seem to flow from him effortlessly. I was so inspired I went home and banged out my own piano version for my cats. Thompson scampered away either in fear or merely to get away from the annoying racket.

8) Arrested Development- This FOX show just keeps getting better and better. Who would have thought that Ron Howard, TV's Opie, director of so many insipid movies could produce something this biting? Scott Baio's attorney character, Bob Loblaw, and Charlize Theron's British siren, Rita, were inspired additions to the already stellar cast.

7) Lucinda Williams at the Minnesota Zoo- She treated us to six new and still unrecorded songs intermingled seamlessly with her older songs (meaning they were all insightful and heart stopping/starting ). I can't wait for the next CD.

6) Shelby Lynne at the Cleveland House of Blues- Lynne was brooding, tender, and by the end of the show she was somewhat drunk. But hearing live versions of songs like "Telephone" and "Where Am I Now?" truly was a treat. The show made me buy all her back catalog- the many CDs that she recorded before she was awarded her Grammy for "Best New Artist" in 2000.

5) Seeing my friend Alex in her hometown of San Diego- We hadn't seen each other in ten years. We had a nice sushi dinner and I marveled at how comfortable our friendship still feels and how much I still admire her drive, ambition, and inquisitive mind and soul.

4) CERA Graduation Beverly Hills- Over the past couple of years I've flown to various parts of the country to take election administration classes taught by the faculty of Auburn University. It's the only election administration certification program in the country and as I finished up my work this summer, I became one of the first 300 people to earn the accreditation. Graduating at the fancy Beverly Hills Hilton (where they hold the Golden Globe awards every year) in front of family and friends was an odd mixture of show biz and the electoral process.

3) Theo- The decision to add a third cat to the household mixture was greeted with skepticism by some of my friends and family. Still once I was introduced to young Thelonious, the decision was a forgone conclusion. He's sweet, spacey, and watching him try to find his place amongst his housemates has been pure joy.

2) Ike Reilly Junkie Faithful- When the blue-eyed editor introduced me to Ike's music a couple of years ago by giving me his first CD, Salesmen and Racists, I was immediately won over. When I got to the ultimate driving song "Angels and Whores" and Ike wails, "Hey motherf*%@er kiss the ground- I not only kept hitting the repeat button and turning the volume up louder and louder, I almost drove by my destination and just kept going. His new CD not only is full of clever and inspiring lyrics- it's got as much kick as it does spirit. My current favorite line? "The things I do in the daytime should only be done at night/Like when I watch my neighbor's wife bend down slow to pull out weeds…" Junkie Faithful is the best CD I've heard in quite a while.

1) Bob Dylan's five shows at London's Brixton Academy- On my way to the Minneapolis/St. Paul International Airport I was walking to my light rail stop when out of the corner of my eye I saw my co-workers running toward me waving a banner that read, "Dylan in London or Bust!" I was quite moved. I was also quite moved throughout the 50 different songs he did in five nights. We were treated to the live debut of "Million Dollar Bash." Along the way there were terrific performances of "Desolation Row," "Positively Fourth Street," "Sugar Baby," "Shelter from the Storm," and "Mississippi" just to name a few. To hear Bob do an abbreviated version of the Clash's "London Calling" during a couple of encores and have the natives go wild- made the expensive and somewhat crazy trip all worthwhile.

My Turkey Day Leftovers

It's been a difficult month for all of us in the Japanese American thespian community. First George Takei (Mr. Sulu), the manliest, but most human of space travelers, came out of the closet (not that there's anything wrong with that). Then Pat Morita (Arnold and Mr. Miyagi) died. To make matters worse one of the Christmas season's biggest movies, Memoirs of a Geisha stars two Chinese actresses playing Japanese characters.

Maybe it only feels like the world has gone wrong. And it probably didn't help my equilibrium any that I saw Paul McCartney in St. Paul and Bob Dylan in London. Somehow that seems a little backwards.

So I may suffer from a vision problem that even a new pair of glasses can't correct.

If life is about, and it seems to increasingly be, about waiting in line, waiting for your chance and praying to somebody or something that your chance will come, then perhaps we can all take a cue from the Swedish. While waiting in line to see Dylan in London I arrived one evening and headed to the end of a fairly long line walking from the front to the back. Not long after I took my place as the very last person a woman walked the path I had just walked but instead of standing behind me, she chose to stand next to the guy in front of me. It was clear she wasn't with him- they didn't make eye contact and didn't say a word to each other.

Later on a group of people showed up and began talking to this woman in a foreign dialect. Turns out they were all from Sweden. It was then I realized that a Swedish line isn't so much vertical as it is horizontal. I may have to try that at Caribou next time I go and get my morning coffee.

Or maybe I'm just plain invisible.

One of my favorite nightly moments in all five London Dylan shows was toward the end when he was introducing the band. As he was telling where each band member was from he doodled on his keyboard. It was like listening to the man compose right in front of you, a small glimpse into how his mind works. His mind is a mystery beyond what even Sherlock Holmes could figure out.

But buck up, they say. News this week gave us all some hope. A French doctor performed the world's first face transplant. I've always wanted a new face and now it's possible. I hear that George Takei's might be available.

Walking around the misty streets of London, somewhere near Scotland Yard, I couldn't believe my own eyes I was where I was at. In my head I could hear Frank Sinatra singing about a foggy day in London Town and then my own personal soundtrack jumped to McCartney singing about ordinary people it's impossible to meet, holding conversations that are always incomplete.

A mere week later I had one whiskey water before the auburn hair pre-grad student and I went to see Derailed where Jennifer Aniston really does a number on Clive Owen. Halfway through the movie I spilled our popcorn all over the floor and the auburn hair pre-grad student looked at me and asked why I did that. I didn't want to admit it but I had nearly passed out. My head started spinning and I broke out into a cold sweat and suddenly the pictures on the big screen got all fuzzy and negative looking at and I just wanted to lay my weary head down. But it all passed. Only there was no more popcorn left. It was all on the ground.

There were no Japanese American actors to be seen on that screen and this time I wasn't acting. I guess if you go all the way around to the other side of the world there are going to be some ill side effects. It only seems natural. But you wanna know the odd thing? I can't wait to go back. I want to hop on the Victoria line going the other direction just to see where it might take me. I want to walk down a street that's brand new even though it's very old. But I have loyalties and I have carved out a certain comfortable place to exist. I hope they will still see me there.

Peradventure, Somebody's Confused Miracle in the Backyard

I was enjoying another scooter ride to work when the oil light came on. Being a scooter novice I'll be the first to admit I don't know thing one about scooter maintenance. I'll further admit that even when I become a scooter riding veteran given my history with automobiles and other mechanical items I'll likely remain quite ignorant about scooter maintenance. I do know enough that when the oil light comes on it's probably a good idea to add some oil and not ignore the warning.

On my way home I stopped at Scooterville in Dinkytown and as I was adding oil to my bike I mentioned to Bob, the owner of the store, that I likely was going to upgrade to a better scooter next summer. Bob said that he had just gotten in an used scooter the very model I'd likely upgrade to- and it only had 600 miles on it. When asked why the owner had sold it Bob said that the guy had gotten cancer after buying the scooter and had died shortly after. After Bob and I worked out the details, I bought the used scooter. It has bigger tires than my old one and has a top speed of around 45 miles per hour as opposed to the 40 miles per hour of my first bike.

It's a much smoother ride- and when I hit the gas the power is evident where my old scooter no matter how hard I tried to accelerate I always felt like I was puttering along.

The first night I had my new used scooter I couldn't get it started. When I finally got it fired up the next morning it kept stalling every time I came to a stop. So as I had the guys at Scooterville clean out the fuel intake tube and look at the carburetor I was mindful that maybe the bike wasn't as good as advertised- no matter all the unanimous glowing reviews I had read on the Internet before I decided to buy it.

Sure enough every morning I rode it to work the scooter stalled at nearly every stop light. It isn't a pleasant feeling to be there in the middle of traffic and when needing to scoot finding yourself at a complete standstill. Worse yet- the electric starter on the handlebar didn't restart the bike so instead I'd have to put it up on its kick stand and kick start it.

Somehow I kept not only the bike but my faith that it would one day be a smooth running machine. As I cycled through fresh gas the bike began to run better. Sure enough once it ran on a couple of tanks of fresh gas, the stalling problem went away. Turned out it merely was bad gas- and who among us hasn't had bad gas a time or two?

The first day the bike was running smoothly I went out to my garage, inserted the key to lift the seat to get to the storage area of my scooter. The key turned but the seat would not lift. This wasn't only a matter of inconvenience at not having access to the storage area- it also meant I couldn't get to the gas tank. On my ride to work all I could think about was that given the timing of this latest setback it was almost if my scooter was haunted. Maybe its original owner wasn't so keen on someone else riding his bike.

I brought my scooter into Scooterville once again and Bob monkeyed with the latch. He got the seat up and found that a screw to one of the brackets holding the latch in place came loose and the bracket was holding the latch in a crooked position. Problem solved although Bob admitted he had never run across that particular problem before.

********

I thought about riding my scooter to the Paul McCartney show at the Xcel Energy Center last Wednesday night but given that I still lacked confidence that it wasn't somehow haunted I decided I didn't want to get stranded in downtown St. Paul late at night.

I got my McCartney tickets the day they went on sale not really wanting to spend as much as I did ($144 for a single ticket!) because after having seen Paul twice before, I knew this show wasn't going to be all that different from the other two. I don't need to hear his versions of his most famous Beatle songs ("Get Back," "Back in the USSR," "Let it Be," "Yesterday,") again. The original versions were quite adequate thank you very much. Still I knew that if I didn't go I'd regret it the day after the concert.

The show seemed to take forever to begin. I didn't have my watch on but I'm assuming it was a little before eight when the piped in classical music stopped and this guy came on to the side of the stage and stood behind what looked like a large computer console. He began to do a DJ dance mix of several songs from the McCartney catalog that likely weren't going to be played later on in the evening including "Old Siam Sir," "Oh Woman, Oh Why," "Morse Moose and the Grey Goose," and "What's That You're Doing?" The thumping electronic bass pulsated rhythmically throughout the mix and a barrage of colors filled the overhead scoreboard screen flashing patterns like a screen saver gone wild.

After about fifteen minutes of this a film about McCartney began. Good God Paul, enough is enough already. When the man and his band finally appeared they opened with a lackluster version of "Magical Mystery Tour" but quite honestly just about any song would have been appreciated and sounded fine after the long wait.

I clearly was in the minority but I was glad that the second song was the less predictable "Flaming Pie" from his 1997 CD of the same name. I love the piano part and the song had a momentum that was irresistible (even though I've found the recorded version to be quite resistible).

The rest of the show followed this jarring pattern. The crowd clearly got into the show whenever Paul played a familiar Beatles or Wings song like "Good Day Sunshine," or "Band on the Run," but the energy level of the Energy Center took a dive when a lesser known song was played. Yet it was in those moments that I absolutely enjoyed the concert more than any other I've seen in a long long time. I never thought I'd get a chance to be in the same room when Paul sang songs like "Til There Was You" or "Helter Skelter" or "Please Please Me."

As I was getting more and more into the concert it struck me that more than any other artist, Paul McCartney has written a song that has been the soundtrack to just about all of the significant moments that have made up my life. As he sang an energetic "I'll Get You" I couldn't help but remember how that song was the one I heard in my noggin in 9th grade math class as I secretly snuck glances at Sue Weiss, the girl I was madly in love with at the time, as she worked on her problems. "Imagine I'm in love with you, it's easy 'cause I know/I've imagined I'm in love with you, many, many, many times before..."

I was glad he sang my three all time favorite Beatle songs, "Hey Jude," "For No One," and "I've Got a Feeling." "Hey Jude" has been his sing along closer since 1990 and for me it never loses its power as Paul aptly shows (and tells) how to make a sad song better. This evening's version of "For No One" was stunning and inspired. Accompanied only by his piano playing and Paul Wickens' synthesizer (recreating the wailing french horn part) I again was taken back to a moment from the past when I heard the song for the first time and was grateful how it captured so clearly my feelings for another Weiss lass, Sue's younger sister Karen. "And in her eyes you see nothing. No sign of love behind the tears cried for no one..."

"I've Got a Feeling" was a song Steve Olson, my best friend in junior and senior high and I used to belt out at the top of our voices on bus trips in the dark. "I've got a feeling, a feeling I can't hide" I'd sing as Steve sang the counterpart "Everybody had a hard year..." part.

There were other highlights as well. I loved Paul's live versions of "I Will" and "I'll Follow the Sun" which are essentially the same song only with different words. The latter featured four punchy coda/reprise endings that Paul explained were because the song was so short.

The song that made the price of admission more than worthwhile however was "Too Many People" from Paul's 1971 LP, Ram. It's long been one of my favorite McCartney songs because it's full of anger, an emotion he doesn't express very often. "Too many people holding back this is crazy and not like me..." Fans and critics took the lyrics of the song to be a slap at John Lennon (among them Lennon himself) especially the line, "Too many people preaching practices, don't let them tell you what ought to be..." especially since the cover of the LP featured a picture of one beetle fucking another.

The live treatment of the song was full of venom and joy. God I was glad I was there to hear it.

The live versions of the four new songs he did from his latest CD Chaos and Creation in the Backyard were full of an intimacy and immediacy lacking in most of the rest of the show. He dedicated "Follow Me" to his wife Heather and the song expressed the inspiration and guidance she has provided in the years that have included significant losses to a man who has always been about getting back, and yesterday, and finding a way back home.

I even enjoyed yet another performance of "Maybe I'm Amazed." This time I appreciated how the lyrics accurately reflect how I feel about the one I'm currently in love with- the one that has taught all about feeling the power. "Maybe I'm afraid of the way I love you/Maybe I'm amazed at how you pulled me out of time/Hung me on a line/Maybe I'm amazed how I really need you..."

********

I was in the still new to me upper wing of my house (formerly known as the attic) listening to the new Bob Dylan song "Tell Ol Bill" from the North Country soundtrack. The song is a foot tappin' country stomp. I broke out into an impromptu jig as my three cats all sat wide-eyed watching me. Diego-san was closest, standing by my bed. Thompson was further away standing outside the bathroom and Thelonious stood farthest away at the head of the stairs. The boyz couldn't take their eyes off of me. "This is new" their perplexed faces seem to say. As I sashayed over near Thompson he bolted away in fear. I guess it was a little too new and thus scary to him.

********

Liz Phair and Paul McCartney may not seem like they do but they do share a lot in common. Both had extreme early success that they have ever since tried with mixed success to overcome. In other words their early work has haunted and shaped every thing they have done since. Liz's first CD Exile in Guyville received so much deserved critical acclaim and fan devotion that every thing she has followed with seems lacking in every way.

That Liz's Thursday First Ave show featured so many songs from her first CD and only three from her newest effort Somebody's Miracle was more than a little surprising. That the older songs display so much more power and depth can't be lost on Liz. She did open with a sterling "Everything to Me" from the new CD and in its live context it was a compelling choice for an opener. "I bet it makes you laugh/Watching me work so hard to reach you/You never gave a damn/ About all those things I did to please you..." The CD version of the song to me seems like an insipid broken hearted love song to a lost love. By opening her show with a song that features the chorus "Do you really know me at all?/Would you take the time to catch me if I fell..." she framed the song in a whole different light- a slap at her fans/critics who don't seem to appreciate her music anymore.

The acoustic arrangement of "Everything to Me" featured Liz alone with her guitarist. The following song, "Baby Got Going" with similar backing was a great example of how if you listen to Liz's voice you can't help but marvel at how perceptive she can be (even in moments like last Saturday's dreadful off tune version of "God Bless America" at the first game of this year's World Series). After "Polyester Bride" Liz made a point that her guitarist had been singing the wrong words to the song for a couple of years. She may have been justified when she accused the male portion of the human race of not caring about the lyrics of songs. Given the reaction towards her new CD one has to wonder if those listening are really hearing what she is singing or if the gloss of the production leads to selective deafness. Her performance of the new songs (and she didn't even do my favorite- "Got My Own Thing") demonstrated that although the artist is in a very different place in her life- her ability to express what she is thinking about is as skilled as ever.

Standing with the Blue-Eyed editor in the (thankfully) non-smoking First Ave crowd I felt like we were with an old friend again. The only part of the show I didn't like so much was standing next to the world's two worst dancers, two women who were not only jerky but who didn't seem to have a clue about moving to the beat of the music. I wished I had a video recorder so I record them and show Thompson the three legged cat that in comparison I'm a blippin Fred Astaire. It's all about perspective. These women were there with a man/woman, a hulking being dressed in a dress and no adam's apple and with very masculine hands and features who kept backing into my dear friend who was doing her best to get into the concert

Perhaps the best part of the show was the seemingly off the cuff moments like when Liz sang a great version of "Girl's Room" without her band as her guitarist was taking care of some technical problems and her acapella version of Sixpence None the Richer's song "There She Goes."

Liz closed the show with a mesmerizing version of "Chopsticks" that contains the, this is an artist with something clever to say, about "doing it backwards" and the devastatingly confessing that after all is said and done, deep down she is "secretly timid."

One Eyed Ingenue

Even though I majored in college in TV, movies, and music, I've never claimed that I have my finger on the pulse of this country's pop culture. I'll be the first to admit I never know why some things hit the public jackpot and why others seem to strike the fancy of the nation's many cultural critics.

Take for example the continued employment (and therefore seeming popularity) of FOX's top baseball analyst Tim McCarver who has now maintained that exulted position since the 1980's as Major League Baseball has moved from ABC to CBS to Fox. McCarver clearly knows the game well but his reliance on puns and his redundant analysis has even made me long for the more palatable Tony Kubek or Jim Kaat.

So the other night as I was watching the Chicago White Sox play the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim and I was getting ready to go to bed, I decided I couldn't listen to McCarver anymore so I turned down the TV sound and plopped my iPod in to listen to the new Liz Phair CD, Somebody's Miracle, for the first time. So unimpressed was I that I nearly turned the sound of the TV back up to hear what McCarver was saying about a horrible call that allowed A.J. Pierzynski to go to first base despite striking out, ultimately causing the Angels the game. But I didn't. I stayed with Liz. And I thought to myself, "God this is awful."

The next day at work I put the CD on again and this time I cut the gal some slack. Somebody's Miracle like last year's Liz Phair is slickly produced and thus all but erases Liz's claim to the throne of one time Indi-Queen. The songs all but sound exactly alike and there's not one of them that hit me between the eyes (or legs) like say, "Divorce Song" or "Perfect World." Yet unlike her last effort (an effort some accused her of trying to be a much older Avril Lavigne) at least this time Liz isn't singing about her favorite pair of underwear or favorite human secretion. This time she's singing about some much sadder stuff albeit at times with nearly Spector-ish bombastic production to cover it all up.

Paul McCartney has recently been praised up and down by music critics for stripping his sound down bare and releasing an album that seems deeper and more intimate. But his CD, Chaos and Creation in the Backyard doesn't reveal as much as Liz poetically does on Somebody's Miracle. Her CD's opening track, "Leap of Innocence" sets the tone for all that is to follow. The singer is expressing remorse for so enjoying an affair while admitting that while you're having fun things can't last "like love in California." And then the chorus is laid out for all to hear. "Anyone can tell you were my instrument/He said, 'I understand you/You want to play me...'" How devastating.

The ultra-polished production is unfortunate making some decent songs sound as if they could have been anonymously written/sung by anyone from Shania Twain to Sheryl Crow. And what's up with such a bland CD title? Liz has previously been four for four in that category with cocky CD names like Exile in Guyville, Whip Smart, whitechocolatespaceegg, and the ironic Liz Phair that revealed less (except for some sexy girly photos) than Dylan's ultimate match this for awfulness cuz you can't, throwitallaway Self Portrait. This time there are shrapnel wound inducing lines that would have made a great CD title scattered throughout like "One Eyed Ingenue" or "Sometimes I Am Inspired." So just what the heck is one supposed to make about Somebody's Miracle?

My favorite track is the playful "Got My Own Thing" that is Liz at her clever best. You gotta smile when she delivers sly lines like, "They say I'm pretty as a song..." or "I don't have to save for a rainy day I know that something comes along... IT ALWAYS comes along..." and "Everybody changed when I do what I do... CUZ I DO WHAT I DO..."

Bottom line may be that I'm in love and may always be with Liz Phair. Sure I may love Bob Dylan's music but I am in love with Liz Phair. Good looks, good luck, cheeky music and that attitude, how can one resist a package like that?

Calm and Constipation in the Well Landscaped Front Yard

Everyone should know by now that Paul McCartney and I have a lot in common. Besides the early fame, the boyish charm and good looks, the billions of dollars, we both share the uncertainty of not knowing just where to go to next.

The Beatles' music was among the first music that changed my life and I always appreciated that so many McCartney-penned songs were piano based enhancing my own struggling keyboard tinkling (extremely accurate use of the term in this instance) repertoire.

McCartney's latest CD, Chaos and Creation in the Backyard has gotten quite a few good reviews. Clearly with Radiohead and Beck producer Nigel Godrich (recommended to Paul by Sir George Martin) at the helm Macca clearly was seeking to do something more significant than just his next CD. It's one of his most introspective CDs from start to finish and the fog of melancholy (unusual in a McCartney effort) lingers throughout.

Upon first listen I was reminded of the spring of my senior year of high school when I was driving with my two best friends at the time, Steve and Jay, and we were discussing Macca and what he had to do at that time to restore some of the luster to his rapidly becoming irrelevant career. I suggested that Paul record an all acoustic LP that would force him to concentrate on his words as much as he did the ever increasing need to show he was the experimental force of the Beatles.

Macca's next release Pipes of Peace was released the fall of my lost freshman year of college. I meandered down to my neighborhood Cheapo store and picked it up the day it was released. On a gloomy, grey fall day when it was my turn to pick the music in our room my two roommates suffered through this insipid music (although in my defense it followed listening to Dr. Pete's choice of the Police's Synchronicity, and Alcoholic Bruce's pick of Cheap Trick's One on One so it wasn't like my choice was that out of line). I remember how after the first listen I commented how Paul seemed to have lost all inspiration altogether to which Dr. Pete for the one and only time in our time together offered some words of sympathy. "It's not that bad and you have to keep in mind he's been writing music for so long..."

So the next time Steve, Jay and I got together was around Thanksgiving time and we tried to analyze Pipes of Peace and tried to find all the hidden meanings. We got stuck on the song "The Other Me" that contained the somewhat confessional yet entirely made up on the spot lyrics "The other me would rather be the glad one/The other me would rather play the fool/I wanna be the kind of me that doesn't let you down as a rule..." It wasn't that Paul wasn't trying, it seemed he was trying too hard- something I've done once or twice.

It is now some 22 years after that forgettable CD and one of the songs on Paul's latest mostly acoustic (maybe he heard me!) CD is a little nugget called "Jenny Wren" (that some of us might disturbingly relate to another Jennie with an animal name). This latest lament about spreading one's wings, a certain flight for freedom doesn't exactly inspire the same release that one might have felt all those years ago but it's still a darn fine song.

It's my favorite song on the CD. Like many of Paul's greatest songs ("Hey Jude," "For No One," "Little Lamb Dragonfly," "Hope of Deliverance,") it's a song about one soul consoling another. And the lasting feeling created is that the singer is singing the song to console the writer beyond the literal meaning of the words.

Chaos and Creation... suffers and yet benefits from the fact that all the songs sound somewhat alike. One of Paul's trademarks over the years has been that most his CDs inevitably feature a somewhat impressive yet equally annoying tendency to trip from idiom to idiom (see London Town) as if he just has to show off how many different styles of songs he's mastered. The CD may lack the big traditional McCartney ballad yet it's clear that Paul has reached the point where he doesn't really want to be just a nostalgia act and he wants his music to still matter. This CD may not quite get there but I for one relate to the effort.

Ike Outtakes

The LAST time I danced in public (if you don't consider dancing nightly in front of three startled kitties being in public) was with the chief election official in Blue Earth County. So when the two of us were recently in Beverly Hills at a banquet where there was a cover band playing lots of Motown my last dance partner told me she expected an encore performance. Fat chance. Those that know me best (probably said kitties) know that if there is one thing I dislike it's like calling attention to myself. With my natural jerky movements (plenty have made fun of the way I walk) that go along perfectly with my natural jerky behavior, I'm not one who will be hitting another dance floor any time soon.

The one time I went to a high school dance was when Sharon Streif asked me and we went and she spent most of the evening with her friends and I spent most of the evening with mine. When the last dance was called I grabbed the nearest chair and halfway through the chair became my dance partner as I spun it around myself as I did a happy lil jig.

I mention all this because last Saturday's Ike Reilly performance at the Minnesota Zoo featured the Olympic Hopefuls as the opening act. I was looking forward to their performance having kinda grown fond of their peppy pop but having never seen them live they were better than advertised.

In a way it was the perfect match- Ike's brooding, angry, poetic pop played the role of Lennon to the Hopeful's peppy, somewhat silly, ever optimistically cynical McCartney like ditties. Midway through their set through a great great romp of "Drain the Sea" the sixth Hopeful came on stage dressed in a dress shirt, tie, and dress pants that contrasted with the other five Hopefuls who were wearing their trademark blue jumpsuits. This sixth Hopeful proceeded to dance with all the exaggerated movements I feature in own dance repertoire.

Later in the show this guy reappeared on stage and he motioned up to all the faithful Hopeful fans to come on down to join him in front of the band. The youthful throng did just that and spent the last few songs jumping up and down in place. It was enough to almost make your aging Asian cynic leave his front row seat and jump up and down with kids half his age.

I didn't quite muster up the energy to do that but I did go out the very next day and buy the Hopeful's CD, The Fuses Refuse to Burn. I haven't been able to stop listening to it ever since. Once again I'm reminded of McCartney's best pop efforts although I'm equally reminded of Crowded House a group I kinda always liked although I liked the Finn's songwriting better than I did the group's execution of the songs.

I'm not sure one will one will ever gain great insight to the meaning of life listening to the Hopefuls but a song like "Whisper" that so accurately recounts the universal feeling of being with one who secretly likes you but is petrified of being seen in public with you, that it'll probably send you back to therapy if you're in anything resembling a weakened condition. Likewise the opening track "Imaginary" features all the studio dubs and sounds the band can muster but that only adds to the lyrics about what it is like to dance with a chair.

The songwriting can be a bit too clever at times "You passed out... invitations to your show..." but seeing the band live the thing I loved most was that the group shared tambourine playing duties amongst themselves which indicates a healthy team spirit that would befit the greatest Olympic team. Listening to The Fuses Refuse to Burn in its entirety was a needed boost, a smile inducing narcotic just when I needed it most facing what might be a life change that blows beyond altering to let's start all over again.

Still if some opportunities that have arisen eventually fall by the wayside I think I may have found my next calling, the seventh Hopeful- the guy that sits at the side of the stage and takes it all in as he is wont to do.

Numb Skull

"And when the time comes round, we will be duty bound/To tell the truth of what we've seen and what we haven't found/Will not be going down, despite too easy ride to see/From a lover to a friend take your own advice/Let me love again. Now that you turned out to be, someone I can trust, someone I believe..."
-Paul McCartney

I'm not sure if numbness runs in my family but it sure seems to be running up and down various parts of my anatomy over the past few years.

Last year about this time I was diagnosed with Bell's Palsy, a disease that rendered the left side of my face droopy and numb. With a little acupuncture and adding a little herb to my diet, my face regained its perpetual frown in no time at all.

This year I have been diagnosed with cervical radiculopathy. The two friends who have expressed the most concern with my suffering happen to be two who are a long ways a way (one in Hawaii and one in Blue Earth County). Go figure. I figured my closest friends would at the very least organize some all night televised marathon for me. It's the least they could do after all. It sucks getting old.

It might be noted for the record that the diagnosis sounds worse than the actual suffering involved. Even my doctor admitted that. Cervical radiculopathy is the medical term for having a pinched nerve in the neck. For years I have had a tingling in my shoulder and recently that mostly annoying but sometimes pleasing sensation spread down my arm to my hand. My forefinger feels like it's always asleep now an affliction similar to the state of my brain for the past six years or so.

When I finally got around to calling my health care people once they heard the words "tingling" and "left side of my body" they told me I had to come in to urgent care. That evening it was determined I didn't have cancer, M.S. or carpal tunnel. I met with one doctor and then days later I met with another (the same one who diagnosed me with Bell's Palsy though she didn't recognize me. Must have been the non-droopy demeanor). With a prescription of an anti-inflammatory drug in hand and an appointment to see a physical therapist scheduled, I went on my merry way.

On my way home I popped in Lucinda Williams' new live CD. Looking at the packaging I must say I was a bit disappointed by the song list. Most of the songs are from her last two CDs and the inclusion of such dirge-like songs like "Joy" and "Atonement" didn't do much for me. Still when she got to "Reason to Cry" I just about did. It's my second favorite performance of the song- right up there with when I was riding with the Grad Student and she sang along with Lucinda. Man she hit the right notes on that ride.

Thankfully the slight discomfort was further alleviated when I finally found out who murdered Veronica Mars' best friend Lily and that Veronica wasn't actually raped nor did she have sex with her brother. Veronica Mars is the show getting all the buzz if you don't count Desperate Housewives. A lot of critics are saying that it is as good as Buffy in its writing and its depiction of the angst of growing up. I thus had to tune in to see what all the praise was all about.

I indeed saw that Veronica Mars is a smartly written show that deftly mixes black humor with insight. Most every character has a dark side including the dour blonde Veronica herself, and the standard operating procedure seems to be to do whatever best suits your individual needs and deal with the consequences later.

Later that night I had a long talk with a friend down in Florida. The purpose of the call was to talk about the shape of my soul, admittedly a little ragged, worn, and torn these days. She sent me a book about the story of life and suggested I read the book of Romans in the Bible. "I'll say a prayer for you," she said and I thanked her profusely. I was glad to hear she is doing well.

"Of everything in this world I guess I'll never know why/Something as good as this could flower up and die/When you lost your happiness when no one's standing by/When nothing makes any sense, you've got a reason to cry..."

Idle Melancholy

Ike asks the musical question, if they are "angels or if they are whores?..." Yikes Ike!

The far from endless summer of 1986 was the last summer before the end of the academic sector of my career. I was feeling a bit adrift and it was the first time in my life not even music seemed to lessen the feeling of a fog like blues I couldn't quite shake. (And as regular readers of the newsletter can attest I'm usually such an upbeat chipper little bird. Some even have come to refer to me as Cap'n Happy.)

That summer three of the then artists who achieved the status of I buy everything new that they release, released new LP's within a month or two of each other. Yet the news of new releases from Paul McCartney and Paul Simon couldn't even get me off my rump and down to the neighborhood Cheapo. It took the release of the first new Bob Dylan LP since I had become a big time fan, Knocked Out Loaded, to convince me I needed some new music in my life.

Bringing my bag o' new music home I must admit my mood took a decidedly noticeable upswing. On my drive home I tried to decide which of the three new LPs I would listen to first. Since I had the highest anticipation for Dylan's I decided I would save his for last. Since I had the least anticipation for Simon's I decided that I would first listen to McCartney's Press to Play first.

I carefully placed the vinyl on my stereo (a Miida one piece component complete with radio, 8-track player, and turntable) and the first song, "Stranglehold" sounded promising enough. But as I made my way through the song cycle on side one it became quite apparent that the music in a word, sucked. Macca gets in trouble when he decides he has to be an artist with a capital "A" and produce what he considers avant garde art. Songs like "Pretty Little Head" and "Talk More Talk" are not only dreadful, but they drain the soul right out of you mighty quick. The whole thing was overproduced and overwrought with wannabe significance.

Strike one.

One look at him and she seemed to somehow see his soul was broken. They hadn't seen each other in a couple of years and she shows up looking elegant, tan, and rested. He shows up with a there to see for anyone who looked too closely, transparent spiritual state of being.

The night before he had come home and gotten drunk after having spent a hell of a lotta energy making love with the Brazilian beauty from the mountains with the perfect peaks. Their time together was electrically charged and yet he knew things seemed like they were just going through the motions.

Good lawd oll mayte!

Feeling even more sad than ever before I bumped up Dylan in the order of things. I gotta say the LP that made me a lifetime Dylan fan was his previous LP, 1985's Empire Burlesque, much maligned by just about everyone under the sun. Compared to that carefully produced effort, Knocked Out Loaded sounded like a complete throwaway- something that could have been made in a drunken stupor and in a day. The songs don't connect and the 11 minute epic "Brownsville Girl" sounds like a car wreck waiting to happen. At the time it sorta depressed me but since whenever I play that CD in my bluer moments it never fails to produce a smile. "Even the swap meets around here are getting pretty corrupt," Bob sez/sings seemingly without a smirk on his weathered face.

Strike two looking.

Simon's Graceland was a whole other story. The foreign sounding music caught me completely off guard. And the juxtaposition of the overly thoughtful (and ever thought provoking) lyrics with the joyful music was pure musical enchantment. As I sat laying on the furry heat absorbing lime green shag carpet of my bedroom, back up in a beam of sunlight, the music thankfully took me to a far away, cooler, and getaway place.

A tape measure home run that one.

Fast forward 18(!) years later to the summer of 2004. There's been far too little softball playing, and I'm far too busy to appreciate a Minnesota Twins season that will culminate in their fourth World Series appearance (you heard it here first) and music? Who has time to listen?

Thus the list of CDs on my must hear list has been growing rather rapidly. Last Sunday in a far too late return trip to my neighborhood Cheapo I finally added four discs that I knew would eventually make their place into my collection, but hadn't yet for one reason or another. Each of the discs come from an artist whose work I've come to respect and admire for somewhat different reasons.

Just like a decade and a half(!) before, I found myself driving home trying to figure out the listening order because I desperately needed something/anything to lift my soul and spirits if only for a fleeting moment. Upon racing my this is now cat Diego-san up the flight of stairs to the recently completed Upper Wing of my house I decided the first disc to be played was Brian Wilson's Gettin' In Over My Head simply because the day before I made the pricy decision that I would buy a ticket to Wilson's Orpheum show where he is giving a live performance of the phantom greatest LP of all time (the one that's never quite been finished) the Beach Boys' long lost, and much written about Smile.

As sunny and surfin' as most of the most famous Beach Boy catalog is, Wilson has always endeared himself personally to me due mostly to his sad songs. Brian Wilson's sad songs are the saddest songs ever written. They are heart and gut wrenching personified, and thankfully forever inspiring in demonstrating how a wounded soul still has a remarkable capacity of self healing.

And that is why upon first listen the new CD revealed the no need to peel back the absolute, undiluted drivel. If this was music written by a teenager it would still sound juvenile. Coming from a sixty-year-old mentally abused, drug zonked out, and psychologically damaged survivor (and who would have ever thought that was possible?) the more stupid than stupefying songs aren't the least bit intriguing like I expected them to be. Wilson's has pulled off the trick of sounding like a crazed "does this guy really have functioning brain- I gotta listen to find out" before with his contributions to the Beach Boys' great 1974 LP The Beach Boys Love You where the songs are full of such childlike and childish lyrics that one can't help but think it's all a wonderful little joke and his first solo effort, 1988's Brian Wilson where Brian was (it was later revealed) under the cult like influence of his psychiatrist, Eugene Landy, cutoff from family and friends.

But the new CD isn't merely an effort to sound childlike and stupid. It is stupid. And insipid. And the effort put in goes far beyond the end result. Ick.

After they were done they lie together in bed, naked and she told him of the house she bought in Brazil and how she wanted to sell it but that any potential buyer was likely too poor to afford it. She came to the United States to help her ailing grandmother who broke her arm and thus couldn't keep her job as a cleaning woman. Her grandmother believed in the ethic of hard work and getting to where you want to get by your own efforts so to be out of work was killing her and depressing her at the same time.

He looked deeply into the overwhelming beauty of the nude young woman's eyes. It was a moment of true connection though he somehow sensed they were never going to see each other ever again.

Going to the wedding as a couple on a "date" was all her idea but he was thrilled that she had asked. He told his co-workers of his weekend plans and asked if dancing was to be expected and how she might feel if he declined. (He wanted his hands nowhere near her). They told him he better dance even if she held a blue belt in kickboxing.

So I adjusted the order of the discs I was going to listen to. Originally I thought I would play Los Lobos' The Ride next because of how the band over the years has been so dependable, workmanlike, and how their music never fails to be worth listening to. Instead I decided I would play the CD I most wanted to hear from the stack I bought, Wilco's A Ghost is Born.

Now I must admit I've never been an adoring Wilco fan like others I know. Yes, my copy of Being There has been worn out and I'd put it on my short list of greatest double discs ever released. But the follow-up, way too arty for its own good Summerteeth hardly ever finds its way in my CD player and their last major label won't release it because it's not commercial enough, so we'll do the admirable thing and do it all ourselves and make a great story out of it all, it's so great it will make a movie, Yankee Foxtrot Hotel, took many listens before I finally warmed up to it. (What is with all the production tricks when the songs could have spoke for themselves?)

And my first listen to A Ghost is Born made me fall asleep in the long lost sunny light beaming in from the skylight of the new addition to the place I call home these days yet I haven't been home enough to truly enjoy it, in blissful sadness if such a thing exists (and doesn't exist every night, night after night). The third song, a ten minute opus called "Spiders (Kidsmoke)" lives up to its title with its sinewy web like and hypnotic if not way too precious we know we are artists groove. The eight song later fifteen minute opus "Less Than You Think" doesn't fare as well. Not even close (not a cigar for the lads here). The electronic drone that makes up for most of the time occupied by the "song" is beyond annoying. It's Tweedy and gang thumbing their upturned noses in an effort to let us know they are a step or two ahead of us (and quite willing to remind us of that). But noise made isn't art just because the noise producer tells us it is (just go ask Lou Reed if he still thinks Metal Machine Music is his shining misunderstood moment of if it is just someone under the influence of something thinking he/she knows something we others can't possibly know and thus must prove it by doing something far too easy but in its easiness it creates an inherent uneasiness that by being what it is, it is art).

There's a word for the music on A Ghost is Born and it isn't art, it's crap. Yes the title insinuates something haunting and the group tries hard to produce. But Wilco needs a serious shot of humor somewhere and sometime. Seriously. What, after all, is musically asked, would we be without wishful thinking?

He arrived at the fort's chapel way too early and feeling way too hungover from many a thing from the previous night. He saw her in the distance as he was talking to someone else he really wanted to talk to. Entering the chapel together, he strolled behind her, as she was escorted to an empty pew by an usher. They caught up. She'd been through a hurricane. He'd been through some troubling winds of his own (making).

The wedding ceremony was touching and brief. At the reception that followed the two truly caught up and she asked him where his faith now was at these days.

The not expected downward spiral continued with the new Los Lobos disc. The Ride features guest appearances by notable musicians like Tom Waits, Richard Thompson, Elvis Costello, and Bobby Womack but I don't need to hear collaborations with the group. They are good enough themselves. It's all very professional, it's all very well produced, but nothing changed nothing inside. As I tried my best to understand I simply couldn't stop asking why Cesar or David couldn't sing the songs contained on the pressed disc?

This wasn't exactly what I expected (or needed). Thus I moved to the disc I knew couldn't disappoint because despite his inherent quirkiness, he doesn't seem to be doing it to impress, it's just the way he is, Devandra Banhart.

Why does the nonsensical deliberate stream of consciousness work for Banhart but not Wilco? Self consciousness I suppose. One tries the other just does.

This is as close to polished as I suspect Banhart will ever get. It's all recorded in a studio (rather than at home like his other CDs) and there is even an orchestral backing on a couple of the tracks.

The lyrics seem impenetrable yet that's their charm. I love the Elvis references sprinkled throughout something called "Poughkeepsie." My favorite track, "The Body Breaks" describes the aging process (something I'm keenly aware of these days) with such surgical precision that it cuts to the bone. My second favorite track, "This Beard is for Siobhan" with it's refrain of having a "real good time" is sung with such strength and conviction that one absolutely believes it can be true even if one is lying in the stifling summer air not believing a word of it.

The false start and giggling stop of "Todo Los Dolores" is made up for the seemingly perfect Spanish annunciation that follows I don't know a word of it but I believe everything Banhart sings.

He tried to explain how lost he felt, how his religion had so weirdly (and probably inappropriately been summed up by season six of the TV series Buffy the Vampire Slayer where Buffy comes back from the dead, brought back by well meaning friends, but torn from a heavenly peace, only to feel completely dead inside). She asked if his lost of faith (just kinda like Buffy's) was related to the death of his mother.

Yes, he said, that might have been part of it. He just didn't know how to feel anymore and didn't know if he really wanted to. She told him to read the Bible and promised to email significant passages to him. He ate a shrimp or two (you are what you eat), tried to act like it could make a difference and then on his drive home paid particular attention to how he felt when he shifted into a new gear in his breaking down car.

Is it somehow wrong to want, no expect music to save my dying soul? When I'm sitting in a throng of people listening intently to one of my favorite artists (Lucinda Williams or Liz Phair say) is it too much to expect it to be a life defining moment? Did I not once have those at least a couple of times a year?

Buying CDs these days isn't on the list of top priorities yet every time I do I want to be changed at the very least, elevated to another place in a perfect world. I just have to keep reminding myself that has always been a lifelong expectation whether the carpet is green and shaggy, or looped and fully of cat hair.

CD Roulette

A few years back when I used to live in the duplex on Linwood with Pistol Pete and Johnny B., our Saturday nights got pretty wild. Johnny would once in awhile get too many beers in him and would remove his shirt while we were watching the Twins on TV. The sight of a bare-chested Johnny B. of course would cause my friend Spunky to immediately vacate the premises.

When I saved up enough of my Cheapo paychecks to buy a five CD-changer, our parties got even more the talk of the town. We'd have a soon to be memorable bash and five of us would each select a CD to put in the player and hit the shuffle button. When a song played from the CD one of us selected that person would have to take a drink. Thing is that CD player didn't shuffle things too good and ended up playing one of the CDs far more than any of the others. The result was one of our friends would get mighty snookered while the rest of us had to tolerate listening to more of a pretentious CD by the Fall than any of us really wanted to.

Many years later when my Mom got sick my Dad and I went out to buy a 50-CD changer. This allowed Mom to listen to her many CDs throughout the day without having to get up and change discs. When she died my Dad was kind enough to give me the CD player.

Of course as with most things in my life this led to an immediate dilemma. What 50 CDs out of my collection deserved their anointed place in the upper echelon of my listening pleasure? Finding the task all too daunting what I ended up doing was picking out 50 of my Bob Dylan concert bootlegs and putting them in the changer. It stayed that way for several years and I must say it was pretty cool hearing a 1994 version of "One Too Many Mornings" next to an entirely different arrangement from 1998. The juxtaposition only reinforced for me that Bob is rather skilled at taking a song and turning it inside out to make it sound completely new.

Last month as I was trying to clean out my office and arrange my CDs I decided I would change my music listening habits by selecting 50 CDs from 50 different artists to put in the changer. The challenge was picking what were essentially the 50 CDs that I listen to most with the caveat that some of my favorite CDs were not going to make the cut because I wanted them to be more handy for me to grab and play on my way to work.

After finally making my picks and loading them up, I have found the random playing of songs from the 50 discs to be at times rather entertaining and at other times rather jolting. I may never get used to hearing a Billie Holiday song followed by L7 or a Willie Nelson song followed by Madonna.

So in memory of those wild Saturday nights with Pistol Pete and Johnny B., I thought I'd wrap up this Saturday night not by taking a shot of whiskey but rather commenting on the songs as they pop up in random play order...

1) "Back of a Car" by Big Star: This isn't exactly one of my favorite Big Star songs and it's made more painful by the associative events of this past week when I spent $200 fixing the axle of my Honda knowing that the car is going to need to be replaced in the very near future.

2) "Dance with the Tiger" by Rosanne Cash: For those of you who have ever experienced relationship trubbles I'd highly recommend you listen carefully to Interiors, the CD this superlative song appears on. Rosanne lays it all out for all to hear here and good golly it makes me cry every time I listen to it. This one is a definite keeper.

3) "Junior's Farm" by Paul McCartney and Wings: There are those out there who believe the similar sounding "Get Back" from Paul's former previous more publicized group is a superior song. But how perceptive and current is the nonsensical lyric to this song, "At the house of Parliament, everybody's listening to the President..." Paul sweats and Paul rocks. I love this song.

4) "September Girls" by the Bangles: Just as I think my only interest in this group is Susanna Hoff's irresistible bug eyed look and the poppy hooks they go and cover an Alex Chilton song. That is so cool.

5) "Look What Thoughts Will Do" by Lefty Frizell: My cat Diego-san ironically left the room when this song plays. I mentioned this because a friend named her cat Lefty after Mr. Frizell. Lefty sings, "So good-bye and here's to you, and I'm happy through and through..." Sounds about right.

6) "I Can Hear the Laughs" by Freedy Johnston: We're all clowns Freedy sings as he wears a mask that smiles.

7) "You and Me" by the Cranberries: Dolores O' Riordon's voice is one of three in this world that can cut me to pieces. And she moves funky too.

8) "Hochsteader Polka" by Tubby Esquire: Any of you see the Greg Kinnear movie about Bob Crane? I've seen every episode of Hogan's Heroes 100 times and thus this song always makes me smile. It captures the essence of the show at the same time it mocks it. A life philosophy worth pursuing?

Don't Touch Me -d Ma Hits and All Time Low

There are some musical acts that infuriate you more than they entertain you yet somehow you just can't manage to look away. Often times it's a matter of a gripping glimpse of initial promise followed by head-scratching mediocrity. Other times it's a flash of brilliance with a frustrating sudden unbearably insipid dreck filled follow up. For me the musical group Don't Touch Me -dMa fits somewhere in between.

When I first discovered the band a couple of years back playing at my local coffee shop I couldn't wait to see just how far they might go once they truly hit their stride. Their music was eclectic and their style uniquely their own. The lead singer -d's social awkwardness somehow seemed appealing and endearing more than it was intentionally anti-social. What the group lacked in pure musicianship they made up for in earnestness.

But after seeing Don't Touch Me -dMa's most recent show last Sunday at open mike night at the Coffee Grounds, one has to wonder if the group has given in to the simple minded cynicism that pervades too much of today's music (and society).

Granted the show was essentially a -d solo performance as the group was missing several key members including Anita the go-go tambourine playing girl, Amy Lou and her inspired concertina accompaniment, and the little red hair girl whose versions of "Crab Cakes" and "Milkshake" always are money in the bank crowd pleasers. Instead what we got was -d alone on his piano playing his version of Paul McCartney's 1992 CD Off the Ground in sequence from the first insipid title song to the closer, the schmaltzy "C'mon People" that urges us to let the future in. Deep stuff this was not. I swear things got so bad that all that was left to watch by the end of the show were a couple of creatures with an odd number of limbs between them.

One might think the performance was all some kind of joke yet -d played it all terribly matter-of-fact and proved in the process if anything that he's no Paul McCartney. Not even close.

As if things were not already insufferable enough, -d took the time in between songs to rant about his world view. He chided people for not being spiritually or intellectually curious enough, accusing the vast populace of being too wrapped up in their own day to day lives to give a hoot about what is going on around them. Maybe it would have sounded convincing if two minutes later he wasn't crooning (and crooning badly) "I saw a cat with a machine in his brain/The man who fed him said he didn't feel any pain/I'd like to see that man take out that machine/And stick it in his own brain/You know what I mean..." Um no -d, some of us really never know what you mean.

Throughout the evening -d's plucky piano playing (always one of his few redeeming qualities) seemed sloppy and unrehearsed. His usual stand up pound out the unexpected notes way of playing gave way to noodle doodling as if he wasn't sure what he was going to do next and he wasn't shy about sharing his apprehension as part of his performance. Where in the past his piano playing technique has always seemed as if it was coming from a frustrated writer-wannabe, his playing this night was as if he has been taking lessons from a big black cat who strolls up and down the keyboard with no real purpose in mind.

And to add to the insufferable performance was -d's singing. Not much to rave about to begin with for whatever reason he sang the entire night out of the side of his mouth as if he was suffering from some type of Brian Wilson numb side of the face malady.

The one redeeming performance of the night came during the encore, a version of McCartney's 1983 song "The Other Me" written 10 years before the rest of the set Don't Touch Me -dMa made us all struggle through. On this one song -d got it exactly right and sang his little heart out as if the organ was shrinking from sight. "The other me would rather be the glad one/The other me would rather play the fool/I want to be the kind of me/That doesn't let you down as a rule..." Suddenly the singer seemed engaged and false empty expression gave way to the offering of a seemingly true sentiment. As he left the stage -d removed the purple Survivor buff that he'd been wearing all show as if he really wanted to reveal even more.

The Pixley Dream

It was one year short of forty years ago when the definition of delivery involving a Chinese restaurant almost took on a new meaning. A mere five days short of the actual anniversary of this more dictionary than novel like occurrence one of the participants (somewhat the sole survivor of the duo), Dohnat Ucmideyv found himself driving right by the now across the street relocated restaurant during a day where he drove from one location to the next and back again trying to solve problems like some sort of ballot counting superhero.

On the car stereo (with the ever present sound of an annoying vibrating sound of a blown out speaker) played a mix he had made for a friend, a CD that he was trying to decide whether or not was indeed a worthy mixture to give to one who had made him two superlative mixes. An early key song, that blared while Ucmideyv was right near the restaurant he had actually never eaten but was nearly born at, was Michelle Branch's "Goodbye to You" a song included because it captured the exact mood of yet another wayfaring relationship he felt himself leaving at the side of the road. "Goodbye to you, goodbye to everything that I knew/You were the one I loved, the one thing I tried to hold on to/It hurts to want everything and nothing at the same time..." The eventual recipient of the mix would know why the admittedly somewhat adolescent song was there even though she probably was the only one who would know. Ucmideyv was good at that- revealing to another what really involved another and keeping the spheres of his ever fracturing world completely separate everywhere but in his head that thought about such things way into the night (night after night).

Ironically enough many of his favorite people were now having babies. His good pal Spunky recently had an addition to his growing family. Wacky late night funnyman David Letterman also joined the ranks of fatherhood and 92-year-old former Wing Paul McCartney proved if nothing else he has always been rather fertile. Ucmideyv thought about the type of life he likely would never have, a life that included procreation and trying to raise the love of his loins at an ever ripening age.

He had come close a time or two in his life. Years ago the one who got away told Ucmideyv she'd give him her first born if he could find her a copy of the Cities Sampler Vol. 3, the only CD she brought with her when she spent a semester studying in France (this was before burnable CDs made digital mixes a feasible possibility). He was most certainly up to the challenge. For awhile he shopped the Cheapo bins and then Ebay came along and he'd see the CD occasionally available with the winning bid being over $50 (what is the going price of a first born child?). Then someone mentioned that the Ramsey County Library had most Sampler CDs and he put his name on a reservation for the one that would finally guarantee true love. And this past week after a half year waiting his name popped up on the top of the list for the CD. Grab the crib, he said to himself.

Over the years Ucmideyv had replaced a lack of any discernible talent with trying to work harder than anyone he knew. The end result was working a lot of hours with not a lot to show for it. He had learned the value of drinking a lot of coffee as a substitute for actual sleep and admiring his feline roommates in place of trying to connect with anyone else more human in particular (in all fairness he felt the ship his soulmate was on had long since left the harbor).

Moo googai Pan. He thought he might interrupt his role in this year's elections (the odd year where the city council race involved some swirling rumors of the relationship between the county sheriff and one of the candidates who reminded Ucmideyv of a friend who fronted a local band and with her husky vocals had always struck a chord deep within him) to pick up some dinner. Maybe Chinese, maybe a submarine sandwich, maybe some leftover hot dish. The next key song on the potential gift/CD mix was Josh Ritter's "Me and Jiggs" a jaunty countryish tune that was the one song of Ritter's that didn't remind the maker of Nick Drake, the most obvious suicide prior to Elliot Smith. "Me and Jiggs staring at the ceiling the stars above the radar range/Song from a station wagon laying foundations on the shadows of overpassing planes..."

From Long Beach to Mazatlan was as far as a lunar eclipse was from a fatal heartbreak as it was from a hurried Chinese takeout dinner to the nearest delivery room. The beauty of life of course, as it appeared this long day to Dohnat Ucmideyv was that all were interconnected by his mere being (or mirror being he liked to feel) so sticking around to see the end result was the only song that mattered. And then the last song added to the mix blasted out, Outkast's wonderfully peppy "Hey Ya!" The song made all that came before, and all that were to follow blur together properly. "But separates always better when there's feelings involved if what they say 'is nothing lasts forever'/then what... makes love the exception?" Hip hop and don't ride the clutch Clyde because if this song wasn't the best of the year than Ucmideyv didn't really exist and if not for what he heard he wasn't sure how much he qualified in that category.

Same Old Same Old

10) Bob Dylan Summer Days Berkeley, CA, In the Summertime St. Paul, MN: The version of Summer Days played on the last tour featured a chaotic three way guitar battle between Dylan, Charlie Sexton, and Larry Campbell. The three seemed to be going in different directions threatening to pull everything apart at the seams. The playing got crazier and crazier and finally Sexton did this cool descending run ending with Dylan stepping to the mike to finally sing again. Divine, simply divine. A month later Dylan pulled out an obscure sublime tune from 1981's Shot of Love my favorite of all my favorite Dylan LPs. The version was nothing like the wistful recorded remembrance. Dylan sang the refrain "YEAH in the summertime, when YOU were with ME" with such exaggerated aggressiveness it bordered on being silly. Still I think that maybe was the point as I couldn't stop smiling. Gosh bless Bob.

9) I Am Trying to Break Your Heart Wilco: Badly in need of a recharge I currently feel the entrepreneurial energy of a grub worm and that is why seeing this movie was so inspiring. Seeing the creative process of one of the better (albeit one of the most overrated yet still overlooked) groups around created some flicker of the embers inside.

8) Tadpole- I made a great friend this year. She's bright, talented, and has the world in front of her and I think the world of her. That I'm closer to her parents' age than her own didn't mean she couldn't offer me some of the wisest advice whenever I asked. We had a pretend date going (appropriately it seems) to Tadpole a movie that had a lot to say and said it in an intriguing way. The highlight of the evening might have been our stop at the local neighborhood Cheapo store where I was treated like a rock star. My friend was impressed.

7) David Sedaris at the Ordway St. Paul, MN: He is the writer I want to be and I decided to share that little fact with a still great friend who had never read Sedaris' work or attended a book reading. She laughed at all the right spots and it was one of the most enjoyable evenings of the year.

6) Paul McCartney Here Today St. Paul, MN: Nothing could possibly be worth what Macca was charging for his tickets but this touching live version of his touching love song to John Lennon came close. Goose bump inspiring enriching stuff that even those who are Beatled out should take the time to listen to- if only to be a better person.

5) St. Paul Saints beat the Duluth Dukes or the Sioux Falls Sioux or somebody: I went to my first Saints game this summer. The game was nothing special but I had a nice memorable time. It was the evening of an all day softball tournament and my legs and feet were absolutely aching and feeling all of the 37 years old that they were. A friend (who was also on the team- we were both irregulars) scored the Saints tickets and kindly asked me to go. I told her we could save money by walking from my house. It was a longer walk than I remembered and I think she thought we'd never make it back. Still it was one of the nicest walks of a life that is filled with believe it or not, nice walks.

4) Lucinda Williams Essence Minneapolis, MN: T'was a hot simmering summer evening in First Ave but this sweltering version of a sweaty sexy song made me fall in love for the first time since the last time that was supposed to be the last time forever (and may still yet be?- nah...).

3) The Twins season- I never believed in contraction but it was still somehow fitting that the Twins' had a most marvelous season while the commissioner's Brewers sucked big time.

2) Warren Zevon Mutineer on the Late Show with David Letterman: Dave gave the recently terminally diagnosed Warren the entire hour. Zevon's heartstopping version of "Mutineer" was stunning and transcendent. For those who should ever happen to question whether or not it is worth being here in this harsh unforgiving place this performance was the perfect answer. Every last breath counts and is not to be taken for granted.

1) Mr. Max's many trips to the vet St. Paul, MN: Max has had a rough year physically. Enduring several trips to the vet he knows if I put him in his carrier and into my rusting car where we are going since we no longer go anywhere else. Mr. Max isn't shy about expressing his displeasure in being taken again against his will. By the time we arrive at the University of Minnesota Veterinary Clinic he seems resigned to the upcoming poking and prodding. We sit in a large waiting area surrounded mostly by large dogs the size of Cadillacs and Max sits in the back corner of his carrier trembling like a bunny occasionally letting out an audible meow calling attention to himself from all in the room. I try to tell him that he might want to lay low but that never has been his once in a lifetime style. Two trips back they put him on thyroid medication for a condition that caused him to lose two pounds (to a skin and bones frame) in seven months. This latest trip it was determined the medication was the culprit behind why he had very few white blood cells left. When the vet called me with the results of the tests I was more than a tad concerned. When I got home I told Mr. Max there was good news and bad news. The good news was he didn't have to take his pill anymore. He then turned around and walked away seemingly not wanting to hear, or not needing to hear the rest. Bless the little fellow for all we have shared.

From Beneath It Devours

"I could tell you what's happening here but I don't know if that would really tell you what's happening here..."
-Jeremy Davis in Solaris

I experienced a startling moment of clarity while watching Steven Soderbergh's film Solaris (a thoughtful little movie that provokes such introspection). As the movie slowly unfolded I found myself thinking that it was nice watching a quiet movie with big ideas but it was all rather mediocre in the way it was being done in comparison say to an average episode of Buffy The Vampire Slayer. Indeed given the themes presented in Solaris (whether or not it is possible for people to truly "know" another person or whether what we think we know is limited to our own personal memories and the values we attach to them) I couldn't help but think had Buffy's Joss Whedon directed and written the movie it would have been much more moving and enlightening.

Soderbergh's work is weighed down (way down) by its unrelenting solemn mood. We are constantly reminded (especially through the grim performance of George Clooney) that this movie is deep if not a little beyond pretentious.

Clooney plays a psychologist who is sent out to a space station near the planet Solaris. Seems something has gone terribly awry on the space station and Clooney is sent out to investigate. What he discovers are some dead bodies and two survivors who aren't exactly forthcoming as to what exactly has gone wrong. Clooney's character decides to snooze on it and when he awakes he is surprised to find his wife lying next to him in bed. He's surprised because his wife committed suicide several years before.

And this is where the movie raises some mind bending questions. Clooney knows that this wife really isn't his wife. But even more peculiar is this wife also begins to realize she isn't really his wife. She's composed only of his memories of her yet she has self awareness that that is not all there is. The crew of the space station want to destroy these 'beings" from Solaris because they don't know for what purpose they have been sent- yet Clooney refuses to destroy his "wife" maybe because he isn't really sure she is not his wife and craves a second chance but probably because the woman is self aware- a prerequisite of anyone with a soul.

This is where my Buffy moment occurred- and the moment means of course that I have reached the end of my ability to participate in any worthwhile pop culture discussion. When Buffy becomes your barometer it probably means other people won't understand or won't want to understand any of your remaining perceptions. I think it's no coincidence that early in the week I was feeling off my game and ill first suffering chills and then a fever. It was if my internal thermostat (or barometer or whatever) was defective. The TV show is deeply emotional, perceptive, insightful and great but it is (and it is not) about young people battlin' vampires. One can't/won't be taken seriously if Buffy speaks louder than Shakespeare, Magritte, Bergman, or Beethoven.

While Solaris doesn't entirely succeed it is noteworthy to mention that it is nice that a major Hollywood director and actor chose to make a quite little contemplative movie especially since just about everything else out there is full of loud action, loud and dumb characters who do loud and dumb things. It is nice to walk out of a movie contemplating the deeper meaning of things rather than trying to remember because it's all so forgettable yet another humdrum action scene, or love scene, or the latest wacky antics and offerings from a former Saturday Night Live alum that passes as inspired comedy.

Solaris has been compared with Stanley Kubrick's great 2001: A Space Odyssey mostly because it's science fiction that relies more on the cerebral rather than dazzling special effects. Indeed look up information on the internet about the original Russian film and it is inevitably referred to as the Russian 2001. Yet Soderbergh's version reminded me more of another film released the same year as 2001- the Beatles' swan song Let it Be. That film documents the disintegration of the group. It was the movie that gave meaning to my senior year of high school- I watched it over and over fascinated by the group dynamics it displayed (plus the wonderful music involved).

Let it Be opens with Paul sitting at a grand piano with Ringo at his side. He is playing a classical piece that sounds like a lost Erik Satie composition but likely is a McCartney original (maybe even made up on the spot). The somber tone sets the mood for the rest of the movie that seems to be about Paul trying to rally the group to get back to touring like they did in the old days. And it's not as if he just wants to recapture the past- he seems convinced that this time it will be different and by taking a sad song and making it better it will bring them all back together again. In the end Solaris makes a similar argument although it is unclear what side the movie finds itself on. It's all lyrical and beautiful- just not as good as Buffy.

Humbert's Leftovers

"She says, 'You can't repeat the past.' I say, 'You can't? What do you mean, you can't? Of course you can.'"
-Bob Dylan

I may be a lot of things, or I may be nothing, but one thing I don't remember hearing someone/anyone describe me as is "nostalgic." I certainly can lean that way on occasion (especially when it comes to holidays and also thinking about a certain leaky kitty described in painful detail last week who has been around for the past eleven remarkable years) but I'm usually the type of fellow who likes a clear line of demarcation between periods of his life and has made it a point to try his best not to blur the lines between those periods.

Yet more than any other holiday I think I miss my Mom most on Thanksgiving Day. It was one of those days I so shamefully took for granted over the years. The pattern had been waking up, grabbing my newspaper and reading one of my favorite writers, Patrick Reusse's pick for Turkey of the Year, and then heading over to my parents' house before most of the rest of my siblings, to the wonderful smell of a baking turkey (and the stuffing involved at that point), and knowing that my Mom knew I had read Reusse's column and together chuckling at his most recent anointed one. Christmas I may have come away with more loot and New Years the meal may have been even better, but there was always something about Thanksgiving that I was well, thankful about.

Thanksgiving these past few years has just been another day. My siblings are mostly married tending to spend the day with their inlaw's families. My dad and I have usually been invited to my one sister's family who lives in my grandparents' house and I have mostly drifted into the background, self chuckling at Reusse's Turkey of the Year.

This year the blue eyed former House Public Information Office writer like intern told me her mom had expressed surprise that we had remained in contact after the internment was complete and if I would be interested in coming over for Thanksgiving. I was quite touched in hearing this bit of information and agreed to try something a little different this time around.

It was a delicious meal (the effort of turkey grilled outside- yummmm) and it was nice finally seeing and meeting the close family that I had heard so much about. Talk about an example of a stellar Midwestern (Apple Valley) family. The parents are employed by two of Minnesota's largest companies. The oldest daughter is attending a prestigious institution of higher learning; the eldest son is attending another fine college. The two youngest children aren't quite sure what comes next for them but both seemed to be fine kids. I arrived and the family was sitting around the kitchen table playing a game of Rack-o. The eldest daughter, my dear friend, gave me a tour of the nicely built and clean home and I finally got to see the famous comforter she painted her bedroom around this summer.

My favorite moment/memory? Going down to the messy basement to hear Eminem's theme song for his movie, 8 Mile with the big howling dog Sophie yapping along. The blue eyed former intern told me it was a brilliant song and hers is an opinion I've learned to listen to with close attention, and one of my favorite music critics (Greil Marcus) confirmed her opinion. The song ("Lose Yourself") shook me to my core.

"'Lose Yourself' begins to play under the closing credits, and in an instant it blows the film away. The music dissolves the movie, reveals it as a lie, a cheat, as if it were made not to reveal but to cover up the seemingly bottomless pit of resentment and desire that is the story's true source. Again and again the piece all but blows up in the face of the man who's chanting it, lost in his rhymes until suddenly people are shouting at him from every direction and the music jerks him into the chorus, which he escapes in turn. The piece builds into crescendos of power, climbing ladders of refusal and willfulness step by step, rushing nothing, never reaching the top because it is the music itself that has put the top so high. "
-Greil Marcus

What makes Eminem's "Lose Yourself" such a great song is that he demonstrates the clear difference between art and entertainment (and commerce). It's a song he has to sing not because the movie dictates it- but because he needs to purge and share the deep feelings inside. Maybe someone will hear and understand and maybe many won't. But it doesn't matter. The art of sharing is what matters. And I probably would have never really listened had my friend not made it a point to point it out. If you want to know why I spent this past summer and Thanksgiving with a person whose parents I'm closer to in age than her- well it all has to do with THE very meaning of life. If there is one thing I've learned about that subject it is how very important it is to keep an open mind, keep learning, keep on being curious. The moment you stop exposing yourself to things you are not used to or are familiar with or uncomfortable with- is the moment you start getting old.

The prior few days I was wrestling with the type of questions I can't wrestle with in public (that the intern was so uniquely good at listening to) for fear of being locked up (again?)- what exactly is the purpose of music? And why does it seemingly mean so much more to me (and my closest {secret} acquaintances) than other people? These questions were on my mind because two of my favorite artists/icons, Paul McCartney and Bob Dylan had on the same day released new concert CDs that were about as different as green mint cake (spiced up with some alcohol) and the more traditional Thanksgiving pumpkin pie.

McCartney's disc Back in the U.S. is a faithful document of his recently completed tour (which included a stop in St. Paul that I forked over $75 to see). Dylan's disc is a document of a most interesting period of his career- the mid-1970's tour dubbed as the Rolling Thunder Revue (that sounds nothing like his stop last month in the same venue as McCartney). Could things be more different? McCartney and company provide what I'm sure they thought their audience (and from the gross profits and critical acclaim from the tour demonstrated they knew what they were doing) were seeking: nostalgia wrapped around faithful recreations of a lot of the Beatles' best music. One can be amazed (and maybe I'm amazed) at how the band manages to match note for note the original songs as they appeared in their recorded form. McCartney's voice may have lost some its power over the years but still he does a quite remarkable job in hitting most of the same notes.

I love the way the disc (and the concert I saw) opens with a loose version of a Beatles song I've never particularly cared for, "Hello Goodbye." It's the perfect concert opener serving as some sort of ironic greeting.

But the other live McCartney recordings (1977's Wings Over America, 1990's Tripping the Live Fantastique and 1993's Paul is Live ) contain so many of the same songs performed in many of the same arrangements that by the end of disc #2 of the new one one has to wonder if one has gotten one's money's worth. Yes it's great to hear live treatments of some really great music but does one want to hear a great song like "All My Loving" enhanced by some of the exact same wacky triplet chords strummed by John Lennon or Rusty Anderson?

But it's not so all easily dismissed. The loving tributes to John and George are quite heartwarming. The Lennon tribute, the sprightly acoustic "Here Today" is a great song that not only captures McCartney's love of his songwriting partner but does so in a way that would have made John proud: in the quaint tradition of Lennon's love songs sung directly to Yoko. (It's as revealing and honest as Eminem's "Lose Yourself.") The equally as intimate cover of George's most famous song "Something" covered by Paul on the ukulele is a treat to behold and at the same time captures George's most endearing quality- his sense of humor- in a tear dropping fashion.

Ultimately however the CD just comes to demonstrate how McCartney in his solo career/quest has always been about how little he can get away with rather than how much he is capable of creating.

That's not quite the case with Dylan. I got Dylan's newest Live 1975 a day after Cheapo's own Pat Wheeler was kind enough to mail me a CDR of Bob's concert in Atlanta this past February. The contrast between the two concerts could not have been any more distinct- and that is what makes Dylan such a still vitally creative artist. Listen to Bob then and listen to him now and you'd be hard pressed to say that this is the same artist. And yet both periods of his career are so rich and revealing.

The Rolling Thunder Revue was Dylan's idea about traveling with a huge group of artists who would show up unannounced in town to town as some sort of minstrel show that would leave the local townsfolk with something different night after night. An idyllic hippie idea at its best and it helped inspire some of Dylan's most accessible and interesting work of his career. Listen to Live 1975's version of his best story song (rage against the justice system) "Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll" and dare to tell me this guy isn't breathtakingly brilliant. And listen to his desperate plea to his ex-wife Sara appropriately named "Sara" "...don't ever leave me, don't ever go..." (they got divorced shortly after the song was released) and Dylan shows that he is no slouch when it comes to that old artful need to express for expression sake.

Listen to a much later night's performance of the sardonic "Things Have Changed" 17 years forward with some of the most idiosyncratic singing imaginable and tell me this guy still doesn't have more to say than anyone that has come before or since. The difference between the two most famous artists boils down to this- Paul wants to blast his audience back to the past- back to another day (yesterday) and the feelings his songs originally invoked. Bob on the other hand wants the past to somehow disintegrate instead rather wanting to focus on what can come next, living in the moment instead of longing for what used to be. Both men are quite effective in delivering the contrasting messages.

Thankfully those unintentionally listening and living between the two can somehow enjoy all the newly purchased new music. And don't get me started on the Buffy the Musical disc that I finally got around to purchasing. That disc is all about the conflicts of those who have souls and those who feel dead inside. Egads, this is all so much to digest and please pass the leftovers...

Breaking the Fall (It's Nice to Get Away Once in a While)

Picture this: a starry Bay Area night in the crisp autumn air sitting in an outdoor 8,000 seat theater built in 1903. The University of California Berkeley's Greek Theater resembles the Roman Coliseum with its stately architecture including large white pillars (as a kitty sitter typically wittingly said when she saw a picture of the venue: "Holler when they bring out the lions and feed the slaves to them...") and the place is shaped exactly like the half moon that shines in the sky above. Three members of the versatile four piece band are dressed similarly (burgundy colored suits the first night, black suits the next). The lead singer is the center of attention not only with his different attire (black suit for night one, gray suit the second night) but also his distinctive swagger. The stage lights go down to the din of an Aaron Copland piece that is mostly drowned out by the whistles and yelps from an expectant crowd.

The band begins with a bluesy rock number. On the left hand side of the stage lead guitarist Charlie Sexton rips off several high arching rhythmic riffs. On the right the other guitarist, Larry Campbell answers Sexton with a less flashy but more melodic stream of notes. Bassist Tony Garnier provides a thumping foundation under the wailing guitars and drummer George Receli is pounding his kit with such force that one fears the fellow's fillings might fly out.

The first surprise of the evening is that the lead singer- who will provide his usually quirky vocals throughout the performance, is half seated, half standing behind an electric keyboard rather than the acoustic and rhythm guitar he usually plays. He pounds chords out simultaneously with both hands looking just like a young boy in Hibbing in the saccharine 1950's shocking an audience of high school students and teachers with his very best Little Richard imitation.

"Well, I'm gonna quit this baby talk now/I guess I should have known/I got troubles, I think maybe you got troubles/I think maybe we'd better leave each other alone/Whatever you gonna do/Please do it fast/I'm still trying to get used to/Seeing the real you at last"

********

It's all about Jennifer. It has been for quite a while, something that will never be explainable, never be understood just like Anya's, the vengeance demon on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, fear of bunny rabbits. If pressed to say what you mean you'd probably stammer and stumble but failing to do so, failing to explain ultimately says much much more.

In the fall four years ago I was scheduled to go to a Bob Dylan show at Midway Stadium (within walking distance of my house) with my friend Jennifer and another friend. I was a bit anxious about mixing these two particular friendships Lord knows why. But Jennifer stood me up. Walked away. So I was minus $32.50 for the ticket, $5,000 for a home improvement loan, and much much more. Things did forever change.

There are times in life when you just need to hear a particular song whether for inspiration, introspection, insight, distraction or mere entertainment, a familiar song can reboot your inner hard drive every now and then. Last week as I was packing a duffel bag for a three day trip to Berkeley I just had to hear Bob Dylan's Oscar winning "Things Have Changed." I couldn't say why, and I didn't feel I needed to. My CDs are currently in a rather disorganized state so finding one particular disc is sometimes a futile exercise. Unfortunately this was one of those times. And for a minute or two there I thought I was going to unravel if I did not find my Wonder Boys CD. If forced to choose the song would make the short list of my all time favorite Dylan songs- not because it has any of his most unforgettable lines- but rather because of the mood it invokes. The singer has seen quite enough and as he wanders through absurd situation after absurd situation he admits his state of mind- he used to care but things have changed.

"I hurt easy I just don't show it/You can hurt someone and not even know it/The next sixty seconds could be like an eternity/Gonna get low down, gonna fly high/All the truth in the world adds up to one big lie/I'm in love with a woman who don't even appeal to me"

Years later as I found myself serenely sitting at the West Coast venue (within walking distance of my sister's apartment) with my friend Spunky I couldn't help but think about Jennifer. I wouldn't have found myself where I was if not for another Jennifer. When Dylan announced his summer tour schedule and it didn't include the Twin Cities I was a bit disappointed having seen the man perform every year for the past ten years. The closest he was coming was Fargo and Sioux City certainly makeable drives. But one thing working at the Legislature has taught me is the necessity of a legitimate balanced budget- meaning not only should revenues at the very least compensate for expenditures but also that the many areas needing funding receive their fair share. In state terms that includes areas like transportation, health and human services, governmental services, public safety, etc. For me it includes mortgage and insurance payments, utility bills, feeding the dying kitty, and necessary entertainment needs. Already having spent another year's amount for Twins' season tickets as well as an outrageously priced seat for a Paul McCartney show I couldn't justify the traveling costs of going to one of the Dakotas to see Dylan.
I knew my fellow Twin Cities resident Bobfan Jennifer (2) was going to go to the Fargo show with her sister. Keeping my options open I asked if I could hitch a ride with them. Jennifer (2) kindly said yes. But common sense (not always such a good thing) prevailed and I decided to bite a difficult bullet and not see Bob in 2002 (this was all before the announced St. Paul show).

But the relative ease of my decision might have come from knowing another option did exist: he was playing two shows in Berkeley where my sister is going to law school and my old college roommate the irascible Spunky lives within an hour's drive. Having not yet visited either one in their new location I thought it might be the perfect excuse to get a few tickets and fly out and spend time with some important people.

But I couldn't pull the trigger until Jennifer (2) said her experience has always been that once you're standing there watching Bob perform, it always seems worth it in the end (she flew out to see him in Seattle). Turns out she couldn't have been more right. I was convinced.

On our walk to the Greek Theater for night one's show Spunky and I walked past a college building where the notes of someone practicing piano scales floated into the air. I kiddingly remarked that I wondered if that was Bob getting ready for the show. Spunky got the joke (one of the few that most often does). We then encountered a rather large line of people waiting to get in. By the time we were frisked and entered the general admission only event there was scarcely a seat to be seen. We wandered to the far left side and sat down on the now cold cement bench like seats.

The usual introduction ("Please welcome Columbia recording artist Bob Dylan") was embellished (somewhat mockingly) to include references to being rock and roll's "poet laureate" and donning makeup and a substance abuse problem in the 70's, finding Jesus and 'becoming relevant' again with some of his best work in the past few years. It was remindful of Dylan's wicked sense of humor- from his interview with a Time Magazine reporter seen in the documentary Don't Look Back ("I can sing as well as Caruso"); to whatever the LP Self Portrait was supposed to be; to the fake beard he wore this fall at his return concert to Newport where he was booed off the stage in the 60's for having gone electric (a sacred no-no in the serious folk world) to the Traveling Wilburys.

Bob's keyboard playing style was fun to watch. He plays the piano like an aging kitty awoken from a nap stretching his spine as far as he can towards the ceiling not only to feel better but to strut his stuff. Night one's highlights included a terrific "Tombstone Blues" where he sang the line "the sun's not yellow... it's... CHICKEN" like a gleeful grade school child who can't wait to reveal the punchline to a recently learned riddle. There was also a sad and mournful yet confident "Positively 4th Street" and a great great country blues version of "It's All Right Ma (I'm Only Bleeding)" that of course got the hippy crowd cheering lines like "even the President of the United States must sometimes have to stand naked..." and "advertising signs that con you into thinking that you are the one/that can do what's never been done/that can win what's never been won/meantime life outside goes on all around you..."

My favorite moment however was a sterling version (the best I've ever heard) of "Things Have Changed" where Bob's weary and sardonic vocal was enhanced by a band that got behind the heart and soul of the observational current state of things (mind) so effectively that even those Berkeley residents (remnants) who smelled of funny herbs seemed to appreciate a newer song.

Bob also did some crowd pleasing covers including the Rolling Stones' "Brown Sugar" and my favorite Neil Young tribute to dads "Old Man." He also included two Warren Zevon songs both nights ("Accidentally Like a Martyr" and "Mutineer") that while not reaching the heights of a Dylan original certainly were quite touching (I cried when I heard about Zevon's terminal diagnosis).

The undeniable highlight of night two was a quiet and reflective "Every Grain of Sand" that usually, unlike most Dylan songs, doesn't match the studio version but this night somehow came quite close. The triplet arpeggios of the song that create such a hypnotic hymn like quality were recreated live by Bob's keyboard work and Larry and Charlie's subtle electric guitar playing. What usually translates live into an awkward ballad was on this occasion a reminder of what a great great intuitive writer/performer Bob is.

He closed both nights with several songs from his last CD Love and Theft, a piece of work that should have changed the world and still might. There were smile inducing jazzy versions of "Floater" and "Moonlight" as well as an apocalyptic "High Water." The swinging "Summer Days" almost fell apart both nights due to the wordiness of the song but I swear the band was swinging/rocking so hard by the end as Bob tried to spit out the words that I was afraid the whole place was going to launch skywards.