I am sitting here at killradio on a Tuesday morning. It's May 22, which is the anniversary of the great Sun Ra's Arrival Day (his birthday), and I am listening to KFJC-FM's 24 hour marathon celebration of All Things Sonny. I am still in awe of what this Saturnian from Birmingham accomplished, and am grateful that there are so many recordings available (and many more yet to be made available) so that we can still share in his ethic and his philosophy and his mercurial, mad music. And as this blasts through me, I am wondering about my own life and what I have accomplished and what is left to be done.
Last night was the final episode, as well, of the tv show House. Big fan here, because like so many of us, I relate to the misanthropic motives of that genius doctor. My friend Gary Rutledge is the one who told me, back in 2005 I think it was, that I should maybe pay attention to this program, that it was special. (Sadly Gary passed away in 2009 and I really miss him because he was about the only person I could talk with about things like tv shows.) So I watched my first House at his prompting. It was about a young girl with cancer who had less than a year to live, but she also had a brain problem that was killing her separate from the cancer, and since she was going to die anyway, what could be done? And House came through, as he always did (which is not realistic -- many many people die from diseases and problems that cannot be figured out before they pass -- but it IS a television show so we should not expect anything else), and at the end she left the hospital, still with terminal cancer, but at least she had a year. Well, I was hooked, and I have not missed an episode since then. I am sad to see the show end, and I have to admit I wasn't that pleased with its conclusion (since we have to wonder how Greg House will survive as most everybody believes he is dead), but as expected the show ends on a dangling note. Nothing ever is really resolved in life either.
I am now contemplating ending my radio program the Chill Room, which I have been doing since June 1997, and have done continually since, with the exception of the year of 1999 when I couldn't find a place to do it. I did a few Chills at Al's Bar in early 2000, about three or four, but that was it, and then killradio.org opened its doors in the fall and I have been on kill ever since. I have hardly missed a weekly show since November 2000. And besides my weekly Chill Rooms, I have also been in more than once a week in the daytime to prep my music and to do the Weekly News. But Chill Rooms, I must have done between 500 and 600 of them by now. Currently on radio4all.net I have posted 245 programs, most of which are still available (a handful of the links have gone down over the years, but again most of them are still there). Over a hundred individual Chill Rooms and a bunch of other news and music and theater programs.
You know, I figured that by now I would have built a decent live audience. If I'd have guessed ten years ago that I would still only have about maybe ten live listeners now I may not have done all this. Don't get me wrong, I love my live listeners. They are real companions, having put up with my rants and angers and musical obsessions. But I have always believed that if I kept this up, I would grow a real audience. I thought by now I would have at least 100 of them. I know that what I do is good, and it's simply not like any other radio show on the air. Oh, there may be other dj's who play the kind of music I love, but nobody else does it like I do. I also love the communication of dj's, and I know I make a great program. It IS demanding, especially the last year in which my shows are about four and a half to five hours in length. It would be hard for ME to be an audience member and listen to so much every single week. I get it, that most people have too much ego to listen to other people's music choices, but again, I have such good taste, and such a broad understanding of music, and can go into so many genres, no two shows ever sound the same. And my collages are as good as it gets. I can pull out any recording of any Chill Room, especially ones I have not listened to in ages (in general, a new show gets play for a few weeks then slips away for the next new shows, and I do not listen to old shows that often, but I am rarely dissatisfied when I do listen to an old show -- they're that good), and surprise myself. But I have reached a point when I am not really sure if it's doing me any good to keep doing the same thing.
Let me put it this way. I am basically doing the same thing I was doing TEN YEARS AGO. Life has not changed very much at all. Every week, no matter what else I am doing, I am prepping for a new show. I am gathering music and studying texts about that music, and thinking about how to present it. Killradio moved into this studio where I sit in the fall of 2002. Before that we had been in two other locations, one "permanent" for a year and a half, and then a temporary space in the summer of 2002 for about four months. So I have been coming to this studio now sometimes as much as four times a week for almost ten years. I have seen dozens of dj's come through kill. I have seen dj's come aboard and disappear. I have seen several dj's grow tired of how kill works and quit to form their own stations elsewhere, and in EVERY single case, those new stations have failed while kill still hangs on. I have seen dj's leave and then come back too. I have been frustrated at how things work here, I have had people grow angry with me, I have been involved in fights and blowups and skirmishes, I have also been part of huge group hugs as we have kept going. I have paid kill many hundreds of dollars in dues. I have bought microphones and speakers and installed more computers than I can count. I have rebooted and restarted the station dozens of times. I have done the minutes of dozens, maybe more than a hundred, meetings. I have been involved in more aspects of kill than probably anybody else. And I am now thinking of saying goodbye.
I mean, am I anything other than "dj bennett"? There certainly are other things I could try to do. The net has more of a need for writing than ever, and I could do that. I am not a young man anymore, almost 60, but I have no family, no major obligations, and I am just tired of doing the same thing endlessly. If I stop being part of kill it will be a huge change, and I am sure I will find myself wondering what the hell I am doing. But if I stay here, will anything ever change for me? Will I just do this until I drop dead? (Which could be tomorrow, you never know. I am surprised I am alive now to be honest.) Is this all that I am?
If I leave kill, I will need to get myself a laptop computer because I still want to be online, and my phone computer doesn't really cut it. Oh, it's definitely better than anything I've had at home before, but it doesn't do enough. But if I take the $20 monthly dues and buy a laptop instead, and stock it full of Audacity or any other editing stuff, I could still do some audio work and post it, just not through killradio. I am not saying I would ever give up my passion for music. But maybe it is time to turn the Chill Room over to this blog and to find out if I can just do something else that would be good for me and for the world.
I told myself I would write on this for about an hour, so I am almost done. Nothing is resolved, but maybe something is revealed. It's not like I'll just quit this week, I would announce a final show and prep for that. This week I am probably going to do a show that has been in the back of my mind for about three years -- a Chill Room on Bob Dylan's Blood on the Tracks album. Still plenty to do there. But it's not like it's tremendously exciting, just something I have wanted to do because I have all this material and something to say about it. And it seems to me that I have done some perfect collages in the past year, and what can you do after perfection? (There was a Chill Room I did in 2010 that I called Perfection Is Failure.) You can't make something any more than perfect, can you?
I posted the possibility that I would end the Chill Room on my Facebook page and I have already gotten questions about it, but I am not announcing it yet, just thinking about it. I have thought about it before too, but I suspect this one might be the real thing. Maybe it is time. I could say something about possibilities, but now I've been writing over an hour, and I have to do my Weekly News, so let me finish. Let me finish sort of, you know, dangling?
Tuesday, May 22, 2012
Tuesday, May 8, 2012
Wiping the Shaman with a Shammy
Chillroom Podomatic title "Shaman"
The last couple months I have been seeking a proper follow up to the February show I did called Sleep (see Sleeping Beauty below and go to Chill Room Sleep for the show itself). Each week I have made a new collage, with titles like Broken Strings, The Angry Chill Room, and Pulse Radio, all in a sweep to find something that would continue the approach of the Sleep show, yet lead in new directions. But I have not posted any of these shows. As Sleep was a reduction, all the way to delta waves as in deep sleep, I knew I wanted to build up rather than reduce -- to barrage rather than withdraw. Each week I accumulate new audio material, and what I find directs where I go. A few weeks back I came across two remarkable audio clips of voices that I never expected to hear -- the author Samuel Beckett and Don Juan's friend Carlos Castaneda. I thought I would build a show starting with that, and the next collage was full of great material but was too schizoid and I recognized that I was taking on too much at once. So I decided to concentrate on Castaneda.
This is one of the very few photos that exist of Carlos Castaneda. Here he is with a friend of his named Jeanie at a wedding sometime in 1962.
Listen to the show to hear what I think of Carlos, but I will say I am not a believer in magic and new age mysticism. However, his 1972 book Journey to Ixtlan had a profound effect on me back in 1974 when I was 20 and first read it. It opened up my perceptions and taught me to not accept consensus reality as the only option available to understand "what's going on." It effected the way I approach art. It changed my ears and eyes to see, I think, better. It helped in my training of my senses and was a major step on my becoming aware of possibilities.
The point is that this radio show, done last Friday night at midnight on killradio.org here in Los Angeles, hit the spot that I needed and it is now available. If you listen you will hear how I grapple with Castaneda the sorceror and Castaneda the man. (Just as a note, I met Castaneda in 1993.) And I think that this show, which I have titled Shaman here, is finally that follow up that I was looking for. It is designed to be a space of sound and thought that you have to negotiate -- including when I turn the talking over to the only recorded interview we have with Carlos Castaneda, from January 1969 -- which I think Carlos left behind as a mistake! But I have weighed this program down with dense, complex, barrages of overlapping music and noise that the auditor can confront as a warrior. There are many ideas at play here, including fraud and manipulation. Shaman also reads as "sham man."
If what I write here sounds all turned into itself, I am sorry, for that is not what you will find on that link. The design is meant to be fun, even if it is difficult. But then, for something to really be worthwhile, shouldn't you have to work?
The last couple months I have been seeking a proper follow up to the February show I did called Sleep (see Sleeping Beauty below and go to Chill Room Sleep for the show itself). Each week I have made a new collage, with titles like Broken Strings, The Angry Chill Room, and Pulse Radio, all in a sweep to find something that would continue the approach of the Sleep show, yet lead in new directions. But I have not posted any of these shows. As Sleep was a reduction, all the way to delta waves as in deep sleep, I knew I wanted to build up rather than reduce -- to barrage rather than withdraw. Each week I accumulate new audio material, and what I find directs where I go. A few weeks back I came across two remarkable audio clips of voices that I never expected to hear -- the author Samuel Beckett and Don Juan's friend Carlos Castaneda. I thought I would build a show starting with that, and the next collage was full of great material but was too schizoid and I recognized that I was taking on too much at once. So I decided to concentrate on Castaneda.
This is one of the very few photos that exist of Carlos Castaneda. Here he is with a friend of his named Jeanie at a wedding sometime in 1962.
Listen to the show to hear what I think of Carlos, but I will say I am not a believer in magic and new age mysticism. However, his 1972 book Journey to Ixtlan had a profound effect on me back in 1974 when I was 20 and first read it. It opened up my perceptions and taught me to not accept consensus reality as the only option available to understand "what's going on." It effected the way I approach art. It changed my ears and eyes to see, I think, better. It helped in my training of my senses and was a major step on my becoming aware of possibilities.
The point is that this radio show, done last Friday night at midnight on killradio.org here in Los Angeles, hit the spot that I needed and it is now available. If you listen you will hear how I grapple with Castaneda the sorceror and Castaneda the man. (Just as a note, I met Castaneda in 1993.) And I think that this show, which I have titled Shaman here, is finally that follow up that I was looking for. It is designed to be a space of sound and thought that you have to negotiate -- including when I turn the talking over to the only recorded interview we have with Carlos Castaneda, from January 1969 -- which I think Carlos left behind as a mistake! But I have weighed this program down with dense, complex, barrages of overlapping music and noise that the auditor can confront as a warrior. There are many ideas at play here, including fraud and manipulation. Shaman also reads as "sham man."
If what I write here sounds all turned into itself, I am sorry, for that is not what you will find on that link. The design is meant to be fun, even if it is difficult. But then, for something to really be worthwhile, shouldn't you have to work?
Monday, April 16, 2012
Supernatural versus Fringe
I am poor. I think that makes me like most people in the world today. It certainly doesn't make me special. But one of the consequences of being poor is an inability to keep up with the technologies that are firing away today. I resent, in fact, that we no longer have real free TV. I did get one of those converter boxes but the remote I got doesn't work, and a while back the converter box itself stopped working, so I can't get any DTV channels. I do have cable, but I simply cannot afford any more than just basic cable. Though even the minimum, giving me just a few basic channels, costs me $14.95 a month with that lousy corporate shit Time Warner. I attempted once to upgrade and got in one of those cable boxes, but then I was only able to watch one channel at a time. I couldn't record one show and watch another, I could only watch what the cable box allowed. Well, that lasted one week and I got rid of it. That also means that I cannot afford a damned DVR. Oh, I could afford a one-time expense but not a damned subscription at $20 a month or whatever it is. Occasionally I'll get calls from Time Warner trying to get me to upgrade but I am always (somewhat) rude to the folks on the line, because I cannot afford their goddamn upgrade! And my basic cable should only cost $5 a month, not $15. Recently, even basic cable was downgraded -- because they took out the TV Guide channel so I get no announcements for what is now on TV. (And the TV Guide Network showed occasional good movies and old TV shows too, so that means my basic cable now has even less on it for $15 a month the bastards!)
So I am stuck with what I can watch on TV. Now I happen to think that while most TV sucks -- by which I mean the shit reality shows, the crap like Biggest Loser and The Voice and American Idol, all completely unwatchable by anyone with an IQ over 70 (did I just insult anyone?) -- that scripted TV now is better than ever. And I am not talking about HBO and Showtime things, because obviously I can't afford to see that stuff, and I don't miss it. I was excited to see FX shows like Rescue Me -- until I actually watched it and found that it's overdone and very very boring. But some shows are really good. I am big fan of TNT's Southland, for instance. And I do like some of the regular network shows. Which leads me to Friday nights.
I leave home on Friday evening to do my killradio.org radio show, The Chill Room. I leave a little after 8pm and am on the air usually before 10pm and on til very late. So I cannot watch TV on Friday evenings. It used to be that Fridays were a desolate spot on the TV schedule -- it was where so many shows went to die. But a couple seasons back one of my favorite shows, Supernatural, ended up at 9pm Friday evenings on the CW. This was fine with me, I could tape it on my VCR and when I got home I would watch. But then another show I enjoy called Fringe moved to 9pm Friday nights on Fox. However, that first season it was on Friday it also played in the old Mad TV time slot on Saturdays at 11pm, so I could tape it then and still catch up with it. But the Saturday run only lasted one season and now Fringe is only on Fridays at 9, opposite Supernatural. Then, to make things even more complicated, I became very fond of the new CBS show A Gifted Man with Patrick Wilson. I would watch it on Saturday mornings fried out of my head after staying up all night and the melodramatic elements would have a powerful effect on me. So for a few weeks I was able to tape A Gifted Man at 8 and Supernatural at 9, and I would miss Fringe. A Gifted Man I guess is not coming back next season, though I wish it would, but at the end of this season CBS ridiculously moved IT to 9pm as well. So now I had THREE shows I wanted to watch at 9pm on Fridays. Then the USA Network took one of its shows, Fairly Legal with the gorgeous Sarah Shahi (one of Iran's greatest gifts to the world), and put it on at 9pm as well. Suddenly there are FOUR shows all on at the same time that I want to see. And I cannot afford a goddamned DVR. (Now for the record I would also like to see that show Grimm sometime, just to watch it, but it's on at the same time as all the rest and that just pisses me off!)
Well, Fairly Legal is rerun a lot, so it took a week or so but I figured out when I could tape it and not miss an episode. A Gifted Man has ended its season and it doesn't look like it's coming back, dammit. So now I am down to the first two shows. Supernatural has become a major pleasure for me. The writing is superb and the two leads are wonderful. It's also the scariest TV show I have ever seen. There are episodes that would have caused me to scream if I had seen them as a young man. Plus Supernatural has an ultimately positive spin on itself that makes it something you learn from.
Well, now this past Friday I learned in advance that Supernatural was rerunning on Friday the 13th and Fringe had a new episode. So for the first time in over a year, I finally caught a new episode of the TV show Fringe. And it was fascinating to catch up with Fringe after being away from it for well over a year, almost two.
Some of the work of J.J. Abrams has been okay to me. I sort of like his Star Trek reboot, though how Kirk becomes a captain when he doesn't belong on the Enterprise at all is ludicrous plotting. I thought Lost was awful and tedious. I watched the first season and tried to be involved with it, but when the second season began by introducing a whole bunch of new characters I grew bored very quickly and stopped watching it. I watched precisely one episode of the Alias show, thought Jen Garner was attractive but became very irritated when characters were randomly killed off for plot points. I know no one is really "killed" but even fictional characters deserve some consideration, and letting one lead character live while randomly introducing characters just to kill them off felt very sadistic and mean. Fringe has always had that problem for me. Each episode begins by killing innocent characters who only exist to make a mystery for the "Fringe" team, and I do hate that.
Let me take a moment about that. On the Supernatural show when bad things happen to characters, especially minor characters, there are ALWAYS consequences, and Sam and Dean are there to stop this from happening again. Oh, don't get me wrong, sometimes random characters are killed and nothing happens, but we viewers always know that this bothers and effects our lead characters. Whereas, on the Fringe show, every single episode begins with horrible deaths and the audience is the only one who feels it. I never get the impression that anyone on the Fringe team loses a bit of sleep over what they do. Even Olivia, who should be our moral center, just shrugs everything off.
All right, so Friday night I see a Fringe for the first time in ages. The last time I watched Olivia had just crossed back to "our" world and -- well, to be honest, I can't tell you what was going on because it really didn't make any sense. This whole alternate universe thing that Fringe does is fascinating and very lively. But when Walter crosses to the other dimension to kidnap a child, that is a HORRIBLE EVIL thing that he did. I got the impression that when he did this, it set in motion something that might destroy the alternate world, at least that was my impression -- but that would be a consequence of Walter's horrible act. But in this new episode now there now is some kind of conduit between the two worlds and there are Fringe divisions in both, so now Olivia and "Fauxlivia" (god I hate that kind of shitty shorthand!) get along with each other, and Walter can transfer from one world to the next easily. But there is some kind of evil whatdoyoucallit that is trying to destroy the world(s). Why? No reason is needed, we just need a bad guy I guess. And Walter is still a complete asshole who is not at all sympathetic yet I suspect we are supposed to be sympathetic to him. The writers really don't get that, do they? I do like Anna Torv and Joshua Jackson and especially Lance Reddick, these are really fine actors. John Noble I have seen on TBN talking up Jesus so I don't like him much. And I would watch this show if it were more easily available to me. (Oh, and by the way I do not have a PC at home, only my Android phone, so I can't watch episodes online.)
So I am glad I was able to catch up with Fringe this week, I did find the episode very watchable, I would continue to watch if they would show it at a time that I could see it. But I prefer Supernatural, it's the better program, better thought out, with a moral center -- by which I do mean religion but there has never been a TV show about religion like Supernatural. We have Angels and Satan himself and this year Cass thought he was God himself. Never ever seen a TV show do that before -- never! I should write a lot more words about what is so good about the show, but I am getting tired sitting here typing this. We are fortunate that TNT shows episodes every weekday.
Wow, first blog post since February. And this post is a mess, and I don't have time to rework it today. Maybe tomorrow but I doubt it. I have enough to do prepping my Weekly News every Tuesday and prepping four hours plus of the Chill Room every Friday night. I would love to write a blog entry every day, but I don't have the time.
Life itself is so sad. We live our lives until we die and then we are forgotten and now we have these electronic memories that lead nowhere. Humanity produces huge amounts of nothing every day online, and who cares? You probably don't. I know I don't. Who does?
So I am stuck with what I can watch on TV. Now I happen to think that while most TV sucks -- by which I mean the shit reality shows, the crap like Biggest Loser and The Voice and American Idol, all completely unwatchable by anyone with an IQ over 70 (did I just insult anyone?) -- that scripted TV now is better than ever. And I am not talking about HBO and Showtime things, because obviously I can't afford to see that stuff, and I don't miss it. I was excited to see FX shows like Rescue Me -- until I actually watched it and found that it's overdone and very very boring. But some shows are really good. I am big fan of TNT's Southland, for instance. And I do like some of the regular network shows. Which leads me to Friday nights.
I leave home on Friday evening to do my killradio.org radio show, The Chill Room. I leave a little after 8pm and am on the air usually before 10pm and on til very late. So I cannot watch TV on Friday evenings. It used to be that Fridays were a desolate spot on the TV schedule -- it was where so many shows went to die. But a couple seasons back one of my favorite shows, Supernatural, ended up at 9pm Friday evenings on the CW. This was fine with me, I could tape it on my VCR and when I got home I would watch. But then another show I enjoy called Fringe moved to 9pm Friday nights on Fox. However, that first season it was on Friday it also played in the old Mad TV time slot on Saturdays at 11pm, so I could tape it then and still catch up with it. But the Saturday run only lasted one season and now Fringe is only on Fridays at 9, opposite Supernatural. Then, to make things even more complicated, I became very fond of the new CBS show A Gifted Man with Patrick Wilson. I would watch it on Saturday mornings fried out of my head after staying up all night and the melodramatic elements would have a powerful effect on me. So for a few weeks I was able to tape A Gifted Man at 8 and Supernatural at 9, and I would miss Fringe. A Gifted Man I guess is not coming back next season, though I wish it would, but at the end of this season CBS ridiculously moved IT to 9pm as well. So now I had THREE shows I wanted to watch at 9pm on Fridays. Then the USA Network took one of its shows, Fairly Legal with the gorgeous Sarah Shahi (one of Iran's greatest gifts to the world), and put it on at 9pm as well. Suddenly there are FOUR shows all on at the same time that I want to see. And I cannot afford a goddamned DVR. (Now for the record I would also like to see that show Grimm sometime, just to watch it, but it's on at the same time as all the rest and that just pisses me off!)
Well, Fairly Legal is rerun a lot, so it took a week or so but I figured out when I could tape it and not miss an episode. A Gifted Man has ended its season and it doesn't look like it's coming back, dammit. So now I am down to the first two shows. Supernatural has become a major pleasure for me. The writing is superb and the two leads are wonderful. It's also the scariest TV show I have ever seen. There are episodes that would have caused me to scream if I had seen them as a young man. Plus Supernatural has an ultimately positive spin on itself that makes it something you learn from.
Well, now this past Friday I learned in advance that Supernatural was rerunning on Friday the 13th and Fringe had a new episode. So for the first time in over a year, I finally caught a new episode of the TV show Fringe. And it was fascinating to catch up with Fringe after being away from it for well over a year, almost two.
Some of the work of J.J. Abrams has been okay to me. I sort of like his Star Trek reboot, though how Kirk becomes a captain when he doesn't belong on the Enterprise at all is ludicrous plotting. I thought Lost was awful and tedious. I watched the first season and tried to be involved with it, but when the second season began by introducing a whole bunch of new characters I grew bored very quickly and stopped watching it. I watched precisely one episode of the Alias show, thought Jen Garner was attractive but became very irritated when characters were randomly killed off for plot points. I know no one is really "killed" but even fictional characters deserve some consideration, and letting one lead character live while randomly introducing characters just to kill them off felt very sadistic and mean. Fringe has always had that problem for me. Each episode begins by killing innocent characters who only exist to make a mystery for the "Fringe" team, and I do hate that.
Let me take a moment about that. On the Supernatural show when bad things happen to characters, especially minor characters, there are ALWAYS consequences, and Sam and Dean are there to stop this from happening again. Oh, don't get me wrong, sometimes random characters are killed and nothing happens, but we viewers always know that this bothers and effects our lead characters. Whereas, on the Fringe show, every single episode begins with horrible deaths and the audience is the only one who feels it. I never get the impression that anyone on the Fringe team loses a bit of sleep over what they do. Even Olivia, who should be our moral center, just shrugs everything off.
All right, so Friday night I see a Fringe for the first time in ages. The last time I watched Olivia had just crossed back to "our" world and -- well, to be honest, I can't tell you what was going on because it really didn't make any sense. This whole alternate universe thing that Fringe does is fascinating and very lively. But when Walter crosses to the other dimension to kidnap a child, that is a HORRIBLE EVIL thing that he did. I got the impression that when he did this, it set in motion something that might destroy the alternate world, at least that was my impression -- but that would be a consequence of Walter's horrible act. But in this new episode now there now is some kind of conduit between the two worlds and there are Fringe divisions in both, so now Olivia and "Fauxlivia" (god I hate that kind of shitty shorthand!) get along with each other, and Walter can transfer from one world to the next easily. But there is some kind of evil whatdoyoucallit that is trying to destroy the world(s). Why? No reason is needed, we just need a bad guy I guess. And Walter is still a complete asshole who is not at all sympathetic yet I suspect we are supposed to be sympathetic to him. The writers really don't get that, do they? I do like Anna Torv and Joshua Jackson and especially Lance Reddick, these are really fine actors. John Noble I have seen on TBN talking up Jesus so I don't like him much. And I would watch this show if it were more easily available to me. (Oh, and by the way I do not have a PC at home, only my Android phone, so I can't watch episodes online.)
So I am glad I was able to catch up with Fringe this week, I did find the episode very watchable, I would continue to watch if they would show it at a time that I could see it. But I prefer Supernatural, it's the better program, better thought out, with a moral center -- by which I do mean religion but there has never been a TV show about religion like Supernatural. We have Angels and Satan himself and this year Cass thought he was God himself. Never ever seen a TV show do that before -- never! I should write a lot more words about what is so good about the show, but I am getting tired sitting here typing this. We are fortunate that TNT shows episodes every weekday.
Wow, first blog post since February. And this post is a mess, and I don't have time to rework it today. Maybe tomorrow but I doubt it. I have enough to do prepping my Weekly News every Tuesday and prepping four hours plus of the Chill Room every Friday night. I would love to write a blog entry every day, but I don't have the time.
Life itself is so sad. We live our lives until we die and then we are forgotten and now we have these electronic memories that lead nowhere. Humanity produces huge amounts of nothing every day online, and who cares? You probably don't. I know I don't. Who does?
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Sleeping Beauty
We spend one third of our lives asleep.
The only thing we know for sure about why we sleep is that we get sleepy. Rest certainly appears to be restorative. Wounds heal more quickly when we sleep. Everyone sleeps, all mammals sleep, birds fish and reptiles sleep. We all share this withdrawal from being awake. Even hibernating animals have stages of sleep, in which case sleep requires more energy than hibernation.
Human sleep through EEG readings shows several stages of REM and non-REM sleep. Rapid Eye Movement or REM stage shows physical reaction like pupil movement. In pets you may find leg movements and verbal noise -- because our pets dream as well. A person in REM in most cases when awakened will report coming out of a dream. Non-REM sleep is broken down into stages of N1 (alpha brain wave patterns slowing down as consciousness fades), N2 (asleep, the stage in which we spend most of the night), and N3 (deep sleep, the furthest "point" from being awake, with the slowest delta wave brain patterns and when we are least likely to dream -- yet it is in the deepest sleep that sleepwalking occurs). These stages have been confirmed through many repeated studies.
In our first hour we drop down fairly quickly into deep sleep, at its lowest level, for a while -- perhaps 45 minutes, then our brain waves move faster and we come back up through the stages N3 N2 N1 into our first REM period, in a short burst just about an hour after we have gone to sleep. But then the brain waves slow back down to deep sleep again, though the second wave of deep sleep tends to be shorter than the first. And so it goes through our roughly 8 hours of sleep, deep sleep alternated with rising back up, REM periods lasting longer and deeper levels getting shorter. You can chart out the periods of REM and non-REM.
On my killradio program, I often evoke dreams. That is usually my goal, to make a dreamlike state of consciousness through the use of familiar music and recognizable narrative forms which are then altered and reworked, to keep things slippery and off balanced. But I now want to deal with something else. Tonight it's about recognizing patterns of faster and slower waves, about binaural beats, alpha waves transforming into delta, with attempts to layer in those REM-like bursts of dreams, and we wrap ourselves around the thought-creation we shall call Sleeping Beauty. Where we are going is to sleep, and so we withdraw and reduce, to reach a goal of what will appear to be -- nothingness. But of course you can't just have nothingness, can you?
I post this with regret that I am so busy I have not posted in a month and a half. Yet I manage to do my show every week, and I do the Weekly News as well, so it is obvious that my priority is to killradio. Still, here I am writing about what I will do as my next show, tomorrow night here at kill. I have been preparing this one for three weeks now. It's going to be very quietly epic. Please listen to my live show Fridays at 11pm PST on killradio.org. Or get my podcasts. I still can surprise and please.
Welcome to the Chill Room.
The only thing we know for sure about why we sleep is that we get sleepy. Rest certainly appears to be restorative. Wounds heal more quickly when we sleep. Everyone sleeps, all mammals sleep, birds fish and reptiles sleep. We all share this withdrawal from being awake. Even hibernating animals have stages of sleep, in which case sleep requires more energy than hibernation.
Human sleep through EEG readings shows several stages of REM and non-REM sleep. Rapid Eye Movement or REM stage shows physical reaction like pupil movement. In pets you may find leg movements and verbal noise -- because our pets dream as well. A person in REM in most cases when awakened will report coming out of a dream. Non-REM sleep is broken down into stages of N1 (alpha brain wave patterns slowing down as consciousness fades), N2 (asleep, the stage in which we spend most of the night), and N3 (deep sleep, the furthest "point" from being awake, with the slowest delta wave brain patterns and when we are least likely to dream -- yet it is in the deepest sleep that sleepwalking occurs). These stages have been confirmed through many repeated studies.
In our first hour we drop down fairly quickly into deep sleep, at its lowest level, for a while -- perhaps 45 minutes, then our brain waves move faster and we come back up through the stages N3 N2 N1 into our first REM period, in a short burst just about an hour after we have gone to sleep. But then the brain waves slow back down to deep sleep again, though the second wave of deep sleep tends to be shorter than the first. And so it goes through our roughly 8 hours of sleep, deep sleep alternated with rising back up, REM periods lasting longer and deeper levels getting shorter. You can chart out the periods of REM and non-REM.
On my killradio program, I often evoke dreams. That is usually my goal, to make a dreamlike state of consciousness through the use of familiar music and recognizable narrative forms which are then altered and reworked, to keep things slippery and off balanced. But I now want to deal with something else. Tonight it's about recognizing patterns of faster and slower waves, about binaural beats, alpha waves transforming into delta, with attempts to layer in those REM-like bursts of dreams, and we wrap ourselves around the thought-creation we shall call Sleeping Beauty. Where we are going is to sleep, and so we withdraw and reduce, to reach a goal of what will appear to be -- nothingness. But of course you can't just have nothingness, can you?
I post this with regret that I am so busy I have not posted in a month and a half. Yet I manage to do my show every week, and I do the Weekly News as well, so it is obvious that my priority is to killradio. Still, here I am writing about what I will do as my next show, tomorrow night here at kill. I have been preparing this one for three weeks now. It's going to be very quietly epic. Please listen to my live show Fridays at 11pm PST on killradio.org. Or get my podcasts. I still can surprise and please.
Welcome to the Chill Room.
Monday, December 19, 2011
Took a look around, see which way the wind blows
It seems that every time I come to this blog, I am always apologizing for not being here more often. But in fact, my real blog is my radio show. That's what I spend my time preparing, and that's where I talk of politics and art and science and history and music. I spend hours each week working on my show, and unfortunately this blog writing stuff has to suffer. And I am not sure what to do about it, because I know had I time I could pump something out every day! I have the discipline for it, but I get so sidetracked with my music digs and my news digs.
I am sitting here at killradio waiting for my latest show to post. I always post first on podomatic.com, even though I am unhappy with the way podomatic treats me (see earlier posts) -- but I have an audience there and so I keep plugging away at it. Next I post to radio4all.net, and am always pleased with the numbers I get there. Lastly the show goes to killradio.org itself. It goes there simply because killradio is my home, though the numbers there have slowed down quite a bit in the past year. (I used to always post my news segments there too, but since my Weekly News reports play for a week on kill anyway, that seems to be enough.) On radio4all my news is actually picked up and played on other stations, including an FM station in mid-state CA. (That's why I am careful to keep my language FCC controlled when I do the news, I used to swear like a sailor.)
All right, so this is another brief post, which few will read, but I am here now, so let me do this. The new show is called The Last of Jim Morrsion and it chronologically goes through the last finely recorded Doors show (Isle of Wight 30 Aug 1970), the last tape we have of The Doors with Jim (Dallas 11 December 1970), the last film of Jim with the Doors (from Australian TV recorded Dec 1970), the last song Jim recorded with The Doors (Riders on the Storm), an excerpt from Jim's last interview tape (Feb 1971), and then tells the Paris story as I have pieced it together. I also play the infamous "Jomo and the Smoothies" tape but I am now almost certain the tape is misdated (explained in the show). I also tell the official account of Jim's death, from Pam and the Paris police, and go into the main rumor of his actual death. I consider Marianne Faithfull's incomplete account pretty realistic and so, even though others call it yet another rumor, I give its details too. We will never know for sure. But the show itself features a lot of music that is not well known and presents it in as fine a quality as I can. The Dallas tape, the longest thing I play, is lo-fi, which is a shame, but hey it's all we have. I edited the Jomo tape of five minutes or so of non-musical blather, though what's left is only interesting historically. (If someone actually authenticates it as recorded in Paris I will change my mind.) You can get it here as The Last of Jim Morrison. If you listen, will you please leave a comment, either on the show itself or here? I would love to get some feedback.
I am sitting here at killradio waiting for my latest show to post. I always post first on podomatic.com, even though I am unhappy with the way podomatic treats me (see earlier posts) -- but I have an audience there and so I keep plugging away at it. Next I post to radio4all.net, and am always pleased with the numbers I get there. Lastly the show goes to killradio.org itself. It goes there simply because killradio is my home, though the numbers there have slowed down quite a bit in the past year. (I used to always post my news segments there too, but since my Weekly News reports play for a week on kill anyway, that seems to be enough.) On radio4all my news is actually picked up and played on other stations, including an FM station in mid-state CA. (That's why I am careful to keep my language FCC controlled when I do the news, I used to swear like a sailor.)
All right, so this is another brief post, which few will read, but I am here now, so let me do this. The new show is called The Last of Jim Morrsion and it chronologically goes through the last finely recorded Doors show (Isle of Wight 30 Aug 1970), the last tape we have of The Doors with Jim (Dallas 11 December 1970), the last film of Jim with the Doors (from Australian TV recorded Dec 1970), the last song Jim recorded with The Doors (Riders on the Storm), an excerpt from Jim's last interview tape (Feb 1971), and then tells the Paris story as I have pieced it together. I also play the infamous "Jomo and the Smoothies" tape but I am now almost certain the tape is misdated (explained in the show). I also tell the official account of Jim's death, from Pam and the Paris police, and go into the main rumor of his actual death. I consider Marianne Faithfull's incomplete account pretty realistic and so, even though others call it yet another rumor, I give its details too. We will never know for sure. But the show itself features a lot of music that is not well known and presents it in as fine a quality as I can. The Dallas tape, the longest thing I play, is lo-fi, which is a shame, but hey it's all we have. I edited the Jomo tape of five minutes or so of non-musical blather, though what's left is only interesting historically. (If someone actually authenticates it as recorded in Paris I will change my mind.) You can get it here as The Last of Jim Morrison. If you listen, will you please leave a comment, either on the show itself or here? I would love to get some feedback.
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
Always Something New
I am right now recording some Chop Shop from wfmu.org for use in my own radio show, and since it's a long track I thought I would make some very brief notes here. It's a really good week, and I have been contacted by several different people about some of my favorite art. This is what I love. See, life will let you down -- friends may let you down -- your family may not understand you -- but there is always art. Your relationship to art could not be more personal. Because what you see IN things is a reflection of WHAT you are.
Every week I do a new Chill Room radio show on killradio.org. My longtime listeners enjoy what I play, but what they seem to love most are the collages. The last time I wrote here about my show I had just posted my Simon & Garfunkel deep listening special, no longer on podomatic but available as Boxer on radio4all. Since then I have done 3 more collage shows and 2 Chill Room specials. Let me briefly tell you about them, and then get out of here.
Inspired by the Occupy Movement, I decided to devote some time to the great 60s songwriter and organizer Phil Ochs. I used some audio from the Kenneth Bowser documentary There But For Fortune and a lot of Phil's songs to present a show called So Many Reasons Why on Podomatic (also as So Many Reasons on radio4all). You can also find it on the killradio.org podcast page.
Oops, time's up. I have to take off. I'll let this stand for now, and will add the other shows on my next post -- which I hope will be on Thanksgiving.
But I will say that I was asked questions this week about Sun Ra, the great filmmaker and late friend Jack Smith, and about Bob Dylan. All is good. I hope you're having a terrific day!
See you next time.
Every week I do a new Chill Room radio show on killradio.org. My longtime listeners enjoy what I play, but what they seem to love most are the collages. The last time I wrote here about my show I had just posted my Simon & Garfunkel deep listening special, no longer on podomatic but available as Boxer on radio4all. Since then I have done 3 more collage shows and 2 Chill Room specials. Let me briefly tell you about them, and then get out of here.
Inspired by the Occupy Movement, I decided to devote some time to the great 60s songwriter and organizer Phil Ochs. I used some audio from the Kenneth Bowser documentary There But For Fortune and a lot of Phil's songs to present a show called So Many Reasons Why on Podomatic (also as So Many Reasons on radio4all). You can also find it on the killradio.org podcast page.
Oops, time's up. I have to take off. I'll let this stand for now, and will add the other shows on my next post -- which I hope will be on Thanksgiving.
But I will say that I was asked questions this week about Sun Ra, the great filmmaker and late friend Jack Smith, and about Bob Dylan. All is good. I hope you're having a terrific day!
See you next time.
Saturday, November 12, 2011
Those Pesky Eternal Myths
First off apologies for not keeping up with this blog, which I think of more as a personal column of cultural notes or something equally introspective. I am so far behind with myself it's silly. But anyway (as my mother used to say).
The Transparency box set of Sun Ra The Eternal Myth Vol. 1 has been released and is now available (you can search for it online or get it on Amazon here). It is a big, expensive box of early Ra history and music. I know what has gone into getting this released, a lot of time and money and energy, and I am hoping that it will sell well for all involved. However, so far there has only been one single customer review on Amazon.com, and it dismayed me a-plenty. The reviewer calls herself "NYC Mom," and apparently her only other Amazon reviews are of child products, so finding a review of a collection of ancient Sun Ra rarities is a surprise, to say the least. But she states (and this is the entire review): "I love Sun Ra, but this set was a huge disappointment. The production value is poor (it is handmade and appears that way; it looks cheap and photocopied). The booklet is white-on-black and difficult to read. The CDs have very little of Sun Ra's music, but contains mostly music he was influenced by (e.g. Fletcher Henderson, etc.). The narrations and interviews between the music (a lot of narrative and interviews) make for difficult and laborious work. This set is really not a pleasure to listen to. They should have instead put all the interviews at the end on one CD. This set is not worth its cost; nearly anything else Sun Ra recorded would be a better choice. It does show his intellectual and artistic development and is important for that, but in terms of listening and enjoying, I give it a zero. Buyer beware."
This was followed with two reply comments. One thanked her for saving him money on the set and other stated they wished they'd read her review before buying because he states that it is not fun to listen to.
I take no individual issue with these people -- criticism is in the nature of what we do when it comes to art, and opinions are welcome. But I felt that they didn't seem to GET what was being done in the box. So I put together the following as a reply, and I want to share this here as well.
As one of the people involved in putting this set together, it would I guess be inappropriate for me to review The Eternal Myth Revealed, but I can at least explain what's going on to those who seem to find it incomprehensible.
In 2009 the Transparency label, through the work of several long time Sun Ra collectors, gathered about 50 tracks from the 1940s and 1950s, all predating 1956, of Sonny's arranging sessions. The original intention was to do a two-disc set to be called The Earliest Sun Ra planned for a late summer 2010 release. To that end, we prepared the tracks, even gathering a few more, and I wrote liner notes for the release. Around then Transparency met up with Michael Anderson, the "Good Doctor" from WFMU, who had actually worked with Sonny from the 70s to the 90s and was the official archivist of Sun Ra. Michael has been responsible for many of the Sun Ra reissues we have seen in the last decade or so, on various labels. When I was first told about Michael my skeptical spirit was raised -- here was someone who claimed to have recordings that were not supposed to exist! But in fact he came through and he has access to an extraordinary body of Sonny's work. It took months to put the project together, but Transparency chose to cancel the original two-disc set and let the Good Doctor prepare something that he had wanted to do for ages -- a long form history of how Sonny Blount became Sun Ra. But when I was told that the project might turn into as many as 30 discs, I admit I became doubtful again. Who would want to hear 30 CDs of history? Especially when I was told that it would be in documentary form and would contain music from the people who inspired Sonny as well as interview segments with Sonny himself. But the project started to come into focus and the 30 CDs reduced down into the 14 of the finished set. Michael Anderson also prepared detailed set notes for every track in the box, which became the over 100 page book in the set. That he chose to also include my original notes was nice for me, considering the work that I had put into them, and I think the notes work together pretty well.
However, the important moment for me was when I actually first listened to the set. As the box states, it covers the years 1914 (the year of Sonny Blount's birth) to 1959. But this is because Sonny wasn't just a musical freak who played crazy communal jazz, he was a real artist who developed in the 20th Century from what inspired him and what made the world. There has never been anything like this available before. Michael Anderson has not only collected the rarest of Sonny Blount into Sun Ra recordings, he has captured HOW Sonny became Sun Ra. This is not some simple tale tossed off in a couple seconds. You actually can hear how Sonny found his voice in this music, and you can feel the Arkestra being born. The music of other artists contained herein is all very rare as well, and there is plenty of commentary by Sonny himself. When I finally heard The Eternal Myth Revealed, it proved to me that Michael Anderson was correct to do it this way. This is the way Sonny himself would want the story told. I repeat, there has never been anything like this available before.
When I see comments that the book is "cheap" and that the set is not a pleasure to listen to, it makes me sad. No, Transparency is not a multi-million dollar record label with an unlimited budget. It still took multiple thousands and thousands of dollars to put this package out. It is a real labor of love, done because we believe in it. I think the book looks fine, and the CDs are mastered professionally with the best sound possible. (When the sound isn't pristine there are notes included about why.) Could it have been done differently? Of course! Yes, in a sense the set is a long multi-part radio program on Sonny's history. But what large radio station would spend 17 hours on early Sun Ra? Especially in today's radio market? One can definitely hear Michael Anderson's own dj history in this, but I also think all the pieces are essential to tell the story. Again, look at the box cover. The cover text explains what the set is, and details how it is organized. It mentions narration and commentary and the fact that there are other artists included. Nothing about the set is hidden. If you want to learn about Sun Ra's early history and how he became what he did, there is no better source.
This is also the first of two big boxes that Michael Anderson and Transparency are preparing. If you look at the book, the front cover and the inside info is all in black and white, because it covers the early days. But if you look at the back cover of the book, you find Sonny in color. Because all of this box set is a lead in to the full blown out-of-this-world psychedelic jazz that Sun Ra unleashed upon an unsuspecting public in the 1960s. But we can't get there without going through the first set. You need to know how we got there. And that's what The Eternal Myth Revealed Volume One is here to do. If what you want is more of Sonny's concerts on album, you can get them. If you want to hear more outtakes from his amazing albums they're coming. But if you want to really get to know who this Man from Saturn was, you need this set. It's up to you.
When you look at the discs, you will see that in fact they are on THREE different labels. One is Sonny's own Saturn label (back again!), one is the Sun Ra Archive label of Michael Anderson, and the third is Transparency, who had the vision to get this out to the public.
The Transparency box set of Sun Ra The Eternal Myth Vol. 1 has been released and is now available (you can search for it online or get it on Amazon here). It is a big, expensive box of early Ra history and music. I know what has gone into getting this released, a lot of time and money and energy, and I am hoping that it will sell well for all involved. However, so far there has only been one single customer review on Amazon.com, and it dismayed me a-plenty. The reviewer calls herself "NYC Mom," and apparently her only other Amazon reviews are of child products, so finding a review of a collection of ancient Sun Ra rarities is a surprise, to say the least. But she states (and this is the entire review): "I love Sun Ra, but this set was a huge disappointment. The production value is poor (it is handmade and appears that way; it looks cheap and photocopied). The booklet is white-on-black and difficult to read. The CDs have very little of Sun Ra's music, but contains mostly music he was influenced by (e.g. Fletcher Henderson, etc.). The narrations and interviews between the music (a lot of narrative and interviews) make for difficult and laborious work. This set is really not a pleasure to listen to. They should have instead put all the interviews at the end on one CD. This set is not worth its cost; nearly anything else Sun Ra recorded would be a better choice. It does show his intellectual and artistic development and is important for that, but in terms of listening and enjoying, I give it a zero. Buyer beware."
This was followed with two reply comments. One thanked her for saving him money on the set and other stated they wished they'd read her review before buying because he states that it is not fun to listen to.
I take no individual issue with these people -- criticism is in the nature of what we do when it comes to art, and opinions are welcome. But I felt that they didn't seem to GET what was being done in the box. So I put together the following as a reply, and I want to share this here as well.
As one of the people involved in putting this set together, it would I guess be inappropriate for me to review The Eternal Myth Revealed, but I can at least explain what's going on to those who seem to find it incomprehensible.
In 2009 the Transparency label, through the work of several long time Sun Ra collectors, gathered about 50 tracks from the 1940s and 1950s, all predating 1956, of Sonny's arranging sessions. The original intention was to do a two-disc set to be called The Earliest Sun Ra planned for a late summer 2010 release. To that end, we prepared the tracks, even gathering a few more, and I wrote liner notes for the release. Around then Transparency met up with Michael Anderson, the "Good Doctor" from WFMU, who had actually worked with Sonny from the 70s to the 90s and was the official archivist of Sun Ra. Michael has been responsible for many of the Sun Ra reissues we have seen in the last decade or so, on various labels. When I was first told about Michael my skeptical spirit was raised -- here was someone who claimed to have recordings that were not supposed to exist! But in fact he came through and he has access to an extraordinary body of Sonny's work. It took months to put the project together, but Transparency chose to cancel the original two-disc set and let the Good Doctor prepare something that he had wanted to do for ages -- a long form history of how Sonny Blount became Sun Ra. But when I was told that the project might turn into as many as 30 discs, I admit I became doubtful again. Who would want to hear 30 CDs of history? Especially when I was told that it would be in documentary form and would contain music from the people who inspired Sonny as well as interview segments with Sonny himself. But the project started to come into focus and the 30 CDs reduced down into the 14 of the finished set. Michael Anderson also prepared detailed set notes for every track in the box, which became the over 100 page book in the set. That he chose to also include my original notes was nice for me, considering the work that I had put into them, and I think the notes work together pretty well.
However, the important moment for me was when I actually first listened to the set. As the box states, it covers the years 1914 (the year of Sonny Blount's birth) to 1959. But this is because Sonny wasn't just a musical freak who played crazy communal jazz, he was a real artist who developed in the 20th Century from what inspired him and what made the world. There has never been anything like this available before. Michael Anderson has not only collected the rarest of Sonny Blount into Sun Ra recordings, he has captured HOW Sonny became Sun Ra. This is not some simple tale tossed off in a couple seconds. You actually can hear how Sonny found his voice in this music, and you can feel the Arkestra being born. The music of other artists contained herein is all very rare as well, and there is plenty of commentary by Sonny himself. When I finally heard The Eternal Myth Revealed, it proved to me that Michael Anderson was correct to do it this way. This is the way Sonny himself would want the story told. I repeat, there has never been anything like this available before.
When I see comments that the book is "cheap" and that the set is not a pleasure to listen to, it makes me sad. No, Transparency is not a multi-million dollar record label with an unlimited budget. It still took multiple thousands and thousands of dollars to put this package out. It is a real labor of love, done because we believe in it. I think the book looks fine, and the CDs are mastered professionally with the best sound possible. (When the sound isn't pristine there are notes included about why.) Could it have been done differently? Of course! Yes, in a sense the set is a long multi-part radio program on Sonny's history. But what large radio station would spend 17 hours on early Sun Ra? Especially in today's radio market? One can definitely hear Michael Anderson's own dj history in this, but I also think all the pieces are essential to tell the story. Again, look at the box cover. The cover text explains what the set is, and details how it is organized. It mentions narration and commentary and the fact that there are other artists included. Nothing about the set is hidden. If you want to learn about Sun Ra's early history and how he became what he did, there is no better source.
This is also the first of two big boxes that Michael Anderson and Transparency are preparing. If you look at the book, the front cover and the inside info is all in black and white, because it covers the early days. But if you look at the back cover of the book, you find Sonny in color. Because all of this box set is a lead in to the full blown out-of-this-world psychedelic jazz that Sun Ra unleashed upon an unsuspecting public in the 1960s. But we can't get there without going through the first set. You need to know how we got there. And that's what The Eternal Myth Revealed Volume One is here to do. If what you want is more of Sonny's concerts on album, you can get them. If you want to hear more outtakes from his amazing albums they're coming. But if you want to really get to know who this Man from Saturn was, you need this set. It's up to you.
When you look at the discs, you will see that in fact they are on THREE different labels. One is Sonny's own Saturn label (back again!), one is the Sun Ra Archive label of Michael Anderson, and the third is Transparency, who had the vision to get this out to the public.
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