trivia

all this is just opinion, of course, but i'll say to you with a fair amount of personal experience that there are good trivia questions (e.g. which was the fourteenth state added to the union?) and there are bad trivia questions (e.g. who led which professional sports league in what statistical category in some year that's no better or more distinct than any other year?) and it's no fun at all to be caught out in a bar with someone running a trivia contest who can't tell the difference.

if i were to try to put my finger on it, i'd say it has something to do with information that you really could very well know, only you and most other people probably do not off the top of your head, though there's enough peripheral information intrinsic in the question that you and everyone else in the bar can happily delve the recesses of your brains to try to work out the answer for the next five minutes, and feel good about doing it--even wrong guesses being fun to make. and, when you get a good question right, you feel vindicated, while, while, when you get a good question wrong, you instinctively want to pound your hand against your forehead and immediately say "ask me another one!". forget who led the american league in triples in 1980-whatever, and even if you're a sports-involved guy like me, you just think to yourself, "so what?" and wonder if there's a re-run of "wkrp in cincinnati" somewhere on your TV at home. (doctor johnny fever, played by howard hesseman, came to wkrp after being fired from elsewhere for saying what word on the air?).

so, anyway, here in lowell on wednesday nights, a number of bars run something called "stump trivia". (though, if you look at stump trivia's website, it would appear possible that one of 'em is bootlegging it, and the only question i might ask after having played a few rounds of "stump trivia" at each of those establishments in the last while is "why the heck would anyone want to do that???") they ask questions like "what won the oscar for best picture in 1980-whatever?", and, "who hit which ball the best the most times in 1980-whatever?", and, except for the overweening sensation of falling asleep, i can't really remember anything else about my times there.

why am i so bitter and jaded, you ask?

for many weeks over the past year or two, major's pub used to host a trivia night on wednesdays that was remarkably un-stump-like, meaning, actually fun, hosted by lowell's own dee tension. questions often (even!) had peripheral (sometimes direct) pertinence to lowell. there were commentary leitmotifs, such as dirk mcgurk turning up as a reported acceptable answer to almost any question for which most folks, laughingly, hadn't had a clue, such as whenever a bar full of mostly white people encounter a question related to ODB, which, i now know, stands for "old dirty bastard", and that right there is funny in and of itself, too. (leitmotif is itself also a commentary leitmotif if you've been following certain world cup trivial comment threads on facebook, but i digress). folks who remember thomas dolby were celebrated each and every night with at least one question taken from the category of "science", (SCIENCE!), and if you can't remember "she blinded me" with same, then, happily, i can recommend for you "stump trivia" instead. but if you liked to have fun with your brain on a wednesday night, there was no better place to be.

alas, it's wednesday again, and i'm once again sad that it simply isn't to be. "stump trivia"? it even pains me to know it's out there. where are you, dee tension, and where is the bar owner in town intelligent enough to recognize a good and right thing when it's out there. no, i'm sure nobody was getting rich on prizes like $25 gift certificates and beer-brand t-shirts, just as i'm sure that nobody was getting rich bankrolling same, on top of dee's honorarium for the night, while a few dozen people drank beer at a bar. but, really, is making lots of money really the only point anyone ever has down here these days?

well, fellow babies, the fourteenth state added to the union is vermont, (being part of new york state upon independence), the word the good doctor found himself banished for was "booger", and there's nothing quite as lame as trying to perambulate on a stump, no matter how many 25 cent chicken wings they throw at you while you're doing it.

i absolutely positively have to buy my own bar. anyone know of any space for sale downtown?

coleman park

not far from downtown lebanon, pennsylvania, 100 acres of fine pennsylvania woodland are accented with walking and hiking trails, tennis courts, and a remarkable and memorable municipal pool. when i would spend summer weeks with my grandparents there, i would always beg for every afternoon at that pool. along with each year's july 4th fireworks at the park, that pool remains one of my favorite memories of childhood.

lebanon, though less than half the size of lowell, bears many urban and industrial similarities (substitute steel for textiles, and there you'll have it) and there is an ubiquity to the summer heat there, amidst the row-housed brick cityscape, that can get under your skin in a way that only submersion can hope to assuage. were it not for the pool at coleman park, i'm not sure how i would have endured, without driving my grandparents to prolicide.

here in lowell, as the city budget strains and falters, money set aside for running the city swimming pools has necessarily dried up, and the ones to suffer first this summer for our fiscal irresponsibility are the children and their harried, overheated parents. into that breach have stepped eastern bank and the greater lowell community foundation, and a matching-donation arrangement that has the city within the last $10,000 of the needed funds to open the pools. i have proudly taken 30 seconds out of my evening tonight to put my money where my nostalgic mouth is, and, in memory and honor of your own personal equivalent to coleman park, won't you consider offering whatever you can to get the effort across the finish line?

http://www.easternbank.com/makeasplash/

whatever you can donate will be doubled, (how great is that), and together it will mean that city kids here in lowell this summer will have what every kid deserves every summer of his or her life.

make a splash.

why the french love le tour de france

their world cup exit is getting quite old by now, but the start of their national bike race is only days away. it's no wonder that the french love le tour de france.

my biggest complaint is that the damn thing isn't scheduled to start until saturday, even though the first two off-days for the world cup matches will be tomorrow and thursday. i mean, what's up with that? i've been watching at least two great matches a day for what will have been 19 straight days, (often three--how great is that!), and then they're going to cut me off COLD TURKEY for 65 effin' hours while those lazy cyclists loll around rotterdam and roll their eyes at all the lance armstrong hype??? puh-leeeeze! tell those skinny guys with the razor-smooth legs to GET ROLLING!!!

yeah, i know, the sox are tops in the wild card after a quasi-miracle resurrection already this year, and my fantasy baseball squad is daily kicking ass and taking names, but dustin joined jacoby on the extended DL the other day, and you know that's going to mean nothing but teeth-grinding from here 'til at least august with the baseball. (hope both tito and me can find the magic combination of miracles to not let the slide get us too far behind--right now the best i could manage is ryan theriot--"the riot", yes, that's his name--and terry's gonna have us believe that just adding sunflower seeds to bill hall's diet can somehow gonna produce an over-250 hitter. i believe... i believe... i believe...)

so it's soon going to be wondering which spanish or portuguese language squad has a chance of understanding german, and a peleton-full of lance armstrong, 24-7. (like brett favre, he's "retiring" again...)

i love le tour de france. not, like the french, who love it because it lets them forget what a national disgrace is their national soccer team, but, like a citizen of the world, because it's human achievement writ large across some of the most beautiful and dramatic curves of the hottie who continues to be our mother earth.

for the record, i wish i didn't live where the only things the newspapers are going to want to write about le tour are the pointless scribblings about one man, great as he was and is, who is only just one man out of hundreds about which it's worth knowing more.

think anyone will try to smuggle in one of those impellers that hides in the bike frame to secretly (and most decidedly cheatingly) help power the bike? who's gonna get caught with their hands in the steroidal cookie jar? which team is going to have the horses this year to challenge the memory of astana's prior all-star lineup of monster riders? will the schleck brothers own this race now that they're a year older and a year wiser? will sanquer be able to manage his stable of astanas (and bakers dozen of kazakh riders) the way brunyeel managed last time? is the radioshack veterans tour (seriously--armstrong, kloden, leipheimer and horner are all over 35, which, in cycling, is like they're already in wheelchairs) going to be anywhere near the front while all these kids start to kick it into the mountains?

i'm very much looking forward to finding out. now, if they can only figure out how to keep me from jumping out a window out of boredom this week until it all starts!

how not to do business, part i can't remember how many

got me an idea for something to do later in august this year that will possibly involve hundreds of people drinking beer from a bar. (while paying for the privilege no less). one local business that shall remain unnamed studiously considered the opportunity and then offered to host it all for $750. no, not to pay for the privilege of collecting cash from hundreds of people ordering beer at a bar for six hours, but to CHARGE for it.

i almost laughed the milk from my cheerios right out my nose when i read the email over breakfast the other day.

no, no thank you, but thanks for playing.

if anyone would like to know, if my more recent experience asking establishments around town the same question is any guide, the going rate, given a few dozen (not even a hundred) people paying cash to drink at a bar for a few hours, is free. not $750, not $75, not $7.50 and not even 75 cents. but free.

seems reasonable to me.

oh, and while i'm thinking of it--consider setting aside the late afternoon and evening of sunday the 29th of august on your calendar if you like local music, supporting the merrimack valley food bank, and just saying no to yokels who think they can just make up numbers and get people to hand them cash.

it's gonna be a great party.

the dutch--quiet and effective

only portugal scored more goals than the dutch during the opening round, and only portugal and uruguay allowed fewer--and nobody won as many games but argentina.

los paises bajos, the low countries, the netherlands, holland... by any name, this is a team to be considered. slovakia learned the hard way today. brazil or chile (i'm picking chile, and you heard it here first) will find out on july 2nd. (upon which date i'm still picking chile, but i'm just sayin') or maybe brazil wins through--but with a uruguay win that would still put 2 south american countries into the quarters. (sorry, ghana, but i can't stand up for you now that you've eliminated the US two world cups in a row). in fact, if you consider argentina's decent chances against the germans, and the wild card chance of paraguay surviving the survivor of spain against portugal, we could even see FOUR south american teams in the quarters...

ok, i started talking about the dutch, but i'm fully distracted to say a few words in favor of the quality of the south american game: when they track the distances covered by soccer players in the course of a top quality match, the average is generally well over 5 miles. (closer to 6, actually, and they do this via a combination of cameras and computers, so it's pretty reliable and scientific, in case that matters). the statistics for the south american game are noteworthy for their consistency in exceeding that world average. (one study i read estimated south american professional players average over 7 miles, and often closer to 9).

so it is that i connect such understanding with the norwegian university studies that have shown that conditioning resulted in better performance (measured by quality touches and other empirical factors) than "skills" training with the ball. combine the two with the skill of players like messi for argentina, and robinho for brazil, and you have a recipe for world dominance that even the dutch can respect.

one thing is clear enough--the chances that the winner of this tournament speaks either portuguese or spanish are pretty good. (at least four of the remaining eight teams, regardless of the outcome of the three remaining round-of-16 games, and maybe as many as five).

the second amendment lives

"A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the People to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."

i've chosen the punctuation and capitalization sent to the states for ratification, rather than the original passed by congress that capitalized "militia", and "arms" and failed to capitalize "state" and "people", because i feel that it best captures my understanding of the framers' intent to preserve for us and all future generations the right and obligation to arm ourselves in defense of our free state. which is to say, in my opinion, the intent of the amendment is the security of a free state, and the implied people's obligation to and interest in preserving it, and not just the right of the people to keep and bear arms. however, the right of the people to keep and bear arms is quite clearly and unequivocally stated, and this can never be ignored.

more recently, the exigencies of denser population has led many thoughtful and well-meaning legislators to attempt to control the use of firearms for lesser purpose (there being no higher purpose than the security of our free state) by restricting the circumstances under which they can be purchased and carried, but the supreme court has today clearly signaled that such legislation treads very close to if not over the line of unconstitutionality, and should be re-examined immediately. (no laws were struck down, which i like and respect very much, since this retains the sovereignty of self-governance for which the arms were intended in the first place, which is only fitting).

many lefties are doubtless to be frustrated by this, but for the life of me i can't imagine why that should be. the simple truth is that the vast and overwhelming majority of gun malfeasance results from either illegal ownership, or inadequate safeguards. (to wit, letting an eight year old fire a fully automatic weapon on a firing range, as recently occurred with fatal result in connecticut). the truth remains that a properly registered, stored and locked weapon is a danger to no one, except the tyrant against which it might be borne in need.

i am always returned to the example of the swiss, where firearm ownership is not only protected, but for all intent and purpose prescribed by their constitution. (almost all serve in the military, and are required to maintain their service weapon after discharge). the incidence of gun violence in switzerland is remarkably low--one incident per quarter million residents per year--and they remain one of the least-invaded countries on the planet, despite historic proximity to an inordinate number of invasion-happy regimes. (in contrast, in the US, around 65 people are shot for every quarter million residents, and we've been invaded more than a few times--twice by the british, once by the CSA, and once by the japanese, with an asterisk for the mexicans who accomplished their invasion of texas before it became a state).

my way of reading these facts is to think that we need a wider program of military service training (including gun training and ownership) instead of narrower, and today's supreme court decision is at least a step not in conflict with that right direction. for those afraid of wider gun ownership, i think the important point is to recognize that there are many forms of gun ownership, and in attempting to eradicate the worst, we must be vigilant never to inhibit the best. blanket bans on certain types of firearms cannot be the answer, just as denying people drivers licenses because people crash their cars cannot be the answer to the 40 people per quarter million who die that way each year on US roadways. (that's right, 40 times more americans per capita DIE in their cars than there are swiss involved in any kind of gun-related violence, which statistic, it should be pointed out, doesn't necessarily even involve fatality, let alone injury!). we require driver training and licensing, and we regularly inspect the roadworthiness of vehicles. (we should be regularly testing the roadworthiness of drivers, too, but one step at a time). i say we invest our energy, not in constitutionally-questionable legislation, but in wider firearms training and licensing, and regular inspection of the maintenance and safekeeping of weapons, as part of wider military service and a shared national ideal of maintaining our free state in trust for our descendants.

good riddance

a former KKK "exalted cyclops", who became a senator before there were even 50 states, and filibustered against the voting rights act of 1964, is somehow this morning turning up in respectful obituaries as if being a senator for longer than anyone else in history is some sort of achievement.

i'll tell you the sort of achievement this is--it's an achievement by the great genius of the universe that everyone, even the most morally bankrupt, dies sooner or later.

just imagine how much worse things would be if a guy who prefers to give more respect to fighting dogs than to human beings might remain in a position to decide the course of our country far beyond his faculties. (check out the video on mr mill city if you have any doubts).

good riddance. a person could be much more generous were there any other way to get the scourge out of the senate, but there you have it.

want a kinder obituary? retire when it's your time. i plan to.

while i'm thinking of it...

"proud to be an american" is one of those anthems beloved by the "my country right or wrong" set, and lots of others too, and i'm not here to take that bit of fun away from them or you or anybody else, but it occurs to me today that being "proud to be an american" is a pretty soulless sport when it's not put on the line for things like the world cup. what, "proud to be an american", except when we don't have the baddest-assed chances to win, or something like that? because you don't understand or don't care for the sport you aren't going to stand with people who have put their heart and soul into representing their country in one of the world's most widely-shared moments?

i'm thinking, that if you're "proud to be an american", and you like singing songs like that while waving your stars and stripes, that you really need to think about why you might not be putting it all on the line in front of the world and everybody else, and rooting for AMERICA'S TEAM in the world cup. really--think about it.

"america's team" is a sobriquet that's applied with love and pride to a lot of teams who, for the most part, aren't. (the '80 olympic hockey team being one notable exception). in the case of landon donovan and the us national soccer team, you won't find a better or better-deserving group of classic american melting pot underdogs than these guys right here, right now. the world dismisses them as unworthy. the referees abuse them with disallowed goals and every manner of slight that would drive lesser competitors to whining distraction. (right, france?) and they just keep coming. they just keep playing. they just keep believing and running and pouring their hearts out onto the field wrapped in the truest spirit of old glory that there is for us to see. it's inspiring. it has nothing to do with soccer on one level, and everything on another.

so it's all on the line against ghana today at 2:30. win or go home. pride in being an american. the 66-to-1 underdogs (for example, the same odds as uruguay and paraguay) up against all arrogance and dismissal from literally everywhere else in the world.

who, being "proud to be an american", can resist a moment like that?

when it's all on the line.

and it's time to stand up and be counted.

are you proud to be an american?

USA! USA!

world cup time

as a public service to all my readers (reader?) who really can't be bothered about the world cup--here's a heads up that you can skip this one.

USA! USA!

2:30 today. it's on other kinds of TV, but you really want to watch it on univision to get the full experience. (GOOOOooooLLLL).

i know cobblestones has it in their bar, but i'm choosing the westford grille down in westford cuz there'll be a bunch of my english teammates there to rile up during the game with taunts about their having to deal with the germans next, which is always part of the fun.

win or go home.

you can't ask for more, and it doesn't get any better, than this.

jackpot redux

you've (hopefully) read the review of taj mahal and nicole ribaudo with ed newton and steve clements, (if not, you can skip down to the next blog post to catch up--we'll wait for you), so you already know it was double bonus time in downtown lowell last night, but what went without saying is that everywhere you walked last night downtown there was something beautiful going on. the cars with the rock and roll equipment were constantly on palmer street, loading in and loading out the kits for the bands upstairs at gemstones, and i don't even know how many more places were celebrating just a friday summer night because a man can only be in so many places at once, but the people walking everywhere and peering into all the windows on their way to where they were going to be the ones inside while everyone else walking by peered into all the windows, were all smiling and buzzing with the energy of it all. the gaelic club was rocking the highlands with an evening of lowell hip hop, featuring dee tension, massta peace, chance, myster DL and el-moises, and, i gotta tell you, when an irish bar sports hip hopsters on its marquee, you KNOW you're living in the best place on earth.

my own personal trifecta wrapped music (taj and nikky and ed and steve) around a book signing upstairs at the old court featuring short stories by lowell's own steve o'connor, whose collection of lowell short stories, "smokestack lightning" can be purchased online or in better bookstores near you. my copy from last night has steve's personalization inside the front cover, so, i'll know if you pinched it from me, but, please, anytime, stop by and read a few of the stories and enjoy 'em--they're great!

that's the thing that never ceases to amaze me about downtown lowell. get to know a band, like, say, melvern taylor and his fabulous meltones, and notice when they're recording for a radio show ("droppin' knowledge" on WMBR) hosted by a guy (joeg aka joe graham) who also runs a tv show ("a local anesthetic", and if you've got a tivo, get on the ball and learn what i mean!) which is produced in part by a beautiful woman named nicole that, who knew, can sing like the proverbial bird and then some, and then you wind up in a bar like fortunato's surrounded by 50 people who could not possibly be a better audience of which to be a part, and experiencing something like i experienced last night. steve o'connor i first played soccer with sometime literally last century, (did you know his brother in law once played for the columbian national soccer team in the world cup, and now lives right here in lowell, too?), and now i learn writes in addition to tells all those great stories, and writes 'em down in a book that everyone can share. taj mahal grew up in massachusetts singing country blues songs and everything else wonderful that he does and can tell you things like bo diddley always loved massachusetts because it was the first place where his music took off, and can collaborate with kids who grew up in alaska but first learned to rock rock and roll houses right here in boston, (and now writes those songs he writes with guys like taj for TV shows and then plays amazing intimate gigs at little local rock clubs like voices rock club with guys like charlie farren and calls the outfit FBI for farren butcher incorporated, cuz he's named jon butcher, natch, and, oh, how cool would it have been for jon to stay over in lowell and join taj for a number! but i know greed like that has to remain under control, because there's only so much of this awesomeness that one universe can hold at once), and play a show in a park that you can sit in under the stars while you listen...

i know if you were to simply walk out into it, that it would take you places, too.

tonight i'm celebrating kismet at fortunato's again, where peter lavender is playing with carl johnson (and maybe arte kenyon, you never can tell) and more of those connections will be made.

make yours!

MUSIC!

somewhere somebody has the sound file from the muppet show of frank oz bellowing in his oft-imitated but never duplicated throaty croak--"MUSIC!"

it's the exact way i feel when i have an evening like last evening, and the stars align (did you SEE the stars last night?) for downtown lowell to be abuzz with the sound of it. it's both a celebration and a demand for more, that's what it is, and there's no better way to express both at the same time than to screw your larynx up in your own little homage to frankie o. and add your own voice to the communal requesting reply. MUSIC!

first of all, the lowell summer music series kicked itself off last night with a great star-shined set by taj mahal, whose vocal enthusiasm is something not to be missed. there's no one who can sing the blues as he can, who can also pour out the vocal gravy to sauce simple country blues swinging gems like "fishing blues" and corinna and make them take over the night and your feet like that. add something southern africa madagascarian carribean calypso like zanzibar that doesn't even have to have any words to make you want to sway and sing, and you have the perfect summer evening out in the perfect summer weather enjoying the perfect summer music.

"but", in the words of tv greats like ron popeil and billy mays, "wait! there's more!"

fortunato's gave nothing away to taj mahal last night, because into it's intimate little bar area was cossetted "ed and me", aka ed newton and nicole ribaudo (backed up by stephen clements, which i guess would make it ed and steve and me but you know how the drummers always seem to be happy sitting in the back, and you could tell steve was, as he always is, happy to be there sitting in the back, so it's all good), to where the energy from the crowd, energized by the can't say it any other way than BEAUTIFUL voice of nicole ribaudo was resounding and uplifting and a joy to be a part. the moment of the show, (during which there were literally dozens, but it just wasn't possible to count), was to hear literally EVERY woman in the place (and there were a TON of, let's also just say it, BEAUTIFUL women all over fortunato's last night to the point where a guy has to sit back and think to himself that, gee, the world is a downright mother beautiful place) sing along with nikky as she poured out the vocals on one of those songs to which every woman in the world knows the words (and doesn't it say something that i'm unable to put my mental finger on the name of the song right now) and, oh, but don't they all love to sing it together. (you know the song, and i know i know the song, but GEEZ i just can't pull it from the ether right now). can anybody who was there last night help me out here???

the lasting effect of the night was to marvel that musicians who have been doing it for decades (i first saw taj mahal at harvard stadium back in 1978 i think with joan armitrading and james taylor, including waddy wachtel, danny kortchmar, russel kunkel and leland sklar) have nothing on others who have done it now just for their very first night (you heard it here first in lowell, everybody, because nicole is the real deal). the way the music can fill you up and make you both sit forward and lean back at the same time is something that nothing else in the world can do in quite the same way, unless it's being in love, which is, after all, what sharing ones music with an audience really is when it is what it is supposed to be.

boardinghouse park had it last night, and the bar at fortunato's, too.

you really gotta get yourself down here, people!

los rojas mejores

it's hard to express world cup opinion without offending some people, but at the risk of alienating two fairly large european countries and their supporters, let me just say that fernando torres dives like an italian. (apparently, the ref gave him a 10 for that ridiculous flop that preceded spain's second goal). this not only perverted the entire premise of sportsmanship underlying the global sporting competition, but it also cost chile the match, forcing them to play the last half of it with only 10, which, notably, did not slow them down from scoring on the perfidious spanish, but left them one shy from winning their group with a draw. (they do go through, so at least there's that).

to spain's credit, they did capitalize on an incredible positional gaffe committed by chile's keeper early in the first half, and pounced on an empty net from distance after he wandered recklessly out in search of a clearing ball. (rule #1 for a wandering goalkeeper--always knock the ball firmly out of bounds rather than anywhere else on the pitch). oh well. spain also scored a better-earned tally, before torres' antics cost chile their 11th man, and a fair chance to equal things on the scoreboard, so a draw wouldn't have been unreasonable. oh well.

the way i see it, chile is still my underdog pick among the goliaths who are through to the round of 16. this does not mean i am anything but ALL for the USA--i'm USA all the way, baby--but it's always fun to pick a tiny country to root for among all the big ones. (chile draws brazil next in the knockout stages, so if they're going to do it, they're going to have to do it against the best, and i'll be rooting them on as hard as i can). i also like germany over england, (it's a german thing), but i'm most looking forward to mexico vs argentina, which should be an awesome game.

i'm all for the americas' teams like uruguay and paraguay over south korea and japan respectively, and i will be tuning in to spain v portugal to update myself on the latest diving and whining techniques so i know what to expect elsewhere in the tournament. i expect the dutch will do well, too. (especially since, rather than diving to the turf themselves, they prefer to knock over other people instead).

so, who are your picks to make it to the round of 8? i like the US' chances to do well, against ghana first, and then the winner of uruguay/south korea. ghana is going to be a tough, tough team to beat, but they're inexperienced, much like the US team, and that's always a better chance than running up against one of the more established programs, which likely have their own diving coach and ways with influencing the referees. (and handball technique coach, too, and, yes, i'm talking about you, torsten frings).

don't care? you just don't know what you're missing. other folks? i'll see you at the westford grille at 2 o'clock tomorrow for the next big game.

USA! USA!

a most beautiful morning

i just went outside--have you seen it? have you felt it? have you breathed deep and filled your lungs and whole soul with it?

a most beautiful day this is. BEAUTIFUL. like when god made his infinite list of days, he put it among those at the very top. stirring.

and taj majal (with whom jon butcher wrote one of the amazing songs he played last night, from the soundtrack to the deadwood series, which i now must get, just to hear that lilt again) opens the lowell summer music series down at boardinghouse park tonight, as if it were scripted to be the most beautiful start to one of the most beautiful music series there is to be heard on this great green earth of god's and ours. (we have to take better care of her--don't you believe?).

i'm heading down now to set out my blanket.

see you there.

because i can't resist

one of my friends last night remarked about how inscrutible the world cup recaps are to her, reading as she does for the music, (and maybe a little bit of the crazy, who knows), but i simply can't resist putting one out here to accompany the paean to farren and butcher et al.

see, brazil is playing portugal this morning, and that's kinda like clapton and page having a guitar battle, or going to see carl johnson playing with jen kearney right after having seen charlie farren and jon butcher, and having carl send "let love rule" and "what is and what should never be" into your ears to remind you that there are more stars in the sky than can be counted. (robinho, ronaldo--the runs to goal today are going to be fast and furious). reality is, with 7 goals for, (yeah--you remember my description of north korea's beat-down, don't you?), portugal is going through no matter what happens today, so it's not like it's for anything else but bragging rights, but, see, when the best football in the world speaks nothing but portuguese, and the two towers of portuguese, brazil and portugal, have their pride on the line, it's a game not to be missed no matter what the context. best of all, you gotta figure it's just a preview, because these two are too good not to have every probability of playing again before this tournament is over, so you know, in order to get the most out of the final chapter, you're going to have to read the whole thing, and if you don't much care for soccer, and if you were ever to pick one game to try to give yourself one chance to figure it out, this one here is going to be the one to try.

were it not, of course, for the others who are the best of the best and are going to be there vying for the cup right along with them. (i'm telling you CHILE, and you heard it here first).

apologies to the argentinians, and the dutch, and the germans and americans and mexicans and uruguayans and koreans (south, of course) and english and ghanans and japanese and paraguayans and slovakians, and maybe even the spanish if they can escape the swiss and the hondurans, but there's good and then there's GOOD, and, today, with brazil playing portugal, it's ALL good.

say it with me:

USA! USA!

the rock show

i'm bursting at the seams this morning, and a bit foggy from the beer, truth be told, but that's part of knowing you were at the epicenter of all that's right. charlie farren and jon butcher, aka fbi, aka farren butcher incorporated, put on a SHOW last night, and i'm still more than a little star-struck to have had the privilege and good fortune to be there.

there will always be a little bit of "who?" in the responses i get for the passions i take in my musical life, and i understand that not everybody made a religious quest of exploring every nook, cranny and marshall stack of the boston music eden that were the 80's, so don't worry that you may not have the same familiarity as i do, but i'm always rewarded when someone hears something they've never heard before, and that little light that begins to gleam in their eye, and it kindles, and catches fire. last night, charlie and jon (and dan kenney on keys, and holy s***, but that guy can play) hit a room that was aroar with the sociable din of too many people talking, and wrestled the grizzly bear of mass distraction to a rapt and blown-away singularity of focus. charlie's guild hollow body electric guitar (just the one single solitary silver pickup--what else do you need?) was as beautiful as the chords he pulled from its strings like so many threads of a story that you discover has captured all of you as its told. and jon... what can be said... his are all hand-made, you can see it (and he didn't even play the baby blue one--mon dieu) and the notes he can send soaring from that simple little fretboard... it's like being in church to me, and if i could have knocked those people off their chairs who started the evening with their mouths open i would have, (though charlie and jon did it the right way--with music that says everything that the heart could ever think might need be said), and i felt like i was both going home and taking off on a musical adventure that could have gone anywhere imagination could send me.

if i were to try to relay for you the set list, i wouldn't have a prayer. there were songs charlie wrote when there was no farrenheit, (was there music in any time before???), and there were songs that jon wrote 20 years ago that were only released in the last decade. ("tiger in the tall grass" is one of my favorite songs out of all of his--and it was a joy to finally hear it live). there was a medley of "can you top this" of all of charlie and jon's most memorable songs--charlie's "fool in love" is pure 80's gold, and you can listen here to the original to refresh you memory--and what else does one need to say about songs like jon's "walk like this"--but the gem of the evening for me was the final encore, when jon gave full voice to one of the prettiest songs i have ever known, "wishes", from the '87 album of the same name. hear it here--and LISTEN!

AND!!!! lest you worry that i get too soapy on you with the "prettiest ever" swoon, let me also tell you that charlie ripped a cover of fleetwood mac's (the REAL fleetwood mac--the one from the 60's with just peter green, mick fleetwood and john mcvie) "oh well" that was blew the room away--you just never knew where they were going to take you next. and it was all GREAT.

so, in a word--awesome. charlie farren and jon butcher (and we won't forget dan kenney) put it on last night, and you can tell folks you know someone who was there when.

if voices rock club keeps landing acts like this, it's going to become the center of a very amazing musical map.

lowell rocks!

goin' to the rock show!!!

there's a certain excitement to discover a last-minute show announcement the day of, and be able to run across town and score tickets, that cannot be duplicated.

tonight, at voices rock club in lowell, charlie farren and jon butcher, aka FBI, are putting on a show that has my adrenaline going like it's 1985. the tickets are going fast, and whatever is left will be $25 at the door. (the early deal for $20 closes at 5, and sorry for failing to give you any notice, but i had to run out the door and GET THERE so i didn't miss it, so didn't stop to blog, and i'm glad i didn't, cuz this rain is biblical...)

charlie farren and jon butcher are boston music icons that are still putting it out there, and still doing it better than ever. (jon's side projects include the barefoot servants, with my own personal favorite bass player of all time, leland sklar, and if you want to hear a taste of what "still doing it" sounds like, go check it out and dare yourself not to rock along. pharoahs house will rip your face off, but i figured i'd start you with the easy stuff). charlie farren just happens to be one of the other best guitar players boston has ever turned out, and the two of them together is like page and clapton to anyone who grew up in the '80's boston rock eden. (we'll consider joe perry the keith richards of that bunch).

so GO!

it's a rock show. you get your ticket at the door. you get in and grab a beer. and you stand in a crowd that is electric, because the performers make it that way, and you know that you, like me, live in the best place on earth.

oh, boy oh boy, but i hope jon plays the sentinel...

"old europe"

i've come across a plenitude of whining from europeans lately (for our purposes today we will include england in that group, and i'd say their recent behavior reinforces their belonging) about this current world cup, and i, for one, am enjoying every last ill-behaved bit of it. i recounted the french story here the other day, but to it we can today also add the implosion of the vaunted italians in that ignominious classification. (losers 3-2 to slovakia, and as well the bottom of their group, beneath even the all whites of new zealand, who, we can all agree, continue to be much better at rugby football than association football). it's like christmas in june!!!

the italians either invented or perfected the art of diving for the officials, (most likely both), and there is nothing more entertaining than watching one of them roll around in the grass as if shot by sniper fire from the stands, unless you count watching them pout as they lose. (the french are just yet another copy of the unsportsmanlike original). they like to pretend they have a fine footballing tradition, but, i have to say, that's a crock, and their bowing out today at the bottom of their group is quit fitting to the quality of their play, and i say good riddance. (yeah, i'm a sore winner).

the other set of whinging wankers i'd like to call out today are the english, who set upon their hapless goalkeeper for his mistake in the opening match as if he'd just shot the queen. (bet his career continues much like billy buckner's here in boston...) they followed that up with a clunker against algeria, and they certainly didn't overly impress by squeaking their way out of the group with a 1-nil win over slovenia. now, i do want to point out that other members of great britain, like the scottish, are much more reasonable about things than their english empire-mates, but, seriously, if you can find me a sanguine and happy englishman today who won't immediately start bitching to you about the bit of yank luck in the first game, and all sorts of other things, i'd like to meet them. they act like they as well have a fine footballing tradition, (and we can all thank them for inventing the sport), but the obvious truth is that they're a marginal program at best, and should be FAR more modest about themselves as a result.

compare this to the americans, who received the bogus end of one of the worst referee calls in world cup history, and who endured yet another goal called back on a good strike in their third match, and were thus facing elimination at the conclusion of 90 minutes against the algerians, yet still kept good spirits, a positive attitude, and nothing but pure joy and unqualified elation when the winner was, and they were, put through. no, we don't think we're entitled. we just enjoy when our boys on the pitch earn what they deserve.

there is an asterisk for the germans, who have not behaved badly, but, truth be told, did have those moments of doubt when they could not even manage a tie against group-bottom serbia, and who remain guilty of disbelieving in their very talented team. however, they've won their group, and they soldier on in good spirits. good on them.

for the rest of old europe already eliminated--greece, slovenia, serbia--it's time to take your hats off and salute the americas, who have put through literally every one of their entrants so far, with the likely prospects of one more (chile) by sunday. even honduras, who are possibly the only team from the americas to miss the round of 16, still maintain a chance if chile can best spain, and if they can beat the swiss by three goals. (unlikely, but still possible!)

and that, my european friends, is the difference. honduras has nothing to lose, and everything to gain, and it's great to be able to root for their (extremely) thin chances. or maybe they don't go through, and so what? seven of the other eight will (likely) have, and that's a pretty good showing compared to europe's contributing as many countries so far at the BOTTOM of their groups, than qualified for the next round.

USA! USA!

"se la perdio--TWICE"

pablo ramirez had the call on univision for the us/algeria game yesterday, and the highlight was his recap of clint dempsey's 57th minute double miss (first against the post, and then second to miss an entirely empty net with the follow-up) with his own inimitable "se la perdiooooo" with the english word, emphasized for effect, "TWICE" to follow.

it was a classic. i've got the whole recording on my tivo, but no way to trim it down and upload it for youtube. somebody, SOMEWHERE, has to get this thing online, and, when they do, i'll link it here. one of the best and most classic calls in sport, and i'll always smile to remember it, since landon donovan found his way clear to drive home the game-winner in extra time and put the us through to the knockout rounds, and we don't have to have nightmares about what might have been.

i love me my univision!

karma--it's everywhere you're going to be

people noticing a little bumper sticker riding around town looking like a little visa logo with the observation that "karma--it's everywhere you're going to be" will be noticing my car, and my overriding sentiment on life. (if you can't stop, wave).

the other day on chowhound.com, (an extremely useful site for information on food and restaurants both local and worldwide, in case you aren't already familiar), i noticed a thread discussing one particular local retail establishment and one poster's recounting of disappointing experiences with their produce and deli meats, to which the proprietor of the market responded with a screed about "haters", and the classic "do you have any idea what it cost to run and operate an independent grocery??" web histrionics. (please excuse the misspellings and semantic errors, e.g. "what it cost", since, i'm figuring, those with histrionic personality disorder aren't always concerned about grammar, spelling or punctuation, and you know i'm just cutting and pasting verbatim because i'm all about accuracy).

anyway, i wouldn't have piled on except the marketer's aggression and complete disrespect for one customer's experience prompted me to be karma's bitch, as my name is earl would have it, so i added a vignette from one episode i had while purchasing a quart of milk there, and if you'd like to read all about it, just go looking for me on chowhound and i'm sure you'll find it. (decorum and the fact that this reflects poorly on a local business inhibits me from linking directly, lest i be daring karma to do a dance on my head, too, so please pardon the inconvenience). i couldn't help be struck by the fact that the proprietor, in his or her righteous indignation and pride in their establishment, was compelled to make themselves look like the antithesis of a kindly local grocer in whose business you'd be tempted to trust. that, and being such a bitter jerk to the poster, who really didn't talk all that much trash if you ask me, other than to invite others to compare experiences, (which is, after all, what chowhound is all about in the first place), that i couldn't help but play the bitter jerk card right back at 'em.

that's karma, yo. (can't wait to find out what universe friction i'll be encountering soon as a result of not being able to keep my own trap shut...)

which all comes to my mind this morning while reveling in all the schadenfreude being strewn about the web regarding the self-immolation of the french national soccer team this week in south africa. for those whose memories aren't long enough to recall, let me refresh you with a youtube clip from this past 18th of november in which thierry henri of france quite clearly, deliberately and against all rules both of the game and of all definitions of sportsmanship, played a soccer ball with his hands to result in a goal against ireland, whose place it was that france took in attendance to this year's world cup finals in south africa. well, karma is a bitch, and she's having her last laugh, as usual.

an associated press recap by john leicester is here, and in it you'll find all the perverse glory of the french national team, writ large across the world stage to demonstrate just how undeserving they were and are for anything but the global embarrassment they now have so well earned. to their credit, french fans booing their team on the big screen in front of the eiffel tower the other day weren't getting it wrong.

seriously--the french players actually went on strike before their last match. (to protest what i surely don't understand, observing as anyone can the luxury accommodations and services they enjoy). my favorite bit is how french president nicolas sarkozy dispatched his sports minister to the team's hotel in bloemfontein to dress them down the night before the match in one of the worst examples of motivational speaking i think may have ever been in a competition of this magnitude, for their bad behavior. (the second place candidate being french coach domenech describing the random strike by his players protesting the summary dismissal of their teammate, anelka, for melting down and cursing out his coach while on the field, as "an aberration, imbecility, a stupidity without name"). ok, i might very well understand the stated reason, but i stand by my original statement that i surely don't understand, because, like our general in afghanistan, you can be right 1000 ways to sunday, but you can't call out your coach in public and expect to still be playing afterwards.

anyway, do you want to know the ultimate expression of french invitation to lady karma to do her dance upon their most deserving heads? that same coach, domenech, who called his players imbeciles in a most profoundly public way, refused to shake hands with his counterpart on the field after their final match. seriously. refused to shake hands. hell, even bill belichick shook hands with eric mangini. but, no, the coach of the french national team thinks it justified that he would refuse to shake the hand of the host nation's team as if his petulance matters more in this world than respecting the privilege he's been given to stand on that pitch. (which, if you go back to that bit of cheating against ireland, wasn't even earned in the first place).

i am only disappointed that i wasn't able to watch the travesty as it happened.

there are no more deserving losers today than les bleus. and i know i'm going to pay for the bad behavior to have said it, but, sometimes, the price you pay is worth it.

karma--it's everywhere you're going to be. (and i'm, of course).

SE LA PERDIOOOOOOOOOOO!

today's ultimate group phase matches in el grupo A were everything the world cup is supposed to be: the match between mexico and uruguay (both through to the second round) was so good, that i didn't even mind that the simultaneous scheduling, and mexican-biased univision preferences, meant that i could only follow the french bowing out to the host south africans via internet updates. (though the frequent and amused updates from pablo ramirez and jesus bracamontes throughout the univision telecast accomplished much the same schadenfreudian effect--"diga me jesus!"--and were even more fun). it's great that the south africans had such a beautiful upset to complete their brace of matches during the tournament, but too bad having two such good teams in mexico and uruguay in their same group meant that matching the mexicans, and even embarrassing the french, would not be enough to earn a spot in the knockout rounds. certainly A is a candidate for el grupo del muerte, though i still say that ivory coast makes group G even tougher overall. but who cares! the french have retreated, and we're only down to the diving italians (who can very easily be eliminated by a good beating by the slovakians on monday, should they choose to rise to the occasion, as have the south africans today) for teams i absolutely would prefer to see eliminated sooner rather than later. (for your pleasure today, please enjoy this beautiful and inspired web video that sums up my feelings on the subject).

:-)

the beauty of single-A baseball

last night was opening day for the 2010 lowell spinners over at the remarkably beautiful and sublime lelacheur park, and it was a GREAT day for baseball. you can try, but i'll wager you won't find a better night for a game this year than was last night. warm. straight sunshine. great opening day crowd. congrats to all who were there to see it, and an admonition to the rest of you that you really have to contemplate your life's priorities that you might not have been there. i mean, seriously--what is it in your life that you put ahead of such things???

anyway... i can write the next bit because hot houston astros catching prospect ben heath (foregoing his senior season at penn state for a shot in the 'stros system with the tri-city valley cats) was fine after a minute or two appreciating the beautiful evening lowell sky from his back in the batters box, but the first spinners pitcher of the evening was an experience i will never, ever forget.

you've seen major league. (with charlie sheen as "wild thing" ricky vaughn). you've seen bull durham. (with tim robbins as ebby calvin "nuke" laloosh). you've seen pitches straight to the backstop. but i'm here to tell you that NOTHING in either of those two at-times-completely-over-the-top dramatizations of the sheer unpredictability of this game captures the real-life and i-was-there-to-see-it essence of the first five valley cat at-bats in the top of the first last night.

ever see a pitcher walk the first four batters of a game without so much as a second strike in any of those at-bats? (i have now!) ever see a pitcher throw FOUR of 'em to the backstop while doing so, against only four strikes among 22 pitches, with a couple so far over the catchers head that he barely even bothered to raise his glove as they passed overhead like so many skyrockets? (i have now!) ever say to the guy sitting next to you, "geez, what must it be like to step into the batters box against a guy throwing high 90's heat with so little control?" and then watch as the very next pitch is hurled like a laser beam straight into the next guy's batting helmet? (that much was NOT fun, as the plunk was not a little "tick" deflection, but a full on "thwack" into the batting helmet, and more than a little time spent letting the dazed and confused #5 hitter, ben heath, regain his bearings on the planet earth, but, as with the experiences before, i can say, once again, i have now!)

so it's no outs, bases loaded, two runs in, and we haven't even seen a strike 2 yet. sure, it was against the home team, but, i have to say, thoroughly entertaining and not a bad reason to love coming out to such a beautiful ball park on such a beautiful evening and have such a beautiful time. better yet, making his professional baseball debut, keith couch, was summoned summarily from the bullpen for batter #6, and he got the spinners out of the jam with only one run in, which was major-league-quality pitching right there for sure, especially without so much as a decent warm-up or any expectation whatsoever that he'd be pitching for the first out in the top of the evening's first inning.

the other joy of the evening was watching sox' new first-round prospect, kolbrin vitek, go 3-for-3 with an extra walk thrown in for good measure. (the other great baseball name of the evening being bryce brentz, who's another top sox prospect, taken #36 in the most recent draft, whose throw in from deep right field on a otherwise-sure-thing sac fly that didn't miss the runner by all that much was a thing of used-to-be-a-93-mph-pitcher beauty, and the guy was drafted for his power with the bat, which can't help but make one so disaffected with the "mail-it-in" aspects of jd nancy drew's play in fenway's right believe that there really may be dewey evans style hope for the future).

yes, a great day at the ballpark, for all sorts of reasons. (you really need to be there!)

tuesday, april 20th, 2010

anyone looking for explanations for the sox' sudden reappearance near the top of the american league standings need go no further than the box score from their game against the texas rangers on tuesday, april 20th, 2010. no, not because it was the game that featured 9 ranger stolen bases, (which is pretty remarkable all by itself, tough as it is on the home team to have let them do it), but because it was the game that darnell mcdonald made his red sox debut, homering in the tying runs in the bottom of the 8th, and winning the thing going away with an RBI wall ball with the bases loaded and two out in the bottom of the ninth--single-handedly re-injecting the pulse of life back into a then-moribund and failing ballclub.

the $14-million-per-year nancy drew was batting .133 at that point in the season, and david ortiz was consistently and positively pitiful at the plate. jason varitek stood up for the veterans by hitting the double that immediately preceeded mcdonalds' game-tying homer, but, the way things were going, you knew the season wasn't going to be pretty unless SOMEONE in the clubhouse stood up and endeavored to play baseball again. (tell me that day that beckett would be out like he's been, and i'd have conceded the season based on the team's performance to that point).

but, as the cliches go, that's why they play all 162 games, and here it is the first day of summer, and our boys are within half a game of the best record in baseball (a game ahead of those same rangers, so lookout for those boys, too).

the us is playing algeria for the right to go through to the world cup round of 16 (you didn't think i could go a whole sports post at this time of year without mentioning, did you?) and the sox are opening up a series that'll feature ubaldo jiminez while they contest with the rays and the yankees for the lead in the american league east, which is, no doubt remaining, the toughest division in all of baseball. (and the fantasy stats are littered with the carcasses of otherwise serviceable pitchers whose numbers are beat to hell by having to pitch to these murderers rows, and josh beckett may be casualty in point number one).

yes, i'm enjoying my summer so far.

AND!!!

the spinners' season has started over at beautiful lelacheur park. doesn't get any better than this.

guitars

ok, one last little something before i get back to work...

i love guitar. i love guitar players. i love watching and listening and being blown away by the incredible array of sounds and emotions that those little six-strings can be made to convey. i'm a FAN.

so it is that i marvel at the various techniques that my guitar gods will employ, and all the little aids and toys that they'll strew about the floor in front of their feet in order to get just the perfect nuance at the perfect time for the perfect moment. carl's custom guitars is my favorite personal armorer, (dave champagne of treat her right now has one of carl's custom amp cabinets, for one example of my not being alone in my appreciation), but there is no end to the options, and the pedals, and the effects racks that show up on stage when you're out to a show. (check out paul ortolano's six-foot wall of wonderful sometime at a serial thrillers show if you want to see one beautiful example of how far these awesome things can go). carl johnson plays his leads with just his fingers on a custom-built strat, a la jeff beck, and you won't be able to believe the sounds he can coax from something so simple, though attentive fans will also notice those little homemade stomp boxes of sonic beauty with which he augments his magic--everybody has their edge.

all of which is to explain why i am always so blown away when magic is made with the simplest of setups. take james hunter, for example. van morrison will have you listen to him for his voice, which is everything van will tell you, and more, but i couldn't help but be struck by the amazing truth that james does it all on his road-worn gibson les paul (with some very worn-in custom pickups of unknown origin) and a single fender '65 twin without anything else, and his sound is like nobody else's out there just so. no pedals. no switches. not even a knob-twist or a string tune during an entire 2 hour show. just james and his gibson. YEAH.

he swings it. he r&b's it. he souls it. he picks out a lead with the heel of his right hand shaping the sound off the strings like a maestro. he buries the lead behind the band, and then he brings it forward when it's time. and he does it all so effortlessly, and so beautifully, that when he finally cuts loose and starts enjoying himself--truly enjoying himself--you become blown away by how much control he has over his instrument. (last night's encore included james unstrapping himself from the les paul and balancing it on his foot while he picked the solo, and then raising the guitar up with his foot to add a glissando without having to move his hand, and then dropping it back down again to go the other way, which was way cool both sonically and visually, which is all you can ever ask of a consummate showman).

i love me my guitars.

the beauty of shangri-lowell

i've lived here long enough to have heard some not-quite-as-hospitable stories from years ago from people who swear they were true, but i also have to repeat yet again how i have never failed to be made to feel welcome into each and every place i have ever gone around here since. this sunday evening's stop in a george's cafe on textile avenue in dracut is just another in a long line of purely positive experiences i've had exploring the greater merrimack valley, and i can't help but be struck yet again this morning at how this is so.

imagine a place where people at the bar introduce themselves to newcomers, and will buy a round of drinks for strangers in honor of new-found acquaintance. (happened again on sunday). now imagine that it's not just one place, but a succession of places where this happens. at not just at bars, but at restaurants, art galleries, stores and private homes. seriously--where else in the world have you ever been where you've had that consistency of experience for years at a time?

could be that i'm just lucky--but i think it's because i'm living in shangri-lowell, the best place on earth. tonight it's the spinners at lelacheur. tomorrow it'll be something else. but it's always with a smile, and a genuine welcome. well, almost always... i do recall being made to feel singled out and diminished by the ex-mayor and certain other city councilors who were always about "how long have you lived here" before assessing a constituent's self-worth, but that right there is the exception that proves the rule. (and he's no longer the mayor, so there's that, too).

if anyone ever asks you why anyone would ever choose to live in lowell, massachusetts, you refer 'em straight away to me, and i'll set them straight.

best place on earth.

father's day

parenting older children (and being dissociated from their mother's misguided attempts to interpret the holiday) affords more flexibility in celebrating father's day, and my preference is to treat it much like a birthday, and indulge myself in order to best capture the spirit of the celebration on behalf of my progeny. (they like it best this way, too, so it's win-win). with that sentiment in mind, i began yesterday on one of the more beautiful soccer pitches in the area (medfield's wheelock school fields) and continued right on through the afternoon with three world cup matches (courtesy of my tivo) and front row seats to see james hunter at the tupelo music hall.

i have the set list here, but looking more closely one has to admit it's hardly more than a general outline, because james and the band immediately responded to the enthusiastic and compelling audience vibe to head way off the reservation and play some rarities never before heard at a james hunter show, and it was awesome to be there to hear it. most fun of all for my money was a spirit-perfect cover of chuck berry's "betty jean" that i can only hope got recorded somewhere so the world can hear it again. (but for the moment we'll just have to make do with a link to the original recording so you can at least get an idea of the ballpark). as always, james' cover of the five royales' "baby don't do it" stands to rival any live r&b show performance of any song you will ever see, so there was that, too. (and, yes, i've seen james brown, so you know the stratosphere into which i'm hurling my hyperbole). in addition to all this, the saxes were ON all night long, with damian hand (tenor) and lee badau (baritone) burning the playhouse down in perfect accompaniment to james' tasty, understated and infectious guitar licks, all of which made jason wilson's double bass a pure pleasure to enjoy from right in front of his substantial ampeg rig while he put the foundation down for all the fun. i'd dearly like to give the drummer some, too, but in all my excitement (and his not being on the kit with james the last time) i neglected to get his name properly into memory. (mason? well, at least i remember he's from donegal) the same apology goes for the keyboards, which is, as well, a crying shame, because these were two of the better-talented musicians you'll see touring around these parts, and i hate it when i'm too far gone enjoying things to keep track of to whom i owe all the thanks. (well, i don't hate it that much ;-).

and if you think that might be all a father might have to enjoy on his day, i'll add to this cornucopia of paternal indulgence some last few words on my very first stop back at george's cafe on textile ave in dracut on the way home. you may have seen george's on your way by, between downtown lowell and the back roads into nashua, (or up to londonderry, natch), and thought to yourself "what an inviting little roadhouse that appears to be", and wondered what it might be like inside. well, STOP IN!!! the service could not have been more attentive, gracious and enjoyable, and the cast of characters around the bar made catching the last few innings of the sox game a real treat. there's a pool table and darts setup in the back, and everything you could ever want in a neighborhood local (perhaps other than an entertainment license and some good local music on a saturday night) all at neighborhood local prices that'll let you get the absolute most out of your evening every time. i'm going back for sure.

hope your father's day was equally fine.

"you should see it--herman's getting a beating!"

one of bill cosby's best routines is the one about the life-sized frankenstein monster statue, and if you don't recall, just let me know, because i have it on my ipod and i'll let you listen for yourself next time you see me.

and, i don't like to be mean, and it's certainly not the fault of the north korean general population that they're ruled by an extremely dangerous moron, but portugal just put a 7-0 beating on the north korean soccer team, and, i have to admit, i enjoyed it more than just a little bit, and can imagine being just as eager as bill and all his little buddies were back in the day.

i also don't like to get ahead of myself, or wish for too much in this world, but, let's just say, if ivory coast is to have any chance of advancing, they're going to also have to score at least seven on the north koreans when they play in a few days. there's nothing quite as much fun as watching an african side go all out on the attack, so i'm very much looking forward to the possibility of some serious fireworks.

and, if not, we'll always have the memory of this morning whenever we think of kim jong il.

ps. even though it would make the score only 6-0 if it were to have been called correctly, i have to say, mostly because i don't like christiano ronaldo at all as a soccer player or as a profoundly arrogant human being, that his goal was from an off-sides position and should have been disallowed.

ok, back to the celebration

USA! USA!

still not sure why the third goal was disallowed, but fighting back to even the game at 2 is not to be dismissed. win or go home on the 23rd against algeria, and here's hoping the breaks go the right way to allow a fourth match on the 27th. (don't think we'll be first in the group now...)

for the rest of the afternoon--GO ALGERIA!

bad things come in 2's today

the us is losing to slovenia 0-2 at halftime, so wouldn't it be nice if one could at least relax a bit with ones morning paper?

travesties are coming in 2's this morning, and i'm going to offer these two tidbits as eloquent proof that our party political system is so far broken and gone that there is no salvaging it.

first, from the left hand side of the partisan political aisle, we have what would otherwise be the most powerful man in the world accepting part-time attention to the deepwater horizon crisis from his chosen crisis chief. (i would not lie about this--read about it here).

next, from the right hand side of the partisan political aisle, we have the guy next in line to assume the house energy and commerce committee chairmanship apologizing to the chairman of british petroleum that his firm might be held financially accountable for the colossal mess they have created. (i would not lie about this one, either--read up on it here).

so one is our president, the other is soon to become one of the most powerful legislators in issues related to oil drilling. one is just fine without having any full-time person in charge of mitigating this disaster, while the other is already issuing apologies for the possibility there might be any accountability for fouling the entire gulf of mexico.

you tell me, if you are either a D or an R, if you can in ANY way condone or explain this sort of nonsense. i'll tell you, if you are either a D or an R, that YOU are the ultimate source of this problem. your party politics prop up nonsense like this, and ensure the perpetrators remain beyond accountability.

and that is WRONG

gotta take care of business

the germans' arrogance got them a world cup sized headache today. first and foremost, star striker miro klose kept fouling serbians from behind even after warned verbally in addition to again by yellow card by the spanish referee, so he found himself sent off after less than 40 minutes were gone in the match, and his team faced the final almost-hour a man down against an inspired serbian side. (we can debate the capriciousness of the referee all day long, but the truth remains that miro insisted on hacking guys from behind all his shortened game long, and, this time, he was sent off--it's how life works). almost immediately, as any properly motivated and focused team would, serbia struck for their goal, and milan jovanovich left no doubt on the end of a tic-tac-toe cross, passing header and finish.

as if this wouldn't be challenge enough for the germans, after serbian star nemanja vidic inexplicably reached as far as he could so as to touch a crossing ball with his hand right in front of his goal, (seriously--it's hard to understand what he possibly could have been thinking) lucas podolski failed to take care of his business, and failed to convert the penalty.

this is how championships are won and lost. you get to the line. you simply have to put the ball where it needs to go. and, if you don't, it's on you. no, not on the refs who give and take away with apparently inexplicable whim. (or conspiracy-tinged malice--who knows). the celtics could possibly look at things this way this morning, who knows, but we do know that the germans today must. you're a man down. you have been given the gift of a chance to even the score. if you can't convert, you can't complain about anything else.

ok, enough about such trivialities.

USA! USA!

big night tonight!

three matches a day, plus work, (plus the sox and any number of other things to be squeezed in), leaves little time for exposition, so apologies for the thin content here lately. if you're curious, i feel no sorrow for spain, (they could have started hitting those corner kicks actually toward the goal a bit earlier in the match if they were looking for sympathy from me), and more than a little excitement for the swiss, who now have a GREAT chance at advancing. and no question, for my money, la grupo del muerte is G, though someone deserving from group A is going home disappointed from the first round, too. have i covered everything relevant to the sporting world?

as for the celtics, lets just say, though i'll maintain good thoughts for them whenever they might occur to me, i'm looking forward to an evening of music, with melvern taylor (and his fabulous meltones, of course) at toad at 7:30, and treat her right at the plough and stars after, because, as often as the celts make the finals, (over a third of the years of my life), to my knowledge this is the first melvern/THR double header there's ever been--and i'm NOT going to miss it. after all, a man has to have priorities.

there's no corner on crazy

"an american armed with a pistol and a 40 inch sword was detained in northern pakistan and told investigators he was on a solo mission to kill osama bin laden". (to their credit, the pakistani police laughed when he gave them his story, before quite appropriately detaining him and calling the american embassy to have him properly taken care of). funniest part to me is that the guy is 52 years old, and, to questions as to why he thought he had any chance to pulling it off, answered that "god is with me. i am confident i will be successful..."

hope springs eternal, and there's absolutely no corner on crazy in this crazy world of ours.

it's total underdog day

lots of underdogs all through these world cup fixtures, but today's are some of the under-est of the bunch. it helps that two of the three games feature two of the top three teams in the world based on fifa rankings (brasil and portugal) and the third features one of the lowest-ranked world cup entrants of the 32 (new zealand at #76).

so any self-respecting us soccer aficionado can enjoy the against-all-odds possibilities between the new zealanders against slovakia in just a couple of minutes, (best part being that you can still feel good about slovakia either way, being themselves quite a world cup long shot themselves), and just as hopeful for a good performance by the ivory coast up against #3 portugal.

but fear not that it will take too much emotional energy to muster an underdog sympathy for a third time today, because we can all look forward to fully flexing our bully muscles when we get to root 110% for #1 brasil and their jogo bonito against the world-pariah and ship-sinking north koreans. here's hoping we will enjoy the total jesse owens thing. ("ordem e progresso").

ps. just listened to the new zealand and slovakian national anthems, and can't help but notice the emotional disparity between eastern europe and the south pacific. remarkable. no question about where to choose to retire, if the choice ever came.

edited to add: upset/draw number one! new zealand took until the third and final allotted minute of extra time, but they found the equalizer to draw with slovakia, and it's a great day in the south pacific!

edited yet again to add: ivory coast looks every bit the equal of portugal in both technique and creativity, as well as today's final score--i think we have one of our favorite dark horses for the second round right here.

wait--there's still more!

got yet another call today from comcast/xfinity, (who truly do suck, in case you haven't been keeping up with the updates), this time to tell me that they are now aware of my problem in their main office. "does that in any way change the situation or the service i'm receiving on this?" "um... no". "you do realize i exchanged the bad set top box and my problem is resolved, right?" "um... yes". "is there anything you're going to do for me beyond this call?" "um... no, we just wanted you to know we were aware of the problem". "gee, thanks".

on a brighter note, i had a problem today with an hp laptop i had purchased for my son last september, (no, that's not the brighter note, just the preamble), though without a receipt or anything else than the knowledge that i had purchased it up at staples in nashua. in one quick trip, staples was able to confirm the purchase, test a replacement power cord and confirm there was no problem with the laptop itself, and help me make a call to hp, whose customer service person instantly and cheerfully announced they were overnighting a replacement power supply "brick". no muss, no fuss.

can't help but note the irony that the situations are more or less identical, (bad equipment), but the experiences with the companies and their service departments is completely 180 degrees different. i'll buy another hp laptop despite the inconvenience, because i know they'll take care of me. i'll take the first option for world cup games at home from the first provider that offers me an alternative from those other SOB's at comcast/xfinity. (who suck, btw, if you only caught up with the gist now). if only the historical commission wasn't so hysterical on the subject of satellite dishes...

"they ought to call it goalie"

"they ought to call it goalie" is an old hockey aphorism that is the absolute truth about that particular game. skate and shoot all you want, but if the goalie is on his game, it's all just bouncing rubber. well, soccer resembles ice hockey in many important ways, but, given the few chances that a soccer goalie may have during a game to make his mark upon it, there are far more opportunities for that goalie to give away the game as there are for him to steal it.

cases #1 and #2 in point during this world cup are england and paraguay, whose keepers solidly squandered prime opportunities to wrest an important win during this tournament's opening round by inexplicably failing to get and keep their hands on balls that were well within their abilities to reach. in the case of robert greene of england, he neglected to set his position squarely enough behind a weakly-shot ball by clint dempsey, and he botched his handling of it to see a dribbling tragedy cross the line against his side, for the favor of the all-too-grateful yanks, who were solidly out-played, and deserved nothing otherwise from the match. on the other hand, justo villar of paraguay was backstopping decided underdogs, though he was also playing with a very fortuitous lead, and he made two very questionable decisions that determined the outcome of his game, too--the first was to come off his line on a corner kick, and the second was to overrun the flight of the ball and miss it completely so that it was able to soar over his head and oustretched fist onto the foot of italy's daniele de rossi, who was all too eager to oblige his mistake with a solid strike into the back of the next. 1-1 draws both, and neither of them necessary.

in the case of italy, it's a bullet dodged, and, for paraguay, a tantalizing moment that may or may not come back to haunt them. for england, it's a confidence-shaking question that will remain over their heads for the rest of the tournament, while, for the US, it's a break that invites conversion into the second round should they be able to muster some solid games against slovenia and algeria. were either or both keepers to have played at the level of a competent high school goalie in those two moments, the results would have been much different.

and, oh, but i would have loved to have seen italy go down to los albirrojas!

a little morning danish

you know what i'm liking? i'm liking having a little world cup to go with my morning. makes monday morning feel like sunday afternoon. (how 'bout them germans?) i know i'll have to pause things on the tivo in a little bit to get a little work done, but, seriously, working for a company full of soccer-mad europeans and asians and south americans, there's really very little going on anywhere anyway.

so, it's the dutch against the danish, followed by the japanese against the camaroons, capped off by the marquee match of the day--the incredible diving italians against los albirroja of paraguay. (gotta love a bunch of charismatic south americans from a tiny little country standing up to a bunch of arrogant over-privileged european prima donnas whose primary soccer skill is whining, though now i'm not sure i'm talking about the other day's match between uruguay and france, or todays...)

got a favorite yet?

wait--there's more!

yeah, i got a bit peevish the other day about my latest comcast/xfinity experience, and you can go back to the original post to read all the details, but i'll summarize to recall there were three out-of-commission cable boxes, followed by five fruitless phone calls, involving the arrangement of three different (and two out of three incorrect) service appointments, culminating one final trip to their offices to swap out a bad piece of hardware in time for me to watch the kickoff of the world cup on friday morning. (phew!)

the funniest part of all of this is that i received a call at home yesterday evening hoping to confirm with me my comcast/xfinity service visit scheduled for sunday morning. ?!?

here's the recap: the original appointment was agreed for monday morning, but was changed inexplicably by comcast/xfinity to saturday morning (even after i emphatically and repeatedly told them i would not be able to be home at that time) in their system, which i only caught because i'm smart enough to re-check everything they tell me, because they are almost always wrong. (i'd say lying, but let's just say "wrong" because it's more polite). the appointment was then was reset for monday afternoon (they could no longer find an opening on monday morning, or any other morning next week, which they agreed seemed pretty arbitrary and unlikely and most probably the result of a system problem on their end, but there you have it), and, in any case, i was ever so happy to get to cancel the whole mess on friday morning when i finally got everything working myself with the help of a replacement box. so, working cable, and no service appointments... right?

yes, fast forward to saturday evening when the aces at comcast/xfinity somehow once again unilaterally and arbitrarily moved an appointment booked in their system, and not only unilaterally and arbitrarily and inexplicably moved it to an entirely new day and time, but even resurrected a canceled one while they were at it.

it's a wonder any of us manage to have any cable tv at all from these folks, and i can guarantee you that if it weren't for their local monopoly here, i wouldn't be doing any business with them at all.

tell 'em raymond--"comcast/xfinity sucks".

when worlds collide

lots of great music down on the concord river greenway today, which would have been a lock for me under most other circumstances, but the us opens their world cup finals campaign against england today at 2:30, and there's nothing like watching a game with fellow hooligans on a saturday afternoon. (at the westford grille--come on down!)

of course, if you're opting for the music, that's not such a bad fall-back plan, either. either way, flip your coin tonight between carl johnson and big trouble up at the hynes, and tex macnamara and his bucking broncos over at the worthen. in the land of $8 pitchers, every man is king. (and woman, too).

back when i had fios...

many years ago, back in the salad days of my pre-divorced existence, i lived in a bucolic eden where verizon fios was a tv, internet and phone alternative. ironically enough, my prior service experience with verizon was little better (possibly worse) than my present service experience with comcast/xfinity, but something happened when the little fios truck pulled up to the house that one sunny summer afternoon, and everything changed.

the signal never went out, the hardware at the house never failed, and each and every time i had to talk to a service person, they were knowledgeable and truly interested in my having a good experience with their service. now, the cynical among us might be concerned that this sort of personal service might become increasingly difficult to deliver as their subscriber base expands, but i can't speak directly to that, since moving here to my present domicile has taken me out of fios availability range, and i'm stuck with comcast/xfinity, and ruing my misfortune. however, i can say, having talked my parents into taking the plunge awhile back, that, though i've had no end of calls trying to recover deleted files and other user errors related to their computer, i've never once had to diagnose a problem with their fios internet service. (they still do antenna for tv, and don't get me started about that).

so please consider this yet one more peevish assault upon the reputation of my present cable tv provider (comcast/xfinity, in case you missed that part) and a paean to the days when i knew a better experience. no promises for you, since whenever you do business with one of these behemoths, you essentially have very little of a leg to stand on, but if i were asked, i'd say take the fios if you can get it, and run, don't walk, away from those shysters down at comcast/xfinity. you may still be screwed, but at least you took a chance.

there. 12 minutes to uruguay. life isn't all bad.

edited to add that the fios bundle is cheaper, too. how about that.

comcast [xfinity] sucks--yes indeed it does

woke up yesterday to set my tivo for all the world cup games, and discovered i had no tv signal on the box. hmmmm... checked the recording for craig ferguson the night before, and it was fine right through 1:30am. checked the other two hookups i have (but hardly use) and they were out too, so i concluded that, hey, my cable must be out.

calling comcast, aka xfinity, their recording before you can reach a live human being is that you should send a "refresh" signal and wait an hour to see what happens. ok, strike 1.

calling comcast, aka xfinity, again, and reaching one of their live humans, it was suggested that i cycle the power on all my little cable thingies, and wait an hour. ok, strike 2.

actually, there was some improvement in the situation, as the two little digital converters (made necessary when comcast, aka xfinity, changed their signal on me awhile back) seemed to reawaken, and i had signal there, but those digital converters only pump signal out on an RF (coax) cable, and, for example, my projection screen tv doesn't have an RF connector, so that's less than convenient all around. i'll pause to mention that comcast, aka xfinity, live humans always like to say, "no problem, just get an RF modulator--they're cheap", but the sad truth is that you need an RF DE-modulator, and they're NOT cheap, and neither can you get your hands on one with less than 24 hours notice (yo, the world cup starts THIS MORNING!) but i digress...

so i called comcast, aka xfinity, a third time, and they told me that nobody could be out to my house before monday morning between 8am and noon if i wanted to get the situation fixed, so i took the appointment and thought to myself, "gee, comcast, aka xfinity, sucks".

here we must pause to mention that i'm experienced with comcast, aka xfinity, enough to know that nothing they tell you on the phone is necessarily true, so i called back to confirm my service appointment time (it's played for you as a recording before you get to talk to one of their live humans, so i wouldn't have to bother anyone and seem unnecessarily paranoid, but, and here you have it, the recording announced that my appointment time was NOT monday morning from 8am to 11am as had been agreed, but on a different date and at a different time. (go figure...)

SO...

i called comcast, aka xfinity, a FOURTH time, and they told me that no more morning appointments were available next week, so which AFTERNOON would i like. well, geez, comcast, aka xfinity, there are no afternoons that i would like (for example, on mondays i head out to pick up my daughter and hang out with her instead) so why can't i have the appointment that was originally promised? (i have the confirmation email in my inbox with that date and time on it to prove, at one point, such was under discussion). well, sorry, but that's just not possible anymore...

WTF...

SO...

i call comcast, aka xfinity, for the FIFTH time and ask to talk to a supervisor, and learn from him that, oh, yeah, you can take a bogus box down to the local service center and swap it out. oh, really? geez, how late are they open? (it's now 6:30pm, after having initiated this whole process around 8:45am). wait for it... 6:30pm.

ok, so it's 8:45am again, and i'm pulling wires and hauling out the box that may or may not be causing my tivo not to be able to record the world cup games for me, and i'm hoping that somebody down there has a good one that can replace it, and, cross your fingers, fix my problem. i'm not necessarily optimistic, but, hey, what else can a soccer fan do?

it's fair to say, were i to have ANY other alternative for TV here, i would be watching it RIGHT NOW.

until then, in case you were wondering, comcast, aka xfinity, sucks--yes, indeed it does.

edited to add that the new box works--no telling what they did last night to break the old one--and i'm watching los tricolores failing to solve the south africans right now. (shabalala!) there's a slight inclination to root for concacaf, but not much. the afternoon game at 2 is a completely different story, when it'll be ALL IN for las charruas over les gonna be bleus. (which is to say, from where i stand, france is the comcast, aka xfinity, of world soccer).

edited additionally to add the reference to xfinity wherever appropriate--i think i'm beginning to figure out why they wanted to re-brand themselves...

one last hockey post before the soccer begins

the big question over the last few days among me and my many friends and acquaintances, with the possible exception of those raised or living in or near philadelphia, was whether it would be best to watch chicago raise the cup in front of their home town fans, or revel in the schadenfreude of watching them do it in front of the chagrined philly fans. i voted for the latter, and was thoroughly satisfied with the suddenness of the victory/defeat in overtime last night.

congrats chicago. can't wait for boston to reap the fruits of the draft lottery coming up, and get one or two of those trips around the ice with the cup of our own.

mundial

much of the world knows it as la copa mundial, and that's as well-understood a term as "world cup" to most americans, and that's a shame. it's sport and drama of global proportion, and it creates a context within which many of not most if not all of our geopolitical allies and opponents construct their world view. it behooves us to understand, but, as well, and as i'm here to speak from experience, it rewards anyone to enjoy as spectacle, sport and entertainment all by itself.

for the uninitiated: unlike our peculiarly american habit of needing to crown a champion every year in every one of our sports, the rest of humanity is quite comfortable savoring preparation and competition that spans many years for the most important of theirs. (the olympics, for one well known example, are quite well accepted as a quadrennial event even by americans). countries design their teams, and begin their campaign to earn a spot in the next competition four years down the road almost immediately upon conclusion of the prior. and the qualifications literally take years--two years, in fact. this time around, 200 countries fielded teams, and 853 matches were played to determine which 32 would be invited to south africa for the final tournament. montenegro, serbia, bhutan, myanmar, timor-leste, comoros and tuvalu participated for the first time. (serbia successfully qualified for the final, which is pretty impressive for a newbie). four years prior, serbia and montenegro (as a combined squad), afghanistan and new caledonia popped their world cup qualifying cherries. for 2002, 22 teams competed for their first time. for 1998, there were 35 new entrants. literally everybody wants in.

i like the whole thing because, even after years of qualifying matches, it still literally takes an entire month to determine the winner after the finalists meet in the host country for the final time. for the geopolitically aware, it's interesting to note that "palestine", one of the original 27 participants in 1934, re-branded as israel in 1950, only once again returned to the competition in 2002 as a separate side. (though neither of our favorite middle eastern belligerents earned a ticket to south africa). for that kind of fun we can instead focus on the presence of both north and south korea in the brackets, and either the 6th or 7th of july, when it is possible they might actually meet on the pitch in a semi-final match. (wouldn't that be fun!)

for tiny, since americans like underdogs, we can root for countries like honduras and uruguay. (who, by the way, won the first one back in '34, which i think is pretty cool). but, for country and all that is red, white and blue, we really need to be getting behind our boys. you remember when the americans beat the russkies in lake placid? that's going to pale by comparison when and should we ever climb to the pinnacle of world sport and win this thing. you'll be able to hear the anguished cries of 6 billion people when it happens. and i so dearly want to be there when it does.

USA! USA!

saturday afternoon at 2:30 the us plays its first match against england. some of my soccer teammates are referring to us as the colonials, and worse. (considering the source, and observing that they're just a bunch of pommy bastards--it comes with the territory).

so let me know what trash you'd like to talk to whom. i collect this stuff. find a favorite. maybe you'll find the land of your ancestors is in there. maybe you'll find that a country you just love to hate is playing. maybe you'll just enjoy tuning into the games on the spanish tv coverage, and hearing them call GOOOOOLLLLLLLL!!!! whenever somebody scores. it's all good.

and please pardon if the blog here becomes littered with references over the next month--it's the mundial.

great things come in 3's

yesterday i bragged on being able to see jen kearney and the lost onion three times in three days, and many of you are doubtless both wondering what it is that a music fan can possibly get from such repetition, as well as what kind of crazy might prompt anyone to be compelled to find out. well, can't answer for the crazy, (as craig robertson sings it, "you is what you is and you ain't what you ain't"), but i can try to articulate the reward:

last night the lost onion was its bedrock four pieces: claire finley on bass, (first for a reason, and i'll tell you in a moment), carl johnson on guitar (in the middle for another reason, and you know the drill), and pete maclean on drums (listed last because the most important dramatic element comes always after the build-up, and, yup, we'll be getting to that, too). jen kearney, ironically enough, because she's the one always introducing the rest of the band onstage, becomes the piece that literally goes without saying--the songs are, after all, hers, and it's her vocals that you'll always recognize first whenever you hear anything they play, and you'll recognize that they're one of the tightest, best, and most rewarding musical experiences you can hear anywhere at any price, and free just makes the whole thing ridiculous. (every monday night at toad--i would not steer you wrong).

so, claire...

some music wahoo wrote about the band on his blog recently (i know!) and opined after bragging on a lot of what else goes on, that claire was clowning around as if that was her role in the band. (oh, if i only had a little dark interrogation room with a single bare light bulb under which to set him straight!!!) the first thought that strikes a person who has seen a half-dozen sets in three days, and has seen many times that number over the past three years, and has noticed the differences now that claire has joined the band, is that she is so much more than meets the amused, entertained and thoroughly satisfied eye. (and we haven't even begun to talk about how the ears feel).

claire once provided an interview in which she articulated why it is that she was drawn to playing the bass, and what it is about playing it in an ensemble that rewards her so much. i dearly wish i had saved the link so i could share it with you... she talked about how the bass connects the rest of the music, and all the other musicians on stage... (i know i'm butchering her original premise--i can only try my best not to lose it entirely). how through it she communicates with the entire band, and feels the joy of that place, and not the least need to stand out in front, or carry a lead... it was one of the most eye-opening and beautiful things i've ever read about music. beautiful...

and so it is that anyone who has seen the band evolve over the past few years can't help but notice: when carl takes the lead, and does that THING he does on his guitar, and the solo lifts you up and brings your heart up so you can FEEL it, and everything is so beautiful and so RIGHT, there is so often claire, leaning just enough so that her shoulder touches his... and you can FEEL the connection, and what it is that her playing and her presence gives the music... (i told you we'd get to carl, too ;-). i was blown away by the show last night, and it was all i could do not to run up on the stage to get closer to it all because claire was there, doing what she does, pulling it all together and making it MORE because she is there... (and, by god, but when she solos on their cover of erykah badu's "bag lady", you can hear a pin drop every time, right before the applause brings the house down, and it was so sweet and so perfect last night that you know that claire could lead every song she ever cared to--she's that talented--but she's chosen to be so much MORE than that). all a fan can do is say "thank you"... (and, not for nothing, but JKLO's cover of "bag lady" is one of those "more than the original" covers that needs to be heard--the only adjective i can find is "transcendent").

and CARL!

what can be said about a guitarist that is so ready and so on that he can rock a first set from its first notes like carl rocked last night's? from right behind the opening chords of jen's piano that introduced "gentle and precise", carl was so on that it was hard to understand how everything that had seemed so perfect and so un-surpass-able for two days prior was immediately taken somewhere beyond. the tone that carl coaxes from his guitar is at once so immediate, and, yet, also, so subtle, that it soars right through you, and when he puts it into that "beyond" place with his playing, it's hard to type about it later because the words just don't begin to match the music. and THEN he takes off through "wait for it", blows you away via "warm bath eyes", and sets off the fireworks that are burning beneath the "bossa nova stereo"... (the record version is resplendent, and live it's an entire new song--hear both!) and when jen sings "you learned, babe", you know you have. this is what music IS. and yet, during every other moment, when the guitar isn't out front, or even, seemingly, anywhere, you can see his hands, and then your ear connects to what he's fulfilling in the back there... the support he gives to everything--almost every moment of every song. it's what keyboards often do, if they can, but so rarely a guitar. not a rhythm part, or a harmony part, or a muted lead part--carl puts out so often the best part of every moment, even though you don't even realize you're hearing it... (yes, i'm a fan...)

so...

pete maclean...

there's no adequate way to "give the drummer some" and give as much as might be deserved, especially when the drummer is pete maclean, but i will suggest that when you've heard pete give the soul to "prime meridian" you'll begin to see a hint of the fuller truth. the recorded version, once again, is there to hear, and it's so good you might think it stands for what the song is, but i'm here to say that ALL the song is can't be discerned before you hear pete do it live, and do it right.

ever watch the giddy hosts trotting out to host saturday night live, and never fail to pantomime (another great jen song, but i digress) the last drum beat on the intro? it's just enough campy to be good every time, but we also can't help but be struck by how that BEAT takes life and inhabits a person who then simply becomes part of it, and one with it, and compelled to express it... they have to jump up, and come down on the close... they HAVE to... it's like that when pete puts the soul into "prime meridian". there's always claire there, too, perhaps unable to touch shoulders this time, but still THERE, too, putting that high voltage bass conduit directly to the source so we all get ALL of it, but it's pete puts it all inside of you, so that it has to come out.

look around the room sometime when he does it... count the number of people you can see who aren't leaning into every held beat, and moving to meet its climax. there won't be a one. it's remarkable. truly remarkable.

as must be, first, foremost and also last, jen kearney, whose music it is that provides the canvas onto which all these remarkable musicians paint their parts. she barely lets herself solo with her hands, so you have to be ready to catch every savory keyboard chop, but she puts it out there with her voice on every number and you can't miss that--that alto that soars to the top of every soprano flourish so effortlessly, that you forget that it's nothing that almost anyone else can do. (which is to say, it's something that almost no one else can do). over the weekend, one blown-away member of the audience heard joss stone in it. (i went to the web today to see what he meant, and found "fell in love with a boy", and he's not wrong). myself, i hear stevie wonder and aretha all rolled into salsa-grooved momentum that is all jen, and i know you'll just have to hear her to know what everyone is talking about. this woman can SING. close your eyes and be in love sing.

but it's her playing that i heard best last night, because it was one with that of claire, carl and pete, and it all was sooooo good.

great things come in 3's. and 4's. and, it should be reminded, 5's, because though mark mullins wasn't part of the sound last night, his horn takes the whole thing somewhere it can't possibly go without him. my companion on saturday afternoon remarked about how singular the experience becomes when his horn is there. something magical. you can't help but agree.

but i have to say, four has always been my lucky number, (it's a bobby orr thing), and i wasn't disappointed in the least with it last night. in fact, i was so pleased with it that i had yet another one of those "i'm the luckiest person on earth" moments all night long, and it was good. so good.

get yours too. mondays. toad. JKLO. or wherever music moves you.