Man of Constant Leisure

Until further notice...

2008-04-02T13:34:00.001-07:00

Cardoons

2008-02-16T10:14:00.001-08:00

I have been a big fan of Mario Batali's for years, and he has waxed rhapsodic about cardoons so often that I have developed a near-pathological desire to try them. Unfortunately, we don't see so many cardoons around our parts. Most folks around here don't even know what they are.

So what are they? Cardoons belong to the artichoke family. We grew one a few years back but unfortunately couldn't figure out how to harvest it; when it flowered, the flower looked just like an artichoke. You don't eat the flower of the cardoon, however; you eat the stalks, which look like celery on steroids.

The local Whole Food had cardoons in stock a few days ago. It was the first time I'd ever seen them in their 'ready to cook' format, and I immediately knew that my commitment to eating locally was about to be compromised. I grabbed what appeared to be the best looking bunch (what does a good cardoon look like? I truly have no idea), plunked down my $3, and started planning my preparation.

Fortunately I have a mountain of Italian cookbooks at home. I lean most heavily on Mario Batali, Marcella Hazan, and Giuliano Bugialli, so that's where I started my research. They all agree that cardoons should be washed, cut into 2" or 3" sections and soaked in acidulated water (a little lemon juice does the trick; skip this step and they will start to turn brown, which I'm pretty sure does not effect the taste but does mar the presentation), then simmered for 30 minutes in acidulated water. The tough strings running through the ribs must be removed; most chefs say that this is easiest to do after cooking.

Because I had never had them before, I wanted a simple preparation that focused on the flavor of the cardoons, so I rejected a delicious-looking but too-elaborate-seeming recipe for cardoons baked with béchamel, cheese, and the like, and chose instead to sauté the cardoons briefly, then dress them with olive oil, lemon juice, salt, and pepper.

My results were mixed. My instinct was to boil less rather than more; I didn't want the cardoons to turn to mush. As a result, they were cooked but still a bit crunchy. A few of the smaller pieces had cooked further and had the consistency of a well-prepared artichoke heart; they offered a little, but not much, resistance to the bite. This is the way cardoons should be prepared, I think; cooked this way, they truly are the poor man's artichoke.

One bunch of cardoons makes an awful lot of cardoons, much more than the missus and I could eat in one sitting. I used the rest the next day in a lentil soup that also featured pancetta, parsnips, carrots, garlic, and onion. As we say down here in the South, it was some good.

Tacos de Lengua

2008-02-16T09:54:00.000-08:00

I was a lucky kid; my mom knew how to get me to try foods that I never, ever in a million years would have tried if she told me what they were. The most memorable example is tongue. The first time she served it, I asked what it was. "Beef," she said. By the time I knew what cut of beef I was eating, I was hooked.

Tongue is very, very tasty; if you haven't tried it, you really have missed out on something wonderful. Like most organ meats, it's not especially good for you. It's high in calories, high in fat, and high in cholesterol. But like all such things, it can and should be enjoyed in moderation.

The tongue my mom served was a cured beef tongue, the style preferred by Jews. Mexicans eat fresh tongue, and because there are so many more Mexicans than Jews in North Carolina, fresh tongue is generally what's available to me. That's fine, because fresh tongue is what you need to make tacos de lengua (doesn't that sound so much better than 'tongue taco')?

I bought a locally produced buffalo tongue (frozen) at the Carrboro Farmer's Market. I defrosted it, brined it for several hours, then simmered it in salted water spiked with some peppercorns and a few bay leaves for three hours. After it had cooled enough to handle, I stripped off the skin. This is easy to do, as the skin is thick and separates easily from the meat. You just have to slice through to the meat, grab a sheet of skin, and pull. It'll come off in a half-dozen or so pieces. I discarded the skin; it's garbage. Then I cut the portion of tongue I planned to use into 1/2" cubes and reserved the rest for later use.

Finally, I heated a skillet with a tablespoon or so of olive oil. When the oil started to shimmer, I added some ground cumin, some cayenne, some garlic salt, some salt, and some pepper and let that all toast for 10 or 15 seconds, stirring constantly. When the aroma of the spices started to waft up from the stove, I added the cubed tongue and cooked until the edges started to crisp a bit, stirring frequently so that the spices would coat the tongue evenly.

Heat some corn tortillas. Did you forget to make pico de gallo? Make it now; diced onion, diced tomato, chopped cilantro, maybe some jalapeno, maybe a little minced garlic, lime juice. Toss, taste, adjust. Fill a tortilla with tongue, dress with pico de gallo, eat. Yum.

Toxinex™: For the New You

2008-02-10T07:30:00.001-08:00

Do you sometimes feel a little blue? Do you occasionally think that your life may not be working out as you'd hoped, that you haven't quite met your potential? When you see a stranger laughing in a public place, does it ever occur to you that he could be laughing at you? Do you yawn simply because you are tired?

If you suffer from any of these troubling symptoms--and quite likely even if you do not--Toxinex™ may be for you. Toxinex™ is a psychoactive drug developed by Pfister Pharmaceutical and Munitions for the treatment of Sporadic Atypical Non-happy Ideation or Tired Yawning (SANITY) disorder.

Toxinex™ is not for everyone. Only your physician can determine whether Toxinex™ is right for you. Visit your physician today and insist that he prescribe Toxinex™ so that he can determine whether Toxinex™ is right for you. Do not take 'no' for an answer; amenability is a leading indicator of SANITY disorder.

Side effects of Toxinex™ may include one or more of the following: rapid hair growth, dry heaves, acute pain in the testicles or labia, development of a tail, profound enlargement of the eyes and/or tongue, spontaneous and frequent orgasm, kidney and liver failure, suicidal thoughts, hearing voices, acute depression, and an irresistible urge to procure an automatic weapon and take out every last bastard at the nearest McDonalds, starting with the one who was laughing at you the last time you were there. If you experience any of these symptoms, contact your physician to determine whether you should increase or, God forbid, decrease your dosage of Toxinex. Under no circumstances should you discontinue the use of Toxinex™; Toxinex™ changes the chemistry of your cells so that they can no longer form cell walls without Toxinex™. Cessation of Toxinex™ usage typically results in immediate and painful death by internal hemorrhaging.

Toxinex™: For the New You. Ask your doctor for it today, lose your SANITY tomorrow. The first bottle's free!

Chicken

2008-02-02T17:58:00.001-08:00

There are many, many different wonderful ways to prepare chicken. For presentation, you can't beat roasting a whole bird (we always stick a lemon, flesh perforated by a fork, in the cavity as per Marcella Hazan's instructions; we refer to this dish as Chicken Lemon Up the Bum). Roasting is not without its perils, however; it is difficult to gauge exactly when the bird is done, and when chicken is cooked whole, the various parts of the bird don't always finish cooking at the same time. The result is either a dry breast or a dark meat portion that could give you the trots.

Then there's braising chicken parts, as in a fricassee or coq au vin. The results are delicious, but I find it impossible to prepare chicken this way without turning the skin into a pale, unappealing goo. Dredging in flour and browning up front helps a little, but fact of the matter is the bird will eventually wind up steaming, and that's going to take all the crunch out of the skin. Also, the resulting sauce must be carefully defatted unless you're going for that Eastern European/Jewish where's-my-heart-attack-I-want-my-heart-attack-right-now!!! effect.

Chicken under a brick is a fabulous preparation, but it's a little labor intensive. Also, because it requires prolonged browning over very high heat in a shallow pan, it results in a lot of fat spattering. The missus, who is on cleanup duty, does not so much appreciate this, so I've shied away from this preparation lately.

For now, my preferred method is to bake the chicken parts. Baking and roasting, in truth, are pretty much the same cooking technique; baking traditionally refers to chicken parts, however, while roasting refers to cooking a bird whole. No, I do not know why that is. What do I look like, the danged Internets? But I digress…

I like to buy my birds whole. They are cheaper that way (making it easier for a cheapskate like myself to pay the 100% extra for an organic chicken or more still for a pastured bird--see note below), and it seems intuitively obvious to me that a whole bird has less likely begun the rotting/degrading/flavor-shedding process than has a package of chicken parts, all other things being equal. Buying a whole bird also means that I can butcher the bird exactly to my specifications and treat myself to some gizzards when I'm done with my prep work. Cutting up a chicken takes all of two minutes. With poultry shears I cut out the spine, then split the bird along the breastbone. Separating the dark meat quarter takes no time at all, as at this point it is attached to the breast quarter only by skin. I trim off the wing tip, find the joint between the wing and breast, and--snip!--I have six pieces to cook: two breasts, two wings, two leg/thigh portions.

Next up is the brine. Brining effects a magical transformation on poultry (watch Alton Brown to find out why; I've had the how and why explained to me many times but it keeps escaping from my head when I'm not looking) that makes it more tender and flavorful. A brine is basically a saline solution, which you can spike with other flavor enhancers. I add some peppercorns, a few bay leaves, and a splash of fruit juice (lately I've been using apricot nectar; try it!). I generally prep and brine the chicken in the morning or early afternoon. It's ready for cooking by dinnertime.

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Cook the chicken parts, skin side up, for 20 minutes. Reduce the heat to 350 degrees and cook for another 30 minutes (for a 4-pound bird; I'm no rocket scientist but I suspect you'd want to cook a larger bird for a little longer and a smaller one for slightly less time). The skin will start to brown a bit and perhaps puff slightly. The chicken parts will release some juices and they will be clear, not pink. When these things happen, it is time to eat chicken.

Last night I served this with a mixed green salad (we are eating a lot of salad around here these days, probably more in the last month than we had in the previous seven years) and parsnip-and-sweet-potato home fries. These were very easy to make. I simply diced the parsnips and sweet potatoes up into a fine 1/4"-dice, heated some oil in a hot skillet over high heat, tossed in the veggies, and started cooking, stirring occasionally to prevent burning. High heat caramelized the exterior, giving each piece good crunch and extra sweetness. After about five minutes I tossed in some fine-diced onion and a little butter, then a little more butter, and then just a wee bit more butter. Once the butter goes in, make sure to reduce the heat to medium, because butter burns easily and you do not want that to happen. I was a little worried about this dish as I've never tried cooking potatoes in a skillet (without boiling them first, anyways) but I had no cause. This dish was a winner and will be entering the regular rotation around here.

NOTE: There are so many different types of chicken out there in the marketplace today. Most common are those produced in Confined Animal Feeding Operations (CAFO). These are your Perdue/Tyson/etc. chickens. I am now committed to avoiding these birds for so many reasons: (1) they have been genetically modified for size, growth speed, and resistance to disease when placed in unnatural conditions (i.e. living nuts to butts with thousands of other chickens in very confined quarters), but not for taste; (2) they are raised in unnatural conditions which also happen to be extraordinarily inhumane; (3) these unnatural conditions under which they are raised also result in all sorts of significant environmental damage.

Organic birds are better, but the term "organic" only means that the birds weren't fed genetically modified plants or plants that were grown conventionally (an odd term since "conventional" growing is a relatively new phenomenon, while its counterpart "organic" is how humans have been growing food for millennia). It usually means they weren't pumped full of antibiotics, either. Most organic birds you'll find at the Whole Foods will ensure right on the packaging that the birds are antibiotic-free. However, organic birds are often raised in CAFO-like conditions. I'd rather the bird I eat didn't spend its entire life as if it were experiencing a never-ending New York City rush hour subway ride.

The term "free range" chicken suggests the bird led a better life, but that's not always the case. Government regulations allow the designation "free range" for birds raised in confinement pens so long as the birds have access to a pasture. That access is typically located at a single point at one end of a long pen; few birds ever find their way to the pasture, nor would they be inclined to since all their food is in the pen. This, unfortunately, is the way a lot of producers of free-range organic chickens run their operations.

So now I try to buy my chickens at the farmer's market from someone who raises chickens the old fashioned way, in a pasture. I must admit I'm not orthodox on this because those chickens are pretty expensive, but as often as possible that's the way I go. The organic and free-range organic birds, while not ideal, are at least a lot healthier for us as consumers than are those CAFO birds, I'm convinced.

Thus ends our lesson on chicken! Oh, yeah, one more thing:

C is the way to begin
H is the next letter in
I, I am the third
C, that's the middle of the word
K. I'm fillin' in
E, we're gettin' near the end
C-H-I-C-K-E-N
That's the way to spell chicken!

Green Beans à la Andy

2008-01-25T12:46:00.000-08:00

My newest favorite side dish/snack couldn't be easier to make. My friend Andy served me a plate one day and I've been making it 3 or 4 times a week ever since.

You need the following ingredients:

green beans
olive oil
salt

1. Wash and dry the beans, then snap off the stem ends.
2. Heat the oil in a skillet until it's not quite smoking; the secret to delicious Green Beans à la Andy is to get that skillet plenty hot.
3. Put the green beans in the skillet. Season with salt. You want the beans all in one layer so that they can be in constant contact with the skillet. I always use the biggest skillet I own so I can make lots of Green Beans à la Andy.
4. Sauté the green beans. The only trick here is to leave them sit long enough so that the beans brown and wilt a bit but not so long that they burn. You have to keep an eye on them and give them a regular toss, but you don't need to keep them moving constantly. Cook until done and serve.

Up to a certain point, the longer you cook these the better they are; the bean exteriors caramelize, making them sweet and a little smoky. At some point they will turn into wilted garbage if you keep cooking them, but there's no way you will be able to cook them for that long. The beans will smell too good and be too tempting; at some point you will no longer be able to resist plating and eating them. That's when they're done (10 minutes probably will do it).

All hail Chef Andy!

On Shopping Across the Spectrum, and Thoughts on Pasture-Raised Chicken

2008-01-17T08:27:00.000-08:00

My sister Amy called the other day to gloat over the fact that I am now shopping at a food co-op. At first her good-natured taunts didn't quite register; I don't really think of the Weaver Street Market Cooperative as a co-op, even though--duh!--it advertises that fact prominently in its name. My confusion arises from the fact that Weaver Street is well stocked, well lit, and professionally run, three characteristics I don't associate with cooperative grocers. I've been to co-ops in New York City and in downtown Durham and they are uniformly dreary places staffed by lotus eaters, stocked sparsely with flaccid produce stored in containers that appear to have been scavenged from dumpsters, and so dimly lit that one suspects it is by design--if one could get past the obvious fact that nothing in these places could possibly be the result of conscious design--in order to confuse and disorient the shopper, thus rendering him unaware of how dolorous an experience he is having. Oh, and they tend to be expensive to boot.

Way, way at the other end of the shopping spectrum, I found myself in a Wal-Mart the other day. Wait, let me explain! I had some items to drop off at the local Goodwill center, which is located next door to the local Super Wal-Mart. I needed windshield washer fluid and a new pair of sweatpants and figured it was less evil to buy these items at a nearby retail giant than to burn gas driving all over creation for two nominal purchases. Once inside, of course, it was impossible to restrict myself to just two items. I remembered we needed some food storage containers for the fridge, and then I decided to explore the grocery section and discovered, much to my delight, that Wal-Mart sells my favorite Amy's frozen entrée for more than $1 less than anyone else in the area, so I piled a bunch of those into my cart as well. I was also delighted to discover cans of Progresso Turkey Noodle Soup, a product that has mysteriously vanished from the shelves of all other grocers. And so I was actually pretty pleased with the experience on the way out the door. Did I get my karmic comeuppance? Would I be telling this story otherwise? On their second day of service, my new sweatpants divested themselves of their drawstring. They are now good for comedy routines that require one's pants to fall to one's ankles, but not for much else (someone 50 pounds heavier than I might be able to use them, I suppose, although that's something I surely would not want to see). Alas, I lost the receipt so I'm just going to have to write off that $7.55 investment. I can't help wondering whether the windshield washer fluid I bought is right now inflicting thousands of dollars worth of damage on Donnie.

Finally, last night I baked the locally produced pasture-raised chicken I bought at Weaver Street over the weekend. It was much, much better than the factory-farmed chickens we'd previously grown used to: lots more flavor, and not so grotesquely proportioned (factory chickens are built like Mamie Van Doren). However, it was a little rubbery. Small price to pay for knowing that this chicken was actually allowed to use its muscles during its lifetime, but all the same I'll try to remember to brine the next one, which should help. I cooked it with the red rice mentioned in the previous blog, which was disappointingly ordinary in taste, although quite appealing to the eye. Salt helped it quite a bit (that's the Marge Simpson cooking tip of the day!).

In Which Our Hero's Faith Continues, Some Tasty Victuals are Recollected and Still More Tasty Victuals are Collected For Future Ingestion

2008-01-13T12:43:00.000-08:00

It has been a little over a week since I recounted my alimentary epiphany, and I am pleased to report that its mandate to eat healthier and more healthfully grown foods has not subsequently weakened. This week the missus and I ate not just healthily but also quite well: grilled lamb andouille sausage with sautéed chard and a basmati rice pilaf; grilled pork chops with pan-roasted potatoes, steamed asparagus, and a delicious salad; coq au vin and spaghetti dressed with sautéed chard, olives, garlic, and plenty of my favorite olive oil; a Trader Joe's frozen pizza (mundane, sure, but quite tasty, truth be told); and plenty of leftovers. Much of what I prepared (including all the meat) was locally and sustainably raised, and much of the rest was organically grown. It was a good week in the kitchen.

I was all set to return to the Carrboro Farmer's Market yesterday to lay in another week's worth of meat products plus whatever produce and cheeses looked good, but alas fate had other plans for me. On Friday night the world-famous juggling troupe The Flying Karamazov Brothers performed in Garner, NC, a good--no, check that, lousy--hour's drive from my home. My college buddy and longtime bandmate Mark is an FKB, so of course the missus and I went to see the show and to hang out with Mark until all hours of the night. The farmer's market closes at 12 and is picked clean well before that hour, so I opted for sleep and allowed that window of opportunity slam shut. Although it made me feel bad to neglect a resolution so recently made, getting up at 9 would have made me feel much, much worse.

Fortunately there was another option: Carrboro's Weaver Street Market Cooperative, which carries a fine assortment of locally and sustainably grown produce and meats. I've been vaguely aware of this store for many years but have rarely set foot in it, as I've always found it a bit off-putting. The clientele mostly look like the sort of people you see at a Sufjan Stevens show: wispy folk with serpentine postures and facial expressions that seem to say "Where did I leave that hackysack?" Despite being surrounded by so much healthy food, they do not look at all healthy. Peppered among the young ectomorphs are equally ectomoprhic academic types, pony-tailed and batiked and more stern than dreamy in demeanor. Perhaps this is what will happen to the Sufjan fans when they grow up.

Customer base aside, Weaver Street is a paradise for folks seeking a healthier diet. The produce is much more robust than it is at the similarly positioned Whole Foods Market up the way in Chapel Hill, and my first impression is that it's much more reasonably priced. Plus, it's pretty much all organic; no having to choose between organic and agrindustrial here. Here's what I scored:

1 beautiful fennel bulb, $2.29 (Whole Foods fennel tends to be pretty sickly and dessicated)
3 portabella caps, $3.71
I large and lovely bunch of red chard, $2.79
2/3 pound green beans, $1.32
2.25 pounds red potatoes, $3.12
1.5 pounds yellow onion, $1.45
1 pound bag of Bhutanese red rice $3.79 (exotic and ostensibly pricey, but I'll get 6 to 10 servings from it so it's really not that bad)
1/2 gallon locally produced low-fat milk $2.89 (plus a hefty $1.20 deposit on the bottle)
1 French bread, baked on premises $2.00
1 ciabatta to eat on the way home $0.75
two substantial locally raised smoked pork chops, $7.20
1 whole locally raised chicken, $6.88

I figure I've got 3 or 4 dinners for two there with some leftovers to boot, all for a little over $40.00. Yeah, the conventional grocery store is cheaper, but not so terribly much so. And for now at least, the way I'm shopping really has me looking forward to another good week in the kitchen. I'll keep you posted.

In Which Our Hero Gets Religion, and an Apology is Proffered

2008-01-05T17:25:00.000-08:00

A while back--two weeks ago, to be exact--I was the sort to scoff at the notion of organic farming, sustainable farming, humane farming, and a whole bunch of other good things that I thought of collectively as "hippie sh!t." I would look at the organic carrots at the Whole Foods, which often cost twice what conventional carrots cost, and laugh that I'd buy the inorganic carrots--you know, the ones made of petrochemicals, I joked--instead. Hahaha. It's funny because it's true. Except it's not funny, and I didn't know how true it was when I was making the joke.

That all changed last week, when I finally read The Ominvore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan (I'd bought it over a year ago but managed to dodge it until now), an engrossing book about food production in the United States. Pollan has a gift for taking complex subjects--agribusiness and monocultural growing, large-scale organic farming and smaller-scale sustainable farming, how economics and not nutrition drives food production policy, etc. etc.--and making them both understandable and extremely compelling. Sometimes I forget how a book can change your life. This book reminded me.

It's impossible to summarize this book in such a short space, but the crux of Pollan's argument is this: the way we produce food in this country is unnatural and unhealthy. Instead of rotating crops and promoting diversity to keep farmland healthy, we grow the same crops on the same ground over and over again, depleting the soil so that we must 'replenish' it with artificial fertilizers (these fertilizers are petrochemical-intensive--hence, carrots made of petrochemicals). We subject our food animals to unimaginable cruelty that in turn makes them susceptible to all sorts of horrible diseases in order to produce cheap meat of dubious quality. The processes required for such large-scale crop and animal harvesting are tremendously damaging to the environment. Occasionally they are tremendously damaging to us as well (e.g. mad cow disease), not even taking into account the effects of living in an increasingly toxic environment.

Pollan spends a good deal of time on the subject of food animals and the ways they are treated by various types of producers. He is a devoted carnivore, as am I, and his experiences with our nation's Confined Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs) do not cure him of that. They do, however, cure him of the desire to eat CAFO-produced meat ever again, an effect his book probably has on most readers, myself included. I won't disgust you with the details, but I will warn you that after you read this book you will likely always feel a little queasy whenever you look at a Tyson chicken or a large-scale produced pork loin. Man has been eating animals for millennia, and I still don't see anything wrong with that. We only started torturing them in the last century, though, and that's wrong. And we do it just to save a dollar or two on the pound.

Admittedly, that sounds like a substantial savings, but Pollan argues convincingly that these savings are illusory. Hidden in the low prices are the tax breaks to large producers that we pay for, the price subsidies we pay for, the cleanup of the singular forms of pollution that industrial farming produces that we pay for, etc. Calculate the true cost of that pound of chicken into its retail price and suddenly it's not the bargain it appears to be.

Pollan contrasts the agribusiness model with both the large-scale organic industry (better but hardly perfect) and smaller local sustainable growth producers. 'Sustainable growth' means doing all the things farmers have done throughout the millennia before agribusiness: rotating crops to maintain fertility, managing pastures, grazing feed animals… basically, creating and managing a complete ecosystem that, because of its thoroughness, doesn't require the annual purchase of seed, insecticides, chemical fertilizers, etc. etc. It's not easy work but the sustainable farmers Pollan profiles are committed to the principle of sustainability, and they sound pretty darn fulfilled in their work.

But is their food any good? This morning I decided to put my money where my head has been. I visited the Carrborro Farmers' Market--an emporium of organic and sustainably produced local food--to see what I could scrounge up for tonight's dinner. January in North Carolina means slim pickings for produce but I did manage to find a lovely bunch of red chard ($2.50) and a beautiful head of purple cauliflower (just under $2). Meat selections were much more plentiful. For tonight's dinner, I bought a fresh ham steak (when it comes to ham, the term 'fresh' designates uncured and unsmoked) about an inch thick (1.5 pounds, $10). At $15, my haul seemed a little pricey for a home-cooked meal for two, but I decided to put that thought on hold until after the meal was done.

I prepared the food pretty simply. The ham steak was frozen, so I had to defrost it. I then brined it for a few hours in a saline solution spiked with some peppercorns and a splash of fruit juice (peach nectar, to be precise) to add a touch of sweetness. When it came time to cook, I rinsed the steak, seasoned it lightly, and threw it on a hot grill. About 4 minutes per side did the trick; it was crispy and singed on the edges, cooked firm through but not overdone.

I diced some onion and smashed a garlic clove and sautéed it all in olive oil, then added the washed and chopped chard and a pinch of salt, covered it, and let it cook down (5-6 minutes). I cut the purple cauliflower into florets, tossed them with a little salt and olive oil, and roasted them in a 460-degree oven for 15 minutes. And that was it, a simple but conceptually appetizing dinner.

And good news--it tasted as good as it had in my mind's mouth. I won't even pretend I can distinguish between the actual taste of the food and the way that my preconceptions of how much 'better' this food was than agribusiness food colored my judgment. For whatever reason, the ham steak was the tastiest piece of pork I've had in a long, long time, and the vegetables seemed to have a more intense and enjoyable flavor than I've come to expect from a serving of veggies. It was all very good. We even had leftovers, meaning that $15 price tag isn't so terribly high after all.

OK, I'm sold. Good thing, too--I've got some lamb andouille sausage and some beautiful pork chops I bought today to cook later this week. I'm all out of farmer's market produce but I can get some of the organic stuff at the local Trader Joe's or Whole Foods. I'll be sure to take my NPR tote bag with me so that I don't have to waste any plastic bags. Dear God, is there a pair of Birkenstocks with my name on them out there somewhere? Peace, man.

PS That apology mentioned in the subject heading belongs to my sister, who has been preaching the virtues of organic and sustainable farming to me for a long, long time. In response, I have joked, scoffed, and parried, but I haven't until now given the subject serious thought. Sis, you were right and I was wrong. I'll even be joining a CSA this year, as you have suggested I do for so many years now. I apologize.

Now let us never speak of this again. :-)

Cheese is Crizal™ Mighty!!!

2008-01-03T18:20:00.000-08:00

I have traditionally been a frugal consumer of eyewear. Since college I've favored those little round wire frames that some refer to as 'granny glasses' but which I've always thought of as 'John Lennon glasses.' They're cheap, they're practical, and they look good to me. The worst you can say about them is that they are inconspicuous, which is hardly a demerit in the eyewear universe. Grandpa glasses, on the other hand--those giant plastic frames that somehow make all old men look like cartoon turtles--are another story entirely.

My wife thinks I can do better, and has reminded me of this point often enough that, last time around, I decided to relent and buy something 'fashionable,' even though doing so would surely double the cost of a product I hardly ever even see. She reminded me that she has to look at me and my glasses all the time, for which there was unfortunately no reasonable rejoinder. And so 'fashionable' glasses for me it would be.

Thus the missus and I went foraging for spectacles the last time we were in New York City. Our wanderings naturally led us to SoHo, for that is where one is most likely to find the most expensive eyeglass frames in this or any neighboring solar system. It took a while to find a pair I liked. The first pairs I tried on were at a distinct disadvantage: I would find out what they cost and then put them on, only to discover that my reaction to the price had turned my skin a shade of green that did not at all complement the color of the frame. Eventually, though, I grew accustomed to Soho prices, to the point where I could laughingly scoff, "What? These cost only $700? I'll take six pair!!!!" Finally I found a pair I liked and they weren't even that terribly expensive. And, truth be told, they looked pretty darn good on me.

I figured it made most sense to have the lenses installed back in my hometown of Durham, NC, just in case there were any problems that required repair or replacement. Having been broken of my eyeglass frugality, I was now intent on spending 'good money' to finish the job. I identified a tony eyewear boutique and headed off to discharge my business. I already had a prescription, so all that was left to do was to deliver the frames, make a deposit, and await the results of this shoppe's anticipated fine work.

Unfortunately, it wasn't quite so simple. The woman working in the shoppe would not allow me to leave until I'd made a seemingly endless series of choices about my lenses. Did I want the lenses tapered on the sides so that I would not look like I was in need of special education? Yes. Did I want lenses that turned dark in the sunlight, clear in the dark, and rose-colored when I was feeling a little gloomy? No. Did I want scratchproof coating? No, I like my glasses really scratched up. That's a joke! Yes, please, scratchproof coating. How about Crizal™ anti-glare coating? Feeling extravagant, I assented.

At this point, I detected just the slightest look of concern on the woman's face. I now speculate that she must have been new to her job and had not yet learned never to cue a customer who has made a terrible, terrible mistake. Alas, her error did not register profoundly enough with me, and soon the inquiry continued. I left her with a ridiculous amount of money as a deposit that, sad to say, covered only half the cost of the lenses, and went on my way.

But I was pretty darn pleased with the glasses when they were ready just a few days later, and after trying them on I was quite happy to bail them out, even though it meant a diet of rice and beans for the rest of the month. I enjoyed them all that first day. Right up to the point, that is, that it came time to clean them. The optometrist had supplied me with a special Crizal™ cloth specifically designed for cleaning Crizal™-coated lenses, which made me feel very special indeed. Out came the special cloth. Rub, rub, rub. Hmm. Jeez, these lenses are still pretty dirty. Rub, rub, rub. No, still not quite clean. Rub, rub, rub. Rub, rub, rub, rub. Rubrubrubrub. Rubrubrubrubrubrubrubrubrubrubrubrubrubrubrubrubrubrub!!!!!! Sigh.

OK, so here's the thing. The special Crizal™ cloth actually does a pretty good job of removing dirt and dust. What it isn't so good at is removing grease, such as might spatter on your glasses, say, when you sauté something, as I am wont to do. Or, if you are human, such as you might excrete as one of the regular biological processes that keep you alive. The cloth does an excellent job of moving that grease around, sometimes relocating it in more or less the same shape elsewhere on the lens, other times smearing it in a delicate veneer across the entire lens, but always, always, always leaving it on the lens.

Thanks to Crizal™, I do not see glare. I do, however, constantly see rainbows. Also, there are times when the world through my glasses looks like a goddamn Monet; a pleasingly glare-free Monet, to be sure, but a Monet nonetheless. I can only imagine that no one at the Crizal™ company has ever been forced to wear Crizal™-coated lenses, because the evil required to knowingly market so profoundly defective a product is too terrible to contemplate. Next thing you'll tell me is that there are folks out there who would start a war based on false pretenses.

I'd like to say I've learned a valuable lesson from this experience, but the lessons here are either too specific ("Don't by Crizal™-coated lenses!") or too trite and obvious ("Let the buyer beware!"). I have learned exactly nothing other than the fact that when you have made a costly mistake, you no longer have enough money left to undo that mistake. I suppose I could have taken the lenses back and demanded satisfaction, but I am unfortunately a little slow witted, and it took quite a while before I was certain of the cause of my consternation. I figured somehow--mysteriously, inexplicably--that my inability to clean my glasses was somehow my fault. That sounds dumb, you say? Are you surprised? I'M THE IDIOT WHO BOUGHT CRIZAL™-COATED LENSES!!!!!

PS As requested by Dave P, a photo of myself in the lovely but smeary glasses. Note my slightly confused look, the result of not being able to see so terribly well.

Happy Holidays!

2007-12-18T11:02:00.000-08:00

Glutinous rice ball, a food traditionally served during Dong Zhi

When the Princeton Review Vocabulary MInute was starting up two years ago, I wrote a seasonal song called "Happy Holidays." It's always been one of my favorite vocabulary songs and I always felt that it deserved to be fleshed out.

To that end, I recently wrote a second verse and a bridge to the song, upgrading "Happy Holidays" from its Pinocchio-like status to that of a "real song." I couldn't convince The Princeton Review to release the entire song as a Vocab Minute (it was too long for the format) but did get them to bend enough to allow me 1:40 for the second verse and chorus, bridge, and reprise of the first chorus for this year's holiday song.

And so I point you to my myspace page, where you can hear both the original "Happy Holidays" and the new "Happy Holidays 2007." Play them one after the other to sort-of kind-of hear the song in its entirety. One day I'll record a full version of the song but it won't be soon; the 2007 version took 7 hours to track, mix, and master. The Phil Spector sound is a real challenge when you've only got one musician to work with.

Happy Holidays

If you want to wish someone a happy holiday
Here's how you can do it in a brand new way
You'll spread a little universal mirth and glee
Bringing joy to the world in perfect harmony

Have a festive Festival of Light (Happy Hanukkah is what you're sayin')
May you have a jubilant Yuletide (Have a Merry Christmas eve and day and)
Hope you have a jovial Kwanzaa, happy as can be
And my New Year bring good tidings, meaning better news for you and me!

If you want to be a part of the latest craze
Just take your favorite greeting for the holidays
Then use some synonyms to write a paraphrase
Change the words but not the meaning that the greeting conveys

May your Kwanzaa be full of elation (hope that it's as happy as can be)
Hope your Christmas bring you exaltation (celebrating 'neath the Christmas tree)
May your Hannukah be blissful, full of joy and mirth
And may New Year's Eve inaugurate an age of peace and love on Earth

Let's wish all Muslims an idyllic Eid al-Adha
And for the Chinese, a delirious Dong-Zhi
Let everyone on Earth be a persona grata
Blessed with the Maker's love and sweet tranquility

Have a festive Festival of Light (Happy Hanukkah is what you're sayin')
May you have a jubilant Yuletide (Have a Merry Christmas eve and day and)
Hope you have a jovial Kwanzaa, happy as can be
And my New Year bring good tidings, meaning better news for you and me!

by Tom Meltzer ©The Princeton Review

Thought For The Day

2007-12-07T07:44:00.000-08:00

Do not walk behind me, for I may not lead.
Do not walk ahead of me, for I may not follow.
Do not walk behind me for a while, then walk ahead of me, then go wandering off in every which direction, for I may get confused.
Just walk along beside me, so I can punch you in the arm if I have to.

Carolina Rollergirls

2007-12-03T19:52:00.000-08:00

Last night I made my first-ever trek to the roller derby. I cannot do justice to my elation at this experience in prose, alas. Fortunately, sweet Euterpe smiled upon me on my way home and inspired a song, a paean to the sport and the ladies who compete in it.

You can hear the song over at the myspace page for Meltzer-Hart, my new band. I should warn you in advance that I programmed the drums, and that they are lousy. The drum rolls sound as though they were played by someone who doesn't play drums, which is close enough to the truth. Ignore them the best you can, and enjoy.

Here are the lyrics, so you can sing along.

You can have every other woman
In this whole wide world
Ain't a one who can change the way I feel
About my Carolina Rollergirl
About my Carolina Rollergirl

You can take all your girly girls
Their pillbox hats and their strings of pearls
I like my girls in helmets and pads
Good girls who know how to be bad

CHORUS

You can hang out with your glitterati
I got no need for anybody that snotty
I like a girl who knows how to jam
That's just the kind of guy I am

CHORUS

You'll never see her on Access Hollywood
But you can find her hangin' in her Raleigh 'hood
And if her name is never up in lights
She'll still look good in lycra and tights

CHORUS

Update: Couldn't resist--I had to contact The Carolina Rollergirls organization to let them know about this song. Do they like it? Apparently so--it's been added to the team's myspace page! Go Rollergirls!

Update on the update: Ah, how fleeting is fame. The Rollergirls have already replaced my song on their website with one by some fellow named Petey Pablo, or Pablo Peaty, I forget which. His song has nothing to do with roller derby at all! It does, however, sound like it would be a lot of fun to skate to. I take solace in the fact that Rollergirl skater Violet Femme--my new favorite member of the team--still has the song posted at at her myspace page.

Off-the-Beaten-Path Television

2007-12-01T13:11:00.000-08:00

Like most modern Americans, we subscribe to a service that provides our television programming. We use DirectTV because it is the only way for North Carolinians to get Baltimore Oriole games. Don't ask, just accept that it is a sickness and that I will probably never be cured.

DirectTV provides us with roughly ten million channels of programming. Most of what's broadcast is wholly worth ignoring, but with ten million channels something good is bound to be on every once in a while, right? The question is, how do you find good programming among ten million channels worth of (mostly) drek?

I'm going to do my best to help you here. Now, I know you do not need my help to find your way to Law and Order reruns. In fact, I assume you are watching one right now, as you are reading my blog. You are, right? Not such a lucky guess; the odds are in my favor.

No, I'm talking about stuff that runs on channels you don't even know you have. Programs that you therefore don't know exist, yet which are really, really good, even better than Law and Order reruns. For example:

Ninja Warrior, G4--On one level, this is just a goofy obstacle-course competition. But the great thing about it is, it's a Japanese obstacle-course competition, and Japanese television is awesome. The announcer sounds like a very angry Toshiro Mifune, growl-shouting play-by-play (thankfully the show is broadcast in Japanese with subtitles, not in some lame dubbed version like Iron Chef). Competitors behave as if this competition is the only thing that has ever mattered--or ever will matter--in their entire lives.

then there's

Nothing But Trailers, HDNet--Admit it, you don't go to the movies any more. You can't stand paying $10 to see something you can watch on your bigass TV at home for free in just a few months, you can't stand paying $7 for a vat of greasy day-old popcorn, and you really can't stand all the morons around you who are either yelling at each other or at the movie screen or into their cell phones, which if there's a God in heaven will be eternally and painfully inserted into their recta for the endurance of the Afterlife. But... you miss seeing trailers, which are so often the best part of the moviegoing experience. HDNet has your back, baby: one half hour of nothing but trailers. Crank up the home entertainment center until the furniture rumbles. It's exactly like being at a movie theater, minus the morons.

finally, there's

Prime Minister's Questions, CSPAN--OK, I have to admit that I haven't seen this since Tony Blair stepped down, so I have no idea if it's still the great program it was back in the day. Question Time, for those unfamiliar, is when Britain's leader comes to Parliament to answer a bunch of questions--some softballs, some incredibly pointed, depending of course on who is asking--from 'backbenchers' (i.e. not Ministers) in the House of Commons. Blair was a master of the format; he handled it like Plato deconstructing the Sophists. He answered so firmly, so authoritatively, so confidently that you couldn't shake the feeling that you agreed with everything he had just said, even when you were quite certain that you adamantly did not agree with anything he'd just said. Great theater, and something that is sorely lacking from the American form of government. Seriously, how great would it be for George W. Bush to have to take questions from the likes of Jerrold Nadler and Dennis Kucinich for a half hour every single week? I bet Bush would've been a one-term-and-out president, a compelling enough argument on its own to institute President's Questions right here in the U S of A.

Only 14 minutes, 57 seconds remaining...

2007-10-31T11:31:00.000-07:00

If you watched The Daily Show last night, you saw Demetri Martin do a bit on the SATs. If you were watching carefully, you saw the home page for Princeton Review podcasts flash on screen for a full three seconds! During which time, if you were really paying attention, you would have seen the title of the podcast I create for the Princeton Review right up there on national television!

Don't believe me? Hit The Daily Show link above and scroll down through the videos until you find the title Martin-The SAT. Click it and let the video stream begin! My moment of fame arrives at 1:08 and lasts clear through 1:10.

I have dropped Mr. Martin the appropriate thank you note via his my space page. I promised him I would mention him next time I'm on television, which seems only fair.

Is this the beginning of a Vocab Minute media blitz? My Warholian clock is ticking.

Dick Cheney's Day of Sport

2007-10-30T13:56:00.000-07:00

Dick Cheney visited an exclusive hunting club in Dutchess County today. From the New York Daily News:

Farm-bred pheasants were released on the preserve 24 hours before Cheney arrived, making them easy targets for the hunting party.

"The way they hunt, I'm not fond of," said Linda Smith, 52, who runs a local preschool. "It's not what I would call a real sportsmanlike activity."

After the hunt, Mr. Cheney and his party repaired to Winged Foot Country Club for a round of golf. In preparation for Mr. Cheney's visit, several modifications to the course were made:

•Holes were widened to a 6-foot diameter
•50-foot tall barricades were erected along the fairways to prevent errant shots from entering the rough, woods, creeks, etc.
•Each tee was moved to a distance of 100 yards from the green
•A "maximum score of one stroke per hole" rule was enacted

The vice president reportedly shot an 18, although White House sources would neither confirm nor deny that. "The vice president's score," said to a spokesperson who asked not to be identified, "is classified."

Live or Let Die?

2007-10-27T16:24:00.000-07:00

This is my car. Its name is Donnie. Donnie is named after Steve Buscemi's character in The Big Lebowski.

Donnie and I have a special relationship. Owing to the fact that I was a miserable and dangerous driver in high school who was fortuitously relieved of his license almost as soon as he got it; and to the fact that I moved to New York City when I was 18 and stayed there until I was nearly 40; owing to these circumstances, Donnie was the first car I ever bought.

Donnie is a 2001 Ford Focus. He's not that old in car years, but he's definitely been through the wars. Between numerous family visits (Baltimore, Pittsburgh, Atlanta) and even more vacations (western North Carolina, the Carolina coast, the Delaware Coast, New York City), Donnie has logged some serious miles. It won't be long before Donnie logs his 130,000th mile, in fact.

Donnie still drives great. He has plenty of get up and go both from a dead stop and on highway onramps, he gets great mileage (about 36 mpg on the highway), and he still handles great in turns. He is as fun to drive as any reasonable person can expect an inexpensive sedan to be. However, Donnie is a Ford, which means that he is an American car, which means that before he was built someone somewhere in an office in Detroit spent a lot of time figuring out how to take this perfectly well designed car (the Focus got its start in Europe) and f##k it up. That someone decided to skimp on some peripherals, no doubt calculating that the resulting savings of $.057 per car might ultimately cover his salary while simultaneously making millions of people like myself very, very angry at Ford, so angry that we swear we will never buy another Ford as long as we live, nor in any subsequent lives we may live, should we be reincarnated.

For instance, a seal on the right side of my windshield failed some time around mile 90,000; this caused the footwell of the front passenger seat to fill with water whenever it rained. Search the net for the terms FOCUS, PASSENGER, FOOTWELL, and BUCKETS OF WATER and you will learn this has happened to nearly every Ford Focus, yet there was never a recall. The dealer knew exactly what my problem was when I called to complain, and how much it would cost me to have it repaired. The question "Why should I have to pay for it?" elicited a shrug and a "Whaddayagonnado?" response I hadn't heard since leaving New York.

Another place where Ford skimped was in a plastic clip that holds the power windows in place. Again, seach the net and you will learn just how many people have had the unhappy surprise of opening their power windows, hearing the bright snap of plastic, and realizing that that window will never close properly again. Again, no recall. Here is a picture of Donnie's rear passenger window.

Recently, Donnie and I reached a crossroads. As previously mentioned, Donnie is approaching 130,000 miles. That means he was very much in need of a new timing belt ($220). He also needed a new set of tires ($360). Making these repairs basically meant committing to another three years with Donnie, begging the question "Should I get that broken power window fixed?" ($300). And what about the other rear passenger window, which, if it's like the rear window on so many other 2001 Ford Focuses, is soon about to snap its clip and descend into the door? Am I ready to sink a pile of cash into a car with 130,000 miles on it?

The decision, it turns out, wasn't such a difficult one. Donnie and I, we're buds. I'm not going to abandon him. Not until I can afford a really pimped out Mini Cooper, anyway, which I currently cannot. So Donnie got a new timing belt and a new set of tires to go with his new clutch (at 120,000 miles). We (Donnie and I, that is) decided that the duct-taped window was "cool," so that remains unrepaired. Soon it will have a parallel twin, no doubt.

Nefarious Ford man in your office somewhere, Donnie and I await the inevitable result of your other niggardly decisions. Fortunately you appear to have had nothing to do with designing engines and drivetrains, so while all your knickknacks and gewgaws break, degrade, disintegrate, and explode, Donnie and I will continue choogling on down the road.

At least until I can afford that Mini.

Monkin' Around

2007-10-14T19:07:00.000-07:00

This past October 10 would have been the 90th birthday of Thelonious Monk, jazz pianist, composer, and eccentric extraordinaire. My adoptive home state of North Carolina lays some claim to this musical giant, as he was born in Rocky Mount. The fact that he moved to New York City at the age of five and thereafter made that grand city his home has not deterred us Tar Heels in the slightest; on the contrary, our six-week, eighteen-event Following Monk celebration has to be one of the more impressive homages to Monk ever mounted.

For my money, the one 'don't miss' event of the festival was last night's recreation of Monk's famous ten-piece 1959 Town Hall concert, performed by the Charles Tolliver Orchestra. The missus and I were so stoked for the event that we made sure to attend a Stanley Crouch lecture the previous night, anxious to gain some valuable insight into the music we'd be hearing. We had reason to be hopeful; Crouch is a heavyweight jazz critic, and the subject of the lecture was indeed supposed to be the Town Hall concert. Alas, someone must have failed to inform Crouch, because while he spoke entertainingly (and sometimes informatively) on subjects ranging from Shakespeare's genius to Louis Armstrong's genius to the differences between blacks and whites to the fact that even light-skinned blacks are a little put off by dark-skinned blacks to the superiority of live music to recorded music to the names of perhaps every famous musician and writer he has ever met, he never really got around to the Town Hall concert. He was considerate enough to circle around to the subject of Monk every so often, for which those of us who remembered that we were attending a Following Monk event were very grateful. The lecture was free, and the dictum 'you get what you pay for' was evinced.

Fortunately, it cost good money to see the concert, so we had cause to expect value, and we got plenty of it. Pianist Stanley Cowell got things started with a fluid reading of "In Walked Bud," then was joined by the rhythm section for a lovely, lazily swinging "Blue Monk." Tenor saxophonist Craig Handy joined them for "Rhythm-a-Ning," demonstrating some very impressive chops and exquisite control of the tone of his instrument; he deftly went from sweet to flattened out to honking in his pursuit of some ugly beauty, and it was all good. Over the course of the night he would continue to impress, a vexing occasional tendency to showboat notwithstanding.

After that, the full band hit the stage to perform the set heard on Thelonious Monk Orchestra at Town Hall. The solos were different, of course, but the arrangements were pretty much dead on; Tolliver reportedly had access to some of Monk's rehearsal tapes for the original show and that helped him get the transcriptions right. The section playing, especially on up-tempo numbers like "Little Rootie Tootie" and "Friday the 13th," was in itself worth the price of admission. Everyone in the band was a player; my favorite was alto saxophonist Todd Bashore, who did a great job of weaving the melody of the tunes into his improvisations.

It didn't hurt that the Town Hall concert contains a few of my favorite Monk compositions: "Blue Monk," the glorious ballad "Monk's Mood" (although, truth be told, I much prefer the Monk/Coltane duet version of the song to this orchestrated version), and "Thelonious," an incredibly catchy melody that for vast stretches consists of a single note. The last of these is especially well suited to a big-band setting; you could easily imagine the Basie or Ellington bands tearing it up on that one.

Throughout the event it was clear—as it always is when you hear Monk's music—that Thelonious Monk was a truly singular artist, someone so unique in his approach to his art that it's very difficult to be influenced by him without coming across as an imitator. I'm trying to think of others who fit that description: Vincent Van Gogh and the Beatles spring immediately to mind, but after that I'm drawing a blank. It's a little sobering to realize that two of those three were batsh!t crazy. In one of his rare moments of focus on the topic at hand, Stanley Crouch answered a question about whether he thought Monk might have been slightly autistic. "Oh, no!" Crouch said animatedly, and then, after a pause that showed some serious comic timing, added "He was a paranoid schizophrenic! [another comic pause] But he wasn't autistic." He wasn't much of a Tar Heel, either, but last night at least I was glad we Carolinians don't sweat such details.

metube, part 3

2007-10-01T15:42:00.000-07:00

Here's an email I received via The Princeton Review a few weeks back:

I am a teacher for the School District of Palm Beach County, FL. I am participating in a technology seminar wherein we are expected to produce an enhanced podcast. I found your wonderful vocabulary songs, and illustrated one with video and text for my students (8th grade language arts).... I am attaching a copy for you to review.

Thanks!

Tom Felt
Bak Middle School of the Arts

And now I, likewise, am attaching a copy for your review, dear reader. Check it out!

PS Many thanks to Tom Felt for his excellent work on this!

metube, part 2

2007-09-24T07:28:00.000-07:00

More metube! Here's a video for one of my Princeton Review Vocab Minutes. It was shot by middle-school students in Gregory Andree's class up at the Old Rochester Regional High School in Mattapoisett, MA. Now this is cool!!!

metube, part 1

2007-09-22T07:43:00.001-07:00

This video was made 22 years ago. I last saw it about 21 years ago and was fairly confident I would never see it again. Damn you, youtube!!!

Underappreciated Geniuses, vol. 6: The Shazam

2007-09-06T18:21:00.000-07:00

The first time I saw The Shazam was at Sparklefest 2004, a long-running Raleigh-based pop music fest that unfortunately pulled up stakes following Sparklefest 2006. Thanks to organizer Mike Nicholson and his fine taste in bands (as well as his ability to persuade them to perform for very little), that event also introduced me to the Rachel Nevadas, Cliff Hillis, and the brilliant Terry Anderson and the Olympic Ass Kicking Team, among others. In the rush of taking in so much new music, I have to admit that The Shazam only registered half a tick on my consciousness. I remember that they were loud as hell and that they all had 70s shag haircuts, and that I thought they looked and sounded a lot like The Sweet.

Then in early 2006, I got my hands on a copy of their 2003 album Tomorrow the World, and I quickly became a diehard fan. The album opens with the wonderfully cheeky anthem "Rockin' and Rollin' with my Rock and Roll Rock and Roller," a far better take on its familiar theme than, say, Kiss' "Rock and Roll All Night" or a thousand other similar songs. That track begins a run of five songs that, if released on their own, would probably constitute the best EP of the new millennium to date. The highpoint is the glorious "Gettin' Higher," a paean to the futility of pursuing rock and roll stardom and rock and roll skirt, but each of these five tracks belongs in heavy rotation on every classic rock station in the country. The album loses a touch of momentum from track 6 on but remains strong all the way to the finish line. Fans more devout than I swear that their 1999 album Godspeed the Shaam is even better, and I may someday come to agree, but right now Tomorrow is the one I'd recommend.

What should you expect if you take my advice and get a copy? A band that draws copious inspiration from Cheap Trick, The Sweet, and Todd Rundgren, for one. A lead singer with a perfect pop voice, clear and sweet when it needs to be but perfectly capable of communicating an ironic wink or sarcastic snarl when necessary, supplemented by the requisite two-part backing harmonies, for another. And great songs written by a guy with a gift for guitar-based hooks and even hookier vocal choruses, as well as a great bag of tricks that allows him to add all sorts of nifty surprises to his song structures—an extra measure here, an innovative turnaround there, and other sorts of geeky songwriting stuff that sparks delight and admiration in geeky songwriting guys like myself.

The Shazam reportedly are putting the finishing touches on a new album. With any luck, that means they'll be touring sometime soon. Keep your eyes peeled for them, because unless you live in Nashville the opportunities to see them are few and far between, and they are a tremendous live band. They performed the penultimate set of Sparklefest 2006 and tore the house down. They were followed by The Upper Crust, who were also tremendous. If a festival has to close up shop—and it's heartbreaking that this one has—that's the way to do it.

The Thalia and Popeye

2007-07-31T17:45:00.000-07:00

One of the great blessings of attending college in New York City was, well, being a college student in New York City. College can be overwhelming and college students are not especially well equipped with perspective, so it's nice to be somewhere that encourages you to see your problems in their proper scale. Living in a city of 8 million gets the job done (especially when so many of those 8 million clearly have problems bigger than a late term paper).

New York in the early 1980s offered innumerable escapes from the college grind. My favorite was a dumpy movie theater called The Thalia, located on 95th Street just west of Broadway. The Thalia was a repertory revival house, meaning that it showed a different double feature of old movies almost every night of the week (occasionally a popular feature would run for two days). It was an extraordinarily poorly constructed space. The front half of the auditorium sloped away from the screen, meaning that someone sitting in this section had to be significantly taller than the person in front of him to have an unobstructed view. The seating sloped along a more conventional trajectory in the back half of the auditorium, which was also the smoking section. This is where I always sat. The whole place couldn't have seated more than 150. Ancient, decrepit, wired at the turn of the century, and with only one narrow exit, it was the sort of place you'd see illustrated in the dictionary next to the word 'firetrap.'

The Thalia is where I received my extracurricular education. I became something of a movie nut (I probably would have called myself a cinefile then, between puffs off a clove cigarette—ugh!), with a special affinity for pretentious foreign films, American film noir, silent comedies, and cartoons. In this last category I was especially lucky, as The Thalia regularly ran three-hour cartoon programs, all programmed by Greg Ford, a film historian who obviously knew his stuff. Programs were organized by main character, film studio, or theme (e.g. "Cartoonal Knowledge" for racy cartoons; there were also nights of appallingly racist cartoons, e.g. "Inky and the Mynah Bird"). A copy of Leonard Maltin's Of Mice and Magic provided all the historical background necessary to achieve total cartoon geekdom.

It was during one of Ford's programs that I first realized the genius of Popeye. Like most folks my age, I'd grown up watching Popeye cartoons on television, but what I'd seen was a hodgepodge of 70 years of Popeye, most of them bland, unimaginative made-for-television cartoons. Ford showed only the cartoons created by the Fleischer Brothers Studio, the ones that begin with the title credits shown between slamming doors on a ship's deck. They are some of the best cartoons ever made, crammed to bursting with surreal gags, mumbled profanities, and a truly wonderful cast of lowlife characters: a one-eyed sailor, his weird beanpole girlfriend whom everyone inexplicably finds attractive, a big fat sociopath whom the beanpole inexplicably finds attractive, a hamburger-devouring mooch… it's a truly dysfunctional society, but one that makes complete sense, and is completely engaging, when taken on its own terms.

These cartoons made such an impression on me that, a decade after last seeing them regularly at The Thalia, I wrote a song about them:

If my life was a cartoon
I'd want to be Popeye the Sailor
I'd have a damsel in distress
And I would never fail her

I'd mutter something clever
Then I'd knock Bluto cold
I'd be a one-eyed mumbling crazy thug
With a heart of gold

And all my problems would be solved
Because I eat my greens
My life it would be measured out
In well-constructed scenes

I'd have drama without tragedy
Anger without pain
Love without loneliness
Hey, I would not complain

But I am what I am
And that's all I am
That's all I can stand
'Cause I can't stand no more

As a result of a rights dispute between various owners of different Popeye licenses, these cartoons existed in copyright limbo, with only a few that had crept into the public domain receiving DVD releases. The warring parties finally settled their differences last year, and today their truce bore its first fruit:Popeye the Sailor: 1933-1938, vol. 1, a four-disc collection of the first 60 Fleischer Brothers Popeye cartoons, in chronological order. It's a beautiful set with lots of great extras (lots of documentaries, a good sampling of Fleischer Brothers silents, including a few of their wonderful "Out of the Inkwell" cartoons); the folks at Warner Brothers should look at this set and hang their heads in shame, as it is everything their animation collections should be but aren't. I spent a good part of today reacquainting myself with these cartoons and I'm very pleased to report that they are at least as good as I remember. Go get it, you won't be sorry. You might want to prescreen it for your kids, though, as they are incredibly violent and not infrequently racist. But hey, we saw them when we were kids and they probably didn't do us much harm.

Right?

Khatte Chana

2007-07-27T19:08:00.000-07:00

I am not a big one for vegetarian dishes. I have nothing against them philosophically, at least not in the way that a strict vegan would against, say, a duck stuffed into a chicken stuffed into a turkey stuffed into a giraffe’s neck. It’s just that meat seems to make all dishes better. Folks in my adoptive home in the South understand this; recipes for vegetable dishes almost always include a ham hock or fat back or bacon or something else greasy and porcine. That’s what makes it “food” down here.

If I had to pick one dish upon which to subsist for the rest of my life, however, it might well be the following vegetarian delight of Indian origin. It is savory (thanks to the Indian spices and the chickpeas), sweet (thanks to the caramelized onions and ghee), and a little sour (thanks to the tamarind paste). Fresh ginger and hot pepper add some zip. It is very, very satisfying.

It’s called khatte chana, which, I suspect, means “unbelievably delicious chickpeas” in one of India’s hundred and eighty thousand languages. Here’s what you’ll need to make it:

1 large onion
1 tbsp. ghee
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 large tomato, seeded and diced fine
2 cans of chickpeas, drained and rinsed
tamarind pulp
½ tsp. turmeric
1 ½ tsp. ground cumin
1 ½ tsp. garam masala
½ tsp. cayenne pepper
2” of ginger root. grated
chapati

A note about ingredients: ghee is clarified butter and is available in jars at your local Indian specialty store, as are all the following; tamarind pulp comes in a black, sticky block about the size of a bar of Ivory soap; turmeric, cumin, cayenne and garam masala are all ground spices that will be much, much cheaper at the specialty store than at your local supermarket or, worse still, Whole Food. Chapati is a flat bread sometimes called roti. You’ll find it in the refrigerator or freezer section; it’s the perfect accompaniment to khatte chana.

All right, then, let’s cook us up a mess. Boil some water. Cut a 1 ½ inch square of tamarind pulp, put it in a bowl, and cover it with 1 ½ cups of boiling water. Let it soak for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Cut the onion in half so you can cut semicircles of onion, then slice the onion halves real thin. Heat the ghee over medium-high heat in a large skillet or a Dutch oven. When it’s hot, add the onions and cook them, stirring occasionally, until they are well cooked, mostly golden brown but with some crispy bits. This will take 15 to 20 minutes. Add the garlic and cook for another 2 minutes. Add the ground spices, stir through, and cook until the kitchen smells like a really good Indian restaurant. Add the tomato and grated ginger. Cook for five minutes.

The next step involves separating the liquid in which the tamarind pulp is soaking (good) from the tamarind pulp (bad). A fine-mesh strainer is perfect for the job. Pour the liquid into the skillet by passing it through the strainer, then give the pulp in the strainer a good squeeze to harvest the last of that good liquid. Stir the contents of the skillet, turn the heat to low, and let the dish simmer for 15 minutes. Add the chickpeas and cook for another 10 minutes. Salt to taste and garnish with a little fresh chopped cilantro if you like. You can make a bunch of khatte chana at one time and eat it over the next few days. You won't tire of it.

You can make chapati from scratch, but I never have. The store-bought stuff is pretty good and not at all labor intensive. Heat up a skillet (nonstick coated with a little cooking spray or a well-seasoned cast iron skillet) over medium high heat. When it’s hot, add a piece of chapatti and wait for it to start puffing up in places. Then flip it, cook it for another 30 seconds to a minute, and serve. The trick is getting the skillet the exact right heat so that the bread puffs but doesn’t burn. Practice makes perfect.

Wings At the Speed of Sound

2007-06-24T17:10:00.000-07:00

Venus and Mars

2007-06-23T10:07:00.000-07:00

With Paul McCartney's new album, Memory Almost Full, due out the first Tuesday of June, this month seems as good a time as any to review Macca's solo career. I am a fan, not a fanatic; I'm in awe of the guy's talent, though, and find a lot of creative inspiration in his work. I don't own all of his solo albums but I own a lot of them. I'll be writing about them, in the order they were released, over the next few weeks.

Venus and Mars opens with one of McCartney's great production numbers, "Venus and Mars/Rock Show," an acoustic homage to Mr. and Mrs. Macca that morphs into an anthem celebrating arena rock. Musically, it's a tour de force: great melody, great arrangement, great performances from get to go. Check out the chromatic electric guitar part that introduces the lyric to "Rock Show," the breakdown during the "drug scoring" section of the song, the bow to glam rock during the "green metal suit" section, the impassioned vocals, the ragtime piano outro… it's all beautifully conceived and executed, and all a great deal of fun. The lyric, on the other hand, is a bit perplexing. It's either entirely tongue-in-cheek or disturbingly self-celebratory. It posits the listener as an audience member in a sports arena, assures us that its subjects (so important they're represented by goddamn planets!) "are all right tonight," then reminds us of how thrilled we are to be seeing them in concert, noting that our "temperatures rise as [we] see the whites of their [Wings'] eyes." Regardless of its intent, it's hard to imagine that audiences hearing this number at the opening of a Wings show reacted by sitting back in their seats, nodding knowingly and saying to themselves, "Ah, yes, nice bit of ironic distance there." To a fist-pumping, screaming audience, it had to play as a paean to the thrill of seeing Wings, and that's a little weird.

Much of Venus and Mars pursues similarly confused/contradictory purposes. With lead vocals doled out to band members Denny Laine ("Spirits of Ancient Egypt") and Jimmy McCulloch ("Medicine Jar," a McCulloch cowrite and the only song on the album not written by Paul), Venus and Mars seems intent on presenting itself as a Wings album rather than a McCartney album; even so, there's no doubt whose hand controlled arrangements, performances, and production here. Furthermore, unlike McCartney or Wild Life, Venus and Mars is clearly intended to be a polished product, not a notebook of ideas and offhand jams; however, a lot of the songwriting is simply too frivolous or glib to sustain any gravitas, lyrical or musical. The album includes way too many genre exercises and throwaways like the 20's-style "You Gave Me The Answer" (whose chorus, "You gave me the answer to love eternally/I love you and you, you seem to like me" injects yet more of that ironic distance that makes "Rock Show" a little creepy), the pleasant-but-forgettable New Orleans blues "Call Me Back Again," the atmospheric rocker "Spirits of Ancient Egypt" (an excuse to play around with modal harmonies and Middle Eastern sounds, maybe?), and the execrable "Magneto and Titanium Man," as compelling an argument as ever there was that smoking marijuana can make you very, very, very stupid.

Still, Macca proves that he can still blow you away when he gives it his all. He keeps it simple on the minor blues stomp "Feel Like Letting Go" to deliver a great Wings arena rocker in the vein of "Let Me Roll It"; wisely lets the music do the talking on the lovely rock ballad "Love in Song"; and knocks it out of the park on the hit single "Listen to What the Man Said," a silly love song that is not nearly as annoying as, say, "Silly Love Songs." McCulloch's straightforward anti-drug PSA "Medicine Jar" stands among the highlights; its earnestness offers a nice contrast to McCartney's sometimes off-putting ironic distance.

Venus and Mars ends on yet another note of confusion, intertwining two songs--"Treat Her Gently" and "Lonely Old People"--that have no apparent connection other than key and feel. Each is a nice if humble vignette on its own, and together they are pleasant enough so long as you don't stop to ask yourself "Why the hell did he combine these two songs?" Maybe it'd make more sense if I listened to it after rolling a bone, but alas those days are long past for me. In the future, I'll try to remember to enjoy this album for its surface pleasures alone, which are considerable. Think too much about Venus and Mars, though, and might well wind up with a big headache.

Band on the Run

2007-06-20T08:23:00.000-07:00

Red Rose Speedway

2007-06-13T19:08:00.001-07:00

Wild Life

2007-06-08T15:18:00.001-07:00

With Paul McCartney's new album, Memory Almost Full, due out the first Tuesday of June, this month seems as good a time as any to review Macca's solo career. I am a fan, not a fanatic; I'm in awe of the guy's talent, though, and find a lot of creative inspiration in his work. I don't own all of his solo albums but I own a lot of them. I'll be writing about them, in the order they were released, over the next few weeks.

It's difficult to imagine an album like Wild Life being released by a major label today; even in its day it had a lot of folks scratching their heads. Recorded in three days by a band that had barely played together before sessions began, Wild Life is a defiantly unpolished record, to say the least. That holds as true for the songwriting as for the performances. If the goal was to create an album that made McCartney sound like a finished, polished record, well, mission accomplished.

Give McCartney credit for not trying to dress this album up. No effort is made to masquerade this album as anything other than what it is, and that holds true right from the opening track, "Mumbo," the lyric to which consists entirely of improvised nonsense. It's not bad, exactly; the groove, the guitar riffs, and the churning rhythm guitars are all quite satisfying. But it's more the germ of a good song than the finished product. Like most of this record, it left me wondering why someone of McCartney's stature and talent would release something like this. This is the sort of thing that belongs on a collector's edition CD box set, not at the front of your brand new album.

You have to figure he just didn't care, a suspicion reinforced by the second track, "Bip Bop," whose lyric makes only slightly more sense than does its predecessor's. Again, it's a nice groove but there's nothing special about the track. By the third track, a hyper-synocpated cover of Mickey and Sylvia's 1957 hit "Love is Strange," it's pretty clear that either McCartney is saving his best for the end or this album just flat out sucks. The title track, a seemingly endless three-chord vamp over which McCartney sings impassionedly about zoo animals, does nothing to change this impression. At least this one has a really nice background vocal arrangement.

Track 5, "Some People Never Know," finally demonstrates some craft. It's a sweet love song with a simple, lovely lyric and a very pretty melody. Linda's vocal is pitchy but, as on much of this album, has a Mo Tucker-like quality that doesn't annoy, which is probably the best one can hope for. (I feel for the lady; she's not a musician at all and yet here she is in a band with one of the world's greatest and most famous pop stars. I try to appreciate her efforts for what they are and admire the McCartneys' approach to handling the challenges of celebrity marriage. And mostly I'm grateful she's not Yoko.)

Track 6, "I Am Your Singer," continues the momentum started by track 5, except with Linda taking a more prominent vocal part. It's a very pretty number, although nothing that stands out especially in the McCartney canon. The remainder of the album consists of reprises of "Mumbo" and "Bip Bop," each under a minute in length, a nifty piano pop song called "Tomorrow" (that, sadly, doesn't contain any apparent references to "Yesterday" but, happily, includes one of McCartney's gorgeous patented Beach Boys-influenced background vocal arrangements) and "Dear Friend," a piano dirge that many praise as a classic musical missive to John Lennon but which, frankly, leaves me cold.

And that's it. The whole thing clocks in at about 38 minutes, but it seems to pass more quickly because so much of it drifts by without your noticing it. When I read Michael Chabon's The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Klay a few years back, I felt at the end as though I'd swallowed a basketball. I was extremely full, yet knew that one carefully placed pin prick would reveal just how little I'd just ingested. After listening to Wild Life repeatedly, I feel as though I've swallowed an inflatable golf ball.

The current reissue of Wild Life includes some great bonus tracks, including the rowdy stomp "Give Ireland Back to the Irish" and a remarkably enjoyable version of "Mary Had a Little Lamb" (I shit you not). I won't bore you with the story of how McCartney came to record a version of this nursery school classic--read about it here if you don't already know about it--but I will note that its inclusion points up what's wrong with Wild Life. If McCartney can work such magic with this little bit of nothing, why is he foisting off stuff like "Mumbo" and "Bip Bop"? Ditto for the remaining bonus tracks "Little Woman Love" and "Mama's Little Girl," throwaways that are nonetheless strong enough that they would fit comfortably in the track list for Ram. Either could have replaced almost any track on Wild Life and, in so doing, improved the album.

Ram

2007-06-05T19:24:00.001-07:00

So I sat in the attic, a piano up my nose,
And the wind played a dreadful cantata.
Sore was I from a crack of an enemy's hose
And the horrible sound of tomato.

Ketchup,
Soup and puree,
Don't get left behind

It's nonsense, as is the rest of this 5-minute-plus long song. It doesn't matter; the song is a pure joy, a nifty and rocking piano stomp with more great musical ideas than you'll find on most entire albums. Check out the nifty little bouzouki part or the great arpeggiated guitar lines or the bass line and scat that McCartney sings during the long outro. Or simply check out how McCartney totally throws himself into the vocal performance on this exceedingly silly song. It's hardly the only slight composition on this album that McCartney elevates through brilliant invention and full-tilt performance. The change in feel at the end of "3 Legs," the bridge section of "Eat at Home," the elaborate background vocals on the ukelele-driven (!) title track, the Little Richard-esque vocal on "Smile Away"--all take what could easily be ordinary, dull songs and transform them into something delightful and wonderful.

Some might cite this these as examples of McCartney's lack of substance, of a proclivity for polishing turds. I disagree. Some people express their profound thoughts in lyrics; others express those thoughts musically. And most of us poor saps are incapable of either. I'll take my genius in whatever form it takes, and if I have to choose one or the other, I'll take music over lyrics. A great song with an innocuous lyric is still a great song, while a great lyric with a terrible melody is a song you will forget.

And Ram is, in fact, more substantial lyrically than many of McCartney's post-Beatles efforts. The album focuses on several themes--the redemptive power of love, the joys of domestic life, the resuscitative powers of solitude and pastoral living--that collectively communicate McCartney's desire to redefine himself, to find meaning and fulfillment in something other than ex-Beatledom and pop stardom. This thematic focus results in the only dud on the record ("Long Haired Lady," which sounds like something from a very bad rock musical), but overall it provides the album with a coherence missing from many subsequent efforts. (Likewise, the relatively spare and organic sounds and arrangements chosen here work well not only on their own but also as a reinforcement of the album's "small is better" motif.)

But Ram's greatest pleasures come from the music, which reaches its pinnacle in the sublime pop songs "Dear Boy," the overplayed but endearingly loopy "Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey," and the closing track "The Back Seat of My Car," which ends the proceedings in much the same way they began: with a guttural scream of indeterminate meaning but communicating an indisputable joy in the creation of great music.

McCartney

2007-06-03T19:32:00.000-07:00

With Paul McCartney's new album, Memory Almost Full, due out the first Tuesday of June, this month seems as good a time as any to review Macca's solo career. I am a fan, not a fanatic; I'm in awe of the guy's talent, though, and find a lot of creative inspiration in his work. I don't own all of his solo albums but I own a lot of them. I'll be writing about them, in the order they were released, over the next few weeks. Paul McCartney's first solo album, entitled McCartney, was recorded on a home four-track, with McCartney playing all the instruments (and providing all the vocals except for some harmonies from wife Linda). It is as raw, intimate, and simple as Abbey Road--completed during the same period--is baroque. The opening track--the brief and beautiful "The Lovely Linda,"--ends with the sound of spontaneous laughter, suggesting that the album is as much a musical diary as it is a commercial enterprise. It's a conscious choice, obviously, and a wise one that sets the tone for the album that follows.

McCartney's offhandedness can be both engaging and infuriating, depending on your willingness to indulge McCartney, who seems to have put absolutely everything he recorded on the four-track onto this album. Thus, the inclusion of "Valentine Day," an instrumental that consists of little more than a two-chord vamp accompanying a simple blues/rock solo on electric guitar; "Hot As Sun/Glasses," the former a "Flying"-style instrumental that might make a great television theme song, the latter the sound of McCartney rubbing the rims of drinking glasses to produce notes; "Oo You," a slight minor key blues/rocker; "Momma Miss America," a vaguely Eastern European sounding instrumental that would not have sounded out of place on Camper Van Beethoven's debut, Telephone Free Landslide Victory; and "Kreen-Akrore," an instrumental named after a Brazilian Indian tribe that is mostly an excuse for McCartney to show off his ethnic drumming.

All this might seem ridiculously self-indulgent, and maybe it is, and yet this is a charming and, at times, overpowering album all the same. Several things save it. First, every one of the throwaways described above has something to recommend it: a nifty bass line, a great groove, a brilliantly conceived chord voicing, or a surprisingly innovative musical turn that reveals a great mind at work. It's almost as if, at this point in his career, McCartney was incapable of creating completely worthless crap (that wouldn't always be the case, alas). The second track, "That Would Be Something," has no right to be any good at all: it's little more than a standard blues guitar lick with McCartney singing "That would be something/That really would be something/That would be something/To meet you in the falling rain, mama/To meet you in the falling rain" over and over. But it's quite good, catching an infectious groove and riding it for nearly three minutes and not even beginning to overstay its welcome. A campfire drum-and-guitar circle could easily drag this one out for several hours.

Second is the fact that McCartney is peppered with some knock-you-down brilliant songs. Track four, "Every Night," arrives just in time--it's the first song on the album that actually sounds like a "finished" song. It's a gorgeous love song to Linda, counterbalancing the depressing humdrum of daily life ("Every night I just want to go out, get out of my head/Every day I don't want to get up, get out of my bed") with the redemptive power of love. The song uses the minor II in the verse and the major II in the chorus to reinforce the dichotomy--that probably sounds stultifyingly technical, but when you hear it you know what it is and why it gives you that happy 'whoosh' up your spine. It's pretty much a perfect small song.

Likewise "Junk," a song about an antique store full of merchandise of questionable value. McCartney may have been thinking about this album of bits and scraps--the album includes a number of songs intended for various Beatles albums--when he came up with the song's conceit, encapsulated in the chorus "Buy, buy says the sign in the shop window/Why, why says the junk in the yard." If so, he thought enough of the album to give its theme song an achingly beautiful melody, and recognized the quality of his work well enough to reprise it as an equally lovely instrumental on track 11. This song has the same sad, quiet, meditative quality that distinguishes the many great songs on Paul Simon's solo debut album. I don't know if there's any connection there in one direction or the other, but this song for some reason reminds me a lot of "Everything Put Together Falls Apart" and "Run That Body Down." "Junk" is immediately followed by "Man We Was Lonely," another hooky little song that pits a simple sing-songy chorus against a much more sophisticated verse. It's a great example of what makes McCartney's writing so extraordinary; he's equally at home with simple and complex musical ideas and so adept at both that he can shift easily from one to another, seemingly without effort.

The crowning achievement of McCartney, of course, is "Maybe I'm Amazed," one of the great pop love songs of the rock and roll era. There's not a lot to say about this song except that it stands up with the best songs in the Beatles' catalogue. Unlike many of the tracks on this album, which are purposefully rough, this is a fully realized recording, spare but brilliantly arranged, layering instruments as the piece progresses to build to an anthemic ending. It's nearly 4 minutes long and yet it's over all too soon, requiring an immediate second spin.

Subsequent entries to this thread will not all be this glowing, I assure you. But McCartney is a gem--not the apotheosis of Macca's solo career (that'd be Ram) but still damn good. It begins a period of Macca's career during which he sought to distance himself from his superstar Beatle persona and explore smaller, more personal themes, to eschew pop stardom and celebrate domesticity. In this way it's a lot more rewarding than some of the more polished Wings albums to come, albums that embrace and celebrate stardom and pop culture and lose a lot of this album's charming personal touch in the process. Seek it out if you don't have it already.

Underappreciated Geniuses, Vol. 5: Michael Hurley

2007-05-31T18:31:00.000-07:00

I was listening to Michael Hurley's Sweetkorn today. Like all of Hurley's albums, it is intimate and odd, warm although vaguely off-putting in its weirdness. A Hurley record is like a visit from that strange uncle your parents didn't want you to see too often and with whom they would never leave you alone but who was charming and wonderful all the same, who did corny magic tricks and made up fun games no one else would ever think of and told rambling stories that had no end and made you laugh without your having the slightest idea why they were funny. He probably had spent some time in jail.

Hurley is the slacker John Prine. I imagine Prine would be a lot like Michael Hurley today had the former not become famous. Hurley did not become famous. He has gotten through life on an assortment of odd jobs that includes auto repair, painting, and singing, and over the course of sixty some odd years he has amassed a small but devoted following.

Hurley's music is laid back and rootsy. Some of it is so laconic that it practically doesn't make it out of the speakers. It is ancient sounding, like an Uncle Dave Macon record, and it is almost certainly the product of disorienting substances. It alludes frequently to a personal mythology that includes werewolves, hogs of the forsaken, talking pork chops, and a character named Snock who is a proxy for Hurley in the alternate universe his music details.

What makes Hurley special is his blend of whimsy and soulfulness. He's no Nick Drake; not much gets him down, and nothing seems to get him down for too long. Yet he's not just some lightweight joker, either. He's quite capable of ratcheting up the stakes and providing something quite stirring and lovely, such as:

Kiss me once, oh, kiss me twice
Give me a taste of paradise
I don't need the blues always on my shoulder
They give me a cold feeling, gettin' colder

Oh my stars how you undo me
Oh my stars, oh my stars
You undo me

or vaguely mystical, such as:

Holy is as holy is as holy
To me
And beauty is as beauty does
Time is watching the show, time is watching the show

With no apparent commercial constraints, Hurley is free to be as wide-ranging as he pleases, and he pleases plenty. Hence songs like "You're Gonna Look Like a Monkey When You Get Old" and lyrics like

Protein monster ate a sack of poison sugar
Crawlin out of the barn to the weeds to die
He's rollin' his eyes... eyes, eyes

Mama molasses broke my glasses
And the moon came up and we wiggled our asses
She's got red eyes... eyes, eyes ("Eyes Eyes", Wolfways)

It's like reading the diary of a slighty crazy but very interesting person. I love it even when I have no idea what he's getting at.

It's all set to some lovely melodies that burrow deep enough in your brain that you'll think you've known them forever the second time you hear them. His records favor organic arrangements of banjos, mandolins, acoustic and electric guitars, piano, etc. etc. so that they sound like very compelling jam sessions, which may very well be the case.

If I still haven't sold you on Hurley's music, surf on over here and stream some Snocktunes before you write him off forever. Start with "Oh My Stars" or "I Paint a Design." If you're interested in more, check out (in this order, more or less): Snockgrass, Have Moicy! (a Holy Modal Rounders album on which Hurley is featured prominently), Long Journey, and Wolfways.

PS NPR did a fairly long piece on Michael Hurley on November 17, 2007. If it's still up, the link will take you to it.

Score One For Corporate America

2007-05-10T09:13:00.000-07:00

I recently did something incredibly stupid, as detailed in the letter below. The letter is pretty self-explanatory; all you need to know in addition is that the CD box set in question has those annoying built-in CD holders that cannot be separated from the box set and which are invariably made of a very hard plastic that breaks too easily.

To: Dr.Rhino@rhino.com
Subject: Help Me, I Am an Idiot
Sent: Thursday, April 19, 2007 2:38 PM

Dear Dr. Rhino:

I am writing to seek your help, because I am an idiot.

I recently--as in yesterday --received as a gift Rhino's "Have A Nice Decade" box set. Like all your products, it is great and I love it.

Unfortunately, because I am an idiot, I have done something incredibly idiotic. One of the teeth of one of the CD holders in the box set was damaged, and as a result one of the discs kept falling out. I attempted to repair the wobbly tooth with Krazy Glue. This was idiotic move number 1, and of course It did not work. Idiotic move number 2 was failing to move the discs far, far away from the area to which I was attempting this repair. This is how I got Krazy Glue on the playing surfaces of discs 1 and 2, and this is why they no longer play.

I understand that you are under no obligation whatsoever to replace these discs. However, I am a loyal Rhino customer and a full-fledged idiot, so I figured I would write you to beg mercy. Is there any way I can replace these two discs without having to purchase the complete box set again? If you could help me with this I would be forever in your debt and would promise to do my best to avoid future Rhino-impacting acts of idiocy on my part.

Sincerely,

Tom Meltzer, idiot

The response was three weeks in coming but was, ultimately, edifying:

Dear Tom,

Please send your damaged discs to:

Rhino Customer Service
Attn. Mac Dunlop
3400 West Olive Ave. 5th Floor
Burbank, CA 91505

We'll send you replacements. Please include your mailing address and a copy of your email (or a note detailing your request). Please allow 4-6 weeks for delivery.

Dr. Rhino

Kudos to Rhino Records. Extra credit for resisting the temptation to address me as "Tom Meltzer, idiot."

Underappreciated Geniuses, Vol. 4: Sister Rosetta Tharpe

2007-04-08T19:06:00.000-07:00

My good friend Mark introduced me to the music of Sister Rosetta Tharpe back when we were still in college. I believe his exact words were "You ought to check this out" as he cued up "Don't Take Everybody to Be Your Friend." Ought to check it out, indeed. Me and everyone else in the world.

Sister Rosetta Tharpe was a great gospel musician. In her day, she was tremendously famous, second among gospel artists maybe to Mahalia Jackson but otherwise to no one. She was a star of the New York jazz clubs and the church circuit alike, and for good reason: there was nobody else remotely like her, and few as good.

Sister Rosetta Tharpe's music will probably sound instantly familiar to you, and not because you've heard it before--few folks other than music geeks and listeners to weekend left-of-the-dial radio programs deejayed by music geeks have much opportunity to hear her music anymore. While many of her recordings are currently in print (thanks in part to the use of a performance clip in the movie Amelie), as often as not they are hardly available, or not at all.

But with its rat-a-tat-tat guitar playing, its bluesy singing, the absolutely electric energy of the performance… you will recognize this music because it is rock and roll, recorded well over a decade before anyone had ever heard of Elvis Presley, before anyone had coined the phrase 'rock and roll.' Listen to Sister Rosetta Tharpe play guitar and you hear the roots of Chuck Berry. Listen to her sing and you know whose shoulders Aretha Franklin stands on.

Her music is exhilarating and it is endlessly rewarding. It is full of passion and humor and, of course, faith. It is foundation music, the music I return to over and over, every time the most recent flavor of the month has lost its allure. You can check it out with the budget CD The Gospel of Blues or you can order up a bigger serving with the budget import box set Original Soul Sister. There's also an excellent biography of Sister Rosetta called Shout Sister Shout!. Start with the music, find your way to the book.

Check her out for yourself.

Underappreciated Geniuses, Volume 3: Mickey Katz

2007-03-15T23:06:00.000-07:00

Novelty records typically don't have a long shelf life, for the simple reason that they don't remain interesting for all that long; hence the term novelty. A rare few have the capacity to captivate over the long term. Such are the recordings of Mickey Katz, a clarinetist and singer who made his name singing Jewish novelties in a mish mosh of English and Yiddish.

Katz studied his craft with the novelty master of his day, Spike Jones. He played clarinet in Jones' City Slickers, also providing ethnic accents and some pretty astonishing cartoonish sound effects. By the time he was ready to strike out on his own, Katz was fully outfitted for a career singing songs with titles like "Duvid Crockett, King of Delancy Street," "Pesach in Portugal," "I'm a Schlemiel of Fortune," and "Ver is Mein Pants?"

Katz sings in a voice that would undoubtedly be characterized as anti-Semitic if it came out of a non-Jew. "Oy, listen how he mocks us!" would not be an inappropriate response. But coming from Katz, the exaggerated accent, the over-the-top nasal tone, and the corny Yiddish jokes sound as natural and as kosher as a black comedian's dropping of the n-bomb, or, for that matter, Jackie Mason's ripping on Jews.

Katz' material consists primarily of parodies of contemporary hits, "Jewish-ified" with cultural touchstones (lots of references to knishes, gefilte fish, and blintzes), ethnic stereotypes (brash women, henpecked husbands), and frequent klezmer breaks, all swinging hard and masterfully played. I have to admit that, for me, part of the charm of these records are the long passages that I don't understand because they're in Yiddish. I pick up bits and pieces, laugh at the delivery, and take my best guess at what it is that's so darn funny. Endless entertainment!

Katz' records are a testament to a time when Americans outside the mainstream fully embraced their 'otherness.' It's not a time I'd want to return to, because that communal solidarity was no doubt rooted in the realization that one's group was and would remain outside the mainstream, that its members would never belong to the fancy country clubs or eat at the starch-linen restaurants or hold seats in the US Senate. We're a better country than that now. And yet there's something very appealing about the joy with which Jews once celebrated their idiosyncrasies and their foibles, a joy to which these recordings give compelling testimony. If it's possible to be nostalgic for that without wanting to return to it, that's how I feel.

There are only two compilations of Katz' novelty records in print in the US: Greatest Schticks and Borscht Riders in the Sky. The mother lode is a UK two-disc set called Mish Mosh, but at 18£, it ain't cheap.

A simple dinner: poached chicken in ginger-scallion sauce, bok choy, rice

2007-03-01T18:24:00.000-08:00

This is amazingly easy to do and is quite delicious. It's also relatively low fat, at least relative to what I usually prepare.

Fill a big pot with enough water to submerge a chicken. Add a splash of soy sauce, a splash of Shaoxing cooking sherry, some ginger slices, and a couple of smashed cloves of garlic. Cover and bring to a boil.

Rinse a whole chicken. When the water is boiling, uncover the pot and put the chicken in the boiling water, breast side down. Return liquid to a boil, then reduce heat to a simmer. Skim scum as it rises to the top (one skim at about 10 minutes' cooking time does the trick). You are now poaching a whole chicken. A 4 1/4 pound bird takes about 50-55 minutes to poach.

Trim some stalks of bok choy to bite size pieces. Set aside.

Grate a finger's length of ginger. Combine in a small bowl with a few tablespoons of soy sauce, a teaspoon of sugar, a half teaspoon of salt, three diced scallions, and a few tablespoons of water. Set aside.

Fill another large pot with cold water and ice. When the chicken is cooked, lift it out of the boiling water (a large plastic slotted serving spoon in the cavity does the trick; so too do those great big wok skimmers the Chinese use--see image at the bottom of this post) and submerge in the ice water. Let cool for 10-15 minutes, until cool enough to handle with bare hands.

Make a nice pot of jasmine rice. Set aside.

Drop the bok choy into the simmering poaching water. Cook until cooked through, no more than one minute. Extricate from liquid and plate. Splash with a little soy sauce.

Harvest the meat from the chicken, shredding by hand as you go. Discard the rubbery skin, it is bad for you and it is tasteless thanks to the poaching.

In a nonstick skillet, heat a tablespoon of sesame oil. When it's good and hot, add the ginger/scallion/etc. mix. Heat through; let the sauce come to a good boil and thicken just a little. Dress the chicken with the sauce. Make a plate of chicken, bok choy, and rice. Eat. Yum.

Underappreciated Geniuses, vol. 2: Charlie Rich

2007-02-01T07:29:00.000-08:00

When I was a kid, there was this song that was on the radio all the time. It was called "Behind Closed Doors," and I was sure it was just about the worst record ever made. That is, until I heard "The Most Beautiful Girl in the World," the follow-up single by the same artist, Charlie Rich. There was no doubt in my mind: Charlie Rich totally sucked.

Years later I started poring through the writing of music critic/historian Peter Guralnick, and of course I was completely mystified by Guralnick's love of Charlie Rich, which is profound. By this point I had a compilation of singles recorded on the Sun label that included Rich's "Lonely Weekends," a great record to be sure but nothing to inspire rapture. A little later, Elvis Costello released an album of country covers called Almost Blue, a decent album with a killer song called "Sittin' and Thinkin'," written by Charlie Rich. The pieces were beginning to fall into place.

The coup de grace was delivered by an album called The Complete Smash Sessions, which contains 29 tracks of relentless soulful bliss. Rich has a great voice--that's apparent even in his shlocky 70's hits--and here he puts that talent to use for good instead of evil. The disc puts him through all his paces--funky little dance numbers like "Mohair Sam," big emotive ballads like "I Can't Go On," rave ups like "Washed My Hands in Muddy Waters"--and Rich nails 'em all. It's a visionary record; what Rich accomplishes on these 1965-66 recordings brought him little commercial success, but a few years later Elvis Presley would follow their blueprint and strike gold.

Up until "Behind Closed Doors," that was the story of Charlie Rich's life. He was a tremendously talented guy making great music who could not achieve the popularity his talent merited. When he finally achieved fame, he did it on bittersweet terms, perhaps explaining why he showed up to the 1975 CMAs drunk to present the CMA Entertainer of the Year Award and, upon opening the envelope and seeing the winner was John Denver, set the envelope on fire and walked off stage.

The period between the Smash recordings and Rich's ascent to pop stardom was a fertile one, throughout which he kept mining the Memphis-driven blue-eyed soul vein. Grab a copy of The Fabulous Charlie Rich if for no other reason than to hear one of the most heartbreaking songs ever, "Life Has Its Little Ups and Downs." The rest of the album is nearly as good, meaning that it's superlative. Complete Smash Session, alas, is long out of print and is correspondingly priced by savvy Amazon resellers. A certain blogger might be convinced to burn you a copy if you ask nice.

Oh, and "Behind Closed Doors"? It's really not that bad.

Underappreciated Geniuses, vol. 1: Betty Hutton

2007-01-30T19:06:00.000-08:00

I have only seen one Betty Hutton movie, and it's probably the only one in which she doesn't sing. It's Miracle of Morgan Creek, and it's one of Preston Sturges' greats, which makes it one of the best movie comedies ever. This, by the way, is an empirical fact, not an opinion.

Truth be told, I don't remember Hutton's performance all that well. I'm sure she's great, but the movie really belongs to Eddie Bracken. If I'd never stumbled across Hutton's work outside that movie, I probably would never have given her another thought. Fortunately, a local DJ is a huge fan and she plays a lot of Betty Hutton. It wasn't long before I'd joined the fan club.

When she performs her signature material, Betty Hutton is probably the closest approximation ever of a living cartoon character. She is Spike Jones on speed, pure energy, liable to explode at any second. She's completely over the top, but unlike today's frenzied clowns, there's nothing ironic in her performance; she inhabits a refreshingly postmodern-free zone. All she's doing is selling a song like it's a life-or-death matter to get you to smile.

The disc Somebody Loves Me is a great introduction to her music. Not only does it include many of her biggest and best records--"Doctor, Lawyer, Indian Chief," "Murder! He Says," "It's Oh So Quiet" (later covered by Bjork)--but also some really wonderful examples of her serious singing. Check out her version of "It Had to Be You" and tell me this lady couldn't have been one of the best crooners of her time.

A performance is worth a thousand words, right? Check this out.

A Little Knowledge...

2007-01-17T17:01:00.000-08:00

I was never any good at science in school. I took the bare minimum number of classes required to graduate high school, then did the same in college. And, I did my best to retain none of what little I was supposed to learn.

Recently this has begun to feel like a shortcoming, which is why I decided to read Bill Bryson's A Short History of Nearly Everything, a book written for science morons such as myself. I haven't learned much from it, but what I have learned has me wishing I hadn't. In fact, it has me huddled in a fetal position in the corner of my office.

Here's what I've learned: Our solar system consists of one star, along with an ever-changing number of planets, some moons, and a whole bunch of space detritus. It is part of a galaxy called the Milky Way, which consists of somewhere between 200 and 400 billion stars. Billion. That is not a typo. Billion. See? Not a typo.

The Milky Way is one of approximately 140 billion galaxies which, I assume, are more or less the same size as the Milky Way, give or take a few hundred thousand light years. Once again, billion. 140 billion, by the way, is the number of frozen peas it would take to fill Carnegie Hall from floor to ceiling, wall to wall. Just in case you were wondering about that.

What this means is not only are we entirely insignificant in the Grand Scheme of Things, but also that our feeble minds are completely incapable of truly comprehending just how insignificant we are.

I'm going to put the book down now and go watch some Spongebob Squarepants.

The Four Stages of a Man

2007-01-13T08:02:00.000-08:00

Beatles music is the first music I remember hearing. Meet the Beatles, Something New, and Hard Day's Night all got heavy play in our house when I was just a toddler; it was my musical mother's milk. I remember singing "I Don't Want to Spoil The Party" to myself as I walked to elementary school, entirely oblivious to the song's emotive meaning but deeply in love with the melody, the harmonies, and the guitars. Over the years, Beatle music has remained a constant in my life. Other music climbs up and down the mental hit parade, but there's always a Beatles song running through my head at some time during the day.

When I was a little kid, Ringo--loveable, cute, devil-may-care Ringo--was my favorite. He was always happy, never took things too seriously, just glad to be part of the gang.

Adolescence was all about John, angry and angsty, irreverent and sarcastic, taking the world so damn seriously. There was a time in my life when Plastic Ono Band seemed the pinnacle achievement of Western art. I was a little depressed at the time.

Adulthood is for Paul. Paul is a genius, pure and simple. Even his crap floors me, because it reveals an understanding of music so far beyond anything I could ever hope for for myself. Fabulous singer, brilliant bassist, stellar guitarist (that's him playing the frantic solo on "Taxman"), and seemingly a nice fellow to boot. Someone to admire, and to aspire to.

Dotage will be devoted to George. Quiet, underappreciated, a tad petulant but ultimately at peace with the world--what better way to prepare for checking out? As George reminded us in his masterwork, all things must pass.

As La Rosita Goes, So Goes Morningside Heights

2007-01-07T08:40:00.000-08:00

I arrived on Manhattan's Morningside Heights 27 years ago, a Baltimore suburbanite with little experience of urban living. I immediately fell in love with the place, embracing its grunginess with much enthusiasm. And it was grungy. My apartment on 109th and Amsterdam got hot water maybe 2 hours a day; sometimes there was no running water at all. I was mugged three times in my first five years in the city. A drug deal on the corner a few yards from my front door culminated in one fellow shooting another in the face. Reports that yet another landlord had torched a building in order to rid himself of pesky rent-control tenants and rebuild as a condo were met with a shrug more appropriate to a 'dog bites man' news story. I have several friends who lost their apartments in just that way, in fact.

27 years later, the grunge is gone. There are now two Starbucks between 110th and 116th Street on Broadway. Fancy grocery stores and drug emporiums are ubiquitous, as are surprisingly upscale restaurants. Gone is the Mill Luncheonette, where Rene served up breakfast 24/7 and threatened to charge you extra for 'crunchy eggs' if you complained about the bits of shell in your food; Ta-Kome, home of the soggiest hero in creation and sole vendors of Canadian Ace, a beer that came in a gallon jug, cost under $1, and gave you a headache the minute you opened the bottle; the Marlin Bar, where a local alcoholic cleared bottles from tables for an occasional drink and where I first heard the immortal dictum "You don't have to go home, but you can't stay here"; Ben and Ralph's Tobacco and Newsstand, domain of two of the grumpiest old farts who ever lived and the place where I first heard the immortal dictum "Hey! This ain't a library! Buy it or get out!!!"; and the Blue Rose, a firetrap at which my band played every other Thursday (after it closed, we discovered that the entire bar was running off a single extension cord that ran out the back window, up the airshaft, and into the owner's apartment).

So it seemed fitting that my favorite Morningside Heights restaurant shut down during the week I was visiting New York. La Rosita was a Cuban restaurant that started as a hole in the wall, two parallel counters with barely enough space between to wedge yourself into your seat; it later moved a block south and expanded to include tables. It was here I first discovered the delights of café con leche, chicharrones de pollo (bits of chicken deep fried, then rolled in garlic), yellow rice and black beans, sweet plantains, Cubano sandwiches, and salads that consisted of nothing more than shredded lettuce, a slice of tomato, and a wedge of lemon. It was cheap, it was filling, it was damn good, and it was nothing like anything I'd ever eaten growing up in Pikesville, MD.

La Rosita's lease came up at the end of 2006 and the building owner told them the new rent would be $18,000 per month. You have to sell a lot of rice and beans to pay a bill like that. And so La Rosita is no more. La Rosita closed with a series of parties featuring live music; my good buddy Mark Ettinger, his daughter Kate, and I performed a set on the restaurant's penultimate night, several hours after I enjoyed my last La Rosita Cubano Especial with fried plantains and a mango batido. I composed a song especially for the show:

The La Rosita Song

Perdon, senor, no hablo Espanol
Pero quiero una plata de frijol-es
Y arroz amarillo y tostones
Y pollo frito; si, los chicharrones!

Par tres chuletas cantare el heptacordo
Now you know why my friends call me Gordo
And also why they call my wife Gordita
Because we take our meals at La Rosita!

The missus and I finished the night at Le Monde, a spiffy and lovely French restaurant on Broadway and 112th Street. We split a bottle of wine and had some late-night snacks and reminisced about what we miss about NYC, and what we don't, and I looked out the window and tried to remember what Morningside Heights looked like when I was a college kid. I couldn't remember what the Le Monde space used to be--a laundromat? a hardware store?--but it sure didn't look like this place, with its gorgeous wood columns and restored hammered tin ceiling and ultra-thin waiters and waitresses. I felt vaguely uneasy without knowing exactly why. This Morningside Heights certainly fits my current lifestyle better than the one on which I first arrived. I should welcome these changes, right?

When I got back home to Durham, NC, a new issue of the New Yorker was waiting for me. The first Talk of the Town piece nicely articulated the uneasiness I was feeling:

[There's a growing sense that] the city’s recovery has come at the cost of a part of its identity: that New York is safer and richer but less like itself, an old lover who has gone for a face-lift and come out looking like no one in particular. The wrinkles are gone, but so is the face. This transformation is one you see on every street corner in Manhattan, and now in Brooklyn, too, where another local toy store or smoked-fish emporium disappears and another bank branch or mall store opens. For the first time in Manhattan’s history, it has no bohemian frontier. Another bookstore closes, another theatre becomes a condo, another soulful place becomes a sealed residence. These are small things, but they are the small things that the city’s soul clings to.

Another soulful NYC venue has done bit the dust. RIP La Rosita. You guys decide to relocate, we sure could use you here in Durham.
photo shamelessly borrowed from Hugh Siegel

NYC 2.0

2007-01-04T15:03:00.000-08:00

The missus and I just returned from a visit to New York City, about which I'll be writing for the next few days. For those who insist on the skinny up front: our trip was great, and we'll be back soon.

It is a trite but true observation that New York is a fabulous city. It's equally obvious that it's a city with a few flaws and that it is much in need of an upgrade. My suggestions for version 2.0 of NYC:

1) Tear out everyone's heating system and start over. There is probably some heat somewhere in NYC that isn't either (a)ridiculously hot or (b)off, but we never encountered it. What we encountered was good old 19th-century radiator heat, the type you might appreciate in a sauna but not in, say, a fancy restaurant, or your bedroom. Our visit was all about dry sinuses and stinky pits, with occasional bouts of the shivers at 3 AM, when we would awake to realize that the oppressive heat had disappeared and an Arctic chill had taken its place.

2) Build more bathrooms. Yes, I know this situation is much better now than it was 20 years ago, because now there's a Barnes & Nobles or Starbucks every ten feet. Still, the ratio of toilets to people in the city is unnatural and unhealthy. By necessity, lots of people are walking around needing to go, but with no place to go in. It is my current working theory that this is why many New Yorkers are so cranky. There is an especial need for more toilets in apartments; where we stayed, 6 people shared a single toilet. I believe this is a felony violation of the building codes in North Carolina.

3) Since suggestion 2 is a pipedream, at least add something to the water that makes pee smell better. Even in this post-Giuliani, suddenly tenament-less, very upscale city, people apparently pee everywhere. You never see them doing it, but you sure know where they did it later, because NYC smells of baked whizz. Even in the wintertime, amazingly. This is probably a function of the paucity of toilets. If adding something to the water is impractical, perhaps the city could rebuild its sidewalks from the material used to make urinal cakes.

And that's about it. Otherwise, New York City's perfect just as it is.

The Hardest Working Man in Show Business

2006-12-25T09:11:00.000-08:00

Back in the mid-Eighties, before "Living in America" put him back in the spotlight, James Brown played some surprisingly small-scale shows, including fairly regular appearances at the old Lone Star Café on 5th Avenue in Greenwich Village. I can't imagine that the club held even 500 people, and the stage really wasn't big enough for JB's huge band (close to a dozen people, including a four-piece horn section). And yet, there he was. I was lucky enough to catch a few of those shows.

The first show is the one I'll remember best and most often, because it was one of those rare events that open your eyes and make you see things in a whole new way. An epiphany? Perhaps not that profound, but in the same zip code, I think.

It was a very cold night, but my friends and I arrived many hours early to queue up for the first-come, first-served seating and floor space. The wait was nasty but, we were certain, worth every frosty, windy, grimy (we're talking NYC in the Eighties, after all, not the modern spick-and-span Giulianized version) minute spent in line. This was James Brown, after all! We were about to see a legend; we were going to be transformed. We arrived early enough to get a spot right in front of the stage, perhaps 10 feet from Maceo Parker's mike and no more than 15 feet from where James Brown himself would, eventually, would be standing.

'Eventually' took a lot longer than we had hoped. It was still an hour to show time when we were let in, and of course the band didn't hit the stage on time. When it did, there was more waiting still. First the band played a couple of instrumentals. Then saxophone stud Maceo Parker was introduced, and he played a long solo over yet another instrumental. The band had been on stage close to 20 minutes by the time Danny Ray, the man who had been introducing James Brown for five! ten! fifteen! twenty! twenty five! years, came out to inform us of the obvious: that the Hardest Working Man in Show Biz, the Godfather of Soul, Mr. Please Please Please, the man behind [endless litany of hits reeled off here] was about to make his way to the stage.

And then he did. He was a jaw-dropping sight, but not in a good way. His hair was unnatural both in color and coiffure; it was a weird attempt at feigned youth that made him look instead like an old lady who's just left a very lengthy beauty parlor session, and the effect was that of a helmet of too-fine hair. Beneath the helmet was a jowly face much too old for the outfit and hairstyle he was sporting. I couldn't help recalling the movie version of Death in Venice at that moment, and it made me feel a little ill. The cherry on the sundae was the obviousness of the girdle he was wearing, which created the illusion of slender hips and a flat belly by pushing all the fat up above his belt, giving him a 'stuffed turkey breast' look. This was a man who was not meant to be seen at such close range, I suspect. Up close, he was the Brother From Another Planet. My heart was sinking.

The band hit a slow, mellow groove, nothing too challenging for the old guy, and went into "Have a Funky Good Time," seemingly reaffirming my worst fears: this guy does not have it any more. James was marching in place, none too vigorously, and singing in a fairly limited rasp--the top end of his once-incredible vocal range was long gone by this era. The band sounded great, though, so there was that. And just about the time I was starting to enjoy the groove, a wonderful transformation began to take place. Brown started to sweat a bit, move with a little more animation, sing a little better--suddenly, he didn't look quite so old.

The metamorphosis kicked into high gear when Brown dropped his right hand, stopping the band on the proverbial dime. "What time it is?" he screamed, and someone from the band shouted "1976!" The horns hit a rapid-fire riff, and James Brown was into "Get Up Offa That Thing," and he was sweating more, and moving, and starting to sound damn good. I still wasn't ready to get religion on the show, though, not yet. Not until Brown slapped the mike stand with the butt of his hand, sending it tilting toward the audience; leaned on one knee and caught it just before it bonked a spectator in the head; tossed it back 180 degrees in the other direction; spun away from the mike, dropped to one knee, and caught it just before it hit the bass drum; set the mike aright; and did a full split. In a girdle! I was sold.

The rest of the show was simply tremendous. It included some truly ridiculous kitsch, inicluding: the band's frequent reprise of the "Entertainment Tonight" theme in between songs; a version of "This is A Man's World" in which Brown stopped the band over and over while he paid tribute to randomly grouped dead folks ("This one's for Bob Marley, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Colonel Sanders!"), then took a long, awful keyboard solo, selecting one note (randomly?) and holding it while grinning at the band as if seeking their approval; and a truly dreadful, Vegas-y version of "Please, Please, Please" to close the set. None of it mattered. Through the extraordinarily good ("Cold Sweat," "Papa's Got a Brand New Bag," "Hot Pants," etc. etc.) and the embarrassingly show biz-y, Brown was immensely entertaining, a man of varied, remarkable, mysterious and occasionally befuddling gifts, and truly the Hardest Working Man in Show Business. By the time Danny Ray had draped Brown's shoulders in his regal cape and Brown had tossed it off several times, I knew I had experienced something very special, the likes of which wasn't likely to happen again. I was right, by the way; the other Brown shows I saw at the Lone Star, while fun and very entertaining, weren't nearly as exhilarating.

There really is no way to overestimate the importance of James Brown's music, I don't think. The guy influenced just about everyone with his showmanship and his many, many musical innovations. I'm glad I got a chance to experience some of that magic, and hope y'all have similar memories of this great man.

Sam Cooke

2006-12-19T17:19:00.000-08:00

Every time I think I've got a beat on Sam Cooke, that I know just where he sits in my personal pantheon, the guy reemerges in my consciousness and forces me to once again reevaluate, and once again upgrade, my opinion.

A little background: like most folks, I first came to know Sam Cooke through his big hits, a deep catalogue of mid-tempo love songs that generally fall into the I-IV-I-V or I-vi-IV-V chord patterns. Wading through such pleasant but lightweight fare as "Chain Gang," "Only Sixteen," "Wonderful World," and "Everybody Loves to Cha Cha Cha," I was naturally floored by the quality of the guy's voice and singing but was equally underwhelmed by the material. I was ready to group him with Nat King Cole: massive talent with a pop career dragged down by middle-of-the-road songs and arrangements.

Then I heard Night Beat, a small-combo album on which Cooke sings a bunch of blues and torch ballads. I was floored; here, finally, was an album of material that reached the level of his talent. If you do not own a copy of this album, stop reading right now and get yourself a copy immediately. Seriously, I'll wait. [patient tapping of shoe]

Night Beat sent me searching for more such music; surely a vein producing such pure gold had to be just the beginning of a rich motherlode. But alas, it was not to be; there's just no other Sam Cooke album like it, at least not in print. At this point I figured I had Sam Cooke pegged as "that guy who made one great album and could have made a lot more if he had only been less attached to his hit-making formula." Which, in fact, extended the Nat King Cole anthology, as Cole's early trio recordings are every bit as breathtaking as Night Beat.

And then, just a few weeks ago, I saw this clip of Cooke singing "Basin Street Blues" on the Mike Douglas Show, and remembered once again what an astonishingly good singer he was. The experience compelled me to pick up keep movin' on (on which the song appears), a collection of the final 23 recordings of Cooke's career, and now, once again, I am reevaluating Sam Cooke. There's a lot of amazing material here--a nifty, up-tempo 4/4 reworking of "Tennessee Waltz," a great little "Shake"-like obscurity called "Yeah Man" (which Arthur Conley later revised and rerecorded as "Sweet Soul Music"--thanks to Mikey for this correction--ed.), "Good News," "Rome Wasn't Built in a Day," "Good Times," "Meet Me at Mary's Place," and of course the jaw-dropping "A Change is Gonna Come," Cooke's self-penned reaction to "Blowin' in the Wind" and the winner of that contest in a first-round knockout. The singing here is freer and more emotive than anything I've heard from Cooke except for perhaps his early gospel recordings with the Soul Stirrers. While you're buying Night Beat, grab a copy of this one too; hell, it's only $9.99, how can you possibly go wrong? You can't.

Perusing Sam Cooke's catalogue at the All Music Guide, I see a ton of Sam Cooke material that's out of print. I hope they bring it all out. I don't know how much higher my opinion of the guy can get, but I'm anxious to find out.

The Main Ingredient

2006-12-12T16:58:00.000-08:00

A while back I wrote about the scourge that is melisma. I've had occasion to think about this terrible, terrible blight again lately, as I recently got one of those iPod Shuffles and loaded it up with 260 of my favorite songs. The mix includes a lot of old soul and R&B--Aretha singing "I'll Say a Little Prayer," a bunch of O.V. Wright, a few songs from Ray Charles' Modern Sounds in Country and Western, that sort of stuff. I am most definitely (or mos' def as the young 'uns say) old school.

One of those songs is The Main Ingredient's "Just Don't Want to be Lonely," and last time it came up on the Shuffle it was the source of a minor epiphany. The singer doesn't do a lot of fancy stuff with the song; he basically just sings it, adding a few flourishes where they fit. And yet it's a totally captivating performance. The beauty of it isn't the vocal pyrotechnics, but the simple fact that this guy has a great voice. He doesn't need to show it off; he knows he has a great voice and is perfectly happy to let it serve the song, rather than the other way around. It's a lovely, subdued, and completely stunning performance.

Now, The Main Ingredient are not legends of R&B. Their lead singer--Cuba Gooding Sr. was his name, and yes, he is the father of the Academy Award winning actor--wouldn't make anyone's All-Time Best 50 (or even 100, probably) R&B Singers list. "Just Don't Want to be Lonely" is a record that its producers almost certainly figured no one would ever want to hear again 10 minutes after it left the charts. And yet, in its own small and silly way, "Just Don't Want to be Lonely" is sublime, a record of more value than the entire recorded output of Celine Dion or Mariah Carey. I'd rather hear it for the millionth time than listen to any of their stuff once.

This epiphany comes with an ancillary downer, unfortunately. Those of us who aspire to sing but don't have great voices like Cuba Gooding Sr.'s? We are consigned to the status of 'stylist.' And while we may be capable of many wonderful musical achievements, performing a vocal like the one on "Just Don't Want to be Lonely" simply isn't one of them. We are Baudelaire's albatross, minus the impressive air show.

PS The Main Ingredient's "Everybody Plays the Fool" is pretty spectacular, too. Don't bother with their greatest hits collection, though; there's a very steep drop in quality beyond the two hit singles. Do as I did and get Rhino's can you dig it? The 70's Soul Experience box set instead.

Back in Business

2006-12-10T10:36:00.000-08:00

Last week blogger.com notified me that I could convert my Stone Age blog to a spiffy new Blogger-in-Beta blog. 'Well, Merry Christmas to me,' I thought as I clicked the requisite buttons to warp-speed my blog into modernity. Then I waited. And waited. And waited some more. 8 days, to be exact.

Finally I contacted the help desk at blogger/google and received some very fine assistance from God only knows whom. Whoever it was managed to restore my blog by sending it back to the Stone Age, where it will stay until blogger can iron the kinks out of its new version. Having experienced beta products before I cannot now imagine what could have possibly compelled me to make the switch in the first place, but I'll remember this lesson going forward. I hope.

So what has happened in the dark void that was my blog-free Beatles-approved-length week? Well, I hit a deer in our formerly brand-new car. The deer got very much the worse end of the transaction, but still, it wasn't pretty. She left a deer-head shaped indentation in our front right bumper, and the force of impact--we were going about 55, she about 5--dislodged the front right fender, jarring it back so that the passenger door no longer opens.

The good news, if anything related to this event can be considered good news, is that no human was injured, and that insurance companies apparently do not regard a collision with a deer as a collision. That's good because the collision deductible on our insurance is $500. This collision-like accident was deemed "other than collision," with a deductible of only $100. We did not trade insurance information with the deer--who, by the way, was clearly at fault--so I guess we'll have to cover the $100 out of our own pockets. Merry Christmas to me, indeed.

Not Quite "Now I've Seen Everything," But Probably in the Same Zip Code

2006-11-21T09:15:00.000-08:00

At the Costco today, prominently displayed on the book table, I saw the new Thomas Pynchon novel. The Costco, for those few unaware, is a giant discount warehouse. It's a Mitch Albom, not Thomas Pynchon, kind of place. Or so I thought.

Could anything have surprised me more? If Pynchon had been there doing a signing, perhaps. Or a Roland Barthes Deconstructor Set in the toy section, maybe. Otherwise, not much, I suspect.

North Carolina Promotes Early Learning Through Its ABC Stores

2006-11-11T10:57:00.000-08:00

The state of North Carolina believes that it is never too early to start one's education. Children here needn't wait for kindergarten to begin learning valuable language arts and mathematical skills, thanks to the many ABC Stores located throughout the state. As the name indicates, an ABC Store is a Golconda of early education.

Youngsters can practice their phonics at the ABC Store, sounding out such words as "Johnnie Walker Black" and "Maker's Mark," all of which are conveniently printed in large, appealing fonts on the labels of bottles displayed throughout. Advanced learners can take a stab at a foreign language, practicing such important vocablary words as Jägermeister and Metaxa.

Math skills are not neglected at our ABC Stores. The store is full of opportunities for youngsters to practice their times table for 2. The little shavers simply locate the "percent by alcohol" information on a bottle label (identifying and finding pertinent information--another valuable skill!) and multiply it by two to calculate the proof. The correct answer is printed right on the label, so the kiddos can check their own work. Those with advanced math skills can stand by the register and practice both adding decimals that end in .99 and calculating the sales tax on their running sums.

Best of all, by observing the customers, children learn what grownups who drink too much look like. This is a proven effective deterrent to alcohol abuse.

Old Folks Boogie

2006-11-06T15:18:00.000-08:00

With all the talk of Little Feat here lately, it seemed a good time to re-post my review of a June 2006 Little Feat show. This originally posted at my now-abandoned blog at myspace.com. The review is followed with proof positive that every word of it is true, that proof being an absolutely killer Lowell George-led version of Fat Man in the Bathtub.

It's not fair to compare the modern-day Little Feat to the Little Feat of old, I know. The old Little Feat was one of those rare bands that could achieve sublimity, but it did so mostly because a genius with a voice to die for and a slide guitar style second only to Duane Allman's was front and center. That genius was Lowell George, and he is of course gone nearly 30 years now.

Still, I'm not really sure how else I could have approached the Little Feat show I saw last night. The Little Feat I love is the Little Feat of Lowell George. Truth be told, Lowell George is what I loved about Little Feat; the rest of the band I could take or leave. There's nothing wrong with the rest of the band, mind you, but Lowell George was one of those gifted individuals who shone in a way that highlighted the mortal-ness of those around him. He was a Mozart surrounded by a bunch of Salieris.

Obviously a band that loses a guy like Lowell George has taken a pretty big hit. Lowell was not only an electrifying guitarist but also a wonderfully soulful singer who could switch from sexy laid-back croon to high-voltage blues growl without missing a beat. The new Little Feat doesn't have anyone who can touch Lowell as a singer. They've tried to replace him with two people: longtime guitarist Paul Barrere, who does a passable low-volume soulful vocal, and Shaun Murphy, a relatively recent addition, who is supposed to add the pyrotechnics. My wife described her perfectly: she sounds like the singer in a beer commercial.

The results were mixed. There were moments of abject misery, the worst of which was when Shaun Murphy grabbed "On the Way Down" by the throat and slung it to the ground, then kicked it repeatedly. When Lowell George sang this song, he communicated a wisdom borne of world-weariness; it's a good song that he makes great with his vocal. When Shaun Murphy sang it, she communicated "I have a great voice, and I'm going to let everyone here know it." Yuck. Another such moment came when Paul Barrere stepped to the mike to sing "Fat Man in the Bathtub." Lowell sang this one at the top of his range, and the result was hair-standing-on-the-back-of-your-neck exhilarating. Barrere sang it an octave lower, like it was quiet-sing time just before lights out at sleepover camp. The band had been really rolling along, but as soon as he started singing the tires quickly deflated.

The 30-minute "Dixie Chicken," with a thoroughly unnecessary interlude into "Tennessee Jed" and countless, endless solos, was a bit much, as was the turgid 8-minute version of "Willin'." And yet there were moments last night, often when the band was jamming out, that the new Little Feat showed itself to be a great band. Barrere and Fred Tackett (the other guitarist, a guy who has played with absolutely everyone) are both very good players, and occasionally Barrere would whip out the slide and play some Lowell-style licks. I wonder whether it bothers him to channel a ghost, to give the people what they want by erasing himself and mimicking a guy so long gone; I suspect it might because he didn't give the audience too much of it, but when he did the energy of the show kicked up several ticks and the audience responded accordingly. And much of the show was a lot of fun, even if it didn't ascend the level of high art. The new Little Feat has the same funky rhythm section as the old Little Feat, and they can lay down a pretty good groove.

As negative as much of this may sound, I really enjoyed myself last night. My friend Jon Shain opened the show and played very well; he got a very warm response from the crowd--I was really happy for him. It was fun to take a walk down memory lane with a band that was so closely associated with the Baltimore-Washington area where I grew up, and it was lovely to hear "Sailin Shoes" played live one more time. Still, when I woke up this morning, the disc I popped into the player was Lowell George's solo album Thanks I'll Eat it Here. It's got to be a bitch to live your life in the shadow of someone else's greatness.

Join My Protest Against the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

2006-11-02T15:53:00.000-08:00

Well, the list of this year's nominees for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame is out, and once again Cheap Trick is conspicuously absent. Adding insult to injury, the Hall snubbed the long-toothed lads of Rockford, IL while potentially opening its venerable vestibules to, among others, Chic.

This madness must end, and it must end now. I don't feel strongly enough about this to go on a hunger strike, I must confess, but I am willing to go on a diet, which is pretty close. I invite you to join me in this temperate crusade. Simply recite the following oath--"Until Cheap Trick is granted its rightful place in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, I swear to eat only sensible portions of healthy foods"--and then do it! We will be lean and we will be righteously angry.

Might not be such a bad idea for the guys in the band to join us. You know, so they'll look good for their induction.

PS I will start my protest--which I am terming a "hunger job action," as should you--on Sunday, right after the 'Homage to Pork' dinner party I had, unfortunately, already planned for Saturday night.

The Impressionists

2006-10-26T10:51:00.000-07:00

Have you noticed that the art of impersonation has died? Sure, satirical programs like Saturday Night Live and MadTV build sketches around impressions of celebrities and politicians, so it cannot be said that the art form is entirely extinct. But whatever happened to folks like Rich Little, John Byner, David Frye, and Frank Gorshin, men whose entire acts consisted of dead-on mimicry of superstars like George Jessel, Eddie Cantor, and Martha Raye? (I sometimes wonder how much more I would have enjoyed these impressionists if I'd had any idea who the subjects of their parodies were. But I digress…)

These geniuses were the great impressionists, men of unfathomable skill in the art of apery. And although they are still remembered for their stage shows, what is not as well remembered is that many of these men were also impressionist painters, capable of rendering detail-perfect copies of the Great Masters.

Below, for example, is Rich Little's impression of Dejeuner Sur l'Herbe, Edouard Manet's masterpiece. The overall effect is uncanny, but note the subtle differences in tone from the original. These tonal shifts are Little's way of winking at the viewer, of telegraphing a playfulness ensconced in reverence much as nougat is ensconced in a Three Musketeers bar.

Next we see Frank Gorshin's impression of a self-portrait by Paul Cezanne. Study the background closely and you'll notice that Gorshin has incorporated the colors of his Riddler costume from the television show Batman. He did this in every painting; it is how curators today distinguish authentic Gorshins from forgeries.

Finally we consider a work by the last great impressionist, Andy Kaufman. Kaufman's stage work, as you no doubt recall, was marked by a post-modern sensibility; it provided a self-consciously self-conscious running commentary on itself, amusing to all but especially to those of us who were stoned. His painting is no different. His impression of the Raphael masterpiece The School of Athens, below, is in fact a reproduction of a work by Jackson Pollock.

What is Kaufman trying to say? No one really knows. But does it make you uncomfortable, causing you to laugh nervously? That's how you know it's an authentic Kaufman rather than a Kaufman impression impression. Or a Pollock, for that matter.

Sangfroid!

2006-10-24T17:01:00.000-07:00

I recently wrote a movie script dramatizing the creation of In Cold Blood, Truman Capote's masterpiece. I realize that this event has been well mined recently by the popular films Capote and Infamous, but I am not worried. My film, entitled Sangfroid!, is quite different from those films, and better. Here are some of the differences:

Sangfroid! is a musical.
In Sangfroid! the murders take place in exotic Paris, France, not in boring Kansas.
In Sangfroid!, Capote is accompanied by the entire Rat Pack.
In Sangfroid!, Capote has the powers of flight and x-ray vision.
Like another extremely popular movie, Sangfroid! is entirely in Aramaic.
At the end of Sangfroid!, Capote wakes up to discover that the whole movie was just a bad dream.

Ode to Durham, NC

2006-10-22T15:21:00.000-07:00

While driving home from Baltimore today, I started to get a little sentimental over my adoptive hometown of Durham, North Carolina. Prose seemed inadequate to the moment, so I composed this poem. Warning: You may need a hanky for this.

Ode to Durham

City of Medicine, my home, Durham
Send us your sick folks, we're gonna cure 'em
Head up to Hartford if you want to insure 'em
But I'm gonna stay right here in Durham

Jews are welcome here in Durham
Bring your grogger! Celebrate Purim!
On Shabbas our goyim can chauffeur 'em
We've got two shuls right here in Durham!

Living down in Raleigh is a capital idea
For rich folks, Chapel Hill's a residential panacea
But only one Triangle town can treat your pyorrhea
Durham! Durham! Citta di Medicina Mia!

Another Restaurant Idea

2006-10-19T17:59:00.000-07:00

A partial menu for The Offal Truth (slogan: "We've got guts!"):

Thymus in the Morning--a sweetbread omelet
Muscles Steamed in White Wine and Garlic
Tripe, Tripe Again--a serving of tripe, followed by a second serving of tripe
Palm of Heart--whole heart steamed in plasma, served in a palm leaf (or a monkey palm)
The Eyes of Texas--Eyeballs of Texas longhorn steer tartare, served with rice, beans, salsa and lots of hot sauce
Beef Wel-lung-ton--Beef tenderloin covered with pureed onion and mushroom and liver pate, then stuffed into an elephant's lung and roasted

...and for dessert...

Assorted Nuts

U Cd B a Mill ion aire

2006-10-17T07:16:00.000-07:00

Looking for a way to turn your extra thousands into millions? You are so in luck. I have been developing two can't-miss fast food chains and they are now almost ready for rollout. All that's missing is the capital to buy equipment, uniforms, and inventory, and to hire employees. And to pay for some advertising. Basically, what's missing is capital.

Of course you want to know more about these restaurants. Sure, my word isn't good enough for you, is it? Ingrate. I'm about to make you a millionaire and all you can do is whine "But what am I investing in? How do I know it's a can't-miss idea?" Fine, this ought to satisfy your morbid curiosity. Your future sources of unimaginable wealth are:

Le Grand Canard: Duck is the chicken of the future, and the future is upon us! Le Grand Canard is poised to exploit this trend; it sells confit of duck leg and duck a l'orange to go, packaged in spiffy Styrofoam containers emblazoned with the French flag. Sides include pommes frites and pommes Anna; for your convenience, the pommes frites have the mayonnaise cooked right into them--no need for dipping! Not that hungry? Try our grilled duck breast cutlet on a baguette and a soda cup full of field greens, dressed with industrial Dijon vinaigrette. The entire staff speaks French only but--here's the twist--is very friendly.

Risotto Hut: This concept presents some challenges, as risotto takes a long time to prepare and does not particularly enjoy sitting under a heat lamp for extended periods. The solution: service on the hour only. Customers are advised to arrive well before the hour mark (to beat the crowd!) and place their orders for one of the following: ground beef, lettuce, tomato, onion and ketchup risotto; fried chicken and mashed potato risotto; and taco risotto. Kids will love our mascot Beppo, the starch-shedding grain of Arborio rice. Beppo plays the accordion and dances to entertain the kiddies during the inevitable long waits.

If you are interested, send cash only (no checks!) to

Penis Enlargement Opportunity
PO Box 45208
Cayman Islands

Researchers Conclude Family Guy is Probably Supposed to be a Comedy

2006-10-10T06:25:00.000-07:00

Baltimore, MD--A cross-disciplinary team of experts at Johns Hopkins University has completed a year-long study of the television show Family Guy, concluding that the program "is probably supposed to be a comedy."

"For a long time we were thrown off the trail by the absence of humor," said Dr. Madeup Funnyname, who led the study. "Occasionally one of us would detect content that he believed was intended to be funny, but only one--never a quorum. And the parameters of the study clearly stated that content could not be classified 'humorous' except by majority decision.

"But then we realized that we weren't seeing the forest for the trees. I mean, it's a cartoon, right? Cartoons are usually funny. And there's the talking dog and the diabolic talking baby. These are leading indicators of the comedy genre. Also, the husband seems to be modeled after Homer Simpson, the main character in a program we are quite certain is a comedy.

"Finally, though, we arrived at our conclusion by process of elimination. Family Guy is clearly not science fiction or a police procedural. It's not a game show; we're certain of that, too. It's not engaging or compelling in any way, so that rules out drama.

"In the end, we had it narrowed down to either a comedy or a news program. At that point, frankly, we guessed."

The team will take a well-earned month off before tackling its next assignment: determining what exactly American Dad is.

My Last-Minute Bid For the Job of UN Secretary General

2006-10-09T17:20:00.000-07:00

I realize I am arriving a little late to the game here, seeing as the UN Security Council today nominated Ban Ki-moon to the position of UN Secretary General and that his ratification by the UN General Assembly is seen by most as a foregone conclusion. But wait: until his nomination is in fact ratified, the field is still theoretically wide open, right? So why not me?

Before the world just hands this plum gig to some guy you've never heard of, I think it should at least hear me out first. I have a lot of qualifications for this post, maybe even more than this Ban Ki-moon guy. After all:

I am a middle child. That means I have a lot of experience mediating disputes and finding the middle ground. Is Ban Ki-moon a middle child? I don't know; do you? And don't you think it's interesting that we don't know? What is Ban Ki-moon hiding?
This guy has "moon" in his name. Is he related to Sun Yung Moon? Wouldn't that be embarrassing if he was? My name is Meltzer. Worst-case scenario, I'm related to Brad Meltzer or Bernard Meltzer. Not too embarrassing.
I studied French for five years in high school. Granted, my French is a little rusty, but I'm sure I could brush it up in no time. Remember, it's not just French people who speak French. They speak French in parts of Africa and in Vietnam, and I'm pretty sure they speak it in other places too. So speaking French is probably an important skill for a UN Secretary General. Also, I studied Latin in college. Isn't that the official language of Vatican City? So I'd be able to talk to the leaders of the Catholic Church. They represent a lot of people! Again, very helpful.
I've got lots of time to do this job. I'm a musician and a writer. This keeps me busy but not that busy. Ban Ki-moon is a foreign minister and a diplomat. He is deeply involved in the six-way negotiations with North Korea. Also, I think he has kids. Seriously, how much time will he have to devote to being UN Secretary General? Whatever it is, I can devote more.

Look, all I'm saying is, before you pick this guy, at least consider my application first. I'd look really good in the crown. See? That's got to count for something.

CDC: Melisma Epidemic Officially Out of Control

2006-10-08T11:29:00.000-07:00

Atlanta, GA--The spread of melisma--a condition that afflicts only singers, causing them to sing multiple notes per syllable while spastically gesticulating with one hand--can no longer be controlled, according to officials at the Center for Disease Control in Atlanta.

"We thought we had successfully contained this to the R&B community, and quite honestly we back-burnered the situation," said Dr. Brains McNuggets, Center spokesperson. "In our defense, we have bigger problems to deal with: AIDS, anthrax, Alzheimer's… and that's just the A's."

For reasons unknown to any sane person, the condition--which is entirely voluntary--has spread from the R&B community to the international, folk, country, gospel and pop music communities. Center officials hypothesize that the origin of the contagion was Mariah Carey, although they also suspect that the popularity of American Idol has contributed greatly to the problem.

Melisma causes deterioration of the brain in afflicted singers, confusing them to the point that they believe that their singing sounds good. Worse, it has been known to cause blind rage and soul-crushing despair in the many millions of music listeners upon whom it is inflicted. "I'd guess maybe a half-dozen people a week drive straight off the road as a result of melisma on their radios," speculated Highway Patrolman Paul Foglino of Elmhurst, NY. "I've seen it and it ain't pretty. They're just screaming and pounding the steering wheel, and then--zoom!--over the guardrail they go. It makes road rage look like a frickin' tea party."

Under the circumstances, citizens might expect the Center for Disease Control to step up its efforts to contain the spread of melisma, but the Center has no such plans for the immediate future. "The government cut our budget pretty severely," explained McNuggets. "Said it was using the money to fund the War on Terror."

Citizen Tom Meltzer of Durham, NC is unimpressed with that explanation. "I haven't seen a single terrorist yet, but my ears are assaulted by melisma every damned day. If the government doesn't do something soon, I'm gonna have to start ripping some throats out."

Mariah Carey was unavailable for comment for this story.

Kenny Rogers' Made-For-TV Movies That Died in Development

2006-10-06T18:14:00.000-07:00

As an educated person who lived during the last half of the twentieth century, you are no doubt aware that Kenny Rogers as The Gambler was one of the highest rated made-for-television movies of all time. You probably also know that it spawned a successful franchise that yielded Kenny Rogers as The Gambler: The Adventure Continues, Kenny Rogers as The Gambler Part III: The Legend Continues, The Gambler Returns: The Luck of the Draw, and Gambler V: Playing For Keeps. You may even have heard that Kenny Rogers as The Gambler VI: The Adventure of the Legend Returns and Continues… On Christmas! is currently in post-production.

But did you know that the success of these Kenny Rogers vehicles generated a side industry of writers and producers who developed other projects based on Rogers' songs? None of these works, sadly, ever reached production. However, while rummaging through Mr. Rogers' garbage the other day (I am Kenny Rogers' A.J. Webberman, as you probably know) I found the following pitch memos along with Rogers' personal assistant's notes for those projects, which I now share with you.

Kenny Rogers as The Coward of the County: A comedy in which Rogers pretends to be a coward so that, when the fighting starts, he can slip off and cat around with all the town wives. His plan seems foolproof…until a newcomer to town (Glen Campbell) starts using the exact same ruse! Laughs follow other laughs as Rogers decides how to dispose of this pesky interloper. With Dan Haggerty as the sheriff.
Reason rejected: Rogers had already appeared (in a secondary role) in a movie called Coward of the County. Also, Rogers cannot do comedy.

Kenny Rogers as Ruby's Husband: Rogers is a war invalid whose wounds have left him immobile, deaf and speechless. And they are killing him, slowly. Think it can't get any worse? Wrong!!! Because he can still see, he has to watch his wife Ruby (Dolly Parton) as she paints up her lips, rolls and curls her tinted hair, and otherwise prepares to take her love to town every night. The bulk of the movie consists of Rogers' fantasies, in which he imagines numerous gruesome ways of killing his wife. Finally he dies, but not before making peace with his maker (in an extended final sequence, the Lord not only accepts Rogers to heaven but also promises to inflict Ruby with a very painful and hard-to-treat STD). With Erik Estrada as Ruby's paramour.
Reason rejected: Way too depressing. Also, Rogers cannot do tragedy.

Kenny Rogers as The Life Decorator: Kenny is a true interior decorator, an angel whose intercessions decorate his beneficiaries' interior lives. Later rewritten, re-pitched and produced as Highway to Heaven, and then later still as Touched By an Angel. With Gary Coleman as "the feisty kid in the wheelchair."
Reason rejected: Kinda gay. Also, Rogers cannot do melodrama.

Kenny Rogers as Lady: Kenny Rogers is a drag queen who stands to inherit ten million dollars from a great-uncle (Jumpin' Bill Carlisle), but only if he'll "go straight" and get married. With Liza Minelli as "Mrs. Lady."
Reason rejected: Way too gay. Also, Rogers cannot do gay.

Kenny Rogers as The Guy Who Just Checked In To See What Condition His Condition Was In: Kenny is a stoned-out slacker who gets involved in the kidnapping of the wife of a wealthy man who also just so happens to be named Kenny Rogers. The wealthy Kenny Rogers (Porter Waggoner) hires stoner Rogers to deliver the ransom, but Rogers screws it all up and mayhem ensues. With Jim Belushi as Kenny's pal Walter.
Reason rejected:First Edition refused to reunite to record updated version of hit.

Kenny Rogers as Reuben James: Rogers is a black sharecropper who adopts an abandoned white boy. His best friend (Charlie Pride) disapproves.
Reason rejected:Technical challenges insurmountable. Also, Rogers cannot do black.

Kim Chimma-Chi, Kim Chimma-Chi, Kimchi Chigae

2006-10-04T16:54:00.000-07:00

I love Durham, my adoptive hometown, but I can't deny that occasionally it comes up a little short in comparison to my former home, New York City. Fortunately, Durham is catching up. No one would mistake the Durham skyline for Manhattan's--or even for an actual skyline, for that matter--but many of the great amenities of Yankee living are slowly but surely insinuating themselves here.

Case in point: until recently, there was not a single decent Korean restaurant in town. Now there are two within a half a mile of each other. Better still, one is attached to a grocery store that specializes in Korean ingredients (more on that in a bit). Now, I love Korean food but I'm no connoisseur. So are these restaurants as good as Kum Gang San, the place Lisa and I used to frequent in Flushing? You will have to ask someone more expert than I. They are good enough, and I am very happy.

Since discovering these places, Lisa and I have paid several visits, and they got me to thinking about trying to prepare some of these dishes at home. I was especially intrigued by the unique flavors of Korean cooking. What are they? To find out, I set out to prepare a typical Korean dish, Kimchi Chigae (Kimchi Stew to us 'Murkins).

To my happy surprise, this turned out to be an easy dish, one that requires a minimum of preparation and comes together very quickly. I chose it pretty much at random but I doubt I could have selected a better jumping-off point for my Korean cuisine adventure. Thanks to the store next door to Durham's Vit Goal Tofu (#1 in Korean tofu soups!!!!!), I had no trouble finding the few exotic ingredients listed below; these (i.e. kochujang and kochukaru) turn out to be the flavor base of many of my favorite fiery Korean dishes.

Kimchi Chigae

4 hearty servings

1 lb. fatty meat (pork belly is traditional, but beef stew cubes, skirt steak, etc. will do), sliced into little shreds, 1" long and a few millimeters thick
2-3 tablespoons kochujang (Korean chili paste--it comes in a red-pepper colored tub)
2 tablespoons soy sauce
1 tablespoon minced garlic
1 cup cabbage kimchi, chopped into 1/2" to 1" segments
4 cups water
2 tablespoons kochukaru (Korean red pepper powder)
6 - 8 ounces bean sprouts
12 ounces silky tofu, sliced to fit easily into a soup spoon
2 scallions, cut into 1/2" dice
3 Korean peppers, chopped
salt and pepper to taste

1) Heat a stockpot over medium-high heat. Toss in the meat and stir so that it doesn't stick. It should start to give off enough fat that no extra fat is necessary. If it starts to stick, drizzle in a tablespoon of oil. Cook for about a minute.
2) Combine the kochujang and the soy sauce, then drizzle it into the pot. Stir, using the liquid to loosen any bits that are stuck to the bottom of the pan. Cook for a minute, until the meat looks pretty well cooked.
3) Add the water and the kimchi. Bring it all to a boil, then reduce to a simmer. Stir in the kochukaru and bean sprouts. Increase heat if necessary to resume simmer.
4) Cook for 20 minutes, then slide in tofu. Cook for another ten minutes. Add scallions, Korean peppers, salt and pepper. Stir, cook for another minute. Serve with sushi rice.

This dish will fill your belly and clear your sinuses!

News Flash: Vocabulary Podcaster Makes Vocabulary Error During Podcast

2006-10-01T13:20:00.000-07:00

In a previous post I noted that I recently did an interview about The Princeton Review Vocabulary Minute, the podcast I create, and that during that interview I made a vocabulary error; I invited folks to identify it.

I am now officially annoyed by my own coyness in the matter and so will 'fess up. I said I lead a pretty hermetic existence

hermetic |hərˈmetik| adjective 1 (of a seal or closure) complete and airtight : a hermetic seal that ensures perfect waterproofing. • insulated or protected from outside influences : a hermetic society. 2 (also Hermetic) of or relating to an ancient occult tradition encompassing alchemy, astrology, and theosophy. • esoteric; cryptic : obscure and hermetic poems.

when of course I should have said I lead a pretty hermitic existence

hermit |ˈhərmit| noun 1 a person living in solitude as a religious discipline. • any person living in solitude or seeking to do so. 2 a hummingbird found in the shady lower layers of tropical forests, foraging along a regular route. • Phaethornis and other genera, family Trochilidae: several species.
DERIVATIVES hermitic |hərˈmitik| adjective

Thus ends this hermeneutic entry.

Sure Don't Feel Like Love

2006-09-29T13:45:00.000-07:00

I've been enjoying Paul Simon's latest album, Surprise, since its release in the spring. One song in particular, "Sure Don't Feel Like Love," has really hit home.

I registered to vote today
Felt like a fool
Had to do it anyway
Down at the high school
Thing about the second line
You know, "felt like a fool?"
People say it all the time
Even when it's true
So, who's that conscience sticking on the sole of my shoe?
Who's that conscience sticking on the sole of my shoe?
Cause it sure don't feel like love

There's an important life message in there, although it's pretty obscure until you hear Simon explain it, as he did in an online-only bonus interview with NPR back when the album was released. Here's what he said:

"[I got a chance to speak with this guru-type guy and ask him] what actually is going on, because the stuff I'm saying to myself sometimes, it's pretty nasty, and it's interfering with… a lot of stuff." … And he said, "You know, that's a very typical thing… There's this inner voice that's extremely harsh, and very arrogant, and very negative. And because you hear it from inside you, you think it's true… but it's not really true. And this is my trick: Take a voice that you think is very funny…. say, Bugs Bunny, and take that voice and put it on the sole of your shoe, and then say all these negative things you have to say and let it come from that place, and then you'll have the perspective on how much you should pay attention to that."

If you're anything like me, this voice speaks to you way too often. It likes to remind you of embarrassing things you did an hour ago, yesterday, a month ago, or 5 or 30 years ago. (Next time you see me spontaneously wince, you'll know why.) Sometimes it even tries to embarrass you over something that's not even remotely embarrassing--say, registering to vote.

Now there's nothing wrong with a little shame--Lord knows there are some very powerful people in our nation's capital who could stand to have a lot more of it--but it's also nice to have a way to cope with it when it starts getting annoying. Let it speak to you in the voice of Sylvester the Cat, or Foghorn Leghorn, or Pee-Wee Herman. Then, like a piece of gum stuck to the bottom of your shoe, stamp on it and scrape it off when it gets to be too much.

So, Paul, if that voice doesn't feel like love, what does?

Some chicken and a corn muffin well that feels more like love

Amen, man. As the Zen Buddhist said when asked to sum up his religion in one sentence: "Eat when you're hungry, sleep when you're tired." Sometimes simple is the most profound.

I Me Mine

2006-09-28T17:04:00.000-07:00

Sick of reading my writing about myself? Surf over here to listen to me talk about myself for a while! The link takes you to a podcast about podcasts--how postmodern is that?--on which I am, of course, discussing The Princeton Review Vocabulary Minute, which I create. The podcast is called The Variety Show.

PS A CD of vocabulary songs to the first person who points out the vocabulary error I make in the interview. Hint: I was only off by one letter.

Dylan You Been On My Mind

2006-09-26T14:45:00.000-07:00

OK, I still haven't come around to Modern Times, although I plan to give it a few more listens before filing it permanently in the "never listen to again" pile. However, I would be remiss if I didn't mention all the good work Dylan has done this year; namely, his DJing of Theme Time Radio Hour, which I just recently discovered. I've been downloading and listening to these things and I have to say they're fantastic; each one is like a mixed tape from your geekiest music-geek friend. Zimmy's got great taste in tunes, that's for sure. Also, his radio demeanor reminds me of the late, great Mitch Hedberg. That's nice too.

Listening to and assimilating Dylan's modern-day croak reminds me of just how many different voices the guy has employed throughout his career. Below, my ranking of Dylan's voices, from best to worst:

1. Woodstock Dylan (Basement Tapes, JWH, New Morning, sessions with Leon Russell, Blood on the Tracks)
2. Finding My Folkie Voice Dylan (Times, Another Side)
3. Hortatory Dylan (Before the Flood and Rolling Thunder Tours)
4. Amphetamine Dylan a/k/a Rollercoaster Dylan (Bringing It All Back Home - Blonde on Blonde)
5. Producer Made Me Blow My Nose Dylan (1989's Oh Mercy) [see list item #9]
6. Dudley Do-Right Dylan (Nashville Skyline, Self Portrait)
7. Woody Guthrie Wannabe Dylan (first few albums)
8. Dirty Old Man Dylan (Time Out of Mind to present)
9. Adenoidal Dylan (Budokan through early 1990s)

Voices 1 through 7 are all pretty good. Number 8 is tough going, mostly because it's hard to figure out what he's singing but also because it limits him to about a four-step range, rendering melody unlikely. Voice 9 is unlistenable.

The Pleasures of the Music Business

2006-09-25T09:53:00.000-07:00

OK, I was tempted to leave this space blank--see, because that would be funny--but as luck would have it, I received some BMI checks today. Apparently an XM station is playing some of the old 5 Chinese Brothers' tracks. I won't be making a special trip to the bank on their account because the cost of the gasoline would put a serious dent in my windfall. But hey, next time I'm out and about anyway, I will certainly stop at the bank to cash these checks, and that will put a nice jingle in my pocket. My gum budget for 2006 is now officially covered. So there's a pleasure of the music business, and now I know that the pleasures of 'the biz' number at least one.

Speaking of music, I performed yesterday at the Carrboro Music Festival, and it was a great experience. I had a really wonderful crowd and I played pretty well, if I do say so myself. Plus I had a nice shvitz, as the owners of the room I was playing in had thoughtfully turned off the AC. At one point I asked whether someone from the audience wouldn't mind splashing some water on the rocks because the heat was getting a little dry. More funny!

I must admit that I'd forgotten how wearing it is to perform. I started the show determined to give my most committed performance, investing every note and lyric with just the right care and intensity. And I pulled it off to my own satisfaction for a few songs. But then I really started to wear down. It was like that old boxing video game where you'd take one punch to the head and all the sudden your energy level would go from full to almost empty. I finished fine but I definitely had to throw it into cruise control for some songs, which bothers me--I doubt the difference even registered with the audience, but I knew the difference, and it brought back unpleasant memories of tours in which I played the same set every night 5 or 6 nights a week, often in that same cruise-control mode. It takes a good bit of the fun and excitement out of performing if you can't stay 'in the moment.'

Anyway, thanks to everyone who turned out for making it such a great day. And thanks to the many fabulous performers Lisa and I have seen recently who never seem to wear down, who always keep it fresh, committed and intense. Folks like Glenn Tilbrook, Dave Alvin, Robbie Fulks and Terry Anderson and the Olympic Ass Kicking Team, just to name a few: you guys are my rock and roll heroes.

Bob Dylan's Modern Times

2006-09-23T11:45:00.000-07:00

Is there anyone else out there who finds Dylan's new album a total snooze? So many critics have fallen over themselves to proclaim this a masterpiece that it's got me clicking my flashlight, asking myself whether it's me or them that's insane. (Clever little Dylan allusion there, huh?)

Consider this my unqualified dissent. The songs on Modern Times are interminable, the melodies are derivative or amateurish, and the backing tracks are a mess of first-take noodling and comping. Dylan's singing has never really bothered me before (OK, it kind of bothered me in the 80s when he was singing entirely through his nose), but now it's a weird little croak that makes it difficult to decipher the lyrics. Which, given the lack of melodies and decent playing on this album, would be the only redeeming aspect of the record. What lyrics I can make out sound like Dylan reading his notebooks; there's no discernable shape or direction to any of the songs.

The songs are so all-over-the-place that I was beginning to suspect that there was no editing involved in the songwriting for Modern Times. If something was written, by God it was going to end up somewhere on the album. However, my research has led to the discovery that there was some editing in the songwriting process. It was minor, to be sure--a single couplet was excised from one song--but it was an edit nonetheless. Having unearthed the missing couplet, I present it here for your edification:

Every couplet I wrote wound up in one of these songs
That's why each track on this album is so ungodly long!

I got this album about the same time I got Dion's Bronx in Blue. Both are blues-infused albums by veteran geniuses of rock. But only one is a joy and a revelation, and it ain't Zimmy's, babe. No, no, no.

PS There is someone else out there: this guy, and his take on the album is quite astute. Check it out.

Horn Toots

2006-09-21T11:28:00.000-07:00

Customers at iTunes have been saying some very nice things about The Princeton Review Vocabulary Minute, a Schoolhouse Rock-like podcast that I write, perform and produce. I shamelessly present some of the nicest comments below.

If the SATs are a worry, then I suggest PRVM. It's brilliantly composed and terribly funny as well.

Of the vocabulary podcasts I've listened to, this one is the best by far. You will get the songs stuck in your mind…

I think these songs are very well written--both musically and actual content. When I first heard them, I thought they would be perfect for use in a classroom that teaches students who are learning English. The vocabulary is so valuable and the song is catchy. Love it!

I expected to get a vocab review out of this podcast, but the songs are also great from a musical standpoint. I keep some of them on my iPod because I like the songs….

Like Schoolhouse Rock--Only FREE! I am a child of the 70s and love SHR, so I was skeptical when I stumbled upon this, but for the life of me I can't think of a single negative thing to say about it! They are nice and short and catchy. It makes you smile to hear it and it is great for ALL ages.

I am an AVID Elective Teacher and I was looking for an effective way to teach my students vocabulary. Songs such as the Princeton Review Orchestra composes are excellent for teaching my students new vocabulary. I have tried many things before but this is by far THE most effective method and my students LOVE IT! THANK YOU! and BRAVO!

That's the sort of thing that will swell your head, huh? No wonder my hat's suddenly so tight. BTW, is it just me or does the phrase "tooting someone's horn" sound like a sexual euphemism to other folks too?

Speaking of getting your horn tooted, check this out: The local daily newspaper has designated my set at the Carrboro Music Festival this Sunday a "must see." Wee hah, ain't no hat big enough to fit my head now!

Sweet and Spicy Chicken with Mushrooms

2006-09-19T17:33:00.000-07:00

Stir-frying basics
1) Cut meat and veggies into uniform bite-size pieces
2) Marinate meat for 10-15 minutes in seasonings and a little cornstarch
3) Assemble aromatics (garlic, ginger, fermented black beans, etc.)
4) Mix a sauce
5) Heat the wok over high heat until it starts to smoke
6) Swirl in oil, add aromatics, cook for 30 seconds to a minute, stirring occasionally to prevent burning
7) Add meat, sear on one side for one minute, then stir regularly thereafter
8) Add vegetables as meat approaches doneness
9) Add sauce, stir to mix
10) Serve over rice, noodles, bean thread, etc.

Once you've got this system down, you can throw together a stir fry with just about any ingredients you like. Tonight I marinated 1 pound of cut-up chicken breast meat in 1 tablespoon of garlic chili sauce, 1 tablespoon of hoisin sauce, and 1 teaspoon of cornstarch. Then I sliced and set aside some white button mushrooms. For aromatics I grated 2" of ginger root, sliced two cloves of garlic, and minced 1 serrano chile. For sauce, 2 tablespoons of soy sauce and 2 tablespoons Shaoxing cooking sherry. I cooked using the method outlined above and served over jasmine rice. The whole process took less than a half hour and the results were excellent. Don't believe me? Just look!

'Light' jambalaya

2006-09-17T18:17:00.000-07:00

Gravity has intensified. That's one possible explanation for the results my bathroom scale is produceing of late. Another is that I'm porking out.

Just to be on the safe side--in case it's me and not gravity that's getting heavy--I'm going to try to lighten up my cooking.

Tonight's experiment in that vein: jambalaya. Jambalaya is a rice dish that starts with a sweat of celery, onions, and carrots, followed by the browning of whatever meat you plan to include. Next, rice is added and stirred to coat with the various fats in the pot. Finally some water or stock is added and the whole thing is set to simmer until the rice is cooked.

For this light version, I tried a few tricks to reduce calories without entirely forfeiting flavor. First, I cooked the vegetables in about an eighth-inch of chicken stock rather than in oil or butter. Next, I used chicken sausage and skinless chicken breast meat (sprinkled with Tony Chachere Cajun Seasoning) rather than the tastier, higher-calorie andouille sausage and dark meat options. These, of course, braised rather than browned, but the important thing was, they cooked. Finally, I cut down on the amount of meat included: just a pound of chicken and maybe 3/4 pound of sausage for 2 cups of rice.

I won't lie to you; Paul Proudhomme it was not. But it was reasonably tasty and a lot healthier than what Paul would have whipped up. Between the Tony Chachere and the chicken stock I cooked the rice in, the sodium content was probably through the roof, but hey, one culinary hurdle at a time, right? This dish probably clocks in around 400 calories per serving, which ain't too bad.

Light Jambalaya
serves 8, at least

1 medium onion, diced fine
3 stalks celery, diced fine
2 carrots, diced fine
3/4 pound Amy's Chicken Andouille sausage
1 pound boneless skinless chicken breast, cut into 1/2 inch thick slices (seasoned liberally with Tony Chachere's Cajun seasoning)
36 - 40 ounces of chicken stock
2 cups long grain white rice
1 bunch of scallions, sliced thin, white parts only
pepper, garlic salt, herbes de Provence

Heat 4 ounces or so of chicken stock in a stock pot. When simmering, add the vegetables. Cook down until translucent and limp. Season with pepper and garlic salt. Add sausage, stir through. Add chicken breast, stir through, let cook until chicken meat starts to turn white. Add rice, stir through, add 32 ounces of chicken stock. Season with a scant palmful of herbes de Provence, crumbled by hand. Bring to a boil, stir, cover, reduce heat to simmer, and cook 20 minutes. Remove from heat, stir in scallions, and serve.

photo taken at the 3D House of Jambalaya

Beef Shank Taquitos

2006-09-16T10:00:00.000-07:00

I used to post this blog at myspace.com. I generally travel light, but I've decided to bring a few of the best posts of the last nine months along with me. Over the next week or so I'll be posting selections from The Best of Man of Constant Leisure.

This was just an experiment, but one that went so right that I want to share it. Also figured if I put this recipe up here, I'd know where to find it when I want to make this again. You know that poor sap who sings "MacArthur Park," the one who whines "I'll never have that recipe again"? I don't want to wind up like that guy.

The concept is pretty simple, really. I was at the local Mexican grocer the other day and noticed beef shanks at the butcher's counter. Now, I've prepared veal shanks plenty of times for osso bucco, and I make braised lamb shanks fairly regularly, but I don't recall ever having seen beef shanks before, or seeing much about them in cookbooks. Still, they looked pretty and they were cheap, so I figured 'What the hey? A shank's a shank. Slow cooking ought to do the trick.'

I seasoned the shanks with salt and pepper, browned them well on both sides in a stainless steel skillet, and removed them from the pan. Then I deglazed with a little bit of beer and tossed in one large onion, diced fine, and sauteed that until it was golden and translucent. I chonked in a palmful of chopped cilantro, a couple of minced chipotles and a teaspoon or so of adobo sauce, two cloves of garlic (crushed), the rest of the can of beer, and the shanks. I brought the liquid to a simmer, then covered and reduced the heat and let it cook for 2 hours.

The shanks were done after two hours but there was still a lot of liquid remaining, so I removed the shanks from the skillet and turned the heat up high to reduce. About 10 minutes of cooking reduced it to a good sauce consistency. I then chopped the shanks up fine and threw the meat back into the pan and tossed to coat with the sauce. I served them in corn tortillas with pico de gallo, Mexican crema, and some salsa verde that, shamefully, I did not make from scratch. It came in a can that looks like this:

By the way: the product pictured above is great, but someone ought to tell the folks at La Costena that salsa verde sounds a whole lot more appetizing than "Green Mexican Sauce." Don't even want to think about the green Mexicans that went into making this product. Blech.

Anyway, give the shanks a try and tell me what you think. I served this with some pan fried sweet plantains, which are always good.

Somewhat remarkable moments (part 1 of a series)

2006-09-15T06:48:00.000-07:00

I used to post this blog at myspace.com. I generally travel light, but I've decided to bring a few of the best posts of the last nine months along with me. Over the next week or so I'll be posting selections from The Best of Man of Constant Leisure.

Not long after we arrived in Durham, NC, the local free alternative weekly ran a contest that asked readers to write haikus expressing their desire to sumo wrestle. The prize awarded the two best submissions: the privilege of sumo wrestling between the 6th and 7th innings of an upcoming Durham Bulls game. Those unfamiliar with the game of baseball may not know that sumo wrestling is integral to the pagentry of the contest, as too are Ants in the Pants/Termites in the Trousers, Baby Buggy Derby and Wool E. Bull Fires T-Shirts Out of a Giant Hot Dog and into the Stands. At least they are in Durham, NC.

I enjoy a good haiku as much as the next fellow, so I immediately set pencil to paper and composed the following:

My bland, pudgy frame
Shrouds a feral endomorph
Aching to sumo

This was deemed one of the two best haikus submitted, and so it was that I suited up and tangled with another bespectacled, underexercised, typical-reader-of-free-weekly-alternative-newspapers-and-occasional-haiku-writer guy like myself, whom I dispatched two falls to one. The best part of the event was when the on-field announcer read the two winning haikus over the PA. You could actually hear the sound of 5,000 people scratching their heads simultaneously when he read my entry. None of us, myself included, was entirely sure how to pronounce feral.

Here I am on that night of glory. This photo was taken before the bout, hence the intimidating grimace.

photo by the missus

I got an iMac

2006-09-13T18:51:00.000-07:00

It takes pictures!
Me as Jay Leno

Hallucinogenic wife

When I get old

Frz. Yellow Eel Strip

2006-09-13T07:19:00.000-07:00

I used to post this blog at myspace.com. I generally travel light, but I've decided to bring a few of the best posts of the last nine months along with me. Over the next week or so I'll be posting selections from The Best of Man of Constant Leisure. This entry was originally posted in January 2006.

Some day you may find yourself browsing in your local Asian grocery, and there you may stumble across a product called "Frz. Yellow Eel Strip" in the freezer section. Your mind may happily wander back to some eel sushi you enjoyed once, or you may remember a delicious braised eel dish you had at a Korean restaurant. And at that point, you may be tempted to purchase the package of "Frz. Yellow Eel Strip" and attempt to work a little Asian magic in your home kitchen.

Here is what the package looks like. Remember it well. Remember also that no matter how delirious your memories of those previous eel dishes are, the product in this bag will not help you relive them. Perhaps the $2.20 price tag should have been a tip off that culinary heaven was not herein contained.

"Frz. Yellow Eel Strip," as its name readily communicates to all but the thickest headed (i.e. myself), does not contain whole pieces of eel. Rather, it contains thin strips of eel that look way, way, way too much like worms. They look so much like worms that I was immediately tempted to throw this product in the garbage, or go fishing with it. But I instead pressed forward; I'm not one to waste $2.20, no sir. Also, it didn't look as though it would kill me.

The packaging for "Frz. Yellow Eel Strip" suggests helpfully that you cut these long, wormy strips into 1 1/2"-long wormy strips. This provides an opportunity for you to handle "Frz. Yellow Eel Strip" for a while before ingesting it. Hooray! More important, it renders the strips bite-sized, which ultimately proves quite helpful (for reasons that will soon become clear).

I heated a little sesame oil to smoking, then threw my bait into the pan; my jasmine rice, resembling no particular invertebrate, bubbled away in another pot. I let those guys cook well–there was no way in hell I was eating these things undercooked–tossing occasionally to make sure they were all cooked through. There was another method to this madness; most of the eel dishes I've enjoyed in restaurants seemed to have been slightly caramelized, and I was hoping to achieve the same effect here. Despairing of the wormy bits' ever reaching edibility on their own, I eventually spiked the dish with some light soy sauce and some Shaoxing cooking sherry. Ginger, scallions, and ten pounds of shrimp would all have helped the dish considerably, but alas I had none of these ingredients available.

Finally the moment of truth arrived: the rice was done, the eel was at least done. I mixed them up and piled it all on a plate. With the first bite I discovered the genius of cutting the eel into bite-size pieces: I didn't have to actually look at the food to shovel it into my mouth! And so, with the most recent New Yorker spread out before me, I dispatched this plate of food bellyward, and, truth be told, it was actually pretty tasty.

But I will never, ever prepare it again.

9/11

2006-09-12T10:33:00.000-07:00

I lived in New York City for 20 years. When I lived there, I had this recurring nightmare. It started with the air growing electric and people starting to panic. Then I would turn to look at a clock that was running quickly backwards to midnight. I would usually wake up in a sweat just before the clock struck 12, which I somehow knew meant that a nuke was about to be dropped in midtown. Occasionally the dream would last long enough for me to see the mushroom cloud.

I suspect most New Yorkers have some version of this dream. They know that their hometown has a big bull's eye on it, and they've known it since long before 9/11. It's part of daily life there, part of what makes the place insane and wonderful. There's something empowering in knowing that you live in a place so important that it--along with Washington DC--is the place our enemies would like to hit most. There's also something ridiculously stressful about it.

That stressfulness is part of what compelled me and Lisa to leave New York in 1999. We were ready to live in a place that was simply a great place to live; we didn't have to be at the center of the cultural universe any more, so it was time for us to cede our spot to someone hungrier for all that the city has to offer. We left a lot of good friends behind, and that was probably the hardest part of leaving.

One of those friends--Lisa's closest--was visiting us in North Carolina on September 11, 2001. That day was a blur, a combination of short spurts of frenzied activity (trying to reach friends and family in the city, rebooking Lisa's friend's trip back to NYC--I even got a call in to work that morning and had an editor describe the scene from her Varrick Street office window in the West Village) with long, dumbfounded stretches in front of the television, watching the crash and the collapses replayed over and over.

By late afternoon we'd made all the calls that were going to get through (not many) and watched as much news as we could stand, so we headed over to our favorite barbecue place for a meal and a break. It was a strange experience. The restaurant was just going about its business as usual: the radio was playing music in the background, folks were eating and laughing… it could have been any day of the year. Americans have made a big show of rallying behind New York and declaring their solidarity with the city since that day, but on 9/11 I got a real sense of how most of the rest of the country views New York City. To them it's practically a foreign location, a city whose allure is incomprehensible and whose misfortunes are remote from their daily lives. Carolinians were concerned and compassionate on 9/11--one of my neighbors, bless her, brought by some homemade muffins to console us on what she knew was an especially trying day--but there was also a general attitude of “That's the sort of thing that could never happen here, and that's why I'm glad I live here and why I'd never live there!”

I realized that day that there's a part of me that thinks exactly like a Carolinian, that you'd have to be nuts to want to live in a place like that. New York City is ridiculously expensive and it smells like baked piss in the summer and in the winter the wind cuts right through you and the people are not exactly what you'd call friendly and you take your life in your hands whenever you cross a street or drive a car or entrust your safety to a taxicab driver…. and on top of all that, some very bad people would like to blow it to smithereens. And still, Lisa and I miss New York a lot. We miss our friends and the long walks through Manhattan and the incredible restaurants and shops and the museums and the parks and the awesome energy of the place and the people who overfill it. There'll always be a part of me that considers New York City home; I lived there too long and have too many close friends there for that to ever change. If we each made six figures, maybe we'd think about moving back.

Then again, I haven't had that nightmare since we left. So maybe not.