Murphy's Law

People who are a lot smarter and more business-savvy than I am (which admittedly is not saying much) have asked me if I have Google Analytics for this site. I tell them that I’m sure I should, but it sounds so…analytical. After all, this is a not-for-profit endeavor and I’m not terribly interested in demographics. Perhaps this stance would soften if I actually understood the implications. I have, for instance, learned in recent days that people in Chiang Mai read (and endorse) this blog. I know, from the messages I am always happy to receive, that people I know (and people I’ve never met) read and are occasionally moved by my writing. What else is there that needs to be said?

According to the “Site Stats” (which I have to trust since my friend and guru JB initially made me aware of them), this blog has been visited over 8,000 times in the month of August. That’s about 8oo times more hits than it received in its first month of existence, back in October 2008. In May of 2009 there were 3,683 hits, and that record stood for a while (and seemed both impressive and humbling, then). Back in January I thought, maybe I can reach the 5,000 mark in 2010, a goal I achieved in April. I’m not sure what has accounted for the growing numbers, but I have to suspect some friends have told some friends. This is the definition of grassroots, because I’ve done little (much to my more business and web-savvy friends’ chagrin) to promote this site. I have also resisted any temptation to put ads or a “tip jar” on the site: I like the idea of having a blog that costs nothing to visit and I don’t intend to change that policy. I do have some ideas about how to make some of this work more easily collectable (for the handful of people not related to me who may be interested in collecting any of my work in a semi-formal manner), and I welcome the long overdue and most welcome advancements the publishing scene is embracing (however reluctantly). More thoughts on that subject (the big picture and my envisioned place in it) another time.

It seemed appropriate (and right) to acknowledge this minor milestone — and extend sincere appreciation for anyone who has taken the time to check out Murphy’s Law. For people who have come back more than once, I’m grateful. For people who come back all the time, I feel I should offer my condolences. But seriously, people don’t do what I do unless they hope they can articulate some thoughts and convey some feelings that just might resonate with and inspire others. It is with the aim of doing that as honestly and consistently as possible that I look forward to playing the truth of what I am, for as long as I can.

Eight years ago today.

I’m sure anyone who has lost a parent (or heaven forbid, a child) can understand that when this happens it becomes a line of demarcation: your life before and your life after. It doesn’t mean nothing is ever the same or that you never get past it (everything is the same and you get past it except for the fact that nothing is ever the same and you never get past it. You don’t want to).

One year ago today this is what I had to say, and I’m not sure I can (or need to) improve upon this sentiment:

Blogs are, or can be, like diaries.

Except that diaries, by nature, are private. Which begs the question: do people who blog censor or soften the observations, complaints or critiques that in other times would exist inside a document designed to remain unread by others? (Or more to the point, should they?) To be certain, only a few years ago, thoughts like the ones I’m about to express would have been safely ensconced inside a journal, not read by anyone else, even including myself (I don’t often return to old journals, hopefully because I’m too busy living in the here and now). And for whatever it’s worth, I am humble enough to know that small numbers of people visit this blog, and I have enough sense (or self-respect) to instinctively acknowledge that nobody is well served by overly earnest airing of personal trivia.

Put another way, I don’t begrudge anyone else documenting every last detail of their existences (no matter how mundane or mawkish); I simply remain uninterested in reading about it. In that regard, blogs are self-regulating: if you don’t write things that others will find interesting, you won’t have an audience. And who cares anyway? In that regard, blogs are like diaries: people post on them because they want to, or need to, and the concept of friends or strangers reading their innermost thoughts won’t necessarily hamper their willingness to compose. Still, only the sensation-seekers looking for notoriety (usually the already famous, and even those folks have a shelf-life of about six months) go out of their way to wax solipsistic in a public forum.

When it comes to the death of my mother, I of course have meditated on the loss privately and publically, and anyone who knows me (or reads this blog) understands that her life and death are an unequivocal component of my ongoing existence. Nothing remarkable about that, really: it is what it is. I am not alone; in fact, one need not suffer the untimely death of a parent to understand that their presence is inextricable from one’s own. That said, it’s not because my feelings or experiences are unique, but because they are the opposite that I have little compunction sharing some thoughts on this plaintive anniversary. Indeed, for me these occasions are much more a celebration of her life (and her unambiguously positive influence in my life) than any sort of disconsolate meditation on death. It is what it is.

As I have mentioned in other pieces (most recently on my birthday), one of my earliest and most positive memories of art and discovery is associated with my mother: listening to Nutcracker Suite and drawing pictures. I still listen, as anyone who knows me knows, and I still draw pictures, only I use words (and, whenever possible, my mouth –as anyone who knows me knows).

I’ve long maintained that while I don’t begrudge anyone their pleasure in augmenting their musical experience with altered substances, I am happy to take it straight, no chaser. When I listen to music it does everything I suppose it is designed to do: it soothes me, inspires me, consoles me and makes me genuinely grateful to be alive. To be among the same species that was capable of creating this magic. To be transported to other times and places while being wholly present in the here-and-now (what a miracle that is when you think about it; something drugs cannot do half as reliably, or inexpensively…or legally). I don’t turn to music when I need it most, because I always need it. But certainly there are some songs I need at certain times more than others. There are, fortunately, too many to list or share, but there will be many more anniversaries of this day to remember, and I’ll look forward to sharing more at the appropriate occasions. For today, here are some songs that always help.

Chopin, “Waltz, Op. 64, No. 2″ (performed by Artur Rubinstein):

Grant Green, “Exodus”:

Bob Marley, “No Woman, No Cry”:

Dizzy Gillespie, Sonny Stitt and Sonny Rollins, “Sunny Side of the Street” (with epic, miraculous vocals by Diz):

Jeff Buckley, “Dream Brother”:

Led Zeppelin, “In The Light”:

Neil Young, “Motion Pictures”:

Living Colour, “This Is The Life”:

Sonny Sharrock, “Who Does She Hope To Be?”:

Jethro Tull: “Reasons For Waiting”:

Not much to add here (other than a h/t to my boy Jamie, who passed it along).

Big misconception about reggae music: it’s all happy, at the beach, drinking music. Biggest misconception about reggae music: it all sounds the same. Even Bob Marley (and it is both respectful and required to at least mention the great man’s name in any consequential discussion or reggae) had markedly different styles he embraced throughout his career, as his sound evolved from straightforward ska and rocksteady in the ‘60s to the full-fledged rastaman vibration everyone has heard on the radio—or at Happy Hour. Indeed, Marley serves as the most obvious case study for the distinctive sounds reggae has produced: anyone unfamiliar with songs not included on Legend, but curious to explore what else is out there, are encouraged to start with the crucial transition albums from the early ‘70s. You cannot go wrong with African Herbsman, the culmination of his brief but bountiful collaboration with Lee “Scratch” Perry. Or to appreciate the incomparable harmonizing of the original Wailers (Marley along with Peter Tosh and Bunny Wailer), Catch A Fire and Burnin’ are indispensable cornerstones of any halfway serious reggae collection. And, above all, if it’s possible to single out one work that encapsulates Marley’s genius, Natty Dread is the alpha and the omega: not only is this his masterpiece, this one holds it own with any album, in any genre.

Okay. Even for those who are not sufficiently intrigued by the notion of a deeper dive into reggae’s abundant waters, there are more than a handful of sure things right on the surface. Enter the Mighty Diamonds and their first—and best—album, Right Time from 1976. Like the Wailers, the Mighty Diamonds are a harmonizing trio (with a killer backing band), and these three men, Donald “Tabby” Shaw, Fitzroy “Bunny” Simpson and Lloyd “Judge” Ferguson, created songs that stand tall alongside the very best reggae. Right Time manages to combine several styles and merge them in a seamless, practically flawless whole. This, to be certain, is roots reggae, yet at times it sounds like the most accessible soul music, closer to Motown than Trenchtown.

The group’s allegiance to Rastafarianism is skillfully articulated in the socially conscious lyrics, but the ten tracks on Right Time tackle romantic turmoil, violent crime, and redemption—sometimes all in one song. The title track, equally an ominous call to arms as well as a rallying cry against the system, sets an immediate tone that predicts chaos while promising resolve, pre-dating Culture’s epochal Two Sevens Clash by a year. The brilliance of the songs that follow must be heard to be believed, and it’s difficult to imagine how singing and song craft this tight, spiritual, and emotionally rich could fail to convince. The next two songs, “Why Me Black Brother Why?” and “Shame and Pride” constitute a one-two punch that manages to invoke Marvin Gaye, Smokey Robinson and Otis Redding: Gaye’s authentic words, Smokey’s silken voice, and Redding’s gut-rending fervor. If the world was right side up, all of these songs would be standards, familiar to anyone who listens to the soul legends mentioned above. The album’s highlight may be the resplendent anthem “I Need a Roof”—-a rather uncomplicated piece of poetry that invokes Marcus Garvey and Jesus Christ with its (obvious) insistence that without shelter there can be no peace, and without justice there can be no love. Listen: even writing about this record, albeit while offering the highest possible praise, inexorably mutes the message. That message is conveyed with voices that must be heard so that the music can make sense. Go seek it out.

Memo to Sarah Palin: when Lady Macbeth cries “Out, damn’d spot!” she is not talking to her dalmation.

I found Sarah Palin’s latest tearjerker invoking William Shakespeare particularly interesting on two levels (and, I say tearjerker in the sense that her indefatigable self-promotion combines with illimitable delusion to produce these types of comments, which at once induce laughter unto tears which then prompts one to weep for our future). First, it was, of course, The Bard who wrote the following lines, which demand to be quoted in full for a variety of obvious reasons:

Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.

I know, right? (This is life imitating art, super-sized.) But second, it is more than a little appropriate to consider that the other great William (Faulkner, that is) utilized this poetry for the title of one of the towering literary achievements of the last century, The Sound and the Fury. It is amusing (aside from the audacity) that Palin likens her creative license (or that of the semi-literate cadre of ghostwriters who Tweet for her) with masters of the form who on occasion changed the language. The difference, aside from the fact that they could actually speak the language with no small degree of proficiency, is that for artistic folks who innovate and advance our template for communicating or creating, one must already have mastered the fundamentals. This is demonstrably true of Slick Willy (Shakespeare) just as it is true of will.i.am (Faulkner), as it is true of Salvador Dali or Ornette Coleman. Can you dig it?

Sarah Palin is in what seems to be a historically unique position in that the more she embarrasses herself, the better it turns out to be for her career. And bank account. Sarah Palin is hated and loved in equal measure, always a good niche market. And she is popular, to a large extent, because her legion of dimwitted acolytes find, in her looks, attitudes, pronouncements and propensity for faux pas (faux pi?), a reinforcement of many things they want and need to believe. She is popular the same way boy-band pop stars are popular: she sells copy because the things that come out of her mouth are the things that a great many people want to hear. There is a formula for insipid pop music and there is a formula for pseudo-populist hucksterism.

What is different about Palin—and what makes her dangerous—is that while virtually every move she makes is calculated and carefully calibrated to resonate with the semi-literate and unreflective Americans whose bigotry is set on cruise control, she is not entirely disingenuous. Indeed, the things that most annoy the principled, learned and sentient citizens happen to be the things that are unaffected and/or unrehearsed. That is, her astonishing, almost impossible-to-properly-fathom ignorance. But that didn’t stop Ronald Reagan (whose amiable dunce routine, in fairness, looks downright Socratic after eight years of his Vice President’s son and Palin’s scorched earth ill-will tour). The problem, now, is what we have wrought as a nation with our voracious appetite for insipidity: being dumb is not only no longer an obstacle, it is a short cut. People like Reagan (and, to a lesser extent, his V.P.’s son) had to work hard to overcome their manifest intellectual shortcomings. Imagine how much time and energy is freed up (to fundraise, for instance) if you no longer have to fake it ‘til you make it. Think of how inordinately liberating it must be to celebrate—and be celebrated—for keeping it unreal on the campaign trail. Consider how much more confident one can be in one’s untested and uninhibited convictions if one never has to explain them.

I don’t blame Palin or her fans for this phenomenon. The staggeringly unenlightened have always been amongst us; mostly innocuous platforms like Facebook and Twitter have just given them more ways to connect and commiserate. No longer do misguided cretins have to conduct solitary diatribes in their attics or consult with their tinfoil hats in a dark room; now they can plug in, connect and blame the godless, the gays, the immigrants and the evil machinations of Socialist-minded social servants with one hand comfortably snuggled in the bag of Cheetos. They can incite riots and excoriate the elites without even leaving the comfort of their recliners.

But I suspect that even if social media (and, of course, the Internet) had been available two decades ago, an unabashed simpleton like Sarah Palin could never have made it out of Alaska back then. And for this I blame our disintegrating, increasingly useless mainstream media. The only thing liberal about today’s media is the appetite they have for horse races and sensational gossip over more mundane matters like what policies (take health care reform) actually contain and who they actually benefit, or making readership aware when a particular pol or pundit is straight-up lying. But we know this is treacherous ground to tread because, as Dr. Stephen Colbert established, the truth does have a liberal bias.

Which brings us to Sarah Palin’s latest crime against the English language and (more distressing) cocksure condemnation of racial and religious intolerance. No, not her own, but the ostensible hatred a certain ethnic and religious group harbors. That would be Muslims or, in Republican parlance, towel-heads. You see, because of 9/11 Muslims hate Americans, want to kill us, and their religious beliefs—and those who practice them—are violent and insidious. They also are not white or Christian, which is two strikes against them from the get-go. But this manufactured outrage over a Mosque in New York City is actually a teaching moment. In one imbecilic sentence, Palin is illuminating the misguided thinking that even allows someone to go there. Rather than attempt to disentangle the convenient (and conveniently backward and bigoted) sleight of mind that can equate Muslims with terror and a Mosque with violence, let’s try to use this insulting illogic in another scenario where Palin currently applies it. Below we have an image of the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. As my perspicacious friend Tony James reminded me, Timoth McVeigh was Catholic, so clearly we need to tear down St. Joseph’s Old Cathedral (indeed, the proposed Mosque will be two blocks from Ground Zero; this church is practically across the street!). Needless to say, the average American redneck cemprehending that comparison would be as conceivable as the average Christian conceding that Jesus wasn’t, in fact, a honky.

Instead, the focus has almost entirely been on her beyond-W butchering of English syntax and no one (outside of the progressive blogosphere which, while useful and necessary, is mostly preaching to the choir) seems terribly concerned in addressing the racist and moronic reasoning that would even lead one to endorse such backwards thinking. (That said, it must be mentioned that the collective genius of humanity has rallied in a time of need, and is busy at work on Twitter making appropriate mockery of Palin’s bungle. Enjoy the hilarity @ #shakespalin.) Naturally, the emphasis has involved a “discussion” of whether she intended to make up a new word (duh) or whether we should take it seriously (DUH). Less than a little effort is made to remind anyone that everything she is saying is historically wrong, mean-spirited to the point of psychosis and flat-out racist. One could also make a case that she is persecuting another group’s religion, something Christians, for all of their whining and “War on Christmas” crapola, should be at least a tiny bit sensitive about. Of course, as we know in America the only groups who are genuinely persecuted are white fans of Jesus and billion dollar crybabies who pay too many taxes (Ha).

(Sidenote: it is either disconcerting or enticing—and possibly both—to consider what would happen if people like Palin and her ilk were really forced to sit down and actually read the bible or the Constitution (including the Bill of Rights) and understand who Jesus really was (even as a fictional character) and who the founding fathers really were (based on the things they actually believed and wrote which, unlike the authors of the bible, bear their signatures). Would heads explode? Would pre-packaged ideologies, at long last, suffocate on their own fumes? Would something approximating enlightenment ensue? Would reading lessons be necessary first?)

A prediction: There is an unforseen silver lining in all of this. Most of us have suspected for quite some time that Palin is the de facto leader of the G.O.P. brand; the only people unwilling (or understandably unable) to acknowledge this are the insiders and party elders themselves, who have so much to lose if and when she ultimately steps out of her Fox-News bunker and pre-scripted press releases (which she calls speeches). Once she puts herself in the proverbial crosshairs of even cursory (and at that point inevitable) media scrutiny, the lies will unspool and the façade will crumble and a modicum of sanity will be restored to our woeful world. And along the way the unthinkable will happen: the Republican contenders will necessarily have to go on the attack. That is when things will get very interesting indeed.

And people will write about it, we will laugh about it, and we will do everything in our power not to learn from it.

Okay, you have to give it up to Jewel and the (hysterical) site Funny Or Die.

Jewel recently agreed to have make-up artists (from F.O.D.) put her in disguise so she could roll into a Karaoke bar and surprise the unsuspecting patrons.

It worked. And it’s, well, darn it, it’s kind of heartwarming.

A few quick observations:

1. Jewel has aged very well. In fact, she seems more smoking than she did 10 years ago. And she obviously has a sense of humor. Good for her!

2. Funny Or Die rules. They’ve already got the (first?) epic Mel Gibson mash-up. Go check it out. Just do it.

3. Jewel is very smart, and this latest adventure indicates that her business acumen is very in tune with the times. At the top of the video, on the site, it announces that she has a new CD out. I’m certain this will help her move more units than she otherwise would. Good for her, and good for Funny Or Die for making that happen. It’s a very rare win-win where everyone comes away happier, and hopefully richer. That’s America, without (much of) the disgusting free-market aftertaste.

4. That old dude they interview has a brilliant t-shirt on. Rock on, Pops!

5. Also, the audience’s reaction to her (in costume) once she starts singing proves that no matter what you look like, you are about one hundred times hotter if you have a good singing voice.

Man, what a rough week for Cleveland.

It’s never easy to watch a homegrown talent — a native son who defied odds to become a national treasure – abruptly depart. Even if you figured it was inevitable, it doesn’t make it any easier.

I’m referring, of course, to the death of Harvey Pekar.

I don’t have a great deal to say about this, other than suggesting you see the fantastic movie based on his life/life’s work entitled American Splendor.

The title of the film was also the title of his long-running comic book. And while Pekar was groundbreaking in a way for making the primary source of his subject material his own life, his life story is more remarkable than anything written by or about him. To go from a genuinely obscure misanthrope living in squalor to becoming the mostly obscure misanthrope living mostly in squalor…that’s America. It’s definitely the American Dream, through a broken glass darkly.

It’s almost impossible to envision now, with everyone’s daily trials, tribulations and ablutions the focus of a billion blog posts, or the solipsistic Greek chorus of the Twittering class, but what Pekar did, then, by pulling the soda-stained cover off his personal life in the service of art was a revelation. Certainly, the subject of our immortal Self goes back to cave drawings and Don Quixote, and only official autobiographies are truly fictional. But when it came to the more postmodern type of tilting at windmills, Harvey Pekar was the patron saint of the unshaven, recalcitrant crank (actually crank is too harsh by half; he was more misanthrope who looked at life the way a chronically ambivalent dieter regards that piece of cake: he knows better but he just can’t help himself).

Perhaps most importantly, the man knew his music. He liked jazz, which says a lot about him and a great deal more about the peers he could scarcely tolerate. If he did nothing else (and of course he did plenty) Pekar warrants our eternal praise for his efforts to get Joe Maneri the recognition he deserved. When Maneri passed away last summer, this is what I had to say (about him and Pekar):

Anyone who has seen the excellent American Splendor (a film celebrating the life of curmudgeonly comic book artist Harvey Pekar) has heard Maneri: his impossibly cool ”Paniots Nine” accompanies the opening credits. Pekar allegedly insisted that Maneri’s music be used, and this stands to reason as Pekar (himself a jazz critic) championed a largely obscure Maneri back in the ’90s. Indeed, it was John Zorn who helped release Paniots Nine (the title of the first track is also the title of the album), which makes all the sense in the world considering Zorn effectively took up Maneri’s baton in the ’80s and began cleverly integrating traditional Jewish music into his own compositions. It’s fair to say that Maneri, though lamentably overlooked for entirely too long, was the first major composer to actively bring those disparate elements and influences into free (but still swinging) jazz.

Anyone interested in some adventurous, unexpected, yet oddly familiar jazz would be happy to hear this album. The fact that this baby was languishing in the Atlantic Records’ vaults is both unbelievable and entirely typical. Of course this rapturuous music would fall on the deaf ears of the dumb executives. Same as it ever was. Suffice it to say, jazz enthusiasts are forever indebted to Harvey Pekar for helping this see the light of day.

The other thing that we can (and should) remember Pekar for is his interesting relationship with David Letterman. The movie does an excellent job of succinctly conveying the love/hate dynamic that undoubtedly benefitted both men. But looking at the actual footage (there is plenty on YouTube; I was old enough, then, to recall seeing some of these confrontations as they aired in all their awkward glory toward the end of the ’80s), there is something more there. It is at once infuriating and, ultimately, invigorating. I’ll attempt to explain.

Does anyone remember, back in the day, when David Letterman used to be funny? When he used to be edgy? When he used to be watchable? I do, which made his languid (but very profitable) descent into prickly bitterness that much more unfortunate. By the time he jumped shark, I mean ship, and went from NBC to CBS, he was already well on the way to irrelevance (his somewhat hysterical scorched earth reaction to the Jay Leno/Johnny Carson debacle has always made him look more than a little like an entitled brat having an extended (and very profitable) temper tantrum; and don’t get me wrong: Jay “Company Man” Leno is about as clownish as they come). But even in the ’80s Letterman was too smarmy for his own good, and his envelope-throwing humor was always cut with a palpable disgruntlement: watching him for too long became like being trapped in a room with a taciturn older guy kvetching about his chronic reflux. But more than that, he was a bit of a bully, even then. And during his mano a mano encounters with Pekar, it became increasingly clear that Letterman saw more than a little of himself –the nerd, the kid who never got picked first, the itchy dude always uncomfortable in his own skin– in the man sitting next to him. And his own insecurities and obsession with control compelled him to poke fun at Pekar and act the way bullies act: glad that there is someone smaller or less successful than them, grateful that they couldn’t be called out by the weakling. To his credit, Pekar did call him out (as well as GE, the entity that owned Letterman, I mean NBC) and after a few too many uncomfortable comments, he was not invited back. In the movie when Pekar’s wife, who has a propensity for one-word psychological assessments, blithely decrees Letterman a megalomaniac, it is a perfect moment, and accurate appraisal.

Why linger so long on Letterman while ostensibly celebrating the life of Harvey Pekar? Well, between the movie and the dozens of other respectful obits, the Wikipedia overview of his achievements will be amply documented. For me, the odd interactions with Letterman manage to represent the truth of what Pekar scribbled about on pieces of scrap paper. With Robert Crumb’s divine (artistic) intervention, his efforts captured the disaffection of the underdog and gave words to the shmucks destined to be forgotten. To become a meaningful artist one must be intolerant of cliche. To become a meaningful human being one must be intolerant of untruth. Although it came at a considerable cost, Harvey Pekar was incapable of cruising along the soul-crushing streets of quiet desperation. In becoming the poet laureate of disinclined endurance he helped remind America that there is a splendor in our shared obsolescence.

Congratulations to a very worthy and deserving Spain for securing their first World Cup title.

Condolences to the Dutch, who did not exactly do their Clockwork Orange-era compatriots especially proud with their thuggish and ungraceful (and occasionally disgraceful) play. Regarding that automatic red card-worthy karate kick, the only conceivable explanation for why the ref did not immediately send the goonish De Jong to the dressing room is because (in the moment) he did not want to soil the world’s most important sports spectacle by putting a team one man down so early in the game. But the game was already soiled by that unconscionable act of unsportsmanlike conduct. Anyone that does not have Dutch blood flowing through their veins had to decide at that moment that Spain deserved to win the game. Justice was done and although it was a pretty forgettable game, that was a pretty exciting goal (and at least the match did not go to penalty kicks –which always imparts more drama but is invariably a graceless conclusion to an event that deserves more).

Speaking of an event that deserves more…if there is one thing to complain about every four years, it is that the final games are (inevitably? understandably? necessarily?) lackluster. It is perhaps an unavoidable reality: this is the game and it only comes around once every four years so of course any mistakes might equate to memories a player (and country) will live with for the remainder of their lives. (Speaking with friends we agreed that there really hasn’t been a remarkable final game since…as long as we’ve been watching. Few recall the Argentina victory –over the Dutch– in ’78 and Italy over West Germany in ’82 was decent but not breathtaking; everything after that ran the spectrum from merely boring to downright forgettable.) But unlike the Super Bowl, which more often than not results in a lopsided smackdown, the World Cup final tends to have teams playing ultra conservative soccer while doing everything not to lose.  With the aim of eliminating error they also eliminate drama. And soul. But it’s, (ironically?) a rather small price to pay after a month of tension, excitement and yes, drama. This World Cup has to rank amongst the best, game-for-game, in the last two decades.

And, of course, for us Yanks there was the goal and the call (eternal props to the inimitable Andres Cantor):

In honor of the Spaniards, here is a sublime interpretation of Concierto De Aranjuez (Adagio), by the remarkable (as well as enigmatic and as yet unmasked) Buckethead:

And the work that inspired it, from one of the coolest dudes that ever lived, Miles Davis:

And the original (1939), from the great Spanish composer Joaquin Rodrigo:

Felicidades!

It was hot. The kind of heat that hurt. The kind of heat that caused children to stay inside and adults to appreciate being stuck in an air-conditioned office. The kind of heat that laughed at rain clouds and dared them to get involved, to even attempt assuaging the agony it meant to inflict.
The kind of heat that made people forget courtesy and compassion and even self-regard. The kind of heat that animals—creatures much cleverer than ourselves—know enough to avoid at all costs. The kind of heat that causes us to envy the sow, supine in her slop, and the worm, cool in its earthen cavern. The kind of heat that made insane people thrust their heads in ovens and sane people stick theirs in freezers*.

(*excerpted from the novel The American Dream of Don Giovanni)

No comment necessary?

Mad Professor, “Internet Spy”:

The Skatalites, “James Bond Theme”: