Nancy Davis Kho's Blog, page 46

Turn Down the Music and Read: Exile in Guyville

At my first post-college job I was the sole female employee in a firm of about twelve people. The boss’ wife, who did our accounting, was around a lot, but I was the only gal on payroll. About a month after I started, we had a “team building” day which consisted of outdoor games executed by bad athletes (all my coworkers were computer programmers, after all) and we  got sweaty and tired. The guys followed our boss down into his apartment building’s sauna where, I presume, they relaxed in towels and talked about who would get promoted next. Then they showered and changed for dinner.

Me? I was asked to help the boss’ wife finish cooking the meal. And all my fantasies of being treated like an equal member of the team dissolved like salt into the pot of boiling water over which I fumed, stirring my male coworkers’ pasta.

I’ve been Exiled in Guyville, is my point. If you’re a woman reading this, I bet you have too, at least once in your life.

I loved that 1993 album of that title by Liz Phair when it came out. It was hugely controversial: a young woman singing about her desires as bluntly as male rockers had been doing for years. How dare she use those words to talk about sex? How dare she treat the men in her lyrics like objects? When they ran out of outrage about a woman keepin’ it real, lyrics wise, they moved on to “She’s a really crappy guitar player, you know!” Spin and Village Voice may have named it an album of the year, but her local Chicago indie music scene turned its back, in a public and vociferous way.

Now, with a new book from the highly esteemed 33 1/3 series from Bloomsbury, rock critic and author Gina Arnold tells us exactly why the reaction against Phair was so charged and emotional. She takes us deep into Guyville, an imaginary place that feels real enough, one where men feel threatened by the presence of a woman playing on their field, and either ignore her or do what they must to keep her in her place.

Some quick context about the 33 1/3 series from their website: it’s “a series of short books about a wide variety of albums, by artists ranging from James Brown to the Beastie Boys. Launched in September 2003, the series now contains 86 titles and is acclaimed and loved by fans, musicians and scholars alike.” Think liner notes on steroids, as written by the president of that particular artists’ fan club who is also willing to admit a few artist imperfections. I love that they’re compact, 4 inches by 6.5 inches, easy to throw into a purse or tuck into a pocket to read on the subway or while waiting for the kids.

Arnold’s take on Phair’s debut album reads as feminist critique and cultural anthropological study, as much as it does an homage to a really great album. She looks at Guyville through four lenses. The first section is a reflection of the limited role women, with a very few exceptions, were expected to play in indie rock in the early ‘90s (girlfriend, critic, or drummer). Second, she takes on the backlash against Phair as an example of how rock criticism tends to be male-gendered. The third section looks at Guyville as a call and response to the album Phair has said inspired hers, the Rolling Stones’ Exile on Main Street. Finally, she looks at what’s changed for women in music since 1993, and how the digitization of music is helping tear Guyville to the ground.

Arnold doesn’t let Phair completely off the hook for the way she was perceived – her come-hither posing for photos shoots and lack of performance chops didn’t help the quest to be taken seriously by her peers. But it was hard to read the slender tome and not feel real sympathy for the way Phair was treated.

After I finished it I felt like I needed to watch High Fidelity (2000) with John Cusack again, because it’s set in the same Wicker Park neighborhood of Chicago during the same timeframe that Phair was recording there. Just as I remembered: the only girls in it are rock critics and girlfriends (or ex-girlfriends.) It’s a good movie – Jack Black alone is worth the price of admission – but it’s Guyville for sure. It needed someone as brash and outspoken as Liz Phair to counter the testosterone fumes on the local music scene.

Want to read it yourself? 33 1/3 has kindly offered to give a lucky Midlife Mixtape reader a copy! To enter for your chance to win, leave a comment with either your favorite Liz Phair song or a moment that you were exiled in guyville (I’d love to read what the male readers have to say on that!) I’ll take entries until Tuesday, August 12 at 5 pm PST, then I’ll pick a winner using Random.org.

Until then: let yourself be mesmerized by Phair. And check out the full list of 33 1/3 titles for your end of summer reading list.

Thanks to everyone who came out to the Cat Club in SF last night for the inaugural Midlife Mixtape “I Have to Work Tomorrow” Early Bird ’80s Dance Party! I’ll tell you all about it on Tuesday when my feet stop throbbing.

                   
CommentsYes, oh yes, I've lived in Guyville. Every time we'd roll into ... by Linda RoyI love Liz Phair! I discovered her in college, just a few years ... by PamI used to get transported by Stratford-on-Guy. Love the name ... by SteveRelated StoriesTurn Down the Music and Read: Mo’ Meta BluesTurn Down the Music and Read: Mad WorldBlogHer 2014: Stories Still Matter 

Midlife Mixtape Concert Review: Echo and the Bunnymen

The Band: Echo and the Bunnymen, August 2 2014. A band from Liverpool band fronted by singer Ian McCulloch and guitarist Will Sergeant that earned huge critical acclaim and cult popularity in the ‘80s with hits like “Bring on the Dancing Horses” and “Lips Like Sugar,” Echo continues against all odds to release new work that is just as well received by critics. The only time I’ve ever seen them play was in 1987 and it was such a magical, amazing, mind-blowing show that I vowed never to see them again. Then I realized they won’t be touring forever and I snapped up a ticket to this show.

McCulloch’s Liverpudlian accent is just as incomprehensible as always. I was able to make out “Tut, tut, Reverend. Tut, tut,” and “This is the third best song ever written.” But the rest of his stage patter Saturday night came out as “MrblbrlbslSanFranciscomrbleosntlsoith.”

The Venue: The Regency Ballroom. Great midsize venue on Van Ness in San Francisco, suitably ornate and chandeliered, with a General Admission floor and a balcony with seating that wraps all the way around the top. Here’s a little piece of intel about the Regency: even for General Admission shows, you can go sit in the seats and you don’t have to pay extra. You’re welcome.

The Company: LitCamp Lisa, who, she remembered during the show, has a HUGE thing for men named Ian. If you are a single man named Ian, duck and cover this week.

The Crowd: LitCamp Lisa said it best, as she so often does: “I don’t think I’ve ever been to a show where so much of the audience is my age and older.” We were stationed next to a dead ringer for Jack Black in High Fidelity, right down to his Eels tshirt and his lecture to LitCamp Lisa on his theory of what percentage of each Echo album we would be hearing that night.

Age Humiliation Factor: Veering into patronizing territory.

When the bouncer asked for my ID I said, as I often do, “Seriously?” and he said, “Oh, but you look very young,” in the same voice I used to say it to my grandma. Let’s not do this to each other, ok?

Opening Band: Kelley Stoltz

A local singer songwriter who is blessed with a lovely, Billy Bragg-sounding voice and cursed both by a bad amplifier that buzzed through much of his set, and a heckler in the audience. He didn’t seem too bothered, though, especially after he stripped down to his own Echo t-shirt that he bought in 1985.

I loved this one: “Double Exposure.”

Cool Factor: High.

Ian McCulloch could teach Honey Badger a thing or two about not giving a sh*t. His aura of aloofness is so vast, it settles on the crowd like a giant shroud of cool.

Worth Hiring the Sitter? If you can spare us the filmer.

I was nervous to see Echo again; my memory of the ’87 show is up there with my wedding and childbirth in terms of life events, and I didn’t want to find my opinion soured. From the standpoint of the band and the performance, it held up: McCulloch, Sergeant and the rest of the band were top notch, sounded as strong as they did thirty years ago and even their new material was captivating. Check out Holy Moses from their latest album, Meteorites.

But the show is actually one of the worst I’ve ever seen and here’s why: the egregious smartphone filming by a few inconsiderate yet determined audience members.

I have learned not to panic when the band takes the stage and the entire general admission audience holds up their screens to capture the moment; most of the phones are stashed by the middle of the first song, emerging only to snap a quick shot here and there. I am even at peace when you film one entire song, because life is about compromise and I get that people want to record the moment.

But this is what happened Saturday: a tall young man in glasses and a white shirt and his diminutive ponytailed girlfriend, standing three rows in front of me, filmed the entire show. I mean, even the moments between songs when Ian went to the back of the stage to have another drink. When her spindly little arms got shaky, she’d hand her phone over to him so he could keep filming. The only time they ever lowered the screens they held over their heads, directly between the band and those of us behind them, was to upload their footage to Facebook, and then see if anyone commented.

So this was my view of 80% of the show.

I wish I could have let it go. I wish I hadn’t allowed a red hot ball of rage over grow and churn inside me, over why this couple believed their right to capture shaky video with crappy sound quality was more important than the viewing experience of the audience around them. I couldn’t. I can’t even tell you what the first 10 songs of the show were. I let it get to me. I wanted to cry at how the holistic experience of attending a show has been misappropriated by people who seem to think their name will show up under “Camera Crew” on some future concert documentary, whose selfishness is so ingrained that they don’t even have the decency to look behind them to see if maybe they’re inconveniencing anyone else.

Until “Bring on the Dancing Horses” started. Then, I could breathe for a minute, even if I still couldn’t see the band. Because that’s how powerful music is in soothing the savage beast. When I heard the first slippery chords of “The Cutter,” I knew what I had to do. I dove between the shoulders in front of me and tapped the tall young man on the shoulder.

“Could you guys please stop filming, just for ONE song?” I said.

“NO!” the man snapped.

You guys. He said no. And went back to his filming.

If I wanted to salvage the concert, I had no choice but to close my eyes and pretend I was listening to a live broadcast of a show. Two encores later the band finished up and it was fine, but I think it would have been on par with ‘87 if I could have had BOTH a visual and an audio experience.

What are we supposed to do? Surrender as outdated the concept of just being at a show and enjoying the music without recording all of it? Knock phones out of hands? (LitCamp Lisa had some surprisingly detailed information on what substances can shatter glass upon contact, and how we could sneak it into the next show. I’m a little scared of her now.)

At this point I feel like venues and bands need to take a stronger stance and ask people to stash their phones when it’s obvious they’re filming everything. I had these two jackweeds to contend with, but I heard people on the other side of the auditorium yell, “Put down your phones!” in unison at one point. So it wasn’t just me, and obviously my little solo voice didn’t solve the problem. (I wish the same people who clapped me on the back and smiled at me after I spoke to the camera couple had amplified my plea when it was ignored.) When I saw the Lumineers they made a point of asking the audience to put phones away for one song, but let’s face it, if Ian McCulloch asked, it would sound like “Mumbletypeg sisketysquatch mrblemrblemrble” and we would have all looked at each other, confused. Still, it would be a start.

It was a great show. I wish I could have seen it.

Next show on the calendar: Dave Matthews Band, Aug 23 at the Greek in Berkeley

                   
CommentsI am impressed at your ability to quell what in me would have ... by FloribundaNancy! Amen to this! it is the most annoying thing ever about ... by AlexaThey said no. THEY SAID NO. #WallSlide by AnnSaw Mudhoney at The Earl, a tiny, but legendary room in east ... by LanceNancy, thank you for your reply. When, and if, the time comes ... by Alan S. Pastonson.Plus 5 more...Related StoriesBlogHer 2014: Stories Still MatterMidlife Mixtape Concert Review: Robyn and RöyksoppAny Old Excuse for a Party 

Literary Death Match: Good Listening Always Wins

At the end of the day, it all came down to who had the best hearing.

I was thrilled when I got the invite to compete in the inaugural Oakland Literary Death Match, a roving, worldwide literary circus that finally touched down in Oakland on Wednesday night. Here’s how it goes down: four readers are given seven minutes to read a piece on stage. Three judges then provide critiques in the arena of Literary Merit, Performance, and Intangibles. Two readers, as selected by the judges, advance to the finals, which is when it all goes off the rails and a winner is chosen by almost completely arbitrary means. The whole night is ably ringmastered by LDM founder and three-piece-suit wearer extraordinaire, Adrian Todd Zuniga.

Our judges were Oakland gold: author, activist and occasional rabbi Joshua Safran; poet and body activist Sonya Renee Taylor, and comedian Karinda Dobbins. It would have been fine with me to just let the judges do some readings and call it a night.

Even with the support of the friends who showed up to cheer me on, I pretty much kissed the trophy goodbye as I listened to the first reader: Tim “Toaster” Henderson, a poetry slam king who read an ode to the Scoop Dunk. Go check it on Urban Dictionary; it’s Definition One you want. Once alerted to the dangers of the Scoop Dunk, I crossed my arms across my chest and will probably never go out in public again, at least not without Toaster at my side to defend me.

He was followed by the lovely Jaz Sufi, who is such a stone cold seasoned performer that a.) she was crocheting backstage and b.) she didn’t use notes for her reading. She killed it with a poem that managed to weave together spiced pumpkin lattes, uggs, and green cards – humor wrapped around a punch to the solar plexus.

The judges gave a little critique to each reader – Safran’s involved a Lake Merritt Alluvial Scale rating – and then conferred to choose a winner to advance to the final. I don’t know how they picked between Jaz and Toaster since they were both so good, except that maybe the judges were are grateful as I was to Toaster for the Scoop Dunk Defense tutorial. Toaster went through. And then Adrian summoned Mac Barnett and me up to the stage.

Mac’s won a little award called the Caldecott for his children’s book writing, and he and his girlfriend are young and nice and super hip. So that wasn’t intimidating at all. His piece was a dramatic and hysterically funny rendition of his book Guess Again. Not only was it one of those rare pieces of writing for children that adults also enjoy, but he had the Librarian Picture Book Swivel down to a T. Mac’s got a new book coming this fall called Telephone that is going to the top of my baby shower shopping list.

And then it was time to walk across a stage floor so sticky that it felt like walking on masking tape, to read a piece I wrote called The Secret to Incredible Parenting. The secret involves a car accident, a colonoscopy, and the surprising scent of redwood. People laughed, which made me so happy because I am gratified when my humiliation can become someone else’s entertainment. The judges said it was some of the whitest ass shit they’d ever heard, and that they, too, had sweat like a big man in a sauna. And suddenly I was in the finals, against Toaster.

The final was decided by a round of Literary Pictionary, wherein audience members came onstage to draw clues to the titles of books related to Oakland, as chosen by Adrian. Shouted guesses from the audience are encouraged, which was helpful because many of the drawing audience members appear to have been drinking Kamikaze shots before they attempted to capture “Call of the Wild” and “Packing for Mars” in pictorial form.

My strategy was to listen as hard as I could to the audience shouting, and when I heard a book title, I screamed it at Adrian. And that’s how I got crowned the first winner of the first Oakland Literary Death Match.

And if getting the LDM medal weren’t enough, Safran had thrown in a medal for the Oregon High School Racquetball League to sweeten the deal. Michael Phelp’s got nothing on me.

In closing, I’d like to thank my friend and Bay Area literary-man-about-town Matthew James DeCoster for putting me forward to participate; the friends who cheered me on in person and from afar; my fabulous opponents, the judges, and Adrian; and finally, my daughters and husband who gave me their blessing to share the story of our terrible, horrible, no good, very bad afternoon. Check out the schedule for upcoming LDM shows (San Francisco, LA, Seattle and NYC are coming up,) go see Toaster and Jaz and Sonya Renee and Karinda perform, and buy Mac’s books for every kid you know.

And most of all: thank you, shouters of Oakland-related book titles. I owe it all to you.

If anyone feels like doing that most Oakland of recreational pursuits, and here I speak of course of ghost ridin’ your whip, I’m available to sit on the hood with my medals.

***Guys! One week from tonight! Join me at the Cat Club SF at 1190 Folsom Street for the “I Have to Work Tomorrow” Early Bird ’80s Dance Night! We will RAGE from 7-9. Then we will go home and watch Matlock.


You don’t want to miss it.

                  Related StoriesJoin Me for a Literary Death Match!BlogHer 2014: Stories Still MatterHistory Sometimes Repeats 

BlogHer 2014: Stories Still Matter

Every time I attend BlogHer, the largest social media conference for women, a theme emerges. The first year, it was about finally meeting my online blogging friends and inspirations in person; a year later it was realizing that I’d moved beyond the beginner blogger sessions and was ready to take my little corner of the Interwebs to a more professional level. Last year, it was bra cups.

During BlogHer2014, held just down the road a piece in San Jose last weekend, it took a bit of time for the theme to present itself.

Would it be celebrities who photobombed my selfies?

Khloe Kardashian photobombs me. It wasn’t the other way around, or anything.

Guy Kawasaki. Note to self: research what I’ve converted to.

Geez, Arianna Huffington, I was trying to get a picture of the “What If Men Had Periods?” booth

RevRun is so tricky, getting into my shots

The fabulous speakers?

Kerry Washington

Tig Notaro

The inimitable Lisa Page Rosenberg aka Smacksy

The thrill of seeing my Voices of the Year post blown up billboard size, and my effort to get it home?

VOTY

Mine All Mine

The fact that the people living in Room 1119 at the Fairmont Hotel are pissed at my roommate and me because when we invited a bunch of people over for a glass of wine Saturday afternoon, we neglected to tell them that we were in Room 1119 at the Marriott, thereby interrupting their Grown Up and Sexy Time?

Nope. In 2014, the message was this: stories still matter. And that blogs play a unique role in widening perspectives, by sharing authentic, honest stories that invite readers inside our lives.

My favorite part of BlogHer every year is the Voices of the Year Community Keynote, when twelve bloggers read a piece that a panel of judges and peers deems representative in the arenas of Humor, Heart, Exploration and Op-ed. This year’s work had a through line of how it feels to be judged: for your race, your addiction, your sexual orientation, your side ponytail.

I will never be black, Asian, or gay (though comedian Tig Notaro’s set made the latter very tempting.) But the searing, truthful writing from bloggers who fall into these categories means that, if I choose to stay open, I can learn how it feels, and gain an understanding that runs bone deep. The more different you are from me, the more important it is that I’m reading your work. My heart feels cracked open a little wider whenever I do. And I’m just one reader. There are millions of people out there who may be isolated, hurting, lonely, who yearn to read something and say, “Me, too. That’s how it is for me. I thought I was the only one.”

This year’s BlogHer was validation that I, too, have a story to share. I hope that when readers come to Midlife Mixtape, they’ll understand why it is that the forty-something white lady in the floral dress at the BlogHer closing party dj’d by Reverend Run from RunDMC knew EVERY.SINGLE.WORD. to every ‘80s hip hop song he played. And performed “Going Back to Cali” by LL Cool J at the Killer Karaoke party, without needing the lyrics. Do you still get an electric thrill when you hear the music you grew up with, a moment when you’re 20 again? Me, too. That’s how it is for me. You’re not the only one.

I feel lucky that I got to visit with so many of these writers in person at BlogHer last weekend, but the good news is you guys can go visit them anytime. Here’s a list of some new and old favorite writers who do a phenomenal job of bringing a unique voice and perspective to the Blogosphere. I hope you’ll check them out.

Awesomely Luvvie: I actually squealed when I heard she would be speaking at BlogHer, and I’m not a squealer. I can’t explain Luvvie Ajay’s writing, her evolving glossary of terms like Pay #Amish and #Crine gleaned from inventive misspellings on her other website DumbestTweets.com, or her magical touch with .Gifs. I can only suggest you dive in, maybe starting with Whose Brother Is This with the Best/Worst Excuse Ever?
Renegade Mothering: Janelle Hanchett’s VOTY piece about being an addict and the excruciating work it took – still takes – to move beyond it and become a mother had me sniffling into my dress hem. Later in the conference I saw her with her adorable baby boy and insisted on pushing her baby carriage to the Lactation Station for her; I felt like I had to do something nice for her, even if she was all, “Um, strange lady, it’s ok, I can handle this.”
FiftyFifty Vision: another anchor of BlogHer is the Open Mic night hosted by Ann “Imig Azalea” Imig, founder of the Listen To Your Mother show. You never know what you’ll hear there, and this year it was the piece by Kim Tackett, a letter to her grown daughters about what she’d learned “at fifty and then some.” Gorgeous writing and I’m eager to read more.
Debi Jackson: Ok, technically I didn’t hear her at BlogHer, but she’s a fellow Listen To Your Mother alum and I heard about LTYM at BlogHer so that’s my segue. This video of her reading in this year’s show, about being mom to a transgender child, is so profound and important, I really hope you’ll take six minutes to watch.
The Flying Chalupa: And last but certainly not least, my BlogHer14 roommate and friend, Tarja Parssinen of The Flying Chalupa. I’ve always admired her distinctive, poetic comedy stylings – check out her “A Mom’s Guide to the Game of Thrones” for proof. What I didn’t know is that her ability to pick an accent and hold it for long, long minutes of conversation was so highly developed. Even if all I’d done is sit in my room and listen to Tarja expound in her British Man on Helium voice, I would have laughed all weekend.

So, here’s to another BlogHer full of stories. May you always stand in your truth, as Luvvie so eloquently put it, and may you always be a sharer of and listener to stories.

You talk too much? No. You talk just the right amount.

And hey! I’m sharing a new story tomorrow night at Oakland’s inaugural Literary Death Match! Come here me battle it out with Mac Barnett, Tim “Toaster” Henderson, and Jaz Sufi. Hope to see you there…tix available here. I’m punching slabs of meat in anticipation.

                   
CommentsYou ARE awesome. That's all. by JillI'm so lucky I scored an invite to the hotel room of ... by LanceI don't know how you keep up this blistering pace, Nancy. Voice ... by KatrinaYou are responsible for many of my laughs last weekend. Because ... by AnnMeeting you (and singing along to every word at Rev Run's show) ... by AmyPlus 3 more...Related StoriesAny Old Excuse for a PartyHistory Sometimes RepeatsI Interview Because… 

History Sometimes Repeats

On Saturday my eldest daughter’s dear friend Yvonne arrived for a ten day visit. Yvonne lives in the city where I grew up, and met my kid at the summer camp I attended and eventually worked. Except that she is way prettier than I ever was, Yvonne’s basically living my life, three suburbs to the northwest and thirty years apart.

But of all the parallels between Yvonne and me, the biggest one is this: when I was sixteen, I flew from Rochester to visit a friend in the Bay Area, and as my almost-two-decade residency in Oakland shows, it was a life changing event.

My friend Catherine had moved at the end of freshman year to the exotically-named “Walnut Creek, California” which I now know to be one of the white-bread suburbs through the Caldecott Tunnel, to the east of Oakland. But to a kid from the whiter-than-white bread suburbs on the East Coast, my destination seemed impossibly exciting. My friend Lise and I headed off for our western adventure, self-funding the airline tickets through copious babysitting jobs.

This was in the early 1980s, and my friend’s parents took care of us the way early ‘80s parents did, which is to say that they basically dropped us off at the Walnut Creek BART station each morning and expected us to report back for dinner. In between, in the pre cell phone era, they had no idea where we were. But we were EVERYWHERE: Union Square, Fisherman’s Wharf, Ghirardelli Square, at various Walnut Creek swim meets where Catherine’s cute California boy friends were competing, and at Tower Records. Oh, did we spend time at Tower Records. We rode cable cars, we walked the hilly streets of San Francisco, we ate our body weight in sourdough bread.

Catherine’s parents also drove us to Gold Country, and Reno, and we swam in Lake Tahoe, which was way colder than it looked from the beach. I came home from that trip with a new wardrobe of sleeveless tshirts I considered to be very California, Devo-inspired sunglasses, and a long horizontal poster of the Golden Gate Bridge. I stuck the poster up on a shelf in my bedroom when I got home, and I took it with me to college. When I met my husband, we both agreed that, given any opportunity, we should probably move to the Bay Area. When a job transfer to San Francisco arose for my husband, we barely discussed it. Just started packing.

So when our daughter and her friend cooked up the plan for this pre-camp visit, I was right on board. It’s my chance to pay back Catherine and her parents for their hospitality, the chance to create positive associations for Yvonne that will last her for decades to come. I’ve taken a few days off so we can show her Big Sur, Monterey, and that teen mecca, the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk. Other than that, I plan to drop the girls at BART and expect them home for dinner, full of stories with which to entertain us.

After Yvonne arrived on Saturday I drove her home the super long way – over the Golden Gate Bridge. Just as we were about to cross it, she said, “I figure if my first flight by myself is all the way to California, I can call myself a traveler. And traveling will be something I do for the rest of my life.”

We’re off to a good start.

The album I most associate with the trip: Sweets from a Stranger by Squeeze, which had just been released and which we played nonstop. I’ve returned.

***Things are getting busy around here! I’ll be at BlogHer in San Jose at the end of this week – let’s find each other and meet in actual 3-D form if you’ll be there too!

Next week, on Weds July 30, I’ll be competing in Literary Death Match in Oakland- a literary circus of epic humor proportions.

And the Midlife Mixtape “I Have to Work Tomorrow” ’80s Dance Party at the Cat Club San Francisco is right around the corner, on Aug 7 - details here!

                   
CommentsI hope they – and you – enjoy every minute of it!! by Tinne from Tantrums and TomatoesFantastic! your daughter's friend will remember this trip for a ... by Linda RoyLove that you are making memories with the “new international ... by Kimi KRelated StoriesI Interview Because…Tour de France Poetry PrimerAny Old Excuse for a Party 

I Interview Because…

For the past decade or so, I’ve volunteered for my alma mater’s Secondary School Committee. We’re the group that does alumni interviews for Bay Area kids applying to the university I attended on the East Coast who may not have a chance to travel there and interview in person. Recently the school sent us all the following form, and asked us to fill it out and take a selfie with it.

The primary reason I interview is because I get to spend 45 minutes with smart, ambitious kids from local high schools. Meeting all these applicants over the years gave me a good sense of what the local area high schools had on offer, so much so that when my eldest daughter chose the school she’d attend, I knew we were in good hands. I am always, without exception, impressed by the curiosity, achievements, and good manners of the young people I meet in these interviews. If you want to feel good about who will be running the country when you retire, I recommend doing some alumni interviews with current high school seniors.

But f you’re asking me to fill out the “I Interview Because” form completely and honestly, I need a few more sheets of paper. I also interview because:

When one of the interviewees asks about my favorite class or professor, it’s a chance to really test my memory capabilities for a name, any name…”Professor Perlmutter? And I think I took a class on nineteenth century British women’s novelists that was good. I’m pretty sure I took one, anyway. It might have been my friend Maria who took it.”
As a native upstate New Yorker, I like to say things to Bay Area-raised students like, “Have you thought about winter in Philadelphia? You know it’s going to be cold. I MEAN COLD. Icy. Do you know how to walk on ice? Do you have mittens?”
It gives me a chance to do a small nutritional infomercial about Philadelphia cuisine, namely, why cheese fries and a Diet Coke are the best way to recover from a late night out.
Ok, there’s a tiny bit of schadenfreude in knowing that I never have to take the SAT again.
My spiel about “finding your passion in one of the many clubs the school has to offer” is really just a chance for me to talk about the time I crewed backstage when New Order played on campus. #GloryDays.
My beloved grad school just narrowly avoided a disastrous acquisition by Laureate Education a.k.a Kaplan Learning Centers, so it seems more important than ever to align with a university that is financially stable. (Related note: my grad school looks like it will be acquired by Arizona State University instead, so I guess I get a new ASU diploma?)
Some tiny corner of my brain actually believes that doing alumni interviews will be viewed by the Admissions Office with the same favor as donating a building or endowing a chair, should my kids choose to apply to my alma mater.
My ego needs the annual reality check that I’d have a snowball’s chance in hell of getting into my university now.

                   
CommentsI love your question! I feel so lame right now because none of ... by PamI find it so reassuring to hear what these kids are into – ... by Nancy Davis Khothis is great! I have interviewed on and off since I graduated ... by pamRelated StoriesMy Advice to High School GradsTour de France Poetry PrimerStill in Rotation: Skylarking (XTC) 

Still in Rotation: Young Americans (David Bowie)

Still in Rotation is a feature that lets talented writers tell Midlife Mixtape readers about an album they discovered years ago that’s still in heavy rotation, and why it has such staying power.

A year ago at BlogHer a friend said, “How do you not know Margit Detweiler yet? She’s a music writer and she’s starting a new site aimed at women over thirty.” She made the introduction and I’ve been a virtual fan of Margit’s ever since, and not just because of her Philly pedigree. Her site, Tue/Night, offers a weekly themed issue chock full of great reads for ladies of a certain age. Here’s her take on an album she first heard when she wasn’t even ten years old; she was a young American when she fell for it, but I don’t think that was the only reason.

 

Young Americans (1975)

by Margit Detweiler

As an 8-year-old in mid ‘70s Philadelphia, I’d rise most school days to the snap and crackle of WFIL-AM, and the Bay City Rollers, Starland Vocal Band or Hot Chocolate imploring me to get up, “you sexy thing.” Whatever that meant. (I also used to sing, “Voulez vous couchez avec moi, ce soir” without a clue what I was requesting. My parents would cringe.)

Then a funky, bellowing crooner started getting heavy airplay with songs like “Golden Years,” “Fame” and “Young Americans.” Who was this guy?

Something about the sophisticated sound drew me in. A lush arrangement of funky beats, sax, piano and “plastic soul.” It was like recognizing a true love for the first time. It was David Bowie, but it was also Music.

I didn’t buy the album Young Americans until many years later, somewhere around age 13 when I spent most of my allowance at Sam Goody. Years later I’d go back and clue into other favorites Ziggy Stardust, Aladdin Sane, Hunky Dory and in high school, of course, sigh, Let’s Dance (finally, I got to see Bowie live.) But it was the full album Young Americans that initially caught my heart. The sound is steeped in thick-cut funk and mellow R&B jams; the perfect high school soundtrack while you were cruising the curves of East River (now Kelly) Drive. It’s an album that I still play constantly, and listen to much differently than I did back then.

Where I was first struck by the unusual, intricate arrangements and the undeniable groove (this ain’t no disco), eventually I hooked into the overall mood and lyrics, often dark and plaintive, lonely and searching.

The title track opens with a cascading spill of beats, the glissando from a piano and a beckoning sax—as if you’re tumbling into the album—or into a snapshot of the City of Brotherly Love. Bowie was reportedly obsessed with the Philadelphia Sound — a style embodied by lavish, string-sweeping arrangements, funky horns and often (to this ear) chillin’ on a Sunday morning. He recorded most of the album at soul central, Sigma Sound Studios — renowned for producers Gamble & Huff and groups like the Trammps, Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes and the Delfonics — and brought in clutch session cats like Carlos Alomar on guitar, David Sanborn on the omnipresent sax and backing vocals by none other than Luther Vandross. The band sort of kicks his ass. (Just listen to Sanborn riff on in “Fascination.”)

No doubt, the album is polished and high concept — like a kid hanging out with his street corner heroes, just for one day. In fact, Bowie wasn’t immune to out and out pilfering, with approval of course. For that sexy sax-pounding “Fascination,” he and Vandross revised one of Vandross’s originals and updated it for the album. (Here’s Bowie’s; Here’s Vandross’ original).

But “Young Americans” is still the stand-out for me, the speed-reading rush of lyrics filled with political jabs (“Do you remember your President Nixon?”) and references to his pal and album co-conspirator John Lennon (“I heard the news today oh boy”). Sharp-witted lyrics and a spirited vibe — it’s just plain fun. Of course Lennon co-wrote and sings back-up on the deeply cool “Fame” and Bowie covers Lennon’s “Across the Universe”, my least favorite track — its earthy, earlier-Bowie style seems out of place.

It’s the soul-searching tunes that are some of the album’s finest. They have an awake in the middle-of-the-night feel to them (maybe because Bowie, addicted to Cocaine at the time is reported to have rarely slept during the recording.) “Win” is maybe my favorite of those, an elegant slow jam pleading, “slow down let someone love you.” Damn. Those bassoon-deep vocals get me in the lady parts every time.

“Can You Hear Me” is another wish for a lost love, with an almost Smokey Robinson romance. The Luther-led background chorus takes it right to the heart.

In a 1991 Rykodisc/EMI re-iussue (and subsequent editions), the album added tracks that are as good as any of the originals. The lush, bluesy ballad “It’s Gonna Be Me” and “Who Can I Be Now?” which one of my treasured, moody mixtape standbys. Hard to believe that either didn’t make the original cut. The latter song is a sort of meta conversation, Bowie’s having with himself — it’s not just who will the Thin White Duke become next but about finding oneself through love. “If it’s all a vast creation? Putting on a face that’s new?”

Some have criticized Bowie for being the perfect “stylist,” an Andy Warhol of music, parroting back current tastes. (More an homage than a thief, Bowie mined Dylan, Elvis, Lou Reed on earlier albums) Bowie might even agree, once calling this album, “Plastic Soul.” But there’s clearly a Bowie sound here like none other. Experimental, searching, slick, and strange and in that, authentically Bowie.

 ♪♪♪

Margit Detweiler is the founder and editor-in-chief of TueNight.com and a “retired” music critic from the ’90s. She lives in Brooklyn. Follow her on Twitter at @margit.

                   
CommentsNOT CRAZY. “Goody Got It” was definitely a slogan. And ... by Julie GardnerDude. Get over to Tue/Night and read her music musings. You'll ... by Nancy Davis KhoAm I crazy of was “Sam Goody Got It” a slogan? by Nancy Davis KhoAnd you two even have the Philly connection. Check out ... by Nancy Davis KhoMy 6 yr old has recently fallen in love with “The Breakfast ... by KirPlus 3 more...Related StoriesStill in Rotation: Skylarking (XTC)Still in Rotation: Barry Manilow Live (Barry Manilow)Still in Rotation: Singles-45′s and Under (Squeeze) 

Tour de France Poetry Primer

(I know last year I said I’d given up cycling for good, what with the doping scandals. But there’s a reason my fantasy cycling team for the 2014 Tour De France is called “I Just Can’t Quit You.”)

In honor of today’s Tour De France stage which ends in the French town that shares my name, I thought I’d provide non-cyclists with a helpful primer. Not of the sport itself; for that, since I can no longer recommend anything Lying Lance ever wrote, I can only offer my husband who taught me everything I know about the epic French road race. If you are able to come over early one morning and perch on the couch next to my husband (we watch it live in California, which is why we are so exhausted throughout July,) he will explain the players, the strategies, and the course considerations in such detail that you will have a Bachelors Degree in Cycling by July 30th.

No, my primer relates to the poetry in cycling, and specifically, to the unmatchable commentary provided by British sportscaster Phil Liggett. No one calls a race like Phil, not even his longtime partner Paul Sherwen who is left to clean up the linguistic spaghetti and explain to mystified listeners, in clear English, what the heck Phil meant when he said, “He’s hauling that big German carcass up over the mountain.” So renowned and beloved are the Phil-isms to longtime cycling fans that there is an actual book of poetry called Dancing on the Pedals that compiles some of his most fevered morsels.

Given that another sport few Americans understand is almost over, why not uncork a nice Sancerre, put some stinky cheese and baguette on a plate, and celebrate Nancy Day the way I am? By sprinkling some of the following Phil Phrases into your vocabulary today.

“Digging down deep into his suitcase of courage.” Alternatively: “Drinking from the decanter of courage.”

o   Translation: Reaching for that little bit of extra effort when it appears that your cause is all but lost. Phil apparently keeps his extra effort around the house in various receptacles, like suitcases and decanters.

o   Use it yourself: “I know there is a spider on the wall in your bedroom, kid, but you have got to start dealing with those yourself. Dig down deep into your suitcase of courage and kill it with a paper towel.”

“They’re having a Tate A Tate.” Derived from the French tête-à-tête, meaning a private conversation between two people.

o   Translation: Two riders are conferring, either about strategy or who is the foxiest podium girl, as they fly at 35 mph over the French roads. Also, Phil didn’t pay a lot of attention in French class, and he doesn’t feel too badly about it.

o   Use it yourself: “Honey, let’s have a tate a tate near the grate.” Then laugh, because you are a poet and you didn’t know it.

“The hard men of the race.” Alternatively: “The heads of state.”

o   Translation: The group of riders expected to have a shot at winning the whole race. Note: this does NOT refer to the sprinters, nor the King of the Mountain contenders, nor the White Jersey contenders, nor the Points racers. If you count all the international and intra-national rivalries going on as the peleton whizzes past, there are, like, eighteen different races happening at the same time. But only the Hard Men of the Race get the glory. It’s very confusing.

o   Use it yourself: “They’ve called me back for a second interview, so I guess that makes me one of the hard (wo)men of the race.”

“He’s using this opportunity to stamp out his authority.”

o   Translation: A rider knows he’s having a good day, which causes him dig down deep into his suitcase of courage to try even harder.

o   Use it yourself: “Nancy is using Friday’s blog post to stamp out her authority as a Tour lingo expert.”

Found this album at a flea market recently and it’s getting a lot of play this month. Perfect.

                   
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Join Me for a Literary Death Match!

I was never much of a Rocky fan. That was my older sister’s gig in the ‘70s; as a teenager she loved that movie, and Sylvester Stallone, so much that all I had to was croak, “Adrian!” and stumble into the walls of the hallway between our bedrooms to work her into a rage. Annoying little sister: job DONE, and efficiently.

But right now I feel like I should have paid more attention to the classic underdog saga, and I definitely need my own Burgess Meredith. Because I’ve been invited to participate in Oakland’s inaugural “Literary Death Match” on July 30 at the Shadow Ultra Lounge. Here’s how it works: four writers get seven minutes to wow the audience and three judges with their wit and literary finesse. After providing very public critiques, the judges choose two of those writers to advance to a final decisive round that’s a bit of a free for all: think “Pin the Mustache on Ernest Hemingway” or “Spell the Complicated Author Name.”

LDM was created back in 2006 by Adrian Todd Zuniga and now is a regular occurrence all over the globe, with shows in London, LA, Seattle, NYC, and Portland ME scheduled in the coming weeks – so if you’re not in the Bay Area, you should still check it out…

My opponents in Oakland? Oh, just a Caldecott Award winner, a seasoned performance poet, and the scariest of all: To Be Announced. Will Ferrell? David Sedaris? Miley? It’s terrifying to think of the possibilities.

Over the next few weeks, if you see me jogging around town in some grey sweats and Chuckie T high tops, or sledge hammering shit in a junkyard, or jumping in the air with my arms raised, all the while silently mouthing what looks like it might be an essay about a recent encounter between my car and a redwood tree, you’ll know what I’m doing.

Getting karmic payback for all the times I teased my sister.

I’d love it if you’d come out and be my corner man/men/women/womyn. You can order your tickets here – the events sell out so get crackin’ and let me know so I can look for your friendly face in the audience!

Rather than the Rocky Theme song I’m going with Eye of the Tiger. Why? Because my teenage daughter swears she loves this song. I think she is messing with me. This is what passes for rebellion in the house of the Alternative Music fan who has become a parent to teenagers.

                   
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Patriot Act

As someone who turned ten the same year America turned 200, I consider myself a patriot from way back. I spent pretty much all of 4th grade dressed in a long dress and a bonnet attending celebratory parades, singing “You’re A Grand Old Flag” or “Spirit of ‘76” with my school choir, joining my neighbors in the middle of the street to clang bells at a time when everyone in all fifty states was supposed to be doing the same thing (did they adjust for time zones? I doubt it.) I was proud to be American. Also mostly unaware that there were other options.

But my high school and college years coincided with the Reagan era. So my growing awareness of American domestic and geopolitics came when I was developmentally primed to scoff at everything the political establishment did and stood for. By the time I moved to Germany at the end of college to start my first job, I was a ready for recruitment: I wanted to be European so much, it hurt.

However, as soon as I moved to Germany, the nature of my relationship to America switched overnight and became very much like my relationship to my family. I am allowed to make fun of it all day long, and often do. But if you so much as utter a syllable of criticism aimed at it, I will end you.

“You Americans have such horrible race relations,” I’d hear. And your record is exemplary, Rolf. By the way, I’m going to visit Dachau this weekend, want to come along?

“You Americans drive too much. You should take the train.” Huh. You know how you can drive four hours from the point we are standing and be in Austria, Switzerland, or Italy? I can drive four hours in any direction from my hometown in New York and be in: New York. Your perception of scale may need a bit of adjusting.

“You Americans don’t study enough foreign languages.” And yet we are conducting this conversation in German. Where I am currently living and communicating.

“Americans use too much water when they wash dishes.” And Germans use too much neon when they design clothes.

Yes, I got defensive. But it made me mad: the people telling me what was wrong with America were the same ones who asked me to bring them back Levis when I went home for a visit, listened to American rap, swore by American technology, such as it was in the late ‘80s, lugging around suitcase-sized Compaq laptops.

I loved my time in Germany. And when it came to claiming the high ground, my German friends were right about a few things: their beer, bread, and butter were far superior (though we’re finally catching up on categories one and two) and I will say that the average German driver is more skilled than the average American one. And if my deep appreciation of state-provided healthcare for every single resident of the country makes me a Socialist then I say, Guten Tag, Comrade.

But mostly I’m grateful that Germany gave me this gift: a chance to view my country at a distance and make a deliberate decision to return to it. To return to the Land of the 24 hour Grocery Stores and the Cereal Aisle of a Thousand Choices and the wide open skies and huge undeveloped tracts of land and oversize restaurant portions. To the creative, optimistic American spirit that looks at opportunities like middle-of-the-night cookie cravings and says, “I could totally turn that into a business.”

To the land of spotty public transportation and woefully underfunded schools. The land of f’d up Supreme Court cases like the Hobby Lobby that are slowly rendering corporations sentient, like some multi-headed, black-robed Dr. Frankenstein. To the land where I have the right, nay, the responsibility, to publicly protest such cases.

America: How could I ever turn my back on it? It ain’t perfect. But it’s perfect for me.

May you all have a very happy Fourth of July!

          
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