3am. The windows are completely foggy and wet. It's not raining. It's Houston, late in the evening. I just finished watching that Metallica documentary "Some Kind of Monster", the one that Bari's husband edited (1200 hrs of footage!). I really enjoyed it and of course formed strong opinions about each member. Lars is a chode. James, I liked. Kirk I really liked. And the new bassist, well, he's one lucky bastard. A million dollar signing bonus, equal voting power in the band. But he seemed to rock it hard, which coming from a jazz nerd like me is sort of like witnessing Bush hop on the drums with that African welcoming committee.

The Frogs outside are fucking and making lots of noise while they do. I'm obsessing on my new scar. They pulled out my appendix less than a week ago. I feel healed, but the changes caused by the surgery are becoming more and more evident. Yes, small worries considering I'm on borrowed time now, eh? 

Okay, let me begin by saying this: I was never a big fan of Journey. In 1982 when I was in 10th grade, Open Arms was the definitive chick song in my High School (and all across the world too). We boys steered clear of this sap-fest and even coined some alternate lyrics. But being the MTV baby I was, I always watched their videos and at that, mostly to get glimpses of Cain's delicious Jupiter-8 and Prophet-5 synths. I also must confess to owning and enjoying the pre-Cain Journey album Escape back in 1980.

So with that in mind, I was over at a friend's house yesterday watching a recent Journey reunion concert DVD. He's a fan, shall we say? It featured a new Philipino guy covering for Steve Perry. Neal Schon found him on YouTube. He really nailed that shit too. But was it really Journey without Perry? I heard there had been some drama between Perry and the rest of his Journeyman. I too remember seeing that VH1 documentary back in the 90's "I never really felt like part of the band." -- perry.

It's pretty fascinating reading the sparing that occurred between them. I found interviews with Schon and Perry, each ripping the other a fairly wide asshole. I don't know why I really care about any of this, apart from basic schadenfreude inherit in us all.

GQ Interview with Perry and Schon (separately interviewed)

I guess if I was on the jury for this trial I would conclude the following:

1) During the mid-90's reunion talks, Perry realized that he had lost his upper register (voice) and over-played the hip injury. He probably should have just said that.

2) Perry was a hypocrite for being upset about discussing touring without him ("stone is broken") since he had effectively toured without journey doing their tunes during his own solo stint (83?).

3) Schon is definitely a monster guitarist; he was hired by Santana as a 15 year-old, after all. Perry, too, was a great vocalist. None of the conflicts seemed to have anything to do with musicality, apart from Perry firing drummer Steve Smith for not  being able to play with a click.

4) Perry seems a wee-bit self-obsessed based on the fan interviews. He acts if he's being stalked by throngs of women eager to marry him. Hey, maybe that's the case. Then again, maybe he should get out a little more. Beyond that, he doesn't appear to be doing much of anything now, except listening to the cash register go cha-ching-ching (quoting Schon "he gets paid like a motherfucker on those songs")

At least he was able to help close the Sopranos...

This is the best vocabulary list ever!! A collection of words so bizarre, you'll just have to conjure the flash cards and get busy.

http://home.comcast.net/~wwftd/

A few highlights:

curglaff -- the shock felt when plunging into cold water

cyanthropy -- the delusion that one is a dog

dactylonomy -- counting using one's fingers

fysigunkus  -- someone who is totally devoid of curiosity

A-W-E-S-O-M-E

To put this in perspective: "At the end of March, there were 16,226 Starbucks stores around the world". The 600 doomed java joints are only among those the new stores opened in the last two years. So, it's but a small ding in the hood of their massive machine. Then again, it's probably the sign of a much larger impending downsizing. Do we really need a Starbucks on every block? Isn't one every three blocks enough?

Here in Houston we have a pair of Starbucks sitting across the street from one another. I guess one's for the inbound crowd, and the other is for those going to work (the latter is a drive-through)... and to think, Kenny G owes many of his millions to a wise original investment in the Seattle company way-back-when. I hope he's diversified his portfolio since then.

Anyway, I always wondered how long we, the cheesy consumer generation, would sustain the exponential growth of Fourbucks coffee. Now we know.

I remember in the mid-70's, Barry Manilow had this big hit about a weekend in New England. Living in Kentucky and being ten years old, I didn't quite get the precise definition of New England, much less what it meant to spend a weekend there. Was New England another state like, say, New Hampshire or New York?

I've been in New England all weekend, driving from NYC to Boston to many points between, most notably a region in Northeastern Connecticut flush with rolling hills and enormous trees. Oh, and very dark skies (since I am now a star nerd). We attended the joyous wedding of a very good friend. In attendance were a handful of our most cherished friends, many of whom I've known since grad school days at Berkeley.

We made a detour to Boston to see my brother and his family.  I installed some computer music recording software for my nephew and helped him record his first tune. What a thrill! Less than 24 hours later, we drove back to NYC to meet with a realtor to discuss selling our home in Queens. This is a good thing.

A strange highlight. Last night, we went to this cute bistro in midtown to see my friend play bass. He was doing duos with a pianist/vocalist. Before we could get perched at the bar and after being introduced as a pianist/college friend, I was being cajoled into sitting in. The manager standing nearby was also a pianist and furthered the prodding. Oh, by the way, they added, Neil Sedaka is at that table in the corner. I turned to spy the famed composer/pianist/singer with his wife quietly eating dinner.

I was introduced as "All the way from Houston via Queens...". It inspired deranged laughter from the die-hard NYC patrons. I ended up playing quite a bit. I even did a four-hand duet with the manager while the house pianist sang. The manager was a very fine player! Later that evening bassist Jay Leonhart stopped in on a break from playing with Les Paul down the street at the Iridium. We compared last names. Anyway, nice place. I will definitely come back next time I'm in town.

I tend to dread the big version number bumps from the major browsers because it implies lots of new testing and compatibility worries. However, Firefox 3.0 is a stunning improvement. It's also noticeably faster. Kudos all around.

FF3 Download

Well last night was really cool. I pulled out my crap telescope and pointed it at Jupiter, which is the brightest thing in the night sky besides the moon these days. It sits low in the East, you can't miss it.

What I saw was remarkable -- four moons and the stripes of the planet itself! Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto were all visible (little dots, but hey!). As I looked closer I realized that I could see 3 more small dots. So I guess I saw 7 moons in all. Awesomely cool!

By the way, Jup has a 10-hour day, meaning if you keep checking back, you should see the surface change. I was hoping to catch the big red storm. I'll try again tonight and see if I get lucky.

I need a bigger telescope.

nerd news

I finally moved my home wireless network to WPA instead of the older, less-secure WEP security model. Now it isn't like I suddenly woke up in a cold sweat worrying about WEP. I really could care less as long as my teenage neighbors don't hijack my network to surf p0rn and download shit. It's just that I bought a second Airport Express to play my itunes on the porch and in the house simultaneously. Unfortunately I had absolutely no luck getting the newer 11n AirportExpress to connect to my Linksys-run WEP Wireless network. The old (circa '04) AE connected happily.

After talking to Apple Support, they strongly suggested that I use WPA. The only reason I picked WEP was because my company-issued ThinkPad has an ancient Cisco Aironet wireless card that seemingly didn't support more modern approaches.I decided it was time to revisit this bottleneck.

Googlex100 and I realized that since I was now running XP sp2 (a recent upgrade), I could bypass the Cisco Aironet Client Utility and let XP manage the connection directly (XP supports WPA/WPA2/etc.). It was surprisingly easy. All I had to do was open the Aironet client and under the Commands menu pick Select Profile and check "Use Other Configuration Application". Under Control Panel>Network Settings I selected Properties on the Wireless Network Connection, selected the Wireless Networks tab and did an Add. It found my network and asked for the WPA password. Done!

The rest was even easier. I reset both Airport Expresses (pin in small hole) and using the Airport Utility, I found each by having my wireless card select THEIR networks (Base Station 2ba9s33, etc). Within that I had them join my network using WPA. Green lights shimmered, I was rolling.

Music is now piping through the entire house on two stereos plus the iMac speakers itself. Pretty damn cool.

nerd out.

My friend Damian sent me this.

The Perfect Song Length?

Hello Austin.

I'm in the somewhat swanky Stephen F. Austin on Congress and 7th tonight. It's a place with a real bed and let's see, 6 big pillows crowding the head of it. I have a nice southern view of downtown.

I'm tweaked from too much coffee as I'm on travel energy today. I'm pondering hitting Waterloo for some mellow bin diving. My main agenda tonight though is to finish this damned "Know-It-All" book which I've been reading in very small increments over the last couple weeks -- free time, me? Ha.

Actually the big thing from last week is that I didn't gig (hooray!) and spent each day recording solo tracks in the living room.  That's a picture of the setting complete with my friend Erich's Millennia pres (4 channels) on the rug. Yummy, lush, and if I had $3000 to spend on equipment that'd be what I'd get (unless of course I spent them on nice mics).

The results? You know... There were things that I was really pleased with and others that made me annoyed. Such is recording. Recorded about 14GB of piano music (@24-bit/96kHz) and will probably only use a few of the tracks. I probably should get some opinions before I banish it all to some forgotten place on an external hard-drive.

Okay, off in search of music.. and food. 

I had my first experience as a DJ last night. It was for a theater company. I started the night with lots of weird stuff -- Sex Pistols, Spank Rock, The Bird and the Bee... It created a cool edgy mood. But by the end of the night (after lots of jello shots and funny punch) a certain faction of the party wanted nothing but dance hits. This faction -- oh, let's just quote what one woman said to me "I love this gay dance music. It's awesome!" -- was the total life of the party. I gave them what they wanted too: ABBA, Madonna, Erasure, Wham, The B-52's. The place was hopping. I so proud. I walked out onto the dance floor in the middle of it and said to my friend "I made this" :) It was a fun night.

I was listening to that track today and decided to see what keyboard was used. Fascinating and quite unexpected!

http://www.thewho.net/whotabs/equip-baba.htm

Here's something that makes me happy. I wrote a review of the Metheny/Mehldau duo CD in 2006. A friend recently saw it mentioned on Mehldau's web site on the news page. If you scroll down a bit you'll see an excerpt from my review where I talk about his piano influences. I guess he agreed!

http://www.bradmehldau.com/news/index.html

The quote:

Jazz Houston:
"Mehldau, whose work in the last few years has become increasingly introspective, truly has a pianism of his own making. His now famous style is one that draws from the varied likes of Hancock, Jarrett, Newborn, and even has classical influences, particularly Schubert as is evidenced on the opening number."
Read the Complete Jazz Houston Review

Hello 3 am.

I played in a bar tonight. It's St. Patty's Day. What a grotesque holiday. Green beer and shots and stupid people becoming more stupid with each additional glass, green or otherwise. My keyboard, my new Yamaha keyboard, was knocked off its stand by a staggering idiot while we were on break. The case was bent a bit. It still works. The drunk was nowhere to be found. At least the music was fun. Me and Jose-Miguel and Richard and Tim playing our unique brand of 80's covers, jazz-style on dual-keyboards w/ laptops. Lots of dueling solos, which is funny since JMY and I play so much alike.

Earlier today I went to the doctor to see what's up with this chronic burning thing in my esophagus. She poked around a bit and referred me to a GI for more tests. Got more sample packs of GERD drugs. Later, I peeked my referral to see what comments she made. This one seemed interesting "failing OTCS". Hmm. Google, google, google. Ahh. OTCS is Over-The-Counter(S). Failing OTC Drugs. Yeah I told her that the arsenal of drugs I've been taking hasn't done anything. So that inspired the entry. Anyway, curious lingo these docs have. No conclusion on whether it's an ulcer, of course.

Let's try to sleep now.

This morning I drove to my parents house to receive the most amazing gift. They gave me a complete Encyclopaedia (Greek Spelling sic.) Britannica set. While telling them about that "Know-it-all" book (see post from 3/11), they said they had not one, but FOUR complete sets and they wondered if I'd be interested in one of them. My dad is currently only using his 1893 and 1911 editions. He says the 1974 edition just doesn't get opened anymore. What a gift! Of course, it's every bit as intractable as the A.J.Jacobs book promises, but I still love it. I love it, love it, love it!

What an absolutely amazing moment! I dragged my rarely used telescope out into the backyard tonight to peep some stars. I was inspired to do so because we recently had this large, precariously perched old tree removed. It opened up the sky in a dramatic way (in the daytime, we get actual sunlight now instead of these gloomy rainforest-like ground shadows).

Well I was pretty sure that the bright dot rising in the East was Saturn, so I pointed my low-end telescope its way. Focusing took some time, then suddenly a complete Holy Shit moment! I saw the rings of Saturn! I ran and got Stephanie. She had the same amazed reaction. Later her sister and nephew dropped in. They were equally impressed.

I'm telling you, if you haven't seen the rings yourself, you need to. It's breathtaking and it's right there!

And now I'm obsessed with the night sky.

A Jazzhouston.com editorial

Houston just lost its Smooth Jazz station. So did New York City. And Milwaukee. Most have found new homes in the emerging HD radio market or online. All were replaced by stations directed at larger and younger audiences. Our own 95.7 FM now boasts a "hot Latin-tinged dance" format. Is this beginning of the end for Smooth Jazz at large?

Let's be honest, this term "Smooth Jazz" is the marketing equivalent of wearing a "Kick Me" sign in an elementary school lunch room; one that parallels New Coke or McDonald's selling Lattes. A more appropriate description is "Instrumental Pop". In fact, that's just what the Grammy people call it. It may lack punch, but it's accurate (even if there are a few vocal numbers thrown in here and there). At the same time it serves a purpose, catering to the demand of a 35 to 55 year old professional demographic.

Of course, the mere existence of this music is anathema to jazz purists. Yet the long-term effects of Smooth Jazz on the rest of the jazz community might actually work in their favor. Could it be that one feeds the other? Or to be more direct, could it be that the sales in this Smooth Jazz market are helping maintain the all-but-dead market of jazz? For every Chris Botti, there are a 1000 unknown jazz artists not selling hundreds of thousands of records. However those 1000 artists may not have received records deals in the first place had it not been for the success of Botti and others like him. In other words, instrumental pop records are buoying the industry. Blue Note, the oldest and most esteemed of all jazz labels, now sells more Smooth Jazz than anything else in its fabled catalog.

Interestingly, the lion's share of hit records in this format have been the mastermind of a fella named Paul Brown out in LA. Brown is smooth jazz's Teo Macero. The Phil Spector of easy listening. His resume is so jam-packed with brand names, one wonders: did he actually invent this genre? To quote the GRP web site:

"The oft-imitated but never equaled producer, composer and arranger has been the primary architect of the genre’s urban sound for close to 15 years, scoring over 40 #1 airplay hits for genre stars like Boney James, Rick Braun, Peter White, Kirk Whalum, Euge Groove, Norman Brown, Patti Austin, Larry Carlton and legendary labelmates Al Jarreau and ... George Benson."

Truly fascinating: one man's vision produces an entire genre with a network of supporting radio stations. Before Paul Brown we were clinging to the less successful "Contemporary Jazz" tag which included artists whose jazzy ambitions prevented wider appeal. The Yellowjackets? Forget it. Too many notes. But Boney, now that's money. Add three backing vocalists to remind us of the aging pop tune being covered and bingo, nostalgia radio is born!

Ultimately as the term 'jazz' finds its way in disparate genres, the resulting confusion creates opportunities. Most listeners don't obsess on the finer points of genre taxonomies. They end up hiring a local jazz group for an event or buying a new jazz CD because they've been enjoying the music on the radio and want more of it. Perhaps it's blind optimism, but I maintain that smooth jazz or instrumental pop, if you will, is a good thing because it helps keep other flavors of the jazz world healthy (and its musician's employed). So while it risks becoming an artifact of passing trends, it's more likely that it will rebrand itself and continue serving the needs of the mellowing middle-aged masses.

As for me, I will miss WAVE 95.7 FM. Not only for the reasons of economy previously mentioned (i.e., it really did create gigs and they were fantastic promoters of local artists), but also because it sparked conversations on jazz with non-musicians who simply enjoyed the station. And that can only be a good thing. Adieu.

Online: KHJZ

Tonight I sit upright in a hotel in Austin, wide-awake after sleeping during the gloaming and eating obscene amounts of pasta hours later. It could have gone differently. I could have stayed sleeping. But this is where the perpetual commuter becomes hardened to a revised hunter-gatherer instinct (one greatly amplified by phoned-in reminders from wifey): eat while you can. Yes, as my late afternoon nap threatened to become a full-blown nighty-night, I forced myself up, blurry-eyed and not particularly hungry, knowing that I needed to go eat before my options were reduced to the likes of Denny's and vending machines.

I fumbled out the door as if being man-handled by an evil drill sergeant. I found myself face-to-foot with the sick swirling carpets of La Quinta. This prompted a quicker pace. Soon I was speeding off in my (incredibly perfect) 2007 Honda CRV, u-turning under the freeway to find a conveniently located and stupidly trendy outdoor shopping center called "The Domain". Parking was a pain, but the many Lexus SUV's assured me I was among the most wasteful and wanton crowd in Austin. Ah, such a contradiction to this town's holier-than-thou image <<snicker, snicker>>.

Naturally I bee-lined my way into the Apple Store first, perusing its many delights (and buying nothing, thank God!). What is it with this company? Their stuff looks so yummy. Anyway with my appetite at its peak, I found a nearby $$$ Italian 'bistro' whose name I'll recall when I get my Amex bill. It proved a wonderful surprise though, despite the pulsing house music and cave-like lighting. I carefully savored a hearty and I must say, stunningly delicious mushroom/pine-nut pasta which I paired with a colder-than-usual glass of Italian Tuscan red wine (I haven't assimilated the vast ocean of Italian wine, so I stick to "red" and "white" when drinking from the boot). It was worth every dime of the $40 bill.

My extravagance concluded with the acquisition of three new books at Border's ($76). Among them a funny memoir called "The Know-it-all", the journey of one man's obsessive pursuit to read all 32 volumes of the Encyclopaedia Britannica (a mere 33,000 rice-paper pages in all). His story is presented in dictionary form, each of its 26 letter-named chapters reviews the most interesting entries from that letter used as clever bait to tell his life story. I'm at letter C an hour after returning to my room. He reminds me of every neurotic (insecure) intellectual I ever knew in NYC, particularly those living in the Upper West. But it's charming nonetheless. I now know that there's a snail called an abalone which has 5 buttholes. By the way, I don't own a Britannica set, but I did grow up with one. Alas, I always have Wikipedia.

Sleeping at sunset is a good predictor of manic public blogging at midnight. And I have heartburn to boot.

I slept 3 hours last night, woke up full of energy at 6am, drove immediately home to Houston from Austin. Watched the sunrise in the East as I made my journey. Arrived with Milk in hand to surprise Steph who didn't know I had even left and still managed to make my 9:30am conf call from home.

Spent the day getting text-flamed by a drummer who thought I was booked for something I wasn't. Made charts for a gig. Did the gig standing up, instead of my usual sitting. Made it home a few hours later, watched hours of Bravo Reality TV crap -- Project Runway whore that I have become, thanks Steph.... Oh and now it's 2am and I'm wide fucking awake.

Of course I spent all of Tuesday puking my brains alternating from chills to fever and sleeping for about 20 hours afterwards. Makes sense I guess.

My body is so Off. Wow. Good thing I have a jar of Peanut Butter to stupify me.

What a strange feeling to hear this breaking news story today. As of 4pm CST, the US embassy in Belgrade is under siege and apparently in flames. Bodies have been found inside. It's tragic. Here's the thing though: I went to 3rd grade in this very same Embassy. We saw movies there on the weekend, American films that somehow made it overseas for the ex-pats. I loved that place. It was home in a very foreign land. For that matter, I loved "Yugoslavia" at the time too.

A little context... Nixon was impeached while we lived there. Marshall Tito was the president of Yugoslavia. His entourages frequently sidelined the city. I even saw the man himself once. Kissinger came to the Embassy too. They shut it down to all low-end personnel and students. Fascinating time to live in a Communist country.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/europe/02/21/kosovo.independence/index.html