tag:dredscott.com,2005:/blogs/dispatches?p=4dispatches2024-02-21T10:16:52-05:00dred scottfalsetag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/73547962024-02-21T10:16:52-05:002024-03-20T09:29:11-04:00Louis Armstrong and Hampton Hawes<img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/s:bzglfiles/u/79745/92a63be9026dc69e4a2286c15fb498c3847ed267/original/img-4515.jpeg/!!/meta:eyJzcmNCdWNrZXQiOiJiemdsZmlsZXMifQ==" class="size_l justify_center border_" /><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/s:bzglfiles/u/79745/ce7c28df63614b21d403cebb13a0765831d5cfed/original/img-4514.jpeg/!!/meta:eyJzcmNCdWNrZXQiOiJiemdsZmlsZXMifQ==" class="size_l justify_center border_" /><p> </p><p><span>Satchmo - My Life in New Orleans - Louis Armstrong (1954)</span></p><p><span>Raise Up Off Me - Hampton Hawes/Don Asher (1972)<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>What is it about books? Not audio books or books you read on your Kindle - actual books. Like record albums, for me, they are physical tokens of a life lived - like photo albums. I still print out my favorite photographs and put them into albums. And it's not because I'm concerned that The Cloud could crash, erasing my life. Or that once I'm gone all that is left of me will exist only in the ether. I like being surrounded by my life's journey and the talismans I've collected. There's something about holding them and the wonder they inspire. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>Perfect example is the original copy of Louis Armstrong's autobiography I came across in a bookstore. This falling apart actual book with the original sleeve was written by Pops himself with no ghost writer. It begins at the beginning and it ends when he travels to Chicago at the age of 21 - a very focused amount of time. I had never heard of this book by the greatest jazz musician of all time and was very excited to read it even though despite the shape it was in was over $50. Original copies in good condition go for hundreds of dollars. But I had mine and I was excited to read it.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>First thing I did was take the dust jacket off so it wouldn't get it damaged while I read it. And I carried the book around in a plastic bag if I was going to read it on the subway. Sure you can read this book online and you can buy any number of editions that came out after this one. But having this edition, this actual book, made me want to read it. It was mine and I was keeping it. This is the greatest legend of the music I love so dearly and have spent my life learning how to play in his own voice on the first pages it was ever told on. Score.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>Every jazz musician should read this book. So I won't go into too much detail. But the book is incredibly well-written for someone that poor with no formal education. The man didn't have shoes until he was like 12! In his words, his family was "broker than the ten commandments." Direct and conversational, it really is like listening to Pops telling you a story. He was 53 when this book was published and his memory is incredibly sharp. Just the names of the characters he was surrounded with - Sore Dick, Black Benny, Cheeky Black, One-eye Bud, Little Head, Sugar Johnny, Nicodemus and my favorite, Boogus - puts you in a place you've never been and can never go, New Orleans in the oughts and teens.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>So much could've gone wrong for young Louis. There were fights, stabbings and shootings all around him. He never got hurt but he did get sent to Juvenile Detention for shooting a gun in the air on New Year's Eve, another life event that could have gone terribly wrong. But that is where he got turned on to the trumpet. Music saved his life. From then on, he had focus and ambition. That and his immense talent and the love of his family saved him from the streets. And we all know the rest of the story.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p> </p><p> </p><p><span>Hampton Hawes is a different and tragic story altogether, maybe the saddest story in all of Jazz. LA- born, self-taught son of a minister whose wife was the church pianist, Hawes had a burgeoning career in the 1950's hey days of jazz piano. Sonny Clark, Elmo Hope, Bobby Timmons, Hank Jones, George Shearing, Red Garland, Oscar Peterson (the list is long) - Hawes was in with the best of them. But in 1958, he got arrested for possession of heroin. The Feds chose Hawes because they thought since his career was SO promising he would rather rat on his suppliers than go to prison. They were wrong. He wouldn't talk so they gave him 10 years in the Ft. Worth Penitentiary. After a few years, he became convinced after seeing JFK on TV, that Kennedy would pardon him. So he wrote a letter to the president and in 1963 he was released. 5 years in prison. For having drugs. He was never the same. In those 5 years, music had gone through tectonic changes and rather than go back to what he was doing - playing jazz piano - he tried to change his style and get with the 60's. But he was a real be-bopper and his records after that seemed forced and were not popular. His career languished. He died suddenly in 1977 from a brain hemorrhage. He was just 48-years-old. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>This book was written in 1972 with the help of ghost-writer, Don Asher. At the time, only Charles Mingus had told the real story of what it's like to be a jazz musician in his own vernacular. The writing of Babs Gonzalez comes to mind as being a precursor to this kind of language - the way black people actually talked. Hampton Hawes was angry and bitter, naturally, and the book allows him to tell his story in his own voice with his own attitude. It was hard to read and made me feel a lot of emotions - anger and rage, for sure, but such sadness and melancholy.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>This book is not a special edition - just a beat-up reissued paperback. But it is a book I will keep to remind me how fortunate I am and have been and to keep myself in check should I start to think I deserve things. It will go in the music section next to the Mingus book and the Satchmo book, the Art Pepper, Duke and Billy Strayhorn biographies - next to Miles' and Zappa's autobiographies. And there's the book of Luciano Berio interviews I keep to remind me music is not an academic pursuit. And the letters between Kandinsky and Schoenberg to remind me to know and collaborate with other kinds of artists. And there's </span><i><span>Please Kill Me</span></i><span>, I flip open every so often to stay punk. The Copeland book about 'the new music,' several books about playing the piano, a big art book about Stravinsky - all of these inspire me just looking over at them on the shelf. People who have a lot of books know what I mean. Oh. I forgot one. Among all these great books by and about legendary musicians sits a narrow paperback of interviews with bass players by Mike Visciglia. It's not a book I will probably ever crack open again. I don't need to be reminded what strings Lee Sklar uses or that the days of making records the way he used to is over. I keep that one just because Mike is my friend and seeing it over there helps me write. I mean, if HE can write a book....<o:p></o:p></span></p><p> </p><p> </p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/73271812024-01-02T12:07:50-05:002024-02-19T07:54:05-05:00Housewife, Jerrie Mock, flies around the world in 1964<p><span>The Jerrie Mock Story - Nancy Roe Pimm (2016)<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><br><span>Happy Mother's Day to all who celebrate. And to those who celibate I say, where would you be if your mother had that attitude? There's something my mother would say, referring to my own 'bad attitude' and referring to herself in the third person. She believed you can control and change your attitude whenever you want. More than 50 years later, I've learned that is the only thing you CAN control in life. I've also learned that it's not as easy to change as it sounds. And I now understand how that explains why she herself had 'bad attitudes' often and that we are all flawed but the honor, grit and soul is in the trying. I think I'm finally giving my mom a break. </span></p><p><span>My mom was a 'doer,' a word she used often.</span><br><span>'Be a doer. Don't be a watcher,' she would say to me and pretty much anyone else. Well, Jerrie Mock was a doer. She was also a housewife not unlike my mother. In 1964, my mom was 43 and lived in Cleveland with her husband and 5 children. Jerrie Mock was 38 and had 3 children and lived outside of Columbus. On March 14, my mother had me at Lakewood Hospital. 5 days later, Jerrie Mock took off from Columbus and became the first woman to fly solo around the world. She had been flying for only 7 years and had never flown further than the Bahamas. To contrast, Amelia Earhart was a professional barnstormer who had crossed both oceans before her attempt to circle the globe in a state-of-the-art twin-engine plane with a navigator on board. Jerrie flew a single-engine Cessna that was 11 years old, by herself. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>Despite these little time and geographic coincidences and a mother who was 'women's lib' before there was such a thing, I had never heard of Jerrie Mock until I happened upon her biography in one of those tiny book houses some people put in their front yard, although this one lives in front of our local liquor store and has a great revolving collection. I am somewhat of an aviation buff and couldn't believe I did not know her story. Maybe because it's kind of not all that compelling. She was not charismatic like Amelia Earhart. She wore a skirt and a blouse in the plane, not an aviator suit. But she wasn't glamorous. Just a regular gal from rural Ohio. I don't get it. Is that why she's not a household name? There are only a couple books about her and there is no documentary or film adaptation. This book is not that well-written and her personal accounts are not terribly exciting. She landed. She slept. She met the officials. She had some great food. She checked on her plane. She talked to or received a telegram from her asshole husband who told her to keep going because another woman was trying at the same time. She kept going. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>Almost 30 years passed between Earhart's famous attempt and Jerrie Mock's success. There must have been others during that time but I couldn't find anything about their attempts. There is barely anything about Jerrie Mock. A brand new book just came out, 'Queen of the Clouds,' about her and Joan Merriam Smith, the other woman attempting to circumnavigate at the same time. I haven't read it but the title isn't promising. It's sure to have more details than this book for kids, so I'm going to check it out. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>I know that most things our mothers do get taken for granted. But this is ridiculous. This typical Midwestern mom was the first woman to fly around the world BY HERSELF in a SINGLE-ENGINE plane with only 7 YEARS of flying experience and not only didn't crash but didn't get killed along the way. She landed in some countries where women didn't do such things, for example. And she flew over Cambodia and Vietnam while the war was raging below. The book mentions the war with one line. Maybe that's why I never heard of her - overshadowed by the upheaval our country was going through - JFK had just been assassinated four months before her flight and the Civil Rights Act was signed four months after. Well, my daughter knows about Jerrie Mock now and she knows about my mom, too, though they only met briefly and Lucy does not remember her. But I tell her stories about my mom. Like the one about how with the right attitude you can do whatever you want. </span></p><p><span><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/s:bzglfiles/u/79745/cd63d02ecbcc2c81276d012a91bdf42f51269f01/original/img-3059.jpeg/!!/meta:eyJzcmNCdWNrZXQiOiJiemdsZmlsZXMifQ==" class="size_l justify_center border_" /><o:p></o:p></span></p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/73271792024-01-02T12:00:36-05:002024-01-02T12:00:36-05:00Roald Dahl<p><span>Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator - Roald Dahl (1972)</span><br><span>Illustrated by Joseph Shindelman<o:p></o:p></span></p><p> </p><p><span>I have loved Roald Dahl since I was 10. I started with Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, of course, and moved on to all his books for kids - James and the Giant Peach and The Witches. The sort of Carrie for kids, Mathilda. The class-conscious, Fantastic Mr. Fox. George's Marvelous Medicine - an absurd and dark tale of revenge, greed and murder. Lucy is 11 and has read all of these, too. My sister found the copy of Great Glass Elevator I read when I was Lucy's age in her attic. When it arrived in the mail, we read it together. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>The elevator has crashed through the roof of the chocolate factory. Charlie has been given the chocolate factory and in the movie, the family and Mr. Wonka fly around in the elevator over their picturesque town. It's Munich, for the curious. The book ends with Mr. Wonka landing at Charlie's house and inviting them all to live with him at the factory - a happy ending if you're not one of the other children or possibly an oompa-loompa. Wonka says they are happy but so say all colonizers and enslavers. I was much older when I considered the circumstances of the oompa-loompa's servitude could be exploitive. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>The story picks up on the family's way back to the factory. The elevator malfunctions and takes the entire family, including the other grandparents who still haven't got of bed, into orbit where mayhem ensues. The group docks to the just completed, Space Hotel, USA (1972!) where Vermicious Knids, shape-shifting aliens, have taken over. I wasn't that into sci-fi as a kid and it's still not one of my go-to genres - Phil Dick, Urusla LeGuin, William Gibson and Robert Heinlen excepted - so I didn't really remember reading this book. It is classic Dahl. Karma is dealt out to the greedy, the crass and the bullies in great measure, though the punishments are usually temporary. Great lessons for kids on what can and maybe should happen to jerky people. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>Now that Lu has read most of the Dahl for kids, she was ready for some adult stories. My Mom bought me his short story collection, Someone Like You, when I was her age and we read them together - at the same time, rather. I don't remember my mom and I doing anything together. For years we talked about his story about the wife who finds out her husband is cheating on her and clubs him over the head with a frozen leg of lamb, then calmly puts it in the oven and calls the police. When the police arrive, the wife tells them she was out at the grocery, came back and there he was, head bashed in on the floor, his scotch up-ended on the carpet and his cigarette still burning in the ashtray. The cops believe her and scour the surrounding neighborhood for the murder weapon or any clues. When they return to the house exhausted with no leads, the wife offers to feed them. She was cooking dinner after all and she couldn't possibly eat an entire leg of lamb by herself and what a waste it would be, so...<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>It wasn't that often but every time my mom made a leg of lamb, that story would come up.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>Some of the stories are too grown-up psychologically for her attention span but there was another one we read about a kid who had invented a game in his head using the multi-colored carpet of his hallway. The red sections were hot coals. The black sections, swirling bands of poisonous snakes. He can only walk on the yellow sections. But is there enough yellow in the carpet design to make it across the hallway and down the steps to the safety of his mother? Before long we are thinking this boy's situation is as real as he thinks it is. And when he falls over into the black puddle of adders and cobras, we are left to wonder if he survived. Incredible story-telling.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>Another of my Mom's favorites from that collection is called, "Man From the South." The setting is a resort in Jamaica. Poolside, The Man, hustles a guy sitting next to him into a bet. An unusual bet. The new lighter the mark has been bragging about lights even in the wind, he says. So The Man bets him it won't light ten times in a row even inside. The wager? The Man will put up a brand new Cadillac against the mark's left pinky. I won't tell you how it ends but it is one of Dahl's greats. He wrote it in 1948. Alfred Hitchcock Presents devoted an episode to this story in 1960 starring Steve McQueen as the mark and Peter Lorre as The Man. </span></p><p><span><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/s:bzglfiles/u/79745/ac07143ae2906e39ec88b379da797470586c7e25/original/img-3185.jpeg/!!/meta:eyJzcmNCdWNrZXQiOiJiemdsZmlsZXMifQ==" class="size_l justify_center border_" /><o:p></o:p></span></p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/73271762024-01-02T11:58:28-05:002024-01-02T11:58:29-05:00Cannibals at sea<p><span>In the Heart of the Sea - Nathaniel Philbrick (2000)</span><br><span>385 days - Jonathan Franklin (2015)<o:p></o:p></span></p><p> </p><p><span>My local is called O'Sullivans. It's three long blocks from the Narrows where I live and is the first sign of civilization on a long uphill walk past suburban Brooklyn to the top of the ridge Bay Ridge is named for. The bar has been family owned for 82 years, purchased in 1934 by its namesake, a retired NYPD police sergeant. I guess you'd call it a cop bar - not like that cop bar in Windsor Terrace they just started admitting women to like 20 years ago. And not like other cop or even firefighter bars I've been in that can seem unwelcoming to outsiders. Although one asshole did put me in chokehold just for fun once because I said something about the death of Eric Garner in Staten Island at the hands of cops. Everyone had a laugh and I didn't make a big deal out of it. Most everyone is friendly or at least polite. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>The bartender, Eddie, is an avid music fan and he kind of tries to watch out for me. Like don't sit in the corner, even if nobody's there. Somebody might show up and wonder who the fuck this guy thinks he is sitting in our corner. There is also a scary looking bald dude with sleeve tats that go all the up his neck who Eddie has cautioned me to never sit next to. That doesn't bother me and I don't mind learning and adhering to the unwritten rules of the bar. I like Eddie and he plays great music. He likes me and my family and we always at least pop our heads in to say hi when we are walking by. Most times we come in and have one or two. Lucy gets her usual - a glass of water in a rocks glass with a straw and a slice of lemon. My wife gets a tequila gimlet and I have a whiskey. The owner is usually sitting at one end of the bar nursing a white wine and is always friendly and welcoming. It really is a family pub - a real local where the locals check in to see what's happening even if they're not drinking. </span></p><p><span>One day I walk in and the only other guy in there is the scary bald dude I've never talked to. He's talking to Eddie about fishing. He loves to fish. The only fishing I know about is Missouri trout fishing. I even used to tie flies with my old man when I was a teenager. He's an ocean going fisherman with a boat - do all ex-cops have boats? - and he's talking about a book he's read. I read. He reads. So I figure I could talk to him. I ask him about the book and he doesn't so much talk TO me, more like AT me - the kind of person who would never think to ask you a question about yourself. But he tells me the famous story of the Essex whaleship that in 1821 got stove by a whale in the middle of the Pacific Ocean and sunk, leaving the 21 survivors alone in 3 whaleboats 3000 miles from South America. Until the sinking of the Titanic it was the most famous sea story there was. It became the inspiration for Moby Dick. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>I love adventure tales. I've read the Krakauer book about the doomed Everest expedition that took the lives of 8 climbers in 1996. I loved The Lost City of Z. I've read about Ernest Shakleton's 1915 journey to the South Pole. Their ship was crushed by pack ice and they survived for two years on the floating ice. Scientists just recently discovered his sunken ship 2 miles below the ice in perfect condition. And I had the book, 385 days, on my reading cart - a story about a fisherman who got swept out to sea and drifted for, you guessed it, 385 days in 2012. I picked up the Essex book and started 385 days at the same time. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>What a contrast in survival stories. The crew of the Essex knew how to sail and navigate and had salvaged sails from the doomed ship. Salvador Alvarenga not only had no sail, he had a useless outboard motor attached to the back of his boat he had no tools to take off to increase the seaworthiness of his boat. Though the crew of the Essex were whale hunters, they had no tackle and could not fish. Alvarenga was in the sea to fish. He was a fisherman. So he could fish. The men of the Essex had only the water they could take off the ship and carry with them in the whaleboats. In 2012, the ocean was filled with plastic and Alvarenga easily snatched up all kinds of water catching containers. When food ran out or someone died, the crew of the Essex ate them. When Alvarenga's mate died, he insists he did not eat him. He had raw fish, had discovered how to kill birds that would rest on his boat and there was turtle blood. It kept him alive. He drifted for 7000 miles from Mexico all the way to the other side of the Pacific. 385 days. The men of the Essex, fearing cannibals in the islands to the west, executed a journey against the wind of 105 days and sailed 4100 miles in the opposite direction. In 1821, in open whaleboats, that is quite an amazing sea story. They both are. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>Since the Essex was a Nantucket whaling ship at the height of Nantucket's whaling dominance, there is a lot of interesting history about Nantucket and Quakers and the old money of the Folgers, Macys and the Starbucks - all very familiar names today that were at the forefront of Nantucket's wealthy history. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>Women ran Nantucket. Men would be gone for years at a time and sometimes wouldn't come back at all. When they did it was 3-5 months at home and then back to sea. So the women ran the business of interactions with the mainland - the island supply chain that kept them in goods and services and the selling of the whale oil the men brought back. With a lot of idle time, it seems they had hobbies. They smoked a lot of opium, apparently. And in 1979 during excavation and demolition of a home from the mid-1800's, workers discovered a Victorian-era dildo in the chimney. It seems the women adapted quite well to not having the men around. Here's a poem islander Eliza Brock recorded in her journal around 1850 -<o:p></o:p></span></p><p> </p><p><span>Then I'll haste to wed a sailor, and send him off to sea,<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>For a life of independence, is the pleasant life for me.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>But every now and then I shall like to see his face,<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>For it always seems to me to beam with manly grace,<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>With his brow so nobly open, and his dark and kindly eye,<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>Oh my heart beats fondly towards him whenever he is nigh.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>But when he says "Goodbye my love, I'm off across the sea,"<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>First I cry for his departure, then laugh because I'm free.</span></p><p><span><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/s:bzglfiles/u/79745/965ec95b335ecce3a0eccd2d430d17d44631959d/original/img-1934.jpeg/!!/meta:eyJzcmNCdWNrZXQiOiJiemdsZmlsZXMifQ==" class="size_l justify_center border_" /></span></p><p><span><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/s:bzglfiles/u/79745/384f4055b1e53ada23ec909097bee61303620d2b/original/img-1935.jpg/!!/meta:eyJzcmNCdWNrZXQiOiJiemdsZmlsZXMifQ==" class="size_l justify_center border_" /><o:p></o:p></span></p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/73271732024-01-02T11:55:03-05:002024-01-02T11:55:03-05:00Ninety-nine bottles of beer and the Great, Great Lakes Adventure<p><span>Ninety-nine Bottles Joseph G. Peterson (2019)<o:p></o:p></span></p><p> </p><p><span>This past summer, my wife and daughter and I endeavored to swim in every Great Lake. We called it, 'The Great, Great Lakes Adventure.' The impetus was the wedding of my nephew in Buffalo. My sister lives in Syracuse and that's right on the way so we would of course stop and visit. Lake Ontario is just north of there and well, Buffalo is right on Lake Erie, so a plan started to hatch. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>We took a day trip from my sister's up to Lake Ontario. One down. We hit Niagara Falls, got wet but didn't swim. Attended the wedding and headed for Cleveland where we stayed with a college buddy who lives right on Lake Erie. Two down. The longest drive was around Lake Erie up to the top of Michigan's thumb where we discovered an amazing beach - Lake Huron, number three. Up to Michigan's upper peninsula where we stayed in a cabin for a few days and hit the freezing but incredibly beautiful, Lake Superior. Back down the west side of Lake Michigan to Chicago and civilization. It had been two weeks on the road and we were ready for some big city amenities. We got an apartment in Lincoln Park for a few days and swam in Lake Michigan right downtown. And had Chicago pizza, which isn't pizza at all. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>Our first night in Chicago we decided to go out with some friends to the famous Green Mill. I've played jam sessions there but have always wanted to perform there with my trio. It has quite a history. You can sit in Al Capone's booth. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>The show was at 8, so we thought we would take Lucy. I called to make sure but they told me no kids. The club was just 10 minutes from our apartment, so we decided to leave Lucy alone. Rather than get sidetracked with should we have left a 10-year-old alone in a strange apartment in a strange city, let me just say that both her and us felt confident in our decision. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>She has a phone, has been alone before and knows what to do in a variety of circumstances. We even have a safe word.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>We got to the club, walked in and the first thing I saw was a 10-year-old boy standing in the back with a guy. My wife and friends went and sat down but I wanted to talk to this guy, so I went over and told him the management told me no kids. He told me the management is his sister and that next time just tell her that Jimmy the Builder told me it was OK. I shook his hand, thanking him and introduced myself. He needed no introduction, so he introduced me to the guy who was now standing next to him, Joe Peterson. We exchanged some pleasantries and I asked him what he did for a living. He told me he's a writer and Jimmy chimed in that he just published a new book and it's called, Ninety-nine Bottles. No shit, I said, and told him I just published my first book, 50,000 Bonghits. We all laughed hysterically at the coincidence of our titles and made jokes like, What's yours about? We became fast friends and I took them outside to smoke some weed. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>Turns out Joe Peterson is a great writer. When I think of barfly stories, there is only one master in my mind, Bukowski. To take on such a colossal comparison - as anyone would do looking at the title - is ballsy. But this is Joe's 6th novel and it's great. Divided into 99 entries, it counts back from 99 like the song, each entry revealing more about the broken narrator slowing killing himself in the pink glow of a Hyde Park bar, his desire 'swimming like a great fish in a murky aquarium with nowhere to go.' There once was a time, though, of hope for our hero - a time when 'all the convoluted minutiae of the inexpressible world seemed on the cusp of being said.' But that's all gone and all that's left is the bar and its inhabitants. 99 bottles of beer on the wall. 99 bottle of beer. You take when down, pass it around, 98 bottles of beer on the wall. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>There is absolutely nothing cliche in this book. Joe - we're on a fist name basis, after all - writes prose that borders on poetry. It's soulful and taut. There is even a beautiful ode to Hyde Park our hero - who is/was, of course, a writer - puts down on a napkin one afternoon as the sun slices through the windows at the front of the bar, silhouetting the hunched over day-drinkers on their stools trying either to claw their way back to sanity or to go completely insane. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>When Hyde Park swings upon a hinge<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>And each and every mind is ajar<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>Then the beaches like waves shall slowly swirl<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>Rise themselves up and spit loudly upon the gloomy lake<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>And the earthlike clouds shall gather themselves thickly<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>And darkly spit rain into the star pocked sky<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>And the buildings like bums shall weakly uproot themselves<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>And stumble penny poor and raving mad through the streets<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>Then crazy you and crazy me shall look madly eye-to-eye<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>and tremble firmly upon the ground<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>As twisted tongue says to bent tooth: Dese are mad times Mistah Jones<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>Bad times indeed. </span></p><p><span><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/s:bzglfiles/u/79745/3fcc33bb584d44a8d658866f90f970c89cfdb491/original/img-1832.jpeg/!!/meta:eyJzcmNCdWNrZXQiOiJiemdsZmlsZXMifQ==" class="size_l justify_center border_" /><o:p></o:p></span></p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/73271712024-01-02T11:51:43-05:002024-01-02T11:51:43-05:00Annie Ross says, "C'mon in!"<p><span>Annie Ross Says ‘Come on In!’...and try her favourite recipes (1972)<o:p></o:p></span></p><p> </p><p><span>My mom used to read cookbooks. I never understood it. How can you just read ingredients and procedure? That's got to be boring. Nobody writes that well. But my mom was into food. She would be called a foodie in her prime - always curious and willing to eat and try to cook new things. I would help her prep for some business dinner party they would be throwing at our house and she would look at me and say loud enough for my dad to hear, "I hope this turns out."<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>We had the usual cookbooks in the house - Betty Crocker, Julia Child and later the Joy of Cooking. But there were no celebrity cookbooks in the collection. After a quick search I am surprised. Elvis had one. Sophia Loren, Liberace, Frank Sinatra. Vincent Price wrote one that's supposed to be the best of the lot. And how did my mom not have Dinah Shore's cookbook? I've read Kenny Shopsin's, Eat Me, that is amazing. He was a local celebrity. I have a cookbook by Mario Bitali's kids from when he was my boss that my daughter read through. That also yielded several great Del Posto related cookbooks by Lydia that were great to read because of the history. I bring this up because the best cookbooks have stories attached or interwoven. I have a cookbook called, The Secrets of Salsa, that is just salsa recipes from all over Mexico told directly by the women from there who wound up in the Anderson Valley of Northern California. Read that one end-to-end in a day, it was so interesting. Salsa. I like salsa but had no idea there were so many variations. </span></p><p><span>But i digest. I just love to talk about food. Let me try and reach around - no, circle back!</span></p><p><span>I used to sell weed to Annie Ross. I frankly mostly knew her from her roll in Short Cuts. I wasn't a Lambert, Hendricks and Ross fan or a fan of vocalese, in general. And had no idea about her appearance on or even the existence of the Hugh Hefner After Hours show. Or that she dated Lenny Bruce. How did I not know that? Or that she made a record with Gerry Mulligan. I knew her signature song, Twisted, but I didn't go any deeper than that, unfortunately.</span></p><p><span>After meeting her the first time, I was so into her vibe, I did my homework. The record with Gerry Mulligan on Pacific is great. She made one with Zoot Sims that I love, too. I didn't have to go far to listen to L,H and R again. My new wife had 2 of their records. And her performance on the Playboy show is so cool. She was the real deal, original bebopper cat. Every time after that I would ask her a little question and she'd tell me a little story. When one day she told me, her pianist, Tardo Hammer, had said, Yeah, Dred can play, I was - as my mom would say - over the moon.</span></p><p><span>I got the gig at Del Posto and didn't have to sell weed anymore, so I didn't see her except when she performed. She came into the restaurant a couple of times. I was playing Lush Life as she brushed by the piano on the way to the bathroom one time and she said, 'Ain't it the truth.' <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>The book. Right. The book is hilarious. Miles, who also wrote a cookbook, told her to put cumin in the chile to give it 'an earthy flavor.' I used her chile recipe. Nothing special. The story about her barely escaping the Haitian revolution is somehow funny, though. The boiled bacon and cabbage recipe is not funny. But her parting advice is and sounds just like I remember her...<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>'Be relaxed, have a drink from time to time, all good cooks do. So start early, take your time, don't panic, and don't get drunk until later.'</span></p><p><span><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/s:bzglfiles/u/79745/520a0434185127a73fda23ccbd8a28545ea03403/original/img-1831.jpeg/!!/meta:eyJzcmNCdWNrZXQiOiJiemdsZmlsZXMifQ==" class="size_l justify_center border_" /><o:p></o:p></span></p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/73271702024-01-02T11:48:55-05:002024-01-02T11:48:55-05:00Jessica DuLong and Rober Lord<p><span>Dust to Deliverance - Jessica DuLong (2021)<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span>A Night to Remember - Walter Lord (1955)</span></p><p> </p><p><span style="color:rgb(5,5,5);">When I moved to NYC more than 20 years ago, I was reading a lot. I bounced around town playing ballet and modern dance classes during the day and played or hung out at the clubs at night, all of it on the subway. I rode it so many times during a week, my 7-day pass made each ride a quarter. And everywhere I went, I carried a bag. I needed ballet music, sure, but I needed my tuning hammer, my weed, a notebook and pen, a bottle of water and whatever book I was reading. I was married to a writer at the time so I read voraciously just to keep up. And the subway was where I did it - the place I spent whatever idle time I had on the way to the next thing. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span style="color:rgb(5,5,5);">The last ten years have been a reading struggle - no more writer wife to kick my reading butt, a little girl and a move to beyond the reasonable reaches of the subway. And I quit playing dance classes. A vortex of illiteracy. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span style="color:rgb(5,5,5);">Thanks to the pandemic and my daughter now reading her own books, I have been reading with some consistency again. I had to start with books my friends have written in the interim and I've shared a couple of those with you on the FB. Here's another one.</span></p><p><span style="color:rgb(5,5,5);">The kid is in a Titanic phase - the movie, docs and a book of things you never knew about the Titanic. So I picked up the famous Walter Lord account of the tragedy, A Night to Remember, so we could read it together. And it is really good. Couldn't put it down, even though I know the whole story mostly already. It constantly reminded me of the last book I read written by my friend, Jessica DuLong, Saved at the Seawall. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span style="color:rgb(5,5,5);">Jessica's book is every bit as riveting as Lord's. At the center is the 9-11 tragedy. But her's is a story from the water's perspective. I did not know that day was the largest maritime evacuation in history. And like the Lord book, she masterfully tells dozens of stories simultaneously in the real-time aftermath of the attack and the collapse of the WTC towers - victims and their literal life preservers colliding in the toxic soot-filled cloud that enveloped lower Manhattan, covering everyone and everything. It was panic and confusion and the natural place to go was to the water where a for real rag-tag assemblage of crafts was waiting to get people off the island to New Jersey. I saw the first buiding collapse from my stoop in Brooklyn. I thought I knew a lot about that day. This book is a gripping insight into the NY harbor world and a new perspective of a day we thought we all knew.</span></p><p> </p><p><span style="color:rgb(5,5,5);"><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/s:bzglfiles/u/79745/bf67475d68e490eb52a10f8947e27c7cfcfbd346/original/img-4382.jpeg/!!/meta:eyJzcmNCdWNrZXQiOiJiemdsZmlsZXMifQ==" class="size_l justify_center border_" /></span></p><p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/s:bzglfiles/u/79745/4e99f76f76d54e5f0a60b823d96c606d6669b932/original/img-4381.jpeg/!!/meta:eyJzcmNCdWNrZXQiOiJiemdsZmlsZXMifQ==" class="size_l justify_center border_" /><span style="color:rgb(5,5,5);"><o:p></o:p></span></p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/73271552024-01-02T11:34:39-05:002024-01-02T12:56:57-05:00John Lithgow and David Koresh<p><span style="color:black;">A Confederacyy of Dumptys (2021)</span><br><span style="color:black;">Trumpty Dumpty Wanted a Crown (2020)</span><br><span style="color:black;">John Lithgow</span><br><br><span style="color:black;">Breaking The World Jerry Gordon (2018)</span><br><br><br><span style="color:black;">I got these two Lithgow books last year for Xmas. They are numbers two and three of his series of satirical poems annotated with factual sources making them more than amusing and at times, hilarious; they are also historical chronicles of a time that when you read all of the antics together and remember, you just can't believe it happened. But it did. </span><br><br><span style="color:black;">His first book in the series was an NYT best seller and no wonder - Lithgow is not only the great actor we know him to be but he's incredibly witty and clever with a Shakespearean actor's command of the English language. He's truly a man of letters. I read and have reread the poems and the accompanying explanatory context laughing and shaking my head. How could ALL of these things have happened? Lithgow writes in his introduction that his intentions are to make us all 'laugh, get mad and remember.' I admit I had the urge to get rid of them after I read them. I've had enough of Lyin' Tiny Bonespurs. New Yorkers had enough of the guy back in the 90's! Part of me wants to stick my head in the sand and na-na-na the idiot bronzer away. Can't hear you. Can't hear you. But the father and history student I am won't let me. We must remember. Our children must remember. </span><br><br><span style="color:black;">----------</span><br><br><span style="color:black;">Speaking of narcissistic megalomaniacs with a god complex....</span><br><span style="color:black;">My ex cousin-in-law's first novel takes place in Waco during the 51 day stand-off in early 1993 between David Koresh and his Branch Davidians and the FBI/ATF. I can't help seeing the similarities between Koresh and Trump and apparently Trump sees them, too. He held one of his klan rallies in Waco this past March where he said, </span><br><span style="color:black;">"I am your warrior, I am your justice. For those who have been wronged and betrayed … I am your retribution." </span><br><span style="color:black;">He went on to say that he would prevent WW3 because "that's where we're headed."</span><br><span style="color:black;">Doomsday, anyone? Very Koresh. </span><br><br><span style="color:black;">Jerry's book - I can call him Jerry because I've known him for 40 years - is told from the perspective of a couple of teens whose parents are gung-ho Davidians and brought their families to Waco. Typical of teens from small towns (or cults), they are not with the program and are like, when and how are we going to get out of our dead end lives that are now quickly becoming deadly? But Koresh is charismatic and mysterious so also like teens without good education, they are easily confused about where their loyalties lie. </span><br><br><span style="color:black;">Jerry would consider himself a sci-fi writer, I know, so I was waiting for the sci-fi as I was reading. It's a taught, historical drama up to a point and pretty much follows the actual events - the Feds eventually attack, Davidians fight back and some get injured or die, the coumpound catches fire - but then the story takes an unexpected turn. I don't want to give it away because I highly recommend you check it out. Jerry's website is www.jerrygordon.net. Let me just say, what if Koresh was right? </span></p><p><span><o:p></o:p></span></p><p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/s:bzglfiles/u/79745/a6b09a26477529db4bcfdff481bc32642d3b4ad3/original/img-3186.jpeg/!!/meta:eyJzcmNCdWNrZXQiOiJiemdsZmlsZXMifQ==" class="size_l justify_center border_" /></p><p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/s:bzglfiles/u/79745/8390d9e8690ca91759f7c2bfd9154c3d8bcb98f4/original/img-3187.jpeg/!!/meta:eyJzcmNCdWNrZXQiOiJiemdsZmlsZXMifQ==" class="size_l justify_center border_" /></p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/71375192023-01-13T10:43:32-05:002024-01-02T11:32:10-05:00Basil Frankweiler and History Smashers<p>From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler E.L. Konigsberg (1967) </p><p>Plagues and Pandemics - History Smashers Kate Messner (2021) </p><p>If I'm going to make my goal of 100, I'll have to include kids books and books I might have already read. And lest you think I have no chance - this makes only 3 and January is nearly over - I have 5 that I'm close to finishing, child of the remote control. </p><p>When I was 10 or so, I read this book about two kids who run away from their oppressive suburban lives to NYC to live in the Met, I was all about it. I lived in a suburban outpost of St. Louis full of sweat and grass clippings. I had never even been to a museum. I was captivated by the idea these kids ran away and lived in a museum. Lucy, on the other hand, has been to the Met lots of times. And she is also a New Yorker. She enjoyed the book once she realized it was written in 1967. No way those kids ride the train by themselves from Greenwich. Somebody would say something. And aren't there motion sensors all over the Met they turn on at night? There are at least cameras they monitor from a control center. Still a great book I enjoyed reading again, too. I hardly remember the details. It was made into a couple of not so good movies, one with Ingrid Bergman and the other with Lauren Bacall. I know, wow. Still not good. </p><p>Germs and bacteria, plagues and pandemics, fevers and pustules, rats and fleas. We kept Lucy out of school her first week back after Christmas to see how the school was going to fare. We've read the Titanic one from this series and liked it so we tried this one thinking it would be an appropriate science lesson for the week. This book covers pretty much all of them - black death, yellow fever, cholera, TB, polio, both pandemics, Ebola, AIDS and smallpox. I didn't know that the smallpox vaccine came from cowpox. Predictably, there were people who didn't trust it at the time despite its obvious effectiveness. There is a cartoon from a contemporary newspaper depicting women running off with bulls because they got the vax. And not off to Pamploma. Microchip anyone? There are other books in the series, one about the Mayflower that's sure to have some information and perspective counter to the narrative we get in school. </p><p>History Smashers. The white-washing, anti-CRT crowd probably would burn these books. Get them while they last.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/s:bzglfiles/u/79745/19541e4ff8b2f6397f19896f1bf10d3a7ba3a29e/original/tempimagemqqe43.png/!!/meta:eyJzcmNCdWNrZXQiOiJiemdsZmlsZXMifQ==" class="size_l justify_center border_" /></p><p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/s:bzglfiles/u/79745/29ae264b5dd1f496d0d5d9736e2b60af09088ad6/original/tempimage0uous2.png/!!/meta:eyJzcmNCdWNrZXQiOiJiemdsZmlsZXMifQ==" class="size_l justify_center border_" /></p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/70741972022-10-04T10:38:10-04:002024-01-02T11:36:03-05:00I'm back from The Jungle<p>What's it been? Two years? How was your pandemic? We survived well enough. Better than too many. I finished my book, <i>50,000 Bonghits,</i> so I did <i>something </i>productive during my down time. At the beginning of this year I was actually disgusted by how little I read during the plague. So I tried to make a committment to get going. I also decided to make little book reports about the books I was reading - maybe to inspire my daughter by my actions. It might also be noted that as a result of my decision to publish my book with proper capitalization, that is how I will write going forward. I might even go back and change the other blog posts. Still trying to figure out if I want to refine and publish the bike riding project. Just pulled my bike out of storage after popping a disc at C7 and being out of comish for awhile so maybe do some more of that project. Writing helps me stay in a creative mode. I hope you enjoy reading it. </p><p> </p><p>The Jungle Upton Sinclair/Kristina Gehrmann (1906/2019)</p><p>One of my resolutions this year is to read more. Can I read 100 books in a year? Didn't W do that while he was President? Clinton read like 300 one year, didn't he? My friend, bassist, Matt Pavolka, read like 800 books during the pandemic. Well, here's number 1 - one of my 11-year-old daughter's Xmas presents. </p><p>Lucy has always identified as a vegetarian. She just does not want to eat animals. I was a veg in my 20's in Cali and so was the wife back in the day, but we are so not now. This is all her own thing. And I am very proud of her. </p><p>Most of the books she reads, I also read, just to make sure she is not skimming and retaining what she reads. It gives us something to talk about, too, like a book club. I came across this graphic novel version of this book I read long ago that influenced me greatly and thought, considering Lu's veginess and her love of comix in general, it would be good for her to read. Her eyes were like saucers most of the time and she read it in a day. I had to field a couple of tough questions - What's a brothel? And why? Why was hard to explain. She was appropriately repulsed by it all. And the rest of the content she understood. </p><p>It's beautifully drawn and well, the story is timeless and powerful. And was so influential, it led to federal food safety laws. It's also a great introduction into the world of worker party politics for your budding socialist. Highly recommend this version for kids 10 and up - depending on the kid, of course. The stockyards are bloody but it's drawn in black and white, so not so gory. But definitely explicit descriptions of animal slaughter. The sexual exploitation is implied but crucial to the story. </p><p>Power to the people.<br><br><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/f6a5387d26881e7006285d43418ef2f75f8025c2/original/tempimage1kctaa.png/!!/meta:eyJzcmNCdWNrZXQiOiJiemdsZmlsZXMifQ==/b:W10=.png" class="size_l justify_center border_" /></p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/62594602020-03-23T17:37:34-04:002024-03-20T09:29:11-04:00today's ride 1.21.18/3.23.20<p>today's ride 1.21.18/3.23.20 </p>
<p>tagot - groupe oyiwane/rough guide to the music of the sahara </p>
<p>hymne a l'amour - william bolcom/marc-andre hamelin/12 new etudes </p>
<p>sugar, sugar - sugar beats/skipped and deleted </p>
<p>images serie 2 la lune....- debussy/thibaudet </p>
<p>the fighting side of me - merle haggard/lonesome fugitive: merle haggard anthology (1963-1977)/skipped and deleted </p>
<p>le jeune: villageoise de gascogne - parthenia/les armours de mai </p>
<p>l'enfance de ko-quo: ii. ne souffle pas dans tes oreilles - satie/thibaudet </p>
<p>the duke - dave brubeck/greatest hits </p>
<p>var 3 - bach/gould/goldberg variations '81 </p>
<p>oh why - freddie king/getting ready </p>
<p>way early subtone - duke/anatomy of a murder </p>
<p>funny (not much) - nat king cole/top pops </p>
<p>this ride took place over two years ago. i don’t remember or have any notes about what kind of day it was. january – warm enough to ride the bike. i’ll ride with long underwear and gloves but if my face is going to get numb, i’m not riding. and it is almost always windy on the narrows where i ride – refreshing in the summer, bone-chilling in winter. this list is kind of long. maybe it was such a rare nice day in the middle of winter, i rode a little farther. </p>
<p>this project stores well because all i have to do is listen again to the list and i am usually immediately reminded of my thoughts about the music at the time. the first cut takes me back to my epic african trip and all of its random memories. i remember i bought this sahara collection because i knew we were going to be driving through southern morroco and mauratania along the western edge of the sahara. southern morroco is even actually called, ‘western sahara.’ once we left the little town of laayoune, it was a 1000 miles of undeveloped coastline to the border of mauritania. yes, vivid memories flood my brain. i took 5 pages of notes every day. i should have brought them with me to my in-laws house in nassawadox we bugged out to when NYC locked down for the corona virus. maybe i will post what i have written so far – the backstory of how i met the fellows i went on the trip with, why the trip and the first leg where i fly over to casablanca and meet my friends in fez. </p>
<p>groupe oyiwane are originally from niger. they formed in 1985 to play the music of the touareg, a nomadic berber tribe still inhabiting parts of northern mali, niger, algeria, all the way over to southern libya. still. they were the first tribe to fight off colonial imperialism in africa and they are still fighting. when i came back and learned volkswagon named an SUV after them, it made me sad. they could surely use that licensing money. i wonder if they even know. then they wouldn’t have to kidnap tourists off the highway i was travelling on through marauritania and blame it on al queda. one meets up with others going south to nouakchott to form little convoys that won’t get attacked. two weeks before i went, two SUV’s containing spanish aid workers were attacked and the people kidnapped and taken into the desert. we made it through without incident. well, there were many incidents, none of them life threatening. </p>
<p>william bolcom’s twelve piano etudes won a pulitzer prize in 1988. i got turned on to them by my piano teacher, pat pace, at the time but it wasn’t until my pianist buddy, leonard thompson, gave me the music that i really started to dig in and appreciate them. they are almost all too hard to play for me but this one is actually one of the more playable ones (by me) with it’s right hand ostinato. i could write a whole jazz tune based off just one of these chords! he’s known as a polymath, ‘a person with wide-ranging kowledge.’ i thought that was being ‘post-modern.’ and that’s what i look for in contemporary concert music. i want it all in there – the tonal, the non-tonal – our musical palette has never been richer and wider. why specialize? except to attract agents and record labels and radio stations who don’t think outside of specific genre constrictions. frederic rzewski comes to mind as another contemporary composer who brings all of his experience to bear in his compositions. keith jarrett has been playing solo since disbanding his trio and i’ve heard all of his new york performances. it’s the same thing. i feel like i’m listening to the totality of keith’s experience coming out in the improvisations he plays. and it is thrilling to me. </p>
<p>sugar, sugar. my daughter loves this song by the archies. she has her own record player and ipad now so i deleted this and never want to hear it again. </p>
<p>the moon descends on the temple that was. beautiful. i have no other words. </p>
<p>i go back and forth from fuck this cracker, merle haggard, to he was a working class hero. but this song, america, love it or leave it, sounds like ignorant hillbilly music. a song like this makes impressionable people do stupid shit – like get all gung-ho to fight wars rich people won’t send their own kids to fight. couldn’t make it through the second verse before i had to skip it and delete it. never want to hear this song again. my friend, bruce barthol, wrote a tremendous parody of this song called, ‘fighting side of jesus.’ it’s on his only recording, the decline and fall of everything. i produced it and probably played piano and some bass. bruce was the original bass player in country joe and the fish and played monterey pop. saw jimi light his guitar on fire. </p>
<p>parthenia is an early music group that plays period instruments. my good pal, carol lipnik’s, brother plays viola da gamba in the band. the music is pale and haunting. it sounds fragile. when my daughter was a baby this was the soundtrack. she would listen to it over and over again. they have a great yuletide album, too. </p>
<p>more satie. blah, blah, blah. kidding. i love it. like i said, he shows up so much in this project because he has a zillion 1 minute pieces and i have a recording with all of them on it. </p>
<p>dave brubeck was the first jazz music i heard. and played, actually. my teenage brother was playing brubeck on the piano. late-60’s. he taught me that ‘take five’ was in e-flat minor and that if you played all the black notes along with the notes ‘c’ and ‘f,’ you could play whatever you wanted and it sounded like paul desmond. i was 3 or 4. he taught me to clap my way through ‘unsquare dance,’ a tune in 7/4. he played ‘the duke’ all the time, too. </p>
<p>the clarity and speed give the ’55 version of ‘var. 3’ a sort of pristine gloss. it’s nice. bracing. like a cold wind coming off the narrows. but this version from ’81 has a whole other attitude. melancholic. longing. amazing gould changes the entire character of the variation just by changing the tempo. well, not just. but the change in tempo brings out different dynamic possibilities for the voices. you hear things you didn’t hear before. </p>
<p>the last three cuts – two kings and a duke. the shuffle algorithm is clever.</p>2:38dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/56362662019-02-10T13:21:02-05:002023-12-10T13:59:15-05:00memory lane<p>memory lane - 2.10.19 </p>
<p>it is now february, 2019. my last dispatch was a year ago. it doesn't seem like that long ago because there have been distractions from my bike riding listening project - some of them health related, some of them professional and there's the small but growing matter of my 7-yr-old, the most fantastic distraction i've ever had. i can enthusiastically and guiltlessly procrastinate on anything if my daughter is the reason. </p>
<p>i've been on 5 rides since then. just 5. or rather, just 5 that i did the project - put my itunes library on shuffle, document the playlist and write about it. it's not that i haven't been riding the bike. i have. it's that i joined the itunes streaming service for $10/month. this service is death to me, the musician, but as a lover of music, it's been incredible. almost any album i can think of is on there. and most of the new music i want to hear from friends and colleagues. i keep a list in my phone - by far my favorite and most useful iphone feature - of all the records i used to own or that i was close to that i have forgotten or haven't heard in a long time. when i lived in san francisco, there was a vibrant world music scene that i was very much into. a lot of the music on my list is from these very formative years.</p>
<p>african music i had only heard through george collinet's radio show, <em>afro pop, </em>was being performed all over town. cuban music was also new to me at the time and i suddenly found myself playing with the great josh jones. i was never into rap and suddenly found myself co-founding one of the first bands to integrate live music with rappers, alphabet soup. this was a major growth period for me that i never really looked back on. i just kept going. but once the enormous hall of music on itunes was at my disposal, i started going through my list and checking out as many of these old influences as i could find. the list was pretty long as i would add an album when something reminded of it or it just randomly popped into my consciousness. over the last year, i've become reacquainted with some great albums on my bike rides: </p>
<p>codona<br> i started to get into the band, oregon, when i got to san fran and eventually wound up becoming friends with their reed player, paul mcandless. that led me to their percussionist, colin wolcott, who died before i had the chance to meet him. i got to know bay area prodigy and now legend, peter apflebaum, around the same time and he turned me on to don cherry, who till then i had only thought of as the guy from ornette. and then there's nana vasconcelos. i can't remember who first alerted me to the existence of the great, egberto gismonti, but i am grateful. i became obsessed with him and all of his albums and his music has remained close to me. i think his favorite of mine is <em>duos voces</em>, a breathtakingly beautiful duo recording with nana. nana, don cherry and colin walcott had a band called codona that made three records that i listened to a lot at one time. colin walcott also made a very beautiful duo record with guitarist steve eliovson called <em>dawn dance t</em>hat i am enjoying again. </p>
<p><em>my life in the bush of ghosts</em><br> i wasn't a huge fan of the talking heads. i liked some of their songs and i really liked the idea of david byrne as i was starting to become interested in the intersection of music with art school practitioners. i discovered laurie anderson around the same time. eno was too ethereal for me at the time. i thought his ambient music was jive but i was aware that he produced my two favorite heads albums, <em>remain in light </em>and <em>fear of music. </em>when someone turned me on to <em>my life..., </em>i loved it. it inspired the band i was in an the time, third plane, to make the song, 'another jazz casualty,' which features televangelist, ernest angsley, in a way that is similar to the eno/byrne record. </p>
<p>salsa/rhumba/cuba<br> to me, josh jones is the bay area personified. he is at half chinese but speaks spanish, is a master congalero, plays all the percussion parts on the drumset and with his hair slicked back and his pencil-thin moustache, looks hispanic. what an education he gave me. i knew next to nothing and he would just show me. play it like this. he was very generous because cats can be very testy if you play the wrong shit in that genre. one time this cuban guy, butch, threatened to kill me if i deviated from the montuno again, the repeated piano part in salsa music that is the role of the piano player when not soloing. we worked it out. josh would give me a conga during the rhumbas that went on after the gigs till dawn. i could get a good sound but didn't know what to play. josh would show me and i would just put my head down and repeat that rhythm with the best sound i could get out of the drum. it gets complicated when they start singing - a natural wonder in itself that they can do that while playing. but i just kept playing the rhythm josh gave me, never faltering. i earned butch's respect eventually. </p>
<p>during this time i listened to a lot of cuban and salsa music. two of my favorite albums i still have on vinyl and listen to often - mongo santamaria's, <em>up from the roots</em> and <em>yambu</em>. but there are many more that have been lost in the shuffle of transiency. i got to see pancho sanchez several times while living in the bay area. i had <em>papa gato </em>and <em>sonando</em> back in the day. i've been relistening to <em>papa gato </em>on the itunes and realizing i know every note i heard it so many times. <em>sonando</em> has turned out to be something of a rarity - it's not on the streaming services. lp's are hard to even find and cd's of this recording can be $100. i found a 'very used' cd copy on amazon for $20. looking fwd to that arriving. other albums i can recall and have been catching up with: </p>
<p><em>new york now! </em>- daniel ponce <br> this one starts with an insane rhumba very much like the ones josh used to lead at the up and down club. this is an all-percussion record except for one track that has some soprano sax on it. </p>
<p><em>tambo-</em> tito puente <br> i don't remember this record but it's on my list. maybe when i hear it, i will remember it. it's not on the streaming services so i bought an (i'm hoping) good vinyl copy for $25 because the cover is so cool. what IS on itunes is a collection of tito 78's from 1949-1955 i never heard and can't stop listening to. </p>
<p>when i showed up in san francisco in 1989, there was african music everywhere. it seemed like everyone was in an african band. at least most of the horn players i knew were. i had good friends in the band kotoja that played around town all the time. i had african hats. we had percussion jams all the time and would go to the public ones in parks around berkeley. i never was in an african band as much as i loved the music. the keyboard parts were too repetitive and i was trying to do my own thing. but i was sure influenced by it all. i have 3 lp's that are special to me i listen to all the time:<br><em>introducing hedzoleh soundz </em>- hugh masekela <br><em>bobby</em> - king sunny ade <br><em>casamance au clair de lune </em>- toure kunde </p>
<p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/58d00a9aa642b1c9a2f3ea00bac714e2d8df9bd4/original/fullsizeoutput-17c5.jpeg/!!/undefined/b:W1sic2l6ZSIsInNtYWxsIl1d.jpeg" class="size_s justify_left border_none" alt="" /></p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>i have over a dozen cassettes i made of the <em>afro pop</em> show that i go back to. and i have some unique cassettes of gaspar lawal, adesanya and foday musa sosa that i could not hear in any other format. and i have this live bootleg cassette of the national dance company of senegal performing in philly. a girl i dated briefly was one of the director's wives. for real. i guess he had so many wives it was cool if she dated me. but a lot of the african music i was into has been forgotten or lost to me from those days. again, through the years i've been keeping a list. and through the itunes, i have found a few old friends recently: </p>
<p><em>jungle rhythms and chants </em>- subri moulin and his equatorial rhythm group <br> this brings back memories. must've listened to this record a zillion times. i love that it's just percussion and singing. african rhumba. </p>
<p><em>soul makossa -</em> manu dibango <br> the list had the manu dibango recording, <em>electric africa</em>, on it. when i checked the itunes i discovered i hated this recording now. it's later in his career and the drums are electronic and sound shitty. why did i used to like this? but there were a bunch of his other albums and i saw <em>soul makossa </em>and remembered that one. and it's great! mj or q ripped off the title track on that hit, 'do you wanna be starting something?' they settled out of court. </p>
<p><em>drums of passion </em>- olatunji<br> this is the one that started the african music fixation for me. it's a famous recording from 1959 and it's so cool that anyone can listen to it anytime they want. i wish i had access to music like this when i was a kid. it was a struggle to hear music like this - a trip to the library to hear field recordings, a radio show, or the occasional exotic lp find. i hope my daughter takes full advantage of the chance to learn about whatever she wants because it was never been this easy to get access to knowledge and beauty.</p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>6:33dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/50620082018-02-05T09:32:34-05:002023-12-10T14:32:45-05:00today's ride 1.12.18 <p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/fc18c35420f60006b3b723504ce646fd7e1631fb/original/img-9291.jpg/!!/b:W1sic2l6ZSIsIm1lZGl1bSJdXQ==.jpg" class="size_m justify_left border_none" alt="" /></p>
<p> </p>
<p>batik - batik/ralph towner </p>
<p>trellis - batik/ralph towner </p>
<p>debbie downer - courtney barnett/sometimes i sit and think and sometimes i just sit </p>
<p>etherraggae - third plane/combination music/unreleased </p>
<p>sideshow - blue magic/soulful spell </p>
<p>pentsatonic - brian allen/hernan hecht/vitamina hueipi </p>
<p> </p>
<p>i don't like to turn on the music till i am on the promenade away from cars. as i walk the bike across the bridge over the highway, i can see the top quarter of the big bridge. it's always there. never moves. even when you can't see it. it's a warm winter day and the air is warmer than the water so an advection fog has covered the narrows and the battery, almost reaching the city. i learned about fog in my bay area days. there are a few types of fog but the one that rolls under the golden gate and stretches all the way across the bay covering berkeley is the same kind as this. and it was a very common occurrence out there. it happens here in the narrows but not that often. </p>
<p>i carry the bike down the steps to the promenade, hit 'shuffle,' get on the bike and start pedaling. i hear a ride cymbal playing some fast swing and immediately recognize it to be jack dejohnette. a twelve-string plays chords with harmonics. ralph towner. <em>batik</em>. it goes perfectly with my view. i can see about ten feet out into the glassy water. no wake. there are some ducks and buffleheads floating to nowhere; the buffleheads kind of in formation, the ducks kind of in pairs. i look back and can't see the bridge at all but i can see the anchor on the brooklyn side clearly. typically, you'd hear some ship horns but maybe nobody's moving around out there because i don't hear any. one long blast every two minutes means a ship is 'making way under power.' that's good - sort of an fyi. if you ever hear one, two or three short blasts, that means a ship is going to maneuver. one would mean altering course to starboard, for example. i've never heard that. that would probably mean evasive maneuvers. not good. </p>
<p>the algorithm could know it was foggy, right? it's a 'smart' phone. there is a weather app on my phone. it could just know, couldn't it? how else could you explain not one but two songs from the ralph towner recording? music that goes perfectly with fog; ambient and mysterious. i love this record. i'm finding i say that a lot during this project. but i really do love this one. it's so easy to listen to, yet it is also full of complexity. ralph towner is one of my favorite musicians, too - equally great on both piano and guitar. and i especially like the sound of the 12-string when he plays it - a sound i would typically associate with out of tune folk music. those things are a pain in the ass to keep in tune. </p>
<p>and jack...i may have close to every recording jack dejohnette has played on. i know i have every one under his name. he is far and away my favorite musician and as usual, he plays great on <em>batik.</em> he gives so much to the music - his creativity, his authority, his virtuosity, his humility. there's really no one else i can think of that is like him or has recorded that much consistently great music. find me a recording jack is on that is only just good, forget about bad. there ain't none. and we're talking about 100's of recordings. </p>
<p>eddie gomez. his incredible virtuosity kind of distracts me from the big picture on some recordings. in others, it is just what is needed. <em>three quartets </em>comes to mind as an example of his greatness. <em>batik </em>is another. there is a lot of room in this record for bass to stand out but it kind of doesn't. eddie contributes to the ambient or airy quality of the music with lots of long tones to go along with his incredible solos - a couple of which are with the bow and not so notey. they're almost not even solos. other places, he's the anchor around which the guitar and drums can float and interact. and his tone is so pure it really blends in with the sonic landscape, at the same time reaching your ear clearly. it's all kinds of bass playing. it makes the group a real trio - like a triangle. dude is a master bassist. </p>
<p>the algorithm must have a sense of humor because after 25 minutes of vibing out to the reverb-heavy beauty and subtlety of <em>batik</em>, it hit me with this courtney barnett track and i nearly fell off my bike. loud, angry, funny and sarcastic, courtney barnett gives me hope for the future. she is a young, aussie rocker and this is only her first record. and it rocks. it fucking rocks. the whole record. </p>
<p>in college, i was in a band called, third plane. it started in a bar called, bauhaus, on main street in akron, ohio's, empty downtown of empty storefronts surrounded by empty factories. this was the first song we ever learned. it is from the john abercrombie album, <em>night</em> - one of my favorite all-time albums. <br>i am playing keyboards. wilbur krebs, guitar. joe brigandi, drums. <br><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/3243668464/1407568.html">Embed for etherraggae</a><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/3243668464/1407568.js"></script></p>
<p>sideshow...the arranging, the orchestration, the vocal harmonies, the chord changes. this is the philly soul sound. they don't make 'em like this anymore. </p>
<p>a few years back i got an email from a guy i didn't know, also on my label, ropeadope. he lived in mexico city and played guitar and had a band called, a love electric. and would i like to join them for a two-week tour-half in cali and half in mexico. i don't think i checked the band out before i responded, i would love to. </p>
<p>turns out, the band is incredible. this was 5 or 6 years ago i did this and they are still going strong. todd clouser is the guitar player and now singer. aaron cruz plays bass. and hernan hecht, the drums. so that's how i met hernan. he is a vegetarian, has a home studio he built and loves his dog. he is from argentina and is very imposing looking. but he is not imposing at all. he is super nice and cool. he just LOOKS mean. he gave me this recording, <em>vitamia hueipi</em>. it's him and trombonist, brian allen and some electronics. again, not the kind of music you would think aaron would make looking at him. i feel i became close friends with todd, hernan and aaron in the short time we were together. music can do that. this music is nothing like, a love electric, a kind of energy-jazz-rock. ambient/avant garde would describe this track a bit better.<br><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/1289653778/1407569.html">Embed for pensatonic</a></p>
<p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/d2be3ab83f6f3c9e4bd34fa245dd06d0aa079e67/medium/hhpicmed.jpg" class="size_m justify_left border_" /><br><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/3243668464/1407568.js"></script></p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/50361312018-01-22T07:52:18-05:002023-12-10T12:04:52-05:00today's ride 1.11.18<p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/0600f5eec71b7311169b30509ae4d72713eaf758/medium/fullsizeoutput-13d8.jpeg" class="size_m justify_left border_" /></p>
<p>lonesome cowboy bill - the velvet underground/peel slowly and see </p>
<p>the church where i belong - marty sammon/sammon/holland 190 proof blues </p>
<p>the cuckoo, too - taj mahal/nat'l blues </p>
<p>i can't quit you baby - little milton/the chess box <br><br>cygnus x-1 book II: hemispheres - rush/hemispheres <br> I. prelude <br> II. apollo (bringer of wisdom) <br> III. dionysus (bringer of love) <br> IV. armegeddon (the battle of heart and mind) <br> V. cygnus <br> VI. the sphere <br><br>ray's idea - phineas newborne, jr/harlem blues </p>
<p> </p>
<p>i was playing at the old nublu on avenue c and east 5th street with my funk band i called, groovula, like dracula. we were in the second half of our set and in walked lou reed. nublu was very dark but he had his lou reed outfit on and was unmistakable. he wasn't wearing the lou reed shades - it was dark - but it was him - black everythng - hair, t-shirt, jeans, jacket and boots. yep. lou reed. </p>
<p>it wasn't unusual to see lou reed. he got around. at the time of this sighting i hadn't been in nyc that long and i'd already run into lou reed twice, each time in an elevator. i said nothing and of course, neither did he. one knows not to talk to lou reed. years later when i got the job at del posto he would come in from time to time. i always played, 'it's a perfect day', when he did, because i thought that is just a ridiculous song, the way he sings it like andy williams or some other crooner. and the scmaltzy string arrangements. it's just awful. </p>
<p>or is it? it has taken me a long time to dig the<em> velvet underground </em>and lou reed - the out of tune guitars, the bad singing, the simple, often corny songs. the only thing that seemed to make them 'cool' is they all wore black and they hung out with warhol. shooting dope is supposed to make you 'cool' but it doesn't. so that didn't impress me either. i just didn't get it. but once i started to look at it as art and not music, i started to appreciate it. if they were kidding or being sarcastic or it was some kind of performance art, i get it. if they were serious, i don't. it's just crappy. </p>
<p>i was watching lou reed watch me. we were pretty damn funky but dude didn't move a muscle - not even a toe tap. he had positioned himself at the corner of the bar on a stool not 10 feet away from me. i had sunglasses with me so i put them on so i could watch him. like i said, he was a fucking statue. it was kind of fucking me up, like, should i play a deconstructionist solo that's sparse and quirky or should i just do my thing - get in the pocket and play lines. i decided i didn't want to sound shitty on purpose the way he does so i just did my thing, checking out lou reed to see if he was reacting to anything i played. dude was a sphynx. </p>
<p>we finished the set and i quickly packed up. there was another band on after us. i put my gear in a corner and went over to the bar to get a beer. there was a spot next to lou reed so i sat down. he was alone. i thought i might ask him if i could buy him a drink but he'd been there for half-an-hour and there was no drink in front of him. right. his liver was probably shot. what else could i say? i was going to say something this time. i had a reason. he'd been sitting there watching me for 30 minutes. i didn't need an introduction. since he didn't seem to be there to hear us, i figured he knew the next band. i leaned over and said, </p>
<p>'so...you here to see the next band?' <br>he looked over at me, his black eyes drilling a hole in my forehead, 'yeah.' <br>'are they any good?' <br>we'll see.' </p>
<p>o--kay. i went back to my beer. he got up and went around me, taking a stool two stools away that had just vacated at the end of the bar. there he could have his back to the wall and people could only approach him from the front. but they didn't. he was lou reed. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>marty sammon has played in buddy guy's band for years. we met through coco taylor's drummer, rick king, a guy who says goodbye on the phone by shouting, 'ok! stay up!' sometimes i call rick just to hear him say that at the end of our conversation. it makes me feel good and lifts my spirits. marty and i became friends and everytime marty comes to town with buddy - they are all from chicago - we go out, usually in search of a good steak. marty is an incredible piano player and singer and i admire what he does greatly. and he's hilarious. man, we have had some laughs. this track is a song of his and he sings and plays on it. here are the lyrics to the first verse. it's not hard to see why we are such good friends. </p>
<p>you ought to check <br>the church where i belong <br>where the pastor is a pothead <br>and he never talks to long <br>the alter boys are drinking and the choir's on cocaine <br>the entire congregation <br>ain't feeling any pain <br>and you never sing no sad, mournful song <br>in the church where i belong </p>
<p> </p>
<p>high priests in the temple of syrinx, the oaks and maples disagree while dionysius and the gods battle over the fate of man. i don't care one way or the other about the lyrics when it comes to rush<em>. </em>like<em> </em>zep, the lyrics are not why i am listening. battles for evermore in the darkest depths of mordor with the cold winds of thor blowing didn't put me off <em>zep</em>. so that wasn't a problem for me with rush. i liked the riffs, the drums and the guitar solos. i have ALL the zep on vinyl but i only like 3 rush records - this one,<em> permanent waves </em>and <em>moving pictures</em>. the rest of their stuff i'm not so into. when i was learning to play the bass as a teenager, geddy lee's unusual rickenbacker sound and great playing reminded my of chris squire - the bass very audible and punchy, not just holding down the roots of the chords but also standing alone as a part. i played along to those three rush records, all the zep, <em>fragile </em>and <em>close to the edge. </em>i wouldn't say i'm a huge prog rock devotee but you had to be able to play to hang. so my musical journey would naturally go through some of those bands. <em>elp </em>was my first concert at 13 but i couldn't play any of their music till years later. <em>brain salad surgery </em>pretty much blew my little teenage mind. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>just what i love about this project - after the rush<em>, </em>here comes some phineas newborne. what a contrast. i've tried to dig him because he had such technique on display. he is regarded as one of the better players of the piano in jazz and i know him for playing lines with both hands two octaves apart. he's not the only one to have done it - that was an identifying feature of oscar peterson - but he did it a lot. i bought this recording knowing nothing about it. i just wanted to check out some phineas. and ray brown and elvin seemed like an unusual combination. the session sounds unrehearsed. elvin plays through the first solo break on this track. phineas has such strong technique he just powers through. same with ray. elvin plays all over his solo but you can still focus on ray. i liked listening to it. the cats weren't always perfect but that wasn't the standard then. as anthony braxton said to me on my very first recording date when i wanted to do another take of a duet we had just played, 'mr. scott. so there was a little mistake. we are not robots.' </p>
<p> </p>4:08dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/50206762018-01-12T15:25:01-05:002022-05-13T11:08:22-04:00today's ride 1.19.18<p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/77c641ea537177bb956a05c6b4b99c024aee68eb/medium/fullsizeoutput-13aa.jpeg" class="size_m justify_left border_" />it's a long way to the top - ac/dc/high voltage </p>
<p>old devil moon - the pacific jazz quartet featuring sasha dobson/unreleased </p>
<p>hook - pj harvey/rid of me </p>
<p>i didn't know what time it was - sonny clark/sonny's crib </p>
<p>semi suite - tom waits/the heart of saturday nite </p>
<p>the phone call - the pretenders/demo </p>
<p>epri 6 - dred/ideas in motion </p>
<p>wave - jobim/wave </p>
<p>all the young dudes - mott the hoople/all the young dudes </p>
<p>moon face, starry eyes - teddy wilson/origin unknown </p>
<p>i may be wrong - gerry mulligan quartet/gerry mulligan quartet </p>
<p>there is still quite a bit of snow on the ground, especially where it was piled from plowing or shoveling. the tiny tires of my folding bike can't go through any snow at all. the wheel just turns and the bike jack-knifes. i couldn't get to the promenade from shore rd without carrying the bike over the unshoveled path so i took shore road to the pier, hoping the promenade itself had been shoveled. it wasn't but i could see a lot of concrete and the sun was out and it was warm for january. i portaged over some impassable snow a couple times but was able to ride all the way back to the bridge without wiping out. </p>
<p> </p>
<p><em>high voltage</em> is one of those records along with <em>dirty deeds </em>that i have digital and vinyl copies of, i like them so much. ac/dc is not really ac/dc to me without bon scott. yes, they bounced back from his death with <em>back in blac</em>k and that is a great record. but the sound of bon's voice - the character, the mischievousness - brian johnson just didn't have that, though he surely sang his heart out. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>the track with sasha was done live in my basement on 17th st. - neal miner, bass. rob sudduth, tenor sax. yours truly, drums. the band is connected on this take. it's the kind of take you want in the studio - loose but tight, creative, everyone feeling free to get inside the music. this is one of the best drum solos i've ever played that got recorded. this is how i would want to play all the time - listening and reacting and adding to the picture but still percolating and feeling good.<br><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/1532161414/1391109.html">Embed for old devil moon</a><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/1532161414/1391109.js"></script></p>
<p> </p>
<p>i love sonny's slick arrangement here. this is jazz in the classic sense - right down the middle, swinging and singing. philly joe and pc. i think spike wilner turned me on to sonny. he is not as well-known as some of the pianists from the 50's, a decade crowded with great jazz musicians that made a lot of records but he is one of the cats, for sure. he has a way of playing that is not aggressive or flashy that i like. he is understated. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>totally didn't know or remember this waits track. it's remarkable because he uses his real voice - not the gravely, drunken, hobo-warming-himself-next-to-an-oil-drum-fire-in-the-train-yard voice. and it's a beautiful voice. i know he was influenced by the crooners he heard growing up - perry como, dino, andy williams, jack jones, johnny mathis, bing, frank. i can hear it. my mom loved all those guys and we had all their records, too. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>interesting to hear this pretenders demo. i've heard this song a hundred times and never could catch the <em>mission: impossible</em> lyrics. they are much clearer in this demo version that came as a bonus track. martin chambers doesn't quite get the instrumental bits that are way tighter on the album version. pretenders I and pretenders II are another two records i have digital and vinyl copies of. i'm reading her autobiography right now. <a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/1849180245/1391187.html">Embed for the phone call (demo)</a><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/1849180245/1391187.js"></script></p>
<p> </p>
<p>this is another 30 second cue for the electric power research institute. <a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/703657671/1391136.html">Embed for epri 6</a><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/703657671/1391136.js"></script></p>
<p> </p>
<p>wave...what a cool album cover. you just know the music is going to be cool.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>did not know this kurt weill tune. mike, the maitre d' at sofia's was/is a huge teddy wilson fan. sofia's is gone. mike is not. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>i may be wrong but 'i may be wrong' sounds a little like 'taking a chance on love.' this band....i have all their records on vinyl. in fact, i collect pacific jazz records and have maybe 50 of them. i love the imprint - a piece of art takes up the whole cover and the band name and title are at the top. chet, gerry, shelly manne, joe pass, art pepper, bud shank, gil evans, clare fischer, paul desmond, lee konitz, russ freeman, chico hamilton, annie ross. the label had a sound that was focused and recognizable. it was west coast. it was cool.</p>
<p><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/1532161414/1391109.js"></script></p>
<p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/59518ff4a47d6244e36de08dcc2d0c297619297e/medium/unknown-1.jpeg" class="size_m justify_left border_" /></p>
<p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/fcfc43b52459bae5db343645bbdcafd115edc5e7/medium/unnamed-1.jpg" class="size_m justify_center border_" /><br><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/703657671/1391136.js"></script></p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/50125012018-01-08T11:06:33-05:002022-05-30T02:24:07-04:00lidia's minestrone 1.6.18<p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/e3984578de14fd781a43a045c27622dc991629ff/medium/lidias-minestrone.jpg" class="size_m justify_left border_none" alt="" /></p>
<p>come back to sorrento - carmen mcrae/out of this world </p>
<p>horse tears - goldfrapp/felt mountain </p>
<p>heaven - stones/tattoo you </p>
<p>bendy - dred scott/prepared piano </p>
<p>theme from the munsters - jack marshall/tv theme songs </p>
<p>sci fi - frank locrasto/locrasto</p>
<p>r.j. - miles/e.s.p. </p>
<p>vangelis - memories of green/blade runner soundtrack </p>
<p>big butter and egg man - louis armstrong/the 25 greatest hot 5's and hot 7's </p>
<p> </p>
<p>i can see by my last entry i haven't been on the bike in 3 weeks. i can also see when i look at the floor that i have gained 5 pounds over the holidays. i have not been able to get back on the bike because of the cold - i draw the line at 30 degrees - and then it snowed. i thought i might make some of lidia's minestrone and that takes 30-45 minutes. then i thought that's about the same time as a bike ride so what if i put the iphone on shuffle and make the soup? </p>
<p>lidia was walking by the piano awhile back right after i had made it the first time so i told her as much. she stopped to ask how it turned out. i said it was delicious and that i didn't know that step about toasting the tomato paste. she said, <br>'THAT is where you get the flavor!' </p>
<p>i wanted to include a link to the recipe but the one that comes up doesn't have that step. i distinctly remember: </p>
<p>for several minutes each.... </p>
<p>olive oil with the garlic and pancetta </p>
<p>add the onions </p>
<p>make a hole in the center of the pot and plop down the tomato paste and toast </p>
<p>add the potatoes and stir </p>
<p>THEN you start adding liquid, beans, veggies, etc. </p>
<p>i couldn't find that exact recipe again. weird. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>is the smart phone really that smart? 'come back to sorrento'? first song? granted, it's a jazzy version in english but how did it know? weird. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>this goldfrapp album is easily one of my favorite albums in the new millenium. i don't hear much in the pop world i like in the 21st century and it makes me feel old and irrelevant but this record is great. i forget who turned me on to them. i guess you would call it 'down tempo' in the modern sense. but it isn't sparse like portishead. it's at times downright cinematic. it's nice to be able to call music from this genre, 'beautiful.' i never tire of hearing it. i've listened to this record a lot. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>ok. this stones track sucks. i never want to hear it again. i went on my computer and deleted it so it will never come up again. i knew that was going to happen eventually with the stones. it's not even funny. if it was funny how bad it is, i could keep it. not funny - horribly, awfully bad. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>john cage wrote a famous collection of pieces for prepared piano called, 'sonatas and interludes.' he 'prepared' or altered the sound of the notes by placing screws, plastic pieces, nuts, bolts and rubber stoppers in between the strings of 45 of the notes. i thought it might be cool to do that to the whole piano - all 88 keys - and to really spend some time with each note, seeing if i could make each note a small universe of sound. i left the piano that way for two months, recording improvisations right after i did the modifications and then recording another set of improvisations after the piano had been that way for two months. interestingly, i wound up using about an equal number of takes from each set. in this track, in addition to the stationary preparations, i used a tuning hammer and pressed down on the string itself, sliding it up and down, creating the illusion i am bending the note. </p>
<p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/ae0252ef3830fa00b3977fb695b32319a8cf8530/medium/images.jpeg" class="size_m justify_left border_none" alt="" /></p>
<p> </p>
<p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/0e03800edd825eee3051473538e421bdd4e40c0b/medium/unknown-1.jpeg" class="size_m justify_center border_" /></p>
<p>again with the locrasto. i know. i love this record. but in this little bike riding project, i've heard it 3 or 4 times. there are thousands of songs in my cloud. wtf? </p>
<p> </p>
<p>love the soundtrack to blade runner. chariots of fire, not so much. some eno had been coming up in this project. i think i mentioned how ambient music doesn't bore me anymore. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>my favorite louis armstrong is the hot 5's and 7's. i'm certainly no louis expert but he seems to be playing his horn better and more creatively in this period - especially when you consider the time. i guess i'm like that with chet, too - i'd rather hear him play than sing. although, louis sings on this track. like chet, they began to insist he sing and i cared for them less. louis was the king, though, no doubt. i can't believe i've lived in nyc for almost 20 years and i've never been to his house in queens. shameful. i can say in my defense, though, i have only BEEN to queens 5 times if you don't count the many us opens and laguardia. and i work at the frank sinatra high school for the performing arts a few times a year. other than that....my niece lived in astoria for a little while. i visited her. but queens....wait, jfk's in queens. been there lots. ok. i'm going to go. you can go to queens college nearby his house and check out an enormous archive of him talking shit with his buddies in his study - hours and hours of tapes. got to do it. i'm going to....</p>
<p> </p>
<p><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/2650440082/1387909.html">Embed for bendy</a><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/2650440082/1387909.js"></script></p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49883252017-12-21T15:39:02-05:002023-12-10T11:46:18-05:00today's ride 12.19.17<p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/be1dca0baecf8c982abc1cb6b263cf0f946a3ada/medium/img-9225.jpg" class="size_m justify_left border_" /></p>
<p> </p>
<p><span class="font_regular">you be my baby - ray charles/what'd i say <br>dance all day - bari koral family rock band/rock and roll garden <br>french suite #4 in e-flat - bach/gould <br>sem contencao - bebel gilberto/tanto tempo <br>to bring you my love - pj harvey/to bring you my love <br>goldberg var 19 - bach/gould '55 <br>song for sharon - joni mitchell/hejira <br>this ain't no russian novel, baby - the dred scott trio/live at the rockwood music hall <br>any major dude will tell you - steely dan/pretzel logic <br>allegro (1884) - satie/thibaudet <br>get it right the first time - billy joel/the stranger <br>if you could see me now - chet baker/chet </span></p>
<p> </p>
<p><span class="font_regular">i've had a long association with saxophonist, jay collins. i played in his band for some years and before that he used to sub in alphabet soup. we have had a lot of laughs together. he turned me on to a lot of music i was not aware of, or was aware of but hadn't really checked out. of course, i had heard ray charles but jay really turned me on to him and many other 'blues' singers i had not heard - percy mayfield, jimmy mccracklin, lee dorsey and king curtis. </span></p>
<p> </p>
<p><span class="font_regular">i played bass, piano and organ on this bari koral track. it's from her 1st album. i think i have a co-producer credit on this album. eric halvorson on drums since the beginning almost 15 years ago.</span></p>
<p> </p>
<p><span class="font_regular">a lot of gould playing bach has come up and i never comment about it. what is there to say, really? i have all of his bach recordings and i have not heard better interpretations - including the re-recorded goldberg's. it's like every version is the one. frank sinatra comes to mind. he just owned the songs he sang making it very difficult for other singers to sing more definitive versions. who could do a better version of 'my way'. well, sid vicious' version is epic - but also epically different. </span></p>
<p><span class="font_regular">speaking of goldberg's...up came #19 of the '55 interpretations of the goldberg variations. people have asked me if i prefer this recording or the version he did in '81, the year before his death the month after his 50th birthday. i can say there are individual variations that i like better. i like the '81 version of this one, for example. it's way slower and kind of haunting as opposed to the sort of stately treatment it gets here. but there are others from '51 i like better - the aria, itself, for example. and the ripping version of the first variation i like better than the '81. and so on. </span></p>
<p><span class="font_regular">dan tepfer recently came up with an interesting project - follow each of bach variations with one your own. pretty balsy. but when you consider that in the improvisation you are not constrained by form or the chordal movement of the originals - it is the 21st century, after all - it's not so scary. personally, i'd be more worried about fucking up the originals. first things first...you'd better play the bach variations themselves flawlessly and dan does. he made a recording of it. it's pretty cool. if you can go hear him do it....even better. </span></p>
<p> </p>
<p><span class="font_regular">'song for sharon' is one of those joni songs i never paid much attention to. but the shuffle knows no favorites and that's the point. i listened to this joni song like i had never heard it - this song about love and marriage and the two different paths old friends have taken. it's beautiful poetry. i went here and read it as a poem after listening to it and it really blew my mind how good it is. <br><a contents="http://jonimitchell.com/music/song.cfm?id=22" data-link-label="" data-link-type="url" href="http://jonimitchell.com/music/song.cfm?id=22" target="_blank">http://jonimitchell.com/music/song.cfm?id=22</a> </span></p>
<p> </p>
<p><span class="font_regular">one day my ex and i were having an argument. she wanted to know WHY i did that thing that i did and didn't believe me when i told her i didn't know. i just did it. it was a mistake and i'm sorry. i'll try not to do it again. i wasn't thinking. and that's the point....i wasn't thinking. it was a dumb mistake and i should've known better. that's WHY there is no why. she couldn't accept that. i was surely up to something. i had been reading some russian lit at the time and was always annoyed when i had to flip to the front of the book where the list of characters is printed to see who this or that minor character was. if it's so complex i can't keep track of who's who, it's too complex for me. so i said to her, <br>'look. this ain't no russian novel, baby. it's real simple.' <br>she said, 'that's a good song title.' <br><br>i tried to make the song sound simple by using a lot of triads. </span></p>
<p> </p>
<p><span class="font_regular">one thing about the steely dan track. i love the way fagan plays the electric piano part - so subtle, yet so full of information. and so funky. </span></p>
<p> </p>
<p><span class="font_regular">yes, the billy joel. i never liked his fake tough guy thing but dude is a songwriting hit-maker who sang his ass off. it's a little cabaret for me but i thought <em>the stranger </em>might be a good album to try at del posto since he sells out like 25 nights in a row at madison square garden whenever he plays there...still. so i'm checking it out again. the songs are really great pop songs. i like listening to them. the 'la-la-la' shit in this one annoys me a little, though. </span></p>
<p> </p>
<p><span class="font_regular">the chet is so beautiful it almost takes my breath away. this is a really great album. his first after leaving pacific jazz and going over to riverside, i believe. there aren't many records of chet just playing.</span></p>
<p> </p>
<p><span class="font_regular"><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/2004460088/1377829.html">Embed for dance all day</a></span><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/2004460088/1377829.js"></script></p>
<p><span class="font_regular"><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/52014821/1377830.html">Embed for this ain't no russian novel, baby</a></span><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/52014821/1377830.js"></script></p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49697412017-12-09T03:56:18-05:002023-12-10T12:08:20-05:00today's post 12.5.17<p>when i got to the pier today, this was on the ground....</p>
<p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/720a3993c90d368c58c9508252d265085b3b3398/medium/img-9119.jpg" class="size_m justify_left border_" /></p>
<p> </p>
<p>epri 3A/9.4.05 - dred/ideas in motion <br>autumn leaves 2 - pacific jazz quartet featuring sasha dobson/unreleased <br>lazy lover - brazilian girls/don't stop <br>palms - frank locrasto/night people <br>tillie 3 - dred/the satie project/unreleased <br>have a cigar - pink floyd/wish you were here <br>eronel - monk/criss-cross <br>crossing - oregon/crossing <br>lola - the kinks/best of <br>the phone call - pretenders/pretenders <br>time for the hard stuff - dred scott trio/live at the rockwood music hall </p>
<p> </p>
<p>'epri' refers to the client - the electric power research institute. this was a slightly different version of a cue i did that you can hear in one of the other dispatches. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>sasha dobson is one of my oldest and dearest friends. 'friends' doesn't really describe our relationship. 'family' would be a better word. when my daughter was born, she held one of my wife's legs, i held the other. i'm good friends with her older brother, smith, who lives in san fran and plays everything. and her mom who is a great singer. in 2001, her father, bay area piano legend, smith sr., died very tragically in a car accident coming home from a gig. he was just 54, one year older than me. it's heart-wrenching to remember him. what a family. they all have/had an incredible natural gift of musicality and artistic sensitivity. even sasha's grandmother sings great. i've known sasha since she was just 17. she moved to nyc a couple of years after i met her - i think i met her through smith but i can't remember. she was a kid. fast forward 10 or so years and i find my way to nyc and we became reconnected. by then she was singing like a seasoned pro. over the years we became closer personally and played a ton of gigs together. she is one of the few jazz singers that almost prefers to sing without chordal accompaniment. i know it's partially because of the hole her dad left in her life - no more chords. but it is also because she sings so freely that chords can get in her way. when there are no chords, the ear of the listener leans forward, giving sash all the attention and you can really her the beauty and artistry of her singing. she first heard me playing drums in one of smith jr's bands that he played vibes in. so she has often called me to play drums on gigs. that lead to this specific project that never made an album - the pacific jazz quartet. a lot of the pacific jazz label albums had no chords - the mulligan/baker quartet, for example - so that's where the band name came from. our other old friend from the bay area, rob sudduth, had moved to nyc. and we were all great friends with life long new yorker and incredible bass player, neal miner, so we started this project. this track was recorded live in my basement. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>lazy lover, cassanova </p>
<p>you roll over </p>
<p>when i want more </p>
<p> </p>
<p>it bears mentioning again the i love this frank locrasto record. the story i wrote for the liner notes is on here somewhere. </p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/7667d20a1a81aa683f328f9e0f40b99359752527/original/img-9264.jpg" class="size_l justify_center border_" /></p>
<p> </p>
<p>i came across this book of satie's containing 20 short pieces for piano in a bookstore sometime ago. he called it, 'sports et divertissments'. it was written in 1914. on one page is a short piano piece written in satie's hand with comments of his written under the music. the one he called 'la chasse' - hunting, for example, has the text written throughout the music:</p>
<p>(translation) </p>
<p>'do you hear the rabbit singing? what a voice! the nightingale is in its burrow. the owl is nursing its children. the young wild boar is going to get married. as for me, i am knocking down nuts with rifle shots.' </p>
<p>on the facing page is a full-page, color illustration by charles martin. my copy is cheaper and black and white. it's a great concept - especially now. the bottom has fallen out of the music industry. noone wants to pay for music anymore. as a musician/composer whatever, i have given a lot of thought to how to monetize my art. one day i thought, what's one of the things you never get rid of when you move - your art books. you sure get rid of your cd's. you just put them in your computer or a hard drive or they go into the cloud. your art books you will always want to look at. the work will mean different things to you throughout your life. so. i thought i'd try and make a couple of these satie-style books because i am friends with so many artists now in my early old age. there will be one focusing on one artist, one focusing on a different artist, a kids one with illustrations done by kids with piano music being playable by kids and so on. the first one i'm almost through with focuses on animal artist, tillamook cheddar - tillie. she has recently passed and this is to be her first posthumous collaboration. i've chosen the plates with the help of her assistant, bowman hastie, and i've composed a dozen piano pieces so far. this is one of them. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>i love oregon. i became aware of them when i moved to california. they have made maybe 30 albums but this one is the last one with all the original members. percussionist colin walcot died in car accident in east germany while they were on tour just after recording this one - hence the title, crossing. he was only 39. </p>
<p>it's jazz, for sure - mostly improvised but it is a different kind of jazz. i wouldn't know what to call it. some people might refer to it as 'new age' but that has a shallow connotation to me, although there are definitely great musicians in that genre. it is not typically heavily improvised like jazz, like oregon. i'm inclined to think oregon invented some kind of genre that i can't really name - new age jazz? it really makes you think how confining labels are to the idea of music - something that can be observed from so many personal references that to label it hampers the experience.</p>
<p>i got to play and hang some with paul mccandless in my california years and he is not only one of the nicest guys i've ever met, he is also one of the most skilled and sensitive players i've ever heard or played with. the sound he gets out of his oboe or soprano sax is so pure and beautiful and his technique is flawless. just great. paul and i had some good times at smiley's in bolinas, where he lives. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>i saw the kinks in the 80's in the music hall in the cleveland public auditorium. i was not a big fan. i liked some of their songs but they were never a big influence. my friend wendy, however, was a rabid fan - all kinks, all the time. she kept trying to get me deeper into them and i was like, meh. then she took me to hear them. ray davies is one of the best performers i have ever seen. he was so generous. in a huge theater full of people, he made you think he was singing just to you. when they came out for a couple of encores, i was on my feet cheering, i was so happy to see him - like an old friend. when the encores were over, i was genuinely sad that i wasn't going to get to keep hanging out with him. i saw him 20 years later doing a solo show in nyc at the edison theater. of course, wendy had driven from cleveland to see him with me. same thing. just so generous is the only way i can think to describe him as a performer. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>the last track i call a 'drinking song'. the melody has some difficult intervallic jumps and the chords are tricky to improvise over. if you've had too much to drink, you will fuck it up. the trio played at the rockwood music hall every tuesday nite at midnite from 2005-2011 and ken rockwood had the idea to make a live record - the first one made at the rockwood music hall.</p>
<p> </p>
<p><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/772123707/1369902.html">Embed for autumn leaves 2</a><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/772123707/1369902.js"></script></p>
<p><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/2743947737/1369903.html">Embed for tillie 3</a><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/2743947737/1369903.js"></script></p>
<p><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/3050679541/1369904.html">Embed for crossing</a><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/3050679541/1369904.js"></script></p>
<p><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/945639703/1369905.html">Embed for time for the hard stuff</a><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/945639703/1369905.js"></script><br><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/772123707/1369902.js"></script></p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49696812017-12-09T03:29:50-05:002023-12-10T11:54:57-05:00toady's ride 12.1.17<p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/d4ba95c2568a87f65d90f4c7db373e765c67f7db/medium/tumblr-inline-p0ajjlprnm1qzw5bq-540.jpg" class="size_m justify_left border_" /><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/1118dd72cd7d938f565675f39927a300c7b06d3d/medium/tumblr-inline-p0ajmcztbg1qzw5bq-540.jpg" class="size_m justify_center border_" /></p>
<p> </p>
<p>yedidim hiou zehirim - emil zrihan/the rough guide to morocco <br>french suite #5/gigue - bach/gould <br>when the lights go out - jimmy witherspoon/the chess box set <br>ccc 10.3 - dred/idm <br>golberg var 19 - bach/gould <br>i can’t get started - bird/the genius of charlie parker: night and day <br>smiling faces sometimes - the undisputed truth/best of <br>ccc 7.1 - dred/idm <br>a man has dreams - mary poppins</p>
<p> </p>
<p>in 2010 i took a ride with a couple of buddies in an audi A3 from fez in north central morocco all the way to accra, ghana. that meant we basically drove through all of morocco - through marakesh, on to agadir and then through the 1000 miles of undeveloped, mostly unpopulated western sahara. we tried to not drive at night but we fell behind our schedule and a couple of times were driving as the sun was setting. my most vivid memory is of the light fading across the scrubby desert while the radio played the unaccompanied singing of the koran - beautiful and haunting. i picked up the rough guide cd before i went to get ready for the trip. i’m working on a book about the trip.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>ccc stands for the california conservation corps. it was founded in 1976 by gov jerry brown. here is a link about who they are and what they do - <a contents="https://ccc.ca.gov/who-we-are/about/." data-link-label="" data-link-type="url" href="https://ccc.ca.gov/who-we-are/about/." target="_blank">https://ccc.ca.gov/who-we-are/about/.</a> this track was the ending credit segment that went into the doc commemorating their 40 year anniversary. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>smiling faces. smiling faces tell lies. and i got proof…. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>ccc 7.1 is the first repeat of this project. for the first time since i started this project, i skipped a track. again, what does the algorhythm actually do? apparently, it doesn’t go through ALL the music before repeating. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>finally, i turned my daughter on to <em>mary poppins</em> because i loved it as a kid her age - 6. this track is about the catharsis the father goes through when he realizes his children’s lives are slipping away from him. there are a lot of rubato sections that help punctuate the father's emotions and it is performed brilliantly by david tomlinson. this song advances this crucial plot point in a way that dialogue never could. written by the sherman bros who famously hated each other.</p>
<p> </p>
<p><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/3591594590/1369892.html">Embed for yedidim hiou zehirim </a><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/3591594590/1369892.js"></script></p>
<p><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/1536925628/1369893.html">Embed for ccc 10.3</a><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/1536925628/1369893.js"></script></p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49686332017-12-08T13:36:17-05:002023-12-10T14:17:35-05:00today's ride 11.21.17<p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/4071f173d94db72b0f17de04fa43338461180b47/medium/tumblr-inline-ozryt9f8dk1qzw5bq-540.jpg" class="size_m justify_left border_" /></p>
<p> </p>
<p>a nightingale sang in barkley square - bud powell/the genius of bud powell <br>hope street - frank locrasto/locrasto <br>wreck up a version - king tubby and friends/dub gone crazy <br>new newlywed game show theme (take 2) - dred/benny chacha/on spec fail <br>don’t stop - fleetwood mac/rumours <br>daniel and the sacred heart - the band/stage fright <br>low key lightly - duke/anatomy of a murder violin solo <br>dear doctor - stones/beggars banquet <br>verset laique et somptueux - satie/thibaudet <br>gone at last - paul simon/still crazy after all these years/demo </p>
<p> </p>
<p>my library did not know the recording the bud powell was from. it’s in a playlist called, ‘misc jazz’ - jazz music i come across one song at a time for various reasons. sometimes i will collect several versions of a song i am trying to learn. so i googled the track and the computer corrected my spelling of 'barkley’ to 'berkeley’. where i found a version on youtube incorrectly spelled. even the wikipedia entry - i guess not so suprisingly - spells it 'berkeley’. anyway, this is a great version. bud had his own style and sound. you know it’s him as soon as he starts playing. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>frank locrasto asked me to write a short story for the liner notes of his first album, locrasto. i listen to this record all the time. it’s super cool. it sounds like future music to me. so i set the story a little bit into the future. it is reprinted below in the blog somewhere. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>when i met my wife, she was working post on the new newlywed game show. i think chuck barris wrote the theme song they were using and they had to keep using it till he died. he died. and i had a connection, so benny cha cha and i took a run at it. nowadays, all this kind of work is done on spec - for free. u make the jam and if they pick your jam over the dozens of other jams, you get paid. when i work for ideas in motion, they pay me half up front, half on completion. they pick ME for the project. that rarely happens anymore - unless you’re mike post. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>my boss at del posto likes my idea of playing whole albums. big boss, joe bastianich was in last nite and dug my version of <em>aja</em>. so now everyone is suggesting albums to do. mario suggested <em>quadraphenia.</em> that’s a double lp with a lot of b side material. i’m going to try <em>who’s next</em> instead. it’s a challenge to play such simple music solo on the piano.<em> aja </em>is harmonically very rich so it kind of plays itself.<em> rumours </em>was suggested so i put it in my library so i could become familiar with the non-hits of which there are exactly 4 out of the 11 songs. pretty amazing collection of songs. it will be a challenge - there are maybe 10 chords on the whole album. on this track, doing some deep listening, i think - and have always thought - mick fleetwood is a great drummer. and the way that buckingham doubles christine mcvie's vocal on the chorus. it’s subtle but it gives it the grit and growl her thin voice can’t do. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>the duke cut - i hate violin in my jazz but there is a long piano intro that’s nice. this is a bonus cut not included on the original lp. i generally don’t want to hear bonus cuts. they didn’t make it on the original for a reason. sometimes it’s a space limitation - lp’s max out at 80 minutes - usually, not. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>more satie. i think i’m onto something here. satie didn’t know his music would come up a lot in a shuffle algorhythm. but i know. next album after the two i’m working on now - make dozens of 1 minute piano pieces. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>another album i’m learning all of is <em>still crazy after all these years.</em> no filler on that recording - all great songs w plenty of harmonic information to translate to solo piano. this is a bonus track demo that came with the digital recording i could do without.</p>
<p> </p>
<p><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/2827602191/1369624.html">Embed for hope street</a><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/2827602191/1369624.js"></script></p>
<p><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/3182444525/1369630.html">Embed for new newlywed game show theme</a><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/3182444525/1369630.js"></script></p>
<p><br><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/1760113802/1369626.js"></script></p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49683552017-12-08T10:08:06-05:002023-12-10T13:05:05-05:00twilight ride 11.19.17<p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/fdb2fe8d4a5cea977a5e8dfe7a973cbc74b00319/medium/tumblr-inline-ozq58u1qks1qzw5bq-540.jpg" class="size_m justify_left border_" /></p>
<p> </p>
<p>we are all vampires now - carol lipnik and spookarama/demo <br>new dreams - old and new dreams/playing <br>tiddlywinks - graham connah/gurney to the lincoln center of your mind <br>lush life - chris connor/carmen mcrae/out of this world <br>malfa sibori - seckou maiga/rough guide to the sahara <br>you’re a lucky guy - billie holiday compilation <br>weeping wall - bowie/low <br>gaku - japanese noh music/various artists <br>electric light - pj harvey/is this desire? <br>nocturnes: IV no. 4 - satie/thibaudet <br>zigeuner song - getz and strings </p>
<p> </p>
<p>i was playing with richard julian at the old living room on the corner of allen and stanton and carol lipnik was on before us. she was so weird and amazing. her voice was haunting and unique. she played this song just her singing and playing a zither. just a one chord drone of a song but i and the audience were mesmerized. she called her band, spookarama, after the crappy, run-down coney island attraction. i was hooked. she was friends with richard so when we were introduced after his set, i told her she was amazing and could i be in her band. she had just a fiddle player with her and my mind filled with what i could add while i was listening to her set. i knew i would be a perfect fit. she agreed and we became great friends. i produced her record, M.O.T.H. this is a demo of a song we never recorded. as of this writing carol is at the club, pangea, first sunday of every month showcasing a new set of songs - songs from the tower. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>when i first moved to san fran, my favorite band was called, papa's midnite hop. ben goldberg, clarinet. sheldon brown, sax. richard saunders, bass. kenny wollesen. i would become friends with all these guys and got turned on to a lot of music through them. it was through this chordless group that i discovered old and new dreams. another great chordless group in the style of ornette coleman's early music. they only made 2 studio records. this track is from the first of two live albums they did. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>graham connah is an old friend of mine from my san fran days - great pianist/composer - and funny. graham is hilarious. he wrote this song about me. here are the lyrics: </p>
<p>i live in terror of a dred named scott </p>
<p>those fidgety, digity chops he’s got </p>
<p>the groove is phat his licks are mack </p>
<p>stay out of the way of his staccato attack </p>
<p>smokin’ like a chimney on fire </p>
<p>tiddlywinks walkin’ on a tight rope wire </p>
<p> </p>
<p>wilbur and jojo followed him out west </p>
<p>all manner of substance they’d ingest </p>
<p>paid a lot of dues back in ohio </p>
<p>he’s the cat with the cat-in-the-hat chapeau </p>
<p>loadin’ up a bowl on the 18th hole </p>
<p>puffin’ on shrub at the up and down club </p>
<p>we dwell in terror of a scott named dred </p>
<p>he’s telling us all small clubs are dead </p>
<p>a man with a formidable plan: </p>
<p>3 more albums in the can </p>
<p> </p>
<p>buds are the kinder </p>
<p>gentle behinder </p>
<p>smokes like a chimney </p>
<p>swirling grimly </p>
<p>sell you an ounce </p>
<p>business man’s bounce </p>
<p>resin is gnarly </p>
<p>14 dead charlies </p>
<p> </p>
<p>i hear he’s working on a string quartet </p>
<p>i guarantee you ain’t heard nothing yet </p>
<p>graduated from the sf mime troupe </p>
<p>now he’s shrekkin’ with the alphabet soup </p>
<p>puttin’ out sides with a click named dark </p>
<p>and giving that phatty a spark </p>
<p> </p>
<p>i got into japanese noh music because i saw the rova sax quartet perform with a noh ensemble. there is a rich theater tradition it accompanies, typically, dating to the 7th century. as i understand it, noh music is mostly improvised. the drummers play one note only in their own time. the concert i saw there were three drummers, all sitting. when a drummer’s time came he would slowly raise his hand high in air, sometimes intoning a single note with his voice, then bring his hand down on the drum, whack! then he would sit there motionless till his next moment. at first there is a lot of silence between the events - i don’t know what else to call them - notes? but as the piece progresses the music becomes more dense as each musician decreases the time between strikes. meanwhile, the flute and at the concert, the rovas, would play long tones or bursts of melody. the concert was a fascinating collision of cultures that really worked. </p>
<p> </p>
<p><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/821534531/1369519.html">Embed for we are all vampires now</a><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/821534531/1369519.js"></script></p>
<p><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/1410169134/1369521.html">Embed for tiddlywinks</a><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/1410169134/1369521.js"></script></p>
<p><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/2184542599/1369524.html">Embed for gaku</a><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/2184542599/1369524.js"></script></p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49683272017-12-08T09:48:39-05:002023-12-10T11:44:46-05:00today's ride 11.11.17<p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/86be3b3cba7b3770e8f04fd9fe725eb67875737e/medium/img-0512.jpg" class="size_m justify_left border_" /></p>
<p> </p>
<p>going up to the country and paint my mailbox blue - taj mahal/the real thing <br>little red rooster - stones <br>some girls - stones <br>everything i love - carmen mcrae <br>prelude e-flat minor op. 16 - scriabin/horowitz <br>tap dancer’s blues - duke/duke the pianist <br>snake - pj harvey/rid of me <br>queen sally - archie sturgill/mike seeger/close to home <br>moss garden - bowie/heroes <br>prelude de la parte heroique du ciel - satie/thibaudet </p>
<p> </p>
<p>i was playing a concert at anna's jazz island in berkeley some years ago - a great venue that is now closed. i knew anna was married to taj but didn't expect he would be in attendance. when i went to the bathroom between sets i looked over from my urinal and there he was, taking a piss right next to me. i said something like, wow, you're taj mahal. and that <em>nat'l blues</em> was one of my favorite records. he smiled and said something like, thanks. you sound good, man. i was pretty nervous before the next set but i could see the crowd well when we started again and he had left. i'm glad i didn't know he was there!! </p>
<p> </p>
<p>it's ironic that the stones track should follow the taj track. is it really random, the shuffle algorithm? because i could hardly stand to listen to their half-assed, british, white-boy version of the blues after listening to taj. they redeemed themselves right away, though, with 'some girls.' that is their shit and i love it. someone gave me a lot of stones records back when i didn’t even know how to get music on my computer. dude was like, hey, i have some stuff from my library i can put on there. i think i literally brought my computer over to his apartment so i could hook it up to his computer - that’s how long ago it was. i really do love the stones but when they sucked, they sucked. fortunately, he didn’t give me <em>under cover</em> or <em>dirty work</em>. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>duke and pj. not as different as you might think. i see duke as sort of a minimalist when it comes to playing the piano - never an extra note, exactly what’s needed. i saw pj harvey once and it was one of the most suspenseful spectacles i’ve witnessed. every song sounded like an extended intro and that the drums were going to come charging in at the top of the next verse or chorus. but they never did. or rarely. she created this sense of expectation that made you sit on the edge of your seat waiting for what never came. it kind of blew my mind. duke is like that. you wait for the flash, the crash, the chops and it never happens. instead, it’s the most restrained, elegant presentation. i see a similarity. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>since bowie’s death, i’ve come to appreciate his albums w eno. it’s now some of my fave bowie. so great to get turned on to music you thought you knew all about already. maybe i just enjoy ambient music now in a way i was unable to in my youthful clatter. those couple of bowie records lead me to go back to <em>music for airports</em> and other eno of that period. i thought it was ridiculous at the time. now i really like it.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>i mite have to do something about this satie business. he seems to come up every other playlist. i have all of his piano music in my library and if you didn’t know, dude was a master of brevity. so there are like 75 piano pieces, most of them not longer than a couple of minutes. i guess that’s not so bad. they are short and i like listening to them. but why do the names have to be so damn long?</p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49682842017-12-08T09:10:06-05:002023-12-10T11:56:35-05:00today's ride 11.10.17<p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/b281daf6ffa9d760acc125c1fec81f67812b2104/medium/tumblr-inline-ozon5eqk1a1qzw5bq-540.jpg" class="size_m justify_left border_" /></p>
<p> </p>
<p>steppin’ in it - herbie/manchild <br>a mansion on the hill - hank williams <br>goldberg var 30 - bach/gould/‘55 <br>when hearts are young - hank jones trio <br>if you want me to stay - sly <br>picadilles importunes: etre jaloux de son camarade qui a une gross tete - satie/thibaudet <br>ccc 7.1 - dred/calfornia conservarion core doc/unused cue <br>alpha - ornette/something else <br>uncle salty - aerosmith/toys in the attic </p>
<p> </p>
<p>40mph wind. rough going out to the pier. guys fishing on the pier were wearing helmets. hardly pedaled coming back. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>herbie is probably my number one influence on the piano or keyboards. i love everything he did. rockit…ok, didn’t care for that so much. but everything else. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>i wasn't really turned on to hank jones till i moved to nyc. i'd heard him, of course, but i didn't go that deep into him. my friend, spike wilner, is a big fan so i started checking him out. he was playing around town well into his 80's and i saw him several times. he always sounded great. he has an elegance to his playing that i really dig. many musicians should stop playing after they turn 80 - brubeck comes to mind. saw him late in his life and it was just sad. shearing, too. saw him and the music was just gone. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>the cue is for a doc i scored for the california conservation corp. this was an early cue and the drums are off. they wanted something hopeful so i went online and googled, 'hopeful music’ - something i had never done. i listened to one that came up with this ostinato piano part so i started with that idea and went from there. my producer said, <br>'great. they’ll love it. what else you got - ’ <br>meaning, i hate it so let’s try for something a little more creative. i have a long association with the people at ideas in motion so i understand them and they appreciate my flexibility. i don’t give one shit if they like this cue or that cue. my job is to find the right cue everybody likes and if this ain’t it, it ain’t it. less of that. more of something else. it’s like a puzzle. i didn’t work too hard making this version perfect (the drums) because i knew they might not go for the vibe. it’s very cliche and they don’t care for that, generally. this was hard for me to listen to.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>sly’s voice. incredible. when it’s all cracking and shit. so cool. and i can’t say enough about <em>toys in the attic</em>. one of my all-time faves. every song.</p>
<p> </p>
<p><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/3397281202/1369512.html">Embed for ccc 7.1</a><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/3397281202/1369512.js"></script></p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49682812017-12-08T09:05:44-05:002023-12-10T12:09:06-05:00today's ride 11.9.17<p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/5dbd74cfa06a99190c541d1dfa11e24701e4e65f/medium/fullsizeoutput-133d.jpeg" class="size_m justify_left border_" /></p>
<p>mystery achievement - pretenders <br>earth died screaming - wait <br>stephen foster - industrial cue/dred <br>california dreamin’ (take 3) - dred scott trio/unreleased <br>country honk - stones <br>not a top, i’m a bottom - rene risque and the art lovers/unreleased <br>etudes book lll: premonitions - bolcom/hamelin <br>a british bank - mary poppins <br>where flamingos fly - getz w strings <br>poudre d'or - satie/thibaudet </p>
<p> </p>
<p>pretenders 1 and 2…every song. very sad what happened after that. chrissie hynde is a hero of mine - a rock n roll warrior. i met her once at the fuji festival in craft services. we had played across the field during her set. when we were through, there was time to hear the rest of her set so we all ran over. i walked over. i had gone onstage with a bucket that i was still holding. despite japan’s meticulous food prep reputation, i had contracted some sort of food poisoning that made me wretch about every 30 minutes since it had started several hours ago. the 40 minute set we had just played was the longest i’d gone without barfing and i was due any minute. but i didn’t want to miss the pretenders, so i took the bucket with me. we got backstage and saw the remainder of her set. love watching martin chambers play the drums. he does this thing in his drum solo where every time he crashes a cymbal, the stick goes flying into the crowd as he seamlessly draws another one from his stick bag all in one motion. after her set i still hadn’t barfed. i thought i should try and eat something so i went to craft services. i was standing at a table with a bunch of food on it trying to decide. i put some lettuce, some carrots, half an apple and some crackers on a paper plate. when i looked up, she was standing next to me. being an outspoken vegetarian, chrissie looked at my plate and then at me. <br>‘right on,’ she said. <br>i said something like, 'i’ve been barfing for the last 8 hours. i think this is the only food that will stay down. thanks for rocking.’ </p>
<p> </p>
<p>i love the song, 'california dreamin’. always have. when california became my adopted homeland, this was a song i wanted to hear when i was away. now that i have been in nyc for 17 years it has taken on an even more melancholy vibe. and that bud shank flute solo. i start the solo w an homage to his solo. this isn’t a bad take. there was something wrong with it but i couldn’t recall listening to it. i think i didn't like the way i played the melody. this is ben rubin, bass and tony mason, drums.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>i played in rene risque and the art lovers for 5 or so years. it was a fake glam, internationally infamous rock act - rocky horror meets gay meatloaf. possibly the most fun i’ve ever had hanging and playing music with these guys - and girl - a most horrible, hate-filled, spiteful girl by the name of luffa barre. drydon springforth, bass. dolce fino, guitar. johnny sunshine, drums. yours truly, leo silver on keyboards. and the rakish, roguish, rock n roll paramour, the irresistible, rene risque. this track was done in a box in the san fernando valley. there are no studio or live recordings of rene risque and the art lovers. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>i am still very strangely attracted to mary poppins. not julie andrews. mary poppins. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>finally, getz w/ strings. just gorgeous. the way he does the fu, fu, fu on the tenor - very reminiscent of lester young. getz was not just a sonic influence on me but a master of how to be cool. jazz musicians should be cool. he was one of the coolest. </p>
<p> </p>
<p><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/522677973/1369504.html">Embed for california dreamin' take 3</a><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/522677973/1369504.js"></script></p>
<p><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/2460980023/1369505.html">Embed for not a top, i'm a bottom</a><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/2460980023/1369505.js"></script></p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49682732017-12-08T08:51:19-05:002022-08-18T07:11:06-04:00the old nyc 11.5.17<p>wistfully nostalgic about the gritty, soulful old nyc? here’s all you have to do… go to greenwich and christopher on a beautiful indian summer evening and have a meal with your family but be sure to sit next to the open patio doors and leave something on the table like a phone. then, because it’s the gritty, soulful, old nyc and you happen to be a musician, turn around and play the piano sitting there. wait, because it’s the gritty, soulful old nyc, you have to go to the bar first to get a rag and dust off the keys because the piano is just so damn gritty and soulful. then, while you are playing, have someone reach in from outside next to where your daughter is sitting and grab that phone. then you can jump up amid shouts of, hey you! grab your wife’s phone who smartly has already got the ‘find my phone’ app open and give hot pursuit. try to jump over the planter and onto the sidewalk but fail, knock over the planter and go down hard on the sidewalk, cutting your finger open somehow and giving you a mysterious limp the next day. then run after the perp through the streets of the w. village like a madman, tracking them on the phone and shouting, 'you’re right here, i can see you, i’m going to fucking kill you!' oh. make sure to bump into as many people possible while you are doing this. it’s ok. it’s the gritty, soulful nyc, remember. they are used to this kind of shit and don’t want to get involved. then when you get to 10th st and 7th ave, lose the signal and stare menacingly at every person you see. it’s ok. in the gritty, soulful nyc, lunatics stare menacingly at you all the time. sadly, though, because it’s the gritty, soulful nyc, that means you’re not going to catch them because crime is so romantic in the gritty, soulful, old nyc. so go back to your family at the restaurant and wait an hour for the cops to show up. but because it’s NOT the gritty, soulful nyc anymore, they actually come and are very nice and helpful. maybe don’t call the cops. it will ruin your gritty, soulful experience. </p>
<p>please don’t say, i’m sorry this happened to you. it’s just a phone. and i got to experience the gritty, soulful days of old nyc for the first time in the nearly 20 years i’ve been here. the experience was so edgy, gritty and soulful that i stayed up all night writing music.</p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49666292017-12-07T10:34:00-05:002023-12-10T11:56:35-05:00today's ride 11.2.17<p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/0510f92aa7d2f325c1dff9ba42e0cb512864ac16/medium/fullsizeoutput-12c7.jpeg" class="size_m justify_left border_" /></p>
<p> </p>
<p>doodle oop - meters <br>and it stoned me - van morrison<br>alameda co. recycling psa/‘james brown’ - dred <br>that’s the way - kc and the sunshine band<br>funny (not much) - nat king cole <br>will you still be mine - sonny rollins/freedom suite <br>i got the news - steely dan</p>
<p> </p>
<p>'the world is a little bit under the weather. and i’m not feeling to good myself.’ one of the few meters tunes with vocals. i did some playing with drummer, zigaboo modeliste in the bay area before i really knew how to play new orleans piano. funny, it wasn’t until i was in nyc that i really discovered nola and her music. zig, gave me some advice once. he said, <br>“just keep going and one day you’ll have a legacy.’ <br>and then he said, 'and don’t do coke.’ </p>
<p>the instructions for the psa were, 'james brown’. there wasn’t enough in the budget for a roomful of cats so i played all the instruments myself. </p>
<p>when i posted this playlist on the fb, someone was surprised to see the kc in my library. when disco came out i thought it was the end of music. i even had a 'disco sucks’ t-shirt. now when i hear disco, it actually sounds funkier than any dance music that came after in pop - actual drums, a bass line played on a real bass. and it’s so slow to my ears now. you can hear the funk - the hockets. i sound like a curmudgeon but i’m right. even disco is better than the crap that passes for pop or dance music today. when i very occasionally need to put a dance band together, i don’t look past the 70’s for dance music. that’s why this song is in my library. i probably had to email a playlist to the band for some gig.</p>
<p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/0f6f04f1efcef06f42d6a568d340f113afd7f3a3/small/tumblr-inline-ozkj5lyz6n1qzw5bq-540.jpg" class="size_s justify_center border_none" alt="" /></p>
<p>i love steely dan. but when i don’t like one of their songs, i really don’t like it. this is the one song on <em>aja</em> that i don’t like. it’s spasmodic and not funky. otherwise, that’s a perfect record for me. i’ve been playing the whole record in order - except this one - on my solo gig at del posto. i didn’t realize how popular this record is. people have been commenting about it bx bites of their goat agnolotti.</p>0:31dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49654482017-12-06T16:24:02-05:002023-12-10T11:56:35-05:00today' ride 10.28.17<p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/846d648e7938a1f113277cd83175309a27fc40b2/medium/fullsizeoutput-133d.jpeg" class="size_m justify_left border_" /></p>
<p> </p>
<p>this is really fun. my love for music and for listening is being rejuvenated. i find myself riding longer because i want to hear what’s coming next. question - is the shuffle algorhythm truly random?? sometimes it doesn’t seem like it. </p>
<p>la vie en rose - grace jones <br>hey, joe - hendrix <br>mercy suite, pt 3 - jon cowherd/mercy project <br>corner store - brazilian girls/don’t stop <br>opus de funk - horace silver <br>uncle salty - aerosmith/toys in the attic <br>presto - dred scott trio/scott free <br>with a gun - steely dan/pretzel logic <br>g.i. jive - duke/live at the hurricane <br>wind cries mary - dred scott trio w/ adam levy/standards 2000 </p>
<p>the grace jones song is on there because she was on the list of possible performers one of the years i md’d the amfar cinema against aids fundraiser in cannes. she didn't get up but i saw her dancing at her table with a dude who looked to be half her age. rite on!</p>
<p> </p>
<p>i love jon’s playing and writing. and he’s a super nice cat. i’m a big fan. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>brazilian girls. nublu. cocaine. good times. the same year we learned the grace jones song, i was walking through the grounds of the <a contents="hotel-du-cap" data-link-label="" data-link-type="url" href="https://www.oetkercollection.com/destinations/hotel-du-cap-eden-roc/" target="_blank">hotel-du-cap</a> to an outside location where i and my trio were going to play some jazz for the cocktail reception. there was music coming out of the bushes. there were little speakers in the bushes along the pathways and music was coming out of them. the singer was singing in french. of course, it was france. wait. that sounded like sabina. it was the brazilian girls coming out of the bushes on the grounds of the hotel-du-cap. interesting side note - the hotel-du-cap was the nazi headquarters in the south of france during the occupation. we searched for nazi gold in the grotto. didn't find any.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>t<em>oys in the attic </em>is one of my favorite all-time records. guitarist joe perry's son, adrian, plays in a band called, <em>evil arrows,</em> with a buddy of mine. we've met a couple of times. he hired me to play a christmas party at his house one year. i made the mistake of asking him if he had any weed on one of the breaks. he informed me he was clean and sober and said, 'you know my dad was big drug addict, right?' of course i did. that's why i asked. </p>
<p> </p>
<p><em>scott free </em>was released in 2004. very little structure or form to this recording. kenny wollesen, drums. wilbur krebs, bass. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>adam levy and i were doing a duo gig in downtown san fran. can’t remember the place. we had been playing a bunch of rock songs in our sets. we went outside on a break and sat down at a bus stop so i could smoke some weed. i was doing a recording session the following day and informally asked him if he wanted to play on some of it. he agreed. ‘wind cries mary’ was one of the tracks he played on. </p>
<p> </p>
<p><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/3374280316/1369501.html">Embed for presto</a><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/3374280316/1369501.js"></script></p>
<p><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/2230808091/1369502.html">Embed for the wind cries mary</a><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/2230808091/1369502.js"></script></p>
<p> </p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49636052017-12-05T15:18:38-05:002022-05-13T18:27:59-04:00today's ride 10.27.17<p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/26da7edb62312fd2f0dac14357c387ab9ba2ed90/medium/img-0523.jpg" class="size_m justify_left border_" /></p>
<p> </p>
<p>pecadilles importunes - satie/thibaudet <br>i was wrong (take 2) - keith everett <br>live and let die (take 2) - dred scott trio/unreleased <br>dance music for alan danielson - dred/jay collins, flute <br>man who sold the world - bowie <br>shoes - bari koral family rock band/anna and the cupcakes <br>rockaway beach - ramones <br>epri 3 - dred/industrial for ideas in motion </p>
<p>keith everett is a local singer/songwriter i did some session work for. this is a demo he sent me - far from how it would eventually turn out. </p>
<p>i accompanied many jose limon classes for the late alan danielson. he was a smart, funny and gentle soul. and an amazing dancer. i also made some music for a piece of his. i don’t believe he used this one but i like it. my old buddy, jay collins, played the wooden flute part.</p>
<p>i’ve been in this kids band with bari for more than 10 years. this is from our 2nd recording. i produced it and played bass, piano and keyboards. eric halvorson, drums. </p>
<p>epri 3 refers to the client - the electric power research institute, located in palo alto, ca. can’t remember if they used this cue or not.</p>
<p><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/2244125890/1367561.html">Embed for alan danielson - flute & drum</a><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/2244125890/1367561.js"></script></p>
<p><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/801202822/1368305.html">Embed for shoes</a><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/801202822/1368305.js"></script></p>
<p><a class="zoogle-track-widget" data-height="510" data-style="border: 1px solid #9E9E9E; max-width: 510px;" data-width="100%" href="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/4282086835/1368326.html">Embed for epri 3</a><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/4282086835/1368326.js"></script></p>
<p><br><script src="https://bandzoogle.com/tracks/79745/3778560687/1367559.js"></script></p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49632592017-12-05T11:51:24-05:002022-06-01T04:36:36-04:00new project - today's ride<p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/1200e4329fa4f7beeb9255da5f6c10c8c0b48878/medium/unknown-1.jpeg" class="size_m justify_left border_" />i don’t like to exercise. i like having exercised but as a musician, i’ve become accustomed to doing whatever i want all the time. and if i don’t feel like exercising, i generally don’t. for a long time, swimming was what i did. it’s not really exercise because you don’t sweat. and i loved the sensation of being submerged in the water. and it gets all your muscles in a low impact way. i have always lived near a pool but for the last five years i have lived in a neighborhood where the nearest pool is 30 minutes away. so i took up running. there is a beautiful promenade across the street from my building and it’s exactly a mile from my house to the verrazzano bridge. it was nice being out on the narrows - in the weather; seeing all the ships go by. that lasted about a year. then even the view couldn’t inspire me. i had to put on work-out clothes, too, and that started to bother me. and the sweating. in the summer it truly sucked. so i bought a bike. a nice bike - not nice like a ten-speed racing bike or a fixed gear bike or a mountain bike. it’s a fold-up made by beria. i’d always ridden it around the neighborhood for errands and whatnot. but i never looked at it as a reasonable source of exercise. it’s only got 5 gears and the tires are really small. then one day i was sitting around thinking about robert shaw. i recently saw <em>jaws</em> for the umpteenth time and so i was reading about the production. how robert shaw would go through 2 or 3 PA's a day getting hammered while the crew was setting up shots. the PA’s would pass out one by one. but robert shaw just got better and better. and he never missed a 7am call. there he was, waiting at the beach, ready to go out into martha’s vineyard and shoot all day. and we can see the results - a brilliant performance. the film came out in 1975. robert shaw was 48 years old. 3 years later he was driving near his home in tourmakeady, ireland, felt ill, pulled over, got out, had a heart-attack and died on the side of the road. just like that - at 51, two years younger than me. my brother who is ten years older than me likes to say the first sign of a heart-attack is sudden death. enough said. i have a 6-year-old daughter and i need to stick around. </p>
<p>so i thought i’d take a ride on the folding bike to the pier on the promenade. i used to listen to music when i ran my route the other direction to the bridge and that helped. but i was so uncomfortable running. everyone i saw running was uncomfortable. nobody smiles when they are running. so i put some headphones on and rode to the pier. it’s much farther than the bridge and if there is wind, it will be in your face. i didn’t push myself, i just rode and put my music on shuffle. but something had changed since i last did this. all of the music on my computer at home was now accessible on my phone through the cloud. music was coming up i hadn’t thought about in years. before i knew it, i had been to the pier and was back to my entrance point onto the promenade so i kept going to the bridge. then i turned around and came back. i had listened to 8 or 10 songs in about 45 minutes. i considered that a worthy workout. i wasn’t sweaty and i wore my street clothes. that meant i could do it without any preparation. just jump on the bike and go. and the idea of listening to all that music gave me an idea. i had even more music on a hard drive. so i dumped it all in my computer when i got home and it went up into the cloud. like magic. now all of the music that’s ever been in a computer i’ve had was totally accessible - 1000’s of songs, tunes, compositions, cues i’d written for film, tv or docs, everything. to someone born in this millenium, this is no big revelation but it kind of blew my mind. i couldn’t wait to get out there and see what would come up next. i bought a bigger more comfortable saddle for the bike and i was exercising again. </p>
<p>what will follow is documentation of these set lists, some commentary about them and musical selections from the things you’ve maybe never heard and couldn’t have possibly ever heard. </p>
<p> </p>
<p><strong>today’s ride oct 26, 2017 </strong><br>how does it feel? - over the rhine <br>all you need is love (take 3) - dred scott trio/unreleased <br>enfantiilages pittoresque: 1 - satie/thibaudet <br>concierto de aranjuez: adagio - miles/gil/sketches <br>concerto for orch: 2. vivace - lutoslawski/warsaw phil <br>john henry - jj neece/ clive and vl suthin <br>subterraneans - bowie/eno/low <br>yesterday is here - waits </p>
<p> </p>
<p>i got turned on to otr through my nieces. they are huge fans and i had never even heard of them. when i met karin bergquist after one my sets at the rockwood music hall and sent my nieces a pic of her with me, they thought i was so cool. my recently deceased friend, tim luntzel, played with them, too. i can see this project is going to bring up some memories - good, bad, happy, sad. </p>
<p>i’m not going to post the trio tune. there’s a reason it’s unreleased and i heard what it was. in this case, it was a lack of inspiration and passion. if you don’t get it on the first take playing live like we were, you going to have a hard time getting it. </p>
<p>one of the things i’m forcing myself to do with this project is listen to the whole selection no matter what it is. so it’s nice to really deep listen to music i’ve known like the miles or the bowie. there is so much i’m sure i’ve missed just with music i already know. the lutoslawski someone gave me and i never really listened to all of it, so that seemed totally new. i wasn’t crazy about it.</p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49632272017-12-05T11:41:05-05:002022-05-16T06:08:01-04:00the collanades<p>the 129 unit building was completed in 1935. it’s called, ‘the collonades.' the brochure said 'every apartment facing the street.' the brochure also boasted views of new york harbor and the atlantic ocean from the roof gardens - dining balconies, stall showers, garage arrangements, a gym, handball courts, a children’s playroom, a ping-pong room and a ballroom. the building is shaped like a 'u’ making a giant courtyard containing a still beautiful sunken-terraced garden. that is the only thing left as it was from the brochure. there are no balconies, or garage parking, or a gym, handball courts, playroom, ping-pong room or ballroom. the playroom, like most of the other rooms in the basement, is stacked floor to ceiling with refrigerators and stoves or chairs, dressers and end tables - stuff someone thought was nice enough to not throw out but is now not nice enough to keep and too much hassle to haul away. the ballroom is now the landlord’s personal man cave. there is a range mat with a giant net you can hit full golf shots into, a fully contoured putting green and a little jam stage with some drums and a bass guitar and an actual bar. the roof is now off-limits and an alarm will sound on the door if you open it. </p>
<p>we’ve lived here 5 years in 2 different apartments. i know a couple of people who have had their apartments in their family since the beginning. the landlord grew up in the building and raised his kids here. his grandfather designed the building and the one next to it. there are three wings, east, west and south, all with their own unique greco-roman lobbies. ours has the original floor lamps resting in floor to ceiling alcoves designed apparently just for them. all the elevators are original with hard, clear plastic covering the beautiful frieze panals underneath. the apartments are like homes with their generous foyers, high ceilings, yellow and black tiled bathrooms with the shower stalls that have the shower head coming out of the ceiling instead of the wall. there are solid wood doors between some rooms, arched doorways between others. and there are plenty of closets. the fixtures are brass and there is crown molding everywhere. our first kitchen was so big the rolling pin had its own shelf. our current kitchen has the original ceiling beams and chair rail moldings but was remodeled predominantly yellow somewhere around 1972. the floors of this and our first apartment are wood with a herringbone pattern. every apartment has a corner that is all windows. </p>
<p>this is the first large apartment building i’ve ever lived in, preferring a floor in a brownstone or 'a’ frame or an open loft space. we really like the collonades but because of it’s size, i was a little concerned that my daughter who is now 6 would grow up without those neighborhood things i knew - like the dog who you always had to pass on the way home from school that would come right up to the fence and bark. you’re afraid, at first, but once you realize he can’t get out you’re not. or the yard you’re not supposed to cut through but you do anyway. or the old lady who lives alone you never see. if the ball goes into her yard over the fence, you just leave it. it’s a romantic notion because growing up in suburban st. louis was actually more boring, trouble-inducing and chore-filled. in my mind it was bucolic but really wasn’t. it was just hot and humid. </p>
<p>but living in the collonades has provided it’s own romance. lucy has known a huge rotweiller named harley down the hall since she was born. he is still bigger than her but now she pets him and he rolls on the floor for her. so while he was never a menace, she got to have a relationship with a dog that scared her at first but is actually a sweetheart. and there are characters in the building, too, she will always remember. there’s the picker across the haul who leaves jazz records he thinks i might be interested in outside my door. there was the 400 lb hoarder that lived upstairs. she had so many cats that weeks after she had moved out and they had cleaned and were painting the apartment, they found a cat. nobody knows where he was hiding but he jumped out the 6th floor window when discovered and is now a neighborhood stray. there was the guy who lit the laundry room on fire putting a rubber matted rug in the dryer. there’s bob, the graphic designer. he and his wife are constantly at war with their upstairs neighbor who they swear puts on high heels and walks around to drive them nuts. there’s akiko and joe. they are musicians like me. she plays B3 organ and there is one in their living room. there’s anthony, the painter, who loves my daughter like his own. we send a tupperware back and forth with minestrone or sauce or cookies, whatever. he says he’ll take a baseball bat to any boy that bothers her. there’s howard, the landlord. everybody in the neighborhood knows him as 'howie wowie’ because he sold weed back in the day. and then there is 'the finger nail lady.'</p>
<p>we never have seen her much. we had, of course, heard about her but couldn’t really believe the descriptions - a hunchbacked older lady with 6-inch fingernails. the first couple times my daughter and i saw her in the elevator we didn’t say anything and neither did she. she had a big, floppy hat on and very large sunglasses that covered her face. each time after she got off, my daughters eyes would widen and she would put her hand over her mouth and say, 'omygod….the fingernail lady!!’ </p>
<p>we first lived in a very large 2 bedroom. it has a dining room. what do people do in the dining room when there is an eat-in kitchen? don’t tell me that dining room table is just for xmas and thanksgiving and for piling shit on top of. for us it was just a big empty room. do you have a hutch? we don’t. it also had a great living room view of the narrows over the tops of trees. all the ships passed by our window. it was very nice. and expensive. but we wanted to get into the building so we took it. two years later, claudia, across the hall died and we moved into her 1 bedroom. at the time, lauren, the hot divorcee who lives under the fingernail lady took me aside in the courtyard and said, </p>
<p>'i’m so glad somebody’s going to be having sex in my vortex. maybe some of it will rub off on me.’ </p>
<p>i wasn’t sure what she meant and she clarified that her vortex, the vertical space in the building above and below her, was stacked with spinsters. claudia, was in her 80’s and alone when she died. shara above claudia was over 400lbs and definitely alone unless you count the cats and the dog. below lauren was an old lady who would introduce herself stoically in a hepburn, mid-atlantic wobble, </p>
<p>'hellooooo. i’m janet goode.’ </p>
<p>and on the very first floor was another hoarder i never actually saw. shortly after we moved across the hall that person died or got kicked out. i remember the guys put on haz-mat suits to clean out the place. and on the 4th floor, right below us, was the fingernail lady, ronni holiday. </p>
<p>here’s what we knew before we moved above her… ronni had a man living with her but he died several years ago. her mother lived in the building next door but she recently died. this coincided with a dramatic increase in the number of packages ronni gets each day - 3-4 is not an exaggeration - a lot from qvc. so she must have a television but i’ve never heard it. none of the supers have ever been in her apartment. she doesn’t answer the door. when they needed to get into her kitchen to check on a leak maybe coming from another apartment, she told them to just turn her water off. she doesn’t use the kitchen. she must eat out a lot. it’s new york. people do. i’d done google searches thinking 'ronni holiday’ is some sort of stage name but nothing came back. </p>
<p>when we moved above her, my daughter was 4. kids make noise. they run around. i’m a pianist. i practice. i thought it would be neighborly to officially meet ronni and maybe find out what her habits were so i didn’t bother her practicing or otherwise. my daughter and i went down to her door a few times with some flowers. that same black rolling valise with the big strap around it was and is always sitting outside. and always, no answer. we never noticed her underneath us walking around or heard her door close. the doors are very heavy and when they close on their own make a loud bang. we were thinking she maybe lived in her mother’s apartment next door and just used the apartment below us to store packages in. </p>
<p>the packages. one day i couldn’t take it anymore. i had to know what was in the packages. so i took a small one and opened it up. there were two identical gray, leather clutches inside. i wasn’t sure what this meant but i felt pretty stupid. i guess i was expecting to find something completely benign and mundane and when i did, it made me feel like the federal crime i had just committed was hardly worth it. i was sure she would never know with all those packages. i taped it back up and put it back down in the lobby but the next day there was a sign to the postman in a very florid cursive requesting that all her packages be brought to her door in the future because of tampering. i saw the mailman later that day as he just shook his head and pulled down the sign. i wondered how she was able to hold a pen. </p>
<p>one day, my daughter and i were in the elevator going down when the door opened up on 4. ronni shuffled in not raising her face to see us. i looked at my daughter. she smacked my thigh. say something.</p>
<p>'hi ronni. we’ve lived in 5H the last couple of years and have seen you around but now we live above you in J. my name’s dred and this is my daughter.’ </p>
<p>i guess i was a little nervous because i couldn’t remember my daughter’s name just then so i said, 'my daughter.' ronni looked up at me through her oversized, jacki-o, rhinestone studded ray-bans and took my outstretched hand with her bony fingers, her fingernails wrapping all the way around to my thumb, covering my hand like a glove - a fingernail glove. i saw her directly for the first time and she had a lovely smile and a kind face. she bent down to my daughter’s level and said, </p>
<p>'and what’s your name?’ </p>
<p>'lucy,’ my daughter managed to choke out. </p>
<p>i went on, 'you know, she’s 4 and we’ll try to keep it down. i play the piano. if you ever have a problem with anything being too loud, just let us know.’ </p>
<p>she continued looking at lucy and said, </p>
<p>'hey. everyone’s got a right to make a little noise.’ then she put her hand on lucy’s shoulder and said, </p>
<p>'i know we’re going to be great friends.’ </p>
<p>the door opened on 1 and she got out. we were going out through the basement. when the door closed, lucy and i looked at each other and said, </p>
<p>'whoah. cool,’ without actually saying it. </p>
<p>we haven’t become 'great’ friends. we see ronni from time to time and she is always very friendly and charming. she hired me to play what she called 'an old lady luncheon’ at barbetta’s one fall afternoon. she told me she had heard me practicing and that i must be a pro, it sounded so good. and she was on the entertainment committee so in her words, 'why not?’ she still gets 3-4 packages daily but now lucy and i bring them up to her door on our way upstairs. maybe she thinks the mailman is finally doing it because she’s never mentioned it to us. </p>
<p><img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/79745/14ef105d051971328c7e90bb505ad6874c9af058/original/collanades1.jpeg" class="size_l justify_center border_" /></p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49632222017-12-05T11:32:46-05:002023-12-10T11:32:54-05:00night people<p>he wakes up. it's dark in his apartment - pitch black. it's the only way he can sleep. even still. he turns on the lamp next to the bed. it's 4:55 pm. he opens the shade to the last light of a short winter day. he just thought he'd try it at first. people were trying all kinds of crazy shit these days - like those kids he saw in the park yesterday. they were all spinning. spinning and spinning. and then they'd fall down and hyperventilate till they passed out. then they would do it again. and again and again, accompanied by a dj who played what could hardly be described as music. it was more like vibrations. </p>
<p>the whole nocturnal thing just began as an experiment. the city was looking for volunteers to become nocturnal, offering incentives like tax breaks, cheap apartments, jobs. he was used to it, having been a musician back when there was such a thing, so he volunteered. he had never actually switched completely to living only at night but he got used to it quickly and now he prefers it - way less people on the streets and it's just quieter. and he doesn't miss the sun. you can hardly go out in it anyway. </p>
<p>he makes himself some noodles on his hot plate. he has to make coffee before his neighbors come home and smell it. he opens his door and goes down the hall to the bathroom. his floor is empty and quiet. no one is home yet. he brushes his teeth and washes his face in the sink. his hair has been gone for a long time so he rarely showers. it's a luxury he can't afford with regularity anyway. back in his room he puts on some music. he looks at his saxophone in the corner collecting dust. since it became more lucrative to become nocturnal he doesn't practice much. the neighbors are always asleep when he's awake, anyway. he picks it up and fingers some lines and the holes open and shut that familiar hollow clicking and clacking sound. he sits down and has his breakfast. after awhile, he puts on his coat and goes out. </p>
<p>he likes living in the city again. if it wasn't for this nocturnal incentive thing he would still be living out in bay ridge in the same apartment he'd had for 25 years. it was nice and by the water but there wasn't much to do. since his wife had died and his daughter moved away he was prone to depression and was looking for a change. now he walks. he walks to the park. he walks river to river. he walks to his part-time job writing copy for the city. but mostly he just walks without having any particular destination in mind. </p>
<p>he stops at a food cart. </p>
<p>'buenos tardes, jesus,' he says. </p>
<p>'hola, amigo. usual?' </p>
<p>'si. nopales. dos.' </p>
<p>jesus opens up two flour tortillas and simultaneously fills them up with the cactus and some salsa. he's not looking at what he is doing and staring out into space says, </p>
<p>'queso?' </p>
<p>'por supuesto!' he loves cheese. even if it isn't really cheese. </p>
<p>jesus hands him the tacos and takes the money off the counter and tosses it in a can where it jingles for a second then settles. </p>
<p>'gracias,' he says after inhaling the tacos. </p>
<p>'de nada, amigo.' </p>
<p>he feels blanketed by the nite. it's cold but not too cold. restaurants are beginning to open and some are closing for the nite. he wishes there was somewhere to hear some music but he wouldn't be able to afford it even if he knew where to go. he tries a few subway stops before he finds someone playing music. not playing with instruments, they are singing a cappella - two ladies almost as old as him. they are singing a christmas carol. right. it's december, he realizes. this is not suiting his mood so he exits the subway and continues walking. he remembers the christmas times with his daughter - with his family. those were some happy times. not like these aren't happy times. there's a feeling of satisfaction that comes with making it this far in life that never goes away. he always has it to fall back on in the lonely times. it's been a good life, after all. </p>
<p>he sees a bar that looks like an old bar but couldn't be. mcsorely's is the only real old bar left and that's nowhere near here. he goes in and looking around the room notices a young girl at the bar. there are tables but something about an actual bar has always appealed to him. nothing will happen sitting alone at a table. anything can happen sitting at the bar. he walks to the end of the bar and sits down exactly two stools away from her - close enough to say something but far enough away to not be obvious. she is reading a book - an actual book. if she happens to look up, if their eyes happen to meet, then he will say something. it happens. she looks up to think about what she just read and looks right at him. she clearly goes from blank stare to focused recognition, so he says, </p>
<p>'a book. wow.' </p>
<p>she laughs and says, 'there are still books. lots of them.' </p>
<p>'i know. it just seemed like a funny ice-breaker.' </p>
<p>'ice-breaker?' she says and laughs again. 'you're funny.' </p>
<p>' what are you reading?' he asked. all books you ever saw outside the library had the same black cover so they looked like tablets. </p>
<p>'oh....nothing.' and she puts the book into her purse. </p>
<p>'no, really. i'd like to know.' </p>
<p>'it's not anything, you know, subversive. i just like books.' </p>
<p>'i wasn't saying that. i just....i like books, too.' </p>
<p>'i gotta go.' </p>
<p>she kills her beer, slings her bag over her shoulder and slaps a couple of coins on the bar kind of all in one graceful motion. and then she leaves without looking at him again. </p>
<p>'bye,' he says after she had left. </p>
<p>he turns down w. 28th st. he knows this block. it used to be lined on both sides with flower shops. there are some vendors on the street selling plastic flowers but all the shops are gone. all the old buildings are gone and in their place the same ultra modern boxes that have become the fashion - cheap to put up and very much in demand. the city was turning into a mondrian painting. he looks across the street and sees this guy in his cube sitting motionless behind his computer. it's 10pm. the sun has been down for hours and he's still working, or maybe just starting. the guy's apartment is on the first floor so he can see the whole thing - no kitchen, one couch behind him. the guy pushes himself back from the computer, takes off his glasses and stretches his arms over his head. he'll go to sleep and wake up and start all over again. and again and again. </p>
<p>he remembers how when he was a boy growing up in the suburbs of st. louis, he swore he would never live in an apartment building - like sardines in a can, his dad used to say. and lord knows you'd never buy one. it's like owning air in the sky. what if the building falls down? what've you got? it's like rent. you pay it and the money's gone forever - making some other guy rich or at least giving him the chance to have a life, to not be stuck in a box in the sky lighting a match to a bunch of cash every single month, year after year - having to work at anything you can do to keep the cash coming. but that's exactly what he ended up doing anyway, going off to the job he couldn't stand every day. he just got to live in a house that he owned. now there are only cities - urban centers. it's the only thing that makes sense. it was weird at first but people will adapt to anything. he'd been around the world and knew that first hand. people will live anywhere. </p>
<p>and so here he was. inertia had him. he swore he'd give new york city a chance for 10 years. he had come from san fran and was reluctant at first. but things change and 10 years turned into 20 and then turned into 30 and now he was nearly 70, old and alone. he coudn't leave now if he wanted to. but he's not sure he would if he could. you try but after awhile you give up. it's not defeat. it's enlightenment. and everything slows down.</p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49626182017-12-04T23:45:13-05:002022-04-06T16:26:22-04:00my first and last 7 jobs<p>some thing was going around the fb about 'what were your first 7 jobs’? most people just listed them without explanation. i thought it might be interesting and hopefully amusing to see if i could recount them in a little more detail. </p>
<p>1. glen echo country club <br> ages 12-16 <br> tennis court maintenance </p>
<p>my dad was a salesman. when i was 7 he got a promotion and we moved from cleveland to st. louis. with the promotion came a business membership at the oldest country club west of the mississippi. olympic golf was held there in 1904. part of his new job as regional sales manager of the southern pacific railroad was to entertain clients. he was a good golfer and that is a good asset for a salesman. </p>
<p>my mom was thrilled we were members of a country club where i was sure to meet the right people. so during the summer we spent most of our days there - her on the golf course or laying around the pool having lunch with the ladies. i would be on the tennis courts playing and practicing with anyone who wanted to and smashing balls against the backboard if no one did. the golf course was too intimidating and the pool was full of cliquey member kids that knew my dad was a business member. so i just hung out at the courts. when a new pro came in who was particularly lazy, the job of watering, brushing and steam rolling the clay courts twice a day fell into my lap, much to my mother’s chagrin. none of the other member’s kids had jobs, much less one where they rode a steam roller around in the middle of a hot and humid st. louis summer day. they were rich and we weren’t and everybody knew it and acted like it. but i thought it was a cool job and for once i had my own money. </p>
<p>i had tried caddying out there but the caddies were all dicks to me, my parents being members. and dragging some rich asshole’s golf bag up and down hills while they nattered on to each other about all the crap they were accumulating made me sick, anyway. it was the late 70’s and punk had just arrived so i had a soundtrack to my emerging views regarding class and society. </p>
<p>2. wade’s - a gathering place <br> age - 13 <br> busboy </p>
<p>my first real job was in a hojo’s converted by st. louis restaurateur, wade dewoskin, into a swanky fine dining establishment….that still kind of looked like a hojo’s from the outside. there, i learned to make a real table-side caesar with a wooden bowl that you smash the garlic into, a raw egg and actual anchovies. one of the captains would even let me flambe the steak diane or the bananas foster if he didn’t like the table. his name was faisal elhumaidi and he boasted to have five different colors of hair on his body, <br>‘blonde on my arm,’ and he held out his arm. <br>’…brown hair on my head, a bit of gray on my sideburns, black eyebrows,’ he would then furrow. ’…and red pubic hair,’ that he would threaten to display, clearing the break room. the other captains would make fun of him when he would sometimes bring the courses out of order, the entree before the salad or appetizer. they called it, ‘the elhumaidi express.’ </p>
<p>there was a woman who played piano in the lounge. there was a rule about not hanging out during your shift in the bar area but sometimes it would be dead and i would get to hear her while i waited for my mom or dad to pick me up. she wasn’t that good and i thought i could do as well if i just knew some standards. i learned 'misty’ and couple of others and even got a manager to listen to me play them once. he seemed to like the novelty of a kid playing piano but it was a bar and i was 13 and i wasn’t actually nearly as good as the house lady. </p>
<p>i got my first taste of crazy cooks one nite when i got off early and took a ride home with the grill guy. he had a '68 mustang you had to get in through the windows like the general lee. there was no back seat. there was a lap belt and i tried to put it on but it wouldn’t snap in. <br>'oh, that’s busted,’ he told me. <br>and he peeled out onto lindbergh blvd. after about a minute, i looked over at the speedometer next to the tach that was dangling from some wires. it jiggled between 110 and 130 so i figured we were doing about 120mph. it seemed a thousand times faster than i had ever been in a car - even with my brother driving. i looked over at him. i’m sure the color had gone out of my face. he said, <br>'i got a date. i’m in a hurry.’ </p>
<p>he dropped me in front of my house. i thanked him for the ride and got out. while i was still standing there trying to get reoriented, he sped off. i got my legs under me and went in inside. my mom asked me how work was and i said, fine, and went to my room. </p>
<p>3. calico’s <br> age 15 <br> busboy </p>
<p>calico’s was and is a high energy pizza and pasta joint. the one downtown is still there but the one i worked in is gone and the 6-plex that was across the street is now a 12-plex. there was a headshop around the corner called, the grok shop, we used to hang out in and around. years later i would read <em>stranger in a strange land </em>and get the reference. </p>
<p>a friend of mine was working at calico’s and got me the job. we stole beer and smoked weed outside the grok shop on our breaks. we would always run into one of the cooks and get high with them. so i thought it might be cool to work in the kitchen. i realized i had no skills but maybe there was some grunt work i could do - prep work or something. after two weeks behind the dishwasher i went back to the floor. </p>
<p>one night i thought i was on the sked to get off early so i took a hit of acid with my buddy who got cut loose an hour before and was waiting for me. it was a slow nite. it got busy. the sound of the dishes clanging together, my hands moving by themselves putting the dishes in the bus tub, walking past all the people talking with their mouths, the steamy, slippery kitchen and then the manager wanted to me to stay. i was losing my shit so i told him i had to go and just walked out and met my friend. that was also my last night. </p>
<p>i smelled like pizza and dirty dishes for another couple of weeks but it was a long time before i could close my eyes and not see a table full of dirty dishes. </p>
<p>4. eastlake holiday inn <br> age 18 <br> electric bass </p>
<p>i had a rock band i played bass in all through high school. we had played a lot of gigs and i could play the bass pretty good by the time i graduated. the second i did graduate i wanted to leave home - like that very day. my brother had a piano trio gig coming up for the summer and he hired me to do it even though i didn’t know that many tunes. or any. but because i played the piano, i could follow my brother’s left hand. he is a master of pointing to the root of the next chord a couple of beats before and i learned a lot watching him. </p>
<p>the gig continued thru the fall. i wasn’t intending to go to college just then but my parents enticed me by paying for it so i went to john carroll. but when i wouldn’t quit the six-night-a-week gig and my first semester gpa was only a 3.0, my dad told me, <br>'i’m not paying for a 3.0 when you could be getting a 4 point if you put in the time!!’ <br>so they pulled the plug on the tuition. and then the gig ended, too. </p>
<p> 5. plantscaping, inc <br> age 19 <br> interior landscape maintenance </p>
<p>one of my other brothers had given me his chevy monza that was brakeless when he gave it to me. other than my bass and my amp, it was my only asset. so i thought i’d try and get a job that required a car. i knew a guy who delivered blood in his beater. at least you can listen to music while you’re driving around. so i answered an ad for this company - flower shop, really - that had been expanding into commercial accounts. the guy who interviewed me was a dwarf and knew everything about plants. my mom owned a successful flower shop during my teen years and somehow, i think by walking around and naming half the plants in there, he hired me. that didn’t mean i knew how to keep them all alive. but this guy was super nice and kind of took me under his wing. i learned a lot from him as i was going around to high-rise or public building atria, offices, lobbies and libraries with him at first showing me how and then me going alone. but i was 19. i started cutting corners to get through my daily accounts faster and have a shorter day and go jam with some guys or get drunk. plants died. i got fired after 6 months. </p>
<p>i felt like i had disappointed the guy when he had to fire me. but i couldn’t be trusted to work on my own without supervision. the company is now called bloom plantscaping and they have a dozen technicians doing what i did when there were just two of us. </p>
<p> 6. longshoreman <br> age 19 <br> port of cleveland </p>
<p>i was trying to figure out what to do next. i had no money for college and my parents were 'tough-loving’ me. my dad knew a guy who knew a guy down on the docks. he said i could get a job as a longshoreman down there - maybe even get in the union. my mom didn’t think i was cut out for it. <br>'it’s actual work, you know,’ was what she said. </p>
<p>the first day i showed up at 6am for what they called, 'shape up.’ they read off a list of guys that are going to work that day. first, were the guys that looked like they COULDN’T work because they were too old or walked with a cane or were passed out. then all the other union guys got called. then, there were 8 or 10 guys trying to get into the union like me. first two days, i didn’t get called. 3rd day, they called my name and i followed the other guys through the yard toward the big ships waiting to be offloaded. i had no special skills like operating a forklift so i go'fered for about an hour, getting the guys in the lawn chairs coffee and donuts - on me, of course. then it was move those 100 boxes from those pallets over onto those other pallets. and then it was lunch. when the foreman told me greenhorns don’t get lunch and didn’t laugh, i left. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>7. beechwood tennis club <br> ages 19-22 <br> tennis instructor </p>
<p> the sherwood lounge <br> ages 19-22 <br> electric bass </p>
<p>i count this as one job because <em>heartlight</em>, the neal diamond cover band i was in, only ever played friday and saturday nites. but it was EVERY friday and saturday nite for almost two years. the tennis job was during the week and ran concurrent. the beechwood job would also be my last straight job….ever. </p>
<p>although i hadn’t played any serious tennis in a year or more, head pro, arun jetli, liked me. he got his ph.d in philosophy from american university and was very curious to know why i wasn’t in college. my parents this and music school that and i hadn’t been dedicated enough to get to the next level of tennis, so i had quit playing altogether…..i think he recognized me as a rudderless drifter and wanted to help me. so he hired me. i didn’t have any tennis clothes anymore so he gave me some duds out of the pro shop i paid him back for. i didn’t even have any tennis racquets so he got me a sponsorship with prince and i was suddenly respectable - teaching kids clinics at first but then graduating to the more lucrative private lessons. </p>
<p>conductor, yoel levi, was one of my students. whenever he was in town, he would make his tuesday lesson at 11am. i would then drive him home on my lunch hour in my monza that now had brakes. his wife always had the car. i couldn’t believe they only had one car but they are not american. in fact, he never seemed to notice or care that my car was a junker. he just flipped the garbage on the floor to the side with his foot and sat down. i always cued something up to play for him before we got in the car. sometimes we would talk about the music. usually, his comments were understated, 'that’s nice,’ or, 'hmmmm. that is interesting.’ one time i was playing some miles for him and he said, <br>'who is this tony williams??!! he is a crazy man!!“ </p>
<p>beechwood racquet club is now a lifetime fitness. arun is now the jr. tennis academy manager at the riviera tennis club in pacific palisades. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>during this time, every friday and saturday nite, i’d head out to the sherwood lounge in northfield, ohio, on beautiful, man-made, lake fell, to play top 40 and neal diamond covers with heartlight. </p>
<p>roger drank b-v and cokes and sounded JUST like neal diamond. he did not look like neal diamond. he wore a beard and was bald up top but had straight, brown hair down to the top of his wing-tipped tux shirt he always wore, always unbuttoned to his navel. he was banging the other singer, sally, a sweet-hearted bleach-blond who sang her ass off. when we played 'magic man,' it sounded like 'magic man.' we called the guitar player, 'big bird.' he had big glasses and an afro and always wore a full tuxedo - vest and all. he was so tall he had to bend over a little bit to keep from hitting his head on the top of the stage. he looked like big bird. it was his band. the keyboard player was good and had stacks of keyboards and sometimes we would jam together - him on one keyboard, me on another. the drummer and i became running buddies and eventually got an apartment together in the hip neighborhood of coventry where all manor of mahem ensued. one nite i came home and he was in the bushes in front of the house. we lived on the second floor and had a little porch he must’ve rolled off of. i couldn’t wake him up so i went to bed. he was still in the bushes when i woke up. i woke him up and we went to breakfast. </p>
<p>another time i had brought ‘anytime’ sheri back to our apartment. that’s what the band called her because she would hook up with me pretty much anytime. we had only been together in the parking lot of the sherwood lounge - usually after the gig - sometimes during. one time we were on the grass by the lake mixing it up pretty good and roger came out and yelled for me to come on, the band was starting. i zipped up and ran in with sheri pawing at my clothes because she hadn’t had ‘her turn,' as she called it. when i got inside, i had to walk through the crowd to get to the stage. when i got there i had to face the band because i still had an erection and i wore my bass a little high in those days - like jaco. the crowd was in an uproar. apparently, roger had told the crowd where i was and was pointing out the grass stain on my ass. </p>
<p>so anyway, somehow we wound up at my apartment one nite. and we were in my bed and she was on her hands and knees and we were going at it pretty good i guess for awhile when she turned around, looked at me and cracked her gum. she always had gum in her mouth - even when we were making out. i’m not sure where the gum went when we were making out but once we quit making out and moved on to something else, there was gum chewing. so she looked back at me and i stopped for a second and she said, <br>‘are you gonna bust a nut, or what?’ </p>
<p>that was the last time we got together. she lost interest. maybe coming to my apartment killed the mystery because i was so obviously a full-time tennis instructor and a part-time bass player. she must’ve thought i was cooler than i actually was. whatever the reason she never talked to me again when i would see her at the gig after that time. </p>
<p>the sherwood lounge is gone, a private school for kids with a.d.d. and language difficulties in its place. i have no idea where any of the members of <em>heartlight</em> are. </p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49625932017-12-04T23:20:06-05:002022-04-11T07:13:15-04:00how to pick up chicks<p>i was in between marriages and one day found myself riding the subway standing over a cute girl with paint all over her jeans holding a tackle box in her lap. <br>‘catch anything?’ i asked when our eyes met. <br>'no,’ she laughed, 'it’s filled w art supplies.’ <br>'you’re a painter? cool.’ <br>'no. not really. my day job is applying gold leaf to things.’ <br>'so you work for donald trump?’ <br>laughing again, 'i have but not on this job i’m doing now.’ <br>'so what do u really do?’ <br>'uh…i’m a clown.’ <br>'really. i used to work w larry pisoni in the pickle family circus and i know geoff hoyle and i used to know bill irwin before he got famous doing all those albee plays. he’s an amazing clown, though.’ <br>'i know!! wow. cool.’ <br>'i got a buddy lives in tokyo goes by guido the clown. he made his own organ grinder. u go to clown college?’ <br>'yeah!’ <br>'the one in florida?’ <br>'is there another one?’ <br>'not that i know of.’ <br>the train pulls into an express connection. <br>'damn. this is my stop,’ i say. 'i’d love to talk to you some more about clowns. i’ve always been afraid of clowns but u seem really nice.’ <br>she laughed and said, 'here’s my number.’ <br>we got together a couple times but the vibe wasn’t there.</p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49625912017-12-04T23:19:05-05:002022-05-12T07:57:54-04:00make-up <p>once again, a young woman sits down next to me on the subway and goes to town putting on her face. stop after stop she brushes and lines and powders and darkens and lightens, making a stirring racket in her make-up bag each time she goes in there for the next tool. i don’t know why this should annoy me but it does. do i clip my fingernails on public transportaion? trim my moustache? <br>she opens another compact and examines it, getting her eye even with the surface and gives it all little puff blowing a kind of peach colored powder onto my trousers. i have my headphones on so i say maybe a little loudly, <br>‘hey!!’ brushing my pant leg and a couple of people are looking. 'please don’t blow make-up on my suit.’ <br>she says something back i can’t hear but her face says, fuck you, asshole, so i take my headphones off. <br>'i’m sorry. what did you say?’ <br>'what’s your problem?’ she says again. <br>'my problem is i don’t want make-up on my suit.’ <br>'i didn’t get any on your suit. why are you so angry?’ <br>'why don’t you get dressed at home?’ <br>'shhh!!!!’ <br>we both look across the aisle and there’s this oldish lady reminds me of bea arthur looking up at us from her book, eyebrows raised over her reading glasses. after a second, she goes back to her book. <br>i want to say something like, mind you own damn business. but i don’t. <br>we sit in silence and the young woman goes back to putting on more make-up.</p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49625902017-12-04T23:18:26-05:002021-06-03T14:48:12-04:00champions<p>we beat you!!! yeaaahhh!! <br>you suck! we rule!! yeaahhhhh!! i knew we could do it. i’ve been waiting my WHOLE LIFE for this. now i’m going turn over some cars and light some shit on fire. whooooooo!!! wait. what? we didn’t win? it was a mistake? but we won. we beat you. and now you say we didn’t win? THEY actually won? that’s not fair!! what the fuck!!! i hate them! they suck! let’s turn over some cars and light some shit on fire! yeaaaahhh!!!!</p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49625892017-12-04T23:18:04-05:002023-12-10T12:03:27-05:00subway dispatch<p>someone is playing their loud video game on their phone so i do what i always do and start scrolling through the sounds of MY phone, lingering on the most obnoxious one, repeating it everytime they kill someone or jump over a barrel or catch the phoenix. the young black kid next to me takes out his earbuds and gives me a look. <br>‘sorry,’ i say. 'i can’t stand those fucking video games. it’s so rude.’ <br>'oh. i thought it was me and maybe my headphones weren’t plugged in all the way.’ he’s checking the jack. <br>'no, no. sorry. i’m just adding to the problem, aren’t i? i should be more zen - just let it go.’ <br>the kid says, 'naw!!! this is new york and that shit IS annoying. that zen shit is some brooklyn hipster shit.’</p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49625882017-12-04T23:17:25-05:002024-01-08T13:31:06-05:00the south<p>when i grew up in st. louis, i never thought of missouri as the south…till i played my first paying gig at the age of 16 in the town of bonne terre in a biker bar about 5o miles south of the city. the drummer’s older brother grew up to be a biker we were scared of but he had decided to help us get some gigs so we went along. when the bartender found out we were prep school kids he took us aside to tell us we were ‘down here where we call a nigger, a nigger.’ then i really looked at a map and realized southern missouri is bordered by arkansas, tennessee and kentucky. that was over 35 years ago. i still have the $2 bill i was given at the end of the gig.</p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49614542017-12-04T11:38:27-05:002023-12-10T12:04:01-05:00organics<p>i was in the health food part of my grocery store today - it’s a whole seperate floor - and the house music was this typical, crappy, auto-tuned, nasaly, overly melismatic singer w backing tracks that came out of a box and could never move air even in a vacuum. it was ruining my shopping experience so i asked the mgr if he could pls put on some organic music to go w my organic shopping.</p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49614532017-12-04T11:35:53-05:002022-03-31T12:56:38-04:00make-up 2<p>a woman gets on and sits directly across from me. within seconds she is into her handbag. out comes the….deodorant? i have articluated my annoyance at people who do their grooming on the subway but this is a first. and then she goes at it. she is wearing a tight fitting, striped blouse and i notice i can see her bra straps as she liberally applies the deodorant under each arm. it is then i notice she is also attractive and dressed very hip - a little like jimi hendrix. she probably walks around naked in her apartment. she goes back in the bag for lip gloss. i’m no expert but it had to be lip gloss because she went around her mouth 10 times with it and her lips didn’t change color. i realize i am not annoyed because she is attractive. and that i liked watching her put on her deodorant and lip gloss. i understand this to be some kind of double standard and resolve to stop writing about these grooming encounters.</p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49614512017-12-04T11:35:15-05:002024-02-19T07:54:05-05:00the lady<p>bus driver: miss, u are $1.40 short. <br>lady: no. this is a weekly card. <br>bd: no, it isn’t. if it were the machine would read ‘expired’ and instead it reads u are a $1.40 short. <br>lady: this is a weekly card. i ride the bus every day. <br>bd: miss, i DRIVE the bus every day, ALL day for the last 15 years. <br>lady: well, i’ve been waiting for 30 minutes! <br>dred: that’s because they come every 30 minutes. i thought u rode the bus every day. <br>lady: why don’t u mind ur own business. <br>lady 2: it IS his business. ur holding everyone up. <br>lady to bd: well, i don’t have $1.40 and i’m not getting off. <br>(goes to back of bus - driver opens up door and we wait - after a minute, bd closes door) <br>bd: i don’t want to hold everyone up. <br>dred: i don’t care. <br>lady 3: i do. i have to get to work. <br>lady 2 to lady: what makes u so special? u don’t have to follow the rules? <br>lady: i’m not getting off this fucking bus. fuck u.</p>dred scotttag:dredscott.com,2005:Post/49614482017-12-04T11:31:23-05:002023-12-10T12:56:57-05:00the scarab speaks<p>jazz is dred <br>america is dred <br>low-fat is a lie <br>you cover dead people with lye </p>
<p> i don’t play the piano <br> i play a box with a big metal board in it <br> upon which a series of strings is stretched <br>and made to resonate individually or collectively <br> by means of a felt-tipped hammer strike <br> piano is such a confining label </p>
<p>nature is not nurture <br> almond butter is very expensive <br> the world will never stop turning <br>i’m getting a fixed gear bicycle </p>
<p>some say jazz <br> some say the rent’s too damn high <br> some say mares eat oats <br> and some say hi</p>dred scott