Guido Nielsen
I have harbored an interest in ragtime music since, well, probably since seeing The Sting at age 11, and it has always frustrated me that any recording of ragtime I could find always sounded like it was recorded at the bottom of a well or else obscenely tarted-up, “cutified” to appeal to popular tastes (like, um, like the soundtrack to The Sting, for instance).
So when I stumbled across Guido Nielsen’s Scott Joplin: The Complete Rags, Marches, Waltzes and Songs at my local used record store, with a handsome package designed by no less an entity (and ragtime authority) than Chris Ware, I snapped it up.
The recordings are revelatory. Nielsen’s performances are clear-eyed, unadorned and unsentimental, letting the the compositions speak for themselves, and the recording is state-of-the-art in its clarity and precision. Impossible to listen to without experiencing overwhelming feelings of giddiness, optimism and joy, while still feeling the deep strains of melencholy and even tragedy that inform some of the melodies. This music is American life itself.
I enjoyed the set so much I sought out Nielsen’s recordings of two lesser-known Joplin disciples, Joseph F. Lamb and James Scott, again abetted by the lovingly lavish Chris Ware designs. They do not disappoint.
Mr. Nielsen hails from Amsterdam (figures, no American musician would treat his nation’s musical legacy with such respect and devotion), and emerges from the Beau Hunks Sextette, which has recorded definitive versions of Raymond Scott tunes and music from Little Rascals shorts. I recommend them all, especially Manhattan Minuet, which is one of my favorite recordings of all time and also features smashing design from Chris Ware.
tonight’s dream
The world has ended, and the powers that be have refurbished a vast underground bunker (many many stories deeper than the above illustration) in order to house the remaining shreds of humanity. All of this seems okay with me.
I am one of the first people to gain access to the new living space. It is windowless and a little corporate, a warren of white-painted, grey-carpeted, mid-sized rooms stretching out into infinity and deep down into the earth, like an office tower built straight into the ground. It is stark and cold but not unpleasant.
I am hanging out in one of the rooms with my friend R. Sikoryak and a couple of other people. We’re talking about a project that we’ve all worked on, a textbook that is being published in order to familiarize people with their new lives inside this vast underground bunker. There is no furniture so we’re leaning against the walls or sitting on the grey carpeting. The place has that “new office” smell and there is still masking tape on the freshly-painted moldings. The room we are in has been set aside as a children’s playroom and there is a small arrangement of wooden blocks scattered about. We talk about the experience of contributing material to the book and the various production and editing headaches that we’ve encountered.
The book’s managing editor shows up. It is a female studio executive I’ve worked with before. She has a proof copy of the new book to show us. R. and I make fun of the cover, which is an ugly, purely-informative temp job done by some graphics-ignorant publishing slave. The editor assures us that this is not the final cover, although she sighs that the publisher (who is, I think, whatever government that exists) will not budge on the title, which is a long, meaningless gibbering of syllables that resembles the title of a software user’s manual.
As R. and the editor talk about production, I flip through the book (which is hundreds of pages long and has the heft of the aformention user’s manual) and note with pride that in addition to R.’s drawings, the book also has illustrations by Tony Millionaire. This makes both R. and I happy because Tony is a friend of ours.
At that moment there is a hubbub in the next room. The building has been “opened for business” and a great, swelling tide of humanity has been ushered inside. The editor opens the doorto reveal hundreds of people waiting in the next room, clutching their meager belongings and angry at us for hogging this room to ourselves.
Sam’s first love letter
click for larger view.
A dad can’t help but be proud when his son comes home from kindergarden with a note like this.
“Dear Sam” writes his admiratrix “I left you a penny and two dimes I love you because you gave me a stick. Love, _____.” (name omitted so that the young lady in question might one day still become a supreme court justice).
What, ahem, stick, you ask, did my son give her that was worth 21 cents and a love letter? No special stick, insists Sam, just a Y-shaped stick “you know, like for a slingshot,” that he found in the schoolyard and gave to her because she admired it.
Why is her declaration of love crossed out? I wasn’t sure how to dance around this subject with Sam, who has already had his 5-year-old heart broken once by the fickle wiles of the pre-teen female heart. But it turns out there is a perfectly rational explanation, at least in Sam’s mind. “She still loves me,” says Sam, noting that she repeats her declaration at the bottom of the letter, “it’s just that she must have read the letter again and thought ‘I love you because you gave me a stick?’ That doesn’t make any sense, that sounds crazy.”
The last time we were talking about career paths, Sam said that he does not think he would make a very good soldier (good for you, Sam) and that he still plans to become an artist (good for you, Sam), but based on this letter, it seems like he will always have “gigolo” as a fallback position.
A tale of two magazine covers
Rolling Stone continues its investigation into the exciting, glamorous, dangerous world of this new music called “rock and roll” with their blistering expose of a band that broke up before most of their readers were born. As they did last September with their revealing “Led Zepplin Was A Good Band” story, RS pushes constantly forward through seas of journalistic valor, delivering us the news on the excessive lives of 70s rock stars. To whom the story “Pink Floyd Did Not Get Along All The Time” is news is a mystery yet to be solved by this humble investigator. Is there a new Pink Floyd album on the way? An important new book? Did Mikal Gilmore (who really should have better things to do) honestly want to write a report on how Pink Floyd broke up, or did orders come from above that this important, emerging story demanded the attention of Rolling Stone? And the cover is, perhaps, the worst in the magazine’s history. I know the guys in Pink Floyd were ugly, but is that really the best available photo of them? It doesn’t even have a credit, only that it is from the Michael Ochs Archives and is owned by Getty Images. The flames in the background, however, are credited, to one Michael Elins.
Jann Wenner: Can you do something to jazz up this drab, ugly photo? We really need it for the cover. People have a driving need to know why this band broke up 25 years ago, and no one else will tell this story. Can you help me?
Michael Elins: Is that Lynyrd Skynyrd?
JW: No, it’s Pink Floyd.
ME: Oh. Damn. ‘Cause, you know, if it was Lynyrd Skynyrd, I could put, like, flames or something in the background.
JW: I like it. Flames, right. Because it’s Pink Fl — wait.
ME: What?
JW: That doesn’t make any sense. Pink Floyd, flames, it doesn’t — we need something else.
ME: Hm. Well, flames is what I’ve got. Hang on. (ME, who has never heard of Pink Floyd before, checks their discography at CDNow) I see one of their albums has a cartoon brick wall on the cover. How about if they stand in front of a cartoon brick wall?
JW: No, no, I like the flames, I just — it needs something else.
ME: How about that prism thing?
JW: Prism?
ME: Um, okay, um, how about a floating pig?
JW: Perfect! Where?
ME: I dunno, stick it on the logo or something.
JW: I love it.
MEANWHILE,
I’m sympathetic to the plight of the American soldier, but this cover falls like a lead piano. And it’s by Barry Blitt, who should know better. Remnicked again!