The Space Farce

Can we please dispense with the dribble?  Gump's acting Secretary of Defense, a Boeing operative, who all ready is in hot water for killing hundreds of innocent civilians suggests the United States Air Force is the appropriate arm of our armed services to manage a newly sanctioned "Space Force."  Space Farce more likely.  We went through this with Ronny.  "Star Wars."  Luckily it became a string of hit movies instead of yet another HAARP.  Open up a sewer and toss America's dollars into the collar, just holler, puking up dollars.  Who more appropriate to suggest an additional pork barrel in addition to the dysfunctional Department of Homeland Security?  W's only response to 9/11 was a new government agency devoted to national security.  As the twin towers were bombed he continued to read to a class of school children.  Cheney masterminded is ascent to power in this moment.  The mere suggestions that socialism was represented by former president Obama.  America purely is a socialist entity.  Our government is a rampantly out-of-control bourgeoisie corporate owning and regulating facade of capitalism.  There is no free market.  The tax payers dollars subsidize this bourgeoisie menagerie, the federal government, the "Swamp," Congress, and the White House.  Gump is the most contemptuous, narcissistic, dishonest president in recent history and still the hillbillies holler for white supremacy.  Our president is the guiding force for renewed violence and racism in America, and yet Ms. Pelosi won't impeach.  He incites murderous violence with his flippant words and takes no responsibility.  The very definition of Beelzebub, agent orange is reveling in his exoneration.  The Mueller report vindicating his regime of collusion but not.  Everyone close to him in his franchise has been indicted, convicted, and imprisoned.  Clearly he has shown his true strength, letting his hired guns take his fall.  Vindication is America's largest joke.  Pelosi won't impeach.  Space Farce, a Boeing operative acting as the Secretary of Defense masterminding his company's resurgence after killing hundreds of innocent civilians with the dropping of a few bits.  Regulating themselves into a pickle with the FAA and FRA sucking their teats like hungry calves, calves that become steer with castrated testicles foraging shit out of the ruts.  Socialism!?  We are a socialist nation, a socialist economy, a socialist entity.  Those offensive bourgeoisie Washingtonians shouting, "Socialism!"  Let's create an entire new arm of the United States military and let Boeing equip it with no bid contracts offered up by Cheney and Rumsfeld.  We've been through this before. 

Keith Jarrett and Pop Swing Time

I would tell Keith Jarrett to sit down.  Upon reflecting on the concept of swing rhythm or rather swing "feeling,"  modern musicians who knows nothing about either would tell me to sit down.  Playing with a computer, a synced track, or anything produced in a studio by others is not being in a band.  It is not being a musician.  I turn on late night TV, I try to watch a musical guest, and I turn the channel..... to more commercials.  There are more drug commercials on the evening national news than there is news.  I would tell Keith Jarrett to sit down.  Upon watching one of his live DVD's of the standards tour with Gary Peacock and Jack Dejohnette, I was trying to wrap my head around Keith's presentation.  Jazz is not popular.  It never has been.  It was and is an underground music.  Mr. Marsalis has tried to take jazz "to the people" by abandoning swing rhythm and replacing it with pop rhythm.  Again modern performers would tell me to sit down.  What's the difference they say?  No one knows.  "Anything is jazz," they would say.  Not so.  Swing feel and pop rhythm or style are not the same.  The only similarity between them is that pop style  attempts to swing between its quarter notes.  It is a drunken lope rather than a swing feel, and it can be created with a pick rather than with a real emotional feeling.  This is how many a name band made their money, faking it with this rhythmic concept.  I would tell Keith Jarrett to sit down, because....  Bueller?  Anyone?  Does anyone think that Mr. Jarrett's physical contortions are natural?  Or are they an act?  No other jazz pianists I know of dance while they play, not that we could call his movement dance.  He just moves around, and because of this movement his lines lack swing feel.  I was watching this trio, Keith Jarrett, Gary Peacock, and Jack Dejohnette trying to get their style.  Mr. Dejohnette plays pretty rigid.  He does not move his body very much to show internalization of the time or feel.  His back is straight and he plays with his wrists.  Then again there is so much movement in Mr. Jarrett's performance, there is enough.  With all of that movement, a stiff approach could be appropriate.  I guess they figured it out.  That trio has their own rhythmic concept, and it has worked for them.  Jazz is not popular music, but they have remained in the mainstream as long as they have been playing.  I hear different cuts from those standard recordings, and often I hear Keith hit his target.  After lots of searching through classical approach, improvisation, and soul he will find the center of a tune.  He will play a truly authentic phrase that purely is jazz.  That is something to which I want to listen, a master.  Then I bought the DVD.  I had to listen through the distraction of his movement.  I thought does this augment this performance?  My conclusion was no.  It appeared to me that he is missing the little finger on his left hand.  That is a set back in piano playing.  I wanted to hear his piano playing, his lines, his ideas, and his expression, but all of this was upstaged by this strange movement.  As I continued to watch these three great musicians play together, I realized that how they are playing is not really swing in nature.  None of these three jazz musicians were articulating the time at the same place.  Each musician had his own idea of where the time was, hence there were three different interpretations of where the time was.  They were not hitting together.  By definition how could this concept swing?  They are playing despite one another or against one another.  That traditional swing feeling that is achieved by playing together in time was absent for the most part.  It was a dialog of jazz ideas but not played in time together as a trio.  It reminded me or "pop."  Pop does the same thing.  It only is a framework, a set of fence posts in between which the musicians play, often not together.  There is no possible way to achieve a swing feeling playing this way, because swing is ensemble music.  In ensemble music you must play together.  I hear Keith searching for the answer, and often he gets it.  I only could think you are only making it more difficult for yourself by creating an undulating cloud in which to play.  How will anyone know if you ever play together, because you are trying to hard to disguise the traditional body language that suggests ensemble playing.  Perhaps it is a duality.  Mr. Jarrett wants the freedom of expression not to be tethered to the piano bench.  The rules of piano realization are concrete, and he is breaking them.  It should be no surprise that they don't swing. 

Saudi Justice

We are traveling to Boone, NC next weekend for my aunt's memorial service.  I am surrounded by loss.  It feels like it, those
feelings from high school that are infused with passion for music and love.  They can become oppressive, and that is when you learn to turn them off.  They can pull you right into the grave.  You need to feel what you feel, and much of that is what is around you. When it becomes detrimental, you have to push your head up out of the sand and follow your own path.  It is not chosen with you feelings.  Feelings have nothing to do with it.  It has been four days of music and feeling and grief and sorrow.  I have enjoyed the music, but it is laced with melancholy.  My father has passed, and we miss his music.  That is of what it reminds us, at least my mother.  I am a child again being whisked around to her functions.  I benefit from them, but is exposes an insurmountable scenario.  She wants me to be caught up in the rapture of the local music scene again.  I don't want it.  When I lived in this house, I was not yet a proficient trumpeter.  The dynamics of this home, while it is comfortable in which to live, is not ideal for the practicing of trumpet.  Throughout college I suffered from this, bad acoustics for trumpet.  The practice rooms in Hill Hall were cinder block and tile.  The acoustics were not good.  My ears are to sensitive for bad sounds.  Bad acoustics are created by the machine, and once again I am going to rage against the machine.  The Marines.  Whence it comes I do not know.  The military's  targeting system.  Those expensive war helicopters.  Underground ammo dumps and loading terminals.  The son-of-a-bitch CSX-T engineer who spends our entire weekend putting around in his two stroke turbo charged AC traction equipped locomotive blowing the most menacing sounding and depressing horn.  All weekend, back and forth and all around "Da Ville" this ignorant, hillbilly, Trump supporter destroys the quality of life for the entire city.  He is not regulated.  "CSX-T failed to respond to our phone calls or E-Mails," say the local news networks.  They are beyond regulation, a metaphor for America's trusts which became to powerful and destroyed the lives of native Americans.  Your spread happens to be in the way of the great iron horse, and its gone.  Nothing has changed.   No one can say anything to this redneck, vagabond, shoe.  When your government fails to protect you, local, state, and federal prosecutors are afraid for their livelihoods, and the FRA and EPA are run by Trump goons, what is our public recourse.  When our friends and neighbors continue to die at an accelerated pace, cancer thrives, and diseases from are not so distant past are resurrected in epidemics.  What kind of society are we?  How is justice served?  Ask the Saudies. 

Phantasy Land

I am bored and listless, but don't tell anyone.  The suggestions will roll in like a plague, most of them insulting and patronizing.  I won't understand the "Baby Boomers," and I don't want to.  They are the most provided for generation.  When you look at the "Boomers," you see America who provided for her people, because these people were in control.  They could ensure their own security.  America no longer has that.  Without dredging up the oft heard story about America's financial inequality, "Them that have gets," in the immortal words of one of America's most influential composers.  We don't remember him or any of the special artists who shaped American culture.  Today as soon as you die you drop off the map.  Who is responsible for carrying the torches of American heroes and artists?  The recording industry for one, but contrary to popular belief, television largely has shaped American culture.  Pundits will disagree.  Watch any prime time late night television talk show, and you will see why.  There is no talent.  When there is talent the maturity level is so low the programming  is insulting.  Jimmy Falon is a talented host, but the network uses one percent of it.  His style is like a sheepish child who kowtows to the guests.  Unlike Conan O'Brien who challenges his guests, Jimmy doesn't want to upset the status quo, which has become mindless.  Once successful television was anti-establishment.  It stretched the boundaries of human sensibility and questioned our government.  Today with the repeal of antitrust legislation and the elimination of corporate oversight, America has become on big company with very little talent.  It's about money, and who gets it.  The high ups get it, and like everything in America once meaningful methods and products have been devalued.  Music is the best example.  One the music industry in America surpassed the earnings of Hollywood.  It was a massive, throbbing, viable force who capitalized on anti-establishment sentiments.  Who wants to be governed by Mitch McConnell?  Who wants a slobbering, selfish, old man in control of your country?  If you die in America today, forget it man.  You're dead, and it will be a hundred years before they discover your artistry.  During Black History Month a lot of criticism was floating around about "Black Face."  Many do not know that Sammy Davis Jr. donned blackface during his career as an entertainer.  There was a malicious and derisive force which created a propaganda campaign against African Americans after the civil war.  The American South continued to fight the civil war after it was over.  It would seem those are some racist motherfuckers.  There was a smear campaign against African-Americans, and it used caricatured images to wage it.  They indeed were ugly, insulting, and egregious.  Not everyone in the entertainment industry born of minstrel blood meant harm with their use of these images.  The proof of that statement lies on modern television.  Television is littered with stereotypical images, but no one will realize.  Times have changed in America, but I don't enjoy a drummer on late night TV who looks like a "Broke Back Mountain" rancher.  This must be part of a new concept developed for television by that big corporation.  They are trying to be LGBT friendly from the amount of transgender publicity floating around.  Whether you like it or not, and I know this is mean-spirited, but Bruce Jenner today is nothing more than a burnt out, cross dressing fag.  You can glam it up all you want, paint a rosy picture, and try to get ratings, but they truth is the truth.  He was not interesting as an aging athlete, so he bends God's truths for his own good.  It is a ploy, and I do not enjoy watching grown men dress in drag.  Drag shows for entertainment purposes are another thing all together.  Why?  The answer is because there is talent involved.  Cross dressing is not enough to earn money, and it shouldn't be.  What are these images of which I speak?  Is anyone looking?  Are the Uncle Tom images scattered on television not conspicuous to anyone?  Buckwheat?  "Oh, he is a lovable little kid."  That couldn't be racially insulting playing down his intelligence for a warm sentiment?  Or could it?  I never have seen African-Americans on TV today work so hard for an image.  We have been through it before, and I am old enough to remember.  When Dr. Martin Luther King was assassinated, STAX records changed.  Their once formative blending of races in their music studio came to an abrupt halt.  The killing of MLK was a blow to America's burgeoning Civil Rights Movement.  STAX responded.  No longer did they continue to produce racially mixed soul music.  Instead they created images often made fun of in what are called "Blaxpolitation" films.  I find nothing satirical, insulting, or racist in these films.  Simply characters emerged who would not bow down to a racist nation.  They became strong, vengeful, and aggressive.  At the same time they became heroes of an oppressed faction in racist America.  I enjoyed the power of the 1970's, and never did I see it, until I watched a Freddie Hubbard performance during this decade.  It was remarkable the power of his band, and they were not rock.  The energy that exuded from this ensemble with their African rhythms and modal harmony was as powerful as a Jimmi Hendrix concert.  George Cables ripped the lid off of his Rhodes.  It was "Black Power," and it was good.  I am not sure we have that today.  There are black writers, comedians, and entertainers creating lots of product in Hollywood.  Some are good are some are not.  Some have talent and some do not.  It seems to me that most of them are establishment.  There is no ground-breaking material being seen or heard on prime time television.  There is murderous violence.  There is that.  Senseless mind-numbing violence.  There is not much material forging a new path for American cultural arts.  It would be difficult to do, because America has achieved her pinnacle.  Jazz landed squarely on the fringe of music.  The Avant Garde has yet to be usurped in terms of sonic power and intent.  America has yet to even recognize Modernism in history.  This milestone of musical achievement, a depiction of the hustle and bustle of city life, has not made a dent in American musical history.  People want to hear what they recognize and are not interested in having their sensibilities challenged.  We have become a tit sucking, addicted, sheltered nation of whiners, instead of those who built America.  We forget them and wipe them off the earth as soon as they are gone.  It is nauseating.  People are concerned with gender identities.  Is this really important?  Is championing your life by your sexual preference a worthy philosophy?  Okay, America has an extremely sexist history, but for the majority of history the human race as recognized heterosexuality as a good thing.  It only was when depraved, evil, zealots corrupted this alignment when thing went awry.  America is spring cleaning, and the trash is coming out.  All of it, and it is a good thing.  Get those puddles of tainted semen out of Hollywood studios, hire some women, and get it going again.  I don't enjoy feeling guilty for being straight.  I never have abused women.  On the contrary back in the day during the 1970's the courtship ritual was a very different thing.  Whether anyone will believe it or not, there are examples of when "No" meant "Yes."  We have lost sight of the very core of human interaction as a component of God's animal kingdom.  We no longer are powerful, confident, and assertive, because America is not smart enough to able to handle that responsibility.  As I look back at my public education I would change some things.  While I appreciate the courses which taught me to think, reason, and solve problems, I would also have appreciated some schooling in gardening, growing your own food, cooking, and repair.  We are a nation with no mainstream and with no idea how to live happily and successfully.  The media keeps us frightened, stupid, and compliant.  Our drinking water and air are laced with Gen. X, a chemical from a Chinese factory, and our streets are flooded with illicit drugs with which to hide our misery and ignorance.  Truly America has stopped empowering her citizens.  We have become a herd of cattle who digests insipidity.  Working on cruise ships for over a decade didn't help me in this department.  We are taught to "Greet and Smile," and that is good.  It is the hospitality industry, and you must be cordial.  Being subservient is something else, and I became that the same way modern television has.  We want out paychecks, and compliance is necessary.  The once Western Frontier which was host to gun play, dominance, and boisterous howling at the moon has been sucked into the internet draining the blood from our veins and the temperaments from our souls.  Anything you want is at your touch, except that it is not real. 

Sixty Minutes and CSX (hardly sixty seconds of sex)

Kudos to "60 Minutes" for their informative program this evening on the volatility of America's rail transportation systems.  It is nothing new to me.  I have been railing against rail, ever since I moved to Columbus, OH and discovered the labyrinth of track work in the city's infrastructure.  It is everywhere, both Norfolk/Southern and CSX-T's track throughout Columbus.  The old ConRail yard still exists as well.  I have a box of photographs in my closet taken on my Minolta 35mm SLR camera of all of it.  I became a "railfan," because I quickly deduced you could not beat their system, the rail industry that is.  We had a meeting of Federal Railroad Administration officials with local neighborhood organizations to air grievances over insensitive freight activity.  Locomotives were left idling for twelve hours at a time in close proximity to homes leaving black microdust residue for homeowners with which to contend.  They were not happy.  Neither was I.  I asked one official if he knew about the invasive nature of AC Traction.  He had no idea about what I was asking.  Tonight "60 Minutes" received refusals from three contenders in the rail debacle, CSX-T (who did send a letter), Amtrack (who refused to consent to an interview,) and the FRA, a taxpayer funded commission who according to our Constitution should be protecting the health and well being of American citizens.  They also refused an interview.  The consensus was the FRA is bought and paid for by the rail lobby.  They, like Trump's EPA and its new coal lobbyist leader, are not for the people.  They are for the corporations they are meant to watchdog and regulate.  America cannot compete with Europe's modern bullet trains, new trackage, and innovative outlook.  America is a spaghetti bowl of old track which is not capable of handling high speed passenger rail service.  The entities responsible for passenger deaths often has been Amtrack engineers.  Where is their oversight.  Most infuriatingly was the discovery that Amtrack is responsible for all damages incurred in their service, even if it was caused by the negligence of employees or track of their host rail company, that being CSX-T.  Although Amtrack is a for profit corporation run privately, it is subsidized by American tax dollars through Washington.  That is a sweet deal.  Americans are liable monetarily for damages incurred during Amtrack operation.  This is the taxpayers.  "Snap!"  Wake up and smell the roses.  CSX-T has been operating with no oversight since past Secretary of the Treasury John Snow consolidated it from Chessie and Seaboard Coastline.  He built the company into a profitable entity and then got out.  Only last year Hunter Harrison's name was used to bolster CSX-T stock.  Unfortunately for them he died a few months after become their CEO.  His emergence into CSX-T was enough to raise stock prices for a brief period.  The major interest in CSX-T is held by a hedge fund owner.  Certainly the most ruthless and wreckless financial instrument has qualifications to manage one of America's largest freight railroads.  Accidents continue, because Washington is not doing its job.  What a surprise.