Friday, July 22, 2005

And then, this afternoon....



There were Raspberries.

TV is one of those things I can live mostly without; a few years ago I went through a period sans cable and ended up not watching nearly so much, and listening to the radio a lot. But once I got the new job it became a) a necessity and b) a business expense! So I went and got cable. (Another advantage, c) meant I could finally afford a cable modem. Whee!)

Since then, there is really only one channel that matters to me, and that's VH1 Classic. I don't think it's unfair to say it's most of the reason I even keep cable, because I still don't watch much TV. Or if I do, it's background just to keep me informed; most TV shows don't require a full brain to process. But VH1 Classic is videos, videos, videos! And largely from the 1980s! I get to regress into nostalgia every morning while I sweat up a storm on the exercise bike, and it's been such a treat to see videos I've never seen (Beat Surrender) to ones I know by heart (Take on Me) to ones I never knew had a video (Games Without Frontiers). And if you can name the three bands who sang those songs, this is a network you should have.

Today I had cause to go and visit the VH1 Classic studio, which is on the 7th floor of a building in the garment district, tucked away and small and buzzing with sweet things far too young to have really been there. The general manager is 38, and he's like an elder statesman there. Nice guy; we had a good chat. Since I know everything, I even asked if I could submit show ideas. I have no idea how this works, but he was interested and told me how to get them copyrighted first (the poor man's copyright, that is, which is to mail them to yourself and not break the seal on the envelope) before discussing them with him. I'd be stunned if it actually played out, but we shall see.

In any case, I was there to interview him and then stick around for the to-be-taped performance of the band visiting the studio. And it was the Raspberries. A band which hadn't toured together since I was about 4, and who I largely knew via the singer Eric Carmen, who cursed us all with the maudlin "All By Myself" and much later, songs on the "Dirty Dancing" soundtrack that included "Hungry Eyes." I'd heard they were a real bastion of pure power pop outta the 70s, a la Big Star, a band who can be clearly heard in Fountains of Wayne but are rarely heard as oldies on the radio. I'd certainly never heard much, and figured I'd stick around a bit and enjoy a few tunes then duck out.

Oh. My. Word!

It was lovely, purely lovely, I tell you. There's a song called "Last Dance" which practically had me in tears, except then it shifts course the way "Band on the Run" (Wings, folks, Wings) does and ignores your interest in sentimentality. There was the cute but memorable "Overnight Sensation (Hit Record)" which is sly in a very presicent way, plus three others whose names currently escape me. The harmonies were tremendous, not quite as surfy as the Beach Boys but along those lines; the guitar was clean and exquisite. And this is from guys who not only just reunited last November having not played together in about 32 years, but who're far from being the young sprogs they were when they formed the band in Ohio back in the day. Here they are rehearsing for their NY gigs this weekend, just two days ago.

And they were nice guys, despite that some smoke like chimneys (having not been around smoke in a long time it reminds you just how obnoxious it is; that said, it's hardly rock and roll to tell someone to douse a butt). I had a quick chat with Eric and the drummer (I gotta get his name); Carmen's a bit overtanned and leathery but it is true that somehow rock is a great preservative -- they all looked quite fit and generally had good hair.

Once again, radio has let us down in not giving these tunes more play. I'm not surprised, just annoyed. I'm also going to go get myself a greatest hits album straight off.

What could be nicer than going to your favorite place in the world and discovering something even cooler inside it?

One last thing: I've been informed that Paul Weller may be coming back in September to play in the VH1 Classic studios. I've made friends. I will be there. Yay!

Thursday, July 21, 2005

The point of children



If that doesn't describe my current opinion of the weather, nothing does.

I met Werner Herzog last night, which should have been one of those amazing experiences, yet had a somewhat deflating quality. I've been a fan of his work since I was hauled over to the Brattle Theater in Cambridge, MA in the 1980s by a film student a few years older than me, and made to watch his films. (We also had to watch Fassbinder, which I enjoyed far less.) Anyway, we saw "Fitzcarraldo" and "Woyczek" back to back, and later on I saw "Aguirre: Wrath of God" and started reading up on Herzog's prickly (to put it lightly) relationship with his constant actor, Klaus Kinski (who was really, really, nuts and simulatneously deeply sexy in a crazy way).



Herzog isn't far off from that, but he's more self-contained so it doesn't show as much. (He once ate his shoe, on camera, as the result of losing a bet with Errol Morris.)

In any case, I try to foist Herzog films on everyone I can get my hands on, so meeting him prior to a special screening of his new documentary, "Grizzly Man," was to have been a real treat. There was a cocktail hour prior to the screening (held without a drip of irony, considering the film's subject) in the American Museum of Natural History's large mammal exhibit hall. Herzog, as was his prerogative, appeared mere minutes before the screening was to start -- and then seemed ticked that there were interviewers who wanted to talk to him. The NY Times and Variety got in their licks before I did, and he fairly flew away from the Variety reporter, around the corner. I nodded at the publicist, who wasn't paying attention: "He's absconded." "Where??" "Around the corner." She found him at the drinks table getting some water and then decided that that was the right time for us to be introduced. He sort of ignored me as he gathered up a few veggies and with some deep embarrassment I tried to introduce myself and ask a few interesting questions, but got almost nowhere. He did respond, but eye contact was fleeting, and I felt like a jerk for intruding. Then again, it's the job, so that's how these things go. I always like to think I'm going to have the one question that makes them stop and think, "What an insightful young woman!" and want to talk to me for hours, but it doesn't work that way.

The movie was fantastic. The story behind the movie is fantastic: This guy Timothy "Timmy" Treadwell -- who probably went around as not fully-diagnosed manic depressive; to watch him is astounding -- went to live in the wildnerness of Alaska to watch and "protect" the bears there. An admirable, if reckless thing -- he was unarmed always -- but as the movie unfolds his motives for doing so seem to take on an almost narcissistic quality. Anyway, he went there for 13 summer seasons; the last five he took a video camera and, sometimes, a girlfriend. At the end of the final season, he and the girlfriend were attacked and ... eaten. It's not gory, though apparently an audio recording of the event exists. Herzog listens to it on the camera but insists it isn't something anyone should listen to. Instead the coroner describes much of what's on the tape, and frankly, that's plenty. So what we're left with is some of Herzog going back to the scene of things (oh, my lord the mosquitos swarm around his interview subjects in that wild so loudly and plentifully you can hear them on the microphone) and a lot of Treadwell's filming. He (Treadwell) can be awfully twee, singing and talking to the bears like they're out of Disney, and he can be awfully frightening (going off on camera in a rant at the Park Service), but he's definitely unique.

Herzog, on the other hand, tries to make the case that the biggest mistake Treadwell made was to believe that if he was warm and friendly to these carnivores, they would return the favor. He makes a good point. But then he makes statements that can make no sense. Apparently the girlfriend who died wtih Treadwell was not just fearful of bears, but really, really wanted to get out of there. Herzog comments, "Inexplicably, she stayed with Treadwell." Inexplicably? It's not like she could walk out and catch a cab. Maybe they had radios for emergency purposes, but that's never mentioned.

After the film, Herzog was part of a panel that included a woman who had been Treadwell's girlfriend and ran his organization with him, a bear expert who had once been mauled and lost his eye by a bear, and the host of Studio 360, Kurt Andersen, who moderated the whole thing. The bear expert liked to point out that Treadwell would have done the bears more protecting if he'd stayed out of their way and maybe observed from a tree. Herzog said he felt some of the "save the" feeling we all have for whales and bears and spotted owls should be applied to indigenous peoples who are in such shrinking communities that their cultures and languages die off when they die. (This coming from a man who filmed "Fitzcarraldo" in the Amazon jungle and, like his primary subject, had no problem using local labor -- some of whom were injured trying to get that steamboat over the mountain.)

I headed out once the panel devolved into audience questions, but as I left I heard one guy stand up and ask: "What was the point of this film?"

Herzog shot back, "That's like asking, 'What is the point of children?'"

Sunday, July 10, 2005

We're really rockin in Brooklyn



I have never yet been to Coney Island when it did not rain. Fortunately, the complete deluge (likened to the one in "War of the Worlds" by my bud Kelly) that greeted me in my last 20 minute above-ground trip out to Coney Island (for ridiculous reasons it takes 1.5 hours to go from where I live in Queens to Coney Island via subway) cleared up by the time I met up with her at Nathan's yesterday. Out came the sun and it dried up all the rain and the itsy bitsy rock'n'rollers climbed out on stage again.

She works for a magazine that's a sister pub to my own, and we sit across from each other at work, so when Kelly landed free tix to see Bryan Adams and Def Leppard play at the minor-league ballfield at Coney in July, who could resist? I've got about equal fan fervor for both (that is, I liked a few hits and remained indifferent to most of the rest of their collective oveure) and it was free and we were guaranteed press access, so no muddy field wandering for us, no siree.

After a terrifying ride on the Cyclone (it's one of those old wooden rollercoaster which no matter how they strap you in you feel like you will fall out, and it goes quite fast in a rattly way) we headed over to the ballfield and met up with the super-nice promoter (which I know doesn't seem likely, but he was cool). He was pissed at the owners of the park, which had (against all logic and common sense and, well, tradition at every other venue in the world) made him and his company liable for anything that might go on during the show. So if the bleachers collapsed, he was screwed, even though it's not his ballfield. That made the show not cost-effective, and though it was too late to pull out, he said there was no way he'd be back.

But such issues weren't our problem and we hung around the upstairs press box, hoping to get a promised-for photo with the promoters and the band(s) for Kelly's mag's Web page. When that wasn't materializing, we ran out for fries at Nathan's and an enormo lemonade. Others were taking advantage of the 64 oz beer cup, which had Kelly's eyes bugging out. Back at the venue the show got started (the opening act, Randy Coleman, was pretty blandly bad; at the end he gave thanks to his dad -- Dabney. OMG!), and Kelly's friend from another sister pub, Katie, and her ride Marco, arrived. We jammed to much of Bryan Adams from the press box area, then spotted another of Katie's co-workers Bram, down in the seats. We all yelled at once to him and he came up with a bunch of his Playboy-mag friends; we ended up on the far side of the fourth-floor venue towards the latter part of Adams, which just sounded better and had its own bar, plus plenty of room to move around.



Katie it turned out was a big Bryan Adams fan from back in the day, and was going nuts. When he sang his sappy "Everything I Do (I Do it For You)" with those lyrics -- "I'd lie for you, I'd die for you" we started making up more: "I'd bake a pie for you, I'd catch a fly for you." So beer and laughs were had, and much poking of fun was made at Adams' selection from the audience -- Mandy from Michigan who worked at a Michael's Arts & Crafts store and apparently had come with her mother and grandmother to the event. They sang a song, badly. But he was personable.

Kelly kept to her task, however, and told us that at 9 we'd need to go to the buses downstairs for the photo op. After threading ourselves through the venue Spinal Tap style, we passed through the food services area ("Anyone for buns?") and out to the loading dock, where the buses, idling and stinky, were waiting. And then it was time for the pictures! Kelly snapped off the official ones she needed of Bryan Adams, who was standing around talking to people, and as she went off to get the Leppard men, I grabbed Bryan's hand, told him what magazine I was with and said Katie was such a fan, could we get a picture. Marco appropriately took my camera and told me to get in. Bryan -- much more slight than he appears on camera -- told me to go ahead and grab on to him, and there you are.



The Leppard fellas were about to go on stage, so we didn't have much time with them either; Adams was waiting to get on his bus and get the heck out of there -- but Kelly got a snap. I stood next to her and also took one, but it was so dark back there that even with a flash it's not all that clear.



The promoter is in there somewhere, as is another guy -- John Scher, I think is how you spell it, who apparently has been a big NY promoter dude for many years. Both were very nice to me. Of course, mentioning the magazine never hurts either.

And finally, back upstairs to have a fist-pumping, devil horn-fingered-raising good time with the Leppards. I was all about "Rockit," which is one of the dumbest songs I've ever heard but which had me going bonzo for all 9 minutes. Maybe the free Sam Adams from the hospitality suite the promoters had set up had something to do with it....

Sunday, July 03, 2005

Inside out

I have several blogs I read on a regular basis. Thirty-nine, if my del.icio.us account is to be believed. Of those, I read maybe 10 with any frequency, and the others are just there so if I wanted to, I could check up on some fun and interesting thinking. And pass the time at work, which just doesn't keep me as busy as I'd like sometimes.

But all of them have been blogs of strangers, until recently. One way or the other I've stumbled across people whose writing and sense of humor and take on various things intrigues me, and brings me back for more. Regularly, I'll read Lileks and the advice column in Tomato Nation. Sirenita is infrequent, but has wonderful, quirky stories to tell -- and interesting photos at the same time. And when one just goes away -- oh, Shelleyness, come back, come back!

Such good times, and with people I've never met. And thus the distant intimacy of the internet takes hold.

That changed earlier this year when my friend Lynda let me know she keeps a regular blog at LiveJournal. She's got a regular group of friends who respond and read her, which was funny because I guess it never occurred to me to find out that any of my friends did this, too. I don't tell most people about this blog, and if anyone stumbles across it fine, but I guess for some reason I thought I'd know if she had one. So now I keep it in my list and it's one of the first ones I go to in a day. She'll do anywhere from 1 to 5 posts a day and then reply to her replies (having a boring job means even more free time to do that kind of stuff) so I feel like I "see" her with greater frequency than ever, considering she's in Baltimore and I'm in NY. I know more about what's going on here and there in her daily life, and that's fun. It's almost better than shooting emails back and forth.

At the same time, it feels like having a conversation while standing just outside the group; I'm getting the information, but what I may or may not say about it is irrelevant, because there's all this other feedback coming in. And now I sometimes wonder if, because she knows I read the blog, whether I'm supposed to respond all the time and know these things even if I haven't been personally told the details.

All of which is a useless hang-up, frankly; we chat and get together and hang out, and it's kind of fun to see her other, more local friends, at least virtually so. But again, there's that odd Internet distant intimacy. Which apparently pops up whether you know the blog subjects -- or not.