It's the little things

 There are certainly things in the world I could be kvetching about, but I don't feel like doing that tonight. So I'll talk about something that I like.

I was listening to Nanobots a little earlier. It's an album that They Might Be Giants released 7-8 years ago. It's made up of songs of pretty much normal length interspersed with some that are truly microscopic, like only a handful of seconds. The latter can feel like they come out of nowhere. On the whole the best thing to compare it to is The Who Sell Out, with its blackout ads. Quite clever and fun.

Here's a song where I'm pretty sure the Buddy Holly resemblance is deliberate.

This one also has a fifties vibe, although more vocal pop than rock 'n' roll.

Looking out

 

Richard Diebenkorn could fairly be called "versatile." He was one of the first generation of artists to embrace abstract expressionism. In the early 1950s, he rediscovered his love for figurative art. And both parts show in his work. Seen above, the grass and the sky are two giant slabs of color (green and blue, respectively) which have just remembered that they can represent things.

Most of these pictures take place under the California sun. Maybe the north of California―Diebenkorn was from San Francisco―but bright and beach-adjacent nonetheless. And yet he shades your view, keeps his figures at a distance. You might never know what these people are thinking.

Missing piece

 I noticed an odd thing tonight. I was watching one of the later reruns of Barney Miller. In this episode the Lou Costello-ish uniformed officer Carl Levitt has brought in three citizens who are witnesses to an act of heroism he performed earlier, and has done this without telling Barney. While testifying in Captain Miller's office, the one woman in the group goes into a "kids today" tangent and contrasts it with the way she raised her own son, who still lives with her at the age of 42. 

Now the thing is, I saw this episode years ago, maybe when it first aired. And I distinctly remember that a little after she finishes this riff, one of the other witnesses says, "Is your son gay or what?" So I was waiting for that line this time, but it never came. 

It's pretty obvious what happened. Somewhere in the gap between airdate and second generation rerun, the joke fell out of favor. For the record the edition I was watching had the TV Land insignia in the corner, so in itself it was from a few years ago. 

The cut is a shame. It's not really integral to the episode―the crux of which is about one elderly man who wants to kill himself so that another can collect the money from a tontine they're both in. But if shown in context it would be pretty clear that the joke doesn't really target gay people either.

GIIP

 Growing up in public. It's the name of a Lou Reed album I'm not actually familiar with, so I can't say anything about it. But it's also a phrase referring to, well, pretty much what it sounds like. 

Child stars, by definition, grow up in public. Or fail to do so, in public. Children of those prominent enough to count as royalty. And of course childhood in public has always been a part of actual royalty. Prince William would have been raised substantially the same if he had been born at any point in the 20th century, although the trends that make him tiresome in exactly the way he is now are more recent.

But for younger generations it's not select. Just about everyone born after 2000 is on camera all the time from birth, either performing or under surveillance. And that's an obstacle to understanding between their generation and even mine. And I wonder if anything will or even can change that trend. Is it even possible for privacy to return?

I suspect...

 There is still beauty in the world. But I suspect that many aren't looking for it where it is. You can find superficial versions of it all over the place of course, but the deeper kind is elsewhere. I think people may look in the wrong place for meaning, as well. But of course all this is just a suggestion.

Can stop the music

 You can get both the facts and some context at this fine article, but to recap: 

The musician Ariel Pink has built up a fandom with his retro, kind of shoegaze-y style. For years he's been releasing records through the small Brooklyn-based indie label Mexican Summer. 

But no more! He flew to Washington recently to show support for (now ex) President Donald Trump and happened to be in town when the storming of the capital happened. By his own account he was napping in his hotel room when it happened. And indeed no one's made any credible accusation that he was involved, even if the presence of an indie music star might account for why half the intruders seemed to be dressed for an Of Montreal show. 

But whether he did anything that would, in other times, be considered wrong seems to be beside the point. He lost his contract with Mexican Summer because he declared an unacceptable political alliance at the wrong time. There are, granted, other accusations from an ex-girlfriend, but given the timing they don't really hold water as a motivating factor. 

What this incident brings home is that independence only seems to go so far. The buying of music in physical formats is a wisp of its formal self. People find what they like through streaming services like Spotify and platforms like Bandcamp. Distributors want to build a loyal audience, but it's hard to do just by releasing tasty platters. Merch like t-shirts and tote bags―both of which Mexican Summer sells―are part of an the overall mystique. What this means is that even small record companies become lifestyle brands as much as anything. And that might encourage a certain conformity in not upsetting the consumer.

Old favorites

 

Popped into my head for some reason or another.

From what I now know of the Pythons, the idea of an argument clinic probably grew pretty organically out of their dynamic. Don't know how much abuse there was. Hopefully not too much.

Also, Palin's character is very right. It wasn't nearly five minutes before Cleese rang the bell. Maybe two.

Another non-YouTube video coming up

 I was very impressed by this stop motion short. All black and white, with the feel of an old documentary reel, it makes good use of ice cubes. The exact narrative I'd find hard to describe, but there seems to be an implication that species boundaries aren't as stable as we think. Somewhat ominous, but in a pretty way, and vice versa.

The actual madness of virtual crowds

 Being human and fallible and having at least a toe in the water of the autism spectrum―mixed metaphor, I know―I've been known to miss or misinterpret social cues. Yet I get the big one, which is that other people exist. They aren't just bundles of stimuli that amuse or annoy me. They have their own subjective worlds, their own ways of thinking and feeling.

One byproduct of people being physically separated by government policy and brand new social conventions is that this gets forgotten much of the time. You become aware of people who may live far away from you, but you know them as words on a screen, a thumbnail picture, maybe some kind of video if they or someone else provide it. So it's easier to reduce them to one thing they've said or done, especially if it's something you hate. And with no presence or awareness of another person who can feel and be hurt, there's less disincentive to act hurtfully towards them. I often suspect that some activists know this and like it, that they've long thought that compassion and empathy are reactionary forces and that putting them aside will allow for actions that will improve the world in the long run. But is that a ride you want to get on?

And then one day it hit me. Something of real consequence was happening. We were at the start of a great renaissance of public shaming. After a lull of almost 180 years ( public punishments were phased out in 1837 in the United Kingdom and 1839 in the United States), it was back in a big way. When we deployed shame, we were utilizing an immensely powerful tool. It was coercive, borderless, and increasing in speed and influence. Hierarchies were being leveled out. The silenced were getting a voice. It was like the democratization of justice. And so I made a decision. The next time a great modern shaming unfolded against some significant wrongdoer―the next time citizen justice prevailed in a dramatic and righteous way―I would leap into the middle of it. I'd investigate it close up and chronicle how efficient it was in righting wrongs.

Jon Ronson's book So You've Been Publicly Shamed came out in 2015, approximately a half decade ago but a time that in some ways feels an eon away. But in it you can see an awareness dawning on Ronson of what's coming over the horizon. 

One of his first subjects is Jonah Lehrer. I've read Lehrer's book How We Decide but I probably wouldn't have given him much personal thought in most circumstances. In the course of writing another book, Imagine: How Creativity Works, Lehrer quoted Bob Dylan saying things that he might not have actually, you know, said. In Ronson's book, another journalist catches him out in a sequence that somewhat recalls the movie Shattered Glass. Recriminations follow, contracts are canceled. In trying to recover, Lehrer delivers a public speech on mistakes. His sponsors place a large screen behind him, displaying Twitter comments in real time. If you're guessing it devolves into an electronic theatre of cruelty, you're quite right.

There's also Julie Sacco, a publicity consultant who, about to depart on vacation to Africa, tweeted "Hope I don't get AIDS. Just kidding, I'm white." A kneeslapper that leaves my knee unslapped, to be sure, but it's not hard to dig beneath the surface at what she was actually trying to do. The comedians Sarah Silverman and Amy Schumer climbed to prominence doing this sort of humor, exposing prejudice by stating it baldly and blithely. They've largely phased out those jokes, after learning firsthand and otherwise that social mores have changed. Sacco got hit head-on with those changes, and among other things lost their jobs. 

These are both cases of people with status and position losing it, which in some cases means that the person can live to fight another day, building their image back up. But mob justice doesn't just come for the rich and famous. Nor does it require in all cases the person to have actually done what they're accused of. In the past few days a retired firefighter was tarred in social media for throwing a fire extinguisher during the MAGA riot of January 6, despite his being home halfway across the country at the time. Society is creating new sins for the thrill of punishing them, and this is something we need to be able to name and recognize if it's to be fought. 

For further reading, two insightful essays from the past couple of days by Bari Weiss and Alana Newhouse.

One last Hitch

 

Throughout his last years, Alfred Hitchcock stoked tentative plans for a final film, The Short Night. Concerning the hunt for a double agent, it was doomed by a decline in both his health and that of his wife Alma. This might not have been a great loss. While the thought of his illustrious career at least technically continuing into the 1980s is enticing, the Cold War wasn't one of his best subjects. (Torn Curtain is kind of a snooze, for one.)

So Family Plot stands as Hitch's last roll of the dice. It's a contrasting work with its predecessor, the London-based horror thriller Frenzy. That film dealt with violence, dysfunction, and a weirdly asexual kind of sexual assault in a fallen world. It revisited the stomping grounds of his earliest films, but the title also suggested it was a cousin of Psycho. Only with a less likable killer and a hero who was also not-too-sweet.

Family Plot has a different tenor. It's lighter and more relaxed, despite the presence of some sinister schemes. The story brings in grand old mystery touchstones like fake psychics, rare jewels, lost heirs, secret passages. In giving his audience what they wanted, Hitchcock entertained the idea that what they wanted might be a surreal mishmash of Agatha Christie book covers. It sounds like I'm making fun, but it actually is rather entrancing to watch. 

It's been reported that he wanted Jack Nicholson to play the main villain, Arthur Adamson, but that Nicholson was still in the midst of Cuckoo's nest when they were to start filming. As is often the case, it's hard to determine whether this is true. In the event, William Devane is more restrained in the role, but fun to watch in his own way.

This is both rock and roll AND genocide!

 Meant to do a longer blog post tonight, and knew what it was going to be about. Got tied up elsewhere, though, so I need to put it off. Later in the week, pinky swear.

I do want to point out a couple of good five year deathiversary essays on Bowie, here and here. The second is especially interesting because it really delves into the Orwellian roots of his 1974 album Diamond Dogs. DD is a humid stab at dystopian storytelling, and critics back then were somewhat leery of it. But, well, you can't please everyone, and you don't have to.

Personality and strategy

 Are you hot or cold? Are you an irresistible force? Or more of an immovable object? Do you have an ability to sway and influence the behavior of others? Or do you find your gift is more in going your own way and not being easily influenced?

I have my own answers―some more tentative than others―to these questions. But it's not just about me. I think people adopt the personas that will be most effective for them. This is partly a matter of convincing the world around you and partly a matter of convincing yourself. 

This is analogous to the talk of changing faces in the Talking Heads song "Seen and Not Seen." Although I guess David Byrne could tell you it's not a perfect system.

Le raton laveur

 

According to the YouTube page where I found this, it seems to be an intentional feeding. They left the food out for the raccoon. 

They're very much nocturnal animals. And they do have a habit of encroaching in our space. Or rather, our space and theirs overlap. We can live with them pretty easily, though. The advantages of being much smaller than coyotes.

Egghead humor

 Admission: The following joke isn't original to me, although the wording is. With that in mind, enjoy.

A philosophy professor gives his class their midterm exam. He's dragged a chair to the front of the room. Pointing to it, he says, "Your grade on this paper will rely on your proving to me that this chair doesn't exist."

Most of the class sets to writing long, abstruse paragraphs filled with arcane terms and complicated logic. The only exception is one kid who always sits in the back of the classroom. He picks up his pen and writes for a few seconds, then turns his paper in and takes off.

By the next week, the professor has graded all the tests. Only one student has received an A+ on the exam, and that's the kid who spent the least time on it. The professor holds up the paper with pride. It reads, "What chair?"

Small world

 Let it be known. It came to my attention a while back that this this blog shares its name with a piece of music by French electronic musician Jean-Michel Jarre. What's interesting is that Jarre's piece only came out in 2018, on his album Equinoxe Infinity. By that time I had been blogging at this space for over a decade. Some of us are just ahead of our time.

To be honest, this stuff isn't really to my taste. I could see him being a successful movie composer, though. It's got a kind of big-budget sci-fi feel.