Plastic Alto with Mark Weiss

There’s a picture somewhere of Dao and I reflected here in 2009. Terry and I visited it in 2017

Hello, Dao.
I am still in Chicago and leave for airport at 6 a.m. for 8:30 a.m. flight. I am meeting my former high school basketball coach directly from airport to help him plan his 400th victory party (representing his work over 20 plus seasons, with both boys and girls, in both Palo Alto and Danville East Bay). His name is Hans De Lannoy and he is of a Dutch and Dutch West Indian background. I never thought of him as Asian until recently when his mother died and the obituary described her as being from a formerly colonized part of the Dutch East Indies. He is about 60 years old.

I had a nice dinner with Anna Fermin, Wally, Oskar and Arlo (sort of). She is very interested in coming to the West Coast and touring with you. Not sure if you think doing Seattle, Portland and SF with her should be same window as Irvine and LA.

Yes, I will get on it with plans for Folk Alliance. I can try Louis Meyers again. Also, I will try to have Nancy Emrich as a resource. (No, I did not see her again — I kinda hit a saturation point with her).

I did see Robbie Fulks and Jenny Scheinman again in Chicago. Jenny endorsed a cd for you which I will forward. She is okay with me writing her a “white paper” on producers. As I described it to her, it helps me think through how I feel about these things apropos of you. (Like: what is the difference between using Lee Townsend, Wayne Horvitz, Tucker Martine or Darwin Smith — there is a thread that links all four to each other; Tucker I believe trained with Wayne, assisted on cds Wayne produced, yet is now probably more popular and has a hotter hand. etc).
It will give me an incentive to research who else each of these producers and others have worked with. I almost wrote “guys” for the predicate nominative (??) — are there any women producers out there?

In your case I think you and Darwin have some momentum to keep going; but if I provide some perspectives to Jenny Scheinman, it is not totally unrelated to what could effect you in the longer run. Also, I will suggest ways for her to collaborate with you (and Darwin) in the near future.

I thought my trip was very worthwhile. Yesterday I took a cab to Millenium Park to catch up with Michael Orlove of the City of Chicago and give him the rundown on your doings. I think there is possibility of doing some stuff with them next time in town.

I will revise the “Chicago Update” file and add in the names of our new friends there. I hope we can get back to Chicago relatively soon.

On a personal aside, on my way to Anna’s yesterday, I noticed a building for rent sign around the corner from her: it said MARK B WEISS realtor. I called the phone number and found a man nine years older than me with the same name. Same middle name even: Mark Bennett Weiss. I find that odd because Bennett is kind of a WASPy name. Doesn’t usually go with Weiss. I was named for Morton Benjamin Weiss, my deceased paternal grandfather, plus we lived on Bennett Street. I joked to the guy in a subsequent email that I may have to change my name. (because in addition to being a real estate wiz, he is on the board of a music non profit).

We should keep our eyes out for more Dao Stroms.

Michael Orlove’s co-worker said her favorite band at Pitchfork is from Denmark, called Mew. I skipped Pitchfork and ended up having Himalayan food in Evanston with my former intern Noah Metz and his girlfriend — they are recent Northwestern grads. I also chatted up a woman selling t-shirts for the sports teams there named Amy Danzer who wrote her thesis on a formerly repressed Soviet writer named Venedikt Erofeev, and also wondered if you had read Linda Le “Slander.” Amy was also into “Hiroshima Mon Amor.”

I am trying on the plane to read Yoko Tawada, Where Europe Begins. Do you know it?

Also, I am tempted to send you that 1970 Playboy magazine after I peruse it. I was thinking that you might have some insightful observations about it. Maybe you can work some of it into your ’70s narrative piece. I also, perhaps more helpfully, keep a file on articles about the Vietnam war, like recent obituaries of Robert McNamara and some U.S General.

I will also try to update the “Dao outline” document as appropriate.

Maybe we can recast as goals for the second half of 2009.

Enjoy the gourmet house concert.

Mark

> Next step, I’m also thinking may be to start looking
> for West Coast dates. I know it’s still a ways off, but
> perhaps we could start looking for a good anchor date
> nevertheless? If you see any opening act ideas to pursue in
> Bay Area, LA, Portland, Seattle or elsewhere along the
> coastline? Just a thought

its funny Texas seems so big until your anchored up in Anchorage or worse Juneau up the road.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=QcDWMqsU7Rg

Ctense, bitter portrayal of a Vietnamese family blighted by insanity, adultery, and incest, observed by the daughter who labors to distance herself from her depressing, indeed disastrous, origins. Written in French and first published in 1993, this spare, cunningly fashioned tale juxtaposes a riot of powerful sensory impressions against–and as correlatives of–the narrator’s vitriolic memories. The novel’s rigorous nihilism, however, undercuts its considerable artistry; the reader shares the narrator’s wish to escape from this experience, and to forget it as quickly as possible.