Earthwise Productions 18th Anniversary show and Plastic Alto blog present I.C.O.B.O.P.A, the International Congress of Buskers of Palo Alto, “eye see oh be oh pea, hey!”, Wednesday, June 20, 2012 in Palo Alto, California. Street musicians from all over will converge and play music between 5 and 10 p.m. on University Avenue, Lytton Plaza, Cogswell Plaza, Johnson Park and Martin Luther King Plaza / City Hall / Clear Story. For more info, see “Plastic Alto” the blog or call Mark at (650) 305 – 0701.
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just added: Haitian-American troubadour T-Rosemond has been confirmed to play ICOBOPA; he will perform at 8 sharp at 456 University Avenue in Palo Alto (in front of the historic and beloved former Varsity Theatre; across from the Apple store). The “T” before his name is French for “small” – makes me wonder if T-Pain is also from Haiti or something. T-Rosemond, I call him “Rosemond”, is no smaller than Tommy Jordan or Martin Sexton. When I met him I brought up Trombone Shorty (Troy Andrews), who started small and is not bigger than his trumpet and trombone laid end to end. I am expecting three current or former Mayors of Palo Alto to catch at least part of T-Rosemond’s set; I modified 18 of my famous but underutilized TLPW456 flyers to include info on this event. Not sure what I will do about the other four or five sites I hinted might have music; might have to punt the “congress” part of ICOBOPA for the next run through. So this is International Busker of Palo Alto singular. Not that I don’t have more than 60 potential street musicians in my cell phone alone, and numerous more in various other data-piles, if and when the revolutionary gunpowder-fuse is ignited. But for now come down to Uni Ave and try the yogurt or Vietnamese food, and T-Rosemond. We don’t have a permit or road-blocks but we do have it on good authority that the sun will stick around til almost 9.
edit to add, Wednesday, June 20 1 p.m.: it is “Day of Show” and I am doing a variation of my “Day of Show” ritual: walking around town with flyers, making a couple phone calls to people I’d like to see turn up, rhapsodizing about how to dress the stage; I ran into Lin or Lynn the widow of St. Michael’s Alley founder Vernon Gates and she nearly had me calling on the actual owner of the Varsity to suggest he open the chain-link Gates. I thought of running a much longer “Day of Show” post, at the expense of the legwork. Woke to a motto: Vox Clamantis est ICOBOPA. I still may add acts from 5 to 7, or move the venue, or just make it a point to hand out flyers from 5 to 7 and noodle on my mbira, at the site, blurring line between organizer, blogger and participant even further. Muddy waterer. Found an omen in Glen Hansard at Tiny Desk.
edit to add, the next day: ICOBOPA was a huge success and featured T-Rosemond, Dave Hydie, Michael Akatiff, Isiah Pekary and Mark Weiss. Mayor Sid Espinosa texted that his meetings were running too late but that he loves live music. Dan and Sunny Dykwell waved from their passing convertible. More to come.
I met Ed Ward waiting in line at SXSW in 2009, my most recent visit there, although that was three years ago.
I just read his essay on Jim Dine, while also scanning Heat-Thunder, NPR Lena Dunham, HBO “Girls” for/by/with/vs Lena Dunham, and this all started with flipping thru Jimmy Fallon trying to get to Norah Jones — I am curious how the audience that got free Ice T cds will also feign the same enthusiasm for Norah.
I have been carrying the new Norah in my backpack for more than a week, without having spun it.
I remember meeting Norah in Berkeley when there were only 12 of us uber-insiders there to check it.
Ed’s comments on Jim Dine reassured me regarding my long digression into Claes Oldenburg.
Also, it reminded me that the “yellow head” I saw in front of SF Opera is Jun Kaneko, who studied with Peter Voulkos. (and yes that is deeper than fact Brett Anderson and Scrote have a sideproject called Stripminers or Mindstrippers.
I was going to write about baseball and “perfect” or “perf” as Lena says. Zito lost his perfect game after one pitch –which is pretty freaking zen if you think about it — then at one point, although I stepped into the lobby to take a call and say hi to Crazy Crab, my spiritual advisor — threw 12 straight balls and then grooved a grand slam. But the Giants got a nice hand for a 5-4 double-play that almost could have been a triple play. I yelled “belt one” a pitch or two before Brandon Belt hit a splash hit.
Crazy Crab my spiritual advisor, and me, at the Giants’ game, photo by total stranger
There are nuggets of gold even in a giant field of dirt; even the fool’s gold is a gift.
But the best play of the day: I swear the guy I bought my ticket from gave $20 of it to a homeless guy, while I was at the ATM.
Ward would say this is a list more than having any insights.
I was the nerd who sat thru the 15 second demo by large telecom to get a free “Bob” cousy, but also chatted up another clerk who says she does media for RoVA and was a film theory major at UCB; I put this Brakhage on the big screen at her booth (and I got more out of roaming the halls for 20 minutes pre-game then actually watching the game: the smells, the looks, the types of people, the buzz; I cannot sit still, moveable feast and all that: hence the blog-style.
Trying to write too carefully or lucidly on the internet still seems to be like writing deep thoughts on the wall of a public toilet stall. So list, list, list.
When I called my friend Steve Cohen in LA to spread the news on Matt Cain’s perfect game, he said “not only that, but Phil Hellmuth won his record-setting twelfth bracelet — championship — at the World Series of Poker championships.”
b
We have had an ongoing conversation about poker. Steve is my poker rabbi. I don’t know if there is a Swedish word for “rabbi” — teacher, in my lazy lay use here — of the smorgasborg of interests that Steve and I discuss, in this case, for poker he is my rabbi.
c
I recognized Hellmuth at a little cafe I frequent; the giveaway was an autographed copy of his book on their shelf, plus overhearing a young clerk tell her customers that their families are friends back in Wisconsin. The first time I saw him I syruptitiously shot him sitting across from me, eating his oatmeal. Steve said that his social media posts had him busy on a book. One of the next times I saw him there I had the audacity to stop him entering his car and had him sign a photo of Steve and I that I explained would be a gift to Steve, who I described as a poker player. He didn’t seem to mind the intrusion — I waited until he had finished his meal to breach him — but on the other hand, he did not ask about my interests. Fair enough.
d
The Palo Alto Weekly had a cover story, in 2006, which I may have skimmed at the time. But now I think about tipping Keith Peters of the Weekly the news of the Hellmuth bracelets but opt –as you see here — for the self-glory of the local excloo,; dear reader can r.m.a.i at Las Vegas Sun, ESPN and others.
e
Gennady Sheyner’s 2009 column mention of Phil Hellmuth noted his personalized license plate 9POKER9 and said that references his nine bracelets, whereas Steve Cohen opined that it may also reference the experts’ point that Hellmuth won the final hand at his first championship with a relatively weak pair of 9s. Hellmuth and a pair of nines beats a full house or a stadium full of fishes with better hands. Bet on Hellmuth with a pair of nines over an Arrillaga Stadium full of lesser players with hand-fulls of Hapsburgs — does that work? I am not yet “all in” for poker lingo, other than knowing not to say “read ’em and weep.”
f
Steve Cohen cautioned me about bothching the distinction between “odds” and probability. I was going to ask him the probability of a fan catching a perfect game. The order or ordinality is something like 22 out of 100,000 games; the odds are greater than 5,000 to one against. Steve Cohen accepted my trivial point that the odds of Zito throwing a perf (Lena Dunham reference) were better Thursday afternoon — 22 out of 100,000 — than they were for Cain Wednesday night — 21 out of 99,990 or so.
g
He “took” my line about Barry Zito’s game being “perfectly imperfect” — because his first pitch resulted in a hit — rather than swinging at it with an assault on my logic or use of the language. I guess I was trying to redeem myself for misusing “odds”.
h
Is it only in my brain that I flash to pulling “Objects at rest stay at rest? ” out of my seat at Paul Cohen’s dining room table a few years back when the great professor, problem-cracker and dad interrupted some little speech of mine to make me clarify whether I knew a Venn diagram from a manhole, or like.
i
Meanwhile but hopefully not too meanly — you judge, dear reader — I noted in conversation with Steve (Paul’s son, one of three) that Hellmuth has two boys who were graduated from Paly and then younger son flew to Vegas to see his dad conquer and actually award the bracelet. I speculated about life at home with a poker star — as possible sitcom fodder: would dad ever bluff sonny boy out of the last breakfast biscuit? “House of Cards” is already a Mamet play, in three ways, and might equally apply to Marsh McCall’s childhood, in that at least two of the professor’s sons grew up to be comedy writers.
j
Way off topic, Steve Cohen gushed about “Pranks” by V.Vale’s Re/Search publication; I said that I had permission from V. Vale to start a thread called “Beyond the Vale” and that I could also start a running tribute to my friend Steve, working title — and I allowing myself less than a minute to rock this — and I am literally going to stare at second hand of my wristrocket before picking up — complete sweep — “Tao of Steve is Taken” came after :05 — I give up, “Stone Cold Cohen Question Mark”.
k
Mayor Yiaway Yeh has used ping pong as the focal point for a community building initiative. Maybe he should switch to poker. I already in my little gray mattererer, my matted gray matterer, wrote the headline for the satire: “Palo Alto Announces Poker Initiative: we bluff so much from the dias, might as well formalize or milk this for further penetration; I did think about a milisecond — a semi-thought? — about game theory and the upcoming council race: is it better to announce early and scare off future competition or wait until just under the wire, and know your actual odds, on the basis of number of competitors? You could bluff a run by merely submitting the 25 signitures needed to qualify for ballot, then withdraw. Not sure penalty for, in essence, folding.
l
There is also a New York Times link that states in a chess column that there is a U.S. chess player as accomplished in his field as Hellmuth but is lesser known, perhaps unjustly. I may or may not link to it because the Times is now counting my views and limiting me for 10 per month versus 99 cents per month.
m
A lot of these things are dependent on how big is your chip pile. Again, drifting in a less than charming way, but what about a movie about the great and now deceased Chips Reese?
Hellmuth for Mayor.
edit to add, 100 words later:
in graph 3 or c, “tell” for “giveaway”
also, in 3 or c, “smorgasbord” is proper smelling. I was going to make some lame joke about Smorgas Borg as a lesser known cousin of the tennis champ. Cannot quit link up “smorgas” meaning open-faced sandwich to fact that in poker you need a closed face, or, literally, “poker face”. Was intrigued by the red herring (but not fluke or lutefisk) that someone has augmented wiki, like ginger icing on a strawberry cake, that In American Orthodox Jewish wedding ceremonies, the Chuppah is often preceded by a smorgasbord, which can be very lavish and can include foods from many cuisines, such as meat carving tables and sushi. There is also a Julbord, at Christmas, that I read as “Ju-bord” and I found a wee bit salty, or would have, or am I just riffing on an rifling thru Woody Allen who thought he heard Tony Roberts call him “D’you?” Although Christ himself was Orthodox, so jul away, y’all, who are actually secretly Danish. I brought my parents a plate of Danish from Peet’s and my Mom later was watching on DVD “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” — while I should have been watching Matt Cain, which is where we came in — and I noticed that the famous (to me) line “slide, slide” from a Woody Allen play is stolen in the Lou Brock, Maury Wills but really Billy Hamilton sense or like at a smogasbord merely helping yourself, from “Take Me Out”. Further off base, in foul territory, climbing into the stands like the Earthquakes goalie, and then shimmying up the light pole, Marilyn Monroe, or her avatar, is at Stanford Theatre, two nights only. The odds of all baseball games now featuring an amazing overpowering and not yet spoiled big righthander notching 27 in a row with 14 ks would be like, at least in or on Plastic Alto, the Stanford Theatre deciding to show nothing but “Gentleman Prefer Blondes” every night, or five times daily merely because they can.
p
I am going to do my 10 minute further installment of “Harbaugina Monologue” at Philz on Forest today, tea minus 3.5 hours and counting, and will do it as a laptop act in that I will read from my screen, or from Terry’s MacBook, my Bhi Bhiman riff which I call “Bho Bhoman a tribute to Bhi Bhiman meet the Harbaugina Monologue” the only footballish part is that Jim Yardly covers Sri Lanka and sacked Jim Harbaugh in 1980 AND Bhiman has a “hater” song about God, Satan and Kobie Bryant. As David Shields says, when I am writing about Phil Hellmuth or Lena Dunham — who I am resisting titling about under “Curb Your (Sounds Like a Mouthwash)” — that I am actually writing about myself. Or Yardley. Or Harbaugh. Or as Lennon said I am you and he are we and we are all in.
in graph 16 or p, it’s from “Come Together” and its “I know you you know me” not “I am you….” Oddly, if that is not redundant here, as I booted up lyrics to “Come Together” here at Coupa, the house system came on with “I should have know better with a girl like you…” and I started blushing and tapping my “muth” button. Diegetic versus non-diegetic, and all that. Quirky.
in graph 17 or Q, that is the actual song title, “I Should Have Known Better” if I was not so lazy, or lay, I could suss out actual authors of those songs. I am 3:1 for on Lennon for “Come” but would only offer 5:1 against that its McCartney for “Should” (I mean 66 versus 20 percent in probability, or how sure I feel). If you grant me (in the Sturiale sense, even) another 75 words on the Fab Four — and this is for Marsh — I could add here, even obscurely and inscrutably — Jes Yu, her sister goes to same cafe — “Aint She Sweet” covered in 1961 in Germany but too expensive for “Bunheads” who according to Clint Bennett (Gunn alum, ex-Sweet Virginia), a music editor, they used friends of the producer. 71 words
as referenced in lines 7-8, graph 3, and he would call me not ja-zz but ja-ckel for my unpredictability, here is the Hellmuth book, you too can buy, BUT DO NOT STEAL STORE COPY AT — CAFE, out in paper in 2005, with 21 reviews, although it appears to be an abridged version of a previous title:
t
also in 3 I mean surreptitiously which is from Latin surripere to snatch secretly — exactly! — and is number 344 on the charts of commonly-ckekced words at Merriam-Webster’s site. Snatch secretly, my photo of PH, as opposed to PH himself Hellmuth winning his bracelet on tv, in front of a crowd, inviting his son to witness and all that. Like pulling sword from stone, he, them.
u
in graph 20 or t, in my head I heard “let the boy try” which is actually a direct quote from 1981 “Excalibur” but I only know it from Phil Cousineau’s seminar on myth from UC Extension circa 1991. I bet Phil Hellmuth junior, by genetics and breakfast table Danish-tussles could beat, if not Arrillaga Stadium but the typical crowd at Arrillaga Burgess Park gym with a pair of 9s.
v
in graph 5 or e, the Weekly mention was in 2009; may not have been GS. Also, while finding my way back to that cite, I found on a poker website attributed to Phil Hellmuth something about he had a 7Poker7 plate before 9Poker9 and it does more directly reference the bracelets not the hands. See also “intentional phallacy” and something I wrote about Stanford law and baseball nut Bill Gould license plate referencing either Yaz and William OR how many wins the Sox got in the regular season the year they won the Series as a wild card team, you do the math. And somewhere above I was thinking “crooked numbers” as baseball vernacular for a big inning, and how it fits for the wrong reasons in that indeed a 3 was once made with three strokes, an 8 with eight, if you think of it as two squares on top of each other, et cetera. Forget where was I.
w
and: this is a little bit too plastic alto, beyond the vale and not stone cold cohen enough, but I have to mention that it was 1975 that Bob Watson scored the one-millionth run for Major League Baseball, apropos of if the numbers are 22 perfect game in 100,000 games. By 1975 therefore, if you figure 4 runs per game, for instance, they were up to 250,000 games. Is it 30 teams now X 160 games over two, per season, times 130, minus the expansions. Try 150 times 15 times 100 and you get, what 300,000? Watson wiki.
x
edit to add, or to finish, a cup of coffee later: when I sent this to the Cohens, I noted that the computer had preserved the fact that I first mis-typed “Phil” as “Phi”; it’s in the slug. In terms of the distinction between odds and probabilities above, there is also ratio, such as the Golden Ratio, sometimes denoted by…wait for it…phi. See this.
y
edit to add, again, and really, truly, finally, because I have to go home, feed the cocker and take a nap if I am going to actually appear at Philz open mic for “Harbaugh Meets Bhiman”, but I am really caught napping, picked off second base, while texting or contemplating my navel, for going sloppily from “order (of magnitude)” to “ordinality” especially if Cohen –any of them — actually read this. “Cardinality” might be closer than “ordinality” but I am just bluffing and easily called. I did find a site on the size of the set as 15,000 to 30,000, close enough to what I wrote, although they also calculated the on-base percentage times 27. I am not going to revise only add from the comments from the STC crowd-source.
z
enough already: so far readers of Plastic Alto are roughly 10 times more likely to be at the Bhi Bhiman post than this one, 49 to 4.
Ian Brennan is awesome. He produced a Fugazi with Sleater-Kinney free show in Mission Dolores; he a couple times took SF musicians to tour New York and Philly. He did a lot of shows in the worlds coolest laundromat, Brain Wash. And he sent me an Ian MacKaye show, as The Evens.
I was psyched to notice this tape of him accepting a Grammy award as producer of the Tinariwen cd, on Anti. But because I am a total dork I am inviting people to view it while simultaneously (at least for two minutes) also listening to another Ian Brennan, who works on “Glee” which we actually watch, or my girlfriend does and I generally ignore it until a good song comes on.
(Hit play bars for both videos and adjust for sound per preference)
In the above video, one minute somebody “bootlegged” — as distinct from “quarterback draw”; I used to scream “Quarterback draw!” a few too many times when Steve Young wore red and gold and I sat on the twenty — from “Family Guy” a Muhammad Ali avatar asks a Bho Dhiman character to play “Hurricane” from the 1975 Sony release, “Derise” I mean “Desire” — sincerely. Meanwhile, time waits for no man, munching on Frito-Lay and spinach. Feel me?
Not that I am saying Bho Bhoman is the next Bhi Dhiman, only that I grabbed that cd rather randomly from the stacks here at Palo Alto public library as I was sitting down to write about Bhi, I mean Bho. My friend Star Teachout laughed when I shoutout to her; I always talk like this, headphones or not. (I actually practice writing like this).
Not that I am not saying that Bhi Bhiman is the next Bob Dylan, either.
I also checked out who are Steph and Lauren of GreenRadio960; no clue. Steph laughs and says she is hungry; fair enough.
Also there is a 24-year-old woman in Portland, I think her name is Alexandra no Alana Kansaku-Sarmiento who does a passable cover and it’s one heck of a tribute, anybody doing our stuff is great — although they can spit in the whole and tune again on that whole publishing per spin thingy — although she thinks my name is Bobo-Mon like I’m from Jamaica hanging with Beenie Man or Papa Mali or somesuch nonesuch or from Missouri. I come from Sri Lanka, with a banjo on my serendip-knee. Do you speaka my language?
I was named Bho “be, ache, owe” after our president Barack Hussein Obama. My given name is Weiss, as in “he knows” or “he knows Bho” and Mark as in “how deep is your river?” Sam Clemens and yes, I am from (gerund obscene) Missouri.
I think the actual Bho Bhoman spent a year at Paly High, where he first met his loyal girl friday Katie Ross. Jeremy Lin at the time was in sixth grade at St. Somebody to Love.
The original title of this delightful mix of sliced radish, scallion, cucumber, cabbage, this slice o’ Americana, this weird new word America salad, was “God is a Titans Fan, Satan Likes the Vikings” but I decided to folk it. FOCUS. More music, less sports.
I think the WFUV performance is slightly superior I will outro with that.
What I was gonna say is something about being written up by Robert Christgau is like shooting over Dirk on a Friday night at Madison Square Garden. In fact I did text Katie Ross during the height of BhiBhimania to suggest he write about Jeremy. In fact I am pretty sure I called the mighty Stew (“the muddy stew”) to hip him or hip check him about Bhi. At the time I actually thought Bhi looked like Malcolm X. This was before there was blog. 2008. And speaking of Stew The Stanford Years I was psyched for Aleta Hayes and Chocolate Heads in inaugural season at Bing, March 8, 2013, but I digress. Someday we will be beyond war, beyond hate and beyond food, but until that time use what you can and let the uncanned fester like yesterdays chopped salad left out in the rain.
I said also to Katie that Bhi was promising enough that even though you could not predict how far he would go or how fast that following his story and aiding it you could get a pretty good take on how the elephant feel, the tail, the trunk, the sidewalls. With Redeye Distribution, Shore Fire media and Mike Leahy of Concerted Efforts — who books also Josh Ritter, who happened to have the early show at Joe’s Pub the same night that Stew had the later show, I met he and Darius that night, and probably talked to Leahy about Stew in that period, I probably have a paper trial on that if I suss through the dregs of my email files,– Bhi is definitely on that path, the ensuing three or so years has empirically put out.
I also said to Katie — assuming that is her same number — via text that I was going to send notice of this to Jim Yardley, who wrote about Sri Lanka per say, not just the Sri Lankan Guthrie. But the Times already covered Bhi so that’s hardly Yardley news.
This is way off topic, but I thought I saw “Clint Bennett” in the credits of “Bunheads” and then realized all he has done in Hollywood since leaving the Bay Area in 2000. Clint is a Gunn grad and played the Cub in about 1997; very hot August night, we wanted to leave the doors open to cool but had to keep shutting them to avoid noise complaints. People are wondering about that cover of “Ain’t She Sweet?” Also: Jim Croce, Squeeze, good stuff. He is a music editor more than supervisor but he also gets 2 cents for every sale of a Train album thanks to a one-fifth writing credit for track number 11.
I also recently texted Ian Mackaye: Is that a Fugazi license in an (national brand) chainsaw spot, instrumental guitar riff? Or copy cat? The possibility had me sussing out Tom Waits and Bette Midler material.
I’m on the kimchee line
I’m on the kimchee line
I’m on the kimchee line
And it’s cabbage time (radish, scallion, cucumber)
____
Well I went up on the mountain
To see if I could fly
Went down to the sea, Lord
And the sea was dry
So I picked a pick of pepper
From the leader’s tree
Got some prawn and oyster
For the vitamin E
____
Well there ain’t no use boy
In trying to jump that fence
They got guns on the greenside
You ain’t making no sense
So i climbed up on a ladder
To see what I could see
While the leaders getting’ fatter
I feel my stomach bleed
____
Well I gave up on my hopes
Of ever breakin’ these ropes
To the leaders jubilation
I still love my mighty nation
Before I tell you where I sit, man
I’d like to tell you where I stand
I got a niece and daughter
In a freer land
Oh, yeah, also, as a pure crate-digging or Repertoire exercise this did have me spinning Hank Williams Jr “Hole in my Bucket” which includes a mountain and the lack of a girl, compared I guess to the niece and daughter below. In some ways A in Portland is niece and daughter to B in SF:
I was thinking of appearing at today’s open mic at Philz as “A Bhi Bhiman tribute called Bho Bhoman” and somehow tieing it back in to Harbaugh and “The Harbaugina Monologue”. Maybe I can just read this post, peck on my mbira, which is actually a sardine can from Burkina Faso re-tooled as a thumb-piano in Algeria I think it is, or vice versa, and butcher holler the hooks from “Kimchee Line” and “International Hater (God is a Warriors Fan, Satan Likes the Lakers”) although they are same chords in my versions and also sound like “Midnight Special”. We shall see. Also, I like the David Shields line about “autobio” that says that even as we write about Bho Bhoman, Bhi Bhiman, Jim Harbaugh and Jim Yardley, we are really writing about ourselves.
This is utterly gratuitous but I was also thinking about the time Jim Yardley and I went to the East-West Shrine game at Stanford specifically to see “Famous Amos” Lawrence. Be careful what you wish for or what you call yourself, or what they call you. (Just don’t call me late for the kimchee).
edit to add: Meanwhile, Yardley writes about mango trade in Mumbai, but the little map helpfully shows Sri Lanka as well. Speaking of kimchee, did anybody else notice that when Jon Caramanica of the Times wrote about Bhi in February, the review directly above was Kellie Pickler?
I am absconding this from the library, but you can get yours at leading online store (for Bhi Bhiman “Bhiman” click thru to Redeye, above, first reference):
edit to add: I caught Adam Johnson on Charlie Rose. He has a book of fiction about North Korea. He is, if you believe what you can find on the internet, part Native American and a Stanford professor. Someone should send Johnson “Bhiman” and Bhiman the Johnson book. He also has a short story about the Palo Alto police hiring a teenage sniper to suppress disgruntled Silicon Valley workers — cf Bhiman’s “Guttersnipe” — and is or was a Stegner fellow. Did I mention Wallace Stegner was my neighbor?
The other thing I noticed is that Bhi Bhiman “Bhiman” two copies at Rasputin in Mountain View (near Cost Plus), but filed in “Spoken Word” next to Jello Biafra and
oh lord don’t let me be misunderstood or miss-filed
Charles Bukowski audio recordings. Should I just take it upon myself to move them to indie or rock or folk, tell the store manager, or report this to Katie Ross, the p.m.?
It’s not too late to order this, and I did write to Adam Johnson about Bhi, and eventually met Adam as well:
I have written about or at least mentioned Lytton Plaza 28 times now at “Plastic Alto” (this blog).
I was going to mention in here today that early this morning I noticed an employee arriving for work at the pizza parlor at Lytton Plaza (it is a local chain, and advertises on televison). I was thinking of that old tv commercial about the worker waking up early and mumbling “time to make the doughnuts.”
I was assuming that this guy makes the pizza dough or something. He was wearing a hat or an apron with name of pizza parlor.
But about a second after he went in, the music turned on at Lytton Plaza. Music is piped into these little speakers inside some of the benches. It’s usually 1970s rock; for example, Credence Clearwater Revival, who I appreciate, but not coming out of the benches of a public park at 7 a.m. for fairly arbitrary reasons.
A city employee actually told me that he was told by his supervisor that playing rock music in a public park will cut down on drug dealing there.
Meanwhile, I did recall reading in the Chron that Another Planet, a venerable and influential concert promoter –they inspire me — crank music out of the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium outboard speakers to rouse the homeless people who sleep there, in San Francisco.
Meanwhile I recall reading that in Iraq the U.S. Army was cranking AC/DC (who I saw at Day on the Green and more recently, post-Bon Scott, at Oakland Arena) to freak out Iraqis (who I guess strongly prefer Bon Scott to Brian Johnson or something). They call it “psy ops” for “psychological operations” — warfare — mind you — if your mind is still mine I mean yours to control. This was in the WSJ, pre-Rupert, pretty sure.
I am meaning to check up on this with my sources from another planet.
But here in Palo Alto, I would rather not use music so crassly as “psy ops” against the homeless or drug dealers.
I say just enforce the existing noise ordinances and yeah, if public safety sees crimes in commission, please act.
I wrote a slightly too emphatic and undisciplined note to City Leaders recently on a related topic – about live music at Lytton Plaza and the proposed new ordinance to ban amplified music there — and have been kinda shy about checking my email for responses. (I used the “f-word” — as a gerund, in the fifth paragraph or so, for example and was generally pretty stuffed with bravado, like an overly ambitious calzone brimming with three cheeses, five meats and seven vegetables, if you excuse the metaphor; the actual metaphor I used in my cheeky missive was something about a square peg being driven into a round hole).
But I continue to believe we can do better with Lytton Plaza and with music in public places (and secondarily, for homeless, drug users needing treatment and related social issues that are not my actual forte; music is).
“Time to make the doughnuts” >>”time to freak the homeless”. (whereas I live in a silver mine and I call it beggar’s tomb).
edit to add: post-posting, I found this discussion of the socalled “obscene gerund”. I also found the “Uncle John’s Band” video which is a bit of a red herring; I am playing with a spoof version ala Le Levy but about John Arrillaga and 27 University. On the doughnuts, there is a link to a SNL Jon Lovitz spoof of the famous commercials.
Jess Rotter
Jess at Kemado
Cc: Jess at jess rotter
Dear Jess and or friends:
Hey, can you set me up an interview with Best Coast?
If they cannot respond from Europe, it can wait until July.
Aren’t they local here in Cali?
If not by phone, email is fine.
If not an actual band member, maybe a driver or sound person is fine.
Also, I noticed that you have a design company as well as doing pr for Mexican Summer bands – unless there are multiple Jess Rotters: maybe you can do a design or painting for me, a commission? My company started in 1994 – I am creeping up on 20 year or 18th anniversary – maybe I can put out a poster or something. Or just buy something for myself and write about it for my blog. (5 year anniversary: superchunk concert; 10 year anniversary, in year 14: Steven Bernstein concert; 15 year anniversary: 7 unknown acts workshopping new material; 16, 17, anniversaries: too busy writing a blog to remember to put on a show, plus times are tight).
Or I guess I can put on a show and then hire you to do a poster.
And don’t think of this as a bribe or related to wanting to interview Best Coast.
I know that if you already have New York Times and Drew Barrymore, you don’t really need Plastic Alto (that’s my blog).
My company, btw, and not to confuse you, is Earthwise Productions which started as environmental benefit concerts – your book cover with carrots and all that is similar style. If you don’t have time to do a commission for me, or I cannot afford you, maybe I can just download the cover art from that book and pretend you licensed it to me or my blog for “Earthwise Productions 18th Anniversary – the blog post”
Let me know about any of above.
My questions:
1) How soon until we have a woman rocker in the white house, and who amongst your peers do you nominate – I think you have to be 35 or so, but not to be age-ist but you would probably get more votes if you run before 50 or so?
2) How do you get that guitar tone?
3) What is your favorite pre-concert meal? Is the food good in the UK?
4) What surprises the fans of Best Coast about the distribution of labor among the bandmembers, perhaps along non-traditional gender lines, like are their non-girlish things that female member or members don’t mind doing, in the day to day running of a show or recording session or travel, and vice versa things that the male member or members do surprisingly willingly or well; this is an age old issue, co-ed or co-led bands, going back to, for example, Fleetwood Mac, Superchunk, X, et al?
I made all that up; if there is an actual interview I can prepare better questions.
Have a nice day and thanks.
Mark Weiss
Plastic Alto blog and Earthwise Productions
I did not know Kathi Kamen also known as Kathi Kamen Goldmark, although I recall meeting her at least twice and am pretty sure I have her old business card in my box that stores such. Maybe in the storage space that stores such boxes.
I am pretty sure I met Kathi Kamen at Cody’s in Berkeley, around 1990. I am pretty sure she was the driver or literary escort for Seth Morgan, who was reading “Homeboy”. Seth signed a copy for me, and it included something about the barker, George, at the strip club on Broadway. I lived up the hill, at Montgomery and Vallejo and then told this George that Seth said hi.
I had never heard of literary escorts before.
Then I am pretty sure I met her again at West Coast Live, the day that both Jim Brunberg and David Jacobs Strain were in the show, at The Exploratorium. I had remembered the name, plus had certainly read in the meantime about her famous band — the world’s greatest vanity project — the Rock Bottom Remainders, featuring famous writers like Amy Tan and Stephen King.
She was married to Joe Goldmark, who I am pretty sure I met with Stephen Yerkey when they played The Cub, and who once looked over my portfolio of concert poster samples, at Amoeba. He is a steel guitar player.
I saw Sedge Thomson of WCL recently in Mountain View, and wrote about he and his wife, my classmate Syliva Brownrigg.
I am on my bike today, downtown at Coupa, and as a tribute of sorts to KKG, will sign off here and write direct to Palo Alto Main library, to seek out the May 27 Chronicle and the page one article “above the fold.”
Even if I barely knew Kathi, as a concert promoter, book clerk and radio host she surely had an influence on me.
Actually what got me back to this post is that Rebecca Wallace mentions a kazoo in her article about Palo Alto’s upcoming street music event — I linked to a minute ago, below — and I recall reading last week that Kathi gave Leah Garchik and others a kazoo at some event. As further tribute, I will try to conjure from my pile of somewhat meaningless things — I think it is in the first or second drawer of the desk in my bed room — a kazoo from the ones I passed out at the Pinetop Perkins show, a few years ago. Maybe Pine and Kathi are now in a band together.
I hope it is more good than bad that my humble in the sense of scant recollection of Kathi Kamen Goldmark includes digressions into mentions of Seth Morgan, George (the Barker), Jim Brunberg, David Jacobs Strain, Amy Tan, Stephen King, Joe Goldmark, Stephen Yerkey, Sedge Thomson, Sylvia Brownrigg, Leah Garchik, Rebecca Wallace and Pinetop Perkins.
There is also enduring and endearing this:
edit to add, five minutes later: ok, it turns out that I had also met her a third time when WCL played the JCC about one year ago and got her autograph on my program, and asked her whether her band had played SXSW!!!! Bang, bang and god be with ye! self pasting from that:
Besides Shields, I got autographs (I like the ritual of asking, post-event) of Thomson, Cassie Gay (box office stalwart), Stewart, author Thor Hansen (who drew a feather) and producer Kathi Kamen Goldmark who I had met years earlier when she was a driver or escort for authors and also says she still plays in a rock band mostly covers (she steals material from songwriters rather than bothering to write her own material, which I mean to talk to her about, to suggest they try to write their own stuff) called The Rock Bottom Remainders. I asked if she has played the music festival SXSW and she said no only book festivals. (From “Shields and Yarns”, Weiss, 2011)
edit to add, 90 minutes later:
SEIZE THE SOUP
I am back at my perch, at Palo Alto’s famous Coupa Cafe, with my trusty Remington I mean Trendy 1’s and 0’s machine; a man at the nearby table chews a wheat crepe while talking about “opportunities in Brazil” and I am treating myself to Soup of The Day, of vegetables, well-chopped and salty broth. My order was #42 which I took as an omen, although I forgot to wave a towel last week for author Douglas Adams.
I did log off to search for an eight-day old newspaper, as promised. To myself and my 26 readers(!)*. When I got to my bike, parked in one of our nifty “bike corrals” I noticed I, like the character in a famous Ray Bradbury story, had missed a rare June rain. I left trusty post-Remington with Phyllis, of the famous Phyllis Store, who asked about my dear old mum.
When I got to Palo Alto Main, after first verifying that Palo Alto Downtown was taking the day off (“no shit” said homelessish guy camped hopefullyishly in its alcove, as I said “Gee, library closed.”), I waited with what became about four others until noon opening bell. I read my Shields — chapter “Q: autobio” from “Reality Hunger”– who I met at West Coast Live Co-Produced by Kathi Kamen Goldmark; Shields in this chapter explains that when I write of Kamen I write of Mark Weiss — “no shit”. I could not stop myself, during the 30 minute rain delay between arrival and Opens, to chat up a 16-year-old with a very heavy looking Crimson colored book-sack. I pedantically explained “ve ri tas” — as I saw it at least; she wore a Harvard sweatshirt, as did the bear dangling from the backpack. I gave a bad account of the statue of “three lies” — one, the date should say 1637 but doesn’t; two, that’s not actually John Harvard, three, beats me, give me a minute, give me a year.
Anyhoo the actual mission took about five minutes, while I fantasized about arguing copyright with an imagined-overly-zealous SEIU regular.
The obit was not actually above the fold, but there was a teaser above the mast! Or, as David Shields might say, it was above the fold in a lyrical poetic way.
I noticed a discrepancy between the actual head and what is listed online as the head; she is better known as Kathi Kamen as I have it or Kathi Kamen Goldmark, than Kathi Goldmark.
I quickly if gratuitously sussed “photo by Robert Foothorap” who appears to have been here since 1969 and shoots authors.
On the way back into Coupa I said hello to Linda who I had met a couple times at St. Michael’s Alley; I recalled to myself at least that I have in one of my notebooks a draft of a potential “oral communications” for City of Palo Alto Council meeting from last fall-never delivered, or previously published, noting the passings of Vernon Gates, Philip Kirkeby and Hannah Scher, all of whom were contributors to the cultural scene here, and are missed. Maybe I could rewrite same and amend to “Vernon Gates, Philip Kirkeby, Hannah Scher AND Kathi Kamen Goldmark” albeit a slight “stretcher” geographic-wise, as Mark Twain might have said, he whose obituary was “greatly exaggerated” or so them say.
*Another stretcher, asterisk as I asm, is my “26 readers.” That’s all day, since midnight, all 421 posts. Only 4 or so so far have read “Karen Kamen transition” per se, I admit.
I’m here all week. Try the soup.
Ms. Kamen shared a birthday with my nephew Aaron Thomas Lipinski.
The WCL site says the May 26, 2012 show featured a tribute to her.
Kathi Kamen Goldmark, literary impressario, co-producer, musician, wife, ex-wife and mom, died last month in San Francisco, according to the Sunday Chronicle
Among the other potential edits, the wheat-crepe guy should say “with his mouth open, while chewing”; he is chewing his lunch and blabbing on about “opportunities in Brazil” with his mouth open, or was. Talking with his mouth open. I mean, talking while chewing. As I turned my head to see if they are still there, I realize he has switched seats and now is less than 12 inches from me. I guess I was checking to see if the plate that once held the crepe was still there, fact-checking or reality-checking or reality-hungering for the plate if it holds a clue, to the rest of the story. Also, “write” for “ride” or vice versa. I rode to library not merely wrote myself there. Et cetera. The words, the songs, they remain, remain the same, even as we players and singers and tap tap tap on the keyboarders may strut and split. Adieu.
From V. Vale’s newsletter is info I am lifting about Shig Murao, the clerk from City Lights who was arrested for selling “Howl” in 1957. Bell’s Books in Palo Alto is also a clearing-house for Shig’s legacy. Sunday in SF, yesterday, all my troubles were so far away, I was at Stanford Theatre watching O’Henry adaptation by Howard Hawks and sleeping through John Wayne “Red River” — I was rooting for the dudes with the feathers — but in SF they were feting Ginsberg’s 86th.
V on Shig:
FREE. Sun June 3, 7pm, Beat Museum, 540 Broadway/near Columbus, S.F.
Shig Murao Anniversary + Allen Ginsberg’s 86th Birthday – Soon after Lawrence Ferlinghetti and Peter Martin opened the City Lights Pocket Book Shop in 1953, they hired Shigeyoshi “Shig” Murao as their first clerk. Shig was young and charismatic, with an infectious geniality that became as integral a part of the bookstore’s culture as the paperbound volumes on its shelves.
Shig Murao was born in Seattle in 1926. In 1942, after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, he and his family were sent to a Japanese internment camp in Idaho. Afterward, he joined the Military Intelligence Service, and worked as a translator in postwar Japan.
Shig Murao hired your editor V. Vale at City Lights; City Lights was the address for SEARCH & DESTROY Magazine; RE/Search was the REvised Editorial Project of V. Vale, who writes this newsletter!
Although Shig was not himself a poet, he became a fixture in the North Beach Beat scene. He could frequently be found at the Caffe Trieste surrounded by his many friends, who included Allen Ginsberg, Michael McClure, Bob Kaufman, Philip Lamantia, Richard Brautigan, Gary Snyder. Ginsberg would often stay at Shig’s apartment on Grant Ave. when visiting San Francisco. Shig collected poems, collages, flyers, photos, and various other material from his Beat colleagues, and sporadically published the material in an eclectic zine called Shig’s Review. He would make about 20-30 copies of each at the nearest photocopy shop, then walk over to the Trieste and distribute them amongst his friends. He published about 80 [?] editions of his Review.
On June 3, 1957 (coincidentally Ginsberg’s birthday), Shig was arrested for selling an ‘obscene’ book to an undercover police officer. The book was HOWL and Other Poems by Allen Ginsberg, and according to Captain Hanrahan of the SFPD, was only the first in a long list of books the department had deemed objectionable.Ferlinghetti was arrested for having published the book shortly thereafter, and the trial that ensued was among the defining battles of the free speech movement.
Please join us at the Beat Museum as we celebrate the legacy of Shig Murao, “the enigmatic soul of City Lights and the San Francisco Beat scene” on the day of his infamous arrest, and Allen Ginsberg’s birthday.
Hosted by Richard Reynolds, who worked at Mother Jones magazine for thirty-two years, mainly in the role of communications director, and retired in 2010. In addition to his work at the magazine, he is a professional French horn player and has written numerous articles on music, food, and coffee. His writing has been published in The New York Times, The San Francisco Chronicle, Gourmet, Saveur, Salon.com, Gastronomica, Imbibe, Fresh Cup, and other publications. He and Shig met in 1976 and remained friends until Shig’s death in 1999. Reynolds created and operates ShigMurao.com
Also, I saw V. Vale at the Bruce Conner Mabuhay show at Paule Anglim and shot a photo of him on a disposable camera, then ran five blocks to get it developed, then came back and gave him the print, recently.
Earthwise Productions 18th Anniversary show and Plastic Alto blog present I.C.O.B.O.P.A, the International Congress of Buskers of Palo Alto, “eye see oh be oh pea, hey!”, Wednesday, June 20, 2012 in Palo Alto, California. Street musicians from all over will converge and play music between 5 and 10 p.m. on University Avenue, Lytton Plaza, Cogswell Plaza, Johnson Park and Martin Luther King Plaza / City Hall / Clear Story. For more info, see “Plastic Alto” the blog or call Mark at (650) 305 – 0701.
Plastic Alto with Mark Weiss 