Plastic Alto with Mark Weiss

as the only person on the planet who saw the negro problem on haight street and 17 years later saw jc brooks at bottom of the hill — the way my pops may be the only guy who heard gabby hartnett hit a World Serious homer and then saw buster posey do likewise on tv, 81 years later — i feel justified                     in pasting verbatim the venerable robert christgau on passing strange. also, i once picked a book randomly out of the library of the hanover inn and opened it randomly to christgau’s yearbook photo. qualified.

to wit (if not too witty):
Always impressed and never bowled over by the auteur’s albums, I only caught his musical after this original cast recording hit me

christgau ripped from times book reviews re lethem

like no Stew or Negro Problem CD ever had. Two clues emerge in the guitared-up “Prologue”: first “If you’re ever not sure what I’m all about/Just ask the song,” then “Since it’s my job I’ma set the scene.” Music as surrogate self, music as daily occupation–if Stew never shone as brightly as he had to on his own records, his craftsman’s approach to his lifework was why. But these limitations feed into this amusing, moving, sophisticated, less than profound Broadway show about racial identity and art for art’s sake. Stew the narrator expresses himself more subtly and forcefully than he ever did as mere persona–the distance frees him up. Similarly, two songs that satirize themselves, the Afro-hardcore “Sole Brother” and the Euro-anarchist “What’s Inside Is Just a Lie,” pack straightforward power. But in the end, there’s only one standard: “Keys,” a celebration of the occasional kindnesses of the bohemia where this 47-year-old African-American has spent his adult life. A-
i give the review a b+ for its manics

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what i was doing is giving a little self-guided self-tour via youtube to a young friend from another planet — no, not Greg Perloff’s intern, but someone you knew my fifth grade girlffriend’s second husband as her teacher at the summit — and went from cee lo to jc brooks to stew and then like pulling a rarebit out of my heart jc brooks “just ask the song” but I had never actually seen otis redding, in real life (?) or tv as far as I recall — my young friend knew this rif from jay z and kanye and chris brown but here is the origi; which also reminds of the bit in the bill graham oral hist about schlepping ice for otis — i think of it whenever i go the extra mile for some rider item or just ask like i have:

and then this only connects in plastic alto but watching “the artist” I was recalling my first time at anthology film archive and a stanley brakhage program and feeling uncomfortable at the silence; only i could not recall his name. now i wonder how alden van buskirk, robert christgau and stan brakhage did or did not overlap in hanover; van was part of a John Cage appreciation at Dartmouth, if that is a clue. which reminds that at crown point press I opened a Cage book to a page called “Seven Day Diary” which I bought because there was a band I knew and presented (and did a workshop at JLS, I am fairly certain with) of that nomber).

I also caught up briefly with Dartmouth Aires graduate Austin Willacy — we were invited graciously to be his guests at House Jacks at Freight Saturday but had already committed to Beth Custer

beth custer

with Fred Frith house concert; the concert was within walking distance to Tikva records where we caught part of Dengue Fever’s set — there are two yids brothers Ethan and Zac Holtzman in that band, one of whom married like David Katznelson a Lowell grad, so that is Jewish enough for Tikva. The Rock Paper Scissor Vietnamese chicken sandwich I could not resist somehow fit the bill perfectly; plus, as a bonus, jew music lawyer Barry Simons tipped us or hipped us to the Royal Koo across the street and we walked in a set by Chris Siebert Jules Broussard Duo — Siebert being the musical partner of the sister of the owner, that would be Lavay Smith and I think she said her name was Kathy Miller.

Beth and Fred did an amazing 60 minute improvisation. At times his guitar, which he hit with a variety of bows and mallets sounded like woodwinds. She banged a few sticks together but otherwise just traveled in five or six dimensions of circular breathing, with two or three reed instruments, and what I think was an ocarina. We found a shorter cut back to Mission from Precita or Bernal Heights with the help of a guide who makes tweeds for the biker set; spokebikes or something.

The Christgau thing is like during my term with Stew the TONY (which in those days was Time Out New York and not an award nomination or seven of them) said something like our staff is divided half like him and half detest his “fey” posings. Although of course the Voice in the same era said dude is funnier than Jimmy Webb and sings better than Richard Prior. They also somewhere in there referred to him as “linebacker sized” or something which is remarkable in that Stew is only about 5′ 8″ at most. He was smaller than most of his peers, especially growing up. I asked him once — we were backstage in the green rooms during the famous John Mayer – Counting Crows – Stew tour — maybe it was the same night that John Mayer finally came by to introduce himself — and then changed our cynicism to support because he was a charmer — I asked if, like the Voice suggested — did he ever play up his blackness or purported toughness to bluff someone out of a physical altercation — he said no way.