Pizza-Shell Game (or What Up, Dough?)

SID

3/24/2014

At the time of this writing…

Last night I watched a DVR'd replay of Aloe Blacc on the American version of NBC's hit The Voice. Aloe Blacc was serving as an assistant coach for "head-coach" Usher. As fate would have it, the song that the battling contestants were to sing for that night’s episode's head-to-head competition just so happened to be Blacc's "I'm the Man". What are the odds? More on this later. Providing a story of encouragement on the face of high criticism, Aloe discussed how he came about writing the hit song. He said that after Dr. Dre had slammed his songs, he  "…went home and wrote 'I'm the Man.'"—SSKIRRRRRRCHHHH!!!!! [cue tire screech]. WROTE?!? "…I'm the Man"?

For months I have heard this song playing as bumper music on one of my favorite television sports shows…ESPN's First Take as it was going to commercial. For those who're not familiar with the phrase bumper music, it's the 10 to 20 sec bit of music that's used to transition into and out of the commercials. As such, I would hear just the chorus of the song in question. For those who haven't heard it, the song sounds exactly like Elton John and Bernie Taupin's (ironically titled) "Your Song"

"Lettuce Produce" or "Producer or Reducer?"

Introducing SIDney Howard the opinionated. Last millennium, in the late part of the last decade of the last century, my nearly lifelong friends and collaborators (Mark Drummond and Aljay Boyd) launched an unfortunately now defunct full-interest music website: streetjamz.com. The invited me to pen an editorial corner. The following is the one that started the ...and SID Sez column that became the eaSS blog. Indulge and enjoy.  

To Halve Undo Whole 'Til Deaf Do Us Part

 …and SID Sez 120413

I usually fall asleep listening to talk radio. After one particularly great sleep, I remained in bed and watched Michael Jackson's "Ghost" video. While I wouldn't call it a disappointment, it wasn't as good as I would have hoped to see coming from the brain-trust of MJJ, Stephen King, and the great Stan Winston. Maybe (not just maybe) it was too long.

Checking my email I saw one of my favorite notices. From Amazon: $5 albums. Nowadays, $5 per platter is an incredible music buy. When I was a teenager buying vinyl, that was in the neighborhood of the going price of nice. …back when a dollar sort of was real money-like. Today, that's half the price of a new MP3. Today that's what I buy more readily than do I consume hardcopies. And why is that so? Convenience: the ultimate impulse buy. I purchased Raul Midon's first album from iTunes immediately after watching him perform on Late Night with David Letterman. A year or so before, when I heard of Chaka Khan's Classikhan album of classic song covers, I visited at least two stores to finally find it and purchase it at the price of $15.99 + 6% MI sales tax + the price of fuel and the wear and tear of aggravation.

Nowadays, the allure of vinyl sound and its comparatively bigger than life package presentation has recaptured the collectors' hearts. …at steep prices. … comparatively. Thinking about the state of music consumption today, I can make a three-way division of end uses.

B-Sides That, What Is There Left to Say?

January 6th, 2013

Welcome to 2013. Half a century ago, a relatively successful record industry was about to explode with the combined 1-2 punch of the Motown phenomenon and the British Invasion, led by the Beatles—forces often imitated but never ever to be replicated. Ten years prior, the one-off singles market filled jukeboxes

with one-hit wonders. "-tions" and "the" doo-wopper's were all satisfied to just hear their songs on the radio. If any singer songwriter was called an "artist', the hyphenated modifier "starving-" probably preceded it.

To put things in their truest light, the early Motown and British Invader acts followed the same formula. But along the way, the successes of the Beatles (and other Brit art school dropouts, starting with Beatle-to-be John Lennon to members of Pink Floyd to Freddie Mercury to "the other Davy Jones"—a.k.a. David Bowie to etc.) became creative license for high art creative experiments that created cults of album devotees and the FM deep cut professor dee-jays high priest. Meanwhile still bound to the proven business model, singles ruled. Most consumers bought their records to serve as sonic semi-subtle background entertainment. This led to the growth in sales of the so-named "LP's". Dance party people still preferred to spin just the hits, so the singles were still flying off shelves.

J.A.M. Episode 1

Oh (313) '13. On March 13th, 2013, Language Universal Recording Society, LLC proudly released the very first SIDney Howard solo album, Jr. Analogue Monster, as a digital download. Now available is its accompanying PDF booklet containing the song lyrics, dedications, and credits. The CD will be available soon for distribution next month.

That Would Never Even Get Made in This Day and Age

I was watching Robert Rossen's 1961 classic film "The Hustler" on our PBS HDTV affiliate on the night of July 13th, 2012—the night that I began this writing. It was the feature film on Elliot Wilholm's classic movie. He lauded with great praise the writer/director Rossen, Paul Newman and cast, set designers and everyone but the accounting firm and limo drivers. And then he said this one thing, which is as egregious to me as is it seemingly a bitterly sad statement on our current reality: "A film like this would never get made today. Executives would never green-light its dark and…" And that's when everything "went all black". When I awoke figuratively, I was literally writing the following:

When a great work of times gone by is lauded in apotheosis with the phrase 'It would never get made today', is it an indictment of present culture, or resignation to bow to trends? The obvious follow up would have to be "Why not?" Those of you who’ve read me or have spoken to me have probably heard me make this complaint: in this day and age, where technologically we have to tools at hand to create the greatest artistic works ever, why does mediocrity (and or mediocrity mistaken for minimalism) excel commercially and so often in the arena of critical acclaim? Roseanne Roseannadanna might respond, "Mr. SIDney Howard, you ask a lot of stupid questions."

Sorry Seems To Be the Hardest Word

Has our cordial approach of "soft" critiquing help lead to the degradation of music? The Bernie Taupin lyric starts:

What have I got to do to make you love me?

What have I got to do to make you care?

Then a little later it reads…

What do I say when it's all over?

And sorry seems to be the hardest word?

While the overall narrative along with the singer setting suggests that it is indeed a "love" song of sorts, the words paint a vivid and accurate picture of the awkward place many of us find ourselves when asked our opinion of a far less talented colleague's music offering. Here's my most common scenario:

I play a piece that I've finished and of which I am most proud for someone who has a love for music—like mine. The song finishes and a grin reflects their awe and full appreciation of my artistic accomplishment—like mine, again. Then comes the dreaded response. "Hey. I have something of mine I'd like to let you hear." I play it, hoping for the best. It's nowhere close to the best. Now comes the dreaded question: "Well? What do you think?" What do you say. Fortunately, they haven't asked for my 'honest opinion'—"Oh…and give me your honest opinion." I jinxed it. Again, what do you do? When was the last time you told a friend, family member, or acquaintance that their music, presented to you for your (maybe not) honest opinion, was honestly just mediocre at best? Perhaps the music profession needs one of those common "…professional. Please do not attempt" disclaimer captions. I even saw one used in a Vitamin Water commercial, at the point where a dancer was doing "the worm" Hip Hop dance move.

Ana Digs It

"Ana Digs It", if memory serves, was the pun-ny name given to an analog-to-digital device released sometime in the late 80’s or early 90’s. Nowadays, it would seem that everyone digs Ana–if you know what I mean. On second thought, perhaps you don't.


What is it that captures the imagination so—when the topic of digital vs. analog comes up in techie to quasi techie conversations? Is it just imagined, the hind-sighted 20/20 aural visions of a better sound?


Some will tell you that analog is warmer, while–they say–digital is bright and harsh. I can tell you, I have heard too bright and very harsh analog. When Rufus Harris and I (google him) worked together at Motown songwriter Sylvia Moy's (google her. hint: "My Cherie Amor") Masterpiece Studios in Detroit, there was a certain engineer in training there who would record and mix at deafening levels. As the session wore on, the engineer's perception of highs waned and the situation was "remedied" by this person raising the highs to subsidize the dullness. Rufus told me how he walked in mid-morning to take over the room for his upcoming session. "Captain Ultrabrite" was just finishing, and asked Rufus his opinion of the mix. I don't remember him telling me how he answered, but I do remember him telling me how overbearingly bright and unpleasant it sounded.

Just Get The Job Done

"Just get the job done." The sentiment is one that one might express in frustration toward a hire who's presented his still uncompleted work as “done”, with nothing but rationalizations and excuses for the unsatisfactory job. The former has been my shared opinion of the state of music today. I have picked on Smooth Jazz and Hip Hop as the culprits. But maybe…just maybe the Digital Audio Workstation is more culpable.

If a child pulls a pot-handle suspended above the edge of a hot stove, or shows up at school with his father’s pistol, we eventually place the blame on the guardians. Such dangerous items should be kept out of the reach of children. Humorist Dick Gregory once said that the way we judge crime is based on money: If an old woman is killed and all the home invaders get from her is a dollar and change, it will be said, "That's a shame; they killed that old woman over a buck-fifty.” If the same woman is keeping her life savings in her mattress, and the crooks haul in twenty-thousand dollars cash, people will say, "It's all her fault; she didn't have no business keeping that much money in her house anyway."  So why don't we blame the manufacturers? …for the same reason you don't sue Chevy for damages from a drunk driver's accident: the consequences were unforeseeable.

When David Smith and his cohorts developed the MIDI protocol, they couldn't have imagined that would mark the beginning of the end for commercial studios.

How's Your Shadow Puppetry These Days?

One famous Sunday evening, gathered around our television sets, many in my "Boomer" generation were convinced that we’d had revealed to us our mission in life. When Ed Sullivan famously announced, "And now…here they are…" and four mop-headed Liverpool lads waved their fretted wands about and casted their spells on us, the music stores next day were selling guitars like snow shovels after broadcasted blizzard warnings. As we passed the showroom window of a Denver music store, I remember my parents asking me what instrument I would like to play. I answered, "Drums." to which mother remarked, "That's not an instrument." No offense to drummers; I'm quite sure she intended that as drums are not typically melodic instruments, especially as she'd heard them played through the cacophony of screaming teen girls on Ed Sullivan.

I remember that before we were treated to the headlining Beatles, we had to endure spinning plates to the tune of Khachaturian's "Saber Dance". The farther we traverse away from that time period, the more it seems incredible that plate-spinners, musical spoon-players, Señor Wences, and the like could actually get booked on the same venue along with great fab four. Then one wonders if the Beatles were viewed as just entertainers by booking agents: Rock Band/Plate-spinners…six for half-a-dozen.

Hunger Games - *B.A.N.A.S.

On the unofficial anti-holiday known as Tax Day, my wife and I anti-celebrated by taking in the 2012 blockbuster film "Hunger games"—along with one of my oldest friends and music associates (and his wife). At that time, HG was about to reach its fourth consecutive weekend at number one. At a time pre-dating current super widespread international and domestic piracy threats, four weeks would equal maybe ten weeks. Just a little less recently to our movie date, I was quasi reticent to even spend the money on that particular movie because of the subject matter—namely the ostensibly hackneyed premise where humans are being hunted by privileged humans for the sport enjoyed by a ruling sect. There is a popular expression: "I've seen that movie". Based on its trailer, I felt this way about the much ballyhooed "HG". The first of this story of the genre I can remember is "The Most Dangerous Game", bonus-beloved by me for (my interpreting) its use of "Game" as double entendre. Much later last century, along came Da pre-governating Tohminator, along with Hogan's Heroic Feud-meister (the late Richard Dawson); they begat "Running Man"—that incidentally begat an annoying dance move that shows up at times on Saturday Night Live when former Nicklodian'ian Keenan Thompson asks the musical question, "Whazzup with That". This rendition was great. Contrary to my misgivings and to my pleasant surprise, what I saw instead was a new work that did use an overused premise but created something new. Therein is today's object lesson brought to us by Tinseltown.

Record/Water Sales

2011 was a record-breaking year for water sold in the States. With 9.1 billion gallons of bottled water sold, bottled water sales broke the previous 2007 record of 8.8 billion gallons sold in the U.S. of A.

[Source: Blue Living Ideas]

When I was in my teens, there are two things in particular that were facts of that time in life that now are no longer so: few people bought their water in bottles and most people bought their music in packages. Today, the reverse is true. Music flows over the Internet as free and freely as once did water. A fact of commerce is that “If you want something good, you have to pay for it"…otherwise you're stealing. It's not only the product or service, but it is the non-replenishable time given to provide tools, materials, and creativity to provide the former.

GIFTED

And the award goes to…

…GOD!

Accepting for God is…

Since our recent release of "The Mμne-Pi Parables"—our latest SIDzCarbonatedMilk project, we have received many accolades, critical acclaim, and much high praise for the music, lyrics, and performances contained and showcased within. As producer, performer, and composer/arranger of "TM-PP", much praise has been lauded me. I immediately share the credit with the rest of the cast—as indeed I must. Although any waning sense of honesty and fairness would impel me to extol them so, I also really believe it serves to encourage us all—especially considering our being an indie operation that is blessedly free of the artificial Baby, you're beautiful hype machines that seed and feed to cultivate cold stars. [As such, just monetary reflections in sales commensurate with said praises and acknowledgements have not just yet been as immediate.] Addressing my own laudatory launches, the reactions from my "band-mates" tend mostly to be humble deflective shuns of my praise toward them and immediate reciprocal projections of said praise. They will ah-shucks the delivery of commendations and express their appreciation for my making them a part of what they will tell me "…is an excellent project." I know them; I know that their reactions do not at all fall under the classification of false modesty. It's just a matter of their being well balanced between manners and candor in a society that frowns upon even the faintest whiff of arrogance.

The Mµne-Pi Morality Manifesto

Morality µ (= resistance) Nimbly Engaging Pure-hearted Intellectualism


We’re through the looking glass, people.
     But is it because a predatory secular society has re-trained brains to perceive mirror-wise through skewed views?  As I groom, primp, perfect, and prepare in my bathroom mirror, I am guided by the image of my movements therein reflected.  I have seen myself operating reverse in it for so long that interpreting my inverse movements has become more natural than ever is my negotiating from the vantage of two mirrors that show true directions in real time.  Similarly, secular humanism’s reversing effect on moral truth has yielded a bumptious bumper crop of meandering minds guided by moral compasses that always point…wherever.

My Brain is a Fat Man!

...full of things, needs the fat bran.

[from the Men in Martian Ice CD*]

"What it is?", we used to say, back in the day when we'd wear our hair that way...long and limp...crowned with flowers, 'fro-on-the-go with the pick up and sticking out a defiant Black power salute to the lifting of spirits, lifting up hair, looking like lions' manes...muh main mans--lifting and lifted the spirit of racial pride.

Like pride, the family of lions, lies ongoing promoting dogma which ignores the dynamics of perceived reality (as opposed to the static nature of eternal truth).

Born in that time, was the notion that if we all just hung out together painting happy pictures on canvases of cloth and/or nubile immodest bodies...if artists ruled the government...the world would be at peace. ...forgetting that only a few decades before, that experiment was tried by a little artists' collective called the THIRD REICH fronted by evil A. Hitler...lethal to their captive audiences.