The Bottom Half of a Music Ethnography Paper I Just Wrote

Yes its been forever, and I have no one but myself to blame....well Fall Semester, but Fall and I are one, so I guess myself after all. The top half of this papers is not shown, it's just all the formal bullshit of seeing Deerhunter the night of the election, but here is where I take off into the sappy poetic world of encountering U Street after the show. I can truly say that this is what living in and around DC has meant to me, for the first time there was actually a tangible sensation to experience:

Emerging from the venue to hit U Street only validated this cyclone of emotions that the show had played upon. Seeing people dancing on the streets, leaning out of balconies, singing, blasting music from cars and from windows was a powerful reminder of what happiness was capable of. I saw the grand crowd of a much larger concert that had been waiting to take place in U Street as long as the urban black experience had been living there. The streets were teeming with people from every walk of life, people collected on the corner of U and 14^th chanting out the victory that resided in everyone who could imagine what this victory meant for their nation. My friend and I ran towards the crowd, lifted our heads to the cool night sky and shared in the shouting that we knew was within us. It was at this moment that I contemplated what a concert meant, in my mind there was no distinction from the time the Deerhunter show ended to the time I found myself lost in the masses of people, people banging on drums, clapping hands, and jumping as high as their joy could take them.

What I began to comprehend was that there should be no formal limitations imposed upon the concert as a mode of cultural exploration of joy and change. That instead it was all around us, it was in the history of this city, and it was in every music venue, every black owned business, every person whose smile on that evening showed who they were in a historical moment in time, and every note that had ever hung on the ears of those who were willing to listen to the music of ongoing time. I have never felt as unified in the political process, because that night it was more than the politics, it was life in music, sound and voice, that came to the forefront; that came to the stage and played for America.

In driving rain, people fill the U Street corridor in an impromptu celebration spanning several blocks, at the news that Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., is now president elect of the United States, on election night in Washington

The Hunt for Sturm und Drang

Richard: Now is the winter of our discontent
Made glorious summer by this son of York;
And all the clouds that low'r'd upon our house
In the deep bosom of the ocean buried.

Richard The Third Act 1, scene 1, 1-4

So opens the lines to one of Shakespeare's most compelling works, which ironically tends to lend itself to iconic expressions of disdain, when really the lines indicate the vile leads satisfaction with his life. First tetralogy (the Henry VI plays) geeks might feel Richard's actions in the former plays, including the heinous murder of Henry, give this the distinct tone of corruption. Richard's contentedness reflects his darker desires that will literally manifest themselves in the next few minutes of this soliloquy-in short he concludes it's high time he killed his brother-the king. The juxtaposition of winter rapidly transforming into summer is an almost unnatural dichotomy through its instantaneousness, skipping over spring as though it weren't necessary, only reiterating Richard's caricature-like status that can only comprehend absolutes of pleasure and malice. The final image of the skies, a fixture as a beacon of hope and perseverance perhaps even sanity in the symbolic order, becoming devoured by the ocean and being confined to an underground world as though clouds of sorrow could die emphasizes the unnerving sway of villainy Richard's language and metaphors possess.

Richard doing hand exercises, part of a daily "pre-stabbing for power" workout.

I revisit this quintessential opening in order to delve into my recent understanding of a concept known as Sturm und Drang a German phrase which translates to "Storm and Stress" and is defined by the omnipresent wikipedia as: "a movement in German literature and music taking place from the late 1760s through the early 1780s in which individual subjectivity and, in particular, extremes of emotion were given free expression in response to the confines of rationalism imposed by the Enlightenment and associated aesthetic movements."(Had to change the color, it was being difficult with me). I discovered the term after reading Brecht's first play Baal, and just to cut through the overgrowth of that wiki's verbose and ambiguous definition, the basic concept that intrigues me is that of individual subjectivity that allows you to have an anti-hero to an unparalleled extent, literally a despicable figure in order to subvert the repressive norms that leave this world far too constricting. Of course Richard the Third wasn't really known for his forays into mid 18th century German literature, nonetheless I find him to be an intriguing predecessor to the movement. While Richard is not an unfiltered representation of a monster whose life is dictated by desire and consumption, since he operates within a moral Shakespearean world which will resolve the play with justice in his fruitless attempts to find a horse as his kingdom collapses (he says it better no?), he still provides a rosy framework for protagonist's that upset conceptions of what a lead is capable of in an ethical sense as well as generally providing the overtone for what the artistic community at large expects. In Brecht's Baal we find a tortured artist Baal whose despicable impulses such as unemotional and ravenous sexuality as well as selfishness, gluttony, and hatred of those around him to the point of ruining the lives of others creates a sensation of a character beyond forgiveness. Yet Baal's poetry keeps people clamoring for his company despite his abominable behavior.

An audience that is limited to the sole experiences of someone they would rather condemn creates an interesting and vital tension in the art community. The audience begins to indulge themselves with the reckless immorality of the play, as it dominates the structure, they will find they are sympathizing and perhaps even rooting for the character that only becomes more and more grotesque as the play goes on. In Richard the Third it is perhaps Richard's asides to the audience that instills in people a feeling of complicity, that they have become confidantes in Richard's conquering schemes. In Baal it might be the sheer audacity of the lead character in complete contrast to his fawning public that makes the audience prefer to identify with the one in power. Either way the Sturm und Drang is not fully realized until it crashes down upon the audience's head in a finale that emphasizes how far we're all able to fall, how capable we are of villainy, be it minute or possessing the gravity of say Richard murdering children. These conclusions tend to revolve around the untimely death of the heinous protagonist (on a side note isn't it interesting that so many of these works rely on the title of the main character for the title of the play, as though their irrepressible ego has truly won out via glory). This genre employs a shock campaign that is channeled through a character in order to threaten the social order that has provided the disturbingly fertile ground for a beast such as themselves to come into existence. I believe that in these days of late capitalism (pretension much?) there is something vital about the intentions of Sturm und Drang, whether we care to dwell on it or not we live in times with an abundance of monsters and savage behavior, perhaps to the point where our modern protagonist may have to be redefined-for example our monsters might be the absolutely apathetic, the indifferent masses who shelter themselves from the terrors of reality by insulating themselves, literally erecting a barricade of emotion and intimacy in order to avoid the ever accumulating woes of the world at large. I am eager to find examples of a Sturm und Drang renaissance of sorts that can yield to a better understanding of why monstrosity should resonate with us, why it is an imperative force in our lives and why it must remain so, why it must be addressed as diligently as the constant desires for tangible love and contentedness that seem to exists in everyone. I want to see David Mamet's play and film adaptation Edmond about a man's journey through a hellish New York in which he finds a bizarre vein of redemption akin to the genre I'm on the search for. I'll keep updates on the pursuit for the disastrous! Now doesn't that sound like a warm and gooey batch of cookies seated next to a chilly glass of milk?

GlobaLapses

Last night I had a dream that I was in Japan with old friends desperately searching for a Canadian restaurant. I was wearing my filthy work clothes indicating that I was an employed Japanese citizen, as were my old friends, and there was something satisfyingly itinerant about mustering up the strength to actively seek out the finest Canadian bacon Tokyo could offer. It only seems fitting then that first thing this morning I should discover an article in the nytimes about a video entitled "Dancing" in which a man dances in various locations around the world, literally transporting from location to location while retaining the same goofball poise of sloppy dancing. The video is here http://youtube.com/watch?v=zlfKdbWwruY and the article is here http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/08/arts/television/08dancer.html?_r=1&ref=arts&oref=slogin The ephemeral sensation of slipping into unknown worlds was sort of offset by the familiarity of a white guy dancing terribly, a faux pas most Americans have either confined themselves to on the dance floor or at the very least have painfully witnessed more than once. While that last sentence may be rife with a postcolonial headache I found something vital in the video in terms of establishing a unified theme in spite of the diverse properties tied to each location, albeit the simple connection of moving your feet in time. The moment in the video in which people swarm the formerly one man act in multiple locations like a battlefield collision is an abrasive and important reminder that the video operates in a context beyond "Tourist-who-makes-me-wish-I-traveled-more" (PS-great battlefield collision in awesome music video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t0LIBCw8syA now just stomach that it's children) and instead becomes part of a world in which dancing silently communicates a latent potential we all have for expression.
Anyhow, I found myself in a place of fond reflection in which I summoned up other ambitious forays into expansiveness via online videos, a specificity if I've ever heard one but nonetheless they do exist. Two of them strike me as worth noting. The first is a video by that there Michael Gondy who seems to keep on weasling into my mind these days whether I know it or not, the video is a condensed journey of a car traveling from LA to NYC http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3A-unBigvoY -again there is the potential for this type of expression to be reduced to a trite attempt at sweeping imagery but I find something raw and uniquely Americana (dare I say it!) about the power of the road journey. America's landscape is traversed by serpentine roads and the borders between nature, city, and suburb are determined by the preferred method of travel-pavement and a 4 seater, the thin lines on a map indicating our routes and highways emphasize America's entrenchment in physical division as well as the potency of all its various locales.
The final video I would like to summon for the day is a collage of pictures a woman took of herself every day for 3 years http://www.videosift.com/video/3-year-long-time-lapse-video-of-one-asian-womans-face I enjoy this video thoroughly for the balance that exists within it. The constancy of the woman's stoic expression is offset by the unrestrained aspects of time that give the video its true angle, the chaos of her hair to the point where it seems as though it were twitching, the tone of her lips as they rapidly shift through a veritable rainbow of light tones, and even her complexion which demonstrates the shifts of time through the occasional roughness of her face. These ever so slight glimpses into expression leave me with an understanding of how dramatic the seemingly nonexistent mutations of time actually are. There are moments in the woman's expression that register with me on an almost imperceptible level, at once I am drawn to create a narrative of her day from the wisp of a face that struck me. What was her mood? What was she going through at the time? Of course the beauty lies in the speed of it all, the sensation of unobtainable knowledge coupled with the grace of her constant and rapid change allows my mind to wander into a nearly meditative space in which my concerns are usurped by the impact of the video, and suddenly it's all vanished.
I think these projects share an aspect of heterogeneousness that reflects the space they occupy within the online realm. The internet offers a multitude of voices that combine and negotiate their desire to exist there, it's a subtle reminder that the freedom of the internet should spur us on to become agents within it. As the online project becomes more and more nuanced, more fully interactive, I feel it's possible for people to lose their grasp on their own ability to create within that space-residing in the internet should not be limited to solely subscribing to the tedium of checking facebook/email/newspaper, instead there is now more than ever a need for people to willingly express themselves in whatever avenue they feel aligned with and to make it public. After all these videos ultimately revolve around the possibilities inherent to public expression, what you can offer for other people can allow them to revel in the constancy of creation and perhaps eventually lend itself to nurturing the audiences' own desires to become players themselves.

(Painting Dance With Your Jailor by Allen Schmertzler)

Pecunatations

I'd like to christen this blog with a maxim, something like: "Feed a man a fish..." in which I bestow upon you unparalleled and well aged wisdom, but I can't seem to commit to anything and when you are looking to initiate something I figure you best not trip over yourself right out the gate declaring yourself "espouser of concepts and all around dialogue wonderchild". I'll try to never forget that the only reason things like this exist are to give people the monologues they feel they deserve, bearing that in mind lets all strive to keep this less conceited. My mission is simple: fill us with the oddities, encounters, musings, and impulses that pass through my day like a subtle wind I'd rather notice for a second. The thing is if I trace down those expressions, if I pen down everything that occurs and incurs damage upon me than I might just be a bit merrier, not just in the "Christmas merry-time jamboree" but a general state of candid merriment with which I can at least attempt negate the hectic world we all reside in. That being said here is the first of many iotas...

I recently encountered the word pecuniary, that all so fancy man Theodor Adorno elected to use it in his work Minima Moralia: Reflections on a Damaged Life. So like any good bibliophile I had my trusty dictionary ready to begin my reeducation. Pecuniary is an adjective defined as "of or pertaining to money or a money penalty; dealing with finance" the root for the word is pecunia a Latin word meaning money which comes form the word pecus meaning cattle. This entertained me to no end as it really shows the etymological pleasure laced into the verbal world around us, money is interchangeable with a tangible possession, in this case a living animal-livestock. This effectively represents the quality of exchange those unbearable Marxist writers seem to keep themselves so entertained with, cattle extend beyond themselves to provide the livelihood of those who own them- ala a farmer whose family wouldn't make it through the winter if Bessie and her friends didn't make a permanent visit to the abattoir. Money in its paper form deep within your wallets and purses seems almost innocuous, dare I say naturalized? But take a living animal and stand it next to you and you might be a bit more reluctant to exchange it for new clothes. Those old guys may have known what they were doing when they were searching for a way to represent C.R.E.A.M, the point in which commodities become indistinct from the money that provides them-really the point in which living things become indistinct from money may very well be the point in which conceptions of human identity may have to be reconsidered. I just dread the day they can clone Benjamin Franklin, it will certainly be awkward having to store a sixty something year old man in a register in order to give a gangsta' fellow change for his new Starter wide brim.