Weeknotes: May 5 – 9, 2025
Monday, May 5
I'm spending another morning with Pink Floyd, this time working on a review for the Live at Pompeii soundtrack that came out last Friday. I re-familiarize myself with some biographical material and stumble upon their early single "Point Me at the Sky." I'd completely forgotten about this song, a fantastic bit of late-'60s psych-pop with shared vocals between David Gilmour and Roger Waters. I loved it when I was young, though it was a rarity that could only be found on bootlegs. I credit Wazoo Records in Ann Arbor with introducing me to the bootleg scene. They had a special cassette section where, if you knew what you were looking for, you could find strange compilations of unreleased live material, non-album tracks, and other oddities from a multitude of artists.
I still have a David Bowie compilation with a photocopied cover that includes a version of him singing "All the Young Dudes," the song he wrote for Mott the Hoople which, incidentally, was the first song I ever learned how to sing and play on guitar. I'd been playing for a couple years by that point, but didn't yet fashion myself a singer. I was about 12 when my guitar teacher, Mike Lutz, taught me how to play "All the Young Dudes," and it was the most complex chord sequence I'd learned to date. I remember feeling a great sense of satisfaction once I'd managed to separate my unformed voice from my strumming which felt like a creative version of patting your head while rubbing your belly. Before that, I assumed I'd be the guitarist in a band with someone else acting as lead singer, as was the custom in most of the hair metal bands I listened to at the time. Being able to handle both was a revelation to me. I can see now that I've followed that path ever since. I love collaboration, but if I can find a way to take care of something on my own, that's how I will probably do it.
Later on, I take my guitar to the luthier for what I've now accepted to be its regular seasonal adjustment. I've had this Martin 000-15M for two years now and its mahogany body is so much more sensitive to humidity and weather shifts than my old birdseye maple Shenandoah. I played that guitar hard for 30 years and, apart from replacing the bridge about ten years in, barely ever had it worked on. It's as sturdy as they come. The new 000-15M fluctuates all over the place, though when the action is right, it's a joy to play and hear. I hope it settles into itself at some point, just like I did.
Weeknotes: January 6–10, 2025
Monday January 6
Outside the giant home decor superstore shreds of yellow caution tape flap like pennants, suggesting unknown drama. Scant cars punctuate the desolate parking lot. Grim is the word that comes to mind. In Chris Frantz's Talking Heads memoir (which I've stuck with, and am now enjoying) he recalls how Johnny Ramone used that word over and over to describe their shared 1977 tour of Europe ("Oh shit, man, this is gonna be grim").
I don't go to this store very often. It's one of those wastelands of excess that makes me feel edgy and cynical. It's like a blander Pier 1 without any curation, a shelter for the world’s decorative vases and wicker plant stands to live out their days in a heady fug of candle store aroma. I'm in the market for new bathroom rugs that will pair well with the tricky seafoam walls and faux driftwood floor covering I inherited when I rented the house. Last winter I spontaneously bought a complete set of grass green rugs and matching towels which I pretended to like for a couple days before recognizing I'd turned my bathroom into a 1980s Holiday Inn. January is when I'm most inclined to tackle these problems. Aren't we all working on our interiors this time of year?
Weeknotes: June 24–28, 2024
Monday, June 24
I've been thinking about all the great bands I've seen recently and how it has rekindled my love of concert-going. This inspires me to start a spreadsheet of every concert I can remember attending. Lists are my language. How have I not made this one yet? I begin with the past decade which is well-documented in my planners and journals. After that I resort to memory and the internet, researching the dates of some of my most formative experiences. Here's what I learn.
Between 1988 and 1990 (ages 11-13), my parents spent a lot of money to make sure I saw some of the bedrock touring bands of the era. Of course, my very first concert was a few years earlier, the Beach Boys with Warren Zevon on Memorial Day weekend, 1984. I have vague sensory memories of it, but can recall no strong details. I sadly remember nothing of Zevon and only know of his participation from the ticket stub. In retrospect, I know Dennis Wilson had died the previous December, so I wouldn't have had a chance to see all three Wilson brothers. Could Brian have possibly been there? It seems doubtful. That was a rough period for my hero, though I later had a beautiful experience in the summer of 2000 taking my mom to see him play the Pet Sounds album live in Cleveland.
But in the late-'80s, I owned my first electric guitar and was already deep into my mania. In August 1988, barely a week after it opened, I was taken to the Palace of Auburn Hills to see Crosby, Still, & Nash and then Pink Floyd, just two days apart. A month after that my mom and Mary Jane Benner took me and her son Josh back to the Palace to see Def Leppard's massive Hysteria tour. To this day my mom remains a big fan of the Lep. In November 1989, I went with Aaron Dilloway and his brother to see the B-52's at the Fox Theatre on the Cosmic Thing tour. Toad the Wet Sprocket, an incongruous pairing, was the opener, touring their first album Bread & Circus, which I also loved. Between December of that year and June 1990, I saw the Rolling Stones (with Living Colour), Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers (with Lenny Kravitz), Billy Joel, and David Bowie. Seeing Bowie's Sound + Vision tour with my brother remains a watershed moment in my life. And of course he, being four years older, was already going to see far hipper bands than me: Jane's Addiction, Pixies, Love & Rockets, Beastie Boys. Some parents pushed their kids into sports or academics. My parents were devoted music fans and lifetime concert-goers. This was the education I received at a crucial age. How could I have become anything other than what I am?