So jazzed

Lately, I've been polishing off my jazz CDs and having a listen to them. I'll admit, I'm not the foremost expert on jazz, so it makes excellent background music, especially on the rainy days we've been having lately.

Let it be said that when I hear jazz, particularly hard-bop, I find myself dreaming about sitting near a rain-soaked window in a high-rise apartment in a big city.

Now, I've gone in a big circle with jazz. My high school concert band played a tune called 'Big Band Signatures' when I was a senior and I bought the Benny Goodman Story soundtrack to obtain several of the more familiar tracks like 'Sing, Sing, Sing,' 'Let's Dance' and 'One o'Clock Jump.'

When I got to my music program in college, the emphasis was on the small combo. I have vivid memories of my late drum teacher asking us what we wanted to learn that semester. I told him that I wanted to learn to play jazz. I had just bought my first drum kit and only could play rock rhythms. He asked me if I owned any jazz albums and I told him about the Benny Goodman disc. He told me - and I found myself a little offended by this at first - that he wanted me to think beyond that.

He had me buy a copy of Jimmy Smith's 'The Sermon!' and told me the key was to listen to the title track and play along with Art Blakey's consistent swing.

I never could last 20 minutes, but I got the idea and began to harbor a silly vendetta against the jazz as 'shoved down our throat' at school. I played the obligatory jazz tunes in my combo and ensemble classes while openly wanting to play some rockers.

It wasn't until my final semester at school that I began to realize how much of an impression the small-group jazz songs I played made on me.

My favourites from school were 'Line for Lyons' (Gerry Mulligan), 'Maiden Voyage' (Herbie Hancock), 'Afro Blue' (John Coltrane), 'Stolen Moments' (Oliver Nelson), 'Speak no Evil' (Wayne Shorter) and the one that introduced me to the genius of Miles Davis 'So what?'

The life-changing moment for me was while on a lunch break at the Grand Avenue Mall, I found a used vinyl copy of 'Kind of Blue'at the Music Recyclery.

I now own 95% of the Miles Davis accoustic catalog, while not being able to appreciate any of his fusion after 'In a Silent Way.'

I persuaded my in-laws to take my wife and I to the Monterey Jazz Festival in 2001 where Miles and John Coltrane's 75th birthday was celebrated with the playing of some of their standards.

The Moment for me of that entire festival was seeing Ravi Coltrane performing with so much of the energy of his father. I have yet to purchase any of his works, but have planned on doing so for years afterwards.

I have long wanted to assemble a small-group to play some of the classic jazz from the 1950s and 60s.

That said, I take issue with the 'jazz' scene in my little neck of the woods.

There are many 'jazz' groups out here and I've been invited to watch/listen and maybe 'jam' with them. My problem is they are those traditional/big-band/Dixieland jazz groups that I find antiquated and much too stodgy.

I've been asked more than once if I can play 'streetbeat.' My reply is "what the hell is that?"

So, I continue to languish, laughing at those who speak of 'trad-jazz' like it is the only jazz worth listening to, while proudly blasting 'A Love Supreme'from my stereo turntable.

The Hives-Black and White and Rad all over

Recently I purchased with a $10 gift card to Best Buy the latest album from the Hives entitled The Black and White Album. Since nothing really disappoints me about this Swedish 5 piece import, I had high expectations that this album would be amazing. Of course they fully delivered.

The first track and single off the record is Tick Tick Boom! This is by far one of the most catchiest songs of the year. It's such a loud and fun song to listen to. The second song Try It Again features some cheerleading yelling during the chorus. Very different for this band, but not different to the punk world (see Unwritten Law's F.I.G.H.T".  They actually have another spelling-choruse called T.H.E. H.I.V.E.S. as well!

One song that shows something different is A Stroll Through Hive Manor Corridors. It's 2:38 of a drum loop with some keyboard/moog parts.  A jazzy number on the Black and White album is Well All Right! Very toe-tapping and different. I like this one the more I hear it.

A strange Tim-Burton-esque song is Puppet On A String. This one features piano, possibly claves and large chimes. Very eery and unique. 

Overall, this album is a great addition to any collection. Whether you have nothing by The Hives, or this is the latest to add to collection, it's well worth picking up.

Can't you turn it off?

Look, I know this blog is supposed to be be about pop culture and in a way, this rant is. You see, I have many interests. Despite feeling myself more qualified than most to discuss music (check the degree, yo!), I'm a walking hockey encyclopedia.

I majored in music, I've played in several bands, I own several instruments, but my main passion is hockey.

The frustration that's been building has to do with my workplace.

It's the newsroom of a daily newspaper with a respectable circulation. We used to have a high turnover rate, where young reporters fresh from J-school (that's short for "journalism school") often bounce from paper to paper before settling down.

There also has been a trend of inside "promotion" from sports to news.

From being in this department seven years, I know of three managers who have moved "up" from sports editor positions and two reporters who have also moved into "real" news from the wonderful world of sports.

It seems that moving away from the Sports department is a promotion. Most people agree.

However, I know of two sports journalists - one who's been here 25+ years and another 10+ - who have not expressed any desire in covering anything else.

These two appear so very one-dimensional. They will engage people in conversation, mostly about college football/golf (the 25+year guy) and high school sports (the other one) giving off the appearance that they just don't know anything else.

Our local minor-pro baseball beat writer can talk about other stuff, and I know one of the high school writers used to cover agribusiness.

But these two people are so simple-minded in their quest to appear all-knowing. Granted, they know who to seek out with this stuff. There are many people here - especially ex-sports staffers - who want the diversion from stuff like city council meetings and shootings and will discuss these things at length with the "experts" who must be so cozy in the "wwos" that they refuse to be moved out.

Some Hall of Fame or "lower-the-bar-to-keep-it-in-the-news."

Another pet-peeve of mine is the so-called "Rock and Roll Hall of Fame."

It'll never see my shadow, despite my love of rock as it should be played.

Supposedly, it's purpose is "...to recognize the contributions of those who have had a significant impact on the evolution, development and perpetuation of rock and roll by inducting them into the Hall of Fame."

How on earth, does one explain how John Mellencamp got voted in?

Bob Seger? George Harrison? ZZ Top? The Ventures? Blondie? The Pretenders? Steely Dan? Jackson Browne? Isaac Hayes? Bonnie Raite? James Taylor? Buffalo Springfield? DUSTY Springfield? ARGHHH!

It seems as if every single artist that had a hit in the 50s and 60s is in there. And after that period, everyone who had more than one hit.

If the standard stays that low, such acts as the Backstreet Boys, nSync, Britney Spears, and (please-giant-astroid-end-the-world-before-this-happens) Fall Out Boy will be inducted.

I dare say, even Hillary Duff might get in.

The only band in the 2008 class that I actually like is The Ventures. However, I cannot agree on that. "Walk, don't run" was a great song, but that was their hit. And how on earth, do they get in but Dick Dale is NOT inducted?

John Mellencamp really was the final straw for me. Soon, we'll see the likes of Dexy's Midnight Runners, Toto, .38 Special and Modern English... Duran Duran's induction is just a matter of time.

Have fun with that, rock-n-roll-ruiner's hall of fame, because I don't intend to give you the time of day, henceforth.

I'm probably weird

Within the past five years or so, I've completely given up on movies.

I just stopped being interested in them, let alone paying to see them in theaters.

People ask me all the time, "have you ever seen (movie)?" and I usually get wide-eyed amazement when I tell them "no."

I think it's a combination of being way too picky and that I just would rather use the two hours doing something else. I've never been much of an observer, whether it be of music or sport. I want to do. I want to participate. I want to play.

Watching is not for me.

I'm sure I've missed a few good stories, but it really takes something I'm highly interested in to get me to sit down for a movie.

I liked the much-reviled "National Treasure" because it played on U.S. history. I'll probably see the much less-plausible sequel (when I can watch it for free) despite my anticipation of much-worse reviews.

Anything having to do with hockey is worth at least one viewing, despite the fact that I didn't care for "Mystery Alaska," "Hockey Mom" or the entire Mighty Ducks franchise. "Miracle" was good, "Slap Shot" is classic, "The Rocket" was excellent, as is "Canada/Russia '72."

I sat through "Immortal Beloved" because I love Beethoven's music, but I kinda regret spending my time watching it. I didn't much care for "The daVinci Code," either. I've completely lost interest in "wild" comedies, which means anything with Will Farrel is out. I'll never forgive him for wasting my time with "Night at the Roxbury."

Maybe I'm just burned out.

When I worked at Kwik Trip, we used to have a "turn-your-back" policy on movies which enabled me to watch nearly everything that came out on video, between 1994 and 1998.

After a while, I just got sick of wasting my time.

I can only thank commercials for keeping me informed on "what's out there," so I don't seem completely out-of-touch with pop culture, despite my hatred of it.

Time Is Running Out-What is the future of music?

So a few days ago, I read an article on punknews.org about how the Bouncing Souls are kicking around the idea of releasing a digital release instead of doing an album. The Gold Record, which was one of my favorite albums of 2006, didn't do as well as they must have hoped. I read that it sold 37,000 copies, which I would look at as a very good sale. Especially from a band that isn't in the media, on TRL or have a regular rotating music video on Fuse or MTV. So it looks like they want to digitally release something, which has Souls fans steamed.

So the last few days, I have been stirring up my feelings towards this phenomenon that is file swapping and music leaking on the web. The future is that CDs are slowly getting obsolete, and everyone will have to jump on the bandwagon, that is downloading music. The majority of the population is already embracing the change of purchasing or stealing music. Unfortunately, this will leave quite a few people out of jobs. First of all, CD duplication will not be needed anymore, they won't require album art, and record stores will be pretty damn empty. It's amazing to think about how things have changed over the last few years. Bands and artists are getting signed to labels because of a few hundred thousand downloads of a single from their myspace. Here is a small list of bands that are millionaires or at least on their way to becoming one because of Myspace
Fall Out Boy
Colbie Callet
Sean Kingston
Arctic Monkeys

Derek Grant, drummer of Alkaline Trio blogged about the file swapping and digitialization of music. He looks at it, from a career perspective. Everyone picks up songs and albums that get leaked online, which hurts record sales. The majority of the younger generations just want some songs and extra material. Hardly do you see a 15 year old looking for any vinyl or records at a store.

This rant has come to some sort of conclusion even though it went in all sorts of directions. Like life, music is ever-changing and I as fan of it am preparing myself for whatever is thrown at me.

Grammy-nominated song

Despite my love for music, the Grammys are often to be avoided.

Except of course, the year Green Day played and blew the roof off... I think there was a year when a bunch of British musicians played "London Calling."

Digressing now, the funny part was when I was curious about Carrie Underwood's song "Before he Cheats."

It's supposedly a song about a woman finding out her man hooked up with a bimbo and so naturally, she responds by destroying his possessions.

I can envision so many naive females saying "you go, girl." Yet, what I'm sure many don't realize is that the song was written for her by two men.

More power to 'em, since they're printing money based on the success of that song, but this is one of those, "how-the-hell-do-they-put-themselves-into-a-female-perspective" situations.

I never got how one "expresses" oneself by singing someone else's song. I love playing other people's songs, but I don't feel that I'm expressing myself. It's almost like agreeing with what they're saying.

Musical expression should be defined as writing and performing your own work.

Singing a song someone else wrote is like being a painter copying someone else's work.

Or like coloring in a coloring book.