This is not my favorite column to write. In my youth, death was death, something which happened to everyone else. As a young man, I looked upon it as simply draining the talent pool because by then I was consumed with music— immersed in it to the point that life beyond it was a blur. In middle-age, it began becoming personal— friends and favorites taking the dive either stunningly quick or in dire circumstances.
I am a vinyl addict. The gateway drug was radio. When it was riding the crest of the wave before TV came along and kicked it to the curb that wasn’t there. Before TV which a lot of people thought would be the death of radio, a format already writhing in pain. You could only get so big and radio was gargantuan— a seething mass of gelatinous goo— an 800 pound gorilla. By the time I came along, everyone had a radio.
Ah, Psychedelia! A musical underground which fed on the springs of youth. God knows where it came from or how it evolved (there are many theories based upon preconceived notions which may or may not have anything to do with anything except ego), but it most likely was a media conception: Old people trying to write about things they didn’t understand, looking at the new world through cataracts and prejudice, and that view taking hold.
Here I go on one of my cerebral journeys, most of which run into a brick wall and consign themselves to the ash heap. I, like most of the world, have a very short attention span, it seems, and while I have bursts of genius (I swear!) little of it makes it to the outside world. This time, the message(s) is(are) spurred by a link posted by friend Greg Phipps, with whom I worked at Peaches Records in Seattle in the 80s (Phipps, btw, records under the name Palestinian Israel-Jones, should you desire to visit his planet), who has been on a roll finding and posting or reposting questions and videos worth my, if not your, attention. For instance, a couple of weeks ago, he asked about the negativity toward celebrities “selling out,” whoring their wares for profit.
Jesus, is 2013 great or what? I’m dancing, crying, thinking, sweating, burping and bopping thanks to a handful of musicians who have me freaking out, they’re so good. I know I said 2012 was good. And it was! Hell, it still is, musically. Musicians put out some of the best music I’d heard last year, but goddamn it, 2013 is smokin’ hot! Seriously! And excuse me for a sec whilst I dance the happy dance. You see, No Small Children‘s anthemic Might Get Up Slow is playing right now and will for a few times more because I need some uppers! Shee-it, this is good! In another time, this would be topping the charts and rocking kids out! Even famed ex-radio disc jockey Robert W. Walker sez “Fuh-reeking great!” Jeez, I’m sounding like Barnum & Bailey here, but sometimes you have to let loose, you know?
Bullseye Records of Canada
Segarini: Don't Believe a Word I Say 