Critics Who Know Jack Read online

  In music we had disco as the latest phase yet there was also the rise of Gram Parsons’ Flying Burrito Brothers, The Eagles and country-rock as a new pop form. The other force in popular music was the singer-songwriter. Besides Joel, who was somewhat unique because his main instrument was the piano, from California came Jackson Browne whose depth of expression rivalled Dylan Z from the previous decade. His mid-70s collection Late for the Sky travels the road from lost love to consideration and disenchantment and lament of the loss of the open-minded 60s. A practitioner of the long song, Browne was both political and capable of almost Mahler-like chords progressions and melodies. Lyrically his competition were Bruce Springsteen out of New Jersey and Tom Waits out of San Diego. But Browne’s articulation of a generation lost after the exuberance of the open road stood on higher ground. His instrument was also the piano, and if one compares his songs to Joel’s, the difference between pop-for-show and popular song as an art-form becomes apparent.

  Billy Joel post-Piano Man wrote melodies and lyrics that sounded like perfume and hair advertisements. Sure, there was talk in his work about love and the society we live in but it was his treatment of those themes that showed his pop-ish-ness. Browne on the other hand, required you to stay in the pocket for an intelligent and emotional length of time. Closer to literary form or poetry than mere song. He had a sense of the troubadour in him. He was alienated. He was able to stand back from the actions of the heart and reflect with doubt and sorrow. It was not only his subject matter but his treatment of the subject matter. Where Joel was catchy, Browne required you to pay attention to complexity of feeling and perception. Joel had some of Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons in him.

  Browne had a uniqueness that was difficult to compare even to previous and contemporary songwriters. His “voice” was both panoramic and intimate, able to speak of loss of innocence and resonate with the cultural mood of the time. Most striking and haunting on his Late for the Sky album was the title track: How long have I been sleeping? / How long have I been running alone through the night / . . . of the bed where we both lie / late for the sky. This lyric is featured in Scorsese’s Taxi Driver. The scene where Travis Bickle becomes more and more alienated and is viewed in his ratty apartment watching of all things Dick Clark’s American Bandstand.

  Travis is a few scenes away from an attempt to assassinate the presidential candidate. He is distorted in his loneliness and trying to make sense of things bigger than himself. Travis is the polar opposite to the smug male pain and tepid lament of Billy Joel’s “stranger.” This “stranger” is always in control, seeing situations that he has no real pain about. Bickle is a mess. He comes from small-town America to find something to survive for or merely just to survive. The Stranger sits on a bed (see album cover) and looks cutely at a mask of a supposed lover, or a reflection of himself. But you know there is not true suffering. It is pop at its most pretentious.

  Bickle though is a study in the line of existential characters. More Tennessee Williams or Arthur Miller or Elia Kazan. He could easily be transposed into an Albert Camus play or novel. He is lost and subject to the fates that surround him. He cannot meet a balance within himself thus he distorts to become part of something. To belong. The Stranger (ironically one of Camus’ most celebrated novels) is willing to eat at fine Italian restaurants and be hurt by kisses missed as if life was a high school prom. From Piano Man to The Stranger Billy Joel lost his power of poetry. He went from raconteur to light-weight “feeler of things.” One can detect a sense of trying to find the right formula for a hit in Joel’s post-Piano Man music and lyric.

  Scorsese’s Bickle is after a different kind of freedom. As is Browne’s protagonist in Late for the Sky. One does not know how he will end up scene to scene or song to song. You cannot predict reactions nor actions to the world Bickle or Browne live in. The fates will align for them and they will interpret external forces as forces that give them direction or no direction at all. They try love but in Bickle’s case he is immature and pornographic (in an innocent way) about love and intimacy. With Billy Joel’s stranger you continue through each song to feel he is writing song, not experience. And, with Jackson Browne, you find that he is able to craft and experience at the same time at a very sophisticated and literate level. Literate in the manner of expressing emotion that is rarely acknowledged or articulated by male or female narrators and artists attempting to enter the music markets.

  CELEBRITY JOURNALISTS

  (“Yellow Up!”)

  The editors of newspapers across North America seem to think we like to have pictures or sketches of the columnists and reporters covering everything from sports to business news and all in between. This projection of the-face-behind-the-story does little to improve or make worse the writing presented. There seems to be a sense of accreditation disguised as giving you a sense of familiarity. Everyone wants credit. I suppose that money you owe on your credit card ain’t enough.

  But honestly, why the photos and the sketches? So we can see their eyes and know they are telling the truth? Well, we all know how a story can be bent so let’s not insult the truth here. Some photos and sketches make the writer look haggard and old. Some make the writer look like they just woke up. But is the story or column about the writer or the story? This is after all “journalism,” no? I understand a photo of Tiger Woods grimacing if he lands in the bunker but do I need the reporter of the story smiling or frowning in static day to day repetition over him? Do these writers have so much doubt about their talents that they need to stick themselves to a story like certain produce distributors need to stick their little logos on an apple or banana? What is with the logos on a plum? You ever try to peel a logo off a plum so you can wash it and eat it for lunch? No chance. You peel the logo — you get a gash in the fruit and you have to eat it right away or you get fruit juice dripping in your lunch bag.

  The other development a la press with the advance of technology is the blog and video of a writer or columnist on camera speaking to the issue they are covering. This becomes a bit more intriguing. You get another dimension. Get to see them move and that includes eyes, the shoulders, the hands, etc. Of course if they are good looking, you likely won’t hear much of the story. If they are not good looking, you probably turn the video off. If they are in between, you listen at least and maybe not look. Then there’s the blog. It isn’t enough that these writers get paid hundreds of dollars a week to write their opinions or a short version of the truth and news, but they use the platform to say even more yet most blogs border on gossip. Now if a writer has talent and a sense of humour that’s probably a good thing.

  If you are looking for expertise you often don’t find it. That, you find in the classifieds and the obits. Clear. Objective — this person died or this person was born or this couple got married or this person is advertising their apartment for rent or selling canoes or microwave ovens. The answer to all this is that the blog, the video and the photo and sketch, and more often than not the column — are market driven. They are supposed to help sell the paper and possibly the writers’ other works when they are moonlighting writing plays, self-help books, essays for journals, birthday cards for friends and family. But the mother paper is the big winner or loser here. Since the mid-1990s most papers introduce their name in the course of a story — I.e.: As the _______ reported last week with its ground-breaking investigation of _______ . As if we live without memory and have to be reminded who did what when we are reading it in the self-same named paper.

  This braggadocio, arrogance and vanity is prevalent in the competitive and congested broadcasting market. Take for example one WB who works for NNC (backwards). He seems to live on the balls of his tongue and reminds you as much as informs you of any news development that you are “watching the best news on the best news network on television . . .” and that he’ll be back in just a couple of minutes to tell you more of how the “best news network” will give you the “best news” and it’s the best. For sure? He, as his n
etwork’s on-air representative, is doing all he can to get you to stay tuned yet watch the network’s sponsors’ ads and be pulled by gravitational and magnetic force field to his network.

  It is true that you have a choice and don’t even have to turn on the television or internet for that matter but maybe you think since you pay a certain amount each month, maybe, just maybe there will be more quality news and less “me, me, us” selling to the whole idea of watching television news and getting relevant in-depth non-repetitive coverage of vital news throughout the day. And further, when you go to commercial break, every second item advertised is about the very station and program you are already watching. Usually with a pitch of visuals and sound bytes that try to gain your emotion viscerally and “in your head” simultaneously. In short, broadcasters throw everything in their realm at you, not even trusting the phenomenon of after-image, that what you see will stay with you anyways. This overdrive causes nothing less than intellectual congestion and fatigue. You actually feel relief turning the TV or internet off and you have paid for that relief in dollars and time and may have to pay even more for an aspirin.

  Yellow journalism used to be the cheap news. The news of gossip tabloids and the news that wasn’t “news.” The gossipy aspect was looked down upon by the major papers and broadcasters and you took comfort in the fact and promise that the majors were not given to trite and superficial coverage of the private lives of celebrities and conspiracy theories about aliens landing in the back yard of nowhere Idaho or the front yard of the Queen of England. This cartoonish coverage was only done in the yellow press. Not the majors or “serious” papers. But things turned for the majors when the number of readers of yellow journalism began to soar in the mid to late ‘80s. The majors failed to see it coming but didn’t hold back from getting on board eventually, regardless of the loss of integrity of broadcast and journalistic standards and qualities that kept press and broadcast journalism real and verifiable.

  The underlying truth to the majors turning “yellower” was motivated by nothing less than the money that sell sell selling could bring in from advertisers and that a larger demographic net could be cast. Interestingly, the yellows didn’t sell much advertising. What they sold was straight UN-adulterated trash. Poor writing and reporting for the masses and growing number of semi-literate North Americans turning more illiterate every day. As the age of the internet came along, the potential for readership and advertising revenue threw a curve at the printed press and major broadcasters. With the exception of PBS and the Canadian Broadcasting Company in Canada and Britain’s BBC, every moment became one of potentially greater gain in advertising revenue yet not in intelligent un-biased reporting.

  As the majors “yellowed up,” the identity of the journalist became more vital at times (many times) than the story reported on. One recalls the news of John Kennedy’s death here. Somewhere in Walter Cronkite a subtle, humble man (at least the persona presented on screen). There was humility and a voice that could stop a war from escalating. A calm and confidence with the soul of both experience and wonder. Like Edward R. Murrow before him, Cronkite’s delivery of the news was straight up and relevant to the state of the world. Advertisers were few as stations were also few yet there seemed a decency, a line drawn between the vulgar and acceptable as to what was trite and where to put it and not to confuse it with news of vital importance.

  The speed of news delivery became a point of import as well. From Murrow to Cronkite and up to WB on NNC (backwards), news began repeating itself quickly and became available at any hour of the day or night. The effect of this repetition was to dull the viewer’s senses and what was sacrificed was in-depth steady dialogue or monologue in the traditional style of older news broadcasts. Advertising more and more determined the shaping of an hour of news. And in the guise or attempt to capture the wider and culturally diverse demographic more than old white males were presented as hosts, anchors and reporters of various news programs.

  Diversity does not equate to a decline in quality yet it became evident that broadcasters and their sponsors knew that going after the cultural variations in society could help sell and increase ratings. Some of the new journalists and faces from various cultural and ethnic backgrounds were schooled in the strong news presentation and some were not. Some were only there for their cultural difference on the superficial level of their visual impact. Not for their perspective culturally or because they were African-American, Latino, Asian-American, etc.

  The intent of this piece is not to go into in-depth analysis of media and the growth of yellow journalism as much as it is to say we give power to people. We give money to people (via our internet and TV cable fees) to interpret the world for us. To offer their expertise. And in many cases in contemporary broadcasts, social media and print mechanisms, we are being sold short. The colour of money has turned yellow and to which colour it turns from here is anybody’s guess.

  ASPHALT AND PLASTIC

  Roland Barthes in his 1957 text Mythologies drew consideration to the semiotic relevance of plastic and its invention and use. His suggestion was that something beyond the confines of nature, something man-made, made us less dependent on nature for our everyday needs. His view on the proliferation of plastic was in part awe-struck. A peculiar position for a Marxist theoretician.

  Barthes’ short cultural essay always reminds me of the green and orange plastic chairs at our cafeteria back in university days. I believe there were other colours, like purple, yellow, event fuchsia, as the makers of these pieces of furniture were touching on the idea of making most common and public environments somewhat of a playground. Who can’t remember “Lego” plastic blocks from their kindergarten class? I thought that, because our university college was named after the Irish patron Saint Patrick, our chairs were green and orange in some kind of contemporary homage.

  As I attended classes in the evening, I worked days on a road construction crew paving everything from rural highways to parking lots to driveways. For anyone who has done that kind of work, the idea and concept of plastic is very foreign except for one distinct item. The hard-hat. And these hats came in a variety of colours. Some symbolized authority. That was the white hat. Others, blue, orange, green and red symbolized different trades. I.e.: electricians wore green, plumbers, blue. But the asphalt was black as bituminous coal. Sticky, hot and smooth.

  What you never wanted was rain coming down with a full load in the paving spreader for the asphalt would congeal and cool into almost hard lava-like rock. Strangely enough, as I was studying Barthes at night in evening sociology classes, one of the main characters at work during the day was a dude named Rollie (Roland), the roller operator. Of course being naïve and given to inconsequential synchronicities (coincidences really) I noted that Barthes’ first name was Roland like Les Chanson de Roland which I had studied a year previously in French Literature Class.

  Rollie was French-Canadian. Roland Barthes studied and taught at the prestigious Sorbonne in Paris, France. Yet Rollie had the face of a Gallic warrior. Broken teeth and sharp chin with a tussle of light-brown locks underneath his red plastic hard-hat, each day he would stand like Charles de Gaulle atop his roller and declare more than question — Rayhain tuddaye?! His hope (and ours) that a great downpour would cool the humid air and shut down work before it began so we could go home and rest our hot tired bones. For working on a road crew is very much like military work. Just ask all the contractors that made a fortune in all the foreign wars building and re-building the infrastructure in the name of “progress.” (For more on this see Marlon Brando in The Ugly American.)

  The work crew bosses didn’t like Rollie much. They would throw glances of contempt his way across the hot road given that the roar of machinery made the use of vocal chords useless and ineffective. But Rollie’s Rayhain tuddaye?! could be heard clear and loud above the roar and din. Yes, the bosses wanted to get rid of Rollie but Rollie was a union man. And further to this, Rollie wanted his brother-in-law Nels
on brought in to work on the crew. Now, Nelson was the polar opposite of Rollie. Quiet, focused, humble in his small town rural manner, he had the most fantastic name — Nelson Beauregard — which brought up images of great flurries of Confederate Civil War cavalries sweeping into battle waving their sabres. And because of Nelson’s honest, substantial work ethic, Rollie benefitted in that way politics works on one of these crews. I.e.: You get rid of Rollie, you lose one of the best men to come along in a long time, who covers for others and begins and finishes every task with precision and can take the heat of order after order. And lives on raw hot-dogs and cola to boot!

  That’s right! Every morning when the canteen coffee truck came by with hot coffee and snacks for break, Nelson would buy raw hot-dogs and cola and whip three dogs down. In the age of health food and greater, healthier living, Nelson would consume these “little baloneys” (as he called them) and say to the Italians on the crew: “Want some? It’s just like what they do on pizza.” The more senior Italian men would recoil at the smell and suggestion of his offer. Their wives packed asparagus and egg sandwiches, plums and apples, cool cucumber salads and cold espresso which they kept well-temperatured in coolers. When lunch-time came these men would sit under a leafy tree to avoid the heat and make a work site lunch period resemble a Sunday picnic. And they insisted all machines be turned off, trying in some way to replicate the rural ease of the hometowns they came from.