Leap In The Dark

For all that Canadians claim moral superiority over Americans, our history when it comes to dealing with issues of race is no better than anybody else's. We have been the master of discreet and covert discrimination from almost the moment we became a country in 1867. Just look at the nearly successful campaign of cultural genocide that we carried out against Native Canadians with the Residential School system. Children were stolen away from their parents, some transported thousands of miles from home, in order to make them useful citizens.This included stripping them of their identities by changing their names, forbidding them to speak anything but English (or French if they were in Quebec), and being taught that their parent's beliefs were superstitions that was going to send them all to hell.

In spite of their best efforts, the combined efforts of the government and the Anglican and Catholic Churches weren't quite successful. Enough people held on to their nation's culture and preserved it for the lost generations. Lost because not only didn't they fit into the white world, they didn't fit into the world of their parents either. Unlike others her age Buffy Sainte-Marie avoided Residential school, but was "adapted" by a predominantly white family (her adopted mother was part Mik'maq) in New England, miles away from her family in Saskatchewan, Canada. Her mother did tell her that there was a world of difference between what she saw in the movies and the reality of being Native American, but she could find out about that stuff when she was an adult if she wanted.

As anyone who is familiar with Buffy Sainte-Marie's music, activism, or art knows she most definitely found out the truth about the circumstances of Native Americans in contemporary society. Her latest release, Running For The Drum, not only once again confirms her talents as singer and songwriter, but reaffirms her commitment to the culture of her people. However, as the DVD documentary, Buffy Sainte-Marie: A Multimedia Life, included as a bonus, shows she's not interested in merely preserving the culture like a museum piece, but keeping it a living breathing entity that isn't afraid to be part of the modern world.

One doesn't need to look any further than the music on Running For The Drum for examples of that as she draws just as heavily upon modern musical influences as traditional native ones when writing her material. In A Multimedia Life she says that her musical influences included everything from R&B, early rock and roll, Miles Davis, to the French singer Edith Piaf, and you can hear traces of just about all of them, on the new disc. Right from the first cut you know this isn't going to be the type of "Native" music they sell in New Age emporiums. There's nothing ethereal about the strident challenge of the lyrics, the dance club beat that pulses underneath it, and the sound effects that surround "No No Keshagesh".

While I've become used to Buffy Sainte-Marie's use of technology in her material, "No No Keshagesh" (Greedy Guts) still took me by surprise with its sound and the amount of technology she used on it. Yet once I adjusted to what she was doing I could hear how this music was working to make the lyrics attacking how businesses have "Got Mother Nature on a luncheon plate/The carve her up and call it real estate" that much more powerful. This isn't some whining, tree hugger song about being nice to the flowers, this a call to arms to fight back: "Mister Greed I think your time has come/I'm gonna/Sing it and pray it and/live it and say it singing/No No Keshagesh you can't do it nor more."

I watched the documentary before I listened to the CD which is where I found out about her being taken from her family as a child and not knowing whether she was born in 1940, 41, or 42. In 1964, as her career was starting to take off, she made a trip up to the Wikwemikong pow-wow on Manitoulin Island (largest fresh water island in the world) in Northern Ontario, and began the process of trying to find her family. Unfortunately all of the records pertaining to her adoption had been destroyed, so finding out who her birth parents were was impossible. However she was readopted by a Native family from her home reserve who she had met at the pow-wow. Her new grandfather was the son of one of signatories to Treaty 4, the treaty in which the Cree Indians of Western Canada recognized Queen Victoria as their ruler, and he was her link in the chain that reconnected her to being a member oft Cree nation.

The documentary does a really good job of telling Sainte-Marie's story from her earliest days as a folk singer in Greenwich Village in New York City, combining archival footage of some of her earliest performances with present day interviews with people like Taj Mahal, Robbie Robertson, and other contemporaries from the time. We find out that her career in the States came to an abrupt halt in the late sixties when she was blacklisted by the Johnson administration for her activism in both the anti-war movement and Native rights.

By the end of the sixties she was making her primary focus Native rights, using every public appearance she made to try and educate people on the reality of being Native in the twentieth century. As a result of this her air time became more and more limited as people like The Tonight Show started applying conditions to her appearances - no talking about civil rights and only singing certain songs - and she would say, thanks, but no thanks. This didn't stop her from winning an Oscar for co-writing "Up Where We Belong" from the movie An Officer And A Gentleman.

The documentary takes us up into the present day and she talks about the things that motivate her now. In the early eighties she started to experiment with digital art and continues to create in a variety of styles and mediums to this day. Her other major focus has been on creating educational programming for Native and non-native children using the Internet. The Cradleboard Teaching Project is a multi media interactive curriculum for students from grade three to twelve while the Nihewan Foundation for Native American Education is dedicated to helping Native American students receive an education and also educating people of all backgrounds about Native American culture.

Needless to say with all this going on her music output isn't quite as prolific as it used to be, but that doesn't mean the quality of her work has suffered any either as the material on Running For The Drum makes perfectly clear. Whether she's doing a tribute to the early music of Elvis Presley on the rockabilly like "Blue Sunday", or a hauntingly beautiful song like "Easy Like The Snow Falls Down" which she dedicates to hospice caregivers who help families care for loved ones who are dying, her music remains as potent as it was when she wrote "Universal Soldier".

She pretty much covers all her musical influences on this disc, including a New Orleans blues tune, "I Bet My Heart On You" that features a piano duet with her and Taj Mahal. Yet, at least in my opinion, it's when she taps into her own heritage for inspiration that her material begins to transcend the boundaries of ordinary pop music. Listen to a piece like the previously mentioned "No No Keshagesh" or "Working For The Government" where she has sampled pow-wow drums and sings in the high falsetto of the pow-wow singer and, if you let it, her voice will lift you out of yourself, and send you travelling in ways you wouldn't think possible with popular music.

More then forty years after starting her career as a professional musician Buffy Sainte-Marie is still continuing to look for new ways to express herself and isn't afraid of taking chances with her music. Running For The Drum is a great example of just how powerful and diverse a musician she is. The DVD documentary, Buffy Sainte-Marie: A Multimedia Life, included in the package as a wonderful bonus shows you the steps she's taken to get to where she is today. Great music, a fascinating artist, and a well told story - what more could you ask for from a two disc CD/DVD set.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 07:23 AM | Permalink

For the longest time I could never understand how anybody could like country music. The problem was that it took me nearly forever to realize there was a huge difference between the music that's performed by people like Shania Twain, and country music. Growing up in urban centres the only type of country music I heard for the longest time was the former, as someone must have decided that city audiences were too sophisticated to want to hear any of the old time, or more traditionally styled, examples of the genre.

Not having any incentive to search out country music it took a series of accidents for me to stumble across the good stuff; walking into a record store and hearing my first Graham Parsons duet with Emmylou Harris, listening to my brother's Jerry Jeff Walker and Kris Kristofferson albums, and learning about Hank Williams by hearing a guy named Sneezy Waters singing his music. Waters had been cast in the role of Hank in the original production of the play Hank Williams: The Show He Never Gave, when it played the bars and theatres in and around Ontario Canada back in the late 1970's. Hank Williams died in the back of his Caddilac on the way to a New Year's Day performance in 1953 from a combination of booze and drugs, and the premise of the play was that he made it to that show.

During the course of the play Hank became progressively drunker and more morose, until by the end he was barely standing. What really made the play work though was Sneezy Waters' ability to reproduce Hank's songs down to that distinctive catch in his throat when the emotions of what he was singing about began to overwhelm him. Having heard another performer singing Hank's music made me want to hear the original article, and in spite of Sneezy Water's remarkable performance, nothing he did had prepared me for the raw emotional intensity of Hank Williams.

Hank Williams wasn't around very long to enjoy the spotlight, as he didn't come to the public's attention in a big way until 1949 and was dead four years later, so there has never been a huge library of his recordings available for fans to listen too. However, back in 1950-51 he recorded a series of radio shows that were sponsored by Mother's Best Flour, and because of his extensive touring schedule he was forced to pre-record the shows on acetate discs. It's these recordings that Time Life have used as the source for their new release Hank Williams: The Unreleased Recordings. The three CDs come handsomely packaged in a tall hard cover package that opens like a book. On the inside front cover are the first two CDs, followed by thirty-eight pages of photographs and text giving the history of the recordings and Williams' biography, with the third disc on the inside of the back cover.

The attention paid to detail in the packaging, how often are CD booklets made large enough that you can read the text without the aid of a magnifying glass and you can see details of like a subject's eyes in the photographs, is a reflection of the quality of the whole package. Previous experiences I've had with collections of "Unreleased Materials" have led me to believe there was a really good reason for the material not to have been released. Either the sound quality is so bad that there's no point in listening to the songs, or the songs themselves are an embarrassment that nobody would have dared release while the performer, or any of their next of kin for that matter, was still alive.

That's not the case here as not only is the quality of the sound is almost universally better than any studio recordings of Hank Williams music made from the same time, they were made during the period in his life when he was able to keep the same band together for the entire year. So even if Williams decided to drop a surprise on them, say like playing "On Top Of Old Smokey" like "my gran'ma used to sing it", he'd only have to give them a chord and they'd follow his lead. As these were recorded for radio shows, quite a number of the tracks also include Hank's introductions to the songs, which are almost as much fun to listen to as the songs themselves.

He and the announcer for the show, Cousin Louis Buck, would introduce the songs in the form of having a conversation that was meant to include their early morning audiences. The show was broadcast in the Mid-West for fifteen minutes, Monday to Friday, at 7:15 am which meant that those listening to it were primarily farmers and their families either working in the barn or sitting down for their second breakfast. This could explain why a great many of the songs Williams performed were older songs or gospel numbers as they would be the material his listeners would be most familiar with.

He also used it as an opportunity to try out some of his newer material that he and the band hadn't even recorded yet. Disc two opens with him introducing a song that 'has never been performed on-air before', "I Can't Help It (If I'm Still In Love With You)". Yet while there are other familiar songs included in the collection, the majority of them are ones that I've never heard him sing before. To be honest there are a great many of them that I've never even heard of before; "The Prodigal Son", "From Jerusalem To Jericho", and "Lonely Tombs". Some of these gospel tunes, like the last one, originated nearly a hundred years earlier, but Williams makes them sound as fresh as if they'd just been penned the day he recorded them.

What really comes clear in these recordings is just how good a singer Williams was. Somehow his voice seems to stand out more on these old radio shows then it did on his studio albums and we hear nuances and shadings that I swear I'd not heard in his voice before. Williams always wore his heart on his sleeve in his recordings, and the songs in this collection are no different from any of his other material that way. In fact due to their clarity, there's even more emotional power to these performances than others, and you can't help but realize how much pain he lived with on a constant basis.

Unlike the mawkish sentiment that passes for emotion in today's popular and country music, Hank Williams' songs sounded like they were torn from his heart. You know when listening to him that the catch in his voice isn't artifice but the real thing and he can make you feel so lonesome that you want to cry. The material gathered together for Hank Williams: The Unreleased Recordings is not only a wonderful opportunity to hear him sing songs that you've never heard him sing before, but reinforces the fact that country music has yet to produce anyone who comes close to matching him for the emotional integrity of his songs and his performance. The anti-Hank may reign in Nashville and Las Vegas, but true believers can find solace in this collection, as it reminds us what country music really sounds like.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 07:52 AM | Permalink

Once upon a time, well in the late 1980's anyway, when we were all younger and lost in the wilderness, desperate for the type of example only a true leader can set, fortune sent us an anarchistic typhoon to clear all the bullshit from our path. With a can of lager in one hand (well actually anything with an alcohol content that could be used in an internal combustion engine without too much corrosive activity) and the other either on the steering wheel of her favourite vehicle or the controls of its weapon's system, she'd stomp out any perceived injustice and give conventional morality a few swift kicks to the groin.

It was 1988 when Tank Girl first saw the light of day. The world had only just survived eight years of Ronald Ray-guns and conservative Christianity's first kick at the can, and anybody else who was down on the ground hurting. By blaming society's woes on the poor they were able to stop spending money on pesky programs like school lunches and increase military spending in order to ensure American business interests around the world were safe from local government interference. Restoring pride in family values meant they were able to call HIV/AIDS the price of amoral behaviour - fags are only getting what's coming to them - and turning the clock back on any advances society had made on gender equality in the previous decade.

We were in desperate need of someone willing and able to give that world the collective finger followed by a boot up the arse and a grenade enema and Alan C. Martin and Jamie Hewlett's creation was just what the doctor (if he was stoned out his head on weird cacti found only in the remoter parts of the Australian outback) ordered. Tank Girl, her somewhat faithful companion, Boga, the kangaroo, and various hangers on, partied, pillaged, rampaged, and generally behaved in ways that would make the average barbarian hoard green with envy, in adult comics, graphic novels, short stories, and one brief appearance on celluloid for a glorious seven or so years.

Now, just in time for the festive season, the good folks at Titan Books have served up a heaping pile of steaming - uhmm - a celebratory coffee table book, The Cream Of Tank Girl, in honour of her thrusting herself upon the unsuspecting world of comics chest first twenty odd years ago. According to Messrs Hewlett & Martin "Tank Girl" came about by accident. Together with other art school classmates in 1987 they had self-published a twenty-eight page comic featuring the two strips they believed showed most promise as being their entrées into the glamourous world of comic books. As neither "Atomtan" or "Max Nasty" have become household names, and "Tank Girl" was a one page ad on page twenty for a comic they never planned on writing, it's obvious prescience wasn't one of their strong suits. However when the editor of Deadline magazine approached them for a strip featuring our heroine they showed they could be counted on to deliver the goods when it mattered and a legend was born.

As its a book you're meant to give pride of place to on your coffee table (which when you think about how many Tank Girl readers own coffee table let alone furniture not made out of orange crates you have to wonder about the minds in the marketing department at Titan Books) the primary focus is of course on illustrations. From full colour reproductions of comic book panels and front covers of Deadline that Tank Girl graced, story boards and design ideas for Tank Girl the movie, to black and white pen and ink drawings, The Cream Of Tank Girl doesn't disappoint in that department.

Over the years Tank Girl underwent various modifications in her appearance as Hewlett's illustrations became more sophisticated. Yet no matter what there has always remained that certain je ne sais quois about her that would shrivel the balls of miscreants to the size of an atom. For, although there is no denying her lasciviousness nature, or that she is built along the lines of super heroines designed by men who still live in their parent's basement where gravity and the laws of proportion don't exist, the glint in her eye - and her willingness to level small towns with her tank - are enough to make even the most testosterone laden idiot pause for thought. Of course there are always those who aren't that swift on the uptake and they find out that yes indeed those are rocket launchers attached to the side of her tank.

As a bonus Hewlett & Martin have also included some of the other strips they have worked on, or attempted to put before the public eye. It's nice to see that Hewlett's talents stretch beyond drawing kangaroos with attitude, tanks, explosions, and Tank Girl as we are introduced to various other characters in their arsenals and a variety of strangeness that somehow has yet to have seen the light of day.

One thing that they make clear in the books is that as far as they are concerned the movie version of Tank Girl not only was awful, but ruined her for ever. Instead of being the parody of the over-endowed super heroine (no those aren't intercontinental ballistic missiles under her t-shirt) the movie softened the hard edges and pointy bits about the character we liked so much and diminished her by filling the movie with stupid locker room humour in an attempt to make it appeal to a mass audience. What the studio didn't realize is that most of "Tank Girl's" appeal was the fact that it wasn't for mass consumption and didn't play well in Peoria.

The Cream Of Tank Girl is a trip back in time to those innocent days when a girl and her tank could travel the outback in the company of her kangaroo boy friend content in the knowledge there were stupid people to terrorize and towns to blow up. If you missed out on the action the first time round, it will give you a taste of what you missed. For the seasoned traveller its a fitting memento from your misspent youth and one that just might make you question your judgement in selling out and taking that straight job.

As of May 2007 that time has come as she made her triumphant return in the Gifting and is now appearing on a regular basis in the British magazine Judge Dredd in a twelve part series, Skidmarks. Look for it to be made into a graphic novel next year around this time, as a new generation of illustrators, Rufus Dayglo and Ashley Wood, have set Tank Girl loose on the world again. Just when we need her most, after eight years of George Bush's social conservatism, Tank Girl is back to send the forces of decency back to the rat holes they came from.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 05:22 AM | Permalink

Music ethnologists have travelled around the world since the days wax cylinders were the height of recording technology collecting examples of music from various cultures. In some instances these recordings have become not only research projects, but records of traditions that were in the process of heading for extinction. Buried in the archives of universities and museums are sound files of everything from Native American healing songs to chants and ritual music from Southern Africa. European encroachment into original people's lives and lands and colonial government policies of cultural genocide and enforced assimilation ensured that those ancient songs would not be passed along to a new generation so these recordings are all that remains of thousands of years of tradition.

Ironically as technology improved to allow better quality recordings, fewer and fewer original cultures existed to be recorded. However, since we have turned into such a disposable society the techniques used by original researchers to record indigenous music have been used in recent years to ensure music that grew out of early North American European and slave cultures are being preserved. While in the United States that's included songs that are as contemporary as the 1930's, in other parts of our hemisphere some of these newer traditions date back to the 17th century and represent a mingling of imported and native cultures.

Sometime in the 1600's two ships carrying African slaves from Nigeria were shipwrecked off the coast of St. Vincent Island in the Caribbean that were occupied by two tribe of indigenous peoples, the Arawars and the Kalipuna called the Caribs by Spanish explorers. Initially there was conflict between the escaped slaves and the natives but eventually they settled their differences, intermarried and created a third people who are now called Garifuna. As colonial masters changed The Garifuna were rounded up by the British to be moved to an island off the coast of Honduras, Roatan. When it in turn was taken from the British by the Spanish the people were moved again, this time to Trujillo to serve as labourers and farmers.

In 1802 the Spanish shipped some or the people living in Tujillo to Belize to work as woodcutters where they established communities and gradually more of their people joined them. When Central America achieved independence from Spain, the Garifuna remaining in Tujillo discovered they were now living in Honduras and loyalty to Spain wasn't something their countrymen approved of. This resulted in the mass migration of the people to the communities already established on the coast of Belize.

In spite of their rather harried early existence the Garifuna managed to develop a culture unique to them which emphasizes music, dance, and storytelling and a religion that combines Catholicism with African and native beliefs. While many cultures have evolved traditions of dance, music and storytelling, the Garifuna have combined the three elements and refined them significantly so that the music, song, and dance work together to tell various stories. In 1990 Alfonso Arrivillaga Cortes and Byron Sosa visited Garifuna living in Livingston Guatemala to make field recordings, and the results can be heard on a new release from the Sub Rosa label called Ibimeni. The music that you will hear on this CD was not performed in order to recreate something that has vanished into the mists of history and barely remembered by a few people, its the sound of a living culture that has somehow survived many hardships and been able to resist assimilation into "civilization".

The rather extensive liner notes that come with Ibimeni breaks down the different types of rhythms that are used in Garifuna music and what each one signifies and how the music is performed. A group of up to four drums, referred to as garaon, made up of primera, high pitched, and segunda, low pitched instruments, are accompanied by both a solo singer and a choir. While the solo singer "tells" the story in song, the choir provides emphasis by repeating verses. Meanwhile dancers are responding to the sounds created by the primera to enact the story. However unlike most dances where the dancer is an extension of the drums beat, here they are reacting to what the drum "says" as if they were having a conversation.

There are three types of rhythm basic to the music of the Garifuna people: Punta, the most common, is used for secular events and some festive occasions; Hunguhugu, is used specifically for rituals associated with the cult of the ancestors known as Chugu and is accompanied by chants known as Abeimahani; and finally Wanaragua is specifically for a dance that recreates the people's battles with the English and is only performed on holidays like Christmas, New Year's Eve and Day, and the Epiphany. Unlike the other dances this is the only one that has specific steps and costumes for the dancers including rattles made of shell hung from the dancer's knees.

Drums and percussion instruments predominate in the music, and one of the things that struck me most about what I was hearing was the similarities between it and the type of drumming I've come to associate with Native North Americans. In fact there was one religious song, track 12 "Wasanriaha" (union), where the combination of voices and drums was eerily reminiscent of the sound of a Pow-wow drum. A steady, heartbeat, rhythm accompanied by voices singing near falsetto chants. Although this is fairly common among the various nations of mid-western North America, and has now been adapted by most nations for their Pow-wow gatherings, this marked the first time I've heard that distinct combination used by people outside of North America.

Occasionally during a song you will hear the sound of what's called a marine small trumpet. There is something quite spine tingling and mournful sounding about it, reminding me of a mixture of a conch shell and the sound of a very distant fog horn in the earliest part of the morning. I did notice that its only used in certain Puntas, and it seemed to depend on their theme. Although the disc did open with a song that featured only that instrument called "Marine Small Trumpet". The liner notes say the song is known as a "call", and while I don't know what it was originally meant to call, it sounded to me like it was trying to call the day out of the ocean after a particularly foggy night. However, that's probably more my imagination than reality, because if you look at the majority of the song titles you realize that their music is primarily concerned with the day to day things of life; "The Water Has Boiled", "It's Getting Dark", and "Edna's Gold Tooth".

Like the rhythms, there are also names for the different types of songs and the different types of instrumental music that is performed. Los arruloos (lullabies) and Los alabados (Catholic liturgical) are the two major song types heard on the album, and the three different instrumentals are known as La Parranda, Las bandas, and El Pororo and refer to which instruments are being performed. The exception is El Pororo, as it also refers to a specific type of music played for festivals associated with The Virgin of Guadalupe. So "Edna's Gold Tooth", a Pororo, is played by a band with high and low drums, the marine small trumpet, turtle shells (percussion instrument), cymbals, and other drums and follows a beat that is similar to what you'd hear during Mardi Gras celebrations.

For all that describing the music makes it sound incredibly structured, listening to it you'd never know. While there are definite distinct patterns that the music follows, there is also a wonderful amount of energy and passion that flows through the song as expressed by the singers which gives them their individuality, so even songs from the same grouping don't necessarily sound alike. I only wish there was some way that the dancers could have been incorporated and the recording presented as a DVD so we could experience the material to its fullest.

Since these songs were recorded back in 1990, the music of the Garifuna people has undergone popularization and is now being performed in concert hall settings. Ibimeni returns the music to the villages and beaches of the Caribbean where it originated and gives you an opportunity to hear it the way it has been sung and played for the last two hundred years. Like all good field recordings this one has created a record of a sound and preserved it for future generations. Culture has to evolve in order to survive, but its origins should never be forgotten. Recordings like this one ensure that no matter what happens history won't be washed away by the tide of change.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 04:34 AM | Permalink

When Bob Koester started selling old jazz and blues recordings that he scrounged in second hand stores out of a box in his collage dormitory back in the early 1950's I doubt he would have believed you if you told him that years later he would not only still be selling records, but would also be the owner of one of the oldest independent record labels in the United States. After all, his love of jazz and blues notwithstanding, his ambition was to become a cinematographer not a record producer. Yet somehow those boxes under the bed turned into Delmark Records, arguably one of the most influential jazz and blues labels in North America. (For a detailed account of Delmark and Koester's history read the interview I conducted with him about a year ago)

Through buying up the back catalogues of defunct jazz and blues labels and lovingly restoring recordings from their master tapes (and in some cases the piano rolls of player pianos) Delmark has created a catalogue of recordings that traces the history of the music as far back as the 1920's and through all their changes in style. However, even in their early years the company was just as concerned with recording the music of current performers as they were with the past and have continually searched out the talented and innovative indiscriminate of style or age. There aren't many labels who can boast issuing current recordings of Dixieland jazz and releases by members of Chicago's avant-garde jazz community at the same time, but with Delmark you never know what treasures they have in store for you.

I've seen and heard everything from a German traditional jazz band featuring a washboard player performing at an Ace Hardware in downtown Chicago (it had originally been a jazz club in the 1920's where people like Louis Armstrong had played), to stuff so experimental I doubt I'll ever understand it, but that left me strangely moved anyway. Delmark's blues catalogue is just as diverse as it includes everything from barrelhouse piano, country blues from Texas, Alabama, Mississippi, and Tennessee, to live recordings from the stages and floors of Chicago's blues clubs where Buddy Guy still plays and Little Walter once stood.

Even more remarkable is the role that Delmark, and Koester, have played in ensuring the future of blues recordings. Not only did they help establish the Chicago Blues Festival and continue to record blues artists of all stripes either live or in the studio, they have been the training ground for those who have gone on to found important blues labels like Alligator, Earwig and Rooster Blues. For those of you like me who've not been able to see the inside of a Chicago blues club, Delmark's DVD recordings of gigs around the town have brought the blues alive in a way that no other label has. Entering into a neighbourhood bar like B.L.U.E.S through the lens of one of the cameras recording the performance is the next best thing to actually being there to watch Jimmy Burns and his band sweat their way through a riveting set of high energy, electric blues.

In the past few years of reviewing discs I've been fortunate enough to watch and listen to a great many of Delmark's recordings. However that only represents three years of the fifty-five years of material they have produced so each of the two, two disc sets (one CD and one DVD) made to commemorate the label's fifty-fifth anniversary, Delmark: 55 Years Of Jazz and Delmark: 55 Years Of Blues, contain tracks that I've not heard before. As DVD production has only been added to their catalogue in the last few years the CDs are a more accurate representation of the label's history with tracks like Big Joe Williams' "Coffeehouse Blues" dating back to his 1961 release I Got Wild and Speckled Red's " The Right String But The Wrong Yo-Yo" from one of the earliest recordings, The Dirty Dozens of 1956.

On Delmark: 55 Years Of Jazz they've included a little something special extra - some of their re-issues. The 1944 album Rainbow Mist featured a band that contained Coleman Hawkins, Dizzy Gillespie and Max Roach among others, and the track selected, "Bu-De-Dant", has Hawkins taking the lead. Twelve years later Sun Ra released Sun Song, and the track "Brainville" may not follow in exact chronological order from the Hawkins' number, but it comes right after it on this disc and is another recording that Koester and company gave a second life.

When the Chicago avant-garde first started to hit their stride and groups like the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) were forming up, it was Delmark who produced their first two discs. Although there aren't any examples of their work on this release, a couple of their descendants, so to speak, show up on the DVD. Both the Ritual Trio; Kahil El'Zabar (kalimba), Ari Brown (tenor sax), Yosef Ben Israel (bass), and guest Billy Bang (electric violin), and Chicago Underground Trio; Rob Mazurek (cornet, computer, moog source), Chad Taylor (drum kit and percussion), and Jason Ajemian (bass and electronics), are taking jazz to, and beyond, frontiers that twenty years ago nobody would have believed possible.

It's only fitting that both of these bands are represented on the DVD half of the release, as they really have to be seen to be believed. Chronicle, the DVD that the Chicago Underground Trio's track "Power" is taken from, was accompanied by visual effects created by filmmaker Raymond Salvatore Harmon that the music inspired. While this is only an excerpt taken from "Power", its enough for you to see the amazing potential for combing abstract video art with the type of experimental music that the Trio is creating. What's even more amazing is that you're watching it on a disc produced by a commercial company, not public television or a state funded art gallery.

Yet, that's what Delmark Records is all about, making sure that all types of jazz and blues are being recorded, not just what's popular at the moment. Dixieland, or traditional jazz, has fallen out of favour among certain circles in the jazz world, but that doesn't stop Bob Koestler from seeking out and recording bands that are still actively playing it. In our interview (see links earlier) Koestler mentioned that one of the things he really appreciated about the people involved in the AACM was that they understood there's a history to jazz and they weren't afraid to use what had been done before as a springboard for what they were doing.

Listening to either Delmark: 55 Years Of Jazz or Delmark: 55 Years Of Blues you are given a unique perspective of that history as you hear the various styles and means of expression that each genre has gone through over the last fifty-five plus years; a small slice of the nearly century's worth of music the label represents. Names like Anthony Braxton and Roosevelt Sykes might not have shown up in any of the history books you studied while in school, but they are part of the fabric of our society. It's not often you get to not only see and hear history, but also see and hear it being made - yet that's what Delmark Records does with every disc they release, and these two are no exception.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 04:52 AM | Permalink

It's always with a certain amount of trepidation that I take on the task of reviewing anything from a culture other than my own. Much of what I take for granted when it comes to the creative process, are wedded to my cultural background, which means that I lack the knowledge to create a context to place something in if its been created under different circumstances. For all I know the indicators in a piece of music, for example, that I'm used to helping me recognize the emotions being expressed by a composer are different in another culture's music than what I've come to expect from my own.

In the past few years I've been fortunate enough to have some exposure to the culture and philosophy of the Indian sub continent. It has become increasingly obvious to me that just trying to understand some of the basic differences between the two cultures is a task sufficiently large to keep me occupied for the rest of this life, and maybe even the next one or two lifetimes as well. So when I do attempt to review something like Asad Qizilbash's new CD on the Sub Rosa label, Sarod Recital/Live In Peshawar, the first thing I try to do is find out as much as I can about the music and the instrument the performer is playing.

Thankfully Asad Qizilbash has made a career out of not only performing his music at home in Pakistan, but around the world in an attempt to establish bridges between musical traditions. His web site is a valuable resource for anybody wishing to learn about him and his music. One of the first things he makes clear in the page dedicated to talking about the music he plays, is the key role played by one of the differences between our society and his. Indian culture, he says doesn't divorce spirituality from everyday life, so there is a spiritual dimension in all artistic creation. As music, at least traditional classical music, is regarded as a reflection of the divine spirit, the musicians role is often spoken of in terms of a spiritual quest, or sadhana.

While a Raga (the name used to designate a piece of music much like our word opus or concerto) is a scale made up of a minimum of five notes played in both an ascending (Aroha) and descending (Avaroha) direction with two notes (Vadi and Samavadi) acting as the "destination" towards which the Raga flows. (I interpreted that to mean that no matter what you do in the Aroha or Avaroha you must always end with either the Vadi or Samavadi) Ultimately a Raga is created anew each time it is played, as the musician(s) role is to bring what is basically a simple scale to life by drawing upon the his or her own experiences to create an improvisation around the basic scale.

According to Asad the life one lives becomes the essence of the Ragas one sings or plays, which is why a musician must have an amazing sense of self in order to carry out their sadhana. Like any artist, the musician will draw upon personal resources for their inspiration, but unlike most art in the West one of those elements is the artist's awareness of his or her connection with the divine. While its true that a great deal of Western Classical music has been composed as an expression of an artist's adoration of God - think of Beethoven's "Ode To Joy" in his Ninth Symphony - they only emphasis how we compartmentalize spirituality and keep it separate from our day to day existence by not expressing anything else about the composer.

The instrument that Asad plays, a sarod is apparently Persian in origin as its name appears to be derived from the Ancient Persian word for music, saroodh. Unlike many of the stringed instruments associated with Indian classical music the sarod has a goatskin head, like a banjo's, over top of a deep wooden bowl which the fret board is attached to. Of its nineteen strings, four are designated for the melody, four to create the rhythm, and eleven are sympathetic strings which resonate during play. Unlike a guitar where the player depresses the strings with their fingertips, a sarod's strings are depressed with the fingernails. Considering a player is already having to worry about playing both the melody and the rhythm, it begins to sound like an insanely difficult instrument to play.

Listening to Asad Qizilbash performing on the disc Live In Peshawar you would never know that it requires any particular skill to play a sarod as it seems like his fingers skip and fly over the strings without any difficulty. Even more amazing is the fact that this is a live concert performed under less than ideal conditions. For those who haven't been paying much attention to the news in recent years, Peshawar is on the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan and has long been a destination for refugees fleeing the conflict in in Pakistan's northern neighbour, and a target for both the Taliban and the forces opposing them.

Accompanied by tabla player Mustafa Khan, Asad performed three separate ragas that night, "Darbari", "Bihag", and "Piloo", in the space of about an hour. As my frame of reference for this music is limited I concentrated on trying to listen to the way Asad extrapolated upon the base structure of a raga. It was like he played in ever expanding circles that spiralled outwards from a core made up of the ascending and descending notes. After establishing the initial pattern he began playing increasingly complicated improvisations that rolled out like concentric waves of sound from a core point that expanded on each pass.

At times it was difficult to believe that it was only one instrument being played, so distinct were the melodies and the rhythms he was playing. Listening to him you begin to gain some understanding of what is meant by filling the song with the stuff of one's own life, as he sounded like he was pouring ever increasingly amounts of his heart and soul into the music. Perhaps it was the environment that he was playing in colouring my perceptions, but there was a palpable sadness to the music. It was like he was tapping into the feelings of the audience and incorporating it as part of his experiences.

I think the key thing with this music is once you understand the intent behind it, not to let yourself get tied up into knots over trying to discern elements that are beyond your capacity to appreciate. Not being native to the Indian sub-continent, or part of that culture, there are obviously aspects of Asad's performance that will escape us. On the other hand we can still appreciate the emotional intensity and the passion of the music as much as we would in any other person's performance. For, in the end, music is still music, and no matter how alien the instrument being played or how foreign the ideals behind a song's conception might be, we are still able to appreciate it for those things that music stirs within all of us, no matter who we are or where we come from.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 07:01 AM | Permalink

In works of fiction, especially fantasy and romance novels, the old maxim of nice guys finishing last receives a reworking to "nice guys just aren't as interesting". While its true that the really evil characters have diabolic natures that make them fun to read about they're usually too one dimensional to to make and enduring character from. No, since the earliest day's of story telling, the characters that have made reader's hearts of both genders beat a little faster have been those bearing the scars of a tragic past.

Preferably he, or she, should exude the type of sadness that only comes from being the cause of their own misery. They should never simply sit and think, but always brood - lurking in a shadowy part of the room where the occasional flicker of light from a nearby candle or fire can throw their face into momentary, stark, relief or give a glimpse of eyes that send shivers down spines. Ideally they are of course loners who eschew the company of others on the grounds that being cursed as they are, all who they dare to love, or even have a casual drink with, will die in their arms.

It was the 19th century gothic novel where these characters pushed their masses of dark hair, and smouldering good looks into the forefront - Heathcliff of Wuthering Heights fame being the Platonic ideal - and they have been brooding their way into the hearts of millions ever since. Unfortunately the line between archetype and cliche is a thin one, and an endless supply of tall, dark, and morose characters can start to wear on you no matter how attractively they are packaged. So when Michael Moorcock first introduced the character of Elric, the brooding, sickly, and cursed albino scion of Emperors from the lost kingdom of Melnibone, novelty alone made him interesting. Bone white skin, long flowing white hair, and pink eyes may not sound immediately romantic, but make him tall and thin and clothe him entirely in black and have his sickly body sustained by the souls his sword, Stormbringer, steals as it slays, and that puts an entirely new complexion, so to speak, on the matter.

Since his first appearance in the 1960's Elric has been popping up in everything from comics, graphic novels, magazines, to books. As Moorcock primarily wrote the Elric stories with the magazine market in mind, most of them were of short story or novella length. A new series, Chronicles Of The Last Emperor Of Melnibone, has gathered together not only the tales of Elric, but all of Moorcock's work that intersects with Elric and his world. In volume three of the series,Elric: The Sleeping Sorceress, being released by Random House Canada on November 25th/08, two interconnected series of stories have been gathered together. The three novellas that make up the title series, The Sleeping Sorceress are set in the mortal realms, The Young Kingdoms, with Elric in his familiar guise of a soldier of fortune. The second series, originally written in 1972, Elric Of Melnibone, is a prequel that details events that took place when Elric was still Emperor and how he came to be in possession of Stormbringer, his fearsome runesword.

The three parts of The Sleeping Sorceress detail Elric's attempts to track down an evil sorcerer named Theleb K'aarna before he can find him. Jealous of a queen's unrequited love for Elric, Theleb hopes that by destroying the albino he will win the heart of the woman who spurned him. While Elric doesn't really have a problem with dying, in fact there are days he would quite welcome what he hopes would be the lovely embrace of oblivion, he knows that Theleb K'aarna won't be satisfied with only killing Elric, but will seek further vengeance by harming those few Elric loves.

As Elric and his companion Moonglum seek out the evil one they meet up with an unexpected ally, the beautiful Empress of the Dawn, Myshella. Although a long time enemy of Melnibone, she serves the gods of Law while those of Melnibone served Chaos, it is Elric she turns to for help to free her from an enchantment that Theleb K'aarna has placed her under. Her body has been forced into an almost eternal sleep, and although she is able to resist and appear to Elric in his thoughts for now, soon she will succumb to the curse and die.

Moonglum and Elric are able to successfully revive her and with Myshella's aid defeat Theleb not just once but twice over the course of the three books. Unfortunately the last battle, from which Theleb still manages to escape alive, costs Myshella her life. When Elric first set eyes on her he had been struck by her uncanny resemblance to the lost love of his life, Cymoril, and all his old guilt and remorse had been brought to the surface. Worst of all was the fact that no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't resist loving Myshella. Her death only further convinces him that there is a doom upon his head that ensures any who he loves, or who love him, will die a violent and needless death.

Was there ever a time when Elric wasn't a tragic and doom laden figure? In answer to that question Moorcock takes us back in time to when Elric still sat upon the Ruby Throne as Emperor of Melnibone. The only child of the previous Emperor, not only was he born weak and sickly, his birth killed his mother. Needing special herbs and medicines to maintain his strength, he, unlike previous Emperors, spends a great deal of time studying the ancient tomes that have been collected in the nation's libraries. The world is changing outside of the island on which Melnibone is located as mortal men, recent arrivals to the world, are gaining in strength and gradually building kingdoms that might soon threaten the ancient land's existence.

However, in Elric Of Melnibone Elric's most immediate threat lies much closer to home, as his cousin Yrkoon makes no secret of his disdain for his sickly relative and ambition to usurp him. Complicating matters is that one, Elric tends to agree with Yrkoon's assessment that he would be a better Emperor of Melnibone than Elric, and two that Elric is in love with Cymoril, Yrkoon's sister. Ironically Yrkoon points to his own survival as an example of Elric's unfitness to be Emperor. For what occupant of the Ruby Throne worth his salt would let someone like him live?
Yet, we see in these stories an Elric whose life has not yet been burdened by the death of those he loves, and he is happy in the company of his true love, even if he is not content with the cruelty of his people. His studies, which have made him a far more potent sorcerer then any Emperor before his time, have also caused him to question the use of violence and power as a means of exerting control over others. Wouldn't it be better to co-exist with the people of the Young Kingdoms, mortals, then engage in a never ending struggle with them to see who would control the world?

After defeating his cousin's attempts to overthrow him, and in the process claiming the runesword Stormbringer, he returns to Melnibone determined to travel among humans for a year so that he might begin to understand them better. Thinking Yrkoon thoroughly cowed after his second defeat, he not only allows him to live on, but appoints him regent for the year he will be absent. Cymoril begs him not, fearing, rightly so of course, that her brother is even more dangerous now that he has been humiliated. Elric in his pride disagrees, and of course dooms them all; his beloved Cymoril, the Empire, and him. The first two to their death and destruction, and he to a life spent seeking out the means to forget, even if only for the shortest of times, the sorrows that plague him.

The stories in Elric: The Sleeping Sorceress have all been released before, but these new editions being published as part of the series Chronicles Of The Lost Emperor Of Melnibone represent an opportunity for those who have never experienced Elric, or the writing of Michael Moorcock for that matter, to do so in a convenient and elegantly packaged manner. The books also contain some fascinating extras, and in this edition they include; examples of the original art work that accompanied previous publications of these stories, essays by Moorcock on the nature of fantasy and comparing Elric to the Spanish hero El Cid, and the introduction to the graphic novel version of Elric Of Melnibone.

The stories as they appear in this book are the definitive editions, with any edits that magazines or other publications might have made in the name of space restrictions, or whatever, restored by Moorcock. The illustrations by Steve Ellis, which are superb black and white pen and ink drawings, are all new for this publication and are a wonderful compliment to the text. Reading these stories in their new surroundings means even those of us who have followed Elric for years, will feel like we are coming to him fresh. They not only still have the power to entertain and move, they will also give you plenty to think about. That's the real difference between Elric and other heroes, not his lack of pigmentation or the colour of his eyes.

You can pick up a copy of Elric: The Sleeping Sorceress either directly from Random House Canada or an on line retailer like Amazon.ca.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 05:56 AM | Permalink

A sure sign that Christmas is approaching is the sudden proliferation of coffee table books on the market. As sure as holly and mistletoe, each book publisher can be counted on to have one, if not two, of these extravagances available at this time of year. With subject matter ranging from antique farm implements to celebrity photo spreads, the coffee table book is usually long on glossy photos and short on text, as they are meant more for display purposes than reading. (Hence the name "coffee table book"; its meant to be ostentatiously placed on your coffee table for bored family and friends to leaf through when they have nothing better to do during holiday visits)

For the most part I consider these books a waste of space and money. Each time I look at one I think about how many novels by how many authors could have been published for the amount it cost to produce a volume that might not even sell enough copies to pay for itself. Check out the remainder bins each year, or even more telling, those publisher clearing house stores, and you'll find most of the space taken up by last year's coffee table books. Even a year of supposed economic hardship like this one hasn't stopped book publishers from putting out their obligatory Christmas coffee table book.

However, once in a while there will be a publication of this kind where an effort has been made to make it not only eye catching, but also informative, with the text being as important to the book as the photography. When there has also been a deliberate attempt on the part of the publisher to make it as anti-coffee table book in presentation as Atlantic Books have done with the recently released The Clash you've stumbled upon something that your not going to leave around for people to use as a coaster this holiday season, or ever.

The Clash, distributed in Canada by Publishers Group Canada, is not just a pictorial record of a band, its a history of the band written by the band. Drawing upon personal accounts left behind by the late Joe Strummer, interviews with the three other principle members; Mick Jones, Paul Simonon, and Topper Headon, and previously unreleased print material (tour posters, band members' journals and scrap books, newspaper clippings, and tons of photos) The Clash tells the story of the most important band to come out of Britain's 1970's punk scene.

Like a Clash song, the book pulls no punches as the boys aren't shy about admitting to their cock-ups nor hesitant to talk about any of the bad times along with the good times. Using album releases and tours as a framework, the book is laid out chronologically. To start off with each of the four fills in biographical detail of their years BC (Before Clash); growing up, and how they ended up in the band. If you didn't know the guys in The Clash were different from other musicians before, reading what and how they write about themselves clues you in. There's nothing sentimental or mawkish - we were poor but loving - or any of the other bullshit you find in these sorts of things.

In fact Joe and Topper both had fairly middle class lives, with Joe spending most of his childhood in boarding schools as his dad was in the foreign service, and Topper's parents both being school teachers. Mick and Paul did grow up in Brixton, London's rough and tumble working class slum, and each recall a childhood spent playing in abandoned bomb shelters. Both of them came from broken homes - Mick was raised by his grandma, and Paul divided his time between his mom and step-dad and his dad - but neither make a big deal out of it. In fact they are each really quite matter of fact when it comes to reporting on growing up, owning up to when they were shits and all, but never looking back to lay blame or to seek excuses.

From reading those bits, and then everything else each of them wrote about their time in the band, you can't help feeling relieved. They sound like the guys who played and wrote the songs that preached personal responsibility that made The Clash so distinct from other bands. Even straining your ears, and reading between the lines, there's not a hint of anything to contradict that impression. There's no bullshit false modesty about what they accomplished, but neither is there any self aggrandizement where they pretend they were anything more than a rock and roll band.

Along the way the boys dispel a lot of the myths that grew up around them and the Sex Pistols hating each other, putting it down more to antagonism between the groups' respective managers at the time. Bernie Rhodes, The Clash's manager, had worked for Malcolm McLaren, who managed the Pistols, and the impression given is that he was constantly trying to outdo his former boss. So when Malcolm decided to try and make the Pistols more in demand by not having them play, Bernie went the opposite route and had The Clash in the public eye as much as possible. That made for some friction because the Pistols thought it was a deliberate attempt to outshine them.

However, hearing Joe, Mick, and Paul talk about the early days, there was a real sense of camaraderie between the two bands - us against them, and they genuinely liked each other. This is one of the few times I've ever read anything where Sid Vicious comes across as a human, instead of some deranged maniac. Sure a lot of shit happened to him at the end of his days, but that didn't stop The Clash from trying to organize a benefit for him to pay his legal fees when he was arrested for the murder of his girlfriend Nancy. That doesn't sound like the kind of thing you'd do for people you didn't like.

In the end what truly makes this book special, and what differentiates it from the usual run of the mill coffee table book shlock, is the fact it is a Clash creation. From the shocking, fluorescent pink of its cover, to the scatter shot lay out reminiscent of the old punk fanzines that were lovingly cut and pasted and run off at Kinkos in the middle of the night, The Clash by The Clash has about as much in common with other books of its type as the band had with the bloated corporate rock that preceded them. In keeping with Clash history, this is the band that released a triple album, Sandinista for the price of as single, the book is retailing at a price only slightly more than that of a normal hardcover.

At 380 plus pages, some 300 photos and illustrations, and around 60,000 words of text, they've not stinted on material either to make this inexpensive. Informative and visually exciting The Clash manages to capture a good deal of the energy and spirit of what made the band for a period of six years "the only band that matters". Who know whether or not this will be the definitive book on The Clash, but for now, its the only one that matters.

You can pick up a copy of The Clash in Canada at selected bookstores or on line through Chapters Indigo and other on line retailers.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 06:00 AM | Permalink

You have to wonder what it is about Memphis Tennessee that so much great music has come out of that city. Sure there are plenty of other cities which are hot beds of musical talent, but it was two independent record companies out of Memphis that created what are arguably the sounds that have most influenced popular music. In the mid-1950's little Sun Records started putting out records that were a strange hybrid of white country and black blues music. Elvis, Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis, and others integrated the music they grew up playing with the music they grew up hearing, and rock and roll was born.

While Son Records may have taken flak for integrating black and white music, that was nothing compared to what happened a few years latter in the converted movie theatre that Jim Stewert and his sister Estelle Axton turned into a recording studio. When they opened their doors in 1957 it was with the intent of recording country music, however they were located in the heart of Memphis' black neighbourhood. When local musicians came knocking on the door, Jim and Estelle threw it open and welcomed everybody. They may not have quite understood what it was they were hearing, but they knew it was good music and Stax Records was born.

The idea of integrated anything in 1961 was miraculous, yet from the moment the doors opened at Stax it was the music that mattered not the colour of anyone's skin. Although the company went down in flames fourteen years later in 1975, mainly because CBS reneged on a distribution deal, its now being given new life as part of the Concord Music Group. However, for those of you wanting to take a peak into the past at the remarkable rise and fall of the original Stax company, Concord, through the Infinity Entertainment Group, has released Stax DVD.

The Stax DVD is a two disc set made up of two previously released DVDs under one cover; a documentary about the company that originally aired on PBS, Respect Yourself: The Stax Records Story and The Stax/Volt Revue: Live In Norway 1967 concert film co-produced with Reelin' In The Years Productions. The two discs complement each other beautifully, for although there are excerpts of performances during the documentary, it's watching the concert film of how Stax performers were received in Europe that you understand how big this little label from Memphis was. There was no way of knowing of course that the European tour was the apex of the innocent early days of that were marked by colour blindness, but innocence died for a lot of the world the year following the tour, 1968, and Stax wasn't exempted.

Respect Yourself: The Stax Records Story is exhaustive in the details it provides about each era of the company's growth. Through interviews with the original core musicians and staff we hear about how various acts, performers, and songs grew out of the company's habit of keeping the doors open to the whole community. The three surviving members of Booker T. and The MGs, Donald "Duck" Dunn, Booker T. Jones, and Steve Cropper, who were the core musicians for almost every album produced until 1968, recount how people like Otis Redding and Isaac Hayes first became part of the Stax family. It was definitely a case of "if you build it, they will come", as talented performers from the surrounding area were drawn to the old movie theatre.

A distribution deal with Atlantic Records, a deal that brought Sam & Dave into the fold as Atlantic sent them down to record with the Stax team and sing the songs written for them by Isaac Hayes and David Porter, not only got their records played across North America, but arranged the Stax/Volt tour of Europe from which the Stax/Volt Revue Live In Norway 1967 footage was taken. While the Stax performers had produced hit records for the North American market, it wasn't until they toured Europe that they received any sort of public adulation. As Booker T. guitarist and songwriter Steve Cropper said, it might not have been as big as the Beatles coming to America, but for us it felt like it.

In interviews included on the Live In Norway disc Steve and Sam Moore, of Sam and Dave, talk about how amazing it was to play in front of audiences in the thousands and to be treated like stars. If the reactions of the Norwegian audience on the DVD are anything to go by, up and dancing from almost the word go, the tour must have been an incredible experience for all involved. A good thing too, for less then a year later the company would be pushed to the brink of ruin, and although it recovered, it would never be the same again.

According to the documentary the death of Otis Redding in December of 1967 when his plane went down would have been a bad enough blow on its own to have hurt the company. They had lost their biggest and most famous performer after all. However, to make matters worse, the company discovered that the fine print on their distribution contract with Atlantic meant that they had surrendered ownership of any titles that Atlantic had handled for them, and their entire back catalogue of hits and their potential revenue belonged to someone else. Adding insult to injury was the fact that although Sam & Dave had recorded hits like "Hold On" with Stax and Stax musicians, they were still considered signed to Atlantic, and were called home when it looked like the little Memphis label was going under.

While they were still reeling from this double blow, the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. spelled the end of their separation from the reality of the division between black and white people in American society at the time. They had been able to keep the world from the door until then, but the world started to force its way through the door and they could no longer be what they once were. Director of publicity and promotions Al Bell devised a method for the company to survive, but it meant producing twenty some odd albums in a short period of time in order to restore their catalogue and focusing on the black market for the first time. Thanks to the success of Isaac Hayes' Hot Buttered Soul and signing The Staple Singers to the label, Stax was not only able to recover their lost standing economically, but become a major player in, and proponent of, the Black Pride movement that filled the vacuum caused by Dr. King's death.

For a while things were great with Isaac winning an Academy Award for the Stax produced movie Shaft and the success of their concert in Los Angeles for the residents of the ghetto Watts - Wattstax, but the end came bitterly and badly in 1975. Whether it was through mis-management, as their bank claimed when they called in a ten million dollar loan, bad luck, with CBS cancelling their distribution deal and denying Stax much needed revenues, or whether the motivations behind both CBS's and the bank's decisions were racially motivated, what the documentary makes clear is the end result was the death of Stax.

The music survived as Fantasy records bought the back catalogue and continued to reissue them, but that must have seemed like small consolation to Jim Stewart who lost everything he owned in an attempt to save the company. Today if you go to Memphis you'll find that the original Stax studio has been rebuilt at its old location and right next door to it stands the Stax Academy of music where neighbourhood kids are being taught music by the musicians who made Stax what it was in its hey-day. As part of the Concord Music Group the Stax label is once again recording and releasing new soul recordings and the legacy of Otis Redding, Booker T. And The MGs lives on.

Watching the concert footage from Stax/Volt Revue: Live In Norway 1967, even in spite of the spotty sound quality, one can't help but be blown away by the performances. Listening to Booker T. And The MGs playing the opening bars to "Green Onions", watching Sam & Dave propel themselves into orbit, and feeling the power and charisma of Otis Redding is as much a testimony to the importance of Stax to popular music as anything anybody could say. While the documentary half of the Stax DVD set, Respect Yourself: The Stax Records Story does a great job in tracing the company's history, and does a really good job of letting the viewer make their own decisions about its chequered past, it occasionally seems to lose focus and wander away from what made Stax really important, the music.

Together, the two discs that make up The Stax DVD make a convincing argument that if Jim Stewart and Estelle Axton hadn't opened their recording studio and started Stax in 1961, popular music would have missed out on something incredibly special. In fact it's impossible to imagine what pop music would sound like if the doors to that movie cinema in downtown Memphis had never opened.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 07:03 AM | Permalink

Mention Peru and most people will think of either the Andes Mountains or the Amazon river, the two great natural attractions of that South American country. Both regions were once home to great civilizations that were decimated by the coming of the Spanish conquistadors. The quest for gold and the souls of heathens followed by civilization's encroachment on their homelands via the mining industry in the mountains and the destruction of the Amazon rain forest has reduced their numbers even further. Now, like other nations native to the Western hemisphere, the Shipibo and the Aztecs live in poverty.

However, in one of those strange quirks of fate that happens on occasion when a collision of cultures occur, the music and culture of the Shipibo was given a new lease on life and is now being brought to an international audience. The strange journey started in the 1970's and is tied up in the history of the musical hybrid of Brazilian carimbo, Columbian cumbia, American surf guitar, psychedelic organ, and native cultural influences known as chicha music.

Chicha's origins lie in the poor working class towns dotted throughout the interior of Peru whose population were a mix of Shipibo and workers brought in to labour in the mines and industries that were final death knell for the native way of life. Ironically instead of the natives being assimilated by the invading culture the reverse happened and a great many of the workers embraced aspects of the native culture as their own. In the small town of Pucallpa a group of those had formed into a band that did the occasional gig playing a mix of jazz and dance standards.

When the original leader, Juan Wong Paredes, of Juaneco Y Su Combo gave way to his son, Juan Wong Popolizio, the band's direction took a radical turn. Juan junior traded in his accordion for the electric organ and hired Noe Fachin, a guitar player with a penchant for native pharmaceuticals. It was Fachin's interest in indigenous folklore and his love for the wah-wah pedal that supplied the first stage in the development of the band's new sound. Thanks to short wave radio the band was introduced to the carimbo and cumbia rhythms that were to become the beat that carried them to popularity.

The story almost came to a tragic end when five of the band members, including Fachin the group's primary composer, died in a plane crash in 1977, but Juan Wong persevered and kept the band going. Now entering its third generation, Juan Wong has died and the group is now being led by his son Mao Wong Lopez, Juaneco Y Su Combo's music is now available to an international audience for the first time thanks to the Brooklyn based Barbes Records who have just released Masters Of Chicha 1 featuring sixteen of the band's tracks from their 1970's hey-day.

The first thing you notice in almost every song is one of the two anomalies that give chicha music its distinctive sound; the sustained warble of a wah-wah guitar or the slightly jarring and hypnotic notes produced by early electric organs. Propelling the music to almost frenetic heights are the staccato sounds of various percussion instruments rapping out the high speed Latin beats that defy you to not dance. Over top of this odd, but compelling melange of sounds, lyrics that draw upon the folklore and traditions of the Shipibo are sung, chanted, whooped, and exclaimed.

While the majority of the band weren't native, they normally performed dressed in Shipibo costume and embraced aspects of the culture with enthusiasm. Fachin's nickname of El Brujo, the witch doctor, wasn't just an idle joke as the chief songwriter made frequent use of ayahuasca, a hallucinogenic drug prepared as a tea used by Shipibo shaman, and claimed to have received his inspiration for a number of their songs while under its influence. You can hear the native influence in the lyrics of songs such "Me Robaron Mi Runamula" which tells the story of a half mule, half woman creature of Shipibo myth and "Vacilando Con Ayahuasca", where a woman's voice repeatedly asks for more "tea" as she ascends further and further into a state of ecstasy.

In some ways the music of Juaneco Y Su Combo is a predecessor to today's house music, specifically trance, with its tendency to repeat the same rhythmic pattern hypnotically. Yet unlike most of today's music, these songs have an emotional texture that brings them to life in ways that you don't often hear in modern electronic music. Of course there are also the tracks where the enthusiasm of the musicians is such, and the beat so strong, that no matter how repetitive it may sound, you'd never find yourself drifting away into another world.

Juaneco Y Su Combo aren't the only chicha band to have come out of the Peruvian countryside, but they are credited with being one of the originators of the sound, and the band who first really popularized it. So it's only fitting that they are also the first band to be given an international release. As odd as reading about it may sound, the music is infectious, fun, and never boring. If you're looking to hear something new, than this is the band for you. I can honestly say that I doubt you'll have come across anything quite like Juaneco Y Su Combo before.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 06:34 AM | Permalink

When American jazz came to Europe in the 1920's it inspired a new type of night club performance. Cabaret, was a mixture of live theatre, burlesque, and a musical revue with featured vocalists. If you've ever seen either The Blue Angel starring Marlene Dietrich or Cabaret starring Liza Minelli, you'll have a good idea as to the kind of performances that were seen in those places that presented cabarets. Those who sang in cabarets were encouraged to sing in as suggestive a manner as possible, drawing upon the sensuality inherent in jazz and blues to make it as sensual as possible.

Perhaps because cabaret style performances were driven in part by the desperation of the times, an attempt to cram as much fun as possible into a short period of time before the inevitable war, it did not survive WW2. After the war, with all the competition for the entertainment dollar, and the advent of accessible home entertainment, fewer were willing to take the financial risk involved in mounting such lavish entertainment.The closest thing to it that we have today is the plastic sexuality of the Las Vegas show.

Another reason for the demise of cabaret has been the compartmentalization of popular music which has led to there being fewer and fewer performers with the skill to perform the variety of music it required of a singer. There aren't many vocalists who have the ability to not only sing the styles of music required, but have the ability to put on a show as well. That doesn't mean there aren't any out there, and if her newest self-produced and distributed release, Pages In My Diary, is anything to go by, Margot Blanche not only has the abilities to sing a variety of styles, she appears to have the required panache for the showmanship side of things as well.

Judging by the images that are included of her in the booklet accompanying the CD she has created a persona for this disc modelled after Varga girls and other classic pin up images from the 1940s. The twelve tracks that are included on the disc, all of which she has at least co-authored, contain elements that are reminiscent of that era, along with more contemporary stylings. She has even gone so far as to include production values on some of the numbers that generate the sound of a song being heard through the thin compressed sound of an old mono, tube radio to help re-create an authentic atmosphere.

If that weren't enough for us to get the idea of what she was trying to accomplish there are even some songs which include samplings of singers like Bessie Smith, Cab Calloway, and the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra. However, least you think she is merely trying to recreate the past her songs also contain elements of hip hop, soul, and R&B and the occasional sample of more contemporary performers like Isaac Hayes and The Meters. While this is beginning to sound like a hideous pastiche of music that will end up a confusing mess, that estimation fails to take into account Margot Blanche's skill as a both a performer and a composer.

She is not only gifted with a voice that has the range to work comfortably at either end of the scale and well beyond a single octave, it's a voice with an exceptional amount of character and the versatility to handle any of the formats she attempts. From the hard edged, street smart voice required for the hip-hop/rap flavour of the title track, "Introduction (Pages Of My Diary)", the teasing sounds of "Material Love", to the genuine soulfulness of "Beautiful Soul", she is able to accommodate all the styles she attempts with ease and naturalness.
Where many people who attempt multiple styles of music within one recording come across as unconvincing or insincere, Margot Blanche is not only able to carry them all off with equal aplomb, but does so sounding like she was born to sing that particular genre. While in part this is due to her ability as a vocalist, it's also a tribute to her talents as a performer. Instead of merely assuming an attitude that would be appropriate for a song, she goes a lot deeper and creates a character who fits what's being expressed in the material.

Of course that makes a lot of sense once you understand that Pages Of My Diary is not merely a collection of love songs. Think of it as a collection of diary entries, each of which are a reflection of the different approaches one person could take to the thorny and complicated subject of love. It's as if Margot has opened the pages of a diary where she's allowed different personalities to hold forth on what they think about love and what they desire in a relationship. In that light, Pages From My Dairy becomes a one woman show about love with songs serving as the script instead of monologues.

Margot Blanche is a gifted singer, a creative songwriter, and a talented producer, with a flair for theatricality which make the songs on her CD Pages Of My Diary not only interesting to listen to, but turns the disc into a mini piece of musical theatre. The art of cabaret may not be as dead as I thought after all.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 03:45 AM | Permalink

It seem ironic to be writing about a television show that deals with the issue of the glass ceiling women run into in the professional world, when the same glass ceiling exists for female actors. Look around and tell me how many really good roles there are for women in either film or television that aren't dependant on their looks and or age. How well a woman fills a t-shirt or a bikini seems to be more important to the screen than how well she can create a character or whether she can deliver a line convincingly.

While there has been some progress made in the past few years, you've still less chance of seeing Dame Judi Dench showing up on your television screen or film than you do the latest bimbo from the pop charts. Even when the do create roles for women, the tendency is to latch onto a successful type and stick to it. How many more series are we going to see featuring a driven woman who has been so desperate to succeed in her career that she has no personal life, or even worse has made a right hash of it. Not only has she had to struggle to survive in a "man's world", but there's always at least one man bitterly resentful of her position and determined to bring her down if its the last thing he does.

If I were to tell you the above scenario was in regards to a British television series that focused on the trials and tribulation of a senior police officer whose personal life tends to spill over into her work, your first guess would probably be the former Helen Mirren vehicle Prime Suspect. Well you wouldn't be too far off, because The Commander comes from the pen of the same person, Lynda La Plante. Acorn Media has just released a box set of the series' first season with The Commander: Set 1's four DVDs each containing an entire episode.

Amanda Burton plays forty-something Commander Clare Blake who after twenty years on the force has risen to become the highest ranking woman in New Scotland Yard; Serious Crime Group Commander and head of the Murder Review Team. Even under normal circumstances both these jobs would be considered high profile and high pressure, but with her being the first woman to ever hold either position the ante is upped even higher. For not only does she have to deal with the public scrutiny that comes with the job, there are those within the force who can't wait for her to slip up and are constantly eyeing her every move on and off the job.

Unfortunately Clare is her own worst enemy and in the first episode, "Entrapment" allows herself to be placed in a compromising position that not only threatens her career, but could put her life in danger. Even if she comes through this unscathed the repercussions won't die down overnight, as the senior staff don't look fondly upon officers who become involved with suspects in a murder investigation. James Lampton has just been released from prison where he served twelve years of a murder sentence. While inside he wrote a book about his rehabilitation and the Commander is very surprised to receive a request to write a forward for the book, as she had been the arresting officer on the Lampton case. However, she agrees to do so, under the impression that the book is only going to distributed among prison officials.

Imagine her surprise when she discovers the book has been published and is climbing to the top of the best seller list, but she decides not to make a fuss because all the proceeds from sales of the book are being donated to a victims of crime charitable organization. Still when two murders are committed with similar MO's (Modus Operandi) to that of Lampton, and he's picked up for questioning by the police at a book signing, it can't help but be a little embarrassing for Clare.

Which is what causes her to become suspicious of the officer in charge of the case, Detective Inspector (DI) Hedges, for she is currently looking into the shooting of a civilian by police a year ago that Hedges had investigated and cleared all the officers involved. The problem is that the family of the victim have filed civil suit against the Police, and all evidence has to be checked and double checked - including a the video from a security camera that captured the whole event and that somehow didn't make it into the initial reports investigation.

While up to this point the show had proven to be well written and interestingly scripted with a few neat plot twist, its credibility takes a serious beating when Clare begins an affair with Lampton. While she's undoubtedly lonely and vulnerable, I found it hard to credit that any senior police officer would become involved with anybody who has the remotest chance of being a suspect in a murder case. This is especially true of a woman officer who has managed to rise to the top as Clare has, meaning she, even more than her male colleagues, would have learned what sort of behaviour could ruin a person's career.

The fact that she had been warned by friends and superiors alike to keep her distance from Lampton as soon as he was charged because of her connection to him from having written the forward to his book and goes ahead with the affair shows the type of "error in judgement" that would see any police officer in trouble. Sure, she's only human, but any woman who has fought her way to the top and dealt with the type of political bull shit she'd have dealt with on the way up the ladder, would know how that type of slip up could be used against her and that there are plenty willing and prepared to do so.

If the writers are serious about wanting us to sympathize with Clare Blake and identify with her struggles as a "woman in a man's world" they have a strange way of doing it. That's not the type of behaviour that any police force would tolerate of any officer man or woman. By trying to mitigate on her behalf by making the officer in charge of the Lampton investigation a slime ball with a vendetta against her, making it seem like she's being set up, in no way changes the fact that he's right when he says that he doesn't have to do anything as she's bringing herself down.

While I applaud any efforts made to provide good roles on television or film for female actors, and especially those which depict women in what are still considered non-traditional careers, it would be nice if it could be done without turning a very serious situation into a cliche or a cheesy soap opera. The glass ceiling is very real in all areas of the work force, and in what were traditionally male dominated professions like policing, the military, and fire fighting it's especially true. However, creating a formula for television serials out of a real social problem doesn't do either the situation or those who are actually struggling with it, any justice.

When Prime Suspect was first televised some twenty years ago, it was a very real and gritty piece of work that was also groundbreaking in its depiction of a mid level female police officer and her struggle to advance in her career. The Commander, in comparison, is merely turning over the same old soil and compounding its failings by undermining the lead character's credibility for the sake of soap opera plot lines. The fact that they've chosen to combine that with lurid crimes scenes complete with the naked bodies of rape victims makes the whole show reek of sensationalism and exploitation.

The DVD box set The Commander: Set 1 comes with special features that include interviews with the creator of the series and the actor, Amanda Burton, who plays Clare Blake, and a featurette about the supporting cast - none of which contain any surprises. The production values are top notch, Dolby stereo sound and widescreen picture, make it as professional as anything you'd see in the theatres. Unfortunately there's nothing any of those features can do to save the series from the flaws in the script and the overall concept that make it at best a poor imitation of other shows of a similar nature.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 03:56 AM | Permalink

I don't normally watch what are known as police procedurals, television shows which involve a crime being committed that follow the police officers through the lengthy process of uncovering who done it. Truth be told I don't usually watch television, as although I own one, it's not hooked up to either cable, satellite, or even an old fashioned antenna. Instead its sole purpose is to act as a video monitor so my wife and I can watch DVDs. So on the occasions that I end up reviewing the box set of a television series, I don't have much that I can use as a basis for comparison save for memories of what television was like in the 1970's and 80's or other material that I've watched in the same format.

In the past couple of years I've taken advantage a few times of some of the box sets offered by Acorn Media of the higher end of British police procedurals; Prime Suspect starring Helen Mirren, Cracker with Robbie Coltrane, and Rebus with Ken Stott as the irascible Scottish detective created by Ian Rankin. Each of these series were distinguished not only by superlative writing but by the performances of their lead actors. The problem is of course that material like this tends to spoil you for most of what's on offer, and it's going to take a pretty special show to match up to any of the above programs.

You wouldn't think to read the description, disillusioned police officer transfers from London's Scotland Yard to the North East of England to fight crime among the pig farmers and fishermen in the early 1960's, that George Gently would stand up in toe to toe competition with any of the heavyweights mentioned above. I mean, it sounds like a cross between Green Acres and All Creatures Great And Small more than anything else, let alone a show that could generate any of the intensity or suspense that makes a good cop show work.

Well, if the three episodes that are included in the box set George Gently: Series 1 distributed by the good folks at Acorn Media are anything to go by, this series is every bit as good as its more established brethren. Not only are the scripts intelligent, and the plots intriguing enough to be interesting without be convoluted to the point of incomprehension, the show's main character is every bit as fascinating as any cop whose appeared on the small screen.

Commander George Gently, played by Martin Shaw, is an incorruptible officer in surrounded by officers at all levels who are on the take. When he starts pushing his investigations into the rot in London's police force a little harder than he should someone sends him a warning: his wife is killed by a hit and run driver right in front of him. When the man he suspects of having been behind that murder is spotted at the funeral of a young man who died under suspicious circumstances in the North East of England, Durham County, he asks for the chance to take over the case.

One of the nice touches in this first episode, "Gently Go Man", was that instead of us meeting George's new colleagues when he arrives at his new assignment, we travel on ahead of him and are introduced to both some of the locals who are involved with the crime and the police officers who are investigating it. So we get to form our own impressions of Detective Sergeant (DS) John Bacchus, Lee Ingleby, who ends up assisting Gently on this first case. Young, ambitious, and a little slick, he drives a MG, it appears that Bacchus is more than likely to get on the wrong side of Gently who is decidedly old school. Yet, at the same time we see that he is a good cop, and really cares about what he does, even if he's not too concerned about the how's, just the results.

Each of the three episodes, "The Burning Man" and "Bomber's Moon" are two and three respectively, check in at just under ninety minutes, which allows plenty of time to not only develop plot, but establish the characters who will be appearing in them. In "Go Gently Man" they take full advantage of the time to not only establish the characters and develop the plot, but to also set the atmosphere of the times. England in 1964 was going through a social upheaval, and there was a real changing of the guard happening. Those who were born during the war are just starting to come of age and aren't content to be like the generation before them - those who fought in the war.

Yet, while Gently is a veteran of WW2 and Bacchus has only vague memories of it, the writers don't play up the obvious areas of conflict. In fact Bacchus' decision to join the police makes him something of an anomaly among his peers as it's seen as being very conformist. At the same time he's enough a product of his generation that he's considered a bit unconventional for a police officer. While this makes his character that much more interesting, we discover as the episodes continue, and we get to know both characters better, that Gently is actually the more liberal and more forgiving of the two. He can understand someone making a mistake, and is willing to overlook minor transgressions in most cases. That the writers resisted going for the obvious, and cliched, approach to the characters is just one example of what marks this series as special.

However, as we learn in "The Burning Man", when a Special Branch agent (sort of like Homeland Security) shows up and starts throwing his weight around and interfering in Gently's investigation, he has no tolerance for people in authority who abuse their power. "We're supposed to be different from them" he says at one point, referring to those who use violence to get their way, Of course that's sorely put to the test for him when he confronts the man who ordered his wife's death, or when he comes into contact with evidence of police corruption. While he's able to resist the call of vengeance in some occasions, there are others when he does let his anger get the best of him.

While the second episode, "The Burning Man", involves gun running and the I.R.A. making it a bit more sensational then the normal police murder, each of the cases are solved through the boring process of a slow investigation. Every so often Gently has to reign in his younger colleague, but together they make a good team. In fact the relationship between the two characters, and the way each actor plays them, makes for some very funny as well as tense moments. They don't instantly become buddy buddy, and even after three episodes they are still getting on each nerves, but that only serves to make what's being depicted all the more realistic.

There's not much in the way of special features included with the three discs of George Gently: Series 1, but what there is are interesting. They've included text interviews with both Martin Shaw and Lee Ingleby where they both talk about what appealed to them about the script and analyse their characters. The text is easy to read, which is a nice change, and both men offer some interesting insights, so they are worth reading. As this is a current television series, the second and third episodes aired last spring in England, the sound quality is very good, Dolby Digital, and the widescreen picture is of the best quality.

George Gently: Series 1 contains the first three episodes of what looks to be another great police procedural series from England. I know they are filmming more episodes and I'm interested to see how the characters continue to develop, and what other interesting plot lines the writers can come up with. One thing I'm sure of, if they continue to produce episodes of the same quality that came in this box set, it will be the equal of any that have come out of England before it.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 05:02 AM | Permalink

Walking through a graveyard in the middle of the day, nobody is going to be overly disturbed as it's much like wandering through a park. In fact there are some graveyards in the world where thousands of visitors flock each year to wander their confines to search for the celebrities like Jim Morrison or Oscar Wilde who are buried there. However, let it be after dark and that very same graveyard is apt to be deserted.

While some might ascribe it to a fear of the supernatural, I think the real reason for people avoiding graveyards at night is because they unite two of mankind's most primal fears: death and the dark. Our fear of the dark is a hangover from the days before we discovered fire and were at the mercy of the many denizens of the night who looked upon us as snack material. While we've devised many belief systems to try and answer the question of what happens to us after we die, there's never been a shred of proof offered that any of them are true. Death, for all the promises of pie in the sky made by so many religions, is the the great unknown, the great darkness that no fire we possess can disperse.

So there aren't that many of us that would think of graveyards as a sanctuary from danger, but in his latest release, The Graveyard Book, from Harper Collins, Neil Gaiman has done just that. Replete with illustrations by his look time collaborator Dave McKean, The Graveyard Book offers a behind the scenes peak at what happens to us after we are laid to rest as it tells the story of the night the inhabitants of one graveyard became involved with the affairs of the living and the events that ensued in the years following.

The story opens with death, as befits a novel set in a graveyard. Thankfully the deaths are all ready accomplished when we enter the story, for they were the violent deaths a husband, wife, and daughter at the hands of a knife wielding killer. However the killer, a mysterious man named Jack, is still on the prowl for the survivor of the house's inhabitants, a baby boy. Yet when he reaches the top floor nursery where the crib lies waiting, it's only to find it empty and the boy vanished.

Sniffing out his trail, for like all good hunters our man Jack follows his prey more by scent than by sight, he follows it out of the house onto the street which leads up the hill to a graveyard. Although he could swear he smelt the baby's scent leading into the cemetery, once there he loses the trail. In fact, all of a sudden he realizes that he's come in the completely wrong direction and there's no reason for him to be in the graveyard at all. The boy he decides must have gone down the hill, not up, and anyway, who or what would a baby find shelter with in a graveyard. No, somehow or other Jack must have followed the wrong scent, and he heads off into the night.

Of course if Jack had been able to see properly he might have noticed the great amount of consternation that had gripped the graveyard's residents as ghosts from as far back as Roman times debated the practical issues involved with them raising a live child. The real sticking point is how are they to provide for the child - none of them can leave the graveyard in order to gather the food he'll need to survive. It's only Silas, the graveyard's only undead resident, offering his services as guardian to the boy until he's grown, and a timely reminder from the Lady on the Grey, the one all the dead know as it's her and her great horse that wait for us at the end of our days, that the dead should know charity, that finally sway them to offer the little tyke Freedom of the Graveyard.

So it is that Nobody Owens, Bod for short, came to live in the graveyard at the top of the hill. As it was the Mrs. Owens who promised the shades of little Bod's parents that she would protect their son, she and Mr. Owens became his Mother and Father and he took their surname. As for his first name, well as Mrs. Owens put it, "he don't look like nobody but himself", and Silas agreed that's indeed who he looked like and named him appropriately.

When next we meet young Bod he's five years old and like all young people is full of questions about what he sees around him. Primary among them is why can't he leave the graveyard, and how do I do what he or she just did, and who lives in which plot. The answers he receives from the ghosts are most unsatisfactory, so he turns to the mysterious Silas for answers to his questions in the hopes of receiving a straight answer. So it is that Bod finds out that he is different from the rest of the graveyards inhabitants, and that things like Fading, Dreamwalking and Haunting don't come naturally to him. It's also when he discovers that there is something or someone outside the graveyard who means to do him harm. Any trip he takes outside the graveyard could result in his whereabouts being discovered and his death.

There is something about Neil Gaiman's writing that no matter the subject, and no matter how scary things might be getting, there's the sense that he's not trying to exploit your fears like other writers who deal with the supernatural. There's such a feeling of awe and wonder to his writing that you can't help but feel entranced by all that's going on in the story. That's the case again with The Graveyard Book as we wander around with Bod meeting the various inhabitants of his graveyard home and watching him grow from a young boy to a young adult. In fact it's the human world that's the scariest as the people out there, from teenagers to adults, are decidedly unpredictable and apt to act nastily without any rhyme or reason.

Gaiman's other great gift is his ability to make all of his characters instantly believable no matter who or what they are. From Bod to Silas, and all the inhabitants of the graveyard, each character has such a distinct personality that as readers we are able to see them in our mind's eye almost immediately upon meeting them. While the world they inhabit might be completely alien to us, after all there aren't probably many among his readers who are terribly familiar with life in a graveyard, we quickly accept their reality as normal because they are so real.

While Gaiman doesn't need much assistance in generating atmosphere in his stories, Dave McKean's illustrations add that little extra something that ensures we remember the other worldly quality of the environment the book takes place in. While his drawings aren't necessarily frightening, they do remind us of the differences between Bod and his friends and neighbours by representing their physical differences. For while Bod is always drawn as a relatively solid person, there is something always ethereal about the way the other characters are depicted.

The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman with illustrations by Dave McKean is a delightful mix of fantasy and mystery that will entertain readers of all ages. Like the best fairy tales there are moments that are scary enough to make us worry about the fate of Nobody Owens, but there are an equal, if not greater number, of magical moments that transport us out of our world and make us forget our mundane reality. What could be better than that.

The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman and illustrated by Dave McKean can be purchased directly from Harper Collins or your local book seller.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 04:05 AM | Permalink

When the world first started hearing the term "ethnic cleansing" coming out of the Balkan countries that made up the former Yugoslavia, once they recovered from the shock of understanding what that reality meant, probably their next reaction was surprise. Where had such a large community of European Muslims come from and what was the basis for the amount of hatred being directed towards them? To properly understand that you would have to travel back close to five hundred years to when the Ottoman Empire was carving its way through the Balkan states in an attempt to follow the Danube river all the way into Europe.

Like all wars where religion is a factor, the ones between the Christian defenders of the various Balkan countries and the Muslim Turkish invaders were pursued with a certain amount of fanaticism on both sides. While some countries were able to mount a fair resistance and even repulse their would be conquerers, others weren't so lucky. While the Ottoman Empire would have tolerated other religions under its rule, there would have also been advantages to converting to Islam in terms of standard of living and comfort. However those who did would have been considered traitors and betrayers by their neighbours, and history doesn't get forgotten easily in some parts of the world. Five hundred years after the fact people were forced to pay with their lives for the so called sins of their ancestors.

I'm sure most people have heard the tale of Vlad The Impaler, who supposedly slew hundreds of Turks by impaling them on stakes, and is the purported model for a certain blood sucking fiend from Transylvania. While Vlad may not have actually drank his victim's blood, there is no denying that the war between the Ottoman Empire and the various Balkan states they invaded were bloody and protracted affairs. Instead of engagements in the field, where the superior numbers of the Empire would prevail, key castles and strongholds were defended, with the result that long and bloody sieges were common. In his recently translated book The Siege, published by Random House Canada, Albanian author, Ismail Kadare, takes us back to the 15th century to witness a Turkish army's attempts to break through the walls of an Albanian castle .

For many years Albania had been completely cut off from the West, and even when the rest of the Warsaw Pact countries were following Russia's lead and throwing off their communist leadership, Albania remained a sealed book. It's only been since the upheaval in the Balkans that we have had our the opportunity to see what was hidden for all of those years, including the work of writers like Ismail Kadre. The Siege was first published in Albania in 1970, and this edition is actually a translation of a French edition released in 1994 that is now considered the definitive version of the text.

For the majority of The Siege we are camped with the Turkish army outside the walls of the castle under attack and we are party to the innermost thoughts of everybody from the Pasha who is leading the army to the four members of his harem that he brought with him from home. A good deal of the time though, we are witnessing the fighting and life in the camp through the eyes the campaign's official chronichler, Mevla Celebi. Even before the actual battle begins he discovers he is faced with a problem of trying to come up with adjectives that will be suitably impressive to describe the important personages involved in assault.

He must of course reserve the more ornate one for his commander in chief, but what to do about all the other members of the War Council. For the truth of the matter is the majority of them just aren't designed to be recorded for posterity; one has a sty, another asthma, and yet another a humped back. It's as if all the officers of the army were formed in such a way as to make it harder to record his chronicle. Unfortunately it soon becomes obvious to him that those are going to be the least of his worries when it comes to recording events. For instead of being the quick and decisive victory that everyone was anticipating, after the first attack is successfully repulsed by the defenders, both sides have to hunker down for a long siege.

While there is a great deal of finger pointing and acrimony among the besiegers, (the spell caster is put to death, and the astrologer is sent to help dig an underground passage into the castle as punishment for their failings during and before the first assault) up in the castle they're not feeling too relieved. They know this was only the first of many assaults, and they have to be prepared for any sort of subterfuge and trickery on the part of those arrayed against them. In the past water supplies have been poisoned and animals infected with diseases have been released over the walls so they know they must be vigilant.

The carnage as described by Kadare in the book is horrible as wave after wave of attackers are killed with boiling oil, or set on fire by being covered in pitch and having torches dropped on them. As the chronichler wanders the camp he sees countless numbers of men horribly disfigured and crippled by the wounds they have taken. His mind reels from the smells and the sights of the carnage, as well as the intrigues that continue apace among the captains of war who are supposed to be vanquishing the Empire's foes.

Yet they seem to be more intent on preserving their status within the hierarchy of the camp, and even more importantly, the court back home, than on winning the war. In fact as soon as it looks like they will have to retreat - back to the Empire - they begin to do their best to make sure they start distancing themselves from the Pasha in charge of the army. Like jackals and hyenas they circle their wounded overlord and look for some advantage that will serve them when they are home and off the cursed plains of Albania.

Kadare does a great job in describing the chaos of battle through the eyes of the Pasha as he sends wave after wave of men to crash against the walls of the castle, and we realize that he has no idea of what is going on at the walls. While it looks like the Turkish army is making advances, the reality is that they aren't able to breach the wall and are repulsed time after time until they are no longer able to sustain the siege. While you'd think, as the book is written by an Albanian, we would be feeling a great deal of joy that the author's historical countrymen were able to repulse their invader, instead we can't help feeling sorry for the Pasha. Kadare has been at great pains to ensure that the people on both sides of the wall are shown as human beings, not monsters. We've spent far too much time among the Turkish soldiers, getting to know various ones among them, to not have formed genuine attachments to people like the Chronicler of the battle.

Somehow Ismail Kadare is even able to inject a little humour into the proceedings as well, for he has a fine sense of the ridiculous on top of everything else. Some of the scenes of camp life, the gossip between the soldiers for instance, are very funny, but also a little sad. For it's here you realize these are just simple men taken from their farms to fight in a war they don't really have any understanding of.

The Siege by Ismail Kadare takes you into the heart of war at its most intense and finds something quite extraordinary, the human beings on both sides of the conflict. While there is nothing pretty in the surroundings, there is a haunting beauty to this book in its depiction of men who don't surrender to brutality or fear in spite of the ease which those around them are doing so. When you finish reading the book, the main feeling you have is one of regret; regret for all the lives lost, and regret for the fact that men will insist upon trying to kill each other for something as trivial as power and glory.

The Siege can be purchased directly from Random House Canada or from an on line retailer like Amazon.ca.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 05:47 AM | Permalink

If you've ever attended a performance of a classical ballet in North America, then chances are you're familiar with the work of George Balanchine. From The Nutcracker to Swan Lake George Balanchine choreographed close to the entire classical canon during his life. However he was more than just a choreographer, as Balanchine was responsible for re-defining how classical ballet was danced the world over.

Until 1933 Balanchine worked and lived in Europe, leaving his native Soviet Union when he was twenty, and was exposed to, and learned from, some of the great geniuses of ballet including the great Ballet Russes of Monte Carlo. In 1933 he immigrated to the United States, at the invitation of Lincoln Kirstein, where he would spend the rest of his life perfecting his vision of what dance should be through the company he and Kirstein established, the New York City Ballet.

After a few fits and starts, the New York City Ballet didn't really get off the ground until after WWll, they established themselves as one of the premier companies in the world. Twice since the company was established, in 1962 and 1972, Balanchine took them to Russia to give performances where they were received enthusiastically. So it wasn't too surprising to find the company heading to St. Petersburg in 2003 to perform for a week's run at the world renowned Marinsky Theatre in Balanchine's native city in honour of the hundredth anniversary of his birth.

On November 11th/2008 City Lights Media is releasing Bringing Balanchine Back, a documentary made about the 2003 visit on DVD. Originally aired on PBS stations, the DVD version of the documentary includes forty minutes more footage then was originally broadcast on television. Narrated by Kevin Kline, the film follows the company from its rehearsals in New York in preparation for the tour to its final curtain call at the end of their week long run in St. Petersburg.

Not only does Bringing Balanchine Back tell the story of the company's tour to Russia, it also gives the viewer a fascinating look into the backstage world of professional classical ballet at the world class level. We quickly see there is nothing at all glamourous about being a ballet dancer as their days are spent in physically demanding classes followed by equally gruelling rehearsals. As current Ballet Master, and former principle dancer, Peter Martins notes, nobody goes into ballet for fame or wealth, you do it because you love it.

We follow one young dancer who is scheduled to perform her first principle role during the tour, as she frantically tries to learn the steps for her part. Two weeks before the tour she had suffered a leg injury that had prevented her from rehearsing and she is struggling to make up for lost time. The cameras follow her into the final rehearsal with the full cast before her big night, and it's obvious she's not ready a she makes mistake after mistake. In the end the missed rehearsal time was too much to overcome and she is pulled from her lead role. She tries to put a brave face on it, she will still be principle dancer in another ballet latter in the tour, but you can hear her heartbreak in the way her voice trembles as she talks about it.

Of course there's also the whole logistical nightmare of transporting a ballet company and all the sets they are planning on using for their performances halfway around the world. The technical people have a day before the run starts to "hang" their sets (Most theatres use what's known as a fly system where sets are hung on rigging high overhead and lowered down onto the stage by a series of pulleys) and focus the lighting to fit their requirements. However if they think they've got problems, that's nothing compared to what faces the music director as she has been given only a week to teach the orchestra the scores for the ballets they don't know.

Facing these types of obstacles, not to mention that the entire corps de ballet is suffering from jet lag, it seems a miracle that they are able to perform, let alone perform up to the standards that are expected of them by a Russian audience. Unlike North America where ballet is still considered something a little suspect by the majority of people, in Russia its as much a part of their cultural heritage as sports are over here. Yet somehow, as is always the case, the dancers rise to the occasion and perform wonderfully. Even the orchestra vanishing for forty minutes during the intermission on opening night for some extra rehearsal, leaving the dancers in limbo as they wait for them to come back, doesn't manage to damage their concentration.

One of the great things about Bringing Balanchine Back is of course the dance itself. Not only have they filmed fairly substantial chunks of the company's performances during the weeks run, it has to be some of the best filming of dance that I've ever seen. Far too many times dance is filmed through one camera pointed at the stage from the middle of the theatre so all you see are a bunch of little figures looking like music box figurines moving around. For these performances they have used multiple cameras so we are able to draw in close enough to the principles when they are soloing to see the expressions on their faces, as well as draw back to see the entire corps as required.

There are also cameras in the wings as well, so we get to follow the dancers onto stage as they make their entrances and hear the sound of their toe shoes thudding into the wood floor. Watching the corps de ballet go from their standing starts to floating on air in the matter of seconds it takes to get onstage from back stage is to be reminded of the magic of theatre, and more importantly the magic of ballet.

The DVD Bringing Balanchine Back is a wonderful record of the New York City Ballet's journey to St. Petersburg to help celebrate the 100th anniversary of their co-founders birth. However what I think is even more important is that it gives people an opportunity to both go behind the scenes of the ballet and gain a better understanding of what it takes to be a dancer, and to witness the magic and beauty of dance up close. That, to me, seems a highly appropriate way to celebrate the legacy of the man, George Balanchine, who almost single handily established classical ballet in North America.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 06:27 AM | Permalink

I never thought there would come the day that anybody would be able to replace Emmylou Harris in my affections. From the first time I saw her singing "Evangeline" with The Band in the movie The Last Waltz I've been in love with her voice, a love that was only cemented over the years by listening to her earliest recordings with Graham Parsons, and her subsequent solo work. No one, I was certain, would ever be able to match that combination of angelic sweetness and grit that made her voice so special.

Then along came the movie O Brother Where Art Thou and its accompanying soundtrack, which included three tracks featuring Alison Krauss. It used to be that I thought the only music that stood a chance of making a Christian out of me were certain Black Gospel choirs and the "Ode To Joy" by Beethoven. That was before I heard Alison Krauss singing "I'll Fly Away" and "Lets Go Down To The River And Pray" during that movie. Of course when I heard her singing "Don't Leave Nobody But The Baby" along with Emmylou and Gillian Welsh, a song of a decidedly more secular bent than the previous two, a little later on in the movie, it, I confess, sent my thoughts in directions other than churchly matters.

In spite of my immediate infatuation for her voice, somehow or other circumstances or whatever have prevented me from obtaining any more of her recordings. I know that she and her band, Union Station, have released more than a few albums, and she's done some exciting work with completely unexpected partners like former Led Zeppelin vocalist Robert Plant (Raising Sand) since that time, but they've never made it into my hands. So when the opportunity presented itself for me to get my hands on a copy of her new DVD being released through Rounder Records, A Hundred Miles Or More: Live From The Tracking Room, it was like an unrequited love finally being reciprocated.

Okay, so that's a little over the top, and sounds just weird enough to probably warrant a restraining order. However, there are so few female vocalists these days that actually sound like human beings or who play music that doesn't sound like it was either computer generated or mass produced in some Las Vegas factory, that hearing somebody as real as Ms. Krauss does tend to send me for a bit of a loop. Whoever decided that female pop singers should either be melodramatic divas or teenage sex kittens should be drawn and quartered for the assault they've unleashed on the our ears.

A Hundred Miles Or More: Live From The Tracking Room was originally recorded as a television special and features Alison Krauss, her band Union Station, and various guest stars performing nine tracks taken from her solo album A Hundred Miles Or More. Filmed in a recording studio that is set up like a comfortable living room, it's the ideal atmosphere for an intimate performance and to hear Ms. Krauss perform. On the original television show the songs were interspersed with interviews featuring the various musicians appearing in the special and Alison.

While her guests mainly talk about how wonderful it is to play with Alison, they also talk about the specific songs they are appearing in. For her part Alison talks about the songs, and the people she is working with. To be honest the conversations are pretty much forgettable, for in terms of quality they are about what you'd expect from one of those mindless "Entertainment News" shows. Thankfully on the DVD you have the option of watching the music with or without the interviews, or if you're feeling particularly masochistic you can watch only the interviews.

Naturally the sound and picture quality on this recording are superlative, in fact I don't think I've heard or seen anything quite as well done as this disc. Unfortunately few of the songs lived up to either the quality of the recording or my expectations. Perhaps I had built Ms. Krauss up to being something she wasn't based on hearing her performances on the soundtrack of O Brother Where Art Thou. For while there was no denying the beauty of her voice and the honest simplicity of her delivery, a good many of the songs could have done with an infusion of energy as they were far too close to fitting into the play list of an adult easy listening station for my liking.

While the first two tracks, "You're Just A Country Boy" and "Away Down The River" were impeccably done, they seemed to be lacking the spark in her voice on the recordings I had heard her do previously. The third track, "How's The World Treating You", is a duet with James Taylor, and unfortunately it reminded me of everything I hadn't liked about a great deal of Taylor's music from his solo career in that it was mellow to the point of being vacant. Allison tries vainly enough to generate some enthusiasm for the material, but she was having to carry Taylor on her back and he ended up dragging her down.

Fortunately the next two songs, "Sawing On The Strings", a duet with Tony Rice, and a cover of Gordon Lightfoot's "Shadows", show her talents in a better light. She and Tony generate a gentle energy on the former that is more than sufficient to bring the song to life and reminded me once again what it was that I had been infatuated with when I first heard her sing. That same warmth and genuine emotional commitment was also present in the latter song, as she took one Lightfoot's better songs and made it into something quite poignant.

Unfortunately, none of the other material on the recording manages to rise up to the same level. I've heard Alison Krauss sing soft material before and in those instances she was able to give them life while respecting the gentle nature of the song. Here though the spark she usually infuses her music with seems to have gone missing on too many of the songs. Perhaps it's the setting, or the fact that it was being recorded for television and they were forced to do multiple takes on occasion, I don't know. Whatever the reason something is definitely missing from her performance.

While A Hundred Miles Or More: Live From The Tracking Room has impeccable sound quality and great visuals, the overall performance from Alison Krauss and her guests is somewhat static. It's a lovely opportunity to see her perform, but except for one or two cases a great deal of the warmth and passion that makes her singing so special seems to have been lost in the recording process.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 06:21 AM | Permalink

Back in the dark ages, the 1970's, an English department's curriculum in most Canadian high school's would consist of at least one work by all of the following Canadian writers: W. O. Mitchell, Robertson Davies, Margaret Atwood, and Margaret Laurence. Although there was a five year gap between us in school, and we each attended different schools, my brother and I each studied the same book by each of the above authors, in the same year of high school.

It's taken me years to overcome the prejudices towards those authors that high school had instilled in me through the way we dissected each of their works under a microscope. Even now it took almost a leap of faith for me to watch the movie adaptation of Margaret Laurence's novel The Stone Angel, now available on DVD through Vivendi Entertainment. To be honest it was only the presence of Ellen Burstyn as the central character, Hagar Shipley, and the type of morbid curiosity exhibited by those who linger at accident scenes, that prompted me watch the movie. Ms. Burstyn is such a talented actor that I figured at the very least I would be able to enjoy another fine performance from her, even if the movie lived up, or down to, the expectations of my memories.

Well, whether it was through the magic of cinema, or, as is more likely, my memories of the novel had nothing to with its merits and everything to do with how it was forced down my throat in high school, there was much more to enjoy about the film than just Ms. Burstyn's performance. Everything about the movie, from the script to the acting, was so far removed from the feelings that the title had evoked in me for all these years, that I wouldn't have believed it was adapted from the same book if not for the title and being familiar with the bare bones of the story.

In the present day Hagar Shipley is coming to the end of her life and her body and mind are starting to fail her. As the movie opens her son Marvin (Dylan Baker) and daughter-in-law Doris are trying to convince her to move into a nursing home. Not only do they no longer feel like they can take care of her anymore, but Marvin's business is failing and he's being forced to declare bankruptcy so he want's to reduce his overhead by selling the house they all live in so he and Doris can move into a condominium. Naturally enough Hagar is less than thrilled with the idea and insists that she is quite capable of managing on her own. Initially our sympathies are with the feisty older woman demanding her independence, but the reality is her health is failing and she does need constant attention.

One of the symptoms of her reduced capacity is that she now has a tendency to disassociate from events around her and slip into her memories. In part this is caused by her having to face up to the fact that she is old and her days are running down so she is easily triggered by images from yesterday that exist in her present. The most prominent of those is the stone angel of the book's title, a large monument that Hagar's father had imported from Italy to mark his late wife's grave and to set his family apart from the rest of the town. The Curries had founded the town and were its most prominent family, and Hagar's father wasn't about to let anyone forget it.

So when Hagar takes up with, and then marries, cowboy and rancher Bram Shipley, (Cole Hauser) her father not only doesn't give her his blessing, he cuts her off completely. Indeed when he dies instead of leaving anything to Hagar at all, he bequeaths everything he owns to the town so they will build him a memorial. She'd already begun to discover that true love with Bram doesn't quite compensate for the loss of privilege she experienced upon leaving home, and being cut off ensures there's no hope of a financial reprieve. With two children and Bram's drinking steadily increasing, Hagar has descended from the peak of local society to the bottom and hates every minute of it.

As the movie progresses, as elder Hagar tries to go back to her past by running away to a cottage she and her family once stayed at, the younger Hagar (Christine Horne) is trying to hold onto the vestiges of her pride and to instil it in her sons as well. Unfortunately she's more like her father than she knows and her pride leads her into making serious errors in judgement that are the cause of a great deal of pain for her self and for others.

Hagar Shipley may be old but she's never been one to shy away from the truth no matter how painful. Running through her memories she recalls the happy times with Bram, the way he made her feel more alive than any other person had before or since, as well as the hard times when it all started to fall apart. She also realizes that she still can effect some changes in her life, and if she ever wants to reconcile the past and the present, now is the time to do it. True to her character she's not at all sentimental or mawkish about it, but that only makes what she does all the more bittersweet and poignant.

This is a movie about memories and at least half of it takes place in the past. Moving between the past and present can be a complicated process when you're telling a story - no matter what the medium. If you're not careful you can destroy the continuity by either not delineating clearly enough between the two or by making the split between them too obvious. Script writer and director Kari Skogland has done a great job in finding the perfect middle ground. While she has created two distinct story lines out of Hagar's life, the past and the present, they are interwoven in such a way that they create one complete picture.

As the younger Hagar Christine Horne does a wonderful job of creating the woman who will one day become the older woman we meet at the beginning of the movie. We see the stubbornness, the head strong nature, and the pride that are both her greatest strength and her greatest weakness. Instead of imitating Ellen Burstyn's performance and translating it as a younger person, Ms. Horne has created her own version of the character with the same basic ingredients. The result is we are always able to see each version of the character reflected in the other.

Our initial impression of Hagar is formed by Ms. Burstyn's performance, and she is thus faced with the difficult job of having to establish her main characteristics quickly. While a lessor actor might have taken the easy route of overacting, Ms. Burstyn manages to capture the essentials of her character through subtle body language and vocal inflection. Not only does she play the elderly Hagar, but she also depicts her in late middle age and does a wonderful job of showing the distance the character still needs to travel before she will find any peace. For she continues to make the same mistakes in middle age as she did in her youth, and the consequences are devastating.

While the two women are the main performers, the supporting cast are equal to the task of appearing on screen with these two powerful actors. The performances of Cole Hauser and Dylan Baker are worthy of special note. Cole does a great job of showing us not only what makes Bram so attractive to Hagar, but of depicting a man who has many admirable qualities. It's that fact that makes his fall all the more painful as we are all too aware of his failed potential. On the other hand our initial impression of Marvin is that he's a bit of a cold fish, and he's very difficult to like. Yet by the end of the movie both us and Hagar have come to realize the inner depths that Marvin possesses. Dylan Baker does a great job of bringing this awkward and shy man to life, and showing that behind even the least confident of exteriors there can be great strength.

For those of you like me who had Margaret Laurences' book The Stone Angel ruined for them by studying it in high school, I urge you to go and see this wonderful adaptation. Not only will you discover that it is a brilliant story, but you will see some great acting and a very real movie. The special features on the DVD are limited to interviews with the cast, but as they are what make the movie, listening to them talk about how they prepared, and hearing their thoughts about the story, is probably more pertinent than anything else that could have been offered.

One thing is for sure, that after seeing this movie I'll be keeping my eye out for a copy of the book and definitely giving it another chance. There's no way it can be as bad as my memories tell me it was if it could be adapted into such a beautiful movie.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 05:56 AM | Permalink

The first time I ever really paid attention to or appreciated big band and or swing music was when I appeared in a play set during WW2 in the 1940's. I was playing the role of a soldier and at various points I would pop up on stage for a letter home to be read out loud. The penultimate scene took place at a dance to the sounds of the Glenn Miller Orchestra's classic song "Jukebox Saturday Night" after my character had returned from Europe.

Although throughout the play we had used bits and pieces of swing music to act as transitions between scenes or as background to events, in this scene the music became as much a character on stage as the actors. While "Jukebox Saturday Night" is upbeat and high tempo, making it great to dance to, there's also something about it that gives it an air of desperation - have fun now because who knows when (or if) the hell you'll get another chance.

However, I've never really sat down and listened to any big band or swing recordings. While part of that reluctance is based on a dislike generated by listening to the slick orchestrations of music that oozes out of Las Vegas like so much slime, the real reason is there's only so much time in a day and only so much music I can listen to at once. If it comes down to a choice between Willy DeVille and the Glenn Miller Orchestra, the former will win out over the latter ten times out of ten.

Therefore the likelihood of me having picked up a copy of the John Burnett Swing Orchestra's latest release, West Of State Street/East Of Harlem, on Delmark Records on my own were slim to none. So it's a good thing the folks at Delmark persist in sending me discs that I wouldn't normally buy, otherwise I would have missed out on a really good CD.

At twenty or so pieces the John Burnett Swing Orchestra isn't the biggest of big bands, but that doesn't prevent their sound from being as potent, or even stronger, than some bands I've listened to with over twice their numbers. Even better is the fact that they don't confuse power with volume. Instead of trying to blast an audience out of their seats, they up the emotional intensity of their playing to match the mood of the music. Now of course you can't have a band with something like five trumpets, four trombones, four saxophones, piano, bass, guitar and drums without making a little noise, but that's where the orchestra leader comes in.

The seventeen songs that are on West Of State Street/East Of Harlem are a mixture of the different ways big band music has been performed over the years. From Broadway show tunes ("Hello Dolly"), popular standards ("Begin The Beguine"), and jazz ("Night In Tunisia") the band plays each of them with equal aplomb and enthusiasm. However John Burnett never allows their enthusiasm to overwhelm the song. There's a very tricky balance on display here, as a band leader has to allow his leads opportunities to shine, so he gives them solos, but he can't allow a solo to go on for too long as that will divert the audience's attention away from the band and the song.

In many ways the band is the orchestra leader's (conductor) instrument and he or she plays it just like any other musician would play a trumpet or violin. Yet instead of plucking an individual string to make a note in a song, he selects the section of his orchestra to bring those sounds to life. His focus is on the song, and how to use the various parts of his instrument to make the song sound great. What I noticed most about John Burnett's orchestra was how clear and distinct each instrument was. No matter how many members of the band were playing, I was always able to hear the distinct tones that each instrument was adding to the sound the band generated.

In the past when I've heard other big bands, both contemporary and older recordings, one of the reasons I haven't really enjoyed them that much has was that aside from the lead instruments, it was hard to distinguish individual sounds. Not only wasn't it really that enjoyable to listen to, but it also meant that it was difficult to appreciate the song being played. Burnett and his musicians, on the other hand, have found a way to ensure that this never becomes a problem and you can hear the individual tones that make up their overall sound. It's sort of like hearing each note that comprises a chord on a guitar and the chord as a complete entity at the same time.

For this concert the Orchestra was joined by guest trumpeter Randy Sandke and he delivers some very impressive solos throughout the disc. In fact all the solos on West Of State Street/East Of Harlem impressed me far more than any other solos I've heard played under these circumstances. Burnett appears to have encouraged his people to take more chances than other orchestra leaders, so there was quite a bit more improvisation than you're liable to hear on other swing or big band recordings.

Aside from Burnett and his eighteen regular musicians the other permanent member of the band is vocalist Frieda Lee. Ms.Lee has a wonderfully mellow voice that is also blessed with an abundance of character. Her phrasing on songs is always spot on, so like every other soloist, when she steps forward to sing, she continues being part of the band's overall sound, instead of separating herself. In fact there are occasions where it sounds like some of the instruments are "singing" harmony for her.

If you're like me and have never really found the time, or had the inclination, to listen to big band or swing music, put aside your hesitations and make some time available for the John Burnett Swing Orchestra's latest recording West Of State Street/ East Of Harlem. Not only am I sure it will change your opinion of the genre, but you'll find yourself listening to some great music performed by musicians who really care about what they are doing.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 04:31 AM | Permalink

Continued from Part One

When an athlete has a remarkable first year in their sport and then fails to live up to the expectations generated by his accomplishments in his second year they call it the sophomore jinx. While there's equivalent for talking about works of fiction there are plenty of examples of an author scoring a success with their first novel only to stumble badly with their second. An even stranger phenomenon is what I've taken to calling the curse of the second book.

It seems to be something that is reserved for trilogies, especially those in the fantasy genre, and is something that I first became aware of when reading Lord Of The Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien. The first time I read the books, it was The Two Towers, the second book in the trilogy, that almost prevented me from finishing series. While the battle scenes are of interesting enough, and the Ents are fascinating, the trek through Mordor with Frodo, Sam, and Gollum was tedious. However, it's not just Tolkien, I've seen the same thing occur in other trilogies, where the second book is the weakest of the series.

Unlike an opening book it lacks the excitement inherent with starting something new. Nor is there a rousing finish to look forward to like there is in the concluding book. When I was an actor I quickly learned that while it was very easy to recreate either emotional highs or lows, mid ranges were another matter all together. How could you make yourself interesting to your audience while portraying something somewhere in the middle? That's much the same conundrum that the writer of a trilogy faces when he or she is needing to keep their audiences attention riveted without the emotional peaks that are built into a beginning or an end.

Perhaps it worked in Christopher Paolini's favour that I read the second book of his trilogy as part of an omnibus edition, The Inheritance Cycle: Eragon & Eldest, containing it and the first book. Yet I'm inclined to think that even if I had read Eragon (the first book) and Eldest (the second) as separate editions it wouldn't have mattered. Eldest is not only as good a book as its predecessor, but in some ways I think it may even be better. For not only is Paolini able to sustain the interest in the story and the characters he had begun in his opening chapter, he managed to draw me deeper into the story.

Pace is a very key element to sustaining a reader's interest, and when an author establishes the type of high speed tempo that Paolini did in Eragon, if he slows it down in the second book he stands a very good chance of losing his readership. Yet the problem Paolini faced was that he was committed to sending his lead characters, Eragon the dragon rider, and the dragon Saphira off to be educated among the elves. I'm sorry, but no matter how you dress it up, school is school, and if the majority of Eldest had been spent on going to lessons with Eragon and Saphira, the book would have died a slow death.

Instead, Paolini took a very big chance and began a new story line to run alongside the ones all ready established. Although he begins Eldest by picking up the story where Eragon concluded and adding some new wrinkles to the plot line, after the opening few chapters the scene changes completely. We travel back to the village of Carvahall, from which Eragon had fled in his search for vengeance against those who killed his uncle. It's his cousin Roran who becomes the focus of our attention, first as he copes with the knowledge that his father is dead and his farm destroyed and somehow his beloved younger cousin is responsible, then as the repercussions of Eragon's actions continue to grow.

For Roran has little time to build up resentment against Eragon, because it's not long before the Empire, in the form of a troop of thirty soldiers led by two of the evil Ra'zac, comes for him. Initially he is able to stay hidden in the woods surrounding the town, but when it becomes obvious that the soldiers and the Ra'zac have no intention of leaving without him things reach a head. The townspeople decide to actively resist the soldiers, and do surprisingly well. Although they suffer casualties of their own, they manage to kill off over half the soldiers and prevent them from taking Roran or inflicting too much damage on their village.

Unfortunately they are betrayed by one of their own, and a squad of soldiers and the Ra'zac attempt to take Roran from where he is staying. Although he successfully avoids capture, his betrothed, Katrina, isn't so lucky and is spirited away by the Ra'zac on their flying steeds. Like his cousin before him he vows that he won't rest until he tracks the Ra'zac to their den and destroys them, and hopefully rescue Katrina in the process. In the meantime the villagers have to deal with the eventuality that the King won't allow them to get away with defying him. Seized by a messianic zeal, Roran is able to convince them that their only hope is to pack up, leave, and make the dangerous trek across land and sea to the country where the Varden - those who are fighting the king - have their base and seek shelter with them.

With the fate of his home village providing the action to stir our blood, the more static adventures of Eragon while he is undergoing his next level of training to be a dragon rider with the elves becomes more interesting through the contrast they provide. It's here that Paolini shows his subtlety as a writer in the ways in which he develops the characters of both Eragon and Saphira. For they are each assigned a teacher by the elves, who works with them not only on their martial skills but also hones them intellectually and emotionally. For if Eragon hopes to succeed in his attempt to overthrow the evil King Galbatorix he will have to not only become far more proficient physically, but he will need to somehow gain the strength of self that usually only comes through years of experience in a short while.

While Roran is leading his people across the empire to what they hope to be the relative safety of joining the Varden, and Eragon and Saphira are being honed as a weapon, Galbatorix has not been idle either. Using magic to shield their movements from the Varden's spies, he has gradually gathered together an army of close to one hundred thousand men, far more than the Varden can hope to field. The only hope the Varden have in defeating an army of that size is if their allies the dwarves can reach them in time, and if Eragon and Saphira have come into sufficient strength to even up the odds.

Not content to rest on his laurels, Christopher Paolini has managed to avoid the second book lag that happens so often in fantasy trilogies by taking chances. Adding a new plot line, and throwing in new twists to the all ready existing plot, could have easily backfired on him by making the story too confusing. However he has the wisdom and the confidence take his time with each new element so that we are able to absorb the information properly. Not only does this allow us the opportunity to fully appreciate the new characters and circumstances, but we also grow closer to those we had met before.

Eldest draws us deeper into the world that Christopher Paolini has created with his trilogy The Inheritance Cycle. While action and adventure play a role in keeping our interest in the story piqued, he is a gifted enough writer that the moments spent by characters in introspection are every bit as enticing as those in a flurry of activity. He also continues to display a fine eye for detail, which allows him to bring the wonders of the elf homeland in all its splendour, the bleakness of the villagers' exodus, and the confusion of battle to life in equal measure.

First Eragon, and now Eldest; one can only wonder at what marvels he has in store for us in part three - Brisinger.

The omnibus edition of The Inheritance Cycle: Eragon & Eldest can be purchased either directly from Random House Canada
or an on line retailer like Amazon Canada.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 02:02 AM | Permalink

Industrial tech no logic civilization is the mining process
The intelligence of each arriving human generation
Is programmed to perceive the reality that meets the needs
Of the industrial society each human generation arrive in
The human beings are individually and collectively mined... John Trudell; "Somewhere Inside My Head"; Lines From A Mined Mind Fulcrum Press 2008.

Huh? That was my reaction when I first read those lines from the introduction to the collected writings of John Trudell, Lines From A Mined Mind. What is this crazy on about with his "Mined Mind" shit. But you know the longer I stared at it, and the further I read on into his introduction and then his poetry, it actually began to make sense - at least around the edges.

Now that's bound to change the way you look at things, and get you thinking outside the lines that make up the carefully constructed boxes that were supposed to think inside of. Talking to John made me realize just how big the gulf is between somebody whose really free, and what I think of as being free. I don't know if that's going to come across in what you're about to read - it pales in comparison to what I remember our conversation sounding like - but I hope by the end you come away with a clearer picture of John and a better understanding of where he's at, and the mining process that's being carried out on your mind on a daily basis.

Can we start off with some of the typical biographical details - where were you born and all that.

I was born in 1946 near Omaha Nebraska and split my childhood half and half between living in town with my parents and living on the Santee Sioux Reservation just outside of Omaha with my grandparents. I dropped out of high-school because it wasn't working for me, and at seventeen I joined the navy. I did my four year hitch, even though it wasn't really right for me, and got out in 1967. I did a couple of years of collage after that, but that didn't work out because of some political shit, and I was denied something that I should have got credit for.

This might be a stupid question, I don't know, but how would your experiences as a child have been different than your so-called typical kid growing up in the suburbs?

Well, like I said I travelled back and forth between the two worlds, living half my time on the reservation and half my time off it, and what I saw as the major difference between the two worlds was that while everyone on the reservation was poor, there was a real community, one that had common roots and a culture that tied it together. Off the reservation, in the non-native world it was more about competition - more emphasis on material stuff and class distinctions.

You know back in those days the emphasis was on finishing high school and getting a good job, no talk of university or collage for us, right, but I never felt like I was fitting out there - that's why I tired the military, and I don't regret that either, but it was all part of looking for a place where I fit. It was only on the reservation where I felt that sense of belonging - that's where my cultural/social peer group was.

I was just curious, up in Canada we had the Residential School system and as late as the 1970's kids were still being taken away from their families - wasn't there the equivalent in the States

Yeah, the boarding schools, but they weren't happening everywhere, and my dad kept me out of them - he also protected me from religion, so I was able to avoid a lot of the stuff I know some other people had to put up with.

What galvanized you to become politically active?

Well like I said I didn't feel like I fit anywhere in the non-native world. You know - no matter what you did, a job, school, whatever, you would have to be subservient to authority if you want to get ahead, and I just wasn't into playing that game. So when I went to Alcatraz (The All Tribes occupation of Alcatraz Island by Native Americans from 1969 -1971) it was like getting back to my community - the place where I fit best.

You were part of the All Tribes occupation of Alcatraz from 69-71 and them Chairman of AIM from 73 - 79. Those were some volatile years for the politically active Indian - Wounded Knee, Pine Ridge Shootout, Anna Mae Asquash. Reading about it - it appears to have been a time of great hope and excitement mixed with fear and confusion. Have you had the opportunity to reflect on those years and are you able to give your assessment of it in general?

Our grievances were just, but the American government declared war on us and fought us for all they were worth. There were great highs and great lows, but we were motivated by good intentions. I know some tribes are better off now because of what we did, but I think the most important thing that came out of it was that our energy and our spirit was rekindled. There was a revitalization of who we were as a people.

Our confusions were those of any human searching for identity, of any human being searching for a way of being. Now when I look back on it I see it as part of my life experience where I might not have realized the lesson I was learning at the time, but at some point I got it.

From reading biographies about you there's the appearance that you became a poet and song writer over night because that's when you first started doing it professionally. Prior to the early eighties when you started recording, had you ever given any thought to music or poetry being part of you life

Nope - never. It wasn't anything I had planned on doing. I started writing in 1979, although I'd always been influenced by music, it wasn't with the intent of doing music. It's just that back in 1978 I knew things were going to change - activism had served its purpose and I could see it had run its course. Then the fire, when Tina, her mom, and the kids died (In 1979 just after John Trudell led a protest against FBI headquarters a mysterious fire burnt down his home killing his wife, her mother, and their children) that was the final severing point for me - the world would never be the same after that. I was falling through realities and writing became something for me to hang onto.

How did you get started with music - you released your first album Tribal Voice in 1983 on your own label - how did that come about, and what kind of music was it?

I had met Jackson Browne around this time, and was just hanging out with him. Now that I was spending time in recording studios and hanging out with musicians I began wondering what these lines I'd been writing would sound like set to music - you see I don't think of myself as a poet or a song writer - I write lines. I decided that I wanted to use the old music - the drum and the singers and set the lines to what I knew best then. Jackson produced and we made Tribal Voice.

It was after that that I met the Kiowa guitar player Jesse Ed Davis - actually I don't think of him as a Kiowa guitar player, just one hell of a great guitar player. Anyway Jesse introduced me to electric music. He wrote music for my lines and we put out our first album in 1986 AKA Graffiti Man. I was still doing the spoken word thing then and Jesse took me out on the road with a band and got me playing in clubs so I could learn what the heck it was like to be a musician, 'cause I didn't know anything about doing that sort of thing. We did that for three years until Eddie died.

I interviewed Martha Redbone a while back, and she said that as a native pop musician one of the hardest things she faced was overcoming people's expectations of what she as a Native woman should be doing musically. What's been your experience with this like?

I just blow it off - no insult to anybody or anything but I can't be anything other than what I am. If people have expectations they just have to deal with them... I'm me and that's who I represent - I can't claim to represent all natives or anything like that, the only ones I might represent are the ones who agree with what I'm saying.

I know, there's this whole Fascism of Romanticism thing going on - people have created an image they want natives to fit into - some sort of fantasy ideal that makes us easy for them to say - that's what they are, but you know that's not reality. I happen to be native and male, but I am who I am and that's how I participate in reality - as a human being - rather than as a race or a sex.

When I reviewed Lines From A Mined Mind I tried to explain what you meant by a "Mined Mind" but I'm not sure how clear I was on it - can you take me through it?

Well you read the introduction right (Me: Yeah but you know I'm still not sure whether I got what you were after) Okay they've got us believing that believing is thinking, but the reality is we're not really thinking cause believing is accepting without thinking about it. Because we're not thinking we end up focusing on our fears, doubts and insecurities. The "being" part of human is being mined and that allows us to be programmed by the beliefs they tell us is thinking.

If we ever want to use the power of creative thinking we must become focused on the conscious power of thought. It's also got to be an awareness that's beyond just the self - it's a recognition of the power of intelligence in of itself without anything tied to it. It's all about energy, because thought is energy, and when you take energy away from humans we're flat - we're mined out.

You write about a variety of topics in your poetry - what does it take for a topic to inspire you?

I don't really think in terms of being inspired you know, sometimes the lines just appear, sometimes I have to go hunting for them. I'm not really that sure what sets the line in motion, sometimes I'm inspired by desperation when I start (laughs)

Your work stands on its own as poetry, yet you perform a good deal of the verse collected in Mined Mind as songs. What are you looking for the music to do with your lyrics?

As an art form music has its own value, but like I said I'm not a poet or a song writer - I write lines - I guess you could call me a liner (laughs). What's great is that they work with music. The way we work as a band is that I write the lines first and then the guys in the band take them and we find the right texture to go with them. That way the music becomes an extension of the lines.

I've always really liked spoken word 'cause we can all talk and we are all used to being talked too. (laughs) There's something really direct about it though - I'm not really sure how it works, most of what I do is based on hunches, I'm just glad when it does work.

What do you hope that listeners, or readers take away from your work?

I don't believe in hope - hope is a sedative - it's something you do instead of doing something - you sit around and "hope" things will get better. You know when Pandora was given her box of evils by the Gods and told not to open it, and she did anyway letting loose all the evils on the world, the last of the things that was in that box was hope!

Okay let me re phrase that - what do you want people to take away from your work?

Hah, whatever they can get out of it - I want it to make sense to them you know - Hell I'm crazy so it's always a relief when people get a little something from it you know? (laughs)

We wrapped it up after that, mainly because my head was spinning with the various stuff that we had talked about. Talking to person who genuinely doesn't give a fuck, who is really free, can be a very confusing thing for the rest of us who are still hung up on the various things that are built into the system that hold us back and keep us in check. I'm sure there's lots of you out there who are going to dismiss what he says as bullshit, and I guess that's your right to do so. However I hope that some of you will be able to get an inkling of what's going on in a genuinely un-mined mind. Don't worry about being confused - in fact take it as a good sign - when things stop making sense it's the first sign that you're starting to think clearly.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 04:54 AM | Permalink

As an adult reader, and somebody whose literary tastes have been known to include the likes of Joyce and other so called heavyweights, I occasionally wonder about my predilection for reading fantasy and other material that presents little or no intellectual challenge. Yet, when I think more on it I realize that although there might be a certain intellectual gap between the various books that I read, the authors I enjoy the most are the ones that are primarily story tellers. It doesn't matter whether it's Joyce or Rowling, as they are both concerned with recounting the events that have impacted on their characters, and how those events bring change into their character's lives.

I'm sure I've scandalized quite a few folk by likening Leopold Bloom to Harry Potter, but I read for enjoyment, not for prestige or any other sort of intellectual bedpost notching. So while some may think Ulysses and Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone are worlds apart, as far as I'm concerned they are both well told stories that bring me great pleasure to read. Certainly the authors have such vastly different styles that there can be almost no comparison between the two, but in the end they both have created a series of characters whose stories they are intent upon telling.

Whenever I find a story that I've not read before that gives me the kind of pleasure that the ones mentioned above do, I feel like I've been given a great gift. Most recently that gift came in the form of an omnibus edition of The Inheritance Cycle: Eragon & Eldest by Christopher Paolini and published by Random House Canada. This is another occasion of me coming late to the feast, as I know the first two books have been available for a while now, and although I'd seen their titles in the book stores for a while, and had toyed with picking up a copy, I confess it took watching the movie adaptation of the first book, Eragon to make me interested enough to read the series.

For those of you like me who are playing catch-up on the series, the third and final book, Brisinger was published at the end of September, this omnibus edition containing the first two books is a convenient and inexpensive way to get up to speed. It not only contains the complete texts of both books, but as a bonus feature (not just in DVDs anymore) they've thrown in copies of Paolini's original hand-written manuscripts - making you once again grateful for the marvels of typesetting as outside of a doctor's I swear that authors have the worst handwriting I've ever seen.

In Eragon we meet the title character, a farm boy of fifteen, around whom the action of the whole series will be focused. While hunting in a mysterious mountain ridge near his village known as the Spine, his quarry is disturbed by a sudden explosion, and although he misses his shot at a deer, he is left with a mysterious blue stone. On the off chance that he may be able to barter the stone for money or food he returns home with it, only to discover the treasure it contains is far more dangerous or valuable than he could have ever imagined. For the blue stone is a dragon egg, one of three that remain from the glory days of when dragons and their riders led the land of Alagaesia and peace and prosperity reigned. But those days are long gone, and an evil king, Galbatorix, now rules with an iron fist.

Once a dragon rider himself, Galbatorix betrayed his comrades and with the aid of followers equally corrupt destroyed the rest of the dragon riders and the dragons. He preserved three eggs in the hopes that he could induce them to hatch for people of his choice so that he could raise a new breed of dragon riders, ones who would enforce his will upon the people of Alagaesia and allow him to expand his empire beyond its current borders. However those who resist him managed to steal one of the eggs and have succeeded in killing all of his former underlings.

Dragons will only hatch when the egg senses the one whom they are destined for is nearby, so for years the resistance has passed the egg between three races; human, elf, and dwarf, in an attempt to find a rider among them. It's when the egg is being transported from one group to another and the courier intercepted by the king's forces that it was sent off to land at Eragon's feet. It was no accident that it ended up near his village though, because one of the chief architects of its theft had gone into hiding there years ago, and in her desperation the courier had tried to send it to him but had fallen short.

Brom, whom the village has always regarded as nothing more than a storyteller, turns out to have been not only a former rider, but the one who managed to steal the egg from Galbatorix. When Eragon's home is attacked by evil minions of the king known as Ra'zac, and his uncle slain, it's Brom who leads Eragon and his dragon, Saphira, into the wilderness in pursuit of the evildoers in the hopes of exacting vengeance on them. It's also Brom who begins to train Eragon in the intricacies of becoming a dragon rider. Not only does this involve learning how to fight with a sword, but how to use magic as well.

Unfortunately, the further they travel, the more they realize how desperate the situation in Alagesia has become. Not only has Galbatorix allied himself with the Ra'zac, but he's also begun to raise armies of Urgals, fearsome bestial creatures, who are terrorizing the population. Eragon is one harrowing adventure after another, filled with unexpected joys and sorrows, as Eragon and Brom chase across the breadth of the country. In spite of all the action taking place, and all the information that needs to be imparted, Christopher Paolini, not only plots a sure course that prevents the reader from becoming overwhelmed by information, he knows when to slow the pace of events so that we have time to get to know our characters.

Eragon may not age physically during the course of the first book, but he grows in other ways. We watch as he struggles to understand what it means to be a dragon rider; exalt in his triumphs and mourn the defeats that inevitably occur along the way. As the connection between him and Saphira grows stronger we watch as they both learn from each other, and see how Eragon grows to realize what it means to truly be responsible for another being. While new characters are introduced through-out the book; Arya the elf-courier who they rescue from the clutches of an evil sorcerer known as a Shade, and the mysterious Murtagh; they enter in such a manner that they don't interfere with the flow of the narrative.

Desperation forces many of Eragon's decisions near the end of the first book, but he has matured sufficiently by then to marshal his resources and see him and his new friends through to the relative safety offered by the stronghold of the Varden - the name given to those who oppose the rule of Galbatorix. It's here that he and Saphira prove themselves in battle for the first time as an army of Urgals led by the Shade who had imprisoned Arya manages to penetrate the stronghold. Although Eragon manages to defeat the Shade, and the Varden repulse the invasion, neither escape uninjured.

As the curtain falls on act one of the series, Paolini lets us know that Eragon's voyage has only just begun, and he and Saphira have leagues yet to travel before they are able to fulfill their promise. The battle against the king has only started, and they've barely survived a small taste of the power that can be brought to bear against them. For what were to happen if Galbatorix himself were to enter the fray - the oldest and most powerful of dragon riders? Will Eragon and Saphira have time to complete their training under the tutelage of the elves before they are needed to fight yet another battle against the king's soldiers, and will even the elves be able to prepare them sufficiently for the battles to come?

Eragon is a wonderful opening chapter to what promises to be a spellbinding trilogy. Not only has Christopher Paolini showed that he can write action and adventure, but he has the required empathy to create characters, both human and non, that are easy for a reader to identify with. Even more amazing is that the world these beings populate is so well envisioned that it doesn't take very much to believe in it's existence. You will believe that man can fly dragons. To be continued in Part Two of this review.

The Inheritance Cycle: Eragon & Eldest can be purchased either directly from Random House Canada or an on line retailer like Amazon.ca.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 06:54 AM | Permalink

I have to admit, that no matter how much I love the blues, there are times when some of the older styles of the music can get boring. After one or two songs there just isn't enough variety in either the music or the vocals to maintain my interest. I think, like any genre, unless the person performing has something unique they can bring to what they are doing there won't be anything of interest for the audience to listen to.

The really good players, no matter what style they play, are always distinguished for me by the force of their personality. When performing a style of music that's as simple as country blues a performer without charisma, or who isn't willing to invest as much of his or her character as possible into a song, won't be able to deliver a performance that will hold an audience's attention. This becomes especially noticeable when you listen to people like Sleepy John Estes and Hammie Nixon.

Delmark Records of Chicago has just released a collection of never before released recordings that Sleepy John and Hammie recorded back in 1974 just prior to the two them heading off for a tour of Japan. On 80 Highway is a collection of standards and original Estes tunes that are perfect examples of just how good the music can be when performed by people who are willing to let themselves become part of the song.

In fact it's quite amazing how much energy is generated by just the two performers. John Estes on guitar and vocals and Hammie Nixon on harmonica, kazoo, and vocals are able to generate more enthusiasm and excitement between the two of them then a good many full rock bands. Now part of that is the interplay between the two, both during the songs, and the in between chat that has been included on the record. It's impossible not to get caught up in the fun the two men are so obviously having doing the music and just hanging out together.

Of course that sort of rapport only comes about after years of playing together, and the two men have been recording music together since the late 1930s. John began his recording career back in 1929 and hasn't stopped playing music since even though his recording career took a break in the fifties when country blues fell out of favour with the rise in popularity of rock and roll and electric blues. It wasn't until the folk/blues revival of the early 1960's that his career started up again and he was able to hook up with the American Folk Blues Festival tour of Europe.

Estes and Hammie not only performed and recorded together but they also rode the rails together when trying to save money. It was on one of those occasions, when they had cashed in the tickets given them to attend a recording session, that Hammie lost his last good eye as a piece of gravel in the gravel car they were hitching on flew up and hit him in the eye. While it's true that for some duos playing and being together for numerous years didn't make them close - supposedly Sonny Terry and Brownie McGee didn't talk to each other for the last few years of their career together - but I can't see how you could continue to make great music the way John Estes and Hammie Nixon did without the camaraderie you hear on this recording.

Even the old chestnuts, and there isn't an older chestnut than "When The Saints Go Marching In", on this album sound fresh in their hands. Perhaps it's because I've never heard it played on kazoo before, but I think it's also because of the character they are both able to imbue the song with. I've heard countless people sing this song, as I'm sure you have, but this has to be the first time that I've heard someone sing it who sounds like they might actually believe what they are singing.

One of my favourite bits of this recording isn't actually them singing a song, its their introduction to "I'll Be Glad When Your Dead". It starts off with some rambling nonsense about John's name - he mumbles something unintelligible for a few seconds - and continues on into Hammie accusing John of stealing every women that he ever wanted to marry. It doesn't sound like much to see it put baldly on the page like that, but there's something about the interplay between the two men and the infectious nature of their laughter that makes the ensuing song that much more alive.

They are also more than just a humorous act, as they show on their passionate renditions of "President Kennedy" (Take 13 & Take 14). These two tracks are in homage to the late John F. Kennedy and what makes them so special is the simplicity of their lyrics and the heartfelt way in which they deliver them. There aren't many songs that I can honestly say I've heard sung more "straight from the heart" than these two versions included on these sessions. The simple line "everybody was sad, we lost the best President we ever had" doesn't sound like much when read, but hearing Estes sing them you hear how much Kennedy had meant to those his presidency had brought the hope of a better tomorrow to.

Mixed with the country blues numbers on the disc are some gospel tunes; "Holy Spirit" and "Do Lord Remember Me" as well as the previously mentioned "Saints Go Marching In", and it's in those songs you find a clue to what makes John Estes and Hammie Nixon so good. Listen to the heart felt belief in every word of what they are singing, it's nothing elaborate or ornate, it's just a simple, honest, and sincere belief in their God. What makes their secular blues songs so powerful is the fact they are able to bring the same passion that fuels their belief in God to songs about loving to eat potatoes; "Potato Diggin' Man".

There's nothing complicated or sophisticated about Sleepy John Estes and Hammie Nixon. They play songs that probably countless other people have played on very basic instruments. Yet, there is a quality to what they do, a spirit that they bring to the music, that makes it alive in a way that you're not liable to hear from many other performers. If you've ever wondered what the fuss is all about when people rave about old time blues, because any that you've heard had bored you silly, give a listen to On 80 Highway and I think you'll really appreciate it for the first time.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 06:25 AM | Permalink

When I think back on the version of history that I learned from attending school and from reading I can't decide which I find more amazing; the conceit of Europeans to believe that they were doing things first or that supposedly rational and intelligent people accepted those facts without question. Even as they traversed the globe discovering new people and evidence of ancient civilizations in countless places European explorers, and subsequently historians, remained unshakeable in their belief that nobody before them could have possibly been capable of doing the things they did.

Even in the twentieth century when Thor Heyerdahl was able to prove, by successfully recreating their voyages, that earlier cultures had accomplished many of those feats long before Europeans, people were, and are, still reluctant to accept that we weren't the first. Unfortunately quite a bit of that reluctance is based on the attitude that before contact with us, everybody were just savages who couldn't possibly have been sophisticated enough to build boats sturdy enough for ocean travel, let alone navigate them across the ocean and back again.

It was during the height of Britain's colonial rule in the 19th century that the term "White Man's Burden" was coined. The great burden that the Empire shouldered in those days was the task of bringing the light of "civilization" to all those poor misguided dark skinned people around the world. Of course you couldn't expect miracles, but it was at least hoped they could be taught English and to put pants on every so often, especially in mixed company.

In his most recent release, and his first for young audiences, Nation, published by Harper Collins, Terry Practchett has not only created a wonderful tale of self discovery, he rebukes those histories of our childhood that had us believing nothing of importance happened before the white man appeared on the face of the earth. With a remote South Pacific archipelago as its location, and an alternate 19th century as the reality, Nation is the story of two young people from vastly different backgrounds thrown together by nature and what they experience together.

Mau was no longer a boy, as was proven by his having survived his time alone on Boy's Island. However instead of his heading home to the island home of his people for his celebration feast, the world had something far different in store for him. A tsunami wiped out the entire population of his island, destroying his whole nation, and leaving him entirely alone - or so he thinks. Unknown to him the storm that sent his people away brought him Ermintrude Fanshaw (the Honourable Miss) who is 139th in succession to the throne of England, via the ship Sweet Judy that the wave had picked up and planted on his home island.

While its true that Ermintrude, who would much rather be called Daphne thank you very much, must face up the fact that nothing in her previous life has prepared her for being stranded on a desert island, her plight is nothing compared to what Mau has to overcome. One of the first tasks he has to undertake upon his return to his home is burying all of his former friends and family by dragging their bodies into the sea and weighing them down with stones so they will sink. What kind of Gods are his that they would allow everyone to be killed? He wants nothing to do with any of them any more. In fact if not for Daphne he might have surrendered to death instead of having to cope with the sense of loss and betrayal.

As the days pass and the two young people establish their new home they begin teaching each other bits and pieces of their respective languages and how to survive. Once they are able to light a fire, other refugees start to trickle in attracted by the smoke and the knowledge that this island has always been favoured by the Gods. The newcomers are shocked by Mau's attitude of feeling betrayed by the Gods and come to think of him as a demon, At the same time though they can't help but respect him for his ability to find ways of taking care of them. Who else would think of attempting to milk a pig in order to feed a starving baby?

However it falls to Daphne to discover the most amazing thing about the island and its history. She convinces Mau that he must uncover the "Grandfather's cave" where all the old warriors of the tribe were laid to rest. With the help of a crow bar that was part of the tool kit on the Sweet Judy they are able to roll back the the cap stone and aside from discovering the corpses of many generations of men, they discover a chamber depicting information and technology that the people had known about at one time. There's even a map of the heavens showing various planets marked out in glass and gold on the ceiling.

As far as Daphne is concerned the chamber of the ancestors proves that at one time the people of Mau's nation had been great seafarers and had travelled around the world long before any other people. It's this discovery that she uses when the inevitable happens and she is "rescued", to convince her father that Mau's island should be left alone and deserves not to conscripted into the British Empire. Unfortunately, along with her rescue comes a return to reality, and the realization that the two friend must separate as Daphne is needed back in her old life, as much as the island needs Mau.

Nation by Terry Pratchett is a wonderful book for many reasons but what I found to be most compelling was the way in which he brings to life the changes that each of his two main characters goes through. Not only does it make for a more interesting story that way, as it maintains our interest in Mau and Daphne far more than is usual in a book written for young people, but it also serves as an example to those reading of the benefits of being open to new ideas.

The idea that this supposedly primitive island nation had at one time travelled the world is not at all far fetched, as it has already been proven that many of the Polynesian and South Pacific nations had at one time been great sea farers. By making this a key element of the story Pratchett is opening his reader's eyes to the fact that Europeans were not the first great explorers of the world and that we need to be careful in making judgements on a people simply because they dress and look different than we do. Unlike so many writers though, Pratchett has incorporated this "lesson" so thoroughly into the story that you never feel like you are being preached at or being told how to think. Rather he carefully builds his arguments by allowing us to see everything through the eyes of his characters. It's their reactions to circumstances, the thought process they go through to form their opinions, that gives the reader the opportunity to gain a greater understanding of the world.

Of course no Pratchett book is complete without humour, and Nation is no exception. However there is also a level of sadness to the work as it becomes obvious that Daphne and Mau are becoming very close, and equally obvious that they will not be able to be together. There's a beautiful little afterward to the book, which genuinely brought a tear to my eye, something I'd not expected from either a book by Terry Pratchett or one written for young people.

Nation by Terry Pratchett may be nominally a book for young people, but it is a tale that will bring pleasure to people of all ages. Intelligent, entertaining, and a little sad, Nation might make you think at times, but it will never bore you. It's too bad we couldn't receive more of our education through books like this.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 01:17 AM | Permalink

A couple of months ago I signed a free lance contract with the German based web magazine Qantara.de - Dialogue with the Islamic World. Qantara is the Arabic word for bridge and the site is an effort on the part of the Federal Centre For Political Education, Deutsche Welle, The Goethe Institute, and The Institute For Foreign Cultural Relations to bridge the gulf between the Islamic world and the West by promoting dialogue between the two cultures.

It seems only fitting that the first article of mine they published was an updated version of an interview I had conducted with Algerian author Yasmina Khadra. It was his criticism of the West during that interview for being ignorant of Muslim culture that spurred me to seek out the material that brought me to the magazine's attention. When you consider that the majority's, and I include myself in that number, view of Islam has been shaped by either the romantic image of Sheherazade telling a story a night for 1001 nights to preserve her life or suicide bombers, he had a pretty good point.

It's not only recently that the Muslim world has been subject to stereotyped representation, although the "War On Terror" hasn't helped matters. The silent movies of the 1920's perpetuated the romantic lover image, and before that, swarthy devils showed up in literature and paintings making off with beautiful maidens. Unfortunately it will take more than the efforts of one on line magazine to offset the accumulation of over a thousand years of misrepresentation and propaganda disseminated about Islam to encourage people to be a little more broad minded in their outlook. So it was a pleasant surprise to see how Ridley Scott's 2005 movie Kingdom Of Heaven presented such a balanced view of both the Muslim and Christian worlds during the fight for control of Jerusalem in 12th century AD.

I hadn't read very much about the movie when it was first released, but when I came across it at My Movie Download.com, a site where you can download DivX versions of movies cheaply, there were so many actors in the cast whose talents I appreciate that I figured it was worth the price just to watch them work. Liam Neeson, David Thewlis, Brendan Gleeson, Jeremy Irons, Edward Norton, and Eva Green were sufficient incentive to overcome any doubts that I may have had about Orlando Bloom's ability as a dramatic leading man.

Bloom's character, Balian, is a poor blacksmith and when we meet him he's just finished burying his wife who had committed suicide after the death of their new born child. A party of knights headed towards the Holy Land stop nominally to have their horses shod, but their leader, Godfrey of Ibelin (Liam Neeson) has an ulterior motive. Many years ago he seduced a young woman who subsequently gave birth to - you guessed it Balian. After announcing that he's his father Godfrey offers to take Balian to the Middle East to give him the chance for a new life. Initially Balian turns him down, but after he kills the village priest in a fit of rage - the priest tells him his wife has gone to hell because she committed suicide - he takes him up on the offer. Unfortunately the church doesn't think too highly of those who kill their anointed ones, and send out a party of soldiers to bring Balian back. In the fight that ensues when Godfrey refuses to hand Balian over, Godfrey is fatally wounded and only lives long enough to make Balian his heir and knight him.

When Balian finally makes it to Jerusalem (after a shipwreck that leaves him alone in the desert and a duel with an Arab warrior in the desert) he takes his father's place in the court of King Baldwin of Jerusalem (Edward Norton). For three years Baldwin has managed to maintain an uneasy peace with Saladin (Syrian actor Ghassan Massoud) leader of the Muslim army. Under Baldwin's rule all faiths are welcome and free to practice their own religion in Christian held territory. Unfortunately this policy has led to a rift among the Christian forces as the fanatical knights of the Templar order desire to wipe all non-believers from the face of the earth.

With Baldwin dying of leprosy, and his sister next in line to the throne, whoever she's married to becomes very important. Unfortunately for those who wish for peace Sibylla's (Eva Green) mother had married her off to Guy de Lusignan (Marton Csokas) a fanatical Templar. When Balian refuses Baldwin's deathbed request that he marry Sibylla, Guy will be killed, war looks to be unavoidable. Templars under the leadership of Reynald de Chatillon (Brendan Gleeson) had been staging raids on Muslim caravans even when Baldwin was alive, so it's not difficult for Guy to convince him to lead the raid against the camp site where Saladin's sister is living that provokes the war he desires.

When Guy foolishly leads his army out into to the desert to meet Saladin, they are slaughtered because of dehydration from being too far from a source of water. Balian, who refused to take his soldiers into the field, as he knew what the result would be, is left to defend Jerusalem with only his household's soldiers and those citizens willing to fight in order to survive. They know they can't beat Saladin, but they hope to hold out long enough to force him to offer terms for surrender. A knight's first duty is to protect those who can't protect themselves, and Balian hopes to buy their protection by making the cost in human lives of taking Jerusalem higher than Saladin is willing to pay.

If I compare the movie to what I remember of actual history, Scott's depiction of events is accurate. After the first Crusade there was a period of peace between the peoples of all faiths in the Middle East, and Jerusalem was indeed open to all. It was an uneasy peace, and factions in both the Muslim and Christian courts fulminated against it. As Scott's main focus is on activities taking place within the Christian army that becomes a key element in the story of the movie, as it was in history, and the depiction of the Templar's fanaticism is accurate.

While we spend far less time among Saladin's people, it's refreshing to see Muslims portrayed with the same amount of diversity of character as the Christians. Some of them are similar to the Templars in their desire to kill the infidels, while others, like Saladin, are more moderate. They won't stand idly by and see their people wantonly cut down by the Christian armies, but if it's possible to avoid war they will. However, one does get the feeling that Saladin would have eventually taken the offensive even without the provocation offered by the murder of his sister. The Christian armies are invaders occupying his people's territory and they need to be driven away.

As is to be expected from the quality of the actors involved, in most cases the acting in this movie is exemplary. Although he has a relatively small role, one performance that stood out for me in particular was Brendan Gleeson's depiction of Reynald de Chatillon. While Maton Csokas' villain was a little one dimensional, Gleeson's characterization had surprising depth. However, the most pleasing surprise was Orlando Bloom's performance. Finally given an adult role he rises to the occasion, doing a masterful job of showing the growth and change that his character goes through over the course of the movie.

As this movie was downloaded from the Internet, there were no special features included with it. Unlike some DivX movies I've downloaded in the past both the sound and picture quality of this film were fine. Even with all the proper codices installed I've had troubles with things like the soundtrack overwhelming the dialogue or the dialogue being slightly out of sync with a character's lip movements.

Kingdom Of Heaven is not only a wonderfully acted and staged movie of epic proportions, it does a superb job of presenting all its characters in equal detail. Muslim and Christian alike are treated as individuals, not as types, so that we can respect and admire those on both sides of the conflict for their characteristics not because of what they are. In these days when we are surrounded by continuous reminders of "us" and "them", it's refreshing to see a movie notable for an absence of that attitude.

Posted by Richard Marcus at 08:28 AM | Permalink