Collecting, Using, or Both?

A dear friend of mine, who shares my interest in music, shared this interesting article from the BBC. It’s about a fellow named Guy McKenzie who collects guitars and bought a collection of rare, British made guitars that had been stored in a basement for ages. First of all, the article confuses me. Is the fellow who said this, the current owner of the guitars, or the collector who had them in the basement: “I don’t actually play,” he said “but I just love them in the same way that people collect old paintings even though they can’t paint.”
I guessed the first, and after further research, found that I am right. The analogy doesn’t make sense. Isn’t it more akin to a non-artist collecting paintbrushes, rather than the paintings? Paintings weren’t made to do anything, other than be viewed. Guitars are an instrument by which one creates music.  A second friend said ” Wow! Who buys all those and doesn’t play them? I hope the new guy gets them into the hands of guitarists. Good looking instruments too.” Yes, they do look good, but it doesn’t sound like those guitars are going to be played.  The friend who originally posted the article responded, ” Same kind of person who buys a library of books that are never read? I hope they are played, too, otherwise what a waste of such fine instruments.” Even Jimmy Page, who once reportedly had a collection of over 1200 guitars, reduced his collection, reportedly because who can play that many guitars? And the dude can play guitar!

Doesn’t a person who buys a library full of books want to present an image of a)being smart enough to have read all these books, or b)having high enough status to have a ‘library’ in one’s mansion. He’s blown the first notion by fessing up that he doesn’t play guitar, so maybe he has a ‘music’ room in his mansion and is decorating it. Now that makes sense. But after rifling through Mr. McKenzies website have decided the real reason is closer to ‘c’. This fellow has a f*ing serious guitar collection. More of a museum really. That is pretty high status.

My other obsession  is books. Recently the Valmadonna Trust Library was offered for sale at Sotheby’s in New York.  It is private collection of Hebrew books, collected by Jack Lunzer, who is getting old and wants the collection to go into the right hands so they “they are well kept and respected.” The reserve is $40 million, so I unless Bill Gates wants it, or Oprah, it will be bought by a museum. In which case anyone who goes to the museum can view the books as works of art. They will never be read, as many of them would crumble if they were handled by a ham-fisted reader such as myself.

But one of Mr. McKenzies guitars is not going to fall apart if I play Mary Had A Little Lamb on it. Just ask Pete Townshend. In fact, if you get a bit rough with one, it’ll damage you, Krist Novoselic will testify to that. I’m different than him, if I owned a library full of books, I would be reading them. If I owned a music room full of instruments I would take lessons so I could at least play Mary Has A Little Lamb on most of them (maybe he can).

Which brings me to my ukelele banjo. Belonged to my great-grandmother who played it and the violin (I have that too, but it’s not in playable condition) and piano (which I don’t have). I’ve dug the uke out of the garage and have managed to tune it, and learn a note (C) and a chord (G7). Now I need to put my pith helmet on and hunt out Mary Had A Little Lamb. Also need more bookshelves so the piles of books that litter every flat surface in my home (and yes I’ve read most of them, and fully intend to read all of them) can have their own special place.

Anyways (heh), nice collection Guy!

Reading and Writing

A couple of years ago bunch of book-worms at my place of employment got a book club together, and while some may tease us about being a wine and gourmet food club, we do read the book and discuss it for at least five minutes. Them’s the rules. Book Club was epic last night, stuffed myself with great food and a delightful Riesling. The highlights were beet and onion salad , cheddar and beer soup , and “Better Than Sex” cake. The pork sampler with fruited sauerkraut was delicious with grainy mustard and brought back memories of dining out in Munich. The book was Skeletons at the Feast, by Chris Bohjalian, which was good to read if light in character development, heavy in subject matter.  Set in Eastern Germany at the ending of WWII, it follows a German family in their trek to get away from the invading Russians, and a group of female Jewish concentration camp prisoners being moved to another camp. The two groups finally intersect at the end to a quasi-Hollywood ending. Of the two war novels we read, I preferred Atonement, better characters and no false redemption or Hollywood ending. I’m an appreciator of well-written tragedy and pathos. That said, I’m ready for something light and perky, to go with my new-found spring is in the air/happiness and light/rainbows and unicorns attitude. Any reccies?

As opposed to the stories I like to read, the stories I write are light humor; bawdy and fun are how most of them could be described. I’m not sure it’s that I’m afraid to turn my hand to drama or that I truly can’t write it. I keep throwing out hints to one of my friends, who has a way with the deep stuff, of a story I would like to read. The dratted woman just ignores my hints. I’m going to have to figure out if tragedy truly is beyond my capabilities or if it’s just fear, and try writing it myself. I read something recently that summed up how I feel: ” Human language is like a cracked kettle on which we beat out tunes for bears to dance to, when all the time we are longing to move the stars to pity.” – Gustav Flaubert – Madame Bovary (Gerard Hopkins’s translation)

I long to move the stars to pity.

Oceangal is twitterpated

This was me. I had no intention of being cheerful and optimistic. After all, teh world is coming to an end and we’re all going to die. And my doggie got skunked. What do I have to be happy about?

Then I read about a strange fish called Barreleye.  It has a transparent head. How amazing is that? A six-inch long fish that lives at 2,000 feet under the ocean has a see-through head. They look up though their heads to find prey above them. Nature is truly wondrous.

But it gets even better. A clever little octopus fiddled with a valve in her tank and flooded an aquarium with 200 gallons of salt water. You’re not supposed to encourage mischievous children and animals. But this Two Spotted Octopus made my day.

While listening to me rhapsodize about these things, a friend gave me a link to the Psychedelic fish. A wildly patterned piscis from Indonesia, its fins have evolved into a limb like appendage that it uses to bounce from coral to coral, looking for goodies. I’ve watched the video several times now, and every viewing elicits laughter and smiles. Check it out, it has the grumpiest expression on it’s face and bounces around like a drunken college student trying to get to the next bar. It doesn’t get any better than this.

Wrong. The Weta Studio is renowned for making film props like Hobbit feet and Ork faces, but that’s not all.  Nadya Vessey lost both her legs as a child, and wrote to Weta telling them about herself and her life long desire to be a mermaid.  In between film projects, the people at Weta worked on the mermaid suit and fulfilled Nadya’s dream. Before setting her free in the ocean, they tested the suit in a pool, it worked perfectly. And it looks incredible. Being an Oceangal, you might guess that I am a swimmer.  And you would be correct. But not only do I swim like a fish, I used to play mermaid as a child. Clamping my legs  together, I flapped them like I  had a tail instead of legs. And now Nadya can swim like a mermaid too. I hope it is as wonderful for her to be a mermaid, as it was for me.

All of these things have conspired to remind me that we live in a pretty cool world. And I may be biased, but the ocean is, by far, the most amazing thing about it. My cynical, blasé heart is unfreezing. I am becoming twitterpated and I can’t open my mouth without a song jumping out of it.

Ranting

Robert and Alison with Grammys in hand

Not one of my popular opinions, and I’ve caught a lot of flak from it on several forums that I belong to but I don’t get why Raising Sand is getting so much recognition and really don’t get all the acclaim it and Robert are getting for it. It’s not groundbreaking at all, nor do I find it stirring or passionate or any of the other superlatives being heaped on it. I did buy the album and listen to it. The first few listenings I enjoyed it in a mild way, it was pleasant. But after repeated listening I found it dull in the extreme. If Robert is so jazzed about the American Roots music he’s being turned onto by Miss Alison and Top Sirloin Burnout, why is he agreeing to smoothing it out and prettying it up into complete blandness? To broaden its appeal of course, get the most people to buy the records and attend concerts. I’m not going to say that I listen to bluegrass all the time or that I am an expert but I’ve been to several bluegrass concerts put on by the Old Time Fiddlers of Washington with my mom and grandma when they were alive. Once I got past the whole amateur production values and lapses into redneckedness, I really enjoyed the music. If you ever see something advertising an Old Time Fiddlers Festival (or contest) in your neighborhood, go! There OTF branches all over the country and if they get around as much down there as they do up here there should be something going on not too far from you. Up here it’ll be put on in a high-school gymnasium or a similar venue,  a very homemade affair. Not everyone is going to love it, but it is real, honest, old time music and you’ll understand why Raising Sand is really not worthy of the attention it’s getting. Or you’ll hate it and keep listening to the musical equivalent of  skim-milk.

Despite Robert’s occasional lapses into mass-appeal music, he’s done stuff that he’s knows won’t appeal to everyone, ie. Priory of Brian and Strange Sensation and hasn’t given a fig. So why now? Is he that desperate for dollars? Maybe the Led Zeppelin cash cow maintained by Jimmy Page isn’t generating what it should. After all the last gig was for charity. Is it for attention? Can’t be, I have it on good authority that people were screaming and shouting their love at Strange Sensation concerts, and the Ahmet Ertegun Tribute Concert on December 10, 2007 (aka the reunion concert and O2) was well received if the bootlegs floating around are any indication (plz gimme an official release Jimmy!). So I’m going to say ‘no’ to the attention factor. So it must be for the music which I’ve already discussed in the above paragraph. Vicious circle.

The next Old Time Fiddlers event in my area is on Valentines Day. I have the day off. I should go. I enjoyed the music the other times I went, and my sentimental streak would be appeased. My mom and grandma would be pleased.

Apology to Jonathan Carroll

Apologies to Jonathan Carroll: I am a terrible ambassador for your books.

Have been telling my friends about a novel I just finished that I loved. It’s called Bones of the Moon by Jonathan Carroll. For some reason, I have not effectively communicated the wonderfulness of this book. One friend, who reads Vampire Slut Novels, told me (very snootily) that if he wasn’t reading VSN, he only read very good science fiction novels. The women in my book club (ok, wine and gourmet dinner club) said oh, sounds interesting, and then chose to read some other book, that I had dismissed ages ago as crap. Then I have a conversation with my trusty sidekick (ala Ren and Stimpy) via Yahoo Messenger™ and tell her all about it:

(I, Oceangal, am ‘O’, my friend is ‘H’, for Honey )
O: Have just finished a book I liked very much called Bones of the Moon by Jonathan Carroll.
H: The moon has bones?
O: In Rondua they do
H: Is that an island?
O: Better
It’s a dream world
H: Ah.
a bony dream world?
O: No- A wonderful dream world in which whoever possessessesess the five bones of the moon will rule Rondua
A kid named Pepsi is Rondua’s next ruler
H: So a handsome lad and ?? sets out to collect plot coupons?
And meet tribulation on the way?
?? = plucky dog?
Pet hen?
O: Lad is 5 years old and is accompanied by his mum
H: Magic hairpiece?
Oh, magic mum.
O: a giant dog wearing a bowler hat is one companion. His name is Mr. Tracy
H: Did you make that Up?
hang on…
O: Nope Jonathan Carroll did.
N: Okay, so plucky woman accompanied by magic boy and bowler hatted dog set off to gather five plot coupons.
It sounds very nice, but not my sort of thing.
(I’m back)
O: Only she’s not very plucky, and she’s dreaming about a world that when she was a child, she almost ruled, but didn’t because she wasn’t brave enough.
It’s got a great villain….
H: Darth Maul?
O: Jack Chili
H: The opposite of Jack Frost?
O: Mean as hell, I tell you.
H: I like good villains.
O: The dream world spills over into her real life of being a New York housewife with an infant daughter. Frightening things happen
H: That’s too scary.
O: There is a very terrifying bit that I couldn’t read fully, and the end made me cry.
I love a good ending
H: The dog lost his bowler?
O: Yes amongst other things
H: Did it have a razor’s edge like Steed’s, so he could throw it and disembowel or disemhead the baddie?
Or was that James Bond?
O: That was from a James Bond flick, bowler belonged to one of the baddies
H: It’s a good trick though.
O: Been done though.

The conversation then disintegrated into discussions on hats as weapons and implements of giants. It was fascinating to us, but only us, I won’t bore you with it. She probably won’t read it off my recommendation, but she would like it. I’m sure of it.

Sorry Mr. Carroll, I loved Bones of the Moon. Your playfulness with words, your imagery, made me laugh and sigh. The absurdity and tension and warm fuzzies you created thrilled me. But evidently I suck at telling people what made this book great so I’ll stop talking about it.

The Mystery of Shady Lady

Billy, who we will all be hearing of soon, is in the front on the right

Through what I can only describe as cosmic convergence, I discovered the most beautiful rock n roll band in the world. The convergence covers brings together some of my most favorite things in the world: the early 1970’s L. A. rock scene, groupies, gorgeous men in drag, fabulous rock-n-roll, and above of all, my love of dramatic tragedy. A fellow devotee of the aforementioned favorite things discovered a remarkable interview with two of the most famous L. A. Queens, Sable and Queenie. Being generous, she shared the interview with me. Of the many fascinating observations from Sable, she tells us who she thinks are the sexiest men in around. Which in her opinion are Robert Plant of Led Zeppelin and Billy, the drummer for a band Shady Lady, but not Mick Jagger. Sable assures the interviewer that we will be hearing of this Billy soon. This interview took place in June of 1973 and I although I had heard of Robert Plant, I still hadn’t heard of this extremely sexy drummer for Shady Lady called Billy. Now this is a woman who knew men, she had to be right. This is where the mystery started. After exhaustive research I now know the secret of Shady Lady. But my friends, that is a tale that is going to have to wait until I’m done with NaNoWriMo.

Filler

Been busy being vilely ill and writing my Magnum Opus, so just a little tit-bit for entertainment:

When I do get back to blogging, I’ve got two words for you: Shady Lady and Zolar X. Your minds will be blown, this I can promise.

Another NaNoWriMo Hopeful

Am being a brave little writer and participating in NaNoWriMo. It’s a contest to write a 50,000 word novel in 30 days starting on November 1st. Don’t panic, editing and re-thinking are discouraged, you’ve only to get words down. I’ve done a lot of the grunt work (that’s allowed) and have a synopsis, character sketch, and timeline. May even do an outline. All of this should be helpful in achieving the goal. What’s the contest winner get? The satisfaction of knowing that you can do it, and at the end of 30 days, I may have something I could actually turn into a publishable piece. Or at least the satisfaction of knowing that it’s something I could do. Confidence building etc. So wish me luck and sanity.

Goal:
Words a day 1,666.67
Words a week 12,500

Synopsis: My story is about an American woman, an artist called Annie, who moves to London at the age of eighteen to go to art school. Meets musician Kenneth, has passionate affair, marries him and has two kids with him while his band becomes one of the biggest acts out there. She doesn’t stop being an artist and has her own success and her own identity other that being Rock Star Ken’s wife. After nearly twenty years of marriage, with her ignoring his rock-star infidelity etc, but always coming back to her and the children, he leaves her for a 19 year old french pop singer. She goes through everything you would expect and months later is a complete wreck. A friend of hers, another rockstar ex wife, decides to take her out and break her out of her rut. They go to a dinner honoring a friend of theirs in the fashion world and Annie gets thoroughly drunk and disgusting, but in a charming way. While the friend is trying to get her out without making a scene, Daniel who is also a fan of this designer, sees them and feeling sympathetic to Annie, comes up to say hello. He has known both of them forever, because of their husbands, he likes Annie’s art, been to a couple of her showings and bought a couple of pieces. Has even been over to her home with Ken for dinner. Friend asks for help with drunken Annie, he gives it. He tries to call her after to see how she’s doing and be friendly and supportive etc (he has guilt feelings as he’s known for fooling around with young women as well, he excuses himself from being like her ex as he’s never left any of his wives for a younger woman) and she tells him to fuck off. That pisses him off but later when he runs into the mutual friend from the drunken night, he asks about her and is told that Annie won’t speak to anybody. They decide to force the issue and find Annie holed up in her home, she’s trashed, the place is trashed, so they hose her down and tidy things up. They stay with her until she sobers up and help her get her back on track. She starts taking back her life, drawing and painting. Daniel comes around again just to be friendly and they start a friendship that turns into love.

That relationship will have it’s own ups and downs with both of them being celebrities (him major, her minor) but I am going to give them a happy ending. There will be lots of flashbacks to wild rock-n-roll shenanigans, which is stuff that turns me on. The rest should be relate to life in general and stuff I love in particular. Music, art, girlfriends, men . Sounds chick-lit-ish, and it is, but chick lit is fun and easy to read, so I’m praying that it’s almost at easy to write. If it isn’t, keep it to yourself and be an Oceangal Cheerleader!!!

Also if you want to be helpful, leave me a comment with some suggestions for scenes, sources etc. Make yourself useful!

Edit: 12/1/08 – Didn’t finish it nor did I hit 50k, my final word count for thirty days is 28,398. I could make excuses but I hate hearing them from other people, sounds too much like whining (most of the time) so I won’t. I’m looking at it as a crash course in “for real” writing and learned a lot I can use in future writing escapes.  I’ll keep my NaNo Novel, there are parts I wrote that I love, maybe I can moosh it around and use it in a real novel one day. Lot’s of work to do though, I’ll keep occupied. There are books I want to read, story lines to work on, and music that I’ve acquired that I have to listen to in order to justify buying more new music. Thanks to everyone who understood and supported me in my endeavor. – Oceangal

John Paul Jones Confirms PBJ Rehearsals

News From the PBJ Front:

John Paul Jones, during a Q&A session at a Manson Guitars event confirmed that he, Jimmy and Jason have been rehearsing with “the odd singer come and have a bash.”

This is very exciting news for me, I’ve been going to bed each night praying for Page, Bonham and Jones (The PBJ’s) to realize they can do it without Planty, about whom Jones comments, “… and he doesn’t really want to make loud music anymore, as we do.” Be loud and proud guys! I want more of those sweet dirty riffs and bass lines that make my heart beat to their rhythm.

Some of the singers that have been mentioned as possibilities are: Steven Tyler, Myles Kennedy and Jack White.

Steven Tyler, as much as I love him, cannot be more that one hour away from his plastic surgeon or will be in danger of losing his face.

Myles Kennedy is unobjectionable, here’s the Alter Bridge version of Kashmir. His voice is more theatrical and polished than I personally enjoy.

Jack White is my favorite ‘now’ singer, he plays guitar like a dream and has more style and presence than anybody performing today. But his music is so wonderful, I would hate for him to subjugate his creative genius to that of Page and Jones.

As far as the singers go, why not get someone unknown? They certainly don’t need a big name to sing with them. Someone unknown won’t bring all the baggage of a musical agenda with them. Worked for them the first time around!

Top Ten Reasons The PBJ’s Should Tour With A Young Singer.

1. Finally have a use for all those floral blouses missing their buttons
2. One less rock star in danger of breaking a hip
3. Hitting the high notes won’t cause hernia
4. Can take care of groupies during JPJ’s and JP’s afternoon naps
5. Won’t be a Viagra hog (see #4)
6. No worries of hair piece slipping when head banging
7. Will be suitably in awe of the Rock Legends
8. Fewer memory lapses, interviewers won’t have to repeat questions
9. Built in babysitter for the grandkids
10. Don’t have to listen to “it’s terribly hard, there are those that can vouch for it being hard” ever again

Oceangal’s Halloween

When I was growing up, I loved Halloween. Me and my sisters loved dressing in weird clothes and going around the neighborhood stopping at each house yelling “trick-or-treat” at the top of our lungs. Mom would make our costumes and make us up as devils and ghosts and we carried around a brown paper grocery bag to collect our treats. At each house the neighbors would have a big dish of candy, and without fail, they would try to guess which kids we were.To entertain us they would always say we were the wrong kids and we’d laugh about how silly the grown-ups were. The best houses had the real bar candy, but we were happy to get bazooka bubblegum (remember the cartoons?) and whatever hard candy was on sale at Woolworth’s. We always got our pumpkins a week before Halloween. Mom didn’t like them sitting out rotting, this was Hawaii and October 31st was still hot enough to rot your pumpkins fast. I sliced my hand open one year carving my pumpkin. I had claimed the big butcher knife and was creating the scariest pumpkin you could imagine. My hand, slippery with pumpkin guts, slid up the blade as I stabbed the pumpkin. Blood spurted everywhere and mom lifted me up to the kitchen sink and washed my hand clean. She made me sit down and hold pressure on it till it stopped bleeding while she finished up my pumpkin for me. I remember trying to tell her where to cut so it would be as scary as I wanted. I think she did a good job. Later she looked at my cut and taped it up herself, she was a nurse and we had be next to dead to go to the hospital. I still have the scar, I make sure to point it out to people every Halloween to prove my Halloween cred. The best part of the night was when we had hit all the houses in our neighborhood we’d go back home and count our candy to make sure none of us got any more candy than the other. Except my older sister, she was the boss so if she got extra it was just her due. Mom would put our grocery bags (we wrote our names on them so they wouldn’t get mine and vice-versa) on top of the refrigerator and let us have some every day till it was gone. So Halloween was stretched out for about two weeks. When we got older, we were just as much into creating a spooky obstacles the kids would have to come through to get candy from us girls. The best one was when I took my big sister’s basketball and rigged it up so I could dangle it over the outside stairs. I covered with a sheet and pulled it up and down while shrieking and moaning. One little kid was scared so bad he wouldn’t come up, so my big sis (the nice one) took the candy down to him and showed him it was just a basketball. I was mad at her, I thought it was really cool the way the kid screamed. Now-a-days all I have to do to get kids to scream is to go out in public with no makeup on. Amazing what changes 30+ years makes.