Return-Path: crispen <@ada3.ca.boeing.com:crispen@eight-ball>
X-Envelope-To: ALLMUSIC@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.allmusic
Date:         Wed, 27 Jan 1993 10:08:31 CST
From:         crispen <crispen@EIGHT-BALL.BOEING.COM>
Subject:      The Stark Fist of Removal

Gary said:

>Wow! The Rev. Bob is gonna be doing backflips when he sees this one.
>And look Bob! he even called her Deborah! Bob's got a woodie, I know it.
                                           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

and Libby Doe says:

>Ummm... tell Bob to call me.  I have a job for him.

Now *that* gives me a woodie.

Phil [or perhaps Ayn] Rand <prand@PAUL.SPU.EDU> sez:

>> Advertising is just out to promote a commodity, to
>> entice you in whatever way possible to spend your money.  I love the
>> use of the term,"pimping."  Now, at least when I see these ads I can
>> visualize them for what they are, exercises in prostitution.

>I am tired of these LEFTIST, COMMIE views going unchallenged.

>Advertising is how a business gets the word out to those individuals who
>may be interested in its product.

Phil/Ayn -- chill, man.  The Eighties are over.  If you're trying to
be a Gordon Gecko, IT'S TOO LATE.  The bill has come due for all the
excesses of Ronny (what-the-hell-I'll-be-dead-soon) Raygun.  You
remember: our first divorced President who hid out on a movie lot
when WWII was going on; who wasn't a churchgoer but sucked up to the
religious right; WHO DYED HIS HAIR and then lied about it...

Pretty soon it's going to be cool to be on the Left.  And history
is ALREADY kinder to Jimmy Carter than to your boy.  How does it
feel being an anachronism, bud?

And, incidentally, to your main point that advertising has no
morality per se -- a big John McLaughlin WRONG to you.  Advertising
is eeeeeeeeevillllll even if promoted your friends the two Pats.

The tragedy of the Conservatism of the Eighties isn't in what it
did, but in how many people it fooled doing it.  Can you IMAGINE
a citizen who is ANNOYED by commercials night and day being fooled
into defending the companies who are PISSING HIM OFF?  Thank you
sir, may I have another!

Gary sez:

>Sure, contact the Rev. Bob "sexpot, dolby loving" Crispen. He's the resident
>Enya nut. Can you believe it? Enya and Debbie Gibson in the same day?! What
>a happy day for you Bob!

You know, maybe I've been too rough on Enya, Barry Manilow, and Deborah.
I mean, their music must have value -- look at how popular it is.
Maybe what we need to do is forget all this commie Miles Davis/Praxis/
Zzaj (etc.) and get with the program.

;-)

Eric Dennis Wincentsen <267@EF.GC.MARICOPA.EDU> asks:

> Speaking of Alternative Tentacles, would anyone have any information on
> what Jello Biafra's next project will be, or maybe when his next spoken
> word album is to be released? I used to receive stuff from them while I
> was on the staff of the campus newspaper, but I don't have their
> catalogues and such an ymore. The last thing I got was Klaus Fluoride's
> last album....

I suspect you already know about Lard.  There's one more band project
(it'll come to me in a minute) that he was in -- there was this
picture of a big orange pumpkin water tank on the cover.

Kyle Legate <9013118@SSCVAX.CIS.MCMASTER.CA> sez:

>his band, Lard, which also contains Paul Barker from Ministry.

Not just Barker, but Jourgensen and the other guy.

"n.n" sez:

>  Re: "What is 'alternative'": Heh... one choice is *NO* choice.  ;)
>We can turn this catagorization into a safe-sex definition, too (as has
>been shown). What I find hilarious are the arguments on the Usenet
>newsgroup 'alt.music.progressive' that the Cure, et al, should be
>discussed in that newsgroup (which is actually devoted to the
>discussion of bands such as Yes, King Crimson, Gentle Giant, the
>whole Canterbury scene, etc. -- in other words, "progressive rock").
>Do they have a right to be mad when others laugh at them for trying to
>adopt an existing label to describe something completely different?
>Don't ask me... I shot the piano player.

Sonia sez:

> But I CAN'T call it fusion because I've had my nose in the air over fusion for
>ten years and it's too late to pull it down now.

and

>Truthfully I haven't the slightest idea how to define jazz either.

and

>I think people mis-use labels and categories because they glom on to them like
>slimy sucker-like parasites (without really understanding the terms or
>caring about them other than to make ONESELF look COOL).

and (worst yet):

>Trying to pigeon-hole everything is dumb, I agree,
>but to try to think about the "essential nature" of something, anything,
>including vagaries of music, is worthwhile (though I'm no good at it).

woj gets it nearly right:

>the semantics are only important if you are on a crusade to free the minds
>of the 120 minuteheads.

but then goes wrong in a later post:

>there is an interesting implication here: alternative being defined by
>how you make your music rather than by the music you make. there might
>be some merit to this.

People, people, people.  Turn my back on you for five minutes and what
happens?  You start thinking of words as having concrete, Platonic
existence of their own.  Wrong.  The right answer is that words represent
linguistic agreements between speakers of the language.

So, if the majority of people we know and talk to have already agreed
that "alternative" includes the Cure, etc. and that "progressive" doesn't,
for us to use the words in any other way would be the same thing as
saying that we don't want to communicate with everyone else.

To hell with "essential nature"s and applicability of the word to the
thing.  There are no decision makers in the linguistic community, and
I don't think you've got a snowball's chance in hell of convincing
everyone that they're using "alternative" wrong.  If you want to start
your own linguistic mini-community where the Cure's kind of music is
called "death metal", or whatever, count me out.

Finally, right on to Marsha whose legal mind caught the distinction:

>No, wait a minute....I have pretty diverse tastes - although I certainly
>don't claim to like everything.

We shouldn't even claim to catholicity of tastes, IMHO (and this is
back at Phil/Ayn again) unless we're willing to admit that we have
no powers of discrimination at all.  And to the newcomers on the
list -- I believe that one of the norms here is (rather than catholicity
of tastes) diversity of tastes.

Jeez, I'm crabby today!
+--------------------------+-------------------------------------------+
| Rev. Bob "Bob" Crispen   | If you consider people's everyday lives to|
| crispen@foxy.boeing.com  | be rubbish, then there's something wrong  |
|                          | with you! -- Deborah Gibson, philosopher  |
+--------------------------+-------------------------------------------+
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