Newsgroups: bit.listserv.allmusic
Date:         Thu, 30 Jul 1992 10:42:44 EDT
From:         "Michael H. Bloom" <MHB@MITVMA.BITNET>
Subject:      Language is a virus

From:         Sonia Kovitz <skovitz@MAGNUS.ACS.OHIO-STATE.EDU>
Subject:      Re: Thursday's oh so sad

>             ...  Anyway, re: "Michael has admitted to over-intellectualizing
> his music..." I'm curious, does he mean while or after performing it?

I think what Chuck meant was more as a listener. What I do when I play is more
along the lines of "Jeez, I hope this doesn't sound as stoopid as I feel about
it right now :-)" which it really never does, I should add. My role in my band
usually has to do with creating certain textures or chordal fields for the sax
player to wail over and the mixmaster to smear around (in fact, when he really
gets into smearing I have to play very defensively :-) So there's a lot of
brute force repetition in my part, which fortunately doesn't lend itself to
over-intellectualization (although you can get absurdly theoretical about it
after the fact). BTW, Sonia, I appreciate the vote of confidence. I hope you
end up liking it as much after you actually hear it! Let's talk when I get
back from vacation...

> ...   There is actually surprisingly little talk about playing
> ... I wish there were more.
> (Odd, I just realized while thinking about this that I am very un-analytical
> about what I hear...but probably way too analytical of what I'm doing while I
> play... which definitely gets in my way.)

Now I'm pretty much the opposite of that. I can play fairly unconsciously (and
usually sound like a poor imitation of Jerry Garcia), but when I listen, I tend
to arm myself with the full set of dissecting tools. This was initially because
I learned to play from records, and I wanted to make sure what I was doing was
the exact notes and effects that my idols were playing. It has become a habit,
and probably a bad one-- not a real problem when you're listening to records
that you can play repeatedly and pick up the parts you missed the first time
through, but going to a concert featuring a whole band and concentrating on
the lead guitarist is kinda dumb.

If I take in more live music, I might learn *not* to over-intellectualize so
much. There was a performance of one of the heavier Schoenberg string quartets
at the New England Conservatory, and I remember being in a state approaching
intellectual agony, because I was obviously grappling with a superior mind.
I should've just gone with the flow, listened to it like it was Debussy.

Anyway, to quote once again an oft-heard statement attributed to Laurie
Anderson, "Talking about music is like dancing about architecture."

From:         AISARMSTRONG%IST%VMI@IST.VMI.EDU
Subject:      re: sins and sinners
X-To:         ALLMUSIC@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU

> The reason I made the comment in the first place was that some singers like
> Hank Williams Jr. are being treated like groups like Guns n' Roses.  Like the
> song "All my rowdy friends have settled down" saids some of the Country Music
> Groups of the 70's used to get drunk and get wild but now have settled down.

Hank Williams Jr. is a special case. You must have heard "Living Proof." He
always felt this need to follow in his daddy's footsteps, both as performer
(which he's not very good at-- his band members talk about the terrifying
sensation of hearing him launch into a song in a completely different key
than they rehearsed it in) and as drug addict, which he did eventually get
cleaned up after...

> I remember once in Roanoke during a Hank Williams Jr. concert there were
> riots at the concert that they had to get the police over to break it up.

Big deal. There was a legendary riot at the debut performance of Stravinsky's
Rite of Spring.
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