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(11/01/07 4:00am)
Robert Plant has always had a soft side. Even underneath those Led Zeppelin yowls, the folk singer lingered in songs such as "Tangerine" and "Black Country Woman." \nNow, with a chance to let that voice shine through, Plant, with collaborator and bluegrass diva Alison Krauss, hushes and vocalizes lyrics in tender, haunting renditions of folk standards by the likes of Tom Waits, Gene Clark and the Everly Brothers. Their two voices work in fascinating tandem, with Krauss' beautiful feathery soprano floating in thirds above Plant's tempered howl, mimicking the close harmonies of the Everly Brothers, whose songs they cover. \nI should mention, though, that their devotion to classics doesn't make them overly reverent. They avoid the mistakes of Eric Clapton on Me and Mr. Johnson by choosing to truly adapt each song to their unique vision. Additionally, Krauss and Plant refuse to turn these tracks into yet another tiresome duet album by ensuring that they harmonize in spirit and sound. \nThough you might expect a jarring dissimilarity between their timbres, they dovetail perfectly, creating a cosmic beauty you wouldn't anticipate. After first performing together, fittingly, at a Lead Belly tribute concert, Plant and Krauss began discussing this project, searching for the elemental roots of folk music. Under the production of T-Bone Burnett, the weirdly familiar tunes sound alien, with voices we know singing in ways we don't quite understand.\nTake, for instance, "Killing the Blues," written by Rowland Salley and made famous by John Prine. Krauss and Plant trade in the folk guitar for wavering electric tones that fill the space between slower punctuated downbeats, all the while adding their own vocal harmonies that open and close delicately.\nThen, when rockabilly is called for on a tune such as the Everly Brothers' "Gone, Gone, Gone," understated percussion keeps the song churning beneath a hypnotically alternating guitar riff, and Plant gets in his wails within the boundaries of the tune.\nIn their quest for roots, Krauss and Plant succeed as collaborators and musical explorers, probing the origins of both their genres. Though media might ballyhoo the "odd couple" pairing, this album doesn't exasperate its listeners with harsh mishmashes. Instead, it weaves timeless songs and singers at the top of their craft into one of the year's best albums.
(11/01/07 4:00am)
Boston's getting some serious attention these days. After "The Departed" and "Mystic River," "Gone Baby Gone," based on a book by the same author who wrote "Mystic River," shares the dark colors and darker sentiments of the other two films. In his directorial debut, Ben Affleck navigates murky ethical waters in search of a missing child. Despite the terrible title and a few lines of regrettable dialogue, the film seethes behind the cold intensity of Affleck's younger brother Casey Affleck's baby blues staring out into darkness.\nCasey Affleck's understated performance grows more complex as his character progresses. A cocksure private eye in search of a missing girl, Casey's Patrick Kenzie descends into an ever-deepening hole of moral ambiguity, losing more than he ever expected on one case that seemed straightforward. \nI won't reveal the movie's many twists, but every character hides a secret motive or tainted past, and the deeper Casey digs, the more his Bah-ston wiseguy manner falls away, replaced by confusion and isolation. From the less-than-ideal mother to the neighborhood toughs to the smirking cops, everyone is hiding something, most significantly the hard-nosed cop played by Ed Harris, who turns in an outstanding performance that is as explosive as Casey's is muted.\nIn a movie about child abduction, the meditations on lost childhood resonate throughout, from pedophiles to deadbeat parents to the police's constant comments about Patrick's age and baby face. Even Patrick's own ruminations on his beloved Boston hint that his childhood, too, went astray, while his partner-lover's (Michelle Monaghan) noble thoughts on motherhood belie their childless relationship. Thus, the title, though clunky, suggests the missing child in every facet of the movie.\nBen Affleck does fall into some typical first-time-director troubles. The shadowy moral decisions come across best through the characters' actions and reactions, not through bland explanatory dialogue, which Ben allows to slow down the film. Additionally, he feels compelled to include lots of outside shots of Boston and its residents, as if we'd forget where we were, with dialogue less crackling but just as vulgar and bah-stardized as that of Mark Wahlberg in last year's "The Departed."\nRegardless, the Brothers Affleck have combined to make a powerful film that will have you talking about the movie for hours afterward. With this film, they have proven that Boston's dark potential has yet to be exhausted.
(10/18/07 4:00am)
Most of the mainstream buzz about In Rainbows concerns the unorthodox selling/leaking method that Radiohead employed for it, leaving the actual music on the band's first album in more than four years to fly under the radar. Though their online direct selling may start a revolution, the songs on Rainbows -- and they surprisingly are distinct songs -- show Radiohead growing out instead of surging forward.\nWithin the atmospheric haze of this album, the rhythmic interest keeps it from drifting to bed. From the drunken 5/4 stumble of the opener "15 Steps" to the most live-sounding percussion I've heard in a while on "Reckoner," the off-kilter, unexpected turns in the beat and meter work well with Thom Yorke's pleading vocals. Even on tracks without heavy percussion, the low rumble in the bass sets the melancholic tone.\nPerhaps the only revolution here is the album's romantic feel: strings soaring, lyrics verging on Motown ("You're all I need"), hidden melodies humming old pop songs at the end of "Reckoner." It seems that, at long last, these paranoid androids have learned to love, but love in the kind of duplicitous frozen way that only Yorke's wail can muster.\nThose hoping for a return to OK Computer and Pablo Honey will be disappointed, but the rock-out rages of the past resurface in places such as the guitar fuzz of "Bodysnatchers" and the raucous high-hat on "Jigsaw Falling Into Place." We don't see a new Radiohead; instead, we get a hybrid mix of all the old Radioheads, from the folksy "Nude" to the electro-rock "15 Steps."\nIn Rainbows, then, rescues otherwise colorless lyrics ("I don't want to be your friend / I just want to be your lover") with its resonance, creating a true wall of sound, hitting at every register to fully envelop the listener in eerie rapture, reminding us after four years why Radiohead was so great in the first place.
(10/11/07 4:00am)
The greatest band in the world just released a full-length record, In Rainbows, for free. \nWrap your head around that for a second. A group of people who ostensibly make a product, and who make a damn good one, are giving away that product for nothing. OK, technically it's "pay what you want," but for our generation, that translates to "pay as little as you want." How little confidence do they have in the medium if they won't charge money for it?\nTo paraphrase David Byrne, how did we get here? The obvious answer is "the Internet," but the record industry has long been suffocating from its own excess. Even as the record industry scores a symbolic legal victory against downloaders, the bulk of online downloading continues to be clandestine file sharing. The industry's unfair pricing has driven its fans into the arms of file-sharers and copiers, who are becoming tougher to prosecute and tamp down. As a result, we consumers spit on their overpriced, outdated plastic discs. \nNow an album means nothing to us. Perversely, the music industry's high-priced discs eventually drove us to music sharing, making us the generation that feels it deserves free music. We'll drop $50 on a concert, even though we balk at buying the actual album. We won't shell out 10 bucks for a good band's new CD, which took months if not years to craft and move to production, but we'll sure spend $20 on the T-shirt with cheap screen print from a Malaysian sweatshop.\nWe've all known for a while that only a small fraction of a CD's sticker price goes to the artist (even on iTunes). What we hadn't figured out was how to construct a new model that bypasses the record industry entirely.\nRadiohead has found a way. Mustering its significant resources, the band is selling directly to the customer, with all the profits going to them. Rather than accept a royalty rate of pennies to the dollar, Radiohead's members can simply cut out the middleman, taking the bulk of the price. Even though Radiohead is giving away music for free, people are still willing to pay an average of about $10 (5 pounds) for the album. Fans know what they're getting with Radiohead and are willing to shell out big bucks. If anything, the In Rainbows experiment shows we're more than willing to help out our favorite artists; we just refuse to continue feeding the major-label machine.\nWhy do we need record companies these days, anyway? To "find" artists? The denizens of MySpace are five steps ahead of the record companies when it comes to finding new artists, such as singer-songwriter Colbie Caillat, whose MySpace phenomenon became a real hit. \nDeveloping bands and musicians? Please. Record companies stopped doing this 10 years ago. Now they're only searching for instant hits. It took Ray Charles more than six years to break onto the pop charts, with the artistic freedom Atlantic Records granted him allowing him to find his trademark sound. Can you imagine any artist getting a similar break today? The music industry today demands ready-made stars, not works in progress. \nRecently, in a rejection of the old recording model, artists as diverse as Prince and Nine Inch Nails have started giving away music for free. Music has gone from service (live performance) to goods (vinyl and plastic) back to service (concerts, streams and downloads). Basically, we've got musicians playing for tips again. And honestly, it's not that bad. The "pay-what-you-want" creates a more dynamic economic model, where the price is exactly what you're willing to pay, with a high ceiling on the number of potential downloads. Plus, more musicians get to hear more music, creating an exciting environment for new music and genre-hopping.\nThe common argument against such models centers on the struggling artist in need of the incentive to keep playing. But the digital age puts that possibility of incentive much closer at hand than it used to be. We've reached a do-it-yourself era in which anyone can plug in a Mac, soundproof their garage and start selling their tunes online. From small-scale garage bands to the best band on Earth, the twilight of the major labels has arrived.
(10/09/07 1:59am)
"I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness.” – Allen Ginsberg, “Howl.”\nThough you may not always know it from the usual themes of my columns, I am an English major through and through. I love nothing more than reading literature and sharing it with others. But sadly, in the last 50 years, our society has become even more ruthless in its declaration of “obscenity” in thoughtful or intellectual circles, while permitting ever-wider latitude for violence, crassness and brashness in general. \nTake, for example, Allen Ginsberg’s iconic poem “Howl.” In 1957, a highly publicized trial cleared Ginsberg’s work of obscenity. Yet today, TV and radio stations fear the Federal Communications Commission fines that inevitably await a broadcast of “Howl.” Fifty years after a court ruled children could read it, you can’t hear this public masterwork on public airwaves. \nIt would be easy to say that our culture has become even more sanitized than it was in 1957, that the “culture warriors” have achieved their victory. Yet, vulgarity and obscenity have not exactly vanished. We can discuss a starlet’s lack of underwear in the public square and violence porn like “Saw” can become a sequel-spawning box-office smash.\nEven with “Howl,” one can easily find copies with a quick Google search or a trip to the library. So why does it matter?\nWhat concerns me is the bizarre double standard of our society’s stance on unpleasantness. When we see Peter Griffin & Co. projectile vomiting on “Family Guy,” we can shrug it off. But when something offensive highlights substantive problems, we’d rather not discuss it at all. If the obscenity is frivolous, we tolerate it; if essential, we forbid it.\nTake, for instance, the images we receive from our wars. People within media and government have decided that we shouldn’t see images of American casualties. Brutality on both sides is cleaned up. Famously, the pictures of the “Falling Man” from the World Trade Center were excised from major media outlets, while the Defense Department tried to quash the Abu Ghraib prison abuse photos. Our wars, for the sake of sensitivity, have drifted away from us, now distant and incomprehensible.\nIn the meantime, we can all sit back, watch “High School Musical 2” and forget the troubles of the world, without its ugliness around to bother us. We have cut the raw power of visceral images and feelings from our lives, living in an unreality, deliberately out-of-touch with everything outside our insulated bubble.\nI mention “Howl” in particular because it rages political agitation in verse, demanding no less than an urgent rejection of greed and its ills. But instead of repeating it in our public spaces or on our public airwaves, we’ve shunted the poem, casting it into a corner rather than inspecting it in the light. \nWe’ll perform any gross act as long as we get famous. We’ll fight any war as long as we don’t see the consequences. We’ll spew all the vulgarity we want as long as there’s no meaning.\nThe best minds of our generation, destroyed by madness.
(10/04/07 4:00am)
Morality stands as the central focus of Paul Haggis' movies. As in "Million Dollar Baby" (for which he wrote the screenplay) and "Crash" (which he wrote and directed), Haggis forces viewers to navigate murky moral waters in the film "The Valley of Elah," this time addressing the impossible morality of the Iraq War: Its soldiers, its conduct, its home front.\nThe film follows ex-military man Hank (Tommy Lee Jones) on a quest to find out what happened to his son Mike (Jonathan Tucker), who dies in a brutal murder after returning from a tour of duty in Iraq. A detective from the local police department (Charlize Theron) helps him battle the military cover-up. \nSure, the plot veers from humdrum whodunit to clunky thriller to overly somber Oscar bait, but how do you make an Iraq War film, anyway? The fog of war still sits atop us, as it does in the movie, pulling a dull khaki palette across the screen and washing out every performance to a blank stare.\nJones carries the whole movie on his world-weary face. The old hand seems never to change expression, but as the dehumanizing grind of war creaks onward, the wrinkles seem to carve deeper into his face. Theron works well as his pesky foil, but Jones' minimalism owns the picture.\nOf course, Haggis, being Haggis, can't resist a few images telling us Very Important morals (see: the ending), but the movie's biggest weakness lies in the unfortunate plot device of a series of Mike's cell phone videos decoded slowly, coming in choppy snippets throughout the movie at convenient times. Each one offers a low-fi glimpse into the hell on earth in Iraq. Like "Elah," the little clips -- disjointed and blurry -- represent the movie's jumbled artistic view of this war: Drowning in images but cripplingly unable to understand.
(09/27/07 4:00am)
After naming your album Ultimate Victory, anything less than that seems like a letdown. Chamillionaire, Houston's latest hit-maker, should have solidified his position as a rap star after mainstream success with "Ridin' (Dirty)." Alas, despite high hopes, this album stands as an admirable, preachy failure.\nOn Ultimate Victory, Cham's had enough with bling 'n' bitches and tries earnestly to inject true politicization into a genre that has only dabbled occasionally and laughably in social criticism ("George Bush doesn't care about black people," "Vote or Die," etc.). His sincerity even makes him swear off swear words and abstain from the N-word, staples of the hip-hop world.\nIt's hard not to applaud him for his attempt, but sadly, Chamillionaire's commentary can't sparkle like his more traditional party tracks, such as the album's two great collaborations with each member of UGK: the one-hand-on-the-steering-wheel of a low-rider "Pimp Mode" with Bun B and the menacing bass line Southern anthem "Welcome to the South" with Pimp C. \nIn Cham's solemn sermon on media bias (seriously) "The Evening News," he commits some rhyme atrocities to fit his nonsensical observations (Does "one" rhyme with "him?"). Despite capable beats and a neat violin hook, criminal lines such as "The White House is gonna stay white/ even though we know that Obama's black" sound terrible regardless. From 9/11 conspiracies to Flavor Flav, Cham sounds as self-righteous as a hip-hop Art Garfunkel -- "7 O'clock News/Silent Night" with a drum machine.\nAside from his unfortunately popular "Hip Hop Police," the track on the album that most epitomizes the face-plant of this audacious experiment is "Rock Star," featuring Lil' Wayne, a wailing guitar-crunk sound, the thumps of "We Will Rock You" and meaningless idiotic rhymes. At once meditative and blustery, bashing materialism while basking in its spotlight glow -- and rapping poorly -- Cham can't quite tie together this mixed bag, but damned if he doesn't try.
(09/25/07 3:55am)
The Rocky Mountain Collegian, a free, student-produced newspaper at Colorado State University, published a two-word editorial on Friday, stating: “FUCK BUSH.” In the ensuing uproar, the newspaper has already lost $30,000 in advertising, prompting 10 percent employee pay cuts across the board. \nHow DARE they? How dare they deliberately attack “The Commander Guy” during a time of war with such crude profanity? As we know, only the president and his cronies are allowed to swear in public:\n“There’s Adam Clymer, major league asshole from the New \nYork Times.”\n“Big time!” – then-Gov. George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, Sept. 4, 2000, Naperville, Ill.\n“Fuck yourself.” – Dick Cheney to Sen. Patrick Leahy, June 22, 2005, Washington, D.C.\n“Get Syria to get Hezbollah to stop doing this shit.” – President Bush, to then-Prime Minister Tony Blair, G8 Conference, July 17, 2006, St. Petersburg, Russia.\n“We’re kicking ass.” – Bush, responding to an inquiry into our success in Iraq, Sept. 5, Sydney, Australia.\n“Fuck.” – Said multiple times by Bush in a Talk Magazine interview with Tucker Carlson. Bush’s campaign staff then demanded that everything be stricken from the record.\nLook, I don’t doubt that the Rocky Mountain Collegian made a poor decision by publishing its editorial. It should have put at least some discussion of the terms it used and why on the page to explain itself. A two-word headline like that could still have the desired effect of “causing a stir.”\nBut the right-wing noise machine, from Rush Limbaugh to blogs to Fox “News,” has demonstrated the absurdity of the conservative base. They all love Bush for being a down-home guy who loves to cuss, but when others use similar language to disparage “The Leader,” they revolt. \nWhen John Kerry said he hadn’t realized how bad the Bush administration was going to “fuck it up” in Iraq, he got lambasted by Bush. Apologies were demanded! Yet, where was Bush’s apology for Adam Clymer, the “major league asshole?” Nowhere to be found. As concerned parents try to filter profanity out from the television set and the movie screen “for the children,” a tirade of profanity from the President of the United States, arguably the biggest role model in America, brings nary a peep. \nI don’t support the coarsening of our public dialogue, and I agree that profanity in public discourse leads to dangerous overgeneralizations and crassness. But honestly, no side has been particularly polite. Do Americans truly imagine that their leaders speak in dignified, elevated tones, never using a personal attack? Haven’t these people been around during election season?\nEventually, all the fracas over profanity and insults becomes misdirection from what really matters. While the U.S. Senate wasted the time it took to vote on and condemn MoveOn.org’s “Petraeus or Betray Us” ad, Republicans refused to let a bipartisan bill on extending troop leave reach an up-or-down vote. While Bush derides the ad as “disgusting,” he continues to run the most disgusting act of all: the Iraq war. Human lives mean less than a newspaper ad to this man.\nTo paraphrase Dick Cheney: Bush, go fornicate yourself.
(09/20/07 4:00am)
It's impossible to hear Northern State without thinking of them as the female Beastie Boys. The three "Lon Gisland" girls, Hesta Prynn, Spero and Sprout, punch the last beat just like the Beasties ("Knock knock. Who's there? Prynn, how you BEEN?/ Do you still have my copy of Huckleberry FINN?"). They dabble in rock and experimental production just like the Beasties. They're white, bright and geeky just like the Beasties.\nAnd just like the Beasties these days, they suck.\nDespite critical love, Northern State sounds like a bunch of privileged white girls play-rapping for a summer camp talent show. While they should have unique perspective in a hip-hop world dominated by lewd misogynists obsessed with their own greatness, they simply cannot rap, reminding me of Blondie's "Rapture," with equally comical lyrics. \nTake these sample rhymes from the highlight on the album, the Seussically suggestive "Things I'll Do": "Call me any time, I'll manage your damage/ I'll balance your budget then make you a sandwich." Ugh. While the production behind them evokes a funky double-dutch, the three girls' flabby rapping fails to illuminate their admittedly humorous, political perspective. Rhyming "2008" and "candidate" seems like the domain of local campaign staffers, not purportedly professional musicians.\nOn their third LP, Northern State has produced a record that spans genres and styles from the post-punk rock-out of "Cold War" to the old school wiggles of "Sucka Mofo." Each track begins with exciting sonic territory, but then these amateur karaoke-hour hacks sadly enter the stage. Ad-rock's production provides the Beastie blessing on boards, and their admirers are many: they've toured with De La Soul, Le Tigre, and Tegan and Sara. With pedigree like that, I want to like them a lot -- but just because they're the best rapping liberal Whole Foods intellectual girl group doesn't mean they're any good.
(09/13/07 4:00am)
"When I picked that date, I was like, 'Yo, people are going to talk about this so much.' People are going to remember this date.'" So spake Kanye West, remarking on his new album, Graduation, released head to head against 50 Cent's Curtis, in a rap scrum to the top of the charts, accompanied by the normal bellicose chest-thumping one expects from rap feuds. Indicative of the exaggerated importance of this event, the release date that Kanye said people will remember fell on Sept. 11. Hate to break it to you, Kanye, but I'm fairly certain people will remember 9/11 for other reasons. \nAt the same time, Kanye's prophecy came true. I am, after all, writing about the potential crowning of a new king of hip-hop. But one wonders: what's so great about being king?\nThough 50 and Kanye may both claim a desire to hoist the crown, I think both are wary of the title. Like Elvis bloated in Vegas, musical kings don't age well. Observe Diddy peddling Burger King and Jay-Z running his empire ("I'm a business, man"), leaving the real rapping to those schmucks still making music instead of selling product. King of rapping is only a stepping stone to leaving legitimate rapping altogether. There's a reason 50 said he would quit solo work altogether if Kanye won the week's record sales. All the kings of hip-hop either end up in an office (the Dr. Dre model) or in an early grave (the 2Pac model).\nAs more pundits decry the death of hip-hop, it's hard not to feel the genre has run out of thematic fuel. Gangsta rap has reached its logical extreme, with the Clipse documenting the meticulous details of a criminal empire, while "conscious" hip-hop has been blinded by dreams of fame ("First nigga with a Benz and a backpack"). Honestly, the most exciting hip-hop is the self-proclaimed stupidity of hyphy and YouTube videos of dances like walkin' it out and crankin' dat. These songs continue to capture hip-hop's energetic bounce, but where is hip-hop's soul?\nThe problem is not unique to rap. Rock and roll was running out of steam in 1975, but then came Born To Run, exploding across the stereo to revitalize the art. When Paula Abdul and Michael Bolton ruled the charts in 1991, Nevermind brought about the grunge revival to save rock and roll one more time. Where is rap's savior? Is a sole superstar possible in the newly decentralized hip-hop environment, where any kid with a video camera can become a rap phenomenon? In the further diversified scene of contemporary music, it hardly seems to matter who rules an increasingly tiny kingdom. It could very well be Kenny Chesney who outsells both blustering rappers this week.\nStill, for all the funerals for hip-hop, it's easy to forget how fertile the genre remains. The upcoming months promise new albums by Chamillionaire, Big Boi of Outkast, Lupe Fiasco and Lil' Wayne, along with commercial stalwarts like Nelly, all circling the Nov. 13 release of 8 Diagrams, by the re-unified, ODB-less Wu-Tang Clan. Thematically bankrupt or not, the massive, heaving contraption of hip-hop continues to putt along.\nWith this continuing creative drive, does rap need a king at all? Sadly, the vacuum in the heart of hip-hop has hurt it badly. Andre 3000, the genre's most exciting innovator, has wandered off into historical archives, while its past kings have receded to the front office. Just as the '50s needed Elvis and the '60s needed The Beatles as the center of rock, so does hip-hop today need a new center, a new king. \nWill it be 50 Cent or Kanye? Bless them both, but neither fits the bill. Both have been players in the game for too long to truly effect a sea change in hip-hop, save for the release of a colossal historic masterpiece. Neither Curtis nor Graduation qualifies. My prediction? Rap's savior will come from among one of those webcam kids who has heard it all and has something new to say. The next king is just waiting for his cue. So are we.
(09/06/07 2:58am)
On Sep. 1, alarmed that there were Arabic-speaking men who “looked mean” on her late night flight from San Diego to Chicago, Leigh Robbins demanded to get off the plane in order “to protect her kids.” Her commotion forced the men to be questioned and searched by American Airlines and airport security, with no probable cause other than Robbins’ unsubstantiated panic. \nNever mind that these seven Iraqi and Iraqi-American men were working as consultants at Camp Pendleton helping to train U.S. Marines. Never mind that one of the men said his mother was killed by Saddam Hussein’s brutal regime. Never mind that the airline and airport police officers probably violated these passengers’ Fourth Amendment rights.\nInstead, I’d like to focus momentarily on Leigh Robbins, the 35-year-old homemaker who raised the “alarm.” What made her do it? It’d be easy to chalk up her response to xenophobia, but that doesn’t appear to be the case. Robbins is trying to contact the seven men to apologize and seemed genuinely frightened for her children, who were with her at the time. \nRather than Arab-hating, Robbins represents the fear-driven world that Americans inhabit these days. As she said, “I can’t describe how afraid I was. … How can you overreact when it’s your children?” This gut-wrenching fear caused her to toss all reason out the window and caused the airline to illegally search seven men for flying while Arabic. The same fear has caused our elected officials to strip us of our First, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, Seventh and Eighth Amendment rights without so much as a peep of discontent. \nThe specter of 9/11, which has loomed for nearly 6 years, has brought our public discourse to a standstill. We can all relate when Robbins says, “All I could think of was 9/11.” I admit, it’s hard not to think about the risk of catastrophe on the horizon.\nAt the same time, think about all that this bunker mentality has cost us. All the goodwill the world showered upon us has evaporated after two bungled wars and a prickly foreign policy that is all stick and no carrot. We’ve lost all the aforementioned rights, along with any semblance of the rule of law. In six years, we’ve lost what it ever meant to be an American.\nAfter all this, the spirit of America still lives on in this story, but not in Leigh Robbins. It lives on in David Al Watan, one of the “very frightening” men who so scared Robbins. Born in Nasiriyah, Iraq, he fled the country, first to a refugee camp then to the United States, where he now works as a consultant for the Marine Corps. Humiliated, he did what a good American should do: he filed a complaint in a court of law. Al Watan stated, “I am an American. I love this country. I would die for it.” As long as Al Watan is willing to die for a country too scared to sit next to him on an airplane, there’s hope for us yet.
(08/27/07 12:15am)
Are we getting dumber?\nOn the one hand, our civilization is more technologically advanced than ever, and thanks to the Internet, we now can access vast stores of information, from the Library of Congress archives to every Letterman Top Ten List.\nBut a number of observers have noted a dumbing-down of society. More Americans can name the three American Idol judges than the five freedoms of the First Amendment. Try it. One in four Americans didn’t read a book last year, because we can’t stay awake. We’re glued to the tube when Paris Hilton goes to jail, but two-thirds of us admit to ignorance on global politics.\nPerhaps most shocking is our demolition of science, where teachers tell kids about the Earth being 6,000 years old and political parties with dubious motives stifle government scientists’ reports.\nThis all sounds pretty bad, I admit. And from the sound of shriller critics like Al Gore, American society is sliding into a pit of dumbassery unprecedented in human history. An unending string of Jackass reruns and dancing penguin videos has lulled us into a terrible ignorance, while we poison ourselves with a Thickburger and murder our earth. Yeah, we’ve heard this spiel before. \nFrankly, there’s nothing new about the phenomenon of cultural ignorance. In 1900, 11 percent of Americans were guaranteed not to pick up a book. They couldn’t read. The Lindbergh baby story captivated the masses just as the Natalee Holloway story captivates today. \nWhat is new about this age is that we are choosing ignorance. Whereas in the past, poor schooling and inaccessibility of information made continuing education impossible, it’s surprising that today in the Information Age, we’re rationally choosing to be ignorant and irrational.\nConsider this economic setup. You can either know about global warming, becoming miserable and worried, or you can remain in the dark, gleefully putting along in your SUV and running the A/C on the Arctic Tundra setting, while consuming one of those tasty Thickburgers. It’s no wonder that we choose to be irrational. After all, there’s nothing in it for us to learn, and there’s seemingly no price to pay for our actions. \nIt may be good for society that I know the names of my representatives in Congress, but I certainly get no benefit from it, other than the occasional patched pothole. \nI’m not endorsing this mentality of willful idiocy, simply highlighting its allure and prevalence. And if you think you’re immune, you’re wrong. I mean, did you get the five freedoms? Hell, I only got four (those pesky petitioners).\nIs this endless stupidity inevitable? I am not nearly so pessimistic. Look at the dying support for the Iraq war, or increasing awareness of global warming. It may be selfish, but we need incentive to care. Only after the choice of ignorance extracts a personal cost will we learn to read up in a hurry. \nSo, are we getting dumber? Probably no dumber than we’ve ever been. \nBut there’s definitely room for improvement.
(08/23/07 10:37pm)
You’ve done it. I know you have.\nYou’ve read columns and editorials, and while reading some particular injustice, you’ve grumbled, “Even I could write better than that.”\nWell, now the chance has come to take your rightful place among the Indiana Daily Student Editorial Board luminaries.\nI think it was Socrates, or possibly Rodney Dangerfield, who said, “Everybody’s a critic.” These days, it’s truer than ever, as punditry becomes its own profession, and highly opinionated, reader-less blogs multiply like rabbits. Perhaps you, like me, author one of these blogs.\nWhile all these talking heads float about on YouTube, CNN and Entertainment Weekly, as well as the empty expanses of the Internet, giving commentary on everything under the sun, it might seem like the copious amount of opinion makes it less valuable. Yet, as the mass of uninformed opinion grows, the importance of high-quality opinion, grows too. If anything, the current fluid environment of opinion means that well fleshed arguments can find audiences quickly and change minds. That’s why we need smart people talking – to stand out from the crowd of dim mouth-breathers.\nThis is where you come in. The IDS is read by everyone who’s anyone on campus, and commentary is one of our prime assets. You can give something that readers don’t find in The New York Times or the The Wall Street Journal. After all, a clear informed opinion from a student is more persuasive than an inscrutable one from some “expert,” whose writing style is as dull as his recycled ideas.\nThe torrent of opinion is unending, and with all this discussion circulating, you might wonder whether your voice will sound original amidst the din. Fear not. The IDS strives for a diverse editorial board, with many viewpoints represented, so long as they are well-argued and well-written. Furthermore, a disinterest in politics is no deal-breaker. Columns on culture, campus life or even a beloved pet can compel, while boilerplate foreign policy polemic can bore us to tears. \nAll the chatter veils the unfortunate truth that so many of the opinions we hear come directly from official sources in an extensive stage show, choreographed by the powers-that-be. Look at the staged “questions” of town hall debates and the rhetorical chest-thumping on Sunday morning talk shows. Instead, you can tell it like it is and liberate debate from the depths of skullduggery. \nBy writing a column, you can help shape what people talk about and how they talk about it. If you don’t think you’ll have readers, the volume of mail hitting the Opinion desk every week will speak otherwise. \nWhy do we need your opinion? In short, because we want to hear what everyone has to say. If you have a story to tell or a point to make, it’s time someone other than your cat has the opportunity to hear it. \nYou can pick up a copy of the application in the IDS newsroom in Ernie Pyle Hall 120 or online at idsnews.com on the Opinion page. We need you!\nOpinion may be cheap in the world, but we’re buying.
(07/12/07 4:00am)
Shot and released just last year, "Okonokos" was shot at the Fillmore in San Francisco and captures one of the most exciting and dynamic live bands around. Director Sam Erickson has done a wonderful job of capturing not only the energy but also the atmosphere of an MMJ show. \nJim James's voice is as hauntingly beautiful and reverb-heavy as ever, and the band is at the top of their game. The set list spans their entire catalog, everything from the heartfelt melodies "Golden" to the spacey riffs of "Gideon" to southern jams of "Mahgeetah." Buy this DVD and be taken to another place.
(04/18/07 4:00am)
AIX-EN PROVENCE, France – We’re in the thick of election fever here, and the watchword for the French elections this year has been “change.” After 12 years of rule by Jacques Chirac, the French want something new, and the candidates’ messages have delivered, each one proclaiming new ideas, new ambitions and a change to a stagnant system. \nSure, there are the requisite fringe candidates from any European election, some of whom veer toward traditionalism. (My favorite? The Hunting, Fishing, Nature, Tradition party. From their presidential candidate: “If I could be reincarnated, it would be as a duck.” Now that’s a party.) Still, all the parties show dissatisfaction with track France is taking these days. Certainly no one, not even Nicolas Sarkozy, from the incumbent president’s own party, offers up any platitudes about the delightful Chirac years.\nSo, let’s take a look at the main players. Ségolène Royal is the Socialist Party candidate and considered by many to be a bit of a policy lightweight. I detailed Sarkozy’s curious political identity in a column last semester, but he’s still the Union for a Popular Movement candidate and a hugely divisive figure in France. The newcomer to the front-runners is François Bayrou, a center-right candidate who calls for a unity government to achieve an end to partisan bickering for a new future. They all have pretty posters, nice slogans and some rather unattainable proposals (eliminating all homelessness comes to mind).\nAlas, while all the rhetoric parades around the idea of change, the fact remains that not one of the candidates has presented the radical transformation necessary to save France’s welfare state and social protections. France’s system of social aid is crumbling, dominating the budget, with increasing payments and diminishing returns. France’s brain drain is growing, and despite all its claims of social protections, the ghettoized suburbs are ignored. Even with such an elephant (or flaming car) in the room, no one seems willing to do more than acknowledge that a problem exists. \nEveryone wants to hear about change, but the change itself elicits reactions ranging from shrugs to violent protest. This paradoxical atmosphere makes it tough for politicians to enact reform. Remember the mass civil disobedience caused by the proposed changes in employment law last year?\nFor all their talk of change, the cautious major candidates have not strongly distinguished themselves from previous regimes (or each other) except through style. All three are EU-backers, support retention of France’s massive public aid, and 35-hour workweek reform, just like the previous administration.\nWith none of these guys providing the real change that the bulk of French people need, it’s no surprise to see the rise of xenophobe Jean-Marie Le Pen and McDonald’s-bulldozer José Bové, signs of frustration with a system that refuses to adapt. Current poll favorite Sarkozy comes closest to a radical shift in France’s stagnant politics, but his reactionary anti-immigrant shtick harkens to France’s darker past. As a friend here told me, “No one expects anything from the elections.” \nFirst round of voting starts April 21, and every candidate promises change for France. \nBut I’m not holding my breath.
(04/04/07 4:00am)
AIX-EN-PROVENCE, France – At this point, no one can doubt the revolutionary effect that the Internet and in particular, blogs, have had on traditional news media. From the unceremonious damning of established journalist Dan Rather to the naming of “You” as Time magazine’s person of the year, Web content’s importance in the national consciousness is unquestionable. \nStill, there remains debate as to how much this online content fits into the erstwhile mass media scheme. Some blogs, particularly those run by major “old media” organizations like newspapers and magazines, choose to identify themselves as “the media.” Others wish to be separate, making a sort of “bloggia” separate from traditional news media. A few others, most journalists who have since forayed into blogging, have blurred the line.\nStarting with a few blogs during the party conventions of 2004, Internet journalists have steadily gained credibility to rival major news sources. However, with so many different conceptions of the medium, it’s hard to judge blogs on traditional media standards. The vast freedom of the medium, which makes it enticing to writers and readers, also makes blogging ethics a perplexing problem. \nFor example, what happens when bloggers try to become journalists? Web video of police brutality has led to serious investigations, yet here in France, a new “happy-slapping” law will punish purveyors of videos depicting violence. Such a law levies a large fine and jail time for someone who is not a professional journalist distributing images of violence. Certainly, the law is well-intentioned and fits with the rest of France’s nanny-state meddling, but as the line between journalists and bloggers blurs, it’s difficult to simply lump all online amateurs as “the bloggers” and lump traditional news media as “professionals.” Would the amateur bystander who witnessed the Rodney King beating have spent more time in jail than the police officers? \nAt the same time, simply handing the keys to “old media” establishment over to Internet content outlets is hard to do, as blogs can often take on a free-for-all, polemical atmosphere, with none of the editing oversight of, say, The New York Times. The demand of many bloggers for more access is impeded by its raucous attitude; one is unlikely to read “douche bag” in a typical broadsheet daily. You might read it in the Indiana Daily Student, but then again, it’s not your typical paper. Lumping legitimate reporting with tabloid sensationalism as “the bloggers” may be unfair of newspapers, as it diminishes the many important contributions of blogs to the public discourse, but it’s easy to understand the uneasiness.\nAt its core, the blogosphere is torn between two equally enticing goals: true legitimacy as journalists and commentators, and anti-establishment “fight-the-man” insurgency. Alas, you can’t claim to be a true citizen journalist while insulting enemies, nor can you demand the access and legal protection of journalism without having higher standards. If we demand accountability of the bloggia as strictly as we should demand it of our traditional media sources, what we call it won’t matter and legitimacy will be a no-brainer.
(03/21/07 4:00am)
AIX-EN-PROVENCE, France – No one can pinpoint exactly where it began, but sometime in the last quarter-century, a culture of scorched-earth politics was born that scourged our country. Mudslinging has become more important than policy, and culture wars stole civility from public discourse. As a Democrat, I unsurprisingly blame Republicans for the wrestling match, just as I’m sure they blame Democrats. \nI know, I know. Such as it is; such as it has ever been. It’s just politics as usual.\nPerhaps though, our shrugging tolerance has reached a breaking point. The gridlock in our government has degraded to a point somewhere between laughable and revolting, while pundits seem gleeful at the prospect of more enemies and battles to fight. Displeasure with the fearless leader’s job performance is only rivaled by displeasure with the democratic Congress.\nDon’t think this disgust with politics as usual is limited to the United States. Here in France, people are about as enthusiastic about the two major-party candidates as they are about eating Velveeta.\nYet instead of showing more indifference, a number of agitated citizens have had enough. In America, Barack Obama’s emerging policy directives may not be particularly revolutionary, but he practices a revolution in style that promises a country of reconciliation rather than constant backbiting. His credentials are definitively on the liberal democratic side, but he has no qualms about working with Republicans to achieve the ends of the moderate majority of population. People who knock his meteoric ascendancy don’t realize that his appeal would be nonexistent if not for the forgotten middle, which has been shunned in favor of pandering to special interests and fringe groups.\nSome in the middle have gone even further than Obama, renouncing the de facto two-party system entirely. The Unity08 party, for example, built a coalition of moderate Democrats and Republicans who reject that either party stands for the majority of Americans. Similarly, in France, Francois Bayrou has taken his center-right UDF party and transformed it into an outlet for moderate dissatisfaction with either major candidate. \nI’ll be honest, I am wary of such developments as another excuse for political fence-sitting. In times of moral crisis, the last thing we need is a committee consensus. Nonetheless, I think it has become increasingly clear that unless voters in the moderate-center unseat the existing power structure, we can expect gridlock to continue.\nWe can’t agree on many issues, so let’s stick to the ones we can agree on. How about fixing an inefficient overpriced health care system or seriously considering the ticking time bomb of Social Security? Instead of leading us to turn away from politics, our frustration should turn us back toward it, to make politicians act on the issues we care about.\nFolks derisive of such centrism often cite the line: “the center cannot hold.” They forget that in the Yeats’ “The Second Coming,” the center’s collapse plunges us into apocalyptic terror. I am not wild about mere anarchy loosed upon the world. I’ll take an active, vital center, even if it does mean some politics as unusual.
(02/28/07 5:00am)
AIX-EN-PROVENCE, France – I was fairly excited about going to the Communist Party meeting. After all, the French Communist Party has long held significant influence over the political environment of France, and to be honest, I’ve never really hung out with 5,500 communists before. (There was this whole Cold War thing that made communism in America fairly unpopular, I hear.)\nThese days, though, the left in France is in dire straits. Marie-George Buffet, the French Communist presidential candidate, is polling poorly, and the once solid left has become disorganized and split into multiple factions, none of which can pass the first round of presidential elections.\nAt a superficial level, the Marseille mass meeting had all the marks of the once-proud party. Talking points ranged from global class struggle to social equality for all, while red banners and flags fluttered at every denunciation of the capitalist system in a packed auditorium. The whole affair had the air of a joyous, chaotic commie carnival. \nAlas, closer inspection yielded more unfortunate truths. The demographics were undeniably skewed toward the aged, and for all the talk of winning, it seemed clear that their candidate had no chance to make a dent in national policy. While “radicalism” and “new changes” to France were bandied about, the meeting seemed more concerned with shoring up old victories rather than forcing a new revolution. \nSigns of weakness were everywhere. A sincere presentation detailed as a major victory the protection of a sugar plant in Marseille from outsourcing. Some kids carried a Communist flag in one hand and a Coca-Cola in the other. And while all the other speakers expounded upon the strength of Buffet’s programs, her own speech rendered the polite applause one expects from John Denver concerts, instead of the energetic radicalism I expected.\nI guess I received more timidity than tumidity. As a party with almost no chance, why not go out on a limb like fringe parties in America and throw out bombastic, radical ideas in florid oratory? Instead, the staid speeches roused a few instances of excited applause, but mostly hewed to a conventional dogmatic line. So much for radical change. \nThe woes of the French Communist Party demonstrate the growing weakness of the left in postindustrial countries around the globe, and particularly in Europe. The constituents the left aims to aid are still there, but its political power is in disarray. Those who have faced job loss due to outsourcing, those who are homeless, jobless or voiceless in the political system need the left to speak for them.\nInstead, the anger and desperation of the left has paradoxically led to an unadventurous campaign. For all her tough talk of a campaign of combat against the right, Buffet seemed unwilling to say anything new, going through the motions. \nNow, I’m no commie, but we need a vital, vocal left, to fight a potentially xenophobic, corporate right-wing future. We need new ideas and new blood, or the left can count on a long, flag-waving party to nowhere..
(02/14/07 1:34am)
AIX-EN-PROVENCE, France -- He also hates Tavis Smiley and Jim Lehrer, too.\nBut mostly, he hates public money being spent on broadcasting quality programming of an educational and worthwhile nature to an America glutting on "American Idol" and "Deal or No Deal." (Note: they have "Deal or No Deal" in France. It's just as bad). \nOur fearless leader, Bush, has proposed his budget, and to no one's surprise, public broadcasting has taken a huge hit. Whereas last year's proposed plan amounted to a 13 percent decrease, this year's could amount to a 25 percent cut in the Corporation for Public Broadcasting's budget. At a time when all broadcast stations have to upgrade to digital television, thereby incurring further heavy costs, Bush wants to further cripple public broadcasting.\nApparently, if our tax dollars are going to fund broadcasting, it had better be propaganda. While Bush's proposed budget slashes public broadcasting again, the Broadcasting Board of Governors, which broadcasts American propaganda overseas, finds its budget boosted. That's right: We would rather pay to send public broadcasting to Iran than to our own citizens.\nI don't need to trot out all the old arguments, do I? PBS takes a chance on unconventional programming (Antiques Roadshow, anyone?) that no commercial station would consider. The best documentary on TV this year, "Street Fight," which detailed the gritty mayoral race in Newark, N.J., was shown on PBS's program P.O.V. While others race to the bottom to see whose infotainment polarizes people more, PBS provides varied opinions and reasoned analysis on issues that would be lucky to get a three-minute blurb on any other station. \nThis is my first column from France that isn't about France and that's for good reason. I believe that when the Bush administration targets programs for elimination, it should look at broken programs rather than working ones. I'm going to stand up for public broadcasting, even if I have to stand up every single year to do it. I'm going to stand up for "Live from Lincoln Center" and NPR's "Morning Edition." I'm going to stand up for "Arthur" and "Reading Rainbow." I'll stand up for "Mystery!" "The American Experience" and I will stand up for "Elmo." Who among us can say that these sorts of shows are not a valuable use of public money? And exactly none of them would be on the air if not for public broadcasting.\nFor some perspective, the CPB's 2006 budget of $460 million would pay for little more than one day of our wars in Iraq and Afghanistan in 2008. It's a small, effective government program that benefits any household in America with a TV. Such exemplary government expenditures deserve to keep running, and it's repulsive to watch public broadcasting used as a Republican hostage for which we have to beg every budget cycle.\nRemember, we won last time. We can do it again. Write your representatives and donate to your local stations. Make it clear that public broadcasting deserves long-term funding. With your help, I hope that by this time next year, I'll have something different to write about.
(01/31/07 4:10am)
AIX-EN-PROVENCE, France -- On the cold night of Jan. 31, 1954, a woman froze to death on the streets of Paris, clutching in her hands the eviction notice dated one day before. It was a forgettable tragedy, one in a million of the small tragedies that pass daily. But the next day, a 41-year-old priest barged into the studios of Radio Luxembourg to issue a plea that such tragedies should not be forgotten, that we can and must do more. "Friends, help!" he cried across the airwaves, and in that moment, the legend of Abbé Pierre began. His career built affordable housing, raised the poor out of poverty, and brought change to a frozen French government. \nBorn to wealth but renouncing it all, sworn to serve God through saving the poor, Pierre was France's conscience for years, reluctantly accepting media celebrity to spread his simple message: "Serve first those who suffer most." \n I've found the popularity of Abbé Pierre confusing in a country moving ever further from religion. Possessing a voice that was unpredictable, prophetic and undeniably religious, Abbé Pierre strangely found a place in the hearts of the French. The French adulation with Pierre seemed to draw forth from his reminder of how much good one determined Frenchman can do, but also how little the countless others in France were doing. Nothing like strength of character and a massive guilt trip to appeal to the French. \nIn an age of religious strife the world over and increasing indifference toward religion in France, Pierre seemed almost anachronistic, but that's precisely what made him so important. Others could only see religion as a wedge to separate groups of people, as another sticking point in an endless war. Yet, here was a man who was just trying to take people in from the cold on a freezing February night. \nPierre called his organization the Ragpickers of Emmaus, after a story in the Gospel of Luke. Luke tells how Jesus, after his resurrection, was met by two disciples who couldn't recognize him on the road to Emmaus, a decent hike from Jerusalem. As night fell, they invited the stranger, the resurrected Christ, under their roof to dine with them and stay the night, where he revealed himself to them. Being homeless isn't a sign of social deviancy or incompetence, just a sign of not having a home, whether the homeless person in question is an anonymous Parisian woman or the son of God. \nAs a fairly unreligious guy, I'm struck by the wealth of feeling the supposedly atheist French feel for this man. As a country that finds its religion on social fault lines, maybe America would also do well to remember what the point of religion on Earth is in the first place. It doesn't matter to which sect, church or creed you belong. The message of the Pierre is incontestable, "Serve first those who suffer most." We lend our hand to those who need it and God will take care of the rest, if he or she is there
