You don’t want to fail in public.

This is why acts are wary of stretching to play larger venues. Nothing puts a stink upon your act like empty seats. Forget the buzz on the outside, the business and the social media scuttlebutt, the attendees are also turned off. What are they doing there if everybody else decided to stay home? Are they no longer hip? Sure, there’s always a hard core that sees its isolation from the rest as a badge of honor, but they don’t stage their events in stadiums.

Now if you were around in 1976…

It was a weird era. There’d been talk about the Bicentennial for years, but in the wake of Watergate everybody was still licking their wounds. The focus ultimately was on light and breezy, fun, no heaviness involved. Ford was now president and people didn’t want any disruption, they were sick of arguing. The war was finally over and it was only a few years before the go-go eighties. The late seventies is when the boomers grew up, looked in the mirror and questioned how they were going to get ahead in the future. It was no longer all for one. There was no common rallying cry. This is when the seeds of the hedonistic eighties were planted, not that we knew it at the time.

But one thing was for sure, everybody still believed in the American Dream, thought if they put their nose to the grindstone they could get ahead, and there was no doubt that America was the greatest country in the world. We were the land of opportunity, we ruled.

July 4, 1976 if not completely flat, certainly was not memorable.

But now it’s fifty years later and…

About twelve months back people stated talking to me about the events they were planning to celebrate the 250th birthday of our nation. Now you’ve got to know that events like this require a lot of heavy lifting, and a ton of money. Good intentions are not enough. And it’s hard to rally people around a generic rallying cry. Look at music festivals… They rarely start with a bang, you need to build them over years, convince the public they’re worth attending, so to plan for one day of events?

At least Trump had the right idea, to have an extended celebration.

But he could not read the room, he had more power than ever before, but despite the ability to quash naysayers, the passion for him and his projects was waning.

Now it’s the little things that get you in the end. The war in Iran? Still incomprehensible to most people. Americans famously lack passports, and many believe that Iran is a third world nation, even though that could not be further from the truth, and all they really want is for gas prices to come down and for inflation to be tamed.

But the algae in the Reflecting Pool…

Did the Reflecting Pool need fixing? Could be, but like with the destruction of the East Wing, we didn’t hear about it until it was happening, and the no-bid contract stuck in the craw of those leaning left, but it was business as usual.

Until the algae bloomed.

First there was the question of the cause.

But we were told the problem would be rectified quickly. And when this turned out not to be the case, it was blamed on bad actors, criminals…and if there’s one person who believes that, they must be related to Trump, or one of the naysayers in Congress.

The thing is when you take action, there’s always a potential for failure. Which is why it’s a fool’s errand to talk about cutting spending, making government smaller. Sure, do your best to control costs, but don’t throw out the baby with the bathwater, i.e. fire people and cancel plans. As for the public at large, they like government services, they don’t like to pay taxes, but you can’t have it both ways.

So now you’ve got a green Reflecting Pool with your mad next door neighbor coming out and blaming those pesky neighborhood kids.

What would even be the motivation? And it turns out if you were anywhere near the neighborhood, you were at risk of being arrested. Furthermore, with cameras everywhere, wouldn’t there be footage? And if not, why not?

So then it comes down to the two week celebration of America 250 on the Mall.

Some call it a World’s Fair.

But there’s a reason there hasn’t been a World’s Fair for eons, everything new can be displayed and experienced on the internet, you don’t have to travel to see something, you just have to log on.

As for a raw celebration/party…

I don’t know who came up with this fakakta idea, but it would have been better to get the experts involved. Hand concerts to AEG or Live Nation, which doesn’t seem like much of a stretch since Michael Rapino actually spoke with Trump.

And until you’ve established the gravitas of your festival, attendance is based on headliners. Who are the headliners?

One thing about the Bicentennial, everyone did their best to make it bipartisan. Then again, as much as we were divided, we were united by the resignation of Nixon, we were coming together. Meanwhile, J.D. Vance is now trying to rehabilitate Nixon, talk about rewriting history…

Then there were the musical acts… When they started to cancel, Trump could have done a mea culpa, said it was not a MAGA event, but instead he doubled-down, said he would be the headliner.

So now there was no talent and a great swath of the public was rubbed the wrong way.

As for coming to a carnival for booths and a Ferris wheel… In the modern era a Ferris wheel is not far away, nor are the booths that titillate you for a moment while they take your money.

And if you want to spend, who wants to go to D.C. in the summer? I mean if you really want to endure the heat, you’ll go to Disney World.

This was a foreseeable failure, and there could have been some course correction, but like last week with the housing bill, Trump is stonewalling.

Now in business they tell you not to do this, that it’s about the customer’s mind rather than the company’s. Nordstrom and Costco will take almost anything back, they want to keep a customer. But if you’re hemorrhaging customers… That’s the thing about businesses, they fade very quickly when the public starts to turn on them, especially in the modern world, where word of mouth is on steroids online.

It’s all about soft power. Feelings.

But Trump seemed to miss the memo.

Now whatever you think about Trump, pictures don’t lie. Scratch that, in the AI era, pictures lie all the time. But I’ve yet to see a deepfake showing the Mall crowded with attendees.

And it’s even worse, since so few people are there, there’s no FOMO amongst the rest of the populace.

So Trump is failing in plain sight. It’s not like he can declare bankruptcy and start over. America isn’t a business.

Now never in my lifetime have Americans been so misinformed. The truth is fungible, facts are up for debate. But the failure of the celebration on the National Mall is not. No one can defend it. But expect Trump to come out and blame someone for the failure imminently, like he did with the Reflecting Pool.

The truth is America is experiencing generational change, and neither the Republicans nor the Democrats truly see this, never mind want it or are effectively countering it, or god forbid embracing it.

The younger, digital-savvy generations, are taking over.

Meanwhile, everybody over the age of 50, especially those with a megaphone, can’t stop sh*tting on the internet and social media, digital communications. It’s just like our parents railed against rock music back in the sixties. Utterly laughable if you’re a youngster. You need to disrupt yourself to stay in power, but both parties are calcified.

Much of America is tuning out the D.C. circus.

But when the Reflecting Pool is green and the Mall is empty, only Karoline Leavitt could spin this positively. Everybody else cringes, if they don’t laugh outright. They see an out of touch Administration in an out of touch city. Maybe if they had rappers and influencers, maybe if they met the younger generations halfway…

But no, it’s Lee Greenwood or the equivalent twenty four seven. 

The game is to have plausible deniability.

But there’s no way Trump and his cronies can spin the disaster of the Great American State Fair positively.

And people may feel positive about Coachella, but they have mixed feelings about state fairs anyway.

What a disaster. Which will seep into Trump’s presidency just like algae took over the Reflecting Pool.

1

There was a standing ovation after almost every song.

As previously established, my dentist turned me on to Yes. His nephew made an 8-track tape of the first album for him and we listened to it as the Dodge station wagon which needed a front end alignment trundled down I-91 from Vermont back to Connecticut.

Now if you know that initial LP, there’s an absolute killer version of the the Beatles’ song “Every Little Thing,” which had the misfortune of being on “Beatles VI” in the USA, a hodgepodge collection with a lame photo on the cover, but in the U.K. it was ensconced towards the end of “Beatles for Sale,” the band’s CD I’ve played the most, because it contains the original recording of my now favorite Beatles song.

But this Yes cover, it was majestic. I immediately purchased the album, played that song for everybody I knew, even during freshman orientation the first week of college, I thought it would close everybody instantly, but it took years for the masses to catch on.

After loving the debut, I saw the follow-up, “Time and a Word,” in the bin at Alexander’s, not evening knowing it existed, I thought the group was one and done, and I played it, but it was not quite as good as the first LP.

And then came “The Yes Album.”

I only purchased it because I was a fan of the band. I did not expect a great leap forward, but that’s what I got. The addition of virtuosos Steve Howe and Rick Wakeman lifted the band to a whole ‘nother level, pushing the envelope of what came to be known as prog rock.

Steve Howe was not there last night. Nor Rick Wakeman.

But unlike Chris Squire, at least they’re still alive.

And Bill Bruford’s replacement Alan White is gone too.

And it’s more than half a century later. Does anybody care?

That’s what I was thinking driving to the gig and during the first number, a full-length version of “Close to the Edge.”

The original Yes only had one hit, “Roundabout,” and this show was from that classic era, except for a few new songs from Jon’s collaboration with the Band Geeks, which fit in seamlessly and were actually quite good.

Most people come to oldies shows for the hits. And depending on how many you have, that’s how many tickets you can sell. Aged Boomers and Gen-X’ers do the calculation. They’ve got the cash and the time, is it worth spending it? I wouldn’t think that many people would want to go see a band with only one hit.

But they did.

But were these the only ones? I mean how broad is the Yes footprint?

I’m not sure.

But this music was from a point in time when hits were just icing on the cake, it was about the album. With none of today’s internet distractions we played them from beginning to end, over and over. And went to see these bands. But now?

This is not like going to see the Journey celebration. This music is too difficult to be pure nostalgia, it demands attention. I won’t quite say it’s work, but if you’re not involved, you don’t even want to be there.

And I’m asking myself why I am there.

It’s so weird, I’m sitting there thinking about what this music meant to me back when, but do I want to live in the past or the present? Stop in my tracks or keep pushing the envelope?

Now let’s be clear, it was my people who were there. Old and rumpled, with gray and white hair, some wearing t-shirts, in some cases band shirts from previous tours. This was not a night out at the Hollywood Bowl, no one was there to be seen. They came for the music, and the music only.

So is this material ancient, or is it our classical music? Were the people going to the show no different from their parents going to the symphony?

And marching forward… There can’t even be any shows like this.

First and foremost, there was no production, which the Spotify Top 50 specializes in. And the Spotify Top 50 also specializes in hedonistic, mindless hits, not much different from superhero movies. Will you really want to spend all that money to see these acts fifty years from now? It’s one thing if they’re part of a revue, but will you want two hours of their tunes?

The people last night did.

2

So what you’ve got to know is the Band Geeks do an excellent job of playing the  material, but they are faceless. Which is a far cry from the Yes of yore, with Wakeman in his caftans…

And there still is a version of Yes plying the boards, sans any original members, but the band is lacking one thing, Jon Anderson.

This is not plug and play, this doesn’t work with an Ariel Pineda. It’s not about suspending disbelief. Unlike with Journey and other bands with soundalike replacement singers, the music is not bigger than Jon Anderson, he is intertwined with it. Yes is beyond songs, it’s creativity in the writing, the playing and the singing.

You need to see Jon Anderson sing these songs. And he’ll be 82 in October, and unlike so many of his peers, he still has his pipes.

So… You miss the other original players, their personalities… I learned way back that you need to be weary of replacing band members, because in addition to musical cohesion, there’s always some part of the audience that is attached to that seemingly secondary player. Don’t forget, George had fans, not only John and Paul, never mind the quirky, lovable Ringo.

And you want to see these people in the band.

And that was lacking last night, and was disappointing.

And to tell you the truth, even though I own and know “Close to the Edge,” it was never my favorite, but here we got the full side rendition. And when it closed…

People stood up clapping vociferously and…

There were no video cameras, no one to impress, they were just that moved by the music.

But then came “Perpetual Change”…

Never mind “And You and I.”

And then I was completely involved, it was not pure nostalgia, it was not like so many oldies shows, this music was alive and kicking, no one on stage was going through the motions, this was as vibrant as all of the new shows out there.

Once again, they’re doing it without a net. Yes, there are two keyboard/synth players, but like I said, there’s no production, it’s purely music. Sure, Anderson claps his tambourine, and occasionally paraded around with a giant flag, but this show was not something so much that you saw, but something you heard, something you experienced. That you were involved in.

And song after song, except for a couple of the new ones, generated a standing ovation. These people knew the music. They’d stand up spontaneously and thrust their arms in the air, they’d clap along and sing too. For all you knew, these people were still living in the seventies.

But it’s the twenty first century.

3

So if you’re a Yes fan, you’ve got to go. Since it’s only Anderson of the originals, it’s actually less nostalgic, it’s like Anderson has thrown off the past and been reinvigorated.

And the venues are not big. There’s no rip-off involved. It’s like it was back in the day.

But those days are long over.

So what do we make of this? Sitting there for the two hour long sets it was clear that we lived through something, whose formula seems to have been lost. Yes, we can call Yes prog rock, but they sounded nothing like their contemporaries Genesis or Gentle Giant. Each of these acts was on their own hejira. And nobody was sitting there saying “let’s write a single,” it was never about the hit. But this music has lasted.

So many of the acts from the seventies can’t even sell out a club. And even if you had a couple of hits, if there were no albums to back it up, there aren’t any rabid fans. But rabid fans will come out every year to see acts they’re invested in, just ask the metal bands.

But metal never dies. And prog rock is almost completely in the rearview mirror.

4

The apotheosis was “I’ve Seen All Good People.”

“Take a straight and stronger course

To the corner of your life

Make the white queen run so fast

She’s hasn’t got time to make you a wife”

Even if you don’t remember every word, you remember the melody. Takes you right back to your dorm room. And they started a cappella and then the voices ascended into heaven and it was positively mesmerizing. All I could do was lean forward, rock back and forth, nod and sing along.

There was joy in this music. It was the other. Not made for radio, seemingly not made for anybody but the people who made it, the band itself. And if the audience could relate…

And we did. And we couldn’t exactly explain why. It’s just that it titillated us, was one step beyond what we’d encountered before, was anything but me-too.

“‘Cause it’s time, it’s time in time with your time, and its news

Is captured for the queen to use”

Don’t ask me what the words mean, they’re open to each person’s individual interpretation.

“Don’t surround yourself with yourself

Move on back two squares”

“Your Move” goes on for minutes, it’s exquisite, prettier and more enticing than music half a century younger.

And then, when you’re completely entranced…

“I’ve seen all good people turn their heads each day

So satisfied, I’m on my way”

5

There was no context. Other than the fact that this was music we knew and loved and wanted to hear performed.

It wasn’t about hype, there was no press, you had to find it yourself.

Once again, the music didn’t sound, still doesn’t sound like anything else, and rather than being set in amber it was scrubbed clean and moving.

I’m not saying this is for everybody. But it’s surprising how many it is for. Those who grew up in an era when music not only drove the culture, it was a constant bastion of innovation. You’d break the shrinkwrap and drop the needle and not know exactly what you were going to experience, even if you owned every one of the act’s previous albums.

It’s a lost formula.

Forget the music, you’ve got to have screens, lights, distractions, the belief is the music itself is not enough, certainly not if you’re playing to 1,800.

But last night it was.

P.S. No one got up and went to the bathroom during the show.

P.P.S. There was no undercurrent of conversation whatsoever during the show, a rare event.

The set list: https://www.setlist.fm/setlist/jon-anderson-and-the-band-geeks/2026/thousand-oaks-civic-arts-plaza-fred-kavli-theatre-thousand-oaks-ca-134841ed.html

Tune in June 27th to Faction Talk, channel 103, at 4 PM East, 1 PM West.

Phone #: 844-686-5863

If you miss the episode, you can hear it on demand on the SiriusXM app. Search: Lefsetz

BritBox trailer:

(Not that I’d tell you to watch it, it reveals too much, you’re much better off taking the series in cold.)

There’s something about Suranne Jones…

So we were watching “Wrong Side of the Tracks,” a Spanish show on Netflix recommended by my cardiologist. She doesn’t watch much TV, she’s consumed with reading medical journals, and when she mentions a show, it’s worth checking out. (This is the difference people talk about when they reference the divide between the health care and longevity of poor people and rich people. If you’re willing to pay, doctors have all the time in the world for you, you can reach them nearly instantly, but it costs you. A sum most people I know are unwilling to pay. But my off-insurance internist diagnosed my leukemia, and this cardiologist says if I follow her plan I won’t have a heart attack, and in the last six months two people I know had heart attacks and two needed stents, so I’m paying up. Funny about money, what’s important to certain people and not others. Sure, you can drive a fancy automobile, but it doesn’t matter if you’re dead. I refuse to save money on health care, not that I don’t blanch at the cost.)

Now when we first started watching “Wrong Side of the Tracks,” I was wowed. It was the exact kind of show I go for. Dirty and gritty with truth. What you’ve got is a racist grandpa who owns a hardware store in a bad neighborhood insisting that his daughter’s adopted daughter come live with him, he’ll set her straight. And there are so many truth bombs. About this mother treating the adopted kid as an accessory, about her brother procreating without the means to provide…the series is so rich and to the bone and informative. Basically, there’s a dope dealer gangster who centers the action, and the crooked cop, the absolute star of the show who works both sides, and you can tell by the way I’m going on about it, I dug “Wrong Side of the Tracks.”

But it’s eight ninety minute episodes a season. A bigger commitment than most. And about halfway through, Felice said it felt like a soap opera.

Now I was trying not to be influenced, I was still into the show, but as I thought about what she said, I realized she was right. No one ever died. The consequences weren’t grave enough.

But we finished the eight episodes and…

There are three seasons, and you never know if each one is a reset. Sometimes the setting remains the same, sometimes the cast, I wanted to continue watching to see, even though Felice was less than enthusiastic. But when the same characters in the same places appeared, I turned it off. I wanted to know what happened, but I didn’t want to dedicate that much time.

So I went to my list.

My cardiologist had also recommended this Nordic noir series “Wisting.” But it turned out to be on AMC+, and we only get that with ads, as part of our Spectrum package. So I’m perusing my list, quickly, not wanting to hang Felice up, I get to choose but she gets to exercise judgment, and I saw this show on BritBox “Doctor Foster.”

I assumed it was like “Doc Martin,” a bumbling physician in the hinterlands.

I couldn’t have been more wrong.

Doctor Foster is played by Suranne Jones, and it’s set in the city.

So what we’ve got here is…

Suranne Jones as the head of the local surgery, and her husband as a real estate developer.

Is he having an affair?

Now I’ve got to tell you, at first you’ll find “Doctor Foster” frustrating, you’re just waiting for Suranne to come out with it.

But she doesn’t. And she wavers.

And, then the show turns into “The War of the Roses.” At least I think it does, I haven’t seen “The War of the Roses” for decades, and I know it’s set in one house, but my point here is the couples are battling.

And Bertie Carvel’s Simon, Suranne Jones’s Gemma’s husband, is categorically unable to tell the truth.

Like I said, at first the series is frustrating.

But then, just when you think it’s predictable.

IT’S NOT!

Everything plays out differently from your expectations. I mean we’ve all seen a lot of movies and TV shows, we know the tropes, we know what to expect, but “Doctor Foster” confounds us again and again.

Now you might be someone who married their high school sweetheart.

But if you’ve ever been divorced, if you’ve ever felt out of the loop in your relationship with your significant other, so many emotions will ring true. In Hollywood, stars get divorced and deny any consequences. In real life, people get divorced and the hangover goes on for years, they might be in your dreams until you die!

Now another thing different from American TV is that Gemma is not wholly likable, she doesn’t always do the right thing. She exercises bad judgment, crosses the line. But she’s possessed, and nothing is going to stand in her way.

Now the third party here is Jodie Comer as Kate Parks, whom you know from “Killing Eve.” Her role is not identical here, but what you notice is she’s so YOUNG!

Then you realize the first season of “Doctor Foster” came out in 2015. If you’re living in the U.K., the show is probably old hat.

But not in the U.S.

And what’s further astounding is it’s not been remade by a U.S. company. It’s been adapted in fifteen other countries, but not here. I guess studios want something that appeals to teens as opposed to adults, something that’s less chiaroscuro. I mean with the right actors you could remake this with a nearly identical script.

And “Doctor Foster” would be great with any solid actors in the key roles, but what truly puts it over the top is Suranne Jones.

You’ve seen her. She’s got credits an arm’s length long. I won’t list all of them, I’ll leave you to Google/Wikipedia.

But what you’ve got to know about Suranne… She radiates a sense of charisma, without being distant or mysterious. She’s just one step better looking than the average bear, she was not the best-looking girl in your high school, but she was the best-looking girl in your specific class.

But it’s not raw looks, when Suranne cracks a smile…

And she radiates an inherent intelligence too. She’s not a two-dimensional model with looks and little talent, she inhabits the role.

And as Doctor Foster she brings home the bacon. But when things go wrong for her and she questions why, her neighbor across the street says Gemma thinks she’s better than the rest. And it’s funny, because nothing has been said, but you can feel that, it’s true. She’s competent and good-looking and…

If someone’s that good-looking, there are scores of men who want to be involved with them just on this basis.

But Gemma… She’s difficult and flawed and she knows it. Then again, she’s aware of her power. She’s a blinking red light. But I’m telling you, there are so many guys who are willing to ride the tiger, they get mesmerized by looks and…

Now season two came out in 2017. And the BBC has just commissioned a final season three, nearly ten years later. But both of the initial two seasons play like they were shot yesterday.

The thing about “Doctor Foster” is on an emotional level, it can be very real. It can be over the top when it comes to plotting, but not too far out there such as to become laughable comedy. But while you’re watching, YOU TENSE UP!

At first you’re just viewing. But a few episodes in, it’s not so much that you’ve been in these exact circumstances as that you see them as plausible, you can foresee the consequences of actions, you can see people screwing up their lives, and when they do so it hurts. You. The viewer.

So on an absolute scale is “Doctor Foster” the best show I’ve ever seen?

No, it’s not in my absolute A tier.

Then again, it’s light years better than all of the stuff people e-mail me every day that is American pablum. They don’t understand that the TV works for you, you’re not subservient to it, this is not the old days of three networks, never mind Bruce Springsteen’s 57 channels. You’re responsible for finding good shows.

And in these shows is where you get the humanity, the points of discussion we used to get in music and movies.

When was the last time you debated a record?

And how much is there to say about superhero and horror flicks, they’re amusement park rides, forgotten right after they’re over.

But you will never forget “Doctor Foster.”

If this were an American show, it’d be the talk of the town.