Who ARE those guys?

We were deep into Blue Sky Basin, his mother and Felice had skied down to Tea Cup, Wyatt said he was tired, but Don convinced him to take a ride on Pete’s Express to ski Grand Review.

Actually, that’s flat in Wyatt’s world. Although only nine, he was begging to ski Highline, Vail’s signature bump run, he raved about skiing Dragon’s Teeth, with its EX warning, the only slopes he said he had not been down were the Frontside Chutes, because they’re rarely open.

Not that Wyatt was always this good. His parents invested in lessons to bring him up to speed with his peers. Learning on your own is so tough, I learned to ski via classes, I’m still using the skills I learned in summer ski camp.

But I didn’t start until I was ten.

So we’re riding Pete’s and it’s cold. The safety bar is down, that’s something they teach youngsters that oldsters ignore. And when we got off the lift, Don told Wyatt to lead the way, to show me his turns, but Wyatt protested that Don wasn’t ready.

Don’s a snowboarder. I made Wyatt promise he would never become one. They’re famous for sitting in the snow and strapping into their gear. And rolling their eyes when they come to flats. And my biggest complaint is that they can’t see behind them, and get agitated when you tell them you’re on their blind side. Furthermore, snowboarders are mostly Gen-X’ers, as in old, and attitude is a bit long in the tooth for these guys.

But I was afraid Wyatt wouldn’t know which way to go. So I said I’d lead until we hit the fork.

And when we did, Wyatt complained he didn’t know which way to go. You see Grand Review is laden with trees, the path is not obvious.

Now I don’t have any kids, never had the inkling until back in 1990, when I was riding the lift with my nephew Andrew at Snow Summit. We were only about six feet off the ground, but he was excited. The same way when he got mini-air over mini-bumps. Seeing the sport through his eyes inspired me.

But I was not inspired to get out early today, because it was in the single digits. Believe me, I’ll get out there, in any temperature, but the colder it is, the longer I linger, waiting for it to warm up.

But Don texted and said it was tolerable. So I suited up and rode the gondola to find not only Don and Jenny, but Wyatt in his orange Spyder suit. With his Salomon skis and his Rossi boots. I’d asked him the night before the brand of the skis he had, but he didn’t know. Oldsters are into equipment, it appears youngsters are not.

And just as we were getting to the Back Bowls, Don informed me Wyatt had to eat.

This didn’t make sense to me, we’d only been out there for an hour, I’d given him most of my Balance Bar… But it appears young kids don’t suck it up, they need to be fed on time.

This is after Wyatt and I rode up Chair 14 with a young girl and her father. The father, a banker from San Diego, was voluble and thrilled we were both there with youngsters. But Wyatt couldn’t get over the fact that Claire was meek and short and was in the fifth grade when he was only in third! He kept mentioning it during the day. Kids have their own social hierarchy, actually, thinking back, it’s worse than that of adults.

So after we stopped at Two Elk to pee and feed Wyatt pizza and chips, we ventured to China Bowl, and then Siberia. And then we convinced Felice to go to Blue Sky, which is not easy.

Ultimately, the group broke up, Felice and Jenny back to Two Elk and us guys up Pete’s to Grand Review. But it turned out the women didn’t stop in Two Elk, when we got there at 2:45 they were nowhere to be found. Still, Wyatt needed the break, to warm his feet. I told him my dogs felt the same way too. This is when he also informed me, as we were drinking hot chocolate, that those slices of pizza earlier were just a snack, on a normal day he’d eat TWO pizzas! But this was not a normal day, we were skiing 20,000 vertical feet.

So with Wyatt flummoxed at the top of Grand Review, I decided to lead.

Now like I said, it’s inundated with trees, you make your own route. And it’s just long enough to be too long for most people, everybody stops. But not me. Then again, should I? To give “tired” Wyatt a break?

And what route should I take? Should I be worried about skiing between tight trees? Would I be responsible if he hit one, they’re very unforgiving, usually you die, would his parents ever forgive me, would I ever get over it?

Then again, I didn’t tell Wyatt to follow me.

And I threw in more turns than usual. And I crossed the slope a bit. Figuring if Wyatt was following me, I’d give him a fighting chance.

But when I didn’t stop and I was cruising quickly, I figured there was no way he’d be behind me. I didn’t look, because that’s a route to disaster, skiing demands total focus, or you fall.

But I’m zipping by everybody else on the slope. The snow is good, but there are some firm spots. And my feet are frozen but I’m digging it, I don’t want to sacrifice, that’s one of the reasons I didn’t have kids to begin with. I didn’t want to stop and wait, I was enjoying testing the limits.

And when I got to the catwalk, which Wyatt refers to as “Flat Jacks,” I stopped, exhaled and…

Wyatt was right there behind me.

We went with the Strasburgs to the Swiss Chalet. Remember that SNL skit with Garrett Morris, SEND US YOUR FONDUE FORKS!? Well, at the Swiss Chalet they’re still using them, and to be honest I haven’t eaten that much in a year, I mean can you say no to chocolate fondue?

And at first we covered Wyatt’s story. How Greta is torturing him, how he’s involved in this Odyssey Project, where he and his buddies are competing to build a mobile vehicle in eight minutes that will fit in two suitcases. Wyatt is nine. Don said he looked bored, so we asked him questions. Funny with little kids, you alternately tease them and ask them sincere questions. Does he have a girlfriend? What books is he reading?

And Don and I talked the obligatory music business, it’s so different talking to a promoter as opposed to a label person, it’s all about whether you can sell tickets or not.

And then we talked about revolution.

Last night Don was with a seventy year old who spoke of music’s leading role in the youthquake of the sixties. The question is, can it happen again?

First is the threshold question, do you want a revolution?

I do. I’m willing to sacrifice, I want change, the end of income inequality, opportunity for all. But I know many don’t agree with me. On both the left and the right. Unlike in my formative years, wealth is no longer inherited, it’s made. And people worked really damn hard to make it, and they have contempt for those who did not. This is a gigantic problem. Along with the fact that no one involved in the 2008 Wall Street crash went to jail. They jailed the bankers in Iceland and the country rebounded. Here, the aftermath of the crash lingers on.

And then there are the people who like things the way they are. I’m confounded. I remember when skiing was a middle class sport. But a lift ticket at Vail this week is $209, and I got on the lift with a class of youngsters all decked out in Bogner and Moncler, and as Jenny said about Wyatt, they outgrow this stuff in a year. But most people have never flown private, they’ve got no idea how the rich really live.

So I ask you once again, do you want a revolution?

You could lose out. What comes first, your job or what’s right?

But assuming you want a revolution, what is the trigger?

Don said it would be like Kent State, some trigger-happy person shooting David Hogg and some other anti-gun protesters.

I’m not sure that would do it, horrible, of course, but would there be a national uproar?

I thought it would be when they got rid of abortion, but it’s nearly impossible to get an abortion in certain states today and there’s been no conflagration, so I don’t think that will be it. Which begs the question, can anything trigger a revolution in America?

Don talked about the environment. But we’ve had hurricanes and fires, and still there’s been no revolution.

And in the sixties, everybody under twenty five was a Democrat, and that’s no longer true.

And all males were afraid of getting their ass shot off in Vietnam, there is no draft today.

Then again we had leaders.

We’ve got no leaders today.

We’ve got brands, that’s the goal of seemingly all youngsters, to capitalize on their “talent” and fame to make money. As for saying no, I never hear that word, no one leaves money on the table.

Then I thought of the Arab Spring, how an overeducated fruit vendor reached his limit, was willing to sacrifice. Is that how it’s gonna happen here?

And then we get back to leaders. You literally put a target on your back, Abraham, Martin and John were shot. Are you willing to risk death?

And if you raise your head above, believe me you get feedback, hate mail, you become an instant pariah. I know, I experience it every day, I’m gonna get it in response to this diatribe. People don’t want you to speak your truth, especially if it’s not theirs. Everybody wants you to stay in your own lane, but this is not how history works.

Martin Luther King was a preacher, but he became a civil rights leader. And fifty years later despite his lionization, there’s still hatred, states that won’t make his birthday a holiday.

Everybody’s trying to pull you down into the hole they’re in.

That’s a paraphrase of a line in Bob Dylan’s “It’s Alright Ma (I’m Only Bleeding).” Dylan got so frustrated, watch “Don’t Look Back,” that he removed himself from the dialogue.

Then again, the leaders of the sixties revolution were middle class, educated. Whereas today the middle class is shrinking, and everybody’s worried about economics, whether they can eat and have a roof over their head. You could have a minimum wage job and make it back then, now you can’t.

And there are a lot of issues. Shouldn’t health care be a right? The newspapers are debating whether outsiders should get into Harvard. Those in the upper class who’ve sent their kids to private schools don’t want this. So is it class warfare or ideological warfare or…

And Don said the revolution won’t come from pop music.

And I agree. And I also don’t know if the revolution can come from music at all, it’s not the sixties with the advent of the Beatles and the addiction to radio. But even more it’s values, doing what is right is less important than doing what will fatten your wallet.

And I can’t say that we came to any conclusions. Turns out we all want change, we’re all up for revolution, but we could not figure out what the hot button issue would be and who would trigger it.

And maybe we’re too far gone. Have you been reading about that book “How Democracies Die”? We’re on the road to destruction, first and foremost the leader minimizes the media, labels it untrustworthy and demands faith in himself, only he knows what’s right. And no matter what Trump does my inbox fills up with people who says he’s right and I just don’t get it. They employ expletives, they use racial and scatological epithets. They want to shut me down.

But the issue is bigger than Trump.

It’s bigger than immigration.

Or as Rodney King once said, “Can’t we just get along?”

It appears not.

Is change a-comin’?

You tell me.

What kind of crazy fucked-up world do we live in where Trump ignores Puerto Rico after the hurricane and the biggest act in the world today is Bad Bunny, from the destroyed island?

Fox News is spinning in its grave. Because Bad Bunny owns Christmas, he’s everything the whites are against, people of color supposedly taking their jobs, their culture and if you deny this…

You’re part of the problem. Just like all the people who are afraid to call themselves Republicans so they keep protesting they’re independents when they’ve never voted for a Democrat in their life.

In case you missed the memo, and you probably did, because paying attention to the news is a 24/7 job and you’re more worried about what’s happening in D.C. than on Spotify, Bad Bunny released an album on Christmas Eve and it’s exploding.

Used to be no one put out music in January, Van Halen made a big statement releasing “1984” at the beginning of the month of that year, but now…

Music never sleeps. Acts are always putting out new music. Fourth quarter, fourth schmauter. Holiday releases are physical product and Christmas music. Otherwise, the goal is just to get people to stream. Hell, Bad Bunny’s “X100PRE” doesn’t even have a physical release. The music business has moved beyond that, unlike the book business. You don’t have to print in advance, you’re ready when the music is ready. This is what digital/the internet allows, and it’s good for art. After all, isn’t the best art about capturing lightning in a bottle?

And Bad Bunny started on Soundcloud. Once again, white people keep bitching about the net eviscerating their business, they want to get paid, just today I got another one of those inane e-mails about low Spotify payments…you’re missing the memo, jump in, the water is fine!

Seemingly everybody ruling the charts today started by giving it away for free. They didn’t wait for a gatekeeper to say yes, for a label to give them money, they just started, they just played. And sure, most of them failed, but not all of them.

And while Trump shuts down the government saying it’s important to keep the brown people out, veiled racism at best, a brown person rules in music. And the great thing about music is it doesn’t matter what it looks like, just what it sounds like, so it’s open to everybody!

And sure, Puerto Rico is part of America, but ask Trump and his supporters whether they truly believe that.

And Bad Bunny’s music certainly doesn’t sound like classic rock, so the fans of Lynyrd Skynyrd and modern country avoid it, pooh-pooh it, yet it’s infiltrating the culture. It’s just like Kodak and digital cameras. We keep hearing that whites will become a minority in the U.S. but it doesn’t happen, and then it does, overnight. So many musicians are people of color. And Latin music has finally hit the mainstream, it was just not about “Despacito.”

It’s happening in music. The distribution wars are over, streaming won, you can get everything for one low price per month. Now the focus is on software, i.e. the music itself. And those taking chances are young with nothing to lose. They’re experimenting, collaborating, building it from the ground up. And it’s incomprehensible to those who lived under the old umbrella.

There’s a burgeoning scene in music. It’s finally going somewhere, the endless dominance of hip-hop in this century is fracturing. There are new sounds, oftentimes growing out of hip-hop, and it’s exciting.

But none of the media outlets and gatekeepers can adjust to this new world. They want one chart with defined hits and defined stars. They want to be in control of who makes it and who doesn’t. But those days are through. The creators are in charge of music. They can just post it to streaming services and triumph. They don’t need radio or TV, those are afterthoughts. They’re just infecting the hard core, their fan base, until they become so big others get clued in.

There is something happening here, and it certainly isn’t exactly clear, but it’s exciting.

Music may change the world once again, just you watch!

If I could turn back time, I wouldn’t watch this show.

Welcome to the twenty first century, where old media has not caught up with new.

First and foremost, special events must be televised live, or we don’t care. You see we read all about these events after they’re recorded and before they air, there is no surprise. But the producers and acts are afraid of live. Well, welcome to the now, where mistakes are badges of honor, where they evidence your humanity, where if we want it perfect we can listen to the recording.

That’s why people go to the gig, to experience something different, when you know the answer to the question, why play the game?

This is the difference between now and then. We want to live in the moment. We want the edges. We want to feel part of the show. Or no go.

And these people honored who’ve risen above, don’t expect many of them in the future, no one can get that much mindshare. Except for maybe Lin-Manuel, and isn’t it interesting that he did it by creating a live experience that you couldn’t, experience that is. Never underestimate the power of sold out, the inability to go, exclude someone and they’re dying to go. In other words, “Hamilton” is unlike a movie, it doesn’t play for a weekend, it plays forever. And it features real people instead of comic book characters.

This is important. You’ve got to downgrade your estimate of stardom. If you’re shooting for the top, you’ll be lucky if you make it to the middle. People now have options and most don’t want to spend time with you, they like something different. Without MTV, Cyndi Lauper does not appear on this show. That channel and its limited offerings, which weren’t available on most cable systems at first, made Lauper a star. Not that she was not deserving, but today if you’re on MTV…when was the last time MTV created a star, since the 16 and pregnant people?

As for Cher…

It’s the power of a great song. When Lauper sang “Turn Back Time,” it fell flat. The hit was the video, not the song, with Cher and the ass tattoo and the strutting and the sexuality… Lauper evidences no sexuality, that’s not her game. As for the song… Sure, automatons in the audience stood up and danced, but that’s probably because they were bored on their asses for the hours it takes to film one of these shows.

But “I Got You Babe”…

That’s the funny thing, the personalities die and the work remains. What did you create, what did you leave? If it’s good enough, you’ll be remembered, if not, SAYONARA!

So the concept of a smorgasbord awards show is done, history, toast. From the Oscars to the Grammys, not enough people care, no one wants to be that bored, that’s why they turn to their phones. I certainly did during this trip back to the last century. To keep our attention you must be great, you must have edge, you must be pushing the envelope. Is there anybody in creation who loves those Grammy duets? They satisfy no one but the producer, they aren’t Grammy Moments but Shammy Shenanigans that are instantly forgotten unless they’re train-wrecks.

First they came for the classical, then they excised the jazz and the country, all to get you to watch the Grammys, but you stopped. You never cared about who won, but you do want to see your favorite acts live. Which is why we watched “Ed Sullivan,” we had no other options! Do you really think we wanted to watch Topo Gigio?

I’m not saying you can’t acknowledge a person’s life work. I’m just saying that in the future, most people won’t care, maybe won’t even know who that person is and certainly won’t tune in for the ceremony.

As for the production…

Prince owned the Super Bowl and Aretha owned the Kennedy Center Honors.

Give an NBA player the ball with seconds to go and they’ll deliver.

Give a has-been performer the mic and they’ll see it as just another exposure, when the truth is we remember when you hit a grand slam, these are the moments worth living for, and if you can’t deliver them, maybe you shouldn’t show up on stage.

But that’s modern America, where no one can say no, believing exposure is everything and if people just saw you, they’d like you.

No.

Furthermore, anything worth watching is available online instantly.

And if it’s great we watch it over and over.

Hell, why would you watch SNL in real time?

Hell, I watched this show to placate the family, to be a member of the group, but there were no hosannas, because the production fell flat.

That’s another thing about art, especially music. It’s oftentimes singular, a bolt from the heavens into the brain/body of the performer. But TV shows are made by committee, trying to please everybody and ending up appealing to nobody. And no one can say no.

Isn’t it interesting that most truly great artists are mercurial, they haven’t got time to listen to your opinion, they’re too busy doing it their way, and if you don’t let them…

So we’ve got the schism between the old and the new, between the networks and the streaming services, between the oldsters and the youngsters.

But the truth is for decades we were hung up on our devices, that’s what we thought the tech revolution was all about.

But truly, it’s about software, we’re only seeing the after-effects now.

Why go to the theatre when you can watch it on Netflix?

You can build it yourself on social networks and Spotify.

The world is changing, but too many don’t want it too, won’t acknowledge it.

Isn’t that what’s happening in governments around the world? People agitating on the right to bring the old days back, Carol Burnett and the Sonny & Cher show?

But that ain’t ever gonna happen. We’ve been blasted into the future, where everything’s up for grabs. New people will be winners, color won’t matter, it’s those who use the new tools best, who understand the culture best, who will emerge victorious.

And once again, music is the on the bleeding edge, the canary in the coal mine.

We’ve got creators using the new tools to make, distribute and promote their wares.

We own live performance.

As usual music gets no respect, but everything’s going our way.

Into the land of cacophony, where it’s all about building an audience and serving it. Mass is dead, that’s why pop expired.

The king is dead.

Long live the king.