{"id":3507,"date":"2010-11-13T08:23:37","date_gmt":"2010-11-13T16:23:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/?p=3507"},"modified":"2010-11-13T08:23:37","modified_gmt":"2010-11-13T16:23:37","slug":"day-of-change","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/2010\/11\/13\/day-of-change\/","title":{"rendered":"Day Of Change"},"content":{"rendered":"

1<\/span><\/p>\n

I meant to write this three weeks ago.\u00c2\u00a0 But I got sidetracked.<\/p>\n

I could not figure out a need for an iPad, but once I experienced the Sonos app, I was hooked, it’s a FANTASTIC remote control! It’s like having the dashboard of the Millennium Falcon in your hands.\u00c2\u00a0 Suddenly I could scroll through the Wolfgang’s Vault concerts with the scroll of a finger, I could SEE them!\u00c2\u00a0 And when I came across a Lee Michaels show, I was so inspired that I jumped up from my bed, walked into the living room and found…no sound.\u00c2\u00a0 Nada.\u00c2\u00a0 The speakers emitted not a note.\u00c2\u00a0 I could have written anyway, but I’ve got an innate desire to troubleshoot, I can’t let a malady go unaddressed.<\/p>\n

So I’m tearing apart wires, surfing the Web, convinced the solution is only an insight away.\u00c2\u00a0 But I was wrong.\u00c2\u00a0 The speakers were toast.\u00c2\u00a0 And that’s a problem, because they come from Italy.\u00c2\u00a0 And it took a week to get their replacements.\u00c2\u00a0 Sure, I hooked up the $150 jobbies I’d used previously prior to their acquisition, but although sound came out, it was not music.<\/p>\n

I’ve had a rough week.\u00c2\u00a0 I’ll just tell you a simple story.\u00c2\u00a0 Which reflects not a whit what actually happened, but represents my frustration.\u00c2\u00a0 I had a flat tire.\u00c2\u00a0 I limped to the repair place.\u00c2\u00a0 They fixed it.\u00c2\u00a0 Only they didn’t.\u00c2\u00a0 And I had to limp back to Sherman Oaks from Glendale, white-knuckling it all the way.\u00c2\u00a0 Was I going to crash on the freeway, was I going to trash the rim?\u00c2\u00a0 My Pirelli spent an hour in surgery.\u00c2\u00a0 They literally drilled a hole in it to insert a plug.\u00c2\u00a0 I shouldn’t have watched, but the repair seems to be holding. And I was so stressed out and overobligated that I didn’t finally get to relax until last night when I was sitting in front of my Mac listening to music suddenly stunned how phenomenally great it sounded.<\/p>\n

I couldn’t get up from my machine.\u00c2\u00a0 Couldn’t pee.\u00c2\u00a0 Couldn’t eat.\u00c2\u00a0 Even though these were MP3s, through these AUX speakers the music was a revelation.\u00c2\u00a0 It was like Bettye LaVette was on my desktop, even though she was only ripped at 162 kbps.<\/p>\n

I don’t ask for much, I only want your trust<\/span>
And you know it don’t come easy<\/span><\/p>\n

If you were here right now, we’d be dancing around the room.\u00c2\u00a0 Bettye LaVette’s take on Ringo’s classic is a wild conglomeration of Muscle Shoals and Stax with a dose of "Let It Bleed" sitting on top.\u00c2\u00a0 You remember listening to "Gimmie Shelter" in the dark, right?\u00c2\u00a0 IT’S JUST LIKE THAT!\u00c2\u00a0 But Bettye LaVette is not going to break through.\u00c2\u00a0 Because nobody can.<\/p>\n

We’ve got a mainstream media that wants to believe we can live in the past and wannabes who want to use the new tools to triumph in the fading mainstream, but the truth is we live in an era of chaos.\u00c2\u00a0 We’re all inside a giant pinball machine, with Steve Jobs and Mark Zuckerberg playing the flippers with unknowns filling in during their absence.\u00c2\u00a0 There’s no center.\u00c2\u00a0 You’re chasing a dream that doesn’t exist.\u00c2\u00a0 Jay-Z’s not that big a star.\u00c2\u00a0 Not even GaGa.\u00c2\u00a0 Unless you made it prior to this Internet mania, most people have no idea who you are.\u00c2\u00a0 Or, if they do, they don’t know your music.\u00c2\u00a0 And this isn’t going to get better, it’s going to get WORSE!!!!<\/p>\n

Despite the gossip sites, everybody’s a journeyman these days, almost nobody’s getting rich, I hope you love what you’re doing, because that’s all you’re gonna get.\u00c2\u00a0 World domination?\u00c2\u00a0 You can’t even dominate KANSAS!<\/p>\n

2<\/span><\/p>\n

When I bought "Barrel", I was listening on a separates system that cost $150.\u00c2\u00a0 And I know most people are listening on systems that cost less than that today, but back in the seventies sound was EVERYTHING!<\/p>\n

But it wasn’t until I moved to Los Angeles that I got the stereo of my dreams.\u00c2\u00a0 JBL L100s.\u00c2\u00a0 Technics direct drive turntable.\u00c2\u00a0 Sansui integrated amp, with 110 watts of pure power.\u00c2\u00a0 I’d drop the needle and that was all the entertainment I needed.\u00c2\u00a0 I could stay home all night, listening to the soaring melodies, I could hear Mick Fleetwood’s foot in the kick drum.\u00c2\u00a0 Literally.\u00c2\u00a0 Listen to "The Chain" on a good system.<\/p>\n

And last night, I had this experience once again.\u00c2\u00a0 My synapses were firing, thinking of tracks I wanted to hear.\u00c2\u00a0 It was like the decades had not passed.\u00c2\u00a0 I was still the same person.\u00c2\u00a0 When everything’s compressed, when music is a second class citizen, suddenly I’m reminded of what once was, just because of these phenomenal speakers.<\/p>\n

And that’s when I was reminded of the Lee Michaels song.\u00c2\u00a0 "Day Of Change" wasn’t contained in that concert I pulled up on Sonos via the iPad, but the sound was so invigorating, I went to my collection and played this early classic.<\/p>\n

There are two versions.\u00c2\u00a0 The studio take on "Barrel" and the version from the live album.\u00c2\u00a0 And on that live album, there are only three elements, Keith Knudsen’s drums, Lee’s organ and his vocals.\u00c2\u00a0 The studio take is better, the lyrics meld with the music to have such power.\u00c2\u00a0 But speaking of power, nothing can compete with the live take.\u00c2\u00a0 Remember going to the show and being overpowered by the sound?\u00c2\u00a0 Not the visuals, not the dancing, not the production, but the hair-raising sound?\u00c2\u00a0 That’s what this is like.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s like Bill Graham brought out giant hoses of medicated goo and covered the floor of the auditorium.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s what the organ sounds like.\u00c2\u00a0 And the drums are the kick in your butt that prevents you from relaxing, you can’t help but have the music inhabit you, grab hold of your insides and move through the mud like Gumby!<\/p>\n

3<\/span><\/p>\n

My favorite Animals record is "Don’t Bring Me Down".\u00c2\u00a0 Eric Burdon’s throaty intimate vocal embodies the midsixties in the U.K. even better the Beatles.\u00c2\u00a0 Underneath the suits, the Beatles were rough and tough, John Lennon ultimately tried to recapture this spirit, of lads who broke more laws than they obeyed, who were raising themselves, trying to escape lives of drudgery.\u00c2\u00a0 They didn’t do it for the money, they didn’t do it to become rich and famous, they did it to ESCAPE!<\/p>\n

And the Beatles did.\u00c2\u00a0 But listening to "Don’t Bring Me Down" you don’t believe the Animals ever did.\u00c2\u00a0 They seem prisoners of this record just like ? is forever wrapped up in "96 Tears".\u00c2\u00a0 It’s nothing without him, and he’s nothing without it.\u00c2\u00a0 Alan Price’s organ on "Don’t Bring Me Down" has got the same sound and feel as the instrument in "96 Tears"…this sensuality is as good as it’s gonna get.<\/p>\n

"Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood" was not quite as big as a hit.\u00c2\u00a0 But it’s this song that Elvis Costello covered.\u00c2\u00a0 And Bettye LaVette too.<\/p>\n

Elvis sounds like he’s afraid he’s trapped.\u00c2\u00a0 His vocal is more expressive than Eric Burdon’s.\u00c2\u00a0 But my new favorite is Bettye LaVette’s version.<\/p>\n

She doesn’t want to be misunderstood.<\/p>\n

And that’s funny.\u00c2\u00a0 In this era everybody wants to be misunderstood. They want to appear to be somebody else.\u00c2\u00a0 Twelve year olds want to be seen as sophisticated.\u00c2\u00a0 Fat cats want to be seen as caring for poor folk.\u00c2\u00a0 Politicians placate through duplicity, they hope the public is too stupid to know the truth.<\/p>\n

The music we loved best is not about artifice, it’s not trying to be something else, just itself.\u00c2\u00a0 The greatest accomplishment we can have as human beings is to be known.\u00c2\u00a0 Actors play roles in movies, now too often singers are playing roles in their own songs. Thug.\u00c2\u00a0 Macho.\u00c2\u00a0 Even wounded.\u00c2\u00a0 But laying it all out honestly and being vulnerable, that’s anathema.<\/p>\n

4<\/span><\/p>\n

Earlier tonight, I inserted Bruce Springsteen’s new old album into my computer.\u00c2\u00a0 I wanted to hear the alternative take of "Candy’s Room", entitled "Candy’s Boy".<\/p>\n

Positively awful.\u00c2\u00a0 Not even interesting as an historical artifact.\u00c2\u00a0 And the rendition of "Racing In The Street" was not much better.<\/p>\n

It’s so funny that these outtakes are being lauded when "Human Touch" was decried.\u00c2\u00a0 Yes, the "Lucky Town" album is better than "Human Touch", but no one had a good word to say about either when they came out because Bruce was no longer working with the E Street Band.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s why you can’t listen to the public.\u00c2\u00a0 They don’t want change, they just want what came before.\u00c2\u00a0 And a concert promoter wants to give you what came before, maybe an agent and manager too.\u00c2\u00a0 But an artist wants to break new ground.\u00c2\u00a0 He wants to take chances, he wants to do something different.<\/p>\n

Springsteen’s released a better track since the title cut of "Human Touch", that song is known as "Streets Of Philadelphia", but "Human Touch" is number two when it comes to the last twenty years.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s got all the power, all the emotion Bruce built his reputation upon.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s all we want, a little human touch.<\/p>\n

You and me we were the pretenders<\/span>
We let it all slip away<\/span><\/p>\n

How prescient.\u00c2\u00a0 We pretended we were rich.\u00c2\u00a0 But the only ones who are are those buying seats down close at the Boss’s show with the winnings they made on Wall Street.<\/p>\n

In the end what you don’t surrender<\/span>
Well the world just strips away<\/span><\/p>\n

They tell you to keep your chin up.\u00c2\u00a0 But from square one, they break us down into winners and losers.\u00c2\u00a0 Bruce Springsteen was put into the latter camp, he didn’t believe it.\u00c2\u00a0 But that was back when the record company gave you a big advance and your music could be played on thousands of stations everybody in the target demo was listening to.

I ain’t lookin’ for praise or pity<\/span>
I ain’t comin’ ’round searchin’ for a crutch<\/span>
I just want someone to talk to<\/span>
And a little of that Human Touch<\/span>
Just a little of that Human Touch<\/span><\/p>\n

These records made me feel alive, in touch.\u00c2\u00a0 I just wanted to tell you.<\/p>\n

<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

1 I meant to write this three weeks ago.\u00c2\u00a0 But I got sidetracked. I could not figure out a need for an iPad, but once I experienced the Sonos app, I was hooked, it’s a FANTASTIC remote control! It’s like having the dashboard of the Millennium Falcon in your hands.\u00c2\u00a0 Suddenly I could scroll through […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3507","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-music"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p96vPs-Uz","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3507","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3507"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3507\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3508,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3507\/revisions\/3508"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3507"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3507"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3507"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}