Felice is a good girlfriend.\u00c2\u00a0 She listens to my podcasts.<\/p>\n
I no longer do.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s too embarrassing.\u00c2\u00a0 Oh, I listened to the first few for technical glitches.\u00c2\u00a0 But all problems\/issues have been ironed out.\u00c2\u00a0 And, I used to tell you about them, but it seemed like too much self-hype.\u00c2\u00a0 And that just doesn’t feel good.\u00c2\u00a0 I figure if something is good enough, word will spread.\u00c2\u00a0 And I’m sick of today’s society wherein everybody’s saying LOOK AT ME, LOOK AT ME!!\u00c2\u00a0 But today I listened to the just-released podcast because of Felice’s e-mail.\u00c2\u00a0 I just couldn’t figure it out.\u00c2\u00a0 The line wherein she asked whether I’d spoken to her for me.\u00c2\u00a0 HUH?\u00c2\u00a0 It made no sense.\u00c2\u00a0 Had Felice wanted to convey something to Celine, who sometimes engineers and always assembles the podcast?\u00c2\u00a0 Then my brain clicked.\u00c2\u00a0 Felice was speaking of Wendy Waldman.\u00c2\u00a0 You see their fathers were in the same line of work.<\/p>\n
And then I wanted to hear the podcast.\u00c2\u00a0 Because I remembered liking it when I did it.\u00c2\u00a0 Because it was emblematic of my MOOD!<\/p>\n
Great work comes from getting in touch with your inner tuning fork.\u00c2\u00a0 If you can convey the feeling you have inside to your audience, with no filter, with no self-consciousness, you can do something great.\u00c2\u00a0 And you know what?\u00c2\u00a0 I think this is a damn good podcast.\u00c2\u00a0 I like what I had to say.\u00c2\u00a0 Shit, I don’t think I could ever replicate it.\u00c2\u00a0 But the reason I want you to listen is because of the MUSIC!<\/p>\n
Well spring is here The wind is sweet Before the dot com crash, at the Aspen Artist Development Conference in December 1999, swag included a Rio 500 MP3 player.<\/p>\n It came preloaded with the usual paid-for label crap which I listened to once, to familiarize myself with the unit, and then I placed the device on the shelf.\u00c2\u00a0 Until October the following year.\u00c2\u00a0 After installing Napster (Macster!) on my computer.\u00c2\u00a0 After taking hundreds of tracks I wondered…could I put them on the Rio?\u00c2\u00a0 Oh, I knew you could do it theoretically, but too often there was a software glitch, it’s not like the iPod and iTunes today.\u00c2\u00a0 In 2000 we were still living in the dark ages of OS 9, and extensions.<\/p>\n I loaded SoundJam.\u00c2\u00a0 Hooked up the Rio.\u00c2\u00a0 And VOILA!\u00c2\u00a0 The songs moved over.\u00c2\u00a0 All thirteen that could fit within its memory.<\/p>\n I got a pair of headphones.\u00c2\u00a0 I plugged them into the unit.\u00c2\u00a0 And started to listen to Wendy Waldman’s "Spring Is Here".\u00c2\u00a0 And the experience was so FANTASTIC that I donned a fleece and went into the cold night air.\u00c2\u00a0 Under a thousand stars on this crystal clear night I heard the above lines.<\/p>\n But it’s not only the lyrics.\u00c2\u00a0 Or the way they’re sung.\u00c2\u00a0 There’s the INTRO!\u00c2\u00a0 Played on a zither I believe.\u00c2\u00a0 I’m not sure.\u00c2\u00a0 You see I don’t have the vinyl album.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s in my ex-brother-in-law’s garage.\u00c2\u00a0 I hadn’t heard it in twenty five years.\u00c2\u00a0 On a whim I took down from the Net songs from Wendy Waldman’s third album that were like DEAD SEA SCROLLS!\u00c2\u00a0 And on today’s podcast, I play a handful of them.<\/p>\n The people who make this kind of music today…\u00c2\u00a0 Their material is half-baked.\u00c2\u00a0 Sometimes they have a good voice.\u00c2\u00a0 Other times they can play their instruments.\u00c2\u00a0 But they just can’t write songs.\u00c2\u00a0 Oh, Tori Amos could, before she flipped out and lost her way.\u00c2\u00a0 Not that Wendy Waldman is Joni Mitchell, but the whole package, the way she delivers her own material, it’s so affecting that you become ENRAPTURED!\u00c2\u00a0 I wouldn’t think of leaving the house without my iPod and the 53 songs of hers I have in my iTunes library.<\/p>\n Oh, you might be familiar with some of Wendy’s material.\u00c2\u00a0 She wrote Maria Muldaur’s "Vaudeville Man" and "Mad Mad Me".\u00c2\u00a0 And she co-wrote Vanessa Williams’ phenomenal hit, "Save The Best For Last".\u00c2\u00a0 And she’s still out there, working at it, mostly behind the scenes.\u00c2\u00a0 And her music would be fading away completely but for the Net.\u00c2\u00a0 This is your opportunity to hear her.<\/p>\n Download the podcast.\u00c2\u00a0 You can subscribe by searching on "lefsetz" in the iTunes Music Store.\u00c2\u00a0 Or you can go directly to the Rhino site<\/a> and listen\/take it\/download it there (hold down the "control" key to download on a Mac).<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n Now if you’re a punk, or a metalhead, I don’t think this is for you.\u00c2\u00a0 Oh, I make some salient points, but this is really about the music.\u00c2\u00a0 And this music is for those who’ve lived long enough to reflect.\u00c2\u00a0 Which is really everybody about six or older.\u00c2\u00a0 You know how you’re alone and your mind wanders?\u00c2\u00a0 Sometimes into places it should not go, other times to good things?\u00c2\u00a0 This is music for that experience.<\/p>\n My segment of the Rhinocast begins at 12:04.\u00c2\u00a0 Before that you can listen to an interview with Kris Kristofferson, whose new album is a return to form, if you so choose.\u00c2\u00a0 But be sure to listen at exactly the demarcated point, a dozen minutes in, because then you’ll hear "Spring Is Here" and you’ll feel what I feel.<\/p>\n
I feel it in the air
The world is turning green<\/em><\/p>\n
I smell it everywhere
And I know that God must be smiling<\/em><\/p>\n\n