Joakim Noah Meltdown

Chicago Bulls center Joakim Noah provides unimpeachable evidence that I am not the only person in the world who occasionally gets irritated with his co-workers and supervisors. I can't and don't do what Noah did when I lose patience with annoying people. It's not my personality nor am I that important to my firm. At worst Noah will lose a small piece of his salary and/or be asked to stay away from work a day or two. Generally speaking I find such hyper emotional displays somewhat childish. I've worked with people who have had regular meltdowns during work conflicts. If the powers that be like them it's written off as passion for their work. If the powers that be don't like them it's considered insubordination and they're written up or terminated. But when you have the exceedingly rare skill set that Joakim Noah possesses you can do things like this on occasion. Noah may well have had a point. I don't know. I just thought it was funny how Noah wanted to make sure each referee knew exactly what he thought of them at that point in time. I guess if you're gonna get ejected you might as well get your money's worth.

Movie Reviews: A Single Shot, Carrie(2013), Cold Comes The Night, Runner, Runner

A Single Shot
directed by David Rosenthal

Although the guitarist Robin Trower should be appreciated in his own right, when you listen to his most famous creations it's very obvious that Jimi Hendrix was a major influence. Trower has never denied this. Hendrix influenced many musicians. Some of Trower's music sounds like unreleased Hendrix Band of Gypsys cuts. That's a compliment but it can also be worrying. Similarly, although A Single Shot is based on a book not written by the famed filmmakers The Coen Brothers, Rosenthal's noir film gives such a homage to the Coen Brothers in general and specifically such films as Blood Simple or Fargo that some people might wonder why Rosenthal just didn't ask the Coens if they wanted to produce or direct. A Single Shot takes place in the isolated West Virginia backwoods. Similar to many movies that I like, especially from the seventies, A Single Shot attempts realism in people's actions and speech. Events take time to play out. There are pauses in conversations and long periods of silence when someone is engaged in a solitary pursuit. The camera work is solid and far from hyperactive. A Single Shot is a quiet bleak film which takes its time getting to the point. The protagonist is not a particularly nice person. The introduction makes that quite clear. I don't know if this was their first film together since 2002's Welcome to Collinwood (which you should see) but it was nice to see Sam Rockwell and William Macy together again. Perhaps the film tried too much for realism as between the attempted accents and oft inebriated or angered state of the characters it was occasionally difficult to understand the dialog. So what's this film about?

John Moon (Sam Rockwell) is a desperate West Virginia hunter and farmer who has lost his father's farm. As a result, and possibly because he's too proud and/or lazy to work for other people, he feeds himself by poaching. Moon has also lost his attractive wife Jess (British actress Kelly Reilly-again showing what seems to me to be a decent interpretation of a upper Southern accent), and son. Jess, a poor diner waitress, wants a real man, that is someone with money. This film doesn't depict her as a golddigger. Jess just would like to be able to live somewhere nice without ducking calls from bill collectors or wondering if she'll have enough money to feed herself and her son. She still likes John. She just doesn't love him any more. The first 5-10 minutes of the film have virtually no dialogue as we watch John stalk a deer.

John briefly loses sight of the deer as it runs into a gully. He's working to flush it out when he sees/feels its movement. He shoots and sees it fall. He runs to finish the killing process and start the gutting. But he's made a horrible mistake, one that anyone properly trained with a gun should never make. Know what you're shooting at before you pull the trigger. John has not actually shot a deer but a young woman. He is horrified and tries to save her but it's too late. Poking around the area John discovers the woman's camp. Searching through her belongings he finds a large amount of cash-tens of thousands. He takes the cash and disposes of the body, hightailing it out of the area before anyone comes to investigate the shot. He doesn't go to the police. So right from the beginning we can see that John is not the most lawful or ethical man.

John tries to convince Jess to reconcile before the divorce is final. He gives her money. While he's in town he stops by his attorney Dagger Pitt's (William Macy) office to order him to slow walk the divorce process. John gives money to Pitt. As everyone knows John never has any money, the fact that he's throwing around $100 bills does not go unnoticed. As the garrulous Pitt points out, they all live in a small town with interrelated businesses, interests and people. Later, going to Jess' apartment, John finds that Jess is absent but that her babysitter has invited over the sinewy ex-con Obadiah (Joe Anderson-another British actor) for some private meet and greet time. Obadiah put a gun to John's head because John entered without announcing himself. John is angry to find another man in his wife's apartment, particularly one who even after he learns who John is, is dismissive and disrespectful. Obadiah seems to know more of John's business than he should. Obadiah may be working for even more dangerous folks.

John's friend Simon (Jeffrey Wright), a rake, has returned to town just to visit or so he says. John starts getting telephone threats to return the money. Local rich girl Abbie (Opehlia Lovibond-another British actress) starts to make a play for John. Pitt hints that he has clients whose interests might conflict with those of John. Someone shoots and kills John's dog. An anonymous phone caller tells John that unless he returns the money the dog won't be the last loved one of John's to be killed. But John won't return the money. He sees the money as his only chance to regain Jess and redeem his father's farm. So events proceed apace. As mentioned, this film moved at a very leisurely pace. The ultimately ambiguous ending dramatically upped the tension and dread but the film may have waited too long to do that. But I'd say it was a good film.
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Carrie(2013)
directed by Kimberly Peirce

It had been a very long time since I had read the Stephen King book upon which this story was based or seen the original film with Sissy Spacek. So I didn't have a lot of preconceptions before sitting down to watch the third cinematic adaptation of this novel. I'm sure you know the basic story. A bullied shy socially inept girl with an emotionally and physically abusive mother is humiliated at her prom. However this girl also happens to have a very strong telekinetic ability. So she proceeds, almost despite herself, to open up a HUGE can of whoop-a$$ on everyone who ever hurt her. That's the big external story. It has some obvious links to current fears about bullying as well as constant fears about the process by which we become men and women. I've heard that some people never really truly believe and understand that they're going to get old and die until they bring another life into this world. Carrie touches on that, albeit obliquely.

The internal theme which is the story's core is how people, in this case, mostly girls, can ruthlessly single out, crush and humiliate those who are different. Girls can be just as wicked, mean and evil as boys can be. Based on talking to or even being related to a few women who weren't exactly founts of joy and happiness during their high school years I think the original novel and this adaptation realistically displayed female aggression and anger. The real horror of Carrie is simply meanness, not a telekinetic run amok. Carrie (Chloe Grace Moretz) is an elfin high school student who is mocked and bullied at school and home. Moretz, perhaps as much as Spacek in the original, captures Carrie's almost visceral vulnerability and naivete. The only misstep is that in today's world of constant sexual information flow in which some people try to lecture third graders on gay sex, it seems beyond belief that a female high school student would be ignorant of menstruation. The movie explains this by having had Carrie home schooled by her mother. Margaret White (Julianne Moore) is a religious nut who cuts and scourges herself. Moore's performance here was suitably disturbing, if not quite as intense as I remember the original. The elder White most definitely believes in Original Sin (S-E-X). Moore inhabits a very different character than her Mrs. Robinson type role in Don Jon but that's why they call it acting. For Margaret the need to cut out sin is FAR more important than anything silly like motherly love.

Showering alone after gym class to avoid being nude in front of others, Carrie has her first period. She has no idea what's going on. She thinks that she's dying. The other girls are initially amused but become irritated as the frightened Carrie becomes hysterical and bleeds over the floor. They start to throw tampons at her, chanting "Plug it up". The lead bully, Chris (Portia Doubleday) records the event on her cell phone. Even Sue (Gabriella Wilde), an intelligent girl who knows better, initially joins in with the taunting. The no-nonsense gym teacher Miss Desjardin (Judy Greer), marches into the showers to see what the fuss is about, stops the bullying and forcefully brings Carrie out of her hysteria. Miss Desjardin arranges for Carrie's mother to take her home. The teacher tries to talk to Mrs. White about Carrie's obvious ignorance of human bodily functions but Margaret is not having it. There is a moment of pathos at home as the frightened and confused Carrie desperately begs her mother to explain why she never told her about the change. But Margaret thinks this is just the sign of Carrie's turn toward sin. She beats her with a Bible and locks her in a closet to pray. Carrie's telekinesis starts to manifest.

But although Margaret may be beyond Miss Desjardin's authority, the girls who bullied Carrie aren't. The teacher doles out suicide drills as punishment. Refusal means that they don't pass gym class and can't go to prom. Being a woman herself, evidently the teacher has some insight into these girls' motivation. The girls agree to this, following Sue's lead. Chris, however is not only dismissive of the punishment but remains extremely vindictive towards Carrie, having uploaded the shower scene to youtube. When Chris refuses punishment she is kicked out of class and school. This breaks the friendship between Sue and Chris. It also kicks off a tragedy as Chris plots her revenge. Sue feels bad about what happened. She noticed that her boyfriend Tommy (Ansel Elgort) stuck up once for Carrie in class. So Sue asks Tommy to take Carrie to the prom instead of her. Against his better judgement, not because he dislikes Carrie but because he loves Sue, Tommy agrees. Tommy sweeps Carrie off her feet without being condescending, something the paranoid Carrie is always expecting. Carrie is researching her power and even showing it to her mother. Margaret freaks out about having a "witch" for a daughter who is attending prom in a dress that shows off her "dirtypillows". Chris and her court of friends have come up with the perfect revenge. And Tommy and Sue remain clueless, tragically so.

The film's final 20 minutes have all the requisite explosions, blood and death but you should never forget that everything happened because Carrie was a victim of an insane sexually repressed mother and mean peers. It's the ugliness of a broken mother-daughter relationship, the flow of repressed sexual urges into other channels, and people hurting the vulnerable among us that stays with you, not the special effects. I thought the Carrie character lost a little sympathy because she has more malice and intent when her powers make their public appearance.
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Cold Comes The Night
directed by Tse Chun

Walter White didn't die. He was just blinded. He moved to Eastern Europe to recuperate and plot his revenge while somehow picking up a Boris Badenov accent. You could be forgiven for thinking that after watching this movie. It's another noir film but it's not quite as cute or as smart as it thinks it is. The stars couldn't really save this movie from just being meh. Cold Comes The Night does feature Alice Eve in a deliberately deglamorized role that is not based on her more obvious attributes as seen in Star Trek. So there's that I guess. Chloe (Alice Eve) is a motel owner who lives in the motel with her daughter Sophia. She's a single mother and evidently money is tight. IIRC it's unexplained as to how she came to own the motel in the first place if money is so tight but details, details. Chloe is under pressure from the state to find another place for her daughter and herself to live. An officious and obese social worker (Ashley Atkinson) doesn't think that a motel is the proper place for a youngster to grow up. 

Chloe has two weeks to find new lodgings or the state will take her child. It would be interesting to know how Chloe's and Sophia's living arrangements came to the state's attention in the first place and by what right does some social worker claim to be able to remove a child from a parent's custody absent abuse or neglect. But the film leaves those details out. The only thing that I can imagine about how Chloe popped up on the social services radar is that Chloe, as do many motel owners, looks the other way about the goings-on in rooms that are rented by the hour. Yes, you see her motel is apparently the local Bristol Hotel. The ladies who ply their trade there are protected by their pimp, swaggering local police officer Billy (Logan-Marshall Green) who evidently has a thang going on with Chloe, despite being married. Chloe meets with Billy in his car(!), (and why do I get a feeling that the determinedly sleazy Billy has had  many other such "meetings" with Chloe and other women in the past) to demand that Billy find some other place to have his "girls" work. Billy doesn't like demands but he does like Chloe.

Meanwhile the taciturn and apparently legally blind "businessman" Topo (Bryan Cranston) is being driven to an undisclosed meeting by his associate/nephew. Time is of the essence so Topo really doesn't want to stop but his associate whines, begs and pleads. And since Topo can't drive he must assent. But he insists that they enter Chloe's motel separately and be on the road again very soon. The nephew is fine with this because he's noticed the young women hanging around. The nephew may not be American but it doesn't matter where you are, men and women can always communicate with each other. He retires to his room with a hooker. But later there's a dispute. The reason will remain unknown as the nephew and the prostitute have both killed each other. Billy and other police arrive to clean up the mess and impound the vehicle in which Topo and his nephew arrived. This is very problematic for Topo. See he's an aging organized crime hitman and courier, who was delivering a significant amount of money which was hidden in the jeep. Being late with the money is bad. Losing the money is far worse. Topo only got this job because of a favor from the boss, an old friend. But it's the boss' son who's running things now and he doesn't like Topo. And by "doesn't like" I mean that he would take any excuse to give Topo the dirt nap.

So the next morning Topo ,who occasionally pretends to have worse sight than he does, takes Chloe and Sophia hostage. He wants to know where the police took the vehicle and how Chloe can get inside it. Topo makes it very clear that he will shoot Sophia in the head, should Chloe try anything funny. However the money is no longer in the vehicle. Topo demands Chloe's assistance in the search. Chloe tries to save her daughter and make a deal with Topo for some of the cash. Although the idea of a legally blind hitman had potential, the film didn't greatly impress me. A good film noir usually needs a femme fatale. I'm not sure Chloe really fit the bill. I guess you could argue that she's an updated realistic resourceful femme fatale though. I liked seeing Cranston again but the role is something of a straitjacket. I think because we're supposed to identify with Chloe we don't need to know much about Topo other than he will shoot our child in the head if he doesn't get his money.
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Runner, Runner
directed by Brad Furman

This film was almost the definition of generic. You've seen it before. The only thing that made it watchable was Ben Affleck's smooth performance as Ivan Block, an American online gambling tycoon, who has relocated to Costa Rica to oversee his worldwide operations as well as run local gambling casinos. For some reason I didn't realize Affleck was that old or that tall. It looks like he's been hitting the weights as well. He plays his part quite well as an aggressive, confident alpha male who always has all the answers, knows what to say to other men to get what he wants, rarely backs down from confrontation and has any kind or any number of women that he desires. And women are a big part of what he desires.

In Princeton, Richie Furst (Justin Timberlake) is a former Wall Street big shot who lost everything in the crash. He may have been doing some shady things in 2008-2009 as well. He's now persona non grata on Wall Street. He's considered too old or too shady. Trying to ride the bad economic times out Richie has gone back to grad school to get his master's degree. He pays tuition by bookmaking and referring other students to online gambling sites. When a student drops a dime on Richie, the Dean warns Richie to stop all gambling activities or else. The Dean doesn't care that that's how Richie pays his tuition. Desperate, Richie starts an epic game of online poker using his own money. Although at first he's winning, he soon gets reckless and greedy and loses everything. But you don't work long on Wall Street without being statistically adept. Richie has noticed some inconsistencies in the play. Once he has someone smarter than he verify the numbers, he knows that the business cheated. Believing in standing up for himself as well as not having any other choice, Richie departs for Costa Rica to confront Ivan Block. Richie knows that in gambling the house always wins so there's no need for a legitimate operator like Block to cheat. 

Through luck and some quick thinking Richie finagles an invitation to a party Block will be attending. There he meets Block and explains that someone in Block's organization has to be cheating. Richie can't believe it's Block which is why he came to him first. Nonplussed, Block takes the proof and agrees to look into it before having Richie seen off. Surprise! Block has identified the miscreants available for the cheating and fired them. He offers Richie all of his money back plus a bonus. Or if Richie has real stones, and Block hopes that he does, Block is willing to hire Richie at a well paid position. At worst this offer is worth mid six figures in yearly income. And with bonus and time served it could be worth seven figures. Richie says yes and quickly rises to become an important member of Block's team. Richie works very closely, that is to say intimately, with Block's second-in-command and on-again/off-again girlfriend Rebecca (Gemma Arterton). Richie hires his friends to work with him. But things that look too good to be true usually are. A intense bully of an FBI agent named Shavers (Anthony Mackie) tries to explain this to Richie while Block pulls the curtains back on his business and invites Richie to swim in some deep waters without a life jacket.

The only question is who cons whom or rather were you conned into watching this film. I won't say it wasn't fun at times. It's stylish. It just wasn't super special or challenging. Definitely something that you keep half an eye on while you're deshedding your German Shepherd or some similar task.
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Warren Michigan Police Officer Cuts Off Woman's Weave

I don't have much to say about this. Perhaps it was jealousy of the other woman's hair? Maybe the officer is just always that abusive? Or maybe it's just a bad person using bureaucracy to do wrong.  To some cops being arrested is not bad enough. They need to make sure that the citizen feels completely humiliated. I don't know. The good news is that Officer Najor no longer has the authority of the state to hide behind. Her boss fired her. Although unnecessarily removing someone's hair is not as bad as a beating I am sure the shock and humiliation are similar. And I get the feeling that the officer intended to send a message about who was in charge and who wasn't. So ladies, if you have extensions or weaves, be careful about getting arrested in Warren, Michigan. Because the police might try to cut your hair. Watch news story below the jump.

At many jails, prisoners are required to remove hair extensions that clip in because they could be used as a weapon or to commit suicide. But Charda Gregory didn’t have clip in extensions. She had a weave that was sewn right into her real hair. Charda Gregory is a young mother who loves her hair. And the 22-year-old hair dresser loves changing her style often by using weaves. But Gregory’s hair changed dramatically after an encounter with a Warren Police Officer. 

Even though there’s no audio on the video from inside the Warren Jail, you can see Gregory kick her legs and writhe in pain as the officer plunges scissors into her hair, hacking away at the weave that was sewn into braids on her scalp. “There’s a real simple thing: it’s called right and wrong. And to me this is something that I won’t tolerate, I don’t think the citizens of Warren will tolerate it,” said Warren Police Commissioner Jere Green. Green says Najor’s explanation that she had to remove Gregory’s weave because of alleged threats of suicide makes no sense.

“I don’t buy that’s the proper way to treat a human being.  I don’t think it’s decent, I don’t think there was any reason to do it, and when I look at it – that bothers me,” said Green. Green says as soon as he learned about the incident, he placed Najor on leave and she has since been fired.

Handymen and Stay at Home Mothers

Do you think that traditional gender roles still have meaning?

Recently on Facebook one of my younger female cousins posted that she and her unmarried friends were running into a lot of male poseurs who claimed to be looking for traditional women insofar as such things as cooking, cleaning, and possibly even who works and who stays at home. She found it a bit upsetting though that when she or her friends challenged these men on their proficiency at such traditional male responsibilities as fixing things around the house, repairing automobiles or other machinery and doing other unpleasant but old school male chores these men were either clueless about such jobs, had to pay other men to do them or claimed that in today's day and age such chores ought to be equally shared between men and women. Showing the somewhat "shady" humor which tends to run rampant in my family one of my male cousins pointed out that although he might not be able to fix a woman's car he was more than capable of unplugging her pipes. He even had references, heh-heh. When I liked my male cousin's post my female cousin goodnaturedly told both of us that we were on timeout. Snicker.

Anyway this got me thinking. My paternal grandfather was a general contractor. So many of his sons, both via knowledge passed down and their own curiosity gained a lot of my grandfather's do it yourself type skills. This included my father. It was a very rare day indeed that my father ever paid someone to do anything around our house or on his vehicles. He normally did it himself. Lots of people in his social peer group did the same both because that's just how they were raised and because they grew up in either extreme poverty or in lower middle class areas where money was very very tight. People were expected to make do with what they had or repair it until they could afford something new. I think that back in the day high schools had more shop classes. These have been stereotyped as holding rooms for people who aren't going to college but I think some people might be surprised at the number of college educated people who are still able to adequately perform some supposed blue-collar work. I don't seem to remember shop class in my high school but it's probably something I wish I could go back and take. Although sadly I have nothing near my father's mechanical skills and deeply regret not paying more attention back in the day I have still picked up some basic things over the years. I find a sense of accomplishment in being able to fix simple things around the house, change my home environment, save a few bucks here or there, or at least have a vague idea when a contractor is quoting me a ridiculous estimate. To me that is a critical streak of self-sufficiency that I think is important for both genders as adults but is 100% necessary for men. This could be why I'm not overly fond of asking for help when I think it's something I ought to be able to do on my own. Ironically I remember changing a flat on the expressway all by myself because that's what the Old Man would have done only to arrive home and be told to call AAA next time instead of taking such a stupid risk. HA! So it goes. Of course as my brother always says his idea of masculinity means that he makes enough money to PAY other people to do that kind of work. And so he does.



From the opposite perspective for whatever reason a woman named Amy Glass felt that she needed to ridicule not only stay-at-home mothers but also the very concept of congratulating people (women) for getting married and having children. She did so in what I considered to be a rather nasty way. 
LINK

Do people really think that a stay at home mom is really on equal footing with a woman who works and takes care of herself? There’s no way those two things are the same. It’s hard for me to believe it’s not just verbally placating these people so they don’t get in trouble with the mommy bloggers.

Having kids and getting married are considered life milestones. We have baby showers and wedding parties as if it’s a huge accomplishment and cause for celebration to be able to get knocked up or find someone to walk down the aisle with. These aren’t accomplishments, they are actually super easy tasks, literally anyone can do them. They are the most common thing, ever, in the history of the world. They are, by definition, average. And here’s the thing, why on earth are we settling for average?

If women can do anything, why are we still content with applauding them for doing nothing?

I want to have a shower for a woman when she backpacks on her own through Asia, gets a promotion, or lands a dream job not when she stays inside the box and does the house and kids thing which is the path of least resistance. The dominate cultural voice will tell you these are things you can do with a husband and kids, but as I’ve written before, that’s a lie. It’s just not reality.
You will never have the time, energy, freedom or mobility to be exceptional if you have a husband and kids.

I don't see anything wrong with congratulating people on getting married or having children. Although it might not be your cup of tea, that doesn't mean you need to knock it for someone else. Whatever happened to live and let live? Although it could certainly be considered oppressive to reduce every woman's worth to solely her reproductive and marital status I think it's just as wrong headed to assume that a woman's worth is only and should only be based on paid work outside the home. The unpaid work that mothers and fathers do can't be valued but is critical to raising healthy productive human beings. For me to congratulate someone else for getting married or having children is not saying anything negative about those who have chosen to walk a different path. Again, I think that some feminists are too quick to over glamorize what they see as the male role and eschew what they see as a female role. Ultimately I think this turns into internalized (and practiced) misogyny, ironically what feminists loudly and reflexively accuse everyone else of doing all the time. I can't speak to what Amy Glass experiences as a woman but I do happen to know and be related to and descended from women who are exceptional who are married and have kids. So I happen to think Glass is full of it on this instance. And as you might imagine plenty of other people did as well. Some of them were women, strangely enough. Go figure. I guess when you tell millions of women that they are just average and will never be exceptional a few of them are going to be upset enough to come at your neck. Who would have thought.

What do you think?

Are men under greater pressure (internal or external) to be self-sufficient?

Is there anything wrong with congratulating women for marrying and having children?

Are gender roles here to stay no matter what we do?

Music Reviews: Howlin' Wolf, Tuvan Throat Singing

Howlin' Wolf
The men don't know but the little girls understand

If I had to pick one bluesman who was the quintessential blues deity that man would be Howling Wolf, or as the IRS knew him, Chester Arthur Burnett. He was named after the President. I don't remember the first time I heard him but he impressed me. He impressed many people with his stentorian gravelly baritone-bass voice that sounded like crushed glass and radiated unrestrained masculinity. Producer Sam Phillips said that Howling Wolf was the literal soul of man who never died while fan and musician Bonnie Raitt talked of the sudden impact that just seeing and hearing Wolf had (from afar) on her lady parts. Howling Wolf stood 6-6 and weighed over 300lbs in his glory days. He received his nickname not just for his unusual howling vocal abilities but because as a child he was quite taken with the Little Red Riding Hood stories he heard. He reminded me of my maternal grandfather. Although it was Howling Wolf's surprisingly expressive, deep and oft sinister voice that most people noticed, he was also a fairly talented harmonica player and decent guitarist. Wolf's voice was such that I imagined that he woke up every morning and gargled with road salt and nitroglycerin. 

Howling Wolf's primary vocal influences were people like Charley Patton, Son House, Tommy Johnson and Jimmie Rogers. Elmore James and Wolf also had similar vocal styles. Wolf toured with Robert Johnson and learned harmonica from his brother-in-law, blues giant Sonny Boy Williamson (Rice Miller). So Wolf was literally a blues Founding Father. Wolf's yelps, howls and vocalizations were unique. As Wolf said "I couldn't yodel but I could howl. And I been doing just fine."

Howling Wolf was an extremely demanding bandleader who did not suffer fools or glory hounds lightly. Wolf once stopped a show to berate guitarist Hubert Sumlin for mistakes and pedestrian playing. He kicked Sumlin off his stage. Wolf sent Sumlin home, warning him not to return until he could play. Sumlin, who later became Wolf's primary foil and soloist, credited that incident with forcing him to improve. Wolf had no problem putting hands on people if he thought they did him wrong. He once knocked Sumlin's teeth out. There was one incident when he and fellow giant (literally and figuratively) bluesman Albert King fought. There were rumors about people that Wolf had badly hurt or worse, down south. Because he grew up in horrible poverty and segregation and often worked around people who were drunk, violent or armed, we shouldn't be surprised that Howling Wolf could be a suspicious martinet. It didn't help his outlook on life that his mother had essentially abandoned him after her divorce from Wolf's father. Wolf grew up with a great-uncle who could have been charitably described as violently abusive. Wolf finally ran away to rejoin his father and siblings. But the maternal rejection left lifelong scars. As adults, mother and son had a conflicted relationship.Wolf's mother, a spirituals singer, thought that blues was the devil's music and that her son was going to hell. 

Wolf was unafraid to tell people, black or white, what he thought. As Vaan Shaw, a blues guitarist whose father worked in Wolf's band said, "He was not necessarily a likable person. If you told him "good morning" he might answer with something like "'Well I don't know how good it is. Let's wait and see"". Working with younger avant garde blues/funk musicians in the late sixties, Wolf told future Miles Davis' guitarist Pete Cosey that "(Cosey) should take all of his pedals and wah-wahs and throw them in Lake Michigan on his way to get his hair cut". Cosey, who had a massive afro, remembered the incident with fondness. Wolf later bluntly described the album he did with Cosey as "dogs***". Generally, musicians who worked with him didn't have problems if they did their job and didn't get on the oft moody Wolf's nerves. Buddy Guy said he never had a cross word with Wolf.

Howling Wolf took his music and life seriously. He despised drunks. He was contemptuous of musicians who allowed alcohol to control them. Even his mentors and heroes like Son House could come in for caustic criticism from Wolf for this reason. Although when Wolf left home he was illiterate, he ultimately remedied that condition. He even briefly went to school to study guitar theory and learn how to arrange horn parts for his band. Wolf was one of the first bandleaders to start withholding Social Security and unemployment insurance from his band employees' salaries, guaranteeing them at least some money in retirement or in unemployment. Wolf was a stickler for paying his employees on time and in full. As Wolf was always fond of reminding people, especially fellow label mate, blues legend and close "frenemy" Muddy Waters, he was already a star before arriving in Chicago. Unlike Muddy Waters Wolf tried to keep the Chess Brothers at arms' distance. He refused to be paid in Cadillacs. He wanted his money. Muddy Waters and Howling Wolf were the premier Chicago post war bluesmen. They did not mind stealing each other's gigs, musicians or occasionally songs. They occasionally assisted each other as well.

Wolf's early Memphis music featured musicians like Willie Johnson, Pat Hare, and Ike Turner(who also played piano), all of whom were fond of a raw distorted guitar sound. The Memphis sides are the beginnings of rock-n-roll.  "House Rocking Boogie" and "Just My Kind", with Willie Johnson on guitar, show this. The early work is not necessarily what we might consider today to be well recorded but occasionally that works better I think. What is a true aural performance? Today we have multi-track recordings, the ability to easily fix vocal or instrumental mistakes in the mix, multiple channels and microphones dedicated to each instrument and other modern advances that make the producer more important. But sometimes it's good to put one microphone in front of the singer and have one or two room microphones for everyone else. That might be closer to what we'd really hear in a concert. Much of Wolf's music swings and swings hard. Although Wolf was not a jazz musician, there's little difference between some of Wolf's more relaxed cuts and some bluesy jazz from the forties and fifties. In other cases Wolf was playing funk music before it was called that. He influenced the next generation. For example Funkadelic's "Music For My Mother" has Howling Wolf's fingerprints all over it, right down to a (false) harmonica solo and a not so humorous reference to a town named "Keep Running, Mississippi".

Much of Wolf's late fifties and early sixties output was overseen, produced and occasionally written by blues bassist, songwriter and  producer extraordinaire Willie Dixon. This wasn't necessarily Wolf's idea. Dixon and Wolf weren't the best of friends. Wolf would occasionally opine that Dixon's lyrics and music were too simplistic, too personally identifiable with Dixon, and too sexual while Dixon often said the best way to get Wolf to do a song was to claim that Muddy Waters was thinking of recording it. Wolf thought that some Dixon written "big man" songs like "Built for Comfort" were silly. Wolf was also suspicious that Dixon was too close to the label owners, the Chess Brothers. Listen to Wolf and Dixon share verses on "Going Down Slow". Dale Hawkins' hit Suzie Q was inspired by Wolf in general and by his song "Smokestack Lightning" in particular. It's both ironic and possibly fitting that Wolf's classic stream of consciousness song "Smokestack Lightning " is being used for Viagra commercials. The ominous song "No Place to Go" and its close relative "How Many More Years" each define existential dread and mystery."Mr. Airplane Man" uses the same melody found in "Smokestack Lightning".

"Evil" reminds me of Louis Jordan's similar musings on domestic relationships. "My Mind Is Rambling" has a delicate tricky beat. When I hear that song I always think of a bull dancing in a china shop and not breaking a single item.
Drummer and Army veteran Earl Phillips had one leg shorter than the other which could be what caused him to place extra emphasis on the "one" of the bass drum's beat. You can hear this most famously in songs like "I'll Be around" and especially "Forty Four". I can't decide whether "I'll Be around" is a classic stalker song, someone begging his woman to change her mind, or a warning from beyond the grave. It could be all of those. Anyway I'll be Around" is a great song with MASSIVE distortion via overdriven amps, microphones and recording board. When Wolf starts playing harmonica it's as if the speakers are going to explode. Wolf's voice is like something from another dimension here. It's scary. "Do The Do" gives a nod to Bo Diddley with its tom-tom heavy rumba riff and avoidance of cymbals. Wolf earnestly explains just what sort of woman he likes and why. ("34 bust, 22 waist, everything else right in place") . "Spoonful" is a song about how small things matter. "Moving" was recorded near the end of Wolf's life while he was suffering from kidney and heart disease and finally cancer. You can hear someone (Eddie Shaw?) feeding Wolf the lyrics. But as Wolf boasts, his name still rings everywhere he goes. "Hidden Charms" sees Hubert Sumlin reel off an extended inventive solo that shows why he was considered to be Wolf's definitive guitarist. "Commit a Crime" is a sinister one chord vamp. It bemoans a murderous woman. Wolf tries to survive long enough to leave. "I Ain't Superstitious" is another Dixon written tune that combines Dixon's favored stop time rhythms with lists of African-American superstitions.

But on "Just Like I Treat You" Wolf is not paranoid and hassled but very happy. The insistent song with a locomotive rhythm is a hymm to male female domestic equality. Wolf knows his wife will return his treatment of her for good or bad. And he wouldn't have it any other way. "Howling For My Darling", "Ooh Baby (Hold me)" and "You'll Be Mine" all express frank appreciation for life's female principle. In "Shake For Me" Wolf explains to a woman who rejected him that she returned a little too late because he's found a woman who shakes like jelly on a plate. It's a blues song but with something close to an Afro-Latin beat. A brokenhearted Wolf begs his woman for an explanation in "Tell Me What I've Done". "Killing Floor" is a famous song that was later "redone" by Led Zeppelin as "The Lemon Song" without proper credit. Wolf plays slide on "Down in the Bottom" which has the same theme as "Back Door Man": Wolf as a Lothario who must depart before his girlfriend's husband returns. "Sitting on Top of the World" is a classic traditional blues that Wolf probably learned from Charley Patton. Long Distance Call (w/Muddy Waters and Bo Diddley)  is actually Moaning at Midnight". It is from a late sixties session featuring Howling Wolf, Bo Diddley and Muddy Waters. The version of Little Red Rooster with Wolf on acoustic slide is quite pretty. If you're unfamiliar with this music I think you missed something. Songs that Wolf wrote or performed are blues or blues-rock standards. Howling Wolf was a giant of American music. 






Tuvan Throat Singing

Although the tone and sound of Tuvan Throat singing has some surface similarity to what Howling Wolf was doing it is completely unrelated and is actually musically something quite different. All the same some blues and other musicians have been fascinated by this sound and have performed with Tuvan style singers. After all humans are brothers and sisters once you get down to it and if you search for a while you can probably find something in common with anyone, no matter how small.
What throat singing does is allow the singer to create more than one pitch at the same time. There is the fundamental pitch and then the overtones. Effectively throat singing allows the singer to become a virtual human bagpipe. In males especially it can come across as a distorted growl with almost electronic sounds that are something akin to a Moog synthesizer.

This is most definitely an acquired taste but I happen to have it. The best stuff to listen to if you are curious about this music is the release "Fly Fly My Sadness" which features the Tuvan throat singer group Huun-Huur working with the female Bulgarian chorale group Angelite. The two music styles fit pretty well together I think. This for me anyway is trance music. It's something you can listen to when you're just reclining in a dark room with your eyes closed and meditating. It's repetitive. It's most definitely not for dancing, or at least not any sort of dancing I would be familiar with. Maybe you could do some sort of odd (to me) interpretive modern dance to the music. Maybe in Siberia and portions of Central Asia this is considered dance music. Dunno. But I doubt it. Although obviously I don't understand any of the lyrics, just like with opera or salsa or various other musics in languages I don't speak, the feeling of the music transcends language. At least for me. As mentioned this isn't for everyone. Nothing is. Some people I know find this music about as relaxing as listening to a broken garbage disposal that won't stop running or a belching contest. So YMMW. All that said though check it out if you want to hear something completely different.

Legend  Lonely Bird  Orphan's Lament   Fly, Fly My Sadness

Jayru Campbell Arrested

There was a lot of talk recently about whether or not Seattle Seahawks cornerback Richard Sherman is a thug. I don't think he is. Generally speaking most thugs, in the most basic understanding of the word, don't attend Stanford or score 1400 on their SAT's. My snobby class bias aside though more importantly I think that your actions, not your words, hair style or skin color make you a thug. Speaking loudly and animatedly without cursing, about your success over a rival player after a big win does not a thug make. See a thug could be someone who body slams a school security guard. That would be Cass Tech QB and Michigan State University (MSU) verbal recruit Jayru Campbell, who was arrested for his actions in the video below. The security guard is of course somewhat fortunate to be alive as getting body slammed on a hard floor without any protection can lead to all sorts of bad outcomes, especially if your head impacts the floor as it did here. I didn't attend public schools until high school and certainly did not attend Cass Tech High School or MSU. Cass Tech has traditionally been considered one of the better public schools in Detroit but I've heard that in recent times (over the past 10-15 years or so) that's akin to boasting that you're the skinniest fat person at fat camp. My brother first brought this to my attention. He didn't attend Cass either. Smirk. Of course these things are not common but stereotypically this explains why people, black and white, racist or not, have been fleeing Detroit Public Schools. 

We hear a lot about about how certain people are improperly disciplined in schools and thus set up for a school to prison pipeline. That's true. A child who is boisterous, loud mouthed or questioning of authority isn't necessarily "disturbing the peace" or "special needs" or a "threat". The flip side of that though is that there are some children who are indeed threats and need to be removed from the school ASAP for the safety of others. Evidently Campbell was given second chances and missed them. So it is what it is. Of course in our society even where there is a video like this the accused is still presumed innocent until proven guilty. Just ask the cops who beat Rodney King. However, unless there is evidence that the security guard was assaulting Mr. Campbell or attempting to molest him or something like that I am not seeing how this ends well for Mr. Campbell. I think he gets expelled from school and convicted of any criminal charges. And I'm okay with that. I am both descended from and related to people who worked or still work in schools. I would hate to see something like this happen to them. Watch video below.

The quarterback of the Detroit Cass Tech High School football team has been arrested in connection with an attack on a security guard.

Jayru Campbell was arrested Wednesday by the Detroit Public Schools Police Department because of an incident that occurred inside Cass Tech at dismissal time. But in a departure from earlier DPS statements, district spokeswoman Michelle Zdrodowski said this afternoon that Campbell has not been charged, describing the earlier statements as a misunderstanding on the district’s part.

In an e-mail this afternoon, Maria Miller, a spokeswoman for the Wayne County Prosecutor’s Office, said her office has now received paperwork on the case, but she cautioned against making any assumptions. “It would be premature to indicate what if any charges (we) will issue until we have reviewed the paperwork and a formal decision has been made,” Miller wrote in the e-mail.

Campbell, a junior, verbally committed to play college football at Michigan State, but commitments are nonbinding until national letters of intent are signed in February 2015. Per NCAA rules, college coaches are not allowed to comment publicly on unsigned recruits. Campbell committed to MSU in August, turning down scholarship offers from Alabama, Notre Dame and Wisconsin, among others. He is rated as a four-star recruit by rivals.com. The alleged assault marks the second incident in recent months involving Campbell, who was suspended from school and for the first game of the 2014 season for throwing a punch after Cass Tech’s state semifinal loss to Novi Detroit Catholic Central in November.

LINK

Do you think that Cass Tech should expel Campbell?

Are you curious as to what Campbell's side of the story is? 

Should MSU reject Campbell because of this incident?

Would you be willing to hire/work with someone if you saw them do this?

Black Man Arrested for Drinking Arizona Iced Tea

This could just be reason # 345,754 as to why I generally don't like the police. I view them as at best a necessary evil. Police often escalate situations unnecessarily. Below the jump check out a May 2013 video from Fayetteville, North Carolina that somehow I missed but that The Janitor brought to my attention. It was hard even for me to believe that it was real at first just because the person arrested literally wasn't doing anything questionable, let alone wrong. The blog lawyers can discuss if any laws were broken. What I took away from this is that some police assume:

1. any black men gathering anywhere must be up to no good 
2. no black man anywhere has any right to not be pushed around by any cop. 

There's a lot of talk about school bullying or online "bullying" because someone implied on facebook or twitter that someone else could stand to drop a few pounds or wasn't the most beautiful person. I think this is real bullying. The citizen Christopher Beatty, a military veteran, is indeed lucky that the cop didn't shoot, tase or beat him. I think the cop made a wrong assumption. To pump up his ego and show Beatty who was the boss, he invented a reason for arrest. Fundamentally this is because some police and their enablers do not concede that black people have a right to public spaces. Watch the initial video and the updated interview video below. We've got driving while black, shopping while black, walking while black, and now standing and drinking iced tea while black. To be fair though it's not just a race thing. Police make mistakes and bad assumptions all the time with white people too. Such incidents are why I think that "victimless crimes" or "lifestyle crimes" should be decriminalized. Police should have limited reasons and authority to interact with or detain their fellow citizens. And no matter who you think you are I don't want your hands on my food or drink. It's just a pet peeve...

Updated Short Interview with Chris Beatty