The Ocean Cliff Clearing

For Dog Blog Friday: Just to make the parents crazy, all the best smells are at cliffside.

Friday Random Ten

David Bowie "Love You Till Tuesday" David Bowie
Elvis Costello & Allen Toussaint "The Sharpest Thorn" The River in Reverse
Jon Langford "Invisible Man" Gold Brick
The Buzzcocks "I Don't Know What to Do with My Life" Peel Sessions
Waco Brothers "Out in the Light" Cowboy in Flames
Joan Armatrading "Lost the Love" What's Inside
Paul Simon "Under African Skies" Graceland
Ziggy Marley & the Melody Makers "Time Bums" Married to the Mob--Original Motion Picture Soundtrack
Otis Ball & the Chains "Hooray for Flowers" Time for a Change--Bar/None Sampler #2
Chris Mars "City Lights on Mars" Horseshoes and Hand Grenades

bonus

Cotton Jones "Gotta Cheer Up" Paranoid Cocoon

Weird. After a song from the album River in Reverse, on the next cut Jon Langford first sings, "There is a bridge where the river flows backwards." Spooky. Otherwise, mostly just strange.

(I'm Not Your) Steppin' Fetchit

July 16 isn't just the date the British humor magazine "Punch" was first published in 1841 (in fact, it began when the British boxing magazine "Guffaw" folded). Nope, it's also the day that Jimi Hendrix gave up trying to convert the nubile young things of America. Yes, it's the day of his last spot opening for the Monkees on their 1967 U.S tour. Turns out he got tired of the crowd shouting "We want Davy!" in the middle of "Purple Haze," although the alternate reality where Hendrix goes to the prom with Marcia Brady is too rich not to ponder. So he gave the crowd the finger, stormed off the stage, didn't even bother to put out the fire on his guitar. America got the last laugh, of course, remaining resolutely uncool and very very white for a long time. Rumor has it there might still be places where the Hendrix lesson has never been learned.

"You Agree with Us? Well, We Don't!"

"It is sort of a unique position to be in, to be willing to accept 64 amendments and having the authors of the amendments reluctant to have their amendments accepted."

No, that's not a line from some lost Joseph Heller novel about the machinations on a fictional, absurdist Capitol Hill. That's a line from the real Capitol, on Monday, uttered in obvious bemusement by Senator Chris Dodd in response to Senator Mike Enzi on the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee. You really have to watch the video--at the least Enzi himself seems embarrassed. (Too bad he couldn't teach that response to his fellow senators asking Judge Sotomayor stupid questions that start with the assumption default human is white male.) It seems the Republicans have 64 amendments to the health care bill. Fair enough. But it also seems they themselves don't like their own amendments, and perhaps not just one's like Tom Coburn's intended poison pill (his amendment: that every member of Congress and their staffs would be required to enroll in the public insurance option).

Or, perhaps, they just don't want anything to get done.

I'm beginning to think they should dump the elephant as their symbol and instead go with a baby. Not one too young--one old enough to just say No. And only no. One old enough to want everything, like, say, both a wife and Buenos Aries babe. Yet one with the attention span and focus of old what's-her-name from Up North.

Sneak A-tax

Just so the record is straight, as this argument always bugged me on its surface, but now I've got the facts to back up my hunch:

INCOME TAXES AREN’T DRIVING AWAY THE HIGHEST-INCOME HOUSEHOLDS.
If high income taxes were chasing away rich Californians, high-income households would be more likely than low-income households to move to states without income taxes—but they aren’t. How come? States without income taxes are cheaper than California in other ways—housing costs, for example—that matter to all types of households, not only to those with the highest incomes. In other words, California does lose people to lower-tax states—but not just because of income taxes.

That's from a report by the Public Policy Institute of California. In some ways if you look at the full report (which I recommend you do) what you get is everyone's leaving California. But if you have to live in Nevada instead, I feel sorry for you, and some ice is in the mail. After all, one assumes you get something for the taxes you pay to a state.

So, my guess is that if you're rich, you might want to stay in California even if you have to pay a bit more in taxes. Here's a bit of what you get for those taxes, and that's even before someone goes to school or gets saved by a firefighter or borrows a book from a library:

Not Enough People Love Him and I Don't Know Why

Perhaps Alejandro Escovedo almost always tours with strings because his voice is in their register, if sometimes unstrung. Of course that one sentence is already too far into the story for many of you, as Escovedo has never got much beyond cult status--sadly mentioning that his niece is Sheila E. might be the best way to put him on most folks' cutural radar. But over his four decade career (wrong word, as that implies a plan), Escovedo has made more good music of more kinds than most, and by being so insufferably un-pigeon-hole-able has never even got the acclaim of, say, a Leonard Cohen, ever the cynical-Buddhist-roué (a genre-busting role, sure, but a consistent one). Escovedo first performed with the SF punks the Nuns, even playing at the infamous Sex Pistols' last concert. But since 1975 he's gone country punk and then maybe just country (Rank & File and the True Believers), fronted the thank the wham-bam-of-glam band Buick MacKane, and released solo albums fine enough to get him named No Depression's artist of the decade (1990s). Of course, those albums feature tunes as sweet as the love song "Broken Bottle" and a cover of The Stooges "I Wanna Be Your Dog." Oh, and he's Mexican-American, but that signifies more culturally (a whole song cycle for his dad and the immigrant experience) than musically ("Castanets," for instance, isn't Latin-tinged but an out-and-out rocker, something like the Chuck Berry meets the Replacements). I mean us anglo-folk can't even say he's the guy who covered "La Bamba" or something.

But we can love his music and his performances of that music, as what looked to be a near sold-out house did at the Lobero Theatre on Saturday night. He opened in front of the stage (it's a usual bit of his performance, working in or near the crowd), and that's part of his power--he draws you in, sometimes so you might swoon, sometimes to make you flinch. Playing with his longtime guitarist David Pulkinghame and a cellist whose name, alas, I couldn't quite catch, they kicked off with "Five Hearts Breaking," a song that sets his musical scene well. The cello gets to both soar and saw; the song whispers and wings--his love of volume/tempo shifts echo how his art witnesses life's duality; as for the words, well, her voice is five hearts breaking, but it's saying, "Believe believe and everything will be alright." Escovedo sings it likes he means it--he always does--so we end up with a song that says believe while recognizing exactly why we shouldn't, too. It's way (weigh?) more than a pop ditty.

That's how the rest of the show went, too. Escovedo brought out show opener (and, sadly, sort of a bore) Chuck Prophet, musical accomplice for his most recent fine album Real Animal, for the last two-thirds of the set, and even those who were not-for-Prophet before had to be converted with killer versions of "Always a Friend" (so damn catchy), "Sister Lost Soul" (slowed down and even more mournful), and others.

Finally, for encores he both pleased and slightly pissed off this fan, and not just because he didn't play the monumental "Pissed Off 2 a.m." Nope, it's because he promised so much that I wanted more--he's not the kind of guy who you let off the hook for just a fine show, it has to be a killer (in every way). First, they played "Broken Bottle," with its haunting melody and wistful lyrics, ever a crowd pleaser. Except I've seen the definitive version of it live, Jon Langford and Sally Timms doing a death-defyingly slow version at McCabe's a few years back. Now, Escovedo could probably win the song back, but not with the help of his special guest Amy Cook, who suffers from that over-dramatic singing thing that gives me American Idol creeps. You have to be more gnetle with a "Broken Bottle" you know. Next up was a cover of the Bowie-penned Mott the Hoople-performed "All the Young Dudes," another winner, till Ms. Cook got her verse and wrung its poor neck. (Sorry to be harsh, but Cook doesn't deliver in my musical kitchen as it were.) Then to close they opted to resurrect an obscure cover (it's on a Bloodshot Records anniversary disc) of Mick Jagger's (no, not the Stones, we're talking solo Jagger) "Evening Gown." It's a terrific country rock romp, a bit too melodically straightforward to fit on Exile on Main Street perhaps, and it fits Escovedo's timbre perfectly. Alas, instead of dueting with (and no, I'm not obsessed, but it sure does seem odd to me he comes up twice) Jon Langford as he did on the recording, he dueted with Chuck Prophet. And going from Jon Langford to Chuck Prophet is like going from Rembrandt to Thomas Kincaide, minus the units moved, of course.

So, what should have been out and out a brilliant way to go out was just damn good. But Escovedo is so damn good, I wanted more.

I realize this probably says more about me than the show.

Here's a version of "Everybody Loves Me" with a violin in place of the cello, but you'll get the point.

Eye Don't Get It

For Dog Blog Friday Sunday: Nigel sort of sums it up here. Was out of town just overnight (but what a night--details will eventually follow about my evening as a scullery maid at Hearst Castle). Got back, friend had a 40th to-do. Saturday was Alejandro Escovedo. Today was my first ever kayaking adventure (and boy are my arms tired). So there's lots to write about, but little brain power to do it with. Here's hoping I can get back to more regular postings. In my irregular way, of course.

Friday Random Ten

Elvis Costello & Steve Nieve "Allison/Living a Little, Laughing a Little/Tracks of My Tears/Tears of a Clown/No More Tearstained Make-Up/Clowntime Is Over" For the First Time in America
Willard Grant Conspiracy "Beyond the Shore" Regard the End
John Hiatt "It'll Come to You" Slow Turning
Franco & Rochereau "Lisanga Ya Ba Nganga" Omona Wapi
The Beatles "Here, There, & Everywhere" Revolver
Big Star "Hung Up with Summer" In Space
Leonard Cohen "I'm Your Man" Live in London
Wilco "Radio Cure" Kicking Television: Live in Chicago
Roger Eno & Kate St. John "Our Man in Havana" Familiar
The Magnetic Fields "Parades Go By" 69 Love Songs

bonus
Daniel Lanois "The Messenger" For the Beauty of Wynona

Late, and in some ways cut 1 should be 1-6, but it ends up all over, doesn't it?