Rochester Writers

I didn’t really start living in Rochester in earnest until a couple months after I moved my stuff here. Just getting over a broken collarbone and still having yet to be gainfully employed, I was understandably incredibly bored. I jumped at the opportunity to accompany some friends/former bandmates from Chicago (Chicago THE CITY; I never traded chops with Peter Cetera) as their current band toured across this fine land of ours. For a few weeks during the late summer, I toured all over this side of the Mississippi, functioning as roadie/band manager/van driver/impromptu mechanic/conflict resolution counselor/babysitter. Those weeks crammed into that Ford Econoline made me realize how much I missed the, uh, rock and roll lifestyle. Not necessarily the “playing dingy holes in the wall to fifteen disaffected punk rock kids” aspect, but just the camaraderie of it all. I have never been a dude’s dude – I don’t like sports, I can’t talk about cars or power tools or my golf game or any of that bullshit. Playing rock music, jumping around like a nimrod, driving around in a van with four other stinky dudes…that’s what my adult life male bonding consisted of.

I never will claim to be the cream of the crop when it comes to writing about music.  Even if someday I achieve greatness writing about music, I will not stoop to the level of Rochester’s local music critic, Jeff Spevak.  Spevak turned an article about a very entertaining, yet still unsigned, local band to complete rubbish by comparing them to Teddy Geiger because they have a strong internet presence.  If you read the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, you may have noticed Spevak’s virtual hard-on for Teddy Geiger’s boring made for tv music.  There’s a plethora of music coming in and out of Rochester but now that we have Teddy Geiger, he is now the be all to which any music that gets heard out of Rochester is compared to.  So this is a note to Mr. Spevak .. I am taking you to task.  Stop it before it gets worse.

And yet, I should not be surprised.  Spevak once called the bands who appear at the Bug Jar “significant national acts of no importance.”

One of the great things about living in Rochester is that it gets you in touch with your inner Canadian.  You know that person - the reasonable one who lives in a quiet cul-de-sac of your psyche, right down the street from your flaming ball of American rage. 

Your inner Canadian always has a moderate solution to thorny problems.   Let's say an obnoxious, French-speaking minority wants to secede from the Union.  What's your solution?  If you're thinking "Start a war and kill half of the adult male population from 18-24", that's your ball of rage talking.  "Change every sign in the country, print everything in two languages, and go on with life" -- now that's your Canadian at work.

On the crazy in Spring theme:  Springtime Can Kill You (mp3) by Jolie Holland.   And, on the contrast between Winter and Spring, Cold White Christmas (mp3), by Casiotone for the Painfully Alone.

While sweating and standing around at a Bug Jar concert last night, I had ample time from some bitter reflection over the recent payola announcement.  The first payments from the Sony settlement have gone out, and you'd think that Sony's classical and jazz divisions had been stuffing Benjamins into the pockets of Simon Pontin and Mordecai Lipshutz .

Unfortunately for Simon and Mordecai, Sony wasn't handing out trips and cash to get the newest recording of Beethoven's Late Quartets played on public radio.  Instead, they were paying to get new Franz Ferdinand, Killer Mike, Train and Celine Dion songs on Clear Channel and Infinity (this giant pdf has all the details).   And it wasn't WXXI listeners who were harmed: it was indy artists who compete with the big names, and fans who buy records in popular genres.  Payola subjects artists to unfair, subsidized competition, and fans pay more for all CDs to finance this form of bribery.

Over the past few days, I've noticed something kind of funny with my iTunes recommendations list.