Tuesday, July 27, 2004

MAGIC AIRBUS: Colby Cosh links to a great retrospective from The Australian in time for the Who's Left's return to Australia after thirty-six years. On their prior trip, they evidently presented on a flight from Adelaide to Melbourne such a noisome tableau to mid-century antipodean sensibility that they were met by forty officers on their flight's arrival:

"This guy in a suit was standing in the doorway just watching us and he looked right at Townshend and said, 'you're coming with me'. Pete asked him 'am I under arrest?' and the cop said he wasn't. 'Well I ain't going anywhere with you pal, cause the last pig that said come with me when I wasn't under arrest kicked the shit out of me in Germany. So I'm not going anywhere with anybody unless I'm formally charged in front of witnesses and at this point I can't understand what you could possibly charge me with'.

"The policeman huffed a bit and said: 'Be it as it may, you will all have to get off this plane and you will go into the VIP lounge where you will be under close surveillance. You will not be allowed to ring or contact anybody, you will not be able to leave the room, and you will not be continuing on this flight."'

After five and half hours in custody, they were allowed to depart for New Zealand, and all swore they'd never be back. (And as Colby points out, Moon and Entwistle were as good as their word.)

It's a neat article for fans of rock 'n' roll mythology and The Who in particular but it's also full of fascinating undertones concerning modern Australian attitudes toward their infamously provincial post-war years. The airports in question are named not merely as Melbourne's and Sydney's, but as "old Essendon" and Mascot (since replaced by, respectively, Tullamarine and Kingsford Smith Int'ls), the airline as the defunct Ansett (then still under the control of its colourful founder, not the Murdoch family as it was before its collapse), the "pigs" as the Commonwealth Police (now called the Federal Police, I believe), and so forth: "Just 3 1/2 years earlier Australia had swooned shamelessly over the Beatles. John, Paul, George and Ringo were lovable moptops whose every indulgence or indiscretion was complicitly overlooked by a breathless nation. But the likes of Pete Townshend and Keith Moon were seen as little better than hoodlums." "Most of them hadn't been to bed, none of them had had a shower. It was summer and they were all wearing singlets. Nobody in Australia had ever seen anything like those singlets with names printed on them."

I suppose all this is intended as a sort of reverse cultural cringe, and Townshend and Daltry's return Down Under a sort of miniature triumph for a more open, englightened Australia. I'm not sure, though, that Australia was as backward in 1968 as the author would have us believe. Although Australians would probably name Sir Kingsford Smith as their greatest contribution to aviation history, I would submit that the Kafkaesque treatment of the pommie rock stars they managed all the way back then (quite reminiscent, in its way, of the opening scene of Anger Management) was more of a pioneering achievement in the development of modern aviation than anything the old boy did (13:20)

THE WAY WE WERE: The Calvin & Hobbes rerun today is rather endearingly sweet and naïve. It's interesting to be reminded how very recently the American sensibility has been post-modernized (the early Simpsons episodes out on disc now throw that into pretty sharp relief, too). I suppose it's little wonder Bill Watterson has pretty much dropped off the chart since 1995, which in retrospect might have been the beginning of the end. (09:19)

THEY MUST HAVE FOUND OUT ABOUT THE HOT MEAT-LOAF SANDWICH I HAD FOR LUNCH:

(17:10)

OH, GOOD LORD: Coors and Molson are in advanced merger talks. The Molson family, bless their hearts, are stonewalling. The sainted James must be lashing about violently in his plot on Mount-Royal. (09:45)

This was supposed to be posted last night but Blogger was under repair.

LEGENDA: I've read three quite good things today: "Neo-conservatism and the American future" by Stefan Halper and Jonathan Clarke; "Ten Reasons to Fire George W. Bush" by Jesse Walker (pity we haven't got fifteen or twenty fingers, for all sorts of reasons); and, coming from on the other side of the fence, so to speak, "Whose Justice? Saddam's trial is spurious and counterproductive" by the redoubtable John Derbyshire. I did go into the last with rather more doubts than the first two but he's got me convinced, not that that matters much at this point. (10:43)

FESTIVUS: This weekend was the Great Blue Heron Music Festival in Sherman, NY, southwestern New York's premier (though by no means only) confab of hippies and fellow travelers. This was my second year going, though I'm not sure last year fully counts given the condition I was in most of the time and the amount of music I actually took in. Be that as it may, I am still prepared to commentate like a vet.

It seemed to me, and to others I spoke with, as though the Man had a tighter grip on things this year than last year, but I think this could also just have been a function of a slightly different crowd. There were a lot fewer straight-up hippies and a lot more stupid white kids. (I know there will be a number of people not prepared to acknowledge an absolute distinction between the two, but you all know what I'm getting at.) I'd try to blame this on the New Yorkers: most of the northwestern Pennsylvanians (largely fellow Warrenites) I ran into were pretty authentic deviants. To take an extreme, if not atypical example, a good friend of mine got ejected sometime near dawn Saturday morning. He was blacked-out and doesn’t personally remember what happened, but the word going around was that he got apprehended pissing on one of Security's golf-carts. I would not call this sort of behaviour beneath my own standards, and I know the guy to be fully capable of much worse on the wrong end of a handle of whiskey, but I can certainly understand how this could be the sort of thing that would get people tossed out of joints. His thoughts were still rather disordered when I spoke to him on my cell Saturday afternoon, and I was at a show then anyway, but it also seems that the guard who tossed him, some giant goon if I understood things correctly (and there were one or two such specimens patrolling around, though most of the security detail didn't look fully capable of even guarding their own wallets), took two of his pieces, one a sentimental favourite, his smokes, and come cigars. I imagine the bastard probably volunteers for security at deals like this all over just for an excuse to jack fucked-up hippies. I surmise this because I know people for whom this would seem a reasonable and attractive hobby to pursue.

To speak further on the taming-down question, hard drugs -- and even pot -- were in shorter supply this year than last, as well. There weren't nearly so many random freaks in the woods at night hissing "El Cid! Mushies!" at you when you passed them by, and the ones who did were mostly lookers, not venders. A few people claimed to have gotten their hands on mushrooms Friday night but I never saw any, and I ran to a lot of people who were a-hunting. There were also a lot of people who were manifestly coked up, more so than I remember from last year and not a welcome innovation, but I never saw anybody with any of the terrible stuff. Anyway, the narco-drought was no particular chap on my ass but it did rather detract a certain element from the event's character.

As to the music, there were a number of good bands there, mostly the same line-up as in previous years, but a lot of decent stuff. A bunch of the groups tried to do some anti-you-know-what-and-whom protest songs but these were mostly pretty embarrassing attempts, and it would have better had they not tried. (The feel of the festival was definitely more politicized than last year. The organizers had a voter registration booth running and nearly every band called everybody out to vote in November. I couldn't help but marvel at such a multitude of "lib'ruls" on my home turf.)

The headlining group was, as ever, Donna the Buffalo out of Ithaca. They're big icons on the north-eastern festival circuit and even attract groupies. They're kind of the prototypical country-zydeco act that everybody at these things tries to imitate now that the 10,000 Maniacs genre is tapped, though they've got a big leg up on rivals with a Nathalie Merchant-sounding lead singer who can play three instruments. Their Saturday show was an impressive showing; they played for about three-and-a-half hours without a break, even though several of the members had been up all night Friday playing in the splinter cell "The Zydeco Experiment." The show was great except for a brief period after some fucked-up head tried to surmount my friend and me to, apparently, crowd surf, and sent both our glasses flying. (There's nothing to give you That Sinking Feeling quite like seeing your glasses disappear through the darkness into a swirling, stamping mob of drug people. Got 'em back, though.)

The other marquee act was Big Leg Emma, from Jamestown. I guess this group is sort of on their way up now, and there were a lot of Emma groupies there from places like Erie (I guess that's a start). They did use to play "Music in the Park" in Warren but don't anymore, so I guess maybe that's a sign of prosperity. I didn't find them at all bad, and they are plenty technically accomplished, but I didn't think they were terribly original or interesting, and they didn't get me stirred up quite like Donna. Then again, I only caught their Sunday afternoon show, by which time everybody was pretty cracked out. So I'll have to check them out again sometime.

Among other notable acts: The Campbell Brothers, a bluesy Christian group which everyone seemed to be thrilling to; The Horseflies, who played a sort of crypto-zydeco/Celtic fusion, similar to what a lot of other people were doing in many respects, but a little bit better; Smackdab, which has a Warren guy in it, and played locally at The Brickhouse earlier this year: they're sort of jazz-rock head-banger band, if you can imagine, and evidently a particular favourite of the festival's hard-driving abusers. I also didn't object too much to The Hindu Cowboys (a lot more cowboy than Hindu, if you catch my drift) or Entrain, who played a brassy species of wimpy New England prep rock, but neither was exactly too, too special either.

The weather was, as a final note, beautiful all weekend long, as gorgeous as anyone could rightly want. But now the vacation is clearly over: back to grey skies, pissy clouds, and a severe weather alert on the radio. Welcome back to the jungle. (09:56)

BRANDO: So Brando is dead. It's been a real hit parade of celebrity deaths over the last couple years, hasn't it? I have to say I'm very crushed, much more so than over losing Reagan (though that may not be saying much: I was much more upset about Smarty Jones flubbing the Belmont that same day than I was about the ex-president), and I say that as someone who hasn't, scandalously, even actually seen A Streetcar Named Desire or On the Waterfront. To my mind, Marlon's best role was Marc Antony in 1953's Julius Caesar, which has the considerable distinction of being the only Shakespeare film I have ever liked. An idiosyncratic choice, perhaps, but I stand by it. Second after that, I will make the philistine suggestion of Sky Masterson in Guys and Dolls, though he was rather second banana to Frank in it, and fuck you all for laughing at me. Rounding out the top five, I would list The Godfather, the brilliant satire of the former, The Freshman (even though Brando later denounced it), and then Apocalypse Now (even though I one viewing will suffice for this lifetime).

But looking through his IMDB listing, I was struck by just how many totally forgettable roles Brando played, in spite of being the popular favourite for Best Actor Ever. At least twenty of his films I've never heard of, and not all of them can be chalked up to my own ignorance. His last film, The Score, I have some affection for, being set in Montréal (and featuring Marlon parleying the français), but it's not one destined for the ages. Nor his last headlining role before that, The Island of Doctor Moreau, in spite of its potential of becoming a camp classic another decade down the line. Perhaps if he had spent his last decade working harder at making great films, rather than hiding out and using earpieces and lines written on pieces of fruit when he did take roles, more people my age or younger wouldn't first associate his name with gags about him having cheeseburgers airlifted to his island. We're an increasingly forgetful culture, and I have a feeling that, sadly, Brando's legend may well be at its perigee right at this instant. (03:10)

CANCON: For my prediction, I'm going with gusto, 135 for the Tories. In addition, I'd say the Bloc will take my (erstwhile) riding of Outremont, and probably (keep? -how soon I forget these things) the one across the street, too (Laurier). No way is Lucienne Robillard losing Westmount/Ville, though, nor will Martin lose in Lasalle or Cotler in Mount-Royal. Those are the only contests in the country I can name off the top of my head, so I'll just leave it at that.

UPDATE: I guess I'll not give up my day job; it's 134 for the Libs as I write (about 11:40). Martin actually did come close, for a few thrilling moments, to getting bounced in Lasalle, though no useful result has come in from Outremont yet. Laurier, as it turns out, is Gilles Duceppe's riding, which of course he kept. How could I forget that?

All in all a disappointment, though if Anne McLellan loses her seat in Edmonton Centre, I'll be happy.

Just watched Jack Layton's speech from the Metro Toronto Convention Centre. He thrice boasted that his party doubled their support and doubled their seats, then went on to shout and stomp about proportional rep. Well, nuts.

Oh, the CBC just profiled Outremont: looks like the Liberal Lapierre has kept it. With that, I'm off to bed.

REUPDATE: D'oh:

Some of you will have gone to bed secure in the knowledge that Lt.-Col. Hawn had finally ended Anne McLellan's legendary string of narrow victories. The CBC actually declared him elected at one point in the evening, perhaps specifically to torture the suckers who've been voting against her since Suleyman the Magnificent was a tot. I heard the news as I was in front of the CBC studio downtown; I swear to God Michael Enright or somebody actually said "No more Landslide Annie." Next time check for a pulse, you horrible assholes.

In other squeakers, Pierre Pettigrew, a favourite of mine from my days "following" the anti-globalization "movement" (my friend Chris was arrested three years ago for trying to break into his office in the Pearson Building in Ottawa), pulled things out in Papineau by 334 ballots; I suppose that absurd coif of his has its purposes after all.

Meanwhile, the NDP has ended with only 19 seats, or about seven seats shy of Layton's doubling claim. So the prick may have, at least quantitatively, a bitch about PR, curse him. (15:47)

BONFIRE OF THE VANITY: I've never woken up in bed with a total stranger but I suspect there's little swifter to pervert a perfectly good physical hangover into a horrible psychological cycle of self-recrimination than finding in the morning newspaper a front-page article about yourself, especially when while reading the quotes attributed, with justification, to you, you then remember you were also very hungover when you gave the interview in the first place. On a Wednesday. And that you're wearing a bow-tie in the photo.

Back to bed. (16:00)

INTERCONTINENTAL REDUX: But of course, it is the Australians who are the obvious masters of synthesizing the veddy, veddy British and the quintessentially American. From the government of New South Wales' new anti-dope campaign:

"Pot. It mightn't kill you. But it could turn you into a dickhead."

It just might at that. (12:36)

ON THE ROAD: I'll be in New York until Monday afternoon, so don't expect either anything here or replies to anything but the most urgent emails. In the meanwhile, you can keep yourselves occupied with the WebShots page I've just gotten set up. (09:09)

ANGLICISMS BEGONE: Some fellow named Ben Yagoda from the University of Delaware (what possible need can there be for such an institution?) writes in the Chronicle that certain angicisms have ceased to be fresh in the American idiom and should be expunged, and that any rate, those who particularly favour them tend to be unbearably pretentious (a questionable charge from someone who goes about talking of "Briticisms," by the way, and just what the hell is wrong with a Windsor knot?).

Such a thesis interests me: I'm always willing to pick at linguistical minutiae, and, like the author, have observed that there does seem to be a bit of an uptick in trans-Atlantic imports like "spot on" and "to sack" (or "a bit of"), though I have not bothered to collect instances myself. Also, my working idiom tends toward a muddily ambiguous blend of the very American and the very Britannic, so I take a personal interest in the matter. (And I must say, I'm rather offended by his inclusion of "at university" in his shame list; in point of fact, I was at university, where I lived "in rez," took my meals "in the caf," and "wrote exams" for "marks" under the watchful eyes of the "invigilators.")

Unfortunately, both in evidence and methodology, Prof. Yagoda seems scarcely up to the task of examining a matter of such earth-shaking import. (Who else besides a Journalism professor -- and what possible need can there further be for such a person? -- would think of Lexis/Nexis as an appropriate instrument of sociolinguistic research?) His first few collected examples fall well clear of being knock-out blows. "Sell-by date" has "a strong British feel?" Did Prof. Yagoda grow up in Orange County or something? I've just checked, and the milk in my fridge says "Sell by: Jun 22," so I think it's likely that the expression has been found in ordinary people's speech, literally and figuratively, for some time now. (Anyway, it's a better term than the equally common "EXP" date, since most frugal people know you don't have to toss your yogurt out at midnight on the date printed on the bottom.) Likewise for "run-up" and "lead-up." The author is an academic and a journalist both, so be can be forgiven for not knowing anyone in the military (especially the aviating branches, in the case of the former), but he should at least know better than to infer too much from his personal experience.

Anyway, this is all small beer, since I've already said I agree that this is an actual phenomenon. More interesting are the hows and wherefors. Prof. Yagoda suggests:

It's hard to pinpoint the cause of the use of all these Briticisms. Anglophilia hardly seems to be rampant at the moment. Perhaps the success of BBC America is a factor, or maybe the importation of British editors like Tina Brown and Anna Wintour a decade ago is finally trickling down. But I wouldn't underestimate the eternal appeal of sounding classy without seeming pretentious. The gathering storm of Briticisms would seem to provide a perfect opportunity.

At this point, the trend is moving beyond journalism, and to terms that (unlike "go missing" and "run-up") have perfectly good American counterparts. In his campaign for governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger talked about having "a" (not "some" or "a cup of") coffee. A visiting friend of mine talked of "booking" (not reserving) a hotel room. David Letterman recently made fun of Oprah Winfrey's saying that she couldn't appear on his show because she was "on holiday" -- what was wrong, he wondered, with "vacation"? A friend has taken to saying, "I'll ring you" instead of "phone you" or "call you up." From various sources, I have heard repeated uses of "sack" (fire), "row" (argument), and "chat up" (talk to, usually in a flirtatious way). Briticisms all: Together they constitute a cultural equivalent of De Vries's poseur.

I think we can safely conclude that Tina Brown's effect on the broader American idiom is negligable, though I do wonder about BBC America (or, a longer standing phenomenon -- and of great impact on middle America -- those British Sitcoms on PBS; everyone in fly-over country has seen "Are You Being Served?" and "Keeping Up Appearances"). Indeed, even on other channels, there are quite a lot of British TV imports on the tube these days: Bravo plays the (far-superior) British version of "Antiques Roadshow" incessantly, and The N (Nickelodeon's teenage angst channel, formerly The N-Spot, which must have sounded too carnal) plays several British coming-of-age shows alongside Canadiana like "Degrassi" (similarly, YTV in Canada plays the excellent sit-com "My Family" late in the evening weeknights). Even on native American TV, especially with the explosion of a hundred-and-one esoteric documentary channels on cable, there are quite a lot of Britishers making guest appearances to "sex-up" the credibility a bit. Of course, there's also the matter of the movies: I think Hugh Grant and Guy Richie have a lot to answer for in this department. In short, I think what we have here is nothing more exotic than plain old globalization -- certainly no one would argue that British English is getting any less Americanized.

More to the point, there is the matter of the Internet. Nobody knows if you're a dog online, nor English. When I was a miserable surly teenager cooped up in my room endless hours on the Internet trying to psychologically avoid being stationed in Appalachia -- and at a linguistically impressionable age -- two of my most regular interlocutors were one an English lad, and the other an Australian. I think it's safe to say we learned a few things off of each other. To stroke Prof. Yagoda's journalistic fixation, there are a terribly lot of -- disproportionately many -- blogs emanating from non-American ends of the Anglosphere. I would imagine these have had as much of an effect on journalistic prose as any of Tina Brown's appalling hijinks.

Speaking for myself, between these blogs, my academic interests (hello there, Oxford University Press), and my taste in fiction (which reminds me, I never did get around to finishing my post on Lucky Jim, for shame), I'm quite sure that on a daily basis I read as many pages written by Englishmen as by Americans. (Then there's the having lived in the Canardian ghetto for four years, where a majority of my professors where English or roughly equivalent.) A bit of this will have rubbed off, and I'm not about to apologize to anyone for having a normally functioning linguistic sponge mechanism, nor should any of you.

I'm afraid I can't resist the inevitable conclusion, so here goes: Briticisms have passed their sell-by date, and the odor (or should I say odour) is getting a bit rank.

Oh bugger off, you tool. (See, perfectly intercontinental!)

(Via Arts & Letters Daily, of course) (09:24)

THE LOCAL BEAT (AKA, THE CONTINUING CRISIS): So, who would travel to Warren to visit a Musarium?

A which, you ask? Why, it's a museum and an aquarium under one roof, of course, and the Babbits of the upper Allegheny are betting the farm that it's just the thing to shower our besieged mĂȘtropolion with prosperity, to say nothing of some juicy back bacon from the Commonwealth budget. Sez their FAQ:

There will be recreations of living environments of the river life, both in the water and on its banks, extending from the river's beginnings to where it empties into the Gulf of Mexico. Living segments of the forest and swamps, complete with the fish, birds, reptiles and plant life will present the Allegheny River environment in an interesting and exciting way. There will be an atrium full of the butterflies and plant life found along the Allegheny.

Warren has a rich and varied history. There will be a focus on the oil and lumber industries, as well as the railroad. The history of the Native Americans who first settled this area will be included. We hope to portray these facets of our area with life size displays and reenactments of historical events. We want to make our history exciting to all who visit.

We are planning indoor displays, life size outdoor displays, and a village with exhibits, things to buy, things to eat.

This is all most felicitous, as the Association announced to City Council Monday night that they would prefer to build their attraction at the Point, where the Conewango Creek and Allegeny River conflow, which location has, among its other features, a twenty-foot high elevated railway line bisecting it, and a natural gas pipeline and oil refinery tank farm immediately adjacent. What a splendid opportunity for the Minivan Nation to experience "the oil industry, as well as the railroad" in person, and how canny for the Association to economize by choosing a sight with "life size outdoor displays" already in place! Likewise, magnificent opportunties for interacting with the "living environments of the river life, both in the water and on its banks" will abound, especially in early spring when said banks swell, and fully half the Point is swallowed by the mouth of the Conewango.

All kidding aside, even if the City decides to hand over the site to the Musarium, thus losing not only a major public park, but also the main shed for the Department of Public Works, and even if the Musarium finds a way to make 130,000 feet worth of use out of a virtually undevelopable parcel of land, and even if 800,000 tourists a year do come to town to breathe sulphrous refinery fumes and the indescribable odour of burning dogs from the Humane Society nearby, exactly how are they are going to get funnelled down Elm Street in a orderly fashion, and where on earth are they going to park? How desirably will it be to have a major regional tourist attraction right next door to the municipal swimming pool and the YMCA? These are all important questions, and I certainly hope I'm not the only one to be asking them. (18:27)

WE'RE THE ONE: I suppose you've all been wondering to yourselves, "Whatever has happened to the Vogues, the harmonious whiz kids behind such classic hits as 'Five O'Clock World' and 'You're The One'?" Well, you'll be gratified, then, to hear that the boys are alive and well and livening up the barbecue rib tournament circuit in towns up and down the Appalachian spine and beyond with their hep stylings. (11:18)

ABSTENTIA: I wish I were posting, now that I've got the time, but I'm back in Pennsylvania at the height of the spring allergen intifada, and I have always found it very difficult to focus on writing while all doped up on histimine blockers with a throbbing head full of mucus. It is my absolute sincerest hope in the world at the moment that the onslaught will end very soon and I can get on with...well, just about everything. Until that blessed moment. (11:27)