Could anyone possibly find a good excuse NOT to vote today? It’s not like it isn’t one of the most beautiful days in weeks. It’s not like there aren’t choices among the refreshingly credible slew of candidates. There are new theories to test and new points to be made in just about every ward. There’ve been energetic battles up until the last minute. There are signs galore pointing you towards the polling places, and plenty of volunteers willing to drive you there if you can’t handle the stroll.

For those who live outside New Haven, even just in one of its suburbs, it’s hard to fathom how important our city’s primary elections can be. This city votes (and registers) overwhelmingly Democrat. Republicans are rarely a threat and the Green party is the only “third” party that’s placed anyone in an elected office in decades.

So today isn’t just Primary day. It’s Finality day as well, the day when just about everything gets decided, or easily forecast. After we vote today, barring any unforeseen deaths or freak acts of nature, we’ll know who our aldermen are likely to be, who our mayor is likely to be, and who their cronies are likely to be.

My own family spent some time this summer canvassing for Frank Douglass, who’s running for Alderman in Ward 2. It was hard to explain to neighborhood newcomers the importance of registering Democrat and voting now, rather than maintaining their dubious “Independent” status and sounding off when the major races have been decided.

I moved to town with “Independent” leanings myself, a quarter century ago, and learned within weeks that if I switched I’d get to vote more often. That’s not an incentive for those who see voting as a chore, granted. But voting is one of my favorite sports, and for those that love to vote, this is the day to do it.

The New Haven Register’s list of city polling places is here.

A wonderful New Haven Independent piece by Paul Bass about the historical context of this year’s mayoral race is here. I worked alongside Paul at the New Haven Advocate for many years, and miss the sort of opinionated, history-based long-form writing he used to do regularly for that paper. This is a wonderful example of that sort of thing.

Having rediscovered the “I Yam What I Yam”/ “He Needs Me” single from the Popeye film soundtrack in my stack of basement 45s, I rented the whole movie from Netflix and gave it a big build-up to my daughters: “They look just like Olive Oyl and Popeye and Bluto and Wimpy, but they’re real people! The songs are by the guy who did ‘The Lime and the Coconut’!” And the ultimate come-on: “There’s a baby in it!”

Mabel and Sally got duly excited. They fetched some bendy dolls they have of the Popeye character, while I grabbed the huge book 100 Years of Comic Strips to show them some of E.C. Segar’s old Thimble Theatre strips which inspired the look of the film.

Then we all sat rapt before the screen as Sweethaven appeared, Brigadoon-like, before our astonished (unpopped) eyes.

Removed from the bewilderment, scorn and disappointment which met the film upon its release, Popeye holds up just fine. In this cartoony milieu, Robin Williams actually comes off as understated. His low-key mumbling is ideal for a film in which he is not so much the star as he is a befuddled visitor. Like most Robert Altman films, this one celebrates community. Williams doesn’t dominate; he fits it, despite those ungainly forearms.

Once the octopus had been undone and two generations of popeyed men had sailed off victoriously, the girls scoured the 100 Years of Comic Strips book and found a Segar scenario which had been staged virtually verbatim in the film. I, meanwhile, luxuriated in the closing credits: Paul Dooley! Ray Walston! McIntyre Dixon! Nilsson! Van Dyke Parks! Klaus Voorman! Plus that baby, Altman’s own grandson. The child, Swee’pea, is an active participant in one of the most touching, sweetest verbal exchanges in the whole picture—with Robin Williams no less, who in his earliest films was regularly criticized for barely interacting with his castmates.

Here’s how it goes: Popeye has discovered orphan babe Swee’pea in a basket. He’s reading a loud from the abandonment letter pinned to Swee’peas swaddling: “Love him like a mudder. Signed, a mudder.” In the midst of this recitation, the perky Swee’pea, unbidden, blurts out “Ba Ba Ba Ba!”

“That’s right,” Williams rejoinds. “You’re a baby. Says so right here.”

You’d think somebody had been killed in there. Or taken a hostage. Or cleaned out the cash register. Or perhaps played a soppy ’70s ballad.

No, this was a crime worse than those. You’ve never seen a club owner more apoplectic.

An out of town band, angry that they’d earned less than expected at the door, broke the door. Shattered a plate glass door.

Hard to do. And harder to clean up. But Q and bartenders Bill And Jan swung into action and had the front area swept and clear by closing time so folks could stumble home safely.

Then came the matter of boarding the door up so the staff could leave too.

The band has been charged with all kinds of things. The Bullfinch owners, who frankly look the other way at all kinds of small fracases and interactions, are throwing the book at the miscreants this time.

It’s the perception of doors. Don’t mess with doors. You’ll get shut out fast.

Folk Nite at the Finch with American Album of Familiar Music, School of the Air and Andy and Virginia… Avalon Time and Beat the Band (don’t tempt us) doing lame covers at Hamilton’s… An Evening with Ann of The Airlanes at D’ollaire’s. With that admission price and no opening act, they couldn’t at least have thrown in another Airlane or two?…

Saw two birds fighting on a windowsill.

Tom Perrotta, The Leftovers (St. Martin’s Press, 2011)

I didn’t want to write about The Leftovers until after the 10^th anniversary of Sept. 11, because I don’t want to think about it as a Sept. 11 book. Others will, and have, but that’s limiting. Tom Perrotta has purposely written a book where a lot of people vanish overnight, causing unmeasurably large social, religious and political changes. But he doesn’t tell you what caused the mysterious disappearances. September 11 is even mentioned in the book—as a whole other thing, much different from this latest (vaguely present-day) cataclysm.

Not explaining why all these people are missing isn’t about adding a layer of fantasy. Perrotta wants to write a book about grieving, If he doesn’t dwell on the reasons for the loss, he can just write a book about loss and not a book about loss and paranoia, or loss and terrorism, or loss and revenge.

Streamlining his narrative to the stories of the survivors, Tom Perrotta has written his most populous  layered and issue laden novel yet. Don’t let that scare you. The Leftovers will scare you, but in the right ways, the suspense-building ways.

Leaving out an explanation gives The Leftovers a neat Stephen King feel. Both Perrotta and King like to comfort readers with anecdotes of domestic life, random musings on pop culture (with canny use of brand names) and the natural suspense which comes from ordinary people who harbor dark secrets, or find themselves in awkward romantic relationships. Perrotta’s use of a supernatural disappearance brings them one step closer. Ultimately he outdoes Stephen King epics such as The Tommyknockers or The Dome because he doesn’t spend the last fifth of the book uniting all the key characters in some frantic search to uncover the meaning of the world-changing event. In The Leftovers, the denouement is much milder. It’s low-key. People have to get on with their lives.

The Leftovers has already been tapped for an HBO miniseries. A grander palette than a two-hour film is appropriate, since the book alternates numerous compelling stories. It’s particularly good in showing how people make their own minds up about something. The mass disappearance? Could be the Rapture, sure. Could be a lot of things. How should people react? Some organize, some join movements, some lose their way, some don’t seem all that affected, some cope by watching reruns of SpongeBob Squarepants. It’s refreshing to read a book about a world-changing event with such believably varied responses

Perrotta also gets the difference between the kind of conversation you’d have in a bar and the kind you’d have in a coffeehouse. He understands the regional differences in such things as well. He knows, and shows, how people’s minds wander when they’re on a road trip. He recognizes, and can relate, the value of silence.

There are other wonderful storytelling touches:

• A thoroughly non-cliched small-town mayor, a regular guy who is neither power-hungry or corrupt, and seems able to leave his work at the office and have a reasonable personal life.

• A young man who’s found himself actively involved in a new religious organization, yet seems admirably clear-headed, confused at times but hardly brainwashed.

• Young adults who have genuine young adult concerns, such as who to accept a ride home from late at night, how to make a little money or whether to stay in school.

• Well-developed minor characters who might ultimately be the deliverers of plot twists but who have endeared themselves already as more than that. There’s a minister who believes it’s his duty to report the sins of the disappeared, and a fresh-born baby with attitude, and a young recruit into a chain-smoking group of martyrs called The Watchers. All lovingly fleshed-out.

Perrotta understands, and knows that readers understand just as well, that individuals can be very different and still get along, diametrically opposed in profound ways yet still attractive and sympathetic to each other.

Best of all, he’s funny. As touching and grieving as The Leftovers is, it never stops being wonderfully absurd. There’s horror and tragedy in losing, and in losing control, but there’s great humor there as well. And Tom Perrotta is a great humorist. Here’s a terrific set piece from 50 pages in:

Depending upon your viewing habits, you could listen to experts debasting the validity of conflicting religious and scientific explanations for what was either a miracle or a tragedy, or watch an endless series of gauzy montages celebrating the lives of departed celebrities—John Mellencamp and Jennifer Loipez, Shaq and Adam Sandler, Miss Texas and Greta Van Susteren, Vladimir Putin and the Pope. There were so many different levels of fame, and they all kept getting mixed together—the nerdy guy in the Verizon ads and the retired Supreme Court Justice, the Latin American tyrant and the quarterback who’d never fulfilled his potential, the witty political consultant and that chick who’d been dissed on The Bachelor. According to the Food Network, the small world of superstar chefs had been disproportionately hard hit.

Stephen King, eat your heart out.

(For a review of the audiobook of The Leftovers, read by Dennis Boutsakiris, head over to my companion blog, New Haven Theater Jerk.)

Louise Burns, Mellow Drama.

There are some heavy sounds on this 12-song album—massive drums and guitars on “Paper Cup,” a soaring snarl on “Burning Bridges”—but there are also demure chansons like the back-to-back “Island Vacation” and “Sea Song,” and old-fashioned pop exercises such as “Street Walking” and “Teen Angst.” It all comes together on “Drop Names Not Bombs,” a witty, wordy musing on one’s place in the world, underscored with tinkly piano and mostly propelled by Burns’ expressive, clear and vibrant vocals. Neither self-absorbed or particularly peaceful, “Drop Names Not Bombs” is a busily beautiful slice of life philosophy.

Four fliers for the Democratic primaries came through the mailbox all at once the other day. It’s the only way some of those guys are ever gonna get together.

I’ve heard Anthony Dawson give his stump speech a couple times, and am impressed with his history as a maverick alderman in the ‘80s and ‘90s. But his flier really turned me off. It’s the most overtly negative campaign lit I’ve seen this month. It’s single-minded focused on street crime, alleging that while incumbent mayor DeStefano does nothing, our children are being murdered!” It parrots the much-maligned assertion that “New Haven is the fourth most dangerous city in America” without footnoting where the info’s from. (It’s from a preliminary FBI report on crime stats which the bureau specifically suggests should not be taken out of context as some sort of national ranking.)

Dawson also dumps on opponent Clifton Graves, coldly labeling him “Puppet of DeStefano” because he worked for the City of New Haven. Say what you like about Graves, but puppets don’t ordinarily run in political primaries against the very people supposedly pulling their strings. If you can’t insult someone better than that, don’t bother.

And how should the other guy in the race, Jeffrey Kerekes, feel, not being mentioned in Dawson’s flier at all?

It’s nice to have a primary with four genuine candidates for a change. They’re different men with different approaches for running the city. They’ve been differentiating themselves well without the need for namecalling and sensationalism, and it’s a pity that Dawson’s playing this desperate card days before the primary.

1. Joy to the World. Bullfrogs are not usually classified as pets, but this one not only has a name, Jeremiah, but is deemed “a good friend.”

2. “Ben. “The Michael Jackson love-rat song. I once heard this played incessantly during a performance art piece by Lyle Ashton Harris during a Yale Conference entitled “Regarding Michael Jackson: Performing Racial, Gender and Secual Difference Center Stage.” Ben came back into my consciousness while reading the autobiography of Meredith Baxter Birney, who co-starred in the film for which Jackson’s tune was the theme song.

3. “Sometimes I Don’t Mind,: The Suicide Machines. Begins like a love song to a human—“Something in the way you walk… I watch you sleep… I buy you things sometimes…”—but the tip-off comes in the penultimate verse: “You won’t lay down, you’ll hardly sit, I give you a bath when you smell like shit…”

4. “Suppertime” from You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown. The original Off Broadway razzle-dazzle version, not the Fosse-fussy Joe Cool revamp from the Broadway revival. There are several solid Snoopy-as-pet routines in the show, including Lucy’s insistence to Charlie Brown that Snoopy “only pretends to like you, because you feed him.”

5. “Eric the Half-a-Bee.” This early Monty Python bit is now over 40 years old, an astonishing half-life and an enduring philosophical inquiry into Bee-ing and nothingness.

Two songs I won’t include in this ongoing series because I’ve never liked them, but also because there are other reasons to exclude them: “Me and You and a Dog Named Boo,” which doesn’t really explain the dog’s relationship to the others; and “A Horse With No Name,” since it can’t be much of a pet if it hasn’t even been given a name.

By Artie Capshaw

You know those songs which open with seemingly endless drum n bass breaks? Most of us just go back to the bar until the set stays in earnest. But DJ Fistula, a connoisseur of live approximations of studio- steady beats, took some bands’ ever- lengthening intros as a personal challenge.
So how far ahead of the vocals and melodies did Fistula choose to begin his beats? Three minutes? Five? Try SIX HOURS. He cane into the Bullfinch in mid- afternoon, set up his kit and started swinging. Forty-five minutes later Mo Walsh waltzed in and plugged in his bass. A half hour later, Fisti was risking carpal tunnel, so Bullfinch booker/ barback extraordinaire Q took over for a while. Q was the guy who’d OKed the project, and who’d warned the middle- aged Bullfinch administrators that they might not want to do office work that day.
A few subs later– including us, in our pro drumming debut– out was nearing showtime, and the sidemen (whom in most bands might be considered frontmen) took their places… for a standard 35- minute opening set.
Which most of us couldn’t focus on anyway, after that longwinded, mesmerizing lead-in.
No one has yet tried to better DJ Fistula’s beat- busting record, But Sonny Blitt insists he’s got a drippy faucet in hits bath tub that’s a contender.

The Composition Books, who don’t even have a drummer, at the Bullfinch… Flight Paper, which boasts two drummers—and two guitarists, and two bassists; they’re kind of a franchise—at Hamilton’s… Made in Vietname at D’ollaire’s….

Somehow, I am already overdrawn.