By Artie Capshaw

Sonny of the New Blats Blits Blots, or whatever they’re calling themselves these days, blasted into a new song Tuesday at the Bull. A bunch of us drank about it later, and we all had seriously different takes on the tortured tune.

Bonnie of the Bonny Joes (you’ll be hearing about them another time) thought it was dumb.

James of Felix Phooey thought it was self-indulgent.

Yoost thought it would never sell.

Janie of the Pippa Pipkins thought it wasn’t about anything.

Millie of the Model Marvels thought it was about everything.

And W.G. Harvest thought it was making fun of Mexican-Americans.

As for your humble reporter, we don’t suspect that Barry has the skill or consciousness to do something that provokes so subtly and yet so broadly. We could easily have elicited his opinion, but we like our quorum better.

 

The offensive and/or indulgent and/or worthless and/or all-encompassing lyrics?

“I.” Just the one letter. Repeated ad nauseam. But with a rhythm, thus:

“I/I-I/I-I-I/I-I-I-I…”

(Or would that last line be “IV”?)

Sing it to yourself. Make up your own melody. Consider the groupings. “I” alone sounds ego-driven. “I-I” sounds like something a sailor would say. “I-I-I” sounds like a worried cartoon character. “I-I-I-I” sounds like that sombrero dance that party bands play in between the dirty jokes.

The evil “I” will get you if you let it stare too long. We could write a book about this song. We can’t wait to hear it again. And that’s the first time we’ve ever said that about a Blats songs.

The house brought a keg and a jug of  gin to the play. I can’t even remember being in it. Gar was apparently unexpectedly in it too, and neither of us can remember that.

My favorite Earth Day anthem by far is What Are We Gonna Do by the power pop band Dramarama. The song hasn’t had much  staying power as a rallying cry for environmentalism, partly because it appears to get the date of Earth Day wrong, singing “It’s April 21^st and everybody knows today is Earth Day,” when everybody knows Earth Day has always been on April 22.

I’ve suspected that lyric to be ironic rather than ignorant—the song’s narrator seems only remotely interested in the subject, and lately launches into an extraterrestrial doomsday theory. But the chorus “What are we doing here? And what are doing to Earth?” seems straightforward enough. Oh, except it’s not precisely clear whether John Easdale’s singing “earth” or “her” there.

Anyhow, Happy Earth Day. Or Her Day.  The rest of my family’s spending it at Sturbridge Village, while I’ll be celebrating by buying shrinkwrapped organic produce at the new Stop & Shop down the block.

By Artie Capshaw

The band played on.

They kept playing. In the rain. And dozens of people were egging them on. In the rain. Not so much so that they could all keep dancing. Probably more because, somewhere way back in their feverish hippie heads, they wanted to see what it was like to see someone being electrocuted.

Drinking was involved, plus less fluid things. You might think this happened in front of a drippy barn on a swath of countryside a few towns away from here. No, this was one of the sidewalk celebrations on the main drag gone awry. A college jam band which had never been offered a gig like this (for money, that is) strummed and tootled, having abandoned all semblance of sanity before they’d even shown up.

Yes, we were there, but we were one of just two disapprovers. The other was the poor guy which the Parks & Rec Department had put in charge of setting up the stage. We were chatting, ignoring the music, when he began to notice the shape of the band’s equipment—frayed wires sticking out of the amps, a used mic that a big-band crooner might have thrown away in 1937, pedals in puddles—and wondered aloud if he should bring the show to a close.

It was a drenching rain by now. The shops had pulled in their card tables and T-shirt bins. The band was its own event, no longer a draw for passersby but playing only for the delight of their dorm buddies. Bottles and flasks were passed around. The Park & Rec ranger made his decision and formed a plan. At the end of this song, he’d pull the plug. Moments later, a clear wind-down from the longwinded jam began, and the ranger began to make his move, advancing to the stage.

Then, in a sudden, unexpected sonic segue which flew in the face of everything in the rock improvisation rulebook, a switch-up the most devious psychedelic axeman could never have consciously devised, I at once recognized the opening notes of the opening riff of what we all know to be the longest, most endless, most disorienting and debilitating rock song of the 20th century.

“Stand back!” I yelled to the righteous ranger, who’d been abruptly caught in the line of fire. “They’re gonna blow!”

 

Pogo to your heart’s content; there’s punk pop at every club junction tonight: Gentlemen of the Fourth Escape, Mice of You and Four Flushing at the Bullfinch (where flushing the men’s room toilet continues to be an advanced art form), Old Eggs in a New Basket, Upon Atom and Every Day Has Its Dog at Hamilton’s (the commercial, college-friendly, preening variety of punk, but good in a pinch)… Ten Foot Poll tax, Bemildred and Merry Crispness at D’ollaires (gotta admire their staying power)…

The play is tonight. (The play has no name.)

The whole house is going. It’s just in the yard next door.

Dreaming of a Face Like Ours

By Prof. William H. Foster III (Fine Tooth Press, 2010; 100 pages).

This is another useful book of essays by Prof. William H. Foster III, who has a longstanding academic interest in the depiction of African-Americans in comics. Nearly a fifth of the book is taken up by “Do We Still Have to Be Black?—Comic Book Creators Discuss Racial Identity,” a transcription of a panel discussion Foster moderated at the 2005 Big Apple Comic Convention in New York City. The panelists include Trevor Von Eeden, Jamal Igle, Mark Morales, Alitha Martinez. It’s a wide-ranging discussion that delves into not just graphic-novelistic but social and cultural stereotyping.

 

Otherwise, the book mostly consists of Foster’s own insights and research, including nine installments of the Foster’s Freehold blog he had on the BlackSciFi website in 2005-06. There are two essays in which Foster deals with his own relationship, as an African-American and as a free-expression-devoted reader, to the n-word. He sees the controversial black character Ebony from Will Eisner’s classic The Spirit series as a positive portrayal of black culture for its time, and writes about telling Eisner so to his face. He has an interesting take on the mute comics hero Henry, whose strip did not denigrate or ghettoize black characters the way so many others have. He chronicles noteworthy and affirmative black strips like Tom Little’s Sunflower Street.

 

He brainstorms a handy list of Harlem-based comics characters with Lloyd A. Williams (from the 2006 book Forever Harlem). He comes up with ten solid comic-book biographies of “Black Women from History,” not to mention a slate of “Black Cowboys in Comic Books.”

 

He also meditates on the mortality of a black superhero which shared his name—William Foster DSc, PhD, aka Black Goliath—following the humungous hero’s death in a confrontation with a clone of the Marvel warrior Thor. I was privilege to edit Foster’s obit for the New Haven Advocate in 2007, and it’s nice to find it now in book form.

 

I’ve known Bill Foster for years know, have seen him speak a few times, and am impressed by his mastery of an ever-shifting, oft-overlooked yet vital niche of comics scholarship.  This book exhibits that range, but it also demonstrates the friendliness and generous nature of its author. Foster doesn’t browbeat you with facts or keep you at arm’s length with scholar-speak. He draws you in with big ideas and bright images. Like a comic book.

 

By Artie Capshaw

Harry joins the circus: Theater on the Air, the student-run “experimental” summer theater which takes over the campus’ Campbell Playhouse (not to ever be mistaken for Joe Campbell’s rock club) and adjacent Koch dormitory every summer, has decided to do The Third Woman as its season-opener, for the first two weeks of June…

This isn’t mere rock opera or pop-conscious theater. When the show—about a “Bohemian Star” with a “Hand of Glory” who’s having an onstage breakdown “In Search of a Ghost”—is done right, it’s indistinguishable from a show you might see at the Finch, only written down and memorized. The only bit of disbelief you might feel is that any band with songs as good as “Dead Candidate,” “It’s a Knockout” and “It’s in the Bag” in its set, not to mention “5000 Pengoes and a Kiss,” would never be as down and out as this play suggests. Even with that horse habit and the whole sex-change thing. There’s that musical-theater optimist in us coming out—we do so love a high-kick happy-ending number!

The director/star of this exciting enterprise, who’s insisting on calling himself Elusive Vermeer for the occasion but whom you’ve unelusively seen front and center at many an Orsons gig, says he’s going for rock purity, not theater trickery. So far, E.V says he’s got Harry from the Orsons to put the backing band together. Patience now, and exult that there’s something with a hard beat to do in town while the college is on break, the bigger venues wallow in summer nostalgia acts and the local bands swelter.

The Bullfinch asked No More Precious to play tomorrow, and the band arranged a whole night of “N” acts, with None Shall Escape, Night and the City and the NMP side project No Minor Vices. The nnnnnight’s billed as “Noble Noir Nite”… Back Pay, The Bang Bang Kids and Avenging Rider assault the collegiate senses (those not already dulled by cheap booze) at Hamilton’s… Luxury Girls and Lucky Boys, guilty pleasure pop, at D’ollaire’s. Pretend you’re bringing your niece, and just enjoy yourself…

Soup. Now we conquer soup.

The Meriden Daffodil Festival, the foremost and most diverse gathering of Connecticut music acts in the state (all wrapped up in a nifty outdoor festival/carnival), is just one week away.

Here’s the line-up. I’ve marked my personal favorites with an asterisk.

SATURDAY, APRIL 30

10:30-11:30 Chico & Friends (FT)

11-11:45- Freshly Squeezed (WS)

12:00-1:30 The Gonkus Brothers (FT)

*12:15-1:00- The Furors (WS). Ageless, legendary perk-pop duo.

12:45-1:30  Surge Chamber (BS)

*1:30-2:15  The Ivory Bills (WS). James Velvet’s songs, snappily played.

*2:00-2:45  The Frank Critelli Band (BS). Winsome and wise folk-pop songwriter.

2:00-3:00 The Church Street Revue (FT)

2:45-3:30- Eran Troy Danner (WS)

*3:15-4:00 The Manchurians (BS). Rhythm & blues that doesn’t disintegrate into meaningless jams.

3:30-4:30 River City Slim & The Zydeco Hogs (FT)

*4:00-4:45  The Stratford Survivors (WS). One of Connecticut’s earliest punk bands, reunitied.

4:30-5:15 Columbia Fields (BS)

5:00-6:00 Raise The Rent (FT)

*5:15-6:00  The Reducers (WS). Longlived punk-pop legends from New London.

5:45-6:30 Kicking Daisies (BS)

6:30-7:15  Echo & Drake (WS)

*6:30-7:30 Caravan of Thieves (FT). Eclectic guitar/vocal aggregation, ideal for festival gigs.

7:00-8:30 Jimmy Hat (BS)

*7:45- 8:45  The Stepkids (WS). The fest’s highlighted new young band, already on their way with an SXSW appearance this year and an album due this summer. Pop psychedelia, replete with light-show projections and danceable frolic.

SUNDAY, MAY 1

10:00-11:00 Tommy Lourdes (FT)

11:00-11:45 John Fries& The Heat (WS)

11:30-12:30  Just Friends  (FT)

11:45-12:00  691 (BS)

*12:15- 1:00 The Sawtelles (WS). Play-anywhere married duo who personify indie drive.

12:30- 1:45 The Michael Cleary Band (BS)

1:00-2:00   The River Street Band (FT)

1:30-2:15 Plume Giant (WS)

*2:15-3:00 Ticket To Ride (BS). The long-established Beatles tribute act Abbey Road has (with a new John Lennon) morphed into a similar act named for an earlier Fab era.

*2:30-3:30 The Shinolas (FT). Country band led by Hartford guitar hero Jim Chapdelaine and steel guitarist Eddie Iarusso.

2:45- 3:30  Heirlooms (WS)

3:30- 4:45  The McLovins (BS)

*4:00-4:45 The Zambonis (WS). They feel they is never an inappropriate venue or time of year for them to play their songs about hockey.

4:00-5:00  Sean, Kelli & Wayne (FT)

 

WS = Welcome Stage

BS = Bandshell Stage

FT = Food Tent Stage

The three stages are all within quick walking distance of each other in Meriden’s expansive Hubbard Park. For the Bandshell Stage, you sit on a spacious lawn. The Welcome Stage has bleachers, and the Food Tent is a vast circus-sized tent full of local organizations selling food specialties.

You reach the park by shuttle bus. Details at http://www.daffodilfest.com

We actually heard a Modern Madcaps tune on real radio! Not a college show, not a local AM talk show, not the backdrop to a cable sports show but genuine daytime FM, announcing who they were and everything. The song is “Stint,” the fraught relationship power ballad which the band’s longterm fans will know as “For a Stint.” The Madcaps remain spread far and wide—drummer Katnip and vocalist Audrey are still in high school, bassist.conceptualist Tommy and DJ Moe are at separate colleges a hundred miles apart, and the band’s recently added violinist Singh and keyboardist/producer Katrina live and/or study in a large Midwestern city with the band’s invaluable friend and illustrator extraordinaire Harvey…

A note from a reader who happens to have been in a class or two with an object of our recent scorn: “Why does Frieda Bettany’s behavior surprise you? She’s a performer at heart, and she expertly targeted two different audiences, academics and club kids, with basically the same material.” That’s true, but we still feel cheated. FreeBet update: Self-produced single “Dance! Dance! Eep! “ made the top ten of the college radio dance charts in its first week. She’s already signed to a major. And she’s weeks away from graduation…

No Bullfinch tonight—private party… And no Hamilton’s—shitty bands (One Crowded Night, The Argyle Secrets, Arkansas Judge)… And no D’ollaire’s—who would pay that outrageous admission price for never-that-good-when-they-were-bigger Beasts of Berlin, (with The Barefoot Mailmen opening, as if that will open your pocketbook).