A Political Moment - US Senate

Congress has lately shown itself to be a foolish vaudeville act that shuns its responsibility in favor of the politicking and hogging the spotlight. You would certainly be justified in the belief that it is a waste of space to devote any lines to such abject silliness.

Despite this spate of bad behavior, I do believe could can come of it, especially in the Senate, especially if the majority shifts. There's a lot of talk around here about Santorum/Casey, and that is a contest fraught with problems. But my current concern is with our sister-state New Jersey. Corzine is committed to his run for governor and I believe he can do a lot of good for NJ, should he be elected.

A Corzine successor is almost given to be a Democrat considering the political leanings of NJ, but this is a perfect opportunity to find someone who embodies fearless reform, instead of just another number to help us get the majority.

So who should that be?

Lil Sadie is coming to town. We're all about to jump out of our chairs with excitement. Look forward to LOTS more photos...

Mail Art for Dylan's 64th Birthday

So is this one of those things where everyone already knows about it and I'm the last one to know? Probably. I'm not very cutting edge.

Anyway, mailart is art that gets sent through the post. I'm just discovering this, but it seems, basically, that simple. Kind of refreshing compared to your current, digitized lifestyle. So to celebrate Dylan's 64th birthday (May 24, 2005) Ed Giecek is hosting a mailart exhibition. The results are posted HERE and they're VERY COOL. Don't forget to look in the archive, seems he's been taking submission since December.

A few of my early favorites are Invisible Now, One More Cup from Sylvia, How Does It Feel?, and Passport Brown Envelope. I really need to digest more of these. There's so much great stuff here.

IN WHAT LANGUAGE - intense

On Saturday, Em & I picked up a six-pack of avant-garde culture at the Painted Bride. 'In What Language' takes you inside the post 9/11 international airport, as experienced by several people of color. It is 17 pieces told through music, movement, poetry, and digital film. You can download an excerpt of what this stew ends up looking like here, although the best bet is to see it in person.

Musically, the show is a pure powerhouse. All the instrumentalists have gobs of ability and everybody gets at least one solo to strut their stuff. It is essentially a jazz score with shadings of Keith Jarrett and early electric Miles, all the way out to modern hip-hop, making stops at more orchestrated jazz and classical motifs along the way. I thought the drummer should have let things get a little crazier - that would have really shot the adrenalized solos with that extra helping of ecstasy, but maybe he held back so as not to give too much joy to these proceedings. Make no mistake, this show is dark.

Which brings me to the criticism made by Emily and friends we were lucky enough to meet unexpectedly at the show (actually, John and Karen really hooked us up with the VIP treatment, since they are Bride members - THANKS GUYS). The poetry that went with the music was hard to hear. Whether it was rap, spoken word or even the rare sung vocal, the instruments really overpowered the voices. Now, I tend to listen to more instrumental music, so I didn't really notice as much, and I don't think it really took away from the central themes of isolation, persecution and suspicion, that were otherwise very much in evidence.

The authors did provide a full print out off all the words that accompanied the performance, but I have to say that outside the context of the music and images, I wasn't as inclined to probe the poetry. It seemed to me much more in its place getting blasted by the musical pieces that would take off and land at times with all the violence of a 747. And maybe that's how it was supposed to work. These voices, many of them fragile and some very strong, are all being overtaken by John Ashcroft and the paranoia and discrimination that has become somehow acceptable post 9/11. I found the vocal present enough to convey the impression, but, as with all great performances, we are left wanting more.

Here is a link to the Vijay Iyer, who is the composer. And here is where to purchase the album of the performance.

Tewnty Paces - MAKE SURE YOU BUY IT on Tues 3/22

You will not be disappointed. Now, just in case anyone forgot:

That's DAREDIABLO

In What Language - at the Painted Bride

Em found us a little culture to enjoy over the weekend. We'll tell you how this was after Saturday night.

Sun Destroyers - we keep rocking

Practice Wednesday night was another nice one. Some of this stuff is getting perilously tight. Maybe an open-mic on Monday. More details when we know where. Here's a link to Barbarian Apeman over at MPomy HQ.

Get Katz - by Dorothy P.

Dorothy's done it again. A great story about patent squatting. This guy is amazing, I'd love to see a picture of him. He's all like, "they say I didn't invent this fabulously valuable telecommunications software, but they can't prove it. He he he..." Sounds like a real pillar of the community. Can't wait til the other shoe falls.

Next up - TiVo and Comcast. Will it be two great tastes creating a couch potato revolution? Or just business as usual?

Working on an update for C&M site

Do you like the Currie & McLafferty site? (just compare it Mpomy HQ - which is what C&M could ended up with - yipes!) If you do and need some high quality Web work, get in touch with Jenine Lurie. She did a great job on the initial architecture - starting from nothing. Now we're working on a few changes and updates. I'll let you know when they're done.

No Foolin' This Time - ANYONE Can Post a Comment

I didn't realize that my attempt to make this change last week just didn't take. Sorry about that.

So go ahead, post a comment - it don't cost nothin'.

Love and Noise

Here's a nice article from today's NYTimes about, among other things, amateur rocking out at a slightly advanced age - as told by the wife. I wonder if Emily can relate?

MPomy HQ - Up and Running

You get stuck with things, some good, some bad, and some indifferent. Some time, long ago, I got stuck with mpomy - this is, like, back at the dawn of email. I don't love it, I don't hate it - I'm just stuck with it. I've tried to maintain some consistency over the years and now I'm going public.

No, no, no - you WON'T be able to buy shares in my oversized collection of guitars, basses, pedals, and amps. Although, that's maybe not a bad idea....

No, I've just decided to take advantage of the measly 25MB that Comcast is offering with our email accounts. Thanks to FrontPage, I am officially a webmaster.

MPomy HQ is by no means a luxurious place, but it will do nicely to host a few recent mp3's, pictures of niece, nephew and baby cat. I'll try to do more with it as I learn more. Hey, maybe one day I'll even get more than a lousy 25MB - we'll see. Permanent link is on the side under "Homes Away From Home"

Now Featuring My Fabulously Talented Sister

Dorothy is a GREAT writer, in fact, a professional (that's so cool). I'm very lucky to be surrounded by these women who write really well. I've made a separate section for some of Dorothy's material - some old and new. I'll be updating that regularly. Check it out!!

El Fairorth - Rock & Roll Extraordinaire

Emily & I had big cousin El over last night for pizza, talkin' baseball and some singin' and strummin'. El was my guitar teacher when I was a wee lad and I owe him a debt of grattitude that simply can not be put in words (but perhaps music?)

Anyway, we managed to rock out for a good little while and I even got to sing a few. Em was in fine form; I think she even surprised herself. El was, of course, fantastic. He knows SO many songs and plays so well. It was a great time.

El - thanks for the Beatles, U2 and Bruce. We'll do it again soon.

Sun Destroyers - Nice Practice

This band consists of Gabe Horowitz on guitar, vocal, songwriting, arranging, conducting and Yuengling. Joe plays drums and he's getting tighter all the time. I swear I'm gonna put a pitcure of that bass up here.

So, you know, we don't have any fancy pitcures, records, CDs, or gigs, but we're having fun and making noise and it's all good. Gabe's pretty serious about all this and he's motivated. So I imagine something will happen - open mic night, cheesy gig, something.

Kos et al love Battlestar Galactica

It's just one big sci-fri love fest over at DailyKos. It's nice to know I'm not totally alone in my love for the new Battlestar. Yeah, I know it got renewed for a second season, but as a wise man once told me, it don't take much to get renewed for a second season on the Sci-Fi channel.

Adding a new practice area

This has been in the workd for a little while. It's not developed enough yet for the Currie & McLafferty webpage, but I thought I'd mention it here.

Thanks to Tony Brady over in Jersey, I'm going to start working on ADA cases. We'll start with some Jersey stuff a week from Friday (Motion for Fees), and hopefully start handling these cases start to finish by the Summer (?)

Here's more info about the ADA.

Now Em's Doing It!

Beck-a-Rants is supposedly up and running. I'll post the link as soon as I have it. This is too much fun.

UPDATE: Here'e the link to Beck-a-Rants. I mistakenly used my last name for the last part of the URL (Rantz instead of Rants). Totally my fault.

Finn Brothers

Emily's reminiscences of our Harrisburg experience are garnering lots of enthusiastic responses. So why am I the one with the blog??

Phillylaw - Currie & McLafferty

The new Currie & Mclafferty website is up and running. Its all about us and our practice. Still under construction in a few places, and not showing up on any search engines (arrgh!), but we're getting there.

I've been using the new website as a launchpad for tort-deform issues and articles. Obviously, there'll be more on that here as we go forward.

I'll leave the other political stuff to the experts.

Speaking of Music

Sun Destroyers are practicing tonight. Thanks to Dave Wolk for the lovely Cort bass. I think it still has the strings it had on it when he first bought the thing. As a matter of fact, I know it does. Sun Destroyers will not destroy you like Daediablo (yet), but it rocks all the same. More on that later.

TWENTY PACES Will Destroy You

Darediablo is getting ready to go out on the road. Here's what you need to do:

1. GET UNIFIED - read about the new release
2. Get the new record here when it comes out on March 22
3. Go see these boys when they come to your town. You will not be disappointed

I've got some old pictures of the last time they were in Philly - I'll post those here shortly.

Late To the Game

I have absolutely no shame whatsoever. I leave it to others to lead. I'll simply be happy to get on board and attempt to do some good - or conversely to do good at something.