SETH (the cartoonist)

Friday night I went to the Dundas Town Hall (now unused since we've been amalgamated with Hamilton) to witness a conversation with SETH. Seth is the artist and writer responsible for such classic examples of comic book art as Wimbledon Green, It's a Good Life If You Don't Weaken and Clyde Fans Book 1. Oh, and Palookaville, his self published irregular comic wherein these books had their beginnings. He was appearing in Dundas, in this glorious old building, to speak about a project of his. In the basement of his home in Guelph, he's been building a city. If you've read any of the books you'll know the City of Dominion. It's a sort of typical Ontario city, of a certain age and size. Seth sees it as having grown to about 300,000 population, but he knows the history from its origin since...he created it. He created the businesses, and schools, the shops and factories, even the water tower. And he made them out of corrugated cardboard, house paint and ink. Lots of glue and a huge amount of imagination!
Seth is an odd fellow, he dresses as if he's an insurance salesman in the mid-1950s, right down to the fedora. But then in his jacket pocket he carries a handful of pencils. His hair is slicked back, and he sits bolt upright in his chair. When he speaks it is with a quiet yet assured voice. He knows why he does the things he does. He traces his own position in the history of cartooning, linking back to Thoreau MacDonald, Windsor McKay, the Katzenjammer Kids, right through to Chris Ware and Art Spiegelman.
This evening he is interviewed by Andrew Hunter whose interview style is a bit reminiscent of Brian Linehan. Okay you did the research, but we really want to hear Seth speak...not you!
He describes the development of the city of Dominion, which he has built, and it seems to exist comfortably next to a project of my own. Well, my wife's really. Together we are walking the streets of the city of Hamilton, until we cover each one. We don't expect to finish this year, or next. We park the car somewhere and then spend an hour zigzagging back and forth through a block of the city. When we're not walking my wife researches the area, and as we walk she tells me of the history...when this building went up, what used to occupy that empty space, and so on. Seth knows all these details of Dominion. He has them written down in his notebooks. He knows when this building was built, by whom, how the Toboggan Factory fared, everything a civic historian would know.
The cardboards buildings are also on display at the Dundas Museum, and it's a fascinating collection. From the portrait of the first mayor on the wall (flanked by the Ontario ensign and Union Jack) to the carefully constructed models laid out throughout the room, in grids, it's like a big boy's train set.
I'll post a photo or two to give you the sense of the scale of the project. Or you can look at and search for Dominion Dundas to download a little booklet with pictures of some of the buildings.
Capped off with a viewing of Milk with its powerhouse performance by Sean Penn...and no e-mails (I made a pact) this was an altogether enjoyable weekend!

Remember Muddy!

Last night I was driving to a practice, guitar in the back seat, thinking how tired I was and how I hoped this practice wouldn't go on too long, when I decided I'd had enough of the radio so I pushed the CD button to see what my wife had been listening to. She drives the car most of the time, so the music is her choice, mainly blues. There was the new Buddy Guy, Honey by Steve Strongman, Eric Clapton, Bonnie Raitt and then...the one that I listened to...Jimmy Rogers. Not the Singing Brakeman he spelled his name Jimmie Rodgers. This guy was from Muddy Waters band, he played rhythm guitar alongside Little Walter (harp) and Otis Spann (piano) to make one of the most potent blues lineups ever. Second only, and arguably, to Howlin' Wolf with Hubert Sumlin. This band was responsible for classic blues like "Blow Wind, Blow," "Hoochie Coochie Man," and "I'm Ready."
Jimmy passed away just before Christmas in 1997, but before he died he finished recording a dandy album with guests Keith & Mick, Jeff Healey, Stephen Stills, Eric Clapton and while it didn't come out til 1999 it's a total classic. Blues Blues Blues is the name, and on it he does some of Muddy's big songs. Look for it, it's dynamite!
Anyway, it made me think of the night I saw Muddy himself at Hamilton Place and was able to snap a couple of pictures which I'll try to post. We had great seats about ten rows back. John Hammond opened the show with a brief set on Robert Johnson songs and then Muddy's band blew the roof off the place. Within a couple of years he would be gone, but that night...he owned the place. I'm just glad I was able to see some of these originators before they passed away. I saw Count Basie, Elizabeth Cotton, Doc Watson, and others live and in person! And there's nothing like live music...whatever they tell you. I found this 35mm slide in a box of slides I had almost forgotten about, along with some family pix, and Ed scanned a few of them for me (Thanks Ed!) so I thought I'd share this one here on Rylander! Enjoy!

Bluegrass in the city...

The sky was clear, a quarter moon shining on the snow below. The stars of Orion glistened from above. The air was beyond crisp, it froze your breath as soon as you exhaled. The Grant Avenue Studio is in the centre of town, on a quiet residential street. The street is narrow, and residents use any available parking spot. I ended up in a grocery store lot two blocks away, which explains my familiarity with the weather. I wasn't sure what to expect. This was the recording studio that Daniel Lanois started. U2, Eno, Yoko Ono, John Cage, Raffi, Gordon Lightfoot had all recorded here. But tonight it was home to an intimate bluegrass concert. Only fifteen guests on a cold dark night.

Inside the door the hostess greeted us with a kiss and checked our names on the guestlist. We were a bit early and toured the facility. The performers were sequestered in a room upstairs that houses the studio's vast instrument collection. You could hear them pickin'. The walls were lined with framed CDs, even LPs, and posters from the artists who had recorded in these rooms. There was a sense that something extraordinary was about to take place. And sure enough it did.

There were a few stools and chairs, a piano bench or two, set out for guests to sit on, and one microphone standing in the middle of the room. A music stand held two pages marked in an almost indecipherable script "set 1" and "set 2". The songs were listed, and if you tried really hard you could recognize a title or two. Joe Clark's mandolin case was over in the corner. I recognized it, having seen it before. It is covered with stickers from a career's worth of bluegrass festivals, and tours. Don Rigsby's instrument was perched in its case on top of the grand piano. And on the floor in its case was Joe's poor old guitar, victim of a house fire, sound hole enlarged by a a Dremel tool. Instruments look so lonely sitting unused. But when Don and Joe entered the room, and picked up the guitar and mandolin, and started to play, the instruments sprang to life.

What a concert! Two 50 minute sets which wandered through the whole history of bluegrass. Joe and Don traded lead vocals, they harmonized with that high lonesome sound that identifies bluegrass. Then they traded solos. Don on mandolin, then Joe on guitar, maybe Don would take two verses, or Joe would, but somehow, magically they ended together with a flourish. Whether singing new songs steeped in the tradition, or paying tribute to the Stanley Brothers, or Tex Ritter, or Clarence White, or the master of them all Bill Monroe, they played beautifully. Fingers flying over the fretboards, their mouths moving, feet tapping, and the audience gasping at the precision of it all.

They traded instruments, Don played guitar and Joe mandolin; then Don played fiddle while Joe brought out the banjo. They brought tears to the eyes of a couple of the ladies with a gorgeous version of "Kentucky Waltz". They brought laughs when they had to start "Cannonball Blues" three times, once when Joe broke a string, then again when Don missed a chord. "Missin' a note is one thang, but missin' a whole chord..." "Well...it happens to the best of us!"

Intimate. Cozy. It was like listening to live music in somebody's living room. And the sound was fantastic. They're playing a couple of house concerts, a club gig and a theatre show on the weekend. But none of them will be as special as this night. Recorded for posterity, and a radio show, I can't wait to hear it again. These fellas are masters of their craft. I feel honoured to have been there!

Happy New Year!

It's 2009! Can you imagine? I just reviewed a book about CSN called (of all things) Crosby, Stills & Nash: the 40th Anniversary Edition and for me that was a rude awakening. FORTY years of CSN! I bought the first CSN album on the same day as Poco's Pickin' Up the Pieces because I was a big Buffalo Springfield fan and here was Stills on one hand, and Richie Furay on the other. In fact, while I admired the harmonies of CSN I liked the sound of Poco better. Sure "Suite: Judy Blue Eyes" was one of the best songs ever, but I played the bejeebers outa that Poco album.
But here it is 2009. I'll be 58 this year! I can hardly believe it! When my grandmother told me she was fifty, I cried! I thought she was not long for this world, and now I'm on from that! Still listening to good music though, still rockin' & rollin' in my way!
The next big thing coming is the new Bruce Springsteen CD due at the end of the month. If it's as good as Magic I'll be thrilled. I went off the Boss for a while, but lately he seems to have got back to where I like him.
I finished the John Lennon bio by Philip Norman, and apart from a couple of small points of interpretation (where I disagreed with Norman's take on something) I found it to be a well balanced look at Lennon's life and work. Started to read Mick Wall's bio of Led Zeppelin which is quite interesting. His comments about Jeff Beck are starting to raise my hackles...but it just makes reading fun!

Christmas...

Ho! Ho! Ho! Well, another Christmas has come and gone, with lots of music and books left in its wake. Just before the big day I picked up copies of the deluxe Electric Ladyland CD + DVD and Brad Paisley's Play both of which tell you plenty about the Fender guitar! Wow! Can those guys play! My brother sent me Steve Winwood's new disc which is his best album in a long time. I heard some recordings of his New York show with Eric Clapton, and have to say that they haven't lost their touch!
Reading the Philip Norman biography of John Lennon I've found quite a few new details to the story that has been told over and over again. Add to that Pete Best's memories (captured on the Best of the Beatles DVD and it makes another Beatles' Christmas, just like when I was a youngster!
Revolutions in Sound is a celebration of 50 years of music at Warner Brothers-Seven Arts Records, and it's a beauty. Large scale, colour pictures, and reminiscences from all the usual (and unusual) suspects it tells the history of how the label went from Frank Sinatra and soundtracks to Neil Young, Alice Cooper and Frank Zappa! Fascinating.
My brother Steve and his girlfriend gave me a gift card which I spent on a couple of DVDs. Pete Seeger Power in Song which is a great way to spend 2 hours, interviews with Arlo, Dylan, Baez, the Boss and more all celebrating nearly 90 years of Seeger's career. Lots of concert footage and bonus homemade films from Pete and Toshi make this a fine piece!
The other DVD is Orson Welles's Touch of Evil, a film from the beginning of Charlton Heston's career and the end of Marlene Dietrich's! Spooky, creepy, film noir...not to be missed!
Went to see The Spirit last night, and while Frank Miller really turned Will Eisner's Spirit into Frank Miller's Spirit...he did manage to pay tribute to the humour and style of Eisner's classic creation. Sure it looks a lot like Sin City but that was one of the most stylish films I had seen in a long time...so is The Spirit!
Well...Happy New Year everyone...see you in 2009!

Pattie Boyd

Went to see the Pattie Boyd photography exhibition last Friday. That's right! It's HER photographs. Now I'll bet you didn't know that she had studied with photographers like David Bailey! It's true! And her pictures are a delight. Not just the polaroids of Eric and George and Ronnie and Keith and all the others...but the new photos of Africa are stunning! I understand the show is moving across the country to Calgary, then Vancouver and back to Montreal. Curator Peter Miniaci held court with Rich and I for a good half hour sharing stories and laughs. Don't miss Through the eyes of a muse if it comes to a gallery near you! And...this shot of George is one of my faves!

now what?

I've bought a few new CDs this past week and a half, and although I haven't really settled in with them, I do have an opinion. What a shock!
The Blackie & the Rodeo Kings best of collection (Swinging From the Chains of Love) is still getting lots of play. Nickel Creek's best of (Reasons Why) is a knock out! A beautiful sounding, wonderfully played selection of material. And it has a DVD of videos too. A signed copy of the David Byrne & Brian Eno album arrived from Newbury Comics. OK it's only signed by Byrne, but the album is excellent, and considerably "poppier" than I expected. A neat package, I might add!
Speaking of neat packages...The Fireman's electric arguments is the best of their three albums, and will actually get played again. The Fireman is Youth and Paul McCartney, and their previous 2 ambient dance thingys did nothing for me. But this one, is Macca's most interesting work in a long time. He should take chances like this more often! JD Souther's first album in 20-something years is a new direction. No more Eaglesish country rock, JD gives us melodic tunes, great singing but in a jazzier context. Kudos to the horn players on here!
And then there's Neil Young's latest archive project, as we get ready for the mega-release next year, Sugar Mountain. It's a CD+DVD set of a very early club date after Neil left Buffalo Springfield. All acoustic, just Neil and his Martin. He sounds impossibly young. His stories are innocent, even naive. A fascinating document. I haven't watched the DVD yet, because it won't play on my computer. Not sure what the issue is...but tonight I'll try it in the DVD player.
Lots of books to read. I have to finish The Grapes of Wrath, then the new John Lennon bio, Ian Thomas's new novel The Lost Chord and then Mick Wall's biography of Led Zeppelin When Giants Walked the Earth. I'm glad Christmas is coming, I'll have some time to read!
Last night I read the cover story on Britney Spears in the new Rolling Stone...ahhh, poor baby!