It's been a fun ride...

So, as you’ve probably figured out by now, A Slight Delay has been somewhat more delayed than usual. This time, however, it’s not because I’ve been idle. Far from it. Visit www.thefirst10000.com (my blog for novice and amateur photographers) to see what I’ve been up to.

ASD will still be updated on its usual (lack of a) schedule, but not quite as frequently as it once was. I appreciate those of you who’ve stuck with this blog for the last few years, and look forward to seeing you at my new online “home.”

Faces of a revolution

I couldn’t help but flash back to watching the fall of the Berlin Wall on television in 1989. There was the same sense — no, the same certainty — that I was seeing history unfold. And the same goosebumps.

There’s also some of the same uncertainty, just as there was then. Just as the fall of the wall was no guarantee that the fall of the wall would bring about all that followed — the end of communism, and the spread of democracy throughout what had been the Soviet Bloc — there are likewise no guarantees as to what will unfold next in Egypt, much less across the rest of the Arab world. The prospect of a new democracy anywhere in the world, be it Tunisia, the new nation of South Sudan, or any of the other places on Earth that have been heartened by what’s happened during the last eighteen days in Egypt, is cause for hope. But it’s worth remembering that genuine democracy, the kind of democracy that’s imposed from the bottom up, and the kind that rules by obeying, may not take a form with which we’re familiar, or even comfortable, here in the States.

If we have a checkered past when it’s come to supporting dictatorships the world over (cf. Kissinger’s infamous comments on Chile for but one example), our track record other democracies has at times been equally dismal. One of the many challenges for American foreign policy, then, will be finding a way to balance the wishes of the Egyptian people with our own security. With this being said, there is such a thing as enlightened self-interest. We can, and must, find a way in the world that respects our national interests without trampling someone else’s. This includes, incidentally, respecting the will of the Egyptian people even if those wishes mean the participation of parties in their government with whom we don’t always agree.

Speaking of which, the fear currently being ginned up on the Right over democracy coming to Egypt (perhaps they’d have approved if we’d invaded instead?) looks, at least from this remove, to be unfounded. The demonstrators weren’t chanting anti-American, anti-Israeli, or anti-anything-else slogans. The only thing we heard, frequently and loudly, were calls for a tin-hat despot to get the hell outta Dodge. Calls for democracy. Calls for the simple right to self-determination. “We want what you have in America,” said one protester to the television cameras. Not our iPods, our American Idol, or a Starbucks on every corner. Just the simple right of one person/one vote self-determination.

And maybe one other thing, while they were at it: the right to hope, and the right to dream. That isn’t something the Egyptian people have taken for granted, and one gets the impression that they won’t any time soon. I’ll let an excerpt from one goosebump-raising interview, courtesy of ex-Egyptian MP Moustafa el Gindy, speak for the unalloyed joy and hope from Cairo:

“Yes, I dream. Yes, I will keep on dreaming, and I will teach my kids to dream. Yes, not a lot of people still had hope. And I was telling them, believe in your country, believe in your history… Anyone I meet, I will will tell him dream. Dreaming means you live. Dream is life, and we will dream. We are 5,000 years old civilization, and we are still dreaming and we will keep on dreaming.”

People like el Gindy, and the millions of others like him whose names will never be known to history, are an embodiment of hope. It’s a simple hope that after the dust settles, and after the unpredictable (and likely difficult) period of transition in the days and months ahead, the people of Egypt have the government that they’ve paid for in blood; a government that is equal to their hopes, dreams, struggles, and no small measure of courage.

Complaints will likely be raised, as they were with the K. C. Porter-produced Dragon, that Ozomatli has somehow abandoned the core sound that made it great. While I’ll readily concede that the sound is miles from anything on the debut or its followup (Embrace the Chaos, which had the misfortune of being released on September 11, 2001), it’s safe to say that this is a stylistic evolution, rather than an instance of the band “selling out.”

Let’s begin at the beginning, shall we, with ”Are You Ready?” The song fairly bursts out of the speakers, a clatter of aggressive percussion, layered with the vocals not only of the irreplacable Asdru Sierra, but also a troupe of South African vocalists. Justin Poree’ gets turned loose on the R&B-tinged “45″, Jack Johnson drops in on “It’s Only Paper,” “Elysian Persuasion” flirts none-too-coyly with Lenny Kravitz…

…But occasionally, the momentum is brought to a screeching halt. Raul Pacheco crooning “It’s Only Time,” one of those gee-ain’t-life-on-the-road-lonely numbers that’s been part of the rock arsenal since time immemorial, is one damn good example. It’s not just because Pacheco’s voice can’t put a candle to Asdru Sierra’s, though it’s that, too; it’s moreso that even when Ozo borders on the conventional, there’s usually some twist to the sound that keeps things interesting, and that’s missing here. Likewise, the other slower number, “Love Comes Down,” lopes along at a gauzy midtempo better suited to a Daniel Lanois joint, and is especially jarring coming off the one-two punch of “Nadas Por Free” and “Malagasy Shock.” Compounding the annoyance, the disc sounds less like it was digitally mastered than as if it was recorded onto an 8-track by means of a handful of Progresso soup cans and a good length of twine… hardly what Ozomatli’s customarily warm and punchy sound deserves.

But I digress. Let’s address the disc’s other highlights. Namely, a troika of tracks (“It’s Only Paper,” “Gay Vatos in Love,” and the stomping “Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah”) that have the sound of the punchier bits of Los Lobos. In fact, the wiseass in me would love to say that Ozomatli just made one of Los Lobos’ better albums.

And you know what? I’ll let that stand. Because like that other Band from East L.A., Ozomatli sounds at this point exactly like what they are: a band that’s got plenty to show but doesn’t have to prove to anybody but themselves. Fire Away is the sound of a crew that just doesn’t care, but in the best damn way possible. While this isn’t the best work Ozomatli has done by a long shot, it represents an interesting change in direction, not least because it signals a band that’s willing to ditch what its fans might think it “ought” to be in place of becoming what it is. And if it’s not your particular taste, don’t sweat it; if they follow true to form, it’s safe to say that the next album, like each that’s preceded it, won’t sound anything like what came before.

Postscript: Ozomatli at the Fillmore East, March 20, 2009

1. If you’re going to trumpet a Zagat rating, you should probably make a good-faith attempt to live up to it.
2. Getting the basics right goes a long way.
3. I ought not to go to a restaurant — any restaurant, but especially not a somewhat expensive one — and at the end of the evening, say to myself, “Y’know, I could’ve probably stayed home and done better.”

Mignon isn’t an especially daring place, yet — at least by the above criteria — they manage to break all the rules. Did I mention that the steak tartare was perfect? It was all downhill from there.

The menu is a pretty straightforward affair, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. While I like good food, and enjoy some measure of creativity, I’m certainly not one to look down my nose at an eatery that doesn’t offer poached muskrat in a WD-40 reduction. Their menu (located here) is standard steak house fare. It’s the execution that disappoints.

The lobster bisque may have been made on the premises, but tasted like Bookbinder’s. The mashed potatoes were gummy, the asparagus risotto salty and indifferent, the vegetables steamed ’til they were limp, and the desserts barely competent. The most glaring flaw, though — for a steakhouse, at least — was the steak itself. My wife and I both like our steaks on the rare side. I don’t even mind a bit of arterial spray or twitching when I poke it with my fork.  But both steaks came out overdone (mine just a shade past medium, hers closer to medium-well).

Now, I’m willing to concede that we may have caught them on an “off” night. But let’s take a few other things into consideration. There’s that Zagat rating. Then there’s the prices. I’m not one to carp about pricing, but I tend to mind when the quality isn’t commensurate with the price. Finally, given that the same owners also operate the Village Gourmet, Taos, and Tina Louise, you’d tend to think that there’d be sufficient experience, to say nothing of pride, to keep from making rookie mistakes. In light of this, I’m not willing to cut them the same slack that I would a newer player, or one with a new chef that hasn’t had the chance to prove him/herself. If I set foot in one of the Village Restaurant Group’s properties again, it’ll be with some seriously diminished expectations.

3 1/2 – 4 lb. of Yukon Gold potatoes, peeled (thickness of soup will vary depending on the amount of potatoes used)
1 32-ounce container of store-bought chicken broth*
1 package of bacon**
1 smallish bunch of green onions
3/4 cup or thereabouts of light cream or half and half
About 1/4 cup sour cream
Half a package (about one cup) of shredded sharp cheddar cheese***
Dash of black, white, and red pepper
Kosher salt, if needed

The procedure:

While you’re bringing salted water to boil in a stock pot, wash, peel and cut the potatoes into uniform chunks. If you’re using Chicago Cutlery knives, as I do, you’ll find they make short work of the potatoes, and probably also your thumb. Take care not to get blood on the potatoes or the cutting board.  Stop the bleeding by putting pressure on the area you’ve sliced (your thumb; the potatoes ought not to require pressure). Season liberally with expletive(s) of choice.

Once you’ve cleaned off your knife (think of this, incidentally, as Viking cookery; just tell everyone it’s your roots, and that you can’t put the knives back in the block ’til they’ve tasted blood) and cutting board, and finished dicing the potatoes, the water should nearly be at a boil. Carefully put the potatoes in the boiling water. You don’t want to add scalding or steam burns to your mangled thumb, since the supply of sympathy available to the chef is, after all, finite.

While the taters are boiling, heat the chicken broth in a saucepan, and cook the bacon ’til it’s just crispy, then blot with a paper towel and dice into small bits. No, on second thought, use the kitchen shears. I don’t trust you with the knife. Thank you. You can also lightly saute the green onions at this point once you’ve removed most of the bacon grease from the pan.

Once the potatoes have finished cooking –they should still be slightly firm, not gone to mush– drain them in a colander and rinse the pot out with hot water. Put the pot back on,  and put enough of the chicken broth in to cover the bottom of the pan to about an inch in depth. Put the half and half in a microwave-safe container (a Pyrex measuring cup would be ideal) and microwave for about 30 seconds. Meantime, you can start putting the potatoes through a potato ricer, directly into the pot. You’ll have a big ‘ol mound of mashed potatoes, into which you’ll incorporate the chicken broth, stirring ’til smooth. Next add your half and half, then dump in the bacon and green onions. Add your sour cream, then pepper to taste. Simmer this for a bit, stirring to make sure it doesn’t stick, and gradually incorporate the cheddar cheese ’til it’s thoroughly blended. Check for off-putting pinkish tinge, and serve!

*I’d suggest low-sodium, since you’ll get salt enough from the other ingredients (between the cheese and the bacon, you’ll have plenty) but you can add a pinch of kosher salt when you’re done if you absolutely think you need it.

**I used turkey bacon, which is lower fat and generally requires less drainage.

***Please do not use “mild” cheddar. If you’re going to do that, you’re better off just leaving the cheese out, as it won’t be nearly assertive enough among the other ingredients.

By now, a day after a 7.0-magnitude earthquake demolished what was left of already-demolished Port Au Prince, you’ve already seen the visuals, and heard the first faltering attempts at making sense of what’s happened in Haiti. A couple of times already, I’ve commiserated with friends who’ve still got friends and family there, as they try and try again to get word of who’s safe, and who’s lost.

If you’re of a mind to help, there are a number of organizations soliciting donations for disaster relief. While news reports focus on the lack of medical supplies and drinkable water, it should be emphasized that what’s needed most at the moment is cash. In the absence, at least for the short term, of means to distribute supplies, a check–even if only for five bucks–would likely go further than the donation of a case of water. This page on MSNBC.com provides links to a plethora of organizations, including the American Red Cross, UNICEF, and Doctors Without Borders that are on the ground in Haiti and offering assistance.

Dammit. It was bad enough when only I could prevent forest fires.

The email comes courtesy of an outfit calling itself Heading to Heaven. They’ve nicked a page out of the Bill O’Reilly playbook and decided that Christmas is under attack by secularists, or progressives, or JC Penney or someone. And how do you save Christmas? By spending a buck ninety-eight on a cheap pin that says, “Keeping Christ in Christmas.” This is a rare opportunity since, according to their website, “Unfortunately, we only ordered a limited print of 1 million buttons.” So, only a million buttons at $1.98 a pop. Only two million bucks. They apparently asked themselves, “WWJD?” and come back with the answer that Jesus would’ve turned the situation into an opportunity for monetary gain, camels and needles’ eyes be damned.

Where’s the money going? Well, someone’s pocket from the looks of it. The company’s website boasts of its efforts in the community, but when you dig deeper for specifics, you find out that these “community” efforts consist largely of the company’s affiliate program, whereby they’ll donate up to ten percent of proceeds to affiliates, provided those affiliates shill for Headed to Heaven. This isn’t altruism, in other words, so much as good old-fashioned American hucksterism, buffed to a high gloss with a dollop of Jesus. Think of it as Amway with a few Bible verses thrown in.

Of course, the problem runs deeper than Headed to Heaven, and really, they’re only a symptom of the problem moreso than the problem itself. If we’re really so concerned about “saving” Christmas, why are we starting out by buying more shit? Isn’t that what got us into this mess in the first place? When I was knee-high to a grasshopper (longer ago than I’d care to admit, but not quite that long), you wouldn’t start seeing all the trappings of Christmas — the lights, the nativity scenes with oddly misshapen Jesuses, 43 billion christmas tchochkes in the stores, the Toys R Us catalog, and ubiquitous Christmas music) ’til Black Friday. The stuff shows up earlier and earlier now, to the point where this year, I was seeing Christmas crap before labor day. Heading to Heaven’s message? Jesus wants you to buy more shit! Not just any shit, mind you, their shit.

So if you’re that concerned about Christmas, here’s an immodest proposal. Instead of getting yourself in a lather over someone saying “Happy Holidays,” try writing to the corporate offices of your local retailer when they’re putting out candy canes on Independence Day. Email Wal-Mart and tell them to let their employees spend some time with their families one day out of the year instead of turning retail into bloodsport. And if they don’t listen (and they won’t; the only thing that talks, in retail as in so much else, is cash), don’t give them your business, whether it’s a national chain, or a self-proclaimed “Christian” company preying on the lowest-common-denominator populist fears of the easily frightened.

I tried to reach Heading to Heaven for something, anything, they might say in their own defense, or at least to give an accounting of what in the hell they were going to do with the two million bucks they’re counting on their pins generating for them. They’ve been silent, and no doubt will continue to be. So I’ll let their advert do the talking: “Every Christian can quietly speak through the simple act of wearing this button.”

Where’s the sport in that? If you want to “save” Christmas, start by driving out the money-changers.

The Flaming Lips fall into the latter category, having hit it small with “She Don’t Use Jelly” in the aftermath of Nirvana.¹ While Transmissions from the Sattelite Heart had its moments, it wasn’t ’til a couple of albums later, with the experimental Zaireeka (a four-disc opus that could be enjoyed in its component parts, or on four CD players simultaneously) that the band would really start to hit its stride. When 1997′s The Soft Bulletin dropped, it was apparent that the Flaming Lips’ sound had come to full bloom, in all its hallucinatory grandeur. Half the fun of the band’s evolution from Zaireeka through The Soft Bulletin, Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, At War with the Mystics, and finally their latest effort, Embryonic, has been listening to a handful of musicians setting out to do something different and startling on each successive release and generally succeeding. The other half of the fun, at least ’til Mystics, was often as not in the songs themselves, finely constructed miniatures with lyrics that would’ve done Syd Barrett proud married to music that sounded like Brian Wilson had recorded Pet Sounds while listening to Brian Eno’s Another Green World.

Embryonic is a logical progression from what’s come before. It’s also their most challenging album since Zaireeka. This is not, as it turns out, a bad thing.

The album’s opener, “Convinced of the Hex,” sets the tone for much of what follows. It’s lo-fi, cluttered to the point of claustrophobia, a wreck of glitchy static and synth bleeps. Much of the music sounds like it was played through a Marshall stack after Spinal Tap had figured out how to crank it past 11 to about 13 or thereabouts. Funky basslines turn to walls of dubby sludge, and bursts of pink noise wash over mellotron strings and found voices. Bitches’ Brew-era Miles gets filtered through Pink Floyd, bubbles up through Monster Movie-vintage Can. Guitar that wouldn’t sound out of place on one of Fela Kuti’s freer-form romps percolates then disintegrates over a disturbed lounge soundscape. And if much of the foregoing description is disjointed and seemingly random, it’s because much of this album sounds pretty much like that.

And if the music swerves from just barely poppy to downright punishing, it’s got lyrics to match. Granted, the Flaming Lips’ lyrics have never really been the stuff of sunshine and roses. That was, in some ways, easy to overlook on earlier discs, mostly because of the tension set up between Wayne Coyne’s melancholy lyrics, and the band’s typically expansive and sunny arrangements. “Race for the Prize,” The Soft Bulletin’s goosebump-inducing opener, is a prime example, as are any number of tracks from its followup, Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots. The pendulum shift that started on Yoshimi toward music whose tone more closely matched the lyric content became more pronounced on At War With the Mystics, and has now reached its logical conclusion on Embryonic.

All of this is rather a longish way of saying that Embryonic isn’t exactly the darkest thing the Lips have done (that darkness, shot through with varying degrees of crypticness, has really always been there). It’s just that now, the music’s caught up with the lyrics, so there’s not much by way of sunshine, or even daylight, to temper the lyrics’ darker side. The net effect is unalloyed melancholy, at least when it’s not downright sadness or despair. That’s only a bad thing, though, if you go to the Flaming Lips for easy listening — which, if you’ve been paying attention to them up to now, and hopefully you have, you’re probably not doing anyway. This isn’t Metal Machine Music by a long stretch, but it’s challenging. And ultimately, like the rest of what the Flaming Lips have done for nearly the last decade and a half, it’s well worth the time and effort. ²

¹ This doesn’t count songs like “The W.A.N.D.” and “Do You Realize,” which have been used in commercials (and the latter, incidentally, also as the official rock song of the state of Oklahoma). Songs being used in commercials and TV shows may get a kind of temporary ubiquity, but that doesn’t necessarily make them hits.

² The sole exception here would be “I Could Be a Frog,” where Wayne Coyne sounds like his usual self, but guest vocalist Karen O. manages to remind me of the freak-out fade-out on the B-52′s “Rock Lobster” so many years ago… you know, the part where Fred Schneider’s rattling off names of fish and Kate Pierson’s making these little expressionistic noises that go with them. Fine if you’re the B-52′s ’cause Fred’s allowed to get away with stuff like that and Kate could make the phone book sound righteous, but it’s a bit jarring on a Flaming Lips album. Just saying.

Sometimes, though, it’s just frustrating. I’m reminded of the more frustrating aspect listening to Wale’s debut effort, Attention Deficit.

There’s a twofold problem in listening to rap past a certain age. First off, it’s a young person’s game. Artists like Chuck D, the Beastie Boys, and KRS-ONE, for instance, are among the genre’s elder statesmen; it’s hard to envision some of these artists still doing it when they’re pushing 70, a la Jagger-Richards (though Gil Scott-Heron and the Last Poets, the elder statesmen’s elders, point a possible way forward).

Second, it’s also, just maybe, a young person’s game if you’re a listener as well.  If you’re of a certain age—say, mid-thirties or older—you’re old enough to have caught pretty much all this stuff, from the Sugarhill Gang and UTFO to the first, second, and all subsequent comings of LL Cool J, to Pac and Biggie to Jurassic 5 and Kool Keith to NWA to Outkast to Eminem to whatever comes next. Hip hop brings with it a sense of history; it’s been around long enough that it’s splintered into different subgenres, it’s gone global, and it’s had its fair share of mindblowing moments.

So I come to Wale with a certain set of expectations, the same as I would an album from any other genre. I can’t shake all that’s gone before, and Wale isn’t helping matters any. A new disc, by any artist — especially one I’ve never heard before — is all possibilities. You put the CD in the player, cross your fingers, and wait for the moment when, if your mind isn’t blown and your way of seeing the world at least subtly altered, at least you will have heard something which, by virtue of its creativity and newness, makes you want to rush out and tell your friends. You think, in short,  “This could be it.”

This isn’t.

I can’t fault Wale for not being MC 900 Ft. Jesus, not being the Roots, not even being Jay-Z or Kanye (not that I think the latter is much to aspire to). From the sound of it, he’s just trying to be Wale, which is all well and good, only he’s not altogether there yet. Some of the disc chugs along to an old-school vibe that’s agreeable enough but not all that adventuresome (the radio-ready “Beautiful Bliss”), while some of the rest tries too hard to be au courant (“Let it Loose”) or sounds like someone else’s castoffs (the Jurassic 5-inflected “Mirror”).

From the disc’s opener, “Triumph,” to the last notes of its closer, “Prescription,” Wale hints around, and gives glimpses of, some genuine potential. Sometimes, though, you really have to dig for it to even begin to dig it. There’s some bright spots to the backing tracks, which throw snippets of Kool and the Gang, Yann Tiersen (!), A Tribe Called Quest and a ton of other stuff into the mix. The lyrics veer from oh-shit creativity (you kinda have to give props to somebody who can name check Bret Harte and Brett Favre in the same phrase) to stuff that’s, well, a bit of a disappointment; there’s at least as much internal contradiction as internal rhyme here. Alright, not everybody’s going to be Foucault on wax, but the lyrical high points on the disc (like the Chrisette Michele collaboration “Shades,” where Wale takes a long, hard look at black-on-black racism, including his own) get dragged back down into the muck, even on some of the catchier tunes like “World Tour,” by the usual dick-grabbing egotism and I-gots-mine tropes that too often pass for “keeping it real” these days. You can’t help but wonder how different the disc might’ve sounded had Wale and co. just been their own bad selves rather than worrying about proclaiming themselves arbiters of the “real.”

Guest spots are all over Attention Deficit, which — for this listener at least — isn’t always a great move. Sometimes these casting decisions (and they are that) come off as though they’re more about marketing, than artistic, considerations. 50,000 Lady Ga Ga fans can’t be… well, maybe they can. Never mind. But I digress. If they’re not done right, the artists with the higher star “wattage” end up stealing the thunder of the person who, by rights, is supposed to be the headliner. By way of analogy, go back and listen to “Scenario,” by A Tribe Called Quest. For a crew with a less-defined sense of self, or a still embryonic artistic identity, that Busta Rhymes cameo could well have been the kiss of death, instead of being a defining moment for all parties involved. It’s hard to see, in most cases, exactly who gains what by the cameos on this outing. K’Naan’s turn on “TV in the Radio” steals the spotlight (the Somali rapper not only turns in a pretty convincing performance, he literally gets in the last word on the track); Lady GaGa’s cameo on “Chillin’” doesn’t do much but make you think how much better the cut would’ve sounded with MIA doing MIA than GaGa doing MIA. And don’t get me started on Pharrell, who’s as ubiquitious as dogshit lately, and about as useful.

Hip hop has a saviour about every, oh, six months or so, half self-anointed and the other half anointed by a music press that promptly forgets them just as soon as the next messiah crops up. It’s hard to say which of these categories Wale falls into. But the simulatneous shame and promise of this disc is that it begins to hint at what Wale might be capable of if he stops believing the hype, regardless of whence it comes.