connecting*the*dots

ah yeah
feel that dive
straight back into the hive
alive with a high five
line language
with spaces in between
the mean whole
the slick sixteenth
the ebony and ivory dream
twinkle fingers on the horizontal ladder
making the bassist groan deeper
making the drummers beat badder
coming together like siameese twins
dropping out like a catheter
straight to the bassline
fine
wine
got
nothing
on
this
rhyme
head bouncing to the riff
as the bridge is about to be built
twisted
encrypted
lifted
clipped

A frenetic interpretation at the fez

So I was hanging out with my bud JD last night at the Fez, checking out Mingus Big Band as I usually do every other Thursday night, when news through the player’s grapevine hit me like a left hook. Smalls is closing saturday night. Smalls!

I’ve been going to this club for almost 7 years now. They’re the most lax Jazz club in the city; it’s BYOB to stock in their own fridge, with jamming until 10am for $10, a cozy environment with plush velore seats… man. A damn shame. I talked to one of the regular musicians last night and he was bummed, but he turned it around by saying:

Hey, that’s what clubs do. They close.

I guess if he can look at it like that, I should be able to as well… but still, NYC is losing a great, intimate venue for up and coming Jazz acts and established ones alike.

i got up in the morning
after a long nights fight
with the back of my mind
the delusional and mystified heights
of sane desires
and excite
meant that i had to move on to another
dream
another scheme
shit, there’s just no way i’ll stick to this routine
when up becomes down
and left becomes right
you gotta turn things around
and make shit tight
so where do i start to unwind this mess?
like a nasty piano bit played by john tesch
i’ll just wipe the slate clean
do what i say
say what i mean
but not like i do all the time
twisted and interpreted through a rhyme
but through my actions in the real
world events make more of an impact
to one’s soul
it’s time to move my ass
make my shit whole

there’s something familiar
about the look in her eyes
a lust for life
kicked back without lies
what you see is what you get
and that ‘tude is mad attractive
i gotta admit
i’m doing a double take
i’m starting to feel hyperactive
but in order to live
and start to once again give
i’ll have to take that chance
cut in on that dance
get back to romance
and snap out this trance…

shit!

the vibe feels so right and my head’s back on straight
i’m way too old to front
it’s time to make my own fate…
hold up
wait a minute
i’m already there
we’re chillin’ like dylan
no need to start losing hair
a friendship is evolving
taking root
taking hold
if the moment is right
i’m down to be bold
and if it’s just not happening
i can back out with grace
no need to dive in
no need to lose face

this isn’t a 100 meter dash
but a marathon with a pace

One moment I was relaxing on the couch and the next thing I know I’m scraping myself off the bathroom floor. I passed out. Hard. I must have held on to the towel rack for balance, ’cause I ripped it clean out of the wall.

Coming to felt as though my body was trying to turn over like an old car’s ignition in the winter — I felt like I flooded my engine.

Scary shit.

The same thing happened to me a couple of times three years ago. First, while I was with my girlfriend at the time — one moment I’m looking into her eyes, and the next I’m coming to while she’s screaming into the phone from across the room for an ambulance to come over.

Two weeks later, I passed out while playing basketball. Bit right through my lip.

After that last spill I went to see my doc, who in turn sent me to a neurologist for a catscan and some sound waves to bounce about in my skull. Results: negative.

Next, on to the cardiologist, who found an “interesting” heartbeat (not irregular) and scheduled me to have a tilt-table test performed. After they induced me to pass out (not too much fun), I ended up in Springfield, MA for surgery, where they ran a cardiac catheter up a vein in my leg into my heart. Results: negative.

At the end of the day, they basically told me to drink more Gatorade and that my heart is in good shape, but is beating to the sound of it’s own drummer.

Great closure, eh?

So now my hip is bruised like crazy and my head is aching from where I smacked it on the sink. This shit is scary. I’m making an appointment with a new doctor tomorrow as my old clinic in Brooklyn wouldn’t know what the hell to do.

If it ain’t one thing it’s another.

It was around 1989 that I read Six Days of the Condor — a perfect story for an 18 year-old, chock full of deceit, murder, paranoia, sex, intrigue, spies. For some reason — possibly my attention span at the time — the end of the book threw me for a loop. So tonight, I kicked back with my Netflix choice of the week and watched the film adaptation: Three Days of the Condor.

Three words: Rent. it. now.

It was made 28 years ago, yet the plot line has come to life in eerie fashion over the last few years. I don’t want to ruin the movie for you, so if you are going to rent it, don’t read on.

Condor (played by Robert Redford) is a spy, and per chance, misses a hit on his office that leaves the entire office of seven dead. After some brilliant screenwriting, we come to find out that one of his previous reports, sent off to Langley as usual, hit a nerve within a secret faction of the CIA that just happened to be playing war games concerning the overthrow of an unstable regime in the Middle East in order to gain control of oil reserves.

Sure, the US has been meddling with numerous foreign spots over the past 50 years to keep a stranglehold on power, but shivers the size of nine inch nails traveled down my spine just the same.

The rogue CIA unit ordered the execution of the entire office after reading Condor’s spot-on investigative report, so he does the only thing he can and goes on the run to plan his next step. After outwitting numerous suits over the course of the film, he ends up confronting the CIA Director directly in front of the New York Times office in Manhattan.

After a quick verbal sparring over the morality of what our government was doing, Condor tells the Director that the story is out and the Times will be publishing it all. The film ends with the CIA Director asking Condor,

“What if they don’t print it, then where will you go?”

Redford’s face drops a bit as the last frame freezes on him.

Does Our Press Get Squeezed?

Forget the uncanny plot line that syncs up with the recent activity in Iraq (and the wild coincidence of the main NYC CIA office being in the WTC) all together. It’s eerie to see this on film, but I’m more interested with the final jab.

I often wonder how free our press really is. Our government has indoctrinated us to speak so harshly against media practices around the world, especially during the eighties and in the midst the cold war (when I was an impressionable teenager). The old “look, over there!” trick has done the trick to build a sycophantic capitalist society of productive worker bees.

Here’s something to ponder: Did you know that congress is on the verge of passing unprecedented legislation, allowing media entities to merge with minimal limitations? Can you imagine what this could mean in an Orwellian novel? Or in this capitalist society where an individual, like Bill Gates, has more wealth than the bottom 45 percent of American households combined?

Less and less competitive news media = a singular perspective.

• Advertising revenue begins to drive editorial premise and journalistic objectivity.
• Agendas are set and met.
• A top down, targeted media push (via news, marketing, advertising, programming, etc.) becomes the mainstay of communication operations.

Our society has evolved from watching the news on TV at 6 and 11 (1970’s) to digesting news 24 hours a day on TV, radio, and the internet (1990’s) to having access to thousands of individual perspectives blasting on blogs (present). So with all of this newfound access we should feel both informed and empowered, right?

To quote Mel Gibson from Conspiracy Theory, “That’s what they want us to think.”

For even the most advanced netizen, information technology is still a hindrance when trying to decipher noise from news, and fiction from fact. Simple to use, individually operated publishing channels are now available to the masses through blogging, but the reach to the majority is minimal at best as they’re presented in a non-digestible ecosystem.

I can easily imagine the power structure in this country thinking:

Let the kids play with their toys — be it bloggers broadcasting opinions based on theory or fact — no one will be able to tell the difference. No one will ever connect the dots even if they do find “truth.” The sheer amount of posts and opinions projected outwards will make all opinions null and void.

Our organized, top-down messaging is so strong via advertising, marketing, media, etc., that the bottom-up representation of the people will become lost in the noise of the the mainstream media, as well as in it’s own scattered presentation.

We’ll then use their information as data to feed our strategic messaging.

Americans have turned into thought veal over the past twenty-years. We’ve been tenderized perfectly to be devoured oh-so-nicely in an economic system that is set up to succeed only if the masses over-consume everything from food to entertainment to material goods to political punditry.

This is the boogie man that lives under my bed. I step on his throat when getting up each morning.