shortest. post. ever.

It's quarter to four in the morning, and I'm watching the seventh inning stretch at fenway park on my iPhone... game 3 of the ALDS, and with the sox in an 0-2 hole, I knew I needed to stay up and watch. So far the games have been on NHK TV, meaning I don't need to look at my 4-inch iPhone screen for hours at a time. For some reason, probably the 1AM local start, this one didn't make the network. Oh well... the MLB app lets me watch the raw camera feed without commercials, graphics, replays, or any other distractions - it's very zen, almost like watching a broadcast from the early days of television.

Haven't been blogging much because I've been putting my energy into building my "professional" website -

www.hoganbass.com

which you should check out and constructively criticize... back to trying to stay awake until the end of the game. Not sure which will come first - sunlight or the last out.

Shopping fun...

Too tired to really write anything epic tonight, so instead I'll take up some space with goofy pictures from the home goods store near the base...

The last few days have been exhilarating and exhausting at the same time. Jet lag has taken a backseat to the smothering Tokyo humidity. Some days are to the point that it's worth it to avoid air conditioning so you don't get hit with it all over again when you finally go back outside...

Yesterday brought the first feeling that we're really here for more than a vacation, something we've been waiting for. Sarah and I ventured in to Tokyo alone for the first time to meet with a few people at her new school and get the official tour - nothing like exploring a high school in 95 degree weather with the AC turned off! This morning we trekked back in to the city - this time to Shin-Okubo to get my bass' soundpost reset. Got some help from Brent on talkbass.com as far as setting up the appointment and getting everything taken care of - really above and beyond what I expected in getting situated. As you can imagine, lugging my enourmous bass, in flight case, all over the Odakyu and JR lines wore me out. So, without further ado, the pictures.

Much like a teenage girl getting random Chinese characters tattooed on her lower back because they "look cool", for some reason people love shirts and items with hopelessly random strings of cliches, phrases, etc.

Same effect, only with the added bonus of a rhinoceros beetle obscuring the phrase. Should be noted that these are NOT baby bibs - they're actually doggie outfits for those aimless middle-aged types who enjoy torturing their pets to the brink of suicide. Cuddwy wuddwy suicide.

Too many things wrong with this picture to count. "Fitting Room" isn't really helpful at all - unless you get off dressing a -stuffed- dog in said outfits. Get some help, people.

And, just to quell the uneasy feeling from the pet outfits, we present "Cow Strength" gloves.

Fingers

I was caught off guard when I opened the Globe site today and saw a big color picture of pianist Dave McKenna front and center. It's sad that my immediate reaction to seeing a jazz musician in the media is to assume the worst, but with most papers here dying is the only way for a jazz guy to get any press. My heart sank when I saw the byline - Dave had passed away Saturday at the age of 78. I felt like I'd lost an old friend, even though we'd never met. For someone I never saw perform in person, Dave McKenna had an immeasurable impact on me, and I'd go so far as to say his music is the reason I play jazz today.

As far as awkward teenagers go, I was possibly the grand champion. My parents had recently divorced and I was trying to live in two houses at once, forgetting school books and homework and generally doing a fantastic job of not holding things together at all. My uninspired search for direction and/or purpose had led me to take electric bass lessons, but after a year or so I had lost interest and my bass sat lonely in the corner of my room at whichever house I wasn't currently staying at. I did manage a rather intense fascination with the music of the Beatles, but more as a way to associate with the slightly cooler kids who wore tye-dye shirts, but without actually smoking all the pot and getting myself in more trouble than I already was. Reasons aside, I enjoyed listening to music passively and not really being too interested in what was happening behind the scenes. 

My dad, as some of you know, works at a power plant in Boston, and has been commuting from New Hampshire for as long as I can remember. 99 percent of the time he drives from his house (Point A) to work (Tab B) and never really does anything involving all the little folds, lines, and slots in the city. For whatever reason one day he was forced to do something he loathes as much as riding the bus, which was take a cab from Mystic station to somewhere downtown. He hailed his ride, got in, and was surprised to be greeted by some of the most interesting music he'd heard in a while. The driver was more than happy to spread his love of the album, going so far as to offer my father the CD as a gift when he arrived at his destination. The disc in question? Dave McKenna at Maybeck Recital Hall.

A few days later I was driving around with Dad when he put in the CD and my ears perked up. The first track was oddly familiar, and after a moment of deciphering piano, bass, and guitar I recognized it as a song from one of my Beatles' albums, "The Sheik of Araby". My dad, as dads often do, turned up the volume, grinned and said "Now pay attention". I strained and did my best to figure out what else could possibly be going on when it hit me - there was no bass player, only the piano player's left hand! I wasn't quite sure of what he was really doing, but I knew it was damn impressive. I would try to get past the first few tracks and listen to the whole album, but it was impossible. For at least the next month it was "The Sheik of Araby" and not much else. The simple intro, the way the piano and guitar traded back and forth, thinking I was hearing not only a melodic lines and walking bass but even -chords-. Dave McKenna played like a man with three hand and 50 fingers. His time rushed a little, but in a way that conveys a sort of excitement to get where he was going, a kind of bounce. I learned later it was called "swing". It was all too much and I was hooked. I had heard jazz for the first time, and knew that this was a sound I somehow wanted to make.

I picked up a few more Dave McKenna albums and was always struck by the self-deprecating words in the liner notes, putting down the music before you've had a chance to listen. For a man with such an obvious gift, it was clear there was no ego here and that Dave considered himself but a simple piano player. I was particularly struck when I picked up a copy of a quartet album with Zoot Sims on tenor sax - the entire back of the record was dedicated to the story of how the album was put together. Everyone just happened to be in town for a day, and it was decided they should record. The musicians all gathered at a studio in New York - Dave was late due to watching the Patriots lose by one point to Buffalo. The songs were chosen as the session progressed, including one that everyone knew but couldn't remember the name of until the next day when the tapes were on the way to the company. Jokes and friendly insults were tossed around, breaks were taken for a few beers, and the end of the session arrived when everyone wanted Mexican food. This, to me, was a revelation. As far as I had ever known performing music was something to be nervous about, an anxious experience at a recital or school event, just hoping you wouldn't make a mistake and humiliate yourself in front of everyone who was surely watching and waiting for the smallest misstep. Grades and scores were supposed to be involved, and enjoying yourself was something that came when you'd stepped offstage and the shaking had subsided. I simply couldn't wrap my head around the idea that such amazing music could be created in this way and that it could be so -fun-. My mental image of the perfect musical experience was formed at this very moment, and hasn't really changed much in the last decade. 

Much has been written about Dave's love of the Red Sox, and I'm always amused when I meet fellow musicians who are baseball fans. Maybe it's a New England thing, maybe it's a side effect of gigs in bars, or perhaps there's some deep-rooted connection between the analytical nature of jazz and the endless ways of looking at baseball statistics. I can't pretend to know the answer, but I know that Dave McKenna has provided the measuring stick for how seriously I'm dedicated to a game. It was mentioned in the Globe today that McKenna would often leave a radio with the game on low volume when he was playing hotel gigs downtown, which may seem a sin to those who'd sit quietly and want to appreciate his music. I've heard from a few sources, however, that during the '86 world series he actually set a portable black and white television on the piano and managed to watch the game while performing. I often use this story to make my fellow musicians feel better when I'm trying to catch a glance of the TV while on a gig, usually with limited success. 

My one great regret is that I really got in to jazz just a little too late to see Dave McKenna perform. I actually have a ticket stub and poster for one of his concerts - he was slated to play a free show in Concord when I was a junior in high school. I went with a few friends and we didn't find out until the beginning of the concert that Dave had taken ill and was unable to make it. We had a great time watching Bucky Pizzarelli and Scott Hamilton, and I was able to make a great friend in the group's bassist, Marshall Wood. A few weeks afterwards, though, we learned the sad truth - faced with some serious medical issues, Dave had made the decision to retire, and he'd been on the fence until about a day before the concert as to whether he'd try to play in what would have been his last appearance. I'm saddened I just barely missed out on the chance to see him, but devastated by the thought of such a man unable to create and release the ideas piling up inside. 

As I sit here tonight exhausted from work, trying to get to my Japanese classwork, and generally frayed around the edges, Dave's music shows me again why I want to play in the first place. I know it sounds like something from a fortune cookie, but music has always had a way of finding me when I need it most. If not for a generous cab driver and the music of Dave McKenna, who knows where I'd be today. I wish I'd had the chance to meet Dave, to thank him for inspiring me and bringing me so much joy. All I can do is keep listening, playing, and hoping that I can take even a sliver of the joy and magic he brought to his music. Thanks, Dave.

Pennsylvania...

Trips to Pennsylvania to see the family farm are always a mixed bag - with the exception of the actual farm and a few "Sheetz" convenience stores, I hate every inch of the entire state. I'm a little bummed every time I cross the NY/PA border and find out that the Centralia mine fire hasn't stepped up and swallowed the surrounding, say, 300 mile radius. I spent two years of my undergrad career in Pennsylvania, and I believe this little nugget from the wikipedia article on the mine fire creates a nice mental picture for those of you who haven't been -

"Centralia's cemeteries now have a far greater population than the town, including one on the hilltop that has smoke rising around and out of it."

I'm pretty sure the whole state feels like that. Anyways, after the journey of 450 miles nears an end and I see the farm on the horizon, I'm able to relax and forget that I'm surrounded by, well, Pennsylvania. After the meet and greet with everyone and the mandatory post-drive nap, it's time to venture out and look for barn cats. This always makes me glad to be on the farm, and, in the absence of scotch, usually takes the edge off after nine hours in the car.

Kittens aside, the real reason we bother driving all the way out to the farm is to hang out with Sarah's family. The Frantz Whitehall Farm has been around in some form or another for the last 350 years, functioning as a tavern, a hotel, a hideout for Civil War soldiers, and of course, a real live dairy farm. Sarah's grandparents have been around for a good chunk of that history, and they always have some pretty interesting stories to tell. Sarah's grandmother, Alma, runs a vegetable stand out in front of the farm, and it's pretty impressive in that it accomplishes two things very well -

1. Selling vegetables.

2. Bringing the entire population of Waynesboro, PA by the farm every few days, ensuring you're always getting brought out and introduced to someone's uncle who bought a horse from the man who worked with your father in law when he was at the plant and needed a ride to Harrisburg but that was the year that the nice Mennonite man from the farm where we get the lettuce and say Matt can you bring this zucchini to the cooler and tell Katie I'm gonna put a roast in?

I should probably point out that Katie is Sarah - when Sarah, er Katie, was little, her family called her Katie after her middle name, Kathryn. Her mom, Kathy, noticed that when Katie went to the dentist or doctor, Katie would often get Kathy's medical records or Kathy would get Katie's "My little pony" novelty toothbrush, this upsetting both Kathy and Katie greatly and potentially setting up a long painful future of awkward first dates, ill-fitting clothes, and general malaise. Kathy made the bold decision to break with tradition and call Katie "Sarah", a moniker derived from her first name, "Sarah". Everyone on the farm, however, had developed a tendency to associate Sarah with "Katie", and thus, whenever on the farm Sarah assumes her alter ego, Hazel. Confused? You won't be after this episode of "Soap!".

After a few hours of playing with barn kittens and remembering to call Katie, "Katie", I was longing for some other source of entertainment. It was found in the form of an old BB gun sitting in a pile of hay. I quickly fetched Katie from the cooler (like in "The Great Escape", but not), and told her I needed her to join me in the barn to help in fulfilling a childhood fantasy. After an uncomfortable pause until the realization that I had said "Childhood", she agreed to help. We quickly rounded up a few old cans and improvised a shooting gallery. My last experience with a firearm was peppering paper targets with a .22 rifle in boy scouts, Katie's was shooting floating oil barrels with an anti-aircraft gun from a carrier in Navy ROTC. Despite my obvious natural advantage, Katie and I for the most part managed a tie. From 10 feet we were both lethal, hitting the cans almost every time. Once the range increased, however, the poor quality of the gun limited our ability to do much more than hit the broad side of a barn (of which two were fortunately present.) Our inner rednecks satisfied, we stashed the BB gun and went back to the normal farm business of wandering around and finding forlorn kittens.

My only complaint about spending time on the farm lately is that by the time you get the hang of doing nothing at all and enjoying it, it's already time to get back in the car. The calming effects of fresh air and good company are replaced with the depressing realization you'll soon be driving through places with names like "Scranton", "Dunmore", and "Throop". I'm pretty sure at least one of those was mentioned in my high school fitness classes as a consequence of failing to "play it safe". Before we leave we always make sure to stock up on plenty of corn, the varieties grown on the Frantz farm being the best I've ever encountered. My personal best in one sitting is seven ears, while Katie's grandfather Herb managed a frightening 22 in one ferocious contest many years ago. I can only hope to attain such greatness one day. As the farm shrinks in the rearview mirror I'm always sad to leave but already excited to make my next visit. In 350 years, this may be the greatest achievement of the Frantz Whitehall Farm - giving me a reason to be excited to visit Pennsylvania.

Vaffunculo!

Wiped out and emotionally hung over from last night's Red Sox win, I had no idea if I'd be able to follow up last night's disappointing blog premiere. Fortunately, inspiration came in the form of an offensive text message from my friend Phil. While in the ICU at the hospital I work at I was surprised and alarmed to notice my phone vibrating - surprised in that I never really get calls or messages during the day, and alarmed as I was in a goddamn ICU and was hoping my forgetting to turn my phone off wasn't about to short out some patient's iron lung. I discreetly opened my phone and saw the words "Eh, funcula!" on the screen. My brain froze for a moment before I was able to form two thoughts - 

1. "What the hell?!"

2. "That's spelled wrong."

I searched my memory for a few seconds and finally was taken back to a simpler time and place, say, about 1997. Phil and I were awkward poorly socialized high school students, a far cry from the awkward, poorly socialized adults we have worked hard to become today. After enjoying an evening of Goldeneye and pringles (I promise they won't get mentioned every time I write here) we sat in front of my extremely underpowered old mac and decided to do what every abnormal teenager does when presented with the opportunity to browse the early internet for porn - record stupid sounds.

Imagine our youthful sense of awe and wonder as we spoke in to a little round microphone, waited a few seconds, heard the whirrs and clicks of the computer, and heard our voices played back to us in all the glory of 22 KHZ 8 bit mono. I like to think it was akin to what Edison felt in his lab, albeit with less of the armpit noises and pale Beavis and Butthead impersonations. We recorded a few forgettable samples, some of which I recall involved extremely creative but woefully ineffective insults of each other's girlfriends. 

I should step back and set the scene a little further and let you know my already antique mac was set up on a flimsy folding table, and it was upon this table which we rested our trusty apple microphone. At one point, while recording, I smashed my knee hard on the table and Phil and I discovered that the resulting sound created by the bouncing mic sounded frighteningly like a crashing bullet or crunching bone. Being the mentally depraved young men we were, we decided to take this and run with it. Phil started off in rather tame fashion, yelling "OW" and hitting the desk, perhaps to recreate my injury of a few moments past. I took things a step further and narrated the sad story of a young man who fell down a flight of stairs and cursed the whole way down, smashing and breaking various bones as he went. My first official recording date.

Suddenly, and not dramatically at all, one of us remembered some Italian we had learned from a friend in French class - don't bother asking, my most impressive achievement in three years of Français involved running face first in to a chalkboard. Our friend DJ had shared a few Italian curse words, "Vaffunculo!", being the one which stuck with us the most. In short, it means "Fuck you!" and has a wonderful "Stereotypical-Italian-I-feel-like-it-should-be-somewhere-in-the-Godfather-movies-but-I-don't-know" sort of sound. Say it out loud with me. Hard drive whirring I did my best attempt to put on a bad accent... what follows is an approximate transcript.

"Eh, Fanculo!" (Pronounced as spelled, incorrectly)

(Three to five loud taps on the desk to simulate a drive by shooting)

(Muffled screams)

And with that, history had been made, a line had been crossed, and Phil and I set a gold standard for simultaneously surprising and letting each other down. I'll spare you the rest of the evening, only telling you one sound involved an Abraham Lincoln quote and more simulated gunfire. Ten years later and I start to wonder if I'm going to be telling a court-ordered psychiatrist about this someday. I would take relief in knowing that surely our offensive sound files are gone forever, where nobody can use them against me, but that's not the case. 

Phil has an odd capability for holding on to items that I usually misplace or forget about. He still owns (and wears) his middle school soccer t-shirt. He is in possession of most of his old French homework, and strangely, some of mine. Imagine a sort of Smithsonian for losers, and you have Phil's room in Concord. Posters from our first gigs, cassettes of our feeble attempts to start a band, and other memorabilia that will skyrocket in value when one of us becomes/harms a prominent public figure. Somehow Phil still has those sounds from all those years back, and I still hear them from time to time. 

Once the realization that I've sadly always been this weird passes, I'm glad Phil still has all his stuff. It makes me want to try and have some sort of record of what I'm hoping I'm about to set out on. If things go as planned in the next few years I want to do some pretty ambitious and crazy things. I think that's a big reason I started writing like this - maybe sometime I'll want to dig up one of these entries and reminisce, or think about how far I've come or where I thought I'd be. Anyways, I'll save the sentimentality for another night - if anything else I'll run out of words soon if I write like this every night. So in short, good night, good luck, and Vaffunculo!

Here goes...

I had high hopes for my first post - I envisioned a "Sports Guy" type running blog during Game 4 of the ALDS between the Red Sox and the Los Angeles California Angels in the Outfield of Anaheim Mighty Ducks First Blood - Part II. Unfortunately for you my evening has turned out to be less than exciting. No worries though, as a lack of quality hasn't ever stopped me from doing anything before...

5:18PM - Arrive home from work. Evaluate cooking leftover healthy indian food.

5:32PM - Half a can of pringles later, indian dish remains safely in fridge.

6:25PM - Awake from nap, shower, eat indian food and comment to wife on how I'm happy to be eating healthier.

7:00 - 8:45PM - Discuss idea of buying domain/starting a blog with my peers. Occurs to me I'm soliciting advice from a man who recently fathered a child and started this site.

8:46PM - First pitch at Fenway. I can see the lights from my window...

8:47 - 10:55 - a blur of setting up my account, enjoying a Sam Octoberfest, debating the merits of a corner store pringles run, and watching the game. 2-0 sox after 7.

10:56 - Masterson walks the tying run on and atones by throwing the next pitch directly at the backstop.

10:59 - Torii Hunter ties the game. 

11:01 - I decide it would be in my best interest to end this experiment and concentrate on the game, mostly so I can be ready in case a Masterson pitch lands in my living room.

I'll be back with plenty of  updates as I embark on my most challenging endeavor in a while next week - taking Japanese classes for an eventual attempt to move to Tokyo.