11-23-08 LA CA: 1307 hrs. Look, another entry. Perhaps this the way to do it, once a week to sum things up. I’ll give it a shot. A lot of mail came into the site about the IFC special we shot in Northern Ireland. No matter how you slice it, you will anger someone. I went into and out of the whole thing in neutral. I am not from there and wanted to hear all I could, understand what I could and put it some kind of context. I am still convinced that peace will work better than anything else.
Thanks for all the mail that you sent into Indie 103 about the move my show made to Saturday nights. Please understand that I like Indie very much and they like me too. They are trying things out to see if they can make things better there. They like the show very much and have always been 110% cool to me, never told me what to play or to cool it or anything so believe me when I tell you, they’re the good guys. The move has changed things for me and Engineer X so we’ll do our best to make the thing fun. The music remains good, that’s the easy part. It’s not being to do the thing live that makes it not as fun as I want it to be. It’s a blast to be in the room playing the music in real time and knowing you’re out there digging it as well.
In the last several days since I wrote you, I have been working steadily on A Preferred Blur and a good part of it is almost in final edit. If I can stay focused on it, we could very well have it off to the printer well before the end of the year. We are also getting the masters and sleeve notes ready for the re-releases of two old talking records, Live At McCabe’s and Human Butt. I am sure you’ve been losing no small amount of sleep waiting for those to come back out again all the same, it’s good to have things in print. We are also working other re-releases, expanded versions of older releases and some new stuff as well. Hopefully, 2009 will have some good releases from the site. We are working on a release schedule that will hopefully take us into 2010.
I have been reading F Scott Fitzgerald for the last two days. I promised myself some literature several weeks ago. I don’t read nearly the same amount of literature as I used to, these days, it’s more history and political-journalistic stuff. I have missed reading fiction. The Fitzgerald I reading isn’t exactly fiction, it’s a Cambridge Edition collection of some of his non-fiction essay material. I always think of him around this time of year. I am usually off the road and in Los Angeles. He died right down the street from here in December of 1940. I’ve been to the apartment and stood in the approximate place he fell. It’s an odd literary landmark but it’s interesting to me.
I went to an Amnesty International function thing the other night. I am part of a poster campaign they’re running so Engineer X, Janeane Garofalo and I went to the thing. The executive director of the outfit, Larry Cox spoke for awhile and for me at least, it was very inspiring. I talked to him afterwards and told him what I was involved with, trying to raise some money for the WFP next year, he thought that was cool. I thought he was cool. I really liked what he had to say. The more I see, the more I think that the best things will come from the efforts of people who are willing to take a small amount of their time and do something for the benefit of others. I am not talking about huge changes you make in your life, more like an awareness that leads you to new conclusions and actions. Perhaps that’s what we are about to start in on with our new president. I don’t think it should matter who the president is really, it’s a thing you would want to do anyway. I’m rambling, I know.
Did you know that I have been writing for Vanity Fair’s website for several weeks? Well, I have. Here’s the site address that will take you to the most recent posting and will direct you to the older ones:
http://www.vanityfair.com/online/politics/2008/11/a-2012-palinalzawahri-ticket-makes-sense-for-the-gop.html
I don’t know if you’ll like the writing but at least the price is right. I have one last show for the year in Seattle at the Moore Theater this coming Wednesday, I am looking forward to it but kinda dragged that it’s just the one show. I have been off the road for a week now and to be honest, I am really done with being here and would like nothing more than another batch of shows to do.
Next week’s radio show is already in the bag and it’s a good one so tune in if you can and thanks for reading this. Henry