I Just Read About That…

SOUNDTRACK: BUKE AND GASS-Tiny Desk Concert #95 (December 6, 2010).

Buke and Gass’ album Riposte made the NPR’s 50 Favorites of 2010.  I listened to a track and liked it but I wasn’t blown away by it.  Nevertheless, I wanted to check out this Tiny Desk concert because I was sure it would be interesting.  And so it is.  And it makes me like them infinitely more–enough to check out their whole album.

The initial attraction to Buke and Gass is their homemade instruments (and if you watch the video, you can kind of see how they work, except I want to know more details (there must be foot pedals of all kinds to make these exquisite sounds)).  Arone Dyer sings and plays a modified baritone ukulele (who even knew such a thing existed) and makes incredibly squalling, cool effects come from it.  Aron Sanchez plays a modified guitar/bass hybrid (there’s bass and guitar strings-the bass are filtered through one amp, while the guitar goes through another).  And someone is playing a tambourine and a bass drum (I think it’s Sanchez with his (unseen) feet).

The songs are weird but incredibly catchy.  Dyer’s voice is wonderful, and perhaps the most amazing thing is that she seems to be playing guitar harmonies to complement her voice and it makes it sound like there are two singers.  It’s also amazing how much noise they make with these two instruments.

The whole set is wonderful and if they can do this on live, I can’t wait to see what the can do with studio magic. Now, just what the hell does their name mean?

[READ: April 15, 2011] “Why I’m a Pacifist”

I enjoyed Nicholson Baker’s earlier works quit a bit, but I have missed a lot of his more recent releases.  Nevertheless, Baker is unafraid of controversy and I enjoy reading what he has to say.

In this article he defends his belief in pacifism. What’ surprising to me is that in his biographical introduction he talks  about his earlier life as a red-blooded Young Republican.  I never would have figured that Baker has such a past, but he evidently did. When he grew out of that phase, he opened himself up to the possibilities of pacifism (which his wife thoroughly supported).

The majority of this article argues against the standard reply to the statement, “I’m a pacifist.”  He states that most people reply to this statement with “But what about Hitler?’  (If someone made a dollar for every time Hitler’s name was mentioned hypothetically, he would be one rich dude).  Or they say But what about WWII, that was a good war.”  I myself have always been a pacifist, although I’ve never had to deal with that question myself.

His argument, well founded and researched is that more people died needlessly because America entered the war than if we had stayed out.  He postulates that Hitler’s threats against the Jews were empty until the US attacked and “justified” his reaction to the assault.  The resources that he cites (and this is not his original idea, by the way) really support this contention.  I’m not going to go into the arguments here (that’s what Baker is for), but I found them compelling and believable.   (The amazing writer and pacifist Howard Zinn fought in WWII and later decided it was not a good war).

In this time of (ridiculous) wars and (stupid) wars and (yet even more) wars and spiraling defense budgets and threats to cut everything but defense spending, it’s nice to hear these arguments get some fresh air.  Maybe (just maybe) they’ll work towards pacifying our nation (and saving a ton of money).