As I type this events continue to spiral out of control in Ukraine. Putin’s military assault on that country reminds me of repeatedly watching footage of the U.S.-backed Indonesian invasion of East Timor in public presentations back when I was campaigning with the East Timor Action Network in the 1990s. I met a lot of Timorese who went through that nightmare and I probably will never have anything close to a real sense of how horrific it must have been, any more than I can know how Ukrainians under siege are feeling this week.
Suffice it to say that I keep thinking about the recent interview with Ukrainian peace activist Yurii Sheliazhenko linked to in the notes below. His common sense and basic humanity really hit home with me, making the situation feel much more immediate. He also made points I doubt anyone has raised on Fox News or CNN, and though if I were in his situation I doubt I'd stick to his hardcore pacifism, I do admire that commitment, and whether or not you think he should cut the Ukrainian leadership more slack, you have to admire his courage in staying put. I don’t have any brilliant ideas about what to do in solidarity with the Ukrainian people or Russian antiwar protestors, but staying attuned to suggestions from the international organization which Sheliazhenko works with, World Beyond War [https://worldbeyondwar.org/events/], seems like a good idea. That group also works on efforts to dismantle our own war machine so we don’t keep learning about global geography through the Pentagon’s destruction of places like Iraq, Afghanistan, and Yemen.
In less terrifying news, I gave my pricey new earplugs an initial test run when I saw the beloved* Southern Cali punk rock dinosaurs the Circle Jerks last Friday at the Fillmore. The little decibel blockers worked like a charm, praise whatever deity might conceivably be responsible. My lack of a smartphone did present a bit of a hassle, as it turned out that after being gouged extra money by a “third party vendor” site I was directed to (a friend had a similar thing happen while booking a hotel room — careful with those internet transactions!), the ticket I bought couldn’t be printed out. Your ticket is your phone, the annoying email informed me. Luckily my pal Philip was nice enough to download the scannable image to his handy-dandy pocket computer telephonic device and walk to the venue with me. It was kind of sweet the way he showed the door person his little screen and sent me through the phalanx of lounging security types like an indulgent mom sending her idiot son off to make new friends on his first day at school. Thanks again, Philip!
Not to be a broken record regarding this whole smart phone dilemma, but, though it’s an inexact comparison, it reminds of when I was told in sixth grade that I had to salute the flag. Everybody did it, so why couldn’t I just go along with the crowd? The problem was that I didn’t want to, so I didn’t. I don’t want a smartphone either. I’m not a luddite but I already do enough jabbering and texting on my flip phone and kill hours online at home and work. No internet in the pocket for this old bucko, thanks very much. Call me a rebel if you will. That label worked for Pee Wee Herman so it’s fine with me.
Stepping off my high horse and getting back to the concert report, I had no foreknowledge of any support acts for the aforementioned Circle Jerks, as I couldn’t find any mention of any other bands online. I suppose the two openers I found out about in the lobby were listed in social media announcements which everyone but uncool moi saw in advance.
If the first band had been onstage at a lower decimal level for ten or fifteen minutes it might have been provided an interesting anthropological look at what happens when a subculture (in this case, hardcore) atrophies and ossifies into a case study in humorlessness and arrested development. Alas, they played for long enough to seriously try my patience. I would have been within my rights to demand a message shirt reading “I sat through Negative Approach’s overlong opening set on 2/25/22 and all I got was this lousy t-shirt”; I meant to suggest to the Fillmore staff that they print up a few but in the blur of the evening that little brainstorm was forgotten.
I liked the two guitar, bass, drums, and yelling sounds of band #2, The Adolescents, more and more as their set wore on. It was a relief to not be looking at the Negative Approach singer do his ceaseless hunker/glower/monotone screaming thing, not that I was sure the second front man didn’t have a similar affect behind his unruly locks and COVID-19 facial covering. The veteran SoCal band was way more fun musically than Negative Approach, though that’s not setting the bar very high. I dug The Adolescents when I listened to them in my twenties but I never figured out the words to their shout-along anthems, and since the singer’s diction and enunciation didn’t exactly bring to mind Carmen McRae, clicking with their lyrics was a lost cause. But at least I did clearly hear him bark some verbally abusive audience member, “fuck you, it’s a mask,” which was a nice safety-first message.
In pre-pandemic times I might have been on the side of the dance floor, flailing and bouncing up and down like a lunatic a safe-ish distance from the aggro alpha male types who gravitate toward the circle pit thing in front center, but that didn’t seem advisable in Corona Time. Instead I immediately went upstairs to a table at a blessed remove from the bedlam below.
As cheesy music that sounded like Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass serenaded the crowd in the lead up to the headliners coming on I relished the superior sightlines from my second-story perch. Since I was at the table closest to the back of the hall there wasn’t a mob scene around me, so I had the option of pushing my chair aside to do the Cretin Hop if I needed to, my own personal land of a thousand dances being a part of the inflated admission price. It had been more than two years since I’d had this variety of trip down memory lane, for Peter Pan’s sake. And with my fancy-schmancy EnvoMask (yes, that’s trademarked) and all the elbow room I was certainly among the COVID19-safest individuals in the hall.
Within a few minutes after the Circle Jerks hit the stage it was clear that they were still at the top of their game. I’m not sure who the current drummer is [Editor’s note: wikipedia states his name is Joey Castillo] but he’s certainly what is referred to colloquially as a monster. Founding member Greg Hetson (guitar) and bassist (since 1984) Zander Schloss had their chops down and then some; long-ass dreadlocked vocalist Keith Morris, a co-founder of the band who is even older than me but remains a force of nature, was also completely on it.
Given the daily grind of doom and gloom national and world news (and we thought the ‘80s were bad!) that continues to deaden my senses and smother potential joie de vie, it was a blessed relief to swim in the aural riptides of not very radio-friendly numbers like “World Up My Ass,” “Deny Everything,” and “When the Shit Hits the Fan” (that last one’s refrain of “We get by however we can / We all have to duck when the shit hits the fan” felt especially timely). It was a bit of a risky moment when the explosive impact of “All Wound Up” hit my central nervous system but luckily the rush of cathartic glee didn’t propel me over the nearby railing.
As I told my pal Clancy in a post-show telephonic debriefing, one might argue that these characters had better be able to play the shit out of their songs, given that they have been performing many of them off and on for more than forty years. It’s also true that most of the new music the three core members have come up with in this century has been confined to their individual side projects. But so what? The commitment and ferocity of their attack can’t be found in many of the Noise Rocking in the Free World ‘70s/‘80s touring revivals which continue to roam the land, so if you’re disdainful of my enthusiasm please don’t tell me. Thanks in advance for staying mum on that score.
Lastly (why the sigh of relief?), there aren’t too many singers who provide between-song patter as well as Keith Morris does. He’s hilarious with hecklers, though I’m running overlong as usual and this is a family show so I’ll hold off on including any of his memorably obscene ripostes here. In his current events commentary, he rightly observed that what’s happening in Ukraine shouldn’t happen to anyone in the world, and said he’d like to send Putin and Trump on a long walk through a minefield. No, he continued, better to put the two kleptocrats on a yacht with several past warmongering heads of state he singled out by he name, along with most CEOs, then blow the vessel to smithereens. I got behind that in a big way. Sadly, my affirmative yelling wasn’t echoed by anybody within earshot. Maybe my fellow concertgoers needed to mull over Keith’s solution but something told me they weren’t likely to be weighing its pros and cons any time soon. Disappointing but not particularly surprising, I guess, as I obviously wasn’t hanging out at Caffe Trieste.
Speaking of heroes, it was a major bummer to read that Paul Farmer died of heart problems at his current home in Rwanda late last month. I met Paul through my good friend Leslie, who was very tight with him. A social justice activist and a brilliant doctor, Paul co-founded Partners in Health, an amazing organization dedicated to providing quality health care to poor people around the world. Though primarily doing international work, he didn’t shy away from pointing out the difference in medical options for cash-strapped and well-to-do individuals in the U.S., or blaming the predatory Medical-Industrial Complex for those unacceptable disparities.
I haven’t read Paul’s last book, Fevers, Feuds and Diamonds: Ebola and the Ravages of History (2020), though I was ordered to do so by Leslie and I certainly want to. I have read the excellent Pathologies of Power: Health, Human Rights, and the New War on the Poor (2005), as well as The Uses of Haiti (2006 [third edition]), which succinctly shows how the powers that be in Washington, D.C. have had it in for Haiti since that country first made its mark as the site of the world’s only successful slave revolution. The Uses of Haiti does a great job of laying out how imperial powers like the U.S. which thrive on exploitation of overseas labor have managed to subvert movements for self-determination in what used to be called The Third World.
The interview I link to below provides a good sense of the importance of Paul’s life work and legacy. He was a righteous guy, and, based on my experiences talking to Paul and everything I’ve ever heard about him, he was also gracious, charming, and funny as hell. Too bad there aren’t more like him. R.I.P. Paul Farmer, 1959-2022.
In my last Dispatch I commented on various annoying aspects of New Year’s Eve, my least favorite holiday after the Fourth of July. My friend Monica wrote me in response, “I cannot understand your suggestion to stop limiting self-reflection to one day a year. You want we should feel shitty all 365?” I value all of your feedback, dear readers, so I devoted long hours to pondering that question. Eventually I got it together to reply:
“Dear Monica,
After weeks of meditation on your query using deeply spiritual techniques gleaned
from various ridiculous therapy cults I've been dragged into kicking and screaming over the years, I found myself thinking about more important things than the choice between navel gazing for one day a year or indulging in said activity for 365 days.
However I would say that, as I realized while staring off into space on the bus the other day, interior self-examination doesn't have to be boring or even slightly self-flagellating. We should feel free to disparage the idiocy of our culture and the irritating nature of most of the people around us when looking inward. I'm not perfect, but when putting my behavior and lackluster accomplishments in the broader context of a world full of unrelenting mediocrity I often wind up laughing inappropriately. Also, keep in mind that, most of the time at least, nobody's paying attention to you, nor do they care.
I hope that helps clarify my views on your question. I will endeavor to spend more time in the coming weeks giving it even more thought. I hereby commit to doing so for at least a minute or two a day.
Yours in Beatitude,
Ben”
Unfortunately I wound up reneging on the commitment I made to Monica. I think there’s a lesson there. Anyone have a suggestion as to what it might be?
*My employer claims he loves this word.
NOTES
March 1, 2022 interview with peace activist Yurii Sheliazhenko: https://www.democracynow.org/2022/3/1/ukrainian_pacifist_movement_russia_missile_strike
Again, the address of that global anti-war coalition is: https://worldbeyondwar.org/
This guy is certainly an improvement on the generalist insta-pundits who clog the airwaves: https://www.democracynow.org/2022/3/7/anatol_lieven_ukraine_russia_peace_possibility
Viva Paul Farmer!: https://www.democracynow.org/2022/2/22/public_health_icon_dr_paul_farmer
I so wish I had bought a condo in this building: https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/article/Millennium-Tower-s-sinking-and-tilting-creates-16942587.php
Probably not a good idea to rely on the climate research churned out by this next of corporate prostitutes: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/feb/24/elsevier-publishing-climate-science-fossil-fuels
As Patrick says of MTG, she’s so smart!: https://www.thedailybeast.com/marjorie-taylor-greene-is-spending-more-than-half-her-salary-on-mask-fines [Note that this vile individual recently reiterated her claim that mask and vaccine requirements were echoes of Nazi Germany. No wonder I want more escape into loud live music.]
Department of Better Late Than Never: https://www.npr.org/2022/01/26/1075778055/california-redwood-forest-native-american-tribes
Save a butterfly, coddle a human trafficker!: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/national-butterfly-center-closes-border-rally_n_61f34067e4b01d3f299902f7