Tokyo Rain

When I was a teenager and trying to learn about Japan, other cultures, and different ways of thinking, I read a Zen parable referred to as "The monk and the strawberry".

In this parable, a monk is out walking when he encounters a hungry tiger. As he backs away from the tiger, he finds he is now on a cliff outcropping with nowhere to go. As the tiger approaches, he stumbles over the edge, grabbing a vine. Hanging from the vine, he notices two mice, one black and one white, nibbling at the vine. Contemplating his fate -- tiger or vine -- he sees a single strawberry growing nearby. The monk plucks the strawberry. The story concludes "how sweet it tasted!"

At the time, I thought it was absurdist.

Today it is raining in Tokyo.

Most people will tell you this is a story about "enjoying the moment", or how one can find beauty even in the most dire circumstances. 20 years ago, I would have said "yes, clearly, that is what the story is about."

I spent the day in meetings, with colleagues old and new, catching up, working on plans, celebrating, griping. The things one does in business meetings.

Interspersed were visits to a conference room reserved as a workspace for my group. But I was the only one there, and in the hot, electrical office air, I gazed at the plastic chairs, cables, whiteboards and marveled in a jet-lag trance at the blankness and emptiness of it all, as my fingers clicked away on my laptop.

Last night, returning to the hotel after a delicious ramen dinner, our female cabdriver concluded transit by handing each of us a small berry-shaped candy as she thanked us for riding with her. A perfectly kawaii detail.

As I pocketed the candy and entered the hotel, I thought of the parable again.

A wise Zen writer argues the parable is about the opposite of what you think. It is, rather than being a celebration of "pleasure in the moment", a cautionary tale. "The moment's pleasure certainly dooms the monk through distraction. What an idiot [the monk is]." Life is danger and suffering, and forgetting that for a few moments of bliss is not a good or enlightened thing to do.

I think of the news. Whether at the public or personal scales, tragedy abounds. The world burns, and the air is choked with its ashes. And if it is not our homes burning, the smoke from others' gives us migraines. Death takes shots at the people we know. It misses some, grazes others, and takes the rest down.

I consider the conversation I had with a colleague over lunch, about how their attitudes about what "success" at their job meant had been changing. I indicated that mine had, too. As we talked, I wondered if I was just getting very good at justifying my own actions, or if I was actually learning something.

The rain pours down in Shinagawa. I step carefully across the wet gray stones of the plaza, trying not to slip.

Perhaps great ambition is a luxury afforded to those without fear, or those without knowledge of what they have to lose. Or those who think their actions will matter, in the grand scheme of things. Because they haven't yet met the tiger, or aren't yet hanging from the vine.

The fortune pinned to my board at work reads "Just to be alive is a grand thing."

I rub the sore spot on my face. Probably just a stone in my salivary gland. Getting older, I see the value of the things I have and the things I have lost. Everything about our lives is so fragile, so temporary. So imperfect. So perfect.

Tokyo is beautiful in the rain, and unseasonably cold.

In my jacket pocket, the berry candy rolls around in its plastic wrapper, uneaten.

Los Angeles, Like You

You remember this place. Los Angeles. You wonder if it remembers you. Cities should be able to do that, right? Seems fair. After all, you lived here for a lifetime. Paid taxes. Loved its streets and skies and parking spaces. Ate in its restaurants. Cried in its parks. Studied its outlines in the Thomas Brothers guide. Even played a few shows in its clubs.

Most of those clubs are gone now, and the rest practically museums. Your car drives you past the bleached bones of what was once the Coconut Teaszer [sic], en route to a meeting with a media-related agency doing business in the echoing carcass of the Directors Guild of America building. "Drive West on Sunset...". You think of Walter Becker's recent passing.

You look around. You've been up and down this part of town many times. It's hard to recognize now, with new construction, new facades, new tenants. Strangers replacing the buildings and businesses you knew, and the ghosts of their memories vanishing in the perfect fall gloom.

Your hotel didn't even exist 3 months ago, let alone 20 years ago. It's down the street from an old, storied Hollywood building. You used to go to that building for singing lessons, where David Gabriel gave you a voice and confidence. Long ago, too late. But you've still got that. You wonder where he is these days. You'd like to thank him.

The windows are dark. Maybe it's being redeveloped or re-sold. So many other places are. The Opium Den? Gone. You walk by its now-anonymous door, thinking of how many times you've found great parking here, waited in line, seen bands and met friends and went home buzzed and reeking of cigarette smoke. There was a time people could smoke in bars, until suddenly, overnight, that stopped.

Nearby Sunset still has some of the old landmarks, even if they've been rebranded for ridiculous dot-coms, news networks, or some kind of modern coffee/yogurt/spin class/boutique you can't quite figure out. A far cry from the all-but-endless strip malls. Everything used to look like an off-brand 7-11, and now it all looks like a cross between Virgin America and Starbucks, tasteful purple lighting and wood.

You wonder why coming back here makes you feel so melancholy, as you glance north towards the Hollywood Hills and Beachwood Canyon. You had some good times here, when the weather was just like this, the nights perfect for walking, laughing, getting one more drink, driving across town to see your friends play somewhere. Maybe it's just a reminder of how much older you are, and reinforces how fragile life is. You think of Tom Petty, gone too soon.

"Oh baby, don't it feel like heaven right now?
Don't it feel like something from a dream?
Yeah, I've never known nothing quite like this
Don't it feel like tonight might never be again?
We know better than to try and pretend..."

You sing to yourself.

It's funny. It's barely 10:30 pm. You notice as you're walking through the upgraded and renovated streets that most of the hip-looking bars, restaurants, and clubs are all but empty and/or closing. They all look nice -- much more expensive and richer than when you lived here, and yet, they're all turning in, closing for the night. Like you.

Is it that they have given up on the possibilities of the evening? Or that they just know better, because it's Wednesday night and everyone's got work in the morning and the weekend seems far away? Or is that just how they roll now, all early to bed and responsible and iron discipline and safety? Like you?

Hollywood Boulevard is still sketchy, between its higher-dollar outposts. You keep an eye out as you stroll on, stumbling over the cracks in the Walk of Fame. Your phone plays one of the last songs you wrote here. You think "this sounds better than I remember".

After dinner you found the CEO and told him that even though you hadn't worked closely together, you appreciated his efforts and thanked him. Surprisingly, he stood up, looked right into your eyes, and gave you a real, non-show-biz hug. Looking back at him, you had a brief flash that he, too, was evaluating his life here in L.A. as he considered his second act.

You pass the banks and the bars and closed clothing shops and loop around. Not really looking for anything, just enjoying being here for the moment. It's quiet and as beautiful as Sunset and Hollywood get between the day's heat and the relentless pummeling of the night's music. There were reasons you stayed here for as long as you did. And reasons you left.

No regrets. If anything, the opposite. But still.

You stand amidst the tangled, looping paths that make up the city's grid and consider how they took you where you wanted to go if you could figure them out, or got you lost, or left you fuming in traffic. Or brought you home. All those streets and vectors don't just outline the city, you think. Those roads, those choices, those outcomes, they are the city.

Thank you, Los Angeles, and good night.

The Sound of Silence

I have not been writing much here, as a glance at the past posts widget will tell you.

Since exiting the digital music business, I haven't felt a need to write much about it. From my perspective, not much has changed, and there's no new insights to be proffered. Some big artists withhold their new albums. Some do windowed releases. Some add or re-add their catalog. Services go out of business. Every service is still struggling, except for the ones part of big giant public companies, who are happy to fund them as part of deeper and longer strategies.

My current employer is not fond of employees commenting publicly at all, even when they are acting as private citizens or not in official capacity. As a result, I have not (and likely will not) blogged about virtual reality, augmented reality, or any other related technology.

Bigger picture, the current state of politics, debate, and discussion is so debased, I feel that it is all but impossible to have any real conversation around issues of substance. Facebook is filled with garbage of various flavors. People on the right are not going to change their minds. People on the left tell me they are exhausted and don't need to hear from people like me. I don't need to contribute to the outrage culture.

I have used my writing as an outlet for my creativity, but other projects have been consuming that as well.

I hope to get back to writing, at least for my own self.

Left and Right Fists

Torture

I find myself arguing points that any mature, educated adult should not have to argue.

I have to tell Trump supporters that torture is immoral, illegal, and ineffective . These points are indisputable (if anything, torture provides opportunities to recruit for "the bad guys). And they respond that they don't care about any of those things, and that they "believe in torture."

After that, it is difficult to accept anything else these people have to say. Particularly disturbing is these aren't all crazy-eyed John Birch Society gun-wavers. These are soccer moms. Students. People who should know better.

But when they advocate torture, I cannot see them as anything other than selfish, soulless, and hateful.

Their avatar, Mr. Trump, has said he is in favor of torture because "they probably deserve it".

This is a morally bankrupt position to take, and indefensible in every way. It is not something that any thinking or feeling person can debate. If our values include torture, we are in the wrong and our values are not worth saving.

Punching

The New Left has its own problems to wrestle with, or perhaps I should say "punch in the face".

The current fashion is to argue that we should be punching Nazis in the face at every opportunity. The justifications for this rely on a semantic shell game (as do some other New Left arguments), conflating those who espouse disgusting neo-Nazi views with actual Nazis invading Poland, building concentration camps, and engaging in a world-wide war; and engaging in the current practice of "just kidding/not kidding" intent-flipping.

At least in America, our laws and culture articulate that people are allowed to speak freely (with a few narrow limitations). And that this idea -- that our society tolerates speech that we might find offensive -- is something that makes us strong.

Without the freedom to express your ideas in words, written or spoken, society cannot evolve. For that most part, that evolution has been in a positive, more progressive direction. But not always, like anything. "Progress" is not always a straightforward endeavor.

Assaulting someone on the street while they are talking is wrong. Committing violence against someone for their ideas is anti-Democratic. It is contrary to our fundamental values as a nation.

There is no exception in free speech (legally or morally) for "when you disagree with them". That is part of the challenge with free speech -- you can't carve out the speech that you don't like, while insisting that everyone else has to accept yours.

As many have noted, freedom of speech does not mean freedom from consequences. Those consequences can include ostracization and wide dissemination of the fact that you said or did these things ("Hey, did you know Jane articulated neo-Nazi values?"). It can also mean that speech becomes part of the official record of the courts or government. Or that others can make recordings of same and put them up on YouTube or WorldstarHipHop or CNN.

In many cases, real-world offensive speech can result in physical violence. Walk into a bar, start calling people names, and you're likely to get punched in the face. Mouth off to a cop, see how that goes (sadly). Be nasty to a woman, get slapped.

However -- and this is critically important -- violence as the first response to speech is indicative of weakness and failure of reason for the listener more than it is the offensiveness of the speaker. For a long time, society considered those who responded to speech with violence to be lacking basic self-control or dignity, operating on a hair-trigger.

When we resort to violence as a first response to someone else's ideas, we effectively state that we have no argument, alternative or retort to the ideas being put forth. We say we are afraid of the ideas.

Put another way, I'm comfortable letting neo-Nazis talk, because I believe the neo-Nazi ideas are disgusting, powerless, and absurd -- and everyone exposed to those dumb ideas will see that. Perhaps a few wackos and losers will adopt them, but so what? There will always be some flavor of hateful and ridiculous ideology out there for people like that to embrace, and we will always counter and defeat it with better, stronger ideas.

And if we cannot trust in the robustness of our ideas and our rhetoric in the face of darkness, evil, or just some other competing ideology, it suggests a much more significant problem with our beliefs (or at the very least our way of "marketing" and delivering them) might be lurking.

The Westboro Baptist Church engaged in some of the most inflammatory and distasteful displays of free speech I can think of (short of people advocating for child molestation, and, yes, neo-Nazis). And yet society still felt physically assaulting them was largely inappropriate, or at least not celebrated to the degree our current moment has been advocating punching Nazis.

Perhaps the neo-Nazis are an appealing target at the moment, because, aside from being loathsome and taboo, they're embodied by the only allowable out-group for the left: white men. That particular demographic allows the left to say "anything goes", because everyone hates Nazis, right? You're with us or against us.

Ask yourself how you'd feel if the video was of someone punching a Muslim cleric (even one who was known to advocate Wahhabism, or had endorsed terrorist attacks). Or punching a woman who happened to be identified with the alt-right (for example, Kellyanne Conway). Or someone on whichever side of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict you disagree with. Or an abortion doctor. Or someone protesting abortion.

Making an exception for violence against certain speech and ideas is dangerous, because what happens next is what always happens in these situations: anyone who disagrees with the ruling dogma gets labeled a ____ (by definition! Because "we" are anti-____). Or a ____ sympathizer. Or just someone who looks like a ____. Then they're fair game. Here comes your beat-down.

Sticks and Words

Over the last decade, our ideas of speech have been deliberately made murky by various parties. The internet and its apps are speech. Money is speech. Marches are speech. What isn't "speech"?

There are even people advocating liberal or left-leaning values who are bringing reactionary thinking and Orwellian philosophy into the picture, They claim destroying property (by smashing it or burning it) is not violence (as long as it isn't yours). It, too, is speech.

And sucker-punching people isn't violence. It's "speech." If that is speech, what is violence?

In some people's views, speech is violence. To say the wrong things, or even say the right things using the wrong words, is violence. They say "words hurt" and that speech can "seem like an assault" or "feel threatening". Yet instead of responding in kind, with their own nasty speech, the proposed solution is the aforementioned physical violence.

So in some contexts and arguments, actual speech is "violence", and actual violence is "speech".

There is a huge difference between someone espousing hateful ideas and someone committing actual physical violence, as anyone who has experienced both will tell you. "Sticks and stones..."

We erode that distinction and clarity at our own peril.

The Quality of Speech

A minor diversion. The current societal moment also likes to chastise people for the words they use, absent original context and intent, amidst shifting definitions. As an example, the word "racist" now has different meanings depending on the people you're talking to, and the chasm in those meanings is being specifically exploited as part of the current political discourse.

It used to be that "educated" people wouldn't use what they referred to as the "f-word" in polite conversation, in art, and certainly not as part of public discourse. Now, the "f-word" is not only no problem, but failure or refusal to use it marks you as some kind of fuddy-duddy (or perhaps f-word duddy.) But if you use the "n-word" in any context (assuming you're not part of the group "allowed" to use it), you will be in big trouble.

There is something almost quaint about the idea that some words can still shock, and still have that kind of power. I say "almost" because more than quaint, I find it ridiculous and arbitrary, or perhaps more accurately an indication that words, language, and society continue to evolve and change. Maybe we shouldn't take it so seriously, or at least recognize that speech we deem "offensive" can be ignored, or says more about the speaker's deficiencies than our own.

Context and intent also matter, and perhaps matter more than the actual words. The words themselves have no meaning or power. It's how they are deployed. It's like if people started using the word "pickle" as a hateful term for people of color. You get upset about the intent and the context, not the word. No matter what words someone is actually using, if their intent is to hurt, they're in the wrong.

This works the other way, too. Certain people jumped all over Steve Martin for a tweet he shared after his friend Carrie Fisher died. Rather than accepting and understanding that he was grieving for a a friend and saying nice things about her, they chose to ignore the context and intent and focus on policing speech. Even if you believe Martin or his choice of language were sexist or representative of the patriarchy or whatever, is this really the best target to pick here? And the best time? It is clear to everyone (including the Speech Police) what Martin meant and was trying to do. Unfortunately some people saw a rich target for making an ideological point.

When people focus on which words you use, instead of what you said and meant with them, every speech or dialog becomes a list of good words to be ticked and bad words to be avoided. And when that happens, the speech you end up with when you do that is bland and empty, "positive" but unable to actually advocate anything for fear of upsetting people.

How and Why

How we do things and why we do them matters as much as, and perhaps more than, the actual results. Winning by cheating isn't really winning, is it? If we defeat our enemies by destroying our values and replacing them with their values, who is the victor and who is the vanquished? We win, but what have we lost?

When we adopt the tactics of the brutal because we are convinced we are right and justified, we give in to the trap of "might equals right". We give in to fear. We give in to our worst instincts. We play by their rules instead of ours. That is what happens when we start by punching people whose ideas we disagree with. We go to the dark side. Or Iraq.

Maintaining the moral high ground isn't just "nice". It is the thing that makes our cause just and gives us the right to exercise force if needed. It is literally what allows us to be better than and different from those we are fighting.

(And I suppose I have to clarify again that I am not talking about self-defense, or responding to individual physical aggression, though depending on where you live, local laws may or may not support you).

What is so ultimately disturbing about all of this for me is the Ourobouros these right and left actions forms. This is not some "both sides do it" argument, but rather an uncomfortable parallel.

Because when you're fighting Nazis or the out-group or ____ or whatever boogeyman you have, why stop at sucker punches on the street? Based on the logic and justifications you used to start punching, you cannot stop there. Ideological purity demands it.

After all, they're evil and we are righteous. What about guns? Assassinations? Blowing up their houses? Attacking their families? Torture?

They probably deserve it.

Grammys 2016: The Mall is Lame

Artists A and B.

I caught the last 5 minutes of the Grammys -- enough to see Adele win "Best Album" for her record "25" (beating out Beyonce's "Lemonade"), and enough to see Adele's all-white crew on stage.

As Adele fought back tears and gave props to Beyonce, I couldn't help thinking that part of why she was crying was the Internet was about to start laying into her for winning and for being #GrammysSoWhite.

The world is predictable, sometimes. Let's clarify a few things.

"25" was a massive record. How massive?

"In 2015, [Adele's] '25', which ended the year as the most popular release by a mile, sold more than the best-selling titles of 2013 and 2014 combined. 

...no album has sold at least 7.4 million copies in a calendar year since Usher’s "Confessions" just barely missed the 8 million mark back in 2004. It’s also worth noting that 25 was released in November, so it added up all those sales in less than two months. 

Adele’s latest blockbuster was responsible for 3% of all albums sold in 2015. That percentage is greater than any record released this millennium, and while it sounds like a small number, remember that this data counts all albums sold from any artist.  

In terms of actual physical CDs sold, 25 was still in the lead, and in fact, the album that spawned the gargantuan worldwide hit “Hello” was responsible for 4% of all CD sales."

The absolute numbers may not be in "Thriller" territory, but in terms of industry impact, that is an astounding achievement. And note that is just for 2015. This was the 2016 Grammys, which means she racked up even more sales and impact. And in the much-diminished music business of 2017, that means a lot.

Regarding Beyonce,

"Lemonade" is 2016’s third-biggest-selling album and one of only two albums released in 2016 to sell at least one million copies. Drake’s "Views", with 1.196 million sold, is the other. Adele’s "25" -- which was released in 2015 -- is 2016’s best-seller, with 1.334 million sold this year. (In total, "25" has sold 8.774 million.)

Beyonce made a record that made a big splash. She did an entire "video album" filled with provocative imagery which slotted nicely into the ideology of her fans, who felt it made a statement.

As of today, her album "Lemonade" can still only be streamed on TIDAL -- it is not available on Apple Music or Spotify, the two largest streaming services. This almost certainly contributed to the lower sales and lower recognition.

Perhaps more importantly, The GRAMMYS are lame. They always have been, and they probably always will be.

Complaining about the Grammys selections is like griping that the mall doesn't have any cool indie stores. Duh. It's the mall. That's not what they do. If you're looking for cool or cultural relevance or good taste, you are not going to find it there.

The list of great artists (of all colors) ignored by the Grammys is long. (I am sure artists of color have been treated worse than white artists.)

None of us should be looking to the Grammys for any kind of artistic validation. They are meaningless, and largely driven by industry insiders who are paying attention to things like how well the record was engineered or the marketing campaign or, yes, raw sales.

I see this as part of a trend in the culture. Today, people demand that institutions, power structure, and "the man" support or pay tribute to their ideology. This is a contrast or change from a few decades ago when people simply ignored the institutions and power structure and created their own DIY systems and structures for validation.

Put another way, we didn't go the mall, we started our own cool indie shops. But now, people demand the mall be cool.

I'm not sure which is more righteous, effective, or "correct". I do know that I listened to both albums by A & B, and I thought they were perfectly competent, enjoyable representations of what pop music sounded like in 2016. I did not buy either one, and I have no desire to hear either of them again.

The 2016 Election: tl; dr

Jonathan Pie covers some of the same ground of my previous piece in a powerful way. Worth six minutes of your time. Contains bad language:

The 2016 Election: How This Happened

"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing" 

-- Edmund Burke

I knew by 6:30 pm Pacific Time that Clinton was going to lose, and lose badly. Shocked, I watched my former classmate Jake Tapper on CNN until almost 11, then stayed up longer reading. I didn't sleep that night, tossing and turning while my brain kept wrestling with the same question everybody else is asking:

"How did this happen"?

The answer is disappointingly obvious:

Trump won because Clinton didn't get enough votes.

I mean that quite literally. Here's a chart:

It shows that the number of Republican voters has been basically constant for the last 3 presidential elections (Obama 1, Obama 2, Trump). But look at the Democratic voters! That is an incredible drop-off, and it happened during this "most important election of our time".

(Yes, there are some "bad" things about this chart, like it doesn't start at zero. It's also not adjusted for population growth. Doesn't matter or affect the assertion.)

Here are some more stats from Wikipedia (all numbers are thousands):

	Florida			Pennsylvania			Michigan			Wisconsin
	Dem	Rep	Est. Pop	Dem	Rep	Est. Pop	Dem	Rep	Est. Pop	Dem	Rep	Est. Pop
2008	4,282	4,046		3,275	2,655		2,872	2,048		1,627	1,262
2012	4,237	4,163	19,360	2,980	2,680	12,770	2,564	2,115	9,885	1,614	1,408	5,725
2016	4,485	4,605	20,280	2,845	2,912	12,815	2,267	2,279	9,655	1,382	1,409	5,783
Difference	248	442	920	-135	232	45	-297	164	-230	-232	1	58

In these 4 "battleground states", the Republican voter turnout was slightly higher, but in all cases, the Democrat voter turnout was lower, and in most cases, substantially lower than the previous election, even when adjusted for population changes.

The Clinton campaign failed to get people -- Democrats, "her" people --  to turn up and vote. That's why she lost.

The Republicans didn't turn out in massive numbers. They pulled more or less the same voter count they pulled for the last 2 elections, both of which they lost handily. They had the same pull, played the same game. The Democrats just didn't show up.

Why didn't people turn up to vote for Hillary Clinton? I think these factors were primary drivers:

1. The Candidate
2. The Campaign
3. The Culture

The Candidate

Clinton and the Enthusiasm Gap. She was extremely unpopular on the right.

But Clinton was also unpopular on the left, with people resenting her for beating Bernie Sanders, unhappy with her previous stance on gay marriage, support for war, Wall Street ties, and more.

"Another Democrat". At best, Clinton came across like the worst of the late 20th-century Democrats like Dukakis or Kerry: boring, stiff, ineffective.

At worst -- thanks to decades of Republican smears and her own bad judgment (and history of same) -- Clinton seemed possibly corrupt and definitely embodying the Washington establishment, with a track record of saying whatever she thought was most politically expedient. The anti-Trump, in every way.

Overconfidence. Plenty of people including Hillary Clinton (and polls) thought she had it in the bag, and "besides, my vote doesn't matter". This is in stark contrast to Obama's two campaigns, who were hell-bent on getting out the vote and treating it like the urgent mission it was.

Plain old laziness. 8 years of Obama's presidency made people forget what happens when you lose the White House. The GOP and the Trump campaign, on the other hand, were on a crusade.

I do believe current social media culture amplified the above effects substantially.

The Campaign

Clinton ran a weak, uninspiring campaign without a clear message or takeaway. I'm not just talking about the literally passive slogan "Stronger Together" (no verb!), but the meta-message, which was...what? "I'm a woman?" "I'm not Trump?" "More of the same?" There was nothing for people to grab onto.

Or worse, what people could grab onto was disappointing: "More of the same". For those who voted for Trump, that message was interpreted as "We still don't care about you. We still don't understand you. We still don't want to try. We're keeping the system we have. And we still think you're deplorable." Which is not how you add people to your flock. Intentionally or not, Trump was able to scoop up people by saying "I will fight for you."

But none of that should have mattered for Democrats or most people, because even if you didn't find Clinton "inspiring", even if your response to her was tepid, she at least was not the candidate saying "I'm going to register all Muslims. I'm going to jail the opposition. I'm going to silence the press." and so on. By staying at home and not voting, Trump was handed the election.

Clinton and her team had (supposedly) decades of experience at this and were supposed to be experts, especially compared with the Trump campaign's n00b crew, which came up with this logo:

...and still, despite running against the objectively worst candidate in 30 years, Clinton and her team were unable to get people into the voting booth.

Don't beat yourself up for not donating. Hillary Clinton had plenty of money (like Romney), more than Trump. Trump spent half of what Clinton did per electoral vote. Her campaign was well-funded, and was supposed to be well-staffed and well-organized.

The Invisible VP. Without knowing much about Tim Kaine, I can say Clinton's campaign basically make him appear as so much wallpaper, saying nothing and having no personality. Contrast with Joe Biden or Sarah Palin. Kaine was a choice that basically said "Nothing to see here. Show's over there, folks". He added nothing. As someone else noted, Clinton could have made some really bold choices, like picking another woman as a running mate, or picking someone really far left (to lock in the liberals) or even more center (to pull in more on the right). Instead, she went with "invisible".

How bad was the campaign?

Well, for one thing, Barack Obama and the Democrats led the bail-out of the US auto industry in the heart of all those red states. The Democrats saved thousands of jobs, entire cities, and arguably the entire US economy. How come those voters weren't constantly reminded of that? Does anyone believe Mr. "You're Fired" would have saved them?

For another, the GOP and their economic and political policies are directly responsible for literally poisoning the well in Flint, Michigan, and guess who Flint and Michigan voted for? (Hint: Not Hillary Clinton. Go look at that first chart again. Nearly 300,000 fewer Democratic voters in this election than the last one). That is astounding.

Mitt Romney:
Actual billionaire who made money by firing people.

I remain irritated with the left for their inability to address these kinds of issues. How does the left -- the party of unions, universal healthcare, and taxing the rich -- get painted as the "out of touch elite", while the party who cuts taxes on the rich, slashes benefits, and whose last 2 candidates were actual billionaires who made their money firing people (Romney and Trump) get painted as the party of the "working man"? Gross incompetence.

Globalization was supposed to produce dividends, some of which were to be used to help displaced workers. We all dropped the ball on that, and we're paying the price.

I think Trump voters said "well, the Democrats haven't helped us, and Trump is a big "f___ you" to the GOP and the Democrats too, so I'm voting for him." I think that dissatisfaction with the current political system and the economy drove a lot of those Trump voters.

The Culture

I do not think sexism and racism in America are the primary reasons Trump won. Yes, of course those things exist, and were probably factors for a fringe minority, but that minority of people voted, and voted Republican in the last 2 elections.

Again, the numbers do not show any kind of Republican "surge". Trump got fewer votes than Mitt Romney did. You could argue for every neo-Nazi that voted for Trump, there was a center-right "reasonable" Republican who stayed home. Democrats would have still won if they'd just shown up.

More importantly, for those who keep wringing their hands about the sexism, racism, etc, look at this race and gender data about who voted and how:

52% of white women voted for Trump.
33% of Latino men voted for Trump.
13% of black men voted for Trump.

They likely voted for Trump despite the bad things he said, because they felt he spoke to them somehow. However bothered they were (or weren't) by Trump's words and deeds, those surprising numbers still preferred Trump to Clinton. Let that sink in for a moment.

You have to be extremely cynical and/or condescending to attribute that to "stupidity" or "they were fooled" or "they hate themselves". Or you have to believe that hatred is extremely quick to grow (and deep), because...

This is more or less the same country that elected Barack Obama twice, by large margins (again, see the first chart up top).

I don't think the country has, on balance, become more sexist/racist/whatever despite Trump's campaign. I do think Trump's awful behavior did let the John Birchers, KKK sympathizers, and other lunatic fringe feel like they didn't have to hide anymore, especially when coupled with the awful media.

But people with those beliefs didn't massively boost the GOP voting base. GOP turnout was basically the same. Democrats didn't vote.

Put another way, this wasn't a "victory for sexism and racism", this was "those who oppose sexism and racism decided it wasn't worth voting for in this election."

But let's dig into that for a moment.

First, there are people decrying Trump voters thusly: "How can you vote for a candidate who says such awful sexist and racist things? Who does such awful things? Voting for him is an endorsement of all that awful stuff."

The response from those who voted is "Well, he doesn't really mean it, he's just doing that to get elected." Or they say "well, he's the guy my party picked, so I'm voting for him". Or "I'm voting for him despite all that because I think he's ultimately better for other, more important reasons" (like "he represents change"...Does "change" sound familiar?).

And then I'd remind you that, during the campaign, Democrats frequently noted that Hillary had said things she didn't mean (anymore, such as her position on gay marriage). She'd supported things Democrats didn't like, including a more hawkish position on war and drone strikes, and being too cozy with Wall Street and big business.

And they were still voting for her -- and thus endorsing all of that -- because, well, she didn't mean it, or she was just doing that to get elected, or that she was the person the party picked, or that you were voting for her despite all that because... See?

The left's position of "if you don't agree with what we say and how we require you to say it, you are a racist, sexist, misogynist bigot" is not particularly welcoming, helpful, or constructive. I believe reaction to that attitude is part of Trump's appeal and his win.

Some of you reading this are applying that attitude to all of the people listed above who voted for Trump.

It's not so much that people are all those bad things (sexist, racist, misogynistic, bigoted) -- though of course, that behavior does exist and there are some truly awful people -- it's that nobody likes being scolded in that way, to that degree. Especially not for what they perceive as ordinary behavior, like expressing their opinion and speaking their mind, or at least previously tolerated, behavior like cracking jokes.

It instantly alienates allies and makes the opposition even more hostile. It's also toxic to debate, thought, and the other things that the left is supposed to embody and support.

I have watched many of my friends make fun of Trump's (and other GOPers') gender, appearance, and name, and it is painfully easy to see how completely indistinguishable it is from the right doing the same. Except when the right does these things, it's unacceptable, and when the left does it, it's "just a joke" or justified in some other way.

The left's insensitivity and lack of self-awareness towards how they treat those that disagree with them (while demanding sensitivity from same) is staggering, and it is a real problem.

The left has focused on making sure people respect "identity" and "feelings". But "uneducated white men" (and really, anyone who disagrees with the left on anything) have feelings and identity, too, and in a truly equal world, that also deserves to be respected and understood, not denigrated.

I believe some Trump voters felt this instinctively: "How come I have to respect them, but they don't have to respect me?" "How come it's always 'white guys are the worst' and I can't say something about someone who treated me bad or that I don't like?"

Yes, Trump and the right played on the sexism and racism of their supporters and America at large. The numbers show it didn't really do much for them. Trump got fewer votes than Mitt Romney did.

Conversely, Clinton and the left arguably said "you are sexist and racist if you don't agree with us". And it appears to have driven away some of those who previously supported them. Clinton got fewer voters to turn up for her than Obama did in the last 2 elections.

The left has some reckoning to do here, both with that hypocrisy and the one-downmanship that leads to arguments about who is the worst off/most victimized and therefore most righteous...and that anyone else's complaints, thoughts, or opinions aren't valid. A good example of how destructive and uncomfortable this gets was the Black Lives Matter vs. Bernie Sanders conflict.

Because Left, if you don't win, you don't get to do anything, and you risk losing all your progress. You need to do what it takes to win. That means being accommodating and welcoming. It means compromising, and not just on policy issues. It means real tolerance, not just of those who agree with everything you say and how you want them to say it. Increasing dogmatism and rigidity of thought and ideology makes you more like the Rick Santorum wing of the GOP, but with different rules, and I don't think that's who you are or what you want.

What Else?

I think these remaining factors played a role in Clinton's voter failure, but were less significant than people are believing:

Voter Suppression. The GOP's gerrymandering and voter suppression enabled by the shameful repeal of the Voting Rights Act ultimately decreased minority votes by 10-25% in some states. Those are significant numbers, but a strong get-out-the-vote strategy in those areas could have overcome that AND made Clinton look like a hero. And in the big picture, getting out the vote overall would have overwhelmed the suppression in a few states.

It's not like we didn't know about the gerrymandering or voter suppression in advance. That stuff was public and months out from the election. More should have been done.

3rd-Party Candidates. I don't think every person who voted for Johnson or Stein represented a lost vote for Clinton, but it sure didn't help. The race would have been closer without them in it, obviously, but the margin is likely insufficient to tip the scales.

I remain frustrated with anyone who "protest voted" or actually preferred either of those two objectively terrible candidates: "What is Aleppo?" and The Doctor Who Didn't Believe In Vaccines.

More importantly, the 3rd-party candidates and those who voted for them represent how uninspiring Clinton was for the masses, and how the Democrats just did not have their act together.  You didn't -- and don't -- see this kind of fracturing or erosion on the GOP side, and when it happens (Tea Party), the upstarts are immediately co-opted (assuming they weren't astro-turf to begin with) to make that party "stronger together".

I'll write it again: The Democrats just didn't show up to vote...and some that did voted 3rd-party (but not enough to make a difference).

The echo chamber of social media kept people from really understanding perspectives outside of their own bubble. This same thing clobbered Mitt Romney in the last election.

I see lots of parallels between the Obama/Romney election and the Clinton/Trump election: The confidence of the wealthy establishment candidate against the "upstart" fighting for the people. Romney was blindsided on election night, too. And he also made a dumb comment about the opposition's constituents in the run-up to the election.

The media and their general abdication of responsibility for "telling the truth" and "educating people" in favor of clickbait and panic-generation. This is also our fault, for demanding all our news be free (as in beer), entertaining, and unchallenging. We killed all our newspapers, felt that MSNBC was a fine "Fox for the left", and that having a "Fox for the left" is actually a good idea (it's not).

Of course, the real "newspaper" is Facebook now, and it's full of lies and distortions and completely unaccountable for any of it. And yet, it's how we're all getting our news.

In Closing

"I can't believe Trump won! How did this happen?"

Too many Democratic voters in too many states didn't even bother to vote. At all.

For all Trump's awfulness and all Clinton's greatness, that's how unmotivated they were. Perhaps now the consequences are starting to become evident, the mid-term elections will be different, and perhaps even the next presidential election. I am increasingly skeptical, however.

So, a message to anyone who didn't show up to vote:

All y'all had to do was show up and vote...and most of you are smart enough to figure out how to vote by mail, so you didn't even have to get off the couch. 

And you didn't. You know who you are.

Now, in the aftermath, what do you do? You can march in the street or wear a safety pin or change your Facebook icon. You can volunteer and give money. You can tell yourself you're doing something.

You can blame her. Blame "them". Blame the media. Blame Facebook. Blame Russia.

Doesn't matter. You didn't even vote. You didn't exercise the one right that our nation was founded on, that we've fought wars over, that people have died for. 

You not only lost, you didn't even try. You did nothing.

Leonard Cohen (1934 - 2016)

Leonard Cohen has died at the age of 82.

Mr. Cohen was the real deal. A brilliant songwriter who fused simple, memorable, hymn-like melodies to lyrics filled with poetic imagery and a wry and dark sense of humor welded to an inescapable sadness.

You are probably familiar with at least some of his work, including:

"Suzanne"
"Bird On A Wire"
"So Long, Marianne"
...and of course "Hallelujah"

Those are the "big hits" from the early days, covered and performed by many an artist, though often missing the subtleties of his wit and delivery. This early work was on a personal scale, and captured something essential about relationships and life.

I loved you in the morning, our kisses deep and warm
Your hair upon the pillow like a sleepy golden storm
Yes, many loved before us, I know that we are not new
In city and in forest, they smiled like me and you
But now it's come to distances and both of us must try
Your eyes are soft with sorrow
Hey, that's no way to say goodbye

Like David Bowie, Prince, and Tomita (who have all died this year as well), Cohen was a massive influence on me, and remains a favorite. In my opinion, he was a far greater talent than Bob Dylan (to whom he was compared).

Cohen's public persona wasn't flashy. It was serious, mature, understated. More Frank Sinatra than Elvis Presley. He wasn't "showy", he didn't play to the cheap seats. He got up there and did his thing, and didn't need to spit fire or blood or smash guitars to make you feel something.

One of the first pieces of music I ever heard was his song "Suzanne", done by both Judy Collins (on her 1966 "In My Life" album) and Neil Diamond (on his 1971 "Stones" album), and both of which my father owned and played. I am also pretty sure my Dad played this on guitar and sang it to me.



I rediscovered Cohen in the late 80s as I filled in my musical education at college, his world-weariness and bleak wit a perfect fit for my sophomoric depression.

Originally a kind of folk-rocker, it was around this time Cohen experienced a kind of renaissance among the post-punks, and was covered on several different tribute albums in the late 80s/early 90s.

By then, Cohen had also traded in his acoustic guitar for (deliberately) semi-cheesy synths and drum machines. He was even dating Rebecca DeMornay, who produced his album "The Future".

I studied him more intensely in the 90s as I was learning to write songs, marveling at how he could make something so beautiful out of such simple pieces, and how deeply shaded and well-constructed his lyrics were.

His backing tracks seemed both deliberately minimal, something of a joke, and kind of sleazy, but arguably even better-suited for conveying his lyrics, both conveying the ridiculousness of the 80s machine and presciently anticipating our impending technological future.

By now Cohen was also old enough and experienced enough to be not just cool, but beyond cool. He posed on the cover of "I'm Your Man" with a half-eaten banana in his hand, looking like he just stepped out of a French New Wave film. Why a banana? Andy Warhol. Phallic joke. Maybe he was hungry. Who knows. But he pulled it off, and it was amazing.

Great songs from this era are numerous:
"I'm Your Man"
"Everybody Knows"
"The Future"

Cohen still wrote about personal stakes and relationships, but his work from this time began to get more political and focused on the world at large:

Everybody knows the dice are loaded
Everybody rolls with fingers crossed
Everybody knows  the war is over
Everybody knows the good guys lost
Everybody knows the fight is fixed
The poor stay poor
The rich get rich
That's how it goes
Everybody knows 

"I'm Your Man" is a great example of how he can inflect his lyrics just slightly and keep things a little off-kilter, hilarious, and sad. It's romantic and creepy and depressing:

If you want a lover
I'll do anything you ask me to
And if you want another kind of love
I'll wear a mask for you
If you want a partner, take my hand, or
If you want to strike me down in anger
Here I stand
I'm your man 

If you want a boxer
I will step into the ring for you
And if you want a doctor
I'll examine every inch of you
If you want a driver, climb inside
Or if you want to take me for a ride
You know you can
I'm your man 

Ah, the moon's too bright
The chain's too tight
The beast won't go to sleep
I've been running through these promises to you
That I made and I could not keep
But a man never got a woman back
Not by begging on his knees
Or I'd crawl to you baby and I'd fall at your feet
And I'd howl at your beauty like a dog in heat
And I'd claw at your heart, and I'd tear at your sheet
I'd say please  

I'm your man
And if you've got to sleep a moment on the road
I will steer for you
And if you want to work the street alone
I'll disappear for you
If you want a father for your child
Or only want to walk with me a while across the sand
I'm your man

...and if all of that weren't clever enough, as the song fades out, Cohen starts the lyrics over again from the top, suggesting that the narrator is making this pitch to a different woman passing by, having been rejected or ignored by the first. Brilliant. Perfect. Subtle. Cool.

Some of my best songs from this period were attempts to emulate his literate writing style.

In 2001 Cohen started a late period to his career, blending his previous ideas and achieving a kind of distilled version of himself. Every record had great, timely songs, such as "My Secret Life":

...I smile when I'm angry
I cheat and I lie
I do what I have to do
To get by
But I know what is wrong
And I know what is right
And I'd die for the truth
In my secret life
...
Looked through the paper
Makes you wanna cry
Nobody cares if the people
Live or die
And the dealer wants you thinking
That it's either black or white
Thank God it's not that simple
In my secret life 

I bite my lip
I buy what I'm told
From the latest hit
To the wisdom of old
But I'm always alone
And my heart is like ice
And it's crowded and cold
In my secret life

As perfect as those lyrics are, they're even better when Cohen sings (or perhaps, more accurately "sighs") them to his perfect little melody and groove:


Cohen's final record was just released. "You Want It Darker" is a fitting send-off. Cohen himself had said he was ready to go and on the title track, he sings "Hineni, Hineni, I'm ready, my lord". At 82, it's hard to say "too soon", but I miss him already.

It is difficult to imagine any modern pop singer demonstrating this level of artistry. They just don't make them like this anymore.

I like a lot of music most other people don't, but almost everyone can appreciate Leonard Cohen. If you've never heard him before, great starting points are his early collection "The Best of Leonard Cohen". For later stuff, his 2014 "Popular Problems" is just about perfect.

Thank you for the music, Leonard, and thank you for all you taught me. I am in your debt.

Reflection book available again

Due to an oversight on my part, the book (and PDF) designed to accompany "Reflection" was not available for purchase. This has been corrected, and it can now be ordered!

Reflection

By Anu

Obsessing over Ghosts: Pokémon Go and Twitter

Twitter has recently been in the news as people have been demanding "something" be done about harassment due to terrible things people have been tweeting about Leslie Jones. All of this is happening against the background of the sudden appearance of Pokémon Go.

Pokémon Go

Pokémon Go is an augmented reality mobile game. It launched a few weeks ago and had the desired effect: Nintendo's stock soared, and for a time made it more valuable than Sony.

The game is an astute combination of 90s nostalgia (if you're under 35, you probably really cared about Pokémon at some point), mobile phones, and the increasingly mainstream elements of virtual goods and virtual and augmented reality.

As might be expected from a highly-targeted mobile game, people are behaving badly. They're looking for imaginary creatures at inappropriate locations. They're not watching where they're going. They're doing obviously dumb things. And in our current world, not everyone can be wandering around in unusual locations without attracting attention. We haven't seen any violence associated with the game yet, but it's really just a matter of time. Much like distracted drivers, people are so intent on finding these electronic ghosts they're putting their actual lives (or at least dignity) at risk.

In the early 2000s, I did some product design work for a company that was going to sell virtual goods for avatars. It felt too early (and it was) but not long after that, young people quickly accepted the concept of virtual goods. And not long after that, somewhat predictably, people started committing crimes to get virtual goods. Some of these were 100% online scams, some were old tricks with some new twists, and a few were straight-up beatings until the user gave up their password. The Korean government had to ban trades of virtual goods for real money.

The surprising part is people are investing such effort into things exist only as ideas and bits on servers. None of it is real.

***

Twitter is [mostly] stupid

Lifting A Dreamer
(a.k.a. Twitter Fail Whale)
by Yiying Lu

Twitter is (mostly) stupid. This is not a particularly new thing to note -- others have said this before. I've said it before. But it bears repeating and dissecting.

There is nothing special about Twitter. It is a website. An email list. Instant messaging. Twitter creates no content of its own. It offers no unique functionality. Its product design is janky and impenetrable.

Even its much-tauted "community" is a mirage, or perhaps most accurately, many mirages. Who uses Twitter and for what has changed over time, both as the company pushes for larger audience and acceptance and the early adopters leave for more interesting and useful tools. 

The hashtag is a prime example of the cultural workarounds required to "use" Twitter. You know it's bad design, a racket, or both when there are entire consulting industries built on helping educate you on how to properly #DoItRight and not be a #Loser.

Worse is when normal writing is broken into a series of bite-sized chunks, posted sequentially. Reading them is akin to listening to someone give a speech after they've run a marathon, or while they're drinking half a glass of water after every sentence. It's tedious, breaks the flow of language, and is a kind of textual hand held up that says "don't interrupt, I'm not finished yet".

Twitter's 140 character limitations aren't some sort of artistic liberation. They force everyone to write in a pared-down way that strips language of nuance and style. It fosters a sophistication and pithiness on par with a bumper sticker. Then again, plenty of people think bumper stickers are funny and insightful.

When I read Twitter, I see an endless stream of "LOOK AT ME!" That's really all Twitter is: people wanting someone to pay attention to them, to acknowledge their clever quote or their clever repetition of someone else's quote.

Even my own tweets fall into this trap. I think it's a fundamental part of the form. You can't write, you can just scribble short notes.

I remain amazed that Twitter has, through sheer force of corporate will, become a place people care about. There are people (including some people I greatly respect) who take Twitter seriously, and post there regularly. There are people who feel Twitter has enabled strong cultural movements and helped revolutions. I find that scary and sad.

It's a corporate website, and not a particularly successful one. Twitter's feed of writing from the people you follow mixes in advertising, which has the effect of turning everything -- including those important messages from your cultural movement and revolution -- into grist for selling whatever stuff Twitter is monetizing. You might be fighting The Man, but if you're using Twitter, you're literally working for The Man.

***

Fear of Ghosts

I ain't afraid of no ghosts.

It is said Twitter has a harassment problem: it's easy to create anonymous accounts and send horrible things to people, or write horrible things about people that "everyone" can read.

These capabilities are actually a fundamental part of Twitter's design. The same things people are complaining about are part of why Twitter has grown into its current incarnation: It affords easy, quick, instantaneous communication across groups; and its limitations and social structure encourage people to be provocative and make big statements with the hope of getting followed, RT'ed, shared, noticed.

It should be no surprise that, like everywhere else on the Internet, anonymity + megaphone = terrible behavior.

Leslie Jones repeated some of the awful things people had written about her and identified the accounts that said these awful things, and then requested some action be taken. [Note: I think Leslie Jones is funny and talented; I have not seen the new "Ghostbusters" movie]

Harassment is not a new problem for Twitter. It's been an issue more or less since the platform launched. Why is the harassment of this one public figure (a comedic actor, no less, someone hardly unused to public abuse) such a big deal, and why now?

People have been writing awful things about other public figures on Twitter for a long time. People have been writing awful things about non-public figures, too. When you're a celebrity, part of the job is putting up with people being terrible and saying mean things. That doesn't make it hurt less (and in fact, for many celebrities, who have a deep need for affirmation, it can hurt more). However, it is indicative of Twitter's priorities and general maturity that they will take action to defend a famous person and not the ordinary people being harassed on a daily basis.

Twitter continues to have an arbitrary and weak policy regarding communications on its platform. One might argue that is OK. It's very dangerous for any communications technology to classify behavior or speech as "unacceptable". Everything is "unacceptable" to someone. You're not entitled to free speech in private venues, but Twitter is designed to feel like a public venue, and encourages people to think of it that way.

So you end up in a world where speech is curated and curtailed. "Please leave only positive feedback, or at least only say mean stuff about the people and things we don't like." With the "we" being whichever group is steering Twitter's culture at the moment. 

There's an evolution that happens quickly: groups who want to say offensive things begin speaking in code, and then the code is banned, too.

The step beyond that is getting banned from Twitter for things you said somewhere else...and then pre-emptively disallowed from joining (Should ISIS have a Twitter account? Monsanto? Fox News? Howard Stern? Rush Limbaugh? Noam Chomsky?). This sort of "bleed" and general enforcement of a corporate behavior and mindset is increasingly spreading. Say the wrong thing in the wrong place and you'll lose your job as well as your Twitter account.

I don't know how aggressively Twitter should police what its users are saying. It reminds me a little of a child's playground, where the kids keep running up to the teacher or parent and asking them to do something about the other kids being mean to them. Sometimes, that's just the way it is on the playground, and you either ignore the mean kids, fight back, or leave.

Appealing to The Man to fix it  feels strange and wrong. Worse, I think having that mindset and taking that kind of action is fundamentally disempowering -- it presupposes we cannot handle it ourselves, are not resilient, and must appeal to a "higher authority" -- and that higher authority is corporate. It is The Man. We've already lost, and lost more than the playground fight.

What seems like a better solution is what Twitter did: ban users who are being abusive. The sad thing here is the person they banned had been an abusive jerk for years. He was a legendary abusive jerk, and one whom Twitter had "verified' an account. So he was an official, verified, legendary abusive jerk. Until he made terrible racist comments about a black actress in a just-decent comedic remake of an old 80s movie. That was apparently over the line.

But everyone Twitter bans can create another account. Or have other people post their garbage. Or continue to write mean things on Tumblr or Facebook or Snapchat or Instagram or Reddit or whatever other internet service people use to communicate.

And of course, to hear the troll tell it, he was trying to prove a point, and Twitter took the bait.

Banning people for speaking their mind (as horrible as it is) means Twitter isn't a communications medium, it's just a community, and one that will enforce a mindset by exile. This is great news if you agree with how these bans happen. It's really bad news when governments, corporations, or other powerful public figures (Donald Trump? Hillary Clinton?) start demanding people get banned from Twitter for being unmutual.

It also raises questions about who gets to wield the banhammer and with what criteria. These questions have no good answers, particularly for private companies.

Finally, banning people doesn't solve the problem. Because the problem isn't the offensive speech. The problem is the people and the particular mindset that produced the speech in the first place. You can make them virtually shut up and kick them out of the clubhouse. They'll go start their own clubhouse and simmer, and the culture in each clubhouse becomes a little more insular (and stable). Banning literally and metaphorically ends the conversation, and there are only a few directions for conflict to go when words stop.

Perhaps a better solution is simply this: Remind yourself that Twitter isn't real. It doesn't exist. It's not a real place. And whatever is scrawled there does not matter one bit. That also means the praise you get on social media is as insignificant and unimportant as the hate. 

Instead of valuing, fearing, and chasing electronic ghosts, perhaps we should focus more on what's real.

***

Some of you will point out that I have at least one Twitter account. This isn't because I think it's good. In my career as a digital media expert, I am required be aware of and understand things of significance on the internet. Twitter can be fun, like Pokemon Go, but I don't play it much.

Isao Tomita (1932 - 2016)

Tomita

Isao Tomita was a remarkable musician. Inspired by Wendy Carlos' synthesized Bach success, Tomita took on more orchestral pieces with more elaborate arrangements and added his own aesthetic and attention to detail. His list of famous synthesized covers includes "Firebird", "The Planets", "Pictures at an Exhibition", and several of Debussy's pieces.

Today, "one-man bands" building entirely synthesized records in their own personal studios is commonplace, but back when this album came out, it was an incredible achievement. All the more so when you realize how primitive the equipment was, and how rich and detailed Tomita's sounds were. And of course, all of his synthesizers were monophonic, too.

His "Kosmos" was one of the first records I heard, and as the years have passed, I have come to realize it left a very deep impression on me.

"Kosmos" was released in 1978. I was 9 years old, and already a hyper-cerebral nerd.

I studied this massive gatefold record intensely. I noted the trompe l'oeil hinges on the spine of the gatefold. How the cover image was itself an image set onto the "steel" of the rest of the art.

The interior of the gatefold showed Tomita sitting in front of his massive Moog modular system, fading into a desert vista, showing you  how he saw sonic landscapes.

The record also featured fantastic liner notes, with Tomita explaining each of the pieces, why he had chosen them, and what they meant.

It also included a comprehensive and fantastic gear list. My mind was blown reading that this record had been made using things like the "Eventide Instant Phaser" and "Roland Dimention IV". Just reading the names of the equipment was exciting.

The record itself was fairly broad. Aside from the somewhat pandery/commercial "Star Wars" theme by John Williams, the album includes a wide range of composers: Bach (Ich Ruf;zu Dir, Herr Jesu Christ/BWV 639, used for "Solaris"), Wagner's "Ride of the Valkyries", Charles Ives' "The Unanswered Question", a bit of Grieg's "Peer Gynt", and Rodrigo's "Aranjuez" (which Miles Davis had also transformed).

I was initially attracted to it because of the novelty of synthesizer sounds, and because it had a version of the "Star Wars" theme on it. But the mystery and emotion in all the other pieces made an impact as well, and nearly all of the pieces on the record ended up being discussed in my "history of 20th century music" class at TIP.

The record sounds both dated and timeless, a strange take on a strange selection of pieces that somehow fit together nicely...though these days I always skip "Star Wars".

Whether great or cheesy, this record became a part of my musical identity in fundamental ways: The sonic exploration, the love of "weird", the melodicism, the space (in every sense of the word). It was an explicit reference when I was working on my first few Captain Kirk records.

Thank you for the music, Tomita-san.