kevincasper.net

play me. because i love you. don’t forget it.

oh, i wish i was in austin
mmm, mmm
in the chili parlor bar
drinking mad dog margaritas
and not caring where you are

i woke up dead today and will live the rest of my uncertain days in sideways flash fashion.

i hope i flash to austin.

been resisting writing of austin at the risk of ranting unfairly – seething with disappointment and disdain, in all likelihood – against my adopted home town of baton rouge.

i remember applying to grad schools and missing the deadline for UT and thinking, ‘oh, well. i’m sick of trendy places to live, anyway. besides, all the californians have certainly ruined austin by now. i want to live in a real regular place for a spell and really get back to basics.’

done and done.

austin is clearly showing signs of california ruination, and old timers seem to lament this fact regularly. i heard at least three people say this phrase (with longing, almost word for word in each case): ‘i remember how austin used to be.’

and, ok, the town from slacker fame is clearly all overgrown up. yuppies have arrived, with their silicon valley economy, topping the hill country with tacky decadent spanish tile monstrosities, laying concrete and painted lines where god intended free loose gravel. you can see it. you can feel it.

however …

there’s still so much to love.

like austin vintage guitar.

(schmitty bought a 1957 fender princeton amp. all recording done from here on out just got infinitely cooler. oh yes. and black, baby champ, you 1964 cutie … i loved you. with your one knob and your big red light. you went to eleven. it was nothing personal. i’m just broke as a joke. we’ll meet again …)

and the continental club with dale watson’s clean as a broke dick dog honky tonk band on a … monday …

(guy played for three hours straight. no set breaks, no breaks between songs. one, two, three, four … )

and austin’s poet laureate james mcmurtry on a wednesday …

(christopher sine, you always have it right. no exception here. i’m sorry i never visited you when you lived here. you should move back.)

and trailer food courts …

with bacon and maple glazed doughnuts …

(and pork leg with brussel sprouts and capers and pork belly sliders and goat cheese and pear salad and fried chicken tacos and bring your own bottle of wine and …)

and scotty and jen beck and subaru sleeping liv con poquito perro …

and travis lake …

and late late late.

so good …

***

so i guess baton rouge is just my island. is it purgatory? perhaps. but i don’t believe in all that shit, so … i can’t think like that.

but it is real. and what happens there does have real consequences. i know that. and there are many mysteries. most will have answers. like will they ever finish the construction on perkins? or will dave ever modify the small bar to become the main music room at chelsea’s? or will i ever learn how to make a decent gumbo? or will couscous ever find a home?

but there are other mysteries as well. mythologies, if you will. the bigger questions. and they might not ever get resolved. and maybe i hope they don’t.

cause it really is just the journey. it’s a cliche, but that’s it. you don’t ever really get anywhere. everything’s in the flashes. some sideways. some head on. some from behind. some too late. some not even yet.

so i’ll lay down here. dark enough to die. in the same place i landed. and feel for more flashes. sideways, some. and try to believe. and try to keep the faith. and try to let go. and try to be a constant. for someone flashing, too.

oh, i wish i was in austin
mmm, mmm
in the chili parlor bar
drinking mad dog margaritas
and not caring where you are

Tags:   austin · dale watson · guy clark · james mcmurtry · smoke monsterNo Comments.

boy, that two hour recap last night sure sucked, didn’t it?

hopefully, that’s not an indicator of the quality of the finale.

for what it’s worth, i’m rooting for the smoke monster.

he’s kind of like milton’s satan.

he got the shaft from the get go.

he’s trapped.

he’s not a blind believer.

i like the smoke monster.

and besides.

jack’s a wiener.

and kate’s a dumb ass.

and hurley is the worst actor i have ever seen.

i hope the smoke monster wipes us all out.

but somehow, i doubt it’ll turn out that way.

the shit heads always win.

let that be a lesson to you all.

Tags:   smoke monsterNo Comments.

these are scotty’s girls. liv and roma.

scotty’s been telling me that roma (age: 3) …

listens to my fruit cd in the car all the time and loves it.

so he says, i figure.

so we get to their hotel and i’m dicking around with the guitar and roma requests joe davies and i play it.

if you ever listen to anything on this dumb site, you gotta listen to this. it’s probably the greatest, sweetest, most significant thing that’s ever happened to me. one of those, ‘well, at least that happened before i checked out,’ moments.

it takes her a verse to settle in and get the giggles out (she comes in BIG on the line ‘boss man’s store’).

she was so earnest singing that damn chorus … devastating.

too much for this fruit.

too much too much too much too much too much.

oh, and she also knew tiny speakers, sweet chicago, and chicken car.

strange magic.

Tags:   joe davies · roma2 Comments

i’m ripe for becoming a political vegan, i fear. this gorilla video made me cry.

pull it together, man.

anyway …

in other news, the gig with schimitt went well considering we couldn’t hear each other on the chelsea’s small bar pa. i really dig how the originals sound like this (a needed challenge for my stagnant guitar playing and harmonies) and am looking forward to writing some new tunes in that vein. did some townes and guy clarke and elo and mark olson/gary louris and buddy holly tunes as well. eric’s just easy to play with and rehearse with and record with. class act all around. and he’s brilliant.

neal started his reading an hour late so we were already getting tuned up when the set started. we hung out for a few hours after the set (drinking tequilla?) and then played for a while longer. i remember that going mostly well. but i’m probably way off.

here’s neal signing books:

his book was about a carnival that broke down in a louisiana town, so he had clowns and a stilt walker and weird shit hanging out at the party, like this bearded woman:

reminds me of that short lived bearded-woman coffee house on 14th street in san francisco. for a kid from a corn field, it was a curiosity, but they never accepted me there; those broads were mean. and ugly. and their coffee tasted like shit.

here’s my super bowl contingent. deighton still maintains that that victory was the greatest moment of his life:

the lady of the barge record is also (almost) finished. hope to master it later today and “release” it at chris’ party tonight. for what it is, it turned out great. i think i’m definitely taking a pass at manning the recording controls on the next one, however. i’m already spread too thin, and it was just too much. i’m happy with how it turned out, but the process was a bit unnecessarily intense at times, and the pay’s not good enough if it’s not, you know, mellow down easy. i just want to play guitar and let someone else deal with sounds and what not. i don’t know. i’ll see how the flatbed honeymoon album goes, i guess. that one will surely be more leisurely, though, and we’re being more deliberate already, so it’s kind of a different thing. it’ll take a while, too, and i’m not starting anything else until it’s pressed to vinyl. vinyl.

i’ll post the mastered LOTB mp3’s in the next few days. you’ll like them i think.

selections from the ’sanders goes to europe and beyond never to return’ photo shoot (this girl spends a lot of time looking at herself):

sanders, you’re the consummate california flake, but you own it so honestly it’s endearing. you’re quite an acquaintance! i’ll miss you … go to paleohora!

Tags:   gorillas! · lady of the barge4 Comments

talia shoot holding six … that’s six … puppies. i’ll be monitoring this situation in the event we need to contact the spca.

good luck to the hooches as they try to give up all but one of the puppies.

in other news, i’m playing a gig tonight with the great eric schmitt …

… at chelsea’s and am very excited. it’s been a blast learning the tunes, and they sound really good (assuming we don’t forget too many words). fifteen songs in less than a week is – how you say? – a bitch. but i’ve been wanting to have a project like this for a long time, so it’s been well worth it.

here’s young roy in front of a huge tent set up in his living room. living room camping. he says, ‘you wanna come see our tent? it’s huge!’ i say, ’sure, roy,’ thinking, ‘huge tent, huh, kid? they’re so cute … think everything’s huge.’ but, really, no shit. huge fucking tent.

finally made it to chicago al’s yesterday. al is a t.r.i.p. old school chicago blues man. i got a chicago dog and we started talking and then he hooked me up with an italian beef, dipped, that instantly reminded me of my grandmother and going to chicago as a kid. nice. i asked him what he sells more of, the hot dogs or the beef, and he says, ‘it’s all hot dogs. these people around here don’t fucking know shit.’ a conversation i had to pry myself away from after an hour.

oh, and thanks, sarah, for the tip on the hipstamatic. my iphone now takes pictures that don’t completely suck (and actually look interesting). best $2 i’ve spent in recent memory … well, almost the best.

Tags: No Comments.

finishing a mega fucking yowza paper on lenny bruce. delirious. just found this online. one of his bits. i’m giggle stupid right now:

I’ve figured out a way you’ll score every time:
“Look I’d like very much to go out with you but there can be no sex between us. You see I don’t do it. I’m celebate. But we will go out and have a good time, I just thought I’d tell you up front because the last dates I was on they got mad and said I had ruined it for them.”
And sure enough on the ride there:
“Why don’t you do it with anybody?”
“I don’t wanna talk about it.”
“Oh, come on, you can tell *ME*.”
“OK, it’s the way I’m built, you see I’m abnormally large.”
“Really.”
“Yes its a disgrace.”
“You mean you never do it?”
“Not since 19–”
“Gee what happened?”
“She’s in the hospital.”
“Don’t you ever go visit?”
“No her brother would kill me. I can’t even wear shorts in public.”
“Can I see it?”
“No”
“Why not?”
“It’s locked up.”
“Locked up?”
“Yeah locked up. My dad has one key the mayor has the other.”

Tags:   lenny bruceNo Comments.

hit the huntington, maybe watch the ponies run at santa anita, grab dinner at musha, wings and things at the rustic, morning hike in topanga, little porch picking and grilling over at darb’s, maybe a los duggans or eagle and talon show in the evening … don’t stop me. please, don’t stop me.

Huntington Library to offer the first look at its Charles Bukowski collection with ‘Poet on the Edge’ exhibit
April 28, 2010 | 12:57 pm

The Huntington Library in San Marino, known as the home of Gainsborough’s “The Blue Boy,” made news four years ago with its acquisition of something a lot bluer: a cache of papers, books and memorabilia belonging to Charles Bukowski, the L.A. author known for hard living and hard-edged writing.

This fall, the Huntington will offer the public its first look at material from its Bukowski collection, which was donated by his widow.

“Charles Bukowski: Poet on the Edge,” which will run Oct. 9 to Feb. 14, will feature more than 60 items from the Huntington’s holdings as well as about 15 other items lent for the show by Linda Lee Bukowski.

Among the exhibit’s highlights will be hand-corrected literary drafts, rare first editions and photographs that offer glimpses of the writer’s personal life. Also on display will be Bukowski’s manual typewriter and annotated racing forms that reveal his system for betting.

The bard of the down-and-out, Bukowski was fascinated with “life’s tough and seamier sides,” says the exhibit’s curator, Sue Hodson, the Huntington’s curator of literary manuscripts. “He wrote about blue-collar workers and about pimps, prostitutes, drunks, gamblers and layabouts. He talked about sex and bodily functions and used all those words our mothers don’t want us to use because he said this was part of life and he was just being honest.”

Bukowski, who died at 73 in 1994, deplored “the traditional poet’s fancy conventions,” says Hodson. “He thought there was no reason poetry should be out of reach for any reader.”

The Huntington received the collection in part because Linda Lee Bukowski, who lives in San Pedro, is a regular visitor to its gardens. (Her husband preferred to spend his time at nearby Santa Anita race track.)
Hodson says Linda Lee Bukowski, who married the poet in 1985, has avidly searched for examples of her spouse’s work. “She acquired a lot of things he never had or no longer had, including early pieces in little mimeographed poetry magazines that are almost impossible to find.”

The Huntington possesses more than 2,700 Bukowski items, including corrected typescripts of poems, correspondence and about 500 to 600 books as well as a draft of the 1982 novel, “Ham on Rye,” and a script for the 1987 autobiographical movie “Barfly.”

The collection has been open to researchers since last summer. “Southern California is Bukowski territory,” says Hodson, who notes there are major holdings of his works at UC Santa Barbara and USC.

Hodson hopes “Poet on the Edge” will attract new visitors to the Huntington, while giving regular patrons “something a little different.”

“Bukowski was such a raw writer and street poet and the Huntington has this staid image,” says Hodson. “Linda and I laugh about this quite a bit. Even if it’s not an intuitive match, we think it will work very well.”

Tags:   bukowski · huntington library2 Comments

glad to see things are carrying on normally back at csun (“Learn how to get banged better, cheaper, and more efficiently”). thanks for keeping me in the loop, white …

CSUN professor shuts guide to Thailand girl scene

University, teacher who ran website agree it tarnished school’s image
By Susan Abram

A Cal State Northridge associate professor who published an Internet guide to Thailand’s “girl scene” shut down his website Friday after he and campus administrators agreed it tarnished the university’s image.

Kenneth Ng, a tenured economics professor who created BigBabyKenny.com, said he concluded it was best to turn the site off amid criticism of his moral judgment and what he says was a mischaracterization of the contents.

“Unfortunately what happened with BigBabyKenny.com is the press got going and implicated me with human trafficking, pedophilia and prostitution,” he said in an interview.

The site offered a wide range of reviews and tourism advice about Thailand, but its main focus was on how to meet women in bars, including how to negotiate prices for sex. As Ng phrased it on the site: “Learn how to get banged better, cheaper, and more efficiently in the Thailand Girl Scene.”

University officials had taken the position that Ng was free to run the site as long as it involved his own time and resources.

But after a story on the site appeared in the Daily News last week, the university received dozens of e-mails from outraged students, staff and faculty, according to California State University, Northridge, Provost Harry Hellenbrand. Many criticized the university for not demanding Ng take the site down after administrators learned about it last year.

Also, nearly 200 people worldwide had signed a petition on Change.org, asking CSUN president Jolene Koester to “instruct Mr. Ng to take down his website, upon penalty of dismissal from his position. Doing so would be taking a stand for the protection of women and girls around the world.”

The university issued a statement Friday signed by Hellenbrand that thanked Ng for removing the site.

“Professor Ng said that he is taking down the site because of the deleterious effect it had on the university’s reputation, not because he considered the subject matter and content as unsuitable for public discourse, public discussion, or public debate,” Hellenbrand said. “I thank him for his reflection and removal of the site. I thank the University community for their comments.”

Hellenbrand also noted that the university had tried to balance an employee’s right to free speech against the “offensive” nature of the site.

“We are trying to balance two principles that, in this case, clashed. Our commitment to gender equity compels us to see the site as offensive; our commitment to expression urges us to tolerate words and pictures we find intolerant.”

Ng disputed the notion that BigBabyKenny.com was a “sex tourism site.”

It also included restaurant reviews as well as articles about riding motorcycles in Bangkok. He also discouraged men from soliciting underage prostitutes.

“Bigbabykenny.com was an accurate depiction of Thailand,” he said. “The site itself was always about a bigger picture of Thailand. The site is about what you’re looking for: wife, girlfriend, professional mistress, and if you were there, which bars and discos to go to. It was about how to get what you wanted, and also, how not to get scammed or cheated.”

While he acknowledged that Thailand carries a stigmatized image of sex tourism, Ng said in the years he has traveled there he never saw such activities.

“The whole time I was there, I never encountered any child prostitution,” he said. “I never saw women who were forced or chained to chairs to work in bars.”

Ng created the site a year ago after a post he wrote for a website run by owners of a Bangkok bar was censored.

The overseas bar owners then contacted CSUN administrators, hoping Ng would be pressured into taking down his site. Administrators acknowledged that Ng had assured them neither his name nor CSUN was mentioned on the site.

Kristyan Kouri, who teaches sociology and gender and women’s studies at CSUN, was among those who took issue with the site, and in particular with a posting called “A Primer on the Thailand Girl Scene.”

“This sexist article asserts that the desperate poverty and the rigid class biases that force so many young Thai into the field of prostitution can be used to a foreign man’s benefit, especially if he’s old and unattractive,” Kouri said.

“All the while, there are photos of young attractive Thai women inserted within the lines of the text. The website, which openly encourages the exploitation of poor Asian women, feels more like a sexist and distasteful porn site rather than the travel brochure he says it is.”

In a shared statement, Sheena Malhotra, chairwoman of Gender and Women’s Studies, and Sandra Stanley, chairwoman of Asian American Studies departments, said such issues as sex tourism as a human rights violation should continue to be discussed. Nearly 1 million women, children and men are victims of illegal human trafficking worldwide and used in the sex trade or in sweat shops.

“We heard that Professor Ng took down his website,” the professors said. “Many in the CSUN community were not only outraged by this site, but also provided thoughtful critiques of the underlying issues raised by this scandal.

“Professor Ng’s website was only a symptom of larger problems related to the exploitation and trafficking of women and children in the sex tourism trade.

Ng, 50, was hired as a temporary lecturer in 1986 and became a permanent professor two years later. He was granted tenure in 1992.

In 2001, a civil lawsuit was filed against him by a then 22-year-old Pasadena City College student, who said Ng mischaracterized her on a website by using photographs of her, then writing erotic fictional tales about her.

The case was later settled, but Ng said the case was an example of extortion against him.

Tags:   csunNo Comments.

the first sound i heard yesterday was thunder. it woke me up early, around 7, and sounded mean. when i had told schmitty the night before that i was going to jazz fest today, he chuckled a bit and shook his head … “you’re gonna get wet!”

he’s one of those people who checks the weather forecasts. i am not. therefore, i get caught walking across parking lots in deluges often in a t-shirt and jeans. there are things i could tighten up around here.

but, alas. i was storm sensitive, yet unafraid. one of the best memories of my life was a day i spent at six flags in st. louis as a kid in a complete downpour riding the jet scream and the screaming eagle over and over and over again (no lines!). and, you know, a little rain never hurt no one.

the second thing i remember hearing was the sound of squirrel falling out of a tree. lefty and i were walking when right behind us i heard a tree limb snap followed by some leaves rustling and then a sound like a ziplock bag full of jelly being thrown against a brick wall. i looked back and this squirrel was lying next to a branch on the street, twitching, looking pretty rough. my first though was, ‘i should help this squirrel,’ but then – very quickly – i came around to, ‘jesus, man, it’s an unconscious squirrel. you’re holding a dachshund on a leash in one hand and a bag of shit in the other. it’s the squirrel’s time.’ i felt bad, though, and thought it might be an omen of sorts. we walked a while longer, and when we doubled back, the squirrel was gone. must have just had his bell rung a little. i felt better. and come to think of it, squirrels must fall out of trees all the fucking time …

next it was robin and fred and benji and gary and sweet howard (‘i just want someone to wrap me up in a blanket and hold me like a baby … i like being crippled inside’) and no artie talking to my girl sarah silverman about the time when she ran up to a friend of hers and gave him a kiss on the mouth and then instantly became disoriented for a second before having a realization that made her ask him, ‘were you just eating pussy?’ and him responding – ‘with a look on his face like i was a magician and just guessed his card,’ – ‘oh, my god! you’re right! i was!’

next was archdiocese of new orleans mass gospel choir singing about wanting the spirit to fall down, right down, down on me.

the next sound was mud.

i ate pheasant, quail, and andouille gumbo (for neil) and drank a strawberry lemonade (for noel) and talked to a father and his twenty-something daughter from half moon bay, just south of s.f. i told them how much i used to love to stop in that town on my way to and from santa cruz, and we talked a little about the giants and their great pitching and and questionable hitting, and all the while this girl’s right breast – nipple, the whole nine – was fully exposed. completely out of her hippie chick kinda sun top thing, just – bam! – breast, right there. the whole damn time. lagniappe, they call it down here …

the first cry came during the treme brass band set. they destroyed a rag and then a slow blues dedicated to all the musicians that passed this year (clarinet solo damn near killed me), but what really got me was when they brought up the kids that they work with all year, the next generation of the treme brass band. early high school aged kids come up, dressed just like the band, and they rip into ‘bourbon street parade’ and the lead trumpet player takes the vocal lead (‘yes i will take you! i will parade you! down bourbon street!’) in this high, right on the cusp of puberty voice that just killed me. so fucking sincere. so transparent, too, the circle of musical life, taking place right before your eyes. i turned to this girl standing next to me and said, ‘this place is amazing!’ and she just smiled and kinda raised her eyebrows. back at jazz fest.

the creole wild west mardi gras indians …

i like to think that a great champion, a horse named tenacious is buried here, but i have no facts to prove it …

some well intentioned middle aged women in obama t-shirts were trying to herd these geese back through a chain link fence to a pond. i left just before it seemed like the elder geese were about to attack. remember the squirrel …

the most amazing sound i heard all day was terrence blanchard in the jazz tent. one of those moments when you really can see the levels of musicianship that can be found on our planet. piano (havanah, cuba), tenor sax (tucson ‘the epicenter of jazz music,’ arizona), upright bass (nigeria by way of london by way of nigeria. he now lives in new york), drums (houston, tx), and trumpet (nola). bebop vibe, but very free at times, extremely dynamic. violent. raging. they flew in spoken word clips by dr. cornell west. all post-katrina material. tight as hip could be. breathtaking fucking music.

i think if you choose to pound beer, this becomes your jazz fest experience … stick to lemonade. then buy two buds from a guy on the street after it’s all over and drink them while walking back to your car. and reflect. (the old guy in the foreground of this photo turns to me and says, ‘you gotta pick lines with guys. guys go faster. unless they have to poop.’ i say, ‘yeah, well how do you know if they have to poop?’ he says, ‘you ask.’

simon and garfunkle was something.

they came on stage behind a brass band and then ripped into hazy shade of winter (full band) and i am a rock. it was weird, i couldn’t hear art. when you heard him he sounded fine, but you couldn’t hear him. there was a little feedback at times and shit just seemed a little uptight for the first few songs. the sound wasn’t really happening. before ‘keep the customer satisfied,’ art says, ‘no, they don’t need to turn up my voice, the problem is i have no voice.’ he was sick or something.

bummer, right? simon and a fifth of garfunkle. they played a few more tunes and then art left the stage so paul can do a few solo tunes. the energy of the place went through the roof. diamonds on the soles of her shoes. boy in the bubble. that was your mother. the only living boy in new york. !!!

art comes back on stage. i gotta admit, i was kinda feeling like art was a bit of a boat anchor on the set at this point and wished paul would just keep playing by himself and chalk it up to, you know, one of those things (once during the solo set, paul even said, ‘yeah, probably no bridge over troubled water today’). but you really never know what you’re going to get. art walks up looking a little sad, and paul says into the mic, ‘you gonna make it?’ he then leans back and presumably says the same thing in art’s ear. he then gets back on the mic, laughing, and says, ‘i asked him, ‘are you gonna make it?’ and he says, ‘i don’t know!’ they then kick into my little town and bridge over troubled water.

this bridge over troubled water performance might have been the most punk rock thing i have ever seen in my life. yes, i said it, and i meant it. art is clearly running on fumes. the whole audience knows he is and they’re rooting for him. cheering him on. the tune starts. art takes a verse. again, he’s spot on pitch, there’s just a faint whisper of his voice. paul does a verse. they come back and sing a verse together. as they started the line, ‘i’m on your side, when times get rough (i’m tearing up again as i write this), i’ll take your part, when darkness is all around’ paul puts his hand on art’s shoulder, gives him a loving little rub, and holds it there through the whole verse. fucking brilliant. they get to the big finale, when paul steps away and art is just supposed to soar, and paul looks at him like, ‘well, here we go,’ and he steps back, and fucking art garfunkle just lays into it, goes for every note, even the ridiculous high one at the end, scratchy, soulful, right on key, with nothing but heart and fucking balls, and paul is peeking around at the band like, ‘are you hearing this?’ and the song ends and those two erupt like ten year old little kids. laughing and giggling and hugging each other and whispering to each other and everyone in the audience is crying and going fucking crazy and … i don’t know, man. it was just one of those things. sometimes, even music, you know? just a real vulnerable human moment framed by a gloriously beautiful song on a gloriously muddy day (it never rained, btw). i felt lucky to see it. they closed with cecilia, and bookended the set with a little brass band solo (lead by terrence blanchard) over the coda (‘jubilation, she loves me again!’)

back at jazz fest.

Tags:   jazz fest · simon & garfunkle · terrence blanchard · treme brass band · u2 Comments

puppies

piggies

arties (i saw this painting hanging on a wall in a deli in downtown oxford, mississippi. the last place in the world you’d expect to find an oil painting of artie lange. the proprietor told me he was looking for stern show artwork to decorate his business. i told him i loved him and asked for a job.)

starties

gods

demons

boys

girls

tractor

Tags: 2 Comments