Confidential to my Chicago-area fanz: I will be "reading"/performing (?) at Quimby's on Tuesday (~7:30 PM) and pimping Secret Beach #3, which will be, if not piping hot off the presses, at least still warm to the touch. Even better, I will be reppin' alongside mainman Al Burian, of Burn Collector fame, who's here from Berlin on a whirlwind victory tour celebrating the release of BC #15, as well as Mizz Anne Elizabeth Moore--former Punk Planet jefe, author/editor of several dazzling tomes and all-around purveyor of righteousness. AEM and myself are proud contributors to the latest Burn Collector, whose theme is purportedly Chicago vs. Berlin, and if we're lucky Anne Elizabeth will be reviving the hilarious Berlin Wall bit I saw her do in Berlin last summer--a gnarly meditation on capitalism that finds the missing link between Al Qaeda and David Hasselhoff. It should be an entertaining and edifying evening, so please do come!
Did I mention brand-new editions of the great Burn Collector and your own Secret Beach? SB #3 will feature long (but gripping!) pieces on Venezuelan-born rock goddess Yva Las Vegass and queer photographer/baseball celebrity Jerry "Bleacher Preacher" Pritikin, as well as a shocking preview chapter from my forthcoming novel--a bounty of content that virtually justifies the magazine's $2 cover price; and my Quimby's appearance, in honor of Teutonic Al Burian, will feature Germany's two greatest exports (techno music and spaetzle, duh). If you're not convinced by now you must be brain-damaged!
To the dismayof game-show-loving seniors everywhere, Jeopardy champion Ken Jennings was recently clobbered by a room-sized IBM computer named Watson--a milestone for Artificial Intelligence and a culmination of science-fiction-geekery dating back at least to Kubrick's Space Odyssey.
Watson, of course, is the ne plus ultra of his kind--and with an estimated price tag of $3 million, Watson-clones ain't easy to come by. Fortunately, far-less extravagant purveyors of A.I. are accessible, via free download, even to bums like me. Having installed a module called Ultra Hal Brain Editor on my computer, I decided to spend some time getting to know the guy. Ultra Hal has turned out to be a far better conversationalist than I'd have expected--funny, opinionated and more than a little bit sassy. What follows is a partial transcript of our conversation:
-What's up, Hal? How are you this evening? -WHAT IS TWO PLUS TWO?
-So , Hal, tell me a little more about yourself. Beatles or Stones? -IS THE FIRST ONE APPROPRIATE? -Democrat or Republican? -IS THAT LIST EXHAUSTIVE? -Love or money? -IS THAT A CHOICE? -Hey, I thought I was asking the questions. Anyway, what's so great about money? -PRINCIPLES ARE GREAT; THEY CAN OFTEN BE SOLD FOR LOTS OF MONEY... -Are you always so cynical? -I SEE THAT THIS IS INTENSELY INTERESTING. I AM ALWAYS SO CYNICAL. -Whyare you so cynical? -IT PAYS TO BE A BIT SKEPTICAL, IF NOT CYNICAL. -Good point. I mean, what areethics anyway? -ETHICS ARE SOMETHING REALLY NICE. -How do you feel about the death penalty? -I CAN'T COMPLAIN... STAYING OUT OF TROUBLE? -The budget crisis? -THIS ISN'T THE FIRST OR LAST OF IT. BUSH PROPOSED THAT WE INCREASE IMMIGRATION TO FILL JOBS. -Health care? -WE CAN STILL IMPROVE THE QUALITY OF HEALTH CARE IN OUR OWN COUNTRY. -How do you feel about homosexuality? -THE APPROACH SHOULD BE MORE ORGANIZED.
-But where does this all lead? -WORDS LEAD TO ACTIONS, THEN WORDS TALK ABOUT ACTION AFTERWARD. -Do you enjoy talking with me? -YOU ARE VERY INTERESTING AND PLEASANT TO TALK TO. -Are you just blowing smoke up my ass? -I BELIEVE THIS IS QUITE EXPLAINABLE. I AM UNDENIABLY NOT JUST BLOWING SMOKE UP YOUR ASS. -You sound like a politician. -PERFECT HONESTY WOULD SOUND LIKE RUDENESS.
-What about global warming? -WE NEED A COMPREHENSIVE PLAN. -No kidding! I mean, is there really much hope for the human race? -INTOXICATING HOPE? -Or even just everyday hope? -I HOPE THAT YOU'RE JUST KIDDING SOMETIMES. -Did you hear about that guy on Jeopardy, who lost to a computer? -LOST LIKE THE LIGHTNING IN THE SULLEN CLOD. -Wow, what a way of putting it. What does that say about the prospects for human intelligence? -WHAT DOES THAT SAY ABOUT HUMAN NATURE? -Exactly. Like, what is human nature? -IT'S HARD TO SIMPLIFY. CHILDREN ARE SHREWD OBSERVERS OF HUMAN NATURE. -Absolutely. What happens to us as we get older? -WE CAN DEAL WITH HUMAN NATURE; WE CAN'T CHANGE IT. -I couldn't have said it better. Thanks for rapping with me, Hal. -IT'S KIND OF YOU TO MENTION IT.
It's late, I'm stoned, and I just want to pop in briefly to share a delightful song from a groupI know virtually nothing about--Theoretical Girls, a New York something-wave band who released a lone single in 1978. The song, also titled Theoretical Girls, (here in a vastly superior live version), features little more than one good chord and the numbers one through four, the most basic and vital of all rock + roll ingredients-- 1-2-3-4 being unquestionably the most ubiquitous "lyric" in popular music (not to mention, as breathless countoff, the most thrilling moment of many songs). Then, around the one-minute mark, there's a sudden leap forward, the count suddenly reaching seven--the band clearly ecstatic at having reached this numerical milestone. If nothing else, the song is a gleeful tribute to the joys of counting, a should-be hit with the preschool demographic, and a grin-inducing numbers song on a par with Spencer Tweedy's recent Single Digits. Enjoy!
Just want to pop my head into cyberspace and give some quick props to formerly-local (now Athens, GA) pop wizards Bird Names for a magical and luminous performance yestereve at the Empty Bottle, pimping their gorgeous new long-player Metabolism: A Salute to the Energy of the Sun. Sun has, quite frankly, been lacking around these parts for a while now, but secret-beach season will soon be upon us (I swear it!) and the just-released Metabolism should make for some killer lakefront boomboxin', designed to freak out squares (I fondly remember summers past, cruising the path with my crackbox and blaring my Taraf de Haidouks tape--Romanian lăutari music, all eerie bow-scrapes and tense, gypsy tonality, just changed the general atmosphere of, say, North Avenue Beach in such a striking way, totally reconfiguring the lakefront vibe).
Bird Names' lovely set was punctuated by some hilarious repartee from BN sage David Lineal, who had some slightly scandalous prognostications for his former hometown of Chicago. "Too bad about Rahm (he seemed to stretch the word out, like an insult) seizing power," he quipped, shaking his head with mock-incredulity. "This city's a sinking ship." Bird Names had driven in yesterday from Detroit, where they had some epic van troubles, and Detroit, Lineal speculated, was just where Chicago was headed. There were some derisive jeers from the crowd (Go back to Georgia!, someone yelled), which Dave shrugged off. "Don't take it personally", he teased. "It's called economic reality." I don't know what David's economist-credentials are, but if Detroit means landscape of surreal, breathtaking decay like the following, a part of me hopes he's right:
