Up 8:30. Scanned book contract for grant application.
Out before 10. Posted tax return. Couldn’t do the last bit of grant submission b/c E77 wifi wouldn’t let me on.
Daybook poems. (They’re crap, by the way.) Read the rest of the Raincoats book (good, stirring, cool that she talked to some contemporaries like Green Gartside and Mayo Thompson, in add. to women musicians the rec. influenced, esp. Tobi Vail. There are some detectable tensions/contradictions that aren’t really explored). Oh, there was a related essay on punk-era feminist detournment in a Routledge collection at the library yesterday. I liked a phrase from a Slits review - “gothic nursery rhymes.”
Came home before noon, finally hit ‘send’ on the grant app.
Listened to Till Eugenspiel’s Merry Pranks (Strauss), w/ Bree when it came on the radio.
Listened to The Raincoats s/t. Profound record. “The Void.”
Correspondence, a couple of small tasks for Bree.
Went out again, 4-6 to have a bite, get my head together and write a bit. I can see the shape of the piece….
Keys went through a hole in my overcoat pocket into the lining; had to tear it more to reach them. I hope I can stop wearing it soon, but not much sing of Spring.
Bree on phone w/ my dad when I got back.
Called Kristin Thompson mainly to get some factual background on her positions at FMC and since.
Played piano while Bree was out - a little Bach and a little improv, no real focus. Took out trash.
Put on a LP of Schubert songs, “Alinde” and others - German pressing, so no translations of the lyrics. Pianist seemed a little heavy.
Read to p. 50 of Stuart Isacoff, Temperament (had started it earlier in the day), and started John Ash, The Anatolikon - the title poem is lovely. “And still I kept looking for something that was not there amid so much that was.” Or “Flute Music”: “The city had been removed like a slide from a projector.”
Lights out midnight. Had a jazz interview podcast on.
5.16.18
Up at 7:30. Watched Last Week Tonight.
Read this interview.
Read about 1/3 of Jenn Pelly’s 33 1/3 on The Raincoats on train.
Replied to editors of the pop music studies encyclopedia I’m revising the “bridge” entry for. Set a deadline of 5/8.
Therapy. Bought $1 CDs of The Chronic and a Brothers Johnson best-of at Housing Works. Lunch.
To Lincoln Ctr. Uploaded all elements of grant application except original book contract, which I have to look for at home. Took until about 4.
Took a break (dithered) for an hr. Ordered a recent Anthony Braxton solo CD, on Brad San Martin’s rec.
Spent an hour sending emails to people I want information from for the PopCon piece.
Looked for farm-raised salmon for Bree in Whole Foods, no luck.
More Raincoats on the way home.
Kept up in poetry daybook. Otherwise unproductive.
Lights out 2 am.
4.15.18
Up before 7. Watched SNL. Better than average - John Mulaney’s delivery/timing, while mannered, is effective. Jack White pretty bad.
Head to LIC/Communitiea around 9. Finished the Assayas on the train - strangely, there’s a lack of particularity to what he says about Debord’s films.
Worked 10 until nearly 4, doing a copyedit on all elements of grant application. When I read the chapters, they seem good!
Couldn’t find headphone adapter on train home. Read Moxley, finished it when I got home around 5. Most appreciated “The Chip” (earns its quietism), a Koch-ish cooking advice poem, and some holdovers from her more difficult style, e.g. “Flutter Out” and “These Houses,” which is effectively inadequate at getting at something difficult about (I think) the co-existence of all temporal moments. Comfortable-in-love poems to Steve, less comfortable ones about a poetic career.
Rested for an hr. Printed something for Bree. Made myself write a few pressing emails (also Facebook/twitter DMs, which is too many inputs).
Dinner out w/ Bree. Local Thai. Picked up bottled water on the way home. I hate the CVS.
Went out again 10-11, daybook poem + looked at “Viable.”
Read last 40 or so p. of Latouche bio, on the Legend of Baby Doe and JL’s death.
Lights out 12.
4.14.18
Up for a while, maybe 4:30-6. Up for good 8:30.
E77 - read a chapter of Latouche, all but the last section of Assayas, and another quarter or so of Moxley. Caught up in daybook - 1 poem rhymed (aabccb). Nice out.
A long and largely indolent afternoon - a failed day. Too much YouTube and social media - hardly a unique problem, but it’s the clearest sign of my malaise.
Spent an hr+ [the length of that Feldman string quartet] trying to get some perspective by typing up a list of all my current incomplete projects and the order in which the big ones need to be tackled. For the curious, these include:
- final submission of grant materials (hard deadline 5/2, want to get it off my desk within the next few days)
- my talk on Salem 66/Tsunami/Your Band Sucks for PopCon (4/26)
- revision of the “Bridge” entry for a reference work (I think they want a draft 5/1, I may negotiate a week)
- returning to the rest of the book (which is my major writing objective for the rest of the year, grant or no)
[on the music front, with no real deadlines except my own wish to move forward]
- add the recent Shrimper cassette to bandcamp, as first step in transferring my “commerce” there
- finish everything that has to be done on the new HH album before mixing; mainly, guest vocals and horn/string parts
- schedule time at Mitch’s, sometime this year, to mix
I also need to return to songwriting — to finishing songs — for my own self-respect and sanity. All of this interacts with the question of when and how long I will be spending tending to my parents in CA over the next few month.
The full list is much longer, and incomplete.
Listened to side 3 of that Blue Note compilation, finally, made some eggs and pasta for dinner.
Went out around 8:30, copyedited Handy ch. until 10.
Came home, dragged out guitar, fooled with “Viable” for 45 min. or so. Holes in the lyric, decisions about changes — as it is now, the bridge goes to a slower 3/4 that will be easier to get into than out of. More trouble than it’s worth, but it’s what I do.
Listened to a podcast about Syria, but I still don’t grasp enough of the background history (which starts during the Ottoman Empire) to grasp the present. (This is not the podcast’s fault.)
Lights out 11:30.
4.13.18
Up 7:30. Nothing of note.
Left at 10. Put a Feldman string quartet on for background, read most of Latouche quota. Elmslie figures frequently by this point.
Coffee/breakfast near library.
Lincoln Center - got there around 11:30.
Worked from 1 to 5:30, with a break for lunch and a trip to the Julliard bookstore across the street.
Didn’t feel like I accomplished much.
Met Jordan Davis in line outside Mercury Lounge to see Caitlyn Smith (and opener Andrea Davidson). Anthropology, for me - she’s a Nashville writer making a bid to be the artist in her own right, and I was curious about what kind of show and backing band you put together for that. Answer: slick.
Had a slice, talked about Jordan’s book.
Read Latouche on train home, back around 11.
Read the Assayas, wasn’t in the mood for poetry.
Lights out 12:30.