Music – Page 2 – THE QUALITY OF MERCY

2022-04-122022-04-27 by David Hughes

I’m Dreaming of a White Bicycle

While searching for half-remembered short films on the theme of public restrooms last month (see In the Can), I ran across a parody of “God Rest You Merry, Gentlemen” posted last fall as a commentary on the trans* bathroom con-troversy.

The performer, Christopher Trautman, explains:

This song was recorded in North Carolina. The only State in the United States that passed a law specifically directing that the restroom you use must be based on the junk you possess. It was later repealed after a national embarrassment campaign [led] by Comedy Central where they opened a food truck called Bone Brothers Barbecue in downtown Raleigh and discriminated against everybody who they determined to be gay… which was everybody.

That barbecue pi—er—bit, which aired on The Daily Show in 2016, was by Roy Wood Jr., assisted by Jordan Klepper. It’s hilarious and is, mm…, cued up below.

2022-03-222022-03-29 by David Hughes

In the Can

Public toilet, Yoyogi Fukamachi Small Park, Tokyo

My introduction to the public restroom would have been in kindergarten, 1960–61. There were issues.

2021-12-302021-12-30 by David Hughes

What’s This Feeling?

Portrait of E. M. Forster by Paul Cadmus

Now we shan’t never be parted.
It’s finished.

— Alec Scudder, from the film

Rob Berg and I released a thirty-year-old song by our band Bachelors Anonymous last week on the the occasion of the Winter Solstice; it also happened to be the birthday of Michael Tilson Thomas, whose work we knew as guest conductor of the Los Angeles Philharmonic in the early 1980s.

“What’s This Feeling?” asks a question that Rob posed to himself, and his affecting account is in the latest post from our BachelorBlog.

2021-08-302021-09-09 by David Hughes

Idol not Idle

Billy Idol has a new music video. And four dates in Vegas.

At the Chelsea. In October.

I remember first hearing Idol’s band Generation X on Rodney Bingenheimer’s show on KROQ. I thought the song was titled “Wild Dove.” Rather, it was the dub side to their second single, “Wild Youth.” It sounded so mysterious, this up-paced power-pop tune pulled apart.

2021-08-062024-03-26 by David Hughes

Friendship Band

Last time, I said I planned to toot the horn of a new songwriter (relatively speaking), but I will toot my own—and that of my wife Andrea Carney—along the way.

2021-07-292021-07-29 by David Hughes

Bachelors In the Land of Nod

Before I start tooting the horn of current songwriters—and shortly I will profile the thoughtful Dan Wriggins of Friendship—let me toot my own. Over the last six months my musical partner Rob Berg and I have released eighteen songs, ten of which never were issued before (unless you received a few as a homemade Christmas gift in 1987).

2021-05-312022-07-28 by David Hughes

Portrait of Rudy Perez 5: Anatomy of a Performance 2

This fifth in a series of portraits of Rudy Perez is akin to the third: an anatomy of a performance. For background on the dancer-choreographer Ruth St. Denis and her consort Ted Shawn, see Egyptian Deities and Jacob’s Pillow from Portrait of Rudy Perez 4. Continue reading “Portrait of Rudy Perez 5: Anatomy of a Performance 2”

2021-01-252022-09-08 by David Hughes

The Old Normal

I was annoyed Tuesday when the Biden-Harris tribute to the 400,000 fallen included that old, mm…, warhorse “Amazing Grace.” I muttered to my wife Andrea Carney, “Well, as long as they don’t trot out ‘Hallelujah’…,” which of course they did. “Amazing Grace” showed up time and again during the inaugural spectacle. Continue reading “The Old Normal”

2021-01-152024-01-25 by David Hughes

Portrait of Rudy Perez 4: Lingering in Spaces

I do what I do because
that’s what I do, and if
I didn’t do it who would?

— Rudy Perez

In talking with Rudy Perez about his career’s performances over the last nine months (see Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3), I noticed how many took place in art spaces. Of course, by the time I met Rudy in 1980, performances—dance and otherwise—were often hosted by galleries—large and small, for-profit and non. What follows are reminiscences of such productions during the years before I left Los Angeles for Denver in 2005, including bits from our conversations earlier this month. Continue reading “Portrait of Rudy Perez 4: Lingering in Spaces”

2020-11-152022-01-20 by David Hughes

Bachelors Anonymous

Most of our readers will know why I haven’t posted here for two months. In preparing for Portrait of Rudy Perez 2: Remain in Light in June, my musical partner Rob Berg and I dusted off music we hadn’t visited in decades. Continue reading “Bachelors Anonymous”

Now we shan’t never be parted. It’s finished.

I do what I do because that’s what I do, and if I didn’t do it who would?

Now we shan’t never be parted.
It’s finished.

I do what I do because
that’s what I do, and if
I didn’t do it who would?