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September 28, 2005
Los Angeles. Hell Yes.
Bob Massey
September 2005
[Ed note: What follows is the first in an ongoing series of dispatches from the heart of Tinsletown. Here’s a bio for Bob I found on a site for an opera he wrote and staged. Yes, I said opera... more on that another time. Bob splits his time between music-making and writing for Spin, The Washington Post, and others. His music steals shamelessly from the visceral impact of post-punk, the emotional palette of classical, and the sonic range of experimental music. Massey has toured and recorded with Jean Smith, Telegraph Melts, Tsunami, and his latest, the Gena Rowlands Band; and has composed scores for film, dance, and the web. [He used to] curate the Punk Not Rock composers’ salon in Washington, DC [before he up and left for L.A. to pursue some kind of movie-related writing career that will undoubtably crush his soul]. Bracketed edits come from RH with love.]
These observations will be somewhat scattered and random until I hit a groove. Right now I’m kinda in the weeds, workwise. Nonetheless…
No kidding, on my first full day in town some short, buff, generic guy walks by and a dinner companion stage-whispers, “Hey, wasn’t he on [insert sexy twenty-something dramedy I’ve never actually seen here – like Party of Five, maybe].” I thought that would take a week, at least.
To calibrate the import of this event, know that once in D.C. I freaked out because Michael Kinsley walked by.
On a day that Princess Di was in town.
(I’m sorry.)
L.A. Story redux, no. 1 – referencing the scene where Steve Martin strides purposefully out to his car, gets in, starts it up, drives forward one car length, stops at the house next door, turns it off, gets out, strides purposefully up to his neighbor’s door.
Trader Joe’s has two parking lots: one adjacent to the store, the other three doors down – maybe twenty yards apart. There is always a line of cars jockeying to get into the lot adjacent. The other lot is always half-full.
Related observation: damn, there’s a hella buncha donut shops in this town. I’m not even kidding. Every strip mall – and this town is nothing but strip malls, apparently – has one. It’s like the devil designed this town to torment bulemics.
I was going to my car (sans donuts) and I passed under a tree. Something scuttled higher into the branches but I couldn’t see what. It was that moment that I realized I hadn’t seen a single squirrel since my arrival in Los Angeles. I looked all around me. Nothing. On the east coast squirrels create a background hum of activity, sort of like your refrigerator. You don’t notice until it stops.
And yet those yappy little Paris Hilton dogs are everywhere. Coincidence?
(Evolution?)
Friday night a guy invited me to see a show at this industrial space inhabited by some Art Couple. It was a bunch of experimental noise performances curated by Sharon Cheslow, whose name is super familiar, and who I feel like I should know from her D.C. days, but apparently I don’t. She’s nice though. Anyway, the first guy was named Jeff something but he goes by Unimpregnable. He set up a table covered with effects pedals, knobs tweaked just so, plus a mic and an enormous PA. Back to the “crowd,” he punched some button, emitted an unholy shriek into the mic, and for twenty minutes pounded the everloving shit out of the table, which caused the gut-rending roar to modulate according to the violence done upon the table. It sounded like a space shuttle launch. It looked like So. Much. Fun.
Outside, a bunch of latino kids in fancy dress got into a street brawl. Ladies too. Fists, feet, manicured nails, beer bottles all made contact with human skulls. I really thought we should combine the two events but no one wanted to help move the PA.
Los Angeles. 2005. Hell yes.
Posted by Rock Heals at September 28, 2005 12:40 AM
