Back in 1942, BBC Radio broadcast the first episode of “Desert Island Discs,” a weekly program that asked guests to choose eight pieces of music* (back then it was records), one book, and one luxury item they’d take with them if they were stranded on a desert island. It’s been going ever since.

Now, if I were ever one of those guests, at least one of my picks would be a Grateful Dead album, in part because you get rock, folk, R&B, blues, psychedelia, jazz, bluegrass, country, and even 20th-century avant-garde in the space of about 10 minutes. The Dead’s music encapsulates—better than any other band I’m aware of—the American experience. And if one person can be said to personify the Dead, it would have to be Jerome John “Jerry” Garcia, whose 72nd birthday is today.

I’d try to explain why he has such a hold on my musical imagination, but John Perry Barlow does a much better job of it in Rolling Stone issue no. 717, published shortly after Garcia’s death in 1995. Barlow, who with Dead rhythm guitarist Bob Weir wrote a sizable chunk of the Dead’s song catalogue, sums it up perfectly:

“Jerry was one of those manifestations of the energy of his times, one of those people who ends up making history books. He wrapped up in himself a whole set of qualities that were very appropriate to a certain cultural vector in the latter part of the 20th century: freedom from judgment, playfulness of intellect, complete improvisation, anti-authoritarianism, self-indulgence and aesthetic development. I mean, he was truly extraordinary. And he never really saw it himself. He could only see its effect on other people, which baffled and dismayed him. It made me sad to see that. There was nothing that Garcia liked better than something that was really diverting and interesting and lively—you know, anything that he would refer to as a ‘fat trip,’ which was his term for that sort of thing. And he wasn’t really able to appreciate himself, which was a pity because, believe me, Jerry was the fattest trip of all.”

By the way, if you happen to be in the Bay Area this weekend, you might want to head over to San Francisco’s McLaren Park for the 12th annual Jerry Day festivities.

*Feel free to leave a comment with your eight Desert Island Discs. Then I can judge you.

posted by: Aaron Bragg  |  category: random thoughts  |  comments(9)

Want to read “the story of what it means to live in a cultural climate that stifles almost every creative impulse, and why it so often seems we should stop trying”? Me neither, especially since it’s just a compilation of tweets.

But looked at it another way—like, say, as an opportunity to poke fun at the “delusion, narcissism, procrastination, boredom, self-congratulation, confusion” that mark today’s aspiring novelists (and, let’s be honest, pretty much all writers ), well…Working on My Novel could be a lot of fun.

Here’s a taste: At 11:44 p.m. on September 23, 2012, Stephen Mangol tweeted, “I’m working on my novel again, and it feels good, you guys. I love my mind.” Almost, writes Dan Piepenbring over at the Paris Review‘s blog, “as if he’s just done fifty reps with it and is admiring it all engorged with blood.”

posted by: Aaron Bragg  |  category: the writing life  |  make a comment

Do you think that the Weird Al video I shared last week is funny? Kevin Gallagher, who refers to “garden-variety internet pedants” and “Strunk & White fundamentalists” in his article claiming that—get this—Weird Al is the humorless one, doesn’t like it one bit.

And if you do think it’s funny, well…you’re probably a racist. Lauren Squires reveals the sinister “linguistic discrimination” behind Mr. Yankovic’s parody:

…a little rumination on Weird Al’s violent reactions against “bad grammar” raises deep and longstanding questions of social equity regarding class, education, race, age, ethnicity, gender, and how these relate to languages, dialects, and social registers. There is ample research on these issues (which any sociolinguist could point you to), but the upshot is that the notion of “Proper English” typically serves to prop up the already-privileged speakers whose native language variety it is (sort of) based on. This puts speakers whose native language variety does not approximate “Proper English” at an immediate disadvantage in society, the same way that privileging Whiteness puts those who are not White at an immediate disadvantage in society. It is not the linguistic differences themselves that do this (just as it is not the racial/ethnic difference themselves that determine privilege), but the *attitudes* about them. This is why many linguists are having a hard time laughing with Word Crimes: to do so feels like complicity in an ongoing project of linguistic discrimination that intersects with class, race, and other kinds of discrimination.

You have to read the whole thing, if only to see for yourself what passes for higher education in this country.

For those who are ready to admit that they need help, there’s hope. And for Kevin, Lauren, and all the other dour descriptivists whose self-regard trumps everything else, Sergeant Hulka has a message:

posted by: Aaron Bragg  |  category: the writing life  |  comments(1)

Ever wonder what an “algorithmically-generated, readability-adjusted scatter-plot of the musical genre-space, based on data tracked and analyzed for 1251 genres” would look like? And wish it contained sound samples? Wonder no more.

posted by: Aaron Bragg  |  category: random thoughts  |  make a comment

posted by: CK Anderson  |  category: staff the design life  |  make a comment

One of American music’s singular voices has been silenced: I just got an email announcing the death this morning of the great bassist and composer Charlie Haden. One of my favorite albums of all time—in any genre—is the one he made with Pat Metheny in 1997 called Beyond the Missouri Sky. Here’s “Waltz for Ruth” from that album.

“I learned at a very young age that music teaches you about life,” Haden wrote in his acceptance speech when he was inducted into the National Endowment for the Arts 2012 class of Jazz Masters. “When you’re in the midst of improvisation, there is no yesterday and no tomorrow—there is just the moment that you are in. In that beautiful moment, you experience your true insignificance to the rest of the universe. It is then, and only then, that you can experience your true significance.”

posted by: Aaron Bragg  |  category: random thoughts  |  make a comment

This is one of those ideas you wish you’d come up with yourself—simple and seemingly obvious, yet brilliantly creative. I hate these guys.

posted by: Aaron Bragg  |  category: the design life  |  make a comment

Thanks to everyone that attended the helveticka open house this past Friday! We enjoyed a wonderful turn out with clients, collaborators, friends, and family. The music was fantastic, the food excellent, and the beverages endless. The outdoor tents proved to be invaluable. And I hear the new helveticka space isn’t so bad, either. In case you missed it, just give me a call to arrange a personal tour.

photo by Photo Ramsey

posted by: CK Anderson  |  category: on location  |  make a comment