Super Bowl Pool Chart

I won this year. Now I can buy that condo. What’s great is that not only do I not have to watch football—I don’t hate football, I just have little interest in it—I don’t even have to understand the chart. I just pluck down the money and pick a square, when the squares are filled, numbers are drawn and assigned. Seeing the names in the filled in squares is more fun than the game, except for this year. I won. I had the right numbers. The funniest part is being informed by the ringleaders of this betting pool that I had winning numbers. Quite frankly, I barely understand the chart. Trust pays off. Of course, I bought a rare lottery ticket on Monday, just in case of a streak. Even though I don’t follow Football, I feel that all Professional Sports owe me payback for being a Mets Fan.

No Plastic Bags Please

They’ve been working on Hamilton Park since last April and they’ve only now gotten around to bagging up the leaves? That’s just a wise-ass comment on my part, expressing my frustration from the ongoing closure of the park. City fathers made the decision, plans approved, selected a contractor and it’s not like I have any expertise to criticize. The bags through the fence make a nifty image. Paper bags as big as the plastic leaf bags, big as anything Glad or Hefty or America’s Choice—formerly Pathmark—manufactures in 39 gallon plastic. Our fair city deems it necessary to print important yet still polite messages on the bags – No Plastic Bags Please ... Thank You For Your Cooperation In Helping to Make Jersey City A Better Environment For All Residents. Perhaps we could all take a lesson in consideration from the Jersey City Incinerator Authority. Isn’t that what separates us from animals and plant life—we’re not just biodegradable but have the capacity for politeness. With gladness I accept the JICA thanks for my cooperation. I believe it to be sincere.

Trains Magazine: 100 Greatest Train Movies

When I found out that Trains magazine had a special issue the 100 Greatest Train Movies, I went to Barnes & Noble to pick it up.

I love trains and I love lists. I like to see trains, I like to think about them, I like to sing along to songs about them. But I’m a piker compared to the readers and editors of this magazine. Their devotion is deep into detail. Sadly, I fall short of that obsession. But I admire it.

Lists are great. I consider High Fidelity the best British Novel of the last 20 years. The movie is okay, but the lists are sort of de-emphasized on the big screen. But even that fictional list doesn’t go as far as some great list magazines—like the Guitarist’s 100 greatest guitar players or the Rolling Stone greatest rock albums—actually, they’ve done a few around this theme, all worthwhile. Lists make you revaluate what you like, reconsider stuff you don’t like as much. Lists challenge your opinion and you should never take your opinion for granted. Lists also tend to be great examples of economy of language. By their very nature, lists require few words. For magazines of course, you just can’t list a name—you have to sum up the subject and show why you feel the entry is list worthy and why you have given the entry the specific rank on the list. It’s actually a lot of points to make and because of the format, you only have a sentence or two. Lists in magazines show off why editing can be essential to writing.

Although well-written and well-edited, the train list thankfully isn’t as economical language wise as other list pubs. It is not a section of a regular edition, it’s an entire magazine devoted to trains on film and many of the films are foreign and/or silent, thus unfamiliar to the casual reader. Damn, some are unfamiliar to all but the most obsessive film archivist. So, instead of a coupe of sentences, there are a few paragraphs for each entry. This issue is one of the best written magazines I’ve ever seen.


Instead of their usual rail road journalists appearing in the regular issues of Trains, the writer here is a Film journalist & film scholar, John Farr, who really nicely encapsulates each one of these films. Illustrations are stills from these classic films. I’ve scanned a few here. They look so damn cool. The magazine’s editorial staff add pop up factoids filled with train-oriented trivia. Farr writes about the importance of the films he selects, in terms of film history, popular culture as well as the expected movie criteria—screenwriting, directing, cinematography, etc. The pop ups are filled with train geek trivia that fascinates: “Grant and Saint’s Pullman Sleeper, Imperial State, was an actual car in the Century’s equipment pool. Pullman standard built nine cars in the Imperial Series in 1938-39...”

That piece of Pullman history is relevant for the #2 Greatest Railroad Movie, North by Northwest. Train movies are broadly defined here and include any movie apparently where a train has a major scene, not just movies about Trains, like The Taking of Pelham One, Two Three—the original--#19. Yes, Subways are trains.

I was first surprised to see La Bete Humaine at #5, but at least it ranked above The General—#8. I have nothing against Buster Keaton, and I first saw this film in a High School film class. I have seen it since, and while the train footage is always entertaining, it is a dopey film and Keaton’s slapstick hasn’t aged well. It just isn’t that funny any more. The fact that it wasn’t listed #1—it would have been the obvious choice and it’s considered such a classic, who could dispute the ranking—is probably the best indication this list has uncommon intelligence and integrity.

Now, I happen to own on DVD, La Bete Humaine and it’s a masterpiece, one of Renoir’s best. Of course, it is based on the novel of the same name by Emile Zola. Zola is one of my favorite novelists (that’s another list) and this was one of his best novels—again, another list. And of course, since this is a literary masterpiece, the novel is far better than the film. The film though—which takes place in the early 20th century, instead of the mid-19th century France that Zola wrote about—details the experience of the train engineer, black and white of course and simply true cinematic beauty. A side note, Therese Raquin, a 1953 film, is #71 and is of course, also a Zola novel.

Number one? What is the Greatest Train Movie of all time? The Train, a 1964 film, directed by John Frankenheimer and starring Burt Lancaster. I had never heard of it and of course, I picked it up within a day or two of getting the magazine. I’ve always liked Frankheimer and I probably could even like a bad Train movie. The writing was so persuasive and convincing: “The action quotient is indeed high—witness the unforgettable scene of the rapidly advancing art train colliding into a derailed steam locomotive..”

Well, it was easy enough to find and Gosh darnit, Farr is spot on. I might rank La Bete Humaine above North by Northwest (I’ve always felt Hitchcock was over-rated), but The Train is not just, without question, the best train movie ever made, I would still rank it as one of the best action films I’ve ever seen. The Train makes me wish for a number higher than #1! World War II, occupied France, the allies are advancing and the Nazis are in retreat. A German officer, played superbly by Paul Scolfied—A Man For All Seasons—wants to ship by train all the great Art of France—Degas, Monet, Picasso, Renoir. Lancaster is a rail road man, works for the Nazi’s but in secret is part of the French Resistance and he sabotages the Art Train. It’s not easy. What an exciting film. Lancaster did all his own stunts and is fascinating to watch—really great physical acting—he eludes the Germans, engineers a steam locomotive, runs around the various train stations. In one scene, Lancaster has to escape from a Spitfire strafing the rail road tracks and takes the locomotive into a tunnel. Yes, a plane firing machine guns at a Steam Locomotive. Awe-friggin-some!

The aforementioned collision is spectacular—what’s better than a train crash. Anyone who has ever been around an electric model train set—I have—knows that sooner or later, you start crashing the dang things. This film blows big things up real good! Oh, the humanity! Derailments, explosions. To save the art, they fool the Germans by running the Art Train around Paris. They deceive the Nazi’s into thinking they’re heading towards Germany. Beautifully filmed, in black and white and even though it’s one of those WW II movies were it’s all in English, I believed every minute. I’ve watched it three times in a row and will probably watch it again tonight. Simply, a great film.

Some choices are questionable. Bad Day at Black Rock—#94 has a train in the beginning and the end, that’s it, does that make it a train movie? It is a great movie, Spencer Tracy is handicapped, comes by train to small town, and has to deal with a gang of racists that include Robert Ryan, Lee Marvin and Ernest Borgnine as he investigates the death of the man they murdered. A stranger in a strange land and when he leaves order has been restored. Why is it a train movie? The metaphor—trains carry strangers and some strangers change your life forever. Or is it that this small town has nothing else going for it besides being a stop on the railroad? But if that’s the criteria, why not Double Indemnity where the train is central to the murder that drives the plot, or why not Kevin Smith’s marvelous Dogma, where nearly the entire second act takes place on Amtrak. But see, that’s the purpose of lists. Lists proclaim—“let the argument begin!” That argument can be about what is excluded almost as much as it is about what is included.

While films specifically about trains—like The Train—seem to get special notice, Farr is inclined towards great films, like Bad Day at Black Rock, or film history. Box Car Bertha—#86—I scanned a still because it is so sexy and what a great title for a film. It’s the first movie by Martin Scorsese. John Cassavettes told him after he screened the film, “you’ve made a piece of shit, now go make a film.” Seriously, it’s unwatchable but dang, the still picture and the factoids—“The Great Mountains Railroad in North Carolina acquired the 2-8-0 in 1996; it has been out of service since 2004.”—makes me want to see the film again, even though I know it still sucks

At #70, one of the few documentaries listed, was The Festival Express, a pretty good concert film and some great footage of Jerry Garcia jamming on a train. There are several films I’ve wanted to see, such as Runaway Train #12, some I’ve sort of knew about and now want to see, like Brief Encounter #7, some I’ve seen but didn’t think of them as being list-worthy, like Santa Fe #85 (it stars Randolph Scott) and is a pretty lukewarm western, and of course, movies I just don’t care about, like Slum Dog Millionaire #36, even though “the railway scenes were shot at the Chatrapati Shivja Terminus... it was one of the sites of the November 2008 terrorist attacks in Mumbai.” Look, I know everybody likes this movie and maybe I’ll catch up with it, but a movie about a TV game show doesn’t interest me enough for me to make an effort.

Anyway, what a brilliant, well done magazine. In my opinion, the two greatest train movies—and I’m defining train movies as movies about trains and the men who run them—are based on a great French novel or takes place in World War II France. The Train is dedicated to the railroad workers of France! How come Hollywood or Independent Film Makers have not made an AMTRAK movie. The people who work for AMTRAK love their jobs. I love taking AMTRAK. How about a film about women who work for the rail road. That is a job with a lot of conflict and would make for a compelling character. AMTRAK deserves its The Train or La Bete Humaine!

vist: http://www.trains.com/

Post-Apocalypse Now

Not a scene from The Book of Eli or 2013, no, just real life in the neighborhood near you. It’s weird how the pay phones, disuse and disrepair, get removed but the exterior of the “booth” stick around. Yes, yes, cellphones are fine things now that everybody has one but let’s be honest, how often have you despised the invention of the mobile phone. At least, once? I know I have. I don’t exactly miss using phone booths, I just remember using them. Like in college, I’ll never forget calling Stephanie from this lonesome phone booth in the pine barrens—I saw her phone number and memorized it and I asked if she minded me calling her. She said, I’ve been thinking about you all the time, too. I was 20. I can still remember the night air, the chill, no one nearby, no one in the world except she on the other line and me in the booth, my pocket bulging with change, all the change I had. The pay phone world is gone—oh sure, there are still some that work, train and bus stations, but how many more are just this, a remnant of a city that was, another piece of wreckage we’ve learned to live with. Tell me Daddy again, of the before time, when a call cost a dime and being connected to a network was a choice, not a mandatory requirement.

The One & Nines: New Songs/Authentic Soul

The One & Nines are Jersey City’s best Soul band. Okay, maybe that’s not a very crowded category, and that category doesn’t get much more populated if you remove the J.C. qualifier. Best Indie Soul Band currently unsigned by a major labor? Whatever the case, I would argue both are true.

On their self-titled, first C.D.—a collection of seven songs that is being called an EP—they revive the classic soul music soul. I caught them at the last Groove on Grove of 09, a searing and raucous set of Soul, R&B and Rock & Roll. They are fun and they have excellent musical chops. They are not just a bunch of precocious young adults playing requests at a Bah Mitzvah—they play with feeling and exhibit a real, awe-inspiring sincerity about this music. According to Band Leader Jeff Marino, WGBO’s Soul Revue played one of their cuts a few weeks back. I can think of no better certificate of authentication, not to mention benediction for acceptance as the real deal.

The One and Nines on the EP are, in addition to Marino who plays guitar – Vera Sousa – Singer, Alex Tyshkov – Bass, Will Hansen - Piano, Organ, Fender Rhodes, Ken Walz –Drums, Barami Waspe –Tenor Sax, Matt Maley – Baritone Sax., RJ Avallone – Trumpet, Craig Redmond – Percussion, Jodi Mozeika – Cello on 'Just Your Fool'.

Marino says he’s "...been listening to Rhythm Revue for as long as I can remember and learned a great deal of what I know from that. I've been playing since I was 11 or 12 and wanting to play and studying this music in my own way for as long as I can remember, Vera has been singing as long as she can remember.......Vera and the bass player Alex have had a group together called Kiwi The Child for 8 or 9 years, they do sort of an eclectic roots reggae kind of thing. The One & Nines came together a little over two years ago when a few us learned some rhythm & blues songs for a 'soul' party and it was good so it stuck."

It’s still sticking, resulting in genuine sounding—according to me & WGBO!—soul music. It’s a marvel, they tap into a sound with honest appreciation and a refreshing musical confidence. On the first listen I would swear it was a reissue, not new material made by Gen Yers.

For Marino, the commitment went beyond just learning R&B chords, but recreating as close as possible the old school recording process used at Stax and Muscle Shoals—Analog: "The analog recording process should be important to any music. It is much more physical and you are much more connected to what you are doing, rewinding and playing the tape etc. It forces you to make decisions on the spot, there is a certain sense of improvisation that is forced by recording live and to tape. That's what a 'record' is, you are recording a moment."

Marino wrote all the songs, but a credit on the cover interested me—horn arrangements by the One & Nines. "In many ways yes the arrangements are an extension of the song writer but I stated 'arranged by the One and Nines' because the songs would not be what they are on this record if it weren't for the band. The way these were done is I basically came to the band with the songs at 8 percent, how they ended up on the record came from the process of us playing over and over for a couple months and trying different things here and there. That 15 percent makes all the difference."

What makes all the difference though between playing soul music and playing a cover of a soul song is group discovery. Musicians coming together, forming a cohesive unit where the sum is greater than the parts. Arrangements for Rock & Roll songs are simple, but simple is a misleading term and really is meant to explain that a smaller combination of instruments are used—not a 100 piece orchestra.

A songwriter brings in a song, sometimes a demo recording and the musicians find the song—sometimes, like the Grateful Dead—they’ll trot out songs to find them before laying down a studio track (sometimes the Dead would then forego the studio and just release the live version). I use the term find the song from the acrimonious though fascinating autobiography by Levon Helm, "This Wheel’s On Fire." The famous Feud between Robertson and Helm has to do with song writing royalties, most of which go to Robertson and Helm’s basic claim is that arrangements of those great Band songs was what made the songs—and he and his Canadian brethren worked through the arrangements and found the song. Copyright and other Legal issues aside, I’ve always loved the term found the song and I sometimes want to argue that the caliber of expressing the relationship between the finding and the arranging is what makes some of the songs of some bands GREAT.

Robertson has never denied that the arrangements of his songs were a group effort. You rarely see an arrangement credit for classic albums of the 50s or 60s (or now either), and I suspect that Booker T. & the MGs found those great arrangements by playing—unlike Motown, the Stax studio musicians toured extensively with the Otis, Rufus, Carla et al—and through studio rehearsals.

The point of my speculation is not the nature of arranging R&B, but the group effort involved. That 15 percent Marino refers to, Ladies & Gentlemen of the Jury, is another piece of evidence supporting my contention that a bona fide, genuine, fantastic R&B band has popped up in Hudson County, New Jersey. Right here, right now in the 21st Century.

"I Walked Alone" opens the C.D., a snaky, vertebrae grabbing groove of a hook—Soul Pop—sounds straight out of Stax, with a organ and guitar mash up crescendo, a flourish of horns and than one of the best endings I’ve ever heard. True to their dedication to the retro, this cut has a hand clap track embedded in the rhythm section and it works damn well, but this astute sonic choice gets subverted at the end. On the final note—the final hand clap if you will—the claps suddenly shatter into applause, a moment I find delightful and funny, gleefully anticipating it every listen. I get the feeling that they however seriously they take the music, they aren’t too serious that they overlook the fact that what makes Soul Music worth reviving is the FUN!

"Wait" is a ballad, with a James Brown horn blast opening. with Vera’s vocals pleading, "wait for me." Her voice reminds me of Grace Slick, she has tremendous range, robust and full then sweet and high. Her voice has an endearing clarity. She’s warm, emotional here but the voice has a confidence and self assurance that might have eluded some of the classic Divas of the genre, who sometimes, especially to contemporary ears, might sound something of a victim (or ultra-obvious non-vicitm, i.e., R-E-S-P-E-C-T). Vera has a voice for our age—empowered, honest, confident and smart—"Wait for Me, Don’t you go running out my door. I can’t keep chasin you no more." The song depicts how a simple moment can reveal the end of a love—one member of the couple is leaving the dwelling before the other, and with a total lack of self pity, Vera sings, "you’ve been telling me lies." It’s a slice of life tale, and when she sings, "Wait," something is dawning on her—is she asking to wait for her, or requesting he wait so she can say goodbye? "I can’t keep on chasing you, no more," Vera wails emotionally to baleful horns as the song fades out.

"Something On Your Mind" slyly opens with the vocal and simple guitar plucking, a tease into a ballad that explores the age-old dilemma about love—intimacy is not telepathy. "If my attitude has changed, I don’t feel anything new/you say I look like I’m always bored, but are you just speaking for yourself." The singer keeps adding, "I think something is on your mind, but not on mine." The One & Nines have plain spokeness aspect to the lyrics—they sound like conversations every body has. This song also features a classic soul horn riff, and has that ying/yang, teasing a soft prelude that evolves into a full-band burst of drama.

"Anything You Got" is the edgier song, the narrator is more desperate —"Sometimes I’m up all night thinking of what to do, then I dream of something else but nothing new." The group builds a blues-jam feel into the song—while the main hook is a searing guitar lick, the first break there’s just a funky bass with tom-tom drums. The next break the horn section wails full throttle. "I’ll stop what I’m doing just to be with you," she sings—Vera really gives a great vocal here, at times nearly channeling Janis Joplin. It’s an angrier song than the others. The lyrics are about those times in a relationship—well, some relationships—where you play the victim because love doesn’t leave you any other choice—that is, if you still want love. You’re in a position that you both do and don’t want to be in—willing to take whatever your loved one dishes out. A fitting lyrical setting for a blues jam—not that they jam out, the songs are terse and less than three minutes—but this one has that feel that it could be a jam and the musicians reveal the talent to sustain a longer burst of improvisation. The song ends with the final break of a wrenching, noir-ish saxophone. That sax has been listening to the guitar lick and the singer, responding in kind.

In addition to two versions of Just Your Fool—the only duet between Marino & Verga—Tears Fall ends this sampling of songs, a full-tilt, Stax boogie.

I suggest going to their Facebook and MySpace pages to find out where to buy the EP. Better yet, find out where they’re playing next and catch the gig. I love classic soul and Rhythm & Blues, but these cats are more than a tribute band—hell, if that’s what they were only about they wouldn’t bother with writing new material. Soul and R&B are integral to rock and roll—Elvis covered Ray Charles, Jerry Garcia covered Smokey Robinson, Springsteen covered Sam & Dave. Shoot, you don’t need me to tell you that—that’s why the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame exists.

But thankfully, the One & Nines have liberated Soul and Rhythm & Blues from the museums and reissues and oldies stations. They have made it new, again—without sacrificing authenticity. I love Soul because it’s about love—lust, heartbreak, doubt, trust & mistrust—but Love nonetheless. "It always seemed so incredible to me that there was a time in this world when stuff like this was on the Top 40," says Marino. "The main inspiration is just American music really. We are attempting to draw from the great songs whatever it was that made them great and keep it moving along. I am not interested in any kind of revival fad that's going around. I just want it to be good music, simple as that."
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Face or Space

Ginsberg’s N.J. Bus Ride

Ride 3 hour thru tunnels past all American Industry,
Bayone preparing for World War II, tanks, gas fields, soda
factories, diners, locomotive roundhouse fortress – into piney
woods New Jersey Indians – calm towns – long roads thru sandy tree fields –
Bridges by deerless creeks, old wampum loading the streambed – down there in a tomahawk or Pocahontas bone – and a million old ladies voting for Roosevelt in brown small houses, roads off the Madness highway –
perhaps a hawk in a tree, or a hermit looking for an owl-filled branch –
All the time arguing – afraid of strangers in the forward double seat, snoring regardless – what bus ride they snore on now?

From Kaddish (For Naomi Ginsberg 1894 – 1956) by Allen Ginsberg
Remember that Ginsberg was writing about a time when he was 12 years old, taking a bus from Paterson to the mental institution to visit his bipolar mom, Naomi.

St Francis

It’s on the north side of 31st Street, between 7th and 8th avenue, this statue of St. Francis of Assisi, you don’t have to enter the church, it’s outside, in an alcove. Hard to get an exact angle for a good camera shot, but we tried. Slightly larger than life, yet in a sort of cramped space. St. Francis was known for his love of nature and animals, which is why the beasts are depicted here—how many statues can boast their own pigeons? On his feast day in October, some churches host pet blessing services. He’s a fascinating historical figure, Francis of Assisi, a mystic, a stigmatist; after being disgusted by his experience as an army officer, he abandoned a life of privilege for a spiritual life of poverty, abstinence, meditation and preaching. According to his earliest biographer, during his life in the 13th century, he famously preached to non-human congregants: ‘Oh birds, my brothers and sisters, you have a great obligation to praise your Creator, who clothed you in feathers and gave you wings to fly with, provided you with pure air and cares for you without any worry on your part.” In Christian theology, as in Judaism and Islam, human beings are seen as exiles in nature, apart. But Francis, the patron saint of environmentalists, sees the human being as a steward of nature and as such, part of nature. It’s actually a big and old conflict between strains of Christianity and it’s not coincidence that Fundamentalist Christians are often the ones denying Global Warming and opposing Government Regulators like the EPA. Not many sculptors are inspired to make beautiful works of art about them are there?