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Egyptian People Need More Independence: Iranian MP
Mehdi Sanaei, a member of the National Security and Foreign Policy Commission of Majlis, says the Egyptian people need more independence to complete the revolution. According to the Iranian MP, Egyptians are suffering from an incomplete revolution, which has led to common problems in this country.
Islamic Republic of Iran and Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamanei have already condemned Egyptian army for ousting the former president Mohammad Mursi.
"As the Egyptian government has failed to establish a consistent revenue stream, the country is forced to accept financial aides from the other countries, especially the United States. According to media reports, U.S. government contributes almost one billion dollar every year to Egypt's economy." Mehdi Sanaei told reporters on Wednesday.
The Member of Parliament believes that Egypt is still following the policies set by the Western governments because of their financial aides.
"Currently, the people of Egypt are mainly suffering from such dependences. I recommend the next government of Egypt to form an experienced team of economists to rebuild the nation's economy from scratch. In my opinion, Egypt is capable of enjoying a flourishing economy." Mehdi Sanaei, Iranian MP, added.
At the time, different sectors play pivotal roles in Egypt's economy. Over the past few years, the energy sector of Egypt has suffered from a large number of problems.
Sanaei also declared the support of Iran for Egyptians. "Islamic Republic of Iran is always ready to offer its sincere helps and aides to the government of Egypt. We strongly believe that Iran as a Muslim state is responsible for helping Egypt, if necessary."
Egyptian army has recently warned Iran of intervening in domestic affairs of Egypt. The Iranian government has repeatedly asked the Egypt's army to cut its ties with Israel and the United States.
Under Mohammad Mursi, Iran and Egypt managed to establish initial ties almost after 30 years. However, the disagreements between Iran and Egypt over Syria's crisis didn't allow the two countries to expand their relations.


text: Do you want to know how to inspire a man to fall madly in love with you? Shelly will be launching an exclusive eCourse that teaches women how, and on this episode of The Truth About Love, she will be revealing some of the reasons men fall in love with women. Callers are welcome with questions: 1-866-472-5795.

subset: commoncrawl


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About TimeOctober 27, 2013 at 8:59 pm | Posted in Film Review | Leave a comment
Tags: Bill Nighy, Domhnall Gleeson, Film Review, Lydia Wilson, Rachel Adams, Richard Curtis, Time Travel
There is a familiar feel to this Richard Curtis film: the streets of London; kitchens, hallways, and bathroom from Notting Hill; and understated Brits. Somehow this film just picks up from many of Curtis' other films – its like putting on a pair of old slippers.
Warning: plot elements revealed.
At the start, Tim, played by Domhnall Gleeson, learns that the men in his family can travel in time. The rest is a light examination of love, morality, and life. There is an element of Groundhog Day, as Tim wins over the love-of-his-life – Mary, ably played by Rachel Adams. Bill Nighy does his usual understated best, as Tim's dad.
Tim's dad's secret is to live everyday twice: the first time is like a technical rehearsal, the second time minimises the bad and focuses on the good. It is no wonder the family lives in Cornwall and is always having long idilic teas on the beach.
The film doesn't have a villain – yet manages to deal with conflict and bad choices without one. Tim executes a major intervention in his sister's life (timeline) when she starts to spiral downwards: he makes sure Kit Kat, played by Lydia Wilson, never meets her not so good for her boyfriend. Tim also learns that when you change time, you change many things – some bad things go away, but some good things can too.
Thus when Tim's dad is diagnosed with cancer the two men do nothing: any time adjustment that is likely to save dad, will also erase the last 21+ years of family life. The film does a wonderful job of portraying the love and respect between a father and a son without either man having to wade through rivers of blood or enduring mass suffering.
In the end, it is about living your life, and enjoying the joyful moments – time travel is not necessary.
On the face of it, it is a film about time, but really its about life.
A lovely film; go see it.
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text:
Ich habe in Vollzeit bei Cancer Research Technology gearbeitet
Friendly staff and interesting science
Sometimes too much work is taken on leading to people being stretched and stressed.
Great team, good cause and good systems in place. Nice offices and great annual leave allowance!
Structure means that implementing changes takes too long. In terms of my team there was some inconsistency with requirement expectations and goals etc.
Rat an das Management
Can't offer any advice as don't feel I know enough about the challenges the face(d). For my direct management there were times that I felt there were inconsistencies.
Hilfreich (5)
I've had to think long and hard about this one and I can't think of a single Pro if you're the kind of person who is looking for career advancement.
However, if you're the kind of person who doesn't "live to work" and more the sort of person who "works to live" then you should consider working for CRT. The hours are good, the pay not bad and nothing much is asked of the staff as the management are always too busy avoiding decisions or running from meeting to pointless meeting (not) deciding on the future of the company.
I you "live to work" then this is not the company for you, unlesss you want to use this place as a quick step into CRUK or buisness management.
There is nothing to get excitied about in this company now.
No career opportunities within the company and very few benefits
Rat an das Management
Senior management of the lab is percieved as weak, directionless and unable to make decisions
Group leader level managment are seen as sneaky, gossipy and promote their own agenda.... in fact we wonder what one or two of you actually do on a daily basis.
Information still does not flow from the top down (despite the training courses).
Hilfreich (1)
Ich arbeite in Vollzeit bei Cancer Research Technology (Weniger als ein Jahr)
None that I can think of. The campus is quite nice though although there is no interaction with the other companies on site.
Strange organisational structure. All the middle management have been entrenched for a long time so no new ideas. Politics drive decision making. A few people appear busy but for the most part this is a part-time job with so little expectations on the employees.
Rat an das Management
Slimline the management and stop thinking like a big pharma company - you are not that.
Hilfreich (4)
Ich arbeite in Vollzeit bei Cancer Research Technology
There is still some very interesting science being done at CRT, and for some very few lucky individuals there are also reasonable to good career opportunities.
On the whole the outlook is bleak. The company is moving to an 'alliance model', i.e. funded soley by external partners (the charity no longer supports CRT directly). The effect is that CRT is becoming a CRO for early discovery; couple this with working on risky oncology targets, suscess is far from assured and funding far from secure.
Rat an das Management
Externally: Fight our corner at CRUK and clarify our role in delivering patient benefit
Internally: Don't talk about personal / career development when you have no chance of delivering this across the board
Hilfreich (1)
- opportunity to work on some cutting edge science
- collaborate with leading academics and industry peers
- well equipped labs for the size company
- good people to work with
- poor opportunites for personal and professional development
- politics
- parts of the buisness can be somewhat isolated
Rat an das Management
better delegation to staff
multi-site labs/offices are clearly a challenge to manage, but sometimes there is a lack of cohesion between various sites/parts of the buisness
Good Work/Life Balance
Open and very friendly company
Fantastic training and development opportunities
Serious Lack of strategy/direction in certain areas of the Business
Internal Politics
Slow in making decisions
No accountability
Rat an das Management
Be pro-active
Make staff accountable
Hierdurch wird die gegenwärtig empfohlene Bewertung für das Zielprofil von ersetzt. Möchten Sie die Ersetzung wirklich vornehmen?
Möchten Sie diese Bewertung als empfohlene Bewertung für das Zielprofil von entfernen?


text:
SRINAGAR: Organisers of Outbound Travel Market (OTM), India's largest travel trade show at Mumbai have adjudged Kargil as 'Best Destination' for this year and confirming 'Award of Excellence' on Kargil.
Meanwhile, a the mega initiative has been undertaken by J&K Tourism Department in collaboration with LAHDC Kargil.
The Tourism Department & LAHDC Kargil facilitated setting up Kargil Pavilion at OTM Mumbai-2017 to highlight the rich heritage and culture of Kargil.
The event was inaugurated by Chairman Legislative Council, Haji Anayat Ali who was the Chief Guest on the occasion. The CEC, LAHDC Kargil, Kacho Ahmad Ali Khan was the guest of honour.
Vice-Chairman JKTDC, Mohammed Rafi Mir, Secretary, Tourism and Floriculture, Farooq Ahmad Shah and Director Tourism Kashmir Mahmood A Shah were also present on the occasion.
The event was also attended by more than 30 members of All Kargil Travel Trade Association. A large number of people from the travel trade fraternity and general public visited the pavilion.
During the three day event, a road show was also organized jointly by Tourism Department and LAHDC Kargil at Hyatt Regency Mumbai, which was attended by more than 500 dignitaries.
Haji Anayat further announced that a mega FAME fest will soon be held at Kargil where all the leading national and international dignitaries of Travel Trade, Media and Film Industry will be invited.
He also announced that two more road shows will be held at Surat and Ahmadabad soon.
Later Haji Anayat and Kacho Ahmad Ali released the 2nd issue of Kargil Tourism Brochure and launched the official website for Kargil Tourism.
An award ceremony was also held where various Travel Agencies including Overland Escape of Leh, A lifetime Trip of Delhi, Shangloo Travels of Kashmir, Trip India Holidays of Delhi and Distant Holidays of Kashmir were awarded for their contribution in projecting Kargil as tourist destination on world map.


text:
(Chamaesyce or Euphorbia drummondii)
(Photos: E. Cousins; growth habit, close up of leaf, tap root)
We recently found caustic weed on our lower site at Cape Jervis. If you have found it in your garden, you will know it is a persistent little sucker. It is an annual or short-lived perennial herb with a deep taproot. Smooth, thin red stems fan out from the centre and hug the ground; these stems can grow up to 20cm long, and can exude a corrosive, milky sap when damaged. The oval-shaped leaves are blue-green with a reddish-purple blotch. They grow in pairs with very short stalks, opposite each other along the stems. The tiny flowers have no petals; they grow in small groups that are composed of one female flower surrounded by several male flowers; even so, the entire flower head is fairly inconspicuous. Seeds can germinate at any time, with the biggest flush in spring; then the plants grow quickly over summer.


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Work Text:
"Are those rules?" Pixie says, once Harry's finished stammering. She looks amused. "Do we have rules on our holiday now?"
"I didn't mean, uh-"
"Don't be a dick, Pepo," Aimee says, kicking Pixie's chair, glass of wine in hand. "Be nice to the poor kid."
"He's only eleven," Ian adds, and Harry gives him the finger. Ian sticks out his tongue, laughing.
"They're not rules, I'm just-" Harry stops. They're all staring up at him. Two years ago they'd laugh about it, but maybe it's different now. "I'm just asking, like-"
"We get it, you're famous and important and a secret international spy," Alexa drawls. "Can you come give me a hug now?"
Pixie laughs, and the tension snaps, everyone's eyes going off Harry, the conversation starting up again. Harry swallows, tosses his bag down. He hugs them all in turn. They smell of suncream and alcohol and they're so relaxed it makes Harry feel uptight in comparison.
Pixie kisses both his cheeks, no trace of the sharpness that was in her voice before.
"Have fun," she says. "There's booze in the kitchen. Wine on the counter, beer in the fridge."
"What're you drinking? Looks amazing."
"Sip?" She hands it over, and he takes it, feeling weirdly grateful for the gesture.
"Cheers." He gulps it. Something sweet and cold, with a piney kick of gin. It makes his head tingle. "That's incredible."
"Bombay, tonic, lemon, orange…" she's counting them off on her fingers. "And- Ian, what else is in this drink?"
"Uhh, gin, tonic, citrus," Ian says, looking up from his phone. "Splash of Cointreau…?"
"Yesss," Pixie says with satisfaction. "Everything's in the kitchen, if you want."
"Amazing, cheers." Harry nods at them, fumbles for his bag and takes it inside.
He's slicing an orange when he hears footsteps, and his mouth curves up in a grin just as Nick says-
"There you are."
He sounds half-drunk, voice shot like he's been screaming or singing. There's not much difference between the two, with Nick.
Harry sets the knife down. Nick's leaning against the counter, watching him. Smiling. He's tan, skin golden against his sheer white t-shirt. Thinner than the last time Harry saw him. Probably been starving himself for telly like an idiot.
Christ, he looks good, though.
"I hear there are rules," he starts, and Harry groans.
"Jesus, that's not what I- I know I'm being a dick, but it's the only way I could get a few bloody days off if it looks like I'm in-"
"Calm down," Nick laughs. "Tell me what the hell you're talking about. Pixie's been pissed since brunch, couldn't get it out of her."
Harry shrugs, wiping his damp hand off on his t-shirt.
"No photos," he says.
Nick shrugs. "What else?"
"Nothing on social media about- y'know, me being here," Harry says, hating that he has to say it. "Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat-"
"I can't believe you know what Snapchat is. Who are you and what've you done with my favorite granddad Harry Styles?"
Harry huffs a laugh. "Lou's always on it."
"Well, I won't be," Nick says, shrugging again, eyes steady on Harry's face. Harry can feel his cheeks heating again. "That it?"
"I mean it, though, Grim. It's - I know it's so fucking annoying, I really do-"
"What's annoying is that you've still got your shirt on." Nick's mouth tugs up at the corner. "And you haven't given me a hug hello."
"Hug first, or shirt?" Harry asks, a bubble of happiness rising in his chest, making it hard to breathe.
"I think you can guess the answer to that, popstar."
Harry laughs, choked, and tugs his shirt over his head from the bottom hem in the way that always used to make Nick simultaneously go all breathless and yell at him for being cheesy.
When he drops it on the ground Nick's watching him, eyes dark. His eyes flit down to Harry's belly, his chest. Harry's not as tan as he could be, but he's fit from weeks of tour. Nick likes that, he always has.
"There's the shirt sorted," Harry says, taking a step closer, and Nick laughs giddily, pulls him in and kisses him. Harry puts his arms over Nick's shoulders, lets himself enjoy it, slow and wet and hot. Nick's mouth tastes of tequila and lime, and he has a hand on the back of Harry's neck, fisted in his hair. His tongue is slow where it sucks at Harry's, gentle little nudges that make Harry's eyes flutter closed.
They break apart when someone shouts outside. A burst of laughter follows, and Nick huffs a laugh of his own, dazed. His face is flushed, damp with sweat, shiny wet gathering in his collarbone. Harry wants- he wants- god. He's not sure. That's the trouble with Nick. His brain fizzles out when he sees him, like he's still eighteen and trying to figure out how to hide his hard-on every time Nick looked at him or touched him or treated him to one of his monologues on hip-hop or reality television, rambling on while Harry watched, shifted in his seat.
He's saved the trouble of deciding by a polite cough. Ian's in the doorway, holding an empty glass.
"Soz," he says. "Refill time."
Harry snorts.
"Were you using this, Harry?" Ian says, picking up Harry's orange slice.
"I - no," Harry says, abruptly. He cares less about drinks than he does Nick's hand, still on the bend of his waist, a thumb rubbing just above the top of his jeans. "Go for it."
"Cheers, mate."
"Seen your room yet, Haz?" Nick says, very pointedly. "Because I could show you."
"Oh, could you?" Harry grins at him. "That'd be wonderful-"
"Yeah, yeah, get out of here," Ian says, laughing and waving them off, and they do.
Harry's room is Nick's room. The bed's elegantly mussed, like Nick made it hastily, fluffy white duvet and white pillows. One's on the floor, crumpled. Nick probably flung it off in his sleep the way he does.
Harry tosses his bag to the ground, breathing deep and slow. Nick has a view of the ocean, curtains billowing in the breeze. The place smells of salt and fresh linens, late-afternoon sun streaming in.
"Posh, innit?" Nick says, right before he steps up to Harry from behind, slides his hands around Harry's waist. Harry shudders, leans back into it. Nick toys with his waistband, one finger slipping under.
"Very." Harry's voice only wobbles a bit.
"And now I've got my very own popstar to complete the fancy holiday package," Nick says, ghosting a breath against Harry's neck. "How nice of them to include you."
"Full service," Harry says, breath catching when Nick's fingers spread lower. "Early - early birthday present."
Nick hums happily into Harry's ear, and opens his mouth against his neck, sucking a kiss into the skin. Harry's eyes close, losing himself in it, until-
"Shit," he says, putting his hand over Nick's on his waist. "That's the other rule."
"Y'know. No teeth."
Nick huffs a sigh. "You're making it very hard to be romantic, Styles."
"Romantic," Harry laughs. "Is that what this is?"
"Heyy," Nick whines in his ear, before he knees the back of Harry's knee, making his leg buckle. Harry chokes on a laugh and staggers forward, Nick pushing him from behind, until they're collapsing onto the bed.
Harry's breathless for a minute, panting up at the ceiling, Nick propping himself on his elbow next to him.
"Shit," he says, eloquently. Harry looks over at him. "You're so fit. I forgot."
Harry's belly goes warm. Coincidentally - completely coincidentally - his dick twitches in his jeans, excited.
Nick stares at his mouth.
"I want to, like, ask how you're doing," he says. "And talk about tour and all that. Like, we'll do that later, I promise. I'm a good host. Get you fed and watered."
Harry nods, as Nick drags his fingers over Harry's bare stomach. Traces over one of the laurel tattoos.
"But right now I really want to blow you," he says, voice dropping low and heavy. "Hope that's alright."
"Yeah," Harry says, trying not to let it squeak. "Alright."
"Mm, didn't think you'd mind."
"I'm pretty easy, so. Have at it."
Nick laughs, creaky and soft, and slides off the bed onto his knees, tugs at one of Harry's ankles.
Harry sits up halfway, feet landing solidly on the floor, watching Nick undo his jeans. It's one of the most familiar sights, Nick between his legs like that, but it's been a while. Harry reaches out to palm over the gel-sticky puff of Nick's hair as Nick wrestles his jeans and pants down to his knees.
Nick grins up at him for a moment. "Hiya."
"Hi," Harry breathes.
"You're here."
Harry nods. Slips his thumb down to Nick's cheekbone, strokes across it lightly.
Nick makes a face, tugs Harry's hands off and lowers his hot mouth to Harry's prick. Oh- there. Harry has to gnaw at his knuckles to keep quiet, toes curling on the rug when Nick snogs the head of his cock. There it is, Christ. Harry missed that.
They join the others for dinner, stumbling downstairs freshly-showered but flushed, Nick all giggly and boneless from Harry jerking him off in the shower. Harry ducks his head when Aimee cat-calls them and Pixie whistles. He sinks into his seat, accepts a drink from Alexa, his first since he got in. It's strong and tequila-y. Sweet.
They all swim after, drunk and splashing in the cool blue pool. Harry has this idea in his head, of him and Nick being the last ones in the pool, when the sky's a blanket of stars and the house is hushed. He wants to kiss Nick like that, like a romantic film, and he keeps that plan right up until Nick looks at him across the crowded pool and calls, matter-of-factly-
"You want to go to bed, Haz?"
It's a different kind of thrill hearing it like that, right out of Nick's mouth in front of everyone.
Harry smiles at him. Starts to say yes, and then Aimee dunks him hard, squealing as she shoves his shoulders.
He comes up laughing, spitting water. "Gonna get you back-"
"Oh are you?" Aimee says, treading water, hair all matted to one side of her face. Her mascara's perfectly intact, because she's a witch. "Think someone's waiting for you."
Harry looks up. Nick's sat at the side of the pool, reaching back to grab his drink where he sat it a safe distance away from the water. He takes a gulp, props himself up on his hands, peers over at Harry, hairy legs kicking in the water. His dick's a bulge in his tight swim shorts.
Well? he mouths. Jerks his head back towards the house.
Harry clambers out of the pool so quick he stubs his toe. Instead of sympathy he gets laughter, including Nick's. Bastards, the lot of them.
He's following Nick inside when he hears Pixie say, "Right, then! Aims, get your camera, I wanna do a handstand."
"Important Snapchat content," Aimee says, and Harry flushes down his neck, as the door closes behind them.
"Am I ruining your holiday?" he asks, as Nick fills them glasses of water in the kitchen.
"Yep," Nick says readily. "Totally ruining it. I wanted to be celibate this trip. I mean, I'm always shagging my dick off, really, I needed a break, and then you showed up, and-"
"Shut up," Harry says, laughing.
Nick turns, hands him the glass of water, and Harry takes a grateful gulp.
"You ruin everything, Harry Styles," Nick says, half-laughing, before he pushes Harry back against the counter and kisses him very slowly.
It's better than the pool, that. The kitchen hushed and dark, Nick's mouth and tongue working softly. Harry strokes over his damp chest, sodden hair and tight nipples, making Nick hiss into the kiss. God, he forgot how nice it is to have time to touch. Nick's body is delightfully imperfect, a varied landscape. Skin and hair and soft bits for Harry to run his fingers over.
Nick shivers when Harry reaches his arse, grabs a handful. Harry uses both hands, wanting another shudder. Slides his mouth down Nick's neck as he squeezes the soft of Nick's arse.
Nick's pulse is juddering fast under the skin.
"Upstairs," he whispers.
Harry kisses the underside of his jaw, stubble rasping against his lips.
"Harry," Nick groans, taking Harry by the wrists and tugging his hands off Nick's arse. "Upstairs."
"Upstairs," Harry repeats, dazed, dizzy. He meant to make Nick all gooey with it, his mouth and his hands, but instead he's the one melting. Always seems to happen. No matter how old he gets, how many people he shags. Nick strips him bare.
Nick draws his face up with a hand under his chin, gives him a kiss. Harry lets it linger, keeps his mouth wide open, lets Nick suck his tongue. It's another minute before they find the willpower to break apart.
"Upstairs," Nick repeats.
Harry follows him.
"Reach back," Nick says, breathless as he eases himself down onto Harry's prick, balancing himself with one hand.
"What?" Harry can't fucking think. He swallows thickly. "What?"
"Reach back," Nick breathes. "Grab the headboard."
Harry has a hand wrapped around his dick at the minute, holding it steady while Nick sinks down. He gasps out a breath, pulls his hand away, and Nick sits down fully.
"Jesus," Nick mutters, eyes rolling back. He breathes heavy for a moment, like he's savoring it. "Christ."
"Nick," Harry says through gritted teeth. He's gripping the headboard with one hand, the other in a fist on his belly, trembling.
Nick looks down at him.
"Both hands," he says, licking his mouth, huffing a breath. "Back."
Harry puts his other hand back, grips the headboard tight. It stretches his arm muscles, makes him shudder. His nipples are hard.
"Yeah, good," Nick mumbles, and finally, bloody finally, he starts to move. Harry groans, sinks into the feeling. He can't control what Nick does, can only keep steady and let Nick use his cock the way he wants to. It's fucking hot, when Nick does that. Hot when anyone does it, but Nick especially.
He's lost in it, eyes closed, when he feels Nick wriggle halfway off his prick.
"Mmgh?" Harry mumbles, forcing his eyes open just in time to see Nick straighten up again, phone in one hand, sink back down with a little puff of breath.
"What're you doing?"
"Now when you said no photos," Nick says, arching an eyebrow. "What about if they're just for me?"
Harry doesn't let go of the headboard. He stares up at Nick for a minute, steadily, and Nick bites his lip, unsure.
"I was just - I mean," he says. "Just thought it'd be fun."
Harry's arm gives a twinge, and he lets go to roll his shoulder, like he does after boxing practice.
"What about a video?" he says, and Nick's mouth spreads in a grin.
"Harry Styles," he says. "You're pervy."
"Not the one who brought the camera into bed."
"Dirty photos are one thing, but sex tapes are a whole other level."
"As long as it's just for you," Harry says, and Nick's face softens.
"Haven't screwed you over before, have I?"
"Yeah," Harry says, sheepishly. Christ. It's Nick. "No. Sorry."
"Plus it's my dick on camera, innit. Yours is safely hidden in my arse. I'm the one with a spot on the X Factor panel to lose. Let's face it, no one would be surprised if you had a sex tape. Just another day in the life of One Direction at this point-"
"Alright, shut up, Grim," Harry laughs, bouncing his hips up. Nick lets out a surprised moan. "Camera. On."
Nick grins down at him, and lifts his phone.
Harry's forced to take his hands off the headboard after a minute, because Nick's shit at filming and fucking at the same time. He slides his palms against Nick's hips, soft flesh over his knobby hipbones, guides him while Nick gasps and groans, camera clutched in one hand.
"Focus," Harry says, at one point. "Grim. The camera."
Nick's letting his hand loll off to one side, as he fucks himself in short thrusts on Harry's cock.
"Gnnghh," Nick says, very coherently. He points the camera back at Harry's face. Harry rolls his eyes.
"This sex tape's gonna be shit."
"This sex is gonna be shit if you don't shut- up-" Nick gasps, balancing himself on Harry's belly, rocking up and down. "Oh god, your cock. Your fucking cock."
Harry watches Nick's cock bob up and down, hard and red, slapping against his belly. That's a lovely view, that.
"Gimme the phone," he says.
Nick's whining now. Not touching himself yet, cos he likes to wait for that. Likes to get himself all worked up on a dick. Bit of a slag for it, really, and-
"Niiick, give me the bloody phone," Harry moans, grabbing at one of Nick's absurdly long arms.
Nick drops the phone on Harry's chest unceremoniously.
"Ow! Wanker."
"Shut up shut up shut up," Nick groans. "Goddd, fuck."
Harry fumbles the camera open, hits record again, lifts it so there's a nice clear view of Nick's dick, his hips lifting up and down.
"Fuck, yeah," Harry mutters. He lifts the camera, but then he can't see it, so he lowers it again. Tries to angle it down.
"Stop fucking with it," Nick laughs.
"You should turn around."
"It's a better view. Can see, like, your arse."
Nick stops rocking. Stares down at him. "This was supposed to be a sex tape of you."
"Well, Grim, I'm having sex with you, so. Turns out we're both gonna get involved."
Nick opens his mouth to argue, and Harry realizes he's still filming. Oops. He shuts it off. If anyone got hold of that, Harry'd more embarrassed over how petty they both are than any of the actual sex.
"Christ," Nick grumbles. "Fine."
Harry waits patiently as Nick lifts up, rustles about til his back is to Harry. He starts to sit and Harry goes dry-mouthed at the sight.
"Wait," he says, hoarsely. "Need the camera."
Nick whines impatiently, as Harry fumbles for the phone, turns the video on.
"Alright," he says. "Go on."
Nick sinks down slow, and Harry lets out a breath, holding the camera steady. Shit, there it is. There it bloody is.
"That's the money shot," he murmurs to himself, absently. Fuck, he looks big like that, sinking inside Nick's hole, Nick spreading to accommodate him.
Nick makes a squawky indignant sound. "Don't narrate!"
"Why can't I?" Harry huffs a laugh, grabbing for a pillow to prop his head up, reaching out with his other hand to thumb over the dimple in the small of Nick's back. "Fuck, look at that. Gorgeous."
"Sound like you're doing a nature documentary."
Harry snorts. "And here we have Nick Grlmshaw's arse in its natural habitat. Observe the way he has to struggle to take Harry's monster cock. But he is determined-"
"I bloody hate you," Nick laughs, one of his hands wrapping around Harry's thigh, just above the knee. "God, this sex tape is now too embarrassing to leak. Not even scandalous, just weird."
Harry grins. "I was just thinking that."
Nick starts to roll his hips, gently. Gingerly.
"S'that good?" Harry says, watching him through the phone camera. "Good angle?"
"Yeah," Nick pants. "Feel really - really good."
"You do too." Harry swallows thickly, not laughing anymore. "You're so fucking tight."
Nick cries out, goes faster, short jerky thrusts up and down.
"You close, Grim?"
He can see Nick nod, feel the pulse of Nick tightening up around him as proof. Nick's hand is jogging between his legs now, arm moving fast. Harry can hear the wet slap slap slap of it, and it does his head in, makes him feverish.
"Go on, fuck," he groans. "Come on it, come on it, come on my dick, Grim, go on-"
Nick curses, hand speeding up, until - he draws in a sharp breath, and Harry whimpers helplessly at the feeling of Nick clenching around him as he spurts.
"Fuck-" he gasps, phone dropping, both his hands going to Nick's hips and holding tight. "Fuck, fuck, m'close-"
Nick gives a last little squeeze around Harry's dick, sinking back until Harry's in him balls-deep, and Harry comes, by surprise almost, hips jerking furiously, gripping Nick's hips so hard his fingers dig in.
He ends up flat on his back, staring at the ceiling, letting it sink in as Nick pulls off, cleans himself up. He's breathing deep, happy. He's happy. It's always a bit weird, being happy somewhere other than the stage. Or- that sounds dramatic. Not like he's crying and depressed when he's not on stage, it's just. There's normal-happy, and stage-happy, and then Nick-happy.
He shuts his eyes.
"Planning on keeping that condom on for a while, Styles? New fashion accessory?"
Harry opens his eyes again. Fair point. He reaches down to tug it off, lifting his head. "Bin?"
Nick waves lazily at the side of the bed.
They settle down into bed after, side by side, Harry half-asleep while Nick flicks through his phone. He can hear frogs chirping outside, through the open curtains. Crickets maybe. Whatever chirps and lives in Spain.
"What kind of animal chirps?" he asks drowsily.
Nick scoffs. "What?"
"Heard a chirp," Harry mumbles, tugging the sheet up over himself. The bed smells of Nick, warm and hair-gel-fruity and slept-in.
Nick laughs again, tosses his phone aside. He presses a kiss to the top of Harry's shoulder. His neck. Then he flops back down at his side, til their shoulders are pressed together, fingers brushing in the space between them.
Harry's mostly asleep but he tries not to succumb, just for a minute. It just feels so fucking good. He wants to savor it. The perfect bed, the breeze blowing lazily through open curtains. The tang of salt. Nick's pinky finger curling against Harry's palm, an idle touch. Harry loves all of it.
"G'night," Nick murmurs, turning over onto his side the way he likes to sleep.
Harry reaches up to stroke the muscles in his back. He can feel Nick heave a deep sigh.
"Night," he says, dropping his hand, and he's not sure who falls asleep first.


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joel b adams family
looking for descendants of the joel b adams
family listed on the 1850 coffee county, al. census. this might have been my gt-grand mothers
family. her name was mary catherine adams-grantham
on her death certificate she names her father
as benjamin adams. and states she was born in coffee county al. the area they lived in was in and around present day kinston, coffee county, al. also she named her eldest son joel benjamin grantham. she was married to joel herring grantham in 1873 in henderson, pike county, al.
will share info with any one connected to this family.
joel lee grantham


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Get it in time for Christmas. Order before the 14/12/2018.
Product Description
Nursing dress Long sleeved O-neck Detailed with bird print Loop at back with button closure Elastic detail inside at sleeveends Elastic panel below chest 3-layered fabric at lower part Stretchable jersey inner fabric Woven quality Hidden nursing function Front length in size M is 94 cm (from top of shoulder to bottom hem) This nursing function features a hidden nursing layer with access to the breast from both sides. To nurse, draw outer layer aside and pull up nursing layer.
- 60% Polyester, 38% Viscose, 2% Elastane
- Machine wash at 30°C
- Do not tumble dry
- Hang dry
- Low temp. iron. Highest temp. 100°C
- Dry clean (any solvent)
- Article Number: 20007813


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Vegetable Lasagne
Found: the most delicious way to get your veggies! Our creamy vegetarian lasagne is packed with pumpkin, tomato, capsicum, zucchini and eggplant, mixed with the classic Italian flavours of basil, olive oil and parmesan.
But this ain't no ordinary lasagne – we've also added pepitas and organic chia seeds for extra goodness! Our veggie lasagne is the perfect healthy indulgence – devour it when you're hungry for the ultimate clean feast.
Vegetarian | Great for dinner | Hearty portion
This product contains eggs, wheat and dairy.
Meals are guaranteed to not contain the direct allergen ingredient, however, we cannot guarantee against cross contamination as trace elements may be present.
Total weight 400g
Serving size is 200g.
All products arrive fresh to your door and can be frozen before expiry, however this meal is best consumed fresh.
|Per 100g
|Per Serving
|Energy (kJ)
|677 kj
|1354 kj
|Calories (cal)
|161 Cal
|323 Cal
|Protein (g)
|Fat (g)
|Carbs (g)
|Sugars (g)
|Sodium (mg)
|Fibre (g)
Pumpkin, Tomato, Cream Cheese, Lasagne Sheet (Durum Wheat, Semolina, Egg Pulp, Water), Milk, Wheat Flour, Semi-Dried Tomato, Capsicum, Onion, Zucchini, Eggplant, Parmesan, Cream, Butter, Chia Seeds, Pepitas, Garlic, Olive Oil, Basil, Salt & Pepper.Contains: Gluten, Dairy, and Egg
May Contain Traces Of: Crustacean, Fish, Sulphites, Sesame Seeds, Peanuts, Tree Nuts, Soybean & Lupins.


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Monday, 18 May 2009
un-realised projects...
I have been invited to take part in the "Un realised projects volume 4" exhibition curated by Sam Ely and Lynn Harris.
Basically it's aimed at artists, writers, musicians and all sorts of creatives to showcase their projects...the ones that have never come to light.
This was a difficult one for me because I have a serious problem when it comes to pigeon holing myself and settling...I have so many interests and disciplines that sometimes it becomes overwhelming.I guess that's why it's so relevant because it leaves me with a large amount of unfinished projects. One of which is music.
As part of the exhibition I have started a My Space page "Frida Black Heart"- my alter ego (one of them anyway!) in an attempt to illustrate the sound scape of my project. My "un realised project". As you will hear there is no attempt to finish the songs because otherwise it would cease to be unfinished/unrealised therefore robbing the spectator of his/her power to use their imagination so to complete the end product and it's numerous outcomes.
I will be uploading samples and ideas I have recorded 10 years ago over a one year period as part of "the lost tapes" series. The page will remain active for the duration of the exhibition.
To find out more about Un realised project visit : www.unrealisedprojects.org
visit my myspace page: http://www.myspace.com/fridablackheart
Labels: frida black heart, my space, unrealised projects
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In honor of the start up of this blog, I'd love to post pictures of your old kitties in action. Please include your animal's name, age, and make and model :) and crazy and interesting things that your cat does.
Picture links can be left in the comment field.
We love all cat's here so if you have a younger kitty who just demands to be in the public eye, we'll post those pics too.
Thursday, November 13, 2008
Send me your old cat pictures!!
Posted by S. F. Heron at 8:32 PM
Labels: Cat pictures, Food, Playtime, Sleep
1 comment:
- The Old Codger said...
Would love to send you a pic of my old cat -- now in catnip heaven -- but don't know how to do it. You can grab him off from one of my web sites -- http://nantongmap.net/images/Stooge-Jack.jpg
See him first at http://nantongmap.net/nantong-dcp/dcp.htm
Livin in China, not having a cat is one of the things that I miss the most...
Old Codger
- December 8, 2008 at 6:43 AM
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So you may have noticed that I am very behind when it comes to reviewing books especially if you've been following my Goodreads account. Honestly I kept remembering to review a book half way through a different book, but fear not I am going to give my opinions on these books. I thought it would be better to write one slightly longer post and get myself up to speed quickly rather than write four short posts over a week or so. Lets get started.
*P.S there may be some minor spoilers because I read these books a while ago and I am not to sure of where scenes came in a book. Just be aware of this before reading these reviews because I wouldn't want anyone to be spoiled.*
1. Will Grayson, Will Grayson by John Green and David Leithan
I hate to say it but I didn't enjoy this book as much as I thought I would. I had read one of David Levithan's books before this and heard so much about John Green so I was expecting amazing things from this book but I only found it ok. The main reason I didn't like this book as much as I thought I would was because I really really did not like the second Will Grayson (WG2 for further reference) I found him very rude and mean and selfish and honestly just an unlikable character. I understand why he is like that from reading the book but I still just couldn't warm to him. However, I did prefer the first Will Grayson (WG1) to WG2 but I still found both of them hard characters to warm to in the beginning of the book. The character that kept me reading the book was Tiny! I love Tiny so much he was by far my favourite character and lifted the book from and being an average 3 stars up to a 4 star book. I read the interview part at the very back of the book and found out John Green wrote WG1 and David Levithan wrote WG2 in case anyone was wondering. I would recommend this book however only if you have read at least one book by each author before hand. This in my opinion was not a good book to use as an introduction to John Green and was not as good as the previous book I read by David Levithan. I think it is safe to say this book was not the best work of either of these fantastic authors.
2. An Abundance of Katherines by John Green
In contrast to Will Grayson, Will Grayson this would be a fantastic book to introduce the fantastic writing style of the wonderful John Green. I loved this book so so much, honestly I am glad this is a quick review because if I had wrote a long review of this book it would quickly turn into a love letter to a book! This book had me laughing from start to finish I just loved it. I also loved the little added bits of information at the bottom of some of the pages, hell I even read the section just on Colin's formula at the back I loved it so much. I loved Hassan and Colin but especially Hassan. Why do I love John Green's secondary characters better than the protagonists? Honestly just a fabulous book definitely 5 stars!
3. Girl With a Guitar by Caisey Quinn
I read this book ages ago so excuse the lack of memory on my part. I remember really liking this book although I found the male protagonist a bit of an ass apart from when he was with his sisters. I don't remember what happened but I remember thinking that he was being overly harsh on Kylie. Obviously this book is set in the south of America and is all about country music so I obviously loved that aspect, and the fact that the male protagonist was an all american country singer made up for his faults. Basically good book 3.5-4 stars (only because I can't remember enough of it to warrant any higher)
4+5 City of Bones and City of Ashes by Cassandra Clare
I am loving these books I'm reading City of Glass at the moment and I am flying through this series. Because I am reading this series so quickly I will not be able to keep up with the reviews. Sooooo I am just going to say right now that I am loving this series so much! I am planning on doing one long post on the whole series, similar to my Wanted Series post; on that I will discuss favourite characters, favourite book, favourite cover and other fun stuff like that. So look out for that.
That's me pretty much back up to date so as I said look out for The Mortal Instruments post and have a good day :).


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Counselors-In-Training13-15 yrsOur Counselors-In-Training program is back, and better than ever! Participants will gain hands on experience in leading activities, supervising kids, and basic job skills that will mold them into fantastic future leaders. Selected teens will need to attend a mandatory training session on 5/19 from 9:00 am-1:00 pm. Summer Camps begin the week of June 11th. The Fee for the selected C.I.T's will be $105/ $90 (Dist. Res)Group Interview | FREE5175.601 5/8 5:00-6:30 pm
Good Vibe Tribe! NEW!12-15 yrsIn this week long, volunteer based, teen camp participants will spend time volunteering at local non-profits in our area, as well as working on various community service projects in our facility. This is a fantastic experience to give back to our community while having fun and making lasting memories.5178.601 7/30-8/3 M-F 9:00 am-3:00 pm


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Resolution introduced to stop Milwaukee residents from paying Foxconn electric bill
Posted: Jan 17, 2018 5:28 PM CDT
MILWAUKEE (CBS 58) -- Milwaukee Alderman Robert Bauman introduced a resolution that would prevent Milwaukee residents from helping Foxconn pay its electric bill.
There's a proposal for a $140 million substation to power the future Foxconn campus.
The American Transmission Company says it would only cost We Energies customers a few pennies each year.
The city's Public Works Committee will hear Bauman's proposal next week.
Save with


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L.S. Lowry exhibition at Tate Britain
The first exhibition by L.S. Lowry to be held by a public institution (Tate Britain) in London since the artist's death in 1976 opened on 26 June. Featuring over ninety works, this beautiful show also explores the "industrial painter"'s connections with French art. Both fascinating and dark.


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Foresite Capital has bolstered its top brass with the addition of Molly He. Molly boasts of vast experience in the healthcare sector, having worked for over fifteen years. Her area of specialty is pharmaceutics and genetic research techniques.
According to Bloomberg, when introducing Dr. He to the firm, Jim Tananbaum, CEO of Foresite Capital, ran out of superlatives to describe their newest employee. He said that Molly was one the moats esteemed authorities in the world of pharmaceutics and next-generation gene sequencing and that his firm was gratified and proud to have landed an exceptional talent such as her. Jim further stated that the in-depth understanding of the sector possessed by Molly would be of significant value to Foresite Capital.
Molly has an outstanding career, with a couple of prominent institutions in her work portfolio. Her first job entailed conducting research on cancer therapies through the study the structure of antibodies. Later on, she joined Pacific Bioscience, where she oversaw the successful development of protein reagents using molecular instantaneous sequencing technology. She left Pacific for her immediate former position, which was at Illumina.
The proficient doctor's Alma mater is the Nankai University, where an undergraduate degree in biochemistry was conferred on her. In her academic credentials, she also possesses a doctorate in protein biophysics from the Los Angeles campus of the University of California. Molly has also authored several publications on contemporary gene sequencing as well as bespoke medicine.
Molly heaped praise on Foresite in her acceptance speech. She said that the firm was unequaled in the adoption of new, innovative research methods, and added that she was exemplified by her addition to such an excellent team. She concluded by expressing optimism about the future, saying that she will assist in the efforts to achieve it.
About Jim Tananbaum
In a report on Businesswire, Jim Tananbaum is an alumnus of the famous Harvard Medical School, where a medical degree was bequeathed to him. Before Harvard, Jim received a Bachelor's degree from Yale. He later pursued an MBA from the Harvard University.
Besides academics, Jim is also a vastly successful entrepreneur. His exploits in the healthcare sector are enviable, having established several pharmacological institutions. Currently, he is at the helm of Foresite Capital, a leading therapeutic solutions provider.
Visit Insidermonkey.com for more details on Jim Tananbaum.


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Robert Buckland MP is urging constituents in South Swindon to ensure that their homes are safe ahead of winter.
Despite the autumn chill, a national survey shows that more than a third of households (36%) have not checked that their central heating is working and four in ten have not prepared their home for winter by getting their boiler serviced. Having an annual boiler service carried out by a Gas Safe registered engineer is crucial as it detects problems with the boiler and controls, including whether it is leaking poisonous carbon monoxide.
Carbon monoxide is known as the 'silent killer', because the gas has no odour or taste, and is invisible. Fitting an audible alarm is the second line of defence against carbon monoxide poisoning and it is important to check regularly that it is working.
Being energy efficient is particularly important during the winter months, and technology can help with this. Whilst nearly half of households (47%) acknowledge that technology could help their home to run more smoothly during winter, just over a third (36%) have smart meters.
Having smart meters installed can help keep household energy in check, as they automatically send readings to the energy supplier. Smart meters also come with a display that shows you how much energy is being used, in pounds and pence, in near real-time, and identify where savings can be made.
Robert said: "It's really important to keep a step ahead of winter. I want everyone in South Swindon to understand what help is available for them, and for their family and friends. Being energy efficient and keeping bills under control is really important, so I'd encourage people to get in touch with their energy supplier to find out what support is on offer."
The British Gas Energy Trust is an independent trust who give face-to-face advice, financial support and grants to help clear energy and household debts. The average grant is around £600 and you don't have to be a British Gas customer. Find out more by visiting: www.britishgasenergytrust.org.uk.


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Dippys Sleepover - Bed Wetting Book
Dippys Sleepover - Bed Wetting BookCode: BK-9780764134258
- Description
- Specifications
- Reviews
Dippy's Sleepover is a terrific book to help your little boy or girl understand that he or she is not alone!
Not only does this book help your child with bedwetting in general, but it helps treat social anxiety associated with bedwetting outside of the home by showing your child that they are not the only one that wets their bed!
This is a reassuring story for children experiencing the problem of bedwetting.
Short sentences with frequent dialogue pair well with McQuillan's softly colored artwork. It's through the illustrations that the emotional aspects of Dippy's dreams are revealed.
Pictures done with sweeping brushstrokes give his bedroom a homey look, and children will enjoy searching for a small, Woodstock-like creature that's tucked into many of them.
Based On 1 Reviews
The artwork in this book is great, however the storyline about a child being able to stop wetting is not quite accurate. From the parents I've spoken to, the majority of their children do not stop by "growing out of it". They usually need help from an alarm or in some cases, medication. This is not a book I would rely on alone to help my child learn to stop wetting because it feels incomplete.


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Wisdom of William Parker, Musician
In the late afternoon of Thursday, September 5, at the Macdonald Stewart Art Centre at the University of Guelph, composer and bassist William Parker delivered a keynote talk for the Guelph Jazz Festival Colloquium (this year's theme: "Sound Knowledges: A World Artist Summit") called "Sound as Medicinal Herb: Creative Music 61 Years in Transition." (The "61 years" refers to his age, he told us.) He was introduced by drummer and musical compatriot Hamid Drake, who spoke about "an energy of compassion and understanding that exudes from Mr Parker" and who acknowledged the important role that William Parker has played in fostering "my own artistic potential and awakening." For about 40 minutes, interspersed with video clips of Cecil Taylor, Sun Ra and Don Cherry, William Parker offered what was essentially an extended set of aphorisms, reflecting on his philosophy of music and on the social impact of artistic practice. If it works, I'm going to reproduce my transcriptions of key sentences from William Parker's largely improvised remarks; this, for me, is an example of one form of improvisational pedagogy, a gathering of reflections and provocations. Any errors or infelicities are my own.
Sound acts as a medicinal herb.
The core of music cannot be taught, the self-sound of a musician's playing.
Why does the musician exist? Save, elevate, inspire and heal.
Muse plus physician equals musician.
As soon as you are born you become part of music.
Music is not something you learn. Music is something you are.
We need to redefine musical terms.
No one owns music. Nobody. Nobody owns music.
Music is the possibility of a miracle occurring.
It is a medicinal herb that heals.
You are responsible for your own self. You play the changes you want to play on a tune.
Sun Ra: "I didn't know anything about music. It came from someplace else."
What is the difference between knowing and feeling? You can know all of the answers, and you still can't get anything right.
You don't have to understand it, you have to feel it.
You need to be flowing with the spirit.
Jimmy Lyons was a shaman. Shamans heal and move us through sound. The have the juju.
Part of it comes from the blues. You can hear it. All of the musicians from Chicago, where'd they come from? Not Chicago. From the South.
They play extensions of Afro-American Improvised Creative Music.
If you play for three hours with Cecil Taylor and Jimmy Lyons, that's some magic. And I played eleven years with those cats.
How can you play music and not know anything about it? You don't need to know anything about it. What's important is whether your music works.
We have to have a revolution in the world. The music has to step it up a notch. We have to play revolutionary music so that we can enter into the tone-world.
You take a tone, you vibrate it enough, and then you're in the tone-world.
Each room in the tone-world is a secret of life.
It's not about making money, but to make music and to heal people through sound.
Don Cherry knew something about music. But at the same time he knew when not to let it get in the way.
Everybody can be an accidental shaman, a shaman for the day.
You don't want to be a shaman for a day. You want to be a shaman every day.
The listener is also a musician.
The sound of what you say and what you do is so very important.
You are your instrument.
You have to find the Don Cherry in you and the Sun Ra in you.
Wear your colours.
We can all be brighter and bigger than what we are.
What's the difference between a musician and a shaman? You wouldn't hire a shaman to play at your wedding.
Music in America is more about entertainment than inner attainment.
Rahsaan Roland Kirk had a composition he called "Volunteered Slavery." Now what we're dealing with is a system of volunteered slavery. You just have to go along with the system and enslave yourself.
The best musicians never get recorded because they're left out of history.
The Guelph festival is very very important because it brings the people who want to hear, to be fed, to rejuvenate, to be inspired.
"It's as serious as your life." [Or, "It's as serious as a laugh."]
What's the future of jazz? In one sense jazz is dead, it has no future. Don't cry. But: music has a future. All your major players are dead: Jimmy Heath, Johnny Griffin. For me, I don't hear anybody playing any jazz. Jazz has moved on. We just find something else. But hope goes on.
"In order to survive, we must keep hope alive."
There is a universal tonality.
Boom. Let's go. Let's play. Boom.
Juju is in every country. It's universal.
It doesn't make any difference what you call it but it will go on.
Improvisation, Text and Media: Research Questions
At the final meetings of the research team for the "Improvisation, Community and Social Practice" research initiative, held on Monday September 2, 2013, at the University of Guelph, we had an opportunity to divide into our various research streams and interest groups, and to reflect on achievements and outcomes over the past six years of the grant, around the establishment of the interdisciplinary field of Improvisation Studies. (Co-ordinators for each of the seven clusters were invited to present at a panel during the upcoming colloquium, on Wednesday morning.) Rather than catalogue books, performances, courses, etc., what many of us elected to do — to reflect the on-going and open-ended aspect of research on and around improvisation — was to produce and hone a set of research questions that had come to inform the work being done by our group.
Here are some of the questions we collectively arrived at, in the "Improvisation, Text and Media" stream, for which I have served as co-ordinator.
How do improvisatory practices affect the production, dissemination and reception of new media art?
What are the impacts of electronic and social media on poetry, literature and other textual practices? How is the study of print culture impacted by a critical emphasis on improvisation?
How can methods and approaches that have emerged from improvisation studies be deployed to assess the velocity of information, and the pace of the transformation of the human archive? What are the emerging temporalities of writing?
How do new media offer a means to investigate the permeability of the academic and non-academic worlds?
What are the key tropes around which inquiry into text and media in improvisation takes place? (Some of the tropes we mentioned included membrane, network, fractal, pod, articulation, mix, polyphony, voice, texture, ear.)
How does improvisation both expose and re-instantiate inherent social power structures, especially around concepts of authority and expertise?
How do social and electronic media influence reading and reception?
How do text and media studies articulate with improvisational pedagogy across the disciplines?
What does the study of improvisation, text and media bring to the understanding of canon, of expertise, genius and orthodoxy? How are we to accept or to resist the tendencies for improvisational tactics to becomes orthodoxies or ideologies?
How are practices of appropriation, borrowing, imitation, representation and revision managed through improvisation?
Our hope was that these questions, and others, might serve as contingent focal points, both to understand the work that has been ongoing in this sub-field and to provoke and urge the development of new work.
Mais, qu'est-ce que c'est donc un noir? Et d'abord, c'est de quelle couleur? (Jean Genet, "Pour Jouer Les 'Nègres'" [1959])
Yesterday I heard El Jones on the radio. The community activist and current poet laureate of Halifax was speaking with Jian Ghomeshi on Q about an emerging controversy surrounding an upcoming concert by Chris Brown, and the building opposition in the city to his appearance there, because of his history of domestic violence. One of the key points she made, both eloquently and forcefully, was that this discussion had much to do with current debates around race and identity, particularly in Halifax, where the cultural politics and the cultural history of blackness has played a significant role in shaping the character of the city and its district (Dartmouth, Bedford and other linked communities).
Her remarks had me think back to the beginnings of my own engagements with the discourse and history of race in this country, how this trajectory of my education was set in motion. I was taught Canadian History in my last year of high school in Truro, Nova Scotia (about an hour's drive from Halifax), by Wayne Foster, who had designed his course around what must have then been a risky and innovative principle in 1981: the first term presented the emergence of the nation filtered through the perspectives of a number of First Nations, while the second term focused on African-Canadian history. I know we had a textbook, although much of what Mr. Foster discussed came from his own research, and I know that he had us reading on our own, too: finding source material for ourselves, if we were able. But I'm sure I had no idea at the time how atypical and how genuinely provocative this class could prove to be. I'm sure he wanted us to think about the ways in which our own history, the history of our place, had been shaped, about how perspective mattered, and about how the recovery of racially-inflected – that is to say, non-Anglo-Celtic – viewpoints had the potential to radically shake up our senses of the given, of what we were told had really happened as our country was being formed, confederated. And I knew next to nothing about the history of the Black community in my own town. Looking back now, I truly admire Mr. Foster's courage, and his willingness to take what were then substantial intellectual risks, and to invite his students to do the same: to raise consciousnesses, to make us more fully and carefully aware of who and where we were. At the time, however, as a slightly smug seventeen-year-old, I remember myself not so much being grateful as resistant. For some reason, and this is still a bit hard for me to explain to myself, I didn't want to hear what Mr. Foster was offering us. I think I wanted to cling to a generic, comfortable and singular view of where my sense of language, place and belonging might have come from. This resistance, this recalcitrance, seems all the more peculiar to me given my reading and my taste in music at the time, which was thoroughly caught up in anti-racist punk, existential political philosophy, soul and post-Coltrane jazz. Really. Somehow, I guess I needed to keep the conceptual and the aesthetic separate from the historical, from the immediate experience of being from small-town Nova Scotia. My reading and my listening were idealized and remote from who and where I was, even though I know I identified powerfully with Miles Davis, with Rahsaan Roland Kirk, with The Clash, with Otis Redding, with Jean-Paul Sartre and Jean Genet. I now realize that, despite my rather artificial adolescent resistance, Mr. Foster's history class has had a substantive impact on how I have come to think about race, about the collision of the aesthetic and the political, of the representational and the lived, in our social and cultural existences in this country. And I need to acknowledge and to thank him genuinely for that.
El Jones's radio spot was one of several public interventions she has made in the past few days: she also appeared on The National on CBC television, and published, in a Huffington Post blog entry called "Protecting Canada's Trayvon Martins," a list of "some things Canadians can do" in the wake of the verdict in the George Zimmerman trial in Florida. Her work, here and elsewhere, voices itself – advocates – primarily in the imperative; here is the sixth of her eight calls to action:
Educate ourselves and our children about racism. Yes, it is important to tell children they can follow their dreams. But we also must give them information that protects them. This case showed us racism isn't over, so let's stop being scared to tell the truth to kids, leaving them vulnerable and confused. Teaching about racism also means teaching them Black Power principles. Don't pretend race doesn't exist for them, give them the knowledge to understand themselves.
The "Canadians" she's addressing in entries such as this sound not like Canadians in general, but like those of us (not me) who identify as black: and maybe even more specifically as east-coast, an identity George Elliott Clarke once named "Nofaskoshan" or "Africadian." A conceptual fracture emerges in the encounter with such an identity when we put a bit of pressure on what specific practice of education El Jones means to call for – despite the overt claim to candour and directness she makes, and even enacts stylistically in the feel of straight talk here. Educating "ourselves" can't only mean discovering the presence of blackness in our Canadian midst, although that's a starting point. That's what I think happened for me thirty-odd years ago in Mr. Foster's history class. While that discovery – that re-discovery – appears to have become a necessity again now for many, education also means going a bit further, I think. It means recognizing, and negotiating, our complicity in a general cultural and historical problematic around cultural constructions of blackness. For me, this fracture runs deep, and it's crucial to acknowledge it and to inhabit it critically, thoughtfully.
Race, in my experience, comes to name not a framework for identity but the ongoing fracturing of identities. Despite its various corporeal and historical materializations, despite its difficult tangibility, despite its challenging lived realities throughout the human world, race – in this instance, blackness, which seems to serve as a synecdoche for race as such – remains largely a cultural and historical construct, a "floating signifier" as Stuart Hall argues. To emphasize the semiotics of race (against its genetics) is not to ignore or to obscure its reality, but to try to find a means – a poetic means, I'd say – to encounter it and to counter its nascent perniciousness, the slippery slope down which race slides into racism. I'm not starting to make a case "against race," although I find Paul Gilroy's approach to what he calls raciology both resonant and critically provocative. The pedagogical imperative to "educate ourselves," as I read El Jones, means learning to face those conflicts, to recognize and to work through the often dire representational fractures that discourses of race tend to frame. But not necessarily ever to be done with that work.
So the imperative, as she recurrently characterizes it, is still a need, but more specifically "the need to have difficult conversations." (I'm lifting this phrase from one of her Facebook updates, but she uses versions of it throughout the radio spot.) It's a hard form of language-work, a poetics. That's not to substitute aesthetics for politics, but to return to the uneasy craft of language a tangibility, an engagement with the what matters: to politicize the aesthetic. The difficulty of conversation, in my view, gets foregrounded in Jones's return to the rhetoric and ideology of the late 1960s. A disturbing question lurks in and behind this call: that is, shouldn't we have been done with Black Nationalism by now, more than 40 years on? (As El Jones rightly points out, it's more like 400 years on. And who, by the way, constitutes this "we" I'm so glibly tossing around?) Perhaps our shame – pointed up by the discursive tangle surrounding Trayvon Martin – is that in North America we clearly aren't done, and aren't going to be done with it. I find I can't accept El Jones's call to return to "Black Power principles," because my critique of race – enabled, no doubt, by a personal history of deracinated privilege, of not having to be subject to discrimination on a daily basis – involves challenging what feels like an under-interrogated identity politics; that challenge, for me, is in fact what it means to educate ourselves. Identity politics, in my experience, tends to shut down conversations, rather than to enable them. But the fact remains that my kind of academically privileged and rarefied critique might not be especially timely, not yet. The work of consciousness raising still, still, seems to require identifications, solidarities, nationalisms and ethnocentrisms. Even now. Perhaps especially now.
So, as I position myself here, I remain at least partially excluded from those adhesions and identifications, and necessarily so. I'm still working to find my way back through the resistance I felt in that history class thirty-odd years ago. But I think that's exactly what I ought to be doing. Exclusions and differences are part of the needful difficulty of talking about race. I'm putting more pressure on El Jones than maybe her words have invited, but I think what she has said in the past couple of days represents an important intervention, and a significant provocation to public discussion and debate. And I'd like to thank her for that, as well.
[Edit: El Jones wrote an excellent article on race, violence and Chris Brown, published in the Halifax Chronicle Herald on July 19, 2013. You can read it here.]
Video Intro for Arts One Digital
Here is a youtube video made by Jon Beasley-Murray (of Posthegemony fame) for Arts One Digital, a first year humanities program at the University of British Columbia in which I taught for the past two years. I mention, and try briefly to describe, something of the improvisational pedagogy I have been trying to develop on my own terms over the past decade. The video was taken in my UBC office on Friday, 5 July 2013. The other materials on the Arts One Digital website form an evolving digital humanities supplement to the Arts One syllabus. Two of Jon's blog posts on MOOCs, pedagogy and electronic media appeared today re-published in The Tyee, and are well worth checking out.
What John Coltrane Left Here for Us to Learn
Listening to jazz, to improvised music, changed my life, and for the better. The music started to matter to me early on, when I was still a teenager. It wasn't that I had a particularly difficult life, but in the struggle through late adolescence to articulate myself as someone I hoped might become a coherent human being, the music was there, impelling. And I don't exactly mean making music, since I was never a player. But for some reason, it presented me with a calling that has remained more or less insistent throughout my adulthood. Listening — actively, deliberately — to this music continues to offer me what feels like meaning. This kind of listening wants to be proactive and deliberate, a willful focusing of the ears and the mind. A concentration you have to work at. A version of this imperative, the call to pay attention, famously takes poetic form in the disjunctive closing line of Rainer Maria Rilke's "Archaic Torso of Apollo" (hardly a jazz poem, I'll admit — it doesn't even mention music, but dwells instead on the visual and the spatial), where a broken classical sculpture conjures the capacity to look (or to perceive, to attend) back through its viewers — its shoulders curve down, Rilke says, "durchsichtig," which means translucent but also, literally, through-sighted — and to invite if not to demand, as the poem finishes abruptly addressing both onlookers and its own readers in the second person, that "Du mußt dien Leben ändern": "You must change your life," you must other your life, live otherwise. Illusions and delusions aside, I always knew I was never going to be much of a musician myself. But I still hear it, and write about it. It's the experience of listening itself that continues to impel me, as what I hope to become as some sort of a creative maker, a poietes.
One of the metaphors that attaches itself to this music is curative; it's good for you because, as Albert Ayler puts it, "Music is the Healing Force of the Universe." This kind of music makes the world — or at least my small corner of it — a better place to be. In "The Sick Man," one of the poems gathered in Sascha Feinstein and Yusef Komunyakaa's first Jazz Poetry Anthology, Wallace Stevens explicitly associates Southern Black American music — a mishmash of folk blues ("mouth-organs in the night or, now, guitars"), gospel choirs and jamming bands — with a capacity to heal an epigone ("late, late"), dispirited and ailing North, a cure that takes on a specific form of attention, a form of listening:
And in a bed in one room, alone, a listener
Waits for the unison of the music of the drifting bands
And the dissolving chorals, waits for it and imagines
The words of winter in which these two will come together,
In the ceiling of the distant room, in which he lies,
The listener, listening to the shadows, seeing them,
Choosing out of himself, out of everything within him,
Speech for the quiet, good hail of himself, good hail, good hail,
The peaceful, blissful words, well-tuned, well-sung, well-spoken. (206)
There's an uncomfortable raciology here that needs to be acknowledged. Still, the seclusion Stevens describes as the generic solitude of the sick-bed is also uncannily analogous to the situation of the music fanatic, headphones on, volume turned up, listening to recordings. The poem attends, in the dual senses of waiting and listening, but it also promises to overcome in an imagined ideality the bifurcations of race, geography and history that both inform this music and mark its distance. What Stevens describes as healthy listening — betterment signaled repeatedly as "good hail" — is not musical imitation, trying to appropriate this music as his own, but verbal response, a mode of speech that wants to find its answerable style. The sort of listening that I find myself aspiring to practice, a listening invited and even provoked by jazz, impinges on the writing, critical or otherwise, here and elsewhere, that I'm trying to do. I aim to write out and to write through acts of listening, and to suggest how, in a number of crucial ways, we can come to recognize the temporal drive and the vitality of literary language — of the intensified, musical verbiage of poetry — by digging into the heft and flux of the improvised as it intersects with words, lines, periods: and by trying to feel, in some measure, the pull of its moment, the "choosing" for which Stevens's poem calls.
On the back cover of Echoes of a Friend, a 1972 recording of piano solos of compositions by and dedicated to John Coltrane, in whose great quartet he played in the 1960s, McCoy Tyner cites an old Calvinist adage: "Many are called, but few are chosen." His intention is clearly to honour Coltrane's genius, to affirm the saxophonist's singularity and to acknowledge with careful humility his own part in Coltrane's legacy. But what emerges in this brief statement is a figuration of the instrumentalist not so much as co-author of the work, which Tyner clearly was, but as listener, as student, as apprentice: the passive voice — "are chosen" — suggests both a sidelining of artistic ego in the service of greater things and an erasure of artistic agency in favour of a more romantic notion of the artist as passive receptor, as Aeolian harp. Stevens, in a subtle but deft move, refigures the listener as an active presence, as hearing becomes a forging in the consciousness of the listener not just of sound but of aural form, and of meaning. Heartsick and passive though he — or she — may initially appear, the listener for Stevens intervenes in the music, which transforms from "singing without words" into a plenitude of speech. The change, the healing that jazz — that Black Classical Music, as Rahsaan Roland Kirk called it — affects in this outsider, is not a case of being called or chosen, but of choosing, of taking up that call and making it speak back, a form of existential call and response.
So then, here is a story about how I once missed my own calling. In junior high when they announced over the PA that anyone who wanted to be in the school jazz band was to come down to the auditorium, I must have been talking, because I missed the announcement. And it never occurred to me, naive and acquiescent as I was by nature, that I might have still been allowed to join up after that. When I found out after school about the call for the band, I figured that was it, I'd missed my big chance, although looking back now I can't really blame anyone else, since I was probably just more interested in other things — other than music, I mean. (I was in the drama club that year, and worked on the yearbook.) I've always liked brass, and used to imagine myself with a trombone, an instrument my younger brother picked up two years later. (He was clearly the kind of guy who paid attention during home room.) Years later, at graduate school I used some of my scholarship money to buy a student-style Yamaha trumpet at a pawn shop; I still take it out of the closet about once a month, squeeze out a few awkward clams, then wipe it down and put it back in its case. If you don't practice every day, you lose your lip. Like I said, I am no player. And, all things considered, I must never really have wanted to be one, or I'd have joined the band, somehow, long ago.
Taking part in improvised music, for me, hasn't meant playing music so much as playing along, enacting a certain kind of participatory audience, of actively listening and responding, of aural interaction. Writing about jazz and improvisation, writing alongside, through and even against it, marks off some of the traces of that interaction, and also gestures at a language of enactment, of improvising critically and verbally, a form of what Ken Nordine and Rahsaan Roland Kirk, in different contexts, once called "word jazz." (Reflecting on his 1957 LP Word Jazz, Nordine defined what he does as "a thought, followed by a thought, followed by a thought, ad infinitum, a kind of wonder-wandering"; essentially, as a precursor to the surreal monologues of Spaulding Gray or the transcribed monologues of David Antin, Nordine improvised serial text over a hard bop background, his first two records featuring a jazz quintet led by cellist Fred Katz.) What this meant, for me, was that there could be a viable intersection of language and music, of the written and the performative, of script and improvisation.
Things started, and kept on, with record collecting, a habit I acquired at fifteen from my friend who lived down the road from me and who had a good stereo. We used to hang around in his basement after school or on Saturdays, listening to his records and, later, some of mine. He got me into jazz. I don't know where he heard about it. We lived in a small town in Nova Scotia, where the local AM station played a mix of country, the hit parade, and MOR rock. We were both pretty well-behaved middle-class fellows, but we were secretly hooked on punk, which was still around (this was about 1979 or 1980), though nobody knew Much about our two-person subculture, since we never actually dressed the part. But even if we never really walked the walk, we still tried to talk the talk. And we weren't all that exclusive in our tastes, and would listen to anything with a bit of a rough edge: the Rolling Stones (Some Girls and earlier, none of that disco), the Who (anything with Keith Moon — and Pete Townshend loved the Sex Pistols, which was cool), Bruce Springsteen (The River was new), Elvis Costello (everything, which at that point amount to four records), and especially The Clash. And then, maybe out of boredom, maybe out of curiosity, we both bought some jazz. Well, I bought what he bought, which started out with two records. My Dad had some old albums by Dave Brubeck (Jazz Impressions of New York) and Al Hirt (On Broadway), but we disdained them as too mainstream and too tame — too middling white like us. We wanted something sophisticated, something unique. Something that didn't fit. And I think in our own restrained way we wanted to rebel, we wanted out. So, we each got a copy of Miles Davis's Kind of Blue — ironically, one of the best selling and ubiquitous jazz albums of all time. And a copy of The Vibration Continues, an Atlantic two-fer compilation of Rahsaan Roland Kirk — an album that hardly anybody had, or ever would, although Rahsaan's music, it turned out even more ironically, was even more closely in touch with mainstream pop, from Marvin Gaye to Burt Bacharach, than Miles Davis's dressed-up "social music" of the 70s and after.
More often than not, that Rahsaan record was, to my ears, just plain weird, some of it to the point of being unlistenable. (There was a three or four minute meander on the nose-flute — Rahsaan Roland Kirk had a notoriously huge and abnormal instrumentarium, most of which he wore dangling from halters around his neck when he performed — called "Rahsaanica" that I could never get into, no matter how hard I tried to force it: Joel Dorn's liner notes said it was genius, but I just heard noodling. It took me a long time to connect with what he called his "natural black inventions – root strata.") Not too many people outside of aficionados and devotees, even now, have likely heard much of Rahsaan. (Most of the liner notes to recent issues and reissues of Rahsaan's recordings used to be by Dorn, on whose independent labels these recordings often later appeared; in almost every one, he cites listeners who have experienced epiphanies — what Rahsaan himself might have called "bright moments" — at one of Kirk's concerts: "I was blind until I experienced Rahsaan," one listener rethinks the saxophonist's disability into his own version of an amazing grace: "blind to the infinite potential of the human spirit." Interestingly such insight, such personal revision, comes from Kirk's auditory presence, his sound. Rahsaan, Dorn notes, "wasn't given his due during his lifetime. He died frustrated, but he knew that someday people would get it." Enlightenment, getting it, has been closely tied to jazz listening since its beginnings, even when it was essentially a popular dance music; the apocryphal story of Louis Armstrong's response to a reporter asking him to define jazz — "If you have to ask, you don't need to know" — implies a closed, cultish elitism that both informs the trope of "getting it" we hear circling around Rahsaan's unjustly neglected music and runs counter to its fiercely loose populism, its imagined capacity to reach out to anyone and everyone.
Rahsaan's music did reach me, however. I know this, because when I listened to one track in particular from that double album — a medley recorded live at the 1968 Newport Jazz Festival, which originally appeared on the second side of his Volunteered Slavery record — something was to break in on me: and not just for the first time, but every time I've played it on the stereo since then. The recording itself is pretty low-end. Rahsaan is backed by a great trio of pianist Ron (later Rahn) Burton, bassist Vernon Martin, and drummer Jimmy Hopps, but the piano is tinny and remote, the bass nearly inaudible, and the drums a slurry wash. But the technical quality, it turns out, didn't really matter, and may even have pushed up the intensity of my bright moment, since Rahsaan's flutes and saxophones are (in contrast to his band) miked so closely that the sound sometimes overloads with wow and flutter. He gets right in your face. While some might hear aggression in this performance, I hear energy, intensity, and explosive vitality. It's next to impossible to describe what happens in the mere twelve minutes that this track takes, and it seems to me you need to hear it to believe it. Not because it's transcendental in some naive sense, transporting us to realms of consciousness beyond words, no. But because it marks an intense collision of form and content, of tenor and vehicle, of signifier and signified that simultaneously informs and defeats what Roland Barthes once called being "condemned to the adjective" (180) in music criticism. It's meaning, for me, consists in an iterable and nearly infinitely reproducible overwhelming of the break between act and description, a break that — if you think about it — actually forms the necessary gap across which meaning in language always occurs; this performance produces meaning both for and in the listener by closing the hiatus that requires language to mean in the first place. But I also need to be clear that I'm not talking about music itself, whatever that might be, but about a kind of affect, a response in and by a listener. About the ways in which the music enables and even contains a practice of audition, of audience.
On the recording, Rahsaan announces to his audience that he wants to play "a memorial and a short medley of tunes that John Coltrane left here for us to learn"; this particular Newport Festival happened almost two years to the day after Coltrane's death, and the anniversary may have been on Kirk's mind, although he also makes it clear that he "was playing this before [Coltrane] split, so I dig him very much." It's noteworthy that Kirk positions himself as a somewhat epigone synthesizer, a latter-day traditionalist who gathers and configures even the immediate musical past, demonstrating important continuities and influences; he gives his audience a lesson in jazz's living history. Only one of the compositions Kirk chooses is actually composed by Coltrane, so the idea that the saxophonist "left" these tunes behind might at first appear odd. (The songs are Billy Strayhorn's "Lush Life," Mongo Sanatamaria's "Afro-Blue" — which has at times been miscredited to Coltrane — and Coltrane's own "Bessie's Blues.") These tunes become Coltrane's, however, not only in as much as he recorded them and put an almost indelible interpretive signature on them, so that they would be associated with him from that point on, but also because the first song in particular points to a continuity between Duke Ellington, from whose band book "Lush Life" comes, and Coltrane. Ellington and Coltrane recorded an impulse! album together in 1962, a session for which the pianist composed the infectious blues "Take the Coltrane," its title signifying on another famous Strayhorn composition. The blues, as the basic idiom of an African-American folk tradition — Rahsaan called jazz "Black Classical Music" — also informs each of the compositions Kirk chooses from the Coltrane canon, but the blues is also variously skewed and rearticulated. Joel Dorn writes in his liner notes to The Vibration Continues that "Rahsaan was interested in preserving the music and reinterpreting it," but his performance creates and sustains a more radical form of musical history than such banal statements indicate. Kirk invokes a complex network of associations and resonances that extend from New Orleans through swing and bebop to Coltrane's avant garde output of the last years of his life; furthermore, he doesn't simply replicate, as repertory, Coltrane's style or sound, but reinvents this music as his own, accounting for Coltrane's presence while freely — and even sloppily — adding in his take. Rahsaan's classicism is neither staid nor fixed, but a renovation, an amicable and lovingly rough scouring of what has come before.
If his aim in revisiting Coltrane is pedagogical, if we are meant to learn something from this music and from Kirk's revisionary re-performance of it, what we are taught, both by example and by participation, is how to listen. Kirk's reworking of Coltrane is an act of directed listening, of "digging" what Coltrane played, but a listening that is also a musical performance to which we — the "us" Kirk invokes is both the audience at the live performance, who scream more wildly as his performance continues, and, because this is a recording, a more general evocation of his rather fallen and decrepit America ("Can you hear that yet?" Kirk asks Dorn, and, according to Dorn, also asks all of us) — are listening. His record becomes an occasion to relearn how to hear.
This insertion of the listener into the potential sound-space of the performance, the way in which the music makes room for response, for a kind of audience participation — or really, for audience as co-participation — emerges on the recording as the Coltrane medley gives way to a Kirk composition, "Three for the Festival," which Kirk had originally recorded in 1961 for the album We Free Kings. Writing or playing himself into this medley might seem an act of egotism, working himself into the canon by attaching his own career retrospective to that of Coltrane, but "Three for the Festival," as various bootleg recordings of Kirk's performances demonstrate, was a staple of his live set. Nevertheless, Kirk clearly and unabashedly does write himself into that history, not only as an exponent but also as a living presence, its embodiment. This intervention is not, however, a form of hubris so much as a delineation in performance of that history, a lived iteration of the past not disguised as immediacy but reworked in a dynamic, present-tense, active mediation. "Three for the festival" is a show-stopper, which begins and ends with Kirk blowing a simple melodic line through three saxophones simultaneously. (Kirk continued to be charged by critics with mere gimmickry for showing off his multi-horn technique, but he was also clearly more interested in the musical potential of this kind of makeshift polyphony than in empty grandstanding.) This riff frames an extended solo on the flute, while the band double-stops behind him. The effect certainly centres the performance on Kirk and foregrounds his instrumental voice (as does the extremely uneven live mix of the recording, as I've already pointed out), but what happens during this solo has little to do with self-aggrandizement. Kirk customarily sang or hummed into the venturi opening of his flute, creating slightly detuned unisons or harmonies; the roughness of the collision between instrumental and vocal sounds isn't so much a failing as a roughening designed to highlight what Barthes named "the grain of the voice." Barthes's essay focuses on operatic baritones, and on the demystification of a perfected tonality that essentially dehumanizes the voice itself. What we hear in Kirk's tone is just the opposite, almost all grain. Breath, vocal cords, even musculature seem to sound across the mouthpiece of his flute, and because of the close-miking what we hear is the impact of air and lip on the surface of the microphone itself. As his solo continues, Kirk refrains from letting the flute sound, retracting his breath rather than blowing into the opening. Instead, a audible set of grunts, as he sings with his mouth nearly closed, along with the clicking of his fingertips on the flute's pads, creates a species of musical mime, a refusal that sounds as music. The notes, held back in this way, become nearly pure percussion, rhythm without melodic content: we hear, in other words, the liminal background noise of the performance — the clicks and thuds of body and breath against metal that are usually covered over by the proper sounding of the instrument — now brought to the aural foreground. We hear the grain of his voice, as the voice holds itself contingently in abeyance; the grain, Barthes writes, is "the materiality of the body speaking its mother tongue" (182). "The grain," he asserts, "is the body in the voice as it sings, the hand as it writes, the limb as it performs" (188). But there is more to this idea than a temporary reification of sound mechanics in Kirk's solo; within seconds, the tension caused by holding back his breath leads to an explosion of sound, a slurry of spittle, ululation, laughter and unmusical noise into the flute. Kirk clearly loses control at this point in the solo, and as he works to find a tonality again, he starts speaking — well, cursing — into the flute. Here, not just sound but extramusical commentary enters into the performance; when we hear him stutter "god damn da da you [unclear swearing]" into his instrument, we also hear his struggle to reformulate his playing on the fly, and to acknowledge his failure to keep his music on track, in line with his intention. But that failure, importantly, also is his music at that moment: it's still integrated into the solo, which never loses momentum, despite itself. Importantly, along with this collision of performance and commentary is a simultaneity of language and music, a simultaneity that Barthes (again, in a rather different musical context) suggests is the outcome of attending to "the grain of the voice, when the latter is in a dual posture, a dual production — of language and of music" (181). That grain, however, is better understood as friction than cohesion, "the very friction between the music and something else, which something else is the particular language (and nowise the message)" (185). Barthes posits a new kind of criticism that becomes immanent to the object or performance that draws its attention, that catches its ear: the engaged listener doesn't decode a message from the musical performance so much as experience, in this duality of word and sound, a rethinking of the structures of message-making themselves.
This doubling is what (via Rahsaan) "word jazz" is all about. This kind of critical practice, in as much as its calls for a newness, still depends on the delivery of a message, however, but it is not a content in the common sense of meaning or message. What listening to this music delivers, its message, is essentially a pedagogy, a mode of apprehension that wants to be learned, and relearned, rather than unquestioningly or casually regarded. You have to hear it, rather than just listening to it; you have to listen instead of merely hearing it. Such imperatives cling to this music, and form the core of what it not only invites but even requires from its audience. On his 1963 album Mingus Plays Piano, the bassist and composer Charles Mingus has a brief tune entitled "Roland Kirk's Message." (Kirk had played with the Mingus's group that recorded Oh Yeah the previous year, with Mingus also on piano instead of bass.) One of my own responses to Kirk's music was published in Descant in 1995, and takes up this idea of content, of message in the music, pace Barthes. It's called "Rahsaan Roland Kirk's Message," and it goes something like this:
Forget the word-jazz; tell it like it is.
Most people sleepwalk through their custard lives,
then waste what little snatch of breath remains
trying to talk their way out of waking up:
volunteered slavery. The world wears its chains
like a badge of honour. Nobody gives
a damn about nobody else. Who says
the blind'll see? Darkness fills my cup.
Somebody tell me why. Charles Mingus said,
"Maybe someday they'll hear," but I doubt it.
The black and crazy blues pass on. We have
to bear the cross before the cross bears us.
The poem (I need to admit) is a tissue of quotations and intertexts from Kirk — including the titles of several of his compositions, as well as a modified line from his "word jazz" version of "The Old Rugged Cross," which forms the last sentence of the poem. The lightly inflected African American idiom isn't and can't ever be mine, but remains an off-kilter ventriloquy of Kirk's voice. This is my attempt, in a far more muted and formally constrained manner, to do something like what he did to Coltrane: not imitation, but tribute. The effort, as I know it, involves finding an answerable style; not trying to sound black, for example, but to collide my sense of my own subject position with Kirk's to produce a tension between idioms, positions, languages. That tension, for me, also manifests itself as a refusal — again, ventriloquized through my imaginary, reconstructed Rahsaan — to accept the idiom in which the poem, as quotation, tries to cast itself; the call to forget the word-jazz, that is, is actually an instance, perhaps as best as I can contingently muster, of word jazz. The imperatives, miming Dorn or Kirk, also belie the demand for honesty, a demand that characterizes the canon of Kirk's music and its interpretation quite thoroughly. An honest speech would, in at least one sense, be an embodied language that inheres in the grain of the voice, into which meaning collapses and from which it emerges as an undifferentiated manifestation of aural plenitude, as fullness. However, such a poem, as a demand, can never lay claim to any such completion. It opens a space, perhaps, but can never fill it, depending instead — whether as invitation or imperative — on the co-presence of another listener, to inhabit that gap.
One last note: the original publication of this poem carried an unattributed epigraph that I want to explain. When my friend first got The Vibration Continues, he played the Coltrane medley for a guy he knew, a trombone player from the school band. (Again, unlike me, he had paid attention during home room announcements.) After the trackfinished, my friend asked his buddy what he thought. "Well," came the response, "I guess he made a few mistakes." "Mistakes?" my friend said. "Man, that's perfection." The imperative, and even a certain elitism, in this statement sticks with me. Some people — well, all of us, really — have to learn how to listen, and listening — if anything can be said to be absolute about it, as an act — requires a renovation of expectations, and a willingness to open oneself to the possibilities of sound or text that isn't necessarily cleaned up, even, rectified or fixed. "Perfection," in this sense, names a phenomenology that is neither passively acquiescent nor egocentrically overbearing, but that seeks out a openings in structures of attention where self and other are held, contingently, in tension, as the technologies of making meaning, of meaning itself, are both produced and interrogated.
Ex Tempore
A quick post ad hoc from my mobile to initiate things. One of the research streams from the Improvisation, Community and Social Practice research initiative is called "improvisation and pedagogy." A symposium on music education was held at the University of Guelph a couple of weeks ago that affirms a general tendency in this research stream to focus on improvised music, particularly jazz, as a model for education, particularly around practice-based research. Other significant threads want to develop community, collective and even networked paradigms for learning and for knowledge-sharing around the kinds of work done by the AACM in Chicago beginning in the mid-1960s. (See George Lewis's A Power Stronger Than Itself.) My own interests, particularly as a pedagogically-untrained academic, involve assessing and exploring the implications of using both musical and theatrical improvisational techniques in the classroom. What are the cultural politics and the ethics around importing such aesthetic practices into an educational setting? How can improvisation be theorized as a pedagogical practice? More to come.