1) The Teenager Takes Over From The Adolescent

First we read from scrolls, like the ones found in Khirbet Qumran near the Dead Sea. Then we got the codex: instead of unrolling and scanning, we began thumbing through, flipping, slamming shut. About 1500 years later, Gutenberg (re)invented moveable type. His printing press eventually led to photocopiers, which gets us pretty close to the 1970s and our first home computers. Next we had the Internet. Thanks parchment and paper, thanks Mr. Postman, we’ll take it from here.

And so we’re back to scrolling and scanning. Our words are not printed, they’re displayed. The new scroll is a screen. We can’t turn the page; we can only go to the next or return. We do not read from the beginning; we start in the middle, we mine for information, we search and seek by way of invisible algorithms; we get what we need and we move on: we click through — and in an instant, one scroll is replaced by another.

CBC TV, “Marshall McLuhan On The Global Village” (May, 1960)

“Look, uh, let’s back up just a bit Marshall.” Why the hell did these old TV presenters feel the need to perform their befuddlement, and in such a smarmy, cartoonish way? And what’s that floppy-lipped expression Marshall McLuhan keeps pulling? Is he drunk?

In any case, safe to say computers and the Internet are changing the way we think and read — and yes, authorship and context are getting harder to determine, narrative is being lost. Got that. So is it the end of the codex, the end of the printed book?

No, it’s not, lets’s just say.

E-books? This is what literary man Harold Bloom has to say on that topic: “Imagine that for the last five hundred years we had nothing but e-books, and then there was some great technological advance that brought us the printed and bound book. We would all be ecstatic. We would be celebrating after the long horror of the e-book.”

2) Look I’m On A Teaching Machine!

If an appliance store was the symbol of the age in 1960, today it’s the iPhone. Switch the channel from prophetic Marshall McLuhan to long-haired, sandal-wearing Steve Jobs, major player in our recent leap into the digital age. Here he is in an early TV appearance, as wowed by it all as the next man.

Steve Jobs, “Early Television Appearance” (1978)

3) The Mozarts Of Digital Design

We spend hours a day gazing into “our new gadgets,” glowing in their blue light. Who is responsible for this? A small group of men from a very modern tribe, and this is their story, told by tribal member Robert X. Cringley, back in 1996.

OPB, “Bob Cringley: Triumph of the Nerds” 1/3 (1996)

4) This 50-Pound Machine Will Help Us Do It

When that first Apple II came out (33:22), IBM was busy selling its IBM 5100. For $19,975, you could get it with both BASIC and APL, as well as 64kB of storage.

MrClassicAds1970s, “IBM 5100” (1977)

5) Give The Prize To The Inventor Exploiter

IBM would have to do better. Apple was stealing market share. People wanted personal computers. The suits at IBM sought out a few well-reputed young nerds to help them make a mass-market personal computer (6:50 onwards). They needed an operating system. The best candidate was Gary Kildall, inventor of CP/M. Don’t recognize the name? Heard of Tim Paterson? They are the relative unfortunates in this part of the story. The winners, you know them all too well.

OPB, “Bob Cringley: Triumph of the Nerds” 2/3 (1996)

6) All The Way To The “Much-Hyped Information Highway”

“You want to sell sugar water for the rest of your life, or do you want to come with me and change the world?” Here comes the part of the story where Steve Jobs discovers the Xerox Alto (7:10), which inspires him to create Macintosh, which leads to more of that changing the world stuff.

OPB, “Bob Cringley: Triumph of the Nerds” 3/3 (1996)

Windows 95, “the biggest, noisiest product launch in the history of the personal computer” (1:48)? Mr. Cringley, you’d better check out Steve Ballmer pulling a Matt Foley at this Microsoft Annual Conference.

Also, what was that? “Apple is now a fading force in the PC marketplace (48:20).” Ha ha! How times have changed since Cringley made his documentary! Once Steve Jobs was restored to Apple as CEO, he got busy developing the iBook, the iMac, and then the iPod, along with close companion, iTunes. Jackpot!

7) Design Is The Fundamental Soul Of A Man-Made Creation

In the mid-nineties, Microsoft was on top of the world, with a clear vision of what portability and cyber networks would mean for the computer industry. “At the centre,” said Bill Gates in 1995, “will be the idea of digital convergence, that is, taking all the information — books, art, movies — and being able to provide them on demand on what the PC will evolve into.” Here is what the PC would evolve into.

Steve Jobs, “iPhone Keynote: Part 1/2” (2007)

Steve Ballmer laughed about the iPhone, and was skeptical about the potential of iPads and other tablets, but turning concept into good design has been Apple’s strength. This is what Steve Jobs said about design: “In most people’s vocabularies, design means veneer. It’s interior decorating. It’s the fabric of the curtains and the sofa. But to me, nothing could be further from the meaning of design. Design is the fundamental soul of a man-made creation that ends up expressing itself in successive outer layers of the product or service.”

8) Mac Vs PC

As Apple Inc. returned to profitability with a series of successful computers, PC loyalists liked to imply that Macs were merely entertaining toys, and that real work could only be accomplished on a good old PC (scam=macs backwards). In answer to this charge, Apple aired a series of “Get a Mac” commercials, with John Hodgman as the uptight, bumbling PC and Justin Long as cool, reliable Mac (Give a listen to John Hodgman in Act One of “This American Life: 329” — 8:08 — discussing his sudden PC Guy fame, it’s hilarious).

In reality, both systems have their shortcomings, as this YouTuber makes abundantly clear with his clever “Get a Mac” parody (though it must be said, his conclusion is lacking in nuance).

JeremyMess, “Computers Suck” (2007)

9) No Longer The Youngest Guys In The Room

That passionate brand rivalry has been fuelled by the big boys themselves. Both of them made snarky remarks over the years — Steve Jobs especially (as we saw in Cringley’s documentary — Part 3: 39:58, ouch!) — despite the interdependence of their two companies. Here’s the real Mac Guy and the real PC Guy, sitting side by side and being friendly with each other. As Steve Jobs points out, “PC Guy’s what makes it all work.”

“Steve Jobs & Bill Gates Together: Part 3″ (2007)

Call them egomaniacal blowhards, ruthless capitalists, lucky bastards, or prophetic geniuses, Steve Jobs and Bill Gates are the two guys who did most to make us into people who are — as Marshall McLuhan quaintly put it — “with it.”

10) Your Gut, Destiny, Karma, Life, Whatever

Steve Jobs passed away in 2011 after battling cancer for eight years. The video tribute that would have most pleased him, the one most fitting to his character and style — it uses the soundtrack of an old “Think Different” Mac commercial — is this one, made by Ken Segall, presumably with the help of iMovie.

Ken Segall, “Steve Jobs Tribute” (October, 2011)

Steve Jobs, you put a ding in the universe. RIP.

John G. Avildsen, “The Karate Kid Trailer” (1984)

In trying to describe how deeply affecting “The Karate Kid” was for me as a young boy, I come up short. Yes, it’s now an obvious cable-TV Sunday afternoon snoozer, a mainstream by-the-numbers whatever. But in its time, “The Karate Kid” demolished the universe as I understood it and refashioned it anew. In the world of Daniel LaRusso, wimps blossomed into heroes, obsessives found redemption, blonde bullies were humiliated, and eccentric role models provided arcane gateways into unexpected enlightenment.

I first saw “The Karate Kid” on a rainy night in a tiny theatre in the town of New Glasgow, Nova Scotia, accompanied by my older sister and a few other kids around our age. The film was rated PG-13, so we did what was apparently then a common trick of soliciting a random adult on the sidewalk to pose as our parent. Thinking back, that was a weird scenario, though one we and this anonymous adult then apparently took as par for the course. But those were different times.

John G. Avildsen, “Mr. Miyagi Lesson 1: Wax On, Wax Off” (1984)

And in the way that time operates differently when you are young, the movie itself seemed ten hours long and massively epic in all respects. And at the movie’s finale, the entire audience of about maybe three dozen rose and applauded. Yes, in a bumpkin town in Scotia on a soggy weeknight, we cheered in earnest as credits rolled the names of humans we were never to meet, never know. Those were different times.

Recently I was made aware of a strange artifact: an alternate version of the film, pretty much in its entirety, as recreated via videotaped (oh, videotape! then so new and modern!) footage of rehearsals, test scenes, etc. put together by its creators, presumably overseen by some production assistant, likely un/underpaid:

John G. Avildsen, “Karate Kid Rehearsal Movie: Pt. 1” (1983)

To view something so embedded in one’s consciousness, its narrative brought to life in the misty strains of nostalgia and gilded youth, yet in this version completely different — reconfigured both in style and delivery, a parallel universe — is to flirt with the uncanny. It’s the revisionism of popular culture approaching the level of trauma. It’s also compelling from a strictly cinephilic standpoint: viewing the scrappy makings of what would emerge as a pretty slick movie, with some memorable and irony-free performances by hard-working, cool young actors in a story that bludgeons every possible resonance without ever quite wading too deep into the maudlin or hokey. For me today, an adult both harder and softer, the “rehearsal version” is actually, in some distanced ways, a more pleasurable watch than the “real” movie.

John G. Avildsen, “Karate Kid Rehearsal Movie: Pt. 13” (1983)

And it’s sort of a mindfuck if you’re a fan. But that’s what makes the vast and ruthless cataloguing reach of the internet, and YouTube in particular, so wonderful and alluring — and, often, kind of upsetting: knowing even more about the things that have made you know what you know.

I sincerely hope kids today don’t take their culture, their “things,” for granted — that, even glutted with the greatnesses of convenience and digital glitz, they remain capable of being swept away in the enjoyment of things as fiercely as us kids so devotedly adored a thing like “The Karate Kid.” Wax on, you kids.

- Rob Benvie

1.

Oh Debbie.

joset0xp, “eHarmony I Love Cats” (July 4, 2011)

This particular video has by now made the rounds, again and again and again and again (so much so that the original has been edited and re-edited so many times that it’s been lost — the only intact version of the original video I could find is this Spanish-subtitled one). It’s even been debunked, with the garish enthusiasm endemic to hammy network-affiliate soft-news reporters. But I’m less interested in this video as a documentary, and more as a document; a text, in lit-crit-ese.

Let’s pretend. Let’s suspend disbelief and pretend that this is an actual dating profile, that sweet, Villanova MBA grad Debbie wants to find love, and is making that hesitant step on to the field of hot coals that is online romance.

The mind reels. This video is a cannonade of red flags, a 21-gun salute to dysfunction, a fireworks display of emotional messiness. Completely incredulous as I am of hysteria as an actual condition (especially when applied to a woman), I might make an exception here: Debbie is so unhinged by her love of cats that she can’t help but weep; her ever-escalating emotional reaction fuels a headlong charge into an increasingly absurd fantasy land of cat-romping (bow ties? baskets?? rainbows?!?). If this is how this woman deals with cats, how on earth would she navigate the volcanic terrain of love? If just thinking about cats debilitates her utterly, what would the knotty complexities of physical and emotional intimacy with another person do to her?

2.

[NOTE: For the love of God, stop the video at 1:59]

shmoyoho, “SONGIFY THIS: Can’t Hug Every Cat” (July 7, 2011)

This song has been running through my brain on a loop for the past week. I’ve even tried to sound it out on the piano. It’s garnered 13 million hits thus far, so I’m clearly not the only one.

I’m just going to say it: it’s a really good song, pathologically catchy. And, like all good songs, the more I listen to it, the deeper are its resonances. So, in an effort to get it out of my brain, I’m going to conduct a close reading. Ahem.

A talking intro: “This is my first attempt at an eHarmony video. I’m nervous, but I’m excited at the same time. So I’m just going to start talking about what I like.” There is the sound of a tape reel looping up, and at the word “excited” a delay echo kicks in alongside the opening chords.

I love cats
I love every kind of cat
I just want to hug all of them
But I can’t
Can’t hug every cat

It begins with a declaration of love: specific, but what is more, all-encompassing. She loves “every,” not “any.” This isn’t the indiscriminate promiscuity of “any”; her love is large, but focused. And as soon as she declares the depth and generosity of her feeling, she is met with limitation: she wants to hug all, but she can’t hug every. Note the repetition of “every”: she loves every, she can’t hug every; it becomes both a signifier of generous largesse, and of the cruel pragmatics of unattainability.

So anyway
I am a cat lover and I love to run
I’m sorry I’m thinking about cats again
I really love cats
I’m thinking about cats again
And again and again and again and again

Here, the overarching theme presents itself. “I love to run”: this conjures forward momentum, linear progress. And then the object of her love asserts itself, and she is derailed. This song is about derailment, interruption, stutter. Just as her love trips her physical running, it attenuates her cognitive running. She is lost in a loop of emotion, and can’t move forward: she thinks about her love “again/ and again and again and again and again.”

I think about how many don’t have a home
And how I should have them
I think about how cute they are
And how their ears
And the whiskers and the nose

“How many don’t have a home”: her love is ubiquitous, wandering, homeless. She thinks about her love’s homelessness, and she thinks about her entitlement: she should have her love. No wonder she can’t run — simply going outside, she sees her love everywhere, and, like some cruel punishment of Greek myth, the very thing she loves escapes her by its surfeit, flaunting its beauty and desirability — ears, whiskers, nose — as it remains unattainable.

I just love them
And I want them
And I want them in a basket
And I want little bow ties

I just love them
And I want them
To be on a rainbow
And in my bed
And I just want us to roll around

She escapes into dream, an Edenic fantasy where her and her love can finally be consummated. Surrounded by the fetishistic trappings of her lust (baskets and bow ties), the fulfillment of their mutual desire (rolling around in her bed) vaults them into heaven, on a rainbow. And finally, as a tragic postscript, the theme of interruption is reiterated before launching into the final chorus. Even her fantasy is ruptured: in the midst of her heavenly reverie, achieving orgasm in a spectrum of refracted light, reality asserts itself and she wakes; she brings herself coldly back to earth, forcing herself to recontextualize her feelings in apology as outsized, unfitting and unbecoming.

Sorry, I’m getting emotional.

- Sholem Krishtalka

1) The New Year, Because We Expect So Much Of You!

Whatever we write or speak or are but seen
We are ever unapparent. What we are
Cannot be transfused into word or book.
Our soul from us is infinitely far.
However much we give our thoughts the will
To make our soul with arts of self-show stored,
Our hearts are incommunicable still.
In what we show ourselves we are ignored.
The abyss from soul to soul cannot be bridged
By any skill of thought or trick for seeing.
Unto our very selves we are abridged
When we would utter to our thought our being.
We are our dreams of ourselves, souls by gleams,
And each to each other dreams of others’ dreams.

— Fernando Pessoa, “Sonnet 1″ from “English Poems” (1918)

2) A Tentative Question In Advance

Nancy Wilson, “New Year’s Eve?” (Z Deschanel, JG-Levitt, 2011) — thx S MacLachlan

3) Dressed Jazz Casual, Countdown To Midnight

The Dave Brubeck Quartet, “Take Five” (1961)

4) Dreams Of Ourselves Dancing

WHZGUD2, “DREAMER|DUBSTEP” (Dec 2011)

5) Singing Auld Lang Syne, Think Ragtime

TheWhiteHat, “Auld Lang Syne: Ragtime Fingerstyle Guitar” (Dec 2011)

6) But Before Any Hasty Resolutions…

George Steiner, “Force Yourself Down Those Stairs” (”Beauty & Consolation,” 2008)

Good luck everybody! Lots of love from Ryeberg!

Long before anyone understood the bacterial provenance of consumption, ancient Greeks described the fecundity it seemed to visit on sufferers as spes pthisica (the disease was then known as pthisis, from the Greek phthiō, to waste, decay and spes from the Latin for hope, expectation). The idea that the wasting disease proffered artistic fertility persisted well into the twentieth century, and it was hard to argue with the evidence: consumptives through the ages have been prolific and their art enduring. Among others, the disease claimed the lives of Katherine Mansfield, Anton Chekhov, Molière, John Keats, Emily Brontë, Franz Kafka, Amedeo Modigliani, and Frédéric Chopin.

Valentina Igoshina, “Chopin’s Prelude Op. 28, No. 15” (2007)

It’s not so surprising, maybe, that a mortal imperative fueled the fires of creation. Chekhov was known to exclaim ‘Time is short!’ incessantly. But there were also the languid periods of enforced inactivity in the sanatorium, the almost endless supply of time for unhurried reading and introspection, and the utter absence of domestic or altruistic burdens. Artists who created while sequestered by the disease include Charlotte Brontë, Jane Austen, Albert Camus, Eugene O’Neill, Paul Gaugin, and Igor Stravinsky. “You must not say disease,” argued Roland Barthes, whose long periods in sanatoriums had a profound influence on his work. “You must say tuberculosis, because at the time TB was a veritable mode of life, a way of being — almost a choice.” It was the perfect incubator.

Waverly, “Waverly Hills TB Hospital” (1931)

Eking out time to create in a post-sanatorium world intolerant of idleness (consider the impatience for Sidney Crosby’s return to the ice, when even one more serious blow to his head could render him vegetative or dead) makes this kind of stasis an object of desire.

Longing for solitude, we fashion sanatoriums of the mind: we retreat physically, wall ourselves off emotionally, turn off the ringer and the modem, not for respite or peace or avoidance but for the brooding that yields to hatching. It’s the human equivalent of fallow, the benign neglect that restores fertility, the state of openness that can happen only in the absence of interaction, the drawing of the bow to compel the arrow’s flight. It’s the practice for dying, the rehearsal that brings life ever closer.

John Cage, “4’33″” (1952)

- Christine Fischer Guy

1) No Need To Hang Your Stockings

TheYahsInitiative, “Miracle On 42nd Street” (December 2011)

Oh yeah! That’s Alex Karigan and Zac Hammer — members of the Amy Marshall Dance Company — giving the gift of dance, with a whole lot more exuberance and joy than we could possibly ask for.

2) Give The Unexpected This Christmas

Woody Allen, from “Take The Money And Run” (1969)

3) Warm Brand New Fleece, World Peace

There’s a lot of hype about Santa Claus this time of year, but as liberal as he is with the gifts, he can be a rude, unappreciative guest, even when visiting his biggest fans.

Amy & Amy Show, “Christmas Cheer with Amy and Amy” (December, 2011)

4) That Anger Not Tear Us Apart

Christmas and Chanukkah overlap this year. During a holiday concert back in 1988, Peter, Paul & Mary performed their wonderful song about the significance of lighting candles. Don’t let the light go out, let it shine through our love and our tears…

Peter, Paul, & Mary, “Light One Candle” (Holiday Concert, 1988)

5) Light Your White Candles

Rudolf Ryberg’s countrymen light a lot of candles around this time of the year. In fact, Swedes are well into the holiday spirit by December 13th — St. Lucia’s Day — when children dress up as angels and star boys and sing carols, most notably a beautiful old Neapolitan song. Of course, the Swedish lyrics are not about the beauty around Naples; they talk about candles in the house, about light taking the place of darkness, and about Saint Lucia, saint of light, clad in white (Saint Lucy, remember, is the pious young Sicilian who the Romans — under Emperor Diocletian — were unable to kill by burning, and so had to resort to the sword).

Lucia Tradition, “Sankta Lucia Sweden”

If you’re the lucky girl, you play Lucia and and wear the big crown made from Lingonberry branches and rounded with white candles. Then everyone drinks coffee and eats Pepparkakor (gingerbread cookies) and Lussekatter (saffron-flavored buns with raisins), provided there is butter available. Eventually the teenagers spill into the darkness in their virginal costumes to get drunk and find other, more potent pleasures.

Here’s a poem — a jul budskap — written by that brilliant Swedish writer, Stig Dagerman, in 1950. If there is freedom, it is in our brothers’ eyes.

Don’t believe in stars. Stars are distant things,
that don’t dispel the darkness over any Bethlehem.
They were not lit for us. They burn for themselves.
For people, eyes shine bright. Let us follow them.

Don’t believe in angels. They are merely prisoners,
dragging their wings as shackles of lead.
If there is freedom, it is in our brothers’ eyes.
If freedom sings, the song will be heard in our blood.

Ryeberg wishes you much happiness in the final moments of 2011. Get yourself a big hug!

[NOTE: It has been pointed out below that, in fact, Tommy is the creation of Norwegian actor/comedian/singer Bjornar Loberg. As much as I wish it were not the case, as much as I wish that there really were some crazy desperate overly-tanned gay Norwegian kid full of lip gloss and furious indignation over the fact that he can't get enough butter to make his pussycat cakes, it's true; it's a fake. There were certain incontrovertible tells: the jump cuts? With all that obvious editing, one can't help think of what got left out; and of course, what gets left in becomes deeply conspicuous. It remains an hilarious clip, and Loberg is some kind of character-actor genius, but still: the thrill is gone, gone away for good, and I can't help but lament the fact that all of the world's eccentricities seem to be flattening out into sitcom vehicles.]

Usually, I like to assemble a bunch of related videos for Ryeberg posts; I like to curate group shows, if you will. But sometimes, solo shows are called for; this video popped up on my Facebook feed the other day. I have since watched this about four times daily, and I have yet to tire of it.

I can’t tell whether or not this video is a fake, or a put-on. I spent a bit of time trying to figure it out. I have watched some of Tommy’s other videos: they’re mainly zany, home-spun little things, webisodes narrating some kind of silly melodrama or other. And they’re obviously intentionally zany and silly, which puts the score at 1-0 in favour of a put-on.

On the other hand, this is his first, and thus far only, English-language outing. And while his other videos are comical and absurd, they’re not knowing. I find them short, if not on self-awareness, then certainly irony. They seem to me to be genuine attempts to manufacture himself as a “singer, famous bloggers, and celebrities.” Which makes me think that this video is his genuine attempt at getting something off his chest, spurred on by the notion that, in fact, people want to know what he has to say. 1-all, sincerity vs skit.

I have stopped trying to figure it out, and decided that the tiebreaker is my desire for this to be genuine. Which leaves us with the question of what exactly is going on here. Nothing kills a joke, intentional or not, like trying to interpret it, so let’s just stick to the facts, shall we? Let’s just communally savour this, moment by moment.

Super Tommy Life, “A Butter Message to the USA!” (December 14, 2011)

“Hi. My name is Tommy. I’m a singer, and a celebrities, and a famerse – famous bloggers from Norway.”

Already, too much in the most thrilling way; I’m already hyperventilating: the vermilion tan, the pink lip gloss (which will make a cameo appearance — product placement? — later on), the dusting of pink eyeshadow, the Rachel haircut, the low-cut space galaxy tie-dye tee.

“Some of you may know that we have a butter crise in Norway right now, which basically means that we can’t get any butter from the store.”

Jump-cut. Call me brutally insensitive, but every time he iterates butter (“bah-ddurr”), my heart leaps.

“But I have noticed that some of your comedians in.. uummm.. Am… USA are making fun of the fact that we don’t have any butter products. Uummmm… wh… aah… then I wanna ask you this: what if it was you that didn’t have any butter? What if I came home to you and took your butter from your fridj-fridjyate-fidjyater and took your butter away from you… on any oth… on any other day?”

Head-shake. Yeah. Your tiny minds have just been blown, America. In your callousness, did you think yourselves immune? Only now, in Tommy’s sass-wake, did you even entertain the apocalyptic consequences of this reversal of fortune! Jump-cut.

“Yes, and uhhh let’s not shove it under the mat, we all know that American people are pretty overweight.”

Oooh snap. He is reading you America. The library is now open.

“How would you feel? What about your sweet potatoes and your sss… ssss… sour… cream and your ssh… psshhh… shtocking [inaudible] then?”

Tommy, you’re losing me. Jump-cut.

“Do you know what this is? This is a traditional box of Norwegian butter. Let’s look inside [No, Tommy, not inside the box! Don’t force me to watch!]. It’s hardly empty. Do you know what’s approaching?! Christmas is appoach-approach-approaching. How do you think we feel? Do you know what the national Christmas cake in Norway is? [Bitter laugh of incredulity at the universe’s cruel, random injustice] It’s something called Lussekatter — “pussycats” in English [you’re not helping, Tommy]. Do you know what the main ingredients in Lussekatter is?! BUTTER.”

Jump-cut.

“Do you think this is enough for all the Christmas cakes that I was gonna make in… uh… Christmas? NO. So FUCK YOU Americaaaaaan… sss… dw… w… pp… people. Because you don’t know how it feels being without butter in Christmastime.”

Jump-cut. This is getting to Chris Crocker-levels of emotional fury.

“And I ask again, what if it was you [exasperated laugh] who didn’t have butter? Would you go ask the neighbour? Oh no that’s right, the neighbour doesn’t have butter, either, NOBODY in the whole wide fucking country has butter!”

Bitter laugh of pyrrhic victory. Forelock swipe. Jump-cut.

“I will come to your house. I will go to your freshyator, your fridj-frech-frishiater, I will take your butter out of your fridge, I will EAT the butter in front of you and your family’s eyes! And I force you to watch me while I eat all your butter that you were gonna have on Christmas eve… ning! You will beg and cry and say ‘NO, DON’T EAT ALL OUR BUTTER, WE NEED FOR CHRISTMAS,’ I will say ‘HA HA NOT MY PROBLEM!’ [head- and shoulder-shake of devastating sass] and take the empty bottle and throw it on the… sss… zzz… stairway. I will go home!”

Is he tearing up? This is how far he’s willing to go to prove a point: he will serve you with Godfather-style revenge realness. More than anything else though, this summons a mental image of a skinny bronzed twink gleefully, ravenously downing stick after stick of butter like a vengeful Karen Finley performance, his face a slicked mess of butter and pink lip gloss, while a suburban American family of four looks on in confused consternation.

“And by the way, for all you Danish people [a war on two fronts!] what if we came and take all your red, disgusting saushdidge, shausidge? [the great Norwegian sausage pillage of 2011!]

Self-satisfied exhale. Don’t hold on to that anger Tommy, it’ll give you premature wrinkles and other signs of eating you from inside out.

“I don’t mean to be violent, I just have to paint it out so you understand. It is not very nice. We are a country in need… and this is the thank. Thank you very much.”

You’re welcome Tommy. You’re so welcome.

- Sholem Krishtalka

1) Why Is This What Democracy Looks Like?

n9productions, “Occupy Wall Street” (October 5, 2011)

Why are those people meditating together? What are they thinking about? Why does the grey-haired man in the pink collar shirt seem so sure of what he’s saying? Why does the grey-haired man in the blue collar shirt call that person a monkey? Why does the guy with the pencil behind his ear seem so sure of what he’s saying? Why doesnt he seem to be satisfied with the status quo, like those guys in the collar shirts? Why are thousands of people parading through the street chanting: We are the 99%? What does that mean? Why are so many of them carrying cameras? Why aren’t they smashing the window fronts at Starbucks? Why is the Hollywood star justifying his presence in the street? What does he mean by a place of love? Why is that crowd of people repeating everything that bald guy says? Why did the bald guy choose to get those tattoos on his arms? What’s he got in that tall coffee cup? Why are those people in the crowd shaking their hands in the air, looking like they’re doing a Kecak Monkey Chant?

2) Why Do So Many Have So Much To Say?

thedailycal, “Occupy Berkeley Movement” (October 13, 2011)

Why did the Occupy Wall Street protests of New York spread to California? Why did Occupy protests spread to Denver, Seattle, Vancouver, Toronto, London, Frankfurt, Madrid, Rome, Sydney, Hong Kong, Tokyo, and hundreds of other cities? Why did Abraham Lincoln say that “to sin by silence when they should protest makes cowards of men?” Why do YouTube films about the Occupy Movement almost always make such heavy use of foreground-background focus effects?

3) Why Zombie News Rooms?

CBC, “Chris Hedges Interviewed by Amanda Lang & Kevin O’Leary” (Oct 6, 2011)

Why does Obama feel able to identify the grievances of the Occupiers? Why are those “folks” he mentions resisting efforts to regulate abusive trading and banking practices? Why does Obama make it seem that he’s helpless to influence them? Why does Kevin O’Leary feel no need to disguise his true feelings about the Occupy Movement on national television? Why is he so camp? Why does the Canadian Broadcasting Company think it’s a good idea for Kevin O’Leary to conduct interviews about a movement he so virulently rejects? Why is he so hostile to the Occupy Movement? What is a left-wing nut bar? How does Chris Hedges maintain his composure? Why has he embraced the Occupy Movement? Why does he paint such an apocalyptic portrait of the future?

4) Why So Afraid Of Virginia Woolf?

nationalBAMN, “UniCal Berkeley Protests” (November 10, 2011)

Why have those policemen surrounded the students and teachers? Why do those policemen violently pull that teacher wearing the colourful scarf by her hair when she’s already offered up her wrist? What are detainees being charged with? Where are the police taking them? Why are the protestors chanting Stop being students? Why was the order to disperse the students and teachers given? Who gave the order? Why did the police obey the order? Why didn’t the students and teachers unlink their arms and go home? Why are scenes of police violence so absorbing, so stimulating, so distracting?

5) Why Articulate Our Non-Freedom?

sbgskf, “Slavoj Žižek@OWS--Human Mic Removed” (October 16, 2011)

Why did Slovenian Philosopher, Slavoj Žižek, travel to New York to speak to this crowd of people? What does he want from them? What do they want from him? Why is the human microphone so much fun for people? Why did the uploader of this video remove most of the human microphone from the video? Why is it easier to remember something once you’ve said it aloud? What is written on Žižek’s t-shirt? Why does he say it’s practically impossible to imagine a capitalist system of production and consumption different from the one that exists? Why does he warn the occupiers not to fall in love with themselves? Why does he paint such a hopeful portrait of the future?

6) Why So Civil? Why So Disobedient?

Reuters, “UC Davis Protest & Aftermath” (Nov 21, 2011)

Why are those policemen pepper spraying a line of motionless students in such a deliberate and nonchalant manner, like they’re watering plants? Why do the students sit there and suffer the boiling pain in their eyes? Why did the university ask policemen to remove the students in the first place? Why does the University Chancellor, Linda Katehi, tearfully apologize to the students? Why do the students feel so passionately angry at her for the actions of police? Why does Sophia Kamran feel at ease with standing on an elevated platform and having her fellow students repeat aloud what she says? Why do those students wait outside for hours in order to watch the university chancellor walk to her car? Why do they sit in silence?

7) Why (Not) Panic?

steve13565, “Newt Gingrich Faces The People’s Mic” (Nov 18, 2011)

Why did this man’s parents call him Newton Leroy? Why did he receive enthusiastic applause for suggesting that Occupiers “go get a job right after you take a bath?” Why do these hecklers choose sarcasm to accuse him? Why do they think the human microphone, used ironically, is their strongest attack? Why does someone say, “Get back to your tent?”

8) Why Respect One Another?

insightoutnews, “Occupy LA Eviction: Protesters Removed From City Hall” (Dec 1, 2011)

Why do so many protestors disregard police warnings? Why do demonstrations often resemble carnivals? Why do newly-formed carnival communities soon manifest the same class hierarchies as any other community? Why is it not surprising to see one of the Occupiers playing with a hula hoop? Why does Shane say he has nothing against authority? Why is he not really the king? Why do some of the Occupiers think prayer is going to influence events? Why does Homeland Security appear on this scene? Why does Sam Rosenfeld, the Densus Group chairman, sound a little like an Australian? Why were Fox, NBC, and ABC affiliates the only TV media allowed to cover the eviction? Why is it necessary to have four large cops standing in front of the entrance of City Hall? Why did Benjamin Constant say that “with newspapers, there is sometimes disorder, but that without them there is always slavery?” Why can’t we get this kind of journalism from the mainstream media?

9) Why Occupy?

nationalinformation, “Occupy Plymouth, Devon, UK” (Dec 1, 2011)

Why does the filmmaker use dramatic video-game music to bookend his video? Why did he make this video? Why do these people from Devon think it worthwhile to protest the system? Why do those people in the street show them so much sympathy?

10) Why Does Righteousness Wither Away?

AlexRoss, “Philip Glass@Satyagraha Protest” (Lincoln Center, 2011)

Why have all those people chosen to occupy the Metropolitan Opera during a performance of Philip Glass‘ “Satyagraha?” Why are police ushering the opera-patrons away from the Occupiers? Why do a few of the opera-patrons choose to walk down the stairs and jump the barricades? Why, after making his bows on stage, does Philip Glass go outside and join the Occupiers too? Why does Philip Glass read these lines from the Baghavad-Gita? “When righteousness withers away and evil rules the land, we come into being, age after age, and take visible shape, and move, a man among men, for the protection of good, thrusting back evil and setting virtue on her seat again.” Why?

I first came to know about Leonid Stadnyk a few years ago. A story about him had gone out through the Associated Press, and had been picked up by all kinds of local newspapers. The stories were relatively short, with a description of his life and his troubles, quoting the man himself, often in the headline:

“God is Punishing Me.”

Some of the other headlines read “World’s Tallest Man Says It’s Lonely at the Top”, “Giant Lives Large: Only Fits In With His Plants”, “Ukrainian Giant Keeps No Mirrors In His Home”, and “Too Tall To Be Happy.” One of the stories closed with an anecdote about how some of his neighbors arranged for him to visit a nearby mountain range, so he could see something “even bigger than he was.”

At that time, I would ride the subway to university, or to my job, which was at the university’s archives. I had access to many newspapers and news sources, and spent plenty of my time combing through papers. Every so often a story would strike me as a shiner, either by a few careful turns of phrase, or some intimate personal content. I preferred mundane stories where the main event was a small surprise encountered by the subject. Stadnyk’s story jumped out at me and I felt attached to it immediately. I felt like I was meant to see it. More than one friend even sent it to me, thinking of me when they had read it themselves.

You can see here, Stadnyk in his home and surroundings, trying to use a cell phone, and a few of his simply stated comments about his life.

Diagonal View, “8-Foot Man Is Pretty Unhappy” (2009)

I felt a guilty pang with my interest and pathos. Stadnyk’s story when told entirely free of frills was humbling, and moving, certainly for any reader. Why did I feel an extra sense of purpose about it, what was my problem? I was not a man living in rural Ukraine. My grandmother, now deceased these past three years, who I was very close to for my whole life, came from a family from just outside Kiev, and I identified with her family as my family. Still, that was remote, and more of a pet detail of ancestry. I am a very average-sized person. When I was young though, I was not. I grew to be my full adult height when I was about ten or eleven, 174 cm, and looked like an adult. When I was 13 I bought 19+ concert tickets with no questioning. People thought I was just very immature or dim before they knew my age.

Still, this is nothing. I was never so big that I couldn’t fit into my own surroundings. A pair of pants, maybe. To a man handing out free Super Mario Brothers macaroni and cheese boxes after a kids’ movie at the theatre, saying “under 16 only, under 16 only,” when I was nine years old, not giving me one? Sure. However, the experiences are far from analagous.

If there was a better purpose behind base freak show appeal to the wide distribution of Stadnyk’s story, it would have been to call to attention that he had needs that were not being met. It seems, from the bits of news footage I have seen, that the dispersal of information provided a few balming antidotes here and there. Viktor Yushenko himself presented Stadnyk with a specially augmented car, so he could travel.

Diagonal View, “World’s Tallest Man Gets New Car” (2008)

And here, a special exercise machine, and a bicycle, plus the important data that Yushenko, along with the car, gave him two track suits.

Russia Today, “No Shortage Of Problems For World’s Tallest Man” (2008)

You’ll notice of course, that near the end of this last video, the mention that Stadnyk keeps busy in his garden. There is also mention that he maintained hopes of one day finding a soul mate.

Love is hard for any person. Finding someone to love, who will love you back, feels so rare that when it happens, the sensation created in the mind and body is nothing short of miraculous. Vocabulary defaults to the sublime when we try to talk about the feeling of this occurrence between two people: incredible, amazing, awesome, he or she is one in a million, it feels like walking on air. We talk about immeasurable lengths of time: forever, eternity, always. We talk about a feeling of completeness, and speak in absolutes. That’s pretty big.

I didn’t wish to be Leonid Stadnyk’s woman; I was not so deluded to think that I was his answer. I did wish someone to be, though.

I have  felt a lightly pedantic sadness around readership of his story, too.  Loneliness is universal. We have all the material goods any group of people could want, but lack a sense of community and suffer from widespread loneliness — so says the Dalai Lama, for what that’s worth. Can the Dalai Lama find Leonid Stadnyk a lady? Or anyone, for that matter?

I hesitate to say it because there is something too precious about the parallel, but Stadnyk’s news coverage does roll out like a fable or fairy tale, or old Biblical story: a gentle, sweet person, too big for his world. He states the conditions of his life simply, not complaining that this or that is wrong-sized, but acknowledging that he is the one who does not fit. He is a good man, cares about his family, tends to animals, has a sense of humour, and wants love. Maybe few people say it so plainly. Who doesn’t want that treasured, prized, almost-impossible experience we delegate to the lucky, and foolish, and worthy?

Leonid Stadnyk, too big for his world, wants love: the biggest thing of all.

- Lauren Bride

1) The Vision That Was Planted In Our Brains

Paul Simon, “The Sound Of Silence” @ 9/11 Memorial Service (Sept 11, 2011)

2) As If Its Vast Tides Were A Conscience

Michael Winter, “Humpback Hits Dory” (August, 2011)

3) Humble, Like The Dust

Jerry Thorpe, “The Tao of Kung Fu #6″ (1972)

4) For Merit Itself Is Offensive

Elvis Presley, “Young And Beautiful” (”Jailhouse Rock,” 1957)

5) If Youth Knew, If Age Could

Louis CK, “20 Year-Olds” (2010)

6) I’ll Miss My Sister, Miss My Father, Miss My Dog, And My Home

Yasujiro Ozu, “Late Spring” (1949)

7) Getting Married Isn’t Happiness?

SCTV, “Scenes From An Idiot’s Marriage” (Series 5 Cycle 5, 1984)

8) These Illusions Are All I Take With Me

Peter And The Wolf, “Dear Old Robyn” (Black Cab Sessions, 2008)

9) My God, What Mystery! What Beauty!

Roberto Rossellini, Ingrid Bergman in “Stromboli” (1950)

10) And Still… Time To Pretend

MGMT, “Time To Pretend” (2008)

Amy Winehouse: 14 September 1983 – 23 July 2011

It’s an old story, of course. Countless artists have prematurely ended their lives from various drugs and other abuses, and a few, like Amy Winehouse, give us plenty of warning that they’re headed in that direction. Can any of us really say we were surprised when we heard of her death at 27?

She was booed off the stage almost as often as she was cheered. People who went to see the Ramones or the Pistols probably had the same question in their minds: are we going to get the sloppy version or the transcendent one tonight? But for Winehouse you didn’t have to go to the show to find out. You could see it later on the internet. What’s unusual about her story, as compared to that of Chet Baker, Charlie Parker, Judy Garland, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, Lenny Bruce, or Kurt Cobain, is how much of her personal chaos appeared on stage, and — because we live in the 21st century — on YouTube.

So the first thing I noticed when I came across this series of clips from the singer’s last real concert, in Belgrade on June 18, was how high the quality of the shot is.

Amy Winehouse, “Some Unholy War” (Belgrade, 18 June, 2011)

RustlingRagazza, whoever he or she is, made sure to get a good spot, and brought a good camera – the title of the clip even has “HD” in it (probably for the quality of the camera), though in the context of Youtube I’m not really sure what that means. I imagine it was in the back of RustlingRagazza’s mind that there was a pretty good chance something would be worth filming that night — a comeback, a gaffe, a collapse, something. It makes watching it feel sordid somehow — that we’re not only watching the car crash, but somehow encouraging the kid who sits at the dangerous curve in the road, hoping to see a bloody one.

If you want to see what Winehouse sounds like when she really nails “Some Unholy War,” you can look here.

Amy Winehouse, “Great Performance of Some Unholy War” (2007)

Here she’s everything people were all excited about: a mix of the hyper-modern and the traditional, a new tone in soul. Tattoos and bouffant, little-girl pout and big-girl voice, R&B romance with a bit of ska jump at the end. Notice how she’s completely lost in the song – the eye-rolling here doesn’t seem drug-induced, but a sign of artistic concentration. She hardly moves, but her presence is enormous.

Here’s the middle shot, from September 2008, in London.

Amy Winehouse, “Some Unholy War” (London, September 2008)

I believe that this one is from the same general period as the one above. Here it looks like she’s pulling on a pint glass of wine around 0:12, and her devotion to the effort of getting the liquid into her mouth is noticeable. A little less clear on the lyrics, occasionally a little flat on the notes, but still the power and the showmanship. Her banter afterwards is a bit slurry, but it’s also charming — singing all these downer songs can be “fucking depressing,” and she’s quick on her feet when an audience member tells her she loves her.

Predictably, though, it’s the Belgrade show that has gotten the most viewings. As of this writing, the London show has about 60,000 views, the “Great Performance” around 182,000, and the Belgrade show 546,000. The car-wreck factor must be part of it for most people.

There’s also a weird little narrative. Around 0:41, Winehouse pretends to fall into the arms of backup singer Zalon Thompson — it’s a bit they’ve done before on stage, but she’s so out of it that, at first, poor Thompson doesn’t realize that she’s doing it on purpose and just sets her right again. The filler music ends, the crowd is restless, but she’s trying to make it all a part of the show, telling Thompson that they’ll try the bit again. Around 1:24, she pretends to scold him, “You have to catch me, though. I’m just letting you know, I’m going to fall.” It’s then that she hears the unhappy crowd and makes a “WTF’s the problem?” face. It’s a classic moment when the drunk thinks she’s being the life of the party, not its embarrassment.

When “Some Unholy War” begins, she thinks that she can save it. She hears the intro, she rotates her hips, steps up to the mic, and then… at 1:45, that’s when it comes apart — she doesn’t know the words, or she doesn’t know which song she’s supposed to be singing, and the terribly sad thing is: she’s surprised. She may be the only one who’s surprised. She gets a cue from the bass player, and belts out the first line with some conviction, but then, at 2:06, the rest is gone, and she looks to Thompson completely lost and, for the first time, ashamed.

The gestures that follow: she covers her mouth with her hand, she crosses her elbows in front of her chest, she looks down, pouts, seems almost in tears at 2:58, even petulantly flops her hands to her hips at 3:18 — are the gestures of a misbehaving girl who finally realizes that she can’t sass her way out of her situation. It’s amazing because, for all the artificiality of Amy Winehouse’s performances in other contexts — the unabashed sexiness, the sheer vavoom of her persona, on stage in these moments she reveals herself to be something smaller, more real, less mature, more tragic, than at any other moment in her career. She’s a spoiled girl, she’s a self-indulgent drunk, she doesn’t know how to stop, and everyone, even she, knows it. And there’s nowhere to hide.

She actually comes back for a moment around 4:16, but it’s too late. She seems genuinely upset and completely unsure of what to do with herself. So she just stands there in front of the mic, unable to look at anything else, naked in her damnation.

The one thing she finally manages at the end is the bit with Zalon Thompson. And it gives Winehouse her one moment of pleasure in this entire clip, complete with a relieved, sleepy smile. At last, something she knows completely how to do: fall.

- Adam Sol

One of my favorite things is the celebrity tabloid magazine US Weekly’s feature, “Just Like Us!” in which candid paparazzi shots of whichever latest object of public fixation are splayed luridly across two-page spreads. They’re shown sneezing, pushing grocery carts, blowing their noses, picking gum off of their shoes; all evidence of their banal humanity.

I find this section so hilarious largely because it’s so absurdly obvious: being ubiquitous doesn’t exempt Beyoncé (or whomever) from having a nose or mucosa; of course she needs to expel some of it once in a while!

I have met few celebrities in my time, mostly in silly circumstances (I used to work at a chain bookstore in my hometown of Montreal, and stars would shop there if they were in town). My first instinct upon meeting them was to laugh. Their place was not in front of me, in human dimensions; they’re supposed to be 20 feet tall, on a giant screen. Milla Jovovich was supposed to be dressed in rubber Jean Paul Gaultier suspenders leaping from futuristic buildings, not disheveled and sweaty (but still totally gorgeous, PS) buying $300 worth of dog books from me on a steamy August night.

So, while “They’re Just Like Us!” is objectively absurd, it’s simultaneously astute in this strange way: they have bodies; they have banalities; and how easy it is to forget this as they float – pre-recorded, disembodied, pixellated – across my horizon.

***

The following videos were just made public. They arrived to me via my friend John Webster, who found them via the website of James St James, who found them on YouTube, via soapbxprod, who, according to her YouTube profile, is a documentary filmmaker named Carole. And Carole apparently received an armload of Roddy MacDowall’s silent home movies.

soapbxprod, “JFonda, TWeld, APerkins, RHudson, LBacall, BGazzara” (1965)

The constellations of these stars in the firmament of MacDowall’s beachhouse deck fills me with awe; my mind reels at what possibilities, relationships, conspiracies the various cliques might imply. Lauren Bacall and Rock Hudson! A nude Anthony Perkins (lounged, odalisque) talking to some bald guy, then calling Roddy MacDowall a fucker! Jane Fonda and James Fox! Kibitzing, tanning, eating, swimming, gossiping! (And what kind of high-octane gossip!)

soapbxprod, “Natalie Wood, Paul Newman, Jane Powell” (Malibu, 1965)

(And just think – these are the three- and four-minute snippets that Roddy MacDowall has allowed this woman to have! What exists outside of these margins? My mind reels at the thought of what all these superstar gays – James Fox, Sal Mineo, MacDowall himself, Rock Hudson, Anthony Perkins, together in one house? – got up to with a camera rolling.)

I won’t say much more about these films. Though I enjoy celebrity gossip, I am not a connoisseur. There are people who know far more about them than I do, who would be able to recognize people I don’t. But the main reason I abstain is that there’s little need to comment on them: they are their own commentary.

Among the many things that amuse me about these videos is how these stars react to Roddy’s camera. Here are a houseful of people who make their living by the camera, enacting a career’s worth of lurid, emotional scenarios for it; and what do they do when Roddy turns his attention on them?

soapbxprod, “Labour Day at Rock Hudson’s House” (1965)

They do what anybody does. They make ugly faces and stick out their tongues; they go cross-eyed; they laugh awkwardly. The women strike glamour poses, which intrigues me above all else. When we little people strike glamour poses for candid videos, we imitate the stars; whom on earth or in heaven would Lauren Bacall be imitating when she camps a glamour pose? Herself? When we lounge on a beach, we aspire to the luxuriant technicolour film stills and paparazzi shots in our minds; when Natalie Wood lounges, to whom does she aspire? Who is her reference? These videos are a kind of semiotic collapse: sign and signifier exist in a single iconic vessel. These stars are our aesthetic and cultural touchstones, the ends of our metaphors. And here they are, in their natural habitat, amongst each other, enacting Platonic ideals of glamour and style that they themselves originated.

soapbxprod, “Natalie Wood, Jane Fonda, Hope Lange” (1965)

The circle (both social and semiotic) represented here is so tight, so hermetically self-enclosed; they can be so candid and so relaxed because they are amongst each other. There are no “regular” people for whom they must perform grandeur, or maintain decorum (has Roddy MacDowall betrayed them all, by handing over these snippets to Carole?). It’s like watching a pantheon of deities on their time off. The gods, they’re just like us!

The entire catalogue of videos can be found here. I watched them while eating out of a pint container of ice cream. I suggest you do the same.

- Sholem Krishtalka