ISAN
007
OPINION
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THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN WWW.KANSAN.COM MONDAY, NOVEMBER 5, 2007 PAGE 5A
Cohen: Remebering Professor Wallace Johnson.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Lawrence full of talented musicians
PAGE 5A
A recent column titled, "Made up names alone do not make the band" posed the question. "Is it good to support something that is just plain bad?" I'd like to delve a little further into that issue.
First off, there are indeed many sub-par musicians in Lawrence. I should know; as a former member of KJHK's Live Events staff, I spent five hours, three years in a row wading through complete crap to find eight talented groups to compete in KJHK's local music competition. Many of these bands were awful; vocalists crying "like prepubescents" and dancing in banana outfits, threatening to devastate your auditory system. For every one of those bands, there was at least one local talent that I was thrilled to support.
Lawrence has been the home to many talented groups, including the Anniversary, Ad Astra Per Aspera, Ghosty, Danny Pound Band, the Embarrassments, The Get Up Kids (technically from Kansas City) and Kelly Hunt. Even the drummer from Flaming Lips lives here (or at least he did), so if you're generous the Flaming Lips might qualify as semi-local (and if you're being super generous, you could even include Charlie Parker). These bands are all first-rate, not just in my opinion, but in the opinion of national music critics like Pitchfork Media and the College Music Journal.
I think it's fair to assume that these bands prospered because of the immense support they received from the Lawrence community. I also think that local music shouldn't necessarily be designated a genre so much as it should be a call to the artist community to lend its support. Calling these bands "local" doesn't mean they all sound the same; it means that Lawrence is proud to be such an artistic community.
I fear that people misunderstand what it means to support local music. No, I do not financially support every band in Douglas County by purchasing every three-song EP they record in their garage. My idea of support is to stand behind
people who want to pursue their dreams, whether it means I give a dollar to someone playing on the street, call a radio station to request a song or applaud an opening band.
If people think that knowing three guitar chords qualifies them to lead a band, I say, "Go for it!" Think about it—for every Picasso, there are a million so-called "artists" attempting to sell their finger paintings. For every Michael Jordan, there are a million mediocre basketball players attempting to dunk with their tongues wagging. And for every Keith Moon, there are a million drummers with no sense of rhythm. There is nothing wrong with that. Music lovers should be open to anyone with a desire to create music, because eventually they will get that gem. As Freddie Mercury once said, "Talent will out, my dear!"
And consider this. Many beloved rock idols supported each other "locally" as they developed their music styles playing in coffee houses and bars. Before he was a Beatle, John Lennon played in a skiffle band in
small pubs. If no one had supported him at the local level, he may not have met Paul McCartery and George Harrison and the Beatles might never have existed. Robert Johnson, the Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan certainly struggled before they became legends. Local support was necessary for these talents to flourish.
Just as no one should listen to local music simply because it is local, no one should listen to The Who and Coltrane simply because they are legends. Whether you start listening to a different radio station, borrow some of your friends' CDs, scour the Internet for new music reviews or attend more concerts (with local as well as national acts), you should make an effort to discover new things. You should support music in general because it is an important part of contemporary culture and always make an effort to expand your tastes.
Laura Watkins
2006 Lenexa Graduate
Administrative Associate,
University Honors Program
Lawrence's music scene is alive and well.
It's something I've heard a lot: "Local music sucks." And Friday's article, "Made up names alone do not make the band" continued to fan the unfortunate flame against all things Lawrence, at least musically. As someone who works to promote Lawrence's unique crop of talented musicians and its powerhouse media outlets, I have to say, I disagree.
In 2005, The New York Times' Seth Sherwood wrote about spending "36 Hours in Lawrence, Kansas." He suggested that the proper Saturday night be spent with the wealth of influential local music pouring out of any given venue.
"It may only be rock 'n' roll, but Ghosty, the Appleseed Cast, the New Amsterdam and other
young bands are playing it with such virtuosity that Lawrence is now perhaps the most vital music scene between Chicago and Denver." Sherwood wrote. So are these bands, you ask?
A nostalgic tour a few years back and a brief search on Lawrence.com yields answers. In the 1990s, Lawrence welcomed musical fame from rock and roll frontrunner The Get Up Kids, and they enjoyed the success of "hundreds of thousands of album sales" and tour appearances with Weezer and Green Day. The Anniversary, a former band whose members now find themselves active in countless other local projects, lists touring with Dashboard Confessional and Ben Kweller as achievements. Another local outfit, The Belles, found huge success in Europe, including music videos featured on MTV Italy. Their single "Omerta" can be heard
on an episode of "Dawson's Creek," and "Disarmed" was featured on an episode of "One Tree Hill."
While recording their album "Grow Up or Sleep In," Ghosty enjoyed a surprise visit from Wayne Coyne of the Flaming Lips. The result was a guest vocal appearance by Coyne, and Ghosty returned the favor by assisting on the Lips' "A Change at Christmas (Say It Ain't So)" track. They've been featured in Entertainment Weekly, and you can catch them playing in the area regularly. Doris Henson toured with Billy Corgan of the Smashing Pumpkins. Other stellar local bands include White Whale, Minus Story, Split Lip Rayfield, Kill Creek, the Esoteric, Ad Astra Per Aspera, White Flight and countless others this letter is too short to contain. And I haven't even touched the local hip hop scene.
To say that, "the problem with supporting local music is that, quite simply, most of it is awful" is a gross oversight of what Lawrence has. Yes, it takes time and dedication to sift through the menagerie of self-proclaimed musicians Lawrence harbors, but it's not impossible, and the benefits are rewarding. Luckily, there are outlets to help you. Lawrence.com features a current local show listing and an impressive database of mp3s and bios, and 90.7 KJHK hosts a radio program, Plow the Fields (Saturdays 4 to 6 p.m.), devoted entirely to local music.
You can have your Stravinsky and Coltrane with a side of Ghosty and Whie Whale, too.
Jenny Kratz
2007 Lawrence graduate
DRAWING BOARD
GARDENING TIPS
Policy for evacuation based on political correctness, not logic Natural disasters are inevitable, but continually rebuilding vulnerable cities smacks of stupidity
BRANDONT. MINSTER
Ever since Hurricane Katrina decimated New Orleans in 2005
New Orleans in 2005, the crisis has been inseparably tied to race. New Orleans is more than two-thirds black, while the nation as a whole is less than one-seventh black. The enormity of the event and the perceived failure of government response has led to criticism such as that by Kanye West, who famously declared on live television, "George Bush doesn't care about black people."
Expanding the question beyond personalities and racial groups, we can ask, "Do government officials care about New Orleans residents?" In the final analysis, elected leaders have been forced into policies which harm the people of New Orleans by the fear of appearing racially insensitive.
When a destroyed city is overwhelmingly white, there is little variation in the response. The Love Canal neighborhood of Niagara Falls, N.Y., was evacuated and demolished for fear of toxic waste contamination which has not been conclusively proven. Instead of waiting for confirmation, the federal government spent nearly $400 million to "clean" a questionably contaminated site.
The mostly-Caucasian Times Beach, Mo., was evacuated, purchased and destroyed in a move than some health experts now question as unnecessary. After spending $37 million on a project now called a mistake by former officials, the site is now a state park commemorating Route 66.
A city in northern Pennsylvania called Centralia has been sitting atop an underground coal fire for more than 40 years. In the mid-1980s the predominantly white city was evacuated and property was purchased under imminent domain laws.
It seems safe to say that, if you are white and your city is threatened by contamination or destruction (or even threatened by threatening), you will be forced to move. New Orleans, however, has made a point of pride of demanding the federal government spend taxpayer money to allow the rebuilding of a waterfront town that is more than 50 percent below sea level.
If this seems like a recipe for disaster, it is. Two weeks ago New Orleans experienced heavy rainfall that led to flooding in many neighborhoods. But as long as water continues to roll downhill (which, as of press time this morning, was still the case), New Orleans will continue to flood.
How many times must New Orleans be flooded before it's no longer rebuilt? Instead of rebuilding, the city must be replaced, either physically (having residents move to safer areas) or functionally (designing a city that can withstand the laws of nature).
A color-blind response would be evacuation, like what happened in previous cases. But because policy cannot be divorced from race, the easiest way to avoid charges of racism is to promote "solutions" that disproportionately hurt a single minority group. In the old days that would be called "racism," but these days that's just called "compassion."
But again, practicality has met its match in the form of racial consideration. In Love Canal, Times Beach and Centralia were all predominantly white areas, New Orleans (and especially the lowest region) has mostly black residents. This takes government policy from the realm of disaster response and makes it a de facto racial response. This is the apparent logic behind Kanye West's criticism, and this is the reason that the unfortunate people of New Orleans are being allowed to set themselves up for further tragedy.
Minster is a Lawrence senior in economics.
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We are ranked #5 in the AP!
White Owl is my hero!
I almost got tired of hearing the fight song yesterday. Almost. It actually played through my head all night last night. Who knew it was possible to score that much?
All in favor of making the Free for All a part of Blackboard?
White Owl was Interviewed on FSN during the game. How awesome is that?
We have so much alcohol in our room, geez.
I can't wait for Touchdown Tuesday!
We won! We won! We won!
76 on the Huskers? Somebody pinch me, so I know it wasn't a dream. Preferably an attractive, single female
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MAX RINKEL
That guy from Nebraska doing the Souja Boy and Heisman pose was awesome. He should transfer.
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The Editorial Board
Erick R. Schmidt, Eric Jorgensen, Darla Silipke, Kelsey Haysen, Bryan Dykman, Brandon T. Minater, Angelique McNaughton and Benjamin R. Smith
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