Friday, January 10, 1969
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
5
The rock hound
Artistic approach
By WILL HARDESTV
An artist may choose one of at least two methods of presenting his art works.
First, the artist may put his work in a medium familiar to his audience. The artist is thereby assured the audience will understand that which is in his artwork. However, the artist may not be able to get all he wants to or has to say in this form and what he does say may not be presented exactly the way he wants it to be.
may not be presented equally. Secondly, the artist may say artistically what he has to say in the way and manner he wants to. This way he is assured of saying what he has to say in exactly the way he sees it and wants it said. However, he runs the risk of not communicating with his audience.
J. Marks and Shipen Lebzelzer chose the latter approach in making their album entitled ROCK AND OTHER FOUR LETTER WORDS on Columbia. What is produced is something which sounds, on first listening, like a horrible mish-mashing of sounds to produce nothing. On subsequent listenings, a pattern slowly emerges and you realize, to quote that famous old TV line, "I think they're trying to tell us something."
"What?" is, of course, the biggest question.
It would appear Marks and Lebzelter are trying to say communication is bad, horrible or non-existent in much of the world today. The titles of the songs tell the basic story. The basies of communications are, of course, words such as rock and "Other Four Letter Words." Marks and Lebzelter quote from Frederic Henry Hedge writing in The Dial, a Transcendental publication, in 1841: "Has this world without me wrought Other substance than my thought? Lives it by my sense alone/ Or by some essence of its own?" "Greatest Hits—Love Your Navel" knocks rock stars as the biggest plastics and phonies of all. They, who have a great chance to communicate, don't. They, and all the rest of us, are living in the "Middle of Nothing."
Side two starts off with "They're Through." This song forecasts a violent revolution in the United States because of the lack of communication. The revolution will happen "Today." The whole "Trouble" is that people are forced to keep asking "Do You Understand What I'm Trying to Say?" "Trouble" also knocks soul singers and soul music as being just as phony and fake as any other form of music or communication. "Poop for Sopranos and Orchestra" is a musical work—the liner says—with "lyrics at random from various sportscasts."
The album finishes with "This Is the Word." The lyrics are words by Woody Guthrie: "I am trying to be a singer singing without a dictionary, and a poet not bound down with shelves of books . . . The word I want to say is easy to say, and yet is the hardest word I've tried to say . . . I will die as quick and as easy as I can to keep this one word living, because it keeps my whole race of people living, working, loving and growing on to know more and feel more. This is the word I want to say."
The whole idea of the album, however, seems to me to have been said better and much more concisely by two of today's most meaningful and articulate musical prophets. "People talking without speaking/ People hearing without listening/ People writing songs/ That voices never shared/ No one dared/ Disturb the sounds of silence."
surface:
Compare ROCK with albums by, for instance, Simon and Garfunkle, and you'll see Marks and Lebzelter are caught in the very trap they seek to avoid.
Lands Role
HOLLYWOOD (UPI) Spanish actor Jose Guardiola landed a featured role in "Hard Contract" with James Coburn on location in Tangier.
For
Plywood, Moulding Plaster,
Shelving Material
Come to
LOGAN-MOORE LUMBER
1011 N. 3rd VI 3-0931
People's Voice, over the last year KU's most active radical group, plans to resume trying to change the "establishment" next semester.
Rick Atkinson, Belleville graduate student and a Voice leader, said the group would probably begin a campaign to end ROTC on the campus and would continue to demand 50 per cent student representation in the University Senate and other University governing groups. Voice has been somewhat inactive after a leadership crisis two months ago.
Voice originated last year as a result of a protest against ROTC and will probably concentrate on that issue again, he said.
Atkinson said although the group was still without formal leadership or structure as a result of the resignation of its coordinating committee at that time, some tentative plans had been made. "Getting something done is the most important thing." he said.
Voice looks at its future
He added that committees would be formed to work on this and other issues, and that such devices as public forums, leaflets and petitions might be used to advance the cause.
Atkinson said less emphasis will be placed on student government. The University Senate Code, which resulted at least partially from Voice actions, is nearing the final action by the University Senate and the student body. Although the code does not follow the recommendations of the minority report, the Voice position, student government is likely to be less of an issue, he said.
Atkinson said the final form of the code would probably not include any Voice recommendations, such as 50 per cent student representation. Voice plans no protest of the code's adoption, though, he said.
Seminar is cancelled
Today's session of the Central American Development seminar has been cancelled.
The seminar, sponsored by the Ford Co-operative Research Program, was scheduled to meet in 203 Bailey Hall from 2:30 until 5:00 p.m.
Speaker Dr. Richard Adams, well-known anthropologist from the University of Texas, will be re-scheduled if possible.
The problems of black students will probably also receive Voice attention, he said. He did not know what form this would take, but said Voice would work with the Black Student Union.
Atkinson said the next Voice meeting will be a rally Tuesday in the Strong Hall Rotunda in support of black students at K-State. He said he would visit Manhattan Sunday and invite student radicals to speak at the rally.
Patronize Kansan Advertisers