16.41
The event of the day: Martha Belew is 31 today (according to daughter Leah) and cake has been eaten.
Rising at 05.40, morning reading Peter Hitchens' A Brief History Of Crime: The Decline of Order, Justice and Liberty in England (Atlantic Books 2003).
A morning conversation with Martha & Ade regarding the future of the world and our part in it. Several calls re: G3, future plans for DGM music licensing, Sister & the Little Luvvie.
Practising and moving onto the time zone.
18.42 From the Knews Guestbook --
Albemuth
Posted: Wed Mar 03, 2004 4:53 pm
Post subject: The Clueless of Dr. Chromatic
I don't understand why Fripp, once again, has returned to the Mr. Clueless of Budapest issue.
RF: One, purely practical, reason is to close a file that's been open on my computer for months. I addressed Mr. C's post last year but a hard-drive crash lost that reply. Since then, engaging positive and forward-looking concerns have taken precedence over putting Mr. C & the Eurotour 2003 to bed. Sebastien's recent well-meaning post from Chile (in his GC Diary) inviting my return, with Crimson, to the (subjective) joylessness of conventional touring, particularly in territories where business practices are particularly idiosyncratic, has brought me back to the subject.
So, overall, this represents a form of personal closure to the Eurotour while assessing, digesting & accepting its repercussions & implications.
Mr. Clueless demonstrated, albeit unwittingly, the difficulty of the working player aspiring to do more than play by numbers. Mr. C comments that he would have done better to go to the Lou Reed show. The fundamental difference in our positions is this: Mr. Clueless believes he attended the King Crimson performance & my view is he wasn't there.
I suspect that the majority of KC fans behave well or well enough at the shows, even by Fripp's standards. But a vocal minority do a great deal of damage.
RF: You only need one prick in a balloon.
Why engage these people?
RF: To discuss & debate standards of public behaviour where conventional norms & forms of manners, politeness & courtesy have been forgotten, lost and/or not learned; to agree a consensual basis for audience/performer relations in the performance context.
Is there any hope of changing them?
RF: Mr. C is not likely to participate in reasoned debate. But, for example, posters to KNews do engage. There is currently less of the angry venting that characterized postings on this subject 5-10 years ago. Realistically, this is a mid to long-term discussion. For example, 10 years ago it was SOP for major labels to own artists' phonographic copyrights; today, it is widely accepted that this is inequitable. Copyright ownership is another subject of ongoing debate where the internet has widened the debating chamber.
I'm not sure that "changing them" is a useful aim. And who am I to say "they" are wrong? What I am able to determine are conditions where my performance is significantly & adversely affected by audience behaviour, and address the mechanics & repercussions of that; based on the experience of almost 44 years of ongoing public & private performance.
Although a reasonable person might despair, hope is unreasonable.
I don't see any other option but to ignore them as best as one can.
RF: This is not an option. I don't walk onstage to ignore the audience but to engage with them. If ignoring the audience is a necessity, better do something else.
We can differentiate between the effects on the performer of passive-clueless, where the energy can be shaped; and active-clueless, which is a block of inert energy that has to be forcefully addressed: sculpted, smashed, side-stepped, shipped elsewhere - and that's only four approaches.
Either that or stop touring.
RF: If those are the only two options, then there's no option.
scorched earth
Posted: Thu Mar 04, 2004 2:39 pm
Post subject: Re: The Clueless of Dr. Chromatic
rogadaire wrote: The point easily missed about our Mr C is that here is a person who did NOT, apparently, take photos, make an illicit recording or holler at inappropriate moments, and I am not sure that his remarks can be construed as supporting those who did (or do). Those responsible for actual 'violations' are probably less inclined to share their thoughts in on-line music forums...
True, but when RF discusses these violations he often focuses not just on the acts themselves, but the "intent" behind the act. What Mr. C shares with the people who take photos, etc. is a mental state which is less than ideal for appreciating and contributing to the event.
Mr. C was not present at the Crimson performance, while submitting a review in the belief that he was. This does not make him a bad man, simply a Mr. Clueless. In a performance context, this makes Mr. C dangerous - he sticks a pin in the balloon while unaware that there is a balloon, that he holds a pin, and that he is poking the balloon with the pin. This is dangerous.
lotus spray
Posted: Thu Mar 04, 2004 3:08 pm
Post subject:
A hopeless basement dweller who was resolute in his cluelessness might be tempted to ask such a question as this,
"Isn't a discipline that makes you so sensitive to the thoughts of a person you've never seen or met, even though present in the same physical space (say in the back of the crowd at a gig), that these thoughts can compromise (or "violate") your performance ultimately self-defeating?"
RF: The quick answer is, no. The longer answer is, one finds a better quality of problem.
My four criteria for professional work, applied over many years, have been these:
Can I learn from this?
Is this serving a useful social aim (however we might understand that)?
Can I earn a living doing this?
Is this fun?
Applying these criteria to the Budapest performance in general, and Mr. Clueless in particular --
1. Can I learn from this?
Live performance (and in a wider context, the life of a working player) has provided me a superb liberal education for many years. Where the same fundamental lesson continues to present itself, one's understanding of it deepens. Nevertheless, there comes a time when one judges that a better quality of problem waits to be addressed.
2. Is this serving a useful social aim?
For my generation, there was no doubt that music (and specifically rock music) could "change the world" for the better; and listening to music, was itself, a significant contribution. There was a spirit of the time, a zeitgeist, and a passion. So the answer, historically, is yes.
But the spirit has moved. Music remains available, but subtleties are involved - are we available to music? - and these subtleties are vulnerable to gross action. Conventional rock performance is now increasingly a business operation & audients claim consumer rights. Where the communion between music, performer & audience?
Overall, my current answer is I don't know.
3. Can I earn a living doing this?
Yes, a working player's living, but significantly less income than if I were to treat music as a business; and not enough to recompense the violation & damage that the family Clueless inflict on the performance event; the disruption to personal (and wider business) lives; and the working conditions of the touring player.
4. Is this fun?
No. Lightness & a sense of play are essential components to having fun. Perhaps read Mr. Clueless again, feel him, and ask: is this a man I'd like to play with?
An alternative approach might be to ask the question: does this work give me satisfaction? despite conditions & difficulties that I don't like?
It doesn't matter very much to me that many situations surrounding the life of the professional working player are less than ideal, providing there is a sense of satisfaction in the work. Satisfaction is an innate recognition of value. Musical satisfaction makes up for much of the grief. If most performances were alive (as in Mexico City) we wouldn't be having this posting-exchange.
A personal discipline confers the capacity to hold oneself in front of situations one finds personally uncomfortable, perhaps dislikes (or likes), and are experienced as difficult; while continuing to function honourably. We are not asked to persist in situations that are damaging & harmful.
There is a difference, then, between holding ourselves in front of the "right" situation, that we experience subjectively as hard; and the "wrong" situation that, objectively, does us damage. How to distinguish between the two? The cultivation of discrimination.
A discipline does enable us to be present in a "wrong" situation, but we are not asked to continue beyond what we can honourably bear: that is, to allow ourselves to be damaged is stupid; and being unable to discriminate between the two situations is ignorance.
Crimson touring last year damaged me, for various reasons. I learnt from it, although many of the lessons were repeat offenders. I am unable to judge whether it had an overriding social value. I was not paid well enough for an unsatisfactory day job. It was not fun.
