In Studio with Ron & Gail Bennington — Papa’s Basement 499
It isn’t often you get to meet your heroes. And, if you do, sometimes the circumstances stink, like Muhammad Ali pounding the shit out of a young, impressionable George Foreman […]
The other day, I was hanging out with my friend Howard watching Office reruns on Netflix. Because I had been drinking since 2pm and I’ve seen every episode of that show at least four times, I nodded off. About 20 minutes later, I awoke to the same suburban bear trap hell I had been trying to escape via the bottle and Howard watching a biography of noted jazz bassist Jaco Pastorius.
I sat through the biography hoping to understand what made Jaco’s playing great. It didn’t happen. After listening to some of Jaco’s music on YouTube later that evening, it dawned on me: I don’t understand one fucking shred of jazz’s appeal.
Don’t get me wrong: There are jazz songs I like. Billie Holiday’s “Gloomy Sunday” sounds like something Morrissey would have sung if he were black, female raging alcoholic (haha, like he doesn’t have that last part covered as an Irishman). I have fond memories of drinking a tankard of Costco wine the size of Aretha Franklin’s left tit to the strains of Dave Brubeck’s “Take Five” because I was such a nerd I could even make drinking in 8th grade uncool. But check out this footage of Jaco Pastorius’s “A Portrait Of Tracy”. Yes, it has a certain appeal because he looks like a Slavic porn star dressed as a samurai for Halloween, but there are times in the video where people, seemingly out of nowhere, lose their minds in applause. WHY?! This happens all the time in jazz music, and it’s more annoying than razor bumps after shaving my bag. All I can come up with is some blonde in the audience is pulling out her tits. Nothing else computes.
I think jazz is forever beyond my comprehension. If you put on a clip of Jimi Hendrix, I may not be his biggest fan, but I can immediately comprehend the guy is a genius. Absolutely nothing like that happens when I hear jazz. It’s like whiskey: Some people take a sip and claim they detect notes mahogany and lilac, while I just taste burning and pray it doesn’t come up on me later that night. Toss on a Misfits cut, and I’m punching the air like a maniac. Start playing Biggie and I’ll nod my head because, as a Caucasian, that’s the only thing I can do and still keep a beat. But God help you if you fire up the Miles Davis. I’ll look at you like I’m a Corgi and you’re trying to explain the significance of the Magna Carta.
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