Errors-To: et-admin at blackcat dot demon dot co dot uk Reply-To: et at cs dot man dot ac dot uk Sender: et at cs dot man dot ac dot uk Precedence: bulk From: et at cs dot man dot ac dot uk To: et at cs dot man dot ac dot uk Subject: Elephant Talk Digest #348 E L E P H A N T T A L K The Internet newsletter for Robert Fripp and King Crimson enthusiasts Number 348 Tuesday, 11 February 1997 Today's Topics: SPECIAL ISSUE Replies from ETers to Robert Fripp's post in ET#328 (part twelve) ------------------ A D M I N I S T R I V I A --------------------- POSTS: Please send all posts to et at cs dot man dot ac dot uk TO UNSUBCRIBE, OR TO CHANGE ADDRESS: Send a message with a body of HELP to et-admin at blackcat dot demon dot co dot uk, or use the DIY list machine at http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/aig/staff/toby/et/list/ ETWEB: http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/aig/staff/toby/et/ (partial mirror at http://members.aol.com/etmirror/) THE ET TEAM: Toby Howard (Moderator), Dan Kirkdorffer (Webmeister) Mike Dickson (List Admin), and a cast of thousands. The views expressed herein are those of the individual authors. ET is produced using John Relph's Digest 3.0 package. ------------------ A I V I R T S I N I M D A --------------------- Date: Wed, 5 Feb 97 14:14:15 EDT From: "Pooh Head Bucket?" Subject: Late response to RF... i) What is the nature of the relationship between the audience / enthusiast / fan and the musician? a)we buy/don't buy what you release and are affected/are not affected by it. ii) What are the rights of the audience / enthusiast / fan? a)anything we wish, up to... iii) What are the responsibilities and obligations of the audience / enthusiast / fan? a)...NOT PHYSICALLY HURTING the musicians. iv) What do you personally, as an audient / enthusiast / fan expect of your artists? a)live until you die. release music when you decide to. v) What do you personally, as a KC-RF audient / enthusiast / fan expect of Robert Fripp? a) see IV. No more, no less. Anything above this is just a big fat bonus. We like your bonuses, Mr. Fripp. Tom. Tom Soriano * sorianot at alpha dot montclair dot edu ------------------------------------------ "It's a typical day on the road to Utopia" ------------------------------ From: Robin Davis Subject: Robert Fripp's Questions Date: Wed, 5 Feb 1997 12:33:02 -0700 I was catching up on ET backlog, I was delighted to see Robert Fripp's first, and subsequent letters. It has prompted me to come out of lurking mode and actively participate. I hope Robert keeps an interest in what goes on here. Like many here, I've been an avid collector of Crimson/Fripp for many years. All of the KC records have their special place in my worldview. When I listen to them now, not only do they still amaze me, but they often return me to that time and place of my life when I first got into that album. I also treasure and am forever amazed by the touch of Fripp. >From Eno's Another Green World to the 'The Grid's 'Evolver', Robert has shown me great taste in who he chooses to work with. Most of my feelings on the questions have already been expressed, so I will try to be brief. i) What is the nature of the relationship between the audience/enthusiast/fan and the musician? In rare occasions the relationship is more than producer/consumer. Lot's of recordings have had an effect of my life, but I would call that a relationship with the music and not the musician. There are those a rare few bands/musicians that join with an audience to create something above and beyond the usual. That was the main magic that Grateful Dead created. Beyond many Dead shows. I've experienced it with Shriekback, U2(before arenas and stadiums), and Fishbone among others. Crimson seems to me to provide that "challenge me" rapport in a live setting with their audience. ii) What are the rights of the audience/enthusiast/fan? The right to like/dislike output. iii) What are the responsibilities and obligations of the audience/enthusiast/fan? Courtesy to the artist and the other audience members. If you go, give the artist the opportunity to do their thing and the persons around you their space to participate. iv) What do you personally, as an audient/enthusiast/fan expect of your artists? Expectations of anyone can often lead to disappointment. About the only expectation I have of an artist is to be on time, and to perform for a reasonable amount of time (at least 90min?) for a headliner. What I respect and like is another thing. Integrity and effort to provide something unique is what sets an artist apart from the norm. I like to be surprised and don't particularly like a simple live rehash of the record. v) What do you personally, as a KC-RF audient/enthusiast/fan expect of Robert Fripp? I expect RF to keep doing his thing, or "pursuing his aim" as I think he put it. So far I've not been disappointed. I truly respect RF because it seems integrity in his product and commitment to his principles are very important. What I would like is for RF/KC to keep "pushing the envelope" in their future releases, keep putting out those "official bootlegs", and keep dropping those smokin' solos on other artist's work. If it's not too much to ask, play in Colorado Springs again. That was an amazing show (from the 2nd row) even if it was a small crowd. An RF soundscape performance in my basement would be cool. Feel free to bring the rest of the band if you want. We'll provide refreshments. That's more than enough for an initial post. Thanks to Toby and crew for all of the good work. RD ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Feb 1997 17:39:30 -0500 (EST) From: Scott Bukofsky Subject: Reply to Robert Well, there have now been seven special editions of ET devoted to responses to Robert Fripp. At the beginning, I read the posts with amusement; ET readers are indeed in love with their own verbiage. As the responses continued from a river to a veritable torrent, I began to get annoyed. Am I the only one who thinks that it is a bit bizaare for Robert to be posting here, and for us to answer to him? When I play a King Crimson record at home, I do not expect RF to appear magically and demand questions of me. I believe the same is true in an open forum of fans, as we have here in ET. Robert, obviously we are all great lovers of your music, or we wouldn't bother to contribute to this forum. However, should we decide to undertake a discussion, even if it is a bit silly like the "Fripp's 'tude" posts, that is our right. In the end, all of this is just verbal masturbation, and doesn't amount to much. You don't have to explain yourself to us, and the same is true in reverse. You'll have to ponder the deep answers to your questions from someone else. Scott Bukofsky ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 06 Feb 1997 06:49:05 -0600 From: medtek at ghg dot net (Sandra J. Prow) Subject: My $0.02 to RF's questions. > i) What is the nature of the relationship between the audience / enthusiast > / fan and the musician? They are part of the system that IS music. Music requires someone to create it, and someone to receive it. You taught me that. > ii) What are the rights of the audience / enthusiast / fan? Rights? Perhaps I have the right to expect the musician'(s) best effort, but perhaps that isn't true either. I do not think my rights have been violated if you are unable to put forth your best effort because of say, an inappropriate atmosphere (noisy, disruptive, etc) > iii) What are the responsibilities and obligations of the audience / enthusiast / fan? To provide an appropriate atmosphere for the creation of music. > iv) What do you personally, as an audient / enthusiast / fan expect of your > artists? Always the unexpected, like the baseball bat you slugged me over the head with in New Orleans. If my answers seem short or flippant, it's because a lot of things have already been said. This is what I have to add to the discussion. Mr. Fripp may be interested to know that the entire Johnson Space Center Clinical Lab has adopted many Guitar Craft ideals in our work, as much as we can without my actually having attended Guitar Craft (yet), but being an avid student to the extent that I can. So among the Guitar Craft "uses," you may perhaps list Medical Laboratory Craft. (or perhaps Sharp Needle Impaling and Chemical Analysis Craft) Sandra ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 06 Feb 1997 21:13:10 -0500 From: Edward Banatt Subject: The Robert Fripp quiz. >3. Would ET readers be kind enough to consider, and respond, to these questions: >i) What is the nature of the relationship between the audience / enthusiast / fan and the musician? The relationship between the audience and the musician is fairly symbiotic, each bringing something to the table (communication) that benefits the other. That the audience member benefits more is questionable, many times I've enjoyed being a band member more than having been an audience member. >ii) What are the rights of the audience / enthusiast / fan? The audience member is entitled to the ticket stub, the seat for the length of the performance, and to an opinion. The desire of an audience member to want to take the communication to the next logical step, direct one-on-one verbal close encounter, is not a right. >iii) What are the responsibilities and obligations of the audience / enthusiast / fan? The audience member is obligated to respect the other members of the audience, and the wishes of the artist. >iv) What do you personally, as an audient / enthusiast / fan expect of your artists? I expect any artist to be true to art. >v) What do you personally, as a KC-RF audient / enthusiast / fan expect of Robert Fripp? I do not consider Mr. Fripp bound to any "artistic vision" contract. I do look forward to what is next. Edward Banatt Fairlawn, NJ ebanatt at internexus dot net http://www.wp.com/EBANATT/ ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 07 Feb 1997 11:56:22 -0500 From: WILLIAM BANATT F Subject: replies and questions for Mr. Fripp This is a multi-part message in MIME format. --------------167E2781446B Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Dear Team, Robert Fripp refers to ETers as a "Team". This implies that we have an aim. So, what is our aim? Well, first, who are _we_? The first thing that comes to mind is that we share a common humanity. Then, answering the question "What is our aim?" is the same as answering the question "What is our goal as human beings?" That's a tough one. Maybe in part it is to overcome our prejudices and egos, allowing ourselves to enter into a mutually beneficial relationship with each other. What better way to do this than through music? I has often struck me that my ideas don't translate well into English. Also, I have heard ideas communicated to me in no more a single note...ideas that I don't think reams of books could ever say. It seems to me that any language, whether it be musical, gestural, natural, mathematical, or otherwise, any language has its particular strengths and weaknesses. Music seems to straddle the fine line between meaninglessness and meaning. Or some crap like that. Here is my best shot at answering Mr. Fripp's questions in English: i) What is the nature of the relationship between the audience / enthusiast / fan and the musician? The audient must remove the expectations placed on the musician. The musician must remove expectations placed on him or her. The word "symbiotic" seems a popular choice to describe this. The audient and musician don't necessarily enter into a relationship with each other, but they do enter a very personal relationship with _music_. So many things can sour a relationship between people. This alternative seems cleaner to me. One can always come back to music as if for the first time. Over the 'Net, the relationship between audient and musician is more personal. It is one of _communication_. Different rights and obligations apply to the people. It is a different time, place, and person. It is potentially all times, places, and persons to come. ii) What are the rights of the audience / enthusiast / fan? Well, I recognize that the audient is a human, and has rights and obligations as a human. Or do they? That's a tough one. Either they have none at all, or far too many to list. I will assume that Mr. Fripp, by writing "rights", and "responsibilities and obligations", means those rights, responsibilities and obligations that apply _beacuse of their role as audient_. ii) What are the rights of the audience / enthusiast / fan? To remove expectations from the music and musician. To sacrifice what we think we want from a performance for what we _need_. iii) What are the responsibilities and obligations of the audience / enthusiast / fan? Our rights and obligations are the same. iv) What do you personally, as an audient / enthusiast / fan expect of your artists? I expect my artists to be true to art. Part of this is being entertained. I expect the music to speak to me in a way of which I cannot speak. v) What do you personally, as a KC-RF audient / enthusiast / fan expect of Robert Fripp? All that I expect from my artists. And possibly more. I recognize that because Robert Fripp is a particular artist, or at least a particular guitarist, that I harbor certain expectations of him. I'd be surprised if King Crimson released an album of tonal music next year. I'd be surprised if, in a performance, Fripp were to jump off his chair, stick out his tongue as far as possible, and the stage were to explode with flying sparks. If something called upon Fripp to make this a reality, I hope he wouldn't hesitate. But I doubt it. :) Would Robert Fripp be kind enough to consider, and respond, to these questions: i) I have noticed that sometimes you refer to yourself in the third person, and sometimes in the first. You have also said that very little in your life is arbitrary. Why do you sometimes refer to yourself in the third person? Does it help you to see yourself from the outside? Is your choice of self-reference governed by time, place, and person? If so, how? ii) Your use of contradiction is understandable, but not really. In ET #328 you write "My own feelings towards this public are intimate, yet utterly impersonal. And sometimes personal." Please explain. How are your feelings personal? How are they impersonal? Many thanks to the Team for recent feedback and quality of discussion. ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 9 Feb 1997 19:19:36 -0500 (EST) From: BPolley at aol dot com Subject: Re: Robert's recent epistles Hi, 'rest of the team'. ;-) Robert Fripp has brought up many thought-provoking issues in his recent posts here. I'd like to share my reply to two of them. (1) The performer in public > What was formerly a personal exchange is now a global exchange in > public. Simply, "personal" moments now have a potentially public and > global effect. (I don't recall seeing this addresed in ET before). > > Question: knowing this, do you think a performer might modify their > behaviour in close encounters of the enthusiast kind? If so, how? IMO, there are two separate issues here. One is the setting down in archival form of exchanges that used to be informal and undocumented. Converting the aural to the written encourages recollection, analysis, and detachment. (To say nothing of pedantry; my teachers would not abide matching the singular 'performer' with the plural 'their' ;-) In simple terms, this means you're on stage all the time, as soon as you leave your home. This applies to everyone, at least in the USA, where you're rarely out of sight of a security camera, and your nose-picking may end up as laugh fodder on a tabloid TV show. Either the performer modifies his behaviour by avoiding backstage exchanges outside of the home, or he does not and accepts that anything said in such exchanges is not 'private' by any reasonable definition. The other issue is the collapse of global into local. There are many strategies that can be used to manage this - some silly, some less so. -> E-talkers develop secret hand signs, T-shirts, etc., and the performers entertain the Net-indoctrinated directly, in person. -> The performers create a separate channel to share what they choose that might not be part of live performances but which illuminates in retrospect. Examples include Tony Levin's Web diary pages and Robert Fripp's use of liner notes. -> The performers create public personae that feed media-space so that it chokes on the volume. Horrible stories about Mr. Fripp's conduct in the presence of some wired one (or, better, FAMOUS wired one) turn out to have been posted by Mr. Fripp under another guise. -> The performers alter their own media-space to protect privacy. Nothing new here - just like unlisted telephone numbers. (I'm not using my 'real' email address to send this, but an address known mainly to junk mailers.) -> The performers retreat and ignore media-space the best they can. No interviews except as needed to push product, no backstage guests except paid security, etc. Warren Zevon's lyric comes to mind ('I wanna live on the Upper East Side/And never go out in the street'), and this is no different from any reclusive strategy. (2) Live performances, bootlegs, and photography > If we try to capture the moment, the moment escapes us. This is a > key principle. When we are present in the moment, our experience of time > changes. Then, our experience of the event changes. Then, the event itself > changes in response to us. Then something changes in us in response to the > event. That's take-off. Then, we wonder that life is not like this all the > time! How we could not live like this always! Then, we fall to earth. Then, > we wonder how we can get back to Paradise again. > If we are not in the present, we can't direct the future. This commentary on live performance and the 'pain' caused the act of documenting it - photography, bootlegs, etc. - is still trawling around in my brain. (I won't flog the bootlegs-are-evil beast here, and of course, if a performer explicitly states a desire that taping should not occur, that wish should be respected.) I think I understand the perspective. As an enthusiast, I find that these audio documents have a wonderful life in themselves, ESPECIALLY for those not witness to the music it documents. Is listening to the wonderful Miles Davis Plugged Nickel live set the same as being there at the recording? Of course not, but the criteria I use for evaluating the CD listening experience are totally different. The 'experience of time' does in fact change if I am engaged with the live audio artifact, and I can 'direct the future' in the way that matters to me most: as a musically sustained animal. I can reach greater mindfulness through this experience, with no direct link to the performer. Had I been there in person, who knows, it have been a complete waste. (Sometimes the live-tape is more moving than the actual music it documents. Sometimes the live-tape is worthless except as background noise.) It's a little more subtle with tapes of shows I've actually attended, as the memory of the event and the (substantially false) representation of the event on tape interfere with one another. Why must I choose between a love letter and a hot date? Those are fine indeed, but so are: reimagining past love affairs, watching dirty movies, walking in the woods with my love, sharing a bottle of wine, etc. The marvels of sound likewise aren't limited to 'records' and 'live shows'. I will say one more thing on the subject of bootlegs: Grateful Dead market live shows to their enthusiasts, directly. The pressure for stellar sound, playing, and packaging is far less under that scenario - the 'regular' releases available in shops are much more 'professional' for the general marketplace... the enthusiasts are forgiving, as they know what to expect up front. I understand the estate of Thelonius Monk will do the same shortly. DGM can have my credit card number anytime. ;-) My 2c for the afternoon. It's been a joy to read the digests lately. Thanks, all. >>b ------------------------------ End of Elephant-Talk Digest #348 ********************************