Not much to this other than to bemoan the rapid passing of summer. July was beastly, but August has been nice, and I’m looking forward to pleasant weather through October (call me optimistic). Karen’s about to enter her last year at Cleveland Institute of Art, Katy just started her second year at Bowling Green, and Lylah’s now a junior at Beaumont—and working: She got a job at Chocolate Emporium, a kosher confectionery virtually around the corner from our house.

Off Provincetown, Mass. this August—whale watching is great!

Lylah, Karen and Katy: my beautiful household.

Read a great book: Paul Bowles’ The Sheltering Sky. Also reviewed a book of his travel writings for the Boston Globe, and for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, reviewed Driving Home, a collection of essays and memoirs by the fine British writer Jonathan Raban. I’m still reviewing jazz CDs for Jazz Times and a little bit of rock for Hearsay.

Invisible Soul is vexing. I applied for a Creative Workforce Fellowship to the Cuyahoga Partnership for Arts and Culture and will know by Oct. 12 whether I got it. It’s for $20,000, which would help me a lot and pay for some research help. In the meantime, I already have an outline and am gearing up to just plain write the thing, or at least parts of it that I have under my belt. Poring over old newspaper stories and display ads is fascinating; there’s so much oddball, uncovered history here. In the meantime, I have another book out (sort of): WIXY 1260: Pixies, Six-Packs and Supermen. Published by a subsidiary of Kent State University Press, it’s credited thus: “Mike Olszewski & Richard Berg with Carlo Wolff.” Basically, I edited it. It’s fun.

One last item: My first wife contacted me through Facebook. I haven’t seen her/been in contact with her since 1983. Amazing how the lines of your life connect—far more easily than they used to.

On another front, Invisible Soul, the Cleveland soul music book project I’m developing, is moving along. I’m encountering some resistance—some key figures are hard to reach and/or simply don’t want to be—and there might be competition. If there is, I hope it turns into coopetition. Seems I’m treading sensitive waters; meanwhile, I’ll continue to post occasional, Cleveland soul-related stories on ohioauthority.

The book reviews are dwindling, probably because a) newspapers continue to cut back, b) bookstores are dying and c) book publishing is shrinking—or at least morphing. Such change is the reason I want Invisible Soul to be a book, an e-book, a soundtrack, a DVD, and maybe more. Gotta be multimedia these days; it’s the only way to market to a wide audience.

On the home front, Katy got a 4.0 in her first semester at Bowling Green and Lylah won high honors for her academic and artistic work in her sophomore year at Beaumont.

Karen’s working hard on updating her book, “Thick Through the Middle,” as a senior project.

A year from now, Karen will be a Cleveland Institute of Art graduate, armed with a whole new skill set. Reinvention is challenging and continuous.

The heart of the book will be East 105th Street and Euclid Avenue, what we now call University Circle. At the time I’m looking at, 105 was home to a gaggle or bars/entertainment venues where in the late ‘50s you could hear Chuck Berry, Bill Doggett, Johnny “Hammond” Smith and Billie Holiday within the same week. I want to recreate those black-and-white times before the people with the right kind of memories pass. Those people are largely black, and it’s a sensitive project.

So starting in April, I plan to devote more and more time to this. I want it and all its ancillaries—it’s a multimedia era—in stores and online by Christmas 2012. Something big to work toward. It’s exciting. Now if only it would warm up…

The weather sucked. Except for one day when it crept near 50, the temperature in Cleveland has been zero to 30 and there’s been snowfall virtually every day for the past six weeks. That might explain why the Hesitations drew only about 150 despite major publicity.

In any case, the Hesitations were just fine, living proof of the second chance. They recorded for Kapp in the late ‘60s and hit the charts with such tunes as “Soul Superman,” “Born Free” and “The Impossible Dream,” speaking to the rise of black power. Those songs, along with such chestnuts as “Stand By Me” and “Mustang Sally,” still have the power, though whether they relate to today’s young people is a question.

Red becomes the Hesitations

It was great to see and hear a group with harmonies and choreography, a group that plays real instruments and tells real stories through their music. Makes you think getting older pays dividends after all.

Which brings me to my top 10 lists. I wrote one for PazznJop, the annual Village Voice poll of 1,500 critics; it focuses on pop and will join 1,499 others in the Jan. 19 issue. I wrote the other, exclusively on jazz CDs, for Jazz Times, the monthly magazine I contribute to.

PazznJop was tougher. I’m of a generation out of step with a lot of current pop, so I suspect my list reads dated. Jazz is easier, now that I’m in the current of jazz recordings. Anyhow, I’m sharing:

For the Voice:
Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Mojo, Reprise
The National, High Violet, 4AD
The Deadbeat Poets, Circustown, Pop Detective
Tom Jones, Praise & Blame, Island
Roky Erickson, True Love Cast out All Evil, Anti
Kanye West, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, Good Music
Dan Auerbach, Keep It Hid, Nonesuch
Bettye Lavette, Interpretations: The British Rock Songbook, Anti
Taylor Swift, Speak Now, Big Machine
Eminem, Recovery, Aftermath/Interscope

For Jazz Times:
Sarah Manning, Dandelion Clock, Posi-Tone
Rudresh Mahanthappa & Bunky Green, Apex, Pi
Dave Morgan, Way of the Sly Man, Being Time
Danilo Perez, Providencia, Mack Avenue
Nik Baertsch’s Ronin, Llyria, ECM
Metropole Orkest/John Scofield/Vince Mendoza, 54, Emarcy
The Nels Cline Singers, Initiate, Cryptogramophone
Stephan Crump With Rosetta Trio, Reclamation, Sunnyside
Charles Lloyd Quartet, Mirror, ECM
Cassandra Wilson, Silver Pony, Blue Note

I’m depressed about the elections, though oddly confident that Obama will now learn to lead the country, particularly since all the GOP seems wont to do is continue to say no to anything he tries. That’s not a program, and even when it’s hard to discern, Obama has one. So maybe there’s hope.

On the CJO: This was the first time I’d encountered several members of the board since I quit in August over its hiring of a communications person other than me. I don’t like some board members, so encounters were prickly. The show featured Cleveland stars Bob Fraser, guitar; Dominick Farinacci, trumpet; Ernie Krivda, tenor sax; the storied blind organist, Eddie Baccus Sr., rocking the Hammond; Ki Allen, vocals. It was a little lurchy and long, but basically nifty, even communal. Ki—my favorite Cleveland singer for sure—was terrific; Ernie was big-toned and expansive, particularly on “Laura”; the Frase made a lovely pass of intricately chorded variations on “Norwegian Wood”; and the restrained, suspensefully soulful Farinacci turned in a gorgeous “Manha de Carnaval,” from the film “Black Orpheus.” The show didn’t quite sell out, but it felt good. I’m still hostile toward the organization but miss the band.

Tomorrow I travel to Vancouver for a Best Western conference. I’m looking forward to a brief visit to a city that years ago was the stage for the wildest week I’ve ever spent. In 1975, I flew there on recommendation of a sometime girlfriend in Burlington who suggested I stop over there on my way to San Francisco and hook up with two of her friends, Jane and Carla. Did I ever: I spent a wild, stoned week there, enjoying myself immensely, profligately, bawdily. I leave the detail to your imagination.

And on Nov. 16, I’m flying to Tokyo for six days, courtesy of Hilton. I’ll stay at the Conrad at the Shiodome, tour the new Tokyo airport, and inhale as much as I can of a city I’ve always wanted to see. More soon.

The CJO decision continues to weigh on me, and I’m not sure whether I’m going to reconsider it. It left me in a world of hurt, a place I don’t want to occupy and one I’m struggling to pry myself out of. Sorry for the grammar, sorry for the circumspection. It’s a matter of calibrating the proper balance between personal and professional.

As for Katy, it was difficult to leave her so far away in beautiful Colorado, but word is she’s adjusting, though not without challenges. Our trip there en famille was stressful, though Boulder’s very attractive.

Ties do bind. Sometimes they fray. Sometimes they break. The last is when repair becomes the operative word. September will be a month of repair.

Other random thoughts: I’m reviewing/working in/on jazz a lot, writing reviews and features for Jazz Times and doing some marketing work for the Cleveland Jazz Orchestra. I’m also listening to rock again. I love the new Tom Jones CD “Praise and Blame” and Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers’ “Mojo” and am intrigued by The National, a New York group running Bowie circa “Low” through a fuzzadelic blender on “High Violet,” their dourly beautiful new album.

Also must direct you to the blog of my wife, Karen Sandstrom, who has crafted a portrait of me at my summeriest, wearing “jorts.” What a drag it will be to wear long pants again. It’s almost time.

What’s great about her first world credit as Lylah Rose Wolff is she hit it age 15. I didn’t go global until the ‘80s, when I was in my late 30s and writing for Goldmine, a record collectors’ magazine. My wife, the amazing multimedia artist Karen Sandstrom, hit the world in 1995 with a preview of the art that would go into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum in Cleveland. That ran in Art and Antiques.

Lylah’s way ahead of the curve. A whiz at Photoshop, she’s wired for contemporary media. She has a Nikon, she’s beginning to turn her bedroom into a studio, and she’s creative and ready to learn. All she has to do is keep on keeping on with her camera, get over any squeamishness that stands in the way of getting a powerful picture (much is distasteful to my very girly girl) and press her case. It’s a powerful one.

Carr is an ambitious kid. He’s going into ninth grade at University School and spent nearly two years on the project. It’s a little crude, kind of like rock itself, and it’s the “official” Cleveland rock story in that it doesn’t mention anything underground or alternative.

But it has some cool footage, including some very raw AC/DC and a clip featuring Southside Johnny and Bruce Springsteen from an Agora concert. Check them out on YouTube:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Karen and I went to the film festival for the first time in it must be 10 years last week, and didn’t hit a clunker. Here’s what we saw: “The Ape” (Swedish); “House of Branching Love” (Finnish); “A Matter of Size” (Israeli); “Fire in the Heartland” (U.S.); “Desert of Forbidden Art” (U.S.); “Marwencol” (U.S.) Each time we went downtown was more fun. The festival was packed, the standby lines long. Here’s a brief rundown of the flicks:

—“The Ape”: Intellectually fascinating study of paranoia and trauma that never resolved, remaining ambiguous and disturbing. The point of view was riveting.

—“House”: Bawdy, funny sex comedy about tribulations and rewards of marriage. Entertaining as hell and ultimately uplifting. The actor who played Wolfi could be a major star.

—“Fire”: About the May 4, 1970 National Guard shootings at Kent State. Well-documented and profoundly sad, it evoked the politics of the ‘60s with minimum preachiness and suggested there still are stories to uncover about that seminal incident.

—“Matter”: Emotionally my favorite flick, it’s a comedy about four giant misfits in a small Israeli village who channel their creativity into becoming sumo wrestlers. It’s a whole new way of seeing fat, too. A blast.

—“Desert”: A documentary about suppressed Soviet-era Modernist art in a museum in Uzbekistan. Great art, amazing story.

—“Marwencol”: From rural, upstate New York comes this documentary about a guy beaten nearly senseless whose “recovery” consists of creating a World War II-inspired community in his backyard, populated by dolls. The most provocative movie I saw, it makes you rethink your notions of art and “wellness.”

Saturday night, I saw John Zorn’s Masada Sextet at the Cleveland Museum of Art. Saxophonist Zorn, who channels what he calls Radical Jewish Culture, and his five co-conspirators played only a little over an hour, but how and what they played! Great, often romantic music with a Sephardic, Spanish coloration; even one highly abstract piece was a kick, because Zorn and Co. so enjoy each other and their shared discipline.

The film festival and Zorn show were breaths of fresh air in a community that often feels ingrown. Seeing crowds downtown was invigorating. Hearing Zorn’s music was similarly mind-expanding. Cleveland felt like an open city this past week. Maybe it’s spring rearing its desired head.

Today I got Martin Benjamin’s “Atomic Age” in the mail. I worked with Marty in Albany in the ‘70s and ‘80s at rock and roll shows, and he’s the best photographer I’ve ever worked with (dig into his website and you’ll find a picture of me—with more hair and way bigger glasses). His book—infrared photos of his wife; shots from irradiated sites; glimpses of remote cultures; startling closeups of what look like perfect strangers—is an event. Like words, but in different ways, images can move and shape and change the world. Marty’s certainly do.

I saw Erickson at the Beachland Ballroom last night, after catching him Nov. 14 at a Janis Joplin tribute in which he sang “You’re Gonna” and “Ooh! My Soul,” a Little Richard number perfectly suited to his primal scream. Could Erickson sustain a whole set? No problem. He was fabulous.

Not only did he end with “You’re Gonna” (no encore despite wild applause, whistles and the usual hoots), he stomped through a gang of other numbers from his work in Elevators and Roky Erickson and the Aliens, and he was fierce. This was hellfire rock ‘n’ roll snatched from the abyss and delivered by a master. In the beginning, the rock word was Sun Records. The second generation was the British Invasion and the American response spearheaded by the Beatles, the Byrds, Dylan—and misfits like Erickson, a leonine phoenix who works idiosyncratic hard rock as if he’d invented it. He’s on a brief tour with Okkervil River, a startlingly good young band from Austin, the liberal oasis in secessionist Texas, where Erickson made his first mark nearly 50 years ago. I can’t wait for “True Love Cast Out All Evil,” his first album of new material in more than 10 years. It’s due out April 20.

The show was cool for other reasons. Not only was it a highlight of the Beachland’s 10th anniversary, it also featured two talented Cleveland bands: Living Stereo, a sharp, new wave quartet with complex songs and stage presence to burn, and the Alarm Clocks, a Byrds- and Petty-influenced guitar band of chops, seasoning and occasionally interesting texture. Living Stereo was a hard act to follow (especially for an opener), the Clocks a nice bridge that got better as the mix settled in. Erickson, however, dominated as soon as he took the stage.

I wish I’d caught Pere Ubu the night before, when the storied and fractious underground Cleveland band recreated “The Modern Dance,” its 1978 breakthrough. Friends tell me the house was nearly full, the energy level high, Ubu mainman David Thomas in relatively high spirits. A frazzled-looking, withdrawn Thomas was at the Erickson show. He looked thin and weary, a shadow of his former self. I hope he enjoyed the Erickson revival as much as I did.

In mid-December, my wife suggested I e-mail as many people as I could think of to tell them I wanted to engage more. Being semi-retired can be lonely, even when there’s work at home; I’ve been looking for part-time work outside home for a while, and haven’t gotten that. Part of that is the economy; a bigger part is that when you apply online—the only way to search for a job these days—you’re very likely to disappear into the digital void. It’s a buyer’s market, an impersonal one. Anyhow.

I e-mailed about 100 people in my various circles and got a gang of invitations to lunch and coffee, some virtual get well cards (“sorry about your situation; I’ll keep my ears open”) and some good work. The best was an assignment to write the history of rock and roll in Cleveland from the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum for its website. I’ve already turned in my intro; it should be online in about a month. I think this will become an ongoing relationship. I might also get some museum-related work in the future. My outreach e-mail was a winner.

Other catch-up: Lylah and I went to New Orleans in January, arriving the night the Saints beat the Cardinals. The city was cool; it’s great the Saints won the Super Bowl. Now the Cavs have to do something similar for Cleveland. Traveling with Lylah was fun; she had a blast photographing scenes from that very scenic place, one of the best in the country for architecture. It’s becoming one of my favorite cities; if you go, be sure to eat at Domenica, in the Roosevelt, and at Acme Oyster House, in the Quarter.

At the Cafe du Monde

A fellow New Orleans tourist snapped this for us

Pleasures of the season: the snow is beautiful but getting old, like the cold. Walking the dog is a pleasure; Pearl likes the snow, likes getting her coat frosted. In the next three weeks, Karen, Katy and Lylah all have their birthdays, so I’ve been busy assembling gifts and the money to pay for them.

Recommendations: Avatar in 3D; the Coen brothers’ A Serious Man (very Jewish, very weird, quite interesting); Crazy Heart (Jeff Bridges is better than the movie, which works despite itself); Jimmy McDonough’s biography of Tammy Wynette; The Nels Cline Singers’ Initiate, and Reclamation, by the Stephan Crump Rosetta Trio.

The cover of Cohen's newest live disk.

For more Leonard Cohen music, click here.

Audio CD (March 31, 2009)
Original Release Date: March 31, 2009
Number of Discs: 2
Format: Live
Label: Sony
ASIN: B001RTP3YQ

Acclaim is building for Milman's third disk.

For more Milman music, click here.

Audio CD
Original Release Date: June 2, 2009
Number of Discs: 1
Label: Koch Records
ASIN: B0026OIBQ8

Leonard Cohen: The mystic as fashion plate.

Cohen’s was one of two concerts (here’s John Soeder’s spot-on review from the Plain Dealer) I saw in the last week by Jewish musicians. Cohen’s was one of the best I’ve ever seen, and that covers hundreds of shows.

The other was by Sophie Milman, a 26-year-old Russian Jew who grew up in Israel and now lives in Toronto. A tiny blonde bombshell whose contralto-alto embodies the airy and the husky, she’s a true torch singer. Milman fronts an excellent band (Diego Rivera stood out on sax), scats like Sarah, and takes over Joni Mitchell’s “Be Cool” for her own smoldering purposes. (Here’s my preview from Cleveland Jewish News). The hottest Canadian import since Diana Krall, Milman is set to explode. Some paintings fell off the wall of Nighttown during her first set; might that have been a sign?

This pictures Sophie's newest disk.

The music on this CD is priceless.

Voices bring you into a sunny marketplace in “Along the Crossroad.” For a contemporary strutter’s ball, try the funky, splashy “Omolareso.” For a sexy cha-cha (Robin van Geerke’s piano rocks), try “Le Nouveau Mande.” And if you want to step inside the rhythm? “Bosumede” will guide you. While the core of Fra Fra Sound is Africa, its sound and approach are decidedly, exhilaratingly international. Founded by bassist Vincent Henar, Fra Fra Sound’s latest spotlights the tunes of saxophonist Efraim Trujillo, who sparkles on soprano on “Nahawi,” the sweetest track.

Audio CD (February 5, 2008)
Original Release Date: 2008
Number of Discs: 1
Format: Import
Label: Phantom Sound & Vision
ASIN: B0012OVEHQ

For more on Fra Fra, click here.

This is the cover of Bobby Selvaggio's latest CD.

Selvaggio can get entangled in his own virtuosity, so there are times his brain outstrips his heart; having the more romantic Werner and the more brazen, charismatic trumpet player Sean Jones as foils helps. “Modern Times,” a very good, very rich CD, puns on rhythm and our turbulent times even as it signifies a step forward for serious, contemporary jazz saxophone.

Audio CD (May 26, 2009)
Original Release Date: 2009
Number of Discs: 1
Label: Arabesque Recordings
ASIN: B002AT8BGO

For more Bobby Selvaggio music, click here.

Willie Nile album art shows him in action.

Nile’s voice is as high and warm as ever, the guitars pop, and the rhythm section burns; Nile’s records never lacked for excitement. Touted as the next Dylan when he debuted in 1980, the Greenwich Village resident has turned into a master of the pop anthem. This is a great follow-up to his “Streets of New York” CD, affirming Nile’s command of territory grounded in those quaint qualities: heart and faith.

For more Willie Nile music, click here.

Audio CD (April 14, 2009)
Original Release Date: April 14, 2009
Number of Discs: 1
Label: R.E.D. Distribution
ASIN: B001TD1XW6

Willie is a great live performer, a true-blue New Yorker who celebrates the city, the young, the innocent, the dreamers. “Vagabond Moon” and the Stonesy “She’s So Cold” should have been hits when they popped out of his 1980 debut, but they weren’t. Later tunes like “Places I Have Never Been” (the title of his 1988 “comeback” album) and the soaring “Whole World With You” should have been, too. Willie spent most of the ‘80s in litigation with Arista, which released his first two albums. The limbo didn’t help. Neither did record-company disinterest.

Anyhow, Willie, who was once described as a “one-man Clash,” soldiers on, rocking hard and passionate as ever, and his writing has gotten even more rugged and true. Willie writes rock that deserves to be classic.

When Willie saw me backstage before his show, he didn’t miss a beat, called my name, we hugged, and it was as if no years had intervened. He’s still charmingly and rightfully convinced of his own talent, sure his writing is getting better. He gave me his latest CDs and a DVD and told me he’s doing really well in Europe, he just performed with Springsteen at Giants Stadium, and he’s about to drop a new CD even though “House of a Thousand Guitars” has been out for only half a year.

It’s a pleasure to hang out with Willie Nile. It’s a pleasure to catch his shows, too. He may be the best folk-rocker most people have never heard. Makes me wish newspapers still published reviews of club acts. They may not draw big crowds, but they can be mighty.

I’m also writing debut columns for a yet-to-be-announced, Cleveland-based news portal that will debut in November. My first two will be about the head of the Civic Innovation Lab and my friend Dave Pech, a photographer who happens to make Ping-Pong paddles.

I just returned from a trip to Phoenix for a lodging conference. I stayed at the Arizona Biltmore, one of the nicest hotels in the U.S. The conference was by no means upbeat—occupancy and rate are way down—but it was great to be warm for a few days after this chilly summer.

Oh, yes. Sunday night, Karen and I are going to be reading at Wise Up!, a benefit for the Cleveland Heights Public Library. I’m going to tell very short stories about jazz—fitting for Nighttown, where Wise Up! will be staged.

Like many others at this get-together, Buddy figures in my book, “Cleveland Rock & Roll Memories.” He’s an affable host, a good drummer (his rhythms animated Rainbow Canyon, Charade and Quantrill’s Raiders) and a soulful singer who can still hit the high notes. On Sept. 14, the weather was gorgeous, the vibes good, and the food—the culinarily talented Carol is a generous hostess—was wonderful.

There were the chronic no-shows, like Raspberry throat Eric Carmen, favorite Cleveland son Michael Stanley and the singularly reclusive Joe Walsh (who doesn’t live anywhere nearby anyway). But there were plenty of notables, like Raspberries lead guitarist Wally Bryson, James Gang drummer Jimmy Fox, and the redoubtable guitarist Billy Sullivan.

It’s a bittersweet event, and not because of the music, which, for the most part, is timeless. But the “reunion” itself shows how far the Cleveland music scene has shrunk since its glory days in the ‘60s and ‘70s, when clubs, arenas, radio and records were a seamless, powerful blend. It’s only at Buddy’s that all of those elements come together. It’s telling it’s by invitation only.

Woody Herman (Mosaic Select)
Woody Herman (Artist)
Audio CD (June 23, 2009)
Original Release Date: January 29, 2008
Number of Discs: 3
Label: Mosaic Select
List price: $83.99

Click here to order from Amazon.com.

At Fairmount Presbyterian, the petite, 45-year-old German phenomenon played for about an hour and a half, traversing a desultory blues, a few Latin numbers, and a finale that shook the rafters, blending Dennerlein’s volcanic flourishes with Bach’s “Passacaglia and Fugue.” At the Bop Stop, she delivered two sets, serving up deep groove with an homage to Jimmy Smith, a fabulous samba in honor of her half-dachshund, half-terrier dog, and a gang of other originals.

The reason I comment on Dennerlein’s performances is that the guy who sponsored her local appearances challenged me to review her. This is my substitute. There’s no regular outlet anymore for reviews that focus on the unusual artist, the artist who doesn’t draw megacrowds. Part of that is the withering of print. Part is the subsequent conservatism, meaning newspapers aren’t trying to cover everything anymore; they just want to hold on to what they’ve got.

The church show drew about 300, the Bop Stop show close to its capacity of 110 seats. The Bop Stop show swung more and was more conventionally jazzy, showcasing the room’s singularly accommodating design and outstanding acoustics. The place is for sale and opens only for special occasions, like the Dennerlein show. How sad that the best music room in Cleveland can’t do regular business.

By the way, I’m beginning to review CDs and preview shows for Scene again. Seems timely given the number of fine, new CDs by Cleveland-based or –originated musicians like trumpeter Josh Rzepka and saxophonists Mike Lee and Bobby Selvaggio. I’m willing to bet that a promoter willing to mix it up—spotlighting jazz one night, blues another and, God forbid, rock from time to time—could make a go of the Bop Stop. As it, the place is magnificent and shuttered. What a waste.

In addition to his embryonic CJO career, he’s lead trumpet for the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra (word is he’ll quit that position, where he’s in the shadow of Wynton Marsalis), a professor at Duquesne University in Pittsburgh, and the star of a small jazz combo with which he’s recorded five albums for the Detroit-based Mack Avenue label.

His arrival on the local jazz scene late this summer will be dynamic, breathing fire into a field that’s shriveled in the past five years. I’m sure he’ll be featured in various publications, on TV and on radio, because he’s a complex, fascinating guy.

I interviewed him for the CJO web site. Visit it, scroll down to the bottom of the home page, and listen to our talk.

It seems that when you call an icon a has-been—you could argue that that was true of Elvis after his initial burst in the mid-‘50s, and of the solo careers of Beatles Lennon, McCartney, Harrison and, particularly, the lightweight, charming Ringo—you threaten people’s memories. I remember dancing to Michael Jackson; how couldn’t you? I remember being a kid intoxicated by Elvis, and as a young man dancing and romancing to the Beatles. I even recall being moved by U2, whose inspirations have seemed largely formulaic for the past 15 years. Just because a band is still commercial doesn’t make it creative.

Michael Jackson will rule the news for about a week—tomorrow’s papers are sure to feature lengthy, heady editorial about his meaning—and then return to the tabloids, his natural home these past 15-plus years. Now, when I think of him, I think of his genius, his moves, his singular spirit. Too bad that’s clouded by the soap opera he generated that defined, and then ended, his life.

I won’t review the album because I wrote the liner notes. But I can’t help telling you it’s a beauty, showcasing a woman I consider the best jazz singer in Cleveland and a guitarist whose gentlemanly approach renders a highly evolved, modernist harmonic sensibility unusually accessible. The album is sweet, often rueful and always highly personal. I hope it gets widespread airplay and brings Bob and Ki the acclaim—and the work—they so richly deserve.

Satellite radio brings me all the music I want, especially now that record companies don’t care (or have) enough to send me the very best, only compressed-data downloads access to which I have to arrange and negotiate for. Besides, writing for print media that still run “record reviews” never has been rewarding; one magazine I used to contribute to regularly actually reduced its rates in 2008, reducing motivation even more. I write book reviews these days for various “national” newspapers, which keeps my brain active. God knows how long that will last, but for now, at least, it’s more nourishing in pay and thought process. There isn’t much I can say about new music because a) I lack the energy to slog through new bands in bars like I did 20 and 30 years ago; b) new music is for newer people like my kids; and c) instantaneous media processing obviates the need for people my age to say—guess what—that good music from the dawn of rock through the ‘90s is still good. Redundancy is not the better part of valor.

I reviewed two albums this year: Bar Band Americanus by Charlie Pickett and Wee’s You Can Fly on My Aeroplane. The first is an anthology, the second a retro, deeply obscure reissue. Their tropes are well worn, the execution fine. I bought and listened to the new Guns N’ Roses—once was enough—out of some kind of loyalty to what used to be a promising, occasionally great band. But what could I write about it that would be more interesting than the facts surrounding its gestation? Where would I publish that anyway? Why, again, would I or, for that matter, anybody else care?

Since file sharing took hold, people swap music easily and no amount of record-company control will work. Couple that with the sampling available through on-line music purchase and you wonder what the remaining function of the critic is, other than reviewing shows. I have read good critics since I can remember and will continue to do so, in fields that interest me. I will also listen to new music as it passes by and occasionally go to a show. Ones I went to this year—Neil Diamond, Roger McGuinn/John Sebastian, Neil Diamond, Nine Inch Nails, Nick Lowe—were nostalgia trips, including NIN. I had no interest in festivals, rap revues, the Disney gang (though I think the Jonas Brothers are OK pop). Taylor Swift is my younger daughter’s latest fixation and she’s good. But interpreting her isn’t for me or up to me.

Politics has supplanted my interest in pop. Since mid-2007, I’ve followed the campaigns and was deeply pleased by the election. I continue to soak up political news and am engaged in “change” meetings the Obama campaign spawned. I think a true third force may emerge in politics via the Internet. Grounded in the notion of community, it will be independent of figurehead and/or candidate and serve as counterweight to traditional political mechanisms like Congress, the Cabinet and the Executive branch. I want to be part of that process. Music seems secondary.