All posts by Matthew Callan

Tuneage

Paul Rodgers’ “Rock and Roll Fantasy” Fantasy Camp

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Welcome to Paul Rodgers’ “Rock and Roll Fantasy” Fantasy Camp. I’m Paul Rodgers, and I’m here to help you live out your dreams. My goal is to make this the best two weeks of your life, so let’s do this! By the end of this camp, you will be transformed from ordinary schmoes into rock and roll fantasy gods!

Before we do anything else, you need to be schooled in the fundamentals of rock and roll fantasy. The key to a successful rock and roll fantasy is knowing the difference between a jester and a dancer. I have two models up here on the stage with me; don’t panic, these are NOT real jesters and dancers. They are are simply here for demonstration purposes.

As you can see, the jester has a floppy hat with bells on it, and a checkered union suit, and he may hold a few items he could use to juggle, such as bowling pins. However, I want to stress this, just because he doesn’t have anything to juggle doesn’t necessarily mean he’s not a jester. That’s a common rookie mistake. Now, onto to the dancer. You’ll notice this model is wearing a silver leotard, and the hair…

Why are we doing this? Because differentiating between a jester and a dancer is the most important aspect of the rock and roll fantasy. If you can’t tell them apart, how are you going to arrange them? Back to the dancer…

Why are you asking about instruments? We won’t be playing any instruments. No, not during this demonstration or at any time during the next two weeks. I don’t know who gave you the impression you would be playing music, but they were mistaken. Now, if I could continue with my demonstration…

No, this is not a rock and roll fantasy camp. This is Paul Rodgers’ “Rock and Roll Fantasy” Fantasy Camp, as in Bad Company’s smash 1979 hit “Rock and Roll Fantasy.” This is where you get to realize your dream of living in the world of the song “Rock and Roll Fantasy.”

Sir, have you never heard the song? It clearly says “my rock and roll fantasy,” meaning me, Paul Rodgers, and my rock and roll fantasy involves jesters, dancers, and nothing else. Except for the part where your mama calls you but you don’t go home because you’re having too much fun, but that’s it. What more could you possibly want from a rock and roll fantasy?

Granted, those 13 things you named sounded exciting, in their own way. However, they are not in the scope of our mission here.

And to the guy in the back who yelled “ripoff,” sir, let me just say that compared to other song-specific seminars out there, this a bargain. Trust me, it costs a lot more to attend Barenaked Ladies’ “One Week” Fantasy Camp. And that camp is actually two weeks long, so that’s false advertising right there. As far as I’m concerned, Paul Rodgers’ “Rock and Roll Fantasy” Fantasy Camp is a steal at $7000 a session.

No, there will be no appearances by any other members of Bad Company, as I am being sued by all of them. Yes, even by the estate of Boz Burrell. Possibly for running this camp, but I am not at liberty to discuss it.

Before I conclude this introductory session, I have to say that I am super excited to teach all of you about “Rock and Roll Fantasy,” and also have to inform you that having attended this camp for 15 full minutes means you are no longer legally entitled to a refund. Now, onto the mess hall for some moderately priced peanut butter and jelly sandwiches!

Literary Endeavors

Discarded Markers

You probably don’t know what this is. I didn’t know what it was when I first saw it. This comes from a coworker of mine, who was cleaning out her desk and decided she could finally part with this register mark dispenser.

In the days before digital publishing, books and magazines were laid out by hand, using lots of tape and glue and X-Acto knives. Blocks of text were meticulously constructed, calculating the character count with monastic dedication, so you would know if a photo that you couldn’t resize without an enormous hassle would fit on the page. When the layout was finalized, you had to place these register marks on the margins of each page. Each of the colors in four-color printing (CMYK) were printed in separate print runs, so these register marks ensured that all the colors would be properly aligned. This was essential, because even slightly misaligned colors produce an unsettling “vibration” effect.

I’ve worked in publishing of one type or another my entire adult life, going all the way back to college. And yet, I’d never seen an item like these stickers. By the time I entered the industry, publishing had already abandoned typesetting by hand. Quark XPress, Pagemaker, and their brethren had made that trade as dead as vaudeville disco. These new layout programs not only removed the tedious algebra of character counts and pica rulers, but they also placed those handy register marks right on the document for you.

At first glance, these register mark stickers struck me as quaint and archaic, in the same category as bygone office equipment such as the intercom and the Dictaphone. But in truth, these stickers were still in heavy rotation much more recently. Thirty years ago, most publishers still needed them by the boatload. A decade later, nearly none of them did. Ten years might seem like a long time in the Internet Age, but in the history of an industry as old as publishing, it’s the blink of an eye.

Continue reading Discarded Markers →

NYC

Respect the Baritone

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I live in a Bus Neighborhood. All subway lines are too far away to make walking an option, so if you want to get anywhere and you don’t want the trip to last 3 hours, the bus is mandatory. The buses that serve the neighborhood are always overcrowded at rush hour, because they’re the only ticket in and out. When a bus arrives at a stop, no matter how packed it is already, people claw their way on as if it’s the last helicopter out of Saigon, because there’s something both terrifying and humiliating about getting left behind by a bus. Watching it chug away from the curb, engulfing you in its exhaust, telling you that you’re not good enough for the bus.

Last week, on one brutally hot afternoon, I emerged from a subway station and jogged toward my usual bus stop. The bus stop isn’t immediately visible when I get above ground, and it’s also on the other side of a very busy street, which always presents the infuriating possibility of arriving just in time to see my bus leaving me behind. That did not happen this time, but what did happen was almost as enraging. As I neared the queue for the bus, a guy chugging toward it in the opposite direction cut into the line a split second before I could assert my I-Am-Here-ness.

Of course, I had the fear that this guy would be The Cutoff, that one last passenger after which the bus driver slams the door shut and moves on. How many passengers can get onto a bus is left to the driver’s discretion. Some drivers let people occupy every molecule of available space, while others rigidly enforce the “stay behind the white line rule,” and this guy arriving just ahead of me made me worry the next bus to arrive would fall into the latter category. But getting beaten to the punch in the bus line was more galling because the man who did it to me was lugging a baritone.

You’re probably familiar with the baritone if you ever played in school band. They’re like tubas that were blasted with a shrink ray. They’re made primarily for marching bands or kids who can’t make the full tuba commitment. Baritones are technically portable, but this man was planning on bringing this thing onto a crowded bus, where sardine-can conditions make handbags deadly weapons. Adding further desperation to his overall mien, the baritone was beaten up, dinged and tarnished, with several sizable dents in the bell. This was a baritone that had been down a few dirt roads.

Initially, I was furious. How inconsiderate was this guy? He didn’t even have a case for the thing, just cradled it against his chest like a huge, brassy child, the enormous, injured bell barely clearing his head. Given a jam-packed bus, crappy road conditions, and the typical skills and safety of an MTA bus driver, he could actually kill someone with this thing.

But then, I began to soften a little, because it occurred to me that no one in their right mind would bring a baritone onto a bus if they had any choice in the matter. I realized that I probably hadn’t seen a baritone since high school, and had a wave of Band Geek nostalgia. And I wondered, where had he been playing this thing, and why? It’s gotta be rough trying to make a living as a working baritone player these days.

The bus pulled up and was, of course, already well full. The line slowly pushed its way inside. The Baritone Man somehow managed to fish a Metrocard out of a pocket, then turned to see the bus’s standing room already completely occupied. By now, I’d done a complete 180 with my feelings. I pitied him. Here it was, a scorching, muggy summer day, and this man was trying to bring an enormous blunt brass instrument onto a jam-packed bus where the AC is being overwhelmed by the sheer mass of sweaty, angry humanity on it. This, I figured, will not end well.

I couldn’t have been more wrong. The aisle between the seats is usually an impenetrable thicket of shopping bags and hate, but for Baritone Man, it parted like the Red Sea. The passengers willingly–gladly, even–moved to allow him to move toward the back. Not only that, but once he reached the back of the bus, someone offered him a seat. And there he sat, comfortable and unperturbed, for at least the duration of my trip. When my stop arrived, there he still was, baritone nestled in his lap, happy as a clam. It was one of the most endearing, yet weird, things I’ve ever seen in my life.

In all my years living in New York, I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone offer a bus seat to anyone else, no matter how elderly, infirm, or feeble they were. When my wife was pregnant, you couldn’t have made someone give up their seat for her with a million dollars and a shotgun. There is a certain mentality that takes over when you ride the bus, which essentially boils down to This is horrible, so we’re all gonna be horrible to each other here.

I used to think nothing could pierce the flinty Darwinian shell of the New York bus passenger. Now I know better. If you want to melt the collective heart of an angry, sweaty MTA bus, bring your baritone.