A Conversation with Pat Metheny

Mike Ragogna: Pat, the last time we spoke, you were very excited about your project, Kin, the second album highlighting your Unity concept. Now there's a related DVD/Blu-ray, The Unity Sessions, documenting the live side of your ensemble. Does the improvisational element and different kind of energy brought to these live performances by you and the other musicians make your original recordings more like sketches of your songs than the versions fleshed-out further over the course of many concerts?

Pat Metheny: If we had stopped at the point of recording the music in the studio and never played any live gigs afterwards, that would have been fine. Hopefully, the records stand up well on their own. The original recordings have a quality about them that makes them unique and valuable and also very different from whatever any subsequent live versions might offer just by the nature of what makes a recording studio different from a live setting. I guess I would say that a studio recording isn't necessarily better or worse than anything that could happen live, it is just different.

That said, we had the incredible opportunity to perform 150 concerts around the world upon the release of the second record. And the band continued to get better and better along the way. I think we all really grew as individuals and as a group from the intense experience of having to address this music night after night. The music seemed to gather a kind of strength and beauty in the details that gave it yet another kind of quality as we went.

MR: Since there is a strong improv aspect to these live recordings, how does the onstage creative process work that respects musical road signs yet experiments beyond the recorded arrangements?

PM: I think there is a kind mythology that surrounds improvisation in this general area of music that gives it a kind exalted status when in fact, the challenge of it might be described as something that is actually much closer to what might happen if you took a bunch of great friends out to dinner for 150 nights in a row. After a while, you would become very familiar with each others stories, vocabularies, tendencies and everything else, and it probably wouldn't be that much fun in pretty short order.

But imagine if you were able to organize a bunch of excellent and very skilled story tellers, authors and griots, and you all made a pledge that the goal was to make up new variations on very particular existing stories each night, you might be onto something closer to what it is like for us.

Then say you got those guys to get together at the end of their long journey together to talk about what they learned along the way with each other in the dialect of music but using the materials and stories accumulated on their trip, that might be what The Unity Sessions DVD is like.

MR: Are there certain songs that have changed drastically from their original structures, maybe verging on being whole new songs?

PM: In each project, a certain culture emerges to support what the goals of the bandleader happen to be at a particular time, who, in this case, happens to be me. I have had lots of different bands over the years, and each one brings a certain set of possibilities that are unique to that particular group of people at that particular juncture of where the culture of the time, the compositions that I have written for those particular individuals, the general sound possibilities and the improvisational skills of the players intersect. In some cases, the options might include totally free, 100% improvised material each night, but in other cases it might be dozens and dozens of pages of written material.

PM: For me, there has never been any reason I have been able to think of why these destinations and all points in between need to be mutually exclusive.

PM: The music that we developed over the course of the two records really rewarded an open approach to what was possible and I think the DVD shows that range well.

MR: After playing for so many years and hundreds of shows, by this point, what does playing live fulfill for you?

PM: Honestly, it is hard for me to answer that. Playing isn't even playing for me much of the time. I am just sort of in it. Mostly, I feel like I am just standing there listening. I just really like being there.

MR: Are there any moments on The Unity Sessions that you're amazed by, you know, in a modest way, of course?

PM: Over the course of the year, we played around 150 plus concerts around the world. And for the Unity Band tour that proceeded it, we had done another 100 or so. And I can say that I have never been around a group of individual musicians who showed up to really play with such utter commitment and devotion to music making night after night as Chris [Potter], Antonio [Sánchez] and Ben [Williams]. That in itself was amazing to me. And I think you can really get that spirit and feeling in pretty much every note of the DVD.

MR: Do you have a personal favorite from ...Sessions?

PM: As much as I am very enthusiastic about the project, the truth is that if there were a way I could be a musician and be invisible, that would be my preference. I never have felt the music was about "me", I always have felt like it was about "it". But, I do realize that there are some folks who really do want to see what it is and how it all comes together on a visual level.

We filmed a very long day to get all this music done. At the end, at about 2 in the morning, I played a whole bunch of themes and compositions that I had composed for various other projects over the years all mixed together, just playing solo guitar. I had done this a number of times before, but I think because it was at the end of such a long tour, there is something special that was captured there.

MR: How much was left on the cutting room floor?

PM: We used pretty much everything we filmed.

MR: Does archiving a live performance affect its execution in any way?

PM: I think it does. As an improvising musician, like everyone else in this general area of music, I have had to wrestle with that issue in the area of making, hopefully, definitive statements about my current musical interests in recording studios in the form of records or CDs for years. You want to be there taking chances, since that is a deep part of what the job description is, but on the other hand, it will remain as a permanent document of that period of your musical output for a very long time to come. There is a certain amount of self editing that then ends up happening when that red light comes on, or not, depending on dozens of variables in the music, the musicians, the producer, the day and on and on.

Filming the process is different again. Like I was saying, if there were a way to do what I do and have no one ever see me, that would be my choice. I don't feel like music has much to do with who I am as a personal presence. It is all about what it sounds like and what it can offer on a soul level as sound. So, for me, being there as someone you see holding a guitar onscreen is something that I acknowledge as being an element in it all that might hold some interest for potential viewers, but a minor part in the final sum of what is actually going on.

However, we live in an increasingly visual world. Documenting a band like this seemed like not just a worthwhile thing to do, but something that I didn't want to miss. We had gotten to such a refined point as an ensemble that I really wanted to share what that became in the most complete way possible and I am really happy we have a document of it all. Also, our producer and editor Steve Rodby did an incredible with this project. It ends up being one of the best films of a band like this in action that I have seen. It is really like you are inside the Group with us.

MR: This is a little random but are you conscious that you might be innovating as you perform or record?

PM: I think anything like that can only exist as a by-product of what you get to honestly and organically. I don't think I have ever seen any kind of musical innovation that happens at a high level just for its own sake. It seems that the quality you are talking about tends to comes out of someone who is looking for something that answers a very personal question of themselves at some level.

MR: Is there any conscious aspect to your creativity or is it all a somewhat unconscious flow? How does your Unity Band support or add to that?

PM: I think that creativity is a natural state, but I also think that you can do quite a bit to evolve your insights into what you hope to achieve by asking hard questions of yourself and the people around you. It is never easy to do something well, and yet the process that you have to undertake to expand your ideas and your skills can not only be really rewarding, it can be a lot of fun too. And from that feeling of progress that usually follows hard work comes a kind of satisfaction that begins to feed on itself, which seems to be the kind of flow thing that you mentioned.

One aspect of this general area of music is that the requirements to "hang" with players at this level are quite high. For all the angst that comes with the politics of attempting to genre-define music, I personally see the goal as finding a way of looking at music as a singular thing devoid of any stylistic boundaries. This band was an excellent manifestation of that.

MR: What is your current definition of jazz and what is your relationship with it these days?

PM: I really just try to honestly represent in sound the things I love about music without really worrying too much about what anyone calls it. It seems like people are always coming up with new names and trying to put up new border fences at every opportunity. Just in the time that I have been around I have seen more than a few really goofy names like "fusion" come and go and the best you can say about any of them is that they are superfluous. The way that this general community functions within the realm of human creativity is a symptom of a way of being that I think reaches far back into our history as a species.

As I kind of just mentioned, I have never been a huge supporter of the whole idea of "genre" or styles of music kind of to start with. To me, music is one big universal thing. The musicians who I have admired the most are the ones who have a deep reservoir of knowledge and insight not just about music, but about life in general and have the ability to illuminate the things that they love in their music. When it is a musician who can do that on the fly, at will, as an improviser, that is usually my favorite kind of player to share the bandstand with. I feel like I am a musician in this broad sense first. And all the subsets and sub-categories of the way music often gets talked about in terms of the words people use to describe music is basically just a cultural/political discussion that I have found over the years that I am really not that interested in in the same way I am interested in the spirit and sound of music itself.

As far as sound goes, I always try to let the music at hand decide what direction I go in in terms of orchestration. I am pretty happy to play in a really dense way, or a really sparse way, or really loud or really soft or all over the dynamic range, really inside the chords or outside the chords...it kind of doesn't matter too much for me--it is whatever seems to sound best for what is happening at that particular moment.

MR: Are you a fan of any innovations or new artists?

PM: I really make a point to listen to all the new guys that I hear about as they hit the scene here in NYC. I am always on the lookout for new ideas and what people are doing. There are a bunch of musicians who I have my eye on, but the standards that I use for myself in terms of originality and musicianship that were so honored by the generation of musicians just above me chronologically--Keith Jarrett, Jack DeJohnette, Gary Burton, Steve Swallow, Herbie Hancock and so many others. That remains the standard. That is the same standard that we all have to aspire to--not just to play well, but to bring something special and personal to the music.

MR: What advice do you have for new artists?

PM: I kind of always say the same thing, but it is really the best thing I can offer to someone because it has worked so well for me. Try to be around people who know a lot more than you do as much as possible. And that probably is true in all areas of life, not just music.

MR: Can you picture pushing boundaries further with your instrument and if so, what might that sound like?

PM: I have so many ideas. There are so many things still to explore and expand on. Some nights I can't even go to sleep because I have so many ideas about music and what could be possible. Every now and then I run into younger players who say, "It seems like it has all been done already," and I find myself going, "What the heck are you talking about?" There is still so much to do, so many stones unturned.

MR: Are you aware of your contributions to music, your legacy and perhaps what you'd like to add to it?

PM: I just try to do my best. I try not to think too much about stuff like that.

MR: What other instrument do you secretly wish you could play with the same mastery as you have with guitar?

PM: To me, music exists before and after any particular instrument. The guitar has a special place for me because I have spent so much time with it, but even with very limited abilities, I kind of try to get to the same ideas on any instrument.

MR: Favorite animal?

PM: People.

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KIM EDWARDS' "WORDS" EXCLUSIVE


photo credit: Allison Harp, FWIW

According to Kim Edwards...

"'Words' came about very quickly -- I wrote it in less than a day, which is not the norm for me at all. But at the time, I was getting over the demise of a long-term friendship/relationship. I was never quite sure which it was, which is why it ended, and even though I was the one who had called it off, there was still a lot of heartache and grief on my end. All those emotions remained pretty fresh for a long time, and so when it came to sitting down and writing, the lyrics and music ended up spilling out very naturally. 'Words' is filled with a lot of raw emotion, but it also articulates a lot of the ache that I felt that I didn't otherwise know how to express -- namely, it's not about blaming or pointing fingers at what went wrong, but coming to grips with the way things are."

And here's all that social media stuff you kids like...
http://www.kimedwardsmusic.com/
http://www.facebook.com/kedwardsmusic
https://twitter.com/kimedwardsmusic
https://www.youtube.com/user/kimedwardsmusic

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A Conversation with John Pizzarelli

Mike Ragogna: John your new album is titled Midnight McCartney. You seem to be a repeat offender with recording Beatles-related music!

John Pizzarelli: Right. This one was totally by surprise. The first one was an idea we dreamed up back at RCA. We didn't have any letter from Paul McCartney saying, "Make a Beatle record," but this one was out of the clear blue.

MR: So McCartney was involved? What that story?

JP: I literally thought that FedEx was dropping off maybe a picture from the session that we did or something. I had no reason to believe anything was coming. But there was a letter in there that kind of mentioned, "Well, maybe it's an idea that you could do this record, post-Beatle songs and some of the later things and call it Midnight McCartney," and I was like, "You're kidding, right?" It's much easier when you get the idea right from the guy.

MR: And the guys at your label certainly have an interest in that since they're reissuing expanded CDs of his catalog.

JP: I think a week after my record comes out, they're releasing Pipes Of Peace and Tug Of War.

MR: Truth be told, Tug Of War is my favorite McCartney album, then Band On The Run and Ram.

JP: Yeah, that's a great record.

MR: Let's talk about that for a second. How does McCartney and his music resonate with you?

JP: It's just that extension of The Beatles thing. I was just constantly following him and trying to listen to the songs and see what was new and what was going on. I just constantly kept an eye on him, buying those new records and things and wondering what he was writing and all of that. I was also in cover bands over the years so we played some of those songs, too. I think we played "Coming Up" and some other things in the early eighties in our band. He was just always on my radar. When I got the letter I was like, "I've got these songs, now I've got to go through everything and really look around and see where we're headed."

MR: And the McCartney connection goes further, because you backed him up on a few live performances, including the Grammys! You backed him up on "My Valentine" there, right?

JP: Yeah, and I actually did myself in, because me and Anthony Wilson were sitting right behind him, and we had played "My Valentine" all week long, we played a MusiCares event and we played it in the studio a lot that week because he did an iTunes concert, so I said, "Let's not use our music stands and then they'll be able to see us on television!" Everybody who had a stand light got seen, but we didn't have a music stand. My wife said, "Were you there?" I said, "Yeah, I was right there behind him, but I was in the dark."

MR: Well, you recorded "My Valentine," so it looks like you get the final say.

JP: [laughs] You know, I kept playing it as a bossa nova all week during breaks and Anthony would join me, so on the last day just before we went on the air at the Grammys Paul walked up and said, "Let's hear the Samba version!" So I started to play it that way. It was very sweet that he had been paying attention to our shenanigans all week long.

MR: So let's look at the tracklist. Why these particular songs? I'm looking at "Coming Up," it's an usual choice, but you jazzed it up so it makes sense. Where did this tracklist come from?

JP: "Warm and Beautiful" and "Junk" and "My Valentine" were mentioned in the letter that he wrote me. "Junk" and "Warm And Beautiful" were specific requests from him as what he called lesser-known songs of his. Then one of the first things that we recorded was "My Love," Larry Goldings' harmonizing song. I called Larry and said, "If you're going to be in town we've got to make a demo of some of these tunes." My wife found "Heart Of The Country." Everybody went into find mode. I ran into a buddy of mine on the subway who's a bass player in New York called Gary Haas--I literally walked into him and he said, "Have you heard from Sir Paul?" because I told him about doing the record Kisses On The Bottom and it was one of those things like, "You're never gonna believe!" He said, "Oh, he wants you to make a record? You've got to do this song 'Some People Never Know,'" so that's how that got on there. My daughter really likes the Christmas tune, so we sat down with that. Larry Goldings made a joke about in an email to me and I sat down with it and slowed it down and changed a few chords and my wife went "Well, that's beautiful." Everything had its little moment. Then it was about trying to find a couple of up tempo things. "Someone's Knocking At The Door," I don't know where that one came from. Gary Haas may have made a demo of that one but not in that style. He had just mentioned the song to me. I came up with that little drum thing, it's from a Ray Brown arrangement of a song called "Squatty Roo." His grandfather used to play that piano part, he used to joke that it was the only thing that his father could play on the piano. I said, "That would be really good for "Let 'Em In." For "Coming Up" I looked up the ten best-selling songs and "Coming Up" was one of them. I looked up the lyrics and was like, "Oh, this could easily be a rhythm and blues song," so that's how that happened.

MR: You mentioned your teenage daughter Madeleine, you've also got your brother on the record, and Jessica Molaskey, your wife, your dad Bucky, this is a family affair.

JP: It's as family affair as it gets. It was Madeleine's first record date. When we were doing the demos we were doing "Warm and Beautiful" in b-flat and my wife said, "It's too high, you should bring it down a step. I said, "Okay," but I didn't want to take the time to rewrite the chart because you're trying to get as many songs done in the time that you have the guys there for, but then I went, "Gee, Maddie just did this at school!" I said, "Could you just bring this down a whole step for me and write this chart back out?" She said, "Sure!" and went into the back room. We did "Hi, Hi, Hi," while she was writing that thing out. We had a couple of days where after we made the main tracks we would go in for the day, we'd get in at noon and go until eight or nine o' clock and start to look at what we needed to tweak and fix and all that stuff. We were up in Pleasantville, which is about a thirty five minute train ride. She'd leave school, get on the train, come up and they would do their vocal things. We used everybody we could. I got Bucky in to play rhythm guitar, "Oh, we're gonna do that Beatles thing, great," he was so excited.

MR: There were so many members of your family there I could just imagine the email blast going out to all your relatives.

JP: Yeah, it's like, "Who can do what?" I feel bad I didn't get my Aunt Vera to make some food or something, that would've really tied the whole thing in. "Catering by Aunt Vera."

MR: [laughs] You have a family full of professional musicians. How do you stay centered in the middle of all of the opinions and suggestions? What was the dynamic like?

JP: It's an excellent question. The thing that's interesting is that when we make the rhythm tracks Martin knows exactly where to be in the rhythm section, and I've trusted him for years. Whatever he does on the bass guides the rhythm section in a certain way. Every once in a while, it might just be a question of two and four. "Are you going to go 4/4 or 2/4?" But I pretty much stay out of his way. That's sort of an innate quality. The biggest say is actually Jessica. She'll say, "It's too high for you, you've got to bring this thing down a whole step." The whole process in this particular record was trust. Me and Jessica just trusted each other, when I said, "No," she said, "Okay, I'm going to trust that you have the right idea," and when she said something I'd say, "Okay, I'm going to try that." Actually, we have a bonus track in Japan of "With A Little Luck" and that came out really well. It was like, "You need that one extra song, that's the one you've got to look at." It took me four weeks to go, "You're exactly right, here's what I came up with." And Bucky just does what Bucky does. Him playing the solo on "Junk" was like, "Go in there and just play. Here are the chords, just play a solo on this song." "Okay!" Boom. Then he goes, "I gotta go." I said, "Can you stay a two minutes to hear the playback?"

MR: This album makes perfect sense top to bottom, the tracks are in perfect order, but with Paul McCartney's library, how do you stop?

JP: You probably could get a couple more, you mentioned "Tug Of War" earlier and there were a couple of other songs out there we liked. But the good thing for us was we were totally working with the idea of Midnight McCartney, so we kept with the idea of love songs and that sort of steered us away from anything too crazy. In a weird moment of one extra light beer, I thought about "Live And Let Die."

MR: Oh my God, that would've been awesome.

JP: Even on Facebook, there are people saying, "You didn't do this one, you didn't do that one," you have to do what you do and move forward. We did at the end basically say, "We could go on forever and ever, but we have to release this eventually."

MR: Of course every song is your favorite, but is there one on the album that represents the hard work that went into it, or something that emotionally hits you the best?

JP: I think the biggest surprise to a lot of people is "Silly Love Songs." I still love it right after the guitar solo when that whole round starts at the end and you can hear Jessica and me and Maddie at the end. I thought that was us at the top of our game, because we put all the right voices in and on the guitar solo Jonathan Demme actually came into the studio with some people to check it out, we played "Silly Love Songs" for him and I said, "I'm so glad he came in because now I know I've got to change the guitar solo." It was one of those things where if you're going to cringe when you play it for somebody you know it's got to be different. The whole process of "Silly Love Songs" was what summed the whole thing up. I really love that track.

MR: And I'm sure you remember how maligned that track was when Paul first released it.

JP: I remember Jim Lowe on WNEW-AM in New York saying something like, "We need to have better songs right now." That was the mid seventies, he said, "I mean, Paul McCartney, 'Silly Love Songs,' come on!" [laughs] But when you listen to it the whole thing, lyrically, you're always working with great songs with Paul McCartney. That's what keeps resonating for me. I go, "Gee, this is a smart song." When you start to mess with it and do it the way you want to do it you still have a great song. You're not improving it. That's the thing that's really amazing, how brilliant the songwriting is over such a long period of time.

MR: The perception is changing now, but back in the day, you had camps of John Lennon fans and Paul McCartney fans, and everybody thought John was the only one with deep songs. I think Paul had a few as well although he did love the big pop hook.

JP: I think the other essence of Paul is Tin Pan Alley. He's still a songwriter in a sense, and a performer. There's that idea of writing songs for people to sing. I think there's the idea of Cole Porter and George Gershwin that he understands and that comes through in his songwriting. I think he always has that thing and that's why he's always been a singer and a performer. He's that guy and you can tell how much he loves to perform. The songs are songs for everyone, too. They're really good songs.

MR: Speaking of really good songs, are you tempted to do a really intense album of your own compositions?

JP: The funny thing is, before the Richard Rodgers record a couple of years ago we actually made that record. We had available studio time and we had spent the summer writing songs, so I said, "Why don't we just record these things and get them all down?" We had about twelve songs in just a couple of weeks. Then I started to tweak it. It was just a quartet and a few little backup vocal things on it. I still listen to it now. It's called Reinvented, as a matter of fact. We did it and everybody liked it--well, not everybody. Somebody at the record company said, "This is no good, we don't like it." I listen to it and it's really good! [laughs] The thing is people get scared of that kind of stuff, so we have to sneak them in on our Carlyle dates and stuff like that. The powers that be always go, "Oh well I don't know how people are going to perceive that," and you just want to go, "We've sort of landed on our feet for the last twenty-five years, I don't think it's going to be that big of a deal. But the project's still there.

MR: Are there any other projects that you really want to get to?

JP: Jessica did a live concert at the Allen Room in New York City of Joni Mitchell stuff that came out really well, so I'd love to record that. I think it's brilliant. For me, I'm trying to think. I don't know where the next idea is going to come from, but The Partridge Family's out for now.

MR: [laughs] But what about "She'd Rather Have The Rain"? "Echo Valley 2-6809"? "Morning Rider On The Road"? You sure about this decision?

JP: I liked a couple of those! I was a fan. I still look at the things I listened to between 1960 and 1985 that still resonate with me, songs in general that I'd like to find, but I don't like to stray far in general from the style I play, so it's about finding things I could translate into my language.

MR: And you already covered Joni Mitchell with "Free Man In Paris."

JP: And when she did it, I started to look at the catalog a lot differently. That was another thing where I was just quietly amazed by the music and lyrics of Joni Mitchell, like, "Where ya been, stupid?" I was pounding my head against the wall going, "I should've paid more attention." There's some amazing music in there.

MR: Joni Mitchell has inspired so many great artists, some of them might have even topped their mentor, which is, of course, heresy to Joni Mitchell fans. Yet isn't that their duty, to be better than the mentor?

JP: Well, I think the other thing is they do that and in a sense they have more of a commercial success because they see the idea that's there but then in making it their own they can sometimes get a more commercial success. Joni is senior year high literature, it's really amazing what's going on in there. The other one I like, as I think of it...there's definitely James Taylor material I could mess with, too. There are some ideas out there.

MR: James isn't somebody you would think of in that category, but if you listen to his last album, those lyrics are so well done I was like, "Wait a minute, this guy's truly a wise man now."

JP: Yeah! I got to work on October Road and that was another amazing record, too. The last five records from him have been really worth waiting for.

MR: So true. Okay, I need to do our traditional question. What advice do you have for new artists?

JP: That's a very good question. It's so different from when I started, I was so lucky. I made vinyl records in 1983, through the eighties and nineties and then CDs and now there's hardly any real product. You can talk to some people and they'll talk you right out of the music business. "I don't know why you want to do that, nobody's doing this anymore, nobody's buying that." It's such a scary field, I'm lucky. I think the key to the whole thing is live performance. You can't take that away from us. I think live performance is just so important to people who want to have an experience and go, "Wow, that was something else." I think that's what is still so important for what we do, no matter what it is that we decide to record. Performing music for people and giving them an experience is still something that I think no one can take away.

MR: Very nice. So this is like your forty-fifth album, right?

JP: It's my twenty first as a singer and then I've made about another twenty instrumental things with Bucky and other groups.

MR: How in the world would you have been able to escape? How will Madeleine?

JP: Madeleine's trying to but she just keeps pulling herself back in. I really loved it and I think Maddie came upon it in the same way, where she just closed her bedroom door and started to go, "Okay, mom mentioned Joni Mitchell and I just stole mom's Joni Mitchell songbook, so I'm going to tune all my guitars in these weird tunings and take it from here." She walks out of the bedroom one day and starts to play for us and we're all weeping. The idea of the guitar is always in the house, but everybody always find their way to something interesting. Martin, we just threw a bass at him and said, "You have to play this. We need this."

MR: Ah the supplemental family musician, the backbone.

JP: We needed our Danny Bonaduce.

MR: [laughs] Nicely done, sir. You do so many projects, how are there enough hours in the day?

JP: I think the big thing for me is just performing everything. I basically see the guitar players on the road, if I go out in certain places I impart my two bits of wisdom along the way. We do find the time to get things done. This is my one week where I have this weekend coming up and then no more weekends until probably Christmas. It's one of those things where you've got to take it where you can get it and then power down. This is the week where my wife and I will talk about our Carlyle show and then come up with song lists and things like that by just sitting outside. It's a very quiet little cabin that we have up here, so it's perfect for that kind of stuff. It becomes a work week but in a really productive way.

MR: And if there's down time, I'm imagining you're listening to The Partridge Family's Sound Magazine.

JP: That comes a little later on tonight, right after we pour the rosé at sunset. [laughs]

MR: [laughs] Is there anything else going on in your life that the world needs to know about?

JP: Oh, no. [laughs] Everything's out there that needs to be out there for the time being.

Check out the Midnight McCartney trailer here:

You want more, don't you. DON'T YOU! Fine, here's John Pizzarelli's take on "No More Lonely Nights":

Transcribed by Galen Hawthorne

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ART SCHOP'S "THE PRINCE OF DARKNESS" EXCLUSIVE


photo credit: Nelson Hancock

According to Art Schop...

"On my upcoming rock album, Death Waits I: Music And Fine Arts, I pay homage to the lives and works of a diverse, esoteric range of cultural and historical figures, including David Bowie, Lou Reed, Will Oldham, Richard Wagner, Michelangelo, Sappho and more. The madrigal composer Don Carlo Gesualdo fascinated me not only because he was a groundbreaking genius, but also because he had murdered his first wife and her lover in cold blood. Here was a man who aspired to the highest ideals of beauty and art, and yet who as a person was reprehensible in many ways. Originally, 'The Prince of Darkness' was a classically inspired folk song, but then Jimi Zhivago and I hit on a sleazy seventies-inspired groove which seemed kind of perfect. With John Bosch's video, the hard part was to go easy on the blood!"

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

Since the Donald Trump phenomenon began I have asked a simple question:

"Which has the best chance to reach fruition: Donald Trump becoming president or a sparrow reaching Mars with an anvil tied to its tail?"

As of this writing, the sparrow is a heavy favorite.

The significance of Trump is not so much his status as the Republican frontrunner with more than 400 days before Election Day, but how he managed to attain this position--his overt display of xenophobia under the guise of public policy to address immigration.

As much as the Republican Party would like to portray Trump as an aberration, the kooky uncle who picked the lock in the attic and crashed the Thanksgiving Day dinner, is he not saying what the party has been advocating since 2001, which has systematically cost them large swaths of the Hispanic vote?

In the aftermath of the 9/11 tragedy conservatives reprised the illegal immigration debate by comingling the people who risked their lives to come to America illegally for work with those who came here legally to send Jets into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and into a field in Pennsylvania.

The canard of fear conveniently and maliciously overshadows the much-needed debate on immigration, which can only be accomplished through a dispassionate lens that relies heavily on reality.

The obvious portion of that reality says it is impossible to deport some 11 million people. To this, Trump and others have questioned the validity of Section 1 of the 14th Amendment.

What about the economic piece of the immigration debate?

Economists Angel Aguiar and Terrie Walmsley conducted a 2013 study and their findings reveal where full deportation (the unlikely Trump et al position) reduces gross domestic product by 0.61 percent; legalization with borders increases GDP by 0.17 percent.

This data factors high and low skill workers. Specifically addressing low-skill workers, University of California economist Gordon Hanson concludes that low-skilled immigrant workers can make the American economy more efficient. Hanson offers the mobility factor of low-skilled immigrant workers is higher than native-born American workers.

According to Hanson:

"Low-skilled U.S.-born workers tend to be immobile across regions. When, say, the demand for low-skilled labor picks up in North Carolina, native-born workers in other regions are slow to move in . . . The consequence of the immobility of low skilled labor is to gum up the labor market, slowing the pace of growth in booming regions and the pace of recovery in slumping regions."

The xenophobia position also holds that the current immigration dilemma suppresses wages, but a 2010 study by the Brookings Institute concluded that, "The most recent academic research suggests that, on average, immigrants raise the overall standard of living of American workers by boosting wages and lowering prices."

Even a judicious immigration policy would not equate to perfection. The unintended consequences would most likely include individual cases where workers were pushed out of due to immigrant competition. But isn't competition germane to a market economy?

Moreover, the xenophobes dominate this debate void of any historical context. Was it not a forced immigration policy that allowed America to go from fledging nation in 1787 to amassing more than 80 percent of the global market share for cotton by 1860?

According to Cornell University professor Edward Baptist, cotton's economic impact in the 19th century was akin to oil in the 20th century and the microchip in the 21st century.

But the economic efficacy of immigration is not the debate we're having.

It is the same debate whether under the shroud of law and order, family values, or some other harmless sounding phrase that masks the vitriol that it spews.

Because one wants restrictions on immigration does not make one by definition a xenophobe, but that is not the conversation that is dominating the discussion. Rather, it is a mountain of reactionary hatred, fortified by fear, that subsumes the current conversation.

Trump did not start this debate. But in his albeit overtly bombastic Neanderthal manner he has taken it to a place this is causing discomfort for his GOP rivals and many within the party at-large.

Ironically, Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama have put forth similar immigration plans that have gone nowhere.

Maybe xenophobia is the flavor of the season. The only sticking point is the way Trump is serving the dish.

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All photos and videos by Shoot Me Peter

The Kickback are new to the music game even though they've been playing it for years. If that last sentence makes sense, congratulations. Anyway, the band will unleash its full-length debut,Sorry All Over The Place, Sept. 18 via Jullian Records, and it's all kinds of genre-bending and retro-contempro (I'm coining that phrase) awesome. The sound of the Chicago band, which consists of Billy Yost (vocals, guitar), Eamonn Donnelly (bass), Jonny Ifergan (guitar), and Ryan Farnham (drums), is intentionally and delightfully all over the place. It's no wonder they've received buzz from Rolling Stone and the Chicago Tribune to name a few.

The way The Kickback came to be is even more interesting than anything I've written so far. Hard to believe...I know. The oft-funny, zany, and whatever-adjective-you-want-to-describe-them-as band actually got their record made by sending demos to Spoon's Jim Eno. He responded, brought the quartet into his Austin studio, and boom went the ultra-catchy, guitar-pop driven album. At Primary Wave late last month, two of the four (batting .500 people) performed and sat down for an interview. Why the latter? Because a stand-up interview would've been strange considering the room was/is filled with couches.

Watch the exclusive A-Sides performance and interview with The Kickback here.



The Beatles. Elton John. Billy Joel. That was about it. The rest were Al Jolson, Broadway tunes I couldn't connect to, and Judy Garland. I'm talking, of course, about the soundtrack my father provided me growing up, which - nothing against the records spun - didn't exactly motivate me to do anything except listen to other music. Anyway, Soren Bryce's dad's collection seems a tad bit cooler. The 18 year old Texan grew up listening to classic rock hits, which led her into a life of music. As for me? I write about music, and live vicariously through the subjects who perform/sit down for a chat with me. Anyway, the classically-trained violinist and self-taught guitar, piano, banjo and ukulele player just dropped her self-titled EP, and it's an accomplished, often infectious, and sometimes lyrically biting experience. It's no wonder Ani DiFranco is a recent influence.

The EP, which was released late last month via Washington Square and produced by David Kahne (Lana Del Rey, Ingrid Michaelson), has already garnered its fair share of love from NPR to this guy (hey look! I'm pointing to myself!) Anyway, at Primary Wave in New York City, Bryce sat down for a chat and performed a pair of songs from the EP.

Watch the exclusive A-Sides performance and interview with Soren Bryce here.

About A-Sides with Jon Chattman: Jon Chattman's music series features celebrities and artists (established or not) from all genres performing a track, and discussing what it means to them. This informal series focuses on the artist making art in a low-threatening, extremely informal (sometime humorous) way. No bells, no whistles -- just the music performed in a random, low-key setting followed by an unrehearsed chat. In an industry where everything often gets overblown and over manufactured, Jon strives for a refreshing change. Artists featured on the series include Imagine Dragons, Melissa Etheridge, Air Supply, Joe Perry, Alice Cooper, fun, Bleachers, Charli XCX, Marina and the Diamonds and Bastille.

Stay Connected:
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It's a Perfect Summer: An Interview with Quino of Big Mountain

The Big Mountain in the 1990's took the world by storm with their reggae music. With hits like "Baby, I Love Your Way," "Touch My Light," and "Sweet, Sensual Love," the bands music was playing all over the world and on all major radio stations. You could not mistake the sound of Big Mountain because of Joaquin "Quino" McWhinney's beautifully unique and powerful voice. I got the opportunity to talk story with Quino about the bands return to the big stage and its certain rise into the hearts of many who love reggae's feel good vibe coupled with classic rock, blues, and other musical influences.

Be excited everyone, Big Mountain is back.

It's a Perfect Summer.


Photo Credit: Brad Puet

Quino (pronounced Keno) if you could tell us about yourself and about the band, Big Mountain. Also can you tell us about how you came up with the name?

My name is Quino. I'm a reggae musician. A Father. A husband. I've been playing in Big Mountain going on 21 years now.

The naming of Big Mountain is a really interesting story. When we were first starting out, our name was Shiloh. We were really linked into this revolutionary/activist café, on the campus of University of California- San Diego. It was called the Che Café, named after the revolutionary - Che Guevarra. We got asked to play a benefit for an organization who would take food and supplies to this Native American community who was being relocated. The land that they were living on was rich in land resources - coal, uranium - and there was a lot of mining going on. Of course, the people were being forced to move out. They were being removed from the land for those resources. The region that they were a part of is called the Big Mountain region. After the benefit, we got more involved. We would join in on the caravans in taking the food and supplies to them. We spent a lot of time on the reservation and spent a lot of time with the people. We got to know them well especially the elders. A lot of the young people either left or got jobs doing the mining so the ones who were left to suffer were the elders. We took a lot of pride in helping them out. Meanwhile we found out that the name Shiloh was owned by Don Henley of the Eagles. So we had to change and since we were so close to the struggle, we changed our name to Big Mountain.

Currently I'm the only member from the original Big Mountain band. Big Mountain is a band out of necessity. If we could do whatever we want, we'd be a much bigger band. Sometimes it's not feasible to be able to bring our whole crew together. So for the original members, logistically it can't or doesn't make sense. When the time comes, when the band is firing on all cylinders, I'd love to have the original crew come back into the fold. Right now, I have some young guns, some young warriors, to fill those original spots.

Big Mountain is a big band and we have some work to do. Hopefully we get everything going and get the big shows with the big tour buses and get the original band with the current band up and doing what we love to do.

Things just won't light up just because, it will take work and Big Mountain is going to do it.


Photo Credit: Pele B

Big Mountain is up and at 'em again. Can you tell us a bit about how that's going for you guys?

Big Mountain is in the middle of a relaunch. We each went and started to work on different things. We would still work on little things here and there but for the most part really focused on our own things.

This music business can be a grind, man. There was a time when it was really hard to keep the whole thing going. We had a real good run in the 90's and lots of fun. We were a part of an amazing reggae tradition. We had a lot of gigs with Reggae Sunsplash. That was an amazing experience.

Then we had to take a break.

Now we're coming back to do this again. I've got a great group of guys that I'm working with. We're all very excited.

It's nice to be back. Also we just released our first album in 11 years, Perfect Summer. It really feels refreshing, man.


Photo Credit: Pele B

Tell us a little bit about your new album, Perfect Summer.

We wanted to come back with something different. We wanted to be different from what we did before and what others may be recording right now. It's also about incorporating influences that have been important in our whole career.

As we've matured we start to reach back into what we used to listen to. We would let those things seep in.

You know the first time around it was really important for us to not sound American for various reasons. We were a reggae band from California, touring with a bunch of Jamaicans and English guys. So we were self-conscious you know. We were insecure about our status as being an American reggae band. So as a result we did everything we could to not sound American. That was where our head space was at, at that time.

This time around I was very happy to let my American and British rock influence come in. I'm human right. I have a lot of influences and I didn't want that to stop with this record. My mind is always being influenced you know. Whenever we hit a road block while recording this record, we'd take a break, and we'd just jump onto YouTube and watch our rock and blues influences come in and help inspire us for Perfect Summer.

SO bands like the Eagles, Robbie Robertson, Eric Clapton, the Beatles, Van Morrison...all helped shape this album for us. I have spent so much time listening to reggae, it was nice to go back and listen to all those songs and records. I had always heard the big songs off those records but to go back now, at this point in my life, I got to really appreciate the obscure stuff. Not only was it influential musically for me, but it was a lot of fun. I re-educated myself on music. We re-educated ourselves on music. We would spend time looking at documentaries on Netflix. We learned so much spending hours and hours and hours learning about these classic bands and how they created their music.

So that's what this record is about. It's about us accepting the American sound. It's about us not running away from it like we did when we were younger. For instance I studied and relearned what I know about the blues. It's hard for someone younger to sing the blues. You know someone younger can't really sing the blues. They haven't suffered enough. But once you've suffered, you can understand the blues. You know, I've been through it all: marriage, divorce, heartbreak, being in love, and all of that. It was natural to incorporate that into our music this time around. We stumbled upon a style that works for us and I think will work well for this country. Perfect Summer is for the US. It's weird because the market is so fractured. What people want Big Mountain to play in South Africa is different than what they want us to play in Asia or in other parts of the world. So when we tour the world, we have to do our classic pop reggae set. In the US, we're almost starting over. We have pockets of strength in the country but we're really trying to cultivate our audience again and that's exciting. We will always have "Baby, I love Your Way" and it will always open doors but really its open game. The band is really excited for creating American reggae music.

Perfect Summer is a great American reggae album.


Photo Credit: Brad Puet

It's also very important especially with all the politically and socially charged issues happening in America nowadays that your music stays current along with the artistry and musicianship. Can you talk about how reggae music has influenced your work in the community?

Big Mountain has always tried our best to stay in the community and be conscious. It is important for us to let people know that we were conscious and well-read. Back in the day we disliked the label given to us as "pop reggae." That left us with a stigma a lot of the times thus the importance for us to stay in the community. We really did our best to understand the politics of the music and the politics of today you know.

We got involved in the Native American movement. We got involved with the environmental movement. Really what I latched onto was the immigrant rights movement. I'm from Southern California specifically San Diego. I'm Chicano. The border has always been an issue and still is now. Me, being Mexican, me living next to the border, I get to see it with my own eyes. I get to see how the border and this issue effects the lives of families and people. It tears people apart. It tears families apart.

I've written a lot of music about the border situation. I always try to be present and active in what I can do. Big Mountain is the same. We always will try to be current and know where the community may need us and our music.

We still stay very close to the struggle especially for immigrants and of course the indigenous people. We have a song on the new album called, "Vision." This song is about the conflict that is going on in Papa New Guinea. Half of this island is owned by Indonesia, the other half is its own sovereign country. We learned a lot about the conflict when we played a show out there about 2 years ago. We played with a band that was very involved with that struggle, Rize of the Morning Star band. Through our music we try to stay active.


Photo Credit: Brad Puet

In closing, what would you like to tell the old and new fans of Big Mountain?

We've been doing this awhile and we've touched a lot of people out there. It seems that every night we play, I meet people who've been affected by our music. It's beautiful and it's very touching. It's nice to know that our music has been a part of people lives. A lot of things have changed but change is what life is all about.

I have a song called "Kalapana Way." When I was 20 years old, I backpacked the Big Island (Hawaii) for 3 months and ended up staying in Kalapana. I walked along that black sand beach. I lived in a tent up on the Pali. I watched the clouds come over me every day. Then years later I went back and it was all a big lava plot.

So the song is about accepting change. There's a lyric in the song:

You know that life will have its changes
May our memories never fade
Got to pick up all the pieces
But to our world today
Remember all the black sand beaches
That we lost along the way
This life will give us oh so much, oh so much
But it can also take away

We have to learn that change is going to happen. We have to have faith that it's the way its supposed to be. Big Mountain has changed. The world is changing for better or worst. We just want to build that big tent for everyone as it changes.

Big Mountain wants to be something that appeals to all people, of all colors, both young and old, really anybody and everybody who will love our music.

It's going to be a challenge especially in the current environment.

So to our fans, our friends and supporters is what I like to call them, we're excited to get to your heart and be a part of your life through our music.

Follow Big Mountain
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I figure everyone on the planet at this very second is writing his or her review of the Late Show with Stephen Colbert so I thought I would be a stand out exception and write one too.

To me The Late Show was like having a date with the one great love of your life who had some work done since your broke up, especially on his set which looked like the love child of Baz Luhrmann and Les Moonves.

What we need, at my age anyway, is for a late show to be on time (even though it's always going to be late) and to be soothing like the all-you-can swallow ambien buffet at your favorite opium den.

What we got instead was an electric eel cranked on a drug that is freely distributed to schools by that evil warlord Nabisco -- and for the most part I loved every single second of it.

Not because the show was perfect.

George Clooney felt like he was doing a manic cheerleader routine for a mentally challenged losing team, trying way too hard to funny-up the down in the dumps crowd.

Being an amusing and sometimes very funny guy does not mean that you are a wild and crazy performer. That is why Letterman began his run with Bill Murray whose droll whacked out persona perfectly matched Dave's own.

Frankly I always thought that the very first guest should have been The Colbert Report's Stephen Colbert to come on to announce his permanent death. That way we could have compared the old Stephen with the new one.

The whole show felt like a race by a marathon runner who was taking a short cut by rocketing to the finish line on the back of CW speedster, The Flash.

There were certainly opening night jitters and I will bet you that they whole thing felt like a two second blur to everyone involved who must have required copious amounts of after-show alcohol in order to help scrape themselves off the walls.

The second guest, George Bush. No. Wait. I meant Jeb Bush. He was more of a symbolic interview rather than an actual guest. Frankly he looked like a monk caught in the headlights who accidentally found himself in the deep end of Hef's pool.

He was pre-programmed robotic and, well, a Bush. He had no clue how to play to a non built-in, automatic response crowd who crows to your each and every talking point, as opposed to the presentation of real, actual ideas and vision.

It was like watching the GOP debates with him debating himself relying on stale, endlessly used lines like "I'm the Veto Corleone of Florida" (does he not know he's used that line a thousand times on national TV?). Stephen kindly pointed out that the Corleones were a family of questionable values which made me think: what exactly is the difference between the Bush family and the Corleones?

As of this writing I still have no idea. But I do know that George is Fredo.

What I think was brilliant was all the adult grown up movie commercials that CBS aired. Their visual and mental assault spoke volumes to me.

They all said "Now coming to your homes... Intelligence! Sophistication! Super smart silliness!"

It was the kind of endorsement that subliminally told the audience: Fallon is for the kids, Kimmel is for the snarky kids, but the Colbert world is the circus: ladies and gentlemen of all ages (but mainly for the ladies and gentlemen).

I even found myself a bit emotional having Stephen -- and for a brief moment Jon Stewart -- back.

Those two are both the genius puppet masters of information deliverance that came packaged in the exact same kind of knowing smirk that is on every Amazon.com box.

The real Colbert has always shown through to me. After awhile the real humanity of the performer can clearly be seen even through his clown make-up -- especially if he brilliant enough.

Honestly, from the moment he said, "Nation" I knew exactly who he was and still is. Plus the crowd chanting "Stephen! Stephen!" said all is right in the world once again. Brand, brand new always needs a sense of the familiar to make us feel at home.

So it's time to settle down now and get ready for the next few decades with Stephen who in some ways is not unlike your four-year-old (or Jimmy Fallon) who insists on PERFORMING for the relatives RELENTLESS.

Things will jell.

Stephen will realize that his mind and mind alone is his greatest strength almost equal to his faith filled, full of love heart.

He is adored by we the faithful because in some ways he has always been transparent to those of us who were in on the joke for the last nine years or so.

Performers like Marcel Marceau without the make-up turned dull and uninteresting. But here is the thing: Stephen never really wore any make up. There was always a genius navigating his way through the Perfect Storm of brilliant satire: a knowing wink if you will that if you got the joke, made you feel like you were an important member of Stephen's chapter of Mensa.

Not once during the hour did I look at my iphone -- who I am currently married to and who demands my ENDLESS attention.

At our wedding we are pronounced man and wifi.

As for the Jon Batiste band while I adored him it did feel a teeny bit trendy-ish (see: Cordon and Fallon's Roots).

But I was so captivated by the sheer propulsion of his impish and impulsive musical force that I'm willing to bet that he's going to show us some hitherto unseen on TV chops really soon.

He's like the love child of Dr. John and the entire Marsalis family rolled into one.

Late arrival Mavis Staples seemed to me like crazy Aunt Ethel who just leapt out of her audience chair to go sing on stage uninvited. And Buddy Guy seemed like he had just wandered out of the hospital in his hospital gown and was walking aimlessly up and down the aisles of K-Mart.

Not knowing who everyone was on stage (beyond Buddy, Derek and the Mrs.) was a bit odd. And PS: who the hell was that screeching gleeful James Cordon guy? Anyone? Bueller?

The best part of the final song (to me) was not the performances of the musical guests. It was the moment that Stephen made his entrance to sing because he is like your Aunt Ethel's equally insane husband, Uncle Loopy, who can't wait to leap and tickle you to death with his love of unbridled love for music and entertainment.

Audible.com has like nine million books on the pursuit of happiness, so let me help you eliminate, well, ALL of them because Stephen Colbert is the answer to all of them.

What Stephen deftly and naturally does is force you into the NOW, GRIPPING you by the collar like Bogart right before he bashes you in the face with a feather and a Maltese Falcon for the duration of the show.

And that is not mere distraction: it is total involvement.

It is PAYING ATTENTION while giggling like a girl who accidentally walked into a totally naked One Direction dressing room.

The final summation?

Intelligence is back.

A ham on wry is back.

Ironic is back.

Originality is back.

Okay, so I own't have any sleep for the next twenty years. But at least I'll die smiling.

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The Miss America pageant is coming up on Sunday, and we got the chance to hang out with the current Miss America Kira Kazantsev before she passes on her tiara to the winner for 2016.

During her visit, she was nice enough to watch some viral videos with us and play a few rounds of "Which is More American?" Hot dog pizza or KFC's Double Down? People deep-frying turkeys for Thanksgiving, or people not observing fireworks safety rules on the Fourth of July? Mr. T horribly singing "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" or R. Kelly's groovy rendition of the National Anthem?

Quite a challenge, we know, but Miss America didn't win her crown without knowing how to tackle important questions.

Make sure you tune in to the Miss America 2016 competition, live on September 13 on ABC!

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Dahi Handi from Mandala Motion Pictures on Vimeo.

Popular in the state of Maharashtra, India, Dahi Handi is a ritual that takes place during the annual celebration of the festival of Gokulashtami.

Known as Krishna Janmashtami throughout the rest of the country, the festival celebrates the birth of the Hindu God, Krishna.

Dahi Handi in Maharashtra involves making a human pyramid in order to reach and break an earthen pot filled with buttermilk, which is tied at a height.

The idea of the human pyramid is based on a legend of the child god Krishna and his friends, who used to form pyramids to break pots of butter, which were hung from the ceilings of houses.

We started An Indian Voice to shoot passion projects around us in between commercial work.

Dahi Handi is a festival which is really intriguing and though popular in Maharashtra doesn't obviously have the legs outside India like a Holi or Diwali does.

The location of the festival is gripping. It happens in the middle of a street, while people are going to work, buses are passing by and citizens are getting on with their lives. There's a wonderful juxtaposition of order and chaos which breathes into the festival. That tension is what we've looked to capture in as immersive a way as possible.

At its core the film is really a celebration of people coming together and scaling huge heights. The arc is simple but the sheer difficulty, co-ordination and life and death stakes, make it hypnotic to watch.

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The story begins like many famous fairy tales. An orphaned infant is sent to live with a relative--a grandmother, this time.

But this is no fairy tale:

"Her grandmother was an alcoholic. Went to work every day, but (was) physically, emotionally, mentally abusive to her. Sometimes the people that her grandmother had keeping an eye on her were some of the people that molested her. They lived in an area where prostitutes walked up and down the street, and she used to watch these ladies, all the time. But these ladies looked kind of shiny. And all she ever wanted to be was shiny. She never wanted anything else. And she asked her grandmother one day, what are those women doing? And she said, 'Well, those women get in cars and take of their panties and men give them money.' She put her little dress on and her little cheap shoes and she went down to an area where she knew prostitutes were. And she got into the car with her first customer."

For Brenda Myers-Powell, who is both the girl in the horror story above and the indomitable inspiration for Dreamcatcher, an award-winning film from Kim Longinotto, the "happily ever after" did finally arrive, some 25 years later. But not until she had been shot five times, stabbed 13 times and beaten by a john who, "...drug [sic] her six blocks, tore all the skin off her face and her body."

"All she asked the Lord for was her face back. And to make her a lady," she tells a group of stunned high school girls in the film. "And today, that young lady stands before you. A lady with a face."

Myers-Powell is more than just a lady with a face. She's a lady on a mission, who spends her very long days reaching out to women for whom that "happily ever after" may never come.

By day, she counsels incarcerated prostitutes and "at risk" high school girls, serving up tough but unconditional love. By night, she drives Chicago's meanest streets in her Dreamcatcher Foundation van, offering condoms and compassion to women in "The Life," as it's called.

A co-founder of the foundation, her message to each woman is the same in the film, delivered with a bear hug and a loving smile.

"You got any dreams you wanna catch?" she asks. "When you get sick and tired of bein' sick and tired, you call us and we will help you."

And they do call. Day and night, her phone rings incessantly. And Myers-Powell answers, ready to do anything and go anywhere to save a woman in peril. Because, as she tells them all, whatever is happening to them has also happened to her. And she is living proof that they can change their lives.

But what happens to them is both harrowing and heart rending. In one scene, troubled teen girls in an after school program bare their souls with touching and terrifying honesty one after the other. And each story is more wrenching than the last.

"I done got beat so many times," one says. "My face was so beat up. I got scars all over my body. I don't trust no men at all."

Another story stops the show.

"I was nine when I got raped. By my cousin," she says. "He was nineteen, I was nine. It was a party, New Years Eve. You know how everybody get drunk? I was in the room sleep. And when I woke up I started screaming but nobody could hear me because the music was loud. He threatened to kill me. He put a knife towards my throat and he threatened to kill me."

An even more compelling--and bone chilling--moment occurs when a former pimp, identified solely as "Homer," visits the same group for a "no holds barred" discussion of The Life and how he found and lived it.

"Child molestation doesn't start just with females," he tells the girls. "At the age of 9-years-old I was molested by my auntie. We became lovers for many years. And what that did was it gave me a distorted sense of what love was."

Seeing his father beat his mother mercilessly gave him a few more erroneous ideas about love.

"Wasn't confused by him beating her up. What confused me was that she stayed," he says. "So that gave this little boy the idea that, 'Okay, if I beat up my girlfriend, it's okay.'"

To escape the hell his life had become, that little boy eventually created a mean, manipulative alter ego named "Fancy," who started pimping at the age of seventeen. And it's Fancy who answers a question about his women on what he calls the the "ho stroll."

Voice cold, eyes intense and menacing, he says the rule was, "Either get my money or suffer the consequences. And once you're in, you can't tell me when you're leaving. You leave when I say you can leave."

And as the room goes still, Fancy's eyes blaze as he offers one last piece of advice before letting Homer come back:

"You better listen. You better listen."

The tense silence proves the girls are listening. And that the message has been received.

Such is the power of Dreamcatcher, which begins a tour of select cities starting in Chicago on September 11th. A Sundance award winner in 2015, (Directing, World Cinema Documentary) it unfolds in "observational" or cinema vérité style, putting you "up close and personal" with its subjects and the world they inhabit.

So it raises tough questions but offers no easy answers. There are no easy answers. But Brenda Myers-Powell never gives up.

"You touched my spirit," one sex worker tells her. "You give hope. And that's what we need out here."

So see the film. And then get in touch with the Dreamcatcher Foundation to find out how you can help them make more happy endings.


Photo credit: With permission of Dogwoof Ltd. 2015. All rights reserved

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Hannibal fan art "Savior" courtesy of Fiona Hsieh on DeviantArt.

With an appropriately bloody and dashing full moon finale came the close of three amazing seasons of Bryan Fuller's Hannibal, hands down some of the best television ever made in the history of the medium. I would have no problem writing a book about every visual metaphor, every intentional blink, and peel back each layer of meaning like Hannibal Lector would certain victims (*cough* Alana Bloom *cough*).

The level of art in Hannibal was and likely will be unsurpassed on television for a long time to come: Oscar-caliber performances, art direction, cinematography, and a new category for food styling would absolutely sweep every awards category. The grotesque deliciousness of Bryan Fuller's unbelievably brilliant and astute adaptation of the well-read Thomas Harris books was beyond our visual translation dreams.

I savored every single frame of Hannibal, often going dizzy from the eye feast because I would forget to breathe, even -- and sometimes especially -- in the moments of beautiful horror the likes of which I had never in my life experienced in those ways or ever. The Human Honeycomb, the Man Tree, the Bloody Angels, the Mushroom People, the Color Wheel, the Heart Stag, and so much more. So many awfuls wrapped in such beautiful packages: a word does not exist to describe how singularly Hannibal's tableaus resonated through me. Fuller concocted an epic arthouse horror show with such surgical precision that it, in fact, can be summed up in only one word: PERFECTION.

Hannibal was also singular in how much Fuller and Company were inspired by the Fannibal community and integrated fan art into the aesthetic of the show. Bryan Fuller's feminism made Hannibal the first crime, horror, drama show to not feature rape. On so many levels, we'll be marveling at what Fuller and Company accomplished for years to come. And I hope this sets a new standard for television in general.

I'd first read Thomas Harris's Red Dragon when I was around 8 and Silence of the Lambs came shortly after. Red Dragon sparked in me a peculiar love affair and morbid fascination with all things Hannibal Lector. I've read each of the books multiple times and have the film adaptations of Dragon and Lambs virtually memorized. And while I'd remembered that the Will Graham of Red Dragon was highly sensitive, empathic, and borderline psychic, it wasn't until Bryan Fuller got his hands on the canon that we received the term empath for the "it" that Will Graham is.

You see, all my life people told me that there was something wrong with me because of my hypersensitivity. My family members often "joked" that I should be institutionalized. I heard the phrases "Stop being so sensitive," "You're overreacting," "You're crazy," so much and so often since I was a child I had internalized it to the point where I fundamentally believed they were right.

The very first episode of Hannibal happened to air on April 4, 2013 -- synchronicitously my birthday. I watched Apéritif with its new, haunted, and beautifully traumatized iteration of empath FBI profiler Will Graham and saw so much of my own behavior mirrored in Hugh Dancy's gloriously apt performance of a highly sensitive individual in a world of torment. I watched all the replays that night, tears streaming down my face, with one thought repeating over and over: Maybe I'm not crazy after all. Maybe I'm not crazy at all. Maybe I'm not crazy.

I took to Facebook with the query, "Are there people like Will Graham in real life and could I be one of them?" I also plugged "empath" and "empathic personality" into Google. My Facebook friends returned with a handful of articles about the Highly Sensitive Personality and agreed that I sounded like one. Google gave me links to Dr. Elaine Aron, a psychiatrist and researcher who is considered the leading scholar in empathic personality research. I took all the personality tests and more than qualified as a Highly Sensitive Person. I really wasn't crazy.

As it turned out, Dr Aron estimates that 1 in 5 people -- roughly 15-20% of the population -- are highly sensitive, which was one of so many amazing things I learned as I delved into research on empaths. I wasn't alone. I wasn't even that special. I had just found my tribe. Happy Birthday to me.

Seeing Bryan Fuller's Will Graham and his super-empathy in action, his ability to close his eyes and know things about another's motivations, his unique way of putting together stories about fellow humans, his sad soul and tortured self, was the mirror into my own personality quirks I'd desperately needed and found nowhere, and certainly not in pop culture. I finally understood the breadth of how I'd been getting gaslighted all along.

For the first time in my life I looked inwards and saw that that sensitive part of me others belittled and disparaged was in fact the root of my own power and the source of my own healing, as well as the biggest gift I have to offer the world. I spent days crying after that first episode aired as I read everything I could find about the Highly Sensitive Personality. But this time the crying was good tears, the kind of tears that wash your soul clean of poison. It was my Becoming.

In the days and weeks post-Hannibal's wicked finale of a mic drop a lot of people are going to write about the artfulness of the show, the incredible acting, the awesome production value, and they're also going to begin analyzing the story and character arcs, unpacking all the visual symbolism, all the references that inspired such gruesome wonderfulness. There is so much to unpack you could get a PhD in Hannibal and still not get to it all.

What I want to bring home here is the magnificent social and cultural contribution to humanity Hannibal wrought with its entrance into our lives. Hannibal assisted in the mainstreaming of not just empathy, but also the mainstreaming of the empathic personality and highly sensitive individuals as forces to be reckoned with in our extrovert-heavy world.

Have you noticed how it's only been in the last couple years that once a week there's a new article on virtually every media outlet about the benefits of being highly sensitive and the often-related introvert personality?

Hannibal has become part of a cultural zeitgeist that opened up a conversation about personality types that aren't really ones to toot their own horns. And by bringing the issues and struggles of highly sensitive people to mainstream media, Bryan Fuller and Company allowed for all us sensitive folks not just to join the discussion, but to contribute to it, and learn from it, and begin building our own communities and support groups.

As it turns out, there's no such thing as too sensitive.

I used the term emotional spelunking in my defense of True Detective Season 2, and it applies to Hannibal as well. Hannibal's creators and viewers both participated in the deepest of emotional spelunking in which we found ourselves communing with the darkest and most entrenched monsters of our psyches in efforts to integrate them in our lives instead of fight against them.

Hannibal also beautifully portrayed the sinister side of being so sensitive, how difficult it can be to suffer from powerful intuition, and how easy it is for an empathic personality to lose oneself in other people's darkness. It went into grim detail about how it feels to be gaslighted, used, and manipulated when being highly sensitive. While detailing the struggles of an empathic personality, Hannibal also gave us an opportunity to discuss the empath's foils: the narcissists, the sociopaths, and the psychopaths. On the spectrum of sanity, the highly sensitive are closer to sane than we're usually taught to believe.

In these three years of watching Hannibal I have seen my own inner struggle to accept myself and purge other people's misperceptions of me once again mirrored in Will Graham's enmeshment with Hannibal Lector. For Hannibal Lector and Will Graham, the end of their affair was a fait accompli, and all empaths have their version (or several) of Lector who they need to shake, gaslighting and all. Not everyone is able, but yet that fight becomes part of our greater sense of collective Becoming.

Because the doors to my own self-awareness opened up thanks to Hannibal, these past three years have been the most fulfilling years of my life. I am grounded in a way I never was before, my diaphanous sense of self now has boundaries, and almost most importantly, I am able to help others -- and especially other highly sensitive people -- do the same. What a relief it's been to at long last know who I am, where my empathic personality fits into this world, and honor both without apology.

Bryan Fuller and Company, from the everything I am I thank you. For the art, the magic, the wonder, the horror, the bloody beauty, and the wisdom you brought through the screen with such thoughtfulness and grace.

I have never been sadder about the demise of beloved art, but I have also never been so grateful for all that you brought into the world.

You made this one broken teacup whole again.

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The first episode of IFC's new comedy series Documentary Now! is a pitch-perfect parody of the cult doc Grey Gardens. Co-creators and stars Bill Hader and Fred Armisen pay homage to mother-and-daughter duo "Big Edie" and "Little Edie," relatives of Jackie Kennedy who are the subjects of the 1975 documentary by brothers David and Albert Maysles. Grey Gardens captures the decrepitude of the Edies' decaying Long Island mansion -- a decay that mirrors their own mental states. In the Documentary Now! parody, Hader mugs for the camera in a headscarf fashioned out of a pair of sweatpants. "The wardrobe department loved that episode," Hader toldEntertainment Weekly. "They would put sweatpants on my head, and I was like, 'What is this? This is so insane.' And then I watched Grey Gardens and, yeah, she has, like, sweatpants on her head."

As much as I admired the episode, I wondered if the brilliance of the parody would be lost on viewers who haven't seen Grey Gardens. But then I realized that documentaries have become so mainstream that even if you haven't seen Grey Gardens, or the 1922 documentary Nanook of the North -- considered the first feature-length documentary, and the source material for Documentary Now!'s third episode -- you've probably heard of them. The popularity of documentaries among ordinary filmgoers who don't have cinema studies degrees has risen steeply over the past decade, and Documentary Now! only confirms the genre's firm standing in mainstream pop culture.

Just as comedy series like Nathan for You, Kroll Show, and Burning Love spoof different genres of reality TV, Documentary Now! spoofs the form and tone of a variety of documentary styles. In fact, I'd argue the television industry's love affair with reality TV is directly related to our growing enthusiasm for documentary films: We've become so attuned to reality TV's editing style, parallel storylines, voiceovers, and, of course, low-budget production values, that we've come to see nonfiction feature films in a whole new light. And now that we're intimately familiar with their formal cues, it's parody time, baby.



What was once considered stuffy and educational -- the filmic equivalent of eating your vegetables -- has become meaty and enticing. As historian Steven Mintz pointed out a full decade ago, the proliferation of cable channels helped create a stable market for documentary filmmakers. This lead to an explosion of different documentary styles on TV, from earnest, social-issues-driven docs à la Ken Burns, to news docs like those shown on PBS's Frontline, to concert films.

In cinemas, persona-driven documentaries of the mid-2000s like Michael Moore's Bowling for Columbine and Fahrenheit 9/11, or Morgan Spurlock's Super Size Me -- docs in which the filmmaker places himself at the center of his narrative -- achieved both critical and box-office success. Documentary heavyweights like Errol Morris and, more recently, The Act of Killing's Joshua Oppenheimer have toyed with the format to present something more surreal and ambiguous than we previously expected from the documentary genre.

In recent years, programmers have begun to realize that audiences are clamoring for more nonfiction films. In 2013, documentaries accounted for 16 percent of the Cannes film market, compared with 8 percent in 2008. In 2014, the documentary Virunga premiered on Netflix (it would later earn an Oscar nomination), and the streaming service -- which has encouraged our obsession with documentaries with its impressive slate of nonfiction offerings -- has pushed for original documentary programming this year with the series Chef's Table and the film What Happened, Miss Simone?.

I think the growing popularity of documentaries speaks to something else, too: the rapidly shrinking space for mid-size theatrical launches, those films that aren't blockbuster franchises or shoestring indies. In a report released earlier this year, research analyst Doug Creutz wrote that "major studios are all moving towards increasingly indistinguishable strategies, as they all put more and more eggs in the franchise picture basket." Nowadays, the place for filmmakers with a vision and a voice is more often than not on the small screen. But for audiences who crave meaningful feature-length entertainment, documentaries have swooped in to save the date night.

According to Patricia Aufderheide, a professor of communication studies at American University and the author of the 2007 book Documentary: A Very Short Introduction, "Documentaries have become more popular as a distrust of mainstream media has grown. Viewers see documentarians as truth tellers."

But, like reality TV before it, documentaries are no longer a niche attraction or an oddity among "regular" scripted programming. Documentary Now!'s painstakingly accurate spoofs are an homage to what is now a totally regular part of our media diet. Welcome to the mainstream, docs! Here's a pie to the face.

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YouTube has become quite the sensation nowadays. With new video bloggers, or "vloggers," and collaborative projects at the new YouTube spaces, the company has changed the face of content creating and sharing.

Although fans and followers flock to the channels of popular vloggers, there are some smaller creators just starting out on YouTube that have a spectacular amount of potential (not to mention a solid fanbase already). These filmmakers and creators who are just starting out have a lot to offer the Internet -- a lot more than we expected.

This is the underground of YouTube.

And this is where we meet Jack Innanen.

Jack, an overachieving 16-year-old high school student from Canada, originally had his start on YouTube when he was in fifth grade, making videos about haircuts for each day of the week ("Messy Monday," "Thrown Together Tuesday," etc.). He also attempted to do standup comedy on an old YouTube channel. Later on, in middle school, Jack started a gaming channel and gained a few thousand subscribers. Three years later, he found himself interested in vlogging and filmmaking. He formed his new YouTube channel, JackIninin, in 2013 and continues to upload content regularly. Take a look at a video he uploaded back in May:



When asked why he had turned to creating YouTube videos, Jack explained that, at first, it was out of pure boredom; he was a young kid that needed a creative outlet, so he turned to the Internet for help. He "discovered" his love of film when he was playing hooky from school one day (which he claims is not common for him). Jack was browsing through Reddit when he found a still showcasing the symmetry used in Wes Anderson's Moonrise Kingdom. He was intrigued and began watching the movie. Jack explains, "That feeling of being so touched mentally and emotionally by an hour and a half of simple symmetry and vibrant colors forever motivated my ambitions and altered my perspective of film."

What also surprised me about Jack was his ability to appeal to his subscribers. With a fresh (sometimes quite dry, actually) sense of humor and a playful tone to his voice, he captures his viewers' attentions. He has also proves to be quite clever. In his video, "Social Ping Pong," Jack describes himself as a "weird kid, with a weird sense of humor to go along with it". He says that when he has an opportunity to make a bad joke, he'll go for it, and begins to explain the theory of social ping pong. Inspired by the comedian Pete Holmes, the theory explains that when someone smiles at you, you smile back. If someone makes a joke, you laugh, regardless of how funny it is (or at least, this is what Jack does). The metaphorical net in the middle of the ping pong table represents life as the inevitable barrier that attempts to keep your jokes, smiles, and laughs at bay. Jack explains, "Why? Why not? Like Pete said, life is hard; we all die someday. So for God's sake, just laugh."

Jack's favorite puns:

• My uncle got in a car accident recently -- it was pretty bad, he lost all feeling in his left side, he's alright now.


• I just tried to make a belt out of watches, what a waist of time!


• I just ate a clock, it tasted good but was so chewy. It was really time consuming.

Jack has released videos on both mainstream and unique topics, including school and the reason behind why he is going to hell. Although he doesn't like school, he does do well. "I am always told it isn't enough of a challenge for me so I am then placed in programs to "challenge myself" on a higher academic caliber. This just adds more stress and higher work loads," he explains. "It is no matter of complexity or difficulty or volume, and I have never been able to get that point across. If you give me a small amount of easy work, I will finish it with 100% of my effort. If you give me a large amount of difficult work, I will finish it with 100% of my effort. That is how school has been for me, and they have just cranked up the difficulty and the volume, leaving the same time to complete it." In his video, "I'm Going to Hell," Jack explains that although he isn't religious, he'd go to hell because of his dark humor. He admits that he finds everything funny and comes up with creative puns and morbid jokes whenever he can.

When asked who he looks up to in terms of creating content, Jack explains his admiration for Louis Cole (FunForLouis) and Casey Neistat (although, he says the former wins, if he had to choose just one). He admires their generous personalities, dedication (editing a vlog every day isn't an easy task), and "crazy lifestyles". For Jack, the two filmmakers are a huge inspiration; he especially respects how positive they are, despite having intense lives and busy schedules. "They keep the metaphorical torch of YouTube burning," he says.

The young filmmaker also plans on releasing new content this year, including short films; he's also putting focus into making videos similar to his video "Stronger Than Stigma". When asked about whether he wants to follow current trends on YouTube (i.e. tags, challenges), Jack says, "I aspire to be more of a filmmaker. I still want to continue to grow and develop with the whole YouTube culture, but I am going to put more effort into my work." The self-proclaimed perfectionist is also working on app and web projects, as well as other small projects, in a multitude of mediums. "I have learned as a 'content creator' that life is a perpetual work in progress," he says.

For those who want to create content and be a part of the YouTube community, Jack's final piece of advice is, "Stay in school, eat your vegetables, and just do it. Nike."

Weird things about Jack:

• "I was born with a small bump about half a centimeter in diameter on the back of my right earlobe."


• "I once ate a plastic gumball out of a "Claire's" gumball keychain accessory when I was 4. Smelt like bubble-mint, but did not taste like it."


• "When I was little I used to be scared that E.T was hiding in my closet at night amongst my stuffed animals after that one scene in the movie, so I would lean a glass of water against my closet door so it would make a noise if opened."

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When Lauren Foster appeared in a six-page spread in a 1980 issue of Vogue Mexico people assumed she was just another girl. Little did they or even the editors know, she wasn't. She was born in Durban, South Africa 23 years earlier as a boy. While she's one of the world's most recognized transgender women and one of the first to appear in Vogue, she really does prefer to think of herself as just another girl.

"I used to say that to my mom when I was kid," Foster says from her New York apartment. "I don't reside in my transgenderism."

With individuals like Caitlyn Jenner and Laverne Cox in the public eye, the trans movement is stronger than ever. Although Foster has been called the "it girl for the transgender community," she doesn't consider herself a pioneer. She acknowledges those who came before her, but feels the time has come to tell her story and continue to provide inspiration to others. On September 8, she launched her new website titled "Just Another Girl," the first online guide to the transgender community.

"With this new gender revolution, we all have an opportunity to change and let the world see us for who we really are, one step at a time. That is how we effect change. One step. One moment. One kindness at a time. I hope in sharing my knowledge with you, your journey is a little easier," Foster writes on her website.

Foster describes herself as fun, exciting, reckless, adventurous and a risk taker. Anyone who saw her on Real Housewives of Miami, the first transgender woman to appear on the franchise regularly, would agree. She's also proven herself as an actress in Circuit and Joseph Lally's provocative and artistic films, Faces and Miss America Commits Suicide. Additionally, for over a decade she worked with Jeffrey Sanker, the most powerful promoter in the underground party circuit, and went on to manage DJ Paolo, Tracy Young and Grace Jones. No matter what path she takes, there never seems to be a challenge too big.

Her journey to greatness started when she was just six and her father, the captain of his cricket team, took her into the men's locker room after a match.

"The smell of the musk of all the men around me made me very anxious and made realize I shouldn't be there in that spot. I ran out of the locker room, tripped and fell and ran screaming to my mother, 'I want to go home!' That's the first recollection of when I realized I wasn't wired correctly," Foster recalls.

Unlike countless individuals who don't have the support from their families, Foster was always accepted and calls her childhood "amazing."

At 18, she fully transitioned and never looked back. She hopes her website, which she equates to Allure or New Beauty magazine for trans women, will offer the same care and guidance she had. With an overwhelming amount of information on the Internet -- some inaccurate and outdated -- Foster says her site contains all of the best resources for those thinking of transitioning, in the process of doing so and the encouragement for every step along the way. With no graphic content, it's also a place where young people can visit and find answers to their questions.

Spiritual leader, author and close friend to Foster, Marianne Williamson, will contribute content to the Spirituality/Mental Health portion of the site. Williamson says it's a gift to know Foster and describes her "like an exotic bird that's also your get-down-with-it girlfriend." The two first met during one of Williamson's lectures in the late '80s when one of Foster's friends dying of AIDS went looking for spiritual guidance. Having founded Project Angel Food, a meals-on-wheels program that serves homebound people with AIDS, Williamson was at the forefront of outreach to AIDS patients. When it comes to the transgender community, Williamson's thoughts resonate with Foster: "Spirit has no gender."

"She had the courage to take on this challenge when it was exceedingly rare; if anybody knows the ropes, she does," Williamson says. "There are a lot of life issues that will be easier for people because her site exists."

It's no small wonder Foster and Williamson would connect. Foster has always chosen to walk in the light and rise above negativity. Shortly after appearing in Vogue, another model outted her as transgender. Foster forged ahead.

"It was in print, so it wasn't so jarring," Foster says about the experience. "A week later the story was probably lining the bottom of someone's bird cage. If it happened now it would be different because the story would continue to live on. I knew I could embrace it or let it hurt me."

Forster is also penning her memoirs that will read as a love story. She says she'll reflect on the beauty in her life, which includes wonderful and intense relationships, including her long-term marriage to architecture-firm owner James Foster.

"Not many men can openly love trans women. I have been fortunate to have had that happen to me. I want to give people hope. You don't need to be embarrassed to have a transgender woman as a girlfriend or wife. I've never been with a man who has been embarrassed to be with me. I want to dispel all the myths," says Foster.

Over the years Foster has learned many lessons; the greatest being honesty and humility. Whether it's in front of the camera or in her private life, she's redefined what it means to be a woman.

"My life has had so many great moments," she says. "It's certainly not tragedy; it's rejoicing."

Not bad for being "just another girl."

Visit Lauren Foster's site: www.justanothergirl.org

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Ashley Madison is a different kind of company -- feeding the appetites of the curious, the forlorn and the insatiable. Could that have been you? There aren't many worldly entities designed to encourage extramarital affairs beyond momentary encounters, but here is one that promises delectable treats for all who would like to indulge. Admittedly, even with my privacy creds, I had never heard of Ashley until the story of their hack -- perhaps because I am happily married or that nobody tipped me off because I wouldn't be a candidate for their services.

In the shock and awe rubble of Ashley's hack, questions about privacy abound. Is this their "oops"? Answers are forthcoming in parts and parcels -- which raise more questions. Weren't Ashley's members promised privacy? Did Ashley adequately protect their member's data and relations? How could the hack occur? How easily will significant other's find out about their partner's secret sex lives? Who is having an affair -- isn't that interesting? Will the press report on the juiciest tidbits and names revealed? Etc.

Listen, the Web is the great equalizer -- and I guess that means that law abiders (not in the biblical sense) are free to choose services that indulge their whims and indiscretions. Democracy and capitalism are all about free will and choices, within the umbrella of the laws of the land. And I do believe that the quality of a marriage and the choice of people to abide by their wedding vows and biblical canons or violate them is not a purvey of the citizen-state. However I also believe that the higher road is always a wise choice, as Ashley's sole purpose is to feed the ecstatic whims of unbounded imaginations -- and after the ecstasy there is always the laundry. History has demonstrated that -- as our lives have also provided plenty of evidence of -- Mom is going to find out.

If you live your life with a healthy dollop of dignity and integrity, chances are you won't be a victim to a crime such as what impacted Ashley Madison and their members. Betray that and it won't matter whether you're online or offline. You're going to create problems for yourself when the laundry comes calling -- and most likely it will come calling.

Sure you can try to be discreet about your indiscretions. But the truth is that most of the time our indiscretions get discovered. And with the Web, that is truer than ever. Ashley Madison works the same way. It's a website of indiscretions, which in this case made it a very attractive bull's eye for hackers. If Ashley Madison was a site for open marriages where people could be themselves and nobody cared, we wouldn't be having this conversation. This hack would never have made the front pages or even likely occurred. But that wasn't the company's business model. Illicit behavior was and thusly was responded to in kind.

To be clear I am not condoning the hackers nor examining their motives -- because the simple fact is that regardless of who the hackers are, the leaders at Ashley Madison should have seen this coming. Surely when designing a site where people are being indiscreet about their sexual affairs, the powers that be at Madison should have taken extra steps to ensure protection for its users. Where was the airtight encryption of user data? The airtight infrastructure? The firewalled network? The fact that the company was so cavalier is really surprising. More than most sites, the Ashley's entire premise is built on promised privacy for cheaters. So basically the company failed at the one thing it rested its foundation on.

If you're one of the 35 million Ashley Madison members, you're dealing with all the fallout now, buying the flowers and asking for forgiveness. You're probably embarrassed and feeling kind of stupid. After all, an online affair? Seriously? Could you have found a brighter neon sign broadcasting a fire on the mountain?

But that's another story. There's something else going on here. Another message delivered for all of us: If you're going to be careless online then be careless with the knowledge that you'll more than likely be discovered. If you're posting on Facebook a picture of you doing anything that could be considered indiscrete or in bad judgment or taste, just know that your bosses, peers, professors, parents, Obamacare, the government, and [your present or future] kids are going to see it -- for the rest of your life and beyond, creepy as that reality sounds.

Yes, many people are laughing about Ashley Madison getting hacked. But in this case I really don't believe pointing a finger at Ashley's flawed privacy structures makes any sense. And watching Ashley fight back and yell at the hackers is perhaps the most absurd part of it all. That is a PR smokescreen and distraction at best, demonstrating a lack of truly accountable leadership at worse. Then again, what Ashley promised was pretty much bottom barrel stuff anyhow, so their corporate actions seem perfectly in line with their service offering. Remember people, their slogan is "Life is short. Have an affair." Really, that's it.

Word on the street is that the cheaters got their just rewards and comics around the world couldn't have dreamed up a better story for delivering hilarious punch lines. One comic suggested their new slogan to be, "Life just got much longer for some of you." Funny indeed, but that's not the real story here. Take a good look in the mirror and think about your privacy. The story here is that if anybody really thinks that they can safely do something illicit, never mind illegal, online, take the Ashley Madison incident as great proof that you can't.

We live in different times. It's not just your past that catches up with you now. In the digital age, it's what you post and the actions you take in the present, too. The world has a far better chance of finding out your secrets today than ever before in history. My advice: at the very least, keep your pants buttoned up online if not everywhere else.

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Well, not a duel exactly, but a one-on-one debate. I think it would be good for Bernie Sanders, it would be good for the Democratic Party, and it would be good for the political health of the American democracy.

Here's why.

1. Bernie Sanders is now seen as at the far end of the political spectrum. He's climbing in the polls by inspiring the progressives in the Democratic Party (who are less than enthralled with the centrist history of Hillary Clinton). The fact that he has described himself as a "democratic socialist" -- using a word that's been used in this country for a century as a term of political abuse -- compounds Sander's vulnerability to being dismissed as the candidate of "the left."

A debate with Trump would offer Sanders an opportunity to show that his populist message can appeal to independents and people generally seen as on the right.

2. Trump and Sanders have widely been tied together in the media, represented as the two insurgent campaigns disrupting the expectations of the two parties. This media narrative signals that the media would be predisposed to take an interest in the idea of such a contest between the "insurgents."

3. More important than what Sanders and Trump have in common is the profound difference between them. Demonstrating this difference publicly could be of vital importance, and a Sanders-Trump faceoff could accomplish this.

Both men are appealing to the dissatisfied. But while Trump's diagnosis and treatment are bogus, Sanders' speaks directly to what truly ails the United States. Trump is a demagogue using peripheral issues and phony arguments -- e.g. about immigration -- to distract people from what is really disempowering them and to their anger and frustration against scapegoats. Sanders, meanwhile, is calling attention to the real problems facing America's middle class and its citizenry in general-- the stacked deck that's leading to growing economic inequality and to the theft of our democracy by Big Money.

It would serve the Democratic Party well -- regardless of who the Democratic nominee turns out to be -- to have this vital difference exposed to the American people.

4. Bernie Sanders is the Democrat best able to expose the way Trump -- and the GOP generally -- are betraying their followers. Bernie has two relevant strengths here.

First, he is clearly authentic, which provides an important contrast to the Donald. Sanders ability to take on this task is not diminished by having the public free associate with his name the word "liar" (as it does, whether rightly or wrongly, with his main Democratic rival). The fact that throughout his career he has been outspoken and articulate on the issues of economic justice, and of people power versus Big Money power surely adds to his credibility.

And second, his considerable strength in argument and his temperament seem likely to make him especially effective in cutting through the blather and nonsense in which Trump specializes.

It might be objected that Trump -- now dominating the Republican field -- would have no incentive to share a stage with Sanders. But Trump might be the prisoner here of the chronically belligerent posture he has cultivated.

It would not be easy for Trump to walk away from a fight. Not the man who has gotten such mileage from showing himself prepared to take a swipe at anyone -- belittling John McCain's war record, going after Fox News and one of its signature reporters, throwing put-downs at Jeb Bush, Rick Perry, and Lindsey Graham.

And if merely challenge Trump doesn't flush the Donald out, Bernie could turn to goading him. He could provide the equivalent of a dueler's slap with a glove by characterizing that vital difference between them -- the difference between the phony and the real, the distraction and the real issues. He can talk about the phoniness of Trump's political solutions, and castigate Trump for how he misleads and betrays the rightfully angry citizens who support him.

Even if that doesn't succeed in getting Trump to join Sanders on a debate stage, it could get an equivalent of a debate going on in the media. (Can one imagine Trump not responding at all to such jabs?)

And such an exchange in the media would help to accomplish the same goals: get Bernie Sanders more attention in the mainstream media, give Sanders a chance to demonstrate appeal in the center and the right, and provide a large forum for the Democratic Party to expose the terrible disservice today's Republican Party is doing to its followers, and to the nation as a whole.

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Donald Trump's rhetoric on taxes is profoundly at odds with Republican Party orthodoxy.

For all his outbursts and overly-zealous irrationalities on protectionism and demonizing illegal immigrants, Donald Trump does surprisingly speak the truth on taxes.

His repudiation of Republican conservative orthodoxy appears no more evident than his advocation to significantly raise taxes on hedge funds. On Face the Nation, Trump outlined his grievances and made the case that "They're [hedgefund managers] paying nothing, and it's ridiculous. I want to save the middle class. The hedge fund guys didn't build this country. These are guys that shift paper and they get lucky." Trump concluded by offering a policy prescription to this injustice: "They're making a tremendous amount of money -- they have to pay taxes."

The foundation of Trump's argument is this: It's not fair that hedge fund managers and investors often pay a 20% capital gains tax rate, whereas the top rate tax bracket for regular income is 39.6%. And yet, this argument is at odds with a Republican Party that Donald Trump is seeking the nomination from. Jeb Bush has labeled Trump a 'fake conservative' for advocating an increase in the capital gains tax. Added to this, in a Boston Herald interview, presidential candidate Marco Rubio lamented Trump's call for a tax increase by stating "I think if someone wants to raise taxes, they should run for the Democratic nomination. That party loves to raise taxes, I want to keep taxes low." Rubio's statement highlights remarkably how the Republican Party ideology and partisanship appears to upend compromise.

It is a profound contrast, of course, because there is deep Grover Norquist-style religiosity inherent within the modern day Republican Party to reject any call for any such tax increase.

Nowhere was that religiosity more evident than at an 2011 Ames Iowa Fox News Republican debate, whereby each of the eight potential candidates were asked if they would reject a deal of $10 of spending cuts for every $1 in tax increases. Every hand went up, every Republican would reject that compromise. It is obviously understandable to detest raising taxes as a conservative party, but there comes a point where political dogmatism can far too easily supersede pragmatism and compromise.

In his most recent New York Times op-ed titled, 'Trump Is Right on Economics', Paul Krugman argues that while Trump is of course an 'ignorant blowhard', he doesn't subscribe to imprudent tax cuts that candidates such as Jeb Bush advocate. Bush has been attacking Trump on this tax-increasing rhetoric, though Krugman adeptly argues that, "the issues the Bush campaign is using to attack its unexpected nemesis are precisely the issues on which Mr. Trump happens to be right, and the Republican establishment has been proved utterly wrong."

Krugman is right, Trump is right. Robert Greenstein of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities is also right in arguing that,"The tax code strongly favors income from capital gains -- i.e., increases in the value of assets such as stocks -- over income from wages and salaries. This imbalance fuels inefficient tax avoidance and unproductive asset-hoarding. It's also very regressive, since the top 1 percent of households hold about 42 percent of total wealth."

Donald Trump is bombastic, yet for all his faults, he manages to reject the Republican Party's religious proclivity for tax cuts. He is wildly irrational, though his tax-increasing stance does appear to show a glimmer of prudence, as he attempts to represent a party where such prudence is amiss.

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When sleep is the last thing on one's mind, what does one do to pass the pseudo slip of a night on a flight to Berlin? Many passengers snooze the quiet hours away, gap-mouthed slumpover pros. I envy them and their relaxed oblivion -- meds or no. Like a child, I am still plagued by the excitement of travel, of getting there and diving headfirst into the culture of a land and city I love and feel so connected to. I am chalking up yet another week-long visit to my relatives in Berlin, the last known extended family on my late Father's side, the main purpose being to spend time with my 89-year-old Aunt while she still lives, rather than scuttle over in typical familial-duty fashion when it is, as they say, too late.

The Tante I visit is my diminutive Aunt of whom I wrote years ago (Sisterhood of the Traveling Pink Sweater). I spend time with her in her graues Gärtchen of a post-war apartment so that my memory of her can still build via real-time interactions. My Aunt's mind and sense of humor are selectively intact, so our time together is now based solely on conversation, laughter, a piece of Kuchen, maybe a sip of Sekt, more talk, more laughter. And speaking of humor....

On board, in the dark, with more How Long Til We Get There than was good for me, I needed to fill my time quietly, like a good and considerate traveler. I decided to watch whatever German-language films were offered, with the dual intention of being entertained and re-acclimated to my second language. I selected a film called Wir Sind Die Neuen (We Are the New Ones), written and directed by Ralf Westhoff, a 2014 piece set in Munich, nominee and winner of several German film awards, basically unknown here in the States. The story pits a trio of reunited, middle-aged friends - fun-loving, creative types - roommates once more after 30+ years, against a trio of über-high-achieving millenials, brilliantly portrayed as pretentious and anemically uptight, who introduce themselves to their neighborly elders with warnings - that they will not go and fetch their groceries for them, and to please keep things quiet since they must study for their exams, bye-bye, aufwiedersehen.

The set-up, from the rickety euro-elegance of the old apartment building to the hilarious discourse between friends and versus the student elitists is slapstick at its classic, everyman's best. And how it works, from wine-slinging conflicts and thumping broomsticks to the eventual resolutions and transformations (Guess: who helps whom?), which though predictable, is absolutely delightful and thoroughly satisfying.

As a child of the 60s who herself is now only starting to get how great the accrued decades serve me as Mensch and woman, I learn to celebrate in my everyday precisely what the jist of "Wir Sind Die Neuen" conveys. Commercially and socially, trends overwhelmingly target younger income earners whose primary focus remains defaulted ever longer on self, for reasons practical as well as entitled, thanks in no small part to what is now decades-old, child-centric parenting styles. Bemused by the ageist Angst I as older-but-not-that-old American consumer observe and experience, I welcome good-natured - if not outright hilarious -- messages such as this film's, which speak volumes on my behalf - which just might serve to help our young ones navigate their own best courses:

1) Hit 50 & all is not lost - don't fear age

2) Work & play: like food groups, you need generous helpings of both - have fun

3) Don't take yourself too seriously - find the humor

Wir Sind Die Neuen is so well written and so well crafted that I would love to see it cross the Atlantic and try its legs out here in the States, with either (quality, colloquialistically cognizant - Ralf: I'm on call) over-dubbing or sub-titles. I want to share Wir Sind Die Neuen with my husband and friends - to let them see a bit of a country and culture I love and enjoy a story that, in the dark plane en route to Berlin, made me laugh like a not-so-good passenger -- out loud -- over and over again.

photo of passenger seat screen by Kimann

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There's a simple rule in entertainment as in any successful business - know what the people want and give it to them.

In the days and weeks leading up to the premiere of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, there was much speculation about who Stephen Colbert actually was, how much of what we'd seen up until now was a made up persona, and which version of whom would be hosting The Late Show.

I don't mind telling you that it's been a tough year for a talk show junkie like me. I come by my talk show addiction honestly, having grown up with the yardstick of Johnny Carson, Merv Griffin, Mike Douglas, and Dick Cavett to measure future talk show hosts by.

I should also say, in the interest of full disclosure, that it's entirely possible I was in some required college science class with Stephen Colbert, since we were both at Northwestern the same years. I wouldn't know if this was, in fact, true, of course, because I was asleep through much of my required science classes, and therefore have no recollection of classmates or anything else from it. You, Stephen?

I, like Colbert himself, watched David Letterman from his inception in late night, and I also reveled in Jon Stewart's entire tenure at The Daily Show from first show to last, from which talents like Colbert emerged to have their own successful careers.

So saying farewell to Craig Ferguson, David Letterman, and Jon Stewart in less than a year, left me not only bereft, but relegated to watching what was left of late-night TV.

I mean no disrespect to the two Jimmy's, James, and Seth. They all seem like lovely people. I just don't find celebrity drinking games and reenactments of Paula Abdul videos to be my particular cup of tea when I tune in to watch a talk show. (And I also mean no disrespect whatsoever to alcoholic beverages or to Paula Abdul. Both have provided wonderful entertainment at appropriate times.)

I was a bit worried that all the hype leading up to Colbert's debut would only leave us all disappointed if, in any way, he didn't live up to expectations.

My worries were for naught, however, because Colbert delivered big time. Opening singing of the national anthem - check. Cameo by Jon Stewart - check. Funny, intelligent, accessible - check. Donald Trump jokes - check. George Clooney - sigh - and check. Kick-ass band - check. Political interview - check.

Short of giving everyone a car like Oprah, I'm not sure what he could have done better. I bought in. I was immediately hooked... and reassured that I would have something to watch every night from now on. Order has been restored to my world. Thank you, CBS.

I know that we as a society love to build people up just so we can tear them down. We dub people kings and queens of things - the King of Pop, the Queen of Soul. Okay, so maybe it's just musicians that do that. But the point is I am predicting that The Late Show will reign triumphant for years to come, because, as it turns out, what we wanted and what they gave us... was Stephen Colbert.

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Today Donald Trump tweeted this open letter to CNN President Jeff Zuker.




If I were Mr. Zuker, here is how I would respond to Trump's challenge:

September 9, 2015

Dear Donald,

Thank you for your open letter to me dated September 8, 2015. You are always full of... surprises.

I was surprised by your statement that "While I refuse to brag..." Correct me if I am wrong, but I do seem to recall some sort of bragging by you in the past. Also, this might be contradicted by your statements following your refusal to brag. It does appear that you were boasting just a bit. I had not realized that "The Apprentice" was the "... virtually the easiest show to sell to advertisers on television, and at extraordinary rates." I haven't done any fact checking on this, but I will take your word for it. I know you would never exaggerate.

I was pleased to see that you are so very concerned about our veterans, who certainly deserve the respect and support of all of us in a grateful nation. But again I was surprised by this, particularly in light of your past comments about Senator John McCain, "He's not a war hero. He was a war hero because he was captured. I like people who weren't captured." It seemed to me that this was rather demeaning of veterans who became prisoners of war.

I am confident that your suggestion that we donate our profits from the upcoming GOP debate to "various VETERANS groups" of your choosing is NOT motivated by self-interest. I say this because you would not be personally benefited by any such contribution. I know that your motives are pure because you are not a veteran and never served in the military. In fact, you sought and obtained multiple student deferments followed by a very convenient medical deferment. I trust you have fully recovered from the condition that was the subject matter of your medical deferment.

Here is my counter-proposal to you. CNN will donate our profits from the debates as you have demanded on two conditions: 1) That you personally match our donation, and 2) That Fox News does the same. Under my suggestion, the veterans groups would receive triple the amount you have required, which we can all agree would be a wonderful result.

Please let me know your decision as soon as possible. Thank you!

Sincerely,

"Jeff Zuker"

P.S. As the head of a news network, I am curious to know how much you have donated to veterans groups (or other charities) in the past.

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When you're six-and-a-half, almost seven years old, you view the movie-making process differently than -- say -- your typical SAG-AFTRA member.

Take -- for example -- Asher Blinkoff. The talented tot who's providing the voice of Dracula's grandson Dennis in Sony Pictures Animation's Hotel Transylvania 2.



What excites Asher most about making movies? Is it walking the red carpet with his fellow HT2 cast members Adam Sandler, Selena Gomez and Mel Brooks? Or getting the opportunity to work with Genndy Tartakovsky on this eagerly anticipated follow-up to his 2012 film.

Nope. What Asher enjoyed most about working on Hotel Transylvania 2 was pretty much what any six-and-a-half, almost seven-year-old boy would enjoy about being at a real working movie studio. And that was getting the chance to ride around the lot in a golf cart.

"That was honestly Asher's favorite part of going to work at Sony Pictures Animation. That after we'd driven onto the Lot and parked our car, they'd come meet us with a golf cart. And he'd then get driven over their onsite recording booth," recalled Marion Blinkoff (i.e., Asher's Mom) during a recent phone interview. "To hear my son talk, those golf cart rides may have been the most memorable part of working on Hotel T2."



Which -- to Marion's way of thinking -- is perfectly fine. Given that Hollywood is a town filled with these extremely driven people, it pleases her no end that her son Asher can still enjoy the simpler things in life. Like being driven around in a golf cart.

"My husband Saul and I have worked hard to foster that kind of attitude in our kids. We don't want being a success in this industry to become their end-all and be-all. Because there are people who do get sucked into that mindset. Become the sorts of stage parents who then push their kids into doing things that they really don't want to do," Marion explained. "Whereas Saul and I, we want our children to enjoy the process. We want our kids to be creative. We like to think that -- by doing things like voice acting for projects like Hotel Transylvania 2 -- that our children are literally finding their own voices and that they're becoming individuals."

And Saul Blinkoff, he knows just how challenging and competitive the entertainment industry can be. For nearly two decades now, he's worked in animation. Saul started off working at Walt Disney Animation Studios -- Florida working on full-length hand-drawn features like Pocahontas, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Mulan and Tarzan. After a brief stint at MTV where Blinkoff co-directed "SpyGroove," he then returned to the Mouse House. Where Saul then helmed two Disney home premieres, Winnie the Pooh: Springtime for Roo and Kronk's New Groove. More recently, Blinkoff directed the entire second season of Disney Junior's hit series, "Doc McStuffins."



"And throughout all of this, my kids were auditioning for voice overs. Especially our oldest, Meira. She did voice work for the first Hotel Transylvania. She was one of the four kids that they brought in to voice all of those werewolf puppies," Saul stated. "From when she was little, Meira always did great at voiceover. Commercials and stuff. And she just love, love, LOVED it. And this part -- I know you're going to find hard to believe -- but my connection with the animation world had nothing to do with them at all. I never made a call."

"In fact, when I took Asher to his Hotel Transylvania 2 audition, even though Genndy Tartakovsky was there, I didn't play my "I'm-an-animation-director-too" card. I took him in there, and then I just sat just there. As far as they knew, I was just another stage dad sitting on the couch, waiting for my son to finish his audition. I have to admit that -- the first couple of times I was in there -- it was difficult for me. Largely because I wanted to get in there and direct Asher because I'm a director. But I deliberately held back and let Genndy do his job. And he did get a great vocal performance out of my son."

Tartakovsky confirmed that the Blinkoff boy was a great fit for Dracula's grandson. "Dennis is playful and fun, but because he's getting pulled by everybody, he's also a bit timid," Genndy said." Asher has such a nice charm to his voice that it brought an instant personality to his character."



And why did Tartakovsky opt to cast Asher as the voice of Dennis, Dracula's half-human, half-vampire grandson? Basically because Blinkoff -- unlike so many child actors working in Hollywood today -- still actually sounded like an authentic six-and-a-half, almost seven-year-old boy.

"And Genndy was so patient with Asher. I mean, you have to understand that Asher booked this job before he knew how to read. So while Saul would prep our son the night before each recording session -- they'd go into one of the bedrooms here at the house, close the door and go over each of the script pages that the Studio had sent us -- it was Genndy who actually got that great performance out of Asher," Marion remembered. "Genndy knew exactly what to do to make Asher comfortable and then get him the proper mindset for Dennis. Genndy knew exactly what to do & say to make a six year-old boy sound happy or excited or sad. He and Asher had this great working relationship."

The Blinkoffs were also quick to praise Sony Pictures Animation, who were more than willing to work around Asher's pre-school schedule, so that he'd then be available to come in and record Dennis' dialogue.



"We never once had to pull him out of school in order to work on this movie. Luckily most of Hotel T2 was recorded last year during the summer months. So that didn't really conflict with Asher's school schedule. But then came the Fall and he'd have to come in to record pick-up lines. But Sony was extremely accommodating. Given that Asher had a shorter school day on Fridays, that's when they'd schedule all of his pick-up recording sessions for," Marion said. "It was on those Friday afternoons that we'd drive onto the Sony Lot and then be met by that golf cart that Asher so enjoyed riding in."

And speaking of vehicles ... Given that there are bus signs and billboards promoting Hotel Transylvania 2 all over town that prominently feature Dennis (i.e., the character that Asher voices in this upcoming Sony Pictures Animation release), how is the Blinkoffs' boy dealing with this sudden taste of fame?

"I have to admit that he's pretty excited that the character he's been voicing is so prominently featured in the trailer and on the Hotel Transylvania 2 poster. But then again, Asher just started first grade. And he's pretty excited about that too. So all and all, he's a pretty typical six year-old boy," Marion laughed.



That said, Asher is a very busy six year-old. On the heels of his highly praised vocal performance in Hotel T2, he's now voicing a character in Jon Favreau's live-action / CG version of The Jungle Book for Disney. Asher's also working on Lunch for Illumination Entertainment where he'll be voicing a pig.

Now any other kid working in Hollywood on high profile projects like that would be thrilled. But not Asher Blinkoff. To be honest, what excites Marion and Saul's children is what comes BEFORE work on these newly booked productions begins.

"You have to understand that we have this family tradition. Anytime one of our kids books something, the Blinkoffs as a family go out for a sushi dinner," Saul said. "That -- to be honest -- is why Meira & Asher get so excited whenever they book work on something like Hotel Transylvania 2. It's not their character being-seen-on-the-poster or being-heard-in-the-trailer that appeals to them. It's -- rather -- that they're going to get to eat sushi again that really, really excites them."



A six-year-old boy who actually likes eating raw fish? That sounds a trifle fishy to me. But then I recall Asher's fondness for riding around in golf carts. And then I have no doubt that the Blinkoff's boy really is six-and-a-half, almost seven.

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