Kevin Slick: Journal

I just heard that CIty Lights record store in State College, PA will be closing soon. I spent a lot of time in that store checking out albums (yes, the vinyl kind), tapes, CDs, books and magazines. Greg, the owner of the shop, was like a master of ceremonies as he presided over the scene. He could direct you towards music you were bound to like because he knew your tastes in recordings. It was like the human version of the "People who bought... also like" links that appear when you buy online. I suppose buying online is one of the reasons why City Lights and numerous other independent record stores are closing their doors. I miss the good old days of going down to CIty Lights and hanging out, but I am not completely nostalgic about those times. These days there is so much more music available to the average consumer. Long ago I used to read about a release and spend weeks or months trying to track down a copy. I did find other great stuff in libraries and enjoyed trips to larger cities to search in bigger stores but overall it was just more work. I know that many artists who work in niche genres are able to sell much more music now online. I used to sell my indie releases at City Lights and now they sell all over the world on iTunes and other online download shops. So overall, there is much that has improved for musicians as well as fans. So what do I miss?
I miss the human interaction. More often than not I'd not buy anything at the record shop, but would hang out and talk music with Greg or any number of other patrons who were in the shop. I miss seeing bands play live, being able to sit two feet away from Greg Ginn flailing away on his guitar was amazing. I think that online retailing of music has many more benefits for the fan and the creator of the music but it misses the human interaction and connection.
Maybe the future will bring coffeehouses or listening centers that are primarily for gathering with other fans of recorded sound. I don't feel bad about buying a CD from a band on it's website, but I miss having a great place to hang out.

I'm back on the air. In case you didn't know I worked in radio for about ten years on the air and as a writer and producer. I grew up listening to the radio in the 1960s and 70s. I would sleep out in my treehouse on summer nights and listen to the magic sounds drifting in through the two inch speaker on my radio with the antenna pointed to the stars. Cousin Brucie would speak to me from New York City, I'd hear the sound of Philly Soul on WFIL, CKYW would come in all the way from Canada. There was the "Groovology" show on the local station WMAJ, not to mention the wonderful sound of baseball games on radio. Even today, the sound of a crowd in the background and the slow measured cadance of an announcer describing the pitcher's preperation for the next pitch is one of the most beautiful sounds I know. And yet, as much as I loved the experience I don't recall that it was a dream of mine to be on the air. I was probably more interested in being a rock and roll guitar player (which I also got to do as a full time job for several years) I stumbled into radio actually. My friend Ron Adams was already working for radio stations in State College, PA, my hometown and he eventually pulled me into doing commercials or small bits on the air reading the weather etc. Soon after that, with art teaching jobs in short supply, I found myself working full time on the air. My last regular broadcast was in 1991 and while I've missed the excitement of the medium, I haven't missed the stressful, uncreative world that radio was becoming even in my last days on the air. Fast forward to 2009, the same Ron Adams now owns a station in the lovely, small town of Ligonier PA and since it's automated, or pre-recorded it means that I can "do" a show even from my home in Colorado. A good microphone, digital recording and the internet are all that's needed. So tune me in sometime on AM 1620 in the Laurel Valley of Pennsylvania or at www.ligonierradio.com on the internet 12 midnight to 5am Eastern Time Mondays through Fridays.

When in the course of human music making it becomes necessary to seperate a band from the name it has previous used etc. You know how it goes. For over a year now I've played with two other musicians as the Slick Allen Trio, three people - trio, everyone's last name was either Slick or Allen, made sense, but also sounded too much like a jazz trio to me so we've changed our name to Big Sky Radio. Well, what does Big Sky Radio sound like? I'd love to know. For now you can find us at www.myspace.com/bigskyradio and on Facebook as well. I'm still here and if you're here that means you've found me.

Les Paul died on my birthday this year. I think I may have seen him on my birthday once. When I lived in New York I went over to the Iridium Jazz Club to see him many nights. I wonder if he kept the drawings I did of him. One night I was drawing during the show and afterwards he asked for a couple of the sketches. My birthday is a good time for me to think about time and how we move through the years. Perhaps it was this nostalgic mood that had me re-listen to my cover versions of songs by the well known and loved State College, PA band Cartoon. I posted them on my page at MySpace - www.myspace.com/kevinslick so you can have a listen if you like. The crickets are singing outside the window tonight, the air is still and warm, the last rays of sun have gone behind the mountains to seek the farthest shore to the west ... "As far as Selidor" now that reminds me ...

It's summer and I've been spending most days tossing the wiffle ball, throwing the frisbee or helping my son learn how to ride a two wheeler. When not doing that I've been working on movie music - This year's silent film is The Magician, which will have it's premier in June at The Monster Bash. I've done music for two short indie films, one a documentary, the other a 50's sci-fi spoof called "Attack of the 50 ft Ghoul Girl". There's also the new Lon Chaney double feature - Outside The Law and The Trap from oldies.com featuring my music. The Slick Allen Trio continues to spin our folky music around the front range and at least two of us are going east this summer to play some shows. You can find out more about the band at www.myspace.com/slickallen trio.
One of the most meaningful works I've taken on this summer has been writing a memorial or requiem for Forrest Ackerman. This will be premiered in June. I used sound bites from an interview I conducted with Mr. Sci-Fi and then used the music to express what the words could not.
I hope you're having a wonderful summertime, drop me a line - come on out to a show, have a good time!

My latest film score for a classic silent film is out now on DVD.
Here's the link:
http://www.oldies.com/product-view/5800D.html
It's a double feature with Lon Chaney - Outside The Law, directed by Tod Browning and a rare Chaney film The Trap which paired Chaney with Irving Thalberg plotting the film. The Trap is short, very little of the film remains but they did a great job restoring the film. the Trap is also interesting in that it's Chaney's most stage-like acting on film and one of his rare flops at the box office. Still you can see elements he would bring back in later films.

More words of wisdom from kindergarten. After talking about Earth Day and what we can do, one boy said "Wow, Earth Day is really a hard day". When I asked why he said "We've got to take care of the whole planet!"

Springtime in the Rockies! The weather changes every few minutes, sunshine and seventy degrees followed by two feet of snow. Reminds me of the story where a king asked his wise men to boil down all the world's wisdom to one sentence and their response was "This too shall pass." The story goes on to say he next asked them to condense all the world's wisdom to one word. After a few years work they returned, the word was "Maybe"

I couldn't begin to tell you all the times I cried today. Seeing Barack Obama hug John Lewis on the steps of the capital, hearing Aretha sing, listening to the soaring melody of "Simple Gifts", hearing the thoughtful, soulful, heartfelt words of change, seeing the ocean of beautiful humanity that stretched across the mall and truly transformed the city and made a people's history. That's only some of the moments I'll remember and cherish. But alone in my car tonight driving home after watching the replay with friends I was listening to Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes singing "Wake Up Everybody" and I was so filled with joy I just started shouting and crying and singing. The words of the song where like dynamite exploding a dam inside me that held back joy, hope and faith in the future.
Isn't this a Time? Isn't this a wonderful time?

Today as I thought about Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday 80 years ago today I recalled the words the words of Abraham Lincoln when, at Gettysburg, he talked about it being up to us to carry on the great work that others had begun.
Later in the morning at work as I talked with kids about King's message we were coloring pictures of him. One child said "I'm going to color him all colors because I think he'd like that".
And I thought so too.

And so it's time to change the calendar once again, one year gone and another one on the way.
I've added some new sites to the links page on this website mostly related to my current group The Slick Allen Trio.
I hope you're all having a lovely holiday time. The sun is shinning here on the snow capped Rockies and my banjo is standing nearby.
Happy New Year and I look forward to hearing from you, whoever and wherever you are, soon.
-Kevin

This year I am thankful for my family and friends and for the courage, wisdom and vision our country has shown.
Today I read once again what I consider to be the greatest speech in American history. It perfectly expresses not only what and who we have been, but what and who we can be.
I invite you to read it along with me:

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

I am thankful for all of you who will be part of this great work.
Happy Thanksgiving

Here's some of the best post election writing I've seen so far from William Greider: "Against all odds, he persuaded a majority of Americans to believe in their own better natures and, by electing him, the people helped make it true. There is mysterious music in democracy when people decide to believe in themselves. "
It's a beautiful day.

Tonight I raised a glass to toast the election of Barack Obama. As I did this, I thought of Paul Robeson, Studs Terkel, Woody Guthrie, Martin Luther King Jr., Eleanor Roosevelt, Marian Anderson and so many others who built this victory with their hard work and their dreams in the past. This is a great day to be alive, a great day to be an American.

This past week we lost a great American treasure, the writer Studs Terkel. In his amazing life he wove the tales of everyday people into an incredible tapestry of Americana. Perhaps his greatest skill and one we could all aspire to was listening. He was a great listener. As an interviewer he spent most of the time listening and his probing, inspiring questions came from a reflective place rather than from an agenda. Studs Terkel was and is one of my mentors and he was following the election with great interest. So tonight as I watch the returns that hopefully will show Barack Obama winning the election I'll be smiling thinking of Studs and how he never gave up, always kept believing, always listening.

I just watched the most uplifting and beautiful segment on Bill Moyers Journal on PBS. Here's the link so you can sing and hope along:
http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/10242008/watch3.html

Yesterday Jamie and I took our first leaf kicking walk of autumn. I love that. What more do I need?

Okay, here's the assignment - Do your part to annoy Sarah Pallin... read a book! and if you really want to piss her off, think about it, maybe even talk about it with friends!
It occurs to me that nothing is more scary to the extreme right wing nuts than people thinking.
Think on!

For those of you who remember the band Neo Pseudo from those long ago days of the early 1990's in Philadelphia and New York you can see a nifty little video of the band on YouTube that was originally produced as a demo in 1993. The web address is:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vfINrrNsxMk

Today, for our nation's birthday, I'm wearing a shirt with a picture of the Constitution on the front. While I have nothing against red, white and blue I thought it was a better symbol to wear today. Our country was founded by people who were radicals in their day and if you go back and read the original documents would still be thought of as radical, possibly dangerous thinkers today. I'm wearing a shirt with the Constitution printed on the front which puts me at odds with the current administration who works daily to destroy that document. But rather than just saying I'm against the policies of the current (and thank God temporary) President I'd like to use the day to say what I support and the truths I hold to be self evident (to borrow a phrase from another document that could be re-read often)

In my mind saints are not those guys in the Bible. Saints are those people who while on earth find ways to help us laugh at this world we live in. Saints point out how funny we are, they show us the beautiful, hilarious moments that are all around us. George Carlin was a saint if ever there was one. When I heard that he had died I said all seven words you can never say on television.
Thank you George Carlin.

My son Jamie is quite a good reader so it was no surprise to see him looking at the front page of a newspaper in the recycling basket. The article listed many of things George Bush has done since being in office. "Wow" said Jamie, "He sure is bad, what does he do?"
I replied "He's President of the United States"
"How can he be so bad and still be in charge of the country?" Jamie asked.
What could I say?
"The good news" I told him, "Is that we get to vote this year for a new President"
"I know about voting" Jamie said, "In gym class we raise our hands for what game we want to play, voting is how you choose"
Let's hope we choose wisely this time.

While driving in the car today we were listening to Christmas music. During "Do You Hear What I Hear?" by Bing Crosby Jamie asked "Why is he shouting?" "Well, he's singing pray for peace, and that's an important idea so he wants everyone to hear it" I said. "Do you mean, like we should throw away all the guns and weapons?" Jamie asked. "Yes, that's the idea" I replied. He was silent for a while in the back seat (a sure sign that some kind of good question or thought is on the way) "I think it would be better to recycle the guns and weapons because there's a lot of metal there that could be used for something good" said Jamie. "That's a good idea" I replied. It was, and it is.

I was watching my son outside the Quaker Meeting House here in Boulder where we attend. He was running and laughing and then twisting, falling and rolling in the leaves that still carpeted the ground. It was one of those autumn days where the slightest hint of chill drifts in the air along side the still bright sunshine. Standing there on the edge of the Rocky Mountains I had a thought that there's nothing more beautiful than this, no place I'd rather be. I thought "Oh yeah, it's the little things that count, I am grateful for life's little blessings" But then I thought, "No, there really is nothing little about this" Sunshine, laughter, rolling in leaves, running crazy across the yard with friends, these are the big things in life! And I am grateful and thankful.
I hope you find blessings surrounding you daily and your hearts glow with gratitude in this season of Thanksgiving.

Reading the last journal entry reminds me of an old quote about pride. Let's see, it goeth before...the wall?, no, something small?, no, the mall? no that's not right. Oh well, the baseball season's not quite over yet, but I do hear a rather large woman warming up her vocal chords.