December 13, 2012
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The Daily News1 I’m a bit struck dumb.
2 For three days running my time has been dominated by outsiders.
3 Fortunately I have navigated some pretty unsteady waters during all of that, and kept my ship somewhat afloat.
4 Long story, won’t bother you with it.
5 It’s just as the semester steams its way to an end, everybody wants paperwork, meetings, and results of accountability NOW.
6 And we teachers have somehow to keep planning, keep grading, and keep everything together while the students are going out of their minds with holiday glitz and glamour.
7 Now drop a super-concert for Hurricane Sandy Relief and the bizarreness reaches the level of cosmic lunacy. Perhaps comic lunacy.
8 I knew that the 12/12/12 Super Concert was on last night AND that it was for a good cause, but literally forgot about it because I was doing a refi.
9 As has been the theme of the year, I had to be everywhere all at once doing things for everybody. I had no time to think about some concert.
10 Let alone report on its weirdness.
11 I think I got on board the thing right around when Eric Clapton played, and he did a marvelous job as always.
12 I missed all the opening stuff with Springsteen and all.
13 I also missed a lot of the backstage shenanigans and oddities that always accompany a sort of throw-together benefit concert.
14 The Rolling Stones came out and did a Jack Flash that alerted the world they remain a powerful musical force. As always, I wondered if this was their last show.They disappeared just as fast as they arrived.
15 I missed Bon Jovi joining Springsteen for Born to Run, but I read about it, and I’m glad that’s all I did, evidently. Springsteen later joined Bon Jovi on Who Says You Can’t Go Home.
16 I had visions of some weird dance group dancing to Roger Waters Another Brick in the Wall, Part Two, but maybe I was wandering around wondering where I was supposed to be.
17 At one point Eddie Vedder glanced on the scene, but I was still wandering around wondering where I was supposed to be. Overwork will do that to a fellow.
18 This is all out of order and just quick jabs and jaws, but the Who finally made it to a concert and sounded pretty nice. Roger Daltrey’s voice was steady, although he might have done all of us the favor of buttoning his shirt and perhaps changing his look. The grey hair and weird little sunglasses weren’t working. The music was.
19 The Who brought the music, Townshend got away with his windmill playing, and they even had Keith Moon on video singing Bell Boy, which was awfully weirdly weird on an overall weird night.
20 Kanye West came out and took it to the crowd, a powerfully intense performance.
21 Then it seemed I sank into my couch, and sort of wondered what Paul McCartney would be up to.
22 More bizarreness. I fell asleep for a bit, and then saw Sir Paul. I assumed Ringo would show, and perhaps Clapton and some others for a jam of some famous tunes.I remember the Concert for George, which did a spectacular job with that tribute.
23 Instead, he did an extremely weird version of Helter Skelter (?), did a few Wings’ songs, and did Blackbird as we’ve always heard Blackbird. He then got into some sort of Nirvana reunion that looked and sounded like an explosion of onion soup to me.
24 The entire thing was weird. These celeb all-star Save the World concerts used to be somewhat okay, and always bizarre considering all of the egos involved, but I guess it was all for a good cause.
25 I realized that I somehow had to stay up during this bizarre tribute to Nirvana that was somehow taking place, and somehow get enough sleep and managed to look over enough notes to produce some form of reporting on the “event.’
26 Alicia Keys sang beautifully, that much I can tell you. But it was way past everybody’s bedtime, including Coldplay’s. Chris Martin and Michael Stipe’s coming together on Losing My Religion seems a mid-winter night’s dream, and was a stabilizing moment.
27 I won’t go into all the names and all the songs, because the entire thing was completely weird, sort of like taking a boat through some mythical underworld, Hades incarnate. I went to rock Hades, had a bit of fun, bit it was also pretty creepy, the entire scene.
28 Old guys should just retire. Or at least button their shirts.
29 Moving on, Part the First: I never thought I’d be able to pull off any report of the concert.
30 I’m glad they all raised some money, but the days of the benefit concerts, which were ALWAYS bizarre, are I guess still eerily here.
31 I’m surprised they didn’t bring out video of MJ, which would really have been Erebus incarnate.
32 Keith Moon was enough.
33 I think I am going to get back to sleep. It is into the 3 a.m. and I know I watched that weirdness, but I also know I somehow have to get more sleep before having my life run by everyone outside of it once again.
34 I’m a bit afraid to go to sleep, because I’m afraid I will wind up sailing on the sea of the old rocker’s underworld, set afire by visions of Kanye in a skirt.
35 Doesn’t matter.
36 I need the rest.
37 I will simply pull my metaphorical covers over my head, and it will all go away.
38 I hope so.
39 Have a GREAT day, and don’t think about the concert too much.
40 They’ll probably have a DVD out within a week.
41 Heaven help us all.
42 I hope I never have to go through anything like that ever again.
43 See you again.
44 Peace.
~H~
