Mediated

Some interesting comments from Nouriel Roubini (known as Dr Doom for some of his predictions on the economy) in this article “Dr Doom Has Some Good News” by James Fallows in the Atlantic.

I asked Roubini whether, similarly, American authorities and the U.S. public appreciated the contradictions in their own position. He answered by returning to the damage caused by boom-and-bust cycles and the need to find a different path.

“We’ve been growing through a period of time of repeated big bubbles,” he said. “We’ve had a model of ‘growth’ based on overconsumption and lack of savings. And now that model has broken down, because we borrowed too much. We’ve had a model of growth in which over the last 15 or 20 years, too much human capital went into finance rather than more-productive activities. It was a growth model where we overinvested in the most unproductive form of capital, meaning housing. And we have also been in a growth model that has been based on bubbles. The only time we are growing fast enough is when there’s a big bubble.

“The question is, can the U.S. grow in a non-bubble way?” He asked the question rhetorically, so I turned it back on him. Can it?

“I think we have to …” He paused. “You know, the potential for our future growth is going to be lower, because of the excesses we’ve had. Sustainable growth may mean investing slowly in infrastructures for the future, and rebuilding our human capital. Renewable resources. Maybe nanotechnology? We don’t know what it’s going to be. There are parts of the economy we can expect to lead to a more sustainable and less bubble-like growth. But it’s going to be a challenge to find a new growth model. It’s not going to be simple.” I took this not as pessimism but as realism.

I do agree that our notion of ‘economic growth’ has been badly skewed by years of easy credit (and before that we benefitted from years of low-competition after WWII).  Where we go next is anybody’s guess.

David Byrne and band (& a marching band!) came to Portland tonight…  and put on a real Show!  Basically a career highlights retrospective, he mixed recent Byrne/Eno material with well-known songs from the Talking Heads days and afterwards.  He had with him three singers, three dancers, bass, drums, percussion, keyboards.  A big, wide open stage, with everyone in back except for David in front and center.  On most songs dancers would be out with David and the other singers - most fun when one guy hopped right over David mid-song.  Each song had its own feel with the lighting and stage arrangements.  As best I can remember, songs included:

• ‘Strange Overtones’ & about three others from the latest Byrne/Eno album
• ‘I Zimbra’
• ‘Air’
• ‘My Big Hands’
• ‘Houses in Motion’ - this one got a huge ovation
• ‘Heaven’
• ‘Crosseyed and Painless’
• ‘Help Me Somebody’
• ‘Heaven’
• ‘Born Under Punches’
• ‘Life During Wartime’

encore:

• ‘Take Me To The River’
• ‘Once in a Lifetime’ - another huge response

then out came a sexy San Francisco marching band through the audience and onstage to join for:

• ‘Road to Nowhere’
• ‘Burning Down the House’

That’s Entertainment!

Saw PJ Harvey, John Parish and the band (including Eric Drew Feldman) last night at Roseland.  The set list was restricted to songs from their two collaboration albums, this year’s “A Man A Woman Walked By” and “Dance Hall at Louse Point” from 1996.  Thus the opening tune “Black Hearted Love” was the most conventionally rocking, after that things ranged widely, with John playing a little banjo and ukelele now and then (PJ sang only, no guitar).  PJ looked great, seemed very at ease and enjoying herself, so one of the best shows of hers I’ve seen over the years!

Went to see an old favorite, Marshall Crenshaw, the other night after the Pedalpalooza Parade, over at the renovated Mississippi Studios.  The new room lacks some of the character of the old space, but the sound was good and the crowd was really enjoying Crenshaw’s solo performance.  Above is his new CD ‘Jaggedland’, first one in a few years, and he played quite a few songs from it along with great oldies, going all the way back to his first single, “Something’s Gonna Happen”.  I picked up the new one, and I’d say it’s right up there with his best stuff.

Here’s a bit from his site on what he’s up to these days:

Over the last few years, Crenshaw has played 40 - 50 shows a year on what he dubs “the NPR singer-songwriter circuit.” Says Crenshaw, “This album took a lot of wear and tear on my emotions, but in the end I think it’s one of my best ever and I am so excited to have worked with so many of my favorite players on it. When people ask me why I keep making music after all these years, I have a simple answer: because I have to. For lack of a more colorful term, there is truly something magical to it and I never take it for granted.”

Funny side note: during the show, particularly for some of the early songs, he asked folks to pull out the key chains and ratttle them to the rhythm  - recreating a bit of that jingle-jangle production!

Here’s the lovely poster for this year’s Pedalpalooza, which starts today!  Bicycling events daily all around Portland for the next two weeks!

You can find all the info here at:  http://www.shift2bikes.org/

Just found out about these from a twitter post - pretty amazing!  The company that makes this is MonkeyLectric based in Berkeley, CA.  Here’s a cool gallery of wheel images from a Portland rider.   Here’s a cool video that shows off some of the more sophisticated stuff they can do - check it out!

(image by James Victore in NYT)

As a follow-up to my earlier post on the new book ‘Pedaling Revolution’ by Jeff Mapes, I note a couple items:

- a nice overview on the success of the book and Mapes’s reaction to it over here at BikePortland.org which notes that the book has gone into a third printing

- David Byrne reviewed the book in the NYT Sunday Book Review last weekend.  He had this to say:

As Mapes points out, when more women begin riding, that will signal a big change in attitude, which will prompt further changes in the direction of safety and elegance. I can ride till my legs are sore and it won’t make riding any cooler, but when attractive women are seen sitting upright going about their city business on bikes day and night, the crowds will surely follow. A recent article in a British newspaper showed the pop singer Duffy on a pink bike. The model Agyness Deyn claims never to be without hers, and Courteney Cox reportedly presented Jennifer Aniston with a Chanel bike last year. Tabloid fodder does not a revolution make, but it’s a start.

I’ll just say that I see plenty of women on bicycles here in town (but have yet to witness a celebrity on two wheels)!

Tonight I went to see author Chris McDougal talk about his new book, Born To Run, not the story of Bruce Springsteen, but a wild tale involving his researches into the incredible endurance feats of a particular tribe in Mexico.  He’s a good story-teller, and adds in a variety of information about theories of evolution of humans as ‘tribe runners’ that hunted animals by running them down, as well as a healthy dose of skepticism about the benefits of modern running shoes.  He believes that we’ve been done a disservice by those who say that there’s no ‘correct’ running style; we don’t say that about swimming or most any other atheletic endeavor, so why would it be true of running?  A look at runners of the past seems to indicate a stride that lands on mid-foot, and leans forward a little, to get the help of gravity to pull you forward.

I personally made it out for a five mile run mid-day, getting up into the Forest Park trails.  I find it very exhilarating to run on narrow trails, winding up and down, in and out along the ridge!

After hearing a ‘double buy it’ review from the Chicago team at Sound Opinions (show #181 5/15/09), I picked up the new CD by the act known as St Vincent, aka Annie Clark, titled Actor.  She’s from Texas, has previously been part of Polyphonic Spree, and this is the second album.  Kind of hard to describe this pop music, it initially sounds light but the lyrics throw some darker twists into the tunes.  I liked it enough to pick up the first CD, entitled ‘Marry Me’, and I think they’re both quite good.  Here’s a Pitchfork review (8.5).  You can hear some tunes over on MySpace.

Just so happens she’s playing Portland’s Aladdin Theater on Monday night, and I will be there.

Update on the show:  Annie came in with a four-piece band, bass, drums, violin/guitar, and a reed player.  She stuck to guitars all evening.  I enjoyed the show, mostly songs from the new album, and she’s an engaging character (though she stands a bit still and static on stage).  She said she felt a bit like she was in a Jr. High talent show, as we were all seated in the small hall.  There was an interesting vocal mic setup, where she actually had two mics, one that did more echo and processing on her voice, the other that sounded fairly straight.  Some songs had lines alternating between mics.  All in all a good show and an rising talent!

I note that George Will’s latest Newsweek column on Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood manages to get in some fine Portland-bashing:

And then, predictably, comes the P word: Look, he says, at Portland, Ore.

Riding the aforementioned wave to Portland, which liberals hope is a harbinger of America’s future, has long been their aerobic activity of choice. But LaHood is a Republican, for Pete’s sake, the party (before it lost its bearings) of “No, we can’t” and “Actually, we shouldn’t” and “Not so fast” and “Let’s think this through.” Now he is in full “Yes we can!” mode. Et tu, Ray?

Where to start? Does LaHood really think Americans were not avid drivers before a government highway program “promoted” driving? Does he think 0.01 percent of Americans will ever regularly bike to work? Intercity high-speed rail probably always will be the wave of the future, for cities more than 300 miles apart. And as for Portland …

Its government has been, intermittently, as progressive as all get-out, trying to use zoning, light-rail projects and high-density housing to cool the planet by curbing automobile use.

Unsurprisingly, this has generated a bit of kerfuffle.  Local congressman Blumenauer has offered Will a free trip out to Portland to see for himself.  And Matt Yglesias challenges some of Will’s figures.

I saw this item today over on bikeportland.org: “City unveils three more on-street bike parking corrals”.  These are special areas on the street to lock up your bicycle.  This bit was most interesting:

According to PBOT bike program specialist Sarah Figliozzi, the smaller corral on Thurman signals a slightly different approach to the City’s business district bike parking plans. “In the future, what I see is a greater number of smaller corrals, about six staples each,” Figliozzi said. This approach would be more suited to Portland’s larger commercial districts, by spreading the commercial advantages of on-street bike parking around different blocks and businesses.

“Generally, we get very strong support for the bike corrals from the business community, due to the increased customer ratio they make available — up to 10 people for each parking spot — as well as the increased street and curb visibility the corrals provide,” says Figliozzi.

Hadn’t thought about it before, but it makes sense that if you can convert one car parking space into room for 10 bicycles, you just might get more shopping traffic.  (On the other hand, most people on bicycles won’t be riding off with big boxloads of stuff!).

I, like many others, first became aware of Ethiopian musician Mulatu Astatke from the soundtrack of Jim Jarmusch’s film “Broken Shadows” from a few years back.  I got the Ethiopiques Vol 4 CD with his music, and recently came across this CD of new recordings by Astatke along with a band from England (described in one spot as a “noise-jazz collective”, but they’re pretty ‘in the groove’ here).   I like the new recording - I think it’s as good as the older stuff.

Astatke goes back quite a few years!  From the Strut label’s site:

Mulatu Astatke is one of Ethiopia’s foremost musical ambassadors. Informed by spells living and studying in the UK and the USA, his self-styled Ethio-jazz sound flourished during the “Swinging Addis” era of the late ‘60s as he successfully fused Western jazz and funk with traditional Ethiopian folk melodies, five tone scale arrangements and elements from music of the ancient Coptic church.

A little web searching turned up this recording of a 2008 live show where Astatke and the Heliocentrics play a bunch of his older tunes; a good place to get a sense of his sound.