I just watched D.A. Pennebaker’s documentary about Bob Dylan’s 1965 tour in the United Kingdom, Don’t Look Back. This was the second time I’ve seen it; the first time was about 30 years ago. What struck me most both times was the conversation between Dylan and the “science student.” During this conversation, Dylan seems to be teasing the young man who is surprisingly open about his feelings. For example, the student mentions that when he interviews musicians (he writes about music for his college newspaper), they don’t want to know him. Dylan responds with something like, “Have you ever asked yourself why?” It sounds worse on paper than it does in the movie, because I certainly get the impression that Dylan kind of likes of kid. Anyway, the student is not easily taken down. He responds that he knows it has nothing to do with him because these people don’t want to know him even before he appears.

What most strikes me about this scene is how the young student is so open about his feelings and about who he is. Dylan comes off looking the cool hipster he is, but the kid comes off looking real in a way that few of us ever attain. Even at this late stage in my life, I’m not sure I am capable of being this honest to my closest friends. I don’t think that speaks so poorly of me so much as it speaks really well of the kid.

It turns out that this science student—he graduated from the University of Newcastle with degrees (?) in math and metallurgy—is Terry Ellis, a man whose name is not associated with science except in relation to Don’t Look Back. After college he started booking concerts and eventually started managing groups. With Chris Wright, he founded Chrysalis Records. He stayed with the company until the mid-1980s, after which he founded another highly successful (but short-lived) label Imago Records. He is most associated with the band Jethro Tull. In addition to discovering and signing the band, Ellis co-produced five of their albums. It may be just a coincidence, but they are the best Jethro Tull albums—the only ones really worth listening to. When Ian Anderson was left to produce alone—early on, but especially later—his natural, but limited, intellectualism was generally fatal.

Ellis has had a great ear for new talent. He was the first to sign Pat Benatar. He signed Aimee Mann, when she was considered poison after the break-up of ‘Til Tuesday. And there are many others: Huey Lewis and the News (when they were still Huey Lewis and the American Express), Blondie, Baby Animals, and many more.[1]

What I think has been most important about Terry Ellis the musical genius is not the ear and eye he has for talent; it is his personal commitment to the artists he’s believed in. He was most definitely an old-fashioned manager who worked closely with his artists. In this regard, he wasn’t always successful. The band Clouds clearly suffered due to Ellis’ preoccupation with Jethro Tull.[2] So in the surprisingly open science student in Don’t Look Back we see all we need to about the remarkable and successful career path that Terry Ellis would go on to follow.

[1] I could name lots more: Ten Years After (little), Procol Harum (little), Robin Trower (little), David Bowie (almost none), Leo Sayer (little), Spandau Ballet (much), Steeleye Span (much). However, the extent of Ellis’ involvement with these acts is unclear. There isn’t a lot of historical information about him.

[2] If you doubt me that the world would be a better place had Ellis spent more time with Clouds, have a listen to the first single Clouds ever produced. Even if you don’t doubt: listen.

Andrea’s recent post, which was just a reprint of a Dilbert Cartoon, got a bizarre comment that had a link for Stag Weekends in Newquay (a seaside community on the southwest tip of the United Kingdom).

Racist spam? No. Political satire. It was inappropriate for the post, so I deleted it, but not before Andrea was responding to it.

It must be hard to focus on reading when you are surrounded by all the stag pleasures of Newquay.

Most people I talk to tell me that they like all styles of music. Sometimes they will admit to a particular style they dislike, especially Country or Heavy Metal. Such statements have always amused me, because I know these people are fooling themselves—not that I shatter their illusions. My experience with people’s actions rather than their words is that they listen almost exclusively to one kind of music and they put up with a lot of other things.

The music you like is the stuff you put on when you are at home when no one else is around to please or impress. If you really will put on Madama Butterfly today, Judas Priest tomorrow, Russian Balalaika quartets the next, and traditional Biwa accompanied Japanese folk tales the last, then you really do like all styles of music. But if you don’t, then you don’t.

I have always thought—opposed to the pretenders around me—that I really did like all styles of music. That, however, is just as much a delusion as that of others who are desperately hooked on a single style of music. In general, I do have eclectic taste. I will listen to Gregorian Chants, followed by Black Flag, followed by Merle Haggard, followed by John Coltrane. I even like good Hip Hop, but given the overwhelming quantity of dreck, I am most likely to settle for very old stuff like Gil Scott-Heron, rather than bother to learn the modern artists, 95% of whom are simply not interesting. But that’s the thing: I like all styles of western music. I have little patience for most non-western music. If it uses the western twelve tone octave, I’m fine. Anything else, I don’t get. I can tell it is music; I can appreciate the rhythms; but the melodies and harmonies are maddening.

So no, I don’t like all styles of music. And I’m fine with that.

As you probably know, I am very fond of The Nation editor Chris Hayes (even if I am less and less pleased with the magazine itself). Thus, I was excited to check out his new MSNBC show. He is an amazing man. He seems to know everything that is going on in politics, even little obscure things. When I listen to Rachel Maddow or Lawrence O’Donnell, I am impressed with them, but they rarely know anything I don’t. That was not the case a few times during last weekend’s Up with Chris Hayes. Here he is destroying James Poulos, who is apparently pushing the same thoroughly discredited Republican talking point that Fannie May and Freddie Mac caused the housing bubble.[1]:

Another great thing about the show is that it is unabashedly liberal. Unlike pretty much all other political shows where a panel will consist of three conservatives and one centrist Democrat (or rarely an actual liberal), this show has three liberals and one conservative. Who would have thought? Of course, everyone will say that Up is a liberal show, but never say that This Week (to name one show at random) is conservative. We’ll see how long Up with Chris Hayes stays on the air in its current form.

Check out the show online. Currently it provides whole hours without commercial interuption.

[1] Poulos seems like a smart guy, and yet he is a conservative. I still don’t understand how anyone other than the super rich (and not even them) can be conservative. All I can think is that they misunderstand what their true interests are because everyone tends to do better under Democratic administrations. Undoubtedly, it has a lot to do with Upton Sinclair’s idea, “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.”

All the excitement over Herman Cain not knowing what has been going on about Libby did not surprise me. It reminded me of Sarah Palin in the 2008 presidential election when she was asked to name a Supreme Court ruling other than Roe V. Wade. It has been some time since I have been surprised by an individual politician doing such a thing—particularly a conservative politician.

What does surprise me is the general phenomenon. Why do people who are obviously far less interested in politics than I am go into politics? Above we have two examples of nationally known politicians who don’t know the answers to political questions that would be easy for a wide swath of Americans with no political ambitions. This must indicate that we have the wrong incentives. We don’t see professional basketball players who have no interest in basketball.

Could it be that politics isn’t about politics, but rather just power?

Aasif Mandvi is one of my favorite people on The Daily Show. Plus, he has rapidly growing jowls. Sure, they’re not too big yet, but just wait. At the rate he’s going, he’ll look worse than I do in two years. Anyway, jowls aside, he has the best scene in the charming romantic comedy Ghost Town.

I was much nicer when I wrote to Senator Boxer—because she isn’t such a schmuck.

I hate artificial uselessness.

Yesterday, I was walking down the street and I passed by this shoe:

I would not normally take a picture of a shoe. Smaller objects, I will often pick up and hold onto for a while. I have no idea why. But shoes are too big, too personal. So normally, I note them and move on. Yesterday, however, several paces past the athletic shoe, I came upon a thong:[1]

I present these lonely shoes to you because they really bug me. I have no problem with junk: half a remote control, a cracked PEZ dispenser, a crushed Hot Wheel. Certainly, I wonder how these things ended up on the road.[2] These are trash. But what of the lonely shoes? Look at the athletic shoe in the picture above. It is in fine shape. But it is useless. I can’t help but imagine that somewhere else there is a matching perfectly good shoe. Also now useless.

I hate waste like this. We are none of us useless just because we no longer have a match.

[1] Just watch. Now I will get all kinds of porn spam on this page.

[2] This is why the opening of Breaking Bad is so great. How does a pair of pants end up on a country road? We’d all like to think that the random objects we see each have such interesting stories.