I pulled the Jan Hammer/Jerry Goodman "Like Children" out of storage fairly
recently and enjoyed it much more than I'd expected - at the time it came
out, of course, its legitimacy for me lay in its being post-Mahavishnu
(unless you're a big fan of the The Flock) but Hammer kind of squandered
his reputation with all that Miami Vice stuff in the 80s - kind of the Bob
James of fusion I guess.
As for taking kids to gigs or cultural events in general, I'm all in favor
and that news blip you referred to seems quite likely the work of people
who fear, distrust and just don't understand rave/dance culture in general
and seize upon the presence of children as a convenient way to cast
aspersions on something that, in the pretense of pluralism, they'd
ordinarily have to portray in more neutral terms.
My son's 4th year has included seeing the big Mego fest outdoors last
summer - needless to say he didn't care much about the music (he enjoyed
the dancing part later, just not the screeching noise that was apparently
coming out of those laptop computers) - as for exposure to drug use, he did
sit and chat amiably with Russell Haswell about the sculpture in the
outdoor garden while the latter smoked his post-performance "bone" but I
doubt he understands that there are varieties of cigarettes.
We also attended the annual winter solstice drone-fest at avant-garde NYC
composer Phill Niblock's loft in Chinatown - this consisted of hours of
humming, melodic sustained drones on tape while various musicians played
along live, accompanied by films of Chinese peasants going about their
daily activities of fishing and farming which included footage of enormous
sides meat on hooks being hacked apart with machetes - now that was scary,
but he fell asleep quickly nonetheless.
He's also fond of the enormous range of imported Japanese toys at the Mondo
Kim's store where I sometimes drag him on record shopping trips - since the
merchandise is aimed at adult collectors, it's a bit of a problem that the
harmless stuff he likes (Sailormoon, Dragonball-Z) is side by side with the
unabashedly pornographic - maybe when he's learned to read and see that
they stock something called "The Cunt Coloring Book", I'll have to think
twice about taking him along. Right now the problem is just convincing him
that, no, that 6-inch tall action figure is not worth $30 (I mean not
compared to a Skam 12" or anything!).
<What I'm talking about are
outdoor events, usually beginning at sunset with an ambient set.
Generally they are held away from the city in really beauiful
surroundings, near the sea, mountains or rivers.>
All of your descriptions of these events are so pastoral - around here just
walking to school and buying a sweet at the corner store on the way home
involves more exposure to vice than what those film-makers fear (and we
live in a decent neighborhood - it's just a big gritty American city of the
sort where millions of kids spend every day).
It's always amusing what a little time and money will do to temper memory -
Woodstock is currently being used to sell tampons here in an ad presumably
aimed at middle-aged mothers who will be advising their teenaged daughters'
purchases.
Still undecided whether to send this just to Irene or the list -after the
"clitorides" thread I guess nothing is off-topic.
Bob