FREE TICKETS – We have five pairs of tickets to see Craig Morgan at Horseshoe Casino on November 14. I have a MySpace page at www.myspace/lmnguy. The first five people to send me an email message through the MySpace page AFTER 6 p.m. EDT on November 6 (two days after the election), will win a pair of tickets each.
The old MOM’s Music building at Frankfort and Stilz avenues in Crescent Hill has been sold to the partners in Weichert Realtors, who operate a business next door. The plans for the building are optimistic and include a ‘high-end’ loft apartment on the top floor. (Would you like to live right next to that intersection - and pay dearly for the privilege?) Details in the C-J
Peruvian opera and pop singer Yma Sumac died in Los Angeles on November 1, 2008 of cancer. She was noted for adapting Incan folk music to Western lounge music. The Los Angeles Times has her obituary
Dale Moss at the C-J reports in today’s paper that the Speakeasy jazz club in New Albany will close tonight (Wednesday, October 29). While this comes as no real surprise, following the demise of the Jazz Factory in downtown Louisville, it leaves jazz fans with very few options to hear their music - the occasional shows at the Comedy Caravan in the Mid-City Mall and the Seelbach Jazz Bar, about which we have heard little of late. Of course, the failure of both full-time jazz clubs suggests that jazz fans are not going out very much and/or that jazz is not very popular, even with two university-level jazz programs running in the city. Whatever the answer, it’s a shame and a loss to the Kentuckiana area music scene.
A post on Rocky Knight’s blog reveals that Mainline Communications, owners of WLRS 105.1 FM, terminated all the on-air staff at the staff on October 13. Apparently, the company did the same elsewhere in their chain. The WLRS website lists no on-air staff.
The all-new LEO website, running on Joomla!, looks much better than the old one and is faster as well. This week, they have reviews of the new Lords CD, Fuck All Y’all Motherfuckers; My Darling Asleep’s eponymous release; Broadfield Marchers The Inevitable Continuing; OK Zombie Do The Zombie; the Villiebillies’s newest From the Belly of the Beast; The Muckrakers’ The Concorde Fallacy; Ben Purdom’s Meets the Morning and Scott Mertz and His Panel Of Experts‘ You Wish.
A few years back, I visited an audiologist to see if there was any treatment available for the tinnitus (ringing in the ears) I was experiencing. After the hearing tests were done and I got to talk to the doctor, he asked me what I did. When I told him that I was a music journalist, he smiled real big and said “Oh, you were there for all the best rock, eh?” and then told me that I had a 50% hearing loss above 6 kiloherz, which means I don’t hear high end sounds very well. Needless to say, there is/was no treatment for the tinnitus except to learn to ignore it. Fortunately for me, ‘denial’ is a tool in my family.
Of course, my hearing loss was a the result of many nights in front of very loud speakers - kind of like the situation for most professional sound men - and the resultant loss was entirely predictable. The same prediction can be made for users of iPods and those ‘little’ earbuds, which have very little bass response. Users tend to turn them up and the resultant volume is higher than that permitted by OSHA in factories and other noisy environments. Accordingly, a few years down the line, there will be even more folks with serious hearing loss than now. (Invest in hearing aid companies.) The New York Times reports on a study of iPod users done in England which makes exactly the same warning.
Now, I understand that this kind of warning will be heeded by roughly zero percent of iPod users, but my years on the planet have taught me that it’s necessary to warn folks, even when you know they won’t pay any attention at the time. (e.g., warnings to quit smoking, lose weight, exercise more.) They will remember them later, however, after the damage is mostly done. If they come back to you and ask why you didn’t warn them, you can just smile and write them a note (or sign in ASL), telling them that you did.
The Courier-Journal’s J. L. Puckett has a big preview of Alanis Morissette’s show at the Louisville Palace on Tuesday.
