Listening Post

I posted this song a couple of months ago, but this morning I don't think anything else will do.

Even the images of lakes and mountains and trees seem appropriate.

Here's Shawn Smith -- Wrapped in My Memory.

Goodbye, Mikey.

The world will be a far lesser place without you.

Higher and Farther Than Anybody in a Gray Place Dares To Dream

Any evening that begins with a car on fire is guaranteed to be memorable.

That's how things got underway as the darkness draped itself over New York City on Saturday, April 12th, 2008: with Michael Chobot spending the first few minutes of his big 21st birthday celebration staring in disbelief out of the window of the cab we were sitting in the back of as it crawled with traffic past an inferno that maybe ten minutes ago was a car. We were heading downtown, toward the Village, and firefighters had already blocked off the lane with the burning, empty vehicle, backing up the FDR for a good half-mile. While at least one of us in the cab was frustrated as hell at the delay, the sense of little-kid wonder I'd come to expect from Mike was in full bloom once the cause of it was revealed. From where I was sitting I could make out the expression on his face reflected slightly in the window as we passed the scene -- the open mouth forming an awed smile, the wide eyes, the appreciation for the sheer surreality of such a moment. Live long enough in Gotham and you start to believe that you've seen it all, that nothing can return you to that place you were when you knew full-well how wonderfully weird the entire world is. But there was Mike, with all the unpretentious exuberance that something like the sight of a car engulfed in flames, out of nowhere, to kick off the night of your birthday bash, should elicit. And at that, I remember cracking a little smile in spite of myself, because if there's one thing you learn from knowing Mike, it's that whatever strange magic it is that he possesses -- the singular way he looks at the world, what makes him him -- it rubs off on you, and that's never a bad thing.

The rest of that evening involved, among other things, Mike drunkenly rushing up to me at a bar after having disappeared for a few minutes to tell me that if we were willing to buy a couple of girls he'd just met drinks, they would make out in front of us; Mike being relieved of his leather belt and spanked with it by a bartender at Coyote Ugly; and the night's master of ceremonies, a good friend of mine, nearly being arrested for public urination. The following morning, I was awakened from unconsciousness by Mike standing there holding up the now very soiled blanket that I'd laid out on the couch for him the night before; he asked me, completely sincerely, with a goofy smile on his face that only served to ratify his perceived innocence, "Hey, man -- why'd you give me a blanket with vomit all over it?" I threw the thing in the laundry, we ordered a couple of Irish breakfasts from a place up the street and spent the rest of the day learning how to jump cars off the roofs of buildings in Grand Theft Auto IV. It was, even during that heady period in my life, with a new baby on the way, one of the best times I could remember. I had taken my wife's kid brother, whom I'd known for six years, out to christen his adulthood and we'd both had an absolute blast.

That's my favorite memory of Michael Chobot, my favorite among many memories. It doesn't even begin to scratch the surface of who he is and what makes him unlike anyone I've ever known, truly unlike anyone period, but at the moment it's what I've got. And those closest to Mike are doing the same thing I'm doing right now: quietly but hurriedly gathering these memories like diamonds spilled across a floor and holding tightly to each one. They're doing this because soon it's all any of us will have. Soon, Michael will be gone.

For almost two full years now, Mike has put up a truly remarkable fight against one of the most ruthless and efficient killers on the planet: acute myeloid leukemia. He's been in and out of the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston. He's undergone not one but two bone marrow transplants. He's straddled the line between recovery and collapse, gone into remission, then returned to that precipice to dangle precariously again. Throughout it all, his sense of humor and his singular outlook on life -- the life he was battling so valiantly to hold on to -- have never waned. He's had terrible days. He's had times he's wanted to be alone, I have no doubt times when he's wanted nothing more than to close his eyes and drift away from everything and everyone -- to open them and find himself floating freely in the ocean off a sunny beach somewhere, truly alive. But somehow with a strength I can't even begin to imagine he's managed to keep the most important part of himself intact. The Michael his family and friends have always known -- the one I've known for more than ten years, since he was a funny, awkward, endlessly analytical 14-year-old kid -- was still there.

Recently, following this latest transplant, which appeared to be holding, Mike took to looking toward the future. Maybe it was that weekend back in 2008 that sold him on a life in New York City, but in the couple of years before being diagnosed, Mike had moved to Brooklyn and was beginning to get some truly impressive work in his chosen field: sound engineering. He worked on Salt, Pokemon, and It's Kind of a Funny Story. He lived payday to payday, like just about everyone starting out in media in New York, and eventually worked on a PBS feature called An Original DUCKumentary. Just a couple of months ago he called me with some incredible news: He'd been nominated for a national Emmy for it -- outstanding music and sound. The ceremony is this coming October. He wanted to go. I joked to him that he needed to leak the fact that he has cancer to the Academy -- possibly get the sympathy vote.

Maybe it's the fact that I'm 3,000 miles away from him and only know what I hear in his voice when we talk on the phone, but I think I finally put out of my mind the ugly reality that had always clawed at my insides. Maybe all of us pulling for him were right: Michael was special. He had taught himself piano as a child and composed symphonies as a teenager. He had an artistic streak most could only dream of and a staggering amount of talent to back it up. He had a strangely old-soul quality about him, becoming a kid fanboy of music that was popular on rock radio even before I was a kid (so much so that I used to rib him pretty mercilessly about it). He was almost supernaturally optimistic. He was an honest-to-God genius who seemed to control everything around him, making his dreams come to vivid life and bending it all to his will without really even trying, always improving it -- or at least making it a hell of a lot more interesting. He couldn't be taken. It simply wasn't possible. He existed in a perpetual state of grace. He was gonna be fine.

But two weeks ago, he was given the news: there was nothing the doctors could do anymore. The cancer had come back with a vengeance. It was too aggressive. Too powerful. He wasn't going to make it. He's not going to make it.

He's home now. With the family he loves more than anything and which loves him with equal ferocity. He's at peace with what's to come.

How do you mourn for what never existed? How do you grieve not for the past but for the future, a future that will never be? I suppose that's what true grief is -- it's not the disappearance of what was there all along as much as it is the sudden absence of what you were so sure was to come. It's the worst kind of cliché, but Michael Chobot was going to change the world. He was going to do something not simply great but truly monumental. I can't even begin to explain how I know this, but it's as certain to me as the searing knowledge that the man who isn't my blood brother but who embraced me as one and has grown to become an inextricable part of my heart and soul is now dying. The only comfort I or anyone else close to him can take is that he's already accomplished such extraordinary things, had so indelible an impact on so many lives, created love and joy as effortlessly as he created sound and music and film, equally beautiful and without question immortal. There's little anyone can do at this point other than to assure Mike that what he's done with his life has mattered. That in just a little over a quarter-century on this planet, he fulfilled every bit of his promise to himself and those around him. That he made a difference. That he can be proud.

Michael is my brother and my friend. I will go to my own grave loving him. I will make sure my daughter, his niece, grows up knowing how fortunate she is that her uncle was the man he was. She'll learn the stories about Mike, hear them repeated endlessly. The hilarious stories, the unusual stories, the profoundly moving stories. She'll hear the stories from his brother, and his sisters, and his parents, and his friends, and every single person whose life he's touched.

Maybe I was wrong. Maybe everyone who's known Michael Chobot throughout the years won't be left with only memories once he's gone. What they'll be left with is what Mike himself gave them, what he gave me: something better. Michael made our lives better. He has since the day he was born -- and his legacy will ensure that he'll continue to long after his physical presence is no more.

He always had fire. He was guaranteed to be memorable.

...

(Adding: Overnight, Michael Chobot died. He is survived by his mother, Gwyn, and his father, Tom, as well as his sisters, Jayne and Sarah, and brother, Joe. And those he called brother or sister, Phil, Megan and, for reasons I'll never fully understand or be able to adequately thank him for, me. He lived with more passion, wonder and innocence than anyone I've ever known or ever will.)

Listening Post

James Gandolfini is being laid to rest today, the funeral service going on right now at St. John the Divine in New York City.

If you're a fan of The Sopranos -- or of Gandolfini himself -- this astonishingly beautiful video, edited by Lyle at Exeterstreet.net, will make you cry.

The music is the great Shawn Smith, frontman of bands like Brad and Satchel.

Here's Trapped in My Memory.

So long, James.

Listening Post

Somehow it just seems necessary this morning.

The show that redefined television -- and the song that redefined television show title sequences.

Here's A3's Woke Up This Morning.

So long, T.

Cut To Black

I had been in the New York City area just a couple of months when I got stuck in traffic on Route 17 out in North Jersey. I was still living in a hotel room then not far from the MSNBC studios, covering the aftermath of 9/11, and wanted to go grab some decent food without actually having to go into the city, so I headed west into inland Jersey and ran headlong into a dead stop, bumper-to-bumper.

I sat in it for maybe ten minutes before I finally gave some thought to getting out and having a look around to see what the hell was going on. That thought stopped cold the second the guy in front of me got out of his car.

It was a maroon Chevy Suburban. The driver's side door opened and out crawled a giant bear of a man dressed in a Tommy Bahama-style short-sleeve button-down with beige palm fronds on it and a pair of basic Men's Warehouse-looking slacks. As he looked around a bit in front of him, I couldn't help but feel like I'd absolutely seen him before but I just assumed it was the type more than anything. This was Jersey, after all.

And then he turned around and faced me. And it was James Gandolfini. No, it wasn't James Gandolfini. It was, sincerely, Tony Soprano.

The SUV, the wardrobe, the guy. On Route 17, the location of the infamous Satin Dolls strip club, better known to TV viewers as the Bada-Bing. I literally froze -- my mouth open slightly, breath shallow, heart-rate spiking -- because, for just a second, I wondered whether the man I was looking at really was Tony, the New Jersey crime boss whose exploits I had watched religiously since The Sopranos debuted on HBO. I wondered whether this guy would take me home to have dinner with Carmela, Meadow, and A.J. if I approached him, or better yet, to the Bada-Bing where I'd get to hang out with Silvio, Christopher and Paulie. I was a good Italian boy, after all.

It was one of the most surreal -- and one of the coolest -- experiences of my entire life.

Several outlets are now confirming that the great James Gandolfini, Tony Soprano, died today suddenly at the age of 51. While vacationing in Italy, naturally. The effect Gandolfini had on the way television characters are portrayed, with the anti-hero suddenly becoming the star, and the effect The Sopranos in general had on television simply cannot be overstated. It's still one of the best shows that's ever graced the medium, and Gandolfini, one of the best actors to ever create an indelible character, possibly the greatest, most fully-formed dramatic character TV has ever seen.

I'll always love The Sopranos. And I'll always remember my thrilling, kind of terrifying brush with Tony.

Listening Post

I missed this yesterday, but there's no way I can let it go completely without mention.

The Doors have always been one of my favorite bands. They were something unique in music: darkness, mystery, hedonism, mythology, poetry, and an appreciation for Los Angeles as the edge of Western civilization in all its grotesque glory. Morrison of course died decades ago, but Doors co-founder Ray Manzarek succumbed to cancer on Sunday, taking with him the heart and spirit of one of the greatest rock'n'roll bands in history, but leaving behind plenty of great music.

Here's The Crystal Ship.

Listening Post: In Memoriam Edition

When a 22-year-old Divinyls record showed up in the section of iTunes normally reserved for new releases earlier this week, my first thought was that somebody in the band must've died. Unfortunately, I was so busy that I didn't bother to go looking for any possible information on it. Then, yesterday, my girlfriend and I were out and I heard I Touch Myself being played in a bar in Hollywood, so I turned and asked, "What, did Chrissy Amphlett die or something?" to which my girlfriend of course responded, "Yeah, breast cancer."

I never liked the Divinyls' biggest hit. I thought it was silly and gimmicky and was sure to diminish all the other great stuff the band had done simply by virtue of making them an inevitable one-hit-wonder. The Divinyls had a long career before I Touch Myself broke them big and most of it was due to the coolness and sexiness of Chrissy Amphlett and her distinctive rasp. To this day, the band's 1988 gem Temperamental is a record I go back to over and over again because almost every song on it is spectacular.

From that album, here's Punxsie.




In high school, my best friend and I had an unusual hero for a couple of idiot kids from Miami: George Jones. Why? Because of the lawnmower story. It was the stuff of country legend and still is. For those who don't know it, it goes like this: George drank -- a lot. And so one night back in 1966, he had gotten so drunk that his wife decided she needed to force him to finally sober up. She cleaned out all the liquor in the house and took the keys to the car so that he couldn't drive to the nearest liquor store, which was about eight miles away. But since any good drunk knows that its when you take his booze away that he suddenly becomes as resourceful as MacGuyver, George went outside, hopped on his riding lawnmower and rode it all the way to that liquor store. And that, my friends, is why he was a hero to me and still is.

George Jones died yesterday at the ripe old age of 81. In 1996, long after my high school days, he wrote a song about the lawnmower story, but this one about drinking is even better. Here's If Drinking Don't Kill Me.

In Memoriam

8-year-old Martin Richard, who was killed yesterday in the Boston Marathon bombing along with two other people.

He was right.

No more.

Take Five

One of my favorite memories of being a kid is of riding around in the car with my dad on a Sunday afternoon, listening to his favorite jazz tapes. He loved Oscar Peterson, Coltrane, and Monk -- but above all, he loved Dave Brubeck. And he taught me, at a very young age, a love for Brubeck as well -- one that would last my entire life.

That's the importance of Brubeck for me personally. As it turns out, his importance in the lives of others and to music in general, likewise, can't really be overstated. Not only did he record one of the most landmark albums of the last century, the near-flawless 1959 masterpiece of jazz and style Time Out, he continued making incredible music throughout his many years -- right up until the very end.

I can't even begin to express how heartbroken I am that Dave Brubeck died this morning, just two days shy of his 92nd birthday. But I can't help but rejoice in the decades of musical brilliance he's left us with. The guy seriously changed my life for the better and gave me moments with my father that I'll never forget -- and for that I can't thank him enough.

Here's Blue Rondo à la Turk.

Quote(s) of the Day

"I am continually fascinated at the difficulty intelligent people have in distinguishing what is controversial from what is merely offensive."

And...

"When you slip on a banana peel, people laugh at you. But when you tell people you slipped on a banana peel, it's your laugh."

-- Nora Ephron, 1941-2012

She was a brilliant, insanely funny lady who will be sorely missed.

"I Can Blow You Away or You Can Ride With Me"

If you argue with the fact that the Beastie Boys changed the face of hip-hop -- that they've been pioneers, a group always years ahead of their time -- and that Adam "MCA" Yauch was a vital part of that brilliance and ingenuity, there's something very wrong with you.

Thank you for everything, MCA -- you will be sorely missed, man.

Rolling Stone: Beastie Boys' Adam Yauch Dead at 48/5.4.12

Adding...

You're hearing a lot of the same sentiment on Twitter right now regarding the death of MCA: This one hurts. And it does. A lot. Like so many, I can only speak about my personal attachment to the band and its music and, quite frankly, both have been an integral part of my life for 25 years. Imagine that -- 25 years. When I was a senior in high school, Licensed to Ill was the unofficial theme music of my class -- the wild-eyed, balls-out party record that seemed to give us all tacit permission to break every rule imposed by adults with both middle fingers held high. Seeing the Beasties on the Licensed to Ill tour -- at a stop in South Florida in which I had to buy scalped tickets and during which the audience actually pulled pieces of drywall off the back of the arena to fan themselves with because of the intense heat -- remains one of the best concert-going experiences of my life. In college, the band I played in worshiped the Beastie Boys. The college radio station I worked at, WVUM, had a rotating cast of kids who all worshiped the Beastie Boys. The band followed me throughout my life, getting older with me, growing with me, always being great, always being vital, never getting dull and forever being a symbol of my transition from impetuous, arrogant youth to only slightly less impetuous and arrogant adulthood -- they were always there. I realize I'm rambling here, but maybe that'll help make it clear how badly this really does hurt. The Beastie Boys have always been more than a band to me, more than an audaciously powerful force in hip-hop and in music in general. They've felt like mine -- the true voice of my generation. And it's devastating to lose one of them because it feels like losing a friend.

The Grand Inquisitor

He was tough, ruthless both on camera and off, confident and even arrogant in the best possible way, a consummate performer and a man who truly lived up to his status as a titan in the news business. But most of all, he was fair. Always.

I'm not sure there will ever be another one like Mike Wallace.

And that's unfortunate.

CBS News: 60 Minutes Icon Mike Wallace Dead at 93/4.8.12

Hurricane Andrew

The insufferable Greg Gutfeld calls Andrew Breitbart the most fearless man he ever met.

It's easy to be fearless when you have no scruples whatsoever -- in fact, it comes somewhat naturally.

I'm not going to be ghoulish and applaud the death of Breitbart, who collapsed suddenly early this morning in Los Angeles and apparently couldn't be revived. It should go completely without saying that I wanted to see him dead as little as I'd want to see almost anyone dead, particularly at the personally disconcerting age of 43. But likewise, I can't in good conscience pay tribute to what had, over the past several years, become his life's work: the infusion of scandal, bile and simple dishonesty and fraudulence into the political discourse, without even a hint of regard for journalistic ethics or a dedication to the truth.

I feel this way not because there was a vast chasm between Breitbart's politics and my own -- for the record, I actually admired him quite a bit as a showman and provocateur -- but because there's a difference between a divergence of opinions and flat-out lying. Lying is cheating. It's stacking the deck, particularly when you're dealing that deck to a group of people willing to take any hand you give them and revel in it without question. Again, I thought the world of Breitbart's passion; the discourse in this country simply would've been far better served had that passion come with an equally robust sense of personal and professional integrity. I don't doubt that Andrew Breitbart did many great things in his short lifetime -- and obviously I offer nothing but the sincerest condolences to the family he leaves behind -- but he also did an enormous amount of damage. To journalism, to civilized debate, and to real flesh-and-blood people.

I mourn him as a human being, one who I have to believe wholeheartedly could be a pretty good guy.

But I also mourn the dedication to the truth in media that he helped to destroy.

It's profoundly saddening that that may be his overarching legacy.

The Huffington Post: Andrew Breitbart Dead at 43/3.1.12

A Storied Life

He had been held against his will in Libya, dodged bombs in Iraq and been shot in Ramallah. And through it all, he brought to life some of the most stirring and vital accounts of years of tumult in the Middle East that you could read anywhere -- which is why he was awarded the Pulitzer not once but twice.

Yesterday, the intrepid Anthony Shadid -- reporting for the New York Times -- died of an asthma attack while covering the popular uprising and the government's punishing response to it in Syria.

He was 43-years-old.

If you're not familiar with Shadid's life and work, you really should be.

The New York Times: Remembering Anthony Shadid/2.16.12

Picture of the Day

Overcome by grief at the death of "Dear Leader," mourners openly weep and gnash their teeth at the memorial service for Kim Jong Il today in North Korea -- and I laugh and laugh and laugh.

Which reminds me, I hope everyone's seen this by now:

North Korea Reports on Death of Kim Jong Il - watch more funny videos

Goodbye

I've been out drinking at Todd English's Pub most of the morning so this will be quick.

If you've read Dead Star Twilight you know about the very good friend of mine whom I called "Brando." If you read the updated version of the book, which includes a kind of "where are they now" afterword, you know that he's been battling stage four lung cancer recently.

Well a few minutes ago I got what I assume was a mass text sent out to everyone in his contact list telling me that he's died.

God how I loved that guy. Fuck. Just -- fuck.

I'll miss you, man.

The Measure of a Man

Anyone who's read this site for any length of time knows how I feel about Christopher Hitchens -- and just about everyone understood once his cancer diagnosis was made public that it was only a matter of time before we had to say goodbye to him. Today, unfortunately, is that day.

There's an almost comical irony to the fact that I can't even begin to find the words to properly explain the indelible mark that Hitchens's brilliance, fearlessness, and all-around larger-than-life presence has left on the world around him over the last six decades -- the irony being that those very words would likely come easily to him, and did, right up to the end. He lived his life with a kind of conviction few of us could muster, turning an intellect so virgorous that one would normally imagine it as a cold and sterile instrument into a weapon of pure human passion. He regularly challenged the expectations and sensibilities of even his fiercest defenders, forcing them, as he did everyone else, to accept that the mark of a truly exceptional mind was the willingness to not simply break with conventional wisdom but to sometimes angrily turn against the opinions of your idols. Put simply: Hitchens never expected you to agree with him all the time, even if you were someone who admired the way his brain worked and reveled in his ability to bring that genius to the page; on the contrary, he'd probably think quite a bit less of you if you did.

Sometimes it felt like he argued simply for the sake of arguing, but he was never some grotesque and gratuitous provocateur, pushing buttons in the hope of drawing attention that would be its own reward; his militant intelligence, scalpel wit and irrepressible tongue never felt self-serving. What Hitch was doing -- always doing -- was flexing a muscle so fucking powerful that, like the many other unabashedly human impulses he exhibited, not even he himself could completely control it.

In the end, Christopher Hitchens was something few of us can claim to be -- a completely honest man. Honest in his beliefs. His faults. His vices. Intellectually honest. And what he may be remembered best for: honest in his willingness to voraciously live the one and only life he knew he had.

Here's to you, Hitch.

Vanity Fair: In Memoriam: Christopher Hitchens/12.15.11

One Final Salute

Harry Morgan: 1915-2011

The Last Laugh

I've been busy over the last few days so I didn't get a chance to respond to this when it was first announced but it's a real shame about the death of Patrice O'Neal. Like a lot of people who have a serious appreciation for the art of comedy and for comics, my "relationship" with Patrice was always a love-hate one. There were times I thought he was absolutely brilliant, and there were other times I could barely even stand to listen to him -- but I always understood that that kind of thing was the mark of a really powerful comic mind.

The Jay Lenos of the world work overtime and will do anything they can to ingratiate themselves to you and to conform to your headspace; guys like Patrice force you, sometimes kicking and screaming, into their headspace. You won't always like what you find there, but you'll always appreciate the gargantuan balls it takes to be that confident in who you are and what you have to say.

Patrice was often a funny, funny guy. And he was just as often an irritating asshole. And his willingness to allow himself to be both -- not caring one bit what you or I or anyone else thought of it -- is what made him great.

Listening Post

There aren't words to describe what a loss to good music the sad, untimely death of this man was. I'm not sure anyone from my generation could say more with only an acoustic guitar and a barely whispered vocal.

Just watch his face during this video -- it tells his whole desperate story to the point of being almost uncomfortably personal.

Here's Elliott Smith -- Angeles.