Hollywood Made Us "Muppets"

After World War II the American people decided to go the path of materialism, stupidity, superficiality and ignorance. 1930s' sophistication was out. Being critical and emancipated seemed ridiculous in the late 40s and throughout the 50s. This new generation decided to be gullible and sexist and the result was the rise of actresses like Marilyn Monroe. It was a matter of fashion, during those days when the "ugly American" was born.

Muppet

Movie sequences like Diamonds Are a Girls Best Friend coined and downright poisoned our society. America was ready for the pudding-headed McCarthy era. The trendy woman of the 30s was supposed to be modern, sophisticated and emancipated -- 40s and 50s women are backwards, silly, sexist and unpolitical. The Marilyn Monroe culture is a society where you can buy anything. Monroe's character is ready to sell herself for diamonds, denying honesty and real love. This was how Hollywood made us muppets. Of course there are some very beautiful 40s and 50s movies. But on the whole it was a path to demoralization, anti-sophistication and materialism. America started dancing around the golden calf.

The 1959 movie High Society can be considered sort of mid-term report for an American society, being trained to become muppets. High Society uncritically admires the successful, wealthy and beautiful. As High Society contains a message for backwardly submissive wives: Men have a right to cheat on you and we consider you the cold statue of a goddess, if you object. The silly admiration of Grace Kelly then tells us everything. Muppets need a lot of glitter to whitewash their rotten gloominess.

The natural, smart 30s American and the ugly American

The idea to write this article is as old as sweet&hot. Last summer and fall I felt the political necessity very deeply, but it didn't seem to be the right time. At that time I preferred my own drawing as avatar : the ideal woman of the 30s, with natural charm -- glasses and pencil give proof of her sophistication. Last fall I just had to join the post-30s ugly American to her : unnatural, entirely put on, tasteless, decadent, stupid, obese, bizarre, grotesque. Not all Americans are like that today, but too many are. And you can easily fraud a muppet like that. FDR's idea of the American Dream had been a chance for every American to raise a family, have house, car ect.; this also was the idea of the realistic Eisenhower Republicans. The modern Republican idea of the American dream is : everybody has a chance to become as wealthy as Mitt Romney. This is a dream for muppets, not living in reality!

The political occasion that now makes me start my war on Hollywood Muppetism, are the latest news on Goldman Sachs' policy. They consider their customers muppets. In their view we're all muppets. My take now is : who made us muppets? I knew it all before, my take comes just at the right time now: Get the whole story about former Goldman Sachs' executive director Greg Smith here on Thom Hartmann's blog:

http://Goldman-Sachs-thinks-you're-a-muppet.wow

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My recent comments on Thom Hartmann's blog:

Clarissa Smith ------ 14. March 2012 - 16:32 ------ #9

....Actresses like Marilyn Monroe represented that new silliness. Just compare them to 30s actresses like Jean Arthur or Carole Lombard -- the spirit totally changed. The philosophy of the 40s and 50s is pretty much "Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend" (you can buy any girl?!?) and the uncritical film "High Society". The civil rights we got in the 60s are important, but all the 60s and 70s revolt did not end that Hollywood silliness. The decadent and materialistic "High Society" mentality survived -- it even intermingled with 70s fashion.

You can easily fraud people who all the time consumed this silly, materialistic 'philosophy'. People who go conform with the 'philosophy' of "High Society" (uncritically admiring the rich and beautiful) are the ideal Wall Street victims. Sadly, those banksters are right : the average American is a muppet. If we look to the south, we have a bunch of major muppets. Frankly, I would be very happy, if I could spark an extended 1930s revival. Not just dancing jitterbug....

Clarissa Smith ------ 15. March 2012 - 6:00 ------ #14

My Twitter Machine wrote:

"Marilyn Monroe's 'Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend' philosophy is for muppets indeed : morally retarded materialists"

.....Frankly I think these films are harmful. They poisoned this country with stupid materialism. People who take that garbage seriously, aren't fit for life and you can easily fraud them. Stop being uncritical, gullible Muppets, Americans!

Mosley's Strut

In late January I got a personal message on YouTube, by a fellow who makes music too. He suggested we might create something together -- an internet jazz co-production, so to speak. He is doing something I had given up on years ago: trying to express 20s jazz with synthesizer sounds. Today I'm very much against this. You can clearly hear, his tuba and banjo ect. are synthetic sounds, but he played it so charming, that I couldn't help liking it. His Clarissa Strut finally worked out; that means his synthetic sounds and my natural wind instruments sound like a unit, without 'alienating' each other.

Whatsoever, after recording and adding my horns & reeds/"whistles & bells", Lord 'Gershwin' Mosley (I gave him the byname "Gershwin"), didn't respond to my emails any more. So what went wrong with Clarissa Strut? I waited several weeks and finally decided to use my improvised brass and reed choruses for a reproduction. The result sounds 'better' referring to authenticity, compared to natural sounds as used during the 20s. Nonetheless, the version with Mosley's synthetic instruments sounds way nicer. Whatsoever, here's my authentically sounding reproduction:

I have no clue where to Lord 'Gershwin' Mosley had aimed stylistically, only know his Strut made me overly 'New-Orleansy'. Indeed my playing jazz had started with New Orleans Jazz, at age 17 -- and that was where the Lord dragged me too: way back to the south. Yesterday he posted a message to my YouTube channel: he just had had too much work. So it looks very much like my next post here is going to be his original Clarissa Strut.

For my last production, Here Comes the Healthcare Slut, I had recorded the digital piano directly over a wire. That's why the piano sounds so digitally indeed. Here in Mosley's Strut, it sounds like an acoustic piano, although it's the same digital piano. How comes? Well, I usually play this keyboard over my Warwick bass amplifier, which has a good treble horn, and therefore a decent sound. After adjusting treble/mid/bass controls (until I have the feeling to get close to my parents old living-room piano) and recording this piano sound with a microphone, the final recording sounds natural -- like recorded from an acoustic piano.

Must I mention the 'clarinet' that just sounds like a clarinet (but actually isn't a real clarinet) once again? Well, it's a recorder-clarinet-hybrid. I actually come from recorder improvisation:

That was my recorder. The 'clarinet' is pretty new, it was a present in late November. Fingering is like on baroque recorder, I just had to train my face muscles (by improvising over Aebersold's play-along CDs).

A miracle is this: I've been performing as jazz trombonist over years, but in late 2004 changed to trumpet/cornet. Since I've never touched my trombone -- until last November. So when I played a little trombone solo in my Shrunk Clarinet Blues (the day after I got that 'clarinet'), the first trombone chorus came out pretty awkwardly, the second then was a better. But I didn't expect, all my old trombone experience would come back, without rehearsing. Still I play trombone once a week, a few minutes -- at the most -- yet it still gets better and better.

Trumpet and cornet players have to rehearse regularly -- it's really a struggle. You must love this instrument very much, to take this for a lifetime. But frankly, at times I almost hated it -- even asked myself whether I shouldn't have kept to the trombone. The idea, you'd like to play a little trumpet, because it's kind of nice...... forget it. The struggle to develop a decent sound and get high notes is too tough and this takes years. You need to be crazy about trumpet playing -- at least for several years. After that you have to rehearse for a lifetime, not to loose those high-notes, you had worked so hard for.

Here Comes the Healthcare Slut

Republicans have slutty ears and slutty brains. They're too lazy to listen and they can't think. Sandra Fluke has lots of patience and explains it over and over again: Yes this is a healthcare issue! Rush Limbaugh called her a "slut", because Sandra is fighting for her suffering friend, who is now disabled. Why? Because of the Republican's ignorance. Aren't cysts and severe menstruation health issues? Or do they consider healthcare advocates nanny-state-sluts? Okay, here's the song.....

"Here Comes the Healthcare Slut"

Today Rush Limbaugh apologized. But actually he wasn't the major problem anymore -- not to me. Limbaugh is an old man now, and he is mighty strange. On Twitter I saw people who are much younger, and are much nastier and uglier though. One of them tweeted something very-very nasty back to me, which I don't want to quote here.* I know Sandra Fluke gets an extreme amount of emails and tweets, and I'm very much afraid, a lot of them are uglier than anything I've seen yet. Let's see how nasty the tweets, referring to this video, are going to bee......

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Melody and lyrics by Clarissa Smith

All vocals and instruments by Clarissa Smith

© All rights: Clarissa Smith

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* Though we have to quote two resulting tweets: the certain insulting right-winger actually helped me to get another liberal follower! I returned the favor and followed this liberal right away.

Clarissa Smith ‏ @ClarissaSmith2

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@VanceCooley That Ian guy is actually helping me to meet nice people, that's swell! He actually made slutty healthcare nanny Clarissa's day.

In reply to Vance Cooley

3 MarVance Cooley ‏ @VanceCooley

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@ClarissaSmith2 I added u just on the basis of that ian guy saying fuck u

Retweeted by Clarissa Smith

Sweet & Hot Theme Song

Here's the new theme song for this blog. The chords are different from the version I created months ago: The second part is a chromatic scale from F7 downwards through B7, while the melody pretty much follows the bass line. It's actually all standard stuff, as to find in many titles for centuries. Same goes for the first part, with the chords F, dm, gm, C7, again standard chords -- which all together makes our theme song a safe thing in things copyright questions. The essential thing now is, HOW we play and sing this crazy musical patchwork, that actually doesn't mean anything. Which actually is the acid test for a decent musician: paraphrasing something that actually doesn't mean a thing, as if it would mean something. LOL

This is how I recorded the sound: (1) Recording of the digital piano as midi file (2) Recording of my vocal part, while replaying the piano (3) Improvising the trombone, while piano volume very low (4) Improvising the cornet, while piano volume very low (5) Cutting all three wave files together and adding two cymbals as sound effect (6) Adding one of my 2010 tap sequences during the video editing

Will We All Die of SOPA?

Lern more about SOPA, how harmful it can be to the internet:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:SOPA_initiative/Learn_more

Happy New Year 1933!

The winter 1932/1933 was the toughest since the 1929 crash. We had our crash in 2008, so lets compare upcoming 2012 to 1933: While Franklin D. Roosevelt was on the way in January 1933 and the Republican Herbert Hoover about to leave, we already have President Obama. So our depression didn't develop a Great Depression, although the teabaggers tried to make it worse. Is 2012 gonna be a happier new 1933?

I recorded the whole thing via cam and at the same time the sound on external device. Then I added a few final notes with recorder-clarinet and trombone to the last cornet bars, to have a collective ending.

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Copyright info: This isn't any tune -- it's just: F major, D minor, G minor, C major (a sequence of chords you can find in dozens of tunes); so here isn't gonna be any copyright problem!

'Santa' Already Gone

It isn't Christmas yet, but 'Santa' has already gone. Why?

His whole name is Saint Nicholas and his death day December 6, 343. And December 6 is his actual day to remember him. We should. Why?

He practically acted like a socialist -- like Jesus. He helped people. What many right-wingers, who call themselves 'Christian', hate like the plague: goodness, kindness, sharing, being unselfish &ct. ....

The big, fat, red dwarf is an abuse of this holy man. You won't see this bizarre figure here on occupied sweet&hot. I would rather load up Easter bunnies for Christmas. For they're cute at least. But this caricature is nothing but ugly. To Christmas belong Mary and Joseph, being homeless right at that night when Jesus was born. So they occupied that famous shed. Got it? This is a message for occupiers! Jesus is one of us!

We're still in Advent -- not yet in the Christmas season. That means, waiting for the Messiah, being prepared for his coming. So stop the stupid party -- or I click you off and zap you away. I do it all the time. Let's go back to the good old ancestors, who came during the 1600s to this innocent land. For we're not innocent anymore, we're awfully decadent. The so-called "American Christmas" is no Christian institution -- it is a dance around the golden calf. And it's even worse than that: terribly stupid and ugly.

Somebody take a non-amplified guitar, others their flutes, clarinets, violins, whatever. The rest please sing. In classical style, or the gospel kind -- both is fine. Then somebody read one of the Bible texts about what happened about 2000 years ago. Even if you don't believe in Christian resurrection: This is the birth of a man who changed the world. He preached love, tolerance, mercy. This man was a progressive, a liberal, a lefty. So this is a message for progressives, for socialists, for occupiers.

We could need some more of all that. And less of the stupid party idiocy.

My 20s Piano Accompaniment

For all those who play a little piano, wondering how the 20s' jazz stuff would go -- this is how I did it for my last minor-cornet post. In the first video you see a typical kind of four-beat blues accompaniment from the 1920s (left hand plays 4-beat octaves/ right hand 4-beat chords). It is based on the keep-it-simple philosophy: you can't express classical blues phrases on a cornet, if the piano dares a crossover to modern jazz styles. Don't try walking bass here, for its swing character would destroy the 20s character!

In the middle of the first video I show a more nuanced variation as well, but still in a 20s style. Here the bass does a constant octave-change-jump, from pinky to thumb, while the right is a little improvising. Then I demonstrate the two-beat variation -- first played with two hands. Finally I show how to do the whole two-beat with the left hand (the pinky is the bass-finger here), which is the base for stride piano playing. You can play a solo in this style, or at times do an accompaniment as well.

In the second video I show the chords I used for my cornet accompaniment: First a change between D minor (dm) and the seventh chord of A major (A7) -- then a change between dm and B♭7 -- and then the final cadence dm/ B♭7 / A7/ dm. Finally a very typical 20s rhythm, with a four-beat kind of jumping octaves in the bass.

Frankly I'd absolutely prefer a non-electrical acoustic piano. But piano isn't my main instrument; my keyboard is just for arranging and tryouts. I even prefer 100% unplugged singing. Let a skilled person with a loud voice do it. There's always a solution that makes it possible to make music without electricity. During the 20s they always managed it without sound system. How about a speaking trumpet? I tried it -- works fine. I made a big card-board speaking trumpet, about three foot long: It makes a big noise, without any electricity.

It isn't just the environment thought. I find the sound of an amplified string bass ugly. A plain acoustically played, unplugged bass sounds always warmer and more beautifully -- simply natural. The same goes for the good old acoustic piano. The digital piano will always be colder. It is kinda CD quality, but cold. If this wasn't a true statement, live classical music wouldn't sound better than digitalized on CD. In fact the sound of plain strings and plain wood is always warmer. You can mix it over the best mixing console in the world, the result will always make me feel uncomfortable. Of course environment protection is also part of the occupy movement, so it certainly motivates me here on occupied sweet&hot as well.

Here's my decision: I wanna play with banjo players and without piano. Most guitar players come on with amplifiers and I don't accept that anymore. In many clubs they don't have acoustic pianos anymore, so you would need those digital ones. The string bass can actually play without amplifier.... if wind instruments are ready to hold back. Modern dixieland trumpeters feel like playing full blast -- during the 20s they had much more discipline. They always played with non-amplified string bass. It works. Trumpeters/cornetists used mutes very often, so it wasn't too loud anyway. If trumpeters are ready, able and willing, they can always adjust -- even unmuted. Today people feel like they can't live without letting it all hang out in full blast. You can't make 20s music with guys like this. Try to find a soft playing drummer.... extremely rare species in our days. If the drummer makes a hellish noise, the bass and maybe even banjo will need amplifiers. So then I will have to play pretty loud on my cornet (it wouldn't sound old anymore). The clarinet will sure drown in this noise and need a microphone. At least now the banjo needs amplifying too. Even a saxophone will need a microphone and I will have to blow full blast all the time. The overall sound result will be urgh! ....ugly as all amplified music today.

No, no, no! Anybody who isn't ready to adjust, is fired on the spot.

1933 Depression Sound for the 2011 Depression

Last Sunday I recorded a merciless Great Depression piano rhythm via midi. You can consider this sort of march/tango/blues mixture -- maybe with a klezmer influence too. Don't take these comparisons too literally, for this is an extra style: It comes from 1920s jazz and its roots from the south -- mainly New Orleans. If you try something too tricky (a boogie-woogie bass or something), you won't hit the right character -- keep it simple, just let it stomp! Then you can add that typical muted cornet, desperately moaning, wailing, outcrying*.... Yeah, that's it!

Actually I'm thinking of My Forgotten Man, in the 1933 film musical Gold Diggers of 1933. People in the occupy movement 2011, who'd like to experience how the 30s addressed the same social problems we have today, should see that film! My Forgotten Man was the final number, sung by the great black singer Etta Moten. Etta was really able to express and stage this typical Great Depression desperation. Certainly it originally came out of the pained souls of African-American plantation workers. Don't let the fair Joan Blondell fool you: she was not able to sing that way, it's Etta all the time! At the beginning Joan is speaking the lyrics and it's really great. You hear a muted cornet sound in her background, although it's a little tame. But as soon as Etta Moten starts singing the next chorus, the music turns entirely jazzy and bluesy. So, while blowing my muted cornet, I certainly didn't do it the tame way, but tried to express what Etta presented so amazingly.

I listened to 20s and early 30s original recordings since my

early youth and it became an important part of my nature,

so it's easy to express myself that way.

The forgotten men of 1932/1933 where the veterans of that time: jobless, homeless, starving.... You already feel we know that in 2011 too? Yes, that's the actual reason why I'm going back to the year 1933 right now -- why I occupied my old 30s blog for the occupy movement. Today we have the same Depression problems: People being put out on the streets.... foreclosure..... The Gold Diggers of 1933 actually begin with a Broadway show being foreclosed: premiere supposed to be the next day, but the police come in and take everything away -- girls laid off and nothing to eat. Their director has great ideas, just found an ingenious composer who sings divinely too (Dick Powell), playing the melody of My Forgotten Man on a home piano: "Ain't ya hear it? That waiiiiling....jobs, jobs, jobs!" the director already imagines the final Depression mood for the planed show. All this was on my mind, while recording my minor themes with piano and cornet. I won't play titles from that film musical, because of copyright risks. I'm just aiming at that style and mood.

We have this good old stuff -- the hippies weren't even born then. Those people, 78 years ago, are very much like us! So why not integrate this old Depression culture into the occupy movement of 2011? Why not inspire amateur jazz musicians to join with their instruments? This is our tradition! We aren't just hippies -- we are those 1930s guys as well.

The great advantage of that music is, you can play it 100% unplugged. The musicians can carry their instruments wherever they want, without carrying amplifiers, or having to plug in somewhere. No long-winded sound check -- they just come and start playing at once. Besides, if you're for environment protection, you're likely to appreciate it anyway.

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* If the background chords were played too modern, I couldn't play the cornet that way. I would just take out that mute and play swing or bebop phrases. But that's not what we're aiming at here -- we want that stomping and wailing 20s/early 30s sound!

** As I said a few days ago, Thom Hartmann and Steve Keen just began to consider, we're actually having another depression in 2011. Between fall 1929 (the big crash) and fall 1932, were exactly three years -- between our 2008 crash and today are also three years! By the way, President Roosevelt was cooperating with the creators of the musicals 42nd Street and Gold Diggers of 1933. It was about the Depression, but already a way to find out of the Depression: Doing something, creating something, showing something -- it was really a great spirit of optimism accompanying those greatly celebrated premieres in 1933. Read more about it here (this is sort of time travel writing!):

http://sweet&hot/Golddiggers1933/2010-article-in-30s-style

***THE PIANO RHYTHM IN THESE VIDEOS--HOW IT GOES--IN THE NEXT ARTICLE!*** ....in the meantime this piano part is out there:

http://sweet&hot/2011/12/my-20s-piano-accompaniment.html