I went to a free concert last night. David Byrne was playing in Prospect Park. Good show. It’s the first in a series of free concerts called Celebrate Brooklyn. My response to that series is “Please, could you occasionally stop celebrating Brooklyn?”
I mean all this celebration kind of smacks of insecurity. It’s like an entire borough with middle child syndrome. “Mommy and Daddy don’t pay enough attention, so I better get on a stage.”
Brooklyn is larger in both population and land area than Manhattan. Manhattan will always be the favorite child. There are tons of classically trained musicians who dream of some day playing Carnegie Hall or Lincoln Center. Nobody dreams of playing at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. There are tons of artists who dream of someday getting a piece in the MOMA. Nobody prays for a show at the Brooklyn Museum. There are legions of actors who want to make it on Broadway. Nobody dreams of performing at the Brooklyn Lyceum.
There is no Celebrate Queens festival. If its residents wanted to promote the borough as a great place to live the festival would be called. “Queens, Doesn’t Care What You Think.” Of course, Queens’ indifference means having such a festival is beneath them.
That’s a huge difference between the two boroughs. Brooklynites are always trying to convince their friends from Manhattan to move into their neighborhoods. Queens is happy to tell you how to get to the airports. Brooklynites want to have a vital cultural scene. Queens wants to go bowling. Brooklynites plan on volunteering at the community gardens. Queens will be working on the car this weekend. It hopes it will stop making that noise.
People used to ask why I lived in Queens for so long. First off it was cheap. Secondly, nobody ever called me up while I was writing and wanted to hang out in some café. Queens was my fortress of solitude. I like all the things going on in Brooklyn. Sometimes I miss the lack of interruptions.
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Brooklyn Keeps it Fake.
There’s the difference between Brooklyn and Queens. Brooklyn is a state of mind. Queens is some letters on a map. Brooklyn has a vibrant cultural scene. Queens has two airports. People name there children Brooklyn. People slur homosexuals as Queens.
You would think by saying this, I’m giving whole hearted endorsement to Brooklyn. I’m not. I mean Brooklyn has a lot going for it but the problem with Brooklyn is that it’s always “in da house.”
This expression was getting tired when Rap was still young. Back when I was a teenager, Run DMC could pump up a crowd by asking, “Is Brooklyn in da house? Does the house also contain Queens? Is the Bronx also taking up residence.” In my leafy suburbia, I was struck by the exoticism of such expressions. It was fresh.
By the time I went to college in West Virginia, the freshness had worn off. I remember friends saying things like, “Pocahontas County is in the house.” You would think that would be enough to make any self respecting black person abandon the use of that phrase. Brooklyn, however, seems unaware it should have gone the way of M.C. Hammer’s puffy pants. I’m just glad there’s no proud Brooklynites endorsing their borough with the phrase, “Brooklyn, you can’t touch this.”
The real problem is that Brooklynites who avow to be “in da house” are the ones who should really not be using Ebonics. I was at the Brooklyn Museum one evening and happened upon the director giving a speech to a culturally diverse, well off looking audience. He took time between extolling the Museum’s permanent collection and promoting its temporary shows to say. “Oh, I have one question I need to ask you all. Is Brooklyn in the house?” The audience responded by enthusiastically raising their chardonnay and going “wooo.” I thought, “No. This audience is not in the house. It may be in the brownstone or in the mansion but it is not in da house at all.
Brooklyn is quickly gentrifying. It still has places like the Marcy Projects and East New York that can be a little scary. Huge swaths of it though are becoming Disneyworld. I mean that’s not really a criticism. Disney’s Main Street U.S.A. is flat out beautiful. Urban planners often study it as a great example of design. The difference between Disney and Park Slope in Brooklyn is that Disney doesn’t pretend to have street cred.
Disney will not produce a cartoon where Mickey greets the audience as follows. “What up bitches? It’s your original gangsta Mickey Mouse. I’m like the original M and M yo. I was chillin at my crib with my dog, Goofy and next thing I know Donald gets all up in my grill. So, I busted out my nine and smoked his ass.”
Most of Brooklyn needs to know that they are not now and never have been in the house. Keep it real yo.
You would think by saying this, I’m giving whole hearted endorsement to Brooklyn. I’m not. I mean Brooklyn has a lot going for it but the problem with Brooklyn is that it’s always “in da house.”
This expression was getting tired when Rap was still young. Back when I was a teenager, Run DMC could pump up a crowd by asking, “Is Brooklyn in da house? Does the house also contain Queens? Is the Bronx also taking up residence.” In my leafy suburbia, I was struck by the exoticism of such expressions. It was fresh.
By the time I went to college in West Virginia, the freshness had worn off. I remember friends saying things like, “Pocahontas County is in the house.” You would think that would be enough to make any self respecting black person abandon the use of that phrase. Brooklyn, however, seems unaware it should have gone the way of M.C. Hammer’s puffy pants. I’m just glad there’s no proud Brooklynites endorsing their borough with the phrase, “Brooklyn, you can’t touch this.”
The real problem is that Brooklynites who avow to be “in da house” are the ones who should really not be using Ebonics. I was at the Brooklyn Museum one evening and happened upon the director giving a speech to a culturally diverse, well off looking audience. He took time between extolling the Museum’s permanent collection and promoting its temporary shows to say. “Oh, I have one question I need to ask you all. Is Brooklyn in the house?” The audience responded by enthusiastically raising their chardonnay and going “wooo.” I thought, “No. This audience is not in the house. It may be in the brownstone or in the mansion but it is not in da house at all.
Brooklyn is quickly gentrifying. It still has places like the Marcy Projects and East New York that can be a little scary. Huge swaths of it though are becoming Disneyworld. I mean that’s not really a criticism. Disney’s Main Street U.S.A. is flat out beautiful. Urban planners often study it as a great example of design. The difference between Disney and Park Slope in Brooklyn is that Disney doesn’t pretend to have street cred.
Disney will not produce a cartoon where Mickey greets the audience as follows. “What up bitches? It’s your original gangsta Mickey Mouse. I’m like the original M and M yo. I was chillin at my crib with my dog, Goofy and next thing I know Donald gets all up in my grill. So, I busted out my nine and smoked his ass.”
Most of Brooklyn needs to know that they are not now and never have been in the house. Keep it real yo.
Friday, June 5, 2009
Early History of my Two Boroughs
So, you’d think two boroughs like Queens and Brooklyn residing firmly in Manhattan’s shadow would have a lot in common. They were both a part of New Netherlands and became a part of the English colony of New York. That is about where the similarities end though.
Breuckelen was founded by the Dutch pretty quickly after they founded New Amsterdam. Just down the road from me is a Dutch Reform church. The charter founding this institution was issued in 1654. Brooklyn, at the time, was largely a wilderness dotted with towns, villages and a few homes. Still, the area was united by Dutch culture.
Queens was never so unified. It was also part of New Netherlands, but the towns of Flushing and Jamaica were settled mostly by English Quakers. Other parts of Queens were largely Dutch. On either side of Queens were representatives of the two greatest commercial empires of its day. New Amsterdam was a bustling hub of Dutch commerce. New England, right across the Long Island Sound, was the Puritan English center of activity. Queens saw how the conflict between New Amsterdam and New England was caused by their cultures. So, they decided they'd be better off without one.
The English took over 1664 and Brooklyn residents started to speak English. They never quite got it right though. The English named it Kings County but by that time, it had already established itself as an entity called Brooklyn.
That which was not Brooklyn, the English named Queens County. Residents of Flushing and Jamaica collectively shrugged their shoulders and answered, “Ok.” Under the British, Queens County also encompassed what is now the County of Nassau. Just think, if they had only remained one entity, Billy Joel might well have been the fifth Ramone.
In 1854 the City of Greater Brooklyn unified several towns into an urban area with an industrial base and its own city government. More towns joined until the whole county was one big city. It had its own baseball team and Brooklyn was the sight of the first stolen base. Also the first stolen car stereo but we’re getting ahead of ourselves.
It wasn’t until 1870 that any part of Queens thought to call itself a city. Back then just as now, Queens had more land and less population than Brooklyn. Agriculture was the dominant culture. Long Island City was the exception. It had industry and a bit of population density. That’s why they didn’t call it Long Island Village.
In 1898, Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens , The Bronx and Staten Island united to form the City of New York. It’s not long before many Brooklyn residents start referring to it as the mistake of 98. The Brooklyn Bridge was still fairly new having been completed in 1883. A good many Brooklynites considered this to have been a colossal error as well and wondered if it would be possible to return the bridge and use the money to dig a moat between Brooklyn and Queens. This didn’t work so they elected to stay a part of the city.
Queens residents see this as a step forward. They wanted to put agriculture behind them and rid themselves of the stench of manure. What they got was a stench of a different kind with the opening of the Corona Ash Dump, the city’s largest landfill. Actually the dump opened in 1895, but consolidation meant Queens was now able to receive trash from the whole city. Eventually, it was turned by Robert Moses into Flushing Meadows Park, where the Mets Stadium resides. So, if you’re wondering why they so often stink…
Breuckelen was founded by the Dutch pretty quickly after they founded New Amsterdam. Just down the road from me is a Dutch Reform church. The charter founding this institution was issued in 1654. Brooklyn, at the time, was largely a wilderness dotted with towns, villages and a few homes. Still, the area was united by Dutch culture.
Queens was never so unified. It was also part of New Netherlands, but the towns of Flushing and Jamaica were settled mostly by English Quakers. Other parts of Queens were largely Dutch. On either side of Queens were representatives of the two greatest commercial empires of its day. New Amsterdam was a bustling hub of Dutch commerce. New England, right across the Long Island Sound, was the Puritan English center of activity. Queens saw how the conflict between New Amsterdam and New England was caused by their cultures. So, they decided they'd be better off without one.
The English took over 1664 and Brooklyn residents started to speak English. They never quite got it right though. The English named it Kings County but by that time, it had already established itself as an entity called Brooklyn.
That which was not Brooklyn, the English named Queens County. Residents of Flushing and Jamaica collectively shrugged their shoulders and answered, “Ok.” Under the British, Queens County also encompassed what is now the County of Nassau. Just think, if they had only remained one entity, Billy Joel might well have been the fifth Ramone.
In 1854 the City of Greater Brooklyn unified several towns into an urban area with an industrial base and its own city government. More towns joined until the whole county was one big city. It had its own baseball team and Brooklyn was the sight of the first stolen base. Also the first stolen car stereo but we’re getting ahead of ourselves.
It wasn’t until 1870 that any part of Queens thought to call itself a city. Back then just as now, Queens had more land and less population than Brooklyn. Agriculture was the dominant culture. Long Island City was the exception. It had industry and a bit of population density. That’s why they didn’t call it Long Island Village.
In 1898, Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens , The Bronx and Staten Island united to form the City of New York. It’s not long before many Brooklyn residents start referring to it as the mistake of 98. The Brooklyn Bridge was still fairly new having been completed in 1883. A good many Brooklynites considered this to have been a colossal error as well and wondered if it would be possible to return the bridge and use the money to dig a moat between Brooklyn and Queens. This didn’t work so they elected to stay a part of the city.
Queens residents see this as a step forward. They wanted to put agriculture behind them and rid themselves of the stench of manure. What they got was a stench of a different kind with the opening of the Corona Ash Dump, the city’s largest landfill. Actually the dump opened in 1895, but consolidation meant Queens was now able to receive trash from the whole city. Eventually, it was turned by Robert Moses into Flushing Meadows Park, where the Mets Stadium resides. So, if you’re wondering why they so often stink…
Thursday, June 4, 2009
Moving From Queens to Brooklyn
So I moved to Brooklyn from Queens a while back. It seemed like a good idea. I had recently lost my job and wanted to go some place cheaper. My girlfriend had lost her lease. She was only marginally employed and also wanted to keep her expenses to a minimum. So we thought, since math tells us “a negative times a negative equals a positive,” moving in together was bound to change our luck.
Anyway, I left the apartment I'd been living in for ten years in Bayside, Queens to move to Flatbush, Brooklyn. If anyone from somewhere outside the New York, Metropolitan area is reading this, I suppose I should explain.
Queens and Brooklyn are boroughs of New York City. When most people hear the words New York City, their minds fill with visions of skyscrapers, Broadway and 9/11. They don’t fill with images of the Queens Farm Museum or the Coney Island Aquarium.
I’m not implying the people who don’t live here are wrong. Even to people who live more than 50 miles away from Manhattan, it's where about half of their town’s population commutes to for work. One of my friends, to save money on his first house, commuted everyday to work from Pennsylvania. That means he had to cross an entire state every morning and every night so he could work in Manhattan. Why? Well now he's a Vice President of a Fortune 500 company. It’s like when somebody asked Willie Sutton why he robbed banks.
Manhattan is a small island. In many ways it is like Australia was in its early days. Just as people on the receiving end of the English justice system were cast out of their communities and sent to a far off island, most Manhattanites moved there to because they never quite fit in at home. Instead of working at the local Jiffy Lube, most Manhattanites wanted to be successful in any one of a number of fields: finance, the arts, fashion, journalism, publishing, even cooking. Most prisoners of Manhattan endure cramped quarters and ridiculous prices to live on an island that is radically different from where they’re from. As a result that small island has become a truly amazing place.
Still, for all it splendor, Manhattan is just one of five boroughs. The population of Queens is just under 2,300,000. Brooklyn has a little more than 2,500,000. According to this table, would make either of them the fourth largest city in the country. Of course, if you did drop either of these boroughs in the middle of most states, that state’s residents would probably consider it a terrorist attack.
I’ve said before, the prisoners are different. They are strivers. New York’s other boroughs are full of the ones who couldn’t cut it in prison. Some were born here and look across the water at the skyline casting shadows over their home and are filled with bitterness. The rest came here and hoped to make it in Manhattan only to find themselves lumped in with the bridge and tunnel crowd. The result, more bitterness. Therefore, if Brooklyn or Queens was actually dropped onto some unsuspecting state, the sudden onslaught of bitter would probably poison the local water supply.
Anyway, I left the apartment I'd been living in for ten years in Bayside, Queens to move to Flatbush, Brooklyn. If anyone from somewhere outside the New York, Metropolitan area is reading this, I suppose I should explain.
Queens and Brooklyn are boroughs of New York City. When most people hear the words New York City, their minds fill with visions of skyscrapers, Broadway and 9/11. They don’t fill with images of the Queens Farm Museum or the Coney Island Aquarium.
I’m not implying the people who don’t live here are wrong. Even to people who live more than 50 miles away from Manhattan, it's where about half of their town’s population commutes to for work. One of my friends, to save money on his first house, commuted everyday to work from Pennsylvania. That means he had to cross an entire state every morning and every night so he could work in Manhattan. Why? Well now he's a Vice President of a Fortune 500 company. It’s like when somebody asked Willie Sutton why he robbed banks.
Manhattan is a small island. In many ways it is like Australia was in its early days. Just as people on the receiving end of the English justice system were cast out of their communities and sent to a far off island, most Manhattanites moved there to because they never quite fit in at home. Instead of working at the local Jiffy Lube, most Manhattanites wanted to be successful in any one of a number of fields: finance, the arts, fashion, journalism, publishing, even cooking. Most prisoners of Manhattan endure cramped quarters and ridiculous prices to live on an island that is radically different from where they’re from. As a result that small island has become a truly amazing place.
Still, for all it splendor, Manhattan is just one of five boroughs. The population of Queens is just under 2,300,000. Brooklyn has a little more than 2,500,000. According to this table, would make either of them the fourth largest city in the country. Of course, if you did drop either of these boroughs in the middle of most states, that state’s residents would probably consider it a terrorist attack.
I’ve said before, the prisoners are different. They are strivers. New York’s other boroughs are full of the ones who couldn’t cut it in prison. Some were born here and look across the water at the skyline casting shadows over their home and are filled with bitterness. The rest came here and hoped to make it in Manhattan only to find themselves lumped in with the bridge and tunnel crowd. The result, more bitterness. Therefore, if Brooklyn or Queens was actually dropped onto some unsuspecting state, the sudden onslaught of bitter would probably poison the local water supply.
Tuesday, May 6, 2008
Servitude, a Bass Conditon
I know I’m never going to be a good guitarist. Still, I’m struggling to learn. I have manual dexterity of the sort that makes flipper babies feel superior. I’m slowly making progress though.
This makes my band-mates unhappy with me. You see I am their bassist. Guitar is something they wish I would not waste time with. My bass skills were once approaching competence. They have atrophied significantly.
Why don’t I stick to the one instrument that I can be most useful to my band on? There’s two reasons. The first is pragmatic. More important to me than my role as a bassist is my role as a songwriter. Hardly anyone writes songs on bass.
The other reason is I’m an only child who, in his younger days, was a social outcast. I’m not comfortable counting on people to be there for me. Learning bass is learning co-dependency. It’s an instrument that is absolutely useless outside of the context of a band. Nobody has ever said, “You know what this coffee shop needs? Somebody laying down a grove that makes the all the cups and saucers rattle.” No one has ever said, “I’m going to hit you with my latest folk song set to this funky ass bass line.”
If a band is like a marriage, a base player is like a battered spouse with no other career options. You’d like to think you can get out and build a life on your own but nobody will hire you solo and you have a tendency to fall in with other abusive spouses.
So the struggle to learn guitar goes on because I can’t count on anybody.
This makes my band-mates unhappy with me. You see I am their bassist. Guitar is something they wish I would not waste time with. My bass skills were once approaching competence. They have atrophied significantly.
Why don’t I stick to the one instrument that I can be most useful to my band on? There’s two reasons. The first is pragmatic. More important to me than my role as a bassist is my role as a songwriter. Hardly anyone writes songs on bass.
The other reason is I’m an only child who, in his younger days, was a social outcast. I’m not comfortable counting on people to be there for me. Learning bass is learning co-dependency. It’s an instrument that is absolutely useless outside of the context of a band. Nobody has ever said, “You know what this coffee shop needs? Somebody laying down a grove that makes the all the cups and saucers rattle.” No one has ever said, “I’m going to hit you with my latest folk song set to this funky ass bass line.”
If a band is like a marriage, a base player is like a battered spouse with no other career options. You’d like to think you can get out and build a life on your own but nobody will hire you solo and you have a tendency to fall in with other abusive spouses.
So the struggle to learn guitar goes on because I can’t count on anybody.
Monday, May 5, 2008
Hey, a blog
So blogging, has it come to this? Well, why not.
What’s my deal you may ask? You probably won’t. If I wasn’t me, I certainly wouldn’t. Anyway what’s with these words on a screen? Aren’t there enough words to choose from? Wouldn’t you be better off reading a good book? The answer to that is of course you would.
Are you still there? Ever heard of the library? Yeah, I know that would mean getting off your computer. So where does that leave us?
Ah yes, blogging.
A little bit about me. I’ve done a bit of stand up comedy. It’s been more than a year since I’ve done it on a regular basis. Currently, I’m bassist-songwriter-singer in a comedy-country band called the Manson Family Singers.
I’ve written plays that have never seen the stage. I’ve started writing books that I haven’t finished. I am soon to turn forty one.
I have a job for an insurance company that is forty hours a week of torture. I don’t know how much longer I can last here.
In short I’m a loser and, good news for you ladies out there, I’m single. Well, I am sort of seeing some one. We haven’t formalized anything yet. But I’m not interested in pursuing anyone else. I’m barely interested in pursuing a continued existence.
What’s my deal you may ask? You probably won’t. If I wasn’t me, I certainly wouldn’t. Anyway what’s with these words on a screen? Aren’t there enough words to choose from? Wouldn’t you be better off reading a good book? The answer to that is of course you would.
Are you still there? Ever heard of the library? Yeah, I know that would mean getting off your computer. So where does that leave us?
Ah yes, blogging.
A little bit about me. I’ve done a bit of stand up comedy. It’s been more than a year since I’ve done it on a regular basis. Currently, I’m bassist-songwriter-singer in a comedy-country band called the Manson Family Singers.
I’ve written plays that have never seen the stage. I’ve started writing books that I haven’t finished. I am soon to turn forty one.
I have a job for an insurance company that is forty hours a week of torture. I don’t know how much longer I can last here.
In short I’m a loser and, good news for you ladies out there, I’m single. Well, I am sort of seeing some one. We haven’t formalized anything yet. But I’m not interested in pursuing anyone else. I’m barely interested in pursuing a continued existence.
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