My grandfather would would finish every visit with “See you in church.” I would chuckle but it made no sense. He went to Saint Boniface and we went to Saint John’s.
Steve Black has created a video for “Rosary,” my personal favorite track on our new lp. Shot in NYC and tweaked with AI from Haiper, it is almost as if Steve was sitting in with the band as we fell into this hypnotic groove. Phil Marshall’s understated, sinewy guitar in dialog with Pete LaBonne’s effortlessly magical piano, Peggi Fournier’s melody, as relaxed as Colorblind James’ “Ride Board,” Ken Franks big bass and my drums making sure the song goes nowhere and Steve Black’s hallucinatory visuals. And do I have to mention that the song captures what it feels like to say the rosary.
It had been too long since we visited Pete and Shelley. Way too long. We couldn’t even remember when the last time was. Somewhere after that first pandemic wave. Kerry and Claire bought a place in the Adirondacks a couple of years ago and they invited us for a ski so we had an agenda. We booked a place at the Mirror Lake Inn for two nights and stopped in Saranac to ski with Kerry and Claire before continuing on to Lake Placid. We took 104 through Mexico and then up 81 where we spotted a billboard that read “BEYOND REASONABLE DOUBT (next line) JESUS IS ALIVE” followed by an 800 number.
We found Kerry and Claire’s place and skied on a nearby golf course. I packed two left-handed mittens for the trip but made it work. Kerry’s skis were too slick so he struggle to ski uphill while our skis were sticky. It was so beautiful it didn’t matter. Kerry and Claire have an active social life up here, open jams and the upcoming Winter Carnival that Garry Trudeau picked the theme for. This one being “Creepy Carnival.”
Claire Marziotti photo of the Ice Palace construction on Saranac Lake
I made a note to send a new Refrigerator hat to Shelley. Her’s has lost its yellow. Shelley and Pete’s life style could not be more different that Kerry and Claire’s. Pete used to come out of the woods to join Margaret Explosion on piano but they are still in hunker down mode and loving it.
With temperatures in the forties there was zero traffic on the many snowmobile crossings. We saw Rustic Furniture signs in every small town. Some just advertising “Rustics” as if it was a noun. And I guess it was for Rochester’s The Rustics. We had dinner in Lake Placid at an Italian restaurant called “Café Rustica.”
Horseshoe Road, the neglected, long closed-to-traffic road through Durand Eastman Park, is as pretty in the winter as it is in summer. We skied up it today, by the clubhouse, and across Kings Highway. There is another half of the park over there, most of it undeveloped, that we rarely see. The hill leading down to the valley was too windswept to provide a soft landing so we turned around.
Fresh, twinkling snow and temperatures in the low twenties made for another perfect ski today. Three in a row. We plan to get out out early tomorrow before this all melts. They haven’t groomed the trails this year. Maybe that is a thing of the past. We don’t mind trudging. We worked our way up to lake and found a large shelf of ice and snow out where the sand bar is. It looked like it started at the mouth of the river and runs all the way to the Sea Breeze Pier.
I added to my Sun Ra library over Christmas with Rodger Coleman’s “Sun Ra Sundays” book and this morning I read an entry on “Nothing Is,” an essential Sun Ra recording. Originally released on the ESP label in 1969, it is a live recording from a 1966 performance at Saint Lawrence University in Canton, New York. Brian Williams from The Goners went there and I asked him if he was at the show. He told me it was very memorable and one of the best cultural events at SLU. The original release was edited by Sun Ra and fit on one lp. ESP recently unearthed over ninety minutes of unreleased material from the concert as a two-CD set entitled “College Tour Vol. 1: The Complete Nothing Is…”
I’m happy to report Margaret Explosion’s “Per La Prima!” lp is getting some healthy local airplay. Scott Regan always plays a track before one of our gigs on his WXXI “Open Tunings” show. Rick Simpson has played a few tracks on his “Gumbo Variations” WITR show. Cal Zone’s “Magic Records” show picked the lp as one of his Best of the Year releases. And Joe Tunis’s “Numbers,” also on WAYO, played “Disappear” this week and let the lp side play out through “Rosary” and “Daydream” while he back announced and yammered on. It was beautiful.
I took the photo above one week ago, just before the snow. The northeast corner of Main and Clinton was looking especially sad. When I was kid I thought this was the four corners of our city. It was where all the actions was, the Roasted Peanut store, Fanny Farmer, Jay’s Record Ranch and the gag gift store. Only later did my father set me straight. The real four corners is blocks away on the other side of the river and it too was once the center of downtown.
Main and Clinton – photo by Paul Dodd 1976
When I photographed Main and Clinton in the seventies I was thinking the same thing, about how run-down and seedy the stores looked. But at least there were people out on the streets.
Main and Clinton mid 1950s, downtown Rochester – photo from City of Rochester
Saint John’s on Humboldt Street had neither a gym or a ballfield. We had recess in the parking lot. We would get on a city bus after school, get off downtown, and work our way to the CYO, now home to Garth Fagan Dance, where they had a gymnasium and pool. There were so many people in the streets back then. I don’t like this trajectory.
Ripton with Hotheads poster for Halloween Bug Jar gig
I did this poster for a Halloween Ripton gig at the Bug Jar. Came across it in a search for Ripton. Must have been somewhere in the nineties. I played drums in Dave’s band for a while. Dave sat in with Margaret Explosion a few times in the early days and we plan to pay tribute to him tonight. Todd Beers will read one of Dave’s poems and we’ll burn a candle for him.
Dave Ripton self-portrait poster for Margaret Explosion tribute
In a recent Facebook post Dave described Margaret Explosion as a “Two hour dreamscape.” I wish I was dreaming and Dave wasn’t dead.
Dave Ripton at the Bug Jar in the 90’s
Listen “Idaho” by Dave Ripton from “Poetry Sucks Me”Leave a comment
Rebecca LaFevre painting in Rochester Contemporary Members Show
“Untitled 002 with yellow” is my favorite painting in RoCo’s annual Members Exhibition. Show runs through February 10. It’s a good one.
Suspicion and speculation clouded our recent conversations with neighbors. Someone’s dog was leaving piles in the road. Not formed but soft-like mounds. Jared’s grandkids stepped in it when they throwing a football around. We spotted some in front of our house but didn’t think much of it. Monica probably didn’t want us to think it was their dog – the piles were too big for Domino so he was off the hook – and she speculated that it might be a coyote. We hear them all the time but hardly ever see them. Over the weekend Jared found a dead coyote behind his shed. He said it looked like old age had caught up with the greying animal. Peggi and I went down to look at it. It’s frozen and intact. Animal Control was called but they probably have the day off for the holiday.
Before posting my mail art collection the other day I looked everywhere for my favorite postcard, one we had hanging on our refrigerator for years, the one that had Peggi’s mom in hysterics. But no luck. I did find a low res version of front and I’m posting it here.
Swimmers at Rochester’s Durand Eastman Beach January 13
I played a Sarah Vaughn single at dinner the night before last and Peggi told me she woke up with the song stuck in her head. She sang a few bars of it and it was stuck in my head all day. We were pretty certain the RPO’s performance of The Rite of Spring would cleanse our heads. As magnificent as it was it failed to do so.
It is hard to imagine people walking out of Igor Stravinsky’s Le Sacre du printemps in 1913. One hundred and ten years later the piece is so melodic and memorable it feels like an old friend. Instead of Ballets Russes, choreographed by Vaslav Nijinsky, the RPO performed with Garth Fagan Dance, choreographed by Norwood Pennewell, “PJ.” It was magical. One moment sent chills down my spine. The primary dancers were clustered on the left side of the stage (is that stage right?) and they were lit to direct our attention accordingly. A group of dancers, either sitting or reclining on the right side of the stage were minimally lit. They rolled their bodies to the left in unison. In our peripheral vision it felt like spring unfolding.
We spent Saturday at our neighbor’s birthday party. Four hours of Jamaican dancehall music, party chat and football playoffs. I was in the kitchen, showing someone my picture of swimmers at Durand from earlier in the day, when my watch and every iPhone in the room sounded an alarm from NY Emergency Management. “Heavy snow will reduce visibility to zero and travel will be impossible.” We were planning to go to Nod’s record re-release party.
The party broke up around nine and the weather didn’t look so bad so we braved the 13 minute ride, our second Saturday night at Skylark. Brave of Casey to host this bill. We hadn’t heard Pengo in a few years and they sounded great. Two synths, drums and a guitar that sounded like a bass in one swirling rush of avant Rochester. Emily Robb was next. She bowed her guitar while we struggled to hear what her synth accompanist was playing. Having started the party early we started to fade early and left while Nod was still planning their set. We brought home their lp, a re-release of their 1992 debut but this time on vinyl. “Summertime” is an anthem like the Stooges “1969” and “1970” and it so good to have on wax.
I guess it was the Ray Johnson book that prompted me to post some of the postcards we’ve received over the years. I have a cigar box full but have only added a few in recent years. The custom is so old-fashioned. As I scanned them I realized about half of the senders have already passed. And if some in the other half object to me sharing these please let me know.
So it finally snowed. We waxed our skis and tried to ski for the first time this year. We got most of the way up to the lake before the snow started sticking so we trudged back. Not complaining. It was pretty. Supposed to go back in the forties this week. In my New Year’s Eve post I noted the ultra fragrant (butterscotch like) witch hazel in the park, that usually blossoms in February, was in full bloom already. I’m sure it will be fine but this cherry tree is not so hardy. What is it doing blossoming in January?
The Members Show opening at RoCo was so crowded we couldn’t see the art. We made a point of revisiting over the weekend. It is always a good one. So many familiar names on the wall, most of whom you recognize before reading the tag. I was happy to see my “Cord in Corner” sold, 100% to RoCo.
Our refrigerator was stuffed before the holidays and nearly empty yesterday. A trip to Wegmans was in order. The battery in the key fob was low so we changed that before getting in the car. We watched a YouTube video on how to get it open. I used my knife and the fob fell apart in our hands. All the little plastic buttons fell on the counter. I placed them back in their slots and inadvertently set off the car alarm. I looked out and saw a delivery truck in the driveway. The driver was afraid to get out of his truck while the alarm was sounding. We opened the car door and the alarm stopped.
We put the fob back together with the new battery and got in the car to go to Wegmans. The car wouldn’t start and the dashboard display cycled through a series of warnings. We went back in the house and called Triple A. We have been members for years and have never used the service. An attendant was here in twenty minutes and he ran a few tests on our battery with his phone. He told us we had about twenty per cent left in the battery and we should be ok for a while.
We went up to Wegmans, saw the guitar player from Joywave in the produce department and we spent a couple of hundred dollars on the basics. We loaded up the car and it wouldn’t start. We called Triple A again and the same guy showed up. He gave us a jump again and suggested we go to Autozone for a new battery. 2024 is off to a good start!
Double self portrait by Dave Ripton and Todd Beers 1992
Cheryl Laurro was the queen of Monroe Avenue back in the nineties. Her clothing store, Godiva’s, functioned like a coffee bar with no coffee. Conversation was the main item on the menu, then music by her latest infatuation. She was a big booster of local artists, poets and writers. She released a series of cassette tapes, all produced by Arpad, by local musicians. My favorite was by Dave Ripton, “Poetry Sucks Me.”.
Peggi and I bought the painting above after seeing it in Cheryl’s shop. Later we got to know both Dave and Todd. Peggi and I backed Todd in a series of poetry readings and I played drums in Ripton’s band. Dave was as much a poet as a musician. He tore it up at a Water Street gig I played with him. Every encounter with Dave since the nineties was meaningful. He made it so.
Dave Ripton cleaning our soffits in 2023
Dave moved to Maine for years and ditched most of his bad habits. He painted houses there and we hired him this summer when he returned. It was a treat spending time with him. He asked me if I ever go down a street and think, this is the last time I’m gonna drive down this street? I said, yeah, sometimes. He said “that’s “Black Irish. I do it all the time.” He became somewhat of a regular at Margaret Explosion shows again. I hugged him at the November gig and he was all bones. I held my tears. We heard he was coming to the Christmas show but . . .
Dave Ripton playing with Ani DiFranco at the Tralfamadore in Buffalo 1996. Photo by Arpad.
Listen “Idaho” by Dave Ripton from “Poetry Sucks Me”
The highway department got cute this holiday season and had their signs alternate between “If You Drive Under The Influence” and “You Are Out Of Your Mind.” I tried photographing the second part.
I asked ChatGPT to “Write a short blog post for New Years in the style of Paul Dodd.” It came up with the heading above and this:
“As we bid farewell to the old and embrace the uncharted terrain of the new, let us channel the spirit of Paul Dodd and embark on a journey of self-discovery and growth.
In the canvas of time, each stroke of the clock paints a unique masterpiece, and the stroke of midnight on New Year’s Eve is a symbol of renewal. Dodd’s approach to art teaches us to find beauty in the imperfections, much like the tapestry of our lives.
As the year turns, let us not just make resolutions but rather, let’s sculpt intentions. Dodd’s artistry lies in the ability to capture the essence of the moment, to freeze time with a stroke of his brush. Similarly, let us freeze our aspirations in the frame of purpose, creating a roadmap for the months ahead.
In the spirit of Paul Dodd, let’s not fear the blank canvas of the year ahead but instead, embrace it with open hearts. May we paint our stories with courage, resilience, and a touch of the extraordinary.
As the clock ticks, let the stroke of midnight be a celebration of the infinite possibilities that lie ahead. Here’s to a year of artful living, where each day is a canvas waiting to be adorned with the colors of joy, love, and purpose. Happy New Year!”
