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CDs to celebrate
A Chet Baker title called Love For Sale, from Justin Time’s historical “Just a Memory” catalog, sat on my shelf for far too long. I finally gave it a spin and was astonished. Captured live in Montreal on March 7, 1978 (a day after my 10th birthday), Chet sounds old but in terrific form, backed by a young Phil Markowitz
The latest from Gilad Atzmon
Gilad Atzmon is a Brit-based saxophonist and “loudmouthed antisemitic demagogue” (per Oliver Kamm) that I’ve touched upon here and here. Now Kamm points us toward this rant, in which Atzmon praises Holocaust deniers such as David Irving for “establishing a rational, dynamic, lucid empirically grounded narrative based on forensic evidence.” And via Judeosphere, a link to Atzmon’s encomium to Hamas.
Now that’s blasphemy
A dark day for Shiite Muslims, and for humanity in general. Here are “before” and “after” photos of the grand Shia mosque in Samarra, Iraq. It was destroyed today by the so-called Iraqi resistance. More offensive than any cartoon, I’d say.
“Things get pretty similar”
Johann Hari has a great eyewitness report from a Holocaust denial conference in southern California in 2003. Money quote: Another young delegate, Russ Gustavson, 22, from Portland, Oregon […] was good-looking and seemed rather charming – but then, in his disconcertingly mild-mannered and polite voice, he explained, “I’m on the far left – I’m a true socialist.” He admitted that
Sayyid Qutb: antiracist?
Naomi Klein caused a stir last August when she argued that Sayyid Qutb, “generally viewed as the intellectual architect of radical political Islam,” arrived at his dim view of America after encountering “what he later described as America’s ‘evil and fanatic racial discrimination.’” In this piece at TNR, Joseph Braude quotes Qutb on jazz: “this music that the savage bushmen
Free speech for Holocaust deniers
I’m all for it. And I’m 100 percent against the trial and conviction of David Irving in Austria. As Oliver Kamm writes today, “The proper policy with regard to malevolent falsehood is to expose it rather than suppress it. That is the task of historians rather than legislators or the judiciary.” But I’ve also been meaning to record this comment
Resign, Rumsfeld
I’m late in posting a link to the newly revealed Abu Ghraib photos, but link I must. Note the man with the words “I’m a Rapeist” [sic] scrawled on his buttocks. As Americans, we should all hang our heads in shame. And remember, many of those detained in Abu Ghraib were captured in random sweeps and believed to be innocent
Don’t touch that dial…
I’ve had no time at all for posts — a shame, since in the last few days I’ve seen: — the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra performing Shostakovich 7 at Carnegie Hall — the 20-piece chamber orchestra Alarm Will Sound performing Zappa, Varese, Cage, Derek Bermel (an old friend from high school) and several other composers at Zankel Hall — jazz bassist