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Utopian Turtletop. Monsieur Croche's BĂȘte Noire. Contact: turtletop [at] hotmail [dot] com

Thursday, March 31, 2005

WHY I LIKE SMOOTH JAZZ

Sorry about last night's harangue. No, I don't love all music, and yes, it's fine to hate music. I'll still object to outright dismissals of entire genres, but please, pay no attention to my moralistic priggishness.

I don't happen to like Kenny G -- tried to, really tried, but failed. I'm guessing it's the sluggish tempos that put me off. One of my best friends in high school was a bluegrass banjo player with a beautiful country tenor voice. He loved bluegrass, classical, metal, and smooth jazz -- all chops music -- and couldn't stand pop or mainstream rock or jazz -- he hated the Beatles. He turned me onto George Benson, and I've always liked him since.

After a stressful day at work, flipping on the Smooth Jazz station gives me the deliciously absurd fantasy that my spouse's '82 Datsun (which I typically drive) is a sleek new sports car, and I have lots and lots of money and a much better clothes sense. And it doesn't always cheer me up, but it often does. I like the bouncy post-disco rhythms, I like the slick-sound-sculptedness of it. Often they play R&B classics like Anita Baker's lush and superbly detailed "Rapture," which I love. I admire the intellectual independence and honesty that sees Anita Baker as jazz.

Smooth R&B and Smooth Jazz are music of class aspiration. I've been engaging with the muzak side of music since I was a teen-ager, but I don't want to go into more of my story with it now. Perhaps another time.
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