Music Writing by Carson Arnold
Music Writing by Carson Arnold
NO ONE CARES
One thing can be said for sure, when our world finally burns over in a flat metropolis of masked fiction- vampires, thieves, amateurs, and melodies sweetened for both- we'll long for that extinct twilight once sung ever so tender by the fidelity of Frank Sinatra. The man in the looking glass. When the last child is helplessly born into our decorated confusion, dusk running from dawn, that exotic culture is sure to be missed. What ever happened to these fine folks, our elders? A generation of fundamentals, elegance, and, most importantly, practiced definable principles, now left to rest their last days in the hands of a time engaged in surreal manipulation (I don't care what their backward politics were, its theme rapped direction). It gets tough to devote your concentration to only visionaries, especially when the flip equation to a visionary is a reactionary (what dry rain it all becomes). Depending at which angle you stand, one can learn anything from the presence of Sinatra. His swinging culture of postwar hope riding on the quickest wave of conservatism and organization, splashing on the beach in a glittering synthetic ambience of small town ambition and JFK honor. Oddly, this entire image is all something to really admire now. Looking back, how little their construction had to offer universally (obviously it did) at least you can say it was construction at all.
There's two sides of Sinatra. The wam-bam Reprise days of martini-Americana with its kinky underworld, or the Capitol years of cocktail neglect and stardom depression (though, some Reprise stuff travels with tears). The Capitol recordings are particularly like wishful dreams of going blind and deaf, ballads for that eternal frostbite of defeated love and lost purpose for passion. Usually accompanied by the delicate string arrangements of Gordon Jenkins, except for the epic Only The Lonely swooned by Nelson Riddle, the stillness of desire swaying throughout these records separates Sinatra from the rest of the rat-pack gang. These sad and silent songs in an odd toneless key out of a booming time, are an atmosphere of simple absence from reason, free like roaming images without metaphor. The echo never heard, the snow never melted, the footprints left behind. Sinatra abandons all productivity that era was proud to present, staining the all American dream with melancholy tales that rusts one of the first signs of decay and failure in the comfortable franchise most were welcomed to call "home". How dare this man spread immoral sagas of depression in a world working away to secure and protect that industrial paradise lost under the blinding sparkle of 'Liz Taylor jewels, moonlight serenades, cocktail fiction, and Mancini tango. Sinatra's response to this invitation was one of the only answers where a silent plead for great revolution was evident without any conflicted anecdote.
You can't just chew about Sinatra and not chat anything about conservatism, the meat and core blast for that rhythmatic time. Something that entirely fades from us with every new day. A society like ours, that is drawn by the weight of commerce, in the arts and beyond, I believe, must always keep that noble conservatism and elder fundamentals alive in order for liberation to still cease as 'liberating'. And liberating 'something' if I might add. The problem with our present time, and the so called liberation of the popular arts down to the underground, is that all forms of controversial expression are now easily accepted, approved, and applauded, leaving no obstacles to build for a level foundation. Controversy was once presented shocking, for it was a classless imagination crying for artistic enhancement, classless for its innocence had not yet been jeopardized. By and large, over time, this imagination has been both capitalized and materialized, simply for the fact that we refuse to understand the dynamics of things that threaten us, and instead, cove our freedom of thought to the attention of liberating only the convention of rebellion and anarchy, demanding only the 'steps' of radical truth without the 'stone' of conservative false. This method seems preposterous. An offer that conforms obscenity to the return of what standard? Thrown back into the legal censorship debate between Tipper Gore and Frank Zappa, I'm uncertain whose side I'd be on now. Check it all out, twenty years later. How the west was won and where it got us. Crazy enough, the prospects of common conservatism should be recognized, studied, and kept somewhat intact, for the sake of the reason to the word in which we're fond in calling "freedom". Otherwise, it becomes just another word. Blindfolded through time. Wet skies rain dry. No one cares. Sinatra wins.
- Carson Arnold December 27, 2002
copyright 2002 Carson Arnold
H(ear) is an online music column consisting of interviews, articles, and investigations written by Carson Arnold. As a freelance writer for various magazines and liner notes, living in the woods of Vermont with his family, Carson widely encourages one to submit their art, writing or any interesting piece of material that you would like to share. H(ear) is accepting both promos and demos for review or any other valuable music-related subjects. If you wish to make a comment or would like to receive H(ear) weekly by email please contact Carson at [email protected]
Thanks and enjoy!
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