Chavez: Better than Tubridy Tonight

There was shite all on the telly tonight so I tuned in to Alo Presidente!, Hugo Chavez’s weekly TV show. Apparently it goes on for hours but I only caught the last 10 minutes or so of it. The first thing to say is that he’s a far better TV frontman than Fidel Castro, who can be quite amusing, but is too disorganised with his papers, and he goes off at a tangent too much to hold the viewer’s attention for long.

Chavez, on the other hand, has a style that bears comparison not to Hitler, as Donald Rumsfeld might have it, but to Montel Williams, although the format of the show borrows from Letterman, with live music and Chavez seated, for the most part, behind a desk. The show was live from an area where thousands of new houses were being built to house people from poor areas. He spoke to officials, and to the new residents. There was Oprah-style applause.

Before the Montel comparison sprung to mind, I was thinking more on the lines of Jim’ll Fix It, or maybe Hugo Duncan, as Chavez read out a letter from an 82 year-old woman who had written to him to say that she didn’t want to die without being able to give him a hug. He then proceeded to read a poem that referenced Charlie Chaplin, Picasso, Faure and Rainier Maria Rilke.

The show closed with music from a group that sounded rather like The Steve Miller Band, but instead of admiring ladies’ peaches and wanting to shake their trees, the group sang about the rights of man and calling people comrade. Chavez grooved along rather approvingly.

In short, I think the show is the perfect template for heads of state who want to have their own weekly TV programmes.

I Agree With Ian Paisley

…Junior.

In today’s Sunday Tribune, he offers the following observation on the Dublin-Tyrone game:

“What saddened me was that no one from the GAA stood up and made these points themselves. It was all just hand-wringing and drooling and we’ll keep this all to ourselves and keep it incestuous.”

Take the time to take the time

I might ring in sick tomorrow. Resist the regular propaganda regularly released about hours lost to industry from people calling in sick when they aren’t, and take the opportunity to acquire some cultural capital to invest in the knowledge-based economy. For instance, I found out on Richard and Judy some months back that bomb scares in London don’t get reported in the press.

Note to self: be sure to google diptheria symptoms before going to bed tonight.

Diamond Geezer

Regrettably, much of my music purchases of late have been impulse buys, executed in shopping centres with a shopping trolley full of groceries in front of me. 12 Songs by Neil Diamond is the latest.

I used to read reviews before buying an album, but now I just read the labels on the front. Most Saturdays, I reckon four stars from a reasonably reputable magazine is all I need to tell me that I Have Not Bought A Piece Of Crap and My Finger Is Still On The Pulse. If last Saturday and the purchase of a CD by Jose Gonzalez was anything to go by, this is not the best approach to buying decent music.

I’m sure it’s no coincidence that the Rick Rubin-produced album has come out while the Johnny Cash film is still in the cinema. The problem for Neil Diamond, however, is that he has no mythology behind him like Cash did. The Man In Flowery Studded Shirts doesn’t have the same ring to it. As far as I know he has shot no men to watch them die either.

Anyway. It seems that the 12 Songs title has been judiciously chosen to demonstrate that this is Neil the serious singer-songwriter stripped to the bare essentials, as Rubin did with Cash. No Northern Ireland fans or UB40. (As an aside, Johnny Adair is a UB40 fan.)

On the count of being taken seriously, I think Neil Diamond has succeeded, at least to the person that really counts (me). Like the Cash albums, a lot of work has gone into making the songs simple. The man’s ability to pen a decent tune was never in doubt, but a lot of his work has a sense of being a bit overwrought. Rubin has corrected this, to great effect.

His voice is deeply impressive: gruff yet powerful, yet controlled, and the accompanying band is used sparingly, but effectively. Despite a few I-don’t-know-where-to-look moments when he gets a bit too spiritual, his lyrics are surprisingly good: taut and well-crafted. He seems aware of his limitations, but is also conscious of the power of simple lyrical imagery.

Burnt Water

Currently reading Agua Quemada by Carlos Fuentes: short stories set in Mexico City.