Chapter Two - "Busted"

One night I was up very late, drinking cheap wine from a gallon screw top jug at art openings in the across river campuses, Robeson and Heisenberg. Robeson featured classes in sociology and liberal arts. Heisenberg was the science and computer center.

Predictably, I woke up the next day with a hangover that made infection with the Hanta Virus look attractive. Stumbling out of the building, I meandered across the street to the Ritz. The usual crew was there, Jerry, Dwayne, and Sandra. Also in attendance at the morning hangover celebration was Jerry's girlfriend, Susan. She was a snooty Photography major from hell. We had the usual "So what are you doing today" conversation. Dwayne and Sandra were going into the City for the day. Jerry had some reading to do, so he was going to hang at Sue's place on the other side of town, near the east campus and former "Women's College" now known as "Doolittle Campus". I had homework to do, so I was going to be at the Hotel, as usual.

I was the last to arrive and the last to leave. It was freezing cold out, and I was in no hurry to leave my pot of coffee. After drinking enough coffee to induce convulsions, I paid my check and wandered out into the empty Saturday streets of snow, slush, and misery. Then I noticed that I didn't have my jacket on. My keys were in my jacket. I go back into the Ritz to see if I left it there, and it was nowhere to be found. Then I remembered how cold it was when I stumbled across the street just earlier. It dawned on me that the jacket and keys were left inside the Hotel. This was not good, but not a crisis, either, because Julio's brother, Sergio, was working that day as the afternoon guard, and he would be there to let students in.

Unfortunately, when I got to the door, Sergio wasn't there.

I was very cold. Very Very Cold. Something had to be done...

I immediately hopped a bus and went to Susan's place to see if she and Jerry were there. No dice. Repeatedly ringing and blowing into my hands, ringing and blowing, ringing and blowing and no answer. Damn! I scampered over to my friend Eileen's apartment building.

Eileen McGrath was one of my favourite artists in the whole world. Her work had this mystical depth to it, completely unlike everything else that was so popular at the time. Her work didn't have this macho swaggering blasting messiness. It was intimate and dear, compelling and compulsive. She would make shrines to gods of her own invention.

She would leave messages of mystery in places of authority- for which she was once arrested, no less. They couldn't stop her art- she would leave wooden fish with myterious statements painted on them, words like "I want you" or "You are someplace nearby" or "Breathe slowly and evenly". She would take these carefully crafted fish and the lovingly painted words and leave them on the stairs of the courthouse in front of the main door. She did this for weeks until one of the Neanderthals who ran the place finally figured out that it was "art" and clearly they had to put an end to it. Culture is anathema to order. So they set up a stake out and busted her for littering. No shit. Littering. The perfect loophole. They couldn't get her for something political- it was way too weird for them to understand it as political. It was too oblique to be anti-cop/justice/jails etc. They just didn't understand the gesture, and in the typical way that ignorance moves, they decided to stifle what they don't understand- violence completes the partial mind. They understood enough that it was an art student, so they had to move in a way that didn't overtly infringe on 1st amendment rights- last thing they needed was a high profile constiutional law case- and littering was the simplest and nastiest response to the unknown they could cook up.

It's all true- She Was Littering.

And furthermore, she was littering on courthouse grounds- a serious issue in this town. So one morning, before the sun came up a waif-like 25 year old woman left a wooden fish on the steps of the courthouse. It was carefully sanded and covered with shellac. On this fish were the words "accidents never happen". As soon as she placed the fish in front of the courthouse door, tall men in long coats came out of the shadows and arrested her. They put hand cuffs on her and took her inside where she was charged with littering on courthouse grounds. Rather than go through an expensive court appearance, she simply paid the $250 fine. She stopped leaving the mystery fish.

Eileen lived above a lingerie shop. I always found that amusing- she was so monastic in her lifestyle- that she would live "above" a lingerie shop seemed oddly appropriate and ironic at the same time. The lingerie shop was across the street from the Hotel, and the bus stopped right in front.

I left the bus and went to Eileen's door, and began buzzing frantically. I was getting cold. That bone chilling middle of February I think I'm going to die cold.

No Answer.

At that point I started getting a little bit panicky. My family lived more than several miles away, and I had no money to get there. As it was Saturday, the bus lines that went to where they lived ran only sporadically, at best. I had to do something, and at that point I remembered the cartoon "Spiderman".....

I went around the side of the school building and looked for our "secret" way in: A drain pipe to the awning, then to crawl along the awning, slowly and carefully making my way to the window, open the window, and tumble inside.

I executed the manouevre flawlessly and getting up from the floor, I rubbed my hands together and turned on the stove in the student lounge area to thaw out. With a warm cup of tea in my belly, I began rolling up some of my homework when I heard some people enter the school building. I paid it no mind- I assumed it was just some other residents of the Hotel coming home after a breakfast out, or perhaps it was Julio's brother finally arriving, so I didn't even bother to turn around to see who it was. Until one of them said,

"Put your hands in the air and turn around slowly!"

I turned around and was faced by four members of the university and local constabulary. I said

"Oh, hi you guys!"

They asked, "What are you doing here?"

I put my hands down and pointed out that I was merely rolling up my homework (something any idiot could plainly see, but I WAS dealing with people whose high point in life was being on the high school football team).

This relaxed them a bit, until one of them asked "How did you get in here?" I motioned for them to follow me to the window and I indicated toward the drain pipe and the awning and explained how I climbed up the side of the building and in through the window. They asked me if the window was open .

I said, "Sure- we keep it open for this very purpose."

They didn't like that answer very much, and splattered me against the wall and said I was under arrest for burglary, and breaking and entering. Two charges I thought were completely absurd- I didn't force anything open- the window wasn't locked. And I certainly wasn't stealing anything. They kicked me down the stairs and into the patrol car, and off we went to the campus police building.

When we arrived there, they tossed me into a cell with some stupid drunken frat boy who began projectile vomiting pizza and beer all over the cell. After his fit of regurgitation, he passed out on the bunk and snored like a sawmill. A cop came by and gave me some paper towels and told me to clean it up. As degrading as it was, I was eager to clean up the odious mess. Several hours later I sat at a policeman's desk and was allowed to tell my "story".

I tearfully explained to the blue suited defender of law and order the soft focus story, the real "truth".

"Well ya see officer, my mom left me off at the school building on her way into the city. There's supposed to be a guard there, but he wasn't, and by that time, my mom had left, and I was really really cold, 'cuz I forgot my overcoat in the car, so I climbed up the side of the building and in, cuz I didn't want to freeze to death, cuz I didn't know when the guard would ever get there, bla bla bla bla."

They did let me go, but I was told to appear in court the following Monday for a hearing regarding the charge of Criminal Trespass. Uff da.

The sun was setting- an orange purple blob sending magenta rays into the polluted twilight sky as I took an hour-long bus ride back to the Hotel. Sergio was there, and getting ready to wrap up his shift. His car had refused to start that morning, so he had to take a bus, and that's why he was late. I told Sergio what had happened, and he gave me some hot chocolate. This made me feel a bit better. He said, "Art- they do nothing to you- you see. Go out and buy yourself a gift or something. Be happy."

I agreed with him and decided to buy myself a record.

Light snowflakes drifted down from the orange sky as I wandered down the street, warmly wrapped in my jacket and scarf, to the local music emporium, a nifty little place called "The Record Hut". The Hut, as it was more affectionately known, specialised in European imports and obscure releases from independent labels, leaving the top 40 crap to the One Stops of the world.

I came upon a record called "Soldier Talk" by the Red Crayola. I looked at the personnel- it was all very familiar- it looked like a Pere Ubu record, only with some guy named Mayo Thompson. I really liked Pere Ubu, and so I took this bit of vinyl "home" with me.

Dwayne had a stereo with a record player in his studio. Most of the records were mine, but I didn't have a turntable, so it was a fair arrangement. Dwayne and Sandra had just returned from the City and were sitting there doing bong hits and listening to a record by the Talking Heads. I showed them my recent acquisition. They said "cool- put it on- koff koff". I put it on the turntable and the music came belting out of the speakers.

"CIVILISATION IS BURNING DOWN BURNING DOWN!!!!!"

It sounded A LOT like Pere Ubu, only with some weird out of key singing. Not that Dave Thomas of Pere Ubu was fond of key signatures, but this other guy, Mayo Thompson, was something else again.

"RATIONALITY LOOKS BAD!!!!"

Dwayne pointed out that he had a Red Crayola record from many years ago "God Bless the Red Crayola and All Who Sail with Her", and dug it out of a milk crate, pointing out that it was a really fine record.

"As an after thought I like to add, what it was I thought you said..."

We were all in agreement- this was one awesome record. Dave Thomas bleated despair in Wonderland as Mayo Thompson's Fender twanged into oblivion. Side one ended. We were amazed.

The cover of the record consisted of snapshots taken form a speeding car in a dull autumnal industrial landscape of highways, pylons, and fences- an environment identical to the one we lived in. We turned the record over and prepared for more.

What we heard was jazz. Not some tweaky punk fusion jazz, not some guitar god jazz, just plain old straight up standard jazz. From the thirties. Coleman Hawkins to be exact.

We agreed that clearly: this is a case of Post-Modern appropriation. At the time Sherri Levine was making a name for herself by copying art from the past as a post-modern art making strategy. Many other artists were busy raiding culture to make culture. Here, we were confronted by a recording of music that featured performances by the Red Crayola and Pere Ubu on one side, and on the other, music by some black jazz star from the half a century ago. Only the titles were changed- now they were called

March #12
On The Brink
Letter Bomb
Conspirator's Oath
March #14
and
SOLDIER TALK!!!

Good grief! Talk about radical! The title track was an Appropriated Object! This was head and shoulders more radical than Sherri Levine's silly little gestures- she would copy stuff, but would reference the original artist in her copying. Red Crayola had gone light years farther with the idea of Appropriation. This was amazing! They didn't do renditions of music from the Class of 1946, they lifted the actual recordings themselves, and retitled them in keeping with the radical politics espoused on the record!

Yow!

The best part was that Coleman Hawkins was great! It would have been just too much of a pose to feature some second rate nobodies from Dubbya dubbya Two- that would have been too easy- but Coleman Hawkins! This great jazz Sax player! And considering how the American white audience co-opted and popularised jazz (heck the first jazz records were by a bunch of white guys) and stole the music of the descendants of the slaves- only now to have some art rock punkers bring this history to Consciousness by appropriating the music itself and representing it with new titles! Eeeee! My head swirled with the implications! The irony! The integrity of thievery for the good! To steal the music of the poor in order to make evident the theft of their culture decades earlier! Not an overt revolutionary opposition but a challenging and intensive intellectual stance combined with some kick ass rock and roll. Wow.

Jerry and Sue had to hear this one!

We called Susan's place, and they said, "Come on over tomorrow night! We'll even feed ya!"