Suzanne Vega
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- Berkeley Concert - August 4, 1996 -
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Subj: RE: Berkeley show rescheduled -- waah!
Date: 96-08-05 01:19:03 EDT
From: joey@creative.net (Joey Shoji)
Sender: owner-undertow@law.emory.edu
To: undertow@serv4.law.emory.edu (undertow@serv4.law.emory.edu)
> After having read Wendy's post (and with list in hand) I got to Berkeley's
> Greek Theatre to see signs that indicated that the show was moved to
> August 4 at 3pm (from today at 7:30pm). Waah!!! I could've made it if the
> time was the same! I am _so_ upset!!!
>
> Hope the rest of you with tickets for today will be able to see it!
Well, I actually did make it (the singing gig fell through on short notice).
As follows:
1. Marlene on the Wall
2. Rock in This Pocket
3. Caramel
4. Small Blue Thing
5. Stockings
6. The Queen and the Soldier
7. World Before Columbus
8. No Cheap Thrill
9. Neighborhood Girls
10. Fat Man and Dancing Girl
11. Tired of Sleeping
12. Luka
13. Tom's Diner
Encore:
14. Gypsy
No "Blood Makes Noise" because of missing equipment (which was the problem and reason the show was postponed), though SV laughingly suggested that sections of the audience do the electronic/percussion sounds vocally.
Loved hearing the new songs, especially "World Before Columbus." This was the first time I heard/saw "Marlene . . ." performed just with acoustic guitar and voice. It was great! Was strange, though, seeing SV in the daylight (a thought which occurred to me half-way through her set).
Joey
Subj: Re: Berkeley show rescheduled -- waah!
Date: 96-08-05 03:27:59 EDT
From: moeller@cis.ohio-state.edu (torsten moeller)
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To: joey@creative.net (Joey Shoji)
CC: undertow@serv4.law.emory.edu
According to Joey Shoji:
>
> Loved hearing the new songs, especially "World Before Columbus." This was the
> first time I heard/saw "Marlene . . ." performed just with acoustic guitar and voice.
> It was great! Was strange, though, seeing SV in the daylight (a thought which
> occurred to me half-way through her set).
I have to agree, that it was an awesome show!
I also especially liked World Before Columbus and No Cheap Thrill!
Although she might hate for thisu :) , we should mention, that she forgot
the lyrics to Tom's Diner. She seemed to take it real easy and made a joke
out of it! She was in general quite talkative!
Great show. Looking forward to the new album ...
Torsten.
Subj: Sunday's show
Date: 96-08-05 16:25:46 EDT
From: tim@synopsys.com (Tim Hunter)
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To: undertow@serv4.law.emory.edu
random comments -- no real content, but good if you want more atmosphere from the Berkely show :)
I hadn't seen Sarah or Paula live before. I've got "Fumbling Towards Extacy", but I searched three different stores in three different cities here in Bay Area for a Paula Cole CD so I could recognize what she was singing during the show. Nobody had her album in stock. She didn't make much of an impression on me live, but I'm rarely moved/impressed by something I hear live for the first time. Suzanne doing "Caramel" at the Steven Talkhouse last year on long island is the only counter-example I can think of.
There was a VERY good vibe at the Berkely show. Few people who had to be noisy during quiet parts. Paula was very energetic (maybe she always is?); both Suzanne and Sarah were quick to laughter. Sarah especially seemed just giddy.
Suzanne didn't roll out any of her stock stories... she did apologize for the postponement... said she'd been walking in Berkeley earlier in the day and had come across what she thought was an abandonded baby stroller; then found the stroller contained a baby and was standing there saying something like "there's a baby in this stroller" before she noticed his parents sitting in the car behind her, at which point she walked off embarrassed...(no, i don't think there really was a point, but at the time it didn't matter)... said that in case we wondered what she'd been doing for the three years she'd be gone, she'd had a baby and finished an album. didn't mention marriage or the fact that the guy who was sitting at the piano is her husband :)
It was quite sunny -- Sarah hoped we'd brought sunscreen. The vendors didn't seem to have anything related to anyone but Sarah. They sold a lot of hats. A lot of other folks spent the concert looking like they were in a perpetual salute as the sun was just over the theatre...
Sarah did talk about how she thought of the two shows as an alternative to the "cock rock" of lollapalooza. She wants to have more women singer/songwriters next year, and the show will be called "Lilith's Fair" after the "first feminist", who was married to Adams (the president ?) (I initially heard this as "Adam" and was very confused).
tim
Subj: Re: Sunday's show
Date: 96-08-05 17:15:41 EDT
From: wchapman@mizar.usc.edu (Wendy Marie Chapman)
Sender: owner-undertow@law.emory.edu
To: tim@synopsys.com (Tim Hunter)
CC: undertow@serv4.law.emory.edu
On Mon, 5 Aug 1996, Tim Hunter wrote:
> Sarah did talk about how she thought of the two shows as an alternative
> to the "cock rock" of lollapalooza. She wants to have more women
> singer/songwriters next year, and the show will be called "Lilith's
> Fair" after the "first feminist", who was married to Adams (the
> president ?) (I initially heard this as "Adam" and was very confused).
At our show she did say that Lilith was Adam's first wife before Eve screwed everything up so I think she meant Adam.
Wendy!
Subj: Re: Sunday's show
Date: 96-08-05 17:53:29 EDT
From: tim@synopsys.com (Tim Hunter)
Sender: owner-undertow@law.emory.edu
To: wchapman@mizar.usc.edu (Wendy Marie Chapman)
CC: undertow@serv4.law.emory.edu
Wendy Marie Chapman said:
#At our show she did say that Lilith was Adam's first wife before Eve
#screwed everything up so I think she meant Adam.
So I wasn't confused, but then I was, and now I'm not. Thanks Wendy! :)
Ok, so for those of you who are as clueless about Lilith as I am I've found a couple of web sites...
The Lilith Shrine
The Lilith Shrine. Welcome to my online shrine to Lilith, my role model as an uppity Jewish woman. This shrine is currently under construction, so expect.. http://lark.cc.ukans.edu/~rrosen/lilith/lilith.html - size 5K - 12 Jun 96
Lilith
Information, pictures and links regarding Lilith, the mythological first wife of Adam, and the feminine dark side of the divine http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~humm/Topics/Lilith/ - size 4K - 30 May 96
Oh, and I think this is the web site that someone from the audience in Berkeley reminded Sarah about, where you can order her B-Sides album...
http://www.nettwerk.com/artists/SarMc.html
[editors note: that's the address for Nettwerk's main Sarah page. the B-Sides album can be ordered through their catalog page]
tim
Subj: Re: Sunday's show
Date: 96-08-05 21:26:56 EDT
From: moeller@cis.ohio-state.edu (torsten moeller)
Sender: owner-undertow@law.emory.edu
To: wchapman@mizar.usc.edu (Wendy Marie Chapman)
CC: undertow@serv4.law.emory.edu
According to Wendy Marie Chapman:
>
> At our show she did say that Lilith was Adam's first wife before Eve
> screwed everything up so I think she meant Adam.
I have never read the bible and are not so hip on feminist issues
(sorry - I am not proud of it myself) so please let me ask - who
is this Lilith person?
About the concert - I personally have heard a Paula Cole CD and
a Sarah ML cd before and I liked Sarah better. But at the concert
I found Paula to be much more fun, energetic and musically interesting
than Sarah. To go one step further, I actually found Sarah a bit
boring. I mean, I surely recognize her talent and her great voice,
but for some reason she doesn't do a whole lot for me. Maybe I should
start reading her lyrics. To go to an extreme, she did a cover of
this song 'Unchained Melody', which I found simply annoying. Well
I don't like covers that much in the first place, but the U2 version
is just so much better (almost better than the original).
She (Sarah) also did a duet with Paula.
Sarah also announced, that she wants to do a 'girlypalooza' (her words!)
next year as an alternative to that 'cockrocker' (also her words)
Lollapalooza, which was taking place that Saturday somewhere else in the
Bay area. This year was kind of a test for this. Well, I am looking
forward for next years whatever-palooza! (Although I personally don't think
that leaving male performers out is getting the right message across, I am
looking forward to whatever happens!)
About Suzanne, she was with two other people and I can't remember who. One on keyboard, well piano (was that Mitchell Froom?) and one on bass guitar, which was Michael Viscageli (sp?). (I was looking at the webpage for his correct name and found that there are no credits for any albums except the new one. Wouldn't it be fare to include the credits also for her older albums?) She was slipping on Toms diner, when they were 'kissing their hellos and ...' and joked around that she always found it sort of strange them kissing and all and that's why she forgot how to continue. At another part she said, that she was gone for a while and that people always ask what she had done, while she was gone and she said that she had done a baby and a new album while she was gone. She then told a little story of what happened to her while she was walking around in Berkeley. She saw a baby seat on the board walk and they were joking, that somebody had thrown out their babysat. As they came closer, they saw, that they threw out the baby with it and she was kind of puzzled, what to do, walking around in Berkeley and finding a baby on the street. What she didn't see though was the car with the parents in there. They were separated by a tree. And when she finally realized the complete situation she was just a little embarrassed and said 'hi' and went her way ...
Did I forget anything?
Well, I am not a very good story teller, but people ask about more details.
Torsten.
Subj: Re: Sunday's show
Date: 96-08-05 21:47:56 EDT
From: mstrong@ozemail.com.au (Michael Strong)
Sender: owner-undertow@law.emory.edu
To: wchapman@mizar.usc.edu (Wendy Marie Chapman)
CC: undertow@serv4.law.emory.edu (undertow)
Wendy Marie Chapman wrote:
>
> On Mon, 5 Aug 1996, Tim Hunter wrote:
>
> > Sarah did talk about how she thought of the two shows as an alternative
> > to the "cock rock" of lollapalooza. She wants to have more women
> > singer/songwriters next year, and the show will be called "Lilith's
> > Fair" after the "first feminist", who was married to Adams (the
> > president ?) (I initially heard this as "Adam" and was very confused).
>
> At our show she did say that Lilith was Adam's first wife before Eve
> screwed everything up so I think she meant Adam.
Yes she probably did mean Adam the first man. The Lilith myth has been embraced by feminists because unlike Eve, who was created from Adam's rib, Lilith was created from the dust in the same way as Adam, therefore making them equal from the start.
The story goes that Adam needed it real bad, especially after seeing all the animals doing it with their partners. He complained to God, who made Lilith in the same way that he had been made. Adam came straight to the point and tried to make Lilith "lie back and think of England" as we say here downunder.
Well Lilith, asserting her equality with Adam, wouldn't have a bar of it. In other words she didn't want to take things lying down. ("She only comes when she's on top", who sang that?) Anyway, there was a bit of a struggle and she invoked the Holy Name of God and flew away.
Adam complained to God again, who sent round the boys (angels) to get her back. She wouldn't come back however, so God created Eve and the rest is history. A bonus for Lilith was the fact that because she didn't participate in the fall, she now lives forever.
Up to this point Lilith is your number one feminist role model. But unfortunatly it's all down hill from there in terms of her mythological reputation. You see Lilith hung out around the Red Sea, a known haunt for demons who loved all that water. She was an easy lay and had lots of demon children, all of them bastards.
Somewhere along the way she became jealous of human children (myths tend to get mixed up together, with different cultures adding their own bits) and was able to kill male babies up to 8 days old (when they were circumcised) and females up to 20 days (I'm not sure the significance of 20 here). There is an ancient Jewish custom, perhaps still practiced today, to protect newborns from Lilith by drawing a circle on the child's wall, and writing the names of the angels on the door posts.
She also has the reputation for attacking men in their dreams when they sleep alone, draining them of blood and other bodily fluids.
There is of course a number of versions of Lilith's story. Some feminists say that patriachial societies have villianised her over time, and they are now reclaiming her. I've read part of one cool version where Lilith and Eve meet up outside the garden and become great friends and sisters, learning from each other, which troubles Adam and even influences God himself.
Lilith pops up a bit in literature. I know she makes an appearance in Shaw's Methuslah play (is it "Back to Methuslah"?) and one of my all time favourite novels is "Lilith" by George MacDonald, published in 1895, which sparked my interest in her. The novel uses the darker, blood sucking, Lilith to explore the nature of evil and a Christian view of redemption, yes even for Lilith herself. It's a great read if you can find it.
While I can't pretend to be a card carrying feminist, I love the fact that men and women have been created equal and abhor our male history of domination that makes racial problems pale into insignificance.
So cheers, Lilith. Here's to your recent comeback. But please lose that blood sucking stuff will ya - it makes me nervous.
Michael
Subj: Re: Sunday's show
Date: 96-08-05 22:18:37 EDT
From: tim@synopsys.com (Tim Hunter)
Sender: owner-undertow@law.emory.edu
To: moeller@cis.ohio-state.edu (torsten moeller)
CC: undertow@serv4.law.emory.edu
torsten moeller, a long way from ohio-state, wrote:
#'kissing their hellos and ...' and joked around that she always found it
#sort of strange them kissing and all and that's why she forgot how to
#continue.
This was pretty funny -- I think where she slipped was that she had the
man at the counter kissing the woman at the window... she joked that
this sort of confusion is especially bad in the Queen and the Soldier,
with the Queen standing in the hall, and the Soldier inside the castle...
I think it's pretty cool that she encourages the audience when we can't help but sing the "do do do-do" bit between verses of Tom's Diner... ;)
tim
Subj: Re: Sunday's show
Date: 96-08-05 23:51:32 EDT
From: 103320.146@compuserve.com (Cathy Rose)
Sender: owner-undertow@law.emory.edu
To: undertow@serv4.law.emory.edu (Vega mailing list)
>About the concert - I personally have heard a Paula Cole CD and
>a Sarah ML cd before and I liked Sarah better. But at the concert
>I found Paula to be much more fun, energetic and musically interesting
>than Sarah. To go one step further, I actually found Sarah a bit
>boring. I mean, I surely recognize her talent and her great voice,
>but for some reason she doesn't do a whole lot for me.
Thanks for saying it first. I too, found Sarah boring. I know she means to carry us away with those sentimental melodies--but me, I'm not really goin' there. Her music strikes me as safe, rather "feel goodish" and she seemed painfully eager to please her (Berkeley) audience. I was squirming in my seat throughout. She's just not for me. I too, found Paula a little more interesting.
But Suzanne,in my mind, is in a completely different class. She is subtle, complex, sees in funny ways, is on the inside of the outside of everything. Her songs shift your vision. The street corner hasn't changed any, but everything around starts to look a little different. Its daring art, what she's doing. And the funnest play. Suzanne was great on Sunday. Very at ease, in command, every song came off beautifully--especially Tom's Diner, and especially after she botched the words and used the goof to grab hold of the audience one notch more.
Cathy Rose
Subj: RE: Berkeley show rescheduled -- waah!
Date: 96-08-06 01:52:14 EDT
From: joey@creative.net (Joey Shoji)
Sender: owner-undertow@law.emory.edu
To: undertow@serv4.law.emory.edu (undertow@serv4.law.emory.edu)
torsten moeller wrote:
> Although she might hate for thisu :) , we should mention, that she forgot
> the lyrics to Tom's Diner. She seemed to take it real easy and made a joke
> out of it! She was in general quite talkative!
Yes, it was quite funny and she seemed at ease.
(And not to be too picky, but I believe verses were switched in "Gypsy"
but were smoothly handled. I've done that when singing "Gypsy" as
well and it's one of my favorites of hers.)
Joey
Subj: Sarah and SV (was Re: Sunday's show)
Date: 96-08-06 15:24:15 EDT
From: rwalters@lafayette.unocal.com (Rob Walters)
Sender: owner-undertow@law.emory.edu
To: undertow@serv4.law.emory.edu, 103320.146@compuserve.com
Hello everyone,
Cathy Rose wrote:
>Thanks for saying it first. I too, found Sarah boring. I know she means to
carry
>us away with those sentimental melodies--but me, I'm not really goin' there.
>Her music strikes me as safe, rather "feel goodish" and she seemed painfully
>eager to please her (Berkeley) audience. I was squirming in my seat throughout.
Allow me to take issue with this a bit, if you will. I know that personal tastes can differ, and those who saw her perform live are certainly entitled to their preferences. I have a different opinion of Sarah McLachlan.
Maybe she's boring in concert, but I have to say that I don't find either of her albums 'Solace' or 'Fumbling Towards Ecstasy' to stick to 'safe' or 'feel good' topics. Examples are many, but songs like 'Black' (dealing w/ greed and destruction of the environment), 'Possession' (self-explanatory), 'Fear' ("there's nothing I'd like better than to fall"), "Ice" ("you enter into me, a lie upon your lips / offer what you can, I'll take all that I can get, only a fool's here"), etc. are just a few that challenge conventionality and push the boundaries. Nothing 'safe' about those topics, IMHO. Even her most upbeat-sounding tune, 'Into the Fire' deals with coming to terms with the past ("Mother teach me to walk again...") in a non-sentimental way.
>But Suzanne,in my mind, is in a completely different class. She is subtle,
>complex, sees in funny ways, is on the inside of the outside of everything. Her
>songs shift your vision.
Oh, I definitely agree with you here, except for the 'different class' tag. I think Sarah M. just approaches things from a perspective that's more direct, perhaps, and a bit more emotional, but that *can* be every bit as complex as Suzanne. I always get something out of her music - it's very powerful. I don't think of it from a 'Sarah vs. Suzanne, who's better?' viewpoint, though.
>She's just not for me.
That's fine. For me, she's still a quality artist. Besides, anyone that covers Joni Mitchell's "Blue" is OK in my book! :)
-Rob
----------------------------------
rwalters@lafayette.unocal.com
*any opinion expressed or information provided is my own and not that of
my employer*
Subj: Re: Sarah and SV (was Re: Sunday's show)
Date: 96-08-06 16:36:39 EDT
From: wchapman@mizar.usc.edu (Wendy Marie Chapman)
Sender: owner-undertow@law.emory.edu
To: rwalters@lafayette.unocal.com (Rob Walters)
CC: undertow@serv4.law.emory.edu, 103320.146@compuserve.com
On Tue, 6 Aug 1996, Rob Walters wrote:
> >But Suzanne,in my mind, is in a completely different class. She is subtle,
> >complex, sees in funny ways, is on the inside of the outside of everything. Her
> >songs shift your vision.
>
> Oh, I definitely agree with you here, except for the 'different class' tag.
Now Rob, you know I love Sarah too but I have to agree with the different class tag--for me there is Suzanne and then a BBBIIIIGGGG gap and then everyone else.
Wendy!
Subj: Sarah and SV (was Re: Sunday's show) -Reply
Date: 96-08-06 16:56:06 EDT
From: rossc@slf.org
Sender: owner-undertow@law.emory.edu
To: undertow@serv4.law.emory.edu
Well, I wasn't there but I do know what is meant by "different class".
Sarah McLachlan has a much more mainstream (ie suburban) approach to things but her appeal to me has always been in the sheer sound of her voice. The sound of "Vox" (the song that sounds like it really ought to be called "Hawaii") just grabbed me first time I heard it. It's a pretty conventional new-age sounding track with a nice loud rock drum track but the kicker is that her voice (with overdubs galore) is just real purty!
But as far as her songwrtiting approach, nothing really off-center like our Ms. Froom.
Charlie Ross rossc@slf.org
Subj: Lilith, Eve and Lily
Date: 96-08-09 17:34:27 EDT
From: algranti@club-internet.fr (David Algranti)
Sender: owner-undertow@law.emory.edu
To: undertow@serv4.law.emory.edu
>While I can't pretend to be a card carrying feminist, I love the fact
>that men and women have been created equal and abhor our male history of
>domination that makes racial problems pale into insignificance.
There's also a theory that the Bible hasn't been well translated, and that
Eve came out from Adam's side and not his rib (I think I heard that in
'Yentl'). Indeed, in French you use the very same word (with an accent on
one) for 'rib' and 'side'.
So the first woman, even as Eve, would have been created equal as man.
I think Kate Bush's song 'Lily' might be about Lilith too, because she tells about being protected by a circle, though that's Lily who tells her how to protect herself so I don't know.
David.
PS: Not that I care much about the Bible.
Subj: Re: Lilith, Eve and Lily
Date: 96-08-08 01:07:13 EDT
From: bobking@gate.net (If you don't leave, I can't start)
Sender: owner-undertow@law.emory.edu
To: algranti@club-internet.fr (David Algranti)
CC: undertow@serv4.law.emory.edu
Not that anyone asked, but I'm feeling high school Bible class flashbacks all of a sudden.
David Algranti writes:
> There's also a theory that the Bible hasn't been well translated, and that
> Eve came out from Adam's side and not his rib (I think I heard that in
> 'Yentl'). Indeed, in French you use the very same word (with an accent on
> one) for 'rib' and 'side'.
> So the first woman, even as Eve, would have been created equal as man.
Actually, there are *two* creation stories in Genesis, the first of which has man and woman being created equally. It's the "In the Beginning" part (at least in the usual English translations), when YHWH (the God of the Torah) is going around creating everything out of nothing by divine fiat. "Let there be light," etc. (Didn't get around to creating the sun for a few days, though). He creates man and woman simultaneously; I think the wording I remember is something like "male and female he created them."
It's only the second story, I think in the next chapter, that has YHWH creating Adam first, out of clay or dirt, and then decides that it is not good that man should be alone, and then makes Eve out of Adam's rib. Since this story has often been used to imply that women are inferior to men, it's amusing that it's never been used to imply that men are inferior to dirt.
One theory on the existence of two somewhat contradictory creation stories is that the second one is the original, Hebrew one, and the first was added during the Babylonian captivity, when the Israelites were anxious to prove that their God could kick the butt of all the pagan deities.
Since we're discussing women's roles here, it's also interesting to note Harold Bloom's theory (in _The Book of J_, which I think was a minor bestseller in the late 1980s) that a woman, nicknamed J, actually wrote the Torah, and that the original text is a classic example of what has since become known as Jewish humor. Supposedly, the muddled text we have now is the result of monkeying around by three men, the Elohist, the Priest and the Redactor, who no doubt had different ideas of how women should behave.
I'm not even going to get into the probable censoring of women's roles in the New Testament, or the church's later nifty decision that Mary Magdelene must have been a prostitute (which is unsupported in the scripture).
Not sure this is relevant to discussing a Buddhist folksinger, but there you go.
-- Bob, breaking my silence
"Don't give me language. You'll only let me down."
-- Pee Shy, "Fear"
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