She has NO intention at all of singing "I'm eating Bunny for Christmas", in response to the posting of humourful Web visitor. Instead, she suggests putting video footage on the DGM Website of Bunny singing (perhaps assisted by vocal chorus) "I'm eating human for Christmas". In the night, returning from a nocturnal interlude, she suggested a second line: "With flesh skinned and broiled".
Bun himself has made no comment on either of these suggestions but spent the night in the bedroom fireplace, his new warren; perhaps in thoughtful reverie of Human Pie as an alternative to dried apricots, Wilton non-designer pet food, spring greens from Tesco (which he prefers to homegrown cabbage) and carrots (from anywhere). Chocolate seems to be a surrogate form of erotic encounter for this chaste rabbit. (In Bunny's view, celibate is where you give it up, deliberately & intentionally; chaste is when you don't get it).
As we came to the end of our supper on the bedroom floor last night, with Salisbury Health Centre Super Fabbo (individual portion) Christmas Pudding, Bun emerged from the deepest recess of the fireplace and licked clean an (almost) empty bowl of Super Fabbo Pud. I'm not sure any of this indicates a likely leap to carnivore from vegetarian.
Also yesterday evening, returning from Close Involvements of the Paper Kind, I spoke on the telephone to Declan Colgan, Virgin A&R. Declan wanted to know: "What's the tune to `I'm eating Bunny for Christmas'?". And then to Gerard Talbot. Both conversations (primarily) in respect of "Sacred Songs".
Gerard is in Los Angeles now, and deals with Caroline Records' licensing. We first met when Gerard was in NYC with Caroline, who were the licensees for the EG Records (and therefore KC / Fripp) catalogue. Gerard received from EG a direct instruction not to discuss with me any details of sales regarding my records. This is embarrassing for a friend in business, one who has a good idea of the real nature of relationship between artist and their manager / record company.
So much for transparency as a pillar of ethical business, do I hear you type? The full history of EG is illuminating, an education in the social history of a period. By focusing closely on the operations of one company, its philosophy & values are revealed in its actions; the philosophy & actions of one company in its time indicates the values and strategies of the larger industry.
As I have suggested before, no reasonable audient could comprehend the level of exploitation, manipulation and deceit upon which this industry is founded - unless they have an extended life experience and involvement in it; like, by working in it over a period of years. If I cannot easily debate / discuss with enthusiasts the assumptions and suppositions of mere artist / enthusiast encounters, how is it possible for the music-lover to conceive of a regular, thoroughgoing undermining of musical process within the music industry; ie artist / business encounters?
Something like: the enthusiast talks of love, and mutually supportive encounters; I know of prostitution, rape and compulsion. The enthusiast believes they speak of something of which they know; I reply, "If you wish me to seriously consider your arguments, your experience must be comparable to mine. This is not something to discuss theoretically: you must know the practice from within if you ask me to consider your view as substantial".
Like: the reasonable auditor presents the artist, in their persona as company director, with annual accounts. The director signs off on these. How do I know what these accounts mean to an Inland Revenue Inspector or chartered accountant? This is why Fripp / the company pay huge fees to qualified specialists to render and transform an incomprehensible ongoing, increasing mass of receipts, accounts, figures, trasfers and transactions into a form which can be grasped - but grasped by someone who "reads" that form.
The mass of receipts yesterday - "What's this SIR bill for?": "King Crimson rehearsals in Nashville, May 1995" - this is an easy one. But what about all the small, fiddly little bits of paper for batteries, various hotel charges, petrol etc. on the road. The analogy is rather like asking an infantry soldier walking into battle, firing an automatic weapon at anything that moves towards them, to account for the number of bullets fired.
Back at barracks (or tent in the desert) - "How many bullets did you fire, why, at what targets, what was your reasonable basis for considering the targets hostile, and where are the bullet cases?": "Well, it moved towards me from enemy lines, I fired, and the spent cases are in the desert I guess".
A Working Gigster who spends six months a year on the road spends three months at home recovering and dealing with emergencies, and three months getting ready to go away again. This necessitates a body of professional advisers such as managers, accountants & auditors, upon whom the Gigster MUST rely. If the Gigster stays at home to take care of business, they aren't going to go away on tour. So, if they aren't going on tour, they're not a Gigster. So, if the Gigster takes care of business, they're not a Gigster and they don't have any business. Catch 22.
My former manager was a chartered accountant, adviser to the Palace, treasurer of a leading music biz charity, governor of a public school: there are no better credentials in the field of trustworthiness than this, surely? And if Sting's accountant (now in prison) could disappear some £17 million, what hope for little people?
As Sting said at the trial of his accountant: "I read music, not figures". So I asked our visiting auditor yesterday: "If I presented you with a music score, would you be prepared to sign off against its accuracy?". When positions are reversed, how stupid simple questions appear to be.
The pragmatics of our increasingly specialised, sophisticated, bureacratic & computer driven / recording information societies are generating unanticipated effects. I find hope in this increasing complexity: when facing hazard, an appropriate response is not to simplify the options in front of us (fundamentalism) but to increase them. In this proliferation of possibilities lie a range of alternative opportunities / options / choices out of a dillemma; we up the ante. So, complexity provides a kind of meta - solution to the strangeness of our times.
Meanwhile, back on the ground, one of the effects of this complexity is to separate what one can reasonably know, what one is (officially) expected to know, and what one can actually deal with, in the life of a Happy Gigster.
"Expect nothing."
