The Jimi Hendrix of columnists

Last week, a musician named Carlos Nunez came to town to play a concert at Nightingale Hall. He was billed as, “The Jimi Hendrix of Bagpipes.” I’m sure Carlos is a master player and all, but boy oh boy, was that handle unfortunate. It created this image of a guy getting up there and bombarding the audience with all these startling, explosive, wheezing sounds out of this crazed, groaning bag that he had just doused in lighter fluid and set aflame. It was not an image that was conducive to the purchasing of a ticket.

Musicians should remember never to compare themselves to bona fide geniuses in their promotional material. It puts way too much pressure on them to be really good, and besides, we’re all jaded as hell and don’t believe the giddy hype for one billionth of a nanosecond. Best just to describe yourself as “superbly nifty” or “amazingly non-mediocre” or “dazzlingly spellbinding, especially when liquored up on free drinks” as opposed to “the Jimi Hendrix of the glockenspiel.”

There are guys in this world who can get away with these Jimi-type labels, but not musicians. I’d love to see a guy bill himself as “the Jimi Hendrix of dermatologists” or “the Jimi Hendrix of cabinet refinishers.” For some reason, that kind of tongue-in-cheek, super-blatant balderdash would really perk up those ads in the yellow pages.

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Why are so many people hung up on having the Mapes block remain some kind of open space? In case you had forgotten, this town is surrounded by open space. It could even be said that we have oodles of open space around here, and that Reno is to open space what Los Angeles is to stoplights. We need a swinging, gleaming, cosmopolitan skyline more than we need central open space. We also need places on the river where nice people with jobs and credit cards and teeth can actually live downtown. Which is why many people are wondering why nobody is talking about a super deluxe new apartment building at First and Virginia.

A permanent ice rink is a fantabulous idea. Put it on the old Bundox block.

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I won’t soon forget a recent George Carlin concert at the Legacy. For his big finish, crabby George stopped with the jokes entirely and reamed the audience’s collective fat, lazy, no ‘count ass for about 10 minutes. It’s the only time I’ve ever been chewed out at a concert. His theme was "stop griping about the government, you slobs, because we’ve got precisely the government we deserve." Every time I go to a candidates’ forum, and I’m one of 22 people who bothered to turn off the doggone idiot box hear what these legislative hopefuls, who will be handling billions of our dollars, have to say, I think of George and his edgy little rap.