“Yeah, there’s a little zombie factor, though to me they’re just sounds that add a little edge and anticipation to what’s upcoming.
Your review is different from a typical jazz review, but that’s a good thing!”
— Bill Anschell
On Jan 29, 2024, at 3:23 PM, Carol Weber <coggiecarol@yahoo.com> wrote:
I also heard many openings to a zombie apocalypse soundtrack...
My ‘review’ is quite different than professionals.
The other day, I thought of “Song For Buster” by Rippingtons bassist Rico Belled, while scrolling my mind for different songs to accompany my random IG posts.
I haven’t talked to Rico in ages, not since he fell for the Covid act like a Fauci fanatic. A lot of people I once liked fell for that act. They’re no longer in my life.
One of the last things he said to me (at Jazz Alley, before a gig) was that I would be one of the few survivors in an apocalypse. Who says G-d doesn’t have a sense of humor?
Back to the song off Rico’s 2012 album, XR7…
I love it because of the soaring musical payoff in the fade. He plays all of the instruments, too, including the piano, which holds the key — many keys — to what makes our hearts soar.
As most jazz musicians tend to do, he downplayed his genius ability to tap into the heart of what matters to us lay listeners, dismissing the song as “cheesy” and formulaic.
The song is about the death of a dog that belonged to a musician he admires. But it could be about the death of anyone and fondly remembering the best moments of their lives.
The song is pure feel over technique, something I think quite a number of jazz musicians can’t abide by. But maybe they’ve forgotten Bill Evans, who spent his short life chasing the muse…to his detriment.
I used to run around the neighbor to that song, pre-Covid, feeling the clean, crisp spring air course through my body, smelling sweet magnolia, lilac, and peony, and seeing the sun light shimmer through many pine trees, turning a holiday scene into a festival.
Rico may not think much of the song, but it’s one of my absolute favorites…one I turn to eventually when I’m down.
Irony, that Big Ole Devil…
Wanna hear something not-so ha-ha funny?
{{waits a beat}}
Rico finally (sorta) came around to the Covid bullshit, after the fact, even though he still gives a lot of credit to Fauci as some trustworthy authority (insert eye roll here). He posted thoughts about the failed vaccines and backstabbing friends, un-ironically, in a recent blog, as if he was always on the right track.
File the following excerpt under No Shit, Sherlock:
“…Put 2 and 2 together and pretty quickly I started suspecting that the vaccines were NEVER going to stop the spread; even Fauci has now pretty much admitted that. When I tried talking to my friends about that, many would get upset with me. Some though, went further, calling me ‘anti-science’, ‘anti-vax’ or even a Trump supporter! One, who will remain nameless, would in the same conversation call me ‘the smartest guy I know’, and then call me ‘WRONG!’, ‘selfish’ etc. etc….” — “Thrown under the bus,” Jan. 8, 2024, Rico Belled website
He put “2 and 2 together,” but skipped over the process of putting “2 and 2 together,” the hardest part…the part everyone gets wrong — the crucial bridge between assumption and realization, which requires a little soul-searching maturity, a lot of humble backtracking, and willingness to say two little-big words, “I’m sorry.”
Most people don’t know how to do that.
Maybe that’s why Rico’s song dropped in my head after all these years. I was supposed to find his blog post and see that he wasn’t such a fool after all.
Cold, cold comfort.
He’s writing about Covid like he was hip to it from the beginning, and he really wasn’t, not from his Facebook posts back in 2020.
I remember quietly unfriending him, feeling horribly betrayed. I was also scared to confront him. I couldn’t read any more of the arrogant posturing from someone I thought I knew as a pragmatic, nice, open-minded guy who would always hear you out without putting you down.
He went from not posting much to constantly dropping what he thought were truth bombs. It felt like the ground beneath my feet caved in.
The unprecedented pandemic changed him, as it had so many others, and not in a good way.
I unfriended/ghosted so many Ricos then…
The Real Betrayal
Covid was a trauma survivor’s worst nightmare. I constantly turned to reliable sources of information, steady hands, and sage voices, and, god help me, they all ran for the hills…leaving me stranded.
Every last one of them.
Much like the time word of an active shooter came around to Mariner High School and I saw for myself how people can turn into a mindless horde charging for the exits — in a New York minute.
Only after most of 2020 came and went did they come calling, like nothing happened, like self-appointed prophets, or Covid Dissidents, as Bret Weinstein (who also called for lockdowns early on) smugly calls himself and his crew.
Now? Now, Rico’s talking about distrusting friends who threw him under the bus.
“…Here’s what I’m getting at: I can’t shake that feeling that some of my best friends just threw me, and many like me, under the bus, in a desperate attempt to keep themselves safe. Of course they have the right to do that, but I have the right to choose my friends. Trust me, I have forgiven them, but I can’t continue like it was. I don’t trust them anymore and at this point, even an apology wouldn’t cut it anymore, without a SERIOUS explanation to show they understand how and where they were wrong. A person who doesn’t trust my intellect is not someone I want to be friends with, as much as I don’t want to make music with someone who doesn’t trust my musicality. The key to true friendship is employing each and every one’s strong points to compensate for the weaknesses of the others…”
I mean…
I wasn’t hip to the Covid bullshit in the beginning, either. I was all for the lockdowns, stricter than what happened, btw, and the vaxx — until a few people in my life showed me a better way, encouraged me to think for myself, do my own research, and trust myself, my experience with what’s true and common sensical… Not rely on other expert opinions or the loudest voices making the biggest noise.
Did I ever apologize for being wrong for the first year and a half? I don’t remember. I did acknowledge some of what I got wrong many times in my blogs and to people in person.
But a formal apology? Well, mama didn’t raise a coward, so…here it is:
I apologize here and now…
for not figuring this out early enough, ignoring the clues from past cold and flu and ebola seasons, giving into my fears as a germaphobe hypochondriac, being weak and clinging to life at all costs over really caring about people, not thinking straight, selling myself and my gut instincts short.
I called for locking down schools even if it meant my son missed out on his senior year. I freaked out every time my husband left the house. I drove with a double-mask on. I sprayed deliveries with Lysol, hoarded toilet paper, flinched at every hug, refused to visit friends before moving away.
I believed the hype. It was easier than going against the grain, standing my ground, and taking some time to follow my own advice to think for myself.
And then, there was this: what if I’m wrong?
There’s a lot I would’ve done differently.
Beyond Covid, I carry the guilt and shame of quite possibly contributing to the eventual premature disease/death of my own child by automatically signing up for every childhood vaccine known to man without question, leaving in his body a ticking time bomb, and dismissing/judging other moms who believed vaccines caused autism in their precious children.
Who am I to throw stones?
I may have vented privately, but I never went off on people, calling for their deaths, persecution, firing. I never belittled anyone for their earnest beliefs about Covid, person to person, even when my back was against the wall. I tried to have honest conversations until I simply gave up defending my choices and let them be.
As unsure as I was, I still did as I was told.
I know people, good, caring, smart people, who made other people feel like shit, who went after them online for misinformation, who lorded their beliefs as fact, and who never allowed anyone to question the narrative.
Like many of you, I lost a lot of friends and realized I couldn’t even count on my family (mom, brother, cousins) in the end when it mattered.
Lord knows I’ve been there before, when everyone in my life abandoned me and left me to fend for myself. I had to basically raise my only child on my own, no thanks to them.
But whatever I believed, I refused to bully anyone over their bodies, their choice.
That’s my saving grace…the reporter in me…always wanting to know both sides, all sides, your side of the story, always willing to hear you out…to see the human being underneath the ideology — to be wrong.
All I asked was the same in return.
So, I forgive you, Rico. I’m glad you came around. I’m glad you’re reflecting. Even if I will never trust you again.
You weren’t the only one thrown under the bus, bro…