The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Arts
Friday, September 21, 2018 — 5A
ACROSS
1 Harmonious
groups
7 Maybelline
product
14 Role for Miley
15 Sticks
16 Result of too
many people
fishing?
18 Customer file
prompt
19 Lincoln and
Grant had them
in common
21 Meet halfway
22 Show of
support
24 Religious
music?
27 Buoyant wood
30 On point
31 ’60s protest gp.
32 Well-versed
about sailing
ships?
37 Exhilarated
shout
38 Fencing gear
40 Dispute
between polite
fellows?
44 Term.
47 Practical joke
48 Stimulate
49 Problems with
cellphone
signals?
54 __ corda:
played using
the piano’s soft
pedal
55 Orly arrival
56 Like little-known
facts
59 Hungary
neighbor
62 “Above my pay
grade” ... and,
read in four
parts, a hint to
16-, 24-, 32-, 40-
and 49-Across
65 Dodging
66 Pushes back,
say
67 No
68 Antarctic
explorer
Shackleton
DOWN
1 Golden State
traffic org.
2 “Bali __”
3 Nearly zero
4 About
5 Indian noble
6 Cutting
7 George Strait
label
8 Munic. official
9 Family ride
10 Shipped stuff
11 Dodges
12 Fix some bare
spots, say
13 Take stock of
17 Sixteenth-
century year
20 Ivory, for one
22 __ Dhabi
23 Jabber
25 Cut or crust
opener
26 Seventh in an
instructional
39-Down,
perhaps
28 Obstacle
29 Back to back?
33 Pines
34 Very small
amounts
35 Volunteer for
another tour
36 Final Four game
39 Order
41 Eau in Ecuador
42 Sister
43 It may be iced
44 Showed
leniency toward
45 Villa d’Este city
46 Hostility
50 Cattle drivers
51 Navel
configuration
52 Shore bird
53 Goal or basket
57 Lenovo
competitor
58 Bangalore
bread
60 Lodging spot
61 Sports rep.
63 Sot’s affliction
64 East, in Essen
By Jerry Edelstein
©2018 Tribune Content Agency, LLC
09/21/18
Los Angeles Times Daily Crossword Puzzle
Edited by Rich Norris and Joyce Nichols Lewis
09/21/18
ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE:
Release Date: Friday, September 21, 2018
Summers at my house are
soundtracked by the oldies. It’s
something that I credit most of my
random music history knowledge
to, just my family sitting with each
other around the pool, talking about
songwriters from the ’60s and ’70s,
listening to soul and rock and, of
course, The Beatles. There is a shirt
my dad occasionally wears to these
parties, partly as a joke and partly
for its shock factor. He bought it as
a gag, I imagine at an airport, or in
Venice, CA., where jokey t-shirts
hang from store vendors like
bananas off a tree. Sometimes, my
stepmom will steal it from him and
parade through the house in her
pajamas, but its slogan isn’t serious
to them. I always question the
words, and they laugh and throw
their heads back, saying, “It doesn’t
really matter, does it? It was all their
faults.” On the front, in big white
letters, the t-shirt says one thing: I
blame Yoko.
Of course, this is in reference to
the constant cultural assumption
that Yoko Ono broke up The Beatles,
a prevailing theory among both
self-proclaimed scholars and casual
fans alike. In reality, the reasoning
behind their infamous dissolution
is a little more complicated than
the work of one relationship,
a combination of the time and
personal differences between those
famous Liverpoolian men. Who
knows, in addition to these things,
I’m sure Ono and John Lennon’s
torrid love affair and his subsequent
obsession with their art and music
together probably had something
to do with it. The Beatles’ breakup
is, ultimately, a mystery, and the
obvious
consequence
of
what
happens when a war, fame, money
and drugs coincide in one place.
But the question remains — why
do we still blame Yoko? Why has
our culture become so attached to
scapegoating the women in famous
men’s lives for anything they do?
In reality, Yoko Ono was an artist
in her own right, and according to
her, she did not even know of John
or The Beatles when they originally
met: In fact, he was a fan of hers, a
patron of her art long before their
romantic relationship began. By
Lennon and Ono’s meeting in 1966,
she had been a leading member
of the Fluxus art movement and
published an experimental book
titled “Grapefruit.” She was her
own person, not just an extension
of a very famous man. Even if you
set aside the invasive effects of
racism in Ono’s case, fans were and
have always been confused about
why such a legendary band only
lasted for a very short time. But the
thing that has lasted, and will likely
continue to be a cultural touchstone
for years to come, is the blame
which floats around Yoko Ono’s
name. She is not the only famous
woman who has been portrayed in
the media this way, and has become
a reference point for something
people call the “Yoko Effect” — a
phenomenon that influences us
today more than we may even
notice.
Earlier this month, in the wake of
rapper Mac Miller’s sudden death,
Twitter and other social media
platforms erupted into outrage.
Most of this was undeservingly
pointed directly towards Ariana
Grande, Miller’s girlfriend of two
years until earlier this year. In this
case, the “Yoko Effect” is still very
much alive, a continuing blame
game which pins the confusing
and sometimes tragic choices
of famous men on their female
partners. It is still happening in
every conversation we have about
The Beatles, about Courtney Love,
about Ariana Grande and everyone
in between. With every affair, every
salacious rumor on Twitter or Page
Six that places the responsibility
of toxic relationship on a woman’s
shoulders, we are still blaming
Yoko. When I read Rolling Stone
writer Brittany Spanos’s article
a week ago on this very topic, all
I could think about was my dad’s
shirt. Here, in 2018, a time full of
feminist movements and supposed
social enlightenment, our culture
is still fixed on this dangerous
pattern of blame and assumption
that absolves problematic men of
culpability and bestows it on their
girlfriends and wives. I have caught
myself thinking in these ways
many times — the “Yoko Effect” is
a product of our society’s fixation
on accountability — where many
people and influences are in play, it
is hard to find a character to blame,
and in most cases, it doesn’t exist.
But there are ways to subvert this
phenomenon, and it is our job as
consumers of the media to break
the cycle. Do it in small ways,
like changing the conversation
when it turns to conspiracy,
understanding the realities of fame
and its influence on choice, and how
society’s misogynistic tunnel vision
can often look for evil in a woman’s
shadows. Beyond all of this, maybe
take off the shirt. It could be a joke,
but there is a real person in all of
these cases, and she deserves to
speak for herself.
Why do we blame Yoko?
DAILY GENDER & MEDIA COLUMN
Lawrence rides the wave
of their own versatility
Just as hip hop’s infamous
boy band seem to multiply on
stage — feeding off each other’s
performances
and
coalescing
into a hive of energy that seems
to either contain 1 or 20 people
— Lawrence seemed to grow
stronger the more they played
through their set at the Blind Pig
last Mon. night.
Coming from New York City,
the eight-member band was
originally formed by siblings
Clyde and Gracie Lawrence.
Pulling from a wild mix of
influences,
Lawrence
weaves
together brass instrumentals,
tight keyboard-driven rhythms
and upbeat melodies to create a
spontaneous fusion of musical
genres; Aretha Franklin soul
shakes hands with Carly Rae
Jepsen pop, and the resulting
agreement
that
Lawrence
manages to broker is nothing
short of magical.
All eight band members are
longtime childhood and college
friends,
and
this
closeness
allows them to showcase their
almost uncategorizable sound in
the best way possible. Standing
side by side, the audience could
see the synergy between the
members, passing smiles and
refrains from one person to the
next like the handwritten notes
you would send your best friends
in middle school geometry. The
music simply flowed. And even
though the small stage allowed
little
extravagant
movement,
the dynamic quality of the music
itself turned the entirety of the
Blind Pig into a retro dance floor.
The
jazz
undertones
and
lounge-pop
bursts
of
“The
Heartburn Song” started off
the show with layered vocals
and guitar chords that crooned,
transforming the worn interior
of the stage into an underground
speakeasy: plush velvet booths
and gilded chandeliers with
tear-shaped crystals. It’s an
aesthetic — a vibe, one could
say — that continued throughout
their performance. As Lawrence
played songs from their newest
SHIMA SADAGHIYANI
Daily Music Editor
WARNER BROS. RECORDS
The Books that Built Us:
‘The Crying of Lot 49’
I don’t remember reading “The
Crying of Lot 49” for the first
time, let alone how it came into my
life. Those details are eclipsed by
what I do recall — the process of
coping with its bewildering form,
shut in my mint green bedroom at
1:00 a.m., poring over Wikipedia
pages on Thomas Pynchon and
postmodernism. I was about 16,
and offended by the bizarre little
book’s refusal to have a plot, to
develop characters, to … conclude.
“Why go through the effort of
writing something that seems to
mean nothing?” I asked myself.
“What the fuck?”
“The Crying of Lot 49” is
composed almost exclusively of
satirical jabs, distracting details
and fruitless conversations. It
chronicles the anti-Odyssey of
Oedipa Maas as she happens to
unearth a peculiar network of
coincidences connected by “a
symbol she’d never seen before,
a loop, triangle and trapezoid,”
meant to represent a muted post
horn.
The
rudimentary
post
horn is the sole illustration in the
slim volume and evolves from a
point of intrigue to a trigger of
sorts as Oedipa begins to see it
everywhere. The physical motif
is graffitied by polyamorists on a
bathroom stall, scrawled amid the
notes of a disillusioned techie and
embossed on the pin of a member
of the Inamorati Anonymous
committed to assisting those who
have fallen in love (“the worst
addiction of all”). Oedipa reads
into the symbols, convinced “she
will create constellations” out of
the chaos, but instead finds herself
“an alien, unfurrowed, assumed
full circle into some paranoia,”
struggling to determine whether
she’s actually stumbled upon a
massive conspiracy or is simply
going mad. It ends abruptly, right
when you think you’ll get some sort
of answer.
Like Oedipa Maas and her post
horns, I found myself desperate
to wring the ridiculousness of
“Lot 49” into some constellation
that made sense to me — one that
looked like clarity, coherence and
resolution. It was an exercise in
pure futility, but one that exposed
a set of rigid expectations for the
novel I had no idea I was harboring.
As I slowly came to terms with
the fact that “Lot 49” isn’t
conventionally “meaningful,” I felt
as if I were becoming unstuck, in a
completely Kurt Vonnegut way. I
realized I was clinging to structure,
got embarrassed and loosened my
grip. The relief was near erotic.
Flash forward two-ish years and
I’m walking to Name Brand Tattoo
one Sept. afternoon after Bio 173, or
some other class I took freshman
year that has zero relevance in
what I think I’m doing now. I’m
half a country away from home, I
have no friends and I’m trying not
to be scared as hell. So I’m getting
a tattoo. When one of the three
Nicks there asks what I want, I
open “The Crying of Lot 49” to the
symbol that haunts Oedipa Maas
halfway across Cali., and a little
more than halfway out of (or into?)
her mind. I get the post horn inked
in an impulsive, grasping attempt
to immortalize that little bit of
un-stuckness I felt in accepting
“Lot 49,” so subsumed in the angst
of my moment that I’m oblivious to
the fact that I’m literally branding
myself
with
a
quintessential
emblem of Postmodern Shit.
It was as if I had accidentally
joined a cult. Since The Tattoo, I’ve
been approached here and there by
randos in public who recognize the
symbol and wish to share a word,
to rave over Oedipa Maas and the
Tristero, to recommend a sweet
new read. If you ink it, they will
come. One of my professors noticed,
told me I had a “dope tattoo”— my
ego orgasmed. Friends who weren’t
familiar with the novel were
intrigued by my devotion and read
it. Some became converts. I visited
one of them this past summer and
noticed he had drawn the post
horn on his wall in Sharpie. When
I pointed it out, I felt a new sort
of intimacy establish between us.
This book gives believers a simple
way to find each other, and we’re
here to spread the paranoid love.
The “Lot 49” subculture, once you
start to recognize it, is impressively
prevalent.
Radiohead
and
Yo
La Tengo have both referenced
elements of “Lot 49” in their work,
an insider signal to listeners who
know it. Oedipa Maas’s signature
appears in “The Simpsons,” and the
Google Smartphone App for the
Treefort Music Fest once featured
the post horn on its icon. It’s under
my skin, on a wall in Berkeley
and scribbled in a bathroom stall
at SMTD. The magnitude of our
devotion nearly brings me to tears.
The realization that I’ve found
belonging in a ridiculous literary
subculture does bring me tears.
All these tears have made me
ironically reluctant to return to
the text. What if I don’t like it?
What if it’s actually the squirmy
sort of Postmodern Shit … and I
still have this tattoo? I gave it a
couple years, marinated in the cult,
continued drawing post horns in
my notebooks and evangelizing
nonreaders. In the past year,
though,
I’ve
noticed
waning
familiarity with the names and
references that typically arise in
“Lot 49” discussions. It was time.
I tracked down my copy of the
sacred text (thanks, Dayton) and
was pleasantly surprised to find
myself frolicking in the prose.
There was so much I had missed
the first time around — the smart
satire, the raunchy references
— the book that was once so
inaccessible had become brilliantly
hilarious. “Lot 49” round two was
like reconnecting with a friend,
and discovering even more virtue
in them. Encounters like that make
the relationship so much stronger.
The most impressive discovery
from my literary homecoming,
however, is the subtly powerful
examination of binary thinking
Pynchon manages to work beneath
all the absurdity. In the agita of
her self-doubt, Oedipa is described
as “walking among matrices of a
great digital computer, the zeroes
and ones twinned above, hanging
like balanced mobiles, right and
left, ahead, thick, maybe endless.”
The dark omnipresence of “this
or that,” the dread of being stuck
between, indefinitely, with no word
exactly appropriate for the self in
the moment. Damn. It is paranoia.
But there’s something to be
said for how the structureless
paranoia of “The Crying of Lot
49” pushes you into a disposition
that can relieve some of the
weight of those thick ones and
zeroes. Once unstuck from my
rigid expectations, I found myself
able to notice and appreciate the
novel’s ridiculousness. Once I made
peace with the fact that there’s no
constellation to be drawn, I entered
an incredible literary community.
“The Crying of Lot 49,” it seems, is
an exercise in detaching from the
anxiety of that tension between
one and zero. What results is the
hysterical grace it takes to exist in
bewildering absurdity — absurdity
not unlike that of television
personality presidents and Bird
scooters.
VERITY STURM
For the Daily
BOOKS NOTEBOOK
album Living Room — “Friend
or Enemy,” “Make a Move” and
“Probably Up,” among others
— as well as songs from their
very first full album Breakfast
— “Do You Want Nothing To Do
with Me,” “Misty Morning” and
“Shot” — they never lost touch
of this transformative spark,
consistently playing with such
a level of passion that the crowd
had no other option but to lose
their feet in the rhythm and just
dance.
The highlight of Lawrence’s
performance came through a song
that didn’t originate as one they
created but still made completely
their own. Halfway through
the set, the first few familiar
notes of “Get Busy” by Sean
Paul graced our ears. Then the
next few notes were completely
drowned out due to the volume of
the crowd’s scream of approval.
Enthusiasm
was
high,
and
Lawrence was grooving, finding
a way to repurpose the song to
fit their own specific abilities
and allowing each band member
to contribute their own personal
style. What brought each of
the various components of the
performance together, however,
was the vocal powerhouse duo
of the Lawrence siblings, turning
the song kaleidoscopic, cascading
down onto the crowd like a disco
ball’s heavenly flash.
CLARA SCOTT
Daily Gender & Media Columnist
CONCERT REVIEW