TIME

WHY I HAVE FAITH IN THE REVOLUTION

IN AURAL CONSCIOUSNESS

baptist

John, The Rock and Roll Baptist, waiting patiently in the rock and roll wilderness for

the Rock and Roll Messiah to appear...while rubbing his feet together.

A TRUE STORY FROM THE KEN KESSEY OF THE AUDIO INDUSTRY ABOUT A LESSON HE LEARNED FROM JESUS CHRIST AND WOMEN IN BLACK IN MOSCOW IN 1989

I convinced Mikhail Gorbachev and the Supreme Soviet, in 1989, to celebrate Christmas for the first time with America. Because of that I spent lots of time in Moscow, in a small dingy room at the Sovietska Hotel that was reserved high Communist officials and official guests of the Supreme Soviet, waiting...waiting..and more waiting.... with nothing to do but think, and I thought about music and audio. Then one beautiful early spring Sunday morning my "KGB Guide" picked me up in his dilapidated Lada and drove me to outskirts of Moscow, and told me that I was being taken to an historic event: for the first time since the beginning of the Soviet revolution, eighty years ago, a monastery was open for public prayer.

Surrounding the ancient monastery (which I was told had been converted to a sewing machine factory in 1919) was an ocean of women in black. I could see the newly gilded golden spires ablaze in the morning sun above the walls..and the bells started to peal...the big black cast iron doors creaked opened, and I was sucked into the courtyard and immediately tripped and fell because so many women in black were down on their hands and knees kissing the ground...and I too got down and kissed the ground...and I too could feel the presence of Jesus Christ, and his spirit lifted me. ...and I am a nice Jewish boy/thermionic techno-shaman born in Brooklyn.

As I stood in the chapel listening and trying to mumble along with the Russian chanting...I said to myself..."Wow...this is really cool...Jesus Christ finally beat out Lenin...it took him eighty years, and over fifty millions were sacrificed in the waiting, hoping and in faith".

Later, back in my dingy Sovietska room, lying on my bed I asked..."Why was I at that monastery"....I had no answer then, so the rest of the day I thought about audio, and watched the "Planet of the Apes" on a tiny black and white TV with the apes and Charlton Heston speaking Russian. This day is embossed in my soul.

I have a better answer to that question now.

We, the PF community, the rebels, are doing a very important job. We are the witnesses to an important struggle. It is not that just music quality matters. It matters that we care so passionately about beauty. And It matters that we share these very intimate feelings. It matters, amidst the artistic squalor and dumbing down of our industry there is a place ( PF) to keep faith in the highest standards the audio arts alive. I believe this is true because PF is Dave’s way of keeping himself Wholey and we are the congregation in his Wholey Place.

Who are we?

Proud to be Rebels, and we must hang in there. Our aural rebellion is the only reason we matter, and we must continue to rebel with the greatest possible vigor, and we must have faith in our mission. Let me say this another way...we only matter if we rebel and demand more from our community. And, let me say that another way, in a way that my bro’ Jesus would appreciate...it is our responsibility to turn up the heat and make others, who care less, uncomfortable. Do we have courage to demand more? What are we afraid of? What do we have to loose, that we haven’t already lost...thank God?

Christ appeared as the Roman Empire began to decay, and, in spite of what appears to be enormous material prosperity and great excitement about digital audio, the soul of the music industry is in shambles. What a glorious opportunity!

I want to wish you all an Easter and Passover filled with hope, shining like a shook golden foil ablaze with the energy of a new spring, reborn in faith that the work we do matters. How blessed we are to be part of the PF community.

And let me remind my enemies; though I am only one warrior (short, pudgy, bald and brain damaged) and you are a mighty legion.....I lived through and survived disco fever.....my spirit is invincible......onward and upward.


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