Even though this might be construed as shouting at the obvious, I choose to whisper, as I’m a not so proud member of the race in question... plus I find the subject terribly confusing as well as embarrassing beyond comfortability. I know it’s been said before, ad nauseum, but seriously folks, white people, for the most part, can’t dance... The race -there are rare exceptions- is inexplicably devoid of natural rhythm, or so it would seem. That point was never clearer after witnessing what I did in a coffeehouse a few nights ago. I was stupefied.
I am first and foremost a maker of shaking asses and dancing feet. I beat on things. With purpose. With conviction. In my mind I’ve been a rhythmatist, a communicator of sorts, in past lives, too. Ingrained and obvious, one could say. And over the years of providing rhythmic nuance I‘ve noticed that white folks just physically don’t get the big bad beat that pummels their psyche and tickles their innards. They respond to it in very odd ways. They flail. They hop. They twitch and huckabuck. All out of time. And because I’m caucasian, I’ve struggled to find the humor when the phenomenon occurs. In short, I manage a giggle or six, albeit nervously. And when faced with the aberration when performing I’m generally forced to close my eyes ‘cause I can’t stand to see these people gyrating out of time. Bottom line? Fucks with my groove. Turns my world inside out, upside down. Entirely alien even.
I’ve oft wondered... is it diet? Peoples blessed with natural rhythm do seem to eat differently than we. Or is it a long forgotten drum and fife cadence buried deep in the micro-walls of our DNA that led our ancestors into war from the peaks of The Caucus Mountains in Eastern Europe, where they emerged en masse to conquer and lord over the duskier of skin and the morally corrupt and spiritually wayward... all according to their unshakeable, hardcore beliefs and religious precepts, of course... some things don’t necessarily change over the course of history, do they? Which brings me to this... I choose the latter, as nothing could make them so seriously rhythmically nil without reasons based in fact. The key being the necessity of reaching far into our historical background, our inherent DNA, where this probable cause could be quantumly delineated. Genetics are a bitch. Argument is rendered moot in most cases. But still, and because, I’m embarrassed. After all, I’m a white man without a way out. In a world fairly bubbling and seething with soul and rhythm I’m stuck. In some luck of the draw I was ceremoniously culled from the herd and whacked upside the head with a rhythm stick from a very early age, and luckily, my groove only got better as my bones and mind expanded. I, however, am one of those rare exceptions, I’ve found.
The other night I attended a most mind-expanding musical experience. “Hairy Apes BMX” is a musical aggregation whose original tunes really spread far and wide with imagination, incorporating elements of funk, free form jazz, poetry and hip-hop, whose performance was attended -for the most part- and oddly enough- only by a room jammed full of pseudo white folk. I choose this word pseudo because of the shock of the experience that enveloped me. Where once I was ignorant, this particular evening I discovered for the first time the evolutionary scale from 60’s hippie into the present day working model. Changes were noticeable. The hippie’s once long, flowing locks have been replaced by dreads. His tie-dyed shirts have been replaced by hemp clothing. And free love? Well, bugger that, these poor souls grew up in the age of AIDS. The drugs are different too, as their drug of choice seems to be coffee in massive doses. I’ve heard these new models called ‘trustafarians” by other members of our estranged pigmentation, which tickled the living shit out of me. It’s been explained by, what I would deem, “regular” white folk, that they view these aberrations of white with a tinge of morbid curiosity liberally spiced with open revulsion. It was further explained to me the term “trustafarian” stems from a hypothesis drawn up by these very same law abiding, tax paying, gun toting, homophobic, Republican voting whites that these renegade white folk have managed to adopt the rastafarian exterior coupled with the underlying, seemingly incongruous fact that they are, for the most part, trust fund babies. I don’t know this to be true, but it was good for a snuck and snort and certainly plausible in this suffocating age of power crazed hard liners wanting to turn back the clocks. I mean, these fringe dwellers must be reliant on some form of cash, otherwise they’d be forced to seek out and commiserate with only their own clan given our societies unflinching bias and hatred of all things foreign to their own social strata. However, no matter the method, survive they have and flower power remains alive and the air did reek of patchouli and random incense burners were on full tilt, these the only hints of any thread of hippie continuum that I could relate, and for that, I accepted. I was too young to have been a hippie in the day, even though I affected some of their garmentry, flashed the peace sign from time to time, but I was close enough in age to grasp an understanding of them and their ideology. I love a free thinker, one who resists the status quo. Regardless of outward appearances, or methodology, I judge not. And one should never make the mistake of labeling me a tunnel vision conformist. If you only knew! But, in the midst of this highly entertaining as well as educational left of center celebration, the inevitable “it” happened...
“Hairy Apes BMX” specialized in very improvisational, extended jam songs. Certainly not the ever prevalent, quaint and specific, three minute pop ditties. And they were good at what they did. Very good. All the members exhibited various high levels of proficiency as well as having the ability to not think, only listening and responding. Makes for a good gumbo. And while the band jammed on, bringing each other as well as the crowd on their own inward/outward journey, the crowd of “trustafarians” swayed and spun manic, letting the music spirit them away on some intangible journey of the mind, their bodies reacting to the melodious assault, not dancing in any specific mode, or form, just free movement. Reminded me of the way in which “Deadheads” embrace the musical sermon of their deities. And for a while, all went well, like a cobra and its charmer, the music and the people in some indistinguishable harmony of body and sound. Then, without warning, the band shifted into a most interesting gear, a time signature most suited to the more pure jazz form; 7/8 time.
At once, every “trustafarian” in the room, on the dance floor, stopped dead in their tracks, unable to rhythmically understand or translate this strange unconventional beat. They were quite simply hoodooed. Their arms fell limp. Their feet stopped shuffling. Even their heads stopped bobbing. they could only listen with uncomprehending ears, thousand mile stares, unable to find the center of the beat and what it meant to their body... that is, all but one black man... the only black man in the building -besides the bass player- as far as I could tell. His body, after a few minor adjustments, naturally went with the flow and found the center of the groove and the drop dime turnaround every seven beats. He kept dancing happily while around him stood a motionless crowd of “trustafarian” mannequins.
Needless to say the vision brought back a host of memories from my musical past when white folk would similarly get flummoxed when I would push time’s envelope into realms unknown to them. And I burst out laughing. Couldn’t help myself.
But, about 35 bars later, “Hairy Apes BMX” switched gears again into the more conventional 4/4 time, the one which led the Aryan nations of yore into battle, I’d be willing to bet. As if on cue, the “trustafarians” went to swirling and swaying, whirling dervishes, bouncing gypsies, the beat marshaling the many intransigent bodies as only it can.
It hit me then all the thoughts I’ve conveyed here.
And then another thought hit me, one that really opened up an interesting avenue, one I’d never ever given a second thought.
As much as I’ve made people dance all my life, providing the big bopping beat for them, I cannot dance at all. I hear the music. I feel the music. But it doesn’t make my toes wiggle, nor my ass to shake. Music doesn’t hold that magical talisman for me.
My curse. White man’s ultimate curse, one would guess. One I’ve learned to live with.
I walked over to the counter and ordered a cold glass of milk and a custard filled eclair, a delicious combination. I sat and slowly nibbled away, watching the barefooted, dreadlocked throng dancing with abandon. After all, despite their rhythmic limitations, a beautiful sight indeed.
