> pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong // // _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _\\ \\ // _ _ // // _ _ // \\ _ _ \\ \\ _ _ \\ // // // // // // // // \\ \\ \\ \\ \\ \\ \\ \\ // //_ _ // // // //_ _ // // \\ \\ \\ \\ \\ \\ _ _\\ \\ // _ _ _ // //_ _ _ _ _ // \\ _\\ \\ _\\ \\ _ _ _ \\ // // \\ \\ // // pong issue #001 november 10, 1995 _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _\\ \\ // // pong is an affiliate of dto productions. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _\\ 'you show me 15 americans out there that can distinguish their colon from their anus, and i'll show you some unaverage americans.' - shadow tao > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong #001 intro >> written by murmur hello out there from tv land! this here is pong. lap it up. alright, mister, what the heck is pong? i'll tell you what pong is. this is pong. and what is this? this is an alternative publication to what we might typify as 'standard' college publications. what need is there for an 'alternative' (don't you hate that word?) to 'standard' college publications? well, it's pretty simple, really. first, i'll split it up so i can individually address the two types of people liable to read this. number one: you attend illinois wesleyan university. our college newspaper is adequate at news coverage, sports coverage, and more or less the coverage of campus events (who can be entirely competent on a campus like this? surely no one we know..) yet it is limited in several major ways. the 'wesleyan bubble' is rarely burst and when it is, it rarely extends to any meaningful level. even things in the immediate community are considered of little importance (and, perhaps, rightfully so, for the sake of the paper in general.) but this leaves a critical void in certain respects. the disadvantage of having a college newspaper be for all intents and purposes the sole form of publication on a campus is that there are other formats of publication (newsletter, magazine, etc.) which offer differing levels of stories, opinions, and simply differing topics, and these divergent notions have (arguably) little or no place in a campus newspaper. therefore, pong has been set out with the intention of filling some of those gaps by allowing multiple and varied columnists, a much more free-form publication style which allows for practically unlimited maneuverability, and an outlet for certain types of stories/features/general ideas of interest that have a difficult means of filtering their way into a college newspaper. number two: you don't attend illinois wesleyan university. perhaps you're still aware of the general notions of wishing to expand upon the basic level of the college newspaper. but chiefly, you're reading this through the electronic format as an extension of having read other similar e-zine type publications (and publication is used loosely here, since you're not actually in possession of a 'published' form.) what does this offer you? we're hoping this offers you a fresh and different form of e-zine. instead of the level of e-zine now popularized by our greatly esteemed dto (doomed to obscurity) where angst meets sarcasm in bubble gum format (by the way, that's sarcastic in and of itself), with pong we hope to have a more stylized approach. you'll find columns and music reviews in here that perhaps would fall into the realm of the standard zine; but perhaps not. we're not out to be some fancy free form zine where we talk about what we think and what bands we like and are interested in shoving our ideas down your throats. no, no, no. we want to get fresh ideas and fresh opinions out, and we want to get them out in a fresh new way. the fact that you're reading this suggests that we've become at least mildly successful in doing so. so, in a very large nutshell, you all know WHY pong. but exactly WHAT pong? this is perhaps the greatest beauty of pong; the sheer flexibility. you'll find in this first release a varied form of opinions and the like, perhaps some informational pieces, perhaps some outright humor. i'm only now developing the pong prototype, you see. this informational bit at the front, this is developed prior to the remainder of this first issue, so we can get an idea where we want to go. and we have set our sights on going places with this. pong, by the very nature of the audience we intend to reach, and by the very nature of the format and style we fully intend to use and stick with, is therefore limited only by the actual quality of the pieces that goes into it. what does this mean? this means that so long as you've got something valuable to say and you find other soap boxes somewhat lacking in the sense of how you could best present yourself, pong is here. gather a general idea of what we're about by reading on. you'll probably find it to be so flexible that you'll consider what you might like to see in pong in the future. we'd like to point out a couple of stylistic themes we're using as well. first off, you'll find that throughout pong we do not use our real names but instead choose to use 'handles'. there are a couple reasons for this. first off, i'll say that it's *not* because we're afraid of putting our name with our work. my name is phil huckelberry, my handle is murmur, and i have every design of standing behind my work wholeheartedly. the reasons we employ use of handles are number one: pong is directly affiliated with dto productions. for the sake of continuity in the zine world, we feel that using our handles would be a much more relevant way of communicating since we stand behind handles (or at least perhaps not our full names) almost everyday on the internet (e-mail, irc, etc.) plus, we don't want a sort of bulky format that says "written by murmur/phil huckelberry". we prefer to be direct and say "written by murmur". also, there is a matter of personal preference in using handles. it adds another level and makes pong less like a standard publication. we are rigorous in saying, however, that if you wish to contact any pong writer, you will not have any trouble doing so. information on contacting myself or other pong writers is included at the end of the issue. so far as the strict text format and not using graphics or any fancier fonts; this is done for convenience and for approach. it is highly convenient because to release the electronic format, we can't really do it much of any other way. plus, we're looking at creating an executable viewer to be used with issues of dto and pong as well. for approach we choose the strict text-based format because it exemplifies what we stand for: simplicity. we're not trying to take over the world and we don't need propagandist fonts to do so. we're trying to get opinions out, talk about things, maybe let people in on things they could be missing out on. what we stand for are the words we write, and not how they come across. and, just in case you were wondering: sometimes there will be all lower case and sometimes not. this is writer preference, and as you'll see in my work specifically, writers prefer different things at different times. read the words, not any twisted symbolism that doesn't really exist. frankly, this informational introduction has already gotten a little bit out of hand as it's reached over 90 lines already. therefore, without further ado, i encourage you to read on and experience what is: pong. > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong #001 table of contents >> written by murmur >>> pong #001 intro >>>> written by murmur >>> pong #001 table of contents >>>> written by murmur >>> Stupidity >>>> written by Reverberator >>> give us a break >>>> written by murmur >>> The Threat >>>> written by Reverberator >>> The Drovers >>>> written by murmur >>> walkin' on down the road (the last of the Jayhawks?) >>>> written by murmur >>> pong #001 epilogue >>>> written by murmur > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > Stupidity >> written by Reverberator I am against stupidity. This blanket statement says nearly nothing. What is stupidity? Why am I against it? These questions are more interesting and challenging to answer. I am not against people who have low cognitive ability: people who read a paragraph and have difficulty assigning a meaning to what they have read. This type of problem may be hereditary (_The Bell Curve_, king of the questionable regression, is the new bible for this opinion) or may be developmental. That argument is not appropriate here, as I know nearly nothing about it. I *am* against those who read in confusion the aforementioned paragraph and *do not care* that they do not understand it. I abhor these people. This type of stupidity is not so much in the action as in the reaction. It is an acceptance of an undesirable status quo. It is a fear of learning, of improving. It is a rejection of the self. An example will illustrate my opinions. Some weeks ago, in my campus' esteemed weekly newspaper, a column was written. I forget the argument -- something to do with unnecessary violence, I believe. The column said nothing inventive or inspiring, but one part (unfortunately) took a firm hold in my mind. The author's point revolved around beating up other people. He wrote, late in the column, "this chastising must end," or some such line. Though I am uncertain of the exact argument and the exact quote, the key word "chastise" remains clear in my memory. It is obvious that this writer wanted variety in his column; he wished to avoid overuse of the word "beat". So he whipped out his handy-dandy thesaurus and found a savior in "chastise". And he used it. He did not bother to look up the word, to discover that in a column eschewing unnecessary violence, "chastise" made little sense. This is an example of stupidity. The action itself -- using an incorrect word -- is disappointing, but not worth hating. We all make mistakes. The reactions: not verifying the word's meaning, allowing the mistake into publication -- these are the reprehensible actions. What would cause this to happen? The writer and proofreaders are accustomed to accepting what they see as truth. They are a result of a passive learning system, where questioning is ostensibly encouraged but rarely practiced; they have thus far lacked the motivation to break free of this passiveness. They are accustomed to fear at discovering their own faults, thus they fear the learning that will expose these faults. Nobody instinctively wants to acknowledge their faults. But this is a necessary, conscious step for improvement; we must know what needs fixin'. Passive acceptance and a refusal to question the self are certainly two sides of the same problem. They both lead to the conclusion that the self is being rejected, since the ultimate self cannot be achieved until awareness and realization are developed. This stupidity in the reaction hampers development of the self and creates a society of apathetic faux awareness. Thus it must be stopped. > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > give us a break >> written by murmur The following is, verbatim, pulled from the Illinois State University Daily Vidette, Wednesday, October 25, 1995, as a letter to the editor: > pong Editor, I was chained by my hands and feet. I was drug into the hull of a dark, damp, rat-infested ship where there was barely enough air to breath and no light. I was bound to my brothers who, through the trauma of being enslaved, has passed away months earlier. I lay in a pool of my own urine and feces, not knowing my future. At night all I could hear were the screams of dying men. I still hear those screams. Upon arrival to this new land, I was put on an auction block like an animal. I was bought by George Washington, that great American whose deeds have been immortalized by placing a monument on the same spot they sold my brothers and sisters just decades earlier. On the plantation, I worked my fingers to the bone from can't see in the morning to can't see at night, with no compensation. I'm sorry, there was affirmative action. Master Washington affirmed that I would be beat to death if I didn't spring into action. Don't get me wrong now, master Washington and I were very close. He even allowed me to sit and watch as he savagely raped my sisters and mother. Today we are still in slavery. The weapons of war have changed but the effects remain the same. [Daily Vidette columnist] Jeff Jurgens and Michael Magee [who also wrote a letter to the editor] are entitled to their opinions, and I'm entitled to my leaders. [Jurgens asked the question "Why does Farrakhan hate me?" in his weekly column earlier.] Farrakhan doesn't hate Jurgens, but should he? James Mason senior, elementary education > pong He sure as hell shouldn't. Nobody should be in the game of hating anyone else. Yeah, everyone's got their own reasons for disliking/hating someone else, but not someone they've never met, and solely on the basis of their skin color. James Mason, who the fuck do you think you are? I hate to break this to you, but you're *not* in bondage somewhere doing my bidding. The Washington Monument was erected in the 1950s, for your information; this means either "just decades earlier" in your mind equates to 150 years or you actively believe the slave trade was alive and well during World War I. Ooops. You're wrong! And I suppose you have overriding historical evidence of George Washington's days of rape and plunder? Give us a break. Racism *is* a problem. No one's going to deny this. But racism rears its wretched face in more than one way, and you, Mr. Mason, have created what I feel is the most hatred-infested racist abuse of the English language I've seen created in the last five years. I didn't enslave anyone. My parents didn't enslave anyone. My grandparents didn't enslave anyone. My great-grandparents didn't enslave anyone. My great-great-grandparents, many of who came to America from Europe, didn't enslave anyone either. Do you, Mr. Mason, seriously believe that the acts of some four or five or six generations ago constitue authority bestowed upon yourself to vent rage against the white populace? I have always hoped that I'd never confront serious, bitter, overblown hatred. I have now, today, in 1995, from you. What's potentially saddest, Mr. Mason is that you are, in fact, an elementary education major. That you could be in a position to spread your wretched views to a younger generation is unthinkable to me. That any man or woman, black, white, hispanic, or whatever, could be in such a position, is a travesty to our nation, and a travesty to humanity itself. I don't hate you, James Mason, and I shouldn't, either. Nor should you hate me. But I hate your attitude. I loathe it and feel completely justified in loathing it. It's not the person, it's the attitude. We can only hope that people like you wake up and realize that you're the problem, and nothing you spoke of in your letter will ever come remotely near being part of the solution. > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > The Threat >> written by Reverberator Recently I read in a major publication of an existing threat to the world. November 13, 1995, at 6:35 PM EST, the 1.4 billion residents of China are going to jump up and down. This, of course, will send Earth out of its orbit and hurtling through space, away from the light and heat of our sun. The only question is whether we'll crash into another heavenly body or if we will die of coldness as the sun grows more distant each day. Our fate is not determined, though! Loyal Americans are being called upon to thwart this nefarious Communist plot. As they did in 1991 and 1993 (the times of the first two attempts by China to dislodge Earth from its orbit), the citizens of America are to organize into counter-jump groups. They will jump simultaneously with the Chinese, thus counteracting their force and preserving the earth's tenuous grip on its path through space. I am organizing a counter-jump here on my campus, and have been pleased to receive support from my dorm council. But my campus alone is not enough to save the world. We need all campuses, all organizations across this verdant land of ours, to unite in an enormous counter-jump. Do not be discouraged by the fact that America has but some 270 million to China's 1.4 billion. As one astute counter-jumper here pointed out, "They're really small." [ed. -- plus, we have Wisconsin!] This November 13, America has the opportunity to be truly united for the first time since the Second World War. Since that era, distrust of the government, distrust of corporate America, and distrust of one another has led to multiple schisms throughout our society. But the time is ripe for a ubiquitous gathering together. The Million Man March is indicative of this ripeness; we cannot let is pass us by. So November 13 at 6:35 PM EST, join forces with your brethren far and wide in this land, and jump up and down. It will be both a jump to save this land as well as a jump to celebrate its rediscovered unity. [ed. -- We at pong deeply apologize for the tardiness of our first issue. We deeply hope that we have not compromised the fate of our good world through sheer laziness. However, we are invigorated with the knowledge that once again, those fellow countrymen of ours that have come into the know will jump for what is right, for what is good, for Earth. Twice the diabolical plans of the Communist Chinese have been foiled; let us make it the third.] > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > The Drovers >> written by murmur In what I hope will be the first in a series of interviews with the prominent and not-so-prominent individuals in music today, the following is my interview with David Callahan (vocals/guitar/bass) of the Drovers, an 'Irish-rock' band out of Chicago that's been around since 1992. Callahan and bandmates Mike Kirkpatrick (guitar/vocals), Paul Bradley (drums), and Sean Cleland (violin/mandolin) deliver a formidable live show, uniquely featuring Cleland's signature Irish fiddling and anchored by Bradley's fabulous drumming. Callahan and Kirkpatrick create an unusual-seeming rhythm section that sets the flow beautifully while Bradley drives with one of the most impressive live drum shows I've ever had the privilege to see. As Callahan would comment, the Drovers can't be pigeonholed, and they prefer it that way. Imagine a four-piece rock band with such technical precision as to play what sounds like the most beautiful outtakes from the _Last of the Mohicans_ soundtrack and with the range to follow it up with music that makes you dance. _Argus_ reviewer Jason Carlson points out the Drovers are long overdue for a major label contract, but for the meantime their records are available on their own label, Tantrum (distributed by Feedback). Their latest effort is entitled _Little High Sky Show_ and may be difficult to find outside of Chicago, but not impossible. To contact the Drovers, write to: The Drovers 4611 N. Seeley Chicago IL 60625 > pong pong: If you could, how would you describe yourselves, musically? Callahan: I wouldn't...until I can find something convincing to say that I can read. It's a lot of things, a lot of different influences; it doesn't lend itself well to verbal descriptions. It makes it less fun to listen to to, reading the artist talking about the music. I never believed anything I've read, anyways. I'd rather have people come up with their own interpretations. pong: When do you know you've done a really good show? Callahan: [One thing is] when you don't hear the audience yapping through the soft tunes...the audience being attentive and the band being focused are [usually good signs]. pong: How did the band get together? When did you all meet? Callahan: We met through the musical circles of Chicago, not all at the same time. I met Shawn and Mike separately about seven years ago. [About four years], Shawn was working full time, and [wanted to devote his efforts to music]. Of course, not too many bands in Chicago were looking for an Irish fiddler, so Shawn started calling around; he called everyone up, [and here we are.] pong: What other things are you listening to yourself? Callahan: Just about anything; the Cocktails, Tortoise, Bjork, Victoria Williams. I work in this coffee shop and they've got some CDs; I usually bring in some of my own but we're supposed to play theirs. They're mostly [pretty bad], but there's two really good ones, one of them is a CD of [Claude] Debussy. He wrote Clare de Lune, and this CD's pretty cool. > pong heh. Like I said, the *first* in what I hope will be a series of interviews. Many thanks to David Callahan. Hopefully next time I'll have one of those little handheld recorders. > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > walkin' on down the road (the last of the Jayhawks?) >> written by murmur According to American Recordings, Marc Olson has left the Jayhawks. Although I personally haven't called American Recordings to verify this, several recent posts to the Jayhawks mailing list would seem to confirm that indeed Olson has left to pursue other interests. Although there is no official word from the rest of the band, it would appear that the Jayhawks' final notes have been played. This is perhaps the most unfortunate thing to happen to the music industry since the death of Kurt Cobain, excluding the latest Candlebox album. Olson and Gary Louris have established themselves as perhaps the finest songwriting duo in the world today. The Jayhawks' brand of country-rock will be sorely missed, to be sure. Don't be surprised if what happened to Uncle Tupelo happens to the Jayhawks. Jay Farrar left Uncle Tupelo and the remainder of the band, not wanting to hang it up, became Wilco. Farrar formed Son Volt and both released fine albums this year. No matter what lays in store for the Jayhawks, the three reasonably available studio albums they leave behind are as fine as any band could hope to accomplish. Their style becoming more and more rock-oriented through the three albums, Marc Olson, Gary Louris, and Mark Perlman released _Blue Earth_ (Twin Tone) in 1989, a heavily country-influenced album. The followup _Hollywood Town Hall_ ((Def) American) spawned the successful "Waiting For The Sun" and established the Jayhawks as, as the Village Voice put it, "The only country rock band that matters." _Hollywood Town Hall_ would go on to win the prestigious Edison award (Netherlands' equivalent of the Grammy) and further solidify the Jayhawks' position. The much-anticipated _Tomorrow The Green Grass_ was released on Valentine's Day, 1995, and is easily one of the best albums of the year. Standout tracks include "Blue", "I'd Run Away", "Two Hearts", "Real Light", and their cover of the Grand Funk Railroad song "Bad Time". If you appreciate _Harvest_-era Neil Young in the slightest, you should easily appreciate the Jayhawks. It's a terrible shame to see the apparent end of the band (luckily I caught them live in Milwaukee this July), but at least we have their strokes of genius to remember them by. > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong #001 epilogue >> written by murmur well, hey, there's pong #001 for y'all. hope you enjoyed. don't worry, we have every indication of a better pong #002. apologies go out to sweeney erect, who wrote a fine piece about cynicism (it figures.) for #001 that i managed to entirely lose. drop us a line or something, hey? epilogues are dull. this is the last epilogue i write for pong. whee! > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong pong issue #001 november 10, 1995 pong is an affiliate of dto productions. pong wholeheartedly welcomes correspondences, critiques, and submissions please send all pong correspondence to: phil_huckelberry@ccmail.iwu.edu call ihop, the official bbs of pong, and an official dto and jonas site. ihop: (309) 556-2579,,,,#11,#11,#11 m y h e a r t i s m a d e o f g r a v y . > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong