More deep musicology. Beethoven loved his chicken, but hated the price. Brahms and his prostitutes. Tchaikovsky is fetching in ballet tights. Maybe next time, we’ll get to why any of this matters to prog-lovers everywhere.

Roger CortonSo in our last, fun filled episode we, well, you went on about all this musicological stuff. Which begs the question, why should we care about any of that?

JCHWell, you shouldn’t. It’s really up to me.

RC

JCHLook, everyone who talks about anything, has to have the arrogance that what they are speaking about is of interest to their audience. And I get sick of the false humility of saying otherwise. People are so concerned about coming across as pompous that they never say anything.

RCMy aren’t we defensive today.

JCHWell, what I do, a bit of musicology is probably in order. If I was doing punk, maybe not so much.

RCAlthough there is that great new book boys “Clothes, Clothes, Clothes, […]

In which we discuss why they don’t write ’em like Beethoven anymore. Including Dada, Beat poets, hip hop and William Burroughs. Next time, we’ll get to why it matters to prog-lovers everywhere.

Roger CortonSo your Seahawks did it again?

JCHThey ain’t my Seahawks. I can’t stand that neon green.

RCThen you must’ve been a lonely guy today.

JCHI heard Garrison say something funny… “For people who don’t like football, the Superbowl is like Christmas for Jews.” Which is true. Man, if you wanted to book a table at the most exclusive restaurant in town, today would be the day. You could probably drag race on I-5 and not get a ticket.

RCI thought you had sworn off radio for a while?

JCHMostly. One other thing I heard was a re-run BBC documentary on William Burroughs.

RCI didn’t know you were a Naked Lunch kind of guy?

JCHMost definitely not. But it’s a great […]

What’s happening 2015 from singles and a summer tour to Detroit The Opera, which looks like it’s going back to high school.

Taylor Swift in 1989. Miles Davis in 1969. The Emperor’s New Clothes. Hypothermia. Why there is no new music. And why we like it that way.

Roger CortonSo you had a letter printed in Time?

JCHWell, a snippet. I wrote one of my rants about the recent cover story on Taylor Swift.

RCWith all that’s going on in the world, why get worked up about some pop star?

JCHShe ain’t ‘some pop star’. She’s the pop star. And, as you may know, the title of the record (1989) is her birth year. The gag is that it’s supposed to be a summary of all the influences throughout her life.

RCBut it doesn’t sound like 1989. At least, not the music I remember from 1989.

JCHExactamundo. EDM wasn’t around. If the beats sound like 1989, it’s a porn soundtrack from 1989.

RCAll EDM sounds like a porn soundtrack.

JCHIt’s true. Anyhoo, I had this realisation: I can’t think […]

We answer some questions en masse about the eponymous epic. Basses. Organs. It turns out the whole thing is 45 minutes of Ninety Nine Bottles Of Beer

Roger CortonOK, so these are e-mails where we’ve gotten the same question three times or more.

JCHThree? Wow. That qualifies as a genu-ine FAQ (laughs).

RCSo… the drum intro to Part III. It sounds planned?

JCHIs that a question?

RCOf course it’s a question. Don’t think. Just say the first thing that comes into your head.

JCHOK fine. My reaction is, “Son, the Russkies don’t take a dump without a plan.” My favourite quote from ‘Hunt For Red October’. Yes. The idea was that the quasi-random drum thing would evolve into some sort of of pattern that would tee up Part III. But pretty much every time I ran through that it would end up the same way: a sort of rhythmic structural map of Part III.

RCWhat’s a structural map?

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