What did we do together, you might ask? Well, clearly a not insubstantial amount of time was spent applying Instagram filters to pictures of French architecture. Of course there are only so many buildings and so many filters, and Paris being the city of love--not brotherly love either--you can well imagine what else might have gone down. You know what they say: "What happens in Montreuil, stays in Montreuil (because no one gives a shit)". For better or for worse these sordid details will have to remain outside of this blog, passed from generation to generation through storytelling or perhaps epic song. Of what remains to be told, I have this to say:
On seeing Alex for the first time outside of Gare d'Austerlitz (sorry it took so long to find you, Alex, but my brain couldn't quite figure out how to determine the front side of a round building) what shocked me most was how not shocking it was to see someone so familiar in such an unfamiliar context. I'm sure members of the British Explorer's Club felt similarly when they bumped into each other in the dark confines of the Amazon: it might seem like an unlikely encounter but is it really? On deeper reflection is it actually that surprising that two globetrotting cultural potentates should cross paths in the City Par Excellence? In any case, bro hugs were executed, remarks on the tectonic shifts of facial hair were exclaimed and escargot were consumed. Escargots, incidentally, are not food but rather distilled gustatory crystals and are therefore perfectly vegetarian. Additionally: shut up.
Above: Luxury
Pictured above: Alex's accommodations for the duration of his stay. Yes, that is the four foot bed of a prepubescent French girl. Yes, that is pink indoor mosquito netting. No, I do not see the problem.
Here's something that does bother me: why would a traffic sign depict a man being crucified on an upper case T? Also, it needs to be said that American fire trucks set the bar for badass-looking rescue vehicles. You can see why as a six-year-old American boy I actually wanted to be a fire engine when I grew up, to say nothing of my extensive collection of emergency response toys. I sympathize with those poor French children who have to make due with their own fire extinguishing role model. Who wants to grow up to be a wagon de pompier? That thing looks like a semi-amphibious leisure craft. I suspect their original role was to supply emergency relief cheese and bread to flooded urban areas.
Obviously Alex's visit kicked off an intellectual maelstrom. One important consequence was the fixing of the first three Laws of the City of Paris, the fundamental rules that govern all activity and reactivity within the city and its banlieux. The first three are as follows, listed roughly in the order in which they were discovered.
Paris: Shit's expensive. You will pay out the ass for everything.
Paris: Shit closes. No, seriously, shit closes. When Jardin de Luxembourg closes they will actually send the gendarmes to sweep the park, flush out all the tourists and then close and lock the ten foot iron gate. You know, just like Dolores Park, except the opposite. Oh, also the Metro closes at 1 am.
Paris: You can't do everything. You want to, but you can't. See laws one and two.
That being said, if you do come to Paris and you're as interested in music as Alex and I are, one of the things you absolutely must do is head to Musée de la Musique which is at Cité de la Musique within Cité de la Ville which you'll find at Cité de Excessively Hierarchical Nomenclature.
Things that you should not do when you get there: try to argue a discount on the admission ticket on the basis of being American.
Her: Monsieur, c'est déja gratuit...
Me: Insupportable! Je suis Americain!
Things that you should do: pick up the audio guide. I know that the audio guide is usually an entry point for grating prose on the character of brushstrokes as read by hyper-thesbian, failed British actors. As should have been obvious from the start this is not the case at the Musée de la Musique; of course a collection of antique musical instruments should be accompanied by a collection of recordings of people playing antique musical instruments. It goes without saying that if you do not pick up the audio guide then your appreciation of the exhibit will suffer. And what an exhibit!
Your iPad has a custom engraving? That's pretty cool...
A pocket violin. Probably about the size of my forearm.
Glass flutes. I wish I could have stolen the recording of this one.
First ever keytar.
Absolutely fucking badass harpsichord. Just listen to this recording:
The museum from the outside
The museum from the inside
Travel harpsichord, both folded up and unfolded.
You want to hear glass flutes? Pocket violins? Violes de gambe? Enormous deep-sea harpsichords? Tubas the size of a baby elephant? You would not believe just how long it would take to really soak in this museum. I know the Lourve holds the record for "most museum" but I think the Musée de la Musique has the Louvre beat when it comes to the staying power of any individual exhibit. Standing in front of each instrument, reading its history, wondering what it's going to sound like, listening, appreciating anew the resonance of the large wooden body and the sympathetic strings: the full experience could take a solid fifteen minutes. Multiply that by four floors and as many centuries and it's no
surprise that Alex and I only made it about halfway through before
running headfirst into Rule #2.
I think I've pointed
out in a previous post that absolutely everything in Paris is named
after something else. One thing I might have not pointed out is the at
times hilarious disparity between the quality of the street and the
quality of the person for which that street is named. Take Edgard
Varèse, for example. As a man Varèse was a "stratospheric colossus of
sound," a groundbreaking in the field of electronic music and influence
to artists from John Cage and Olivier Messiaen to Frank Zappa. As a
street Varèse is an unimpressive concrete turd leading from the least
interesting part of the Cité to an intersection where--and this is the
most interesting thing I can think to say about it--one can find cars.
Maybe one day they'll name an alley by the Gowanus after me...
Days later, when I would visit La Géode, I would recall when Alex and I felt the need to point out just how much crazy shit there is in Cité de la Villette, and in general just how obsessed the French seem to be with throwing incongruous stuff all over the place. This, for example, is a playground that we found maybe 100m from Rue Edgard Varèse:
About another hundred meters down the road we found this 21st century monument to Stonehenge: a field willed with polished eight foot mirrors.
That guy, whose name was Samad, was actually nice enough to let me record him playing. When he finished I, being the colossal dumbass that I am, asked him what was the indigenous name of that tribal rhythm he'd just played. "Actually that was more like a techno-style rhythm." Oh. Okay, I'm a pretentious bell-end. Good to know.
Here's something that does bother me: why would a traffic sign depict a man being crucified on an upper case T? Also, it needs to be said that American fire trucks set the bar for badass-looking rescue vehicles. You can see why as a six-year-old American boy I actually wanted to be a fire engine when I grew up, to say nothing of my extensive collection of emergency response toys. I sympathize with those poor French children who have to make due with their own fire extinguishing role model. Who wants to grow up to be a wagon de pompier? That thing looks like a semi-amphibious leisure craft. I suspect their original role was to supply emergency relief cheese and bread to flooded urban areas.
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