Perseverance
On the 4th of July of this year, I heard the tune "The Entertainer" (a.k.a. the theme from The Sting) coming from an ice cream truck at the carnival at St. Louis. I remarked to Brad that it would probably be the largest audience Marvin Hamlisch would reach this year.
Brad looked at me uncomfortably. "That was written by Scott Joplin. He came from St. Louis, you know."
I contested the point for a few minutes, sure enough of what I knew to have confidence, yet not remotely familiar enough with the subject matter to have any chance of winning the argument.
Time was on my side. Joplin wrote it, but Hamlisch recorded the version most often heard. And I feel confident in saying that that tune indeed reached more people at the carnival than "I Cannot Hear the City" did on Broadway this year, so my joke holds up.
I say there's no statute of limitations on proving yourself right, even technically and in a limited sense. Neener-neener, Brad.
I hear that song several times a day when the ice cream truck (perhaps the very same one) drives up and down the streets of my south St. Louis neighborhood. Maybe it's just the way the Doppler effect distorts it as the truck comes and goes, so it sounds like a warped record, or maybe it's the association I draw between it and clowns, but for some reason it creeps the hell out of me....
Happy music with a tiny tinge of distortion sounds like it's in creepy counterpoint to something, like the music over the end titles of The Evil Dead or even The Shining (which looks indistinguishable from a Woody Allen movie at the end).
BTW, am I the only one who liked the original Evil Dead better than the sequel or Army of Darkness? Offtopic, I know.
Neener neener indeed, you petty little man. I stand by my defense of the hometown guy.