Sunday, January 18, 2004 :::
 
Wow, if you are interested in language and accents, check out the jumble of accents that come from the mouth of this young artist whose face popped up on the old computer this morning. Ben Jelen is his name, and that implies German roots (as do his face and the fact that he pronounces it "yay-lin"), but he is English. He moved to Texas at 11, and then to New Jersey, Scotland, in New York, plus he hangs out with "cool" people in NYC these days, so hisoice bears the mark of all of those influences. He is a very talented musician, so he surely just absorbs what is around him subconsciously, as does, in fact, the much less talented but still very musical A Mind That Suits.

(In all his life, he has only met one person who correctly identified his basic accent as Orlandan, which indeed it is, though his conversation, too, bears the marks of every place he has lived. That particular person did so from one sentence when A Mind That Suits was bartending at a huge conference at the magnificent Air and Space Museum on the Mall (the old one), with disco music and the chatter of 3000 well-lubricated guests. When she vouchsafed her belief that "you're from Florida," A Mind That Suits could only respond, "wow, you're good.")

In any case, Mr. Jelen appears to be quite talented, but his piano music is rather romantic and light, which is, of course, a great way to pick up girls, so more power to him. He was also discovered by someone looking for Calvin Klein models, so one can well imagine that he has all the necessary means for really enjoying his young adulthood. He is also good at pouting and saying that he doesn't want to make light music, though the lyrical piano playing and the voice that wanders somewhere between Paul McCartney and the 1970's West Coast singer-songwriters make that a hard one to swallow. Unless you are a 22-year-old girl, a large number of which, one assumes, he impresses with ease.

But check out the interview and listen to every town he ever lived in.

The video for his first hit, while clever, has a setting so obviously ripped off from Yoko Ono's brilliant film for her husbands regrettable "Imagine" that this baby boomer cringed, but, as mentioned above, more power to him.

::: posted by A Mind That Suits at 11:27 AM


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What doesn't kill me, makes me laugh... usually.