the hundred-year-old veteran

permit me a bit of agitprop.

a few weeks ago, as the drums of war beat on, the BBC aired a piece on a 106-year-old veteran of the first world war. becca and i often listen to the radio while cooking dinner, and sometimes the BBC is the most engaging thing on the air. we were drawn into this particular segment for a couple reasons. for one thing, the veteran was, like me, an italian-american from massachusetts, who, unlike me, had an impeccably deep boston accent. what drew our interest most strongly, however, was the man's uncanny resemblance to mel brooks's "the 2000-year-old man"--a hilarious imagining of the world's oldest man as a jew with a new york accent, a penchant for glib responses, and a love of nectarines. (the file may take a bit to download: it's a 12-minute gag. but if you've never heard it, or not for a while, it's worth it. i apologize about the end getting cut-off--i obtained the mp3 from a peer-to-peer network.)

anthony piero, the 106-year-old veteran, responded to his interviewer's questions in a brooks-esque manner, complete with interjections of "oh boy," a preoccupation with girls and sex, and an ability to make war--as brooks does with ancient history--seem hilariously mundane. (compare "we were in the woods" with "banging on rocks.")

aside from the charming humor of mr. piero's responses, i was also impressed by the texture he gives to life during war. his emphasis on daily life and romance expresses a need to go on with life even as the world collapses around you. "dancing every day" perhaps says it best. his common-sensical argument for respecting the power of the united nations to resolve international conflicts reminds us how much the bush administration has undermined an important process toward peace.

i was only able to get part of the interview on tape, as i was a little too late to recognize how priceless a piece it was. from this recording, i selected various snippets in an attempt to represent the interview faithfully, but also to condense it and represent it in musical form. the beat over which i have layered the vocal samples is based on a twenties-era jazz sample, variously filtered, and i think its mix of past and present fits the interview samples well. (listen)

i admit that i conclude the piece a tad heavy-handedly, but i cannot resist underscoring the irony that a veteran of the war-that-was-supposed-to-end-all-wars has not only had to live through another eighty years of conflict but will have to spend the december of his life watching hyper-real footage not of shells bouncing innocuously off trees but of bombs devastating baghdad. the song ends with a recording of my television set, transmitting the sounds of bunker-busting explosions directly into my living room on the first night of gulf war II. i do my duty.