Call of Cthulhu: Masks of Nyarlathotep 2 (New York)

#1

For the previous chapter, see Call of Cthulhu: The Curse of the Kharisiri

Bom diddy bom bom bom… For obsessive completists, note that I’m continuing the track numbering from The Curse of the Kharisiri.

Session 06 - …And I Happen To Have a Clarinet In My Hands: Four years after the events in Bolivia, we meet again in New York to visit our good friend.

Session 07 - A Bit of a Gut Feeling: We find out more about what our good friend was up to, and start making plans to follow in his footsteps (ideally in a less murdery way).

Session 08 - Hums Along Like an Erotic… Frog: Further investigations in New York, visiting the rich and being visited by the less rich.

Session 09 - White In A Predominantly Ethnic Area: We continue our trip down the social scale, associating with accused murderers and taxi drivers.

Session 10 - Jack Them Off Slowly: With a different set of Good Friends at our backs, we break and enter in a vague hope of finding some compelling evidence. Of something.

Session 11 - Peritoneal Cavity: But how did they get such an impressive cellar space dug out and stone-lined in the first place?

Session 12 - The Obligatory Missing Episode: Our heroic escape was not recorded. Rabbit’s Foot explains what happened.

#2

Everyone says what a good friend he is, but on reflection the man has been nothing but trouble.

#3

Well, I’m sure he won’t cause any more trouble now.

#4

Spoilers! Don’t tell everyone he’s dead.

#5

What?! He’s dead? When did that happen?

#6

Incidentally, just took a quick dip into the audio and it seems a bit boomy and distorted. Do we need to look at the levels for next time?

#7

There’s a bit of clipping, true. The ideal is to have relatively low input levels and high outputs - we might have a short level-adjusting at the start of the next session.

#8

“You know why they call it Free Jazz?”

“Ain’t nobody going to pay for it.”

I do like Benny Goodman, but he appears to have a bit more of an intentional person with a clarinet.

#9

The stuff I tend to like is more entertainment (that people might drink or dance to) than a concert - Django, Stephane Grappelli, some of the early Ellington. In more recent groups, the Pasadena Roof Orchestra, the Temperance Seven, Henry’s Bootblacks, Sweet Substitute, the Swing Sisters.

#10

I tend to go to Jelly Roll Morton for that drinking and dancing feel.

I’m not a scholar or a connoisseur by any stretch though. Benny Goodman as a clarinetist just always sticks in the mind.

#11

Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers. Sublime.

#12

Is there going to be a return to the potty mouthed whartson hall soundcheck?

#13

I hope not. Different time, different players.

Maybe Nick will do some oom-pah music next time.

#14

Shall I tell a joke? Would that help?

I made abed out of rice the other day. Didn’t think it would, but I was asleep as soon as my head hit the pilau.

I saw that Van Gogh in a pub the other day. I asked him if he wanted a pint, and he said ‘No thanks mate, I’ve only got one ear.’

#15

It would certainly be a change.

#16

You are an acknowledge Artist of Chuckles, Jon, but I like to think of myself more of a mechanic - perfectly-constructed fine machines of mirth. It’s just that occasionally I like to describe the inner workings of my Internal Comedy Engine to the world, to make sure they fully appreciate the craftsmanship. I think you’ll find that with complete understanding, the type that comes from someone patiently explaining the joke carefully and potentially patronisingly, you’ll will come to the end of your joke journey with a more refined giggle than would have previously been possible - any maybe, just maybe, you’ll have learned something along the way.

#17

All that said, I’ve realised that I slightly cocked up the Van Gogh joke up.

#18

Say it ain’t so! What an earful.

#19

I was trying to decide whether you’d done that deliberately.

#20

Yes, let’s go with deliberately. I seem to have a blind spot with this joke (no pun intended sadly) as exactly the same thing happened when I told it at work.