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Tuesday, June 5, 1984/The Battalion/Page 9
’60s singer comes to Dr. G’s
By ROBIN BLACK
Reporter
Singer/songwriter/composer John
Sebastian, member of the ’60s rock
group the Lovin’ Spoonful who
wrote and sang the theme to the TV
sitcom “Welcome Back, Kotter,” will
bring the Dreaded Shark and 20
years of music to Dr. G’s tonight.
Dreaded Shark is Sebastian’s
name for his guitar, a unique, low-
tuned instrument.
“The Dreaded Shark lets me carry
a bass line as well as a lead line,” he
says, “which most solo performers
can’t do. It gives me a much richer
sound.”
This is helpful, he says, since he is
a solo performer and needs to
achieve a full background sound.
He said his low-tuned guitar com
pares to the average guitar about the
same way the low-pitched cello com
pares to a violin.
Sebastian and his shark travel ex
tensively, performing a broad reper
toire of songs ranging from Lovin’
Spoonful hits such as “Do You Be
lieve in Magic” and “Did You Ever
Have to Make Up Your Mind?” to
the more recent “Welcome Back”
theme.
In addition to his work on the
road, he has kept busy working on
much less visible projects.
Sebastian has scored or co-scored
many movie soundtracks as well as
done production and background
work for artists such as Tom Petty
and Randy Van Warmer.
Sebastian’s film work began as
early as 1964 with the score for the
Woody Allen film “What’s Up, Ti-
ger-Lilly?” and he was the first rock
’n’ roll artist to compose music for a
Broadway production when he
wrote the score for the play “Jimmy
Shine” that starred Dustin Hoffman.
His latest work has been for two
new films: “The Act,” a dark, Nixon-
era political thriller, and “The
American Snitch,” a comedy about a
scandal sheet that wins a Pulitzer
prize.
“I like scoring because it lets me
be a musical actor — it lets me act
through my music and do things my
audience wouldn’t normally expect
from me,” he said. “It lets me bring
out another side of my music other
than the upbeat stuff like I did with
Spoonfuls.
Sebastian has gained a lot from his
scoring work, and he recognizes its
value.
“If you’re gonna do this (music)
for a living — once the tide of fash
ion turns away from you — you find
out what the business is all about,”
he said.
But, he says, he gains as much
from his road work as well as from
his work as a composer.
“The road is very valuable to a
musician and it’s a wonderful place
to test new songs,” he said. “An audi
ence will tell you how your new song
is better than any record company
can, and a performer can sense this.
He can actually gauge the reaction as
he plays.”
Sebastian’s show at Dr. G’s will
start about 9 p.m. and tickets will be
on sale for $7.50. Since a big turnout
is expected for the show, tickets can
be purchased earlier today before
the show, and those who buy tickets
early will be put on a list to guar
antee a seat for the performance.
JOHN SEBASTIAN AT WORK
The Troubles’
Ireland divided by imaginary wall
United Press International
BELFAST, Northern Ireland — E
ven punk rockers cannot escape the
stamp of Northern Ireland’s sectari
an warfare.
A shock of green hair, shellacked t
o stand 5 inches high like a dinosaur’
s spine, denotes a staunch Irishman
— and hence a Roman Gatholic.
Vivid orange hair is for the Protes
tant “Orangeman,” spiritual followe
r of the 17th century William of Ora
nge who triumphed on the battlefiel
d over Britain’s Gatholic King James.
“We live in tribes, really, in North
ern Ireland, cut off from each other,
with no idea of how Protestants live
or they us,” observes a Catholic cabd
river, who approaches the idea of a P
rotestant like some newly discovered
African tribe.
“Did you know the Protestants wa
nt to build a wall between us and sou
them Ireland?” he asks. A gentle Iris
h grin lets you know a bit of blarney i
sat play.
There is no Berlin-style border wa
11 yet. But in Belfast 14 years of riots
and bombings have left the Protesta
nt majority and the Gatholic rninorit
y separated by a brick wall that repla
ced a corrugated steel fence once inc
ongruously dubbed the “Peace Line.’
The communities are polarized, i
mprisoned in their own neighborho
ods, their own pubs, their own cultur
es.
West Belfast today is almost compl
etely Gatholic.
It is a place of graceless housing p
rqjects and antiquated homesteads t
urned into scorched slums, “fortress
-style” police stations with 25-foot co
ncrete walls topped by barbed wire, s
oldiers in flak jackets hiding in armo
red Range Rovers, walls scrawled wit
h “Maggie the Murderer” slogans an
d streets with lyrical Gaelic names.
East Belfast is Protestant.
It is full of nice suburban homes,
peopled by descendants of English a
nd Scottish immigrants who subjuga
ted the Irish. Many Protestant police
men live here, mostly in terror of Ca
tholic attacks. The once-proud Prote
slant shipyards are now in decay, an
d so is the textile industry.
The downtown shopping district i
s shut off by 10-foot-high green steel
gates. Before permitting access, poli
ce rifle women’s purses, search cars f
or bombs, sometimes perform a disc
reel body frisk. At store entrances, w
omen flash open their coats by habit.
The Forum Hotel, Belfast’s “fines
t” accommodation, is fenced in, too.
Guests enter through a creaky log ca
bin to be eyed by wary security guar
ds — it’s been hit by 28 bombs. Gath
olic turf is out back, Protestant out fr
ont.
In the past 14 years, yet another p
eriod in Irish history known as “The
Troubles,” nearly 2,400 people have
died in sectarian warfare between Ca
tholic and Protestant, with the police
and British army providing the latest
targets for gunmen.
So far this year, the Royal Ulster C
onstabulary lists 18 deaths, compare
d to 16 in the same period last year.
Shootings are down to 65, compare
d to 110 last year. But explosions are
nearly double — 75 compared to 40.
Army bomb squads have defused onl
y half as many devices — 16 compar
ed to 30.
Protestants are still the majority wi
th about 62.5 percent of the populati
on. They still send their sons off to fi
ght for Britain. Most still pledge feal
ty to the queen of England.
The Catholics, representing 37.5
percent of the population, still fight
for union with the Irish Republic.
The two sides rarely mix. Protesta
nt children go to state schools, Catho
lies to church ones. One side learns I
rish traditions, Irish dancing, history
with the Irish slant on the 1921 parti
tion. The other side learns British tr
aditions, the British version of histor
y-
“My 13-year-old was astonished w
hen he met his first Protestant,” Chri
stina Moira McCulloch told a mixed
group of Catholic and Protestant m
others. “I remember he stared and s
aid, ‘They look the same as us.”
In the past 14 years, yet another period in Irish his
tory known as ‘The Troubles/ nearly 2,400 people
have died in sectarian warfare between Catholic
and Protestant, with the police and British army
providing the latest targets for gunmen.
n
l
Baptist Student Union Summer
Activities
Noon Bible Study
Tuesdays and Wednesdays
11:45am
Howdy Party-Thursday, June 7
featuring Brenda Grim
7:00pm
201 College Main (behindK i„ko’ s )
846-7722
n
by Judi Sheppard Missed
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Continuious classes - Register in class
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1503 University Dr.
next to Ramada inn
846-1860
1969 record year for deals
Mergers down
United Press International
The merger frenzy that has seized
American business under the Reaga
n administration pales in compariso
n to the takeover revolution of the la
te 1960s when the giant conglomerat
es were formed, analysts say.
“One can make a good argument t
hat we’re not in another boom perio
djust by looking at the total number
of merger transactions,” said Tomi
Simic, director of research for W.T.
Grimm & Co., the Chicago-based m
erger analyst.
In 1969, the record year for merg
er activity in the United States, more
than 6,000 deals took place as many
managements and business schools
encouraged companies to spread ou
t their risks by acquiring diversified v
entures and building conglomerates,
she said.
The number of mergers in 1983 t
otaled only 2,533 — less than half of
1969’s heated pace but somewhat hi
gher than the 2,346 business marria
ges in 1982, Simic said. The merger
rate has picked up slightly so far this
year.
“The one thing that sets today apa
rt from the late 1960s is the size of th
e deals,” Simic said. “Price tags have
hit the stratosphere.”
Larger players have entered the ri
ng with the nation’s oil titans bidding
billions of dollars for competitors to
replace declining oil and gas reserve
s.
This year alone Standard Oil Co.
of California’s purchase of Gulf Oil
Co. for $13.2 billion broke new grou
nd as the biggest merger in U.S. hist
ory. Texaco I nc.’s $10.1 billion acqui
sition of Getty Oil was not far behind
in second place and Mobil Corp.’s $5
.7 billion takeover of Superior Oil C
o. ranked fifth in the merger line-up
“But even if you were to take the d
ollar totals of these merger transact!
ons and adjust them for inflation, th
ey would come out about the same as
the 1969 dollar totals,” Simic said.
Statistics tell only one side of the st
ory, however.
The recent wave of megabuck tak
covers in the oil industry has raised c
oncern in Congress and other quarte
rs that energy companies are using v
ital funds to buy proven oil and gas r
eserves rather than moving ahead fu
11-tilt to search for new reserves at a t
ime when U.S. oil imports are rising.
Consumer advocates contend that
retail prices for gasoline and home-h
eating oil could rise by up to four ce
nts a gallon as oil companies close do
wn service stations and refineries to s
atisfy government antitrust conditio
ns for their mergers.
Even on Capitol Hill and in some
corporate boardrooms there is a pal
pable uneasiness that the Federal Tr
ade Commission has been too lenien
t in giving the green light to muld-bil
lion-dollar acquisitions within the sa
me industry that previous Republica
n and Democratic administrations w
ould have challenged.
“Asking the FTC these days to pro
tect the consumer is like relying on v
oodoo antitrust,” said Edwin Rothsc
hild of the Citizen-Labor Energy Co
alition consumer group in Washingt
on, D.C.
But many observers believe merge
rs may be the only weapon that U.S.
companies have left to upgrade effic
iency and to meet stiff competition i
n the world market.
“These acquisitions and mergers a
re American industry’s answer to the
recent decline of U.S. leadership in t
he international sphere of procluctiv
ity and distribution,” said Dan Lund
berg, publisher of the Los Angeles-b
ased Lundberg Survey that tracks pe
troleum markets.
“We have almost become a nation
of distributors of other people’s goo
from past year
ds and services, which has led to the
export of so many jobs and the virtu
al loss of whole industries.
“But we’ve reached the turning po
int and now there is a largely unimp
eded struggle on the part of business
, banking institutions and the admini
stration to restructure industry in th
e direction of increased efficiency an
d productivity.”
The jury still is out, however, on w
hether mergers are the best tools to
make U.S. industry lean and tough
again.
“One can view a merger very simp
listically as moving a lot of money ar
ound just to change the ownership o
f an economic entity that existed bef
ore and debate whether that’s produ
ctive,” said Robert McTamaney, a pa
rtner in the Wall Street law firm of C
arter Ledyard & milburn.
“Wouldn’t it be better to spend fu
nds on expanding physical plants, e
mployee benefits, jobs and new mar
kets to increase the CNP of the coun
try and to improve the economy rath
er than making money for stockhold
ers and insiders who are the main be
neficiaries of mergers?” McTamane
y asked.
“On the other hand, you can argu
e that larger is better and usually a m
ore efficient organization. In an idea
1 merger, when an effective manage
ment group buys a less competent m
anagement, both the company and t
he economy benefit.”
Most specialists have some qualms
about the rash of oil mergers — part
icularly the unknown impact on cons
umers. But few take issue with the ec
onomic wisdom of buying cheap oil a
nd gas reserves as an alternative to ri
sking billions on long-shot explorati
on efforts.
“Pessimism over future U.S. oil an
d gas prospects culminated late last y
ear in the Mukluk dry hole offshore
Alaska,” said Daniel Yergin, preside
nt of Cambridge Energy Research A
ssociates in Cambridge, Mass.
The failure of the $1.7 billion Mu
kluk well — the most expensive ever
drilled — dashed waning hopes for
a major oil strike in one of the natio
n’s last frontier areas and set off the
current scramble for reserves on the
stock exchanges.
“Mukluk drove home the point th
at it’s going to become increasingly d
ifficult, if not impossible in North A
merica, to find massive accumulatio
ns of petroleum reserves,” William R
andol, senior oil analyst at First Boso
n Corp. in New York, said.
Analysts estimate the current cost
of buying domestic reserves on Wall
Street at $4.50-$6 a barrel compared
with $ 12-$ 15 a barrel before taxes fo
r finding new reserves.
Critics maintain that the massive d
ebt incurred in the oil industry takeo
vers will shrink exploration dollars a
nd make the United States even mor
e vulnerable to another foreign oil s
hock.
Book offers
criteria for
students
United Press International
ELMIRA, N.Y. — You’ll
really know you’re in college
when your parents rent your
room back home.
This is among several criteria
published in Elmira (N.Y.) Col
lege’s “Student Handbook.”
Other sample criteria:
— Your high school sweetie
wants to meet other people.
— You find the movies you
used to think were silly are, in
fact, cinema.
^bu won’t see a better
value than TSO/“„ nd P « g
scription eyewear, come to TSO. You’ll find a wide
selection of quality frames, all professionally fitted
with prescriptions filled exactly to the doctor’s
specifications. And all at a reasonable price. CS
Texas State Oeticat
Bryan 214 N. Main 779-2786/Post Oak Mall College Station 764-0010
The band gets its news from the Batt.