Fifteen Minutes: Jamming with Prof. Vaux

ASSOCIATE Professor Bert Vaux, best known on campus as professor of Linguistics 80, "Dialects of English," teaches teaches phonology and field methods. But his real interest, he says, is endangered languages, such as Abxaz, Tigrinya, and Homshetsma, some of which are spoken by only one tribe or even one person and are in danger of dying out. But even with all of the classes he teaches, he says his work with endangered languages has to be done on the side, cautioning, "Once you choose a profession, you'll probably have to confine what you enjoy to the weekends."

What else does this professor enjoy doing on the weekends? A big clue comes in the form of his Web page, www.geocities.com/SoHo/6816, the home of his band, the Redundant Steaks. The group, which Vaux formed with three other classmates in his undergrad days at the University of Chicago, has produced four major projects to date. "Columbian Inventions" (a collection of songs in honor/protest of Columbus Day), "Buster Crabbe" (celebrating the life of the actor who played Tarzan, Superman, and other macho characters in early movies), "Mister Rogers' Neighborhood: The Twelve-Tone Rock Opera," "Liquid Dwarf, Rusty Dwarf" (an album boasting songs such as "Barbecue of Love" and "Petrified Vomit"), and "Petrified Barbecue" (greatest hits) all belong to the band's repertoire.

FM joined the Redundant Steaks guitarist, now a Harvard professor, in his Boylston office for a jam session.

Vaux starts by discussing the unorthodox song-writing methodology the band employs. The Redundant Steaks pick the title first and write the songs after. "We look at it as an intellectual challenge to pick random names and create lyrics that fit them," explains Vaux.

Whether making a rap out of a Gilbert and Sullivan operetta, belting out a song about red shoes in Swedish, or fashioning an ode to dinosaur puke, the Redundant Steaks struggle to come up with songs appropriate for their titles. In reference to the two songs entitled "Missing Buddha" (one Angry, one Dyslexic), Vaux warns: "We couldn't come up with lyrics for that random title, so we just did some Indian improv... I wouldn't bother listening to those; they're very painful and long."

Along with Gilbert and Sullivan, Vaux credits Led Zeppelin as an early musical idol.

"In my high school band we played a lot of Led Zeppelin. I think that was pretty typical of male high school bands. I was watching "The List" last night on VH1--do you ever watch that? Don't bother watching the List, except for sociological reasons--but last night they had the question: 'What are the four most influential bands?'" After listing all of the random celebrities hosting the show, including the guy who played Elaine's leather-jacket-wearing boyfriend for an episode of "Seinfeld," Martha Sokoloff, and "some California-looking guy from Baywatch" (a later e-mail revealed it was David Chokachi, who reminds Vaux of Chuck E. Cheese), Vaux nails home his point. "Two of the guys picked Led Zeppelin. Marla picked Hole."

Explaining his high school obsession with Zep, Vaux continues "I got my hands on this book--'The Hammer of the Gods'--it was utterly shocking, the things they did at their parties and in their hotel rooms. Now that stuff is cliched, but as a high schooler it was very satisfying."

"After we picked the title, "Steak," we thought, people will think there is the potential to exploit it in a stupid, sexual way. But there are no sexual connotations in the names of our band and its members, just bizarre, random implications. So that when people see the lead singer is named Ribeye, they'll try to think of the implications, but there aren't any really."

Each member of the band has a carnivorous nickname. Ribeye is a lawyer for the House of Representatives. Cubesteak is a physics professor at George Mason University, focusing on chaos theory. Buttersteak is an insanely wealthy computer programmer. Bert Vaux is Buttsteak.

The physics professor,whose real name appropriately enough is Ernie, is an incredible whistler. "He had braces all throughout college, and he has this special whistling technique that's different from what everyone else uses. We were all worried that he wouldn't be able to do it once he got the braces off, but he could." He performs with music-minus-one, which involves whistling over classical recordings with the solo instrument removed. "He whistled at my wedding this summer," Vaux reveals. But because of some problem with the sound system, he had to whistle a Bach piece a cappella. "He did it just right, but without the accompaniment, it's hard to follow...It just left everyone very confused."

What's next for the Redundant Steaks? "We're working on a 12-tone rock opera based on Mister Roger's Neighborhood." Convinced the show is sinister, Ribeye dedicated an entire Web page to a parody of the show. Unfortunately, neither Mister Rogers nor his lawyers found the page very humorous, and it has been removed. The Steaks have since concentrated their efforts on the rock opera, which features puppets. "Puppets are always sinister because their eyes don't move and/or they have wooden heads and fake hair," he deadpans. "And in Mister Roger's neighborhood they're rendered even more sinister because they're represented as being goody-goody." In the rock opera, they're cutting the crap, and doing it straight-take sinister. An evil triumvirate consisting of the Purple Panda, King Friday, and Eichmann the Mole end up killing everyone else. Vaux adds, "What better musical form to create utter evil but 12-tone?"

"Mr. Rogers is a nice guy. My dad met him once-they're both Presbyterian ministers. Nevertheless his show calls out for parody."

Vaux moves on to TinTin and the Real World. "Have you ever heard of TinTin? It's a Belgian cartoon from the '20s to the '70s. People used to tease him for his haircut -it was sort of smooth but stuck up in the front-but now everyone has that haircut. TinTin is marginal in the U.S., but for some reason he's been a popular subject for French intellectuals. They have many, many books on him--one says he's a drunk, one says he and Captain Haddock, his companion, are lovers, and several claim the author, Herge, was a Nazi." Vaux is currently translating TinTin into a number of endangered languages--Singaporean English, Calypso (an English-based Creole spoken on St. Thomas), and Cape Verdean.

Vaux then notes that Justin, a Harvard Law student who was a cast member in The Real World Hawaii season, looks like TinTin. "He has that haircut, and he just looks a lot like him in general. He actually left the show, though. He couldn't take it."

Not like TinTin. "TinTin was very mature."

"They pick people for these shows based on the expectation that they'll be interesting, not mature. Unless maybe they're really, really attractive. But that never works. I think they learned that from San Francisco. That girl in med school never did anything. Everyone's been unstable since Pam."

The Redundant Steaks' web page reveals another of Vaux's hobbies--basketball. As a member of the varsity team at the University of Chicago, Vaux once appeared in Sports Illustrated. Apparently a career in basketball wasn't in the cards, however. "This coach was awful. I learned a few Albanian curses from him, but that was his only useful function."

Of course, Albanian might mean something to Vaux, who speaks five or six languages. "Badly. And I'm not good at accents. I can read about 20 languages. But this is not the focus of linguistics these days. People focus on the structure of languages instead of learning how to speak them well."

Relatedly, Vaux mentions that studies show that diversity in English is increasing. For instance, people often ignore the spelling of words. Vaux points out that, for instance, about half of the population pronounces the word "Semitic" differently than it is spelled, saying "Semetic."

"You can't legislate the way people use language," he says. "Yes it's true that many languages are disappearing, but it will never happen that every person will speak exactly the same way. It's impossible. We may all speak English, but there will be an incredible variety in it."

For instance, the Boston dialect is commonly thought to be in immediate danger of disappearing, but the traditional linguistic features associated with it have been replaced by new distinctive characteristics. A Bostonian might not say "cah" any more - for car - but they will say potato puff for tater tot. Sprinkles will be jimmies. And they'll use terms like "triple-decker" and "grinder," which don't really appear outside of the region. Vaux says he could probably identify where a person is from, by asking under ten questions regarding such idiosyncracies in language. He explains that one of the main reasons the world's languages vary so widely involves the way in which children learn language. "They construct their language based on what they hear from

their families and peers, but since they hear only a limited number of words and sentences from these sources, children must extrapolate much of their phonology, morphology, and syntax from that tiny base, which opens the door for linguistic change."

And how many questions must regular people ask to identify a tune by the Redundant Steaks? Judge for yourself. Songs from each of their CDs are available on the MP3.com website, but Vaux warns, "You can listen to it on our web site if you're a glutton for punishment."