Squid Vicious
Herewith the results of a day behind Goldman Sachs with what I am now calling "Squid Vicious" but which formerly was called "Big Lloyd 3 (The Root)."
Do you get the squid reference? No? Well, the second sentence of Mike Taibbi's partly-fair, partly-unfair undressing of Goldman Sachs, and probably it's most oft-quoted, went something like:
Oh shit--Rachel Maddow just started talking about Goldman Sachs. Man, that thing is everywhere. Which adds some weight to Taibbi's opening sentence, which went something like:
Me? I don't want to get into the whole relativity of evil question about Goldman Sachs or, for that matter, any of the other banks. Except maybe the vampire squids at Morgan Stanley who, when opportunity literally knocked on their front door, chose to write virtually nothing on my painting.
Note to Morgan Stanley employees: how ya gonna become masters of the universe if you got nothing in your underwear? How ya gonna become a BSD if you got no D?
Ernie DiGregorio, famous offensive wizard out of Providence College and the Buffalo Braves (rookie of the year--'73/73), was such a bad defensive player that when he hit the pros the commentariat changed his nickname from "Ernie D" to "Ernie No D." The assumption here is that he's currently playing for the Morgan Stanley league team.
Anyway, all that negativity aside, I don't want to get into the whole relativity of evil question about Goldman Sachs. I just want somebody to depart one of the upper floors of 85 Broad Street, take the elevator down, walk out the back door, stride over to me with that imperious Goldman Sachs stride (a type of walking that says something along the lines of "Not only did I go to Duke, but I played lacrosse there. And yes, everything you heard is true. I then overcame the hurdle of not going to an Ivy League school, much less someplace as fundamentally sissified as Duke, got my MBA at Wharton and then leveraged family connections to land at 85 Broad." Surely you've seen walking like this?) and say, "You, my friend, are providing a valuable and unique public service by means of your art and I would like to trade you this check for thirty-thousand dollars for your painting of my boss."
Is that asking so much?
In return for your $30K (which--c'mon, really--is the equivalent of two hard nights of bottle service, plus a shitload of drugs, plus a couple of hookers, at Marquee--and basically represents chump change for somebody who has made five/ten million dollars-plus annually for the last five/ten years), I can guarantee that for the foreseeable future, your friends are going to walk into your home or office (okay--that would take some balls) and say something like:
a) worth way more than two nights at a fading Chelsea nightspot; and
b) the reason people buy my paintings.
And later that same night, my friend, I guarantee that you'll hear that same guy talking on his cell, saying something like:
Final note--check this out:
Freaky, yes?
Odd-looking, yes. But does it look like it could harm a fly? Hell, it looks like a Muppet.
Absolute Final Note:
The photo session for "Dancer #3 (Reclining--Chelsea Hotel)" took place in Room 103 of the Chelsea Hotel, directly across the hall from where Sid met his ugly end.
Do you get the squid reference? No? Well, the second sentence of Mike Taibbi's partly-fair, partly-unfair undressing of Goldman Sachs, and probably it's most oft-quoted, went something like:
The world's most powerful investment bank is a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money.Actually it went exactly like that.
Oh shit--Rachel Maddow just started talking about Goldman Sachs. Man, that thing is everywhere. Which adds some weight to Taibbi's opening sentence, which went something like:
The first thing you need to know about Goldman Sachs is that it's everywhere.Actually it went exactly like that.
Me? I don't want to get into the whole relativity of evil question about Goldman Sachs or, for that matter, any of the other banks. Except maybe the vampire squids at Morgan Stanley who, when opportunity literally knocked on their front door, chose to write virtually nothing on my painting.
Note to Morgan Stanley employees: how ya gonna become masters of the universe if you got nothing in your underwear? How ya gonna become a BSD if you got no D?
Ernie DiGregorio, famous offensive wizard out of Providence College and the Buffalo Braves (rookie of the year--'73/73), was such a bad defensive player that when he hit the pros the commentariat changed his nickname from "Ernie D" to "Ernie No D." The assumption here is that he's currently playing for the Morgan Stanley league team.
Anyway, all that negativity aside, I don't want to get into the whole relativity of evil question about Goldman Sachs. I just want somebody to depart one of the upper floors of 85 Broad Street, take the elevator down, walk out the back door, stride over to me with that imperious Goldman Sachs stride (a type of walking that says something along the lines of "Not only did I go to Duke, but I played lacrosse there. And yes, everything you heard is true. I then overcame the hurdle of not going to an Ivy League school, much less someplace as fundamentally sissified as Duke, got my MBA at Wharton and then leveraged family connections to land at 85 Broad." Surely you've seen walking like this?) and say, "You, my friend, are providing a valuable and unique public service by means of your art and I would like to trade you this check for thirty-thousand dollars for your painting of my boss."
Is that asking so much?
In return for your $30K (which--c'mon, really--is the equivalent of two hard nights of bottle service, plus a shitload of drugs, plus a couple of hookers, at Marquee--and basically represents chump change for somebody who has made five/ten million dollars-plus annually for the last five/ten years), I can guarantee that for the foreseeable future, your friends are going to walk into your home or office (okay--that would take some balls) and say something like:
"Oh my fucking God! You've got one of those?!?!?!?!?"And that, my friend, is:
a) worth way more than two nights at a fading Chelsea nightspot; and
b) the reason people buy my paintings.
And later that same night, my friend, I guarantee that you'll hear that same guy talking on his cell, saying something like:
"You are not going to believe what Figby has hanging on his wall."And that, my friend, is how you become a master of the universe (assuming here that your name is Figby).
Final note--check this out:
Freaky, yes?
Another bottle of Patron, sir, to go with that line of blow?Actually, that's a viperfish. This is a vampire squid:
Odd-looking, yes. But does it look like it could harm a fly? Hell, it looks like a Muppet.
Count my feet! Count my feet!Quant Dracula? Anyway, taking the long way around in explaining the Squid Vicious comment, it's a rif on famous punk rocker Sid Vicious and the Goldman-as-vampire-squid notion.
Absolute Final Note:
The photo session for "Dancer #3 (Reclining--Chelsea Hotel)" took place in Room 103 of the Chelsea Hotel, directly across the hall from where Sid met his ugly end.
posted by Geoffrey at 6:28 PM
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