Letter Perfect                                                        GREEN  3.1
 

Someone recently asked me a question that I have heard repeated many times in the past, but one that I had never personally pondered. They said to me, "Stan, If you had only one letter of the alphabet that you could save from your entire music collection, what letter would it be?" Lately that question has been haunting me. What would it be? There are some great letters in the alphabet, C, R, S, and T to name just a few. Damn, just lose the letter B and you've lost Bowie and the Beatles, James Brown, the Birthday Party, Beck and Bjork, and even the friggin Bonzo Dog Band. No doubt that the letter B would be a major loss.

 Ahh, but here is the crux of the matter. This is not about losing a single letter, it's about losing every letter except for one.

What would you do? It might be an interesting exercise for you to mentally put yourself into my shoes and try to feel your way through this situation. What would you choose? Close your eyes and try to sense what this loss would mean, while trying to awaken a sense of what really matters to you. The lone letter paradigm is a Zen exercise that has been passed down from one rock critic to the next since the early days of the great Lester Bangs.
 
Of course, in the end, for me it all came down to the letter P. P is the Penultimate letter in Stan Keaton’s alphabet. P stands for Parliament, Pere Ubu and Prince. P is for the fabulous Pixies, what a remarkable and under-appreciated band. P is for Public Enemy and Public Image. And foremost, P is for the Godfather of Punk, Iggy Pop, and his incredible band The Stooges.

            - from 'Listening to Music The Stan Keaton Way', 'Letter Perfect