Beloved Earth-tet followers,

Our big Jones Beach-ish concert with guest Billy Joel is coming up in a few hours. Don’t forget to get your tickets in advance – complimentary ham sandwich offer has been extended to 2pm. We’re even throwing in extra mayonnaise, and a pickle – for free! Led Zeppelin never did that.

I should be focusing on final touches for the show, like the soaring harmony I’m attempting on “New York State of Mind.” Don’t worry, I’ll get it together. With each try, it’s sounding more like Geddy Lee and less like Edith Bunker, which is the goal. And the blisteringly fast funk-bop rendition of “Movin’ Out’ is coming along, although it’s hard to hear the words. I’m hoping naked, drunk people on the beach eating ham sandwiches won’t mind.

Since I’ll be preoccupied with travel and autograph signing after the show, I’m taking a short break now to tell you about the amazing journey the Joel Newton Earth-tet (JNET) is about to embark on. Just a bit for now: I’ll provide more details when I’ve landed safely and gotten my bearings in … yes, it’s true … Dayton, Ohio. I’ve hit the big time, baby.

Just kidding, Dayton is kind of a shitty little place, but that’s exactly why we’re going there. Check it out:

When Dr. Ivana Vakov won her Nobel Prize for proving that the Earth is hard and crunchy on its surface but much more chewy in the center, she was invited to speak at the esteemed Nathan McFliggle Institute for Earth Sciences. Upon returning, she told Janice and Cedric (our bassist and drummer, Dr. Vakov’s assistants at the time) about her experience:

Vakov: “After years of putting up with snooty MIT and Harvard types, it was so refreshing to see herds of easy-going, simple, kind people.”

Cedric: “What people? Where were they?”

Vakov: “At Denny’s.”

Janice: “What else impressed you.”

Vakov: “How much they ate, and how big they were. It was hard to do that back in Russia. Enough about this: Cedric, fetch me another jellyfish from the tank.”

What I took away from all this is that JNET needs to be a little more of the people. Good, simple, fun-loving Americans. Let’s face it, Nyack and Long Island have a lot of elitists. As exciting as it is to have sophisticated fans, I don’t think you can become a global mega star if you skip over regular folk – people who work in factories or in the backs of supermarkets, or farmers, retailers, roofers, appliance salespeople, second-rate attorneys, demoted cops, assistant dog-trainers, truck drivers, construction workers, thieves, etc.

No, I have to show the world that everyone, no matter how ignorant and uncultured, can enjoy my music. Sure, I represent the sublimely refined cutting edge of music, fusing into one Super-Music the best of mankind’s rhythmic, harmonic, melodic, and textural traditions since ancient times. But JNET’s real talent has to lie in allowing that music to flow freely and nourishingly into the ears and souls of the most ordinary people in the world.

That is why I chose Dayton as the site of our next chapter. And that is why we will forgo a mega pop-star this time and join forces instead with the Dolores J. Stangaroni Elementary School Orchestra. They’re not great, but we’ll rehearse for a few days and they’ll add a nice Beatles-esque background to my quickly-developing lead vocal chops. I can’t believe I thought I needed that blowhard Nugent a few weeks ago. What an a-hole.

Our audience will be simple folk. Our guests will be simple folk spawn. We will be stars. Our music will go under their heads, over their heads, and right through their heads. I think this is the beginning of an exciting new epoch of our ascendance.

JNET: “World, we are our own mega pop-stars.”

World: “What about Billy Joel, Ted Nugent and Taylor Swift?”

JNET: “They taught us a lot, but it’s time to show the world’s people that we don’t need them anymore.”

World: “What if you guys just sound like a bunch of jazz-funk-fusion wankers without a real singer, who can dance.”

JNET: “I can sing and dance, so there. Did you see me with Taylor at Smart Cafe?”

World: “We tried to get in, but the place only seats 20 people.”

JNET: “That’s understandable. We’ll let pop-stars play with us now and then, but if I can sound like Geddy Lee and do leg kicks like Taylor Swift, we’re gonna be just fine on our own.

World: “Someone else is calling, I gotta take this.”

JNET: “Alright, call me later.”

We’ll update you in a few days with details for the Dayton gig. Expect scorching JN originals and some covers of your favorite hits from 1971 to 2014, excluding 1987-1989.

Oh, almost forgot: we head to Afghanistan after Dayton. Weird, right? I’ll explain. It’s gonna be off the hook. Some of us might get killed.

Guess who’s the best JNET fan ever.

YOU!