It's the lyrics on this one...

Happy Thanksgiving from the degenerates from the Group W bench who run this place. We love you all.

Just For Now - Imogen Heap

My former student, US Army Specialist Corey Shea, will be laid to rest today. Yesterday, at his wake, there were honor guards from the local police and fire units, an Army honor guard, and all the flags in town were at half mast, including flags in people's yards. Tomorrow, his funeral procession will go past the high school, where all the students will be outside at attention. Someone has set up a homemade memorial on the front lawn, with flags and pictures.

Generally, military funerals, or funerals for other public servants (police, fire, high elected officials) leave me teary and emotional. This one, being a boy I knew, a boy I taught, was just too emotional for me, and I hadn't seen him in years. I didn't last 5 minutes at the wake after speaking with his mother. I sat in my car and cried.

He served his country honorably, and I'm sure he knew the risks involved with his service. It's just always tragic to see someone so young gone so soon.

Rest in peace soldier.

"Now the sun's gone to hell,
And the moon's riding high.
Let me bid you farewell,
Every man has to die.
But it's written in the starlight,
And every line on your palm,
We're fools to make war
On our brothers in arms..."

Labels: dire straits

MJ sez:

So, Tesco's latest post is his list of his favorite bands. He's done thirty four, while a reader of his compiled a top 100. I won't be attempting 100, but Courtney and I figured 50 apiece would do. Plus, I'm not ready with my reviews yet, so this is a nice time filler. Here's my personal top 50 bands/singers, in no particular order.
1. Radiohead
2. The Rolling Stones
3. Bob Dylan
4. Johnny Cash
5. Faith No More
6. Bob Marley
7. Led Zeppelin
8. Linkin Park
9. The Killers
10. U2
11. The Clash
12. New Order
13. David Bowie
14. Velvet Underground
15. The Smiths
16. Pink Floyd
17. The Beatles
18. The Who
19. Iggy Pop
20. Violent Femmes
21. Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers
22. No Doubt
23. Stereophonics
24. The Specials
25. Social Distortion
26. R.E.M.
27. Queen
28. Prince
29. Nirvana
30. Muse
31. Fleetwood Mac
32. Eric B. and Rakim
33. The English Beat
34. Elvis Presley
35. Elton John
36. The Doors
37. Elvis Costello
38. Genesis
39. The Eagles
40. The Chieftains
41. Blackthorn
42. Simon & Garfunkel
43. Sex Pistols
44. Jimi Hendrix
45. Van Morrison
46. Pearl Jam
47. Donovan
48. Mighty Mighty Bosstones
49. Wilco
50. Black Crowes

Your turn, C.

C sez...

Bankrupt. Or sick. Whichever. I stole from one of my pals on my main site last night, so it's all about the thievery. My 50 will sort of be in order, as the first band I list will be the band that I would choose above all others if I could only have one for the rest of my life. Because that's SO LIKELY to actually happen. Courtney = mega tool.

1. The Beatles
2. R.E.M.
3. Bob Mould (including all his incarnations here, Husker Du, Sugar, solo)
4. Bob Dylan
5. Ani DiFranco
6. Wilco
7. The Hold Steady
8. The Minutemen
9. Richard Thompson
10. Elvis Costello
11. Bruce Springsteen
12. Pink Floyd
13. David Bowie
14. Led Zeppelin
15. The Foo Fighters
16. Cat Stevens
17. Fleetwood Mac
18. The Replacements
19. Dave Matthews Band
20. Jay Z
21. Guided by Voices
22. Def Leppard (yeah, deal with it)
23. Buffalo Tom
24. O Positive
25. The National
26. Queen
27. Peter Gabriel
28. Pixies
29. The Cult
30. KISS
31. Warren Zevon
32. ABBA
33. Allison Krauss and Union Station
34. The Black Crowes
35. Dropkick Murphys
36. The Clash
37. The Ramones
38. Eminem (again, deal)
39. Joe Jackson
40. Elton John (pre-1985)
41. Prince
42. The Police
43. Red Hot Chilli Peppers
44. The Bad Plus
45. Rage Against the Machine
46. Sleater-Kinney
47. U2
48. Squeeze
49. The Pogues
50. The White Stripes

It loses any sense of coherence or "order" after #10, but the top 10 are pretty accurate. So, who are the ones you can't live without, kids?

Labels: BFF, I'm Lazy, lists

Look around. This week marks the 40th (yes, you read that correctly) anniversary of The Beatles, also fondly known as, "The White Album". Popmatters will be running a week of articles about the significance of this double album. Personally, although not my favorite Beatles platter, I think I incorporated this as a piece of art into my life more than any of their other records. The four iconic portraits of the lads from Liverpool, the collage art inside, the emergence of all four as songwriters, some with obviously greater success than others. This album showcased not only all the talent, but the beginning of the unraveling of one of the greatest popular musical forces to ever grace this earth.

Read a little, listen more. It's beautiful, and so are you.

Dear Prudence - The Beatles

Labels: The Beatles

My sister and I, out of breath, stood stock still, trying not to let the air creep back into our screaming lungs too fast for fear of fainting, and for the very real fear of being heard. It's extremely difficult to run hard for miles, while being chased, and then once relatively safe, to catch your breath in silence. Both of our hearts were pounding with the effort, the sirens echoed in the distance, screams could be heard erupting out of the black night.

I could hear a lyric in my head as the agonizing pain shot through my entire body. "Now all the criminals in their coats and ties are free to drink martinis and watch the sun rise." That's from "The Hurricane", Dylan's controversial song about Ruben "Hurricane" Carter, a boxer who had famously been accused of murder in Paterson, New Jersey. Dylan seems to speak to me when I'm in times of stress. Growing up in a sheltered life in Pennsylvania but hearing the stories of Belfast in the Seventies had still not prepared either my sister or myself for having to literally run for our lives.

Whenever violence broke out, everyone ran. You ran as fast as you could away from where it had occurred, but you ran. Belfast was a neighborhood-driven town, and it was all based on religion. The Protestants had their portion of town, the Catholics had their part. You absolutely never wanted to get caught out anywhere near the other's part of the city. If you did and something happened, it wasn't anyone's fault but your own. I spent three youthful summers in Belfast, ones I'll never forget for a variety of reasons, but the least of which was learning firsthand that men would stoop to hate for reasons that I didn't understand and would never truly comprehend. After a while, the real reasons for the hate evolved into a sadistic one-upsmanship when it came to blowing things up and firing guns into unsuspecting crowds, and setting off car bombs. The ghosts of Belfast never rested, the angry warriors of days gone by, their appetites for destruction never truly sated. A thousand year civil war, never ending, never failing to destroy and denigrate, a war without end. This was terrorism at the forefront, but instead of watching it happen on television, I was in the middle of it, along with my younger sister. Both of us had been told what it might be like, out there on the streets, and to watch everything we did and everywhere we went and everyone we talked to, but we were too young and headstrong to pay attention to the warnings.

When my sister and I ventured out walking on a fine evening, we thought we could walk down to the Catholic part of town and just stroll about as if were in fine farm country, where people sit out on their porches and wave hello as if they've known you their entire lives. We couldn't have been more mistaken in that belief. We crossed one block too far, and I was recognized. I should tell you that my Father was at one point a fairly large figure in a certain Catholic organization that I'm not going to name by name, but if you know anything about Northern Ireland, you know what organization I'm talking about. Everyone knew who he was in Belfast. I can't say that I bear a striking resemblance to him, but I hadn't even considered at the time that there were probably people at the airport that took our pictures and knew that we were in town. That's more than likely what happened. Dad wasn't kidding when he said that we shouldn't walk around. We were recognized, chased, hunted. Guns were fired. My sister said she felt a bullet whiz past her ear at least twice. They were aiming to kill. We couldn't even raise a laugh at the ridiculous thought that we, who had never even thought about what this conflict was truly about, were now in the middle of a full scale riot over the fact that we had strayed one block too far into the wrong part of town.

She looked at me from the darkness, and as my eyes adjusted, she held up a finger to say "Don't say a word, they are still looking for us." I knew exactly what she meant.

"Here comes the story of the Hurricane, the man the authorities came to blame, for somethin' he had never done"

It was nothing like a rock and roll moment, that's for sure. We stayed an hour or so in the deserted house we had flown into, waiting for the sirens to die away, waiting to hear the voices stop. We crawled out the back door, into the back garden, got our bearings, and began to slink back to our part of town.

My Dad was waiting up for us, he had heard that we had strayed. He was more disappointed in me than her, as the two of them were already on the rocky road that would encompass the rest of their adult relationship. I had been thoughtless, careless, stupid. It was a lesson I wouldn't learn enough, sadly. He did not yell, though. He shook his head. He sighed. He smiled, slightly, at the thought that we had been able to get back alive. His only words were "My son. My daughter. Never, EVER do that again, hear?" I shook my assent, but I knew if we came back here, I'd manage to fuck up again, it was in my nature.

We were on a plane 48 hours later.
**************************************************************
I'll post the quiz answers on Saturday. Enjoy your day!

Labels: Bob Dylan, Lifestories

So, I thought since most of you who visit here are music and pop-culture heads like C and I are, I'd bring out a staple of a blog author when he can't figure out what else to write about.

The rules of this quiz are simple. NO GODDAM WIKI-EFFING-PEDIA, GOOGLE or any other tool to find out the answers. Just use your brain. If you can't remember what the answer is, and you give it an honest go, then go look it up. The answers will be posted over the weekend.

Okay, we clear? Good. Take out a number 2 pencil and start your test...NOW!

1. From what movie about music is the following quote:
"And there's these three girls with the band, I've had lustful thoughts about all of them."

2. What are the alter-egos of Gene Simmons, Ace Frehley, Peter Criss and Paul Stanley called (when they are in their full on make-up)?

3. Who's third album (after calling their first two albums "BANDNAME" 1 and "BANDNAME" 2) was called "The Serpent Is Rising" and contained a song called "Krakatoa" on it?

4. What song by Soundgarden contains a lyric that became the title of a 1996 movie starring Keanu Reeves and Cameron Diaz?

5. What was the last single by the Beatles to reach #1 on the charts while they were still together as a band?

6. Who is listed in the Guinness Book of World Records for having the "Best Selling Album by a teenage solo artist"?

7. Who's first live album was called "101"?

8. What star's real name is Brian Hugh Warner?

9. Who's first solo record after leaving one of the biggest groups of the 60's was called "If I Could Only Remember My Name"?

10. Name the fictional bands in the following movies:
"Rock Star"
"Almost Famous"

Good luck. Post answers in the comments if you like.

Labels: QUIZ SHOW

Some albums come to you when you need them, I truly, truly believe this. Wilco's Yankee Hotel Foxtrot was like that; I hadn't ever been a fan of theirs, and I certainly wasn't an alt-country, or any sort of country fan, previous to the summer of 2003. But when you're faced with loneliness, and no money, and a sense of uselessness, and a song like "I Am Trying to Break Your Heart" drifts into your view, well, you sit up and listen. YHF saved my sanity that summer, as I could channel all my negativity into this record that understood it.

Ten years ago, Billy Bragg was contacted by Nora Guthrie, daughter of the illustrious Woody, to help bring some unpublished songs of her father to fruition. Bragg contacted Wilco to help him flesh out this project. The resulting albums were "Mermaid Avenue" volumes one and two, and I have suddenly embraced volume one like a long lost brother come home. Ten years ago, I wouldn't have even given this album a second thought, for the reason listed above regarding country/alt-country, and the fact that I've never been a big Billy Bragg fan. Sometimes, though, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, and this collection of songs certainly illustrates that metaphor perfectly.

The ghost of Woodie Guthrie lingers in my musical consciousness fairly heavily. He presides over my iTunes in the form of Springsteen, Allison Krauss, Wilco, Ani DiFranco, and Bob Dylan. Remember, I have this not-so-secret "twang" fetish. So, in thinking about what Bragg and Wilco could bring to the table collaborating on his lyrics, the marriage of his proletariat, unionizing politics, and his wistful folk, one could argue that this was a marriage made in heaven. These songs were hidden away until this collection of artists could unearth them and bring them to life. Songs of the people, people who were hurting, lusting, longing, organizing, hoping. People just like you and me.

Just this weekend, my friends Scott and Jay played together with their respective bands. Jay told me later on that, had the monitors worked and they were able to play their acoustic set, his band would have played "At My Window Sad and Lonely", and dedicated it to me from the stage. In fact, Jay said he asked the band to learn it, just for me. Maybe I can convince them to learn "California Stars", too. Perhaps Jay asked the band that simply because he knows I'm a Wilco fan. But, there are so many other Wilco songs they could have learned, and this was the one that called to him regarding me. I'm still mulling over what cosmic coincidences there may be on that one. Usually, an album trips itself into my life when I don't know how, or don't want, to say something building inside of me. And even if I don't let those words out on my own, I will take that album and listen and listen and listen until whatever's churning has settled, enough for me to keep carrying on. Call it a placebo, call it sublimation, call it whatever the hell you want. I use music to make sense of my life, and right now, Mermaid Avenue makes more sense to me than anything. And I'm sharing this with you all now, letting you in, simply because I think I hide too much, and I want you all to know...

... I'd give this world/Just to dream a dream with you/On our bed of California stars

Labels: billy bragg, wilco

Billy Bragg and Wilco

Billy Bragg and Wilco