White nationalism. Fellating the wealthy. No wimmin folk allowed. What's a little treason? Hillary and Obama suck. Ryan and Pence sit behind, both playing the role they were born to play: being dicks with ears. Make America hate again. The End.
Because this is the legacy of the republicans who have held all the power in Michigan over the last eight years: the state of Michigan poisoned the water of thousands of children in Flint and it is currently embroiled, in the Larry Nasser child molestation at Michigan St., in the biggest sex scandal in American history.
The next time any republican in Michigan says anything about protecting our children from anything, I think the rest of us should be allowed to give them a boot to the head.
Another week, another song discovered on Roadies...
A couple of months back the Beautiful Girl and I were at the mall and for shits and grins we went into the music store...of which about 10% of the store was actually devoted to music. It was one of those life goes on moments, but with a little regret that there will be kids growing up who will never know the joy I had in the thousands of hours I spent browsing record shops. Yet while parts of music's history are dying others remain: this week's tune continues the fine tradition of one hit wonders....
Massachusetts native Matt Nathanson began his recording career in 1993, and over the course of the past 25 years has released 11 albums and has managed to have a modestly successful run. Nathanson has had a host of songs featured on TV shows, and tours regularly. While not knowing the thrill (one supposes) of mega stardom (his best selling LP sold just north of 300,000 copies), Nathanson has nonetheless carved out a tiny place in the music world and is still making a living singing and playing some 25 years down the road--not a bad claim to fame.
Released on his album Some Mad Hopein 2008, "Come On Get Higher" would only reach #59 (with a bullet!) on the Billboard Hot 100, but would go on to sell over 1.8 million copies and be certified platinum by the RIAA.
I've noted a time or two here on Friday Night Jukebox that my indoctrination to the Gospel of Rock and Roll came from the top forty radio of WLS in Chicago. And if there's ever been a song I've featured on FNJ that would have felt right at home in mid seventies top forty pop, it's "Come on Get Higher." Opening with a lightly strummed acoustic guitar, Nathanson sings a paean to a woman in a relationship at a crossroads, trying mightily to get her to give him a second chance. Nathanson sings of the power of love with a catchy as all hell melody, and a chorus that is (emaycee fave!) repeated often, especially in the closing. In the end, it's another in a long but beautiful line of songs that are a piece of pop heaven--or as the Stones noted, it's only rock and roll but I like it....
Liner Notes: "If I could walk on water/If I could tell you what's next/I'd make you believe/I'd make you forget..."
I don't pay much attention to Ann Coulter anymore--it dawned on me years ago that (much like Rush Limbaugh) she's a not particularly intelligent person whose one talent is being a hateful asshole (yawn).
But when I noticed the other day that she's calling on Trump to engender her Great White Homeland utopia by starting with deporting the Dreamers, I thought to myself, "Man, if we really wanted to make America great again, we could start by deporting Ann Coulter."
My initial reaction to the deal the Democrats cut with republicans today to reopen the government was being massively pissed off. However, after reading a couple of thoughtful pieces (here and here), remembering that most voters will have long forgotten the deal by November, and being encouraged by the second women's march this weekend (there is definitely something special in the air for those of us on the left), I don't think in the end it's anything to lose sleep over.
But I will say that if you're a Democratic Senator and you had aspirations for the party's nomination for the Presidency in 2020 and your name isn't on this list opposing the continuing resolution...your dream is over.
This week's tune is a study in perseverance--I originally heard the song at work, spent nearly a year plugging in lyrics to Google with no luck (would have really helped if I'd known the chorus was "Baby we ain't poor" instead of the mistaken "Baby we ain't fools") until one day , lo and behold, it appeared in the search. Hallelujah I love her so....
Meaghan Smith is decidedly not a mega selling artist. Of her three LPs and two EPs, exactly one has charted--it was her latest album and it didn't exactly rip up the charts in her native Canada (she's had but a whimper here in the states). She did, however, manage to win a Juno Award (Canada's Grammys) for best new artist in 2011. Other than that, there really isn't much to be said of her career other than if you're an aficionado of Christmas music her song "It Snowed" is absolutely delightful and has become one of my yuletide favorites over the past couple of holidays.
Fun Fact: Smith did a cover version of the Pixies' classic "Here Comes Your Man" (well worth a listen--here) for the soundtrack of the film (500) Days of Summer, for which she played an omnichord. Yeah, I had to look it up, too--it's basically an electronic accordion if you ask me....
Released in 2009 on her whimsically titled LP, The Cricket's Orchestra,"Poor" was never released as a single, but if you're a regular shopper at any number of retail outlets (Kroger, Meijer, Target, et al) there's a good chance you've heard it since it's in the regular rotation of piped in music at any number of big box retailers. I read a review of the album, and the reviewer said it was obvious that her label was trying to turn her into the next Norah Jones which, surprisingly enough, wasn't all that obvious to me. If I had to compare Smith, I'd say she's more like Rickie Lee Jones' extremely dorky younger sister....
Opening with what I think is an acoustic guitar (though it could be any of a number of stringed instruments) wherein a single note is rhythmically plucked again and again, "Poor" becomes a jazzy pop (or is it a poppy jazz?) once Smith begins her vocals, which tells the the tale of a woman telling her lover not to sweat having no money because they've got each other. Keeping in mind that emaycee has noted often that he loves him some female vocalists, Smith's voice has a whimsical quality to it that drives the song--it's a syrupy sweet love ballad, but because of the song's sparseness and Smith's subtle sense of humor it doesn't become saccharine sweet. Smith has a fine way of turning a phrase, and the song closes with a whimsical (it's late and I'm tired and I'm not checking the online thesaurus for synonyms for whimsical--the song is whimsical, goddamn it, and that's all there is to it) la da da da over the wah wah wah of a whimsical (arghhh) trumpet. It's probably not for everyone, but I've fallen in love with it over the past couple of years and it never fails to bring a smile, and makes for a fine if quirky addition to the annals of Friday Night Jukebox.
Lyric Sheet: "I don't need no mansion home/to get lost inside/there's no room to feel all alone/with you by my side..."
With another upset win this week (Wisconsin) Democratic enthusiasm and confidence continues to grow for the elections this November. I, however, after the 2016 election fiasco (Hillary was a lock for President, Dems were going to win back the Senate) have pretty much become the Doubting Thomas of Democrats: I'll believe we're going to win when we actually win the race. The poll numbers all too often look much better for us than the actual result, and conversely, republican poll numbers seem to look worse than they actually turn out to be.
Still...
After the past couple of elections, I have begun to believe that Iowa, for Democrats, is going the way of Missouri. Joni Ernst absolutely crushed Bruce Braley in the 2014 Iowa Senate race, we pretty much get our clocks cleaned in three out of the four U.S. Rep races, and Donald Trump won easily over Hillary Clinton--the math just doesn't look good. We're getting beat and we're getting beat badly.
Cue, however, to this week. Both of their Senators, Joni Ernst and Chuck Grassley, had townhalls in their home state this week...and they both went about as badly as they possibly could--in republican friendly rural areas. Ernst sounded Palinesque as she tried to explain Trumps racist comments about shithole countries by noting that Norway was close to Russia. She pretty much got laughed out of the room. Grassley kept trying to deflect questions about Trump's competency which his constituents were having no part of, and even worse, when asked if he would promise not to cut Social Security or Medicare, Grassley refused. Can't you just see his next opponent already filming the political ads for that colossal mistake?
Who knows? Maybe there is something magical in Iowa's cornfields that brings the dead back to life to play ball....
I was one of about three people who watched the Showtime series, Roadies, which I watched as much for the music as I did for the show itself. Each week I'd watch with a notebook in hand and write down any songs (of which there were usually several) from each episode that I wanted to check out later. Near the end of its one and only season, one of the characters was asked what his favorite song of all time was, and he replied, "It's a little tune called 'Willin'' by Little Feat." I wrote the song in my notebook and at show's end went to Spotify and gave it a listen. About ten seconds in I said to myself, "I'm going to love this song for the rest of my life." I may have been a little late to the party, but I've been making up for lost time over the past couple of years.
Formed in 1969 in L.A. by Lowell George and Bill Payne, Little Feat has had a career that's hard to recap in a paragraph or two. Their first two albums were critically acclaimed and they developed a fine reputation as a live band, but had little commercial success and disbanded. A couple of years later they reformed, continued to be critically acclaimed, had a bunch of dissension, and disbanded again. Sadly, Lowell George passed away in 1979, from a heart attack at the all too young age of 34. The band would reunite again, had some commercial success in the late eighties which brought their older work to a new audience, and have continued to record and tour, in several different incarnations, to this day. All told, the band has released 16 studio albums, countless live records, and the respect they have garnered from their peers through the years is phenomenal--it'd be easier to find bands who haven't covered a Little Feat song than ones who have.
The band's name, by the way, comes from A) a comment about George's "little feet," and B) the spelling of "Feat" being a tribute to the Beatles.
"Willin'" has been released in a couple of different versions, but the one I'm familiar with is the version from their Sailin' ShoesLP in 1972. The song was originally written by George when he was in Frank Zappa's back up band, The Mothers of Invention, and if George is to be believed, led to him being kicked out of the band due to its drug references (Zappa was notoriously anti-drugs). While the song was not released as a single, it has become Little Feat's signature song, and has been covered by numerous artists, including Linda Ronstadt, Tom Petty, Jackson Browne, and the infamous cast of Roadies, among many others.
The song itself is a sparse ode to life on the road, specifically that of a trucker. It features some nice acoustic guitar, some nice slide guitar, a nice piano interlude, and some stark, yet heartfelt vocals from Lowell George. It's a song about the human spirit, in both its defiance and its frailty--believe me, the only thing I know about truck drivers is how to cuss them out when they get in my way while I'm weaving through traffic. But when you listen to this song, it's hard not to admire the driver's steadfastness in the face of all his losses--and like him, to be willin' to keep movin'....
Fun Fact: Despite their rather odd names, the cities noted in the chorus all actually exist. Tucumcari (Pop. 14,000+) is in New Mexico, Tehachapi (Pop. 2600+) is in California, and Tonapah (Pop. 5300+) is in Nevada. Amazingly enough, Tucson (Pop. Lots of Arizonans) is still located in Arizona.
Lyric Sheet: "And I've been kicked by the wind/Robbed by the sleet/Had my head stoved in/But I'm still on my feet..."
With Dianne Feinstein's release of the GPS fusion transcripts this week it is becoming increasingly obvious that republicans are trying to do everything they can to undermine American democracy and are flirting with, if not actually guilty of, treason.
And when the republican temple comes tumbling down, it's important that not just Donald Trump be removed from office, but also all of those who undermined the Russian collusion investigations--from Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan to Devin Nunes and Chuck Grassley--are removed from office as well. They have all obfuscated, diverted, and outright lied about investigations that are proving more and more each day that a hostile nation colluded with the Trump campaign to influence the 2016 election.
After Donald Trump's comments yesterday referring to Haiti, El Salvador, and all African nations as "shithole countries," a number of folks in the national media finally seemed to realize what millions of us on the left have been pointing out since Trump declared his candidacy: Donald Trump is a racist.
But you know who else is racist?
The people who voted for him.
And it would be nice if the media stopped apologizing for them and called them out, too.
When Trump toadie Stephen Miller refused to answer any substantive questions on CNN concerning the allegations in Michael Wolff's book, Fire and Fury, about the towering inferno that is the Trump administration,host Jake Tapper had finally had enough and cut Miller short, saying, "And I think I've wasted enough of my viewers' time."
Thank Christ--the time for pretending that Trump remotely resembles anything close to normal is long past. The man is an abomination, a psychopathic liar who is completely unfit to shine shoes in the White House, let alone be President. He is an embarrassment to everything the United States of America has ever stood for.
Now if only we could get the mainstream media to put a muzzle on Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan and their gaggle of thieves, all of whom have sold out their country for a few dollars more.
Am I the only one who sees the irony in Mike Pence saying the Trump administration will support the Iranian people in their struggle for economic justice against the theocrats who rule Iran, when Pence was put in place by the DeVos and Prince families to...turn America into a theocracy where we'll be ruled by wealthy religious people who expect us to praise the Lord and starve?
You cannot make this shit up--these people know no shame.
"My God is rock and roll. It's an obscure power that can change your life. The most important part of my religion is to play guitar."--Lewis Allan Reed
I'm not an aficionado of live recordings. While there have been a handful worth listening to (Barenaked Ladies' "Brian Wilson," Kiss' "Rock and Roll All Nite," Cheap Trick's "I Want You to Want Me," Jackson Browne's Running on Empty, Springsteen's Live 1975-1985), most live recordings pale dramatically compared to the original. But Lou Reed's "Coney Island Baby" recording from his Live: Take No Prisoners LP is a once in a lifetime phenomenon, and becomes a song that in its live version takes on a new persona, and comes as close to a spiritual experience as I've ever had in life. I shit you not--when I die (hopefully many years hence) I hope the live version of "Coney Island Baby" will be the background music as the lights fade to black.
I wrote about Lou Reed's "Street Hassle" in FNJ #38, and I begged off trying to write a synopsis of his career due to its complexity and wizardry--which I'll do again here, though I will note that this week Reed becomes a two time honoree here on Friday Night Jukebox. Rock and Roll Hall of Fame? Pshaw--he's got the emaycee seal of approval...twice.
"Coney Island Baby" was released in 1976 on Reed's incredibly aptly titledConey Island Baby album. The lyrics were from a poem, "The Coach and Glory of Love," which he had published in 1971 in The Harvard Advocate: Journal of Fiction and Poetry (not a bad place to get a start). While the album version isn't as grandiose as the live version, through the years I've developed a sneaking kindness for the original--its deadpan cool has a charm of its own.
Fun Fact: The Coney Island baby of the song was Reed's lover at the time, a trans woman named Rachel. Ooh la la!
I could tell you how Reed opens the song with a monologue about being a high school football player. Or I could tell you how the song is a symphony of sorts, how the instruments mesh so well that you can't even really tell--well except the triumphant piano--which ones are playing. Or I could tell you about the backing vocalists who turn the song into a religious experience--the gospel according to Lou Reed. I could tell you about Reed's prowess with the written word or the power of his vocals. And I could tell you how after the three minute mark or so, Reed and his band take the song to another level, where the song literally turns you into Saul on the Road to Damascus, but for rock and roll, not God. But all you need to know is that Lou Reed, Lou Reed the cynical purveyor of the dark underbelly of human nature, is telling us all that the glory of love just might see us all through, and despite your doubts, yes, it could happen to you.
And in the end, whether it's a spouse or a significant other, or the girl two seats up in History 101 or the boy who jogs for the cross country team past your door, your children or your parents, your best friend or even your dog or cat, isn't it the glory of love that makes this crazy roller coaster ride through the Hotel Hades worth it?
Can I get an amen, brothers and sisters?
Lyric Sheet: "But remember the princess who lived on the hill/Who loved you even though she knew you was wrong/And right now she might just come shining through/And the glory of love, the glory of love..."
The average American gets paid just enough so he doesn't quit his job, and works just hard enough so he doesn't get fired.
"When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying the cross." Source unknown
Uncle emaycee Wants You For the Coming Class War! Enlist today....
Capitalism: Give a man a fish, feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you can exploit his labor, become filthy rich, and keep the poor bastard living paycheck to paycheck for the rest of his life.
