A beautiful bridge, fully built, ready to open, much needed and long awaited, now sits unused because the owner of the older, smaller, more run down toll bridge nearby bribed the president to stop it from opening.
So Trump got paid AND got a chance to punish both Canada and Detroit.
.@Eminem: I don't think anyone wants an America where people are worried about retribution of what people will do if you make your opinion known. I think Vice President Harris supports a future for this country where these freedoms and many others will be protected and upheld pic.twitter.com/tVVHO00ANn
This week's tune was the last song on the last studio album this week's band recorded before disbanding. It was a lovely way to go....
I wrote about the White Stripes in Jukebox, Vol. CXVI(seven--seven!--years ago), and for many years it was the second least viewed music post I ever wrote (not enough cool kids reading emaycee's blog!). God only knows why it was so low for such a killer band, but over the past couple of years its page views have leapt up to respectable (for a half-assed blog written by an amateur musicologist). Nothing much to add as the band remains happily defunct, though I would like to note that the White Stripes were nominated for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in their first year of eligibility (2023) and were not inducted. To which I can only say: What. The. Fuck?
"Effect and Cause" was not released as a single (should have been!), though not from a lack of trying as the band released four singles from the rather surprisingly named Icky Thump. The album debuted at number two on the Billboard 200, making it the highest charting in America of their career. However, it debuted at number one in Great Britain (so many cool kids in the U.K. need to be reading emaycee's blog!).
Fun Fact: The album got its title from an exclamation of surprise in Lancashire (a county in northern England where Jack White's second wife is from, who is said to have used the exclamation): ecky thump. The band claims to have changed it to icky to make it more appealing to Americans, but there were also copyright concerns as it gained fame from being used in a British TV comedy, The Goodies.
"Effect and Cause" is a testament to how much Jack and Meg White could do with so little. Featuring nothing more than a metallic acoustic guitar and some snappy drums, Jack gives an inspired vocal performance that is the embodiment of an all-knowing smart ass. The lyrics are comprised of clever turns of phrase and plays on cliches that stream forth like a rollicking preacher's sermon, as the protagonist commiserates over a lost lover. Every time I hear this song it calls to mind classic rock from the seventies, and I'm sure that if it had been released in that decade it would have been a staple on every AOR FM station in America. Alas, it wasn't, and it's left to me to educate pop music fans on its wonder--which, come to think of it, isn't a bad calling at all....
Lyric Sheet: "Well I ain't saying I'm innocent, in fact the reverse/But if you're headed to the grave, you don't blame the hearse/You're like a little girl yellin' at her brother 'cause you lost his ball..."
Oddly enough, my main recollection of this week's tune isn't the first time I heard it or a TV show or a movie where it suddenly struck me how great it was. Rather, it's that after my first marriage ended the gentleman who lived above me in the apartment I rented after moving out used to crank the volume to ten on his stereo and blare the song at 5:00 AMevery single morning. Fortunately for me, I wasn't sleeping much during that time in my life, and he moved out within a few months...lest there might have been a good chance the tune didn't make it to a blog post (other than most hated songs).
The Temptations started in the mid-fifties with various line-ups in various local bands before settling in my current home, Detroit, Michigan. In 1961 they had a successful audition with one Berry Gordy and joined his Motown label. They actually had some trouble in their early years having hit songs, and were jokingly called "The Hitless Temptations" by their label mates. Eventually their silky smooth vocals and harmonies, as well as their finely choreographed movements kick started their hit making abilities and they went on to become one of Motown's most successful groups and earned a spot in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1989. They are often credited with being the progenitor of psychedelic soul (their song "Cloud Nine" is considered the first), which near as I can tell was a very short-lived, if incredibly successful, movement. The Temptations were the first Motown act to win a Grammy, and totaled three for their career. In all, the Temptations released 43 studio albums (four top tens on the Billboard 200, and a stunning 14 #1's on the R & B chart), and 109 singles, enjoying four number one hits on the Billboard Hot 100. The Temptations continue to perform sixty years after their start--twenty-five different men have been members of the Temptations at one time or another. Sadly, twelve of those men have gone to the great Motown Revue in the sky, a number of them at far too young of an age.
"Papa Was a Rolling Stone" was released in 1972 on their album All Directions. The album version runs almost twelve minutes, and was listed at #169 on Rolling Stone's list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All-Time. The single version was just shy of seven minutes, and became the last #1 hit and top 40 hit the Temptations would have on the pop charts.
Fun Fact: The Temptations did not want to record or release "Papa Was a Rolling Stone" fearing it would be a flop. Funny how sometimes things work out....
The surprising thing about my choice this week is that a guy who adores a good pop song...didn't choose "My Girl" or "Just My Imagination" from the pantheon of Temptations' songs. But there's a maturity to this one, a band being pushed (successfully) past its comfort zone and creating an incredible piece of music. Some of the credit goes to producer Norman Whitfield for the incredible instrumentation and using four different singers (each representing a different child of the father noted in the title), but the Temptations had to execute those vocals to capture the song's nuances, and execute they did. It's a poignant and deft portrait of a man who didn't live up to his fatherly responsibilities, and of the heartbreak of the children he left behind. A masterwork from a band at the height of its powers.
Lyric Sheet: "Folks say Papa was never much on thinking/Spent most of his time chasing women and drinking/Mama I'm depending on you/To tell me the truth..."
Enjoy:
476,000 Dead Americans Because of Donald Trump's Incompetence
Yesterday, when two republican Wayne County Board of Canvassers (William Hartmann and Monica Palmer) refused to certify the votes of Black Americans in Detroit, the outrage from Michigan voters was so quick and so overwhelming that within hours they reversed themselves and certified the votes. Keep in mind that Hartmann and Palmer were questioning a couple hundred votes (Trump lost Wayne County by more than 300,000 votes), and both made it perfectly clear that they were happy to certify white votes, just not black votes.
After the Constitutional Convention Benjamin Franklin was asked what kind of government had been created for America and Franklin famously responded, "A republic, if you can keep it." If we do indeed save our Democracy from Donald Trump and his minions, I have no doubt that the actions of Michigan Democrats yesterday to cry foul and call for our better angels to guide us will be taught ages hence to our school children as an important moment in the salvaging of our great nation.
Ned Staebler, a Democratic activist and businessman, gave an impassioned speech that--and I say this with all due respect to hyperbole--may go down with Patrick Henry's "Give me liberty or give me death" speech as one of the most important and courageous in our history:
In the end, republicans like to talk about heroes, but Democrats actually become them and in so doing, come to represent the moral center that has held us together for 144 years.
256,000+ Dead Americans Because of Donald Trump's Incompetence
Take a good look at the young woman in the picture above these words. Her name is Skylar Herbert, and she was the first child to die in Michigan from the coronavirus. She was five years old. Her parents are first responders.
A conservative guess would be that she lost seventy years of life. Her parents lost countless years of the unbridled joy she would have brought them. Her mother and father's lives have been irreparably worsened. Their world will never be the same because of the incompetence of Donald Trump and his administration.
Slylar Herbert is what Donald Trump, the republican party, Fox News, and all the "freedom" protesters are willing to sacrifice to re-elect Donald Trump and keep Corporate America, Wall Street, the DeVos family, and the Koch family happy.
"If we embrace a far-left agenda, they're gonna say we're a bunch of crazy Socialists.
If we embrace a Conservative agenda...they're gonna say we're a bunch of crazy Socialists."
That was South Bend, IN mayor and 2020 Democratic Presidential hopeful Pete Buttigieg at this week's debate amongst the 20 some odd Democratic candidates vying to be the one to send Donald Trump back to whatever sewer it was he crawled out of in New York. Of all the points made by the all the candidates in the four debates thus far, this is far and away the most important.
Only four or five of those candidates will be left standing after Iowa and New Hampshire, and a year from now there will be only one. Whoever that candidate may be, it is vital, as Mayor Buttigieg has implied above, that he or she run focusing on our agenda and not on theirs.
Ours is the only one that matters--running a republican lite campaign (or on promises of some kind of bipartisan bullshit) is a sure way to depress Democratic turnout and, even worse, not give Independent voters a reason to vote for us. And it's also one sure way to give Donald Trump another four years to destroy everything America is and will be.
There's a sculpture of a fist in downtown Detroit, and it commemorates Detroit native and all-time great boxer Joe Louis beating Germany's Max Schmeling in their second meeting. Louis lost their first fight on a twelfth round knockout, and Adolph Hitler and the rest of Nazi Germany used it as a boast of the superiority of the white race...until Louis decimated Schmeling in the rematch with a tremendous first round knockout, and became one of America's first African-American heroes. It is said that the fist points toward Canada because it is a symbol of America fighting for Democracy outside its borders.
I note this because Donald Trump said this week that he would welcome a foreign adversary's help again in 2020 and would feel no obligation to report such aid to the FBI. While Trump kinda/sorta walked his statements back later in the week, he had all the sincerity of a man dealing three card monte. One would suppose that this would be enough for Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi to say enough is enough and open impeachment hearings as Trump stated he would be happy to cheat again in order to win another four years in office. Nope--Pelosi still thinks slow and steady will win the race, except for the fact that all of her and her leadership team's political calculations will fall to rot if Trump happily cheats his way to a second term.
Seventy-five years ago America gave all it had to save Democracy for the world. It is time for Nancy Pelosi to do the same.
Choosing a song from Stevie Wonder's vast (and excellent) catalog of songs to be featured here on FNJ is a bit like looking at a counter full of candy bars when you have the munchies--you finally end up choosing one because you know that eventually you'll be hungry again and you can choose another candy bar later. I'll be amazed if another of his songs isn't featured again somewhere down the road...says the man who wrote posts about 207 songs before finally getting to the inimitable Stevie Wonder.
Writing a one paragraph synopsis of Stevie Wonder's career is a tall task...but I'm going to attempt it anyhow. Starting out in my adopted home of Detroit, Wonder signed his first music contract when he was eleven years old with Motown. Wonder's musical success started slowly as he didn't have his first hit until he was all of thirteen ("Fingertips"--it also made him the youngest person to top the Billboard Hot 100). Wonder added more hit singles throughout the sixties, before coming into his own in the seventies. By the time he was twenty-five, Wonder had won two Grammys for album of the year, and would go on to win three album of the year Grammys in four years. After the seventies, Wonder settled into a more commercial groove, and while he never again reached the artistic success of his earlier works, he sold a shitload of records. Overall, Wonder has released 26 LPs, sold over 100 million records, three of which hit #1 on the Billboard charts, and ten of which hit the top five. He's had ten number one singles and thirty which hit the top 40. He's won twenty-five Grammy Awards (you read that right, 25--the most for any single artist in Grammy history), won an Academy Award for best song, been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, been inducted into the Songwriter's Hall of Fame, and been given an honorary music degree by Yale. He's also been a political activist, fighting against racism, hunger, AIDs, and war, as well as championing Nelson Mandela when it wasn't popular to champion him, and also performed at Barack Obama's first inauguration. Wonder is also known for collaborating with too many artist to count (he's a multi-instrumentalist, and his harmonica playing has been featured on numerous songs). Did I mention that he's been blind since shortly after his birth? Taken as a whole, that's a legacy to end all legacies.
Fun Fact: Wonder was instrumental (so to speak) in establishing Martin Luther King's birthday as a national holiday--he wrote the song "Happy Birthday" to popularize the campaign and also staged a rally which helped to bring in a petition with over six million signatures in support of making King's birthday a national holiday.
"If You Really Love Me" was released in 1971 on the album Where I'm Coming From. It would eventually reach #8 (with a bullet!) on the Billboard Hot 100. Wonder wrote the song with his first wife Syreeta Wright, and played piano, synthesizer, and drums on the song.
One of the reasons I chose this week's tune (other than it's one of my favorites of his) is that I like how Wonder opens with the catchy as all hell chorus and then moves into the considerably slower, almost ballad-like stanzas--it's a fine juxtaposition of the two styles. As I did my half-assed research for this week's tune, I noticed that the album "If You Really Love Me" came from was the last of Wonder's career before Motown turned control of his work over to Wonder himself, and in a lot of ways you can see in this song what was to come in his seventies work over the next few years--Wonder was really stretching out a little bit, seeing just what he could do with his music. I also chose it because there's a joyousness, a playfulness, to the song that is a hallmark of Wonder's work--he did some great socially conscious songs through the years, but Wonder's genius has always been that he could do it with some of the greatest pop music sensibilities of any artist I can think of. I would be remiss if I didn't note that the song has some fine horn work from Motown's in house band, the Funk Brothers, and that Wonder's wife at the time also provided some fine backing vocals. All in all, it's a hell of pop tune from one of the greatest practitioners of pop this country has ever seen--and a man with the heart of a lion.
Lyric Sheet: "First the feeling's alright/Then it's gone from sight/So I'm taking out this time to say.../Oh, if you really love me won't you tell me..."
It's back to my adopted home city for another in a long line of bands from the Motor City who have put their stamp on pop music.
The Romantics formed in 1977 right here in Detroit, Michigan, and played their first show on Valentine's Day opening for the New MC5 (not to be confused with the old MC5, who could really kick out the jams, motherfuckers!). Over the next decade they would have a fair amount of success, especially in 1983 when they had a top 20 album and a top five single (the not particularly good, "Talking in Your Sleep"--there was a lot of hit and miss in the new wave era). While they won't be entering the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame any time soon, they were voted into the Michigan Rock and Roll Legends Hall of Fame in 2011 (shit you not, had absolutely no clue such a place existed and I've lived in Michigan for 17 years now). Through the years they have released 6 LPs (the last in 2003), two EPs, and one live album, and have toured regularly. While they have appeared in somewhere near a million different incarnations (only a slight exaggeration) since their inception, thanks to two hit singles they are still together and performing to this day. I've said it before and I'll say it again, playing music for a living can be a great gig with a little luck and a knack for writing an arresting tune.
"What I Like About You" was the first single released from their rather inventively named debut album The Romantics in 1980 (egads, has it been that long?). The song would go on to reach #49 (with a bullet!) on the Billboard Hot 100, though it would reach #2 on the Australian charts (so many cool kids in Australia...). The song would actually become a much bigger part of the pop music lexicon in the late 80's when it was used as the background music for a series of Budweiser commercials. As some famous pop singer once said, whatever gets you through the night....
"What I Like About You" is the type of song that music critics probably hate and fans of pop music anthems adore. It's little more than a I'm Cray-Cray-Crazy For You Baby song, but it is otherworldly catchy and absolutely chock full of musical goodies. Right from the beginning with the in unison screaming of "Hey" (featured throughout) and the "Uh-uhs" through the hand claps, and all of it backed by some fine jangly guitars. There's a nice instrumental break in the middle that closes with some hyperkinetic harmonica (and emaycee always loves him some harmonica), before the band breaks into the final verse, closing with the lead singer whispering "That's what I like about you" repeatedly before the hand claps return to bring us to the end. And once again all the little pieces come together to make an unforgettable single for a pop lovin' doofus like me.
Lyric Sheet: "What I like about you/You keep me warm at night/Never wanna let you go/Know you make me feel all right, yeah..."
This week's tune was released just a short while after I began managing my first Camelot Music store, and not only did it teach me that the business end of music was often forgettable, but it also taught me that music artists can make some serious magic when they combine the best of pop with the best of soul. The first lesson probably explains why I never made it to Executive Vice President (there was a lot more to it than that...), while the second led me to many a fine R and B tune over the course of my life.
William "Smokey" Robinson, Jr. has been in the music business longer than I've been alive. Starting out in my adopted hometown of Detroit, Michigan in 1955, Robinson began making music when he was still in high school with The Five Chimes, who eventually became the much better known the Miracles. In 1957 Robinson met one Berry Gordy, who helped him and the Miracles release their first single ("Got a Job"), and it would lead to one hell of a collaboration. Between 1960 and 1970, Smokey Robinson and the Miracles would release 26 singles that reached the top 40 (including Motown's first million selling record, "Shop Around"). When Robinson wasn't writing songs for the Miracles he kept plenty busy writing hit songs for other Motown artists--"My Guy" for Mary Wells, "My Girl" for the Temptations, and "I'll Be Doggone" for Marvin Gaye, among many others. In the early 1970's Robinson departed the Miracles to focus on his duties as VP of Motown, but eventually returned to music and went solo, and while not quite having the success he did with the Miracles, did pretty darn well for himself (including winning his only Grammy Award). He last released an album in 2014 (the obligatory--these days--duet album) which reached #12 on the Billboard 200. Robinson was elected into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987 (though, oddly, the Miracles weren't until 2012), and also elected into the Songwriter's Hall of Fame in 1989.
"Being with You" was released in 1981 on his appropriately enough entitled LP,Being With You. It would go on to reach #2 (with a bullet!) on the Billboard Hot 100. Surprisingly, for all the hits Robinson has had throughout his career, he's only had one #1 single--the classic "Tears of a Clown."
Fun Fact: Robinson got his nickname from a favorite uncle who used to take him to cowboy movies (which Robinson loved) when he was a child. The uncle wanted to give him a cowboy name and came up with "Smokey Joe." Eventually Robinson dropped the Joe and just became Smokey.
Somewhat like last week's (yesterday's?) tune, there's a subtlety to "Being with You" that's easy to miss at first listen. With Robinson's silky smooth vocals and a dreamy melody, one could easily mistake the song for a walking on the beach, holding hands with the wind in our hair kind of love ballad. Alas, this one's about a man whose friends are warning him about the woman he's crazy about, but he doesn't care because he likes being with her (thematically, it's somewhat similar to Wilson Pickett's "When a Man Loves a Woman"), and he's willing to give them up rather than lose her. Robinson shows a maturity as a songwriter, though, as the protagonist does wonder whether he's been made blind by love, and if he's being a fool. There's some nice saxophone work throughout, Robinson coos wondrously in the background (one could probably write a post just about Robinson's vocals--a gift from the gods of music), and even some twenty-six years into his career, he can still write a tune that you'll be singing and humming for days. While Robinson has had any number of singles that could be called classics, this one is a nice reminder that although artists get older, they can still make a little magic.
Lyric Sheet: "Or can it be, that like love I am blind?/Do I want it so much 'til it's all in my mind?"
For the umpteenth time here in 2018, FNJ will be featuring another tune from the 70's--while I'll never be one of those people who claims they don't make music like they used to (sure they do--you just don't have the time you once did to hunt it all down), there was certainly something special about the music of the 70's (which, not coincidentally, could also have a lot to do with the 70's being the time of my coming of age).
The Spinners formed in 1954 in my adopted home of Detroit, Michigan and began their careers on Gordon Berry's dream, Motown. They wouldn't have their first hit until 1961, their second until 1965, and shortly after their third ("It's a Shame"--another great cut, penned by one Stevland Morris) they would move on to Atlantic Records and under the guidance of producer Thom Bell would shoot into the stratosphere of seventies soul groups. Between 1972 and 1980, the Spinners would have 7 top ten singles (including a #1 with Dionne Warwick, "Then Came You"--again, another great cut), and 16 singles total in the Billboard Hot 100. Unfortunately, after 1980 the Spinners commercial success fizzled out, and they released the last of their 18 albums in 1989, and their last single to chart was in 1995. Though only one original member is still with us, the Spinners remain a huge draw on the oldies circuit and continue performing to this day. In one of pop music's greatest travesties, the Spinners, though nominated in 2015, have yet to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame--seriously, Bon Jovi and Kiss are in, but not the Spinners? WTF?
Released in 1975 on their Pick of the Litter LP, "Games People Play" (also referenced as "They Just Can't Stop It (Games People Play)" though God only knows why since it's considerably longer and not what the song was originally called upon its release) would go on to reach #5 (with a bullet!) on the Billboard Hot 100.
Fun Fact: "Games People Play" was also a #1 hit on the Billboard R & B chart--and it immediately followed FNJ #170, Natalie Cole's "This Will Be (An Everlasting Love)." A good couple of weeks for a child of the 70's....
I could tell you that "Games People Play" features some rock solid piano and horn playing, as well as a hint of electric guitar. I could also tell you it's a song about being a little blue about the nature of your fellow beings, and finding a face in the crowd that gives just a little hope. And I could tell you about the wonderful interplay of the vocals of Bobby Smith, Pervis Jackson, and backup band singer Evette Benton. But the piece de la resistance, the part that makes it a classic instead of just a great song, is the interlude that begins with Jackson's magical bass vocals that begins "12:45...." This is how great it is: Jackson earned the nickname "Mr. 12:45" for his role in the interlude and he only sings four lines. My words don't do it justice, but trust me "Games People Play" is a wondrous soul single from a wondrous decade for soul singles.
Rap Sheet: "12:45/Headed for the subway home/I took my time/'Cause I felt so all alone/Not far away/I heard a funny sound took a look around, and I/Could see her face/Smiling as she came, calling out my name..."
We'll spend another week in pop heaven as FNJ features a song by an artist who hails from my adopted home--and one who offers proof that Michigan has produced many a talented musician, and not just twits like Kid Rock and Ted Nugent.
I recently read someone who said that if we lived in a just world, Marshall Crenshaw would rule the airwaves and I nodded in agreement. After spending his formative years here in the suburbs of Detroit, Crenshaw began his career as an understudy playing John Lennon in Beatlemania. After eventually taking over the role and touring the country, Crenshaw left the troupe and formed a band in New York City and began his solo career in earnest. In 1982 Crenshaw released his debut album and first single to critical acclaim--both would go on to be the most commercially successful of his career, though they were moderate sellers at best. Crenshaw has gone on to release nine more albums, six EPs, wrote a book about rock and roll in the movies, and still plays 40-50 shows a year, most within driving distance of his home. He's known for playing a mean guitar, too.
Every now and again you'll hear a song for the first time and think "Holy shit, what was that?" Invariably, it's a song you'll love for the rest of your life--and such was the case with "Someday, Someway" for me. Released as the initial single from his very aptly titled first album, Marshall Crenshaw, it garnered enough airplay and sales to reach #36 (with a bullet!) on the Billboard Hot 100. Opening with what a friend of mine called jangly guitars (if there was anything the 80's was good at, it was jangly guitars), Crenshaw forays into a power pop plea to the love of his life to tell him what's making her so sad--alas she won't and Creshaw is left to hope that someday, someway he'll understand and be able to return the love she has given to him. Throughout, "Someday, Someway" swings and sways, a little rockabilly, and is given a pop sheen through Crenshaw's sincere vocals, power drumming (provided by Crenshaw's brother Robert), and a melody that I'm sure Jesus Christ himself would be humming for days if he'd ever heard it. It's primal pop for people who worship at the altar of rock and roll....
Fun Fact: Crenshaw was often compared (favorably) to Buddy Holly early in his career, and eventually would play Holly in the movie La Bamba. Cool!
Lyric Sheet: "Now after all you've done for me/All I really want to do/Is take the love you brought my way/And give it all right back to you...."
While there have been quite a few songs since the turn of the century that I've quite enjoyed, I'd be hard pressed to remember one that I enjoyed more than I've enjoyed this week's tune.
And to those who say it sounds like a White Stripes tune (not surprisingly, as Jack White sings lead vocals and plays lead guitar), I counter with...ain't nothin' wrong with that.
The seeds of the Raconteurs were formed in Nashville in 2005 when old friends Jack White and Brendan Benson got together and wrote "Steady, As She Goes." Later that year they were joined by Jack Lawrence and Patrick Keeler of Detroit band The Greenhornes (not familiar) in the Motor City and between their full-time gigs managed to record an album's worth of tunes. They followed with a tour (including being an opening act for Nobel Prize laureate, Bob Dylan), and another album in 2008. They have reunited here and there since, and in 2014 got together and started on another album but it remains uncompleted and it's uncertain whether they will return as a foursome. Nonetheless, all four continue to make and play music successfully for a living and one supposes it's hard to complain much about that.
Released on their Broken Boy SoldiersLP in 2006, "Steady, As She Goes" would go on to be a minor hit here in the states (#54--with a bullet!--on The Billboard Hot 100), but do considerably better in Canada (#3) and the UK (#4), probably because they're so much cooler than we are. Both the album and the single would earn the Raconteurs Grammy nominations, and the song ended up on numerous year end best of compilations for 2006.
Starting with an ominous drum count, "Steady, As She Goes" moves into a funky ass bass line which sounds very much borrowed from Joe Jackson's "Is She Really Going Out With Him?" (what the hell--if you're going to borrow, might as well be from a good one), before running headlong into some bitchin' guitar work from Jack White, a staccato scratch of the strings that plays well with the bass. The chorus moves into power chord heaven with some great backing vocals from Brendan Benson (I don't know a lot of Benson's solo work, but from what I've heard, despite the comparisons to the White Stripes, Benson's influence can definitely be heard in the chorus--for those not in the know, Benson's "What" is well worth a listen). You may notice I've stayed away from the song's lyrics--that's partly intentional as the song seems to me to be the chiding of an acquaintance who may have married more for stability than love and I'm pretty sure there have been people married for worse reasons, but what the hell do I know. Anyway, it all adds up to a power pop dream of a song, with guitar, bass, and drums becoming so much more than the sum of their parts, and a catchy as all hell chorus that'll (thankfully) stay with you for days.
Lyric Sheet: "But no matter what you do, you'll always feel as though you tripped and fell/So steady as she goes...."
Today we're going to feature the best 1970's band not to actually record in the 1970's....
Another in a long line of artists that I was introduced to by my daughter (she sent me a copy of their album White Blood Cellsand after hearing "Fell in Love with a Girl" I fell in love with The White Stripes), The White Stripes are arguably the best band rock and roll has seen in the last twenty years. From their beginning in my adoptive home of Detroit, Michigan in 1997, Jack White and Meg White (they claimed to be siblings but were actually married from 1996-2000) literally set the pop music world on its ear. Though they only released six albums, two of them ended up on Rolling Stone's list of "The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time." They were critical and fan favorites, sold several million records, won six Grammy Awards, and were widely regarded as an exceptional live band. The weight of fame eventually became too much for the very introverted Meg White, and they went their separate ways in 2011--but they had a hell of a ride for fourteen years.
Fun Fact: The White Stripes got their name not only from Meg White's last name (Jack Gills took his wife's name when they got married), but also from the fact that Meg really liked peppermint candies. Fascinating, my God...
Released on what is widely considered their best album, Elephant(and I wouldn't disagree) in 2003, "Ball and Biscuit" is most amazing to me for being the type of song I usually hate: it's long, it has a lot of guitar solos, it's bluesy, and it's about drugs. And yet I adore it--and such is the magic of The White Stripes. Clocking in at a little over seven minutes, "Ball and Biscuit" is an amalgamation of Jack White's otherworldly guitar playing (needless to say, he's one of my all time favorite guitarists), Meg White's understated but evocative drumming, and Jack White's matter of fact yet yearning, cocksure yet vulnerable, vocals. It's the love song of a drug addled man, sung to an unimpressed drug addled woman, and in the hands of The White Stripes, it's a reminder of just how soul ravaging the blues can be.
Lyric Sheet: "It's quite possible that I'm your third man, girl/But it's a fact that I'm the seventh son..."
So I'm driving home from work yesterday on (Eminem's famed) 8 Mile Road, stuck at a red light behind a semi, wall to wall cars, and feeling pretty pissed about all the other assholes who are in my way, when I look to my right and I see a sign in big, bold, red letters: Oumy's African Braiding and...Tax Services.
How cool is that? I can stop in and while I'm getting my weave I can have my taxes done, too.
You know, our conservative friends talk about making America great again but if you ask me, Oumy's is proof that we still are.
The above is a picture from a school in Detroit. Yes, those are mushrooms growing through the floor.
You know what scares me most about this picture? The complete and utter lack of caring that it is the result of. And make no mistake, this is what the republican party thinks those students who aren't trust fund babies are worthy of. They have sapped democracy in Michigan with their appointments of Emergency Managers who are only accountable to a governor who is only accountable to the wealthy few that control his puppet strings.
Oh, well, right? I mean as long as we train those kids well enough to be shelf stockers at Wal-Mart, it's all good, isn't it?
Republicans may not give a shit only about Detroit city schools now, but it's only a matter of time before they don't give a shit about your nice middle class schools, either.
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.
