Saturday, October 9, 2010: Louis Gordon - This Air

Saturday songs are a stuggle.

Somedays I just want to crank up the volume, wake the neighbours, rattle the dishes and scream out loud, "Thank God It's The Weekend!"

But then, other days I'll want more of a reflective time, something not too catatonic, but nothing too jarring. You just want to let the coffee settle in the French press, lay on the sofa and relax.

Exhale.

Here's a song for everyone who needs to exhale this Saturday.

Enjoy.

Friday, October 8, 2010: The Gaslight Anthem - American Slang

What is it about New Jersey?

From The Misfits of Lodi to Hoboken native Frank Sinatra, Newark's own Whitney Houston, Frankie Vallie and Queen Latifa, Perth Amboy born and Sayreville raised John Francis Bongiovi (you'd have changed your name too), Count Basie hailing from from Red Bank, and Ricky Nelson hailing from the township of Teaneck, New Jersey has produced as rich a heritage of American Music as almost any other city in the colonies.

And now, we can add another name to this illustrious list, New Brunswick's own The Gaslight Anthem.

Wait, did I forget someone on that list of musicians from New Jersey?

It'll come to me...........

CSOTD Bonus Edition: Allen Ginsberg - Howl (NSFW)

No, not a song, but a revolution.

Fifty-five years ago, on October 7, 1955, at the Six Gallery on Fillmore Street, San Francisco, a room measuring 20 x 25 feet with a dirt floor, Allen Ginsberg read his poem "Howl" for the first time. To about 150 to 200 people.

And the world changed. Forever.

As noted, this is NSFW. It's just a warning, here be strong liquor.

If we are still cautious in 2010, you can only imagine it's impact in 1955.

Enjoy.

Thursday, October 7, 2010: The Five Stairsteps - O-o-h Child

The Five Stairsteps - Ooh Child
Uploaded by KSOSA

Yesterday was a sad song about fathers.

How about today, a hopeful song for our children.

Ooh-oo child, things are gonna be easier

Ooh-oo child, things'll get be brighter

Some day, we'll get it together and we'll get it all done

Some day, when your head is much lighter

Some day, we'll walk in the rays of a beautiful sun

Some day, when the world is much brighter

Maranatha, may those days come soon.

Wednesday, October 6, 2010: The Streets - We Never Went To Church

I've always been irked at all the sports stars who, after they score a goal or hit a home run, thank their moms. I've always wondered if there was a dad sitting there thinking, "What about me?"

Dad's get a bad rap in our society. That's a shame, because I think they are hugely important to our lives. Yes, it is a shame that too many fathers have abdicated their responsibility, but it's also a shame that fatherhood as an institution has be subjugated to sitcom fodder and hasty dismissal.

So here is Birmingham's own Mike Skinner, aka The Streets, offering his own thanks to his, at the time, recently deceased father.

With almost every post I struggle not to include quotes from the comments sections of the video, because almost every one has real insight and commentary. And are funny as hell.

However, for this track there is one comment that just speaks volumes, so I've got to quote it:

"Whoever says that this isnt singing or rap is right.......It's Modern Poetry..."

Agreed. Mike Skinner sort of raps, but you can't really put him into those nicely defined categories like "rap". This is far more like spoken word, and I doubt you will fine any more profound or poetic statement than this track. I also doubt your eyes will be dry by the end of it.

So, this one of for all the fathers in the world. You're doing great, even if you don't think you are, and even if the world doesn't tell you nearly often enough.

And, while I'm here, I love you, dad, and I'm thankful I got to say that while you're still around.

Tuesday, October 5, 2010: TWOfer Tuesday - The "Hanging Out In Athens" Edition

I was an Art Major in college, with my emphasis in Drawing & Painting. Later on I worked towards a Master's Degree in Theology.

I have a resume that screams "No Marketable Skills".

We'll get back to theology later. Today we're talking about my time in art school.

Two schools, actually; two years and change in a local community college to get my Associates Degree, and several years after that to get the full Bachelors Degree.

I was the only person I know of in community college who didn't change their major. Changing majors seemed rampant, especially in the Art Department. Either people coming into the program from other (read, "more boring") majors like Accounting, or people leaving the Art Department for more profitable majors, like Accounting. I was pretty much the only person who walked in on day one saying, "I'd like to major in Art, please", and leaving two years later with an Associate of Arts Degree.

In short, I really couldn't imagine doing anything else. As cliché as it sounds, art was my life.

I learned early on, however, that there are two types of people who attend art college. There are those who are interested in being artists, and there are those who are interested in making art.  I was most definitely in the second group.

Truth is, I busted my ass in college.  I love those people who think an Art degree is an easy ticket.  I guarantee you I worked harder than any marketing major, or finance, or any number of other majors on those campuses.  Art majors put in longer hours, more money and, more importantly, more of their soul and flesh into their major than pretty much anyone else. Fact.

That said, it always bothered me that while I was working hard making great art but somehow I still looked like a dork, while so many others just oozed cool from every fashionable, malnourished bone in their body. Even though they barely bothered to lift a brush.

Not that I'm bitter.  Okay, maybe a little.  But, I get the appeal of living the (imagined) lifestyle of an artist, I really do.  Looking around at the bland conformity of your surroundings, or perhaps seeing your parents slave away at some mind-numbing, soul-crushing job wasting away the best of their lives for a paycheck that will only be gone soon as it arrives, it is easy to reject that path and try to find something more "fulfilling", whatever that means.

Besides, doesn't everyone deep down in their heart of hearts long to be interesting?

That's what is so cool about these two songs (somewhat) documenting the bohemian life of Athens, Georgia, where bands like REM and the B-52s made their name.  You can sit at your desk in some mundane office building, put on the B-52's, and suddenly you're no wage slave; you're a beatnik, a maverick, an iconoclast living life as a carefree spirit, freewheeling along and shunning the idea of working for a living.  Dancing in the garden in torn sheets in the rain.  You're skinny dipping in the early morning hours after attending happening parties where art and politics and religion and life were debated, hootch consumed, desire cultivated and debauchery consummated behind every door.

Without even having to get paint on your clothes.

Enjoy.

Monday, October 4, 2010: Shapeshifters - Lola's Theme

On Thursday, July 12, 1979, at Comiskey Park in Chicago, Illinois, Chicago radio DJ Steve Dahl and baseball promoter Mike Veeck organized an event dubbed "the world's largest anti-disco rally". Their plan was to blow up a box of thousands of disco records in the middle of center field inbetween games of a twi-night doubleheader between the White Sox and the Detroit Tigers.

What started as a "Disco Sucks" rally soon turned into a riot as records and beer bottles were thrown, fans stormed the field and the second game of the doubleheader had to be called off as the explosives tore a hole in the outfield and started a small fire.

Nile Rodgers, producer and guitarist for the popular disco group Chic said "It felt to us like Nazi book-burning. This is America, the home of jazz and rock and people were now afraid even to say the word 'disco'."

Some say disco died that night.

Many others, including the Shapeshifters, never got that message. And we are all the better for it.

Sampling Johnny Taylor's "What About My Love", here is an outstanding wake-the-hell-up-and-shake-the-sleep-from-your-feet Monday song to start your week off right.

Enjoy.