The Music Thread

[billy.pilgrim]

Great interview with one of my all time favorites.

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/musi ... in-205425/

"Sail Away - Bobby Darin "covered this [in 1972], but he was such a musical guy that he missed the
point. He was like, “Little one, come to America.” Etta James did it,
and I guarantee she knew what it was about, absolutely."

"In America you'll get food to eat
Won't have to run through the jungle
And scuff up your feet
You'll just sing about Jesus and drink wine all day
It's great to be an American

Ain't no lions or tigers ain't no mamba snake
Just the sweet watermelon and the buckwheat cake
Everybody is as happy as a man can be
Climb aboard little wog sail away with me"

Or

"It was seeing [Russian leader]
Vladimir Putin in those pictures with his shirt off. Like what the hell does he want? He’s the most powerful man in the world – and he wants to be Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt. The song is less critical than I thought it would be, although the tone gets menacing at the end. If it’s just a joke, it’s worth something to me. It’s worth less unless there’s something else. But I can’t tell people what to
get from a song. When I’m doing “Rednecks” for a crowd and they’re like “We’re rednecks, yeah!”, that bothers me. It’s closer to home."


Satire, sarcasm and irony can be as difficult in music as it is in a forum discussion with a conservative, but for those who understand, Randy is one of our best.

"One of the best things I do is assignments. I do it easily, and I do it well. People say, “Isn’t it a sellout?” No, it’s who I am. If you want me to write a song about an Albanian gardener who moves to Bulgaria, I’ll do it. I’m a professional songwriter. And that’s fine with me."

And me too

"We got no necked oilmen from Texas
And good ol' boys from Tennessee
And colleges men from LSU
Went in dumb, come out dumb too
Hustlin' 'round Atlanta in their alligator shoes
Gettin' drunk every weekend at the barbecues
And we're keepin' the niggers down"

[billy.pilgrim]

https://youtu.be/APkQBID5K9k

Vedder in SA last week


Consequence of Sound: Eddie Vedder reunites with South African high school choir, covers The Beatles: Watch.
https://consequenceofsound.net/2018/12/ ... les-video/

[Vrede too]

Heavy Metal Confronts Its Nazi Problem

“The world is on fire,” Ben Hutcherson told an audience in Brooklyn, last month, before a set by his band, Glacial Tomb. He added, “At least we can all burn together.” Over the next thirty minutes, the band, which Hutcherson describes as playing “blackened, sludgy death metal,” roared through a half-dozen songs, replete with thundering drums and growled vocals. The set ended with a broadside of defiance, in the form of a cover of the punk band Aus-Rotten’s “Fuck Nazi Sympathy.” As Glacial Tomb sped through the song—which includes the lines “Don’t respect something that has no respect” and “Don’t give them their freedom, because they’re not going to give you yours”—audience members shouted the lyrics, churned in a mosh pit, and dove from the stage.

The set was part of a fifteen-band weekend festival at Brooklyn Bazaar, in Greenpoint, called Black Flags Over Brooklyn, which was organized as probably New York City’s first anti-Fascist extreme-metal show. It was planned partly as a celebration of an underground form of music that has traditionally thrived on images of drama and danger, and partly as a response to a subgenre known as National Socialist black metal, which espouses neo-Nazi views and has been described by the Southern Poverty Law Center as aiming to recruit youth to white-supremacist causes. The organizer of the Black Flags show, Kim Kelly, who, until recently, was a metal editor for Noisey and has written for Pitchfork, Spin, and Rolling Stone, said that, although National Socialist black-metal bands comprise only a small percentage of metal music, they have recently had outsized visibility. And, as far-right movements have grown in the United States and Europe, she said, some metal fans have begun having discussions about politics and expression that mirror those taking place in the broader culture....

:sunny:

[billy.pilgrim]

https://healthymusicobsession.com/2018/ ... um-review/

[neoplacebo]

https://healthymusicobsession.com/2018/ ... um-review/

I was listening to an old Doors record album today; LA Woman. It's invigorating to stomp to a feverish beat now and again. My neighbor was gone so I was liberal with the volume

[Whack9]

Is anyone familiar with John Fahey?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Fahey_(musician)

The minimilistic genre is described as "American primitive guitar".

Good stuff.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=l21IyJQIKws

[Vrede too]

Is anyone familiar with John Fahey?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Fahey_(musician)

The minimilistic genre is described as "American primitive guitar".

Good stuff.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=l21IyJQIKws

Nice.

Be honest, you found him because you thought it was going to be death metal, right?

[billy.pilgrim]

Is anyone familiar with John Fahey?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Fahey_(musician)

The minimilistic genre is described as "American primitive guitar".

Good stuff.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=l21IyJQIKws

Been listening to him since high school. Yeah, he's good stuff.

[Whack9]

Is anyone familiar with John Fahey?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Fahey_(musician)

The minimilistic genre is described as "American primitive guitar".

Good stuff.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=l21IyJQIKws

Nice.

Be honest, you found him because you thought it was going to be death metal, right?

Hah!

I use Google Play for my music spuelunking. I was probably listening to the America (the band) station or something like that and he popped up being in a similar musical vein. He's got some good stuff. When I took the overnighter in the Okefenokee swamp last year I jammed to his stuff so it brings back good memories of chilling and fishing from the dock I camped on

[billy.pilgrim]

Is anyone familiar with John Fahey?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Fahey_(musician)

The minimilistic genre is described as "American primitive guitar".

Good stuff.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=l21IyJQIKws

Nice.

Be honest, you found him because you thought it was going to be death metal, right?

Hah!

I use Google Play for my music spuelunking. I was probably listening to the America (the band) station or something like that and he popped up being in a similar musical vein. He's got some good stuff. When I took the overnighter in the Okefenokee swamp last year I jammed to his stuff so it brings back good memories of chilling and fishing from the dock I camped on

I just learned that Fahey discovered Kottke. The same guy turned me on to both, but it took Wiki to show me the connection.

I've never seen Fahey, but Kottke is way fun to watch - strings everywhere.

[Vrede too]

Tonight Show, just now:



Jade Bird: I Get No Joy

Lyrics

[Vrede too]

Yankees stopped playing Kate Smith's 'God Bless America' after discovering her racist songs

Kate Smith statue removed, Flyers ax her 'God Bless America' after racist songs come to light

That's a shame. One of my favorite bars used to blast it at closing time. It would usually clear the place out, but on particularly wild nights we would stay in place and sing along as loud as we could.

[billy.pilgrim]

Yankees stopped playing Kate Smith's 'God Bless America' after discovering her racist songs

Kate Smith statue removed, Flyers ax her 'God Bless America' after racist songs come to light

That's a shame. One of my favorite bars used to blast it at closing time. It would usually clear the place out, but on particularly wild nights we would stay in place and sing along as loud as we could.

It's also a shame (I don't know all the details here) to always judge the past based on present understandings.

[Vrede too]

It's also a shame (I don't know all the details here) to always judge the past based on present understandings.

No one is burning her in effigy. All they're doing is no longer featuring her - entirely predictable and understandable once the offensive songs came to light. No team wants to hear booing when they play a song, especially 'God Bless America'. Call it a judgment on OUR racist past.

[billy.pilgrim]

It's also a shame (I don't know all the details here) to always judge the past based on present understandings.

No one is burning her in effigy. All they're doing is no longer honoring her - entirely predictable and understandable once the offensive songs came to light. No team wants to hear booing when they play a song. Call it a judgment on OUR racist past.

The specifics are fine with me. I meant that all our present judging of all things past seems overly cherry picked.


Bring back Song of the South. The strongest character in the film was a black man.

And someone please tell me what the fuck is wrong with Aunt Jemima?

[Vrede too]

The specifics are fine with me. I meant that all our present judging of all things past seems overly cherry picked.

I edited while you were composing, no major changes.

Bring back Song of the South. The strongest character in the film was a black man.

Controversies

Mixed reactions, even among black civil rights groups. I may have seen it when I was young, don't remember.

And someone please tell me what the fuck is wrong with Aunt Jemima?

Diabetes?

Not carried at my Co-op. I see her as joyful, warm, generous and tasty, but also understand:

Idealization of plantation life

One interpretation is that Aunt Jemima embodied an early twentieth century idealized domesticity that was inspired by old southern hospitality. There were others that capitalized on this theme, such as Uncle Ben's Rice and Cream of Wheat’s Rastus. The backdrop to the trademark image of Aunt Jemima is a romanticized view of antebellum plantation life. The myth surrounding Aunt Jemima's secret recipe, family life, and plantation life as a happy slave contributes to the post Civil War idealism of southern life and America's developing consumer culture. Early advertisements used an Aunt Jemima paper doll family as an advertising gimmick to buy the product. Aunt Jemima is represented with her husband, Rastus, whose name was later changed to Uncle Mose to avoid confusion with the Cream of Wheat character, and their five children: Abraham, Lincoln, Dilsie, Zeb, and Dinah. The doll family was barefoot and dressed in tattered clothing with the possibility to see them transform from rags to riches by buying another box with civilized clothing cut-outs.

Slang

The term "Aunt Jemima" is sometimes used colloquially as a female version of the derogatory label "Uncle Tom". In this context, the slang term "Aunt Jemima" falls within the "Mammy archetype" and refers to a friendly black woman who is perceived as obsequiously servile or acting in, or protective of, the interests of whites. The 1950s television show Beulah came under fire for depicting a "mammy"-like black maid and cook who was somewhat reminiscent of Aunt Jemima.

BRN's John Fogle - remember him? - used to say that America's slaves were treated better than modern Cuban citizens. Maybe it was from too much Aunt Jemima.

[O Really]

Yeah, nobody had ever heard any music from the Broadway musical where Kate Smith sang "That's why darkies were born" in 1939ish. Since nobody went to the performances, and nobody knew there was such a play, and nobody had ever heard any of the other versions of the song, then it took a lot of diligent research to dig up the fact that Smith played a role and sang a song somebody else had written during a time period when Al Jolson was considered acceptable entertainment https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o2M4dzQjT94

[Vrede too]

Yep, pretty much anything that was ever public, and much that wasn't, is now available to everyone. Not much point in bemoaning the consequences. You can be sure that there won't ever be any Vrede too statues outside of Philly sports venues.

Who plays Al Jolson during their 7th inning stretch?

[O Really]

Who plays Al Jolson during their 7th inning stretch?

Funny.
I don't know a lot about songs in 7th inning stretch songs. Red Sox play Sweet Caroline, which can get a little icky if you consider a 12-year old Caroline Kennedy at the time the song came out. I've heard "Take Me Out to the Ball Game"

Anyway, I wouldn't be surprised if the San Bernadino 66ers played "California Here I Come." And I've heard "Alexander's Ragtime Band" played in various places. Don't anybody tell them Jolson was a blackfacer.

[Vrede too]

... I don't know a lot about songs in 7th inning stretch songs. Red Sox play Sweet Caroline, which can get a little icky if you consider a 12-year old Caroline Kennedy at the time the song came out....

I never made or heard about that connection.

Sweet Caroline

... In a 2007 interview, Diamond stated the inspiration for his song was John F. Kennedy's daughter, Caroline, who was eleven years old at the time it was released. Diamond sang the song to her at her 50th birthday celebration in 2007.

It's even worse than that:

On December 21, 2011, in an interview on CBS's The Early Show, Diamond said that a magazine cover photo of Caroline Kennedy as a young child on a horse with her parents created an image in his mind, and the rest of the song came together about five years after seeing the picture.

She was about 6!

... Who'd have believe you'd come along

Hands, touching hands, reaching out

Touching me, touching you

Sweet Caroline
Good times never seem so good

I've been inclined
to believe it never would... but now I...

...look at the night
And it don't seem so lonely
We fill it up with only two ...

Ewwww! Or not:

However, in 2014 Diamond said the song was about his then-wife Marcia, but he needed a three-syllable name to fit the melody....

Yeah, right.

That's one song that will never ever be the same for me again.