Led Zeppelin Admission

[Warning: the following will be of interest to only fans of Led Zeppelin... and possibly fans of my personality cult]

Zeppelin has remained my favorite band for decades now.  As a teenager, I remember my friends introducing me to their albums and I just fell in love, even when they moved on to the Who (who, har, I greatly respect, more on that later) I stayed with Zeppelin.  They have the fewest proportion of bad songs of any long standing band (and I can listen to the crud... usually).  I also possess every bootleg I can get my digital hands on and they are a great treasure trove.

What's the admission?  Well, as a teenager, my friends denigrated Presence in favor of In Through the Out Door, which they considered musically more adept.  Nonetheless, after years of listening and fandom, I have to say that ITTOD is their weakest album by far, containing two of their lowest quality songs ("I'm Gonna Crawl" and the poignant and heartbreaking yet not-very-good "All My Love"). Presence, on the other hand, has a great start ("Achilles Last Stand" is freakin' awesome) and it's only weak entry is "Tea for One." 

The real scandal though, is that I actually like their last album, Coda, a heckuva lot.  The only weak entry is their redone "I Can't Quit You Baby" (a holdover from their early note-for-note Blues mimicry*), and many of the tracks are very fun: "Walter's Walk" (another admission, I also like "The Crunge" so that could disqualify me), and "Darlene" (which is a better parody of country music than "Hot Dog"). 

Naturally, I hold the trump for last: "Bonzo's Montreaux" - so good they later merged it with "Moby Dick" (halavai they should merge in one of the "Pat's Delight"s).  Of the later albums, ITTOD just doesn't hold up, even compared to Coda!   Throw tomatoes if you must.

* = when I first heard the early Zeppelin, and early Rolling Stones, I thought their blues songs were atrocious, and I judged the bands accordingly.  I thought that they were young and untrained and only later were able to refine their skills.  Then I heard the original blues songs they were covering and found out that they were equally as bad.  Gadzooks!  I love the blues, as every red-blooded American male does, but not so many of the early bluesmen were listenable.  There are a handful of supermen better than their British successors - Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, John Lee Hooker - but a lot of the early stuff is as bad as the early UK blues-rock.   More tomatoes now I assume.

Lou Reed

So, Lou Reed, important (Jewish) rock pioneer died this week.  He was one of those artists that I felt I *should* like way more than I actually did.  I have a bunch of his albums and they are largely unlistenable.  But he was a very important source for not only blues-rock but punk, as I found out in the The Heebie-Jeebies at CBGB's.

Itunes Idiocy

Microsoft finally "upgraded" (an Orwellian term) Windows Media Player so many times that it finally became useless. So a few years ago I switched to Itunes since Mac controls music now (as I painfully found out when I got an Ipod years back, before that hunk of junk broke in a few months). I'm very serious about my music collection and I was sad to see that Itunes isn't very good. Observe this list:

Things Itunes doesn't do that I really liked from WMP:
A. Enable deleting missing files en masse
B. Very easy to change song data en masse
C. Background process to consolidate and organize the music library.

I've been searching for a long time for simple fixes. Sure, the simplest would be for Apple - for an ironic twist - to copy what Microsoft does well, instead of the vice versa. I could buy third party software, but hell hasn't frozen yet. Recently I got fed up enough that I renewed my efforts to solve 'em with online advice. Here's what I found:

A. Finding and Deleting Files En Masse

I found online advice and it actually worked! How To Remove Broken Songs From iTunes Library It also clued me into the glory of "smart playlists" - which makes up for the very irritating itunes interface. Thanks intertube stranger!

B. Change Multiple Names at Once

You can change song titles, artists etc, but NOT THE SONG NAME. Why can't it be done? Hatred?

So here's my homemade solution which WORKS! Alert!

My solution is to use the powerful search function of Windows 7. I discovered that you can change song data in Windows via "Properties."

For example, I have a lot of bootleg albums of Led Zeppelin (which I've been assured is completely legal). And I want to change the song name from "Moby Dick" to "Moby Dick (Live)"

It helps if you have one Music folder (I did this even though itunes refuses to sort them easily, see below) but I guess it can be done if music is scattered all about.

1. In the search box (F3) of your folder, I entered: "album:live artists:zeppelin"
   
2. sort by song title
   
3. higlight the songs you want to change
   
4. right click for 'properties'
   
5. click on the 'details' tab
   
6. go to the field you want to change, in my case it's 'title'
   
7. insert new title
   
8. click OK or Apply
   
9. enjoy a milk bone in a commie free world

Addendum: Actually there's a slight glitch in that Itunes did not recognize the new file names until I played the song (or some other such modification). So my trick was to find all the files whose names I changed and then adjust their rating to 1 star (or whatever) and that updated the names.

C. Consolidate the Library There's an option in Itunes already to do this but it retains the original locations as well, which means you need to have space memory in the computer to have 2 sets of files. I'm not a fan of that, so I'll keep searching. UpdateHere's another version of the milkbone cartoon.

Two Disco Giants Die

In my advancing years, I've come to appreciate Disco as a sporadically talented offshoot of Funk (and undisputed good). And over the past few days, two of the very greatest of the genre passed away: Donna Summer and Robin Gibb.

Below are two songs that I think are apporpriate for my nostalgic tribute to great musicians. For Donna Summer, I can't put the 17 minute "I Feel Love" so this is "Dim All the Lights"


For the Bee Gees, it's hard to choose. While their best song is "Stayin' Alive" not only is that inappropriate for an obituary, it's also overdone. I've chosen two, because they made so many good songs (I'm not joking - only a churlish ideologue can deny the quality of the Bee Gees). Here's "Tragedy" and "Inside and Out"

Tragedy

Inside and Out

Weird Thought of the Day: The 90s vs 00s

My brother and I have light-hearted kerfuffles over the value of 70s music (me) versus 80s music (me). We both agree, as guys in their late 30s will do, that all music in recent years doesn't match up. However, it got us thinking about the nostalgia recreation of those two decades and whether there's an actual taste/feel of the 90s versus the 00s? Is there any difference? Probably there is, given that my taste has been blunted by the fact that I can't remember much about those two decades as I was busy living life, but it's something that I'm going to investigate further. As far as I can tell, the two decades feel indistinguishable in terms of fashion, music, and taste. Sure, one decade was filled with peace, prosperity and joy (Clinton Years) and the other was war, hatred and death (Bush years) but did that effect movies and music?

Don't Pay the Ferryman, Part 2

As I posted earlier today, I enjoy the song "Don't Pay the Ferryman" and as part of the celebration for this song, I played it for my middle child. He likes the song and was boogying around to it in our living room. When we put him in for a nap, he was still grooving to it and was singing the lyrics (which he made up) at the top of his lungs. Below is a small clip, recorded off the child-monitor audio, of his 20+ minute rendition of "Don't Pay the Ferryman" (lyrics by Chris de Burgh and Jota Minuscula Styx)

Song of the Day: Don't Pay the Ferryman (1982)

The current song of the day is "Don't Pay the Ferryman" (1982) by Chris de Burgh. This song is great because it's part of a good 1970s rock tradition of gothic storytelling, along the lines of Hotel California.

The song is cheesy, but it does what good rock should do: get caught in your head, tell a good story, and allow you to scream out the lyrics in a culturally significant way.



Lyrics (from here):

It was late at night on the open road,
Speeding like a man on the run,
A lifetime spent preparing for the journey;

He is closer now and the search is on,
Reading from a map in the mind,
Yes there's the ragged hill,
And there's the boat on the river. And when the rain came down,
He heard a wild dog howl,
There were voices in the night - "Don't do it!"
Voices out of sight - "Don't do it!
Too many men have failed before,
Whatever you do,

Don't pay the ferryman,
Don't even fix a price,
Don't pay the ferryman,
Until he gets you to the other side;

In the rolling mist, then he gets on board,
Now there'll be no turning back,
Beware that hooded old man at the rudder,
And then the lightning flashed, and the thunder roared,
And people calling out his name,
And dancing bones that jabbered and a-moaned
On the water. And then the ferryman said,
"There is trouble ahead,
So you must pay me now," - "Don't do it!"
"You must pay me now," - "Don't do it!"
And still that voice came from beyond,
"Whatever you do,

Don't pay the ferryman,
Don't even fix a price,
Don't pay the ferryman,
Until he gets you to the other side;

Don't pay - the ferryman!

While I know the song from listening to 'greatest hits of the 80s' albums, others know it because of a priceless scene from MST3K:

Missing Old Enemies

My birthday's coming up (and my brother just hit the Big 4-0) so I've been listening to a lot of 70s and 80s music. Just now, hearing "Burning Heart" by Journey Foreigner Survivor, reminds me of a point about our old enemies, the Commies, and our new ones, the Sicko Mooslims. If you recall from the song, and the accompanying movie (Rocky IV), the Russians were a technocratic menace able to create chemical-mechanical monsters to dominate the world. While the reality was sad (Russia seemed to be a third world country with a first world reputation, hence their designation of the 'Second World' in that particular triad), there's an essential fact here: the Commies were totalitarian, fascist, brutal, atheist, racist, and implacable. Their core idea, Marxism, is seductive - especially for the third world, and the Soviets were undeniably trying to take over the world. We must remember these facts. Yet, I miss one key aspect of having them as enemies: their denial of God came with a veneration of science and the arts. This enemy insisted on having high education, music, dance, and critically: science and technology. And because our enemies were trying to dominate these fields, we needed to keep up.

Why did JFK's famous Boston accented boast "putting a man on the moon at the end of the decade" actually happen? I ask this because many pundits like bloviating that if a president makes such a boast then we can accomplish it (Bush tried this, so did His Honor Jed Bartlett). The reason we got to the moon wasn't because of JFK's boast, it was because we were in a death race in tech and science with the Rooskies. The moon was just Vietnam in space.

I miss this part of my old enemy - their primacy of science and technology meant we needed to do that too. It made us invest seriously in education (e.g. my mother was sent to grad school on a Defense scholarship to learn Spanish - because Commies were everywhere, we needed to know what they knew... nowadays we discharge linguists from the military if they're gay). The commies converted the isolationists and anti-intellectuals - who now vocally dominate the GOP - to celebrate American international achievement in every endeavor. *

Our new enemies, radical Muslims, are similar in some respects, and worse in many others, than the Soviets. Ironically, one of the main crimes of Communism - atheism - turns out to have been a mixed blessing. If you had asked a normal American back in the Cold War 50s, why we were fighting the Commies, they're respond "atheism!" This is why we made "In God We Trust" our national motto, and put God in (badly) the Pledge of Allegiance. That's even what I recall reading in the words of the Rav. Yet the radical Muslim enemy is quite theistic, and it's their theism that makes them much worse than the Commies could ever hope to be.

The God Fearing radical Muslims, because they fear a god, hate science, technology and art. Six months before 9/11, the Taliban dynamited famous, and 1500 year old, statues of Buddha - the violence driven by righteous religious belief.

As a child of the 80s, I lived in fear of the Commies, especially with Reagan and Thatcher rattling their geriatric sabres, but my antagonism of the Soviets wasn't about their atheism as much as their desire to turn the whole world into a totalitarian hell-hole. People argued that their cruelty came from atheism, yet not many people become suicide bombers if they don't believe in an afterlife.

The god the radical Muslims trust in, the one they are under, is what motivates their very worst behavior. Suicide bombing? Slaughtering children? All because of theism. And like with the old rock Buddha, these God-fearers hate science and art. In fact, universities are as much a target for these God-fearers as idol worshiping Hebrews and Nazarenes.

And this leads to the crux of the matter: because our current enemy is animated by religion and hates science, our counter-response is one of beliefs and not of science. The growth of American power in the Twentieth Century came from our choice of enemy. Our new enemy is going to help us go down the dismal road of religious fervor (to combat theirs) with full throated anti-intellectualism - because that's not the perceived battleground.

The further sick irony is that it's precisely in science, tech and art that we can beat the Radical Muslims. Not only does the rest of the world treasure the Western World's dominance in science and art (just ask the billions or so heathens out there, a.k.a. Chinese, Indians, Japanese) but it is only through a desperate push to replace oil as fuel that we will defeat our enemies. George W Bush and cronies thought we could beat the Mooslims by conquering them (hence the Iraq War) but the only way to truly conquer them is to destroy their power from within - eliminate our dependency on oil. Just as we conquered Communism by impoverishing them in the arms and space race, so we can impoverish our enemies now in a more direct fashion. If we invent easy solar power, for example, the terrorist funding will turn into thick black mud.**

This is why I miss the commies: they were good enemies not only because they allowed us to create decent James Bond films, but because they brought out the best of the West: science, tech, and art; and because they turned our idiot religious thugs to at least accept all religious people - even Jews - and to reject isolationism. Our current enemies are bringing the worst in us: religious intolerance, rejection of science, fighting over belief and not excellence. We were cursed in 2001 to have the worst kind of president to respond to the current enemy (ironically his father was pretty bad in his response to the fall of the Berlin Wall, but like in everything Bush Jr. made Bush Sr. look like Abe Lincoln). I hope that Obama is able to convince America that we need to take the science-tech response to our current enemies... it's the only thing that can save us from a pretty bad next decade.

NOTES:

* We can still see vestiges of the Kommie Kompetition with our fear of the Chinese - and there's potential there for the old Cold War rivalry to be renewed. Except that the Chinese don't seem to care about taking over the world, unlike the USSR, and while they are a brutal threat to key allies (ask South Korea and Japan how much they like China), common Americans may not fear the Chinese like the way we did the Soviets, and the fear is what drove our country to excel in science, tech, and art.

** Note, they still have drug money, but one problem at a time.

Top pic from here. Second and third pics from the Wiki. According to the Wiki, the second pic is of kids pledging allegiance with the "Bellamy Salute" - invented by the Pledge's author - yet was adopted by the Italian Fascists and later the Nazis. Wow, life is ironic.

Reverse Boycott Time

While I'm not in favor of anti-Semites, and their Halloween costume cousins Anti-Zionists, being so loud (hate speech is rough on the psyche) I am glad when they are vocal. According to Jacob Weisberg's recent Slate column (h.t. Goldblog), a number of celebrities are boycotting Israel. A great quote:

What they're saying instead is: "We consider your country so intrinsically reprehensible that we are gong to treat all of your citizens as pariahs." Instead of warning that Israel risks becoming an apartheid society if it fails to make peace, boycotters have concluded that Israel already is an irredeemable apartheid society.

Now, as I've mentioned here, I keep my eye on those moral artists who davka tour Israel, so I'm happy to track the opposite side of the spectrum as well. So, according to Slate, here are the new immoral anti-Zionist scum: Meg Ryan, The Pixies, Elvis Costello. Now I have no idea who the Pixies are, and now I'm glad that I don't have to, but I have experience with the other two scumbags and I find a bittersweet silver lining to the hate cloud.

First of all, sweet anorexic airhead shiksa Meg Ryan. What red-blooded American GenX male has not feared her presence in any movie? She's in the category of "pretty only to women" (other members of this group: Julia Roberts and Sarah Jessica Parker) and her one character, recycled in numerous romantic comedies, is the same shrill high-maintenance ditz we discovered when Sally met Harry. Those of us who have secretly detested her reduction of femininity to the most irritating traits (helpless, brainless, neurotic, impossible to please, materialist, irresponsible) can have a concrete reason to hate her.

But the real prize is Elvis Costello. Man oh man, I do not like that guy's music. And yet, all the pallid hipster music snobs have insisted for decades that he's some kind of genius. Yet, these aesthetes seem to overlook that the man sings like a geek. It's his own pretentiousness, the arrogance of his fans, and his utter lack of voice quality that has earned my ire before his latest bigoted escapade. And, hey, look at the Wiki, it says that "Elvis" (a.k.a. Declan Patrick MacManus) had a famous incident in 1979 of publicly calling James Brown and Ray Charles the N-word.

So here ya go, the great entertainers and the moral conscience.

Cotello pic from here.

Dvorak's Symphony No. 9

Just now listening to Dvorak's "New World" Symphony which has been my favorite for decades. So much so, that recent nostalgic musings have reminded me (I just got my son's report card, more on that later) about a nerd explosion of mine back in 1982 when I moved from Binghamton to Ithaca.

Back then my pop music consumption was eclectic and my classical music knowledge was pretty good for a 10 year old. We had some decent pop records at home, notably the Jackson 5 which got me into their song "ABC" (who knew my father was so funky to own that record?) but when we would drive frequently from Binghamton to Brooklyn to visit my mother's parents (an action I know mightily endorse and would probably do the same if I could) the music in the car came entirely from 8-track tapes of classical music. And Dvorak's 9th was my permanent favorite.

The nostaglia point is to illustrate my immense dorkiness back then. Again, I knew pop music, but I dare say that compared to Dvorak's 9th, pop back in 1982 just couldn't compare. It was all soft-rock and disco for goodness sakes! I am defensive because, in 1982, I had entered a new school in a new city. I had been in Hillel Academy, a Torah U-Mesorah parochial school, and had just entered Northeast Elementary in Ithaca - a public school. And for the 5th grade yearbook, we were all asked what our favorite song was. The most popular ones were "Billie Jean" by Michael Jackson (which is great, don't get me wrong) or "Africa" by Toto. But when asked I said "Dvorak's 9th Symphony, 4th Movement."

And you know what, I'm still right!

But I also dare you to find non-pictorial proof of greater dorkiness than having a newly acclimatized Orthodox Jewish keepah-wearing fish-out-of-water-in-public-school 10 year old declare in his 5th grade yearbook, on a page of neo-disco tunes, that his favorite song is - the editorially shortened - "9th Symphony." I guess I'm still ticked that they shortened it, because I actually like Dvorak's 9th better than Beethoven's "Ode to Joy" (which is my second favorite classical ditty).

And, I guess this shows that I'm still a massive nerd. Ah well, at least I get paid for it now. That's the joy of adulthood and the hope of all teenage nerds everywhere - in America, and other Western countries - you will get paid handsomely for being a nerd.

Pic of the autographed score of Dvorak's 9th from here.

Temptations and Serious Music

I grew up listening to the Temptations. I got lucky, I guess, because my High School library in Ithaca had records (no CDs) and we had a record player at home, and I was able to listen (Leo Strauss would emphasize that I did not transfer these records to audio-tape for listening later) to this music over and over. I was primed to know the artists because I listened to Ithaca College radio for hours, especially on Sunday afternoons where they had, from 10:00 am - 12:00 pm "Breakfast with the Beatles" and 12:00-6:00pm "Classic Rock Sunday." I listened every week, for years. IC was a center for training professional broadcasters, so this wasn't hippie ganja-smoking alternative dumpage but well-trained jocks spinning quality music.

So, I had a good environment (IC radio), experience (listening for hundreds of hours), and resource access (HS library, record player at home) for choosing among many different types of music. It was at this time that I fell in aesthetic love with Jethro Tull (and to a lesser extent with the other Flute-Rock dudes, Traffic), but primarily with the Temptations. I also had access to the Four Tops, and the two bands are often compared (and confused with each other). It's not hard to see why, superficially, this confusion exists: 4 vs. 5 young black men singing syncopated R&B and produced by the same label (Motown).

Even though I felt that musically the Temptations were just plain better than the Tops, I couldn't begrudge the latter's top tunes: "Standing in the Shadows of Love," "I Can't Help Myself (Sugar Pie, Honey Bunch)," "It's the Same Old Song," "Reach Out, I'll Be There," "Ain't No Woman (Like the One I've Got)," and "Bernadette." Yet, I gravitated to the Temptations who I subconscious appreciated on a greater level.

After years of listening, I realize one reason that I may have been attracted to the Tempts and not the Tops could be the inherent seriousness of the Temptations' songs and lyrics. Just now I did the research online and it's clear that there were main songwriting teams for each group, and they did not share, and that the crew behind the Tops (Holland-Dozier-Holland) wrote catchy love songs and the crew behind the Temptations, Norman Whitfield & Barry Strong, wrote serious deep music. To cite the Wiki:

[Whitfield/Strong wrote] the long line of "psychedelic soul" records by The Temptations, including "Cloud Nine", "I Can't Get Next to You", "Psychedelic Shack", "Ball of Confusion (That's What the World Is Today)", and "Papa Was a Rollin' Stone",

Even without knowing that there were these distinct schools, just compare the themes of the top-scoring songs:

"Standing in the Shadows of Love" = The moment of realization when love goes sour
vs.
"Cloud Nine" = singer's faux-autobiography of poverty leading to drug abuse

"I Can't Help Myself (Sugar Pie, Honey Bunch)" = uh, the singer can't help himself because he loves his woman so much
vs.
"Runaway Child, Running Wild" = the sad fate of teenage runaways

"Bernadette" = a woman, named Bernadette, makes lovin' hard
vs.
"Papa Was a Rollin' Stone" = the difficult life of broken families and deadbeat dads.

"Baby I Need Your Loving" = The singer, speaking to his woman, whom he calls 'baby', states that he needs her loving, in fact he got to have all of it.
vs.
"Ball of Confusion (That's What the World Is Today)" = a plea for sanity in a world beset by war, poverty, and declining trust in institutions of leadership.

I could go on, but you get the pattern. True, the Tempts had they cheezy songs as well (e.g. "My Girl") but I could make a claim that were deeper, more soulful, than the others, but I won't bother with that direction - because the Tops did not have deep songs and the Temptations had dozens - even from artists other than Whitfield/Strong.

This insight struck me the other day and a little googling confirms the stunning pattern, and why I recommend their music with confidence. That even though they are best known for their flashy costumes and choreography (allmusic states in the first line of their biography: "Thanks to their fine-tuned choreography -- and even finer harmonies -- the Temptations became the definitive male vocal group of the 1960s;") their serious music is why they should be given the most respect.

Pic from here.

In Honor of Music

Here's the only version of Hava Nagila* that I can listen to: by hizzoner, Mr. Pulp Fiction Theme Music Himself, Dick Dale:


*=global exception: my eldest son's graduating nursery school class all sang Hava Nagila together (he was one of the "vanishmechas" in his own words). That was nice.

Michael Jackson, Farrah Fawcett, Ed McMahon

So in a matter of days, Michael Jackson (50), Farrah Fawcett (62), and Ed McMahon (86) die. McMahon seemed like a decent fellow and he lived a long life. Fawcett seemed like a dingbat and since I was too young for her heyday, I never found her that attractive or interesting. Sad to die of serious cancer though. Bummer.

Then we come to Michael Jackson, who was of my era. After a day's full of hype over his death, my first and lasting reaction is "meh." Yes, his music was great... but not recently. In that sense, he stopped being relevant to me a while ago. And in the age of producers/DJs/mixers, I have a hard time figuring out how much was him and how much his crew.

Then there's the fact that his early years (which I like; "ABC" is one of my favorite songs) were the result of serious child abuse from a horrific stage-father - it taints everything from that era.

And let's not forget the persistent charges of child-molestation. Meh.

I understand the veneration for John Lennon who was a musical genius and a martyr; I understand even the intensity for Elvis... but I have never understood the attention/concern about Michael Jackson.

But "Billie Jean" is a great song.

Pic from here

Daytime TV

While lying in bed, gently writhing in lumbar-exploded pain, I was able to catch up on about 5 or 6 years of back TV watching. When I was a child and sick on a weekday, I had to make do with either the weird stuff they put on PBS after 10 am, or, if I was lucky, the Price is Right (in fact, ask any gen-Xer, and we'll tell you that 2 things are synonymous with being sick: the Price is Right, and ginger-ale).

Anyway, this decade, I was able to relive my childhood not through bad TV but through VH1 - which is now strictly programmed for my age group. I was able to soothe my pain with 5 straight hours of the Top 50 One-Hit-Wonders of the 80s. Electric Avenue, indeed.

Random Personal Firsts

As I was listening this morning to my tunes, I went through a list of personal musical/entertainment milestones - which, because I am as yet only a consumer not a producer - are all about acquisition. My wife produces (she's a moose-ishun) and I believe my role in the entertainment industry will be harnessing the talents of my kids. That said, the milestones:

1. The first TV show I recorded on my home VCR: parts of the 1984 Summer Olympics

2. First CD purchased: In 1986 (or so): Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band by the Beatles. [As with most of the following, this was a purposeful decision - to declare that this was the epitome of albumlyness.]
   

3. First CDs acquired through the BMG Usury Club: "Digital Duke" by Duke Ellington, "Chronicle Vol 1" by CCR, "Rewind" by the Rolling Stones [All of these were to impress my father in the erroneous thought that he wouldn't mind me buying stuff if he liked the music as well; anon]
   

4. First CD Box-sets: purchased simultaneously: The Temptations, Emperors of Soul & Led Zeppelin's Box Set. [This was my declaration that these were the two pillars of my soul-ar system - what music about which I wanted to be comprehensive.]
   

5. First DVD: 1999 - "The Matrix" [like with Sgt. Pepper, I felt that this was the epitome of DVDyness]
   

And speaking of Temptations, courtesy of Dewey Cox:

Leonard Cohen is One of Us

I came across Leonard Cohen the way most people did - through Jeffrey Buckley's cover of Cohen's Hallelujah. The lyrics were amazing, and Buckley really sang the heck out of it (and the fact that Buckley suicided soon afterward gave extra pathos to the song.

But I was intrigued enough by the lyrics that I sought out the original version... and, when I heard *that*, I thought it was a joke. Compared to his natural cognate, Bob Dylan, Cohen's lyrics are better but his voice is worse! Yes, it's possible.

So I kept a space in my mind for honor for Cohen while staying far away from his mumbly monotone singing. But just now, I read a NYTimes story that says that Cohen is shomer shabbat! Which now raises my esteem for him to the highest level.

h.t. Imshin, pic from here, Backpost finished 2009-12-06.

Song of the Day: Dog Police

A favorite from my youth (and my always persistant novelty song obsession). It's especially gratifying when pundit-doyens like Andrew Sullivan don't get it. Hee.



Lyrics:

(ruff ruff ruff ruff)
Dog Police! where are you coming from
Dog Police! nobody knows who you are
(ruff ruff ruff ruff)

Jumped in my car last Saturday night
Had a blind date she was out of sight
She was a chick from the canine scene
Her hair was blue, her teeth were green

Drove down to the Lone Star Bar
Scratched her flea as I parked the car
As the place was full of punks and minks
Got a little table and a couple of drinks

Went to the bathroom and combed my hair
Left my baby at the table there
Looked in the mirror and I wiped my nose
And when I came back, what do you suppose?

The boys in blue had my baby on the floor
They were asking her if she wanted some more
They pulled out a net, they pulled out a leash
They said they were the...

(ruff ruff ruff ruff)
Dog Police! (Bow Wow)where are you coming from
Dog Police! nobody knows who you are
(ruff ruff ruff ruff)
Dog Police! (Bow Wow)where are you coming from
Dog Police! nobody knows who you are
(ruff ruff ruff ruff)
(awooooo)

I guess I should have noticed that box of filled bones
She sniffed the cups in my stereo phone
She barked so much she was on fire
She wented outside and whizzed on my tire

Havin’ those puppies was a little insane
But boy she loved that gravy train
Next time you’re out with a real strange beast
Make sure she’s not wanted by the....

(ruff ruff ruff ruff)
Dog Police! (Bow Wow)where are you coming from
Dog Police! nobody knows who you are
(ruff ruff ruff ruff)
Dog Police! (Bow Wow)where are you coming from
Dog Police! nobody knows who you are
(ruff ruff ruff ruff)

(Repeat)

Random commentary here.

Superbowl 40 Highlights

I still have a soft spot for Superbowl 40 - the Steelers win over the Seahawks. As I've written before, my oldest son became addicted to that game when he was 2 years old. I had taped only the second half (which was just as well as the first half stunk) and by mistake we played the game for him while intending to show Thomas or some other kiddie fare. He got addicted to the game and started calling himself Hines Ward while jumping all over the living room couches, hollering about a 'gadget play' (see below).

A highlight reel of Superbowl 40 MVP Hines Ward (from many different games). The insanely wonderful and wonderfully insane "gadget play" is at 1:16.

Music credit: AC/DC who, despite being Australian, seem to be made for American football.

Video of the Day: Stay the Night

or Another version here (Youtube page).

This video had these effects for me at the time (I was 12):

1. I fell in love with the medium of music videos (which were new at the time)
2. I got hooked on the band "Chicago" (I have all their albums and a number of bootlegs)
3. I learned a lot about women (or so I thought at the time) - the main lesson was to stay away from spooky witchy women with pale skin, bright red lipstick, hoop earrings, and ambivalent feelings of pursuit (yes, she said "no", slapped our hero in the face, yet the conclusion of the affair puts it all into doubt; a much better version of the Blair Witch Project if you ask me)
   

Effects in retrospect:

1. I still think the look of women circa 1984 is the best (I guess it's a puberty thing, were I born in 1572, I'd probably think that powdered petticoats and 6-month B.O. was pretty)
2. The narrative is still great (not every video had a real story, this one is a cross between a comic book romance and the A-Team)
3. OK, so I don't know how the truck can leap in the daytime and land, moments later, at night... nor to explode at night while stationary (after leaping over a ramp). The best answer I have is the same answer for how the mystery women ends up driving the ambulance: spooky witchy woman physics!
4. Does anybody know who the actress is? What kind of car that is? I guess Mr. Google should know; or should I say Dr. Google, given his powers. Note, pseudo-scientist Dr. Nick Wikipedia, does not have much to add.
5. Nary a year ago, this video was not to be found online. I'm very glad to have found it.
   

Update, lyrics:

I don't want you to misunderstand me
I just wanna say what's on my mind.
No need to hit me with an attitude because I haven't got the time.
I want you to know one thing's for certain
I surely love your company.
And I won't take "no" if that's your answer
at least that's my philosophy.

REFRAIN:
Stay the night
there's room enough here for two.
Stay the night
I'd like to spend it with you.
Stay the night
why don't we call it a day?
No one can stop us
nothing is in the way.

Have some friendly conversation
and if you still don't have a clue.
Unless there's something else you've got in mind
We've got better things to do.

REFRAIN

Just to have you near me
here by my side
Just to have you near me
And when I get next to your body

Just to have you near me
I wanna tell you something
make it perfectly clear
We're gonna have a very good time.

REFRAIN

I only wanna say: Stay the night
there's room enough here for two.

Video of the Day: Sabotage

Also, song of the day.



This is my favorite Beastie Boys song (they are largely irritating, but there's a half-dozen I like). The video really makes the song; the Boys are in my generation (they're 6-8 yrs older) and they grew up with (and are likely as obsessed with) 70s cop shows as I did/am. And the video is a narrative (which make the best videos - and songs) about a slamming TV show that I'd like to see.

Update, Lyrics:

I Can't Stand It, I Know You Planned It
Ima Set It Straight, This Watergate
I Can't Stand Rockin' When I'm In Here
'Cause Your Crystal Ball Ain't So Crystal Clear
So, While You Sit Back And Wonder Why
I Got This Fucking Thorn In My Side
Oh My God, It's A Mirage
I'm Tellin' Y'all It's Sabotage

So,So,So, So Listen Up 'Cause You Can't Say Nothin'
You Shut Me Down With A Push Of Your Button
But yo, I'm Out And I'm Gone
I'll Tell You Now I Keep It On And On

'Cause What You See You Might Not Get
And We Can Bet, So Don't You Get Souped Yet
Scheming On A Thing That's A Mirage
I'm Tryin' To Tell You Now It's Sabotage

Why; Our Backs Are Now Against The Wall
Listen All Of Y'all This Is Sabotage
Listen All Of Y'all This Is Sabotage
Listen All Of Y'all This Is Sabotage
Listen All of Y'all This Is Sabotage

I Can't Stand It, I Know You Planned It
I'ma Set It Straight This Watergate
I Can't Stand Rockin' When I'm In This Place
Because I Feel Disgrace Because You're All In My Face
But Make No Mistakes And Switch Up My Channel
I'm Buddy Rich When I Fly Off The Handle
What Could It Be, It's A Mirage
You're Scheming On A Thing That's Sabotage