There is wall-to-wall coverage of the passing of Nelson Mandela, and many wise and informed folks are offering their thoughts. So I'll leave the job of remembering Mandela to them.
Instead, I wanted to write about how I even knew who Nelson Mandela was in the first place.
I could literally count, on my fingers, the number of non-white people I knew that lived in my town, growing up.
I understood the concepts of racism and prejudice and oppression, but in the very, very white suburbs north of Boston, they were abstract concepts, not daily struggles that took place before my eyes.
By 1985, a number of charity songs had hit the airwaves and MTV, led by "Do They Know It's Christmas?" and "We Are The World." But I was intrigued by the video and song for "Sun City."
First, it was really the first instance I'd seen of rock artists working with artists from the relatively new, strange and curious world of rap music (the song pre-dates Aerosmith/Run-DMC's "Walk This Way" by a year). "We're Rockers And Rapper united and strong . . ." was something completely unprecedented.
Second, I was struck by the kind of artist who appeared in the video. While bonafide superstars like Bruce Springsteen and Bono did appear, there was a lot of focus on some real esoteric and/or underground names like Lou Reed, Ruben Blades and Gil-Scott Heron.
But mostly, I was fascinated by the politics of it all. I mean, I'd never really heard an artist call out the President in a popular song like Joey Ramone does.
I'd never heard of Sun City, the place. I'd not seen images of violence, protest and strife as shown in the video. The song inspired me to learn what exactly Apartheid was, what "constructive engagement" meant, why they were showing images of Martin Luther King Jr. in a video about South Africans, and why all these artists weren't going to play "Sun City."
Baby Boomers can go on and on about how images like these, and songs on these subjects were nothing new---they lived through the Vietnam era. But the fact is that despite whatever accomplishments they might have made in the late 60s and early 70s, now that they were the adults, they were not doing a damn thing to teach social justice, or even contemporary history, to the next generation.
I learned it from a song.
Nelson Mandela will be remembered in a number of ways.
One person can make a difference.
Education makes a difference.
Speaking truthfully and never turning a blind eye makes a difference.
Encouraging people to reject violence, but demand change, will make a difference.
Nelson Mandela's struggles were half a world away from where I lived.
But thank God there were people like Steven Van Zandt who could take his message, and make it mean something to a little White kid living in a little White world.
Hear the original song on Youtube.
Hear the live version on Youtube.
Postscript:
This post was about Nelson Mandela and the power of song, and I didn't want to fill it with silly and snarky comments and observations. But HOLY SHIT does the video need to be watched with live commentary.
Just a few observations . . . It is VERY worth your while to read about the background of the song on Wikipedia . . . Miles Davis was only supposed to do a few seconds, he played for 7 minutes so they made a full jazz version of the song . . . (:58) DJ Kool Herc wants you to know his sunglasses flip up . . . (1:08) Steven Van Zandt looks like he should have been a vampire on "True Blood" . . . (1:16) blink and you miss it---Pete Townshend was involved in this project . . . (1:48) it makes some sense to put Springsteen with 2 former Temptations (I'm sure Bruce was psyched), but Pat Benatar as the fourth in the foursome is weird, right? . . . (2:13) scratch that, weirder quintet---George Clinton, Joey Ramone, Jimmy Cliff, Daryl Hall and Darlene Love . . . (2:55) Bonnie Raitt's mainstream success was still a few years away, in the context of this video she was another "esoteric" artist . . . (3:10) I think the world is a sadder place not having heard a full album from "Reed N Oates" . . . (3:28) What's happening on the wall behind Bobby Womack?!?!? . . . (3:39) Does Ruben Blades give a slow motion "fuck off"? . . . (4:02) DJ Kool Herc really wants you to know his sunglasses flip up . . . (4:14) Daryl Hannah??? . . . (4:28) Peter Wolf hand dance! . . . (4:30) Does Jackson Browne have his shirt buttoned only at the top? How very LA-in-the-80s . . . (4:42) Bono, auditioning for the role of The Devil . . . (5:00) Ringo! And your first peek at future drummer-in-high-demand Zak Starkey . . . (6:19) Bono kisses a Fat Boy! . . . (6:22) Weird, context-less, and inexplicably-slow-motion shot of Michael Monroe of Hanoi Rocks . . . (7:17) The most powerful singing yet . . .
Thursday, 5 December 2013
Lord Huron "She Lit A Fire"
Sometimes, the case for a song it made quickly. "It's a one-listen song" is a line employed by promo folks when they know a tune is going to be quick to win people over.
Sometimes, the case for a song is made slowly.
The Lord Huron record has been out for a year, and folks have been talking to me about it for a year.
I liked the first single, "Time To Run," but we didn't add it. I felt like the beat was a little on the modern side. And that very contemporary thing of making the vocals seem very far away and church chorus-y, while popular, is quite the opposite of the voice-up-front-and-clear folk roots of MVY-core artists like Dylan and John Lennon and Gregg Allman, etc, etc, etc.
Lord Huron was at Newport Folk, and I did catch a good chunk of their set. In short, they were super-impressive. And the singles, including the second one "She Lit A Fire" sounded strong.
And Jess Phaneuf has been lobbying for this band.
Now, so have a few listeners.
Getting emails asking "Why don't you play more polka?" isn't going to get MVY to play more polka.
But when we're on the fence about an artist, then hearing that listeners are excited about a band, is helpful.
We're passed the time of year when we're going to get any singles from major artists, so now is the time we can go a little farther afield, and add a track like "She Lit A Fire."
Hear "She Lit A Fire" on Youtube.
Hear "Time To Run" on Youtube.
Sometimes, the case for a song is made slowly.
The Lord Huron record has been out for a year, and folks have been talking to me about it for a year.
I liked the first single, "Time To Run," but we didn't add it. I felt like the beat was a little on the modern side. And that very contemporary thing of making the vocals seem very far away and church chorus-y, while popular, is quite the opposite of the voice-up-front-and-clear folk roots of MVY-core artists like Dylan and John Lennon and Gregg Allman, etc, etc, etc.
Lord Huron was at Newport Folk, and I did catch a good chunk of their set. In short, they were super-impressive. And the singles, including the second one "She Lit A Fire" sounded strong.
And Jess Phaneuf has been lobbying for this band.
Now, so have a few listeners.
Getting emails asking "Why don't you play more polka?" isn't going to get MVY to play more polka.
But when we're on the fence about an artist, then hearing that listeners are excited about a band, is helpful.
We're passed the time of year when we're going to get any singles from major artists, so now is the time we can go a little farther afield, and add a track like "She Lit A Fire."
Hear "She Lit A Fire" on Youtube.
Hear "Time To Run" on Youtube.
Wednesday, 4 December 2013
Burl Ives "Holly Jolly Christmas"
I asked Barbara this week, “When did the Stocking Stuffer start?”
She looked up and ahead, searching through the years . . .
“I don’t know. The 80s, probably? It may have started before I got here.”
So for maybe 27+ holiday seasons, we’ve had the mvyradio Holiday Stocking Stuffer.
When I first started at MVY, we had the Singing Elves.
The Singing Elves were a number of MVY DJs (Barbara included), singing a 15 second snippet of a Christmas carol, with their voices altered up to high-pitched, elf-speed.
By the time I arrived on the scene at MVY, the staff haaaaaaaatedthose f-n elves.
There were 4 songs, and they rotated heavily, annoyingly.
But we couldn’t get rid of them. People were obsessed with them.
Calls would start coming in, mid-November: “When are the elves going to start!?!?!”
Every year, we’d entertain the subject of ditching the elves. But inevitably, the question of “What will we replace them with?” stumped us.
Finally one December, in the middle of playing those annoying little bastards for the one-too-many-th time, we committed to it. The elves were going to go, and we were going to decide NOW, what we’d do next year.
After much discussion, involving new Elf jingles, or the voice of Santa, or other talking bits, we decided that the only way we were going to survive the repetition that would continue each year, ad infinitum, was do not do a voice. Just do a jingle.
I set about finding a short, distinct holiday jingle.
After many underwhelming ideas, I found the piece of music that we use today.
Burl Ives famously sang “Holly Jolly Christmas.” But he reprised his version of the song in the stop-motion animated classic “Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer.”
And in this version of “Holly Jolly Christmas” there is a prologue/intro to the song that is easily clipped from the more familiar beginning of the tune.
Maybe in the year 2025, some Program Director at MVY will be insanely sick of the Stocking Stuffer jingle. But for now, it rules the (holi)day.
(The Stocking Stuffer jingle is the first 6 seconds of this clip, right up until the singing starts)
Hear the song on Youtube.
Tuesday, 3 December 2013
Grace & Tony "November"
As we get to the end of the year, I start looking at songs that we haven't ever added, but seem to hang around my iTunes playlist for one reason or another.
On closer inspection, many of them turn out to be likeable tunes.
But after further consideration, still don't quite fit the station. Or they can be memorable songs unto themselves, but in the larger picture, we're not convinced that this is a band we could potentially follow for songs and albums to come.
So I'm on the fence on this track.
Whether or not we add it, you might find it fills a spot in your playlist, when you realize that Tony is the brother of John Paul White of The Civil Wars. And Grace and Tony are married. So for all of you who were disappointed that John Paul and Joy of The Civil Wars were not a couple, and that the band itself divorced, here's close relative, figuratively and literally, whose story has a more pleasing ending.
Hear the song on Youtube.
On closer inspection, many of them turn out to be likeable tunes.
But after further consideration, still don't quite fit the station. Or they can be memorable songs unto themselves, but in the larger picture, we're not convinced that this is a band we could potentially follow for songs and albums to come.
So I'm on the fence on this track.
Whether or not we add it, you might find it fills a spot in your playlist, when you realize that Tony is the brother of John Paul White of The Civil Wars. And Grace and Tony are married. So for all of you who were disappointed that John Paul and Joy of The Civil Wars were not a couple, and that the band itself divorced, here's close relative, figuratively and literally, whose story has a more pleasing ending.
Hear the song on Youtube.
Monday, 2 December 2013
Frozen "In Summer"
We took the kids to see the Disney movie "Frozen" this weekend.
We're only on December 2nd, and I have already seen "Elmo's Christmas Countdown" three times, and "The Grinch" twice.
The switch in my brain the kinda turns off the holiday-kiddie-fare has been activated.
That said, "Frozen" was actually very, very good. Like, I walked out of the theater humming the songs, feeling good about the message, and not having to console any small children because the villain was too f-n scary.
My wife enjoyed it too. And before we were even to the car she said what I knew she was going to say:
"Oh, we are buying that soundtrack!"
The songs were particularly good in this Disney effort. On par with Disney's best modern musicals, like "The Little Mermaid" and "Beauty And The Beast."
On the whole, big thumbs up for this film.
If I had any minor critique about the film, it was that the Snowman character seems a little out of place. The rest of the movie has this mystical-realism style, similar to "Brave." And the Snowman is straight out of something very cartoon-y, almost like a computer-animated Chuck Jones creation. It's like he's wandered in from a different film project.
That said, I expect to see more of Olaf the Snowman. I would not be surprised to find him showing up in his own future shorts and specials. He is hilarious (voiced by Josh Gad of "Book Of Mormon" fame), and has one of the best songs in the film, where he imagines the wonderful life of a snowman in summer.
Hear the song on Youtube.
We're only on December 2nd, and I have already seen "Elmo's Christmas Countdown" three times, and "The Grinch" twice.
The switch in my brain the kinda turns off the holiday-kiddie-fare has been activated.
That said, "Frozen" was actually very, very good. Like, I walked out of the theater humming the songs, feeling good about the message, and not having to console any small children because the villain was too f-n scary.
My wife enjoyed it too. And before we were even to the car she said what I knew she was going to say:
"Oh, we are buying that soundtrack!"
The songs were particularly good in this Disney effort. On par with Disney's best modern musicals, like "The Little Mermaid" and "Beauty And The Beast."
On the whole, big thumbs up for this film.
If I had any minor critique about the film, it was that the Snowman character seems a little out of place. The rest of the movie has this mystical-realism style, similar to "Brave." And the Snowman is straight out of something very cartoon-y, almost like a computer-animated Chuck Jones creation. It's like he's wandered in from a different film project.
That said, I expect to see more of Olaf the Snowman. I would not be surprised to find him showing up in his own future shorts and specials. He is hilarious (voiced by Josh Gad of "Book Of Mormon" fame), and has one of the best songs in the film, where he imagines the wonderful life of a snowman in summer.
Hear the song on Youtube.
Sunday, 1 December 2013
Mini Blog Series ~ Going Rogue
Hey Lovelies!
Going Rogue is a mini series off of End of the Line. This will contain a little bit of a spoiler for those who have not read End of the Line. If you don't mind spoilers you can try reading, but you might be confused, if you want to read the book first it is on sale in all formats even the paperback on Amazon. Don't worry about getting left behind, I plan on putting a link to previous 'chapters' on the latest edition. I will post every Sunday instead of a Sample Sunday.
I wrote Going Rogue because a couple of reviewers thought there was something missing in End of the Line. It got me thinking that I could write something short to help fill that period of time in End of the Line that people thought was short. Sorry for sounding vague again I'm trying to avoid spoilers! I don't really like ebooks that are .5. They kind of drive me a little crazy on various reasons that I have vented about on another entry. Those short stories are fine for the first one, but between kind of drive me nuts. I'm still writing a sequel to End of the Line. I thought it would be a trilogy, but I might combine 2 and 3 if I do think it's not just rambling. I hope you enjoy the first week of Going Rogue!
Going Rogue is a mini series off of End of the Line. This will contain a little bit of a spoiler for those who have not read End of the Line. If you don't mind spoilers you can try reading, but you might be confused, if you want to read the book first it is on sale in all formats even the paperback on Amazon. Don't worry about getting left behind, I plan on putting a link to previous 'chapters' on the latest edition. I will post every Sunday instead of a Sample Sunday.
I wrote Going Rogue because a couple of reviewers thought there was something missing in End of the Line. It got me thinking that I could write something short to help fill that period of time in End of the Line that people thought was short. Sorry for sounding vague again I'm trying to avoid spoilers! I don't really like ebooks that are .5. They kind of drive me a little crazy on various reasons that I have vented about on another entry. Those short stories are fine for the first one, but between kind of drive me nuts. I'm still writing a sequel to End of the Line. I thought it would be a trilogy, but I might combine 2 and 3 if I do think it's not just rambling. I hope you enjoy the first week of Going Rogue!
Going Rogue
Chapter One
Aaron
My heart pounded against my chest as I bolted down the stairs. Screams rose from the rooms that I passed then a thud as a person was thrown into the hall. Jumping over the body I made my way down the stairs not even checking to see if that person was okay. I needed air my throat was closing in. Shoving the broken door of the building I was once again outside. My head was spinning and the shouts from my surroundings were only mixing with my own inner arguments. What was I doing? I shouldn’t have put Lauren in that kind of situation. Pinning her to the mattress like that was dumb and we weren’t alone. God forbid if we started something and the relationship went bad how were we suppose to make things work out with an ex? We could potentially get to a point where we hated each other. Yet, I doubt we could survive without each other. Our numbers have been helpful.
Or things could work out between us…
Racking my fingers through my hair I took deep breaths, my steps slowed slightly. A day away from them should be fine. Just enough time to clear my head then go back to them so that we can be one big happy group. I’m probably over analyzing I mean the desire to be close to Lauren is probably because we're stuck together for so long with no one else around. Finally sitting down I glanced around not fully sure where I had wandered off to. It was quiet. I couldn’t even hear the town. I had traveled a good enough distance that even the noise wouldn’t travel.
I stared up at the sky. Dark clouds were rolling in. When was the last time it had rained?
Yet all I could see were two blue eyes staring at me. Those blue eyes were still on me, confused by my actions of being on top of her. I really wanted to kiss those lips once again. We had kissed one other time, but it was quick, chaste, this time would've been the real deal. Would her lips be soft? Though the bigger question would be would she return the action?
She hadn’t pushed me off of her…
Laying down I rested my head down on some moss I just stared up above unable to close my eyes.
A shuffle of leaves woke me causing me to sit up quickly. It had gotten darker and I started to wonder how long I had been passed out. There was movement to the left of me and I slowly got up, but kept myself crouched behind some trees. Keeping myself fleshed against the tree I peeked around to see what it was. My heart pounded against my chest when I saw a light. The flashlight went from one side to another. Squinting I tried to make out who was holding the light.
"How far of a search does Manson have for the boy?"
"Last I heard I heard New Jersey and parts of New York , Pennsylvania , and Maryland . He figured he can't travel that far considering everything."
"It's amazing how one man was able to get that many followers."
"Power."
They paused.
"Should we go look in that town back there?" the man holding the flashlight shined the light in the other's eyes.
"Worth a shot right?"
Sean and Paige couldn't out run these men. Lauren will not see these men coming. My eyes scanned the area. I clenched my fists.
"Hey morons," I shouted as I jumped out in plain view. "Is this the ass you're looking for?"
The light was shined on me and I bolted further into the darkness. No matter what happened to me I needed to make sure nothing happened to Lauren and the group. I was not going to let the group suffer from my past mistakes or because of my confused mind.
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