ALBUM: “You’re Never Alone With a Schizophrenic” (1979)
MVC rating: 4.0
Hey, who am I to call out anyone for not being politically correct about a brain disorder. But the album title did kind of make me wince. And wouldn’t it be ‘funnier’ if it was ‘You’re Never Alone When You Are a Schizophrenic.”
Ian Hunter, lead singer of the sturdy, straight-head Mott the Hoople, puts out his fourth solo record here (1979).
This is a good album, that I have neglected playing for years. Backed by members of the Bruce Springsteen’s E-Street Band, Hunter dishes some radio-friendly rock and roll.
Guitarist Mick Ronson is reasonably understated throughout most of the record. No major show-off solos in songs that had more of a Bowie/Jagger vibe. Ronson likely helped create that sound.
In “Just Another Night,” Hunter does an exaggerated, on-purpose, Mick Jagger vocal. On ‘Wild East,’ Hunter enjoys hanging out in a bad neighborhood.
And then there’s ‘Cleveland Rocks’ who many remember was a theme song for “The Drew Carey Show,’ — a rendition by The Presidents of the United States. It’s an anthemic rocker with some of those 80’s gratuitous synthesizer warbles and whoops.
‘Ships’ is the radio ballad, and it is syrup, topped off by a disturbingly bland cliche’. And so it didn’t surprise me that Barry Manilow covered this with some success. (The chorus cliche’? We’re just two ships that pass in the night.)
This is an opinion column by Mike Oliver who writes about his diagnosis of Lewy body dementia and other health and life issues, here on AL.com and his blog.
This morning I had a memory from my childhood.
That, in and of itself, is not particularly newsworthy. But it did make me think how my brain is working.
I have a degenerative brain disease called Lewy body dementia, and I think my experiences can be useful to the medical community and the care-giving community – or anyone interested in what it feels like inside the head of a dementia patient.
Mike and Catherine Oliver help each other remember.
My memory this morning was this:
I was looking at some pants getting for work, realized the pants were — unlike most of my pants – too loose in the waist. The pants would be literally pants on the ground after about five or six steps.
This triggered a memory: it was a sunny day in Auburn, AL,. I was a 5 or 6-year-old kid going out to play on Rudd Avenue (which I don’t think exists anymore. The road’s there, but the name changed for some reason.)
In my memory I am running to get to the creek we used to play in and then we’d likely walk in the creek to Prather’s Lake.
As I run, I realize I‘m having to hold my pants up. With both hands.
I only had two things on like every Auburn boy on my street in the 1960s: Underwear and short pants. And my short pants kept sliding down. Not cool.
Luckily. I had belt loops on my shorts.
My memory only lasted a split second, but it was very visual. I remembered I found a piece of skinny rope. It was only about 5 or 6 inches long. Not enough to go all the way around my waist. So. I couldn’t use it like a regular belt because it was too short.
I guess the idea just spontaneously erupted in my 5 or 6-year-old brain. I tied two front belt loops together with that little rope. Tailor made! The britches held up nice and tight now.
I don’t remember anybody ever teaching me that trick or ‘hack’ as it would be called using current nomenclature. But, indeed, it was a real ‘necessity-is-the-mother-of-invention’ moment.
I think of this, not because there is anything unusual or profound about it.
But it made me stop and wonder why my brain chose to furnish me this quite vivid memory of a past event with no relevance to anything, other than it was triggered by me looking at some pants.
Is it my brain saying: ‘Hey, here’s some info you used before in a separate waist-fitting pants escapade. Here, see if this will help you,’ my brain seems to be saying. Pretty dang complicated for a brain awash in clumps of protein named after Dr.Lewy, who discovered them.
Or maybe it’s a symbolic lesson about how the answer, the cure, is right in front of you, like the piece of twine.
I’ve got my brain sitting here right now — and at all times — inside my head.
What if thinking alone can literally change the brain?
Wonder where that thought came from?
I’ll try it.
-=-=-=-=–=-=-=-=-=-=
Here are five essential facts about Lewy body dementia from the Lewy Body Dementia Association.
LBD is a relentlessly progressive disorder affecting thinking, movement, behavior and sleep. On average people with LBD live 5-7 years after diagnosis, though it can progress as quickly as 2 years or as slowly as 20 years.
Despite its low public awareness, LBD is not a rare disorder and affects an estimated 1.4 million Americans along with their families and caregivers.
People living with LBD and their family caregivers need a high level of support from family members and healthcare professionals from the early stage of the disorder, due to early and unpredictable frequent changes in thinking, attention and alertness, as well as psychiatric symptoms like hallucinations and delusions.
LBD is the most misdiagnosed form of dementia. Getting a diagnosis of LBD typically takes 3 or more doctors over 12 to 18 months. The LBDA Research Centers of Excellence network includes 25 preeminent academic centers with expertise in LBD diagnosis and management.
Early diagnosis of LBD is extremely important, due to severe sensitivities to certain medications sometimes used in disorders that mimic LBD, such as Alzheimer’s disease and other medical and psychiatric illnesses. An early diagnosis also empowers the person with LBD to review, pursue and fulfill their personal life priorities before the illness progresses too far, review their legal and financial plans, and discuss their care preferences with their physician and family.
By Guy MacPherson – Joe Henderson, CC BY 2.0, 4 WIKI
ALBUMS: Our Thing (1964, RE Blue Note 1985)
MVC Rating: 5.0/$$$$$
Another Blue Note reissue. Another great jazz album.
It’s the bop era, late 50s, early 60s. The drumming is always setting pace. –doh doh doh chicka doe.
A little bass, boom boom de boom. Piano, tinkle tinkle.
Then Henderson blows the sax…. whaa whoa whaa whoa whee whah, wha whump.
There you go my note-for-note rendition of Teeter Totter. which is an up B-flat blues, says a Youtuber. It is the only major key track in the set. I’ll try to pull a video of it.
Meanwhile, however many solos Henderson takes, the light but steady and ready Tap Tap Tap Tap continues on the drum and cymbal. This song I can watch the news to. Of course turning the volume off the TV.
Gordon’s music has a way of putting the daily disasters in their place.
Its more fun than progressive rock.
So putting that fun aside, this is seriously good jazz from a jazz rich era. The band is tight and Henderson’s keeps it all reeled in, even when it seems it’s not.
Ever wonder what are those numbers near the title of each My Vinyl Countdown blog item.
It is there at the top next to the singer’s name. Some know that’s the number of records left to go before having done them all. So for example, Broken Homes is 624 and that means 623 were lef to review at the time that was being written. THe Head and the Heart was the last blog I did so it is at the top of the website, counting down in alphabetical order. The H&H is at 429.
So if you knew nothing about the numbering, you could assess which letters I have been through by picking on of the Letter categories to your right.
For example I’m on the H’s now with Jimi Hendrix, Heart, etc. In C’s we had the Carpenter’s, Eric Clapton. There are more than 200 musical posts.
My goal for my records is 678 which I counted before I started this thing about 14 months ago. That number definitely won’t stand as I have been receiving records and yes, occasionally still buying, records. But 678 has been my number I’m sticking to until the end and then maybe we’ll start down an Odds ‘n Ends list with whatever’s left over
TO find older material, the search field works really well on laptop/desktop. Not so sure on mobile.
Upcoming: I’ve decided to file a short update on my fitness training each week, the quest to dunk.
Okay, here’s another from a relative, and a relatively new record at that. The Head and the Heart is the name of this earnest alternative folk group.
There seems to be a real genre beginning with this big band easy folk-rock, atmospheric music. Kind of like a mix of Fleetwood Mac and Fairport Convention. With a hint of and updated sounding Pentangle. (John Renbourne, look him up).
Other artists such as the Fleet Foxes, Mac DeMarco, and to a certain degree Father Misty (originally in the Fleet Foxes) and Arcade Fire appear to be sharing some of this ground.
Some fine singing and harmonizing on this. Fun to listen to with your eyes closed in an easy yoga position.
Band members, should and probably do understand the increasing competition in their space, maybe due to higher demand for the sound.
I’m leaving out to play some more of these newer ones that I haven’t listened to as much. This particular album has a very good soft jam thing working here.
