Legend has it, though Snopes doubts it — Hemingway jotted those six words down on a beer napkin and walked out with $10 from each member of the group.
Baby shoes, kids-sized shoes, adult-sized shoes. There’ll be closets full of these shoes in Russia and Ukraine — some never to be worn again.
I’m thousands of miles away but I can’t shake the shakes and the disbelief. And it makes me so sad on many levels. I feel like I’m leaving a world for my daughters that is so messed up.
It’s always been like this, you say? Wars, plagues, exploitation, greed and discrimination. Greed? Did I mention greed? Maybe I’m the guy who keeps beating his head against the wall expecting a better result. Some tiny shred of evidence progress is being made in human history.
Instead, we see and hear, through our gadgets, teenagers lining up to get their very own Kalashnikov and an ill-fitted helmet. We see brigades of men and women bustling in a room where they pour gasoline into beer bottles and stuff it with a cloth. A Molotov cocktail.
We see daughters and sons and mothers crying for their fathers at the train station as evacuation was not allowed for men over 18.
If challenged, I, too, can come up with a six-word story.
We live life seeking pleasure and meaning. But we too often settle for something just slightly less uncomfortable. And more questions.
If you know what I mean.
We are fooled every day into thinking we are in control. When in reality, we are not.
If you know what I mean.
It’s hard to understand there are billions of opinions, laws, edicts, theories, declarations and warning signs. Each formed by human observation and experience over time. We build the tower of knowledge one brick at a time. With lots of coffee breaks. Thousand-year coffee breaks.
If you know what I mean.
It’s hard to believe that when you look up into the sky you are seeing the distant past, hundreds of millions of stars that don’t exist anymore. They burned out long ago.
If you know what I mean.
It’s hard not to believe that your own opinion is the correct one when in reality it may not be. Or, it may be that there are many correct answers to a question. Or, that the answer is that the universe is both finite and infinite
If you know what I mean.
It’s hard to believe our own star — the sun — will burn out too, and its light may be seen by someone, some being, (another version of ourselves), a million years later, a million miles away. Eating pizza. On a coffee break.
If you know what I mean.
We are billions, but we are connected. By the roar of the machines we make, by the blood running through our bodies, by the inexplicable violence against one another, by the definition defying qualities of love.
No fish catching for the first time in my last three or four outings at Smith Lake. That’s all well and good. I forgot my gloves and pliers, and I was worried about having to barehand the fish while digging a deep set hook or lure out of its mouth.
I always felt kind of bad for throwing fish back after doing that to them. I mean, here I am, using trickery to rip a bass out of the water while it pursues its constitutional right to seek food smaller than itself.
The sudden change of environment must seem to the fish like it has entered a different dimension.
Upon throwing the fish back in, I imagine it would feel a lot like I did last week before the getaway to the lake. I went to the dentist and received two crowns and replaced a bridge. At times during the two-hour- tooth chiseling, it felt like a hook was in my mouth. (Props to my dentist, though, for a job well done.)
As I was saying, I didn’t catch anything so that was one less worry off my mind as my wife and I sank into vacation mode. Vacation mode is where you put things into perspective and push sad thoughts away.
We sat on the dock, fishing poles by our sides, and inhaled fresh air. The trees were fiery, oranges, yellows and reds. They seemed to have been painted by children using water colors.
On our first day, a beaver swam close to Catherine who was standing on the dock. She said, ‘Aren’t you a cute little otter?’
And that’s when the animal turned over and smacked his tail like a paddle in the water.
I was not an eyewitness.
But she made sure I would see the red moon.
On Friday, she woke me up around 2:30 a.m. to go stand outside and gaze at the moon, which by golly was red or reddish. I was in a daze. I was wearing shorts, a bathrobe with no shoes or slippers. It was freezing. My feet kept finding the sharpest rocks.
I said in my Chevy Chase at the Grand Canyon voice: ‘Beautiful, time to go now.’
But it’s the longest lunar eclipse to occur in nearly 600 years, she said, obviously thrilled with her job as tour guide of the night sky from somewhere near Arley, Alabama.
I wondered: How did I get so lucky to be in that small fraternity of people who get to stand on shards of granite and peer into the sky in 38 F weather, looking at something — now get this — named the Beaver Moon.
It was a good ‘vacay’ though. We built campfires, made S’mores, read books and watched much of the first season of ‘Bewitched’ on TV.
Oh. and just one tip to somehow tie all this into music: Don’t start thinking about the instrumental theme song of ‘Bewitched.’ It gets stuck in your head.
ALBUMS: 100cc 10cc (1975); Original Soundtrack (1975); How Dare You (1976); Bloody Tourists (1978)
MVC Rating: 100cc 4.5/$$$$; Original 4.0/$$$; How 4.0/$$$$/ Bloody 4.0/$$$
I’ve got 10cc in a previous post as one of my top underrated bands. I’ve had conversations with ‘friends’ that think 10cc is not underrated –but shouldn’t be rated at all because they are so bad!
This attitude comes from several things, namely two Top 40 hits. One, ‘I’m Not in Love” was a song off of the Original Soundtrack album that was a big radio hit that people either loved or hated. It has syrupy strings and slow tempo. But as I’ve pointed out in my arguments, it is satire, like a lot of 10cc. They are clever and very good musicians and songwriters:
In that song: ‘I keep your picture on the wall/it hides a nasty stain that’s lying there … I’m not in love.’
The song ends in a whisper spoken refrain: Be quiet, big boys don’t cry, big boys don’t cry.
So, if you are entering the 10cc universe with that one song on the radio, you would miss out on some interesting music.
The other ‘success’ that I think hurt them a little was a song several years later that was a sappy, big radio pop song, ‘The Things we Do for Love’ — their most successful song but I think it hurt their credibility a bit.
‘The things we do for love, like walking in the rain and the snow and there’s nowhere to go ...’
No satire to save this one as it did for ‘I’m Not in Love.”
Fortunately I entered in through their 1975 compilation album of early British hits. Or, another way to describe that would be early U.S. flops.
This really is an album of near misses. ‘Rubber Bullets,’ ‘Wall Street Shuffle,’ The Worst Band in the World,’ and ‘Silly Love,’ (Not to be confused with Paul McCartney’s sappy ‘Silly Love Songs.’ Or their own ‘Things We Do For Love.) 10cc’s ‘Silly Love’ opens with riffing power chords. .’
‘Rubber Bullets’ satirizes a couple of jailhouse songs that were popular on the 1950s including ‘Jailhouse Rock’ and Riot on Cell Block No. 9. In the song, the warden is calling guards to ‘Load up, load up, load up with rubber bullets.’
Then it got out of hand as the music do-wops along:
Well we don’t understand Why you called in the National Guard (national guard, national guard) When Uncle Sam is the one Who belongs in the exercise yard (exercise yard, exersise yard
We all got balls and brains But some’s got balls and chains At the local dance at the local county jail
100cc is a great place to start although there pleasures and treasures to be found in the others, including ‘Art for Art’s Sake,’ off of the ‘How Dare You,’ album, ‘Dreadlock Holiday’ (I don’t like cricket, I love it).’
If I had to describe their music, it would be Frank Zappa (without the overt weirdness) and Queen with its emphasis on sound production and structure.
So, I’m at an historic mile-marker in my quest to review the 678 vinyl records that I bought or were given over the past 50 years.
I’m down to 100.
I’m doing this to raise awareness of Lewy body dementia.
My goal is to finish before I die of that degenerative brain disease.
Starting with 678, I’ve done 578; I have 100 to go.
How much time I have is unknown. I’m 61, diagnosed in 2016. The average life span is 4 to 8 years after diagnosis. I’m into my fifth year and have every intention lasting another five years or at least until I’ve finished this project.
The terminal illness, for reasons unknown, causes a proliferation in the brain of naturally occurring alpha synuclein proteins, which willy nilly coat parts of the brain, smothering brain cells. Parkinson’s disease works in the same manner, only the killer proteins affect different parts of the brain, resulting in varying symptoms.
Given time, in many cases, near the end of its disease stage, a Parkinson’s patient will look just like a Lewy body patient.
Upon hearing the bad news I had Lewy body dementia, I came upon this idea to count down my beloved record collection. It’s a hodgepodge for sure and certainly not a high end collection. Lots of cut-outs and promotional records. I tended to drift toward the bargain bins.
My father gave me that record, not that he was a big fan but he saw how much I enjoyed their songs on the car radio. Remarkably, they are a band whose straight ahead rock and roll from the 60s and 70s more than holds up today.
I also had a Jackson 5 album, ABC, at about this time. Jackson was 11 when that album was released; I was 10.
In my parents’ childhood, there really wasn’t rock and roll unless you knew how to pick up a blues station on the AM dial at night.
The radio stations were more diverse when I was 10 or 11 than they are now. Terry Jacks’ ‘Seasons in the Sun’ would come on right after “Hey Jude,’ followed by Tony Orlando and Dawn’s ‘Candida,’ then Wilson Pickett doing ‘Land of 1,000 Dances.’
My mother took me to guitar lessons for a few months and I learned three chords. I just wasn’t musical in that sense but I loved music. I still dance like no one’s watching, even when people are watching. Although my dancing is less fluid rhythmic swaying to the beat and more episodic spasmodic dystonia.
‘No,’ I reply, unable to stop. ‘It’s doing me.’
Certainly the disease has affected my life and our family system. Heck, the effects have even trickled down to our dog, Gus, a yellowish poodle mix who at 15 or 16 seems to be hanging around for me. Sometimes we just sit and stare at each other like we’re building a Stareway to Heaven.
But until that’s completed I am hanging in there and learning the best practices on living with Lewy Body Dementia.
————————–
They say life is short but I say life is long
Full of pretty faces and beautiful songs
You can think too much about moseying along
It’s best to stay calm
Life is long, life is long, life is long
–Jared Mees, ‘Life is Long’ from the album Life is Long.
—————————–
I don’t drive anymore after an accident several years ago. More recently, as in three weeks ago, I had to get my head stitched up after fainting.
Only six stitches, but the fainting is a condition –orthostatic hypotension — I’ve warned about on this blog. I was not following my own protocol when I stood up quickly from the couch and began walking toward the stairs. I kerplunked and my head hit the floor. So we are escalating my attempts to thwart this blood pressure problem. More salt in diet. More fluids in diet, standing slowly, deep breathing and putting my head down to feel the blood rush back to my brain.
We take my blood pressure frequently to monitor. I think the typing of these blog posts is stimulating my brain in a way that is slowing my Parkinonian effects, as well as my cognition effects. I think putting together words in sentences and paragraphs are all stimulating my brain. I think looking for a record that I just saw yesterday and now can’t find even though I know it was there and it makes me want to scream is stimulating my brain. It’s certainly raising my blood pressure, which is good also!
It gets tricky when you are looking for that one record which could be in one of three rooms, on two levels. They were fairly well organized alphabetically when I started.
I’ve become more philosophical about the disease. Getting the diagnosis was such a shock to the system but not a shock that I really let anyone see. I’d make jokes about it (still do). ‘We all die sometime’ became the cliche’ of my life.
Years ago I lived every day as if I had a month or so. Now the years have come and gone; my daughter Claire got married, my daughter Hannah moved here from Korea with her husband; and my daughter Emily moved to be close to me — all not knowing how long Dad had.
The years went by.
I still don’t have an answer to the question: If I had to do it all over again, what would you change?
(BTW it took me a good minute to find the question mark sign on my keyboard just then. That ‘s how the memory effects of Lewy body manifest themselves in little ways. But finding it was a mental exercise or, put another way, it was exercise for the brain.)
Just about a year ago, I went through a hallucinatory stage where I became immersed in another world: I communicated with other beings and talked to people no one else could see. I retired from my job at AL.com. Fixed the hallucinations for now. And here I am writing still on this blog I started four years ago.
I’ve written 578 album reviews, all available right here right now on this blog, www.myvinylcountdown.com
One hundred to go.
No, I still don’t have any more understanding of how we all ended up here on this big ball of mud, third from the sun.
While my disease has reinforced my belief that the universe can be a soul-crushing crucible and that its understanding is beyond human reach, I gotta believe God is good.
The sound of the record was what struck me first. Though it may be available remastered now, it wasn’t when I picked it up in high school in Athens, Ga, at WUXTRY. The guitar solos were executed wonderfully and seemed to hang in the air allowing it to sink into your cerebellum.
This is one where teen-age audiophiles would pick to show of their super sonics. That, and of course, Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon. The thread that binds these albums, nay not thread, the ROPE, tying them together was Alan Parsons of the Alan Parsons Project and producer of DSOFTM and Year of the Cat.
One day about 15 years ago, I was working at the Oakland Tribune newspaper and Alabama News Group. when I got a call from my wife that Al Stewart was playing for free at a church in Marin County (Ross to be exact). It was on my way home and I got there to find standing room only. It was him on guitar and, I believe, a piano accompanist.
This is one I’m giving a ‘5’ and I’ll admit it is partially for nostalgic reasons. It also had an appeal to musicians who liked the interplay between guitar, keyboards and strings. If you’ve followed my blog you know I don’t give out ‘5’s very much at all. But this one does it with literacy, musicianship and that it was different then pop/rock that was coming out at the time. Rick Wakeman, of the progressive rock group Yes played on this record. If you can’t tell from many of the song’s names, Stewart writes on historical events and weaving his own story within the historical context.
This is better than I thought. I bought this brand new in Athens, Ga., at about 17 or 18. I heard the song ‘Summer Eyes” on the radio and then trained my ears on the DJ’s voice as he said ‘New one from Nite City, which features on keyboards Ray Manzarak of the legendary Doors.
I like ‘Summer Eyes” still, Nite City and ‘Love Will Make You Mellow.’
I’m not sure if that’s what the radio guy said or not. But it’s pretty much what happened. I’d say half of my inclinations to buy something new came from either radio– which should be no surprise — or hearing a new one at the record store and asking who was on the turntable. This usually endeared me to most record store clerks except the orneriest ones.
“Hey man, what’s that playing,” I’d ask.
“Little band called Kid Creole and the Coconuts,” he’d say back. “You might also check out Dr. Buzzards Savannah Dance Band.”
“Cool, thanks,” I said.
I do have this one and Kid Creole and Dr. Buzzard thank you very much. Several great albums from those guys.
One of a pair of Kid Creole albums I have.
So how about Nite City? Doors collectors definitely. Like I said it was better than I remembered, and Summer Eyes could have been a hit. But overall this slice of 70s rock had lyrics that were too clilche’. Jim Morrison was slinging W.B. Yeats next to some of these lyrics:
When i walk in your fantasy/ Do I look like reality?
When I start talking like a Bantam cock/does your heart start beating rock rock rock.
From Allmusic.com: Manzarek’s keyboard work is as intelligent as ever, while guitarist Paul Warren and bassist Nigel Harrison (later of Blondie) play with gusto throughout. The weak link is Noah James, a decent vocalist who strains far too hard for a dash of the late Morrison’s lyrical abilities.
ALBUMS:The Best of Melanie (1977): From the Beginning (1974)
MVC Rating: 4.0/ Best $$; Beginning $$
Melanie jumped into public consciousness with her Woodstock performance. Candles in the Wind Lay Down, Lay Down) is a showcase for her amazing voice projection.
Funny, how most people remember Melanie for a child-like nursery rhyme with sexual innuendos ‘Brand New Key.’ Song (to me) yucky.
But I do love Melanie’s ‘Look What They’ve Done to My Song, Ma.’ Everyone who has been edited understands this sentiment.
I’ve got a couple of old Melanie albums. The anti-war Lay Down you would think would seem aged but to me it’s quite the opposite — it is powerful, especially when she’s singing with the Edward Hawkins singers as seen on the German video below.
Tuesday/Wednesday post-holiday edition. We had good fun over the Memorial Day weekend at my parents’ in Athens, Ga. I bought a short stack of bargain bin records at a cool little thrift store . We ate hot dogs walked quite a bit and some of us swam.
As you can see I missed my 4/28 post. Well to be honest I forgot; I mean I actually remembered about mid afternoon but put it off and then forgot. Actually I was probably distracted by the afternoon lunch/brunch prepared at our house by dear friend Mary Porter. I had two helpings of a delicious dish of quinoa in a coconut milk sauce and chicken. Delicious and healthy. Also Sunday, Cat and I went for a long walk around HP golf course. If you take that walk you might consider strapping on a helmet for that part on Clairmont. We had one golf ball sail over out heads. Few minutes later we heard a golfer shout FORE and I nearly did a barrel roll on the sidewalk. Back when I was driving I remember a ball went over the fence and bounced right in front of my moving vehicle. Survival in the big city. Bye for now,
