Jewish Steel

Oh, no! Not Ricky Jay. He was awesome. 72 seems kind of young, but I think he lived a pretty full life.

There is a whole bunch of his stuff on Youtube. If you’re not familiar with his work, treat yourself.

Try Try Try To UnderstandPost + Comments (61)

Warning! Flaming Hot Take Ahead: Thanksgiving is the least musical holiday. Apart from one very long “song” that I don’t think anyone under the age of 40 is aware of, when you think of Thanksgiving, no music springs to mind. Can you think of a song that even mentions Thanksgiving? If you say The Cranberries are a Thanksgiving band I will come to your house and make you pay for what you done said.

In order to satisfy my own curiosity I had to see if The Cranberries were a “the” band or just Cranberries. Some bands will try to pull that on you. I’m glad I did because otherwise I’d never know Google’s opinion on the matter. Burt Reynolds, huh?

And as long as we’re being bold, let me say that since I predicted a 40-seat net gain in Congress and came pretty close, I am back in the prognostication game: It’s going to be Beto.

 

Now Be ThankfulPost + Comments (162)

If I had been more on my game for Independence Day, I might have suggested Joe Strummer’s 1989 album Earthquake Weather. It was supposedly the product of a renewed sense of confidence in his powers which may indeed be true, but according to his biography by Chris Salewicz (a real ox-stunner at 600+ pages!) he was a habitual weed-smoker. While I am totally down to Legalize It, we can also be (ahem) clear-eyed about what it can do to one’s sense of motivation. Rock legends can work to whatever schedule pleases them, anyhow.

I would have recommended it because it is a very American-feeling album, in the same sense that Big Audio Dynamite feels European. It’s made with an all-American cast of musicians, apart from Joe, some of whom you might recognize from the film Repo Man. Strummer writes about American politics and cars and highways and diners and dive bars and jazz. The traditional stuff non-Americans gawk at. For someone with such a reputation of being a punk rock teller of hard truths, Strummer’s lyrics are quite dazzlingly poetic. They are beat-like, too, and don’t always make a lot of linear sense. Fine by me! They fit the music like a glove.

The music is Clash-level quality. It’s even got a reggae cover. Strummer’s later solo albums had great moments, but I don’t think he ever sustained as high a quality of songwriting subsequently. Every time I would teach a Jimmy Buffet song  to some grey-faced office worker, florescent-light-sick and lusting after some color, chaos, and sunshine, I would think of how Strummer’s Island Hopping captured everything Buffet had ever done more vividly and tunefully and in under three minutes. And the pity of the fact that, too late to cash in on Combat Rock and too early for Grunge which it resembles more than a little, this splendid album got overlooked.

Let Me Tell You ‘Bout Your Blood, Bamboo KidPost + Comments (33)