Hi y’all. This is the last Wednesday before the election, and hopefully by the next Wednesday we’ll be in a mood to celebrate. In the meantime, I want to give you a bit of a reminder of why I started this series back when this blog was still known as Booman Tribune. Part of it is simply that I love music, and YouTube made it extremely easy to post any of a number of favorite songs, performances, etc. The other, and perhaps more important part has to do with the aftermath of the 2016 election, which is when I started this series. I was witness to, and no doubt participated in some very heated discussions about the meaning of that election cycle and what it meant to be liberal/progressive/leftist etc. The impression I had, correctly or incorrectly, was that some of the language of the alt-right had filtered into the sort of center-left circles (of which this blog is one) with regard to issues concerning how to prioritize racial/ethnic inequality, with some fairly loud voices seeming to privilege the white working class as the primary focus. As someone who is aware if how many of our problems are intersectional in nature, and that we’d really lose something by ignoring the very diversity that we’d once embraced as a broader liberal/progressive community, I felt the need for some pushback. So, I put up the first cafe/lounge late in 2016 and saw what happened. It served as both an “up yours” for some detractors and a warm embrace and gentle reminder of what makes our liberal and progressive communities here and abroad so beautiful. In the intervening nearly four years (with a few breaks here and there) I’ve shared music from a variety of genres, eras, and cultures. Some weeks were clearly themed. Some I sort of improvised as I put something together. Some folks took the call and responded with their own videos. As someone who lives by a saying that “vision is part revelation and revolution: it is the call and the resonse”, I enjoy those moments especially. That saying is one I coined, based on some liner notes to a William Parker LP. His words were a bit more eloquent at making the same point.
So here you are, reading this preamble and wondering, when are we getting some music? It’s coming. Let’s start with a documentary entitled What Ever Happened to Hazel Scott?:
She was a talented pianist and vocalist who had a very promising career that was cut short in the US around 1950 thanks to HUAC. Her story is one that deserves telling over and over. And I hope it is a stark reminder of what happens when that fascist impulse rears its ugly head. Normally, as a courtesy I don’t link to Daily Kos, but since I got this video from a diary about her, it is only fair that I give credit where credit is due. We live in a time that certainly parallels the paranoia of the McCarthy era, and we have an election coming up that will hopefully be the beginning of the end of our current sorry era.
Here’s Alicia Keys giving a nod to Hazel Scott before moving on to some other music that inspired her:
While we’re at it, why not just enjoy Hazel Scott playing two pianos:
Okay. The bar is open. So is the jukebox. Remember to vote if you haven’t already. Vote early, and depending on your state, probably best to vote in person at this point. The GOP deserves to be taken to the woodshed. This is our chance.
Cheers!
I’ve been away for a while and I’ve really missed these posts. The president’s comments regarding NYC being a “ghost town” and the DOJ declaring NYC an “anarchist jurisdiction” got me to thinking about the Stones last really great album, Some Girls. The New York flavor really struck a chord with this rural Texan when it was released, and probably influenced my decision to relocate to the big, scary city in the 90’s.
https://youtu.be/oBlLbNVBKCc
“Some Girls” was one of the first LPs I picked up as a very early teen. Amazed my parents let me get that one. That one was great from start to finish. I’ve been thinking about the Stones a bit lately as well, as they seemed to capture what I understood of what NYC enough to be the musical guest on the first episode of SNL’s fourth season – the one where Mayor Koch made an appearance as NYC was emerging from bankruptcy and gave an amusing speech about the city coming back and surviving (and essentially saying to the federal government, “up yours”). From what I recall, the LPs released after “Some Girls” (“Emotional Rescue” in 1980 and “Tattoo You” in 1981) were primarily outtakes from the same recording sessions. Explains why those LPs were uneven and why the handful of good tracks seemed like they belonged in 1978. I still have that old LP. Don’t have a record player anymore, but hey we can stream this stuff now. Good to see you back. I may not have been a rural Texan growing up, but I was a suburban Texan for a bit, and was raised by Texans. Visited plenty of elders who lived in rural parts of the state pretty regularly once upon a time. Leaves an impression that follows one wherever one lands.
By the way, it’s damned good to see you back in these parts. I hope you are doing okay.
Doing well, thanks. All my people are healthy and my employer continued to pay full salary and benefits while we were shut down. Very, very lucky. How about yourself?
I am hanging in. Middle age is really starting to hit hard. Other than that, I still manage to stay employed in higher ed, and thankfully I am able to mostly work from home. Good thing seeing as my state is often considered a red zone for COVID-19. Good to know your employer looked after you and your colleagues. Not everyone did.
Another great track: https://youtu.be/MYvy3kBYN4Q
The energy they put into this song was always so fun. Again, think SNL Season 4 Episode 1. This take is very similar. They were on fire.
Did you see this?
I’d seen the tweet, but had not had a chance to give it a listen. Truer words have not been spoken in recent memory.
Sarah Cooper’s new special on Netflix dropped recently. Had a chance to view it. Got a kick out of it. A lot of the special hits a bit close to home, but that’s the point. Her lip syncs of Trump are very much on point, as always. There’s so much more. Plenty of SNL alum to back her up. Hopefully she gets some more breaks.
Another classic:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RbmS3tQJ7Os
They’re a pretty decent cover band also.
https://youtu.be/qH3oVVtw4b4
Interesting combo of Motown and Country/TexMex. I know they had a bit of a fascination with Country & Western in the late 1970s (heard some of that on the Some Girls LP). They knew what they were doing. I could see how this interpretation would have played well in Texas at the time. Lived in South-central Texas for a bit as a kid. Heard more than my share of progressive country and TexMex thanks to my dad. Can’t really remember most of those bands, save for Sir Douglas Quintet, and only because by some fluke I was briefly friends with the son of one of the band leader (and had no idea what a big deal his dad was).
I remember this from my youth, but also from the V for Vendetta soundtrack:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BUt0dZXPFoU
Just about the most perfect rock song ever.
When I first moved to Sacramento in the late 1970s, there was at least on of the AOR station DJs who loved to play that one. Forgot his name, but he loved to play a lot of the more aggressive-sounding songs from the mid to late 1960s. Used to refer to The Who as the original punk rockers (probably inaccurate, but then again I recall some lore that Pete Townsend decked some hippie who made the mistake of jumping on to the stage when they had their gig at Woodstock, of all places). That was back in the days when commercial DJs chose their rotations. A different time.