Blues on a Saturday: Allman Borthers Band

The Allman Brothers Band perfroms Elmore James' "The Sky is Crying" at on 12/3/2011 at the Orpheum Theater, Boston, MA.For some fans this is a controversial and inferior lineup with neither Duane Allman or Dickey Betts, the twin guitars who made the band's sound. To my ears, Warren Hayes and Derek Trucks play at a level barely below Duane and Dickey.

Separated at Birth?

Rachel Maddow says Paul Ryan is a Ayn Randist, not a fiscal conserviate

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Blues on a Saturday: Robert Cray "Smokin' Gun"

I've heard Robert Cray live several times. Once in Washington DC when he was first rising on the scene and several years ago in Wichita after he had become an established star of the blues. He gave great performances both times. As a star, howoever, his security people wouldn't let amateur photographers close to the stage.

Blues on a Saturday: Mose Allison Parchman Farm

Mose Allison was named a jazz master this week, so naturally I'm going to pick one of his great songs. Listen carefully all the way to the end. Mose stopped performing this live at some point. I've previously posted Allison songs here ("Your Mind is on Vacation" and here ("Ever Since the World Ended".

KItty Wells

It was reported today that Kitty Wells has died. Wells 1952 hit "It wasn't God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels" was the first song by a female to top the country music charts. Wells paved the way for later generations of women in country music: Patsy Cline, Loretta Lynn, Tammy Wynette, and many others owe her a debt of gratitude.  Her wikipedia entry reports that she is the sixth best selling female artists in country music.

There were women stars in country music before Wells--Maybelle Carter, Rose Maddox, and Patsy Montana come to mind,  but Wells was at another level and duration.    I fear some obits may not get this right.

Well's defining song "It Wasn't God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels" is the greatest answer song in American popular music. It outsold Hank Thompson's "The Wild Side of Life." For a while, Wells' song was banned by the Grand Ole Opry and radio stations. That fate doesn't seem to have befallen Thompson's disc.
 Here's "The Wild Side of Life" performed by Hank Thompson in a guitar shop, decades after the
western-swingish original
Both songs share a melody with Roy Acuff's 1939 "Great Speckled Bird" and the 1929 Carter Family's "I'm Thinking Tonight of My Blues Eyes.



There are at least two other country songs written to this tune: Reno & Smiley's “I'm Using My Bible for a Roadmap,” and Townes Van Zandt's “Heavenly Houseboat Blues.” Rock historian Nick Tosches say that the melody is an ancient British tune.

The Obama Effect

Charles Dutton is one of our finest actors and he has now branched out to direct his first theatrical release "The Obama Effect."   It's debuting in AMC theaters across the country this weekend. There's not one near me, but if you have a chance to see it, I think it will be be  entertainment gamble worth taking.
Here's the description from the website

A serious health scare ignites John Thomas, an insurance salesman in his 50’s (played by writer/director Charles S. Dutton) to take a closer look at his life. Motivated by a misguided obsession with getting Barack Obama elected, John takes an overwhelming involvement in the Presidential campaign. While John becomes obsessed with the ideal of change that Obama represents for Americans, he has in turn neglected to create positive change in his own life, particularly with regard to his health and familial relationships.

Blues on a Saturday: Jimmy McGriff and Hank Crawford

Jimmy Mcgriff on organ and piano with Hank Crawford on alto sax, Bob Devos on guitar, and Jimmie Smith on drums. Performing the blues classic "Every Day I Have the Blues"

Blues on a Saturday: Lonnie Mack, Albert Collins, and Roy Buchanon--Further on Down the Road

Andy Griffith's Great Performance

When Andy Griffith died this week, most commentators focused on his classic role as Sheriff Andy Taylor on the CBS series Andy Griffith Show or his later role as the avuncular lawyer Matlock.  Less known is Griffith's performance as Lonesome Rhodes in the 1957 Elia Kazan movie A Face in the Crowd, which was selected in 2008 for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".

It's a great movie.  Interestingly, the trailer compares Griffith to Marlon Brando and James Dean.  

UN Take Over of Internet? :Congressman Mike Pompeo vs. New York Times

Mike Pompeo (R-KS4)

...there is an effort to manipulate the International Telecommunications Union—a treaty originally created in 1865 to address telegraph service—to provide the United Nations jurisdiction over the Internet.  The showdown over whether the UN will seize control will happen at the December 2012 World Conference on International Telecommunications (WCIT) in Dubai.

 Pompeo  boasts that he has written a House resolution opposing the UN takeover of the internet.

New York Times

Documents prepared for the December meeting, which leaked out last week — yes, on the Internet — show that there are no proposals to hand governance of the Net to the I.T.U. The union insists that it has no desire to play such a role. And even if some governments would like to give the agency increased regulatory powers, the United States and other like-minded countries could easily block them.

Blues on a Saturday: Buddy Guy --two songs from 1969

Here is Buddy Guy in the UK 1969 with Jack Bruce of Cream on bass and Buddy Miles of Electric Flag and Jimi Hendrix on drums, along with some horn players, most likely from Colosseum or one of John Mayall's bands. They perform two tunes from Guy's classic "A Man and the Blues" album:"Mary Had a Little Lamb" and "My Time After a While." Pay special attention to Guy's use of dynamics.

Blues on a Saturday: B.B. King Session

Okay, I've missed a few Saturdays, so I'll make it up with this full concert featuring B.B. King with guests Eric Clapton, Albert King, Stevie Ray Vaughn, Etta James and others.  Pay special attention to some great harmonica from Paul Butterfield.

Gems on the web

Coatesy Tendance on why the British SWP and other leftists are wrong to support the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood.

Ralph Seliger reviews Peter Bienart's "The Crisis of Zionism" for the Partners for Progressive Israel blog.

Two interesting pieces by Bill Wienberg on World War 4 Report: Assange to Ecuador: three questions nobody (on the left) is asking and "Anti-war" movement betrays Syrian people


US Lefty blogs worth following

Corey Robin 

Debate Link

Smoke Filled Room  a collective blog by poltical science graduate students

Is Democracy for Sale?

Talks at a June14, 2102 forum in Wichita on democracy and the Citizens United Supreme Court decision. (Order of talks was Hansen, Fox, Merrit, and Goseland.)

 Louis Goseland of Sunflower Community Action and KanVote.

Friends University Political Science Professor Russell Fox
 David Hansen, retired UCC pastor and director of Wichita Interfaith Worker Justice
Davis "Buzz Merrtit, retired Wichita Eagle editor and author of three books on journalismL "Public Journalism and Public Life," "The Two W's of Journalism", the latest being Knightfall: Knight Ridder and How the Erosion of Newspaper Journalism Is Putting Democracy at Risk

Rise of the Slacktivist

Sortable The Rise of the Slacktivist

Best Concert Videos

Russell Fox selects his five favorite concert videos which he boldly terms the greatest ever.  Russell writes that he has been on a convert video binge and discusses some very worthy videos that didn't make his cut.

Here are Russell's picks: The Last Waltz, Rattle and Hum, Shine a Light, Stop Making Sense, and Woodstock.

I'm not prepared to put forward my five best, but there a few prime candidates that Russell missed.

Hail! Hail! Rock 'n' Roll 

 a 1987 documentary film directed by Taylor Hackford that chronicles two 1986 concerts celebrating rock and roll musician Chuck Berry's 60th birthday.  Interaction of  Chuck and Rolling Stone Keith
Richard is a real highlight of the movie.



 

 Jazz on a Summer's Day

Set at the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival in Rhode Island, and filmed and directed by noted commercial and fashion photographer Bert Stern and the film director Aram Avakian, who also edited the movie. The film features performances by Jimmy Giuffre, Thelonious Monk, Sonny Stitt, Anita O'Day, Dinah Washington, Gerry Mulligan, Chuck Berry, Louis Armstrong, Jack Teagarden, and others.

 Jazz 34

 When Robert Altman made his 1996 movie Kansas City, he did a Altmanesque creative move--he brought in 21 of the greatest young jazz musicians, recreated the ambiance of a KC jam session, and filmed them over several days. The result was several key scenes in the movie, two great CDs (soundtrack and KC After Dark) and the Jazz 34 video of the jam sessions.

Bues on a Saturday: Junior Wells: Hoodoo Man Blues

Circa 1966, probably on a European tour, Junior Wells performs his "Hoodoo Man Blues." The LP features Buddy Guy on guitar. This video seems to feature the left-handed Otis Rush and is tkane at a slower tempo.

RIP Duck Dunn and Chuck Brown

Donald "Duck" Dunn, bassist for Booker T. and the MGs, Stax studio ace who played with many of the greats of rock, soul, and blues died over the weekend. He was featured in the Blues Brothers movies. One of my favorites was his playing on Fathers and Sons, the Chess double LP that featured Muddy Waters and other Chicago blues veterans with up and comers Paul Butterfield and Mike Bloomfield. Naturally, they picked Duck to play bass.

 Check out his website, wikipedia entry, and allmusic.com bio. 

I love this early 1960s clip of the Booker T. hit "Green Onions" espeically how animated Duck is. The camera focuses on him during Steve Cropper's guitar solo.



Chuck Brown's death, also this weekend, will attract only a fraction of the notice given to Dunn's passing. Brown, a fixture on the DC music scene for decades, was known as the "godfather of go-go" was an immensely creative musician, guitarist, singer and bandleader. I've never quite understood why "go-go" never caught on the way rap did.

Here is Brown's website (down at the moment), wikipedia entry , allmusic.com pages, and Stephen Crocket's tribute in the Washington Post tribute.

Here is a video of his big hit "We Need Some Money"

 

Zombie Ayn Rand

HT Taner Edis at The Secular Outpost