Thursday, January 10, 2002
np: uncle tupelo - anodyne
short news: new uncle tupelo retrospective to be released by sire/reprise in march. to contain previously unreleased tracks and rarities as well as 'best of' their three rockville records albums and the one for sire.
last year this guy who played at guilford (an ex-guilco student who had returned with a backing band called red kelly) played a cover (not only of tom waits' "looking for the heart of saturday night" but also) of doug sahm's "give back the key to my heart." as performed on anodyne in impeccable rendition by uncle tupelo and a guesting sahm on vocals. mesmerising.
i don't know why i felt like reeling off mundane alt-country facts. perhaps it is because jay farrar just released a new solo record? and that jeff tweedy and wilco are releasing their oft-delayed yankee hotel foxtrot in april? it's going to be a good year for music. everything, as the great nanci griffith would say, is coming up roses.
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now for a brief, rote recitation of recent loved snippets:
'Who would have thought it, Flask!' cried Stubb; 'if I had but one leg you would not catch me in a boat, unless maybe to stop the plug-hole with my timber toe. Oh! He's a wonderful old man!'
'I don't think it so strange, after all, on that account,' said Flask. 'If his leg were off at the hip, now, it would be a different thing. That would disable him; but he has one knee, and good part of the other left, you know.'
'I don't know that, my little man; I never yet saw him kneel.'
-- Moby Dick
"I've got to fight. It could easily be me...Although I use my brain before I use a fist, don't push it! wake up! refuse! and resist!" - dilated peoples
why should things like this excite me so? words are so powerful. they carry so much connotation. not only in the way they're phrased, used, dissected and re-arranged. but in the spelling, in the usage, in the very nature of their representation. "u" and "you" and "yoo" and "yah." they all could sound out the same word. "you're," "yer," "ur." but you look at all of them in different lights. or at least i do. i don't know if that just comes from my experience with them or what. even the name of this journal! normally..i would've thought to spell gimme as 'gimmie,' but i checked my spelling against both my name's origin (the replacements' "gimme noise") and some other samples (the stooges' "gimme danger"). linguistics..it's amazing
which makes me look even more forward to next week. and my rheotoric and composition class. not to mention my 1820-1990 southern u.s. history course. oh, lord it's gonna be great.
plus i'm seeing the jayhawks next monday. c'est le vie. and life is so good.
remember the billions who can't make that statement though. not only cos they can't necessarily speak english (heh) but also because of oppression, racism, bigotry, poverty and the limitless greed and willingness for one human being to get ahead by stepping on another's head, heart and soul.
this post started out happy. but i feel guilty sometimes. you can't let the worst parts of the world run your life. you just have to live with them in mind. and live your life to the betterment of all of us.
in no depression this issue, there's a letter from an african-american alt-country fan with her perspective on the whole september eleventh debacle in the wake of all this 'unabashed' patriotism. "There's two kinds of patriots," she quotes from another article. "The 'God Bless America' types and the 'This Land is Your Land' types. I think I'll throw my lot in with Woody Guthrie."
Amen.
was a big high wall there, that tried to stop me
a sign was painted said: private property
but on the back side it didn't say nothing --
that side was made for you and me.
- Woody Guthrie
posted by J. Neas |
1/10/2002 02:41:00 PM
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