Much That Is Hidden

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Y'all know I loves me some Gram. One of the things I like most about him is the solid legacy (as opposed to the romantic, at times embellished one) he's left for musicians that paralleled and came after him. GP's "Cosmic American Music" reverberates through the Stones and the Dead, the Lemonheads, the Jayhawks and Beck just to name a few. His brilliance was certainly not in his guitar chops and perhaps barely in his voice, but moreover in his turn of a lyric.

That said, I present the masterful Wilco (Chitown represent!) to interpret a little Parsons ditty apropos for any time but so much now, a cautionary tune of paradoxical optimism:

Labels: "I Likes", every blue light cheap hotel, heroes, music, soul, words

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Ye gods! Mathman has turned down meme lane once more, and honks as he throws the paper through my window.

I've not seen this one before, though, and it's pretty cool. The rules:

1. Put your music player on Shuffle
2. For each question, press the Next button to get your answer.
3. YOU MUST WRITE THAT SONG NAME DOWN NO MATTER WHAT (this is in capital letters, so it is very serious).

BEGIN

1. IF SOMEONE SAYS “IS THIS OKAY” YOU SAY?
21st Century Schizoid Man - King Crimson

2. WHAT WOULD BEST DESCRIBE YOUR PERSONALITY?
Crosseyed And Painless – Talking Heads

3. WHAT DO YOU LIKE IN A GUY/GIRL?
LaGrange - ZZ Top

4. HOW DO YOU FEEL TODAY?
Jammin’ – Bob Marley

5. WHAT IS YOUR LIFE’S PURPOSE?
Alabama Song (Whiskey Bar) - The Doors

6. WHAT IS YOUR MOTTO?
Feelin’ Alright – Traffic

7. WHAT DO YOUR FRIENDS THINK OF YOU?
Conservative Christian, Right Wing Republican, Straight, White, American Males - Todd Snider

8. WHAT DO YOU THINK OF YOUR PARENTS?
Achilles Last Stand - Led Zeppelin

9. WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT VERY OFTEN?
A Change Is Gonna Come - Sam Cooke

10. WHAT IS 2+2?
Give Back The Key To My Heart - Wilco

11. WHAT DO YOU THINK OF YOUR BEST FRIEND?
John Barleycorn Must Die - Traffic

12. WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THE PERSON YOU LIKE?
I Second That Emotion - Jerry Garcia and Merl Saunders

13. WHAT IS YOUR LIFE STORY?
Laugh Laugh - The Beau Brummels

14. WHAT DO YOU WANT TO BE WHEN YOU GROW UP?
Home At Last – Steely Dan

15. WHAT DO YOU THINK WHEN YOU SEE THE PERSON YOU LIKE?
Eyes Of The World - String Cheese Incident

16. WHAT DO YOUR PARENTS THINK OF YOU?
A Wolf At The Door – Radiohead

17. WHAT WILL YOU DANCE TO AT YOUR WEDDING?
Let’s Work Together - Canned Heat

18. WHAT WILL THEY PLAY AT YOUR FUNERAL?
I Need More Love – Robert Randolph & The Family Band

19. WHAT IS YOUR HOBBY/INTEREST?
That’s How AIDS Began - Todd Snider

20. WHAT IS YOUR BIGGEST SECRET?
After The Goldrush – Neil Young

21. WHAT DO YOU THINK OF YOUR FRIENDS?
Salt Of The Earth – Rolling Stones

22. WHAT SHOULD YOU POST THIS AS?
The Man Who Loved Life – The Jayhawks


I'm thoroughly amazed at how some fit in so perfect, while others might have fit better under a different question. I'm also amazed that no Dead showed up, but I did get the Jerry/Merle Motown cover and the String Cheese version of "Eyes."

I am cross-posting this at Where The Vibe Is and invite my fellow musical authors (nat, Joe, Cheezy and Jefe) to post up their results there and/or on their own blogs. Hmm, I’m thinking I need to see Miz UV’s results as well. And what the hell, because he needs to make up his mind about blogging (and because I want to see 22 songs from his player) Fez Monkey can get on it also.
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Labels: "I Likes", memes, music

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I gotta admire those Germans. It is a testament to their efficiency and foresight to start a beer festival called Oktoberfest in the month of September. Beer lovers from around the world will be Prost-ing for the 185th annual festival in Munich through October 7.

Oktoberfest also marks the beginning of my favorite season. The Indigo Girls do make a great case for spring (as does Mel Brooks, in a twisted sorta way), but alas the milder weather, campfires and hearty brew awaiting me in the coming weeks, never too soon on the heals of the oppressive summer, win hands down.

The forecast for autumn colors in the south is bleak, however. With rainfall deficits for the region well into the double digits there may be brief flashes of color but most all the leaves will likely turn to brown quickly just before they fall.



Pictured here is one of the gifts that my Sweet Babou procured for my birthday (Alles Gute zum Geburtstag!). Why yes, there are just two left. Better hurry - I’ll share one on the back porch with the first person who gets here.







Zum Wohl!
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Labels: "I Likes", Beers, Bier, Go Beers, seasons, wildlife

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Jeff Kah-zlah-skee as good as tagged me with his recent post on films he can watch repeatedly. Essentially this post could start there at Boiled Dinner, as most every one Kos listed could also be on my list. And with that, here are some that I had a great time remembering and rekindling the jones to see them all again soon. My picks here start with some of the old classics and move toward more contemporary films. Of the 16 here, 10 are comedies (including the fifth down, which wasn't released as one), and that pretty much reflects my film-viewing preference. What are some of your favorite lines from these films (um, not the first two, duh)?

































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Labels: "I Likes", entertainment, film

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EG Kight at Music on the Square in LaFayette, Georgia
Saturday, November 11, 2006

Although it’s not possible to have a performance at this small café that is not intimate, EG Kight, an irrepressible and inspired woman of the blues, seems particularly adept to bringing warmth to her act with an audience at arm’s length. “I love little places like this,” she told me after the show. “I can be up close with the people.”

She exemplified that at her performance this night, as there didn't seem to be any strangers in the place. She called the older women “mama” and the young men (and me) “sugar.” She requested a pair of shades to wear for her gritty blues numbers, and when fans called out requests she obliged them often. At one point she put forth the claim that “you can write a song about anything,” and proceeded to prove it by requesting a topic from the audience and quickly putting together a few bars about it (it was either toothpaste or no-good men, I can’t clearly recall). In short, up on the stage EG Kight is comfortable, and marvelous.

EG hails from Dublin, Georgia, which is down “below the gnat line,” a reference to the prevalence of tiny bugs whose purpose in their short lifespan seems to be flying kamikaze into your eyeballs. South Georgians often tell tales of small animals being carried away by gnats, but I digress. She grew up on a farm and still lives on land once owned by her great granddaddy. She is low country to the bone, but her musical talent has also made her a woman of the world. She recently returned from a film festival in Torino, Italy, where between films she performed and lectured a bit. She said that American blues music is very popular over there, and music students just eat up the likes of Bessie Smith and Ella Fitzgerald. “Of course music is the universal language,” she said, “and no more so than with the blues - they love how you can hear it and feel it all in one.” To celebrate her experience she sang the old Dean Martin standard “Return To Me”, complete with a few verses in Italian.

Like many little girls in the south who grew up in musical families, EG cut her teeth on gospel, first performing in church at the age of four. She grew up into her teens performing country music, but relates how she had a “blues epiphany” of sorts when she first heard Koko Taylor. From that point in the mid-1990s her career shifted into having “blues as the backbone,” and has come into her own with a versatile voice that can range from a mournful yet sweet torch song melody to belting out blues gravel. She backs that up on her guitar with confident hands and a joyful demeanor as she moves them.

She performed two solo acoustic sets, nearly 30 songs in all, with a varied set list that included standards like “Stardust”, “Stormy Weather”, and “At Last” to blues classics like Koko Taylor’s “I Cried Like A Baby”, “Stormy Monday”, and “Mama He Treats Your Daughter Mean”. EG’s cover of the latter, a hit for R & B songstress Ruth Brown in the early sixties, was recorded live in August 2005 for her most recent album, the solo acoustic “EG Kight (live &) Naked”. The song held the No. 1 spot on XM Radio’s blues channel for several weeks. She also threw in a good bit of country, with a sweet rendering of Merle Haggard’s “Silver Wings”, and laid down Johnny Cash’s “Folsom Prison Blues” with grit so true it was not necessary to suspend disbelief of it being sung by a woman. Another cover tune that was one of the highlights of the night for me was her sweet and soulful rendition of John Prine's “Angel From Montgomery”, a tune that, as was the case here, often moistens the edges of my eyes.

As a performer EG Kight also plays electric guitar with her band, and she has shared the stage with the likes of such a diverse bunch of musicians as George Jones, Taj Mahal, Delbert McClinton, Jerry Lee Lewis, Merle Haggard and Little Feat. As a songwriter she has built up a repertoire of several albums and honors to go with them. Highlights of her songs from the show at Music on the Square, which was professionally video recorded, included “attitude” songs like “Trouble With A Capital ‘T’”, an up beat blues shuffle with plenty of down and dirty gravel in her voice, and “Is It Me Or Is It Hot In Here?”
My favorite of her slow blues tunes was “Southern Comfort”, the title song from her 2003 release on Blue South Records, in which she tells her man that he don’t need no bottle, ‘cuz she’s like Southern Comfort for him. That's true for the ears of her audience as well.

If you’re interested in checking out some audio samples from EG's albums such as “Peach Pickin' Mama”, “Unlove You” and “Let The Blues Move You”, poke around her website a bit at www.egkight.com

EG Kight performs at Music on the Square in LaFayette, Georgia. If you think her glasses are cool, you shoulda seen her boots! Look closely behind her and you might recognize some of the faces on the mural (in progress). And check out
Music on the Square
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Labels: "I Likes", music

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I've surfed about the Net looking at polls on people's favorite season, just to see where mine stood. Among the several I checked, there really was no consensus, though spring or autumn seemed to edge ahead most of the time.

For me it's autumn, hands down, and a big reason for that is the oppressive summer heat of the south. I noticed a lot of northerners prefer spring, likely for the similar reason that winters there are often so harsh and dreary.

The foliage of the southern Appalachians does not compare well to the intensity of the northeast hardwoods. But with the season coming later and the abundant green conifers breaking up the golds, reds, browns and oranges, the south has its own autumn charm.

And the weather! October is Georgia's driest month, and it is magnificent to have sunny days that start in the 30s and creep up to the low 60s by mid afternoon. It is camping season extraordinaire. This year is a bonus for me since on my trip out west I got to experience the start of autumn in the southern Rockies.

Spring can be quite lovely here if it's not a wet one, but for moi le printemps brings the allergies, zut alors! Winter is nice because its not usually too harsh, and can actually be a great time for outdoor activities (like mountain biking) if you are not too cold-natured. In contrast to the summer bush, the views in the Appies are wonderful. I confess that I'd actually like to see it snow here more, as would my teacher wife, who never seems to catch a break on the local snow days.

Oh well, enough rambling - I'm interested to hear other takes on preferred time of year.

Labels: "I Likes"