well, it's that time of the year again... when the "meadow leaves are turnin brown... summertime is a fallin down..". and here we go again...
i glow inwardly after reading the internet reviewer who compared david wilcox to james taylor stylistically and to my man bruce cockburn in the intensity of his lyrical images... close seconds to joni in that arena... would love to see joni and bruce, david and bruce, david and joni, or, gasp, all three? collaborate... oh well... my congratulations to Rob Ettridge of the UK, he came up with the name of the song Joan Armatrading played in homicide life on the street... "sometimes i don't wanna go home"... and is the OFFICIAL winner of the 69 dollar question... thanks Rob...you brits are really quite a fine bunch... the best... as for the story about joan's sometimes lackluster performances, well, what can you say? i once saw a lady named beverly spaulding play a rather uninspired folk/rock/jazz set at a place in Venice Beach called the Taurus Inn... and as she was putting up her sax, i plugged in jt's How Sweet It Is on the jukebox ...and soon the joint was jumpin', she pulled out her horn, and everyone was dancing, gettin up on tables...singing... and the smiles were on everyone's faces. she came up afterward, introduced herself, and thanked me for putting on that song... it was the perfect encore... would love to see a tom waits video of a scene like that... or joni the inspiration just isn't always there... even for the professionals watched an espn special about Len Bias today, along with the news of George's death, and this week's death of a gal i had such a crush on in high school who ended up getting MS...lead me into thinking about the cycles of things and such... somehow The Urge for Going is a comfort... and i am thankful i am still healthy...my thoughts still very much with the victims of the attacks, and the firefighters and rescue teams... choices for people are never easy, even if it seems like you have everything going for you, like Len Bias, or Phil Ochs, or Jim Croce. and we're fighting our own demons. it's the inexplicable ones, like Payne Stewart or Reggie Lewis, that leave us shaking our heads... or Billie Holiday Phil Ochs once said that his song Crucifixion..."it might be about Jesus, it might be about JFK, maybe even Dylan." I'll just end with an image of one of the most memorable scenes in 20th century cinema, and arguably the finest work of American literature ever... Henry Fonda, as Tom Joad, explaining to his Ma that he don't know where he's going, but "maybe it's like we're all just a little piece of one big Soul." and a community like the jmdl is proof of that... as was George's belief in mysticism... "and we wait for a new dawn parade"...phil delurking more tangentially, yet with feeling, i hope alan
