Happy 4th of July!
This country has gotten a lot of things wrong—music it got right.
The Blasters, “American Music,” live, Champaign, Ill., 1985
**********
lagniappe
art beat
Bruce Davidson (1933-), Chicago (south side blues bar), 1962
*****
radio: WKCR (Columbia University)
What better way to celebrate Louis Armstrong’s adopted birthday than to play his music around the clock?
only rock ‘n’ roll
Mick Collins (Dirtbombs) with Don Was Detroit All-Star Revue (DW, bass; Randy Jacobs, guitar; Luis Resto, keyboards; Terry Thunder, drums), “Stop,” live, Detroit, 2008
**********
lagniappe
art beat
Bruce Davidson (1933-), New York (Brooklyn), 1959
sounds of Chicago
Your day’s about to get better.
Hound Dog Taylor and the Houserockers (HDT, vocals & guitar; Brewer Phillips, guitar; Ted Harvey, drums), live, Cambridge, Mass. (Joe’s Place), 1972
1st Set*
***
2nd Set*
*****
*Set lists (courtesy of YouTube):
1st
1) Gonna Send You Back To Georgia
2) Taylor’s Crawl
3) Rock Me Baby
4) Goodnight Boogie
5) Wild About You
6) Jumpin’ With Symphony Sid
7) The Things I Used To Do
8) Phillip’s Stomp
9) I Just Can’t Take It
10) What Do I Say
11) Ingleside Blues
2nd
1) Dust My Broom
2) Phillip’s Crawl
3) Freddie’s Blues
4) Strollin’ With Brewer
5) It Hurts Me Too
6) Jumpin’ With Symphony Sid
7) Take Five
8) Blues For Suzie
9) Roll Your Moneymaker
10) Let’s Get Funky
11) Florence’s Blues
only rock ‘n’ roll
MC5, “Looking at You,” live, Detroit, 1970
**********
lagniappe
radio
As you may have heard, Ornette Coleman died yesterday; WKCR (Columbia University) will be playing his music around the clock today, tomorrow, Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday, wrapping up its memorial broadcast Wednesday morning.
In response to Monday’s post on Dylan covers, a reader commented:
Fairport Convention’s “Si tu dois partir” (a French-language version of “If You Gotta Go, Go Now”) comes to mind.
Fairport Convention, “Si tu dois partir” (B. Dylan), recording, 1969
**********
lagniappe
random sights
Tuesday morning
Louisville, Kentucky
only rock ‘n’ roll
Ride, live, Barcelona (Primavera Sound), 2015*
***
*Set list (courtesy of YouTube):
00. 00:00:00 – 00:01:58 Intro: This Mortal Coil – Fyt
01. 00:01:58 – 00:10:30 Leave Them All Behind
02. 00:10:30 – 00:13:45 Like A Daydream
03. 00:13:45 – 00:18:35 Polar Bear
04. 00:18:35 – 00:26:35 Seagull
05. 00:26:35 – 00:30:44 Sennen
06. 00:30:44 – 00:33:15 Black Nite Crash
07. 00:33:15 – 00:40:45 OX4
08. 00:40:45 – 00:46:52 Dream Burn Down
09. 00:46:52 – 00:50:22 Time Of Her Time
10. 00:50:22 – 00:54:28 Chrome Waves
11. 00:54:28 – 01:00:23 Paralysed
12. 01:00:23 – 01:03:52 Taste
13. 01:03:52 – 01:08:22 Vapour Trail
14. 01:08:22 – 01:18:16 Drive Blind
15. 01:18:16 – 01:22:55 Mouse Trap
16. 01:22:55 – 01:26:02 Chelsea Girl
MCOTD Hall of Fame
Henry Threadgill’s Zooid,* live, Washington, D.C., 2013
**********
lagniappe
reading table
Nothings’s a Gift
by Wislawa Szymborska (1923-2012; translated from Polish by Clare Cavanagh and Stanislaw Baranczak)Nothing’s a gift, it’s all on loan.
I’m drowning in debts up to my ears.
I’ll have to pay for myself
with my self,
give up my life for my life.Here’s how it’s arranged:
The heart can be repossessed,
the liver, too,
and each single finger and toe.Too late to tear up the terms,
my debts will be repaid,
and I’ll be fleeced,
or, more precisely, flayed.I move about the planet
in a crush of other debtors.
Some are saddled with the burden
of paying off their wings.
Others must, willy-nilly,
account for every leaf.Every tissue in us lies
on the debit side.
Not a tentacle or tendril
is for keeps.The inventory, infinitely detailed,
implies we’ll be left
not just empty-handed
but handless too.I can’t remember
where, when, and why
I let someone open
this account in my name.We call the protest against this
the soul.
And it’s the only item
not included on the list.
*****
the beat goes on
Two thousand posts—and counting.
*****
*HT (flute, alto saxophone), Liberty Ellman (guitar), Jose Davila (tuba, trombone), Christopher Hoffman (cello), Elliot Humberto Kavee (drums).
sounds of Niger
Mdou Moctar, “à la maison,” live, Niger (Ingall), 2013
**********
lagniappe
reading table
Neither question nor assertion makes sense / when truth is a tone of voice.
—Karen Solie, “Interior” (The Road In Is Not the Same Road Out)
only rock ‘n’ roll
The Oblivians, live, Bartlett, Tenn., 1996
More of The Consolers (Sullivan & Iola Pugh).
Live (TV Gospel Time), early 1960s
**********
lagniappe
art beat
Helen Levitt (1913-2009), New York, c. 1938
Today Helen Levitt enters the MCOTD Hall of Fame, joining saxophonists Von Freeman and Henry Threadgill; trumpeter Lester Bowie; poets John Berryman, William Bronk and Wislawa Szymborska; and gospel singer Dorothy Love Coates.
music clip of the day 