🎵 Music
🎵 The Gas Man Cometh
The gasman had an appointment this morning … he was on time and we spent some quality time together. End result? The next step would be to call a plumber (not a carpenter) … see the first verse below.
My mind went to Flanders and Swann’s rendition of their wonderful song … The Gas Man Cometh. The audio is well worth a listen if you don’t know it - and really - these days - who honestly does remember the duo.
The lead up to this particular version should be listened to - not jumped across!
T’was on the Monday morning, the gas man came to call,
The gas tap wouldn’t turn, I wasn’t getting gas at all;
He tore out all the skirting boards to try and find the main,
And I had to call a carpenter to put them back again!
☢️ This Is Not America
🎵 This Is Not America was always a 🎵musical favorite in my world - as indeed was The Falcon and The Snowman, which featured the song … and then the movie came to mind this morning as I was catching up on my ‘piece of glass’.
To some, the meaning of the lyrics …
A little piece of you,
the little piece in me,
will die
(this is not a miracle)
For this is not America
… seem to be shrouded in mystery - but to me - not really. At the simplest level they seem to reference that the geography that the two characters found themselves in was definitely not America. Happy Days … you could leave wherever you are - come home to America - and all would be ‘well’ again.
Fast forward 35 years.
The lyrics remain relevant - except now you don’t need to leave America. And because of that, there is no longer that safe haven that our two ‘heroes’ wanted to return to.
(Yes - I am having a day - and it’s not even 11am)
Later - in the title, I really wanted to use the Americn Flag EMOJI - but for some reason, it wasn’t rendering correctly on the web site ….
So I changed it.
🪦 RIP Cable News
Cable News (1980-2023) by Dana F. Blankenhorn has a very relevant 🎵 track that opens the post.. You can find the 🔗 lyrics here.
Who “wins,” i.e., who is the last one standing? Probably NBC. Comcast has cash flow. NBC has learned how to segment the market with MSNBC, CNBC, NBC Now, NBC News and Local Now. That’s five bites at the remaining cable apple, five channels they can sell to the “skinny bundle” boys like YouTube Plus. And the cost is nominal – a few sets at the NYSE and 30 Rock. Reporters are no longer stars at any of those shops. CNN and Fox are out in the cold. Their owners are going to squeeze all the juice out for profit until there’s nothing left, then throw the remaining goodwill at one of the big boys.
💬 Dana Blankenhorn
🎵Just tried to add ‘Perfect Day’ to an Apple Playlist. It adds just fine, but in the play list is greyed out - and not playable. Go back to the source and it plays just fine. The track was on Transformer. There is another version on ‘The Essential Lou Reed’. Add that - and no problem.
🎵 That moment you realize that his really good ‘new’ stuff is now 30 years old, his ‘transitional band’ … who were absolutely awesome … was around 40 years ago and his first band (that he is probably best known for) was started over 50 years ago.
Just dropped Jax off at the airport … heading back home …
“Heh Siri … play some random music.”
… and up comes this 🎵 (song whip)
Seriously? Siri is clearly tapping into something.
🎵 A clue to how far through Better Call Saul I have got.
Marvelous piece of Music.
If I do it - it will be 3 hours and 20 minutes of my life that I won’t get back - but then …. it is 🎵 The Velvet Underground - and the information the guy delivers is always interesting and not the usual average ‘fodder facts’.
I haven’t thought about this album for years - and then Tedium wrote about it at length ….
🔗 🎵 Jeff Wayne’s War of the Worlds: The Rock Opera That Shaped the Form
I relistened to some of it earlier today. I still enjoyed it - but to my ears it hasn’t aged well. Not yet put my finger on why - but I suspect a new listener might not engage with it in the same way.
stick a fork in him, the motherfuckers done
… 🎵 Reminded me of this classic … enjoy.
I just read @colinwalker ’s 🔗 post re Ryuichi Sakamoto’s passing …
Sharing a 🎵 perfectly elegant beautiful piece of music that he wrote over 40 years ago.
Farewell Ryuichi and thankyou.
Me? I’m keeping it all in the 🎵 Family tonight.
Friend of mine was telling me out 🎵 this event coming up soon in The Desert …
The prices are – well shall we say ‘higher than i might have expected’, but I guess they have to pay for LA Billboards somehow!
It’s been a while (over 3 years), but just now rebuilding my connected networks and home music system … and my Sonos is back online.
First test artist … 🎵 Aha.
God they were good!
🎵 The Theme Song Of Madam Blanc Is More Of A Mystery Than Any Of The Stories.
The Theme Music for the Madam Blanc mysteries has firmly embedded itself into my brain and I love it. Still do. But who is the artist?
Turns out, a ‘duo’ called ‘Hague and White’. But the White might not be who you think.
I thought ‘the white’ was one ‘Steve White’. You might know him as the drummer for The Style Council and pretty much all the subsequent solo albums of Paul Weller. He clearly has chops in the drumming arena. He is also married to Sally Lindsay - the star of Madame Blanc - and the co writer and creator of the show. (I guess they thought they would keep it in the family).
But no …
The song is actually written by Hague and Joel White - who is also the vocalist. In fact Joel is credited with writing their first (and only album), Alan seems to have come along later.
And who is Joel White? Only Richard Hawley’s cousin!
That explains (so much of it) it.
🎵 Can’t Find My Way Home … Winwood, Clapton .. oh - and Trucks.
A friend of mine down under shared with me … seemed a pertinent message at this point time … not to say it is just gorgeous.
🎵 This Is The End
I wrote an email this morning, responding to something that had been sent to me, announcing - and I paraphrase - that despite the longevity of the work that he had been personally driving for decades, he has decided that this was indeed - ‘the end’.
I guess it is one of those days, where every where you look, every page you turn emotion takes over and (at least for me), music takes hold.
Because I - and indeed he - are ‘of a certain age’, ‘The End’ came to mind. (If you aren’t of a certain age - I commend you to watch just one (if not all three) of the YouTubes below.) If you are of a certain age - you don’t need me to tell you.
This is the end
Beautiful friend
This is the end
My only friend, the end
Of our elaborate plans, the end
Of everything that stands, the end
No safety or surprise, the end
I’ll never look into your eyes again
“Every time I hear that song, it means something else to me. It started out as a simple good-bye song… Probably just to a girl, but I see how it could be a goodbye to a kind of childhood."
💬 Jim Morrison
If you want a really good cry, the images most certainly do nothing to distract from the pain of the song …
If you want to listen to the original recording of nearly 11 minutes that took just 30 minutes of studio time (think about that) …
If you are of the live music persuasion… in the US you had Woodstock. In the UK we had The Isle of Wight …
🎛️ A couple of revised posts on the blog.
🖇️🎛️ Will Arnett doesn’t like the word content either.
🖇️🎛️ Why my term ‘English Progressive’ might make sense in musical genres.
Opening up a new category on the blog that I call ‘🖇️ snippets’.
More refinement might yet occur.