"if i knew the way, i would take you home"

Found while looking for something else

On the other side, also in my writing: "Charlemagne! How do you spell relief? R-O-L-A-N-D-S" which is clearly a play on the old Rolaids advertisement. Proof that I was destined for marketing all along.

The paper opens up to a flier that asks, on the other side, "Would You Be Interested in Tutoring? The Learning Center Has Tutoring Opportunities..." All the 'o's are shaded in and there's another sketch of a Greek goddess in profile in the margins. Her proportions are slightly off.

Well, it's like Tom Leher said "Bright college days, oh, carefree days that fly, To thee we sing with our glasses raised on high..."

I do like the oars coming out of the wheel-wells on the bus though!

As seen on Doc 40, but not in the UK

The critically acclaimed album Trouble Pilgrim -- the first Radiators from Space album in many a year -- is due for an upcoming UK release. But it won't be featuring the album artwork that the band wanted it to have.

The controversial cover (shown below) provides a glimpse into one of those mid-century American moments of synchronicity that Don Delillo would savor: James Dean and Ronald Reagan co-starring in some forgotten TV drama of dubious artistic quality.



Read what Mick Farren has to say about it over at Doc 40

"Fuld og skæv og bange vakled’ jeg til Mollys kammer"

Originally written in late 2002 with some updating over the years. Smart-ass tone is vintage to the period.

In permanent rotation on my playlist is one variant or another of that Celtic classic known as Whiskey in the Jar. This is the song with the highwayman relieving a uniformed officer of a substantial amount of cash and returning, with cash in hand, to a woman who betrays him to his erstwhile victim. The song with the 'wack fo the daddy oh" chorus. The song covered by the Clancy Brothers, the Dubliners, the Pogues, Tempest and every bar band from here to Buffalo New York.

Now, in the world of folk music, there is no such thing as the ‘correct’ version of a song, but there is certainly such thing as a ‘favorite version’ or ‘the kick-ass version’ or perhaps even ‘the only f*ck*ng goddamn version worth playing.’ And in that category, there is for me only one version of Whiskey in the Jar.

And that would be the song with the nasty sawed-off guitar riff that tears through the lyrics EXACTLY in the way a primer-coated late-model Camaro, filled with empty cans of Bud and a bunch of teenage thugs ditching shop class, tears through a high school parking lot.

The song that CD Universe lists as “heavy metal.” The song ably covered by Metallica. The song with Molly instead of Jenny.

Yes, the song by Thin Lizzy.

It is not just a question of style. Thin Lizzy’s version of Whiskey in the Jar just tells a better story than the one you are likely to hear from the local bar band. Plot, pacing, characterization – line for line Thin Lizzy’s Whiskey in the Jar delivers a cynical classic of greed and betrayal. All other ‘Whiskeys’ – particularly the ‘Jenny’ labels –are just inferior rotgut blends. It’s Jameson vs Yukon Jack.

But let’s examine in detail…

First, there’s the encounter on the highway, which manages to suggest both premeditation and opportunism – an ambiguity of motives and consequences that persists throughout Thin Lizzy’s version:

As I was goin' over the Cork and Kerry mountains
I saw Captain Farrell and his money he was countin'
I first produced my pistol and then produced my rapier

With some geographic confusion aside, most versions get immediately to this point. Even the one where Sergeant Pepper has been promoted out of his post as band leader:

As I was a-walkin' 'round
Kilgary Mountain
I met with Captain Pepper
as his money he was countin'
I rattled my pistols and
I drew forth my saber.

Actually, I always thought one rattled sabers and drew forth pistols, but threatening weapons have been produced and that’s the important thing. As for ‘walking ‘round a mountain’ it just seems like it would take some time.

Then most versions -- the ‘Jenny’ versions¹ -- just get silly:

As I was a going over
Gillgarry Mountain,
I spied Colonel Farrell and
his money he was countin'.
First I drew me pistol
and then I drew me rapier,
Sayin' stand and deliver
for I am your bold deceiver.

"For I am your bold deceiver?" What kind of hold-up line is that? What the hell is a "bold deceiver"? Frankly, it sounds like something Amanda Wingfield would buy for her glass figurine-collecting daughter Laura in the first draft of a Tennessee Williams play: "Now, Laura dear, be sure to pin those bold deceivers securely in your bodice, so your gentlemen callers don’t discover our little secret..."

Yeah, maybe when Colonel Mustard is finished giggling he’ll hand over the loot, but for the moment he’s being robbed by Trelane, the childish alien with Liberace’s wardrobe in Star Trek: Original Series. Whereas,

I first produced my pistol and then produced my rapier
I said stand and deliver or the devil he may take ya

makes a far more effective threat.

Then there’s the chorus; the “Musha ring um du rum da” part which I have no complaints with in any version². But let me point out that Thin Lizzy injects more menace into “Musha ring dum a doo dum a da” than you’d expect. They’ve got your “Whack fol my daddy-o” swinging.

The second verse introduces our third character. In most versions, she’s named Jenny:

He counted out his money and it made a pretty penny,
I put it in me pocket to take home to darling' Jenny.
She sighed and swore she loved me and never would deceive me,
But the devil take the women for they always lie so easy.

Nice pun there on ‘lie so easy.” Yes, I expect they do, especially when a pile of gold coins is on the table. But this is Jenny, the heroine of the lesser Whiskeys and it’s just an obvious rhyme with penny. There’s another traditional version with a rhyme that introduces us to Molly:

The shinin' golden coins
did look so bright and jolly
I took 'em with me home and
I gave 'em to my Molly
She promised and she vowed that
she never would deceive me
But the devil's in the women and
they never can be easy

Although Molly’s shortcomings will soon be undeniable, it’s not worth a sweeping generalization of the failures of womankind. And, besides, the pun on easy is gone, which is a shame. Molly and/or Jenny couldn’t be easier if it was Girls Gone Wild on Bourbon Street and you’re the lucky sod holding the video camera.

So it’s with a rocker’s sneer at the requirements of rhyme and rhythm that Thin Lizzy gives us another story:

I took all of his money and it was a pretty penny
I took all of his money, yeah, I brought it home to Molly
She swore that she'd love me, never would she leave me
But the devil take that woman, for you know she tricked me easy

Which is a good thing, because the word “jolly” has no business in a rock song, unless it is followed by the word “roger.” And “roger” is a dicey word in any genre, so it’s best to avoid the whole business altogether.

Thin Lizzy’s Molly is a secret unto herself. She’s warm and loving; she’s full of tricks. And, in the lesser versions, as Jenny she may have cause for complaint:

I went into me chamber
all for to take a slumber
To dream of gold and girls
and of course it was no wonder.
Me Jenny took me charges
and she filled them up with water,

Now, there’s just too much Freudian imagery for me to analyze here, especially when we reach the crisis of the story:

Next morning early before I rose to travel,
There came a band of footmen and likewise Colonel Farrell.
I goes to draw me pistol for she'd stole away me rapier,
but a prisoner I was taken I couldn't shoot the water.

Yeah, my friend had that problem too, but Viagra³ cleared it up.

I’m not sure why Jenny is so quick to betray our narrator, but perhaps an hour invested in taking care of her needs before dreaming of “gold and girls” might have saved his worthless hide.

Now in the Thin Lizzy version, the moment of discovery packs a little more tension and a lot more drama:

Being drunk and weary I went to Molly's chamber
Takin' money with me and I never knew the danger
For about six or maybe seven, yeah, in walked Captain Farrell

No ‘next’ morning here. And no unnecessary cast of thousands with footmen and such. Drunk and weary, maybe, but also in Molly’s chamber with money. And losing track of time. This is a man who knows a little bit about savoring the spoils of victory, and perhaps even coming back for seconds. And then, ‘in walked Captain Farrell…’ Now, maybe I’m a romantic, but I always see this moment as the bad luck of evil co-incidence and poor scheduling on Molly’s part. I don’t think Captain Farrell, or Molly, or our hapless narrator; expect to see the intersection of their three lives at this very moment. Maybe Molly has been providing the hospitality of her chamber to both highwayman and captain without incident for years, but on this fateful night she’s gotten her Palm Pilot entries mixed up. Though the sense of shock and three way betrayal is strong, not a moment of hesitation (or watered-down pistols) on our hero’s part:

I jumped up, fired my pistols and I shot him with both barrels

Well okay! Vaya con Dios, Captain Farrell. And doesn't that teach you not to flash your paycheck while wandering around alone in the countryside of Cork and Kerry? And, sadly, Molly’s active role in the song is pretty much done at this point too. But with the Captain dead and our hero in serious trouble, she’s certainly up one bag of gold with no questions asked. Let's hope she used the swag to book passage for Boston and finance a Day School for Young Ladies of Good Massachusetts Families with herself as headmistress. That’s certainly what I’d do, at any rate.

In the ‘Jenny’ versions, matters go their dreary course:

They put me into jail
with a judge all a writin'
For robbing Colonel Farrell
on Gilgarry Mountain.
But they didn't take me fists
so I knocked the jailer down,
And bid a farewell to
this tight fisted town.
I'd like to find me brother
the one that's in the army,
I don't know where he's stationed
in Cork or in Killarney.
Together we'd go roving
o'r the mountains of Killkenney,
And I swear he'd treat me
better than me darling' sporting Jenny.

Well, pal, which locality is it? Cork or Killarney? Where I live, the County Jail gives you only ONE phonecall on the gov’t dime, so you’d better know what you’re about. And why is the brother going to be especially motivated to abandon three hots and a cot to go roving o’r the mountains with his jailbird sibling who’s also expecting him to be a substitute for ‘darling sporting Jenny?’

Trust me, there’s no substitute for what Jenny/Molly can deliver.⁴

And, besides, introducing the brother at this point just messes with the neat triangle of characterization established so far. Furthermore, knocking down the jailer after arrest is no way as exciting as unloading a double-barreled blast on the Captain himself at the moment of discovery.

So. Far, far better is the dramatic power of the stripped down final verse in the Thin Lizzy version. Savage electric guitars dropping away, the story shifts from past glory to present miseries:

Now some men like the fishin' and some men like the fowlin'
And some men like to hear, to hear the cannon ball a roarin'
Me I like sleepin' especially in my Molly's chamber
But here I am in prison, here I am with a ball and chain yeah

And there it is – a tale of gold, love, murder and the vengeance of the law in four neat verses. No post-arrest escapes, no brother. And this is the only version I’ve found that brings Molly back for the finale, and that wistful tone of regret for her chamber strengthens my argument that Molly was guilty of nothing more than loving too much (or too many…) but no grudges are held.

Musha ring dum a doo dum a da
Whack fol my daddy-o
Whack fol my daddy-o
There's whiskey in the jar-o

¹It has recently come to my attention that the Dubliners sing the "Jenny" variant of this song, which has probably led other bands down that road.

However, I would submit that the Dubliners could sing "Sunshine and Lollipops" or "I'm Just a Girl Who Can't Say No" or “Genie in a Bottle" or any such song with any such lyrics and still be one bad-ass band.

²Just try singing it with boys after three pints. Huh buddy? Where’s your self-respect now?

³[2007 edit] I’ve since learned that Viagra was invented in Cork, Ireland. Yes, it does have a kind of ‘coals to Newcastle’ feeling, doesn’t it? I imagine the lab conversation as follows: “Say, you know what I think? I think this world could use more langers. Big, proud and ready-for-action langers!” “Funny you bring that up. I’ve been working on this pill…” *The two scientists then beta-test the pill.* “BRILLIANT!”

⁴[2007 edit:] Unless you are ex-Senator Craig [R], Idaho. Nice job supporting those American family values, Senator!

"Gimme a 'D!' Gimme a 'U!' Gimme a 'C!'..."

Yes, the famous Country Joe McDonald DUCK cheer. Heard many a time over the years. Latest incarnation this morning on KFOG, live from the historic Poster Room at the Fillmore.



(This image and other Rick Griffin artwork on display at www.myraltis.eclipse.co.uk/griffin)

"Is it out of line if I was to be bold and say 'Would you be mine'?"

Bought on a complete impulse at the HMV kiosk at Heathrow ("Indecently Rousing" said the Independent on the sticker promo). Then discovered I could listen to it as a featured CD on the inflight entertainment. Back home, listened again lots of times in the car. The sort of play where you let the song finish out before turning off the engine. And then on office iTunes.

This one here is my favorite song of the moment. In that top forty way where you need to hear the song every hour or so. It's endless summer.



Then finally had the presence of mind to check out The Fratellis over at Wikipedia. Turns out: Glasgow.

Told the husband "I know I was intending to wait til you could come with me, but I can't fight it much longer. Next time over, I'm going to Scotland."

Merv Griffin and his Doorman

If you've seen the Buena Vista Social Club, you'll know a story of once-famous musicians in Cuba rediscovered by Ry Cooder on his own musical journey. The resulting movie and recordings brought a second fame to such capable musicians as Ibriham Ferrer and Manuel Galbon, Orlando "Cachato" Lopez, "Guajiro Mirabal, Jesus "Aguaje" Ramos and Roberto Fonseca.

Something like that has happened before. In New York City. And the rediscovered music was the traditional Irish form of singing known as sean nos. Here's how that happened (as told on the Irish Rochester.org website):

Merv Griffin is best known as the producer of such popular game shows as Jeopardy and Wheel of Fortune. In the 1960s he was the host of his own late afternoon talk show, always on the lookout for new and interesting guests. One day when he was vacationing in Ireland, he entered O'Donoghue's Pub in Dublin and was startled to see a familiar face on the wall. That's my doorman! the celebrity exclaimed in surprise. That, said the patient publican to the ignorant Yank, is Ireland's greatest traditional singer! They were both right. Joe Heaney (October 1, 1919-May 1, 1984) was acknowledged then (and is still so regarded) as the greatest exponent of Irish sean nos singing, but unlike Sarah Makem (see below) he had to leave Ireland to receive the popular recognition that was his due. The first prize winner at the Dublin Oireachtas in 1942 and again in 1955, musical partner of Willie Clancy, Seamus Ennis, and Mick Moloney (among many others), and a recording artist for Gael Linn records, he was a regular participant in the traditional music scene of the late 1950s and early 1960s.

...

If, as the Bible says, "A prophet is not without honor except in his own country and in his own house," Joe was more warmly received in America. In 1965 he appeared at the Newport Jazz Festival and the following St. Patrick's Day appeared on Merv Griffin's television show. In 1980 he was appointed an adjunct professor in Irish folklore at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut and was later appointed to a similar position at the University of Washington in Seattle. He was a regular performer at concerts and festivals across the country. Finally, in July 1982 he was presented with the National Heritage Award for Excellence in Folk Arts by the National Endowment for the Arts. Ever a modest man, Joe never took himself or his art too seriously. "Where I come from," he said, "they all sing like that."

I've been to O'Donoghue's myself a time or two and sat under that very photo in 2004 and reeled this same story off to my husband and friends. And I certainly recommend the double CD set The Road from Connemara.

So let's raise a glass to Merv Griffin who was lucky enough to know Joe Heaney and to America who was lucky enough to see Joe at Newport and on TV, thanks to Mr Griffin.

It's Tourist Season in San Francisco!

Just yesterday on the Ferry sat next to a group of Married Cousins from Over There who were happily pawing through their bag of the day's acquisitions: Alcatraz Penitentiary Swim Team t-shirts for the whole extended family.

Meanwhile, I've discovered a treasure trove of photos over at the San Francisco Public Library's online archives. Here's another visitor to our fair City from back in 1919! (Tall guy in back, sorta looks like Alan Rickman. Not the statue.)



There's another great photo of the same guy out in front of a Grateful Dead concert at Winterland (still open back then) holding the requisite "I need a miracle" sign. The Library said he was on a business trip, talking with Silicon Valley venture capitalists for some funding for a start-up.

Strange Sounds from the MySpace Grounds

The new Dun Ringles CD has arrived! Only 100 copies of this exceptionally pure prog-rock sound from Stornoway in the Outer Hebrides will be made available for the general public.

I was out of my blogging habits when I first met the Dun Ringles (and their much more avante friends The Guireans), so I'll have to quickly summarize by quoting liberally from their MySpace Page:

Band Members - Jason; Lead Guitar, bass, drum progs, keyboards,mandolin, backing vocals Robin;Keyboards, mandolin, accordion, backing vocals Wattie; lead vocals, bass, backing vocals Jon;lead guitar,mandolin, fiddle, backing vocals

Influences - Peatstacks Tractors Salmon Poaching Jethro Tull Horslips Cardiacs Crowded House Jori and Innes Isles FM The Comhairle Queen Deep Purple Blackmores Night The Valtos Outdoor Centre The Castle Grounds

Keeping the flame of Avante Gaelic Obscurist Folk Rock alive in the Outer Hebrides. Two sets of brothers( jason and jon/robin and wattie) fused together by an irrate record company and not allowed out to play until they have played Madison Square Garden at least twice and sold more than 2 copies of Redun from Fonn. Writing idiosyncratic songs about life in the Western Isles is all they do, spending long hours in candle-lit garrets and sipping from bottles of Absinthe whilst wearing fingerless gloves and muttering to themselves like some old geezer from a Dickens novel. Written seven or eight albums worth of songs and amassed a small but fanatical fan base (which also has a branch on Norway!!!!!!!! thanks Irene) whislt trying to keep the wolf from the door. If you want to know about Peatman, the illusive Funky Peatstack, Hump-backed lobsters and many characters of a Stornowegian slant, then this is the band for you.

The Unfortunate Cup of Tea

"She was a cattleman's daughter, but all the horse men knew her."

Lately, my husband has lured me into a weekend hobby that is giving the Internet a run for its money. A hobby so compelling that it has me looking at horses with a whole new level of respect.

What's involved here are six plots of land in our community garden: two are ours in perpetuity and then I'm exercising squatters' rights on the other four for the purpose of growing pumpkins. (Being a slightly later season crop, this was an ideal use for the plots left unclaimed after mid-April.) I have one main field of jacks and sugar-pies, complete with a fierce "Road Warrior" style scarecrow, a left-over prop from a college production of Macbeth, and a sign proclaiming it The Great Pumpkin Patch. Nasturtiums and purple bush bean plants here and there for the color (and as an open invitation to ever-helpful bees.)

Spilling over from this thriving metropolis of autumn delights is the run-down suburb of transplants and stragglers. Over to the right from that, a new community of sugar-pies planted too late for All Hallow's Eve but sufficient for turkey and football a month later.

But far in the back, in the field we used to dump our rocks and dead soil, is a solemn triad of hills, each only holding two plants a piece. These are the monster pumpkins. We've lost one of the six, and we'll be lucky to bring the five remaining plants -- each allowed only one fruit -- to harvest. These are the pumpkins that can weigh as much as 100 pounds a piece. These are the pumpkins who taught me that horses are a farmer's best friend.

A neighbor, looking at the seed packet as we planted, said "You'll want some manure tea for these."

And so it was that we were shown the large plastic bucket in her patch where she brewed her daily batch of mineral-rich water for plants with "tea-bags" courtesy of her horse in a West Marin stable.

Yesterday, she brought in a fresh round of 'leaves' and gave them to me. It was the coolest gift I'd had in a long time! (I'd made tentative arrangements with my hair-dresser, who also has a horse, to go out to the stable where she kept it and get myself started there. But this is even better: one horse, lovingly fed on the best.)

Today, we brought in our own pots and cozies (buckets from the paint store, the feedbag cut in two and bungee cords.) I divided up the goods and wetted them down. There was an immediate buzz in the vicinity as all the flies sensed the opening of a high-end four star restaurant in the neighborhood (organic too!) so we hustled on the feedbags and left our buckets to brew in the hot summer sun.

Now I can turn my attention to the gophers...

"Someone told me long agoThere's a calm before the storm"

I know. It's been coming for some time.



See. This is why I go in the winter. No expectations: no disappointments!

"English guys are not beyond two girls at a time."

One of my prized pieces of vintage trash is a little paperback entitled "Groupies and Other Girls: A Rolling Stone Special Report" from 1970.



Absolutely loaded with primary source interviews, including this little segment on international relations from "Sunshine":

English guys are not beyond two girls at a time. They're not beyond anything they might want to try. American guys are very conservative. An Englishman at 19 is as mature as an American at 26--or 27. I thinks [sic] that's because most Englishmen are broken in by older women. They don't fumble into it, they learn it right. They're gentle, never pushy. Englishmen, a lot of them are bisexual. They're not hung up. I know a lot of them who have slept with men to see what it was like. American men are constantly trying to prove their virility. They won't wear lace shirts or anything like that. They don't realize that there isn't a woman in the world who can't be had by a man who know he's a man. A woman is only as good as the man she's with.

Much more of the same and some names are named. (Rod Stewart! Who would have thought!?!) All of it edited [with the one free hand?] by the guy who wants to keep the Monkees out of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Classy.

Now it is true, in '70, that the flavors of the rock 'n' roll lollipop were predominately American and English. Makes me wonder what sort of backstage compare/contrast reputation was earned in the hands of these ladies a mere decade later by Bono and the boys?

"Twilight, I only meant to stay awhile"

Okay. Who knew that ELO managed not one not two but three albums after the cocaine-fueled and airbrushed car-wreck that was Xanadu? Not me obviously. In 1981, I was snapping up Devo and Blondie singles and saying "When is the cable company going to get on the stick with this here MTV? That Cars video looked HOT!"

But perhaps there was a reason beyond my own young impatience with the (by then) sodden sound of corporate rock and the desire to try everything (anything!) newer.

According to Wikipedia entry on Time, "Many of the group's fans consider this album to be Jeff Lynne's "forgotten masterpiece," partly due to the perception that Lynne has allowed it to languish (ironically) over the course of time. Lynne has since admitted that Time and the two subsequent ELO albums (Secret Messages and Balance Of Power) were only recorded to satisfy contractual obligations, and while material from every other ELO album was performed during the short-lived Zoom tour in 2001, none of the material from these three albums was included."

As I wander around this wreck of a town
Where people never speak aloud
With its ivory towers and its plastic flowers
I wish I was back in 1981

Wow! Time to see if there's still a Laserium show with Pink Floyd music happening somewhere!

And as for Xanadu, a certain decline of aesthetic standards that heralds an impending midlife crisis has me regarding fondly, if not the vintage movie or upcoming Broadway musical, then at least those devotees who have tended Kira's altars and kept the flame burning all these years. You have to believe we are magic.

Accidental Fan: The Decemberists

There are times where a strange set of circumstances leads me to a new infatuation. So it was with the Decemberists. Back in the day when I used to Google daily on 'Horslips' (in 2004 I was not yet familiar with Google News Alerts), I stumbled across a Boston Globe review of a Portland Oregon indie band that had had the nerve to do a concept EP based on The Tain. The same band was in town that very week at the Great American Music Hall. And so on and so forth.

Inevitably, there could be comparisons between Horslips' own 1973 masterpiece and the Decemberists' 2001 oddity. Both have literary roots: the Horslips album quotes W.B. Yeats introducing Lady Gregory's Cuchulain of Muirthemne (1902), and Colin Meloy is on record crediting Thomas Kinsella's 1969 modernist edition as his inspiration. Found in a Portland bookstore. In the early days of the Bush administration. This cultural distance, in my opinion, is exactly why it is worth a listen with Meloy delivering a strangely unanchored and 'dislocated' take on the saga. Then there's the gap of years and the consciousness of style-experimentation from The Decemberists, who were thoughtfully exploring prog-rock and metal from an almost archaeological perspective at the time, as this review details:

Pitchfork Review: The Tain

"I never was a metal head," remarked Colin Meloy in an Earlash interview last July. "It's something in my later years I've come to regret a little bit just because everybody has their stories of when they were a metal head. And it wasn't until recently that I started listening to Black Sabbath and started appreciating it."

Two albums and a six-song Five Songs EP into their career, The Decemberists' are beginning to seriously define their sound; a sudden plunge into, say, heavy metal, seems unlikely. Yet the first movement of The Tain EP, the band's new 18-minute composition based loosely on the 8th-century Celtic Ulster cycle's central poem "Tain Bo Cuailinge", finds Meloy and the others most immediately concerned with-- am I about to say this?-- serious Ur-metal riffage. Granted, Decemberist metal is not going to weigh down the Dominique Leones of the world, but make no mistake: Never has this band sung a flag so black, a maiden so iron.

The opening of The Tain is indeed jarring, though there's always more than meets the ear with this band, and the disc's dark acoustic guitar opening is not without foil: Pay attention to how Colin overdramatizes the dark line with his heavy plucks, disarming its sense of foreboding. When the rest of the band joins him in unison, what should be enough of a killer riff for friendly genocide is undermined by the organ's funny whir and Rachel Blumberg's gentle cymbal taps. In short, the sound is off-kilter, though not without ample deception, and only hints at the level of sophistication to come in the remaining movements.

More at the link. And that was some time ago. The Decemberists are now signed to a major label, sell out dates in Dublin and San Francisco, have their newest album Crane Wife at the Starbucks counter near you and, once in a very great while, you even hear them on commercial radio.

Decemberists Homepage.

Double Half-Caf, Soy Milk McCartney with Carmel Topping

Yes, it is true that I still owe the world my confused thoughts on Starbucks: the music store that sells coffee. For only this last spring I purchased a CD from the amazing Sounds Eclectic: the KCRW music program hosted by Nic Harcourt.

I bought it to hear Damien Rice cover Radiohead's Creep and I was a bit harsh on ole Damien 'cause he wimped out and wouldn't say a word that Bono (practically an archbishop these days) tosses around like loose change. (Hmmm...do you think Bono is familiar with 'loose change' anymore? He can probably pay Bill Gates to pick up that five dollar bill for him!) Later I realized Damien was probably constrained because it was National Public Radio and all and we don't want our tax money spent on obscenities.

The main point being: I can't throw stones at Starbucks and its music franchise anymore. But with Paul McCartney signing to their label, I might need an extra java jacket to ward off the shudder. Eamon Carr reviews:

Paul McCartney's Full Circle Review

WHILE the world celebrates the fortieth anniversary of Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Heart's Club Band, his own concept, Paul McCartney releases a new solo album which explores his 64 years of memory.

But, interestingly, he appears to have forgotten about EMI, the company associated with him and The Beatles since the beginning and, instead, assigned this album to a label that's part-owned by Starbucks.

Is McCartney's music now a side-order to a sandwich? Or is it once again the main course?

While he expertly tapped into the King's Road/ Haight Asbury zeitgeist in 1967, we don't expect McCartney to nail the mood of the times these days.

He playfully acknowledges this by sticking a comfy armchair on the album cover. This is the first sign that this isn't simply a throwaway collection or mere contract filler...

More at link.

ALLLRIGHT!!!!! "Oh, oh big ol jet airliner, Don't carry me too far away"

Direct flight to Dublin finally set

After four years of trying by city officials to establish a nonstop flight between SFO and Dublin, Ireland, San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom said Friday that the airline Aer Lingus is expected to begin a five-day-a-week, direct flight by the end of the year.

Joined by Supervisor Sean Elsbernd and Martin Cullen, the Irish minister for transport, Newsom said it was an important milestone for the 11 percent of Bay Area residents who are of Irish descent. He said it would prove an economic boost, providing more than 900 jobs and bringing in $6.8 million in taxes each year to the city and state.

The European Union's Council of Transport Ministries must approve the flight -- which it is expected to do at its meeting next week

Hey Heathrow!!! B*te me!

Pretzels for the President

Boz reviews the Radiators' Trouble Pilgrim

TROUBLE PILGRIM is the sound of a band reconnecting with all the musical roots which initially inspired them, but as people with life experience rather than as teenagers. The Flaming Groovies in particular stand as a comparison to the resultant sound - a blend of very many raw underground influences with the more sophisticated likes of The Byrds, Love, Bowie, Elvis Costello etc... It could of course be assumed that the band had already arrived at this sound much earlier.... many of their odd-bits - BUYING GOLD IN HEAVEN (80), TAKE MY HEART AND RUN (80), PLURA BELLE (87) would sit comfortably within this collection of tracks.

The opening track TROUBLE PILGRIM is a rigid garage workout and in many ways ( EPs aside ) the perfect introduction to where the band have landed soundwise. Not content with the basic band ( although that’s pretty much what you get live ), they’ve embellished the rawness throughout with 12 string guitars, vintage synths, organs and even Glockenspiels and French Horns. There’s little doubt this expanding of possibilities in the studio was learned and noted while working on GHOSTOWN with Tony Visconti, but here it’s driven by their own experience rather than the guiding hand of a hotshot name producer.

More at the link. Boz, the reviewer, contributes great editorial cartoons to my local paper. Also does artwork for various punk bands of my acquaintanceship.

"For I am a poor and a wretched boy, A chimbley, chimbley sweep."

Tales from the Dark Side

The Decemberists let their inner weirdos shine, with songs that hark back to a literary tradition of gruesome morality tales and also embrace more modern abominations such as the Shankill Butchers. Singer Colin Meloy talks to Jim Carroll

A COUPLE of years ago, Colin Meloy had a day job in a bookstore in Portland, Oregon. "I remember one day seeing this children's storybook, The Crane Wife, coming into the store. I had an idle hour and I flicked through it and I was really taken by the story." When it came time for his band, American indie folk-rockers The Decemberists, to record their fourth album, that old Japanese tale about a poor peasant who nurses a sick crane back to health kept coming to mind. It seemed to be the perfect starting point for an album which Meloy felt could be both epic and quirky.

"It's an amazing story, and I suppose what I find interesting is that you have all these different themes about greed and curiosity and love running through it, which have an universal application beyond what that one tale is about."

The Crane Wife is a hugely ambitious undertaking for The Decemberists, one of the most thoughtful and bookish of America's new indie school. The album consists in the main of longform songs reminiscent in some ways to their earlier work, The Tain, which was based on the Ulster mythological story once also musically explored by Horslips. The Crane Wife is a major league outing from a band raising their game on every level.

Meloy has always taken an interest in ancient fables and tales, particularly the more gruesome ones.

More at the link.

I've been a fan of The Decemberists for about three years now. If my discovery of Horslips was nearly accidental, the path to The Decemberists was almost random in its happening. They first popped up years ago under a Googling of "Horslips-News" in an article in the Boston Globe. "And just who is this upstart Portland band who thinks they can do a concept album on the Táin?" I said as web engines ferreted out the official site. "Oh," sniffed I, once there, "Playing next week at the Great American Music Hall are they? Well. We'll just have to go see about THAT."

Came home with three of their albums.

“Vertigo is the conflict between the fear of falling and the desire to fall.”

Previously on our Trip to Cork: It is a bank holiday weekend and our flight to Cork has become an extended tour of circling the airport for nearly an hour and then flying off to refuel at Shannon. At Shannon, a deserted airport lounge is our home for the next couple of hours or so. Dinner has become a priority over missed entertainment. Fortunately, I have discovered that the vending machines at Shannon accept US dollars. (It's because of the military flights, my husband explained later. Well, Yankee Doodle Dandy!) And now: Part the Second of

MY FIRST VISIT TO CORK
or
THE AMERICAN TOURIST & THAT F**KING STONE
Part the Second in a Series of Three

Before going further I should explain, in 2002 I was traveling on business to Europe quite regularly. We were involved in a major programming effort with the subscription fulfillment software and the whole thing was based in Bognor. I was identified early on as the one person here who could represent our interests and be responsible for the testing. In retrospect, I was woefully unprepared. But we made the deadlines. And now I generally go over just once a year for upgrades or enhancements.

But it was on these trips that I could take a Friday night flights over to Ireland and enjoy a weekend. The first trips had been to Dublin – the first one would be officially B.H. (before Horslips) in summer of 2002 – but even the June 2003 trip was still before I knew many people in the guestbook and my plans were my own to make.

So I thought I'd branch out from Dublin a bit. I identified Galway and Cork as other possible weekend spots. I flipped a coin. And Cork it was.

And you've already heard about the flight over from Heathrow.

But by midnight, we were finally on the ground in Cork and I went out to catch a cab to the hotel. Mossie Daly was the cab-driver's name. I have his card somewhere.

Because revenge is a dish best served cold.

I wasn't, as you can guess, in a cheerful mood. But I quickly explained the whole business traveler on a weekend jaunt and been to Dublin and everyone says Cork is very nice, etc. etc. Then Mossie said "Are you going to visit Blarney Castle?"

Oh. Shit. That's here? I gave an inward sigh. Should have gone with Galway.

"Oh! Wow! That's here?" I enthused politely. "To think I nearly went to Galway!" And the Bernard Hermann score from Vertigo started playing softly in the background of my imagination.

(Backtracking for a moment: I have a fear of man-made heights. My earliest memories are of the terrors of down-escalators in shopping malls. I tend to avoid window offices in tall building, high balconies, or modernist stairs where the treads are held by metal risers, allowing you to look down and down and down the flights. I believe that my eyesight, which plays tricks on my depth perception, is part of it. But there's also just a primal response beneath all that. And whenever I mention that I'm going to visit Ireland, someone will invariably say "Are you going to kiss the Blarney Stone?" And then because it is not nice to say "Sure, when Hell freezes over" I usually change the subject.)

Mossie went on for a bit about the area and offered his services for a day's tour of all the regional highlights. Something he does for the visiting Japanese golfers. I suggested I was more of a 'find my own path' sort of tourist and probably would be too busy enjoying the many attractions of Cork throughout the weekend.

So by 2 p.m. the next afternoon after I had thoroughly savored the many attractions of Cork, I called Mossie. "Okay, you're on. But that Castle is out of the picture."

To his credit, I did see much more of the area than foot travel or mass transit would have given me. Cobh, in particular, was the highlight of the day. And through the radio station in Mossie's cab, I discovered the whole genre of Irish country and western. So there was my money's worth right there.

But he would not let up about that Castle. Finally I agreed that it would be a shame to come all this way and not just go see it. From the ground. Get a few photos for the album. While he checked in with his sons who were keeping a running report of the day's football game going for him via cell phone.

And when I was standing at the Tower's base I looked up to the highest part and saw the hole with sky beyond suddenly fill with the head of some foolish tourist – for all the world like Marie Antoinette at the guillotine – and Bernard Hermann cranked it to 11. I looked back down to ground level to steady myself and found Mossie holding two tickets for the climb.

"They come as part of the package," he smiled apologetically. "I'll be right there with you. It's all right. It's very safe!"

Really, I still can't remember how he convinced me, but it might have been a play on my innate sense of competitiveness. And the climb up was quite a bit like hiking a particularly rocky trail. (Natural heights are not a problem. I'll peer over the edge of a volcano with no fear at all.)

But the shock of the Tower's hollow core at the top – the rook in my chess set isn't hollow! – seriously unsettled me and early signs of full panic were beginning to manifest. My ears began buzzing and it became very, very important that I not look over the edge of the railing into the interior of the tower's depth where I imagined I would see the broken bones of some poor Japanese golfer...silken tropical shirt faded by the elements...at the bottom. It was also important to not see the stones of the parapet's edge in the foreground. Instead I kept eyes focused on the distant horizon and followed the ant-trail of tourists around to the exit tower.

Mossie tried pushing his luck one final time when we reached that hellish spot where the hole in the crumbling masonry allows people to slide out on a cardboard mat and do what they think they need to do. There's someone there too, with a tip jar, and he offers to spot you and help with the process. He looked up at me expectantly. Mossie looked at me expectantly.

"You know," I turned to Mossie, trying to keep my voice low and steady. "It's a good gig. God knows the mouldering bones of P.T. Barnum are rotten green with envy. But I'm not kissing that damn Stone. I'm in marketing. I think I'm fine as is. I also think I'm going to need to sit down soon."

I did nearly break into complete panic at the exiting stairs. The uneven and worn stones that would require close foreground attention and the little frayed rope railing for gripping pushed me dangerously close to the faint I was trying to avoid. Only the press of tourists at my back and the thought of what sort of rescue effort would have to be mounted to get my unconscious body out of there kept me anchored to alertness.

By the time we reached earth, I think Mossie was finally convinced that I wasn't just being an obstinate American tourist. He let me sit down on the grass until the buzzing in my ears stopped and my heart rate slowed.

Later he bought me an ice-cream cone and didn't even add it to the day's bill. And we drove back to Cork listening to T.R. Dallas and Margo on the radio.

Stay tuned for Part the Third:
"One foot in the grave, one foot on the pedal
I was born a rebel..."

"That clinking, clanking soundCan make the world go 'round"

Consolidating some of my older website essays to here where Google can have its merry way with them. Also, as an acknowledgement that it was my company's IT department that made my Horslips addiction possible, these old travel stories are fair game for inclusion here. This was originally written in Autumn 2003 and recounts

MY FIRST VISIT TO CORK
or
"YOU NEVER GIVE ME YOUR MONEY"

Part the First in a series of at least Two

On January 1, 2002, twelve countries sharing the centuries of common history that comes from proximate geography, apposite culture, and occasional bouts of intra-nationalist animosity took it upon themselves to unite behind that symbol of humanity which we all value.

I refer to, naturally, money.

And so as it was written, so was it done that Mac and PC programmers were set to the task of creating a ALT key shortcut, which – when executed – delivered the following:

€

And, lo, the Euro was born.

Yes indeed, for the Yank tourist traveling between Belgium, Germany, Greece, Spain, France, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Austria, Portugal and Finland, life was no longer the border-crossing ritual of learning new coinage, new denominations, and new terms. Harder it was for the locals to hide the fact they overcharge for the regional warmed-over variant of cerveza; easier it was for the cosmopolitan traveler to breeze through the airport not passing the Monetary Exchange booth and not collecting 200% in currency conversion fees.

Twelve countries. It could have been a baker’s dozen…but for one nation state that decided it would opt out of the new currency and remain with the monetary unit that saw it through the glory days of the Empire and the no less glorious, if slightly refracted through the prism of Washington D.C., days of New Labour.

I refer to, naturally, England.

Sure, Denmark and Sweden opted out too. However, as they aren’t directly responsible for my nightmare Friday night in Counties Cork and Kerry in Ireland, this rant is dedicated to the one nation in the three that does NOT contribute significantly to tasteful interior design or the international porn industry. In for a penny, Chancellor Brown, in for a Pound.

Now I’ll be the first to say that there’s something pretty damn satisfying about walking into a pub somewhere down in Sussex County and slapping a fistful of Pound coins down on the bar. Their weight, their thickness, that Latin or Welsh scratched into the edge like some Elven inscription waiting for Gandalf to decipher – Spend Friend and Enter – the Pound coin can take you back to the age when six people hauled trunkfuls of similar stuff ashore to some Caribbean fever-ridden swamp and only one person returned to the ship tucking up his sleeve the freshly drawn map made from what the rest of the crew hopes is just vellum and red ink. Why just the ring of those coins on the counter at the Dorchester Arms or the Prancing Pony! “Rum, Jim, rum!” I’d bellow. “Tell me when I’ve worked my through THAT, woman,” I’d say, throwing the leather coin purse at the landlord’s doxy. Yarrrgh….

And when pub talk was dull, nothing could kill a few minutes of time like lining up all the coins in chronological order and tracing the sag of the Queen’s chin line through the years. I think they should do one more coin for each monarch showing their final corporal state. A memento mori, if you will.

True, America’s got this one quarter for every state thing happening now, but it doesn’t compare to the fun of wondering exactly what that Welsh phrase is saying about its role in the United Kingdom. What is the Welsh word for Langer, anyway?

But for every pleasure, there is a price. And in the case of those of us who work a week in England followed by a weekend of vacation in Ireland, that price is carrying around TWO separate pirate hoards of coin and currency.

And for God’s sake, Europe...why so much coinage? Both Euros and Pounds have a TWO DOLLAR coin! Lovely, yes, and fit for presentation as a medal, but haul around a pocketful of them and you feel like some Vegas granny that won’t cash in her chips because she thinks it’s more valuable that way.

So, after my fourth business trip, I had a small haul of both pounds and Euros which I kept in separate bags for obvious reasons. Also, when leaving England, I kept a portion of the pounds with me in carry-on, but checked the other two bags of surplus poundage and the Euros in my check-in luggage.

Why would I do that, you ask? Let’s review the situation. Solitary American tourist, late Friday night weekend flight from island to island, and – why, what’s this on the X-Ray? - a mass of metal bits in a loosely shaped container hiding in the carry-on luggage. Spent a lot of time at the ‘special search’ area getting acquainted with security guards those first few trips that way.

So the routine was: taxi to Heathrow with trip and tip in pounds; one last English beer at the airport’s hostelry, a competitor with TGI Fridays for charm and authenticity, again in pounds; candy bar and paperback at the last English airport newsstand in the Irish departure terminal with the astounding collection of porn (and what’s up with THAT, Mr. Irish business traveler?), once more in pounds. Fly to Ireland, claim baggage, and commence the weekend...in Euros.

It all works like a charm, until one bank holiday weekend in June 2003 when the Cork City Airport tells your pilot that he can’t land until the runway lights are fixed. And then, after two hours of circling get the fuel to the point where a side trip to Shannon commences, a long evening of wandering around the deserted Shannon airport terminal teaches you the lesson of what Ireland would be like if there were no pubs at all.

A handful of English pounds, a planeful of fairly grumpy people who are not living up to that Tourist Board image of welcoming Yank strangers like myself and enfolding them to their bosom (or just maybe sharing their goddamn package of crisps, anyway), and a terminal full of shops and restaurants that closed hours ago. "Still," I thought, "at least you get a chance to see another part of Ireland" and I hurried over to the windows to see what could be seen before the gloom of darkness dropped its curtain. No lights, no hills, no buildings, no features of any kind except Vladimir and Estragon hanging out under a blasted tree. And at that moment, I knew their chances of having a fulfilling evening were better than mine.

It gets to the point where I eat all the cough drops and breath-mints that I have. I make a half-hearted effort to get the flight attendants to go back to the grounded plane and get something from the cabin kitchens, but since this was supposed to be a fifty minute (HA!) flight, there’s nothing doing with that. Then, on my way to the bathroom, I spot a vending machine with that universal red and white logo of carbonation and caramel water. "Don’t know what good that will do," I say to myself, "because it’s just going to want a Euro" but wander over any way. There’s a whole bank of vending machines back there it seems: peanuts, Oreos, candy bars, fruit drops, cheese-its, licorice...a bacchanalian vision that Epicurus would savor. O, for a Euro!

Then, I see him! Engraved near the coin slot--showing the direction his paper banner is to be inserted—is the father of my country, the only George to hold a certain leadership office with any merit, that old cherry-tree chopper himself: General Washington.

Here, in the farthest western reaches of air travel in Ireland, with the dark wilderness of bog and mountain held back by the thinnest veneer of late-twentieth century plate-glass windows, is a vending machine that Takes U.S. Dollars!

And, Mark or Yen or Euro or Pound, I ALWAYS carry Uncle Sam’s greenbacks! Five of them later and I was fit and full, ruminating comfortably over my paperback porn in an airport row chair, waiting for the announcement that Cork Airport found their D-Cell batteries and we could all get on that plane and back to our weekends.

A weekend in Cork, I thought, will more than make up for this unfortunate beginning.

Stay Tuned for Part the Second: Blarney Stoned Again...