Best of 2007 (1) "So wait for the stone on your window...your window..."

Everybody's heard the story. The Decemberists were a indie band from Portland, Oregon that had the nerve to do a concept album based on the ancient Irish epic The Tain. That was late 2004 and I, ever the intrepid Horslips fan I, went to see these upstarts at the Great American Music Hall.

And walked away with four of their early efforts.

But like Peter before the crowing cock, I denied them within the Horslips circle of fans and quietly muffled my own opinions that a great epic can have many versions and perhaps even needed one from an American band struggling to give voice to alternative viewpoints in the shadow of the early years of Iraq.

2007 found the Decemberists on a major label, with sell-out gigs at the Village in Dublin and at the Warfield in San Francisco, and on sale at the counters of Starbucks across the nation. That an album featuring the deeply chilling ballad "Shankill Butchers" could sit side by side with biscotti and half-dipped dark-chocolate madeleines of the Frappacinos and half-caf mochas of the world should surely be one of the year's signature moments.

I had the opportunity to hear Colin Meloy sing an acoustic version of this on KFOGs morning show. Romeo and Juliet in South Central. Same as it ever was...

"He kept a shop in London town,Of fancy clients and good renown..."

A recent splash ad on MySpace tells me there's a new Johnny Depp movie in the offing. A Tim Burton/Johnny Depp venture, which should be about as good as it gets. And perfect for the holidays too: a musical in a nineteenth century London setting. That's Dickens Town, by golly! City of chimney sweeps and cherubic pickpockets and parlor games at the nephew’s and Tiny Tim, who did NOT die, casting a universal benediction on us all. Or, even later along in the century, a child’s deceptive haven of waistcoated rabbits visiting from Oxford and mischievous pixie fairies who live in the Park. Where nannies float down from the coal-soot skies and little lost boys in search of their shadows tap on the nursery windowpane.

But, of course, Mr. Depp is not giving us a new Ebenezer or Mr. Banks or Captain Hook (though the last IS a thought...just sayin'). Instead, his own gallery of risky performances will now include the doomed story of Benjamin Barker, Fleet Street barber convicted of a false crime and sent to Australia. But escaped, and returning home and searching for wife long lost and child long grown.

London London London. Damn me. London.

My first trip over in July 2002, I spent two days on my own in London. World Cup Weekend it was. Using Travelocity, I originally booked some delightful sounding place, but co-workers reading the postal code on my reservation form told me I was well away from City center. So a hasty reshuffling landed me the only reasonable vacancy, something near the Gloucester Station on Cromwell Road (yeah, not forgetting that soon). Later I realized from reading Mrs. Palfrey, a novel by Elizabeth Taylor (No. Not THAT Elizabeth Taylor. The other one.), that I might have been staying in what was more akin to pensioners housing offering a semblance of self-sufficiency in the City and a tenuous toe-hold on middle class respectability. Which would explain the enormous pile of empty gin bottles collecting on the back stoop. But it was cheap and within (what I, urban hill-climber that I am, considered) walking distance to Harrods.

After checking in early in the mid-morning, I headed off in a quest of food and City fun. Slight confusion as the streets twisted and turned about and I was seeing less commercial and more residential and a directional sign saying "Shepherd's Bush" and, drawing on my history of the Who, I knew I was headed in the wrong direction. Back again and finding the Gloucester Station shopping area, I went inside to the first lunch counter I saw and ordered a meat pie. When it arrived, all steamy and flaking, I crooned down to it: "Mrs. Mooney has a pie shop. Does a business, but I've noticed something weird. Lately all her neighbors' cats have disappeared. Wouldn't do in my shop! Just the thought of it is enough to make you sick. And I'm tellin' you...them pussy cats is quick!" And the waitperson behind the counter hustled me out into the street.

Attend the tale of Sweeney Todd...

Stephen Sondheim's masterpiece. Listen ye, Andrew Lloyd Weber, and grovel before it.

What doesn't this musical have? Escaped convict, vengeance, lust, barber chairs and medicine shows, cannibalism, madhouses and lunatics, sailors and holiday seaside songs, beggar women whores, corrupt government officials, true love and tragedy. And meat pies. God, that’s good.

Still, I'll confess that I'm more than a little worried about Helena Bonham Carter here. We're not seeing much of her in the preview and we're hearing less. Mind you, I saw the great Lansbury her very own self bring the doting, daffy and quite dangerous Mrs. Lovett to life on the stage in '79. And this after weeks of listening to the original Broadway cast recording of the whole thing so that I would know each bawdy pun and wheedling caress of her voice by heart and can type all this from memory even now.* A canny businesswoman, first and always: "What's my secret? Frankly dear, forgive me candor. Family secret. All to do with herbs. (And mind, now: pronounce that 'H') Things like bein' careful with your coriander. That’s what makes the gravy grander!" A tender mother's heart of tatted doilies and seaside mementos denied its rightful place in the safe haven of home and family: "Nothing's going to harm you, Toby, not while I'm around." A spurned and desperate lover: "Your Lucy! A crazy hag picking bones and rotten spuds out of alley ashcans? Would you wanted to know she ended like that? Yes, I lied because I love you. I've been TWICE the wife she was! Could that THING have cared for you like me...?"

Oh it's a GREAT role. Ms. Carter better be up to it!

But I'm not in London this December. That's breaking a personal record, though we have hopes for January. Still, if I'm not there, the Duke de Mondo is and I’m trying my level best to not be consumed with a deep, resentful envy as a result. Which makes it all the harder to say that his new blog London in Broken C is every bit as good as anything he's written in the past. As with his Dublin of Sinead and the Savage Purple and hometown Belfast, another world-famous metropolis has found in the Duke an able chronicler for the new millennium of all of its wild attractions, its inexplicable eccentricities and its ageless sorrows.


*I'm onboard the Mendocino at this very moment, so there's no Google on hand to double-check. Of course, I could only post this later when next online, but I swear: straight from memory.

ByeSpace? (2) "I am a Rock, I am an Island..."

And I am a Vampire (Catholic Schoolgirl class); right-brained; attending the world's largest Octoberfest; in possession of an IQ 15 points lower than my friend Mal McGinley of Antrim; in a torrid 'poking' contest with photographer Sean Hennessy; a member in good standing of the HUGE Horslips and Horslypse fanclub; and rating local restaurants and my exhaustive CD collection.

Yes, I am on Facebook.

Sometime in October, Birmingham-based guitarist Joe Forde enticed me over to Facebook, the social networking site eclipsing ole MySpace in the buzz. By November, something else was eclipsing Facebook, (It's LinkedIn my coworkers affirm and I'm there too, but strictly for professional reasons. No Zombie Games need apply.) but I found myself enjoying it anyway. Until the constant round of apps started piling up and I thought "What am I to my friends? Some 'chump' (that's a vampire victim in the game, actually) who's gonna sit down and participate in every little interactive piece of stickiness that a Silicon Valley nerd came up with on their lunch hour?

Facebook Fatigue hit approximately 26.5 days after signing up. I needed to go somewhere quiet to rest. And so, back to MySpace. Where the honest hustle of flash animated ads of Britney Spears being shaved by that creepy looking doctor felt almost like instant nostalgia. I logged on. THESE were my real friends!

And bloody hell! I had over 480 of them! Who ARE these people? A recent article in the Wall Street Journal states that we all have a ceiling on the personal contacts we can manage to maintain in our lives. That number: 150.

I had nearly 500 in the Horslips profile alone. 220 in my poetry/lit profile. And nearly 1500 in the Irish pub and ballad profile. Quoting Joni Mitchell:

"I do my best
And I do good business
There's a lot of people asking for my time
They're trying to get ahead
They're trying to be a good friend of mine"

And trust me: after the first few weeks in '06 of making friends with friends, I vetted each request carefully with the following guidelines:

1. if you are a voluptuous blonde with an 'i' ending first name (Candi, Brandi, Bambi, etc), you better have at least The Waterboys listed as one of your favorite bands
   
2. if you are a young, sculpted, dark-haired lad with puppy-dog eyes and a Mediterranean tan, it doesn't necessarily have to be The Waterboys. Big Country will suffice.
   

Seriously, I did use the following as warning signs to quickly cull some of requests:

1. obvious political banners/mottoes/messages.
   
2. band that falls completely outside of the genres I've indicated interest in.
   
3. band with more than 1,000 friends (harsh because I had 1,300 friends myself by this point on the pub profile -- but remember: I'm not the one out there building a mass mailing list).
   
4. band that isn't based in Ireland/Scotland/England/Wales or the great pub cities of America. Recently added Germany and Netherlands as "I'll give your song a longer listen" countries because I am digging some of the great stuff from those scenes!
   
5. excessive use of glitter gifs in profile/avatars.
   
6. Ponies and seascapes are a warning sign too.
   
7. anyone who hasn't bothered to edit their profile beyond the basic "Tom of MySpace" look.
   
8. anyone who hasn't bothered to kick Tom out of their Top Eight friends.
   
9. anyone who mentions "real estate" "vitamins" "investment" in their 'About Me' section.
   
10. guns or balaclavas in profile/avatars. Click. (But do LOVE the new Artic Monkeys song!)
    
11. red font on black background is not Goth. It is just hard to read. Click.
    
12. same thing goes for the jpeg that's too small to tile as wallpaper attractively. Click.
    
13. the American flag is inspiring, true, and we all love eagles. But. In. Moderation. Click!!
    
14. I'm sorry, was that Loreena McKennitt I saw listed in your influences? SO click.
    
15. Yes, I'm proud to be Irish and/or American too, but I don't seem to need to mention it quite so often!
    
16. okay, you know, everyone else's MySpace page only took two seconds to load. What was the freakin' hold-up with yours? Believe me, it wasn't worth the wait.
    (Here's the actual page that generated this part of my rant: blueflashinglightmeup)
    

This is not to say that I haven't made firm, fast friends with some people who broke these rules. For example, The Guireans of Sandwick, Isle of Lewis have done f*ck all for style and presentation on their MySpace page, but they are head and shoulders above any other friend I made for inventiveness, originality and true artistic achievement:

The Guireans

Yet even with this stringent guideline, I still find myself up to the neck in chain letter bulletins and self-advertising comments. And now is the time I'm expected to go around and wish Holiday greetings to the lot.

480 friends? Caroline Astor managed with just 400 and she had a big house. It was time to start cleaning mine.

(Stay Tuned)

Hot for Preacher (3) - Chapter One: I am Born

And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them; and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.
2 Luke, 8:10, Bartleby.com

Coll: Something's wrong with this baby.
Gib: I'll say: he looks like our sheep!
Coll: Let me see, Gib! (Mak and Jill try to escape)
Daw: I see thieves trying to sneak away!
Gib: That was clever. I've never seen anything like it.
Coll: What a fraud!
Daw: Yes, men, wasn't it? Let's tie her up and bind her fast. A false scold when she's caught hangs at last. Look how they swaddled his four feet in the middle?
I've never seen a horned baby in a cradle before. I know him by his ear-mark. He's ours.
The Wakefield Second Shepherd's Play, a medieval retelling of the Nativity and some other stuff, translation by Karen Saupe.

Paul was a cranky baby. He cried most of the day. Peace only settled on the new house after he went to bed where, exhausted from the trauma of his waking hours, he slept long and soundly. Iris tried all known methods to still the noise coming from the cot. Her sister Ruth would come over to lend a hand. Onagh Byrne, a sympathetic neighbour from two doors along, was also enlisted to help pacify Paul. Norman, who was now a sensible eight-year-old, often walked his young brother around the block to give Iris a break.

David Lee Roth was born on October 10, 1953, in Bloomington, Indiana, where his achievement-oriented father, Nathan, went to medical school.

Iris was sure something was wrong. Nobody would cry like that just for attention. When he was two, Iris took Paul to Dr. Lee Kidney, a noted specialist at Crumlin Children's Hospital.

David was an energetic kid, but he was plagued by allergies and fought with health problems that forced him to wear leg braces from almost the time he could walk until age four. Then he was shipped off to therapy for the better part of a decade. At nine years old, he began three intensive years of clinical treatment for hyperactivity. He had a few healthy outlets--Roth's parents called his dinner-hour routines "Monkey Hour," when he acted out cartoons and sang revved-up vaudeville songs for dinner guests.

Dr. Kidney couldn't find anything wrong with his young patient but suggested he stay in the hospital for a week for observation. The good news, seven days later, was that Paul was healthy and normal.

Everyone else was simply having trouble playing their part in his continuous mental picture show, a fast, animated flipbook of MAD magazine and Playboy.

The bad news was that he was unlikely to stop seeking attention.

...his roots were knotted tightly around the Old World--his grandparents were Ukrainian Jews who traded the mountains and steppes of Eastern Europe for the sweltering cornfields of the Midwest. In fact, all four of his grandparents spoke Russian. "My great-granddaddy died dancing," he later joked with a TV interviewer, "at the end of a rope."

Hot for Preacher (2) - A Brief News Update

Bono Awarded Liberty Medal

U2 frontman Bono has been awarded the Liberty Medal in Philadelphia. The award is given annually and recognises leadership in the pursuit of freedom.

...

After being awarded with the medal, Bono paid tribute to the US, saying: "In the American body politic there's no poetry like the poetry of the Declaration Of Independence and the Constitution.

Actually, I happen to be pretty fond of Casey at the Bat. And there's still bars up in Sitka where a spirited recitation of The Cremation of Sam McGee will set you up with free rounds of Yukon Jack for the night. (Technically, that one's Canadian, but none other than Seamus Heaney has cited it as a childhood favorite.)

Speaking of Canada:

Hail to Van Halen

Van Halen's two-hour-and-10-minute performance kicked off with a triple-shot of great classic rock -- their cover of The Kinks' You Really Got Me, I'm the One, which the band stopped mid-song to rapturous applause -- "It only took us 20 years to get this far," said Roth -- and Runnin' With the Devil.

In between, there were such classics -- all from the Roth-fronted years of 1978-84 -- as Romeo Delight, Beautiful Girls, Dance the Night Away, Everybody Wants Some, their cover of Roy Orbison's Pretty Woman, I'll Wait, And the Cradle Will Rock, Hot For Teacher, Little Guitars, Jamie's Cryin', Panama, and Ain't Talkin' Bout Love.

Truthfully, it was hard to maintain the energy of that trio of opening songs, but the band definitely aimed to please with a hits-heavy set list and backed by impressive green laser lights, an enormous video backdrop and confetti raining down on the audience by the very end.

"I can't tell you all how excited we are to be here tonight," said Roth.

By the way. It's 'brown' M&Ms. The green ones were valued at my high school for their supposed aphrodisiacal qualities, which probably led to my confusion. And, having read to that point in the story, I've learned that the brown M&M clause was a cold and calculated business trick, further encouraging my growing respect from the little old rockers from Pasadena.

Hot for Preacher (1) -- Mano a Mano con Bono

Ever since Grace Cathedral ruined my grand finale¹ for last December's email carol of The Twelve Days of Bono, I've felt that there's been some unfinished business betwixt myself and Mr. Hewson.

I knew that I needed something new to focus my somewhat unexamined, but always emailed, feelings for the man and the band who continue to haunt my life in strange and unexpected ways. (Most recently by very nearly providing Hillary Clinton with her '08 campaign song.) Maybe even something like that worked like a kind of penance or atonement for all those cheap jokes and unpurchased albums.

And although I hadn't a clue as to what form that it might take, I knew there would be a Sign. A Path. I had Faith that Providence would Provide. (Providence seems to be good at that. Hence, perhaps, that name it's got. 'Providence.') A Way would be made Clear. I would also Need to get my Caps Lock Key FIXEd.

Or I'd just find a really cheap, used copy of Eamon Dunphy's Unforgettable Fire at the record store where I probably bought the bulk of any U2 vinyl I ever owned. And I'd think "Yeah, that'll work. I'll read Unforgettable Fire and write snide rants to my friends who will quietly block my email address and alert the appropriate authorities. It'll be like a book club meeting that goes on and on and there's nothing you can do about it."

Reader, I bought it!

And after a couple depressing thoughts on the twenty year old copyright date, I started in. And there we are, onstage in 1985, at Wembley. It's Live Aid, clearly the greatest stadium concert with [as the book says] "the greatest rock 'n' roll bill of all time." And off we go:

It all hung on Bono. At moments of acute need like this it was as if he was the vessel into which all their fears and hopes, ideas and emotions dissolved. In him and through him the pool of accumulated sadness, joy, anger and yearning swelled and began to flow -- from Edge's guitar, through Larry's drums and Adam's bass the music gathered force, bursting out through Bono whose task it was to give it words, meaning, substance on a day like this. He was the medium for their message. When Bono prayed that day, as he always did backstage, he asked for strength...

Right there. That's when the needle scratched across the vinyl of my attention span. Praying backstage. At a ROCK concert? And am I the first to catch that "through him, with him, in him" echo in the second sentence? Yet I keep reading. A page later, we have Bob Geldof and Paul McGuinness crying like reunited brothers in each others' arms.

Oh dear. It's going to be a looooong book.

I understand atonement and all, but shouldn't a rock-n-roll biography have something a little more ...ah...carnal about it? Like underage blonds in hotel suites, roadies with bicycle chain belts and tattoos, mirrors and razors, M&Ms painstakingly sorted by flunkies backstage, wads of under-the-table cash exchanging hands, suits from the record label harshing the buzz...all that sort of thing? At the least, a certain snarky, smart-ass tone capturing the hustle and balls of it all?

For example, here in Ian Christie's new book Everybody Wants Some: The Van Halen Saga, published by Wiley. (Oh yes it is!) Does the legend of Eddie, Alex, Michael and Dave start with prayers and hugs? Let's take a look:

Like the stories of other great Americans from Henry Ford to Walt Disney to Fievel the Mouse, the saga of Van Halen begins in an ancient land, far from the United States and its constant supply of hot water and electricity. As a narrator would say in the old movies: Among the windmills, tulips, and wooden shoes of lovely Amsterdam, Holland, there lived a kindly musician named Jan van Halen.

Now that's not too bad on the snark-o-meter, but to be fair and balanced we need to give it a full page of text as we did for the other. And so to:

As they traveled all around Holland and sometimes across the border to Germany, the boys saw the practical aspects of a musical career firsthand, and on some of the more rustic and ribald nights they discovered the perks--Alex reported losing his virginity at age nine after one of his dad's gigs.

Hot DAMN! You can almost hear that clicking sound of green M&Ms being sorted now.

And so I've decided that I will read BOTH books. At once. As in together. Randomly. Flipping from one to the other whenever the mood strikes. Confusing names, places, venues, genres until I forget whether it's Bono or Alex who trips over a cable and twists his ankle at the Anaheim Stadium in '78. Whether its Paul McGuinness or David Lee Roth who gets sent down from Trinity College, Dublin. It's a Lit-Crit Mash-up! Prayers AND M&Ms backstage! Let there be ROCK!

I am running a little bit hot tonight, now that you mention it. I can barely see the road from the heat coming off. So I reach down between my legs and I still haven't found what I'm looking for...

^1. How did they get wind that I was planning to attend the much vaunted U2charist with two of the City's leading members of the leather community and a young, brash, rising star in the drag performance firmament, that's what I want to know.

Husband says "Best CD you played in the car stereo in a long time."

It's not often that one of my music choices on the Saturday shopping drive earns an instant response from the housemate, but Lady's Bridge, an album from Sheffield artist Richard Hawley, managed it. Eamon Carr reviews:

Hawley Grail

..."I'd be a shit rock band. On all my records the influences I draw on are well before 1969. I still listen to Marty Robbins, one of the best singers that ever lived.

"I don't hear that very much in a lot of modern music that I hear. People seem to be scared to expose themselves to what they're feeling."

For a man who's quite relaxed and not bolshy or argumentative, Hawley has fixed ideas on what makes interesting music. "If I'd been in a pub band playing blues or whatever I'd be happy," he says. "When you earn your living out of music there's a honesty to it that I like. I refuse to compromise. When I write songs the first person I have to please is myself," he says.

The songs on Lady's Bridge pass the test. It's the most compact treatment of loss and lonliness since Frank Sinatra recorded In The Wee Small Hours in 1954 or Roy Orbison, the Sultan of Sorrow, performed surgery on heartache in the 1960s. Echoes of that bruised baritone haunt Lady's Bridge...

Whole review at the link.

"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.