Mom pointed me to the video, below. It's about my home town, by a band from my home town. The words and music say the rest. (Thanks, mom.)
Sunday, June 13, 2010
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
An Act of Congress
If you know me at all, you know what a nerd I am. Well, check this, for evidence. While perusing a blog I frequent called Boing Boing, I happened upon a fascinating piece illustrating the wondrous nerdi-ness of the Library of Congress.
"The Library of Congress has nearly 150 million items in its collection, including at least 21 million books, 5 million maps, 12.5 million photos and 100,000 posters. The largest library in the world, it pioneers both preservation of the oldest artifacts and digitization of the most recent--so that all of it remains available to future generations. "
One of the things the LoC preservationists do is to create "a high-resolution digital map of a record's surface without touching it. Recordings on warped and damaged vinyl can be recovered and restored, then played back by a computer program that emulates the movements of a stylus passing over the modeled grooves." Now, just think about what that information does to the mind of a music collector. Rare, damaged, and otherwise lost recordings can be recovered! They do similar things with books, and film.
I've always wished I could go there, because research is one of those nerdy things I like to do. But just taking a virtual tour of one small part of the LoC is to absolutely stretch one's imagination. If you're a nerd, go check it out. Give yourself some time to read, view and watch video, too. Great stuff.
Sunday, May 16, 2010
Thursday, March 18, 2010
No Place Like Home
Brilliant songwriters have a way of taking words and music and striking a chord that resonates in all of us. Billy Joel's brilliance is pounded out in his 1982 song, "Allentown," one that still rings in my head, and reminds me of who I am, and from where I came.
No, I've never been to Allentown, Pennsylvania, but, like many others, I came from a place much like it. My Allentown is called Flint, Michigan. Flint wasn't a steel town, but a town of car factories. One day, the folks with all the money, the same folks for whom the town was built, left. They left for new places like Mexico, because a 4.5 billion-dollars-a-year profit was somehow not enough. Free enterprise, ya know. It's the American way.
But tell that to the tens of thousands of Americans in that town left with nothing but unemployment, crime, and hungry children.
That, and Billy Joel's words.
"Well we're living here in Allentown
And they're closing all the factories down
Out in Bethlehem they're killing time
Filling out forms
Standing in line"
As a kid, I stood in the unemployment line with my dad, for hours. There were a lot of desperate people there, and it's an awful feeling.
"Well we're waiting here in Allentown
For the Pennsylvania we never found
For the promises our teachers gave
If we worked hard
If we behaved"
I remember my eighth grade history teacher constantly reminding us that if we worked hard, if we behaved, if we attended school everyday, we too, could share in the American Dream. A lot of people believed those words. I believed them, and was one of many standing empty handed when it came time to live my American Dream. No one expects to be handed anything, but, what happened to those promises?
"So the graduations hang on the wall
But they never really helped us at all
No they never taught us what was real
Iron and coke,
Chromium steel
And we're waiting here in Allentown"
When I was working three jobs to pay for college and my step-father was hounding me about getting a real job with good pay, and my college advisers said that if I studied math education I was guaranteed a career, I found a way to get my graduation. But I still had not learned what was real. Like when the only horse in a one-horse town runs off, and leaves you stranded. No jobs for thousands meant no jobs for a shiny, new, wanna-be teacher. Factories, schools, and dreams had all been shut down. I applied to a couple hundred schools. I went to over a hundred interviews. More than ninety of those folks bothered to send me a letter to say "sorry, we don't need you, but thanks for your inquiry." I kept those letters in a stack bounded with rubber bands for years, to remind me where I came from.
"But they've taken all the coal from the ground
And the union people crawled away"
Yep, the biggest labor union of all started in Flint. Where are they, now?
"Well I'm living here in Allentown
And it's hard to keep a good man down
But I won't be getting up today
And it's getting very hard to stay"
Well, I did get up, everyday. One day, I got up and left. I got a job in Texas, and I'm doing the best I can. I've been doing it for 22 years, now, and I still have a lot to do. That's the real American dream.
The thing is, I left my hometown, but it has never left me. Everything I ever learned about life is somehow attached to that experience. I doubt I'll ever forget, but if I do, there's always Billy Joel's song to remind me.
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
The House Was Rockin'
Lisa and I have seen several concerts in the last year, and I was never able to report on them. Well, we saw Everclear last Saturday (1/23), and this time I must at least say something.This occasion was the first time I'd seen them, and it came long after the band's biggest years. Essentially, Everclear is Art Alexakis, and what amounts to at least the third incarnation of his group.
Alexakis has issues. Boy, does he have issues, and he lays it all out there in his songs. Here's a little clue for ya, via song titles: "Father of Mine," "Heroin Girl," "Everything Is Wonderful," and for cryin' out loud, the band is named "Everclear," after all. Alexakis responded onstage to a fan chiding him to at least smile: "Yeah, I have four ex-wives who all said the same thing!" No doubt.
We sat up on the balcony for this one, not wishing to fight with the general admission crush on the floor. We had good seats, too, and enjoyed it all. We even stood up for a while, taking it all in.
Everclear is supporting a "new" CD, one consisting of remakes and a couple new songs. If Art and his band should come around again, I'll make sure to buy some tix.
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
Easy Way To Help Relieve Hunger
Land O'Lakes is donating $1 for every person who clicks on their web site. Go to the website listed below and on the upper right side of the screen there is the green area where it says:"You Click, We Donate!"
Click it, and that'as all you have to do!
http://www.landolakesinc.com/company/corporateresponsibility/foundation/default.aspx
If you need, here is more info on their "Operation Co-operation" campaign, from their website:
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
Still Groovy
My friend Roger, the school librarian, gave me a cool little article about vinyl records. You know, the long playing platters most cool cats used to listen to. How cool are records, now? Imagine my search for equilibrium when Roger told me the article came from that bastion of hip-ness, AARP Magazine. Yeah, I've finally caught up with the folks who rally to advance the cause of retired persons.Roger related a chat he and I once had about my "show and tell" with kids to teach them about my passion for music. He read the following passage, and told me later, "it reminded me of you, and it was just like you said." From the article:
Even the nonlistening rituals of record ownership are burned into the memories of everyone who ever had a collection. Need proof? Head down to a music store and buy a record—most larger shops now have at least a small vinyl section. The rest will come naturally: bring the record home (on the way, I guarantee, you'll admire the cover artwork). Now slip your thumbnail into the cellophane sheath, right at the album's business end, and slide it along. Feel that flutter in your stomach as the album opens? You're remembering what it's like to access your music with a single, graceful stroke—instead of peeling, stabbing, cutting, and finally biting your way into a CD jewel case. Now slide out the inner sleeve. There she is: the proud, black thing of beauty, her label winking at you through the sleeve's center hole. As you extract the disk from the sleeve, you'll find you haven't forgotten how to hold it safely: your thumb at the ridge, the label resting on your fingers.
The part the author left out, Roger explained, was that I also related even how the smell of brand new vinyl was part of the experience. Oh, how sensory memories affect us...
It seems that about every month or so, there's another article about records, how we are buying, selling, and wanting more. They never completely went away, kids. Get this: Vinyl record sales soared 89 percent in 2008, according to Neilson Soundscan. New records by old and new artists alike are being released on vinyl. (See the chart.)
Call me grandpa, but my turntable fits in nicely as a component of my surround sound system.
Read this article, and some others, too, at the links below.
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