In Memoriam – Page 4

GIVE TIL IT HURTS!

Another name added to the Must Be Avenged list

Posted on November 15, 2021November 15, 2021 by Mike

A voice from the Great Beyond.

Michael “Mike” Anthony Granata of Gilroy, California | 1965 – 2021 | Obituary

Michael “Mike” Anthony Granata February 21, 1965 – November 1, 2021

Michael, a longtime resident of Gilroy, passed away on November 1, 2021. Never a kinder more gentle man did I know than my husband, Michael.

For those who knew Mike, you know that he was a good and honest man. He was kind, considerate, and always polite.

Mike was adamant that people know what happened to him that caused his early and unexpected death. Message from Mike:

“Many nurses and non-nursing staff begged me and my wife to get the truth out to the public about the Covid-19 vaccines because the truth of deaths from the vaccine was being hidden within the medical profession. I promised I would get the message out. So, here is my message: I was afraid of getting the vaccine for fear that I might die. At the insistence of my doctor, I gave in to pressure to get vaccinated. On August 17th I received the Moderna vaccine and starting feeling ill three days later. I never recovered but continued to get worse. I developed multisystem inflammation and multisystem failure that medical professionals could not stop. My muscles disappeared as if to disintegrate. I was in ICU for several weeks and stabbed with needles up to 24 times a day for those several weeks, while also receiving 6 or 7 IVs at the same time (continuously). It was constant torture that I cannot describe. I was no longer treated as a human with feelings and a life. I was nothing more than a covid vaccine human guinea pig and the doctors excited to participate in my fascinating progression unto death. If you want to know more, please ask my wife. I wished I would have never gotten vaccinated. If you are not vaccinated, don’t do it unless you are ready to suffer and die.”

Mike did not deserve the pain and suffering he endured. He was a good man and deserved better.

Granata’s needless death was caused by a relentless campaign of manipulation and deceit perpetrated by his own government; its “health care” and “science” bureaucracies; the pharmaceutics industry; Establishment Media; Murder Gnome Anthony “Little Mengele” Fauxci, to name but a few. Mike is one among many other innocent victims of a nefarious plan or program whose ultimate goal remains unknown, but whose results are increasingly obvious. May his death—may ALL their deaths—be not in vain.

Which, y’know, is all up to the rest of us.

Angelo Codevilla is dead

Posted on September 21, 2021September 21, 2021 by Mike

A great thinker, a gifted writer, a grievous loss.

RIP: Angelo Codevilla, R.I.P.

Codevilla, the historian of spycraft and powerful analyst of American political and social trends, has died. It is difficult for many commentators to see beyond the current news cycle. But Codevilla, because he could see America as it is presently, could also see into the future. Here in National Review in 2009, he predicted a populist-type figure, one that could unite the “Country Party,” could eventually come to lead the Republicans.

Far be it from me to suggest that Sarah Palin should be or is likely to be our next president. She has not shown the excellence of cognition or of judgment that would recommend her ahead of other possible candidates, nor does her path to the presidency look easy.

But as the nation celebrates the anniversary of the revolution of 1776, every presidential hopeful should realize that in the next election Sarah Palin — or someone like her — could be the vehicle for another revolution. The distinctions between Republicans and Democrats, liberals and conservatives, are being overshadowed by that between what we might call the “Court party” — made up of the well-connected, the people who feel represented by mainstream politicians who argue over how many trillions should be spent on reforming American society, who see themselves as potters of the great American clay — and the “Country party” — the many more who are tired of being treated as clay.

Read the whole thing.

The excerpt and included link (not transcribed here, natch) is from/to NRO, so use your own discretion concerning Ed’s closing advice.

I must say, I’m taken a bit aback at how little reportage I’m seeing out there on what I consider to be a quite momentous event. I dunno, maybe it’s just me and my sadly lacking search-engine manipulation skills. The only further information I’ve run across so far is this:

He was walking when he was struck by a drunk driver. He died of his injuries at the hospital.

Codevilla had just recovered from covid. And then a drunk driver killed him.

That’s from Ace, and is pretty thin on the details. Perhaps we’ll see more of the story soon.

In any event, Codevilla was certainly one of the bona fide giants, no two ways about it. Everyone here will surely know of his best-known flash of inspiration and insight: the seminal 2010 American Spectator article wherein he postulated the division of the FUSA into the Ruling Class and the Country Class. It’s long and in-depth, but this ‘graph provides a pretty fair summation:

The ruling class’s appetite for deference, power, and perks grows. The country class disrespects its rulers, wants to curtail their power and reduce their perks. The ruling class wears on its sleeve the view that the rest of Americans are racist, greedy, and above all stupid. The country class is ever more convinced that our rulers are corrupt, malevolent, and inept. The rulers want the ruled to shut up and obey. The ruled want self-governance. The clash between the two is about which side’s vision of itself and of the other is right and which is wrong. Because each side — especially the ruling class — embodies its views on the issues, concessions by one side to another on any issue tend to discredit that side’s view of itself. One side or the other will prevail. The clash is as sure and momentous as its outcome is unpredictable.

No better proof of the 20-20 acuity of Codevilla’s political vision is likely to be found than that one paragraph, moreso when you consider how it’s even more relevant and apt today than it was back then. Bill expresses the severity of our loss best:

This is an absolute tragedy. Give the garbage refugees from various progressive and liberal fascist dumpster fires masquerading as high intellects, we can ill afford to lose the man who was, in my opinion, the leading American public intellectual.

His work has guided my thinking since his pieces on the awful way GWB was (not) waging war in the Middle East (No Victory, No Peace was the most important one, as I recall), on through his dissection of the American Ruling Class, to his current work on the emerging Patriotic American (Trump) movement.

He has been a shining light in the gathering darkness.

I shall miss him. And so will America.

We most certainly will. The old saw asserting that “No man is indispensable” may be true enough, in the strictly literal sense. But if Angelo Codevilla wasn’t indispensible, he came closer to it than just about anybody else I can think of.

Rest ye well, sir.

RIP Charlie Watts

Posted on August 27, 2021August 27, 2021 by Mike

A bit belated, I know, but still. One of the all-time great drummers just shook these mortal coils to join Heaven’s Own Band.

In a previous piece, I described Led Zeppelin’s John Bonham as the overall rock drummer par excellence. Extraordinarily dynamic, Bonham had a lot of gears. He could play louder and heavier than anyone, but could also finesse quiet passages, zig-zag between funk and reggae and swing, and, well, you get the picture.

Charlie was a different sort of drummer, at least while playing with the Rolling Stones. If Bonham was a six-gear, $100,000, 230 horsepower, hot-rodded Harley (with Batmobile-style mods like a smoke-blower, mini-machine guns, and oil-slick dispenser), Charlie was your English grandfather’s vintage Raleigh bicycle. It never broke. It was easy to maintain. You could cruise along on it all day long year after year, decade after decade. It had only one gear, but for a bicycle, it was the perfect gear. And it is with drummers and vehicles as it is for everything else: horses for courses. Which one’s best depends on what you need.

Simple, steady, rock-solid—that was Charlie Watts in a silver-sparkle Ludwig nutshell, and is exactly why I always loved his playing. No flash, no trash, just a backbeat you can feel deep in your soul, if you have any at all. The very best rock and roll drummers are like that, or so I believe. I never have been just a huge Stones fan, I can take ’em or leave ’em alone, but I DO love me some Keef, and some Charlie too.

No eight-bazillion flavors of crash cymbals; no racks-o-toms surrounding him; no gongs behind him, nor tympani he might hit one precisely (1) time over the course of a two-hour set; no synchronized kick-drum pedals by the dozen, when you only got two feets to play ’em with anyway. Just a simple trap kit, a no-nonsense, smack-it-silly snare-drum crack, and…well, just sheer nonchalant elegance, really.

I saw Buddy Rich a couple times years ago, and he was pretty much the same way, at least as far as his bare-bones kit went. The nonchalance and elegance…ehh, not so much; Rich’s facial expressions alone were absolutely maniacal, truly a sight to behold. Both times I saw him, he was sweat-drenched and purple-faced from early into the set, and he weren’t no spring chicken by then either. The energy level and overall vibe he exuded was powerful, not something easily caged or controlled. Joyful too, which I didn’t expect, having heard the stories and the infamous recordings confirming all the rumors of what a total bastard he was to work for, onstage and off. It was a little like watching a precocious teen on his first trip to the titty bar or something.

Anyhoo, back to Charlie.

First, you might never guess, listening to his recorded Rolling Stones drum performances, that Charlie was a precocious jazz drummer. With the Stones, he was a paragon of percussive minimalism. In fact, I’m not sure there’s a single drum fill on any Stones song a five year old couldn’t play.

But that’s no sleight. What matters is playing the right thing—not the complicated thing—and as it happened, Charlie always played the right thing. He played what he played because that’s what he should have played in the Rolling Stones song he was playing. That’s what good musicians do, after all.

Bingo. I’m reminded of something I saw in the Creem mag letters section soon after Van Halen had hit big with their debut album, wherein an EVH fanboy got himself all worked up and slobbery over Eddie’s otherworldly virtuousity, which nobody was trying to argue with anyway. He ended his long, effusive rant thusly: “Why play three notes when you can squeeze in ten?” Which flabby sentiment one of the editors blandly eviscerated with one of the pithiest yet most profound comebacks I ever did see, one that’s stuck with me ever since: Why play ten notes when you can say it in three?

I’m sure that statement went right over that kid’s head, but it’s a more important point than most non-musician types might realize. In all pop music, the Thing, the essential, crucial Thing, is to not overplay, to not burden a good tune with a lot of extraneous self-indulgence. Every talented professional will get his chance to show off his chops and shine a little, in every set he plays. But the REAL pros know that when you throw in everything but the kitchen sink in every damned song, you dull the impact of your sharpest material. First rule of showbiz, taught to me by my dad, my uncle, my early-childhood piano teacher, my church-choir director and high-school band director (same guy), and pretty much every musical mentor I’ve ever had: always, always, ALWAYS leave your audience wanting more. ALWAYS. Playing with discipline and restraint rather than letting it all hang out and flop around all over the place is one of the ways you do it.

This is the key to every Rolling Stones song. Charlies never breaks character. He starts the song, pumps along underneath, hits the fills where needed, but never plays a single gratuitous note. Then the song ends. Then he starts a new one. On it goes. As each song begins, everyone else hangs on, so to speak, to his chugging rhythm. It’s no wonder Keith once said “Charlie Watts is the Stones”.

Not to shortchange Charlie here, but there’s another great drummer who also lived his musical life by the less-is-more rule I gotta mention: Cheap Trick’s Bun E Carlos. Way underappreciated, in my view, but he’s another one who eschewed the flashy sturm und drang for just quietly doing an impeccable job of holding down the bottom end and keeping the proceedings rockin’ right along with neither fuss, muss, nor excess of any kind.

And this KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid, not their 1977 tour-mates) approach from the drummer of a band that, for years, opened every show with a fucking DRUM SOLO, mind you. I mean, NOBODY likes drum solos, ferchrissakes. Not even other drummers.

Ahh, but simplicity wasn’t always the Bun E Carlos Way. As with almost every aggressive but unschooled young hotshot whose only thought is to swing for the fences on every pitch, holding back was an acquired taste for Carlos too.

In 1973 or 1974, Carlos gained a major insight into his drumming. He told interviewer Robin Tolleson in 1986 that, like most young drummers, he was mostly interested in making his drumming stand out (“Where can I get the most licks in, and how cool can I sound”). While listening to a tape of a Cheap Trick concert, he realized he was rushing the beat and interfering in the performance of the other band members. Afterward, he began taping every Cheap Trick show to study his own drumming much more objectively, focusing on keeping time and supporting his bandmates. The band also played several gigs alongside Mahavishnu Orchestra about this time. Carlson says he learned a great deal about ambidextrous drumming from drummer Billy Cobham.

Making yourself a part of the music instead of trying to dominate or overwhelm it—recognizing that YOU must be all about the music, rather than the music being all about YOU—is a critical step in every player’s career, and sometimes a quite difficult one as well. Given my own background in hard rock/classic rock, I struggled mightily with it myself, and never really managed to master the thing. In fact, that’s why I never was able to play traditional blues at all well, and eventually just pretty much gave up on ever getting it right consistently, aside from the occasional (VERY occasional) fluke solo.

When it comes to restraint, blues is a particularly demanding genre, maybe the toughest of any modern popular music styles. It’s often said that blues lives and breathes in the spaces between the notes, not in the notes themselves. With blues guitar, what you DON’T play is every bit as important as what you DO play, very often moreso. Of equal importance is playing those notes correctly, what BB King meant when he used to talk about making his trademark single-note solos “sting.” Shaping the notes you play is paramount, and attack is all.

All of that is a little different for drummers than it is for guitarists, of course. Nonetheless, the basic principle of Less Is More still applies. Both Bun E Carlos and Charlie Watts spent long and notable careers providing an excellent education for all of us in how it was fucking done.

Update! Almost forgot another thing I always dug about Carlos: when onstage with Cheap Trick, he actually had a drum tech whose primary responsibility was this: whenever Bun E’s ever-present cigarette was near the end, said roadie would light up another, run out, and replace the expired butt with the fresh one, thus averting the unacceptable calamity of Carlos having to play without a gasper dangling from his lips. Too funny, that.

The lion donkey lays down with the lamb pit bull

Posted on August 20, 2021August 20, 2021 by Mike

Remember the other day when I told y’all that pit bulls were the absolute best dogs on Earth? I was NOT just winding my watch, y’know.

Two soul-enriching pittie vids in the same week calls for the rerun of a few pics of the last dog I will ever own: my beloved Cookie Monster, late and more lamented than you could possibly imagine.

One of the late Cookie with my late wife, who originally picked her out to bring home. Over my objections, fool that I was.

One just as proof that pitties really ARE sweet dogs capable of getting along with just about anybody.

Finally, my absolute all-time favorite of old Kookie-Kook. So somber, so dignified, so noble she makes Walter Cronkite look like a goddamned drunken fratboy.

Vidya via Ace. For all you animal-fanciers out there, if you aren’t a subscriber to The Dodo’s YT critter-vid channel, you’re really missing out on something good.

THIS SHALL NOT STAND!!

Posted on July 30, 2021July 30, 2021 by Mike

I have been saddened and dismayed by the rather blasé response to Dusty Hill’s death from my local classic-rock radio stations, which I listen to sometimes while I’m out delivering food or picking up/returning the young ‘un or whatever. When Tom Petty died, it was pretty much a three-day orgy of tribute to the man, which I had no problem with. I mean, I was by no means a rabid Petty fan, but on the other hand he WAS a truly gifted songwriter, with a top-notch band behind him. All in all, Tom was okay with me, and he had a long string of hits, so give the man his due, right?

By contrast, I’ve heard very little at all in the way of mention, recognition, or repeat ZZ Top spins in the wake of Hill’s death apart from a brief notice that their tour dates would go on more or less as scheduled. Commercial-free two, three, or four-play song sets,, interviews with the band, obscure live tracks, all that sort of thing? Not on your life, or not that I’ve heard, anyway.

Well, screw that. When I said the other night that I considered ZZ to be one of the greatest rock bands that ever was or ever will be, I meant every word of it. So have yourselves a couple bonus slices of musical genius from that li’l ole band from Texas, gratis. No need to thank me, y’all.

For anybody who might not know already: the trademark deep, rough-and-ready grizzly-growl on their records is Billy Gibbons, who handled most of the lead vocal duties. The higher, somewhat smoother, sweeter croon swapping verses with Gibbons on some songs, and holding forth on its own on others, is Dusty Hill. Of course, that’ll be obvious in the video footage. But still.

I repeat: God rest him, and may His comfort and love bless Dusty’s bandmates, family, friends, and fans.

Just a li’l ole band from Texas

Posted on July 28, 2021July 28, 2021 by Mike

RIP Dusty Hill.

Dusty Hill, the bassist for blues-rock trio ZZ Top, has died. He was 72.

“We are saddened by the news today that our compadre, Dusty Hill, has passed away in his sleep at home in Houston, Texas,” wrote ZZ Top drummer Frank Beard and lead vocalist Billy Gibbons in a joint statement Wednesday, Rolling Stone reported. “We, along with legions of ZZ Top fans around the world, will miss your steadfast presence, your good nature, and enduring commitment to providing that monumental bottom to the ‘Top.’ We will forever be connected to that ‘Blues Shuffle in C.’ You will be missed greatly, amigo.”

Hill served as the still-active group’s bassist for over 50 years. In 2004, Hill was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the group, which was founded in 1969.

ZZ Top is, of course, the only band ever to have kept its original lineup for that many years. I’ve always loved ’em, and I still consider them one of the greatest rock and roll bands that ever has been, or ever will be. Out of so much exemplary material to choose from for posting purposes here tonight, I just gotta go with my young ‘un’s personal hands-down fave—not only because it really is a great song, but also because it features what might be the best opening stanza ever:

Well I was rollin’ down the road in some cold blue steel,
I had a bluesman in the back, and a beautician at the wheel

Schweeeeet.

Rest easy, Dusty, and thanks for all the choice tunes. You will be forever missed, and never forgotten.

Departures

Posted on July 26, 2021July 26, 2021 by Mike

I’m gonna have to postpone my examination of the TSM piece mentioned below, having unexpectedly run across another one at WRSA that led me to…well, first, we have this obit and remembrance for a legendary Naval aviator:

We wake to the sad news that Snort (Capt Dale Snodgrass, USN-RET, callsign “Snort”—M) died in a crash yesterday. I was honored to interview him in 2000, but it wasn’t our first encounter.

In 1985, I was there in the crowd as a teenager when he awed us all in the Tomcat at the Pratt & Whitney airshow in East Hartford. I have chills this morning thinking of the chills I had then, watching the Tomcat in formation with the other Grumman cats, and I do believe it was a missing man formation.

RIP, Snort. Thank you for taking the phone call from a young writer with no credentials, but who was thrilled beyond words to interview the legend.

I imagine so. Follows, a repost of his 2010 interview with CAPT Snodgrass, which runs below one of the most famed photos of Tomcat derring-do ever captured, which I cannot possibly resist running here.

You can practically hear those jet-jock sized Big Brass Ones all a-clank just looking at that pic. On to the interview.

If you’ve researched information on the F-14, it is pretty likely that the name Dale Snodgrass has appeared somewhere in what you’ve read. “Snort” is virtual legend in the Tomcat community, and with more than 4,800 hours in the F-14, he is the most experienced Tomcat pilot in the world. Over a 26-year career in Naval Aviation, he had moved from being the first student pilot to trap an F-14 on a carrier to commanding the US Navy’s entire fleet of Tomcats as the Commander of Fighter Wing Atlantic. Now retired, Snort is on the airshow circuit, flying a wide range of aircraft, from the F4U and P-51 to the F-86, MiG-15, and MiG-17.

The accolades for Snort’s flying are long and distinguished…twelve operational Fighter Squadron/Wing tours, including command of Fighter Squadron 33 during Desert Storm, the Navy’s “Fighter Pilot of the Year” in 1985, Grumman Aerospace’s “Topcat of the Year” for 1986, a US Navy Tomcat Flight Demonstration Pilot from 1985-1997, and numerous decorations for combat and peacetime flight.

This is all good stuff, well worth reading in full if you’re any kind of military-aviation guy at all. But then we get to the part that stopped me COLD and made my eyes bug out comically.

What was your most tense moment in the 26 years?

From a combat perspective, it was when I had a flameout over Iraq while executing a last ditch surface-to-air missile defense. I was leading a night Fighter Sweep in support of an A-6 strike on a power plant on the north side of Baghdad.

As I said, the story of Snodgrass’ close encounter with an Iraqi SAM, which caused a flameout that in turn brought on a 15k-foot altitude drop, leading to an attempted air-start of the dead engine whilst flying through the middle of a thick triple-A barrage, is all good, gripping stuff for sure. But what slammed me betwixt the orbs was the part I bolded in the last line. Because see, I happen to know a little something myself about that A-6 strike he mentioned. In order to explain it, though, we’re going to need to make a little side-trip here, to another obit from 2015.

Reggie Parks Carpenter, 51, Captain, United States Navy, died from sudden cardiac arrest in Buenos Aires, Argentina, on February 3, 2015. Captain Carpenter, from Cherryville, North Carolina, graduated from the University of North Carolina in 1985 with a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Communications. He was commissioned an officer in the Navy via the Aviation Officer Candidate School, and received his aviator “Wings of Gold” in 1987. Captain Carpenter, also known as “Regbo” to fellow aviators, bravely served in the defense of the United States for 29 years.

He flew tactical missions in three jet aircraft, in four operational squadrons, and over six aircraft carrier-based deployments, including one as an exchange pilot with the French Navy.

A graduate of the U.S. Naval War College with a Masters in National Security and Strategic Studies, the personal highlight of Captain Carpenter’s career was his tour as commanding officer of Strike Fighter Squadron EIGHTY THREE (VFA-83), an F/A-18C Hornet squadron at Naval Air Station Oceana in Virginia Beach, VA. His final tours of duty, which he also enjoyed immensely, were in military diplomacy. He served as Naval Attaché to France, from 2007 to 2011, and to Argentina, from 2012 to 2015.

Captain Carpenter was a highly decorated naval aviator who earned many awards and medals during his career, including the Distinguished Flying Cross. A devoted, loving husband and father, he was also a kind, passionate man with quick wit and boundless zest for life. Captain Carpenter is survived by his wife, Suzanne, and daughters, Avery and Caroline; mother, Barbara Cannon; sister, Kelly Stewart; brother-in-law, Bob Stewart; and many loving friends and colleagues from all over the world.

A funeral service will be held at 2 p.m. on Thursday, April 23, 2015, at Vienna Presbyterian Church, 124 Park St. NE, Vienna, VA. Interment with full military honors will take place at 3 p.m. on Friday, April 24, 2015, at Arlington National Cemetery.

You CF Lifers might begin to see where all this is going, I bet. For the shavetails, nuggets, and noobs, this oughta help clear things up.

The CF community suffered a serious loss yesterday, although most of you might not know about it. My “cousin”, Captain Reggie Carpenter, USN, died suddenly in Buenos Aires, where he was serving as naval attache, capping off a distinguished three-decade career as a naval aviator and diplomat.

He wasn’t really my cousin; he was actually my first cousin’s cousin, but his family and mine had been tightly intertwined for our whole lives; our fathers, uncles, and other kinfolk were all close friends from childhood, and the subsequent generations have all retained a sort of extended-family relationship ever since.

Those of you who have been around these parts a good while may remember him as “Regbo,” his flyboy call sign, or simply as “Cuz.” He did a fair bit of writing for the site back in its early years under those handles; he preferred the anonymity of them, for obvious reasons.

Y’all also might remember a post I did years ago from NAS Oceana, where the band had gone to play Reggie’s change of command party at the O-club there. He was taking over Rampager squadron, VFA 83, after having served as XO of the Sunliners. We didn’t get paid for the gig, or at least not in money; we got paid with twenty minutes apiece in the F/A-18 simulators instead. Which just made it one of the most richly remunerative shows I ever did. Hell, just hanging out at the O-club, meeting and hearing the sea stories of these “casual American heroes” as Reg called them, was payment aplenty.

He was a damned fine pilot, flying the A6 Intruder in the first sorties of the first Gulf War, then F14s, then Super Etendards off the Foch for a year as part of the officer-exchange program with the French. He graduated to the Hornet after that, and stayed in ’em for the remainder of his career. He was invited to join the Blue Angels and even toured with them awhile while he considered the offer; he eventually decided against it, and went to the War College instead. Back in his college days he got one of the highest scores ever on the Navy’s Pilot Aptitude test, and just moved on ever upwards from there.

Reg had a heart attack either on his way to or shortly after arriving at work yesterday morning in Buenos Aires (the family is still waiting for details on that); he’d just returned from an African safari with his beloved family. He was due to retire next spring; in fact, the last conversation I had with him was shortly before he left for the Africa trip. He asked if I wanted to attend his retirement party, and I assured him I did. We were talking about maybe having the band play for the festivities, in fact, and I was looking forward to seeing him again. He was 52, which is way too damned young to lose a guy like him. Hard to believe he’s gone so quick. He’ll be missed by all who knew him.

Rest easy, Reg, until we meet on the other side to pick some guitar and talk fighters and politics again. Your whole family was extremely proud of you, as well they might be, and your friends were glad and grateful to know you. Much love to you and your family, brother.

That, of course, is part of the obit I wrote for Reg right here at CF, which includes a photo of him leaning nonchalantly against his own personal F/A-18 that I took at NAS-JAX during a post-gig visit we paid him there once.

So here’s the payoff: that aforementioned A-6 strike over Baghdad on opening night of Desert Storm? Well, guess who else was out there along with Snort Snodgrass? Yep, you got it: none other than one Reggie “Regbo” Carpenter, that’s who.

Reg later sent a somewhat illicit cockpit video home to his (also my) Uncle Gene from that eventful night, along with a letter detailing a harrowing misadventure when his Intruder was struck by lightning (!!!) on the way back to the carrier, knocking out every electronic gee-gaw and instrument save for the gyrocompass. After being asked by the Midway’s comm shack if he wanted to attempt a trap on the carrier deck—sans all instruments and lights, at night, in a storm, no less—Reg opted for what’s known as “the better part of valor” and diverted to the airbase at Riyadh instead, where he landed his damaged aircraft without further trouble.

And that concludes tonight’s amazing tale of serendipitous coinkydink. You really just never know what you’re going to run across out there on the Innarnuts, do ya?

Men like Reg and Snodgrass are a breed apart for sure—capable men, courageous men, dauntless men, men without an ounce of give-up in ’em. Men whose vocabulary assuredly does NOT include discouraging words like “can’t” or “impossible.” As I so often say around here, we need all of such men we can get, and will never have enough of them. RIP, CAPT Snodgrass, and farewell. You too, Reggie.

Solemn anniversary

Posted on June 6, 2021June 6, 2021 by Mike

Saw somewhere that yesterday was the anniversary of the passing of punk-rock icon Dee Dee Ramone, which inspired me to revisit my own obit from way back when. Seems only appropriate to repost a bit of it:

So you wanna disagree with me about the impact of the almighty Ramones? It still stuns me that there are people out there who like bands like Nirvana or Green Day or Pearl Jam or Smashing Pumpkins, and who don’t even realize that none of those bands would even exist if the Ramones hadn’t left some very large footsteps for them to follow in. I don’t know if the same can be said of more modern flashes-in-the-pan like Limp Bizkit or Kid Crock or Puddle of Mudd and the fact is I’m glad of that, because they suck. But whether you like the Ramones or not, anyone who cares at all about real rock and roll knows whose faces would be the first carved into any punk rock Mount Rushmore, and it ain’t Fred Durst’s. Nor would it even be John Lydon’s or Sid Vicious’ or Dave Vanian’s or Stiv Bators’, although they’d all have their place. The Ramones did it first, the Ramones did it better, the Ramones did it longer. The Ramones did it. To paraphrase the Beatles, before the Ramones, there was nothing. Period.

Those of you who are old enough to remember (God help us every one), think back to 1976. Disco was king, as was Elton John and Queen and Styx and a whole slew of other pomp-and-pageantry bands. I won’t belabor a history that has been restated thousands of times since then, but the crucial point is that rock and roll was so far removed from the grasp of the ordinary disgruntled kids in the garage – the people who had kept it living and breathing since the beginning – that they couldn’t even see it from there. Rock and roll wasn’t just dead, it was starting to smell. Now imagine the Ramones strutting onto the scene, all leather and tattered denim and just plain noise. They were like an invasion from Mars, and truth to tell, I still can’t figure out just where in the hell they came from. I have a video that shows the Ramones doing “Loudmouth” from 1976. Joey looks like a freak scarecrow, doing those awkward leg kicks and clinging to the microphone stand as if it were a life raft on a sinking ship. Johnny was cool incarnate, slinging his stick-straight hair around and slashing at the guitar with that untireable right arm. Tommy was, well, Tommy, which means replaceable. Good enough, but replaceable, and he soon was. And then there was Dee Dee. That Fender Precision bass almost scrapes the ground, and Dee Dee hacks at it as if it had just assaulted his girlfriend. And the sound; my God, the sound. The level meters aren’t just in the red – they had to be trying to fly out the right side of the machine, they were pegged so hard. All distortion, all the time – and it’s beautiful. The sound is so pure, so chunky, so hard, so goddamn fucking pissed off that it makes me come up off the couch and yell every time I watch the damn thing. Still. The raw power and energy is so intense it makes me dizzy, and I’ve seen it a million times. I’ll be seeing it a million more this weekend, I’m sure.

And yet somehow, even with all the energy and buzzsaw adolescent aggro, they managed to keep it FUN. They never once lapsed into self-parody or foolish smug irony (the blood and sinew of New York bands these days, seemingly, and the last refuge of a rock-and-roll scoundrel). They never tipped a sly wink at their milieu, mocking their fans for cool points with critics, like so many alterna-dorks do these days. They always played it straight, and it was always just about smiling and moving and enjoying. It was rock and roll, plain and simple. Some critics in Elvis’ early days assumed that he was either the cleverest manipulator they ever saw, milking the dopey teeny-boppers for cash on the barrelhead, or he was just simply dumb as a box of hair. Most inclined towards the latter view, and so it was with the Ramones. I can’t tell you how many reviews I read in the early days, by pompous twits who liked to explain rock and roll in terms usually reserved for Van Gogh and Raphael, whose headline had the word “D-U-M-B” in capital letters over ’em. As usual, the art-wonks didn’t get it.

The Ramones truly changed the rock and roll world, in a way that is attainable for only the truest and deepest innovators. And Dee Dee WAS the Ramones. D-U-M-B? ‘Fraid not, Jocko. God rest his outrageous soul, and Dee Dee, if you can somehow hear my thoughts, I hope you know how much you meant to so many of us.

Back in the Gay 90s I met Joey at a NYC joint owned by a good friend of mine called Coney Island High, on the hallowed St Marks Place. I told him that he and the Ramones had quite literally changed my life, which was nothing but the God’s honest truth, as we say around these environs. He was deeply gracious and humble, not a trace of ego or pretention about him, expressing his sincerest thanks for my saying so. We did the usual music-biz chit-chattery for about twenty minutes or so, and then a brawl broke out that slammed one of the participating pugilists into Joey’s back, causing him to spill his drink. Off he went to the bar for another; the rumble sort of petered out, and I went back to sit with my girlfriend in a dream-like state of shock and awe at who it was I’d just been speaking with.

I met Dee Dee a few times on St Marks also. He could be seen regularly around what we used to call the Trash & Vaudeville block, the holiest of ground for American punk fans; pretty much everybody that hung around the area knew him. He seemed nice enough, but was usually way too focused on scoring dope to spend very much of his time idly conversing with worshipful, gushing strangers like myself. Dee Dee’s story is a truly sad one, albeit a too-familiar one in the rock and roll universe, and I hope he’s at peace.

I’m Rick James, bitch!

Posted on May 27, 2021May 27, 2021 by Mike

Still some of the most howlingly funny stuff I ever saw in my life.

That, of course, is from an early installment of Charlie Murphy’s True Hollywood Stories, one of the standout feature skits from Dave Chappelle’s short-lived (2003-06) TV show. The Rick James sketch was always my personal favorite, but the Prince one before it was a scream too…and apparently, as Murphy always swore and Prince and James both later confirmed, it really did happen.

Secrets about Charlie Murphy’s true Hollywood story and pancakes with Prince — among the best Dave Chappelle sketches ever
The funniest sketch on “Chappelle’s Show” didn’t come from Dave Chappelle — it was a gift from Charlie Murphy.

Murphy, who died Wednesday at 57, spent years as part of an entourage around his famed younger brother, Eddie, amassing weird tales from Hollywood. And while most of his stories seemed too crazy to believe, the greatest one of all was the time Charlie learned how Prince not only had a great jump shot, but could cook amazing pancakes as well.

“I swear it’s true,” Murphy told me years later. “I swear every word of it is true.”

In the sketch, part of an ongoing series called “Charlie Murphy’s True Hollywood Stories,” Eddie, Charlie and their friends meet Prince (played by Chappelle) and his band, The Revolution, at a party.

In November 2003, Marcus Bishop-Wright, a stand-up comic, landed a part in the sketch playing Miki Free, a member of Prince’s band. He arrived on the set the day it started filming. He didn’t know much about Murphy and they had never met.

“There was definitely an air of comedy royalty about him (Murphy),” said Bishop-Wright. “He seemed like this other version of Eddie, the street-cred version.”

The sheer absurdity of Charlie’s story made it tough to film without people on the set laughing,” he recalled. “It was really hard keep a straight face. Dave (Chappelle) was cracking up the whole time we were shooting, he would say, ‘Stop! I can’t believe this s–t really happened.'”

But there was Murphy the whole time insisting everything was true.

“I could even believe the part about them (The Revolution) arriving on the basketball court in those outfits,” Bishop-Wright said. “But the part about the pancakes? I kept thinking, ‘This is where it all becomes part of a comedy.'”

The sketch was filmed over a two-day period along with another “Charlie Murphy’s True Hollywood Stories” about the time he met Rick James.

Years later, Prince and other members of the band confirmed Murphy’s entire tale was true.

“The sketch didn’t even have to be written,” Bishop-Wright said. “The only stuff that was added were Dave’s little flourishes while being Prince.”

Bonus Gaye!

Posted on May 25, 2021May 25, 2021 by Mike

In the comments to the Marvin Gaye piece below, Kenny reminded me of another one of my all-time faves.

I should maybe add that I don’t disagree at all with Kenny’s evaluation of What’s Going On, either. I always liked Gaye, but as far as I’m concerned his best work was already behind him by the time WGO came out. His latter-day stuff, although certainly influential and bold, just left me cold for the most part, and I didn’t mean to imply otherwise in the earlier post. More deets on “Peculiar,” and on Marvin Gaye himself:

“Ain’t That Peculiar” is a 1965 song recorded by American soul musician Marvin Gaye for the Tamla (Motown) label. The single was produced by Smokey Robinson, and written by Robinson, and fellow Miracles members Ronald White, Pete Moore, and Marv Tarplin. “Ain’t That Peculiar” features Gaye, with The Andantes on backing vocals, singing about the torment of a painful relationship.

The single was Gaye’s second U.S. million seller successfully duplicating its predecessor “I’ll Be Doggone”, from earlier in 1965 by topping Billboard’s Hot R&B Singles chart in the fall of 1965, peaking at #8 on the US Pop Singles chart. It became one of Gaye’s signature 1960s recordings, and was his best-known solo hit before 1968’s “I Heard It Through the Grapevine”.

Marvin’s accompanied with background vocalist The Andantes: Marlene Barrow, Jackie Hicks and Louvain Demps with instrumentation by The Funk Brothers and Marvin Tarplin of The Miracles (guitars).

Gaye helped to shape the sound of Motown Records in the 1960s with a string of hits, including “How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved By You)” and “I Heard It Through the Grapevine”, and duet recordings with Mary Wells and Tammi Terrell, later earning the titles “Prince of Motown” and “Prince of Soul”. During the 1970s, he recorded the concept albums What’s Going On and Let’s Get It On and became one of the first artists in Motown to break away from the reins of its production company. Gaye’s later recordings influenced several R&B subgenres, such as quiet storm and neo-soul.

Following a period in Europe as a tax exile in the early 1980s, Gaye released the 1982 Grammy Award-winning hit “Sexual Healing” and the Midnight Love album. Since his death in 1984, Gaye has been posthumously honored by many institutions, including the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

At around 11:38 am on April 1, 1984, as Marvin was seated on his bed talking to his mother, Gaye’s father shot at Marvin twice. The first shot, which entered the right side of Gaye’s chest, was fatal, having perforated his vital organs. Gaye was taken to the emergency room of the California Hospital Medical Center and was pronounced dead on arrival at 1:01 pm. Gaye died a day before turning 45. The gun with which Marvin Gaye, Sr. shot his son was given to him by Marvin as a Christmas present.

Another gifted musician dogged, and eventually doomed, by what’s generally known as a “troubled” personal life—an old story, a common one, and a tragic one. We’ve lost all too many of our greatest artists due to their “troubled” tendencies, one way or another. It’s long been my own belief that those “troubled” personal lives very often come along with the territory of creative genius. That maybe, just maybe, you only rarely get the one without the other—as if a skewed, reckless personality actually feeds the creative bent, both of them being integral components of the artistic soul. The flame that burns twice as bright burns half as long, as the saying goes.

Happy birthday

Posted on May 10, 2021May 10, 2021 by Mike

To trad-country icon Hank Snow.

Clarence Eugene “Hank” Snow (May 9, 1914 – December 20, 1999) was a Canadian-American country music artist. Most popular in the 1950s, he had a career that spanned more than 50 years, he recorded 140 albums and charted more than 85 singles on the Billboard country charts from 1950 until 1980. His number-one hits include the self-penned songs “I’m Moving On”, “The Golden Rocket” and “The Rhumba Boogie” and famous versions of “I Don’t Hurt Anymore”, “Let Me Go, Lover!”, “I’ve Been Everywhere”, “Hello Love”, as well as other top 10 hits.

Snow was an accomplished songwriter whose clear, baritone voice expressed a wide range of emotions including the joys of freedom and travel as well as the anguish of tortured love. His music was rooted in his beginnings in small-town Nova Scotia where, as a frail, 80-pound youngster, he endured extreme poverty, beatings and psychological abuse as well as physically punishing labour during the Great Depression. Through it all, his musically talented mother provided the emotional support he needed to pursue his dream of becoming a famous entertainer like his idol, the country star, Jimmie Rodgers.

As a performer of traditional country music, Snow won numerous awards and is a member of the Country Music Hall of Fame, the Canadian Country Music Hall of Fame and the Canadian Music Hall of Fame. The Hank Snow Museum in Liverpool, Nova Scotia, celebrates his life and work in a province where his fans still see him as an inspirational figure who triumphed over personal adversity to become one of the most influential artists in all of country music.

The influence of The Singin’ Ranger, as he was known early in his career, wasn’t limited to country music.

A regular at the Grand Ole Opry, in 1954 Snow persuaded the directors to allow a young Elvis Presley to appear on stage. Snow used Presley as his opening act and introduced him to Colonel Tom Parker. In August 1955, Snow and Parker formed the management team, Hank Snow Attractions. This partnership signed a management contract with Presley but before long, Snow was out and Parker had full control over the rock singer’s career. Forty years after leaving Parker, Snow stated, “I have worked with several managers over the years and have had respect for them all except one. Tom Parker [Snow refused to recognize the honorary title “Colonel”] was the most egotistical, obnoxious human being I’ve ever had dealings with.”

Snow’s evaluation of Parker is by no means a unique one, shall we say. Although to be fair about it, I’ve also heard tell that Snow could be pretty prickly and unpleasant his own self. But now that we’ve brought Elvis into this thing, enjoy yourselves an early Hank Snow hit that the King covered as well a few years later on, which version has always ranked near the tippy-top of Ye Olde Blogghoste’s list of personal favorite Elvis tunes.

Happy birthday, Hank. Country music—REAL country music, I mean, not the sappy, crappy contempo swill—just wouldn’t have been the same without you.

Legend you never heard of

Posted on April 13, 2021April 13, 2021 by Mike

Another day, another effing brilliant SteynMusic outing.

This weekend marks the centenary of George David Weiss, born April 9th 1921. Who was George David Weiss? Well, he’s no household name, but, to reprise my old line on obscure songwriters, you’d be hard put to find a household that doesn’t know at least one George David Weiss song.

So who was George David Weiss? Well, even George Shearing, who wrote his one and only enduring song with Weiss, had no more to say about him in his autobiography than that he was “a man by the name of George David Weiss”. The man by the name of was born under that name in April 1921 and was all set to become a lawyer or accountant when he decided to follow his heart and go to Juilliard, where he learned composing and arranging. The latter got him employment with Stan Kenton and other bands, until he met his first songwriting partner, the talented West Indian composer Bennie Benjamin. A young Sinatra picked up their “Oh, What It Seemed to Be”, and a few years later Kay Starr had a monster hit with “Wheel of Fortune”…

Starr’s chartbuster is of course a true gem, one which I’ve thoroughly enjoyed performing onstage myself who even knows how many times. Robert Gordon did a mighty fine version as well.

Weiss had one hell of a capacious catalog, and as Steyn somewhat bemusedly notes, had everybody from Sinatra to Nat Cole to Peggy Lee to Elvis to…ummm…Whitesnake(?!?) cover his stuff over the years. That’s a variety so stylistically broad that it says a lot about the enduring appeal of the man’s work all by itself. I’ll embed another of my personal all-time Weiss faves before we all move on to what I consider the really fun part of the story.

The Tokens, in an ironic twist quite commonly found in the music biz, not only had no faith in the song but actually despised the thing, even going so far as to plead with the producers and their label not to release the very song that would end up being their one and only bona fide smash. Not the first time such lightning-strikes weirdness has occurred in the biz, and you can be sure it won’t be the last.

Now we come to the part I was most amused by, a chapter of the Weiss story all a-brim with music biz irony of its own unique flavor. This will require some heavy excerpting, but I assure one and all that the payoff is well worth the arduous wade to get there.

It started with Bob Thiele, who was a successful record producer but only a very occasional songwriter. So, for a composing partner, he turned, as so many others have done, to George David Weiss. In theory the latter could have written any or all of “What a Wonderful World”, but Thiele told me that Weiss stayed mostly down the musical end.

Which I find hard to believe, because the tune is mostly “Twinkle, twinkle, little star” and, after decades in the music biz, Weiss was way beyond that.

On the other hand, Weiss told Graham Nash (of the Hollies and Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young) that he wrote it with Louis Armstrong in mind – which suggests he also had a hand in the lyric.

Why Satchmo? Well, it was a ballad of hope and optimism that transcended the times. But for that very reason it also required a singer who transcended the times.

A singer like, say, Louis Armstrong…

And, if you think that seems kind of obvious now, it certainly wasn’t in 1967. If you pick up almost any jazz critic’s biography of Satchmo, they generally follow the same basic arc: Terrific trumpeter, innovative musician – and then he sold out and did commercial pap for suburban hi-fi filler. I don’t subscribe to that crude reductio myself, but it is true that, after he’d booted the Beatles off the top and taken “Hello, Dolly!” to Number One, the calculus changed somewhat for Armstrong’s management: There’s a new Broadway show opening? Take the big song and do another “Dolly” knock-off. Hence Satchmo’s “Mame” and Satchmo’s “Cabaret”, and doubtless, had he lived, Satchmo’s “Jesus Christ Superstar” and Satchmo’s “Phantom of the Opera”.

Nevertheless, the writers met with Louis to pitch the song. As Bob Thiele recalled, “We wanted this immortal musician and performer to say, as only he could, the world really is great: full of the love and sharing people make possible for themselves and each other every day.”

Instead, Satch peered at the sheet – unlike many singers, he was a musician who could read the music – and, when his eye got to the bottom of the page, he looked up and said:

What is this sh*t?

He was studying the music – no words, just a contemporary ballad tune that called not for Armstrong’s tight jazzy All-Stars but for a string section willing to play “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star”. I wouldn’t myself say the tune was exactly “sh*t”…But, as I said, Armstrong hadn’t seen the lyrics. And, when they passed him the words, he fell in love. Not so much because of the green trees, red roses, blue skies, white clouds, but because of the final eight bars, which ditch the “colors of the rainbow” theme:

I hear babies cry, I watch them grow
They’ll learn much more than I’ll never know
And I think to myself
What A Wonderful World…

That quatrain reminded him of 107th Street in Queens, the tree-lined block he and his wife Lucille had lived on for a quarter-century (and whose modest red-brick home now houses the Louis Armstrong Museum):

There’s so much in ‘Wonderful World’ that brings me back to my neighborhood where I live in Corona, New York. Lucille and I, ever since we’re married, we’ve been right there in that block. And everybody keeps their little homes up like we do and it’s just like one big family. I saw three generations come up on that block. And they’re all with their children, grandchildren, they come back to see Uncle Satchmo and Aunt Lucille …and I got pictures of them when they was five, six and seven years old. So when they hand me this ‘Wonderful World,’ I didn’t look no further, that was it.

He was genuinely touched by the heartfelt optimistic simplicity of the sentiment, and its faith in the future – that a new generation would know things that he would never live to see. Like, er, Twitter. Well, let’s not get hung up on the details. He was struck by the song’s message, and so agreed to sing it.

An arrangement was made, musicians were booked, and a studio was procured – for a midnight session in Vegas, after Satch had finished up his set at the Tropicana. There was just one problem. Louis Armstrong had recently switched record labels, to ABC, and the president of the company, Larry Newton, was opposed to Satchmo doing “What a Wonderful World”. I don’t mean he was antipathetic or indifferent to it, or felt it was not a strong choice for a single but would be okay for Side 2 Track 5 of an album. I don’t even mean that he disliked it. He loathed “What a Wonderful World” with a passion: He thought he’d signed the Number One bestselling pop star of “Hello, Dolly!”, and he didn’t want his new act doing what he regarded as the polar opposite of “Dolly” – a soporific inert crawl-tempo ballad.

He’s not necessarily mistaken about that, as my kid’s class certainly demonstrated. So I’m not unsympathetic to Larry Newton’s concerns. The trouble was that on August 16th 1967 he’d flown in to Vegas for a photo shoot with his new star and that evening he showed up at United Studios determined to prevent the recording. He went so totally bananas that Ed Thiele, as producer, and Artie Butler, the arranger, and George Weiss and Frank Military, who were also present, hustled him through the door and locked him out of the studio. Which isn’t exactly conducive to Louis Armstrong recording a tender and sensitive ballad unlike anything he’d sung before…

It was a long session – either because of Newton’s antics or because they were interrupted by the toots of passing Union Pacific freight trains, or because the material was a little outside Pops’ comfort zone. They stayed there till 6am, and then they all went for breakfast. And the label only agreed to pay the orchestra for their extended shift on condition that Satchmo himself accept a mere $250 for the session. But it was worth it: Louis worked and worked on his interpretation until he and the writers were satisfied. I confess as a young child I always heard “the dark sacred night” as “the dark say goodnight”, but once I’d grasped Satch’s enunciation I appreciated what a fine pairing that makes with “the bright blessed day”: it adds a subtle touch of the holy and transcendental to the song; that the world is not merely “wonderful” in the way that a great cheeseburger and a vanilla shake can be, but truly wonderful because it’s the wonder of God’s creation. But, as I said, it’s discreetly done. And Armstrong’s reading of the middle-eight, in that unmistakeable beautiful gravelly rasp, is as sincere and true as anything he ever sang:

The colors of the rainbow, so pretty in the sky
Are also on the faces of people going by
I see friends shaking hands, saying ‘How do you do?’
They’re really saying, ‘I love you…’

Is that really what they’re saying? Well, Pops bought into it. In the studio that night, representing all those children who’d grow to learn more than he’d ever know, was George Weiss’ kid Peggy. “So you’re George’s daughter? Pleased to meet you!” And he shook her hand, and maybe, for a small, shrunken old man not in the best of health, it really did mean “I love you.”

And, for those wondering what the hell all this hippie-dippie peace’n’love stuff had to do with Louis Armstrong, he waited to the very end to tie it back to his entire oeuvre in what, with hindsight, was the only possible wrap-up:

Ohhhhhh, yeahhhhhh.

Larry Newton wanted another “Hello, Dolly!” Well, he got the last two words.

But he wasn’t happy, and he swore to exact his revenge – by doubling down on the petty and stupid. In order to prove he was right about the song, he released the single in late 1967, but refused to promote it. He didn’t ship it to radio stations, so no disc-jockeys played it, and nobody bought it. In those days, ABC’s UK distribution was licensed to EMI, and, in the fullness of time, “What a Wonderful World” showed up at the London office, and they released it as a normal single. Actually, not that normal, because it was, I believe, the very last single EMI released on their HMV label. But, other than that, they did all the things you’re meant to do with a new release: They sent review copies to the BBC and to trade magazines, and discovered what Larry Newton, once he’d gotten over being locked out of the studio, should have realized – that people really liked it. It entered the UK charts at the beginning of February 1968 at Number 45, cracked the Top Forty in its second week, the Top Thirty in its fourth, and then climbed through March and April up to Number One.
So, just for the record, where did it get to on the Billboard Hot 100?

Er, big hit sound Number 116.

In fact, Larry Newton’s singular talent for sabotage was so effective that he wound up with a record that was a hit everywhere except his own territory: Top Thirty in Australia, Top Twenty in New Zealand and the Netherlands, Number Seven in Switzerland, Number Six in Belgium and Germany and Norway, Number Two in Ireland, Number One in Austria… What a wonderful world (America excepted). In London, EMI decided the song was so big they needed an album built around it. At which point Larry Newton decided to triple-down on the moronic. He agreed to the LP, but only if Armstrong did it for $500. Joe Glaser, Louis’ manager, wasn’t in the mood for that, and instructed Bob Thiele:

You tell that fat bastard to go f**k himself and give us $25,000 for eight more sides.

Larry Newton responded:

Tell him to go f**k himself, and why do we give a sh*t about these European companies? Screw ’em all.

They’re really saying “I love you”.

Three years later, Louis Armstrong was dead. If you’d been listening to the radio in Britain, Europe, around the planet in 1971, they marked his passing with “What a Wonderful World”. On American stations, they played everything but.

It took two decades and Good Morning, Vietnam for a great record finally to achieve the recognition on its home turf it had known for a generation everywhere else. It doesn’t matter that Satch was born in 1901; he sounds old and elegaic on the record, and that’s the point: he’s a fellow approaching the end of his life, but he’s not bitter or even bittersweet; he’s not looking back but looking forward to when those babies will grow. It’s an old man, but it’s a young song. That’s why it’s a popular father/daughter dance at weddings: It’s the past blessing the future.

And that’s also true of any great songwriter’s catalogue – which is why we salute George David Weiss on his centennial.

As for Larry Newton, well, I wasn’t sure whether he was still with us or not, so I looked him up, and read:

Newton is probably best remembered today for trying to stop Louis Armstrong from recording ‘What A Wonderful World’.

Ohhhhhh, yeahhhhhh!

Beautiful song, beautiful story, no? Tales like this provide a small window onto why it is that people get into the music business in the first place, and why a not-negligible percentage of them are perfectly willing to break themselves—financially, spiritually, morally, even physically—to stay in, on any level they can contrive. I swear, out of all the great music posts Steyn has done, and he’s done quite a few, this one may well be the beat of ’em all.

About a guy most of us have probably never even heard of.

Plugs in

Posted on April 13, 2021April 13, 2021 by Mike

Steyn gives us one more perfect Prince Phillip quip, with a Shirley Bassey bonus thrown in.

If you’re a Royal consort, you wind up going to a lot of nights out you have not the slightest interest in, like the Royal Command Performance and the Royal Film Premiere and the like. In November 2002, arriving at the Royal Albert Hall for the world premiere of the James Bond film Die Another Day, His Royal Highness was informed by an excited person in the welcome line that Madonna would be singing the title song. He turned to the Queen, and remarked drily, “So we’ll need earplugs then.”

He was quite right. Shirley Bassey had neglected to bring hers, and so, just a few minutes later, the opening titles and the song ended, and Dame Shirl yelled from the stalls, “Rubbish!” She was quite right, too.

Hey, when you’re right, you’re right.

Enemies in common update! If they’re ag’in him, I’m for him.

It's Prince Philip's comments about other nationalities — often inappropriate, occasionally racist and sometimes made on visits hosted by the nations who were the subject of them — that most complicate his legacy. https://t.co/IXLFYTF3oZ

— CNN (@CNN) April 10, 2021

I imagine Philip’s “legacy” will be just fine, thanks, whatever caviling PC nudniks may think, say, or do. In fact, I’d wager the Prince will be fondly remembered long after CNN is dead, buried, and forgotten. I’m with the WSJ’s Gerard Baker all the way:

I had the privilege some years ago to be invited to a July 4 dinner at the American ambassador’s residence in London. Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip were the guests of honor, there presumably to bear witness that, after a couple of centuries, the unfortunate business over the repeated injuries and usurpations inflicted by one of her ancestors had been quietly forgotten.

The ambassador rose to give the not-so-loyal toast.

He began with the inevitable nod to the two nations’ divergent histories, noting that some time earlier, in their great wisdom, his compatriots had decided to go it alone. “Oh yes!” cried the prince from a sedentary position, fortified, no doubt, by a couple of glasses of the embassy’s very good wine. “And how’s that working out for you?” It was a good question then, and it’s more apt than ever now given America’s current predicament. The people that once boldly threw off the tyranny of a distant monarch now seem to be meekly submitting to the diktats of a regnant class and ideology that tolerate less independence of thought and action than King George III did.

As the prince did at that dinner, he had an unerring capacity to ask awkward questions, speak inconvenient truths and challenge polite orthodoxies.

When we are obligated to toe an increasingly stultifying conventional line, the queen’s consort was the human antidote to the virus of verbal oppression that has us in a death grip. You’d search a very long time to find a less woke individual than the duke of Edinburgh.

He got all the right knickers in a twist, and he’s still doing it, which makes him a-okay in my book. The unhappier shitlib types are, the better I like it. Kruiser says it well:

Three cheers to Prince Philip for being able to annoy our worthless woke morons first from beyond an ocean and now from beyond the grave.

I don’t care how rich he was, I would have bought him a drink in a heartbeat.

Rest in peace, Phil.

Amen to that.

Ghastly!

Posted on April 10, 2021April 10, 2021 by Mike

Haven’t mentioned the death of Prince Phillip here yet, because…well, because meh, honestly. But then I saw this.

The royal consort of the UK has died at age 99. An acerbic individual, here are a selection of Prince Philip’s greatest hits, including his long-running wars against Tom Jones and Elton John, from a 2011 article in The Independent:

1. “Ghastly.” Prince Philip’s opinion of Beijing, during a 1986 tour of China.

2. “Ghastly.” Prince Philip’s opinion of Stoke-on-Trent, as offered to the city’s Labour MP Joan Walley at Buckingham Palace in 1997.

7. “How do you keep the natives off the booze long enough to pass the test?” Asked of a Scottish driving instructor in 1995.

8. “Damn fool question!” To BBC journalist Caroline Wyatt at a banquet at the Elysée Palace after she asked Queen Elizabeth if she was enjoying her stay in Paris in 2006.

11. “We don’t come here for our health. We can think of other ways of enjoying ourselves.” During a trip to Canada in 1976.

13. “British women can’t cook.” Winning the hearts of the Scottish Women’s Institute in 1961.

15. “What do you gargle with – pebbles?” To Tom Jones, after the Royal Variety Performance, 1969. He added the following day: “It is very difficult at all to see how it is possible to become immensely valuable by singing what I think are the most hideous songs.”

16. “It’s a vast waste of space.” Philip entertained guests in 2000 at the reception of a new £18m British Embassy in Berlin, which the Queen had just opened.

18. “If it has four legs and it is not a chair, if it has got two wings and it flies but is not an aeroplane and if it swims and it is not a submarine, the Cantonese will eat it.” Said to a World Wildlife Fund meeting in 1986.

22. “I would like to go to Russia very much – although the bastards murdered half my family.” In 1967, asked if he would like to visit the Soviet Union.

Good, goooood squishy, that is. More equally succulent Royal badinage at the link. May flights of angels sing thee to thy rest, Your Highness.

They just don’t make ’em like this anymore

Posted on March 24, 2021March 24, 2021 by Mike

Another comment-inspired post, this latest one brought on by Ironbear’s use of one of true American hero Chesty Puller’s most well-known quips: They have us surrounded. There’s no way they can escape from us now. That got me to digging around for more Puller quotes to respond with, plenty of which are easy to find on the Intarwebs. A sampling—all of them good, all candid and plain-spoken, some alarmingly prescient.

“Our country won’t go on forever, if we stay soft as we are now. There won’t be any America—because some foreign soldiery will invade us and take our women and breed a hardier race.”

“They are in front of us, behind us, and we are flanked on both sides by an enemy that outnumbers us 29:1. They can’t get away from us now!”

“Great. Now we can shoot at them from every direction.”

“We’re surrounded. That simplifies our problem of getting to these people and killing them.” – November 1950, during Chosin Reservoir campaign

“Remember, you are the 1st Marines! Not all the Communists in Hell can overrun you!” (at the Battle of Chosin Reservoir)

“Take me to the Brig. I want to see the real Marines.”

“Where do you put the bayonet on the damn thing?” (upon seeing a flamethrower demonstrated for the first time)

“You don’t hurt ’em if you don’t hit ’em.”

There’s something for Real Americans to learn from in every one of these, either the words themselves or the fearless, never-say-die spirit of the man who spoke them. A few more:

“The mail service has been excellent out here, and in my opinion this is all that the Air Force has accomplished during the war.” – Chesty Puller in a letter to his wife while in Korea

When an Army captain asked him for the direction of the line of retreat, Col Puller called his Tank Commander, gave them the Army position, and ordered:

“If they start to pull back from that line, even one foot, I want you to open fire on them.”

Turning to the captain, Chesty Puller replied “Does that answer your question? We’re here to fight!” At Koto-ri in Korea

“They are a damn sight better than the U.S. Army, at least we know that they will be there in the morning.” – Lewis B. Chesty Puller, when a journalist asked him about being surrounded by 22 enemy divisions

“There are not enough Chinamen in the world to stop a fully armed Marine regiment from going where ever they want to go” 

That last one smarts a bit, seeing as how Puller’s beloved Corps has fully knuckled under and is now welcoming opportunistic cross-dressers seeking choppadicktomy surgery on the USMC’s dime, as well as boatloads of mollycoddled bimbelinas incapable of meeting minimal standards for physical fitness, into its ranks. The entire US military is now every bit the hollow, ineffectual parody of its former robust self that the country it serves has become. Which is only fitting, I guess. Really, how could it possibly be otherwise? They’ve both been drinking from the same poisoned well.

America just isn’t turning out fierce, indomitable warriors like Chesty Puller anymore, and that’s no accident; it isn’t, because it can’t. That’s no accident either, rather being just one of the Left’s strategic objectives. Thanks to “diversity,” political correctness, general pusillanimity, and overall Leftard tomfoolery, the nation has created a military wholly unable to effectively fulfill its sole purpose of defending the nation.

How powerfully ironic that the Chinese will never even need worry about stopping that “fully-armed Marine regiment” of Chesty’s in the first place. Neither will it be necessary to send a single PLA soldier here for invasion, conquest, and colonization purposes. Thanks to the FUSA’s having sat back limply as its internal enemies slit its throat, the ChiComs already own the banana republic lock, stock, and barrel anyway, without ever mussing a single dink grunt’s hair.

The intentional sapping of our national will and self-respect cost us legendary fighting men like Puller, Claire Chennault, Curtis LeMay, George Patton, Jimmy Doolittle, Pappy Boyington, Audie Murphy, Dick Winters, and too many others to list, “fundamentally transforming” them from role models into icons of American immorality and disgrace. Even worse, celebrating their selfless bravery has been disallowed; in certain despicable circles, they and their exploits are to be harshly condemned, eventually to be quietly edited out of the historical record and forgotten.

The most bitter irony of all? The Left robbed us of these exemplars of real American greatness precisely when we needed them most. Which was no accident either.

Category: In Memoriam

Another name added to the Must Be Avenged list

Angelo Codevilla is dead

RIP Charlie Watts

The lion donkey lays down with the lamb pit bull

THIS SHALL NOT STAND!!

Just a li’l ole band from Texas

Departures

Solemn anniversary

I’m Rick James, bitch!

Bonus Gaye!

Happy birthday

Legend you never heard of

Plugs in

Ghastly!

They just don’t make ’em like this anymore

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