Saturday, March 17, 2007

PAT & PATTI



Today is St Patrick’s Day and I’m going over to 00Soul’s to eat cabbage and get drunk most likely. The IRA has hung up their guns and I don’t feel like writing, so, instead, I’m posting this rumination by Patti Smith, (aptly sent by Pat) because, although no one is going to give me any fucking prizes, or put me in a Hall of Fame – and if they did I would look pretty askance and mutter about speech day at school – I have had similar thoughts.

"On a cold morning in 1955, walking to Sunday school, I was drawn to the voice of Little Richard wailing Tutti Frutti from the interior of a local boy's makeshift clubhouse. So powerful was the connection that I let go of my mother's hand. Rock'n'roll. It drew me from my path to a sea of possibilities. It sheltered and shattered me, from the end of childhood through a painful adolescence. I had my first altercation with my father when the Rolling Stones made their debut on the Ed Sullivan Show. Rock'n'roll was mine to defend. It strengthened my hand and gave me a sense of tribe as I boarded a bus from south Jersey to freedom in 1967.
Rock'n'roll, at that time, was a fusion of intimacies. Repression bloomed into rapture like raging weeds shooting through cracks in the cement. Our music provided a sense of communal activism. Our artists provoked our ascension into awareness as we ran amok in a frenzied state of grace. My late husband, Fred Sonic Smith, then of Detroit's MC5, was a part of the brotherhood instrumental in forging a revolution: seeking to save the world with love and the electric guitar. He created aural autonomy yet did not have the constitution to survive all the complexities of existence. Before he died, in the winter of 1994, he counseled me to continue working. He believed that one day I would be recognized for my efforts and, though I protested, he quietly asked me to accept what was bestowed - gracefully - in his name.
Last night I joined REM, the Ronettes, Van Halen and Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. On the eve of this event I asked myself many questions. Should an artist working within the revolutionary landscape of rock accept laurels from an institution? Should laurels be offered? Am I a worthy recipient? I have wrestled with these questions and my conscience leads me back to Fred and those like him - the maverick souls who may never be afforded such honors. Thus in his name I will accept with gratitude. Fred Sonic Smith was of the people, and I am none but him: one who has loved rock'n'roll and crawled from the ranks to the stage, to salute history and plant seeds for the erratic magic landscape of the new guard. Because its members will be the guardians of our cultural voice. The internet is their CBGB. Their territory is global. They will dictate how they want to create and disseminate their work. They will, in time, make breathless changes in our political process. They have the technology to unite and create a new party, to be vigilant in their choice of candidates, unfettered by corporate pressure. Their potential power to form and reform is unprecedented.
Human history abounds with idealistic movements that rise, then fall in disarray. The children of light. The journey to the east. The summer of love. The season of grunge. But just as we seem to repeat our follies, we also abide. Rock'n'roll drew me from my mother's hand and led me to experience. In the end it was my neighbors who put everything in perspective. An approving nod from the old Italian woman who sells me pasta. A high five from the postman. An embrace from the notary and his wife. And a shout from the sanitation man driving down my street: "Hey, Patti, Hall of Fame. One for us." I just smiled, and I noticed I was proud. One for the neighborhood. My parents. My band. One for Fred. And anybody else who wants to come along."
© Guardian News and Media Limited 2007

By way of a St. Paddy gift from Doc40. Here is a copy of The Hollow Men by T.S. Elliot.

The secret word is Erin

Wednesday, March 14, 2007

NEED I SAY MORE?

















Actually I'm sweating a deadline and wouldn't say more if I could. And, of course, I'm an Englishman with everything that entails.

But there is more news on the bees.

The secret word is Metrosexual

Tuesday, March 13, 2007

CAN YOU SPELL THAT FOR ME?


For some reason that I don’t quite understand, I find it profoundly disturbing that 45% of the sampled group couldn’t read the paragraph below with perfect ease. Or maybe because it’s the way I spell. (Supplied by Sheri)

Fi yuo cna raed tihs, yuo hvae a sgtrane mnid too. Cna yuo raed tihs? Olny 55% plepoe can.
i cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it dseno't mtaetr in waht oerdr the ltteres in a wrod are, the olny iproamtnt tihng is taht the frsit and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it whotuit a pboerlm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Azanmig huh? yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt!


The secret word hardly matters.

CRYPTIQUEYou know the rules. It doesn’t stop until you’re dead.

Monday, March 12, 2007

TODAY...



Today is an anniversary I would really rather not be remembering, and maybe I shouldn’t even be making reference to it at all, especially in this semi-public context lest I reveal too much and loose another company of demons with which I can drive myself insane. Or should I attempt to explain the madness that visits, these dozen days into the month of March? I don’t know. I don’t know. Except I fear the same risk applies. Can one really undo or heal the damage wrought by events, and the disasters that remain after the passing of the show? Again I have no answer. I don’t know. I don’t know. It repeats like an infinite electric echo. The best I can do is to leave you with a lesser-known fragment of Jim Morrison that fidicen sent me, Jim also being dead.

GRAVEYARD POEM

It was the greatest night of my life
Although I still had not found a wife
I had my friends right there beside me
We scaled the wall
We tripped through the graveyard
Ancient shapes were all around us
No music but the wet grass
Felt fresh beside the fog

Two made love in a silent spot
One chased a rabbit into the dark
A girl got drunk & balled the dead
And I gave empty sermons to my head

Cemetery cool & quiet
Hate to leave your sacred lay
Dread the milky coming of the day
I´d love to stay
I´d love to stay
I´d love to stay

The secret word is Gone