Friday Night Music Byte

Lynnrockets recently watched the film Julie & Julia about a thirty year old New Yorker who decided to cook every dish in one of Julia Childs’ cookbooks and to blog about it. It was a novel idea so we decided to copy it. No, we will not be cooking in the usual sense (that could start a fire). Rather, we will adapt the recipe a day concept to our nightly music bytes. From now to infinity (didn’t somebody else coin that phrase?) we will post a music video and brief description of the artist or song in a sort of alphabetical order as culled from Tom Moon’s wonderful reference book, 1,000 Recordings To Hear Before You Die (A Listener’s Life List). The book describes both whole albums (remember those) and individual songs from all music genres that are essential listening. Do yourselves a favor and purchase this book. Where the book deals with an individual song, we will post that song, but when an entire album is the subject, we will exercise judicial discretion and post a single song therefrom. So what do you say, let’s get cooking…

We have come full circle by going through the alphabet once already, so here we are back at the letter A. Coincidentally, today’s band is Aerosmith.

A

Aerosmith          Toys In The Attic – “Toys In The Attic” and “Sweet Emotion” (1975)

Aerosmith didn’t invent blues-rock, wasn’t the first to dish bawdy lyrics, and really brought nothing innovative to the game – unless you count the scarves vocalist Steven Tyler tied around his microphone stand. Yet with their third album, Toys In The Attic, the Boston quintet took the basic three-chord guitar scheme, added some old fashioned show-biz razzle-dazzle, and gave “rawk” a new attitude.

Toys is thirty-seven minutes of teenage-boy air guitar bliss – all double-time peel outs and leering talk of fast girls, with a bit of rebellion on the side. Its pulverizing backbeats and tightly wound riff boogie ooze horniness (“Walk This Way” still the prototype rock strut). Its songs about drugs (“Uncle Salty” and “Sweet Emotion” the cleverest deployment of bass marimba in rock history) are disciplined verse-chorus odes disguised as spacey meandering.

An instant hit that sold millions and established the band as arena headliners, Toys solidified the trick that the “Toxic Twins” songwriting team of Steven Tyler and Joe Perry would turn for decades: slightly sleazy bad-boy stuff made irresistible by fireworks on cue hook-craft.

“Toys In The Attic”

“Sweet Emotion”

Palin’s Pesky Pugnaciousness Proves Pointless

Much like herpes, Sarah Palin is the gift that keeps on giving. Remember when the gracious ex-Governor of Alaska came to the defense of Miss California, Carrie Prejean, who stirred up a world of controversy after publicly stating that she opposed gay marriage. Sarah Palin telephoned the beauty queen so as to personally deliver her support, and then said,

“The liberal onslaught of malicious attacks against Carrie Prejean for expressing her opinion is despicable. Our Constitution protects us all – not just those that agree with the far left.”

That was just one of many examples of Palin needing a refresher course in Constitutional Law. Had she attended any one single institution of higher education for more than a month or two, she may have learned that the Constitution of “this great nation of ours” protects a person’s right to free speech from restriction by the government, but not from the invisible hand of the private sector free-market that she so often praises. The Constitution does not protect someone’s free speech from criticism by others. Indeed, the Constitution provides the same free speech protections to those critics.

This brings us to the former half-term ex-quitting governor of Alaska’s most recent foray into the realm of Constitutional law and rights of free speech. Last week, you will recall, that uber-conservative right-wing radio host Laura Schlessinger said what is known as the “n-word” 11 times in 5 minutes to a black caller who was inquiring how to handle racial slights from relatives and friends of her husband, who is white. The public backlash to Schlessinger’s insensitivity was so severe and widespread that she was forced to announce this week that she is ending her radio show.

In essence, the private sector (i.e. listening audience and advertising sponsors) decided that Schlessinger’s radio program was no longer worth listening to and advertising on. No audience plus no advertisers in the free market radio world equals no profit and consequently, no more show for Dr. Laura. This is simple free market Economics 101: There is no longer any demand for Schlessinger’s product and thus her enterprise has now failed. No government involvement of any kind stymied Schlessinger’s right to free speech. She was free to go on spewing the “n-word” as often as she chose, but the rejection of her product by the listening public and her advertisers forced her to voluntarily cease production. Sarah Palin is simply too stupid to understand this.

A day after Schlessinger told CNN’s Larry King she was ending her show amid controversy over her repeated use of the N-word during an on-air conversation, Palin tweeted,

“Dr.Laura:don’t retreat…reload! (Steps aside bc her 1st Amend.rights ceased 2exist thx 2activists trying 2silence”isn’t American,not fair”)”

Later that day she once again resorted to the sophomoric means of communication and tweeted,

“Dr.Laura=even more powerful & effective w/out the shackles, so watch out Constitutional obstructionists. And b thankful 4 her voice,America!,”

Apparently unable to keep her mouth shut for even one day, Palin next chose Facebook to make a fool of herself. She posted,

“Does anyone seriously believe that Dr. Laura Schlessinger is a racist? Anyone, I mean, who isn’t already accusing all conservatives, Republicans, Tea Party Americans, etc., etc., etc. of being racists? I can understand how she could feel ‘shackled’ by those who would parse a single word out of decades of on-air commentary. I understand what she meant when she declared that she was ‘taking back my First Amendment rights’ by turning to a new venue that will not allow others the ability to silence her by going after her stations, sponsors, and supporters.”

Well Sarah, yes, at least one person believes that Schlessinger’s racist tirade was wrong? Who might that be, you ask? Why it’s Dr. Laura herself. Of the incident, she said,

“I was attempting to make a philosophical point, and I articulated the N-word all the way out – more than one time. And that was wrong. I’ll say it again – that was wrong.”

Honestly Sarah, apart from your now stale quip about “retreat and reload” (code words to incite violence?), please be advised that in no way have Schlessinger’s “1st Amend.rights ceased 2exist”. She is free to self-fund her own show to her heart’s content and to say whatever she desires if she is willing to suffer the economic consequences of such an endeavor. The fact is that her show was silenced by operation of the free market and not by any governmental restriction on her right to free speech. Your alleged “Constitutional obstructionists” had nothing to do with Laura Schlessinger’s failure. And what the heck do you mean by, “Dr.Laura=even more powerful & effective w/out the shackles”? Do you honestly believe that her racist message is more powerful and effective without a radio show to broadcast it? Will Dr. Laura now get her message across more effectively by means of standing atop some soap box in a public park or maybe by transmitting a flurry of tweets and Facebook postings like you? Give us a break.

For her own good, Sarah Palin should stop commenting about the Constitution of the United States of America until she learns a little bit about it.

In honor of the troops, please remember to click on the song link below to familiarize yourselves with the tune and to have more fun singing along with today’s Sarah Palin song parody.

It’s All Over Now song link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XbpU5vBYnfU&feature=related

IT’S ALL OVER NOW

(sung to the Rolling Stones version of the song “It’s All Over Now”)

Well, Palin was around way too long
She winked those eyes, went to Hong Kong
But her heart’s now broken, that’s no lie
Tables turn and now it’s her turn to cry

Some crackpots used to love her, but it’s all over now
Some crackpots used to love her, but it’s all over now

Well, she thought that she’d be crowned a queen in D.C. Town
She’d spend book deal money to buy herself some fame
She has no clout, that must be a blow to her pride
Tables turn and now it’s Sarah who cries

Some crackpots used to love her, but it’s all over now
Some crackpots used to love her, but it’s all over now

(musical interlude)

Well, on Meet The Press Sunday morning, did you hear what they said?
“Palin’s political future is all but dead”
Brooks, Dionne and Murphy really smacked Palin down
Now the whole world knows that she is just a clown

Some crackpots used to love her, but it’s all over now
Some crackpots used to love her, but it’s all over now
Some crackpots used to love her, but it’s all over now
Some crackpots used to love her, but it’s all over now