I’ve spent most of my creative life measuring the distance between that American promise and American reality. For many Americans, who are today losing their jobs, their homes, seeing their retirement funds disappear, who have no healthcare, or who have been abandoned in our inner cities, the distance between that promise, and that reality, has never been greater or more painful.

The whole set in Philidelphia can be seen here

That being said, of those on his list I can offer up a quick recommendation for artist Kirsten Brown as I own some of her work myself, the site grinding as it is among the top feeds I check, the game work of Zachary Anderson who I fortunately know in real life, albeit not as well as I’d like, and the also wonderful art of Ben Templesmith (the 21st century’s answer to Bill Sienkiewicz, not that Mr. Sienkiewicz is not still producing great work, but if you like the latter, you’ll probably like the former and vice versa).

My mom is looking to convert tapes of my late stepfather (he was a drummer and played with several well known people and groups including Little Richard (other names are escaping me now)). If you know of somewhere (particularly if you’ve dealt with them) or even just know someone who might know, please let me, uh, know.

Such a frustratingly long wait until they announce the ‘08 tour dates.

Where the Rising was largely a reaction to 9/11 and was thus a mix of mourning and celebration, this one is a clear reaction to the six years since. A couple of tracks sound like lost Pet Sounds tracks musically, but with lyrics that undercut such an upbeat melody. The title track in particular starts off as just a throw away tune, slowly twisting around into a condemnation of the powers that be.

Some of it’s not quite so subtle though:

Who’ll be the last to die for a mistake
The last to die for a mistake
Darlin’ will tyrants and kings
fall to the same fate
Strung up at your city gates
Who’ll be the last to die for a mistake

And now I’m watching the Democratic gubernatorial debate for Georgia and cringing. The only one that has said anything I can support is Mac McCarley, a World War II veteran who doesn’t have any real chance, but who at least sounds like he’s saying what he thinks instead of what he’s been told to say.

For those who are in Georgia, here’s the AJC election coverage page.

So, as a favor to those of you who stumble across me because that’s what you’re searching for, here are the lyrics (along with an annoying midi file of the song), where you can see that you should be spelling it with an “i” in “docious”, not an “e” like I originally did and like you just did. Of course, you don’t have to take my word for it.

(And in case any Disney lawyers want to come after me for linking to a webpage with the lyrics, take note that it’s posted on the National Institutes of Health site, so if you want to take on the government, be my guest.)

I’ve got a new girlfriend (yes, I’m as shocked as the next committed bachelor). Following the grand old tradition of merging our interests, I’m currently at work on introducing her to Springsteen’s musical oeuvre. I decided on what I thought was a simple method of asking her for a couple of her favorite musicians and then picking an album which most closely matches the output of those artists. First part went fine. It did happen that several of the Boss’s albums match with the work of the musicians she chose, but that should be a good thing, shouldn’t it? I thought so. I wasn’t going to have to worry over handing her a copy of Human Touch. So I started listening to the albums and then the real flaw in my plan stuck up it’s head and said “boo” or it might have been “supercalifragilisticexpialidoceous”, either way, it caught me by surprise.

Turns out I know his music too well. For all of my adult life (including the years when I wasn’t yet an adult, but thought I was), Springsteen’s music has been within earshot. Very few of his songs aren’t inextricably wrapped within memories and emotions to such an extent that I can’t listen to them again for the first time. I listen to one album and I suddenly remember the smell of the flowers outside the townhome where I lived in Las Vegas, the feel of my hand on the concrete wall I jumped on the way home from my girlfriend’s house out there. Another album brings back memories of lying awake the night before Easter when I should have been sleeping, but the silence of the night was overcome, via headphones, by Bruce’s voice singing about racing cars and faith and hope and standing strong against the storm. Queuing up a third album smacks me with the feeling of being at a concert with another girlfriend as our song blew the rafter roof off and I was thinking, completely out of touch with reality, that no one else there knew just what that song meant the way we did. I’m listening to the memories and not the music.

So now I’m going to go back to it and try briefly, having spilled some of the associations out here, to purge my mind of years of memories. I’ll sit down and just picture her while listening to these albums. I’ll imagine the new memories we’ll make together and what the soundtrack for them should be.

And you still can hear me singing to the people who don’t listen
To the things that I am saying, praying someone’s going to hear;
And I guess I’ll die explaining how the things that they complain about
Are things they could be changing, hoping someone’s going to care.

I was born a lonely singer and I’m bound to die the same
But I’ve got to feed the hunger in my soul;
And if I never have a nickel I won’t ever die of shame
’cause I don’t believe that no-one wants to know!

(full lyrics for those that want to read them)