dimland radio 4-19-14 show notes

 

A Little Talk About The Weather

Let's just say this winter/spring has been pretty annoying.

The Goal Is To Be An Entertainer?

Notice anything about the individuals in the above image? Yes, they are all dead, but what I pointed out was that they are all (with the exception of Hunter S Thompson) entertainers. The quote is by author Chuck Palahniuk and I'm not sure he meant that entertainers are the only creators. I gave a few examples of other people who could have been included had the person who made this image hadn't been so shallow in their thinking.

However, it is good to see Keith Moon included.

Never Found In The 80s: The Minutemen

 

After a long absence, there was finally a new Never Found posted on the Stuck in the 80s blog. I had sent in several, but none had been posted. Steve Spears is a busy man so let's cut him some slack.

 

So, this past week The Minutemen were profiled. An alt rock band from California whose existence was cut short by the death of lead signer and guitarist D Boon.

The Ghost Of Capt. Kidd

In another bit of guest bloggery, I had written a piece about a long lost toy recently. Actually, I had written about it a few years ago, but there was an important update that needed to be made. So, the updated blog has been posted to the Two Different Girls blog. Well, I am a different girl, I guess.

What Does Courtney Love Know?

Apparently, Courtney Love is a vlog contributor to Rolling Stone now and, in a recent vlog on Bruce Springsteen, Ms Love made it known that she doesn't care for the Boss's concerts and, in an off hand aside, stated that "saxophones don't belong in rock & roll."

Well, in the comment thread of this shared on Facebook post I listed the following examples of how saxophones (not my favorite instrument) can be use effectively in rock & roll...

 

Shake Rattle and Roll - Bill Haley & the Comets

Walk On The Wild Side - Lou Reed

Young Americans - David Bowie

Save It For Later - The English Beat

Tequila - The Champs

Us and Them - Pink Floyd

Can't You Hear Me Knocking - The Rolling Stones

Who Can It Be Now? - Men At Work

Can't Get There From Here - REM

Hit The North - The Fall

Fun House - The Stooges

Waiting For A Friend - The Rolling Stones

A Night Like This - The Cure

Whatever Gets You Through The Night - John Lennon & Elton John

Respect - Aretha Franklin

Deacon Blues - Steely Dan

Mercy Mercy Me - Marvin Gaye

Brown Sugar - The Rolling Stones

Money - Pink Floyd

Never Say Never - Romeo Void

Cure For Pain - Morphine

Mirror In The Bathroom - The English Beat

The New Pollution - Beck

Oh Bondage! Up Yours! - X-Ray Spex

Baker Street - Gerry Rafferty

Modern Love - David Bowie

You mean to tell me Courtney Love doesn't like any of these songs? 

 

Not Arrested For Merely Standing In The Shade

The headline of the article made it seem as though the "man" arrested Ms. Slate for simply standing in the shade. Well, that's not the case. Former military and current folk singer Emily Slate decided to stand in an area sealed off by the park rangers in anticipation of a legalize pot rally. Park rangers asked her to leave the area. She refused. Park officials repeated their request for her to leave the area. She kept refusing. The rangers gave her one minute to comply or she would be arrested. She refused. The rangers then arrested her. She resisted. The rangers had to wrestle her into a park ranger vehicle to take her to jail. She kicked, spat, and screamed about living in a police state, while on-lookers called the park rangers fascists.

Congratulations, Ms. Slate. You escalated the situation by not complying. You could have made your point and walked away and not have been "assaulted" and arrested. But then you wouldn't have that street cred for your folk singing career, would you?

Here's the somewhat biased account of what happened. There's a video clip showing the rangers exercising great patience as Ms. Slate continued to not comply with their repeated requests. Here is another account of what happened. I guess you can decide if my take is correct or not.

Movie Recommendation: 20 Feet From Stardom (2013)

 

Tremolo Productions/Gil Friesen Productions

This Oscar winner for Best Documentary is a fascinating look at the careers of some of the best background singers in the business. There are some great insights into what they go through to practice their craft and how the right backing vocals can make good songs great. However, if you aren't a fan of the African American style of Gospel singing, there will be parts of the documentary that might be hard to get through. But it is worth it.

Music heard on the show...

Dimland Radio opening theme song: 'Ram' by The Yoleus

First ad break bumpers: 'Pride' by Echo & The Bunnymen & 'King of the Hill' by The Minutemen
Second ad break bumpers: 'Love is a Stranger' by Eurythmics & 'Gone Daddy Gone' by Violent Femmes
Closing song: 'Angler's Treble Hook' by $5 Fiddle

That's it! See you next Saturday night for Dimland Radio 11 Central, midnight Eastern on www.ztalkradio.com you can also download my show from the z talk show archives page. You can email your questions and comments to drdim@dimland.com

You can also go to my CafePress store and buy stuff with my artwork on it and have me do a portrait for you if you like. Find out more here and here.

concert memoirs pt. 3 - aerosmith, jefferson starship, willie nelson & kansas

Aerosmith w/Pat Travers
Early 1983 (?) Met Center w/John Ticket Price: $10.75

This one is pretty vague. I recall that we sat pretty far back, Pat Travers played his hit ‘Boom, Boom (Out Go the Lights)’, and Aerosmith kicked off their set with ‘Back in the Saddle’. This was also that era of Aerosmith in which Joe Perry wasn’t with the group. He was out doing his Project.

That’s it.

Jefferson Starship w/Shooting Star
Early 1983 (?) Orpheum Theater w/Paul Ticket Price: Unknown

This show was intended for the larger venue of the Met Center, but lack of ticket sales (that’s my guess) moved it to the smaller Orpheum Theater. Lack of interest was also the reason John didn’t go and I went with another friend, Paul.

I think I felt somewhat obligated to ask John to this show, because of the previous two we had seen. He wasn’t interested in Jefferson Starship. He was wise.

As I have said before, I liked a lot of crap music in those days and Jefferson Starship’s was some of the crappiest. They were in the midst of their slow descent from ‘White Rabbit’ to ‘We Built This City’. So they weren’t as bad as they would get, but they were pretty lame.

Think Spinal Tap.

Willie Nelson & Family
8/25/83 MN State Fair w/Paul Ticket Price: $3.00

My friend Paul and I were at the great Minnesota get together, checking out the sights and eating the food, when we decided to get tickets to the Willie Nelson show that would be later that night. For many years running, it was traditional for the MN State Fair to have Willie as the first of their Grandstand concerts. We bought bleacher seat tickets on a spur of the moment decision.

It was a fun show opening and closing with ‘Whiskey River’. Well worth the three bucks.

Kansas
9/3/83 MN State Fair w/group of high school friends Ticket Price: $8.00

Unlike the Willie Nelson Grandstand show, this was a show that we planned on seeing and purchased tickets before heading to the Fair. But, I don’t have much to tell of this Grandstand show. Let me think..... umm..... There were fireworks after the show.

concert memoirs pt. 2 - the who

The Who w/T-Bone Burnett

10/2/82 St. Paul Civic Center w/John & Eric Ticket Price: Unknown

This was a life changing concert for me. I know that sounds dramatic, but it is true. Seeing this show got me big into The Who and that lead me to punk rock which lead me to even more and varied styles of music. At the time I was listening to mostly crap. Journey, Styx, Foreigner, Boston, yuck! (Although, I must admit a soft spot for some of that crap to this day.)

I wasn’t much of a Who fan at the time. I knew who they were, knew a few of their songs. I knew Pete Townshend had some solo stuff out. The Who’s new single ‘Athena’ was getting some airplay. I thought they were ok and that was all.

In fact, I hadn’t planned on going to the show at all. I was even downtown St. Paul right next to the Civic Center (now the Xcel Center, home of the Minnesota Wild) that afternoon. I was at a comic book shop getting my monthly comic book fix. I hopped on the bus to head home. The bus stop was located right in front of the Civic Center. While on the bus I was accosted by a pothead who worked at the same restaurant at which I was working.

“Hey, Man! Are you going to The Who concert tonight?”

“No.”

“Oh! Man!”

“Sorry.”

Well, I got home and my mom told me to call John right away. I did. It turned out John had bought three tickets to the show, but he hadn’t anyone to go with. He did get one friend, Eric, to go and I would make it three if I wanted to. I did.

I called the restaurant I was working at and told them I might be a little late for my shift that night. I was working the graveyard shift and I did end up being only about 10 or 20 minutes late. No big deal.

This was The Who’s North American Farewell tour and I was glad to risk being a little late for work to see them, because they’d never tour again. Riiight.

This was also the tour that saw The Clash opening some of the shows, but not this one. We got T-Bone Burnett. We had no idea who he was or what he was doing. He did a guitar solo consisting of him plucking one note at one part of the stage and then walking to another part and pluck another note. He did that a few times.

John and I have talked about how we regretted not getting The Clash as the opening act, but if we had seen Burnett after we’d begun exploring and appreciating new kinds of music we might have enjoyed his act more. In doing some research for this blog I found that it was likely Mick Ronson (who had played with David Bowie during the Ziggy Stardust days) was with Burnett’s band at the time. I saw a legend and didn’t even know it until now.

Speaking of legends, there was a headlining act, the greatest rock ‘n’ roll band in the world, The Who. As I said, this was to be their last North American tour and they were promoting their latest album, ‘It’s Hard’. Not a perfect album, it’s no ‘Quadrophenia’ or ‘Who’s Next’ and it does lack the maniac Keith Moon, but it’s not as bad as the critics were making it out to be.

I attended the first night of a two night concert stop in St. Paul. And it was loud. It may be the loudest show I’ve ever seen or, certainly, one of the loudest. Both shows were sold out, packed with boisterous Who fans and I got caught up in it. I found myself shouting and whistling as loud as I could. Cheering for Pete in particular. I’m not sure why, but a connection to Pete Townshend was formed that night and it has never been broken.

I wondered if they would play any of his solo material. They didn’t. It was a Who concert after all. They also didn’t play ‘Athena’, their minor hit at the time. They did, however, feature four or so other songs off ‘It’s Hard’. They played the great song ‘Eminence Front’ and Roger played guitar on this tour. Something he hadn’t done since he took over lead vocals back in the days when they were The Detours.

Their light show featured three sets of spotlights. One set on either side of the stage and one at the back of the main floor. Aimed straight up, they would twirl around and open and close, casting bright white beams of light to the heavens (well, the ceiling of the Civic Center anyway).

Another fun feature of the show was the glow sticks that were sold to the fans. People starting tossing the green glowing objects over the audience’s heads. They looked pretty cool as they sailed over us. Even better was when some fans realized that if they used a lighter (a must have item at concerts) to melt a hole in the plastic container and then throw it high above the crowd, the glowing liquid would sprinkle out. This made for a very fun effect.

John remembers a very lame attempt by me to throw one of the melted glow sticks, spilling the liquid on myself and him. I don’t recall that, but that’s what John remembers.

The Who concert weekend was a pretty big event judging by the excited talk at school that following Monday. It was truly a major event in my life. I was transformed into a monster Who fan. I bought all their albums and bought and read books about them. I was all about The Who and Pete Townshend.

I’ve mellowed some, but not much.