It's All Happening at the Zoo

I do believe it, I do believe it's true...

Yesterday afternoon, Laura and I went to the National Zoo. Got there around 1 pm and it was overcast and chilly. The main purpose of our visit was to go and see the lion cubs. There were seven cubs born in two litters last August and September. They did not disappoint and Laura took some cute video snippets that she's posting on her facebook page.

We also saw the "new" Pandas, zebras, cheetahs, and various and sundry other animals. By the time we left, the sun had broken through and it was warming up to a respectable Spring temperature.

Things happening this week - I'll be performing (weather permitting) at the Paradise Springs Winery in Clifton VA on Friday evening from 5:30-8:30 pm. For more information and directions you can go to http://www.paradisespringswinery.com/ .

Paul Simon is releasing a new album tomorrow. So far, I've read some reasonably good reviews, but I'm reserving judgement. Is a new album by Paul really relevant or necessary? I guess we'll find out. In any event, there's nothing he could release that would diminish his overall relevance to the musical conversation of the last 50 years. Hopefully, I can be as good or better than I am now, when I reach his age.

CD Review: Bruce Cockburn, Small Source of Comfort

I’ve been listening to Bruce Cockburn since 1984. I read a review of a concert he had done in Chicago and I was intrigued, so I went out and found a cassette of Stealing Fire. I was captivated from the first notes of Lovers in a Dangerous Time and I’ve been listening ever since.

Bruce’s new release, Small Source of Comfort, is another worthy addition to the collection. Some reviewers have hailed it as a return to form and to his “folk” roots. While I would say that his last studio effort, Life’s Short Call Now, was somewhat of a disappointment, you can’t get much folkier than a live solo acoustic recording such as Slice of Life. To me, Bruce is working from the same sonic palette that he has been working with, to good effect, at least since 1991’s Nothing But a Burning Light. What’s new, or at least different here, are his collaboration with Jazz violinist Jenny Scheinman and his collaboration with Annabelle Chvostek on a couple of tunes. There are also five standout instrumental pieces. This is an unusually large number, although one or two instrumentals has become common over the last 20 years and more instrumentals have surfaced on some of the deluxe re-issues.

One thing that you can usually count on from Bruce is a strong opening track, which sets a tone and sometimes the theme for what follows: songs like Lovers in a Dangerous Time, Dream Like Mine, Night Train, Tried and Tested, If a Tree Falls, and Call it Democracy. Here, the song is Iris of the World. It reminds me a little of his song World of Wonders, especially the acoustic version on Slice of Life. It starts out with the mundane indignities and uncertainties of crossing a border in these post 9/11 days and how the minutiae that they check misses the bigger picture. That is followed by snapshot images from the road and the feelings that they spark. The third verse is kind of self-assessment, the kind of mental chatter that I can imagine myself getting into on a long solitary drive. Despite the indignities suffered in the passage, what comes through and what lasts is love. Driving is the source of many of the images that fuel the songs on the entire collection.

Call Me Rose is a pretty unique addition to the Cockburn catalog. I can’t think of the last time (if there ever was one) where he ventured into satire. This song has prompted some debate among reviewers and among the fans on the Humans group on Yahoo. While I can say that this is not great Cockburn, it is certainly intriguing. Despite the outrageous premise of Richard Nixon being reincarnated as a poor single mother in the projects, it doesn’t seem that far-fetched. Where it falls short is that it doesn’t really illuminate the condition of the single mother, and thereby is merely amusing rather than biting. Also, Richard Nixon seems like a pretty dated target for this kind of rumination. He also wasn’t that bad a President on the domestic front. He certainly didn’t advocate the undoing of the New Deal or even welfare. Perhaps having him return as a Vietnamese peasant in a sweatshop would have been more appropriate. Or just changing the subject to Richard Cheney would have been more delicious.

Bohemian 3-Step is the first of the very strong and engaging instrumentals, which is just guitar with a touch of light drums. Bruce provides the bass with his strong thumb. Radiance is the first tune that really highlights Jenny Scheinman. In contrast to the lyrics, the music is actually quite dark and mysterious with the violin and accordion giving it a European world-weary feeling. For me, this is not the kind of tune that Bruce’s vocals shine on. They come across as a little formal and stilted.

5:51 is a blues tune, another form that Bruce has used sparingly over the years. The last one I can think of is Soul of a Man from Nothing but a Burning Light. The “cops at the door in the middle of the night” harkens back to Peggy’s Kitchen Wall and the “diesel on the breeze” and "too much traffic on my mind" ties this song of waking up tired, aching and distracted to the road theme. Here, the vocals are more comfortable

Driving Away is one of two collaborations with Annabelle Chvostek. The liner notes suggest that the lyrics were mostly written by Annabelle and I would say that they are more impressionistic than Bruce’s lyrics usually are. The listener has to fill in the blanks on the story (if there really even is one). The song is about leaving something or someone behind and the images are of longing and regret. Lois on the Autobahn is another instrumental, written for his mother who died last year. It’s a jazz tune supported by Jenny’s violin. The collaboration really shines on this piece. While the guitar work could stand on its own, it would really lose much of its beauty without the violin part.

Boundless is the second collaboration with Annabelle C. According to the liner notes, this was mostly lyrics by Bruce. This song is marked by strong religious and spiritual imagery and is probably the song (aside from Iris of the World) that many long-time fans will gravitate to. It is certainly the “deepest” song on the record, and open to many interpretations depending on your spiritual bent. I also catch an echo of Wait No More where he says that “Lightning's a kiss that lands hot on the loins of the sky.” Here, Bruce says that he “feel[s] these serpents of desire ripple my skin like ropes of fire.” Perhaps to avoid getting too serious, Bruce places the humorous song, Called Me Back, right after this one. Humorous songs are another rarity in the Cockburn catalog. This is not to say that Bruce doesn’t have a sense of humor, just that he will never be mistaken for Loudon Wainwright or Jimmy Buffett. The song has some lyrical similarity to Anything Can Happen, from 1989’s Big Circumstance.

Comets of Kandahar is another instrumental showcasing Jenny Scheinman’s sometimes dissonant jazz violin over a strong, insistent drumbeat and, of course, Bruce’s steady guitar. There are also some vaguely Middle Eastern accents to some of the violin riffs. It was inspired by the planes taking off at night and Bruce described it as “Django meets John Lee Hooker.” The violin takes a more supporting role in Each One Lost, a simple folk melody about the ceremony for two dead soldiers at an airbase in the Middle East.

Parnassus and Fog is another guitar and violin collaboration, with some accordion and barely noticeable electric guitar from producer Colin Linden. Some of the guitar work harkens back to the instrumental style of late 70’s albums like Dancing in the Dragons Jaw. Ancestors is another instrumental. This time it is just Bruce and Gary Craig on Singing Bowl or chimes with some delay effects on the guitar. The album ends with the short song Gifts, something that Bruce wrote about 40 years ago. He used to close his live shows with it, but never thought it felt right to record it until now. It is a non-sectarian prayer of sorts, acknowledging our oneness with nature, with the rain and sunlight and rocky shore. The song of the rain becomes his song and his gift to us in the end.

After 31 albums it is a little difficult not to make comparisons. For example, you might ask if Bruce made a compendium of road songs similar to Speechless, would Driving Away or Iris of the World make the cut? The bottom line is that this is a good album by a consistently strong artist. I’ve made mention of connections to other albums and his past work, but this album stands on its own and would be a reasonable introduction to his music. For his long-time fans, this should have more than enough sonic and lyrical gems to satisfy.

Also posted on Nodepression.com

CD Review: Leeann Atherton – Heart Traveled Road

Leeann Atherton is in fine form on this 2009 release produced by her long-time collaborator Rich Brotherton. This album showcases Leeann’s voice and songwriting, and covers a vast musical landscape from Acoustic Blues to Blues Rock, Country Rock, Gospel, a little Jazz, and Folk. If you’ve heard Leeann, particularly in her live shows, you know that she projects the image of a very strong woman who knows her own mind. That comes through in this collection of songs, but there is also the counterpoint of at least playing the more traditional female role, or perhaps, more accurately, playing off that stereotype. Leeann has strong Southern roots, having grown up in South Carolina, spent time in Nashville, and about 25 years in Austin.

Leeann’s voice is a powerful instrument. I saw her perform recently and she really sunk her teeth into Janis’ Piece of My Heart. But she can also sing a sweet and soulful ballad and there are moments of tender vulnerability, such as in I Believe where she sings: “What I’m trying to say/If I’m still not clear/My heart is on the table/I’m standing naked here.” The standout tracks are Looking for a Rainbow, a gospel tune about keeping your focus through the storms of life, Change of Heart a blues song about the battle of the sexes with a nice twist, and Soul Song, a perfect little folk-infused love song marked by beautiful interplay between the finger-picked guitar and the violin.

Remember Me is a little old-time Jazz shuffle, that lets the mind wander back to old movies and is also a very sly brush off song. Kiss is solid Country rock and starts off with a bang: “Got me dizzy, got me spinnin’, /got me wantin’ it again/ your kiss. /I’m drunk on the moon, /don’t you leave me so soon, /not like this.” There are quite a few breakup or brush off songs in the set and the men in these stories seem to come out on the short end more often than not. Not sure if that is fresh autobiography or just good songwriting.

Rich Brotherton’s production, arranging, and playing (acoustic and electric guitar, bass, mandolin, mandola, cittern, and harmonium) is impeccable throughout. Rich has played with and produced records for a who’s who of Austin and Texas songwriters and singers over the last two decades. He’s worked with Robert Earl Keen, Eliza Gilkyson and many others. He even played Mandolin, Acoustic Guitar and Bass on a track of mine back in 1990. And Leeann helped me out with backing vocals on a couple of tunes in 1992. So perhaps I’m biased, but I think this is a very good record that will find a place in your heart.

Just Back from a Weekend in Austin

We flew out to Austin last Thursday to spend a little time with some friends and hang out doing Austin things. Cynthia and Bill have a great house in Lost Creek and since the temperature in DC was hovering in the 40's, it was great to be in the 80's for a few days.

We had a leisurely breakfast on Friday, then took a walk on the Town Lake Hike and Bike trail, doing the loop from MoPac to the Lamar Foot Bridge. We were amazed at all the changes in the downtown skyline and all the new residential construction downtown. At least the trail was still more or less the same. After the walk we had a late lunch at Magnolia Cafe on Lake Austin Blvd. I had a heaping bowl of black beans with avocado and pico de gallo and a cornbread pancake on the side. Great Austin comfort food.

Friday evening we drove down to South Lamar for the Happy Hour/Dinner at Maria's Taco Xpress. An old acquaintance of mine, Leeann Atherton, was performing there outdoors on the deck with a band. She was singing and playing guitar, with Juliann Banks on bass, Sonny Coleman on lead guitar and Bill the Buddha on drums. They played a mix of covers and original tunes, mostly high energy rock and blues. Leeann can belt it out with the best of them and she did a fine Janis impression on Piece of my Heart. After the show we drove up Lamar to a "new" place, a Greek wine/beer bar called Opa's in an Old House with a great patio area in front underneath a pair of gorgeous Live Oak trees. That was a great finish to the evening.

On Saturday, we drove over to Manchaca & Stassney and had breakfast at the Bakehouse. Cynthia told a funny story about a column that John Kelso had written about them and calling them out for their pretentions at trying to be an "International" restaurant in South Austin. They have pictures of International destinations on the walls and lamp covers in the booths which are globe maps.

After breakfast, Laura and I drove around a bit, taking William Cannon over to 290 near where we used to live and then took 290 up to MoPac and drove around downtown, mostly taking 5th Street east past I-35 and then 6th Street back across town. We stopped at Waterloo Records and I looked around, while Laura did a little shopping at Chico's. Then we drove across the river and stopped for a couple of drinks at Chuy's on Barton Springs. Inevitably, we talked about our own retirement plans and how maybe we ought to put Austin on our short list. The major drawback is whether we could handle the summer heat again.

That night we had a belated "Retirement" Party for Cynthia at their place. A lot of good friends were there: Mita, Cindy & Gemma, Anne & Dan, our friend Danielle, and a couple of others. There were fresh squeezed lime Margaritas; chicken, beef, and pork margaritas with lots of fixins; plenty of beer and wine; and, ice cream to top it off. Definitely off our diets. I played a few songs as the night wound down.

Sunday, Bill and I drove out near Bee Caves and played golf at Falconhead Golf Course. It was overcast and much cooler, which was good for the golf. The round started out pretty well, but unravelled a bit as it went on, but it was a pleasant way to spend the afternoon. That night we drove down to the Saxon Pub to hear the Resentments. Laura and I hadn't heard them since 2008, so we hadn't seen them since Stephen Bruton died. John Dee Graham had also gone his own way, so, for us at least, it was a fairly new lineup. You had Bruce Hughes on Bass, Jud Newcomb on electric and acoustic guitars, Miles Zuniga on acoustic guitar, Jeff Plankenhorn on pedal steel, mandolin, and guitar and Johnny Morocco on Drums. I think that Jeff might have been with them the last time we saw them, but he was more just a backup player at that point. This time he was a full member of the ensemble and some of his songs were among the highlights of the evening. They are really fantastic and have great energy. They mix country, folk, blues, rock and even a little jazz (mostly Bruce Hughes on the jazz). A great evening and a great end to the weekend.

Monday we were up early to catch a flight back to DC and our lingering cold spell. Too bad we couldn't just quit our jobs and move back...

Nobody Died at Three Mile Island (Tsunami edition)

Also posted at Smirking Chimp.com

It came as no surprise really that Nuclear Power has been pitching itself for a comeback against a backdrop of Global Warming, Wall Street greed and an oil slick disaster of epic proportions. Indeed, many people have recently been pitching Nuclear as a green energy option. But now Godzilla and Mothra have joined the conversation in the wake of a deadly tsunami and the smoking ruins of Fukushima Dai Ichi. So, here we are again debating Nuclear safety, technological hubris and our overall ability to manage dangerous materials in perpetuity.

Of course, Nuclear’s really more like some crazed zombie returned from Dawn of the Dead. In the late 70’s and early 80’s I was pretty well versed in nuclear power plant economics and environmental concerns. It was a hobby of mine, but I was relieved and quite happy to move onto other things as it appeared to die as a viable option (ironically, as much because of cheap Saudi oil as anything else).

These days, even before this latest issue, I was very ambivalent about the technology and its problems, although willing to grant it a sort of grudging “support”, along the lines sketched out by James Lovelock. In essence, the argument in favor of allowing a nuclear renaissance boils down to: we’re all screwed anyway, so why not? I mean, it’s not like the species (particularly Homo Americanus) has shown great judgment or ecological vision or compassion. We’ve pretty much had an uninterrupted celebration of greed, selfishness and stupidity in high and low places, at least since the late 70’s (well OK, since we crawled out of the premordial slime).

Last year, I dusted off a song I wrote back in the 80’s about the nuclear industry, added a new verse about the Oil Spill (How soon we forget…), and took it out to play for awhile. And now there’s a new verse about the misadventures of the Nuclear Industry and the Tsunami. As I mentioned, I was a bit of a geek about Nuclear issues back in the day. Before Three Mile Island, there was a 1975 accident at a power plant at Browns Ferry in Alabama. A fire started by a candle that wound up doing something like $100 million of damage. As Wikipedia puts it: “the March 22, 1975 fire started when a worker using a candle to search for air leaks accidentally set a temporary cable seal on fire. The fire spread through the wall from the temporary seal.”

At the time that I was contemplating writing a song about TMI, I was thumbing through a book of old folk songs and came across the “Brown’s Ferry Blues”. It seemed like a perfect frame for the story I wanted to tell, though, aside from the tag line “Lord, lord I’ve got the Brown’s Ferry Blues,” there wasn’t a whole lot of the song that I could actually re-use. I did re-use half of a verse, which fits nicely with the overall flavor of the work. Just the other day, it was pointed out to me that the song is by the Delmore Brothers (or may be, there is some controversy on its origins) and may be copyrighted.

I revised the song again after Chernobyl, but since that time it has been gathering dust. Anyway, the words follow and I should be posting a recording of it soon. Let me know what you think and if you have verses to add, feel free to contribute. Unfortunately, I’m sure I’ll have reason to update it again in the not too distant future…

Brown’s Ferry Blues

Fire in the morning, fire at night
When the reactor goes there won’t be no light
Lord, Lord, I’ve got the Brown’s Ferry blues
Put on you coat, get on down the road
Don’t want to be around when it shoots it’s load
Lord, Lord, I’ve got the Brown’s Ferry blues

Early to bed and early to rise
And your woman goes out with the other guys
Lord, Lord, I’ve got the Brown’s Ferry blues
She doesn’t want your contaminated fingers
After it’s over radiation lingers
Lord, Lord, I’ve got the Brown’s Ferry blues

Nobody died at Three Mile Island
Chernobyl was just a few commies fryin
Lord, Lord, I’ve got the Brown’s Ferry blues
Got a two headed mule and a three headed calf
I go out to the barn when I need a good laugh
Lord, Lord, I’ve got the Brown’s Ferry blues

Deepwater oil bearing down on the coast
As Global Warming slowly turns us all into toast
Lord, Lord, I’ve got the Brown’s Ferry blues
GE Lobbyists wading into the fray
Nuclear Power’s gonna save the day
Lord, Lord, I’ve got the Brown’s Ferry blues

Earthquakes and tsunami on a distant shore
Fukushima Dai ichi’s burning down to the core
Lord, Lord, I’ve got the Brown’s Ferry blues
No time to panic, keep your eye on the bottom line
The future looks bright, things’ll be just fine
Lord, Lord, I’ve got the Brown’s Ferry blues

Fire in the morning, fire at night
When the reactor goes there won’t be no light
Lord, Lord, I’ve got the Brown’s Ferry blues
One of these days it’ll be all over
We’ll sleep together in a field of clover
Lord, Lord, I’ve got the Brown’s Ferry blues

(c) 2011. Jim Heald. All Rights Reserved.

Playing at Epicure Cafe tonight, Friday 3/4

I'll be performing at the Epicure Cafe in Fairfax tonight from 8-11 pm. For more information and directions check out www.epicurecafe.org.

We've Lost our Minds (or maybe just our Souls)

All I can say is that I can’t believe what’s going on in this country right now. We (okay, not all of us) seem to have lost our collective f%#king minds. As we bow down at the base of the golden calf and ignore the fact that it was Wall Street crooks that crashed our economy (and none have paid any price whatsoever for it), but now we want to “solve” our financial crisis by taking it out on teachers and street sweepers and janitors and “overpaid” public employees. I mean, sure, they all have private planes and vacation homes in St. Barts, so clearly they make too much money. And by God, they have actual pension plans and decent medical insurance packages, so we’ve got to make sure that we take that away from them. We don’t want them having something that we (whoever WE are) don’t have…

Listen, I understand that unions aren’t perfect, and that it is too difficult to fire bad employees in union shops, but guess what? The reason that some of you still take home a decent wage and some of you still have decent health benefits (even if you have to pay something for them) is because of the unions and the struggles of working people in the early part of the last century. That’s why you have Social Security and Medicare too, but heck, those programs are too expensive and need to be trimmed back too. We all pay too much in taxes that we’ll never see again, right? Well, just remember that if we didn’t have them, each of us would be shelling out to support our parents and grandparents in their old age instead of them living reasonably healthy, independent lives. And that would cost each of US a heck of a lot more than the taxes we pay out to keep the programs running.

Feel free to bow down and kiss the feet of the gazillionaires and keep cutting their taxes, if you think that’s what it’s all about to be a FREE American. But don’t be surprised when they kick you in the teeth, climb over your prostrate body, and swipe your wallet as they run off to devise next Ponzi scheme or cash in on a good business opportunity (probably in some down and out country where they can pay workers pennies a day). The rich aren’t better or smarter than the rest of us, although many of them have absorbed the management and get rich tips of Attila the Hun and Genghis Khan. In other words, they know that there’s a war going on and they finally see the opportunity to roll back the 20th Century that was just a glimmer in Saint Ronnie’s eyes 30 years ago.

Unions, even in their withered state in this country, set the floor or the foundation for the wages and benefits for the rest of us. Take that away and we’ll be nickeled and dimed by the Millionaires and Billionaires every day for the rest of our lives. Our pensions and our salaries and our health benefits will disappear and our houses will get foreclosed on and sooner or later Bangladesh (or some Chinese sweatshop) will start looking like Paradise to us fools.

Realize that most of our current financial crisis WAS NOT caused by greedy unions and Social Security checks going to seniors or Medicare. It was greedy banks and mortgage companies and the pursuit of empire in the Middle East that was much of the cause of the current crisis. Restoring the Clinton-era tax rates would take care of most of the problem. Getting out of Iraq and Afghanistan would help tremendously. Scaling back on our more than 700 military installations around the world would help put us back on the road to full scale solvency.

You may not like unions. But when the Governors of Wisconsin and Ohio strip workers of their collective bargaining rights and get their first round of concessions on wages and benefits, they won’t stop there. They’ll be coming after what’s left of your pension and wages and benefits next. Maybe not this year or next, but it’s coming.