First off, have you heard Marc Martel, the singer who can channel Freddie Mercury's voice?
Here he is with some backup singers in 2007.
Cf the originals:
I have long felt that the death of Freddie Mercury was a tragic loss ot the world of rock 'n' roll and to music in general. He was so, so talented, even beyond the fact of his four-octave range. Queen's music remains some of favorite, as I am sure it is for many (including Wayne and Garth). I mourned the loss of Janis and Jim Morrison and Warren Zevon and Frank Zappa and Jerry Garcia when they died, but imnsho none of them were the monumental talent of Mercury.
This past week we lost another giant when Steve Jobs succumbed to pancreatic cancer. No matter his personal quirks and failings, he was an unparalleled visionary in the computer and electronics field. Quite simply, he changed our world, not once but over and over. The Mac. The iPod. The iPhone. The iPad. Apple can replace a CEO but can they replace his creativity?
Here is my idea. If Freddie Mercury's voice can be re-found in Marc Martel (I cannot speak to the latter's other musical talents, but they seem to be prodigious), how about Steve Job's imagination and dogged pursuit of simplicity and perfection? Let us have a world-wide audition and see what comes of it.
I heard this song on the Net a couple weeks ago and loved it. Here are three different music videos for it. Which is your favorite?
Finally, the official video.
I think the reason that Love Lost caught my fancy is that it reminds me of this song, a long-time favorite. Although LL loses the reggae beat; I guess it is the falsetto male voice that catches me.
#2 Son drove up last weekend to swap cars with me. He, Smokey, and I were sitting in the living room chatting and my iPod was sitting on its dock playing the playlist of mostly Baroque music I had put together for a library event last Friday night (that's another post). This song came on (my version is by Jean Soldan and the Lucerne Festival Strings, conducted by Rudolf Baumgartner, but it is not available on YouTube):
Matthew stopped talking and looked perplexed.
"I know that song," he said.
Then he pulled out his Raspberry (I love calling it that) and played this:
I think I prefer the first version, but the second has much to recommend it...
I had a very happy Sunday. I picked up all the stitches for the sleeves on the kimono sweater.
Music to work by:
That's a set of $10 speakers Smokey picked up a while back. I committed to provide the recorded music at a library event next month, and I wanted to test them with my iPod. All systems go so far.
I really don't know why it took me a week to work up the gumption to do this little task. I don't mind picking up stitches, although knowing I would have clear off the dining room table to have a place to work was a little daunting.
I picked up the all the stitches for each sleeve on its own needle, then decided I should count them to make sure that, 1, I had the same number of stitches for each sleeve, and, b, that I had picked up the same number on front and back. (The sweater, except for the fact that it is a cardigan, is perfectly symmetrical side to side and front to back. Such is the nature of a kimono [sweater].) Turned out I had nowhere near the same number of stitches in corresponding areas, so large parts had to be redone. But math and counting and a wee bit of measuring -- and remembering that 5 rows need 7 picked-up stitches -- saved the day. Each sleeve = 100 stitches.
Now I just need to knit the sleeves, which is perfectly mindless knitting for the first two-thirds or so, then lots of decreasing down to rolled-back garter cuffs. It is entirely possibly that I may get to wear this sweater before the snow melts.
The Stones have always been one of my favorite bands, ever since I was in high school in the 60s. For a time in my early 20s when I was plagued by depression, this album -- Let It Bleed -- was the only thing I could stand to listen to when I was down. On Sunday I cued up (queued up?) all the Stones music on my iPod and rocked out whilst picking up stitches. It was highly enjoyable.
* * * * *
#2 Son was here on Saturday and Sunday. He and Smokey spent a fair bit of time out in the garage swapping out new tires on his car and attempting to install a new exhaust system. But they took a little break to fix my office chair first.
For some reason the seat of the chair has been unlevel for several months. A few weeks ago I realized that sitting askew has been part of the reason for my chronic back pain. My resident fix-it experts to the rescue; I had looked under the chair myself and found nothing that looked like I could fix.
Success!
While they had the chair upside down, they cleaned the animal hair and other snarf out of the wheels.
Snarf that included a piece of yarn. Unbelievable!
Knitting was primarily of a stealth nature, but did include scientific swatching and the F'ing of a couple of O's that had been OTN for nearly, and over a year, respectively. (I am rather proud of that sentence -- and its punctuation -- awkward though it may be.)
June
June was for knitting and vacation and celebrating that brief magical time that is summer in the north woods.
Lots of knitting.
July.
July was for more vacation -- the rest of the one in Wyoming and another on the North Shore.
I learned the difference between eagles and turkey vultures, and I had surgery to remove some extra/unneeded bits and pieces and repair that torn cartilage in my knee.
Knitknitknit.
September.
In September I had lots of catsontheblog, it was my turn to give the prayer at the beginning of the monthly county board meeting, the county budget process blew up, and the most gloriously gorgeous month of the year was here.
morenew-to-memusic found its way into my iTunes, and we celebrated 35 years together
by not-camping on Lake Superior.
The kneedles continued to fly.
November.
The van that took us on some wonderful vacations met up with an unfortunate bear on the road and was replaced by an older but bigger and more customized van.
Cold weather arrived, and once more I cooked and baked.
Mostly, though, I knitted. Apparently I can crank out hats like other knitters crank out... sweaters
December.
I continued to be thankful (there is a lot to be thankful for).
With the help of Matthew and Maggie, I decorated for Christmas. This decorating thing is never a given.
I showed you my ornaments, y'all showed me yours.
We ate well.
A bit more knitting* for others.
I pretty much finished my Christmas knitting. (Shhh, the Calorimetry is a surprise.) The medical mittens are still OTN -- stay tuned.
*For someone who doesn't like pink, I sure knit a lot of it lately...
I am not a big fan of avant garde music. John Cage sets my teeth on edge. John Coltrane and Theolonius Monk make me want to change the channel. I do like a bit of Philip Glass occasionally, also Steve Reich. but in general I prefer the 17th and 18th century classics.
Then I heard Zoe Keating on Radio Lab. Maybe it is because I find cello music to be orgasmic (figuratively speaking; I'm not THAT weird), maybe it is because her music reminds me of Philip Glass, maybe (probably) it is because she does not completely abandon melodic themes, but I instantly fell in love with her music, so much so that I scurried off to the iTunes store and bought one of her albums, something I do very, very rarely. (Heh. Diagram THAT sentence.)
He borrowed a bike trailer from a friend and has been towing around the speakers (above), amp, and a car battery so that he had MUSIC! when he rides. The whole things must weigh at least 70 pounds. Source music comes from his iPod. Smokey has promised to get me a photo but it hasn't happened yet. To me it kind of defeats one of the reasons a person might enjoy bike riding -- to enjoy the quiet and listen to the birds, etc. But that's just me.
He says he gets some really strange looks when he rides, pulling this contraction. No, really?
But I love the idea of the rolling bike/dance party, especially the "no-hater" part. That's-a my boy!
So if you are a Twin Cities biker who likes to stay up late and doesn't mind getting wet (rain in the forecast), head on over to the West River Road bike path under Hennepin Avenue at 9 pm Friday night.
And say Hey! to this [slightly dorky-lookin'] guy:
#2 son introduced me to Bela Fleck and the Flecktones. This particular piece is one of the most unabashedly joyous pieces of music I have ever had the pleasure to listen to.
* * * * *
Speaking of joy, have you ever visited this site? It is a powerful antidote to that other site I gave you.
ETA: thanks to IBOL guy for posting the GMH link on his blog.
Last week I got a belated birthday present from #1 son. He sent me 9 CD-Rs filled with music that he had acquired. About half is classical: Bach (Goldberg Variations), Beethoven, Brahms. Chopin, Debussy, Dvorak, Handel, Hayden, Holst, Mahler, Mozart, Tchaikovsky, Vivaldi; much of the rest is 20th century: Philip Glass (I love his music but don't have much), Shostakovich, Stravinsky; some minimalist: Steve Reich, Terry Riley; some I had not heard of: Gyorgy Ligeti, Anro Pärt, The Magnetic Fields; and Tom Waits (for someone with a weakness for gravelly voiced singers, I find it odd I had never gotten into his music).
It's gonna take a long time to synch my iPod...
* * * * *
Attention, knitbloggers!
Bullwinkle is asking for our help to get to Antarctica. Go read her blog, then go vote for her if you want
And the Black Hole award for excess packaging goes to...
GNC!
I took your advice and searched out arnica gel to use on any future bruises. Too soon for any verdict on the gel, but it was easy to give this award.
Did they really need a 6"x6"x8" box for a plastic tube barely 5" long and 1" in diameter? ::le sigh::
* * * * *
Today is Tuesday (yeah, I wrote this yesterday), and it has been...
::counting furiously on fingers and toes::
five (5!) weeks since I last fell down!
Sort of like AA's medallions for x weeks/months/years of sobriety, I intend to award myself something similar for every week I manage NOT to injure myself by falling.
The perspicacious among you may notice that "NOT injuring my self by falling" is not exactly the same as not falling down. Last night I was walking around the van to the driver's side after putting my tote bags and purse into the passenger side. It was dark and I was tired -- perfect conditions for a mishap -- and I ran into the trailer hitch on the van; it sticks out about a foot beyond the rear bumper. I got a little bruise on my leg (arnica gel used, but no verdict yet), but more importantly, I did NOT injure myself by falling onto the pavement. I attribute this 100% to my newly-acquired habit of walking more slowly. I did sort-of fall, but caught myself on my hands; if I had been walking at my usual speed I would have landed -- on my bad knee! -- before I could react.
Now, to decide what my reward should be...
* * * * *
A couple more images from the Thorogood/Lang concert.
Why in the world would anyone pay $30 -- let along $45 -- to go see this turkey? I can be annoyed by him for free any time I want.
Besides the Harley Davidson apparel that was so evident among the audience members, there was, of course, a fair bit of brand-new Thorogood apparel.
The very best Thorogood-inspired t-shirts, though, and ones that I tragically failed to get a photo of, were worn by three guys who hung out near the video cameras. Each had on a light green t-shirt; the back of the first said, "1 BOURBON," the second, "1 SCOTCH", and the third, "AND 1 BEER". When they were shown on the big screens the crowd cheered.
But not everyone in the crowd was an aging boozer/low life.
And lest we ever forget that I live in the great Scandinavian north:
* * * * *
A sign at the Bristol zoo snack bar that cracked me up when I saw it at boingboing.net:
As we all know, the featured performer is only half the fun of going to a concert. Particularly if one spends most of her time in seclusion with her knitting and her cats, venturing out only to small-town venues where she already knows everyone, an excursion to a place where there are crowds! of various (and variant) peoples! is an entertainment in itself.
I took more pictures of the crowd than I did of the performers on stage.
We fit into this crowd quite well. There was plenty of gray hair.
Before we left home we discussed whether to bring along Smokey's walker. It was still disassembled from the Wyoming vacation, so would have fit into the car easily. His arthritis makes it difficult for him to walk any distance, and since we had never been to the Grand Casino amphitheater we didn't know how far we might have to walk. We ended up leaving it at home, and since we got to park in the handicapped parking area, we didn't have to walk far.
But once again, we would have fit right in.
I coveted some of the wheelchairs we saw -- any one of them would have been a big step up from the one I used last year.
The Harley Davidson look was extremely popular. Just one example:
complete with well-earned wrinkles.
Once upon a time we were all young and svelte and lithe. Nowadays, not so much.
That could just as easily be a picture of my own sit-upon except that it was too difficult to take a picture of myself.
So if you are ever wondering if the median age of the population may be increasing, rest assured that it is. But also know that just because we are aging, we ain't dead yet.
And we can still party like it's 1999... as long as we can spend the rest of the weekend recovering.
I'm sure you all guessed which of those guilty pleasures I mentioned yesterday was the one we indulged last night. We saw the show here:
The amphitheater is an outdoor venue.
An outdoor event is a risky venture pretty much anywhere in the US except maybe the desert. Rain, snow, wind, excessive chill or heat -- all are possible, perhaps even in the same day. But as you can tell from the above photo, we had ideal weather last night. The sky was perfectly clear, there was no wind, the temp was about 70℉ at the time of the photo, dropping to the high 50s by 11:30 when it was all over. Luckily Smokey had reminded me that the concert was going to be outdoors so I was prepared with heavy socks, fingerless gloves, a wool scarf, warm sweats to pull on over my jeans and t-shirt, and my Calorimetry. (Turned out I didn't need the scarf or Cal and only needed the gloves for a short period -- as soon as I started clapping again my hands got warm.) We even brought a down comforter stuffed into a tote bag just in case; never took it out.
You cold-weather-phobes are shaking your heads right now, while many of the Upper Midwesterners are nodding in agreement with my assessment of the weather. So be it. Let's agree to disagree and move on, 'kay?
JonnyLang (first link has audio of Bump in the Road that starts automatically when the page loads; turn down your sound if you are at work and crank it up if you are at home) was the warm-up act, although any number of people at the concert were there specifically to see him; George Thorogood was "...just the icing on the cake", to quote the guy who was sitting next to us.
[digression] When that guy slid onto the bench next to me, he said looked over and said, "Well, hey, Smokey! Small world, man!" Turns out he a CD counselor on one of the chemical dependency units at the hospital where Smokey works. They have worked together many times, and Smokey likes him a lot. Rick is a good man: good with the kids, good to work with. It was a treat to meet him and his wife. [/digression]
Jonny Lang is an awesomely talented blues musician, a semi-local boy from Fargo, ND, who already sounded like a 40-year-old blues singer when he hit the charts at age 14. I saw him once at a Twin Cities Best Buy store in the mid-90s. Didn't know who he was at that time. I just saw this pimply-faced teenager who looked like he should be bagging groceries at Super Valu sitting behind a table autographing CDs for a long line of people. Had to ask who he was. Duh.
Anyway.
Like all good [blues] musicians, he really gets into a song.
Having trouble seeing it?
How about now?
This is actually a very mild grimace. That young man really, really feels his music.
Disclaimer: I don't mean to sound snarky, even though I do. He is awesome and I love him and his music. It is just that displays of emotion are disquieting to say the least to us Scandinavians. Hence, my comments.
It is always a plus when, in addition to being talented and entertaining, the performer seems to be a decent human being. Jonny Lang gave us that plus.
On to the headliner, GeorgeThorogood and the Delaware Destroyers.
(Note: once again, the first link automatically cues up and starts an
audio; turn down your speakers if you are at work and crank 'em up if
you are at home.)
It was dark by the time George came on, and I wasn't able to get good still photos of him. (The two photos in the Wikipedia article could have been taken last night, though -- he wore that same black t-shirt and pants and coordinating headband and played that same white guitar.) Here is the only video I took that turned out to be in focus. The sound sucks, but that is because it was LOUD! and overwhelmed the microphone in my little camera. Rest assured, it sound way better in person.
Notice how bored the bass player looks. That was actually the most animated performance he put on all night. I guess when you have an exhibitionist in the front, you don't need to put on a show in the background.
As good a show as GT & D put on, I cannot say that he came across as a decent human being. An extrovert and a flamboyant rocker, but not necessarily someone you would want to have coffee with or have as a neighbor. (Gee, ya think, Kath?) Happily, that quality of decency is not required of a performer, only that they entertain us, which he most certainly did. At one point, right after he had made some overtly sexual remarks apparently directed at a woman in the audience, he laughed and said, "I'm so full of shit I don't even believe it myself."
I find it amusing that Smokey and I -- about as far from party animals and drinkers as two people can be -- enjoy this performer and his music so much. Thorogood and the Destroyers are the ultimate down-and-dirty bar band. Another comment I heard: "I don't even like to drink that much, but when I hear these guys I just want to go get hammered."
And that is the perfect compliment to their style of music. Total fun and a rollicking good time; just don't take it too much to heart.
