The Americana and roots music authority
10 Things Grant Wants You To Know
In no especial order...
(1) I finally put the Courtyard Hounds album in the CD player in the little red truck, though it wasn't what I was listening to when I backed into the football player this afternoon. It leaves me wondering what Natalie Maines might do should she have a solo album in process somewhere. And reminds me that Jesse Havey, one-time lead singer of the Duhks, has a solo EP out. Or she did. Or I thought she did. And I should go get it now, except I have nine more things to type.
(2) I was listening to the Phil Ochs demos CD when I blindly reversed into that Ohio license plate (sorry, really). I realize it's already been written about here, but I was struck immediately by the opening song lampooning the American Medical Association, and how many of those barbs might still stick, how little has changed since the early 1960s. A pity, all around.
(3) Inevitable political digression, borrowed from a Facebook comment I made when somebody else simply printed the First Amendment and got a wee bit of flack for it. How do the strict constructionists of the right justify not extending the notion of religious freedom to Islam. And why do we allow sham arguments -- like the siting of a mosque or whatever the correct word for the proposed structure might be -- to dominate our political discourse.
(4) There is nothing quite like learning that your chickens have learned how to fly when trying to catch one. I'm sure there's karmic justice in that mouthful of feathers, but, still...
(5) I'm right proud of Barry Mazor and the attention his book, Meeting Jimmie Rodgers: How America's Original Roots Music Hero Changed the Pop Sounds of a Century, is getting. It does me proud to see our writing alums out there working.
(6) I'm also right proud of Kurt Reighley's new book, United States of Americana. Even though I haven't seen it yet.
(7) Speaking of books, which is sort of what I sat down to do...some months back I meant to commend to your attention Hard Luck Blues: Roots Music Photographs from the Great Depression by Rich Remsberg. I am a sucker for documentary photography, for Walker Evans and Margaret Bourke White and all the other early black and white artists. This is the culmination of a many-year project culling images from the Farm Security Administration's Depression-era project documenting rural America. Evans is represented here, as is Dorothea Lange and some other names less familiar to me. I tend not to read words which surround photo and art books because they tend generally to be attempts to justify tenure or some such. Remsberg does a stellar job setting the context for these images; indeed, I like his words almost more than the photographs. Which are sometimes...less...than one might hope for. And yet, revealing. I also wish the photos had been better reproduced, but budgets are tight.
(8) Speaking of books and ND alums...Maggie and I had a splendid few evenings reading the latest from Laurel Snyder, who was an occasional stringer for us in the early days. It's called Penny Dreadful, written for I'd guess fourth through sixth grade readers, but beautifully written nonetheless. The story concerns a young girl raised in affluence in a big city, transported by the magic of transformative events in one's life to a small town and an intentional kind of community in rural Tennessee. It's smart and kind and gentle, and made my wife cry at the end. Hell, I even choked up reading it to Maggie. So there.
(9) If ever you were tempted to attend the America Music Association's Honors & Awards (thanks, Dick Clark, for that easily repeated name), this is the year. And not simply because it's my third final year working on them, although I mean it, man. Because it promises to be worth the trip. And that's absolutely all I can say, in public or in private.
(10) My title references a brilliant punk fanzine called 10 Things Jesus Wants You To Know that was started by a guy who worked in the back room of the Backstreets shipping department. Kind of like Sub Pop and grunge hatching in Muzak's tape duplication rooms.
(1) I finally put the Courtyard Hounds album in the CD player in the little red truck, though it wasn't what I was listening to when I backed into the football player this afternoon. It leaves me wondering what Natalie Maines might do should she have a solo album in process somewhere. And reminds me that Jesse Havey, one-time lead singer of the Duhks, has a solo EP out. Or she did. Or I thought she did. And I should go get it now, except I have nine more things to type.
(2) I was listening to the Phil Ochs demos CD when I blindly reversed into that Ohio license plate (sorry, really). I realize it's already been written about here, but I was struck immediately by the opening song lampooning the American Medical Association, and how many of those barbs might still stick, how little has changed since the early 1960s. A pity, all around.
(3) Inevitable political digression, borrowed from a Facebook comment I made when somebody else simply printed the First Amendment and got a wee bit of flack for it. How do the strict constructionists of the right justify not extending the notion of religious freedom to Islam. And why do we allow sham arguments -- like the siting of a mosque or whatever the correct word for the proposed structure might be -- to dominate our political discourse.
(4) There is nothing quite like learning that your chickens have learned how to fly when trying to catch one. I'm sure there's karmic justice in that mouthful of feathers, but, still...
(5) I'm right proud of Barry Mazor and the attention his book, Meeting Jimmie Rodgers: How America's Original Roots Music Hero Changed the Pop Sounds of a Century, is getting. It does me proud to see our writing alums out there working.
(6) I'm also right proud of Kurt Reighley's new book, United States of Americana. Even though I haven't seen it yet.
(7) Speaking of books, which is sort of what I sat down to do...some months back I meant to commend to your attention Hard Luck Blues: Roots Music Photographs from the Great Depression by Rich Remsberg. I am a sucker for documentary photography, for Walker Evans and Margaret Bourke White and all the other early black and white artists. This is the culmination of a many-year project culling images from the Farm Security Administration's Depression-era project documenting rural America. Evans is represented here, as is Dorothea Lange and some other names less familiar to me. I tend not to read words which surround photo and art books because they tend generally to be attempts to justify tenure or some such. Remsberg does a stellar job setting the context for these images; indeed, I like his words almost more than the photographs. Which are sometimes...less...than one might hope for. And yet, revealing. I also wish the photos had been better reproduced, but budgets are tight.
(8) Speaking of books and ND alums...Maggie and I had a splendid few evenings reading the latest from Laurel Snyder, who was an occasional stringer for us in the early days. It's called Penny Dreadful, written for I'd guess fourth through sixth grade readers, but beautifully written nonetheless. The story concerns a young girl raised in affluence in a big city, transported by the magic of transformative events in one's life to a small town and an intentional kind of community in rural Tennessee. It's smart and kind and gentle, and made my wife cry at the end. Hell, I even choked up reading it to Maggie. So there.
(9) If ever you were tempted to attend the America Music Association's Honors & Awards (thanks, Dick Clark, for that easily repeated name), this is the year. And not simply because it's my third final year working on them, although I mean it, man. Because it promises to be worth the trip. And that's absolutely all I can say, in public or in private.
(10) My title references a brilliant punk fanzine called 10 Things Jesus Wants You To Know that was started by a guy who worked in the back room of the Backstreets shipping department. Kind of like Sub Pop and grunge hatching in Muzak's tape duplication rooms.
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Comment by Kim Ruehl on August 25, 2010 at 1:41pm -
I would love to hear a Natalie Maines solo album, and have a suspicion it would be a rollicking disc. It'd probably be exactly the opposite of what that Court Yard Hounds record is. I like the what they did live at SXSW, but the album came out decidedly more tame than all that.
The fact that the AP had to tell its reporters to avoid employing the phrase "Ground Zero mosque" (being that it's neither a mosque, nor at Ground Zero) speaks volumes. Still, I'm afraid the bullshit hose already sprayed that spin far enough. The whole debate is embarrassing.
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Comment by Adam Sheets on August 25, 2010 at 1:44pm -
As long as Christian missionaries are allowed in Iraq, there is no debate.
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Comment by Kim Fowler on August 26, 2010 at 9:29am -
The debate is embarrassing now and will be a dark mark on our history. I read a great quote the other day, "you can't simultaneously acknowledge a right and insist your government suppress it."
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Comment by Andy on August 26, 2010 at 9:57am -
What my dear American friends has Iraq got to do with it?
Don't you see that stuff like this makes y'all petty really
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Comment by Andy on August 26, 2010 at 9:58am
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Seem petty I meant sorry
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Comment by Adam Sheets on August 26, 2010 at 10:05am
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Just making an analogy to go along with item number three on Grant's list.
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Comment by RP N10 on August 26, 2010 at 3:37pm -
I heard the Courtyard Hounds record when NPR was streaming it a few months ago and thought it sounded a bit thin. Then last month I found it on special at a branch of HMV and decided to take a chance. There's a lot more to it than there seems at first listen and I'm now looking forward to their show at Union Chapel on All Saints Day; comment re SXSW noted.
For non-mosque not at ground zero comment this one was pretty good:
http://tinyurl.com/35za5p4
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Comment by Grant Alden on August 26, 2010 at 5:19pm -
I think Iraq has to do with the Ground Zero mosque to the extent that the discussion [sic] about the mosque furthers the impression that we are the implacable enemy of Islam. And some seem to be just that, just as once they were the implacable enemy of the Irish, the Chinese, the Jewish, the Swedish, and every other wave of immigrants which has settled on this already settled land.
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Comment by Daniel T on August 30, 2010 at 11:38pm -
The Courtyard Hounds? One more to look up.
Natalie solo? Bet Lloyd would produce and play. Bet it would sound good too.
How little has changed indeed. For all our technical marvels, and they are testaments to human ingenuity, we still haven't changed the basic human character with all it's flaws. BP is a good example. The Sudan another , Mexico and our "illegal" problem another, my neighbor with the bonfire and parties 'till dawn ...ad infinitum
As for ground Zero ( + 2 blocks north , 1 west) . They own it. They aren't breaking any zoning laws. Deny them the right to do with it as they please, and we throw away the principles so many in this nations history have died for. Shameful.
Hundreds of Muslims died in the WTC murders also. Al-Qa'ida may consider them martyrs. Their families consider them victims.
Chicken's can fly? I thought they just kind of jumped while flapping their wings.
I'll put Barry Mazor's book on the list. Jimmie Rogers !! Where would we be without him. Seriously, would there even be an ND without Jimmie Rogers?
There's nothing wrong with novel's written for 4th-6th graders. It takes a lot to capture their attention. And when a book can make you choke up, any book....... I gotta find this read. But then "Atlas Shrugged " choked me up too. Seriously. I love that book.
"Photographs of the Depression"? Get out your Canon and start snapping. Downtown, vacant housing tracts, the old factory side of town, the "wrong" side of the tracks, closed retailers, the faces of the unemployed and homeless. Take a few every day for 10-12 years and you may be able to put out your own book on "Photographs of the Depression,2009-2021".
And whatever happened to America being the implacable enemy of tyranny and injustice? Or am I just naive?
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Comment by John Flavell on September 5, 2010 at 4:37pm -
Political digression. Political discourse. Political message. The only way to make us forget who put us in this mess is to find something to talk about. Especially when they know their opponents are fractured and weak.
FYI: Photographers do not 'snap' pictures. They make pictures.
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