Golden Country

I'm pleased so many people enjoyed "Monster" by Steppenwolf. For those who think that sort of hell-raising song was rare or a fluke during the 70s, let me assure you, it wasn't.

Below, a fantastic, must-see video set to still another 70s revolution-oriented staple of FM rock radio, Golden Country, by REO Speedwagon. (Their very popular song Ridin the storm out was probably the first hippie-survivalist rock song, or at least the first to start with an air raid siren.) Golden Country likewise starts off like major gangbusters--I used to leap over furniture to turn up the radio when I heard those first few distinctive wah-wah notes. Kevin Cronin wasn't always the best singer, but what he lacked in talent, he made up for in sheer verve. This song was written by lead guitarist Gary Richrath and originally released in 1972. Richrath's guitar work is blazing and obviously heartfelt.

No, you don't have to listen to all 8:27 of this either. Lyrics below. Various lefties of my acquaintance used to make fun of the line "and your freaks are crying"--but hey, it rhymes with "dying," okay? (And yes, despite the bad rhyme, us freaks were crying, then as now.) We could also argue that a COUNTRY's face can't actually be red, but well, I suppose that's quibbling.

Enjoy, you counterculture maniacs! The visuals on this one are exemplary! (Even the late Iron Eyes Cody makes it into the video!)



Golden country your face is so red
With all of your money your poor can be fed
You strut around and you flirt with disaster
Never really caring just what comes after
Well your blacks are dying but your back is still turned
And your freaks are crying but your back is still turned
You better stop your hiding or your country will burn
The time has come for you, my friend
To all this ugliness we must put an end
Before we leave we must make a stand

Mortgage people you crawl to your homes
Your security lies in your bed of white foam
You act concerned but then why turn away
When a lady was raped on your doorstep today
Well your red man's dying but your back is still turned
And your freaks are crying but your back is still turned
You better stop your hiding or your country will burn
The time has come for you, my friend
To all this ugliness we must put an end
Before we leave we must make a stand

Golden country your face is so red
With all of your money your poor can be fed
You strut around and you flirt with disaster
Never really caring just what comes after
Well your blacks are dying but your back is still turned
And your freaks are crying but your back is still turned
You better stop your hiding or your country will burn
Now you don't wanna see it burn

The time has come for you, my friend
To all this ugliness we must put an end
Before we leave we must make a stand

Oh people, doncha know, we must make a stand

Odds and Sods - last debate edition

A self-defined radical lesbian feminist writer named Julie Bindel has been nominated for a Stonewall award. The problem with this person is her hateful writing against transgendered people. Why has she been nominated? Did they even READ her work first?

I won't link her nastiness here, but Lisa at Questioning Transphobia (previous link) has chronicled it well. She proclaims "a world inhabited just by transsexuals" would look like the set of GREASE. Not sure I get that, but hey, that rhetoric reminds me of various offensive shit I heard growing up. Is the whole world clamoring to transition? We must POLICE the gender-borders to insure people aren't illegally crossing over! She sounds like she believes trans people are a GATEWAY DRUG! Or maybe it's the Domino Theory as applied to gender: First you let them transition and .... the whole world will want to do it!!! And then the whole world will look like GREASE!!!!!!

It's the Cold War all over again.

A Facebook group has been formed expressly for the purpose of protesting Bindel's nomination, and Bindel herself has joined it to "monitor" the "harassment" being directed at her persecuted personage. Yes, she has even barged into the group formed to talk about her, taking it over to defend herself! Some people really do amaze me in their abject cluelessness. A good lesson in how NOT to behave, is yours for free, so go over to Lisa's and read.

Momentary digression: I find Facebook distracting in a way I don't find regular blogs. Maybe it's because my eye is "trained" to read blogs, while Facebook seems like a free-for-all with too much going on. It's like when I used to have penpals and exchange "slam books" by mail in my youth--did anyone else do that, waaaaay before the advent of computers? It was terribly distracting, since I would end up writing book-length letters to people I barely knew...it was a lot like blogging!

And so, my attention is majorly diverted, particularly when there are lots of attractive people around of varying genders, all looking fabulous, as if they are dressed up to go see Iggy Pop. (I'd name names, but that would be rude.) Suffice to say, I end up going over to their blogs, Flickr accounts and suchlike, to see more pics and read about their interesting activities. FUN! But yes, as I said, distracting.

~*~

Christina Hendricks heats up the office on MAD MEN, photo from The Way of the Future.


And speaking of bisexuality (nice segue, yes?), my new celebrity crush is Christina Hendricks of MAD MEN, whom some of my fellow Scifi geeks will recall from the cult-series Firefly. I first saw her in one of those Lifetime TV-movies about anorexia, titled Hunger Point. Admittedly, I really enjoyed the movie, in a daytime-soapsuds sort of way... and then I see her on MAD MEN looking exceedingly VOLUPTUOUS, and I wondered if the movie had any influence on that fact, or was she cast in Hunger Point primarily for that reason?

Christina Hendricks' character is the fabulous Joan Holloway, who sizzles even (especially?) when she is firing some poor, hapless, weeping secretary... I don't mind telling you: I would LOVE to be fired by Joan! ("Hey, no problem, girlfriend, this job sucks. Can we get together for coffee later?") Interestingly and predictably, there is a lot of talk about her weight. Googling her name and the word "weight"--however, I see that there are lots of folks who feel just like I do, starved for a woman with real CURVES on TV. Since MAD MEN is set in 1962, it is completely historically accurate and realistic that a Marilyn-Monroesque woman would be the office diva. (In one episode, Joan and her typing pool sob after learning of Marilyn's death.)

Nonetheless, Christina's ample form has attracted attention from many quarters:

Christina Hendricks as Joan on "Mad Men" could single-handedly bring back hips. Real hips. The kind that will send a skinny man skittering across a dance floor. And I must admit that my jaw still drops when she sashays on screen with a rump as big as a holiday ham. My first reaction is always: She's huge! What a silly reaction to a woman who is probably a size 8 or 10.

Then I realize that most leading women on TV, such as Holly Hunter and Teri Hatcher, are pipe cleaners, and so I never expect to see prime-time zaftig. It's as odd to me as a virgin martini. Frankly, I am so accustomed to seeing protruding hipbones that I have to adjust my own visual definition of what is womanly. That's pretty screwed up, in fact.

Yes, I'd say so.

Well, not me, people! MORE CHRISTINA, MORE CHRISTINA! Christina, 24/7!

~*~

And finally, as everyone knows, the last presidential debate between the two candidates, Senators Barack Obama and John McCain, was last night. Working my ass off and preparing for retail inventory, I scurried in only towards the last half, and found myself staying up late to watch the debate rerun on MSNBC.

(When it comes to politics, some of us are just plain junkies.)

I gotta ask: Is there STILL any question who should win? Who isn't ready to bomb-bomb-bomb-bomb-bomb Iran? Which person is more thoughtful, careful, cautious? I don't want someone in the Oval Office who is eager to nuke other countries at the drop of a hat, you know? McCain's vengeful, angry, warmongering vibe radiated off the screen, in countless ways.

Barack Obama deserves major credit for not rising to the trash-Sarah-Palin bait...at first I thought he should let her have it, but after various commentators congratulated him on his cool and restraint, I realized, no, his instincts were perfect. (That's just what I would have done.) He is too smooth and smart to cave in to that pettiness.

Just think how EXCELLENT he will be on the world stage.

Novenas in triplicate for my favorite Chicago politician, ascending to heaven as we speak.

More:

Debate III: Edgy McCain sheds no new light (Politico)

Put McCain out of his Misery (Huffington Post)

John McCain: Openly scoffing at your Health (Feministe)

Thank You, Right Wing Pundits (Daily Kos)

So much for McCain's outreach to women voters (Crooks and Liars)

Obama Three for Three: Short Takes on the Final Presidential Debate (AlterNet)

And McCain's "regular American"--Joe the Plumber--presented to us for our ongoing edification? Turns out to be an unlicensed plumber and tax evader.

Well, what did we expect? John McCain has had problems choosing his friends ever since the Keating Five scandal.

Wordless Wednesdays: Signs, signs, everywhere a sign

Sign #1 is a Greenville, South Carolina institution. (Apologies to my fellow vegetarians!)


Sign #2 is from a church in Greer, South Carolina.


Sign #3 is from Cafe and Then Some; a local comedy troupe spoof of the TV show.

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Listening to: Uncle Tupelo - Chickamauga
via FoxyTunes

Now it's a monster and will not obey

No, you are NOT expected to listen to all 7 minutes.

Offering this as Exhibit A, in my efforts to prove to people that revolutionary talk was all the rage in 1970, the year Bill and Bernadine were cooking up bombs in Greenwich Village and blew up three of their friends... and for the record, those are the only people they ever killed. Themselves.

As I said in the comments of my post titled the Bradley Effect, everyone got in on the act.

I wrote the following, in that thread, which I am reproducing here:

Did you ever hear the song "Monster" by Steppenwolf? I mention it (as a totally random example) because I first heard it at a redneck* party with a bunch of bikers drinking beer. I thought, WOW, since some of them were enthusiastically singing along with it, even the ones with confederate flag tattoos. And this was Bill Ayers' era.

[Mike commented on the thread]: "but that that class of radicals think different from mainstream America."

Speaking of 2008, you would be right... in fact, any time after Reagan was inaugurated, you would be right. BUT AT THE TIME???? You are dead-ass wrong. As the poet-laureate of the age so memorably sang, "There was music in the cafes at night and revolution in the air." Hippies, bikers, housewives who frequented the same beauty salon my grandmother did, my neighbors, et. al. talked about revolution as if it might be inevitable, and there was even a revolutionary faction of ex-GIs against the war. Even serial killers (think: the most famous of our time) believed in revolution and made that part of their psychosis. IT WAS VERY DIFFERENT THAN NOW, and even my Republican grandfather from West Virginia thought there could be revolution.

Can I ask how old you are, and if you were there at the time? How old were you in the 70s?

As I wrote [in my Bill Ayers post linked above], I am getting fed up with the rewrites of history by people who have it wrong in countless ways. In addition, you are applying the morality of NOW to the morality of THEN, and as we all know, 20/20 hindsight is perfect.

And I offer the lyrics, also, to "Monster" (below) for those who can't get through the whole song. Musically, starts off like gangbusters alright, great middle-section, then at the end, turns into a sing-along... but again the SING-ALONG aspect was the POINT. Regular people, not Weatherman, but REGULAR PEOPLE bought this album and used to SING ALONG!!! The video I have selected, however, is pretty good. There are several versions, suggesting this song is as much of a landmark in other people's lives, as it was in mine.

This song represents so much. I wondered, as a teenager, if it meant there really might be revolution, which excited me. I was a working class kid from Ohio, and that's what I thought. The concept of revolution was not APART from the masses of mainstream America, at that time... just as now, "ordinary, mainstream America" is suddenly learning the intricacies of Wall Street economics, whether we really want to or not.

Dammit, stop rewriting history!


*one of those words I am allowed to use, but you aren't. :)


~*~

Words and music by John Kay and Jerry Edmonton

(Monster)
Once the religious, the hunted and weary
Chasing the promise of freedom and hope
Came to this country to build a new vision
Far from the reaches of kingdom and pope
Like good Christians, some would burn the witches
Later some got slaves to gather riches

But still from near and far to seek America
They came by thousands to court the wild
And she just patiently smiled and bore a child
To be their spirit and guiding light

And once the ties with the crown had been broken
Westward in saddle and wagon it went
And 'til the railroad linked ocean to ocean
Many the lives which had come to an end
While we bullied, stole and bought our homeland
We began the slaughter of the red man

But still from near and far to seek America
They came by thousands to court the wild
And she just patiently smiled and bore a child
To be their spirit and guiding light

The blue and grey they stomped it
They kicked it just like a dog
And when the war over
They stuffed it just like a hog

And though the past has it's share of injustice
Kind was the spirit in many a way
But it's protectors and friends have been sleeping
Now it's a monster and will not obey

(Suicide)
The spirit was freedom and justice
And it's keepers seem generous and kind
It's leaders were supposed to serve the country
But now they won't pay it no mind
'Cause the people grew fat and got lazy
And now their vote is a meaningless joke
They babble about law and order
But it's all just an echo of what they've been told
Yeah, there's a monster on the loose
It's got our heads into a noose
And it just sits there watchin'

Our cities have turned into jungles
And corruption is stranglin' the land
The police force is watching the people
And the people just can't understand
We don't know how to mind our own business
'Cause the whole worlds got to be just like us
Now we are fighting a war over there
No matter who's the winner
We can't pay the cost
'Cause there's a monster on the loose
It's got our heads into a noose
And it just sits there watching

(America)
America where are you now?
Don't you care about your sons and daughters?
Don't you know we need you now
We can't fight alone against the monster

Dead Air Church - Fall for Greenville

My first attempt at sports photography! Not bad!

I totally underestimated how fast these guys were.

There I was, messing around with stuff and getting ready--and by the time I snapped and snapped, I got the two guys bringing up the rear. My second attempt was ALL BLURRRR, and it was three laps before I finally understood, start snapping as soon as they pass; just TAKE THE PHOTOS and do not attempt anything as high-minded as aim or focus. Consequently, this was the best of several.

I am now more respectful of actual professional sports shutterbugs, but they probably have pretty nice equipment, yes?

Fall for Greenville, our local street fair, is this weekend. This was the St Francis Hospital bike race, last evening.

~*~

The Official Dead Air Fall for Greenville Music award goes to Mac Arnold & Plate Full O' Blues (left) who sounded so fantastic, I bought their CD titled Backbone and Gristle.

Feeling particularly moved, I also bought one of their souvenir T-shirts, commemorating the 2nd Annual Mac Arnold Cornbread and Collard Greens Blues Festival--which is not one those things you get a chance to buy every day. (Yes, it's an actual local event organized by Mac, and I'm disappointed I missed it!)

~*~

At left, The Randall Bramblett Band. Entertaining enough.

~*~

South Africa's Civil Twilight. Very good; the guitarist has excellent, quite admirable abilities at harnessing feedback and is very impressive.


























And the drummer is exceptionally CUTE. :)

















The teenyboppers were madly shooting pics of the singer, he was a big hit.