One of Bruce Springsteen's under-appreciated talents is his ability to pick covers.
Think of songs like "Jersey Girl," "Trapped," "Raise Your Hand" or "My Ride's Here." The average person---and even many true Bruce fans---has no idea that Springsteen didn't write these tunes.
Bruce has always covered songs that not only fit his familiar themes (like his Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger covers) and his love of previous eras (like his Elvis and Little Richard covers).
But he is also very successful at finding songs the sound like he could have written them.
Such is the case with his new single, "High Hopes," originally performed by The Javalinas. Check out these lyrics:
Monday morning runs to Sunday night Screaming slow me down before the new year dies Well it won't take much to kill a loving smile And every mother with a baby crying in her arms, singing Give me help, give me strength Give a soul a night of fearless sleep Give me love, give me peace Don't you know these days you pay for everything Got high hopes I got high hopes
I was standing at the back of the crowd as Tom Morello ended. I was looking for my wife, who'd been texting me from somewhere up front, when I saw Sue come out of the crowd.
She, like pretty much everyone else who'd just seen his spirited set, was pretty amped up. She gave me a big smile, said something like, "What a show!" and slapped me a high-five.
Then she said a quote that I knew I knew, but I couldn't place right away. But knowing Sue, I was sure it was a Bruce Springsteen line.
I first spoke to Sue McDonald several years ago. She had contacted to the station to let us know that she, along with some other Bruce Springsteen fans, were raising money for the Danny Federici Melanoma Fund. (Federici was the longtime organ player and multi-instrumentalist in the E Street Band). We made her the mvyradio Person Of The Week (hear it in our archives), to spread the word about the good deed she and her other Springsteen loving friends were doing in honor of the band member who'd recently passed away from cancer.
I thought of Sue again, two years ago, when my wife was approaching the due date of our second child. We knew it was going to be a boy, and I knew that I wasn't going to be able to keep up this blog while I was out. So I contacted Sue, and asked her if she'd like to do a Guest Blogger slot, and write about Springsteen songs featuring Fathers and Sons. Two of the Top Five Most Viewed Posts in the history of my blog, are by Sue.
Sue and I continued to bump into each other at various shows and mvy events, including the Newport Folk Festival on a few occasions. And because we're friends on Facebook, I kept up with her musical adventures. It seemed like every time I saw her status, she was off to see another live concert.
So it was curious to see her post a comment on the mvyradio Facebook page, during Newport Folk 2011. I wrote her a quick email to ask why she wasn't at Fort Adams this year.
"I'm with you in spirit, PJ! Unfortunately some medical stuff has gotten in the way . . ."
She went onto explain that she'd be diagnosed with lymphoma. She called it "highly treatable," but she was still going to have to go through chemotherapy. She had, in fact, had her first treatment the day before the festival, so she felt it would be wise to spend a couple of days on the couch, and enjoy the festival vicariously through mvy.
I heard from her periodically through the Fall. She lost her hair ("Apparently I'll be rockin' the Sinead O'Connor look for a while"), but the chemo did what the doctors said it would do. Her tumor disappeared and she began the to road to reclaiming her life, which (as best I could gather from Facebook) included getting out to as many shows as time and money would allow.
I ran into her early in the weekend at Newport Folk this year.
"I think about where I was at this time last year . . . " she said. We let that thought hang in the air for a minute. "I'm just glad to be here."
I saw her a couple more times over the course of the weekend, including at the Tom Morello set, as we were all running from one stage to the next.
You know, I was slightly embarrassed when I thought about high-fiving
you on my way out of the tent after this show. I'm a pretty reserved
person, after all. But, I was so energized by Tom Morello's
performance, by raising a fist to "Union Town", by his guitar hero
antics during Ghost of Tom Joad, by asking us to "jump the f-- up", and
by his cheekiness in getting "us" on stage. It was by far my favorite
set of the weekend. I'm pretty sure I told you "it ain't no sin to be
glad you're alive"!
But, after reading about it, and watching it
again, I'm not embarrassed, and I'm really, really happy for your wife
that she got on stage. What a memory to take away from the weekend!!
-Sue
"Badlands." She was quoting Springsteen's "Badlands."
My favorite moment from last week's Newport Folk Fest? Right here:
(you'll have to forgive the typos)
That's a text exchange between me (in green, on the right) and my wife (on the left), who came to the Festival on Sunday, specifically to see Tom Morello.
I had been running around Fort Adams, taking pictures and doing live breaks and such. I really don't get to hang out with my wife (or anyone). But I did try to join up with her whenever I had a few minutes.
I happened to be near the Harbor Stage when I got her text saying that Jackson Browne was on stage with Tom Morello.
I got over there in time to catch them do the most rocking version of "This Land Is Your Land" you'll ever hear.
I positioned myself way in the back, middle, near the sound guy, so I could get an overview of the crowd and perhaps pick out my wife.
Little did I know, I was about to get a very clear view of the crowd.
For the finale, Morello invited the entire audience up on stage, much to the chagrin of security.
I'm not great at estimating crowd size, but I'm going to guess there were a good 100 folks on stage with Tom, singing out loud, singing out strong.
And, as you've surmised from the text, my wife was on stage too.
It was a pretty wild scene, made wilder by the fact that, while being a rebel is fun, it does sometimes create a safety hazard. Mid-song, security and officers of the law started kicking people off stage, forcibly having to remove some of them. It made for quite a visual.
As you can imagine, it was all captured on video. You can see a few of the Youtube videos made by folks in the audience, and on stage. It's totally worth your while to hear how engaging and passionate Morello is, and what delight he took in his mischief.
My wife was energized too. Later, after we had met up and talked about her adventure, she sent me another text as I headed back into the Fort:
"I might leave you to become a revolutionary woman!"
I was catching my breath after The Ramones. It was Lollapalooza 1996, and earlier I had wormed my way to the front of the stage to soak up what I knew would be my last chance to see the Punk icons. Now, sweaty and beat from the hot sun, I had retreated to a place a good football-field-away from the stage.
"When Rage Against The Machine comes on, we are moving back," said the Mom to her 10 year old boy.
"Aww, Mom!" said the kid standing next to me.
Now, God bless this Mom, for taking her 10 year old to Lollapalooza. Fat chance of my Mom ever having done such a thing.
But I thought, Lady, give me an f-n break and just relax.
When The Ramones had played, there was a mosh pit that extended out in a swirl some 100 feet from the stage. For Mom and the boy to be caught up in any of the mayhem, the pit would have to more-than-triple in size. Not bloody likely, I thought.
An hour later, I was hoping that the kid had listened to his Mom.
Lollapalooza 1996 made a stop in a field outside of Knoxville, Tennessee, and I will tell you I have never, never, never seen anything like it in person.
And (let me apologize for this in advance) the only place that I've seen anything even comparable, was in watching "Triumph Of The Will."
"Triumph Of The Will" was Leni Renifenstal's Nazi propaganda film. It showed Hitler at the height of his speaking powers. They made us watch it in film school, and I remember really being struck, even though I didn't understand German, that Hilter had such a powerful way of speaking, and influencing his audience, that he seemed to be producing mass hysteria---and compliance---with his incendiary rhetoric.
There is nothing more frightening than 25,000 kids jumping up and down, in unison, screaming, in unison, "FUCK YOU I WON'T DO WHAT YOU TELL ME. FUCK YOU I WON'T DO WHAT YOU TELL ME. FUCK YOU I WON'T DO WHAT YOU TELL ME."
The mosh pit had more than tripled in size, and the dust from the dry earth rose up from the crowd. Somewhere, far to stage left, a couple of people through empty "personal pizza" boxes in the air. Within 30 seconds, pizza boxes went up by the dozens in that area, and the idea caught on. Like "The Wave" at a baseball game, boxes and paper plates were spinning in the air from left to right across the field.
The band was in complete command.
I have no doubt that after a half-hour of the set, had the band said, "We'll storm Knoxville and burn it to the ground!" that the crowd would have done this, without a second thought.
But they knew what they were in command of and wielded the power carefully.
While Zach de la Rocha was speaking out against the government during a breakdown section of the song, someone raised the Rebel flag.
Can you imagine? The f-n Confederate flag?
I think there was a moment, when he would have liked to say something. A pause.
But instead, he just stopped. And glared. Like you've never seen a man glare before.
I don't know who raised the flag, what he was thinking or what happened next---I was too far away from it.
All's I know is, the flag came down quickly and decisively.
"FUCK YOU I WON'T DO WHAT YOU TELL ME."
Ironically, he didn't have to say a word for the crowd to do exactly what he wanted.
---------------------------
Tom Morello plays the Newport Folk Festival this weekend. It won't likely be as crazy, but it might be as powerful. Listen in at www.mvyradio.com
Disclaimer: I feel the need to apologize for comparing anything to Hitler. Obviously, RATM's politics are as far as you can get from the Nazis. I was only comparing how the audiences reacted to the speakers.
For a lighter take on the ridiculousness of a crowd chanting "FUCK YOU I WON'T DO WHAT YOU TELL ME" in unison, please see the scene from Monty Python's "Life Of Brian" below.
Is there a lonelier man, than the man with a pregnant wife?
When you get to the point in your life where you have little kids you notice that there is certainly a gulf between your friends who have kids, and your friends who don't.
I mean, you can still all get along, but when you have kids, all decisions and all conversation seems to be dictated by the kids. And on the other side of the chasm are the friends without kids, who, try as the might (or who might not try at all) can't really understand why it's so fucking hard to make simple dinner plans.
But in the unfortunate purgatory, is the couple having their first child.
The friends who have never been pregnant, have no concept of how your 24-hours-a-day are ruled by a kid who hasn't even shown up yet.
And your friends who do have kids mostly just say, "You think you're tired now," with a shocking lack of sympathy. It seems to be an evolutionary truth that people who have gone through pregnancy, tend to forget or minimize the process, so as to make future pregnancies not wholly unattractive.
Meanwhile, it's you and your wife.
Not long ago, you were a responsible adult. You love your wife, but she's pretty self-sufficient.
But then she's pregnant, and in short order, you have suddenly become the third most important person in your own life.
And as far as other people are concerned, well, when you walk into the room with a pregnant woman, you might as well be invisible. And no, not a soul on the planet has a mustard seed of sympathy for anything that you might be going through, when there is a woman next to you who is in the midst of performing nature's greatest miracle.
So there we were, face to face, Scott and me.
I don't think we ever really talked about any of the above, but we implicitly knew the other's plight.
We, and our wives, met during a class for expecting parents at the local hospital. Our wives were due within a week of each other, and, I recall, were thrilled to have one another to talk to---someone who understood exactly what the other's body and mind were going through at that stage.
Scott and I, after some small talk about parenting things (co-sleeping, night feeding, nesting weirdness) moved on to normal topics. And believe me, you friends out there who have never gone through pregnancy (male and female), after 8 months of pregnancy, you are desperate to talk about something that is not related to babydom, that reminds you of that life you so recently had.
Scott is the editor of Cape Cod Magazine, but was looking to do some freelance work in music. He was getting ready to pitch a story to No Depression about Tom Morello and his upcoming solo project.
Well, I had recently interviewed Morello for mvyradio and knew a lot about No Depression. When I got home, I made sure to dig out a copy of an anthology of their best feature interviews, to give to Scott for some guidance.
Over the last 4 years, Scott and I have each had a daughter, and each had a son, all of whom play together regularly. Our wives, much on the same track in terms of parenting, have each other as a parallel-Mom to connect with. And when they need to escape the role of Mom, they have each other to go get a drink with.
And Scott and I have each other, when we need to connect with someone who knows what it feels like to be the fourth most important person in his own life.
Or to talk about music. I'm in vacation next week, and Scott is going to Guest Blog for me. Being the editor of Cape Cod Magazine, he is always connecting what he sees and hears, to the Cape and Islands. Starting Monday, he'll be writing about songs that make him think of our special spot on the map. They may be songs written about us, or they may just be tunes that connect with the feeling of this special place.
Some of our On The Road trips are to big, well know Festivals. But some are to events that aren’t really open to the Public. That’s where I met Tom Morello.
Every year, radio stations similar to mvyradio, go to something called The Non-Comm---it’s a Convention for Public Radio Stations to get together with their friends from the Music Labels. There are discussion panels, and good face to face meetings with people you talk to on the phone. But mostly it’s about the music.
If an artist has a new record, then their label brings them to the Non-Comm, for a performance in front of the very folks who are deciding what records are essential listening for their audience. It’s often a little awkward and a little less than glamorous, to see a legendary someone like T-Bone Burnett, sit in a hotel conference room, at 11am on a Friday, in front of a bunch of bleary-eyed radio folks spread out on folding chairs, eating lunchmeat sandwiches.
Even more strangely intimate, is what WE ask the artists to do. We invite them up to Barbara Dacey’s hotel room, where we’ve set up our On The Road recording scheme. Nestled in every nook and cranny is a person and some gear---recorders, laptops, microphones, video camera, etc.
The artist will sit on Barbara’s bed, or a chair in the corner, and we’ll ask them to perform their stadium-ready anthem for an audience of 4.
But Tom Morello is a pro. A super-pro.
When we met him, in a hotel room in Louisville, he couldn’t have been more gracious and sweet. He was out promoting his first solo record as The Nightwatchman. He was about the best interviewee you could ask for. He was chatty, he was effusive, he gave thoughtful, articulate, extensive answers. He was like my best buddy.
Then he played.
I’d heard the record, so I can’t say I was shocked, but it was still really remarkable to see this positive, thoughtful human being, become this tense, angry, righteous, singer-songwriter. His whole body language changed, as he spun some dark, violent tales. Then the song would end, and he’d go back to being my buddy Tom.
He played Newport Folk a few months later, and I got to introduce him, before he led a near-riot of hyped up fans under the Harbor Tent.
He’s back this year, and I can’t wait to see my buddy Tom, AND the angry Nightwatchman.
I'm the Program and Music Director of mvyradio, a broadcast and internet station on the Island of Martha's Vineyard. You can hear it here.
I've been in radio since the early 90s, programming shows. As Music Director, I receive dozens of CDs and songs every week, from Record Labels, Promotion People and Independent Artists. I try to listen to everything anyone asks me to.
So the old iTunes list is pretty long.
The idea of this blog is to go to that list, grab one (usually at random, but not always) and write about it. Every song has a story. How it fits into the artists oeuvre. What it meant to me when I first heard it.
I'll try to post the song in full, whenever possible, and I invite you to listen and tell me what it makes you think of.
And for more great music, you can stream mvyradio from anywhere in the world, here.
