A blog about Arts & Entertainment.
Real Name: Lost Hills Gender: male Member Since: September 19, 2007 Last Signed In: August 29, 2008 Profile Views: 522 Blog Views: 623 Running on empty..... Come out to support Sequoia Forestkeeper Monday evening. Good times at the Treehuggers Ball... Neil's Cadillac The Sound Of Silence Folk Music Legend Utah Phillips Passes From Ira Hayes to Brian Rand... Free Protest Song... Live At Mama Hillybeans One Day = 720 Million... September 07 October 07 November 07 December 07 January 08 February 08 March 08 April 08 May 08 June 08 July 08 August 08 
RSS 2.0    |
|
|
Folk-Rocker Jackson Browne is suing John McCain and the Ohio National Republican committee for using his song Running On Empty in a campaign advertisement. The song was used in the background of an ad slamming opponent Barak Obama’s energy policy. Browne is an Obama campaign contributor and is well known for supporting liberal and environmental causes. He is asking for $75,000.00 in damages, saying that the Republicans used his song without permission, and damaged his reputation by associating him with McCain. Poor John… You would think his staff would know better than to use a song by an artist who is actively campaigning against their man. They have already been asked to stop using songs by Abba and John Mellencamp. Perhaps they should call up Toby Keith… This is reminiscent of a similar flap when George Bush Senior was using Bruce Springsteen’s Born In The USA on the campaign trail, and Bruce denounced him in the press. The lesson here is to ASK before using someone’s song– it could save you a lot of bad press, as well as legal fees. Jackson Browne has a new album out called Time The Conqueror, his first album of new material in six years, and is embarking on a world tour– as well as campaigning for Barak Obama… http://www.jacksonbrowne.co... 
Jackson Browne Our great homegrown environmental organization, Sequoia Forestkeeper, is having a fundraiser at Mama Hillybeans in Tehachapi. The event will be held on Monday, July 21st, from 6 to 9 PM. I'm going to be playing with Pat Seamount and Mike Gallagher from the Kern Valley bluegrass group, Out Of The Blue. Also appearing will be Hammered Dulcimer player, John Hammond. There will be an organic vegetarian dinner, a talk about the Sequoias by special guest, Ed Begely Jr., and a power point presentation from Sequoia Forestkeeper Programs Director, Valerie Cassity. Suggested donation is $25.00. Come on out to have a great time and raise money to protect the Sequoias! Mama Hillybeans Community And Coffee, 426 E. Tehachapi Blvd, Techapi, CA, (661) 822-BEAN peace
A good time was had by all at the Treehuggers Ball. It's a yearly event put on by the Canyonlands Conservation Fund and the Orange Hills Task Force of the Sierra Club to raise money to protect the last undeveloped land in the Orange County hills. I was invited to play by my friend Karl, who is a member of an online protest songs group that I host. Karl is also a nephew of Woody Guthrie, so of course I played some Woody Guthrie songs... It's a one of a kind party, held under the stars in still wild Baker Canyon. There was a deep pit barbecue dinner, micro brews, arts and crafts, petitions, green demos and presentations, and about eight hours of music under the stars. There was a Bluegrass band, a Jazz trio, a Blues-Rock band, and the headliner was Cubensis, a popular and inspiring So-Cal Grateful Dead tribute band. One of the joys of being the opening act is that there wasn't much of a crowd when I played. The vendors were setting up and the treehuggers just arriving. But I had a great time and got a lot of positive feedback, and met a lot of good people. I was invited back next year and asked to play at the Country Fair in Silverado in October. The video is my version of I Ain't Got No Home, by Woody Guthrie. The promoters know Arlo, and they sent him the video. He's probably too busy to watch it, but that was a nice thing for them to do...
http://www.fortmilltimes.co... Remembering Bobby Kennedy 40 years later... Yeah, there was a time when you could really believe in something. 40 years later, it's hard to remember that. 40 years later, we're in the same damn mess. Leaders with real courage were made examples of and cut down with bullets. 40 years later we have to take our own stand, and do it ourselves. This is who we look up to.... There's a great article and film from the LA Times at this link: www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-robert_kennedy,0 ,4867119.htmlstory Let us remember, so we know what we're up against. And what we have to do.
One of my musical heroes, Utah Phillips passed away last week. Utah was one of a kind. He was a folksinger, songwriter, storyteller, humorist and folk music historian. I was lucky enough to meet him at a folk club I used to hang out at, and I took a protest songs workshop and a labor songs workshop fro him at the first San Diego folk festival. Utah was a lifetime member of the Industrial Workers of the World, and in his life he was a hobo, a union organizer, a Korean war veteran, an archivist, a historian and an activist. He was the greatest interpreter of the songs of Joe Hill, and he started a homeless shelter in Nevada City, where he lived for the last twenty years of his life. Utah had unique gifts and he will missed greatly and never replaced. His songs were recorded by Waylon Jennings, Joan Baez, Arlo Guthrie and many others, and he won a grammy for the album he made with Ani DiFranco. His stories were wickedly funny and deadly serious at the same time. "Say brother, have you ever heard the roar of the fast express? Have you ever seen starlight on the rails?" I talked about Utah a little bit and played one of his songs at my show at Mama Hillybeans on Saturday. The video is me playing his song, Starlight On The Rails. Find out more about Utah, his life and his work here:
I was thinking about Ira Hayes, the Pima Indian who raised the flag at Iwo Jima and returned home to die in a ditch of untreated alcoholism... And I was thinking about a story I read about Sgt. Brian Rand, an Iraq war veteran suffering from untreated PTSD who blew his brains out the other day.... And I was thinking about the cold ststistics I had read that 2,000 Iraq war veterans committed suicide in 2007 and the thousands who are returning whom with PTSD and missing limbs and burned faces..... And I was thinking about the friends I worked with in the Army at the end of the Vietnam war who had just returned home and didn't want to talk about their experiences at all....... And I was thinking about the carnage and human destruction I witnessed second hand on a moviola viewing screen editing combat footage in my little cubicle at Fort Monmouth eight hours day. I didn't have to work this weekend. Maybe I had too much time to think....... .. www.truthout.org/article/memories-iraq-haunted-so ldier-until-suicide "According to the Army, more than 2,000 active-duty soldiers attempted suicide or suffered serious self-inflicted injuries in 2007, compared to fewer than 500 such cases in 2002, the year before the United States invaded Iraq. " A recent study by the nonprofit Rand Corp. found that 300,000 of the nearly 1.7 million soldiers who've served in Iraq or Afghanistan suffer from PTSD or a major mental illness, conditions that are worsened by lengthy deployments and, if left untreated, can lead to suicide. "Soldiers deployed from Fort Campbell have served up to 15-month stints and have fought in such heavy combat zones as Basra, Mosul and Al Anbar province. Some soldiers, like Brian Rand, have been deployed multiple times since the war began." Ira Hayes en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ira_Hayes The song was written by Native American folk singer, Peter La Farge, and made famous by Johnny Cash. The video is by the late Townes Van Zandt. "Where Do We Go From Here?" I wrote this song a few months ago, after the las protest march I attended. I've been giving the lyrics out to friends. Anyone who would like to sing this song is welcome to... I think this country is mesmerized by the presidential election, thinking that the next president is going to bring big changes. I think that a lot of people are going to be severely disppointed if they think the next president is going to bring this war to a conclusion. The majority of Americans want the war to end. My message is that the war will end when we decide to end it ourselves. The photos are from marches that I went to in Los Angeles. The video is me playing at the Kern River Preserve in Weldon.
Where Do We Go From Here ( G, C, D, Am, Em )
Many nights I sat listening To the static on my radio. More lies, more fear, more deception Falling all around me like snow... You could see from the start where it was goin' Cause we've seen it all before. And they always find more reasons To send your children off to war. ........... Now where do we go from here, My Brothers, Where do we go fro here? We've got to find a way out of this darkness! Where do we go from here? ~ Now some of us spoke out from the beginning; Others are beginning to see the light. But our leaders can't seem to hear us, And all they want to do is fight. ~ We tried talking, But maybe we didn't talk loud enough. We tried voting, But the vote was just a bluff. We tried marching, But maybe we just didn't march far enough. We tried believing, But believing is just so tough.... ~ Now where do we go from here, My sisters, Where do we go from here? We've got to find a way out of this darkness! Where do we go from here? ~ But we are the ones who decide. And we are the ones who choose! It's our sons and daughters who die, And we are the ones who loose... ~ So let's keep talking To everyone we know. Let's keep voting, And make them count our votes! Let's keep marching Through the wind the rain and snow... Let's keep believing Until our belief begins to grow. ~ Now I know when I get up in the morning Just what my radio will say: More bombs, more death, more destruction. More mothers crying half a world away. But we have the power to stop this: Stop the lies, the hate, the fear. War is over if you want it, people, But where do we go from here? ~ Where do we go from here, My friends, Where do we go from here? We've got to find a way out of this darkness! Where do we go from here? ~ © 2008 Lost Hills I played my songs at Mama Hillybeans Coffee And Community in Tehachapi a couple of weeks ago, and a good time was had by all. I had never been there before, so I didn't know what to expect, but I had heard that it was a good place to play. Got there during the last little snow storm of the year, found the local music store and bought a blues harp and showed up for my sound check. They have a great sound system, and Tim the soundman totally had his shit wired. Mama's is a great place with a great vibe and great food and coffee. The Tehachapi community made me feel welcome, and it was a super cool live performance experience. I played my own songs for two hours and threw in a couple folk songs so that I don't get in trouble with the folk singers union. Three of my friends came out from Lake Isabella, and that made it special. The train came by three times at just the right time-- at the beginning of a song, and not in the middle... It was great for me to be able to play my songs for an audience that actually listens to you with a great sound system. I've been invited back at the end of May, and I'm already looking forward to it. The Iraq War costs us 720 million dollars each day. Think about that..... Is this the best use for our tax dollars, or could that money be put to better use here at home? Here are some ideas for what could be accomplished with that money from the American Friends Service Committee: 720 million dollars could buy health insurance for a year for 163,525 people. It could pay for 84 brand new elementary schools. It could buy free lunches for 1,153,846 kids for a year. It could build 6,482 homes. It could send 95,364 kids to head start. It could outfit over a million homes with solar panels. It could pay the salaries of 12,478 teachers for a year. It could pay for a college education for 34,904 students. That is how much money we are spending on this war in one day. It is time to stop this madness. Find out more and sign a petition to end this disgrace at: peace.... |
Local time is currently Fri Aug 29, 2008 9:52:39 pm PDT
Bakotopia is 100% local to Bakersfield, CA, USA
