It's so hard to believe that it has already been 20 years since Freddie Mercury passed away !! Sometimes, when I listen to his singing or watching one of his performances, I can only think of him being so alive & vibrant, and running around on stage. Oh, that it were so !!
How do you begin to describe Freddie: dynamic lead singer; charismatic frontman; flamboyant stage personality? All I can come up with is "great eye candy with a tremendous set of lungs" !!
A writer for The Spectator described him as "a performer out to tease, shock and ultimately charm his audience with various extravagant versions of himself". Yeah, that works too.
For years, on Grey Cup Sunday, one of my brothers would call me, asking me to play Queen's "We Are The Champions" over the phone to my other brother.
Talk about coincidence !! The Toronto Argonauts won the Grey Cup championship on November 24, 1991. Freddie Mercury passed away November 24, 1991.
The show must go on....the show will never end ! The King (Elvis) is dead; long live the Queen (Queen Freddie).
My brother would visit me often. We'd play 500 Rummy & listen to the tunes.
He really liked Slim Whitman -- especially his yodelling songs. I told my brother that I had just the ticket to teach him to yodel....this is it !!
Well, it didn't work....but, like everything, he gave it his best shot !! Maybe yodelling was just not for him. Maybe he shoulda just stuck with "Disco Duck" !!
(Too bad your daughter can't be there to celebrate with you; she's busy Occupying Toronto !!)
Seems like Gordon Lightfoot's been around forever -- actually, 73 years. Over the past 50 of those, he's had a ton of hits in the folk, folk-rock, and pop-rock categories.
His "Carefree Highway" came to my mind immediately, as we drove from Phoenix to Flagstaff.
But, to be sure, the one song that strikes closest to home for me is "Christian Island" (I was almost stranded there once, when the ferry broke down. I was quietly freaking, because of all of the childhood stories I'd heard about being captured and scalped !! But, I digress.)
When it comes to Canadian musicians, I guess we really have to give Gordon Lightfoot his dues. As I've said, he's been around forever and you'd be hard-pressed to find anyone who hasn't heard of him.
Researching one's family tree can be a most challenging and daunting effort. However, it can also be a greatly rewarding -- sometimes even comical -- task. I've stumbled across some pretty peculiar things:
A child dies & the name is given to next born child (Yuck ! A constant source of misery for parents and child alike);
Upon the death of their sister, girls have married their brother-in-law (well, at least they waited);
It seems quite common for sisters to marry brothers (I guess it beats having to remember a ton of surnames);
Some people give their children up to 5 names ! (What's with that ? Afraid of offending one of the relatives by omitting their name ? Geez....thank goodness we're not of Greek descent. Imagine being named Themistokles Epaphroditos Agathangelos Olumpiodoros Chrysanthopoulos -- you'd likely be 53 years of age before you could say your name, let alone try to write it... in one sitting !!);
One sad thing I've noticed is that some people have a bunch of daughters. They finally have a son, who either dies in infancy or enters the priesthood (Guess the family tree soon becomes dead wood.)
Well, no matter what I uncover as I progress, I take a bit of comfort in knowing that other people have some pretty "special" family history too. Consider what skeletons might have prompted artist Napoleon XIV (real name Jerry Samuels) to write "The Nuts on My Family Tree".
I flip every time I take a look
At the pictures inside my family book
And my mind wanders back where I'd like to be
With the nuts on my family tree
Chorus:
I take off my hat and burst with pride
When I recall all the things they tried
Their classic bits made such history
The nuts on my family tree
The first stood his ground at Waterloo
And it was such a foolish thing to do
He was soaking his feet, but he wasn´t done
So I ask you, how could he run?
The next nut was sure a lot of fun
He was there in the boat with Washington
When a leak in the boat made the water spout
He drilled a hole to let the water out
[Chorus]
The next got the word from Paul Revere
But he stayed just to have that one last beer
So the word he was just too drunk to say
That the British were on the way
The one who, with Custer, took a stand
I am now going to give a great, big hand
But the hand that he gets should be in the mouth
´Cause he forgot to tell old George go South
My niece & her two girls are all soooo into dance. Not only do they dance, but they are extremely talented....WOW ! Move over Tina Turner !!
I think of this song, "Music Box Dancer", when I see them perform, or view photos of their performances. For the longest time, I didn't even know this song had lyrics. I remember when I first heard the words: I was on a Gray Coach bus, sharing a headset with my brother, and listening to the radio on his brand spanking new & state-of-the-art Sony Walkman !!
I do have to disagree with the girls though, when they say, "Dance like nobody's watching", 'cause they certainly deserve an audience, and any audience would always be wishing for an encore !!
Every Remembrance Day, for as long as I can recall, right after their moment of silence, Q107 plays Dire Straits' "Brothers In Arms".
It is so perfectly suited to the occasion. Being a more contemporary song, I think it appeals to an audience who just might not capture the spirit of Remembrance Day from "The Last Post" or listening to a recital of "In Franders' Fields".
Little Darlin's Rock 'n Roll Palace, Kissimmee, Florida:
This episode features intro and signoff by Wolfman Jack and Emcee Glen Stetson, as well as the following artists:
- Spencer Davis - (1st set) Keep On Runnin', Somebody Help Me, I'm A Man
- Billy J. Kramer - Bad To Me
- Spencer Davis - (2nd set) Don't Want You No More, Gimme Some Lovin'
[Dubbed from VHS recording from The Nashville Network 1988]
As the weather starts to get colder, my thoughts turn to planning a winter vacation. My first "real" winter vacation was in 1978, after having saved for a year at my first job. I went to Grand Cayman, where I stayed with my Uncle Joe, the Island's resident Presbyterian Minister.
Uncle Joe was preparing his sermon on Saturday night and I was reading the tourist guides. I stumbled across an ad, saying that the Barefoot Man (real name George Nowak) was playing at the Holiday Inn, just a short distance down Seven Mile Beach.
Well ! I just had to see him. So, off I went to the Holiday Inn. I was personally introduced to the Barefoot Man and got the best seats in the house (Thank you, Uncle Joe), and I came home with 3 of his LPs !! (picked up another CD, while in the Bahamas earlier this year too !!)
(Who Put The Pepper in the Vaseline)
I had first heard of the Barefoot Man on the Dr. Demento show, singing "I Get High By Going Down". Get your mind out of the gutter, folks; the song is about a "diver's high", from scuba diving. Of course, I'm sure it was not that interpretation that got this song aired on Dr. Demento !! Ditto for his songs, "Divers Do It Deeper" and "You Dont Have To Be Gay To Ride a Ferry".
I guess that, like me, everyone who sees "Barefoot" in person for the first time is a little shocked. When you hear him on the radio, you picture him looking like Harry Belafonte -- wrong !! He's of German descent and has blonde hair and blue eyes ! His lyrics are extremely funny and highly satirical, mocking everything from Caribbean life and love to local and international politics. Some people say that "he's to the Caribbean what Jimmy Buffet is to Key West", while others say that's selling him short.
His "Bank Song" is quite entertaining; it tells the true story of Jean Doucet who lured many Caymanians into investing in his bank. Then, as the lyrics go, "Where oh where has all the money gone / .....Well I heard somebody say / that they saw it fly away in a Lear jet / That's why I'm poor today".
"That's A Moray" is simply hilarious !! It reminds me of my phone call to Uncle Joe, prior to our visit. The movie "Jaws" was still quite popular and I just had to ask Uncle Joe, "Are there any sharks in Grand Cayman ?" He laughingly told me the only ones I had to worry about were "land sharks" !! "That's A Moray" goes like this: "See that thing in the reef / With the big shiny teeth / That's a Moray / Put your hand in the crack / and you won't get it back / That's a Moray." Ha ! Ha ! Ha !
While preparing this post, I actually learned a few things about the Barefoot Man. The Barefoot Man and Band was featured in the 1993 film, "The Firm", starring Tom Cruise and Gene Hackman. For this film, George Nowak wrote the song "Money, Money, Money" which appears on the film's soundtrack. I'll have to check that out more closely.
I've also learned, from this article about his book "Which Way To The Islands" (http://www.abacoescape.com/Books/Abacobookpage.html), that he "...accidentally killed a man in a bar room scuffle ...". Wow ! All those years ago, I had been rubbing shoulders with a murderer !!....in an island bar, no less !!
Now...where was I? Oh yeah, planning a winter vacation. Actually, the weather has been so fine lately, I think I can procrastinate a while longer. I'll get back on that wavelength at the sight of the first snowflake of the year !!
Little Darlin's Rock 'n Roll Palace, Kissimmee, Florida:
This episode features intro and signoff by Wolfman Jack and Emcee Glen Stetson, as well as the following artists:
- Roger McGuinn - (1st set) Mr. Tambourine Man, Mr. Spaceman, Turn Turn Turn, Tiffany Queen
- Del Shannon - Little Town Flirt, Searchin'
- Roger McGuinn - (2nd set) So You Wanna Be A Rock and Roll Star
[Dubbed from VHS recording from The Nashville Network 1988]
How do you begin to describe Freddie: dynamic lead singer; charismatic frontman; flamboyant stage personality? All I can come up with is "great eye candy with a tremendous set of lungs" !!
