The Boss Gives a Music History Lesson

Bruce Springsteen gave the Keynote Address at t his year's South-by-Southwest Music Festival in Austin, Texas. I couldn't find a video clip, but click here for the audio. It's about 50-minutes and well worth a listen.

Springsteen talked about music like recalling a first love. He crooned a little doo-wop — “the sound of bras popping across the U.S.A.,” he said — and played a few bars of the Animals’ “We Gotta Get Out of This Place,” declaring the first time he heard the band as “a revelation, the first records with full-blown class consciousness.” The chorus of the song, in which working stiffs are simply looking for a better life, can be heard, Springsteen said, in every one of his albums.

“That’s every song I’ve ever written,” he said. “That’s all of them. I’m not kidding, either. That’s ‘Born to Run,’ ‘Born in the U.S.A.’” Springsteen even went further and strummed the opening notes of the Animals’ take on “Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood” and segued into his own “Badlands.”

“It’s the same fuckin' riff,” Springsteen hollered. “Listen up, you youngsters, this is how successful theft is accomplished.”

Here's the recap.

What is Life?

I'm three-quarters of the way through Philip Roth's "American Pastoral" and I came across an interesting passage...

"The final question assigned to the class was "What is life?" Merry's answer was something her father and mother chuckled over that night. According to Merry, while the other students labored busily away with their phony deep thoughts, she -- after an hour of thinking at her desk -- wrote a single, unplatitudinous declarative sentence: 'Life is just a short period of time during which you are alive.'"

Most Revealing Graph of the Day

Conscientious Resignation

For the first time in my recollection, a financial sector vulture has backed away from the carrion and flown the coop (so to speak) as an act of conscience.

To put the problem in the simplest terms, the interests of the client continue to be sidelined in the way the firm operates and thinks about making money. Goldman Sachs is one of the world’s largest and most important investment banks and it is too integral to global finance to continue to act this way. The firm has veered so far from the place I joined right out of college that I can no longer in good conscience say that I identify with what it stands for.

It might sound surprising to a skeptical public, but culture was always a vital part of Goldman Sachs’s success. It revolved around teamwork, integrity, a spirit of humility, and always doing right by our clients. The culture was the secret sauce that made this place great and allowed us to earn our clients’ trust for 143 years. It wasn’t just about making money; this alone will not sustain a firm for so long. It had something to do with pride and belief in the organization. I am sad to say that I look around today and see virtually no trace of the culture that made me love working for this firm for many years. I no longer have the pride, or the belief.

Derrick Morgan -- The Conqueror

Stargazer Alert

Apparently tonight would be a good night to check out the western sky. Just a bit after sunset, Jupiter and Venus will come as close together for our Earth-bound eyes as they haven't in 147 years. I'd been noticing this convergaence over the past couple weeks (as have you if you take the time to watch the sun go down), but tonight is going to be zero-hour for this astronomical event.

Eff tha [Food] Police

Every time I read one of these silly articles about how red meat will kill you (this one is particularly alarmist), I'm reminded of this classic scene from Woody Allen's "Sleeper"...

Four Words to Address Afghanistan's Demand for An Explanation Regarding the Weekend Shooting Rampage in which a US Solider Killed 16 People

He was plumb crazy.

Red-Headed Stepchild

Not to mock my own town (it is Oprah's "Happiest Place in America," after all), but whereas the Santa Barbara International Film Festival can boast such A-List attendees as Martin Scorcese, Sandra Bullock, Angelina Jolie, Colin Firth and Charlize Theron, the San Luis Obispo International Film Festival claims...{drumroll, please}...Drew Carey as a last minute replacement for the rumored, but never confirmed, Harrison Ford (who may or may not own a beach home around here somewhere).

Is it any wonder SLO-Town has a bit of an inferiority complex when compared to its cosmopolitan neighbor to the south?

A Reminder of Why Obama's Got It in the Bag

The Staple Singers: If You're Ready

All you need to know, right here.

Lost Verbiage from the Lexicon

Heard a word used yesterday (at work, no less) that I hadn't heard since my youthful days in Cambodia, CA. Sano, as in:

"He got his car detailed and now that thing is totally sano."

Republicans are Against Any & All Tax Increases...

...except in cases of rape, incest or the life of the mother.

Putting Out Fire with Gasoline Dept.

New study says LSD is an effective treatment for alcoholism.

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