The Little Red Blog

Sunday Sermon: "When the Night Comes Falling from the Sky"

"When the Night Comes Falling from the Sky" (Bob Dylan)

Look out across the fields, see me returning
Smoke is in your eye, you draw a smile
From the fireplace where my letters to you are burning
You’ve had time to think about it for a while

Well, I’ve walked two hundred miles, now look me over
It’s the end of the chase and the moon is high
It won’t matter who loves who
You’ll love me or I’ll love you
When the night comes falling from the sky

I can see through your walls and I know you’re hurting
Sorrow covers you up like a cape
Only yesterday I know that you’ve been flirting
With disaster that you managed to escape

I can’t provide for you no easy answers
Who are you that I should have to lie?
You’ll know all about it, love
It’ll fit you like a glove
When the night comes falling from the sky

I can hear your trembling heart beat like a river
You must have been protecting someone last time I called.
I’ve never asked you for nothing you couldn’t deliver
I’ve never asked you to set yourself up for a fall

I saw thousands who could have overcome the darkness
For the love of a lousy buck, I’ve watched them die
Stick around, baby, we’re not through
Don’t look for me, I’ll see you
When the night comes falling from the sky

In your teardrops, I can see my own reflection
It was on the northern border of Texas where I crossed the line
I don’t want to be a fool starving for affection
I don’t want to drown in someone else’s wine

For all eternity I think I will remember
That icy wind that’s howling in your eye
You will seek me and you’ll find me
In the wasteland of your mind
When the night comes falling from the sky

Well, I sent you my feelings in a letter
But you were gambling for support
This time tomorrow I’ll know you better
When my memory is not so short

This time I’m asking for freedom
Freedom from a world which you deny
And you’ll give it to me now
I’ll take it anyhow
When the night comes falling from the sky

________________________________________

 

When the Night Comes Falling from the Sky | The Official Bob Dylan Site

Bob Dylan - When The Night Comes Falling From The Sky (Official HD Video) - YouTube

Live version with Tom Petty: Bob Dylan 1986 - When the Night Comes Falling From the Sky - YouTube

Sunday Sermon: Holocaust

{No, this is not an appropriate post for Mother's Day, but it is for Mental Health Awareness Month. The song itself, but especially Alex Chilton's performance, captures the state of depression with chilling accuracy. For emotional, if not musical, comparisons, think of Randy Newman's "I Think It's Going to Rain Today," Richard Thompson's "End of the Rainbow," Neil Young's "Borrowed Tune," or pretty much anything by Nick Drake.} 

“Holocaust” (Alex Chilton / Big Star)

Your eyes are almost dead
Can't get out of bed
And you can't sleep
You're sitting down to dress
And you're a mess
You look in the mirror
You look in your eyes
Say you realize
Everybody goes
Leaving those who fall behind
Everybody goes
As far as they can,
They don't just care.
They stood on the stairs
Laughing at your errors
Your mother's dead
She said, "Don't be afraid."
Your mother's dead
You're on your own
She's in her bed
Everybody goes
Leaving those who fall behind
Everybody goes
As far as they can
They don't just care
You're a wasted face
You're a sad-eyed lie
You're a holocaust.

_________________________________________ 

Source: LyricFind

Songwriters: William Chilton

Holocaust lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group

(4) Holocaust - YouTube original, from Big Star’s “Third” (aka “Sister Lovers”)

(4) "Holocaust" Big Star's Third - YouTube

(4) Holocaust (Remastered) - YouTube from This Mortal Coil

Sunday Sermon: "Across the Universe"

{It has come to my attention that this will be post number 3,500 of The Little Red Blog. By any standards, that is a lot of blogsmithing. It makes me wonder what I might have accomplished had I spent my time (and that of Pascal the existential Russian blue cat) doing something constructive.}

"Across the Universe" (The Beatles)

Words are flowing out like endless rain into a paper cup
They slither wildly as they slip away across the universe
Pools of sorrow, waves of joy are drifting through my opened mind
Possessing and caressing me

Jai guru deva, om
Nothing's gonna change my world
Nothing's gonna change my world
Nothing's gonna change my world
Nothing's gonna change my world

Images of broken light which dance before me like a million eyes
They call me on and on across the universe
Thoughts meander like a restless wind inside a letterbox they
They tumble blindly as they make their way across the universe

Jai guru deva, om
Nothing's gonna change my world
Nothing's gonna change my world
Nothing's gonna change my world
Nothing's gonna change my world

Sounds of laughter shades of life are ringing
Through my open ears inciting and inviting me
Limitless undying love which shines around me like a million suns
It calls me on and on across the universe

Jai guru deva, om
Nothing's gonna change my world
Nothing's gonna change my world
Nothing's gonna change my world
Nothing's gonna change my world

Jai guru deva
Jai guru deva
Jai guru deva
Jai guru deva
Jai guru deva
Jai guru deva

 --written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney

(3) Across The Universe; The Beatles – Lyrics - YouTube

(3) Fiona Apple - Across the Universe (Official HD Video) - YouTube

Sunday Sermon: The Man Comes Around

The Man Comes Around (by Johnny Cash)

 

And I heard as it were the noise of thunder, one of the four beasts saying come and see and I saw, and behold, a white horse

 

There's a man going around taking names

And he decides who to free and who to blame

Everybody won't be treated all the same

There'll be a golden ladder reaching down

When the Man comes around

 

The hairs on your arm will stand up

At the terror in each sip and in each sup

Will you partake of that last offered cup?

Or disappear into the potter's ground?

When the Man comes around

 

Hear the trumpets, hear the pipers

One hundred million angels singing

Multitudes are marching to the big kettledrum

Voices calling, voices crying

Some are born and some are dying

It's Alpha and Omega's kingdom come

 

And the whirlwind is in the thorn tree

The virgins are all trimming their wicks

The whirlwind is in the thorn tree

It's hard for thee to kick against the pricks

 

Till Armageddon no shalam, no shalom

Then the father hen will call his chickens home

The wise man will bow down before the throne

And at His feet they'll cast their golden crowns

When the Man comes around

 

Whoever is unjust let him be unjust still

Whoever is righteous let him be righteous still

Whoever is filthy let him be filthy still

Listen to the words long written down

When the Man comes around

 

Hear the trumpets, hear the pipers

One hundred million angels singing

Multitudes are marching to the big kettledrum

Voices calling and voices crying

Some are born and some are dying

It's Alpha and Omega's kingdom come

 

And the whirlwind is in the thorn tree

The virgins are all trimming their wicks

The whirlwind is in the thorn tree

It's hard for thee to kick against the pricks

 

In measured hundred weight and penny pound

When the Man comes around.

 

And I heard a voice in the midst of the four beasts and I looked and behold, a pale horse and his name that sat on him was death and Hell followed with him.

______________________________________

Johnny Cash-The_Man_Comes Around - YouTube

Johnny Cash - When The Man Comes Around ((Original Version)) - YouTube

(from Valachi Art)

Sunday Sermon: "Easter"

Easter (by Patti Smith)

Easter Sunday, we were walking
Easter Sunday, we were talking
Isabel, my little one, take my hand
Time has come

Isabella, all is glowing
Isabella, all is knowing
And my heart, Isabella
And my head, Isabella

Frederick and Vitalie
Savior dwells inside of thee
Oh, the path leads to the sun
Brother, sister, time has come

Isabella, all is glowing
Isabella, all is knowing
Isabella, we are dying
Isabella, we are rising

I am the spring, the holy ground
The endless seed of mystery
The thorn, the veil, the face of grace
Brazen image, the thief of sleep

The ambassador of dreams, Prince of peace
I am the sword, the wound, the stain
Scorned, transfigured child of Cain
I rend, I end, I return

Again, I am the salt, the bitter laugh
I am the gas in a womb of light, the evening star
The ball of sight that leads that sheds the tears of Christ
Dying and drying as I rise tonight
(Isabella, we are rising)

Isabella, we are rising
Isabella, we are rising
Isabella, we are rising
Isabella, we are rising

Isabella, we are rising
Isabella, we are rising
Isabella, we are rising
Isabella, we are rising

Isabella, we are rising
Isabella, we are

Source: Musixmatch

Songwriters: Patti Smith / Ivan Kral / Jay Dee Daugherty / Leonard J Kaye

Easter lyrics © Bohemia Music, Druse Music Inc

Easter - YouTube

Arthur Rimbaud

Sunday Sermon: "I'll Be You"

“I’ll Be You” (The Replacements)

If it's a temporary lull
Why'm I bored right outta my skull?
Man I'm dressin' sharp an' feelin' dull

Lonely, I guess that's where I'm from
If I was from Canada
Then I'd best be called lonesome

And if it's just a game
Then I'll break down just in case
Oh yeah, we're runnin' in our last race

Well laughed half the way to Tokyo
I dreamt I was Surfer Joe
And what that means, I don't know

A dream too tired to come true
Left a rebel without a clue
And I'm searching for something to do

And if it's just a game
Then we'll hold hands just the same
So what
So what, we're bleeding but we ain't cut

And I could purge my soul perhaps
For the imminent collapse
Oh yeah
Oh yeah, I'll tell you what we could do
You be me for a while
I'll be you

A dream too tired to come true
Left a rebel without a clue
Won't you tell me what I should do?

And if it's just a lull
Why'm I bored right outta my skull?
Oh yeah, keep me from feeling so dull

And if it's just a game
Then we'll break down just in case
Then again, I'll tell you what we could do
You be me for a while
You be me for a while
And I'll be you

_____________________________________________

Written by Paul Westerberg

Live 1989: (10) I'll Be You (Live at University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, WI, 6/2/1989) - YouTube

Studio original: (10) REPLACEMENTS - I'LL BE YOU (with Lyrics) - YouTube

The Great Refusal: Hey Hey, Ho Ho, Perverse Modernism Has to Go!

{In her 1994 book 'Hole in Our Soul,' culture critic Martha Bayles did not reject Modernism in its entirety, only the Perverse aspects of it, like the Rolling Stones.}

“The West is the only civilization to have created a form of art whose sole purpose is to attack morality.” (Martha Bayles)

“It is mostly in the arts that the dream of radical change still perpetuates its cruel hoax.” (Martha Bayles)

We have met the enemy and it is what Martha Bayles (Hole in Our Soul) labeled ‘Perverse Modernism’. While that awful contagion has long infected the creative arts and modern culture in general, Ms. Bayle’s particular concern (writing in 1994) was with the damage it had done, and was doing, to American popular music:

Something has gone seriously wrong with popular music, both with its sound and with the sensibility it expresses. [Its] anti-musical, antisocial antics would be laughable if they weren’t so offensive. Just as assaultive as the lyrics and images of contemporary popular music are many of its sounds. From the shrieking clamor of thrash metal to the murky din of grunge, from the cheap, synthesized tinsel of pop ballads to the deadly pounding of computerized rhythm tracks, popular music seems terminally hostile to any sound traditionally associated with music.

Perverse Modernism, according to Bayles, began in France in the 1870s with Arthur Rimbaud, who took it upon himself to “personify the idea of the poet as social outlaw.” Rimbaud, in the words of one critic, was a product of “the hysteria of the late nineteenth century, an age recently deprived of religious faith, demoralized and embittered by war, and becoming dissatisfied with social utopianism, science, and the cult of art as an end in itself.” While still in his teens, Rimbaud “took symbolism to the very edge of perversity,” only to perversely abandon his project shortly thereafter; he ceased writing poetry and left Europe to live out the remainder of his short life in Africa, denouncing the very idea of poetry as “disgusting” and “absurd”. ¹

Rimbaud aside, Perverse Modernism, wrote Bayles, has unleashed its “anarchistic, nihilistic impulses” in a variety of guises.  It has appeared as ‘Decadence,’ as ‘Futurism,’ as ‘Dada’ and ‘Surrealism,’ as the ‘Theater of Cruelty’ and as the ‘Theater of the Absurd’. While it has sometimes displayed “a strong affinity for totalitarianism,” it is quintessentially “anarchistic, hell-bent on disrupting the systematizing power of all organization, social as well as political.” ²

To return to the ostensible subject of Ms. Bayle’s Hole in Our Soul, the same nihilistic impulses were eventually (you’ll never guess when) “grafted onto popular music, where they have encouraged today’s cult of obscenity, brutality, and sonic abuse. ³ The [pivotal moment] came in the late 1960s, when the counterculture went sour, and popular music began attracting people who were less interested in music than in using such a powerful medium for culturally radical purposes.”

Those “culturally radical purposes” apparently included making truckloads of money, given who it was Bayles singled out for their cultural villainy:

“The harbingers of this break [with tradition] were the Rolling Stones, who relished the blues but did not hesitate to make it over in the image of the stale perverse modernism that some of their members had picked up in British art colleges. The Stones enhanced their musical reputation by shocking the public and being arrogantly rude to their audiences—behaviors now accepted as part of rock.”

I cannot speak to the virtues of British art colleges, but it seems to me that the Stones were guilty only of “shocking” the staid and easily shocked British establishment; moreover, they were not “arrogantly rude to their audiences” but rewarded said audiences with intense and lengthy performances that brought, one might say, plenty of satisfaction.

After the Stones, however, the deluge:

“More drastic were the changes wrought by American performers like Frank Zappa, the Velvet Underground, and the New York Dolls, all steeped in perverse modernism, whose late 1960s stage shows resembled the ‘happenings’ of Andy Warhol more than they did concerts. (Indeed, the Velvet Underground made its name touring with Andy Warhol.) Then, in the 1970s, an even more dedicated contingent of cultural radicals climbed aboard the bandwagon, and the strain known as ‘punk’ effectively turned rock into a species of performance art. The Sex Pistols became famous for attacking music along with everything else. Today, the punk legacy persists wherever noise, shock, and ugliness are cultivated for their own sakes, and wherever the fires of adolescent anger and aggression are stoked in ways that are almost totally destructive.”

Ms. Bayles’ failure to mention the Clash, the Ramones, the Cramps, Alice Cooper, or Patti Smith (among others) is disappointing. Regardless, there is no point in arguing over matters of taste, musical or otherwise; besides, Ms. Bayles was not just complaining about music she disliked, she was making a significant statement about—I don’t know what, but it couldn't have been good. Cultural debauchery? Philistinism? Why we can’t have nice things?

Whatever the perceived problem might have been, Bayles offered the solution:

[We need] a shift in public taste, brought about by the usual combination of things we cannot control and things we can, including the old-fashioned tools of persuasion, debate, and education. We need to trace the roots of our present predicament to their true sources in the larger culture, and we need to change our tune about artistic matters. We need to follow the historian Jacques Barzun, who recommends learning to say, ‘It is because I understand this work of art that I dislike it.’

I give Ms. Bayles credit for not entirely dismissing modern popular music (she liked the Beatles!) and for championing what she called “the Afro-American musical idiom” (blues, jazz, and gospel). I also appreciate that she wasted no time denouncing the corrupting influence of comic books or Mad magazine, or the deterioration of television’s standards of decorum (from Ozzie & Harriet to Married with Children was truly one giant leap for mankind). What is unforgiveable, however, is the following:

“Bob Dylan’s first album of original material, ‘The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan,’ contained four songs that became instant protest classics: ‘Masters of War,’ ‘Ballad of a Thin Man,’ ‘A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall,’ and ‘Blowin’ in the Wind’.”

Anyone who botches Dylan’s discography that badly simply cannot be taken seriously.⁴

_________________________________________

¹ My favorite Rimbaud quote is this: “‘I’ is another.”

² Ms. Bayles does not mention that Perverse Modernism arose around the same time that Western societies were constructing what Max Weber called an “iron cage” of bureaucracies, industrial regimentation, and mass production—developments against which the Perverse Modernists were almost certainly reacting.

³ “Sonic Abuse” is an outstanding name for a band.

⁴ For the uninitiated: “Ballad of a Thin Man” appeared on Dylan’s Highway 61 Revisited album, released two years after Freewheelin’. It was both musically and lyrically miles removed from Dylan’s earlier “protest” material. Martha Bayles gets points, I suppose, for saying that Dylan’s turn to electric rock music “reclaimed the distinctive sound of the Afro-American idiom from both the incipient distortions of early rock and the prettiness of popular folk.” But there is, I repeat, no excuse for misplacing “Ballad of a Thin Man”.  

Harbingers of Doom, circa 1969

Sunday Sermon: Let's, um, Drive Around

{No doubt there will be some who say, ‘Hey, what kind of ‘sermon’ is this, anyway?’ My reply is that sermons are in the eyes and ears of the beholder. I listen to this back-to-back with the Jesus Culture version of ‘Break Every Chain,’ and I find them equally exhilarating. The Spirit blows where it listeth, man…}

Let’s Take Some Drugs and Drive Around

There's nothing to do
There's nothing to say
And everything I know, I knew yesterday
Until something new comes around
Let's go take some drugs and drive around

Let's do something dumb, let's get in a fight
I'd rather get beat up than sit around all night
Let's go get some lights, let's go get some sound
Let's go take some drugs and drive around
Drive around

Gas up the car, get some beer too
How about a sixpack for me and a twelvepack for you

Turn off your TV
When you were a kid you didn't want to grow up and be a bum
Be treated like the morons we've become
I turn on my radio, all I hear is metal and motown
Let's go take some drugs and drive around
Drive around

Turn out the headlights, let's go get lost
And every blind lane we must cross
Every poor boy who fears for his life
Get out of our way or get in and ride
As we drive and drive

Just saying no to drugs is easy if you got
The kind of life that I have not
But honey if I did, I'd lay that money down
Buy some more drugs and drive around
Drive around

______________________________________

Let's Take Some Drugs And Drive Around by The Silos (waltersalashumara.com)

The Silos - Wikipedia

The Silos never got the attention or the audience they deserved. Don’t blame me; I loved this band.

Album version: Let's Take Some Drugs and Drive Around - YouTube

Michael Hall version (he wrote the song): Michael Hall - Let's take some drugs and drive around - YouTube

The Setters version: The Setters Let's take some drugs and drive around - YouTube (An obscure and short-lived supergroup: Gurf Morlix (pride of Buffalo NY), Alejandro Escovedo, Michael Hall, and Walter Salas-Humara)

Sunday Sermon: "Slow Train Coming"

Slow Train Coming (by Bob Dylan)

Sometimes I feel so low-down and disgusted
Can’t help but wonder what’s happenin’ to my companions
Are they lost or are they found
Have they counted the cost it’ll take to bring down
All their earthly principles they’re gonna have to abandon?
There’s a slow, slow train comin’ up around the bend

I had a woman down in Alabama
She was a backwoods girl, but she sure was realistic
She said, “Boy, without a doubt
Have to quit your mess and straighten out
You could die down here, be just another accident statistic”
There’s a slow, slow train comin’ up around the bend

All that foreign oil controlling American soil
Look around you, it’s just bound to make you embarrassed
Sheiks walkin’ around like kings
Wearing fancy jewels and nose rings
Deciding America’s future from Amsterdam and to Paris
And there’s a slow, slow train comin’ up around the bend

Man’s ego is inflated, his laws are outdated, they don’t apply no more
You can’t rely no more to be standin’ around waitin'
In the home of the brave
Jefferson turnin’ over in his grave
Fools glorifying themselves, trying to manipulate Satan
And there’s a slow, slow train comin’ up around the bend

Big-time negotiators, false healers and woman haters
Masters of the bluff and masters of the proposition
But the enemy I see
Wears a cloak of decency
All nonbelievers and men stealers talkin’ in the name of religion
And there’s a slow, slow train comin’ up around the bend

People starving and thirsting, grain elevators are bursting
Oh, you know it costs more to store the food than it do to give it
They say lose your inhibitions
Follow your own ambitions
They talk about a life of brotherly love show me someone who knows how to live it
There’s a slow, slow train comin’ up around the bend

Well, my baby went to Illinois with some bad-talkin’ boy she could destroy
A real suicide case, but there was nothin’ I could do to stop it
I don’t care about economy
I don’t care about astronomy
But it sure do bother me to see my loved ones turning into puppets
There’s a slow, slow train comin’ up around the bend

___________________________________________

Copyright © 1979 by Special Rider Music

Bob Dylan - Slow Train (Official Audio) - YouTube

(1) "Slow Train Coming" - Nathaniel Rateliff & The Night Sweats Ft. Bobby Weir - YouTube

Sunday Sermon: "Get Together"

“Get Together” (The Youngbloods; written by Dino Valenti)

Love is but a song we sing
Fear's the way we die
You can make the mountains ring
Or make the angels cry
Though the bird is on the wing
And you may not know why

Come on people now
Smile on your brother
Everybody get together
Try to love one another right now

Some may come and some may go
We will surely pass
When the one that left us here
Returns for us at last
We are but a moment's sunlight
Fading in the grass

Come on people now
Smile on your brother
Everybody get together
Try to love one another
Right now

If you hear the song I’m singing                                                                                                      You will understand 
You hold the key to love and fear
All in your trembling hand
Just one key unlocks them both
It's there at your command

Come on people now
Smile on your brother
Everybody get together
Try to love one another
Right now

The Youngbloods – Get Together Lyrics | Genius Lyrics

Original album version: (1) The Youngbloods - Get Together (Audio) - YouTube

Jefferson Airplane version: (1) Jefferson Airplane - Let's Get Together - YouTube (before Grace Slick joined the group; female vocal by Signe Toly Anderson) The Airplane here sound like an American version of Fairport Convention, though Fairport didn’t exist at that time.