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Hey, Raggedy. Never was much of an Elvis fan, but Love Me Tender was pretty good. Still think of Don McLean's American Pie, "....and while the king was lookin' down; the jester stole his mighty crown...."

The very first time that I heard David Bowie sing something that I really liked was from a movie, Labyrinth, I think:

You remind me of the baby
What baby? baby with the power
What power? power of voodoo
Who do? you do
Do what? remind me of the baby

I saw my baby, crying hard as babe could cry
What could I do
My baby's love had gone
And left my baby blue
Nobody knew

What kind of magic spell to use
Slime and snails
Or puppy dogs' tails
Thunder or lightning
Then baby said
Dance magic, dance (dance magic, dance)
Dance magic, dance (dance magic, dance)
Put that baby spell on me
Jump magic, jump (jump magic, jump)
Jump magic, jump (jump magic, jump)
Put that magic jump on me
Slap that baby, make him free

I saw my baby, trying hard as babe could try
What could I do
My baby's fun had gone
And left my baby blue
Nobody knew

What kind of magic spell to use
Slime and snails
Or puppy dog's tails
Thunder or lightning
Then baby said
Dance magic, dance (dance magic, dance)
Dance magic, dance (dance magic, dance)
Put that baby spell on me
Jump magic, jump (jump magic, jump)
Jump magic, jump (jump magic, jump)
Put that magic jump on me
Slap that baby, make him free
Dance magic, dance (dance magic, dance)
Dance magic, dance (dance magic, dance)
Dance magic, dance (dance magic, dance)
Dance magic, dance (dance magic, dance)
Jump magic, jump (jump magic, jump)
Jump magic, jump (jump magic, jump)
Put that baby spell on me (ooh)

You remind me of the baby
What baby? the baby with the power
What power? power of voodoo
Who do? you do
Do what? remind me of the baby

Dance magic, dance, ooh ooh ooh
Dance magic, dance magic, ooh ooh ooh
Dance magic

What kind of magic spell to use
Slime and snails
Or puppy dog tails
Thunder or lightning
Something frightening

Dance magic, dance
Dance magic, dance
Put that baby spell on me
Jump magic, jump
Jump magic, jump
Put that magic jump on me
Slap that baby make him free
Dance magic, dance (dance magic, dance)
Dance magic, dance (dance magic, dance)
Dance magic, dance (dance magic, dance)
Dance magic, dance (dance magic, dance)
Jump magic, jump (jump magic, jump)
Jump magic, jump
Put that magic jump on me
Slap that baby
Dance magic, dance (dance magic, dance)
Dance magic, dance (dance magic, dance)
Dance magic
Slap that slap that baby make him free
Dance magic, dance (dance magic, dance)
Dance magic, dance (dance magic, dance)
Dance magic, dance (dance magic, dance)
Dance magic, dance (dance magic, dance)
Dance magic, dance (dance magic, dance)
Dance magic, dance (dance magic, dance)
Dance magic, dance (dance magic, dance)

Thought for the day:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Put your hand on a hot stove for a minute, and it seems like an hour.
Sit with a pretty girl for an hour, and it seems like a minute.
THAT'S relativity."
~Albert Einstein

In the mid 50s, my Mom listened to a DJ named Cottonseed Clark. Clark had a low threshold for suggestive songs. He banned several, such as Slippin' Around and this one:


You Better Not Do That (1954)

I'm just a plain ole country boy, and I like to do what's right
But just like any other boy, I like to hold em' tight
Sometimes I got resistance, but no matter how I try
When a cute little gal just looks at me, with a gleam in her eye

And I say, "you better not do that", and she said "why?" and I said
"Cause, you just better not do that"

When was in a country school, I always had a girl
That'd laugh and giggle all so cute, and put me in a whirl
And every day at recess time, she'd follow me outside
I'd scratch my head and wonder, are they ever satisfied

And I'd say "honey, you better not do that", and she'd say "why",
"Cause you just better not do that"

When I was a little older, I went to a country-dance
I went to have a little fun, wasn't thinking about romance
But the dim lights just lured them on and they'd snuggle up to me
I knew that I wouldn't last too long, cause I'm human, you see

I'd say "baby, you better not do that", and she'd say "why" and I say
"Cause, you just better not do that"

Now that's the way my life has been, ain't it a crying shame
How much longer can I last, if I keep playing in the games?
Sometimes I don't know who I am, don't they know what they're doing
I'm afraid in days to come, girls will be my ruin

Now I say, "honey, you better not do that" and she'll say "why", and
I'll say well, "you just better not do that', and she'll still say "Why"
And I'll say oh, well, oh, oh, it's alright to do that

Edgar, keep em comin. There's a gap in my musical knowledge...I didn't arrive in the states til 1961.

Letty Betty. Just wanted to pay homage to you and your radio station. You're like a Mrs Pynchon overseeing your domain. You've found a perfect vehicle for your vast knowledge. All of us here on A2k are better off for it.

edgar, I have to smile thinking of your mother listening to that song. The only one that I can recall having heard my mom listen to was:

Precious Lord Take my Hand.

panz, That's a kind thing to say. Thank you, my friend. I really wanted this station to be the one heard around the world.

Well, I must do things that I have put off for too long. I'll tune in again later.

Mornin' Pan.
Here is one that got banned from Corpus Christi stations. That city also banned American Woman.


Little Egypt
The Coasters

I went and bought myself a ticket and
I sat down in the very first row, wo wo.
They pulled the curtain but then when
they turned the spotlight way down low, wo wo,
little Egypt came out strttin',
wearing nutton but a button and a bow, wo wo,
singing, "Yeah yeah! Yeah yeah! Yeah yeah! Yeah yeah''.

She had a ruby on her tummy and
a diamond big as Texas on her toe, wo wo.
She let her hair down and
she did the hoochie koochie real slow, wo wo,
When she did her special number on a zebra skin,
I thought she'd stop the show, wo wo,
singing, "Yeah yeah! Yeah yeah! Yeah yeah! Yeah yeah!".

She did a triple somersault and when she hit the ground,
she winked at the audience and then she turned around.
She had a picture of a cowboy tattooed on her spine,
saying Phoenix, Arizona, nineteen forty-nine.

Yeah, but let me tell you people,
little Egypt doesn't dance there anymo', wo wo.
She's too busy mopping and
a taking care of shopping at the sto', wo wo.
'Cause we got seven kids and
all day long they crawl around the flo', wo wo,
singing, "Yeah yeah! Yeah yeah! Yeah yeah! Yeah yeah!"

I saw the movie School Ties(I think) last night and it was a very good exploration of anti-semitism in our culture back in the 50's. The song all the boys in the doem were singing was Smoky Joe's Cafe.
R&B really grabbed white kids by the throat back then. And it was so taboo.

My Mom grew up an avid country music fan, particularly liking Hank Snow. She also loved the old Hollywood musicals. In 1955 my brother came home from high school one day and asked permission to put the radio on Lucky Lager Dance Time. That was the one playing Frankie Lymon and the Teenagers, Fats Domino, Little Richard, Elvis Presley, Pat Boone and Clyde McPhatter. Mom instantly took to the music and became a lifelong fan of rock. Several years later her favorite singer was Gene Pitney.

Smokey Joe's Cafe was a song recorded by the Robins. They later changed their name to The Coasters. I searched for the lyrics but they eluded me. I could almost do a credible job by memory, but not quite.

On Bi-polar's Misanthrope thread, I noticed that Princess Di showed a picture of that sweet bird, the phalarope, so like the sandpiper. edgar, we've come a long way, have we not?

Panz, I saw School Ties a long time ago, but I realized the struggle that certain ethnic groups have had. In Alan Paton's book, Cry the Beloved Country, the same theme was woven:

The novel Cry, the Beloved Country takes place in South Africa in 1946, just before the 1948 elections and the onset of apartheid, or the separation of races. As the novel shows, however, long before the South African apartheid era, racial inequality existed; apartheid laws merely institutionalized it. Since its publication, Alan Paton's poetic story of tragedy and hope has helped to raise the consciousness of the world about the injustices of apartheid.

During the apartheid era, both black and white South Africans fought against legalized racism. In many ways, the South African fight against apartheid was similar to the American civil rights movement. In this activity, you will compare the struggles against apartheid in South Africa and segregation in the American South.

The connection between all this, is the fact that Paton also wrote Too Late the Phalarope, and Portal Star rather stunned me with her observation.

Have you ever heard the B'way musical, Lost in the Stars, based on Cry the Beloved Country? It's beautiful. The lyrics are by Maxwell Anderson and the music by Kurt Weil. I think Edgar and I discussed this on a music thread once, not sure - but anyway, after I've had my General Tso's Chicken for lunch, I'll try to find the lyrics if you're interested.

Interested, Raggedy? ABSOLUTELY. We're still educating Panz.

Dang. We need the real John of Virginia back in here. At the end of the program today, we're presenting a pulitzer prize, and/or a golden globe award.

I think Panz is doing a pretty good job of educating us. (lol)

I could never be a misanthrope, but I often bewail the failings of my bretheren. Of course I am also minded of the phrase, Do as I say, not as I do, so I've got to becareful.

Printing these lyrics doesn't do justice to the songs (the vocals and chorus are beautiful) in "Lost in the Stars", but they give you some idea of how Anderson tried to follow Paton's novel. In 1974 Lost in the Stars it was made into a movie , music intact, with Brock Peters, Melba Moore, Clifton Davis, but I've never seen it listed anywhere since.

The young African, whose wife is expecting a child, has just been sentenced to hang for the unintentional killing of a white South African during a store robbery:

Cry the Beloved Country,
Cry the Beloved Land
The wasted child, the wasted youth, the wasted man
Cry the broken land? and the broken hills
And the right and wrong forsaken,
The greed that destroys us
The birds that cry here no more.
Cry the beloved country,
Cry the lost, cry the lost, cry the lost.

Cry the unborn child,
Inheritor of our fear
Let him not laugh too gladly
In the water of the kloof (valley)
Nor stand too silent
When the setting sun makes the veldt red with fire.

Cry the unborn son, fatherless let him not be moved
By the song of a bird
Nor give his heart to a mountain ,nor to a valley
Cry the Beloved Country, Cry the Beloved Land

The great red hills stand desolate
Cry the beloved country.
And the earth has torn away like flesh
Cry the beloved country
These are the valleys of old men and old women
Of mothers and children
Cry the beloved land.

The Titihoya cries here no more.

(the young men have abandoned their villages and gone to work in the mines in Johannesburg)

LOST IN THE StARS:

BEFORE LORD GOD MADE THE SEA AND THE LAND,
HE HELD ALL THE STARS IN THE PALM OF HIS HAND,
AND THEY RAN THROUGH HIS FINGERS LIKE GRAINS OF SAND,
AND ONE LITTLE STAR FELL ALONE,

THEN THE LORD GOD HUNTED THROUGH THE WIDE NIGHT AIR,
FOR THE LITTLE DARK STAR ON THE WIND DOWN THERE,
AND HE STATED AND PROMISED HE'D TAKE SPECIAL CARE
SO IT WOULDN'T GET LOST AGAIN,

NOW A MAN DON'T MIND IF THE STARS GROW DIM,
AND THE CLOUDS BLOW OVER AND DARKEN HIM,
SO LONG AS THE LORD GOD'S WATCHING OVER THEM,
KEEPING TRACK HOW IT ALL GOES ON,

BUT I'VE BEEN WALKING THROUGH THE NIGHT AND THE DAY,
TILL MY EYES GET WEARY AND MY HEAD TURNS GRAY,
AND SOMETIMES IT SEEMS MAYBE GOD'S GONE AWAY,
FORGETTING THE PROMISE THAT WE HEARD HIM SAY,

AND WE'RE LOST OUT HERE IN THE STARS,
LITTLE STARS, BIG STARS, BLOWING THROUGH THE NIGHT,
AND WE'RE LOST OUT HERE IN THE STARS,
LITTLE STARS, BIG STARS, BLOWING THROUGH THE NIGHT,

AND WE'RE LOST OUT HERE IN THE STARS.

Thanks Raggedy, you're so very gracious.

A couple of things I forgot to mention

Ian and Sylvia were very popular in my house in the 60's. More so than Joan and Buffy.

-"Their debut album from 1962, 'Ian & Sylvia', saw the release of the single "House Of Cards" that did nothing if not make them a fixture of the early 60's folk boom.

The duo continued their remarkable rise in popularity and were inspired by the success of Dylan. Sylvia managed to write what would become one of the most famous of all folk songs, "Four Strong Winds" after hearing Dylan do "Blowin' In The Wind" in 1964. The duo were married the same year and continued working the college circuit.

Though not hits for the duo, both "Four Strong Winds" and "You Were On My Mind" were successes for Bobby Bare (1964) and the We Five (1965)/Crispen St. Peter (1966) respectively. The duo returned to Canada in 1964 and they had a son, Clay. Later, Sylvia would develop some throat problems leaving Ian to perform solo to make ends meet."-

Even more lovely is Ian's song Summer Wages

Never hit 17 when you play against the dealer
For you know that the odds won't ride with you
And never leave your woman alone when your friends are out to steal her
Years are gambled and lost like summer wages.

And we'll keep rollin on'til we get to Vancouver
And the woman that I love who's living there
It's been 6 long months and more since I've seen her
She may be gambled and gone like summer wages.

And all the beer parlors all down along Main Street
The dreams of the seasons are all spilled down on the floor
All the big stands of timber just waiting for falling
And the hustlers sitting watchfully as they wait there by the door.

So I'll work on the towboats In my slippery city shoes
Which I swore I would never do again
Through the worst fogbound straits where the cedars stand watching
I'll be far off and gone like summer wages.

Ah, she's a woman so fine I may never try to find her
For good memories of what we had before
They should never be changed for they're all that I'll take with me
Now I've gambled and lost my summer wages.

Years are gambled and lost like summer wages.

Main Street should read Yonge Street
Dumb hicks don't know Toronto

Number 2,
I wanted to point out the irony of anti semitism in young whites who were being educated in R&B by mostly Jewish A&R men and record company owners who were sure that this youth oriented music would be big. Alan Freed too I believe was Jewish.

I have a beautiful version of Lost in the Stars by Lena Horne. It's on the NOW album.