Grape Picking Break

I haven't posted for a few days. Quite a few excuses...ummm, I've been busy, my computer's acting up....ahhhh...actually, I'm getting ready to leave for 10 to 14 days
for the Vendenge. The Grape Harvest at the Chateau Vieux Chevrol where I have performed this job for the last 6 years. I will bring back pictures, but duriing that time, I will be pretty much cut off again from all media, except for my radio.
I can pick up BBC World sometimes and I hear a lot of French FM Stations.

Until then, I found this little gem from the 60's. A song which might just be timely again. Back in the days when pop music could be truly eccentric.
SomeThing's In The Air by Thunderclap Newman.
The guitarist is 15, Jimmy McCullough, who later went on to play with Wings. The Pianist is a 50 something Thnderclap New man who plays a type of Barrel house style.
The record was produced by Pete Townsend and it was an orchestral rock piece inciting violent revolution and it was glorious!
If only we could all get up from our computers and go out into the streets.
See you in a little while!

OLLABELLE

Here's a shameless plug for a great American Band, Ollabelle. They are performing a good old time song called "Ain't No More Cane on The Brazos".
These guys are friends of mine and have 2 records out, the latest is called Riverside Battle Songs. I wish I could find a better live piece and when I do I will post it, but here's a group of musicians that can sing and play and keep old forms of American musical tradition alive in the footsteps of The Band and other keepers of the flame!
I reviewed their album earlier this year some where on this blog!

A Kind Of Pornography

Today marks the 6th anniversary of the destruction of the World Trade Center in New York. It will be a day filled with words and emotion as politicians try to get what ever mileage they can from this terrible tragedy.

The men who perpetrated this act, the planners knew what they were doing, it wasn't the physical damage, the tragic death of 3000 innocent victims, it was the trauma, the tragedy of the events sent in motion by this act that is the the continuing cataclysm.
They empowered the destruction of American Freedom or, How the Bush/Cheney administration was allowed to turn the America Dream into a nightmare.

At this point, I lose my attempt at eloquence, my brain goes into rewind as I relive my panicked bicycle ride through a traffic jam up Church Street as the wall of debris and dust is chasing my back as the first Trade Center tower collapses. The indescribable smell of the destruction and the dust that coated everything for days. Scraps of paper that drifted out of the sky for the next day or so. The insane realization that what I saw really happened and I have to show picture ID to get into my neighborhood for the next week.

The anger as I realize that a man who stole the 2000 election and was on his way to a one term presidency was grabbing the coat tails of this disaster and dragging us all down into his medieval vision of the future. The disgust as I read the bare bones of the Patriot Act and realize that these guys were waiting to spring this on us, they just needed the right disaster of a proper magnitude to do it.

The revulsion I feel as these bastards twist Americas agony to accomplish what ever adventure they fantasize. The image of the planes smashing into the Towers replayed over and over and over again until it becomes a kind of pornography.

Yeah, I feel cheapened and used. America will never be the same. A nation of self centered trauma victims, unable to let go of the pain, howling for revenge led by psychotic madmen who will never let us heal.

Miss Sarajevo

This is a live performance of Luciano Pavorotti, the members of U2 and Brian Eno performing the piece Miss Sarajevo in 1995, in Sarajevo.

RIP Luciano Pavorotti

If you are interested, search thebrainpolice for the entry of Pavorotti dueting with James Brown on It's A Man's World. You won't be disappointed.

The Unthinkable, Now!

I read a very curious piece by Larry Johnson in a blog on National Security called

No Quarter. In it, Mr. Johnson raises some very interesting questions about the alarming story that appeared yesterday about the cross country flight of nuclear armed missles in a B-52.
The flight was from Minot, North Dakota to Barksdale, Louisiana. In his article, Mr. Johnson raises the question as to how the story made it off the base in the first place.
The flight of a B-52 across country from one base to another is like a a postman walking out of a post office. What is remarkable about that? How would someone watching the the plane be able to identify the cruise missles being shipped as nukes?
His supposition is that someone on the inside wanted to leak the information.
Why? Because, Barksdale, Louisiana is a jumping off place for Middle East Operations. Are we thinking of using nuclear cruise missles in Iraq?
That is preposterous, the only other supposition is that they are being prepositioned for a strike on Iran. The only time nuclear weapons are moved in a plane is when we are on alert or they are positioning weapons in a specific site.
So what is going on here? Is someone trying to alert America to the reality that
the Administration is actually planning to use nuclear cruise missles in a strike against Iran? This is a real, tough question that has to be asked now and if it is true,
the implications are almost unthinkable.

FIGHT!FIGHT!FIGHT!

Don't give up Senator Craig! If you think you got half a hair on a rats ass of a chance,
fight! Show those hypocrites thay can't make you give up your power!
We're behind you all the way, or something like that!
C'mon gang! Everyone, everywhere has to tell Senator Craig
that he has to stay and fight.
Don't believe the nay sayers who say you are delusional!
Senator Craig, tell'em Microdot wants you to fight,
fight, fight! Drag this debacle out as long as you can!
And if you happen to screw your parties chances in the next election even worse than
they're screwed already, well, fuck'em!

Mens At Work

Microdot has big headache! Computer acting very funny and I've been doing diagnostics on it all day. I live in the middle of nowhere near noplace with an Apple dealership. It's a 8 year old IMac and I have done some strange things to it to make it run OSX. I am not a computer tech but hey, a guys gotta do what a guys gotta do! I took it apart and cleaned it and put it back together and it turns on now. My brains hurt! Maybe it will work after I turn it off tonight and turn it back on tomorrow! Cross your fingers for me.
Meanwhile, I have found this video of Jimi Hendrix playing All Along The Watch Tower live. I think it's at the Isle Of Wight Festival in 1970. For your Pleasure!