In Honor Of The 64th Anniversary Year Of The Chinese Revolution of 1949- From The Pen Of Leon Trotsky-Problems Of The Chinese Revolution (1927) –A Strangled Revolution-and Its Stranglers-June 13, 1931-Kadikoy

Click on link below to read on-line all of Leon Trotsky's book, Problems Of The Chinesee Revolution

http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1932/pcr/index.htm

Markin comment (repost from 2012):

On a day when we are honoring the 63rd anniversary of the Chinese revolution of 1949 the article posted in this entry and the comment below take on added meaning. In the old days, in the days when I had broken from many of my previously held left social-democratic political views and had begun to embrace Marxism with a distinct tilt toward Trotskyism, I ran into an old revolutionary in Boston who had been deeply involved (although I did not learn the extend of that involvement until later) in the pre-World War II socialist struggles in Eastern Europe. The details of that involvement will not detain us here now but the import of what he had to impart to me about the defense of revolutionary gains has stuck with me until this day. And, moreover, is germane to the subject of this article from the pen of Leon Trotsky -the defense of the Chinese revolution and the later gains of that third revolution (1949) however currently attenuated.

This old comrade, by the circumstances of his life, had escaped that pre-war scene in fascist-wracked Europe and found himself toward the end of the 1930s in New York working with the Trotskyist Socialist Workers Party in the period when that organization was going through intense turmoil over the question of defense of the Soviet Union. In the history of American (and international) Trotskyism this is the famous Max Shachtman-James Burnham led opposition that declared, under one theory or another, that the previously defendable Soviet Union had changed dramatically enough in the course of a few months to be no longer worth defending by revolutionaries.

What struck him from the start about this dispute was the cavalier attitude of the anti-Soviet opposition, especially among the wet-behind-the-ears youth, on the question of that defense and consequently about the role that workers states, healthy, deformed or degenerated, as we use the terms of art in our movement, as part of the greater revolutionary strategy. Needless to say most of those who abandoned defense of the Soviet Union when there was even a smidgeon of a reason to defend it left politics and peddled their wares in academia or business. Or if they remained in politics lovingly embraced the virtues of world imperialism.

That said, the current question of defense of the Chinese Revolution hinges on those same premises that animated that old Socialist Workers Party dispute. And strangely enough (or maybe not so strangely) on the question of whether China is now irrevocably on the capitalist road, or is capitalist already (despite some very un-capitalistic economic developments over the past few years), I find that many of those who oppose that position have that same cavalier attitude the old comrade warned me against back when I was first starting out. There may come a time when we, as we had to with the Soviet Union and other workers states, say that China is no longer a workers state. But today is not that day. In the meantime study the issue, read the posted article, and more importantly, defend the gains of the Chinese Revolution.

*********

Leon Trotsky

Problems of the Chinese Revolution

---

A Strangled Revolution-and Its Stranglers-June 13, 1931-Kadikoy

Urgent work prevented me from reading sooner the article by Malraux in which he defends, against my criticism, the Communist International, Borodin, Garine, and himself. As a political publicist, Malraux is at a still greater distance from the proletariat and from the revolution than as an artist. By itself, this fact would not justify these lines, for it is nowhere said that a talented writer must necessarily be a proletarian revolutionist. If I nevertheless return to the same question again, it is for the sake of the subject, and not of Malraux.

The best figures of the novel, I said, attained the stature of social symbols. I must add: Borodin, Garine and all their “collaborators” constitute symbols of the quasi-revolutionary bureaucracy, of that new “social type” which was born thanks to the existence of the soviet state on the one hand, and on the other to a definite régime in the Comintern.
I declined to classify Borodin among the “professional revolutionists”, as he is characterized in the novel. Malraux endeavours to show me that Garine has enough mandarin’s buttons to give him the right to this title. Here, Malraux finds it in place to add that Trotsky has a greater quantity of buttons. Isn’t it ridiculous? The type of the professional revolutionist is not at all some sort of an ideal type. But in all events, it is a definite type, with a definite political biography and with salient traits. Only Russia created this type during the last decades; in Russia, the most perfect of this type was created by the Bolshevik Party. The professional revolutionists of the generation to which Borodin belonged began to take shape on the eve of the first revolution, they were put to the test in 1905, they tempered and educated (or decomposed) themselves during the years of the counter-revolution; they stood the supreme test in 1917. From 1903 up to 1918, that is, during the whole period when, in Russia, was being formed the type of professional revolutionist, Borodin, and hundreds, thousands of Borodins, remained outside of the struggle. In 1918, after the victory, Borodin arrived to offer his services. This does him honour: it is worthier to serve the proletarian state than the bourgeois state. Borodin charged himself with perilous missions. But the agents of bourgeois states in foreign countries, especially in colonial countries, also and that quite frequently, accomplish perilous tasks. Yet they do not become revolutionists because of that. The type of the functionary-adventurer and the type of the professional revolutionist, at certain moments and by certain qualities, can find points of similarity. But by their psychological formation as much as by their historical function, they are two opposite types.
The revolution pursues its course together with its class. If the proletariat is weak, if it is backward, the revolution confines itself to the modest, patient and persevering work of the creation of propaganda circles, of the preparation of cadres; supporting itself upon the first cadres, it passes over to mass agitation, legal or illegal, according to the circumstances. It always distinguishes its class from the enemy class, and conducts only such a policy as corresponds to the strength of its class and consolidates this strength. The French, the Russian or the Chinese proletarian revolutionist, will look upon the Chinese workers as his own army, of today or of tomorrow. The functionary-adventurer raises himself above all the classes of the Chinese nation. He considers himself predestined to dominate, to give orders, to command, independently of the internal relationship of forces in China. Since the Chinese proletariat is weak today and cannot assure the commanding positions, the functionary conciliates and joins together the different classes. He acts as the inspector of the nation, as the viceroy for the affairs of the colonial revolution. He arranges combinations between the conservative bourgeois and the anarchist, he improvises a program ad hoc, he erects policies upon ambiguities, he creates a bloc of four classes, he swallows swords and scoffs at principles. With what result? The bourgeoisie is richer, more influential, more experienced. The functionary-adventurer does not succeed in deceiving it. But for all that, he deceives the workers, filled with the spirit of abnegation, but not experienced, by turning them over to the hands of the bourgeoisie. Such was the role of the bureaucracy of the Comintern in the Chinese revolution.
Considering as natural the right of the “revolutionary” bureaucracy to command independently of the forces of the proletariat, Malraux informs us that one could not participate in the Chinese revolution without participating in the war, and one could not participate in the war without participating in the Guomindang, etc To this, he adds: the break with the Guomindang would have meant, for the Communist Party, the necessity of passing into illegality. When one thinks that these arguments sum up the philosophy of the representatives of the Comintern in China, he cannot refrain from saying: Indeed, the dialectic of the historical process sometimes plays bad jokes upon organizations, upon men and upon ideas! How easy it is to solve the problem: in order to participate successfully in the events directed by the enemy class, one must submit to this class; in order to avoid repressions on the part of the Guomindang, one must paint oneself up in its colours! There you have the secret of Borodin-Garine.
Malraux’s political estimate of the situation, of the possibilities and the tasks in China in 1925, is entirely false; it hardly reaches the border line where the real problems of the revolution begin. I have said elsewhere all that had to be said on this subject, and Malraux’s article gives no ground for a re-examination of what has been said. But even by standing on the ground of the false estimate Malraux gives of the situation, one can in no case justify the policy of Stalin-Borodin-Garine. In order to protest in 1925 against this policy, certain things had to be foreseen. In order to defend it in 1931, one must be incurably blind.
Did the strategy of the functionaries of the Comintern bring the Chinese proletariat anything but humiliations, the extermination of its cadres and above all, a terrific confusion in the mind? Did the shameful capitulation before the Guomindang avert repression for the Party? On the contrary, it only accumulated and concentrated the repressions. Was not the Communist Party compelled to pass into illegality? And when? In the period of the crushing of the revolution! If the Communists had begun by illegal work, at the beginning of the revolutionary tide, they would have emerged upon the open arena at the head of the masses. By effacing and demoralizing the Party with the aid of the Borodins and Garines, Chiang Kai-shek compelled it later, with all the greater success to take refuge in illegality during the years of the counter-revolution. The policy of Borodin-Garine entirely served the Chinese bourgeoisie. The Chinese Communist Party must begin all over again at the beginning, and that on an arena encumbered with debris, with prejudices, with uncomprehended mistakes and with the distrusts of the advanced workers. Those are the results.
The criminal character of this whole policy reveals itself with particular acuteness in isolated questions. Malraux presents as a merit of Borodin and Company the fact that in turning over the terrorists to the hands of the bourgeoisie, he deliberately pushed under the knife of the terror the leader of the bourgeoisie, Chen Dai. This machination is worthy of a bureaucratic Borgia or of the “revolutionary” Polish szlachta (gentry and nobility) who always preferred to fire with the hands of others behind the backs of the people. No, the task was not to kill Chen Dai in ambush, but to prepare the overthrow of the bourgeoisie. When the party of the revolution is obliged to kill, it does it on its open responsibility, in the name of tasks and immediate aims understood by the masses.
Revolutionary morals are not abstract Kantian norms, but rules of conduct which place the revolutionist under the control of the tasks and aims of his class. Borodin and Garine were not bound up with the masses, they did not absorb the spirit of responsibility before the class. They are bureaucratic supermen who consider that “everything is permitted” within the limits of the mandate received from above. The activity of such men, effective as it may be at certain moments, can only be directed, in the last instance, against the interests of the revolution.
After having killed Chen Dai with the hands of Hong, Borodin and Garine then turn over Hong and his group to the hands of the executioners. This stamps their whole policy with the brand of Cain. Here too Malraux poses as a defender. What is his argument? Lenin and Trotsky also punished the anarchists. It is hard to believe that this is said by a man who came near the revolution, even if but for a moment. Malraux forgets or does not understand that the revolution takes place in the name of the domination of one class over another, that it is only from this task that revolutionists draw their right to violence. The bourgeoisie exterminates the revolutionists, sometimes also the anarchists (more and more infrequently, because they become ever more obedient) in the name of safeguarding the régime of exploitation and baseness. Under the domination of the bourgeoisie, the Bolsheviks always defend the anarchists against the Chiappes. After having conquered power, the Bolsheviks did everything to draw the anarchists over to the side of the dictatorship of the proletariat. They succeeded in actuality in drawing the majority of the anarchists behind them. Yes, the Bolsheviks severely punished those anarchists who undermined the dictatorship of the proletariat. Were we right or weren’t we? That depends upon the manner in which one evaluates our revolution and the régime instituted by it. But can one imagine for a single instant that the Bolsheviks – under Prince Lvov or under Kerensky, under the bourgeois régime – would act as its agents in the extermination of anarchists? It is enough to formulate the question clearly, to turn aside in disgust. Just as Bridoison interests himself only in the form and ignores the essence, so the quasi-revolutionary bureaucracy and its literary attorney interest themselves only in the mechanics of the revolution, ignoring the question of what class and what régime they should serve. Here lies the abyss between the revolutionist and the functionary of the revolution.
What Malraux says about Marxism is a joke. The Marxian policy was not applicable in China because, you see, the proletariat was not class-conscious. It would seem then that from this flows the task of awakening this class-consciousness. But Malraux deduces a justification of the policy directed against the interests of the proletariat.
The other argument is no more convincing and still less amusing: Trotsky speaks of the need of Marxism for revolutionary politics; but isn’t Borodin a Marxist? And Stalin, isn’t he a Marxist? Then it is not a question of Marxism. I defend, against Garine, the revolutionary doctrine, just as I would defend, against a sorcerer, the medical sciences. The sorcerer will say to me in his defence that diplomaed doctors also very often kill their patients. It is an argument unworthy of a moderately educated burgher, and not only of a revolutionist. The fact that medicine is not omnipotent, that the doctors do not always effect cures, that one finds among them ignoramuses, blockheads and even poisoners – can this fact serve as an argument for giving the right to practise medicine to sorcerers, who have never studied medicine and who deny its significance?
I must make one correction, after having read Malraux’s article. In my article I expressed the idea that an inoculation of Marxism would do Garine good. I don’t think so any more.

***Out In The 1960s Night- Michael Caine and Demi Moore’s Flawless  

 

 

From The Pen Of Frank Jackman

DVD Review

Flawless, starring Demi Moore, Michael Caine, 2008

No question, no question at all that it was tough, tough as hell, to be a woman with executive level skills, CEO-type skills in the international diamond business then based in London, or any business for that matter, in the 1960s. But what were you, that woman, to do about it, except endlessly smoke cigarettes and fume. No question, no question at all that the private health insurance racket for serious illnesses in England, or anywhere for that matter, is predicated on providing the least possible help for the sick when all is said and done. Those two hurts, the first held by Demi Moore, the other by Michael Caine (in about his twelve millionth film) around the treatment of his dead wife is what drives the plotline in this film under review, Flawless (as in flawless diamonds or flawless plan, I assume).         

Naturally, naturally for a suspense thriller these hurts can only be resolved by action, here by criminal action. See Michael, a janitor at the London Diamond Exchange, recruits Demi, a middle- level executive there to a plan that he has cooked up to get revenge for his wife’s death on the insurance executive whose policy didn’t provide the expected coverage when she developed cancer.  And as part of the package help Demi get even for being passed over when promotion time came up and some lesser guy, lesser male got pushed ahead in that old rat race.

The plan: steal a few million dollars in diamonds from the vast haul in the vault as restitution. Hell, their disappearance would never be noticed. He says. And the damn plan worked, worked real well. Except in the end though Michael had a bigger political objective, to ruin that insurance company so he ingeniously stole the contents of the whole vault and held it ransom. And the ransom after much hemming and hawing was paid. Nice work. Except that was not Michael’s point in this caper and so Demi wound up with the 100 million dollar ransom which she spent the rest of her life trying to give away to various charities. Yah, I know, far-fetched but what isn’t far-fetched is that for once crime did pay, did pay for the side of the angels for a change.     

 

 

***The Roots Is The Toots- The Music That Got Them Through World War II-Peggy Lee Backed By The Benny Goodman Band- From Deep In The American Songbook-George Gershwin’s How Long Has This Been Going On …

And memories of that girl (or guy) who got away, or who was married to another, or who had another girlfriend (or boyfriend, or today mix and match, and then too come to think of it), or one of a thousand other reasons for parting, some good, some bad but in misty future time regret, sheer regret for that maybe first love and why things hadn’t worked out. Thus this song to get one by on that cold, lonely remembrance night.          

**********

Over the past several years I have been running an occasional series in this space of songs, mainly political protest songs, you know The Internationale, Union Maid, Which Side Are You On, Viva La Quince Brigada, Universal Soldier, and such entitled Songs To While The Class Struggle By. This series which could include some protest songs as well is centered on roots music as it has come down through the ages and formed the core of the American songbook. You will find the odd, the eccentric, the forebears of later musical trends, and the just plain amusing here. Listen up-Peter Paul Markin       

Additional Markin comment for this series:

Whether we liked it or not, whether we even knew what it meant to our parents or not, what sacred place it held in their youthful hearts, this is the music that went wafting through the house of many of those of us who constitute the Generation of ‘68. Those of us who came of age, personal, political and social age in the age of Jack Kennedy’s Camelot, and who were driven by some makeshift dream, who in the words of brother Bobby quoting  from Alfred Lord Tennyson were “seeking a new world.”  Those who took up the call to action and slogged through that decade whether it was in civil rights/black liberation struggle, the anti-Vietnam War struggle or the struggle to find one’s own identity in the counter-culture before the hammer came down. And that hammer came down quickly as the decade ended and the high white note drifted out into the ebbing tide. But enough of that about us this is about forbears and their struggles, and the music that they dreamed by on cold winter nights or hot summer days.

This is emphatically the music of the generation that survived the dust bowl, empty bowl, no sugar bowl street urchin hard times of the 1930s Great Depression, the time of the madness, the time of the night-takers, the time of the long knives. Survived god knows how by taking the nearest freight, some smoke and dreams freight, Southern Pacific, Union Pacific, B&O, Illinois Central, Penn Central, Empire State, Boston and Maine, or one of a million trunk lines to go out and search for, well, search for… Search for something that was not triple decker bodies piled high cold-water flat with a common commode and brown stained sink, rooming house, hell, call it what it was flop house stinking of perspiration and low-shelf whiskeys and wines, or tumbled down shack, window pane-less, tarpaper siding, roof tiles falling, and get out on the open road and search for the great promised American night that had been tattered by world events, and greed.

Survived the Hoovervilles, the great cardboard, tin can roof, slap-dash jerry-built camp explosions along rivers, down in ravines and under railroad trestles when the banks, yeah, the banks, the usual suspects, robbed people of their shacks, their cottages, their farm houses, robbed them as an old-time balladeer said at the time not with a gun but with a fountain pen, but still robbed them. Survived the soap kitchens hungers, the endless waiting in line for scrapes, dreaming of some by-gone steak or dish of ice cream, and always that hunger, not the stomach hunger although that was ever present, but the hunger that hurts a man, hurts his pride when he has to stick his hand out, stick it out and not know why. Out of work, or with little work waiting for that day, that full head of steam day in places like Flint, Frisco town, Akron, Chicago, hell, even in boondock Minneapolis when the score gets evened, evened a little, but until then shifting the scroungings of the trash piles of the urban glut, the rural fallow fields, and that gnarring hungry that cried out in the night-want, want that is all. 

Survived too the look, the look of those, the what did FDR (Franklin Delano Roosevelt for the young, or forgetful) call them, oh yeah, the economic royalists, today’s 1%, who in their fortified towers tittered that not everybody was built to survive to be the fittest. They fought tooth and nail against the little guy trying to break bread, trying to get out from under that cardboard, tar paper, windowless soup kitchen world along with a hell of a lot of comrades, yes, comrades, kindred in the struggle to put survival of the fittest on the back-burner of human history, to take collective action to put things right, hell, made the bosses cry bloody murder when they shut down their factories, shut them down cold until some puny penny justice was eked out.      

Survived to slog through the time of the gun in World War II, either carrying one on the shoulder in Europe or the Pacific or waiting at home hoping to high heaven that some wayward gun had not carried off sweetheart Johnnie or Jimmy. Survived the endless lines of boys heading off East and West, waiting for the other shoe to drop, hanging in some corner drugstore, Doc’s, Rexall, name your drugstore name, sitting two by two at the soda fountain playing that newly installed jukebox until the nickels ran out. Listened to funny banana songs, rum and coca cola songs, siting under the apple tree songs to get a minute’s reprieve from thoughts of the journey ahead.

Listened too to dreamy, sentimental songs, songs about faraway places, about keeping lamp- lights burning, about making a better world out of the fire and brimstone sacrifice before them, about Johnnie and Jimmie actually returning, returning whole, and putting a big dent in their dreams, hell, about maybe the damn wars would be over sooner rather than later. Listened and as old Doc, or some woe-begotten soda jerk, some high school kid, told them to leave he was closing up, they made for the beach, if near a beach, the pond, the back forty, the hills, or whatever passed for a lovers’ lane in their locale and with the echo of those songs as background, well, what do you think they did, why do you think they call us baby-boomers.               

It wafted through the large console radio centered in the living room of my house via local station WDJA in North Adamsville as my mother used it as background on her appointed household rounds. It drove me crazy then as mush stuff at a time when I was craving the big break-out rock and roll sounds I kept hearing every time I went and played the jukebox at Doc’s Drugstore over on Walker Street down near the beach. Funny thing though while I am still a child of rock and roll (blues too) this so-called mushy stuff sounds pretty good to these ears now long after my parents and those who performed this music have passed on. Go figure. 

**********
How Long Has This Been Going On  

As a tot, when I trotted in little velvet panties,
I was kissed by my sisters, my cousins, and my anties.
Sad to tell, it was hell, an inferno worse than Dante's.
So my dear I swore,
"Never, never more !"
On my list, I insisted that kissing must be crossed out.
Now, I find I was blind, and oh my ! , how I lost out !

I could cry salty tears ;
Where have I been all these years ?
Little wow, tell me now :
How long has this been going on ?

There were chills up my spine,
And some thrills I can't define.
Listen, sweet, I repeat :
how long has this been going on ?

Oh, I feel that I could melt ;
Into Heaven I'm hurled !
I know how Clombus felt,
Finding another world.

Kiss me once, then once more.
What a dunce I was before.
What a break ! For Heaven's sake !
How long has this been going on ?

Dear, when in your arms I creep,
That divine rendez-vous,
Don't wake me, if I'm asleep,
Let me dream that it's true !

Kiss me twice, then once more.
That makes thrice, let's make it four !
What a break ! For Heaven's sake !
How long has this been going on ?
--How long has this... been going ... on ?... .

From The Marxist Archives-In Honor Of The Anniversary Of The John Brown-Led Raid On Harpers Ferry-

Labor Struggles and the Capitalist State

 

STRIKE THE BLOW-THE LEGEND OF CAPTAIN JOHN BROWN

Reclaiming John Brown for the Left

BOOK REVIEW

JOHN BROWN, ABOLITIONIST, DAVID S. REYNOLDS, ALFRED A. KNOPF, NEW YORK, 2005
From fairly early in my youth I knew the name John Brown and was swept up by the romance surrounding his exploits at Harpers Ferry. For example, I knew that the great anthem of the Civil War -The Battle Hymn of the Republic- had a prior existence as a tribute to John Brown and that Union soldiers marched to that song as they headed south. I was then, however, neither familiar with the import of his exploits for the black liberation struggle nor knew much about the specifics of the politics of the various tendencies in the struggle against slavery. I certainly knew nothing then of Brown’s (and his sons) prior military exploits in the Kansas ‘proxy’ wars against the expansion of slavery. Later study filled in some of those gaps and has only strengthened my strong bond with his memory. Know this, as I reach the age at which John Brown was executed,I still retain my youthful admiration for him. In the context of the turmoil of the times he was the most courageous and audacious revolutionary in the struggle for the abolition of slavery in America. Almost 150 years after his death this writer is proud to stand in the tradition of John Brown.

That said, it is with a great deal of pleasure that I can recommend Mr. Reynolds’s book detailing the life, times and exploits of John Brown, warts and all. Published in 2005, this is an important source (including helpful end notes) for updating various controversies surrounding the John Brown saga. While I may disagree with some of Mr. Reynolds’s conclusions concerning the impact of John Brown’s exploits on later black liberation struggles and to a lesser extent his position on Brown’s impact on his contemporaries, particularly the Transcendentalists, nevertheless on the key point of the central place of John Brown in American revolutionary history there is no dispute. Furthermore, Mr. Reynolds has taken pains to provide substantial detail about the ups and downs of John Brown’s posthumous reputation.

Most importantly, he defends the memory of John Brown against all-comers-that is partisan history on behalf of the ‘losers’ of history at its best. He has reclaimed John Brown to his proper position as an icon for the left against the erroneous and outrageous efforts of modern day religious and secular terrorists to lay any claim to his memory or his work. Below I make a few comments on some of controversies surrounding John Brown developed in Mr. Reynolds’s study.

If one understands the ongoing nature, from his early youth, of John Brown’s commitment to the active struggle against slavery, the scourge of the American Republic in the first half of the 19th century, one can only conclude that he was indeed a man on a mission. As Mr. Reynolds’s points out Brown took every opportunity to fight against slavery including early service as an agent of the Underground Railroad spiriting escaped slaves northward, participation as an extreme radical in all the key anti-slavery propaganda battles of the time as well as challenging other anti-slavery elements to be more militant and in the 1850’s, arms in hand, fighting in the ‘proxy’ wars in Kansas and, of course, the culmination of his life- the raid on Harpers Ferry. Those exploits alone render absurd a very convenient myth by those who supported slavery or turned a blind eye to it and their latter-day apologists for his so-called ‘madness’. This is a political man and to these eyes a very worthy one.

For those who like their political heroes ‘pure’, frankly, it is better to look elsewhere than the life of John Brown. His personal and family life as a failed rural capitalist would hardly lead one to think that this man was to become a key historical figure in any struggle, much less the great struggle against slavery. Some of his actions in Kansas (concerning the murder of some pro-slavery elements under his direction) also cloud his image. However, when the deal went down in the late 1850’s and it was apparent for all to see that there was no other way to end slavery than a fight to the death-John Brown rose to the occasion. And did not cry about it. And did not expect others to cry about it. Call him a ‘monomaniac’ if you like but even a slight acquaintance with great historical figures shows they all have this ‘disease’- that is why they make the history books. No, the ‘madness’ argument will not do.

Whether or not John Brown knew that his military strategy for the Harper’s Ferry raid would, in the short term, be defeated is a matter of dispute. Reams of paper have been spent proving the military foolhardiness of his scheme at Harper’s Ferry. Brown’s plan, however, was essentially a combination of slave revolt modeled after the maroon experiences in Haiti, Nat Turner’s earlier Virginia slave rebellion and rural guerrilla warfare of the ‘third world’ type that we have become more familiar with since that time. 150 years later this strategy does not look so foolhardy in an America of the 1850’s that had no real standing army, fairly weak lines of communications, virtually uninhabited mountains to flee to and the North at their backs.

The execution of the plan is another matter. Brown seemingly made about every mistake in the book in that regard. However, this is missing the essential political point that militant action not continuing parliamentary maneuvering advocated by other abolitionists had become necessary. A few more fighting abolitionists, including Frederick Douglass, and better propaganda work among freedman with connections to the plantations would not have hurt the chances for success at Harpers Ferry.

What is not in dispute is that Brown considered himself a true Calvinist avenging angel in the struggle against slavery and more importantly acted on that belief. In short, he was committed to bring justice to the black masses. This is why his exploits and memory stay alive after over 150 years. It is possible that if Brown did not have this, by 19th century standards as well as our own, old-fashioned Calvinist determination that he would not have been capable of militant action. Certainly other anti-slavery elements never came close to his militancy, including the key Transcendentalist movement led by Emerson and Thoreau and the Concord ‘crowd’ who supported him and kept his memory alive in hard times.

In their eyes he had the heroic manner of the Old Testament prophet. Now this animating spirit is not one that animates modern revolutionaries and so it is hard to understand the depths of his religious convictions on his actions but they were understood, if not fully appreciated, by others in those days. It is better today to look at Brown more politically through his hero (and mine, as well) Oliver Cromwell-a combination of Calvinist avenger and militant warrior. Yes, I can get behind that picture of him.

By all accounts Brown and his small integrated band of brothers fought bravely and coolly against great odds. Ten of Brown's men were killed including two of his sons. Five were captured, tried and executed, including Brown. These results are almost inevitable when one takes up a revolutionary struggle against the old order and one is not victorious. One need only think of, for example, the fate of the defenders of the Paris Commune in 1871. One can fault Brown on this or that tactical maneuver. Nevertheless he and the others bore themselves bravely in defeat. As we are all too painfully familiar there are defeats of the oppressed that lead nowhere. One thinks of the defeat of the German Revolution in the 1920’s. There other defeats that galvanize others into action. This is how Brown’s actions should be measured by history.

Militarily defeated at Harpers Ferry, Brown's political mission to destroy slavery by force of arms nevertheless continued to galvanize important elements in the North at the expense of the pacifistic non-resistant Garrisonian political program for struggle against slavery. Many writers on Brown who reduce his actions to that of a ‘madman’ still cannot believe that his road proved more appropriate to end slavery than either non-resistance or gradualism. That alone makes short shrift of such theories. Historians and others have also misinterpreted later events such as the Bolshevik strategy which led to Russian Revolution in October 1917. More recently, we saw this same incomprehension concerning the victory of the Vietnamese against overwhelming American military superiority. Needless to say, all these events continue to be revised by some historians to take the sting out of there proper political implications.

From a modern prospective Brown’s strategy for black liberation, even if the abolitionist goal he aspired to was immediately successful, reached the outer limits within the confines of capitalism. Brown’s actions were meant to make black people free. Beyond that goal he had no program except the Chatham Charter which seems to have replicated the American constitution but with racial and gender equality as a cornerstone. Unfortunately the Civil War did not provide fundamental economic and political freedom. That is still our fight. Moreover, the Civil War, the defeat of Radical Reconstruction, the reign of ‘Jim Crow’ and the subsequent waves of black migration to the cities changed the character of black oppression in the U.S. from Brown’s time. Black people are now a part of "free labor," and the key to their liberation is in the integrated fight of labor against the current one-sided class war and establishing a government of workers and their allies. Nevertheless, we can stand proudly in the revolutionary tradition of John Brown (and of his friend Frederick Douglass). We need to complete the unfinished democratic tasks of the Civil War, not by emulating Brown’s exemplary actions but to moving the multi-racial American working class to power. Finish the Civil War.
**************

Workers Vanguard No. 987	30 September 2011

TROTSKY

LENIN

Labor Struggles and the Capitalist State

(Quote of the Week)

In fighting company union-busting, longshoremen in Longview, Washington, are confronting anti-labor laws enforced by government agencies, the courts and the police. Drawing some lessons of the successful 1934 Minneapolis Teamsters strike, Trotskyist leader James P. Cannon pointed out that many workers were learning from their own experience that the state was not neutral but was an agency of the capitalist class in suppressing labor struggles. He also explained that strike strategy and tactics must be guided by a realistic assessment of the actual balance of class forces in the concrete situation.

This spirit of determined struggle was combined at the same time with a realistic appraisal of the relation of forces and the limited objectives of the fight. Without this all the preparations and all the militancy of the strikers might well have been wasted and brought the reaction of a crushing defeat. The strike was understood to be a preliminary, partial struggle with the objective of establishing the union and compelling the bosses to “recognize” it. When they got that they stopped and called it a day. The strong union that has emerged from the strike will be able to fight again and to protect its membership in the meantime. The accomplishment is modest enough. But if we want to play an effective part in the labor movement we must not allow ourselves to forget that the American working class is just beginning to move on the path of the class struggle and, in its great majority, stands yet before the first task of establishing stable unions. Those who understand the task of the day and accomplish it prepare the future. The others merely chatter.

As in every strike of any consequence, the workers involved in the Minneapolis struggle also had an opportunity to see the government at work and to learn some practical lessons as to its real function. The police force of the city, under the direction of the Republican mayor, supplemented by a horde of “special deputies,” were lined up solidly on the side of the bosses. The police and deputies did their best to protect the strikebreakers and keep some trucks moving, although their best was not good enough. The mobilization of the militia by the Farmer-Labor governor was a threat against the strikers, even if the militia-men were not put on the street. The strikers will remember that threat. In a sense it can be said that the political education of a large section of the strikers began with this experience.

—James P. Cannon, “Minneapolis and Its Meaning,” New International (July 1934)

 

Out In The 1950s Film Noir Night-Jeanne Crain’s Dangerous Crossing

From The Pen Of Frank Jackman

DVD Review

Dangerous Crossing, starring Jeanne Crain, Michael Rennie, Carl Betz, 1953

You really should be wary of whirlwind romances, quick romances that end in marriage, and maybe danger. No I am not an old spoilsport, a naysaying in matters of the heart, but unless you know somebody for a while, get a feel for what they are about, get that “under your skin” feeling then back off, back off a little. You just never know when some guy or gal might be a gold-digger just looking to get fat and sassy at your expense.

Take the lovely Ruth (played by Jeanne Crain) in the 1950s film noir mystery under review, Dangerous Crossing, she was feeling blue after the sudden death of her rich father and grabbed onto the nearest Johnnie around, took the whirlwind, and then the marriage plunge. If she had taken my advice, or had this John Bowman (played by Carl Betz) guy who swept her off her feet checked out she could have saved herself a lot of angst and anguish. But no she took the plunge, clueless, and then went on a honeymoon cruise that took the starch out of everything.

Now your average ship cruise, until lately anyway, is pretty uneventful, just food, booze and shuffleboard. But from about minute one this turned out to be the cruise from hell and Ruth’s life was upended. The loving couple (knowing each other for all of four weeks), Ruth and John, boarded the ship and then John took a powder, went missing. Ruth, a little unstable due to the father’s death, was frantic. She looked everywhere, asked everybody about his whereabouts, making a general nuisance of herself in the process. Nobody seemed to believe her story denying that this John was on board. She was ultimately medical help by one Doctor Manning (played by Michael Rennie) but was looked at by one and all as a looney.

But here is the funny thing this John was on board, had a confederate on board (okay, his real honey, but that’s still a confederate isn’t it), and had created an elaborate hoax to do away with Ruth and grab her dough. Now you know in these film noir things, particularly 1950s noir, that the main point driven home is that crime does not pay so you know that, elaborate hoax or not, this Johnnie is doomed. Watch the film is find out how. Oh yah, and be careful, very careful the next time you have a whirlwind romance. Enough said.

***Films To While Away The Class Struggle By- The Class Struggle is….”hot running water and a big old bathtub”- "Harlan County, U.S.A."- A Review

DVD Review

Harlan County, U.S.A., starring the workers of the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) and the women of the Brookside (Kentucky) Women’s Club, directed by Barbara Kopple, 1976
This excellent documentary, directed by Barbara Kopple, focuses on the long, somewhat isolated strike in 1973 by the new United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) local of Brookside, Kentucky coal miners fighting for a union contract against the Eastover Mining Company (a subsidiary of the massive Duke Power Company, the modern equivalent of the old villainous Peabody Mining Company well known in labor circles and in coal country songs). That long strike, the ups and downs of the battles for recognition, the changing tactics on both sides over time, the frustrations of the strikers and their wives and other supporters, and the lessons to be learned for labor militants today are what make this such a compelling and rewarding documentary to view.

That “hot running water and a big old bathtub” caption in the title may need some explaining in post-industrial America, although perhaps not by as many people as one would think. One of the virtues of this documentary is that the participants in the strike and their wives and loved ones get plenty of air time. Thus, we get to hear and see, up close and personal, them express their views, their frustrations during the strike and their hopes for a successful strike and a new contract that will provide enhanced safety standards (notoriously poor throughout the inherently dangerous history of coal mining underground and a central goal of coal miner unions up to the present day), produce more benefits and place the Eastern Kentucky miners on a equal footing with other UMWA miners.

The most poignant expression, as noted above, of that hope was provided by a poor miner’s wife living in a ramshackle old cabin (company-provided, I believe, which is not unusual in coal country) without hot running -water or a proper bathtub to her daughter while the daughter was being bathed in a washtub. That, my friends, is what the class -struggle meant down at the base then, and, I daresay, now. We politically-oriented labor militants may express that proposition a little more theoretically concise and analytically profuse but I dare anyone who fights for a more just society to say they can express the sense of the struggle down at the base better than that.

And what of the lessons to be learned by today’s labor militants, including today’s coal miners who have lost a great deal of the spirit of their militant history in the last almost forty years since the events depicted in this film occurred. Well, as always, the question posed by the sub-theme that drives the spirit of the struggle in this documentary and as eloquently expressed by the writer of the song in the 1930s when there was also a huge wave of class- struggle in the coal fields, Florence Reece - “Which Side Are You On?” After a few minutes of viewing here one should be very clear about that point.

Further that, “picket lines mean don’t cross”, a chronic problem during the strike with scabs being sent into the mines by the company daily- a question that repeatedly comes up these days when labor disputes come up as well. And another lesson, not surprisingly, do not trust bourgeois politicians, judges, cop, the pro-capitalist union bureaucracy or anyone else that gets in your way. That is for starters.

Moreover, a strike committee has to be tactically supple, as the heroic work of the Brookside Women’s Club demonstrated when the miners were enjoined from keeping effective picket lines to keep the scabs out. And… well I could go on and on but the best bet is to actually watch this film, and re-watch it because there is plenty to pick up on there. And plenty to make you glad, glad as hell, that you are a labor militant. A retrospective hats off to the 1973 Harlan County, Kentucky coal miners, a place very close to this reviewer’s heart.

***Enough of Mountain Music, Already –Almost

Roscoe Holcomb on Pete Seeger's Rainbow Quest

DVD Review

Traditional Music Classics, Doc Watson, Roscoe Holcomb, Buell Ezell and Kilby Snow with Mike Seeger, Yazoo productions, 2002

The music of the mountains, in this case the mountains of Appalachia, down in coal country in eastern Kentucky, as I have seemingly endlessly noted in the recent past, is the music of my father and his forbears, although I am a city boy and came to an appreciation of that music by a very circuitous route. But it must be in the genes, right? Well, genetic disposition or not when I view the first parts of this “Traditional Music Classics DVD even I was ready to disown my heritage. Why?

Well, partly it was due to the weak performances of the first performer, Doc Watson (and ensemble). While I can take old Doc in small doses he does not generally speak to me. He certainly did not here. Then there was the problem with mountain banjo player extraordinaire Roscoe Holcomb. His previously viewed performances in other venues were the reason I wanted to see him on this one. Maybe, it is a matter of overexposure but old Roscoe’s performance here seemed weak and tinny (unless his performance on the 1960s Pete Seeger television show “Rainbow Quest” where he wowed me, see above). And then...


And then, indeed. Up comes Kilby Snow, a performer who I had heard of previously but whose music I had not heard, with his very own Montgomery Ward-purchased autoharp (with some personally done refinements), aided and abetted by the late Mike Seeger of the New Lost City Ramblers (and Pete Seeger’s half-brother), and blew me away. Mike hardly needed to coax Brother Snow to strut his stuff but remember that point I made above about the genetic connection. Old Kilby and his autoharp-driven songs called me back to the hills of home. This is why you will want to view this one, even if you are city folk.

Lyrics To "Streets Of Laredo" as performed by Doc Watson on this DVD (there are many other versions, as noted below)

As I walked out in the streets of Laredo
As I walked out in Laredo one day,
I spied a young cowboy, all wrapped in white linen
Wrapped up in white linen and cold as the clay.
"I see by your outfit, that you are a cowboy."
These words he did say as I slowly walked by.
"Come sit down beside me and hear my sad story,
For I'm shot in the breast, and I'm dying today."
"'Twas once in the saddle I used to go dashing,
'Twas once in the saddle I used to go gay.
First to the dram-house, and then to the card-house,
Got shot in the breast, and I'm dying today."
"Oh, beat the drum slowly and play the fife lowly,
And play the dead march as you carry me along;
Take me to the valley, and lay the sod o'er me,
For I'm a young cowboy and I know I've done wrong."
"Get six jolly cowboys to carry my coffin,
Get six pretty maidens to bear up my pall.
Put bunches of roses all over my coffin,
Roses to deaden the sods as they fall."
"Then swing your rope slowly and rattle your spurs lowly,
And give a wild whoop as you carry me along;
And in the grave throw me and roll the sod o'er me.
For I'm a young cowboy and I know I've done wrong."
"Go bring me a cup, a cup of cold water.
To cool my parched lips", the cowboy then said.
Before I returned, his soul had departed,
And gone to the round up - the cowboy was dead.
We beat the drum slowly and played the fife lowly,
And bitterly wept as we bore him along.
For we loved our comrade, so brave, young and handsome,
We all loved our comrade, although he'd done wrong.

[edit] Origin
The song is widely considered a traditional ballad, and the origins are not entirely clear. It seems to be primarily descended from an Irish/British folk song of the late 18th century called "The Unfortunate Rake", which has also evolved (with a time signature change and completely different melody) into the New Orleans standard "St. James Infirmary Blues". The Bodleian Library, Oxford, has a copy of a nineteenth-century broadside entitled "The Unfortunate Lad", which is a version of the British ballad.[1] Some elements of this song closely parallel those in the "Streets of Laredo":

Get six jolly fellows to carry my coffin,
And six pretty maidens to bear up my pall,
And give to each of them bunches of roses,
That they may not smell me as they go along.
Muffle your drums, play your pipes merrily,
Play the death march as you go along.
And fire your guns right over my coffin,
There goes an unfortunate lad to his home.
However, the cause of the Unfortunate Lad's demise is not a bullet wound but a sexually transmitted disease, as is clear from the verse:

Had she but told me when she disordered me,
Had she but told me of it at the time,
I might have got salts and pills of white mercury,
But now I'm cut down in the height of my prime.

***The American Songbook Pantheon- The Music Of Irving Berlin

CD Review

Irving Berlin: A Hundred Years, Irving Berlin compositions as performed by various artists, Columbia Record Company, 1988

I have been running through the legends of folk music, the blues, rock and assorted other genres over the past period. Not intentionally, at least I do not think that this was my intention at the start, I have reviewed a number of musicians, composers and recording artists who have been influential in the preservation of American roots music. You know, names like Pete Seeger, The Lomaxes, Bob Dylan, Woody Guthrie, Willie Dixon, Sam Phillips and, probably, a dozen more who have sung, recorded, produced or preserved parts of what is termed “the American Songbook”. These names, however, are hardly all-inclusive, as this review will try to make clear. The American Songbook is a “big tent” operation that extends back to the times of Stephan Foster in the 19th century, if not before, and is brought up to date by the likes of Mr. Seeger and Mr. Dylan. Along the way, including a significant part of the 20th century, Irving Berlin did more than his fair share of helping to fill that book.

We could go on and on about who should be or not be, beyond the names mentioned above, included in the American Songbook pantheon. However, there is no question, whether you tastes run to Tin Pin Alley tunes or not that Irving Berlin is up on that first level. This little compilation by Columbia Records put out some years ago both honored him on his 100th birthday and can serve as a primer for those unfamiliar with Mr. Berlin’s work. Although if you have been the least bit conscious, or are very, very young, you already ‘know’ many of these songs, if not their author.

A Berlin biography is beyond the scope of this little review but needless to say this son of immigrants caught at least a portion of what America meant to both immigrant and native alike at a time when assimilation into American society, its manners and mores, was a more pressing issue than today. Berlin’s hey days were in the 1930’s and 1940’s and he is forever tied in memory to such Great Depression/World War II Broadway music as “Putting On The Ritz”, “Cheek To Cheek”, “How Deep Is The Ocean”, “’I've Got My Love To Keep Me Warm” and a slew of other classics included here. And done by the likes of Fred Astaire, Judy Garland, Billie Holiday, Etherl Merman, Ethel Waters and a host of others, all famous in their time for singing whatever Mr. Berlin put before them, gladly. This is the music your parents or grandparents hummed back in the days. On this compilation it seems that Columbia has gone out of its way, way out of its way to get the best renditions by the most definitive artists to present these tunes.

Irving Berlin is, whether the fact is well-known now or not, closely associated with popular American patriotic songs like “God Bless America”. He is also associated with novelty songs like “White Christmas”, “Easter Parade”, “Alexander’s Ragtime Band” and “Let’s Have Another Cup Of Coffee”. Now some of this is not to my taste and, perhaps, not to yours. Some of the patriotic stuff is way overblown. And a few tunes have not aged well. Those are separate, more political questions, that can be more properly addressed elsewhere. But hear me out. The next time some asks Irving who? Or I don’t know his work? Just start humming “White Christmas”, or the like. Berlin may not be my top candidate for Number One composer in the American Songbook but he belongs in the select company of that pantheon.

***Just A Good Ole Country Boy- Bob Dylan’s “Nashville Skyline”

Bob Dylan And Johnny Cash Doing Dylan’s “Girl From The North Country”

CD Review

Nashville Skyline, Bob Dylan, Columbia Records, 1969

In trying to get a handle on reviewing the long musical career of Bob Dylan I have worked under the general outline that his early work constituted one segment, his various ‘bootleg’ and ‘basement’ materials a second and the later post -1990s stuff a third. The album under review, “Nashville Skyline” falls under that first category. The work of this period is reviewed here under the sign of the following paragraph:

“In a review of Bob Dylan’s “The Freewheeling Bob Dylan” elsewhere I noted:

In reviewing Bob Dylan’s 1965 classic album “Bringing All Back Home” (you know, the one where he went electric) I mentioned that it seemed hard to believe now that both as to the performer as well as to what was being attempted that anyone would take umbrage at a performer using an electric guitar to tell a folk story (or any story for that matter). I further pointed out that it is not necessary to go into all the details of what or what did not happen with Pete Seeger at the Newport Folk Festival in 1965 to know that one should be glad, glad as hell, that Bob Dylan continued to listen to his own drummer and carry on a career based on electronic music.”

That said, originally I was not “glad as hell” when I first heard “Nashville Skyline”. I had no problem with Dylan protest songs like “Blowin' In The Wind”. (In fact, those were the songs that first drew me to his work.) Nor did his turn to the electric guitar and to more personal, inward songs like “Desolation Row”. However, at the time of this album, I thought he had sold out to Nashville. Well, we are all wiser now and so that initial scorn has turned into at least partial delight.

A couple of things have contributed to that re-evaluation. First, seeing Dylan as part of the New York folk milieu of the early 1960’s hid the fact that he was raised in rural Hibbing, Minnesota (and influenced by the country sounds he picked up there in his youth). So while the Grand Ole Opry would be “square” to an urbanite like me it was the bill of fare for Dylan and others out there in the hinterlands. Secondly, it took me a long while to realize that Bob Dylan was deeply immersed and interested in knowing about and understanding the so-called American Songbook. All of it. If that is one’s frame of reference then country music has to be part of one’s musical repertoire. What really made the me shift though was hearing a ‘basement’ tape recording of Dylan in his hide out days in the mid-1960s (along with The Band) doing a hard to hear but incredible version of the country classic “I Forgot To Remember To Forget”. A lot of country artists cut their teeth on recording this one; virtually all have to take a back seat to Dylan on it. Including Elvis and Jerry Lee Lewis. Who would have thought?

Needless to say the duo with Johnny Cash on Dylan’s “Girl from the North Country” stands up against the test of time. As do “Lay Lady Lay” and “Tonight I’ll Be Staying Here With You”. The others you can judge for yourselves.

*******

Girl of the North Country Lyrics

Girl From the North Country

If you're travelin' in the north country fair,
Where the winds hit heavy on the borderline,
Remember me to one who lives there.
For she once was a true love of mine.

If you go when the snowflakes storm,
When the rivers freeze and summer ends,
Please see she has a coat so warm,
To keep her from the howlin' winds.

Please see if her hair hangs long,
If it rolls and flows all down her breast.
Please see for me if her hair's hanging long,
For that's the way I remember her best.

I'm a-wonderin' if she remembers me at all.
Many times I've often prayed
In the darkness of my night,
In the brightness of my day.

So if you're travelin' the north country fair,
Where the winds hit heavy on the borderline,
Remember me to one who lives there.
For she once was a true love of mine.

***Buddha Swings- The Jazz Music Of Benny Goodman-Before Be-Bop Bopped, Swing, Sister, Swing

A YouTube's Film Clip Of Benny Goodman And His Band Performing "Sing, Sing, Sing".

CD Review

This Is Benny Goodman: Volume Two, Benny Goodman and various side men, RCA, 1972

Musically, I am a blues man. I am informed, malformed, deformed, reformed by the blues. Then I am a rock man. And a folk man, in all its variants. So where doe that lead me into an exposition of jazz that I have recently started to write more about in this space. Well, let’s just call it an extension of the blues (not hard to do by the way). I mentioned in a recent review of the work of jazz singer Mildred Bailey that the clearest example of that is Lady Day, Billie Holiday. I noted there, that, yes, I know that she was a jazz singer extraordinaire. But, the way she swept my blues away when I was down in the dumps sure made me think she was the queen of the blues (Bessie Smith being, of course, outlandishly the “Empress” ). I would further note in the category of male bandleaders (that is, after all, what jazz was about back in the days, bands) Duke Ellington’s work has a similar status.

Taking this idea once more as my theme all of this is by a very round about way of bringing the jazz band leader under review, Benny Goodman, into the picture. Duke Ellington set the standard in the 1940’s for the phrasing of a jazz piece, for the mix of instruments, for the hush that signaled a new direction to the piece, for the … well, underlying sense of what was going on. As I expressed elsewhere, for that something unsayable but certainly knowable when the music is done right. Benny Goodman, although I believe more into the commercial showmanship of the music than Ellington and others like Chick Correa (who will be highlighted here later) had that in spots. But Benny had that something different, consciously so. He made his work jump, 1940s jump, to the swing that would have gotten get even a tongue-tied, doubled-jointed clod like this reviewer up and dancing if I had been around. That, my friends, would have been (is) no mean trick.

I believe that Benny Goodman had two good stretches. One when he had the singer Peggy Lee fronting for his big band. And as highlighted here when he worked (and according to the memories of those who worked under him, worked them hard) small groups that demonstrated that swing could be done in that small combo, if you just had the right personnel. Proof here? “King Porter Stomp". “Avalon" (Christ, even the name gives the swing sense of the piece). “One O’Clock Jump”. "When Buddha Smiles" How’s that. If you need more, believe me there are more here and on other Goodman CD’s. No wonder Hitler, according to some memoirs of Hamburg youth in the late 1930s that were made into a movie, wanted his work banned. Swing On...

***Songs To While Away The Class Struggle By-Stephen Foster's "Hard Times Come Again, No More"

YouTube film clips of the McGarrigles and others performing Hard Times Come Again, No More.

In this series, presented under the headline Songs To While Away The Class Struggle By, I will post some songs that I think will help us get through the “dog days” of the struggle for our communist future. I do not vouch for the political thrust of the songs; for the most part they are done by pacifists, social democrats, hell, even just plain old ordinary democrats. And, occasionally, a communist. Sadly though, hard communist musicians have historically been scarce on the ground and have rather more often than not been fellow-travelers. Thus, here we have a regular "popular front" on the music scene. While this would not be acceptable for our political prospects, it will suffice for our purposes here. Markin.
****

Stephen Foster's original lyrics:[4]

Let us pause in life's pleasures and count its many tears,
While we all sup sorrow with the poor;
There's a song that will linger forever in our ears;
Oh Hard times come again no more.
Chorus:
Tis the song, the sigh of the weary,
Hard Times, hard times, come again no more
Many days you have lingered around my cabin door;
Oh hard times come again no more.
While we seek mirth and beauty and music light and gay,
There are frail forms fainting at the door;
Though their voices are silent, their pleading looks will say
Oh hard times come again no more.
(Chorus)
There's a pale drooping maiden who toils her life away,
With a worn heart whose better days are o'er:
Though her voice would be merry, 'tis sighing all the day,
Oh hard times come again no more.
(Chorus)
Tis a sigh that is wafted across the troubled wave,
Tis a wail that is heard upon the shore
Tis a dirge that is murmured around the lowly grave
Oh hard times come again no more.
(Chorus)

***Preserving The Roots Anyway We Can- The Saga Of A Desperate Man’s Blues- Roots Music Preservationist Joe Bussard- A CD Review

CD Review

This CD review complements a DVD review of the same name: Desperate Man's Blues: Discovering The Roots Of American Music, Joe Bussard and a cast of thousands of old 78 speed records, Cubic Media, 2006

Desperate Man’s Blues, various artists from American roots songbook, Dust-to-Digital Records, 2006

In reviewing the DVD of Desperate Man’s Blues I mentioned the following which applies here as well:

“Recently I went to great lengths, and rightly so, to tout the Antone’s: House Of The Blues DVD that chronicled the trials and tribulations of the late Austin, Texas blues club owner Clifford Antone and his efforts to keep the blues tradition alive by keeping old time Chicago blues legends like Hubert Sumelin, Eddie Taylor, Sunnyland Slim and Jimmy Reed gainfully employed. So they could pass the torch to the next generation of aficionados…”

“…Well, apparently running music clubs is not the only way to go in preserving American roots music, as this ‘reality’ film documentary of the saga of a fifty plus years journey by record collector Joe Bussard rather strikingly points out.”

“Joe Bussard‘s trial and tribulations are however of a different order than Clifford Antone’s. Joe has taken on the task of traveling many a mile to find rare old roots music wherever he could find it. In short, he has some of the same obsessive, traits that we saw in the Antone film. And that is to the good. Plus old Joe has an engaging, if definitely old-fashioned, sense of collecting. Nevertheless when he ‘played the platters’ of Clarence Ashley, Robert Johnson, Son House , Uncle Dave Mason, and a few I really didn’t know I was right there with him…”

And this compilation, sampler compilation really, just proves the point, again. Much of this esoteric material formed the old time American songbook that got passed on to modern blues guys like Muddy Waters and Howlin’ Wolf, modern country guys like Hank Williams, modern bluegrass guys and gals like the late Doc Watson and the late Hazel Dickens. In short, the definition of what one commentator summed up rather neatly in one line-“the roots are the toots.”

A list of just the most recognizable names puts paid to that sentiment: Robert Johnson, the totally underrated Joe Hill Louis (incredible on When I ‘m Gone), fantastic Lonnie Johnson, Blind Willie McTell, Clarence Ashley, The foundational Carter Family, and heaven-bound Blind Willie Johnson.

Note on exclusion:

As I also noted in my commentary on the DVD and I will repost here as an aside I did have one problem with the DVD and now with the CD as well but I will get over it with a couple more listens:

“The only problem I have, a big problem I must confess, is old Joe’s dismissal of “rock and roll” music. Part of that is generational, his World War II against my generation of ’68 rock break-out, to be sure. But part is a different understanding of the nature of American roots music. Jerry Lee Lewis when he was in high swamp redneck form, Elvis when young, hungry and tired of driving truck, Carl Perkins, Ike Turner, Chuck Berry and on and on in the rockabilly and rhythm and blues traditions that served as the foundation of the best of rock relied heavily on those very roots. No, I do not agree , do not agree at all, that rock break-out was "all junk," as he put it. For the rest though, Joe I am right with you.”