Busy week on Capitol Hill for veterans' health
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Monday, April 29, 2019
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Of Marriage And Its Vows-Spencer Tracy’s “The Father Of The Bride” (1950)-A Film Review
Of Marriage And Its Vows-Spencer Tracy’s “The Father Of The Bride” (1950)-A Film Review
DVD Review
By Frank Jackman
Father of the Bride, starring Spencer Tracy, Joan Bennett, Elizabeth Taylor, directed by Vincente Minelli, 1950
Sometimes it pays to just not say anything. Take the recent case, my recent case, of being handed a review of a 1934 social/romance comedy/drama starring crooner turned actor (and crooner) Dick Powell Happiness Ahead. There I fumed about the on-going tendency of site manager Greg Green to hand out certain less than desirable assignments under the sign of “broadening horizons” He has tried to pull that gag on many of the younger writers, especially the stringers who after all without the least bit of security have to take it-or leave it- which means another assignment in say 2047. When I thought he was trying to pull that old gag on me I took him up short until he mended his ways by telling me that I was the cat’s meow at doing period “slice of life” pieces. So I did the assignment and he liked it and so he tried to smooth my edges by running this Father of the Bride goof film by me on that same “slice of life” mumbo-jumbo. Be forewarned Mr. Green Mrs. Jackman didn’t raise any kids who it took forever to figure out when he has been had. Enough said.
I learned long ago from Seth Garth (who I am told now got it from that old hawk Sam Lowell) that when you are up against it for a “hook” on an assignment pull the old chestnut “slice of life then” angel angle out of the fire. But that can only get you so far in some films like this dog since the subject matter is about some young daughter of the leafy suburban upper crust crazy to get married and have her own house and family just like millions in previous generations of leafy suburbanites and those to come as well. Can one who has been married three times though like me (and an amazing number, or maybe not so amazing, of corner boys from the old Acre section of North Adamsville) really do justice to such a subject other than the by-the-numbers social reality of in this case post-World War II upscale complete with servant, black and female of course, family life out in what felt like Connecticut.
Well Greg is paying the freight so here goes. Pops, played by versatile Spencer Tracy who seems a little lost and filled with hubris without sweetie and long-time co-star Katharine Hepburn, is sitting around completely spent after footing the bill for daughter Kay, played by a young and startlingly beautiful Elizabeth Taylor who ironically would have a couple of fistfuls of marriage but was the soul of leafy suburban post-debutante in this one, quicksilver marriage to some up and coming guy from town. Being a guy with no married daughters or granddaughters as of yet I don’t know how a guy in 1950 would take the fall for losing his daughter to some young guy who, well who knows, could be a con artist or serial murderer when all is said and done. All I know is that the father of the bride in those days, now too I would think, has to foot the bill for the big day. That is the easy part when you think about it because the real hard part is dealing with losing that daughter who not so long before was wearing pigtails and braces. Yeah, I can see where that would be the tough part then, or today.
This one though is played seemingly strictly for laughs as Pop is so worried about daughter dear that he gets Mom, played by Joan Bennett in a dither. We get to see every aspect of the wedding process back then, similar to now in many ways although I am not sure, based on my own female kin that such a father would get a feminist seal of approval. No indeed. Such is life among the Mayfair swells and their progeny.
Do Not Forsake Me Oh My Darling-Or Political Liberty Either-Grace Kelly And Gary Cooper’s “High Noon” (1952)-A Film Review
Do Not Forsake Me Oh My Darling-Or Political Liberty Either-Grace Kelly And Gary Cooper’s “High Noon” (1952)-A Film Review
DVD Review
By Si Lannon
High Noon, starring Grace Kelly, Gary Cooper, 1952
Sometimes in life, sometimes in the publishing business might be a more appropriate way of putting the matter, you get handed gratis something like the assignment of this film under review High Noon you would have given your eye teeth to get hold of. The way this one played out was recently added stringer Sarah Lemoyne, who apparently as she has advertised is indeed a quick learner, had been assigned the classic Technicolor Western Johnny Guitar starring an over the hill Joan Crawford and getting there Sterling Hayden despite the fact that she knew nothing, hated even, the genre. Her smart move was to attach that gripe to her review which while site manager Greg Green, the guy who hands out the assignments these days, called it a very good one from an unseasoned and unversed critic in the genre the rest of us, and maybe Sarah too, knew was a dog. Showed those tell-tale signs of somebody going through the motions. The fact of putting her gripe in a review left Greg kind of in a box when he wanted her to do this review, another Western, after she said no mas. So, to keep the inmates from getting restless he assigned this iconic beauty to me. Apparently in the back and forth over the issue it became clear to Greg that Sarah really was clueless about how important this film was cinematically and politically. Too young to know of red scares and such.
The reason that I would have been willing to give my eye teeth to review this film though has nothing to do with cinema or politics but my boyhood (and now still) “crush” on “the girl next door” Grace Kelly. I never tire of telling all who will listen the remark made by Seth Garth when I think he was reviewing Ms. Kelly and Cary Grant’s To Catch A Thief and he was so struck by her form of beauty that he could understand why her husband Prince Rainier of Monaco, a man not known for public displays of emotion openly wept at Princess Grace’s funeral after she was killed in a car accident. I could have told Seth that as well ever since my boyhood infatuation.
Now to the story and to the politics which are intertwined with what the creators, or one of the creators of the story line was attempting to do back in 1952 when the height of
the Senator Joe McCarthy-led red scare was hitting full stride and Hollywood was continually in the direct line of fire for alleged “communist influence” and as a hotbed of mostly former Communist Party members and fellow travelers as they were called then. People were forced, maybe against their better judgments to “snitch”, “fink,” “rat out” their fellows who were under the Red Scare microscope but they still did it to their every lasting shame which hopefully caused more than a few sleepless nights when they “named names” to cover their own asses. Worse let the night-takers have their way without uttering a whisper against the madness. Would not stand up for the innocent, or the guilty if such a word is appropriate in this context. Cowards and other words I would rather no use here but which we used all the time in the old neighborhood when something smelled rotten.
And that same understanding propels the action in this film where Will Kane, played by Gary Cooper, soon to be ex-Marshall of a Western town which he did much to make hospitable for ordinary folks and taking action against the wild boys who ruled the roost previously. Leaving the profession, the job since he was now married to lovely Quaker convert Amy, played by Ms. Kelly and she insisted they move away and start a new less dangerous life. All well and god except the leader of the bad guys whom he had sent to prison for life had been pardoned and was heading back to town to seek his revenge against Will. Headed back to town on that regularly scheduled noon train which will get plenty of play via many shots of the endless railroad tracks, the ticking clocks and the bad guys waiting for their boss to come back to begin the slaughter. The question is put point blank-can Will leave where danger is afoot and all that he stands for is threatened.
Of course not everybody saw the question in that same way, didn’t see that he was a standup guy and could do no other. Including Amy who was ready to leave town-with or without him. The story unravels around the fact that friend or foe, upstanding citizens or not, fearless or fearful not one goddam bastard was ready to stand up to the bad guys back in those late 19th century days when the West was being tamed. Just like standup people were scarce as hen’s teeth when the deal went down in the Cold War red scare night. In the end Will stood down the bad guys alone, well almost alone because his sweetie Amy came through in the end. Best of all after the bad guys were no more and Will gave his fierce look of scorn and contempt on the scurrying town rats after the dust had settled he and Amy wordlessly left town. Nice.
Yeah, Talk To Me Of Mendocino-The Voices From Up North The Music Of The McGarrigle
Yeah, Talk To Me Of
Mendocino-The Voices From Up North The Music Of The McGarrigle
By Zack James
“Jesus, Seth did you hear
that Kate McGarrigle of the McGarrigle Sister had passed away,” lamented Jack
Callahan to his old-time high school friend and fellow folk music aficionado
Seth Garth. Seth replied that since he no longer wrote music reviews for
anybody, hadn’t since The Eye the newspaper that he had
written for had gone out of business that he did not always keep up with the
back stories of those who were still left standing in the ever decreasing
old-time folk performer world. Jack’s sad information though got Seth to
thinking about the times back in the early 1970s when he and Jack had gone out
to Saratoga Springs to visit a cousin of Sam Lowell, also an old time friend
and part-time folk aficionado, who lived in nearby Ballston Spa and had invited
them to go to the Caffe Lena to listen to a couple of young gals from Canada
who would make the angels weep for their inadequate singing voices. In those
days Seth was free-lancing for The Eye so he had called Oakland, California
where the newspaper then had its offices to see if they would spring for a
review, a paid review of the performance. They agreed although there was the
usual haggling over money and whether they would actually use the
sketch.
That night after Lena’s
introduction (Lena the legendary, now legendary owner and operator of the
coffeehouse) the McGarrigle Sisters did two sparking sets, a few songs in
French, since they were steeped in the increasing bilingual Quebec culture
which was demanding French language equality in the heated nationalist period
when many were looking for independence. They also did a wonderful cover Heart
Like A Wheel, a song that Linda Rhonstadt had had a hit with. But the
song that Seth found his hook on, the one that he would center on to insure
that his piece was published (and paid for) was Talk To Me Of Mendocino, their
homage to Lena who desired to go out and see the place along the rocky ledges
of Northern California, land’s end. (Whether Lena ever went out there
subsequently Seth was not sure but he rather thought not since she was totally
committed to the club in those days, was something of a homebody and perhaps
wanted the memory than the actual experience.)
Seth mentioned to Jack that
night that the sisters had evoked just the right mournful tone in presenting
the song, and recalled how majestic they had thought they place was when they
and their wives (Seth’s first wife, first of three, all failed,
Martha, and Jack’s one and only Kathy) had gone from San Francisco up the
Pacific Coast Highway and basically stumbled on the place with its sheer rock
formations, fierce ocean waves beating against the rocks and the then quaint
and unadorned town that sat just off the rocks then. So Seth was able to close
his eyes and envision travelling from the overheated, over-crowded over-wrought
East and pinpoint a map to head out West “where the rocks remain.” The rocks,
the ocean, our mother and some solitude in world gone mad with having to run
away from what it had built. Seth was sorry that he had not been back there in
many years. Hoped that Lena did get to gout to the rocks and glad that Kate and
Anna McGarrigle spoke of the place, made it immortal in song.
When The Blues Was Dues- The Classic Alligator Records Compilation
CD Review
By Zack James
Long before Seth Garth
became back in the day, the 1960s day, the music critic for the now long gone
The Eye published in those day out of Oakland California he had been bitten by
the blues bug. Of course in the 1960s one to be a successful and relevant music
critic one had to concentrate on the emerging and then fading folk music minute
(of which the blues was seen as a sub-set of the genre especially the country
blues wings) and then post-British invasion and the rise of the
counter-cultural movement what was called “acid” rock. So Seth’s blues bug,
except for an occasional sneak-in was cut short by the needs of his career.
Even then though Seth would keep up with the various trends coming out of
places like Chicago and Detroit and of the artists who had formed his first
interests.
Strangely Seth had come to
his love of the blues almost by accident. Back in the 1950s he had been like
many teenagers totally devoted to his transistor radio to shutout the
distractions of parents and siblings around the house. In those days though he
was drawn to the fresh air of rock and roll, guys like Elvis, Jerry Lee Lewis,
and Chuck Berry. One Sunday night though almost like a ghost message from the
radio airwaves the station he usually listened to WMEX was drowned by a more
powerful station from Chicago, WABC. The show Be-Bop Benny’s Blues Hour (actually
two hours but that was the title of the show). The first song Hound Dog
Taylor’s The Sky Is Crying. He was hooked, hooked mainly
because in those days the blues coming out of Chicago sounded like a very
primitive version of rock, like maybe it had something to do with that beat in
his head whenever a serious rock song came on WMEX like Chuck Berry’s Sweet
Little Rock and Roller. He couldn’t always get the station on Sunday night,
something to do with those wind patterns but he was smitten.
Like a lot of things
including his later interest in folk music and acid rock Seth always wanted to
delve into the roots of whatever trend he was writing about. That was how he
found out that a lot of the songs that he heard on the Be-Bop Benny show were
the genesis of rock. Also that rock had eclipsed the blues as the be-bop new
thing leaving many of the most popular blues artists, overwhelming black
artists, behind to pick up the scraps of the musical audience (only to be
“discovered” later by some of the more thoughtful rock stars like the Stones
just as the old time country blues artists from the South were “discovered” by
folk aficionado in their turn).
Seth also dug into the
technical aspects of the industry, who was producing the music. Those where the
days when there were many small, small by today’s mega-standards, essentially
mom and pop record companies producing blues material. In Chicago, with the
huge migration of blacks from the South during the previous two generations
there were a myriad of labels. But two stuck out, two were the ones who grabs
the very best artists around Maxwell Street and made them stars, from the many
one hit wonders to classic stars like Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf, and B.B.
King. Of course most people have heard of those artists who worked out of the
Chess Record label. But the other big label, the one under review, Alligator,
also produced a shew of stars. So that very first night Seth had heard the
legendary Hound Dog Taylor doing The Sky Is Crying he was
under contract with Alligator. For more artists check out this two CD
compilation of those others who also graced that label. Then you will be up to
date on the genesis of the Chicago blues explosion that changed blues from
acoustic to electric back in the
day.
*From The Archives Of The “Revolutionary History” Journal- Guest Book Reviews
Markin comment:
This is an excellent documentary source for today’s militants to “discover” the work of our forbears, whether we agree with their programs or not. Mainly not, but that does not negate the value of such work done under the pressure of revolutionary times. Hopefully we will do better when our time comes.
***************
Reviews
Matt Merrigan, Eagle or Cuckoo?: The Story of the ATGWU in Ireland, Matmer Publications, Dublin 1989, pp332, £9.50/£19.95
Many Irish workers continue to belong to unions based in Britain, just as they did before the Irish Republic was established. The Irish Region of the Transport and General Workers Union has its title prefaced by the word Amalgamated because of legal harassment by the Dublin based ITGWU.
This book is disappointing in that it gives a disproportionate amount of space to national conferences and bureaucratic quarrels compared to that devoted to grass-roots struggles. This is surprising, considering that Matt Merrigan is a highly respected left wing former official of the union, who has an outstanding record of service to the movement. However, as the book’s title implies, international recognition and legal considerations have been very important in fighting off nationalist attacks on the ATGWU’s right to exist.
These attacks have failed, partly because excluding British based unions from the Irish Republic would implicitly accept partition. The author accepts the Connolly/nationalist doctrine, which is more popular among the British left than among Irish workers, although he is more critical of the Catholic Church than Connolly ever was.
John Sullivan
This is an excellent documentary source for today’s militants to “discover” the work of our forbears, whether we agree with their programs or not. Mainly not, but that does not negate the value of such work done under the pressure of revolutionary times. Hopefully we will do better when our time comes.
***************
Reviews
Matt Merrigan, Eagle or Cuckoo?: The Story of the ATGWU in Ireland, Matmer Publications, Dublin 1989, pp332, £9.50/£19.95
Many Irish workers continue to belong to unions based in Britain, just as they did before the Irish Republic was established. The Irish Region of the Transport and General Workers Union has its title prefaced by the word Amalgamated because of legal harassment by the Dublin based ITGWU.
This book is disappointing in that it gives a disproportionate amount of space to national conferences and bureaucratic quarrels compared to that devoted to grass-roots struggles. This is surprising, considering that Matt Merrigan is a highly respected left wing former official of the union, who has an outstanding record of service to the movement. However, as the book’s title implies, international recognition and legal considerations have been very important in fighting off nationalist attacks on the ATGWU’s right to exist.
These attacks have failed, partly because excluding British based unions from the Irish Republic would implicitly accept partition. The author accepts the Connolly/nationalist doctrine, which is more popular among the British left than among Irish workers, although he is more critical of the Catholic Church than Connolly ever was.
John Sullivan
On The Centennial Of His Birth- When Old Pete Ruled The House-With Banjo Man Pete Seeger In Mind
On The Centennial Of His
Birth- When Old Pete Ruled The House-With Banjo Man Pete Seeger In Mind
CD Review
By Zack James
Pete Seeger: headlines,
footnotes and-a collection of topical songs, Pete Seeger, Smithsonian/Folkways,
1999
“You know you are wrong
Seth about that first time we heard folk music, Woody Guthrie folk music in Mr.
Lawrence’s music class back in seventh grade at old Jeramiah Holton Junior
High,” Phil Larkin told one Seth Garth former old time music critic for the now
long gone The Eye. Paid music critic a not unimportant point back
in the day when alternative newspapers like The Eye survived
and flopped on the sweat of on unpaid unrequited volunteer labor and today too
when the social media are flooded with citizen critics by the barrelful and
everybody claims some expertise. Paid or not though Seth had called up Phil to
verify what his fellow folk aficionado Jack Callahan and more recently drinking
partner at the Erie Grille had told him when he had called upon Jack to refresh
his memory about the first time he/they had heard a Woody Guthrie song. Jack
had told Seth about the time that Mr. Lawrence had tried to unsuccessfully ween
the class away from their undying devotion to the jail-break rock and roll
music that was sweeping up youth nation just then. Seth had accepted what Jack
said because he was after all a fellow aficionado, even if Seth had had to
shoehorn him into the genre at the beginning and because he knew that Jack
would not spread word around that Seth was not totally on top of every bit of
arcane folk music lore around.
So it was a reputation
thing Seth was worried about even these many years later. He had mentioned Jack
and his conversation at the Eire to Phil in passing one afternoon and Phil had
said he would think about any possible earlier listening. This was important
since Seth had become very cautious about using any information not fully
verified ever since early on in his journalistic career he had made the
cardinal error of not checking out hearsay and rumor fully. So he was using his
double check method on this question since he had been asked to write an unpaid
article about the old folk days for the prestigious American Folk Song
Review.
Phil continued the
conversation by telling Seth, “Tell that jackass Jack Callahan didn’t he
remember that in fourth grade Miss (now Ms.) Winot had played This land
Is Your Land on that old cranky record player of hers in order
to teach us some kind of civics lesson, taught us that we were part
of a great continental experiment. Remember that she had played the Weavers’
cover of that song with Pete Seeger doing that big bass voice thing and some
other guy whose name I don’t remember was booming out the baritone and Ronnie
Gilbert who just passed away was doing a big time soprano thing.” Jesus, Seth
thought to himself Phil was right, right as rain. The two spoke of a few other
non-music issues and then they both hung
up.
That was not the end of it
for Seth though, not for his article anyway. See Phil’s mentioning of the name
Pete Seeger had sent a chill down his spine. Pete Seeger, and only Pete Seeger
had been the reason that he had been ever cautious about sources. Back in 1965
he (and Jack and Jack’s then girlfriend now wife, Kathy, and he thought Mary
Shea was his date) had attended the Newport Folk Festival that summer. That was
the summer that Bob Dylan exploded the traditional folk universe by introducing
the electric guitar into some of his songs. Did so on the stage the final night
of the festival to boos and applause. Seth had been working his very first job
as a free-lancer for the East Coast Other, another of the million small
publications starting up and falling trying to find a niche in the print
universe (free-lancer by the way since the usually cash-stripped publication
had nobody else going to the concert so Seth got the assignment).
Here is where Seth had
gotten into trouble though. He had a friend, a sound man friend who worked at
the Club 47 in Cambridge who was doing duty at that job for the festival. A
couple of days later he had run into the guy in Harvard Square and had asked
Seth if he knew what had happened on the stage the night Dylan went electric.
The guy swore that Pete Seeger had at some point pulled the plug on Dylan in
disgust at taking folk music out to the common trough of rock and roll. Seth
could hardly believe his ears-this was the hook that he would run his story on.
In the event he put this hearsay into his article. No big deal, right. Just
something to spice up the piece. The article was published with that
information in it. No problem for a while. About a month later he was called
into Larry Jeffers office, the editor of the East Coast Other then and shown a
personal letter to the publication from Pete Seeger disclaiming the whole story
about pulling the plug on Dylan and was looking for a retraction. Seth immediately
went to the Club 47 to check with the sound man. It turned out that the sound
man had not actually seen Pete pull the plug but had heard about the story from
one of Dylan’s sidemen. The newspaper issued a retraction and Seth had egg all
over his face.
The whole story of whether
Pete Seeger pulled the plug or not on Dylan became part of the urban legend of
the folk scene and still has devotees on both sides of the dispute long after
Pete is dead and Dylan in out on another leg of his never-ending tour. But you
can bet six two and even that one Seth Garth will be checking sources to see if
Miss (now Ms.) Winot was the original proponent of Woody Guthrie’s music.
Enough said.
*Those Who Fought For Our Communist Future Are Kindred Spirits- Honor The Haymarket Martyrs
Click on the title to link to an undated May Day presentation in honor of the Haymarket Martyrs.
Every January, as readers of this blog are now, hopefully, familiar with the international communist movement honors the 3 Ls-Lenin, Luxemburg and Leibknecht, fallen leaders of the early 20th century communist movement who died in this month (and whose untimely deaths left a huge, irreplaceable gap in the international leadership of that time). January is thus a time for us to reflect on the roots of our movement and those who brought us along this far. In order to give a fuller measure of honor to our fallen forbears this January, and in future Januarys, this space will honor others who have contributed in some way to the struggle for our communist future. That future classless society, however, will be the true memorial to their sacrifices.
Note on inclusion: As in other series on this site (“Labor’s Untold Story”, “Leaders Of The Bolshevik Revolution”, etc.) this year’s honorees do not exhaust the list of every possible communist worthy of the name. Nor, in fact, is the list limited to Bolshevik-style communists. There will be names included from other traditions (like anarchism, social democracy, the Diggers, Levellers, Jacobins, etc.) whose efforts contributed to the international struggle. Also, as was true of previous series this year’s efforts are no more than an introduction to these heroes of the class struggle. Future years will see more detailed information on each entry, particularly about many of the lesser known figures. Better yet, the reader can pick up the ball and run with it if he or she has more knowledge about the particular exploits of some communist militant, or to include a missing one.
Markin comment:
Every year on May Day this space honors the Haymarket Martyrs, as it should. I would only add that the struggle they were fighting around- the eight hour day still is a worthy cause in many quarters even these hundred plus years later.
Every January, as readers of this blog are now, hopefully, familiar with the international communist movement honors the 3 Ls-Lenin, Luxemburg and Leibknecht, fallen leaders of the early 20th century communist movement who died in this month (and whose untimely deaths left a huge, irreplaceable gap in the international leadership of that time). January is thus a time for us to reflect on the roots of our movement and those who brought us along this far. In order to give a fuller measure of honor to our fallen forbears this January, and in future Januarys, this space will honor others who have contributed in some way to the struggle for our communist future. That future classless society, however, will be the true memorial to their sacrifices.
Note on inclusion: As in other series on this site (“Labor’s Untold Story”, “Leaders Of The Bolshevik Revolution”, etc.) this year’s honorees do not exhaust the list of every possible communist worthy of the name. Nor, in fact, is the list limited to Bolshevik-style communists. There will be names included from other traditions (like anarchism, social democracy, the Diggers, Levellers, Jacobins, etc.) whose efforts contributed to the international struggle. Also, as was true of previous series this year’s efforts are no more than an introduction to these heroes of the class struggle. Future years will see more detailed information on each entry, particularly about many of the lesser known figures. Better yet, the reader can pick up the ball and run with it if he or she has more knowledge about the particular exploits of some communist militant, or to include a missing one.
Markin comment:
Every year on May Day this space honors the Haymarket Martyrs, as it should. I would only add that the struggle they were fighting around- the eight hour day still is a worthy cause in many quarters even these hundred plus years later.
Sinn Fein- Ourselves, Alone
Book Review
Mick- The Real Michael Collins, Peter Hart, Viking, New York, 2006
This is the 100th Anniversary of the Easter Uprising of 1916- Chocky Ar La
I have spent a fair amount of my adult political life fighting for a just solution to the national question in Ireland and for justice for the Catholic minority in the North (and any Protestant workers who will listen) thus I am no stranger to the name Michael Collins. However, as Peter Hart has gone to pains to describe in his well-thought out biography Mick is a very contradictory man both in his expression of his personal aspirations for Ireland (and himself) and the political choices that he made in the important 1920-22 period just before his death. The consequences of his actions (and others, notably Eamon de Valera) are still being played out today as the struggle for that just solution to the national question continues.
For those who are not familiar with Collins’s biography (affectionately known as the Big Fellow) or have not seen the fairly recent commercial film about his life (starring Liam Neelson) Collins represented that next generation of leaders who survived the Easter Uprising of 1916- the event that is the real start of the modern national liberation struggle in Ireland. Mr. Hart spends some useful time detailing Mick’s schooling, upbringing and the development of his administrative skills that would prove very helpful in his rise to the top of the Irish revolutionary movement. The real meat of the book, however, describes the rocky road to the top in the struggle to break Ireland from English domination.
This period from about 1917 to his death in 1922 is both where his huge reputation was made but also where the limits of his capacity to lead Ireland to real independence from the British are displayed. That failure, exemplified by the Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1921, has caused no little ink to be spilled on both sides of the divide that ultimately led to the civil war that tore the republican camp apart. This is hardly the place to have a full discussion of that question but I confess that I am still baffled by Mick’s decision to sign the treaty. To a great extent he, more so than de Valera, was the very Irish face of the military struggle lead by the then current version the Irish Republican Army.
Despite Collins' well-informed and industrious intelligence apparatus formed in his role as ‘commander-in-chief’ of the republican military forces I believe that he overrated the ability of the British to stay in Ireland in the immediate post World War I period. That miscalculation, among other issues, led to the signing of the treaty widely seen as a betrayal of the republican struggle and the abandonment of the peoples in the North. While Collin’s historically has had the best of it on this question though the efforts of his many biographers this thorny issue is still with us. Too much blood has been spilled to ignore it. Read on.
Mick- The Real Michael Collins, Peter Hart, Viking, New York, 2006
This is the 100th Anniversary of the Easter Uprising of 1916- Chocky Ar La
I have spent a fair amount of my adult political life fighting for a just solution to the national question in Ireland and for justice for the Catholic minority in the North (and any Protestant workers who will listen) thus I am no stranger to the name Michael Collins. However, as Peter Hart has gone to pains to describe in his well-thought out biography Mick is a very contradictory man both in his expression of his personal aspirations for Ireland (and himself) and the political choices that he made in the important 1920-22 period just before his death. The consequences of his actions (and others, notably Eamon de Valera) are still being played out today as the struggle for that just solution to the national question continues.
For those who are not familiar with Collins’s biography (affectionately known as the Big Fellow) or have not seen the fairly recent commercial film about his life (starring Liam Neelson) Collins represented that next generation of leaders who survived the Easter Uprising of 1916- the event that is the real start of the modern national liberation struggle in Ireland. Mr. Hart spends some useful time detailing Mick’s schooling, upbringing and the development of his administrative skills that would prove very helpful in his rise to the top of the Irish revolutionary movement. The real meat of the book, however, describes the rocky road to the top in the struggle to break Ireland from English domination.
This period from about 1917 to his death in 1922 is both where his huge reputation was made but also where the limits of his capacity to lead Ireland to real independence from the British are displayed. That failure, exemplified by the Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1921, has caused no little ink to be spilled on both sides of the divide that ultimately led to the civil war that tore the republican camp apart. This is hardly the place to have a full discussion of that question but I confess that I am still baffled by Mick’s decision to sign the treaty. To a great extent he, more so than de Valera, was the very Irish face of the military struggle lead by the then current version the Irish Republican Army.
Despite Collins' well-informed and industrious intelligence apparatus formed in his role as ‘commander-in-chief’ of the republican military forces I believe that he overrated the ability of the British to stay in Ireland in the immediate post World War I period. That miscalculation, among other issues, led to the signing of the treaty widely seen as a betrayal of the republican struggle and the abandonment of the peoples in the North. While Collin’s historically has had the best of it on this question though the efforts of his many biographers this thorny issue is still with us. Too much blood has been spilled to ignore it. Read on.
Upon The 50th Anniversary Of The Death Of "King Of The Beats" Jack Kerouac-*Notes From The Old Home Town- From A Far Bridge
Click on the title to link to a "Wikipedia" entry for the 1950s that gives some background to the entry below.
Markin comment:
Not all the entries in this space are connected to politics, although surely most of them can be boiled down into some political essence, if you try hard enough. The following is one of those instances where trying to gain any “political traction”, or as I am fond of saying drawing any “lessons” would be foolhardy. I should also note that this entry is part of a continuing, if sporadic, series of “trips down memory lane” provoked by a fellow high school classmate who has been charged with keeping tabs on old classmates and their doings, even those of old-line communists like this writer. Go figure?
The Old "Beat" Town, Circa 2010-A Fragment Of A Thought
Crossing the Riverside bridge from the Boston side ain’t like it used to be, what with that new, higher, ever pot-holed, unevenly paved, unfriendly, ugly slab concrete bridge that routes traffic, hither and yon, to the beach down Shore Drive or to Main Street up pass the high school and beyond to the Downs, and then to the downtown Center. It’s silly to get misty-eyed over it but I miss the old drawbridge of my youth with its gates to stop traffic and the lonely tower (and its poor, bored keeper, or tender or whatever you call that guy, and it was always some old guy who looked like he could swap stories, buddy to buddy, with King Neptune) to let the bigger boats make their way to dock or, better, I hope, to get clearance to the open sea, and more adventure than I could even dream of.
And now it has that parallel “Red Line” subway extension crossing that used to be part of the Old Colony railroad that used to scare me silly as a kid when the whistle blew at the old Atlantic station near my grandmother’s house on Welcome Street. That river bridge though was always, to me, back in the days, more than a mere stone or concrete barrier separating the world of Boston and beyond that to Cambridge and all their charms, real or imagined. Some of those were real enough and some turned out to be just imagined enough, as well. Coming in over that bridge anytime, and I mean anytime, always meant the end of some trouble-filled adventure, or more likely, the need to brace myself to take ‘guff’ from Ma about one thing or another that I did, or didn’t, do, or later when I got older more often than not just heading back the other way when things got too crazy to think about. Or do much about, for that matter. Too bad Ma wasn’t more easy going like Dad, who knew how to roll with the punches a little, as much as it cost his self-esteem. Damn, that man was righteous, even if it only took me about fifty years to figure that out so I never adequately got the chance to acknowledge that little gem of wisdom.
Ya, that bridge was more like some latter day rite of passage and I crossed its grated drawbridge, cars whizzing by making different-sounding, fearful noises different from regular pavement noises like that old bridge was going crack open and I would be swallowed by the waters below. Maybe, that was the start, or a part anyway of my love/hate thing with the waters of the world. Or maybe I was just scared: of the too many times that I went back the other way too soon when things went bad at the house as I tried desperately to get away from home, from teenage problems, from myself. A far bridge, indeed.
Markin comment:
Not all the entries in this space are connected to politics, although surely most of them can be boiled down into some political essence, if you try hard enough. The following is one of those instances where trying to gain any “political traction”, or as I am fond of saying drawing any “lessons” would be foolhardy. I should also note that this entry is part of a continuing, if sporadic, series of “trips down memory lane” provoked by a fellow high school classmate who has been charged with keeping tabs on old classmates and their doings, even those of old-line communists like this writer. Go figure?
The Old "Beat" Town, Circa 2010-A Fragment Of A Thought
Crossing the Riverside bridge from the Boston side ain’t like it used to be, what with that new, higher, ever pot-holed, unevenly paved, unfriendly, ugly slab concrete bridge that routes traffic, hither and yon, to the beach down Shore Drive or to Main Street up pass the high school and beyond to the Downs, and then to the downtown Center. It’s silly to get misty-eyed over it but I miss the old drawbridge of my youth with its gates to stop traffic and the lonely tower (and its poor, bored keeper, or tender or whatever you call that guy, and it was always some old guy who looked like he could swap stories, buddy to buddy, with King Neptune) to let the bigger boats make their way to dock or, better, I hope, to get clearance to the open sea, and more adventure than I could even dream of.
And now it has that parallel “Red Line” subway extension crossing that used to be part of the Old Colony railroad that used to scare me silly as a kid when the whistle blew at the old Atlantic station near my grandmother’s house on Welcome Street. That river bridge though was always, to me, back in the days, more than a mere stone or concrete barrier separating the world of Boston and beyond that to Cambridge and all their charms, real or imagined. Some of those were real enough and some turned out to be just imagined enough, as well. Coming in over that bridge anytime, and I mean anytime, always meant the end of some trouble-filled adventure, or more likely, the need to brace myself to take ‘guff’ from Ma about one thing or another that I did, or didn’t, do, or later when I got older more often than not just heading back the other way when things got too crazy to think about. Or do much about, for that matter. Too bad Ma wasn’t more easy going like Dad, who knew how to roll with the punches a little, as much as it cost his self-esteem. Damn, that man was righteous, even if it only took me about fifty years to figure that out so I never adequately got the chance to acknowledge that little gem of wisdom.
Ya, that bridge was more like some latter day rite of passage and I crossed its grated drawbridge, cars whizzing by making different-sounding, fearful noises different from regular pavement noises like that old bridge was going crack open and I would be swallowed by the waters below. Maybe, that was the start, or a part anyway of my love/hate thing with the waters of the world. Or maybe I was just scared: of the too many times that I went back the other way too soon when things went bad at the house as I tried desperately to get away from home, from teenage problems, from myself. A far bridge, indeed.
The Centennial Of Pete Seeger’s Birthday (1919-2014)- When Old Pete Ruled The House-With Banjo Man Pete Seeger In Mind
When Old Pete Ruled The House-With Banjo Man Pete Seeger In Mind
CD Review
CD Review
By Zack James
Pete Seeger: headlines, footnotes and-a collection of topical songs, Pete Seeger, Smithstonian/Folkways, 1999
“You know you are wrong Seth about that first time we heard folk music, Woody Guthrie folk music in Mr. Lawrence’s music class back in seventh grade at old Jeramiah Holton Junior High,” Phil Larkin told one Seth Garth former old time music critic for the now long gone The Eye. Paid music critic a not unimportant point back in the day when alternative newspapers like The Eye survived and flopped on the sweat of on unpaid unrequited volunteer labor and today too when the social media are flooded with citizen critics by the barrelful and everybody claims some expertise. Paid or not though Seth had called up Phil to verify what his fellow folk aficionado Jack Callahan and more recently drinking partner at the Erie Grille had told him when he had called upon Jack to refresh his memory about the first time he/they had heard a Woody Guthrie song. Jack had told Seth about the time that Mr. Lawrence had tried to unsuccessfully ween the class away from their undying devotion to the jail-break rock and roll music that was sweeping up youth nation just then. Seth had accepted what Jack said because he was after all a fellow aficionado, even if Seth had had to shoehorn him into the genre at the beginning and because he knew that Jack would not spread word around that Seth was not totally on top of every bit of arcane folk music lore around.
So it was a reputation thing Seth was worried about even these many years later. He had mentioned Jack and his conversation at the Eire to Phil in passing one afternoon and Phil had said he would think about any possible earlier listening. This was important since Seth had become very cautious about using any information not fully verified ever since early on in his journalistic career he had made the cardinal error of not checking out hearsay and rumor fully. So he was using his double check method on this question since he had been asked to write an unpaid article about the old folk days for the prestigious American Folk Song Review.
Phil continued the conversation by telling Seth, “Tell that jackass Jack Callahan didn’t he remember that in fourth grade Miss (now Ms.) Winot had played This land Is Your Land on that old cranky record player of hers in order to teach us some kind of civics lesson, taught us that we were part of a great continental experiment. Remember that she had played the Weavers’ cover of that song with Pete Seeger doing that big bass voice thing and some other guy whose name I don’t remember was booming out the baritone and Ronnie Gilbert who just passed away was doing a big time soprano thing.” Jesus, Seth thought to himself Phil was right, right as rain. The two spoke of a few other non-music issues and then they both hung up.
That was not the end of it for Seth though, not for his article anyway. See Phil’s mentioning of the name Pete Seeger had sent a chill down his spine. Pete Seeger, and only Pete Seeger had been the reason that he had been ever cautious about sources. Back in 1965 he (and Jack and Jack’s then girlfriend now wife, Kathy, and he thought Mary Shea was his date) had attended the Newport Folk Festival that summer. That was the summer that Bob Dylan exploded the traditional folk universe by introducing the electric guitar into some of his songs. Did so on the stage the final night of the festival to boos and applause. Seth had been working his very first job as a free-lancer for the East Coast Other, another of the million small publications starting up and falling trying to find a niche in the print universe (free-lancer by the way since the usually cash-stripped publication had nobody else going to the concert so Seth got the assignment).
Here is where Seth had gotten into trouble though. He had a friend, a sound man friend who worked at the Club 47 in Cambridge who was doing duty at that job for the festival. A couple of days later he had run into the guy in Harvard Square and had asked Seth if he knew what had happened on the stage the night Dylan went electric. The guy swore that Pete Seeger had at some point pulled the plug on Dylan in disgust at taking folk music out to the common trough of rock and roll. Seth could hardly believe his ears-this was the hook that he would run his story on. In the event he put this hearsay into his article. No big deal, right. Just something to spice up the piece. The article was published with that information in it. No problem for a while. About a month later he was called into Larry Jeffers office, the editor of the East Coast Other then and shown a personal letter to the publication from Pete Seeger disclaiming the whole story about pulling the plug on Dylan and was looking for a retraction. Seth immediately went to the Club 47 to check with the sound man. It turned out that the sound man had not actually seen Pete pull the plug but had heard about the story from one of Dylan’s sidemen. The newspaper issued a retraction and Seth had egg all over his face.
The whole story of whether Pete Seeger pulled the plug or not on Dylan became part of the urban legend of the folk scene and still has devotees on both sides of the dispute long after Pete is dead and Dylan in out on another leg of his never-ending tour. But you can bet six two and even that one Seth Garth will be checking sources to see if Miss (now Ms.) Winot was the original proponent of Woody Guthrie’s music. Enough said.
From The Boston May Day Committee-Boston May Day 2011 at the Rose Kennedy Greenway Park-All Out In Boston On Our International Working Class Holiday!-Honor The Haymarket Martyrs!
From The Boston May Day Committee-Boston May Day 2011 at the Rose Kennedy Greenway Park-All Out In Boston On Our International Working Class Holiday!-Honor The Haymarket Martyrs!
When: Sunday, May 1, 2011, 12:00 pm
Where: Rose Kennedy Greenway Park • Cross St. and Hanover St. • across from the Haymarket T Station corner • Boston
Start: 2011 May 1 - 12:00pm
*******
Boston May Day 2011 at the Rose Kennedy Greenway Park
Let's commemorate International Workers Day this year with a rally at 12 noon at the Rose Kennedy Greenway Park, across from the Haymarket T Station, in the corner of Cross and Hanover streets in Boston.
After the rally we will take the T to East Boston to join in the East Boston March to the May 1 rally in Chelsea.
We demand:
1. Stop attacks on workers!
2. Stop the detention and deportation of migrant workers and their families!
3. No racist profiling Secure Communities programs!
4. Money for jobs and education, not for war and occupation!
5. Unity of all workers to defend our rights!
6. International unity for immigrant rights.
Special performance by the radical theater group Bread and Puppet
This event is initiated and sponsored by the Boston May Day Committee.
For organizational endorsements please write to info[@]bostonmayday.org
When: Sunday, May 1, 2011, 12:00 pm
Where: Rose Kennedy Greenway Park • Cross St. and Hanover St. • across from the Haymarket T Station corner • Boston
Start: 2011 May 1 - 12:00pm
*******
Boston May Day 2011 at the Rose Kennedy Greenway Park
Let's commemorate International Workers Day this year with a rally at 12 noon at the Rose Kennedy Greenway Park, across from the Haymarket T Station, in the corner of Cross and Hanover streets in Boston.
After the rally we will take the T to East Boston to join in the East Boston March to the May 1 rally in Chelsea.
We demand:
1. Stop attacks on workers!
2. Stop the detention and deportation of migrant workers and their families!
3. No racist profiling Secure Communities programs!
4. Money for jobs and education, not for war and occupation!
5. Unity of all workers to defend our rights!
6. International unity for immigrant rights.
Special performance by the radical theater group Bread and Puppet
This event is initiated and sponsored by the Boston May Day Committee.
For organizational endorsements please write to info[@]bostonmayday.org
Sunday, April 28, 2019
*The Music Of The Celtic Fringe- The Chieftains- An Encore
Click On Title To Link To YouTube's Film Clip Of Sinead O'Connor And The Chieftains Performing "The Foggy Dew".
CD Review
Fire In The Kitchen, The Chieftains and various artists, BMC, 1999
If you want to hear good old-fashioned Celtic music then The Chieftains is one place where you will have to visit to get a taste of that music done to more modern sensibilities. The lads have gone to Nova Scotia here to grab another aspect of the Celtic diaspora. Moreover, as here and on a number of their albums they have gotten virtual who’s who of top-notch musicians from many genres to play along with them. That is always a sure sign of respect. What else can you ask for? Well here how about Laura Smith on “My Bonnie Lies Over The Ocean” or The Ennis Sisters doing “Red Is The Rose” (also known by many other names but the result remains the same, a deep longing for a lover). If you want to go to tradition how about The Rankins and “An Innis Aigh or “A Mhairi Bhoidheach” done by Mary Jane Lamond. My favorite on this one is “Come By The Hills” done by Rita MacNeil. Nice.
Long Black Veil lyrics
Ten years ago on a cold dark night
Someone was killed 'neath the town hall light
Just a few at the scene, and they all did agree
That the man who ran looked a lot like me
The judge said "Son, what's your alibi?
If you were somewheres else, then you won't have to die"
But I spoke not a word, tho' it meant my life
For I'd been in the arms of my best friend's wife
Chorus:
She walks these hills in a long black veil
Visits my grave when the night winds wail
Nobody knows, nobody sees
Nobody knows, but me
The scaffold is high, eternity near
She stands in the crowd, she sheds not a tear
But sometimes at night when the cold winds moan
In a long black veil, she cries o'er my bones
Chorus
The Chieftains
Mo Ghile Mear lyrics
Chorus:
'Se/ mo laoch, mo Ghile Mear
'Se/ mo Chaesar Gile Mear
Suan na/ se/an ni/ bhfuaireas fe/in
O/ chuaigh i gce/in mo Ghile Mear
Grief and pain are all I know
My heart is sore
My tears a'flow
We saw him go ....
No word we know of him...
Chorus
A proud and gallant cavalier
A high man's scion of gentle mien
A fiery blade engaged to reap
He'd break the bravest in the field
Chorus
Come sing his praise as sweet harps play
And proudly toast his noble frame
With spirit and with mind aflame
So wish him strength and length of day
Chorus
"The Foggy Dew"
As down the glen one Easter morn
To a city fair rode I.
There armed lines of marching men
In squadrons passed me by.
No pipe did hum, no battle drum
Did sound its loud tattoo,
But the Angelus Bells o'er the Liffey swells
Rang out in the foggy dew.
Right proudly high in Dublin town
Hung they out a flag of war.
T'was better to die 'neath an Irish sky
Than at Sulva or Sud el Bar.
And from the plains of Royal Meath
Strong men came hurrying through
While Brittania's huns with their long-range guns
Sailed in through the foggy dew.
The bravest fell and the requiem bell
Rang mournfully and clear
For those who died that Eastertide
In the springing of the year.
While the world did gaze with deep amaze
At those fearless men but few
Who bore the fight that freedom's light
Might shine through the foggy dew.
And back through the glen I rode again
And my heart with grief was sore
For I parted then with valient men
Whom I never shall see more.
But to and fro in my dreams I go
And I kneel and pray for you,
For slavery fled the glorious dead
When you fell in the foggy dew.
"The Rocky Road To Dublin"
In the merry month of may, from me home I started left the girls of
Tuam,
sad and broken hearted, salute me father dear,
and kissed me darlin' mother, drank a pint of beer,
me tears and grief to smother, off to reap the corn,
leave where I was born, I cut a stoat black thorn to banish ghosts and
goblins,
in a pair of brand new of brogues, I rattled over the bogs, frightened
all the dogs,
on the rocky road to Dublin, 1,2,3,4,5
hunt the hare and turn her down the rocky road,
and all the way to Dublin, whacks fer al de da!
In Dublin next arrived, and thought it such a pity to be so soon
deprived,
a view of that fair city, then I took a stroll,
all amongst the quality, me bundle it was stole,
in that neat locality, something crossed me mind, when I looked behind,
no bundle I could find, upon me stick a wobblin. Enquiring after the
rogue,
said me Connaught brogue, was not much in vogue,
on the rocky road to Dublin, 1,2,3,4,5
hunt the hare and turn her down the rocky road,
and all the way to Dublin, whacks fer al de da!
The boys of Liverpool, when we safely landed, called meself a fool,
I could no longer stand it, me blood began to boil,
me temper I was losing, for old Erin's isle,
they began abusing, horah say I, me Shelelagh I let fly,
some Galway boys were by, they saw I was a hobblin',
with a loud hurray, they joined in the afray,
we quickly cleared the way,
for the rocky road to Dublin, 1,2,3,4,5
hunt the hare and turn her down the rocky road,
nd all the way to Dublin, whacks fer al de da!
CD Review
Fire In The Kitchen, The Chieftains and various artists, BMC, 1999
If you want to hear good old-fashioned Celtic music then The Chieftains is one place where you will have to visit to get a taste of that music done to more modern sensibilities. The lads have gone to Nova Scotia here to grab another aspect of the Celtic diaspora. Moreover, as here and on a number of their albums they have gotten virtual who’s who of top-notch musicians from many genres to play along with them. That is always a sure sign of respect. What else can you ask for? Well here how about Laura Smith on “My Bonnie Lies Over The Ocean” or The Ennis Sisters doing “Red Is The Rose” (also known by many other names but the result remains the same, a deep longing for a lover). If you want to go to tradition how about The Rankins and “An Innis Aigh or “A Mhairi Bhoidheach” done by Mary Jane Lamond. My favorite on this one is “Come By The Hills” done by Rita MacNeil. Nice.
Long Black Veil lyrics
Ten years ago on a cold dark night
Someone was killed 'neath the town hall light
Just a few at the scene, and they all did agree
That the man who ran looked a lot like me
The judge said "Son, what's your alibi?
If you were somewheres else, then you won't have to die"
But I spoke not a word, tho' it meant my life
For I'd been in the arms of my best friend's wife
Chorus:
She walks these hills in a long black veil
Visits my grave when the night winds wail
Nobody knows, nobody sees
Nobody knows, but me
The scaffold is high, eternity near
She stands in the crowd, she sheds not a tear
But sometimes at night when the cold winds moan
In a long black veil, she cries o'er my bones
Chorus
The Chieftains
Mo Ghile Mear lyrics
Chorus:
'Se/ mo laoch, mo Ghile Mear
'Se/ mo Chaesar Gile Mear
Suan na/ se/an ni/ bhfuaireas fe/in
O/ chuaigh i gce/in mo Ghile Mear
Grief and pain are all I know
My heart is sore
My tears a'flow
We saw him go ....
No word we know of him...
Chorus
A proud and gallant cavalier
A high man's scion of gentle mien
A fiery blade engaged to reap
He'd break the bravest in the field
Chorus
Come sing his praise as sweet harps play
And proudly toast his noble frame
With spirit and with mind aflame
So wish him strength and length of day
Chorus
"The Foggy Dew"
As down the glen one Easter morn
To a city fair rode I.
There armed lines of marching men
In squadrons passed me by.
No pipe did hum, no battle drum
Did sound its loud tattoo,
But the Angelus Bells o'er the Liffey swells
Rang out in the foggy dew.
Right proudly high in Dublin town
Hung they out a flag of war.
T'was better to die 'neath an Irish sky
Than at Sulva or Sud el Bar.
And from the plains of Royal Meath
Strong men came hurrying through
While Brittania's huns with their long-range guns
Sailed in through the foggy dew.
The bravest fell and the requiem bell
Rang mournfully and clear
For those who died that Eastertide
In the springing of the year.
While the world did gaze with deep amaze
At those fearless men but few
Who bore the fight that freedom's light
Might shine through the foggy dew.
And back through the glen I rode again
And my heart with grief was sore
For I parted then with valient men
Whom I never shall see more.
But to and fro in my dreams I go
And I kneel and pray for you,
For slavery fled the glorious dead
When you fell in the foggy dew.
"The Rocky Road To Dublin"
In the merry month of may, from me home I started left the girls of
Tuam,
sad and broken hearted, salute me father dear,
and kissed me darlin' mother, drank a pint of beer,
me tears and grief to smother, off to reap the corn,
leave where I was born, I cut a stoat black thorn to banish ghosts and
goblins,
in a pair of brand new of brogues, I rattled over the bogs, frightened
all the dogs,
on the rocky road to Dublin, 1,2,3,4,5
hunt the hare and turn her down the rocky road,
and all the way to Dublin, whacks fer al de da!
In Dublin next arrived, and thought it such a pity to be so soon
deprived,
a view of that fair city, then I took a stroll,
all amongst the quality, me bundle it was stole,
in that neat locality, something crossed me mind, when I looked behind,
no bundle I could find, upon me stick a wobblin. Enquiring after the
rogue,
said me Connaught brogue, was not much in vogue,
on the rocky road to Dublin, 1,2,3,4,5
hunt the hare and turn her down the rocky road,
and all the way to Dublin, whacks fer al de da!
The boys of Liverpool, when we safely landed, called meself a fool,
I could no longer stand it, me blood began to boil,
me temper I was losing, for old Erin's isle,
they began abusing, horah say I, me Shelelagh I let fly,
some Galway boys were by, they saw I was a hobblin',
with a loud hurray, they joined in the afray,
we quickly cleared the way,
for the rocky road to Dublin, 1,2,3,4,5
hunt the hare and turn her down the rocky road,
nd all the way to Dublin, whacks fer al de da!
*From The Archives -Our Flag Is Still Red- May Day 2010 In Boston- A Guest Announcement
Click on the headline to link to a "Boston Indy Media" post concerning the upcoming May Day events in Boston.
Markin comment:
This is a repost of 2008's (and the two previous years)commentary in honor of our international working class holiday. I would add that the comments made then still apply today. I would further add that these damn bourgeois presidential campaigns have taken most of the air out of the political atmosphere thus retarding our efforts. Notice the virtually total fade away of pro-immigration street demonstrations. To speak nothing of Iraq. What happens to these parliamentary reformists if they wake up on January 20th 2009 and one John McCain is getting ready to take the oath of office? Enough said-for now.
COMMENTARY
THIS YEAR(2010) MARKS THE 124TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE MAY DAY HAYMARKET FRAMEUPS. HONOR THE MEMORY OF AUGUST SPIES, ALBERT PARSONS, ADOLPH FISCHER, GEORGE ENGEL, LOUIS LINGG, MICHAEL SCHWAB, SAMUEL FIELDEN, OSCAR NEEBE- CLASS WAR VICTIMS OF AN EARLIER TIME. ALSO REMEMBER LUCY PARSONS WHO CARRIED ON THE STRUGGLE FOR VINDICATION AFTER HER HUSBAND’S EXECUTION. LET US REDOUBLE OUR EFFORTS TO FREE TODAY’S CLASS WAR PRISONERS.
Politically, the writer of these lines is far distance from those of the Haymarket Martyrs. Their flag was the black flag of anarchism, the writer’s is the red flag of communism. Notwithstanding those political differences, militants must stand under the old labor slogan that should underscore all labor defense work now as then- ‘An injury to one is an injury to all’. Unfortunately that principle has been honored far more in the breech than in the observance by working class organizations.
Additionally, in the case of the Haymarket Martyrs today’s militants must stand in solidarity and learn about the way those militants bravely conducted themselves before bourgeois society in the face of the witch hunt against them and their frame-up in the courts of so-called bourgeois ‘justice’. Not for the first time, and most probably not for the last, militants were railroaded by the capitalist state for holding unpopular and or/dangerous (to the capitalists) views. Moreover, it is no accident that most of the Haymarket Martyrs were foreigners (mainly Germans) not fully appreciative of the niceties of 19th century American ‘justice’. This same ‘justice’ system framed the heroic anarchist immigrant militants Sacco and Vanzetti in the early 20th century and countless other militants since then. As we struggle in the fight for full citizenship rights for immigrants today we should keep this in mind. Although, as we know, this American system of ‘justice’ will not forget the occasional uppity ‘native’ political dissenter either.
Most importantly, we must not forget that the Haymarket Martyrs at the time of their arrest were fighting for the establishment of a standardized eight hour work day. It is ironic that 120 years later this simple, rational, reasonable demand should, in effect, still be necessary to fight for by working people. All proportions taken into account since the 1880’s, a very high percentage of the working class still does not have this luxury- given the necessity of two wage-earner families, two job wage-earners, dramatic increases in commute time in order to gain employment, unpaid but mandatory work time (note especially the Walmartization of labor time) and a high rate of partially or fully unemployed able-bodied workers. To do justice to the memory of the Haymarket Martyrs this generation of militants should dust off another old labor slogan that used to be part of the transitional demands of the socialist movement- 30 hours work for 40 hours pay. TODAY THIS IS A REASONABLE DEMAND.
Obviously such a demand cannot be implemented in isolation. To even propose such a demand means we need to build a workers party to fight for it. Moreover, and let us not have illusions about this; this capitalist state does not want to and will not grant such a demand. Therefore, we must fight for a workers government. That would be a true monument to the memory of the Haymarket Martyrs.
Markin comment:
This is a repost of 2008's (and the two previous years)commentary in honor of our international working class holiday. I would add that the comments made then still apply today. I would further add that these damn bourgeois presidential campaigns have taken most of the air out of the political atmosphere thus retarding our efforts. Notice the virtually total fade away of pro-immigration street demonstrations. To speak nothing of Iraq. What happens to these parliamentary reformists if they wake up on January 20th 2009 and one John McCain is getting ready to take the oath of office? Enough said-for now.
COMMENTARY
THIS YEAR(2010) MARKS THE 124TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE MAY DAY HAYMARKET FRAMEUPS. HONOR THE MEMORY OF AUGUST SPIES, ALBERT PARSONS, ADOLPH FISCHER, GEORGE ENGEL, LOUIS LINGG, MICHAEL SCHWAB, SAMUEL FIELDEN, OSCAR NEEBE- CLASS WAR VICTIMS OF AN EARLIER TIME. ALSO REMEMBER LUCY PARSONS WHO CARRIED ON THE STRUGGLE FOR VINDICATION AFTER HER HUSBAND’S EXECUTION. LET US REDOUBLE OUR EFFORTS TO FREE TODAY’S CLASS WAR PRISONERS.
Politically, the writer of these lines is far distance from those of the Haymarket Martyrs. Their flag was the black flag of anarchism, the writer’s is the red flag of communism. Notwithstanding those political differences, militants must stand under the old labor slogan that should underscore all labor defense work now as then- ‘An injury to one is an injury to all’. Unfortunately that principle has been honored far more in the breech than in the observance by working class organizations.
Additionally, in the case of the Haymarket Martyrs today’s militants must stand in solidarity and learn about the way those militants bravely conducted themselves before bourgeois society in the face of the witch hunt against them and their frame-up in the courts of so-called bourgeois ‘justice’. Not for the first time, and most probably not for the last, militants were railroaded by the capitalist state for holding unpopular and or/dangerous (to the capitalists) views. Moreover, it is no accident that most of the Haymarket Martyrs were foreigners (mainly Germans) not fully appreciative of the niceties of 19th century American ‘justice’. This same ‘justice’ system framed the heroic anarchist immigrant militants Sacco and Vanzetti in the early 20th century and countless other militants since then. As we struggle in the fight for full citizenship rights for immigrants today we should keep this in mind. Although, as we know, this American system of ‘justice’ will not forget the occasional uppity ‘native’ political dissenter either.
Most importantly, we must not forget that the Haymarket Martyrs at the time of their arrest were fighting for the establishment of a standardized eight hour work day. It is ironic that 120 years later this simple, rational, reasonable demand should, in effect, still be necessary to fight for by working people. All proportions taken into account since the 1880’s, a very high percentage of the working class still does not have this luxury- given the necessity of two wage-earner families, two job wage-earners, dramatic increases in commute time in order to gain employment, unpaid but mandatory work time (note especially the Walmartization of labor time) and a high rate of partially or fully unemployed able-bodied workers. To do justice to the memory of the Haymarket Martyrs this generation of militants should dust off another old labor slogan that used to be part of the transitional demands of the socialist movement- 30 hours work for 40 hours pay. TODAY THIS IS A REASONABLE DEMAND.
Obviously such a demand cannot be implemented in isolation. To even propose such a demand means we need to build a workers party to fight for it. Moreover, and let us not have illusions about this; this capitalist state does not want to and will not grant such a demand. Therefore, we must fight for a workers government. That would be a true monument to the memory of the Haymarket Martyrs.
Poet's Corner- William Butler Yeats' "Meditations In Time Of Civil War"
Markin comment:
The times in America are out of joint, no question. The smell of civil war, at some primal level, fills my nostrils today and hence to thoughts of William Butler Yeat's highly symbolic, if not strictly politically on point, poem.
Meditations In Time Of Civil War
poem of William Butler Yeats
I. Ancestral Houses
Surely among a rich man's flowering lawns,
Amid the rustle of his planted hills,
Life overflows without ambitious pains;
And rains down life until the basin spills,
And mounts more dizzy high the more it rains
As though to choose whatever shape it wills
And never stoop to a mechanical
Or servile shape, at others' beck and call.
Mere dreams, mere dreams! Yet Homer had not Sung
Had he not found it certain beyond dreams
That out of life's own self-delight had sprung
The abounding glittering jet; though now it seems
As if some marvellous empty sea-shell flung
Out of the obscure dark of the rich streams,
And not a fountain, were the symbol which
Shadows the inherited glory of the rich.
Some violent bitter man, some powerful man
Called architect and artist in, that they,
Bitter and violent men, might rear in stone
The sweetness that all longed for night and day,
The gentleness none there had ever known;
But when the master's buried mice can play.
And maybe the great-grandson of that house,
For all its bronze and marble, 's but a mouse.
O what if gardens where the peacock strays
With delicate feet upon old terraces,
Or else all Juno from an urn displays
Before the indifferent garden deities;
O what if levelled lawns and gravelled ways
Where slippered Contemplation finds his ease
And Childhood a delight for every sense,
But take our greatness with our violence?
What if the glory of escutcheoned doors,
And buildings that a haughtier age designed,
The pacing to and fro on polished floors
Amid great chambers and long galleries, lined
With famous portraits of our ancestors;
What if those things the greatest of mankind
Consider most to magnify, or to bless,
But take our greatness with our bitterness?
II. My House
An ancient bridge, and a more ancient tower,
A farmhouse that is sheltered by its wall,
An acre of stony ground,
Where the symbolic rose can break in flower,
Old ragged elms, old thorns innumerable,
The sound of the rain or sound
Of every wind that blows;
The stilted water-hen
Crossing Stream again
Scared by the splashing of a dozen cows;
A winding stair, a chamber arched with stone,
A grey stone fireplace with an open hearth,
A candle and written page.
Il Penseroso's Platonist toiled on
In some like chamber, shadowing forth
How the daemonic rage
Imagined everything.
Benighted travellers
From markets and from fairs
Have seen his midnight candle glimmering.
Two men have founded here. A man-at-arms
Gathered a score of horse and spent his days
In this tumultuous spot,
Where through long wars and sudden night alarms
His dwinding score and he seemed castaways
Forgetting and forgot;
And I, that after me
My bodily heirs may find,
To exalt a lonely mind,
Befitting emblems of adversity.
III. My Table
Two heavy trestles, and a board
Where Sato's gift, a changeless sword,
By pen and paper lies,
That it may moralise
My days out of their aimlessness.
A bit of an embroidered dress
Covers its wooden sheath.
Chaucer had not drawn breath
When it was forged. In Sato's house,
Curved like new moon, moon-luminous
It lay five hundred years.
Yet if no change appears
No moon; only an aching heart
Conceives a changeless work of art.
Our learned men have urged
That when and where 'twas forged
A marvellous accomplishment,
In painting or in pottery, went
From father unto son
And through the centuries ran
And seemed unchanging like the sword.
Soul's beauty being most adored,
Men and their business took
Me soul's unchanging look;
For the most rich inheritor,
Knowing that none could pass Heaven's door,
That loved inferior art,
Had such an aching heart
That he, although a country's talk
For silken clothes and stately walk.
Had waking wits; it seemed
Juno's peacock screamed.
IV. My Descendants
Having inherited a vigorous mind
From my old fathers, I must nourish dreams
And leave a woman and a man behind
As vigorous of mind, and yet it seems
Life scarce can cast a fragrance on the wind,
Scarce spread a glory to the morning beams,
But the torn petals strew the garden plot;
And there's but common greenness after that.
And what if my descendants lose the flower
Through natural declension of the soul,
Through too much business with the passing hour,
Through too much play, or marriage with a fool?
May this laborious stair and this stark tower
Become a roofless min that the owl
May build in the cracked masonry and cry
Her desolation to the desolate sky.
The primum Mobile that fashioned us
Has made the very owls in circles move;
And I, that count myself most prosperous,
Seeing that love and friendship are enough,
For an old neighbour's friendship chose the house
And decked and altered it for a girl's love,
And know whatever flourish and decline
These stones remain their monument and mine.
V. The Road at My Door
An affable Irregular,
A heavily-built Falstaffian man,
Comes cracking jokes of civil war
As though to die by gunshot were
The finest play under the sun.
A brown Lieutenant and his men,
Half dressed in national uniform,
Stand at my door, and I complain
Of the foul weather, hail and rain,
A pear-tree broken by the storm.
I count those feathered balls of soot
The moor-hen guides upon the stream.
To silence the envy in my thought;
And turn towards my chamber, caught
In the cold snows of a dream.
VI. The Stare's Nest by My Window
The bees build in the crevices
Of loosening masonry, and there
The mother birds bring grubs and flies.
My wall is loosening; honey-bees,
Come build in the empty house of the state.
We are closed in, and the key is turned
On our uncertainty; somewhere
A man is killed, or a house burned,
Yet no clear fact to be discerned:
Come build in he empty house of the stare.
A barricade of stone or of wood;
Some fourteen days of civil war;
Last night they trundled down the road
That dead young soldier in his blood:
Come build in the empty house of the stare.
We had fed the heart on fantasies,
The heart's grown brutal from the fare;
More Substance in our enmities
Than in our love; O honey-bees,
Come build in the empty house of the stare.
VII. I see Phantoms of Hatred and of the Heart's
Fullness and of the Coming Emptiness
I climb to the tower-top and lean upon broken stone,
A mist that is like blown snow is sweeping over all,
Valley, river, and elms, under the light of a moon
That seems unlike itself, that seems unchangeable,
A glittering sword out of the east. A puff of wind
And those white glimmering fragments of the mist sweep by.
Frenzies bewilder, reveries perturb the mind;
Monstrous familiar images swim to the mind's eye.
'Vengeance upon the murderers,' the cry goes up,
'Vengeance for Jacques Molay.' In cloud-pale rags, or in lace,
The rage-driven, rage-tormented, and rage-hungry troop,
Trooper belabouring trooper, biting at arm or at face,
Plunges towards nothing, arms and fingers spreading wide
For the embrace of nothing; and I, my wits astray
Because of all that senseless tumult, all but cried
For vengeance on the murderers of Jacques Molay.
Their legs long, delicate and slender, aquamarine their eyes,
Magical unicorns bear ladies on their backs.
The ladies close their musing eyes. No prophecies,
Remembered out of Babylonian almanacs,
Have closed the ladies' eyes, their minds are but a pool
Where even longing drowns under its own excess;
Nothing but stillness can remain when hearts are full
Of their own sweetness, bodies of their loveliness.
The cloud-pale unicorns, the eyes of aquamarine,
The quivering half-closed eyelids, the rags of cloud or of lace,
Or eyes that rage has brightened, arms it has made lean,
Give place to an indifferent multitude, give place
To brazen hawks. Nor self-delighting reverie,
Nor hate of what's to come, nor pity for what's gone,
Nothing but grip of claw, and the eye's complacency,
The innumerable clanging wings that have put out the moon.
I turn away and shut the door, and on the stair
Wonder how many times I could have proved my worth
In something that all others understand or share;
But O! ambitious heart, had such a proof drawn forth
A company of friends, a conscience set at ease,
It had but made us pine the more. The abstract joy,
The half-read wisdom of daemonic images,
Suffice the ageing man as once the growing boy.
The times in America are out of joint, no question. The smell of civil war, at some primal level, fills my nostrils today and hence to thoughts of William Butler Yeat's highly symbolic, if not strictly politically on point, poem.
Meditations In Time Of Civil War
poem of William Butler Yeats
I. Ancestral Houses
Surely among a rich man's flowering lawns,
Amid the rustle of his planted hills,
Life overflows without ambitious pains;
And rains down life until the basin spills,
And mounts more dizzy high the more it rains
As though to choose whatever shape it wills
And never stoop to a mechanical
Or servile shape, at others' beck and call.
Mere dreams, mere dreams! Yet Homer had not Sung
Had he not found it certain beyond dreams
That out of life's own self-delight had sprung
The abounding glittering jet; though now it seems
As if some marvellous empty sea-shell flung
Out of the obscure dark of the rich streams,
And not a fountain, were the symbol which
Shadows the inherited glory of the rich.
Some violent bitter man, some powerful man
Called architect and artist in, that they,
Bitter and violent men, might rear in stone
The sweetness that all longed for night and day,
The gentleness none there had ever known;
But when the master's buried mice can play.
And maybe the great-grandson of that house,
For all its bronze and marble, 's but a mouse.
O what if gardens where the peacock strays
With delicate feet upon old terraces,
Or else all Juno from an urn displays
Before the indifferent garden deities;
O what if levelled lawns and gravelled ways
Where slippered Contemplation finds his ease
And Childhood a delight for every sense,
But take our greatness with our violence?
What if the glory of escutcheoned doors,
And buildings that a haughtier age designed,
The pacing to and fro on polished floors
Amid great chambers and long galleries, lined
With famous portraits of our ancestors;
What if those things the greatest of mankind
Consider most to magnify, or to bless,
But take our greatness with our bitterness?
II. My House
An ancient bridge, and a more ancient tower,
A farmhouse that is sheltered by its wall,
An acre of stony ground,
Where the symbolic rose can break in flower,
Old ragged elms, old thorns innumerable,
The sound of the rain or sound
Of every wind that blows;
The stilted water-hen
Crossing Stream again
Scared by the splashing of a dozen cows;
A winding stair, a chamber arched with stone,
A grey stone fireplace with an open hearth,
A candle and written page.
Il Penseroso's Platonist toiled on
In some like chamber, shadowing forth
How the daemonic rage
Imagined everything.
Benighted travellers
From markets and from fairs
Have seen his midnight candle glimmering.
Two men have founded here. A man-at-arms
Gathered a score of horse and spent his days
In this tumultuous spot,
Where through long wars and sudden night alarms
His dwinding score and he seemed castaways
Forgetting and forgot;
And I, that after me
My bodily heirs may find,
To exalt a lonely mind,
Befitting emblems of adversity.
III. My Table
Two heavy trestles, and a board
Where Sato's gift, a changeless sword,
By pen and paper lies,
That it may moralise
My days out of their aimlessness.
A bit of an embroidered dress
Covers its wooden sheath.
Chaucer had not drawn breath
When it was forged. In Sato's house,
Curved like new moon, moon-luminous
It lay five hundred years.
Yet if no change appears
No moon; only an aching heart
Conceives a changeless work of art.
Our learned men have urged
That when and where 'twas forged
A marvellous accomplishment,
In painting or in pottery, went
From father unto son
And through the centuries ran
And seemed unchanging like the sword.
Soul's beauty being most adored,
Men and their business took
Me soul's unchanging look;
For the most rich inheritor,
Knowing that none could pass Heaven's door,
That loved inferior art,
Had such an aching heart
That he, although a country's talk
For silken clothes and stately walk.
Had waking wits; it seemed
Juno's peacock screamed.
IV. My Descendants
Having inherited a vigorous mind
From my old fathers, I must nourish dreams
And leave a woman and a man behind
As vigorous of mind, and yet it seems
Life scarce can cast a fragrance on the wind,
Scarce spread a glory to the morning beams,
But the torn petals strew the garden plot;
And there's but common greenness after that.
And what if my descendants lose the flower
Through natural declension of the soul,
Through too much business with the passing hour,
Through too much play, or marriage with a fool?
May this laborious stair and this stark tower
Become a roofless min that the owl
May build in the cracked masonry and cry
Her desolation to the desolate sky.
The primum Mobile that fashioned us
Has made the very owls in circles move;
And I, that count myself most prosperous,
Seeing that love and friendship are enough,
For an old neighbour's friendship chose the house
And decked and altered it for a girl's love,
And know whatever flourish and decline
These stones remain their monument and mine.
V. The Road at My Door
An affable Irregular,
A heavily-built Falstaffian man,
Comes cracking jokes of civil war
As though to die by gunshot were
The finest play under the sun.
A brown Lieutenant and his men,
Half dressed in national uniform,
Stand at my door, and I complain
Of the foul weather, hail and rain,
A pear-tree broken by the storm.
I count those feathered balls of soot
The moor-hen guides upon the stream.
To silence the envy in my thought;
And turn towards my chamber, caught
In the cold snows of a dream.
VI. The Stare's Nest by My Window
The bees build in the crevices
Of loosening masonry, and there
The mother birds bring grubs and flies.
My wall is loosening; honey-bees,
Come build in the empty house of the state.
We are closed in, and the key is turned
On our uncertainty; somewhere
A man is killed, or a house burned,
Yet no clear fact to be discerned:
Come build in he empty house of the stare.
A barricade of stone or of wood;
Some fourteen days of civil war;
Last night they trundled down the road
That dead young soldier in his blood:
Come build in the empty house of the stare.
We had fed the heart on fantasies,
The heart's grown brutal from the fare;
More Substance in our enmities
Than in our love; O honey-bees,
Come build in the empty house of the stare.
VII. I see Phantoms of Hatred and of the Heart's
Fullness and of the Coming Emptiness
I climb to the tower-top and lean upon broken stone,
A mist that is like blown snow is sweeping over all,
Valley, river, and elms, under the light of a moon
That seems unlike itself, that seems unchangeable,
A glittering sword out of the east. A puff of wind
And those white glimmering fragments of the mist sweep by.
Frenzies bewilder, reveries perturb the mind;
Monstrous familiar images swim to the mind's eye.
'Vengeance upon the murderers,' the cry goes up,
'Vengeance for Jacques Molay.' In cloud-pale rags, or in lace,
The rage-driven, rage-tormented, and rage-hungry troop,
Trooper belabouring trooper, biting at arm or at face,
Plunges towards nothing, arms and fingers spreading wide
For the embrace of nothing; and I, my wits astray
Because of all that senseless tumult, all but cried
For vengeance on the murderers of Jacques Molay.
Their legs long, delicate and slender, aquamarine their eyes,
Magical unicorns bear ladies on their backs.
The ladies close their musing eyes. No prophecies,
Remembered out of Babylonian almanacs,
Have closed the ladies' eyes, their minds are but a pool
Where even longing drowns under its own excess;
Nothing but stillness can remain when hearts are full
Of their own sweetness, bodies of their loveliness.
The cloud-pale unicorns, the eyes of aquamarine,
The quivering half-closed eyelids, the rags of cloud or of lace,
Or eyes that rage has brightened, arms it has made lean,
Give place to an indifferent multitude, give place
To brazen hawks. Nor self-delighting reverie,
Nor hate of what's to come, nor pity for what's gone,
Nothing but grip of claw, and the eye's complacency,
The innumerable clanging wings that have put out the moon.
I turn away and shut the door, and on the stair
Wonder how many times I could have proved my worth
In something that all others understand or share;
But O! ambitious heart, had such a proof drawn forth
A company of friends, a conscience set at ease,
It had but made us pine the more. The abstract joy,
The half-read wisdom of daemonic images,
Suffice the ageing man as once the growing boy.
*Songs To While Away The Class Struggle By- The Wolf Tones- "Kevin Barry"
Click on the title to link a "YouTube" film clip of the Wolf Tones performing "Kevin Barry".
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, although hard communist musicians have historically been scarce on the ground. 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.
Kevin Barry
Irish Folk song
In Mountjoy jail one Monday morning
High upon the gallows tree,
Kevin Barry gave his young life
For the cause of liberty.
But a lad of eighteen summers,
Still there's no one can deny,
As he walked to death that morning,
He proudly held his head on high.
2. Just before he faced the hangman,
In his dreary prison cell,
The Black and Tans tortured Barry,
Just because he wouldn't tell.
The names of his brave comrades,
And other things they wished to know.
"Turn informer and we'll free you"
Kevin Barry answered, "no".
3. "Shoot me like a soldier.
Do not hang me like a dog,
For I fought to free old Ireland
On that still September morn.
"All around the little bakery
Where we fought them hand to hand,
Shoot me like a brave soldier,
For I fought for Ireland."
4. "Kevin Barry, do not leave us,
On the scaffold you must die!"
Cried his broken-hearted mother
As she bade her son good-bye.
Kevin turned to her in silence
Saying, "Mother, do not weep,
For it's all for dear old Ireland
And it's all for freedom's sake."
5. Calmly standing to attention
While he bade his last farewell
To his broken hearted mother
Whose grief no one can tell.
For the cause he proudly cherished
This sad parting had to be
Then to death walked softly smiling
That old Ireland might be free.
6. Another martyr for old Ireland;
Another murder for the crown,
Whose brutal laws to crush the Irish,
Could not keep their spirit down.
Lads like Barry are no cowards.
From the foe they will not fly.
Lads like Barry will free Ireland,
For her sake they'll live and die.
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, although hard communist musicians have historically been scarce on the ground. 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.
Kevin Barry
Irish Folk song
In Mountjoy jail one Monday morning
High upon the gallows tree,
Kevin Barry gave his young life
For the cause of liberty.
But a lad of eighteen summers,
Still there's no one can deny,
As he walked to death that morning,
He proudly held his head on high.
2. Just before he faced the hangman,
In his dreary prison cell,
The Black and Tans tortured Barry,
Just because he wouldn't tell.
The names of his brave comrades,
And other things they wished to know.
"Turn informer and we'll free you"
Kevin Barry answered, "no".
3. "Shoot me like a soldier.
Do not hang me like a dog,
For I fought to free old Ireland
On that still September morn.
"All around the little bakery
Where we fought them hand to hand,
Shoot me like a brave soldier,
For I fought for Ireland."
4. "Kevin Barry, do not leave us,
On the scaffold you must die!"
Cried his broken-hearted mother
As she bade her son good-bye.
Kevin turned to her in silence
Saying, "Mother, do not weep,
For it's all for dear old Ireland
And it's all for freedom's sake."
5. Calmly standing to attention
While he bade his last farewell
To his broken hearted mother
Whose grief no one can tell.
For the cause he proudly cherished
This sad parting had to be
Then to death walked softly smiling
That old Ireland might be free.
6. Another martyr for old Ireland;
Another murder for the crown,
Whose brutal laws to crush the Irish,
Could not keep their spirit down.
Lads like Barry are no cowards.
From the foe they will not fly.
Lads like Barry will free Ireland,
For her sake they'll live and die.
When Women Played Rock And Roll For Keeps- The Music Of Bonnie Raiit
When Women Played Rock And
Roll For Keeps- The Music Of Bonnie Raiit
CD Review
By Zack James
Seth Garth and Jack
Callahan who had been friends since highs school down in Carver after they
returned from a whirlwind few months on the road on a magical mystery tour
yellow brick road merry pranksters adventure out in California were sitting in
Jack’s, the local hang-out bar in Cambridge where the drinks were cheap and the
conversation interesting, when a young woman stepped up to the small stage
preparing to sing. Jack mentioned to Seth that she looked familiar, that flaming
red hair a giveaway, and asked him if he could place the face. Seth who was
beginning his long career as a music critic just then for The Eye whom he had
contracted with when he was out in California blurted out that didn’t Jack
remember seeing her, seeing Bonnie Raitt, on the Boston Common before they had
taken off for California where she blew away the crowd with a cover of Down
Highway 61. Jack laughed and said that he was so stoned that night that he
wasn’t sure who he had heard (Seth reminding him that it had been an afternoon
concert.
Of course Seth as a budding
music critic, expecting to ride the way from folk to folk rock to what was now
being called “acid” rock with all the strobe lights and dipping into the drug
bag to bring out the right mood had done some basic research on Bonnie as an up
and coming star who was riding her own wave of the new trend in having female
singers lead the bands they were in. Grace Slick, Amy Kline, Nicky Adams and
then her. He had also found out that Bonnie had dropped out of Radcliffe a
little earlier in order to pursue her musical career as a result of the success
of the Boston Common concert. He also had found out that here budding virtuosity
with the slide guitar had come from sitting at the feet of country blues legend
Mississippi Fred McDowell. So she had a pedigree. Still she a was only starting
out and grateful that Jack’s had allowed her up on the stage a couple of years
earlier where she had begun to hone her skills both at presenting a professional
musical veneer and connecting with the audience. So the night Seth and Jack
were sitting there at the bar drinking and talking about everything under the
sun Bonnie was doing “pay back.” Performing for the old crowd, performing for
Jack.
She started her first set
with Hound Dog Taylor’s The Sky Is Crying and McDowell’s Highway 61 and the
rest would be history. A history which is well documented in this compilation
from those classics to Richard Thompson’s The Dimming of the Day.
*From The Archives- Proletarian Revolution And The Fight Against War
Click on the title to link to a "Workers Vanguard", newspaper of the Spartacist League/U.S, article on the subject mentioned in the headline.
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