*Songs To While Away The Class Struggle By-Nina Simone's "Mississippi Goddam"-In Honor Of Harper Lee's "To Kill A Mockingbird"

A "YouTube" film clip of Nina Simone performing her "Mississippi Goddam. Thanks, Nina.

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.

Markin comment:

On a day when I am honoring Harper Lee's Alabama-based classic, "To Kill A Mockingbird", Nina Simone's "Mississippi Goddam" easily comes to mind.

Markin comment:

50 plus years later and even the mere mention of Mississippi puts me directly in mind of Nina Simone's no-nonsense song about the struggle down South in the early part of the civil rights movement in the 1960s. Thanks, Nina.

Mississippi Goddam Lyrics
(1963) Nina Simone

The name of this tune is Mississippi Goddam
And I mean every word of it

Alabama's gotten me so upset
Tennessee made me lose my rest
And everybody knows about Mississippi Goddam

Alabama's gotten me so upset
Tennessee made me lose my rest
And everybody knows about Mississippi Goddam

Can't you see it
Can't you feel it
It's all in the air
I can't stand the pressure much longer
Somebody say a prayer

Alabama's gotten me so upset
Tennessee made me lose my rest
And everybody knows about Mississippi Goddam

This is a show tune
But the show hasn't been written for it, yet

Hound dogs on my trail
School children sitting in jail
Black cat cross my path
I think every day's gonna be my last

Lord have mercy on this land of mine
We all gonna get it in due time
I don't belong here
I don't belong there
I've even stopped believing in prayer

Don't tell me
I tell you
Me and my people just about due
I've been there so I know
They keep on saying "Go slow!"

But that's just the trouble
"do it slow"
Washing the windows
"do it slow"
Picking the cotton
"do it slow"
You're just plain rotten
"do it slow"
You're too damn lazy
"do it slow"
The thinking's crazy
"do it slow"
Where am I going
What am I doing
I don't know
I don't know

Just try to do your very best
Stand up be counted with all the rest
For everybody knows about Mississippi Goddam

I made you thought I was kiddin' didn't we

Picket lines
School boycotts
They try to say it's a communist plot
All I want is equality
for my sister my brother my people and me

Yes you lied to me all these years
You told me to wash and clean my ears
And talk real fine just like a lady
And you'd stop calling me Sister Sadie

Oh but this whole country is full of lies
You're all gonna die and die like flies
I don't trust you any more
You keep on saying "Go slow!"
"Go slow!"

But that's just the trouble
"do it slow"
Desegregation
"do it slow"
Mass participation
"do it slow"
Reunification
"do it slow"
Do things gradually
"do it slow"
But bring more tragedy
"do it slow"
Why don't you see it
Why don't you feel it
I don't know
I don't know

You don't have to live next to me
Just give me my equality
Everybody knows about Mississippi
Everybody knows about Alabama
Everybody knows about Mississippi Goddam

That's it for now! see ya' later

***On The 50th Anniversary-Never Forget Birmingham Sunday 1963

Songs To While Away The Class Struggle By- Phil Och's "Here's To The State Of Mississippi"-Mississippi Goddam, Once Again-And Alabama Too

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. Markin.

***********

Markin comment:

This is a continuation of entries for folksinger/songwriter Phil Och's who back in the early 1960s stood right up there with Bob Dylan in the protest songwriting category. The entries on this date testify to that. However, early on I sensed something special about Dylan and never really warmed up to Ochs. His singing style did not "move" me and that counted for a lot in those days. The rest just turned on preference.

********

Here's to the State of Mississippi Lyrics

G Em D
Here's to the state of Mississippi,
G F
For Underheath her borders, the devil draws no lines,
G F
If you drag her muddy river, nameless bodies you will find.
G F
whoa the fat trees of the forest have hid a thousand crimes,
G Em Am D
the calender is lyin' when it reads the present time.
G Em C G
Whoa here's to the land you've torn out the heart of,
G Em D G
Mississippi find yourself another country to be part of!

Here's to the people of Mississippi
Who say the folks up north, they just don't understand
And they tremble in their shadows at the thunder of the Klan
The sweating of their souls can't wash the blood from off their hands
They smile and shrug their shoulders at the murder of a man
Oh, here's to the land you've torn out the heart of
Mississippi find yourself another country to be part of

Here's to the schools of Mississippi
Where they're teaching all the children that they don't have to care
All of rudiments of hatred are present everywhere
And every single classroom is a factory of despair
There's nobody learning such a foreign word as fair
Oh, here's to the land you've torn out the heart of
Mississippi find yourself another country to be part of

Here's to the cops of Mississippi
They're chewing their tobacco as they lock the prison door
Their bellies bounce inside them as they knock you to the floor
No they don't like taking prisoners in their private little war
Behind their broken badges there are murderers and more
Oh, here's to the land you've torn out the heart of
Mississippi find yourself another country to be part of

And, here's to the judges of Mississippi
Who wear the robe of honor as they crawl into the court
They're guarding all the bastions with their phony legal fort
Oh, justice is a stranger when the prisoners report
When the black man stands accused the trial is always short
Oh, here's to the land you've torn out the heart of
Mississippi find yourself another country to be part of

And here's to the government of Mississippi
In the swamp of their bureaucracy they're always bogging down
And criminals are posing as the mayors of the towns
They're hoping that no one sees the sights and hears the sounds
And the speeches of the governor are the ravings of a clown
Oh, here's to the land you've torn out the heart of
Mississippi find yourself another country to be part of

And here's to the laws of Mississippi
Congressmen will gather in a circus of delay
While the Constitution is drowning in an ocean of decay
Unwed mothers should be sterilized, I've even heard them say
Yes, corruption can be classic in the Mississippi way
Oh, here's to the land you've torn out the heart of
Mississippi find yourself another country to be part of

And here's to the churches of Mississippi
Where the cross, once made of silver, now is caked with rust
And the Sunday morning sermons pander to their lust
The fallen face of Jesus is choking in the dust
Heaven only knows in which God they can trust
Oh, here's to the land you've torn out the heart of
Mississippi find yourself another country to be part of

***On The 50th Anniversary-Never Forget Birmingham Sunday 1963

When The Blues Is Dues- In Jim Crow Times – 50 Years Later It’s Still Nina Simone’s “Mississippi Goddam”-And Alabama Too

… his hitchhiked ride, a good guy, a guy in pick-up truck, an almost new 1961 Ford model, who picked him up after dark just south of Richmond, left him off right off Highway 61, just outside of town, Clarksburg, early that next blazing hot afternoon after that good guy had tooled that pick-up about fourteen hours straight with only a couple of pits stops. As he ambled toward the center of town figuring to get a little lunch at the bus stop before heading out on the bus to head west some before he picked up the hitchhike trail again he noticed, he clearly noticed that he was in the colored section of town, or what seemed like it. All kinds of shacks, run-down and worst, junk cars, or worst, the latest, maybe about a 1949 Hudson from what he could see, litters of little black children playing in front of decayed yards filled with debris,and a feel of poverty, not ground-down, groveling poverty but just the poverty of the poor, the poor who have been poor for a few generations and don’t know any other existence. As he passed the rows of shacks some residents gave him short looks, not hostile but more like“whitey, what are you doing here in this section of town, you must be a stranger.”Others just went about their poking around business.

These stares (or indifferences) kept up until he hit the edge of the colored section, or what seemed to be the edge, when he thirsty, thirsty as hell, by this point stopped in a store, one of those old time country-type stores, a store out of some William Faulkner Mississippi novel, he thought, filled with colored folks, and one white man behind the counter. He approached the counter, asked for a Pepsi, cold, ice cold, and large. The white man behind the counter (who turned out to be the owner, and who he would hear of a couple of years later in some televised news report as the leader of that town’s White Citizens Council) said this -“boy, where do you think you are, Boston?”, this here is a nigra store and no whites are served here. By rights I should have you thrown out of town but since you are a stranger I will just tell that if you want a Pepsi, or any damn drink, you will have to go to my store over in town a couple of miles from here up this same road, right next to the bus station which I hope you plan to be using.” He left without a word, but still thirsty as hell.

After walking what seemed like an eternity, now with white stares coming fromall kinds of shacks, run-down and worst, junk cars, or worst, the latest, maybe about a 1949 Hudson from what he could see, litters of little white children playing in front of decayed yards filled with debris, and a feel of poverty, not ground-down, groveling poverty but just the poverty of the poor, the poor who have been poor for a few generations and don’t know any other existence, he reached the downtown bus station, and Mister’s grocery store next door. He went into the store, now filled with white folks, and with a white man behind the counter, approached the counter and asked for a Pepsi, cold, ice cold, and large. In reply the white man said the following-“We don’t take with white folks trading at the colored store so if you want a Pepsi, or any damn drink, you’ll have to get it at the bus station-on your way out of town.” He left, again without a word.

He entered the small bus station, stepped up to the clerk’s counter, bought a ticket to New Orleans, and then asked for a drink of water. The clerk pointed behind him and he went and got that precious drink of water, a drink at the “whites only”drinking fountain not the “colored only” one that his new found instinct told him that he should not use…

…and thus james crow in the flesh. And Mississippi goddam too.

***On The 50th Anniversary-Never Forget Birmingham Sunday 1963

Preserving The Roots Anyway We Can- The Last Of The Mississippi “Jukes”-But Also, Once Again-"Mississippi Goddam"-And Alabama Too

DVD Review

Last Of The Mississippi Jukes, Morgan Freeman and various artists, a documentary by Robert Mugge, 2003

Apparently, from the subject matter of the reviews that I have penned lately I have fallen into something of a roots music preservationist kick. Recent reviews have included a saga about the trials and tribulations of Austin, Texas blues club owner, the late Clifford Antone of “Antone’s” fame, in his attempt to save and expand the rich blues tradition that area of the country. I have also highlighted the attempts of Joe Bussard down in Maryland in his seemingly eternal quest to find every relevant old roots 78 rpm record ever produced. In the current review we are faced with the attempts, apparently unsuccessful, to save from the wrecker’s ball an old Jackson, Mississippi "juke joint”, the Subway Lounge (and attached separately historically important hotel, Summers Hotel) a location that is significant for the blues and for the civil rights struggle in the 1960s, as well.

I had initially intended to review this DVD mainly on the basic of the roots aspect of the documentary. Something along the lines, as I have done in the past, of paying tribute to those like Bobby Rush and King Edwards who continue the roots traditions down at the base without much hope of great recognition or riches. However, after viewing the footage of the up close and very personal indignities suffered by the older performing artists here back in Jim Crow days, day after day, as they were trying to keep the blues alive as an expression of the black cultural gradient that forms the American experience I feel more strongly the need to put on my political hat on this one.

Although there are plenty of references to blues, old and new and several performance from the new crop of blues devotees I was struck, and powerfully so, about the insights that this documentary put forth about the nature of Jim Crow society that existed in the not distant past down in Mississippi (and not just Mississippi and not just in the deeply segregated South). This policy struck the famous and those not so famous among the black population, homegrown or tourist. There are many anecdotal stories here about a number of events that revolved around the hotel, the “juke joint”, and just the every day of black experience and what Jim Crow was down at the base for black people. Yes, get this one for its slice of black history. But also get it to remember as I have said it before but Nina Simone’s old lyrics brings out so strongly. Once again, "Mississippi god dam".


Mississippi Goddam Lyrics
(1963) Nina Simone

The name of this tune is Mississippi Goddam
And I mean every word of it

Alabama's gotten me so upset
Tennessee made me lose my rest
And everybody knows about Mississippi Goddam

Alabama's gotten me so upset
Tennessee made me lose my rest
And everybody knows about Mississippi Goddam

Can't you see it
Can't you feel it
It's all in the air
I can't stand the pressure much longer
Somebody say a prayer

Alabama's gotten me so upset
Tennessee made me lose my rest
And everybody knows about Mississippi Goddam

This is a show tune
But the show hasn't been written for it, yet

Hound dogs on my trail
School children sitting in jail
Black cat cross my path
I think every day's gonna be my last

Lord have mercy on this land of mine
We all gonna get it in due time
I don't belong here
I don't belong there
I've even stopped believing in prayer

Don't tell me
I tell you
Me and my people just about due
I've been there so I know
They keep on saying "Go slow!"

But that's just the trouble
"do it slow"
Washing the windows
"do it slow"
Picking the cotton
"do it slow"
You're just plain rotten
"do it slow"
You're too damn lazy
"do it slow"
The thinking's crazy
"do it slow"
Where am I going
What am I doing
I don't know
I don't know

Just try to do your very best
Stand up be counted with all the rest
For everybody knows about Mississippi Goddam

I made you thought I was kiddin' didn't we

Picket lines
School boycotts
They try to say it's a communist plot
All I want is equality
for my sister my brother my people and me

Yes you lied to me all these years
You told me to wash and clean my ears
And talk real fine just like a lady
And you'd stop calling me Sister Sadie

Oh but this whole country is full of lies
You're all gonna die and die like flies
I don't trust you any more
You keep on saying "Go slow!"
"Go slow!"

But that's just the trouble
"do it slow"
Desegregation
"do it slow"
Mass participation
"do it slow"
Reunification
"do it slow"
Do things gradually
"do it slow"
But bring more tragedy
"do it slow"
Why don't you see it
Why don't you feel it
I don't know
I don't know

You don't have to live next to me
Just give me my equality
Everybody knows about Mississippi
Everybody knows about Alabama
Everybody knows about Mississippi Goddam

That's it for now! see ya' later 

***The Solution To The Student Debt Crisis- 21- A Film Review

From The Pen Of Frank Jackman

DVD Review

21, starring Kevin Spacey, Lawrence Fishburne, 2007

Everybody and their brother (and sister too) knows by now that the current student debt crisis in America is out of hand. Kids trying to get a serious higher education that might keep them off the streets, off the public dole, and gainfully employed in someplace other than bottom- feeder Wal-mart or Mickey D's are practically becoming indentured servants to the banks and other lending agencies in order to get out from under such a fate. Over the long haul we really are going to have to promote, as a matter of public policy, of social survival policy, a program of free quality higher education for all who want to go that route. Of course that proposition today is pie-in-the-sky and is a question for the future. So what is a kid, a hard- working grind of a kid, totally committed to getting him or herself a higher education to do in the meantime ? Well, one possible solution is presented by the film under review, 21.

And that is the solution not just the title of the movie. Basically go to Vegas (or I suppose Atlantic City or some other such gambling venue) and play 21. Simple, simply work out a system of counting cards and presto you are rich, rich enough anyway to grab that higher education. In the film it is a nerdy guy, an MIT grind, who through hard work and,well, grind has been accepted in Harvard Medical School in order to pursue his dream of being a doctor. But he has no dough , no $300,000 price tag dough, and so it looks like no go for our young hero. Except a fairy godfather (really an MIT professor) shows our student the way forward through working as a team with four other "best and brightest" to grab lots of dough "under the radar" with the professor's system. A system he had worked out and perfected from the days when he was a card-counter, now retired, in the old days.

Oh yeah, there is one little problem. No, not the problem that one might get addicted to beating the odds and go overboard, begin to like the "life" while having tons of fun being comped and everything in Vegas (including a little fling with one of the female team members).That 's nothing. No, the problem is that those casinos in the desert (or anywhere ),well, frown on card-counters. And they are more than willing to do something about it whether you are some weary old professor or a young MIT grind. Watch the film to see what the "they" (led by Lawrence Fishburne) are willing to do about the problem. As for non-elite college students, non-grinds, non-math memory whizzes, or the merely timid. perhaps you should think about fighting for that social policy of free quality higher education mentioned above.

From The Marxist Archives -In Honor Of The 75th Anniversary Of The Founding Of The Leon Trotsky-Led Fourth International-

Workers Vanguard No. 948	4 December 2009

TROTSKY

LENIN

On the Centrality of Marxist Theory

(Quote of the Week)

In his classic 1902 work, What Is To Be Done?, V.I. Lenin polemicized against the Economist tendency in the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party, a tendency that limited its agitation to trade-union demands and passively supported bourgeois liberal efforts to reform tsarist absolutism. Against the Economists, who were hostile to Marxism and loosely associated with the reformist current of Eduard Bernstein in Germany, Lenin stressed the centrality of Marxist theory for revolutionaries. Lenin’s emphasis on Marxist theory is particularly important in the present post-Soviet period, which is marked by the ascendancy of deep theoretical, political and social reaction.

Without revolutionary theory there can be no revolutionary movement. This idea cannot be insisted upon too strongly at a time when the fashionable preaching of opportunism goes hand in hand with an infatuation for the narrowest forms of practical activity. Yet, for Russian Social-Democrats [i.e., socialists] the importance of theory is enhanced by three other circumstances, which are often forgotten: first, by the fact that our Party is only in process of formation, its features are only just becoming defined, and it has as yet far from settled accounts with the other trends of revolutionary thought that threaten to divert the movement from the correct path. On the contrary, precisely the very recent past was marked by a revival of non-Social-Democratic revolutionary trends (an eventuation regarding which Axelrod long ago warned the Economists). Under these circumstances, what at first sight appears to be an “unimportant” error may lead to most deplorable consequences, and only short-sighted people can consider factional disputes and a strict differentiation between shades of opinion inopportune or superfluous....

Secondly, the Social-Democratic movement is in its very essence an international movement. This means, not only that we must combat national chauvinism, but that an incipient movement in a young country can be successful only if it makes use of the experiences of other countries. In order to make use of these experiences it is not enough merely to be acquainted with them, or simply to copy out the latest resolutions. What is required is the ability to treat these experiences critically and to test them independently....

Thirdly, the national tasks of Russian Social-Democracy are such as have never confronted any other socialist party in the world. We shall have occasion further on to deal with the political and organisational duties which the task of emancipating the whole people from the yoke of autocracy imposes upon us. At this point, we wish to state only that the role of vanguard fighter can be fulfilled only by a party that is guided by the most advanced theory.

—V.I. Lenin, What Is To Be Done? (1902)

************

Vladimir Ilyich Lenin

What Is To Be Done?

BURNING QUESTIONS of our MOVEMENT

---

“...Party struggles lend a party strength and vitality; the greatest proof of a party’s weakness is its diffuseness
and the blurring of clear demarcations; a party becomes stronger by purging itself...”

(From a letter of Lassalle to Marx, of June 24, 1852)

•

Preface

According to the author’s original plan, the present pamphlet was to have been devoted to a detailed development of the ideas expressed in the article “Where To Begin”, (Iskra, No. 4, May 1901).^[1] We must first apologise to the reader for the delay in fulfilling the promise made in that article (and repeated in response to many private inquiries and letters). One of the reasons for this delay was the attempt, undertaken in June of the past year (1901), to unite all the Social-Democratic organisations abroad. It was natural to wait for the results of this attempt, for, had the effort proved successful, it would perhaps have been necessary to expound Iskra’s conceptions of organisation from a somewhat different approach; in any case, such a success promised to put an end very quickly to the existence of the two trends in the Russian Social-Democratic movement. As the reader knows, the attempt failed, and, as we propose to show, was bound to fail after the new swing, of Rabocheye Dyelo, in its issue No. 10, towards Economism. It was found to be absolutely essential to begin a determined struggle against this trend, diffuse and ill-defined, but for that reason the more persistent, the more capable of reasserting itself in diverse forms. Accordingly, the original plan of the pamphlet was altered and considerably enlarged.

Its main theme was to have been the three questions raised in the article “Where To Begin” – the character and main content of our political agitation; our organisational tasks; and the plan for building, simultaneously and from various sides, a militant, all-Russia organisation. These questions have long engaged the mind of the author, who tried to raise them in Rabochaya Gazeta^[3] during one of the unsuccessful attempts to revive that paper (see Chapter V). But the original plan to confine the pamphlet to an analysis of only these three questions and to set forth our views as far as possible in a positive form, without, or almost without, entering into polemics, proved wholly impracticable, for two reasons. On the one hand, Economism proved to be much more tenacious than we had supposed (we employ the term Economism in the broad sense, as explained in Iskra, No. 12 (December 1901), in the article entitled “A Talk With Defenders of Economism”, which was a synopsis, so to speak, of the present pamphlet^[2]). It became clear beyond doubt that the differences regarding the solution of the three questions mentioned were explainable to a far greater degree by the basic antithesis between the two trends in the Russian Social-Democratic movement than by differences over details. On the other hand, the perplexity of the Economists over the practical application of our views in Iskra clearly revealed that we often speak literally in different tongues and therefore cannot arrive at an understanding without beginning ab ovo, and that an attempt must be made, in the simplest possible style, illustrated by numerous and concrete examples, systematically to “clarify” all our basic points of difference with all the Economists. I resolved to make such an attempt at “clarification”, fully realising that it would greatly increase the size of the pamphlet and delay its publication; I saw no other way of meeting my pledge I had made in the article “Where To Begin”. Thus, to the apologies for the delay, I must add others for the serious literary shortcomings of the pamphlet. I had to work in great haste, with frequent interruptions by a variety of other tasks.
The examination of the above three questions still constitutes the main theme of this pamphlet, but I found it necessary to begin with two questions of a more general nature – why such an “innocent” and “natural” slogan as “freedom of criticism” should be for us a veritable war-cry, and why we cannot come to an understanding even on the fundamental question of the role of Social-Democrats in relation to the spontaneous mass movement. Further, the exposition of our views on the character and substance of political agitation developed into an explanation of the difference between trade-unionist politics and Social-Democratic politics, while the exposition of our views on organisational tasks developed into an explanation of the difference between the amateurish methods which satisfy the Economists, and the organisation of revolutionaries which we hold to be indispensable. Further, I advance the “plan” for an all-Russia political newspaper with all the more insistence because the objections raised against it are untenable, and because no real answer has been given to the question I raised in the article “Where To Begin” as to how we can set to work from all sides simultaneously to create the organisation we need. Finally, in the concluding part, I hope to show that we did all we could to prevent a decisive break with the Economists, a break which nevertheless proved inevitable; that Rabocheye Dyelo acquired a special significance, a “historical” significance, if you will, because it expressed fully and strikingly, not consistent Economism, but the confusion and vacillation which constitute the distinguishing feature of an entire period in the history of Russian Social-Democracy; and that therefore the polemic with Rabocheye Dyelo, which may upon first view seem excessively detailed, also acquires significance, for we can make no progress until we have completely put an end to this period.

N. Lenin

February 1902

---

---

Notes

^[1] See present volume [5], pp. 13–24.—Ed.

^[2] See present volume [5], pp. 313–20.—Ed.

^[3]Rabochaya Gazeta (Workers’ Gazette)—an illegal newspaper issued by the Kiev group of Social-Democrats. Two issues appeared—No. 1 in August and No. 2 in December (dated November) 1897. The First Congress of the R.S.D.L.P. adopted Rabochaya Gazeta as the official organ of the Party, but the newspaper discontinued publication shortly after the Congress, as a result of a police raid on the printing-press and the arrest of the Central Committee.

***When  Doo Wop Bopped-The Music Of The 1950s

A "YouTube" film clip of the Fiestas performing their Doo Wop classic, "So Fine".

CD Review

Old Town Doo Wop, Volume Two, Ace Records, 1992

I have been doing a series of commentaries elsewhere on another site on my coming of political age in the early 1960s, but now when I am writing about musical influences I am just speaking of my coming of age, period, which was not necessarily the same thing. No question those of us who came of age in the 1950s are truly children of rock and roll. We were there, whether we appreciated it or not at the time, when the first, sputtering, moves away from ballady show tunes, rhymey Tin Pan Alley tunes and, most importantly, any and all music that your parents might have approved of, even liked, or at least left you alone to play in peace up in your room hit post World War II America like, well, like an atomic bomb.

Now strictly speaking “Doo Wop” is not really rock and roll, but rather a second cousin to it coming out of the black-dominated rhythm and blues tradition. The fantastic harmonics, precise rhythmic patterns, and smooth lyrics reflect that tradition more than the over-heated, guitar-driven, solo-singer rock performances that drove most of us to the dance floor back in the day. The kind of rock and roll that most of us children of the genre listened to, went wild over and spent that precious disposable income on was the rockabilly, hillbilly, black country blues variation that Sam Phillips and Sun Records first produced in the early 1950s and that Elvis, Carl Perkins, Chuck Berry, and Jerry Lee Lewis came to be exemplars of. But some of us, when we had a little extra cash, definitely bopped “doo wop” as part of our coming of age, especially if some dreamy girl (or guy for shes) was falling all over herself to listen to. Remember to be young was to be ready.

So what still sounds good on this CD compilation to a current AARPer and some of his fellows who comprise the demographic that such 1950s compilations “speak” to. No one came out of the 1950s without having at least listened to “So Fine” by the Fiestas, or maybe less possible their “Our Anniversary. And with Ruth McFadden on “School Boy” Or the very edgy fine “Life Is But A Dream” by the Harptones. Or The Chimes classic, “My Broken Heart”. Now this sub-genre is a very acquired taste, to be sure, but if you need a "doo wop” primer here is a place to start.

SO FINE
THE FIESTAS

So fine, so fine.
So fine, yeah.
My baby's so dog gone fine,
She loves me, come rain, come shine
Oh oh yeah so fine.
she thrills me, she thrills me
She thrills me, yeah.
My baby thrills me all the time.
she sends those chills up and down my spine,
Oh oh yeah so fine.
Well I know
she loves me so.
Well I know,
because my baby tells me so-oh oh so fine.
So fine
So fine, yeah, My baby's so dog gone fine
She sends those chills up and down my spine,
Oh oh yeah, so fine

Write a letter to Maj. Gen. Buchanan for PVT Manning's clemency. Is this email not displaying correctly? View it in your browser. Pvt Manning needs you to write a letter in support of clemency bid PVT Chelsea (formerly Bradley) Manning’s 35-year sentence is an outrage to the idea of American justice, and creates serious concerns for democracy advocates around the world. It's been condemned by public figures as wide ranging as Cornel West, Ron Paul, and American Civil Liberties Union 'Speech, Privacy, and Technology' Project Director Ben Wizner, who stated, [A] legal system that doesn't distinguish between leaks to the press in the public interest and treason against the nation will not only produce unjust results, but will deprive the public of critical information that is necessary for democratic accountability. However, there's something you can do right now. Under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, Convening Authorities are granted the power to reduce or eliminate a convicted soldier’s sentence. They use this power when they feel the court martial failed to deliver justice. As Commanding General of the Military District of Washington, Major General Jeffrey S. Buchanan is the only other individual besides President Obama with the power to lessen WikiLeaks whistleblower PVT Manning’s sentence in the immediate future. We are now requesting letters from professors, law experts, human rights advocates, politicians, artists, veterans, and concerned citizens urging Maj. Gen. Buchanan to reduce PVT Manning’s sentence. These letters will be submitted as part of an application for clemency from PVT Manning’s legal defense. We are collecting these letters at nathan@bradleymanning.org So what are you waiting for? Write a letter yourself, then encourage any professors, lawyers or community leaders you know to do the same. There are a few important guidelines to keep in mind as you compose your letter: Your letter should be approximately 1 page long. It should be composed on personalized letterhead -you can create this yourself (here are templates and some tips for doing that). Pvt Manning’s recently announced that her preferred name is Chelsea, and that folks should use female pronouns. However, she also understands that for efforts such as these, it is most effective for supporters to use her legal name and military rank, “Pvt. Bradley E. Manning”, along with male pronouns. The letter should focus on your support for PVT Manning, and especially why you believe justice will be served if PVT Manning’s sentence is reduced. The letter should NOT be anti-military and/or anti-Buchanan, as this will be unlikely to help. A suggested message: “Pvt. Manning has been punished enough for violating military regulations in the course of being true to his conscience. I urge you to use your authority as Convening Authority to reduce Pvt. Manning's sentence to time served.” Beyond that general message, feel free to personalize the details as to why you believe PVT Manning deserves clemency. Please print and sign the letter, then scan it and send it to nathan@bradleymanning.org by November 1, 2013, and sooner if possible. If you cannot scan the letter, please mail it to Pvt Manning Support Network, c/o Courage to Resist, 484 Lake Park Ave #41, Oakland CA 94610. We will review these letters prior to forwarding them to PVT Manning’s legal defense, and may request that you make changes if necessary. Convening Authorities have reduced the sentences of soldiers who broke military law for conscientious reasons in the past. We think PVT Manning deserves clemency as much as anyone -thank you for helping us show the Convening Authority that the public agrees! Here is an example letter written by Jeff Paterson, Courage to Resist Project Director. Note these letters will be submitted by Pvt. Manning's attorney as part of the formal clemency packet. Help us continue to cover 100% of Bradley's legal fees! Donate today.

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***Films To While Away The Class Struggle By- The Halls Of Justice The Only Justice Is In The Halls- The Life and Hard Times Of Lenny Bruce

DVD Review

Lenny Bruce: Without Tears, Lenny Bruce and various commentators, directed by Fred Baker, New Titles Productions, 1972

Okay, the average black male kid on the average ghetto city block knows, and knows without blinking, and knows from some seemingly unspoken source deep within his genetic structure that the cards are stacked against. That the cops, the courts, or some other part of the “justice” system will, eventually, come knocking at the door or grab him off the street for something, usually dope. The average Latino male kid on the average barrio city now knows pretty much knows that same thing, again usually on some bogus drug charge. And nowadays even young black and Latina women are getting that same message coded into their psyches. What is not encoded is for a white, Jewish comic guy who has an off-beat sense of humor and has something to say, sometimes something profound to say to face that same music, anytime. That, my friends, is the Lenny Bruce story in a nutshell and forms the theme for this commentary.

Really, I could leave the headline, taken from something Lenny Bruce said when he was in deep and surreal legal trouble back in the 1960s, and that would tell the tale here. Nevertheless the case of one off –beat comic who tried to “go outside the envelope” of confines of safe, secure, no waves, post-World World II cultural expression is an object lesson for the rest of us. Being a little bit uppity, being a little too black or brown, or being a little too red will get you in more trouble than you can shake a stick at then, and now.

On viewing this documentary my first impression was “what is all the fuss about?” At the vantage point, forty or fifty years after the events, it is hard to see what the so-called moral police of the day got in a dither over in Bruce’s work. On any given day you can hear more lewdness, lunacy, and sheer vulgarity on “talk” radio or television than Lenny ever uttered. That, however, is the point. Lenny was the point man, the trenchant social critic cum comedian who was honored after the fact, but not while the heat was on.

One of the highlights of this documentary is Lenny Bruce performing in various venues interspersed with “talking head” commentary by those who knew or interviewed him. The most interesting one is with jazz critic and social activist, Nat Hentoff, when Lenny is deep in trouble and has physically been ravished by his struggle. Kenneth Tynan, of 1950s San Francisco poetic fame, and Malcolm Muggeridge add their somewhat bizarre two cents worth. As does Bruce fellow social critic, Mort Sahl.

Throwing out the above names and discussing the time frame of Bruce’s troubles brings one final point. Was Lenny, like Kerouac, Ginsberg, Burroughs and Tynan, part of the 1950s “beat” generation? Certainly he was part of the avant guarde back door jazz scene and miles in front of any one else in the Milton Berle/Sid Caesar 1950s comedy world. One of the commentators noted that Bruce was primarily an entertainer, a man trying to make a living at what he did best. That seems right. But whether he was “beat” or not, he certainly pushed the envelop. And that is part of his legacy, and worthy of honor by us.

***Films To While  Away The Class Struggle By- In The Halls Of Justice The Only Justice Is In The Halls- "Lenny"

DVD Review

Lenny, starring Dustin Hoffman and Valerie Perrine, directed by Bob Fosse, MGM, 1974

Except for the last paragraph the rest of this review was used to review the documentary "Lenny Bruce: Without Tears". The points made there apply here, for the most part, as well.


Okay, the average black male kid on the average ghetto city block knows, and knows without blinking, and knows from some seemingly unspoken source deep within his genetic structure that the cards are stacked against him. That the cops, the courts, or some other part of the “justice” system will, eventually, come knocking at the door or grab him off the street for something, usually dope. The average Latino male kid on the average barrio city now knows pretty much knows that same thing, again usually on some bogus drug charge. And nowadays even young black and Latina women are getting that same message coded into their psyches. What is not encoded is for a white, Jewish comic guy who has an off-beat sense of humor and has something to say, sometimes something profound to say, to face that same music, anytime. That, my friends, is the Lenny Bruce story in a nutshell and forms the theme for this commentary.

Really, I could leave the headline, taken from something Lenny Bruce said when he was in deep and surreal legal trouble back in the 1960s, and that would tell the tale here. Nevertheless the case of one off –beat comic who tried to “go outside the envelope” of the confines of safe, secure, no waves, post-World World II cultural expression is an object lesson for the rest of us. Being a little bit uppity, being a little too black or brown, or being a little too red could get you in more trouble than you can shake a stick at then, and now.

On viewing this documentary my first impression was “what is all the fuss about?” At the vantage point, forty or fifty years after the events, it is hard to see what the so-called moral police of the day got in a dither over in Bruce’s work. On any given day you can hear more lewdness, lunacy, and sheer vulgarity on “talk” radio or television than Lenny ever uttered. That, however, is the point. Lenny was the point man, the trenchant social critic cum comedian who is honored now after the fact, but was not while the heat was on.

One of the highlights of this documentary is Lenny Bruce performing in various venues interspersed with “talking head” commentary by those who knew or interviewed him. The most interesting one is with jazz critic and social activist, Nat Hentoff, when Lenny is deep in trouble and has physically been ravished by his struggle. Kenneth Tynan, of 1950s San Francisco poetic fame, and Malcolm Muggeridge add their somewhat bizarre two cents worth. As does Bruce fellow social critic, Mort Sahl.

Throwing out the above names and discussing the time frame of Bruce’s troubles brings one final point. Was Lenny, like Kerouac, Ginsberg, Burroughs and Tynan, part of the 1950s “beat” generation? Certainly he was part of the avant guarde back door jazz scene and miles in front of any one else in the Milton Berle/Sid Caesar 1950s comedy world. One of the commentators noted that Bruce was primarily an entertainer, a man trying to make a living at what he did best. That seems right. But whether he was “beat” or not, he certainly pushed the envelop. And that is part of his legacy, and worthy of honor by us.

*****

The commercial movie "Lenny", starring Dustin Hoffman as Lenny, delves more into the personal side of Lenny's life, including his various affairs with women, especially the one leading up to his marriage(his wife here played by Valerie Perrine who seems perfect in this languid, strangely alluring stripper role), his jones, and his sinking down as a person under the weight of all those things and the long arm of the law. Hoffman is strongest when he digs deep into the legal imbroglio of Bruce's life and when he does some of his stand-up routines although anyone who has watched the Bruce documentary will note that it is almost impossible to mimic Bruce's mannerisms successfully. But a well done job, nevertheless.

***Books To While Away The Class Struggle By- James Baldwin's "If Beale Street Could Talk"

Recently I have begun to post entries under the headline- “Songs To While Away The Class Struggle By” and "Films To While Away The Class Struggle By"-that will include progressive and labor-oriented songs and films that might be of general interest to the radical public. I have decided to do the same for some books that may perk that same interest under the title in this entry’s headline. Markin

Book Review

If Beale Street Could Talk, James Baldwin, The Dial Press, New York, 1974

Recently I started a review of a film documentary, “Lenny Bruce: Without Tears”, using the following lines that I find appropriate to use to set the same kind of tone in reviewing James Baldwin’s 1974 novel, “If Beale Street Could Talk”:

“Okay, the average black male kid on the average ghetto city block today knows, and knows without blinking, and knows from some seemingly unspoken source deep within his genetic structure that the cards are stacked against him. That the cops, the courts, or some other part of the “justice” system will, eventually, come knocking at the door or grab him off the street for something, usually dope. The average Latino male kid on the average barrio city block pretty much now knows that same thing, again usually on some bogus drug charge. And nowadays even young black and Latina women are getting that same message coded into their psyches.”

And that sums up the message behind Baldwin’s’ work, at least the message that will last and that should be etched in the memory of every fighter for social justice.

Now I have been, as is my wont when I get “hooked” on some writer, on something of a James Baldwin tear of late, reading or re-reading everything I can get my hands on. At the time of this review I have already looked at “Go Tell It On The Mountain” and the play “Blues For Mr. Charlie”. Frankly those works, while well written and powerful did not remind me why I was crazy to read everything that Baldwin wrote when I was a kid.
The theme of the first work mentioned, a story of a fourteen year black boy coming to terms with the power of religion over his life did not today “speak” to a man who at fourteen was running as far away from religion as he could get. The second, based on the 1950s Emmett Till murder, again is well written but the facts of that case are enough in themselves to drive the action. And drive us, once again, to say Mississippi goddam. This book under review, “If Beale Street Could Talk”, although, perhaps not as well-written does “speak” to me these forty years later.

And why? Well, as the female narrator of this tale, "Tish”, notes being black while breathing, being black while being male, being black while breathing in the “projects”, being black while breathing and at the tender mercies of the white-run “justice system from the cop on the beat to the judge on high is enough to give one pause. And that sums up the story line, except this. Baldwin has gotten to some core truths about being on the “outs” and left to one’s own resources when the cards are stacked, no, double- stacked, against you. Now for those who may read this book, and you should, in so-called “post-racial” Obama America doesn’t it read like it could have been written today? I mean the today of the real mean streets of black existence in America. Think about just that statistic on the very high probability that a young black male will be in jail, on the way to jail, just out of jail or on parole before he gets very old and that “speaks” to a very different reality. Nice work, James.

 

***Books To While Away The Class Struggle By- The Works Of James Baldwin-"Go Tell It On The Mountain"

Recently I have begun to post entries under the headline- “Songs To While Away The Class Struggle By” and "Films To While Away The Class Struggle By"-that will include progressive and labor-oriented songs and films that might be of general interest to the radical public. I have decided to do the same for some books that may perk that same interest under the title in this entry’s headline. Markin

Book Review

Go Tell It On The Mountain, James Baldwin, Dell Publishing Co., New York, 1952

One of the side events of the 2008 American presidential elections, the one that resulted in the election of the first black president, was the widespread exposure of the role of the black church as a central social, political and religious institution in the black community, for good or evil. That centrality, the subject matter of black writer James Baldwin’s first novel back in the early 1950s and from there carried back by him to his youth in the 1930s, is longstanding. Moreover, the black church and its activist clergy, despite it long role as adhesive, healer, protector and face of the black community is not an unambiguous legacy as Baldwin, very wickedly, and profoundly demonstrates here.

Baldwin uses the old tried and true novelistic devise of using a two-tier plot structure to delve into the lives, the loves, the likes and lies of two generations of a black family, a family that although it found itself in the North, in the black metropolis of Harlem, had deep and continuing roots in the old worn-out land of the South that most of the characters fled, willingly or unwillingly, at some point. The first tier discusses the present status of most of the main figures, including the transparently autobiographical John and his “father”, Gabriel, a born-again Christian preacher, a character not unknown in the black community. The second takes place through personal recollections in a store front, primitive Christian church, also not an unknown phenomenon in the black community, or the white one for that matter.

The details of the various relationships of the very mixed clan can best be appreciated by the reader. What I would note here, as I have noted elsewhere when discussing James Baldwin’s work, is his ear for the various voices of the black community even though he himself seemed, by the facts of his biography to have been fairly removed from the mainstream of the black community. He clearly knows “religion” and the role it plays in the community. Also of the teutonic struggle between the old ways of the de jure segregated South and the de facto segregated North. While I am more devoted to the works of Langston Hughes as an exemplar of black literary blues, James too knows that condition. James can sing those chords. And the late Norman Mailer was not wrong when he noted that his contemporary, Baldwin, in 1950s America was “one of our few writers”. I will say amen to that.

***Coming Of Age In The 1950s, Period-An Encore

A "YouTube" film clip of The Temptations performing "My Girl".

CD Review

Oldies But Goodies, Volume Nine, Original Sound Record Co., 1993

I have been doing a series of commentaries elsewhere on another site on my coming of political age in the early 1960s, but here when I am writing about musical influences I am just speaking of my coming of age, period, which was not necessarily the same thing. No question that those of us who came of age in the 1950s are truly children of rock and roll. We were there, whether we appreciated it or not at the time, when the first, sputtering, musical moves away from ballady Broadway show tunes and rhymey Tin Pan Alley pieces hit the radio airwaves. (If you do not know what a radio is then ask your parents or, ouch, grandparents, please.) And, most importantly, we were there when the music moved away from any and all music that your parents might have approved of, or maybe, even liked, or, hopefully, at least left you alone to play in peace up in your room when rock and roll hit post- World War II America teenagers like, well, like an atomic bomb.

Not all of the material put forth was good, nor was all of it destined to be playable fifty or sixty years later on some “greatest hits” compilation but some of songs had enough chordal energy, lyrical sense, and sheer danceability to make any Jack or Jill jump then, or now. And, here is the good part, especially for painfully shy guys like me, or those who, like me as well, had two left feet on the dance floor. You didn’t need to dance toe to toe, close to close, with that certain she (or he for shes). Just be alive…uh, hip to the music. Otherwise you might become the dreaded wallflower. But that fear, the fear of fears that haunted many a teenage dream then, is a story for another day. Let’s just leave it at this for now. Ah, to be very, very young then was very heaven.

So what still sounds good on this CD compilation to a current AARPer and, perhaps, some of his fellows who comprise the demographic that such a 1950s compilation “speaks” to. Of course, The Temptations, “My Girl”, always played at those dreamy, dreaded school dances. Yes, I know, this is one of the slow ones that you have to dance close on. And just hope, hope to high heaven that you didn’t destroy your partner's shoes and feet. The mournful “Hurt” still sends a chill up my spine. As does the school dance closer- “Please Love Me Forever". There you have it.


The Temptations - My Girl lyrics

I've got sunshine
On a cloudy day.
When it's cold outside,
I've got the month of May.

Well, I guess you'll say
What can make me feel this way?
My girl. (My girl, my girl)
Talkin' 'bout my girl. (My girl)

I've got so much honey
The bees envy me.
I've got a sweeter song
Than the birds in the trees.

Well, I guess you'll say
What can make me feel this way?
My girl. (My girl, my girl)
Talkin' 'bout my girl. (My girl)

Ooooh, Hoooo.

Hey, hey, hey.
Hey, hey, hey.

I don't need no money,
Fortune or fame.
I've got all the riches, baby,
One man can claim.

Well, I guess you'll say
What can make me feel this way?
My girl. (My girl, my girl)
Talkin' 'bout my girl. (My girl)

Talkin' bout my girl.
I've got sushine on cloudy day
With my girl.
I've even got the month of May
With my girl.

***Not Ready For Prime Time Class Struggle- Who Is That Rita Hayworth Is Dancing With?-“You Were Never Lovelier”- A Film Review

A YouTube film clip from the movie, You Were Never Lovlier.

DVD Review

You Were Never Lovelier, Fred Astaire, Rita Hayworth, Xavier Cugat, Adophe Menjou, music by Jerome Kern and Johnny Mercer, 1943

The first paragraph below is taken from other reviews about Rita Hayworth although the male stars are different here, except they all have a similar feature; they all are smitten, very smitten, by Ms. Hayworth’s charms. Join the line, boys:

“Okay, let me bring you up to speed on the obscure meaning of the headline. See, a while back I was smitten by a film star, an old time black and white film star from the 1940s, Rita Hayworth. The film that sent me into a tailspin: the black and white noir classic Gilda where she played a “good” femme fatale who got in a jam with a no good monomaniacal crook. But that part is not important femmes fatales, good or bad, get mixed up with wrong gees all the time. It’s an occupational hazard. What is important though is that I got all swoony over lovely, alluring Rita. And as happens when I get my periodic “bugs” I had to go out and see what else she performed in. Of course Lady From Shang-hai came next. There she plays a “bad” blondish femme fatale (against a smitten Orson Welles)."

And now this film under review, You Were Never Lovelier. We are caught up.

Now the plot line here, the never-ending boy meets girl plot line that Hollywood mass-produced (and mass-produces) is pretty simple, except that it takes place in Buenos Aires (although the twelve dollars spent on fake stage scene-settings made me think of little white houses with picket fences in Indiana, or some place like that). When all is said and done, despite the machinations of Maria’s (Rita Hayworth) father (Adophe Menjou), Broadway show dance man Fred Astaire is smitten, very smitten (join the aforementioned line, the now long line, Fred) by her “Spanish” charms and her sweet coquettishness. And from there the hi-jinks really begin as all parties, wives, aunts, sisters, Christ, even grandma, and a much put upon father’s business assistant try to get this pair matched up. And as these Hollywood boy meet girl things often turn out, we will hear wedding bells before the end.

But forget the story line. This thing, like almost all Fred Astaire vehicles, and righteously so, is strictly about Fred’s dancing, dancing alone, dancing with a partner, dancing up a wall (oops that was another film) but dancing with so much style it is impossible to keep your eyes off him (saying how did he do that all the while). For style, grace, and physical moves every one of those guys you see on shows like Dancing With The Stars, well, just tell them to move on over, and watch a real pro. Hey, wait a minute, what about Rita? Ya, what about her. Here she is just along for the ride, although less so than in the previously reviewed You’ll Never Get Rich. She is more in synch here with Fred’s moves but it is still Fred's dancing which draws the eye. As I noted before, Rita, however, has other charms, okay.

Note: The music of Jerome Kern and Johnny Mercer need no further comment, nor does the work of band leader Xavier Cugat. These are all pros from the old Tin Pan Alley music days of the American songbook. Enough said