In schā'a llāh

J'ai vu l'Orient dans son écrin avec la lune pour bannière et je comptais en un quatrain chanter au monde sa lumière

Mais quand j'ai vu Jérusalem coquelicot sur un rocher j'ai entendu un requiem quand sur lui je me suis penché

Ne vois-tu pas humble chapelle toi qui murmure paix sur la terre que les oiseaux cachent de leurs ailes ces lettres de feu : danger frontière

Le chemin mène à la fontaine tu voudrais bien remplir ton seau arrête-toi Marie-Madeleine pour eux ton corps ne vaut pas l'eau

In schā'a llāh, in schā'a llāh in schā'a llāh, in schā'a llāh.

Et l'olivier pleure son ombre sa tendre épouse son amie qui repose sous les décombres prisonnière en terre ennemie

Sur une épine de barbelé le papillon guette la rose les gens sont si écervelés qu'ils me répudieront si j'ose

Dieu de l'enfer ou Dieu du ciel toi que te trouve où bon te semble sur cette terre d'Israël il y a des enfants qui tremblent

In schā'a llāh, in schā'a llāh in schā'a llāh, in schā'a llāh.

Les femmes tombent sous l'orage demain le sang sera lavé la route est faite de courage une femme pour un pavé

Mais oui j'ai vu Jérusalem coquelicot sur un rocher j'entends toujours ce requiem lorsque sur lui je suis penché

Requiem pour six millions d'âmes qui n'ont pas leurs mausolées de marbre et qui malgré le sable infâme ont fait pousser six millions d'arbres

In schā'a llāh, in schā'a llāh in schā'a llāh, in schā'a llāh.

In my circles the guy is forgotten, even more so than Roy Black and Freddy Quinn. But in my childhood this Italian Belgian was big. And in '67 one could still make and sing songs like that and be immensely popular.

Or take, for example, this one by Naomi Shemer, melody adapted and extended from a Basque lullaby, that already all tank-drivers in the land of Israel sang and peacenik Ury Avnery tried more than once to make the new hymn of the country.

And though the song is still very popular in all Jewish communities of the wide world, outside of Israel its original singer Shuli Natan (Video from '68) is as forgotten as Salvatore Adamo in my circles and probably outside of Belgium. Moments lost in time like tears in rain. And, may we add, it still holds that while there is a soul in prison, we are not free.

Finally, as now we are still in need of a bit more of consolace and hope, here's a link to an older post of ours about a stroll to Caeserea and the essentials of this earth, the lyrics of which had been made before or during the biggest war of them all. Sholem, in schā'a llāh!

Waltzing Above Ground

Here is the promised upload of Waltzing Above Ground by Guy Klucevsek.

It is a little adapted to the existing moving pictures we had for it and also to today's a bit shorter attention spans. But still lovely from start to end.

Mimi and Joan Sing a Duet

Just by accident me and a friend detected that sometimes the same song performance has the power to comfort us when the mind is on the brink of despair.

This one has two sister's voices and an absurd South American patriotism song. The location is Sing Sing Prison and the year is 1973. We were 16 and 15 years or so then. And honestly, it's less so the more famous and accomplished Joan but of course the harmony and especially the magic of Mimi Farina's sweet soprano that does most of the consolation work.

Dixie Chicken

Long before the Dixie Chicks there was the Dixie Chicken (and the Tennessee lamb of course). For people with a sometimes more down to earth musical taste like us here in Jamaica, the song was one of the highlights in any Little Feat concert. Lowell George († June 29, 1979) played and sang it in a way that one could only love. And thanks to YTBS we can also not just write about it but simply show it to you, the p.t. audience.

This version also has the then still young but now surviving and still going strong Emmylou Harris and the fabulous Bonnie Lynn Raitt who had already provided backing vocals in the studio, two ladies that we adore, in it. The third Little Feat studio album took its title from that signature song and was also the first one we really perceived and then bought, we must admit. If you like white New Orleans style Rythm and Blues, that record could be called a must. So here's the beef:

Lowell George was born in Hollywood, California and had his first appearance on Ted Mack's Original Amateur Hour at the tender age of six. He joined Frank Zappa's The Mothers of Invention at age 23 and at 24, upon being either fired or leaving by mutual agreement, formed his own band Little Feat.

Mr. George seems to have led an indulgent lifestyle of binge eating, alcoholism, and throwing speedballs (if you know what that is). He died from a heart attack at Arlington, Virginia and age 34 and was cremated in Washington D.C.. His ashes were then flown back to Los Angeles, where they were scattered from his fishing boat into the Pacific Ocean.

From Chicken to Chicks and 30 years back to the future

Speaking of Dixie Chicken, it is a shame that there are no articles on the Dixie Chicks yet in this magazine. We were sure we had praised them in 2003 when they harshly spoke out against the Bush jr. administration and the President o' th' UnitedStates himself.

During the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, the band performed a concert in March of that year at the Shepherd's Bush Empire Theatre in London. During the introduction to their song "Travelin' Soldier", Natalie Maines, a native of Texas, said: "Just so you know, we're on the good side with y'all. We do not want this war, this violence, and we're ashamed that the President of the United States is from Texas."

Not Ready To Make Nice

What followed was everything from death threats to radio bans. And although their royalties slimmed down quite a bit and the venues they sold out were reduced in numbers and size the Dixie Chicks did not give in. The good country girl sisters Martie Erwin Maguire and Emily Erwin Robison stood by their outspoken singer. It took Neil Young and other great protesters in rock and country some years and many news programs to come out against the most foolish war since Emperor Augustus in 9 B.C sent his legions into Germany and lost them while 3 girls from Texas publicly denounced it even before it had begun to ruin every bit of stability in the middle east and more than half of America including nearly all of the press and TV stations had nothing to say but "hurray for America and democracy export".

The Dixie Chicks responded in their own style with a song and published Not Ready To Make Nice which we deem a more than adequate answer. But here we will show you a different song that we like a lot, for it touches so nicely on when we left the province that is not quite but definitely was our Texas equivalent back there in Austria:

And us, us, we've been a long time gone an' will be gone even more, soon.

Said she could hear me singin' in the choir, me, I heard another song. I caught wind and hit the road runnin', and Lord, I've been a long time gone.

Now they sound tired but they don't sound Haggard. They've got money but they don't have Cash. They've got junior but they don't have Hank. I think, I think, I think, the rest is a long time gone.

Post Scriptum: It will be about Bonnie Raitt soon, a guitar playing and singing redhead who looked the same in the 90ies and early 2000s as she did in the 70ies. Marvelous. And Emmylou of course, our darling of all times. Both deserve a post anytime but we have missed out on it so far. Here's a glimpse of Bonnie performing "one of her favorites from Luck of the Draw" with Allison Krauss on the fiddle and harmony. plink, nix,    praise or blame!
 

The Wind Screams Mary and the Doves Cry at Themselves

50 odd years ago, a nice gentleman from Seattle, King County, Washington wrote a nice song for me. Had to think of it and him yesterday while sobering up from yesteryear's 2^nd most funny day and this year's holiday thereafter. Even had to cry a little bit remembering him. He's been dead for 47 years now.

A broom is drearily sweeping up the broken pieces of yesterday's life. Somewhere a queen is weeping, somewhere a king has no wife. And the wind, it cries Mary.

Will the wind ever remember the names it has blown in the past? And with its crutch, its old age and its wisdom it whispers "no, this will be the last". And the wind cries Mary.

Come thinking of lazy brooms another poem and song comes to mind written by the late great Itzik Manger, Chava Alberstein and the Klezmatics at very different points in time:

Shtiler ovnt, tunkl-gold, an alter groer yid davnt frum avek dem shtoyb fun dem yor-yarid. Zol khotsh a murml fun dem yid arayn tsu mir in lid...

Another guy lived a bit longer than Jimi did and had reached the ripe age of 56 when he was taken away. Did not write songs for me but only for himself and maybe 5 or 6 people around him. Many of them were real marvels though and got worldwide publication and airplay. Rightfully so. Videocraft had advanced quite a bit in the 20 years from the mid 60ties to the mid 80ies (though now in the mean time the fx look quite ridiculous), but when the guitar takes over from keyboard controlled electrosounds the guys'n'gals were still using the same old technology from the fifties.

Had a band called The Revolution that I digged especially because Wendy Melvoin played a mean rythm stick that f.e. inspired Macy Gray to become a guitarist. It also featured an always sunglass bespectacled doctor named Fink in it. That guy was cool. Altogether, in the early eighties a band with 2 niggers, 2 bitches and 2 jews in it was quite a feat.

How can you just leave me standing alone in a world that's so cold, so cold? Maybe I'm just too demanding, maybe I'm just like my father too bold. Maybe you're just like my mother, she's never satisfied, she's never satisfied. Why do we scream at each other? This is what it sounds like when the doves cry.