Whew! I forgot how much work blogging is. Thank goodness it's Wednesday, half time. Speaking of which -- great billboard at the MD/WV border showing the WVU logo and the score from the Orange Bowl, with the legend: "Seventy isn't just our speed limit."
Still here? Let me get out the good stuff. (Don't tell everyone who left early that they missed out. Actually, yes, tell them.) Here's poet-musician (and the houseband of my old talk show) Franklin Bruno singing "Two Knives."
More writing tomorrow, and more videos after the jump...
We tend to overvalue the cultural productions that hit us between the ages of 12 and 15, and my assessment of Lloyd Cole is no exception: he is the best singer-songwriter of the last thirty years. Unfortunately for him, the world (read: my age cohort) got wise to singer-songwriters.
Bebe Manga's vocals and the horns on her 1980 hit "Ami O" are great -- but check that guitar line at the beginning. Don't tell me that's not Peter Buck playing, and two years before Chronic Town.
"Ami O" is one of 183 tracks on the incomparable Africa 50 Years of Independence 50 Ans d'Indépendances set from Stern's. If you pick up only two anthologies this year, this should be one of them.
Did you know there's footage of banjo great Buell Kazee on YouTube? This is the best news I've had since discovering FreeMandolinVideos.com.
No banjo on this track, but I do think David Sylvian's "Snow White in Appalachia" works in the elliptical narrative mode of some of the great folk and bluegrass ballads. Long and slow -- no instrumentation to speak of until 40 seconds in. Not for everybody, I suppose. I like it, though.
Second act in today's half-time show... the voice of CD 101, Ms. Anita Baker. Let's make it stronger by bringing it down a notch.
