Category: Music

Soothes the savage beast.

Nanci Griffith, State Theater, Ithaca, 9/11

It’ll be the third time Elly and I have seen Nanci: Allentown, Pa., circa 1984 and Minneapolis, Minn., circa 1988 being the other two. (Opening act in the Twin Cities was a young James McMurtry backed by a much older David Bromberg.) Way too long since we’ve seen her and way too many YouTubes to choose from.

I’m goin’ back where my garden blooms all year
Where the wintertime speaks softly in the fallin’ rain
I’m goin’ back to my green eyed lover there
and we will dance along the banks of old Lake Pontchartrain

Update: With this song going through my head the last couple days, I finally realized it’s allure: It may be the last of the great train songs. Who writes train songs any more? The rumble and roar, whistles and whine? Great expectations of where the tracks would take you? Beats the hell out of even my favorite car songs (Rocket 88.)Across the Great Divide:

It’s a Hard Life:

Speed of the Sound of Loneliness

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Mussolini vs. Stalin

Had Greg Brown been from the Ukraine instead of Iowa, he might have written this enigmatic little song, performed acoutically by Gogol Bordello. If anyone can translate the graffitti in the video, let me know.

Mussolini was a-shavin’, whistlin’ Tarantella,
Stalin was keeping eye on barbeque
When their fish line bell started to jingle,
Mussolini caught a-nothin’, Stalin caught two

You know my friend, It’s a kind of pretty,
Said Josef Stalin and loosened up his straps
Mussolini turn to him, with a restling glitter
Mussolini turn to him, and then, then he said: Yah!

Update 1/21/08: Original YouTube is no longer. The replacement is by Galucucu, who I know nothing about other than they are from Sao Paulo and sing mostly in languages I do not understand.

Galucucu:

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