Enjoy Yourself! (It's Later Than You Think)
“To cling to the past is hypocrisy, because no one knows those moments.”― Heinrich Böll
AS I am compiling my end-of-year best-of, I stopped for a second to think about how this newsletter has played such an important part of my life since I started it. I am indebted to Jonathan Abrams (I owe you a call) for first getting me to publish the initial version and Ken Shipley for suggesting that I take my writing interest more seriously and make it more of a practice. Having this newsletter…having all of you read it…comment on it…send me articles…be there when I press publish: this medium has fueled this writing practice that I find real satisfaction in (and I recommend the newsletter concept to anyone wanting to have a reason to write more).
Thank you for being there in lock step with me in 2022. Given that the subscriber base of The Signal has grown by 60% this year (thank you!) I want to welcome the newest readers.
I cannot do the Signal without you.
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It is impossible not to say something about the impact the passing of Terry Hall has had on me. The singer died of cancer this past week. I remember sitting in Dominic Shwartz’s room in High School, listening to his Jamaican ska compilations (or were they his Moms?) and then throwing on The Specials’ A Message To You, Rudy. I had already been turned onto The Specials, playing their first record over and over again in my room, but for some reason that moment, hanging with a group of friends, together taking in the greatness of the rocksteady beat that the UK had punked-up a smidgeon, that moment is defining.
Of all the ska bands to come out of Britain in the late 70s/early 80s, The Specials were BY FAR the best. Their first record BY FAR better than any other in class, their live shows (which can be seen on youtube) the most batshit exciting and crazy of them all (no, I was too young to see them back then). There were reunions of sorts…I saw one of them in the 90s at the House Of Blues in Los Angeles…but it wasn’t Terry Hall and the Specials.
Flash forward to Glastonbury 2007, during Lily Allen’s early set on the Pyramid stage with a huge crowd helping her celebrate her big year. I was with the classic Glastonbury crew—Dave & Rom Chumbley, Jon Blaufarb, Steve Backman—Dave and Rom especially huge Specials fans like myself, when Lily brought to the stage Terry Hall and Specials mate Lynval Golding, the first time they had been on-stage together in decades, and the three of them launched into the classic Gangsters. Completely unexpected, the performance blew that space in my brain where my teenage mind still huddled.
Hours later around a Pimm’s Cup, Chumbley waxed at the importance of the band in London…a truly integrated band in the punk scene, integrated, working class—daring and fearless, like their music. When the band reunited and played Glastonbury a few years later, we were right there…this time with my girlfriend and long-time Specials fan Barbara, who I would propose to before the festival was over…deep in the middle of a packed crowd of generations of fans skanking the dirt and mud off the King Arthur fields. Terry Hall was right in front, peering out into the crowd with his constant deadpan not-care gaze, singing all of the classic Specials numbers with that iconic voice that defied time, singing while the rest of the band played and danced behind him.
The Specials defined the Two-Tone movement and Terry’s voice defined their sound. Oh—and he also co-wrote the Go-Go’s hit song Our Lips Are Sealed (which he also had a hit with in England with his post-Specials band, The Fun Boy Three).
Brooklyn Vegan collected amazing remembrances from past friends and collaborators, including Elvis Costello and Jerry Dammers. It is a great salute to such an impactful artist…
Bob Dylan Q&A about “The Philosophy of Modern Song”
A Dylan authorized interview on Dylan’s website. For the master of narrative control, it demands questions as to what the true purpose of the interview was…what questions did Dylan think he needed to answer through the questions he was asked? Regardless, it is a fantastic read—his band references, his music discovery strategy…I actually liked this interview more than the pieces of the new book her published (which is discussed).
Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions by Edwin Abbott Abbott
My 6th grade science teacher Mr. Geisler gave us Flatland for extra-credit reading. Even though it was written in the 1800s, it still is such a modern reading story. Abbott’s birthday was yesterday and caused me to reread…and send it to you.
Hall of Fame songwriting legend Mike Stoller lends support to honoring Alabama’s ‘Big Mama’ Thornton
Big Mama Thornton is buried in a paupers grave and Stoller, who co-wrote her hit Ain’t Nothing But A Hound Dog is trying to get a monument for her. The article does a deep dive into how the 19 year old songwriting team Leiber and Stoller got the song to Thornton via Johnny Otis…
BILLY CHILDISH OPENS EXHIBITION OF NEW WORKS IN NEW YORK.
I used to help Billy sell his paintings to Headcoats fans in the US in the mid-90s. He has come a long long way!!! This exhibition looks fantastic for anyone in NYC over the next three weeks while it is still up…
What Happened to the Rare Books Brought Aboard the Titanic?
A great story about book collecting, fate and humanity framed by the sinking of the Titanic and a love for Robert Louis Stevenson:
“Just before the ‘Titanic’ sank,” his bookdealer friend A. S. W. Rosenbach reported in a posthumous catalogue of Harry’s collection of works by Robert Louis Stevenson, “he said to his mother, ‘Mother, I have placed the volume in my pocket; little “Bacon” goes with me.’”
A Lesson In Geography
By: Kenneth Rexroth
The stars of the Great Bear drift apart
The Horse and the Rider together northeastward
Alpha and Omega asunder
The others diversely
There are rocks
On the earth more durable
Than the configurations of heaven
Species now motile and sanguine
Shall see the stars in new clusters
The beaches changed
The mountains shifted
Gigantic
Immobile
Floodlit
The faces appear and disappear
Chewing the right gum
Smoking the right cigarette
Buying the best refrigerator
The polished carnivorous teeth
Exhibited in approval
The lights
Of the houses
Draw together
In the evening dewfall on the banks
Of the Wabash
Sparkle discreetly
High on the road to Provo
Above the Salt Lake Valley
And
The mountain shaped like a sphinx
And
The mountain shaped like a finger
Pointing
On the first of April at eight o'clock
Precisely at Algol
There are rocks on the earth
And one who sleepless
Throbbed with the ten
Nightingales in the plum trees
Sleepless as Boötes stood over him
Gnawing the pillow
Sitting on the bed's edge smoking
Sitting by the window looking
One who rose in the false
Dawn and stoned
The nightingales in the garden
The heart pawned for wisdom
The heart
Bartered for knowledge and folly
The will troubled
The mind secretly aghast
The eyes and lips full of sorrow
The apices of vision wavering
As the flower spray at the tip of the windstalk
The becalmed sail
The heavy wordless weight
And now
The anguishing and pitiless file
Cutting away life
Capsule by capsule biting
Into the heart
The coal of fire
Sealing the lips
There are rocks on earth
HAPPY FIFTH NIGHT!!!!