now Agnes, why would you want to read about my family? we are about as screwed up a bunch of Okies as you ever did see. I mean my Uncle Nulan was certainly an interesting character who married in. It makes me laugh to think of him. It always makes me laugh to think of him but I know my cousins had a different view (you see my Uncle Nulan spent his years on the road til the day he died..nothing was going to tie that man down). I guess in reality he lived a sad life but i imagine he saw it as just a series of adventures, always another scheme on the horizon. I remember when he was just beginning to enter his final adventure, his body just starting to go and i saw him lookin' sharp as ever dancin' with Aunt Zelda (that is a good Okie name for ya) to the tune of Together Again, my teardrops have stopped fallin. Aunt Zelda was not my momma's sister Gordonna, but she was a woman who had crossed through Nulans life since the beginning of his time apparantly. I am running on coffee right now and Uncle Nulan deserves Glenmorangie, so maybe I'll try to focus on that tonight for an hour if you are interested?

i guess it is funny that i would want to come back and read the same story again...and i realize that sometimes there are some serious matters involved...but the way you told it made me laugh (i kind of wondered if you might bring something like that up). i guess it reminds me in that way, a little of the way my dad tells some stories (needless to say though, you are two different characters, but characters you are)...like, just as a for instance, when he found out about the brakes in his work vehicle having gone out while on it's way down a really steep hill and how it collided head on into a retaining wall and how everyone rushed to the wreckage cause they were really scared and he hollered to them from further up the hill waving,
"hey!" cuz he'd jumped and rolled out! and boy were they all relieved. he was in his fifties at the time. anyway that is an example in a nutshell and he is better than i am at telling his stories.
i know that some stories are sad too...
maybe i'm making sense. anyhow, if you feel like writing more about uncle nulan (that is an unusual name) i will listen, or if you feel like writing about something else that's okay too.

so ya think muswell hill is ready?

I can't help but wonder at the various philosophical conflicts in my life:

I mean Agnes your last post here a long time ago was about Muswell Hill

You see its funny, I did a "hippie" sojourn in the Northwest and spent a lot of time thinking about the Band and Dylan in their Woodstock days. Now at the time they were in Woodstock they were caught up in the whole crazy 60's movement and openly said they didn't want to be a part of it while creating a music that was truly as emotionally and philosophically liberating as any (Music from Big Pink and John Wesley Harding, I mean Holy Crap, that is some potent stuff, and totally unlike anything that was "cool" at the time (of course a nod to Arlo who never played the "cool" game)). I have also gone on and on about Muswell Hill, and a group who in parallel in England created Village Green Preservation Society that is an incredible English counterpart to Big Pink that was created in the same days. Those English (totally ignoring the "cool" English approach of the time and with a lot of introspection and soul searching) began writing a set of commentary songs on the individual in social and political roles and without any fanfare.

Oddly enough it makes me think of my own conflicts

A pacifist who hates the image the American prominence in the world has created but who would be scared without an American military presence in the world.

A socialist at heart who doesn't want the burden of taxes. I want to portion my money away and create a security buffer (whether it is real or not) but then I see all the, well I see the world, and I feel guilt for the greed.

All that thought wandering makes e think of another Richard Manuel song (I don't know why, but his songs just stand out for me).

We can talk about it now
A
It's that same old riddle only starting from the middle
D Em D G
I'd fix it but I don't know how
A
Well, we could try to reason but you might think it's treason
G
One voice for all
F E7 A
Echoing across the hall
Bm G
Don't give up on father clock
A D A
We can talk about it now
D Em D G
Come, let me show you how
A
To keep the wheels turnin' you've got to keep the engine churnin'
D Em D G
Did you ever milk a cow
A
I had the chance one day but I was all dressed up for Sunday
G F
Everybody, everywhere
E7 A
Do you really care
Bm G
Pick up your heads and walk
A D G7
We can talk about it now
C E7 F
It seems to me we've been holding something underneath our tongues
C E7
I'm afraid if you ever got a pat on the back
F G
It would likely burst your lungs
A E7 A E7
Woh, stop me, if I should sound kinda down in the mouth
A E7 A
But I'd rather be burned in Canada than to freeze here in the south
D Em Dm G
Pulling that eternal plough
A
We've got to find a sharper blade or have a new one made
D Em D G
Rest awhile and cool your brow
A
Don't need it, no need to slave, the whip is in the grave
G F
No salt, no trance
E7 A
It's safe now to take a backward glance
Bm G
The leaves have turned to chalk
A D A D
We can talk about it now,
A D
We can talk about it now


OK enough enough, enough useless chatting
get a grip son and find a way

(I was skimming Chronicles last night and read the part where Bobby D says he played in Folk City with Billy Higgins and Don Cherry, now, I don't necessarily doubt it, but it is hard to visualize let a loan audiolize)

i just love some of the songs/lyrics off the village green preservation society album (which i'd never heard of before you mentioned it here) ...like animal farm and sitting by the riverside (i thnk?) the village green song...and i just love phenomenal cat.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=EJYmbr6anT0
(i couldn't stop myself)

big pink i have heard of, but didn't know much about...i do love those lyrics

(it may look like i'm straying off subject, but really, i'm not?)

Strangely enough, we have family friends who have a college age daughter who is dating a guy who's parents bought, own and live in Big Pink in Woodstock. I have asked for a tour at some later date.

Larry, I think Don's son is in school in Florida (I think he said Florida). The owner is a pretty nice guy who used to do sound for various people (he had a lot of stories about NRBQ and nice things to say about a G Nash and Arlo). It was interesting staying there and wandering through the surrounding woods and stuff. I highly recommend a Midnight Ramble at Levon's house if you can make it. Jimmy Vivano and Larry Campbell were in the group with a nice horn section and Brian Mitchel on accordian and they played tons O The Band songs including Tears of Rage (for Richard), It Makes no Difference (for Rick) the Weight, Chest Fever (Larry Campbell played the intro on guitar and did a nice job but I would have loved to have seen Garth who had just played with Levon at the Beacon) and a rockin' Don't Ya tell Henry that morphed into W S Walcott Medicine Show.
oh well, i did get some nice pictures of Pink

I remember what he said about Arlo, Don said that being a sound man was often difficult because entertainers are usually very impatient if things go wrong and get a bit snappy and stuff, but he said, that if things went wrong and there was no sound man there who would deal with it. Anyway, he said, he was doing a festival somewhere along the Hudson and Arlo was playing and sure enough an issue arose. He said Arlo was great because all you got to do is point to a live mike and Arlo will start talking, and people are laughing and smiling and the sound problem was corrected long before Arlo got to the end. That is what he said. That was totally unsolicited as I didn't even bring up Arlo but from what I can personally recall I would think that might be true.

i love this place!

Me too! Those are neat stories esp the one about Arlo...

I have met Don's son, but not Don. I forget his name for the moment, but his girlfriends name is Bev.

Of the multitude of songs that evolved in that basement from You Ain't Going Nowhere (the first chords I ever learned) and The Weight and Nothing Was Delivered and Wheels on Fire, It was the following Richard Manuel silly blues song (I don't know why his songs appeal to me) that I found myself singing over and over

oh well, enough of that!


D7 G7 C7
I had a hard time waking this morning
G7 D7
I got a lotta things on my mind
C7
Like those friends of yours
F7
They keep bringing me down
Bb7 D7
Just hangin' round all the time

I've had a hard time waking most mornings
And it's been that way for a month or more
You've had things your way
But now I've got to say
I'm on my way out the door

Chorus:
(NC) D7
Why don't you get right, try to get right, baby
C7 Bb7 A7
You haven't been right with me, why don't you get right?
D7
Try and get right, baby, don't you remember how it used to be?

(Solos like verses (2), repeat chorus)

You had a hard time waking this morning
And I can see it in your empty eyes
But there's no need for talking
Or walking round the block
Just to figure out the reason why

I have a hard time handing out warnings
I'll just slide on out the door
Cuz I'm tired of everything
Being beautiful, beautiful
And I ain't coming back no more

Richard Manuel songs and his performance?... expressive, expressive, uncommonly expressive. I think that's why they stand out. A sound artist of emotion, I think.

that they are.

and well put Gerry, I think

The Band, an odd mix of fragile souls, and, I heard, el rumor a mundo, I heard tha Dylan came back from Nashville with Harding and asked the band to "fill it out". OK, if you don't remember, listen to it, it was about as sparse as it comes, great songs but basically well done rythm and dry and sparse as a killer martini, there are standouts, I mean all along the watchtower and dear landlord are my favorites, but there are good songs, the rumor is Dylan played them with the band and they discussed filling them out but, they agreed it was untouchable, why??? Probably a good decision I suppose???Well, I would argue Garth is why... Now the rumor, there are basement tapes of the John wesley songs prior to the Dylans trip to Nashville. I don't know, speculation and such, but, If a John Wesley Harding remix (similar to that Beatles Love remix sort of) came out with Garth in charge, I would be extremely tempted to freak out!!

or maybe its just some fantasy but if basement tapes exist of those songs with Richard singing and Garth doing the ambience (OK Brian Eno, Garth was first with Ambiance, he just did it behing songs (oops apologies to Talking Heads)

I don't know, I fanticizzzze too much!!!!

I am Drifting into Deep Water