On this holiday weekend, I want to note that with an exception or two, our Union has never been universal, as in unified or united, much less totally uniform in its common and professional and congressional and judicial and presidential opinion, throughout as I will put it, about 244 of its 250 years. Roughly. (Roughrider at the presidential rodeo?)
So not to rain on their parade, but it is apt that we have removed the right to piss in the great big reflective presidential pool, which might even help by killing some of the presidentially proliferating algae, or loosening the paint that made things worse so that it can be peeled off by an Olympian on trial right now for wanting a sample. Hey, he removed a piece. It’s a start. This place could at least provide a pool party for those baking most in Global Warming heat — and they’d likely be hungry enough to eat the algae too. A brunch that would actually lessen the overall waste there.
So let’s say it. We are divided. Again. About even the right to joke about such things as we write.
But to continue, those aforementioned six years are the exception, based on my brief scan of history, that are largely warranted in the two world wars, and we’ll only be kind to the politics of the times to give them in a way not necessarily straight divided, about three years each. (Minus World War III that we are basically in, which has a status that unlike a basically charging straightforward transference or you could say transgression, changes by the day, or even group of hours, depending on the press release status of the person at the podium. So we’re going to bring the heat for the speaker, two meanings, who couldn’t pass muster in the real world, forget those feuding without a family to fight and making it a dog eat dog day.
— Or at the mic stand, at Hudson Booster Days. Under the bandshell on Thursday night, the lead singer of Good For Gary had her stage presence technique of quickly bopping around perfected, and the male lead was noteworthy for having well-tattooed-on-top, bare feet.
On Friday it was Chris Kroeze, with his redneck country lyrics made perky by playing with opposites, like some of my fav metal songwriters too. It’s noteworthy that The Voice runnerup from several years back was worth only $30,000 at the end of the Biden era, but now under Trump and with relentless touring it is up to upwards of $3 million.
By Sunday the heat was starting to wither people, and in Hudson it showed up, as in bottled and cupped drinks, in terms of twos and sixes, but we didn’t quite get as far as the burn of 666. A couple at the convenience store, with children I safely presume, OK one asked the other about how many bottled waters to get, and she said six. Along with six candy bars, and the bottles were bigger. Another man with child, I should say with a child, was scoping out the Gatorade and got two big ones, and a pair of smaller snacks. On the walk back home, I saw not-so-cold-anymore-ones split between bottles and glasses, mostly partially empty, two and two, setting on doorsteps to upstairs apartments. —
We are a country that is said not to discriminate based on a whole host of factors, some more than others, yet we continue to discriminate in very un-unified but still orchestrated ways, concerning all of them.
That is today’s battlefield, (and we’ll get back to that in a few paragraphs, and also being primarily a music website, we’ll throw in a few musical references and twists and shouts). But in days of yore there was the Battlefield of the Republic. Before there even was one, the colonists were not united in whether to wage war with those English overlords who continued to come over “on threshing oar … to reach the western shore.” They were not united in whether various colonies should be left into The Union and form a full “13,” the classic Sabbath CD withstanding. They were not united on either race issues or even whether we should stay together as a union at all, during the Civil War, or to further the analogy, in the name of now unbridled Christendom, for that matter, if there should be the westward expansion that made us form such an allegedly great dominion. Or I dare say, if we should rival the English and the French and continue such so-called dominion through imperialism.
And a bit later, whether we should drop The Bomb, or enter Korea, or Vietnam. (Or the war-protest music slam, or disco damn, as arts and literature were suddenly like never before, possibly, under attack or given their full due as genres. More on that in a minute.) Suddenly I am starting to sound like Billy Joel, and We Didn’t Start The Fire, which has always been churning while justice is yearning and babies are burning.
With another holiday just past, we have good news and bad news, and for those uncommitted, and other groups from which they can get recommendations, polls show slight or more changes in the offing — mostly in the promotional languge of their several timers a month flyers.
Our collection, or could be callled a cauldron, of phrasing, typed and prepared for launch, is growing, and we have made major advancements toward getting the subscription-only option to read more posts — and fully functionally. The bad news is that even now with summer upon us, it may take a bit more time, but there will be a lot more very cool reading material coming your way, a lot more, and sooner than you think. For example, you’ll see a lot more song lyrics, with many currently ready to go. Or quick takes on a night out. And there still are the regular posts and update briefs loaded-up-on under The Current Headliner. Hang in there during the opening credits, as they continue to roll and pick up speed. Hey, the overall content volume should pick up. And on and on, striving for a uniform message. But to the point? Our strength is our diversity, and even our divided thought. As numerous varied voices roar.
But now …
We have hunger and homelessness continue to be on the rise, yet we have a so-called biggest fireworks display ever on perhaps the biggest-showcase-of-materialism-ever National Mall. On their being held, as our 50 small town state fairs are now I fear being replaced by the corporate-sponsored 50 biggest such entities, in our-only-today’s display of unity. (All this makes our local war on what fireworks are legal, held annually in Wisconsin and Minnesota, seem petty and paltry.) And wrestling matches are staged not at county fairs, but from the giant scaffolding of the aforementioned grand mall, with a certain thin plotline and obliteratingly entertaining if you are in the front row, I’ve been told, but upstaging actual art. All those performers with ethics turned their head on The Donald, to the point that the planned music was muted.
While the actual congressionally-sanctioned event roars on nearby, showing we can’t even be united on The Fourth. Not even on its 250th.
And that patriotic music is just too bland for my tastes, while the Mount Rushmore backdrop amid flags and a flyover or two, of Trump’s holiday speech, where he says he belongs, is too extravagant. Just make his added fifth head a merely small, one-chisel chip agate and lay it at the bottom. Hey its original sculptor is said to be a Nazi sympathizer. So what is the same-day solution, such as it is? Taylor Swift’s wedding, (at the Madison Square Garden that when I was there had rats scurrying about, like the prairie dogs of Rushmore), with I’m sure the speakers rising beyond those giving toasts. Rats. Such salad might be on the guest-list menu, lower level in food if not placement to entice Taylor Lovers encamped in the Black Hills.
But just who is playing? And not the Chiefs that Travis Kelce made famous. His QB helped with that, and he and his wife scored a prominent invite, while some did not, frequently citing health concerns and laying low with their status.
Musically, reports say it’s Stevie Nicks and Ed Sheeran, spanning eras, as voice reigns over instrumental, with Adam Sandler, in the middle years, as the “ex officio” officiant. Swift (new album?) has attracted some heat for being rumored to be possibly singing herself, maybe a love song to her new spouse, who himself proposed to her on one knee. They were said to be arriving for the wedding not in a limo, but in a simple Chevy SUV, amidst some criticism of lavishness. But one man who just couldn’t stay out of the fervor was Trump, who reportedly issued a poster of himself along with Swift and historical figures in a pose in the style of Eras, the recording she made famous.
But you can expect an update on the fashion trends the new couple start, and the names a baby or babies are given.