Several months ago, I got Rhett Miller's The Interpreter: Live at Largo. It's an album of him covering a bunch of songs that probably are particular favorites of his. The recording is live, so you get a bit of concert banter introducing some of the songs. I have no idea what Largo is/was, but based on the banter, it sounds like this sort of performance was typical: established musicians performing covers.
What I find interesting about it, apart from Rhett's gorgeous, lovely voice, is the songs that he chose. I had no idea, until I listened to it, that he's a Bowie fan. (Recently, he wrote a piece in Salon in which he explains to his children why Bowie's Hunky Dory is a great album: Trust me on this: David Bowie's "Hunky Dory") The Bowie song he covers is "The Bewlay Brothers" and, having never heard it before, I assumed it was a Dan Bejar song. Rhett also performs songs written by Tom Petty, Elliott Smith, Elvis Costello, The Pixies, The Ramones, Roddy Frame, The Beatles, Dylan, and Robyn Hitchcock.
I will forever be grateful to Rhett Miller for this album because it introduced me to the song "California Stars." This is a song that was on Mermaid Avenue, a collaboration (of sorts) among Wilco, Billy Bragg, and Woody Guthrie. Apparently, Guthrie left behind many lyrics without music and Wilco and Bragg put them to music. "California Stars" is simply beautiful and, even though I am a mild fan of Wilco and I loved Billy Bragg's Talking With the Taxman About Poetry, I probably wouldn't ever have heard it if it weren't for Rhett Miller. Thank you, Rhett!
I was surprised to hear him say, in his intro to "Waterloo Sunset," that it was "the greatest song ever written by a human being." It is a great song, but I wouldn't call it the greatest song ever written.
This got me wondering what song I would call the greatest song. This is really such an impossible and pointless exercise that I must try it. Here is a list of contenders, in no particular order:
- "Every Line of a Long Moment"
- "God Only Knows"
- "Caribbean Wind"
- "Thunder Road" (I do love a big gesture.)
- "The Whole of the Moon"
- "Care of Cell 44"
- "A Fond Farewell"
- "Wild Horses" (I prefer the version by The Flying Burrito Brothers.)
- "Walk Away Renee"
- "The Bleeding Heart Show"
- "Freeze the Saints"
- "Thousands Are Sailing"
I attended a pen show in Apex, NC earlier this month. It was a bit of a letdown because I had built it up so much in my mind. I have a tendency to do this. When I'm enthusiastic about something (and, especially when there isn't much that I'm enthusiastic about at the time, like now), I tend to obsess about it and put so much weight on it that it can never live up to my expectations. It might sound strange to feel that way about a pen show, but live and let live, already!
One of the reasons that I was a bit disappointed was because there wasn't much there for someone who knows little about antique pens. Most of the displays/vendors were antique pen collectors/dealers and, although I have always found antique pen collectors to be more than willing to explain things to me, I was hoping for a few more opportunities to see new pens. I particularly wanted to see the new Parker Ingenuity line, which uses "Parker 5th technology." They're not fountain pens. They're not ballpoints. They're not roller ball pens. I'm intrigued.
Anyway, I did find a few things that I am enjoying using these days. I bought a pen from a company called TWSBI.
I hadn't heard of them before, but the pen writes very nicely and looks great. It has a broad nib, which may become my new favorite nib size. I have always gone with the fine or extra-fine nib on my fountain pens, but I'm really enjoying the way this broad nib writes. I also got several new inks, which is always delightful. The J. Herbin 1670 Anniversary ink is a beautiful shade of red.
I also now have a bottle of J. Herbin ink in Rose Cyclamen, which is a lovely shade of pinky-purple. It's the ink I am currently using most.
One of the more interesting shades I have is Pelikan's Edelstein ink in Jade.
I've never had a bottled green ink before, although I've had many items in the shade of bottle green. This, however, is not bottle green. It's a lighter green with some gray or ashy tones to it. It's kind of liberating. It's a nice color and I'm impressed by the quality of colors in the Edelstein line.
Perhaps the best part of the whole pen show weekend, though, was discovering Office Supplies & More in Chapel Hill. What a treasure this place is! So many pens!!! So many notebooks!!! It is exactly the kind of store I could spend a lot of time and money in. Why aren't there more of them?
Yesterday, I despaired for the future my country. Although it was what I had expected, I was very sad that Scott Walker won his recall fight and will be the Governor of Wisconsin for the remainder of his term. People voted for him in spite of his questionable (to put it mildly) testimony to Congress and in spite of (perhaps because of?) his vicious attacks on the rights of public employees. I despaired for the future of all of us who are not among the very wealthy, all of us who need our jobs not just for the pay, but also for the health insurance. And I was amazed at the utter lack of imagination among so many of the voters of Wisconsin.
"Why a lack of imagination?" you may ask. Because it shows a serious lack of imagination to vote to keep someone who, as soon as he had the power, immediately stripped away the rights that had been won through hard experience, the rights that were, in fact, protecting the rights of ALL of Wisconsin's workers, regardless of whether they belonged to unions. Do the people who voted for Walker really believe that their jobs are safe as long as he is in office? Do they really think that he won't want to take away other workers' rights? Do they actually believe that their lives will be better now?
The truth is that workers with rights are what keep our economy going. Walker talks a lot about how good for Wisconsin's economy his policies are, but where will Wisconsin's economy be in, say, 5 years? Our national economy relies on consumers, primarily middle-class consumers, with disposable income. How many of those consumers will be left after a few more years of Scott Walker? Now that public employees can no longer bargain collectively and he's made it so hard for their unions to work for them, we're going to see their pay and benefits dropping, which will mean they will have significantly less disposable income. There will be, to quote a famous Republican, a "trickle-down effect" throughout the economy of Wisconsin. Stores will close. Companies will downsize. The few manufacturers who remain will relocate their businesses. People will lose jobs.
Yesterday, I imagined similar scenarios playing out in other states over the next few years, with similar outcomes. I saw short-sighted voters all over the country electing people who would take away collective bargaining rights, would cut funding to schools, would cut the few remaining public programs that help those in need, and would increase tax breaks for corporations and wealthy individuals. The social-class divisions that exist today are nothing compared to what we could be living in just a few years from now.
And why would people vote for the politicians who would enact such harmful policies? I suspect that much of it boils down to the attitude of, "If I don't have a union representing me, why should you? If I don't have good health insurance, why should you? If the people in my profession can't bargain collectively, why should anyone else have that right?" But maybe that's just cynicism on my part. I confess that I am feeling exceptionally cynical right now.
