CRTC Amps Up the Volume on Commercials (Abstract: so far no-one has come clean on the CRTC’s decision to allow/facilitate cable companies’ jacking up volumes on digital commercial content exponentially beyond any previously recorded levels.) Remember when we had all those extensive hearings about reducing the volume on TV commercials?
Continue readingAuthor: Dan Zorg
Zorg Report: CRTC Amps Up the Volume on Commercials
CRTC Amps Up the Volume on Commercials (Abstract: so far no-one has come clean on the CRTC’s decision to allow/facilitate cable companies’ jacking up volumes on digital commercial content exponentially beyond any previously recorded levels.) Remember when we had all those extensive hearings about reducing the volume on TV commercials?
Continue readingZorg Report: CRTC Amps Up the Volume on Commercials
(Abstract: so far no-one has come clean on the CRTC’s decision to allow/facilitate cable companies’ jacking up volumes on digital commercial content exponentially beyond any previously recorded levels.)
Zorg Report: The Nature of ISIS and the Key Harper Enablers
The Nature of ISIS and the Key Harper Enablers Well, first of all, it’s hopeless young men looking for or needing something to do. They are easily swayed by a Manichean world view, and even the madrasa chants in languages they don’t even comprehend have a kind of mesmeric, repetitive,
Continue readingZorg Report: The Nature of ISIS and the Key Harper Enablers
Zorg Report: The Nature of ISIS and the Key Harper Enablers
The Nature of ISIS and the Key Harper Enablers Well, first of all, it’s hopeless young men looking for or needing something to do. They are easily swayed by a Manichean world view, and even the madrasa chants in languages they don’t even comprehend have a kind of mesmeric, repetitive,
Continue readingZorg Report: The Orenda — finally figured it out
Orenda – Probably most famously in recent times, the Orenda was known as the Splenda in Orenda, when Mayhem Melvin Johnstone met Jonoby Jefferson in a 10-round title fight. Jeffersonappeared to stop Johnstone as early as the 3rd with a left hook that staggered the bigger fighter, but in the
Continue readingZorg Report: The Orenda — finally figured it out
Orenda – Probably most famously in early TV times, the Orenda was known as the Splenda in Orenda, when Mayhem Melvin Johnstone met Jonoby Jefferson in a 10-round title fight. Jeffersonappeared to stop Johnstone as early as the 3rd with a left hook that staggered the bigger fighter, but in
Continue readingZorg Report: The Orenda — finally figured it out
Orenda – Probably most famously in early TV times, the Orenda was known as the Splenda in Orenda, when Mayhem Melvin Johnstone met Jonoby Jefferson in a 10-round title fight. Jeffersonappeared to stop Johnstone as early as the 3rd with a left hook that staggered the bigger fighter, but in the later stages of the 5th, Johnstone began to assert his power, feinting with the right, but employing also a lethal left. Jeffersonfought gamely into the 8th, but by then his dancing moves lacked crispness, and his blows, owing to his shorter reach, did not tell. Against the ropes, both eyes closed with bruising and sealed by open cuts, Jefferson not only stood up to the pounding, but made his way around the ring and never fell. The bout, held in Equatorial Guinea at the pleasure of then-dictator Malik al-Foussah-Homi-be-Im, has come to be regarded as one of the greatest matches in this sport’s history. The card read 52-48, 51-49, and 51-49.
Zorg Report: Zorg Report 2014-04-11 09:54:00
(CP) – In a statement released today, Canadian Minister of Democracy Pierre Poilievre said that, while he supports North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un’s efforts to standardize haircuts, he had already gotten his own. “It’s this guy, Larry,” Poilievre said. “He’s in Ottawa.” “I was talking to Kim the other
Continue readingZorg Report: Zorg Report 2014-04-11 09:54:00
(CP) – In a statement released today, Canadian Minister of Democracy Pierre Poilievre said that, while he supports North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un’s efforts to standardize haircuts (http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-news-from-elsewhere-26747649), he had already gotten his own. “It’s this guy, Larry,” Poilievre said. “He’s in Ottawa.” “I was talking to Kim
Continue readingZorg Report: Zorg Report 2014-04-11 09:54:00
Zorg Report: Jim Flaherty is not dead, only in Ireland (or Michigan)
One ought not to speak ill of the dead, nor inflict more grief on the aggrieved. Still, the instant hagiography surrounding Jim Flaherty will attach some burrs. Through his actions to protect himself, Jim Flaherty gleefully destroyed the lives of others. He knew it, he loved it, and he did
Continue readingZorg Report: Jim Flaherty is not dead, only in Ireland (or Michigan)
One ought not to speak ill of the dead, nor inflict more grief on the aggrieved. Still, the instant hagiography surrounding Jim Flaherty will attach some burrs. Through his actions to protect himself, Jim Flaherty gleefully destroyed the lives of others. He knew it, he loved it, and he did
Continue readingZorg Report: Jim Flaherty is not dead, only in Ireland (or Michigan)
Zorg Report: Canada’s New National Anthem: “Before the Courts”
Canada’s New National Anthem: “Before the Courts” Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair Takes Questions about Mayor Rob Ford Or new national index of societal morality. It seems there is no sin these days that cannot be covered by saying that the matter is “before the courts.” After all,
Continue readingZorg Report: Canada’s New National Anthem: “Before the Courts”
Zorg Report: Canada’s New National Anthem: “Before the Courts”
Canada’s New National Anthem: “Before the Courts” Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair Takes Questions about Mayor Rob Ford Or new national index of societal morality. It seems there is no sin these days that cannot be covered by saying that the matter is “before the courts.” After all,
Continue readingZorg Report: A Brief History of "Oh So Many Years"
_1_
Norah Jones and Billie Joe Armstrong (2013)
starts at around 23:28, so go back.
–Billie heard the Everlys’ Songs Our Daddy Taught Us, and thought, since he was rich and famous, he’d like to cover it. His wife urged Norah, who he’d once met at an awards gala, as someone to do it with him. So it happened, over a total of 9 days. The Everlys, of course, came from a steeped tradition going back generations. But if you’ve got the money and a hint o’ time, well, that cures all defects.
_2_
The Everlys – Songs Our Daddy Taught Us (1958)
–This must have been a bit of a weird album; after a couple of big hits like “Wake Up, Little Susie” (banned in Toronto in ‘58), the Everlys had to provide more content, overnight. So. . .songs they knew from youth and had sung forever. Even Phil at 76 admitted that they didn’t really know what they were singing; they were just striving for good harmonies and music and to please an audience and so on.
They explicitly used only an acoustic guitar and bass; they wanted the songs to sound like they would be heard on a porch. What they knew. What they had.
Or that would give cache’, too, a bit like Billie Joe and Norah now.
Notice _1_ sounds like a cacophony with all kinds of things happening at the same time so that the import of the song, lyrically, is lost. Drums destroying any sense of the music.
I like how the Everlys’ voices hadn’t even seemed to break by 20; Kentucky never met science. Those steel-stringed acoustics, those voices like silken filaments (ever tried to break silk?). Vulnerable, enduring, frail, resonant.
_3_
The Bailes Brothers akaThe Bailey Brothers (1949)
Of course, nothing comes from nowhere, and the Everlys (songs our daddy taught us) learned from the Bailes, or Bailey Brothers; that’s where they got the harmony. The Everlys’ dad could easily have introduced this one, since it was in his puberty.
The steel guitar put the melancholy in the song, and the banjo lends the bouzouki-type sound; if one hasn’t a grand piano or a sophisticated horn or wind instrument, one has voices or banjo with its available steel strings. Notice this sound.
Importantly, Billie Joe Armstrong made Norah Jones swear that she would listen to no other versions of the Everlys’ album. Clearly, however, he did; his entire approach to the song, and obviously the lead riff from _1_, is based on the original by the Baileys. Yep, women. Keep ‘em in the dark. Never let them know or they might mess it up. Billie Joe just wanted to make sure Norah sang the high Don part. This overproduced version, _1_, actually loses something by Jones not being ½ way in control of the song, as she isn’t. It gets throwaway honky-tonk instead of meaningfully moving. Still, good song; captivating, captive female; I can get into that, but in the end I’m a man and it ends up being a long way from a “Rocking Good Way” with Brook Benton and Dinah Washington.
_4_
This song is not about Billie Joe of Green Day, or Norah Jones; it’s about a young girl, and that’s where this great music came from. Would Billie Joe, or Norah, or for that matter even Phil or Don Everly, choose “oh so many years” as a chorus line?
so _5_
The song was written a long time ago by a woman for a man. The later renditions are great, as I’ve said above, but I am haunted by the missing voice in this song. And that’s the lead voice of the woman in this song, and also the one who wrote it. It sure ain’t, ain’t, ever Billy Joe. I hope a great female singer will do this song again one day and put it in its rightful place in the country pantheon.
-zr
Zorg Report: A Brief History of "Oh So Many Years"
A Brief History of “Oh So Many Years” _1_ Norah Jones and Billie Joe Armstrong (2013) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7lZhbCZ4QQ starts at around 23:28, so go back. –Billie heard the Everlys’ Songs Our Daddy Taught Us, and thought, since he was rich and famous, he’d like to cover it. His wife urged Norah,
Continue reading