MUSIC ROW DEMS

Rolling Stone just ran an article about Music Row Democrats.

I first became familiar with this group because my buddy Ed Pettersen is involved in it (a member of the executive board.) I quoted Ed in a story about the infamous Johnny Cash demonstration I wrote from New York during the 2004 Republican Convention.

TERRELL'S SOUND WORLD PLAYLIST

Sunday, January 22, 2006
KSFR, Santa Fe, N.M.
Webcasting!
10 p.m. to midnight Sundays Mountain Time
Host: Steve Terrell


OPENING THEME: Let it Out (Let it All Hang Out) by The Hombres
Sharkey's Day by Laurie Anderson
Journey to the Center of the Mind by The Amboy Dukes
Why Won't You See Me? by Concrete Blonde
I Want the Answers by The Fleshtones
Moving to Florida by The Butthole Surfers
Here Comes Your Man by The Pixies

Sputnik City Buvi Buvi by Kishidan
Drowning Witch by Frank Zappa
Two Amber Things by The Residents
Feedback Jazz by The Stilettos
Stabbing by Jon
Lost Avenue by Johnny Dowd
The Way We Were by Wild Man Fisher & Mark Mothersbaugh


R.I.P. WILSON PICKETT
(All Songs by Wilson Pickett except where noted)
Funky Broadway
I'm in Love
Soul Survivor
She's Lookin' Good
Hey Jude
Don't You Ever Let Nobody Drag Your Spirit Down by Linda Tillery & The Cultural Heritage Choir with Wilson Pickett
Land of 1,000 Dances
In the Midnight Hour

Why? (The King of Love is Dead) by Nina Simone
Pride (In the Name of Love) by U2
Keep on Pushing by The Impressions
His Eye is on the Sparrow by Isaac Hayes
CLOSING THEME: Over the Rainbow by Jerry Lee Lewis

THE SANTA FE OPRY PLAYLIST

Friday, January 20, 2006
KSFR, Santa Fe, NM
Webcasting!
10 p.m. to midnight Fridays Mountain Time
Host: Steve Terrell

OPENING THEME: Buckaroo by Buck Owens & The Buckaroos
Broken Bottle by Jon Langford & Sally Timms
Nobody's Fault But Mine by Bethleham & Eggs
60 Acres by James McMurtry
Castanets by Los Lonely Boys
Gloriously Tangled by Boris & The Saltlicks
The Things I Done Wrong by Danny Barnes
Jeannie's Afraid of the Dark by Robbie Fulks

Panties in Your Purse by Drive By Truckers
Oh My Jesus by Destiny Whores
Loser's Lullaby by Ronny Elliott
My Beautiful Bride by The Handsome Family
Sweet Virginia by Camper Van Beethoven
That's What I Like About the South by Hank Thompson
Don't Be Afraid of the Neo-cons by Norman & Nancy Blake


What Makes Bob Holler? by Bob Wills & His Texas Playboys
Draftboard Blues by Cliff Bruner & His Boys
Roly Poly by Asleep at the Wheel with The Dixie Chicks
Brain Cloudy Blues by Merle Haggard
There'll Be Some Changes Made by W. Lee O'Daniel & His Hillbilly Boys
Trouble in Mind by The Pine Valley Cosmonauts with Jimmie Dale Gilmore
Oklahoma Stomp by Spade Cooley
Keep on Truckin' by Smokey Wood & The Wood Chips
Faded Love by Rod Moag & Dayna Wills
Bubbles in My Beer by Bob Wills & His Texas Playboys

Love Make a Fool of Me by Big Al Anderson
Burn That Broken Bed by Iron & Wine with Calexico
Welcome Back by Mike Ireland & Holler
Life of a Texas Man by Blaze Foley
Red River Memory by James Talley
Pilgrim by Steve Earle & The Del McCoury Band
CLOSING THEME: Comin' Down by The Meat Puppets

Steve Terrell is proud to report to the monthly Freeform American Roots Radio list

TERRELL'S TUNE-UP: THE HIGH PRIESTESS & THE KING

A version of this was published in The Santa Fe New Mexican
Jamuary 20, 2006

Many speeches were made about Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. this week during his annual holiday. But if you really want to know how King affected people, pick up a copy of a new compilation of political songs by Nina Simone called Forever Young, Gifted and Black: Songs of Freedom and Spirit and cue up Track 4, “Why? (The King of Love is Dead).”

Just three days after King’s assassination, Simone, performing at the Westbury Music Fair in Westbury, N.Y., unveiled undoubtedly the most moving musical tribute to King ever conceived.

And someone was smart enough to record it.

Written by her bass player, Gene Taylor, it’s a slow dirge that, like many a powerful gospel song, gradually picks up tempo.

The pain in Simone’s voice has always been obvious. But in this unedited version of that performance, listeners can get a taste of the full depth of the raw grief, the outrage, even the honest paranoia behind that song.

Previously released versions of “King of Love” had been seriously edited, to about half the length of the nearly 13 minutes on the new CD.

The previous versions crescendo until Simone wails, “What’s going to happen/Now that the king of love is dead?

But in the unedited version, we learn that there was more to the performance before she got to that last line.

“ What’s going to happen now when all of our cities/Our people are rising,” Simone begins to improvise as the music starts slowing down. In fact, many American cities were on fire at that moment as black people raged against the murder of King.

“They’re living at last,” she sings, “even if they have to die, even if they have to die at the moment that they know what life is/Even if at that one moment that you know what life is, if you have to die, it’s all right/Because you know what life is, you know what freedom is for one moment of your life/What’s going to happen/Now that the king of love is dead?”

As the applause subsides, it appears as if Simone is about to introduce another song. But then she goes off on a tangent about how many black leaders, artists, and musicians had died in recent years. She names Lorraine Hansberry, Langston Hughes, John Coltrane, and Otis Redding.


“We can go on,” she says, her voice beginning to quiver. “Do you realize how many we have lost? It really gets down to reality, doesn’t it?”

By now, Simone is in a stream-of-consciousness mode: “Not a performance. Not microphones and all that crap. But really something else.” Now she’s whispering. “We’ve lost a lot of them in the last two years. But we have remaining Monk, Miles ...”

Breaking the tension, a man in the audience adds, “Nina.”

“I love you, too,” she responds warmly. The audience applauds.

She could have left it there on a sweet sentiment. But this wasn’t a time for greeting-card clichés. Simone had more to say.

“And of course for those we have left we are thankful, but we can’t afford any more losses,” she says. Then she breaks down.

“Oh no,” she sobs. “Oh my God! They’re shooting us down one by one. Don’t forget that. ’Cause they are. They’re killing us one by one.”

She theorizes that King might not have been killed had just a few more people stayed “a little closer” to him. “Just a little closer to him,” she says, “Stay there, stay there. We can’t afford any more losses.”

As if there were no more words to say, Simone begins singing the bridge of “King of Love”: “He had seen the mountain top, and he knew he could not stop ...” And the band joins in.

Here Simone completely blurs the lines between entertainer, political advocate, and grieving friend. In that moment — “Oh no. Oh my God!” — Simone expresses the horror of a nation, not only for a terrible murder but for the grim realization that the civil-rights movement was doomed to dissipate.

Simone and her music soon would largely fade from the American consciousness. A few years after her Westbury performance, Simone left the United States. After living in several countries in Europe, the Caribbean, and Africa, she settled in France, where she died in 2003.

(Troubling fact: There’s a tradition of great black artists — including Josephine Baker, Sydney Bechet, James Baldwin, Memphis Slim, and Tina Turner — moving to France. I don’t think it’s for the cheese.)

While “King of Love” definitely is the highlight of Forever Young, Gifted and Black, the compilation is full of hard-hitting political songs from an artist who was hard to peg.

Known as the “High Priestess of Soul,” Simone, born Eunice Waymon in rural North Carolina, studied at the Juilliard School of Music in New York. Her music, especially her piano-playing, drew from her classical training.

But she also interpreted folk music, gospel, blues, soul (also released this week is an expanded reissue of Nina Simone Sings the Blues, featuring an ultra-funky version of “House of the Rising Sun”), and show tunes. She even makes pop pap like the Association’s “Cherish” (from the album Silk and Soul, rereleased this week) sound soulful.

But it was her protest tunes that distinguished Simone. Forever Young, Gifted and Black has her inspiring anthem “I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel To Be Free” and stirring versions of “Turn! Turn! Turn!” and “The Times They Are A-Changin’.” There’s a song called “Revolution,” which sounds like an answer to the Beatles song. (But unlike the Fab Moptops, Nina’s saying, “Count me in!”)

The compilation includes two other tracks from the 1968 Westbury Music Fair — “Backlash Blues,” featuring words by poet Langston Hughes (“Who do you think I am?/You raise my taxes, freeze my wages and send my son to Vietnam”), and one of her most powerful songs, “Mississippi Goddam.”

Simone wrote the latter herself in the early ’60s, following a spate of murders of civil-rights activists. With its title and refrain, Simone ensured that this song would never get radio play in this God-fearing nation. But instead of a top-10 teen tune, she left us an honest testament from a troubled but promising era.

ROUNDHOUSE ROUND-UP: STORMING THE BASTION

A version of this was published in The Santa Fe New Mexican
January 19, 2006

What has been called “the last bastion of secrecy” in the state Legislature is under attack.

Lawmakers once again will try to open up conference committees — panels made up of members of both houses to iron out differences in bills that have passed both chambers.


Conference committees are now held behind closed doors.

“Other public bodies have done this and they’re still able to get things done,” said Sen. Dede Feldman, D-Albuquerque, who is sponsoring such a bill in the Senate.

In the past, some senators who have opposed the change claim that real negotiations can’t take place if reporters and television cameramen are present.

Lawmakers, the opponents say, would tend to grandstand for the cameras and not seriously negotiate. They would dig in their heels and stick to their positions as not to offend constituents and interest groups instead of trying to work out reasonable compromises, the argument goes.

But, Feldman said, “After a month or so, I think all the grandstanding would stop.”
According to a report distributed by Bob Johnson, executive director of the New Mexico Foundation for Open Government, New Mexico is one of only eight states in which conference committees are closed.

Gov. Bill Richardson, at a National Freedom of Information Coalition Conference in Santa Fe, endorsed the idea of opening the conference committees. According to an Associated Press account of the May meeting, Richardson said he wasn’t aware the meetings were closed.

On Wednesday the governor sent a formal message that he had put the conference committee bill on his call — which is necessary for a nonbudget bill to be considered during a 30-day session.

In recent years, attempts to open the conference committees have made it through the House, but died in the Senate. In 2001, Sen. Michael Sanchez, D-Belen, now Senate majority leader, argued, “The institution needs some privacy.”

And then there were two: The Democratic race to choose a candidate to run against Republican incumbent Pat Lyons got a little less crowded Wednesday. San Miguel County Commission Chairman Leroy Garcia, who was the first candidate to announce last year, said he was stepping out of the race to back another candidate — Jim Baca, former land commissioner and former Albuquerque mayor.

That leaves just Baca and another former land commissioner, Ray Powell Jr., on the Democratic side.

Garcia said he’d already collected about 4,000 petition signatures — more than the approximately 2,800 needed.

But he said he was afraid that he and Baca would split the Hispanic vote.

Garcia, a former analyst for the state Transportation Department, said he has been offered a position with that department.

Speaking of state jobs, Baca, who was hired by Gov. Bill Richardson as state natural resource trustee, said Wednesday he’ll retire from his post on March 1.

More fun at the Land Office: Last week this column reported that Baca was criticizing Lyons for spending more than $100,000 on television advertising spots featuring Lyons himself. Baca’s argued that the ads were nothing but “political commercials paid for by taxpayers.”

This week Land Office spokeswoman Kristin Haase argued that the ads were not paid for by taxpayers.

“In fact, we don’t spend taxpayer money,” she said. “We save taxpayers money. The Land Office generates its own income. We don’t get any money from the general fund.”

Baca replied that it doesn’t matter if the money is from the general fund or not — it’s still state money. “It’s $100,000 that’s not going to the beneficiaries,” he said.

Roundhouse dementia: Senate Republican Whip Leonard Lee Rawson on Wednesday demanded that fellow Las Cruces senator, Mary Jane Garcia, who’s also the Democratic whip, apologize for calling former Doña Ana County Sheriff Juan Hernandez “demented.”

Hernandez was nominated by Richardson for a spot on the state Parole Board. The Senate confirmed the nomination, though Garcia voted no.

“Sen. Garcia calling Sheriff Hernandez demented on the Senate floor today is totally irresponsible, completely inaccurate and vindictive,” Sen. Rawson said in a news release. “I am calling on her to formally apologize to Mr. Hernandez personally and to the Senate publicly.”

Garcia, however, won’t apologize. In an interview, she pointed out that Hernandez resigned in 2004 because of “dementia.”

A Dec. 1, 2004 news release from Doña Ana County said that “Hernandez has been diagnosed with frontotemporal dementia, an untreatable disease of the frontal and temporal lobes of the brain. His mental facilities are expected to deteriorate over the next 3-10 years.”

Hernandez’s supporters say that medication has helped Hernandez’s condition.