The third of October always makes me think about Matthew Ryan’s wonderful song “3rd of October.” So, I thought it would be a good time to check in and see what Mr. Ryan is up to this October. And he has a new album coming out on October 14 called Boxers.
I like the title track from Boxers. Another great track on the album is “This One’s For You Frankie.” Check out the video with the lyrics.
I like a lot of Ryan’s work, but I tend to gravitate toward his rock songs more than his quieter introspective songs, although many of those are quite beautiful. From the sound of “Boxers” and “This One’s For You Frankie,” as well as the cover directions saying to play the album loud, I am guessing that Boxers has the potential to emerge as one of my favorite Matthew Ryan albums.
In 1981, Squeeze released the single “Tempted,” from the group’s fourth album, East Side Story. Although the song did not become a top-40 hit, the song became so popular you probably can sing along (“Tempted by the fruit of another. . .”). But did you know that Elvis Costello sings on the recording? Costello worked with Squeeze in the early 1980s, producing some of the band’s work, including co-producing “Tempted.” And, on the song, he sings a few lines.
Glenn Tilbrook, Squeeze’s usual lead singer, wrote “Tempted” with the band’s guitarist Chris Difford. But keyboardist Paul Carrack — who was only with the band for one album before a solo career and work with Mike and the Mechanics — sang lead on “Tempted.”
Tilbrook does sing a few lines on the second verse (starting around the 1:19 mark), as does Costello. Although a Rolling Stone article seems to imply that an “almost unrecognizable Elvis Costello” appears in the video, it appears to me that Costello is not actually in the video.
You hear Costello’s voice starting at the 1:24 mark (and elsewhere in backing vocals). But it looks like guitarist and songwriter Difford is moving his lips. Check it out for yourself.
If you were not around in the 1980s, you may still know the song, which has been used in movies, video games, and commercials. Among other places, the song was used in a Burger King commercial. The band recorded a new version of the song for the film Reality Bites (1994), once again joined by Elvis Costello.
After Carrack left the band, Tilbrook took over the lead vocals on “Tempted.”
If you want to know more about what happened to the members of Squeeze in the decades after “Tempted,” check out this 2003 episode from VH1’s show, Bands Reunited below. For more information, check out the Squeeze website.
What is your favorite Squeeze song? Do you know more about Costello’s work on “Tempted”? Leave your two cents in the comments.
On September 29 in 1907, Orvon Grover Autry was born in north Texas, although he eventually would become better-known as the singing cowboy Gene Autry. Autry’s career spanned radio, television, movies, and records — including the 1934-1953 TV series The Gene Autry Show.
Autry had a number of hit songs, including his biggest hit, “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.” But it was “Back in the Saddle Again” that became his signature song. Below, he sings the song in the 1941 movie Back in the Saddle.
Those too young to remember Autry’s TV show may remember him as the founder and owner of the Angels baseball team from 1961-1997, which started out as the Los Angeles Angels and then became the California Angels, and now we call the team the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.
Back when his run on his TV show was ending, though, on October 4, 1953 he appeared on the TV show What’s My Line? where a blindfolded celebrity panel asked questions and tried to guess the name of the person in their presence. Using a heavily disguised voice, he manages to fool the panel . . . for awhile.
Gene Autry rode off into the sunset for the final time on October 2, 1998. Photo of the Gene Autry Show via public domain. Leave your two cents in the comments.
These new videos from Michael Tan take hit songs from the last two decades and show how they incorporate older songs. For example, the video includes the transformation of 1976’s “More, More, More” from Andrea True Connection into 1999’s “Steal My Sunshine” by Len. Check out this video of “12 Hit Songs and Their Original Samples.”
If that leaves you wanting more, here is Part 2 with more songs.
On September 25, 1960, Clyde Kennard was arrested in Mississippi and charged with stealing $25 worth of chicken feed. An all-white jury then convicted the black man of the crime. And he was sentenced to seven years of hard labor at the Mississippi State Penitentiary, otherwise known as “Parchman Farm.”
Kennard eventually would be released from prison after he was diagnosed with cancer and was near death, and he died on July 4, 1963. What makes the story especially tragic, though, is that Kennard had been framed with the theft only because he had tried to go to a white college.
Kennard Sought an Education
Kennard with his sister after being paroled in 1963
Clyde Kennard had been born in 1927 in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. After serving for seven years in the military, he completed three years of college at the University of Chicago.
After three years into his political science major, though, his father died. So, Kennard returned home to Mississippi to help his mother run the family farm.
Back in Mississippi, Kennard wanted to complete his degree but he needed to go to a school near to the farm so he could help his mother. The only nearby college was the the all-white, Mississippi Southern College. And state officials did not want a black man challenging the status quo. Officials realized they might lose any challenge due to the 1954 Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education.
Applications to Mississippi Southern College
Kennard first applied to Mississippi Southern College in 1955. But he was rejected on technical grounds because he did not have letters of support from prior graduates.
Kennard applied to the school again in 1958. This second time he withdrew his application after civil rights leaders persuaded him to withdraw. They had concluded it was not the right time to try to integrate the school.
Then, Kennard tried again to apply to the school in September 1959. The school president again rejected him on a technicality.
Kennard’s Arrests and Prosecution
After this attempt to get admitted to Mississippi Southern College, as Kennard was leaving a meeting at the school, he was arrested. The alleged charges were speeding and possessing alcohol, even though Kennard did not drink.
Kennard did not give up. He wrote letters to a newspaper, stating that he would go to federal court if necessary to get in the school. Then, in September 1960 he was framed for a chicken-feed theft and sent to prison. At the prison, he endured horrible treatment and had to work in the fields picking cotton.
Cancer Diagnosis and Death
When Kennard was diagnosed with cancer, state officials first refused to release him from prison. But pressure from civil rights leaders like Medgar Evers and Martin Luther King Jr. led state officials to fear having a martyr die in their prison system.
So in February 1963, officials released the very sick Kennard. He died several months later on July 4, 1963.
Kennard’s Innocence
Decades later, a reporter would get the “witness” to the chicken-feed theft to recant the story. The “witness” explained that the charges had to do with Kennard’s attempts to go to school.
Newly discovered documents support Kennard’s innocence too. And in 2006 the Circuit Court of Forrest County, Mississippi exonerated Kennard. Thus, it became clear what everyone knew at the time: Kennard had committed no crime. He was just a man who wanted to go to school.
“We Are Climbing Jacob’s Ladder”
The tragic story of Clyde Kennard reminds me of one of the great African-American spirituals, “We Are Climbing Jacob’s Ladder.” Like many spirituals, the song connects the struggles of American slaves to the plight of the Jewish people in ancient Egypt. “Jacob’s Ladder” uses the Biblical image of the ladder climbing to heaven that Jacob dreamed about.
One of my favorite versions of the song is by Bernice Johnson Reagon, who founded the wonderful a cappella group Sweet Honey in the Rock in 1973 before retiring from the group in 2004. You may recognize this version of “Jacob’s Ladder” from Ken Burns’s series The Civil War.
Clyde Kennard knew it is a long ladder that he helped climb. In response to the song’s question, “Children do you want your freedom?,” Kennard responded with a resounding “yes.” And for that and for his sacrifice, we should remember him.
In one of the final newspaper letters Kennard wrote before he was sentenced to prison, he explained, “If there is one quality of Americans which would set them apart from almost any other peoples, it is the history of their struggle for liberty and justice under the law.”
Every rung goes higher, higher; Every rung goes higher, higher; Every rung goes higher, higher; Soldiers of the cross.
Photo via public domain. Leave your two cents in the comments.
.
