Tag: bob dylan

Pop Culture Roundup (April 2012 Edition)

a night to remember blu ray Unfortunately, some of the biggest pop culture news recently has been about the deaths of Mike Wallace, Dick Clark and Levon Helm. But in case you missed some of the other recent news, check out the following.

–Movies–

The Titanic anniversary prompted some film revivals. Salon critics debated: Is the film Titanic a classic or crap? Also, check out a review of that “other” Titanic movie on Blu-ray, A Night to Remember.

Captain America will return to screens in his own sequel in April 2014.

Universal is rebooting the Mummy films that starred Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz.

Really? As if he doesn’t have enough going for him, Ryan Gosling saved a woman from a speeding car.

Where are the stars of the movie Grease now? (slide show)

Bob Dylan’s Blood on the Tracks is going to be made into a film.

Daniel Craig wants to continue to play James Bond as long as he can.

Watch the trailer for Oliver Stone’s upcoming film about a drug cartel and a kidnapping, Savages.

–Television–

Arrested Development creator Mitch Hurwitz is considering more seasons because of Netflix.

Paul Feig offered his thoughts on each episode of the great TV series, Freaks and Geeks. (Onion A.V. Club)

Jeopardy has lined up celebrity “Power Players” to compete in May, including Lewis Black and Chris Matthews.

Interview with Denny McBride of HBO’s Eastbound & Down.

From Chipwich to Hummer: 10 iconic brands that disappeared.

Jonathan Frid, who played vampire Barnabas Collins on the original Dark Shadows series (and frightened me as a kid) has died. RIP.

–Music–

Ted Nugent is pleading guilty to transporting a black bear he illegally killed in Alaska.

10 best breakup albums of all time.

Scott Fedor writes about Bruce Springsteen connecting with a paralyzed fan this week. (Thanks to Mike S. from Cleveland)

The neuroscience of Bob Dylan’s genius via @guardian (Thanks @sonjathegreat)

Review of Johnny Cash – Bootleg Vol. IV: The Soul of Truth. (from Hyperbolium)

Review of Ray Wylie Hubbard’s new CD, Grifter’s Hymnal. (No Depression)

Greg Ham of the band Men Down Under was found dead in his home in Australia.

Musician Herbie Hancock is writing a memoir.

Hear Lisa Marie Presley’s new single, “You Ain’t Seen Nothin’ Yet,” from her upcoming Storm & Grace CD.

The tragedy of country singer Johnny Paycheck (from No Depression).

The 10 best cover songs you didn’t know were cover songs: (from Popdose)

A hologram of Tupac Shakur performed at the Coachella festival. How did they do that?

–Other Pop Culture News–

Slide show of the Space Shuttle Discovery on its final flight, past several DC landmarks. (The Guardian)

Pulitzer Prize nominations were announced, giving a nod to growing online journalism.

11 Athletes Who Had Their Own Cereals. (Thanks @mental_floss)

J.K. Rowling’s new novel, The Casual Vacancy, will be published September 27.

Did you know crows and squirrels are among the 10 smartest animals? (from Animal Planet)

Soon, you will no longer be able to buy thoughts in Canada, as the country is withdrawing the penny from circulation.

Finally, here is Marc Cohn’s song about Levon Helm, who passed away last week. “I was was lost/ I was gone/ Listening to Levon/ I was looking at the girl/ But I was listening to Levon.” -Marc Cohn.

  • Clarence Ashley: “The Cuckoo” & “Little Sadie”
  • The First Farm Aid
  • Nelson Mandela, Sun City, and Changing Times
  • Cowboy Jack Clement: “I Guess Things Happen That Way”
  • Tim Heidecker Foresees Dylan’s Upcoming “Titanic” Song
  • Pop Culture Roundup (for Early February 2012)

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    Peter Paul & Mary’s First Contract . . . and Puff

    Peter Paul & Mary signed their first recording contract on January 29, 1962.  Thus began a recording career with Warner Brothers that would help bring folk music and Bod Dylan’s music to a broad audience.

    That broader audience included me when I was a kid. We did not have Bob Dylan albums in my house when I was a kid, but we did have Peter Paul & Mary’s second album, Moving (1963), which included “Puff the Magic Dragon.” The trio and “Puff” eventually led me to Dylan and other folk singers. They even led me to John Denver with their cover of “Leavin’ on a Jet Plane.”

    Although today I only have a couple of Peter Paul & Mary albums, I have a huge collection of Dylan and other folk songs that they helped me discover. So, while some hear them and think of a group less authentic than some other folk singers because of their smooth harmonies and the way the group formed, I hear the joy in their music.  And I appreciate the role they played in my music education.

    “Puff the Magic Dragon”

    The story of “Puff the Magic Dragon” began in 1958 when Leonard Lipton, who was a Cornell student, found inspiration in Ogden Nash’s “The Tale of Custard the Dragon.” Lipton used that inspiration to write his own poem about a dragon.

    Lipton showed his poem to another Cornell student, Peter Yarrow, who added music and additional lyrics. Not much later, Manager Albert Grossman, looking to capitalize on the growing folk music trend, put together what he saw as a commercial pairing of Yarrow with Peter Stookey and Mary Travers.

    Thus began Peter Paul & Mary.  The new group recorded “Puff the Magic Dragon” in 1962, and it went on to rise to #2 on the Billboard charts.

    What is “Puff” About?

    Several years after “Puff the Magic Dragon” was released, rumors started about drug references in the song. Yarrow and Lipton have both explained that the song is really about a loss of innocence, and Lipton has compared the story to Peter Pan on his blog.

    Many decades on, the song’s themes about lost innocence resonate more strongly for those of us who grew up listening to the song. When I hear the song, I think not only about the lost innocence of Little Jackie Paper.  I also think about my own childhood listening to the unusual dark children’s song.  In the song, I sensed some frightening message about the world ahead where little boys do not live forever and dragons are left alone to disappear.

    But in addition to the haunting elements, there was something comforting in the way the three voices blended together, revealing something else in the world.  Perhaps there was a touch of the nearly half-century friendship between the three singers that continued until Mary Travers’s death in 2009.

    And maybe some things do last forever. I do not know where I will be in another half century, but I do know that children still will be singing the college student’s poem about a dragon who frolicked in the autumn mist in a land called Honalee.

    And that is The Story Behind the Song.

    Update: Dick Kniss, who played bass for Peter Paul & Mary for almost five decades, passed away in 2012 at the age of 74. He also co-wrote John Denver’s hit, “Sunshine on My Shoulders.” RIP.

  • Peter, Paul & Mary’s Ode to Playing “Right Field”
  • Peter Paul & Mary: El Salvador
  • John Denver’s First Number One Song
  • Duet of the Day: Cass Elliot and John Denver “Leaving on a Jet Plane”
  • What Song Did Jennifer Jason Leigh Sing in “The Hateful Eight”?
  • The Story Behind the Album Cover: Dylan’s “Highway 61 Revisited”

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    The Death of Emmett Till

    Bob Dylan Whitmark Demos

    On January 24 in 1956, Look magazine published “The Shocking Story of Approved Killing in Mississippi” that featured a confession from two men claiming they had murdered the teenage Emmett L. Till on August 28, 1955.  The killing would inspire both Bob Dylan and the Civil Rights movement.

    The Murder

    Jurors had acquitted the two white men, Roy Bryant and J.W. Milam, of the 1955 kidnapping and murder of Till. But after the acquittal, in the magazine article, Bryant and Milam described the killing.

    After beating and shooting Till, they used barbed wire to tie a heavy cotton gin fan around his neck to weigh down his body when they threw him in the Tallahatchie River.

    Throughout the ordeal, the two men could not break the spirit of the teenager.  Till maintained that he was as good as them and that he had dated white women.

    Emmett Till

    Emmett TillTill was a 14-year-old African-American teenager from Chicago.  Prior to his death, he was visiting Mississippi relatives in 1955.

    In Money, Mississippi, he went to Bryant’s Grocery and Meat Market to buy some candy. Reportedly, while he was in the store, the teen either whistled at or requested a date from Carolyn Bryant, who ran the store with her husband Roy, who was out of town.

    As word spread around town about the incident, the husband Roy Bryant returned to town and contacted his half-brother J.W. Miliam. A few days after the encounter in the store between Till and Byrant’s wife, Miliam and Bryant abducted Till from his great-uncle’s home. Three days later Till’s body was found in the river.

    Response to the Murder

    Word of the horrible killing spread. Reportedly, 50,000 people attended the funeral, where Till’s mother had an open casket to show the world what was done to her son (warning: disturbing photo at link).

    Authorities arrested Miliam and Bryant, who were tried and acquitted by an all-white all-male jury. Many were outraged with the acquittal, and some credit the events with helping inspire the Civil Rights Movement.

    Miliam and Bryant later both died from cancer.  But as recently as 2005 the U.S. Justice Department was looking into the case about prosecuting others still living who helped with the crime.

    Bob Dylan’s “The Death of Emmett Till”

    The events also inspired a young Bob Dylan to write about the Till in the song “The Death of Emmett Till.” He performed the song on a radio program in 1962, explaining the tune came from a song by folk-musician Len Chandler.

    On the March 11, 1962 radio show, the host flattered the young Dylan’s skills.  But Dylan responded, “I just wrote that one about last week, I think.”

    Relatively consistent with Dylan’s comments, in Keys to the Rain: The Definitive Bob Dylan Encyclopedia, Oliver Trager reports that the 22-year-old Dylan wrote the song around February 1962.  That date means it is one of the first songs Dylan ever wrote. Trager also suggests that Emmett Till’s death may have affected Dylan because they were born only months apart.

    Although Dylan initially was proud of “The Death of Emmett Till,” he later seemed embarrassed by its literalness.  He claimed he was just trying to write about something topical. He even went further and said that it was a “bullshit song.”

    It’s true that the song does not rise to the poetic level of the more brilliant similarly themed song, “The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll.” But “The Death of Emmett Till” was a good start for the young songwriter, and it helped highlight a great injustice.

    Through the years, listeners rarely got the chance to hear Dylan’s song.  “The Death of Emmett Till” never appeared on an official Bob Dylan release until in 2010 when it was on the CD The Witmark Demos: 1962-1964 (The Bootleg Series Vol. 9) (2010).

    The photo above of Till — whose nickname was Bobo — was taken by his mother on Christmas 1954, eight months before he was murdered.

    How does “The Death of Emmett Till” rank in the Dylan canon? Leave your two cents in the comments.

  • They’re Selling Postcards of the Hanging: The Real Lynching in Dylan’s “Desolation Row”
  • A Hard Rain, Lord Randall, and the Start of a Revolution
  • Three Missing Civil Rights Workers in 1964 Mississippi
  • Dylan’s Late-Career Classics: Mississippi
  • One Degree of Separation Between Bob Dylan & Twilight Zone: Bonnie Beecher & “Come Wander With Me”
  • Sheila Atim Peforming “Tight Connection to My Heart” (Great Bob Dylan Covers)

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    This Week in Pop Culture Roundup (11 Dec. 2011)

    chewbacca toy In case you have been too busy this week angrily Tweeting about American Airlines because a flight attendant interrupted a game you were playing on your phone, here are some of the pop culture stories you might have missed this week. FYI, see below for a funny video relating to the American Airlines incident. Three of the big stories that were already covered this week in Chimesfreedom were the passings of actor Harry Morgan, singer Dobie Gray, and blues man Hubert Sumlin, so check out those stories too. But here are some of the lesser known reviews and stories from the fields of movies, music, and popular culture.


    —— Movies —–

    Filmmakers are clashing with each other over access to West Memphis 3 witnesses.

    The Hangover III may be set in Los Angeles and may try a new formula.

    The Los Angeles Times contemplated predictions for the Golden Globe race for drama films.

    The Sundance Film Festival announced its short film roster.

    Salon featured a slide show of 20 classic spy movies.

    The trailer for the new Three Stooges movie is out.

    Jeremy Piven revealed that an Entourage movie is in the works.

    A sci-fi fan is suing James Cameron, claiming the director stole Avatar story idea.

    Below is a video tribute to the year of 2011 in film and music, “The 2011 Portfolio”:

    —– Music —–

    Amnesty International released a 4-CD set: Chimes of Freedom: The Songs of Bob Dylan: Honoring 50 Years of Amnesty Intnl.

    In the New York Times, Camille Paglia reviewed Greil Marcus’s new book on the Doors.

    Was Gram Parsons an underrated songwriter?

    2012 R&R Hall Inductees: Beastie Boys, Donovan, Guns N’ Roses, Laura Nyro, Red Hot Chili Peppers & Small Faces/Faces.

    Barbara Orbison, the widow of Roy Orbison, passed away Tuesday.

    Lady Gaga’s latest video, for “Marry the Night,” is 14 min long and reflects one of her darker days.

    Popdose has a funny discussion of the AM Gold songs from 1967.

    New music collaborations include My Morning Jacket & Kelly Clarkson, as well as Black Keys and Arctic Monkeys on tour.

    Cover Lay Down has covers of songs in the new Christmas canon.

    Twangville has a review of a recent performance by Gillian Welch and David Rawlings.

    Blogness has Bruce Springsteen’s performance with Gaslight Anthem from this week in Asbury Park.

    Billboard named Adele the top artist of 2011 as she makes history.

    —– Television —–

    In Wookie news, Chewbacca is going to guest star on Glee.

    The Mythbusters guys apologized after they accidentally fired a cannonball into a residential area earlier this week.

    “Very funny.” — Tonight Show bandleader Kevin Eubanks on the Roots’ controversial entrance song for Michele Bachmann.

    Laugh-In star Alan Sues, who also was in the Twilight Zone Episode “The Masks,” passed away this week.

    Was it too soon for Saturday Night Live to spoof the Penn State scandal? Colin Quinn thinks so. In other SNL news, Alec Baldwin appeared on the show last night to apologize about the American Airlines incident to . . . Alec Baldwin, “an American treasure.”

    —– Other Pop Culture News —–

    Manny Ramirez un-retired from baseball. That’s Manny being . . . Brett.

    Salon listed its favorite non-fiction books of 2011.

    Jerry Robinson, the comic book artist who created Batmans’s The Joker, passed away yesterday. RIP.

    In the way that all sci-fi alien horror movies begin. . . NASA just discovered an earth-like planet. Assuming the aliens do not attack us, we will see you with more pop culture stories soon. . .

  • I Wish It Was Christmas Today
  • Clarence Ashley: “The Cuckoo” & “Little Sadie”
  • The Flying Burrito Brothers Song That Includes a Tribute to Bobby Kennedy
  • The Star Wars Holiday Special 1978
  • Paul McCartney Joins Springsteen for “Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town”
  • The 1977 Johnny Cash Christmas Show

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    High School Trauma for Pop Stars

    Bob Dylan No Direction Home

    I once saw a story where Christina Aguilera told about her high school prom experience. She already had her first hit with “Genie in a Bottle” and was no longer attending regular classes. But one of Aguilera’s girlfriends found Aguilera a prom date at her old high school. So, Aguilera hoped for a somewhat normal experience for her age of attending prom, just as she was on the border between being a teenage student and pop star.

    Christina Aguilera Genie in a Bottle Everything went well at first. She had fun with her girlfriends and her date. The other students were on the dance floor. Then, the DJ put on “Genie in a Bottle,” and all of her former classmates stopped dancing and went to their seats. Aguilera felt embarrassed and heartbroken.

    I can imagine both sides in the story. There was Aguilera trying to hold onto normalcy for a few hours longer before her life became completely insane, and then she was rejected and scorned by those from whom she sought acceptance. But I also understand teenagers being teenagers and making a stand against someone who had effectively placed herself on another plane, one they would never reach. Therefore, they refused to play a part in some rich and famous person’s fantasy.

    I thought of that story recently when re-watching Martin Scorsese’s Bob Dylan documentary No Direction Home (2005). One of Bob Dylan’s high school classmates told a story about Dylan performing at a high school talent show. Dylan banged on the piano like Jerry Lee Lewis, belting out a rock and roll song. His Minnesota classmates did not know what to think and probably did not react the way the Dylan had hoped. The principal pulled the curtain while Dylan was still singing, thus ending one of the first public performances by the future icon in humiliation.

    Taylor Swift I know we often ascribe too much to childhood events. But I still cannot help speculating how Aguilera’s experience shaped her, just as our high school experiences shaped us. Similarly, in a October 10, 2011 New Yorker article, “You Belong With Me,” Lizzie Widdicombe recounted how Taylor Swift went through a similar period of exile in adolescence when her friends turned on her as she started becoming famous. Despite her success, like Aguilera, she still felt the sting. To get back at the mean girls, during her sophomore year of high school, Swift bought a silver Lexus convertible because in Mean Girls, that was the type of car driven by Regina George, who the girls in Swift’s high school idolized.

    Just as in those cases, I see a little of the teenage Dylan, facing rejection from his principal and peers, standing on the stage with his older self years later in 1966 in Manchester at the Free Trade Hall. As Dylan listened to a crowd booing his conversion from folk music to electric music, he might as well have been playing for his principal and high school classmates when he (or someone in his band) requested, “Play it fuckin’ loud.”

    Dylan found his high school revenge in an expression that was better than buying a car or anything else money can buy. While the lyrics of “Like a Rolling Stone” ask the listener, “How does it feel?,” there is never an answer back from the song’s target. But we know from the roar of the song what the singer is feeling. Redemption.

    Note: The above Free Trade Hall performance later became misidentified as the “Royal Albert Hall” performance. Bonus Trivia Question: What legendary group mentions Royal Albert Hall in a famous song?

    What do you think of these high school stories? Leave your two cents in the comments section.

  • When Bob Dylan’s Ship Comes In
  • Dylan’s Inspiration: “Drifting Too Far From the Shore”
  • The Man Behind the Organ in “Like a Rolling Stone”
  • A Famous Encounter and “Like a Rolling Pin”
  • Dylan Plays “Like a Rolling Stone” With The Rolling Stones
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