Hey look at me, getting a music notes column out on time. I recently read Alex Harvey's Song Noir: Tom Waits and the Spirit of Los Angeles. Focusing on Waits' early years as a musician, up to the making of Swordfishtrombones, I thought it a...
music
This is the grave of Johnny Pacheco. Born in 1935 in Santiago, Dominican Republic, Pacheco grew up around music. His father Rafael was a bandleader who led Orquesta Santa Cecilia..
This is the grave of David Ruffin. Born in 1941 in the amazingly named Whynot, Mississippi, Ruffin grew up the son of a minister and a lumber truck driver. That's.
This is the grave of Johnny Otis. Born in Vallejo, California in 1921, Ioannis Alexandres Veliotes grew up in a Greek immigrant household. His father owned a grocery store and he mostly grew up in Berkeley, in a Black neighborhood, where the store was. That...
This is the grave of Obie Benson. Born in 1936 in Detroit, Benson went to the local schools and became friends with a guy named Lawrence Payton while in high.
This is the grave of Ella Fitzgerald. Born in 1917 in Newport News, Virginia, Fitzgerald mostly grew up in New York. Her parents, both light-skinned African Americans, broke up, but.
This is the grave of Lester Flatt. Born in 1914 in Duncan's Chapel, Tennessee, Flatt grew up around music. He learned the banjo, the mandolin and the guitar at the very time that people such as Bill Monroe were inventing bluegrass music and connecting it...
This is the grave of Lawrence Payton. Born in 1938, Payton got involved in the robust Detroit music scene as a kid. In 1953, he and some friends--Abdul Fakir, Levi.
This is the grave of Ray Charles. Born in Albany, Georgia in 1930, Ray Charles Robinson grew up very poor. His mother was an orphan a family had taken in.
"Comrade Lenin Sweeps the Globe Clean" by Mikhail Cheremmnykh & Victor Deni, 1920 I'm curious to get a closer look at the actual legislation, but this strikes me as a promising step in the right direction in terms of addressing the oppressive, larcenous, predatory practices...
This is the grave of Mel Tormé. Born in Chicago in 1925, Tormé grew up in a Jewish immigrant family, at least on his father' side, who had come over.
It's time for something a bit more light hearted than usual. So here's this great story about how a bunch of teenagers who don't care about some old man named.