The Rover
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Let's see.....today it is supposed to be 84 degrees and sunny. Ahhh, it sucks to be here!!
These Depressing Posts have got to Stop !
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I'm thankful for the sleet that feel tonight.... it covered the ice that had already come from the frezing rain earlier. It made the drive home doable.
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Jan 28, 12:06 AM EST
Rock fans head to Iowa to recall day music died
By MARCO SANTANA
Associated Press Writer
CLEAR LAKE, Iowa (AP) -- It's been 50 years since a single-engine plane crashed into a snow-covered Iowa field, instantly killing three men whose names would become enshrined in the history of rock 'n' roll.
The passing decades haven't diminished fascination with that night on Feb. 2, 1959, when 22-year-old Buddy Holly, 28-year-old J.P. "The Big Bopper" Richardson and 17-year-old Ritchie Valens performed in Clear Lake and then boarded the plane for a planned 300-mile flight that lasted only minutes.
"It was really like the first rock 'n' roll landmark; the first death," said rock historian Jim Dawson, who has written several books about music of that era. "They say these things come in threes. Well, all three happened at the same time."
Starting Wednesday, thousands of people are expected to gather in the small northern Iowa town where the rock pioneers gave their last performance. They'll come to the Surf Ballroom for symposiums with the three musicians' relatives, sold-out concerts and a ceremony as the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame designates the building as its ninth national landmark.
And they'll discuss why after so many years, so many people still care about what songwriter Don McLean so famously called "the day the music died."
"It was the locus point for that last performance by these great artists," said Terry Stewart, president and CEO of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland. "It warrants being fixed in time."
Clear Lake is an unlikely spot for a rock 'n' roll pilgrimage - especially in winter. The resort town of about 8,000 borders its namesake lake, and on winter days the cold and wind make the community 100 miles north of Des Moines anything but a tourist destination.
The crash site is on private property, a five-mile drive from Clear Lake and half-mile walk off the road. Corn grows high in adjacent fields during the summer, but in winter the fields are covered with snow and a path to the small memorial is often thick with ice. The memorial features a small cross and thin metal guitar and records, all of which are draped in flowers during the summer.
"It's a much nicer trip in the summer," said Jeff Nicholas, a longtime Clear Lake resident who heads the Surf Ballroom's board of directors. "But in the winter, you get more of a feel of what it was like."
No one tracks the number of visitors, but fans stop by throughout the year and on some summer days visitors to the crash site can create the oddity of a corn field traffic jam.
Stewart said the deaths still resonate because they occurred at a time when rock 'n' roll was going through a transition, of sorts. The sound of Chuck Berry, Jerry Lee Lewis and Holly was making way for the British Invasion of the mid-1960s.
"The music was shifting and changing at that point," he said. "The crash put a punctuation point on the change."
All three musicians influenced rock and roll in their own way.
Holly's career was short, but his hiccup-vocal style, guitar play and songwriting talents had tremendous influence on later performers. The Beatles, who formed about the time of the crash, were among his early fans and fashioned their name after Holly's band, The Crickets. Holly's hit songs include "That'll Be The Day," "Peggy Sue" and "Maybe Baby."
Richardson, "The Big Bopper," is often credited with creating the first music video with his recorded performance of "Chantilly Lace" in 1958, decades before MTV.
And Valens was one of the first musicians to apply a Mexican influence to rock 'n' roll. He recorded his huge hit "La Bamba" only months before the accident.
The plane left the airport in nearby Mason City about 1 a.m., headed for Moorhead, Minn., with the musicians looking for a break from a tiring, cold bus trip through the Upper Midwest.
It wasn't until hours later that the demolished plane was found, crumpled against a wire fence. Investigators believe the pilot, who also died, became confused amid the dark, snowy conditions and rammed the plane into the ground.
The crash set off a wave of mourning among their passionate, mostly young fans across the country. Then 12 years later the crash was immortalized as "the day the music died" in McLean's 1971 song, "American Pie."
Vonnie Amosson, who manages the Veterans of Foreign Wars hall in Clear Lake, said that ever since the plane crash, the community has embraced the tragedy. It's a continues stream of tourism dollars, and the town's chamber of commerce estimates that this year's events, dubbed "50s in February," will generate more than $4 million for Clear Lake's economy.
"It's kind of sad that that is what we are known for," Amosson said. "But on the other part of it, I think the whole '50's in February' weekend is a huge memorial and it's an honor to them."
In part because of its role in rock history, the Surf Ballroom has retained its vintage look, with a 6,000-square-foot dance floor, ceiling painted to resemble a sky, and original cloud machines on either side of the room. Ten Buddy Holly banners line the wall opposite the stage. The 2,100-capacity ballroom still hosts many national and regional performers, most of whom add their names to a backstage wall that is now crowded with drawings and signatures.
"It's quite a special place," said Nicholas, the Surf board member. "This place looks just like it did in 1959."
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A Salute to Buddy Holly is the feature story on the cover of the current Texas Music Magazine.
HOW A SKINNY KID FROM LUBBOCK BROKE — AND REMADE — THE TEMPLATE FOR ROCK ‘N’ ROLL
The Article:
http://www.txmusic.com/articles/2009/01/bu...y-changing-game
February 3, 2009 is the 50th Anniversary of “The Day The Music Died,” the anniversary of the crash of the flight that took the lives of ‘50s rockers Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and The Big Bopper, and finally, the vault of rare Buddy Holly tracks will be opened wide for two multi-disc sets on October, 21st, 2008. The triple CD, entitled, Memorial Collection, (Geffen/UMe), is a 60-song, thorough overview of the great rocker’s career. It will feature rare early undubbed recordings by Buddy with his original partner Bob Montgomery, all of his hits, and will conclude with selections from the legendary “Apartment Tapes.”
At the same time, Geffen will release a two CD, 59 song set of rarities. This package, entitled, Down The Line/Rarities, will also include both the entire undubbed legendary “Apartment Tapes” and the entirety of the undubbed “Garage Tapes,” recorded with The Crickets in Holly’s family garage. The set is rounded out with outtakes and alternates of familiar recordings by Buddy and The Crickets.
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I just picked up the 2003 edition of the Toby Press paperback "A Tale of Two Cities" by Charles Dickens. It was typeset in Garamond by Jerusalem Typesetting, and it was printed and bound in the US by Thompson-Shore, Inc., of Michigan. [i also picked up the Bill Graham auto-biography, mentioned juat a couple of posts ago....For all of the Rock stories, including Zeppelin, among, many, many others...]
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way- in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only. -
I found the 568p. 1992 Bill Graham auto-biography, that he wrote with Robert Greenfield, at the Half-Price bookstore today. I just happened to flip the book open, to the chapter specifiaclly devoted to Led Zeppelin. I began reading.... and it was all about the 1977 Day on the Green goings on. Besides what Bill had to say, there were specific remeberances and quotes from:
PETER BARSOTI
BONNIE SIMMONS
JIM DOWNEY
JIM MATZORKIS
NICHOLAS CLAINOS
ROBERT PLANT
I went ahead and bought the book. It's just plain interesting to read about the world of concerts from the perspective of someone like Bill Graham, born Wolfgang Grajonca, and who escaped the Nazi's as a child by crossing Europe by foot, and, won a bronze star for his valor in Korea.
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I also ran across this article from Proximity that covers some things from July of 1977.
Though he {Bill Graham} may never have felt vindicated, some kind of a truce must have been reached by 1985, when the paths of Graham and Zeppelin crossed again at Live Aid in Philadelphia. And as stage manager of the Atlantic 40th Anniversary concert in 1988, Graham nixed the idea of an all-star jam to close the show, accurately stating, "No offense to anybody else on the bill, but nobody could follow Zeppelin!"Despite the trouble in Oakland, the band left California with the intention of completing the final seven dates of the tour, arriving in New Orleans on the 26th to prepare for their July 30 show at the 80,000 seat Superdome. It was here that Robert Plant got the trans-Atlantic call bearing the tragic news of his son's death, and the remaining dates were immediately cancelled.
http://www.oldbuckeye.com/prox/77tour.html
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I want to read over the information in the Graham book {BILL GRAHAM PRESENTS} several times, to really get the picture that he is painting.
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I wish the posts in this thread ahered to the Thread Title, and were exclusively about movies that you went to see at a movie theater... Anyway, that's hwat I assumed the thread topic was about from it's worded title.
I saw MARELY & ME and it was a good movie.
Anyone that has ever owned a dog should see this movie.
I'm glod I did.
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There are three "trailers" now at :
One is a Teaser Trailer
Another is the "Trailer"
And another is a TV Spot which is taken from the "Trailer".
One place listed as a filming location is Vasquez Rocks Natural Area Park, Agua Dulce, California,
I may check this movie out at the IMAX Theater. I have never yet seen a feature film at the IMAX.
I'm hopeful that it will at least as much acting as action.
Spock looks good.
But the Kirk character.... I hope I'm not dissapointed with Chris Pine's acting, as I was with Mark Wahlberg's under-acting, in The Planet Of The Apes....
Funny, how the Swiss, Beligum, and the French get May 6th Release Dates ? ? ?
But, the Special "World" Premiers are not yet noted....
http://www.startrekmovie.com/releasedates/
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And Robert's lyrics sung with passion and spiritual loft...his best effort by far. Beats Kashmir in complexity and ferocity.
Simply put - Achilles Last Stand is a masterpiece for generations to come.
Complexity for the sake of complexity..... is much like speed for the sake of speed...
Or Loudness for the sake of Loudness....
It may have it's devoted followers..... but Louder is not always better... than softer, etc.
They use the same resoning for argueing that Neal Peart is a better drummer than John Henry Bonham, becuase Neal's drumming ... is more "complex"....
You want complexity ? ? Don't begin and end with ALS.... Seek out Jazz .... Now that's complex...
I think that ALS is for 12 year olds..... Or the mentality of a 12 year old....
And, those that are facinated with complexity...
Nothing wrong with that....
I was never in to Zeppelin when I was 12. Went straight from The Beatles ... to Led Zeppelin.
No KISS or Def Leppard to "bridge" the gap....
But complexity for the sake of complexity... doesn't get me.
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Lunch made me Happy today.....
Someone else paid for it....
And it was Sunny... in the midst of cooler weather.
Yesterday... I was made happy after getting my car washed.
It had been a long long time.... and it was rerally ditry from the sanding from the last cold snap...
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Before I start, let me slip into my Nomex undies because i'm sure to get flamed.
Most of the polls i've seen around here about LZ's greatest songs usually include ALS and I have a tough time with it. I just don't think it's one of their better songs. Sorry, but to me it's gets boring and I wouldn't even list it in my Top 20 of their library. Even on Presence, which I think is one of their better albums, i would listen to Hots On, NFBM or Royal Orleans long before Achilles. In fact, i can remember skipping over the song to get to FYL and RO back when it was a new record.
Geez, I know i'm committing a felony here, but I got to get it out.
I agree, ALS is not considered by me to be one of Zeppelin's Greatest works......
A GOOD work by anyone's standards......
But.... up against the other great Zeppelin works, ALS is not top of the tops.
Seems like -many- younger fans really take a liking to ALS, as one of their very favorite Zeppelin tracks. But, even back in the day... ALS NEVER eclipsed the great Zeppelin tracks that had come before..
I can stand to listen to ALS about once a year....
NOw.... I'm going to go listen to live versions of other Zeppelin songs....
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A Side Note:
The US Postal Service is issuing an Edgar Allan Poe Stamp this Jan. 16th.
In 2009, the U.S. Postal Service commemorates the 200th anniversary of the birth of Edgar Allan Poe, one of America’s most extraordinary poets and fiction writers. For more than a century and a half, Poe and his works have been praised by admirers around the world, including English poet laureate Alfred, Lord Tennyson, who dubbed Poe “the literary glory of America.” British author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle called him “the supreme original short story writer of all time.”
The stamp portrait of Edgar Allan Poe is by award-winning artist Michael J. Deas, whose research over the years has made him well acquainted with Poe’s appearance. In 1989, Deas published The Portraits and Daguerreotypes of Edgar Allan Poe, a comprehensive collection of images featuring authentic likenesses as well as derivative portraits.
Scheduled issue date: Jan. 16 in Richmond, VA.
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After the storms moved through this morning, and the dark skies dissappeared....
The Sun is out and Blue Skies are about !!
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New Years Eve on the shores of the world's most beautiful harbour in my shorts and tee shirt, sipping on cold beers, eating lobster and prawns, watching fireworks and listening to great music with the family.
It doesn't get any better than that.
We do that, in a similar sort of way on July 4th ....
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34 F winds 17 mph, wind chill 12 .... It's COLD
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79 Degrees F - Sunny
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BTY, the closest Full Moon of 2009, will be on Jan. 9th........
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Well, Friday night, I looked up at the Moon, and this noght there were some clouds in the area.....
What was special about tonoght's viewing was the large cloud circle around the moon....
THat was nice to look at......
But still, the brillance of the Moon around midnight Thursday evening was something !
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Another astronomical treat that could be seen tonight and for the next two nights is the annual Geminid meteor shower, one of the year’s best displays of shooting stars. Up to 100 meteors an hour can fly across the sky. The meteors, which are easy to spot with the naked eye, appear to shoot out from the constellation Gemini, hence their name, but they can be seen all over the sky. However, with a full moon so bright, the best place to look is away from the Moon.
Meteor showers happen when the Earth passes through clouds of debris shed from comets. As the tiny fragments smash into the Earth’s upper atmosphere at about 100,000mph, they burn up in streaks of light.
For reasons that are not understood, the Geminid meteor showers are tending to grow stronger each year.
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If the full moon tonight looks unusually large, it is not your imagination – it is the biggest and brightest full moon to be seen for 15 years.
Each month the Moon makes a full orbit around the Earth in a slightly oval-shaped path, and tonight it will swing by the Earth at its closest distance, or perigee. It will pass by 356,613km (221,595 miles) away, which is about 28,000km closer than average.
The unusual feature of tonight is that the perigee also coincides with a full moon, which will make it appear 14 per cent bigger and some 30 per cent brighter than most full moons this year – so long as the clouds hold off from blocking the view.
In addition to this lunar flypast, much of Britain may also be treated to a strange phenomenon known as the moon illusion. As the Moon rises in the late afternoon, it will appear even larger as it lies close to the horizon. Psychologists have tried to explain this as a trick of the eye, as the landscape on the horizon appears to make the Moon loom much larger, an effect that disappears as the Moon rises above the horizon, although viewing it through a tube, such as a toilet roll, can make it look large again.
With the Moon approaching so close to the Earth, its gravity will pull a slightly higher tide than normal for a full moon. This so-called perigeal tide adds about 0.5m (1.6ft) to the high-water mark, and with freshening southwesterly winds forecast, this may cause some flooding, especially along parts of the South West coast.
Tonight’s full moon is also notable for rising to its greatest height in the night sky for the entire year, lying almost overhead at midnight. This is because we are approaching the winter solstice, on December 21, and thanks to the tilt of the Earth the Moon appears at its highest, as the Sun is at its lowest.
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Paid sick leave
From Yesterday ? ? ? ?
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What the heck is that ? Their lovechild ? Ole Robot got him some action !!!!
But does she feel guilty.... like the chick in Heavy metal that had sex with a machine ??
Remembering Buddy Holly -- The Day The Music Died
in Other Bands / Music
Posted
I agree.... I thought it was just so marvelous to hear the outakes from ITTOD, and John Henry Bonham's magical and wonderful beats.
We can't get enough of Buddy Holly !!