Keep it rocking and rolling?

I’ve been listening to CDs in my car lately, as I’m tired of hearing commercials every 5-10 minutes on the radio. 

Plus, it's hard to get a good station in some days, as the signals are weak in places. What does come in... is country, Spanish, religion (Christian), political (Republican) and a couple themed stations with one off names (Bob-FM, Arrow). I like NPR, but now that we're in the season of giving, mixed with the "we are sorry to interrupt the programming, but we could use some help" (aka "please donate" messages), it's time to start listening to something more solid.  

Over the past month or so, I had on rotation various Goldie albums along with some other electronic music. This week I’ve started “normal” stuff like Casey Kasem Presents: America's Top 10 Through Years - The 1970. I’ve got another Casey Kasem disc labeled Casey Kasem Presents: America's Top 10 Through the Years - The 1960s that brings back the youth of people older than me but memories of big family parties and road trips. The latter also brings back the "sing by yourself as you cruise back and forth to work" with the comment of "No throat singing" (see previous posts regarding this). Yea... try to belt out Roy Orbison's  Crying and tell me how you manage that falsetto without getting all out of breath. 

Meanwhile, what I started listening to the other day, is a six disc anthology set of American Folk Music as put together by Harry Smith (the disc linked is not the official cover as I had gotten them. The official one looks like this, which is unavailable on Amazon). With everything going on in this world right now, listening to stuff from the 1920s and 1930s seems like a bad thing.. like some sort of heresy... because "the woke / cancel culture" has changed the landscape of everything we do. 

Don't get me wrong - I'm not trying to say certain issues aren't problems, as I acknowledge there is some challenges in the world, but when the simple things we knew "back in the day" are getting taken away from us (why have banned books? Who and what are they really hurting???), it's no wonder why something labeled as "an eclectic and idiosyncratic mixture of blues and hillbilly songs, ballads old and new, dance music, gospel, and numerous other performances less easy to classify" (Amazon synopsis on Harry Smith's Anthology of American Folk Music: America changed through music by Thomas Ruys Smith) feels like you're doing something illegal. And its not being taken away... yet. At least not that I know of.  

Although, to continue on with the book synopsis, "Where previous collections of folk music, both printed and recorded, had privileged field recordings and oral transmission, Smith purposefully shaped his collection from previously released commercial records, pointedly blurring established racial boundaries in his selection and organisation of performances. Indeed, more than just a ground-breaking collection of old recordings, the Anthology was itself a kind of performance on the part of its creator", it really shouldn't be something to make you feel guilty or look over your shoulder about, thinking you're going to get arrested. It's a part of the history of sound. - how we got to where we are now. 

According to Folkways.si.edu (a Smithsonian Institute site), the Anthology "is one of the most influential releases in the history of recorded sound. Originally issued by Folkways Records in 1952, the Anthology brought virtually unknown parts of America's musical landscape recorded in the late 1920s and early 1930s to the public's attention. For more than half a century, the collection has profoundly influenced fans, ethnomusicologists, music historians, and cultural critics; it has inspired generations of popular musicians, including Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Jerry Garcia, and countless others. Many of the songs included in the Anthology have now become classics". 

Like I said, it's almost as if not matter how you try to rationalize it, it feels somewhat dirty. Sure, if this music wasn't around, the questions become, "would we have the 'Folk Generation'?" or "would any of the elder musicians still recording now, actually be around now, if it wasn't for certain pioneers of the 1920s and 1930s?". 

For example and side note: 

Look at some of the sketch comedies we roll in the aisles in laughter over. Would those be safe or made if the shoulders they are currently stand on, didn't exist a decade ago? What about a century ago? How about the pioneers in movies from the last millennia? All the history we have from black and white film with people like Charlie Chaplin and his United Artists group (Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks, D. W. Griffith ) didn't end when the foursome split up and MGM grabbed the company ("Suppose Mary Pickford divorces Douglas Fairbanks"). It exploded into what we recently saw with actor strikes because technology has gotten out of hand (along with pay and other incidents). 

If we didn't keep innovating, would anyone know the reference of The Tramp? What about Al Jolson's Black Face (bad kind of example, I know, but it's part of his history) and the Jazz Singer? Look at the different remakes that film has had. What about all the film nods to Mae West and her brashness? Everyone misquotes Lady Lou and thinks nothing of it. How about Rock Hudson or Cary Grant? Would Marilyn Monroe have been seen as a nobody if she wasn't in the right places at the right times? Okay, sure, maybe the JFK / Mafia conspiracy with Marilyn wouldn't also be in existence, but also, would it? Would Mel Brooks have helped launch so many comedians? Saturday Night Live and MAD TV might have not been around if it weren't for their forecomicfathers. 

I'm totally getting off topic and digging myself into a hole I probably shouldn't have started scratching at. So to go back to the original thought at hand: is listening to stuff from 100 years ago really hurtful? Will I be going out and causing problems by knowing these songs existed? No. I'm going to be the better person and learn from that era and want to do more research about it. Plus, I think the more I'm circling the drain any more with crazy references to prove points, it won't end well. 

Therefore, I think I'm going to change the subject one more time and call it a day.

I caught a gecko the other day in the garage and released it back into the wild.

Apparently it's been hanging out too long where my mother parks, and once I was able to get it in the catcher, he hasn't shown his little head since. Which means, hopefully, he's bothering someone else. 

As per usual lately, the photos were taken on an iPhone 11. I did some slight editing and dropped them here.