FOLLOW me on my popular Twitter feed. Just click this photo! @hbbtruth - David - Common sense on #Politics #PublicPolicy #Sports #PopCulture in USA, Great Britain, Sweden and France, via my life in #Texas #Memphis #Miami #IU #Chicago #DC #FL 🛫🌍📺📽️🏈. Photo is of Elvis and Joan Blackman in 'Blue Hawaii'
Beautiful Stockholm at night, looking west towards Gamla Stan
ABCNetwork YouTube Channel video: "Rayna's Daughters Perform Sound Check" - Lennon & Maisy Stella (as Daphne & Maddie Conrad ) get to perform a cover of The Lumineers' song "Ho Hey" for sound check at their mom Rayna's concert in New York City. Uploaded April 4, 2013. http://youtu.be/PTNGVCqsZCA
Pitch-perfect 'Nashville' is only getting better: ABC-TV's 'Nashville' continues to enchant me with its great music, terrific cast and compelling storylines with moments large and small that ring true in every episode, reaching right inside your heart and your head; Lennon & Maisy Stella (as Daphne & Maddie Conrad ) cover The Lumineers' song "Ho Hey"; Rascal Flatts "Changed" video featuring "Nashville's" Charles "Chip" Esten
ABCNetwork YouTube Channel video: Rascal Flatts "Changed" - ABC Music Lounge. Rascal Flatts video for "Changed" featuring 'Nashville's' Charles "Chip" Esten. Uploaded April 3, 2013. http://youtu.be/6d2iDPm5Foc
ABCNetwork YouTube Channel video: Rascal Flatts "Changed" - Making of video- ABC Music Lounge. Rascal Flatts and 'Nashville's' Charles "Chip" Esten. Uploaded April 3, 2013. http://youtu.be/tUA3Al28b2c See also: The New Republic Connie Britton: The Blue States’ Red State Dream Girl By Noreen Malone October 12, 2012 http://www.newrepublic.com/article/books-and-arts/108426/connie-britton-the-blue-states%E2%80%99-red-state-dream-girl Ivy League Small-World-Afterall Trivia: At the same time that Connie Britton was an Asian Studies major at Dartmouth, next door in Massachusetts, Mira Sorvino was an East Asian Studies major at Harvard. Seven years after graduating, Connie acted with Mira's father, veteran actor Paul Sorvino.
My last blog post on 'Nashville' was on February 25, 2013, titled, Sweet, sweet music to our ears: the 'Nashville' soundtrack album; 'Nashville' star Hayden Panettiere (Juliette Barnes) sings "Fame" and "Consider Me"; Clare Bowen (Scarlett O'Connor) and Sam Palladio (Gunnar Scott) sing "If I Didn't Know Better," and cause a ripple to turn into a wave; #ABCNashville, @haydenpanettier http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2013/02/sweet-sweet-music-to-our-ears-nashville.html My last blog post on Rascal Flatts was December 19, 2012, titled, Two great new songs from Jill Johnson - "A Woman Can Change Her Mind," and her duet with Rascal Flatts, "Come Wake Me Up" http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/12/two-great-new-songs-from-jill-johnson.html
Hia80 YouTube Channel video: The Ark - Calleth You Cometh I (LIVE at Allsång på Skansen 2003, Stockholm) Uploaded May 28, 2008. http://youtu.be/u5PNmHCvZg8
In my music-oriented post of this past Monday, titled, Sweet, sweet music to our ears: the 'Nashville' soundtrack album; 'Nashville' star Hayden Panettiere (Juliette Barnes) sings "Fame" and "Consider Me"; Clare Bowen (Scarlett O'Connor) and Sam Palladio (Gunnar Scott) sing "If I Didn't Know Better," and cause a ripple to turn into a wave; #ABCNashville, @haydenpanettier http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2013/02/sweet-sweet-music-to-our-ears-nashville.html I mentioned that I'd spent a good part of Saturday listening to the sweet sounds of the "Nashville" soundtrack album from the ABC-TV show, but that in between, around two o'clock, I hopped onto my computer and rode the Internet to Sweden and our friends at SVT Play. Then, from thousands of miles away, I watched LIVE the fourth heat of this year's Melodifestivalenin Mälmo to send Sweden's representative to the 2013 Eurovision Song Contest. http://www.eurovision.tv/page/malmo-2013
Since Sweden won last year in Azerbaijan with Loreen, Sweden will be hosting this year's competition in May. In fact, in the very arena where last Saturday's competition was held. I also mentioned that it was probably the worst individual heat I'd seen in years, and that I even felt obliged at times to mute the volume because I was so NOT feeling it! :-( What I didn't mention then was that the only time where I actually stood up and paid attention was when they introduced teen singer Ulrik Munther. And that's only because the music intro they used to fire-up the crowd as he walked across the catwalk and onto the stage -at 0:45:33 here, http://www.svt.se/melodifestivalen/se-program/23-2-20-00?autostart=true was The Ark's "Calleth You Cometh I," only one of the most melodic and punchy pop song of the past 25 years, and one of my Swedish favorites. Literally, a song I have hummed to myself while stuck in traffic more times than I can count. Which is why I have two versions of the song above today for you to see. The second video was uploaded by Hia80, known here on the blog as "Sofia from Umeå," who was the savvy person we all have to thank for recording those four simply amazing videos of Robyn performing LIVE in concert in Skellefteå back on July 1, 2011, which I posted here a week later on July 9th, a post which received a ton of hits from all around the world: Wow! Sofia in Umeå -a.k.a. Hia80- has four must-see home videos of Robyn performing at Skellefteå 2011 last Friday http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2011/07/wow-sofia-in-umea-aka-hia80-has-four.html Sofia's YouTubeChannel is at http://www.youtube.com/user/Hia80 Check it out and subscribe!
ABCNetwork YouTube Channel video: 'Nashville' star Hayden Panettiere (Juliette Barnes) sings "Fame" at the Ryman Auditorium. Uploaded February 24, 2013. http://youtu.be/X2hnCfrIxyA
Listened all day Saturday to the amazing 'Nashville' soundtrack album. That is, before and after watching Melodifestivalen's Fourth Heat in Malmö on SVT Play Saturday around 2 p.m., 8 in Stockholm, by far the worst group of songs performed so far in this year's contest. I even had to mute the sound for some!:-( http://www.svtplay.se/video/1033650/deltavling-4
'Nashville' stars Clare Bowen (Scarlett O'Connor) and Sam Palladio (Gunnar Scott) sing "If I Didn't Know Better" (entire song) Uploaded October 2, 2012. http://youtu.be/gAI_1FsJ8rE
As a beloved music icon begins to leave the stage for good, due to Alzheimer's, we stop and wonder if a more beautiful song could possibly be sung about two such incongruous words? "Wichita Lineman," et al - Glen Campbell's Long Goodbye makes us so very sad and wistful; see him while you can...
Allansmix YouTube Channel video: Glen Campbell Tribute - 45th CMA Awards 2011 on ABC-TV, Bridgestone Arena, Nashville Tennessee, November 9, 2011. Medley: By the Time I Get To Phoenix - Vince Gill, Wichita Lineman - Keith Urban, Galveston - Brad Paisley. https://youtu.be/gTWxvJndGDc
In a career that has spanned five decades, his last concert ever in Los Angeles was held Sunday night, at The Hollywood Bowl, and I'd have given anything to have been there to see that. Do I even need to tell you here that Glen Campbell won't be playing in South Florida?
No, because you come here so often, and you know how things are down here in South Florida and quite naturally, assumed that he wasn't, as well you should, because the closest he'll be coming to a city and region like Miami that thinks it's so important in the larger scheme of things is Panama City.
How do you like those apples, Miami?
Glen Campbell's final tour, ever, and the closest he's coming to me is the part of Florida that's just eastern Alabama -on July 15th. http://glencampbellmusic.com/tour/
If that doesn't say it all...
RockShorts video: Glen Campbell performs three songs on the Mike Douglas Show. September 23, 1965. http://youtu.be/FqRqGGOwDdI
Glen Cambell March 2, 2012 interview on WBUR-FM, Boston
officialglencampbell video: Glen Campbell -"A Better Place" (Official Video) June 14, 2012.From the "Ghost on the Canvas" CD. http://youtu.be/JMh78jF-fMQ
As a young kid growing-up in Memphis when Jimmy Webb's Wichita Lineman came out in 1968, not just a huge hit in the U.S., but an international hit by someone from next-door Arkansas, I personally knew SO many women who cried whenever they heard this song.
"And I need you more than want you..."
officialglencampbell video: Glen Campbell - Wichita Lineman (Live, CBS-TV's "The Glen Campbell Goodtime Hour") January 29, 1969. Uploaded March 12, 2009. http://youtu.be/-HFCuBLAjXo
It was only when I asked one of the aunts of the kids I always played with, who frequently visited on weekends, that I learned why that was so, at least in their case, since I just didn't understand it.
One day, remembering that I'd asked her before about that, she had me sit on a swing outside and there, standing beside me, told me that she wanted to answer my question. But that I had to promise to keep it a secret, most especially from her nephew, my friend.
She explained to me that her sister-in-law, my friend's mom, like many other families living in that nice, new apt. complex, and even that particular part of Memphis, had husbands, fathers and uncles who were serving in Vietnam.
I've never forgotten the way that whole scene played out that day, because the woman who told me that also eventually revealed that she'd already lost one brother in Vietnam, and had another brother, my friend's father, still over there.
And that it weighed on all of their minds -all the time.
She told me that was why his mother always seemed so sad and yet so high-strung.
I filed that away in my little kid's mental notebook, so that when my friend's mom would sometimes make a big deal about something relatively minor, be over-dramatic for no particular reason, esp. about his safety, and start crying, I'd know that it was probably more than just the situation that was weighing on her mind.
That it was actually everything else that she was thinking of. And that try as she might to keep it all bottled up inside, so her son wouldn't worry all the time, sometimes, it gets out.
After my family and I moved to South Florida that summer, and eventually found ourselves living in North Miami Beach, I know that one of the very first things that I noticed once school started for me was something that I'm sure most other kids I came to know probably never thought about. All of them had their fathers and older brothers around
Like nearly everyone we met in NMB, they seemed remarkably unaffected and disconnected to what was going on over there, and didn't seem to actually know someone who was directly connected to the war. Especially compared to how it seemed like nearly everyone we knew in Memphis, regardless of race or age, even families like ours that had moved there from somewhere else -for us, from a big military town like San Antonio- knew many guys involved in the conflict in one way or another.
But here, well, not so much.
Make of that what you will, but over the years I've often found myself in social situations where the majority of the group I belonged to, while thinking it was typical, was, in fact, quite atypical, maybe even somewhat elitist. And sometimes, when you get to the heart of it, one of the things that was clear to me was that they didn't know anyone who was directly involved in the most controversial issue of the past fifty years, nobody who had a direct connection to the war.
To them, it was like an abstract idea.
We all saw that that political disconnect very clearly with the rise of Reagan Democrats in 1980 and '84, and it's one of the reasons that the national Democratic Party of today now holds so little favor with such large chunks of this country, especially in The Plains and The South. It's no accident.
CBS News 60 Minutes: Taylor Swift: A young singer's meteoric rise. November 20, 2011. Correspondent Lesley Stahl profiles and interviews the dynamic 21-year old singer who keeps her feet firmly on the ground while entertaining and charming her millions of fans all over the world.
