The Countertop Chronicles

And I am not frightened of dying, any time will do, I
don’t mind. Why should I be frightened of dying?
There’s no reason for it, you’ve gotta go sometime.

If you can hear this whispering you are dying.

I never said I was frightened of dying.

RIP, Richard Wright

From a post originally published August 11, 2005

We also mourned, this weekend, the anniversary of the death of two truly fine guitar players. Saturday was the 13th Anniversary of Jerry Garcia’s passing.

Today, we mourn the sixth anniversary of Widespread Panic guitarist Michael Houser who died from pancreatic cancer August 10th, 2002.

For the geeks out there - this was his killer setup - complete with the “If Its Too Loud, Your Too Old” bumper sticker.

Over his last five or so years, he developed a problem with his leg that required him to sit down during performances. That is how most of Widespread Panic’s current crop of fans remember him.

I’ll keep the vision of his solitary figure standing on stage right, head hung down with his flop of hair covering his face - wailing away with a blistering Michael Bloomfield-esque riff behind whatever groove the band settled into.

Rest In Peace good buddy

RIP

RIP Ellas Otha Bates

Diddley died of heart failure at his home in Archer, Fla., spokeswoman Susan Clary said. He had suffered a heart attack in August, three months after suffering a stroke while touring in Iowa. Doctors said the stroke affected his ability to speak, and he had returned to Florida to continue rehabilitation.

One of my fondest memories, was catching him in the Spring of 1991 under the Tent at Knoxville’s World Fair Park. Opened up with Hey Bo Diddley.

Went with my roommate, we were smack dab in the center, second row. Mayor of Knoxville at the time (Victor Ashe???) sat in front of us, and he and his entourage got up after the press left. Bo let people video tape his first song, but then threatened to stop playing if he saw any other video cameras in the audience.

He put on a great show - and came back out with a killer Hey Bo Diddley after the recordings had stopped. Apparently, there was a dispute over money before the show started. I was surprised at all of this, but he was a rock pioneer, and probably learned the hard way that he needed cash up front or he was gonna get screwed.

”They copied everything I did, upgraded it, messed it up. It seems to me that nobody can come up with their own thing, they have to put a little bit of Bo Diddley there,” he said.

Despite his success, Diddley claimed he only received a small portion of the money he made during his career. Partly as a result, he continued to tour and record music until his stroke. Between tours, he made his home near Gainesville in north Florida.

”Seventy ain’t nothing but a damn number,” he told The Associated Press in 1999. ”I’m writing and creating new stuff and putting together new different things. Trying to stay out there and roll with the punches. I ain’t quit yet.”

Diddley, like other artists of his generations, was paid a flat fee for his recordings and said he received no royalty payments on record sales. He also said he was never paid for many of his performances.

”I am owed. I’ve never got paid,” he said. ”A dude with a pencil is worse than a cat with a machine gun.”

RIP Bo. I’ll drink one to you.

RIP, Dr. Hoffman

Albert Hofmann, 102, a Swiss chemist and accidental father of LSD who came to view the much-vilified and abused hallucinogen he discovered in 1938 as his “problem child,” died April 29 at his home in Burg, a village near Basel, Switzerland, after a heart attack.

Dr. Hofmann came across LSD while working on medicinal uses of a fungus to act as a circulatory heart-lung stimulant. His first LSD “trip” occurred in 1943, a troubling experience that led him to write in his journal, “A demon had invaded me, had taken possession of my body, mind and soul.”

After its discovery, LSD was viewed as a wonder drug with the potential to treat problems including schizophrenia and alcoholism. For the latter, some held the theory that chronic drinkers quit only after experiencing the hallucinations of delirium tremens.

LSD attracted many prominent advocates. They included Aldous Huxley, the author of “Brave New World,” and psychologist Timothy Leary, who saw the drug as a potent way for people to live up to his 1960s counterculture motto: “Turn on, tune in, drop out.”

Indeed - body, mind and soul

In his honor - here’s a little of the Good ‘Ol Grateful Dead in a fitting tribute

He’s Gone Jam ->
The Other One->
Spanish Jam ->
Mind Left Body Jam - >
The Other One

Here’s the complete set list
10-17-74 Winterland Arena, San Francisco, Ca. (Thu)
1: Promised, Half Step, B. T. Wind, FOTD, Jack Straw, Loser, El Paso, China Cat> I Know You Rider, Me & My Uncle, Roses, WRS Prelude> WRS Part 1> Let It Grow
1.5: Phil & Ned
2: Scarlet, Big River, Ramble On, Mexicali, He’s Gone> Other One> Spanish Jam> Mind Left Body Jam> Other One> Stella Blue, Sugar Magnolia
E: Casey Jones, U. S. Blues
“Casey Jones” appears on “Steal Your Face”

The New York Times weighs in

”I had to leave work for home because I was suddenly hit by a sudden feeling of unease and mild dizziness,” he subsequently wrote in a memo to company bosses.

”Everything I saw was distorted as in a warped mirror,” he said, describing his bicycle ride home. ”I had the impression I was rooted to the spot. But my assistant told me we were actually going very fast.”

Upon reaching home, Hofmann began experiencing what he called ”wonderful visions.”

Here’s some more of the freak show

Space -> (Walk Me Out In) The Morning Dew

10-18-74 Winterland Arena, San Francisco, Ca. (Fri)
1: Around, Sugaree, Mexicali, Peggy-O, BIODTL, B. E. Women, Cumberland, El Paso, Tennessee Jed, Jack Straw, Row Jimmy, WRS Prelude> WRS Part 1> Let It Grow
2: Phil & Ned> Jam> Dark Star> Morning Dew
3: Promised> Bertha> Greatest, Ship Of Fools, NFA> GDTRFB> Saturday Night
E: U. S. Blues
“Beer Barrel Polka” tuning before “Mexicali” - final “WRS Part 1″ - final “WRS Prelude” - “Sugaree”, “BIODTL” and “Ship Of Fools” appear on “Steal Your Face”

For what its worth - I’d LOVE to get my hands on this complete show.

Both of these really.

Wow. Just Wow!!!!!

Zooooombabababoombatrippaloomba, you listening????????

There is sorrow enough in the natural way
From men and women to fill our day;
But when we are certain of sorrow in store,
Why do we always arrange for more?
Brothers and sisters, I bid you beware
Of giving your heart to a dog to tear.

–Rudyard Kipling

December 24, 1999 - February 9, 2008

RIP Beaux. Your a good buddy. Chase a squirrel in that big field in the sky for me. We’ll miss you.

Quiet Riot singer Kevin Dubrow was found dead yesterday in his Las Vegas home.

RIP Kevin.

In 1983, this was one of the biggest song in America, reaching #5 on the billboard charts and propelling Metal Health to the #1 sales slot (knocking off The Police’s Synchronicity) and selling 6 million albums.

So you think I’ve got an evil mind
I’ll tell you honey
I don’t know why
I don’t know why
So you think my singin’s out of time
It makes me money
I don’t know why
I don’t know why
Anymore, oh no

So come on feel the noise
Girls grab your boys
We’ll get wild, wild, wild
wild, wild, wild
come on feel the noise
Girls rock your boys
We get wild, wild, wild
Til dawn

So you say I got a funny face
I got no worries
And I don’t know why
I don’t know why
you say I’m a scum bag well it’s no disgrace
I’m in no hurry
And I don’t know why
I don’t know why
Anymore,

So come on feel the noise
Girls rock your boys
We’ll get wild, wild, wild
We get wild, wild, wild
Come on feel the noise
Girls rock your boys
We get wild, wild, wild
Until dawn

well think we have a lazy time
you should know better
I don’t know why
I don’t know why
And you say I got a dirty mind
well I’m a mean go-getter!
I don’t know why
I don’t know why
Anymore, oh no

So come on feel the noise
Girls rock your boys
We get wild, wild, wild
We get wild, wild, wild
So come on feel the noise
Girls rock your boys
We get wild, wild, wild
Until dawn

Tried to leave this as a comment to Ravnwoods post on the certain rise in gas prices from the just passed
energy bill. Alas, his spam filter is keeping me out.

Not just higher, but significantly higher.

And don’t forget, the already quite expensive renewable energy share of your gas purchase will be increasing and rising even further in price (while jacking up the cost of food at the same time). All while providing a 1/3 decrease in efficiency (necessitating your use of even more energy)

Yep, Democrats really are the working man’s party.

Interestingly, if Democrats wanted to really help out us working slobs AND stick it to the gas companies they’d cut out the ethanol subsidies altogether.

There are two main ones:

A 54 cent/gallon import tariff that keeps brazilian ethanol off the market and destroys any hope of ree market mechanisms working (ie: forcing domestic ethanol companies and corn growers to become more efficient).

The second is a 51 cent a bushel (1.53/gallon) tax credit for BLENDING etjanol into gas. Now, who BLENDS gasoline for commercial sale?? That’s right, the gas companies!!

Instead of hitting them hard, the energy bill (once finalized) is going to increase taxes on consumers, artifically raise the price of corn (and food), and provide the gas companies a 55,807,000,000 subsidy (yes, you read that correct, a 55 billion dollar a year subsidy at its peak in 2022 - 1.53×36 billion gallons).

UPDATE added this to the obits category since its basically the death of common sense.

RIP Brad Delp

I saw Boston once, in about 1988 or so at the Brendan Byrne Arena. They were the masters of arena rock and good guys (high tech engineers when not pretending to be rock stars) too.

Rock and Roll Band
Boston

Well, we were just another band out of Boston
On the road to try to make ends meet
Playin’ all the bars, sleepin’ in our cars
And we practiced right on out in the street
No, we didn’t have much money
We barely made enough to survive
But when we got up on stage and got ready to play
People came alive.

Rock and roll band
Everybody’s waitin’
Gettin’ crazy
Anticipating love and music
Play, play, play, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah

Dancin’ in the streets of Hyannis
We were getting pretty good at the game
People stood in line and didn’t seem to mind
You know everybody knew our name
Livin’ on rock-n-roll music
Never worry ’bout the things we were missing
When we got up on the stage and got ready to play
Everybody’d listen.

Rock and roll band
Everybody’s waitin’
Gettin’ crazy
Anticipating love and music
Play, play, play, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah

Playin’ for a week in Rhode Island
A man came to the stage one night
He smoked a big cigar
Drove a Cadillac car
And said, “Boys, I think this bands outta-sight
Sign a record company contract
You know I’ve got great expectations
When I hear you on the car radio
You’re goin’ to be a sensation!”

Rock and roll band
Everybody’s waitin’
Gettin’ crazy
Anticipating love and music
Play, play, play, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah