Various and Sundry

Just read a Rolling Stone interview. Jon Stewart interviewing Bruce Springsteen.
That's my kind of interview, baby. Two creative and successful guys who are also exceptionally intelligent, informed, and outspoken.
Who knew comedy and rock 'n roll could evolve to this point?
Although the roots were there decades ago.
Sixties rock was all about rebellion. Shining a light on lies, hypocrisy and injustice. Questioning an entire way of life.
Comedy had Lenny Bruce and Richard Pryor and Redd Fox and George Carlin.
The marriage of great art with intelligence and social activism is powerful, and brings serious attention to disciplines that some might consider diversions.
Springsteen just put out an album called Wrecking Ball which deals with all the financial bullshit that has occurred over the last four years and how the regular working stiff is the one paying the price. First album, first tour without the Big Man.
Talking about the financial meltdown, Bruce says: "All the radical hippies, longhairs - no one ever came as close to sinking the USA as the guys in the pinstriped suits." And:"This is what the guys at Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers forgot. They forgot that they are a part of a continuum of history, and it's not about the f***ing buck that you make today at whoever's f***ing expense. If there's not a sense of continuity, a sense of some sort of communal obligation and responsibility, a sense of a future involved in what you're doing, and a sense of being beholden to the past, you end up being one shallow, greedy motherf***er, just trying to get all you can."
Great interview.

ALL THINGS STONES:
Read that the Rolling Stones will not be going out on a fiftieth anniversary tour this year. Shooting for 2013. I'm disappointed, I was gearing up to find a way no matter what of attending one of their concerts. But then again this gives me another year to get rich and famous so I can afford to go, without sucking all the equity (which is rapidly diminishing thanks to Wall Street f***s) out of my house.
There were comments in the article alluding to worries about Keith's health. As you know he fell out of a tree onto his head on vacation in Fiji in April 2006, and some say his guitar playing suffered as a result. After The Bigger Bang tour, he stopped playing completely. All this health stuff is getting to me because............................
My soul is pining away though because I am also worried about The Allman Brothers. Gregg looks and sounds awful. Very old, very tired, very unhealthy. They are doing the Beacon right now and some reviews I read say Gregg is struggling. Other nights he kicks ass.
But if there is no Allman Brothers tour this summer and no Stones, I will be hard pressed to find something substantial musically to feed my soul.
Maybe Justin Bieber.
Although it is widely believed that 2012 marks The Stones 50th, Keith says: "The Stones always really considered '63 to be 50 years, because Charlie didn't actually join until January. We look upon 2012 as sort of the year of conception, but the birth is next year."
Works for me.
Also Bill Wyman, their original bassist, recently sat in with The Stones for the first time since leaving the band in 1992. Sparking rumors that he might join them on tour.
Very cool.
There is a Stones documentary coming out in the fall tracing the band's entire 50 year journey, and it's packed with unseen footage and unreleased music. That will serve as a substantial appetizer for me as a prelude to front row seats for me and my lovely wife in 2013.

Davy Jones is dead at 66. Life is strange. When he auditioned for The Monkees at the age of 19, he was already an accomplished actor on TV and Broadway and London stages. He got into The Monkees, who blazed for two or three years, then it all fell apart and they all wound up broke. And it killed Davy Jones acting career. FOR THE REST OF HIS LIFE. All anybody ever saw was an Ex-Monkee. You would think The Monkees thing would have set him up for life. Instead it ruined him. You would think his acting talents, already recognized, would save him. But minds were closed.
Life is an exceptionally cruel mistress.

Recently Leonard Cohen and Chuck Berry were honored at Boston's JFK Library by receiving the first-ever PEN New England Award for Song Lyrics of Literary Excellence. PEN is a bastardized acronym for poets, playwrights, essayists, editors and novelists. Their website describes them as "a literary community celebrating literature and protecting free expression."
Heavy duty.
So I love the fact that they decided to recognize Leonard and Chuck. Although I'm not quite sure how Chuck got into the mix.
I love even more that Keith Richards was one of the presenters. Picturing Keef walking around this high brow organization gives me reason to keep on keeping on.

That's all the rock 'n roll news for today, people.
Get on with your lives.