JACQUES BREL IS ALIVE AND WELL AND LIVING IN PARIS REVIEW

Eric Blau and Mort Shuman’s 1968 Off-Broadway hit Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris is now alive and kicking in L.A. at the Odyssey Theatre. The current show consists of four gifted singers/ dancers/actors -Miyuki Miyagi, Susan Kohler, Marc Francoeur and Michael Yapujian - performing on a bare set about two dozen numbers originally created by Belgian singer/songwriter par excellence, Jacques Brel. The quartet is backed by musicians playing bass, percussion, keyboard and guitar.

 

Brel composed the music and wrote the lyrics for his chansons, most of which he also performed live in cafes, cabarets, concert halls, on albums, films and TV, although other top talents also covered his oeuvre - Ray Charles, Judy Collins, John Denver, Nina Simone, David Bowie, Andy Williams, Johnny Mathis, Leonard Cohen and Ol’ Blue Eyes himself, Frank Sinatra. Chanson is a lyric driven type of French song that has its origins in the Middle Ages, although the 1929 Brussels-born Brel gave this musical genre his own unique twist.

 

Instead of Trying to Sabotage the Trump-Putin Meeting, Democrats Should Support Vital Proposals

Some leading Democrats in Congress are eager to turn the summit meeting between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin away from avenues for improvements in U.S.-Russian relations, even if that means deflecting it toward World War III.

 

On Wednesday, the New York Times reported that “the White House announced that the meeting with Mr. Putin would be a formal bilateral discussion, rather than a quick pull-aside at the economic summit meeting that some had expected.” Meanwhile, Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer criticized the lack of a “specific agenda” for the Trump-Putin discussion and tweeted “the first few things that come to my mind” -- with 10 items denouncing Russia and not a single step to help avert a nuclear war between that country and the United States.

 

De-Authorize the Use of Military Force

Last Thursday the U.S. House Appropriations Committee unanimously passed an amendment that would — if passed by the full Congress — repeal, after an 8-month delay, the Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF) passed by Congress just after September 11, 2001, and used as a justification for wars ever since.

Make No Mistake, We Are Already at War in Syria

Something peculiar happens to American presidents after they take office on January 20.

Campaign promises to right the easily perceived misdirections in foreign policy are abandoned, and the new program for dealing with the rest of the world winds up looking very much like the old one. Bill Clinton was an anti-Vietnam War draft dodger who preached the moral high ground for going to war before he turned around and got involved in the Balkans while also bombing Sudan and Afghanistan. George W. Bush promised non-interference and no nation-building overseas, but 9/11 converted him into an exemplar of how to do everything wrong as he sank into the quagmires of Iraq and Afghanistan.

The song remains the same: unplayed, and other ComFest musings

"Without music, life would be a mistake."--Friedrich Nietzsche

Would the occasionally fantastically misunderstood German philosopher have understood the massive appeal of super-energetic sing-along songs of teen-angst? Or a free festival's fear of the riot potential of a band playing N.W.A.'s "Fuck the Police" on a Saturday night?

Yes, because he understood power.

Consider what went down the last full week in June here in our little nest-egg of an American dream town.

21 Pilots, two twenty-something Columbus musicians who were America's biggest breakout act in 2016, sold out two arenas and an outdoor amphitheater, plus the Newport and a small basement club the last full week of June. That's about 45,000 people, from near and far coming to see a two-man band--a drummer and a front man who played ukelele or bass part of the time.

"That's power, Oskar," as Amon Goeth, SS commandant, said in 'Schindler's List.' "That's power."

Perhaps we can say music has the power of life and maybe the power of death and destruction. Again, consider the latter at of all places, ComFest on its Saturday night.

All Eyez On Me Spotlights Tupac’s Leftist Activism & Repression

Lots of black & white photos of Tupac and others with captions

Leftist black activists don’t get represented in Hollywood productions much, unless they represent the more mainstream Civil Rights movement. All Eyez On Me gives the radical leftist angle on rap icon Tupac Shakur’s family, upbringing, and his little-known political activism. Despite some of the movie’s small departures from eyewitness accounts, it surprisingly creates a pretty close approximation of Tupac, and the U.S. intelligence apparatus that murderously targeted him and his Black Panther family.

The movie opens with a filmed interview that Vibe magazine conducted with Tupac in prison. This interview frames the first two thirds of the film, until it reaches the point when Tupac is recalling the reason he ended up there.

Stop Trumpcare

words Stop Trumpcare

Thursday, July 6, 12noon-3pm
Senator Portman's office, 37 W. Broad St.
Activists are mobilizing across the country to stop the GOP healthcare bill in its tracks. On Thursday, July 6th—during the 4th of July recess when Senators return to their home states—there will be sit-ins at Senate offices across the country demanding Republican Senators vote NO on the bill.

The so-called “Better Care Reconciliation Act” introduced in the Senate would take away health insurance from 22 million working, poor, and disabled Americans, gut Medicaid by almost $800 billion, and provide a massive tax cut for the wealthiest 2% of the population. The passage of this bill means that thousands of middle-class and poor people will die so that the rich can get richer.

Inspired by ADAPT’s courageous nonviolent sit-ins last week targeting Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, we believe greater nonviolent direct action is called for to elevate the impact and unpopularity of the healthcare bill within the media and to pressure Republican Senators to vote NO on the bill. 

Be Healthy: Utilizing Prodigy to Examine Hip Hop’s DNA

Black man in red jacket with red doo rag scarf on head with gold necklace, making a sneering face

Prodigy of Mobb Deep died June 20th from sickle cell. The QBoro rapper’s value to Hip Hop can be illustrated by oversimplifying statements like: Prodigy is more influential than Rakim because he helped Rakim become 90’s New York Hip Hop form. 

Nas, OC, Wu and others also helped Prodigy make Rakim resonate in the 90’s New York akin to 2pac popularizing Scarface’s rapping style everywhere.

Prodigy, Like Rakim, utilized his speaking voice in a cool, calm manner with controlled patterns creating the embodiment of the New York contrast between Hip Hop’s clean and dapper presentation and the grittiness of a gothic industrialization. Rakim’s 1992 song “Causalities of War” depicted a Desert Storm veteran who loses his mind because of PTSD that humanized the channel change from BET and CNN when people got bored of watching play by play of scud missiles.

The PTSD in Queensbridge from neighborhood violence during Mobb Deep’s rise had everyone speaking in the “dun” language while the East Coast adopted gulf-war names like CNN, Desert Storm and labeled neighborhoods Kuwait.

COTA Moves People…to Central Ohio’s latest addiction

COTA bus, sllver bus with red white and blue curvy stripe on side driving in dusk

On May 1st COTA overhauled its transit system by increasing routes and connections, including to more jobs, such as at Rickenbacker on the far southeast side, which has an estimated 21,000 warehouse-related positions.

But more routes and increased frequency for those without their own transportation to an expanding Central Ohio and to more jobs apparently wasn’t the only improvement in mind for the transit authority. COTA also boosted the number of routes and frequencies to a place fueling an increasing addictive form of entertainment in our community – gambling.

COTA has two lines going to Rickenbacker, but four lines going to Hollywood Casino on the west side. Keep in mind there are jobs at Hollywood, but the majority of people taking these lines are going there to gamble.

What’s more, the four lines to Hollywood travel through some of Columbus’s poorest neighborhoods where the last thing these people need is a place where they lose what little money they have.

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