At the age of 72, most pure pop vocalists (if they’re still able to sing) are playing it safe, rehashing their tried and true work, or recording duets with friendly young stars to lift their visibility. Spirit in the Room,the new album from Tom Jones on Rounder Records in the U.S., is, however, nothing like [...]
Posted on May 1st, 2013The Old Bushmills Distillery in County Antrim, Northern Ireland, describes itself as the oldest licensed distillery in the world, and no one seems able to mount a serious challenge to that. The license to distill in that spot was granted by King James I in 1608. As with my previous considerations of Jameson and Tullamore [...]
Posted on March 17th, 2013
This is exceedingly déjà-vu pour moi, but I can’t quite resist responding to a current news story related to Bob Dylan. Dylan apparently has been in the running to receive France’s highest honor, the “Légion d’honneur,” but according to news outlet France 24 his nomination has run into some trouble due to the discovery by [...]
Posted on May 11th, 2013Happy Easter, again! Today, May 5th, was Easter Sunday for those Christians following the Eastern Orthodox calendar (a not inconsiderable number). Reaching around in the muck of my memory for a song to reference in celebration of this fact, I thought about the big concepts of Easter, and thought of various songs about “rising again” [...]
Posted on May 5th, 2013
The scenes of apocalyptic devastation after yesterday’s tornado outbreak in Oklahoma are heartbreaking and horrifying. Yet, so many of the victims, when spoken to amid the torn up debris of everything they owned, are themselves being incredibly inspirational, using their voices to thank God for their survival instead of cursing the fate that put their [...]
Posted on May 21st, 2013Mark Steyn’s paean to Swedish supergroup Abba, and their great song “Waterloo,” is his typically hilarious combination of global politics, knowing-puns and kitschy references, and shouldn’t be missed. It is also in its way a sincere appreciation of the real talent they possessed. As he points out, “[F]rom the rubble of their marriages, they produced [...]
Posted on May 20th, 2013
There is a story in National Geographic regarding a study conducted by researchers at the University of Chicago and elsewhere, which finds that various genes in humans and dogs, “including those related to diet and digestion, neurological processes, and disease” have been “evolving in parallel for thousands of years.” I’m not quite sure what to [...]
Posted on May 15th, 2013Most dog owners would be familiar with the list of things you’re supposed to keep away from your dog: chocolate, chicken bones, recordings of “Old Shep” and the like. However, this one was new to me: Apparently, one cent coins minted in the United States since 1982 contain zinc, and if such is swallowed by [...]
Posted on April 25th, 2013
The funeral of country singer extraordinaire George Jones will be this coming Thursday at 10 a.m.; it will take place at Nashville’s Grand Ole Opry House (where else?) and the public will be permitted to attend. My guess is that it will prompt a kind of outpouring rarely seen. There will an awful lot of [...]
Posted on April 29th, 2013“I wonder if you can …” A new documentary film titled Scatter My Ashes at Bergdorf’s is said to reveal many celebrity shopping “secrets,” culled from happenings over decades at the ultra-high-end fashion mecca known as Bergdorf Goodman in New York City. For example, on Christmas Eve of either ’78 or ’79, former Bergdorf fur [...]
Posted on April 25th, 2013
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