Last month LA musician and writer Andrew Brel sent The Society his thoughts on the background to this horrendous story of mindless racism hatred, lies, callousness and child murder.

His writing sparked memories of Emmett’s story and Bob Dylan’s ballad which rails against Emmett’s death, racism and the authorities. And of course Bobby Gentry.

Andrew’s and The Society’s writing highlighted this awful bigotted tragedy, the lies and the cruelty, the disregard for Emmett and his family.

So, what if he had whistled at you Carolyn?

Why in the minds of the little town of Money in the Mississippi think such a thing should warrant torture, terror, an ultimate death sentence?

Less than a month after we tried to remind people of this almost forgotten story – more a folk tale more than anything else after 60-odd years – then this news began to filter through to our newsdesk:

No one has been convicted of Emmett’s death…

But investigators sifting through records in the basement of a Mississippi courthouse have found an unserved warrant for the arrest of a third suspect — the woman who had accused Emmett of harassing her — for her involvement in his kidnapping.

That woman, Carolyn Bryant Donham, is still alive and Emmett’s relatives are demanding that the case be reopened and Ms Donham arrested. ‘Justice has to be served,’ said Deborah Watts, Emmett’s cousin.

Now in her 80s and living in North Carolina, Ms Donham has not said anything — she hasn’t done for decades.

‘She has been evading justice for over 66 years now,’ said Keith Beauchamp, a filmmaker who helped to find the document. ‘The only reason why Carolyn Bryant was never given that warrant was because of the protection of white womanhood.’

A police note on the back of the warrant says she wasn’t arrested because she was not in the county at the time. However, following the killing, a local sheriff told reporters he didn’t want to ‘bother’ the woman since she had two little boys to care for.

***

Leigh G Banks writes: The little hamlet of Money is notorious. Yet few have heard of this tiny Mississippi delta settlement.

Way back in the Fifties – when its reputation became forever linked with racism, bigotry and child murder – Money was said to be a ‘fine’ place to live…

...or die because of the colour of your skin.

It was a tin-roof town with a giant cotton gin and a church. And that was about it except for Bryant’s, a grocery store where locals, including the families of black share-croppers, would gather.

Then it all went wrong … a black teenager smiled at a white man’s wife. The teenager was called Emmett Till.

Emmett was a 14-year-old African-American boy from Chicago, and was visiting his uncle Moses Wright.

It was August 1955 and black boys and girls weren’t allowed to flirt. But he tried it with Carolyn Bryant – who owned the store with her husband Roy.

She was supposedly scared. Emmett was tortured, hanged and thrown over the a bridge near the fabled Tallahatchie Bridge.

It was Roy and his half-brother, J.W. Milam, who did it.

Money, Money, Money – it was a white man’s world.

Bob Dylan took up the cudgel and wrote the Ballad of Emmett Till.

He wrote: “And then to stop the United States of yelling for a trial

Two brothers they confessed that they had killed poor Emmett Till

But on the jury there were men who helped the brothers commit thisawful crime

And so this trial was a mockery, but nobody seemed to mind

I saw the morning papers but I could not bear to see

The smiling brothers walkin’ down the courthouse stairs

For the jury found them innocent and the brothers they went free

While Emmett’s body floats the foam of a Jim Crow southern sea

If you can’t speak out against this kind of thing, a crime that’s so unjust

Your eyes are filled with dead men’s dirt, your mind is filled with dust

Your arms and legs they must be in shackles and chains, and your blood it must refuse to flow

For you let this human race fall down so God-awful low!”

And then there is the fiction: Bobbie Gentry’s Ode to Billie Joe.

Here, LA writer and musician Andrew Brel looks at the background to this horrendous story of mindless hatred, lies, callousness and child murder. Bobbie’s real name is Roberta Streeter.

Andrew writes: 56 years ago today.  Poor Billy Joe.  Jumped. Tragic.  So many lives ruined.  

Roberta Streeters story is far more compelling.  Raised by Grandparents on a farm after her parents split when she was one. Learned some guitar. Taught herself to write story songs. Moved at a young age to her mother Ruby’s latest marriage in California. 

Soon as old enough, 17, in 1960, moved to Los Angeles. Initially a secretary looking to sell her skills as a songwriter. Met a guy with a studio. Recorded her best songs, fast. Accompanying herself. 

One of those was a song she wrote after learning about the racist lynching of Emmett Till, the 14 year year old kid gruesomely beaten to death and tossed off a Bridge for looking at a white woman in a whites-only store in a racist town in a racist state in a brutally racist Country. (1955.) 

That passionate but subtle reaction, a conscious or even sub conscious musical interpretation of racial injustice shone so brightly through the dinner table narrative, Ode to Billy Joe got her a major record deal. 

On the writers demo Roberta, by now Billie, played the distincive repetitive guitar part herself – not in perfect tune and certainly not in constant time. 

She never had ambitions to be a professional recording guitar player. (Listen to her glide across some five bpm in the course of the almost five minutes it takes to tell her story.)

 Unable to embellish the demo into a release master with a section (like the wrecking crew, whose guitarist she later worked with to great commercial success) due to the irregular timing, the label hired legendary string arranger Jimmie Haskell, whose orchestration of the story is transcendent. Turning a acoustic demo into a work of musical art. Treating it like a film score rather than scraping on the saccharine string parts common for three minute pop tunes of the era. In my view, but for Haskell’s arrangement, you would never have heard of this song, or this artist.  That intelligent arrangement was the magic spark that awoke the giant talent of Bobbie Gentry.  

What you hear from Roberta in that song is a single take recording of voice and guitar. Simply astonishing capture of the moment in 1967 America – illuminated by that astonishing string arrangement. No wonder it rocked the entire world and lives on to this day as a magical moment of what makes America and music both magnificent.

Roberta Streeter will be 80 next month.  Almost certainly still married to the man from Memphis who took her from Vegas when she became an early pioneer of the Block function.

#tallahatchie

 #McAllister

#bobbygentry

#BOBDYLAN

#emmetttill

#billiejoe

#bryants

#racism

#klukluxclan

Biker Barger dies still claiming Stones caused Altamont death riot

The hippy ethos of love and peace was battered out of existence at Altamont in Canada as the Rolling Stone’s gave their free festival answer to Woodstock, in 1969.

Rock’n’roll had descended into drugged decadent anarchy – Morrison wasn’t there, he was about to slam The Doors shut on his band’s future, and Dylan had fallen off his bike and gone home to get somebody to lick his wounds.

Sonny Barger was there though.

And he and his henchmen were about to destroy a naive but potent way of being – the ethos of the hippy… dance, take acid, laugh, create shimmering fantasy. And make love. It was simple but unworkable.

But we must never forget, Barger was probably more responsible than any other for the destruction of that dream.

Let’s at least remember that Meredith Curly Hunter Jr, an African American stabbed and stomped to death to the thunder of music on the stage just above his head.

Hunter had approached the stage and was attacked by members of the Hells Angels Motorcycle Club who were under the impression they were The Stones’ security guards.

Sonny Barger, who died a few days ago aged 82, was the founder member of the Hells Angels Motorcycle Club. Ans he always said the blame lay at the feet of The Stones.

But the truth is the band were horrified. Mick Jagger looked on at the dying man just a few feet away from him, you could see the shock in his face..

Nobody could claim that Barger was a good man.

But he was an anti-hero, good looking, wild, hard, a drinker and a smoker, a spirit of the road… a man not to be messed with.

He had the charisma of hell.

Journalist Hunter S. Thompson made his name by getting Barger to let him ride with them. Hunter wrote Hell’s Angels: The Strange And Terrible Saga Of the Outlaw Motorcycle Gangs after spending a year with Barger and his cronies.

But even he fled after he was stomped for asking a biker to stop hitting his girlfriend.

Women expected to be abused and way back then Barger called his girlfriends ‘Old ladies’, or ‘Babes. Chicks. Good-time broads. Can’t live without them, can’t use their bones for soup’.

He believed most women are ‘drawn to wild macho guys. That’s what turns them on.’

In 1982, he was diagnosed with throat cancer, after smoking 60 cigarettes a day since his teens.

He published several books and had a cameo role in Sons Of Anarchy, between 2010 and 2012, as Lenny ‘The Pimp’ Janowitz.

Barger died from cancer on Wednesday at his home. In a statement written to be released after his death, he wrote: ‘Know that in the end, I was surrounded by what really matters: my wife Zorana, as well as my loved ones.’

#hellsangels #sonnybarger #altamont #mickjagger #MeredithCurlyHunterJr

‘Vlad’s first-class, I’d take a bullet for him,’ says ex-F1 boss

Former Formula One boss Bernie Ecclestone has said his friend Vlad Putin invaded the Ukraine ‘unintentionally’!

Really? Well, that’s alright then isn’t it!

Here’s what Putin did ‘unintentionally’ to the country of blue and yellow one fine day in late winter when he wasn’t, perhaps, focused… after all, he’s not been well has he:

Around 4 a.m. Minsk time on February 24, Ukrainians woke to the sounds of explosions.

Even though Vladimir Putin had predicted a military operation in Donbas, the attacks were carried out immediately in 10 regions of Ukraine, primarily in the east and south of the country.

‘Ooh, sorry’, I bet he said as his ‘mistake’ became clear.

Are you mad Bernie?

Oh, the 91 year old billionaire also he would “take a bullet” for Putin in a really very bizarre interview on Good Morning Britain.

Bernie seemed to me on fire as he said the war was not “intentional” and could have been avoided by actions taken by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

He said Zelensky should have spoken to Mr Putin, who he said is a “sensible” man.

Mr Ecclestone was asked if he still regards Mr Putin as a friend, and he replied: “I’d still take a bullet for him. I’d rather it didn’t hurt, but if it does I’d still take a bullet, because he’s a first-class person.

“What he’s doing is something that he believed was the right thing he was doing for Russia.

“Unfortunately, he’s like a lot of business people, certainly like me, we make mistakes from time to time. When you’ve made the mistake, you have to do the best you can to get out of it.

“I think if it had been conducted properly, I mean the other person in Ukraine (Mr Zelensky), I mean, his profession, I understand, he used to be a comedian.

“I think he seems as if he wants to continue that profession, because I think if he’d have thought about things, he would have definitely made a big enough effort to speak to Mr Putin, who is a sensible person and would have listened to him and could have probably done something about it.”

Presenter Kate Garraway said to Mr Ecclestone: “So just to understand you clearly, you think that President Zelensky should have done more to avert this war and it could have been avoided by Zelensky’s actions, not by a change in Putin’s actions?”

Mr Ecclestone replied: “Absolutely.”

It was put to Mr Ecclestone that he surely cannot justify the actions of Mr Putin and the deaths of thousands of people.

“I don’t. It wasn’t intentional,” he replied.

Mr Ecclestone again said the war in Ukraine was not “intentional”, adding: “I’m quite sure Ukraine, if they’d wanted to get out of it properly, could have done.”

Asked if he has had a chance to speak to Mr Putin about “what a mess” the situation is or urged him to rethink what he is doing, Mr Ecclestone said: “No. He’s probably thought about that himself. He probably doesn’t need reminding.

“I’m absolutely sure he now wishes he hadn’t started this whole business, but didn’t start as a war.”

Mr Ecclestone was asked what he thinks of the Russian Grand Prix being removed from the Formula One calendar and the ban on Russian drivers.

He said: “I’m not in the position now to have done anything about that. I’m not sure I would have stopped that, and I certainly now wouldn’t, and I think it’s wrong, to stop Russian athletes, including obviously drivers, in taking part in their sport.

“They didn’t get involved in this in the first place. They shouldn’t be punished.”

#putin #ecclstone #formulaone #F1 #preperationH #putin #russia #ukraine #war

Broadcasting survivor Tony Blackburn has reached his golden years, but he reckons his prime-time Golden Hour on Radio 2 has fallen victim to BBC’s rampant ageism.

He even described the decision to demote his show from a Friday to a Sunday as “strange”.

The 79-year-old DJ tweeted: “Doesn’t anyone value experience any more?

“I hate ageism and there’s a lot of it about.”

Even the ever youthful ex Corrie star Craig Charles – who’s 20 years younger than Tony – has had his popular House Party show axed.

And Liz Kershaw has claimed she was sacked from BBC 6 Music “because they don’t want women over 60”.

Liz said this to campaigners who want a Parliamentary debate on the way “women are being erased from public services and institutions”.

And what about Sue Barker? Remember her? Paddy McGuinness got his feet under the table while her ‘elderly’ seat was still warm.

The average BBC2 viewing age is 62 and over at BBC1 it’s 61. One in 20 viewers aged 18 to 30 watch BBC shows as they go out.

The channel is hosting new shows from RuPaul’s Drag Race UK judge Michelle Visage, Waterloo Road actress Angela Griffin and DJ Spoony. An insider said there were ‘a lot of unhappy DJs at the moment as a result’.

So, why is the jolly purple nosed and bleary old Beeb still insisting on putting out tawdry, middle-class pointless rubbish like The Archers, a show that lost its way the first time the cows lay down in the rain?

And why did they make such a big deal of Paul McCartney, Bruce Springsteen and Diane Ross at Glastonbury… between them they managed to be wrinkly and grinny, nostalgic and a bit sick-making (for me anyway).

But didn’t you notice Aunty? While you might be mistreating the elderly by changing their show ‘bedtimes’ – you are still extolling the virtues of the world’s worst soap by a country mile and promoting three singers with a combined age of well over 200!

Of course the BBC must move on and get down with the kids, yehhhh, — but why do they think talent flops like an empty colostomy bag after you reach your half century?

#tonyblackburn #craigcharles #bbc #glastonbury #paulbeatles #springsteen

Don’t take a fence though! But is no-spine Sneer really better than no-morals Boris?

Sitting on a fence is a bit like riding a bike without a seat. At least if you sit down you won’t fall off.

And that nice Lord Sneer is so impaled by his own indecision over strikes, whether to resign over Beergate (as he promised), over Rwanda …

And Brexit … and it is inevitable that a ‘picket’ fence will split his slimy indifference and expose his vacuous insides.

He simply does not have the balls to condemn — or support — the strikers who are paralysing our country.

Mere Starmer was of course the simpering poster boy for the second EU referendum – a referendum is a clear sign of somebody who refuses to jump either side of the fence.

And now he won’t even say that he thinks Brexit has been a failure.

Starmer is of course against sending illegal immigrants to Africa, but we have no idea if he believes in open borders.

To be honest if he was found in a lifeboat in the middle of the Channel it would only prove just how far he has drifted from the shore of good sense and decision making.

We really don’t know what Keir Starmer believes about any of the massive issues facing our country, and the world, today.

Because he won’t tell us.

Maybe Sneer just doesn’t know what he thinks either. A fence post up your a*rse can wipe your mind clean…

Boris bashers say we have a prime minister with a morals by-pass.

But would a lord who is so spineless he should be carried around in a bucket make us feel safer today?

#STARMER #DONKEYS #BEERGATE #FENCES #BORIS #STRIKERS

The fascinating little Minnesota town with different views of Bob

The people of Hibbing tell their own stories about their town and how it has changed over the decades since Bob took to the road more than sixty years ago. They talk plenty about Bob too. Fascinating insights into one of the world’s greatest performers and story-tellers.

They talk about the half-truths he told about Hibbing as he built his ethereal rock’n’roll bard persona.

They talk about his musical abilities and ask was his brother David actually better at it than him?

They talk about Bob’s friends, his humour, his strangeness, why he wasn’t liked by some …

The writers also discuss racism – remember what ‘postcards of the hanging’ alludes to. And what the attitude of the town now towards people from other lands.

And they talk about Bob and his time and antics at Hibbing High.

It’s fascinating.

I thank you all for taking the time to write.

The comments are un-edited and in the vernacular and style the writers chose ot express themselves.

On the whole, we don’t dislike Bob

Dawn Allison

It sounded like you genuinely wanted feedback from people in Hibbing. So here’s mine!

I don’t agree with your representation of the community as a whole disliking Bob Dylan.

That’s unfortunate, in my opinion.

The younger generations, and MOST of the generations the same age as Bob, do think he’s pretty awesome. I’m 38, and my mother always spoke so highly of him. She watched him perform in that talent show on the Hibbing High School auditorium stage. I think she said he was two grades ahead of her.

My mother always felt bad for how he was treated around here, and she always enjoyed his music.

I grew up listening to him.

My favorite teacher in high school just might be his #1 fan, even if it’s self proclaimed! Therefore, many, many students were repeatedly submitted to the magic that is Bob Dylan on school trips…since he was a swimming coach, key club advisor, and I believe also the Mathlete coach, he alone may be mostly responsible for the younger generations appreciating and experiencing Bob.

Yes, he still works at the high school. Too bad you didn’t speak to him.

So, truthfully, many born and raised as well as many relocated Hibbingites keep the magic of Bob Dylan alive in this small town. Creative license. Your process. Your story. Can I ask how long you spent in Hibbing?

I saw the camera on a tri-pod, so figured someone was doing an article! How many people did you speak to?

Did you already have an idea of what spin you wanted to take on this? Curiosity mostly. It reads pretty one sided.

I think we have a pretty co

Dawn ol community here, and we are always trying to improve. There are several new council members stepping up to make change for the good, and I am bummed to see you had to slap a political statement in there, that in my opinion is completely unrelated to the article.

It also puts a lot of negative weight on the community. Man, I think I want to move away now. We sound like a bunch of jerks!

Not jerks. Iron Rangers. Just tougher than most. It’s all the extra iron in the water supply I think!

The over generalization of a town, and the negative connotation implied simply by calling it Trumpian Racism instantly changed the direction of the article, and made the whole article drop in tone significantly.

I have not read any of your work previously, so I have nothing to compare it to. Maybe this is the style you always go.

Overall, not a pleasant read for me at all. I would have enjoyed it a lot more had it covered a broader spectrum and better represented Hibbing as a whole. It kind of sounds like you just hung out at the local watering hole, and listened to all the retired old timers complain as they drank their happy hour brews!

Well written. I expected the tone to not be great due to the title. That’s my honest feedback. Next time you’re in town, look me up! I’ll make sure you don’t miss the magic again!

Renee, Bob and the ‘tired’ horses in the sun

John Pileckie

In the summer of 1974, after my first year of teaching, flush with cash from a car accident insurance settlement, I drove my first new car (a 1974 yellow VW Rabbi) on a cross country trip, and drove north in the Midwest on Highway 61 to visit Robert Zimmerman’s hometown, inspired by Toby Thompson’s “Positively Main Street” (first published in 1968, republished in 2008).

My aim was to walk the streets of what I knew to be a small town and perhaps talk to folks who knew Dylan back in the day.

Led by the instincts of a 24-year-old male, I stopped by the first tavern I could find, one called Shoes Instant Replay (ice hockey was huge in the region, and instant replay technology had been perfected during the prior decade).

There I met a gentleman who knew the Zimmerman family, Bob’s father Abe who owned an appliance store in town ( “Abe was a good man, you told him what you wanted and he gave you credit on the spot”) and drew a small street map on yellow paper that would lead me to 2425 7th Ave., a pleasant walk away. The barkeep told me that I should talk to Bob’s cousin, Renee Stone – described as a friendly, outgoing woman who “is in here all the time” and would be glad to talk to me.

She gave me Renee’s number, and, after a brief intro on the phone in the back of the bar, we had a nice conversation, confirming the bartender’s description. Renee told me that she had recently spent time with her cousin, on his farm, “…somewhere in Minnesota, Bobby would kill me if I told you where he lived.”

She said they rode horses together, and Bob was mostly quiet. I then walked down to Dylan’s homestead, took some pics, and talked to a person living in the neighboring house, who had been a classmate of Bob at Hibbing High.

I knew that Dylan had performed at a talent show in high school, and I asked his former classmate how the performance was received: “We pretty much laughed.”

He also said, the previous summer he saw a person “dressed the way you’d expect (Bob) to dress” climbing a tree in the backyard of his childhood home. I ended my walk tour with a return into town and stopped by another tavern. There, I found supporting evidence for the bibical quote (John: 4-44), “No prophet is accepted in his home town.”

I told the bartender in that joint my purpose for visiting Hibbing, he waved his finger in the air and exclaimed in disgust, “Bob Dillan, Bob Dielan, whatever his name, his brother David was twice the musician he was, that stuff about sniffing drainpipes …”

Another tavern patron told me that Roger Maris, the NY Yankee who broke (with an asterisk) Babe Ruth’s home run record of 60 in 1961, and who was born and spent his earliest years in Hibbing, was better known in town as a famous native of Hibbing than was Bob.

All of this was at a time when Dylan, while surely well known among rock fans and those familiar with pop culture, was not the universally known and widely revered personage that he would become in future decades.

Few, I guess, would have predicted that their hometown Bobby Zimmerman would one day be honored by the consecration of a wall in front of their community’s high school, two blocks down from his youthful home on 7th Street.

RE-READ THE OFFENDING ARTICLE:

• Gossips in a little Minnesota town – and the two sides of Dylan’s brick wall – The Leigh G Banks Preservation Society

Cheers Charlie Miller

Carol Anderson

I had Charlie Miller for a teacher too. I have always admired him, and I think he taught us a lot. I never saw any racism either. In fact in HJC as it was called when I went there, our freshmen class voted a person of color to be our class president.

My home from home on the range

Jim Burho

Thanks for asking Leigh. I don’t live in Hibbing any more, but do live seasonally south of there in Cotton, MN. I do get back to Hibbing every summer to visit friends and have so many mixed emotions.

My old neighborhood and home is a run down mess and I hear crime and drugs are a real problem not only in Hibbing but across the range. Howard street lacks any identity of its past, the boarded-up store fronts, and closed businesses abound.

That hurts to see since the Hibbing I grew up in is still in my heart and wonderful, innocent memories flood my mind on those return visits. Some towns’ grow and their character gets better with time and some don’t.

I think Hibbing falls into the latter category as it somehow lost that unique character of it’s immigrant population of high moral standards that protected our innocence.

Leo (sic!) is a lazy journalist!

Erin McCabe Ningen

One of the laziest examples of journalism I’ve ever seen.

Leo (oops! Lazy! – Editor) G Banks clearly did not do his research.

A blogger who cared to put in even a minimal amount of effort, would have discovered that the story of Hibbing is remarkable, even in a country full of remarkable achievements.
He mentions the “castle in the wilderness” and expresses condescending dismissal and confusion as to why people seem so proud of it.
A minimal amount of research would have revealed to Mr. Banks the incredible story of immigrants from 43 countries who, in spite of the underhanded efforts of the mine barons to divide us, stood our ground and achieved not only concessions on workplace safety and pay, but also forced the mining companies to put some of their profits back into the community including building the high school and the state’s first pool.
That High School, in the span of about 30 years, graduated Governor Rudy Perpich, baseball player Roger Maris, basketball player Kevin McHale, Manson prosecutor Vince Bugliosi, Palucci, Dylan and hundreds of others whose achievements would be considered notable if they were from a town without so many remarkably accomplished people.

For instance, did you know that Hibbing was home to a lady who went on to become one of Macy’s head buyers? Did you know that Hibbing produced a Broadway performer who went on to become one of the producers of the Vagina Monologues? Pp did you know that the journalists who uncovered the Enron scandal was a graduate of Hibbing?

Did you know about the little bus company that grew up to become Greyhound? Did you know that the ore from these mines became the steel with which we won World War II and built the greatest industrialized country the world has ever known?
It seems like Banks was content to try and find in Hibbing a town deserving of Dylan … early dismissive comments without considering that those may have been the sentiments of a young man freshly freed from small-town life and eager to experience a much bigger world.
Again, with just a minimum amount of effort, Banks could have uncovered Dylan recent comments where he explains that his recent successful career as a sculptor of iron gates is an homage to his hometown and the hard-working people who lived there.

Bob was laughed at – as well as admired!

Rhonda Wiiliainen

Mr. Banks, Understanding everyone has an unique lense the look through, I accept your view of Hibbing.

Being a life long resident, my lense is different. Our town’s history has molded us here. We are a melting pot of many religions, races, and cultures. I encourage you to listen to the Podcast “Power in the Wilderness” and read the book of the same name, which will come out this year.

It tells much about how we grew out being a mining camp who’s residents lived under a form of indentured servitude, fought the biggest company in the world to become the “richest village in the world”. I believe history provides insight.
My early years in Hibbing were good.

Our diversity was not colorful but cultures from what we called the old country were strong and, from saunas to poticia, we still share and celebrate them.
My education was exceptional. Our teachers were great. I was prepared for college. We were an inclusive bunch. One teacher said “this is the first school I’ve worked in where I can’t tell the rich kids from the poor.” I was taught by my parents that skin color, gender or any “differences ” are hard to live with, not because of the differences, because of how some people react to those differences.
Politically we were strong DFL – socially liberal and fiscally conservative. Things have changed but, the changes are not unique to us.

Our politics are leaning more conservative, mostly because the DFL is not the DFL anymore and has basically Stopped listening to the people and become part of the machine.

Our country is changing and has been for years.
If you compare my time and Robert Zimmerman’s time to now, we had it good and Hibbing was different then.

He was laughed at, he was also admired. His experience wasn’t much different than most other American middle class kid. I think we romanticize our idols experiences. As for Hibbing now, our education system is not what it was.

We don’t have the finances or the population we had before. Our diversity in color is growing but still low.

We are good people here no better no worse than anywhere else. I’m glad I grew up here and that I am still here. That is my view.

An uninformed, disjointed curmudgeon

Gina Forti

Not “very nice”. It’s his blog and his opinion, as negative, uninformed and disjointed it may be, so I’ll just file this one under “badly written free speech”. Call me “judgmental”, but I would prefer to have read something more positive about the wall itself versus of a curmudgeon’s opinion of the community.

I didn’t quite understand this one …

Plinkin

“Leaders in Hibbing have joined a Police Department task force to sort out any hints of Trumpian racism left in the community”…
So now it’s totally acceptable to admit to a systematic process of taking out people you disagree with politically? Who exactly are these “racists”?
“At midnight, all the agents and the superhuman crew, come out and round up everyone that knows more than they do”

Eight years and £6million investigating why 1,400 girls – victims of sex abuse – were systematically failed by the police.

Yes, our police “failed to protect vulnerable children” from the deviant members of sick predatory gangs of Rochdale men.

And that’s not the end of the story.

There is a growing list of reports, including one commissioned by Oldham Council into abuse.

For instance, it reveals Shabir Ahmed, the ringleader of a gang in nearby Rochdale, had worked as a welfare rights officer in the council, despite being accused of sexual abuse being levelled at him for years.

Police never bothered to tell his employers.

Vulnerable girls – barely in their teens mainly – working-class backgrounds, depressed towns, parts of which have been deliberately allowed to become dark rainy Northern ghettos for immigrants.

Add into this mix predatory men.

Yes, in towns like Oldham and Rochdale, and in so many other parts of Greater Manchester – and other parts of the country – there has been a culture of cowardice about facing up to Asian grooming gangs.

And those in power are to blame.

Unconscionably, today it is feared that many of these gang members are back on the streets.

How can our justice system allows it?

Why did the police turn a blind eye?

There is no doubt that the police looked away because they feared stirring up racial tensions.

And now it has also been revealed that gang members, finally out of prison, are continuing to exploit the legal systems to swerve deportation.

It is here that madness, secrets, lies and a kick in the teeth for victims and their families feels like a dull ache… the perpetrators of these horrendous crimes are invoking their human rights.

That’s right the Human Rights of the Scum of the Earth.

Adil Khan – he served four years after getting a 13-year-old girl pregnant – has invoked a legal challenge against deportation. Others are also going down that same dirt road.

Adil Khan says deportation would breach his human rights.

And the human rights he wants are to a family life. And to be a role model for his son.

It is the shame of our justice system for allowing this immoral behaviour.

Why do we so often put the rights of criminals before the reality of justice for victims?

And do you know, that if the police and the authorities stopped being cowards, stopped worrying about being ‘right on’ within racially mixed communities, if the Blond Arian Bimbo at the top started thinking about things beyond his own survival, then Britain might have a chance.

A chance to create the world of sustainable race relations and multi culturalism the UK began in the 1950s, a chance not to see crime as a skin-colour problem anymore…

But, what does Britain’s PLC public relations department do?

Along with the Blond bimbo, Pritti Patel and every pot-bellied, T-shirt wearing, ‘I’m not a racist but…’ thug and thug-ess we thought it was a good idea to send refugees to Ruwanda (innocent or not and still on the cards) to keep trafficking and sex-abuse gangs from arriving from Europe.

And yet it still goes on in the ghettos and back street terraces we allowed to grow un-hindered almost…

Now a pervert wants to be a role model for a child and we are willing to allow it to go to court…

#sexgangs #sexabuse #girls #rochdale #oldham #rwanda #france

I do have to say, people saw the advent of social media – in particular Facebook – as grand freedom, freedom of communication, freedom of speech, freedom of artistic expression, freedom to campaign and stand up for what’s right.

FREEDOM! The right to speak your mind out, yep, that is freedom, it is equality and an in-alienable right to say what you want.

However, FREEDOM is never the right to say what thou wilt – no! That is the Crowlian Law of Thelmena.

Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore, the bard of Bagalore, opined: “Where the mind is without fear, where knowledge is free; where the world has not been broken up into fragments… into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake”.

He saw the earthly heaven of freedom, the freedom of the individual from social oppression.

So, why does social media offer very little more than social oppression.

The reason I’m writing this is because a friend of mine, a professional LA musician and writer, had the temerity to say what he thought about a Bob Dylan concert a few days ago in Long Beach.

Andrew Brel, was critical and analytical but fair, so I published it.

Then the black crows and howling hyenas of Facebook took exception to him.

No longer was he the Hollywood artist, who campaigns for families and children across the world.

As far as Facebook contributors are concerned he became amongst other things a c*nt and an imbecile.

Seriously, why did Andrew not have the right to speak his mind out about a concert given by one of the most controversial – and also endearing – performers in the world during the last two centuries?

And just as importantly, why do people on social media think they have the right to ridicule, insult and deride a man just doing his job. And having an opinion.

I say to you now, Facebook is not the new REAL media, it is a bear garden set on the edge of a painted desert in a Wild West town inhabited by the misfits and inarticulate pundits who couldn’t make in the real world of opinion.

There are of course millions upon millions of people on social media who are intelligent, sensitive and worth communicating with.

But… (scroll down)

Come writers and critics – why molify with your pen? Social media warriors just want to stab you with it!

#facebook #socialmedia #andrewbrel #LA #bobdylan #roughandrowdy

Despite a bit of a rough and rowdy show, Bob gives his heart to one great love… us!

The trails and tribulations of boss who thinks Amin is ‘most popular’

Leigh G Banks remembers a short interview with one of the world’s biggest despots…

Welcome to the asylum! The day I spoke to Idi Amin, he laughed down the phone at me. In fact he barely stopped laughing.

It was almost like Madman’s Therapy – a booming voice that could blow a Gold-Crested Crane out of a bambuwa tree.

But it was the constant faux-affable bar-room laughter that got to me as I sat on the newsdesk of a leading daily and tried to fire a quick question in.

One eventually slipped between the guffaws: “President Amin, is it true you like to torture people?”

He howled like a broken bell.

“President Amin, why do starve people for weeks then electrocute them in chambers below your palace?”

He wasn’t unnerved by my question: “There are many things told to people about me that have never happened…”

And then he laughed out loud again.

Idi Amin’s was a tin-pot and mad murderous regime. More than 300,000 people died horrifically.

He liked having people tortured.

So, he had real chambers of horror built in his palace grounds. Thousands up on thousands were executed while he had noisy dinner parties with his accolites.

The chamber floors were flooded with water. The victims, blindfolded, would cross the chamber in boats as music played from hidden speakers.

The boat moored, the victims got off, the lights went out and the music stopped.

The water was electrified.

Each chamber held more than 500 people. Idi could have a bit of a laugh while he decided if they would be left to starve to death or be zombied by electric water.

Okay, things have changed a lot in Rwanda since the mid-1970s and Idi Amin is barely a blot on the world’s landscape any more.

But his circus of sour will never be forgotten.

Particular if Stephen Asiimwe has his way.

This man, Stephen Asiimwe, the chief executive of Uganda Tourism Board (UTB). wants an Idi Amin tourism trail … he says: “Idi Amin is the most popular Ugandan ever but no one is making use of him. We have to develop this trail.”

The proposal announced by Asiimwe, wants to see the awful legacy of Idi Amin turned into an attractive and profitable tourism trail. He claims it will be as popular as the holocaust museum in Germany or next-door neighbours Rwanda Genocide.
He also wants trails in Imbalu carnival, Kampala carnival and some schools.
“In June we hope everybody participates in the Uganda Martyrs trail. We have cut Uganda into clusters – a sustainable domestic domain is critical for development.”
Chief executive Asiimwe said that the ministry of finance was giving £1.5m to the project.

#idiamin #uganda #rwanda #boris #torture #asians

Andrew Brel reviews Bob Dylan at the Terrace Theatre, Long Beach

It’s a 50 minute drive up Coast Highway from home to the venue. 8pm kick off for Bob Dylan.

We left at 5 to enjoy a dinner in Long Beach which has become an extremely vibey place for nights out. We arrived at the venue at ten to 8. A short line. Easy enough access.

First curiosity. When we entered they take your phone. And lock it in a secure lock box. This not only causes you to not have use of your phone, it also requires you to carry this weighty lockbox all night.

Uncool experience element #1.

The Terrace Theatre has three sections accommodating some 3,000 audience. I booked seats in the center, in the second half of the venue. $60 a ticket including the ticketmaster upcharge.

The event was almost sold out. Maybe 10% empty seats.

We entered at exactly 8.01. And the band had already started. Six players in shadows on a backlit stage.

In a compact venue of this nature, noticing two giant semi-trucks outside that would have brought in two tons of stage equipment, you would expect quality live sound. But that is not what greeted us on entry. Clearly there was an issue with the bass. Occupying some 80% of the sonic space at the level we were seated.

The drummer was evident to the eyes. He had a bass drum and a snare. However the ears were unable to find either in the bass heavy mulch of sound through which a atonal guitar solo meandered gormlessly, almost always missing the center pitch of the note. Surely, as this was just the start, this must have been intentional and not a guitar gone out of tune after two hours of sweaty thrashing.

The instrumental sound check warm-up completed and in the center of the stage an upright piano suggested that is where Bob would appear. And so it came to pass, without announcement as one of the six shadows sat down at the piano and began to sing.

Yes it was Bob.

Two things about the live sound on his voice. Heavy short tail reverb. Overpush on the upper-mid EQ to make it more or less one solid block of frequency that appeared just above the over-loud bass player and simply overwhelmingly too loud for the short shout phrases he uses now that his 81 year old vocal chords have that limited range.

My first thought was; why?

There was no joy in that sound, loud though it was. By the end of the first minute I could not tell you one word he sung. But then the words “Watching the River flow’ emerged from that sonic mess and I guessed it was the lyric to that song he was narrating in that gruff reverb tuneless baritone.

No words were spoken. Just sequing from one song to the next. Sounding largely like the same song, varying only slightly in tempo, with several constants. His over-loud voice, snatching at phrases in a for-fans-only approach to singing. His over-loud bass player, occupying most of the space where other parts would have been welcome. And the drummer whose bass drum and snare were not present throughout the show. Yes, perhaps I was in a sonic blip in the room, that the live sound guy had missed. But I don’t think so. It sounded just the same when I walked through for a toilet break.

So; uncool experience #2.

The live sound quality.

Had I been able to record the show on my now locked up iPhone, I fear what you would hear would be this. 80% bass boom interrupted only by overloud snatch phrases that were difficult to decipher.

At one point I heard “You go your way and I go mine.”

I think that’s what I heard although my familiarity with that recording from the 70’s found no other element to confirm this was the song he was playing.

During the drive up I played the Rough And Rowdy Ways album from the beginning. I admit I had not really made it through a listen previously.

The most fun part of this listen through was guessing the rhyming couplet. Bob is nothing if not formulaic.

I contain multitudes is a good example. Put it on. And then guess what he will rhyme the first line with each time. Bear in mind ‘Multitudes’ is a challenging choice for rhyme.

Mostly from there it’s a slog through limited production values and unspectacular rhymes drawing, as ever, from Biblical references, until the one surprise. A sweet Dylan love song. “I made up my mind to get close to you.”

In the canon of last albums by great artists, like Leonard Cohen and David Bowie, who said goodbye with an epitaph collection, this one struck home for me. The emotional harmony singers underpinning a message. Bob has given his heart to one great love. Us. His audience. He will keep on touring for this reason.

That was my take away – but more about this song later.

Our car drive listening session ended with Murder Most Foul. All 16.55m of it. (Link in comments below.)

Bob at his flow of consciousness streaming best. Beautiful couplets of thought provoking reminders that his is the voice of the civil rights movement, albeit it flawed by his multiple wrong turns since the transcendent messaging of his 60’s and 70’s writing. No single writer provoked more thoughtfulness in more curious minds learning critical thought than Bob Dylan.

His place as the GOAT of love song writers is secure. (I saw a shooting star tonight. And I thought of you.)

None of which would be evident to anyone attending the show I saw. No proper versions of the songs were performed. Even the one off Rough And Rowdy ways, the album he is promoting with this tour, ‘I made up my mind to get close to you’, was, basically murdered by this band.

The song does rely on those melodic harmony voices singing those simple few notes throughout. How hard would it have been to repeat that live. But no. Just a hack and slash though this beautiful song turning it into a painful experience in atonal nail scratching.

By the twenty minute mark I was fidgeting with discomfort. Looking around I noticed several people were literally asleep. Yet at the same time I watched as each song ending was greeted by rapturous standing ovations by the front five rows. Perhaps their expensive seats included a different sound mix?

I needed a break and decided to get a beer. That turned into ‘Any beer you like as long as it’s a can of Modelo.’ And that turned out to be $20. Hmmm. #Uncool experience #666

The one good thing about that break from the noise is that the toilets at the theatre overlook a yard below. In there were four vehicles. Two huge semi’s and two super dooper Residential Trucks. Both with five air cons units. Suggesting five separate rooms in each. Bob travels in style. I imagined he would have come out of his RV at 5 to 8, started at 8 on the dot. And closed at 9.30 on the dot to get back to his luxuriant accommodations just fifty yards from the stage, in time for his favorite Netflix show.

We did go back in for another fifteen minutes, because; he is a legend and to be in the same room as him is something.

But.

Uncool experience #3. The lighting. While the audience was brightly lit throughout, so any would be phone recorders could be spotted by the Dylan Gestapo lookouts, contributing to the uncomfortable atmosphere in the hall, the stage was backlit. Although I went to see Dylan, I didn’t see Dylan. Just his backlit outline. I couldn’t tell you if that was actually Dylan on stage or just a bad karaoke soundalike, heavy on the bass and reverb.

During my ruminations while this interminable mishmash of bad Dylan growls went on, I thought of two people.

Muhammad Ali. Like Dylan, the voice of an entire generation. A truly inspirational spokesman for critical thinkers, uplifting the consciousness of a whole generation. I remember all too well when he went back into the ring in his forties. Larry Holmes I think it was. Bashed his brains in. How I wished Ali would have used his superior intelligence to know. Do not get back in the ring.

Your time there is done.

Bob’s show had that same brain bashing element. Despite his assurance that “I made up my mind to get close to you” how I wish he would have done that in a less aggressive fashion. I remember being booked in pubs with bands playing Dylan covers. It occurred to me that this band applying for pub work playing Dylan covers would struggle to get booked at the Albion.

After all the great players populating his musical recordings, why does he not hire at least one great player to share the stage with?

The second person I thought of, to get away from having to process the unhappy noise, was Paul McCartney. Just a year younger than our Bob. And the man who 60’s Bob introduced to Cannabis with such a rewarding outcome.

Only weeks ago Paul sold out the LA Stadium. The reviews were outstanding. On stage for almost three hours. A band of great young players. Lots of tech videos referencing past glories. And singing only what he can still sing in a passable way. By all accounts, well worth the $400 ticket price.

Bob could almost certainly have chosen this same option.

I guess for many, the first five rows who gave every song a standing ovation, the intimate feeling of a small venue and a loud group of thrashing youngsters surrounding the overloud old growler, serves some useful function in the name of entertainment and respecting legacy.

I know all too well the role mystique plays in the Zimmerman biography. And will leave it there.

It’s a mystery to me why he does this. But some people like it. And I guess he just can’t get enough of those first five rows.

#bobdylan #la #roughrowdy #bobsbus