Oxford American Magazine

My favourite overseas magazine at the moment is the Oxford American, now based in Little Rock, Arkansas. It is tagged as The Southern Magazine Of Good Writing, it publishes a music issue each year and the result is fabulous. This year to celebrate the tenth anniversary they have a double CD featuring an eclectic array of artists.

You can buy a copy of the magazine online at the website (www.oxfordamericanmag.com) and it has to be the bargain of the year (or any year) – US$9.95 including airmail. I bought three copies.

You can also purchase the Oxford American Book of Great Music Writing – and it is truly superb – but it is a lot more expensive.

Memphis & New Orleans 2009

Well, the details are all being finalised and the itinerary has been worked out (below). We are now taking deposits for the tour. So please, if you are interested and have not already registered let me know asap.

Saturday April 18 – Leave Melbourne / Arrive Memphis

Sunday April 19 – Monday April 20 - Memphis
Graceland / Sun Studio / Stax Museum / National Civil Rights Museum / Rock & Soul Museum / Willie Mitchell’s Royal Studio /  Beale Street

Tuesday April 21 – Wednesday April 22
Tuesday: Memphis in the morning. Travel to Clarksdale / Delta Blues Museum / Check in at the Shack Up Inn / Dinner at Madidi (Morgan Freeman’s restaurant). Blues gig at Juke Joint.
Wednesday: Sonny Payne’s King Biscuit Time radio show Helena, Arkansas // Rock ‘n’ Roll & Blues Heritage Museum / Greenwood – Robert Johnson’s Grave & Stephen LaVere Museum / Gig at Shack Up Inn.

Thursday April 23
Travel – Clarksdale – New Orleans / Welcome Dinner / Gig

Friday April 24 – Saturday April 25 – Sunday April 26
New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival

Monday April 27
Plantation Tour / Riverboat Cruise / Lunch and Special Gig

Tuesday April 28
Ponderosa Stomp – Night 1
During the day you are free to explore, do a Cemetery Tour, take a street car ride up St Charles, or go to the Music Conference associated the Ponderosa Stomp.

Wednesday April 29
Ponderosa Stomp – Night 2

Thursday April 30 – Friday May 1 – Saturday May 2 – Sunday May 3
New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival – Second Weekend

Monday May 4 – Leave New Orleans (or stay if you wish)

Note: All your museum entries, festival tickets and tickets to the Ponderosa Stomp are included in the cost.

Jesus Just Left Chicago

Last Saturday I played the ZZ Top song ‘Jesus Just Left Chicago’ in a bracket for incoming President, Barack Obama. Not that it really had anything to do with politics, I was just reminded of Obama’s joke during the Al Smith dinner last year that, contrary to popular belief, he was not born in a manger.

I also played Marvin Gaye’s ‘What’s Going On,’ along with ‘Black Wish’ by The Last Poets and ‘People Get Ready’ by Pops Staples.

I am sitting up tonight to watch The Inauguration. It is strange that an event involving a foreign politician could touch us so strongly. It is almost as if Obama is becoming ‘our’ President as well. I suppose after 8 years of George W. Bush the world is looking for someone to give us hope.

I recall a conversation Phillip Adams had with an author who had an essay published in the Harvard Law Review while Obama was its editor. She claimed that he could have walked from that job into many exceptionally well-paid jobs in publishing.

Then I recall that on a flight across the US late last year I met someone who had taken leave from their high-powered job to work on Obama’s campaign. ‘He seems too good to be true,’ I said. ‘Believe me, he is the real deal,’  she told me. On the strength of one meeting at a local fund raising party she and her husband had put aside 6 months of their lives to devote to the Democrat campaign. That’s impressive.

Of course, he is not the saviour and the weight of expectations of a nation must be enormous. But as someone told me last September when I was in the USA, ‘Maybe, if he is elected I won’t have to travel with a Canadian flag on my pack.’ Just maybe, the rest of the world won’t dislike America and Americans quite so much.

If you have been to the National Civil Right Museum in Memphis you will certainly understand the significance of today’s event. The Museum is on the site of the old Lorraine Motel where Dr Martin Luther King Jr was assassinated. The facade remains the same as it was in 1968.

Along with a detailed history of the Civil Rights movement there is also display with a replica of the bus that Rosa Parkes sat on and refused to give up here seat. You can sit there and hear the voice of a driver telling you to get to the back of the bus. I have not seen anyone escape the display without being in tears.

There is also a recording of a phone conversation between JFK and the Governor of Mississippi made during the attempts to admit James Meredith to the University of Mississippi. I have to say that JFK’s reasonable tone, insistence on a principle and razor sharp intelligence is recalled when I hear Barack Obama.

Not that visiting the Museum gives us, as Australians, the right to be self-righteous. It did make me feel terribly guilty and made me think about what I should do for our indigenous people.

My one wish for the Inauguration is that Bono does not appear!

Welcome To The New Year

The older one gets the fewer the imperatives to celebrate the New Year. At least, that is the way it seems to me. Last night we ushered in the New Year in Mansfield. The town was buzzing in the afternoon as we arrived and I have never seen it busier. It seems to me that it ticks all the boxes for everything you would want a country town to be and, as usual, I talked about moving there.

We stayed at the Travellers’ Lodge, which has to be the best value, and least publicised, place in town. The rooms are large and immaculately clean, the hosts Sue and Seth are friendly and the rate seem cheaper than the competition.

There was a late dinner at the Mansfield Hotel (which was busy and bursting with bonhomie) and a chance to enjoy the stone cooked porterhouse; then, the opportunity to watch the festivities on TV while enjoying a sav blanc and planning the next trip to the USA.

Okay, it was hardly a wild night but it sure beats the New Year’s eve parties I have been to where most people seemed to sit around, get stoned or drunk and lament either the year that had passed or the state of their lives. There were a few memorable New Year’s eves at the Woodford Folk Festival in Queensland, the most vivid of which involved trying to avoid an elderly lady who had taken a shine to me.

So the chance to get out of town again was most welcome. I might try to get even farther away this coming December 31.

New Year’s resolutions? Only one personal one. I’ll keep it to myself.

One the other hand, I am determined to improve Off The Record. The additional hour has added an extra dimension to the program and, as well as a chance to play more music, it also affords me the opportunity to broadcast some of the interviews I do which often never make it to air.

In the recent vaults I have face to face interviews with Gary Louris & Mark Olson, legendary producer Jim Dickinson, CC Adcock & Doyle Bramhall, Jody Stephens (Big Star) and phoners with Jackson Browne, Joan Baez, Jeff Beck, Chick Corea, Black Joe Lewis, Glenn Mercer (The Feelies), Will Courtney (Brothers & Sisters), Joe Henry and more!! So I think a few music specials are in order.

There is also the chance to expand a few segments (the Cellar of Sound) and introduce some new elements. Of course, this all depends on the response from listeners so let me know your feedback.

I hope you have a happy and fulfilling 2009.