A Total Stranger Owns My Blog!

Yesterday I went over to the The Flypaper Theory to taste some sour grapes:

Seems TFT didn't show up on some list of Tennessee's most influential political blogs. We weren't registered with the site. I'd never heard of the thing and still don't quite know what it is or does.Anyway, it wouldn't be fair for TFT to compete with all the little blogs out there.

Making sure my treasured spot in the TFT blogroll was still intact, I took that blog's implicit invitation to click the BlogShares button at the bottom of their pages. (It's just below the TFT's confidential hit counter.)

On the BlogShares site, I saw this chart for The Flypaper Theory:

Oh My! A press release on the site said:

The Pesky Fly suffered a huge setback with several analysts urging their clients to ditch the stock as it suffered a public relations disaster. The exact nature of customer dissatisfaction was not known....

Despairing of my friends' recent fall from grace, I was nonetheless able to find some consolation in this list of The Flypaper Theory's "Top 100 Incoming Links":

1. Sadly, No! (B$7,242.13)
2. The Daily Docket (B$1,126.14)
3. Lawn Jockey & Amos 'N' Andy Hall of Elected Officials (B$1,100.00)
4. Blogging in Memphis (B$1,100.00)
5. Rachel & The City (B$882.06)
6. Memphis Blue (B$855.60)
7. Confessions of a West Tennessee Liberal... (B$420.09)
8. Tennessee Guerilla Women (B$396.43)
9. Queer Notes (B$349.69)
10. Randomthoughtpatterns (B$328.21)
11. LeftWingCracker (B$293.02)
12. corrente (B$284.21)
13. The Conservative Zone (B$278.74)
14. Thursday Night Fever (B$274.46)
15. SharonCobb (B$206.65)
16. Midnight, and I'm Still Not Famous (B$201.91)
17. Rock'n'roll Minor Planets (B$198.12)
18. Aspire to the Stars (B$185.55)
19. Half Bakered (B$144.96)
20. The Memphis Scene (B$142.43)
21. Tread lightly on the things of earth (B$137.18)
22. Cherry Blossom Special (B$132.54)
23. theology&geometry (B$127.62)
24. webraw/blog :: uncooked web goodness (B$127.55)
25. In The Driver's Seat (B$124.14)
26. Just Another Girl On The IRT (B$118.73)
27. Elevator Cabeza (B$118.28)
28. AlphaPatriot (B$93.04)
29. Loudersoft (B$78.46)
30. Peripetia (B$76.56)
31. Newscoma (B$75.78)
32. artbutcher (B$75.51)
33. The Phil Harwell Blog-Type Thing (B$73.33)
34. a pulp faction (B$61.18)
35. Cherry Blossom Special (B$61.05)
36. Knox Views - R. Neal (B$21.72)
37. KnoxViews (B$14.86)
38. Fret Free Fridays (B$6.88)
39. Off The Grid (B$6.55)

I had no idea I was listed on this exchange, so I clicked on over to see how my chart was doing:

Hmmm....looks like my stock is way up! However, much to my horror, I then saw that a total stranger owns 80% of my blog! And probably made a killing off me, buying me for what the uninformed thought I was worth and holding me for what I'm really worth. Imagine that...an old stoner like me....

Shares Owners

Player---------------Number (%)---Last Bought / Sold

Rosemarie Wilindar--4000 (80%)--09:43 20 Dec 2006

Total Shares: 4000 by 1 owners (80%)
1000 shares are reserved.

I can report, though, that Rosemarie has not tried to exercise any editorial control over The Daily Docket....

Are You a Slut? Or Just Highly Sexed?

MSNBC has an AP report on a new federal survey by the National Center for Health Statistics about how many lovers men and women have had sex with.

The median number of lifetime female sexual partners for men was seven; the median number of male partners for women was four.

I know you'll want to read the rest here.
You can also take MSNBC's online poll here.
The federal survey itself is here in .pdf.

Incarcerex

Via super cool dude Jake Sullum at Reason Magazine:

The Drug Policy Alliance has put together a cute pharmaceutical ad satire that mocks politicians who believe locking up drug offenders is the key to electoral success.

I truly wish all the self-styled libertarians at Reason would concentrate more on Jake's issues instead of the aberrant position in favor of open borders stuck in the Libertarian Party's early platform thrown together by its handful of founders back in 1971.

NRSC Internet Campaign Guide

The National Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee has issued a new Internet Campaign Guide that Democrats need to read as well.

The snazzy new publication The Politico is on the case:

And btw, the mainstream media are so, uh, 2006. The first stop for press secretaries, according to the guidebook, should be bloggers who can create "buzz" and inevitably trigger stories in the drippy MSM.
. . . .
Open the campaign checkbook. Hire at least one staff member, but hopefully three, to lasso the wild Web. Basically, the Internet can't be a payroll afterthought. Campaigns must have people who constantly update the website, manage postings on YouTube and MySpace, and monitor the hundreds, if not thousands, of chattering bloggers.
. . . .
Make blogs your first point of contact. It used to be that campaigns checked in with newspaper reporters, then everybody else. Now, friendly blogs should be the first point of contact.

Go read the whole piece here; and read excerpts from the Guide itself here.

'Cause I can play this here guitar, Pt. 13: Lenny Breau

There are rock, country, classical, and folk guitarists. And then there are players who transcend a genre, who transcend every genre, and just simply master the instrument. At that point, they have mastered the language of the instrument, and any sound or voice is a possibility. Of course, these players are few and far between.

Ever hear of Lenny Breau? I didn't think so (from Wikipedia):

Lenny Breau (August 5, 1941–August 12, 1984) was a brilliantly innovative American-born Canadian jazz guitarist who brought together country, classical, flamenco and jazz guitar techniques. Breau developed a great deal of technical ability; inspired by country guitarists like Chet Atkins, Breau used a fingerstyle not often used in Jazz guitar. Largely unknown in popular music, he is known today as a musician's musician.

1941, in Auburn, Maine. His francophone parents, Hal "Lone Pine" Breau and Betty Cody (nee Coté), were professional country and western musicians who performed and recorded from the end of the Second World War until the late 1950s. Their son began playing guitar at the age of eight, and by the age of twelve he was the lead guitarist for his parents' band, billed as "Lone Pine Junior", playing Merle Travis and Chet Atkins instrumentals and occasionally singing. Breau made his first professional recording in Maine at the age of 15, appropriately titled Boy Wonder.

Read the rest, it explains a lot.

Here's a video of Lenny showing how all styles of guitar are really the same:


And here's some video from a '68 documentary that shows Lenny's mastery of the instrument:


When he was on his game, no one showed more independance as player. By that, I mean, he could sound like 2 players at once: one playing bass & chords, piano style, while the other played the lead part. Some of his recordings really do sound like 2 guys playing at once, when in fact they are just Lenny.

I saw him play only once, at a NAMM show, with Steve Morse of the Dixie Dregs playing (unnecessarily) rhythm guitar, and smiling like he had just won the lottery. Even Morse, a truly wonderful player, knew when he was in the presence of genius.

Lenny is gone now, but his legacy as a player leaves much for any of us who fancy ourselves players to strive for.


Update: from darkblack in comments at SteveAudio:




Cross posted at SteveAudio.

Oxytocin - The Cuddle Hormone

My SO found another goodie on filly.ca - the chick website:

Research suggests that if a love potion does in fact exist, the mammalian hormone called oxytocin is likely the key ingredient.
. . . .

• Oxytocin is produced as a result of touch



• Oxytocin causes feelings of intimacy and closeness



• Oxytocin triggers powerful orgasms



• Women in committed relationships experience enhanced oxytocin production

Go read the rest and become more aware of human sexuality.
P.S. filly.ca has a great favicon.ico !

Blind Mississippi Morris Cummings

Morris is in Dutch again over the condition of his house in Memphis.

Frankly, I'm not sure the house is worth saving. I've never been inside it, but I've seen the outside plenty of times when picking Morris up to take him to a gig.

Here we are gigging at the Peabody Hotel's Corner Bar. That's Phillip Dale Durham of Moloch fame drumming on the left, Blind Mississippi Morris blowing harp in the middle, and yours truly playing bass on the right. Click the image to enlarge.

You can hear some music samples from Morris' "You Know I Like That" or "Bad To Worse" albums by clicking on the album covers below.

Morris, man, I'd let that house go, get your best offer for it, and get you a smaller place easier to maintain and keep comfortable. Plus which, that neighborhood is a North Memphis combat zone; and you don't need to be there to be preyed on.

UPDATE: Bluesman Mississippi Morris has 30 days to leave his home

Meanwhile, here are some more sites for blues fans.

Morris "Blind Mississippi Morris" Cummings (Wikipedia)

Morris "Blind Mississippi Morris" Cummings (b. April 6, 1955) is an American blues artist born in Clarksdale, Mississippi. Cummings lost his sight at the age of four, but that didn’t stop him from learning the blues. Morris has become a popular blues act on Beale Street. Morris and his band, the Pocket Rockets, are known as the "real deal from Beale". Morris has a talented lineage. His cousins, Robert and Mary Diggs, led the Memphis Sheiks, and his Aunt Mary Tanner played with the Harps of Melody. Morris is also a cousin of the late Willie Dixon. Morris is the very embodiment of the Delta bluesman. He has been called a new disciple of the Delta blues, he was rated one of the 10 best harmonica players in the world by Bluzharp magazine. He has peformed with legendary artists B.B. King, Rufus Thomas, Muddy Waters, David Porter and many other Memphis artists.

Brad Webb's Morris page

Blind Mississippi Morris Google search

Phil Durham's MySpace Music site

Moloch Album Re-released!

Doing a little fair use of Mark Jordan's special to the Memphis Commercial Appeal for you Los Angelinos:

Los Angeles-based Concord Music Group, owners of the Memphis Stax Records archive, has embarked on a yearlong series of reissues celebrating the soul label's 50th anniversary. But a pair of new English re-releases put the spotlight on Stax's lesser known but still influential rock subsidiary, Enterprise Records.
. . . .
Also originally released on Enterprise, Memphis blues rock band Moloch's eponymous LP (Fallout Records), released here with a pair of bonus tracks, is today revered as one of the most complete documents of the guitar prowess of the late Lee Baker.

Moloch -- Baker, drummer Phillip Durham, bassist Steve Spear, organist Fred Nicholson and vocalist Gene Wilkins -- was a lynchpin of the Memphis psychedelic scene of the late '60s, sort of a bluesier Grateful Dead with Midtown substituting for the Haight. Their one and only album was produced by Don Nix (the Mar-Keys, Leon Russell), who also wrote most of the songs on it. Wilkins and Baker are the stars of the effort, however, with the latter giving a pointed schooling in the essentials of blues-rock guitar on tracks such as the original recorded version of the standard "Going Down."

Following the demise of Moloch the following year, Baker would go on to a storied career backing up Furry Lewis and Alex Chilton and forming the groups Mudboy & the Neutrons and the Agitators. Unfortunately, his career was cut short when he was murdered in 1996, but with this first CD reissue of Moloch, his legacy perseveres.

The bonus tracks are both sides of a 45 recorded later. Here's the album cover missing from the article, and the back side too, courtesy of an Amazon.com user:



I think the front cover is from a scan I submitted to allmusic.com some time ago, because you can see the cutout punch in the upper right-hand corner that existed in the promotional copy I had.

I road-managed and lived with these guys for a couple of years circa 1971-72, and played some hand percussion and wrote a couple of songs for them later on. Don Nix produced and wrote all the songs on the album.

Click these links for music samples of: All tracks on the re-released Moloch album; AMG's picks off the album; Lee Baker singing on the original recording of "Going Down" (since covered many times); and drummer Phillip Dale Durham's amazing original vocal on "Same Old Blues" that freaked Freddie King out so badly that he had to record the song himself.

RIP Lee Baker.

If I lost you would I cry

I blogged about this piece of music recently, and I wish to extend and revise my remarks.

First, as often happens, the video disappeared from YouTube, reasons unknown. YouTube has been hit recently with several copyright complaints, perhaps this was one. While I am very sensitive to that issues, making my living in the music business, I'll return to that discussion later.

For now, it's all about the music. This is why Phil Spector was considered a genius. This is why Tina Turner was considered a star. Forget "Private Dancer", forget the murder trial, and remember a slice of time where categories hadn't crippled radio, MTV didn't exist, and musicians, producers, engineers, and the music-loving public were exploring new territory everyday.

"River Deep, Mountain High":



TubeSock: save YouTube videos to your computer.


Cross posted at SteveAudio.