Friday, August 01, 2003
You're havin' a birthday, happy birthday to you
Flaskaland posts patriotic tribute to American spirit:
20 years of reggae on the river (and they said it couldn't be done)
Addendum: What isn't reported is that traditionally all the concessions were run by local non-profit groups, and were likely the major fund-raiser of the year for them -- these are rural schools, rural health centers, volunteer fire departments, local little theatre, ecology groups, environmental groups, salmon restoration projects, save the river from getting polluted more groups, lots of do-good groups, and so on. Or at least that's a sample listing of who used to be around there, there might be slightly different ones now.
While the VOA (the VOA, would you have ever, ever in your wildest imaginings have thought that reggae on the river would ever, ever be mentioned by the VOA ... please notice the words "biggest" and "best"). While the VOA article taps some of the historic roots, I'll provide some litty bitty root follicles.
I'm doing this because I'm told that people who know the music industry know it is driven by gossip and that means that in music journalism people want gossip!
Well, that's likely true, but also they've started playing a unique online version of Reggae on the River trivia.
OK, one of the performers at this year's festival was responsible for bringing Jimmy Cliff over on his very first U.S. tour -- imagine those distant days of yesteryear, long ago when Jackson Browne had facial hair and groupies.
Hey, this is getting juicy already. You know (wink!) -- Groupies!
Well, I could describe them if I chose, but be assured they were sometimes toothsome lasses with frizzed coiffures and wooly shawls or silky scarves, who wore toe rings and favored natural look earth-color chinos. Anyway, this was back in the day when reggae was nearly unknown to anyone outside of Jamaica or certain locations in England, though heard occasionally on records broadcast in the South of France or in England or the more with-it radio stations (usually in college towns, at least in the U.S.), and reggae was witnessed by most only in movie form in art-house cinemas. This also was back in the day of social upheaval and unrest in Jamaica, and Chris Blackwell would soon give Jimmy Cliff his big pink mansion .... This sounds a magnanimous reward and unspeakably generous, but I can't help but being reminded of that time I'd heard of, shortly after Pearl Harbor when a similar phenomenon temporarily erupted -- the rich folks in Manoa, Hawaii gave their upscale homes and mansions to their local Japanese servants because war was looming large and in such upheaval they knew they couldn't sell their properties -- yes, so Blackwell gave his house to Cliff and the record company magnate was about to move himself and his mom from their plantation island home to safer quarters while they rode out the storm.
Well, I kind of got off track there a bit, so back to Jimmy Cliff. But nonetheless people took a creative risk for what they believed in and Jimmy Cliff was contracted to share the tour with Jackson Browne shows, and this was the first time Jimmy Cliff had been to America to perform. It's also true to say that in those days, the audiences in (say, Pocatello or Tucson) who had come to hear Jackson Browne just didn't all catch the wave at once -- they just didn't get it, not right away.
In those days, too, the security squads coached and instructed by Island records acted every bit the same then as they do now with U2 -- they packed themselves densely like a football squad around Jimmy Cliff and kept everyone at arm's length, being "protective". It's almost hackneyed now to say the very person who suggested Cliff for the tour in the first place couldn't even get close to say hello to him, even though they were sharing the same stage night after night.
Because that nowadays has become so commonplace everywhere as to become some form of rock star anecdotism, too, to talk about how you can't get back stage to say hello to your friends or can barely get in to perform, yakity yak yuckity-yuck. OK, I admit this might've been a funnier anecdote twenty-five or thierty years ago before it became a par-for-the-course reality in everyone's repertoire of experience.
But that person who got Jimmy Cliff his first tour in the U.S. is scheduled to perform at this year's festival. Can you guess which performer that might be?
Times have changed a lot since then. These days, I sometimes doubt anyone even remembers or cares there ever was a place called Fireman's Hall or how any of this really was getting started, but I for one think it's fun and dare I say important to know something about history, especially local history Back in the days when reggae on the river was still inchoate, still forming as an idea, just a figment of longing and imagining and a dream yet to be realized ...
Back when there was no budget to speak of in a community center, a local reggae band was tapped to perform at every single local benefit, and people thereabouts really liked reggae so there were a few outside reggae bands booked into the Fireman's Hall, with the idea of making some money and then being able to bring more reggae bands into the area to perform.
Starting logically in the count-up to success was Earl Zero, a one-man show. Earl that night was a toaster and a prancer and performed with echoed amp heavy on the reverb and a handheld mic on a wriggly cord that looked like it was from a taxi driver's radio. He was, truthfully, by no means a famous or high earning performer. Yet Earl Zero was so taken by the spirit of everyone there, and what they hoped to someday do, he donated his entire evening's pay (all of $300) to help fund future reggae shows, I think with the idea that he would in this way be helping other reggae musicians down the road to take a trip out of shantytown.
That was awfully nice of him, wasn't it? Bless the Earl, too.
¶ 8/01/2003 07:59:00 AM
Flaskaland posts patriotic tribute to American spirit:
20 years of reggae on the river (and they said it couldn't be done)
Addendum: What isn't reported is that traditionally all the concessions were run by local non-profit groups, and were likely the major fund-raiser of the year for them -- these are rural schools, rural health centers, volunteer fire departments, local little theatre, ecology groups, environmental groups, salmon restoration projects, save the river from getting polluted more groups, lots of do-good groups, and so on. Or at least that's a sample listing of who used to be around there, there might be slightly different ones now.
While the VOA (the VOA, would you have ever, ever in your wildest imaginings have thought that reggae on the river would ever, ever be mentioned by the VOA ... please notice the words "biggest" and "best"). While the VOA article taps some of the historic roots, I'll provide some litty bitty root follicles.
I'm doing this because I'm told that people who know the music industry know it is driven by gossip and that means that in music journalism people want gossip!
Well, that's likely true, but also they've started playing a unique online version of Reggae on the River trivia.
OK, one of the performers at this year's festival was responsible for bringing Jimmy Cliff over on his very first U.S. tour -- imagine those distant days of yesteryear, long ago when Jackson Browne had facial hair and groupies.
Hey, this is getting juicy already. You know (wink!) -- Groupies!
Well, I could describe them if I chose, but be assured they were sometimes toothsome lasses with frizzed coiffures and wooly shawls or silky scarves, who wore toe rings and favored natural look earth-color chinos. Anyway, this was back in the day when reggae was nearly unknown to anyone outside of Jamaica or certain locations in England, though heard occasionally on records broadcast in the South of France or in England or the more with-it radio stations (usually in college towns, at least in the U.S.), and reggae was witnessed by most only in movie form in art-house cinemas. This also was back in the day of social upheaval and unrest in Jamaica, and Chris Blackwell would soon give Jimmy Cliff his big pink mansion .... This sounds a magnanimous reward and unspeakably generous, but I can't help but being reminded of that time I'd heard of, shortly after Pearl Harbor when a similar phenomenon temporarily erupted -- the rich folks in Manoa, Hawaii gave their upscale homes and mansions to their local Japanese servants because war was looming large and in such upheaval they knew they couldn't sell their properties -- yes, so Blackwell gave his house to Cliff and the record company magnate was about to move himself and his mom from their plantation island home to safer quarters while they rode out the storm.
Well, I kind of got off track there a bit, so back to Jimmy Cliff. But nonetheless people took a creative risk for what they believed in and Jimmy Cliff was contracted to share the tour with Jackson Browne shows, and this was the first time Jimmy Cliff had been to America to perform. It's also true to say that in those days, the audiences in (say, Pocatello or Tucson) who had come to hear Jackson Browne just didn't all catch the wave at once -- they just didn't get it, not right away.
In those days, too, the security squads coached and instructed by Island records acted every bit the same then as they do now with U2 -- they packed themselves densely like a football squad around Jimmy Cliff and kept everyone at arm's length, being "protective". It's almost hackneyed now to say the very person who suggested Cliff for the tour in the first place couldn't even get close to say hello to him, even though they were sharing the same stage night after night.
Because that nowadays has become so commonplace everywhere as to become some form of rock star anecdotism, too, to talk about how you can't get back stage to say hello to your friends or can barely get in to perform, yakity yak yuckity-yuck. OK, I admit this might've been a funnier anecdote twenty-five or thierty years ago before it became a par-for-the-course reality in everyone's repertoire of experience.
But that person who got Jimmy Cliff his first tour in the U.S. is scheduled to perform at this year's festival. Can you guess which performer that might be?
Times have changed a lot since then. These days, I sometimes doubt anyone even remembers or cares there ever was a place called Fireman's Hall or how any of this really was getting started, but I for one think it's fun and dare I say important to know something about history, especially local history Back in the days when reggae on the river was still inchoate, still forming as an idea, just a figment of longing and imagining and a dream yet to be realized ...
Back when there was no budget to speak of in a community center, a local reggae band was tapped to perform at every single local benefit, and people thereabouts really liked reggae so there were a few outside reggae bands booked into the Fireman's Hall, with the idea of making some money and then being able to bring more reggae bands into the area to perform.
Starting logically in the count-up to success was Earl Zero, a one-man show. Earl that night was a toaster and a prancer and performed with echoed amp heavy on the reverb and a handheld mic on a wriggly cord that looked like it was from a taxi driver's radio. He was, truthfully, by no means a famous or high earning performer. Yet Earl Zero was so taken by the spirit of everyone there, and what they hoped to someday do, he donated his entire evening's pay (all of $300) to help fund future reggae shows, I think with the idea that he would in this way be helping other reggae musicians down the road to take a trip out of shantytown.
That was awfully nice of him, wasn't it? Bless the Earl, too.
¶ 8/01/2003 07:59:00 AM
