I post a weekly diary of historical notes, arts & science items, foreign news (often receiving little notice in the US) and whimsical pieces from the outside world that I often feature in "Cheers & Jeers".
OK, you've been warned - here is this week's tomfoolery material that I posted.
CHEERS to Bill and Michael in PWM, our Laramie, Wyoming-based friend Irish Patti and ...... well, each of you at Cheers and Jeers. Have a fabulous weekend .... and week ahead.
ART NOTES— an exhibition on slavery in the Netherlands— banned at home, but legal in its colonies up to 1863 — will be at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam through August 29th.
YOUR WEEKEND READ #1 is this essay in The American Prospect about the expansion of public broadband in …. Chattanooga, Tennessee (with Consumer Reports ranking it the best in the country).
YOU’VE HEARD of someone ‘getting their clock cleaned’ ... this week, the 1726 clock in the Old North Church in Boston — of “One if by land, two if by sea” fame — was placed back-in-service after a two month cleaning and restoration.
WEDNESDAY’s CHILD is named Izzy the Cat— who became the #RaiseTheCat icon for fans of the Philadelphia 76ers basketball team (photographed being lifted after a 76ers victory) — inspiring other fans to do-the-same with their own felines.
Sadly, Izzy was scheduled to be euthanized yesterday … and alas, the Philadelphia 76ers did not win the game her family had hoped for.
YOUR WEEKEND READ #2 is this story from National Public Radio on teenagers seeking bariatric surgery— sometimes the only solution available, yet frowned on by insurance companies and also by stigma.
THURSDAY's CHILD is named Sammy the Cat— an Ohio kitteh celebrating his nineteenth birthday at an Ohio shelter … and later was adopted.
YOUR WEEKEND READ #3 is this essay in The Guardian by the nonpareil Jonathan Freedland, noting that “Boris Johnson wants to be Biden’s buddy. But thanks to Brexit, he can never be a true ally”.
FRIDAY's CHILD is named Frankie the Cat— an English kitteh who went missing, was found dead by the side of the roadway and sent for cremation, only to have ….. Frankie return home later on.
YOUR WEEKEND READ #4 is this quite lengthy (yet gripping) Pulitzer Prize-winning essay in …. Runner’s World….. entitled Twelve Minutes and a Life— with a subtitle of How Running Fails Black America, telling the athletic story of Ahmaud Arbery.
BRAIN TEASER— try this Quiz of the Week's News from the BBC ...… and the usually easier, less UK-centered New York Times quiz (no common questions).
SEPARATED at BIRTH— film star Amy Schumer, whose name went viral on Twitter… due to a Tennessee woman whose photo (on a parody website) was accompanied by a bogus story, according to Snopes— yet Snopes could not rule out “Amelia” … at least being a doppelganger.
...... and finally, for a song of the week ...........................… someone who this century has focused on film scores yet (from the late 60’s into the 80’s) wrote several memorable songs is Mark James— little-known to the general public, as he never succeeded as a successful performer — yet honored by musicians and the music industry alike for his work covered by others.
Born as Francis Zambon in Houston, Texas in 1940 (changing his name while in his early twenties) he made friends then with future star B.J. Thomas. He performed in bands around Houston (recording some regional hits) before a stint in the Army during the early days of Vietnam. Upon his return, B.J. Thomas convinced him to go to Memphis, where Thomas had some success recording for Scepter Records.
Once there, Mark James did some records for Scepter, as well as Liberty and other labels. Then he was signed as a songwriter for the record producer Lincoln “Chips” Moman, who had founded his own recording studio. Mark’s first commercial success came from 1968-1969 with songs he wrote that were recorded by B.J. Thomas, beginning with The Eyes of a New York Woman (#28 in the charts), It’s Only Love (#45) and at #5, Hooked on a Feeling (which has such an interesting history, it will be the subject of a Top Comments essay of mine, next week). This led to a publishing deal with Screen Gems signed in 1972.
Mark James still was recording his own songs and released a song on Scepter in 1968 … that went nowhere. Yet the next year, Chips Moman booked a then-struggling Elvis Presley into his studio to record a comeback album and Moman’s assistant manager asked James … if he had any songs for him?
Mark James asked him to pitch the aforementioned song … and Suspicious Minds became Presley’s final #1 hit, restoring him to the charts afterwards and it was ranked by Rolling Stone as #91 on its 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. (Side note: one of the back-up singers was future Grateful Dead singer Donna Godchaux). It has been covered by a wide variety of performers (Waylon Jennings, Thelma Houston, Fine Young Cannibals, Dwight Yoakam, Phish and Clay Aiken).
Mark James went on to write other songs recorded by Elvis — Raised on Rock and Moody Blue (the title track to Presley’s final studio album). In the 70’s, others who performed his songs included Brenda Lee (Sunday Sunrise in 1973, covered by Anne Murray in 1975) and Mac Davis (One Hell of a Woman in 1974). In 1978, Mark James (with his Trio) recorded a final album She’s Gone Away.
Starting in the 1980’s, he began to focus more on film scoring (studying at UCLA and at the American Film Institute). Among the films he worked on are Trade Day, Reservoir Dogs, Honeymoon in Vegas, Practical Magic plus Kramer Vs. Kramer. And earlier this year, he signed a contract extension with Screen Gems, with extended rights for several songs including “Suspicious Minds”.
At age eighty, his legacy is set: with three songs on the publishing rights firm BMI’s Top 100 Songs of the 20th Century, induction into both the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2015 and (the prior year) the Songwriters Hall of Fame.
Mark James won two 1983 Grammy Awards for a song that started in the mind of a fellow songwriter Wayne Carson (who wrote The Letter for the Box Tops in 1967). Carson was in Memphis in 1970, explaining to his upset wife over the phone why he had to stay longer than he promised … uttering a phrase that gave him an idea for a song. He upset herfurther by saying: he had to hang-up to write the song. B.J. Thomas did a demo of it that year (yet it was shelved until 1996).
After being unable to finish more than two verses, in 1971 Carson asked for help from fellow songwriters Johnny Christopher and Mark James — and they completed the song that expressed Carson’s remorse, Always On My Mind. The first to have it released was Brenda Lee, then a minor hit for Elvis Presley and with cover versions over the years for Marilyn McCoo, the Pet Shop Boys, Cissy Houston and B.B. King, who in 2003 declared this to be his favorite song.
It was Willie Nelson’s 1982 cover that won the three songwriters their two Grammys … but let’s hear them sing it themselves: with the late Wayne Carson (left), and Johnny Christopher (right) flanking Mark James (on piano).
Maybe I didn't love you Quite as often as I could have And maybe I didn't treat you Quite as good as I should have If I made you feel second-best I just never took the timeBut you were always on my mind You were always on my mind
Tell me that your sweet love hasn't died And give me one more chance to keep you satisfied
Maybe I didn't love you Quite as often as I could have And maybe I didn't treat you Quite as good as I should have If I made you feel second-best I’m so sorry, I was blind
But you were always on my mind You were always on my mind