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Odds & Ends: News/Humor (with a "Who Lost the Week?" poll)

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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 Wyoming-based friend Irish Patti and ...... well, each of you at Cheers and Jeers. Have a fabulous weekend .... and week ahead.

ART NOTES — an exhibit of previously unshown works (from 1956-1962) by the offbeat portrait photographer Diane Arbus is at the Met Breuer museum in New York City through November 27th.

In NYC — thru November 27

HAIL and FAREWELL to the Savannah, Georgia transgendered singer Lady Chablis— who became famous as a result of the book (and film) Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil — who has died at the age of 59.

THURSDAY's CHILD is named Mokey the Cat — a New Jersey kitteh who went missing from an elderly woman’s car in Maryland (causing the woman to become lost in the woods in sweltering temperatures) … but after being rescued, the woman and Mokey have been reunited …. with the two now inseparable.

          Mokey the Cat

SCIENCE NOTES — researchers at Stanford are working on summertime clothing that originated with work on battery membranes— now, the trick is to make it stylish as well as its capability to wick-away perspiration.

FRIDAY's CHILD is named Joy the Cat— an Italian kitteh (whose name in Italian is Gioia) who was rescued six days after Italy’s major earthquake — dehydrated, but expected to recover — to the delight of a woman whose house was destroyed …. and who told rescuers and firemen to “please find her; she’s all I have left.”

        Joy (Gioia) the Cat

THE OTHER NIGHT yours truly hosted the Top Comments diary with a look at the annual time passage that Labor Day used to represent …. and the fact that it also represents the annual change in my personal odometer— with a surprise party for my milestone birthday (which is why I was away this past holiday weekend).

When asked to reflect, all I could fall-back on was this line, uttered by the late actor Dennis Hopper on one of his TV commercials (for Ameriprise Financial planning, intended for baby boomers) a few years back:

 D. Hopper (1936-2010)

"I just don't see you playing shuffleboard ………..... you know what I mean?!?!?"

BRAIN TEASER - try this Quiz of the Week's News from the BBC.

DIRECT DESCENDANTS? — Turkish Marxist revolutionary leader Mahir Çayan and Tonight Show host Jimmy Fallon.

Mahir Çayan (1946 — 1972)   Jimmy Fallon (born 1974)

...... and finally, for a song of the week ...........................… although he never had the same cross-over appeal to white music fans that his friend BB King has enjoyed, the singer Bobby ‘Blue’ Bland had a sixty-year career that earned him awards and a steady (if not glamorous) life.

As Sean Elder wrote in Salon - "If there was any justice, you would hear Bobby Bland on the radio at night. Of course there is no justice, and you won't hear Bobby Bland on the radio … you are more likely to hear some white band covering one of his tunes. And like some roadhouse Sisyphus, he seems by and large resigned to the life he has chosen". Fortunately for us, his music is there for the taking.

Born in 1930 as Robert Calvin Bland in Rosemark, Tennessee, he moved with his family to Memphis where he began singing in Gospel groups. He won the Wednesday night Talent Show at the Palace Theater in Memphis often, and joining the Beale Streeters - with BB King and Junior Parker among its members – before its members went on to their own careers.

He was signed by Duke Records and recorded for a time before he was drafted into the Army in 1952. Upon his return in 1954 he found that Duke Records had been – fatefully – sold to the Houston businessman Don Robey - one of the first African-Americans to own a highly successful record label (predating Motown's Berry Gordy by more than a decade). Like many of his white counterparts, Robey was notoriously heavy-handed - with both performers and songwriters often cut out of their just rewards – and the name Deadric Malone (or just ‘D. Malone’) as a songwriter credit was a pseudonym for Robey, yet he rarely contributed anything to a song. Either way, he figured prominently in the career of Bobby Bland for the next twenty years, and Bland remained loyal to Robey after his death in 1975, grateful for his chance to become a star.

He began as a singer in the band of the saxophonist Bill Harvey, with a key bandmember being trumpeter Joe Scott– a talented songwriter and arranger, who taught Bobby Bland about phrasing and timing. "I’d say he was everything" was Bobby Bland’s assessment, and the two worked together for nearly a decade after Bobby Bland became a headliner, with Joe Scott as his bandleader.

His first national hit is perhaps his most enduring song, 1957’s Farther Up the Road– which was a #1 R&B hit and even reached #43 in the pop charts. It was written by Joe Medwick Veasey (1/2 credited to 'D. Malone'), has been recorded by many performers (and is a staple in Eric Clapton concerts to this day).  

In addition to Joe Scott, Bobby Bland had a number of first-rate guitarists who helped define his sound. Clarence Holliman and Pat Hare did so in the 1950’s, with Wayne Bennett becoming his axeman throughout the 1960’s.

Some of Bobby Bland’s other hits through the end of the 1960’s – most of which were actually written by Joe Scott (though sometimes uncredited) - included "Little Boy Blue", Blind Man (which was recorded by Steve Winwood and Traffic in 1969), I Pity the Fool (long before Mr. T. uttered those words), "I’ll Take Care of You", "Ain’t Nothing You Can Do" (written by Brook Benton) and "Two Steps from the Blues" – which was also the title of a noted album of his from 1961.

His style was different from many other R&B singers of the time: combining a guttural 'chicken-bone' sound with a smooth, romantic counterpoint – and with his songs not about cheating or boozing but about commitment (such as "I’ll Take Care of You") he had a dedicated female following.

Yet even after the color barriers came down, and he recorded two albums in the 1970’s with B.B. King and his work was championed by rock stars such as Boz Scaggs and Van Morrison: unlike many other blues/R&B singers, Bobby Bland never had much of a white audience, with few singles of his reaching the Top 40. In the excellent book by Preston Lauterbach, Bobby Bland’s followers came first from the Chitlin Circuit - with appearances at blues festivals his main contact with a wider audience.

Bobby Bland’s career began to diminish in the late 1960’s, as (a) Joe Scott left his band, (b) Bobby Bland had a drinking problem which was not resolved until 1971, (c) Don Robey sold his labels to ABC Records, which didn’t quite know how to market Bland and (d) musical tastes began to change, with a half-hearted effort at a disco album flopping. As mentioned, there were two nice duet albums with BB King and other releases, but the 1970’s were a dry period for him in record sales.

After 1984, he found his niche recording for Malaco Records– a soul/blues/Gospel label based in Jackson, Mississippi that is described as "a sort of living Smithsonian for blues musicians" — where he had several releases, the most recent being Blues at Midnight from 2003.

Bobby 'Blue' Bland died in June, 2013 at the age of 83. He had a great legacy, being inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 1981, the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1992 plus a Rhythm & Blues Foundation Pioneer Award that same year, and had a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award from 1997. As noted, Van Morrison had long been a fan, inviting him to be a guest singer at concerts and released a duet version of Tupelo Honey in 2007. The Simply Red lead singer Mick Hucknall recorded a 2008 tribute album to Bobby, there is a nice compilation album of his most noted work, and there is a biography entitled Soul of a Man– the title of one of his best albums from 1966.

     A young Bobby Bland … … and later on in life

Of all of his work, easily my favorite is the 1961 Joe Scott composition (although that dreaded “D. Malone” co-credit still can be seen) entitled Turn on your Love Light– where it is the horn arrangements that put the song over the top (#2 in the R&B charts and #28 in the pop charts).

It has been recorded by performers such as Tom Jones, The Rascals, Grand Funk, Bob Seger, Jerry Lee Lewis, Edgar Winter and perhaps most notably by the Grateful Dead during the Ron ‘Pigpen’ McKernan era. And below you can hear Bobby 'Blue' Bland sing the original.

Without a warning … you broke my heart ... You took it darling and tore it apart ... You left me sitting in the dark, crying … You said your love … for me was dying

I'm begging you, baby, I'm begging you, please - Come on baby and I'm on my knees

Turn on the light … let it shine on me … turn on your love light let it shine on me … Let it shine, shine, shine, let it shine

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