As the coronavirus, economy, and politics dominate the days in negative ways, I thought of Peter Gabriel and Kate Bush performing Peter Gabriel’s quiet and hopeful “Don’t Give Up” (1986).
The song is about struggle, trying, getting beaten, and trying again.
Though I saw it all around
Never thought that I could be affected
Thought that we’d be last to go
It is so strange the way things turn
Drove the night toward my home
The place that I was born, on the lakeside
As daylight broke, I saw the earth
The trees had burned down to the ground
Don’t give up, you still have us
Don’t give up, we don’t need much of anything
Don’t give up, ’cause somewhere there’s a place where we belong
Rest your head, you worry too much
It’s going to be alright
When times get rough, you can fall back on us
Don’t give up, please don’t give up Got to walk out of here, I can’t take any more
Gonna stand on that bridge, keep my eyes down below
Whatever may come and whatever may go
That river’s flowing, that river’s flowing
Cyndi Lauper’s 1986 song (wow, so long ago, in retrospect), “True Colors” gave to mind today as I perused the news.
Everything seems like political news in the U.S. in this era. Trump wants to stop Bolton’s book from being released, using the conflicting reasons, it’s all lies, and it’s all classified, making the book classified lies, which I think would be a good name for a music group. “Classified Lies”. Think they might be a one-hit wonder.
Karens — white women who call the police for calling on Blacks for living while being Black — have been caught showing their true colors, smugly declaring how right they are in hateful tones, demanding that Blacks go back to where they came from or stop what they’re doing, or police! The tactic seems to have been solidly ingrained into their psychic, as they have little fear of using it. Oh, how often when the video exposes their true colors do they sob about how sorry they are, how they didn’t realize. Sure, too late; we see your true colors.
More on the right insist that wearing masks and social distancing doesn’t matter, they want to invoke herd immunity. “The economy,” they scream. Many are ‘pro-lifers’ who also screamed against abortion choice and spread rumors of death panels when the ACA was being debated. Now, the possibility of spreading death doesn’t bother them. Life isn’t so precious as the economy. They’ve shown their true colors.
As protests supporting Black Lives Matter and against police brutality rose and spread, some people spoke up for the police even as video evidence of their abuse and disregard spread. True colors were shown.
Yes, the pressure to stand somewhere and declare yourself often exposes true colors. It’s a good song for Juneteenth, 2020, as we see too many people’s true, ugly colors.
Tom Kelly and Billy Steinberg wrote “True Colors”. I didn’t know that until I read it on wikipedia.org. Cyndi Lauper puts a beautiful spin on it. While I mock the true colors of racists and the right wing in the light of current news, the song is an antidote to such trumpshit.
No, “True Colors” is more supportive of the protesters standing for change, because more of us, a majority, are awakening to the wrongs manifested in our names, and are trying to put it right.
You with the sad eyes
Don't be discouraged
Oh I realize
Its hard to take courage
In a world full of people
You can lose sight of it all
And the darkness inside you
Can make you feel so small
But I see your true colors
Shining through
I see your true colors
And that's why I love you
So don't be afraid to let them show
Your true colors
True colors are beautiful
Like a rainbow
Show me a smile then
Don't be unhappy, can't remember
When I last saw you laughing
If this world makes you crazy
And you've taken all you can bear
You call me up
Because you know I'll be there
Murder hornets. Asteroid heading for Earth. Forty thousand year old worms dug up, thawed out, and living again.
2020 is seen by many to be a year of worsening situations. Many read something new happening, fill with dread and ask, “Oh, no, is another disaster about to strike the planet?”
Chuckling to myself over this today, Europe’s song, “The Final Countdown” (1986) entered my musical memory stream.
The song is about leaving Earth, but you know, just pause a mo’ and shift words around, and it’ll work for this year.
If we need a theme song for this year, maybe this is it. Maybe it is the final countdown, not to leaving, but to another crisis.
Reading, hearing, and thinking about many black people’s comments yesterday and this morning, I realize (again, sadly) how often they live in tension and fear.
Yet, so many whites do as well – as witnessed by them recorded on videos calling police on blacks just because they’re black.
Blacks have a foundation for their fears; we’ve seen too many videos of police applying unnecessary force and violence on black people, or white people getting away with violence against black people, because, white…black.
As we watch and protest, counter-protest, or hold our breaths and wait, I thought about people and praying, and stumbled into Bon Jovi’s “Livin’ On A Prayer” (1986). The song is about a couple who have nothing but each other, who are hoping to make it together. As noted many times, the song was written during the Reagan era as trickle-down economics were touted. As we know, trickle-down is a bullshit theory that enables the wealthy to get wealthier and provides a cop-out to others, permitting them to issue tax cuts to the wealthy without remorse. (Yeah, and it certainly worked during the coronaivirus in America, as the wealthier managed to increase their wealth while a huge swath of Americans struggle between buying food or paying rent/house payments.)
Anyway…
Seems like, with high-unemployment, a corrupt Republican administration, continuing police brutality and militarization, protests, looting, riots, and then natural disasters AND the novel coronavirus, many in the United States are living on a prayer.
I was working on my jigsaw puzzle late Sunday afternoon. Fifteen hundred pieces, it’s been slow progress. My wife rarely works on it (it doesn’t draw her – c’est la vie), and I work on it during free time. But I’m close to finishing it (well, it’s eighty percent done) and other puzzles are waiting, so I working on it.
Then I hear, “You won’t hear me.”
“What?”
“But you’ll feel me.”
It was my mind, of course. “I’m busy,” I said. “Go away.”
“Without warning, sometimes dawning, listen.”
“Wait a minute. I know those words.”
Then — bam bam bam bam bap — “Turbo Love” (1986) by Judas Priest blew into my head.
“Really?” I asked my mind. “Why?”
My mind responded by playing “Turbo Lover” over and over. So, it’s one of those ronasits that I need to share it with you to get it out of my head.
Hope you enjoy it. My mind seemed to. Check out the video at least. Such an eighties look.
The Talking Heads crashed my music stream with their 1986 song, “Wild Wild Life”.
Sounds right for now, cause it’s a wild, wild life, being locked up, entertaining ourselves via digital connections, wondering when we’ll be able to comfortably socialize with others as we used to do, driving our pets and family members by our constant presence.
Thinking of all the ways we’re being told to stay home or in semi-isolation and seclusion – shelter in place, hunker down, etc. – when the thoughts dredged up an old Joe Cocker song.
“Shelter Me” is from his album, Cocker (1986). That album is known more for “You Can Leave Your Hat On” (written by Randy Newman), which was used in several movies (bet you can think of at least one) (if you’re of a certain age or older). Meanwhile, I’d play the album and grew to like “Shelter Me”, even though it has that late eighties sound that sometimes was over-used (you’ll know what I mean, if you are of a certain age).
But the song’s opening lyrics work for the age of the coronavirus.
This ain’t no place for losers
Or the innocent of mind
It’s a full time job
For anyone, to stay alive
The streets have shallow boundaries
For the war that’s everyone
What a wasteland for
Broken dreams and hired guns
Shelter me, baby shelter me
When I’m sitting like I’m losing ground
Shelter me
Okay, they’re not perfect, but I can play off that sense of boundaries – stay six feet away from one another, watch what your touch (don’t touch your face), and wash your hands (properly) – and the wasteland of shopping areas, airports, highways, restaurants, etc, and how some might think we’re losing ground and standing still.
Or maybe I’ve gone for a metaphor too far. Possible.
Read a WSJ/NBC poll results. Posted today, the poll was conducted during 11 – 13 March 2019. It was about the coronavirus. The surprising results weren’t about support for the POTUS (not much changed there). No, more surprising was that most polled, particularly Republicans, didn’t think COVID-19 would have a major impact on their lives.
The poll was conducted as the NBA was shuttering the season for a while. The POTUS mad a speech that Wednesday and the stock exchanges showed a brief rebound. Since then…well, the news speaks for itself about what’s been shut down. It’s easier to list what isn’t shut down or impacted by the coronavirus. I guess it isn’t a surprise, then, as the POTUS has previously denounced COVID-19 as a hoax, or overblown as fake news by the media. Fox News happily supported those points for a while.
I then read another commentary on Italy’s situation (over twenty-five thousand cases now, and twenty-one hundred deaths). Then came an article that the U.S. (with over four thousand cases today) is where Italy was two weeks ago.
Finally, I read about Patient 31. She’s a woman in South Korea who carried on life as usual, attending church, eating at a lunch buffet, and working through a fever, a carrier who didn’t go and get tested, a woman now identified with a spike in South Korea’s coronavirus cases, a woman now considered a super-carrier.
Then I thought back to all the Americans who plan to continue business as usual, just as Patient 31 did.
From that came an old Bob Seger melody, “American Storm” (1986). Seger’s song was about a different epidemic, the increasing use of cocaine. But all the warning signs were ignored, and it spread. Feels like another song, about another storm, is due.
Today’s music was brought to me by the muses. That’s my assumption.
See, I’d finished walking, and arrived at the coffee shop. Beginning to unpack my ‘puter stuff, set up, plug in, and turn on, I thought, time to rock. In response, “We Will Rock You” by Queen (1977) kicked into my stream. I decided it was my muses (sounds like a stadium full of them in there today) singing to me.
With a song like that, I expect an interesting writing session, good or bad. Cheers
I’ve always liked this song. While a powerful declaration, it features a strong beat, and the special voice and style of Aretha Franklin. Annie Lennox’s voice is good as well, and Mike Campbell (of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, and the guitarist on “Boys of Summer”) sits in.
Why “Sisters Are Doin’ It For Themselves” (1986), The Eurythmics with Aretha Franklin, is running the stream today is beyond me. Dream material? Suppose so; it was a busy dream night (too much to write down today).
It’s a good sentiment, though, for any sex or race, orientation or gender; do it for yourself. Don’t let yourself be labeled and stuck in a silo of expectations and stereotypes. Stand on your own two feet and do it for yourself.
Michael Seidel, writer 