Champ Called It a Strike

My life just gets weirder - and sweeter and richer - with each passing year. This week I had the chance to throw out the first pitch at a Vermont Lake Monsters game. Now, this does not even begin to compare with my late and wonderful friend Gary Beatrice who threw out the opening pitch at a Cincinnati Reds game twice, but the terminally uncool do the best we can. I was excited about it but also more than a bit nervous because I hadn't picked up a baseball, let alone thrown one, in around a decade. My friends, of course, helped out by posting videos of magnificent first pitch fails. As it turns out I threw a brilliant strike, and it seems to be getting better - and faster - with each passing day, and it's doubtless the most impressive thing I've done at a Lake Monsters game since I ate eleven hot dogs to defeat Joey Vespa in a context of excellence.

A view of beautiful and historic Centennial Field as shit was preparing to get real. My directions were essentially, go down to the first base gate and look for Ronan. Happily, I found him, and he was a great guy, and everything was sorted out pretty easily.

You know it's a real serious sporting even when Santa Claus shows up. As it turns out there are several people throwing out the first pitch at any given day, and I was there with SC, four five year olds, and Miss New Hampshire USA and Miss Vermont USA. We queued up and threw like an assembly line. It was a little worrying that the five year old girl in front of me threw all the way from the mound to the catch, which definitely ratcheted up the pressure on me.

The young lad who doled out the baseballs from a pizza box.

Just about started. I think most of my friends were running into the stadium at this moment. Thankfully they all arrived in time for the extravaganza. 

Miss Vermont USA and Miss New Hampshire USA who were throwing after me. Miss NH USA was kind enough to hold my phone and snap a couple pictures, which was awfully nice of her.

One of the pictures that Miss NH USA took. I can't thank her enough for taking the pictures, and, trutfhully, me standing there is much more impressive than the video of me lobbing the ball toward home plate.

Play ball.  My good friend Bob Craigmile asked if I threw a fastball or a slider. I told him that everyone was pretty amped up so I threw an off-speed pitch (and that is certainly true). Amazingly, the ball made it to the catcher without bouncing. I hadn't picked up a baseball in around ten years so I was a little nervous about getting there in the air.

I'm including a slightly cropped version so that you can see Champ acting as umpire. He called it a clean strike. It might have been a tad outside, but when you consistently paint the corners then you usually get the call (I think Greg Maddux had the same experience).

The day was made complete by the number of friends who showed up ti wish me well.  Here's Phil Seiler who stopped by to gab about the pitch and our shared desire to play cricket and curling.

The Three Fates, Kathy, Cyndi and Jen, the three women who tend to dominate most of my life.

And my most excellent friend Steve, who hung around to dole out advice and salted peanuts.

And even some of my students, in this case Ines and Kendra, showed up to root me on. There were a few others who were in the crowd and who I unfortunately didn't see but who later commented through social media about my sporting failures. I am very blessed to have so many friends.

What It Means - Day 104

"Say, 'We believe in God, and in that which was sent down unto us, and in that which was sent down unto Abraham, Ishmael, Issac, Jacob and the Tribes, and in what Moses and Jesus were given, and in what the prophets were given from their Lord. We make no distinction among any of them, and unto them Him we submit.'"
Quran 2:136

This is one of the many passages in the Quran which speak to the prophetic tradition that ties Judaism, Christianity (the Peoples of the Book) and Islam together. According to Islamic tradition there have been 124,000 prophets stretching back to Adam, the vast majority of whom are not named. As Nasr tells us in The Heart of Islam, "Islam sees itself as at once the primordial religion, a return to the original religion of oneness, and the final religion; the Quran itself calls the Prophet of Islam the 'Seal of the Prophets.'" (p. 18)  If you don't know much about Islam, essentially what the Quran is stating is there have been innumerable prophets over the millennium, and that God makes "no distinction among any of them." So, as Muslims look at the prophets there is no attempt to say that some are Jewish prophets and others are Christian prophets, but that instead they are all prophets of the same tradition, which includes Islam. A foundational belief of Islam is that notion that Muhammad was the final prophet. It would be way too much to say that it is a belief I reject or even struggle with, but, truthfully, it does give me pause, and I'll talk about this in a later. Nasr continues, "The two characteristics of primordiality and finality have bestowed upon Islam its trait of universality and the capability to absorb intellectually and culturally so much that came before it."

A quick side thought: how is primordiality not in spell checker? This says something very bad about the world in which we live.

What It Means - Day 103

"Alif. Lam. Mim. This is the Book in which there is no doubt, a guidance for the reverent, who believe in the Unseen and perform the prayer and spend from that which We have provided them, and who believe in what was sent down unto thee, and what was sent down before thee, and who are certain of the Hereafter."
Quran 2:1-4

I'm sure it seems like I should be talking about the significance of the Quran as a "guidance for the reverent" (and maybe I will come back to that - like I said, there's never any plan) but instead I'd like to talk about the beginning of this passage. The second surah, al-Baqarah ("The Cow"), is, as we know, the longest surah. In addition it it is one of the 29 surahs (out of 114) that open with individual Arabic letters. So, what do they mean? Well, truthfully, nobody knows. Abu Bakr, one of the Prophet's closest companions and the first of the four Rightly-Guided Caliphs, proposed, "Every book has a mystery, and the mystery of the Quran is the beginnings of the surahs." Is it possible that they mean nothing at all? Obviously, when you're talking about a book like the Quran that's a dangerous road to go down, not simply because if they're revelations from God (if you believe that) then it seems inexplicable that God would simply reveal things that mean nothing - and also because if some things in the Quran are meaningful and others are not meaningful that brings even more human opinion and inconsistency into the analysis. Ali, the Prophet's cousin, son-in-law and the fourth of the Rightly-Guided Caliphs, said, "Every book has a quintessence, and the quintessence of this Book is the spelled-out letters." In this sense we have to believe that they mean something, and there are all sorts of theories that have been championed over the last fourteen centuries. As Nasr explains to us, if we are to understand the Quran as "a clear Book (5:15) or Wise Book (10:1) and as a guidance (2:2 in clear, Arabic tongue (16:103)" then the notion that there are parts that we simply can't understand is, on some level, problematical. As you might expect, some of the theories are very esoteric, so I won't chase them down that rabbit-hole (at least here). In the end many scholars try and fashion a middle path, by saying that there are some things that we are capable of knowing while there are others which we simply can't.  The other night in class we were discussing surah 18, "The Cave," which is one of my favorites (and which I'll discuss , at length, later) and it deals wit the balancing act between exoteric and esoteric knowledge. As Muslims we are instructed to believe in the seen and the Unseen, and the separated letters definitely falls under that admonition.

Tailenders

As I've often opined, overseas trips are planned around historical or cultural masterpieces but defined by small, unplanned moments. A classic example of this theory occurred during March's trip to India when we decided to play cricket. While we were still in New Delhi during the first couple days of the trip we were killing time outside a shop while some of the students were hunting for souvenirs. The rest of us were watching a pickup cricket match. Santosh and I quickly decided that we needed to set up a cricket match when we reached Dudhwa for our (ill-fated) tiger hunt. Being efficient and a good soul Santosh quickly arranged it. To be fair, Santosh is more than a bit of a cricket fanatic so this was clearly not a dispassionate decision on his part. I've played cricket three or four times in my entire life, not surprisingly every time in India (including pickup games behind the school when I taught in India; the kids would let me bat, but then quickly stop me because I was embarrassing their national sport). As it turns out the kids loved cricket and ended up playing it two different times. I also took a couple at-bats, but happily none of the students captured it. Hopefully the students remember the cricket adventure as fondly as I know I will.

Santosh, on the far right, watching while the students are instructed on the basic rules of cricket.

Alex, armed with a bat bigger than her, was ready for action.

Hattie, well, Hattie was enthusiastic.

Charlie striking a heroic post. He turned out to be a dead pull hitter and the ball ended up in the plowed field quite a bit.

Shelsea, an intense competitor, put on her game face while she bowled.

Sally, looking slightly suspicious about cricket, was nevertheless her usual happy self.

John was, as the kids say, raking.

This should be the picture that appears on Harry's cricket baseball card (until you see that the ball is behind him).

What It Means - Day 102

R.J.: How did you imagine God at that age?
S.H.N.: That is a pertinent question. I had two or three very important dreams which appeared very early in my life. I do not even know when it was. Maybe I was two or three years old. Among my very first memories is that I was falling from a great height and I was saved by the angels. The angels were very beautiful beings, very large, luminous beings. They picked me up in the middle of the air and told me that they would never let me fall, and, in fact, I have never had a really bad dream since, never had a terrible nightmare. I have also had several dreams of being in the Presence of God. I did not see God as a big, bearded man sitting on a throne or something like that, but it was always a sort of luminous Presence. I would use these two words, light presence, in relation to these experiences. I have also had an intense personal relationship with God. It has always been a strong direct relationship from the moment of childhood. I have always prayed to God, and I have felt that He always hears me and is always very close. I have never, however, had an anthropomorphic image of Him with two ears or two eyes. It has never been like that.
Seyyed Hossein Nasr with Ramin Jahanbegloo, In Search of the Sacred: A Conversation with Seyyed Hossein Nasr on His Life and Thought, p. 13

I'm continuing on the passage from yesterday, once again drawing from an interview with Hossein Nasr. In Search of the Sacred is a fascinating book, ranging from the most deliriously metaphysical discussions of God to what sports Nasr played at university. I love his discussion of his intense childhood dreams and the description of the presence of God (a decidedly non-anthropomorphic one). As I've said before my sense of God, both now and throughout my life, even if I didn't quite understand what I was feeling, is a quiet sense of the union of all things. It's difficult for me to even understand such an intense, immediate, utterly real sense of God. Again, people are wired very differently, and are some people simply constructed from birth with an ability to see the unseen that others don't possess? Nasr himself quotes that famous line from Rumi about how we each see the unseen in proportion to the clarity of our hearts. Some of that clearly comes from study and mental discipline, but I would think that some of us are simply born that way (we apologies to Lady Gaga). I'm also struck by Nasr's comfort in having this discussion. Even today, four years after my conversion, I'm uncomfortable discussing faith publicly (he said, on his blog - so clearly I'm getting more comfortable). A couple of long-time friends have essentially dropped out of my life, and I wonder if I've simply grown less interesting (which is saying a lot because I've never been particularly interesting) or even the little I discuss my faith is too much for them.

John Goes Exploring

I know I've talked several times about my student (now graduated) John Van Egas. It's hard to believe that it was four years ago that he showed up in my COR 110 Concepts of Community class, which was the first class he ever took at Champlain. For about a week I thought he was the most annoying student I had ever had, and then I just fell in love with him. John is genuinely excited in class every day, and is truly appreciative for the opportunity. By the time he strolled across the stage he had taken me five times and went to India with me twice. Even considering that fact he still caught me off-guard when he texted me the other day with this picture. He was driving to Colorado and decided to visit the hometown of his "hero" (his word, not mine). I was quite taken back by it, and it reminds me why we do what we do. What a great young man. If everyone loved learning as much as John does this would be the easiest and most rewarding job in the world.

I think it was Henry Adams who said (I'm paraphrasing): "A teacher affects eternity. He can never tell where his influence stops."

What It Means - Day 101

R.J.: So when was your first contact with religion, I mean before you went to the United States?
S.H.N.: During my childhood, as I said, I used to be taken to pilgrimage sites and to holy places, often with your grandmother. Our father would not come, and I was mostly with the women of the family. The women would also take me as a child to Muharram processions. Moreover, there was a little mosque behind our house when I lived in the area of Shahabad, and I used to visit it often.
R.J.: Did these events affect you?
S.H.N.: Very much so. I felt myself very deeply Muslim from the beginning without any kind of fanaticism. There is a fact that I will mention to you; it is a very personal point but, nevertheless, I shall mention it to you. Through all the cultural and intellectual ups and downs I have experienced in my life, I have always loved God. The first memory I have of my childhood is of loving God, and that has lasted until now. This relation has never ceased, and I never went through a period of religious doubt as have so many people, including the great St. Augustine.
Seyyed Hossein Nasr with Ramin Jahanbegloo, In Search of the Sacred: A Conversation with Seyyed Hossein Nasr on His life and Thought, p. 12

Here's another section I've culled out of the wonderful In Search of the Sacred, the book of interviews with Seyyed Nasr. As I've often opined to my students, I can't imagine ever saying anything intelligent in an interview let alone have something profound enough to say to warrant a three-hundred page book. My equivalent would be: In Search of the Farcical: A Conversation with Gary Scudder on His Life and Thought (published as part of the Postcard Series). Nasr tells us, "The first memory I have of my childhood is of loving God, and that has lasted until now." We often hear of folks who have come to an understanding of the divine, either, like most relationships I suppose, either gradually or as love at first sight. It's rare, at least it seems to be in today's world, and especially in the secular west, to hear of someone who knew an unquestioning, unfailing love of God from the very beginning. It seems to be that we are introduced to religion, essentially socialized to it, but God is, of course, a different concept. I've talked before about the fact that I've never had that intense perception of a God, but rather a quiet sense of the interconnectness of things; I think that's true now, and I suspect it was also true when I was "officially" an atheist, I just didn't have the intellectual tools, or maybe just the maturity and focus, to understand what I was sensing. There have been times when I felt that more intensely than others, especially on a rocky outcropping along the Appalachian Trail in Virginia and then much later in an all but deserted little cathedral in Vienna, but then it would fade. I don't know if one can will those intense feelings to return. Maybe some people are truly just constructed differently, right from birth, and that allows them to feel the sense of God, long before they are socialized to love or hate religion? From my readings of Nasr, and our brief Skype session with him, I'm certain that he would be horrified by the thought that someone would identify him a person who, like the prophets, was wired to see and feel what others can not see and feel.

What It Means - Day 100

"The Quran does not teach that people should be detached from worldly affairs in order to attain this spiritual state. Rather, it is opposed to otherworldliness. It is by struggling to do what is right and good in our lives on this earth that we develop our spiritual depth and awareness. It is for this reason that the Quran addresses our closest and most contentious relationships - with family, neighbors, and business partners - emphasizing the need for integrity and honesty."
Ingrid Mattson, "How to Read the Quran," in Seyyed Nasr, The Study Quran, p. 1593

Yes, here's another passage from one of the informative essays found in The Study Quran. The last two days doesn't mean that I've run out of Quranic passages to explore (and doubtless misinterpret), far from it. From the beginning of this quest I've blogged on what was running through my mind on any particular day, and this is where I am today. This is an essay that I'll frequently have my students read at the beginning of my dar al-Islam classes because it lays out the Quran in a very logical fashion, including its origins, unique structure and also its major themes. Here Mattson is touching upon one of the things that first drew me to the faith: it's role in helping us live in this world and not simply the next. One of the constants in my daily prayers is the 103rd surah, often rendered as "The Declining Day," which goes: "By the declining day, truly mankind is in loss, save those who believe, perform righteous deeds, exhort one another to truth, and exhort one another to patience." We know that faith and good works are coupled more than fifty times in the Quran. Here you add truth and patience, which brings us back to Mattson's points. When I pray I never ask God to help ease my way into heaven, and, truthfully, I never devote any time to that question even when I'm not praying. Instead, I use the quiet time to reflect upon the many gifts I have in my life and this includes friends and family, and how I could be a better and more supportive friend to them. Again, we are exhorted to return the worse with the better. We may dream of another world, it's this world we live in, and what matters is what we do with those countless moments when we could make someone's life better.

What It Means - Day 99

"From a Quranic perspective, there are thus different ways of revering and worshipping God for different communities. God has not revealed one laws, but many laws, and to each law corresponds a particular path that is based upon the performance of rites particular to that form of worship."
Joseph Lumbard, "The Quranic View of Sacred History and Other Religions," in Seyyed Nasr, The Study Quran, p. 1767

Yes, another advantage of The Study Quran: many fascinating supportive essays. Here Lumbard makes a point, granted with much greater authority and doubtless a more assured knowledge of the English language, that I've made several times: there are many paths to God. Human nature being what it is we all, at least on some level, think that our own religion is the best path, but that's not the same as believing that it's the only path. I've had brothers and sisters tell me that Islam is the perfect religion, and I always, despite knowing I should probably just smile and nod, say, "But, you know, it's not." Now, why do I get myself in trouble like this? Hint: it's not simply that I'm a contrarian, at least not completely. First off, we simply are told in the Quran, repeatedly, that there are other paths. Secondly, anything that humans have played a role in creating can't be perfect; no matter the purity of the initial revelations we've had fourteen centuries of very human interaction in the construction of the faith. Thirdly, you should never believe your own press clippings, and if you're too full of yourself (and your faith) then you stop trying to improve. Islam is a path to moral improvement, not a shield that you hold up to prove how amazing you already are.

Not surprisingly Lumbard points out this passage from the 22nd surah: "For every community We have appointed a rite they are to perform; so let them not argue with thee over the matter. And call to thy Lord. Truly thou art following a straight guidance. And if they dispute with thee, say, 'God knows best what you do. God will judge between you on the Day of Resurrection concerning that wherein you used to differ.'" (22:67-69) Even if you read this in the most exclusive fashion (which I don't) the worst you can logically go is to disagree, nod your head, and shut up. Lumbard also cites 2:97, 3:3, 10:37, 35:31 and 46:30.

Obviously, this is far more than a reminder to people to not being annoying. If you think, truly believe, that your path is the only true path then that can take you - no matter your faith - to a very dark place in a hurry.

Four-Ninths of a Bucket List

As with most folks, I guess, one of the most important items on my bucket list (although, truthfully, I don't believe in buckets lists, which are mainly an excuse to not follow your dreams) is to see a game in every CFL stadium. This year I'll be adding a third and fourth site, bringing me up to four of the nine teams in the league. Along with my most excellent friend Sanford Zale (creating a Canadian version of our infamous Trip of Excellence to Oklahoma) will be watching the Ottawa REDBLACKS host the Winnipeg Blue Bombers on Friday 5 July and then the Toronto Argonauts host the BC Lions on Saturday 6 July. I suggested adding the 4 July game at Montreal wherein the Alouettes are hosting the Hamilton Tiger-Cats, but Sanford absurdly and irresponsibly said no. From there I'll be moving westward, with 2020 being the Winnipeg Blue Bombers and Saskatchewan Roughriders year, 2021 the Edmonton Eskimos and Calgary Stampeders year, and then finally all the way to British Columbia to watch the Lions play in 2022. By then the CFL should have expanded to include the Atlantic Schooners and I'll have to reverse field and head east, which might not happen until 2023. I may be moving from Vermont's Leading CFL Fan to America's Leading CFL Fan.

It's better to look at the cities than the icons themselves to make sense of the trip. The trip both benefits from the peculiarity of the CFL schedule, but it's also held hostage by it. So, the Winnipeg/Saskatchewan and Edmonton/Calgary years might end up being switched if the CFL schedule-maker doesn't set up something as easy is this year's Ottawa and Toronto games being on consecutive nights.

What It Means - Day 98

"And I go into women, and I eat meat, and I fast, and I break my fast. He is not of my people who maketh men eunuchs or maketh himself a eunuch."
Martin Lings, Muhammad, p. 169

Lately I've been reading Martin Lings's biography of Muhammad, which I actually started during Ramadan but haven't finished (anyone who knows me can testify that I have the bad habit of perpetually being in the middle of five books at once, often geographically - some at my office and some are at home, and some of the first floor and some are on the second). As you might expect there have been many biographies of the Prophet written, and while it's not my goal to read every one of them I do expect that I'll work my way through a lot of them. I read them less to learn about Muhammad and more to learn about the faith itself if that makes any sense. As I've said before there's always a danger in the fact that we know so much about the life of the Prophet because then we, essentially unbidden, have trouble viewing the Quran as revelation as compared as simply through the eyes of Muhammad; the classic example would be the many admonitions related to the care of orphans, which you can find yourself saying "well, of course Muhammad would care about orphans because he was an orphan" as compared to considering that God might actually want us to look after the weakest amongst us (unless you work for the Trump junta, of course). Again, as I've opined, there's also a danger in letting our respect for the Prophet turn into worship. The Prophet, PBUH, was a man, an extraordinary man, but in the end, as we're reminded in the Quran, a man. Still, reading biographies of Muhammad does help me understand more about the faith, and, well, they're also fascinating, because few people led a more amazing and in some ways almost inexplicable life.

The passage quoted above is a response from Muhammad to Uthman ibn Maz'un (not the Uthman of the Four Rightly-Guided Caliphs), who Lings reminds us was "the most ascetic of his Companions." Again, as Lings writes, Uthman "had become so bent on suppressing earthly desires that he asked permission  of the Prophet to make himself a eunuch and to spend the rest of his life as a wandering beggar." Muhammad's response forms an unqualified rejection of extremism. Muslims often speak of themselves as the Middle Community for several reasons, and one of them is a stress on moderation and a rejection of extremism (although, sadly, we've produced more than a few). Over the last three months (has it been three months already?) that I've been involved in this project I've often made the point that there are aspects of Islam that remind me of other faiths, including Buddhism, mainly the very human, day to day struggle to control the ego. A big difference to that view would be the notion of renouncing the world and living your life as a wandering mendicant, which you still see in Buddhism although obviously more in Hinduism. In Islam we are instructed to be out in the world, which is why the five daily prayers also work as a metaphor for the faith; take a break from the world, reconnect with God, and then get back out there - people are depending upon you.

What It Means - Day 97

"In the end no religion can give you something you won't give yourself."
GS 1019

Recently I was swapping texts with a friend who is on her own spiritual journey. She told me about her struggles to convert in her faith and how she really needed the conversion. Without any great agenda (because I'm very supportive of her personal path) I found myself responding with, "In the end no religion can give you something you won't give yourself." Immediately, and on the surface level, I was talking about the fact that the conversion won't automatically help her with self-esteem and self-love issues; those need to come more organically and slowly, and from within. However, the more I reflected about that comment the more I think it may represent my view of my faith, and all faith, on a more universal level. As Muslims we're taught that we are naturally good in that we don't believe in the concept of original sin. So, we're not born having to make up for a mistake stretching back to the beginning of human history. At the same time, we're told that when we convert our sins our wiped away, so in that way religion is giving us something that we didn't have before. In The Heart of Islam Nasr proposes that the biggest sin in Islam is forgetfulness; that is, our relationship with God is so natural and total and primordial that we couldn't logically, consciously move away from it, but might instead simply forget it. Some of my brothers, whether they're being sincere or trying to be clever, will propose that no one ever converts to Islam, but rather simply reverts because it is the primordial relationship with God.

My answer here is utterly predictably to those who suffer through my endless struggle between the internal and external aspects of faith, but I have trouble believing that an organized religion could ever give you anything. Whether you think that you are moving towards God for the first time or returning to some primordial oneness with God, in the end what matters is your personal relationship with the divine.  If you're waiting for your religion to give you something then you're making a conscious/unconscious decision to not give yourself the very same thing you so desperately want.

What It Means - Day 96

"You are my breath,
My hope,
My companion,
My craving,
My abundant wealth.
Without You - my Life, my Love -
I would never have wandered across these endless countries . . .
I look everywhere for Your love -
Then I am suddenly filled with it.
O Captain of my Heart,
Radiant Eye of Yearning in my breast,
I will never be free from you
As long as I live.
Be satisfied with me, Love,
And I am satisfied."
Rabia of Basra
Reza Aslan, No god but God (pp. 211-212)

I've talked previously about the Sufis and my fascination with the, and I'll doubtless talk about them again. Of course, I don't know if I actually have the dedication to true give of myself to Sufism. As Seyyed Nasr reminds us in the collection of interviews In Search of the Sacred, very few people actually have that energy. Instead, we are quite happy with a more mild and commodified version of Rumi as compared to devoting years of our lives to studying with a Sufi master. I've shared how when I was first considering converting I was talking to our local Imam and providing a list of why I was considering it. When I mentioned a love for Sufi poetry he smiled and said, "Yeah, so about that . . ." In this case I don't think the Imam was referencing the years it would take to study with a Sufi master but rather the fact that mainstream Muslims are always a little uneasy with the Sufis. One of the reasons can be seen in the poetry cited above.

As Aslan tells us in the wonderful No god but God:

"When Sufis speak of their love for God, they are not referring to the traditional Christian concept of agape, or spiritual love; quite the opposite. This is a passionate, all-consuming, humiliating, self-denying love. As with Majnun's love for Layla, Sufi love requires the unconditional surrender to the Beloved's will, with no regards for one's own well-being. This is love to the point of utter self-annihilation; indeed, that is its very purpose."

Rabia of Basra was the first female Sufi master, although not the last. In addition she was an extraordinary poet, although unfortunately and somewhat inexplicably she isn't as popular as Rumi or Hafiz or Omar Khayyam (and I suspect their are many competing misogynies at work here). As Aslan tells us, "In Sufism, this union is most often expressed through the most vivid, most explicit sexual imagery." And there are few better examples of this than Rabia's poetry. The Sufis aren't alone in this, obviously, as you can see from the work of Theresa of Avila or bhakti poetry in India.

I guess this resonates with me because I've never come close to that all-consuming sense of God. I often talk of my fascination with the inner aspects of the faith as compared to the external, but I guess I would argue that I've failed at both. Instead, my faith is a very quiet sense of the unity of all things, as compared to the explosive all-consuming spiritual union that Aslan discusses.  Maybe that's enough. I don't think every vessel can contain every liquid.

7 January 2020

OK, so for years I've been telling my friends that on 7 January 2020 I'd be out of the country.  Why? Because on that day, as hard as it is for me to believe, I'll be turning 60. The trip has, at least in my tortured imagination, turned into a giant fuck you to growing old. The decade of my fifties, although it started off pretty horribly, turned out to an amazing time. I traveled all of the world, spent a ton of time with wonderful friends, and was blessed to have love affairs with two extraordinary women (and almost, although not quite, managed to marry them).  I am far less optimistic about the next decade, which is shaping up an endless series of medical procedures. But, then, who knows? I wasn't looking forward to my 50s and that was wonderful. Where am I going for this Trip of Excellence? Well, that's a secret, or at least it's none of your business (or anybody's, for that matter). As I've told my friends, just pop onto Twitter or Facebook that morning and figure things out based on a picture I post. I did the same thing when I got back from Sana'a, Yemen, and my friend Sanford figured it out instantly (a lot of years reading National Geographic, would be my guess). As tends to be the case this trip has taken on a life of its own over the years, which, doubtless, is my own fault, which means that there's no way I can back out now. Actually, the bigger problem I'm having is finally convincing myself to spend money on myself, which, traditionally, I've not done. One of the ways that I insured that I would finish a closer reading of Remembrance of Things Past - and for that matter to insure that I continued my year of intensive reflection of my own personal faith - is to make both of them public through featuring them on this blog (or at least public for the eight people who read my blog). Similarly, I'm forcing myself to plan the trip and actually make it by making it a public promise. Essentially, I'm prostituting myself out to TechDren (the non-profit which I'm a part of that provides laptops to elementary students in Zanzibar). I'm selling bets on exactly where I'll be on 7 January 2020 for $5 a piece (you can send along as many proposals as possible). If someone wins then they receive two things: 1) unrelenting glory, and 2) a free dinner from me on my dime.  All the proceeds goes to TechDren (meaning that I'm paying for the entire trip on my own). Several folks have already donated and sent along their picks (which I'll share down the road). Obviously, much more on this later, including the attempts of my friends to spirit out where I'll be. Truthfully, no one knows.

What It Means - Day 95

"God is not merciful to one who is not merciful."
"The merciful are shown mercy by the Merciful. Be merciful to those on earth, and He who is in Heaven will be merciful unto you."
Ahadith, Seyyed Nasr, Study Quran, p. 1256

I culled these ahadith, that is, sayings of the Prophet, out of the commentary from Nasr's Study Quran (which, as I've pointed out, is one of the many great reasons to own a copy). One of my students, who is well on her way to converting to Judaism finds the Study Quran fascinating, mainly because she likes reading the commentary because it, not surprisingly, deals with many of the same issues that she deals with on her own spiritual journey. I liked both of these ahadith because, well, first off, they're beautiful, but also because mercy is a central pillar of Islam. As Nasr proposes, "Mercy is understood to be an essential component for binding together any community." Sadly, it's a concept that is in very short supply in America today, where we seem to have very little time for mercy, and in fact celebrate cruelty and insensitivity. Ar-Rahim, the Merciful, is one of the 99 Names of God, and 113 of the 114 surahs open up with "In the Name of god, the Compassionate, the Merciful." If mercy is not "an essential component" for holding together a community then what can you fall back upon? Sadly, our present administration has replaced mercy with hatred and intolerance as unifying concepts, and while it may temporarily fire up the base does anyone really think this approach will last?

What It Means - Day 94

"And those who believe and perform righteous deeds, and believe in what has been sent down unto Muhammad - and it is the truth from their Lord - He has absolved them of their evil deeds and set their state aright."
Quran 47:2

"Muhammad is naught but a messenger; messengers have passed before him. So if he dies or is slain, will you turn back on your heels? Whosoever turns back on his heels will not harm God in the least, and God will reward the thankful."
Quran 3:144

"Muhammad is not the father of any man among you; rather, he is the Messenger of God and the Seal of the prophets. And God is Knower of all things."
Quran 33:40

"Muhammad is the Messenger of God. Those who are with him are harsh against the disbelievers, merciful to one another. You see them bowing, prostrating, seeking bounty from God and contentment; their mark upon their facts is from the effect of prostration. That is their likeness in the Torah. And their likeness in the Gospel is a sapling that puts forth its shoot and strengthens it, such that it grows stout and rises firmly upon its stalk, impressing the sowers, that through them He may enrage the disbelievers. God has promised forgiveness and a great reward to those among them who believe and perform righteous deeds."
Quran 48:29

In the old days people from outside the faith, partially out of ignorance and partially out of a desire to piss off Muslims, would refer to Islam and Muhammadism. Thankfully we'll past the time - that is, the use of the term Muhammadism, not, sadly, the time of ignorance or willful cruelty. Some vestige of this belief still exists in that sometimes the Quran is identified as a book about Muhammad, when, of course, any Muslim would tell you that it is a book about God. In reality, Muhammad is only mentioned four times by name in the Quran. Many characters are mentioned more times in the Quran than the Prophet, including both Jesus and Mary (foreshadowing of later blog posts, obviously). At this point I simply wanted to cull them out. They're all important and I'm hoping to talk about all of them separately later.

What It Means - Day 93

"Say, 'He, God, is One, God, the Eternally Sufficient unto Himself. He begets not; nor was He begotten. And none is like unto Him.'"
Quran,112:1-4

This is the entirety of surah 112, sometimes rendered as "Sincerity." As we know, almost uniformly the surahs get shorter as the Quran progresses (with the obvious exception of the first surah) so, naturally enough, the 112th out of 114 surahs would be very brief. As Nasr tells us, "This surah is second only to Surah 1, al-Fatihah, in Muslim devotional life and is often recited in both canonical and supererogatory prayers as well as supplication (dua)." Not surprisingly, scrawled across the top of this surah in my Study Quran is the line, "g - learn this in Arabic after surah 1, al-Fatihah." It is very straightforward, although the meaning itself is profound. The Prophet was supposed to have said that this surah was the equivalent of one third of the Quran because the central message of the Oneness of God is so essential to Islam. Oh, and I have learned this one in Arabic, sort of, although my Arabic is brutal and an affront to the entire language. It should sound like this. Truthfully, there is no excuse for my wretchedly bad Arabic and my failure to master the basic prayers and recitations other than some combination of fear/laziness/incompetence. I will try and do better.

Dad - 2019

I just wanted to post a picture of my Dad that I swiped off of one of my sister's Facebook posts over the weekend. And, yeah, I know: apple, tree, falling, etc. We had a great chat on Father's Day. I think my siblings think that my Dad and I don't like each other for some reason, when, in fact, we're just two very independent people. We're also way too much like each other, and not simply structurally. But, as I tell him every time we talk, I love him and am proud of everything he's ever accomplished, and I'm deeply appreciative of everything he ever gave me - all of which are true statements.

I'm hoping to head back to Indiana to visit him mid-August before the chaos of semester prep gets too real.

What It Means - Day 92

"The parable of those who take protectors apart from God is that of the spider that makes a house. Truly the frailest of houses is the spider's house, if they but knew. Truly God knows whatsoever they call upon apart from Him. And He is the Mighty, the Wise. These are the parables; We set them forth for mankind. But none understand them, save those who know."
Quran 29:41-43

The opening verse is one of the most famous in the Quran, and it is what gave the name to surah 29, usually simply identified as "The Spider." I'll come back to that later (yeah, I know, I say that a lot, and occasionally I do). However, at this point I'd rather focus on verse 43: "These are the parables; We set them forth for mankind. But none understand them, save those who know." On the most basic level this verse is talking about the parable of the spider, but also more generally about other parables revealed throughout the Quran. As Nasr informs us in the related commentary from the Study Quran, "Similarly, 59:21 states that God sets forth parables for mankind, that haply they may reflect." That is, God could have simply told us what to do, but that the very human act of reflection is an essential part of the process, and forcing us to parse through a parable is part of the process. Yesterday I made the point that, to me anyway, the messiness is the divinity, so not surprisingly I was drawn to this passage.

Nasr quotes al-Tustari who concluded:

"God sets forth the parables for mankind in general, since those things that bear witness to power point to the Powerful. But none understands them, save His elect. Thus knowledge is rare and comprehension of God even rarer. Whosoever attains knowledge by himself through his natural self is delude. And whosoever comes to know Him through the knowledge of God, God knows what He Himself desired for him. The creature has no knowledge of the truth beyond that. This allusion [to the parables] was made due to the distance of hearts from the knowledge of reality."

And, of course, things now get even messier (and thus more divine?). The point al-Tustari seems to be making is that dissecting the parables through cold reason alone can lead you astray, and that you need to tackle them "through the knowledge of God." So, then are the parables a sucker's bet? I mean, they are designed to get you to a specific location, right? I remember talking to my students about video games and the freedom (and sense of accomplishment and ownership for the player) that they inculcated as compared to those who read novels growing up (I loved to read, but it never occurred to me that I was actually going to change the narrative of David Copperfield), but my students pointed out that the game actually produced a false freedom because the designer had a very definitive goal in mind with you - and the best you could do is wander around a bit. So, are parables simply video games with less impressive graphics? God is using parables to a) tell you things in a different way and hope that you'll understand one of them (as a teacher I understand this concept completely) and b) hope that in the process of sorting through things you'll actually learn something and be better prepared to sort out similar problems in the future - but in either instance there is a definite answer in mind.

What It Means - Day 91

Today's blog post is actually a follow-up to one I began on Saturday, that is What It Means - Day 89, the one on the meaning of shariah. I promised to follow it up the next day, but ended up getting distracted by a dozen different things and thus took a different approach on the fly (which is pretty typical, and why there really is no overarching theme this year). I will be borrowing extensively from a paper by Azizah Y. al-Hibri, J.D. Ph.D. entitled "Family Planning and Islamic Jurisprudence" which I also use in class.

This article brilliantly, but also plainly, lays out how shariah works, using the issue of family planning as a case study. Dr. al-Hibri starts off by discussing the extraordinary importance of the Quran as well as the Hadith and Sunnah in helping the average Muslim work there way through difficult decisions, but also makes it clear that not every answer is answered easily or clearly in these principle resources. Consequently, "In such cases, Muslims rely on ijtihad, which is the ability to analyze a Qur'anic text or a problematic situation within the relevant cultural and historical context and then devise an appropriate interpretation or solution based on a thorough understanding of Qur'anic principles and the Sunnah." In layman's language, his point is that despite the guidance you're still often left to sort these things out as best you can.

Dr. al-Hibri also makes it clear that there is flexibility, and that it is intentionally built into the system. That is, we're supposed to be working these issues out and using the Quran and the Hadith and the Sunnah as tools in the process. I guess I would add that we're not robots and we're not just memorizing things; we're humans and we have to live and think about our faith.  Continuing, Dr. al-Hibri adds that there are fundamental principles of ijtihad:

"1. Laws change with changes in time and place;
2. Choosing the lesser of two harms; and
3. Preserving public interest."

So, you study the Quran and the Hadith and the Sunnah, you do your best to make analogies if the answer is not clearly defined, and you follow some basic guidelines. The notion that "laws change with changes in time and place" is an interesting point, and one that really resonates with me. This brings me back to my well-documented struggle between the external and internal aspects of the faith, and my belief that most of the rules that we fixate on (and often cruelly and hypocritically judge each other on) are products more of time and culture than divine intent.

Now, with this background, I'll try and briefly walk through Dr. al-Hibri's point, at least in regards to the issue of contraception (I suspect his discussion of abortion will have to wait for another day). Starting off, does the Quran or the Hadith/Sunnah definitely cover this issue?  Some would say yes, but the vast majority of scholars would say no. al-Hibri summarizes the argument that Islam does not permit family planning: "First, that the Qur'an prohibited Muslims from killing their children for fear of want. Second, that the Prophet exhorted Muslims to multiply." While these are compelling pieces of evidence, they do not definitively make this a clear cut decision. Dr. al-Hibri also makes the point that in Islam and Shariah if the answer is not definitely No, then the default is Yes (something that would also surprise non-Muslims, and doubtless some Muslims, who view the faith as remarkably rigid).

In the end this argument comes down to an interesting discussion of sperm, which would also surprise folks outside the faith who consider all Muslims as either joyless stuffed-shirts or misguided fanatics (we, like all religions, have more than a few of both categories). As al-Hibri points out, "Semen in Islam has no special value. Alone, it is not life and whether ir ever develops into life is a matter of divine omnipotence." Central to this argument is the concept of al-azl, which you might be more familiar with by it's Latin term coitus interruptus (or, as one of my students said the other night when discussing this article, "wait, what, are you talking about pulling out?"). The argument, simplified, is as follows: 1) There are no specific Quranic revelations specifically against contraception, and the one cited refers to taking the life of a child after birth based on fear of want, so in the absence of a definitive No then it is a Yes; 2) If al-azl was common during the time of the Prophet and he never definitively said that it should never be practiced, then, again, without a definitive No it's a Yes (again, not every school of Islamic thought agrees with this view); and 3) since al-azl is a form of contraception (why else would you do it?) then, drawing an analogy, there is no definitive No on contraception, so then the default is a Yes.

Now, is this as clean and easy and universal as it might appear from my summary - of course not - but the point is just to show how Shariah works. Again, it's not simply a set of laws you can download off the internet or memorize, but rather a process of solving everyday problems. To me, the very messiness of this process is what I find interesting (and useful). The point is not that you have to go through this nerve-wracking process fearing that you'll go to Hell if you choose incorrectly. Rather, it's designed to help you do as good a job as possible when faced with the seemingly endless complexities of life. We are told several times in the Quran that if God wanted us all to believe the way things then we'd believe the same thing. Similarly, I would argue that if God wanted us all to act the same way and make the same decisions then we'd all act the same way and make the same decisions. So, instead, it's as if God said, "Here are some tools, go try and do the best you can with them, and in the process you'll learn something and become better people." to me, the messiness is the divinity.

Doubtless, I'll come back to this again later.

What It Means - Day 90

"Then God will say, 'O Jesus son of Mary! Remember My Blessing upon thee, and upon thy mother, when I strengthened thee with the Holy Spirit, that thou mightest speak to people in the cradle and in maturity; and when I taught thee the Book, Wisdom, the Torah, and the Gospel; and how thou wouldst create out of clay the shape of a bird, by My Leave, and thou wouldnst breathe into it, and it would become a bird, by My Leave; and thou wouldst heal the blind and the leper, by My Leave; and thou wouldst bring forth the death, by My Leave . . ."
Quran 5:110

This is a portion of a lengthy verse from surah 5, usually rendered as "The Table" or "The Table Spread." I will have a lot more to say about this surah later because it is a very important one, especially in regards to the relationship between Islam and Christianity. When Christian friends or acquaintances ask me for portions of the Quran to read I'll, naturally enough, direct them surah 18, usually rendered as "Mariam" (and this will be the inspiration for many posts later), but I'll also cull out sections from this surah. If you know nothing about Islam and are handed the passage above it would doubtless come as a tremendous surprise. Your natural response might be, "Wait, what is Jesus doing in the Quran?" If you're a Muslim or are even simply familiar with Islam you wouldn't be surprised at all because you'd know that Jesus is so key to so much of the faith. Again, I'll have more to say about this later, but for now I simply wanted to introduce the subject matter (it's a subject worthy of books, not simply blog posts). The reason why I introduce folks to this particular passage is because a) it shows that Jesus is in the Quran, and thus in Islam, b) it affirms the foundational Islamic belief that Jesus is a prophet but not the son of God nor divine, which is clearly shown by the recurring disclaimer "by My Leave," (that is, these miracles took place because God can do whatever God wants, and you shouldn't associate the miracles with Jesus possessing a divine nature), and c) it mentions a miracle with which Christians aren't familiar.  A couple times in the Quran the miracle of Jesus breathing life into clay birds is mentioned in passing, but never discussed in any great detail. I will revisit this again later when I talk about Mustafa Aykol's fascinating book The Islamic Jesus, and the fact that this miracle is actually discussed in certain early Christian sects (but more on that later). Now, if you're a devout Christian you might also feel a little insulted, as in, who do these Muslims think they are stealing Jesus? Of course, Jews might also ask Christians a similar question. Muslims believe that they aren't borrowing anyone since we are merely the continuation of the same tradition. Obviously, much more on all of this later.

Discography - Summer 2019

And here we are with the latest of our Discography One-Offs, as we listen to new music and gather energy to tackle another year's worth of music and analysis.  Lately I've been getting grief for not starting up again, so I suspect people are getting ready. The task this week is for each of the noted musicologists to create a museum or hall of fame dedicated to their favorite artist and then choose what five songs would be the foundation. They could be the "best" songs or instead the songs that are most representative of the different aspects of that artist. Until the every end, when it all falls apart, this is pretty amazing.

Bob Craigmile

Hello music nerds.  Welcome to RUSH.  The band has taken indefinite hiatus aka retired.  It was sad to read about, but honestly I haven't kept up with their  music in 30 years (!).  Alex (guitar) has developed arthritis in his hands; Neal (drums) found the physical demands of touring too, well, demanding on his 66 year old body; Geddy (aka Gary Lee Weinrib, vocals, bass and keys) now has to screech to reach notes that he sang effortlessly 20 years ago.  It was time.  

Why love this band?  The question is fair;  they are "prog rock", one of the more hated subgenres of rock by the cognescenti in the music media.  It's always odd when smart (?) people hate smart things.  What strikes some as an interesting blending of jazz and rock, others hear as snobbish attempts to impress.  Geddy's voice is usually an issue for listeners too.  

Here's the thing:  if you can "rock out with yer cock out" and still have smart lyrics while going beyond 4/4 and three power chords, you've done something remarkable.  I came to Rush in college in the early 80's.  LIke everyone else in the Chicago area, I only knew Tom Sawyer, but then heard Exit Stage Left (their live album. I'm a sucker for greatest hits collections and parentheses).  

I was amazed at the musicianship and how it sounded like an orchestra playing due to the synths Lee had plunged into.  He'd also figured out a way to play bass notes using pedals while doing keys (and pedals to play synth while playing bass).  While singing.  So basically, JS Bach met Robert Plant.

I'm not a hardcore fan; others go to RushCons and make youtube videos of their tribute songs and have all the albums.  I've not done any of these.  Yet I consider myself a solid fan of an era in the 80's when they dominated FM rock radio.

So, to the list.

The Spirit of Radio.

This song has a mesmerizing guitar intro that should itself be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.  This is prime Rush for me.  The lyrics allude to the music biz:

All of this machinery
Making modern music
Can still be open-hearted
Not so coldly charted
It's really just a question
Of your honesty, yeah your honesty

One likes to believe
In the freedom of music
But glittering prizes
And endless compromises
Shatter the illusion
Of integrity, yeah

This song really has all of the elements of what made them great.  Tight musicianship (breaking into a reggae bridge) and offering homages to other songs:  

For the words of the profits
Were written on the studio wall 

Art and commerce have been intertwined since at least the medieval era.  Rush nearly flamed out when their record company cut them off (which lead to the epic 2112 album).  If you want to make art, do it your way, but remember, the

"Concert hall...echoes with the sounds, of salesmen"

Limelight

Yet another song about the music industry.  Yet another song started with a crunchy guitar riff.  

But wait, what's it like to be a "rock star" REALLY?  Bob Seger and others have tried to share the drab, dull side of diners and motels.  But there is a level of personal alienation to be someone you're just not.  Peart, the drummer/lyricist, warns:

Living in a fish eye lens
Caught in the camera eye
I have no heart to lie
I can't pretend a stranger
Is a long-awaited friend 

So much for winning the "meet and greet" from the local 50,000 watt station.  Backstage passes be damned, he won't enjoy meeting you because he's had to meet you 30 times on this tour alone.  Oh, you're with the local free weekly and want an interview? 

Cast in this unlikely role
Ill-equipped to act
With insufficient tact
One must put up barriers
To keep oneself intact 

Nerdy deep dive: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4P-yUOlOC5M

Subdivisions

Growing up, it all seems so one-sided
Opinions all provided
The future pre-decided
Detached and subdivided
In the mass-production zone

Nowhere is the dreamer
Or the misfit so alone

Okay, we've got the alienation thing going again.  So now this is clearly more about me than the band.  Why am I like this?  Why does this music resonate with me and a million other (mostly) white guys in the midwest who came of age in the 70's, the "Me" decade, where drugs were available and the government was actively trying to kill our older brothers in a war that made no sense?  

I have no idea.

Subdivisions
In the high school halls
In the shopping malls
Conform or be cast out 

No doubt your sociology professor would find this amusing, if trite.  But to a young person at the time, it made things click into place.  Someone else knew what was up.  And they had a microphone.  

While the punks are of the same generation as Rush, they wanted to destroy the system (it seemed), but only had a guitar so that would have to do.   There are other parallels here but I will not make them now.  There was no way Rush was smashing their instruments, because they loved them too much.  They're from the suburbs. 

Red Barchetta

He mispronounces the name ("k" not "ch") but it's a great song nonetheless.  

It starts out with guitar "harmonics" which are those chimey notes you can do if you lightly (VERY lightly) fret the strings on the 5th, 7th and 12th while picking.  I remember Tuck Andress saying that his wife Pati wanted him to do a whole song of harmonics, but since he held his breath while doing it, it would kill him.

Rush is a literate band, and often stayed in their rooms reading or watching the Cubs (Lee is a huge baseball fan and collector of some note) while on tour.  

This song is based on a short story and describes a futuristic boy daring to take out an old car in a time when cars are outlawed.  Sure enough, they're spotted by the nanny state police who chase them in "gleaming alloy air cars".  So tires are the real problem?  Whatever.

The joy of driving an old sports car illicitly is pure thrill:

Well-weathered leather
Hot metal and oil
The scented country air
Sunlight on chrome
The blur of the landscape
Every nerve aware  

Somehow, our hero eludes the agents of President AOC and big solar.   

Race back to the farm
To dream with my uncle at the fireside  

You can have his fossil fuel based car when you pry it from his cold, dead hands.  You'll have to catch him first.

La Villa Strangiato

No lyrics!  No screeching! Just pure instrumental showoffery: Several guitar sounds.  Lee playing synths with his feet while plucking the bass.  It features a shoutout to Powerhouse (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r3FLN0iQ9SQ ) among other things.

https://youtu.be/eK1hmDpa8bo

The bass is, as the kids say, sick. 

Mike Kelly

The Jay Farrar Hall of Fame 

Lots of times on this blog, we wax on about the subtleties of the songs that we love and the lyrics that are easy for the untrained ear to miss, but sometimes the simple things are the truest.  Such is the case for my first argument Jay Farrar Hall of Fame Nomination.  Put simply, listen to this guy's fucking voice.  The rich baritone allows him to carry a quiet confidence through the intense navigation of the unknown that the subjects of his song often encounter.  

For instance in, "Looking for a Way Out" -- Uncle Tupelo, there's a realization that sometimes even the best of dreamers don't get what they think is coming for them and that time is fleeting.  At a time in American music where all the cool kids were either listening to 2Pac or Fugazi, this UT song split the difference in previously unreachable ways for my 16 yr old self.   In lots of these songs, there's an understated urgency that permeates how we all live, but don't admit all that often. 

However, time can be long too.  "When morning comes twice a day or not at all/ If I break in two will you put me back together" is the resonate line that speaks to the agonizing pace of being banged up from last night and desperately missing someone that makes "Still Be Around" -- Uncle Tupelo -- a representative sample of a Hall of Fame career.  

But here's the thing.  One of the most noteworthy things about JF songs is that they are timeless.  Songs like "Tear Stained Eye" -- Son Volt --  could just as easily fit in on country radio in the late 1950s or provide two people a soundtrack for driving on rural highways through the American South 15 years from now.  There's lots of good choices in this HOF ballot, but they are mostly linked to an era in ways that Jay Farrar songs are not.  

It would be sort of easy to typecast Jay Farrar as nothing more than John Cougar Mellancamp who happened to read a few more books. To that end, I wanted to include "Medicine Hat" -- Son Volt --

in the Hall of Fame discussion, not because this is one of his better songs, but to show the lyrical and emotional depth of how he's accurately able to tell the story of what a life is and can be.  "There will be strains that break out of straight time/paved with grace/different roads to the same place" is the line that reminds us to embrace the predictable uncertainties of being alive.  

Sometimes, things really are that simple though. In  "World's on Fire" -- New Multitudes the importance of a simple, "I've got your back" is all the song needs to be.

Cyndi Brandenburg

Neko Case

Let me begin by saying what I assume to be obvious: pinpointing a “favorite” artist and then doing right by that artist in a paragraph or two is damn near impossible. But identifying a compelling person whose talents slipped into my consciousness unexpectedly and have remained there so appreciatively ever since, and feeling challenged to demonstrate why that might be so to a broader audience, well...that seems more doable. So for this discography one-off, I am going to try to either lure you into loving Neko Case for the first time or remind you why you love her even more than you thought you did in the first place. Seriously, you need read no further....just listen to the links below because some things go without saying. However, I have provided a wee bit of context for my particular choices in case that helps, highlighting the range of experience and expression that she is capable of offering. For me, it is the growth and change of my own relationship with her music over time that matters, because the trajectory of how people’s tastes evolve and the anticipation around what they might discover next is what it’s all about. In that vein, I’m excited to hear what everyone else posts to this challenge.

I Wish I Was The Moon was my gateway Neko song—kind of like a first crush that I should have payed more attention to. It took me a while before I started listening to her other work, and looking back now I wonder why I couldn’t see more clearly where this one was heading.

Whip The Blankets is just super fun....teasingly playful and simultaneously urgent, when I first heard it I thought to myself, “turns out I do like to steep in the pleasure of a little country after all.”

I blogged about the song Furnace Room Lullaby before. I still find this hauntingly soulful brooding selection to be strangely reassuring, and I still listen to it for comfort in the middle of the night when I get stuck in a 3am sleepless mind-loop.

This Tornado Loves You is quintessential stormy Neko Case, with lyrics that capture desire-fueled desperation wreaking havoc on the world like no other.

I heard Neko Case perform Sleep All Summer live at the Flynn Theater about five years or so ago, and started looking for a recorded version online the very next day. This one, a duet with Eric Bachmann, appears on her latest album. The timing of the slow wistful harmony gets me every time. I’ll be listening to it a lot over the next few months.

Finally, it is only fair to recognize the great contributions she has made doing lead vocals for The New Pornographers over the years. The song Challengers is a favorite, and I guess it sort of works as a metaphor for negotiating a complex musical career that defies the odds and challenges expectations? Nah, actually it doesn’t. I just chose it because I like it.

Alice Neiley

What is this "favorite artist" crap, anyway? Who has just one? Who can choose THAT without a tremendous amount of anxiety? Well, apparently I will have to suck it up in order to avoid eye rolls and subsequent teasing from Mike Kelly because I "always bend the rules". 

Since there likely IS already a museum of sorts dedicated to Ella Fitzgerald (who would be my first choice), I will go with Patty Griffin, whose lyrics and melodies I've been in love with since I first heard "Useless Desires" 14 years ago. It was 2005, a year after her album Impossible Dream was released. I was sitting at a red light at the four way stop near the Shelburne Country Store, and the tune came on Burlington's best independent radio station, The Point 104.7 :). It was about 2pm.  I remember where I was and the time so specifically because those lyrics, that melody, made me feel like someone had reached into my life and heart and made a song. As it turns out, about 90% of her songs are that way for me -- like sudden little moments of heat from embers that were already there. 

The five songs I would choose for the Patty Griffin museum: 

1. Useless Desires (Impossible Dream album)

2. Rowing Song (Impossible Dream album)

3. Long Ride Home (1000 Kisses album) 

4. Go Wherever You Wanna Go (American Kid album)

5. Blue Sky (Flaming Red album) 

**runner up** (shutupmikekelly): When It Don't Come Easy (Impossible Dream album) 

Dave Kelley

Anyone that has known me for at least a day is aware that Springsteen is far and away my favorite musician.  I thought of going with a different artist because he is such an obvious choice and because the odds are good that he will also be Dave Wallace's selection as well.  I decided to stick with Bruce.

The analogy of blind individuals each feeling a different part of an elephant is an old, tired, and overused cliché.  But since I am also an old, tired, and overused cliché, that is what I will go with for my blog entry.  I chose the five songs that I did, because each in its own way represent a different aspect of Bruce's music that I love.

One of the many things that I love about Bruce is his versatility in terms of style, sound, and mood.  At his live shows he switches on a dime from loud, boisterous, funny, and celebratory to somber, quiet, contemplative, and even morose.  These are not my five favorite Springsteen songs by any means, but I love them all and taken together I think that they encompass many of the things that I love about him and his music.

 "Born to Run".          This will probably always be his greatest song.  It was written when he was twenty-five years old and in danger of being dropped by the record company if his third record did not sell much better than his first two.   Steve Van Zandt has said that what separated Bruce from all of the other countless other young musicians that he knew was that Bruce never had nor wanted to have a plan B.  His only ambition was to be a great musician.  In the documentary about the making of the Darkness record Springsteen said that more than being rich, or famous, or even happy, he wanted to be great.  Perhaps that is why instead of recording a seaside party song filled with pop hooks guaranteed to get radio play, he decided to write an incredibly complex song that included every musical instrument known to man.  I wrote extensively about this song in the original blog so I won't go overboard.  To me this song is about being young, ambitious, and wanting EVERYTHING.  Most of us never really get to that place where we really want to go, but we should sure as hell try.  To paraphrase a better writer than I, the crucial line in the song is "but till then."  Can we live and be happy and fulfilled "until" we get to that mystical place where we have everything we want.  We better be able to because we probably ain't ever getting there.  

 "Born in the USA"  If "Born to Run" is a song about wanting to strike out and leave your home to find something better, "Born in the USA" is about being stuck where you are.  The singer has been lied to by his government, shipped off to fight an ill conceived and pointless war, and then returned home to a "thanks but we got nothing for you."  The singer in Born to Run believes he has countless options, the singer in Born in the USA believes he has none.  Apparently the original lyrics had lines about Richard Nixon should have his balls cut off.  Maybe that dipshit Reagan would not have tried to appropriate Bruce's music had that stayed in the song.  Bruce avoided the draft due to injuries he sustained in a motorcycle accident and is still haunted by wondering who went in his place and what happened to that person.  No wonder that he is one of the biggest supporters of combat veterans that we have.

"State Trooper".  For the follow up to his sprawling best selling double record :"The River" Bruce released...…...an album of stark acoustic songs recorded at home on a 4 track tape machine.  I read an interview in which he said that when he presented the record to Columbia Records he could see in the executives' faces that they were saying goodbye to a Christmas bonus.  Bruce wrote extensively in his autobiography about his personal and family history of depression.  Much like Neil's "Tonight's the Night" this is his dark night of the soul.  Another similarity between Bruce and Neil is their willingness to follow their muse wherever that might lead.  In Bruce's world, isolation is a very dangerous and toxic thing.  The singer in this song is a very dangerous man indeed.  He is furiously praying that the state trooper does not pull him over because it seems like the trooper would survive the encounter. 

"Darkness on the Edge of Town"    I was certainly not the first or the last person to view the singer of this song as the guy from "Thunder Road" with a few more years of life behind him.  There is no longer a hope that the right girl, and the right car, and the right destination will cure all that ills you.  Now his marriage to Mary is over, and he is stuck back in the town he was so desperate to leave.  I find that "Darkness" has a perfect blend of despair and defiance.  Do you have the guts to go on after your dreams crumble to dust.

"tonight I'll be on that hill , cause I can't stop

I'll be on that hill with everything that I've got

with lives on the line, where dreams are found and lost

I'll be there on time, and I'll pay the cost

for wanting things, that can only be found

in the darkness on the edge of town"

"Just Around the Corner to The Light of Day"  Bruce wrote this for Joan Jett and to my knowledge has never released a studio version of his own.  He does pull it out in his live shows on occasion and to my mind it fucking kills.  Bruce and the E Street Band are such a fucking joy to see live.  There are so many great musicians on stage that have played together forever.  I had to include this to convey how joyous the live shows are.  For someone who is very shy in interviews, Bruce is just an uninhibited nut onstage.  I find watching this live clip a way to remember the sheer rapture he and the band convey onstage.  

Phil Seiler

As much as I would have liked to do a left turn with this theme and pick a beloved but not most beloved artist (Prefab Sprout, Neil Finn, Kate Bush), I must adhere to the rules and so my artist is Todd Rundgren. This is a huge challenge in and of itself as there are so many different incarnations of Todd: Pop Todd, Rock Todd, Prog Todd, Utopia Todd, Broadway Todd, Goofy Todd, Rap Todd. Just 5 songs is a major ask. But, once again, I will adhere to the rules (haha, not really.) I will, however, askew Todd's two biggest hits: Hello It's Me and Bang the Drum All Day. There are better choices. I have discographied Temporary Sanity

before and even though it is a perfect song, I will give it a pass for this exercise as well.

1) International Feel - Let's start close to the beginning. In 1973, after a breakthrough double-album of pop gems, Something / Anything, including his biggest hit, Hello, Its Me, Todd released the album A Wizard, A True Star. The title is less hubris than cheek as Todd was surely aware of the fleeting nature of fame. But genius he had aplenty as he kicks off this album with International Feel, a rollicking bit of weirdness that is a complete departure from most of his catalog before. Starting with a pulsing synthesizer that surely is meant to evoke a plane taking off into a rocket liftoff into transcendence (????) into a beautiful melodic riff into the opening lyrics: "Here we are again / the start of the end / But there's more / I only want to see / if you'll give up on me" Barely in his twenties, Todd makes just an astounding observation of an artist wrestling with the direction his muse is taking him versus his audience (and the world's) expectations. How many artists have summed up their 50 year musical careers so succinctly in a song so early in their career?

2) Bread - The Hermit of Mink Hollow is such a beautiful pop album full of amazing tunes that us Todd fans remain utterly confused that it is so little known. Oh sure, some people might recognize "Can We Still Be Friends" but this album is literally 12 amazing songs showcasing Todd's talent. I really want to include "Too Far Gone" as I just saw a video of this live from his most recent tour where he is celebrating his autobiography and this song is a description of the year he took off, buying one Pan Am ticket that allowed the flyer to stop as many times as they wanted, for as long as they wanted, as long as they continued in the same direction when they got back on. Instead, I need to feature Bread. This was the start of side B and was one of those songs that absolutely stuck in my craw as a young Republican as I couldn't shake the legitimacy of the message. "I hear the cries of the children at night / I watch their faces grow sallow with hunger / who draws the line between what's wrong and right / and when I ask what my life is for it's all been for nothing / save your regrets for the dead / but for the living / give them love, give them bread". I'm not sure a message ever resonated with me so deeply. Onwards comrades! Worth also noting that for a softer song, there is some lovely guitar work here, an underappreciated strength of Todd's music.

3) I Love My Life - In 1989, Todd entered the studio to record Nearly Human. Unlike so many of his previous albums where he recorded and layered all the instruments, vocals, and tracks himself, this album was to be recorded live with a cadre of musicians he had worked with over the years including members of his band Utopia, The Tubes, Bourgeois Tagg, and future wife Michelle Gray. The album is organic and lively and thoughtful. It shows the hallmarks of both 4 years of pent up creative energy and an attention to detail, perhaps to make this his last true attempt to reach the charts. The excellent single Want of a Nail made it but only barely. Thankfully, we were about to enter an era when artists could fund their music and creativity with methods other than labels and hits. The album closes with the gospel inspired anthem "I Love My Life". If you can't hear the joy in all the singers and players in this recording, you need better headphones. Try not to raise your hands and testify as Todd preaches about time (although it does appear he misuses the word ameliorator in his sermon and later live recordings show he changed it to "compromiser".) On the other hand, I know of no other pop song to use the word ameliorate. Todd's vocabulary has always been an unexpected little gift in his music.

4) Afterlife - From the underrated 2004 album Liars comes the track Afterlife. Liars is a thematic album built around all the lies we tell ourselves and are told to us as truth. But Afterlife stands out as a testament to what may come next and what is truly important. Musically, this song showcases Todd's ability to build a song around an infectious hook. It's just a beautiful melody with the right layers of harmony (catch those backing vocals rising and disappearing into the ether.) But the message is again the motivation for my inclusion of this song. "Kiss it all goodbye / It was just a clever lie / If I could never see your face / then I would have to fall from grace / even in my afterlife". There is only now. Find the love that you would fall from grace for.

5) Healing Part I - Part II - Part III - I don't actually care if nobody ever hears what I hear in this opus and it is probably the worst track to try to highlight Todd. If forced to have one piece of music on a desert island this would certainly be among my top choices. Todd plays and sings every note in this piece, layered with his studio skills. I especially love the triangle, playing on the off beat in the part 1 as it is clearly before computerized instruments. You can hear the occasional pattern changes and they give the piece so much vibrancy and life. Much like a classical composition, Part II slows down and settles in for a quiet meditation on self. And then Part III picks up the pace with the uplifting message that I always found in Todd's work: you are your own savior. "Listen to the voice / That whispers in the silence / listen as the voice / solidifies your self-reliance / Let the peace that you've discovered / Be a guiding light / Let the cry that you've uncovered / Set the world aright / You could not be closer to your maker / Never more or less alone / If you know thyself there's nothing else to know / you are whole / you are whole". To this day I cannot tell if that first "whole" is actually "home" but Todd clearly wants that ambiguity as he vocally ad libs "Welcome home" soon after. Almost homophones, almost synonyms. It's those little lyrical touches that move me.

So there is my celebration of Todd and it omits at least three other songs I started writing about and abandoned. It also omits any songs that the average listener might actually know Todd for. It is the deepest of catalogs, after all, and worth exploring in depth for the ambitious. Finally, let me offer two little codas: one for our blog host, Utopia's celebration of the desert: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rXnfMc8lqOg">Caravan. Can't imagine why it makes me think of him. And to the rest of the world, Todd's final track on Runt: The Ballad of Todd Rundgren: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z4vJIhv67M4">Remember Me.

Gary Scudder

Like most of us I found this to be a difficult challenge, but unlike most of you I can only blame myself for it. For the rest of you your personal responsibility ends at being dumb enough to have me as a friend. As I said previously I was determined to not focus on Neil Young because I had already done something similar to this in the 110 NY songs better than Heart of Gold blog post. So, then I moved on to Lucinda Williams, Kathleen Edwards and the Drive-By Truckers - only to discover that I had already written on most of the songs that would have constituted my top five for each of their museums/halls of fame. This is what happens when you hit every week for both years of the Discography (and also have more limited musical knowledge than the rest of you).

So then I started over. And in this case I truly thought of this assignment as a museum, and created what amounts to a travelling exhibit for a Neil Young Museum (although I did see, at least the outside, of the now sadly-closed Neil Young Museum in Omemee).For some time I've argued that while some singes/artists are the Artist of the American Dream or the Artist of the Failure of the American Dream or the Artist of the Broken Heart or the Artist of the American South or the Artist of the Poor and Disenfranchised, Young is the Artist of the Liminal Space. So many of his songs exist in that ambiguous space between worlds, and this case his weakish voice and opaque lyrics are a perfect fit.  Take a song like Harvest; I think every line of the entire song is a metaphor for liminal spaces. With this in mind, I then decided to set myself the challenge of taking it to the next level, and associating the top 10 songs from the Heart of Gold List and picking out a painting that spoke to the song and it's existence in the liminal space (it all made much more sense when I thought of it while walking my dog one afternoon).

Anyway, here you go. I've started with the original list and commentary, and then included a piece of art and new commentary. Obviously, I think this shows that I've ready for the Discography to start up again full-time.

1. Helpless, Album: Deja, Vu, CSNY (1970)

"There is a town in north Ontario, with dreams, comfort, memory, despair." Or something like that.  I've also seen it listed as "dreams, comfort, memory, to spare," which, truthfully, doesn't make any sense to me at all.  I've sometimes used it in class as a perception/memory experiment.  I literally can't hear it as "to spare."  The song is so cripplingly elegiac that "despair" seems to be the only way to read it.  Either way, it is a song that is so beautiful that it still makes the hair stand up on the back of my neck.  When my friend Mike Lange and I drove to Omemee, Ontario a couple summers ago to almost visit the Neil Young Museum there I made sure that this was playing as we drove into the town.  It is actually in southern Ontario (unless you're completely Toronto-centric), but northern just fits the mood. Young is infamous for having a warehouse full of tapes (which I'm certain is what Lucinda Williams is referring to to Real Life Bleeding Fingers and Broken Guitar Strings) and it is supposed to relate to the fact that the definitive version of this song was never recorded because some stoned techie forgot to turn on the tape machine.  After that he recorded everything himself endlessly.

Paul Cezanne, The House with the Cracked Walls (1894)

*** It wasn't until I started teaching Aesthetic Expressions that I truly grasped how influential and profoundly great Cezanne was. The first time I was teaching the class a group of students had clearly not done the reading in Gombrich and I, in frustration/anger, projected a Cezanne painting (not this one) on the board, dramatically locked the door, told the students to group up, and let them know that no one was getting out alive until they could tell me why the painting was great and transformative (and such the in-class analysis exercise was born). In his The Story of Art, Gombrich proposes that modern art was born with Cezanne, Gauguin and Van Gogh and one shared concept: dissatisfaction. One could probably make the same argument about rock, true rock.

2. Like a Hurricane, Album: American Stars 'n Bars (1977)

I just wrote at length about this song recently on our main Discography discussion thread so I don't know what else I would have to add.  At the time I made the point that I always spun the song around because I've always felt that people saw me as a hurricane and just couldn't get past the gale force winds of ego and temper and general snarkiness.  More importantly, this is just soaring guitar work from Crazy Horse vol. II.  It's not as precise as the golden age Crazy Horse with Danny Whitten (see below) but you can see why to an entire generation of great bands Young was the Godfather of Grunge.  The version off the album Live Rust is my favorite version.

Tracey Emin, More Ugly, More Self (2009)

*** Tracey Emin is one of the many artists I discovered because I teach Aesthetic Expressions. One of the many things that makes teaching such a great gig is that we actually get to learn new things all the time (which may be the biggest defining attribute between great teachers ["we get to learn new things"] and those who phone it in ["wait, what, we have to learn new things?"]). She has a definite edge, which turns off many people, which she obviously doesn't care two fucks about (a constant of great artists).  

3. Expecting to Fly, Album: Buffalo Springfield Again (1967)

To me this is classic Young, and almost ended up being number one on the list.  The lyrics are maddeningly opaque and just seems to capture an age, which probably explains why it shows up in films like Coming Home.  In most ways it's just a song about a breakup, but it seems to be about so much more.

Anne Harris, Self-Portrait (with Jane's Eyes) 1998

*** In my Concepts of the Self first year class we look at self-portraits every day, every single day, much of the chagrin of my long-suffering students. In ArtStor I have dozens and dozens of folders, and one is chock full of nothing but self-portraits, and this is one of them. And what could be more representative of a liminal space than a self-portrait that makes use of someone else's eyes.

4. Powderfinger, Album: Rust Never Sleeps (1979)

Not surprisingly, this is a song that I associate with my son, but it could be any young person faced with an impossible situation as they pass into adulthood.  It's a song that still makes me very emotional, and at times has been very difficult for me to listen to.  During one of the times when my son disappeared for months on end I found myself listening to this song endlessly and, almost uncontrollably, constructing tombstones quoting lines: "Just think of me as one you never figured to fade away so young/with so much left undone/remember me to my love/you know I'll miss her."  It's difficult to imagine a song that does a much better job getting at the end of innocence. His version off of Live Rust is the closest Young ever came to perfection.

Paul Gauguin, Life and Death (1893)

*** The second most well-known fact in the world (after only the fact that Dave Kelley's favorite musician is Bruce Springsteen) is that my favorite painter is Paul Gauguin. Brow-beaten Scudder veterans can, unbidden, fill in the blanks to these statements in class: "If you approach me with a request to look at an attempted late submission you will be met with [cold, derisive laughter]" and "Every right-thinking individual in the world knows that the greatest painter of all time is [Paul Gauguin]." To me this painting captured the cruel/cold/uncertainty between life/death and innocence/experience that Young celebrates in the song. 

5. Soldier, Album: Journey Through the Past (1972)

I discovered this song when I first began to understand the allure of kicking back against authority, and what better choice than a song that was both anti-military and anti-religion.  Young wonders why the soldier's eyes "shine like the sun," and later asks the same thing about Jesus, after proposing that he can't believe him because "he can't deliver right away."  It's a song I tend to post on Twitter or Facebook on national holidays celebrating war.  I included a link to the version off of the compilation album Decade because I like it a little better than the original, which is featured on the film and album Journey Through the Past.  Beyond singer/songwriter/activist there is also Neil Young filmmaker, and he's really bad at it.  A reporter once asked Young's long-time collaborator Jack Nitzsche why in the hell anyone allowed Young to make a film.  His response is one of my favorites of all time: "When you deliver an album like Harvest, record companies will let you cum in their mouth."  It's more than slightly indelicate and inappropriate, but it captures the mood of the 1970s, the age of the artist as auteur.  It inspired genius but also excess (with the passing of Michael Cimino, we can remember The Deer Hunter and Heaven's Gate).  Oddly, the film has a couple inspired moments and a couple good songs, which cannot be said for Human Highway, which is an hour and a half I'll never get back.  That said, Young is very honest about his failings as a director.  He says he does it to jump start the creative process when he's stalled, but allows that it's an entire learning process, which is what gets his juices flowing.

Marc Chagall, War (1943)

*** So many paintings would have worked here, but I've always had a soft spot for this Chagall painting.

6. Running Dry (Requiem for theRockets), Album: Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere (1970)

It may seem strange when talking about an album which features Cowgirl in the Sand, Down by the River and Cinnamon Girl, but most of the time I think Running Dry is the best song off of Everybody Knows This is Nowhere.  In the midst of an album with a lot of thrash Running Dry is a slow brooding song that beautifully features some haunting fiddle work from Wilson Thibodeaux.  "My cruelty has punctured me/ and now I'm running dry."  It is classic Young in that it is wildly evocative and completely draws you in, whether it is the first or the thousandth time you've heard it.  Young is probably singing about the crimes that he committed against a lover, although before Crazy Horse was Crazy Horse they were a California bar band that Young discovered and rechristened.  Running Dry really showcases Young's ability to construct a complex song.

Paul Gauguin, Spirit of the Dead Watching (1892)

*** My all-time favorite painting for one of my all-time favorite songs. I guess this selection works for me because it's that constant reminder that the end is always near (and that it's not actually that scary of a concept) but that consequently the consequences of your actions are always near, not that you're paying for them as part of some sort of divine retribution, but rather that your ability to make up for hurting people is gone.

7. Sugar Mountain, Album: Canterbury House (1968) and Decade (1977) (released initially as B side single, twice)

Another Young song that was almost too obvious to place this high on the list, but it's just an amazing song.  He wrote this on 12 November 1964 on his 19th birthday.  It didn't show up on an album till 1977's compilation album Decade.  It's actually taken from the Canterbury House recording from 1968, that was released a few years ago.  I am always wont to opine that no one sings about desire like Lucinda Williams.  In much the same way, I just don't think anyone sings about innocence and the terrifying boundary areas leading to the loss of innocence like Young.  "You can't be twenty on Sugar Mountain, even if you think you're leaving there too soon."  It's funny to hear him talk about it being an "oldie," although in 1968 the four years that had elapsed since he wrote the song was an awfully long time.

Andrew Wyeth, Christina's World (1948)

*** Last night one of my students posted on Twitter that she had just turned twenty and had mixed feeling about it. I just typed in the words "Sugar Mountain". She replied with a gif of a confused puppy tilting his head. This is all you need to know about the failure of modern American education. I guess using Wyeth's classic Christina's World is pretty cliched here, but I still think it works.

8. A Man Needs a Maid, Album: Harvest (1972)

Harvest was Young's best-selling album, and was actually the best selling album of 1972.  In my mind A Man Needs a Maid is by far the best song on the album.  It has been criticized, mildly, as being misogynistic, or at the very least dated, but I don't read it that way at all.  I think the point is that it's a tortured soul so shredded by a series of terrible relationships that he can't begin to think about being with anyone, but yet he somehow needs human contact, even if it's just a maid.  Some critics also thought it was a bit overdone (it was recorded with an orchestra), but Young said that it was one of Dylan's favorites and that's all he needed to know.

Judy Dater, Self-Portrait with Stone (1982)

*** Another self-portrait that I routinely show in Concepts of the Self. Usually it's the first one I share because half of the students don't actually recognize Dater's body as, well, a body, so it works very nicely as a metaphor that they're now in college and they'd better start looking more closely and deeply at everything. I chose it for this NY song because I think it speaks to the pain and alienation at the heart of Young's work.

9. Cowgirl in the Sand, Album: Everybody Knows This is Nowhere (1970)

And speaking of Golden Age Crazy Horse.  Young, like Dylan, is one part reality and about nine parts legend.  Allegedly Young wrote Cowgirl in the Sand, Down By the River and Cinnamon Girl in one afternoon when he was laid up with 104 F fever.  It's funny to go back and read the initial reviews of Everybody Knows This is Nowhere, and especially this song.  Some critics loved it, and others felt that it was essentially unfinished and needed some editing (we were at that period of massive over-dubbing, which Young was certainly guilty of as well; such as Broken Arrow from his Buffalo Springfield days).  I think the guitar work is just blistering.  The song is either about - and it sort of depends upon what mood I'm in when I listen to it - a promiscuous woman or Young himself and his inability to stay faithful to any band.

Edvard Munch, Vampire (1895)

*** Like A Man Needs a Maid, I think Cowgirl in the Sand speaks to the almost unimaginable pain of love, and thus my second favorite Edvard Munch painting seems like a perfect fit (and, no, my favorite is not The Scream).

10. Tired Eyes, Album: Tonight's the Night (1975)

I really struggled with where to rank Tired Eyes, or, for that matter, any of the other songs from Tonight's the Night.  As I will drone about endlessly, and as all-right thinking individuals know, Tonight's the Night is the greatest rock album of all time.  Did it ever have a hit?  Not even close. With the exception of a small lunatic fringe (at least one of which lived in southern Indiana), the world was generally horrified.  This wasn't Harvest Revisited.  However, I would argue that Tonight's the Night holds together better and more consistently than any other album.  It has a message without falling into the trap of a clumsy concept album.  Two of Young's closest friends, original Crazy Horse guitarist Danny Whitten and roadie Bruce Berry, had just died of heroin overdoses and while Neil could have written more anti-drug songs he decided to take the listeners on the most exhaustive, drugged out overnight road trip imaginable.  You want to understand the undercurrent of the drug world, OK, hop in.  Any aspiring artist should read the chapter in Shakey on the recording of the album, which was done at 3:00 a.m. when everyone was appropriately drunk and tired enough to get the vibe right/wrong.  Of course, take everything I've just written with a large grain of salt because my son assures me that the only reason I teach or am on social media is to champion this album.

Paul Cezanne, Pyramid of Skulls (1900)

*** OK, I guess this is probably a "duh" but ever since I had this thought I can't hear the song without this Cezanne painting arriving unbidden.