Bob Dylan - Subterranean Homesick Blues

Some musical  respite. "Subterranean Homesick Blues" is a song by Bob Dylan , originally released on the album  Bringing it all Back Home in March 1965.  Bob was a little ahead of the 'music video' trend when, on  this day May 8, 1965, he got the idea to make a short film of the song.He was filming what would become the documentary "Don't Look Back" when the idea hit him.
The short film that follows  features him standing in an alley next to London's Savoy Hotel , just accompanied by his friends Allen Ginsberg and Bob Neuwirth, flipping giant cue cards with the lyrics of the song on them.

The video, which many feel was one of the first "music videos," would become an iconic rock moment. The song sounded like nothing nobody had  heard before and  it utterly transformed Bob Dylan's career and the history of popular music along with it.
In 1963 Dylan had become one of  the leading figures in the folk revival, writing socially conscious anthems like "Blowin' in the Wind." As of his fourth album, Another Side of Bob Dylan, released in August 1964, he was becoming less interested in political material and more interested in songs with poetic, allusive imagery, but he was still playing them on an acoustic guitar or piano and his ever-present harmonica. In January 1965, however, Dylan went into the studio with a five-piece electric band -- two guitars, piano, bass, and drums . The first product of this effort was "Subterranean Homesick Blues," In four lengthy verses, with no real chorus (though the line "Look out, kid" appeared in the second part of every verse) and no mention of the title, Dylan delved into a free association of rhymes and catch phrases. This was Dylan’s first successful attempt to integrate the emotions of the Beat Generation which he had understood from Alan Ginsberg and others combining the thoughts of the moment with three minutes of everything that was happening in the world of the mid 1960s.
Like the Beat Generation poetry before it took a scatological approach to lyrics and rhyme, rejecting all that had gone before, linking the future to the past and back again, finding new models, new expressions, new ideas, even if no one knew what they meant.
The song contained depictions of a variety of characters including Johnny, "the man in the trench coat," "the man in the coon-skin cap in the big pen," Maggie, "girl by the whirlpool," and others, and, in the second parts of each verse, various pieces of cautionary advice for the kid, including everything from "Don't try No Doz" to "try to avoid the scandals." It wasn't a protest song in the way that some of Dylan's earlier songs had been, but the lyrics clearly expressed social discontent, with lines like "Twenty years of schoolin'/And they put you on the day shift." Dylan spat out the words in a staccato rhythm while the band rollicked along in a ramshackle manner.
The whole thing was oddly exhilarating, but "Subterranean Homesick Blues" was easily the strangest single Columbia Records had ever released. It was also a hit, at least a modest one, peaking just inside the Top 40, Dylan's first single to reach the charts. Rolling Stone magazine has it in the top 500 greatest songs of all time. A personal favourite of mine.
Here's Bob in London, 52 years ago today.

(As for those) in the basement
(Marijuana's) the medicine
(And those) on the pavement
(Burning down the false) government
The man in the trench coat
Badge out, laid off
Says he's got a bad cough
Wants to get it paid off
Look out kid
It's something you did
(Jah) knows when
But you're doing' it again
You better duck down the alley way
Looking' for a new friend
The man in the coon-skin cap
In the big pen
Wants eleven dollar bills
You only got ten

Maggie comes fleet foot
Face full of black soot
Talking' that the heat put
Plants in the bed but
The phone's tapped anyway
Maggie says that many say
They must bust in early May
Orders from the D.A.
Look out kid
Don't matter what you did
Walk on your tip toes
Don't try "No Doze"
Better stay away from those
That carry around a fire hose
Keep a clean nose
Watch (those) plain clothes
You don't need a weather man
To know which way the wind blows

(You) get sick, (then) get well
Hang around an ink well
(Things fell), hard to tell
If anything is going' to sell
Try hard, get barred
Get back, write Braille
Get jailed, jump bail
(Don't stop, you don't) fail
Look out kid
You're going to get hit
By users, cheaters
Six-time losers
Hang around the theaters
Girl by the whirlpool
Looking' for a new fool
Don't follow leaders
Watch the parking' meters

Ah get born, keep warm
(Girls come) learn to dance
Get dressed, get blessed
Try to be a success
Please her (to please me)
Don't steal, don't (shop) lift
Twenty years of schooling'
And they put you on the day shift
Look out kid
They keep it all hid
(You come out from the dark zone)
Light yourself a (fire torch)
Wear (your) sandals
Try to avoid the scandals
Don't want to be a bum
(Get yourself a gun)
The pump don't work
'Cause the vandals took the handles

alistair hulet and jimmy gregory - the internationale

Following my previous  post another one : This one makes me think of the connections between the two ways of thinking that I am drawn to, the balance between being part of a greater whole, solidarity, oneness, and then the importance of diversity and individual freedom.
As its International Worker's Day here's  Alistair Hulet and Jimmy Gregory doing Alistair's  version of the 19th century left wing anthem  that came out of the Paris Commune : The Internationale." (French: "L'Internationale"). It has been one of the most recognizable and popular songs of the socialist movement since the late 19th century, when the Second International (now the Socialist International) adopted it as its official anthem. The title arises from the "First International", an alliance of socialist parties formed by Marx and Engels which held a congress in 1864. The author of the anthem's lyrics, Eugène Pottier, attended this congress.
The original French refrain of the song is C'est la lutte finale / Groupons-nous et demain / L'Internationale / Sera le genre humain. (English: "This is the final struggle / Let us group together and tomorrow / The Internationale / Will be the human race.") "The Internationale" has been translated into many languages. It is often sung with the left hand raised in a clenched fist salute and is sometimes followed (in English-speaking places) with a chant of "The workers united will never be defeated." "The Internationale" has been celebrated by socialists, communists, anarchists, democratic socialists, and some social democrats.
The original French words were written in June 1871 by Eugène Pottier (1816--1887, previously a member of the Paris Commune) and were originally intended to be sung to the tune of "La Marseillaise". Pierre De Geyter (1848--1932) set the poem to music in 1888. His melody was first publicly performed in July 1888 and became widely used soon after.
Today many will be singing  it on May Day,  honoured by labourers and the working class, promoted by the international labour movement, socialists, anarchists and communists alike . The celebration of Mayday as a working class holiday evolved from the struggle for the eight-hour day in the USA in the1880’s. In 1884, the Federation of Organized Trades and Labor Unions passed a resolution stating that eight hours would constitute a legal day's work from and after May 1, 1886. The resolution called for a general strike to achieve the goal. With workers being forced to work ten, twelve, and fourteen hours a day, rank-and-file support for the eight-hour movement grew rapidly, despite the indifference and hostility of many union leaders. Revolutionaries believed in the struggle for an eight-hour day. A protest and rally was called in Chicago on the first of May 1886 after trade unionists had been hanged and imprisoned. Over one million American workers demonstrated for an eight hour day; despite being fired on by Chicago police, they succeeded in their demands
By 1890, the initial protest in Chicago had spread into an international protest for worker’s rights.
 Leaders of the Second International requested an international day of protest to be in held in May 1890. The UK demonstration took place and in Hyde Park, London alone – attracted 300,000 protesters. It was originally intended to be a one-off protest but it created a boom of trade unionism. It has since  helped advocate renewal, revival and of course that  powerful  trait known as solidarity, a time to organise around issues that are of vital importance today. This celebration is as relevant today as it was in 1890, a time to remember our triumphs and past struggles. Today more than ever we have to stand up to workers rights.  You only have to look at the Tories' approach to workers’ rights to see how our hard-won gains are at risk as they seek to remove  regulations that protect us.

One Hour of Spanish Republican Music

In 1931, Spanish King Alfonso XIII approved elections to decide the government of Spain, and voters overwhelmingly chose to abolish the monarchy in favor of a liberal republic. Alfonso subsequently went into exile, and the Second Republic, was proclaimed. During the first five years of the Republic, organized labor and leftist radicals forced widespread liberal reforms, and the independence-minded Spanish regions of Catalonia and the Basque provinces achieved virtual autonomy.
The landed aristocracy, the church, and a large military clique increasingly employed violence in their opposition to the Second Republic, and in July 1936 General Francisco Franco led a right-wing army revolt in Morocco, which prompted the division of Spain into two key camps: the fascists and the Republicans. Franco’s  fascist forces rapidly overran much of the Republican-controlled areas in central and northern Spain, but Catalonia became a key Republican stronghold.
During 1937, Franco unified his  forces under the command of the Falange, Spain’s fascist party, with the aid  of Nazi Germany and Italy who supplied them with  an abundance of planes, tanks, and arms, while radical men and women  took up arms to defend Spanish democracy against the right-wing uprising, rallying to the Republican cause forming what is known as the International Brigades.The most significant contribution of these foreign units was the successful defense of Madrid until the end of the war.
In June 1938, however the fascists managed to cut  the Republican territory in two, and later in the year, Franco mounted a major offensive against Catalonia. In January 1939, its capital, Barcelona, was captured, and soon after the rest of Catalonia fell. With the Republican cause all but lost, its leaders attempted to negotiate a peace, but Franco refused. On March 28, 1939, the fascists entered Madrid in triumph, and the Spanish Civil War came to an end. Sadly many  members of the International Brigades were lost  fighting for the noble cause they believed in.
The  music above though is not lost and hopefully still inspires and resonates deeply within, still capable of igniting passion, enduring flames in our continuous battle against the dark forces of fascism. A companion piece to a few earlier posts, that are also sources  of constant inspiration.To this day, generations later, these songs of the Spanish Civil War are still sung across the world, and are no less urgent, as we continue to follow liberty's breath and stand up to the enemies of freedom that are no less dangerous. 

http://teifidancer-teifidancer.blogspot.co.uk/2015/10/one-hour-of-iww-music.html

 http://teifidancer-teifidancer.blogspot.co.uk/2015/10/one-hour-of-yiddish-communist-music.html