Roger O Green

Most awarded songs #8

Albany Institute of History and Art

These are more of the most awarded songs #8. They’ve been touted by the Grammys, the Oscars, Rolling Stone magazine, RIAA, ASCAP, CMA, NPR, and all other sorts.

80. We Are Family – Sister Sledge. This song became the theme song for the 1979 Pittsburgh Pirates. The baseball team featured Dave Parker and the aging (at 39) Willie Stargell, referred to as Pops. They played the Baltimore Orioles in the World Series and the Bucs were down 3-1 to the Birds. Inexplicably, I made a small wager that the Pirates would win, first game 5, then game 6, which they did. But I didn’t bet on game 7 when the Pirates took the Series. This song was the first written by Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards for someone other than Chic.
79. Purple Rain – Prince and the Revolution. I saw the movie. Great tunes, including by The Time. The song was the last tune performed live by Prince.
78. Born To Be Wild – Steppenwolf. On the Easy Rider soundtrack, of course. But it’s the hit from that first Steppenwolf album, which is my favorite of theirs.
77. I Want You Back – Jackson Five. Unashamedly, unironically, I loved the most of the songs from the group’s first two albums. This was the first hit. I liked singing along on the Jermaine parts, the second lead. Incidentally, the B-side, a cover of Who’s Loving You, is also great.

The music died

76. That’ll Be The Day – The Crickets. Buddy Holly wasn’t credited for contractual reasons. Regardless, given how young Holly was when he died, it’s astonishing what a force of nature he was.
75. Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow – The Shirelles. The Goffin/King song was the first by a black all-girl group to reach number one in the US pop charts in early 1961. Carole King later covered it on Tapestry.
74. Beat It – Michael Jackson. A rock song, featuring a guitar solo by Eddie Van Halen.
73. American Pie – Don McLean. Speaking of Buddy Holly, the line ‘the day the music died” of course refers to a plane crash on February 3, 1959. Holly, Richie Valens, the Big Bopper, and others were killed. The song was the source of much speculation about its meaning.
72. Maggie May – Rod Stewart. As much as any song, this song defined my freshman year in college, 1971-72, with the constant play on dorm record players of the Every Picture Tells A Story album.
71. I Want To Hold Your Hand – The Beatles. There is a famous photo of The Beatles engaged in a pillow fight. It took place in a hotel in France after they heard that the song went #1 in the United States. A month later, the band was on Ed Sullivan. I saw the Harry Benson photo at the Albany Institute of History and Art, a part of a show called The Beatles: Now and Then in early 2003. There was a complementary exhibition, THE BEATLES: Community Stories, in which I participated.

Practice Joy

Karen Oliveto

Since Easter, our pastors have offered a series of sermons called Practice Joy. The anthems and hymns have been joy-based.

Still, sometimes I forget about doing joy. I read the news or watch it on television and become distraught. It’s not just the latest shooting, but about some state legislator from Tennessee (I think) who says we can’t do anything about it. Or the book bans that are designed to “protect” our kids from becoming transvestite Latinx bisexuals spouting Critical Race Theory. When I see this, I curse at my television, quite literally.

But two events last weekend reminded me of the power of joy. One was the sermon, tied to Romans 12:9-21. Specifically, in verse 15, “Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn.” There is power in not going through the pain alone; there is even a reflective joy.

The other was that my wife and I attended a gathering at the First United Methodist Church of Schenectady. The congregation was celebrating its 27th Anniversary as a Reconciling Congregation. For those not versed in UMC lingo, “All persons are recipients of God’s love and grace; God intends the church to be a community which embodies love, grace and justice for all people as a sign of God’s covenant. We, therefore, will continue to seek and welcome persons of any age, gender, race, ethnic background, sexual orientation, physical or mental ability as full participants in our community of faith.”

The speaker

The speaker was Bishop Karen P. Oliveto of the Mountain Sky Conference, the first openly LGBTQAI Bishop in the United Methodist Church. She may be the most optimistic pastor I’ve encountered, and I’ve known a few.

After speaking for a while, she asked us to discuss the things that distress us with a neighbor. This was very easy. After another bit of her sharing, she called on us to share what we did to bring ourselves joy. This was more difficult.

After the talk, my wife and Karen got reacquainted. Karen is the sister of one of my wife’s best friends since college. Karen had spoken in Oneonta, about an hour from here, at some point pre-COVID, but I couldn’t make it.

On the lookout

After the talk, I started looking for every opportunity to find joy. We went out to a diner and had cheeseburgers. Of late, we rarely have beef, so it was terrific.

Then I went home. A blanket had covered my stuffed animals because I was tidying up. But they gave me joy – I was reminded of this when a young girl at the Karen Oliveto talk mentioned hers – so I needed to liberate them. One of my favorites is Lenny. He’s named after Leonard Bernstein and has the sweetest roar. We hung out on the sofa and watched TV.

The next day at church, there were several opportunities for humor. Like many funny things, the humor is diminished in the retelling. One encounter involved pizza, inside out.

Don’t forget to practice joy. It’s easy to forget.

Movie review: Air (2023)

Michael Jordan’s footwear

On the surface, there is no reason the movie Air (2023) should work. It’s a film about the inner workings of Nike, a sneaker company, a clear #3 in the basketball world, trying to get players to endorse and wear their product. It sounds as though it could be boring.

Yet I was captivated at the onset, from the opening montage of 1984 images – “Where’s the beef,” Mr. T on the A-Team – to the musical selections. The key, though, was driven by Alex Convery in his debut as a screenwriter. The dialogue was fresh without being affected.

Sonny Vaccaro (Matt Damon) is a middle-aged, overweight guy with a radical plan. Instead of trying to sign three or four rookie prospects to put on the foot apparel as usual, Nike should commit the entire budget to one player. Sonny violates corporate protocol to try to get Michael Jordan to agree to sign with them.

While getting some support from his colleague Howard White (Chris Tucker), Sonny is getting resistance from his boss Rob Strasser (Jason Bateman), and especially Nike head honcho Phil Knight (Ben Affleck.) To contact Michael, he has to deal with the athlete’s mother Doloris (Viola Davis).

There’s no need to fear

This is a sports story about an underdog. But the underdog is not Michael, though the actual player had been underestimated in the past. The underdog is Nike, and especially Sonny.

Interestingly, the character Michael himself barely appears in the film. The creators decided, probably rightly, that the actor would be unfavorably compared with the real deal. Thus the shots of Michael (Damien Young) are usually from his back. He barely speaks. Film clips of Michael are used, especially near the end.

The acting is solid throughout, and director Ben Affleck keeps the mostly talk-driven film moving. It was reviewed well.

BTW, at least seven movies on the IMDb titled Air in this century alone exist. I saw the MJ-related Air at the Madison Theatre in Albany at a Wednesday afternoon matinee on the last day it played there, along with two other people.

Trailers

Before the movie, there were trailers for three movies. One was for the Dungeons and Dragons film, and another was for Guardians of the Galaxy 3.

The first was the red band trailer for Sisu. “When an ex-soldier who discovers gold in the Lapland wilderness tries to take the loot into the city, Nazi soldiers led by a brutal SS officer battle him.” It was quite violent; you can find it on YouTube, but I’m not linking it.

From the New York Times: “The Finnish way of life is summed up in ‘sisu,’ a trait said to be part of the national character. The word roughly translates to “grim determination in the face of hardships,” such as the country’s long winters: Even in adversity, a Finn is expected to persevere, without complaining.”

Serendipity at the bus stop

pleasant interactions

On a recent busy day in April, I experienced serendipity at the bus stop.

After my Bible study, I took the bus to the library. My pal Patricia was talking about her book about helping chronically ill people. This was much more interesting and affirming than you might think.

I walked down to the Board of Education building to get an absentee ballot for the school and library budget vote on May 16. Leaving the building, I saw the #18 bus rolling by, and there wouldn’t be another one for a half hour.

My friend David came by. I hadn’t seen him in a few years, even though he lives in town. That is until March, when he and his wife saw the Sister Act at Albany High School, as we did.

He was coming back from serving on a grand jury. I surprised him by knowing that there were 23 people empaneled. I didn’t realize that they only need 18 to make decisions. He’s been selected regularly for various petit and grand jury services.

This led to a conversation about my limited previous jury selections in 2007 and 2014. Hmm. If I were a betting man, I would guess I’d get called again this year.

The ‘burbs

I took the bus to Delmar to pick up two chicken dinners, a fundraiser for the FOCUS Churches. After picking up the meals, I got to talk with Fred, the executive director, and a former neighbor.

Fred recalled a specific incident from nearly two decades ago. He was walking his daughter, who was about a week old. Her name is the same as my wife’s. My wife was about four weeks pregnant then, though we didn’t tell him about that until some weeks later. It was a fond memory.

As I took the bus home, Rebecca, who I used to enjoy frequently seeing on my work days, boarded. Her son went to my college alma mater. We had a brief but lovely chat.

Sometimes, I have to pay attention to the good stuff. They’re not big, shiny events but pleasant interactions that hadn’t occurred as often during the pandemic. So I honor them.

Midnight, the demented cat

the perils of doing laundry

I have written before about our demented cat, Midnight. In some ways, this is not a great photo. On the other hand, it’s rather representative of his demeanor. His arm – OK, front leg – hangs off his loft as though he were Hugh Hefner holding a cigarette at the Playboy Mansion.

Notice the deformed window treatment? That’s the result of Midnight either chewing on the curtains or kneading them. And there are three or four of them in similar conditions. My wife has talked about replacing the curtains, but I said that there’s no point unless we get something made of stainless steel.

When we have people over, he goes to the basement. There are only a handful of people who he won’t harass. And when something I can’t quite ascertain sets him off, the target of his wrath is me.

Domestic chores terrorist

Back in October, I was taking a basket of laundry down to the basement. There was a bottle of TIDE detergent that was next to the doorway, so I grabbed it to take it downstairs. Midnight, sitting on a chair ten feet away, suddenly started yowling and hissing at me. I don’t know if it was the basket or the TIDE that ticked him off, but someone dubbed him a male chauvinist feline because he never bothered my wife or daughter when they transported the laundry.

For the next three days, I was his enemy. I avoided him when I could. My wife would feed him. And I started carrying around a tambourine. Why a tambourine, you may ask? Because carrying around a vacuum cleaner was too heavy. I tried to talk to him, but when he got too close and too scary, I’d rattle the instrument, and he’d run off.

Where’s the feeder guy?

But then, a few days later, he started missing me. “Where’s the one who usually feeds me?” First, he’d get proximate to me, then a little closer. I’d go downstairs to feed him, percussion in hand, and he’d be okay. Then he became desperate for my affection. “Pet me!” And “pick me up and scratch me under my chin.” He needs to be near me and hates it when I close the office door, but I can’t write and tend to him simultaneously.

And it’s all good. Well, except for the time I was walking toward the sofa, and he ran in front of me. He’s ALWAYS getting underfoot, but I usually anticipate it. This time, I must have stepped on him, although I didn’t feel him underneath. He yowled and dug his claw into my foot. But this was a short-lived irritation for him.

Still, when he’s on the sofa and someone is petting him, he’ll suddenly bite them. He did this to my wife and tried to do the same to me. He is a demented cat.