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Sly and Brian

They were both 82 when they died

I’m compelled to write about Sly and Brian. Coincidentally, when I was writing for the ABC Wednesday meme, I created a series of family-related band posts in 2014. It included Sly and the Family Stone -Sly Stone and his siblings, Rose and Freddie; and the Beach Boys – Brian Wilson, his brothers, Dennis and Carl, plus their cousin Mike Love. The posts were only two weeks apart. They are chockablock with musical links.

Check out Coverville 1537: Sly Stone and Brian Wilson Tributes.

Sylvester Stewart (March 15, 1943- June 9, 2025)

The first time I heard of the Family Stone was when I listened to their hit single, Dance to the Music, but I didn’t have any of their albums. My sister got the album Stand! It was a revelation, with the title song, Everyday People, Higher, and others.

I REALLY got Sly and the Family Stone when a bunch of my friends and I went to a cinema in 1970 and watched the movie Woodstock. They were mesmerizing, especially Sly. I seem to recall that when the group was on stage, the projector emitted a purple glow. And then, in those days, the theaters didn’t seem to care – we all watched the movie a second time. (This video is much longer than what was used in the film.)

Soon, I bought the greatest hits album, which has some of the wonderful songs not on a previous album (Hot Fun In The Summertime, Thank You).

Every time I played There’s A Riot Going On, I felt… stoned, and I didn’t even have to smoke. I followed Sly’s various travails. It was great to see the 2021 movie Summer of Soul, featuring the group in 1969, the same year as Woodstock. I’m looking forward to seeing the new documentary ‘Sly Lives!’ as Questlove sets out to answer one question: What is Black Genius?

Long before I’d heard of the Family Stone, Sly produced an album by young Billy Preston, which I own.

Stuck in my head: Sing A Simple Song (the chorus always starts on the first beat of a 4/4 measure, then, at the end, crazily comes in a beat early), Thank You, and Family Affair. Here’s the NYT obit.

Brian Wilson (June 20, 1942- June 11, 2025)

I may have written more about Brian Wilson than any other non-Beatle musician. Surely, I noted that when The Beach Boys first came out , I found them pleasant enough, but I felt no compulsion to buy any of their albums.

Still, I was very aware of them because The Beatles and The Beach Boys were both on Capitol Records, so the inner sleeve of my Beatles LPs listed all the Beach Boys’ albums. I did have two Beach Boys songs from a compilation album.

My first Beach Boys album I purchased was Pet Sounds. I belonged to the Capitol Records Club and never set back the negative option card. Surprisingly, I loved it, and it led me to buy many Beach Boys albums at a time when the group was becoming generally less popular. There are some great songs from that era.

Then Capitol, in its capitalist wisdom, released a collection of their old songs called Spirit of America. I bought that and suddenly became a full-fledged Beach Boys fan. I’ve also purchased several Brian solo albums.

I gave my friend Donna a boxed set of Beach Boys CDs in the late 1990s. Before she died of cancer in the early 2000s, she wanted her friends to divvy up her books and music; I took the boxed set.

I knew that

The New York Times article about Brian contained about 95% of the information that I already knew, including the Beatles/Beach Boys competition. You should see the movie Love & Mercy. I worried about Brian’s well-being after his second wife, Melinda, died in 2024.

I was madly in love with the 2014 BBC cover of God Only Knows by a variety of musicians, including Brian. You can watch the December 2007 Kennedy Center Honor Tribute, part 1 and part 2.

The three songs floating in my head are God Only Knows – effectively used at the end of the movie Love, Actually – ‘Til I Die, and Our Prayer.

American Seditionist Day is coming!

a fourth term?

Congress has introduced legislation to make June 14 a holiday honoring FOTUS. I so agree. June 14 should be American Seditionist Day!

Think about it. He ran for president in 2016 and won despite having less than a majority vote. His second impeachment came after the insurrection he fomented on January 6, 2021. This occurred after he lost the 2020 election, a fact he continues to deny. In its infinite wisdom, the Senate failed to convict because he was no longer in office, and they saw no point.

In light of the January 6 committee reports and various indictments against him, he did the only thing he could: he ran for President AGAIN, won the Republican nomination easily, and was elected with a plurality, not majority, of the vote, in 2024. He was convicted in one trial but would serve no consequential punishment because, by then, he was President-elect.

I came across a Substack article, Comparing Trump and Hitler’s Tactics During Their First Weeks in Office, by Rabbi Jonathan Kligler. “Both pretended to be populists in order to stir the passions of their base. Both were considered to be buffoons by those that saw through their lies, but both were woefully underestimated by their opponents…. Once in power, both immediately took dramatic action to consolidate their power with complete disdain for democratic rules and norms.

“Both had previously attempted violent overthrows of their democratically-elected governments… When those violent attempts failed to secure power, both plotted to secure their power through legal means, the better to enact a bloodless coup d’etat.

If at first…

“Upon securing power, Hitler and Trump each claimed overwhelming electoral mandates to transform their governments, despite neither having won a majority of the vote. They both immediately moved to purge their governments of anyone they considered insufficiently loyal. They weaponized their judiciaries and law enforcement agencies to terrorize and punish their opponents.

“They took advantage of paralyzed and supine legislatures to usurp power…” Indeed. He’s inspired people in Congress to go after, even threaten impeachment, of “activist” judges, who are merely putting on the Constitutional brakes on spending freezes that Congress – Article I Congress – usually fails to do.

“On his first day in office, Trump granted clemency to every person charged or convicted for their role in the January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, calling them patriots.” He has suggested offering the perpetrators compensation.

And now, FOTUS says: “I’ll tell you, I have had more people ask me to have a third term, which in a way is a fourth term because the other election, the 2020 election, was totally rigged. So it’s actually sort of a fourth term in a certain way. I just don’t want the credit for the second because [former President Joe] Biden was so bad, he did such a bad job, and I think that’s one of the reasons that I’m popular, if you want to know the truth.”

What he is telegraphing is that he has no intention of ceding power on January 20, 2029, and may find a backdoor way of staying around.

He is a consequential President, wrecking international trade markets, debasing the US around the world, and shredding the social safety net.

So, FOTUS is president again, despite his many crimes, a remarkable political feat that deserves recognition. Happy American Seditionist Day is coming! In honor of the holiday, I shall heretofore refer to him as the Seditionist!

The 2025 Pride Parade -ALB

throngs of people

**This was from the 2024 event. The church won the Brillance Award for the “float” in the Albany Pride Parade, with the canoe on the roof of a car.**

The 2025 Pride Parade in Albany on Sunday, June 8, felt different to me from the beginning. For one thing, when I arrived at my church, which is located near the parade route, there were numerous garbage trucks at most intersections. They were there undoubtedly because of the New Year’s Eve/Day attack on people in New Orleans, plus several other vehicular assaults in Europe.

But it was also different because it felt like there was a lot more energy, as though the current regime’s attack on LGBTQ+ folks demanded a response.

After I helped set up communion, we had choir rehearsal, and then the service, which is always less well-attended because many folks, including one of the pastors, are decorating the “float” and then positioning the vehicle in Washington Park. By the end of the service, we can already hear the parade. After church, I need to clean up the communion stuff and put away my music.

By the time I got outside, I wasn’t feeling the energy to walk to the park where our First Pres contingent would have been starting. Walking the route seemed unwise, given that my Achilles was still untreated.

So I resigned myself to watching the festivities as the paraders passed by our church, as many of our congregants do every year. It’s always interesting to see which politicians attend; I saw three of the four mayoral candidates and two of the three people running for city auditor, but I might have missed the others because the event lasted for quite a while.

He’s so spontaneous!

As the First Pres group came by the church, they were on a flat-bed truck. I suddenly impulsively thought, “If I don’t have to walk this thing, maybe I will ride on this thing.” Several people got on. I had trouble maneuvering up the narrow stepladder, but I ultimately managed to get on and shuffle towards the front of the cab. This was cool! Actually, the temperature began to rise very quickly.

One of my favorite moments every year is being most of the way down Lark Street and turning around and seeing the throngs of people still marching. This time I was already facing the back, but it was nevertheless very moving. But I saw people I knew who didn’t see me because the balloons obscured me; oh, well.

Sun/Son

I was sitting next to the Jesus cardboard figure that was wearing a purple “God Is Genderfull” T-shirt. At some point the Jesus was starting to topple over. Since I was right next to it, I was holding it (Him?) up with my left arm, but I got tired quickly, so I used my cane, which was much easier.

Someone from the crowd yelled, “Christ is risen!” Indeed. At the end of the route, as we undecorated the truck, I decided to carry the Jesus through the park back to the church, which got all sorts of fascinating comments, almost all positive.

At some point on the truck, I realized I hadn’t even told my wife that I was going to the parade. I thought to call her and tell her I could take the bus home, so she wouldn’t have to wait. But then I remember that she had left her phone at the EMPAC the night before. It turned out she was at church, waiting for me, which was very nice.

Eclipsed (theater); ASO

Art at APL

Even though we complain about being too busy, my wife and I had three events in three evenings.

Thursday, June 5: Eclipsed is the third program this season from the Black Theatre Troupe of Upstate NY, after Berta, Berta, and Once On This Island.

The description: “‘Eclipsed’ tells the story of five Liberian women and their tale of survival near the end of the Second Liberian Civil War.

“Their lives set on a nightmarish detour by civil war, the captive wives of a Liberian rebel officer form a hardscrabble sisterhood. With the arrival of a new girl who can read—and the return of an old one who can kill—their possibilities are quickly transformed.” It was excellent, but very intense, and occasionally quite funny. Here is a review from the Berkshire Edge.

I was unfamiliar with the Danai Gurira play, which played on Broadway about a decade ago. Here’s a New York Times review from a 2016 production featuring Lupita Nyong’o.

From here: “Danai got the idea for Eclipsed from a 2003 magazine article featuring a female rebel solider named Black Diamond. The influence from that article, Danai’s own African upbringing, and her research in Liberia helped her to shed a light on enormities that are still issues today.”

I’m looking forward to next season from BTTUNY at the Cap Rep building.

Art

Friday, June 6: The Albany Public Library and Opalka Gallery celebrate the latest Art at APL exhibition, “Sight Specific.” The opening that night at the Pine Hills branch of the APL featured The Pine Hills Band.

“The artists in ‘Sight Specific’ are not directly mapping a place, but employing memory, direct observation, documentation, comparison, or abstraction, to tell stories of familiar places like gas stations, rest areas, basketball courts, backyards, living rooms, landscapes, industrial sites, or neighborhood streets…

“The exhibition features Michael Bach, Seth Butler, Matt Chinian, Sean Hemmerle, Susan Hoffer, Maeve McCool, Rob O’Neil, Andrew Pellettieri, and Laura Von Rosk.” It’ll be in place through November 8.

I went by myself because my wife had a work thing.

Symphony

Saturday, June 6: Last year, my wife and I attended almost the entire American Music Festival of the Albany Symphony Orchestra at EMPAC. Indeed, on Thursday night, we were invited to attend the open rehearsal, but we chose to attend the play instead.

This year, we only attended the American Music Festival, which had the theme of Water Music. It started with What do flowers do at night? by Sophia Jani. A cactus species called the Selenicereus grandiflorus blooms only once a year for one night.

Then Play: A Concerto For Percussion Quartet, Vocalist & Orchestra by Clarice Assad, which was just wack. The percussionists played glockenspiel, marimba, xylophone, toy drums, bells, rubber chickens, and many other instruments. It was excellent, lots of fun, and semi-autobiographical.

From here: “Indigo Heaven is a clarinet concerto in all but name, laid out in three movements running 27 minutes. The work is inspired by the open Western vistas described in Mark Warren’s novel of the same title.” It premiered with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, composed by Christopher Theofanidis, commissioned for the CSO’s principal clarinet, Stephen Williamson, who also played it at the ASO.

Bobby Ge’s Beyond Anthropocene was commissioned, premiered, and recorded by David Alan Miller and the ASO. The final movement is solastalgia, which is defined as “the distress that is produced by environmental change impacting on people while they are directly connected to their home environment.” It was a workout, especially for the horns.

Concert: No Doubt, 10 July 1997

MxPx, The Selecter

Reading the book 60 Songs That Explain The ’90s by Rob Harvilla reminded me of a concert by the group No Doubt on 10 July 1997 at the arena in downtown Albany. It used to be the Knickerbocker Arena, and now it’s the MVP Arena, but I believe that it was the Pepsi Arena at the time.

I had a friend who was widowed shortly after her first child was born, her husband dying of Agent Orange in the early ’80s. So I occasionally babysat the girl. When the teen wanted to see No Doubt, her mother suggested that I accompany her and four of her friends. I was familiar with the group. My friend dropped us off.

The first group was called MxPx. The sheer constant audio assault was unnerving to me, but the audience seemed to enjoy it.

Then came an English 2-tone ska revival band, The Selecter – I misremembered that it was The Specials, but they had similar roots. I thought they were excellent. Still, a goodly number of the audience literally turned their back on them; they did not like this music. (Here’s Too Much Pressure.)

Not only did I think it was disrespectful, but they were also oblivious to the fact that the roots of the music that No Doubt was playing came from ska. It would be like if, in the 1960s, a white Blues musician such as Eric Clapton in Cream or Keith Richards in The Rolling Stones were the headliners, with the opening act being B.B. King or Albert King, and the audience turned their backs on them. This ticked me off greatly.

Stefani and company

The main act came out, and they were entertaining enough. I remember very distinctly that Gwen Stefani, the lead singer, wanted the boys to sing the line, “I’m just a girl.” Some were uncomfortable, but most did so.

Harvilla says in his book regarding the group, “…which brings us to the sell-out adjacent song that’s only.005 ska… No Doubt is a great many things: zippy new wave monolith worthy of Cyndi Lauper, the Go-Go’s, or the B-52s. [It’s] a delivery system for lead singer Gwen Stefani, the blindingly sunny pop star and wildly out-of-pocket cultural appropriator who combines the appeal of Jessica Rabbit, Olive Oyl, Cher from Clueless…

“It’s not entirely that the band abandoned its roots on this record, but the roots are no longer a focal point. Maybe with Just A Girl, it’s best to imagine No Doubt as a space shuttle with the rocket boosters’ burnout detachment. She’s a true superstar orbit, and in this case, those abandoned rocket boosters just happen to be labeled ska, and everyone in the band, other than Gwen. “

All that said, I’ve never been all that fussy about selling out or “authenticity,” having seen the movie A Complete Unknown about Bob Dylan. The notion of selling out can be pretty darn fuzzy.

BTW, here’s the likely No Doubt playlist of the concert:

Tragic Kingdom
Excuse Me, Mr.
Different People
Happy Now?
Just a Girl
The Climb
End It on This
Total Hate ’95
Hey You
The Imperial March
Move On / Ghost Town
Don’t Speak
Sunday Morning
Spiderwebs
Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da
Oi to the World