Another wonderful broadcast of Theme Time Radio Hour by Bob Dylan. This week was an unannounced, "super-sized," President's show. The theme was loosely Presidential. In honor of President's day, Dylan made something of a President's Day sale out of the show. Many of the songs he played were leftovers (from other shows), like the knick knacks you see in store windows on the aforementioned holiday. Dylan called it "cleaning the shelves," but most of the songs were hardly back-of-the-closet material.
Dylan talked about almost all the Presidents. I wouldn't be surprised if he mentioned all of them over the course of the 2 hour special. Lincoln's name popped up often. The most interesting factoid concerned Honest Abe's son, Robert Todd Lincoln. He was present, or nearly present, for three presidential assassinations. The first, naturally, was his father's. He was supposed to be at Ford's theatre watching Our American Cousin with his father, but was tired from a long wagon ride the previous day. In 1881 he was to meet James A. Garfield, our twentieth president, at a train station in D.C. He was late, but not too late to witness Garfield's assassination. Then in 1901, he was to meet William McKinley at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo. Though he was not late for this meeting, by the time he arrived McKinley had been shot through the stomach, kidney, and colon. Ouch. Mr. Robert Lincoln was around for 75% of the presidential assassinations.
Jack White, of the White Stripes, spoke for a moment, from a local video store, about George Washington and his refusal to shake hands while in office. White mentioned that Washington was the only President to not belong to a political party. Interesting. Ruth Brown sang an enthusiastic version of Hello Little Boy that sounded as if her larynx might explode. Dylan then surprised me by playing a They Might be Giants song. It amuses me to imagine him listening to songs like Shoehorn with Teeth or Birdhouse in Your Soul. Naturally the song he played on Theme Time was James K. Polk, an informative summary of the effective single term of our 11th president.
We listened to an audio clip of Jackie Kennedy giving the first television tour of the White House. She sounded more like British royalty than American royalty, which she was, in a way. She spoke about a painting of George Washington that hung in the WH, the only remnant existing from before the fire of 1814, when British troops set it ablaze in retaliation for the Battle of York.
At about the halfway point of the show, Dylan accepted a call from a "listener." The call was clearly bogus- the "caller" was clearly reading off a card- probably someone who works on the show. He asked a question about Presidents with beards, which Dylan instantly spun and announced that only Republican presidents had grown them. The caller then asked for a song that Dylan presciently played, seemingly before the caller had even finished his request. It was much smoother and more amusing than having some real caller fumble through compliments and some silly question about the White House.
The first half of the show wasn't as mellifluous as last weeks', but it improved in the second half. A much sampled song by Roy C. and the Honeydrippers, and then Dylan was talking about FDR and his black cabinet. Now this is something I'd never heard of. Apparently, Roosevelt had a collection of African American advisers, officially known as the Federal Council of Negro Affairs. The council kept Roosevelt aware of increasing needs and opinions of black Americans. They spearheaded the civil rights movement of the '30s and several members of the council held prominent roles in the administration. FDR did it all.
Dylan talked about Nixon "losing" the 1960 Presidential debate to JFK. It was the first televised debate, and many viewers at the time said that's what lost it for Tricky Dick. His 5 o'clock shadow, lack of makeup and bulging sweaty forehead was a grotesque site in comparison to Kennedy's natural and composed good looks and thick shock of hair. Radio listeners almost universally agreed that Nixon won the debate with his superior knowledge of the economy and foreign affairs.
While Dylan promoted the show as an "emptying out (the) closets in honor of presidents day," most of the music was superb. He played a song by Clover, called Mister Moon, which had a swing bite to it that was reminiscent of Elvis Costello's first release, My Aim is True. I say this because Costello fans will recall that Clover was the backing band on My Aim, and the band eventually evolved to become the News of Huey Lewis fame.
The next piece was entitled Gloomy Sunday. A song penned by two Hungarians, it's often referred to as "the suicide song," and it was banned in Hungary because according to legend multitudes of fans killed themselves while listening to the song. Countless reports of people found dead, with this song click click clicking in the groove at the middle of the record. Dylan played Billie Holiday's version. It was a sad song but it didn't make me wanna kill myself. It made me wanna eat toast but I was out of bread. One of the songwriters, Laszlo Javor, took his life by jumping from a building in 1968. Here's a terrific lyric from the song:
Angels have no thought of ever returning you,
would they be angry if I thought of joining you?
This was followed by an excellent track by Ella Johnson about getting rough with her man. It was called "Go Upside your Head." What a sweet honey voice she had. One can be introduced to so many great artists with just one episode of Theme Time Radio Hour. The presidents everyone loves, Dylan said, are the dead presidents. The ones that "jingle in your pocket." No jingle better than the paper rustle of a Salmon P. Chase at your hip. He was a senator, than a Treasury Secretary and finally a Chief justice. But more importantly, he was on the $10,000 bill. Not sure wy they don't have those anymore. Little Walter, blues, "Dead Presidents."
We heard Randy Newman's Have Pity on the Workin' Man, one of many Newman songs about the President and American politics. When complimenting Randy's sardonic lyrical cries and insults, Dylan got on the subject of song poems. Song poems are poems put to music, done professionally, and often through magazine ads. You still see them in the back of magazines. Send in your poem and 50-500 dollars and someone will make a song out of it. Dylan called it a racket and a scam, songwriters busting out as many as 12 songs an hour. He played snippets from a few and they were hilarious. My favorite was about Jimmy Carter, and it could be roughly described as Disco marching band style. Here's a line from it:
can our government be competent,
jimmy carter says yes, jimmy carter says yes.
The show ended with Elvis Presley singing If I Can Dream, an apropos tune, possibly about Elvis' presidential aspirations, which showed off Elvis' gnarling bobcat voice, that was common in his later albums. Another good tune I failed to mention was It's All in the Game, sung by Tommy Edwards. Apparently this song was written by Charles Dawes, who was later vice president under Calvin Coolidge.
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