Who Do You Like In March?

Old Dominion University won another CAA Conference tournament championship this year, begging the question: how many teams will join the Monarchs in the big dance?



Then It Must Be Light

Perhaps it’s the current state in which I find my particular condition to be, but I feel it appropriate, if not imperative, to expound upon the significance of one of Bob Dylan’s more recent masterpieces: “Not Dark Yet.”

To begin with, consider the song’s opening lines, accompanied, mind you, by the galant march of a military drumbeat: “Shadows are falling and I’ve been here all day. / It’s too hot to sleep and time is running away / Feel like my soul has turned into steel / I’ve still got the scars that the sun didn’t heal.”

Nevermind Dylan’s own biography, which I believe can shed a tremendous amount of light on the above lines.  No, nevermind that; instead, take the preceding lines into consideration of your own life.  Mind you, some people haven’t lived long enough to comprehend the meaning of Dylan’s lyrics, but I have.  Never has a song made me contemplate the events in my own life more than Dylan’s track from Time Out of Mind.  Now, I don’t claim to identify with every line, but it’s damn near close.  Like all of you, “sometimes my burden is more than I can bare.”  In these lines, Dylan transcends the voice speaking, amidst many contexts, in the haunting tales of Desire (I’m thinking, specifically, of the characters in “Isis” but my claim applies to more songs on that album and, indeed, many more from the artist’s storied career).

Granted, I find myself listening to and writing about “Not Dark Yet” late into the night, but who would have it any other way?  Seriously.  Listen to the song, and try to tell me that Dylan wrote it early one morning.  No, the song is an existential late-night meditation.

At times, the singer is lamenting the passing of a golden age.  Not unlike Hunter S. Thompson commenting on the high-water mark of the sixties, Dylan’s voice in “Not Dark Yet” speaks from beyond the pale.  He talks of time “running away;” again “a soul that has turned into steel;” and “scars that the sun never healed.”  If Dylan was the voice of a generation, than he is no less a voice that speaks to proceeding generations, my own included.  I have yearned to be a part of the times that were so swiftly changin’ back in the sixties; yet, I feel prouder to be a part of the generation spawned by the baby-boomers.  If nothing else, I believe Dylan has been speaking to my kind from the point of view of my parents.

I won’t take you line-through-line, though I could if you dare.  Simply consider a few of the lyrics thrown out in this song, whether I’ve mentioned them before or not:

“Sometimes my burden is more than I can bare”…Christlike in its imagery if not altogether in its sentiment.

“I was born here and I’ll die here against my will.”

“I don’t even hear the murmur of a prayer.”

All this would be remarkable for any artist to produce in the heyday of his or her career; but consider the fact that Dylan is producing this material nearly forty years after his first album…nearly thirty-five years after the so-called most creative outburst of his time (I’m referring, here, to his release of Bringing It All Back Home, Highway 61 Revisited, and Blonde on Blonde, all within fourteen months of each other).

Okay, if you have no regard for songwriting (as is the case with many of the people I have befriended through the years), then I have no expectations for you to appreciate Dylan’s writing.  Having said that, if you care at all about the written expression of the human soul, I implore you to give Dylan’s latest contributions to the American songbook another listen.

As most of you, who know me, recognize, I am bound to defend nearly every product of the Shakespearean American songwriter; nevertheless, I dare you to find any serious artist who can deny the profound significance of Dylan’s most recent renaissance.  More than a poet, he is a soothsayer…a conjurer of human emotion…a necessary presence in a world of void.

Old Uncle Tupelo Never Ending

Listening to and watching Jeff Tweedy perform tonight at the Paramount Theater on the historic downtown mall in Charlottesville, Virginia, blew my mind.

Mind you, of course,  I have heard Bob Dylan, The Band, Paul Simon, Tom Petty, Prince, the Heartbreakers, the Grateful Dead, the grateful-yet-ever-living Rolling Stones, etc. etc. etc.

No matter, I was there–thirty years too late to witness the soul that is John Lennon–but there to recognize the greatest songwriter of my generation.



Dunk-A-Do’s

This one’s for Seth:

Blake Griffin has had more posterizing jams in the first month of his promising NBA career than any rookie in recent memory. Last night, the phenom from Oklahoma ignited the crowd with dazzling dunks, though he could not manage to inspire his team as they fell to Amare’ Staudamire’s New York Knickerbockers. And if last night’s show doesn’t convince you:

then take a look at the collection of Blake Griffin dunks on Google images.

For as long as I’ve been watching the L. A. Clippers, they have lost in one remarkably unmemorable performance after another for nearly three decades. So, while still off to a lousy 1-13 start to the 2010-2011 season, at least they are proving to be the most exciting team to watch so far this year, which is some sort of change and an amazing claim considering the hype surrounding the Miami Heat coming into the year.

Where’s The Justice?

If the fans of the Cleveland Cavaliers are seriously distraught about Lebron James “abandoning” their squad, why don’t we see them burning Zydrunas Ilgauskas’s jersey in the streets? After all, the seven foot center sold-out the Cavs as much as James supposedly burned his old squad.

For the record, I love Z and I adore Lebron. I think it is ridiculous to chastise any NBA player who pursues championship titles no matter how much it may disappoint his hometown allegiance. But, seriously, why isn’t anyone in Cleveland lamenting the loss of Ilgauskas who, after all, played more seasons in a Cavs uniform than James?

Of course, I know why…it’s easier to hate an “other” than it is to face one’s own deficiencies.

Life’s More Difficult Decisions

I went out to dinner with a woman last night who presented me with an intriguing question: when in doubt, who would you rather see/hear perform live, Tom Petty or Paul Simon?

She was siding with Paul Simon–at once a woman after my heart–nevertheless, my gut forced me to defend Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers.

Later, though, I began to think about the fact that I have attended several Petty shows, while I have only been in the presence of Paul Simon once; so maybe my gut was misguided.

Then again, I wanted to stand staunchly behind my inclination.

What do you say…Tom Petty or Paul Simon?

Javier el Gigante

It’s difficult to describe the feeling of pride that pulsated through my very being, and presumably that of every Robinson Secondary School alumni, tonight as I watched Javier Lopez strikeout the Atlanta Braves’ remarkable rookie Jason Heyward with a paralyzing breaking ball for the final out in the seventh inning of Game 2 of the NLDS.

To hear Dick Stockton refer to Javier’s roots as a native son of San Juan and product of (northern) Virginia sent chills up-and-down my spine. So in awe was I that I almost overlooked the fact that the broadcasters referred to Javi–who graduated, mind you, from high school the same year as I–as a spry twenty-nine year old. Conjuring the spirit of Seth Myers of Saturday Night Live fame, I found myself uttering the words: really? four years my junior? really?

Regardless, in the end, all I could do is join the chorus of former Robinson Rams around the country, if not the world, exclaiming: ¡Vamanos Javier! Y vamanos los Gigantes!