SUCH IS LIFE

A TORTURED INTERROGATOR

Matthew Alexander led an interrogations team assigned to a Special Operations task force in Iraq in 2006. He is the author of "How to Break a Terrorist: The U.S. Interrogators Who Used Brains, Not Brutality, to Take Down the Deadliest Man in Iraq." He has an excellent piece on the Washington Post website, called "I'm Still Tortured by What I Saw in Iraq."

TRUE AS BLUE

Hello friends.  I invite you to listen to my album of song demos, 'True as Blue'.  You can hear all 24 of the songs by clicking on 'Song Recordings' in the Pages section in the left column.  Or, you can audition a selection of songs on my Sonicbids Electronic Press Kit.  Hope you enjoy.  Cheers for now.  David.

 

PLEASE PASS THE GRAVY

Here is a great demo of how to make real turkey gravy:

Sauces & Condiments:How To Make Perfect Turkey Gravy

TURKEY TALKS, TURKEYS DIE

OH MY GOD! You can't make this stuff up.

THE WAY YOU MOVE

Not a day goes by, I don't think about you.

TO THE LOVELORN

Around this time each year my thoughts recall a lost love and a life that might have been.  So, in healing memory, I send this out to all the lovelorn, a trio of great compositions, sung by Judy Garland, the greatest performer ever recorded.

FINE AND MELLOW

Billie Holiday had one of the saddest voices I've ever heard. Here she performs her composition 'Fine and Mellow' in 1957 with Lester Young (tenor sax), Coleman Hawkins (tenor sax), Ben Webster (tenor sax), Gerry Mulligan (baritone sax), Roy Eldridge (trumpet), Doc Cheatham (trumpet), Vic Dickenson (trombone), Danny Barker (guitar), Milt Hinton (bass), Mal Waldron (piano) and O.C. Johnson (drums). 

This jazz greats' track is intoxicating. Play it more than once if only for Roy Eldridge's searing trumpet highs. According to a comment on YouTube, the solo order is: Holiday, Webster, Young, Holiday, Dickenson, Mulligan, Holiday, Hawkins, Eldridge, Holiday.

"Love will make you drink and gamble, make you stay out all night long.
Love will make you do things that you know is wrong."

- Billie Holiday

ARCHIVAL REVIVAL

Before there was digital, for years I kept a VHS tape in the VCR to record any music that aired on broadcast TV.  I've been going through those tapes and have converted a few of my favorite performances into digital files.  For your watching and listening pleasure, I will be presenting clips from my collection, 'Archival Revival.'  First up, one of my all-time favorites, Tom Rush performs his songs 'No Regrets' and 'Rockport Sunday.'  Enjoy.

You can buy Tom's music directly from Tom on his website. Please do.

CHANGING MY TUNE

I am just so happy and relieved that Barack Obama is going to be our next president.  I can stop worrying so much about my children's future and the terrible, terrible course this country has been on under the dangerous, arrogant, belligerent buffoonery of Bush/Cheney/Rove/Wolfowitz/Rumsfeld/Kristal.

So, in this blog, I'm going to 'change my tune' a bit and spend some time on my first and true love - songwriting.  Here are a tip of the hat to Johnny Cash:

ABSOLUTELY ADORABLE

All politics aside now, could 7-year-olds Piper Palin and Sasha Obama BE any more adorable?

Bless their hearts.  The Huffington Post has slide shows of Piper's and Sasha's so-called sassier moments.