RIP:

David Allan Coe, the outlaw country music singer known for his unrepentant, confrontational image and songs such as “You Never Even Called Me by My Name” and “The Ride,” has died. He was 86.

Coe’s wife, Kimberly Hastings Coe, confirmed the singer’s death to Rolling Stone. “One of the best singers, songwriters, and performers of our time [and] never to be forgotten,” Kimberly wrote to Rolling Stone. “My husband, my friend, my confidant and my life for many years. I’ll never forget him and I don’t want anyone else to ever forget him either.” A cause of death was not immediately available.

Saw him a time or two at the Georgia Theater in his less than best self, but he made some legendary songs.

This happened over the weekend.

A town that prides itself as one of the forerunners of the music scene for the nation, and it comes down to this. Truth be told, I could think of a ton of folks out there I’d rather see in Sanford, as I know many of you have opined here before. But, I guess if they’re going to potentially ruin the field for music, might as well sell a bunch of tickets and get butts in the seats and make money. I wonder if any of it could go to the Collective?

Anyway, it got me to thinking about this group, which I used to enjoy immensely in my time in Athens. I think I’d rather see them in Sanford than those two above.

Have a lovely Monday, Refugees.

Here’s the sports related element:

Here’s the musical element:

Okay, so I was a kid of 80s music, so Michael Jackson was in my regular rotation. He was a baked in part of the 80s music that I listened to regularly, so I can still enjoy Jackson’s music, regardless of the allegations and thoughts of him past his passing. Admittedly, he was a weird dude, but I can still recall distinctly listening to LPs of him on my parents stereo, especially his collaboration with Paul McCartney (Say, Say, Say) and thinking how great the quality of mixing and sound was present in what I heard.

Jackson is a side note in this exercise, but for those of you my age, or older or younger, what’s the missing quality in today’s music that makes you nostalgic about the music of yesteryears?

Is it quality? Musicianship? Talent? I’ve long hypothesized with my buddy that quality of music has declined ever since the advent of the cassette tape, but maybe I’m just jaded.

What say you?

To quote the great Nelson Muntz: “Ha, HA!”

With that being said, enjoy:

Featuring an opening with Sting singing “I want my MTV” to the same notes of “Don’t Stand So Close To Me”, the song was supposed to be more of a Rolling-Stones ballad but a riff played during the click track took over the rest of the composition. Mark Knopfler spoke of the inspiration to the song:

The lead character in “Money for Nothing” is a guy who works in the hardware department in a television/​custom kitchen/​refrigerator/​microwave appliance store. He’s singing the song. I wrote the song when I was actually in the store. I borrowed a bit of paper and started to write the song down in the store. I wanted to use a lot of the language that the real guy actually used when I heard him, because it was more real….

According to Knopfler, he had visited an appliance store in New York City. At the back of the store, a wall of televisions were all tuned to MTV. Knopfler said that standing next to him, watching the TVs, there was a male employee, dressed in a baseball cap, work boots, and a checkered shirt, who was delivering boxes. As they watched MTV, the man said things like, “What are those, Hawaiian noises?… That ain’t workin’,” etc. Knopfler requested a pen to write some of these lines down, and eventually put them to music.

And now you know.

A little late, but, still.

Bob Weir, the guitarist and songwriter who was a founding member of the popular and massively influential American rock band the Grateful Dead, has died. According to a statement from his family posted on his website and social media pages, Weir died from underlying lung issues after recently beating cancer. He was 78.

We’re getting old, folks. I remember when Jerry died when I was working at NAPA during my college days. The store manager, oddly, was a huge Deadhead and he had to take a week off. Endless numbers of bad orders must’ve occurred that week because I knew little about automotive repair and less about how to use the archaic parts system we used at the local Stockbridge store.

Still, I enjoyed the Dead although being a Parrothead was more my speed, but countless candles from Junkaman’s Daughter’s Brother were burned, along with incense, on nights we spun Terrapin Station on our apartment’s stereo speakers, to the dismay of our Pre-Vet neighbors.

We were Journalism majors, so there’s that.