Posted On: Saturday - July 8th 2023 3:07PM MST
In Topics: Music Political Correctness Economics US Feral Government Race/Genetics Southern rock
Time really flies when you're blogging! It was almost a full year ago, the middle of last July, when Peak Stupidity had a 2-part series on US Post Office "Forever Stamps" - Part 1 and Part 2. Our point then was just to discuss the idea of hedges against inflation and what is real money. (Retroactive spoiler: These stamps can be the former to a small extent, but they surely aren't the latter.)
Though this post will be a quick anecdote on another subject, I will mention one economic thing first, one that relates to what I'd written in the 2nd paragraph of the 2nd footnote in Part 2. Now that the banks are giving out some significant interest*, it doesn't make as much sense to pay ahead - as in bills and such** to save envelopes, time, and (these) stamps. At practically ZERO interest it did. Now, that $1,000 or so average floating out there for say 4 months ahead average, could have gotten me a whopping 12 bucks! That is more than the extra stamps and envelopes, but as for my time ...
While down there at the P.O. checking if my son's amended tax form and enclosed paperwork needed more than one stamp, I figured I'd buy another few sheets of Forever Stamps.. for the bug-out bag, you know .... The Black! lady at the counter was the only employee in the place, and she'd come to the counter from the back where she'd been working. (Well, one would hope...) She was nice, and I didn't want to waste too much time picking stamps out, as there was a short line behind me.
Holy moley, though, the first 10 or so styles of stamps were this Black! guy and this other Black! lady. I had no idea who they were. No Tuskegee Airmen, no Peanut guy, no Aunt Jemima... but then, I gotta admit my near vision is not so hot. You think you can do that faggy swipe on everything to zoom in, but that doesn't actually work in meat- or stamp-space.
Well, I didn't want a one of them, even if some of these stamps may have had a wonderful human being on them. You don't want to be rude though. I could see lots of White people, simply trying to not cause a scene or bad vibes, opt for one of those first bunch of sheets. You just stick them on envelopes anyway, and lots of the handling of bill payment mail may be done with machinery and software. (In China perhaps, the SYSTEM may note your stamp choice for purposes of your credit score.)
The only exception I can see is if you still write love letters to girlfriends, yes, on paper with pens and stuff. "Who is this Nancy Reagan lady you put on your letter? You like her, don't you?! We said we'd be honest with each other...." Yes, I gotta a couple of sheets of her.
There at the P.O., I just told the Post-lady flat out, "Nah, I don't know who these people are. What else?" Her fingers kept on turnin', Peak Stupidity kept on learnin'.... "The Mighty Mississippi! Yes," I took all the sheets she had and a couple of sheets with waterfalls. Refrain from being a part of the wokeness.
One on each sheet has an old riverboat. Hey, Peak Stupidity does riverboat songs! You gotta go back a long ways, to the beginning of this blog, 6 1/2 years back. We featured an upbeat riverboat song by Elton John called Dixie Lily (1974) and then a much darker tune about a riverboat*** by Neil Young called Powderfinger (1978). I don't know how anybody couldn't like them both.
Going back half a decade before Elton, and almost a full one before Neil, there was another song about a riverboat that is much more widely known than the other 2, having been a #2 hit on those old Billboard magazine charts. That would be Proud Mary by CCR (Creedence Clearwater Revival), from their 1969 album Bayou Country. This falls between Dixie Lily and Powderfinger in tone - hard rockin' (more than Elton's and less than Neil's "fuill-distortion guitar") but upbeat like Elton's.
Bayou Country had only 7 songs on it, with one, Good Golly, Miss Molly being a cover song. It is a great album nonetheless.
CCR was:
John Fogerty - Lead vocals, lead guitar
Tom Fogerty - Rhythm guitar
Stu Cook - Bass guitar
Doug Clifford - Drums
What a band! Under that name, they played for only 5 years - '68-'72, but made 7 albums.
Southern Rock? Nah, the band was from the San Francisco Bay area (El Cerrito/Berkeley), but that Bayou Country album would have listeners figuring they were from the South. It was a different time, you understand... and the song bring back an even "differenter" time in this great land on the Mighty Mississippi. Well, we still got the stamps ..., so there's that ...
* No, of course not enough to even make up for inflation - which is not the actual point of charging/paying interest either, this point being lost to many. I'm not happy with that rate, but it's better than 0.15%. ("Wait, but the APR is ...!")
** I have my reasons to not do this stuff on-line, but I explained that.
*** Not a riverboat, per se, but "a white boat comin' up the river..."
*************************
[UPDATED 07/09:] Changed the song out for the one I'd really intended to include, before I got rudely interrupted by dinner or something. Removed The Doobie Brothers' Black Water and Doobies' info, and inserted CCR. Interestingly, the band's hometown and the Southern Rock misinterpretation still fit. And, it got to #2 on the charts, not #1.
*************************
Comments:
Moderator
Friday - August 11th 2023 6:03PM MST
PS: Al, I hadn't known what exactly Powderfinger was about.
Al Corrupt
Tuesday - August 8th 2023 3:04PM MST
PS
Considering Powderfinger is referencing revenoors, I like it better than the other gay song.
Considering Powderfinger is referencing revenoors, I like it better than the other gay song.
Mr. Anon
Wednesday - July 12th 2023 12:12AM MST
PS
@Hail
"This is an extension of what the Internet already has been, frankly, for years. A lot of people believe everything of value is "online" and so there is no point in doing anything else. This idea was the core spiritual-value of the Lockdowns of 2020."
Indeed. It is part and parcel of the whole synthetic existence that the globalist overlords want to force us into. Synthetic experience (the Web, the Metaverse), synthetic food (bugs, fake meat), synthetic social interactions (AI), synthetic mythologies (comic-book "super-heroes", Star Wars, and the like).
@Hail
"This is an extension of what the Internet already has been, frankly, for years. A lot of people believe everything of value is "online" and so there is no point in doing anything else. This idea was the core spiritual-value of the Lockdowns of 2020."
Indeed. It is part and parcel of the whole synthetic existence that the globalist overlords want to force us into. Synthetic experience (the Web, the Metaverse), synthetic food (bugs, fake meat), synthetic social interactions (AI), synthetic mythologies (comic-book "super-heroes", Star Wars, and the like).
Adam Smith
Tuesday - July 11th 2023 8:01PM MST
PS: Greetings, everyone,
A few AI commercials...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iXF0zAawvW0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_XmSgrpR36k
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=738U7UIs5-Q
Cheers!
☮
A few AI commercials...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iXF0zAawvW0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_XmSgrpR36k
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=738U7UIs5-Q
Cheers!
☮
Moderator
Tuesday - July 11th 2023 9:01AM MST
PS: "And, Mr. Moderator, not to be critical, but how could you miss this one:" I couldn't:
https://peakstupidity.com/index.php?post=1102
Johnny Cash wrote it, and he did a nice job singing and playing it. Also, the lyrics are great, especially if you like geography. The only thing is, The Dead did it better. As always.
https://peakstupidity.com/index.php?post=1102
Johnny Cash wrote it, and he did a nice job singing and playing it. Also, the lyrics are great, especially if you like geography. The only thing is, The Dead did it better. As always.
Ganderson
Tuesday - July 11th 2023 7:46AM MST
PS
“Have you ever seen that old Mississippi
Queen of the delta land
Then you’ll understand
Why I’ve got the blues for Dixie…”
Bob Wills
Or more Bob Wills:
“Way down in the Delta, on the Mississippi shore
In that muddy water, I long to be once more
When night shadows creep about
And the whippoorwills call,
You can hear old mammy shout “come in here you all”
Way down on the levy, strolling’ in the pale moonlight
You can see that steamboat and the fields of snowy white
It’s a feeling I can’t lose, the muddy water in my shoes
When I get those Mississippi delta blues”
And, Mr. Moderator, not to be critical, but how could you miss this one:
Well I met her accidentally in St. Paul, Minnesota
Tore me up every time I heard he drawl that Southern drawl
And I heard my dream went back downstream
Cavortin’ in Davenport
And I followed you big River when you called
Taught that Weeping Willow how to cry cry cry
Taught the clouds how to cover up a clear blue sky
Tears I cried for that woman
gonna flood you big River
I’m gonna sit right here until I die.”
This version was done a literal stone’s throw from the Big River itself on 5/11/1977, at the Saint Paul Civic Center.
https://relisten.net/grateful-dead/1977/05/11/big-river?source=337144
“Have you ever seen that old Mississippi
Queen of the delta land
Then you’ll understand
Why I’ve got the blues for Dixie…”
Bob Wills
Or more Bob Wills:
“Way down in the Delta, on the Mississippi shore
In that muddy water, I long to be once more
When night shadows creep about
And the whippoorwills call,
You can hear old mammy shout “come in here you all”
Way down on the levy, strolling’ in the pale moonlight
You can see that steamboat and the fields of snowy white
It’s a feeling I can’t lose, the muddy water in my shoes
When I get those Mississippi delta blues”
And, Mr. Moderator, not to be critical, but how could you miss this one:
Well I met her accidentally in St. Paul, Minnesota
Tore me up every time I heard he drawl that Southern drawl
And I heard my dream went back downstream
Cavortin’ in Davenport
And I followed you big River when you called
Taught that Weeping Willow how to cry cry cry
Taught the clouds how to cover up a clear blue sky
Tears I cried for that woman
gonna flood you big River
I’m gonna sit right here until I die.”
This version was done a literal stone’s throw from the Big River itself on 5/11/1977, at the Saint Paul Civic Center.
https://relisten.net/grateful-dead/1977/05/11/big-river?source=337144
Hail
Tuesday - July 11th 2023 6:58AM MST
PS
RE: Mr. Anon
"AI-generated pop music" sounds dystopian to me, something out of Blade Runner.
Much of the whole AI thing also seems "satanic" to me in the classically understood sense(s), in that it creates a false reality, is deceptive, undermines the human-spirit, and encourages people to give up and not seek fulfilment because there is nothing that can be done "better than the AI" (supposedly). This is an extension of what the Internet already has been, frankly, for years. A lot of people believe everything of value is "online" and so there is no point in doing anything else. This idea was the core spiritual-value of the Lockdowns of 2020.
Yes, "AI-generated pop music" and AI-generated anything leaves one feeling pessimistic, and one can understand the harsh reactions from people about the AI-apocalypse.
One unseen happy-result of "AI-generated pop music" and similar trends could be a return to live-music performed by human beings, as a guarantee that it's not artificial; a premium on Humanity. It's hard, for now, to see us get out the other end to such a place, but it's possible.
RE: Mr. Anon
"AI-generated pop music" sounds dystopian to me, something out of Blade Runner.
Much of the whole AI thing also seems "satanic" to me in the classically understood sense(s), in that it creates a false reality, is deceptive, undermines the human-spirit, and encourages people to give up and not seek fulfilment because there is nothing that can be done "better than the AI" (supposedly). This is an extension of what the Internet already has been, frankly, for years. A lot of people believe everything of value is "online" and so there is no point in doing anything else. This idea was the core spiritual-value of the Lockdowns of 2020.
Yes, "AI-generated pop music" and AI-generated anything leaves one feeling pessimistic, and one can understand the harsh reactions from people about the AI-apocalypse.
One unseen happy-result of "AI-generated pop music" and similar trends could be a return to live-music performed by human beings, as a guarantee that it's not artificial; a premium on Humanity. It's hard, for now, to see us get out the other end to such a place, but it's possible.
Mr. Anon
Tuesday - July 11th 2023 12:14AM MST
PS
"I would never have figured the period of great pop/rock music would end, Mr. Anon, even at 30 years back. This is highly arguable, but I'd say it was from 1965 to '95."
That sounds about right. I don't much care for most music from the 90s (with a few exceptions), but there was still a recognizably common culture. With the advent of the internet, everything got highly segmented and targeted. And this century has been, for the most part (again, there are a few exceptions) an arid wasteland when it comes to pop/rock music.
I suppose from now on, pop music will be AI generated.
"I would never have figured the period of great pop/rock music would end, Mr. Anon, even at 30 years back. This is highly arguable, but I'd say it was from 1965 to '95."
That sounds about right. I don't much care for most music from the 90s (with a few exceptions), but there was still a recognizably common culture. With the advent of the internet, everything got highly segmented and targeted. And this century has been, for the most part (again, there are a few exceptions) an arid wasteland when it comes to pop/rock music.
I suppose from now on, pop music will be AI generated.
Al Corrupt
Monday - July 10th 2023 4:25PM MST
PS
Mountain… Mississippi Queen!
Mountain… Mississippi Queen!
Moderator
Monday - July 10th 2023 2:09PM MST
PS: I would never have figured the period of great pop/rock music would end, Mr. Anon, even at 30 years back. This is highly arguable, but I'd say it was from 1965 to '95.
Mr. Hail, I thank you for your summary of the politics of Mr. Fogerty. I'm not really up for going to see a 75 y/o rocker (with exceptions, of course, Mr. Ganderson! - if you're reading) anyway, but the song lyrics you pasted in would just make it a solid no go. I don't need that. I don't need to give him money, and I would think John Fogerty doesn't need any money.
Mr. Hail, I thank you for your summary of the politics of Mr. Fogerty. I'm not really up for going to see a 75 y/o rocker (with exceptions, of course, Mr. Ganderson! - if you're reading) anyway, but the song lyrics you pasted in would just make it a solid no go. I don't need that. I don't need to give him money, and I would think John Fogerty doesn't need any money.
Hail
Monday - July 10th 2023 7:11AM MST
PS
- Checking in on John Fogerty in the 2020s -
I don't know what kind of commentary it is on things that the lead-man of CCR, John Fogerty (b.1945), is still out there, including with a Youtube presence, doing things.
As the current year is -- (checking) -- now 2023, That makes 55 years after the first arrival of CCR on the scene.
(File under, "it's always 1968.")
--
In winter 2020-2021, then still a ripe young 75 years of age, John Fogerty released a political song. The lyrics are more ambiguous and mainly reflect the Corona-Panicker cultural hegemony of the moment (with Fauci and co. depicted as braver medicine-men and Trump depicted as an irrational an angry pharaoh), and secondarily the Leviathan-like power of Wokeness that symbiotically grew even more bloated during the Panic:
--
Weeping in the Promised Land
John Fogerty
released Jan. 5, 2021
(partial lyrics)
Pharaoh shouting down the medicine man...
Forked-tongued pharaoh, behold he comes to speak
Hissing and spewing, it's power that he seeks;
With dread in their eyes, all the nurses are crying.
Pharaoh keep a-preaching but he never had a plan...
Pharaoh's army, knocking on the door
Shoot you in your bed just like they done before
Out in the street, on your neck with a knee,
All the people are crying your last words, "I can't breathe!"
And a white judge says, "There been no crime here today."
(laminate, copy in triplicate, and file again under "It's always 1968"...!)
- Checking in on John Fogerty in the 2020s -
I don't know what kind of commentary it is on things that the lead-man of CCR, John Fogerty (b.1945), is still out there, including with a Youtube presence, doing things.
As the current year is -- (checking) -- now 2023, That makes 55 years after the first arrival of CCR on the scene.
(File under, "it's always 1968.")
--
In winter 2020-2021, then still a ripe young 75 years of age, John Fogerty released a political song. The lyrics are more ambiguous and mainly reflect the Corona-Panicker cultural hegemony of the moment (with Fauci and co. depicted as braver medicine-men and Trump depicted as an irrational an angry pharaoh), and secondarily the Leviathan-like power of Wokeness that symbiotically grew even more bloated during the Panic:
--
Weeping in the Promised Land
John Fogerty
released Jan. 5, 2021
(partial lyrics)
Pharaoh shouting down the medicine man...
Forked-tongued pharaoh, behold he comes to speak
Hissing and spewing, it's power that he seeks;
With dread in their eyes, all the nurses are crying.
Pharaoh keep a-preaching but he never had a plan...
Pharaoh's army, knocking on the door
Shoot you in your bed just like they done before
Out in the street, on your neck with a knee,
All the people are crying your last words, "I can't breathe!"
And a white judge says, "There been no crime here today."
(laminate, copy in triplicate, and file again under "It's always 1968"...!)
Mr. Anon
Sunday - July 9th 2023 9:50PM MST
PS
CCR was a great band. I have their "Greatest Hits" CD, with about 20 songs on it. Not one bad one among them, and of course some of them are phenomenally good.
As you say, they were an East Bay band, but produced a very C&W tinged folky type of rock. As did The Eagles a few years later (whom I always associated with California, although only Tim Schmidt was actually from there).
There was a lot of country/rock crossover music in the 70s. John Denver was a big name. Olivia Newton John started out as a country singer.
Truly, a great time for music.
CCR was a great band. I have their "Greatest Hits" CD, with about 20 songs on it. Not one bad one among them, and of course some of them are phenomenally good.
As you say, they were an East Bay band, but produced a very C&W tinged folky type of rock. As did The Eagles a few years later (whom I always associated with California, although only Tim Schmidt was actually from there).
There was a lot of country/rock crossover music in the 70s. John Denver was a big name. Olivia Newton John started out as a country singer.
Truly, a great time for music.
Moderator
Sunday - July 9th 2023 3:35PM MST
PS: I'd never heard that one before, Alarmist. That's one I hope to keep in my memory. Thanks.
The Alarmist
Sunday - July 9th 2023 6:19AM MST
PS
Yeah, I’m old school country ... I think it was Kenny Rogers’ “She Believes in Me” that forced me to move along.
Q: What happens when you play a country song backwards?
A: You get your wife, your trailer, your dog, and your job back, and your truck springs back to life... hell, you might even hit the lottery.
Yeah, I’m old school country ... I think it was Kenny Rogers’ “She Believes in Me” that forced me to move along.
Q: What happens when you play a country song backwards?
A: You get your wife, your trailer, your dog, and your job back, and your truck springs back to life... hell, you might even hit the lottery.
Moderator
Sunday - July 9th 2023 5:52AM MST
PS: I didn't know the Randy Driftwood song, but I do know (and like) "Forever and ever, Amen" by Randy Travis. That goes pretty far back! (to before I was disgusted with country music.)
I realized a couple hours later that I meant to embed CCR's "Proud Mary" here - got interrupted for a few hours and "lost the narrative". I may need to switch it out, later on.
I realized a couple hours later that I meant to embed CCR's "Proud Mary" here - got interrupted for a few hours and "lost the narrative". I may need to switch it out, later on.
The Alarmist
Sunday - July 9th 2023 2:31AM MST
PS
You could have also included Randy Travis’ “Forever and Ever Amen.”
You could have also included Randy Travis’ “Forever and Ever Amen.”
Hail
Saturday - July 8th 2023 8:40PM MST
PS
"The Mighty Mississippi! Yes..."
Allow me the liberty of providing the Peak Stupidity-verse, all you good people out there, with a handy how-to guide on how to deal with The Mississippi when encountered:
_________________
I built a hundred campfires
beneath that Southern moon;
Then I went to old Kentucky,
with my buddy Daniel Boone...
When the settlers crossed the mountains
and squatted close to me:
I crossed the Mississippi
and the mighty Missouri!
I'm just a good old country boy
That's just what I am.
My mammy's Miss America
and my daddy? Uncle Sam.
(--Jimmy Driftwood.)
_________________
"The Mighty Mississippi! Yes..."
Allow me the liberty of providing the Peak Stupidity-verse, all you good people out there, with a handy how-to guide on how to deal with The Mississippi when encountered:
_________________
I built a hundred campfires
beneath that Southern moon;
Then I went to old Kentucky,
with my buddy Daniel Boone...
When the settlers crossed the mountains
and squatted close to me:
I crossed the Mississippi
and the mighty Missouri!
I'm just a good old country boy
That's just what I am.
My mammy's Miss America
and my daddy? Uncle Sam.
(--Jimmy Driftwood.)
_________________