Hudson River Radio dot com. And now it's time to listen to one of
my personal favorites. It's the Hallelujah Tabernacle Choir with their beautiful rendition of you
are having my baby? How does Sassie Jot from the Airsberry Jukes? Hey,
this is Tom Chapin. Hello. Did you speaking in Rock and Roll
History Show? You're listening right now? Hey, everybody, welcome back to
the Rock and Roll History Show and Hudson River Radio. I'm Brian Horrowitz.
We have a weird topic tonight that I'm gonna let somebody else try and explain.
But before we get to that, as always, allow me to introduce
all the crambones joining us here tonight. First and foremost from the Richter Observatory.
He thinks the knight who invented King Arthur's round table was probably named sircumference.
Neil Richter is here. Oh and by the way, I am not
having your baby. I had to say, Neil, if you think back
real hard, I never asked. That's not on the radar. No worries
there. The host of Paranormally yours. She says that you can't hear a
terror dactyl go to the bathroom because the pa is silent. Yale Nukeam is
with us, yell yes it is that it is. From the silver screen,
she saw penguin walk into a bar and asked the bartender, has my
brother been in here for a drink? And the bartender says, I'm not
sure? What does he look like? Mercedes can't? Is here? Him?
Mercedes, the puzzled look like going over my head lately? What does
a penguin look like? Like every other penguin? There you go? No
like a waiter, No, like every other penguin. I would say a
penguin walking into a bar might be a little bit memorable, or it's a
really bad bartender. Maybe him Mercedes, Hi has everybody too? And joining
us from his spare bedroom, he says, a bug that can make a
decision is called a maybe. John Kelly is here. Hi, everybody good
to be here? Wow? That Ryan, you're I would not say you're
in rare form. This is this is just everyday good form. It's typical,
typical. And joining us farm our secret bunker, she says that if
people make you sick, you should just cook them a little bit longer.
Becky Weisman's here. That is awesome, Bran, And of course I knew
it's official Crambone. She left her phone number under the pillow and when she
woke up there was a dollar. It was the Bluetooth Fairry. Jessica Demas
back, jess Hey, everybody, how you doing? And popping on with
us tonight. Is the host of Getting Dirty Here on Hudson River Radio,
our show about farming and gardening. She is the founder and farmer at Dick
Farm in Westchester County, New York, which makes her the c I e
IO. Alison Turkey's here. That's exactly how I refer to myself all the
time. So Alison is here because she and I. Last weekend we're a
far made recording interviews as we do every year. It was in Noblesville,
Indiana. My first time in Indiana. I don't know about you, Allison,
my first time in Indiana. Okay, there was so much corn corn
just good. Yeah, it's good. I had an evening off and I
have the motorcycle. I'm still on the road, so like tonight, I'm
in muscle Shoals, Alabama. Again. Last week I was in Indiana.
I have the motorcycles. I'm like, I got some time, let me
go explore and you can make ten turns and it's corn. Turn and it's
corn, and turn and it's corn. And then you turn around and it's
corn. And you better hope you know your way back because it's all corn.
It's like a giant corn maze. Brian, did you almost get lost
in like a Children of the Corn? Kind of a thick situation here.
I would have been a crying grown up in the corn if I was.
I'm gonna say that sounds like a horror movie just waiting to happen. Yep.
I mean, at some point, if you keep going straight, you're
going to run into something or somebody. But I found my way back.
It's all good. But we had a great time. We wound up recording
a bunch of interviews. They all wound up being with Farmers for getting dirty,
so those shows will be coming up. We met a lot of interesting
people. Didn't get any musicians this year. I think I don't think anybody's
getting the musicians anymore. It seems to be. I think there was a
hardcore you had to be, you know, totally messed up, and there
was a lot of protocol yeah, yeah, I didn't see anybody actually get
selected. I don't know. So well, we can peek behind the curtain.
So there's a media tent when you go as media, and then there's
a sign up sheet if you want to interview musicians, and the way it's
been the last several years we were there, it's like each musician has their
own clipboard and you sign up who you want to and who your you know,
your show or who you represent, And this year it was one sheet.
You know who you are, who you want to interview and for what.
And I think that went right in the shredder, I don't think.
Do you think the musicians don't want to do it? Did something happen that
they don't want to do it? No, I don't know if they did.
Like Allison said that, everybody on stage other than the performers was messed
up, and I think they were on a little more highlert because Neil Young
was back. True, that's true. He was back this year, so
maybe he was picky, you know. Maybe, I don't know, but
we did get some good interviews and met some interesting farmers and those interviews are
going to be on getting dirty over the next couple of weeks, right,
yes, sir, they are all right excellent, and you're gonna stick around
and give us your witty comments on tonight's selections. Absolutely. Tonight's topic is
Mercedes idea, and I'm just gonna try to let Mercedes explain it because I
knew you're going to pick on me about that. Okay, So our topic
tonight is bees, and I don't know does it really need an explanation?
I mean, anything about babies. I think it's it's weird, isn't it.
I don't know. Is it weird for me? It is? But
I don't know. I think something I know literally nothing about, except rumor
has it. I was one at one time. Ah, we all were
gale and and you shouldn't drop them. And if you do, don't tell
anyone. This is why I don't hold one ever. Think my inspiration was
was the Talking Head song, which I think nobody picked right. Which one
is that that's not going to blink out of the name? Now you know,
A little fingers, little toast sick all night, up, all night,
up all night. Yeah, yeah, that would have been a good
one. I didn't think of that either. Oh I read about that one
it's not about it's about actual infants, not like if it has the word
baby in the title, like like hey baby, Yeah, no, not
that kind of baby. Like young people, like tiny people, tiny humans,
yes, exactly nice, all right, every very young humans. Why
don't we hop right in and see where this takes us tonight. Becky is
going to lead us off tonight. So take it away, Becky. Thank
you. Brian Mercedes. This was a challenge. I looked at a lot
of songs, and I am not an expert in babies, and so I
just picked a really obscure song because I was happy to find it. And
it's very interesting. A lot of the songs you know about are about,
you know, people, people who weren't expecting to have babies and they did,
and so forth and so on, and that's connected to mine. So
my song is called Me in Honey by Rim and it was from their nineteen
ninety one album Out of Time, which was their seventh album. I did
a ton of research on RM for this and learned so much. I've always
loved Rim, but I didn't really know that much about all of the intricate
details of their history and so forth. So the song was written by the
members of Rim, Michael Stipe, Peter Buck, Michael Mills, and Bill
Berry. And I came to find out that they all of the members get
writing credits for all of their songs, which is pretty cool. And the
other reason I chose this song, other than it being kind of weird,
is that I listened to it and thought, do I hear Kate Pearson in
this? And the adler is yes, cool, Yes, Kate Peerson from
the VW fifty Who's Love Love Kate Pearson? And so Kate Pearson sang on
three songs on the out of time album Shiny Happy People is I'm sure you
remember that one? And she's on that one. It's just so awesome,
So she's considered this is considered a duet. She's not considered a backup singer.
Michael Stipe said, it's considered a due it with Kate Pearson and Mike
and Rim. So anyway, this song was written in response to the song
Eat for Two, released in nineteen eighty nine by ten Thousand Maniacs. And
so that song, if you've read about it, is about a woman who's
eating for two because she's pregnant, and it was unexpected pregnancy and so forth.
So Michael Stipe said, I wanted to write a song about pregnancy from
the man's point of view, like, oh, I don't really want to
have anything to do with this, you know, like men thinking, oh,
you're pregnant. I don't want to have anything to do with this,
and then going wait, maybe I have feelings about this, Maybe I do
care. So that that's really what the song is about. He finds out
about his girlfriend being pregnant and he's like, oh, maybe I have feelings
about this after all. So that's really the gist of the song, and
let's take a listen to it and listen for Kate Pearson. I sat there
and looking ugly a piano me. I knew what you were saying. You
were saying to me, maybe he's got some new rules me. The shit
just had in me seems shame ways to time thing seems and that waste to
time? Love me love, what is it? That's why honey in the
squirrel being with this hon and me got to do what you do do with
me? It seems to shame, waste of time for me, love me
love? What is do? Not silly enough? Flat sideways down these things
that you up, turn you around, say your piece, say sweet to
me. It's all the same, same and me, it's all the same,
same, the same for me, Love me love, what it's baby's
got some noodles, babies that she's having me as a fly in the night,
baby's at a meeting. That's hard, that's hard of me. Love
me love? What is lovely love? What is? What about me?
What about me? So when you're listening to the lyrics, I know I
wasn't paying close attention the very first time I heard this was, which was
years and years ago. But if you look at the lyrics, he does
say baby a lot, and that's his girlfriend that he's talking about. Babies,
got some new rules, babies said, she's had it with me.
So in those lyrics, he's talking about, you know, his girlfriend as
baby. But then at the very end and last verse he says, there's
a fly in the honey baby, he's got a baby with me, and
he also sings in the chorus, he sings, left me to love.
What it's doing to me? I never knew that's what he was saying.
So that's that's the whole gist of It's like, okay, flying the honey,
baby's having a baby with me. Okay, she's left me to love
what it's doing to me. So it's left me to, you know,
like think about this. And so I just thought it was a really interesting
song. But also I found out that as a response to Eat for Two
by ten Thousand Maniacs, there's a nice little tie there. Eat for Two
is not autobiographical by Natalie Merchant, but she did date Michael Stipe, and
so she Michael Stipe is the lead singer of r EM, so her writing
had a lot of influence on him, and so this song is not about
them and their relationship, but they did have a relationship that was very interesting.
I did not know that he's from Georgia. The band formed, they
were all students at the University of Georgia. I didn't realize that. I
know, the fifty twos were down in Athens, Georgia, and ultimately ten
thousand Maniacs spent some time in Athens as well. So I think that's how
they all just kind of got to know each other. And the other thing
I wanted to say about RM is that they were inducted into the Rock and
Roll Hall of Fame in two thousand and seven and just this year, twenty
twenty three, they were nominated for induction into the Songwriters Hall of Fame.
So that is what I have for this topic. All Right, that was
a good lead off. I think it fits the topic perfectly, So maybe
it won't be I think she did good. I think I would agree excellent,
gal, how did you do well? I'm about to make the quality
of things go way downhill because it kind of has nothing to do with anything
except just called rain and babies, which sounds kind of messy in more than
not dropping them idea, it sounds like they're slippery, so you gotta watch
out for that. Yeah, it's when it's raining and their way they're brand
new, or you left them out in the rain. They shouldn't be slippery.
And if you left them out in the rain, then we have another
problem. Yeah, this was definitely a challenging topic for me, and I
wanted to find something unusual, and yes I did. Flaming Lips, need
I say more? Uh, they're apparently considered a psychedelic rock band, which
I did not know. I best know them for their single from years ago,
she Don't Use Jelly, which the first time I ever heard that song.
The words are so silly in my mind. I laughed so hard I
almost drove off the road because the first time I heard that song, I
was driving home from work. So they're from Oklahoma City. They've been active
since nineteen eighty three. They are still active. The current members of the
band are Wayne Coyne, Stephen Drawsed, Derek Brown, Matt Duckworth, Curzy,
and Nicholas Lay. Coin and Drowsed have remained the band's only consistent member
since nineteen ninety one, and Coin's the only remaining founding member because the bassist
and keyboardist Michael Ivan's left in twenty twenty one. Now. The song I
Chose Rain and Babies is the third track on their fourth album. The album
is called are You Ready for This? In a priest driven Ambulance? I'm
trying to get a visual that and I imagine there are clergy people that also
drive ambulances. I don't know, but it's definitely a strange visual. So
this album was released in nineteen ninety I would say, if you're a patient
in that ambulance and you look up and see the priest standing over you,
I don't know, like it's it's a little worried, yea, or comforting.
You might not know. You might not know they're a priest because if
they're I don't like. I don't know if they would wear their little collar
with the uniform. And of course in my religion, women can be priests,
so you wouldn't know. But it's yeah, yeah, I don't know.
I think it would make me feel better personally, but that's just because
I'm a church lady. Yeah, it sounds you kind of. I think
my first question would be, like, where am I in heaven? What's
happening? Oh goodness, Yeah, if there's heaven, I'm sure we're not
gonna be able to discern who's who was a clergy person on earth. So
anyway, so this song random Babies was not released at a single. As
a single, I was not able to find anything else about it, including
what inspired it something I found super super interesting. Another song on the album,
called Unconsciously Screaming, was shot at a religious theme park called Holy Land
USA in Waterbury, Connecticut. Now that place is abandoned, deteriorated. I
went there with a friend and her family in I'm thinking like nineteen seventy six
or seven, when it was abandoned. No, it was. It was
a working like religious theme park, like not with rides or anything, but
with you know, displays, And I would have done Moses in a basket
and you can ride that's the Lazy River. There you go, there you
go. But but if if you they still have photos and stuff on the
internet. So if you google Holy Land, usay in Waterbury, Connecticut,
you will find the background of that place. So anyway, let's listen to
randon babies. What I'm thinking is so delicate. If I'm breathing now,
I'm all lose it. Its ad I've been the biggest potion I know I
ever seen, and at the moment it's big enough to drown the whole world.
This is not to take This is my frien to you take it back?
Why movies? I don't know else. It's training babies from the sky
out on the tiny drops from my windshield and in a second its ray to
training all over the whole world in my playford world. No wise, da,
this is my friend. Take it Coppic. And what bigget is if
I beat you up, I'm a losing. This is a drop in the
biggest potion I know that I've ever seen, and in a moment its big
enough to down the hall, my fra the world. So you see,
my choice was not quite the same quality as Becky's choice, but they got
our attention. I'll give you that good. I just added that to my
playlist. So good. Now you said they were They were called a psychedelic
bands. It says supposedly, Yeah, supposedly psychedelic, maybe psychotic. Maybe
that's why I like them. I don't know. I prefer both. So
all covers, all bases. It's good. So people sometimes wonder how the
Flaming Lips got their name. One theory is that it was inspired by the
nineteen fifty three feature film Geraldine, in which comedians stand for Freiberg sings several
songs, in concluding one named Flaming Lips. Another theory is there was a
nineteen sixty four Shirley McClain Shirley McClain film What a Way to Go, in
which Gene Kelly's character stars in a film titled Flaming Lips. However, the
thought started by two of the band members themselves, and I need toward this
very delicately came up with a rumor that they knew a classmate who had contracted
an STD after being on the receiving end of an intimate act from a partner
with active cold source. So if you wind up on the priest ambulance after
that, is it like an extra layer guilt? Usually a shot of penicillin
takes care of that. Yeah, and stay off your bicycle for two weeks.
Oh oh sorry? So are we supposed to vote on which one we
thought was the correct choice? I don't care. Well, you know,
there were three choices, Gil, and two of them were similar. Ver
one was not out there. I'm going with the third one. Yea is
not like the other. I don't think there's any doubt in there whatsoever.
Yeah, so that's my song. Thank you for humoring me. All right,
thank you, Gil. I was really afraid that you were gonna that
it was named after the movie I think it was called Chatterbox about a woman
who has parts of her body the talk. Oh lord, I've never even
heard of that. Yeah, it's it's a very obscure movie. It's probably
for the best that I yeah, it's gonna say it should probably say that
way. Yeah, yeah, very funny though. All right, on that
note, we're going to take our first real quick break and we will be
back with more, so stick around Hudson River Radio dot com. This concludes
the first part of this cassette. Please turn the cassette over and begin again
on side two. If radio dcs had taught me anything about radio that you
gotta do poof things, turn it up and rip that noo Hudson River Raio
dot com and welcome back to the rock and Roll History Show Tonight. We're
talking songs about babies and we have a special guest tonight, the host of
Getting Dirty or Gardening and Farming Show on Hudson River Radio, Alison Turkin,
is with us. Alison and I were at Farm Made last week. I
was going to ask, what's your favorite act on stage was, but we
all know it's Dave Matthews right, yes, yes, hands down. Yeah.
I thought he he rocked it. Yeah, yeah, he rocked it.
I would say, I'm sorry, go ahead, no, go ahead.
I was gonna say Nathaniel Rayliff is one of my favorites. He came
on and they did a cover of Bruce Springsteen's Dancing in the Dark that nobody
expected and knocked it out of the park. His version. I think is
better than Bruce's. Yeah he's a badass too. Yeah. I mean,
what a great show. So there's a media event before they opened the gates
for everybody where everybody comes out and you know, Mellencamp and Willie and and
Dave Matthews, Neil Young, they're all up on stage along with some farmers
and they show videos about the farmers. They're interviewing them and talking about their
stories and all that, and some of them are the ones that Alison got
to interview. So you want to give us a little sneak peek on what
might be coming up on Getting Dirty. Absolutely, we were excited to be
able to interview almost everybody that was on the stage featured at Farm Aid this
season, which was exciting. We spoke to one of the farm One of
the farms was Fisher Family Farms in Indiana, and we spoke to David and
Joseph Fisher, father and son of a seventh generation family farm and exciting.
You know, we mentioned before corn corn is good, but not that kind
of corn, but we won't get into that now, but well you can
because I learned that most of the corn there is for feed, yes,
right, so you see, yes, you see all that corn, and
that corn is going to cows, and cows are not even supposed to be
eating corn. You know, the system is challenging, to say the least.
But what I really liked about Joseph and Dave David who was they've taken
the seventh generation family farm and they've turned it into regenerative uh beef cattle farms.
So instead of horrible situations that animals live in, these guys are not
only doing things that are good for the land, but they're good for the
animals. I know there's some vegetarians on this crambone panel right here, but
for those who do enjoy meat at least you would want to know that that
meat had a nice life before it was, you know, steak on your
plate. Well, they were talking about controlling methane, you know, methane
from a thing, and yes, they were talking about how they're actually helping
to control that with the cow's diet and all that. Yeah, it was
interesting and just the way that they just the way that they run their farms.
So they're managing land in a good way. And what's nice about that
is their four thousand acres, which means that you know, systems can change
on a bigger scale. But the press conference was good too. Press conference
was good. We'll get back to that. So you definitely need to check
out getting Dirty, especially over the next couple of weeks as they put these
interviews out. So it was a lot of fun and I always learned stuff
every time I'm there. And I've said it before, when you go to
farm Mate, it is the only concert where you wind up buying fresh fruit
from a concession stand. Yes, you want like it is actually really good,
Like you're buying apples from the kids who just grew them. Yeah,
you know, I'm about a whole bunch of plums. Yeah. Where have
you ever walked around a concert eating an apple before and not stuck out like
a sore thumb? You know, That's just the way it is there,
and it's Yeah, they had a vegetarian booth too, they did. The
line was much shorter for some reason, so I went, right, were
they serving real vegetarians? Yes, yeah, they served Alison. When you
get a chance, you should look up North Haven Pastures in Red Hook,
New York. It's a beautiful two hundred acre cattle and pig farm that they're
doing a lot of interesting things up there. You should give them a look.
See, I definitely will. Thanks for the tip. Do there a
live stock of good lives too? Yes? They do. Actually, I
am at this particular farm most Monday afternoons for my for my regular job,
and it is a beautiful piece of property. They're doing a lot of interesting
things with raising cattle and pigs and trying to do it in a sustainable way.
Uh and kind of like a free range kind of a situation. And
it's it's a new venture and I think you should look it up. I
am going to look it up. And I leave that thought with get out
there and for your family farmers people, that's a family farm. That's a
family farm, by the way, run by run by two people and their
families. That's it beautiful cool, And we'll talk with Alison Moore because there's
lots of stuff to talk about, but we're gonna turn it over to Neil
for his selection on on Baby Songs. It sounds like you had an awesome
time there, and yeah I heard there was a special guest to the kid.
Yeah, that's what we're talking about in a little bit. Talk about
that. Yeah, we'll talk about that later. It's very cool. But
anyway, well, my song it isn't about a baby per se. It's
not about babies per se, but it's about something that every baby needs every
once in a while. And no, not a diaper change, no you
read my mind. No, I'm talking about a babysitter. In the song
I chose for today is called Babysitter and it's by the Ramones. Now I
know that I've picked many Ramones songs here on the Rock and Roll History Show.
I was gonna say, what a surprise. Yeah, and we're we're
shocked, in part because of course I think they're, you know, the
greatest band that ever was. But in addition, also because they seem to
have they always have a song ready for every occasion. So as you've proved.
Now now for the best benefit of those out there might not know who
they are. The Ramones formed in nineteen seventy four in Forest Hills, Queens,
New York. Joey, Johnny, Dedy and Tommy all adopted the surname
Ramone. It wasn't their real last name, and by the way, they
got it from an alias that Paul McCartney used to use to avoid fans when
he checked into hotels or et cetera. That kind of thing. He was
Paul Ramone. They were pioneers in the New York City punk rock scene in
the midnight seventies, and in a nutshell, basically, they were influenced by
everything that came before them, and in turn influenced just about everything that came
after them. Their career, with a few personnel changes, lasted twenty two
years. They performed two two hundred and sixty three shows, released fourteen studio
LPs, tons of singles, live albums, videos, and a movie,
all before retiring in nineteen ninety six. They were inducted into the Rock and
Mall Hall of Fame in two thousand and two. Okay now. The song
Babysitter was recorded during sessions for their second LP called Leave Home on Sire Records.
It was recorded at Sun Dragon Studios in New York City in October and
November of nineteen seventy six. The budget for recording Leave Home was about ten
thousand dollars compared to their debut, which they'd only received a mere six thousand,
four hundred dollars to record, wouldn't produce, so they got a little
bit of a raise and it also allowed them to hire Tony Bongiovi to help
produce the album, and yes he is the cousin of John Yes. This
also allowed them to put more emphasis on the mixing and production, which resulted
in a better quality sounding LP than their first album. Dede and Joey were
pretty much the primary songwriters in the band, with Tommy contributing songs as well,
but all the original songs. Kind of like what Rim did. What
Becky was saying there was they gave credit to the whole band. The whole
band got credit for all their original songs, initially, Babysitter being no exception,
and it wouldn't be until later that they began receiving their individual credit.
But in my mind, in my opinion, Babysitter sounds like a song that
Joey wrote. That's just my opinion. It's a tale of young love that's
written from the point of view of an adolescent teenage boy whose girlfriend calls him
up and says that her parents are going out for the evening and she invites
him over for perhaps a little romance. But there's just one catch. She
will also be babysitting her younger sibling in her parents' absence, and in an
ironic case of who's watching who or who's chaperoning who, it turns out the
kids kind of peeping tom and it's likely to tattle on them if he sees
anything risque going on, thus forwarding any attempts at making whoopee. And that's
the technical term I was gonna say, You're you're getting real technical on us
here, Neil keeping your family friend of course. All right, now,
let's hear the story of the babysitter by the the moment she says she's been
sitting and do that, she says, come over. It's a hard rest
on the Cattrick must as a wolf, but the timoth ever born at bore
On the cat but a wolf, but the Timoth that we won at Boar.
She says, She's been and done that, She says the other it's
a whole rest. Yeah you know how the tivvy are only playing Let the
buds are gone? Yeah you know why the damon are are we glad that
the bus are gone? She went to see the kids, she said,
the quiet the boy. We can'st on eating and day, why we can't
go to give and to get the live by she says, she's baby me
to do that. She says, go mother, it's our rat on the
gather of the But the demin never won ever y you no will hasn't did
it on on we g that the f dog she is then she baby did
that. She's done off the all right, she's den in baby that she's
the mother is the all right? All right? Ah, yeah, it's
all right, or maybe it wasn't so and now the original release of the
LP Leave Home did not contain the song Babysitter. It was left off the
initial release, but that album did include a song called Carbona Not Glue,
which presumably was a follow up to their classic song Now I Want to Sniff
some Glue that from their debut. Yes, that is until they found out
that the name Carbona was a registered trademark and the record label had to remove
it from the album. They had to take the song off the album now,
although some copies of the LP with the offending Carbona song did get out,
like the one I Got. Carbona not Glue was later replaced by Sheena
is a Punk Rocker, which was on the US release, and Babysitter was
then the replacement on the UK release. Now, Babysitter would not get a
proper us release until nineteen seventy eight, when it appeared as the B side
of a single, and that's where I first got a hold of it.
Although they used to play it live, so I was aware of the song,
I just didn't know where it was, but it was on a B
side. The A side was their cover of Bobby Freeman's classic do You Want
to Dance, which is found on their third LP, Rocket to Russia and
Do You Want to Dance. It was also featured in the film Rock and
Roll High School. If you've seen it, you know that the scene where
they're going down the hallway. Anyway. Subsequently, Babysitter did find its way
onto several reissues, compilations as a bonus track, demo versions, live versions,
etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. But yeah, I think it's an,
you know, a rather obscure gem for them, and I've always liked it.
I always liked it when they played it live, and I was glad
that I finally got a decent recording of it. I'd say, now it's
on every you know, any comp you can find it easily. But it
wasn't so in the day. You know, back then, it's like you
couldn't go online and and look it up on YouTube or anything like. No,
it was more fun. You had to go to the record. So
it was a yeah, that was yeah. But anyway, yeah, that's
my baby song, the Babysitter. I love it. That was great.
That was great. Yes, that was a great one. Jess, you
are up, okay. So I too went into a different direction than babies.
Babies, I think Gail and I have more in common than I realized.
I yeah, I find them a little bit, you know, scary
when they're small and like dropable. You could beat them up, you had
too, don't worry about it, Okay. So I actually went with a
song that's more about as being apparent as your child gets older. So the
child song I chose is called Here for You by Neil Young. It was
on his album called Prairie Wind, which was released September twenty seven, two
thousand and five. So Happy Anniversary. That was his twenty sixth studio album
that was recorded in March of two thousand and five at Masterlink Studio in Nashville,
Tennessee. The genre is described as country rock, folk rock, or
Americana and the label is Reprise. The album heaked at number eleven on the
US Billboard two hundred and The song is described as being very emotional, heartfelt,
and straightforward. According to songbacks, it was written for his daughter Amber
Jean, who was twenty one years old and in her last year of college
at the time, and it speaks to balancing being supportive and letting your child
grow into an adult, which I think is probably one of the more difficult
tasks of being a parent. And Neil Young also had some very special challenges
with letting this particular child grow and become independent, and we'll talk more about
those after we hear the song. When your summer days come tumbling down and
you find yourself below, then you can come back and be with me.
Just close your eyes, can all be there. Listen to the song this
so hard Beating for You. Yes, I miss you, but I never
want to hold you. Might say I'm here for you. When the winter
comes to your new home and snowflakes are falling down, then you can come
back and be with me. Just close your eyes and I'll be there.
Listen to the song the soul Hard Beating for You. Yes, I miss
you, but I never want to hold down. You might say, I'm
here for you, spring protective arms around me in the bar, well,
let you go on your way. Happiness, I know always spire and man
it does I hope at it scares. Yes, I miss you, but
I never want to hold you. Now. You might say I'm here for
you. Yes, I miss you, but I never to hold you now
you say you always. So through this exercise I got to learn a little
bit more about Neil Young and his family through an article in far Out Mac
magazine written by Joe Tayson and published on January twenty one of twenty twenty one.
So, Neil Young is actually the father of three children. The first
one his name is Zeke and he was born in nineteen seventy two to carry
snodgrass and then in nineteen seventy eight, his son Ben was born with his
wife Peggy, and both of those two children were diagnosed with cerebral palsy.
So yeah, so you know, raising those two children and caring for them
is something that you know he had with with two different spouses. So when
Peggy was pregnant again, you know, this was a challenge for them,
and this whole thing was about healing and overcoming their fears. And in nineteen
eighty four is when Amber Jean was born, and luckily she was healthy,
and so you know, she's the only one who was able to grow and
become independent. And I can't imagine what that was like for him, you
know, when she's twenty one and kind of, you know, like moving
out on her own. And in nineteen eighty eight, Neil Young actually interviewed
with Rolling Stone and talked about what the challenges were with having disabled children.
So, like I said, I can't imagine, you know, after that
experience then trying to raise a healthy child and balance independence and support and what
that letting go experience must have been like. So so that's my song.
And I guess you guys got to see him perform at Farmade as well.
We did, Yes, we did. But that's why he wasn't at Farmade
because when COVID happened, he was very, very concerned about transmitting any kind
of disease or COVID obviously to his kids. So he had been away and
then finally we got him back this year. I'm glad he was able to
be back this year. He did a shorter set for a reason. We'll
talk about after our break. Jess, did you call this an exercise I
did researching is listen, it's brain work. It's it's brain work, and
it's it's fun brain work because it gets to use a totally different part of
my brain than I than I normally get to the inside us. I don't
use the inside very much. There's a lot of squishy stuff in there.
I don't want to make it well, you know, if I'm not mis
steak. And Neil Young has a I don't know if it's a yeah,
like a clause or whatever. It's called the Bridge School, which is actually
I know he's done concerts for that. It's for developmentally challenged children. You
know, it's like and I think it was in part because of his own
kids. I know he's I don't know if he still does it or what,
but yes, it is so cool. I love it when artists get
involved in you know, causes and awareness and what better better reason than your
own kids. So I'll always have a soft spot at a soft spot in
my heart for Neil Young because he was at the first rock concert that I
ever went to. Wow. And I'll tell you the story if I may,
yeah, yeah, and I'll you know it was. It was in
nineteen sixty seven, that's right, nineteen. I was about a week shy
of my twelfth birthday. I was seven back and one of the one of
the neighborhood parents got a whole bunch of tickets for a show in White Plains,
New York at the Westchester County Center and the headline it was the Beach
Boys. So all of us kids piled in the car we went. But
one of the opening acts of several was a band called the Buffalo Springfield,
which would go on to become more famous because of Neil Young and Stephen Stills
and of course Crosbie Stills, Nash and Young. And I didn't know who
they were. I had not, but I remember watching them and saying,
this is the real stuff. This is I thought they blew the Beach Boys
off the stage. Personally at twelve years old, I was like, this
is insane, this is great. And then, of course I learned more
about them later and I was like, yeah, you know what he Neil
Young is a rock and roller in spite of it all, deep down and
he's never quit. So yeah, he's got that. I mean twenty six
albums and he probably has more sense then. That's pretty amazing in and of
itself. Well, I'll tell you one more story that I just remembered too,
and this was probably nineteen seventy four. He was doing a solo thing,
or I think he was with Crazy Horse, and it was at Madison
Square Garden. I know, Brian, your favorite police it was, but
it was nineteen seventy four. The only Canadian was Neil Young. You were
safe. The borders were tighter back then. Anyway. Anyway, before the
show, there was rumors that then President Richard Nixon was going to be on
television making, you know, a big announcement, and we were all kind
of hoping what it was going to be, but you know, nobody dared
hope that much. Anyway. So I went to the show and some friends
I knew had tickets right up front. They were like third row, so
I kind of snucked down to where they were able to hand me the ticket
stub that they had so I could get through the you know, through the
gate and get down there. So I snucked into the third row to see
the show, and about halfway through, somebody came out and hands near the
Young a piece of paper and he kind of stands off to the side,
opens up, reads it, walks up to the microphone and says, the
Vietnam War is over. Wow. Nice. The whole place Madison's We're going
went insane. People were crying, hugging, and I turned around and looked
into the you know, the from kind of almost the view that he would
have had the entire bowl, except I wasn't up on the stage, and
they turned on all the lights and people were just it was like it was
it was. It was such a celebration. It was so crazy. I
was just I had just turned like eighteen, so I was, you know,
stop the draft. Yeah, but I was. I was, you
know, I could have been, so to me, that was like,
whoa, Okay, that's one thing I don't have to, you know,
be concerned about. But on a larger scale, that was just the fact
that it was that it was over. You know, it was and Neil
Young, of all people, was the man that I heard it from.
It was it was that's amazing. Better than Nixon, right, But of
course, yeah, yeah, what a story that ten soldiers and Nixon's coming.
Yeah, so that yeah, there you go. Anyway, that's my
Neil Young story. So I want to hear you guys from what he was
doing at the over the last weekend too. Yeah, but first we're going
to take another real quick break and then we'll come back and talk about that.
All right, So stick around this more coming up. This is Hudson
Riddle Radio dot com. Oh right, Hudson Radio dot com. A nicer
hop you can't stop and welcome back everybody. So we left off talking about
Neil Young, so we should probably just pick it up from right there.
He was back at Farm Made this year, so Alison I got to see
him. He was out there by himself, no band, you know,
for the last few years it's been Lucas Nelson's band, promise of the real
behind him, nothing, just him by himself. Came out, played I
think three songs and that was it, and excuse himself because he was turning
time over to the surprise performer that showed up unannounced, and that would be
about Dylan. Yes, but I just want to say though the three songs,
you know, Neil Young with a guitar and his harmonica, it's still
good. But I have to say I missed keep on rockin in the Free
World. Oh yeah, I mean I was like, you know, yes,
that absolutely carry the stage by himself without the band. Yes, sounded
great. He couldn't kept going. Nobody knew he was going to be cutting
it short. And then yeah, Bob Dylan came out. But apparently Dylan
asked for all the big screens to be shut off, so if you were
in the back, he couldn't see anything. And I don't know if there
was a problem with the lighting or if it was done on purpose, but
it was done on purpose. I read it. Okay, yea, I've
heard both, because you know, everything was kept really dark and then the
lights would come on a little bit and go right back off, and you
know, so he sounded just like himself, which you never know what you're
gonna get with Bob Dylan. I keep flip flopping how much of a fan
I am. But his backing band was the Heartbreakers. It was Tom Petty.
Oh my gosh, yeah, yes, that's crazy, that's cool.
Yeah, I mean they sounded great, Yeah, it was. It was
weird from my perspective of where I was on the stage. I see the
you know, I could see everybody, but I was kind of on the
side, uh, and everything went dark and it was just so bizarre,
and I'm like, why did Neil young willl do three songs? What's going
on? Right? And then you know the voice is unmistakable. And then
he started playing Maggie's Farm and that's pretty recognizable for Bob Dylan, and we
moved in a little closer and just yep, that's him. Well I could
see from where I was sitting, because you know, I was like kind
of in the middle, and I could see him straight on, even the
outline with the with the giant hair. Yeah, you know about Dylan hair,
so like, yep, all right, I know it's coming. Yeah.
He didn't say anything, he didn't introduce anything, no talk about anything.
He did his songs and and schedaddle. But it was the thirty eighth
farm, Maide, thirty eight was at the first one, so I think
that was a big part of what I Also I read that he was playing
guitar, and lately he's only been playing yano at his at his concerts,
so this was also another rarity. You know that, yes, playing guitar
again. Yeah, yep, he was playing guitar. Yeah, I mean,
I definitely, you know, we'll check it off. Like, Okay,
I saw Bob Dylan. That's it, it's he did. It was
a few years ago. He was doing the minor league ballpark tour. I
forgot who he was touring with, but like his shows were universally panned.
Everybody said it was awful. He sounded awful, the acoustics were awful,
everything. So I'm like that, you know, why am I going to
go be disappointed? But he he sounded as good as Bob Dylan cans sound
at at farm Aide. I know he's he's like a love hate people love
him hate him. Yeah, I keep flip flopping, but I'm glad I
got to see him. I'm glad I was there for that. It was
yes, me too. Yeah. So all right back to our topic,
Mercedes, you're up. Well, I guess I took this in a whole
different direction than all of you. Oh okay, I think it's so interesting
that y'all had a problem with the topic because it just seems really a problem.
It was just it was very specific. Okay, So we like challenges.
It was good. Nobody's yeah, it's good. It's good. Challenges
good. So in looking for songs about babies, I found a few good
ones and a lot of really bad ones that were so sappy that it was
tough to listen to it. That's why I couldn't do it. Everything was
too syrupy. Yeah, well, I hope you don't feel that way about
my song because I like it. And this song I finally picked is Kooks.
It's a song written by David Bowie and it's on his nineteen seventy one
album Hunky Dory. His fourth album the same album is Changes and Life on
Mars. I have never heard this song, didn't know anything about it.
He wrote this song to it and Angie's newborn son. The song was similar
in sound to early nineteen seventies Neil Young, So I'm gonna go back to
Neil Young a little bit, because Bowie was listening to a Neil Young record
at home on May thirtieth, nineteen seventy one, when he got the news
of the arrival of his son. Some speculations from one article as to which
Neil Young album it was after the gold Rush, which has a song called
I Believe in You. But also the sound is similar to according to this
article, is similar to Till the Morning Comes from the same album, which
features a similar swing tempo acoustic production, trumpet interlude and backing vocals. Musicians
on the song are David Bowie obviously lead and backing vocals, acoustic guitar and
Alto Sachs, Mick ronson string arrangement, Trevor Boulder bass and trumpet mid Sorry,
Mick wood Men, how do you say that? Would man say?
Woodman c on drums, and rich Rick Wakeman on piano. Wow. But
Bowie said in a press release, the baby was born and it looked like
me, and it looked like Angie. The song came out like if you're
going to stay with us, then you're gonna grow up bananas. The couple
divorced in nineteen eighty. I don't know. I think it was like drug
issues. Does anybody know for sure what the deal was there? I don't
know. And that's they alluded to that in one article that I read,
and Bowie got custody. I have a son. At age eighteen, Zoey
decided that his full name was Duncan Joey. I don't know if it's pronounced
Zawe or Joey. It's Cowie anyway, Yeah, as his full name was.
But then somewhere else it said it was pronounced like zoe, like if
a girl's name zoe or Zoe. Yeah, Zoe. I've heard that pronounced
both ways too, so I don't know anyway. His full name was Duncan
Zoe Heywood Jones, and he would use his name Duncan as his first name
starting at age eighteen. He said, I always did feel in the shadow
when I was growing up, he once said an interview, and how can
you not feel like that with a father like David Bowie? Yeah, I
mean really so. Duncan Jones now works in the film industry as a successful
director. And I just want to I just want to tell you a couple
of lines on the song because I thought, I think it's really cool,
So I think you should listen to this. A funny old crib on which
the paint won't dry. I bought you a pair of shoes, a trumpet
you can blow, and a book of rules on what to say to people
when they pick on you. And another line is, and if you ever
have to go to school, remember how they messed up this old fool.
Don't pick fights with the bullies or the cats, because I'm not much cup
at punching other people's dads. And if the homework brings you down, then
we'll throw it on the fire and take the car downtown. Love it,
Love it, so let's hear the sun. Will you stay in a love
a story? If you stay, you won't be sorry because we believe in
you. Soon you'll grow, So take a chance with a couple of gooks.
I'm a bromance sing Will you stay in a love a story? If
you stay, you won't be sorry because we believe in you. So you'll
grow, So take a chance with a couple of cooks. I'm a banoon
man saying, we bought a lot of things to keep you warm and dry,
and a funny old crip on which the paints won't dry. I bought
you a pan, shoes, a trumpet you can blow, and the book
of rules of what to say to people when they pick on you, because
if they stay with us, you're gonna be pretty cookie too. Will you
say in a love starry? If you stay? You want this alright,
because we believed in you. See your brow, So take a chance with
a couple of cooks. I'm a baloon man saying, And if you ever
have to go to school. Remember how they messed up this old fool.
Don't big fights with the brothers on the carts because I've got much got at
bunching other people's darts. And if the homework brings you down, then we'll
throw it on the barren. Take the car down town. Will you stay
in a love story if you say you won't be a surren? The sweet
field in you seeing your brown so'll take a chance when a couple of cooks
up an old man say, well, you say in a love story if
you say you won't be a surre as we believed in you. So obviously
bo uses the word coop in like calling themselves geeks or something. Today it's
sort of self deprecating. And I had to laugh at one of the comments
in the comment section on song Meetings because, oh my gosh, somebody wrote
in I'm pleased to discover that this was written for a son. I always
thought it was about a couple of old perverts trying to get a younger girl
to live with them. A crib weird, Yeah, crib that's a little
bit kinky. Yeah, well your crib is your department kind of you know,
true, that's true, But it's like, will you stay in our
lover's story. I don't know. There's a couple of lines of fit.
She didn't really paid. I was thinking, you know, Jess had to
tug at the heart string song of the week until that one, and I
think that one was a little more tugging at the heart strings. I never
would have taken in that direction. What which one it lost me? Was
more tugging at the heartstrings even really, yeah, I think it's very sweet,
like tugging in a good way. Yeah, okay, okay, good,
okay. So. Patrick O'Neill, a history professor at Methodist University in
Fayetteville, North Carolina, wrote in an article Cooks seemed to have been written
from the perspective of a member of the gender bending counterculture who's struggling to figure
out how to be apparent when all the examples of fatherhood around him mimic the
authority structures those folks were fighting against, Just says O'Neill, Bowie solves that
problem by inviting his child into his life, which I thought was very cool.
When asked in twenty thirteen if Koks was written for him, Duncan said,
truth is it was written to pass coded messages to the KGB controllers in
Moscow. I was just a cover, Joel. It's great joke. Keep
them guessing. The British indie band the Kooks named themselves after this song.
And that's my child song, my baby song. That was a good one.
I enjoyed that. Thank you, Mercedes. I wish David Bowie was
my dad. Be interesting? Yes, nice? All right, John,
your turn, Okay, everybody. My selection for tonight was Lullaby, good
Night My Angel. It is the seventh track from Billy Joel's nineteen ninety three
album River of Dreams, released in nineteen ninety four as a fourth and final
single for the album. I know you're so shocked that I would pick something
from Billy Joel. Anyway, I'll tell you a little bit about the song
here, we'll listen to it. I have a couple of little snippets after
that. You know this, it's an interesting topic for me, you know,
given my work. I spend my days working with children with various special
needs, so it's it has a kind of a significant meaning to me.
When you're talking about children, I should say, or babies or juveniles,
whatever you want to call it. Billy Joel wrote this as a lullaby for
his then seven year old daughter, Alexa Ray, in response to her question
where do we go when we die? Now? I did not know that
this was written in response to that specific question until I did a little bit
of research on here in twenty sixteen. Billy Joel said he told Alexa when
she first asked him about life after death. He said, after you die,
you go into other people's hearts and they take you with them through their
lives, and then you pass that along to your children. She seemed content
with that answer. It was kind of a scary question, but the answer
made sense to her. So without further ado, let's go to the song
and we'll talk about it afterwards. Good Night, my angel, Time to
close your eyes and save these questions. Foreign are the day. I think
I know what you've been asking me. I think you know what I've been
trying to say. I promised I would neverve you, and you should always
know wherever you may go, no matter where you are, I never will
be far away. Good Night, my angel. Now it's time to sleep,
and still so many things I want to say. Remember all the songs
you sang for me when we went sailing on an emerald bab and like a
board out on the old Shane. I'm rocking you to sleep the waters dark
and deep inside this anchient heart, You'll always be upart of me. Good
Night, my Angel. Now it's time to dream and dream how wonderful your
life will be. Sunday your child may cry. And if you sing this
lallaby, then in your heart there will all always be a part of me.
Sunday will all be gone, but La llah By is gone and on
they never die. That's how you and I Whooby Lullaby good Night My Angel
by Billy Joel. It's an interesting song. Again, it's always I always
like to see where people's inspiration comes for their music, and this one was
fairly obvious, but it also kind of goes deeper. I think into the
struggle that adults have in trying to address difficult topics with children, and the
surprising ways that children cope and deal with them, as I know all too
well in my daily work. A couple of interesting points here. On the
River of Dreams album, he wrote each song in reaction to the one that
came before it, and Lullaby was written to precede the title track. He
wrote it as a piano piece and had the melody before he came up with
the lyrics. I could just kind of picture of my mind. I'm trying
to put this together. There's a gentle idea was for it to be a
part of a suite with the River of Dreams. Another interesting point about this
song because right about this time, Billy Joe was also going through a breakup
with his then wife, Christie Brinkley, and he didn't want his daughter to
feel like she was being abandoned in the midst of a split with his then
wife, so he used the song to reassure her that he'd always be around.
That's a little bit of the song. It's it's good good kind of
I don't know what didn't say a special meaning to me, but it certainly
had an interesting meaning tip to me, a bit of a different take than
some of the other songs we've been hearing tonight. It was I would say,
was this a little sappy? Probably? But I think that's okay because
when you're dealing with kids sometimes it can be a challenging subject to talk about,
So okay, we'll enjoy. Yeah, it's a very stripped down,
simple, not a simple song but stripped down, you know, him and
a piano with some background instruments. Yes, it was like a Neil Young
almost, you know, just guitar and him kind of feel. Yeah,
it's it's interesting. What's interesting is that it really shows the talent of the
musician here and how he can take this deep discussion with his daughter about her
question about death and also about his separation from his then wife and tie it
all together to a really beautiful piece of music. And it's a testament to
his talent as a musician. I should say so, agree, I hope,
yes, so, thank you, Hope you all enjoyed. That was
a good one. I like that song. Yeah, yes, yes,
it's good. All right, one more quick break and then one more selection
to go. And if I don't say myself, say so of myself.
You don't want to miss this, so stick around. We'll be right back.
Brian. Yes, can I can? I tell the audience what you
wrote on our little chart? Okay? He literally wrote it's a surprise,
so we don't even know what the song is. Everybody listening out there,
we are all going to be as surprised as you are, So I'm expecting
it to be good. I'm scared as you should, probably with good reason.
Yeah, all right, we will be right back Hudson River Radio.
Your dog likes us Hudson River Radio dot com and welcome back. One more
selection to go before I forget Allison. Thank you for joining us tonight and
for hoppings your pleasure to hang out with the Crambones. Thank you. I
highly recommend to have you here. You have to check out Getting Dirty because
it's not only about farming, but it's gardening and it's tips and all that.
And and I will never forgive Allison and her co host Van because now
I have tomatoes growing in the home studio if you will time this fines,
I got avocados to grow, and lemon trees and all these things are in
this tighty little room. Yeah, and something I never would have done without
a little coaxing from the two of them. So thank you both. What
else can I say? All right, are you ready, Crambones? Put
your seatbelt? Scared will ever be? We are going back first to the
mid fifteen hundreds in Italy. Yeah you were mid fifteen hundreds. Boy,
you're going way back. Is that a good wind? Yeah, you're gonna
be thankful you were not a kid back then. Let's just leave it.
You'll see what I mean. So, the predominant religion in Italy at the
time was Catholicism, as we've talked about before, usually on on our Winter
holiday episodes. The Catholic Church was the largest benefactor of music at the time,
along with royalty. There were no record companies, there was nothing like
that. If you had a composer, they were hired by somebody to piece,
usually for a specific occasion. So church had a lot of money.
The royalties had a lot of money and they were able to hire these composers,
and these composers would write beautiful pieces. They contained notes combined from the
lowest low, the real low based notes, to the highest highs, and
all these notes blend together, and if you're a good composer, you know
what you're doing. It sounds really good. The singers of the highest highs
are known as sopranos mezzo sopranos. They're the ones who singing super high.
When it came to church music, specifically, women were banned from singing because
it was deemed too seductive, a problem that we still have today. Right,
I'll think of that next time I put my choir ropes on. There
you go, you gotta tread lately there. I'm afraid I know where this
is going. Yeah, sit tight. So choir would use young boys to
substitute for these women because they had higher voice and as we know, without
picking a fight. The Catholic Church has a wonderful history with young boys,
right right, So as time goes on, what happens to kids they grow
up? Right, their voices change. The Church would spend all this time,
all this money training these kids, practicing with these young boys, just
like music school today. They would go to music theory classes, they would
learn how to compose, they would learn how to conduct, and in just
a few short years, these boys would just minuto themselves out of their jobs
by growing up. Just when I was thinking, yeah, so what if
there was a way to stop these high pitched voices from changing? Oh yeah,
there just might be away back in the HU, I guess the snip
predated counter tenors. M. Yeah, we're talking ye old snip from both
the old Yeah. We're not going to get into exact specifics on how snip
snip was done, but I will say that many boys were actually killed by
an opium overdose, which was administered before the procedure was performed. These kidnren
sake God for the opium, right. Sometimes if they didn't have opium,
or in addition to they would compress the carotid arteries on the kid's neck until
the kid passed out, and then they would submerge him in an ice bath
in order to perform yield snip snip Right, sounds like those things where you
wake up in a hotel bath stubb full of ice with no kidney. Yeah,
I was gonna say, I've definitely seen this movie. This is much
much worse. You have two kidneys. I mean, technically you have two.
You know, they tended to take them both. Oh man bakes welcome
back, Alison at Yeah, I know. I'm like, and what planet
is this logical thinking? Oh, oh, don't worry, we'll figure it
out here. So if this boy recovered, if he survived, the recovery
would be about two weeks before he was back up on his feet. Proverbally
speaking, these boys would be known as castrati. They would not go through
puberty like a regular young man would. They would just develop a little bit
differently. A side effect of their procedure was that the growth plates in their
bones didn't fuse, so they would often grow super tall, over six foot
three, which was considered giant back then. They would have huge rib cages
like big barrel chest rib cages, which gave them powerful voices and the ability
to hold notes much longer than most other singers could. Most of the time,
they didn't go bald because male pattern baldness is caused by testosterone, which
they were now lacking. They didn't age at the normal rate, and most
of them had baby faces for most of their lives. They looked much younger
than they were, and they may or may not have had tons of affairs
depending on what resource you read, because they couldn't be a dad. Yep,
right, okay, So technically speaking, the church banned the practice early
on, as in, no, no, don't do this, but if
you do, boy, we have a job for you. You know,
say what you will about following the rules. So technically they weren't allowed to
do this, So a lot of these boys would be given excuses to tell
the church, such as they were kicked in the crotch by a horse or
some other type of tragic crotch related accident that would allow them to keep their
high pitched voices and sound young, and then they were brought into the choir.
The height of popularity for these voices was around seventeen twenty. In the
seventeen twenties, when an estimated four thousand boys were castrated annually, oh mike
annually. Most of them were from poor families and their parents were hoping that
their son would be able to make a good living and support the family.
Huh. There were a few boys who actually asked to have the procedure done
because they wanted to preserve their voice and that was the line of work that
they wanted to go into. But just like now, the odds of a
successful solo music career were not very good. You were the odds were stacked
against you. But being a professional singer in a choir, in a church
choir was a steady job. They would always have a paycheck, they would
have a roof over their head, they would have food to eat, and
if they wanted to quit the choir, the church would quietly ordain them and
give them another job to do somewhere else within the organization. And so it
was kind of a safe path for these boys to take. However, some
castrati were discovered in these choirs and then went on to have superstar careers in
opera. They would leave the church and they would go into basically the secular
side of things and have these huge opera careers, and they were easily on
par with some of the biggest stars of today. The practice was not officially
made illegal in Italy until either eighteen sixty one or eighteen seventy again depending on
which you know source you're looking at. But we're talking about the time of
the US Civil War. This all relap with that. It wasn't that long
ago. I'm still stuck on castrat Yeah, wow, I gotta take a
sip tog. Where on the internet there's a video with audio of one of
the last cupstoms. Sit tight here now, relax, relax, you don't
just yet. Bryan did his homework. I did my homer. Only one
castrato was known to have made solo recordings, as Gail just alluded to.
His name was Alessandro Moreski. Now, remember the phonograph was invented in eighteen
seventy seven, right around this time, not long after the last official snip
snip, So there was a little bit of overlap there. Alessandro was born
in Italy in eighteen fifty eight, just before the start of the US Civil
War. Nobody is really sure when he had the procedure, but it could
have been as late as eighteen sixty five, which may have been illegal at
that point, again depending on which resource you use. But long story short,
his ability was recognized early by the Church and he was recruited into the
Sistine Chapel choir, which was pretty good, pretty big in the Vatican.
Sometime before eighteen eighty six. He was promoted to what we would call the
director in eighteen ninety one. He was immensely popular, especially in the Vatican,
but he never jumped to opera. He probably could have had a real
big career in opera, but he decided to stay with the Church for his
entire career. He died in nineteen twenty two at age sixty three, so
one hundred and one years ago, not that long ago in the grand scheme
of things, fortunately for us. In nineteen o two and again in nineteen
o four, Alessandro made some recordings in the Vatican. He recorded a total
of seventeen songs. Unfortunately, by this time, he was a little bit
past his prime and he didn't sound as good as he did when he was
younger. The critics kind of harped on him a little bit. The vocal
stylings back then are not the same as we're used to now, so that
they sound a little bit weird to us. So I picked a song that
we all know. I went with Ave Maria so we can focus on him
instead of focusing on a new song that we haven't heard before. This one
was recorded in nineteen oh four. It was recorded on a wax cylinder,
and remember at the time, the wax cylinders were mechanical recording device, not
electronic like we have now. It was a needle that would vibrate against the
wax cylinder as it was spinning, so you had to be loud. There
wasn't a whole lot of dynamics, not a lot of soft sounds in there,
because the needle wouldn't vibrate enough to pick it up, so everybody had
to be loud. The instruments had to be loud, so the dynamics aren't
there like you would expect nowadays. There's a little weirdness going on with his
vocal jumps because again, the wax cylinder doesn't pick things up that great.
But what he's actually doing, he's jumping up and down a tenth. He's
jumping more than an octave, which is kind of an impressive thing to do.
When you hear and when you know what he's doing, then you kind
of understand it. If you don't know what he's doing, it just sounds
like something's wrong. The recording quality kind of kind of messes things up.
So why don't we have a listen to the only known recorded Castrado doing a
solo. Remember this is a big boy with a little voice here, I'm
a Maria from nineteen o four. So ho say, and now I'd like
to open the floor to comments from the crambones. Yeah he was good,
a little squeaky there. I am speechless, but I'm often speechless after Brian's
picks. So that voice was a early forties, forty one forty two year
old man. Yeah, yeah, that was Mercedes. You had to pick
babies, right, I had had to go there. You know, we
have to be very careful about Brian in our next few topics. Yes,
let's all be very selective, ladies and gentlemen, Look, it's interesting,
for sure. I've never heard anything about any of that. I never heard
of it either. Yeah, it's it's a fascinating subject. I mean I've
heard of a lot of things and dating back to the Middle Ages and you
know, and going all the way forward into the eighteenth cent tree early nineteenth
century. But this one, Bryan, if nothing else, this is why
you don't run with scissors. Yeah, let up out. I've heard it's
suffering for your art. But no, no, nowadays approachols. You can
just transpose it up. You know, nowadays they have women playing those roles
in opera. At least you got to be careful with that seduction there in
church and if you really need to get a counter tenor, or if there
are any left, there is one actually that I have heard sing at the
church that I go to in somers Oh, you have to just tell us
what that means. Account Peter Sara from Chicago. What Peter Satara from chic
is a male who can sing really really hot, really really realized. And
if they're good and they're singing a piece you'll like, it'll give you chills.
There used to be a counter tenor in there was this group years ago.
Becky has probably heard of them, the Waverley Consort, Yeah, I
think so. Yeah. They were a medieval group and they used to do
a performance called the Christmas Story at Rockland Community College and they played medieval instruments
and they sang period music and they had a counter channel. I'm getting chills
just thinking about. Oh my gosh, was he good. I'm getting killed
about the proceed I have to say hearing hearing this counter tenor in this past
year in two performances it was. There were some fundraising concerts for the Ukraine.
Oh boy, I just I don't know. You close your eyes and
it sounds like it's a woman. Open your eyes and the dude, you're
just confused. You're just like, wait a minute, because this particular one
not only did he sound like a woman, we kind of looked like a
woman. Okay. And I'm just like, I'm just a bass clarinetist,
like I can hardly hear in those opp barches, you know, like the
whole thing is just breaking me out. Oh please let me hear some bass
notes. When a counter channer is good, they're really good. Yeah.
And you know, I used to work for Glimmerglass opera and I just so
much prefer seeing the women play with it's called a pants roll. Okay,
so instead of because we don't do the snip snip that Brian was talking about.
So those roles that were written, especially both arts operas, they're played
by women. So women dressed up like little boys and you know, like
that's a pants role and it's fun and they're usually you know, fun and
cute and I don't know, it's it's kind it's fun to see women do
those roles because they really get into it and I don't know, maybe they're
really trying like to overdo it playing a little boy or something. I don't
know, this is really funny. That could be fun. Yeah, I
think it's I think it's funny and really really fun. More power to those
women doing those pants roles. So we have to make one of those selections
when we finally get the Crambones band together. Oh yeah, yeah, we're
going to do that. Yeah, good luck. I'm sure it wasna I
have I've never had a band like. Somebody will do it. We're good,
Ryan. It's it's very interesting to me that there are some there are
some benefits to what to the snip stiff, like, what was it?
No balding they get their faces were very young. Yeah, they would keep
their baby faces. Usually they didn't have bald you know, the growth plates
didn't fuse, so they would grow super tall. So all right, we're
going to get into with them. I'll go with the baldness. Okay,
you know right now. Okay, I'm going to tread on the edge of
it. So this was not precision laparoscopic surgery, so it wouldn't necessarily be
one hundred percent effective. So there may be a few cells left over that
would produce just enough testosterone to allow certain functions and not others, which I'm
gonna let you, you know, finish that thought and all that. So
yeah, but you know what, thanks, knife could slip too, you
know what I'm saying. You know what I'm saying. Yeah, you're saying
the benefits are not guaranteed. Anyway. I hate to change the subject,
but how about those Mets, Yeah, playing with all their balls? Yea,
Actually, if you're a Met fan, probably not too much, and
not this year. The Yankees. Yeah, all right, right, I
want I want to thank you for this. Yeah, that is the Yeah,
this is the time to pull the plug. Yeah, we're definitely pulling
the plug now. So thank you all for the Rock and Rolling Show.
I never thought i'd see the day that we would hear at on this show.
Oh yeah. I like a challenge, so we have to see what's
coming in the future. Because all right, thank you everybody for joining us
here. Crambone's excellent choices as always, Alison, thank you for joining us.
Everybody has to check out Getting Dirty. We recorded some great interviews and
it's definitely worth checking out because I learned a lot and you really want to
know where your food's coming from, really, when it comes down to it,
Yeah, you do. There's so much to it and it was a
great experience. A lot of economics, a lot of legal stuff. So
definitely interesting interviews that you're gonna want to check out. So subscribe to Getting
Dirty wherever you get your podcasts. And with that, we are out of
here. We will be back next week with a brand new episode of the
Rock and Roll History Show. Until then, have a great weekend, everybody,
and he's out job dune and yell about a lot of income a rock
cock bottom and from Okay, Bye bye. Watson River Radio dot Com A
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