Blogging Like Billy

Just got in from seeing Billy Bragg perform. It was the best I've seen him in years! In the last couple years I've seen both him and Paul Weller (from the Jam, Style Council, wherever you found him...) and I've seen so much of my schtick. I talk about the Beatles and Curtis Mayfield...people like that when people ask about influences, but it was really Billy Bragg, Paul Weller and maybe Suzanne Vega that really got me writing in a voice that was somewhat my own. I caught them when they were writing their vital stuff and that's what encouraged me. And I'm just so grateful for those guys...I wish Suzanne would do a new album...her last one 5 years ago was incredible in it's honesty. (I guess I can't leave out the Clash or the Smiths or Elvis Costello...maybe my 80s guys weren't as good as the "Classic Rock" guys, but that was probably a big part of it. When I first heard them the weren't iconic, they were artists trying to create their own groove on a road well traveled. The road wasn't really there for those titans before. I never did hip hop which was the equivalent of my generation. I liked the songs, I liked the Guthrie...so my road was and is--like any guitar playing singer/songwriter's--well traveled.)

But I am f-in' happy to stumble into Billy Bragg's footprints. One of his rants tonight was all about a shift from left vs. right politics worldview, to seeing cynicism, not ideology, as the enemy. Then he did this song called I Keep Faith that in other hands could've sounded like a Poison power ballad. Yes...Poison, the hair band. But I let my own snarkiness melt away and it was gorgeous.

Billy's always been that mix of bleeding romantic and passionate political idealist that I love. I was thinking...if I just met the woman that loved Billy songs, my life would be perfect. But maybe just the one who loves my songs would be even better. But we all know that's only a part of it... OK time to get to my personal journal...

If you are coming to the show tomorrow, you're in for a real treat. Not only do I have two amazing women sharing the stage with me, but the shows after I've seen a hero perform are usually the best. I might even try to learn I Keep Faith...'cause I do. Music and hope can move a nation and world. Like Billy kept saying, the shared event of the concert is a recharging of the batteries to go out with optimism and activism to bring about a more beautiful world. That's my hippie take.

Which reminds me, John Lennon says in the intro to one of the songs on the US vs. John Lennon says "Okay, so flower power didn't work; so what? We start again." Billy said he worked for 18 years to get Tony Blair elected. With cynicism it's hard to begin again. But we're gonna. Or, to quote that other important 80's band, Twisted Sister, "We're not gonna take it anymore."

[Uh... Twisted Sister had nothing to do with me finding my own voice...]

Happy Thursday.

Jason