Election Day 2024

[bryan_styble]

Well, it's "the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November", and
we all know what THAT means.

I've known four people over my 70 years--none well, but each friendly
acquaintances nonetheless--over the years who were murdered; one would
have been MORE than enough, but four is the total to date: two in
California in the 1980s and one in Washington State early this century.

But the first of the four victims was in Texas. And it so happens he
was something of a minor sensation in the Texas music scene back in the
years [1978-1980] when I knew the late Blaze Foley in Houston.

Foley was hanging out at a pal's place one night (long after I'd
permanently departed Texas for California). As news accounts reported
it, unexpectedly some friend of Foley's host (with some beef against the
host) came barging into the host's home and attacked Foley's pal--and
Blaze Foley was sadly shot to death in a blaze of gunfire in the scuffle
while he was trying to protect his buddy (who in the end DID survive).

Foley was a talented guy who wrote a lot of tunes--and vaguely resembled
animated Tennessee Tuxedo's pal Chumley the Walrus--but Foley only was
really known for one paricular number, a song that over the years has
been covered by a few other musical acts, both in and outside The Lone
Star State.

Its title is "Election Day", and of course its catchy melody comes to
mind every quadrennial first-Tues-after-the-first-Mon-in-November. It's
something of a pot-themed ditty, and was always fun to watch Foley
perform on his six-string acoustic:


ELECTION DAY
by Blaze Foley


Oh, Mr. Police man:
Please don't take my stuff !
(It cost me too much money,
And it probably ain't enough
To get me through Election Day.)
Didn't I hear you say?:
"[It'd] Be alright, be alright, be alright"...


SO: May all your favored candidates win--and best wishes to one and
y'all alt-obiters this fateful day !

BRYAN STYBLE/Florida

[Jason]

Blaze Foley's Wiki page is quite the interesting read. Mentions a
documentary and a biographical drama about him.

[bryan_styble]

Thanks for that, Jason; hadn't seen his Wiki entry, but now I shall.

Have a nice election!

BRYAN STYBLE/Florida

[MJ]

I think "Clay Pigeons" is far more well known than "Election Day," but
both are fine songs. His friend, Gurf Morlix, continues to perform many
of the Blaze songs today.

[Big Mongo]

On Tue, 5 Nov 2024 13:30:50 +0000, MJ wrote:

There's quote attributed to Mark Twain going around the net that goes:
'If voting made any difference they wouldn't let us do it.' but I think
its probably fake as I've seen attributed to several different folks.
and it doesn't have the right gravitas and flippancy to be Twain...

[J.D. Baldwin]

Post by MJ
I think "Clay Pigeons" is far more well known than "Election Day,"
but both are fine songs.

I would have bet money that Clay Pigeons was written by John Prine.
But I looked and I see that I was wrong.

If I were a songwriter, and John Prine had done one of my songs, I
would never shut up about it. I would introduce myself to strangers
with that information.

[bryan_styble]

Surprised we have yet to see a mainstream media publication offer this
sour-grapes headline:


TRUMP BEATS ANOTHER WOMAN


=================
BRYAN STYBLE/Florida

[David Samuel Barr]

For me the perennial Election Day music is
Virgil Thomson's "Fugue & Chorale on 'Yankee
Doodle'" from his score to the film "Tuesday
in November":

(Slatkin takes it a little too slow here but
it's the only readily available recording)
since it was the very first piece I ever
played in an orchestra. Years later when I
reconstructed Thomson's famed scores to two
other government films ("The Plow That
Broke The Plains" and "The River") from his
manuscripts for concert performances and a
recording (https://www.discogs.com/release/8516541)
and had the opportunity to meet with him he
autographed my copy of the score of this
piece and later approved my initial attempt
to render a solo piano version of it though
then asked me to let one of his then-current
students finish it as a graduate thesis.

As they say in Chicago, vote early, vote often.

Post by bryan_styble
Well, it's "the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November", and
we all know what THAT means.
I've known four people over my 70 years--none well, but each friendly
acquaintances nonetheless--over the years who were murdered; one would
have been MORE than enough, but four is the total to date:  two in
California in the 1980s and one in Washington State early this century.
But the first of the four victims was in Texas.  And it so happens he
was something of a minor sensation in the Texas music scene back in the
years [1978-1980] when I knew the late Blaze Foley in Houston.
Foley was hanging out at a pal's place one night (long after I'd
permanently departed Texas for California).  As news accounts reported
it, unexpectedly some friend of Foley's host (with some beef against the
host) came barging into the host's home and attacked Foley's pal--and
Blaze Foley was sadly shot to death in a blaze of gunfire in the scuffle
while he was trying to protect his buddy (who in the end DID survive).
Foley was a talented guy who wrote a lot of tunes--and vaguely resembled
animated Tennessee Tuxedo's pal Chumley the Walrus--but Foley only was
really known for one paricular number, a song that over the years has
been covered by a few other musical acts, both in and outside The Lone
Star State.
Its title is "Election Day", and of course its catchy melody comes to
mind every quadrennial first-Tues-after-the-first-Mon-in-November.  It's
something of a pot-themed ditty, and was always fun to watch Foley
ELECTION DAY
by Blaze Foley
Please don't take my stuff !
(It cost me too much money,
And it probably ain't enough
To get me through Election Day.)
"[It'd] Be alright, be alright, be alright"...
SO:  May all your favored candidates win--and best wishes to one and
y'all alt-obiters this fateful day !
BRYAN STYBLE/Florida

[Mig.Rhodes]

May the best man win.