Whether you celebrate Christmas or a different holiday, or just agnostically take some time off, I hope it’s a great holiday season for you this year.

I actually feel some Christmas spirit this year, at least a bit more than usual. I haven’t been a very ‘Christmasy’ kind of guy for years. I’ve faked it for Nathan but my heart hadn’t been in it.

This year, though, as tough as times are for you, me, and most everybody right now, I see smiles everywhere I go and I find myself smiling back.

It’s like we all know the score now, no matter which side you’re on, in this country where we take sides over every little thing, we at least know the score now.

Obama’s said things are going to get worse before they get better, and I believe him. I’m bracing myself.

But I can smile through that, like a lot of people, because we’ve BEEN through economic turmoil before. THAT we can survive!

I never felt that serene about pre-emptive war. I think hardly anybody did.

Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays and Happy New Year. It’s a new time. And we’ve been due one.

God bless,

(A message about a great holiday bargain for a great cause, from the Right Reverend Keith A. Gordon…)

Perry Baggs, the longtime drummer for Jason & the Scorchers, suffers from kidney problems due to diabetes, and spent several months last summer in the hospital. Scorchers frontman Jason Ringenberg and guitarist Warner Hodges have performed a couple of benefits to assist Perry with medical bills, but he’s still under the gun.

Perry is currently on the list for a transplant, but to add insult to injury, he was recently laid off from his job as a librarian with The Tennessean newspaper as part of Gannett’s recent cost-cutting. To help out, I’m selling copies of the three Alt.Culture.Guide books, as well as my Rock Talk collection of interviews (including a Jason & the Scorchers interview) to benefit Perry.

Any one of our four books can be purchased for $8.00 postpaid and $5.00 from the price of each book will be donated directly to Perry Baggs. Full details can be found here:

http://www.thatdevilmusic.com/books/

For those wanting to make direct contributions to Perry, a PayPal account has been set up to receive donations:
perrybaggs@yahoo.com

Thanks!

Rev. Keith A. Gordon
Conspiracy M.E.D.I.A

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I played my first memorial service yesterday. A fan of mine, Jim Coone, died of a heart attack early last week. I knew Jim from him coming to my gigs and from his e-mails, both from him and from his alter ego, Jarvis H. Lloyd.

Jim was a practicing physician and a mean guitarist with a stratospheric IQ, way too high for him to get any peace. Jarvis was a raving lunatic. He would say things that even Jim wouldn’t say, and Jim didn’t exactly flinch from speaking his mind to begin with. I’d get a ten-paragraph e-mail from Jim (or Jarvis, and it took me a while to catch on that they weren’t two different people!). I’d answer that e-mail, and five minutes later I’d get ten more paragraphs from one or the other of him. I envy anyone who can write that fast, with no misspellings, no bad grammar and flawless flow. It takes me a day to write as much as he’d write in five minutes, in his office, between patients!

At the invitation of Jim’s cousin, Travis Kilgore, I went to Chattanooga and sang “Martin Luther”, one Jim’s favorites (with Travis on bass and good drumming from another fellow who’s name escapes me now.) The service was in a Lutheran church and Travis tells me it’s not the first time the song had been sung there, and that a former pastor now moved to Texas loved the song and has taught it to parishioners in his new church. I love that. Jim would have loved me singing that at his service. Jarvis would have more than loved it.

Rest in peace, buddy. Life is more painful for some people than it is for others. You’ve earned the time off. I hope you’re jamming with Jimi right now. Godspeed.

Tommy

I am thrilled to tell you that Daddy (myspace.com/daddytheband) has been accepted to SXSW. We’re going to Austin in March. This means a lot to me. I always look forward to going to SXSW; it’s the official start of Spring for me. When it’s still cold in Tennessee I get to go to Texas, feel the sun on my bones, eat fajitas, play music, see a million friends and generally feel like - in the great sphere of humanity - I ain’t got it so bad. Not to mention the fact that I know now I’ll be in Texas in March - and England in August - reassures me that I’ve got another year of playing music ahead of me. That brings its own bagggage but at least it’s baggage I’m familiar with.

Sinus infections suck. You get all the effects of a fever without any of the good dreams. When I get infected I get a hot spot on the right top of my head, in my right ear and a sore deep down on the right side of my throat that makes eating purgatorial. My sinuses feel like they’ve been packed with lead. Still, I’m grateful. I’m not the Governor of Illinois!

Oh God, Billy Mays is on the television. That’s the Oxy-Clean guy with the beard that doesn’t appear in nature. He’s always yelling. Can you imagine what it’s like having dinner with him? The plates and cutlery rattling from the noise? Does yelling sell more detergent? I could get a megaphone and apply for a job.

The workers at the window factory in Chicago just got Bank of America to float their company. Score one for the workers! I like seeing the good guys win every once in a while.

Does anyone have Sgt. Pepper or the White Album in mono? I’ve been intensely curious of late. It’s so weird that the (stereo) albums we all grew up with are not the albums the Beatles signed off on at all! In ‘67, stereo was still a high-end, blue-ray type thing, the mono mix is what counted. That’s what everyone would actually hear, it was reasoned at the time. The mono mix of Pepper took 12 hours and all four Beatles were present; the stereo mix the next day took 2 hours and no Beatle attended. And it wasn’t just the difference between the sound being split between 2 speakers or 1; the mixes - I’ve read - are often profoundly different. If anyone could make me dupes of those records, I’ll send you something nice in return.

I’ve been reading Nietzsche. I’ve always heard that smart people read Nietzsche, so I’m trying it out. So far I’ve learned that Nietzsche was one pessimistic bastard. I can totally picture Hitler reading this stuff and saying “hmmmmm…” Other than that, it’s not very compelling reading at all. If it doesn’t get good in 20 more pages I’m going to go back to my Stephen Ambrose.

I hope you’re having a good season of Christmas, Hannukah or Eid. I’ll be at Norm’s in Nashville Dec. 20 and the Jambodians fest in Bowling Green Dec. 27th. I hope to see you there, especially if you live in England. That’ll impress me a lot.

Namaste
Now Namaheel
Good girl!

Tommy