The Rolling Stones, Gimmie Shelter, First Performance Ever!

Posted in The Rolling Stones, Youtube Favs on September 28th, 2011 by Willie

Like the title says, this video represents the first time the Rolling Stones played, “Gimmie Shelter” in public.  They played the song on “Pop Go the Sixties,” a variety show no doubt, (the 60s were rife with them,) and they pull it off as good as they ever would.  Made for the brilliant Let it Bleed record, “Gimmie Shelter” was Richard and Jagger’s genius abstract mashup of all the apocalyptic violent atmosphere dominating the hearts and minds of people across the world in the late 60s.  It’s one of the best songs of the Vietnam era, and it just drips cool and burns with bluesy hellfire.  The song also reflected the tumultuous time the Stones were going through themselves what with increased heavy drug use from Richards, the death of Brian Jones, and killing at their massive free Altamont Concert.  Oh, and I can’t end my little entry without mentioning how legendary guest vocalist Merry Clayton, the female vocalist who burns her voice into music history with her lines, “Rape, murder, it’s just a shot away, its just a shot away.”  Of course Mick performs that part in the live performance, but still, timeless.

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Ted Kennedy's Eulogy for Robert F. Kennedy

Posted in Politics, Robert F. Kennedy, Youtube Favs on September 12th, 2011 by Willie

Revolution, liberty, discovery, and moral courage.  These were themes prevalent in Ted Kennedy’s eulogy for his brother Bobby, after his insane assassination in 1968.  Drawing directly from one of Bobby’s greatest speeches, Ted quoting Bobby, said that, “Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope.  And crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current that can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.” Well, I don’t know about you, but that’s one of the greatest things I’ve ever heard or read.  To me, it encapsulates the frontier thinking that marked the cultural and social revolutions going on in the 1960s.  Bobby originally gave that speech in apartheid afflicted South Africa in 1966, where racism and intolerance were raging.  Ted’s eulogy for his brother was also perhaps his finest moment and speech, summing up his brother’s life by stating that “his brother not need to be idealized, or enlarged in death beyond what he was in life,” and that “he be remembered as a good and decent man, who saw wrong and tried to right it, saw suffering and tried to heal it, and saw war and tried to stop it.”  It’s at this point, where Ted’s voice begins to quaver, and he delivers Bobby’s greatest thought ever, “some men see things as they are, and say why, I dream things that never were, and say why not.”

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