The Mongrel Dogs Who Teach

Month: January 2013

  • Listening to Levon (30 Days of Marc Cohn — Day 14)

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    “Listening to Levon” Join the Parade This was the pop song leading off Join the Parade, the first studio album from Marc Cohn in a long time — and the first after he was shot.  This gave it some emotional oomph beyond the song. It’s a warm nostalgic tune which probably helped inspire (or at least…

  • Walk Through the World (30 Days of Marc Cohn — Day 13)

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    “Walk Through the World” The Rainy Season This song holds a special place for me.  Marc Cohn was a transformative album for me — heck, I even considered attending grad school at the University of Tennessee just so I could be “Walking in Memphis” — and so I looked forward with eager anticipation to Cohn’s sophomore…

  • Review: Tron Uprising (Soundtrack)

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    Tron: Uprising (soundtrack) Joseph Trapanese This is not Daft Punk.  This is not Daft Punk’s soundtrack for Tron: Legacy. Neither of those are bad things.  I really enjoyed Daft Punk’s Tron: Legacy soundtrack and thought it evoked the movie’s themes flawlessly.  But Uprising is its own show and should have its own music.  The needle to be threaded…

  • True Companion (30 Days of Marc Cohn — Day 12)

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    “True Companion” Marc Cohn I’ll admit it — I was very on the fence about including this song.  It’s always struck me as somewhat mushy and it so clearly is “the wedding song”.  It seemed a bit trite to add it to my list, especially in the year when I got married. But then I…

  • Life Goes On (30 Days of Marc Cohn — Day 11)

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    “Life Goes On” Join the Parade This is one of those pop songs that have a catchy melody but when you stop to listen to the words, you say, “Wait, what?” It’s a pop song about dying, but it’s surprisingly upbeat. Marc is a little brutal here. Life goes on, no matter what we lose: Elvis,…

  • Perfect Love (30 Days of Marc Cohn — Day 10)

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    “Perfect Love” Marc Cohn This is another gentle song.  It’s incredibly an incredibly sweet tale.  I have to wonder if a real couple served as a model and if so, who?  It’s not his parents (since we know Marc’s mom died when he was young) and it’s not him (because he would have been 5…

  • One Safe Place (30 Days of Marc Cohn — Day 9)

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    “One Safe Place” Live 04/05 This is a gentle song, far from the usual brash rock that marks his other guitar songs.  It’s also one Marc seems to strum in concert himself, rather than leaving it to Shane Fontayne.  As in many other of Marc’s song, there is a palpable sense of longing in this…

  • Saving the Best for Last (30 Days of Marc Cohn — Day 8)

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    “Saving the Best for Last” Marc Cohn I missed a day, so this will be quick.  The second song in my list from the incomparable debut album.  I like this song because it is so unconventional.  Not a bit about love, unless you count the line, “When I finally take this journey, I’m going to…

  • The Better Nation We’ve Become

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    In his post today (“Seneca, Selma, and Stonewall“), Paul Krugman links to a graph showing growing acceptance, over time, of interracial marriage in the United States: I like this for the chart that indicates that 86% of the country agrees that it was OK that I married my wife. That trendline — and all the…

  • De-tuned

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    I wrote this nearly five years ago.  I was mad then; now I’m more or less just resigned.  The intellectual commons is being fenced off, now more than ever.  I think we’re losing more than outlets for creativity or profit; we’re losing the shared language to remember who we were, who we are. ============== De-Tuned…