Randomly Blogged: Ben Keith, Bert Jansch, Crowded House, Jim Jarmusch, Greendale

Ben Keith

From What Makes a Legend: Ben Keith | Crawdaddy! by Denise Sullivan:

It’s hard to imagine “Out on the Weekend”, “Are You Ready for the Country”, “Heart of Gold”, “Alabama”, “Words (Between the Lines of Age)”, and the album’s title song without Keith’s graceful guitar echoing Young’s own crying tones. Keith left a giant footprint not only on Harvest but on Tonight’s the Night, Comes a Time, On the Beach, and Young’s mid-life masterpiece Harvest Moon as well. In later years he was involved in literally all of Young’s recording and touring projects, from Silver & Gold to Chrome Dreams II.

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'Old Man' with Liam Finn & Lawrence Arabia @ Ruth Eckerd Hall from Crowded House on Vimeo.

Crowded House and Liam Finn cover Neil Young’s ‘Old Man’ (In Tribute to Ben Keith) in Clearwater, Fla., 7/28/10

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Bert Jansch
Photograph: Sarah Lee for the Guardian

From Bert Jansch's cancer comeback | Music | The Guardian by Will Hodgkinson:

"Neil and I had dinner," says Jansch. "He told me I should be playing to a lot more people. Half of me was saying no to that, because it was terrifying to go from my normal gigs of 400 people in a concert hall to auditoriums of 4,000, but actually it was a godsend. From the end of last year to the beginning of this one, it was nothing but hospitals. I got the call from Neil's manager just after the chemotherapy and it gave me something positive to focus on."

Young has been a fan ever since he heard Bert Jansch, as his 1965 debut LP was called. "That first record is epic," says Young, of the album that was recorded for £100 in a kitchen. "I was especially taken with Needle of Death, such a beautiful and angry song."

Jansch isn't famous in America. How did fans react to him co-headlining with Young? "The people who knew Bert were overjoyed to see him play with such passion," says Elliot Roberts, Young's manager. "And young people who hadn't heard him before all said the same thing: 'This is the real shit.'"

More on Bert Jansch and Neil Young.

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Jim Jarmusch on working with Neil Young

More on Jim Jarmusch and Neil Young.

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-- From t r u t h o u t | Vampire Blues: Suckin' Blood From the Earth by Chris Genovali:

When Neil Young recorded the anti-Big Oil "Vampire Blues" for his brilliant album On the Beach in the mid-1970s, who could have known that the song would end up even more relevant a quarter century later? Speculation abounds on fan sites that Neil, who is currently on tour, believes the time is right to perform "Vampire Blues" once again, particularly given the ongoing disaster in the Gulf of Mexico.

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-- From Comic Riffs - The 'Riffs Interview: Comic artist CLIFF CHIANG offers an insider's tour of Neil Young's 'Greendale':

CLIFF CHIANG: First, it's hard to take a very heartfelt story about coming of age and [about] finding your voice and finding the strength to have confidence in your beliefs. It's also a trickier thing with the politics. With Neil's politics, you can't dillute them. But we didn't want the story to focus so much on that that it would be strident and brash. We wanted to keep the appeal broad enough. ... If some [readers] didn't share the political views, we wanted them to appreciate the real humanity of the characters. And the message: No matter what you believe, you can't remain quiet.

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-- Greendale News of the Moment:

From Arctic sea ice volume heads toward record low as Northwest Passage melts free fourth year in a row « Climate Progress:

The Northwest and Northeast Passages are open
The Northwest Passage–the legendary shipping route through ice-choked Canadian waters at the top of the world–melted free of ice last week, and is now open for navigation, according to satellite mosaics available from the National Snow and Ice Data Center and The University of Illinois Cryosphere Today. This summer marks the fourth consecutive year–and fourth time in recorded history–that the fabled passage has opened for navigation. Over the past four days, warm temperatures and southerly winds over Siberia have also led to intermittent opening of the Northeast Passage, the shipping route along the north coast of Russia through the Arctic Ocean. It is now possible to completely circumnavigate the Arctic Ocean in ice-free waters, and this will probably be the case for at least a month. This year marks the third consecutive year–and the third time in recorded history–that both the Northwest Passage and Northeast Passage have melted free, according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center. The Northeast Passage opened for the first time in recorded history in 2005, and the Northwest Passage in 2007. It now appears that the opening of one or both of these northern passages is the new norm, and business interests are taking note–commercial shipping in the Arctic is on the increase, and there is increasing interest in oil drilling. The great polar explorers of past centuries would be astounded at how the Arctic has changed in the 21st century.

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