DIG THIS WITH BILL MESNIK AND RICH BUCKLAND- THE SPLENDID BOHEMIANS
My Fellow Americans, Life is actually just a microscopic, deluded moment in time, so let's cut to the freakin' chase. One look at our impending election debacle can solidify my case. It has been my contention since birth, that the answer to every difficulty we encounter on this sacred yet demented Stone, can be revealed with ultimate clarity through the ultra neurotic engagements of Music, Art, Literature, Film, Poetry and a good Pastrami sandwich. Why would any sane human spend so must time on a film set (Do you know how long you gotta wait until your 8 second deliverance of an edited beyond repair line gets a chance to become a professional embarrassment etched in time forever? ) or expend so much energy in a recording studio, piecing together another ode to a man or woman who could not care less how much love existed within your digestive tract? It's all about hymns and prayers and a quest for mercy and forgiveness and silence and faith. We were blessed with Charles Bukowski, Gene Chandler, Lenny Bruce, Mitch Ryder and a legion of creative explorers whose influences provided the air we breathe. So Let's Dance! This site shall explore the reaper, find a way to disarm the stench of injustice, discover some true loves and talk it all over before it's all over. So what's the worst that our desires could produce? Failure? So sue me. I'm going to require your assistance in making as much trouble for the grown-ups as possible. Let the record show that my childish heart yearns to disrupt the madness. Join me Ladies and Germs!
With Gratitude For Gena Rowlands, Nancy Sinatra, Jerry Quarry, Leo Gorcey, Arthur Alexander and Joey Heatherton, Your Splendid Bohemian, Rich Buckland.
DIG THIS WITH BILL MESNIK AND RICH BUCKLAND- THE SPLENDID BOHEMIANS
THE SPLENDID BOHEMIANS PRESENT "DOUBLE TROUBLE" - GIVING LOVE ONE MORE CHANCE - WITH TRACY CHAPMAN AND SIPPIE WALLACE. DOUBLE DOWN!
Today we feature two black female vocalists, born 66 years apart, both renown for their independent spirit, singing songs about trying to make love work - despite clear signs to the contrary.
As artists, they’ve both shunned the spotlight, maintaining the mystery of their magic:
Sippie Wallace quit show business for 30 years, preferring to express herself through her church organ, and LGBTQ icon Tracy Chapman staunchly separates her private life from her public one.
Sippie returned to the spotlight by way of the blues festivals of the 60s, and was celebrated and covered by Bonnie Raitt, among others, and although Tracy appears regularly to perform for political causes she champions, only recently did she resurface in a big way in the mind the general public, by way of an emotional re-appearance at the 2023 Grammy’s to perform her song “Fast Car” in a duet with Luke Combs, who made it a Country hit almost 40 years after its original release.
SIPPIE WALLACE
On this 1926 Okeh recording of “Special Delivery Blues”, we first hear the whistle of the approaching mail train, then the crescendoing piano rolls building up suspense musically. This wave of energy is capped by the immortal cornet of Louis Armstrong and the yearning phrases of Sippie Wallace begging for news of her man’s return. She wishes and hopes that the guy who left her will come back soon, but it doesn’t look good. Despite this, Sippie makes it clear she’ll keep up the vigil as long as it takes.
“The Texas Nightingale” built up her reputation playing tent shows, and releasing a spate of recordings that put her up there with Ma Rainy and Bessie Smith, but she decided to chuck it all and dedicate her musical talents to the Church, where she played organ for 30 plus years. During the folk/blues revival of the mid-1960s, she was rediscovered and enjoyed immense appreciation for another 20 years, until her death at age 88.
TRACY CHAPMAN
I love GIVE ME ONE REASON because it’s so simple and direct. Tracy is drawing a line: “I’m telling you that I love you, but you have to reciprocate, or I’m gone”. It’s clearly stated without equivocation, but as the verses add up, you can just picture her, standing in the doorframe, giving her object of desire just one more chance, then another, then another…. Drawing one line, then moving it back a bit. She doesn’t want to go, but it looks like she’s going to have to.
Tracy Chapman catapulted out of the Boston coffeehouse scene in 1986, 25 years after Joan Baez had accomplished the same feat, and her first single, “Fast Car,” a song which alluded to economic inequality, was ubiquitous - a definite anomaly during the MTV era, which shows that the public can respond to bare-boned honesty, (without bells and whistles), when they hear it. And, she has maintained her integrity as a socially conscious artist throughout the intervening decades.
