The Alternate “Dead Flowers”

Dead Flowers Alternate In promoting the upcoming reissue of the classic 1971 album Sticky Fingers, The Rolling Stones have been releasing some alternate versions of some of the songs off the album. One of my favorite Rolling Stones songs has always been “Dead Flowers,” so I was excited to hear how the Stones had played with the sound before releasing the album.

The alternate version of “Dead Flowers” is below. Slate writes that this alternate take is “bluesier” than the country-tinged original, with Mick Jagger giving a “looser” delivery and Ian Stewart’s piano muted compared to the original. Check out this alternate take and see what you think..

.The reissue of Sticky Fingers comes out June 9. The Sticky Fingers 2-CD release will include a CD with alternate and live versions of songs from the album.

Which version of “Dead Flowers” do you like best? Leave your two cents in the comments.

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    “Nebraska” and the Death Penalty

    Nebraska Death Penalty The Nebraska unicameral legislature in 2015 voted to abolish the death penalty, following a number of states that have come to realize that capital punishment is ineffective and a waste of resources. Although Governor Pete Ricketts vetoed the action, the legislature overrode his veto, making Nebraska the eighteenth state (in addition to the District of Columbia) that does not sentence human beings to death. According to a recent book on the history of the death penalty, states that have stopped sentencing people to death in recent years also include Connecticut, Illinois, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, and Maryland.

    One of the great songs about the death penalty is Bruce Springsteen’s “Nebraska,” which Springsteen based on Terrence Malick’s movie Badlands.  And that movie was loosely based on the real-life case involving Charles Starkweather and Caril Ann Fugate.

    The song, in the voice of the condemned, offers no straightforward judgement on the death penalty.  Springsteen would address the topic again years later in his song “Dead Man Walking.”

    But by taking the voice of the condemned man in “Nebraska,” Springsteen challenges the listener to find some humanity in the narrator. By the time the singer/condemned tries to explain why he did the horrific things he did, all he can come up with is “I guess there is just a meanness in this world.” Taken on its face, one might find little sympathy for the killer. But the way Springsteen sings the words, you believe that the condemned is not a personification of evil.  Instead, he comes across as someone unable to understand the world because he has been on the other end of that meanness his whole life too.

    Thus, it is not surprising that in the real world, Bruce Springsteen is opposed to capital punishment. Below, following an introduction about how the album Nebraska focuses on the downtrodden, Springsteen performs the song “Nebraska” on a 12-string guitar with harmonica from a benefit show in Los Angeles in November 1990.

    The real Starkweather grew up with a birth defect and a speech impediment, and he was a slow learner. Nebraska executed Charles Starkweather in the electric chair, just like in Springsteen’s song.  Starkweather died on June 25, 1959 at the age of 20.

    The young teenaged girl who went with him on the murder spree did not die in his lap.  She was eventually paroled in 1976 and lives in Michigan, which is the first state in the United States to abolish capital punishment.

    Check out our posts on other songs about capital punishment.

    Leave your two cents in the comments.

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    Jim Thorpe, Great American Athlete

    Thorpe James Francis “Jim” Thorpe was born around May 28, 1887 near the town of Prague, Oklahoma. Because there was no birth certificate, different sources list different birth dates.  One official website lists the May 28, 1887 date while Wikipedia lists the birth date as May 22, 1887. The Bio website lists the birth date as a year later on May 28, 1988. Either way, the Native American would grow up to be regarded as one of the great — if not the greatest — American athlete of all time.

    Thorpe’s athletic career included two All-American honors while playing college football (1911 and 1912). He won the pentathlon and the decathlon at the 1912 Summer Olympics. He later played professional baseball and football, even doing a stint on a basketball team.

    Despite his great talents, he faced great difficulties in his life, including ongoing racism, a controversy about his Olympic medals, alcoholism, and struggles to make a living wage. Even after his death in 1953, his body has not been able to rest in peace, as battles continued about his remains, which were bought by a Pennsylvania town named after the athlete as a tourist attraction.

    But Thorpe left a lasting legacy, continuing to receive honors after his death.  For example, in 1963, he was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

    Below is a short video about Thorpe’s career. Below is Part 1.

    Here is Part 2 of the documentary from ESPN.

    Regarding longer feature films, Jim Thorpe had a cameo in Knute Rockne, All American (1940), and Burt Lancaster played Thorpe in Jim Thorpe – All-American (1951).

    Leave your two cents in the comments.

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    • Jason Segel as David Foster Wallace in ‘The End of the Tour’

    Segel as David Foster Wallace
    In a new trailer for “The End of the Tour,” actor Jason Segel portrays the brilliant writer David Foster Wallace. The film follows Rolling Stone reporter David Lipsky (Jesse Eisenberg) traveling with Wallace for an interview not long after the publicatoin of Wallace’s 1996 novel Infinite Jest. James Ponsoldt directed the movie, which is based on a memoir by Lipsky called Although Of Course You End Up Becoming Yourself: A Road Trip with David Foster Wallace.

    The trailer indicates Segel pulls off the serious role as the late Wallace very well and makes this one of the movies I am looking forward to seeing.

    The End of the Tour will hit theaters in a limited release on July 31.

    What do you think of the “The End of the Tour” trailer? Leave your two cents in the comments.

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    Willie and Merle Are “Missing Ol’ Johnny Cash”

    Willie and Merle

    Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard have teamed up to release the new album Django And Jimmie (2015). The two men, who created country gold with the similarly named 1983 album Pancho & Lefty, feature a range of styles on their new album, incorporating some humor along the way with songs like “It’s All Going to Pot” and “Missing Ol’ Johnny Cash.”

    Check out this video about the making of “Missing Ol’ Johnny Cash,” a song that also features help from Bobby Bare.

    Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard’s Django and Jimmie hits stores on June 2, and for a short time you can give it a streaming listen on NPR First Listen. The title song from the album celebrates guitarist Django Reinhardt and country music legend Jimmie Rodgers.

    Leave your two cents in the comments.

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