3 Chords & the Truth: Take out the trash

This election is tight. That's the problem.

Donald Trump is a demonstrated "fascist to the core." His rhetoric sounds exactly like Adolf Hitler's. About half of Americans tell pollsters they'll vote for the fascist. For the Hitler impersonator. That's the problem.

Does -- can -- the program, 3 Chords & the Truth, go forward in a fascist country? I don't think so. There will be other priorities, namely, either fight or flight. Trying to ignore evil -- killing one's conscience with the excuse "I'm not political" is not an option that allows you to look in the mirror every morning.

So, we have come to what just might be the Big Show's not-very-long goodbye. Going on as normal -- even by the loose definition of normal we've had this past decade -- will be impossible, as least for me. Your mileage may vary, but be warned that the risks to your soul in the face of a Trumpian "normal" are unacceptable.

I SPENT much of my young life in Louisiana observing and living a version of that reality during Jim Crow and in the wake of Jim Crow. The America of Trump 2.0 would be even worse, and it would have the weight of the entire federal government and military behind it.

And that is our choice. It's either "a new way forward" under Kamala Harris . . . or the abyss.

That it's entirely possible Americans will choose the abyss points to the real problem, of which Donald Trump's rise is merely a symptom. The last decade has pointed out the terrifying likelihood that the United States' real problem is more akin to societal -- civilizational -- collapse.

Every institution is amid a full collapse, and the void has been filled with distrust -- which is not irrational by any means -- alienation and boiling anger. And demagogic psychotics like Trump know exactly how to exploit what ails us.

Feed your demons, feed Trump. Feed Trump, feed our demons.

The end result is the grave. It would not be a peaceful death.

Boy, this doesn't sound like a pitch for this week's edition of a show that's supposed to entertain. No, it doesn't. On the other hand, 3 Chords & the Truth never has been just about entertaining you. It's also been about something bigger. It's been about trying to make you think, too.

Well, we stand at the corner of THINK and DON'T THINK -- or at least, if you do think, don't let anybody know what you're thinking.

I can't live that way. The Founding Fathers didn't think anyone could live that way. You shouldn't accept living that way.

And if you think electing the fascist won't crush your freedom and come after your very soul, you're a damn fool.

Don't be a damn fool. Do listen to the Big Show; it's as good as ever this week.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all -- for now. Be there. Aloha.

3 Chords & the Truth: A beastly affair

Here's a truth bomb for you: I've kinda been dreading this show, No. 666.

Six hundred sixty-six. 666. Mark of the Beast. That's some seriously bad juju.

When you enter this neighborhood, you don't know what will happen. You do know it will not be good.

While the music on this portentous edition of 3 Chords & the Truth is just as exceptional as ever, it did not take long for the god of hellfire to show his sulfurous self. That's bad.

AS IT TURNS OUT, 6-6-6 is not the only way to spell "mark of the beast." God preserve us.

Listen and learn, my friends. Listen and learn. Do not let this happen to you, especially on Nov. 5.

Like I was telling you, the music this week on the Big Show is great -- really, really great. But I must tell you that you're going to have to endure some things to get there. I would suggest you arm yourself with some garlic, some holy water, a crucifix . . . and perhaps a Kamala Harris yard sign.

Yeah, it's going to be a bumpy ride.

Thou hast been warned. Hold thy soul, and thy family, close to thy heart. The Enemy lurketh, seeking the destruction of souls . . . and nations.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

3 Chords & the Truth: Xanax, take me away!

If you can't laugh, you'll end up sticking your head in the oven.

Yeah, I watched the presidential debate pitting a bad debater who's lost a step . . . and a pathological liar who aspires to be Short-Bus Hitler. Couple that with a thoroughly broken journalistic infrastructure (I'm looking at you, CNN), and if cannabis were legal in this state, I'd be snarfing pot gummies like Raisinettes in a freakin' movie theater.

Thus, the importance of good music on 3 Chords & the Truth . . . and the ability to laugh at this s***.

I'm hoping I achieved the good-music and humor goals on this week's edition of the Big Show. I am betting heavily that you are, too.

Well, I guess you'll just have to see, now, won't you?

This has to work. I have an electric oven. Ouch.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

3 Chords & the Truth: Baby, it's you

Here's to you.

After all, without you, we at 3 Chords & the Truth are talking to ourselves and playing records for the wind.

So, musically, that's where we're starting on the show this week. But that's not where we're going to end. There is lots to love -- as usual -- about yet another episode of the Big Show. I mean, we're talking some seriously good music, intelligently presented.

Thank a seriously massive music library.

And that's about all I have to say about that. If you know, you know. If you don't -- yet -- this is as good a time as any to find out. You can thank me later.

With that said. . . .

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

3 Chords & the Truth: What just happened?

What just happened here?

Well, as this episode of 3 Chords & the Truth came together and headed to the Internet tubes, a former president of the United States was convicted on 34 felony counts in New York. That's a first in two and a half centuries.

Momentous stuff, to say the least.

And, unsurprisingly, convicted felon Donald Trump and Republican politicians from soup to nuts -- emphasis on the nuts -- are waging a brutal rhetorical war on the American justice system. Throw some dude in the 'hood under the jail, our criminal courts are great. Convict a psychologically damaged, orange authoritarian? THE TRIAL WAS RIGGED! DEMOCRATS ARE WAGING WAR AGAINST THE PEOPLE!

EVEN THOUGH our system held here, even though we saw that no man is above the law -- in New York state, at least -- the United States remains in a world of hurt. American patriots (the real ones, not the performative ones) continue to fight for our democratic lives.

Interesting week to come out with another Big Show.

And the existential question remains: Which side are you on, boys? Which side are you on?

Here, we're on the side of America -- the noble idea of America. America is an idea, you know. It's a creed, an aspiration. We haven't fully lived up to the tenets of that creed yet, but the defining characteristic of Americanism is that we keep trying to.

Our national bond, now so horribly frayed, is in the trying . . . trying to live up to the words of the Declaration of Independence. Trying to remain faithful to our constitution.

This is a music program, however. We're also on the side of great music, and we're pretty firmly rooted in that respect. I'd recommend, after the day -- after the decade -- we've had that you kick back and chill with the musical greatness of the Big Show.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

3 Chords & the Truth: Here comes the music

Sooner or later, the Big Show's gonna get ya.

Sooner or later, friend, you got to give in.

Sooner or later, the tunes are gonna let 'cha.

Sooner or later, the music's gonna win. Music's gonna win.

IT'S JUST a matter of time before you make up your mind.

To give all those grooves that you've been hiding.

Its just a question of when, I've told you time and again. You'll get all the tunes you've been denying.

Sooner or later, 3C&T is gonna get ya.

Sooner or later, friend, you got to give in.

Sooner or later, the tunes are gonna let 'cha.

Sooner or later, the music's gonna win. Music's gonna win!

So . . . here comes the Big Show. You betcha.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

3 Chords & the Truth: Nekkid truth

I sit here at the keyboard, naked before you, telling and playing the truth.

Well, not naked naked but figuratively naked. And certainly not nekkid. As any Southerner will tell you, there's a difference between naked and nekkid. Naked is clothesless. Nekkid is naked while up to something. There's a 3 Chords & the Truth naked truth for you.

I'll tell you the naked truth of why Linda Martell's debut country album was her last album. It is not an easy path for Black women in Nashville today. It was exponentially harder in 1970 and, indeed, it didn't work out -- for obvious reasons five years past the technical end of Jim Crow.

Back then, the miraculous apparently was all used up on the great Charley Pride's stardom.

HERE'S ANOTHER naked truth for this edition of the Big Show: Great music encompasses all genres, and they all can coexist on a single program. You know. like this one. And yet another one: Too many people are too parochial to embrace that fact.

Having grown up before the culture splintered into microcultures, it was pretty easy for an old guy like me to realize that at a relatively early age. It got even easier when I aged out of any concern for being "cool."

And the nakedest truth for me right now is that, in writing this, I'm just all over the place. Like, are people going to think I'm an idiot when I say The Who's "Naked Eye" is on Who's Next? Well, if you have a later CD re-release, it is.

Another version is on Odds and Sods (1974). The naked truth is that digital re-releases of classic albums make one's musical-geek life confusing. Bonus tracks good; bonus tracks kinda bad if you nerd out on who released what when.

Like I said, all over the place, I am. No, I am not Yoda. I just write like him.

Perhaps I'd better stop now. That's the naked truth, but not the nekkid truth. Nekkid truth, you would not want to see.

And there goes the thread, which I have lost.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

3 Chords & the Truth: Feebling stubbfy

Ogbayb, dis willb be shorbt anb sweeb. I hab a code in my nobe and keeb coughinb.

I dib a showb, anb I managbed to keeb thinbs togebber longb enough to doob dis edibsion ob da Bibg Showb. Anb ib turbed oubt prebby goob despibe eberythinb.

And I dib nob cough onb anythinb, so I don'b thinb you bill catchb anybing fromb libbening to dis 3 Chorbs & da Trub.

Ib reallyb ib prebby goob dis weebk. Lobs ob goob mubic.

Ib's 3 Chorbs & da Trub, y'all. Be dere. Alobha.

3 Chords & the Truth: Placement is everything

Placement is everything.

Placing the right players in the right positions on the right team? It's everything.

Hiring the right coaches? Everything.

Placing the right people in Congress, while placing the wrong people far, far away? As we have seen the past few years . . . everything.

Placing the right man in the White House? Everything.

Placing the man with 91 criminal counts pending before a jury -- and definitely not placing him in the presidency again? Everything.

Here at 3 Chords & the Truth, it's an undisputed canon of life that placement is everything. And that covers everything, including the music you hear. If the wrong song is in the wrong place, it will not be pleasant for anybody.

If a totally unexpected song is in just the right place, it can be magical. On this episode of the Big Show -- every episode, actually -- we go for the magic. Thank your lucky stars for good placement.

You see, as I've said previously, placement is everything.

Now, if you would be so kind as to place yourself in a comfy chair and place your favorite high-fidelity audio device on "loud," we can commence with some musical magic.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

3 Chords & the Truth: Truth or lies?

The good book tells us that the truth will set us free. If that is so -- and I believe it is -- America today might as well be a gulag.

And there will be no great escape. Welcome to 2024, the year we've been dreading.

Hell of a thought to sell another episode of 3 Chords & the Truth with, but it is what it is, and we are where we are this election year in America. The choice this election year in these Disunited States of America isn't just between a representative, constitutional democracy and a crazy man's authoritarian dystopia, it's also as simple as a choice between truth and lies.

Reality and delusion.

A MORE perfect union and "Screw it. Let's find some scapegoats to persecute, so that we might feel holy."

That, frankly, is what on my mind as we dive into the year we've all been dreading, and dive into it with music -- as is our want.

Fortunately, unlike the political news, the music on the Big Show is quite good. And it goes down a lot easier.

And that's the state of things today, as seen from the culture-war bunker here in Omaha, by God, Nebraska. Now you know why I have a bunker.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

3 Chords & the Truth: Sundown serenade

In my mind's eye, I've always seen 3 Chords & the Truth as something best listened to in the dead of night, in a room dimly lit by the dial of an old radio.

Just as good, I think, would be listening to the Big Show with your smartphone (or whatever) playing through a classic piece of audio gear, the room lit just by the glowing face of a 1960s or '70s stereo receiver. I am a hi-fi nerd, so I'm funny that way.

Still, I think that concept resonates with Baby Boomers like myself, who spent many a night listening to the radio in our rooms -- or attached to the earphone of a transistor radio hidden under the covers -- instead of sleeping like our parents demanded.

Who needs dream time when you have far-away voices and all your favorite music drifting through the sky and into your head?

THAT'S THE VISION in my aging mind's eye, the vision I've always had for 3 Chords & the Truth. Your mileage may vary. After all, it's your head, your room and your particular Internet appliance.

That said, we're winding our way toward Christmas here in the culture-war bunker in Omaha, by God, Nebraska, and the music just keeps on a-comin'. And, boy, is it good. If you happen to be celebrating Hanukkah instead, it's just as good as a plate of warm latkes.

I do love me some latkes, so that should tell you something about this week's program. The show, in my humble opinion, is even as good as a nice brisket.

Perhaps I was born the wrong religion, come to think of it.

Let's just say this week's musical selections are nice -- holiday nice.

So let's get on with the show, shall we?

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

3 Chords & the Truth: Love and hate

It's a thin line between love and hate.

Or is it a chasm?

Perhaps it depends on the context. In America today -- or is it Amerika? -- there's a chasm. And hate is all around. Fascism is on the rise.

This week on 3 Chords & the Truth, we take a musical look. The subject matter is harsh, but the music goes down easy.

I'm biased, but I recommend you give this edition of the Big Show a listen. The devil you try to ignore will kill you even faster than the one you acknowledge.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

3 Chords & the Truth: The music, the aether and you

There's music in the air.

It's the Big Show, drifting across the aether, in the night, into your device and into your soul -- a refuge in dark and stormy times. That is kind of the niche we occupy these days.

If nothing else, the program -- if everything goes to plan and we hit the sweet spot -- can be a reminder that we can be so much better than the times we unfortunately inhabit. America has had moments when we were better than this, and we can be better than this once again.

3 Chords & the Truth music certainly points to that. Once, when we grimaced because a song hit No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100, it was because it was just dumb. Now, and we're looking at you Jason Aldean, it's because the hottest song in the land reminds one of the heat coming from a flaming cross.

IT'S BECAUSE one suspects the song would at least sound better in the original German.

The Big Show doesn't play that game. We expect you're better than that. If you're not, I'm pretty sure you are not listening to this particular podcast coming from a Midwestern enclave somewhere behind America's own Iron Curtain . . . the Ironic Curtain.

What the show is . . . is diverse. That's not a popular thing in many quarters in a country teetering on the edge of fascism. What 3 Chords & the Truth is . . . is eclectic. The expectation here is that, like two things being able to be true simultaneously, you are able to appreciate -- and love -- several genres of music at the same time.

And in the same show. We're funny that way.

If you love music, period, and if your mind is capable of expansion, this is the show (and the episode of the show) for you. If not, I'm wagering you never listened to start with -- and won't in the future.

So get ready for another great episode of a great music program. It starts as soon as you click or download.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

3 Chords & the Truth: Sound advice

I favor playing music just the way it was supposed to sound when it came out.

I also have a soft spot for the high-fidelity miracle devices of my youth, like 1950s and '60s record changers. No, a mid-1960s LP is not going to sound as good as a well-recorded and mastered CD, but it's (first) going to sound the way it did when it was made, and (second) is going to be a hell of a lot more fun.

This is the kind of thing that makes music such an enjoyable obsession, especially for geeks like me who do shows like 3 Chords & the Truth.

AND THEN comes somebody like Jason Aldean to f*** everything up. Bad bro-country music (as if there were a good kind) with a deeply stupid, deeply bigoted, deeply deplorable message. The boy has both kinds of music -- shitty and hateful.

The music video for "Try That in a Small Town," by the way, is even worse. It manages to feature a Tennessee courthouse noted for a lynching that took place there. We won't be linking to any of it.

On the bright side, your Mighty Favog has a solution for shitty music by hateful people. We don't play it on the Big Show. At all. The farthest we'll "go there" is to warn you of its existence.

Consider yourself warned. And here's some more sound advice that has nothing to do with sound: Don't be a peckerwood who thinks it's some sort of a virtue to parade your hatefulness and ignorance for the whole world to see.

That is all. That is enough.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

3 Chords & the Truth: Wired in

I was wired in, but then I shorted out.

Such is the life of your Mighty Favog as he continues with this enterprise we call . . . we call . . . we call . . . (looks at picture) 3 Chords & the Truth.

I know we play a whole lot of exemplary music on . . . on . . . on . . . (looks at picture) 3 Chords & the Truth this week, but I would have to look at the playlist to tell you what it is. On the bright side, I do not know why I came into this room, either.

Belle the Dog informs me that I came into this room to post this episode of the . . . the . . . the . . . (Belle whispers "Rig Row") the Big Show. Alrighty then. I shall do that.

Do what?

Oh, yeah. That.

Say goodnight, Gracie. Goodnight, Gracie.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

3 Chords & the Truth: Keeping score

I took me out to the ballgame. I took me out to the crowd.

I did not buy me some peanuts and Cracker Jack (substitute Fritos walking taco, hamburgers and a brat here) but, ultimately, I did have to come back.

To the Big Show. You knew that I would.

STILL, the College World Series here in Omaha, by God, Nebraska was maybe the greatest that's ever been -- 11 days of outstanding contests, including the best baseball game I have ever witnessed. That would be the 11-inning pitchers' duel between my alma mater, LSU, and Wake Forest . . . that ended in the bottom of the 11th with a two-run homer to give the Tigers a crucial victory on their way to the national championship.

LSU's seventh national championship in baseball.

We, of course, will pay tribute to that in this week's edition of 3 Chords & the Truth. Is this Heaven? No, but it ain't half bad.

There also will be, during the show, the usual complement of mind-blowing musical moments, with a healthy smattering of "Can he DO that?" Yes. Yes, I can. It's my program.

Well, that's about it for the preshow promotin' and explainin'. Just one more thing to add, though.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

3 Chords & the Truth: Beware the flying monkeys

New this week in the culture-war bunker, far behind America's Ironic Curtain: A flying monkey warning.

Now that Donald Trump has been indicted on federal charges of the conspiracy and Espionage Act variety, we at 3 Chords & the Truth are hunkered down here in Red America, waiting for the disgraced former president and future felon to unleash his flying monkeys upon us all. Trust me -- there's no more disturbing sight than flying monkeys in red MAGA hats.

Still, the show must go on. And go on, it will.

Given that much of what the former prez says sounded much better in the original German, the Big Show will feature some music . . . in the original German. Which sounds fine to me, being that it features none of the original Nazi.

Unlike most of what we hear here behind the Ironic Curtain, which is much like the old Iron Curtain.  Here in the former United States, though, it's incongruent with the "freedom" and "liberty" blather favored by the flying-monkey crowd.

Anyway, just because we hunker in the bunker, it doesn't mean we can't crank out program after program featuring the best music mix on the Internets. After all, the proof is in the listening. Which you should begin about now.

So, that's about it for another introductory missive for yet another show. There's only one thing left to be said.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

3 Chords & the Truth: Something stupid

Something unusual happened. The world has noticed Nebraska . . . and its politics.

 

Nebraskans long have lamented being overlooked by the world. They long have wanted a little attention. They long have wanted their props, dammit!

 

You know that old saying, "Be careful what you wish for"? Bingo.

 

This week's installment of 3 Chords & the Truth notes that we finally got some attention from the folks in the Big Apple -- a long examination of this year's dominant legislative shenanigans by New York magazine. It wasn't pretty.

 

And Omaha Sen. Christy Armendariz didn't come off so well.

 

One day, a freshman senator named Christy Armendariz led me to a bench in an empty hallway. She found it puzzling that a reporter from New York would come all the way to Nebraska to cover this affair. "I don’t watch the news or get the newspaper," she said. "Is there anything going on I should be aware of?" I mentioned that other states had passed similar bills and that a federal appeals court in the same circuit as Nebraska had ruled one of them unconstitutional. "So is it a big widespread thing?" she asked. As far as she could tell, ordinary Nebraskans did not know about the issue. "I knocked doors for a year, and nobody brought this up." She said she wished the bill had never been introduced.

 

Yet, she voted for it.
 

THE BILL was LB574 which, in its original iteration, banned all "gender-affirming" medical care and surgery for transgender minors. It ended up being amended to regulate the medical care while still banning surgeries.

 

And senators tacked a 12-week gestational-age abortion ban (about 10 weeks from conception) onto the bill after a six-week ban failed earlier.

 

You'd like to think legislators knew that all this was a big Republican Party push nationwide this year. You'd like to think that even someone as as negligent and clueless as Armendariz would've known her party was pushing all that as a grand culture-war political strategy.

 

You'd also like to think that readers nationwide might not believe all Nebraskans are that @#*$%+! dumb. Not all legislators here are, though many probably are. And, to be fair, ordinary Nebraskans elected these clods, so there's that.

 

But this is not a political column in the newspaper. This is a music show. On the other hand, the political stuff certainly informed the music show . . . and now you know that's the name of that tune on the Big Show this go around.

FRANKLY, that's why I love doing an old-school, beatnik-adjacent, freeform kind of a thing here on the Internets. One, you don't much see this kind of thing on the radio anymore. Two, when folks on the radio give you the impression they think at all, what they want to you to think they think might not be what they actually think. They just pander to what they think you think.

And those folks don't even have any good tunes. 3 Chords & the Truth, though. . . .

Anyway, perhaps the real value of the New York magazine piece is something akin to Robert Burns’ poetic wisdom:

 

O wad some Pow'r the giftie gie us

To see oursels as ithers see us!

It wad frae mony a blunder free us,

An' foolish notion:

What airs in dress an' gait wad lea'e us,

An' ev'n devotion!

 

It’s a hard pill to swallow when what “ithers” see ain’t so flattering. But at least you know, and knowing gives you the chance to evaluate, and evaluating gives you the opportunity to change.

Just as long as you don't change that Internet dial!

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

3 Chords & the Truth: Thatsa lotta shows!

It just so happens that episode No. 599 of 3 Chords & the Truth drops on my birthday.

After all those years, and shows, I certainly hope the program is fresher than I am. For I am . . . not young.

Five hundred ninety-nine editions of the Big Show. That means the next one will be . . . let me get out the calculatin' machine here . . . hang on . . . workin' the problem . . . any second now . . . just about there . . . No. 600.

Thatsa lotta shows.

But I'll worry about that next time. This week, there is good music, of course, but I'm at a loss over what else to say. Birthday, don'tcha know. Takin' a break from thinking too hard.

So, with that not said. . . .

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

3 Chords & the Truth: Tick tock

Let's do the time warp again.

This week on 3 Chords & the Truth, we turn back the clock a little more than usual. To the Old Days. But not much.

Still, the Big Show is a real sentimental journey.

So, looming over the whole thing is the clock up on the wall . . . running backward. If you have any complaints about that, please direct them to PA 6-5000. Ask for Flat Foot Floogie.

It's a floy floy, Daddio.

As usual, though, it's gonna be a real trip. A journey to unexpected places. Just don't get nervous on the road -- it's going to be all right. You might even learn something. Or not. That's entirely up to you.

Also, I am pleased to announce that everything is in full-fidelity stereo. Except when it's not.

And if all this is somewhat confusing to you, then you don't know me. But that will change as days go by if you keep listening. There's a lot on the website to help you get up to speed with all the eclectic wonderfulness of this here endeavor.

So, there's only one thing left to say here.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.