3 Chords & the Truth: Don't fence me in

This is 3 Chords & the Truth. We don't do fences here.

There's not much to keep the easy listening out of rock 'n' roll's business. Nothing separating jazz from classical. Or country from the blues, punks from mods, the secular from the sacred.

On the Big Show, it's always a free-for-all. What you know you'll get next is not knowing what you'll hear next.

It's Christmastime now, so expect some musical surprises under the tree. And clichés embedded in program descriptions.

Hey, you come up with new, pithy things to say about 3 Chords & the Truth every week, why don't ya?

I've been under the weather. I'm tired of writing now. Listen to the show, OK? Peace out.

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

3 Chords & the Truth: What, me worry?

When I was a young'un, if there was stuff in the world that damn well needed a good dose of ridicule, MAD magazine was there to do what needed to be done.

And at 60 cents -- cheap -- we angsty adolescents well could afford a crucial element of our education.

This week's edition of 3 Chords & the Truth testifies to the impact MAD has had on me half a century later. And I regret MAD is no longer on the periodical stands in drugstores and supermarkets everywhere in a country so, so ripe for a good satirical roasting.

REALLY, it's gonna be good on the Big Show this week. I'd give it a listen if I were you.

Never, ever completely let go of the 12-year-old inside you. The kid will come through exactly when you need him. Or her.

And so will MAD, even though it's disappeared from drugstores and supermarkets. Now -- where you can find it -- it overwhelmingly consists of reprinted classic material. Pity. More than ever, this country is, as they say, a target-rich environment.

The best thing I can say about this here podcast, probably, is it's produced by a child of MAD. And that's pretty damn good.

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

3 Chords & the Truth: Whatever

You’re in tune with 3 Chords & the Truth. Welcome to my stream of consciousness.

Most weeks, I have no idea where the Big Show is going when I start to pick the music. I’m just looking to mix it up and not play stuff that I’ve recently had on the program.

That’s about it.

This week. . . . This week is that on steroids. I had no effing idea.

I SCROLLED through stuff, and I picked something that caught my fancy. Then I picked something else that sounded good to me. Then something that I figured would go with what came before.

The stream of whatever got to be something else.

Again, welcome of stream-of-conscience programming on 3 Chords & the Truth. It is what it is, and you get what you get.

And I’m hoping it doesn’t suck. Maybe I’m the best judge of that; then again, maybe not.

Note the slick use of the semicolon there.

And that pulled pork in the Whole Foods dinner really was almost pureéd. Not bad tasting, just baby foodish. The collard greens and macaroni and cheese were surprisingly good for store food.

OK, the stream-of-conscious thing is getting out of hand here.

I think it’s time for me to stand down now. Just listen to the show and let me know. Wait, is the LED lightbulb in the studio fixin’ to go out? Blink, blink. blink. I hate that.

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

3 Chords & the Truth: Don't be a monster

We're going to go places -- musical places -- during this edition of the Big Show. Not that that's surprising by now.

I am hopeful it will take us far, far away from the ugliness, strife and hatred enveloping everyday life in these Disunited States of America.

At a time when the worst of us is on full display, as it has been for a while now and keeps getting worse, it's all the more important to keep sight of the best of us. It's important to hear the best of us.

THAT'S what 3 Chords & the Truth is all about.

Yesterday, someone told me he could have sworn I was a Jew. It wasn't a compliment. Amid my visceral sickness at the exchange, I nevertheless took it as a backhanded one.

The past three weeks or so, we've been getting a master class in how the "friends of the oppressed" left can be just as awful as the MAGA right. And when you can't bring yourself to condemn terrorism, regardless of the perpetrator, you are demonstrably awful.

You are not the best this country or world has to offer, and that's a profound understatement.

Things here are ugly, and people ain't playin' anymore. I can't single-handedly stop that; I can remind people of the beauty surrounding us instead. Without that, we become inhuman.

Without that, we become monsters.

Don't be a monster. Do listen to the Big Show.

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

3 Chords & the Truth: It's not nothin'

World affairs have not improved in the last week. There was another spasm of mass murder via assault rifle in the United States. And MAGA Ned Flanders is the new speaker of the House.

It's still time to be desperately worried about . . . well, everything.

Good thing there's 3 Chords & the Truth to elevate the mood around here. Fine pieces of music, expertly crafted into an eclectic, yet coherent, whole can do that for you even in the darkest of times.

That's not nothin'. And that's the Big Show -- though I'm not sure "not nothin'" is the best slogan one could craft.

It's a good thing I'm not relying on myself to be the advertising guy. Oh, wait. . . .

Well, shit.

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

3 Chords & the Truth: That's freeform for ya

I have a new minimum standard for the Big Show.

All I need to do is not f*** this thing up as badly as House Republicans f*** up everything. That should be easy enough.

And what am I not f***ing up? Basically, playing what the hell I want. All I have to do is make sure that makes some sort of sense.

Again . . . way ahead of the House GOP.

Freeform in the 21st century. That's exactly what 3 Chords & the Truth is, and this week's program is about as freeform as it gets. Minus the Tuvan throat singing or Bulgarian folk songs.

This time.

The Big Show. It's a little of the 1960s in the 2020s. It's a little vintage big-city, freewheeling FM radio behind red-state lines.

What it is, is 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all.  Be there. Aloha.

3 Chords & the Truth: Further out, man

It was Friday, Sept. 22. It was gray and damp in Omaha, by God, Nebraska. I was working the night watch out of the 3 Chords & the Truth culture-war bunker.

My partner's Belle the Dog, the boss is Mrs. Favog. My name is Favog. A powerful new podcast capable of producing strange and mind-expanding auditory phenomena had found its way onto the Internets. It had fallen into the hands of listeners in several places. We had to try and keep the party going, man.

We had to get further out, man. We had to get further out.

MAN, IT WAS a blast having half your head in rock and half your head in the space-age bachelor pad. But, man, you have to get further out. You have to get further out.

We could give you something on a sugar cube or in a little capsule, man. But that requires some bread, you dig? But, man, this thing cats call the Big Show, that don't cost nothin'. It don't cost nothin', man. And it'll get you further out.

Way far out, man.

MAN, it's groovy. Trippy. You'll go into orbit, man.

Forget Coca-Cola, man. 3 Chords & the Truth is the real thing. It's a happening all by itself.

Man.

And it's real, so real, so real, so real, so real, so real.

Can you dig it?

I can dig it, he can dig it, she can dig it, we can dig it, they can dig it, you can dig it. Oh, let's dig it. Can you dig it, baby?

I thought that you could.

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

3 Chords & the Truth: Walk on by?

Some of the most vexing questions in our daily lives revolve around a single vexing question.

Walk on by, or don't walk on by? That is the question.

3 Chords & the Truth cannot answer that for you, but we do have a strong suggestion in one particular case. A strong suggestion.

Another strong suggestion for you right now is not to walk on by this week's episode of the Big Show. It's another good one.

And dat's the name of dat tune.

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

3 Chords & the Truth: Just let the mystery be

We live in a country -- hell, a world -- of limited horizons.

Cynical people more accustomed to sitting in the front row of class, of sucking up to teacher and all the "right" people, make their money by foisting the mediocre off on those who sat in the back of class, more interested in spitballs than scholarship.

That assessment may strike you as cynical as all get out. You may be right. But I would argue there's more truth in it than any of us are comfortable with.

IF YOU DON'T believe me, turn on the radio. Hell, follow country music today.

Six words: "Try That in a Small Town."

3 Chords & the Truth ain't about that. Thus, our putting out a little Big Show from the cramped confines of a culture-war bunker, somewhere behind America's Ironic Curtain somewhere in Flyover Country.

But did you ever consider that the leavening in what's left of our culture just might be the work of the unknown and unheralded -- the presence of extraordinary anonymity in our midst? That's a big part of the program this week.

Extraordinary talent doesn't always, or even usually, lead to fame and fortune in our society. When you zoom out for a wide-angle look at things, extraordinary talent probably more often leads to a lifetime of being overlooked. Remaining relatively unknown . . . or completely unknown.

Consider the Unknown Dorm Singer, circa 1967. At the University of California, Santa Cruz during the fall following the Summer of Love, we had a guitar-toting hippie hitchhiker in need of a place to crash, a freshman-dormitory room, a young man with a decent tape recorder . . . and magic.

TO THIS DAY, no one can figure out who was that girl. So, for now, we have no choice but to let the mystery be.

But that doesn't mean we can't enjoy the music -- the magic -- 56 years hence. On 3 Chords & the Truth, we will.

Today, that isn't something likely to be tried in a small town. So they say.

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

3 Chords & the Truth: Fly, pigeon, fly

I shall share with you a scene from the week's hiatus of the Big Show. It starts with a stroll through City Hall Plaza in Chicago, a resumption -- after a 41-year delay -- of my Great Blues Brothers Tour.

 

Picture a walk-by of the site of Jake and Elwood’s last stand — along with its iconic Picasso sculpture.

 

A healthy (or perhaps, medically speaking, not) gathering of Big City Pigeons attracted my attention for a bit before I turned back to the Picasso. After a while, I was distracted by the sound of what only could be described as a pigeonado. This is similar to a sharknado, only oddly more impressive.

 

I entertained the possibility that this phenomenon might be even more impressive than what greets you weekly on 3 Chords & the Truth.

 

Likewise, I entertained the alternate possibility that this might be Armageddon, defying centuries of end-times Cassandras by starting in the Windy City. In fact, after witnessing this Avian Apocalypse, I considered this might be where Chicago got its nickname.

 

I will not pussyfoot around. There was a whole lot of flappin’ goin’ on.

 

IN THE CENTER of the maelstrom was not a cosmic cage match between the Son of God and the Prince of Darkness, but instead a little Asian lady tossing the last of a sack of rice into the whirlwind. Then, as suddenly as she appeared, she faded into the mists of time.

 

OK, that was hyperbole. 

 

Instead, she crossed the busy street and vanished into the evening hubbub.

 

Mrs. Favog and I struck up a conversation with a nonplussed bystander who explained what we had seen was, alas, not Beelzebub but instead the "Crazy Asian Pigeon Lady," a figure as determined as she is reviled by Chicagoans sick and tired of scraping pigeon crap off of sidewalks, downtown structures . . . and themselves.

 

ANGRY CITIZENS, exasperated property mangers and pissed-off members of Chicago’s Finest apparently are helpless against a determined woman and a bag of rice.

 

It's kind of similar to how radio and musical convention are helpless against the mind-blowing experience of this humble . . . ish . . . podcast, the Big Show.

 

Anyway, the fellow we talked to said the pigeon lady comes to feed the city’s flying rats every evening at 6 sharp. Also, pigeons can tell time. He noted, though, that she was a few minutes late that evening.

 

I blame climate change.

 

There is no word on whether the city of big shoulders will get serious about ending this crap — literally — once and for all with full deployment of the Chicago PD SWAT team, the Illinois National Guard, a sizable contingent of state police . . . and the fully strapped ghost of Carrie Fisher. (I told you this was a Blues Brothers tour.)

 

There also was no official confirmation that the dude who was way too happy to be considered of sound mind (or permanent address) as he danced amid — and perpetuated — the pigeonado, is, in fact, Da Screwtape.

 

Film at 11 on WBBM-TV, fortuitously positioned right across North Dearborn Street from the coming manifestation of the End of Days.

 

As you may be able to tell, Chicago is one of my favorite cities ever.

 

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

 

3 Chords & the Truth: Uh . . . well . . . um. . . .

You know the old saying, "When you have nothing in particular to say, just shut up and play the music"?

You don't?

Well, you do now. See, there's a reason you listen to 3 Chords & the Truth.

Maybe it's because I'm preoccupied with taking a week off next week. Mrs. Favog and myself are celebrating our 40th anniversary (Yes. I am old. She, however, has not aged a day.), and we plan to revel in goofing off and doing fun stuff. For a whole week.

Listen, would you want to be stuck with me non-stop for four decades? The woman has earned at least a week of goofing off and doing fun stuff. At least.

So, I'm talking about pretty much nothing, and I'm letting the music do all the heavy lifting. (As if that weren't the case already.)

It's gonna be great.

Naturally, the lack of things to say extends to describing the episode of the Big Show where I have nothing much of importance to say. So . . . so . . . so . . . so. . . .

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

3 Chords & the Truth: The knowing

You have to admit there's one thing about American life that's easier today. It's easier to be a depressive.

That, I think, is a sane reaction to . . . American life today. And all you have to do to get there is pay attention.

But that's not healthy, you might say. You likely are correct. But tell me this: How healthy is it to check out from the world around you, to no longer pay attention, to live in a world faux-sanitized for your peace of mind?

Does balance exist? Where might it be?

These are the questions confronting every episode of 3 Chords & the Truth. And to tell you the truth, they're not easy questions, and it's not easy to do a music program that aims neither to ignore our reality today nor to wallow in it with no respite in sight.

PERSONALLY, I think the root cause of this country's social and political brokenness is some sort of American civilizational collapse. Try "keeping it real" amid a nationwide nervous breakdown while also trying to be somewhat entertaining.

"Keeping it real" could make you a total depressive. Being tight and bright might tend toward delusion, with a certain head-in-the-sand je ne sais quoi. If you live on this side of America's Ironic Curtain, behind authoritarian lines somewhere in a red-state enclave, it helps to do your show from a culture-war bunker.

What does this have to do with a freeform music program, this Big Show, going out over the Internet during troubled, spite-infused times? I suppose both nothing and everything. Your guess is as good as mine.

I tell myself this weekly 90 minutes is a refuge, though not one for delusional thinking. Maybe the better analogy is a sanctuary for what beauty and sanity we can preserve. Maybe it's the audio version of a candle in a dark room.

Whatever it is, I'm certain that 3 Chords & the Truth is better than the prevailing social and political ethos -- at least in many quarters to the right of me -- of burning the motherf***er down, because one's grievances (justified or no) demand it. The nihilism of the "burn the motherf***er down" crowd has no Plan B and no plan for what comes next.

The only thing left, as one stands in the ashes following a conflagration of one's own making, is "Well, f***."

"Well, f***," indeed. Maybe the truth of the Big Show is that all we can do is remind folks of what they're putting the match to -- so much beauty, so little regard for it. I don't know . . . but I reckon that's not nothing.

All I do know is that a country full of mental toddlers really shouldn't be allowed to play with matches. Now here's something to listen to by the warm light of the flickering flames outside as you recall when we were better than this.

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: The Big (click) Big (click) Big (click)

A fair portion of the music we play on the Big Show falls into one of two categories -- stuff that's even (crackle) (pop) older than your Mighty Favog, and various records that (click) that (click) that (click) that (click) that (click) that (WRRRROOOOP!) are almost that old.

That's the beauty of 3 Chords & the Truth. That you'd be extremely hard pressed to tell that was the case, that is.

You see, your genial host works magic to make sure that's the case, to make sure even the oldest, scratchiest, snap-crackle-and-poppiest records get new life through audio science. Now, don't go getting a big head . . . you may or may not deserve it.

But the music does. The music deserves to sound just the way it did when it was new. And it deserves to make a good first impression (or 200th impression), so you'll fall in love with it, too (or fall in love with it all over again).

IS THE Brand X program on the radio -- or on the Internet -- all about love? Probably not. That right there is what makes the Big Show different . . . and better.

Sometimes, you just can't do that with a compact disc or download. Sometimes, if you already own the vinyl, why pay again to get the digital? And sometimes, you just gotta do what you gotta do. We're not fanatics here, after all.

I wasn't sure what new to say about this week's episode, being that all of them are pretty decent. So, I just thought I needed to say this. So I did.

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: Hearing ghosts

I'm hearing ghosts. At least it seems that way.

Of course, what you hear in a program like 3 Chords & the Truth depends on the context. The context of these times we live in has me hearing ghosts in the music.

Ghosts of times past. Ghosts of our past selves. Ghosts of those who've passed. Ghosts of normality. Ghosts of a country and world that seem long gone.

Good ghosts, evil ghosts. Ghosts all.

I hear ghosts. Perhaps you will, too.

I'LL TELL YOU now what I'll tell you during this week's edition of the Big Show -- the ghosts I hear in the music, hear in my mind . . . they feel like being at the end of your life and looking back at what was, and you're regretful, wistful. You regret what you -- we -- have come to, You regret the opportunities that were passed by.

You regret the things that were done but shouldn't have been. You wonder what the actual f***.

The ghosts often provoke nostalgia. Nostalgia can be a blessing. It also can be a curse.

Yeah, this week, I'm playing -- and hearing -- ghosts, and it's not even Halloween. They hearken me toward better times and remind me of worse, and the worse remind me of today in these disunited and dysfunctional United States.

And that's the way it is, May 12, 2023. I'm your Mighty Favog, reporting from 79 Wistful Vista.

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

3 Chords & the Truth: 20 songs in the sunset

I suppose, as much as anything, this episode of the Big Show is about sunsets. The sunset of life, the warm glow of the sunset -- you could go on and on.

However the sunset speaks to you is good enough for us. That's what it's about today.

Of course, that didn't become clear(er) to me until this go-round of 3 Chords & the Truth was in the can, so to speak. So . . . yeah. Just consider the show this week to be 20 lovely songs in the day's fading light.

THE PAST couple of weeks, as is increasingly the norm for folks the age of your Mighty Favog, have seen the passing of a couple of musical giants -- Harry Belafonte and Gordon Lightfoot. The loss is great. What they have left us, have left in our cultural coffers, is tremendous.

And you'll get a taste of that this week.

You'll also get a taste of a lot more, as well. That's utterly normal for what we call the Big Show. That also is what makes this program stand out . . . and, during these times, stand apart.

If you know, you know.

If you know, you're exceptional. And fortunate.

There's really not much more to say, so I'll leave it right here. Now get comfortable and get musically enriched.

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

3 Chords & the Truth: Two steps forward, 80 years back

Big shows don't play on tiny radios . . . and, to tell you the truth, they're not easy to do in small-minded states. Like this one.

Yet here we are with the latest edition of 3 Chords & the Truth.

After the last week in the Nebraska Legislature, I am tempted to tell you to boycott this state. But then you'd probably boycott the Big Show, too, and that would be like Ron DeSantis trying to kill Mickey Mouse. Wouldn't end well for anyone.

So I just curl up next to the big, big radio and just do the damn show. With appropriate measures of snark, sarcasm, warped humor and a great and eclectic mix of music -- mostly great music.

I mean, if you're contemplating curling up into a fetal position, turn on some tunes first, man.

But brace yourself for that King Crimson to George Martin segué. You'll understand when you hear it.

Well, that's about all before I curl up next to the stereo system and turn on the program. Except for this. . . .

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

3 Chords & the Truth: What do we do?

It's a stormy, stormy night here in Omaha, by God, Nebraska. Fitting for those of us living in a state that has become a shitstorm.

Pardon my French, but that's the best description I can muster for a place where the MAGA crackpots have taken full control . . . and now are doing what MAGA crackpots do. That would be punching down at The Other and generally waging war on what's left of civil society.

It's especially depressing when one's church is in on the action. Then again, Judas was a disciple, and Peter was a dolt. Things have gotten worse -- at least in these parts -- since.

"But what, Favog," you may ask, "does this have to do with 3 Chords & the Truth?

Excellent question.

And the only answer I have, as humble as it may be, is that the Big Show is a bit of a refuge -- for me and, one hopes, for you, too. That's all I got.

That's all I got.

As for the Nebraska unicameral, all I can say is that try as the booboisie might, the blind can't lead the blind. And it's pretty dark in there.

So, given the above, I'll enjoy the thoroughly enjoyable music as I ponder my options. I suspect you can, too. Actually, I really hope you do -- as usual, it's a hell of a show.

But not a shitshow. We'll leave that to the Republicans.

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