For the record. . . .

Once upon a time, when young folk bought these things called "LPs" for $3.98 at a retail establishment called a "record store," you actually got stuff.

You got a 12-inch vinyl disc with grooves on the surface -- the "record," which was played on a "phonograph." It came in a large cardboard sleeve with artwork on the front and back covers. This artwork was large enough to see, as was the track listing on the rear.

If during one of your treks to the "record store" -- in, say, 1972 -- you happened to purchase Melanie's "Stoneground Words" album ("album" is what we often called "LPs," or "records"), you also got lyrics (again, large enough to actually read) on the "inner sleeve," which held the "vinyl" within the "sleeve."

And for your $3.98, you also got a fold-up display of many photos of Melanie, suitable for hanging on the wall of your room because, frankly, Melanie was a babe.

Can you get all that with iTunes, bunkie?

I didn't think so.

3 Chords & the Truth: Wanna be a Big Star

I wanna be a Big Star.

Trouble is, no matter how good you are, it's still easier to remain relatively anonymous. Stardom has many considerations, and "good at what you do" is only a minor one.

Well, we at 3 Chords & the Truth always can dream, can't we?

Take the late Alex Chilton, for example. Great talent. Had a couple of stellar groups -- the Box Tops and, later, Big Star.

Big Star broke new ground in rock. Big Star turned out to be massively influential in shaping what rock music would become -- if you've heard REM, or Wilco, or even the Bangles, you've heard bits of Big Star.

Back in the 1970s, though, Chilton and the other members of Big Star weren't. Big stars, that is.

AND NOW poor Alex Chilton is dead of an apparent heart attack at 59 -- a hero to musicians and serious music fans, and a big "Huh?" to the world. Maybe stardom isn't all it's cracked up to be.

Maybe, when you get right down to it, the theme of this week's episode of 3 Chords & the Truth is the basic unfairness of art, which is just mirroring life.

Still, we're giving Chilton -- and the Box Tops, and Big Star -- their due on the Big Show, even if proper "props" rarely were forthcoming from the music industry . . . or the American consumer. Because in our heart, 3 Chords & the Truth is a national music and media powerhouse unfortunately confined to a little studio in Omaha, by God, Nebraska.

We can sympathize, as it were.

And I'll bet you can, too.

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

3 Chords & the Truth: Turn down the lights

Turn down the lights.

This episode of 3 Chords & the Truth is best listened to with the lights low. Curled up somewhere. In something comfortable.

Sipping on your favorite beverage.

And preferably in the still of the night.

That's because, at heart, your Mighty Favog is just your all-night DJ, spinning some midnight music in the semidarkness of a radio studio . . . after hours. The overnight man spins his records, and he brings the microphone real close. Like this.

He speaks softly . . . over the airwaves, in the predawn darkness, a friendly voice in the night. It's the Big Show. And you're along for the ride.

Can you dig it? I knew that you could.

SOMETIMES, your pilot of the airwaves (Charlie Dore, 1979 . . . but that's not important now) gets in a mood, as opposed to a toot. This trip on the 3 Chords & the Truth-go-round represents one of those times.

I'm in a mood. A night music mood.

You don't know where it's going; you just know that it will be unique. You know that it'll be good.

You know that it's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

3 Chords & the Truth: This reminds me . . .

WBRH radio was where I got my start doing this kind of thing . . . with "this kind of thing" being 3 Chords & the Truth, the musical half of the Revolution 21 media empire.

The FM voice of Baton Rouge High School has been around for nearly 33 years now. Without the training your Mighty Favog got there during the station's earliest days, the Big Show would be hugely nonexistent all these years later.

THAT'S WHY it's so appropriate that one of the sets in today's episode is soooooooooooo quintessentially WBRH: The Rock 'n' Roll Days. It just is.

If you're up for a bit of sport, see whether you can figure out which set. This should be easy if you're from Baton Rouge and go back a ways.

And if you're interested, you can read more about WBRH here. And here. And here. And here.

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

3 Chords & the Truth: Blues and grace

This week on the Big Show:

can be quite

and even give us reason to be But through it all -- if we look -- we just might discover

That, in a musical sense, is some of what we cover this week on 3 Chords & the Truth.

Well, that and some good ol' rockabilly (and fusion-y prog rock, too).

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

3 Chords & the Truth: Dial up the music

Tired.

Hit the wall.

Motivation took a vacation, leaving the rest of me behind.

But I still had to crank out an episode of 3 Chords & the Truth. Just great.

Ah, screw it. I just phoned it in this week. Deal.

EVEN THOUGH I phoned the Big Show (Medium-Sized Show?) in, the music still is pretty decent . . . probably. Whatever. Hope you like country. Then again, it's all the same to me.

'Cause I just phoned it in.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. (Or not . . . like I care this week.) Aloha.

3 Chords & the Truth: We got ours

No matter what, it's all about us.

This week on 3 Chords & the Truth, El Favog-bo shows us it's all about you not liking who we don't like.

It's about keeping all our cash. Because it's ours, all ours.

On the Big Show, it's about looking at tragedy and wondering "Why is he so anxious for us to send our money to those people?" There's got to be a catch.

Besides, says El Favog-bo, we already gave at the office. Find another sucker.

IT'S ALL ABOUT self-reliance and survival of the fittest. That's the way God made the world, and if it takes a little earthquake to make the point clearer. . . .

My morphine is I Me Mine. Give it to me, because -- if you hadn't already noticed -- there's nobody but me. At least nobody who matters.

This week on 3 Chords & the Truth, our guest host makes the case that every man is an island. And if the island you happen to be happens to be Haiti . . . well, it sucks to be you.

Let's just say it's been an interesting week here at the Big Show. And between the cool tunes -- some of them by well known commie dope fiends -- we'll see how the Island of El Favog-bo fares.

All by itself.

BUT JUST IN CASE, your Mighty Favog is standing by . . . music in hand.

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

That's a little island lingo there.

3 Chords & the Truth: Will DJ for heat

On a day like this, maybe I should have played Springsteen's "10th Avenue Freeze-Out."

But I'm not playing it. My brain was too dang cold to think of it at the time.

Everything's cold. Twenty-below cold. We rely on the warmth of hearth, furnace, wool cap and wonderful music -- like the tunes on this week's edition of 3 Chords & the Truth.

I will gladly share the warm fuzzies of the music. My wool cap, you cannot have.

ALSO ON this edition of the Big Show you'll find out how many good songs are in the Bible -- and we ain't talking church hymns or something by Sister Janet Mead. If you remember Sister Janet Mead and her Top-40 hit, you may be middle-aged.


ANYWAY, it's a fine show this go 'round; give it a listen. That's about it . . . my fingers are freezing up here and, at any rate, you can't type with gloves on.

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

3 Chords & the Truth: Aquarius redux

EDITOR'S NOTE: Your Mighty Favog is kicking back for a week, so he thought he'd start a New Year's tradition by reposting his favorite show of the previous year. For 2009, that would be the Woodstock 40th-anniversary show.

Favog doesn't know whether that was the best show of the year, but he knows it was the most fun to do. So, once again, let's travel back to the age of Aquarius . . . on the Big Show.

During the Age of Aquarius, Uncle Favog was the coolest cat I knew.

He drove the coolest VW microbus, he wore the coolest beads, and he had the coolest bell bottoms adorned with the coolest peace-and-love patches.

Uncle Favog protested the war, expanded his mind and got all the groovy chicks. And he played groovy music all night on Radio Free Omaha . . . master of his own fate (at least so long as he didn't cause The Man to come down on the station, bourgeois capitalist convention being what it was, man) and host of 3 Chords & the Truth.

This present 3 Chords & the Truth on the Internets is a tribute to that wonderful show of Uncle Favog's four decades ago on the FM airwaves.

Remember when FM was hip, cool, happenin' and now?

Didn't think you did.

ANYWAY, I was rummaging through a box of old reel-to-reel tapes, and I came up with this Big Show gem from 40 years ago this week. Anybody remember what was going on then?

Yeah, you may have seen the news stories featuring aging hippies remembering a certain "happening" in New York state. Uncle Favog, though, would not have been one of them.

Oh, of course he's an aging hippie, but he also was right here in Omaha, playing the musical "guru" as he spun the righteous tunes over the Radio Free Omaha airwaves.
Back in the day . . . when we had problems, but still held out hope, all the while groovin' to the music that could move our souls.

It was -- and is -- 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

3 Chords & the Truth: Six to the three

This week on 3 Chords & the Truth (among other aural goodness). . . .

Well, hang on. Let me quote the Four Seasons here:

Oh, what a night!
Late December back in '63,
What a very special time for me,
As I remember what a night,
Oh what a night!
You know, I didn't even know her name. . . .

WELL . . . all right, then. Enough of that.

How about that 3 Chords & the Truth, eh? Good stuff, am I right? We present only the finest in musical entertainment on the Big Show.

YEP, a chunk of this week's show is devoted to the one to the nine to the six to the three -- 1963.

You know, stuff like this:


AND THIS:

LEST WE GET carried away completely here, maybe it's time to apply the brakes to all this:

SO, WE'LL just leave you with this simple thought. Here goes.

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

Drat. Five years too soon with that one.

3 Chords & the Truth: Two! Four! Six! Eight!

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Good God, it really is the '60s all over again.

Of course, when you're talking Louisiana, that can have, er . . . interesting ramifications. Really, when did you ever think miscegenation would be a legal issue again?

Can you say "biracial president"?

AND I THINK we at 3 Chords & the Truth now can answer -- musically and with full confidence -- the burning question "Will Louisiana ever stop shooting itself in the foot . . . and other interesting places?"

The answer is "no."

But anyway, since it's the '60s again, and since elected officials in the Gret Stet are still doing '60s-stupid (not to mention flat-out evil) things, I guess it's time to start the protests. Right here.

Right now.

LOUISIANA, this episode of 3 Chords & the Truth is for you. From your perspective, that is not a good thing.

For everybody else, I think you'll enjoy this week's edition of the Big Show.

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

3 Chords & the Truth: Let it snow!

Welcome to October 10 on the Great Plains.

Now that the produce is in and the wheelbarrow has gone fallow under an autumnal coating of snow, it's a good time to grab a hot cup of something, prop up your feet and enjoy another episode of 3 Chords & the Truth. After all, that's what winter's for.

Even when it comes in the middle of fall.

TODAY'S EPISODE of the Big Show is a good 'un . . . and decidedly New Wavish. What can I say? Sometimes I get in moods.

But this mood has led to some fine tunes for watching the leaves change -- or the snow fall. Just don't trip on your Snuggie (as seen on TV) if you get an urge to dance.

Consider this a consumer warning about dancing to 3 Chords & the Truth while wearing a Snuggie. I don't want none of your dang lawsuits.

So . . . there you go. The weather outside is frightful, but the music on the Revolution 21 website is delightful. Let it snow! Let it snow! Let it snow!

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

3 Chords & the Truth: Not easy being green

Would you rather listen to 3 Chords & the Truth right now, or would you rather mix up a batch of earthen plaster to do some interior work on your house?

Now, the Big Show this week is a mighty fine offering, as always. It features a fun, diverse music mix, and you just might learn something, too.

HERE'S just a sampling of what you can expect to hear:

* The Subdudes
* Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass
* Tony Bennett
* Ella Fitzgerald
* Frank Sinatra
* Chicago Transit Authority (Dude! Bummer about the Olympics.)
* Bela Fleck
* Tragically Hip
* Theresa Andersson

THERE'S MORE, of course, but you get the picture of what awaits you on 3 Chords & the Truth.

On the other hand, maybe you'd just rather go outside and -- in a fit of "green" initiative -- make a bunch of your own earthen plaster to fix up your house with that au naturel je ne sais quoi.

That's cool. I'm in favor of being green. In fact, here's the recipe for a nice, big batch of earthen plaster:

* 15 gallons of 1/16th-inch sifted sand.
* 5 gallons of clay.
* 5 gallons of fresh cow manure.
* 8 cups of wheat paste.
* Cattail fluff to preference.

WHATEVER you'd rather do is fine with me -- listen to the Big Show or be elbow deep in cow s***. It's your choice.

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

If only he'd stayed forever young

If only Bob Dylan had stayed forever young, maybe the New Jersey cops would have recognized who the hell they were about to run in.

As it is, a scruffy looking old man walking through a neighborhood is enough to cause homeowners to freak out and have cops ready to arrest America's greatest living songwriter for vagrancy. Ironic that this story breaks on the 40th anniversary of Woodstock.

The hippies grew up, got sober -- more or less -- sold out . . . and now we're almost arresting freakin' Bob Dylan for being a bum. Kind of like how Omaha cops have been known to harass church ladies for feeding the animals homeless in a downtown park.

Thing is, the theory -- an entirely reasonable one -- some folks float in this ABC News story about why Dylan was in that particular Jersey neighborhood is kind of sweet:

Was Bob Dylan looking for the home where Bruce Springsteen wrote "Born to Run" in 1974 when he was detained by police near the Jersey shore last month?

The 68-year-old music legend was picked up one Thursday last month by a 24-year-old cop who failed to recognize him as he walked the streets of Long Branch, N.J. in the pouring rain.

It may have been as simple as it appears: Dylan told police he was talking a walk and looking at a home for sale.

But the area where Dylan was picked up was just a couple blocks from the beachside bungalow where Bruce Springsteen wrote the material for his landmark 1975 album "Born to Run."

In the past nine months, Dylan has visited the childhood homes of Neil Young and John Lennon, in both cases appearing without fanfare and barely identifying himself after he was recognized.

Last November, Winnipeg homeowner John Kiernan told Sun Media's Simon Fuller that Dylan and a friend arrived unannounced in a taxi to his Grosvenor Ave. home, where songwriter Neil Young grew up.

Dylan, Kiernan said, was unshaved and had the brim of his hat pulled down over his head. He asked for a look inside and inquired about Young's bedroom and where he would have played his guitar.

Dylan has shown a deep affinity for the Canadian rocker over the years, most recently in his 2001 song "Highlands." And Young said at a Nashville concert in 2005 that he once lent Dylan one of his most precious musical treasures -- Hank Williams' guitar, for which Young wrote the ballad "This Old Guitar." Both men revere Williams, a country music legend.

In May, Dylan joined a public tour of John Lennon's childhood home, according to the BBC. A spokeswoman for the National Trust, which runs the home as London landmark, said Dylan "took one of our general minibus tours.

"People on the minibus did not recognize him apparently," the spokeswoman told the British news agency. "He could have booked a private tour, but he was happy to go on the bus with everyone else."

(snip)

While it remains unclear whether Dylan was looking for Springsteen's old home in this case, and he never mentioned that he was to Buble, the description that the Winnipeg homeowner gave of Dylan when the singer visited Neil Young's home last year was similar Buble's story.

"So these guys were standing at the front of the house about to get back into their taxi,'' Kiernan, the homeowner, said of Dylan and his friend in Canada. "I noticed he was wearing these expensive-looking leather pants tucked inside these world-class boots. Then I studied his face and tried to keep cool."

It was Bob Dylan, who'd grown up just over the U.S./Canadian border, in Hibbing, Minn., Kiernan said.

"When he said, 'Would Neil have looked out this window when he played his guitar?'," said Kiernan, "I realized what a spiritual experience he was having at that moment, knowing that he would have been doing the same thing at the same time in Minnesota.

GEEZ. Where's Chris Crocker when you need him?

Britney, hell. LEAVE BOB DYLAN ALONE!

3 Chords & the Truth: Aquarian flashback

During the Age of Aquarius, Uncle Favog was the coolest cat I knew.

He drove the coolest VW microbus, he wore the coolest beads, and he had the coolest bell bottoms adorned with the coolest peace-and-love patches.

Uncle Favog protested the war, expanded his mind and got all the groovy chicks. And he played groovy music all night on Radio Free Omaha . . . master of his own fate (at least so long as he didn't cause The Man to come down on the station, bourgeois capitalist convention being what it was, man) and host of 3 Chords & the Truth. This present 3 Chords & the Truth on the Internets is a tribute to that wonderful show of Uncle Favog's four decades ago on the FM airwaves.

Remember when FM was hip, cool, happenin' and now?

Didn't think you did.

ANYWAY, I was rummaging through a box of old reel-to-reel tapes, and I came up with this Big Show gem from 40 years ago this week. Anybody remember what was going on then?

Yeah, you may have seen the news stories featuring aging hippies remembering a certain "happening" in New York state. Uncle Favog, though, would not have been one of them.

Oh, of course he's an aging hippie, but he also was right here in Omaha, playing the musical "guru" as he spun the righteous tunes over the Radio Free Omaha airwaves.

Back in the day . . . when we had problems, but still held out hope, all the while groovin' to the music that could move our souls.

It was -- and is -- 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

3 Chords & the Truth: Sixty-Seven Candles*

3 CHORDS & THE TRUTH TEST

Question 1: Have you ever touched it?

I clicked the mouse once to play it on the computer. It worked. Is that touching it?

Question 2: Have you ever done it?

I told you I clicked the mouse to listen to the show. The Big Show . . . you know, 3 Chords & the Truth. Is that doing it? This is a weird-ass test.

Question 3: If you answered ‘I don’t think so’, would you ever if you could?

What????? I listened to the flippin' show. Of course I would if I could, because I did. Why wouldn't I think so? Are you an idiot?

Question 4: With who? (Be honest, your name’s not on this so it’s okay)

My wife. I listen to 3 Chords & the Truth with my wife.

Question 5: Does she know that you like her?

I hope so. We've been married 26 years. What kind of test is this???

I think you're weird. Doesn't everybody listen to 3 Chords & the Truth? Why the hell do you care if I touched it . . . touched it? Does it come on CD? And what do you care who I "touched" the show with?

Freak.

* For 67 shows.

3 Chords & the Truth: As seen on '60s TV

This week's episode of 3 Chords & the Truth has a lot to do with this. "This" being the video just above.

Of course, "a lot to do with" doesn't mean the Big Show is about nothing but the old Red Skelton Hour on 1960s television.

That's just our jumping-off point.

For instance, this week's program also could be said to have much to do with this:

OR PERHAPS this instead:

AW HELL, it's 3 Chords & the Truth, which means this week's episode could have something to do with most anything. That's just the way your Mighty Favog rolls.

Give it a listen and find out what's in it for you today.

3 Chords & the Truth: As seen on MP3

Remember back when you were young and you used to sit in your room and listen to the stereo, shutting the world out with your music blasting through your headphones?

Those days are back! That's right, you can hear those same wonderful songs you loved as a teen-ager . . . or a young adult . . . or love right now . . . all in pristine digital quality!

We call it the 3 Chords & the Truth collection, and it all can be yours for the price of a free download over the Internet. You've never had it so good -- at least not since you were 17 and borrowing your dad's car to take your honey to the malt shop, where you danced all night to your favorite hits on the Rock-Ola jukebox.

HI, I'm the Mighty Favog, and we at the Big Show know what that music means to you. Why? Because we know what it means to us.

And it's all right here -- yours for the listening -- on the 3 Chords & the Truth collection. For three easy payments of not a single dime, you can relive those halcyon days when music was music and your pimples were starting to clear up.

A little.

It will seem like it was just yesterday when you spent all night "Hanging on the Telephone," where you "Heard It Through the Grapevine" straight from your best friend, who heard it from a cousin, who heard it from a neighbor, who got it from somebody who saw it all happen. Honest to God!

And when you tune into the Big Show, yesterday will be today . . . and you're skating on thin ice, Mister! Because your old man saw you hanging out in that hippie coffeehouse, listening to that commie Miles Davis be-bop crap and snapping your fingers like some damn mental deficient!

Cut your damn hair! You look like some kind of a bum . . . or a girl! A girl bum!

What are you anyway, some kind of dope fiend?

I'M TELLING YOU, buddy boy . . . you'd better give your heart to "Jesus of Suburbia," because your ass is gonna be mine!

That's right, the 3 Chords & the Truth collection will make it seem like you're 17 once more and have had it up to f-ing here with that square old bastard.

Or, as one of our favorite bands said:

This is the day
Of the expanding man
That shape is my shade
There where I used to stand
It seems like only yesterday I
gazed through the glass
At ramblers
Wild gamblers
That's all in the past

AH . . . but it doesn't have to be "all in the past." Not with this fine collection of your favorite music, available exclusively through the Big Show! Listen to your old Mighty Favog . . . it can be yesterday once more.

After all, they call Alabama the Crimson Tide . . . call me Deacon Blues.

That made absolutely no sense, did it?

Well, neither did being 17. Back when you were drinking scotch whiskey all night long and trying not to die behind the wheel.

If you download right now, not only will you get the wonderful 3 Chords & the Truth collection, you'll also receive -- absolutely free -- the illusion of recovered youth and eternal coolness.

BUT WAIT! There's more!

As a token of our appreciation for listening to the Big Show, we'll also send along a three-month supply of Stridex and a crapload of raging insecurity. And it won't cost you a penny!

So what are you waiting for? Download now . . . it'll be righteous! Maaaaaan.

I'm the Mighty Favog, and we'll be seeing you on the Internet.

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

3 Chords & the Truth: Sounds like America

Today's episode of 3 Chords & the Truth is brought to you by the letter U, the letter S and the letter A.

Additional funding for the Internet's premier music program comes from the letters U and K, and the Corporation for Non-Corporate Webcasting.

ON TODAY'S EPISODE of the Big Show, we're chillin' for the July Fourth holiday. We're taking some leisure time, and so is our brain.

No grand message, no lofty theme -- as if -- just some cool music and a nod to the red, white and blue, Yankee Doodle, and kickin' back for the lazy days of summer.

So, your mission for this week's journey into the land of cool music is to grab some cool refreshment, settle into a comfy chair, kick back and enjoy. That's about it.

YOU BRING the illegal fireworks, we'll bring the music.

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

3 Chords & the Truth: Just a little bit loony

We're all just a little bit crazy, aren't we?

Well, not all of us are over-the-top tormented like Pink Floyd's Syd Barrett (God rest his soul) was three-plus decades ago when the Band released Barrett-inspired songs like "Brain Damage" -- featured this week on 3 Chords & the Truth -- and "Shine on You Crazy Diamond," et al. But we all are at least a little bit "eccentric," aren't we?

I mean, how boring would life be if we weren't?

Take my wife, for example. . . . You wouldn't believe h




ON SECOND THOUGHT, my lovely bride is perfect in every way. Sometimes, she feigns imperfection or eccentricity, but that is solely a ruse to make me feel less conspicuously inadequate as a human being.

I am flawed. I am unworthy.

And if you're like me, I have just the set for you this week on the Big Show. Because we're all "Crazy as a Loon."

Or something like that -- except for my wife. Whom I love.

WE'LL ALSO spend a lot of time this week strolling through the history of rock 'n' roll (and all the flavors of rock, too) . . . at least a little bit. Lots of fun this week on 3 Chords & the Truth.

And that's about all I have to say about that. To say any more would just give the whole thing away, and that would be no fun.

It's the Big Show, y'all. Be there. Aloha.