Gunga Spin strikes again

Once upon a time, my wife and I were sitting down to Sunday dinner at my parents' in Baton Rouge. It was Labor Day weekend, and the Jerry Lewis MDA telethon was on the Magnavox in the living room.

I always was fond of the Jerry Lewis telethon, and I'd always call in to make a donation. Sitting there at the table, I think I made the mistake of asking my old man -- not a fan -- whether he was going to contribute.

What followed was a seemingly deranged rant about people in wheelchairs who were armed to the teeth and ready to commit Swiss cheese against the rest of us. The missus and I weren't as good at the poker face then as we are now.

In other words, we burst out laughing. Trouble is, the old man was serious, and now he was really pissed.

"You might have book learnin'," he thundered, "but I got common sense!"

And then he didn't speak to us for weeks.

SO WHAT did I immediately think when I saw the latest bit of "Are you f***ing kidding me?" from former Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal (a.k.a., Gunga Spin, or the Destroyer of Louisiana or any number of unprintable epithets) regarding der Comb-Over?

You got it. "He may have book learnin', but I got common sense!"

Thanks a lot, Bobby.

But at least I do have common sense enough that -- if I were that sorry sack of s*** (the Jindal sorry sack of s***,  not the Donald Trump sorry sack of s***) -- I would just hide in a deep hole somewhere and not say anything. I do think I'd possess enough self-awareness not to write an op-ed  in the Wall Street Freakin' Journal saying I was going to vote for a guy I once called "a madman who must be stopped."

The Republican Party deserves every horrible thing that's going to happen to it. But for Gunga Spin, every horrible thing wouldn't be nearly enough.

3 Chords & the Truth: Making America hate again

We have to deal with the comb-over in the punch bowl.

Trouble is, the last thing I want to talk about this week on 3 Chords & the Truth is the vulgarian with fascist tendencies hiding in the woodpile . . . otherwise known as one of America's two major political parties. So, how do you say GOP in the original German?

OK, I don't want to talk about Donald Trump on the Big Show. You probably don't want to talk about Donald Trump. So let's not talk about the plague on American democracy.

Let's let the MUSIC for the Age of Trump do the talking for the both of us.

OK? All right.

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

Trolling the fascists

We have come to this: Donald Trump is going to be the presidential nominee of the Republican Party.

I don't have much to say about this, being near despair for my country because I think Trump actually could win, but I will say this.

What this means is that half of the political universe this country has known since 1856 has gone full-blown fascist.

That’s not just my opinion, it’s also Andrew Sullivan’s in a New York magazine piece which, by the way, probably is the best thing written thus far about this fine mess we’ve gotten ourselves into.

THE IMPLICATIONS of that are as follows: We will be well on the way to becoming that which my father's generation fought against 70 years ago. There will be no fig leaf to cover the United States’ bare-assed moral bankruptcy.

It also puts the terrifying possibility (how large, I do not know) of civil war on the table as well.

If anyone is unsure as to who’ll be worse for what’s left of this nation, let me put it this way: Hillary Clinton would be bad — perhaps very bad. But the Donald would be the end of us, one way or another.

There will be election violence -- lethal election violence -- before November. Mark my words. I hope I'm wrong, but I don't think so.

For now, I'll just comfort myself by trolling Reince Priebus, the feckless head of the wicked GOP.

3 Chords & the Truth: Boogity boogity shoop

This week's edition of the Big Show is all about the stomp.

And the waltz.

And the mope-itty mope, mope-itty mope mope mope.

Well, yeah, we also have some boom boom-ba-booms and some sha-na-nas on 3 Chords & the Truth as well this go around, but you probably already figured that was coming. It's a diverse and eclectic cornucopia, I tells ya!

So pull up a chair. Take your shoes off. And enjoy what's about to caress your eardrums.

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

BRRRRRRRRAAAAAAP!!!

I love this newspaper ad for one of the radio stations I listened to during my misspent youth in Baton Rouge.

Look closely, though, and connect the dots on the ol' schematic.

Isn't this really a very 1970s-cool advertisement for some rock 'n' roll electroshock therapy? Inquiring minds -- what's left of them -- want to know.

On the other hand, I was told by a Republican presidential candidate that it's not really torture unless the radio is playing "Muskrat Love" by the Captain & Tennille.

Decent people's mileage may vary.

3 Chords & the Truth: Never fear, the King is here

"And that's the evening news for tonight. I'll see you again Monday on. . . ."

Click.

Wall. Head. Thwack!

Thwack!

Thwack!

Thwack!

Click. Thunk. Crackle crackle.

Muss i denn, muss i denn
Zum Stadtele hinaus
Stadtele hinaus
Und du, mein schat, bleibst hier?

There's no strings upon this love of mine
It was always you from the start
Sei mir gut
Sei mir gut
Sei mir wie du wirklich sollst
Wie du wirklich sollst
'Cause I don't have a wooden heart

Thank you, Elvis. Thank you, 3 Chords & the Truth.
Save yourself. Listen to the Big Show.

A big smile's just a click away. Be there. Auf Wiedersehen.

SWPL: The Darwin Awards edition

If you're old enough to have stayed up late every night to watch Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman in the 1970s, I need to say no more about this featured collection from ebay.

Well, nothing except "Remember the Rev. Jimmy Joe Jeeter?"

It's Spectra-Sonic!

In 1959, Liberty Records represented "the most EXCITING sound in the world." Said so right there on the record sleeve.

In 2016, do we get excited about anything anymore?

By the time you have porn sites cutting off access to North Carolina perverts because the smut-purveyor is morally offended that the state passed a law stating that human persons with XY chromosomes -- and a tallywhacker -- really should use the men's room and human persons with XX chromosomes -- and lacking an appendage -- really should use the ladies' room, you as a society probably have lost the emotional chops to get anything but outraged. 

I mean, when did this become a thing? And you thought this post was going to be about old records.

I'll tell you what I'm not excited about. The future. The future is going to be dreary, and joyless, and overwrought, and angry . . . and we're all going to end up killing one another. Perhaps we can stave this off a couple more years by outlawing urinals and mandating doors on bathroom stalls.

For now, I think I'll just hide out in a time when we still had something to get excited about.

Look up!

Old Market,

Omaha, Neb.

3 Chords & the Truth: If we make it through December

I keep thinking "If we make it through December. . . ."

But then somebody else -- yet another giant -- dies. And we're yet again musically orphaned. This sucks.

This got old long ago. 2016 is a very, very bad year.

And this time, it's the great Merle Haggard. Anymore, what can you even say? You just start repeating yourself while merely swapping out the name of one legend for another.

So . . . once again we merely pay humble tribute. To Merle.

And I think I'm gonna just sit here and drink.

MEANTIME,  we have some other stuff going for you on this edition of 3 Chords & the Truth, including a really wild set later on in the show. In other words, the usual eclectic and cool stuff you've come to associate with the Big Show.

Umm hmm.

Listen to the program. It's good.

And that's about all I have to say about that.

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