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By sixth grade, though, Haslam remembers Haggard playing a borrowed guitar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The neighborhood we lived in was full of people from the Southwest, and it was not uncommon for people to have guitars and fiddles. And on long summer evenings, no air-conditioning, of course, people would sit out on their porches and play music and sing,” Haslam recalls. “He was one of the young fellows who could do that kind of thing.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignright\">'He was a real free thinker. A song like ‘Okie from Muskogee’ might make someone think he was a reactionary. Quite the opposite.'\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>Haggard grew up in a converted boxcar, which Gerald Haslam later raised money to help \u003ca href=\"http://www.sacbee.com/opinion/california-forum/article29919502.html\">preserve as a historical site.\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was actually one of the nicer houses in the neighborhood,” explained Haslam, who grew up four blocks away. “His dad was a carpenter for the railroad, and somehow Mr. Haggard obtained the boxcar, and he converted it. He did a very nice job.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When Haslam and other friends of Haggard's arranged to move the boxcar to a museum last year, they found a family still living in it, explains Haslam. “It stood up after all these years.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I ask Haslam what he thinks some of Merle Haggard’s fans might find most surprising about the man who released more than three dozen hit songs over a long and illustrious career.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[contextly_sidebar id=\"HK1NkkFmlN5jqSmBr6YAsjWkD8MWpd08\"]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“People who know him only through his commercial successes don’t understand what an open-minded man he was,\" says Haslam. \"He was a real free thinker. A song like 'Okie from Muskogee' might make someone think he was a reactionary. Quite the opposite. He and I could talk about politics. I’m on the left, and we would be right on the money with one another.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Haggard, in fact, was vehemently against the Iraq War, a sentiment he put to music with his song “America First.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\"Why don’t we liberate these United States. We’re the ones who need it the worst\u003c/em>,” he crooned. \u003cem>“Let’s get out of Iraq, get back on track, and rebuild America first…”\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10924191\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/04/Merle-Haggard-accepts-his-Honorary-Doctorate-800x600.jpg\" alt='Merle Haggard accepts his honorary doctorate at Cal State Bakersfield in 2013. His childhood friend, author Gerald Haslam, watched him accept the honor of becoming \"Dr. Haggard.\" ' width=\"800\" height=\"600\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-10924191\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/04/Merle-Haggard-accepts-his-Honorary-Doctorate-800x600.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/04/Merle-Haggard-accepts-his-Honorary-Doctorate-400x300.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/04/Merle-Haggard-accepts-his-Honorary-Doctorate-1920x1440.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/04/Merle-Haggard-accepts-his-Honorary-Doctorate-1180x885.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/04/Merle-Haggard-accepts-his-Honorary-Doctorate-960x720.jpg 960w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/04/Merle-Haggard-accepts-his-Honorary-Doctorate.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Merle Haggard accepts his honorary doctorate at Cal State Bakersfield in 2013. His childhood friend, author Gerald Haslam, watched him accept the honor of becoming \"Dr. Haggard.\" \u003ccite>(Alice Daniel/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“He was also open-minded musically, so it shouldn’t have been surprising,” says Haslam. “He would perform Dixieland, or Norteño, or just plain West Coast jazz, along with more conventional forms of country music.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But for all Haggard's creativity and originality, Haslam laments that he didn’t have more of an impact on how people look at the Central Valley.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Unfortunately, I think there are still people who think of the valley as being something between uncivilized and primitive,\" he says. \"Merle is a good example of the open-mindedness and sophistication that’s possible, and that manifests itself there. He also illustrates the complexity of politics and philosophy. He wasn’t just a left-winger or a right-winger.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I hope more people will understand that he wasn’t just a country singer, he was a singer. He wasn’t just a country songwriter, he was a songwriter. His musicality came to us at a very high level indeed.”\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://www.geraldhaslam.com/\">Gerald Haslam\u003c/a> met Merle Haggard in elementary school. They both grew up in the tiny Kern County town of Oildale, which was mostly settled by Dust Bowl migrants.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“By the time we got to fourth or fifth grade, he was just one of those kids who seemed to be a little bit different, a little more assertive, a little more creative,\" recalls Haslam. \"Sort of an adventurer. A Huckleberry Finn type.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Haslam has authored some 20 books about California, including \"\u003ca href=\"http://www.ucpress.edu/book.php?isbn=9780520275058\">Working Man Blues: Country Music in California.\u003c/a>\" I asked him to share some of his childhood memories of Haggard, who died April 6, on his 79th birthday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cdiv class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__shortcodes__shortcodeWrapper'>\n \u003ciframe width='100%' height='166'\n scrolling='no' frameborder='no'\n src='https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/258067386&visual=true&color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false'\n title='https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/258067386'>\n \u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/div>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Because their school was funded by oil companies, Haslam says, they were offered music and art classes, unlike kids at other nearby public schools. But Haslam says Merle Haggard never really stood out as a kid who was a particularly good singer or musician at school. By sixth grade, though, Haslam remembers Haggard playing a borrowed guitar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The neighborhood we lived in was full of people from the Southwest, and it was not uncommon for people to have guitars and fiddles. And on long summer evenings, no air-conditioning, of course, people would sit out on their porches and play music and sing,” Haslam recalls. “He was one of the young fellows who could do that kind of thing.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignright\">'He was a real free thinker. A song like ‘Okie from Muskogee’ might make someone think he was a reactionary. Quite the opposite.'\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>Haggard grew up in a converted boxcar, which Gerald Haslam later raised money to help \u003ca href=\"http://www.sacbee.com/opinion/california-forum/article29919502.html\">preserve as a historical site.\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was actually one of the nicer houses in the neighborhood,” explained Haslam, who grew up four blocks away. “His dad was a carpenter for the railroad, and somehow Mr. Haggard obtained the boxcar, and he converted it. He did a very nice job.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When Haslam and other friends of Haggard's arranged to move the boxcar to a museum last year, they found a family still living in it, explains Haslam. “It stood up after all these years.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I ask Haslam what he thinks some of Merle Haggard’s fans might find most surprising about the man who released more than three dozen hit songs over a long and illustrious career.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“People who know him only through his commercial successes don’t understand what an open-minded man he was,\" says Haslam. \"He was a real free thinker. A song like 'Okie from Muskogee' might make someone think he was a reactionary. Quite the opposite. He and I could talk about politics. I’m on the left, and we would be right on the money with one another.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Haggard, in fact, was vehemently against the Iraq War, a sentiment he put to music with his song “America First.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\"Why don’t we liberate these United States. We’re the ones who need it the worst\u003c/em>,” he crooned. \u003cem>“Let’s get out of Iraq, get back on track, and rebuild America first…”\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10924191\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/04/Merle-Haggard-accepts-his-Honorary-Doctorate-800x600.jpg\" alt='Merle Haggard accepts his honorary doctorate at Cal State Bakersfield in 2013. His childhood friend, author Gerald Haslam, watched him accept the honor of becoming \"Dr. Haggard.\" ' width=\"800\" height=\"600\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-10924191\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/04/Merle-Haggard-accepts-his-Honorary-Doctorate-800x600.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/04/Merle-Haggard-accepts-his-Honorary-Doctorate-400x300.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/04/Merle-Haggard-accepts-his-Honorary-Doctorate-1920x1440.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/04/Merle-Haggard-accepts-his-Honorary-Doctorate-1180x885.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/04/Merle-Haggard-accepts-his-Honorary-Doctorate-960x720.jpg 960w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/04/Merle-Haggard-accepts-his-Honorary-Doctorate.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Merle Haggard accepts his honorary doctorate at Cal State Bakersfield in 2013. His childhood friend, author Gerald Haslam, watched him accept the honor of becoming \"Dr. Haggard.\" \u003ccite>(Alice Daniel/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“He was also open-minded musically, so it shouldn’t have been surprising,” says Haslam. “He would perform Dixieland, or Norteño, or just plain West Coast jazz, along with more conventional forms of country music.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But for all Haggard's creativity and originality, Haslam laments that he didn’t have more of an impact on how people look at the Central Valley.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Unfortunately, I think there are still people who think of the valley as being something between uncivilized and primitive,\" he says. \"Merle is a good example of the open-mindedness and sophistication that’s possible, and that manifests itself there. He also illustrates the complexity of politics and philosophy. He wasn’t just a left-winger or a right-winger.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I hope more people will understand that he wasn’t just a country singer, he was a singer. He wasn’t just a country songwriter, he was a songwriter. His musicality came to us at a very high level indeed.”\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"disqusTitle": "Welcome to the Signal Room, Secret Venue for San Francisco’s Arts Underground",
"title": "Welcome to the Signal Room, Secret Venue for San Francisco’s Arts Underground",
"headTitle": "The California Report | KQED News",
"content": "\u003cp>On a recent evening I joined a group of strangers on a twilight tour of San Francisco’s Yerba Buena Island. This wasn’t your typical urban outing. First, consider our guide, an artist named Eugene Ashton-Gonzalez. He’s wearing a tattered nautical jacket and a two-day beard. He’s confiscated our cellphones and placed them in a heavy briefcase.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Then there’s our stealthy, guerrilla-style approach. Ashton-Gonzalez leads us across a small beach, around a clump of trees and up a steep trail. As we pass rows of empty military homes, he orders us to take cover while a private security guard passes nearby. We’ve entered a restricted area that is scheduled for demolition.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Step lightly,” he whispers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[soundcloud url=\"https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/252914190\" params=\"color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false\" width=\"100%\" height=\"166\" iframe=\"true\" /]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the top of the island we dart across a small parking lot to reach our destination -- a lonely wooden tower. Ashton-Gonzalez delivers us through a secret passage and up a darkened staircase to the top floor.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s when our collective jaws drop. It’s as if we’ve entered the bridge of a giant ship anchored grandly in the middle of the bay. Jutting \u003cem>beneath\u003c/em> us are the white towers of the Bay Bridge. And shimmering all around are the lights of San Francisco, Oakland, Berkeley and beyond.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10900553\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalGroup.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-10900553 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalGroup-800x533.jpg\" alt=\"Events here are free unless food is served, and typically involve 15 or 20 people invited by previous guests. \" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalGroup-800x533.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalGroup-400x267.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalGroup.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalGroup-1180x787.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalGroup-960x640.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Events here are free unless food is served, and typically involve 15 or 20 people invited by previous guests. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Mona Caron)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Welcome to the \u003ca href=\"https://www.facebook.com/thesignalroom/\">Signal Room\u003c/a>. It’s a rogue museum and a modern-day speakeasy, except that the illicit part of the experience is not what you drink, but how you get in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ashton-Gonzalez created the Signal Room last year after returning from a few years in New York City. He was moonlighting as an actor and storyteller, and conspiring with a group of urban explorers and trespassers. Their rogue pop-up projects included running a bar in an abandoned water tower in Manhattan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ashton-Gonzalez was looking to replicate his New York experiences back in his hometown. That’s when he discovered the abandoned radio tower on Yerba Buena Island and began researching its history. It was built by the military in 1917 to direct ships through San Francisco Bay. Later, it guided aircraft during World War II and served as an officers club. After the Loma Prieta earthquake struck in 1989, the building was sealed shut. Until Ashton-Gonzalez found a way to sneak inside.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10900505\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalTowerHistoric.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-10900505 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalTowerHistoric-800x568.jpg\" alt=\"Navy signal corpsman F.R. English at the berth board receiving instruction from Chief Signalman Stanley Jones. The operations of the signal tower were military secrets until Dec 27th, 1945. One of the towers of the Bay Bridge's western span is visible in the background.\" width=\"800\" height=\"568\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalTowerHistoric-800x568.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalTowerHistoric-400x284.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalTowerHistoric.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalTowerHistoric-1180x838.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalTowerHistoric-960x682.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Navy signal corpsman F.R. English at the berth board receiving instruction from Chief Signalman Stanley Jones. The operations of the signal tower were military secrets until Dec. 27, 1945. One of the towers of the Bay Bridge's western span is visible in the background. \u003ccite>(Save the Signal Tower/Facebook)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Working with a small group of artists and urban explorers, he repaired and resupplied the tower. He installed tiny exhibits detailing the island’s history -- as an Indian burial site, as a smugglers’ haven and as a listening post for the military. He’s also staged dozens of secret events -- from small concerts and poetry readings to panel discussions and plotting sessions -- making this location the most exclusive (or certainly the most restricted) nighttime venue in the Bay Area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Events here are free (unless food is being served) and typically involve 15 or 20 people who are invited by previous guests. Eugene says that protects against what he calls \"cool hunters.\" On my visit I nibbled on plates of smoked lamb, while a group of storytellers recounted old family yarns and Oakland-based musician Alycia Lang sang her tender songs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ashton-Gonzalez says the tower’s wooden construction, combined with traffic noise from the Bay Bridge, provides an acoustic camouflage that protects his events from the scrutiny of police and private security (so far not a single happening has been raided).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>All this cultural commotion caught the eye of San Francisco writer Gary Kamiya, who \u003ca href=\"http://www.modernluxury.com/san-francisco/story/the-unkillable-arts-underground\" target=\"_blank\">visited the tower earlier this year\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When you see a site like that, you cannot be intellectually prepared for it,” he says. “It’s so stunning.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10900551\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalView.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-10900551 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalView-800x519.jpg\" alt=\"The view from the Signal Room looking across the western span of the Bay Bridge toward San Francisco.\" width=\"800\" height=\"519\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalView-800x519.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalView-400x259.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalView.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalView-1180x765.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalView-960x623.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The view from the Signal Room looking across the western span of the Bay Bridge toward San Francisco. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Eugene Ashton-Gonzalez)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Kamiya says the work of Ashton-Gonzalez and others is proof that an underground countercultural scene is still vibrant in San Francisco in spite of a tech boom that has driven many artists from the city. He says it’s a tradition that began decades ago with groups like the \u003ca href=\"http://www.suicideclub.com/\" target=\"_blank\">Suicide Club\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"http://www.cacophony.org/\" target=\"_blank\">Cacophony Society\u003c/a>. They used tunnels, bridges, sewers and civic buildings as a kind of illicit stage set.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That’s why people like Eugene describe themselves as 'experience designers,' ” Kamiya says. “It's not that you're going to design a play or a piece of music. You're going to design an experience. And ideally it will be an intense experience. So when you go up into an abandoned old room with one of the greatest views in the world with a group of strangers, you've succeeded in doing that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">If all of this is such a big secret, why talk about it to a reporter?\u003cbr>\n'I want to save the building,' he says.\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>Another fan of the Signal Room is John Law. He joined the Cacophony Society in the 1980s and was a co-founder of Burning Man (he later broke with the festival).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“To me the whole thing about urban exploration -- and the best thing about it -- is that it's a connection with the past and it's really ephemeral,” Law says. “And Eugene, finding this space and understanding what it was and giving it a last breath of life, that's brilliant.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At this point you’re probably wondering something. If all of this is such a big secret, why is Ashton-Gonzalez talking about it to a reporter?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I want to save the building,” he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Preservation isn’t what motivated him at the beginning. He admits that when he first discovered the tower all he wanted to do was have a huge party. But he’s come to see the space as something more than a speakeasy on life support. It’s a San Francisco landmark, albeit a hidden one.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10900627\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalPath.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-10900627 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalPath-800x493.jpg\" alt=\"“Experience designer” Eugene Ashton-Gonzalez leads guests along a trail to the Signal Room. \" width=\"800\" height=\"493\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalPath-800x493.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalPath-400x247.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalPath.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalPath-1180x728.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalPath-960x592.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">'Experience designer' Eugene Ashton-Gonzalez leads guests along a trail to the Signal Room. \u003ccite>(Mona Caron)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“This place seems so uniquely special,” he says. “Could you put a little museum up here? Could you put a little exhibition space for public art, street art, sculpture?\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Recently, Ashton-Gonzalez assembled a team of architects and began a quiet lobbying effort to save the building.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s sublime in the truest sense,” says Bruce Tomb, a San Francisco-based architect who helped transform a former Army outpost in Marin County into the Headlands Center for the Arts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The view is priceless. And to have an artifact in that location is an opportunity to talk about our heritage.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ashton-Gonzalez says he brought city officials to the tower but he declined to identify them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They were pretty much to a man and woman quite impressed,” he says, but “a little curious about the bureaucratic jumps and hoops that would be required” to save the tower.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10900645\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/Rupa.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-10900645 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/Rupa-800x533.jpg\" alt=\"The band Rupa & The April Fishes performs at the Signal Room.\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/Rupa-800x533.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/Rupa-400x267.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/Rupa-1180x787.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/Rupa-960x640.jpg 960w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/Rupa.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The band Rupa & the April Fishes performs at the Signal Room. \u003ccite>(Jason LeCras/San Francisco Magazine)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Officials from the Treasure Island Development Authority confirmed that the tower is slated for demolition in May as part of a plan to bring hotels and luxury condos to the twin islands. With that in mind, Ashton-Gonzalez is stepping into the spotlight, knowing that more publicity could bring an end to his secret gatherings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But he doesn’t care. He says it’s time for all of San Francisco to share the story of the Signal Room.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Eugene Ashton-Gonzalez is a transmedia storytelling artist and director of \u003ca href=\"http://eatmyheartout.org\">Eat My Heart Out \u003c/a>[\u003ca href=\"http://eatmyheartout.org\">eatmyheartout.org\u003c/a>] , a private storytelling dinner party for KWMR community radio in West Marin.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>On a recent evening I joined a group of strangers on a twilight tour of San Francisco’s Yerba Buena Island. This wasn’t your typical urban outing. First, consider our guide, an artist named Eugene Ashton-Gonzalez. He’s wearing a tattered nautical jacket and a two-day beard. He’s confiscated our cellphones and placed them in a heavy briefcase.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Then there’s our stealthy, guerrilla-style approach. Ashton-Gonzalez leads us across a small beach, around a clump of trees and up a steep trail. As we pass rows of empty military homes, he orders us to take cover while a private security guard passes nearby. We’ve entered a restricted area that is scheduled for demolition.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Step lightly,” he whispers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cdiv class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__shortcodes__shortcodeWrapper'>\n \u003ciframe width='100%' height='166'\n scrolling='no' frameborder='no'\n src='https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/252914190&visual=true&color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false'\n title='https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/252914190'>\n \u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/div>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the top of the island we dart across a small parking lot to reach our destination -- a lonely wooden tower. Ashton-Gonzalez delivers us through a secret passage and up a darkened staircase to the top floor.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s when our collective jaws drop. It’s as if we’ve entered the bridge of a giant ship anchored grandly in the middle of the bay. Jutting \u003cem>beneath\u003c/em> us are the white towers of the Bay Bridge. And shimmering all around are the lights of San Francisco, Oakland, Berkeley and beyond.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10900553\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalGroup.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-10900553 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalGroup-800x533.jpg\" alt=\"Events here are free unless food is served, and typically involve 15 or 20 people invited by previous guests. \" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalGroup-800x533.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalGroup-400x267.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalGroup.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalGroup-1180x787.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalGroup-960x640.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Events here are free unless food is served, and typically involve 15 or 20 people invited by previous guests. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Mona Caron)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Welcome to the \u003ca href=\"https://www.facebook.com/thesignalroom/\">Signal Room\u003c/a>. It’s a rogue museum and a modern-day speakeasy, except that the illicit part of the experience is not what you drink, but how you get in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ashton-Gonzalez created the Signal Room last year after returning from a few years in New York City. He was moonlighting as an actor and storyteller, and conspiring with a group of urban explorers and trespassers. Their rogue pop-up projects included running a bar in an abandoned water tower in Manhattan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ashton-Gonzalez was looking to replicate his New York experiences back in his hometown. That’s when he discovered the abandoned radio tower on Yerba Buena Island and began researching its history. It was built by the military in 1917 to direct ships through San Francisco Bay. Later, it guided aircraft during World War II and served as an officers club. After the Loma Prieta earthquake struck in 1989, the building was sealed shut. Until Ashton-Gonzalez found a way to sneak inside.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10900505\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalTowerHistoric.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-10900505 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalTowerHistoric-800x568.jpg\" alt=\"Navy signal corpsman F.R. English at the berth board receiving instruction from Chief Signalman Stanley Jones. The operations of the signal tower were military secrets until Dec 27th, 1945. One of the towers of the Bay Bridge's western span is visible in the background.\" width=\"800\" height=\"568\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalTowerHistoric-800x568.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalTowerHistoric-400x284.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalTowerHistoric.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalTowerHistoric-1180x838.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalTowerHistoric-960x682.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Navy signal corpsman F.R. English at the berth board receiving instruction from Chief Signalman Stanley Jones. The operations of the signal tower were military secrets until Dec. 27, 1945. One of the towers of the Bay Bridge's western span is visible in the background. \u003ccite>(Save the Signal Tower/Facebook)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Working with a small group of artists and urban explorers, he repaired and resupplied the tower. He installed tiny exhibits detailing the island’s history -- as an Indian burial site, as a smugglers’ haven and as a listening post for the military. He’s also staged dozens of secret events -- from small concerts and poetry readings to panel discussions and plotting sessions -- making this location the most exclusive (or certainly the most restricted) nighttime venue in the Bay Area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Events here are free (unless food is being served) and typically involve 15 or 20 people who are invited by previous guests. Eugene says that protects against what he calls \"cool hunters.\" On my visit I nibbled on plates of smoked lamb, while a group of storytellers recounted old family yarns and Oakland-based musician Alycia Lang sang her tender songs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ashton-Gonzalez says the tower’s wooden construction, combined with traffic noise from the Bay Bridge, provides an acoustic camouflage that protects his events from the scrutiny of police and private security (so far not a single happening has been raided).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>All this cultural commotion caught the eye of San Francisco writer Gary Kamiya, who \u003ca href=\"http://www.modernluxury.com/san-francisco/story/the-unkillable-arts-underground\" target=\"_blank\">visited the tower earlier this year\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When you see a site like that, you cannot be intellectually prepared for it,” he says. “It’s so stunning.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10900551\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalView.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-10900551 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalView-800x519.jpg\" alt=\"The view from the Signal Room looking across the western span of the Bay Bridge toward San Francisco.\" width=\"800\" height=\"519\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalView-800x519.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalView-400x259.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalView.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalView-1180x765.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalView-960x623.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The view from the Signal Room looking across the western span of the Bay Bridge toward San Francisco. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Eugene Ashton-Gonzalez)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Kamiya says the work of Ashton-Gonzalez and others is proof that an underground countercultural scene is still vibrant in San Francisco in spite of a tech boom that has driven many artists from the city. He says it’s a tradition that began decades ago with groups like the \u003ca href=\"http://www.suicideclub.com/\" target=\"_blank\">Suicide Club\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"http://www.cacophony.org/\" target=\"_blank\">Cacophony Society\u003c/a>. They used tunnels, bridges, sewers and civic buildings as a kind of illicit stage set.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That’s why people like Eugene describe themselves as 'experience designers,' ” Kamiya says. “It's not that you're going to design a play or a piece of music. You're going to design an experience. And ideally it will be an intense experience. So when you go up into an abandoned old room with one of the greatest views in the world with a group of strangers, you've succeeded in doing that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">If all of this is such a big secret, why talk about it to a reporter?\u003cbr>\n'I want to save the building,' he says.\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>Another fan of the Signal Room is John Law. He joined the Cacophony Society in the 1980s and was a co-founder of Burning Man (he later broke with the festival).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“To me the whole thing about urban exploration -- and the best thing about it -- is that it's a connection with the past and it's really ephemeral,” Law says. “And Eugene, finding this space and understanding what it was and giving it a last breath of life, that's brilliant.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At this point you’re probably wondering something. If all of this is such a big secret, why is Ashton-Gonzalez talking about it to a reporter?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I want to save the building,” he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Preservation isn’t what motivated him at the beginning. He admits that when he first discovered the tower all he wanted to do was have a huge party. But he’s come to see the space as something more than a speakeasy on life support. It’s a San Francisco landmark, albeit a hidden one.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10900627\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalPath.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-10900627 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalPath-800x493.jpg\" alt=\"“Experience designer” Eugene Ashton-Gonzalez leads guests along a trail to the Signal Room. \" width=\"800\" height=\"493\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalPath-800x493.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalPath-400x247.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalPath.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalPath-1180x728.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/SignalPath-960x592.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">'Experience designer' Eugene Ashton-Gonzalez leads guests along a trail to the Signal Room. \u003ccite>(Mona Caron)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“This place seems so uniquely special,” he says. “Could you put a little museum up here? Could you put a little exhibition space for public art, street art, sculpture?\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Recently, Ashton-Gonzalez assembled a team of architects and began a quiet lobbying effort to save the building.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s sublime in the truest sense,” says Bruce Tomb, a San Francisco-based architect who helped transform a former Army outpost in Marin County into the Headlands Center for the Arts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The view is priceless. And to have an artifact in that location is an opportunity to talk about our heritage.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ashton-Gonzalez says he brought city officials to the tower but he declined to identify them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They were pretty much to a man and woman quite impressed,” he says, but “a little curious about the bureaucratic jumps and hoops that would be required” to save the tower.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10900645\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/Rupa.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-10900645 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/Rupa-800x533.jpg\" alt=\"The band Rupa & The April Fishes performs at the Signal Room.\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/Rupa-800x533.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/Rupa-400x267.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/Rupa-1180x787.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/Rupa-960x640.jpg 960w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/Rupa.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The band Rupa & the April Fishes performs at the Signal Room. \u003ccite>(Jason LeCras/San Francisco Magazine)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Officials from the Treasure Island Development Authority confirmed that the tower is slated for demolition in May as part of a plan to bring hotels and luxury condos to the twin islands. With that in mind, Ashton-Gonzalez is stepping into the spotlight, knowing that more publicity could bring an end to his secret gatherings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But he doesn’t care. He says it’s time for all of San Francisco to share the story of the Signal Room.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Eugene Ashton-Gonzalez is a transmedia storytelling artist and director of \u003ca href=\"http://eatmyheartout.org\">Eat My Heart Out \u003c/a>[\u003ca href=\"http://eatmyheartout.org\">eatmyheartout.org\u003c/a>] , a private storytelling dinner party for KWMR community radio in West Marin.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "New Book Explores Woody Guthrie's Formative L.A. Years",
"headTitle": "The California Report | KQED News",
"content": "\u003cp>The great American songwriter Woody Guthrie is usually associated with his home state of Oklahoma and the folk scene of New York City’s Greenwich Village. But it was his time in L.A. that helped define his politics. Those years are the subject of a new book, “\u003ca href=\"http://www.angelcitypress.com/products/guth\">Woody Guthrie L.A., 1937 to 1941\u003c/a>,” co-edited by historians Darryl Holter and William Deverell.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[soundcloud url=\"https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/252910261\" params=\"color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false\" width=\"100%\" height=\"166\" iframe=\"true\" /]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Guthrie came from a middle-class family in Okemah, Oklahoma. His mother had Huntington's disease, which he eventually succumbed to as well, and she was committed to a state hospital. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Guthrie was pretty much on his own after the age of 16. He learned to play guitar in high school and performed old-time music with friends in a group called “The Corncob Trio.” He learned hundreds of hillbilly and folk songs, and began writing his own compositions about the dust storms that were driving families from their land in the Great Plains.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After hopping freight trains and doing itinerant work in Pampa, Texas, the young musician landed in Los Angeles, along with tens of thousands of other Dust Bowl refugees. But he learned that living in L.A. isn’t cheap, as he explored in his song \u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-qCpFn1iIqk\">\"Do Re Mi.\"\u003c/a>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>California is a garden of Eden, a paradise to live in or see;\u003cbr>\nBut believe it or not, you won't find it so hot\u003cbr>\nIf you ain't got the do re mi.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10900488\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-10900488 size-full\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18827_43051-SlowTrainThroughCA_WGdrawing-qut.jpg\" alt=\"Woody Guthrie wrote, illustrated, and bound a pamphlet that included his eyewitness observations of Depression-era California.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1504\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18827_43051-SlowTrainThroughCA_WGdrawing-qut.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18827_43051-SlowTrainThroughCA_WGdrawing-qut-400x313.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18827_43051-SlowTrainThroughCA_WGdrawing-qut-800x627.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18827_43051-SlowTrainThroughCA_WGdrawing-qut-1180x924.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18827_43051-SlowTrainThroughCA_WGdrawing-qut-960x752.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Woody Guthrie wrote, illustrated and bound a pamphlet that included his eyewitness observations of Depression-era California. \u003ccite>(Woody Guthrie Archive/Woody Guthrie Center)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“Woody was someone who read a lot of things and he was always interested in things, but his politics were relatively unformed when he came,” says Holter. “He came from places that were basically steeped in segregation. So it was a very different atmosphere, and he came to L.A. and a lot of his political views really changed. I describe him as a kind of a Dust Bowl populist.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Guthrie never had a permanent address in Los Angeles. He crashed with friends in Echo Park and Glendale, and stayed in flophouses on Skid Row, where he also busked in cafes and bars and on streetcorners for spare change.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the summer of 1937, Woody and his cousin, Leon “Oke” Guthrie, were hired to host the “Oklahoma and Woody Show” on L.A. radio station KFVD. A couple months later, Guthrie launched “The Woody and Lefty Lou Show” with Maxine Crissman, the daughter of a friend. He called her “Lefty Lou” because she was left-handed and because Lou rhymed with \"Missou,\" her home state of Missouri. They received nearly 500 fan letters within the show’s first month, and it became the highest-rated show on the station.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10900481\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-10900481 size-full\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18825_47011-WoodyLeftyLou-qut-1.jpg\" alt=\"Maxine “Lefty Lou” Crissman and Woody Guthrie promote their Woody and Lefty Lou radio show on Los Angeles’s KFVD, ca. 1937.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1299\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18825_47011-WoodyLeftyLou-qut-1.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18825_47011-WoodyLeftyLou-qut-1-400x271.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18825_47011-WoodyLeftyLou-qut-1-800x541.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18825_47011-WoodyLeftyLou-qut-1-1180x798.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18825_47011-WoodyLeftyLou-qut-1-960x650.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Maxine 'Lefty Lou' Crissman and Woody Guthrie promote their radio show on Los Angeles’s KFVD, ca. 1937.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“The show became very popular, particularly among the Dust Bowl population that lived in L.A.,” Holter says. “Even if you were poor you could listen to the radio. And a lot of letters came in, and Guthrie became sort of a minor radio celebrity.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 1939, Woody met Ed Robbin, a fellow radio host at KFVD, who got him a gig singing at a Communist Party rally at the Embassy Auditorium in downtown L.A. Guthrie became a fixture among L.A.’s radical left and performed at many political and union events around Los Angeles. He also wrote a column for the Communist newspaper People’s Daily World. He called it “Woody Sez,” and wrote in a hillbilly style to seem more authentic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Woody Guthrie is a very shrewd political actor,” Deverell says. “On the one hand, we might assume -- and that could be right -- that he's surprised by his rising success and fame. On the other hand, it may be in part cultivated by his own sense of a persona. So he's very clever about identifying as just folks.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Guthrie visited Dust Bowlers in their encampments, which were nicknamed \"Hoovervilles.\" For these migrants, the big city held plenty of danger.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When they came to L.A., I mean this is a whole new experience. Not only was it big, noisy, full of cars, full of people, but also you could buy liquor all over, it wasn't dry. There were all kinds of temptations. You could buy your cars on credit. You could buy furniture on credit and lose it as well,” Holter says, citing Guthrie's song \u003cem>“\u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xqg6k1hVCFw\">\u003cem>Them Big City Ways.\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem>”\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Brother John moved into town, rented him a flat and he settled down\u003cbr>\nLord lord, he’s getting them big city ways.\u003cbr>\nBrought his wife and kids along, but fifteen dollars didn’t last long\u003cbr>\nLord lord, he’s getting them big city ways.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Guthrie also traveled around the Golden State. He performed political skits with actor Will Geer to support strikers in the cotton fields of Kern County and got arrested at the state capital in Sacramento. He performed for migrant farmworkers in the San Joaquin Valley. He met the writers John Steinbeck and Theodore Dreiser. Guthrie’s songs addressed issues of inequality that were amplified by the Depression, and are still relevant today.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10900485\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg class=\"size-full wp-image-10900485\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18826_43021-WoodyGuthrie_Singing_Shafter_FLCamp-qut.jpg\" alt=\"Woody Guthrie singing at Shafter Labor Camp, 1941.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1919\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18826_43021-WoodyGuthrie_Singing_Shafter_FLCamp-qut.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18826_43021-WoodyGuthrie_Singing_Shafter_FLCamp-qut-400x400.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18826_43021-WoodyGuthrie_Singing_Shafter_FLCamp-qut-800x800.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18826_43021-WoodyGuthrie_Singing_Shafter_FLCamp-qut-1180x1179.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18826_43021-WoodyGuthrie_Singing_Shafter_FLCamp-qut-960x960.jpg 960w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18826_43021-WoodyGuthrie_Singing_Shafter_FLCamp-qut-32x32.jpg 32w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18826_43021-WoodyGuthrie_Singing_Shafter_FLCamp-qut-64x64.jpg 64w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18826_43021-WoodyGuthrie_Singing_Shafter_FLCamp-qut-96x96.jpg 96w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18826_43021-WoodyGuthrie_Singing_Shafter_FLCamp-qut-128x128.jpg 128w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18826_43021-WoodyGuthrie_Singing_Shafter_FLCamp-qut-75x75.jpg 75w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Woody Guthrie singing at Shafter Labor Camp, 1941. \u003ccite>(Seema Weatherwax)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“Things like police-community relations. Things like unemployment. Things like poverty. Things like homelessness. Things like really heavy rainfalls and people getting swept away by the L.A. River,” Holter says. “Things about love, things about sex, the same kinds of things we talk about today. And it's a kind of timelessness to the themes of his songs.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Song's like \u003cem> “\u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXRT-5rL8z8\">\u003cem>Los Angeles New Year's Flood:\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem>” \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Kind friend, do you remember?\u003cbr>\nOn that fatal New Year's night\u003cbr>\nThe lights of old Los Angeles\u003cbr>\nWas a flick'ring, Oh, so bright.\u003cbr>\nA cloud burst hit the mountains\u003cbr>\nIt swept away our homes;\u003cbr>\nAnd a hundred souls was taken\u003cbr>\nIn that fatal New Year's flood.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The L.A. River, in the early years of the Depression, it takes a heavy, heavy rainfall and it floods its banks. And many of those Okie and Arkie out-migrants from the Dust Bowl were living in encampments alongside the river. And they get washed away. Or at least their possessions get washed away,” Deverell says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Woody Guthrie and his family left Los Angeles in 1939 and moved to New York, where he wrote “This Land Is Your Land” as a response to Kate Smith’s then-current hit “God Bless America.” The authors of the new book say Guthrie’s experiences in Los Angeles inspired what would become America’s “other” national anthem.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Guthrie eventually wrote some 3,000 songs, although we have the score for only about half of them. He’d revisit some songs and modify the lyrics, reflecting his own changing political ideas. For example, one stanza of “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wxiMrvDbq3s\">\u003cem>This Land Is Your Land\u003c/em>\u003c/a>” often gets left out:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>As I went walking I saw a sign there\u003cbr>\nAnd on the sign it said \"No Trespassing.\"\u003cbr>\nBut on the other side it didn't say nothing,\u003cbr>\nThat side was made for you and me.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wxiMrvDbq3s\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Guthrie eventually became a hero to the burgeoning folk scene of the 1960s and a mentor to musicians like Pete Seeger, Phil Ochs, Ramblin' Jack Elliott and Bob Dylan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Guthrie died in 1967. Interestingly, his ghost keeps popping up in the 2016 presidential election. When Democratic candidate Bernie Sanders campaigned in Oklahoma last month, he made sure to stop by the Woody Guthrie Center in downtown Tulsa. Sanders has been a longtime fan of Guthrie’s music, even covering “This Land Is Your Land” nearly 30 years ago. And at an Iowa rally earlier this year, he hummed along to the tune onstage with Vampire Weekend.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s not the only connection to the 2016 campaign. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Earlier this year, \u003ca href=\"http://www.nytimes.com/politics/first-draft/2016/01/25/woody-guthrie-sang-of-his-contempt-for-his-landlord-donald-trumps-father/\" target=\"_blank\">an archivist found in Guthrie’s notebooks some nasty things he’d written about Fred Trump\u003c/a>, the father of Republican front-runner Donald Trump. Guthrie rented an apartment in Brooklyn belonging to Trump for two years. And Guthrie wrote angrily about what he called racist housing practices by the real estate mogul, specifically about the lack of diversity among the residents of Trump’s Beach Haven apartments.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>The great American songwriter Woody Guthrie is usually associated with his home state of Oklahoma and the folk scene of New York City’s Greenwich Village. But it was his time in L.A. that helped define his politics. Those years are the subject of a new book, “\u003ca href=\"http://www.angelcitypress.com/products/guth\">Woody Guthrie L.A., 1937 to 1941\u003c/a>,” co-edited by historians Darryl Holter and William Deverell.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cdiv class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__shortcodes__shortcodeWrapper'>\n \u003ciframe width='100%' height='166'\n scrolling='no' frameborder='no'\n src='https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/252910261&visual=true&color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false'\n title='https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/252910261'>\n \u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/div>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Guthrie came from a middle-class family in Okemah, Oklahoma. His mother had Huntington's disease, which he eventually succumbed to as well, and she was committed to a state hospital. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Guthrie was pretty much on his own after the age of 16. He learned to play guitar in high school and performed old-time music with friends in a group called “The Corncob Trio.” He learned hundreds of hillbilly and folk songs, and began writing his own compositions about the dust storms that were driving families from their land in the Great Plains.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After hopping freight trains and doing itinerant work in Pampa, Texas, the young musician landed in Los Angeles, along with tens of thousands of other Dust Bowl refugees. But he learned that living in L.A. isn’t cheap, as he explored in his song \u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-qCpFn1iIqk\">\"Do Re Mi.\"\u003c/a>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>California is a garden of Eden, a paradise to live in or see;\u003cbr>\nBut believe it or not, you won't find it so hot\u003cbr>\nIf you ain't got the do re mi.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10900488\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-10900488 size-full\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18827_43051-SlowTrainThroughCA_WGdrawing-qut.jpg\" alt=\"Woody Guthrie wrote, illustrated, and bound a pamphlet that included his eyewitness observations of Depression-era California.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1504\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18827_43051-SlowTrainThroughCA_WGdrawing-qut.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18827_43051-SlowTrainThroughCA_WGdrawing-qut-400x313.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18827_43051-SlowTrainThroughCA_WGdrawing-qut-800x627.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18827_43051-SlowTrainThroughCA_WGdrawing-qut-1180x924.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18827_43051-SlowTrainThroughCA_WGdrawing-qut-960x752.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Woody Guthrie wrote, illustrated and bound a pamphlet that included his eyewitness observations of Depression-era California. \u003ccite>(Woody Guthrie Archive/Woody Guthrie Center)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“Woody was someone who read a lot of things and he was always interested in things, but his politics were relatively unformed when he came,” says Holter. “He came from places that were basically steeped in segregation. So it was a very different atmosphere, and he came to L.A. and a lot of his political views really changed. I describe him as a kind of a Dust Bowl populist.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Guthrie never had a permanent address in Los Angeles. He crashed with friends in Echo Park and Glendale, and stayed in flophouses on Skid Row, where he also busked in cafes and bars and on streetcorners for spare change.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the summer of 1937, Woody and his cousin, Leon “Oke” Guthrie, were hired to host the “Oklahoma and Woody Show” on L.A. radio station KFVD. A couple months later, Guthrie launched “The Woody and Lefty Lou Show” with Maxine Crissman, the daughter of a friend. He called her “Lefty Lou” because she was left-handed and because Lou rhymed with \"Missou,\" her home state of Missouri. They received nearly 500 fan letters within the show’s first month, and it became the highest-rated show on the station.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10900481\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-10900481 size-full\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18825_47011-WoodyLeftyLou-qut-1.jpg\" alt=\"Maxine “Lefty Lou” Crissman and Woody Guthrie promote their Woody and Lefty Lou radio show on Los Angeles’s KFVD, ca. 1937.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1299\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18825_47011-WoodyLeftyLou-qut-1.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18825_47011-WoodyLeftyLou-qut-1-400x271.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18825_47011-WoodyLeftyLou-qut-1-800x541.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18825_47011-WoodyLeftyLou-qut-1-1180x798.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18825_47011-WoodyLeftyLou-qut-1-960x650.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Maxine 'Lefty Lou' Crissman and Woody Guthrie promote their radio show on Los Angeles’s KFVD, ca. 1937.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“The show became very popular, particularly among the Dust Bowl population that lived in L.A.,” Holter says. “Even if you were poor you could listen to the radio. And a lot of letters came in, and Guthrie became sort of a minor radio celebrity.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 1939, Woody met Ed Robbin, a fellow radio host at KFVD, who got him a gig singing at a Communist Party rally at the Embassy Auditorium in downtown L.A. Guthrie became a fixture among L.A.’s radical left and performed at many political and union events around Los Angeles. He also wrote a column for the Communist newspaper People’s Daily World. He called it “Woody Sez,” and wrote in a hillbilly style to seem more authentic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Woody Guthrie is a very shrewd political actor,” Deverell says. “On the one hand, we might assume -- and that could be right -- that he's surprised by his rising success and fame. On the other hand, it may be in part cultivated by his own sense of a persona. So he's very clever about identifying as just folks.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Guthrie visited Dust Bowlers in their encampments, which were nicknamed \"Hoovervilles.\" For these migrants, the big city held plenty of danger.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When they came to L.A., I mean this is a whole new experience. Not only was it big, noisy, full of cars, full of people, but also you could buy liquor all over, it wasn't dry. There were all kinds of temptations. You could buy your cars on credit. You could buy furniture on credit and lose it as well,” Holter says, citing Guthrie's song \u003cem>“\u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xqg6k1hVCFw\">\u003cem>Them Big City Ways.\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem>”\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Brother John moved into town, rented him a flat and he settled down\u003cbr>\nLord lord, he’s getting them big city ways.\u003cbr>\nBrought his wife and kids along, but fifteen dollars didn’t last long\u003cbr>\nLord lord, he’s getting them big city ways.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Guthrie also traveled around the Golden State. He performed political skits with actor Will Geer to support strikers in the cotton fields of Kern County and got arrested at the state capital in Sacramento. He performed for migrant farmworkers in the San Joaquin Valley. He met the writers John Steinbeck and Theodore Dreiser. Guthrie’s songs addressed issues of inequality that were amplified by the Depression, and are still relevant today.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10900485\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg class=\"size-full wp-image-10900485\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18826_43021-WoodyGuthrie_Singing_Shafter_FLCamp-qut.jpg\" alt=\"Woody Guthrie singing at Shafter Labor Camp, 1941.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1919\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18826_43021-WoodyGuthrie_Singing_Shafter_FLCamp-qut.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18826_43021-WoodyGuthrie_Singing_Shafter_FLCamp-qut-400x400.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18826_43021-WoodyGuthrie_Singing_Shafter_FLCamp-qut-800x800.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18826_43021-WoodyGuthrie_Singing_Shafter_FLCamp-qut-1180x1179.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18826_43021-WoodyGuthrie_Singing_Shafter_FLCamp-qut-960x960.jpg 960w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18826_43021-WoodyGuthrie_Singing_Shafter_FLCamp-qut-32x32.jpg 32w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18826_43021-WoodyGuthrie_Singing_Shafter_FLCamp-qut-64x64.jpg 64w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18826_43021-WoodyGuthrie_Singing_Shafter_FLCamp-qut-96x96.jpg 96w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18826_43021-WoodyGuthrie_Singing_Shafter_FLCamp-qut-128x128.jpg 128w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/RS18826_43021-WoodyGuthrie_Singing_Shafter_FLCamp-qut-75x75.jpg 75w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Woody Guthrie singing at Shafter Labor Camp, 1941. \u003ccite>(Seema Weatherwax)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“Things like police-community relations. Things like unemployment. Things like poverty. Things like homelessness. Things like really heavy rainfalls and people getting swept away by the L.A. River,” Holter says. “Things about love, things about sex, the same kinds of things we talk about today. And it's a kind of timelessness to the themes of his songs.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Song's like \u003cem> “\u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXRT-5rL8z8\">\u003cem>Los Angeles New Year's Flood:\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem>” \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Kind friend, do you remember?\u003cbr>\nOn that fatal New Year's night\u003cbr>\nThe lights of old Los Angeles\u003cbr>\nWas a flick'ring, Oh, so bright.\u003cbr>\nA cloud burst hit the mountains\u003cbr>\nIt swept away our homes;\u003cbr>\nAnd a hundred souls was taken\u003cbr>\nIn that fatal New Year's flood.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The L.A. River, in the early years of the Depression, it takes a heavy, heavy rainfall and it floods its banks. And many of those Okie and Arkie out-migrants from the Dust Bowl were living in encampments alongside the river. And they get washed away. Or at least their possessions get washed away,” Deverell says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Woody Guthrie and his family left Los Angeles in 1939 and moved to New York, where he wrote “This Land Is Your Land” as a response to Kate Smith’s then-current hit “God Bless America.” The authors of the new book say Guthrie’s experiences in Los Angeles inspired what would become America’s “other” national anthem.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Guthrie eventually wrote some 3,000 songs, although we have the score for only about half of them. He’d revisit some songs and modify the lyrics, reflecting his own changing political ideas. For example, one stanza of “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wxiMrvDbq3s\">\u003cem>This Land Is Your Land\u003c/em>\u003c/a>” often gets left out:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>As I went walking I saw a sign there\u003cbr>\nAnd on the sign it said \"No Trespassing.\"\u003cbr>\nBut on the other side it didn't say nothing,\u003cbr>\nThat side was made for you and me.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/wxiMrvDbq3s'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/wxiMrvDbq3s'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Guthrie eventually became a hero to the burgeoning folk scene of the 1960s and a mentor to musicians like Pete Seeger, Phil Ochs, Ramblin' Jack Elliott and Bob Dylan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Guthrie died in 1967. Interestingly, his ghost keeps popping up in the 2016 presidential election. When Democratic candidate Bernie Sanders campaigned in Oklahoma last month, he made sure to stop by the Woody Guthrie Center in downtown Tulsa. Sanders has been a longtime fan of Guthrie’s music, even covering “This Land Is Your Land” nearly 30 years ago. And at an Iowa rally earlier this year, he hummed along to the tune onstage with Vampire Weekend.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s not the only connection to the 2016 campaign. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Earlier this year, \u003ca href=\"http://www.nytimes.com/politics/first-draft/2016/01/25/woody-guthrie-sang-of-his-contempt-for-his-landlord-donald-trumps-father/\" target=\"_blank\">an archivist found in Guthrie’s notebooks some nasty things he’d written about Fred Trump\u003c/a>, the father of Republican front-runner Donald Trump. Guthrie rented an apartment in Brooklyn belonging to Trump for two years. And Guthrie wrote angrily about what he called racist housing practices by the real estate mogul, specifically about the lack of diversity among the residents of Trump’s Beach Haven apartments.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"disqusTitle": "After 50 Years in L.A. Clubs, Singer Troy Walker Still Going Strong",
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"content": "\u003cp>It's the early '60s. It’s a Saturday night on the pre-hippie Sunset Strip. It’s a swinging scene, men in sharp suits, women in cocktail dresses. Everybody smokes. In a lounge called The Interlude, they’re squeezing in to see Troy Walker.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"I’d never imagined myself even having that much talent,” admits Walker. “I was just a singer and I liked showing off.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That inclination paid off for Walker, who was raised in Arizona. As a young boy, he first realized his divine gift of song during a Christmas worship service in his hometown of Phoenix.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignright\">'Mommy wanted a girl, Daddy wanted a boy, now they’re both happy. I played with it rather than let it bring me down. And it worked fine because I was never out of work, never have been.'\u003ccite>Troy Walker\u003c/cite>\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>“I remember on a Christmas cantata in church, our choir director Mr. Beasley had me sing ‘O Holy Night,’” Walker says. “I had a very high soprano voice. I sang it and I looked at my mother and she was crying and Mr. Beasley stood up and said, ‘God has sent us an angel.'\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He moved to Hollywood in 1958, “just to come out to Hollywood. I understood I could be a little freer, especially in my personal life, so I came out to Hollywood to see if that could happen.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"I walked into a bar on Hollywood Boulevard, and the young man behind the piano asked me if I could sing. I’d sing in school, so I said, ‘Yep,’ and he gave me the microphone and I sang a song. I was only 19. And the owner came over and asked me if I could come in every night and sing a couple songs and he’d give me 10 bucks.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[soundcloud url=\"https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/251447759\" params=\"color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false\" width=\"100%\" height=\"166\" iframe=\"true\" /]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“At the time I was downright broke, and I asked if I could get an advance because my rent was due. At that time it was nine bucks a week. He said, ‘Don’t try and con me, kid.’ I told him I’d be back the next night. That’s how it started, and it’s been that way ever since.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Walker was, to put it mildly, a very pretty boy, something that he learned to use to his advantage onstage. “My first line was, ‘My name’s Troy Walker and whatever you’re thinking, you’re right.’ It just worked for me,” he says. “‘Mommy wanted a girl, Daddy wanted a boy, now they’re both happy.’ I played with it rather than let it bring me down. And it worked fine because I was never out of work, never have been.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Flamboyant young Walker developed a set of current hits and standards recorded by artists he admired like Judy Garland, Johnny Ray and Johnny Mathis. His chops were formidable; his ability to sell a song and give his all to the crowd was immense. He released his first album in 1962. His second -- and last -- record came out two years later, and while neither took off, his reputation as a must-see live act flourished.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10896794\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-10896794 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TroyWalker2-800x942.jpg\" alt=\"Troy Walker was a very pretty boy, something he learned early on to use to his advantage onstage. “My first line was, ‘My name’s Troy Walker and whatever you’re thinking, you’re right,'" he says.\" width=\"800\" height=\"942\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TroyWalker2-800x942.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TroyWalker2-400x471.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TroyWalker2.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TroyWalker2-1180x1390.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TroyWalker2-960x1131.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Troy Walker was a very pretty boy, something he learned early on to use to his advantage onstage. “My first line was, ‘My name’s Troy Walker and whatever you’re thinking, you’re right,'\" he says. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>He was on fire, packing rooms and drawing names like Ricky Nelson, Natalie Wood, Ronald Reagan and Elvis himself. He shared the stage with everyone from Ella Fitzgerald to Pat Collins the Hip Hypnotist. He joked, he trash talked, he worked risque but never mean.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He was a dazzling, flamboyant attraction, meaning he was as openly gay as an act could be in those closeted times. But it wasn’t really camp, it was just who he was. And that was something that may have hindered his professional growth.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I often wondered why the big [career] push wasn’t made and I just kind of decided, well, nobody wanted at that time to affiliate themselves with a somewhat effete, somewhat maybe feminine man. It was that age.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Walker survived, playing all manner of nightspots. For years he was an attraction at the legendary Palomino Club in North Hollywood. “I became the headliner at the Palomino,” he states. “[Owner] Tommy Thomas called me and asked me to come and I said, ‘They’ll stone me,’ 'cause it was very country. But I wound up there for 17 years every Tuesday night.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And so it was that five years ago he began singing at Cody Bryant’s Viva Cantina, a Mexican restaurant in Burbank that’s become the singer’s monthly gig, backed by guitarist Bryant’s house band for the last five years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“So who does he draw?” asks Bryant. “For some people it’s a freak show, [there’s] some intelligentsia, some hipsters. He cuts a funny path across a lot of personality types. But he’s infinitely human, and that’s what translates to everybody.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That includes people like Jan Damiano, who go way back with Walker.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“He taught me to do the twist on Sunset Strip at the Interlude,” she says after a recent Walker set at the Cantina. “My husband and I went there and we learned the twist, and we were twisting everywhere, Miami and everywhere, but I learned from him. It’s a long time ago! He loves his audience. And that’s why people come back.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10896853\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TroyWalkerad.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-10896853 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TroyWalkerad-800x477.jpg\" alt=\"An advertisement for a 1981 Troy Walker performance well encapsulates the singer's approach to gender normativity.\" width=\"800\" height=\"477\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TroyWalkerad.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TroyWalkerad-400x239.jpg 400w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">An advertisement for a 1981 Troy Walker performance well encapsulates the singer's approach to gender normativity.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“I let them know I was there for them,” says Walker of his audience. “A lot of performers don’t project that. They don’t have that thing about letting them know you really are grateful they’re there, and that’s a feeling you have to have to be a good performer.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tom Kenny, the actor/comedian and voice of SpongeBob SquarePants, has been a Walker follower for years, catching him whenever he can. Like snowflakes and fingerprints, Walker’s sets are never the same.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You really never know what you’re going to get with Troy,” offers Kenny. “A lot of it seems to depend on what mood he’s in and what he’s going through and what songs are resonating with him on a given night, so the shows are kind of like a really long medley mash-up of the American songbook, with dirty jokes peppered in between. What’s not to like?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Walker uses no set list, but moves from song to song seemingly on a whim, rarely finishing anything. You might hear a chorus, a couple verses, and then it’s on to something else.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The music follows him,” says Damiano. “He goes where he wants, he segues on a word. He sails. He floats.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You have to kind of guess,” offers Bryant. “You have to listen, you have to make your ears go out 3 feet on the side of your head to figure out where in the hell he’s going to go. And to make him look good. You want him to look good.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10896846\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-10896846 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TomKenny-800x567.jpg\" alt='Actor Tom Kenny, voice of SpongeBob SquarePants, has been a Troy Walker fan for years calling his shows \"kind of like a really long medley mash-up of the American songbook, with dirty jokes peppered in between.\"' width=\"800\" height=\"567\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TomKenny-800x567.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TomKenny-400x284.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TomKenny.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TomKenny-1180x836.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TomKenny-960x681.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Actor Tom Kenny, voice of SpongeBob SquarePants, has been a Troy Walker fan for years, calling his shows \"kind of like a really long medley mash-up of the American songbook, with dirty jokes peppered in between.\" \u003ccite>(Brad Barket/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>And really, that’s the thing. Everybody’s rooting for Troy. He’s lovable. He’s impish. He’s a pussycat who’s had a lot of lives but no grand strategy for success. His 50-year career vision has never extended beyond the last set of the night.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I can’t say that I had a real plan,” Walker admits. “I just came to Hollywood and people asked me what I did and I said, ‘I’m a singer.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And he does it all for the nice people out there in the dark who have been filling the seats—or most of them—for this unique act that never ends.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They give a meaning to my life,” Walker says of his loyal followers. “They want me, even if nobody else does, and I guess that’s the way I qualify what I do. People have no idea, they lay things out like ego and selfishness, but it’s not that at all. If every night you get 20 or 30 minutes of this [he claps] and standing ovations periodically, and you say, “Wow. I’m worth something.' ”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On this Wednesday night in Burbank, for a handful of hipsters, drinkers and gray-haired women he’s turned briefly back into 25-year-olds, he’s worth a lot.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"I walked into a bar on Hollywood Boulevard, and the young man behind the piano asked me if I could sing. I’d sing in school, so I said, ‘Yep,’ and he gave me the microphone and I sang a song. I was only 19. And the owner came over and asked me if I could come in every night and sing a couple songs and he’d give me 10 bucks.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cdiv class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__shortcodes__shortcodeWrapper'>\n \u003ciframe width='100%' height='166'\n scrolling='no' frameborder='no'\n src='https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/251447759&visual=true&color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false'\n title='https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/251447759'>\n \u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/div>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“At the time I was downright broke, and I asked if I could get an advance because my rent was due. At that time it was nine bucks a week. He said, ‘Don’t try and con me, kid.’ I told him I’d be back the next night. That’s how it started, and it’s been that way ever since.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Walker was, to put it mildly, a very pretty boy, something that he learned to use to his advantage onstage. “My first line was, ‘My name’s Troy Walker and whatever you’re thinking, you’re right.’ It just worked for me,” he says. “‘Mommy wanted a girl, Daddy wanted a boy, now they’re both happy.’ I played with it rather than let it bring me down. And it worked fine because I was never out of work, never have been.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Flamboyant young Walker developed a set of current hits and standards recorded by artists he admired like Judy Garland, Johnny Ray and Johnny Mathis. His chops were formidable; his ability to sell a song and give his all to the crowd was immense. He released his first album in 1962. His second -- and last -- record came out two years later, and while neither took off, his reputation as a must-see live act flourished.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10896794\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-10896794 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TroyWalker2-800x942.jpg\" alt=\"Troy Walker was a very pretty boy, something he learned early on to use to his advantage onstage. “My first line was, ‘My name’s Troy Walker and whatever you’re thinking, you’re right,'" he says.\" width=\"800\" height=\"942\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TroyWalker2-800x942.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TroyWalker2-400x471.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TroyWalker2.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TroyWalker2-1180x1390.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TroyWalker2-960x1131.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Troy Walker was a very pretty boy, something he learned early on to use to his advantage onstage. “My first line was, ‘My name’s Troy Walker and whatever you’re thinking, you’re right,'\" he says. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>He was on fire, packing rooms and drawing names like Ricky Nelson, Natalie Wood, Ronald Reagan and Elvis himself. He shared the stage with everyone from Ella Fitzgerald to Pat Collins the Hip Hypnotist. He joked, he trash talked, he worked risque but never mean.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He was a dazzling, flamboyant attraction, meaning he was as openly gay as an act could be in those closeted times. But it wasn’t really camp, it was just who he was. And that was something that may have hindered his professional growth.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I often wondered why the big [career] push wasn’t made and I just kind of decided, well, nobody wanted at that time to affiliate themselves with a somewhat effete, somewhat maybe feminine man. It was that age.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Walker survived, playing all manner of nightspots. For years he was an attraction at the legendary Palomino Club in North Hollywood. “I became the headliner at the Palomino,” he states. “[Owner] Tommy Thomas called me and asked me to come and I said, ‘They’ll stone me,’ 'cause it was very country. But I wound up there for 17 years every Tuesday night.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And so it was that five years ago he began singing at Cody Bryant’s Viva Cantina, a Mexican restaurant in Burbank that’s become the singer’s monthly gig, backed by guitarist Bryant’s house band for the last five years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“So who does he draw?” asks Bryant. “For some people it’s a freak show, [there’s] some intelligentsia, some hipsters. He cuts a funny path across a lot of personality types. But he’s infinitely human, and that’s what translates to everybody.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That includes people like Jan Damiano, who go way back with Walker.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“He taught me to do the twist on Sunset Strip at the Interlude,” she says after a recent Walker set at the Cantina. “My husband and I went there and we learned the twist, and we were twisting everywhere, Miami and everywhere, but I learned from him. It’s a long time ago! He loves his audience. And that’s why people come back.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10896853\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TroyWalkerad.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-10896853 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TroyWalkerad-800x477.jpg\" alt=\"An advertisement for a 1981 Troy Walker performance well encapsulates the singer's approach to gender normativity.\" width=\"800\" height=\"477\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TroyWalkerad.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TroyWalkerad-400x239.jpg 400w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">An advertisement for a 1981 Troy Walker performance well encapsulates the singer's approach to gender normativity.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“I let them know I was there for them,” says Walker of his audience. “A lot of performers don’t project that. They don’t have that thing about letting them know you really are grateful they’re there, and that’s a feeling you have to have to be a good performer.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tom Kenny, the actor/comedian and voice of SpongeBob SquarePants, has been a Walker follower for years, catching him whenever he can. Like snowflakes and fingerprints, Walker’s sets are never the same.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You really never know what you’re going to get with Troy,” offers Kenny. “A lot of it seems to depend on what mood he’s in and what he’s going through and what songs are resonating with him on a given night, so the shows are kind of like a really long medley mash-up of the American songbook, with dirty jokes peppered in between. What’s not to like?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Walker uses no set list, but moves from song to song seemingly on a whim, rarely finishing anything. You might hear a chorus, a couple verses, and then it’s on to something else.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The music follows him,” says Damiano. “He goes where he wants, he segues on a word. He sails. He floats.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You have to kind of guess,” offers Bryant. “You have to listen, you have to make your ears go out 3 feet on the side of your head to figure out where in the hell he’s going to go. And to make him look good. You want him to look good.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10896846\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-10896846 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TomKenny-800x567.jpg\" alt='Actor Tom Kenny, voice of SpongeBob SquarePants, has been a Troy Walker fan for years calling his shows \"kind of like a really long medley mash-up of the American songbook, with dirty jokes peppered in between.\"' width=\"800\" height=\"567\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TomKenny-800x567.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TomKenny-400x284.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TomKenny.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TomKenny-1180x836.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/TomKenny-960x681.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Actor Tom Kenny, voice of SpongeBob SquarePants, has been a Troy Walker fan for years, calling his shows \"kind of like a really long medley mash-up of the American songbook, with dirty jokes peppered in between.\" \u003ccite>(Brad Barket/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>And really, that’s the thing. Everybody’s rooting for Troy. He’s lovable. He’s impish. He’s a pussycat who’s had a lot of lives but no grand strategy for success. His 50-year career vision has never extended beyond the last set of the night.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I can’t say that I had a real plan,” Walker admits. “I just came to Hollywood and people asked me what I did and I said, ‘I’m a singer.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And he does it all for the nice people out there in the dark who have been filling the seats—or most of them—for this unique act that never ends.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They give a meaning to my life,” Walker says of his loyal followers. “They want me, even if nobody else does, and I guess that’s the way I qualify what I do. People have no idea, they lay things out like ego and selfishness, but it’s not that at all. If every night you get 20 or 30 minutes of this [he claps] and standing ovations periodically, and you say, “Wow. I’m worth something.' ”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On this Wednesday night in Burbank, for a handful of hipsters, drinkers and gray-haired women he’s turned briefly back into 25-year-olds, he’s worth a lot.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"disqusTitle": "March Music Highlights From Thao, Heron Oblivion and Los Cenzontles",
"title": "March Music Highlights From Thao, Heron Oblivion and Los Cenzontles",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cb>Thao & the Get Down Stay Down, 'A Man Alive'\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last time we checked in with \u003ca href=\"http://www.thaoandthegetdownstaydown.com\" target=\"_blank\">Thao Nguyen\u003c/a>, she’d been evoking Pete Seeger and Joan Baez, strumming a banjo outside a women’s prison and singing her “We the Common” as a protest through a battery-powered megaphone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With her new album, she sounds like she’s been spending some time on the dance floor. Rhythm is the most immediately notable currency of “A Man Alive,\" maybe more Prince than Pete. Or Tune-Yards. And that latter is no coincidence. The album was produced by Merrill Garbus — \u003ca href=\"http://tune-yards.com\" target=\"_blank\">Tune-Yards\u003c/a> herself. And right from the opening global-minded drumbeats of \"Astonished Man,\" there’s the spirited hey-kids-let's-put-on-a-show sparkle that’s been core to Tune-Yards shows.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37yrktde6m0\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Not that Nguyen and her band didn’t already have that spirit. The “We the Common” album three years ago saw them shifting across a variety of instrumental combinations and sounds. With Garbus on board, they sound like kids let loose in a roomful of instruments and devices, but with two guiding mottos: Anything is possible, but less is more.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Arty, percussive “The Evening” is joyful, spare funk — that Prince thing, though with some Talking Heads bounce, perhaps — leaning to the pop side of the pop art formulae at work. The next song, though, “Departure,” goes heavier on the art, with weird electronics and effects, and what sounds like Garbus’ distinctive voice in the background. That duality continues its shifting balance through the album, to great effect.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She’s still got a lot to say, still wants to put herself on the front lines. “I’ve got my guts, I don’t need my blood,” she sings on the new song, “Guts,” sounding tested but determined. The most arresting words come on “Nobody Dies,” as she gets inside an all-too-familiar test we all face: “We act like nobody dies,” she sings, anguishing over “what to say” when, presumably, inevitably, that proves untrue. And at the end, a distorted guitar takes over for the questioning voices as words fail to manifest. And you can dance to it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>\u003ca href=\"https://www.subpop.com/artists/heron_oblivion\" target=\"_blank\">Heron Oblivion\u003c/a>, 'Heron Oblivion'\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Heron? \u003ca href=\"http://www.dragcity.com/artists/meg-baird\" target=\"_blank\">Meg Baird\u003c/a>’s earthy yet elegant voice, taking flight almost effortlessly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Oblivion? Sonic blasts from fuzzed-out guitars and bass from Noel V. Harmonson, Ethan Miller and Charlie Saufley.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Together they soar and sear, sometimes in turn, sometimes at once, freaky psychedelic folk mixing with freak-out psychedelic rock, like long-ringing echoes from the stage of the Fillmore circa ’68.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10892721\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-10892721\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/HeronOblivion-800x514.jpg\" alt=\"Heron Oblivion\" width=\"800\" height=\"514\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/HeronOblivion-800x514.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/HeronOblivion-400x257.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/HeronOblivion.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/HeronOblivion-1180x758.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/HeronOblivion-960x617.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Heron Oblivion \u003ccite>(Courtesy Alissa Anderson)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>None of that will be a surprise to anyone familiar with Baird’s solo work or tenure in folky band Espers and/or with the ear-rattling sounds of Bay Area band Comets on Fire, former home to Harmonson and Miller. Nor will it disappoint one bit. It really won’t disappoint if you miss those days of the Fillmore. Or if you rue having missed those days entirely.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The guitarists favor the tremulous tones that were the signatures of Jorma Kaukonen in the Jefferson Airplane and John Cipollina in Quicksilver Messenger Service.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And if opener “Beneath Fields” is more shoegaze-y than the Airplane or Quicksilver ever got (Baird’s introspective words as much as the music), the chords that blast open the next song, “Oriar,” erase that impression, alternating with lyrical folk-rock choruses, gorgeous and mystical, framed by the instrumental power.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNgij4jBNJI\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Yet there is strong appeal well beyond nostalgia, most attractively in the straighter, catchy folk-rock of “Sudden Lament,” as close to a pop song structure as this gets. And several longer songs — one runs more than 10 minutes, two others more than seven — are marked by strong blends of mystique-filled power and grace.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Closer “Your Hollows” adds organ for a richer swirl of sounds, nicely expressing questions posed by Baird as she contemplates what’s going on in the head of a (her?) young child: “The shadows left your mind — shadows will forgive all in time.” And this is the sound of those shadows.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Los Cenzontles, 'Covers'\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In its 25 years, the musical arm of the East Bay’s \u003ca href=\"http://www.loscenzontles.com\" target=\"_blank\">Los Cenzontles Cultural Arts Academy\u003c/a> has covered pretty much all the bases of Latin folk and roots music. Now it’s covering, uh, covers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Looking to some different roots, founder Eugene Rodriguez and his crew of young talent are taking on songs by nine of their favorite rock and pop artists spanning the ’60s through the ’00s, to be posted on the band’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/user/loscenzontles\" target=\"_blank\">YouTube\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://www.facebook.com/Cenzontles/\" target=\"_blank\">Facebook\u003c/a> pages over the course of the next several weeks starting next Friday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10892723\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-10892723\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/LosCenzontles-800x800.jpg\" alt=\"Los Cenzontles\" width=\"800\" height=\"800\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/LosCenzontles-800x800.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/LosCenzontles-400x400.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/LosCenzontles.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/LosCenzontles-1180x1181.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/LosCenzontles-960x961.jpg 960w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/LosCenzontles-32x32.jpg 32w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/LosCenzontles-64x64.jpg 64w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/LosCenzontles-96x96.jpg 96w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/LosCenzontles-128x128.jpg 128w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/LosCenzontles-75x75.jpg 75w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Los Cenzontles \u003ccite>(Courtesy Los Cenzontles)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Though Los Cenzontles means “the mockingbirds,” there are no mere copies of the originals. One of the two that will be released in the inaugural posting is “I Think of You,” a relative obscurity by Sixto Rodriguez — the subject of the 2012 Oscar-winning documentary “Searching for Sugar Man” — given a mariachi treatment, horns and all.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a great introduction to the series, which includes similar Latinized interpretations of Bob Dylan (“Just Like a Woman”), ELO (“Can’t Get It Out of My Head”), Jimi Hendrix (“Little Wing”), Randy Newman (“Memo to My Son”), the Pogues (“A Pair of Brown Eyes”) David Bowie (“Young Americans,” pointedly), the Killers (“When You Were Young”) and, spoiler alert, the final cover, a Latin-pop version of “Every Kind of People.” Of the latter, Rodriguez says, “We need that message today.”\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cb>Thao & the Get Down Stay Down, 'A Man Alive'\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last time we checked in with \u003ca href=\"http://www.thaoandthegetdownstaydown.com\" target=\"_blank\">Thao Nguyen\u003c/a>, she’d been evoking Pete Seeger and Joan Baez, strumming a banjo outside a women’s prison and singing her “We the Common” as a protest through a battery-powered megaphone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With her new album, she sounds like she’s been spending some time on the dance floor. Rhythm is the most immediately notable currency of “A Man Alive,\" maybe more Prince than Pete. Or Tune-Yards. And that latter is no coincidence. The album was produced by Merrill Garbus — \u003ca href=\"http://tune-yards.com\" target=\"_blank\">Tune-Yards\u003c/a> herself. And right from the opening global-minded drumbeats of \"Astonished Man,\" there’s the spirited hey-kids-let's-put-on-a-show sparkle that’s been core to Tune-Yards shows.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/37yrktde6m0'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/37yrktde6m0'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Not that Nguyen and her band didn’t already have that spirit. The “We the Common” album three years ago saw them shifting across a variety of instrumental combinations and sounds. With Garbus on board, they sound like kids let loose in a roomful of instruments and devices, but with two guiding mottos: Anything is possible, but less is more.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Arty, percussive “The Evening” is joyful, spare funk — that Prince thing, though with some Talking Heads bounce, perhaps — leaning to the pop side of the pop art formulae at work. The next song, though, “Departure,” goes heavier on the art, with weird electronics and effects, and what sounds like Garbus’ distinctive voice in the background. That duality continues its shifting balance through the album, to great effect.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She’s still got a lot to say, still wants to put herself on the front lines. “I’ve got my guts, I don’t need my blood,” she sings on the new song, “Guts,” sounding tested but determined. The most arresting words come on “Nobody Dies,” as she gets inside an all-too-familiar test we all face: “We act like nobody dies,” she sings, anguishing over “what to say” when, presumably, inevitably, that proves untrue. And at the end, a distorted guitar takes over for the questioning voices as words fail to manifest. And you can dance to it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>\u003ca href=\"https://www.subpop.com/artists/heron_oblivion\" target=\"_blank\">Heron Oblivion\u003c/a>, 'Heron Oblivion'\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Heron? \u003ca href=\"http://www.dragcity.com/artists/meg-baird\" target=\"_blank\">Meg Baird\u003c/a>’s earthy yet elegant voice, taking flight almost effortlessly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Oblivion? Sonic blasts from fuzzed-out guitars and bass from Noel V. Harmonson, Ethan Miller and Charlie Saufley.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Together they soar and sear, sometimes in turn, sometimes at once, freaky psychedelic folk mixing with freak-out psychedelic rock, like long-ringing echoes from the stage of the Fillmore circa ’68.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10892721\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-10892721\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/HeronOblivion-800x514.jpg\" alt=\"Heron Oblivion\" width=\"800\" height=\"514\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/HeronOblivion-800x514.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/HeronOblivion-400x257.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/HeronOblivion.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/HeronOblivion-1180x758.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/HeronOblivion-960x617.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Heron Oblivion \u003ccite>(Courtesy Alissa Anderson)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>None of that will be a surprise to anyone familiar with Baird’s solo work or tenure in folky band Espers and/or with the ear-rattling sounds of Bay Area band Comets on Fire, former home to Harmonson and Miller. Nor will it disappoint one bit. It really won’t disappoint if you miss those days of the Fillmore. Or if you rue having missed those days entirely.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The guitarists favor the tremulous tones that were the signatures of Jorma Kaukonen in the Jefferson Airplane and John Cipollina in Quicksilver Messenger Service.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And if opener “Beneath Fields” is more shoegaze-y than the Airplane or Quicksilver ever got (Baird’s introspective words as much as the music), the chords that blast open the next song, “Oriar,” erase that impression, alternating with lyrical folk-rock choruses, gorgeous and mystical, framed by the instrumental power.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/bNgij4jBNJI'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/bNgij4jBNJI'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Yet there is strong appeal well beyond nostalgia, most attractively in the straighter, catchy folk-rock of “Sudden Lament,” as close to a pop song structure as this gets. And several longer songs — one runs more than 10 minutes, two others more than seven — are marked by strong blends of mystique-filled power and grace.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Closer “Your Hollows” adds organ for a richer swirl of sounds, nicely expressing questions posed by Baird as she contemplates what’s going on in the head of a (her?) young child: “The shadows left your mind — shadows will forgive all in time.” And this is the sound of those shadows.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Los Cenzontles, 'Covers'\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In its 25 years, the musical arm of the East Bay’s \u003ca href=\"http://www.loscenzontles.com\" target=\"_blank\">Los Cenzontles Cultural Arts Academy\u003c/a> has covered pretty much all the bases of Latin folk and roots music. Now it’s covering, uh, covers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Looking to some different roots, founder Eugene Rodriguez and his crew of young talent are taking on songs by nine of their favorite rock and pop artists spanning the ’60s through the ’00s, to be posted on the band’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/user/loscenzontles\" target=\"_blank\">YouTube\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://www.facebook.com/Cenzontles/\" target=\"_blank\">Facebook\u003c/a> pages over the course of the next several weeks starting next Friday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10892723\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-10892723\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/LosCenzontles-800x800.jpg\" alt=\"Los Cenzontles\" width=\"800\" height=\"800\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/LosCenzontles-800x800.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/LosCenzontles-400x400.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/LosCenzontles.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/LosCenzontles-1180x1181.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/LosCenzontles-960x961.jpg 960w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/LosCenzontles-32x32.jpg 32w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/LosCenzontles-64x64.jpg 64w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/LosCenzontles-96x96.jpg 96w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/LosCenzontles-128x128.jpg 128w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/LosCenzontles-75x75.jpg 75w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Los Cenzontles \u003ccite>(Courtesy Los Cenzontles)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Though Los Cenzontles means “the mockingbirds,” there are no mere copies of the originals. One of the two that will be released in the inaugural posting is “I Think of You,” a relative obscurity by Sixto Rodriguez — the subject of the 2012 Oscar-winning documentary “Searching for Sugar Man” — given a mariachi treatment, horns and all.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a great introduction to the series, which includes similar Latinized interpretations of Bob Dylan (“Just Like a Woman”), ELO (“Can’t Get It Out of My Head”), Jimi Hendrix (“Little Wing”), Randy Newman (“Memo to My Son”), the Pogues (“A Pair of Brown Eyes”) David Bowie (“Young Americans,” pointedly), the Killers (“When You Were Young”) and, spoiler alert, the final cover, a Latin-pop version of “Every Kind of People.” Of the latter, Rodriguez says, “We need that message today.”\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"disqusTitle": "A Freestyle Hip-Hop Revival at San Francisco's Boom Boom Room",
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"content": "\u003cp>Every Sunday night for the last two years, San Francisco's \u003ca href=\"http://www.boomboomroom.com/\" target=\"_blank\">Boom Boom Room\u003c/a> has played host to \u003ca href=\"https://www.facebook.com/SFCypher/\" target=\"_blank\">Return of the Cypher\u003c/a>, or ROTC for short.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The event's website describes it as a show that “features amazing local freestyle artists taking the stage in improvised sessions, known as Cyphers, where emcees, singers, beat-boxers and musicians collaborate in a spontaneous combustion of pure skill.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10879268\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-10879268\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/FloJSimpson-800x548.jpg\" alt=\"Hip-Hop artist Flo J Simpson takes the stage at the Boom Boom Room in San Francisco. The Sunday night Return of the Cypher event draws rappers from across the Bay Area.\" width=\"800\" height=\"548\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/FloJSimpson-800x548.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/FloJSimpson-400x274.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/FloJSimpson.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/FloJSimpson-1180x809.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/FloJSimpson-960x658.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Hip-hop artist Flo J. Simpson takes the stage at the Boom Boom Room in San Francisco. The Sunday night Return of the Cypher event draws rappers from across the Bay Area. \u003ccite>(Alex Cwalinski/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>I checked it out one Sunday night to see for myself.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under a pink neon sign advertising \"Live Grooves, Cocktails and Dancing,\" music bursts onto the sidewalk as local emcees with varying skills take turns on the mic, honoring the hip-hop artists who came before them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Opening \u003ca href=\"http://www.sfweekly.com/shookdown/2013/10/24/dj-kevvy-kev-on-djing-for-the-rza-playing-chess-onstage-and-the-decline-of-commercial-radio\" target=\"_blank\">DJ Kevvy Kev\u003c/a> has been spinning records in the Bay Area for over 30 years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"ROTC is something that needed to happen, so we built it,” Kev explains. “And the response has been really, really cool. It’s been gratifying to see the response. It’s my favorite thing that I do every week.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[soundcloud url=\"https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/250267435\" params=\"color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false\" width=\"100%\" height=\"166\" iframe=\"true\" /]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>DJing wasn’t a part of Kev's plan when he moved to California in the early 1980s to attend Stanford University. His initial goal was to graduate with a degree in chemical engineering, but everything suddenly changed when he studied abroad.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“My junior year I went over to France for a quarter. This was the year hip-hop was exploding overseas,” Kev says. “So my timing was exact. I went over there, and it was the first time that anyone reacted to me as the hip-hop guy. It meant something to be a DJ, an emcee or a B-Boy. They were really into the culture over there, so I started thinking in terms of maybe this isn’t the plan B, maybe chemistry is the plan B.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10885288\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-10885288\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/KevvyKev-800x1078.jpg\" alt=\"DJ Kevvy Kev\" width=\"800\" height=\"1078\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/KevvyKev.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/KevvyKev-400x539.jpg 400w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">DJ Kevvy Kev \u003ccite>(cgnsfo/Flickr)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Kev hasn’t put the turntable down since. After returning to Stanford he began DJing for the university’s hip-hop radio show, \"The Drum,\" \u003ca href=\"http://www.amoeba.com/blog/2008/11/jamoeblog/interview-with-kevvy-kev-host-of-world-s-longest-running-hip-hop-radio-show-the-drum-on-kzsu-stanford.html\" target=\"_blank\">where he continued DJing for 27 years\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Back at the Boom Boom Room on Fillmore Street, Kev wraps up his first set and makes room for the Gemstone Band, who take over and keep the rhythm going for the rest of the Cypher.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cyphers are unique events, dating back to the late 1970s when rappers, beat-boxers and dancers would gather in a circle and take turns showing off their skills in one big open jam session.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>ROTC’s Cypher works a little differently. Rappers get one minute to freestyle onstage. A head emcee keeps the time on an old school hourglass sand timer and passes along the mic to the next rapper when time runs out. Performers can go back on stage, but they’ll have to get in line among the many waiting. Meanwhile, the band just keeps playing, seamlessly changing the beat every few minutes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10879343\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-10879343\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/CypherMC-800x568.jpg\" alt=\"A local hip-hop artist takes the stage at the Boom Boom Room in San Francisco at Return of the Cypher.\" width=\"800\" height=\"568\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/CypherMC-800x568.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/CypherMC-400x284.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/CypherMC.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/CypherMC-1180x838.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/CypherMC-960x682.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A local hip-hop artist takes the stage at the Boom Boom Room in San Francisco at Return of the Cypher. \u003ccite>(Alex Cwalinski/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>There are also some great dancers who bust out some impressive moves. “Just about every week there's somebody that gets open on the floor and starts spinning on their neck,” Kev says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The event is very inclusive and I didn’t see anyone getting turned away from the mic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Local hip-hop artist Flo J. Simpson has been coming to ROTC for about a year now, and he told me why he keeps coming back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I really believe it’s the positivity and the atmosphere that’s created, where everyone feels comfortable expressing themselves, however they do it,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Every Sunday night for the last two years, San Francisco's \u003ca href=\"http://www.boomboomroom.com/\" target=\"_blank\">Boom Boom Room\u003c/a> has played host to \u003ca href=\"https://www.facebook.com/SFCypher/\" target=\"_blank\">Return of the Cypher\u003c/a>, or ROTC for short.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The event's website describes it as a show that “features amazing local freestyle artists taking the stage in improvised sessions, known as Cyphers, where emcees, singers, beat-boxers and musicians collaborate in a spontaneous combustion of pure skill.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10879268\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-10879268\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/FloJSimpson-800x548.jpg\" alt=\"Hip-Hop artist Flo J Simpson takes the stage at the Boom Boom Room in San Francisco. The Sunday night Return of the Cypher event draws rappers from across the Bay Area.\" width=\"800\" height=\"548\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/FloJSimpson-800x548.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/FloJSimpson-400x274.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/FloJSimpson.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/FloJSimpson-1180x809.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/FloJSimpson-960x658.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Hip-hop artist Flo J. Simpson takes the stage at the Boom Boom Room in San Francisco. The Sunday night Return of the Cypher event draws rappers from across the Bay Area. \u003ccite>(Alex Cwalinski/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>I checked it out one Sunday night to see for myself.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under a pink neon sign advertising \"Live Grooves, Cocktails and Dancing,\" music bursts onto the sidewalk as local emcees with varying skills take turns on the mic, honoring the hip-hop artists who came before them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Opening \u003ca href=\"http://www.sfweekly.com/shookdown/2013/10/24/dj-kevvy-kev-on-djing-for-the-rza-playing-chess-onstage-and-the-decline-of-commercial-radio\" target=\"_blank\">DJ Kevvy Kev\u003c/a> has been spinning records in the Bay Area for over 30 years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"ROTC is something that needed to happen, so we built it,” Kev explains. “And the response has been really, really cool. It’s been gratifying to see the response. It’s my favorite thing that I do every week.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cdiv class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__shortcodes__shortcodeWrapper'>\n \u003ciframe width='100%' height='166'\n scrolling='no' frameborder='no'\n src='https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/250267435&visual=true&color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false'\n title='https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/250267435'>\n \u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/div>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>DJing wasn’t a part of Kev's plan when he moved to California in the early 1980s to attend Stanford University. His initial goal was to graduate with a degree in chemical engineering, but everything suddenly changed when he studied abroad.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“My junior year I went over to France for a quarter. This was the year hip-hop was exploding overseas,” Kev says. “So my timing was exact. I went over there, and it was the first time that anyone reacted to me as the hip-hop guy. It meant something to be a DJ, an emcee or a B-Boy. They were really into the culture over there, so I started thinking in terms of maybe this isn’t the plan B, maybe chemistry is the plan B.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10885288\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-10885288\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/KevvyKev-800x1078.jpg\" alt=\"DJ Kevvy Kev\" width=\"800\" height=\"1078\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/KevvyKev.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/03/KevvyKev-400x539.jpg 400w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">DJ Kevvy Kev \u003ccite>(cgnsfo/Flickr)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Kev hasn’t put the turntable down since. After returning to Stanford he began DJing for the university’s hip-hop radio show, \"The Drum,\" \u003ca href=\"http://www.amoeba.com/blog/2008/11/jamoeblog/interview-with-kevvy-kev-host-of-world-s-longest-running-hip-hop-radio-show-the-drum-on-kzsu-stanford.html\" target=\"_blank\">where he continued DJing for 27 years\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Back at the Boom Boom Room on Fillmore Street, Kev wraps up his first set and makes room for the Gemstone Band, who take over and keep the rhythm going for the rest of the Cypher.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cyphers are unique events, dating back to the late 1970s when rappers, beat-boxers and dancers would gather in a circle and take turns showing off their skills in one big open jam session.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>ROTC’s Cypher works a little differently. Rappers get one minute to freestyle onstage. A head emcee keeps the time on an old school hourglass sand timer and passes along the mic to the next rapper when time runs out. Performers can go back on stage, but they’ll have to get in line among the many waiting. Meanwhile, the band just keeps playing, seamlessly changing the beat every few minutes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10879343\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-10879343\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/CypherMC-800x568.jpg\" alt=\"A local hip-hop artist takes the stage at the Boom Boom Room in San Francisco at Return of the Cypher.\" width=\"800\" height=\"568\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/CypherMC-800x568.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/CypherMC-400x284.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/CypherMC.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/CypherMC-1180x838.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/CypherMC-960x682.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A local hip-hop artist takes the stage at the Boom Boom Room in San Francisco at Return of the Cypher. \u003ccite>(Alex Cwalinski/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>There are also some great dancers who bust out some impressive moves. “Just about every week there's somebody that gets open on the floor and starts spinning on their neck,” Kev says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The event is very inclusive and I didn’t see anyone getting turned away from the mic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Local hip-hop artist Flo J. Simpson has been coming to ROTC for about a year now, and he told me why he keeps coming back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I really believe it’s the positivity and the atmosphere that’s created, where everyone feels comfortable expressing themselves, however they do it,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"disqusTitle": "'Salt Into the Wound': Why Anohni Is Skipping the Oscars",
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"content": "\u003cp>What was behind the decision not to invite the artists behind two tunes nominated for Best Original Song to perform on Sunday night's Academy Awards broadcast?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One of the snubbed musicians is singer and lyricist \u003ca href=\"http://anohni.com/\" target=\"_blank\">Anohni\u003c/a>, whose song \"Manta Ray,\" with music by J. Ralph appears in the documentary \u003cem>Racing Extinction.\u003c/em> On Thursday, she published a heartfelt \u003ca href=\"http://antonyandthejohnsons.com/news/news.html\" target=\"_blank\">essay\u003c/a> on why she feels she was left out — and why she has decided not to attend the ceremony at all.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Variety\u003c/em> \u003ca href=\"http://variety.com/2016/film/in-contention/oscars-song-performances-youth-racing-extinction-1201710638/\" target=\"_blank\">reported\u003c/a> last week that both \"Manta Ray\" and Pulitzer Prize-winning American composer \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/120995816/david-lang\" target=\"_blank\">David Lang\u003c/a>'s \"Simple Song #3,\" sung by Grammy-winning soprano \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/16320515/sumi-jo\" target=\"_blank\">Sumi Jo\u003c/a>, were being omitted from the broadcast due to \"time constraints.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f1JiJhWkM9M\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, the three other nominated artists — \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/120001078/lady-gaga\" target=\"_blank\">Lady Gaga\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/384927706/sam-smith\" target=\"_blank\">Sam Smith\u003c/a>, and \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/135036318/the-weeknd\" target=\"_blank\">The Weeknd\u003c/a> — will be \u003ca href=\"http://oscar.go.com/news/oscar-news/oscars-2016-presenters-and-performers-the-complete-list\" target=\"_blank\">singing\u003c/a> on Sunday evening, as will Foo Fighters frontman \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/173424658/dave-grohl\" target=\"_blank\">Dave Grohl\u003c/a> in a \"special performance.\" The Weeknd's \"Earned It,\" from \u003cem>Fifty Shades of Grey, \u003c/em>became a Top 3 \u003ca href=\"http://www.billboard.com/artist/419413/weeknd/chart?page=1&f=379\" target=\"_blank\">hit\u003c/a> on the \u003cem>Billboard \u003c/em>Hot 100 chart, and \"Writing's On The Wall,\" co-written by Sam Smith and Jimmy Nape, became the first James Bond movie theme to ever reach \u003ca href=\"http://www.officialcharts.com/chart-news/sam-smith-makes-history-with-first-ever-official-number-1-james-bond-theme-this-is-a-special-moment-i-ll-never-forget-__10891/\" target=\"_blank\">No. 1\u003c/a> on the British charts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"Til It Happens to You,\" the song co-written by Lady Gaga and \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/127988436/diane-warren\" target=\"_blank\">Diane Warren\u003c/a> for the documentary \u003cem>The Hunting Ground\u003c/em>, hasn't made any headway on the American or British charts, but Gaga has been a staple during this awards telecast season, particularly after her Grammy Awards \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/2016/02/21/467269601/it-changes-you-forever-lady-gaga-on-david-bowie-and-being-brave\" target=\"_blank\">tribute\u003c/a> to David Bowie earlier this month.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/sections/therecord/2012/08/06/158237793/antonys-future-feminism-stage-banter-as-statement-of-purpose\" target=\"_blank\">Formerly known as\u003c/a> Antony (of \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/15239231/antony-and-the-johnsons\" target=\"_blank\">Antony and the Johnsons\u003c/a>), Anohni writes that she feels humiliated by the Academy's decision: \"There I was, feeling a sting of shame that reminded me of America's earliest affirmations of my inadequacy as a transperson.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But, she adds, she thinks that there is another issue at play:\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\n\u003cp>\"I want to be clear — I know that I wasn't excluded from the performance directly because I am transgendered. I was not invited to perform because I am relatively unknown in the U.S., singing a song about ecocide, and that might not sell advertising space. It is not me that is picking the performers for the night, and I know that I don't have an automatic right to be asked.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But if you trace the trail of breadcrumbs, the deeper truth of it is impossible to ignore. Like global warming, it is not one isolated event, but a series of events that occur over years to create a system that has sought to undermine me, at first as a feminine child, and later as an androgynous transwoman. It is a system of social oppression and diminished opportunities for transpeople that has been employed by capitalism in the U.S. to crush our dreams and our collective spirit.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>She added some stinging words for those artists, actors and other people who are participating in this year's ceremony: \"I will not be lulled into submission with a few more well manufactured, feel-good ballads and a bit of good old fashioned T. and A. They are going to try to convince us that they have our best interests at heart by waving flags for identity politics and fake moral issues. But don't forget that many of these celebrities are the trophies of billionaire corporations whose only intention it is to manipulate you into giving them your consent and the last of your money.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Anohni is the first transgendered performer ever nominated for an Oscar, but not the first transgendered artist. In the 1970s, the late composer Angela Morley was nominated for scores to \u003cem>The Little Prince\u003c/em> and \u003cem>The Slipper and the Rose\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[contextly_sidebar id=\"y9KvQtaAGcLOjPzagrLi7NblGmZbxaxg\"]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As the British-born Morley wrote in an essay on her \u003ca href=\"http://www.angelamorley.com/site/bio.htm\" target=\"_blank\">website\u003c/a>, she was thrilled by how she was received in Hollywood: \"I went to California on both occasions to attend the Oscar ceremonies. The wonderfully warm and generous way that I was made to feel at home there by my American colleagues and friends resulted in my being rather seduced by the California lifestyle and I soon returned with the intention of staying.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Over the past several years, there have been a few instances of certain Oscar-nominated songs not being performed on the live broadcast. In \u003ca href=\"http://deadline.com/2010/02/oscar-spoilers-best-original-song-artists-not-performing-25443/\" target=\"_blank\">2010\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"http://carpetbagger.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/02/08/without-man-or-muppet-singing-pharrell-williams-has-other-options/?_r=0\" target=\"_blank\">2012\u003c/a>, no nominated songs were given live performance airtime.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>David Lang declined to comment for this story. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Copyright 2016 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>What was behind the decision not to invite the artists behind two tunes nominated for Best Original Song to perform on Sunday night's Academy Awards broadcast?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One of the snubbed musicians is singer and lyricist \u003ca href=\"http://anohni.com/\" target=\"_blank\">Anohni\u003c/a>, whose song \"Manta Ray,\" with music by J. Ralph appears in the documentary \u003cem>Racing Extinction.\u003c/em> On Thursday, she published a heartfelt \u003ca href=\"http://antonyandthejohnsons.com/news/news.html\" target=\"_blank\">essay\u003c/a> on why she feels she was left out — and why she has decided not to attend the ceremony at all.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Variety\u003c/em> \u003ca href=\"http://variety.com/2016/film/in-contention/oscars-song-performances-youth-racing-extinction-1201710638/\" target=\"_blank\">reported\u003c/a> last week that both \"Manta Ray\" and Pulitzer Prize-winning American composer \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/120995816/david-lang\" target=\"_blank\">David Lang\u003c/a>'s \"Simple Song #3,\" sung by Grammy-winning soprano \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/16320515/sumi-jo\" target=\"_blank\">Sumi Jo\u003c/a>, were being omitted from the broadcast due to \"time constraints.\"\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/f1JiJhWkM9M'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/f1JiJhWkM9M'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>However, the three other nominated artists — \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/120001078/lady-gaga\" target=\"_blank\">Lady Gaga\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/384927706/sam-smith\" target=\"_blank\">Sam Smith\u003c/a>, and \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/135036318/the-weeknd\" target=\"_blank\">The Weeknd\u003c/a> — will be \u003ca href=\"http://oscar.go.com/news/oscar-news/oscars-2016-presenters-and-performers-the-complete-list\" target=\"_blank\">singing\u003c/a> on Sunday evening, as will Foo Fighters frontman \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/173424658/dave-grohl\" target=\"_blank\">Dave Grohl\u003c/a> in a \"special performance.\" The Weeknd's \"Earned It,\" from \u003cem>Fifty Shades of Grey, \u003c/em>became a Top 3 \u003ca href=\"http://www.billboard.com/artist/419413/weeknd/chart?page=1&f=379\" target=\"_blank\">hit\u003c/a> on the \u003cem>Billboard \u003c/em>Hot 100 chart, and \"Writing's On The Wall,\" co-written by Sam Smith and Jimmy Nape, became the first James Bond movie theme to ever reach \u003ca href=\"http://www.officialcharts.com/chart-news/sam-smith-makes-history-with-first-ever-official-number-1-james-bond-theme-this-is-a-special-moment-i-ll-never-forget-__10891/\" target=\"_blank\">No. 1\u003c/a> on the British charts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"Til It Happens to You,\" the song co-written by Lady Gaga and \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/127988436/diane-warren\" target=\"_blank\">Diane Warren\u003c/a> for the documentary \u003cem>The Hunting Ground\u003c/em>, hasn't made any headway on the American or British charts, but Gaga has been a staple during this awards telecast season, particularly after her Grammy Awards \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/2016/02/21/467269601/it-changes-you-forever-lady-gaga-on-david-bowie-and-being-brave\" target=\"_blank\">tribute\u003c/a> to David Bowie earlier this month.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/sections/therecord/2012/08/06/158237793/antonys-future-feminism-stage-banter-as-statement-of-purpose\" target=\"_blank\">Formerly known as\u003c/a> Antony (of \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/15239231/antony-and-the-johnsons\" target=\"_blank\">Antony and the Johnsons\u003c/a>), Anohni writes that she feels humiliated by the Academy's decision: \"There I was, feeling a sting of shame that reminded me of America's earliest affirmations of my inadequacy as a transperson.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But, she adds, she thinks that there is another issue at play:\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\n\u003cp>\"I want to be clear — I know that I wasn't excluded from the performance directly because I am transgendered. I was not invited to perform because I am relatively unknown in the U.S., singing a song about ecocide, and that might not sell advertising space. It is not me that is picking the performers for the night, and I know that I don't have an automatic right to be asked.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But if you trace the trail of breadcrumbs, the deeper truth of it is impossible to ignore. Like global warming, it is not one isolated event, but a series of events that occur over years to create a system that has sought to undermine me, at first as a feminine child, and later as an androgynous transwoman. It is a system of social oppression and diminished opportunities for transpeople that has been employed by capitalism in the U.S. to crush our dreams and our collective spirit.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>She added some stinging words for those artists, actors and other people who are participating in this year's ceremony: \"I will not be lulled into submission with a few more well manufactured, feel-good ballads and a bit of good old fashioned T. and A. They are going to try to convince us that they have our best interests at heart by waving flags for identity politics and fake moral issues. But don't forget that many of these celebrities are the trophies of billionaire corporations whose only intention it is to manipulate you into giving them your consent and the last of your money.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Anohni is the first transgendered performer ever nominated for an Oscar, but not the first transgendered artist. In the 1970s, the late composer Angela Morley was nominated for scores to \u003cem>The Little Prince\u003c/em> and \u003cem>The Slipper and the Rose\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As the British-born Morley wrote in an essay on her \u003ca href=\"http://www.angelamorley.com/site/bio.htm\" target=\"_blank\">website\u003c/a>, she was thrilled by how she was received in Hollywood: \"I went to California on both occasions to attend the Oscar ceremonies. The wonderfully warm and generous way that I was made to feel at home there by my American colleagues and friends resulted in my being rather seduced by the California lifestyle and I soon returned with the intention of staying.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Over the past several years, there have been a few instances of certain Oscar-nominated songs not being performed on the live broadcast. In \u003ca href=\"http://deadline.com/2010/02/oscar-spoilers-best-original-song-artists-not-performing-25443/\" target=\"_blank\">2010\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"http://carpetbagger.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/02/08/without-man-or-muppet-singing-pharrell-williams-has-other-options/?_r=0\" target=\"_blank\">2012\u003c/a>, no nominated songs were given live performance airtime.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>David Lang declined to comment for this story. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Copyright 2016 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>California continues to serve as a musical laboratory for catalytic collaborations. Three recent releases bring musicians together in very different ways while all arriving at fascinating destinations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://www.brianandres.com/afro-cuban-jazz-cartel\">Drummer Brian Andres\u003c/a> and the Afro-Cuban Jazz Cartel is a talent-laden ensemble that has steadily expanded its rhythmic purview over the past decade. \u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"alignright\">\n[soundcloud url=\"https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/249103637\" params=\"color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false\" width=\"100%\" height=\"166\" iframe=\"true\" /]\u003cbr>\n\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>With its third album, \"This Could Be That,\" the band delivers a consistently smart and entertaining program of Latin jazz and salsa. The Cartel’s core octet features some of the strongest players on the Bay Area scene, including a bevy of noted bandleaders (like \u003ca href=\"http://orquestadharma.com\">trombonist Jamie Dubberly\u003c/a>, and the co-leaders, Grammy Award-winning \u003ca href=\"http://www.pacificmambo.com\">Pacific Mambo Orchestra\u003c/a>, pianist Christian Tumalan and trumpeter Steffen Kuehn).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Just about every track features a noted guest artist, including Cuban-American vocalist \u003ca href=\"http://www.venissasanti.com\">Venissa Santi\u003c/a>, bata master \u003ca href=\"http://www.michaelspiro.com\">Michael Spiro\u003c/a>, Peruvian percussion star Alex Acuña and percussion maestro \u003ca href=\"http://johnsantos.com\">John Santos\u003c/a>. But what I love most about this band is the way it’s become a community affair in the Bay Area’s bustling Latin jazz scene. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TsVz3XzZBRg\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Players who don’t perform regularly with the band are eager to contribute arrangements, like bassist Saul Sierra’s tasty version of late Cuban percussion legend Daniel Ponce’s “Bacalaitos,” a chart that celebrates the cultural kinship between Cuba and Puerto Rico (with an assist from Fania All-Stars percussion great \u003ca href=\"http://www.mazacote.com\">Louie Romero\u003c/a>). For blazing Latin jazz, it’s hard to beat Tumalan’s concise version of Chick Corea’s fusion flag-waver “Got a Match?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem> \u003cimg class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-10879047\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/JamesCover-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"JamesCover\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/JamesCover-800x600.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/JamesCover-400x300.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/JamesCover-1920x1440.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/JamesCover-1180x885.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/JamesCover-960x720.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If Andres and the Afro-Cuban Jazz Cartel is busy lighting fires, guitarist \u003ca href=\"http://www.heydavidjames.com\">David James's GPS\u003c/a> demonstrate the power of cool on \"Billionaire Blues.\" James is a veteran sideman who has done memorable work in an array of contexts, including Michael Franti and Spearhead, Sila and the Afrofunk Experience, and the \u003ca href=\"http://bethcuster.com\">Beth Custer Ensemble\u003c/a> (he's still performing with the latter two ). \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After three decades of elevating other bandleaders’ projects, he’s put out his first album. And it’s a stunner.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>James is known as a groove master, and there are some fierce ones on \"Billionaire Blues,\" but he’s more interested in creating long sinuous melodies and transparent textures than displaying his rhythmic chops. The album explores an array of styles, from the lithe reggae of “Rubber Foot” and the sinewy bop of “Obama Hop” to the playfully cartoonish bounce of “Wag the Puppy” and the elegant Afrobeat of “Black Ops.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E55fb4850Mo\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What makes the album cohere so beautifully is James’ uncluttered orchestrations. He makes brilliant use of his cast, creating spacious arrangements that leave plenty of space for his enviable cast of violist Dina Maccabee, bassist Lisa Mezzacappa, clarinetist Beth Custer, trombonist Alan Williams and drummer Jan Jackson (half of GPS — James, Jackson and Custer — can also be found in the Beth Custer Ensemble, as can entirely different versions of “Wag the Puppy” and “Black Ops” on her excellent new album \"For the Grace of Any Man\"). \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A striking achievement by a player who’s been in the background far too long, \"Billionaire Blues\" is my favorite album of the year so far.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-10879048\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/kneedelus-main-800x800.jpg\" alt=\"kneedelus-main\" width=\"800\" height=\"800\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/kneedelus-main-800x800.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/kneedelus-main-400x400.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/kneedelus-main-960x960.jpg 960w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/kneedelus-main-32x32.jpg 32w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/kneedelus-main-64x64.jpg 64w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/kneedelus-main-96x96.jpg 96w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/kneedelus-main-128x128.jpg 128w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/kneedelus-main-75x75.jpg 75w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/kneedelus-main.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Where James’ album seemed to come out of nowhere, the collaboration between the great avant funk jazz combo \u003ca href=\"http://www.kneebody.com\">Kneebody\u003c/a> and Los Angeles producer and beat master \u003ca href=\"http://daedelusmusic.com\">Daedalus\u003c/a> (aka Alfred Darlington) comes with a great deal of history. A digital release on \u003ca href=\"http://www.brainfeedersite.com\">Brainfeeder\u003c/a>, the creatively charged L.A. label responsible for saxophonist Kamasi Washington’s 2015 breakout \"The Epic,\" \"Kneedelus\" is the latest and most extensive encounter between artists with ties dating back to high school (where Kneebody saxophonist Ben Wendel and Darlington first met).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of the music has a celestial Miles Davis \"In A Silent Way\" vibe, and other times it brings to mind the space funk of Herbie Hancock’s Mwandishi band. But there’s nothing retro about \"Kneedelus.\" \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I love the way the push and pull of sound manipulation keeps me off balance. Kneebody has honed an expansive sonic palette wedded to a menagerie of circuitous grooves unlike any other band, and with Daedalus subtly manipulating the proceedings it’s a truly seamless merging of sensibilities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LKq0Kv7GlgU\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I see a \"Daedebody\" project in the future, but in the meantime, Kneedelus is \u003ca href=\"http://www.kneebody.com/tour/\">performing around California\u003c/a>, including Feb. 26 in San Diego, March 3 in Santa Cruz and March 4 in San Jose.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>California continues to serve as a musical laboratory for catalytic collaborations. Three recent releases bring musicians together in very different ways while all arriving at fascinating destinations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://www.brianandres.com/afro-cuban-jazz-cartel\">Drummer Brian Andres\u003c/a> and the Afro-Cuban Jazz Cartel is a talent-laden ensemble that has steadily expanded its rhythmic purview over the past decade. \u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"alignright\">\n\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cdiv class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__shortcodes__shortcodeWrapper'>\n \u003ciframe width='100%' height='166'\n scrolling='no' frameborder='no'\n src='https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/249103637&visual=true&color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false'\n title='https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/249103637'>\n \u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/div>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>With its third album, \"This Could Be That,\" the band delivers a consistently smart and entertaining program of Latin jazz and salsa. The Cartel’s core octet features some of the strongest players on the Bay Area scene, including a bevy of noted bandleaders (like \u003ca href=\"http://orquestadharma.com\">trombonist Jamie Dubberly\u003c/a>, and the co-leaders, Grammy Award-winning \u003ca href=\"http://www.pacificmambo.com\">Pacific Mambo Orchestra\u003c/a>, pianist Christian Tumalan and trumpeter Steffen Kuehn).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Just about every track features a noted guest artist, including Cuban-American vocalist \u003ca href=\"http://www.venissasanti.com\">Venissa Santi\u003c/a>, bata master \u003ca href=\"http://www.michaelspiro.com\">Michael Spiro\u003c/a>, Peruvian percussion star Alex Acuña and percussion maestro \u003ca href=\"http://johnsantos.com\">John Santos\u003c/a>. But what I love most about this band is the way it’s become a community affair in the Bay Area’s bustling Latin jazz scene. \u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/TsVz3XzZBRg'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/TsVz3XzZBRg'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Players who don’t perform regularly with the band are eager to contribute arrangements, like bassist Saul Sierra’s tasty version of late Cuban percussion legend Daniel Ponce’s “Bacalaitos,” a chart that celebrates the cultural kinship between Cuba and Puerto Rico (with an assist from Fania All-Stars percussion great \u003ca href=\"http://www.mazacote.com\">Louie Romero\u003c/a>). For blazing Latin jazz, it’s hard to beat Tumalan’s concise version of Chick Corea’s fusion flag-waver “Got a Match?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem> \u003cimg class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-10879047\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/JamesCover-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"JamesCover\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/JamesCover-800x600.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/JamesCover-400x300.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/JamesCover-1920x1440.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/JamesCover-1180x885.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/JamesCover-960x720.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If Andres and the Afro-Cuban Jazz Cartel is busy lighting fires, guitarist \u003ca href=\"http://www.heydavidjames.com\">David James's GPS\u003c/a> demonstrate the power of cool on \"Billionaire Blues.\" James is a veteran sideman who has done memorable work in an array of contexts, including Michael Franti and Spearhead, Sila and the Afrofunk Experience, and the \u003ca href=\"http://bethcuster.com\">Beth Custer Ensemble\u003c/a> (he's still performing with the latter two ). \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After three decades of elevating other bandleaders’ projects, he’s put out his first album. And it’s a stunner.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>James is known as a groove master, and there are some fierce ones on \"Billionaire Blues,\" but he’s more interested in creating long sinuous melodies and transparent textures than displaying his rhythmic chops. The album explores an array of styles, from the lithe reggae of “Rubber Foot” and the sinewy bop of “Obama Hop” to the playfully cartoonish bounce of “Wag the Puppy” and the elegant Afrobeat of “Black Ops.”\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/E55fb4850Mo'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/E55fb4850Mo'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>What makes the album cohere so beautifully is James’ uncluttered orchestrations. He makes brilliant use of his cast, creating spacious arrangements that leave plenty of space for his enviable cast of violist Dina Maccabee, bassist Lisa Mezzacappa, clarinetist Beth Custer, trombonist Alan Williams and drummer Jan Jackson (half of GPS — James, Jackson and Custer — can also be found in the Beth Custer Ensemble, as can entirely different versions of “Wag the Puppy” and “Black Ops” on her excellent new album \"For the Grace of Any Man\"). \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A striking achievement by a player who’s been in the background far too long, \"Billionaire Blues\" is my favorite album of the year so far.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-10879048\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/kneedelus-main-800x800.jpg\" alt=\"kneedelus-main\" width=\"800\" height=\"800\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/kneedelus-main-800x800.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/kneedelus-main-400x400.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/kneedelus-main-960x960.jpg 960w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/kneedelus-main-32x32.jpg 32w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/kneedelus-main-64x64.jpg 64w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/kneedelus-main-96x96.jpg 96w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/kneedelus-main-128x128.jpg 128w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/kneedelus-main-75x75.jpg 75w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/02/kneedelus-main.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Where James’ album seemed to come out of nowhere, the collaboration between the great avant funk jazz combo \u003ca href=\"http://www.kneebody.com\">Kneebody\u003c/a> and Los Angeles producer and beat master \u003ca href=\"http://daedelusmusic.com\">Daedalus\u003c/a> (aka Alfred Darlington) comes with a great deal of history. A digital release on \u003ca href=\"http://www.brainfeedersite.com\">Brainfeeder\u003c/a>, the creatively charged L.A. label responsible for saxophonist Kamasi Washington’s 2015 breakout \"The Epic,\" \"Kneedelus\" is the latest and most extensive encounter between artists with ties dating back to high school (where Kneebody saxophonist Ben Wendel and Darlington first met).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of the music has a celestial Miles Davis \"In A Silent Way\" vibe, and other times it brings to mind the space funk of Herbie Hancock’s Mwandishi band. But there’s nothing retro about \"Kneedelus.\" \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I love the way the push and pull of sound manipulation keeps me off balance. Kneebody has honed an expansive sonic palette wedded to a menagerie of circuitous grooves unlike any other band, and with Daedalus subtly manipulating the proceedings it’s a truly seamless merging of sensibilities.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/LKq0Kv7GlgU'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/LKq0Kv7GlgU'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I see a \"Daedebody\" project in the future, but in the meantime, Kneedelus is \u003ca href=\"http://www.kneebody.com/tour/\">performing around California\u003c/a>, including Feb. 26 in San Diego, March 3 in Santa Cruz and March 4 in San Jose.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"disqusTitle": "Ty Segall, Lucinda Williams, Anderson .Paak Kick Off 2016's Musical Highlights",
"title": "Ty Segall, Lucinda Williams, Anderson .Paak Kick Off 2016's Musical Highlights",
"headTitle": "The California Report | KQED News",
"content": "\u003cp>There's no question 2015 was a fantastic year for California music, with groundbreaking albums from Kendrick Lamar, Kamasi Washington and Julia Holter among notable, acclaimed releases.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Can 2016 possibly live up to that? Well, we’re off to a good start, with compelling work from three distinctive artists -- two \u003cem>California Report\u003c/em> favorites and an exciting newcomer -- among the highlights so far.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ty Segall, 'Emotional Mugger'\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Following his acclaimed, wide-ranging 2014 tour de force “Manipulator,” the ever-prolific Orange County rock sprite \u003ca href=\"http://emotionalmugger.com\" target=\"_blank\">Ty Segall \u003c/a>scratched an itch last year with an album collecting his versions of some T. Rex songs titled — what else could it possibly be? — “Ty Rex.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With “Emotional Mugger,” the proper “Manipulator” follow-up, he shows that the foray into the glam icon’s canon was no mere whim, but rather an exploration of his current headspace. The chunky guitar riffs, the nicely naughty demeanor, the celebration of youth, the preening, it’s all here, Segall-style.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The album opens with a reference to a Marc Bolan glam-era contemporary, Roxy Music, with footsteps to a car and an engine starting, much as opens Roxy’s “Love is a Drug.” Not that anything here has the Roxy suave, though one could glean a little of the early Roxy experiments with Brian Eno in some of the sonic weirdness.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And ironically, the song that may be the most Bolan-esque, most redolent of London ’71, is “California Hills” — though the dark turns it takes and the little bursts of double-time weirdness in the middle are pure Segall. And the bass line of the title track (medleyed with the very glam “Leopard Priestess”) is very much in keeping with the T./Ty tone. Maybe T. Rex by way of the Residents.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xY_6-YTjMrw\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Candy” — “Candy I want, want your candy” — leans menacing in “Breakfast Eggs.” The sweet-stuff reference returns in “Candy Sam,” the very title suggesting T. Rex’s “Telegram Sam.” And with song there’s no pretense to anything that’s not a Bolan tribute. As such, it’s one of the most engaging, fully realized songs on the album. Though after “Squealer Two” there’s “W.U.O.T.W.S,” a somewhat random-sounding collage (I kept waiting for someone to say, “Number 9 … Number 9 …”). Perversely, perhaps, the album ends with “Magazine,” which \u003ci>is\u003c/i> the most realized song on the album, a psychedelic dream and the least Bolan-esque of them all, hinting at the “Manipulator” type range that never really materializes on this album.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Which is OK. This is no “Manipulator” and not meant to be, no career statement, or at least not a big one. Rather it’s another stop on the way, a little fun and strangeness, some rock ’n’ roll jollies, some studio goofing around, nothing to be taken too seriously. Oh wait, maybe that \u003ci>is\u003c/i> a statement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Lucinda Williams, 'The Ghosts of Highway 20'\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://lucindawilliams.com/?fp=true\" target=\"_blank\">Lucinda Williams\u003c/a> has covered a lot of ground, musically and emotionally, in 35 years or so of recording. But nothing before has been quite like where she goes at the end of this two-CD exploration. The closing “Faith and Grace” plays on for nearly 13 minutes, by the end becoming more a prayer than a song, as guitarist Bill Frisell surrounds Williams’ repeated testaments with curlicues and sparks, like a Van Gogh night sky.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Faith and Grace will help me run this race,” she sings. And clearly she’s needed it to get through this journey, which started, more than 80 minutes earlier, with words of pure desolation, in the song “Dust”: “There’s a sadness so deep the sun seems black.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lighthearted romp this is not. But the ride that comes from there to grace is a rewarding one. Well, it’s Lucinda Williams, so you knew that already.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10849063\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-10849063\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/01/LW-800x488.jpg\" alt=\"Lucinda Williams\" width=\"800\" height=\"488\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/01/LW-800x488.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/01/LW-400x244.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/01/LW-768x469.jpg 768w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/01/LW-1440x879.jpg 1440w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/01/LW.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/01/LW-1180x720.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/01/LW-960x586.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Lucinda Williams \u003ccite>(Photo: David McCalister)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“The Ghosts of Highway 20,” Williams’ second consecutive double-CD, following 2014’s bracingly ambitious “Down Where the Spirit Meets the Bone,” \u003ci>is \u003c/i>a ride — figuratively along the road that marked her youth in the South, literally through her memories. But as with all of Williams’ best, and this is very much among her best, “Highway 20” is really about the person she is now, wrestling to come to terms with where the road has led her, and most profoundly with losses along the way.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On the one hand, it’s a tour of the South of her youth, the places she lived and saw growing up, so the gothic hues come with the territory. On the other hand, it’s as personal an exploration of emotions and the very fabric of her being as she’s ever done — which is saying a lot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And it comes with some of the most evocative, involving music she’s ever made. For most of the album, the music centers on the dynamic pairing of guitarists Frisell (one of the most inventive figures in modern jazz, at once lyrical and challenging) and longtime Williams associate Greg Leisz (who plays both conventional guitar and steel, for which he is best known, and also co-produced the album with Williams and Tom Overby). Their prodding interplay both illuminates and elaborates the complex emotions, not necessarily relieving the darkness, but giving it character and shape as they serpentine through songs that are allowed to stretch as called for.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vu1kBnR01VM\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Death Came,” a wrenching lament for her mother, who died in 2004, is as stark an examination of loss as she’s ever done, which is also saying something. Williams’ talent for distilling complex emotions to the barest perfect words and images, is at its fullest effect here as she places herself between the tangible memories and the unanswerable but essentially human questions. The music here is just as stark, a simple waltz, gently scribed by Frisell and Leisz, with only the slightest support from bassist David Sutton and drummer Butch Norton.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Death is also there in \u003ca href=\"http://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2016/01/13/lucinda-williams-if-my-love-could-kill/\">“If My Love Could Kill,”\u003c/a> which came from watching her father, poet Miller Williams, fade away with Alzheimer's, a different kind of death. (His real death happened shortly after the release of her last album and the impending loss can be felt throughout it.) Here the emotion is anger, pure and simple. Her voice is rather flat, resigned but seething underneath as she sings, “Murderer of poets…. Destroyer of hope.” Her father is also present in “Dust,” the opening track quoted above, inspired by one of his poems.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The words of two other artists also come into play, with “House of Earth,” music written by Williams to unused Woody Guthrie lyrics, and an effectively spare version of Bruce Springsteen’s “Factory.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Through it all, the memories of the places of childhood are the sources of salvation, or at least potential salvation, the touchstones of her life. The very Springsteenian “Louisiana Story,” one of several songs with L.A. guitar ace Leisz replacing Frisell, name-checks some of the places where she lived in that state, sketching some scenes right out of Harper Lee or William Faulkner. “If you were from here, you would fear me to the death along with the ghost of Highway 20,” she warns in the title song, before ending on a more hopeful note: “My saving grace is with the ghost of Highway 20.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Anderson .Paak, “Malibu”\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One of the last things you might expect to hear on what is ostensibly a hip-hop album is someone waxing, no pun intended, about surf nostalgia. But there, at the end of “Come Down,” a highlight on the new \u003ca href=\"http://www.andersonpaak.com\" target=\"_blank\">Anderson .Paak\u003c/a> album “Malibu,” a voice intones, “Before Vietnam, when boards were long and hair was short, the center of the surfing world was a place called Malibu.” It’s not .Paak’s voice — it’s from an old documentary or some such. But it’s an intriguing tag that fits an oddly nostalgic thread that runs through the album.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-mlg-fFJZGA\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Not sure if this is the real Malibu or a metaphor, though it’s worth noting that .Paak was born Brandon Paak Anderson in Oxnard, just a little up Highway 1 from that famed beach locale.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So no, this isn't N.W.A. But it's also not the Beach Boys. What it is, is an impressively idiosyncratic artistic statement rightfully earning comparisons with Kendrick Lamar’s “To Pimp a Butterfly” and various projects coming from the Odd Future collective. Not that it sounds like any of them either. The overall tone echoes early ’70s soul — Stevie Wonder ballads, the Spinners — mixed with some curved-mirror weirdness, such as the warped-record wobble behind “Lite Weight.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The bass line and jazzy trumpet in opening “Bird” might bring to mind Sly Stone’s “If You Want Me to Stay,” though there’s also some Prince in here, as there is in the next song, “Heart Don’t Stand a Chance,” with its lower-case sly tone and fuzz-guitar solo. And the lilting “Celebrate” sounds plucked off of early ’70s radio, though the fatalist lyrics sound a bit more now: “You’re doing pretty well, I mean, you’re not dead. So let’s celebrate while we can.” If the era references are not obvious, there’s Wolfman Jack’s voice popping up at the end of the jumping “Parking Lot.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXdW0g6jAxE\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the irresistible “Put Me Through” sounds like a hit for any era from the ’70s on, and more often than not the album is marked by the kind of genre and time-busting music OutKast did at its best. There’s also new confidence here, gained since his 2014 debut, “Venice.” And understandably: This is his first since being tabbed as a rising star by no less than Dr. Dre, who featured him on several tracks from the “Compton” album last year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Venice? Malibu? What’s next? “Straight Outta Rincon?”\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>There's no question 2015 was a fantastic year for California music, with groundbreaking albums from Kendrick Lamar, Kamasi Washington and Julia Holter among notable, acclaimed releases.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Can 2016 possibly live up to that? Well, we’re off to a good start, with compelling work from three distinctive artists -- two \u003cem>California Report\u003c/em> favorites and an exciting newcomer -- among the highlights so far.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Ty Segall, 'Emotional Mugger'\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Following his acclaimed, wide-ranging 2014 tour de force “Manipulator,” the ever-prolific Orange County rock sprite \u003ca href=\"http://emotionalmugger.com\" target=\"_blank\">Ty Segall \u003c/a>scratched an itch last year with an album collecting his versions of some T. Rex songs titled — what else could it possibly be? — “Ty Rex.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With “Emotional Mugger,” the proper “Manipulator” follow-up, he shows that the foray into the glam icon’s canon was no mere whim, but rather an exploration of his current headspace. The chunky guitar riffs, the nicely naughty demeanor, the celebration of youth, the preening, it’s all here, Segall-style.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The album opens with a reference to a Marc Bolan glam-era contemporary, Roxy Music, with footsteps to a car and an engine starting, much as opens Roxy’s “Love is a Drug.” Not that anything here has the Roxy suave, though one could glean a little of the early Roxy experiments with Brian Eno in some of the sonic weirdness.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And ironically, the song that may be the most Bolan-esque, most redolent of London ’71, is “California Hills” — though the dark turns it takes and the little bursts of double-time weirdness in the middle are pure Segall. And the bass line of the title track (medleyed with the very glam “Leopard Priestess”) is very much in keeping with the T./Ty tone. Maybe T. Rex by way of the Residents.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/xY_6-YTjMrw'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/xY_6-YTjMrw'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>“Candy” — “Candy I want, want your candy” — leans menacing in “Breakfast Eggs.” The sweet-stuff reference returns in “Candy Sam,” the very title suggesting T. Rex’s “Telegram Sam.” And with song there’s no pretense to anything that’s not a Bolan tribute. As such, it’s one of the most engaging, fully realized songs on the album. Though after “Squealer Two” there’s “W.U.O.T.W.S,” a somewhat random-sounding collage (I kept waiting for someone to say, “Number 9 … Number 9 …”). Perversely, perhaps, the album ends with “Magazine,” which \u003ci>is\u003c/i> the most realized song on the album, a psychedelic dream and the least Bolan-esque of them all, hinting at the “Manipulator” type range that never really materializes on this album.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Which is OK. This is no “Manipulator” and not meant to be, no career statement, or at least not a big one. Rather it’s another stop on the way, a little fun and strangeness, some rock ’n’ roll jollies, some studio goofing around, nothing to be taken too seriously. Oh wait, maybe that \u003ci>is\u003c/i> a statement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Lucinda Williams, 'The Ghosts of Highway 20'\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://lucindawilliams.com/?fp=true\" target=\"_blank\">Lucinda Williams\u003c/a> has covered a lot of ground, musically and emotionally, in 35 years or so of recording. But nothing before has been quite like where she goes at the end of this two-CD exploration. The closing “Faith and Grace” plays on for nearly 13 minutes, by the end becoming more a prayer than a song, as guitarist Bill Frisell surrounds Williams’ repeated testaments with curlicues and sparks, like a Van Gogh night sky.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Faith and Grace will help me run this race,” she sings. And clearly she’s needed it to get through this journey, which started, more than 80 minutes earlier, with words of pure desolation, in the song “Dust”: “There’s a sadness so deep the sun seems black.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lighthearted romp this is not. But the ride that comes from there to grace is a rewarding one. Well, it’s Lucinda Williams, so you knew that already.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10849063\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-10849063\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/01/LW-800x488.jpg\" alt=\"Lucinda Williams\" width=\"800\" height=\"488\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/01/LW-800x488.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/01/LW-400x244.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/01/LW-768x469.jpg 768w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/01/LW-1440x879.jpg 1440w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/01/LW.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/01/LW-1180x720.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/01/LW-960x586.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Lucinda Williams \u003ccite>(Photo: David McCalister)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“The Ghosts of Highway 20,” Williams’ second consecutive double-CD, following 2014’s bracingly ambitious “Down Where the Spirit Meets the Bone,” \u003ci>is \u003c/i>a ride — figuratively along the road that marked her youth in the South, literally through her memories. But as with all of Williams’ best, and this is very much among her best, “Highway 20” is really about the person she is now, wrestling to come to terms with where the road has led her, and most profoundly with losses along the way.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On the one hand, it’s a tour of the South of her youth, the places she lived and saw growing up, so the gothic hues come with the territory. On the other hand, it’s as personal an exploration of emotions and the very fabric of her being as she’s ever done — which is saying a lot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And it comes with some of the most evocative, involving music she’s ever made. For most of the album, the music centers on the dynamic pairing of guitarists Frisell (one of the most inventive figures in modern jazz, at once lyrical and challenging) and longtime Williams associate Greg Leisz (who plays both conventional guitar and steel, for which he is best known, and also co-produced the album with Williams and Tom Overby). Their prodding interplay both illuminates and elaborates the complex emotions, not necessarily relieving the darkness, but giving it character and shape as they serpentine through songs that are allowed to stretch as called for.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/Vu1kBnR01VM'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/Vu1kBnR01VM'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>“Death Came,” a wrenching lament for her mother, who died in 2004, is as stark an examination of loss as she’s ever done, which is also saying something. Williams’ talent for distilling complex emotions to the barest perfect words and images, is at its fullest effect here as she places herself between the tangible memories and the unanswerable but essentially human questions. The music here is just as stark, a simple waltz, gently scribed by Frisell and Leisz, with only the slightest support from bassist David Sutton and drummer Butch Norton.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Death is also there in \u003ca href=\"http://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2016/01/13/lucinda-williams-if-my-love-could-kill/\">“If My Love Could Kill,”\u003c/a> which came from watching her father, poet Miller Williams, fade away with Alzheimer's, a different kind of death. (His real death happened shortly after the release of her last album and the impending loss can be felt throughout it.) Here the emotion is anger, pure and simple. Her voice is rather flat, resigned but seething underneath as she sings, “Murderer of poets…. Destroyer of hope.” Her father is also present in “Dust,” the opening track quoted above, inspired by one of his poems.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The words of two other artists also come into play, with “House of Earth,” music written by Williams to unused Woody Guthrie lyrics, and an effectively spare version of Bruce Springsteen’s “Factory.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Through it all, the memories of the places of childhood are the sources of salvation, or at least potential salvation, the touchstones of her life. The very Springsteenian “Louisiana Story,” one of several songs with L.A. guitar ace Leisz replacing Frisell, name-checks some of the places where she lived in that state, sketching some scenes right out of Harper Lee or William Faulkner. “If you were from here, you would fear me to the death along with the ghost of Highway 20,” she warns in the title song, before ending on a more hopeful note: “My saving grace is with the ghost of Highway 20.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Anderson .Paak, “Malibu”\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One of the last things you might expect to hear on what is ostensibly a hip-hop album is someone waxing, no pun intended, about surf nostalgia. But there, at the end of “Come Down,” a highlight on the new \u003ca href=\"http://www.andersonpaak.com\" target=\"_blank\">Anderson .Paak\u003c/a> album “Malibu,” a voice intones, “Before Vietnam, when boards were long and hair was short, the center of the surfing world was a place called Malibu.” It’s not .Paak’s voice — it’s from an old documentary or some such. But it’s an intriguing tag that fits an oddly nostalgic thread that runs through the album.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/-mlg-fFJZGA'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/-mlg-fFJZGA'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Not sure if this is the real Malibu or a metaphor, though it’s worth noting that .Paak was born Brandon Paak Anderson in Oxnard, just a little up Highway 1 from that famed beach locale.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So no, this isn't N.W.A. But it's also not the Beach Boys. What it is, is an impressively idiosyncratic artistic statement rightfully earning comparisons with Kendrick Lamar’s “To Pimp a Butterfly” and various projects coming from the Odd Future collective. Not that it sounds like any of them either. The overall tone echoes early ’70s soul — Stevie Wonder ballads, the Spinners — mixed with some curved-mirror weirdness, such as the warped-record wobble behind “Lite Weight.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The bass line and jazzy trumpet in opening “Bird” might bring to mind Sly Stone’s “If You Want Me to Stay,” though there’s also some Prince in here, as there is in the next song, “Heart Don’t Stand a Chance,” with its lower-case sly tone and fuzz-guitar solo. And the lilting “Celebrate” sounds plucked off of early ’70s radio, though the fatalist lyrics sound a bit more now: “You’re doing pretty well, I mean, you’re not dead. So let’s celebrate while we can.” If the era references are not obvious, there’s Wolfman Jack’s voice popping up at the end of the jumping “Parking Lot.”\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/KXdW0g6jAxE'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/KXdW0g6jAxE'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>But the irresistible “Put Me Through” sounds like a hit for any era from the ’70s on, and more often than not the album is marked by the kind of genre and time-busting music OutKast did at its best. There’s also new confidence here, gained since his 2014 debut, “Venice.” And understandably: This is his first since being tabbed as a rising star by no less than Dr. Dre, who featured him on several tracks from the “Compton” album last year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Venice? Malibu? What’s next? “Straight Outta Rincon?”\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"disqusTitle": "The Blues, Alive and Well in a South Central L.A. Garage",
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"content": "\u003cp>On a sun-baked residential street in South Central L.A., you hear the constant ebb and flow of jets cruising in line toward Los Angeles International Airport. Unless you’re in Franklin Bell’s garage, where you hear the blues.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[soundcloud url=\"https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/227720239\" params=\"color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false\" width=\"100%\" height=\"166\" iframe=\"true\" /]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For the last decade, 81-year-old Bell has hosted the Blues Workshop every Sunday, regular as church, in a one-car garage rebuilt to hold about 50 people. The place gets crowded, folks dressed to the nines. For a small, voluntary donation, they dance, eat and drink to music that ranges from raw to graceful. There’s a stage in the back, and anyone’s welcome to sit in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We play R&B, we play a lot of pop music, but basically we go with the blues,” explains Bell. “That’s what people look for when they come to the Workshop. They love to come to try to participate, play the blues and listen to it. And I just love that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10713895\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/MississippiBo-800x561.jpg\" alt=\"Guitarist and singer Mississippi Bo kicks back between sets.\" width=\"800\" height=\"561\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-10713895\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/MississippiBo-800x561.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/MississippiBo-400x280.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/MississippiBo-1440x1010.jpg 1440w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/MississippiBo.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/MississippiBo-1180x827.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/MississippiBo-960x673.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Guitarist and singer Mississippi Bo kicks back between sets.\u003cbr> \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Bell came to L.A. from his hometown of Tuscaloosa, Alabama in 1968. He ran a Chevron gas station that fell to the construction of the 105 Freeway. A musician since high school, he picked up his drums and hit the road. The years passed. His eyesight was failing, “and I was getting tired of the travel, hotel, motel, and carrying them drums,” says Bell. He hit on the idea of setting up shop in the garage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As the players onstage dig in, finding and changing grooves, trading fours and eights, Bell works the crowd. He’s dapper, sporting a crisp, dark suit and tie despite the heat. He wears a white cap tilted back on his head. He carries a Styrofoam cup in his hand, sipping from it every now and again. He looks you in the eye when he speaks, despite being legally blind. It’s just part of getting older, and there’s a lot of that in the garage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The average age, you’re talking about 65. Average!” exclaims Bell. “So that means, we got people 75, 85, even 90 in the audience every Sunday. But young? Once in a while, maybe someone in their 50s, maybe under 50. Very few.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lester Lands is a guitarist and vocalist from Baton Rouge who cut his teeth on the southern gospel circuit. Lands looks about half of his 62 years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If you stop and think about it, the blues is for people that age, 60 and over,” Lands says. “A lot of them live the blues, coming out of the South and stuff, man. And still today, that’s their soundtrack, the blues. So that’s why it’s so nice and so popular around here.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10713900\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/CuttingaRug-800x671.jpg\" alt=\"The dance floor kicks in on another Sunday in the garage.\" width=\"800\" height=\"671\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-10713900\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/CuttingaRug-800x671.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/CuttingaRug-400x336.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/CuttingaRug-1440x1208.jpg 1440w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/CuttingaRug.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/CuttingaRug-1180x990.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/CuttingaRug-960x806.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The dance floor kicks in on another Sunday in the garage. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Workshop audience regular Betty Madison is a beautiful woman with a Lena Horne smile, another Bayou State transplant.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>“\u003c/strong>I’m originally from Louisiana but I’ve been here since 1942,” she says. “I’m 84.” Eighty-four? Watching her work the dance floor, this is astonishing news.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m here every Sunday,” Madison says. “I go to church and come home, get me a nap and then get dressed and come over and listen to the blues. 'Cause I enjoy the people, and the people be enjoying themselves. That’s what I like, too.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Madison and most of the folks here fall into what’s known as the Second Great Migration of African-Americans, people who moved from states like Texas, Mississippi and Louisiana to cities in the North and West, a period that lasted from the early 1940s until about 1970. They came searching for jobs in California, and many found them in the burgeoning defense industry, as did harp player and singer Sammy Lee, who left Shreveport, Louisiana for the City of Angels in 1965.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“[I] graduated from high school,” Lee says. “Started working at a car wash. Few years later I got drafted, went in the Army. Came out the Army. Went to work for Northrop Aircraft.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I met Bell in the early ‘80s when he was playing in a band. Then he got this place going. I think it’s fantastic. It’s a great place for the neighborhood. Keeps the blues alive, right here in South Central.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10712143\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16974_bells-players-qut.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-full wp-image-10712143\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16974_bells-players-qut.jpg\" alt=\"Left to right: Roland Atkins, Lil' John Dantzler, B.J., and Sammy Lee.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1095\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16974_bells-players-qut.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16974_bells-players-qut-400x228.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16974_bells-players-qut-800x456.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16974_bells-players-qut-1440x821.jpg 1440w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16974_bells-players-qut-1180x673.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16974_bells-players-qut-960x548.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Left to right: Roland Atkins, Lil' John Dantzler, B.J., and Sammy Lee. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The relocated Southerners brought more than just regional music. “Blues and food,” Bell gushes. “We got something to eat! Got to have some food to go along with the blues.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Supper is the handiwork of a number of Bell supporters who lend their culinary skills. Bell’s cousin Alice Cabile is among them. And what’s on the menu?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Spaghetti and beans, a variety of salads, cake and pie,” Cabile says. “We have one lady that makes the bomb banana pudding. Chicken, pig feet, meatloaf, fish, hushpuppies, coleslaw. It’s always great.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The buffet table is a mighty ritual at the Workshop, and Lester Lands is called upon to offer grace from the bandstand.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>“\u003c/strong>Right now they telling me that some food is about to be served,\" Lands says. \"We don’t wanna offend nobody but we give thanks to the Lord and savior Jesus Christ here. Now, let’s bow our heads … Father God in the name of Jesus we come to you right now thanking you for another beautiful day. We thank you for the Workshop, Lord.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10711871\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16961_no-drinks-sign-qut.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-full wp-image-10711871\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16961_no-drinks-sign-qut.jpg\" alt=\"There are rules at the Workshop.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1363\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16961_no-drinks-sign-qut.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16961_no-drinks-sign-qut-400x284.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16961_no-drinks-sign-qut-800x568.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16961_no-drinks-sign-qut-1440x1022.jpg 1440w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16961_no-drinks-sign-qut-1180x838.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16961_no-drinks-sign-qut-960x682.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">There are rules at the Workshop. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Post blessing, Lands explains that everyone is welcome in the garage. “Here, it’s not no mess, no racial barriers, none of that. It’s just good clean fun, man.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Yet you don’t see many young people showing up for the good clean fun. Twenty-nine-year-old Donae Alexander is an exception. She says her generation just doesn’t get the blues.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think that they need to just wake up cause that’s what time it is,” Alexander says. “If you don’t know basically where we came from, far as in your roots and a certain type of music that you listen to, and what they have going on today, hip-hop is not the same, to be honest. It’s not. Not without the old school. You have to go way back to come to present, that’s how I look at it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10713902\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/Guitarist-800x543.jpg\" alt=\"Guitarist and singer Tony Ibarra, a regular at the Blues Workshop. \" width=\"800\" height=\"543\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-10713902\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/Guitarist-800x543.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/Guitarist-400x271.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/Guitarist-1440x977.jpg 1440w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/Guitarist.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/Guitarist-1180x800.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/Guitarist-960x651.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Guitarist and singer Tony Ibarra, a regular at the Blues Workshop.\u003cbr> \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Guitarist and singer Tony Ibarra is one Workshop fixture who didn’t come from the American South. The Guadalajara native played in primal Mexican rock combo Los Fugitivos, and came to Southern California in 1963. He’s been slinging the blues for decades and has seen his share of rough joints. In fact, he spent his Summer of Love playing onstage in Tijuana. But this scene, he says, is a far cry from that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Here and there is somebody screaming, which is normal, you know, but nothing to scare you away,” says Ibarra with a chuckle. “Everybody’s cool. It’s very unique. It’s like the real thing to me, you know? Everybody’s friendly, no fights. We eat, have a few beers, listen to good players, listen to good music, talk to the people. To me it’s great.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s exactly what Franklin Bell wanted all along.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It don’t take no big crowd,” says Bell. “It take a few peoples that you can get together and if they can get some joy and they can spread that as they go through life it makes a difference. That’s what my thing is about.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And as the jets continue overhead, flying toward the future, in the garage, the blues will continue to extend the past, thanks to Franklin Bell.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This article was originally published on Oct. 10, 2015.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>On a sun-baked residential street in South Central L.A., you hear the constant ebb and flow of jets cruising in line toward Los Angeles International Airport. Unless you’re in Franklin Bell’s garage, where you hear the blues.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cdiv class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__shortcodes__shortcodeWrapper'>\n \u003ciframe width='100%' height='166'\n scrolling='no' frameborder='no'\n src='https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/227720239&visual=true&color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false'\n title='https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/227720239'>\n \u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/div>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For the last decade, 81-year-old Bell has hosted the Blues Workshop every Sunday, regular as church, in a one-car garage rebuilt to hold about 50 people. The place gets crowded, folks dressed to the nines. For a small, voluntary donation, they dance, eat and drink to music that ranges from raw to graceful. There’s a stage in the back, and anyone’s welcome to sit in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We play R&B, we play a lot of pop music, but basically we go with the blues,” explains Bell. “That’s what people look for when they come to the Workshop. They love to come to try to participate, play the blues and listen to it. And I just love that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10713895\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/MississippiBo-800x561.jpg\" alt=\"Guitarist and singer Mississippi Bo kicks back between sets.\" width=\"800\" height=\"561\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-10713895\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/MississippiBo-800x561.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/MississippiBo-400x280.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/MississippiBo-1440x1010.jpg 1440w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/MississippiBo.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/MississippiBo-1180x827.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/MississippiBo-960x673.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Guitarist and singer Mississippi Bo kicks back between sets.\u003cbr> \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Bell came to L.A. from his hometown of Tuscaloosa, Alabama in 1968. He ran a Chevron gas station that fell to the construction of the 105 Freeway. A musician since high school, he picked up his drums and hit the road. The years passed. His eyesight was failing, “and I was getting tired of the travel, hotel, motel, and carrying them drums,” says Bell. He hit on the idea of setting up shop in the garage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As the players onstage dig in, finding and changing grooves, trading fours and eights, Bell works the crowd. He’s dapper, sporting a crisp, dark suit and tie despite the heat. He wears a white cap tilted back on his head. He carries a Styrofoam cup in his hand, sipping from it every now and again. He looks you in the eye when he speaks, despite being legally blind. It’s just part of getting older, and there’s a lot of that in the garage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The average age, you’re talking about 65. Average!” exclaims Bell. “So that means, we got people 75, 85, even 90 in the audience every Sunday. But young? Once in a while, maybe someone in their 50s, maybe under 50. Very few.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lester Lands is a guitarist and vocalist from Baton Rouge who cut his teeth on the southern gospel circuit. Lands looks about half of his 62 years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If you stop and think about it, the blues is for people that age, 60 and over,” Lands says. “A lot of them live the blues, coming out of the South and stuff, man. And still today, that’s their soundtrack, the blues. So that’s why it’s so nice and so popular around here.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10713900\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/CuttingaRug-800x671.jpg\" alt=\"The dance floor kicks in on another Sunday in the garage.\" width=\"800\" height=\"671\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-10713900\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/CuttingaRug-800x671.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/CuttingaRug-400x336.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/CuttingaRug-1440x1208.jpg 1440w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/CuttingaRug.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/CuttingaRug-1180x990.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/CuttingaRug-960x806.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The dance floor kicks in on another Sunday in the garage. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Workshop audience regular Betty Madison is a beautiful woman with a Lena Horne smile, another Bayou State transplant.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>“\u003c/strong>I’m originally from Louisiana but I’ve been here since 1942,” she says. “I’m 84.” Eighty-four? Watching her work the dance floor, this is astonishing news.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m here every Sunday,” Madison says. “I go to church and come home, get me a nap and then get dressed and come over and listen to the blues. 'Cause I enjoy the people, and the people be enjoying themselves. That’s what I like, too.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Madison and most of the folks here fall into what’s known as the Second Great Migration of African-Americans, people who moved from states like Texas, Mississippi and Louisiana to cities in the North and West, a period that lasted from the early 1940s until about 1970. They came searching for jobs in California, and many found them in the burgeoning defense industry, as did harp player and singer Sammy Lee, who left Shreveport, Louisiana for the City of Angels in 1965.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“[I] graduated from high school,” Lee says. “Started working at a car wash. Few years later I got drafted, went in the Army. Came out the Army. Went to work for Northrop Aircraft.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I met Bell in the early ‘80s when he was playing in a band. Then he got this place going. I think it’s fantastic. It’s a great place for the neighborhood. Keeps the blues alive, right here in South Central.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10712143\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16974_bells-players-qut.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-full wp-image-10712143\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16974_bells-players-qut.jpg\" alt=\"Left to right: Roland Atkins, Lil' John Dantzler, B.J., and Sammy Lee.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1095\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16974_bells-players-qut.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16974_bells-players-qut-400x228.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16974_bells-players-qut-800x456.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16974_bells-players-qut-1440x821.jpg 1440w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16974_bells-players-qut-1180x673.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16974_bells-players-qut-960x548.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Left to right: Roland Atkins, Lil' John Dantzler, B.J., and Sammy Lee. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The relocated Southerners brought more than just regional music. “Blues and food,” Bell gushes. “We got something to eat! Got to have some food to go along with the blues.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Supper is the handiwork of a number of Bell supporters who lend their culinary skills. Bell’s cousin Alice Cabile is among them. And what’s on the menu?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Spaghetti and beans, a variety of salads, cake and pie,” Cabile says. “We have one lady that makes the bomb banana pudding. Chicken, pig feet, meatloaf, fish, hushpuppies, coleslaw. It’s always great.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The buffet table is a mighty ritual at the Workshop, and Lester Lands is called upon to offer grace from the bandstand.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>“\u003c/strong>Right now they telling me that some food is about to be served,\" Lands says. \"We don’t wanna offend nobody but we give thanks to the Lord and savior Jesus Christ here. Now, let’s bow our heads … Father God in the name of Jesus we come to you right now thanking you for another beautiful day. We thank you for the Workshop, Lord.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10711871\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16961_no-drinks-sign-qut.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-full wp-image-10711871\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16961_no-drinks-sign-qut.jpg\" alt=\"There are rules at the Workshop.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1363\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16961_no-drinks-sign-qut.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16961_no-drinks-sign-qut-400x284.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16961_no-drinks-sign-qut-800x568.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16961_no-drinks-sign-qut-1440x1022.jpg 1440w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16961_no-drinks-sign-qut-1180x838.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/RS16961_no-drinks-sign-qut-960x682.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">There are rules at the Workshop. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Post blessing, Lands explains that everyone is welcome in the garage. “Here, it’s not no mess, no racial barriers, none of that. It’s just good clean fun, man.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Yet you don’t see many young people showing up for the good clean fun. Twenty-nine-year-old Donae Alexander is an exception. She says her generation just doesn’t get the blues.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think that they need to just wake up cause that’s what time it is,” Alexander says. “If you don’t know basically where we came from, far as in your roots and a certain type of music that you listen to, and what they have going on today, hip-hop is not the same, to be honest. It’s not. Not without the old school. You have to go way back to come to present, that’s how I look at it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10713902\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/Guitarist-800x543.jpg\" alt=\"Guitarist and singer Tony Ibarra, a regular at the Blues Workshop. \" width=\"800\" height=\"543\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-10713902\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/Guitarist-800x543.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/Guitarist-400x271.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/Guitarist-1440x977.jpg 1440w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/Guitarist.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/Guitarist-1180x800.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/10/Guitarist-960x651.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Guitarist and singer Tony Ibarra, a regular at the Blues Workshop.\u003cbr> \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Guitarist and singer Tony Ibarra is one Workshop fixture who didn’t come from the American South. The Guadalajara native played in primal Mexican rock combo Los Fugitivos, and came to Southern California in 1963. He’s been slinging the blues for decades and has seen his share of rough joints. In fact, he spent his Summer of Love playing onstage in Tijuana. But this scene, he says, is a far cry from that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Here and there is somebody screaming, which is normal, you know, but nothing to scare you away,” says Ibarra with a chuckle. “Everybody’s cool. It’s very unique. It’s like the real thing to me, you know? Everybody’s friendly, no fights. We eat, have a few beers, listen to good players, listen to good music, talk to the people. To me it’s great.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s exactly what Franklin Bell wanted all along.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It don’t take no big crowd,” says Bell. “It take a few peoples that you can get together and if they can get some joy and they can spread that as they go through life it makes a difference. That’s what my thing is about.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And as the jets continue overhead, flying toward the future, in the garage, the blues will continue to extend the past, thanks to Franklin Bell.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This article was originally published on Oct. 10, 2015.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"disqusTitle": "How the 'Vietnamese Madonna' Became a Sandwich Maven in Orange County",
"title": "How the 'Vietnamese Madonna' Became a Sandwich Maven in Orange County",
"headTitle": "California Foodways | The California Report | KQED News",
"content": "\u003cp>In Orange County, California, there’s no shortage of restaurants selling bánh mì, that delicious Vietnamese sandwich featuring a crunchy baguette filled with grilled meat, pate, and fresh and pickled vegetables. The county's Little Saigon is home to the largest Vietnamese population outside Vietnam. But go to the town of Westminster and you can see a pop star behind the counter, a woman known as the \"Vietnamese Madonna.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[soundcloud url=\"https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/216225838\" params=\"color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false\" width=\"100%\" height=\"166\" iframe=\"true\" /]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lynda Trang Dai is the most glamorous proprietor of a sandwich shop I’ve ever seen. She sports stiletto heels, a short skirt and perfect makeup -- including false eyelashes. She’s also a bit of a diva. She makes me wait two hours to interview her! Yet in between text messages and phone calls, \u003cem>she’s\u003c/em> the one running to the kitchen -- checking an industrial mixer as it churns a special sauce for the sandwiches. She’s the only one who knows the recipe.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Her shop, Lynda Sandwich, sit in the middle of a parking lot in a strip mall. Inside, though, it feels like a posh living room, with lush plants, brightly painted murals of her idols like Michael Jackson and Marilyn Monroe, and a wide-screen TV playing the Food Network. There’s also a wall of fame, with framed images of Vietnamese-American singers, but Lynda Trang Dai might be more famous than any of them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10614788\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaStorefront-800x603.jpg\" alt=\"The storefront of Lynda Sandwich in Westminster, Orange County.\" width=\"800\" height=\"603\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-10614788\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaStorefront-800x603.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaStorefront-400x301.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaStorefront-1440x1085.jpg 1440w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaStorefront-1400x1054.jpg 1400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaStorefront-1180x889.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaStorefront-960x723.jpg 960w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaStorefront.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The storefront of Lynda Sandwich in Westminster, Orange County. \u003ccite>(Vickie Ly/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“I used to watch her in videos with my parents when I was a kid growing up. So, she's pretty famous among the Vietnamese community,” says customer Patrick Pham, adding sheepishly, “I never met her, personally,” even though she’s actually at a table just a few feet away.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He’s clearly star-struck, but he insists he comes for the bánh mì. “They have really good food here. Yeah, it's really simple, you know what I mean?\" he says. \"I think the whole baguette came from like France, when they colonized us for 100 years.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Another customer, Javier Alcala, works at the local community college. He’s eating his favorite \u003cem>cha tom\u003c/em>, a slightly unconventional bánh mì with shrimp cake. Alcala first came in out of curiosity. For years he’d seen posters around town, announcing the singer’s concerts, so he wanted to come in and try the food made by the Madonna of Little Saigon.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lynda Trang Dai’s journey to Orange County was pretty arduous, but as she talks even about her earliest days, in the ‘70s in central Vietnam, it’s clear that food has always been a driving force.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10614792\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside-800x805.jpg\" alt=\"Lynda Trang Dai's shop features framed images of Vietnamese-American singers, but she might be more famous than any of them.\" width=\"800\" height=\"805\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-10614792\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside-800x805.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside-400x403.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside-1440x1450.jpg 1440w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside-1400x1409.jpg 1400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside-1180x1188.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside-960x967.jpg 960w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside-32x32.jpg 32w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside-64x64.jpg 64w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside-96x96.jpg 96w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside-128x128.jpg 128w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside-75x75.jpg 75w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Lynda Trang Dai's shop features framed images of Vietnamese-American singers, but she might be more famous than any of them. \u003ccite>(Vickie Ly/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“I remember sitting on this wooden table. My grandmother taught me how to make \u003cem>bánh bèo\u003c/em>, dough with shrimp on it,” a dish she still loves.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After the war, her family went from well-off to poor, and she remembers, “I would buy fruit, a whole big watermelon, cut it up, and sell it and make money.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Then, in 1979, her father got tipped off that the government was going to investigate him on suspicion of aiding the CIA during the war. They escaped at 2:00 in the morning, family members split between tiny boats.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We had to be quiet, so quiet,” Lynda remembers. “It was scary. If we got caught, we'd go to jail.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They went through storms and ran out of food, and finally found some refuge on a Chinese island, where she says they were fed rice with sugar. “It’s strange to eat rice with sugar, but it was so good at the time,” she says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They got back on the water, headed for Hong Kong, and then saw the large British ship that would save them. They all started waving.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I could never forget. It was just unbelievable, the most amazing moment,” Lynda remembers, choking up. “When we got up for them to rescue us into land, they gave us croissants. That was like going from hell to heaven.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10614790\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/BanhMi-800x532.jpg\" alt=\"One of Lynda's signature bánh mì.\" width=\"800\" height=\"532\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-10614790\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/BanhMi-800x532.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/BanhMi-400x266.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/BanhMi-1440x958.jpg 1440w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/BanhMi-1400x931.jpg 1400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/BanhMi-1180x785.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/BanhMi-960x639.jpg 960w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/BanhMi.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">One of Lynda's signature bánh mì. \u003ccite>(Vickie Ly/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>But when her family got to the United States, she developed another passion, and found her first career. She always loved to sing, the first to volunteer in elementary school, she says. As a high school student she started performing in tiny venues around Little Saigon, putting up her own fliers. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And then one night she was discovered singing at a club. She was invited to film her first spot in a variety show called \"Paris By Night\" -- a hugely popular video series -- so she missed her high school graduation and flew to France.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She became a star, dressing provocatively, singing in both English and Vietnamese, a draw for young Vietnamese-Americans. In the '90s in any home throughout the Vietnamese diaspora, you’d probably find a VHS tape featuring Lynda Trang Dai. The videos even made it back to Vietnam in a kind of gray market.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">'Sometimes when I travel to sing on a tour, I would be up all night making sauce, and just sleep on the plane.'\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>“Back then, it's illegal to watch,” Lynda explains, adding that if people got caught they could go to jail. But an estimated 72 million people in Vietnam did watch.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lynda started touring Vietnamese communities around the U.S. and the world, but her obsession with Vietnamese food remained constant. She says the first time she went to Australia, she brought food on the plane with her, including \u003cem>bánh bèo \u003c/em>and a noodle soup that she asked the flight attendant to heat up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“All the other Vietnamese singers would look at me, like, ‘You are so weird,’ ” she says. But she found good Vietnamese food all over the world, and started a kind of ritual wherever she touched down.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In any city I'd go to, I'd just check in on the hotel, throw all my luggage down and go and find a Vietnamese restaurant, that’s it,” she says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10614785\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaPerforming-800x562.jpg\" alt=\"Lynda Trang Dai at a recent performance.\" width=\"800\" height=\"562\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-10614785\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaPerforming-800x562.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaPerforming-400x281.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaPerforming-1440x1012.jpg 1440w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaPerforming-1400x984.jpg 1400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaPerforming-1180x829.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaPerforming-960x675.jpg 960w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaPerforming.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Lynda Trang Dai at a recent performance. \u003ccite>(Vickie Ly/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>She still tours a lot, but when I visit she’s performing in Westminster with her contemporaries in a banquet hall, just a few hundred feet away from her bánh mì shop. People in the crowd are dressed to the nines, including sisters Hang and Juliette Nguyen. They came from L.A. to see this show.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When they were younger, the sisters say, these were the big Vietnamese stars. They used to watch them on videos, and go to their concerts whenever they came to the South.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The sisters say there weren’t a lot of Vietnamese people in Alabama in the '80s. Tonight the singer is dressed in a barely-there strappy outfit. It fits the image the sisters remember: the sex symbol among Vietnamese singers. She was the \"Vietnamese Madonna,” they say in unison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That comparison thrills Lynda, who is in her late 40s, but she says she worked hard to communicate to the larger community that it was just her onstage persona. “When I’m off stage I’m like 100 percent completely different, a total Vietnamese traditional girl who takes care of their family, food on the table, everything,\" she says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Case in point: She started her sandwich shop as a business with her family, and though a small staff does most of the food prep and sales, Lynda Trang Dai is still is the only one to make the special Lynda Sauce.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Sometimes when I travel to Australia to sing on a tour, or to Europe, I would be up all night here making sauce, and just sleep on the plane if I have to.” Anything, she says, for a great meal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story was originally produced for KCRW’s \u003ca href=\"http://www.kcrw.com/news-culture/independent-producer-project\">Independent Producers Project\u003c/a> while Morehouse was at a residency at \u003ca href=\"http://www.mesarefuge.org/\">Mesa Refuge\u003c/a>. The series \u003ca href=\"http://californiafoodways.com/\">California Foodways\u003c/a> is supported by \u003ca href=\"http://www.calhum.org/\">Cal Humanities\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This article was originally published on July 25, 2015.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>In Orange County, California, there’s no shortage of restaurants selling bánh mì, that delicious Vietnamese sandwich featuring a crunchy baguette filled with grilled meat, pate, and fresh and pickled vegetables. The county's Little Saigon is home to the largest Vietnamese population outside Vietnam. But go to the town of Westminster and you can see a pop star behind the counter, a woman known as the \"Vietnamese Madonna.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cdiv class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__shortcodes__shortcodeWrapper'>\n \u003ciframe width='100%' height='166'\n scrolling='no' frameborder='no'\n src='https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/216225838&visual=true&color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false'\n title='https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/216225838'>\n \u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/div>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lynda Trang Dai is the most glamorous proprietor of a sandwich shop I’ve ever seen. She sports stiletto heels, a short skirt and perfect makeup -- including false eyelashes. She’s also a bit of a diva. She makes me wait two hours to interview her! Yet in between text messages and phone calls, \u003cem>she’s\u003c/em> the one running to the kitchen -- checking an industrial mixer as it churns a special sauce for the sandwiches. She’s the only one who knows the recipe.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Her shop, Lynda Sandwich, sit in the middle of a parking lot in a strip mall. Inside, though, it feels like a posh living room, with lush plants, brightly painted murals of her idols like Michael Jackson and Marilyn Monroe, and a wide-screen TV playing the Food Network. There’s also a wall of fame, with framed images of Vietnamese-American singers, but Lynda Trang Dai might be more famous than any of them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10614788\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaStorefront-800x603.jpg\" alt=\"The storefront of Lynda Sandwich in Westminster, Orange County.\" width=\"800\" height=\"603\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-10614788\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaStorefront-800x603.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaStorefront-400x301.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaStorefront-1440x1085.jpg 1440w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaStorefront-1400x1054.jpg 1400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaStorefront-1180x889.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaStorefront-960x723.jpg 960w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaStorefront.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The storefront of Lynda Sandwich in Westminster, Orange County. \u003ccite>(Vickie Ly/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“I used to watch her in videos with my parents when I was a kid growing up. So, she's pretty famous among the Vietnamese community,” says customer Patrick Pham, adding sheepishly, “I never met her, personally,” even though she’s actually at a table just a few feet away.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He’s clearly star-struck, but he insists he comes for the bánh mì. “They have really good food here. Yeah, it's really simple, you know what I mean?\" he says. \"I think the whole baguette came from like France, when they colonized us for 100 years.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Another customer, Javier Alcala, works at the local community college. He’s eating his favorite \u003cem>cha tom\u003c/em>, a slightly unconventional bánh mì with shrimp cake. Alcala first came in out of curiosity. For years he’d seen posters around town, announcing the singer’s concerts, so he wanted to come in and try the food made by the Madonna of Little Saigon.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lynda Trang Dai’s journey to Orange County was pretty arduous, but as she talks even about her earliest days, in the ‘70s in central Vietnam, it’s clear that food has always been a driving force.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10614792\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside-800x805.jpg\" alt=\"Lynda Trang Dai's shop features framed images of Vietnamese-American singers, but she might be more famous than any of them.\" width=\"800\" height=\"805\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-10614792\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside-800x805.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside-400x403.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside-1440x1450.jpg 1440w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside-1400x1409.jpg 1400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside-1180x1188.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside-960x967.jpg 960w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside-32x32.jpg 32w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside-64x64.jpg 64w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside-96x96.jpg 96w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside-128x128.jpg 128w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside-75x75.jpg 75w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaInside.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Lynda Trang Dai's shop features framed images of Vietnamese-American singers, but she might be more famous than any of them. \u003ccite>(Vickie Ly/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“I remember sitting on this wooden table. My grandmother taught me how to make \u003cem>bánh bèo\u003c/em>, dough with shrimp on it,” a dish she still loves.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After the war, her family went from well-off to poor, and she remembers, “I would buy fruit, a whole big watermelon, cut it up, and sell it and make money.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Then, in 1979, her father got tipped off that the government was going to investigate him on suspicion of aiding the CIA during the war. They escaped at 2:00 in the morning, family members split between tiny boats.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We had to be quiet, so quiet,” Lynda remembers. “It was scary. If we got caught, we'd go to jail.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They went through storms and ran out of food, and finally found some refuge on a Chinese island, where she says they were fed rice with sugar. “It’s strange to eat rice with sugar, but it was so good at the time,” she says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They got back on the water, headed for Hong Kong, and then saw the large British ship that would save them. They all started waving.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I could never forget. It was just unbelievable, the most amazing moment,” Lynda remembers, choking up. “When we got up for them to rescue us into land, they gave us croissants. That was like going from hell to heaven.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10614790\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/BanhMi-800x532.jpg\" alt=\"One of Lynda's signature bánh mì.\" width=\"800\" height=\"532\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-10614790\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/BanhMi-800x532.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/BanhMi-400x266.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/BanhMi-1440x958.jpg 1440w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/BanhMi-1400x931.jpg 1400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/BanhMi-1180x785.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/BanhMi-960x639.jpg 960w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/BanhMi.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">One of Lynda's signature bánh mì. \u003ccite>(Vickie Ly/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>But when her family got to the United States, she developed another passion, and found her first career. She always loved to sing, the first to volunteer in elementary school, she says. As a high school student she started performing in tiny venues around Little Saigon, putting up her own fliers. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And then one night she was discovered singing at a club. She was invited to film her first spot in a variety show called \"Paris By Night\" -- a hugely popular video series -- so she missed her high school graduation and flew to France.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She became a star, dressing provocatively, singing in both English and Vietnamese, a draw for young Vietnamese-Americans. In the '90s in any home throughout the Vietnamese diaspora, you’d probably find a VHS tape featuring Lynda Trang Dai. The videos even made it back to Vietnam in a kind of gray market.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">'Sometimes when I travel to sing on a tour, I would be up all night making sauce, and just sleep on the plane.'\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>“Back then, it's illegal to watch,” Lynda explains, adding that if people got caught they could go to jail. But an estimated 72 million people in Vietnam did watch.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lynda started touring Vietnamese communities around the U.S. and the world, but her obsession with Vietnamese food remained constant. She says the first time she went to Australia, she brought food on the plane with her, including \u003cem>bánh bèo \u003c/em>and a noodle soup that she asked the flight attendant to heat up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“All the other Vietnamese singers would look at me, like, ‘You are so weird,’ ” she says. But she found good Vietnamese food all over the world, and started a kind of ritual wherever she touched down.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In any city I'd go to, I'd just check in on the hotel, throw all my luggage down and go and find a Vietnamese restaurant, that’s it,” she says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10614785\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaPerforming-800x562.jpg\" alt=\"Lynda Trang Dai at a recent performance.\" width=\"800\" height=\"562\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-10614785\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaPerforming-800x562.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaPerforming-400x281.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaPerforming-1440x1012.jpg 1440w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaPerforming-1400x984.jpg 1400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaPerforming-1180x829.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaPerforming-960x675.jpg 960w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/07/LyndaPerforming.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Lynda Trang Dai at a recent performance. \u003ccite>(Vickie Ly/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>She still tours a lot, but when I visit she’s performing in Westminster with her contemporaries in a banquet hall, just a few hundred feet away from her bánh mì shop. People in the crowd are dressed to the nines, including sisters Hang and Juliette Nguyen. They came from L.A. to see this show.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When they were younger, the sisters say, these were the big Vietnamese stars. They used to watch them on videos, and go to their concerts whenever they came to the South.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The sisters say there weren’t a lot of Vietnamese people in Alabama in the '80s. Tonight the singer is dressed in a barely-there strappy outfit. It fits the image the sisters remember: the sex symbol among Vietnamese singers. She was the \"Vietnamese Madonna,” they say in unison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That comparison thrills Lynda, who is in her late 40s, but she says she worked hard to communicate to the larger community that it was just her onstage persona. “When I’m off stage I’m like 100 percent completely different, a total Vietnamese traditional girl who takes care of their family, food on the table, everything,\" she says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Case in point: She started her sandwich shop as a business with her family, and though a small staff does most of the food prep and sales, Lynda Trang Dai is still is the only one to make the special Lynda Sauce.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Sometimes when I travel to Australia to sing on a tour, or to Europe, I would be up all night here making sauce, and just sleep on the plane if I have to.” Anything, she says, for a great meal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story was originally produced for KCRW’s \u003ca href=\"http://www.kcrw.com/news-culture/independent-producer-project\">Independent Producers Project\u003c/a> while Morehouse was at a residency at \u003ca href=\"http://www.mesarefuge.org/\">Mesa Refuge\u003c/a>. The series \u003ca href=\"http://californiafoodways.com/\">California Foodways\u003c/a> is supported by \u003ca href=\"http://www.calhum.org/\">Cal Humanities\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"disqusTitle": "Despite Severe Arthritis, Pianist Gets Second Chance at Stardom",
"title": "Despite Severe Arthritis, Pianist Gets Second Chance at Stardom",
"headTitle": "The California Report | KQED News",
"content": "\u003cp>Some kids know from a very young age what they want to be when they grow up; Anthony Ferraro knew he wanted to be a concert pianist. That is, until early onset arthritis in his hands threw his entire career up in the air.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ferraro grew up in a home where you didn’t hear much Top 40 music. The stereo played Beethoven sonatas, and his mom, dad and sister all practiced on the Yamaha grand in the living room. Ferraro gave his first recital at age six. By the time he was in high school his dream of becoming a concert pianist had come into sharp focus.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I fashioned these grandiose visions in my head of me with a full orchestra and band behind me playing a concert hall to standing ovations,” Ferraro says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He was accepted to Baylor University’s piano program and was on his way to classical music stardom. But then, just when his dream seemed close at hand, he began to experience random bouts of stiffness in his hands.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[soundcloud url=\"https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/199158709\" params=\"color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false\" width=\"100%\" height=\"166\" iframe=\"true\" /]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ferraro, now 24, had been diagnosed with arthritis in his knees at age 10, and he was afraid it had moved into his hands. But he was even more afraid that he was imagining things.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The most sinister part is that sometimes I’d be playing a piece, and wondering, 'is this just my ability, or is this the disease?' The not knowing is the part that just killed me,” he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Plagued by self-doubt, he dropped out of Baylor before he even started. He moved back in with his parents in Orange County. Unsure of his next move, he got a job at the clothing store Urban Outfitters. And that’s where, against the odds, the next chapter of his career began.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The music playing at the store sounded nothing like the symphonies and concertos of his youth. It was at the store that he first heard an electro-pop musician from South Carolina called \u003ca href=\"http://toroymoi.com/\" target=\"_blank\">Toro Y Moi\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was on constant rotation in the store. I knew the three singles nauseatingly well,” Ferraro says with a laugh. “I associated it with putting people in fitting rooms.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Around the same time he received a loan from his dad to buy keyboards, a guitar and recording equipment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I had to do music somehow,\" he says. \"Pop music seemed like a possible solution.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He began crafting his own songs under the name \u003ca href=\"https://soundcloud.com/astronautsetc\" target=\"_blank\">Astronauts etc.\u003c/a> -- singing in a distinct, piercing falsetto. After a year at home, Ferraro enrolled in the music department at UC Berkeley and got a job at a local coffeehouse called Philz. That’s where things got really weird.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was working there for a few months when Chaz (Chazwick Bradley Bundick of Toro y Moi) walked in the door,” he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ferraro recognized him from an interview.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“He got his coffee and sat outside. I asked my shift leader if I could take my 10-minute break,\" Ferraro says. \"I knew it was going to be strange. I’d probably come off as a fan who couldn’t keep his mouth shut.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bundick explains via email that he had moved to Berkeley from South Carolina the day before. He knew no one.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I mentioned that we should hang out. I guess I asked him on a date,” Ferraro adds with a laugh. “We just kind of hit it off.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bundick became a mentor and friend to Ferraro. One day, months before Ferraro was set to graduate from UC Berkeley, he got an unexpected email from Bundick, who was on tour in Brazil.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Hey man,” it began. “I’ve been talking to the guys. We think it would be great to add you to the group starting in the fall. What do you think?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“His casualness made me think this can’t be earnest,” Ferraro says. “He can’t actually be asking me that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A second chance had fallen into his lap. No grand piano, but electric keyboards. No concert hall, but festivals stages and rock clubs the world over. His dream had come true, but could he keep his arthritis at bay?\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10473726\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 575px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/04/credit-jeremiah-garcia-anthony-on-left.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-full wp-image-10473726\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/04/credit-jeremiah-garcia-anthony-on-left.jpg\" alt=\"Anthony Ferraro, far left, with Toro y Moi. The group has just begun a world tour, starting with a string of dates across California that includes a stop at the world-famous Coachella festival next week.\" width=\"575\" height=\"383\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/04/credit-jeremiah-garcia-anthony-on-left.jpg 575w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/04/credit-jeremiah-garcia-anthony-on-left-400x266.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/04/credit-jeremiah-garcia-anthony-on-left-320x213.jpg 320w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 575px) 100vw, 575px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Anthony Ferraro, far left, with Toro y Moi. The group has just begun a world tour, starting with a string of dates across California that includes a stop at the world-famous Coachella festival next week. \u003ccite>(Jeremiah Garcia)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Ferraro’s first tour with Toro Y Moi in the summer of 2013 was a seven-week jaunt across the United States, and his medication kept him in decent shape. It wasn’t until he returned to Berkeley that the most painful symptoms appeared.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"It started with difficulty walking; my knees, my hips, elbows, shoulders,\" Ferraro explains. \"On a good day I could get around with a cane. On a bad day I was bed-ridden.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In preparation for the next leg of the tour, in Australia, Ferraro switched to a new medication taken through an IV. But he missed one of his injections before leaving, and he found himself often playing to crowds in the thousands only able to use some of his fingers. Traveling from city to city proved to be even harder.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If the pain was contained to my hands, I could still set up my equipment,\" he says. \"I’ve broken my wrist before -- that was the only analogous pain I could relate to.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When he returned home he went to the doctor for his next IV infusion. But his body rejected the medication.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“[The nurses] always tell you, if you feel lightheaded, let us know right away,” Ferraro recounts. “Five to 10 minutes in, I started to think ‘I could feel a little bit dizzy right now. By the time I said how dizzy I felt, it was almost too late.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He slumped over in the chair, and had to be revived with a steroid injection.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That was over a year ago. Now Toro Y Moi has a new album, \"What For?,\" out April 7. They’ve just begun a world tour, starting with a string of dates across California that includes a stop at the world-famous \u003ca href=\"https://www.coachella.com/\" target=\"_blank\">Coachella festival\u003c/a> next week. It has only been in recent months that he has found a medicine that should sustain him during the tour.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Finally, Anthony Ferraro will be able to leave his symptoms behind and focus on the music in his head, not the pain in his body.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This article was originally published on April 5, 2015.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Some kids know from a very young age what they want to be when they grow up; Anthony Ferraro knew he wanted to be a concert pianist. That is, until early onset arthritis in his hands threw his entire career up in the air.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ferraro grew up in a home where you didn’t hear much Top 40 music. The stereo played Beethoven sonatas, and his mom, dad and sister all practiced on the Yamaha grand in the living room. Ferraro gave his first recital at age six. By the time he was in high school his dream of becoming a concert pianist had come into sharp focus.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I fashioned these grandiose visions in my head of me with a full orchestra and band behind me playing a concert hall to standing ovations,” Ferraro says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He was accepted to Baylor University’s piano program and was on his way to classical music stardom. But then, just when his dream seemed close at hand, he began to experience random bouts of stiffness in his hands.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cdiv class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__shortcodes__shortcodeWrapper'>\n \u003ciframe width='100%' height='166'\n scrolling='no' frameborder='no'\n src='https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/199158709&visual=true&color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false'\n title='https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/199158709'>\n \u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/div>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ferraro, now 24, had been diagnosed with arthritis in his knees at age 10, and he was afraid it had moved into his hands. But he was even more afraid that he was imagining things.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The most sinister part is that sometimes I’d be playing a piece, and wondering, 'is this just my ability, or is this the disease?' The not knowing is the part that just killed me,” he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Plagued by self-doubt, he dropped out of Baylor before he even started. He moved back in with his parents in Orange County. Unsure of his next move, he got a job at the clothing store Urban Outfitters. And that’s where, against the odds, the next chapter of his career began.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The music playing at the store sounded nothing like the symphonies and concertos of his youth. It was at the store that he first heard an electro-pop musician from South Carolina called \u003ca href=\"http://toroymoi.com/\" target=\"_blank\">Toro Y Moi\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was on constant rotation in the store. I knew the three singles nauseatingly well,” Ferraro says with a laugh. “I associated it with putting people in fitting rooms.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Around the same time he received a loan from his dad to buy keyboards, a guitar and recording equipment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I had to do music somehow,\" he says. \"Pop music seemed like a possible solution.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He began crafting his own songs under the name \u003ca href=\"https://soundcloud.com/astronautsetc\" target=\"_blank\">Astronauts etc.\u003c/a> -- singing in a distinct, piercing falsetto. After a year at home, Ferraro enrolled in the music department at UC Berkeley and got a job at a local coffeehouse called Philz. That’s where things got really weird.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was working there for a few months when Chaz (Chazwick Bradley Bundick of Toro y Moi) walked in the door,” he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ferraro recognized him from an interview.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“He got his coffee and sat outside. I asked my shift leader if I could take my 10-minute break,\" Ferraro says. \"I knew it was going to be strange. I’d probably come off as a fan who couldn’t keep his mouth shut.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bundick explains via email that he had moved to Berkeley from South Carolina the day before. He knew no one.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I mentioned that we should hang out. I guess I asked him on a date,” Ferraro adds with a laugh. “We just kind of hit it off.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bundick became a mentor and friend to Ferraro. One day, months before Ferraro was set to graduate from UC Berkeley, he got an unexpected email from Bundick, who was on tour in Brazil.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Hey man,” it began. “I’ve been talking to the guys. We think it would be great to add you to the group starting in the fall. What do you think?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“His casualness made me think this can’t be earnest,” Ferraro says. “He can’t actually be asking me that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A second chance had fallen into his lap. No grand piano, but electric keyboards. No concert hall, but festivals stages and rock clubs the world over. His dream had come true, but could he keep his arthritis at bay?\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10473726\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 575px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/04/credit-jeremiah-garcia-anthony-on-left.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-full wp-image-10473726\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2015/04/credit-jeremiah-garcia-anthony-on-left.jpg\" alt=\"Anthony Ferraro, far left, with Toro y Moi. The group has just begun a world tour, starting with a string of dates across California that includes a stop at the world-famous Coachella festival next week.\" width=\"575\" height=\"383\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/04/credit-jeremiah-garcia-anthony-on-left.jpg 575w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/04/credit-jeremiah-garcia-anthony-on-left-400x266.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2015/04/credit-jeremiah-garcia-anthony-on-left-320x213.jpg 320w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 575px) 100vw, 575px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Anthony Ferraro, far left, with Toro y Moi. The group has just begun a world tour, starting with a string of dates across California that includes a stop at the world-famous Coachella festival next week. \u003ccite>(Jeremiah Garcia)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Ferraro’s first tour with Toro Y Moi in the summer of 2013 was a seven-week jaunt across the United States, and his medication kept him in decent shape. It wasn’t until he returned to Berkeley that the most painful symptoms appeared.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"It started with difficulty walking; my knees, my hips, elbows, shoulders,\" Ferraro explains. \"On a good day I could get around with a cane. On a bad day I was bed-ridden.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In preparation for the next leg of the tour, in Australia, Ferraro switched to a new medication taken through an IV. But he missed one of his injections before leaving, and he found himself often playing to crowds in the thousands only able to use some of his fingers. Traveling from city to city proved to be even harder.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If the pain was contained to my hands, I could still set up my equipment,\" he says. \"I’ve broken my wrist before -- that was the only analogous pain I could relate to.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When he returned home he went to the doctor for his next IV infusion. But his body rejected the medication.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“[The nurses] always tell you, if you feel lightheaded, let us know right away,” Ferraro recounts. “Five to 10 minutes in, I started to think ‘I could feel a little bit dizzy right now. By the time I said how dizzy I felt, it was almost too late.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He slumped over in the chair, and had to be revived with a steroid injection.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That was over a year ago. Now Toro Y Moi has a new album, \"What For?,\" out April 7. They’ve just begun a world tour, starting with a string of dates across California that includes a stop at the world-famous \u003ca href=\"https://www.coachella.com/\" target=\"_blank\">Coachella festival\u003c/a> next week. It has only been in recent months that he has found a medicine that should sustain him during the tour.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Finally, Anthony Ferraro will be able to leave his symptoms behind and focus on the music in his head, not the pain in his body.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"officialWebsiteLink": "/californiareportmagazine",
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"order": 10
},
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vS1FJTkM3NjkwNjk1OTAz",
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},
"city-arts": {
"id": "city-arts",
"title": "City Arts & Lectures",
"info": "A one-hour radio program to hear celebrated writers, artists and thinkers address contemporary ideas and values, often discussing the creative process. Please note: tapes or transcripts are not available",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/radio/wp-content/uploads/sites/50/2018/05/cityartsandlecture-300x300.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.cityarts.net/",
"airtime": "SUN 1pm-2pm, TUE 10pm, WED 1am",
"meta": {
"site": "news",
"source": "City Arts & Lectures"
},
"link": "https://www.cityarts.net",
"subscribe": {
"tuneIn": "https://tunein.com/radio/City-Arts-and-Lectures-p692/",
"rss": "https://www.cityarts.net/feed/"
}
},
"closealltabs": {
"id": "closealltabs",
"title": "Close All Tabs",
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"info": "Close All Tabs breaks down how digital culture shapes our world through thoughtful insights and irreverent humor.",
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"officialWebsiteLink": "/podcasts/closealltabs",
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"order": 1
},
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"id": "code-switch-life-kit",
"title": "Code Switch / Life Kit",
"info": "\u003cem>Code Switch\u003c/em>, which listeners will hear in the first part of the hour, has fearless and much-needed conversations about race. Hosted by journalists of color, the show tackles the subject of race head-on, exploring how it impacts every part of society — from politics and pop culture to history, sports and more.\u003cbr />\u003cbr />\u003cem>Life Kit\u003c/em>, which will be in the second part of the hour, guides you through spaces and feelings no one prepares you for — from finances to mental health, from workplace microaggressions to imposter syndrome, from relationships to parenting. The show features experts with real world experience and shares their knowledge. Because everyone needs a little help being human.\u003cbr />\u003cbr />\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/podcasts/510312/codeswitch\">\u003cem>Code Switch\u003c/em> offical site and podcast\u003c/a>\u003cbr />\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/lifekit\">\u003cem>Life Kit\u003c/em> offical site and podcast\u003c/a>\u003cbr />",
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"meta": {
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cubnByLm9yZy9yc3MvcG9kY2FzdC5waHA_aWQ9NTEwMzEy",
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"id": "commonwealth-club",
"title": "Commonwealth Club of California Podcast",
"info": "The Commonwealth Club of California is the nation's oldest and largest public affairs forum. As a non-partisan forum, The Club brings to the public airwaves diverse viewpoints on important topics. The Club's weekly radio broadcast - the oldest in the U.S., dating back to 1924 - is carried across the nation on public radio stations and is now podcasting. Our website archive features audio of our recent programs, as well as selected speeches from our long and distinguished history. This podcast feed is usually updated twice a week and is always un-edited.",
"airtime": "THU 10pm, FRI 1am",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Commonwealth-Club-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
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"meta": {
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"source": "Commonwealth Club of California"
},
"link": "/radio/program/commonwealth-club",
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cDovL3d3dy5jb21tb253ZWFsdGhjbHViLm9yZy9hdWRpby9wb2RjYXN0L3dlZWtseS54bWw",
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},
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"id": "forum",
"title": "Forum",
"tagline": "The conversation starts here",
"info": "KQED’s live call-in program discussing local, state, national and international issues, as well as in-depth interviews.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 9am-11am, 10pm-11pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Forum-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
"imageAlt": "KQED Forum with Mina Kim and Alexis Madrigal",
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"meta": {
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 9
},
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vS1FJTkM5NTU3MzgxNjMz",
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"id": "freakonomics-radio",
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"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/05/freakonomicsRadio.png",
"officialWebsiteLink": "http://freakonomics.com/",
"airtime": "SUN 1am-2am, SAT 3pm-4pm",
"meta": {
"site": "radio",
"source": "WNYC"
},
"link": "/radio/program/freakonomics-radio",
"subscribe": {
"npr": "https://rpb3r.app.goo.gl/4s8b",
"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/freakonomics-radio/id354668519",
"tuneIn": "https://tunein.com/podcasts/WNYC-Podcasts/Freakonomics-Radio-p272293/",
"rss": "https://feeds.feedburner.com/freakonomicsradio"
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},
"fresh-air": {
"id": "fresh-air",
"title": "Fresh Air",
"info": "Hosted by Terry Gross, \u003cem>Fresh Air from WHYY\u003c/em> is the Peabody Award-winning weekday magazine of contemporary arts and issues. One of public radio's most popular programs, Fresh Air features intimate conversations with today's biggest luminaries.",
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"link": "/radio/program/fresh-air",
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?s=143441&mt=2&id=214089682&at=11l79Y&ct=nprdirectory",
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"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/381444908/podcast.xml"
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"info": "A live production of NPR and WBUR Boston, in collaboration with stations across the country, Here & Now reflects the fluid world of news as it's happening in the middle of the day, with timely, in-depth news, interviews and conversation. Hosted by Robin Young, Jeremy Hobson and Tonya Mosley.",
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"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/510051/podcast.xml"
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},
"hidden-brain": {
"id": "hidden-brain",
"title": "Hidden Brain",
"info": "Shankar Vedantam uses science and storytelling to reveal the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior, shape our choices and direct our relationships.",
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"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.npr.org/series/423302056/hidden-brain",
"airtime": "SUN 7pm-8pm",
"meta": {
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"source": "NPR"
},
"link": "/radio/program/hidden-brain",
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},
"how-i-built-this": {
"id": "how-i-built-this",
"title": "How I Built This with Guy Raz",
"info": "Guy Raz dives into the stories behind some of the world's best known companies. How I Built This weaves a narrative journey about innovators, entrepreneurs and idealists—and the movements they built.",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/05/howIBuiltThis.png",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.npr.org/podcasts/510313/how-i-built-this",
"airtime": "SUN 7:30pm-8pm",
"meta": {
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"source": "npr"
},
"link": "/radio/program/how-i-built-this",
"subscribe": {
"npr": "https://rpb3r.app.goo.gl/3zxy",
"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/how-i-built-this-with-guy-raz/id1150510297?mt=2",
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"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/510313/podcast.xml"
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},
"hyphenacion": {
"id": "hyphenacion",
"title": "Hyphenación",
"tagline": "Where conversation and cultura meet",
"info": "What kind of no sabo word is Hyphenación? For us, it’s about living within a hyphenation. Like being a third-gen Mexican-American from the Texas border now living that Bay Area Chicano life. Like Xorje! Each week we bring together a couple of hyphenated Latinos to talk all about personal life choices: family, careers, relationships, belonging … everything is on the table. ",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/Hyphenacion_FinalAssets_PodcastTile.png",
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"officialWebsiteLink": "/podcasts/hyphenacion",
"meta": {
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 15
},
"link": "/podcasts/hyphenacion",
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"spotify": "https://open.spotify.com/show/2p3Fifq96nw9BPcmFdIq0o?si=39209f7b25774f38",
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"rss": "https://feeds.megaphone.fm/KQINC2275451163"
}
},
"jerrybrown": {
"id": "jerrybrown",
"title": "The Political Mind of Jerry Brown",
"tagline": "Lessons from a lifetime in politics",
"info": "The Political Mind of Jerry Brown brings listeners the wisdom of the former Governor, Mayor, and presidential candidate. Scott Shafer interviewed Brown for more than 40 hours, covering the former governor's life and half-century in the political game – and Brown has some lessons he'd like to share. ",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/The-Political-Mind-of-Jerry-Brown-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
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"officialWebsiteLink": "/podcasts/jerrybrown",
"meta": {
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 18
},
"link": "/podcasts/jerrybrown",
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/id1492194549",
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}
},
"latino-usa": {
"id": "latino-usa",
"title": "Latino USA",
"airtime": "MON 1am-2am, SUN 6pm-7pm",
"info": "Latino USA, the radio journal of news and culture, is the only national, English-language radio program produced from a Latino perspective.",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/radio/wp-content/uploads/sites/50/2018/04/latinoUsa.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "http://latinousa.org/",
"meta": {
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"source": "npr"
},
"link": "/radio/program/latino-usa",
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?s=143441&mt=2&id=79681317&at=11l79Y&ct=nprdirectory",
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"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/510016/podcast.xml"
}
},
"marketplace": {
"id": "marketplace",
"title": "Marketplace",
"info": "Our flagship program, helmed by Kai Ryssdal, examines what the day in money delivered, through stories, conversations, newsworthy numbers and more. Updated Monday through Friday at about 3:30 p.m. PT.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 4pm-4:30pm, MON-WED 6:30pm-7pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Marketplace-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.marketplace.org/",
"meta": {
"site": "news",
"source": "American Public Media"
},
"link": "/radio/program/marketplace",
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"rss": "https://feeds.publicradio.org/public_feeds/marketplace-pm/rss/rss"
}
},
"masters-of-scale": {
"id": "masters-of-scale",
"title": "Masters of Scale",
"info": "Masters of Scale is an original podcast in which LinkedIn co-founder and Greylock Partner Reid Hoffman sets out to describe and prove theories that explain how great entrepreneurs take their companies from zero to a gazillion in ingenious fashion.",
"airtime": "Every other Wednesday June 12 through October 16 at 8pm (repeats Thursdays at 2am)",
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"officialWebsiteLink": "https://mastersofscale.com/",
"meta": {
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"source": "WaitWhat"
},
"link": "/radio/program/masters-of-scale",
"subscribe": {
"apple": "http://mastersofscale.app.link/",
"rss": "https://rss.art19.com/masters-of-scale"
}
},
"mindshift": {
"id": "mindshift",
"title": "MindShift",
"tagline": "A podcast about the future of learning and how we raise our kids",
"info": "The MindShift podcast explores the innovations in education that are shaping how kids learn. Hosts Ki Sung and Katrina Schwartz introduce listeners to educators, researchers, parents and students who are developing effective ways to improve how kids learn. We cover topics like how fed-up administrators are developing surprising tactics to deal with classroom disruptions; how listening to podcasts are helping kids develop reading skills; the consequences of overparenting; and why interdisciplinary learning can engage students on all ends of the traditional achievement spectrum. This podcast is part of the MindShift education site, a division of KQED News. KQED is an NPR/PBS member station based in San Francisco. You can also visit the MindShift website for episodes and supplemental blog posts or tweet us \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/MindShiftKQED\">@MindShiftKQED\u003c/a> or visit us at \u003ca href=\"/mindshift\">MindShift.KQED.org\u003c/a>",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Mindshift-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
"imageAlt": "KQED MindShift: How We Will Learn",
"officialWebsiteLink": "/mindshift/",
"meta": {
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 12
},
"link": "/podcasts/mindshift",
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vS1FJTkM1NzY0NjAwNDI5",
"npr": "https://www.npr.org/podcasts/464615685/mind-shift-podcast",
"stitcher": "https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/kqed/stories-teachers-share",
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}
},
"morning-edition": {
"id": "morning-edition",
"title": "Morning Edition",
"info": "\u003cem>Morning Edition\u003c/em> takes listeners around the country and the world with multi-faceted stories and commentaries every weekday. Hosts Steve Inskeep, David Greene and Rachel Martin bring you the latest breaking news and features to prepare you for the day.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 3am-9am",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Morning-Edition-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.npr.org/programs/morning-edition/",
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"link": "/radio/program/morning-edition"
},
"onourwatch": {
"id": "onourwatch",
"title": "On Our Watch",
"tagline": "Deeply-reported investigative journalism",
"info": "For decades, the process for how police police themselves has been inconsistent – if not opaque. In some states, like California, these proceedings were completely hidden. After a new police transparency law unsealed scores of internal affairs files, our reporters set out to examine these cases and the shadow world of police discipline. On Our Watch brings listeners into the rooms where officers are questioned and witnesses are interrogated to find out who this system is really protecting. Is it the officers, or the public they've sworn to serve?",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/On-Our-Watch-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
"imageAlt": "On Our Watch from NPR and KQED",
"officialWebsiteLink": "/podcasts/onourwatch",
"meta": {
"site": "news",
"source": "kqed",
"order": 11
},
"link": "/podcasts/onourwatch",
"subscribe": {
"apple": "https://podcasts.apple.com/podcast/id1567098962",
"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5ucHIub3JnLzUxMDM2MC9wb2RjYXN0LnhtbD9zYz1nb29nbGVwb2RjYXN0cw",
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"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/510360/podcast.xml"
}
},
"on-the-media": {
"id": "on-the-media",
"title": "On The Media",
"info": "Our weekly podcast explores how the media 'sausage' is made, casts an incisive eye on fluctuations in the marketplace of ideas, and examines threats to the freedom of information and expression in America and abroad. For one hour a week, the show tries to lift the veil from the process of \"making media,\" especially news media, because it's through that lens that we see the world and the world sees us",
"airtime": "SUN 2pm-3pm, MON 12am-1am",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/radio/wp-content/uploads/sites/50/2018/04/onTheMedia.png",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.wnycstudios.org/shows/otm",
"meta": {
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"source": "wnyc"
},
"link": "/radio/program/on-the-media",
"subscribe": {
"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/on-the-media/id73330715?mt=2",
"tuneIn": "https://tunein.com/radio/On-the-Media-p69/",
"rss": "http://feeds.wnyc.org/onthemedia"
}
},
"pbs-newshour": {
"id": "pbs-newshour",
"title": "PBS NewsHour",
"info": "Analysis, background reports and updates from the PBS NewsHour putting today's news in context.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 3pm-4pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/PBS-News-Hour-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.pbs.org/newshour/",
"meta": {
"site": "news",
"source": "pbs"
},
"link": "/radio/program/pbs-newshour",
"subscribe": {
"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/pbs-newshour-full-show/id394432287?mt=2",
"tuneIn": "https://tunein.com/radio/PBS-NewsHour---Full-Show-p425698/",
"rss": "https://www.pbs.org/newshour/feeds/rss/podcasts/show"
}
},
"perspectives": {
"id": "perspectives",
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