This week Canada lost a modern troubador and patriot in the person of country-folk artist, Stompin' Tom Conners. Whether you liked him or not, I bet you know the words to his songs. It is difficult to choose a fave -- Sudbury Saturday Night, Bud the Spud, Good Old Hockey Game or one of the hundreds of others. His work is a narrative of Canadian life -- an amazing body of work that will tell generations to come about the last 50 years of Canadian life.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/arts/story/2013/03/06/stompin-tom-obit.html

 

Choosing one song to represent this repertoire is a daunting feat, but I've settled on one that has always made me smile. The lyrics have been made into a wonderful children's book. I chose this one due to its relationship with the food system -- one that is fairly local for me (PEI is within 100 miles -- much less as the crow flies). If you are at all familiar with Stompin'  Tom, the song is already clear to you -- but just in case, it is 'Bud the Spud'

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNEg65rlnu4

Media 'Created' Idols

Specter provides intriguing points in this New Yorker story. The current Lance Armstrong situation shows just what a mediated construction 'lance armstrong -- cyclist' has been -- and may continue to be. Media can craft amazing idols -- and then turn on a dime to destroy the pedastol the idol stands upon. And, just as many other idolized folk, the media works with what it is provided -- neither side is fully responsible or innocent.

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/sportingscene/2013/01/what-lance-armstrong-did.html

A Place to Share

A new place here for me to share all those things I ponder when I should be doing other things. Posts will be sporadic and range from travel to life's deeper questions to food, for 'Food is my Life'[tm]. So eclectic, but with a definite postmodern bent, if you will. I'm looking forward to putting things 'on paper.'

"authenticity vs. artifice"

As a media analyst/researcher, this article deals with much of the contrived nature of the mass media -- trying desparately to be 'real' when it is all a manufactured image, much as McLuhan noted in the early '60s and George Balanchine noted into the 70s ('the mirror is not you, the mirror is you looking at you, and they are not the same thing.'[from Suzanne Farrell's autobiography]) So -- the argument over "authenticity vs. artifice" (as stated by Browne in this article) has been around for a very long time. Longer than television itself has lived amongst us. So -- when arguing about what is real and what is not, I'd argue it is all in the eye of the beholder -- NOT the manufacturer, but the viewer.

Why the Monkees -- and Davy Jones -- should get respect - CNN.com

www.cnn.com