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It is just a few days after the arrival of Nowruz, the new year in Iran, and some of the Equality and Freedom Seeking University Students still remain locked in the notorious Evin prison, located in the Iranian capital of Tehran. They remain in jail due mostly to the incredibly high bails placed on the students -- in some cases as high as US$400,000. Families of some students have attempted to post percentages of these bail amounts, but even one-tenth of the bail amounts to a significant sum.
Visit the blog "Nothing Can Stop Us" for more information. (Note: The link may prompt an "Content Warning," likely due to the political content of the site. Click "I UNDERSTAND AND I WISH TO CONTINUE" to view the official site of the Iranian Students.)
It is important to maintain solidarity with these students. They need as much support as possible throughout the course of their struggles.
"I'd like to say that people . . . people can change anything they want to. And that means everything in the world. Show me any country . . . and there'll be people in it just trying to take their humanity back into the center of the ring . . . And follow that for a time. Y'know, think on that. Without people you're nothing." -- Joe Strummer 10: "Why I Don't Believe in God" by Everclear from the 1997 album (So Much for the Afterglow) lyrics
Despite all the awards and accolades while they were at their peak, I still think of Everclear is still one of the great underrated rock bands of the last couple of decades. After Sparkle and Fade, a lot of media-types were basically writing off Art Alexakis and Co. As something of a one-hit wonder. I even remember one time when I was listening to an Everclear song on the radio and at the end of the song, the DJ said something like, "That was Everclear from their album Sparkle and Fade, which is exactly what that band did." Well, not quite. So Much for the Afterglow was a brilliant follow-up to Sparkle and Fade, ultimately going double-platinum after a string of successful singles. Alexakis (that's a Greek name, mind you) has a Springsteen-like knack for writing about common everyday struggles and deeply personal issues in a way that is uniquely eloquent and touching . "Why I Don't Believe in God" was never released as a single, but it is far and away my favorite Everclear song of all time. For a long time, I never understood when people would say that art or music "spoke" to them, but this particularly dark and sad song speaks to me in a way that is difficult to explain.
9: "Anarchy in the U.K." by Sex Pistols (from the 1977 album Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's the Sex Pistols)lyrics I think I still remember where I was the first time I heard – and I mean really heard – the Sex Pistols for the first time. I think I was a junior in high school and a friend was driving me back to my folks' house. I asked what was playing on the car's tape deck and somebody else in the car told me we were listening to the Sex Pistols. I was kind of like, "Oh...Really?" I had heard of the Pistols, but I had never really listened to them before and I liked what I was hearing. Although I usually have a pretty good memory for these kinds of times in my life, it's really kind of a blur from there. 1970's punk was a something of a revelation for me, as I had been listening to a steady diet of 80's metal and "classic" rock for about a decade. I really don't know how long it took me to buy my first Pistols album, but I know I went kind of crazy there for a while. I was watching Sid and Nancy at least once or twice a week and buying just about every Sex Pistols tape at the mall's Camelot store...and there were a lot of compilations floating around back then. And the Pistols opened all kinds of other musical doors for me, paving the way for my later interests in bands like The Clash. I think one of the things that I still love about "Anarchy in the U.K." is that the first lines of the song are probably still the most blatantly and purposefully offensive song lyrics in the history of music. "Holidays in the Sun" would be a runner-up for my favorite Pistols song ever.
My favorite picture of Joe Strummer Taken from the booklet of the Clash on Broadway box set
8: "Gangsterville" by Joe Strummer (from the 1989 album Earthquake Weather)lyrics I was pretty much in the thick of my obsession with the Sex Pistols by 1990 or so, and I was working a part-time job at the local library. One of my coworkers was a girl whose brother was pretty big in Dayton's indie/alternative music scene and she seemed to know quite a bit about the vintage punk bands that had influenced our generation's budding college-rock scene. She loaned me some well-played cassettes of the Clash's eponymous first album as well as the masterpiece London Calling and it wasn't too long before I was really taken with them. I have loved The Clash ever since then, but I have always preferred Joe Strummer's vocals and song-writing to that of Mick Jones . This might be in some small part due to the fact that Joe had also performed the theme song to Sid and Nancy, which was probably my favorite film back then. But Joe's style has always been much different from Mick's and this is most apparent when you compare their respective post-Clash work.
Joe Strummer's musical evolution is something of a fascinating path. In his early days, he started out playing the ukelele for a band called the 101'ers. The Wikipedia article on the 101'ers has them pegged as a "pub rock" band, but I remember seeing them referred to as a ska or reggae-like act some years ago. A few years after joining the 101'ers, Joe would rise to prominence as a punk icon as the front-man and guitarist for The Clash. In and of itself, The Clash would go through an incredible musical evolution during their decade together. During his time with The Clash, Joe Strummer would experiment with the Latin American sound, rockabilly, reggae and dubbing. These sounds would ultimately shape his post-Clash work with the Latino Rockabilly War and the Mescaleros. This incredible blend of musical genres, along with Joe's distinctive "gravelly" singing voice and his documented contempt for enunciation made him one of the most incredibly unique performers in rock history.
Joe Strummer's Earthquake Weather was released a few years after he left The Clash for good. I think I bought my first copy of this album on cassette in 1990 or 1991. I actually remember the day quite well, but in retrospect, I must say it wasn't really a day worth remembering when I think about it. I had heard just about all of the major releases by The Clash and I happened to have a little extra cash in my pocket the day I discovered the album at the record store. I bought it without having heard a single track on the album, so I wasn't really sure what I was getting. "Gangsterville" is the opening track of the album and while I love every song on the album, this particular track has been my favorite since the day I bought the album. One of the most favorite things about the song is the way it begins, with the Joe yelling, "Let's rock again!" before the first verse kicks in. The song features some classic Strummer lyrics, including some historical references and even a few lines that required footnotes when the lyrics were printed on the album's sleeve. "Gangsterville" has some great guitar work by Zander Schloss, including a terrific, multi-part solo . There's also a hint of calypso music in there if you listen closely. Leave it to Joe to build a masterpiece out of such an uncanny blend of different elements.
7: "Heart-Shaped Box" by Nirvana (from the 1993 album In Utero)lyrics 1993 was a big turning point for me, as I was finally able to really come into my own. I was starting to see a light at the end of the tunnel with my undergraduate studies and an impending career path. I had also made some new friends and some important new relationships were on the horizon. I bought In Utero very soon after its release and I will always associate the album with memories of an important transitional period in my life.
I had initially resisted Nirvana when Nevermind exploded into popularity because I was pretty fixated on the notion that grunge was killing heavy metal (although, I think that pop-sounding sappy metal had as much to do with the temporary demise of heavy metal as grunge did, really). But sometime in the summer of 1992 or so, I heard "Territorial Pissings" and "Drain You" and I was pretty impressed, so I borrowed a cassette tape of Nevermind from a friend to give Nirvana a closer listen. The quality of the recording was pretty bad, so I ended up buying the album on CD shortly thereafter and I really enjoyed it. A lot of the singles had been played to death on MTV and I found myself enjoying the less popular songs on what was basically the second side of the LP/cassette release. I picked up Incesticide right after it came out and blew a lot of cash on Nirvana singles and bootlegs in the months that followed, so by the time In Utero was released, I was pretty excited about the chance to hear some new material. In Utero certainly didn't let me down. "Heart-Shaped Box" was the first single from In Utero and I remember being completely captivated by the video the first time I saw it. To me, the song is just so perfect with its enigmatic lyrics and a sound that is raw and bleeding with emotion and energy.
I first heard about the Billy Bragg & Wilco Mermaid Avenue collaboration in 2000 or 2001 while I was having lunch with a couple of friends. I didn't know much about Bragg or Wilco, so I didn't really pay much attention. Some time later, I picked up Billy Bragg's EP The Internationale and I was so impressed with his collection of working-class anthems, that I sought out more of his stuff, eventually discovering the Mermaid Avenue albums for myself. When I finally understood the whole concept of the project (which was to put a selection of Woody Guthrie's previously unpublished lyrics to music), I was pretty interested in hearing the results for myself. A friend loaned me Vol. I first and it was that album which would eventually yield one of my favorite songs of all time...but more on that song later. I borrowed Vol. II a few weeks later and enjoyed it as well, but I was more partial to the shorter, "catchier" songs on the album, like "My Flying Saucer," "Against th' Law," and "Secrets of the Sea."
It was quite a while after I had purchased my own copies of the Mermaid Avenue albums on CD that I discovered "Remember the Mountain Bed" on Vol II. I had a lengthy commute to work at the time, and I would try to listen to albums all the way through instead of skipping around and just listening to my favorite songs. That way, I'd stretch my material out instead of running out of stuff once I had heard all of my favorites. So one morning while listening to Vol. II, I came to to "Remember the Mountain Bed" and I finally gave it a good listen. I will never forget the moment I heard the lyrics "You smiled when I said the leaves were just the color of your eyes" because I immediately thought of Thomai. As I listened to the song, it reminded me of the life Thomai and I were building; who we were, where we had been and where we were going. As soon as I got to work that morning, I pulled the lyrics up on the Internet and sent them to Thomai in an e-mail. To this day, I still feel like there is so much about this song that really captures the essence of our relationship and how great we are together.
The Youth of the
Democratic Army at Inspection Photo detail from
The Youth of
Greece: The Heroic Struggle of
EPON, also available from the Greek Civil War Subject Archive at marxists.org
Written prior to the critical events of 1949, this work by Olive Sutton casts a critical light on British and American intervention in Greece following the formulation and execution of the Truman Doctrine. Sutton's piece places special emphasis on the horrors of the "White Terror" in Greece, a period rife with the execution of political prisoners and the starvation and murder of many Greek civilians. Murder Inc. is indeed a candid chronicle of the marriage of imperialist intervention and capitalist exploitation in post-WWII Greece. [Thanks to Mike B.]
Excerpt from the Introduction toMurder Inc. in Greece:
MOST of the seats in the auditorium were filled by bright-faced youngsters—boys just old enough to borrow their father's ties, and girls the age of trying out lipstick and piled-up hair.
They listened wisely when the speaker mentioned Hitler and Mussolini. But when he recalled "Guernica, Barcelona, Granada, the battle of the Ebro, the fight for the Spanish Republic," they widened their eyes and looked at each other, puzzled.
They didn't know the story of the Spanish Republic the first European battleground against fascist aggression, where World War II could have been prevented. They didn't know Hitler's first blow was struck in Spain ten years ago, and they grew a little restless as the meeting wore on.
It wouldn't have mattered at all if, leaving the meeting, you could think: They don't have to go through that again. But you couldn't.
You could only think: These kids may have to learn the meaning of other names, other battles…Salonika, Larissa, Sparta, Corinth, Athens…They must learn these names now, before they become the names of lost battles.
We've already fought one war so that one generation could grow up in peace. But in Greece, children die of disease and starvation and stray bullets. Bullets made in America. Those bullets endanger American children, too.
I had planned to write about something a little more serious tonight, but then Chris Jericho won the WWE Intercontinental Championship. Now I am too giddy to focus on much of anything else. Awesome.
She was a volunteer, a member of the civilian militia, wearing the blue blouse of a workman. She clasped her rifle with ardour, as though it were not a weapon of death but a much-desired plaything. Amidst the groups of merry militia men who were going smilingly to fight and perhaps to die, she marched in silence, serious and self- engrossed. A light burned in her eyes. They expressed hatred, inflexible determination and courage. I approached her and asked:
"Where are you from?"
"Toledo."
"Why are you at the front?"
She was silent for a few moments, and then answered:
"To fight fascism, to crush the enemies of the working people and…to avenge the death of my brother."
"Was he killed?"
"Yes, he was a soldier and a communist. When the rebellion broke out they wanted to make him, like many other soldiers, fight our brothers and go against the Republic. He refused and they shot him like a dog. I have come here to join the ranks, to take the place he would have occupied, and to avenge his death, to show the fascist scoundrels that when men die, women take their place. We are fight- ing with the same enthusiasm and courage as the men. We have learned from them how to die. It is better to die than to live in the fascist hell in which the workers of other countries are suffering, isn't that so, comrade?"
It seemed to me that she was asking this question of herself, or rather that she was answering a question that rose from the depth of her being.
I questioned her comrades, curious to know how she behaved in battle. They spoke of her with admiration. She was the first wherever the danger was greatest, risking her life with astonishing calmness.
A fighting woman!
She, like the other girls and women who are challenging death, and many of whom are meeting death, is reviving the tradition of the heroines who throughout our history have fought for independence and a constitution—the heroines of Sagunto and Nuinantia, La Vaillida, Augustina of Aragon, Maria Pita, Manuela Sanchez, Mariana Pineda. Women have always played a prominent part, supporting the men in the struggle for liberty and showing them by their example that it is better to die than to bow to the butchers and oppressors of the people.
The heights of Guadarrama, Madrid and many other cities have witnessed the heroism of women who are battling a strong and brutal enemy. They march to death merrily singing. They cheer those who have lost heart, infuse courage into them. and inspire them with the fighting spirit. So it was at Alto de Leon, in Somosierra and elsewhere. These places, drenched in the blood of many a nameless hero, will shine with an inextinguishable flame in the history of our country's struggle against reaction.
With them will be bound up the revolutionary traditions of our people, with them, the women who are fighting at the front, who are donating their blood to save the wounded, who, forgetting their own fatigue, watch at the bedside of wounded heroes, who died exclaiming: "Long live liberty!"
We dip our colours in honour of you, dear women comrades, who march into battle together with the men.
I was a semi-regular reader of Wizard magazine back in my college (undergrad) years. It's been quite a while since I bought an issue and I remember the last time I even bothered to pick one up at a comics store was about three years ago. I remember asking the "Comic Book Guy" clone in the store where I was shopping why there was no price guide section in the magazine and he told me that Wizard had dropped the feature some time ago. That was especially disappointing, because it was one of my favorite features of the magazine. The price guide section always contained a lot of bonuses, like specialized character-related checklists and the "Bullet Exchange" tracking page for Golden Age comics. For a while, the price guide section also included an interesting feature entitled "The Good Stuff" in which the writers and editors would share a little bit about good but relatively obscure title or run from a particular series. It was kind of a fun way to learn about back issues that I might not normally consider picking up from the comic book shop. In fact, in one edition of "The Good Stuff," I discovered a comic book that would eventually make it into the ranks of my "Wall of Fame": Spectre #22. Well, if Wizard isn't going to turn folks on to "The Good Stuff" any more, I figure the least I can do is use greeklish.org to share a few of my picks every so often. So here's my first look at some of "The Good Stuff" from my collection.
Fantastic Giants, Vol. 2, No. 24 (Charlton Comics, 1966) I love old Charlton Comics and when I found a decent reading copy of this issue a few weeks ago, I was happy to shell out a few dollars for it. It's a 64-page collection of monster tales featuring artwork by the great Steve Ditko. Included in the collection is a reprint of the origin of the great ape Konga. Reading Konga's origin in "Fantastic Giants" is the next best thing to getting a copy of Konga #1. "Gorgo" is a pretty good Godzilla-ish yarn, but my favorite story of this anthology is the odd tale of "With the Help of Hogar," which is set in South Africa, of all places. The story features an exiled tribal leader named Manu who brings an alien statue to life in hopes that it will exact revenge on Manu's enemies. It's a short narrative-style tale that's not overly detailed or complex and, like the other stories in the collection, it stands on its own merits as a quaint, old-school Silver Age classic. Rounding out the book is the bizarre and offbeat tale of "The Mountain Monster."
Oddball Comics has a terrific and detailed write-up of Fantastic Giants Vol. 2 here. And here's another great write-up on this book.
DC Super-Stars #19: War Against the Giants (DC Comics, December-January 1975-76)
More old-school giant-themed madness! I found this last week when I got on the floor to root through a newly acquired collection of back issues at Fearless Readers Comics in Dayton. "War Against the Giants" is an anthology of Silver-Age reprints including a Superman tale written by former Marvel Editor-in-Chief Jim Shooter. In this story, Superman battles the so-called "Superman Revenge Squad" and their giant robot named "Eterno the Immortal." (Click here for a bit of "Best Blog Ever" ridiculousness using a panel from this story.) This issue also includes two features illustrated by the legendary Gil Kane, one of which is a Green Lantern tale. The final story is a Wonder Woman classic entitled "The Human Charm Bracelet," featuring some vintage Ross/Esposito artwork. As far as comics go, "War Against the Giants" is just a really good read, plain and simple.
