The Twisted World of Billy Connolly

 

 

 

Tall Tales & Wee Stories (2019)

By Billy Connolly

Two Roads, 325 pages.

★★★

 

Billy Connolly will be 82 next month. He has nee called the funniest comic in British history. That’s debatable, of course, though he has been knighted. That’s pretty funny, as he’s a supporter of Scottish independence!  Americans might know him best for his work in TV and movies, like Mrs. Brown (1997), a Muppets movie, or in Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events. The last two are hilarious given that Billy Connolly is one of the filthiest comedians ever to make the stage roar.

 

If you pick up his Tall Tales & Wee Stories, you might want to keep it out of reach until young whelps are ready for blue words–say six when they hear them in school. Connolly is Lenny Bruce unleashed. (Bruce got arrested for material that has gone from obscene to routine.) Connolly’s also an example of what happened once Scotland threw off the chains of John Knox-style Presbyterianism. These days you’ll run into people who think the Scots are the funniest people on the planet. T’was not always so. Until World War II, Scots were as grey and gloomy as their weather.

 

Connolly came of age in gritty postwar Glasgow, was abandoned by his mother, was raised by two aunts, and became a welder. In other words, a working class outlook with no time for bourgeois niceties. This became fodder for the no-whinging first section of his book: “Childhood & Family.” Thank heaven for someone who can say of deprivation, “Nonsense! When you’re a wee boy it’s not like that.” The things that rankled were a visiting priest that ate all the good crumpets and pretense. All of sudden their tenement had a “cloakroom.” (“ Bloody ‘cloakroom.’ She thinks it’s a dance hall she’s in.”) Connolly’s rants against mathematics, substitute teachers, and telling a cardinal to “fuck off” are priceless. Outings to swim in the North Sea led to one of his greatest lines: Scots aren’t white people; they’re translucent blue.

 

 

 

Rock n’ roll, the folk revival, and the counterculture fit Connolly like a condom, which he hates by the way. He’s six feet tall, but projects the ‘tude and swager of someone even more substantial and gained the nickname “Big Yin." He certainly cut a commanding figure with a bull neck,  a wild, long mane and striding in his banana boots. Wait! Did I say banana boots? Yep. They were his trademark for a while and are still on view at the People’s Palace in Glasgow. Connolly is also a very good musician who still gets called upon to pick up an instrument (banjo, guitar, autoharp) for gigs and studio recordings with traditional musicians.

 

In in “Scotland and Beyond” Connolly regales us with observations about the Irish, Australians, waiters who don’t offer menus, Scots getting drunk on crème de menthe, rain, and the British National Anthem. He’s okay with the idea of “saving the Queen” in the latter, but overall the anthem is “boring… appalling… racist.. and anti-Scottish.” Leave it him to link the anthem to poor showings in the Olympics.  

 

The chapters get bluer as he delves into “Real Characters”–never trust a comic who uses the word real– “Accidents and Adventures,” “Sex, Drugs & Folk Music,” and “A Life Worth Living.” He offers commentary such as, “Never trust a man who, when left in a room with tea cosy, doesn’t try it on;” and “if you’d like to lose weight, never eat anything that’s served in a bucket. A bucket is the kitchen implement of the farmyard.” He hates  stupid questions, like when you witness an accident and you’re asked, “Can you tell us in your own words what happened?” ‘What, do you think I have my own words? Who would I talk to?’” You name it and Connolly has a twisted POV: computers, “beige” people, naked bungie jumping, cuddling, sexy bandages, scrotums, vomit, New Age nonsense, and swearing (he’s for it).

 

I’m a huge Billy Connolly fan, so why just three stars? First, Connolly often goes for cheap jokes and second, non-Scots will be baffled by some of his tales. Mainly, though, Connolly has to be seen to be appreciated fully. His comedy is akin to the manic energy of the late Robin Williams; it’s often not what he says, but how he says it. Read his cuddling story and then see it on YouTube. Connolly has been married to a psychologist for the past 35 years. Take from that what you will!

 

Rob Weir

2024 MLB Wrap Up and Predictions

 

 

 

The Major League Baseball 2024 regular season is now in the books. As usual all the pundits, including me, gave prognostication a bad name. Here's a postmortem of the regular season followed by my postseason predictions.

 

There are a few things about which we can be thankful, plus a few rants.

 

            1. We don't have to watch any of the perennial lambs go to the slaughter once again. The Tampa Bay Rays should be renamed the Crayfish. That’s appropriate for a team that spends about $75 on its roster.

 

            2. Minnesota should be christened the Twinkies. Every year they are big pretenders in a division as soft as the aforementioned pastry, but I doubt they would win a postseason series were Kirby Puckett to rise from the grave.

 

            3. Seattle once again came close to making the postseason, but my advice is never bet on the Mariners;  they will rain on your dreams every time.

 

            4. The Cubs did a terrible thing by winning the 2016 World Series. They were lovable losers. Now they're just bums.

 

            5. There's hope in Boston even though Bay Staters would like to eviscerate ownership for being cheap. I'm not a Red Sox fan but this team has a future. They got close to the postseason in today's “Every Kid Gets a Wild Card” setup. They have nice young talent and a better bullpen could have easily gotten them a Wild Card in 2024.

 

            6. Much has been made about the White Sox historic 121-loss season. That was ugly, but we ought to hang a Hollywood-sized LOSER sign in Anaheim where the Angels lost 99 games and finished six games behind Oakland, which didn’t even pretend to compete. What a freaking waste the Angels have been of Mike Trout’s career! If I were he I'd hang ‘em up now and wait for the Hall of Fame to call.            

 

            7. Will MLB ever learn that nobody cares about summer baseball in Florida? Another 100-loss season for the Miami Dead Fish and another of drawing AA-sized crowds in both Miami and Tampa.

 

            8. When MLB talks about its colorful past, Pittsburgh and Cincinnati are mentioned because what else is there to talk about? It could ask the same about Denver, except it doesn't have a colorful past.

 

            9. Back up the van in Toronto, San Francisco, and St. Louis.

 

 

And now for my predictions that will probably collapse by the end of the week.

 

American League Wild Cards:

 

Tigers over Astros: Houston was Jekyll and Hyde all year and Detroit figured out it's best to be hot in the autumn.

 

Orioles over Royals, though I'd not be shocked if it went to the other way.

 

 

National League Wild Cards:

 

 Mets over Brewers: Milwaukee’s pitching is mediocre and the Mets can hit.

 

Padres over the Braves,  though I’m not sold on either of them. San Diego needed a surge to get there and the Braves dithered for much of the season.  

 

AL Division Series:

 

Guardians over Detroit: Just like it was in the Central Division. Cleveland is the best small ball team in MLB.

 

Orioles or Royals over the Yankees.  New York had the best record in the AL, but it still can't score if Judge or Soto don't hit home runs. Between them they knocked in 1/3 of all the runs the Yankees scored this year! The Yankees also have a terrible bullpen and a robot manager who thinks it's creative to flip Soto and judge in the order. I'm a Yankees fan, but I do not believe in this team.

 

I'm picking the Guardians to win the American League Pennant.

 

NL Division Series:

 

I think the Phillies will sweep whomever they play.

 

The Dodgers over San Diego in four. The Padres are another perpetual disappointment team.

 

Phillies over Dodgers in five games to win the NL pennant because Mookie Betts doesn’t pitch and neither can Othani (this year).

 

World Series:

 

Call me a sentimental fool but I think that Cleveland will win the World Series because Stephen Vogt is a better manager than Rob Thompson. That matters in the World Series.

 

Codicil: Should the Yankees make it to the World Series, they will lose for the reasons I stated above.

 

 

September 2024 Music: Lisa Bastoni Kylie Fox Moira Smiley Surrender Hill Yosef Gutman

 

Time for more this and that music. In other words, yours truly has fallen behind again!

 

 

If, like me, you often crave soothing music from an earnest songwriter who doesn’t do fake drama, check out Lisa Bastoni. I picked up two of her albums, her most recent On the Water and 2019’s How We Want to Live. Each is as soothing as a warm shower–even when she’s singing about painful things. On the Water includes a cover of Dylan’s “Workingman’s Blues” but her own “Pockets Full of Sighs” has a similar languid, phlegmatic vibe in that it’s personal yet sounds detached. Mainly it’s just a good song. Also try the upbeat good earworm “Walk a Little Closer.” That’s the versatile Sean Staples with her and the man is lethal with a mandolin in his mitts! How We Want to Live is practically self-defining. “Right Side of the River” covers topics of self-discovery and it’s a backdoor tribute to where she now lives (says her fellow Northamptonite). “Let’s Look at Houses” is a little bit of country and a cheeky sneak attack on property values. Ironically, though this album is often amusing, she wrote it as her marriage was dissolving. Many of the compositions were inspired by her grandmother’s wisdom–not to mention that she inherited “Nora’s Guitar,” a poignant and lovely song on the album.

 

 

Moira Smiley has an Irish name, but is a Vermonter by birth. She does some sean​-​n​ó​s (old style) Irish singing, and has performed with Irish musicians, but she’s also grounded in shape-note, jazz, classical, and Eastern European music, plays numerous instruments, and has a penchant for medieval music. For all that, she’s a folkie at heart, if you accept that any album named The Rhizome Project Album will veer into unexpected places. It’s actually the handle of the string quartet that accompanies her, but also descriptive of melodies that sheer in both lateral and horizontal directions. Smiley sings well known trads such as “Go Dig MyGrave, “Now is the Cool of the Day,” and “John o’ Dreams,” the first suitably haunting and sober, the last introed by a poem (that reappears), and makes us wonder about the significance of a vid featuring a beach and a woman in angel wings. The vocal of “Cool of the Day” is as minimalist as “Dig My Grave” is lush. “My Son David” (with Taylor Ashton) is a dark Child ballad that is somehow warm, yet invites eschatological contemplation. I’m assuming there aren’t many Welsh speakers out there, so listen to “Ar lan y mor” to appreciate Smiley’s considerable vocal chops. Pick any track on the album and you’ll discover that old ballads have more present-day relevance than you might imagine.

 

 

Kylie Fox specializes in Canadiana music, which like the Americana handle, is a kitchen sink of folk, folk rock, country, and jazz-pop fusion. On Sequoia Fox celebrates things we take for granted. That song pays tribute to firefighters who battled to save a giant tree from perishing, which she connects to other things her life that are rare. It might be a bit of a forced analogy, but many of the strands of Canadiana appear in it. “Brandi Baby” reveals that Fox leans harder toward the pop side of the mélange. It won’t surprise readers that I much prefer straightforward folk such as “Alberta,” which more clearly reveals the colors of Fox’s voice–its power, control, and high-to-low range. It’s inevitable that when musicians opt for a broad repertoire that some explorations will enthrall more than others, but in all honesty I liked Fox’s earlier repertoire better. To my ear it was less cluttered.

 

 

 

Seems only fair to turn to a “Americana record. River of Tears is the seventh studio release from the married duo of Robin Dean and Afton (Seekins) Salmon who perform as Surrender Hill. As noted, Americana is also a catchall category, though the dominant strain isn’t hard to find. For Surrender Hill it’s the rock-influenced modern country music. Nonetheless, it’s been a twisted road to get there; Robin Dean was born in South Africa and once played heavy rock, and Afton is a native Alaskan from a folk background. As songwriters, hers are often the more emotional contributions. On Valentine’s Day she wrote “Holding Me, ”a straight up love song. whose title says it all despite tinges of hopefulness. His contribution was "River of Tears," a love song for sure, but more in the vein of classic country. “Cry Baby” is basically a rock n’ roll song with vocal twang, but “Get Out of Your Own Way” has a Western flavour, right down to the spaces in the musical phrasing. If you like old-style country, “Angel, The Devil and Me” says it all.

 

 

 

Yosef Gutman Levitt is an observant Jew from Jerusalem, but the man plays a mean standup bass, including a five-string model that he had a hand in developing. Gutman’s music emanates from a spiritual place, but he is also interested in what he calls a “light, bouncy” effect created when classical music and jazz improv are made as accessible as folk music. His new release, The World and Its People, is on his own new label, Soul Song Records, a perfect handle for his intentions. He is joined by guitarist Tal Yahalom, cellist Yoed Nir, and pianist Omri Mor. The quartet might not always make music that you’d normally gravitate toward, but as odd as it might sound, many of the compositions have jam band-like explorations. Try the two tracks “My Soul Thirsts” and “Shifting Sky.” Note how the first has an understated yearning and the second what seems a loosely structured meandering that embodies its title. 

 

 

 

Rob Weir