New album: No Truce with Kings 1
My new Bandcamp album, No Truce with Kings, is available as a payment-optional download. The songs are:
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Gary McGath
King George III is on Bluesky
Follow King George III on Bluesky as he pledges to Make Britain Great Again. Reposts and likes will help this new account to get noticed.
Protests on June 14
Todd Lyons is “demanding” that we stop saying bad things about his Gestapo. Hegseth has threatened to deploy the Marines against the American people. Let’s give them the answer they deserve.
On June 14, Donald Trump is celebrating his birthday with a Soviet-style military parade at our expense. It’s also a day when there will be many protests against the brutal turn our government has taken. You can look for one in your area at 50501. Read the description of any event you’re considering, and check other sources if necessary. Some event organizers merely want a socialist all-controlling state instead of a populist one, and they’re trying to hitch a ride on justified public outrage. In my limited experience, though, most are focused on the administration’s gross abuses of power.
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I’m on Letterboxd
Recently I learned of Letterboxd, a social media site for film fans, and decided to sign up to talk about silent film. My profile is here. Follow me if you’re so inclined.
A primer on Trumpism for libertarians
It shouldn’t be necessary to write this. The way Trump is running the presidency is so obviously hostile to liberty that libertarians should be unanimous in opposing him. Some people who call themselves libertarians, though, don’t quite get it. A few actually support him.
The Democrats aren’t good, but the issues with them aren’t as urgent. The first thing is to stop the country from sinking into dictatorship, then we can worry about excessive regulation and runaway deficit spending. Let me outline the main reasons Trump is a major danger and requires unequivocal opposition.
A lot of this will be familiar to many of you. I’m sorry that I have to belabor the obvious. Even if it’s all familiar, you might find some value in having all these items in one place.
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Reclaiming the American narrative
Narratives are a powerful thing in shaping a culture or a political movement. Narratives are patterns of explanation that turn a series of events into a story. They ascribe a consistent purpose to actions and show one event leading to another. Sometimes narratives stray from the facts, but they don’t have to. What makes a narrative is an underlying direction and a causal chain.
They’re often more powerful than facts for influencing people. Convince people of a narrative’s validity, and they’ll ignore or reject what doesn’t fit it. They’ll accept even implausible conclusions that fit with it. They’ll admire people who promote it and dislike ones who contradict it. To persuade large numbers of people, it isn’t enough to muster facts; it’s necessary to assemble them into a story.
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“Its hour come round at last” 1
My mind keeps coming back to Yeats’ 1919 poem, “The Second Coming.” He wrote it shortly after World War I, knowing that nothing had really been resolved. In retrospect, we know the answer to his question, “What rough beast, its hour come round at last, slouches toward Bethlehem to be born?”
We also know the answer to that question today in America. We see again that “the best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.” There’s plenty of noise opposing Trump, yet too little broad-based opposition. Congress is, with a handful of exceptions, divided between the Minion Party and the Coward Party. Outrage should be building to the point of besieging the White House, but as far as I can tell, it’s declining. People’s idea of opposing Trump is to put “#Resist” into a social media hashtag.
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Accompanying Buster Keaton films 1
This post is for the Buster Keaton Blogathon run from the Silent-ology blog.
I accompany silent movies. Four times a year, I accompany one for a live audience at the Plaistow, NH Library. In addition, I post public domain silent films with my accompaniment on YouTube. In just a few days I’ll accompany One Week as part of the library’s 25th anniversary in its present building. In July I’ll be accompanying The General at the library. In 2023 I accompanied Steamboat Bill, Jr.
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A library tour on the NH seacoast 1
Thursday was a rainy day, chilly for late May, and I needed to do something to improve my mood, so I set out on an afternoon’s tour of libraries near the New Hampshire coastline. The towns in this region mostly have small land areas, and each other has its own library, so I could cover a lot without too much travel. The ones I put on my list were South Hampton, Seabrook, Hampton, Rye, and Stratham. On the way home I passed right by the East Kingston library, so I dropped in there, as well as the Plaistow library.
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Spohr’s string quartets 31-36
After a long gap, Spohr wrote six final string quartets. The numbering gets confusing because he withdrew the last two, having rewritten one of them in a different key. There’s a detailed discussion by Keith Warsop of these quartets on the Spohr Society’s website.
Important composers are generally expected to produce some of their best work, or at least their most adventurous, toward the end of their lives. Spohr had done his best writing long before. He even lost confidence in his own writing, withdrawing or abandoning several pieces, including the Requiem and the Tenth Symphony. He may have seen himself as a relic. When he died in 1859, Brahms wrote that he was “probably the last of those who still belonged to an artistic period more satisfying than the one through which we now suffer.”
But he wasn’t completely finished! These quartets explore new directions and are less exhibitionistic, and some are rewarding to listen to.
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