I'm back, watching the Olympics.... no, sorry; ya'll who get that reference, thanks for being forever friends with me. In fact, I'm listening to the World Series, Diamondbacks at Rangers for Game 1, specifically.
I don't know if people without ADD open a tab, think of a thing, open another tab, and then, seven more tabs and $87.54 later, struggle desperately to recall what it is they had INTENDED to do when signing onto the computer three and a half hours ago.
No? Just me?
Okay, so at any rate.....
I'm supposed to be writing a review- which I will finish, eventually- I feel like I have a Yogi Berra-ism in me to the effect that of writing is 70% stalling, 20% facts, and the other half is perspiration- of something wonderful I watched last night. In fact, I've finished writing it and will shortly be listening to Game 2 of the World Series. The review's now in my editor's hands.
As is my habit, I have several windows open JUST for the thing I'm writing, plus additional ones open because I'm hunting for work (anyone reading this, ya hiring?) so instead of being responsible, limiting myself to just the pertinent ones, or heavens forfend, CLOSING any of them....
...I begin breadcrumb-trailing a song I heard once on The Muppet Show (Episode 310, with Marisa Berenson, original air date December 1978) that I thought thematically fit the show I'd just seen, Cabaret Macabre, which I saw for the first time in 2014 because, primarily, of this song by Tom Waits in the show, which, by the way, is LOADS better when sung by the glorious Sarah Olmsted Thomas of Happenstance Theater.
Now, even though I'd seen the sketch in '78, the song stuck with me. In fact, once, more than a decade later, in the car with my (then) boyfriend and Mother, someone said "our house" and three of us sang a riff from three different songs. Mother sang Crosby, Stills and Nash, Gomez sang the one by Madness, and, well, I've told you mine.
I find video of the sketch I remember, then, after investigating Marisa Berensen, who was a model and I theoretically saw her in Barry Lyndon, (a movie which I remember as being lyrically beautiful and also scarring) and her sister who died when her plane collided with a famous NYC building, I fall down a rabbit hole regarding Shel Silverstein being the writer of that song (yes, The Giving Tree dude, I KNOW)...
...but then chance upon a summation / interpretation of the song and, well.
Ya know, when someone on the internet is wrong, Something Must Be Done.
When I came upon it, the article discussed how the song was about inclusion and acceptance. It included "lyrics" from the song which are not there. It talked about the supportive nature of the sweet song.
It talked about the song "The Giving Tree" that Silverstein had written- which he hadn't; it's by Plain White Tees, released in 2013, four years after Silverstein's death. The song references the children's book of the same name, but isn't remotely BY Silverstein. Good song, though.
The erroneous article mentioned that Shel Silverstein wrote "A Boy Named Sue," a singular part of the article which was accurate. Now, I went internet hunting, as I was certain that was a Johnny Cash song, and I wasn't entirely wrong about that. Johnny Cash performed it for the first time at San Quentin in 1969. But no, it was true that Shel Silverstein wrote "A Boy Named Sue," partly due to a conversation he had with Jean Shephard (yes, of A Christmas Story fame, based on In God We Trust- All Others Pay Cash, that looks like a collection of short stories- which he always claimed it wasn't, it was a novel, but it was never his idea to repackage his radio memories anyhow; they were recorded and transcribed by guess who, yep, Shel Silverstein)
Johnny Cash, on that fateful day in San Quentin, performed the song somewhat differently from how Silverstein imagined and recorded it. If you're new to "A Boy Named Sue," you're not alone. The Twins hadn't heard it, either.
At any rate, I debated in a comment the author's conclusions. I used the phrase "egregiously, verifiably, factually wrong." I questioned whether the writer was AI. I said that howsomever the author had reached his conclusion, it was obviously not through careful research of the original source material.
Fewer than 24 hours later, it's as if the original had never existed. Wish I'd screen-shotted that nonsense. My comment, naturally, is also missing.
YES; "Changes" 1983
