Motley Moose – Archive

I post a weekly diary of historical notes, arts & science items, foreign news (often receiving little notice in the US) and whimsical pieces from the outside world that I often feature in “Cheers & Jeers”.

SEPARATED at BIRTH – “Harry Potter” author JK Rowling and TV/film star Felicity Huffman – best known for “Desperate Housewives”.

   

OK, you’ve been warned – here is this week’s tomfoolery material that I posted.

ART NOTES – numerous types of work (with one thing in common) are in an exhibition entitled Gold at the Bass Museum of Art in Miami Beach, Florida through January 11th.

HAIL and FAREWELL to the former Rolling Stone music journalist Charles M. Young – who has died at the age of 63.

HISTORY NOTES – a 93-year-old nun has been questioned regarding the alleged abduction of babies in public and private hospitals in Chile during the military dictatorship (1973-90) of Augusto Pinochet.

WEDNESDAY’s CHILD is Elias the Cat – the winner of Britain’s “Most Caring Cat” award by helping an Army vet consumed by the painful effects of post-traumatic stress disorder.

DEBAUCHERY CENTRAL – three married Swiss couples who were having sex in a van when their driver was stopped by Spanish policemen have been fined ….. for not wearing their seatbelts.

FROM A PROFILE of José Mujica, the outgoing president of Uruguay – someone who spent ten years in solitary confinement has little need for trappings .. which is why he drives an old VW Beetle and has lunch in the bars of his capital city.

THURSDAY’s CHILD is Legz the Cat – the (three-legged) winner of Britain’s “Rescue Cat of the Year” award who rules-the-roost at a pub in London … and has inspired many locals to adopt rescue cats of their own (and even one to begin volunteering for a cat charity).

BRAIN TEASER – try this Quiz of the Week’s News from the BBC.

EMPLOYMENT RECRUITING is being changed (at least for professional careers) by LinkedIn – where recruiters are able to spot those who are not actively looking for a new job but are ‘persuadable’ … as well as helping large firms evaluate its own internal talent pool.

FRIDAY’s CHILD is Mr. Chips the Cat – the winner of Britain’s “Better Together” award by helping a man suffering from numerous ailments cope … even bouts of suicidal thought.

HAPPY TRAILS to the youngsters from Chicago, the Jackie Robinson West baseball team … who lost to a team from South Korea in the Little League World Series championship match today.

Chicago had eliminated the Philadelphia team featuring star pitcher Mo’Ne Davis – who was on a recent cover of Sports Illustrated – in order to get where they were today.

AN INTERESTING THEORY was posited in today’s NY Times:

Over the last few decades, residents of many traditionally liberal states have moved to states that were once more conservative. And this pattern has played an important role in helping the Democratic Party win the last two presidential elections and four of the last six.

SEPARATED at BIRTH – “Harry Potter” author JK Rowling and TV/film star Felicity Huffman – best known for “Desperate Housewives”.

   

…… and finally, for a song of the week ………………….. for the past twenty-five years, one of the premiere singer-songwriters has been Sarah McLachlan – whom Chris Woodstra of the All-Music Guide describes as performing ‘atmospheric folk-pop’. Either way, she has not only carved out her own niche but has also championed the work of female musicians and participated in numerous charities (both musical and otherwise) that make her a familiar face around the world.

Born in 1968 in Halifax, Nova Scotia she was an adopted child who studied music from a young age. She began fronting a New Wave rock band called October Game and – after appearing as an opening act at a Canadian university concert – was offered a contract to be a solo performer. She agreed, but on the condition her parents set: complete high school and spend at least one year of college (attending the Nova Scotia School of Design). In her high school yearbook she was voted Most Likely to Be a Rock Star – and while most would not describe her work as being rock music, she did say on a recent CBS Sunday Morning profile that she does have a rock and roll side.

Her 1989 debut album Touch spawned a minor hit single Vox and resulted in her being distributed by Clive Davis’ Arista label. The 1991 followup album Solace was her break-through album in Canada, and was produced by Pierre Marchand – who has been her collaborator ever since (even co-writing a few songs). Songs such as The Path of Thorns and Into the Fire helped begin to generate an audience in the US as well. At this time, she travelled to Cambodia and Thailand to provide material for a Canadian documentary on poverty and child prostitution … which helped shape her future efforts to give back to the community.

Her break-through album worldwide was 1993’s Fumbling Towards Ecstasy – partly on the strength of songs such as Good Enough and one about a stalker, Possession – which spent 62 weeks in the US charts. She also recorded the 1995 theme song for the Brothers McMullen film, entitled I Will Remember You – which enjoyed chart success in North America both in 1995 and 1999.

It was in 1996 that Sarah McLachlan grew tired of being told by both concert promoters (and radio station managers) that featuring two female musicians in-a-row was … not profitable. She booked a tour with singer Paula Cole that sold well, and a show in her hometown of Halifax featured the two along with Lisa Loeb … that bore the name Lilith Fair – after the medieval legend that Lilith was Adam’s first wife.

The next year, she helped organized a Lilith Fair tour – which had some male musicians on-stage, just that each act had to be led by female musicians – that grossed $16 million and generated $7 million for charitable causes. A second and third tour followed in 1998 and 1999 before being discontinued – alas, an attempt to revive the tour in 2010 had to be cancelled 2/3 of the way through due to poor ticket sales.

Meanwhile, in 1997 Sarah McLachlan released her fourth album Surfacing – which remains her best-selling album to-date, with songs such as Building a Mystery and Last Dance (both of which earned Grammy Awards). It also featured perhaps her best-known song Angel – dedicated to the Smashing Pumpkins keyboardist Jonathan Melvoin (who died as the result of a drug overdose) and the song was featured in the film City of Angels in 1998.

Her first live album Mirrorball was released in 1999 just as she was taking a hiatus from touring – for the birth of her first child – although she did put in guest appearances on Sheryl Crow’s 1999 Live in Central Park show, singing the Randy Newman song When She Loved Me – from the Toy Story 2 soundtrack (that earned an Oscar nomination) and also sang on a 2001 Stevie Nicks solo album, among others.

She returned in 2003 with the album Afterglow – which featured singles such as Fallen, Stupid and World on Fire – plus a second live album the following year. In 2006 she released the album Wintersong – featuring traditional Christmas carols as well as other songs of the season (such as Song for a Winter’s Night by Gordon Lightfoot). That same year she sang the Dave Stewart (of The Eurythmics fame) song Ordinary Miracle for the Charlotte’s Web film.

As noted, all along she has been involved in numerous benefit/charity works. Some of these include: performing at a 1997 show for the Leonard Peltier defense fund, at the 2005 Live 8 concert in Philadelphia and also writing a letter (on behalf of PETA) in 2012 to her own prime minister, Stephen Harper – protesting Canada’s annual seal hunt.

In recent years, you have seen her on several public service announcements for the ASPCA – urging the adoption of shelter cats and dogs – over the music of her songs such as Angel and Answer. Some feel the spots are overly maudlin …… and in response: during this past February’s Super Bowl, an ad for Audi featured her in a spoof with a Doberhuahua gnawing on her guitar’s neck. And close to her heart: the Sarah McLachlan School of Music opened in her adopted hometown of Vancouver: providing free music lessons to at-risk children.

In this decade, she recorded the song One Dream as the official theme song of the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics and released the album Laws of Illusion that same year. In 2011 she performed Angel and I Will Remember You at the 10-year anniversary commemoration of the Pennsylvania crash site of United Flight 93 on 9-11. And just this past May, she released her latest album Shine On – dedicated to the death of her adoptive father – her first release on Verve after having left Arista Records after twenty years.

At age forty-six, Sarah McLachlan has already won three Grammy Awards, eight Canadian Juno Awards, a Kiwanis International award for the founding of her Vancouver music school and a 1998 Elizabeth Cady Stanton award for advancing the interests of women in the music field. She has a 2013 compilation album of note and – having completed a major US tour launches a Canadian tour in October.

   

And while “I Will Remember You” is my favorite song of hers ….. I most enjoy hearing her on a song where she is a duet singer … because the back-story is so powerful.

In 1997, Darryl McDaniels (of the hip-hop group Run-D.M.C) credited Sarah McLachlan’s song “Angel” with steering him away from suicide (for a multitude of problems) and told her so a year later. He didn’t discover (until his thirties) that he was adopted, and devoted his time and efforts into helping adopted child support groups.

And he had an interesting idea for a song: wanting to reprise the Harry Chapin classic Cat’s in the Cradle – but with revised lyrics about being adopted (and this time, with a happy ending). He obtained the blessing of Harry Chapin’s family .. and picks up the story from there:

Then a light goes on in my head. I’mma get that lady. That lady whose record helped me, I’mma get her to help me make a record that’s gonna help somebody else.

She agreed to sing the chorus for him, and here is the resulting record.

Then, once the record was finished: Sarah McLachlan told McDaniels …. that she, too was adopted. McDaniels was floored.

That’s what music is supposed to do. I call up the lady that touched my life and then she tells me we had that in common. That’s miraculous.

And below you can hear their collaboration entitled “Just Like Me”.