Red Sox Nation mourns the passing of George Scott, the Boomer

Former Red Sox, Brewers slugger George Scott dies at 69 

He had a great glove.

Whereupon Keith Emerson blows my mind wide open!

"Lucky Man" magnificently unleashed!

Rare Greg Lake version of King Crimson's Cadence and Cascade

Soothing and wonderful. That's Greg Lake's voice at the beginning of his prime on an out-take from In the Wake of Poseidon  (You Tube version here.)

The scene that will remain seared in a Bruins hockey fan's memory! Gregory Campbell after taking a slapshot to leg, fighting on in penalty kill

True grit!

Progressive rock at its best! Wow!

Amazing music!

Another loss for zealot U.S. Attorney Carmen Ortiz

Federal judge comes to the rescue in property rights case. Carmen Ortiz should have known better.

Jon Chesto of the Boston Business Journal has the details.

Thank goodness for the Institute for Justice. The government was out to seize owner Russ Caswell's motel in Tewksbury because several unaffiliated drug deals took place. A federal Magistrate Judge, Judith Dein, thought otherwise.

Dein’s ruling today pointed to several reasons why prosecutors didn’t have the right to seize the Motel Caswell:

• The government had identified only a limited number of qualified drug-related incidents, spread out over a 15-year period. None of the incidents — law enforcement officials eventually named 15 of them — involved Caswell or his employees, or even people that Caswell was familiar with.
• There were essentially no efforts to work with Caswell to reduce drug crimes at the property before prosecutors moved ahead with forfeiture proceedings in 2009
• There was no warning given to Caswell that the possibility of a property seizure even existed.
• Caswell, who lives next door to the motel with his family, and his employees took reasonable steps to secure the property and cooperate with police.

Prosecutors had been tipped off about the motel by a federal agent whose primary job was to identify properties for forfeiture. But prosecutors maintained that this wasn’t about raising money for the government, and was instead about helping local police crack down on the drug trade.

Amusing.

Stunningly beautiful in all its range, Bruckner's Symphony No.8, Karajan conducting

Bruckner's Symphony No.8 w/Karajan conducting "live" in St. Florian (1979)

My favorite Bruckner Symphony, No. 8 here from St. Florian.  Bruckner was no "mere country bumpkin." He was a genius who created music that gave us a glimpse of how God roars. Amazing music. It's an honor to be the 38,270th viewer of this performance.

R.I.P. James Buchanan, 1986 Nobel Laureate in Economic Science. A great man!

Economist Richard McKenzie writes a tribute to his teacher James Buchanan

 "Today, I am pleased to call James Buchanan my professor for pressing on me a remarkably simple but important point that escapes so many colleagues across the country:  Being a professor is a privileged position.  It demands scholarship, but it also demands that you give of yourself in ways that will never show up on your resume, or in your obituary."

Bravo.

Happy Birthday David Bowie and thank you for "Where Are We Now?"

I love it! David Bowie: Where Are We Now?

Winter without professional hockey is really not winter at all.

NHL lockout has chilling effect on business -

No kidding!

JEAN-LUC PONTY, STANLEY CLARKE, AL DI MEOLA "Memory canyon" - YouTube

JEAN-LUC PONTY, STANLEY CLARKE, AL DI MEOLA play "Memory canyon" from the Rite of Strings

Wherein Stanley Clarke allows us to see his soul.  Astounding music! 

Hey Hippies! Ravi was just not that much into your indulgences!

The Telegraph:

Until Ravi Shankar, most people in the West were familiar with Indian music – if at all – only as background noise in establishments with flock wallpaper, and would not have been in a position to discern the fine distinction between a morning raga and evening one, or even know whether in Shankar they were listening to a virtuoso or a rank beginner. 

But Shankar could be a fastidious man. The rock audiences who came to pay homage he haughtily dismissed in his autobiography as “these strange young weirdos”; while his appearances at the Monterey and Woodstock festivals – the great quasi-religious gatherings of the alternative society – were apparently painful ordeals, where the audiences were “shrieking, shouting, smoking, masturbating and copulating – all in a drug-crazed state… I used to tell them, 'You don’t behave like that when you go to hear a Bach, Beethoven or Mozart concert.’” Quite.

 Here is the master: 

R.I.P.

spfq412.pdf (application/pdf Object)

spfq412.pdf (application/pdf Object)

Grateful Dead Live at Alumni Stadium, U. Mass/Amherst, May 12, 1979

I am proud to say I was at this show and it was awesome. Patti Smith opened. 

Grateful Dead Live at Alumni Stadium, U. Mass. on 1979-05-12 : Free Download & Streaming : Internet Archive

Paul Kurtz, prominent "secular humanist" has died.

R. Joseph Hoffman has a good write-up at the The New Oxonian.

Be careful with that ax Allan!! Holdsworth & Chad Wackerman "Tell Me"

Allan Holdsworth remains one of the great guitarists of modern music.
Chad's not bad a drummer either.

Allan Holdsworth Chad Wackerman "Tell Me" - YouTube

Let's make this go viral! "Big Jet Plane"

With apologies to Joni Mitchell...

A great protest video!

Big Jet Plane - YouTube

Reconnecting with Mission of Burma - "Semi-Pseudo-Sort-of Plan"

My God the world has passed me by.  I just I need to get my ears out more often....

Very nice! Mahavishnu Orchestra Live at BBC 1972

Geese at rest at Lake Quannapowitt

Lake Quannapowitt, Wakefield at sunset, August 21, 2012.