Wednesday 30 November 2005

I am blessed

Not only do I get a magnificent S L A D E DVD on Monday, but today I picked up two (count 'em, TWO) Buffy Sainte-Marie DVDs! The light of righteousness is shining brightly!

Of course, when I say 'Buffy DVDs' I mean she's in them. Not for long, but she's in them!

The best one is 'Festival', a compilation of the Newport Folk Festival over 1963-66 and features a range of people including Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Donovan, Johnny Cash, Staple Singers, Pete Seeger, Peter,Paul & Mary and loads of people I've never heard of. And Buffy who's looking mighty fine and young. She sings 'Cod'ine', her song about drug addiction that's been recorded by people ranging from Donovan to The Charlatans and most recently by Courtney Love (not a very good version). I'm very pleased with it.

The other DVD is less satisfactory - 'Tower of Song - an epic story of Canada and its music' - a Canadian TV programme about its musical Hall of Fame. Buffy's in it for a couple of minutes, mainly footage from her induction into the Hall of Fame and some footage of her on a reservation (possibly a pow wow festival). She's not interviewed at all - she probably couldn't see the point of it.

I like her Hall of Fame acceptance speech - she reels off all these funny names of (what I assume are) real small towns in Canada, much to the audience's amusement, and then she points out that people who live in these odd-named places way beyond the flashy lights of the ceremony and the cities appreciate the music of people present and are artists in their own right and that she goes out to see them and play to them... presumably implying that the others don't. The footage then ends so we don't see or hear how the assembled dignitaries react to her subtle comments about them and the implication that the 'real' people don't get a very good deal.

That's wor Buffy!

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