rla on March 30th, 2011


Dante and the Hypocrites

We are looking at Actors and Hypocrites – the same game, different rules: people playing parts, sometimes asking us to play along, sometimes desperately keeping us from perceiving that this is not their true self. We hear from the usual guests: Kinks, Dylan, RLS, and also old friends like Leonard Cohen and Randy Newman. And a lot of attention on what Dante’s myth can tell us about these false faces people put on. Thoreau comes into it too.

Everybody’s in Show-Biz (Kinks, “Celluloid Heroes”)

Land of Dreams (Randy Newman, “Masterman and Baby J”)

Abbey Road (Beatles, “Carry That Weight”)

Biograph (Dylan, “Positively 4th Street”)

The Future (Leonard Cohen, “Be for Real”)

Dante: Inferno (Penguin Classics) (trans. Robin Kirkpatrick)

The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde and Other Tales of Terror (Penguin Classics)

Walden and Civil Disobedience: (American Library) (Thoreau, “Civil Disobedience”)

rla on February 7th, 2011

Tashi & friend

RLA & Tashi


This our third show on Animals, a topic always good for interesting music and poetry. Several dogs here this evening, including the original “Hound Dog” – not sounding like you thought it sounded – and cats and a rooster (cockerel) and a bumble bee with a stinger as long as my arm, a spider, a tiger, some birds, and, yes, even a dragon. Our usuals – Dylan, Kinks, RLS – plus, well, listen along and you’ll see who else.

The Village Green Preservation Society (Kinks, “Animal Farm”)

Anthology 3 (Beatles, “Octopus’s Garden”)

New Morning (Bob Dylan, “If Dogs Run Free”)

Ulysses (Modern Classics) (James Joyce’s Ulysses, read by Jim Norton)

Songs from a Room (Leonard Cohen, “Bird on a Wire”)