The Unspin Room

We knew him above all for the Troggs' "Wild Thing," but Chip Taylor was also responsible for indelible ballads like "Angel of the Morning." I had the loveliest dealings with him in later years when he returned to recording. We'll miss him. RIP youtu.be/32-hkmaIpeI?si… via @YouTube

Women didn't put Trump in the White House: in 2016, 58% voted for Hillary Clinton; eight years later, 51% went for Kamala Harris. There is no truth that we can't break the glass ceiling. She just needs to carry less baggage than the names now bandied about berkshireeagle.com/opinion/column…

The Broadway cast of Operation Mincemeat is not to be beat: Brandon Contreras, Jessi Kirtley, Julia Knitel--with her extraordinary comic timing and expressions--Jeff Kready and Amanda Jill Robinson. This talented ensemble and the producing team deliver a master class in theatre👏

What becomes of the brokenhearted... generations who embrace a "me first" brand of nihilism, dreading a future so dim they won't need shades. If the Sixties reeked of immature idealism, the boring Twenties hum to dystopian steampunk. Something's gotta give berkshireeagle.com/opinion/column…

Parkinson's claims Country Joe McDonald, immortalized by a Fish Cheer at Woodstock, but there was more to him, epitomized by an ineffable Who Am I: "There were some things that I loved one time, but the dreams are gone I thought were mine" RIP youtu.be/KQ1OWvpfW44?si… via @YouTube

Around our nation's capitol, an enterprising soul took it upon himself to tack up 2,000 signs that read "EMPATHY." Now a MAGA acolyte has been blacking them out. Their kind think empathy is a sin, not a virtue. End times, 2,000 years on.berkshireeagle.com/opinion/column… via @berkshireeagle

In this Berkshire Eagle Reels, I talk with Marlene Warner, CEO of the Massachusetts Council on Gaming and Health, on underage online gambling. If you saw the Super Bowl, gaming sites were ever present. In many states, regulators don't regulate.youtu.be/VaXPF9mUX5g?si… via @YouTube

With the announcement of Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band spring tour of the U.S., here for the first time in full his rendition of The Rising from the kickoff to last year's Continental tour on May 14 in Manchester. Come on up for the rising, we need it now more than ever

On this Valentine's Day I take a look back through the mists of time to the origins of this celebration, and probe not only its meaning, but the need to support young people for the betterment of society. The human capital of love may be the capitalism we really need these days❤️

On a recent trip to Mexico I saw masked patrols, and shocking as they were there I never expected to see them here. The answer lies in working collaboratively with the rest of the hemisphere, not anti-immigrant brutality. We need change.berkshireeagle.com/opinion/column… via @berkshireeagle

Start a campaign to get Grammy to open the show Sunday with Bruce Springsteen doing "Streets of Minneapolis." It's their last year on CBS, so despite the network's current cowardice, don't give them a chance to say no. Grammy: just do it. Be relevant again.youtu.be/_jHeCwz4LGA

"Everything dies baby that's a fact, but maybe everything that dies someday comes back." Listening to a full "Atlantic City" from Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band in Albany April 15, 2024, thinking of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, joining Bruce insisting their deaths matter.

On April 15, 2024, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band treated Albany to Jimmy Cliff's "Trapped." Here is the full version from that show. Its resonance is renewed today, as the Boss' "Streets of Minneapolis" aims to help us break free of the ties that bind with bands of ICE.

They say history rhymes. Ringing down through the years, Jefferson Airplane at Woodstock in '69 rocked their anthemic Volunteers. Is Minneapolis today's inflection point with Springsteen's new Streets as his Streets of Philadelphia was to AIDS?youtu.be/IsoqRvYqWDg?si… via @YouTube

Delivering again with voice and song power, Bruce Springsteen hits hard and fast in "Streets of Minneapolis." He picks up a mantle Bob Dylan once wore with "Hurricane" and "George Jackson"--anthems to galvanize resistance, light in a dark time.youtu.be/wWKSoxG1K7w?si… via @YouTube

Bruce Springsteen took the stage at the Light of Day Winterfest, restating the mayor's plea unvarnished: "ICE should get the f**k out of Minneapolis!" He went on, "If you believe you don't deserve to be murdered for exercising your American right to protest, then send a message."

They sit in Casablanca and wait, and wait...for a 60 Minutes segment on the disgrace of deportation to the CECOT facility to air. You can find it in 60 seconds on the internet thanks to the CBC--and no thanks to CBS, where corporate dealmaking trumps all. Shame on CBS' Bari Weiss

In a New Yorker profile of Willie Nelson by Alex Abramovich, Bob Dylan waxes eloquent to lasso Willie's magic. When I worked with Willie at a White House show, his hands shook, yet he insisted on signing a hundred gifts intended for vets. He's an angel flying just off the ground.

These days I think about "Eve of Destruction"--not just Barry McGuire's 1965 hit, but the man who wrote it, PF Sloan, taken from us by cancer ten years ago. Elvis taught him guitar when Sloan was 13. Largely forgotten now, his words still echo.youtu.be/MFARzZVKQ3Y?si… via @YouTube

I first heard the distinctive voice of Derry native Feargal Sharkey when his Undertones rocked Belfast's Harp Bar. The "troubles" were on so I wore dangerous winklepickers. In 1985 he hit the Top of the Pops with "A Good Heart." It still rocks.youtu.be/tflbagvY_A8?si… via @YouTube