Mikey

The Let Us Boogie Address
By Tutu Floyd
with apologies to Lincoln, and thanks to Alta Vista

Four score and seven years ago -- before S(illerman's)FX, Don Law, Bill Graham, even Colonel Tom -- the club scene could not foresee what system would be brought forth onto this continent, a new system -- of oligarchic club ownership, herd mentality promotion, and taste-free talent purchasing -- conceived in monopoly, and dedicated to the proposition that musical performance is a standard product.

Now, though we are yet engaged in no great civil war, we witness developments (among them the explosion of jam bands, and the advent of online journalism) testing whether this nation, or any nation, can long endure a system so conceived and so dedicated. We meet on no great battlefield of war, to witness carnage and mourn dead; we gather through screens, to mourn plasticity and laud the groove. Via jambands.com, we come to dedicate a portion of our screens, as a living place for those who give their lives that that system might wither. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

In a larger sense, we cannot dedicate - we cannot consecrate - we cannot hallow - this ground, because the brave musicians, living and dead, who've struggled at their work, have thusly consecrated it far above our poor power to add to or detract from it. The world can little note, nor long remember, what we say here, but it ought never forget what they did, and do. When music is a product sold rather than an expression given, and to the extent it becomes a need wonted (or, worse, a placebo) rather than a resource scattered, the struggle becomes not an attempt to express deeply but merely to express freely. It is thus for us, rather than to dedicate this ground, instead to be dedicated ourselves to the unfinishable work in support of they whose fight is thus far so ignobly advanced upon. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us - that from these honored, dead and alive, we may take increased devotion to that cause for which they give their full measure of devotion - that we here highly resolve that their music shall not be quieted in vain - that this nation shall have a new birth of freedom - and that music of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

Or ... that we at least get tickets.