"Rob was in a total coma for a long, long time. About six years. Then he was in a state of some awareness but could not respond...."...That's a sad story about a Wisconsin man. I guess "Alabama songs" refers to songs by the country rock band Alabama, which has been around since 1969.
"The hospice has a music therapist who would come in and play her guitar and sing to Rob his favorite songs, Alabama songs. Right after he died, she came back and sat there until the funeral parlor came and picked up Rob. She sat there very quietly singing her songs to him"....
I see Wikipedia has a page "List of songs about Alabama." It's a long list, including "Alabama Song," the Brecht/Weill song that The Doors covered. ("Show us the way to the next whisky bar... show us the way to the next pretty boy....") The most famous song about Alabama is probably "Sweet Home Alabama." Or is it "Stars Fell on Alabama" — which Billie Holiday sang so sweetly.
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Tough thing and it's a choice that shouldn't be made by government.
I guess "Alabama songs" refers to songs by the country rock band Alabama, which has been around since 1969.
I guess. Heh. (there is a more recent country song by brad paisley about Alabama too: "Now we’re listenin' to Old Alabama, and we’re drivin' through Tennessee")
That song about the lady playing guitar is very sweet.
The story, not the song.
FWIW I always thought the definitive treatment of Stars Fell Over Alabama was sung by Hoagy Carmichael..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mFr3-xiIuCg&feature=player_detailpage
Oh Susanna!
I had a woman
Down in Alabama
She was a darkskinned girl
But she sure was realistic
I once saw a local band play "Sweet Home Alabama" and segue seamlessly into "Werewolves of London."
It freaked my mind.
1. Had a high school buddy in Lynyrd Skynrd. Originally they were a British Blues cover band (Cream, Savoy Brown, et al) before Al Kooper discovered them and thus "Sweet Home Alabama".
2. Billie's version of the "Stars Feel on Alabama" is THE rendition of the song.
3. The people of North Alabama are some of the nicest, kindest people in all of the contiguous United States.
4. It is truly a beautiful, though unknown, area of the United States. Shhhh...I didn't say that.
He certainly was disabled as a result of that accident 30 years ago. But did he actually die as a result of it?
@Surfed,
3. The people of North Alabama are some of the nicest, kindest people in all of the contiguous United States.
I'll gracefully accept that compliment on behalf of my kith & kinfolk.
While I don't think they ever mentioned 'Bammy in a song, I've always been partial to the Louvin Brothers as the acme of AL's musical talent.
Well, them & Hank Williams.
rcommal said...
He certainly was disabled as a result of that accident 30 years ago. But did he actually die as a result of it?
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Disabled is not a term I would use for a man made a vegetable by an accident.
And in the natural course of things, without modern machines and tubes and millions in free government care, he would have died in the 1st year or so.
Didn't have the sentience to feed himself. "Awareness" of external activity could mean a lot of things. A rutabaga plant also responds to external stimuli.
20 years , 25 years ago someone needed to say "Pull the plug!"
Free the taxpayer or insurance premium payer funded "musical therapist" to play Elvis songs to the droolers in the nursing home Alzheimers section..
While New York is softer on crime than most other states, it has one peculiar practice that no other states seem to follow: prosecuting people for murder when the victims die years or even decades after the attacks (which is less uncommon than might be imagined). In many cases the people already have served prison time for aggravated assault.
This policy may have been prompted by the case of Andy Warhol, who died from the effects of gunshot wounds twenty years after being shot.
Peter
Evidently, I don't follow the art world crowd, and didn't know that Andy Warhol had been shot, curious, I went to Wiki. The shooter:
Solanas moved to New York City in the mid-1960s, working as a writer, beggar, and prostitute. She met Andy Warhol and asked Warhol to produce her play, Up Your Ass. She gave him her script, which he proceeded to lose, followed by Warhol expressing additional indifference to her play. After Solanas demanded financial compensation for the lost script, Warhol hired her to perform in his film, I, A Man, paying her $25.
She spent 3 years in prison. Up Your Ass.
Let's not forget Warren Zevon:
The cattle all have brucellosis
We'll get through somehow
"Sweet home Alabama"
Play that dead band's song
Turn those speakers up full blast
Play it all night long
Any songwriter who can work in the word brucellosis deserves a round of applause.
rcommal said...
He certainly was disabled as a result of that accident 30 years ago. But did he actually die as a result of it?
Of course. The accident left him in that condition to begin with, therefore you can make the logic argument that it was what killed him. The fact that it took this long is irrelevant.
Search You Tube for Leningrad Cowboys singing Sweet Home Alabama with the Red Army Chorus (this is not a joke)
I've had a ball with the youtubes of "Alabama Song"(the one on the first Doors album}...thanks Ann.
I took care of a young man in a vegetative state, at his family's home for 7 years. He was on Medicaid, which paid for round the clock nurses.
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