jackson Browne

An Open Letter to Old Fuddie Duddies, you know who you are…

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As my life has progressed, so has my knowledge and use of modern technology. It doesn’t mean I’m keeping up, just not far behind. You can imagine my surprise when old friends and new friends huff and puff about using new technology. This post will be about modern stuff young people know already, and have probably moved on from, so if you’re tech savvy (any age), don’t read any farther. You’ll be bored.

Computers, laptops and cell phones entered my life in the early 80’s and 90’s and most of my cohorts are reasonably up to a slow speed with them. Reasonably. Many still use checks and check books and balance their accounts every month. I’ve given up arguing, debating, and teaching the merits of on-line banking, bill paying, and account maintenance. It isn’t that the ship has sailed, it never even got out of the dock. If you are my age and wondering what the hell I’m talking about, ask a grandchild. Or someone else’s grandchild. Don’t bother me. Benefits? See your account activity every day, not 30 days later when your statement posts and you sit down with your calculator, check book, and mailed, printed statement. Balancing or reconciling a checkbook, monthly, is an avoidable, self-inflicted torture–by the way–some seem to enjoy…so there is that aspect to consider.

Bonus sidebar: How many of you old couples still use two (or more) checkbooks for one account? A man once told he had three: one for him, one for her, and one for the “house” to keep track. Beside the possible S and M angle (google it), maybe those monthly account balancings (sic) helped keep them together? Again, don’t ask a man thrice divorced and recently dumped.

          In 1960 when kids like you know who wanted to get a local baseball game together, we called a house phone. If someone answered, gold! As long as it wasn’t answered by a teen-aged girl waiting for a certain boy to call. If no one answered, you kept trying. Imagine getting 10 kids together for a game (we only used half the field). I cannot remember when answering machines came out, but I do remember getting my first cell phone in the mid-90’s about 5 years after a good friend got a car phone. Even then most calls still went to a “House Phone”. Car phones didn’t last long but then the cells hit and we all had them. Now calls went to the person holding the phone, still never certain of the message getting through but at least progress. Then, voice mail, group phone calls, etc.

          The next big leap was texting. Most old people are still confused about all the phones can do, but texting should be easy. It is a combination of mailing, calling, emailing and smoke signaling, all of which can be used for effective communication: effortlessly thanking distant relatives, asking out a possible mate, and getting 10 old men together for whatever it is ten old men could do. Not only does the sender get control of the message (I sent it to you hours ago. Must be glitch.) the receiver does, too. (I didn’t get your text. Must be a glitch.) Imagine both excuses happening on the same text. It’s possible. Maybe everybody’s not happy, but at least they aren’t mad. Some tried, right? Why can’t old people see how great this form of communication is? And learn to use it? Oh, and you can send a text, any time, like when you want to tell someone something but don’t want to talk with them. Early morning, around 3am is the best time for that particular text. They won’t be up for a phone call, and the text might wake them up, a bonus. Genius.

          The best modern technology to keep up with is music. I’ve spoken before of the records, 8-tracks, cassettes, and CD’s of the past, and how ear buds have revolutionized the way we can hear music as loud as we want without upsetting uptight neighbors. For anyone reading this older than me, I just found—online–and listened to a 1943 live recording of “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy” by The Andrews Sisters. The miracle of modern technology isn’t just the access to centuries of music, but the quality of the music, as well. A past post mentioned Jackson Browne and how the vinyl, monaural records of the past have been “digitalized” (read: fixed) and everything can be heard, now, not just the singer and lead guitar. As a single man living alone with slight disabilities, my indoor activities are often accompanied by a soundtrack no one else can hear…or complain about. Try Led Zeppelin’s “When the Levee Breaks” at 11 on your stereo, then add ear buds. Write back to me about who was happier, you or the people in your vicinity. Of, course, they might be Zep fans, so, be ready to share, or explain. Learn to text, old people. Please.

          Yes, I should be listening to “The Great Courses of Mankind”. FYI: I’ve penciled them in for my next hip replacement when I won’t be able to dance for a month.

Music. Jackson Browne. The Brothers Comatose. Serendipity.

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The last post about waking up in the middle of the night? Anxious? Distraught? Possibly even in despair? A lead-in to depression?

Ha.

A fortuitous click/flick on a Samsung phone yielded a Youtube video of The Brothers Comatose performing Jackson Browne’s “These Days”.

If you are at all unhappy with life, politics, a cruel ex-girlfriend, or calamities of any kind…find this video. As a strong, modern American, internally fortitudely (sic, for the entire sentence) secure man, I cried. After 10 plays, still crying.

Music has the power, seemingly the duty to save us from…everything. A good poem helps us. A good tune helps us. But a great song? It heals. Alters the mind. Makes life better. Not just better, but wonderfully okay, euphorically livable. Especially in old age.

I’ve written about Jackson Browne (JB) before, and how many males my age grew up with his music, his fantastically, emotionally pertinent music. You can hear almost his entire, 60 year, lifetime catalogue—done by him—performed differently in every decade since 1970. You can also hear most of his catalogue covered by DIFFERENT artists in every decade since 1970. A lot of the great 60’s and 70’s acts have such an emotional power for us, The Aging Man and Woman. For you, it might be someone else. Definitely someone else for you younger readers.

The power of this type of music is amazing, whoever it is, whenever you hear it. God’s gift to us.

“These Days” was written by JB when he was 16 and recorded by Nico in 1967. AI says the song deals with “loss and regret”. I’ve listened every decade, since.

The Brothers Comatose have covered “These Days” more than perfectly, more than respectfully. They turned it into a divine version so singularly apt for the time I accidentally found it, when it was needed most, as if their version was meant for me, alone, at this time in my life. Serendipity. Karma. Providence. (The Brothers Comatose did the same thing to Neil Young’s “Harvest Moon”, a performance I rely on, frequently, for mood settling and the overall restoration of good feelings.)

It is a hope that you, the individual, unique, one-of-a-kind reader, has something similar in your life.

One of the problems, however, is remembering you have this power to turn to in time of need. If I’d have listened to “Harvest Moon”  last night, for example, instead of memorializing my angst in writing, well…

Now I have JB, The Brothers Comatose, and the rest for comfort. How fortunate is that? Bring it on, Trusk…and the rest of life.

JB can be watched from the early days, when he was a young, handsome man, all the way up to now, age 76 in 2025. While interesting to view, does it make JB, himself, sad/happy/unsure to see himself age?

JB’s voice is gruffly pleasant to some, but not to others. It is intriguing, then to hear his songs covered by females like Bonnie Raittt, Linda Ronstadt, Nico, Allison Krause, and AJ Lee. They all—and others—have the power to add emotional depth to every JB song they perform. See Bonnie’s version of JB’s “My Opening Farewell”.

An interesting video, too, is JB and Gregg Allmann “outgruffing” each other on a live version of The Allmans Brothers’ “Melissa” from ten years ago. It is a spectacular live performance.

It’s 3 am and it has taken three hours to type this short post. Damn music videos. It appears there are many things in my life to be thankful for, many blessings to appreciate.

Calamities, Trump, deceitful girlfriend, and every single problem Old Age can throw at me, be damned. Oh, and death. Screw ‘em all.

My new motto? Devour Feculance. (Thank you, Mr. Milchick.)

And thanks to all the great artists who have accepted their gifts and shared them with us, the rest of the world.

Jackson Browne, a benefit of old age and progress

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From memory: music at age 10 (in 1960) was late night AM radio. At 13, it was a “box” record player for 45 rpm, two sided records, one song each side, A and B. At 15 it was a “monoaural” stereo placed next to the bed so sleep could be induced by listening to the big albums of Steppenwolf, The Troggs, The Kinks. The Kingsmen, and et.al. Age 17, a real stereo. At college, I learned how much sound ceiling-high, high-fidelity speakers could make, and how all my old favorites sounded “different”. Volume was important and if anyone complained, it was ignored and counted as an honor. 8 tracks, cassettes, Cds, MP3 and others followed, but I have no clue where the free music on Youtube comes from these days

The point I’m trying to get to (when not sidetracked by reminiscing), is music seemed to have evolved over time in partnership with the devices offering the sounds. Hmph. That’s not really the point but it helps to know because now—at this late stage in my life—I’ve been exposed to the wonderful world of ear buds. Good ear buds. They’re not new to me, but the ones I tried costing less than $300, never seemed to work good. (Well?) Same with headphones.

So I went back to listening as if in college: naked and close to the speaker with volume on 11. And I meant a “naked” ear, juveniles.

In 1970-something, Jackson Browne “dropped” an album we now refer to as “Saturate Before Using”, even though…long story for later. Let’s go with that title. Google it if you’re curious. The record had some good songs but nothing that made the record worth buying after hearing AM radio, and juke boxes. My disinterest did not stop Jackson and he continued to make records and two years later “For Everyman” hooked me. It got worn it out over the next 5 years or so.

 Then, I lost track of music, hearing it in the background, but not asking it to come forward and be the focal point of life. It was just there. Important note: there was all kinds of good music coming from good musicians (Eagles? Fleetwood Mac?) in the years between the late 1970s and when music reintroduced itself decades late, at my retirement. Not working gave me free time.

Let me end this because you’re drifting away…in 2023, while being treated for cancer, I accidentally purchased a pair of ear buds for $19, They were so fantastic they changed everything about music and life. No hyperbole.

Then, the ear buds got ahold of Jackson’s “Saturate Before Using”. The intricacy and flourishes, and backing sounds, and bass lines, the drums, and the shear musical craftsmanship coming from those ear buds brings me back to The Chair EVERY DAY, for at least an hour of music. And each time, there is something new and wonderful in songs I’ve listened to for many years but never really heard. Thank you, Ear Buds, and the company which finally decided to sell them at a decent price. (Not naming the company, but they know who they are. Call me?)

          Besides Jackson’s songs, find “Melissa” by Greg Allman with Jackson Brown. “Harvest Moon” by both Neil Young, (who wrote it) and a cover by The Brothers Comatose. And “River of Dreams” by Billy Joel. Find these songs, sit in your favorite chair, plug in your GOOD ear buds, and “Drift Away”…and find your own music.