Sammy Hagar

I was sick recently, and having already blogged about being sick – in addition to being generally uninspired – I waited until now to post.   Especially since I finished reading Hagar’s autobiography.

Montrose.   He started out in this band and is on the first two albums.  Highlights are “Rock Candy” and “I’ve Got The Fire”.  According to Hagar, this was his first major break.  But Ronnie Montrose was insecure and couldn’t handle a singer getting more attention and credit than him, so he had to leave the band and go solo.

Solo.  He went solo fairly early and amassed an impressive volume of material.  We purchased Street Machine, Three Lock Box, and VOA, the latter having “I Can’t Drive 55”.   Our first ever exposure was “Heavy Metal”, from the soundtrack album, which occurs on Standing Hampton.  Nine on the Ten Scale, the first solo album, has a strange vibe to it, but I enjoyed listening to it.

HSAS.  Hagar, Neil Schon (Journey & Santana), Kenny Aaronson and Michael Shreve.   Only one album, plus a cover of “A Whiter Shade of Pale" that I’d like to hear. 

Van Halen.   Here’s the only times I’ve seen SH live:  on the OU812 and F.U.C.K. tours with Van Halen.  Total of four albums:  5150, OU812, For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge, and Balance.  Of this material my favorite is “Black & Blue”. 

Chickenfoot.   A supergroup with Chad Smith (RHCP), Michael Anthony, and Joe Satriani.  It refers to the peace symbol and is neither sex, drug, nor car related.  Actually damn heavy and well worth listening to.  The second album is deliberately misleadingly titled III. 

The Circle.  Vic Johnson on guitar, Michael Anthony on bass, Jason Bonham on drums.  Another excellent collaboration.  I’d never heard of Vic Johnson before, but he gets the job done well.  The album has an impressive array of covers and his own material, including “Rock Candy”. 

Cars.   He loves cars, especially Ferraris and late 70s Trans Ams.  The car he bought with his first advance from Montrose was a Citroen 2CV.   “I Can’t Drive 55” is one of my favorite songs.  I’m not aware that he actually knows how to work on them, he sings about going fast but nothing more detailed than that.  He shared Eddie Van Halen's mechanic, which is how he got into that band.    

Mexico.  Give him credit – he went down to Cabo Wabo when there was nothing there, and put something there.  Is his tequila any good?  Who knows.  He smoked weed, did acid, but never cared for heroin or beer.  He also admits not being faithful on the road.   What can he say?  He knows he's human.   All too human.

If I have a problem with Hagar it’s his narrow range of topics.  Moreover, much of his material can’t figure out it it’s meant to rock or be commercial.  I suppose you could say he successfully straddles both, but I’d say only a few songs like “Heavy Metal” truly hit the sweet spot. 

The autobiography is actually intriguing.  By nature these things are self-serving, and too many are full of insincere crap, like blaming all mistakes on someone else.   Brian Johnson’s book makes him look like a buffoon – his OWN BOOK – and Ritchie Blackmore’s documentary also makes him look like an arrogant asshole.  Too many oddball stories about Ian Gillan.  But Hagar seems willing to own up to his own mistakes and take responsibility, presumably because he knows that when it comes time to blame someone else – like Eddie Van Halen – it will sound more sincere.  By now we’ve heard about the meltdown, and I suppose some of us may have heard Eddie’s side.  Without having been there in person, I can’t say I can really say for sure, but Hagar puts his case convincingly.  

Retour: Statue of Liberty

From     Secretary of State Tom Shannon

To        Francois Hollande

Re:       Revision to Statue of Liberty

Let us start by reaffirming America’s deepest appreciation for the Statue of Liberty, which your country so kindly gave to us in the third quarter of the nineteenth century.   This beacon of hope and freedom has served us well in the intervening years.  Perhaps a little too well…

Indeed, the current administration, in particular the President himself, now believes the statue is outdated and gives potential immigrants the wrong impression about our willingness to accept them.

Mexicans.   Although the Statue is in New York harbor and nowhere near the Mexican border, somehow it attracts the rapists.  Moreover, although these rapists are predominantly Catholic, the President believes that Muslims have infiltrated their ranks.  The rapists are apparently oblivious to Muslims in their midst praying to Mecca five times a day instead of going to mass on Sunday.  We ask that you ignore the absence of credible evidence to support the President’s position and simply accept it at face value.

Muslims.  The President has a major issue with Muslims, as you may well know.  In fact, he understands that France also has a major problem with Muslims as well.   While Muslims come to France walking across Europe, which costs little, and it takes money and effort to come to the US, this substantial difference in logistics makes no difference to the types of Muslims coming to our two countries.   And that these Muslims are frequently coming from countries such as Iraq and Afghanistan which have ongoing hostilities at least partly engendered by our own actions and policies, is not something which concerns the President.  He remains firm in his conviction that virtually all Muslims come here with the intention of committing terrorist acts and enacting Sharia law; the exception being those with business dealings with the President himself.  Again, we believe you should be particularly sympathetic to his viewpoint given the recent events in Paris. 

In fact, the President has decided that the US Government will be run and managed to maximize his own personal business interests, with any conflicts thereof to be ignored as a matter of principle.  In particular, the country’s immigration policy will reflect this, and solely those individuals with existing or potential business affairs with the President himself will be permitted entry to the US. 

Revision to Statue.   President Trump asks that the Statue be revised as follows.   Instead of a torch in her right hand, a beacon of hope to the unwashed masses of non-Americans, Lady Privilege raises her hand with palm out and index finger up, as if to say, “Wait there”.  With her other arm, she cradles a guest list on a clip board and looks down on it to verify that the immigrants in question are ON the list and may come in.  While this is less impressive than a torch of liberty, we feel it far better represents the country’s current attitude on immigration.   

Elections

Now we have President Donald “Orange” Trump.  I voted for Gary Johnson, and it looks like he didn’t win.  Let’s look at the prior ones…

1976.  The first election I can remember, as I was only 3 years old in 1972 and not even born in 1968.   This was between the GOP candidate, the incumbent President Gerald Ford (VP Bob Dole of Kansas) and Democrat, Jimmy Carter, former Governor of Jawja, with VP candidate Walter Mondale.   With the exception of my friend Mike’s dad, who preferred Ford, most people I heard express preferences for Carter.  Ford had become President when Nixon resigned, and had become VP when Spiro Agnew resigned, so he had no prior track record of winning a Presidential election. Honestly, though, I can’t remember who my parents voted for.   Carter won fairly easily.

1980.  By this time we were living in Paris, France, going to Marymount.   I was in seventh grade.  The election was between Ronald Reagan (George H.W. Bush, VP) for the GOP, against the incumbent Jimmy Carter.  By now Carter was highly unpopular due to the Iranian hostage scandal.  Jon Anderson ran as an independent.  I heard no one voice support for Carter, and one student – Michael B., now a university professor and Bernie Sanders supporter – voice support for Anderson.  

1984.  Now Mondale came into his own and ran as a Presidential candidate for the Democrats, with Geraldine Ferraro – a woman – as his VP candidate.  Reagan was highly popular.  Mondale did himself no favors by admitting he would raise taxes.  By this time I was in high school (sophomore year) at the American School of Paris.  Michael B was going to the Lycee International, so I don’t know who he supported; I’d guess Mondale, but both of us were still below voting age at this time.  Most of my fellow students supported Reagan (even if we couldn’t vote) but a few expressed support for Mondale, which earned them ridicule.  Of course, Reagan won this.

1988.  By now I was in college at the University of Maryland – and finally old enough to vote.   No surprise that Reagan did not seek a third term.  His VP, George H.W. Bush – father of later President George W. Bush – ran on his own, with a head-scratcher as a VP candidate, Dan Quayle of Indiana.  Handsome but dumb was the consensus on him, not entirely accurate or fair.  I voted for Bush.   In fact, this was the ONLY election in which the candidate I voted for actually won (though for some special reasons you’ll see below).   The Democratic candidate was Michael Dukakis, former governor of Massachusetts, a short guy.  His VP candidate was Lloyd Bentsen, who was more popular and respected than Dukakis.  A cartoon at the time showed a GOP elephant holding a sign with BUSH in big letters and QUAYLE in very small type, while the Democratic donkey carried a similar sign with DUKAKIS in very small type and BENTSEN in large letters.  Not a close race.

1992.   Ah, Bill Clinton (with Al Gore).   My vote for Bush Sr. went by the wayside, and Clinton won easily.  This launched Hillary’s political career, such as it was, as well.  I was in law school at the time.

1996.   The GOP picked Bob Dole – It’s my turn now, damn it! – with Jack Kemp (RIP) as his running mate.  My vote for Dole went down the tube.  The election was called for Clinton fairly early in the evening.   By this time I was in private practice as an attorney.

2000.   Here’s when I got fed up and started voting Libertarian:  in this case, Harry Browne, who I met in person at a Libertarian event.  I had just started a job in Woodbridge at a firm, doing only contested Virginia divorces.   Based on the prior elections, we all expected the race to be called before bedtime, but even by midnight, we still didn’t know who won:  George W. Bush (w/Dick Cheney) or Al Gore and Joe Lieberman.   I went to bed assuming they’d have it figured out by the morning – WRONG.  It took a Supreme Court decision in December halting recounts in Florida before Bush came out as the winner.

2004.   I voted for Badnarik (Libertarian) this time around, and he lost.  Yes, really.   John Kerry and cheating-on-his-wife DURING THE ELECTION John Edwards were the close losers this time, with Ohio being the state which decided this one.   So we got four more years of Bush & Cheney.   I didn’t mind that much.  By now I was in solo practice in Northern Virginia.

2008.   Time to vote for Bob Barr!   What?  Cheese made of breast milk?  So that’s why he didn’t beat Obama or John McCain (w/Sarah Palin as VP).  Still at the same job this time around.  And Obama easily took Virginia, my state.   Barr’s %, like the prior LPA candidates, was negligible.

2012.   My mom, fearing another four years of Obama, convinced me to wait three hours in line reading Game of Thrones and vote for Mitt Romney, who lost not merely Virginia but also the heavily BLUE zone (Fairfax County) in which I live and vote.   However, Libertarian candidate and successful two term New Mexico governor Gary Johnson pulled 1% this time around, with better numbers than the Ed Clark/Dave Koch LPA ticket of 1980.

  

2016.  My brother and I voted for Rand Paul in the GOP primary – the first time I can recall actually voting in the primary as opposed to just the election.  By that time he was out, but had withdrawn too late for his name to be removed from the ballot.  Having voted either GOP or LPA in the past elections, and with Hillary Clinton not particularly likeable, I couldn’t vote for her.  Trump, of course, was out of the question.  So Gary Johnson was a no-brainer for me.  Like everyone else, I assumed – incorrectly, it turns out – that Hillary would win.  At the very least, she would easily wrap up Fairfax County and Virginia.  As it was, she narrowly won Virginia, but lost the electoral vote nationwide, and did so well before bedtime.  For his part, Johnson pulled 3%, below the 5% we needed, but still 3x the prior number and a good sign for the future, depending on how poorly Trump does, who the Democrats pick in 2020, and who the LPA chooses.  Austin Peterson will STILL not be qualified absent an unusually productive four years.  Adrian Peterson might be a better pick - well, he'll win Minnesota.

Since the guy just took office, it’s too early to predict just how badly Donald Trump will ruin our country.  Will we be speaking Russian by 2020?   Mushroom clouds over Washington, a la Man in the High Castle?   A huge wall, paid for by Pink Floyd?   Or will he just muddle through, doing vaguely what his GOP competitors – aside from Rand Paul – would have done?  For those of you morbidly hoping he has a convenient accident, let’s look over the track record:

William Henry Harrison (1841).   He caught enteric fever three weeks after the inauguration, and died.  Given the timing of the illness, we no longer blame his long speech and light wardrobe for his death. 

Abraham Lincoln (1865).   Shot at Ford’s Theater, DC, by a disgruntled actor, John Wilkes Booth, who proclaimed “Sic Semper Tyrannis!”

James Garfield (1881).  Shot by Charles Guiteau, a disgruntled office seeker who felt he’d been cheated out of a patronage job – consul in Paris, despite not speaking French.  Nominally the Secretary of State, James G. Blaine, would be responsible for giving Guiteau the positon, but Blaine considered Guiteau completely unqualified for the job.  Guiteau had no actual beef with Garfield, but simply calculated that Chester A. Arthur, the VP, would be more inclined to allow him to get the job once Garfield was out of the picture.  An odd theory, since he shot Garfield in public at the train station and was recognized immediately by Blaine, who was present.  He was tried, convicted, and hanged.   

William McKinley (1901).  Shot by an anarchist, Leon Czolgosz, at the exhibition in Buffalo, New York.  Czolgosz was apprehended, tried, convicted, and executed.  But he gave us Theodore Roosevelt as president.

Warren Harding (1923).  Died of a stroke.   The  VP, former Massachusetts governor Calvin Coolidge, took over.

Franklin D. Roosevelt (1945).  Died of a stroke.   Two in a row.  The VP, former senator from Missouri Harry S. Truman took over.  

John F. Kennedy (1963). Shot by Lee Harvey Oswald – and no one else.  VP Lyndon Johnson (senator from Texas) took over.  

Ronald Reagan (1982).  Shot at by John Hinckley, who was trying to impress Jodie Foster.   He survived to finish out his term in January 1989.  He died in 2004 of pneumonia/Alzheimer’s. 

Of seven Presidents to die in office, three died of natural causes, and four were shot.  Presumably Trump will improve security at the White House.   We’ll see.

Tribute Bands

Yes, I know it’s Friday the thirteenth.  I don’t watch the movies and I’m not superstitious.  (“Aww, you’re no fun anymore.”  Idle: “That’s my line!”)

I’ve been scouring the websites for local (DC) and NYC-area clubs for concerts coming up in 2017, but too much of what I see on their calendars are tribute bands. 

I’ve seen a few in the past:  tribute bands for AC/DC, Black Sabbath, Iron Maiden, Pink Floyd, and the Grateful Dead.  They vary in the effort they make to reproduce the band’s image as opposed to its sound.  We saw Def Leppard recently, and singer Joe Elliott joked that “we’re the top Def Leppard tribute band!”

 

One guy in a Beatles tribute band said he heard that Paul McCartney was NOT a fan of such bands.   McCartney in fact showed up at one of their shows.  Sir Paul asked the guy if his band plays “Tomorrow Never Knows” (one of my favorites, by the way) and upon hearing an affirmative answer, turned away with a smirk and said nothing more.  My guess is that McCartney feels that tribute bands are lazy bastards, covering others’ material instead of writing their own.  Face it, even if a band faithfully replicates the Beatles’ 1964 stage show, or their 1967 Magical Mystery Tour setup – hell, even if the bass player is right-handed and learns to play left-handed – we’re still talking about a band plunging deep into cover territory instead of writing their own material.  Another reason for the smirk is that the Beatles themselves never intended “Tomorrow Never Knows” to be played live, so doing so is kind of silly.  I’ve seen the Grateful Dead cover it – RFK 1992 – but we know the Dead are not a cover band even if they play a fair amount of them.

We saw an Iron Maiden cover band at Jaxx in Alexandria the same night Iron Maiden themselves were playing in Rio de Janeiro.  They played a set similar to what Maiden themselves played at the time, or the Live After Death set.  Mind you, several years ago Maiden played a tour – including Janick Gers – which promised a set solely from the first four albums.  Except that since all that material was still commonly in the set anyway, the only deep cut was “Phantom of the Opera”, a Paul D’ianno song which appears on side 4 of Live After Death.  Judas Priest did the same with British Steel, an album which already gets 50% of its material played on a regular basis; Rush did the same with Moving Pictures.  I’d ask that bands refrain from being disingenuous like this.  And if you’re a tribute band, how about making at least 50% of your set deep cuts?  Please don’t simply copy the band’s existing setlist.    

A cover band of a band still recording and touring – still active – seems a bit silly.   Even if you don’t like Metallica’s current direction, they still play material from Kill ‘Em All and Ride the Lightning live.  Getting back to the Beatles, the cover band mentioned above focuses on the Beatles’ post Revolver material, i.e. after the Beatles stopped touring.  Their attitude is, “it’s a shame the Beatles never played these songs live, as even the Beatles themselves would agree it’s better than the songs they did play live when they were still touring.”  Tool might be a special case – we’re still waiting for a follow-up to 10,000 Days (released in 2006) and they don’t tour that much these days.  Maynard is touring with A Perfect Circle and seems to indicate that he’s waiting for the rest of the band to finish the music before he puts down his vocals.  Anyway.

The Dead are another special case.   Long after Garcia’s death, the remaining band members have reunited several times and currently tour as “Dead & Company”.  But they’re playing stadiums for $$$, whereas Dead cover bands are playing clubs for $.  The Doors are obviously not touring.  Pink Floyd no longer tour as a band, and are effectively over, but Roger Waters is back in stadium form.  Given his preference for Dark Side and later, any Floyd cover band should probably focus on the Syd and “weird shit” eras, i.e. Saucerful of Secrets through Meddle.  Performing “The Atom Heart Mother Suite” with an orchestra would be a nice touch, but good luck persuading Gilmour OR Waters to do that, and that’s probably too ambitious a project for a tribute band to tackle. 

“Rock Star” was a movie about a tribute band, loosely based on Judas Priest.  Mark Wahlberg played the de facto Ripper Owens character in the story, the tribute band singer who wound up in the actual band.  Dominic West (“The Wire”) and Zakk Wylde were also in here, Jeff Pilson (Dokken) played bass, Jason Bonham handled the drums, and Myles Kennedy, the singer for Alter Bridge, is the one Wahlberg passes his torch/mike to at the end of the film.  There’s a scene in the film where he corrects someone, “we’re not a COVER band, we’re a TRIBUTE band!”  We only cover songs by ONE band!

Having said all that, I have the guitars and amps, and know the material well enough, to establish several different tribute bands, mostly AC/DC, Black Sabbath, and Pink Floyd.  What I would consider most worthwhile would be a band that didn’t focus on any one particular band – i.e. a cover band, not a tribute band – rather, which focused on the deep cuts of our favorite 70’s bands.  “Dreamer Deceiver”>”Deceiver”, by Judas Priest,  “Thrill of It All”, by Black Sabbath,  “Overdose”, by AC/DC, or “Strange World”, by Iron Maiden.  These are songs which were probably NEVER played live by those bands, but which we all love.  If I found a bassist and drummer willing to go at, this might be a good idea. Stay tuned.

The House of Hohenzollern

Fancy struck me at random, Germanophile that I definitely am – despite having zero German blood, except remotely by Anglo-Saxon in the one-quarter British ancestry I have.  Anyhow.  This is the ruling dynasty of Prussia (1701-1871) and Germany (1871-1918). 

Until Germany’s unification in 1871, Prussia was just one of many Germanic kingdoms, which gradually developed into the most important.  The unification itself consisted of 4 kingdoms (Prussia, Bavaria, Saxony, and Wurttemburg), 6 grand duchies, 5 duchies, 7 principalities, 3 free cities, and Alsace-Lorraine.  Bismarck, the architect of this, was actually an opponent of German nationalism, and structured this as Prussia essentially taking over all of these smaller dominions.  The Kaiser – Emperor of unified Germany – was the King of Prussia. 

Here’s the line of succession:

Frederick I (1701-1713) First King of Prussia, beginning of the house of Hohenzollern.

Frederick Wilhelm I (1713-1740)

Frederick II (The Great) (1740-1786)

Frederick Wilhelm II (1786-1797)

Frederick Wilhelm III (1797-1840)

Frederick Wilhelm IV (1840-1861)

Wilhelm I (King of Prussia and First Emperor of Germany) (1861-1888).  Big mutton chops, like General Burnside and Austrian Emperor Franz Josef. 

Frederick III (1888).  Only reigned for a few weeks.

And then…

Wilhelm II (last Emperor of Germany) (1888-1918).  By far the most famous due to World War I.  He fired Bismarck, which was NOT a good idea.  He did not get along with his cousins King George V or Tsar Nicolas II, and even had a rough time with his grandmother, Queen Victoria; he was her first grandchild.  He spoke English fluently. 

Crown Prince Wilhelm.  The Kaiser’s oldest son, who only outlived him by ten years.   A French officer who met him during WWI (after having been taken prisoner) said the Prince spoke fluent French and was quite charming.  Before the war he was given command of the garrison at Danzig (now Gdansk, Poland) but had a reputation for playing tennis rather than taking care of military duties.  The papers made fun of him with a cartoon showing him in a tennis outfit, asking himself, “Danzig…Danzig…I’ve heard that name before!”  The Nazis courted him very early on, but even then he rejected their offers, claiming – quite astutely – that “nothing good will come of them.”  After WWII the French tried to prosecute him for war crimes during WWI.

Since then, there have been two heirs, though neither has served as King of Prussia or Emperor of Germany: Louis Ferdinand, and the current heir, Georg Friedrich.   Germany’s likelihood of reinstating the monarchy is fairly low, but then again we were surprised to see the Berlin Wall come down, East and West Germany reunited, and the Soviet Union collapse.  And how knows if the alternate realities hinted at in “The Man in the High Castle” might actually exist?  Whereas in Turtledove’s Timeline 191 (CSA wins Civil War), since Germany won WWI, the Hohenzollerns were never deposed and continued to reign through WWII. Kaiser Wilhelm II died just as WWII was beginning, and the Crown Prince became the Kaiser. 

FYI: notwithstanding the Hohenzollerns’ love of the name Frederick, the famous Frederick Barbarossa was NOT a Hohenzollern ruler.  He was a Holy Roman Emperor from 1155 to his death in 1190.  He famously drowned in the river during the Third Crusade. 

Bourbons.  While I’m on the topic of royalty, I’ll mention a few others.  The French royal family were the Bourbons, starting with Henry IV, who reigned from 1589-1610.  He’s followed by the famous Sun King, Louis XIV (1648-1715), and the ill-fated Louis XVI (1774-1791), who supported America’s cause in our Revolution and whose life ended with a guillotine during the French Revolution.  After Napoleon was dispatched to Devil’s Island in 1814, they brought back the French kings:  Louis XVIII (1814-24), Charles X (1824-30), and finally Louis Philippe (1830-48), who was deposed in the Revolutions of 1848, and who thus counts as the last reigning Bourbon king.  Since then there have been 4 Republics: Second 1848-52 (ended by Louis Napoleon, aka Napoleon III), Third 1870-1940, Fourth 1946-1958, and finally the current Fifth Republic, 1958-present.  The Brazilian royal family, whose reign ended in 1888 with Dom Pedro II, is an offshoot of the Bourbons.  Today’s living heir, Louis Alphonse, would be Louis XIX if the Fifth Republic were to somehow dissolve into a monarchy.  That looks unlikely.

Habsburgs.  Actually Habsburgs-Lorraine, as the Habsburg house died out in the 1700s.  This group is extremely complicated but mainly associated with Austria-Hungary, which itself, as a country, only dates from 1867.  As such, there were only two rulers:  Franz Joseph, another of those mutton-chopped guys, who died in 1916 while WWI was going on, and his grand-nephew Charles I, who took over and only ruled until 1918, when A-H’s monarchy died and both countries split off into independent republics. 

Romanovs.  First off, the entire royal family of Nicolas II, his Empress, Tsarina Alexandria, four daughters (Olga, Tatiana, Maria, and Anastasia) and Alexis, the son with hemophilia were murdered by Ermakov and the Bolsheviks in Ekaterinburg, Russia, in July 1918, when the city was surrounded and besieged by the White Armies.  The dynasty began with Michael I, who reigned from 1613-1645.  As of now, Maria Vladimirovna claims to be the heir apparent, but her claim is well disputed.  While Vladimir Putin appears conscientious about using Russian nationalism to promote himself, his regime, and his country, I see no evidence that he would be amenable to abdicating to any Romanov pretender and allowing a new Tsar – or Tsarina – to take power from him. 

House of Windsor, formerly Saxe-Coburg & Gotha.  Of these, the only ones still in power, though Britain’s government has made the Prime Minister and Parliament the effective rulers and the monarchy purely symbolic.  The current ruler is obviously Queen Elizabeth II.  This dynasty began with Edward VII (immediately after Queen Victoria), George V (king during WWI), Edward VIII (the one who abdicated to marry Wallis Simpson in the 1930s), George VI (played by Colin Firth in “The King’s Speech”), and of course QE2.  Her eldest son is Prince Charles (who would be King Charles III, though he says he would prefer to be known as George VII), her eldest grandson is Prince William (who would be King William V), and great-grandson George (who would be King George VII, though right now he’s only 3).   

The prior House of Hanover consisted of King George I, George II, George III (during the American Revolution), George IV (portrayed by Hugh Laurie in Season 3 of The Black Adder), William IV, and Queen Victoria.  

The Seven Sisters of Sleep

More book stuff about drugs.   In this case, a book written in 1860 by Mordecai Cooke, intended as a definitive guide, at the time, on how to get f**ked up.  Or rather, how people around the world got high back them.   Cooke has been accused to writing this to suggest that what they do in China or India or South America is appropriate for them and not for UK souls, but I didn’t get that impression.  What Cooke was going for was suggesting that our natural nightly downtime had some competition from various inebriants of varying quality and potency, scattered across the globe.  

These were 1) tobacco, 2) opium, 3) cannabis, 4) betel nut, 5) coca, 6) Datura (aka Jimson weed), and 7) fly agaric (Europe’s magic mushroom). 

Tobacco – why does this qualify as a sister of sleep?  Isn’t nicotine a stimulant?  MC cites an 18^th century priest railing against the drug citing blackened lungs of heavy smokers revealed in autopsies.  So in the 1700s they knew what tobacco did!  Amazing.  But to read Cooke’s account, you would think that tobacco was LSD.  So far it’s a chapter on tobacco itself, then a chapter on smoking it in pipes, a chapter on snuff (tobacco consumed in the nose), and the next on chewing tobacco (most popular in the US where everyone spits).  Finally a chapter on “pretenders” (tobacco substitutes of various types, none of which he considers comparable though acknowledging that others do).

 

Finally we can move on… to opium.  After a tedious chapter on how opium is made (like anyone needs to know) he proceeds to finally tell us: WHAT DOES IT DO.   And so far as I can tell it’s the LSD of the 1800s.  Except that it’s addictive.  Thank you, Albert Hofmann. 

In fact there are not just one but – as with tobacco - several chapters on opium.  And what I found surprising was this.  By now we’ve been consistently presented with the spectacle of the opium addict, reduced to poverty and crime, health ruined, to support his habit.  But apparently there were “chippers”, occasional users, who may have used regularly but probably more like once a month instead of daily.  These opium users show no health issues, lived long healthy lives, and had normal lifestyles.  In other words, they were not addicts.  Overall Cooke takes the position that opium is actually no worse than alcohol in terms of aggregate damage caused to its users and society as a whole (what economists would refer to as negative externalities).  He observed that drunkards frequently became extremely violent under the influence of alcohol, whereas chronic opium users retreated into a dreamlike catatonia which threatened no one other than the user himself.  The real problem for either substance is excessive consumption, not consumption per se.

Next, there’s an extensive section on HEMP and HASHISH, with the inevitable reference to Assassins from Syria.  From what he says, recreational cannabis use was well known at that time, except that it was extremely uncommon as such in the Western world – that is to say, hemp was well known in its non-marijuana properties but cannabis was only smoked recreationally outside the Western world, with the Middle East being a consistent consumer of hashish, which is highly concentrated marijuana.  He makes some brief mentions of Fitzhugh Ludlow, who was a contemporary of his.  In fact, it would seem the express reason for Ludlow to write his book, The Hasheesh Eater, was specifically because marijuana and hashish were so little known in the US at the time.  Oddly, although Ludlow’s book was published in 1857 and reissued several times in the following decade, Cooke makes no specific references to it.  Apparently he didn’t read it.  For that matter, I don’t see any evidence that Cooke actually even tried hashish.  And that looks to be the case with the majority of the exotic substances he chronicles.  I would hope he at least smoked tobacco or drank alcohol.

Next is a chapter on coca leaves, mainly consumed by the Indians of Peru.  The active ingredient is cocaine, which was synthesized soon after this book was written, and acts as a more concentrated version of the coca leaf.  From Cooke’s writing it does not appear that coca leaves were exported abroad for recreational consumption, and my impression is that cocaine itself was initially marketed as a legitimate drug before being banned and turned – much later – into the rich and famous party drug.  Even so, although far less concentrated and effective than cocaine, chewing the leaves did produce a substantial narcotic effect and this practice counts as a form of recreational use, which was popular and widespread in that part of the world at that time.

Next are chapters – only one each – on eating clay/dirt/lime (quicklime/whitewash); low doses of arsenic, obviously a poison in higher doses, but also addictive and with no apparent narcotic properties; Datura, belladonna, and henbane, all of which appear to cause hallucinations but possibly death.  Betel Nut stains your teeth and makes you high.  Apparently he did not try it.

Finally, one chapter on fly agaric (magic mushroom), which mainly grows in Siberia and the far east of Russia, in Kamchatka (remember RISK?).  The big fun thing about this is that the active ingredient survives unscathed into the user’s urine.  The same person, or someone else, can conceivably drink that – if so inclined – and trip all over again.  Even Cooke couldn’t ascertain if there was a limit on how many times it could be so “recycled”.  But since Mexican mushrooms, which appear to be the strongest and most trippiest of all the psychedelic varieties (psilocybe cubensis), were not commonly known outside the little villages in Mexico until Gordon Wasson blew the whole scene open in the late 1950s, Cooke would have been oblivious to that branch of the shroom tree.  

Storm of Steel

Merry Christmas!  I’ve already covered the Christmas Truce of 1914 in a prior blog, but I still believe World War I is an inexhaustible source of holiday blog material.  The ironic juxtaposition of trenches, poison gas, and pointless slaughter really fits in with Christmas.  Or Festivus.  Anyhow.

A few weeks back we met our old Paris buddy Jean in Virginia, and while browsing through Barnes & Noble with him I picked up this book by Ernst Junger.  It’s his memoirs of World War I in the Imperial German Army.  

Junger was actually in the French Foreign Legion immediately before the war and returned to Germany to fight.  He started out as a private and won a commission through Germany’s equivalent of Officer Candidate School.  He served  throughout the war, though wounded several times.   Immediately after the war he wrote this.   Oddly, he never joined the Nazi Party, though he and Hitler exchanged autographed copies of their books.  During WWII he served as a captain in the Wehrmacht in Paris, France, in a non-combatant role.   He lived all the way to 1998.

I recall an Internet article on WWI a few years ago, which served to dispel the notion that troops were in combat continuously throughout the war, and this is reflected in Junger’s story.  In fact, the troops were rotated from behind the lines, second line, and front line, and even front line service could be fairly quiet if there was no battle actually going on at the time.  The battles themselves were terrifying, and Junger was amazed to survive brutal bombardments and fairly accurate enemy fire.  Grenades were popular because they could be thrown around corners in traverses.  Gas warfare figures heavily in his story, and is yet another peculiar horror of this war, and mostly absent thereafter.  The nature of mobile warfare – tanks and motorized infantry, e.g. WWII – make slow-moving clouds of poison gas impractical once the trenches are left behind.

The majority of his opponents were British, and all of his service was on the Western Front.  He had a high opinion of their morale and skill.  On rare occasions Junger faced off against the French, and they were also deadly foes.   His quotes of French were correct (!).  Despite serving through November 1918, he makes no mention whatsoever of Americans, and only brief mentions of tanks, after battles with no direct experience in combat against them.  Although the cover illustration shows Germany’s A7V and a British Mark IV, he makes no specific reference to either and a brief reference to smaller, faster tanks, presumably the French Renault FT.   The book ends abruptly with the end of the war and he offers no opinion on the outcome.

The obvious comparison is with “All Quiet on the Western Front”.   That story, though, is fiction, whereas Junger’s account is first person non-fiction.  Remarque’s story is apolitical; the German soldiers show no particular love or loyalty to the Kaiser or even Germany, nor any hostility to him or to the opposing sides.  The general idea is that the war is a huge slaughter and an equally huge mistake on the part of everyone concerned – i.e. pretty much anti-war.  Both film adaptations were American, with US actors.  Storm of Steel has yet to come to the big screen, and after having read it from cover to cover, I suppose I can ascertain why.  

Junger makes only passing references to the Kaiser.  He won the Pour Le Merite, the “Blue Max”, Imperial Germany’s highest award.  Nowhere in the book does he express the opinion that the war is wrong or a mistake, or that Germany bears responsibility for it; the closest is a later, vague acknowledgement that things could be going better for his side.   There is really zero politics here and certainly NO anti-war sentiment.  Hell, Junger even makes jokes.  He respects the British and French as worthy opponents (no mention of Americans, Russians, Italians, Austrians, Turks, etc.).   For him, war was glorious, fun, and exciting.  This alone seems to turn off many readers, especially since he’s happy to describe the appalling casualties he witnesses, even on his own side, which he obviously saw more of.  This lack of passion or remorse hits many people the wrong way – how could you go through WWI and NOT become a pacifist?  Well, that was his take on the whole thing, and people are free to disagree with him.  Apparently his non-combat role in WWII was simply because of his age, not his inclination. 

Movie directors and producers being fairly liberal and anti-war, no one short of Mel Gibson could be expected to turn this book into a movie, though even so I’m puzzled even the Nazis didn’t tackle it.  Be that as it may, it serves as a good compliment to “All Quiet on the Western Front” and well worth reading in its own right.