moon traveller herald

MoonTraveller recognizes the passing of astronaut Neil Armstrong , who together with Buzz Aldrin, landed on the Moon in July of 1969. Neil is pretty busy in this landing audio, Buzz is reading-out the computer telemetry etc, and Neil is focused, but this NASA transcript includes debriefing commentary (what he was thinking) and later historical reminiscences by Neil. On touch down he says  "Engine arm is off. Houston, Tranquility Base here. The Eagle has landed." He had the Midwestern pilot drone attitude down cold. Uninterruptible, he was thinking, and going to land this thing come hell or high water. Before the moon he was a famed test pilot. His coolness when a prototype model LEM blew up [he ejected] was part of his legend. From this transcript I detect a call out that I take it as his descent engine had 30 sec of fuel left about 26 sec before he landed. The press asked questions. He'd laconically respond. Actually, he was thinking. Tom Wolfe: "You'd a...

Walter Davis was a St.Louis blues pianist, well recorded in the 1930s and 1940s. He is usually mentioned as part of litany of Missouri players that could include Pettie Wheatstraw, Henry Townsend, Roosevelt Sykes. It's not too well known that Missouri was a hotbed of blues activity at one time. Sunnyland Slim told me he more or less spent 10 years in the area, after leaving Mississippi but before going to Chicago. Davis style is something like the other Mo. players.. but different too. He had a staccato approach that shows the way to drone-like rocknroll (and even the Velvet Underground) more than boogie woogie does! His lyrics could be racy, and quite evocative, as Doing Something Wrong (I Can Tell by the Way You Smell). His biggest song perhaps (recorded widely by others) was ComeBackBaby. I wouldnt mind crediting him with the original Sloppy Drunk. He did a number called Sweet Sixteen that was used in part for a later version by St. Louis's Charles Berry. Davis (no relatio...

How many beautiful bodies/can Dylan garner a night --/ 50 - 100? How many can James Dickey garner'/two - or three?/How do all the girls with beautiful bodies /who get aced out, for dickey or dylan feel? - Poetry & Beautiful Bodies (1970) Came to learn from Dave Murray recently that great Milwaukee poet Bob Watt died. It happened in January. It was old news to many, but it was new news to me. This set the mind neuros to popping. I think I’m going back to the time when Bob Watts’ poetry first blew my mind. I remember when I first heard Bob Watts poetry: it was sudden and familiar. Music of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, the Midwest. Most importantly it said that poetry was right here, where we were. Not far. Moreover it did not have to wear a sportscoat. One with leather elbow patches. Watt was an exterminator. On the outskirts. His obit tells us he was in the service in Japan. That gave him a jump on Zen, maybe.    In a local night club, a girl got drunk/ And yelled, “I...

I dropped a penny in the river, back in the days I lived in New York. The idea came from a song by Ike and Tina Turner. Im Blue shoobedoobe. I could not sleep. I could not sleep in rooms of spilt gypsy rose wine. Not when I was remembering the wind and wondering was it a friend. But there was no wind in the city. And I lived in an underworld there, unable to act. Frying my brain in August. City that consists of well-placed pretensions. I read the papers and bopped around too. I had entered the island sanatorium. At the Mercer saw Ahmet Ertegun with Jackie Kennedy on his arm. And thought: This is a dangerous time for those not chauffeured. Cause it was a city of strange phantoms. Tic Tic Tic. My brain was cogitating. Addicted were the people of night – mugs, zombies, appearing in their time. Walking down the street was cause for alarm. You had to be there. You must remember this: think of your eyes as you look at the police. You will scurry to the door with its per...