Now Hear This: You Have Wasted Your Life - Vol II

-Merton Sussex, Wanderer of the Waste

A number of weeks ago, I brought you a video featuring Yuto Miyazawa, a nine-year-old Japanese kid who tore up some "Crazy Train" on a Randy Rhoads guitar. I watched that video, and my jaw hit the linoleum.

Today, I saw a video that made the motherfucker drop clean off, and roll into a storm drain.

The following video features a young man named Jon Baglo. Jon Baglo has what ya call "talent." See, Jon wasn't content to just attain mastery of ONE instrument. Heavens, no. He decided to learn EVERY LAST MOTHERFUCKING ONE OF THEM. And then, once he knew them, he used use those talents to go into the studio, and play a song. EVERY PART of the song. And he filmed himself doing it, then cut the video together in four-way split-screen.

And the song he chose? "Mary Had a Little Lamb!" I'm kidding, of course...Because a dude with this much raw skill doesn't fuck around. no, he instead chose to play Boston's 1976 hit, "Foreplay / Long Time," a song which has given players in classic-rock cover bands spastic conniption fits for over thirty years, so soaring is the arrangement, and so precise are the parts. And he plays them all, every one, note-for-note, and perfectly.

"So what?" some will scoff. "He plays someone else's song. Big deal!" These are undoubtedly the same people who think playing Guitar Hero makes them 'cool.' "Okay, FINE," they'll counter. "But he's not SINGING it. Nyeeh." And they'd be right. Because the guy who IS singing lead is David Steele...Former bassist and backup vocalist for Fine Young Cannibals, and The English Beat, who also performs his part absolutely perfectly (as does Jon's school chum Spencer on backups). In short, if you know anything about playing a real instrument, this will blow your socks right into the laundry hamper.

Did I mention that Jon Bagwell just turned 18 years old this past April? Because that happened. Yeah, really. At the age where most kids are just trying to get to graduation with their skin intact, Jon here is spending his weekends doing shit like THIS.

Normally, we're all about the snark and satire around here, but some things are above reproach. Here's one of those things. Enjoy.

James Brown Saves Boston (or the DoF Gets Serious for a Moment)

by Blaine Fridley, Editor-in-Chief

"SOUL POWER, ACTIVATE!!"

In the days after Martin Luther King, Jr.'s assassination, America's major cities were ablaze with violent rage.

But over in Beantown, it was a different story.

They had Soul Brother Number 1 on the scene.

An already-scheduled appearance was set for April 5th, the day after the person Tavis Smiley calls the greatest American ever produced was silenced by gunfire in Memphis.

Boston's mayor wanted to cancel it, fearing the racially-charged worst.

Council member Tom Atkins urged him not to. If the show went on AND they televised it live, it might be enough to keep people - and their Molotov cocktails - off the streets.

For Mr. Brown, it took A LOT of convincing and A LOT of money ($60,000 to cover fines he would incur from another TV show for appearing on air before its broadcast), but the show did go on -- at the Boston Garden and over the air waves.

And by all accounts, Brown didn't perform on a stage that night, but a tightrope.

Tensions were high. Brown made several pleas for calm and respect as the balance started to tip the way of chaos.

Brilliantly, Brown made the pleas for peace about him. With an unruly audience openly defying police, and on the brink of mobocracy, the Godfather scolded his fans for lack of respect:

"Now I asked the police to step back because I figured I could get some respect from my own people. Now are we together or we ain't?"

He wasn't playing a show so much as he was attempting to defuse a bomb, which he did.

James Brown. The Soul Brother Super Hero Saves A City.

There's a reason he wore a cape, you know.

Here's footage from the actual show:

And as for Dr. King, take a moment to go waaaay deeper than "I Have A Dream." His legacy is SO much more than the fight for racial equality.

He was the booming voice of justice for everybody: The poor. The war-torn. The neglected.

And he served them all fearlessly.

Thanks, Dr. King. The world misses you.