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Wednesday 9 October 2019

State of the Union - Nebraska


George writes
The previous week’s state was not inspiring, so I checked my list to see if this week’s state could somehow inspire me, get the creative juices flowing with it’s many interesting cities, landscapes and references. And I recall that Penny from  the Big Bang Theory is from Nebraska. It’s a start. There is also an album called Nebraska, surely that can yield a suitable and good song???


A powder called Kool-Aid was invented in Hastings, Nebraska. You add water to it and get a fruit-flavoured drink. I’ve never seen it in the UK, not that I’ve ever looked for it. It sounds something like Creamola Foam (middle-aged Scottish people will be familiar with that disgusting stuff). I think some Weegies liked to mix vodka with their Creamola Foam. Made a change from Buckie and Eldorado, I suppose.


Also from Nebraska, and more famous in the UK certainly than Kool-Aid (or Creamola Foam) are Henry Fonda and Nick Nolte. And Marg Helgenberger (original CSI). And Fred Astaire. The website furnishing the above four did not think Marlon Brando (born in Omaha) was sufficiently famous to be included on their precious list. It also excluded de facto president of the USA from 2001-09 Dick Cheney. Also excluded were ex-President Gerald Ford, and Malcolm Little (Malcolm X), Montgomery Clift and James Coburn. And, again one for the middle-aged, Bosley of Charley’s Angels was born in Omaha. He appeared in every episode, all 110 of them. He was born David Doyle. That Ranker website, it’s not the greatest at this “famous people” thing, is it? 


And after all those blethers about Omaha-ans, here’s a track called……….Omaha………


And Omaha is going to supply the second song as well, by Sonny “Young Love” James, with a great banjo interlude half way through.


Arbor Day in the USA began in Nebraska in 1872, when one million trees were planted.

That’s Nebraska, where in Blue Hill, a woman wearing a hat that might scare a timid person can not be seen eating onions in public.

That’s Nebraska, where Prague allegedly holds the world’s largest kolache festival. Kolache, that’s a Czech fruit flan.

Over to CC for his tune. And another one next week.

CC writes:
In his first paragraph George alludes to one of the the greatest albums ever made.Here Andrew and Peter collectively known as The Cash Brothers pay hommage:




11 comments:

  1. Wot, no 'Omaha' by Moby Grape or 'Dressed Up Like Nebraska' by Josh Rouse?

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    1. I suspect I have cost CC many readers already thanks to my selections, and I think Moby Grape would have bought the series to a premature end.

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  2. A few years back I saw a band called Alice Drinks The Kool Aid suppoorting James McMurtry. They were one of the best supporting bands ever, not because they were any good but because they were the hobby band of the owner of hte Lagunitas Brewery and he laid on a free bar for as long as stocks lasted.

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    1. This lot? Are you featured in the video?
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKATTdaLPF8

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    2. Right band, wrong gig. The one I went to was in London, they brought some supplies with them

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  3. Being a middle-aged weedgie, I reckon a Creamola and Buckfast cocktail might just be worth exploring.

    Jamie

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  4. Another entretaining post George. Didn't realise Creamola foam was specific to Scotland but another example of the rubbish we used to consume during our childhoods.

    Always thought that Nebraska was just about the most unlikely place for the twinkle-toed Fred Astaire to come from but it was by way of Austria I suppose (born Frederick Austerlitz).

    Great songs too.

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  5. Hi George. I'm sure you know the phrase "drinking the Kool-Aid" that has been used since cult leader the Rev. Jim Jones had more than 900 of his flock drink a grape-drink concoction laced with cyanide. Too bad that Kool-Aid has been linked to the mass suicide for 50 years since it was actually Flavor Aid.

    I'll add Omaha from Tapes 'n Tapes to your music list... an okay song from a quite good album called the Loon.

    Have you ever seen the movie Nebraska? Highly recommended. Nebraskan Alexander Payne made a string of great flicks between 1999 and 2013, including that one.

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  6. Picked up two lovely tracks here from Sonny James and the Cash Brothers so many thanks. BTW if there's some kind of problem with Moby Grape I don't get it.

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  7. I would like to commend George for his restraint. I'm sure he could have been much crueller to "one of the greatest albums ever made".

    I'm pleased to see you're a Counting Crows fan though, George. ;-)

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