I’m at a loss as to why so many people rush to the music store or their favourite music site to gorge themselves on the music of any recently-deceased singing star. Last week there was a great hue and cry when it was discovered that Sony Music had raised prices on Whitney Houston albums after her sudden death. It was a disgraceful act of price gouging which they quickly rescinded with a pretty clumsy and insincere apology. However, and in no way am I defending what they did, they knew the volume of albums was about to explode because of her death. I don’t understand why that is. Many of my favourite singers are dead but I wasn’t immediately propelled to the nearest music store when any of them died. I don’t understand how Sony thought, even for a moment, that raising the album prices was ok. However misguided their ...

Buddy Holly died fifty three years ago today. A Beechcraft Bonanza aircraft crashed in a field near Clear Lake, Iowa. Holly died along with the pilot, Richie Valens and the Big Bopper. The latter two were well known but neither had achieved the status and star power that Holly had.

I’ve always hated the phrase “The Day the Music Died” when referring to Buddy Holly’s death. It changed but it didn’t die: that was just someone's over-blown phrase to describe an already tragic event.  Make no mistake: I consider Buddy Holly one of the giants in music history and if he’d lived and grown old, I think he’d have been as big as the Beatles. To me, Buddy Holly was a rock and roll Mozart: a phenom who’s like we’ll never see again. The Beatles as a unit were in that category too. I don’t think Elvis was because he wasn’t ...

This week marks the 63^rd anniversary of the debut of the 45rpm record. It’s a shame so many people never had the chance to collect 45’s. I remember buying my first one. My brother and I walked to Foodmaster, our local grocery store that also carried other household items including a very small record department. In my pocket I carried a couple of bucks I’d earned helping my brother with his paper route along Hiway 53. I was planning on buying a 45 because I didn’t have enough for an album (I had yet to become familiar with the idea of saving more to buy more). I looked over their selection and chose, “Question” by the Moody Blues. I handed over my 74 cents (no tax) and gleefully carried my treasure home to spin on our record player. Allow me to explain my logic for choosing that record. Two ...

Much is being made about Tim Thomas and his refusal to join his Boston Bruin teammates and accept the invitation of President Obama to come to the White House and celebrate the Stanley Cup Champions. Some are heralding Thomas as an example of a principled man standing up for his deeply held beliefs in a public forum, as is supposed to be his right. Others believe he acted selfishly and decided to grandstand, embarrassing himself and his teammates and insulting the President. Neither side will ever convince the other of its folly.

Freedom of speech is mentioned in the 1^st Amendment of the United States Constitution and may well be the most hotly contested codicil in the entire document. Though never intended as such, it has become what Greek mythology referred to as a hydra: a beast with many heads. Free speech is guaranteed but we all know that ...

Martin Luther King believed in the non-violent means to achieve civil rights. As bad as things were in the 60’s, I shudder to think of how bad it would’ve been without him. Dr. King believed in and ultimately lost his life in pursuit of the ideal that all men are created equal. So now, 44 years after his death, are we closer to his dream? Sadly no, it would appear not. For example, Barak Obama’s title is President of the United States, not the first black President of the United States. The world of sports still perpetuates stereotypes and division in various ways. One of the most disgraceful examples is the Augusta National Golf Course, despite being one of America’s oldest golf courses; they didn’t allow an African American member until 1990. It’s not hard to find racism in football either with frequent references to black quarterbacks or black head ...