it was Thursday night where I think I turned a corner on my funk. I am not in a good place still, but part of my turn for the better was finding a song that I identified with that wasn’t entirely a mope. It said exactly what I was feeling.

I’ve known it for years but with thanks to mumbled lyrics by Mick Jagger (a lot of spoken word recitation) and the dreariness of the tune itself, the epiphany of the lyrics just don’t come through as strongly as they should.

Indeed, it’s a gorgeous lyrics that I so identified with from the song Out of Tears.

It’s the second verse that captured me… That and of course the lyrics in general. It’s not because of the sadness, the personal loss that’s on display. It’s how that second verse ends…

I won’t drink
I won’t eat
I can’t hear
I won’t speak
Let it out
Let it in
All this pain
From within
And I just can’t pour my heart out
To another living thing
I’m a whisper
I’m a shadow
But I’m standing up to sing

In the face of all that despair and sadness, there is a defiance. I won’t keep suffering this, life goes on and I revel in that knowledge.

At least that’s what I take from it.
During the day Friday, just casually listening to my iPod… I had my moral rebound completed with a song that I should consider cliché in it’s uplifting message to me by now. Not uplifting per se but turning-the-corner… from what I took from the lyrics of Out of Tears, George Harrison and the Beatles Here Comes the Sun was the perfect compliment. Better times are ahead… The winter has passed.

It was a couple of years ago that I was wondering just what Michael Stipe was singing about in the R.E.M. classic “Losing my Religion”. For the prudes or the ultra-religious, the title might suggest the song is about a conflict in faith of the Divine. It’s a crisis of faith, indeed, but it’s faith in ones own self and self confidence.

In simplicity, it’s about someone not able to work up the courage to talk to the object of their affection:

You know, I get my thoughts out pretty well on here. It might be snipping about personal matters, it might be poetry, it might be just re-listing song lyrics (which seem to be popular with the Search Engines) or quoting movies. Whatever the case, I blog here not-so-much but I do blog here from time to time.

I also blog elsewhere… And tonight I figured I would blog on DFA-link int he Pinellas County DFA group about my fondness for Al Gore and how I am holding out for him to enter the 2008 Presidential primaries.

The only thing I didn’t expect when I blogged this was the fact the post was going to get wider exposure than what I was aiming for. Much wider. Hugely wider.

Blog for America front-paged wider.

More than three years ago, I never would have dreamed in my wildest imagination that I would be featured on the front page of Blog for America — the then-It blog of the Howard Dean for President campaign. Dean failed in his attempts, but he founded Democracy for America in an effort to organize Democratic support better. Blog for America lived on and is still highly thought of on the liberal/progressive blogosphere.

And at 11:45 PM ET, on February 12th 2007 — yours truly has made it to the front page. Whodathunkit?

Flippign around the boob-tube, I’ve seen the new Ameriquest commercials featuring Mick Jagger and the Rolling Stones… I sigh and contemplate that there is another sell-out rock group, conforming with the Man to make money.

Well, conforming only a little bit.

When you think of politics and British rock, you think of the Beatles and there mantra of Peace and Love and all that jazz (and John and Yoko telling us the War Is Over — if you want it), or Radiohead for that matter… You don’t think of the Stones, do you?

Enter Sweet Neo Con

I haven’t heard the song yet or read all the lyrics except for the stuff in the news but I am itching to see what Mick and Keith are up to in this number….I don’t get like that with most protest songs…

“Hockey Rumors”

That’s all it takes right now. Stick the phrase “hockey rumors” somewhere on you site and presto – you’re going to have a dumpload of hits.

I’m saying this while Boltsmag / Raw Lightning nears it’s first 400 hit day. By “Hit” I mean how many site visitors the site has had. 400 Visitors is almost half of what I used to get at Beatle Lyrics.com (now Fab 4 Lyrics) which set the bar for me on the web.

Boltsmag / Raw Lightning are setting a new bar for me though.

I wonder if anyone in their right mind would click on this link?

I wonder if any Beatles fan would buy anything form this one?
Hmm, I wonder….

Nice to have an old friend drop me a line — Robert, thanks for showing up man….

It was not so nice, however, to discover that my former love and my bane at the same time has gone the way to digital tumbleweeds, so to speak. Beatlelyrics.com is now a spammer site… Apple Corp LTD couldn’t be bothere dto renew a domain name and now a spammer owns it. Nice, fellas. You guys suck so much when it comes to business, it’s not even funny.

Rock Me Gently
Andy Kim

Ain’t it good
Ain’t it right
That you are with me
Here tonight
The music playin’
Our bodies swayin’ in time
(In time, in time, in time)

Touching you
So warm and tender
Lord, I feel such a sweet surrender
Beautiful is the dream that makes you mine

Mmm
Rock me gently
Rock me slowly
Take it easy
Don’t you know
That I have never been loved like this before

Baby baby

Rock me gently
Rock me slowly
Take it easy
Don’t you know
That I have never been loved like this before

Oh my darlin’
Oh my baby
You got the moves that drive me crazy
And on your face I see a trace of love
(Of love, of love, of love)

Come hold me close
Don’t let me go
I need you, honey
I love you so
You were made for me by the stars above

Oooh
Rock me gently
Rock me slowly
Take it easy
Don’t you know
That I have never been loved like this before

And baby baby!
Rock me gently
Rock me slowly
Take it easy
Don’t you know
That I have never been loved like this before

Rock me gently
Rock me slowly
Take it easy
Don’t you know
That I have never been loved like this before

Ain’t it good
Ain’t it right
That you are with me
Here tonight

Rock me gently
Rock me slowly
Take it easy
Don’t you know
That I have never been loved like this before

Baby baby!
Rock me gently
Rock me slowly
Take it easy
Don’t you know
That I have never been loved like this before

Thank you, Jenna…

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I think the lyrics speak for themselves how I am feeling — there is something positive while surrounded by a moment that I can’t get out of….

Beautiful Day

The heart is a bloom, shoots up through the stony ground
But there’s no room, no space to rent in this town
You’re out of luck and the reason that you had to care
The traffic is stuck and you’re not moving anywhere
You thought you’d found a friend to take you out of this place
Always
Someone you could lend a hand in return for grace
Always

It’s a beautiful day
The sky falls and you feel like
It’s a beautiful day
Don’t let it get away

You’re on the road but you’ve got no destination
You’re in the mud, in the maze of her imagination
You love this town even if that doesn’t ring true
You’ve been all over and it’s been all over you
Always

It’s a beautiful day
Don’t let it get away
It’s a beautiful day
Touch me
Take me to that other place
Teach me
I know I’m not a hopeless case

See the world in green and blue
See China right in front of you
See the canyons broken by cloud
See the tuna fleets clearing the sea out
See the Bedouin fires at night
See the oil fields at first light, and
See the bird with a leaf in her mouth
After the flood all the colors came out

Day

It was a beautiful day
Don’t let it get away
Beautiful day

Touch me
Take me to that other place
Reach me
I know I’m not a hopeless case

What you don’t have, you don’t need it now
What you don’t know, you can feel it somehow
What you don’t have, you don’t need it now
Don’t need it now
It was a beautiful day

It’s warm in the sun, I reach to the sun

It’s the first set of stanzas that really I can relate to….

I’m ending this year on Der Stonegauge with a post with lyrics from not the most happiest of songs… In fact I used to get down watching this video and listening to this song…

But reading the lyrics over again, Michael Stipe wasn’t out to down people with this thing. He was out to keep them around a little longer.

In the face of things in this world that are not good – from politics to disasters, unjustified wars, self absorbed people and the heartbreak they cause – just seem to justify the song… Don’t throw your hand, cuz everybody hurts sometimes. When the night is long and yours alone – remember you’re not alone because everybody hurts sometimes….

Everybody Hurts

When the day is long and the night, the night is yours alone,
when you’re sure you’ve had enough of this life, well hang on.
Don’t let yourself go, everybody cries and everybody hurts sometimes.

Sometimes everything is wrong. Now it’s time to sing along.
When your day is night alone, (hold on, hold on)
if you feel like letting go, (hold on)
when you think you’ve had too much of this life, well hang on.

Everybody hurts. Take comfort in your friends.
Everybody hurts. Don’t throw your hand. Oh, no. Don’t throw your hand.
If you feel like you’re alone, no, no, no, you are not alone

If you’re on your own in this life, the days and nights are long,
when you think you’ve had too much of this life to hang on.

Well, everybody hurts sometimes,
everybody cries. And everybody hurts sometimes.
And everybody hurts sometimes. So, hold on, hold on.
Hold on, hold on. Hold on, hold on. Hold on, hold on. (repeat & fade)
(Everybody hurts. You are not alone.)

(Copyright © R.E.M./Athens Ltd. for all R.E.M. originals).

Happy New Year, ladies and gentlemen. Let us have hope for 2005 – a sight more than what has been provided for us as a race in 2004.