#Last Thoughts On Woody Guthrie

[harrisonarchive]

Hariprasad Chaurasia, George Harrison, and Shivkumar Sharma, 1973; photographer unnamed, photo courtesy of hariprasadchaurasia dot com.

“George used to always say that if ever you are not feeling right, you should listen to Bob Dylan’s ‘Last Thoughts on Woody Guthrie’ and [Hariprasad Chaurasia, Shivkumar Sharma and Brij Bhushan Kabra’s] ‘Call of the Valley.’” - Olivia Harrison, The Hollywood Reporter, October 22, 2011 “‘Bhoop Ghara’ from Call of the Valley, recorded in 1967 by Shivkumar Sharma, Hariprasad Chaurasia and slide guitar player Brijbhusan Kabra, was ‘something George had on our juke box. We played it as a remedy in our home if you were feeling a certain way. Kabra was one of George’s heroes as a slide guitarist, up there with Ry Cooder,’ [Olivia explains].” - Songlines, June 2018 “[Ry Cooder] inspires me to try and play that [slide] better. At the same time, I’m into this Indian music and there’s a guy called Brijbushan Kabra who plays a guitar but he plays it like a lap steel, he lays it on his leg, and plays it with the slide on top, like, and restrung it and plays sort of groovy Indian stuff on it.” - George Harrison, Rockline, February 10, 1988 “[Hariprasad] Chaurasia’s face lights up as The Beatles guitarist and songwriter George Harrison’s name is mentioned. ‘We were very close friends, or, at least, that is what I believe. He used to come to India every year, especially to go to Vrindavan. And, whenever he came, he would come to my Bandra residence at times, with his then-girlfriend, Olivia. Every time we met, we used to play music together,’ says Chaurasia. [...] ‘One of the best musicians I ever met, George loved Indian music and had a deep understanding of it. He made an attempt to learn the sitar, and though he played it for himself, he did not want to play it in front of an audience,’ says Chaurasia. When asked what Harrison was like as an individual, the maestro was quick with his response: ‘George was a great human being. He treated everyone equally, irrespective of his or her race or nationality. I remember George would always remove his shoes or chappals before entering anyone’s house,’ he says. Harrison loved everything Indian — culture, traditions and food. 'So much so that he that he wanted to be born in India in his next life. He used to go to the Lord Krishna temple at Mathura, with his face covered with a shawl to avoid recognition. He enjoyed going to the temple alone and collecting prasadam. He loved listening to the dholak and the singing and dancing. His favorite place in India was Vrindavan and said that he could never find such an environment anywhere else in the world,’ says Chaurasia.” - The Week, February 17, 2018 (x)

[slowtraincumming]

[flowerfan2]

Sometimes you see something and the fic just happens. I watched Jesse Welles singing "There Ain't No 'U' In United Health" (if you haven't seen it, watch it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J_swGiAHhbQ) and all I could see was Eddie.

Stranger Things, Steddie, ficlet. A03.

****

“Eddie, your song’s gone viral.”

Eddie looked up as Steve came into their apartment, holding his phone out for him to see.

“What song?”  Eddie asked.  He posted a lot of shit online, most of it pretty crap.

“You know.  The one about health insurance.  ‘There ain’t no “u” in United Health.’”  Steve sat down at their rickety kitchen table and steadied it with one hand as he passed his phone to Eddie with another.  “It’s crazy, look.  This post has over three hundred thousand views.  And two thousand comments.”

 “Good.  About time.”

Steve took his phone back and scrolled, pausing every few seconds to read a comment.  “This one says you’re embodying the spirit of Pete Seeger.  Pete Seeger!  That’s pretty cool, right?”

Eddie nodded, a reluctant smile tugging at his cheeks.  “Yeah, that’s pretty cool.”  

“Like Woody Guthrie, too.  The ‘this machine kills fascists’ guy.  Eddie, you’re amazing.”  Steve leaned over and kissed Eddie messily on the cheek.  “High school English teacher by day, activist folk musician at night.  Who would have thought?”  

“I did it for Wayne,” Eddie said softly, and Steve turned to him, his face immediately sobering.  

“I know, sweetheart.  And he’d be so proud of you.”

The photos on their mantlepiece documented plenty of good times in the Munson-Harrington household, but they also revealed the progression of Wayne’s cancer, his face in the photographs more and more gaunt.  Wayne wasn’t in the picture of Eddie and Steve from last Christmas.

“Too bad I can’t quit my job at Hawkins High and do music full time,” Eddie said, sighing against Steve as his husband pulled him close.

“Because we need the god damned health insurance,” Steve said.  “Terrible fucking thing, that catch-22.”

[aheathen-conceivably]

Long before the last note Antoine had grown aware of Zelda’s presence; but as he finished, he looked up at her with a newfound vulnerability in his eyes. As she stared at him unmoving, he absentmindedly moved his hand along the strings to fill the quiet left by the watching stars, “Was it alright, you think? Writing lyrics, it’s new. Harder than assembling notes, if you ask me.”

She looked at him in amazed silence. His original piano pieces had been brilliant, and sometimes he had written ditties for her to sing, but never before had she heard him sing his own lyrics. She had always known how much he loved it - this place that he had left but that walked alongside him everywhere he went; but it was so much clearer this way, so full of both love and hate, loyalty and disdain, longing and relief, that it was difficult for anything other than music to encompass it. 

She brought her hands together in something that may have been a clap if she wasn’t so afraid to disrupt the stillness of the desert air. On silent footsteps, she left her reverie behind and moved to sit where he had made room for her on the worn wooden bench.

She looked at him earnestly, trying to ease his fear with even just the movement of her eyes, “It’s brilliant, Antoine, truly.” And she meant it, not just because she was under his spell and not her own now; the judgmental eyes of God and her sisters were shut out when she was in his orbit. Now there was only him and his memories for her to get lost in. 

He left his hands on the strings, still playing the familiar notes as though they helped make the admittance easier to utter, “You were right, you know? When I play it’s like I can see it all laid out in front of me. Or better yet, under me. Like I’m above it, observing it all like a story. Makes me realize I loved it more than I thought I did. That house. That place. Her. I wrote it because I know it’s gone now, probably nothing but rubble under a cheap government build. I just don’t want to forget. Or maybe I don’t want the world to forget.”

The stars looked down on them as his smile widened with every inch she drew closer to him. They reflected brightly in her eyes as she leveled them to his, “Would you sing it again? So I can hear it better?”

He let out a small laugh, just as much in relief as in humor. “Surely you would prefer to sing it? With a voice like yours I would hate to imagine what mine must sound like.”

She brought her knee up on the bench with them, curling as close as she could without dislodging the guitar from his arms. “Hush and sing. You don’t need me now.”

“I always will, Mrs. Duplanchier. No matter what. But as you wish….” 🎶

Part 3/3

(As Antoine is meant to have written House of the Rising Son in this universe, I’m going to leave a little disclaimer about this song and its origins under the cut, in case you are interested!)

The origins of the song House of the Rising Sun are much older and more complicated than I have presented here. Folklorist Alan Lomax has written more on it if you are interested, but it is commonly thought to have originated as an English folk song, morphing into the version we know today amongst various groups of American immigrants.

Perhaps best known for its 1964 version by The Animals, it has long formed a staple of American folk, blues, rock, and country recordings, with recorded versions by everyone from Lead Belly, Woody Guthrie, Doc Watson, Nina Simone, Dolly Parton, Joni Mitchell, Bob Dylan, and Alt-J (amongst so many others). However, I have taken inspiration from the earliest known recorded version, which was done in Appalachia in 1933.

Of course, in having Antoine write this song I have compressed much of this history into a single figure, as well as slightly twisted the meaning of the song to fit the story line. The latter is mostly based on personal interpretation of the lyrics and is purposefully meant to draw a line from this family’s musical heritage through the 1960s and beyond. It also gives a face to the very real figures behind many of the staples of American music that have come to us from the early part of the 20th century, many of which were written or played by black men and women whose songs have continued onward while many of their names and stories may have been forgotten.

[allyricas]

I love gay Eddie and bisexual awakening Steve. It's solid and popular for a reason. It works, makes a lot of sense.

But...I also love flirty-cluelessly-queer Eddie and comfortable-with-his sexuality Steve.

Eddie does flirt. With everyone. It was pretty clear he was flirting with Chrissy. He was flirting with Steve. Calling him big boy and getting up in his personal space, being all cutesy.

So, imagine Eddie just casually flirting with Steve and it doesn't mean anything to him. He's just being Eddie. He isn't even aware that it's flirting. He really considers it teasing. The man is dramatic and silly. He loves to make a scene. So "teasing" people is fun for him.

Eddie who is a super senior running a DnD club for outcasts, loves Lord of the Rings, plays in a metal band. I think Eddie is always into some sort of hyperfixation to be trying to bang chicks or dudes.

There was totally a phase were he was obsessed with folk and old country music (Woody Guthrie much). There was the Jane Austen phase (It fits, c'mon). The time he tried to learn to crochet. His lasting phase with fantasy novels. His intense love of metal music. He knows a lot about music in general. Obscure shit. Oh, those handcuffs-definitely from his magic phase. Tell me, 12 year old Eddie didn't want to be a magician. He probably did card tricks, the whole deal.

Eddie would be the kind of guy who'd spout all sorts of random knowledge. He probably has one specific time period in history he could rant about for hours.

The man has raging ADHD (takes one to know one). He's a self-professed nerd and outcast. The only thing that might be considered "cool" is that he plays in his band. But even then, he's a total nerd about it.

Eddie is hot as hell. That is undeniable. But Eddie has been too damn busy being a fucking nerd to date or hook up. I think he's so focused on his interests, it could easily not have been on his radar. Same way he's failed senior year twice in a row despite being smart as hell. The shit they are trying to teach doesn't interest him and that makes Eddie fucking struggle.

He's bouncy and hyperactive. He probably has terrible tunnel vision when he gets into a book or movie or campaign. Dating has thus far not been interesting enough especially combined with how he's treated by the people in Hawkins.

So, yeah- he flirts and teases. He thinks it's harmless fun. With Chrissy, it was a way to make her feel safe and lighten the mood. With Steve, it's a way to disarm him. It's King Steve afterall. Why not play up the metalhead freak persona. Let him think he's weird.

It isn't until Steve starts flirting back and gives Eddie butterflies that Eddie realizes this is not heterosexual behavior. And he knows a lot about that because he was accidentally flagging for a whole goddamn year. Because he wanted to look metal as fuck and thought the bandana was badass.

Steve calls Eddie princess. Calls him pretty boy. Throws in a babe. Everytime Eddie refers to him as big boy or Stevie, Steve just smirks and comes up with a new pet name that wrecks Eddie (who has no idea what is fucking going on). Throw in the boys getting high together with no inhibitions and Steve actively trying to romance him and Eddie's in a full blown sexuality crisis.

best part: Steve thinks Eddie is gay because of the bandana that he wore all year. Add in all the flirting and then Steve's really putting the moves on totally clueless Eddie. And say what you want about Steve, but he has game. I can just imagine Eddie trying to frantically figure out why all of the sudden he wants to make out with Steve "the hair" Harrington and Steve's like...aren't you gay?

(if anyone knows of steddie fics anything like this, please rec them!)

[lilacerull0]

STORY OF A NEW NAME + ELECTRIC DYLAN CONTROVERSY: Lila Cerullo as a Dylanesque figure

How did Bob Dylan change music? | Song to Woody | The Times They Are A-Changin' | Restless Farewell | Blowin' in the Wind | It's Alright, Ma (I'm Only Bleeding) | Masters of War | Bob Dylan's Dream | Gates of Eden | Last Thoughts on Woody Guthrie | Maggie's Farm | My Back Pages | Review: ‘Dylan Goes Electric!’ Considers Folk, Rock and a ’60s Divide

[shadowland]

Emmylou Harris interview by Cameron Crowe Rolling Stone, June 19, 1975

Fame Catches Up with Emmylou

Los Angeles – Guitar in hand, Gram Parsons sat in his road manager’s Laurel Canyon home and coached singer Emmylou Harris through the harmonies of the old Burritos classic, “Sin City.” Later, after she’d excused herself for a visit to the kitchen, Parsons grinned proudly. “There she is,” he said, “that’s my kick in the ass, keep an eye on her.”

That was in 1973. Now, two years later, Harris’s first major solo effort, Pieces of the Sky, has done well and her current club and concert tour (augmented by a band featuring Elvis’s guitarist James Burton and his keyboard player Glen D. Hardin) is drawing unanimous raves. But Emmylou Harris, it seems, is the last to catch up with Emmylou Harris. Still a bit dazed over Parsons’s untimely death in the fall of ’73, the 28-year-old singer is only now waking up to the reality of a successful solo career.

“I know what’s happening but it hasn’t really hit me yet,” she drawls softly, curled up on the sofa of a West Hollywood hotel room. Two nights earlier, she’d enthralled a capacity Palomino Club audience that included such luminaries as Bonnie Raitt, Maria Muldaur, Lowell George, Commander Cody, Joni Mitchell and Linda Ronstadt (for whose recent country hit, “I Can’t Help It” Harris provided the strong counter harmony). “I guess it’s just been a kind of long hard road. In a way I’ve been at this for almost ten years on almost all kinds of levels – from waiting tables to playing in New York clubs and not having anybody listen to me, to making a terrible first record for a bankrupt company to working with Gram.

“I suppose working with Gram was the most amazing thing that ever happened to me,” she continues. “There was just something very magical about the experience. It was so much fun to just get up there, sing with him, and not worry about carrying a show myself. Everyone paid all this attention to me and told me how good I was and all that. It was really like being some kind of fairytale princess. Somehow that affected me more than all this that’s happening now.” She lets her words settle for a moment, then decides on a quip. “Maybe I’m on time delay.”

Born in Alabama and raised in Virginia, Harris remembers a reputation of being a “real prig” in high school. “I was considered to be a kind of oddball. You know, always studying and making good grades. Singing began as a social thing. I realized when I started singing at parties people began noticing me. High schools are real hip now, everybody’s cool, but there was a counter-culture in Woodbridge, Virginia, in 1963. You were either a homecoming queen or  a real weirdo. Here I was a 16-year-old Wasp, wanting to quit school and become Woody Guthrie.”

Instead, Harris made it to the University of North Carolina on a drama scholarship. Using free time to play off-campus bars in a folk duo, she lasted a year and a half before applying to the more prestigious drama department at Boston University. “I was gonna work as a waitress in Virginia Beach for a while to get enough tuition money,” she recalls. “But there was an incredible little music scene going on down there. That’s when I got serious about singing.”

Harris never made it to Boston U. “I thought I was going to get married. My first big love below up in my face, so I just went to New York ’cause there was nothing else to do. I was greener than green. I got a room at the YWCA, started going to the Village, playing basket houses [pass-the-hat-clubs] and just . . . hangin’ out.”

In two years of scuffling around New York, Emmylou made some valuable friends like singers Jerry Jeff Walker and David Bromberg. “Besides turning me on to country music, they sort of looked out for me,” she says. “Even so, I must have had some protective kind of bubble around me. I used to walk home from gigs on dark streets at two in the morning with my guitar and never think anything of it. Looking back, I get scared to death.”

Harris’s first album (on the now defunct Jubilee records), recorded in New York just after her marriage, is one she’d like to forget. “I was trying to keep it a secret,” she laughs (ironically, since the 1970 release was titled Emmylou Harris). “I hope somebody in authority will be able to buy the masters and burn them. Everybody involved with that record hated everybody else and I was in the middle trying to keep the peace. It was a disaster.”

Several months after recording, “the worst possible thing any girl could ever do to her budding career” happened. Harris became pregnant with her child, Hallie. “Up until then,” she admits, “my life had been a little too nebulous, I had no clear vision at all. The pregnancy, although it wasn’t planned, gave me something very real and something present to relate to.”

Later, with her marriage broken and ten dollars in her pocket, the protectiveness of motherhood, soon drove Harris out of New York. “I didn’t know where I was gonna go, but I knew I had to get a job and make some money. By accident I got back into music through some friends, Billy and Kathy Danoff [writers of ‘Take Me Home, Country Roads’]. They were still living in their basement apartment with all the cockroaches running around. They were the ones that put a guitar in my hands and ordered me onstage again.”

It was early ’71 when Flying Burrito Brothers guitarist Rick Roberts stumbled onto Harris performing in a small Washington D.C. bar called the Red Fox. The next night, Roberts brought the rest of the Burritos down for a look. They invited her to join the band; before she could accept, the Burritos had dissolved.

“Chris Hillman,” Emmylou remembers, “wanted to come out to L.A. so he could produce some demo tapes. He was really busy at the time. Anyway, I think it probably worked out the way it should have.” The way it worked out was for Hillman to turn on Gram Parsons, the Burritos’ long estranged cofounder, to their incredible discovery. Months later, Parson dropped in on one of Harris’s many D.C appearances and made a few vague promises. A year later, Parsons invited her to L.A. to sing on his first solo album, GP. Their partnership quickly intensified. “It was gonna be a Dolly Parton-Porter Wagoner situation. We didn’t see any need to break up that partnership because we really got higher on what we did together than anything we did separately. I still feel that way.”

It was hard work, she says, that kept her from slipping into an extended depression. “Gram’s death was like falling off a mountain. It was a very hard year between his death and the recording of my album [Pieces of the Sky]. A year of throwing myself into a lot of work that my heart wasn’t really into. There was a lot of stumbling involved. I was playing quite a few bars and was in a real vulnerable position. People felt that they could come up and ask me anything. I used to get hostile. It  hurt. I didn’t want to get emotional around some perfect stranger who had the goddamn gall to come up and ask me something that was none of his goddamn business.”

The subject brings her close to tears. “Gram was such an amazing part of my life. I have so many good memories of him, it seems pointless to dwell on the tragedy of it.” Abruptly, she reaches to turn up the country station already blaring from a hotel room radio. “Do you like Conway Twitty?” she asks. “I just love the harmony on this.”

Pieces of the Sky was almost a year long project in itself. Emmylou for one could not be more proud. With the help of Anne Murray’s ex-producer Brian Ahern, great care was taken in selecting material. “I’m just starting to write again,” says Harris. “I don’t mind the fact that I only wrote one song [“Boulder to Birmingham,’ cowritten with Bill Danoff] on the album. There are just too many tunes that I get off doing and want to turn people on to. I feel very deeply and personally involved with each one, so I don’t miss that writer’s identity of making a statement.

“I think any singer feels that way,” Harris says about choosing songs like the Everly Brothers’ “Sleepless Nights,” the Beatles’ “For No One”and Dolly Parton’s “Coat of Many Colors.” Like Linda [Ronstadt]. When she sings a song it’s really sung. Nobody cares that she doesn’t write; the delivery’s all that really matters.”

Besides a heavy touring schedule and the summer recording of her next album, Emmylou Harris spunkily refuses to acknowledge the long-range future. “A lot of my life has been circumstance. The future just doesn’t exist for me. You’re not responsible for decisions if you don’t make them.

“What do I see in the future?” Harris asks, reaching for the telephone. “A chocolate shake. Hello, Room Service?”

[vegetable-man]

Wayne’s Radio

Product of winter break. Gotta get this one out of my brain before I rot. Same universe as my other mechanic eddie fics (which is why it’s tagged as so); it’s mentioned once. Beginning of the explicit romantic relationship between these two idiots. Lub y’all.

Eddie munson x reader 

(although everyone is welcome to reading, fem pronouns are used)

TW: mentions of abuse of young Eddie (physical + drug) QUICK mention. other than that- just love babyyyyy

Wayne’s radio

{*_*}

Wayne has this air about him. The hard exterior of a working man, and the heart of a sweet southern boy taking refuge in a small trailer in Indiana.

And although technically Eddie was his brother’s boy, Wayne thought of him as his own and nothing less. As soon as little Eddie, head shaved and face bruised- track marks running up and down his arms, showed up at his doorstep with an officer gripping his arm, Wayne knew he would do anything to see his boy happy.

Anything to keep his boy happy, but Wayne had some stipulations.

Whenever Wayne wanted control of the stereo in the trailer, he got it.

Technically, it wasn’t often that he booted Eddie off the radio, but often enough that Eddie got a taste of some sweet slow heart. Slow guitars, Blaze Foley, Woodie Guthrie, Joni Mitchell, Jim Croce. Eddie loved the chaos and resistance of metal, more than any other music, but he knew what made him think of home. I mean, he would never forget Wayne’s face when he painted ‘this machine kills dragons’ on his guitar like some knightly medieval Guthrie.

Wayne loved his boy, and never knew his heart could swell so large.

So when the slow plucks and strums would settle Wayne after a long shift at the plant, Eddie would settle also. Eventually, however, Eddie could only think of one thing.

Or rather, person.

…

It wasn’t a slow falling.

Eddie has been in love with the same girl for the last ten years for god’s sake. Somehow, every year, Eddie found a new layer to his love.

He found the first layer when he would pretend to be a wizard on the playground and you’d play along as his fairy companion, finding cool rocks and sticks to deem magic objects. He found the second layer when you begged him to come to your 10th birthday party and then spent the entire day with him away from the other guests, even his uncle who was also in attendance, to find salamanders under rocks behind your house. When it came time for you to blow out your candles, Eddie found himself wishing that he would never lose this.

Each layer didn’t surprise him. Even when you both started to hit puberty and he would come home to the trailer flushed and embarrassed that he began to think, obsessively- he wouldn’t admit, that you were far more than pretty.

Wayne, of course, had seen this and quickly gave him ‘the talk’ as Eddie’s face got so red he thought he would explode. He whined and denied, so Wayne pretended Eddie’s flushed face was sunburnt on hot lakeside days with you and your family.

Secretly, Wayne and your dad would cackle over beers at Eddie’s fumbling scrawny body, eyes squeezed shut and shy, trying avoid even the slightest brush of your shoulders.

Eventually, however, as his body caught up with yours, Eddie got taller, he got more muscular, he grew his hair out, adopted leather and rings, and a newfound confidence that made you swoon and blush like he had when you both were younger.

It didn’t bother Eddie. He already knew he loved you. And it didn’t help that he thought it was unbearably endearing.

Teasing, sweet as hell, but teasing Eddie then had ammo and more excuses to poke and grab your sides as you hid your face and squirmed away from him.

If he wasn’t going to really be with you yet, he’d make it clear to others that you both were off limits through giggles and flying hands.

As you got older, and admittedly melancholier, it became frustrating how unclear your relationship with Eddie was.

You knew Eddie loved you, but it wouldn’t kill him to just be with you, would it?

…

Late high school was hell.

All your friends were losing their virginities, going on dates, and here you were hung up on Eddie. And although you and him were inseparable, it brought tears to your eyes to see girls flirt with him, fawn over him at his gigs, ask him to fix their cars, and him smile back and wave at them like the sweet boy he was. Though he was the town freak, there was an allure to him that teenage girls just couldn’t resist.

What if you were one of those girls?

Just someone to smile at, maybe not as important to him as you thought.

Those were the thoughts floating around in your head a few days before graduation, laying in your bed staring up at the ceiling a few hours before a Sunday lunch with Eddie and Wayne.

The sound of soft metal through the glass of your windows guided you out of your trance and, reluctantly, into a world where you had to spend the day with Eddie.

…

The drive to Eddie’s wasn’t so bad. As soon as you heard the music from his van, you dragged yourself out of bed and into the passenger side of his precious car. You were greeted with a soft hi, a blinding smile, and a hug from the other side of the center console. And while for the rest of the drive he turned his music down to a reasonable level, the heat of his hand continuously pinching your elbow created a dichotomy of soothing and aching.

Eddie was nothing if not gentle and sweet with you.

Considering the circumstances, it was hard to appreciate.

Pulling up to the trailer, Eddie put the car in park, shut the car off, and rapidly got out. You squinted your eyes as he jogged to the passenger side of the car to open the door with a flourish and a mumbled “my love”.

…

Every week Eddie had lunch with you and Wayne. His little ‘Sunday dinner’, at about 1 pm, he liked to call it. It was one of the things he looked forward to at the end of the week. The people he loved the most sitting down to eat together both warmed his heart and made his hair stand on its ends. No matter what shit Mrs. O’ Donnell pulled in class, or who tried to push and pull at him in the hallways, his little Sunday dinner healed all.

Above all, he appreciated his post-dinner traditions the most.

But that could wait for later.

As he opened the door for you, he could tell you were feeling a bit quiet. Perhaps not abnormal, he decided, maybe tired, but he knew to lay on the love.

…

With bellies full, of both Wayne’s famous garlic chicken casserole and promises to plan a big outing for both your graduations, you and Eddie retired to the couch to watch a movie and Wayne got ready for a fishing trip with his buddies.

The ambiance of soft acoustics floated through the trailer as Eddie picked a movie for you both to watch. It normally didn’t matter what he put on, as you’d fall asleep on his shoulder, hands gripping his waist and large brown eyes peering down at you with a grin.

As Eddie settled on the couch with you, he placed you on your side beside him and pressed your head into his shoulder as you looked onward towards the television.

As you lazily watched the beginning of some horror movie Eddie was probably siked to show you, you heard the soft piano of Joni Mitchell through the radio from the kitchen.

With a shuffle upwards towards Eddie’s face, you pressed your hand on his chest in order to get his attention and sit up.

Eddie felt slightly startled as he sat up and scanned you for discomfort. Maybe you wanted to switch positions? Maybe your arm was numb? Did you just have to pee?

His train of thought was interrupted by your small voice asking him something.

“Huh?”

With a hot face and a small huff, you said softer “this song reminds me of you.” and quickly looked away towards the TV showing some gory opening scene.

Eddie strained to hear the radio in the kitchen. But when he did, his body flushed and his heart soared. Above the clashes and screams coming from the movie, he could make out the lyrics of ‘My Old Man’.

With a flourish and rather rapid movement of his body into a standing position, Eddie leaned down to pull you with him.

He wanted to dance.

“Eddie no” you huffed, rigid, uncomfortable, and unready to partake in his fit of spontaneity.

“Sweetheart” he paused to look at you “give this old man a dance huh?”

And so somehow ending up in the kitchen, you and Eddie gently swayed to the soft tunes of Wayne’s favorite radio station.

Breaking the peace between the both of you, you raised your head out of the center of Eddie’s chest and said “I love you.”

Eddie always felt like his heart stopped when you said it and yet he returned an “I love you too, bug” with a tug back to his chest.

He was confused when he was met with resistance, looking back down at you.

“no, Eddie” you looked into his eyes, “I love you” and continued to switch between his left and right eyes. Noticing the slight differences in color between them but not noticing the immense shift in Eddie’s face.

Eddie took his hands off your waist to slither between your arms and to the apples of your cheeks.

With tears lining his eyes, he slowly kissed you.

Pulling apart felt like life or death to him, but as he parted from you and scanned your face, he realized that even if he did die, he was in heaven at least.

He felt a full body shiver overtake him as you leaned back in for another kiss.

With the heat of your cheeks and the lidded look of love in your eyes, Eddie knew that he was set for life.

…

In a hush of whispers to and from an old receiver:

“That son of a bitch finally got her huh”

“I know… you don’t know how long I been tryin to put em together”

“YOU? Wayne, give me a fuckin break, this was a team effort”

“Well at least we ain’t gotta meet nobody’s families”

A booming laugher filled the back room of Wayne’s trailer with the small click of a telephone as Wayne’s heavy footsteps crossed the threshold of the kitchen to get to the front door.

“Goodbye…” he looked between the two of you “both of you.”

“Okay….?” Eddie drawled out.

“Tell my dad I said hi” you smiled at him from under Eddie’s arm.

“Oh I will.” he chuckled, and promptly walked out of the trailer as if he couldn’t wait.

…

“Was Wayne acting weird to you?”

“I don’t know, maybe… KISS ME TO REVEAL THE ANSWER!” Eddie boomed like one of those fortune teller machines.

“I hate you so much” you laughed and paused to look into his eyes.

Eddie leaned in to place small clicking pecks all over your face.

He’d have to thank Wayne and his radio tomorrow.

[rodeoromeo]

you only need one track to prove that Bob Dylan is deserving of every inch of literary praise he receives, and it’s Last Thoughts on Woody Guthrie

[slackville-records]

I Must Not Think Bad Thoughts

X

The facts we hate

We'll never meet

Walking down the road

Everybody yelling, "hurry up, hurry up"

But I'm waiting for you

I must go slow

I must not think bad thoughts

What is this world coming to?

Both sides are right

But both sides murder

I give up

Why can't they?

I must not think bad thoughts

I must not think bad thoughts

I must not think bad thoughts

The civil wars

And the uncivilized wars

Conflagrations leap out of every poor furnace

The food cooks poorly

And everyone goes hungry

From then on, it's dog eat dog

Dog eat body and body eat dog

I can't go down there

I can't understand it

I'm a no-good coward

An American, too

(A North American, that is)

And I must not think bad thoughts (not a South or a Central)

And I must not think bad thoughts (or a Native American)

And I must not think bad thoughts

Oh, I must not think bad thoughts

I must not think bad thoughts

I'm guilty of murder

Of innocent men

Innocent women, innocent children

Thousands of 'em

My planes, my guns

My money, my soldiers

My blood on my hands

It's all my fault

I must not think bad thoughts

I must not think bad thoughts

I must not think bad thoughts

The facts we hate

You'll never hear us

"I hear the radio is finally gonna play new music

You know, the British invasion"

But what about the Minutemen

Flesh Eaters, DOA

Big Boys and the Black Flag?

Will the last American band to get played on the radio

Please bring the flag?

Please bring the flag

Glitter disco synthesizer night school

All this noble savage drum, drum, drum

Astronauts go back in time to hang out with the cave people

It's about time

It's about space

It's about some people in the strangest places

Woody Guthrie sang about

B-E-E-T-S, not B-E-A-T-S

I must not think bad thoughts

I must not think bad thoughts

I must not think bad thoughts

The facts we hate

We'll never meet

Walking down the road

Everybody yelling, "hurry up, hurry up, hurry up"

But I'm waiting for you

I must go slow

I must not think bad thoughts

What is this world coming to?

Both sides are right

But both sides murder

I give up

Why can't they?

I must not think bad thoughts

I must not think bad thoughts

I must not think bad thoughts

Songwriters: Excene Cervenka / John Doe

[onemorecupofcoffee]

last thoughts on woody guthrie is so ridiculously good it might be one of my top songs 2024..

[broadsidemagazine]

"Yevtushenko, Lorca, and Bob Dylan", written by Josh Dunson

"Mr. Dylan's compositions don't fit into any pigeonhole; the minute you have one characterized, it flies away. His lyrics mix a solo sermon out of Guthrie's conversational folksay with a dash of Rimbaud's demonic imagery or even a bit of Yevtushenko's social criticism." Robert Shelton, New York Times, April 13, 1963

A lot of other people have been comparing Bob Dylan not only to Yevtushenko but to Garcia Lorca, especially after hearing Bob do his “Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall”.

It is difficult to fit any true poet in a “pigeonhole”. That's too small a space for a creative artist, too small for a roving singer like Bob Dylan. When asked how he writes his songs, Bob just says they're up there in the air, and he just picks them down, and if he didn't, somebody else would. I think there's more in this thought than merely modesty. In it there are many scatterings of truth.

Why is it when you read through great poets of different cultures and different times that much of their imagery is similar, and many times they talk about the same feelings and things? One way of answering this is to say there are certain common events all these poets see and react to -- war, love, nature, children; and that their images likewise come from common experience. The way Bob Dylan might answer it would be that these poets reached up into the same piece of air, and what they pulled down, in their individual ways, was their poems and their songs.

A number of people see Yevtushenko and Dylan as being close together. as both being social critics, and thereby playing a similar role in their respective countries. It seems to me that the impact of and the poetry itself are quite different. In Russia there is the tradition of the poet as an important social critic that dates back to Pushkin, and goes right through the Soviet period beginning with Mayakovsky and finally to the present day where Yevtushenko’s most recent book, published in 1962, sold out its edition of 100,000 copies. America's most important social critics have been her novelists, ie: Harriet B. Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin, and her journalists, ie: Lincoln Steffens’ Shame of the Cities. Our poets, even our popular ones like Robert Frost and Carl Sandburg, undergo book editions of 5 to 10 thousand with the publisher still taking a loss.

But we have had our great social poets, and I think when Bob’s work is fully evaluated he will number among them. Bob does not mince words when he speaks about the "masters of war”:

I hope that you die and your death will come soon, I’ll follow your casket by the pale afternoon, And I’ll watch while you’re lowered down to your death bed, Then I’ll stand over your grave ‘til I’m sure that you're dead.

Yevtushenko wishes death on the anti-semites in Babi Yar:

How horrible it is that pompous title the anti-semites calmly call themselves,  Society of the Russian Race. No part of me can ever forget it. When the last anti-semite on the earth is buried for ever let the International ring.

Yevtushenko sees in the death of the anti-semites a re-affirmation of the society in which he lives. Dylan in his songs too calls for the righting of the wrongs in his society, but they are so multitudinous and deeply imbedded what may be necessary is a new society as Woody Guthrie visualizes. A striking difference between Yevtushenko and Dylan is that Bob’s action is much more intense -- he will follow the war planner's casket to make sure that he is dead. And in “Emmett Till” he lashes out not only at the lynchers but at the great mass of us who by standing aside and failing to take action against racism permit it to continue:

If you can't speak out against this sort of thing, A crime that's so unjust,  Your eyes are filled with dead man's dirt, Your mind is filled with dust. Your arms and legs they must be in shackles and chains, Your blood must refuse to flow, For you would let this human race, Fall down so godawful low.

Intensity added to a wide-ranging view gives us this Dylan verse in “With God On Your Side” which has implications much deeper than only the problem of anti-semitism:

When the second World War came to an end We forgave the Germans and then we were friends. Though they murdered six million, In the ovens they fried, The Germans now, too Have God on their side.

I get the feeling on hearing Dylan and reading Lorca that they both pull their poems out of the same body of air, although there are marked differences and Bob has never read Lorca. It is as though they met one night on a mountainside and looked out over the world’s lands and oceans and saw the same things and agreed to tell us, each in his own way, what they saw. Bob sings: “I heard the sound of a thunder that roared out a warning” while Lorca says: “these clouds are broken by fistblows of coral that carry a fiery cocoon on their backs.”

Bob is much influenced by Woody Guthrie, of course, and I think it is here where comparisons become the most meaningful. Woody did not confine himself to “silo sermons” and those who say he “did not exceed the boundaries of talk song” should take another look at his work. His imagery many times is subtle, strong and lyrical:

I tell you about the winds and the weathers and oceans and the lands and the continents that have riz and sunk since this little hunk of dirt first whirled off the burning sun. I tell you of the men and the women that bathed their eyes in the zig zag lightning and hugged and kissed in the rumbling thunder and about every union wheel that ever did run down a union road…

Bob Dylan’s “Hard Rain” and “Blowin In The Wind” come to mind right away. He means it sincerely when he sings in his “Letter To Woody”:

Hey Woody, but I know that you know All the things that I’m sayin and many times more.

(Broadside #27, June 1963)

[spellucci]

Decisions, Decisions

Thursday, October 12, 2023

It is decision time. Today we need to make a firm, clear, hard, solid, unalterable, set in stone, unbreakable decision about where the weather will be optimal, or at least workable, to see the eclipse. The eclipse track is a two day drive from where we are in Kansas. And those darn weather predictions are not yet firm enough to guide a firm, clear, hard, ..., well, you see the problem.

If we go south, the weather looks more favorable, but is in the wrong direction for the friends we want to visit on Sunday. If we go west, which takes us more in the direction of our friends, the weather is unsettled. We decide to wait until we reach Wichita, Kansas to choose which direction to take.

I'm the meantime, Tim's nephew cooks us a fabulous breakfast. A mound of luscious hash brown potatoes, bacon cooked to perfection in the oven, and scrambled eggs toped with Cholula hot sauce start our day with our mouths happy and our bellys full. Dora had fun playing with Spot, a chihuahua mix. After happy goodbyes, we set the GPS for Wichita and head out.

As we drive, we learn more geography than we had really wanted to know. Head west to Farmington, Albuquerque, or Roswell New Mexico? South to Hobbs, Odessa, or Midland Texas? The weather report that had earlier said Roswell would be clear now says partly cloudy. And the weather report for our original destination of Farmington looks like it is improving. Two Spellmans in our heads. Argh!

We leave the highway and head down a dirt road looking for a place to lunch and collect our thoughts. We stop between a harvested corn field and a dormant oil well. Dora is so full of curiosity for the sounds and smells of the field that she ignores her ball.

We eat leftover Thai red curry and rice from last night. It is still decision time. We are fortified with food and with three different weather reports that favor Farmington. We decide: Farmington it is.

The wind picks up as we head across central Kansas. The National Weather Service has forecast winds of 35 MPH, gusting to 50. The dust clouds the air in every direction. It brings to mind Woody Guthrie's song of the dust bowl era, "Dusty Old Dust."

This is the oil-producing section of Kansas. We wonder how they, whoever "they" is, keep the oil separate from the produce.

U.S. 56 heads west along the plains. The wind is blowing from the South. Hard. The driver has to hold the wheel left just to stay going straight. The speed limit is 65, while the road is a single lane in each direction with a two-foot breakdown "lane." Each time we meet a big rig coming toward us, we slam into its wake, immediately dropping our speed by 2 MPH. As we pass it, we get yanked toward its lane, and have to be ready to re-center ourselves before the next oncoming vehicle arrives. Everyone is shading themselves toward the side of the road. The beeping of the lane keeping assist warning is incessant. It is so nerve-wracking that we abandon the regular two-hour shifts for one-hour shifts or less.

We stop for water in a small town with (not one but!) two public parks that RVs can use. To our right was a deserted fairgrounds and across the street the endless farm fields restarted. The temperature was 86°, although the RV thermometer got up to 106° in the sun. We didn’t pack for hot weather, but the high winds kept us comfortable in tshirts and jeans.

We stopped for the night at a pleasant rest area at the crossroads of two state highways. Tim opened the door and at least a dozen flies came in. Jeanne screamed and Tim hastily retreated from whatever he wanted from the front seat. The rest of the night was split between planning how to minimize opening the doors and swatting flies.

The howling winds continued to shake the RV hard all night long.

[violentdevotion]

my personal ranking

i cant do rankings im too partial for that but my opinion on your opinions

jeff buckley sang like rent was due! if jeff buckley covered your song it's not your song anymore its his and also you're gonna think about it at sunrise for the rest of your life. he had to die before the indie folk girlie's (gn) entered the scene otherwise there'd be carnage.

I hadn't heard bettye lavettes cover before but I love it. I didnt think I would at first but I love what she did to the song. its really amazing when artists aren't afraid to play with the pacing or rhythm of a song they're covering especially in tandem with how she altered the lyrics too. cunt indeed.

i can believe we are augustine truly love and miss the mama in question but I hate what they did to the word me 1:19 seconds in. it's a good cover but it's just that. doesn't radicalise or change it much it's just a good cover ! no shame in that !!

bob dylan voice. godbless joan for being there, yes girl give us something !!!! also I like hearing the audience laugh, some soul. its also fun bc it's such a,,,, I don't wanna say sad but you know what I mean, nostalgic(?) melancholic (?) song it's fun to hear it more upbeat and tempo and hearing them have fun as they do it

bob dylan voice but he wrote the songs so whatever ig

rod was singing as if he was reading the lyrics on a scrap of paper as he went. boring. uninspired.

ITS THE VOWELS !!!! i love a good scouse accent. anyone who knows me knows I love a good fucking accent. you garble your vowels and i want you but not like this george!!!!! you know that annoying tiktok voice filter that warps your voice, george harrison luv.

extra

jack johnson - so embarrassing I actually dig it. i like how the guitar sounds. does it kinda sound like some guy at a party pulling out his guitar? yeah? and it's working on me, sorry. but then he starts singing smth else.

joan baez - godbless her. we need more women to cover it. the speed in which she sings it though.

johnny cash - 😔 idk why he started at the end and he changed colour of the sun caught flat to dark dark night. im not feeling it. just discarded the best parts of the song

ricky nelson- whatever

[thisaintascenereviews]

The Misguided Anger Of Oliver Anthony & The Working Class

Pioneering folk singer-songwriters The Almanacs, which included influential folk musician Pete Seeger, penned the protest song “Talkin’ Union” in 1941. The song is about forming a labor union, including the positives and the roadblocks that would get in the way, but it mainly is about how necessary they are. That song was written in the 1940s, but the need for unions has extended to the present day. Protest music itself is an idea that’s just as American as baseball, apple pie, and McDonald’s. A lot of these songs, as well as the ideas that these songs express, are timeless. Labor unions, for example, are just as important now as they were almost a century ago. An artist being able to express their thoughts through song is a right that’s guaranteed by the First Amendment, but that free speech works both ways. Just as an artist can release a song that has one point, they can release songs that has the opposite.

This year has seen the rise of two songs, almost back to back, that the (mainly) right side of the political spectrum are championing, more specifically Jason Aldean’s “Try That In A Small Town” and Oliver Anthony’s “Rich Men North Of Richmond.” The former song has already faded from most people’s minds, as most folks who defended the song forgot about it a couple of weeks later, and moved onto Oliver Anthony’s “Rich Men North Of Richmond.” There is something to be said for an independent artist that was a nobody a week ago suddenly blow up and have millions of plays on streaming services out of nowhere, but that’s a good topic for another piece. This piece, however, is about the complicated subject matter of the song.

At first glance, “Rich Men” is a song that aims to unite the working class against politicians and corporations that don’t pay them fairly. Lines like “I’ve been selling my soul, workin’ all day / Overtime hours for bullshit pay / So I can sit out here and waste my life away / Drag back home and drown my troubles away” make a lot of people think that. The chorus, while still having that idea, is a little less interesting, because all Anthony says is that rich men north of Richmond are bad and they want to control you. So far you’d think the song is ultimately about the blue collar worker struggling to get by, but the song takes a dramatic turn in the second and third verses that made me understand why conservatives specifically love this song.

Thanks to many Republican politicians using rhetoric that purposely divides people, there always needs to be a hypothetical “they” to blame for their problems. Well, who does Oliver Anthony blame for his? You’d think that he would blame the corporations, the politicians, or the capitalist system that they all benefit from, but instead he blames “the obese milkin’ welfare.” With lines like “Well, if you’re 5’3” and you’re 300 pounds / Taxes ought not to pay for your bags of fudge rounds,” the issues with the song start to present themselves. Anthony’s idea of blaming obese people on welfare for his woes is very odd, but it’s also very misguided. What Anthony and people that love the song don’t seem to realize that you don’t need to punch down on others to make a point. Bruce Springsteen, John Mellancamp, Tom Petty, Woody Guthrie, and Pete Seeger didn’t punch down on people to make their points about wanting to be paid equally, or their everyday struggles as blue collar Americans.

Seeing these types of songs, especially “Rich Men North Of Richmond,” getting popular, makes me wonder where other songs and artists like this are. A few of the popular heartland-rock artists of the 1970s / 1980s are still making music and regularly touring, but there aren’t modern artists in this vein that are a household name. I’ve been thinking about all of this for the last week, especially with the song debuting at number one on the Billboard 100. Personally, I have mixed feelings on the song itself, because as much as it attempts to make a great point in the first half, it’s the rest of it that leaves a very sour taste in my mouth. The song itself, looking past the controversy, is mediocre, and it sounds as amateurish as you can get. It’s still cool seeing the power that people can have on the music industry and seeing a completely independent artist rise to the top, especially about the average blue collar worker’s experience, but why him, though?

Springsteen, Petty, and Mellancamp were so popular in their time for being vivid and grounded storytellers, whether talking about themselves or characters in their music that accurately represented the average American. While Anthony’s “Rich Men” sort of does that, it just feels like he’s angry about how the way things are, and doesn’t know how to properly articulate it. This song relies more heavily on emotion, versus what he actually has to say, and maybe that’s why people are resonating with it, but there are other artists out there (especially in Appalachia) that speak more to the average American’s experience and do so in a way that doesn’t blame anyone or paint anyone else as an enemy.

A great example of an artist that should be held in the same regard as Oliver Anthony is Adeem The Artist, a country / folk singer-songwriter from North Carolina that speaks openly about their expediences as a queer and non-binary person in the South. Their last LP, 2022’s White Trash Revelry, is a record that has a lot of themes and ideas that speaks to the average (Appalachian) American’s experience, such as racism and white supremacy, the opioid epidemic, toxic masculinity, and poverty. When I listened to “Rich Men North Of Richmond,” I immediately thought about the song “Books & Records” by Adeem The Artist. That song is a much more compelling look the blue collar worker’s struggle, because it’s a very grounded song that has Adeem (or an unnamed character) having to sell their books and records just to be able to eat.

That’s a sad reality for many everyday people; they don’t want to sell their prized possessions, but surviving is much more important, so they do what they need to do. There is a warm sense of optimism at the end, however, saying that they’ll buy them back someday, which is something that “Rich Men” unfortunately lacks. Instead of providing an answer to Anthony’s grievances about being paid unfairly, and what he can do to remedy that, he points a finger at groups of people that he feels that are to blame. He ultimately shrugs and says that’s the way it is without really offering any solution, or pondering why he’s in that position. Books & Records” doesn’t punch anyone down, or blame anyone, it’s just an honest look at being poor and having to sell your books and records so you can eat.

I don’t think that “Rich Men North Of Richmond” is going to stick around in the weeks to come. A lot of the people that love the song are going to move on, just as they did with “Try That In A Small Town.” If they truly resonate with the message of being paid unfairly, and being angry with politicians, they’d protest, form labor unions, or much more simply, vote for politicians that are not going to let these corporations commit unethical and unfair business practices. The sad reality is that the same people that love this song are still going to vote for the politicians that the reasons for why they’re facing these hardships. They don’t realize that those politicians don’t care about them, and only care about their self-interests. The most powerful weapon that we have in this country is our vote, and the only way to at least attempt to upend the capitalist system that benefits the corporation and disenfranchises the average worker is to vote for the politicians that will repeal or enact laws to limit the power of these corporations.

Until that happens, more songs like “Rich Men North Of Richmond” are sure to get popular for a week or two, only for people to forget about them (and what they say), just to move onto the next guy that says the same thing in a slightly different way. The cycle is going to repeat over and over again, and that’s the way a lot of politicians want it to be. They don’t want anything to change, and they have both trained people to live with the way things are, and divided people in a way that blames their fellow Americans, instead of everyone uniting together to take them down. There are many hypothetical “theys” that politicians want to paint as the enemy for people to point their fingers at, and “Rich Men North Of Richmond” buys into that propaganda, but the real enemies are the politicians themselves and that’s who we really need to go after.

I wrote this piece last week, right as the song was starting to get traction, and I wanted to add onto it at the very end, because Anthony has come out in the days since to talk about his thoughts as the song has gotten bigger. He has come out and said he thinks it’s funny that Republicans have co-opted the song, and that it was played at the GOP debate, only because he wrote that song about people like that. He also said that he celebrates diversity, and people need to unite together instead of be torn apart. Those sentiments are fine and dandy, but those welfare lyrics still don’t sit well, nor give me the impression he loves diversity, and the fact that he hasn’t quite denounced his Republican fanbase is telling. You can say you’re an “independent” all you want, but most people that say that, they lean towards the right. It’ll be interesting to see where the song lands on the Billboard 100 this week, considering the hype has pretty much disappeared, as to be expected, but we’ll see.

[oddree13]

Restless Year - Chapter 7

(Part 1) (Part 2) (Part 3) (Part 4)

(Prior Chapter) (Next Chapter)

(Read on AO3)

Chapter 7 - Be My Baby

November 1989

“I know you hate the city but a deal’s a deal, Wayne. We come for Turkey day and you come up here for the first two nights of Hanukkah.”

“But won’t you be at the shop?” Wayne huffs, and Eddie can tell he’s on the porch outside his double-wide smoking. 

“During the day for a bit, but I want to show it to you! I know Steve sent you photos of the inside but it doesn’t do it justice,” Eddie pleads, despite knowing his uncle is just giving him a hard time for fun. “I even got a nice Johnny Cash and Woody Guthrie record to play while you're in the store. None of my music, promise.”

“Fine, but only because if I say no I’ve got to deal with Steve’s puppy eyes all throughout the football game. Why’d you have to go and mate the kind of man who can wrap you around his finger?”

“Because he did exactly that Wayne and I was happy to let him. Now Steve is going to get the bird from a deli here and we’ll drive in Wednesday night. And did you look into that thing I asked you about?” Eddie whispers, turning into the phone so Steve can’t hear him from the living room. 

“I did that and I did the other thing too. They won’t be in town so don’t gotta worry about them seein’ ya,” Wayne assures and some of the anxiety seeps out of Eddie. The Harrington house has been empty for months now but Eddie didn’t want to take that chance.

“Thank you again and we’ll see you soon. Love ya.” Eddie hangs up the phone and goes to join Steve on their sofa where he’s reading something for class. He can see his eyes squinting and honestly thinks the younger man should think about getting glasses. 

“Seems like you won the argument. How many rounds of convincing is this?” Steve queries, not looking up from the page.

“Three. You’d think with months' notice, a bus ticket, and me assuring him that ‘no it would not be an issue’ over and over again that I could make it through one call without him waffling, but no. I had to convince him again.”

“What won him over this time?”

Eddie wants to lie because if he tells Steve the truth his mate will be insufferably smug. But lucky for Eddie he enjoys that look on Steve. “He said he wanted to watch the Lions game in peace and didn’t want to deal with your, and I quote, puppy eyes, throughout the match. Seems the Harrington charm works on all the Munsons.”

“Good to know. And he’s right, I would have guilted him but only between downs.”

“I still don’t know what that means Steve.”

“And that’s why I can win your uncle over. I make his nephew happy AND I can talk about sports. And speaking of making you happy, I called the court today and they have spots in a week to sign the papers. But I sort of had another idea.”

“Another idea? If this is your way of wanting to back out of this arrangement, it’s a little too late princess. The ink on the paper might not be set, but the ink on my neck is.”

Steve rolls his eyes and goes forward without acknowledging Eddie’s comment. “No, I was thinking that we should wait a week and just register our bonding at the courthouse in Hawkins. I called and they’ve got openings. Thought it might be nice to do it back where we met.”

Eddie turns to look at his mate. Steve is still focused on the paper in front of him but isn’t reading, which tells Eddie he’s nervous about his suggestion. Depending on the day Hawkins is still a sore spot for both of them so he understands Steve’s hesitation. 

“I mean that could be nice, but doesn’t that mean the whole town would find out? I mean last I checked the Hawkins Post still lists out all the marriage announcements in the Sunday Edition.” It clicks for Eddie as he finishes that thought. Steve wants that. He wants the whole town to know.

“Would that be so bad?” Steve wonders, his voice cautious and small. 

“Not at all, baby. My only regret is that I won’t be able to see the look on your dad’s face when he opens his Sunday edition and finds out we bonded as he tries to complete the crossword.” The image earns a laugh from Steve who tells Eddie his parents only get the Chicago Tribune at the house. 

“It’s not going to stop people from gossiping. I bet my mom will get a grey hair each time someone tries to congratulate her on her new son-in-law.”

"Well, that right there is the cherry on top. Why don't you book us a spot for the Friday after Thanksgiving so we can wrangle Robin into being our witness? And I know I've asked you before but are you sure you don't want to do anything? I know you keep saying you don't want a wedding but-"

"I don't want a wedding Eds. If you really want to make it special get a nice collared shirt to go under your leather jacket so I'm not the only one dressing up for our courthouse date."

"Whatever you want Stevie."

*

“Steve, I’m supposed to ask you if you have the numbers for December yet,” Carmen asks as Steve walks into Smash Records. Following the success of his Halloween analysis, Eddie and Moxie pleaded with him to run numbers for the holiday rush which makes Steve wonder how they’d been running the shop in the black for the last ten years. 

“And why are you asking me and not my lovely mate?” Steve inquires, looking around the shop for said mate. 

“Because Eddie thinks you’ll be nice to me and give me an actual answer instead of sarcasm,” they admit, and honestly they're not wrong. It’s not that Steve isn’t running the numbers,he is. It’s just that finals are coming up and he feels like everything is starting to run him down, making normal work take longer. He’s found mornings harder to deal with, and a few times his warm showers have left him nauseous to the point of almost vomiting.

“Well, my answer depends on whether or not you have the pecan pie recipe I asked for. I’ve got an uncle to win over in a few days and I’m not trying to find good bourbon for it in suburban Indiana.”

Carmen reaches behind the counter and passes Steve a recipe card. “One chocolate bourbon pecan pie recipe as requested. Numbers please?” Their smile reminds Steve of the kids when trying to get something, and with a fond roll of his eyes, Steve reaches into his satchel for the folder. 

“All here, including some ideas of how many CDs to stock since they're growing in popularity, much to your fearless leader’s dismay. He really doesn’t want to start collecting a whole new medium.” 

“We’ve all heard the rants, believe me. But really, thanks for this. Eddie tells us you’re going back to your hometown for Thanksgiving. Seeing your kids for the holiday?” 

Steve has to laugh and honestly prefer it to the question he’s been getting all week at school - ‘seeing your family for Thanksgiving?’. He inherently knows it's an innocent question, so he just nods along, not eager to explain his situation to casual acquaintances. But it seems Carmen has been clued into Steve’s extended pack. 

“Yeah, we’re staying with Eddie’s uncle. It’ll be a day of me cooking while Eddie does his best to derail me. Giving both Wayne and me a headache as he fails to grasp football for another year. Usually, the Friday after we’ll get together with our pack for what has been dubbed ‘The Byers Leftovers Feast’ where everyone just brings their leftovers and chows down. Most of the kids are in town for the break so it’ll be good to see them. And no doubt remind me the entire time that they are indeed, not children.”

“That sounds like a fun time. And if you happen to have leftover pie or are tempted to bake a test run, feel free to send it with Eddie,” Carmen hints as Steve walks to the back office to find his mate. 

Eddie is on the phone when Steve walks in, fidgeting with a rogue d20 on his desk. 

“No, no, you are not covering this. I don’t care if you say it’s a gift, it’s not a gift if I’m springing this on you. I’m an adult now Jim, with money gotten through legal means,” he argues, clearly frustrated with the person on the other line. Steve knocks on the door to announce his presence, causing Eddie to lose balance on his seat and flail a bit to stay upright. 

“I’ve got to go but this discussion is not over,” Eddie mutters before hanging up the phone. “Hey there Stevie, did you talk to Carmen?”

“They have the numbers and I have pie. But stop sicing your employees on me, Eddie.”

“But you don’t say no to most of them so they’re a great asset to my arsenal. Thank you again by the way. My store mathematics only extends to inventory and cashing out the register.” Eddie gets up and walks over to Steve, shutting the door behind him before pulling him in for a kiss. “Hey, there gorgeous.”

“Hey there yourself. Who was that on the phone by the way?”

Eddie glances back to the phone and just shrugs. “No one important. Just calling in a favor that someone is taking too seriously. But you have good timing, I was about to take my mid-day power nap, and what better person to use as a pillow than my perfect mate.”

“You love using that word don’t you?”

“I do Stevie, I do. But less talk more sleep. C’mon.”

*

The ride to Hawkins is uneventful. They leave after rush-hour dies down, opting to drive at dusk rather than deal with the bumper-to-bumper hell that was I-90 getting out of the city. The turkey is chilling in the trunk in a cooler already, and Eddie is still bitching that he had to carry the bird down three flights of stairs. Their much finessed ‘Car Compromise Mix 4’ plays on the radio, filing in the gaps in Eddie’s monologue. 

Somewhere just past the border of Illinois, they switch spots, Eddie taking the wheel while Steve takes his turn to stare out the passenger window. It’s been six months since they left Hawkins. It both sounds like a long time and not enough time. Distance from the town that brought them together while giving them nightmares has been good for them both, and not just for the freedom it’s given them. Steve noticed the night terrors began to lessen within weeks of being in Chicago. Eddie smoked less as a result, and Steve’s dependency on caffeine had lessened. Sure his bat is still in the closet, but it’s no longer under the bed within reach. 

Steve’s not naive enough to have imagined they’d never return. As long as one of the pack remained in Hawkins there would always be a pull beyond the lingering fear of the upside-down. And for as much as he agreed to come back and continue their Thanksgiving tradition with Wayne…a part of him wonders when they’ll opt to stay in Chicago, making their own traditions and rituals. 

Holidays weren’t an easy thing for Steve. Growing up he remembers looking forward to events like Easter and Christmas until he realized that it was another part of the Harrington facade. It was only there to showcase how they were a nice Christian family and there was no need to look any closer. Once Steve was out of his childhood years the traditions stopped as there was no longer currency in family photo cards or Christmas parties at the Harrington home. They were traded for formal winter galas and an envelope of cash for Steve to buy what he wanted. Throughout high school Steve spent the Eve of the holiday with a friend or date, lying through his teeth about his family plans for the next day. 

After their second encounter with the upside-down Dustin spilled the beans to his mother that Steve would be alone for Christmas, which led to a few years of intruding on Henderson holidays. It’s not that he didn’t appreciate it, on the contrary, he had his own stocking over the fireplace, but he knew it wouldn’t always be his tradition. This is why in the winter of ‘86 Steve was all too happy to accept Eddie’s invitation to watch Little Shop of Horrors and get takeout. They’ve been doing it ever since. It wasn’t a hardship to leave the rituals of his childhood behind, especially when they’ve been to actual hell and back. So for now he doesn’t mind going to Hawkins, but hopes that soon Wayne will trek into the city for Thanksgiving and more.

“Okay, I know something is up. Whitney Houston is playing and you aren’t singing along. What gives?”

“Didn’t know you missed my singing voice. I’ll happily oblige.”

“I don’t think you can call your tuneless caterwauling a singing voice but go on. Entertain me, princess.

*

The courthouse is unsurprisingly empty. It’s the Friday after Thanksgiving and every employee inside looks hungover and ready to go home.  

Steve and Robin are sitting outside of the family division waiting for Eddie who insisted on Steve getting ready at Robin’s - “it’s bad luck to see the bride before the wedding”. Steve knows he just wants to make an entrance. His knee is bouncing again with anticipation, and Robin can’t help but tease him. 

“Steve, do I need to remind you that you and Eddie are already mated, so I’m really not sure why you’re nervous. And stop playing with your tie, you’re going to crease it,” she chides, smacking his hand. 

Steve is grateful that he only needs one witness for this as he doesn’t think he could have handled more than Robin. He knows Dustin will be disappointed when he finds out, but he didn’t want to be fussed over. Instead, he had Robin tease him as he ironed his khaki slacks and navy blazer, reminding Steve that he was getting married to Eddie Munson, not going on a yacht. 

“I’m not nervous, I’m excited. This is the last step, Robin. We got engaged, mated, and now we’re signing the last bit of paper that makes it very difficult for Eddie to change his mind about us.”

The comment rips a snort from Robin. “Right because after one year of pining and two years of dating, today is the day Eddie is going to change his mind. Don’t think I didn’t see his newest tattoo, Steve. That man is head over heels for you.”

“That I am Buckley, but no heels today. I wore my nice boots!”

Eddie is walking towards them in what he considers his nice boots, holding a bouquet of pansies. His hair is pulled back, and under his black leather jacket, Eddie has the promised button-down shirt complete with a tie he probably borrowed from Wayne. He looks gorgeous, Steve thinks, and gets up to kiss him, only to be blocked by Eddie’s hand. 

“Nuh uh-uh, that comes after the papers, Stevie. I’m going through all this effort to keep you honest and you’re about to ruin it before the finish line.” A tug on Steve’s tie pulls him close, as Eddie leans in to whisper in his ear. “You look good by the way.”

“So do you. Ready?”

“Been ready,” he grins and walks forward to open the door to the clerk’s office. 

Steve walks in first and goes to the desk to sign in only to see a familiar face behind the counter - Nicole Anderson. Steve hasn’t seen her since that whole debacle with Jonathan and Nancy and didn’t imagine anyone his age would be working at the courthouse. 

“You know I saw your name on the schedule and convinced myself that it must be another Steve Harrington, because there was no way King Steve was settling down.” 

Steve does his best to not bristle at the nickname and just gives a tight-lipped nod. “Yeah, been with my mate for about three years now? We figured it was time.”

Nicole leans over to look behind Steve and her eyes land on Robin. “Is that Robin Buckley? I mean there were always rumors,” Nicole starts, only to have her words interrupted by the sight of Eddie Munson looping an arm around Steve’s waist. 

“I wouldn’t go suggesting that. Robbie’s alpha is the protective sort. Nah, Stevie here mated me,” Eddie supplies. “And we would very much like to register that today if you don’t mind.”

The look of utter bewilderment on Nicole's face is worth the awkward interaction. She passes the clipboard with the form and tells them to fill it out before she bolts to the back, saying something about needing more certificate paper.

“Well if you all wanted to be the town gossip you’ll certainly get that with or without the paper," Robin giggles, watching the now empty chair swivel. 

“Fine by me.” Steve takes a seat and begins filling out the form, checking box after box. By the time they're done Steve is sliding the clipboard back through the window to another clerk who assures them the certificate will be right out. Steve doesn't miss the group of people staring at them through the swinging door. 

“I do not miss that,” Eddie whistles. The trio makes small talk until the clerk comes back with a fancy-looking document. 

“Gentleman if you'll just come and sign there you'll be all set.”

Steve walks up next to Eddie and signs his name. A part of him feels like he should say something, but before he can think of something Eddie is pulling him aside for a kiss as Robin puts her name on the witness line. 

“You're mine forever now Steve Harrington.”

The clerk is blushing between them and informs Eddie that the certified copy will be sent by mail along with the name change forms. He thanks them and walks out of the room holding Steve's hand. 

*

“I know it's a tradition but we can totally leave the Byers Leftovers Feast early and go celebrate. Maybe head down to the lake?”

Steve's suggestion earns a gag from Robin, who reminds them that they're married adults who can fuck in a bed. Steve flicks her off in return. 

“As if any of the kids will let us escape. Besides, everyone is in town for once and I know you miss everyone.”

It's odd seeing so many cars in front of the Byers-Hopper house but Steve figures the kids are just finally making use of their licenses. Robin walks in ahead with the excuse of going to find Nancy, but Steve figures she's just dying to change. 

Steve moves towards the house but finds Eddie holding him back. 

“Hey, just a second before we go in there." Steve figures that Eddie wants a moment to themselves before the chaos of seeing their friends. 

“I know you said you didn't want a wedding.”

“Because I don't Eddie.”

“I know, I know Steve. But this still deserves to be celebrated. We deserve to be celebrated. Which is why through those doors isn't the Byers Leftovers Feast. It's our wedding reception, Stevie. And I really hope you're not mad at me for planning it.”

It takes Steve a moment to process just what Eddie is saying. He looks at the door and then back at Eddie. For a second he lets himself hope that somehow his parents are here but knows that's a stupid pipe dream he doesn't actually want. What he really wants is his chosen pack and from the way the lawn is packed he's getting exactly that. 

Steve reaches up to cup Eddie's face, pulling the alpha close. “I'm not mad Eddie. At all. Thank you. You didn't have to. You never have to. But you always do.” Steve kisses Eddie like he'd wanted to in the courthouse. His lips press against Eddie, pouring into him every ounce of affection and love he has for this man. How he appreciates every effort Eddie has been making to show off their bond. The rings, the Halloween party, the mark, and now this. 

“Let's go celebrate Eddie.”

Champagne bottles pop as soon as they walk through the door. Everyone is dressed up and the inside of the Byers' living room is decorated. Jonathan is there snapping photos as they walk in and hug everyone, and Steve wonders what vinyls Eddie had to trade to get that favor.  

Joyce wraps Steve in a hug as soon as the kids get off him, while Hopper is showing Eddie the spread. "I'm not going to hear a word about any of this alright? It's a gift," he insists and suddenly the discussion Steve overheard in Eddie's office last week makes sense. 

Among the guests are Wayne, Karen, Claudia, and even Charlie.  A few of Eddie's Hellfire friends are there along with Jeff and Gareth. Everywhere Steve and Eddie turn someone is ready to congratulate them, ask them about Chicago, and give their two cents on married life. Food and drink are handed to them without asking and they spend a lot of time trying to find a way back to each other's side.

When the music starts playing Steve looks and finds Max with a pile of mix tapes at the ready. Robin pulls Steve to dance and despite Eddie insisting he would not be dancing, El wins him over with a small 'please'. The middle of the Byers’ living room turns into a dance floor, alternating between pop hits and heavier songs that Eddie appreciates. 

Steve is just about to sit down to take a break when Eddie catches his hand and pulls him close. Steve recognizes the familiar drum beat coming through the speakers and relaxes into Eddie’s arm. 

“Who picked this, you or Max?”

“I put in this particular request.”

“I didn’t know the Ronettes were on your radar.”

Eddie nods, leaning in to kiss Steve’s cheek. “This was another song on rotation when my mom was still around. And it might have wound up on a mixtape of mine when I was still pathetically pining after you.”

“Is that why you call me baby?” 

Eddie doesn’t answer Steve, opting instead to whisper the song into Steve’s ear until it fades out.