Tuesday, June 13, 2017

The one and only Laura Nyro

Hope you caught Ruth's "Laura Nyro."

Now go catch UNCUT, they've posted their Laura Nyro article online:

There is an abiding image of Laura Nyro as the black sheep at the crowning of the counterculture. On June 17, 1967, the 19-year-old played Monterey. According to cousin and confidant Alan Merrill, the moment producer Lou Adler called and asked Nyro to play, “Her lips went blue from the shock.” Once she recovered, she started sketching costumes. Her outfit was a black dress that hung off one shoulder, forming a batwing beneath the other arm. A decade later, Kate Bush and Stevie Nicks would take this look mainstream. In ’67, Nyro came off as an earnest East Coaster in a field of flower children.
Onstage at Monterey, Nyro would have preferred to perform at the piano, but there was little precedent for a young female artist playing her own songs, and the house band struggled with her complex charts. Certain she had heard the crowd booing, Nyro demanded that DA Pennebaker omit her performance from his documentary. When he reviewed the footage in 1997, he discovered these were cries of “beautiful!” and invited her to see for herself, but Nyro died from ovarian cancer before she could resolve her fear. The film shows the Russian Jewish/Italian Catholic girl from the Bronx to be the greatest white female soul singer until Amy Winehouse emerged four decades later. “Wedding Bell Blues” sparkles with festive harmonies, while on “Poverty Train”, Nyro searches the sky as she details a bad trip. She’s vulnerable and dramatic, and appears daunted by her own power.
Contrast this tentative performance with a solo appearance at LA’s Troubadour in 1969. In attendance was Jackson Browne, songwriter, admirer and aspiring artist. (Joni Mitchell was also allegedly there, taking notes. “She was the only female singer-songwriter at the time that I knew,” she would tell PBS.) “She had brought in a grand piano,” Browne recalls. “Her fans were so crazy about her that, in between each song, she’d walk out to the edge of the stage and pace the front to rolling applause. Then she’d compose herself, and go into another song. I’d never seen anything like it. She wore a red velvet dress – she was not like the freaks, the hippies she was playing to. Her audience was just wilding for her. But she was a diva; she took this in her stride.” Browne laughs. “There was no false modesty in Laura! Never any, ‘Oh, you’re too kind’, she just expected it.”

 

I think I may review an album in Laura's catalogue.

Closing with C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot:"


Tuesday, June 13, 2017.  The Mosul Slog continues, deportations of Iraqis begin in the US, and much more.



The never-ending Mosul Slog continues.  Day 237.


And the 'accomplishments' just keep rolling in.  As the use of White Phosphorus begins to get coverage, other issues emerge.  James Cogan (WSWS) reminds, "Prior to the allegations of war crimes relating to the use of white phosphorus, evidence had already emerged in Mosul of the torture and extrajudicial murder of alleged ISIS fighters by US-backed forces."


And this morning?






UNHCR issued the following:


Food poisoning incident at Hasansham U2 displacement camp.
Around 800 individuals have been affected by a serious outbreak of food poisoning at Hasansham U2 camp, which houses 6,235 individuals who have been displaced from Mosul and other conflict areas; around 200 people have been taken to hospital. At least one person (a child) has died.
The police authorities are currently carrying out an investigation into the incident.
UNHCR is extremely concerned by events at the camp, which has resulted in at least one casualty, with hundreds of other people falling ill, and more than 200 hospitalised.
Staff have been working closely overnight to coordinate the response with other agencies and the relevant authorities in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq and Baghdad to ensure that those who have fallen ill were able to receive swift medical treatment and that the seriously sick were provided transport to nearby hospitals.
Extra clean water is now being provided at the camp and additional health agencies have been brought in to help in the response.
We are waiting for the police investigations to understand clearly the chain of events and to draw lessons from this tragic incident which will allow agencies to reinforce public health protocols to prevent such situations in the future.
Staff who were at the camp on Wednesday saw many residents being treated by health staff.
It is understood that families became sick, complaining of stomach ache and vomiting, after eating an iftar meal to break the daily Ramadan fast.
One woman receiving treatment in the camp with her daughter and neighbour, told UNHCR staff : "We felt stomach pains as soon as we ate. We felt we couldnt breathe and then saw that our neighbours were all suffering at the same time".
Another elderly man, who was waiting to return to his tent after being treated said: "We're grateful for the assistance you have provided. You have been very good with us".
PHOTOS: UNHCR/ Amira Abd El Khalak
















Zamira Rahim (CNN) reports, "People began vomiting and complaining of stomach pains shortly after Iftar, the evening meal that Muslims eat to break their fasts during Ramadan."  ALJAZEERA adds, "The food was provided by a non-governmental organisation. Authorities have launched a formal investigation into the incident, officials said. The Kurdish news agency Rudaw, citing Erbil's mayor, said the owner of the restaurant that made the food had been arrested."  AP quotes Ministry of Health spokesperson Seif al-Badr stating, "There are 752 cases of food poisoning and two death, a woman and a child."






The tragedy continues Hundreds of people poisoned in IDP camps around , no official statement on what is caused this.







Deadly outbreak of food poisoning strikes Iraqi refugee camp







Day 237 of The Mosul Slog.


Still it continues.

It's produced a record number of refugees.

It's produced War Crimes.

And still it continues.


Igor Kossov (USA TODAY) reports:


The Iraqi military had planned on a big celebration Saturday, the third anniversary of the Islamic State's capture of Mosul, by completing the liberation of Iraq's second-largest city and the militants' last major stronghold in the country. But it didn't happen.
Instead, the military is still struggling to eject a militant group that has shown renewed determination and ferocity than expected despite being heavily outnumbered.




Remember when The Mosul Slog was only supposed to last a couple of weeks?



Meanwhile, in the United States . . .





Replying to 
A daughter of 38-year-old Iraqi immigrant arrested Sunday recalled what happened when ICE agents showed up at her Sterling Hts, MI, home:


ICE has arrested and is planning to deport dozens of Iraqi Christians






Eric London and Niles Niemuth (WSWS) report:
 
In a series of raids Sunday, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents arrested as many as 100 Iraqi immigrants in the Detroit metro area, including Muslims and many Chaldean Catholics, some of whom were reportedly captured while leaving church services.

Family members of the arrestees told the World Socialist Web Site that the detainees were sent to a for-profit prison four hours away near Youngstown, Ohio, from where they face immediate risk of deportation to Iraq.
[. . .]
Relatives say that deportation will be a “death sentence” due to the ongoing war and sectarian strife that has enveloped Iraq since the US invasion of 2003. While ICE claims they are only deporting dangerous criminals, relatives say some of the arrestees were convicted for crimes as minor as marijuana possession and that many of the convictions are decades old.
The decision by the Trump administration to deport refugees to Iraq explodes the claims that the US wars in Iraq and Syria are “humanitarian” interventions aimed at protecting the population. In violation of international law, the US government is sending the arrestees into an active warzone in a region that it continues to bomb. Iraq has been laid to waste by 25 years of permanent US-led war. The death toll is in the millions.





Link to headline article










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