Protests, Moonlit Fishing, Philadelphia, and More

Hi folks!  Happy Father’s Day to the dads out there.

Been a wild week for the world, but when is it not these days?  Yesterday morning we were on our way to the Minneapolis No Kings protest with Zippy when we found out that it had been cancelled due to a shelter-in-place order.  A state senator and state representative had been shot by a far right terrorist impersonating a police officer.  The state rep, her husband, and their dog were killed.  Her name was Melissa Hortman, and she was the architect of the “Minnesota Miracle” legislative session that passed an avalanche of progressive laws in the state.

We decided to leave Zippy at home, obviously, but I headed over to the St Paul protest, because, you know, fuck that.  Can’t let political violence from fascist terrorists get exactly what they want.  And you know what?  The turnout was incredible, just like it was in the rest of the nation.  On a very dark day, it was inspiring.

I thought about sharing with you this amazing speech that was given by Minneapolis poet “Guante” that I recorded on my phone’s voice memos.  I also thought about sharing with you a song I’ve been working on, but it’s not quite there yet.

Here’s what I want to share instead.

This is audio I recorded from the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness last month while fishing as the full moon rose and the frogs and loons chattered and the wind gently blew.  I went up there with my Minneapolis pals Eric  (who recorded several Taxpayers albums) and Tony (who played banjo and piano on some early Taxpayers albums), and we didn’t see another human being for 4 days.  It was perfect. I've attached a few pictures.

This audio makes me feel calm and happy and makes me contemplate the things in life that really matter.  I hope it does the same for you.

In other news, there is some juicy drama happening with the upcoming Philadelphia Taxpayers show at World Cafe Live.  Much of the staff at World Cafe Live began picketing Wednesday evening to protest wage disruption, executive incompetence, hostile behavior by new CEO Joseph Callahan, and more.  Many of those employees were then terminated.

We got in touch with the striking workers and sent the CEO and Board Members of World Cafe Live an email letting them know that we are prepared to move the show to another venue if the workers’ very reasonable demands are not met by Wednesday, June 18th.

I think some of your Song of the Week Clubbers are in the Philadelphia area, so heads up that we might be moving the show out of solidarity with the striking workers.  We’ll know for sure one way or the other by Wednesday, and I’ll keep you all in the loop.

If you’d like to read our email, get some more context on the workers’ demands, or just read up on the situation, you can do so here.

Anyway, that’s all for now. 

Keep on loving, keep on fighting, hold on for your life.