Rant #1,591: King Day

Today is Martin Luther King Jr. Day in the United States.

This day has been set aside to honor the memory of civil rights activist Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Today is supposed to be a day of duty for Americans, a day of volunteerism to honor the memory of Dr. King.

I know the day's founders probably aren't too happy about his, but over the years, it has become nothing but another holiday to celebrate rampant consumerism, with every store worth its brick and mortar existence having sales today.

Me, I work on King Day. My wife works, and now, so does our son.

Heck, in my professional life, I personally, have never had this day off from work.

So much for volunteerism.

Anyway, this past weekend saw winter voluntarily came back to my neck of the woods.

We finally had some snowfall, and what was first supposed to be nothing but a dusting became a little bit more, nothing horrid, but I still had to clean off my car when I picked up my son from work last night.

Just a week earlier, several municipalities in my area registered record warmth, and it was nearly 60 degrees where I live just a week earlier.

This winter may be sneaky, but honestly, you cannot continue to expect 60 degree temperatures as we go through January, February, March, and the even sneakier beginning of April, which to me, is the strangest month on the calendar for weather. Early in April, you can have frigid temperatures and snow, while around my birthday at the end of the month, you can have 90 degree temperatures.

While I was sitting in my car waiting for my son to finish work yesterday, I got a chance to listen from beginning to end--I finished up listening as I was driving both of us home--to David Bowie's final new release, "Blackstar," and I am going to give you an honest appraisal of it, not what you hear from people who are going to give it a five-star rating because they want to honor him in death.

It is a good album, but to me, not a memorable one from Bowie.

He goes from techno pop to harder rock to truly melodious music on this LP, so it is really a tour de force, showing us once again that Bowie can go from one genre to another with ease.

At one moment, you swear you are listening to Nine Inch Nails, the next moment, is Barry Manilow in the house?

The creepiest song from the LP, but not the best song on it, is "Lazarus," where Bowie seems to be personally confronting his upcoming demise in front of our eyes and ears.

Personally, I would say that one should listen to this song before they see the video, because the video puts the images in your head rather than you creating those images from listening to the song.

It really is a creepy song, sort of a mix of "Heroes" and "Scary Monsters" slowed down, yet on speed.

Actually, in my mind, the two best songs on the album run into each other at the end of the disk. "Dollar Days" and "I Can't Give Everything Away" are excellent pop tunes that really get into your brain, really counterpoints to the noise that the first few songs are.

And they let on that this guy knew his time was going to be up really soon, but he wasn't going to leave us without one or two more jabs to our pop sensibility.

So all in all, "Blackstar" is a good album, but let's not make it into what it is not, which is a terrific album.

More than anything, it is a going away present from Bowie to his fans, and he did leave us in style with this release.

Not perfect, but good enough.

So as we celebrate Dr. King Day, let me ask you one thing.

While you are lounging around, volunteering to take it easy today, please think of me as I toil at my work.

There's nothing worse than working on a holiday that is a holiday for everyone else but you, and that is what I am doing today.

Bah!