i’ve been listening to jason heath and the greedy soul’s the vain hope of horse since about march, and much like the bombadil record there’s a heck of alot more going on then initially meets the ears. musically its a very nice piece of americana fare w/ nels cline and wayne kramer helping out on a few tracks, but lyrically is where the record really shines. its a pretty politically charged record, but you wouldnt know it if you really didnt listen to what heath was laying down cause the music tempers his lyrics with a less serious tone.

anyway, when i asked if jason would be interested in participating in the “tell me something…” deal i really didnt know what to expect, in fact i dont know what to expect from any of em when they happen to grace my inbox. but i was particularly interested in seeing what he would come up with, and he doesnt disappoint….

here’s a couple upcoming dates not including the flyer of the show above
9/11 – the cat club (sunset strip music fest) 9pm
9/26 – the roxy (scott ford benefit) 8pm
9/30 – air-conditioned supper club (venice) 10pm

far rockaway off the vain hope of horse

here’s jason…..

Let me tell ya something…
I live in Los Angeles, CA, just minutes from a place known affectionately as “Skid Row.” A few times a week I take a group of developmentally disabled men and women down to place called The Midnight Mission. There, we commence to roll hundreds of forks into napkins for the afternoon lunch service, where, depending on the time of the month, (you see some folks get the general relief checks and can eat at home for a few days before the dough runs out) we will serve lunch to a few hundred hungry individuals, sometimes as many as 1,000, three times a day…365 days a year.

I don’t mention this to pat myself on the back, nor am I campaigning for sainthood. You see, both of these groups of people have something in common: they’re both being cut out of the American dream one budget slash at a time. You see, in the richest nation on earth we only seem to find the will to bailout the bloated, greedy, myopic corporations. But, when it comes time to lend a hand to the truly needy, well… it’s every man/woman/child for themselves. We’d better not help too much; “Why, that’d be un-American” or even worse: “SOCIALIST”!

When I hear the debate over nationalized healthcare – “Too many Bureaucracies” or “We won’t have as many choices,” I’d like to offer those folks a chance to visit a place where there aren’t any options for most. Yes, some are suffering from drug addiction, alcoholism and other maladies our society deems undesirable. Before we brand them “deserving of their fate”… why don’t we ask ourselves why we’re so tolerant of the “disease of conceit” and GREED? I think probably because those traits have, sadly, become the defining characteristics of our nation. We have the will to build bombs to drop indiscriminately in the name of freedom. We sentimentally morn the possibility of the loss of FORD or GM. But the life of a mentally ill woman on the streets of downtown L.A.? – “Well, that’s really not our problem.”

I say it is our problem. A Systemic Problem! Until we can muster the will to understand that behind every hungry, sick face in this nation, this world, there abides a friend, a sister, a brother, a father, or a mother. The very people that populate all our lives. How can we even begin to talk about “freeing the populations of other nations” if we’re exporting our brand of callous “tough love” consumerism to the rest of the world? Maybe they’re better off without it.

The developmentally disabled guys and gals I mentioned earlier – the ones who donate their time to help out down on skid row, are facing the third “cutback” to their funding this year. When will the corporate welfare state end? How long do we just watch helplessly? More and more people suffer whilst we debate the evils of liberalism, too many bureaucracies, and the “trend toward socialism”. That doesn’t mean shit to a hungry, sick child! Shame on us if we don’t find our way out of this “Town Without Pity.”*

Sincerely
Jason Heath

*see “The Vain Hope Of Horse” by Jason Heath & The Greedy Souls

related posts

• jason heath and the greedy souls (3)
• tell me something with john gleason of roadside graves (1)
• tell me something with bryan rahija of bombadil (1)
• tell me something with adam killip of the tailors (3)