Bulls On Parade.

             I spent last summer living in Russia--in Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk--on Sakhalin Island.

     I came home a year ago this week.

     I guess unless you're an astronaut, there's nothing quite like landing almost 24 hours after take-off in the middle of a culture where you are instantly illiterate and will be for a while.

     If ever you can, man, just do it.

     Reading, writing, drawing, and music were my tethers there, as they are here; sublime Russian ladies and Baltika 7 helped, too...

     Tom Morello is the guitarist for "Rage Against The Machine"--RATM--and he also performs as his alter-ego, "The Nightwatchman", allowing him the opportunity to be a "One Man Revolution", the title of Morello's first solo disc.

     I listened to "Revolution" constantly in Yuzhno, and sang along to my iPod as I walked potholed Russian streets.

     It kicked ass.

     Still does.

     "One Man Revolution" will always remind me of Russia, which may be strange as it seems like such an American tale. 

     But, then, as an American expat in Russia, maybe those songs hit me harder there than they did (or do) here, walking in my comfort zone, blissfully barefoot along this gleaming Strand. 

     RATM were in the Twin Cities for the Republican National Convention--TBLMISBT was there, too--and they are far superior patriots than all the red, white, and blue-clad, buttoned-up yutzes at that freak-fest combined.

     And that certainly includes the cops.

 

     "The Nightwatchman's" latest--"The Fabled City"--comes out September 30.   

     

     "And I will sing to myself

     that I'm gonna be free.

     But the road I must travel,

     it's end I cannot see."

     It's a couple of weeks down the road now, but check out this report and video of RATM at the RNC, from The Nation, via AlterNet anyway:

             http://www.alternet.org/blogs/video/99022/the_relentless_activism_of_tom_morello/#more