By Stephen Pate
Tickets for the Bob Dylan Modern Times Tour at Moncton, Halifax and St. John’s went on pre-sale today.
Reviews of his Southwest, Mexican and South American performances have been glowing.
This is Dylan’s only Northeastern tour until mid-summer. After St. John’s, Dylan heads to Europe.
St. John NB doesn’t have pre-sales yet.
The open sale starts Saturday (check the venues for times)
Sales are brisk. I could only get mid-way along the lower bowl at supper time.
I couldn’t be happier than to find out Bob Dylan and his band will be playing 4 cities in Atlantic Canada this spring.
Starting in St. John NB on May 19th, he will move to Moncton on the 20th, Halifax on the 21st and St. John’s NF on May 24th. Must be taking the slow boat to Newfoundland.
This is the same tour he did a few years back, only in reverse.
This is a don’t miss tour. I saw Dylan 3 times each during the summers of 2005 and 2006. The music was awesome. The crowds super filled with everyone from babies to boomers.
Guess where I’ll be that week.
Tickets go on sale March 29th.
By Stephen Pate
With Cohen touring we are getting lots of newspaper inches about how wonderful he is. Nice to see the accolades but please ladies and gentlemen, let’s put it in perspective.
The Guardian called Cohen “arguably the greatest singer-songwriter of modern times”. I guess the key word is “arguably” in the phrase. The line is fluff from his official webpage.
Cohen is the child of Bob Dylan who clearly holds the title of greatest singer songwriter. Dylan created the modern poet singer songwriter and keeps creating at over 800 songs. Most modern singer songwriters credit Dylan as a main influence. He even influenced the Beatles.
On hearing Dylan, Cohen is reported to have said – if he can do that so can I.
What about Paul McCartney and then the duo Lennon/McCartney? Then there’s Tom Waits and Paul Simon and a host of others.
Here’s the BBC poll on Dylan’s 60th birthday of top singer songwriters.
Bob Dylan: 32.65%
John Lennon: 18.83%
Bob Marley: 13.64%
Paul McCartney: 8.47%
Paul Simon: 6.73%
Cole Porter: 5.63%
Jim Morrison: 4.44%
Eminem: 3.50%
Joni Mitchell: 3.47%
Irving Berlin: 2.64%
Cohen doesn’t make that list but he is 6th on the Paste Top 10
The Top 10
10. Prince
9. Joni Mitchell
8. Elvis Costello
7. Brian Wilson (The Beach Boys)
6. Leonard Cohen
5. Paul McCartney (The Beatles, Wings)
4. Tom Waits & Kathleen Brennan
3. Bruce Springsteen
2. Neil Young (Buffalo Sprinfield, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young)
1. Bob Dylan
St. Paddy’s Day usually presents itself as an opportunity to connect with Irish roots, as opposed to dark roots, in a loud and liquor filled place. All good and all done many times before.
Yesterday my procrastination got the better of me and I was working feverishly on a story about Lennie Gallant, ok maybe just working would be accurate. The deadline was midnight – no article, no party.
I missed the Richard Wood and Robert Arsenault performance at Brennan’s at 4 pm since my friends called me when it was over. That would have been sweet. Kier Kenny created the event on Facebook but neglected to invite anyone except Trudi. I’m trying to date a clairvoyant so I can know when they are doing fun and imaginative things at Brennan’s.
Just as my story was done, Pierre Bujold called and wanted to go to Churchill Arms. So off we went for a few brews. Joining us was Dave Prendergast back from Halifax and a whole cast of characters from the pub like Richard Kurial and…well we won’t report names.
We had the bubbly Irish music. People were dancing up near the smoking door and of course the Guinness flowed freely.
We talked art and music and no politics. For the first time in years I remember what happened.
By Preston Gralla
An investigation by the U.K.’s National Consumer Council has recommended that Microsoft and 16 other software companies be investigated for unfair practices related to End User License Agreements (EULAs). The investigation found that as a result of the way the EULA are designed and written, consumers agree to unfair terms, and sign away their legal rights without realizing it.
The NCC report found that software companies, including Microsoft, “mislead computer users into signing away legal rights.” It concludes that Microsoft and other software companies, “are shifting the legal burden onto consumers who buy computer programmes, leaving them with less protection than when they buy a cheap biro (pen).”
According to the NCC report:
The survey found a widespread lack of clear, upfront information written in plain English. More than half of the 25 products surveyed did not mention on the packaging that the consumer has to sign an end user licence agreement (EULA) before they can use it.
Among the offending products are Microsoft’s Microsoft Office for Mac standard edition) 2004, and Microsoft Office 2007 (standard edition).
Microsoft isn’t alone in their practices; the NCC is recommending that 16 other companies be investigated as well. Here’s the entire list: Adobe, Microsoft, Apple, Chief Architect, Symantec, Magix, Nero, Corel, Sega, Nova Development, Britannica, Sonic Solutions, Twelve Tone Systems, THQ, GSP, McAfee, and Kaspersky.
Here are the main examples of EULA problems the report found:
* complex wording and widespread use of legal jargon
* legal uncertainty, with frequent references to legislation in other countries
* immediate contract termination rights for the provider
* the right for the provider to remove services without notice
* ambiguous references to ‘statutory rights’
* restrictions on the transfer of the users’ rights to a third party
* excessive exclusion of liability.
Does any of this surprise you? Me, neither. No one I know bothers to the read incomprehensible legal rules embedded in a EULA before installing software. They take for granted that the game is fixed against them.
The NCC is asking that the European Commission investigate, and has also referred the matter to the UK’s Office of Fair Trading (OFT). I’m not sure if anything will come of it, but here’s hoping it will. If you want to read the full report, by the way, here’s where to get it.
PerryInk: used with permission