The two oldest surviving British veterans of the First World War.Above: Henry William Allingham, aged 112
Below: Harry Patch, aged 110
Both men intend to be present at the ceremony at the Cenotaph in London to commemorate Armistice Day this coming Tuesday, ninety years after the end of the war.
Photograph of Henry Allingham, 2008, by Martin Roemers, published in The Independent online, with the caption "released to support Willam Henry Allingham's work as the face of the World War One Veterans' Association." The photograph of Harry Patch, 2007, published by the Daily Mail . . . which itself gives no photo credit to anyone.
michael
ReplyDeleteOn a completely different topic, I would be interested to hear what you think of Paul Westerberg..
He seems to me to be one of the best songwriters around today and one of the few (like Lou Reed, Leonard Cohen, John Prine and Bruce Springsteen) who have used the influence they drew from Dylan in the same way that he dealt with that of Woody Guthrie - as a step towards finding their own voice...
Speaking of Paul Westerberg, here's a quote from a recent interview he did with Spin Magazine
ReplyDeleteWESTERBERG: "I felt that way meeting Keith [Richards], but even more so with Bob Dylan. We couldn't get out of the parking lot of this studio because there was a car in the way, so we banged on the door, like, "Somebody move this fucking car!" and Bob pops his head out. So he invites me to hang out at the session while some lackey moves the car and starts playing me his new stuff as I'm shitting myself. He had Jakob with him, who wanted to meet the band. We were speechless, we didn't know what to say, but he was a normal fucking guy"
Jakob Dylan has frequently mentioned Westerberg as being one of his favourite songwriters.
In relation to Paul Westerberg, here's a quote from an interview with Jakob Dylan a while back:
ReplyDeleteWith Dylan's writing style, it's not surprising that he might find interesting parallels between his own career and that of a certain legendary Minnesota-born songwriter.
Paul Westerberg, of course.
Dylan points to the Minneapolis native and former leader of the Replacements as a prime influence on his own songwriting. He has a kinship with Westerberg, he says, and feels both of them are reluctant songwriters, doing it because they have to, not that they want to.
"I do find him to be one of the better songwriters America has ever offered," Dylan says. "I listen to all his stuff. I've always been a huge fan of Paul Westerberg.
"I really admired and was interested in the fact that he seemed to be this reckless character in this somewhat punk-pop group," says Dylan. "He had this attitude, then somewhere, these songs started creeping through, songs like 'Sixteen Blue,' 'Androgynous,' 'Unsatisfied,' and 'Answering Machine.' You started to realize he had this undeniable gift for writing that the average guy in these kinds of groups could never touch on. He seemed to resist it for a long time, also, but he obviously was into something he couldn't deny.