No Place For Grief

Part of the problem with the wholesale removal of the blues from popular music is that there’s no place for grief or lamentation any more. If you don’t think that’s a by-product of advertisers who only want you unhappy because you haven’t bought what they’ve told you to buy, you’d better think again.

Members of the bluegrass brain trust have actually said, on various discussion boards, that songs about sick and dying kids are irrelevant in this day and time. Gotta keep those advertisers interested, you know. So, blues, one of the building blocks of bluegrass, is fast-disappearing from that music, too.

But I digress.

The fact is, kids do sicken and die, even now. People do hear about the passing of loved ones after it’s too late to say goodbye. These same people sometimes only realize how fiercely they loved and needed someone after that someone is gone for good.

The psychotherapist’s office should not be the only place we can talk about these things. The fact is, we need the blues.

This is Son House with “Death Letter Blues”.