Two RIP's

I've got two wonderful innovators to add to the GNABB cemetery.

RIP John Glenn, 1921-2016

I know it’s a cliché, but do they make men like this anymore? I mean seriously. John Glenn was such of a different era, a different America. An America that was full of hope, that looked to the future, that was rising so fast that it broke the bonds of gravity and the earth. True, America wasn’t so rosy for many people during the Cold War era. Segregation still existed. I’m not downplaying that at all. But John Glenn and his fellow astronauts represented the best of what we were then. Duty, brains, work ethic, dreamer but with the technical know-how to actually reach those impossible dreams as the rest of the world watched slack-jawed. (I know the Soviets kept up and actually led for a little while, but that didn't last).

There was something extra special about the Mercury astronauts to me. Even more than the Apollo missions, as great as they were, these seven astronauts (and Glenn was the last of them, so they are all a memory now) were true pioneers. Talk about calm under pressure, John Glenn was the most celebrated of them all. It takes a special kind of man to sit on top of a missile that has a decent chance of blowing up at ignition. The re-entry drama and Glenn’s cool response during his history making first American to orbit the earth mission is the stuff of legend. He showed that no matter how technically advanced we think we are, sometimes it still takes the human instincts and decision-making of a pilot to get the ship down.

I know a big part of my romanticizing the Mercury program comes from one of my favorite movies of all time, The Right Stuff. Glenn was played pitch perfectly by the great Ed Harris. Maybe I need to pop that in tonight, and bask in a bygone age when the sky wasn’t the limit. John Glenn and the other six Mercury astronauts showed us that we could dare to go beyond the sky. Our moon landing, our eventual trip to Mars, even our eventual eventual colonizing and moving off the earth once we have destroyed it beyond repair…the foundation of all of that was John Glenn…and Alan Sheppard, Gus Grissom, Gordon Cooper, Wally Shirra, Deke Slayton and Scott Carpenter.

So not only RIP John Glenn. I can now say RIP The Mercury Seven. And thank you all for showing us what we can be and accomplish.

And...

RIP Greg Lake, 1947-2016

Man, 2016 has been a deadly year for music. As well-known and respected as Greg Lake was, I always felt that he could have done more. He sang and played bass on the groundbreaking King Crimson debut In the Court of the Crimson King (and sang on the follow-up), but then left the band to form Emerson, Lake and Palmer. As a massive Crimson fan, I have always felt that was a lost opportunity. It would have been fantastic to get two or three more records with Lake and Robert Fripp working together under the Crimson banner before moving on.

I could never get into ELP very much. I do love me some prog rock, but ELP has aged terribly. My favorite ELP tunes are the more down to earth folky Greg Lake numbers like “Lucky Man” and “Still You Turn Me On.”

Regardless of his career choices, the man was hugely talented. Great and expressive singer, virtuoso on the electric bass, and a good guitarist too. RIP Greg Lake.