FridayNightListeners - June 2023

Friday, June 2:?Willie Nelson - On the Road Again

Friday, June 9: Stars on 45 - Stars on 45

Friday, June 16:?Robert Palmer - Every Kinda People

Friday, June 23: Channel 5 - No one else

Friday, June 30:?Depeche Mode - Enjoy the silence

Dear?#FridayNightListeners,

Welcome to the review of the?five FridayNightListeners?posts released during last month, June 2023.?

Before we get to the review, allow me to make a brief comment on my own behalf or better on #SocialSelling. For the most recent issue of the German-language BankingNews (No. 295) I was allowed to contribute an article this time: "Social Selling – ein untersch?tzter Ansatz in der Finanzdienstleistung". Maybe you will like it - enjoy reading it and maybe it can inspire you a bit.

But now, without further ado, let's quickly jump to the review:

Friday, June 2:

As you may have noticed, the video was recorded at Farm Aid 2022 - and Willie Nelson was 89 years old at the time. And he plans to be on stage again in 2023, now 90 years old. But what is Farm Aid actually? Before I saw the video, I had never heard of it.

Well, it is a US organisation whose mission is to preserve and support family farms in the USA. To this end, it organises an annual music concert with well-known stars. The history of Farm Aid began with a charity concert in Champaign (Illinois) in 1985 with the aim of financially supporting family farms. The organisers were:?John Mellencamp and - Willie Nelson. The success was great: 80,000 spectators were captivated by artists such as Bob Dylan, Billy Joel, B.B. King, Loretta Lynn, Roy Orbison and Tom Petty. The end result was a capital of over $9 million for US family farmers! The activities also influenced the passing of the Agricultural Credit Act in 1987, which, among other things, approved a $4 billion financial assistance package for financially vulnerable Farm Credit System (FCS) institutions. Farm Aid is likely to take place in September this year. And then the motto for spectators and artists (which is what the song is really about) is: On the road again!

Friday, June 9:

The post was about the first format war in music history, the fact that there are records that are played at 33 1/3 revolutions per minute, others at 45. Maybe some of you still have an old record player, or your parents or grandparents. If it dates from before the early 1980s, there is a good chance that there was a third speed that could be set: 78 revolutions!

This was the standardised speed for shellac records, the predecessor of the vinyl record. Shellac, also known as gum lacquer and lacquer resin, is a resinous substance obtained from the excretions of the lacquer scale insect Kerria lacca after it has sucked on certain plants. However, the plate did not only consist of this eponymous ingredient; barium sulphate, slate flour, soot and cotton flock were also added. Incidentally, it was invented - just like the corresponding gramophone - by Emil Berliner, a German, born in 1851, who emigrated to the USA in 1870 and became a US citizen in 1881. Speaking of the USA: There, too, the medley from the Netherlands was a Number One hit: Stars on 45.

Friday, June 16:

In this post I talked about Pride Month and also tried to explain the term LGBTQIA+. As fundamentally important as the topic is, it is also important that the community becomes aware of the actual goals. And I'm not saying that, but some people from the community do. For example, a community member sent me a message:

"I think that the activists of the scene often set the wrong accents. The exaggeratedly colourful and also sexualised images put those affected in the wrong light and are annoying (drag queens and dog masks at the CSDs). And the press jumps right on it and shows only that. This is totally unfortunate, because 99.5 per cent of people are not like this, but are normal people, and this creates a dysfunction. But here, too, people are talking about Facetime. Shaking people up was certainly good for the early days, but with the polarisation and discrimination today, it rather harms women and men. In the field of professional DEI work, we make sure that this does not happen, but that solutions for equity and inclusion are created that help everyone."

Personally, I am also not sure whether the regular addition of new group-based letters to LGBT... does more harm than good. Doesn't this lead to more and more categorisation, pigeonholing...? Which letter does someone belong to? In the end, isn't that the opposite of what it's all about: Every Kinda People?

Friday, June 23:

If you search for "Channel 5" on Wikipedia - you will find countless TV stations with this name, all over the world. I don't know if one of these channels gave the Hamburg band its name inspirationally? Or maybe it was a perfume - because if you cross out just one "n", you quickly arrive at Chanel No. 5.

And this is not just any perfume: fashion designer Coco Chanel launched the women's fragrance 102 years ago, in 1921 in Paris, and it is considered the most successful women's fragrance of all time. The following quote from Marilyn Monroe may have been very helpful for this success; she said in 1952: "I wear five drops of Chanel No. 5 and nothing else in bed". The band's sound, which is definitely internationally oriented, was developed by co-founder Jan Krueger and producer Lorenz Westphal. Westphal, by the way, also sang himself under his stage name Lonzo and I'm sure many of my age group from Germany can still remember "Die Dinosaurier"?! Anyway, maybe next time you give a flacon of Chanel No 5 as a gift - maybe have Channel 5 playing in the background, with No one else?

Friday, June 30:

Inflation, and especially the rise in energy and food prices, is causing many people to save money. Because they have to. The budget available for leisure activities has sometimes been drastically reduced. And concerts by superstars are increasingly reserved for the wealthy, well-off upper class.

As a rule, prices at stadium concerts start at around 80 euros - worst category, mind you. Those who want to see and hear better can easily expect double that. Add to that the travelling costs, food and drinks, and if you go as a couple, it's already a burden on the family budget. But many save it literally from their mouths, because many people live off such a concert for days, for weeks. So it was all the more pleasing that tickets for Depeche Mode were already available for just under 50 euros, if you were lucky enough to get hold of one. So to keep the memory alive, here is DM's most successful song again: Enjoy the silence.

As always: Thank you for listening and engaging during June! The next??#FridayNightListeners?post is planned for tomorrow, Friday, July 7, 5pm (CEST) - stay tuned!

P.S.1?The?#FridayNightListeners?archive

P.S.2?The?#FridayNightListeners?Newsletter

P.S.3?The?#FridayNightListeners?playlist on spotify