"Gone, Baby Gone"

I've just reached a place
Where the willow don't bend.
There's not much more to be said
It's the top of the end.
I'm going,
I'm going,
I'm gone.

The well-respected and talented gather music correspondent Fred Bals is now gone, baby gone. He's literally gone, having written his final article here last week, and I guess figuratively gone, too, since his gather name is now "Gone, Baby Gone."

All of his articles are gone, baby gone, too (see fhbals.gather.com).

It's a shame, and it's hard to understand what gather is really looking for in terms of content.

Fred brought all kinds of music history to our attention, explained trends, found rare and fascinating YouTubes for us to watch (from Tiny Tim's ukelele to Dylan's "Mississippi" to the kids with Dylan in the Liverpool picture, now grown up), and did it all in a very entertaining and enlightening style. If I understand it right, gather paid him a bit to do this, and yet, when he wrote his last feature a week ago, a truly terrific story tracing the history of "The House of the Rising Sun," and announced that he was leaving, one of the (few) gatherites who responded said, in effect, "I don't know who you are or why you are leaving, but good luck."

How does gather search for and hire a writer and then fail to make sure everyone here knows his work? It's incomprehensible to me that this place would not only NOT promote the talent they hire, but would let someone like Fred Bals walk away.

I'm closin' the book
On the pages and the text
And I don't really care
What happens next.
I'm just going,
I'm going,
I'm gone.

The first article I ever read of Fred's was a countdown of the best bootleg recordings in existence. One of them happened to be Bob Dylan's 1962 radio interview with Cynthia Gooding of WBAI in New York, which includes not just talk but Dylan playing and singing too. I'm a Dylan fanatic, so I immediately got connected to Fred and tried to find out more about this recording. And he went to great lengths to help me acquire a copy of it, and then he created "Come gather 'round people, the Bob Dylan gather group" here on gather.  

I been hangin' on threads,
I been playin' it straight,
Now, I've just got to cut loose
Before it gets late.
So I'm going,
I'm going,
I'm gone.

Fred's a professional writer who played it straight here. I have always thought of him as a cultural historian, a person I'd love to have come and talk to my students not just about America, but American history, particularly 20th Century American musical recording history, which is not simply background music to our lives but both reflective and generative of our culture and attitudes.

Unfortunately for us who admire good writing, love music, and crave historical perspective, Fred is now Gone, Baby Gone. Not a starter of games like, "Name a once-promising on-line forum for good writing that begins with the letter G," he's severed his ties with gather. Since he makes his lving as a writer, I'm sure he really does care what happens next, except perhaps at that once-promising on-line forum for good writing called gather.

Grandma said, "Boy, go and follow your heart
And you'll be fine at the end of the line.
All that's gold isn't meant to shine.
Don't you and your one true love ever part."

I'm no Grandma (yet), but Dylan's lyrics are good advice here. And just as Dylan himself has always refused to part from his one true love, his art, Fred stood up to gather's refusal to promote this site as a place for serious writing and make sure its writers received the exposure and recognition their hard work deserved.

I been walkin' the road,
I been livin' on the edge,
Now, I've just got to go
Before I get to the ledge.
So I'm going,
I'm just going,
I'm gone.

So, Fred, good bye, good luck, God bless, and don't be mad at me for publishing your picture just one more time! (Thanks, google!) 

And before you go, a different Dylan lyric for you: 

The trail is dusty,
The road it might be rough,
But the good road is a-waitin'
And boys it ain't far off.

Trails of troubles,
Roads of battles,
Paths of victory,
We shall walk.

(Lyrics quoted from Dylan's "Going, Going Gone" and "Paths of Victory")