Rickie Lee Jones

A reporter from Billboard called the other day to ask if association with musicians who endorse candidates is dangerous. I was right in the middle of putting together our next Blue America contest, which is a benefit for Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), the prize being an ultra-rare original Nirvana gold record (Nevermind) before they were really famous. Is the association with Nirvana going to help or hurt Jayapal, who has a strong presence of her own as the author of the new and improved Medicare-for-All bill and as the co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Congress.

It's been two weeks since we kicked off the series with Tulsi Gabbard, an obscure congresswoman from Hawaii who wants to be president (of the United States). Gillibrand, the junior senator from New York, is slightly better-known.

I had dinner with an old comrade-in-arms last week. You may remember her from this great song she did with the Squirrel Nut Zippers for Blue America candidates. Yep, Rickie Lee Jones, currently of New Orleans. She told me about the video above for a song she and Madeleine Peyroux had recently recorded with producer Larry Klein. I was a fan of the David Essex version but this duet is amazing-- and the video: WOW!

Yesterday we looked at two perspectives of the issues around Climate Change, one regarding a planet hurtling towards uninhabitability and another, by Jack Hannold, about how current price fluctuations in the oil market will impact supply.

Rickie Lee Jones has been working on her next album in New Orleans. Over the weekend she took some time off to travel to Orlando to help Alan Grayson turn out the vote for today's primary-- which he won with 75% of the vote. At a musical event in downtown Orlando, Grayson introduced her to his supporters and staff by reading the lyrics to one of his favorite songs from The Evening of my Best Day, her 2003 album. The song (below), "Ugly Man" questions what George W.

In 2006, Blue America worked with a group of various artists to promote several dozen little known challengers to Republican House incumbents. The video above, which we did for Kirsten Gillibrand in her first run for Congress against powerful, entrenched incumbent John Sweeney, may have helped her win her 53.1- 46.9% victory. She's now a U.S. Senator and someone on the list of future potential national leaders.