This week I finished:

Heirs of the Founders: The Epic Rivalry of Henry Clay, John Calhoun and Daniel Webster, the Second Generation of American Giants, by H. W. Brands: The following words go through my mind a lot these days:

We learn about Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Douglass, Lincoln, Gandhi, Mandela, and MLK because we want to be like them. Learning about role models helps us learn to live like them.

But if we want to learn about who we are, we should learn about people like John C. Calhoun and Benedict Arnold.

It’s uncomfortable to accept, but the people in the first list are so important because they had to overcome so much resistance, which came from everyone else, which most of us resemble. We who pollute and deplete are today’s versions of those that people following their legacies have to lead and influence.

I read this book to learn about Calhoun. He is renowned for saying that slavery wasn’t a necessary evil, as people before him claimed, but a “positive good.” Was he an evil person or psychopath?

On the contrary, he was living in the wake of Washington, Jefferson, Madison, and peers who believed in liberty but were surrounded by slavery, which they practiced. The founders told themselves legitimizing myths to rationalize and justify slavery, just as you and I tell ourselves legitimizing myths to rationalize and justify polluting and depleting, which hurt and oppress more people than slavery, by a wide margin.

As slavery grew in size and cruelty, those practicing it grew their myths, leading to Calhoun. We’re in a late stage of legitimization, probably more advanced than Calhoun. Learning about him can teach us how we got to where we can claim that we “have to fly” and other modern equivalents of what he and his peers did, with the difference that we’re hurting and oppressing more people.

I, II, III, IV/Zoso, Houses of the Holy, Physical Graffiti, Presence, In Through the Out Door, Coda, by Led Zeppelin: Growing up, I liked what was then called rock and roll but is now called classic rock. I liked The Beatles most.

In the last year or so I finished memoirs by Bruce Springsteen and Keith Richards and a biography of Led Zeppelin. I also watched documentaries on Jimi Hendrix and I’m sure others I forgot.

Somehow after the Led Zeppelin book, I decided to listen to all their albums in order. Their YouTube channel makes it easy. They’re almost all there and the rest are on YouTube elsewhere. I owned Zoso/IV growing up and listened to it plenty. I heard their music often on the radio. I never listened to any other of their albums straight through. They don’t have so many albums that going through them all would take too long.

I finished the book in late November. I listened to each album straight through, undistracted, so not reading or doing anything else, generally lying in bed or on the couch. I also listened to each two or three times. I tended to listen to some singles many times. I’m so focused on my book and other things that it took me four and a half months to finish them all.

I was mainly driven by the book’s characterization of the band’s start from Jimmy Page’s vision for a sound he saw missing but that would resonate with himself and some population that loved rock, then the members finding something powerful in common. The parties and huge concerts were what I knew about before. Now I was looking for personal expression, personal growth, teamwork, artistry, technical prowess.

I’m not a musician nor critic, so I won’t comment on what they know better than I do.

I had never listened to their music to pay attention to just the guitar, just the drums, or anything other than just the overall impression. Sometimes I feel ashamed at my naivety regarding music. Now, listening to separate parts, I couldn’t believe the skill and expression of each part. I kept remarking internally at how the feeling of perfection came from every note and drumbeat.

I thought they were just rock and some blues. Now I learned how much else they played, how sensitive their music could be.

Crap, while listening to each album I made mental notes of what to comment, but writing now, I’m realizing that I would have to write a book to get it all out.

Darn, I’m going to have to disappoint you and me in not writing all the thoughts and impressions bouncing around my heart and mind. I’ll just say that I loved this assignment I gave myself.

I’ve been thinking if I should go through another band or artist’s material and if so, which. I thought of

• Bach, since his influence seems the longest
• Pink Floyd, since they seem groundbreaking like Zeppelin
• Robert Johnson, since Zeppelin and their peers learned so much from him and some call him the first rock and roll star
• Amy Winehouse, since she seemed as groundbreaking and seemed to speak as openly and honestly, plus I watched a couple documentaries on her
• Taylor Swift, since she seems the biggest today
• Public Enemy, since they seemed as groundbreaking and seemed to speak as openly and honestly

Maybe some others from outside the US and Europe.

I may not dive into an artist or band since I’m focused on writing and creating a movement and I mostly consume other media to advance those causes. On the other hand, since I consider leadership a performance art, experiencing artistic expression by people who have mastered their craft inspires me. It helps me learn more about myself and to express myself more openly and effectively.

• ← The ability to empathize with or speak for the oppressed isn’t what we think
• The Constitution has no extraneous protections. →