Grateful Dead to Rock for Obama Again? Pennsylvania Gig Reportedly in the Works

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Hoping to win votes for Obama in perennial swing state Pennsylvania, the surviving members of the Grateful Dead will reportedly stage a concert in the Keystone State on October 13th. No city has been named for the event, but the frontrunners appear to be Pittsburgh and Philadelphia. If the show does go on, it would mark the second Deadheads for Obama concert, as the reunited Dead previously played a San Francisco benefit concert in February (sans drummer Bill Kreutzmann). Bassist Phil Lesh first got involved with Obama's campaign when his son worked as a volunteer for the Democratic presidential candidate. According to Relix, "sources confirm" a full Dead tour in the Spring of '09, but there has been no official announcement or confirmation of that report.

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Song Stories

“V.T.T.L.O.T.F.D.G.F.”

Fishbone | 1985

Quite a few musicians have utilized initials for song titles -- Michael Jackson's "P.Y.T.," Abba's "S.O.S.," Donald Fagen's "I.G.Y.," etc. But the more curiously initialed tune has to be "V.T.T.L.O.T.F.D.G.F.," short for "Voyage to the Land of the Freeze-Dried Godzilla Farts." Fishbone's original guitarist, Kendall Jones, explained to Rolling Stone, "When Norwood [Fisher] wrote it, he introduced it to the band saying, 'Man, I've been hearing about all these Nazi right-wing groups on the news saying the Holocaust was staged. So what if America said it never dropped two atom bombs on Japan, that it was actually Godzilla popping a couple off?' Only Norwood would come up with something that out." The same year "V.T.T.L.O.T.F.D.G.F." was released, the film Godzilla 1985 appeared in North America.

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