Pearl Jam, NIN, R.E.M. Sign New Orleans Debate Petition, Ask Obama and McCain to Partcipate

Pearl Jam, My Morning Jacket, R.E.M. and Nine Inch Nails' Trent Reznor have all signed a petition asking both Barack Obama and John McCain to have a presidential debate in the flood-ravaged city of New Orleans. Organized by the Gulf Restoration Network and Voice of the Wetlands, the petition asks the candidates to come to the Big Easy to discuss how the government plans to use federal money to restore Louisiana's coastal security and stabilize the state's communities. Google, YouTube and New Orleans universities are co-sponsoring the debate, scheduled for September 18th, and ask both candidates to commit the attend the event. Artists like 311, Jackson Browne and a host of N'Awlins-based musicians like Dr. John and the Neville Brothers have also signed the petition, which was then sent to Obama and McCain via the U.S. Senate. So far, neither has responded.

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Song Stories

“Piano Man”

Billy Joel | 1973

Billy Joel’s first hit, “Piano Man,” was – ironically – an autobiographical lament about how his first album wasn’t a hit. When Cold Spring Harbor didn’t take off, Joel briefly became a lounge pianist in Los Angeles, and this song, about that experience, expressed his frustrations and fears at the time: “And they sit at the bar and put bread in my jar/And say, ‘Man, what are you doing here?’” “It was all right,” Joel said later, about the gig. “I got free drinks and union scale, which was the first steady money I’d made in a long time.”

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