It seems Mick Jagger skims the papers

The Rolling Stones had their latest concert in Chicago – Friday at Soldier Field. And it seems they did a touch of homework, in terms of localling up his stage patter.

The modern-day tour

For none other than Mick Jagger, whose freakishly huge lips are the band’s logo, not only welcomed new Mayor Lori Lightfoot, he also said he was “sorry” that Ed Burke couldn’t be amongst those in attendance at the first of two Stones’ concerts to be held in Chicago as part of their U.S. tour of 2019.

NOW IN SAYING, “I’m sorry Ed Burke couldn’t make it tonight,” was Jagger truly expressing some sort of desire that he would have wanted the city’s veteran alderman on hand?

Was he praising, or dissing, the alderman?

Just what was his point in even mentioning Burke? Personally, I’m inclined to think that anybody who shelled out the kind of cash charged for Rolling Stones concert tickets probably didn’t do so to hear anything of a political nature being said.

Jagger could have waved his hand at the crowd and shouted “Hello, Chicago!!!!!!” and been just as locally relevant in his commentary as he was in mentioning Burke’s persona.

SO FOR THOSE people who are claiming that Mick Jagger is taking a jab at our Chicago politics? I don’t see it!

As they once were

More likely, he checked out the Internet briefly for local happenings, and saw the Burke name prominently mentioned. Nothing more.

Personally, I’m inclined to think that Jagger’s more substantial Chicago commentary was when he happened to mention Friday that he’s never actually had an Italian beef sandwich – even though he’s been to Chicago dozens of times during the 55 years that the Rolling Stones have been a culturally-significant rock ‘n’ roll band.

BURKE: A lame Jagger joke?

Mick Jagger apparently has never got no Satisfaction from a beef sandwich – either “wet” or “dry.” Although the real question of significance to put to him would be to ask what kind of pizza he’d most enjoy.

DEEP-DISH OR thin, and also thin slices or the party-cut into squares? Then again, giving the “wrong” answer to that question would probably ensure many life-long Rolling Stones fans suddenly coming to the realization that the Beatles were better all along.

WALKER: Blew bad Blagojevich joke

Although maybe he has some sense of Chicago tucked away Under his Thumb – I still get my kicks out of that time many years ago that the Stones made an appearance at Chicago’s now-defunct Double Door club, and that then-Gov. George Ryan made a point of stopping by to see them.

Of course, Ryan was not yet amongst the roster of indicted gubernatoriales. So perhaps he would have been welcomed into the Rolling Stones’ realm of existence.

But if Jagger did give our politicos much thought, it likely was fleeting. Not likely to be repeated when they have their second Chicago concert of this tour come Tuesday (the one where Lightfoot says she WILL try to attend).

ALTHOUGH AT LEAST Jagger didn’t make the same gaffe that aging comedian Jimmie Walker once made about a decade ago while performing at the clubs that used to exist in Merrillville.

LIGHTFOOT: Will she take wife to concert Tuesday?

For Walker thought he’d be able to localize his comic patter with jokes about then-recently indicted Gov. Rod Blagojevich.

Only he butchered the pronunciation so badly, he elicited mere groans. Perhaps he should have checked out the Blah-GOYA-vich pronouncer that Rod himself used to offer up,

While Blagojevich himself (a.k.a., 40892-424) was always the big Elvis fanatic who probably doesn’t view the hit “Jailhouse Rock” quite the same way he used to.

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What should we think about safety?

We’re not safer. We’re just crummier shots.”

That was the  observation I heard from a Jewel bagboy when, while bagging some grocery items I was buying, he took a glimpse of the front page of the Chicago Sun-Times I purchased.

 THAT FRONT PAGE  gave us the headline “Under The Gun,” and teased a story about how the number of people killed in Chicago this year thus far is less than what it was last year.

 BUT…

 The number of shooting incidents that have occurred this year compared to last is on the rise.

 Specifically, 5 percent fewer people killed but 8 percent more incidents involving gunfire, according to the Sun-Times for the first six months of 2014 compared to the first half of 2013 – which was a way-above-average year.

 ONE IN WHICH people would have to look back into Chicago history to find a period that was more violent than ’13 was for the Second City.

 Now I’m not about to take seriously the views of a guy who managed to avoid crushing my grocery items while putting them into plastic bags. I’m well aware that he was trying to make a joke while engaging in some small talk to keep himself from being bored.

 He also speculated about how wonderful Jose Abreu was for the Chicago White Sox this year. Is he a top-notch sports commentator?

 Besides, a part of me wanted to retort as a gag that perhaps that the statistical combination  was evidence of the advancement of medical techniques – we’re saving more lives of gunshot victims.

 THE REALITY IS more a matter of  the fact that there are certain parts of  Chicago that have become so violent – and so isolated from the rest of the city that it is way too easy to ignore what happens there.

 While also looking at the fact that there are certain neighborhoods in Chicago where violence, homicide and crime in general is so low that some of us want to believe all the crime stats must be some sort of lie!

 Which is a shame because, in some ways, Chicago is no better or stronger than its weakest, most violent neighborhoods,

 We can brag about the Gold Coast (although my memory of a quarter-century of news stories I wrote about includes people who were shot and killed there too) and try to pretend that Englewood is an alien land.

 BUT THAT KIND of  rhetoric just makes us all seem foolish. Besides, even if the number of people killed is on the decline, there’s still the reality that even one homicide is one too many.

 And to the people directly impacted by the list of the deceased, that one is all that matters. Too many families get devastated, then forgotten about in the mess of murder statistics that are being compiled.

 The sad part is that just the other day, I stumbled across some four-decade-old reruns of “Good Times,” the show where Jimmie Walker tried to become the clown prince of the Chicago ghetto and public housing.

 The episodes I saw were the two-part tale of where Walker’s “J.J.” character was shot by a streetgang member who was trying to recruit/pressure him into joining the “gang.”

 FOR A COMEDY television series, it was way too real. For J.J.’s gunman, gang leader “Mad Dog” wound up getting probation for the shooting because there was no space available to hold him either at the youth home in St. Charles or at the Cook County Jail.

 Those are a set of circumstances that were all too real in 1970s Chicago, and remain true today. How many “Mad Dogs” (his real name was supposed to be “Cleon”) are being produced by the rising numbers of shootings occurring in Chicago?

 

And isn’t that a more significant problem than however many homicides are occurring? You want numbers, check out 11, 25 and .312 – the home run total, runs batted in and batting average for Abreu during the month of June.

 They’re less depressing to think about.

 

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