Tribute to Benjamin Orr ~Cap'n Swing with the Demo of "Blue Moon Saloon" 

HELLO AGAIN - on the comments below all Agreed - GREAT WORK and love this one. HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!!!!!

Happy Birthday Tia🎈 This is good thank you!

@@brettbasil Thank you so much my friend 💙 Lots of love

@@julenepegher6999 Thank you so very much 💙

Thank you so very much 💙 💙 💙 💙

Thank you so much dear Linda 💙

I thought my birthday would be a great day to share this as I love this so much

@@benjaminorrelectricangelro5493 Happy Happy Birthday Dear TIa!!! I hope you have had a most wonderful birthday!!! I Wish I could orb over to you and celebrate !! I sure hope you and Gerry and your family are all doing well!!! Sure love all that you put together for us to enjoy!!! xoxoxoxoxo Sending lots of love and best wishes!!!!

@@LittleMissIssues Thank you so much

Hi Mary, Thank you, you are very welcome. Firstly, I am surprised and totally disagree with your statement and that there is no one talking truthfully about Benjamin. That is not correct. If this were the case I would not know what I know about this incredible human being and amazing musician. I am friends with some of his loved ones and they certainly are truthful. What do you think people are lying about? And who is lying or not telling the truth as you put it? That is not my take on this at all. It seems as if you are not satisfied with what has been disclosed, why? Do you feel there should be more gossip, rumour and innuendo? I think these days we expect to know more about our favourite musicians, but I totally respect Benjamin's privacy or Benjamin's loved ones' desire for certain things to remain private. I am satisfied with what I now know and feel as fans we do not have a right to know EVERYTHING, especially about painful times. My husband is a musician and whilst not famous as Benjamin 😉 one thing remains true, what happens in bands stays in bands. Band breakups can be like a bitter and painful divorce and there are more sides to this with so many band members not just 2 people involved. As far as the band break up is concerned, you can work out what happened from what you read anyway and all I needed to know was that Ric and Benjamin met and made up and what happened is their business and certainly not mine. There are also 3 remaining band members and they also continue to respect this privacy so perhaps we need to respect their wishes as well. They have not talked about it either. I am grateful for the music. I also feel if they had not had so much pressure from the men in suits perhaps they would not have broken up and we still would have had more albums. There is a biography called Let's Go in fans can read about Benjamin all in one book with the timeline of his bands and his early years to of his courageous battle with cancer and of course so many loved ones of Benjamin share their memories. I think if you read all there is to read and listen to interviews it is pretty clear what happened, I do not need to read it spelled out in total detail and again I respect that some matters remain private. I also do not think that it is hard to find out facts about Benjamin. One thing that is being repeated again and again is what a kind, humble, gentle, caring man Benjamin was and that he was private, his death does not mean we get to discuss what he wanted to remain private. Anyway, this is how I feel and this is how I try to honour Benjamin and his legacy. Kind regards, Tia

@@benjaminorrelectricangelro5493 Hi I agree with a lot of what you have said and I did read the book Let's Go. The problem is that no one is addressing"the elephant in the room" and that is that Ben is the only 1 that did not do well after the breakup of The Cars mentally, physically or emotionally. He was on a roll, famous, multitalented, handsome, what happened, why did everything fall apart for him. The other members of the group had families, hobbies, other musical outlets if they wanted to pursue them. I'm not sure that Ben did. I think that the music was his life and when it stopped he was lost. And he and Ric had been through so much together, best friends, that must have really devastated him. He said he loved touring he loved playing live. According to the other members of the band Ric quit and pulled the rug out from everybody and they were all in shock!. By the way if you listen to the 1987 Columbia Missouri D2D concert, in the very last track, You Might Think, Ric substitutes one of the lines of the song. He sings "well I think that you're scared , and not that well prepared" I think he absolutely directed that to Ben. Aren't you shocked to see him in 1994 playing at a railroad station or playing festivals? That's so sad, this man was a world class superstar and he was relegated to that? Then it gets worse, he's drinking and smoking on stage, he's gained a lot of weight, something was very, very wrong. Joe Milliken said that he was told the truth of things by people but he didn't want to put anything "negative" in his book he wanted it to be an "upbeat happy book". Well that's nice, but we'd like to know why Ben went "off the rails" when the rest of them did not. The man spent 10 years writing this book and it was not a complete picture according to many fans and many reviewers. Without this knowledge it makes for a lot of speculation and unhappy fans. I don't expect every gory detail but yes I would like to know what happened and apparently so would a lot of other people. If you read the reviews for that book you will see what I'm talking about. People were not happy that the only book that will probably ever be written about Benjamin Orr is not complete, has not told the whole story, and has left people bewildered and unsatisfied. Sorry that we seem to disagree but I do love your work, thank you for your postings.

@@maryuline2585 I am glad you like my postings and of course we cannot all agree on things but I guess personally I do have a little bit more of an insight as to what happened and also I have been in touch with some of Benjamin's loved ones and also some people who knew him well during the days after The Cars broke up. Also some band members. All I can say is to re read what is said about Benjamin. He was a sensitive caring romantic man. It was said he had changed when he returned after his time in the army. His friends said he was different, that tells you how deeply sensitive he was. He was not comfortable with some of the aspects of fame and it is clear what he thought in this when you listen and watch the very final interview in which he speaks about " putting on a show " when performing. I have not heard Joe saying he did not wish to put something negative in the biography, I have heard how he was mindful of Benjamin's son reading the biography and that he some things he left out. That is different than not writing anything negative. If people are bewildered by the book perhaps it means they have not understood how to read between the lines, but then I do have a better and clearer insight especially now . But at the time when I read the book I read it and understood. I got it. It did not leave me bewildered at all. Benjamin ,I think, was obviously devastated and hurt by Ric doing what he did and HOW he did this. From your comment you understood this so what else needs to be said about this matter? But Benjamin himself says in one of the interviews I shared that ( although music and being a musician was all he ever wanted to be) there was more to life than music and having fun was important and he loved doing other things as well. But I think being so sensitive he was hurting badly. He had no family (children at this stage) as the others did and his relationship with Diane according the biography was not going well. Drinking too much did not help. Drinking often comes with bad health and weight gain and we all know how much energy would be used to perform so without performing from 1987 to the say early mid 90's after working non stop since he was a teenager and performing since then it must have had a huge impact on Benjamin and his health. Sadly this is a thing that happens often to the sensitive musicians when things go wrong and bands or projects fall apart. When I first saw the performances of Benjamin in the mid & late 90's (until Big People) or so , I did feel some sadness to think this legendary musician was performing such gigs in smaller venues and to smaller numbers of audiences , but I am realistic enough and know only to well that the music industry is very tough (it can chew you up and spit you out to put it very indelicately ) and at least Benjamin had returned to the stage again doing what he loved to do which was performing. And he performed with smiles and what a voice !!! 💙 He went on to perform until he literally could no longer sing the way he wanted to do, this shows how much he loved performing. So my question to you is what else needs to be said? You obviously come to some conclusions as have other fans so does it need to be all printed in black and white? What else is there to say? If you want to know what Benjamin felt himself during those days you would have had to be one of his trusted loved ones to know. He got to do perform again and he is remembered 21 years after his death with love and affection by so many fans. The tragedy was the cancer and that it arrived just as things were turning around for his career. I do not know what more you would need to know or want to know as this says it all. I really do not understand what there is left to say about this or what is meant to be ' shared' or written. I am pretty sure Benjamin would not wish for us to discuss his bad times in great detail ( and so I have been told). I feel if Benjamin had not gotten cancer and he had lived on we would never be thinking about that part of his life as he would have performed again at the levels we saw him do with The Cars and perhaps may have reunited at some stage with this band. Wishing you a lovely weekend, From sunny Tasmania, Tia

​@@benjaminorrelectricangelro5493 Thank you so much, my sweet friend. Why do people think that because playing at South Station that he "went off the rails"? He was performing, that's what he loved. Didn't matter where. Were the others from The Cars performing like that? I haven't seen it. And yes, I'm sure Benjamin was totally shocked & devastated when Ric decided, let me emphasize, RIC decided to break up the band. It was also Benjamin's band. He was co-founder and had done soooo much more prior to The Cars than Ric had done. Why do people just thrive on dirt? Makes me sick. Joe did not say he wanted a "happy" book. He was told things "off the record" by people in the know and was not going to publish anything in his book that was not approved. That's called integrity, which I don't think the commenter has. So be it. Love you, my friend. I hope your birthday was as wonderful as you are! OON!!

@@maryuline2585 LET BENJAMIN REST IN PEACE FOR PETE'S SAKE. Why do you feel the need to know dirt 21 years later??