Although I was not an avid Dolly Parton fan, I always enjoyed her presence so hearing that she has passed away today (25 August 2026) just added a little more to my grief as only yesterday, my final remaining Aunty also left this earthly plain. I never did include any of Dolly Parton’s songs in my original 2020 Covid Island Discs playlist so now she joins all the other artists in 2026.

Rest in Peace Dolly and thanks for all the music and memories.

I guess an appropriate song performed by her for her friends and family is this one.

Well how do you plead
An actor indeed
Go re-learn your lines
You don’t know what you’ve done
The finale’s begun.

Reagan of course was an actor and when he came to power it felt that the cold war could erupt into a full nuclear conflict. Thankfully, this scenario was avoided and yet little did anyone know that Reagan was to set in motion 50 years of rapidly growing and unsustainable wealth inequality that would result in a US billionaire class and the top 0.1% controlling 13.5% of the nation’s wealth while the bottom 50% controlled only a further 2.5% in 2024.

So I write this post as Trump gets inaugurated for the second time in 8 years. It is incredible to me that someone as immoral and sociopathic as Trump could become President even once, let alone twice. And yet many historians see obvious parallels with past nation empires especially with the rise of the Caesars in the Roman empire.

The pattern seems to always be the same. Too much wealth inequality where many people become desperate for a slice of the pie even though that pie is plentiful. The problem is a small oligarchy that hoards resource forcing many of their fellow citizens into poverty.

The big mistake the USA and subsequently many Western nations made was to conflate the regulation of wealth distribution with egalitarianism or even socialism. The idea that there should be a good differential between the net worth of someone who has contributed much to society versus someone who has contributed little, makes complete sense. However, in such a world the poorest may only possess a small amount of capital whilst the richest might possess many millions. Let’s say 50 million. Yet we do not live in a world like that. Instead we live in a world where there are now a substantial number who have 950 million more than the 50-millionaire. These individuals are hiding behind the traditional wealthy hoping that those who struggle to make ends meet do not differentiate between someone who has a personal fortune of 50 million versus someone who hoards a billion.

The odd thing about Americans voting Trump into power is they think someone who is a billionaire is going to fix the system that creates billionaires. Obviously, such an idea is preposterous. So is there any hope? Well according to the historians, the current state of affairs is unstable. Wealth inequality like this will not last forever and it will be corrected in one of four ways:

1. A major conflict either a civil or international war.
2. A revolution.
3. A major catastrophe such as a pandemic or major natural disaster
4. Major political reform driven by strong leaders who forcibly pursue wealth redistribution to help correct the inequality

The 4^th option has happened in the USA before at the turn of the 20^th century in what was called the gilded age. Presidents like Roosevelt and Wilson introduced many reforms to control the burgeoning wealth of the aptly named robber barons. Let’s hope the current problems plaguing the USA are corrected peacefully as they were at the turn of the 20^th century rather than by a revolution or civil war which would be catastrophic in a nation that is so awash with guns.

What are the dogs of war? Those ideologues who justify the murder of innocent people in the name of some political cause. In this sense Pink Floyd on their album A Momentary Lapse of Reason, were spot on in their diagnosis of an age-old problem that seems to continually plague humanity.

Going back to Youtube to find other music she published I came across two songs both directly related to Christianity so I wonder now if she did have a faith in Jesus. If so, I hope now he is wiping every tear from her eyes.

Rest In Peace and Goodnight Sinéad.

The first song below is Silent Night and is rather haunting to listen to on the day of her passing. The second song Something Beautiful is from her album theology also a song related to God’s promise to his chosen people that he cannot forget them or cease to love them.

Silent Night

Something Beautiful

After watching Hargreaves excellent analysis of the Harrison’s song, along with his detailing of the complicated tensions that existed between the Beatles in the late 60s, it became obvious that the band was always in trouble and it was only a matter of time before the fab four would go their separate ways. Hargreaves analysis challenges the commonly held idea that the breakup of the band was solely down to Yoko entering the scene as clearly relational tensions in the Beatles were not just confined to John and Paul.

A less known version but better version (in my opinion) of the song before Lennon and McCartney fell into a possible trap set by Harrison (see Hargreaves analysis below).

Analysis of the song and its meaning by James Hargreaves

The mainstream version of the song as first published on the Yellow Submarine Album

So Covid Island Discs sadly now functions as a catalogue recording the inevitable passing away of a generation of super rock stars who were so much of my childhood and young adult memories. Today’s citation is Tina Turner. Although I did not collect her music, her powerful voice was always arresting when her music came on the radio. Thanks for the memories. RIP Tina.

RIP Christine!