Still Crazy After All These Years?
Okay, part of the fun of my day is setting vendor meets for technicians... it's usually a five minute call that takes you off the firing line for a second, AND you hear some Inn-Ter-Rest-Ing things on Muzak while waiting.
Just a minute ago I heard "We Are the World." ['Tis the season, so they say...] Now the only reason I mention this is because it used to be a family tradition [Galupi/Zottola/Leone/Horn, bunch of misplaced Yankees from Pittsburgh in Texas] to make these videos at holiday time... Like one year, we decided to do a Letterman show and I mean complete with guests and "Brush with Greatness" and my friend Marty as Paul Schaeffer...I got to be Dave and write a monologue and all that... I remember at the time that John Gotti had just had someone whacked outside Spark's Steak House and that was one of the jokes... My aunt Donna as Gloria Vanderbilt and my dad and Uncle Rich as "G and Z" who made "music for toads." One year we did Dallas, my dad as J.R. It's a great way to keep yourself entertained when there's NOTHING on TV and the stores are all closed...
Anyway, of course one year we had to do "We Are the World..." now the kids are all in high school by this time and I think my cousin Sherri had some friends over and the great thing is that my aunt Donna [Z] has a personality that just brings EVERYONE into the fun with us... and they all talk about it later and the parties keep getting bigger and bigger, which is great at, oh, graduation and weddings... So we're doing "We Are the World" and the big debate is who gets to be BRUUUUCE and who gets to be Ray Charles and all that... funny, I don't remember anyone asking to be Michael Jackson, though...
Anyway, I just mention that in passing... it's great to have fun folks like the Zotts and Leones and Hornes, great people who will grow old but never "grow up."
Roger Wilco?
Been kind of blue with the holidays, but I am in a major Wilco groove this week, contemplating the genius of Jeff Tweedy... Somehow I can connect with those songs... not just great titles [Should've Been In Love, I'm the Man Who Loves You, Nothingsevergonnastandinmyway [Again], How to Fight Lonliness] but lines like "There's rows and rows of houses/with the windows painted blue/ with the light from the TV..." from Sunken Treasure [the same song with my mantra: "I was named by rock and roll / I was tamed by rock and roll / I was maimed by rock and roll"] ... plus he writes great pop songs, though I was contemplating on the drive in today JUST how important Jay Bennett was to the last three records and how different they will sound without his input. Whose idea is all the mellotron and that plaintive harmonica on She's A Jar? If nothing else, the next one may sound different because Bennett engineered a lot of Yankee Hotel and Summerteeth.
Anyway, I have just found them to be so perfect for my mood. Even the lines that are nonsense: "Take off your band aid ' cause I don't believe in touchdowns" but then you temper that was "You were so right when you said that I'd been drinking / What was I thinking when I said good night?" And of course there's even a line for LB: "It's become so obvious / you are so oblivious to yourself." Then, of course there's this one:
"You’ve been dealing with all these feelings
They’ve got you believing that they got no meaning
But they do
Life’s been stinking, you’re heart’s been sinking
And you’re too busy thinking
You stop, you blink and you’re blue
Should’ve been in love
Mind’s been racing, your heart’s been chasing,
And you might as well face it,
Time’s wasted it’s true
You’re life’s been stinking, your heart’s been shrinking
And you’re too busy thinking
You stop, you blink and you’re blue"
Great Christmas
No, not this one... I just don't feel it this year. Something's missing. I have the folks ad the kids and all that, but it just feels blah this year...
However, I can remember one Christmas in Arlington, I want to say 78 or 79, that I got the Steve Martin Wild & Crazy Guy album... well of course you put on, and at 6 o'clock in the morning Steve busts out a few shits and fucks and I am sure my parents are horrified to hear this and realize they've just given it to their 12 year old son... remember, this is before all those silly warning stickers and all that... but they never panicked, they just suggested I listen to it in my room, away from my 'little sister.' Still it was a far cry from the Bill Cosby I had been listening to before that... never had any Richard Pryor, though and only a couple of George Carlin to this day... Mark, of course, has Cheech and Chong's Big Bamboo that came with the 12"x12" rolling paper... of course we heard that stuff and Gallagher [censored of course] on the Dr Demento and the hour long comedy show that used to run after that when Demento got switched from the Zoo to the Eagle... I'll never forget seeing Gallagher the first time out at Richard and Donna's in Andrews, which is out between nowhere and Midland-Odessa; I don't remember which one it was, but I liked that humor right away. Might have been the first time I saw HBO, too...
Other great Christmas presents: gee, records were always a safe bet... one year I got the Red and Blue sets of the Beatles [1962-1966 and 1967-1970] since I was always borrowing the neighbor's. I was disappointed that mine weren't on red and blue vinyl like his were... gee, really nothing that makes an impression... getting a bike was always cool, think I got two in my time, one was a replacement for one that got stolen by some 'friends' of mine...
But now it's about the kids, and I still like to see them opening gifts, though I know they'll become jaded eventually, same way we all do...
Thursday, December 18, 2003
Its A Wonderful Life: a quick hit
Okay, I know it’s cheesy to call a holiday column that, but hear me out, especially with all we went through this year.
First of all, I’d still like to thank everyone for love and support through a Trying Season this summer. I hope I was able to give back as much as I got. So I am sitting watching most of It’s A Wonderful Life tonight, and I thought of all of us milling around out there at Restland and how surprised Becky and Roger and Andee were at the outpouring of love and respect from the people who were there and people who were unable to be there. I wasn’t. Those two lived by the ‘do unto others’ and ‘treat people as you expect to be treated.’ I think it reinforced the message of Frank Capra’s classic movie: “We each touch so many lives and we never know it.”
I worry sometimes that we, as in my circle of friends, have fallen immediately back into old habits and gotten caught in old ruts, even after going through this thing and saying “we need to get together more often.” And I am as guilty as anybody, because the phone and the email go both ways. It is easy to go back to our old ways. I don’t know how many times I have said in the last two weeks ‘I need to call so and so.’ Roger and Andee’s email is off and I know they’ve been trying to get moved and I wonder how they are coping with the holidays. I know people get busy with work parties and family and all that stuff, too. Just remember to be careful out there. Remeber, Jim Dunnigan used to not drink on New Year's Eve; called it "Amatuer Night."
A few nights later, sitting here listening to the new Unearthed box by Johnny Cash. I have started with My Mother’s HymnBook to try and get myself some ‘Pure Religion’ [That’s a Rev. Gary Davis/Hot Tuna reference]. Having some hummus [you can get hummus at Albertson’s? Cool, but not as good a Gyro House… need some falafel for Xmas!] and typing here. Never did find pita bread, but tastes good on a tortilla! Just lonesome John and his guitar here, how powerful, even for a 60-70 year old man.
Been having a discussion with LB [for Lizard Breath] about finding your soul mate. I find it hard to believe that one could have [or need] a list with 14 points on it! Of course, she’s been through the wringer a couple times, so she’s entitled. But I think that takes the magic out of the whole thing. And even if she finds someone who meets all those criteria, there are no guarantees. Me? *sigh* I just want to feel the electric kiss that sends a tingle down my spine and makes my big toe shoot up in my boot. It’s been a long time. I want to feel the sickness of being separated from someone that squashes your heart down like a six ton steamroller… the swell of being near or having them smile at you… the electric of a touch between people that says all that needs to be said… laying next to someone who makes you feel complete and listening to them breathe in the night... SICK ISN’T IT? That's what I get for running across Serendipity on TV last night... How jealous I am of all of you who have found that person that makes magic possible in your life!
I think I have been close a couple of times, though I am refusing to name names. I look back and I know who it was NOT very easily with a little distance. Who knows why? Some I was painfully attracted to, but once I got close, where I wanted to be, it just didn't work out.
Jesus! Johnny and Joe Strummer! Fucking FANTASTIC! Doing Bob Marley's Redemption Song... wow. Two great talents. Two great singers lost in less than a year.
Ah, love lost, such a cost, give me things that don't get lost, like a coin that won't get tossed... Why sometimes CAN'T we see what we had until it's gone? One mistake in judgement and a good thing rolls right away... so caught up in appearances and what other people might think... burned and afraid, pretending aloofness...
Hmm, starnge thoughts this night, maybe making a close of the circle of another year gone and wondering what was accomplished. That's all things like New Years and birthdays are for really. Measue your time and see if you've accomplished what you said you would at this time last year. This year I've had two funerals in one, a wedding, lots of questions answered [too late, but good to know things], pondered the meaning of life, been reminded to take care of myself and that I matter, no matter what I might think, and not had that electric kiss.
Robbie Robertson once wrote [and Rick Danko sang] "There's no love as true as the love/ that dies untold." Is that crazy? But is it true? What about knowing that 'falling in love ' with someone will just break your heart? Do we do things like this just to keep up hopes and ideals? I can think of three people, one recently and two from a few years ago that I just wound myself up for and knew nothing would or could come of it... none the less, I kept looking for that look that would gie me a hope or a word... why do we do this to ourselves?
Wow, finished the second disc all ready... how powerful... great take of Wichita Lineman, too...
Okay, I know it’s cheesy to call a holiday column that, but hear me out, especially with all we went through this year.
First of all, I’d still like to thank everyone for love and support through a Trying Season this summer. I hope I was able to give back as much as I got. So I am sitting watching most of It’s A Wonderful Life tonight, and I thought of all of us milling around out there at Restland and how surprised Becky and Roger and Andee were at the outpouring of love and respect from the people who were there and people who were unable to be there. I wasn’t. Those two lived by the ‘do unto others’ and ‘treat people as you expect to be treated.’ I think it reinforced the message of Frank Capra’s classic movie: “We each touch so many lives and we never know it.”
I worry sometimes that we, as in my circle of friends, have fallen immediately back into old habits and gotten caught in old ruts, even after going through this thing and saying “we need to get together more often.” And I am as guilty as anybody, because the phone and the email go both ways. It is easy to go back to our old ways. I don’t know how many times I have said in the last two weeks ‘I need to call so and so.’ Roger and Andee’s email is off and I know they’ve been trying to get moved and I wonder how they are coping with the holidays. I know people get busy with work parties and family and all that stuff, too. Just remember to be careful out there. Remeber, Jim Dunnigan used to not drink on New Year's Eve; called it "Amatuer Night."
A few nights later, sitting here listening to the new Unearthed box by Johnny Cash. I have started with My Mother’s HymnBook to try and get myself some ‘Pure Religion’ [That’s a Rev. Gary Davis/Hot Tuna reference]. Having some hummus [you can get hummus at Albertson’s? Cool, but not as good a Gyro House… need some falafel for Xmas!] and typing here. Never did find pita bread, but tastes good on a tortilla! Just lonesome John and his guitar here, how powerful, even for a 60-70 year old man.
Been having a discussion with LB [for Lizard Breath] about finding your soul mate. I find it hard to believe that one could have [or need] a list with 14 points on it! Of course, she’s been through the wringer a couple times, so she’s entitled. But I think that takes the magic out of the whole thing. And even if she finds someone who meets all those criteria, there are no guarantees. Me? *sigh* I just want to feel the electric kiss that sends a tingle down my spine and makes my big toe shoot up in my boot. It’s been a long time. I want to feel the sickness of being separated from someone that squashes your heart down like a six ton steamroller… the swell of being near or having them smile at you… the electric of a touch between people that says all that needs to be said… laying next to someone who makes you feel complete and listening to them breathe in the night... SICK ISN’T IT? That's what I get for running across Serendipity on TV last night... How jealous I am of all of you who have found that person that makes magic possible in your life!
I think I have been close a couple of times, though I am refusing to name names. I look back and I know who it was NOT very easily with a little distance. Who knows why? Some I was painfully attracted to, but once I got close, where I wanted to be, it just didn't work out.
Jesus! Johnny and Joe Strummer! Fucking FANTASTIC! Doing Bob Marley's Redemption Song... wow. Two great talents. Two great singers lost in less than a year.
Ah, love lost, such a cost, give me things that don't get lost, like a coin that won't get tossed... Why sometimes CAN'T we see what we had until it's gone? One mistake in judgement and a good thing rolls right away... so caught up in appearances and what other people might think... burned and afraid, pretending aloofness...
Hmm, starnge thoughts this night, maybe making a close of the circle of another year gone and wondering what was accomplished. That's all things like New Years and birthdays are for really. Measue your time and see if you've accomplished what you said you would at this time last year. This year I've had two funerals in one, a wedding, lots of questions answered [too late, but good to know things], pondered the meaning of life, been reminded to take care of myself and that I matter, no matter what I might think, and not had that electric kiss.
Robbie Robertson once wrote [and Rick Danko sang] "There's no love as true as the love/ that dies untold." Is that crazy? But is it true? What about knowing that 'falling in love ' with someone will just break your heart? Do we do things like this just to keep up hopes and ideals? I can think of three people, one recently and two from a few years ago that I just wound myself up for and knew nothing would or could come of it... none the less, I kept looking for that look that would gie me a hope or a word... why do we do this to ourselves?
Wow, finished the second disc all ready... how powerful... great take of Wichita Lineman, too...
Thursday, December 11, 2003
Part 1: Eight Tracks, 45s and AM Radio
Some people are just born to music, I suppose.
I don’t know where this love of music comes from, anymore than I know where my greatness at trivial banal facts comes from. I really would rather go blind than deaf, though I know I will still hear music in my head when I am deaf. Unfortunately it’s always someone else’s music and not my own, which is why I am a great critic and not a great songwriter.
I thought at one time my Dad was the source for this music madness, but it turns out my mother liked all the cool things that were brought into the house. She has a small but very select collection of scratchy 45s of early 60’s soul that was popular where she [and my dad] grew up, the Steel Belt and former pollution capital of the USA, Pittsburgh Pennsylvania. Lots of the early Motown [Mary Wells, the Four Tops especially] with a touch of James Brown and some doo-wop groups on small labels.
I know my grandfather was a guitar player. During the war, [“The big one, WWII” as Archie Bunker used to say] he and some guys from his company would go around to other units in the area and play country music. [Remember, this was when there was “both kinds, country and Western.”] They were loosely known as the Ozark Mountaineers, Ozark being the name of their company. I just asked for the clarification, as I thought he played in a band in the States, but he said, “No, other than some guys that used to come around once in a while.” [I called him a “Hootenany-ing Hippie” for this]. He used to play for me, up to about 1995 or so before his hands shook so much. Last time my cousin’s fiancée was up, he learned a couple of the songs and he said it “nearly brought the old man to tears, not being able to play anymore.” I know he always liked music and was always humming or whistling something. Unfortunately, he was also a big Hee Haw fan, and there was no better way to clear a room of a bunch of little kids in 1974 than to turn on Hee Haw. Now I kind of wish I had paid more attention to the Hee Haw, but oh well.
[If I’d get ‘home’ more than once every couple of years, I might know more about my family history. Apparently it used to be a Saturday night thing to go up to Grandma and Grandpap’s (I assume this is up the hill to the Vodderbrogen house) and have square dances and card games. Apparently Pap was a fiddler and could call dances.]
One of my first memories, I couldn’t be more than three or four, is of my mother ironing and listening to the Temptaions Get Ready album. I remember the album cover more than the song, though I definitely hear the Temp’s trademark vocals. The album cover is a bright blue with the Temps in a dressing room [“Getting ready” for the show, ya dig?].
There is a family story of Grandma Galupi [or Mrs. Webb at the time] sitting with a very sick young Charles who refused to move his ear from a record player playing Marvin Gaye’s great I Heard It Through the Grapevine [Mom’s scratchy 45] playing over and over again.
My Mom and Dad, from what I have been able to gather, were at least into rock and roll, which is more than I can say for a few of my friends. I remember being home ‘sick’ about 1974 [well, maybe I was and maybe I discovered the ‘I-go-to-school-sick-so-I-need-a-stomach-ache-day’] and sitting playing DJ with my folks 8-tracks: Crosby Stills Nash & Young 4 Way Street, Led Zeppelin II, Elton John Madman Across the Water, Traffic John Barleycorn Must Die… I know there were a couple 60s compilations [16 Great Hits from Motown and shit like that], Aretha Franklin 30 Greatest Hits, the Beatles, Creedence Clearwater Revival Pendulum [after their big hits period, but has Have You Ever Seen the Rain and Hey Tonight and it is still a favorite of mine… call it nostalgia for sitting in the back seat on a road trip to see grandma…], Alice Cooper Killer [which scared the shit out of me]… a collection soon to be augmented by classics [courtesy of the Columbia House Record Club] like Steve Miller Fly Like an Eagle, Aerosmith Toys in the Attic, Earth Wind and Fire Gratitude and Spirit, the Ohio Players GREAT Honey [which recently re-acquired on vinyl and still kicks your ass as a great soul record! Imagine me sitting on the porch with the windows open on a mild fall night and these 70s soul licks and layered vocal of L-O-V-E coming out of my bacelor pad windows, not too loud because it was late, you understand...] My Mom always liked a little soul; we had a band called Brass Construction on 8 track which I do not really remember, but we also had the Brothers Johnson’s first Lookin’ Out for #1, before they did Strawberry Letter #23… glad to see y’all caught up to my mom a couple years later! Of course I found out later my Mom also brought the Stones Black and Blue and the Eagles Hotel California into the house! Sigh I remember a new girl at school just before we moved to Texas and hearing New Kid in Town and thinking about her… I was an advanced romantic for my age. Of course, I also remember driving all over Charleston West Virginia and hearing those great Linda Rondstat singles like When Will I Be Loved, early Hall and Oates; singing ‘It’s a BITCH girl’ on Rich Girl and knowing I was getting away with SWEARING! Roller skating to great 70s singles… going to Pennsylvania and hanging out with my cousins who were playing the Sweet and stuff like that. Talk about bubblegum pop shit, there was one song I remember from one summer with Grandma Galupi, who kept a radio on a lot of the time, maybe just for us kids, a song called Playground in My Mind that was just awful and would become one of the famous Sound Warehouse [on Collins, 1986-87] ‘closing-time-is-coming-drive-them-out-with moldy-oldies’ songs, things along the lines of Paperlace The Night Chicago Died, Blue Suede Hooked on a Feeling and Mac Davis Baby Don’t Get Hooked on Me. Though I was almost truly offended when David Eckstrom cued up Louden Wainright’s Dead Skunk for Moldy Oldie because I still like the song! Of course we also had LOST CLASSICS like The Jimmy Castor Bunch Troglodyte, the Rockin’ Rebels Wild Weekend and Donovan Atlantis.
I know I heard things when I was very young that still bring up images of Grandma Galupi’s place in Ambridge: Deep Purple Smoke on the Water, Hocus Pocus by Focus, Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey by Paulie and Let It Be and The Long and Winding Road by some band called the Beatles… I know they had one of the radio contests at the time for a Pittsburgh station called 13Q [call letters unknown, sorry!] that you had to answer the phone with some phrase like “I only listen to the new 13Q” or something and you’d win a jackpot of 50 bucks or something and I would answer the phone with that as a four or five year old kid. Like they were going to call into the next county to Ambridge, but what did I know? Shows you where my priorities were.
I guess I always had an ear for music and certain songs recall certain periods still. David Bowie’s Fame recalls driving through Canton Ohio past the Football Hall of Fame in a canary yellow Capri. Band on the Run recalls driving to the pool way back in the hills at Kanawha County State Park… driving through the hills and back roads in West Virginia, where there is NO SHOULDER, just cliff!
We ended up in Charleston, West Virginia because my Dad worked for a man named Sam McBride who ran a McDonald’s in Pennsylvania and bought the franchise right to Charleston and took my Dad as the manager. That’s right: there was NO McDonald’s in Charleston West Virginia until 1974-1975! I remember the first store in downtown [truly downtown with a cheesy old style parking lot, where the guys got your keys and moved cars to get your car out; none of this park it yourself and put the money in the slot crap behind the restaurant, and rows and shops downtown. The McDonald’s was a Capitol and Quarrier [damn if I know which was which, the only two streets I remember are Virginia Street, which had an exit off I64 and a bridge that crossed the Elk River a couple blocks up from where it ran into the Kanawha, and Patrick Street, which had its own bridge across the Kanawah at the bottom of which was a building that was or had a mural for WXIT radio and a Borden’s hamburgers and a McDonald’s next to the Kmart [third of four in the area I believe, the last when we were still there being out by the St Albans Mall.] I was just looking at a map and restaurant guide for the city and if you ever find yourself STUCK in Charleston, go to Grazziano’s Pizza at 243 Capitol, it’s still the best pizza I can really remember, though I had an affinity for Punky’s Pizza in Indiana PA. Always have loved a great, greasy slice of pizza!
Anyway, I made my first purchases of music and received my first albums while stationed at the ‘way station’ that is Charleston. I mean ‘way station’ meaning it’s a place people spend a couple of years on their way up the chain. A lot of kids I went to school with had Dads who worked at Union Carbide or Dupont plants in the area and would be gone in two or three years. Lots of chemical and coal related work in the area I guess. Anyway, my first 45 paid for by me was Rick Dees Disco Duck, followed by the Spinners great Rubberband Man and Gordon Lightfoot Wreck of the Edmond Fitzgerald, ALL of which I still have, thank you. I received my first album, Bad Company’s Bad Co. when one of the radio stations had a promo gig at the Cap and Quarrier Mickey D’s. My second was a copy of the Doobie Brothers What Were Once Vices Are Now Habits [featuring Black Water] from a Creeker babysitter girl we had during the summer named Becky.
Now I will advise you right now that in West Virginia, there are TWO breeds of rednecks from the hollows: Hillers and Creekers, Hillers live on the hills and Creekers live down on the creeks [DUH!] and they don’t like each other. Well when I was smaller, my Mom had these two Creeker girls who would baby-sit us in the summer while Mom worked. I remember going out to their house a couple times and you had to cross a shot one lane wooden plank bridge across the creek to get to their house! Weird, eh? Anyway, one summer it was Becky, the next it was her sister Vicky, nice girls just watching rugrats for some summer cash. Probably spent it on pot and concert tickets… When I was six or seven, the local babysitter of reference Lisa Crow would come by and watch for an hour or two; she taught me to run my sock feet across the carpet to build up a static charge and walk up behind someone and ZAP them!
Some people are just born to music, I suppose.
I don’t know where this love of music comes from, anymore than I know where my greatness at trivial banal facts comes from. I really would rather go blind than deaf, though I know I will still hear music in my head when I am deaf. Unfortunately it’s always someone else’s music and not my own, which is why I am a great critic and not a great songwriter.
I thought at one time my Dad was the source for this music madness, but it turns out my mother liked all the cool things that were brought into the house. She has a small but very select collection of scratchy 45s of early 60’s soul that was popular where she [and my dad] grew up, the Steel Belt and former pollution capital of the USA, Pittsburgh Pennsylvania. Lots of the early Motown [Mary Wells, the Four Tops especially] with a touch of James Brown and some doo-wop groups on small labels.
I know my grandfather was a guitar player. During the war, [“The big one, WWII” as Archie Bunker used to say] he and some guys from his company would go around to other units in the area and play country music. [Remember, this was when there was “both kinds, country and Western.”] They were loosely known as the Ozark Mountaineers, Ozark being the name of their company. I just asked for the clarification, as I thought he played in a band in the States, but he said, “No, other than some guys that used to come around once in a while.” [I called him a “Hootenany-ing Hippie” for this]. He used to play for me, up to about 1995 or so before his hands shook so much. Last time my cousin’s fiancée was up, he learned a couple of the songs and he said it “nearly brought the old man to tears, not being able to play anymore.” I know he always liked music and was always humming or whistling something. Unfortunately, he was also a big Hee Haw fan, and there was no better way to clear a room of a bunch of little kids in 1974 than to turn on Hee Haw. Now I kind of wish I had paid more attention to the Hee Haw, but oh well.
[If I’d get ‘home’ more than once every couple of years, I might know more about my family history. Apparently it used to be a Saturday night thing to go up to Grandma and Grandpap’s (I assume this is up the hill to the Vodderbrogen house) and have square dances and card games. Apparently Pap was a fiddler and could call dances.]
One of my first memories, I couldn’t be more than three or four, is of my mother ironing and listening to the Temptaions Get Ready album. I remember the album cover more than the song, though I definitely hear the Temp’s trademark vocals. The album cover is a bright blue with the Temps in a dressing room [“Getting ready” for the show, ya dig?].
There is a family story of Grandma Galupi [or Mrs. Webb at the time] sitting with a very sick young Charles who refused to move his ear from a record player playing Marvin Gaye’s great I Heard It Through the Grapevine [Mom’s scratchy 45] playing over and over again.
My Mom and Dad, from what I have been able to gather, were at least into rock and roll, which is more than I can say for a few of my friends. I remember being home ‘sick’ about 1974 [well, maybe I was and maybe I discovered the ‘I-go-to-school-sick-so-I-need-a-stomach-ache-day’] and sitting playing DJ with my folks 8-tracks: Crosby Stills Nash & Young 4 Way Street, Led Zeppelin II, Elton John Madman Across the Water, Traffic John Barleycorn Must Die… I know there were a couple 60s compilations [16 Great Hits from Motown and shit like that], Aretha Franklin 30 Greatest Hits, the Beatles, Creedence Clearwater Revival Pendulum [after their big hits period, but has Have You Ever Seen the Rain and Hey Tonight and it is still a favorite of mine… call it nostalgia for sitting in the back seat on a road trip to see grandma…], Alice Cooper Killer [which scared the shit out of me]… a collection soon to be augmented by classics [courtesy of the Columbia House Record Club] like Steve Miller Fly Like an Eagle, Aerosmith Toys in the Attic, Earth Wind and Fire Gratitude and Spirit, the Ohio Players GREAT Honey [which recently re-acquired on vinyl and still kicks your ass as a great soul record! Imagine me sitting on the porch with the windows open on a mild fall night and these 70s soul licks and layered vocal of L-O-V-E coming out of my bacelor pad windows, not too loud because it was late, you understand...] My Mom always liked a little soul; we had a band called Brass Construction on 8 track which I do not really remember, but we also had the Brothers Johnson’s first Lookin’ Out for #1, before they did Strawberry Letter #23… glad to see y’all caught up to my mom a couple years later! Of course I found out later my Mom also brought the Stones Black and Blue and the Eagles Hotel California into the house! Sigh I remember a new girl at school just before we moved to Texas and hearing New Kid in Town and thinking about her… I was an advanced romantic for my age. Of course, I also remember driving all over Charleston West Virginia and hearing those great Linda Rondstat singles like When Will I Be Loved, early Hall and Oates; singing ‘It’s a BITCH girl’ on Rich Girl and knowing I was getting away with SWEARING! Roller skating to great 70s singles… going to Pennsylvania and hanging out with my cousins who were playing the Sweet and stuff like that. Talk about bubblegum pop shit, there was one song I remember from one summer with Grandma Galupi, who kept a radio on a lot of the time, maybe just for us kids, a song called Playground in My Mind that was just awful and would become one of the famous Sound Warehouse [on Collins, 1986-87] ‘closing-time-is-coming-drive-them-out-with moldy-oldies’ songs, things along the lines of Paperlace The Night Chicago Died, Blue Suede Hooked on a Feeling and Mac Davis Baby Don’t Get Hooked on Me. Though I was almost truly offended when David Eckstrom cued up Louden Wainright’s Dead Skunk for Moldy Oldie because I still like the song! Of course we also had LOST CLASSICS like The Jimmy Castor Bunch Troglodyte, the Rockin’ Rebels Wild Weekend and Donovan Atlantis.
I know I heard things when I was very young that still bring up images of Grandma Galupi’s place in Ambridge: Deep Purple Smoke on the Water, Hocus Pocus by Focus, Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey by Paulie and Let It Be and The Long and Winding Road by some band called the Beatles… I know they had one of the radio contests at the time for a Pittsburgh station called 13Q [call letters unknown, sorry!] that you had to answer the phone with some phrase like “I only listen to the new 13Q” or something and you’d win a jackpot of 50 bucks or something and I would answer the phone with that as a four or five year old kid. Like they were going to call into the next county to Ambridge, but what did I know? Shows you where my priorities were.
I guess I always had an ear for music and certain songs recall certain periods still. David Bowie’s Fame recalls driving through Canton Ohio past the Football Hall of Fame in a canary yellow Capri. Band on the Run recalls driving to the pool way back in the hills at Kanawha County State Park… driving through the hills and back roads in West Virginia, where there is NO SHOULDER, just cliff!
We ended up in Charleston, West Virginia because my Dad worked for a man named Sam McBride who ran a McDonald’s in Pennsylvania and bought the franchise right to Charleston and took my Dad as the manager. That’s right: there was NO McDonald’s in Charleston West Virginia until 1974-1975! I remember the first store in downtown [truly downtown with a cheesy old style parking lot, where the guys got your keys and moved cars to get your car out; none of this park it yourself and put the money in the slot crap behind the restaurant, and rows and shops downtown. The McDonald’s was a Capitol and Quarrier [damn if I know which was which, the only two streets I remember are Virginia Street, which had an exit off I64 and a bridge that crossed the Elk River a couple blocks up from where it ran into the Kanawha, and Patrick Street, which had its own bridge across the Kanawah at the bottom of which was a building that was or had a mural for WXIT radio and a Borden’s hamburgers and a McDonald’s next to the Kmart [third of four in the area I believe, the last when we were still there being out by the St Albans Mall.] I was just looking at a map and restaurant guide for the city and if you ever find yourself STUCK in Charleston, go to Grazziano’s Pizza at 243 Capitol, it’s still the best pizza I can really remember, though I had an affinity for Punky’s Pizza in Indiana PA. Always have loved a great, greasy slice of pizza!
Anyway, I made my first purchases of music and received my first albums while stationed at the ‘way station’ that is Charleston. I mean ‘way station’ meaning it’s a place people spend a couple of years on their way up the chain. A lot of kids I went to school with had Dads who worked at Union Carbide or Dupont plants in the area and would be gone in two or three years. Lots of chemical and coal related work in the area I guess. Anyway, my first 45 paid for by me was Rick Dees Disco Duck, followed by the Spinners great Rubberband Man and Gordon Lightfoot Wreck of the Edmond Fitzgerald, ALL of which I still have, thank you. I received my first album, Bad Company’s Bad Co. when one of the radio stations had a promo gig at the Cap and Quarrier Mickey D’s. My second was a copy of the Doobie Brothers What Were Once Vices Are Now Habits [featuring Black Water] from a Creeker babysitter girl we had during the summer named Becky.
Now I will advise you right now that in West Virginia, there are TWO breeds of rednecks from the hollows: Hillers and Creekers, Hillers live on the hills and Creekers live down on the creeks [DUH!] and they don’t like each other. Well when I was smaller, my Mom had these two Creeker girls who would baby-sit us in the summer while Mom worked. I remember going out to their house a couple times and you had to cross a shot one lane wooden plank bridge across the creek to get to their house! Weird, eh? Anyway, one summer it was Becky, the next it was her sister Vicky, nice girls just watching rugrats for some summer cash. Probably spent it on pot and concert tickets… When I was six or seven, the local babysitter of reference Lisa Crow would come by and watch for an hour or two; she taught me to run my sock feet across the carpet to build up a static charge and walk up behind someone and ZAP them!
Saturday, December 06, 2003
from my life story, a work in progress...
Part 2 : FM Radio and LPs
My golden age of rock and roll began in 1978 when I received a new record player [with eight-track player] for my 11th birthday. That year I also received ELO’s great A New World Record and I could listen to mom and dad’s eight tracks in my room. I gave The Best of BTO and Frampton Comes Alive a lot of plays. That was also the year I discovered Sly and the Family Stone’s Greatest Hits in their LPs.
This is when I discovered FM radio. In 1977 we moved from Charleston West Virginia to Arlington Texas. In West Virginia, as far as I know, we only listened to AM radio, lots of top 40 AM radio at that. I still have good memories of winding around the West Virginia hills lsitening to Grand Funk’s We’re An American Band, all those early Wings hits like Band on the Run, Silly Love Songs, Let ‘Em In and Listen What the Man Said, and Jefferson Starship’s Miracles. Of course the problem winding around those hills was losing the signal. On the other hand, on clear nights you could get the great WLS out of Chicago, which became an after dark favorite winding from Charleston through Ohio into Pennsylvania to visit the family. “Boogie Check, Boogie Check, ooh ahh.”
Anyway, we arrived in Texas and suddenly we were on the FM dial, mostly the top 40 leaning Z97, [which became Eagle 97 and finaly just the Eagle] with ocasional trips next door to the late great KZEW [“The Zoo”]. I remember hearing longer, stranger songs on the Zoo, things like Zebra’s Who’s Behind the Door and hearing Foghat and Led Zeppelin. When we moved across town in late 78, there was Cheap Trick At Budokahn all over the radio, with the first few Journey hits with Steve Perry, the Blues Brothers and the Knack’s My Sharona.
One of my sixth grade teachers, Mary Miles, told us about the Dr. Demento show, which was then airing at like 900 on Sunday nights on the Zoo and how they payed this obnoxious song every week called Fish Heads. Well of course, me and my pal Mark “Margarita Ledbottom” Lederman had to hear this and we became fans. Mark also turned me on to Kiss. I’ll never forget it, I borrowed his Kiss Alive! and Alive II to tape them, my first crude tapes placing a cassette player between the two speakers of my stereo. I had been curious because record 2 of Alive II; the first two songs on either side couldn’t be played because the record was broken, big jag out of one corner. Well, I was getting on the bus and I picked up the albums and I watched this slow motion horror as one of the records slipped out of the sleeve and a big corner got torn off. It was record 1 of Alive II, so now he had a matched set of broken records. I felt really bad because it took two of the best songs, Calling Dr Love and Christine Sixteen out of play.
Mark and I had gone to school across town the year before but his parents moved over a few blocks from us and we became good friends. Mark had been born in New York and he was WAY cooler than me. He had Led Zeppelin and we discovered Queen. We also had our first drinks [scotch at his bar mitzvah... I remeber us being at the bar and someone told him "you're a man now, have a man's drink." I only tasted it and the smokey flavor and whiskey burn... blech!] and found his dad’s Playboys and Hustlers and I smoked my first joint with Mark.
After we moved out to Burleson I gradually lost touch with Mark. We saw Queen and Billy Squier in 1982, my first concert without my parents. We would also see Aerosmith, once when they did their first reunion tour with my sister from the lower balcony, once two days after Mark twisted his ankle running around his folks pool. We parked over by Union Station and I made his hobble about a mile down the railroad tracks on crutches [where he lost one of those rubber tips on the crutches], which was kind of funny, and THEN we had to get him up into the nosebleed seats[!] and once from the front row on the Permanent Vacation tour. I guess I was forgiven for the crutches when I got those front row seats [the secret was, I learned, to get the operator on line a couple of minutes before the tickets went on sale and keep them on line; you can't do that now, it's all computerized!], but that was also the next to last time I saw Mark. The LAST time I saw him, I ran into him at a friend’s college graduation at TCU and I tried hooking up with him a couple times after, but never did.
I place this part up here because I mentioned Mark in an earlier piece and never got back to the subject. Like I said, he was around for much of the 'maturing' process we went through as teenagers... the pain of discovering girls and being shot down and all that... Mark at least had confidence. He was originally from New York, and he was proud of it, though he did not have the accent. I spent a few months of my 4th grade and my 5th grade year [though he was in the next class, we shared a common area] in central Arlington before we moved over by the lake... about a month into the school year, Mark moved about a quarter mile from me and we were buddies until I moved out to Burleson in the middle of my 8th grade year. For you girls, that's when boys FINALLY notice girls. Though I had been noticing girls for a long time before. There is a legend of me in the 1st grade [I am not making this up] of me lifting up my my 'girlfirend' Jessica [last name not given to protect the young, but I know what it is] mask at Halloween and kissing her in front of the class...find someone who was in the Oakbrook Elementary class with me and they may confirm... unfortunately Jessica and I were separated when she was[I am not making this up] held back in the 1st grade. See, I have ALWAYS been a lover! Unfortunately I peaked in the 1st grade... 7th grade was a torture of Stephanie Sheehan, 8th grade was Robin Hatfield and Franny D'Augustino. [8th grade was also when girls began really developing... ah the sweet ememories of 14 and staring at girls boobs in class!] Skating at Big Wheel in Arlington [before the fire and they went totally roller disco] to the Eagles, Steve Miller and Ted Nugent! But I digress...
Anyway, we went through talking about girls and rock and roll and reading Playboy. My parents were pretty liberal, but Mark's let him put up the Bo Derek /wet t shirt poster with the nipples prominently showing and the 'Start of the Nude Bicycle Race' poster from Queen's Jazz album. Mark joined Columbia House and he picked up a handful of records that would havge a big influence: Led Zeppelin IV, the Scorpions Blackout, Judas Priest British Steel, AC/DC Back in Black and For Those About to Rock... aside from the Queen, some of the albums that set me up for the 80s!
Mark had confidence that I certainly never had. I know he nailed someone I would truly have loved to have nailed one night when we were going to a party. I also remeber him drooling over one of my sister's friends one weekend he was out in Burleyville.
I say all this only because the first page of my book if/when it is published will be: Dedicated to Mark Harry Lederman who taught me all about sex, drugs and rock and roll... yep it's all HIS fault. I raise my whiskey glass to you wherever you are Mark! Salud!
Part 2 : FM Radio and LPs
My golden age of rock and roll began in 1978 when I received a new record player [with eight-track player] for my 11th birthday. That year I also received ELO’s great A New World Record and I could listen to mom and dad’s eight tracks in my room. I gave The Best of BTO and Frampton Comes Alive a lot of plays. That was also the year I discovered Sly and the Family Stone’s Greatest Hits in their LPs.
This is when I discovered FM radio. In 1977 we moved from Charleston West Virginia to Arlington Texas. In West Virginia, as far as I know, we only listened to AM radio, lots of top 40 AM radio at that. I still have good memories of winding around the West Virginia hills lsitening to Grand Funk’s We’re An American Band, all those early Wings hits like Band on the Run, Silly Love Songs, Let ‘Em In and Listen What the Man Said, and Jefferson Starship’s Miracles. Of course the problem winding around those hills was losing the signal. On the other hand, on clear nights you could get the great WLS out of Chicago, which became an after dark favorite winding from Charleston through Ohio into Pennsylvania to visit the family. “Boogie Check, Boogie Check, ooh ahh.”
Anyway, we arrived in Texas and suddenly we were on the FM dial, mostly the top 40 leaning Z97, [which became Eagle 97 and finaly just the Eagle] with ocasional trips next door to the late great KZEW [“The Zoo”]. I remember hearing longer, stranger songs on the Zoo, things like Zebra’s Who’s Behind the Door and hearing Foghat and Led Zeppelin. When we moved across town in late 78, there was Cheap Trick At Budokahn all over the radio, with the first few Journey hits with Steve Perry, the Blues Brothers and the Knack’s My Sharona.
One of my sixth grade teachers, Mary Miles, told us about the Dr. Demento show, which was then airing at like 900 on Sunday nights on the Zoo and how they payed this obnoxious song every week called Fish Heads. Well of course, me and my pal Mark “Margarita Ledbottom” Lederman had to hear this and we became fans. Mark also turned me on to Kiss. I’ll never forget it, I borrowed his Kiss Alive! and Alive II to tape them, my first crude tapes placing a cassette player between the two speakers of my stereo. I had been curious because record 2 of Alive II; the first two songs on either side couldn’t be played because the record was broken, big jag out of one corner. Well, I was getting on the bus and I picked up the albums and I watched this slow motion horror as one of the records slipped out of the sleeve and a big corner got torn off. It was record 1 of Alive II, so now he had a matched set of broken records. I felt really bad because it took two of the best songs, Calling Dr Love and Christine Sixteen out of play.
Mark and I had gone to school across town the year before but his parents moved over a few blocks from us and we became good friends. Mark had been born in New York and he was WAY cooler than me. He had Led Zeppelin and we discovered Queen. We also had our first drinks [scotch at his bar mitzvah... I remeber us being at the bar and someone told him "you're a man now, have a man's drink." I only tasted it and the smokey flavor and whiskey burn... blech!] and found his dad’s Playboys and Hustlers and I smoked my first joint with Mark.
After we moved out to Burleson I gradually lost touch with Mark. We saw Queen and Billy Squier in 1982, my first concert without my parents. We would also see Aerosmith, once when they did their first reunion tour with my sister from the lower balcony, once two days after Mark twisted his ankle running around his folks pool. We parked over by Union Station and I made his hobble about a mile down the railroad tracks on crutches [where he lost one of those rubber tips on the crutches], which was kind of funny, and THEN we had to get him up into the nosebleed seats[!] and once from the front row on the Permanent Vacation tour. I guess I was forgiven for the crutches when I got those front row seats [the secret was, I learned, to get the operator on line a couple of minutes before the tickets went on sale and keep them on line; you can't do that now, it's all computerized!], but that was also the next to last time I saw Mark. The LAST time I saw him, I ran into him at a friend’s college graduation at TCU and I tried hooking up with him a couple times after, but never did.
I place this part up here because I mentioned Mark in an earlier piece and never got back to the subject. Like I said, he was around for much of the 'maturing' process we went through as teenagers... the pain of discovering girls and being shot down and all that... Mark at least had confidence. He was originally from New York, and he was proud of it, though he did not have the accent. I spent a few months of my 4th grade and my 5th grade year [though he was in the next class, we shared a common area] in central Arlington before we moved over by the lake... about a month into the school year, Mark moved about a quarter mile from me and we were buddies until I moved out to Burleson in the middle of my 8th grade year. For you girls, that's when boys FINALLY notice girls. Though I had been noticing girls for a long time before. There is a legend of me in the 1st grade [I am not making this up] of me lifting up my my 'girlfirend' Jessica [last name not given to protect the young, but I know what it is] mask at Halloween and kissing her in front of the class...find someone who was in the Oakbrook Elementary class with me and they may confirm... unfortunately Jessica and I were separated when she was[I am not making this up] held back in the 1st grade. See, I have ALWAYS been a lover! Unfortunately I peaked in the 1st grade... 7th grade was a torture of Stephanie Sheehan, 8th grade was Robin Hatfield and Franny D'Augustino. [8th grade was also when girls began really developing... ah the sweet ememories of 14 and staring at girls boobs in class!] Skating at Big Wheel in Arlington [before the fire and they went totally roller disco] to the Eagles, Steve Miller and Ted Nugent! But I digress...
Anyway, we went through talking about girls and rock and roll and reading Playboy. My parents were pretty liberal, but Mark's let him put up the Bo Derek /wet t shirt poster with the nipples prominently showing and the 'Start of the Nude Bicycle Race' poster from Queen's Jazz album. Mark joined Columbia House and he picked up a handful of records that would havge a big influence: Led Zeppelin IV, the Scorpions Blackout, Judas Priest British Steel, AC/DC Back in Black and For Those About to Rock... aside from the Queen, some of the albums that set me up for the 80s!
Mark had confidence that I certainly never had. I know he nailed someone I would truly have loved to have nailed one night when we were going to a party. I also remeber him drooling over one of my sister's friends one weekend he was out in Burleyville.
I say all this only because the first page of my book if/when it is published will be: Dedicated to Mark Harry Lederman who taught me all about sex, drugs and rock and roll... yep it's all HIS fault. I raise my whiskey glass to you wherever you are Mark! Salud!
Sunday, November 30, 2003
It's official: I AM AN OLD FART
In an UNOFFICIAL meeting of the Rock and Roll Discussion Group [myslef, J Michal Leone, 'Uncle Rich' Zottola and guest panelists Lonnie King, Bill Horn and Bob Costanza [i think] in Bill Horn's garage over Hienekins Friday evening, we have deiceded that rock and roll is DEAD. The consensis we reached was that R&R died when the Sex Pistols came out... PUNK KILLED the rock and roll. Specifically, they took all of the ROLL out of rock and roll. So I guess we are stuick with rock, as long as we no longer call it rock and roll.
Actually, we decided there is an occasional rock and roll artitst [i say the Black Crowes, Michael nominated Lenny Kravitz]... Of course, Michael does ot believe that London Calling is one of the top 10 albums of all time, so we will have to discount his opinions from now on.
I was stuck in a room of 50-somethings trying to defend the 80s and losing... what could I use, Duran Duran? Of course. none of us understood much of anything today, so that makes me an OFFICIAL Old Fart, just like them. The question eventaully became "Is it a youth, it was better then thing because that's when it made its impact on me" thing. I think we tabled that one for now. Just like the "What was the first rock and roll record?"
Michael will be back in town and wants to meet the local contingent of the Rock and Roll round table. I will try to notify you with as much lead time as I can so we can hook up for dinner and friendly debate... hopefully on Michael's Visa card....
In an UNOFFICIAL meeting of the Rock and Roll Discussion Group [myslef, J Michal Leone, 'Uncle Rich' Zottola and guest panelists Lonnie King, Bill Horn and Bob Costanza [i think] in Bill Horn's garage over Hienekins Friday evening, we have deiceded that rock and roll is DEAD. The consensis we reached was that R&R died when the Sex Pistols came out... PUNK KILLED the rock and roll. Specifically, they took all of the ROLL out of rock and roll. So I guess we are stuick with rock, as long as we no longer call it rock and roll.
Actually, we decided there is an occasional rock and roll artitst [i say the Black Crowes, Michael nominated Lenny Kravitz]... Of course, Michael does ot believe that London Calling is one of the top 10 albums of all time, so we will have to discount his opinions from now on.
I was stuck in a room of 50-somethings trying to defend the 80s and losing... what could I use, Duran Duran? Of course. none of us understood much of anything today, so that makes me an OFFICIAL Old Fart, just like them. The question eventaully became "Is it a youth, it was better then thing because that's when it made its impact on me" thing. I think we tabled that one for now. Just like the "What was the first rock and roll record?"
Michael will be back in town and wants to meet the local contingent of the Rock and Roll round table. I will try to notify you with as much lead time as I can so we can hook up for dinner and friendly debate... hopefully on Michael's Visa card....
Thursday, November 27, 2003
Turkey Day
So it’s Thanksgiving Day, the turkey has been devoured, the football is over and I am looking for something to do because one more night of staring at my own four walls is going to drive me nuts. So I am driving through town, just up and down some side street to see what’s there and I come across a little non-descript shack with an old gold Caddy and busted neon sign that reads J--rn-list L-unge. Hmmm, I am up for someplace named ‘The Journalist Lounge,’ I thought.
I walked into a dank, dark bar, couple pool tables, couple old four chair dining room tables with wooden chairs that had seen better days before ending up in here and an old black squat jukebox that still plays 45s over on one wall. It’s just me and the bartender in there, a tall blonde guy with glasses behind the bar watching some sitcom on a TV in the corner. I took off my jacket and sat down at the corner stool next to the TV.
“What’s it going to be tonight?’ he asked.
“Bourbon and Coke,” I told him. He reached for a glass and started pouring. “Slow night?”
“Always is,” he said. “’Specting some traveling folks will be through tonight though.”
He handed me my drink and leaned against the cooler again and resumed watching his show, leaving me to stare at the ice in my drink. Out of boredom I wandered over to the jukebox. Man it was a beauty, circa 1979 like they used to have at the little grill down by the lake when we lived in Arlington. I used to ride my bike down there in the summer and get a soda and listen to Rick James’ Superfreak, Blondie doing One Way or Another or Nick Gilder’s Hot Child in the City. Or maybe it was James’ Mary Jane… Anyway, so I am checking the titles, not bad, little Luchenbach, Texas, little That’ll Be the Day, the Buddy Holly version, Chuck Berry, Creedence, London Calling!
“Get away from that fucking jukebox!” someone yelled at me, making me jump and almost spill my drink. “That’s a travesty of a jukebox! Not one fucking Sex Pistols song on it!”
“And there ain’t gonna be, neither!” shouted the bartender. “We put one on for you and you broke four tables spinnin’ ‘round drunk and bouncin’ off the walls, you fuckin’ walrus!”
“Aw what do you know about rock and roll?” the stranger shouted back. “The most progressive thing in your record collection is Frank Zappa.”
I turned to that taunt to see a wide bodied man in a black T shirt, black leather jacket, jeans and black boots glaring at the bartender. His shining shaved dome reminded me of Brando in Apocalypse Now. The bartender clicked his tongue and shook his head, not daring to meet the stranger’s glare.
“Whatta you want tonight Lester? I ain’t talking music with you no more you evil motherfucker.”
Lester slammed his hand on the bar at that.
“That’s right you fucking yokel, you know I’m right, that’s why you won’t argue with me! Gimme bourbon, straight up!”
“Bangs, you’re still a fucking pig, despite the haircut,” the bartender growled and he poured. “And you don’t know SHIT about music and you never did.”
“I knew how to make a living writing about it,” he said.
“You knew how to write enough to get paid,” the bartender said. “I wouldn’t call it living.”
“Fuck you Clem,” Lester shot back. “I did the Morrison and ‘died’ and now look at me! I’m worth more now than I ever was alive! My name is everywhere! EVERYONE’S comparing themselves to me, a fucking loser form El Cajon California who just typed for something to do while he was speeding away! I’m a fucking genius now that I’m dead!”
“You sure are a LOUD son of a bitch for someone who’s dead,” Clem growled back.
“SHEE-IT Clem, you should see it! They’re out there knocking themselves out trying to figure this shit out. ‘What would Lester say if he was alive today? What would he think about today’s music? What would he think about the state of rock journalism?’ I’ll tell you what I think of the state of rock journalism. Those fuckers like Marcus and Marsh and that hack Kurt Loder can eat my fucking smelly BVDs. Jann Wenner is a starstruck faggy asshole who wouldn’t know a musician if they bit him on the ass. He’s an Art Garfunkel loving, Mick Jagger’s dick sucking wanna be. He wanted to be the star. Fuck him! Fuck his slick, star fucking loving fashion plate magazine! Man, back in the day…”
Suddenly, mid-rant, Lester turned and started glaring at me.
“Who the fuck are you and why are you here?”
“Man, I just stopped in for a drink,” I said, sitting back down at the bar.
“You can’t just stop in here for a drink,” Lester howled. “You’ve gotta be a licensed journalist! You just letting anybody wander in here, Clem?”
“I got a BLOG I write on.”
“Oh fuck,” Lester rolled his eyes. He downed the shot and motioned for a refill. “A BLOG? Well excuse the fuck out of me! You fuckers, you all think you’re Lester bangs, don’t cha? You ain’t him pal. There’s only one and he’s dead.”
I stared at Lester for a second. “Didn’t you just say you were him?”
Lester laughed.
“Yeah, you got me. Well, I used to be him.” He sipped a bit of the whiskey. “Yeah, I used to be. Had someone sell all my shit and send it to me in Mexico where I can write in peace. Great move dying. Suddenly, everyone re-thinks their stand on you, man. They forgive you for whatever fucked up shit you did to them. Talk nice about you. I miss some of those dudes. Loved that little shit Cameron Crowe. Thought about calling his ass after Almost Famous, ha ha. ‘This is the voice from the grave you little fucker, send me some money! Quit writing dipshit movies and tell us what it’s like to bang Nancy Wilson all night!’”
He stopped and sipped on the whiskey again.
“Ha ha,” he chuckled. “That would have been hilarious. See how they got Phillip Seymour Hoffman to soften me up for the movie? I’m an angel now, a ‘prophet for the fall of rock and roll and rock journalism.’ Ha ha. Man, I was just rambling. I just did what I did, I just let it fly.”
He took a crumpled pack of smokes out of a pocket of his jacket and fished one out.
“I wanted to be a musician,” he sighed, taking a drag. “Never learned to play though. Never… shit I don’t know. I tell that drunken buffoon Morrison I wrote better lyrics than the fucking Crystal Ship or anything on that third Doors album, but he just calls me a hack and keeps going down the beach. I keep telling him to get a haircut, too, but he’s still a fucking hippie.”
“Jim Morrison?” I asked.
“Yeah, he split for a walking tour of Europe in’71 and never looked back, he says. Seems like a nice enough guy now that he gave up coke and shit. Met him in Mexico in ’85, now we’re neighbors in a little town in Guatemala. He’s a jogging freak, too. Always walking or running somewhere. The Doors guys are hip, send him some cash when a CD is re-issued or shit. Man you should have seen the fat check Marcus cut when they issued that second book of MY shit. I saw all those zeros and I thought I missed a decimal point somewhere!”
He stubbed out the cigarette and downed the whiskey.
“So you’ve got your little BLOG and you write about what you like and you do it for kicks and hope someone reads it. You do it to clear your head. It’s a great thing, no deadlines, no column inches to fill, just write what you want when you want. That’s it man, that’s the way to be. Paper will always be around, but the Internet is where it’s at man.”
Lester stood up and put the crumpled pack of smokes in his pocket again.
“Hey Clem, set him up on my tab,” Lester said. He offered a hand and I shook it. “Nice to chat with you, I gotta run. Catching a plane to Hunter Thompson’s for a weekend of football and drunken debauchery.”
“But Lester,” I asked, “What about the future of music journalism?”
“Fuck it man. Like the man once said: NO FUTURE. All you can do now is get a job writing ass kissing pieces for Rolling Stone or people or churning out shit books on Springsteeen like Marsh, or ghostwriting Levon Helm’s memoirs. No man, rock journalism is fucking dead as a doorknob. Dead as Michael Jackson’s career. Man I write reviews on Amazon.com for grins. There ain’t no money in it, but it’s as valid a medium as any of the rock and roll magazines today, since there’s no such thing as a bed review anymore. Still afraid to piss off advertisers.” He chuckled to himself again and put a friendly hand on my shoulder. “No, you keep doing it the way you are, plugging away for a dozen or so friends on your little web page. Because there is no real journalism anymore.”
And he stood up again and shook my hand again. “Gotta run. See you next time through, Clem! Get some real music for that jukebox!”
And with that, he was gone. I sat stunned for a few minutes. Clem sat another bourbon and coke down next to my half empty one.
“Intense, isn’t he?” he said wiping down the bar and putting the shot glasses in the sink. “I don’t know if he really is or not. He just shows up once in a while and has a few and we don’t see him for three or four months. Been doing it for years now. He’s awful fun to hang around with anyway.”
I sat there and drank my drinks in silence for a while, thinking about what the man had said and thinking ‘That’s what I get for looking for an adventure after the turkey has been devoured and the football is over.’
So it’s Thanksgiving Day, the turkey has been devoured, the football is over and I am looking for something to do because one more night of staring at my own four walls is going to drive me nuts. So I am driving through town, just up and down some side street to see what’s there and I come across a little non-descript shack with an old gold Caddy and busted neon sign that reads J--rn-list L-unge. Hmmm, I am up for someplace named ‘The Journalist Lounge,’ I thought.
I walked into a dank, dark bar, couple pool tables, couple old four chair dining room tables with wooden chairs that had seen better days before ending up in here and an old black squat jukebox that still plays 45s over on one wall. It’s just me and the bartender in there, a tall blonde guy with glasses behind the bar watching some sitcom on a TV in the corner. I took off my jacket and sat down at the corner stool next to the TV.
“What’s it going to be tonight?’ he asked.
“Bourbon and Coke,” I told him. He reached for a glass and started pouring. “Slow night?”
“Always is,” he said. “’Specting some traveling folks will be through tonight though.”
He handed me my drink and leaned against the cooler again and resumed watching his show, leaving me to stare at the ice in my drink. Out of boredom I wandered over to the jukebox. Man it was a beauty, circa 1979 like they used to have at the little grill down by the lake when we lived in Arlington. I used to ride my bike down there in the summer and get a soda and listen to Rick James’ Superfreak, Blondie doing One Way or Another or Nick Gilder’s Hot Child in the City. Or maybe it was James’ Mary Jane… Anyway, so I am checking the titles, not bad, little Luchenbach, Texas, little That’ll Be the Day, the Buddy Holly version, Chuck Berry, Creedence, London Calling!
“Get away from that fucking jukebox!” someone yelled at me, making me jump and almost spill my drink. “That’s a travesty of a jukebox! Not one fucking Sex Pistols song on it!”
“And there ain’t gonna be, neither!” shouted the bartender. “We put one on for you and you broke four tables spinnin’ ‘round drunk and bouncin’ off the walls, you fuckin’ walrus!”
“Aw what do you know about rock and roll?” the stranger shouted back. “The most progressive thing in your record collection is Frank Zappa.”
I turned to that taunt to see a wide bodied man in a black T shirt, black leather jacket, jeans and black boots glaring at the bartender. His shining shaved dome reminded me of Brando in Apocalypse Now. The bartender clicked his tongue and shook his head, not daring to meet the stranger’s glare.
“Whatta you want tonight Lester? I ain’t talking music with you no more you evil motherfucker.”
Lester slammed his hand on the bar at that.
“That’s right you fucking yokel, you know I’m right, that’s why you won’t argue with me! Gimme bourbon, straight up!”
“Bangs, you’re still a fucking pig, despite the haircut,” the bartender growled and he poured. “And you don’t know SHIT about music and you never did.”
“I knew how to make a living writing about it,” he said.
“You knew how to write enough to get paid,” the bartender said. “I wouldn’t call it living.”
“Fuck you Clem,” Lester shot back. “I did the Morrison and ‘died’ and now look at me! I’m worth more now than I ever was alive! My name is everywhere! EVERYONE’S comparing themselves to me, a fucking loser form El Cajon California who just typed for something to do while he was speeding away! I’m a fucking genius now that I’m dead!”
“You sure are a LOUD son of a bitch for someone who’s dead,” Clem growled back.
“SHEE-IT Clem, you should see it! They’re out there knocking themselves out trying to figure this shit out. ‘What would Lester say if he was alive today? What would he think about today’s music? What would he think about the state of rock journalism?’ I’ll tell you what I think of the state of rock journalism. Those fuckers like Marcus and Marsh and that hack Kurt Loder can eat my fucking smelly BVDs. Jann Wenner is a starstruck faggy asshole who wouldn’t know a musician if they bit him on the ass. He’s an Art Garfunkel loving, Mick Jagger’s dick sucking wanna be. He wanted to be the star. Fuck him! Fuck his slick, star fucking loving fashion plate magazine! Man, back in the day…”
Suddenly, mid-rant, Lester turned and started glaring at me.
“Who the fuck are you and why are you here?”
“Man, I just stopped in for a drink,” I said, sitting back down at the bar.
“You can’t just stop in here for a drink,” Lester howled. “You’ve gotta be a licensed journalist! You just letting anybody wander in here, Clem?”
“I got a BLOG I write on.”
“Oh fuck,” Lester rolled his eyes. He downed the shot and motioned for a refill. “A BLOG? Well excuse the fuck out of me! You fuckers, you all think you’re Lester bangs, don’t cha? You ain’t him pal. There’s only one and he’s dead.”
I stared at Lester for a second. “Didn’t you just say you were him?”
Lester laughed.
“Yeah, you got me. Well, I used to be him.” He sipped a bit of the whiskey. “Yeah, I used to be. Had someone sell all my shit and send it to me in Mexico where I can write in peace. Great move dying. Suddenly, everyone re-thinks their stand on you, man. They forgive you for whatever fucked up shit you did to them. Talk nice about you. I miss some of those dudes. Loved that little shit Cameron Crowe. Thought about calling his ass after Almost Famous, ha ha. ‘This is the voice from the grave you little fucker, send me some money! Quit writing dipshit movies and tell us what it’s like to bang Nancy Wilson all night!’”
He stopped and sipped on the whiskey again.
“Ha ha,” he chuckled. “That would have been hilarious. See how they got Phillip Seymour Hoffman to soften me up for the movie? I’m an angel now, a ‘prophet for the fall of rock and roll and rock journalism.’ Ha ha. Man, I was just rambling. I just did what I did, I just let it fly.”
He took a crumpled pack of smokes out of a pocket of his jacket and fished one out.
“I wanted to be a musician,” he sighed, taking a drag. “Never learned to play though. Never… shit I don’t know. I tell that drunken buffoon Morrison I wrote better lyrics than the fucking Crystal Ship or anything on that third Doors album, but he just calls me a hack and keeps going down the beach. I keep telling him to get a haircut, too, but he’s still a fucking hippie.”
“Jim Morrison?” I asked.
“Yeah, he split for a walking tour of Europe in’71 and never looked back, he says. Seems like a nice enough guy now that he gave up coke and shit. Met him in Mexico in ’85, now we’re neighbors in a little town in Guatemala. He’s a jogging freak, too. Always walking or running somewhere. The Doors guys are hip, send him some cash when a CD is re-issued or shit. Man you should have seen the fat check Marcus cut when they issued that second book of MY shit. I saw all those zeros and I thought I missed a decimal point somewhere!”
He stubbed out the cigarette and downed the whiskey.
“So you’ve got your little BLOG and you write about what you like and you do it for kicks and hope someone reads it. You do it to clear your head. It’s a great thing, no deadlines, no column inches to fill, just write what you want when you want. That’s it man, that’s the way to be. Paper will always be around, but the Internet is where it’s at man.”
Lester stood up and put the crumpled pack of smokes in his pocket again.
“Hey Clem, set him up on my tab,” Lester said. He offered a hand and I shook it. “Nice to chat with you, I gotta run. Catching a plane to Hunter Thompson’s for a weekend of football and drunken debauchery.”
“But Lester,” I asked, “What about the future of music journalism?”
“Fuck it man. Like the man once said: NO FUTURE. All you can do now is get a job writing ass kissing pieces for Rolling Stone or people or churning out shit books on Springsteeen like Marsh, or ghostwriting Levon Helm’s memoirs. No man, rock journalism is fucking dead as a doorknob. Dead as Michael Jackson’s career. Man I write reviews on Amazon.com for grins. There ain’t no money in it, but it’s as valid a medium as any of the rock and roll magazines today, since there’s no such thing as a bed review anymore. Still afraid to piss off advertisers.” He chuckled to himself again and put a friendly hand on my shoulder. “No, you keep doing it the way you are, plugging away for a dozen or so friends on your little web page. Because there is no real journalism anymore.”
And he stood up again and shook my hand again. “Gotta run. See you next time through, Clem! Get some real music for that jukebox!”
And with that, he was gone. I sat stunned for a few minutes. Clem sat another bourbon and coke down next to my half empty one.
“Intense, isn’t he?” he said wiping down the bar and putting the shot glasses in the sink. “I don’t know if he really is or not. He just shows up once in a while and has a few and we don’t see him for three or four months. Been doing it for years now. He’s awful fun to hang around with anyway.”
I sat there and drank my drinks in silence for a while, thinking about what the man had said and thinking ‘That’s what I get for looking for an adventure after the turkey has been devoured and the football is over.’
Wednesday, November 26, 2003
Let It Blurt
There’s a lot of talk on various blogs right now about rock criticism. Is it dead? Is ‘rock journalism’ dead? Is there any future for rock criticism? Are we all just pretending we’re Lester Bangs out here? Wasn’t it better ‘way back when?’
The reason I mention it [other than finally posting something new… okay here’s something new to read Lizardbreath!] is because I was just contemplating the same thing before my trip to Pennsylvania to see relations, because I was reading about the arguments of Bangs and Co. circa 1978. [Is 'rock journalism' in decline? What's the next avenue?] Yeah, well, that book is good mind wasting reading; hey I just finished East of Eden and I am halfway through Grapes of Wrath, so eat chain. The short argument is that the rise of garbage like People cut the meat out of real rock and roll journalism, making reviews shorter and articles more about ‘celebrity’ and talent [or relative lack there of]. I think this is important, because it’s something that is never really addressed and it’s something the 10 second TV blurb or the fawning VH1 Behind the Music: Brittany has only made worse. This crap is beginning to get on my nerve. I all ready blocked MTV in this house because I don’t CARE about ‘Cribs’ or ‘The Real World’ or ‘Road Rules’ or whatever. I wanted MUSIC on Music Television, but I have to get digital or satellite to get a real music channel like M2. And if VH1 isn’t running some ‘Worst Hair Decisions’ or ‘Top Bodies in Rock’ or ‘I Miss My Rubik’s Cube and Pac Man and Whatever Happened to My Cheryl Ladd Poster’ show, they’re hip-hopping me to damn death. Listen to me: I don’t care about ‘bling-bling,’ how many cases of Kristal champagne can fit in your party room fridge and I am tired of videos with people in various states of undress shaking big butts in my face. Show me four guys with instruments again, who step up to a mike for a chorus and make guitar player faces during short, noisy solos! Show me the speaker like “Bastards of Young” or the Ramones hitting the black and white TV trying to tune it in on “Do You Remember Rock and Roll Radio.”
Oh, but I am forgetting that this is the S.A.S generation. What’s that? Short Attention Span! I blame the original MTV for this, too. Fast cut editing and off the wall angles; yeah they had to get our attention somehow, even if they were the only game in town, eh? But in the SAS Generation, the FIRST thing they learned was get it while you’re on top, cause if you slip for two weeks, people are on to the next thing, pronto, Billy. And the corporations learned it faster. “Man you are it! You’re hot, number six with a bullet, here’s the new video budget, take half a mil!, whoops, new record didn’t sell, blame Napster and the economy, you owe us for that last video, we’ll take it from your one hit album for the rest of your life, you may start seeing some nickels when you’re fifty, see you in the 3.99 bin at the used CD store, NEXT!”
Let’s take Brittany for an example. What the fuck is she? She’s a face and a body. Can she sing? Debatable, but we’ll say for the sake of argument she can sing. Does she have anything to say other than “I am not a role model” and “I wanted my record to address adult issues like sex.” Well hell, this is Madonna all over again! But like the Mo girl, she’s getting press, amazing amounts of press ‘cause she’s a tits and ass show and it brings in viewers. That’s right I said it! Was that ‘kiss’ anything more that Madonna rolling around showing her garters under the wedding dress at the MTV awards whatever year that was? Give it to the girl, she learned from [and apparently has the blessing of] the best: ‘Ain’t no such thing as bad press!’ My prediction, dated, right here, right now: Brittany will utter the F Word on her next record. And it will get a LOT of press and she will sigh and again utter ‘I am not a role model, I want to be seen as an adult. I am not a virgin you know.’ You read it here first.
What has me so cranky? Michael is in town. I love Michael, but he admits he is stuck in a time warp: 1964-1974. I want to do an hour on tape and post our discussion. Ask what was so great about then? What about the 80s? What about REM and Replacements? Do you let your 12 year old daughter listen to the shit that’s out there now?
Man, sitting here with whiskey and coke and remastered Television [reissued by, you guessed it, Rhino again!]; maybe I am channeling the spirit of Lester [big HAW HAW]! Why is Marquee Moon so GREAT and Adventure [2nd] so mediocre? So maybe I am in my own time warp I know I like a lot on Michael’s era…not the Monkees or the Turtles or Dave Clark Five, maybe a couple singles but not ALL encompassing! I don’t need ALL the Monkees, maybe not even a full greatest hits album. On the other hand, Michael is an anal complete archivist. He all ready owns all the Beatles, but he wants the two double CD sets 1962-1966 and 1967-1970! I keep asking why he needs those, can’t he burn them himself or burn BETTER compilations, but he just shrugs and says “I want them, that’s why.” Like owning the Rolling Stones Hot Rocks collection. He doesn’t understand why I am put off by this [IMHO] egregious purchase; part of it is “you all ready own half of this, why pay for it again? You’re playing right to the record company pricks Zappa warned you about! How many Doors Greatest Hits CDs have been released in the last 15 years?”… the other part is it make me grin to know I am grating a nerve.
Now I owe Michael a lot. He turns me onto many things I never would have heard otherwise. Like the other day we were watching football and listening to the first Journey [the Neal Schon-Greg Rollie-Anysley Dunbar, fresh from Santana Journey, not the ‘label says you should get a real singer, how about Steve Perry?’ Journey] and [Leslie] West, [Jack] Bruce and [Corky] Lainge and discussing Robin Trower [Bruce, Bill Lordan and Trower’s BLT, great under rated record!]. He played a Turtles record called Battle of the Bands, [remember battle of the bands? I remebered one night seeing Trying Season lose to a cover band someplace in Arlington… the cover band had a talk box and did ‘Do You Feel Like We Do’ and ‘Those Shoes’ while I am screaming “play something ORIGINAL!”] with the Turtles doing ten different musical styles that was really cool. Discussing the original Alice Cooper band [Alice Cooper was the name of the band and they quit in 1975 because, well, Alice became Alice.] and Alice replacing them with Lou Reed’s Rock and Roll Animal band for Welcome to My Nightmare. I am worried he is becoming that ‘baby boomer, we were the greatest generation’ person. Of course, he is a Rush Limbaugh fan, so I don’t know.
ADD: I think I have just figured it out... I am afraind Michael is going to be some sort of Elitist Completist, which is the ULTIMATE musical snobbery, and we all know I HAVE to be the biggest music snob on the BLOG. I mean I have been trying recently to determine whetjher I am a music collector [i.e. Am I collecting songs and not worried about formats, so what's wrong with burning down CDs I have and selling the 'corporate packaging'] or if I am a record collector [i.e. Am I collecting the music ALONG WITH the sleeve and photos and liner notes and stuff I find so interesting]. So far it's a pretty even split, the sitcking point being Aerosmith Toys in the Attic and Rocks. Do I want people to come in and SEE that little plastic box printed in a factory somewhere and go "Cool album" or do I just need to have it for myself and let people ask when they DON'T see it in my collection? Or do I burn a two on one CD and go buy some used vynil for "showing off?"
Anyway, I am working Thanksgiving and the day after. I’ll take the money, but I know getting off at 800 Thursday night and being in at 700 Friday morning is going to suck. Y’All enjoy your turkey America, I will be thinking of my next rant…
There’s a lot of talk on various blogs right now about rock criticism. Is it dead? Is ‘rock journalism’ dead? Is there any future for rock criticism? Are we all just pretending we’re Lester Bangs out here? Wasn’t it better ‘way back when?’
The reason I mention it [other than finally posting something new… okay here’s something new to read Lizardbreath!] is because I was just contemplating the same thing before my trip to Pennsylvania to see relations, because I was reading about the arguments of Bangs and Co. circa 1978. [Is 'rock journalism' in decline? What's the next avenue?] Yeah, well, that book is good mind wasting reading; hey I just finished East of Eden and I am halfway through Grapes of Wrath, so eat chain. The short argument is that the rise of garbage like People cut the meat out of real rock and roll journalism, making reviews shorter and articles more about ‘celebrity’ and talent [or relative lack there of]. I think this is important, because it’s something that is never really addressed and it’s something the 10 second TV blurb or the fawning VH1 Behind the Music: Brittany has only made worse. This crap is beginning to get on my nerve. I all ready blocked MTV in this house because I don’t CARE about ‘Cribs’ or ‘The Real World’ or ‘Road Rules’ or whatever. I wanted MUSIC on Music Television, but I have to get digital or satellite to get a real music channel like M2. And if VH1 isn’t running some ‘Worst Hair Decisions’ or ‘Top Bodies in Rock’ or ‘I Miss My Rubik’s Cube and Pac Man and Whatever Happened to My Cheryl Ladd Poster’ show, they’re hip-hopping me to damn death. Listen to me: I don’t care about ‘bling-bling,’ how many cases of Kristal champagne can fit in your party room fridge and I am tired of videos with people in various states of undress shaking big butts in my face. Show me four guys with instruments again, who step up to a mike for a chorus and make guitar player faces during short, noisy solos! Show me the speaker like “Bastards of Young” or the Ramones hitting the black and white TV trying to tune it in on “Do You Remember Rock and Roll Radio.”
Oh, but I am forgetting that this is the S.A.S generation. What’s that? Short Attention Span! I blame the original MTV for this, too. Fast cut editing and off the wall angles; yeah they had to get our attention somehow, even if they were the only game in town, eh? But in the SAS Generation, the FIRST thing they learned was get it while you’re on top, cause if you slip for two weeks, people are on to the next thing, pronto, Billy. And the corporations learned it faster. “Man you are it! You’re hot, number six with a bullet, here’s the new video budget, take half a mil!, whoops, new record didn’t sell, blame Napster and the economy, you owe us for that last video, we’ll take it from your one hit album for the rest of your life, you may start seeing some nickels when you’re fifty, see you in the 3.99 bin at the used CD store, NEXT!”
Let’s take Brittany for an example. What the fuck is she? She’s a face and a body. Can she sing? Debatable, but we’ll say for the sake of argument she can sing. Does she have anything to say other than “I am not a role model” and “I wanted my record to address adult issues like sex.” Well hell, this is Madonna all over again! But like the Mo girl, she’s getting press, amazing amounts of press ‘cause she’s a tits and ass show and it brings in viewers. That’s right I said it! Was that ‘kiss’ anything more that Madonna rolling around showing her garters under the wedding dress at the MTV awards whatever year that was? Give it to the girl, she learned from [and apparently has the blessing of] the best: ‘Ain’t no such thing as bad press!’ My prediction, dated, right here, right now: Brittany will utter the F Word on her next record. And it will get a LOT of press and she will sigh and again utter ‘I am not a role model, I want to be seen as an adult. I am not a virgin you know.’ You read it here first.
What has me so cranky? Michael is in town. I love Michael, but he admits he is stuck in a time warp: 1964-1974. I want to do an hour on tape and post our discussion. Ask what was so great about then? What about the 80s? What about REM and Replacements? Do you let your 12 year old daughter listen to the shit that’s out there now?
Man, sitting here with whiskey and coke and remastered Television [reissued by, you guessed it, Rhino again!]; maybe I am channeling the spirit of Lester [big HAW HAW]! Why is Marquee Moon so GREAT and Adventure [2nd] so mediocre? So maybe I am in my own time warp I know I like a lot on Michael’s era…not the Monkees or the Turtles or Dave Clark Five, maybe a couple singles but not ALL encompassing! I don’t need ALL the Monkees, maybe not even a full greatest hits album. On the other hand, Michael is an anal complete archivist. He all ready owns all the Beatles, but he wants the two double CD sets 1962-1966 and 1967-1970! I keep asking why he needs those, can’t he burn them himself or burn BETTER compilations, but he just shrugs and says “I want them, that’s why.” Like owning the Rolling Stones Hot Rocks collection. He doesn’t understand why I am put off by this [IMHO] egregious purchase; part of it is “you all ready own half of this, why pay for it again? You’re playing right to the record company pricks Zappa warned you about! How many Doors Greatest Hits CDs have been released in the last 15 years?”… the other part is it make me grin to know I am grating a nerve.
Now I owe Michael a lot. He turns me onto many things I never would have heard otherwise. Like the other day we were watching football and listening to the first Journey [the Neal Schon-Greg Rollie-Anysley Dunbar, fresh from Santana Journey, not the ‘label says you should get a real singer, how about Steve Perry?’ Journey] and [Leslie] West, [Jack] Bruce and [Corky] Lainge and discussing Robin Trower [Bruce, Bill Lordan and Trower’s BLT, great under rated record!]. He played a Turtles record called Battle of the Bands, [remember battle of the bands? I remebered one night seeing Trying Season lose to a cover band someplace in Arlington… the cover band had a talk box and did ‘Do You Feel Like We Do’ and ‘Those Shoes’ while I am screaming “play something ORIGINAL!”] with the Turtles doing ten different musical styles that was really cool. Discussing the original Alice Cooper band [Alice Cooper was the name of the band and they quit in 1975 because, well, Alice became Alice.] and Alice replacing them with Lou Reed’s Rock and Roll Animal band for Welcome to My Nightmare. I am worried he is becoming that ‘baby boomer, we were the greatest generation’ person. Of course, he is a Rush Limbaugh fan, so I don’t know.
ADD: I think I have just figured it out... I am afraind Michael is going to be some sort of Elitist Completist, which is the ULTIMATE musical snobbery, and we all know I HAVE to be the biggest music snob on the BLOG. I mean I have been trying recently to determine whetjher I am a music collector [i.e. Am I collecting songs and not worried about formats, so what's wrong with burning down CDs I have and selling the 'corporate packaging'] or if I am a record collector [i.e. Am I collecting the music ALONG WITH the sleeve and photos and liner notes and stuff I find so interesting]. So far it's a pretty even split, the sitcking point being Aerosmith Toys in the Attic and Rocks. Do I want people to come in and SEE that little plastic box printed in a factory somewhere and go "Cool album" or do I just need to have it for myself and let people ask when they DON'T see it in my collection? Or do I burn a two on one CD and go buy some used vynil for "showing off?"
Anyway, I am working Thanksgiving and the day after. I’ll take the money, but I know getting off at 800 Thursday night and being in at 700 Friday morning is going to suck. Y’All enjoy your turkey America, I will be thinking of my next rant…