A Hole in the Head

2012-01-01T17:00:00.002-06:00

Another year, another massive amount of transferring my record collection. This year for some reason I transferred a large number of vocal group and organ albums, plus quite a few albums that were made for small groups that played at nightclubs around town...

Some highlights from this compilation are: Art Newman, who runs the Night and Day TV Repair shop in Dayton Beach. In the 80's a friend of mine when to school at Avery Riddle and brought me back several of Art's homemade recordings. Arthur Newman would given them out whenever anyone got their TV or VCR fixed. I love his albums for their earnestness; The Irritants, singing Dead Rock Funeral, is off of an old cassette I had of some friends singing songs that either they or I recorded. I always thought this had the makings of a hit. It is definitely an earworm song.

I through a couple of my songs on here as well. Moon River is a discarded song from a project I worked on last year called Empty Orchestra. On the recording I sing along with either Music Minus One recordings or Karoeke tracks. After all the songs were done we through this one out because it just sounds too Karoeke and the other songs have a real band feel to them. Sunshine Day is also from those sessions; all the people involved with the recording participated in the song, Gary Ward, Brian McNally and his wife Gwen. Damn singing Cindy Brady's part was hard.

I've also put on a lost Bric-a-Brac song: Dreams of an Everyday Housewife.

The rest is a total mishmash. I tried to stick with my rules of only records or songs I transferred during the calendar year. But I think this came out o.k. I do have to say I compiled this with a new program and the levels are a little off... If I ever get around to fixing that I'll re-post it...

Happy New Year...!!!!

Stereo Balance

The Theme From S.W.A.T – Ray Conniff Singers

I Can See For Miles – Frankie Randall

We Can Work It Out – The Brothers Four

Steppin’ Stone – The Golden Gate Strings

Mountain Greenery - Frenchy Boutan

Happy Together – The 7^th Sound

I Like How You Taste – Unknown

The Touch – Betty Johnson

Destination Moon – The Ames Bros

Life on Mars – The King Singers

Dead Rock Funeral – The Irritants

To Die in Summertime – Rod McKuen

The Impossible Dream – Liberace

Moon River – John S. Connors

A House is Not a Home – Art Newman

Going Out of My Head - Gene and Joey

Are You Lonesome Tonight – Bob Kames

Dreams of the Everyday Housewife – Bric-a-Brac

Feelings – Ford and Angel

Three O’Clock in the Morning – Wendy and Bonnie

Wonder Why – Joanna Gault

Where Does It Lead – The Little Sisters

Where Flamingos Fly - Linda Lawson

It’s Silk – India Adams

Sunshine Day – Empty Orchestra Singers

Goodbye Yellow Brick Road - 101 Strings Singers.

2011-01-01T11:55:00.003-06:00

The Year of Transferring Dangerously

This year I spent a huge amount of time transferring my extremely huge record collection to mp3's... I've been doing this for ten years now and have barely made a dent...

Each year for friends I make a compilation of the best or most interesting songs I stumbled upon...

There are also three new songs I've recorded this year... I Will Follow You I did in my kitchen using CuBase and a Karoeke track...

The Sea and Sand was a demo I did with Mike Armstrong to play for our band so we could learn it... we sent it a former band member Erik Johnson who over laid strings and punched it up...

and A Taste of Honey is a preview of some of the work I've been doing with Brian McNally in recording an album using found backing tracks...

Below is a player where you can listen to the whole CD as a podcast...

Enjoy and Happy New Year 2011!!!

The Ghost and Mr. Chicken - Vic Mizzy

Rubber Bands and Bits of String - Telly Savalas

All My Friends Have Gone to California - Anthony Perkins

I Will Follow You - John S. Connors (from the kitchen sessions)

Don't Rain on My Parade - Nelson Riddle

Bye Bye Brown Eyes - Anthony Newley

Let's Fool Around - Johnny Charro

The Green Grass Starts to Grow - Percy Faith

The Sea and Sand - Bric & Brac (produced by El Nazn)

I've Been Wrong Before - Julius LaRosa

What Became of Life - Jimmy Durrante

Forever - The Carravelles

Holiday For Strings - Sue Raney

Soul and Inspiration - Jane Morgan

A Bad Case of You - Dolly Holiday

I've Grown Accustomed to Her Face - Nino Nanni

The Ballad of The Shape of Things - Blossom Dearie

Shapes - Eileen Fulton

A Taste of Honey - John S. Connors (produced by Brian McNally)

My Cigarette and I - The J's With Jamie

Theme from The Stowaway in the Sky - Nelson Riddle

We've Loved Before - Henry Mancini

Over The Sun - Tony Bennett

You Were Meant for Me - Peggy Lee/Michael Franks

When It Doesn't Work Out - Cass Elliot

Nessun Dorma - Joah Valley

2009-10-01T00:37:00.007-05:00

Love Isn't the Answer - It's a Vocal Coach

So I listened to the new Barbra Streisand album Love is the Answer this afternoon while at work. Pretty closely because I was doing mindless data entry. A new Streisand album is always something I've anticipated since I was a teenager. When I was in high school and a new album would come out I would purposely take one track on the album and not listen to it for a week, just to prolong the joy of hearing Babs sing another song I didn't know... Even her last album Guilty Pleasures, for all it's over produced Barry Gibb-ness had a couple solidly good songs on it.

I've been looking forward to her first album of standards and was really hoping that Diana Krall would be the guiding hand that would force Barbra out of the things that made her Movie Album almost unbearable... except for Moon River every song was so frickin' slow...

So, I listened to Love Is the Answer and I'm just shocked... shocked at how terrible it sounds. Now there are two CDs one with strings and one sans strings. I listened to both; the one with strings has a nice sound, Johnny Mandel is no slouch when it comes to arranging. He did my favorite Peggy Lee album Mirrors. But Barbra, Barbra, Barbra... her voice is gone... As part of the publicity there was a New York Times interview where she professed never to warming up before recording or doing scales, or taking a lesson. Uh, at 67 I'm sure you can't do a lot of things you used to be able to do.

The deterioration in her voice is even more pronounced on the CD without any strings. During You Must Believe In Spring it sounds as if she has asthma, barely making it through the smallest of phrases. My favorite version of this song is by Sylvia Syms, who sounds as if she gargled with rocks and whiskey before singing it. So it's not a song that requires a great singer, but it should sound as if you mean it. Barbra sounds as if she just picked up the sheet music and they kept the first take. Was Krall so fearful to ask for another try?

The sad thing is that nearly all of the songs are all time favorites... the selection couldn't have been better. A Time for Love, Here's That Rainy Day, Here's to Life, If You Go Away... timeless classics; all I'm afraid done better by other people. Barbra brings nothing. She again slows them down to the entertainment value of watching a piece of ice melt. The band is pedestrian at best; crap, how much money did they spend on this album and the band is no better than anything I've seen at any high brow fundraiser.

This is really an album that maybe she could have pulled off 20 years ago; but there seems to be nothing left. Take away her high notes and she isn't that good of an actress to do a jazz reading of a song.

I'm a great fan of watching performers get older and adapt their voices to their age. Peggy Lee comes to mind; she made much out of nothing. When she sang slowly it was because there was a meaning to the slowness; When Sinatra got older his gravel voice and shakey higher register was used to dramatic effect to show a whisper of pain. Rosemary Clooney did most of her best work after 65... Jeez, Delores Hope (Bob's wife) recorded an album after 80 and it was a solid piece of singing. Barbra just comes off under rehearsed, out of shape and not very interested in the material.

Song overview:

1. Here's To Life (Listen to Shirley Horn's masterful version, or Eartha Kitt's amazing version that is actually full of life)

2. In The Wee Small Hours Of The Morning (Sinatra's version is the definitive. Although Streisand included a recording of her singing this in 1969 on her For the Record, pared with Tony Newley's song When You Got to Go. That was a great version... why re-record a bad version)

3. Gentle Rain (Probably the best song on the album and the only one with any beat to it; albeit a slow bossa nova.

4. If You Go Away (Ne Me Quitte Pas) (Painfully slow; and I know I recorded a painfully slow version myself. Youtube Dusty Springfield singing it; or Rod McKuen's own version)

5. Spring Can Really Hang You Up The Most (Again Streisand included a lovely version of this song on her For The Record. Why sully the memory...?)

6. Make Someone Happy (Argh I've always hated that song... the best version I've heard is Dean Martin singing a swinging style.... Slowed down it's like nails on a blackboard.

7. Where Do You Start? (Really a disappointment; this song should be perfect for her... but it's too late... the best version I ever heard of this song during Bea Arthur's show... Barbra sings it like the pizza delivery man is late, not like she lost a long time lover.)

8. A Time For Love (again a great song... Matt Monro has the best version... It's just too slow...)

9. Here's That Rainy Day (Sinatra has the best version; Her version is o.k. but her voice really sounds creaky in this one)

10. Love Dance (Argh, I hate this song... no one should ever record this awful song again... Did Paul Williams guilt her into doing one of his songs.)

11. Smoke Gets In Your Eyes (A hard song to do regardless... she just barely pulls it off... but with lots of oddly flat notes scattered about... She just sounds really tired...)

12. Some Other Time (This ends the album, and it sounds wistful, just because I don't think there is going to be another time... I can't imagine another album after this one... )

13. You Must Believe In Spring is a bonus cut. (As I mentioned before she sounds wheezy and lost... sung with just a piano it could have/should have been a great closer to the album. The last song on Guilty Pleasures was done with just a piano and her voice sounded vulnerable but strong. Here it sounds like she record this after she got over a flu.)

Poor Barbra. I was telling my friend Dan as we were going back and forth in e-mails about this album ; Forget about her doing Sunset Blvd... she should jump on that Fokkers sequel.

But I'm sure there is many a disappointment waiting to happen in the career of our Barbra.

2009-06-08T20:36:00.000-05:00

RIP Kenny Rankin...

One of the all time best jazz/folk singers...

2009-05-16T18:48:00.003-05:00

Dad's Buddies

In going through video tapes I found this collection of photos of my father's buddies from his years in the army. He just missed WWII and was drafted in 1946 soon after the war ended. He spent a lot of time in Korea.

The photos are charming and very sexy. My father isn't in any of them, so I'm assuming he was the photo taker or he got these from one of his friends.

2009-05-03T13:37:00.005-05:00

On Rainy Afternoons

This performance was from 2002 when I hosted a night of video clips of Barbra Streisand. It was good evening. Dan Wingate put together a fantastic collection of rare clips, I had a few people get up and do some Barbra songs; However, in the back of my mind I thought that it might be a good place to meet someone. but to my surprise there were very few gay guys there, mostly uber fan women. Some of whom drive in from the suburbs.

This song is a little clunky but I like it... Larry Blustain is on the Hideout upright piano which always sounds like it belongs in a 3rd grade classroom and Seamus Harmey is playing the violin. We had only gone over these songs once the night before and poor Seamus didn't really have anyplace to noodle over in this turgid tune. So, for most of the song it looks like he is frozen in space and time.

(Note: I'm almost done with this walk down my musical memory lane... Soon back to regular programing.)

2009-04-30T22:14:00.005-05:00

Viva Las Vegas

From Milly's Orchid Show 1990. The Elvis Show. I'm playing with Peter Allen who at the time was going by the name Peter Mitchell because he didn't want to be confused with the flamboyantly gay singer/songwriter of the same name. During my tenure with the Orchid Show we must have played this song dozens of times. I always thought Peter's arrangement of it was really fun and inventive.

Peter was my next door neighbor at this time. He and his twin brother Paul were two strikingly handsome guys. Peter was a fantastic musician and I should credit him with teaching me to sing on the beat. Before him I just sort of wandered around the notes (and issue I guess I still deal with.)

These clips make me cringe a little; doing this fake nightclub act, acting like I'm some smooth son-of-a-bitch, when I couldn't have been more naive and un-smooth. However, it was a fun time back then; if only because we didn't know what we were doing and all that counted was we were getting reactions from the audience.

This was soon after I was in Interview Magazine. Cartoonist Linda Barry was a fan of mine from seeing me at these shows and talked about me when she was being interviewed. Before I knew it I was in a national magazine when I had maybe sung before people a half a dozen times. I thought I was pretty hot shit because everyone was asking Peter and I to play at parties, and opening for bands. At the height of this whirlwind I was asked to open for Dread Zeppelin, a Led Zeppelin cover band where the lead singer was an Elvis Impersonator sang songs with a reggie beat. So, who better to open for them but me and faux lounge Sinatra singer. Opening up for them was a pretty big deal at the time (Robert Plant was touting them as his favorite cover band); it was going to be the place to be on St. Patrick's Day.

So Peter and I were all set to do the show and then Peter called me up because he wanted billing in the advertisements. He wanted it to say John Sinatra Connors & Peter Mitchell. I had no idea how I was going to do that considering it wasn't my show and I wasn't in charge of the advertising. But Peter said either I did something about it or he wasn't going to play. I remember telling him that in future shows we could do it, but not this one. It was a strange power play and I was stuck.

Blurb in the Suntimes about the show

I paniked because I thought I was going to have cancel this gig and asked another guitar player I was working with at the time if he wanted to do the show. Peter was hurt and that was the end of our musical relationship together. In retrospect I should have more sensitive to Peter and tried to make him change his mind, but I was being pigheaded too thinking the act was really about me. Me. Me. Me... I was 24 you know... As it turned out my performance was a complete failure. The show was sold out. Alice Cooper was even there. I was completely out of my element trying to do these rock songs like slow ballads and I was booed off the stage while people threw beer bottles at me. I think I lasted ten minutes.

I wish Peter and I could worked longer... we were starting to come up with our own style just as it fell apart. We made up later on and played some shows together again. The last being about four years ago doing this song. But you can't go home again.

2009-04-27T00:02:00.005-05:00

The Theme to the Patty Duke Show

Two Weeks in Heaven

I can't believe this was 20 years ago! Going through these tapes has been a very emotionally trying experience for me. I've been revisiting moments that I think would have been better left to a fuzzy memory. I really didn't have any business performing in these shows; This was the third time I ever got up in front of an audience and sang. Granted it's a pretty amusing bit, but it almost hurts to watch me look so awkward; and it stings even more to see myself at 25 looking all cute and remembering how things were then.

This clip brings back a very clear memory for me... I had only sung once before at the Orchid Show. I was asked to come back for the next show however I didn't think I could make it because I had a date with Gamal. Gamal was this six foot four, out of work Venezuelan runway model and kick boxer. I adored him and we had this two week affair that I think I'll remember until I die.

We met at Club Berlin one night when I was standing around with friends. From behind me I heard some one say, "I dare you, do it, do it..." Suddenly, this strikingly handsome, tall man with a shock of black hair said to me in this deep Fabio-ish voice, "I'm going to take you in my arms and kiss you now..." And he swooped me in his arms, leaned me back and kissed me... All of his friends applauded. I think I almost fainted...

After that we started to date. Going out with him was like being with a movie star... heads turned wherever we went. He called me his "Little Crystal" and told me how wonderful I was every other minute. Sigh... Of course, it couldn't last. The night of the show, which I really wanted to do, he wanted to go to see "A Handmaid's Tale" which was playing across the street at the Biograph Theater. However, I won battle and we went to the Orchid Show and I sang this silly song.

Things then were never the same again between us; Afterwards we went to Berlin and he got drunk and cried and said he wanted to go back home to South America, thinking he was having a psychic vision that his grandmother was dying. Then he would go off and dance like a whirling top on the dance floor. He wore a black turtle neck sweater whose every pill and speck of dust glowed bright in the black lights that lit the club, "Look John, look at my chest, I have the whole universe on my chest..."

He stopped answering my calls, I think I even wrote a sensitive poem and mailed it to him... he called me and said, "I can not see you anymore, you are too wonderful, and we should always remember these last two weeks as something special. I will treasure the time we had together forever..." He even made breaking up seem like a Charles Boyer movie. In the following months I'd see him sometimes waking down the street with some new guy; Gamel in his short toreador coat his arms up like a Tyrannosaurus.

I know now why actors don't like to watch their old movies, it's always about something else... not the performance...

During this time, I was doing the Sinatra-thing. It was the only way I could think of to get on stage and sing. I would never have thought just to sing as myself. I think in my head I was going for a type of Gordon Jenkins lush arrangement. I can't believe I was bold enough to get up and do this stuff then... and oh, I purposely mixed up the lyrics at the end. Sinatra at the time was always getting his lines turned around.

There's a lot more where this came from... for better or for worse...

2009-04-26T15:59:00.001-05:00

RIP Bea Arthur.

A lovely tribute to a one of a kind performer from my pal Dan.

2009-04-15T23:32:00.000-05:00

Happy Tax Day...

Still really busy... be back in May... but in the meantime...

2009-03-29T11:04:00.003-05:00

Lick a Lolly

This song makes me very happy. The Electric Company was sort of like grad school for Sesame Street watchers. I was a really early reader, by the third grade I was reading at an 8th grade level and probably this show was one of the reasons.

When I first watched this number I thought it was cute and a little naughty, but after the 2nd time I marveled at the wonder of the songwriter Joe Raposo. He wrote a number of songs for Sesame Street and The Electric Company. Probably his best known song is "Sing" (Sing a Song). Raposo knew how to make ear bugs, songs that were just stuck in your head, that tickled that part of your brain that makes you happy. This song is drowning all other thoughts out of my mind. La, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la!

2009-03-27T07:50:00.004-05:00

LUKA - 1993

Hair Have You Gone

Sorry for the lack of posts, but I'm working on some other projects this month. Mainly transferring some old videos and family photos. Among these were some old performance videos of mine that I thought I'd share.

This is from 1993. It was for a benefit called Operation Pride and was held at the Improv Comedy club. The benefit was for a local theater company and to support the cause to give gays the right to serve in the military. (From the time I was four I was terrified of being drafted, so it's a right I have reservations about. Did no one remember the Vietnam War?)

The show featured all gay performers. The host the late Ted Bales really liked me and had me do four pieces in the show. My lounge meets performance art style at the time really didn't fit in with the drag acts, monologists and comedy troop. Except for this song all the other pieces I did completely flopped. Probably rightly so, looking at the tape now I was pretty awful and unsure of myself. I can't even bare to look them today.

However, I have always liked this performance. At the time I was working with Peter and Paul Allen, they were my neighbors and good friends. Peter was a great rock guitarist and he would come up with these very simple arrangements of popular songs that I would sing. This performance is pretty typical of my style at the time. Over the top Patti LaPone dramatics meets Andy Williams lounge. My perm and ability to show some chest really dates this clip.

2009-03-16T21:21:00.003-05:00

Summer Beach in Wisconsin

The morning after the Polka dance party my family hit the beach. This clip is a little fuzzy, but it's great if only for the Greco-Roman wrestling of my uncles, complete with a cigarette hanging out of my Uncle Bruno's mouth.

Music: Ferrante & Teicher from the album Pianos in Paradise, African Echoes.

2009-03-03T08:49:00.003-06:00

Once in Love With Amy

Joe.My.God recently linked to another post about the 100 things everyone should see on the Internet. This video was one of them. Anyone whose been to a wedding or had to get up and speak knows the horror of having to go from your regular life to being Milton Berle, but with more pathos. I've only had to do it once, and luckily I got to sing a song.

This video is amazing just for the guests ability to pull it all together. It's sweet and touching. I love the look on the bride's face. And girls, this is why you got to get some gays in your life. They'll make your wedding video a youtube hit.

2009-03-01T19:42:00.023-06:00

The Kindness of Strangers

We Are Loving Those Crazy Ads...

The great thing about doing this blog for almost three years is that I've met so many fun cyber friends. It's been a great place to chat with like minded people who I can help such as a guy in South American whose for last father's day was looking for Ruth Welcome zither albums and I was able to send him my whole collection. His father's collection was stolen or was somehow destroyed.

Or the ever kind Vassilis who sends me beautiful music from the other side of the world. Last month Jana at AnyPlaceFarm wrote me and said that she had some magazines that she was trying to sell on ebay and that they didn't sell and did I want them. The next thing I knew a big package with some classic women's magazines showed up in my mailbox... My favorite is Modern Screen that is so chocked full of fantastic articles; I don't know what one to post first... Troy Donahue's haunted house or Tab Hunter's fate worse than death; or the intimate details of Debbie Reynolds Honeymoon!

Of course, the first thing I go to in those old magazines are the ads. These did not disappoint.

Women's Personal Health issues. "It's What Women Want to Know" are always good fodder for lots of laughs... especially when you can incorporate the word "Gay" in big type in the ad. I swear I've seen so many variations of this ad with Sally being gay, Jane being gay... I wonder if the ad man who worked this ad up ever had a sinking feeling during the Gay Rights Marches of the 60's. "Damn... that word had to catch on... didn't it..." I reminds me of that All in the Family where Archie complains that the queers took away a perfectly good word away from us...

I'm also surprised that I've never seen this ad printed on the front and back of tee-shirts for sale at any gay pride parade... perhaps I've just seen how I can get that down payment on that new home...

Torture becomes this woman in a horrifying ad that really brings home the fact that she has a really, really bad sore throat. Not that I'm a doctor but if she came into my office I would either diagnosis this as strep and no amount of Neo-Aqua-Drin is going to help it. This woman needs some antibiotics and a wire cutter!

And lord... this ad for Solarcaine!!! Remember that product, I thought it was for mild sunburns, not for 2nd degree burns. These ads shouldn't be in women's magazines but in an Italian Gallo movie.
If those two ads haven't scared and depressed you enough. How about suicidal mice who eat themselves to death? I'm assuming a pamphlet comes with this where you have to yell at the mice and tell them that no one will ever love them. Ingmar Bergman films not included.

But ladies don't you fall into that eating yourself to death trap... try Diet Delight. With the wonderful new plan that tells you how many carbs and calories are in each can of corn... and no sugar! I just love this illustration!
My mother was an expert ironer. I swear I've taken my shirts to the best of dry cleaners and they can't touch mother Pearl's perfect creases. It was an art I guess passed down for generations. I don't remember her putting starch in a pot; the canned versions were popular already.

I think in the church of ironing this must be one of there stain glass windows. And Lo the winged iron came down and dispelled Iron Drag, Stick and Scorch and there was much rejoicing.
I think that this final panel is just as frightening as the burning woman or the barb-wired torture. Her the winner of the title of Speed Ironer is given the award of "Speed-Ironing" for Life! Perhaps she'll get free of her fate if she eats herself to death with the mice.

And this next ad, doesn't have anything to do with the themes of the other ads... but I put it in just for the sake of it... $5.95 for a glamour wig. I think I'd get at least three... Ice Blue for shopping days, Grey Streak for bridge Wednesdays. And Pink for those special nights with the husband.
Now I have to finish another box of this D-Con; I swear you can't stop eating it once you start. Yum...

2009-02-21T20:27:00.015-06:00

Naked Boys Swimming

I was recently talking with my friend Lyle about the subject of locker room gym behaviors. We discussed the comfort levels of men who are comfortable being naked in front of each other. Some are quick strippers, down to the buff and on comes the towel (I fall into that category) but for the most part I've gotten over my fear of being naked in the gym.

Some “if you got it flaunt it” guys. Mostly Koreans. Nudity means nothing and culturally is just natural. Some are prudish with putting a towel around themselves and slipping out of their clothes like they are doing a magic act.

I confessed that it took me a long time to get over my fears of the locker room; years of gym classes where even the slightest deviation from the status quo, from underwear to penis size, was cruelly mocked by the alpha males. When joining a gym in my 20's I remember the irrational fear of going in there and changing my clothes. As if some businessman was going to start to pick a fight with me or steal my underwear and throw it out of the room.

Lyle asked me if in High School I had to swim naked. "No one ever believes me when I say that all the boys swam naked in high school…" Talking about this brought back a flood of memories. I'm not sure if this is uniquely Chicago or if this happened in other parts of the country, but as a teenager I was forced to undress in front of all my other male classmates and swim naked for an hour a day. It was as strange and humiliating as it sounds.

I believe the rational behind this comes from a bygone era. The era that taught that it was good for boys to bond together naked; I remember my gym teacher telling us it was healthier for us to swim naked. The other rational was that the school didn't have to pay for swim trunks for boys. Could it also have been that it was expected that after high school the boys would naturally be going into the armed forces and this would be a way to toughen us up.. Whatever it was until I was 17 I skinny dipped at the public school pool.

I went to Kennedy High School, which was a fairly new school relative to the other ancient structures in the city. It was built around 1962. Connected at one end of the high school, attached by a bridge, was Kinzie Elementary. Since I was 4 until I was 18, those two buildings were where I grew up. Rumors about naked swim began to surface when I was in the 2nd or 3rd grade. And we knew it was true… because we could see them; The swimming pool's slightly frosted windows looked out on our playground. Year after year during recess and lunches we would watch the parade of naked boys walking past the window, occasionally they would lean back against the glass and we could see their squished buttocks. It terrified me. Someday I would be on the other side of that glass.

The legends spread through the grade school playground about naked swim. “They just make you stand there naked in front of everyone and then they push you in the pool. If you try to get out they poke you with a stick. If you start to drown they have a big metal hook that sticks through you to pull you out.” And we all believed them… how could we not? These stories were passed down from older siblings who were there in the high school and reporting back to us. We were doomed.

I graduated to Kennedy High School in 1977. That summer was a nervous one as I fretted over the future of naked swim and showering in front of people in general. I would practice taking a quick shower and drying myself off with one towel and getting dressed as quickly as I can. Filled with as much fear as a teenager can hold, I started as a freshman.

High School Gym class seems to be the turning point for everyone's personal development. Stephen King depicted it well in “Carrie”; all of us who were shy or outsiders could feel her rage and would have easily used our psychic powers to destroy the gym and everyone in it. Janis Ian wrote in her song “At Seventeen” ' To those of us who knew the pain Of valentines that never came And those whose names were never called When choosing sides for basketball'. I look back on those gym classes with no nostalgia, but still a relief that they are over.

My gym teacher's name was Mr. Gaylord (no kidding). He was a tightly, muscled, short man with thinning hair. Thinking back, he was probably pretty sexy, but then he couldn't have been more horrifying with his just out of the army, drill sergeant style of yelling, butt smacking, and name calling. We were being trained to go into the service you know, we needed to be made strong, and they only way you can make a boy strong is to break him first and build him up. And the way to break a pack of young boys is to strip them and make them all fall in line.

(the pool today)

The pool at Kennedy was huge. Olympic size, built in the early prosperous Kennedy years when physical fitness was one of the president's high priorities. We were all lead into the locker room and told to strip down and put our clothes in the locker; I was terrified to forget my locker combination and repeated it over and over for a week before school started. Trying it again and again like the shower tests so I could open the locker as quickly as possible. We all stripped and stood in a line. The showers were going full blast and Mr. Gaylord stood at the front of the shower with a squeeze bottle of some pink slippery goo that he was shooting out over each boy as he went into the shower. Sometimes he would rub the soap down the back of the boys. We had to shower before getting into the pool; it was the rule. The soap or whatever it was had a chemical smell; did it have some sort of insecticide to kill lice?

Then from there into the large room where the pool was, again in lines of four or five. Some of the guys were really natural with their nakedness. Wrestling with each other, shoving and pushing. I don't know when I first knew that something was different about me sexually, but I'm sure it when I was seeing guys that I had just sat next to in history and now we were front to butt with each other going to jump in the pool. Dare I say at age 14 I had definite stirrings, although I didn't know what they were? I don't think at that time I could have given it a word. But we were all comparing ourselves to each other. Big dicks, small dicks. There were two obese twins whose genitals were completely covered by rolls of fat. I can't imagine what this experience did to them. Other boys with big members proudly knew that they had something special and would strut around with semi-boners telling of how they screwed their girl friends last night.

One good thing was I did learn to swim and I loved to swim. There is a freedom to swimming naked; years later I did it in Lake Michigan and it really does feel wonderful. If anything was making it strange it was Mr. Gaylord and his army-like tactics for the boys that couldn't swim. One of these kids was Nemick. Looking back now I think he had some mental issues. There were rumors that he had killed his neighbor's dog. Nemick was terrified of the water. We would have to line up and jump off of the diving board into the deep end and do laps as part of our test to pass the quarter. Nemick had never gone into the deep end and he would just stay in the shallow end slowly walking from one end to the other. Mr. Gaylord would yell at him “Look out Nemick, there's a shark coming…” Nemick's eyes would fill with panic and he would try as quickly as he could to get out of the pool. And the kids would laugh. Once he got an erection and he stood in the pool beating and beating his penis. Gaylord laughed with another gym teacher, “He's trying to beat it down…” Writing this now, I wonder does this shit still go on?

Being one of the weaker guys I was not exempt from bullying. Once my locker was completely kicked in and I stood naked freezing in the locker room unable to get my clothes until the janitor came with tools to take the door off. Another time my locker was pulled open (so much for the locks) and my glasses were stolen. I am practically blind without them. I had to wear my mother's old glasses for a month until my glasses were found at the bottom of the pool. I counted the days until swim was over.

OK on top of everything else, this was the weird thing about naked swim: The ROTC room was in the basement of the high school. A dank, spooky room where guys who were planning in advance to make a career of the military would go to do gun twirling or play RISK or whatever they did down there. In that room was a huge Weeki Watchee picture window that looked into the swimming pool. Are there 8mm films of years of naked teenage boys swimming somewhere? The other thing was there was stadium seating that looked over the swimming pool. This was never locked and years later we learned that it was common for the girls to sneak up there and watch the naked boys.

This went on until 1979 when in my Junior year the gym classes were made Co-Ed. No more naked swim. My prayers were answered. However in my senior year they had decided that they would do separate swim classes again, returning to the tradition. A couple friends of mine decided to take matters into their own hands and snuck in late at night, broke some glass bottles, and tossed them into the pool. The pool had to be shut down while they cleaned it. Once it was cleaned and ready for swim classes, they did this again! Hence avoiding having to swim naked.

We are all shaped by these experiences; and although I don't dwell on high school and how horrible it was… but I feel I did learn the truth at seventeen. And I never forgot it.

It also makes me wonder... for the last few years there hasn't been a gay film that hasn't had some swimming pool scene in it.

A note about Mr. Gaylord… that summer after my first freshman year. Mr. Gaylord was found dead in the pool. He was swimming and had hit his head against the side of the pool and drowned. I'm just saying…

A couple links to other experiences and views:

Swimming nude in Houston: HERE

Male coach swimming nude with girls: HERE

2009-02-15T14:14:00.005-06:00

WISCONSIN DANCE PARTY

This is my favorite video of my family and especially my crazy dancing Aunt Celia. She was always my favorite aunt; always so kind and funny. She is doing the dance on the floor starting at 2:59.

My family every year would rent a cabin in Wisconsin. It's what you did when you were middle class in Chicago. You couldn't afford to go anywhere too fancy on vacation; so Wisconsin fishing trips were the thing. Each year my mother's brothers and sisters would rent several cabins and spend four days fishing. As I mentioned in my 25 Things About Me list... it would have been these trips that I as a small child had to be subjected to hours in the fish cleaning house.

All day fishing; Drinking and dancing all night at the local tavern. My mother can be seen coming in the door with a record in her hand following the portable phonograph. My mother still has a world class polka music collection. When I transferred these films years ago I scored them with music from my record collection. This clip I put a vocal by my mother. Pre-Karaoke, my mother and (very off-key) father sing the song in the first part of the video.

I love this because everyone looks like they are having a blast... Glad I can share this with everyone...

2009-02-11T08:05:00.004-06:00

25 Things About Me...

or the List that Changed the World

It's been about a month since I joined Facebook and have been captured by that "Time Vampire". Besides feeling now that I have to do a few blog posts a week, I feel like a have to think of witty "What Am I Doing Now?... Status updates twice a day. Really though, it is fun in a "Don't you want to know all about me..." sort of way.

One of the biggest things on there right now is the 25 Things About Me... I spent about an hour trying to come up with 25 interesting things about me that people actually might not know... I thought hmm... let's do some double blogging and double post this on here... So for your consideration... Here is my list.

1. I didn’t eat Peanut Butter until about two years ago. I used to lie to people and tell them I had a peanut allergy so they would stop asking me to “just try it”. Now I eat it all the time.

2. I once ran across Midway Airport. Completely across. No kidding. The runways are huge; It felt like I was an ant crossing a sidewalk.

3. When I was a child I would compulsively pull my hair out of the back of my head. It’s called trichotillomania. My parents never seemed to notice or care. My hair is still thin back there.

4. When I was a teenager my father once caught me lip synching to a Barbra Streisand song into a broom handle. I can still see the shocked look on his face.

5. When I was a child I was obsessed by the Flying Nun. I made a coronet out of a card board box and would run around the yard convinced I would be taking off any moment.

6. My first kiss by a girl was on the same day that Bobby Brady got his first kiss on the Brady Bunch. Even then I thought it was a strange coincidence.

7. Religion-wise I’ve been a Born Again Christian, an NSA Buddhist and I studied witchcraft. I just consider myself a spiritual mess.

8. I believe in angels, but I’m not sure about God.

9. I haven’t had cable or regular television in four years. I’m completely clueless about new shows until they come on DVD.

10. I obsessively watched every Dark Shadows over a period of two and a half years with my friends Erica and Thax Douglas. All 1100+ episodes. After we finished the last one This American Life sent me to the convention to do a piece about it.

11. If I start watching something like a TV series I have to watch every episode, even if I don’t like it. I mean I watched all of the Children of the Corn movies, because I had to.

12. My mother was so upset that I was going to prom that she ran out of the house before I went to pick up my date; she didn’t talk to me for a week afterwards.

13. I hate fish, and get sick even from the smell. But strangely I love tuna. My only explanation is that I used to go on fishing trips with my parents when I was small; I’d watch them gut the fish. But Tuna isn’t really fish… because it comes in cans.

14. After the stem-cel transplant my brother has my exact DNA in his bone marrow. If he were to commit a murder I could be convicted on the DNA evidence. I heard CSI did a show about this.

15. I moved away from home when I was 23. Since then I’ve always lived alone except for one year when I moved in with a friend. It was a terrible mistake.

16. I have vivid dreams, and often they include celebrities. For a while I had reoccurring dreams with Peggy Lee.

17. I love to sing, but I can’t stand the sound of my regular speaking voice or my laugh.

18. I would rather watch a bad old movie, than a good new movie.

19. I’ve been a Netflix subscriber since 2000. Patrick Hughes introduced it to me at a party.

20. I’ve have an allergy to cats, but I’ve had two cats over the last 14 years. Both with bad additudes.

21. I was beaten up (bashed) on my 21st birthday by a gang of neighborhood thugs. I remember as I was being kicked in the stomach thinking that it was a crappy way to spend my birthday.

22. The first song I ever sang in front of an audience was “You Needed Me” the Anne Murphy 80’s hit. It was at a community college as part of a music class.

23. The ending of “It’s a Wonderful Life” always makes me cry. Even thinking about it now I’m tearing up.

24. I’ve a black spot on my ankle from when in the 2nd grade I put a pencil in my shoe and the tip of it broke off in side of my left foot. I never told anyone about it because I knew I would get in trouble. The mark from the pencil is still there.

25. I’m proud of myself for finishing this list and not putting one filthy, sexual fact about myself in it. Hurray. I’m all grown-up.

2009-02-09T23:02:00.006-06:00

RIP Blossom Dearie

I was so sad to hear that one of my favorite singers died a couple days ago, the great Blossom Dearie. Known to baby boomers as the singer of the haunting School House Rock song "Number Eight", she was one of the premier jazz vocalist of our time.

I really never listened to her until a few years ago. But once I started I was hooked. Such a sweet and simple voice that she could use be funny or heartbreaking. It was always a dream of mine to take a whirlwind weekend tour of New York and see Blossom play at the small jazz club she sang at until just a couple years ago. Sadly I never made that trip.

Here are some examples of Blossom's best... Someones' Been Sending Me Flowers is one of my favorite songs she recorded, The Surrey With the Fringe on Top (posted by Dan the Video Man), The video to Number Eight and a nice tribute and "I Like London in the Rain"

2009-02-09T19:09:00.003-06:00

Passing it On...

It's no wonder that network TV is nervous about its survival. With the number of fantastic youtube videos, who needs to watch Grey's Anatomy. I wonder if in 40 years they will call this the Golden Age of YouTube...

This first video was forwarded to me this week by my pal Gary... Thanks Gary... 5 million views already... how did I miss this... It's great that it manages to be cute and disturbing at the same time...

Of course, a video that gets five million plus views is bound to have some tributes...

The best is this one by Chad Vader...

Chad Vader is a character from the on-line video comedy Chad Vader: Day Shift Manager. A very clever web-com (Is that what the kids are calling these?) about what if Darth Vader were manager of a supermarket called Empire Foods. Hilarity ensues.

After you watch that... Check out Chad's his take on David After the Dentist.

2009-02-08T18:16:00.013-06:00

RIP Chicago Eddie Schwartz

In the 1970’s I used to be a big AM radio listener. With my little black transistor with the white earplug I would for hours scan the AM dial seeing how far of a signal I could get. Chicago AM radio consisted of news on WBBM, and rock music on WLS and WCFL, or country on WMAQ. On WIND was what we would today call Talk Radio. This was before talk radio became synonymous with right wing political talk. Talk Radio then had a quieter, less confrontational demeanor. (No matter what your politics, I don’t know how anyone listens to Limbaugh or Hannity or even some of the Air America hosts. Everyone is so constantly angry.) Radio was much more intimate, and the listeners relationships with the hosts much more personal.

The biggest name in Chicago in the 70’s was Eddie Schwartz. An unlikely radio show host who was an obese man with a wheezy, high reedy voice. Chicago Eddie Schwartz, as he was known, did overnights on WIND. His show was a combination of light conversations about the goings on in the city, show business interviews and hours of him playing tracks from his comedy album collection. It was great at that hour of the morning when there was ‘nothing’ else on. This was also at a time when television stations would go off at 2 AM, so when I say ‘nothing’, I mean nothing! If you had insomnia, it was Schwartz or a hot water bottle and a good book.

Growing up I must have logged hours and hours of time listening to Eddie as I would sneak my transistor radio under my pillow and lay with my plug in my ear. My biggest memories of listening to him were his comedy albums; it was the first time I heard Stan Freberg or Allen Sherman. It was exciting listening to Eddie during big snow storms as he would take calls from reporters treating our Chicago winters like they were the crash of the Hindenburg. Big stars like Bill Cosby and Phyllis Diller would routinely call if they were in town to promote their local shows. Believe me in 1974, this was a huge deal at 2 in the morning.

I have such crystal clear memories of Eddie’s frequent guest Richard Crowe, a local ghost hunter. This was a good 15 years before the advent of Art Bell or Coast to Coast radio. Eddie would dedicate usually a full six hours of talk about ghosts and local hauntings. I would sit and listen completely utterly petrified, unable to move as I listened to the callers tell of how their brother’s wife’s cousin actually saw Resurrection Mary. I recall that I was in my room listening on my transistor, while in the basement I had a reel-to-reel going at the slowest possible speed. However, even at the slowest speed the tape would run out around 3:15 in the morning. I had to gather all my 14 year old courage and go downstairs and turn the tape over. Even now I don’t know how I did that… (See download below)

As the years progressed Eddie became more popular and he moved to the bigger and more prestigious station WGN. During the 80’s he was a Chicago legend and easy fodder for the new shock jocks who were taking over the FM dial. Steve Dahl and Gary Meyer were merciless in their taunting of Eddie and his weight, high pitched voice, and old fashioned style. The odd thing was that Eddie made a decision to leave his cozy AM radio WGN and move to FM and the WLUP where all the young shock jocks were on during the day. It didn’t work for him; Eddie’s audience was older and conservative and I’m sure would never even think of tuning into an FM station.

It was around this time that my friend Randy, whom I’ve mentioned before, got a job as Eddie’s producer. Randy and I had spent many a summer night listening to Eddie. I couldn’t believe I was one degree of separation from this local icon. Randy found the experience less than glamorous. Eddie was bitter and extremely obese. During the day the shock jocks would mock him, including Danny Bonaduce. One jock Kevin Mathews even did a daily character based on Eddie and called him Ed Zeppelin; He continued doing the character for years after Schwartz had left the airwaves. At night Eddie would come on and continue to do his regular AM show with interviews with aldermen or has-been celebrities. Randy’s job consisted of pulling together the guests and making sure that Eddie had his cart with various stomach acid aides. “Go down to the Walgreen’s and get me more TUMS and some Diet Coke.” I would hear his daily horror stories about working the overnight show; how creepy Bobby Vinton was in his crushed velvet jumper hitting on the female interns; or once when I got a phone call in the middle of the night, “I’m putting you on-air in 30 seconds. Ken Barry is on the show and we are dying. No one is calling… Ask him a question about Mayberry R.F.D.”

I would listen in my roach infested studio to Eddie berating Randy for not having the cart to a commercial ready or some other on-air mistake. It was surreal. My favorite Randy/Eddie story was when Bob Hope was in town for some benefit. Eddie wanted Bob on the show. Randy worked for weeks to get Bob’s manager to give him ten minutes on the air over the phone. Randy personally delivered flowers to Bob the day of the broadcast as a thank you. That night I made sure I was listening. Eddie’s voice at this point I would describe as wheezy, slurred and a little unintelligible. Bob was probably in his early 90s and I think more than a little hard of hearing. The interchange went something like this:

Eddie: Mr. Hope I’m so happy you could join us... (garble, garble, wheeze)

Bob: Wonderful…love Chicago

Eddie: You are in town for the Heart Association Benefit. Have you been involved (garble, wheeze, wheeze, cough) with them for a long time.

Bob: Wonderful…

Eddie: Will you be doing anything else while you are in Chicago?

Bob: I’m at the Heart Association Benefit… Wonderful organization…”

Eddie: (cough, wheeze) Is that in the suburbs?

Bob: Wonderful love Chicago.

I got a call from Randy… “Are you listening to this…? Are you listening…? Bob can’t understand Eddie at all…”

Randy ended up leaving the show and going back to his airline job after not getting a raise. I think he was only making $17K a year as his producer. So much for show business.

The last few years of Eddie’s life were sad. He left WLUP with low ratings and broken spirits soon after Randy left the show. I don’t know if Randy leaving the show had anything to do with the end of his radio show; Randy was trying to produce the show like the ones we used to listen to in the 70’s with lots of celebrities and lighter topics. After he left the shows were mainly Eddie complaining about local politicians. And he never did regain his initial loyal listeners who were probably still listening to whomever was on WGN overnights on their transistors to AM radio.

Eddie wrote for a while on a local paper but his health and weight finally caught up to him. He spent the last few years of his life in a nursing home virtually penniless and recluse. As an ironic twist all the shock jocks who mocked him for years threw a big fundraiser for him when they learned that he needed money to pay for his medical bills.

I was truly sad when I heard he was gone. Another piece of the city I knew growing up was gone forever.

The links below is the full Eddie Schwartz show from some hot summer night in the mid-70s. It runs about 3 ½ hours.

2009-01-28T00:00:00.000-06:00

The 2008 Collection

I've been paying $5 a month to keep my Podcast page up and running... one of my resolutions was to use it; if only to do some long music podcasts...

Every year I put together a mix-CD of some of my favorite songs I found in my record collection while collecting or songs I found somewhere on the net. I give them to friends. For the first time I offer them to the cyber world. I hope you enjoy it...

Click HERE to download the mix...

2009-01-27T05:00:00.000-06:00

End of the World

Joe.My.God posted this. I don't know anything about this performer, except he's gay, and sounds a little like Rufus Wainwright, except not as annoyingly nasal-ey.

It's a lovely video and song. And it's been a while that I've heard a song and it made me want to buy the whole album.

2009-01-26T19:07:00.004-06:00

Winter Vacation

I've been on vacation. I've not had any extended time off from work for about four months, so it was badly needed if only to catch up on stuff around the house. Of course, what I ended up doing was taking lots of afternoon naps. The sort of sleeps where when I would wake up at 5:30 to a early dark winter afternoon I wouldn't know what day it was.

I did create a to-do list and I'm happy I got to 75% of my tasks. The one about writing a store of blog posts got pushed to the back of the list. Right above laundry; This is still waiting for me.

So what I did on my Winter vacation.

1) FACEBOOK. For the last six months various friends would send me an invite to join Facebook. I'm on Myspace and Friendster, but I rarely, if ever, check my messages. If I get a new friend request it's some cam-bot girl wanting me to look at her cam show. I don't know what happened this last month, but everyone, and every conversation came back to the question, “Have you joined Facebook yet?” I put it off, because I couldn't bare to fill out another profile questionnaire. But from meeting Gwen in the parking lot of the gym saying: "How come you are not on Facebook", to Graeme guaranteeing that I would get a date within a month; I finally sat down and joined.

And now I have to add my voice to the chorus. If you are not on it, you must. The only way I can describe it is that it's like a map of everyone I've ever had any social contact with, from current friends to ones that I haven't talked with for years, old lovers, school friends from high school, people I met in passing performing in shows, suddenly they are all gathered in one spot; and suddenly I know what they are doing, thinking about almost to the minute. In a way it's exciting and a little frightening. There is a function called “Status”… this is where people put what they are doing now… I put that I was doing Pub Trivia at a local bar and a friend popped in to say “Hi... I knew you'd be here because of your status…” Forget about worrying about Big Brother. We are our own Big Brother.

I've put a link on the Left to my Facebook account. If you want to be my Facebook friend, just send me a request and mention that you are a reader… Love to have you jump into the pool… Come Join Us…

Here I am having lunch with Mark (left) and Randy (right). Mark I haven't seen in 7 years.

2) Election. I spent the inaugural ceremony at Sidetracks a local gay video bar. They advertised they would be open at ten in the morning and most importantly they would have brunch snacks. I thought for sure that there would be at most fifty people there. So, I was shocked when we walked and saw hundreds of people. So much for the snacks, but I did nab the last piece of carrot cake. It was an amazing place to be. Of course, as per my usual, while Obama was being sworn in I was at the bar getting drinks.

Oh, and I had a social faux pas. I was in such a hurry to get out of the house that I just grabbed some newly bought clothes that I'd gotten on sale at Sears that weekend. After the swearing in ceremony some guy came up to me and tapped me on the shoulder and said, “Um… you have tags on your pants…” I had left on not only the “70% off tag, but the long sticker down my leg that proudly showed how big my ass is…” Once a nerd always a nerd.

But what a feeling of celebration. I can't remember being so excited about a politican and seeing so many other people excited. His speech was inspiring. I can only wish this country luck to get back on track. I compare the Bush administration to as if we had a slumlord running our apartment building for the last eight years. Everything needs to be fixed. This country needs new tile on the kitchen floor, but that toilet also needs to be replaced. I'm not expecting miracles, but boy do we need one…

3) Because I was off I decided since I wasn't going to travel, I had license to spend money will a little touch of the devil-may-care about it. I went to see a local production of Xanadu, which was fun, if a little over priced; bought myself a new scent Cordovan; and went out on Saturday and drank a little too much wine and beer. (I forgot the golden rule of “never mix, never worry”) Oy… Thankfully, nights like this are becoming few and far between. Here I am at Daniel's Birthday party. I also, went to my friendly local tarot card reader to see what the next few months will bring. A sweet faced, white haired middle aged woman named April M greeted me at the Chakra Shoppe and for $30 dollars told me that I need to do more meditation. That I will have a love affair in February that will quickly turn sour, but that June and July are better months for romance. I'll have good months with money in April and May, but look out in June and July. Lucky in love, but not in money in the summer. And May will be bring major adjustments in my life when it comes to my job and my family; She shook her head and said it will be very stressful. You've heard it here first… check back for the results…

4) And generally I napped a lot. Dinah, my cat, has gotten high points for getting cozy this last week. She can be a mess of trouble and is still attacking and biting, but she knows how to create a little nest among my legs on these cold chilly nights.

Anyway… that's all the news… that's fit to print… J

Peace…

2009-01-19T23:33:00.002-06:00

Hello Mr. President.

I've never felt such excitement in the air as for the election of our new President Obama. Tomorrow I'm going to a local video bar at 10 in the morning to watch the ceremonies. However, my Polish pessimistic side of me is just waiting for everything to fall apart. But for now I'm wishing everyone a happy President inauguration day.

In honor of the occasion I present this oddity of albums. A musical album with Perry Como and Kaye Ballard as the President and First Lady. This was one of Irving Berlin's last musicals. And it's not his best. But even bad Berlin is better than anyone's worst.

So enjoy our historic tomorrow.

2009-01-15T08:09:00.003-06:00

It's Minus 8 degrees this morning!

This winter reminds me of being a teenager in the 70's. Winters then always seemed to be this long and cold. I found this January 1977 Post in my diary to prove it, here.

I woke up this morning and for some reason I was worrying about all the birds and squirrels that usually run outside my bedroom window... Stay warm little creatures.

2009-01-14T20:04:00.017-06:00

Very Odd(s) and Ends Ads

Circa February 1929 Photoplay Magazine

I Thought I Had Bad Self-Esteem Until...

It's just common sense that in collecting these women's magazines from a bygone age that most of the ads will be about women's special issues. But to see the number of ads you'd think menstruation was all women ever thought or talked about.

This ad is particularly disturbing. Can you imagine working in a office and having the Personnel Manager start talking about your period. The look on the employee's face says it all, "First I'll kill her by smashing this typewriter over her head and then I'll jump out the window..."

Actually this ad needs Aaron's razor sharp tongue to tell this woman where to go...

But not to leave out the men... I give you The Man I Pity Most

Here Earle Liederman "A Muscle Builder", takes pity on the modern man with his weak muscles and organs. I found this odd that there was an ad aimed at building up men's muscles in a woman's magazine. The other ads are almost exclusively about women's health and beauty needs. Then I read the last sentence... It contains 48 full page photographs of myself and some of my prize winning pupils I have trained. Look them over now and you will marvel at their present physiques.

Muscle magazines are well known as coded as 'pink' in the day. I'm assuming they were trying to appeal to the Joan Crawford fan base.

Because the text of this ad is in .5 type... I'll recreate this homoerotic tone poem below:

POOR OLD JONES. NO one had any use for him. No one respected him. Across his face I read one harsh word - FAILURE. He just lived on. A poor worn out imitation of a man doing his sorry best to get on in the world. If he had realised one one thing, he could have made good. He might have been a brilliant success.

There are thousands of men like Jones. They, too, could be happy, successful, respected and loved. But they can't seem to realize the one big fact that practically everything worth while living for depends upon STRENGTH, upon live red-blooded, he-man muscle.

Every you do depends on strength. No matter what your occupation, you need the health, vitality and clear thing your big strong virile muscles can give you. When you are ill, the strength in those big muscles pull you through. At the office, in the farm fields, or on the tennis courts, you find your success generally depends upon your muscular development.

Here's a short cut to Strength and Success

"But" you say, "It takes years to build my body up to the point where it will equal those of athletic champions" It does if you got about it without any system, but there is a scientific short cut. And that's where I come in.

In just 30 days I can do things with your body you never thought possible. With just a few minutes work every morning I will add one full inch of real live muscle to each of your arms and two full inches across your chest. Many of my pupils have gained more than that but I GUARANTEE to do at least that much for you in one short month. Your neck will grow shapely, your shoulders begin to broaden. Before you know it, you'll find people turning around when you pass. Women will want to know you. Your boss will treat you with new respect. Your friends will wonder what has come over you. You'll look ten years younger, and you'll feel it, too.

But I'm not through with you. I want ninety days in all to the job right and then all I ask is that you look yourself over. What a marvelous change! Those great squared shoulders! That pair of huge lithe arms! Those firm shapely legs! You'll be just as fit inside as you are out too, because I work on your heart and your liver, all of your inner organs, strengthening and exercising them. Yes indeed, life can give you a greater thrill than you ever dreamed...

Wow!

But don't worry ladies... weight loss is so much easier for you. Just ten minutes will roll the fat way and absorb it into your body. Keep the fat in the places you want it and roll it to where it will do the most good.

Then send away to the Psychology Press in St. Louis (a hotbed of psychology in the late 20's) and find out just what you should avoid to get your man. You'll learn the secrets to a man's mind with the booklet "Fascinating Womanhood".

Just remember not to have exposed or irritated skin. "They just don't belong. They express bad form more clearly than an ill-fitting frock..."

And finally A New Skin. Never again "suffer humiliation nor take a 'back seat' in society, business, or love affairs." All around an amazing ad worthy of any art museum or tee-shirt.

Peace... stay warm...

2009-01-12T19:06:00.019-06:00

The Worst Movies I watched from Netflix in 2008

Per my ying and yang of Netflix reviews … I wanted to conclude with some thoughts on some horrible movies I sat through this year. It actually was not that bad for my Netflix picks. Maybe I've just gotten a little more savvy about what I should be watching. I'm only including eight films instead of the traditional ten. I could have included The O in Ohio, which wasn't so much bad as not funny and disappointing. And the She-Beast, which was an awful movie, but partly because the print was so bad I could barely see it.

Doing these lists can be dangerous. People get so emotional about their movies. If I recommend a movie to someone and they don't like it, the worst that might happen is they'll not trust my advice again. But if I tell you I hated your favorite movie an argument might ensue. I am pretty confident that these films are no one's favorite movies…

The Neptune Factor: Take one part Poseidon Adventure, one part Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea and mix with large helpings of the early 70's craze for aquariums and you have The Neptune Factor. This movie is so dull that it's almost a zen-like experience. The seafaring threesome (Ernest Borgnine , Yvette Mimieux , and Ben Gazzara take a diving bell down to where no man has gone before. That is unless you are not counting that plastic diver at the bottom of your fish tank. The plot follows our stars as they try to save some fellow marine biologists who fell into a crack in the sea floor during an earthquake. There they find giant fish of the same variety that you can find at any Pet Smart. Best scene: Borgnine being attacked by lion roaring Angel Fish. I swear the cast was looking at their watches waiting for the movie to end.

Doomsday: Occasionally I like a good futuristic Apocalypse story. I loved the 28 Days Later films and I'm not against the occasional violent, zombie blood bath.. But this film was one gigantic headache. Filled with screaming heavy metal music, it's nearly non-stop like someone just left a CD playing in the editing room; horrible violent mutilations and death scenes, and poor, poor Malcolm McDowell who should have done a sequel to Caligula instead of having any connection with this overblown, faux video game of a movie. Worst scene a bloody execution while Fine Young Cannibals song She Drives Me Crazy is played in the back ground. The director is supposed to be some new wunderkind. Egads learn how to put your camera on a tripod Mr. Marshall.

Days of Darkness: As I said, I love a good zombie movie; but when a zombie movie goes bad… they go terribly bad. The plot is standard: A group of people are trapped in a military base in the desert while zombies wander around trying to get in through the barbed wire fence. But they aren't really zombies they are dead people with aliens in them; Follow the zombie rules people! That wouldn't be bad; but the real purpose of the movie seemed to be just an excuse for the actors all run amok with improv'd dramatic scenes about their lives. It's the Pasadena 'Lil Theatre on the Mall's Players' big chance to read that monologue that they've been saving up for ten years. The repentant porn star with the virgin daughter, the sickly Christian preacher, the gay guy who watched his partner devourer their adopted Chinese daughter… Argh… Even the zombies looked bored.

Macbeth (2006): This year I made an effort to watch at a filmed version of a Shakespeare play every few weeks. One of my favorites was Roman Polanski's Macbeth. Just brilliant! This version takes the classic story of Macbeth and his lady and envisions it as a two hour Mazda commercial. It's not really bad, just insanely disconnected as the extraordinarily attractive actors spout the Bard's dialogue. Out, out damn spot.

New York, New York: I've been wanting to see this film for decades. Martin Scorsese, Liza Minnelli, great 40's big band songs. How could it fail? Oh man… I felt like I was being dragged through a field of broken glass by the end of the second hour of its three hour running time. Very colorful broken glass mind you, but it is painfully uninteresting and irritating. Liza actually fairs the best and it could have been really something if Scorsese had actually written a script in advance. According to the documentary I watched on it; he decided that he wanted a movie that would look like a 40's musical, everything else would be modern and 70s. Such as not having a script. And when actors don't have scripts they resort to yelling and screaming at each other. Even Liza was told not to sing like herself, but to develop a high reedy voice that would be in keeping with the 40's big band singer style. Unfortunately she just sounds out of tune. Note: There is an amazing last number called Happy Endings that steals the show. And Note again: It was cut when it first was released. Also the closing number is pretty spectacular. But you have to wait three hours for it to happen. At the same time I rented NYNY I also got a Showtime's Master of Horrors episode that I watched the next night. It was about how George Washington was really a cannibal. It was awful, disgusting, sophomoric. But after it was over I thought, well it was better than New York, New York.

What the #$*! Do We Know!?: I've been interested in this new found theory about "vibrating"and willing success into your life. It's recently found a new blast of fame with "The Secret". This movie take that theory and adds quantum psychics and then tries to explain it's theory by having poor Marlee Matlin get drunk at a wedding. All the while these new-age BS "scientists" give some mumbo-jumbo theory about how if you visualize that you have a car it will appear in your life. I was offended, confused and overall completely bored by the whole thing. To top it off that 80's channeler Rhamtha had something to do with the making of the movie. I shouldn't even put this movie in this list because technically I just watched half of it; the rest I skimmed through at 2x the speed. If anyone tries to talk you into watching this movie be very suspect.

The Sunshine Boys (Peter Falk/Woody Allen): The Sunshine Boys with George Burns and Walter Matthau is one of my favorite films. Matthau makes the word "Enter…" one of the funniest moments in movie history. So I was interested in seeing how it would be with the great Peter Falk playing the Matthau role and the always interesting Allen in the George Burns role. Add in Sarah Jessica Parker as their agent niece and I thought it couldn't be that bad. I had no idea it would be this complete train wreck. As someone wrote on imdb.com about this pairing, "Falk and Allen are supposed to be a 50's comedy team, but they act like they are in two different movies. "Indeed one is left asking how if these two ever shared a coffee and a chat together, never mind a TV career" To top it off, they are supposed to have had this great career but you never see a second of their act. Absolutely one of the most needless remakes in history, that is until the release of Casablanca starring Madonna.

Charlie Chan: Curse of the Dragon Queen: Remember when there was this resurgence of Art Deco in the 70's. Everyone wanted to go back to the 30's. By the time this movie came out that fad had already died away. But I guess the director wanted to make sure that they nailed that coffin down tight. An amazingly spectacular 70's cast of has-beens: Peter Ustinov, Lee Grant, Roddy McDowall, Angie Dickinson, and a very young Michelle Pfeiffer. I had this year watched a slew of Charlie Chan movies; it was a passable series with some good mysteries. Except for the accent and the white suit there is very little connection with the original character, and the real mystery is how did this ever get released on DVD. The screenwriter David Axelrod's credits include The Dean Martin Roasts and it shows. Every joke is painfully overplayed. Poor Angie Dickinson who plays the Dragon Queen seems to be just passing through the film on her way to some costume party. Ustinov puts Asian American relations back a couple decades and Roddy McDowell plays the role in a wheelchair in order to make sure that there isn't a single group that isn't offended. The great character actress Rachel Roberts committed suicide shortly after the completion of this movie. I think Chan should solve That crime. Click Here for the trailer

I had to watch this movie in ten minute bits, I was determined to make it through. I think I might need an intervention.

I watch this abysmal dreck so you don't have to…

2009-01-11T00:39:00.001-06:00

Snowfall

We were hit with a surprise snow storm starting last night. We were told it would be one to two inches... but it started and didn't stop. I walked around with my camera. It was very pretty.

2009-01-07T19:02:00.003-06:00

Sweet Marijuana

This very odd musical number is from the long forgotten murder mystery musical, "Murder at the Vanities" starring Jack Oakie and Kitty Carlisle. Filled with grisly killings, ditsy showgirls, lecherous policemen and a bunch of faux Busby Berkeley numbers you get your moneys worth with this film.

This number Marijuana although short is a show stopper. Why they perched girls on top of cactus plants is any one's guess. Or maybe there is something I don't know about the evil weed.

Thanks to my friend Paul for making me a copy of this...

2009-01-06T21:45:00.013-06:00

My Favorite Movies of 2008

I should start with one of my long winded apologies about not posting for a couple of weeks, but it seemed like none of the blogs I read were posting after December 20th. Much like the streets and highways during the holiday season, the cyber highway was also pretty slow. Even people that usually post every day were down to once a week.

That said, I've had lots of ideas for year end posts that I never got to because of family obligations, out of town friends, and general malaise. I hope everyone had a happy end of the year… 2009! Argh every year seems more like I'm in a science fiction story. 2010 will be almost unbearable. I say let's start a petition to put it off another year.

Anyhoo… I've been a Netflix subscriber since October of 2000… Back in the day when I had to wait four days for my movies as there was only one hub in San Diego; back when my mailman stole every other one; back when the sleeves were a slippery plastic. I had first heard about Netflix at a dinner party. My friend Patrick talked about this movie subscription service where you got a movie and when you watched it and sent it back you got another one. Impossible… what? No it couldn't be… I purchased my first DVD player a little while later and began an insane journey into film and TV series watching. My first DVD was Sex and the City followed by the Judy Garland Show. Hello Mary…!!! Four years ago I upped my movies out quota to 8, cut off my cable and exclusively watch nothing but DVDs.

For a completest like myself it's been a blessing and a curse. I've watched all of Six Feet Under, X-Files, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel… currently I'm plowing through the Doris Day Shows and the Naked City. As my friend Sally once said, "Lord save me from the completest".

This year I watched over 250 DVDs… about five a week… At times it feels like I have movie watching homework. Right now I should be watching Love Story, but I thought I'd better pound out a post instead. One of my favorite features of the system is the ability to write a mini 300 characters review about the movies I've watched and send it to my Netflix friends. I thought I'd modify that structure a bit and give you my 10 favorite Netflix movies of 2008.

10. Portrait in Black: This year I had a renewed interest in Lana Turner movies (Postman Always Rings Twice, The Big Cube, Imitation of Life) but this one really made my camp bone tingle. Not to give too much away but Lana Turner and Anthony Quinn kill Lana's dying husband and most of the movie is wondering how they are going to get away with it. Sort of Colombo but with more Edith Head dresses. I just love these outlandish melodramas with lush scenery, over the top performances, and insane twisty plotlines. And you ain't seen nothing until you seen Lana try to drive down the Pacific Coast highway, in a rainstorm, a dead body in the back seat, all while wearing a black dress bedazzled with rhinestones, and after she tells Quinn, "I don't know how to drive"... Hilarity ensues.

9. The Host: I loves me some big monster movie. And this one took me completely by surprise.

Funny, scary, and punch you in your gut emotional. This Korean made film tells the story of a down and out lakeside vendor and his family as they battle a toxic sludge made monster. It sounds pretty standard, but I was laughing one moment and holding back the tears the next. Note: If you do get this, don't watch the dubbed version, go for the original with subtitles. The dubbing is awful; I almost turned it off when I started to watch it the first time around.

8. Killer Bait
I already wrote a post about this film. See HERE. However this was my year to do a Noir festival, The Big Heat, Naked City, Black Angel, Strange Impersonation, The Dark Corner, The Big Combo are all worth seeing. What makes Killer Bait stand out is that it's so undiscovered. Awful print, terrible sound, but Lizbeth Scott's performance just leaps out and pulls your hair out of its roots.

7. Imitation of Life: Amazing that two Lana Turner movies made my list, and more amazing that this film snuck by me for so many years. This Summer my pals at Hell in a Handbag, put on a staged reading of a homage to this film at Hamburger Mary's called L'IMITATION OF LIFE. Ed Jones' hilarious portrayal of Lana was spot on, and creative director David Cerda told me afterwards that most of the script was straight from the movie, the lines were so funny. Such as when Lana tells her black maid/friend "I never thought of you as having friends…" I put it at the top of my list. I was expecting another camp fest, but the great Douglas Sirk once again took schlock and made it into art. True there are campy parts, but it uses the melodrama format to punch home the message of the racial problems of the 50's. The ending will leave you speechless and in tears. Ironically I watched this instead of watching Obama accept the Democratic nomination.

6. Perfume: The Story of a Murderer: I read the book years ago and remembered nothing about it except I read it in about two days and loved it. I recall when this movie first came out critics said it wasn't as good as the book, the book was impossible to film, etc… Maybe they should have waited a few years between reading it and watching it because I thought the film was brilliant. The story of a man born seemingly without a soul but the ability to detect the slightest smell. Seems like an odd subject matter for a film, but rarely have I been horrified and titillated at the same time. Erotic in the best sense of the word. And lushly beautiful.

5. Tess of the Storm Country: This year I've been watching a lot of Mary Pickford movies. Poor little Mary Pickford… but if you haven't seen one then you are missing out on a major part of film history and some amazing films. Mary was America's number one star and her films show why. They are so well crafted that I can see them being watched 500 years in the future and they would still be understood. Mary always plays the underdog, be it in modern times like in My Best Girl or as a street urchin like in Suds. I picked Tess of the Storm Country not because it was the best of the films, but it was the one that I will remember forever. It's a simple story of rich evil people trying to bring down the poor but hard working people. Mary plays a simple girl who falls in love with the rich man's son, is betrayed and of course resurrected. It's so extremely overplayed, over dramatized, over everything. But soon I was caught up in the drama I was clutching my handkerchief rooting for poor Mary to win in the face of adversity. It's simply a movie that has to be seen to be believed. A four hanky as my mother would say…

4. Mephisto Waltz: This is probably the only time I will ever say this, but Alan Alda was pretty sexy in the day. As those who know me know, I love TV movies. This movie plays out with the same pace as a TV movie, but with big screen cash behind it. It's a lovely 70's tale of devil worship and music. Soul transference and I understand now why every man was in love with Jacqueline Bissett. Plot: A aging brilliant pianist wants to take over the body of a young man to continue his career. Reason to watch: A party filled with worshipers of wine and the devil and a dog wearing a William Shatner mask.

3. Brief Encounter: Again, another movie that I can't believe I'd never seen. Noel Coward's urban and sophisticated dialogue brings to mind how terrible screenwriting has become these days. A short film about two people brought together out of ordinary circumstance and torn apart by their honor. Just a simple, honest and unforgettable film.

2. Hangover Square: The great Laird Creger's swan song as a man who goes mad when he hears dissident notes plays like a great opera; An amazing score by Bernard Herrmann whose music makes this film. Cregar was a giant of a man with the softest eyes in the world. Linda Darnell plays a bitchy dance hall queen who almost steals the movie. Reminded me of a combination of the best of Hitchcock and Welles. Another classic film that should get much more notoriety that I've seen it have. 1. Off the Menu: The Last Days of Chasens: My favorite film of the year is this small documentary about the end of days for an L.A. restaurant. Neatly paced with some lovely film portraits of the people that worked there for over 30 years, lots of stories about the where the elite went to eat. Wonderful testament about the power our jobs have over our lives and how our lives affect others, even if it's just making sure they have a nice dinner. I laughed, I cried, I really wanted to taste their chili.

Coming soon: My much funnier post on the worst movies I've seen this year…

Peace…

2008-12-27T12:04:00.002-06:00

Year of The YTube

Huffington Post Did a piece on the top ten youtube videos of the year. CLICK HERE. I thought for sure my cat Dinah eating the record off of the turntable would have been amoung them, but alas; Maybe next year I'll catch her doing something darling that will go viral.

Most of the videos I'd seen, and if you owned a computer, had e-mail and friends how could you miss them. I had missed the 3 year old re-telling Star Wars (cute) and the partying teenager in Austrialia (who is now a star).

I am glad to see one of my favorite youtube series was featured, Drunk History. The first piece I thought was a brilliant ode to anyone who has ever tried to have a serious conversation while intoxicated. I've not been keeping up with the series beyond the first one about Alexander Hamilton.

A few of the later ones feature a tad too much vomiting by the storytellers. But this one with Jen Kirkman the telling of the story of Washington's slave Oney Judge is funny and at the same time informative. It's a story that they must have left out of the history books. And her hiccups are hysterical.

2008-12-25T13:30:00.004-06:00

MERRY CHRISTMAS FROM

A HOLE IN THE HEAD BLOG...

I hope that all of you are having as much fun

as my family did in this 1949 Home Movie.

2008-12-24T15:39:00.008-06:00

Merry Christmas!

Christmas Eve is always been sort of melancholy for me. Growing up my parents were usually in bed by ten leaving me to watch as each of the television stations went off the air after their showing of A Christmas Carol or watching Midnight Mass from Holy Name Cathedral. On the rare occasions we did go to church it was at Our Lady of the Snows where the mass was done in Polish.

I always had jobs where I worked on Christmas Eve or when I moved away from home I usually spent them by myself with some rare and fun exceptions. One year Thax and I watched Zombie movies all night, that was fun. And when I was dating Robert we went to a sleazy bar and drank Long Island Ice Teas until we were both sick. I think that was the year my mother asked me on Christmas if I was mad at her... when I was just barely hold it together with a massive hangover.

Don't worry about me this year, I've got plans for a dinner with other Christmas orphans. But getting back to the album. This is one of my few and favorite Christmas albums. Jackie Gleason along with being a comic was a great conductor of "mood music". As the liner notes says it's meant to be played after the day is over and you have time to reflect on this and past Christmases.

It's also a chance to hear the slowest renditions of "Jingle Bells" and "Winter Wonderland".

Have a Happy Christmas Eve

2008-12-22T20:04:00.004-06:00

Hello Gentle Readers

This month is just slipping by me like my wheels trying to get out of my frozen parking space. I've hardly had any energy or time to post silly youtube videos let alone sit down and think about something interesting to pull out, scan and post... However, I thought I'd do a post catching you up on some odds and ends in my life.

I really should write some observations everyday. I've begun trying to write my dreams down. I did it pretty regularly for a while, when I could pull myself out of bed to write something half asleep. It's fun and a little scary to read them later when I have no remembrance of the dream. For example:

I had this dream that I was with Burguss Meredeth. He was giving people tattoos and drilling holes into people’s bodies. He gave me an elaborate tattoo on my right arm. It filled up my whole arm and the images were so dense that I couldn't make them out.

He then wanted to drill 20 holes in my body. I stopped him at the last minute and he started to do it to someone else. I was horrified and had to walk away.

The mind is a spooky thing.

This last week has been exhausting. Not because of Christmas. I've not gotten anybody anything. Even shopping on-line seems like a chore. My office is moving to a new space and I've been in charge of basically anything that plugs in; so on top of my usual duties I've had lots of dealings with Networking people and American Telephone and Telegraph (AT&T) workmen. (I've tried to talk my boss into going with an all telegraph office to save money on phones.) I've nothing to say about this whole process of moving. Just typing this paragraph has bored me, so I can't imagine what it's like for people to read it.

This week I also had the dreaded phone call in the middle of the night. My parents are now in their 80s and my mother is pretty much bedridden. While in the deepest of sleeps, with two blankets, a patchwork quilt and Dinah, my cat, snuggled sleeping on my leg, the phone rang. After four rings I realized I was really hearing the phone ring and I wasn't dreaming. I laid there thinking it must be a wrong number, but knowing that something was wrong. I picked up the phone too late, and then tried to figure out with the caller ID who called. Before I could it rang again. My father sounding scared said that his heart was racing and he wanted me to come pick him up and take him to the emergency room. I told him to call an ambulance because it would take me at least an hour to drive to his house. He protested saying he didn't want them to take him to some hospital that he didn't know. I told him to calm down and to call my sister; I would be there as soon as I could. I threw on some clothes and crawled into my freezing, freezing car. It was about 10 degrees .

It was creepy driving on the empty Lake Shore Drive wondering what I was going to find on the other end of the highway. I listened to an old radio show from 1939 of Orson Welles' Mercury Theatre production of some 1920's melodrama about two men and a woman who crash land in a faraway Indian country where the king decides to put them to death to revenge the death of his brothers who were about to be hanged by the British. I should have had something cheerier on, but it seemed fitting to listen as the heroine said she would rather die than be the king's "wife". The roads were just icy and awful, and the few cars that were out were whipping by me at 80 miles an hour. It's funny how 3:30 in the morning seems different when you are up all night rather than when you just get up.

I got to my parent's home and went into their living room. My sister was sitting on the couch and she said as I walked in, "He says he's fine now and he doesn't want to go anywhere..." She offered gratefully to stay and take him to his regular doctor later on that morning. I sat for a while asking, "Well what should I do...?" Should I stay? Should I go home? Should I go to the gym? Shopping? They were predicting a huge storm that evening. I said after twenty minutes of making sure he was o.k. and watching the Weather Channel that I was leaving. My sister said, "Let's just consider this a dry run..."

I drove home barely keeping my eyes open. I had gone to bed at 12:30 the night before so I was only going on a few hours sleep. Orson Welles voice drone on as he threatened to take the young heroine for either his wife or "his slave". As I drove back up Lake Shore Drive at a little after five in the morning, two young women jogged next to me along the lakeside. I just don't understand where that dedication to physical fitness comes from. Not only to get up early, but to go outside and run in sub-freezing weather, along a large choppy body of water. I vowed to not complain when the steam was too hot in the sauna at my gym again.

I pulled back into my neighborhood and drove up the street that runs past Blagojevich's house. In the distance a huge bright light was in the sky. I thought it was the moon, but it was an enormous tower on top of the ABC News van. It looked like the star of Bethlehem. I don't know what was going on, but the press was out in force. Back in my warm apartment, the cat looking curiously at me, I crawled back into bed. It was 6:30 in the morning; I could sleep for at least an hour. Suddenly I heard the whoosh-whoosh of the helicopters hovering overhead. I looked out my window and watched as they floated around the neighborhood looking for a glimpse of the governor jogging in the frozen streets and floated off to sleep.

I've been exhausted ever since. Not to mention two more trips there to take my father to a couple doctor's appointments. Plus the cold has been awful. I hope it's warm wherever you are... It's been just painfully cold. In a way I like it a lot when it's like this, it's so bracing; and introspective. But then the uncontrollable shaking happens and I just want to be warm.

So thanks for indulging me in a daily diary entry. Maybe I'll do more. They are a bit cathartic. Stay warm...

Johnny C...

2008-12-16T10:31:00.001-06:00

30 Ways to Die of Electrocution

A lovely Flicker set from blogger Bre Pettis of scans from a German illustrated book Elektroschultz in 132 Bildern. Some extremely disturbing images. And if you were paranoid about taking a bath before... 30 more drawings HERE.

Check out Bre Pettis's Blog. He's cute and clever... Here is one of his videos.
Things - Zoetrope from Bre Pettis on Vimeo.

h/t Land of Links

2008-12-12T17:39:00.001-06:00

Lana! On the Tube...

It's been two years since I wrote a post about the singer Lana Cantrell. Click Here if you haven't read it.

It's been one of my most read posts. There is still so little written about Miss Cantrell, when you type in her name my blog is right at the top of the searches. I've had many wonderful e-mails from cyber-friends concerning their love for this forgotten diva. Recently, a reader William S. wrote me and informed me that there was a youtube video of her on-line. It's very exciting for me. I've never "seen" her sing. She does have a touch of Streisand about her, but Barbra never performed among such amazing 60's golden flotsam.

Love to hear from more Lana fans. Feel free to write your Lana memories in comments here...

2008-12-11T08:26:00.005-06:00

Thursday Morning Update:

Since six this morning helicopters have been hovering over my house!

This usually only happens when someone throws themselves in front of a train. Which I guess politically, he did...

2008-12-10T19:33:00.006-06:00

The Circus Has Come to My Neighborhood

You'd have to be living under a rock not have heard about this whole Blagojevich scandal. If not, then just look it up in Google News or something... It's quite the story of the year. What's interesting to me is that this is all happening just about two blocks from my house; He's lived in my neighborhood for the past eleven years. In fact, not a day goes by when I don't drive by his home; I've seen him mowing his lawn (rarely), watched while his family had Thanksgiving dinner, and often seen him in the morning leaving for the office with his strapping, State Police undercover agents with the big black SUV waiting for him. (His officers are always there in their black cars with their little TV's. During the day the Desperate Housewifes of the neighborhood would walk their dogs past them to stop and chat.)

My closest encounter with him was once after a night of much tom catting and drinking I was walking home crossing over the over the river just as the sun was rising. As I dragged myself over the bridge, Blagojevich came around the cover and ran right into me in his little red satin jogging shorts, his guards close behind. After a big "Aaah" from both of us and he grab me so I wouldn't fall down. We both laughed and said, "That was a close one... a couple more feet and I'd be in the river..." Now that would have been a scandal. Governor pushes boozed up barfly into Chicago River.

A few years later I organized a poster campaign in my neighborhood when the non-profit I work for almost got their state funding taken away. My idea was to knock on all the doors in the neighborhood and give big posters for people to put in their windows demanding that he restore our funding. It worked. He couldn't drive in or out of the neighborhood without seeing his name and our organization together. I'm sure he hated me, if he knew who I was...

Such memories. Now tonight when I drove past his house it was completely dark. News crews stood around on his neighbor's lawns waiting for a moment when he'd throw his garbage out or maybe shovel that ice off the walk. I thought if I really want a viral youtube video I should just go out there with a boom box and lip Lip-sync to a Judy number, maybe Get Happy. Or just hold up a sign that says: Visit a-hole-in-the-head.blogspot.com. It seems like a waste to have those cameramen out there doing nothing but waiting for something to happen.

But it's too icy for either of those ideas. I had however, to tell you about my current brush with national news. I'll update you if he knocks me over as he runs from the law.

2008-12-08T18:47:00.013-06:00

A Boy With a Heart to Lose
or
A Date With Tony

During all the news coverage of Prop 8 Tony Perkins from the Focus on the Family (or whatever evil group he belongs) was on all the talking heads shows spouting about why gays shouldn't get married. All I can think of when I see him is another closeted Tony Perkins.

Tony, probably better known as Anthony Perkins from Psycho. He lived an odd life of being a gay man in the conservative 50's and 60's, having affairs with Tab Hunter, Rudolf Nureyev, and Rock Hudson. In the "me generation" of the 70's he decided that he was not gay after having sex with Victoria Principal and then through therapy became 'straight' and married fashion photographer Barry Barenson and had two children Oz and Elvis. He died in 1992 from complications from AIDS.

I've always thought Anthony Perkins was one of the most handsome men that ever was. Anyway, thinking about Tony reminded me of this photo essay from a Movie Stars magazine circa November 1957. It includes articles like, "How Far Should a Good Girl Go? (Marriage? Not for Natalie Wood), Sal Mineo's Mystery Girl, Intimate Moments in John Saxon's Arms and Elvis' Rules for Love. The studios must have paid to have Tony go on a date with blond bombshell, Venetia Stevenson. Probably to squash those ugly rumors about Tony and Tab. Yes... "There's a new glow in Tony Perkins' heart these days. Is love, in the luscious guise of Venetia Stevenson, the answer? Tony's not talking, but our intimate peek into an evening they shared just might be a peak at the future, too!"
At Venetia Stevenson's apartment it's often Benson, her pet Siamese who greets her date first, and hew as on hand the night Tony Perkins arrived to squire Venetia to the Pride and the Passion preem. On the dot as usual Tony was glad to see Venetia was almost ready.

That poor kitty.

Tony'd had a long day's work at Paramount on Desire Under the Elms, changed his clothes and shaved in his dressing room. With no time to eat earlier, he wheedled Venetia to giving him some soup and milk, then fell victim to a little begging himself!

I guess I could make a joke about that's the closest that Tony got to any pussy that night... but I won't... that would be cruel.

Pesky last-minute crisis always happen when time matters! With Tony and Venetia, it was zipper trouble for her, a loose shirt button for him, but they saved their tempers and nerves by playing maid and valet for each other!

Even then, a girl's best friend is her gay.

A girl may be entitled to that important last minute primp session, but to Tony, being punctual counts, too! He often skips meals or extra grooming to be on time.

Yes, Tony is worried he's going to miss the credits, or is he anxious because he's expecting to run into someone at the event? But who could it be?!!!
Slight delay came while Tony made sure he had the premiere tickets and gave them to Venetia for safe keeping. That's Tony's Thunderbird in the background - no more hitchhiking for this boy! He used to hate big occasions because he's near-sighted, now has enough self-confidence to wear his glasses, expect in tete-a-tete conversations.
At start-studded post-preem party in Bali Room of Beverly Hitlon, Tony and Venetia exchange a champagne toast. He doesn't drink, except on very special occasions, but attacks any food served him as though he hasn't eaten in days, "tho I never gain weight!"

Sophia Loren, who co-stars with Cary Grant and Frank Sinatra in Pride and the Passon, was congratulated by Venetia and Tony during a rare minute when photogs weren't pursuing her. In Desire Under the Elms, Tony's her stepson who falls under her spell.

Sophie looks confused but her Tony sets her straight telling her Venetia is just his beard for the evening.

Tab Hunter, who also manages to date popular Venetia, stopped for a brief chat too. Since her divorce from Russ Tamblyn, Venetia's been on a dating whirl, but Tony's rare seen with anyone else. Insiders report he's really smitten. (Tony's in Columbia's This Bitter Earth; Venetia's in Warner's Darby's Rangers.)

Finally, this is the happiest we've seen Tony. His real date for the evening has shown up. Creepy that they say that Tab is also dating Venetia, the hot divorcee. I think this photo shows who he's really smitten with.

One of the benefits of Tony's 'goin' straight' turnaround and marriage to Berry Berenson are their sons Oz and Elvis. Oz is an actor and Elvis is an accomplished and really great singer songwriter. His album "Ash Wednesday" was dedicated to his mother Barry who died on American Airlines Flight 92 on 9/11. This song is wonderful.

And as an added bonus: I've always loved Anthony Perkins, the singer. I've all of his albums. Below is the Anthony Perkins Jukebox... Enjoy.

2008-12-03T21:05:00.003-06:00

MANDOM
OR

THE OTHER SIDE OF CHARLIE

Big h/t to Graeme

2008-12-01T01:00:00.001-06:00

Nat Goldstein Follow-up

I received this annoucement concerning the book version of the story of the tragic story of the murder of the daughter of Nat Goldstein as I posted HERE. The story is going to run on CBS's 48 Hour Investigates in a couple of weeks, and the book is available on amazon.com. HERE.

e-mail from Ira, Donnah's father:

This is to advise you that relative to our daughter’s tragic story which has been shown on CBS’s 48 Hour Investigates program three times the TV producer Gail Zimmerman, has written a book entitled “Invitation to a Murder” which has been published by Pocketbook which is Simon & Schuster and is available for public sale at Borders or Barnes & Noble or Amazon and most anywhere.

CBS TV and the 48 Hour program brought Sara Jane and I up to New York to interview us and to re-edit and update the previous program on Thursday the 30th of October.

We do not earn any money from this book or the TV program and the only reason we did this, is to raise more money through your donations for Donnah’s Fund, which is part of Women in Distress of Broward County, Box 676, Fort Lauderdale, 33302, as CBS will list Donnah’s Fund on their website during the show and made a substantial donation.

To date, I have been advised that through the monetary disbursements to women who have qualified, the money from Donnah’s Fund has assisted 66 women and their families start a new life away from their abusers.

I have just been advised that the date for the 48 HOUR MYSTERY CBS PROGRAM is on SATURDAY NIGHT DECEMBER 13, 2008 AT 10 PM EST…….

This story has also been shown on Court TV’s “Forensic Files” and Tru TV’s “Murder By The Book” and on the Montell Williams show and written in Reader’s Digest.

Thanks for your kindness and please buy the book which is a soft cover pocket book and it sells for $7.99.

My best,
Ira

2008-11-29T11:53:00.012-06:00

To Die For...

This weekend's tragic crushing of a Walmart employee by Xmas shoppers trying to get the early Black Friday bargains reminded me of an incident that happened to me in the early 80's when I was working at a Walmart-ish store called Zayre. It was similar because they sold cheaply made clothes and low cost foreign made crap. It was the first place to go to buy a Michael Jackson sparkly glove or to get vinyl blinds cut to order. For over three years it was my world. I started as a part-time associate and then moved up to the manager of the Toy department. Quite the accomplishment on the Southwest Side of Chicago. (When I quit to go back to college my mother cried crocodile tears and proclaimed it was the 'worst mistake I'd ever make in my life'. I think she was really crying about her 20% discount going out the window.)
I've many stories about my years there, most of them I think of fondly. There was, as in all work environments, a myriad of characters: Ed Crowley, the burly guy who worked in the hardware department, the sweet Irish lady who worked in Bed and Bath, funny Mary Sims who worked in Housewares. Matt the sexy Polish guy who I had the biggest crush on, nerdy Jeff in electronics, etc. Not a week would go by when someone wouldn't say, "They should make a TV show out of this store..." I mostly remember laughing a lot. You had to, it was a shit job, working in that huge fluorescent tube lighted store with it's miles of low cost clothes, cleaning supplies, and various other junk.

It was Christmas 1983 and Zayre had decided to keep its stores open 24 hours a day. I gladly took the night shift from 11 to 8. It was quiet and all I had to do was restock and take inventory. Every so often a stray factory worker or Midway Airport crew man would wander through like a zombie and maybe get a Barbie Works at McDonald's play set or Masters of the Universe talking Skelator mask. My job was mainly picking up the mess from a days worth of kids running through the department tearing apart every package that was in reach. I found that some parents felt like their children could do whatever the fuck they wanted as long as they didn't have to deal with it. Parents would go do their shopping after telling their children to go play in the toy department. I never understood how a mother who carried a child for 9 months would feel o.k. with leaving them alone in a store. Bob and I once ran across a cute little girl, about four years old, in the housewares department sitting on the floor with blue Tydee Bowl running out of her mouth and down her front. It took ten minutes of paging the mother who showed up screaming as the ambulance pulled up to the store. Whenever Bob talked about the incident he'd just say, "Ba-Ha... She'd been Smurfed..."

But Christmas just turned up the stress with out of control kids and maniac parents. I would have a calendar in my room that I would hang up after Thanksgiving. It would count down the days until Christmas was over. Ten days. Nine days. Eight days. If you want the joy of the holiday season knocked out of you work in one of these stores. That year, 1983 was the year that at the International Toy Fair in New York City the Cabbage Patch Doll was introduced. That fall Zayre got its first shipment in. I thought they were nothing dolls and in fact, the ten or so we got sat on the shelves for weeks without even being pulled out of their boxes by the mobs of roving children; Even they weren't interested in them.

By Thanksgiving however it was a different story. The news was all over the 'hottest' item to get your children this Xmas. It was from Kim Davis, a cashier, that I recall hearing about how popular the Cabbage Patch Kids Dolls were becoming. Kim never said two words to me before, but since she heard that these new type of dolls were coming in she acted as if we were the best of friends. "Please, you'll do that for me, huh?. You'll put one aside. My little girl saw a commercial and has been after me for weeks for one." "Sure..." I couldn't imagine that they would sell out, we were getting over a hundred units of the doll. There was no mad rush for them on that first sale day, although they did sell quickly. People were curious and slowly picked through the dolls looking for the one they wanted. My only job was to tell people that there were no more dolls in the back, that we didn't have one by a particular name or trying to find the missing birth certificate that was pulled out of the box and thrown on the floor. As the big holiday came nearer, the frenzy began to build, everyone wanted one. Even the few left over dolls that were pulled out of the boxes and were damaged disappeared from the shelves.

Every day more and more people started to come up to me asking for the dolls. Once while working the night shift, at 3 AM in the morning, I noticed two couples wandering around my aisles. They had obviously been drinking. One of the women came up to me and slurring told me she wanted a Cabbage Patch Doll. I told her we didn't have any in stock and she snapped at me, "My girlfriend works at the Zayre on Southwest Highway she told me that this store has them hidden in the back." I said I didn't know what she was talking about and she yelled at me and accused me of lying, then pushed her way into the storeroom at the back of the department and began looking for the dolls. Her boyfriend looked pitifully at me and shrugged and then went and got his girlfriend. She yelled, 'Fuck, fuck, I know they have them!" It was downright spooky.

Two weeks before Christmas the dolls were completely sold out everywhere. No one could get them and there was the beginnings of a panic among parents that their children would be left out of the experience of having one on Christmas morning. Around that time Zayre had the doll featured on the cover of its sale flier for $30. These dolls were now selling for hundreds of dollars if you could get them. When the shipment of two hundred units came in they were put in the the locked manager's offices and it was announced that the day before the sale the store would be closed at 11 and not reopen until the big sale started the next day at 7. Bob, Jeff and I worked through the night moving merchandise to make a large space in front of the cashiers where we piled the dolls. All the other employees were forbidden to touch the dolls. A lottery held for employees and that would decided who would be able to buy one.

It was a bitterly cold December night. By two in the morning we could see that people were pulling up in the parking lot; By 3 AM, they were lining up at the door. Jeff nasally said, "This is out of control.." By 7 AM there were hundreds of people pressed up against the glass doors. I don't remember what we as 'associates' were expected to do when the doors opened, but Jeff, Bob and I just stood back and watched. The doors opened and people pushed in with a big roar and descended on the pile of dolls. One big guy ran and did a belly flop into the pile, his arms outstretched trying to grab as many as he could although there was a 'Limit One Doll Per Person". People yanked and pulled each other out of the way, grabbed dolls out of each others hands, pulling some of the dolls apart. Most shocking I saw a man punch an elderly woman in the face breaking her glasses and her nose to get the doll out of her hands. The cashiers with panic on their faces tried to check people out as people pushed to get into line. The guards, whose job mainly was to sit in a booth and look for people shoplifting had suddenly become crowd control. It was fucking the most frightening thing I'd ever seen. Police were called, people were arrested, and the dolls sold out in under fifteen minutes. The store was closed down until noon and a big sign on the outside was put up that said "Out of Cabbage Patch Kids".

Reading about this poor, underpaid Walmart worker who was crushed by that crowd trying to get some X-Box or Elmo Doll or whatever the fuck the media is telling us is what we need to have made me sad and angry. Is it because the economy is in the crapper again as it was in the 80's that this behavior is surfacing again? What if there were a real disaster and shortages of food? The image of those zombie-like people attacking that pile of dolls comes back to me every time I see one dirty and worn out in a bin at at thrift store. What was all that energy for? Is getting something on sale so important that someone had to die?

At the time, I thought of a good idea for Christmas giving. Alternate gift buying for odd years. So every other year is a gift giving year, the even years are just a time for reflection and get togethers. Sort of Big Xmas, Small Xmas. I'm sure that the retailers wouldn't back me up on this one. There is this group who is trying to promote: Buy Nothing Day. Coming from a family of shopaholics this really hits home.

I'll get off my soap box now... But be safe, shop responsible, don't push and think, "Is it really a bargain if you don't need it?"

Peace...

Are you a Good Consumer? Click Here

2008-11-27T11:30:00.004-06:00

HAPPY THANKSGIVING

1951!

This year is going by so fast. I can't believe it's Thanksgiving already. I'm working my way through my families home movies and luckily there is a treasure trove of goodies for this time of year.

Watch as my my family stuffs themselves on giant turkey legs, enjoys a smoke and then out comes the whiskey. Even Grandma takes a shot. Remember to save some room for pie! It's a feast.

Seen in this film is my Aunt Mildred. She was a man-ish sort of woman. During this period when women were forced to wear dresses, I swear she looked like a transvestite. It's sweet to see how much my parents are in love with each other. But question... what the hell is my mother smelling?

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

2008-11-18T19:56:00.004-06:00

DIRTY OLD MEN

While trying to distract myself while excercising I've been putting random comedy albums on my Ipod thingy. It amuses me that I'm listening to Belle Barth or Rusty Warren singing about Knockers and Peckers while I'm trying to lift dumbells over my head.

Recently, I plopped on these Milton Berle Roasts that I downloaded from somewhere. I swear I don't remember where so I can't give credit. I felt like I had to share because "Damn, this shit is dirty..." Fag jokes, Milton Berle's big penis jokes, pussy jokes, Paul Lynde is Dead jokes..." These Friar's Club evenings must have been a blast. Nothing was sacred.

I found myself gasping with 'crap did they just say that..." to letting out a big "Ba-Ha" while on the StairMaster. These were the sort of tapes my father would hide on the top shelf in the lights over the bar. We all knew they were there; and sometimes I'd sneak down stairs at night and play them quietly; I knew they were forbidden; I just didn't know why.

That said, they probably aren't safe for work; Unless you work in an all-men real estate office. In which case, turn it up as loud as you want.

2008-11-12T20:30:00.018-06:00

Costumes with the Dramatic Instinct

Joan Crawford Shows Her Stuff

Found in the February 1929 issue of Photoplay Magazine is this lovely spread of a 24 year old Joan Crawford modeling the latest of high fashions of the day. It's clear why Joan became a star, she just lights up these photos. I think people forget just how beautiful she was when she was young.

2008-11-09T11:50:00.013-06:00

Too Late For Tears

Lately, I've been really into the Film Noir genre. Double Indemnity, The Big Combo, Asphalt Jungle, to name a few of my favorites. Last night I watched one that I never heard of before. And it's a doozy. It has everything that makes my little dark heart jump for joy: A cold-as-ice blond, lady-slapping bad guys, and characters who just keep digging themselves into deeper and deeper holes.

Too Late for Tears AKA Killer Bait is a hidden gem starring the 'oh so mean' Lizbeth Scott and wonderful Dan Duryea. I fell in love with Dan Duryea when I saw him in Fritz Lang's Scarlet Street (a must see classic). I didn't think I'd ever see a role where he gives a sleazier performance with snapper lines like:

Jane Palmer : Did you notice where the liquor was when you went through my kitchen?
Danny Fuller : Sure!
Jane Palmer : Go make us a drink.
Danny Fuller : Stallin' honey?
Jane Palmer : What do I call you besides 'Stupid?'
Danny Fuller : [Chuckles] Stupid'll do if you don't bruise easily. Otherwise you might try Danny.

Much like the great film Detour, Too Late For Tears just cries out to be discovered. It's risen high on my list of favorite films. Just classic. Noir of the Week has a wonderful review of this movie; but don't read it until you've watched it. It's also where I got the link for the film and the poster art. Check it out.

So if you have an hour and half to kill go to the player below. You can actually watch the full film, it's a little dark at the beginning. Someday I'm hoping for a restoration. This film is part of a 5-DVD set called 5 Noir Killer Classics. It's a great set because it includes DOA, Detour, Scarlet Street, The Stranger and To Late For Tears. Five films that will get you hooked on this genre.

2008-11-09T00:00:00.002-06:00

LIVE BOX O' PUPPIES!!!!

Go Here to See the Puppies HERE

(The live link was really slowing down my site...)

Still the cutest thing in the world... when it's on...

2008-11-08T11:03:00.005-06:00

Time to Look Towards the Future
Future Fashions That Is...

"Oooh Swish".

They did correctly predict that men will have a suit with a phone and Ipod. But the style is about 20 years off. That suit is very 1985.

2008-11-06T19:34:00.013-06:00

Girl with a Cock

1940's Joe Average Thought Picasso was Nuts

Painting found at the abcgallery.com

In the May 25, 1940 issue of Life Magazine readers found pen in hand to comment on a feature the week before profiling Picasso and his painting Girl with a Cock. Guess what? They hate him! Ghoulish! Detestable! La Trash! 68 years later these Letters to the Editor are hysterical.

Note: I'm wondering if my hits will go up now because I have Girl With a Cock in my post.

The painting above is really called Farmer and Nude, Surrounded by Hens. 1938. Charcoal on canvas. I'm assuming this is the painting that is being referenced. I searched all over, this was the closest I could come. Girl with a Cock is referenced in many books but no on-line scans. (If anyone finds it, please pass it along.)

2008-11-05T07:58:00.002-06:00

JUST AMAZING!

2008-11-04T07:06:00.003-06:00

A Bit of Hope

This video has been pretty viral, but it was one of my favorites of the political season. I'm going to vote in a few minutes for Obama. I hope that it's a landslide. These last eight years have been pretty tense. With Clinton it was all Sex, Money and Rock N' Roll, with the Republicans it's been War, Death and Kenny Chesney. It think the world needs a break.

Even my father who has been pretty much a Republican his whole life is voting for Obama, I think... He told me Sunday he was still undecided, but he wants to have the war end in Iraq and McCain will continue it. As my mother said when the Iraq war started, "Even when I was a little girl, we knew never to go poking a stick into that vipers nest in the Middle East."

Eight years ago I didn't vote, I got so complacent after 8 years of Clinton that things would stay the same, that we never could go back to the Republicans after the years of Reagan/Bush I. I've never forgiven myself.

So get out there and vote... Peace...

2008-11-03T20:09:00.005-06:00

RIP

Yma Sumac

The embodiment of 50's Lounge. Exotic and truly one of the most unique and amazing voices that ever was...

Limited Time Yma Sumac Jukebox:
This is her super rare last album. A psychodelic, hard rockin' romp with Les Baxter no less. Enjoy.

2008-11-03T09:00:00.000-06:00

What's in a Name

As a child I always thought it was odd when my father would tell the gas station attendent to put Ethyl in the tank. Ethel was always the blonde lady with Lucy.

And don't you love the pre-rock era hair banger maestro, Ceasar.

2008-11-02T13:40:00.004-06:00

The Big Secret

Another feminine odor ad, with some beautiful Vargas Girl-ish drawings. (click on photos to enlarge) The story:

The Bride: (tearfully) We've been married eight whole hours, and he hasn't so much as kissed me, and...

The Bride is then told by the mysterious US about The Big Secret! The secret of personal daintiness. And that soap doesn't have have that mannish smell to be effective.

After a bath where the mysterious US gives her some crap about it smelling like $20 an ounce perfume, her husband comes back after ignoring his new bride for eight hours to give her the old what for, but not before The Bride asks: But tell me... does Cashmere Bouquet always make a groom so attentive?

US: It's you who rates the attention, my pet... Cashmere Bouquet just insures the perfection of tender moments by guarding your daintiness!

I think Cashmere Bouquet would make a great drag name.

2008-11-01T17:32:00.004-05:00

Nailin' Palin

A Montreal radio comedy duo placed a prank call to Sarah Palin. The surprise is that not for one moment does she go off message. But also shows that she does not listen. Best line: "I love the documentary about your life, Nailin' Palin, very edgy."

Story about the prank HERE

2008-10-31T03:15:00.002-05:00

HAPPY HALLOWEEN

FROM A HOLE IN THE HEAD

2008-10-30T21:00:00.004-05:00

The Tragic Truth

or
The Smell that Must Not Speak Its Name

This is not a story for smug complacent wives! It's for you who cherish happiness... and seek to keep it!

People were talking...about how young Mrs. Smith had changed! In fact, how the Smith marriage had changed!

Those two had been the town's gayest, most devoted young couple. But now you seldom saw them together -- and she went about with smiling lips but tragic eyes.

The truth was that lovely young Mrs. Smith was losing her husband's love... the tragic part was she didn't know why! Click on ad below for the answer.

If this was so tragic, why didn't Douglas Sirk make a movie about it with Lana Turner or Lauren Bacall?

2008-10-29T21:21:00.005-05:00

My Dad Could Skate Rings Around You...

This is one of my favorite films of my father. This is probably 1955 judging by my father's glasses and the newly constructed Kinzie grade school in the background. My father loved to skate and still has them hanging up in the garage. Several years ago he and his brothers Harold, George, Art would get together once a week and go to the suburban skating rink and go around and around for hours together. My mother really resented these outings my father did with his brothers. (She never liked my Uncle Art since 1966 when he got drunk and threw their anniversary cake down the basement stairs.) If I called and he wasn't there she would snort, "Your father isn't here. He's off acting like some kid for the afternoon with his brothers. I was glad they had this quality time together, because soon after he lost all of his brothers from some form of cancer.

Anyway, this was taken in Wentworth Park in Chicago. Do they still flood parks to make them ice skating rinks?

Recently I watched these home movies with my parents. My father commented on this film when we watched it how cold it was that day and how my mother froze her hands taking these movies.

2008-10-28T20:04:00.002-05:00

Blogging...

I love Despair Inc. Their posters mock those sappy inspirational posters that you see while waiting for a job interview or going to see your doctor. I thought this one was appropriate. "Never Before Have So Many People With So Little To Say Said So Much To So Few."

Their calendars make great gifts... Christmas is coming...

2008-10-28T00:22:00.000-05:00

LOL!!!

h/t Dave White

2008-10-26T22:38:00.007-05:00

House Party -

Home Movies

I suppose that there is nothing more horrifying than to be asked , "Do you want to watch some home movies?" Badly shot scenes of people smiling blankly into the camera, wandering around, wide slow pans of scenery. It's like watching French cinema!

I'm going ask you to indulge me in joining me as I post some of my family's 8mm home movies. Unlike most things home movies just get better with age. My parents filmed everything during this period of their life; fishing trips, birthdays, Thanksgiving dinners, vacation trips. My only regret is that I'm not in many of our home movies. Out of the five hours of home movies I'm only about a half hour.

My mother was a very good photographer. I remember we had all those "How to Make Home Movie" books around the house. And she followed them to the letter. Smooth pans. Good cuts. I can always tell when someone else has the camera in their hands. What she captured on film is an amazing document of the times and the history of my family. I'm so glad that I have it. And glad that I transferred it to tape several years ago. I asked my father recently where the films were, because I could do a better job these days with a digital camera. He said, "I've no idea. I might have thrown them out!" So much for family history.

I'm not sure what the circumstances were for this particular party; I watched this with my father recently and he laughed to see the amount of liqour bottles piled by the couch. My father is the dark haired man pretending to drink the two bottles of whiskey. My mother is the woman who almost gets knocked in the jaw by the pool cue. The other guys are my uncles Harold and Art. The man in the t-shirt is Bill, my parent's best friend. The woman he's kissing at the beginning isn't his wife, she's the blond drinking shots down the way...

I asked my father, "Who is Bill kissing..." "That's his wife's cousin..." Man! Scandalous.

I've hours of this stuff. So expect more to come... Sorry, I'll supply the chips and beer while you watch...

2008-10-26T00:00:00.000-05:00

Wassup!

Go Vote...

1999

Eight Years Later

h/t Dave & Americablog

2008-10-25T06:12:00.017-05:00

The Winter is Cold... It's Cold!

Finally, I'm getting around to transferring some video, as if I don't have enough to transfer. Anyone who has any good links to video transferring info sites, please pass them on to me. I'm having sound syching problems.

This video is from 2002. Bric-a-Brac was asked to perform on the long running cable access show Chic-a-Go-Go. It's actually quite an honor to be on this show. Wicker Park hipsters and their kids dance around to rock and rap songs, and then a band is brought in to lip sync to one of their songs.
The Winter is Cold is always a fun song to perform; I never screw up the words. I found it on a album by a 1960's sisters group called Wendy and Bonnie. Got to love the sister groups. This is the 2002 band line up, with Seamus Harmey on violin, and Evelyn Weston on musical saw. Only Mike, Larry and myself are left from the original members. If you like this, you can buy our album on CD Baby.

We are planning on working on a new album, but it's been difficult getting everyone back together.

Oh, the video reminded me about a couple things. First my hair. I had long hair for about five years by this point. After I saw myself on this show I cut it. It was looking a little too thin on the top. But I still miss it. Perhaps I should start wearing wigs.

And the coat is made out of beaver fur. Randy gave it to me when some girlfriend of his gave it to him. He didn't like it; thought it was too 'gay' It actually reverses so that the outside is beaver leather. I'm sure it's really expensive. I'm not exactly anti-fur, but I'd never buy one for myself and I have felt conspicuous when I've worn it. I only drag it out when the temperature falls below zero. At that point, the anti-fur advocates be damned...I'm cold; It's the world's warmest coat.

One night it was a horribly cold. I'd gone to see Johnny Mathis at the Chicago Theatre. Where else could I wear a beaver skin fur coat without it being out of place? Afterwards, a friend of mine was having a birthday party at a bar called The Eagle. The Eagle is a hard core leather bar where they have a strict "leather only" dress code. I didn't want to go, but Vic told me that they'd let me in the front bar, I just couldn't go in the back. However, the doorman took one look at me in my beaver leather skin, fur lined, coat and conservative suit and he wouldn't let me in. I said, I was only going to come in for a drink in the front bar which was empty except for about five people who were there for the birthday drinks. But he got stern and said that only people in leather could come into the bar. "Well" I said, "it's your loss, 'cause I'm a big drunk!"

Original Wendy and Bonnie Version.

2008-10-23T19:57:00.016-05:00

Jonesing for Some Joans

I love this ad I found. Click on photo for large version. Joan will personally sign your check. I'm hoping that somewhere a rabid fan decided not to cash in her $10 and it is now a beloved family memento. And what a contest: Just tell Joan what you think of her personality and ways to improve her screen work. I'm sure many a scream was heard in the Hollywood Hills the night Joan and her staff read the responses. The biggest Joan fan I know is David Cerda. He's written many a nice thing about me on his Hell in a Handbag blog; so I thought I'd gush about him for a while. I've known David for only a couple years, but we've had mutual friends for a long time. But it wasn't until I started this blog that we found out we had so many common interests.

David is the artistic director for Hell in Handbag Productions. Handbag and their troupe are a fabulous and fantastic group of people who have put on some of the best satirical comedies I've ever seen. I was introduced to them for the first time when I went to see their production of Poseidon: The Musical. Years ago, I dabbled in writing a musical parody production of Psycho (videos coming soon); After seeing Poseidon I remarked that it was exactly what I was striving to achieve with my musical and failed. Great songs, amazing cast, and at the heart of it a feeling that they really loved the original material. It was a tribute and not a cardboard cut out.

Over the years I've been amazed again and again. Never more so when I saw their production of The Birds. On top of it being very funny, it was also a thoughtful insight into Tippi Hedren's experience making the film. The night I saw it Tippi was there and did a short cameo where she talks to her on-stage persona. Other troupes might have exploited the moment; but this was touching as the real Tippi told her younger self that things would get better. David is, as Joan might have said herself, "One hell of a writer".

But where David really shines is on stage and recently along with running the company he is currently starring in Haywire. A homage to Joan's later horror classics Straight Jacket and Berserk. It runs through November 15th. Go see it! I've not seen it yet, so I can't gush about it.

And if that isn't enough Joan to put in your shopping basket, David is also the front man (woman) for a Joan Crawford Rock and Roll band called The Joans. Originally started as a one shot band thing for Gary's Flesh Hungry Dog Show; It was such a big hit that every since they have been performing all over Chicago. They were recently asked to play at the Folsom Fair in San Francisco! (Favorite blogger Aaron is their drummer and blogs about their trip HERE.) Their songs of course are all about Joan Crawford.

I don't know how David has the energy to do all this. I swear I can barely clean my bathroom when people come over for movie night. But I'm glad he does. He's truly one of the people in Chicago who makes it worth being here. However, I'm sure that David would like you to tell him frankly in your own language just what you think of his personality suggesting if you wish ways he may improve his work. I'm sure he'll even send you a personal check if he likes your answer.

The Joans

2008-10-22T23:41:00.004-05:00

Drive Time Voice Mail

Randy has left the small town radio station that he won the award for best personality in Wisconsin small market radio. I wrote about it in this April Post. HERE. So in place of doing his show I've been getting voice mails like this comment about one of my posts.

Funny...

2008-10-22T00:00:00.003-05:00

A conversation with Graeme about squirrels brought to mind this bit of forgotten ephemera that I've had in my personal stash for some time. In 1996, I visited Atlanta with my then boyfriend. He was friends with the creator of Baby Sue comix. He had a quirky sense of humor and would go around Atlanta and put up these fake Lost/Found signs. Another one had a photo of a snarling poodle with the caption in broken English: Have you seen Ling Ling's Head? Someone Come in yard and take her head.

Anyway, this was on my refrigerator for years and it always made me laugh.

2008-10-21T00:00:00.001-05:00

IT'S AUTUMN!

Extreme Weather Alert: Meteorologists Predict Intensely Brisk Autumn

2008-10-19T21:19:00.001-05:00

As Things Weren't Bad Enough...

'who put this dick on my back...'

2008-10-19T15:17:00.011-05:00

RIP Edie Adams

Last week we lost another pop icon Edie Adams. Edie fits into that niche of actress that seems to have gone the way to the dodo bird. The beautiful sexy woman who was funny, could sing, act and I'm assuming could fix her own sink if she had to.

Known in the 50's as Ernie Kovak's wife and straight woman, she had to rebuild her life out of nothing when she found herself alone with a child and in debt. Probably known best to people of a certain age as the Muriel Cigars girl, but I remember her best as Sid Caesar's wife in It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World. About five years ago, I was lucky enough to be treated by my pal Dan to see a 40th anniversary screening at the Cinerama Torchlight Theatre on that gigantic screen. (Lanie Kazan and Michelle Lee were sitting a few rows behind me - now that's how a movie is meant to be seen!) We arrived breathlessly almost late because of the horrible L.A. traffic (there was a transit strike on so it was worse than usual). We ran in and Dan almost stepped right into Edie. There she was glass cane in hand all dolled up to watch that movie probably for the nine thousandth time. What a great evening!

Dan has also shown me some amazing clips from her specials. I hope they'll be rediscovered someday so this incredible performer can get the kudos she deserved.

Here is one of my favorites from Dan's collection of her commercials.

and Click HERE for a touching tribute to her by of all people Tommy Chong.
Here is a lovely song by her on the final episode of I Love Lucy. This is class.

See below for the Edie Adams Jukebox.

Peace...

2008-10-12T00:00:00.002-05:00

Men Behaving Badly

It's been a while since I've posted something with women being put down for not having basic housewife skills. I think this fills my quota for a while. These Folger commercials are unusual because they are Mrs. Olson free.

2008-10-11T18:10:00.003-05:00

Hey Everyone I'm Gay!

Today is National Coming Out Day!

There I've said it! Whew...

I came out in the late 80's after I'd finally moved away from my parents at the ripe age of 24. I knew I was, but never really acted on it out of fear and self-denial. Then I met Jason who was a long haired, blond free spirit, and I was completely smitten. Of course, he could have cared less about about me and I was broken hearted for a long time; but the gay cat had been let out of the bag and it couldn't stuff it back in. I think Gloria was the first person that I told and her response was "Oh everyone knows that. They were just waiting for you to admit it..." Years later I ran into Jason in a bar. It was around the time that the Ellen show was dealing was her coming out. The storyline was that Ellen was in love with Laura Dern and her feelings for Dern make her realize that she's been denying these feelings all her life. I told Jason that I was thankful to him because he was my Laura Dern. If it weren't for him who knows when I would have run across a long haired pretty blond guy I would have fallen for...

or I would have had to have waited until I watched this commercial.

2008-10-06T08:32:00.006-05:00

The Digital Conversion.

It's been years since I've watched regular TV, so I feel blessed that I won't have to go through this digital conversion process. The paranoid, Dr. Strangelove in me knows this is just a way for the government to monitor my activities and probably there is an underground bunker where groups of men and women in matching jumpsuits would be watching me watch The Simpsons in my underwear.

At work, because I'm the 'computer guy', I'm already getting people coming up to me with questions about this box. People tend to think that if it plugs into a wall I'm an expert on it. So this video made me laugh. And the elderly actress in it is absolutely adorable.

h/t Land-O-Links

2008-10-04T17:08:00.011-05:00

I LOVE A MYSTERY

Last week, Graeme saw this lovely handmade wallet on ShopGoodwill.com. He had thought of giving it to Doris whom he's gotten to know since he moved into my building a few months ago. Doris is known as the squirrel lady in the neighborhood; always making sure that they have little tuna tins of water under the trees, giving them sugar cookies, and generally making them do her bidding whenever she wants. There is a small park across the street where she is the high mistress of her squirrel kingdom, where she rules over her minions of Ralphies. (Oh did I forget to mention she has named them all Ralphie.) It's eerie, you can feel dozens of eyes staring at you when you pass through the park. If you stand too long they come out and demand that you give them some food. Doris has created a park full of spoil brat wild creatures.

Needless to say, he thought this wallet would be a perfect gift. Especially because along with the squirrel on the front of the bill fold there is a special "No Hunting" notice carved on the back. He won the bid and it arrived a couple days ago. The wallet was all that was promised with its leather hand tooled drawing of what looks like a squirrel choking on something. But what was surprising was that he found in the bill fold a crumbling, badly typed letter from the original owner that recounts a crime and the strange circumstances in which he was given the wallet.THE LETTER:

When I was Marshal in Jameston, on a night of Nov 4-64 this happened, Amos Holt, London Ky, and brother Ray both now living in Boone Co, Ind. and a friend that worked with them was drinking in Lebanon and were thrown out of a Club there. Then the brother's wanted to go hunting, Oliver Borton, their friend said we would go hunting down by Jamestown. They went to Harry Hoovermales farm south of Jamestown. Ray started to release a female dog and Amos objected, said not to she would get lost, Ray said he would turn her loose if he wanted to, she was his, the brothers got into a fight. Amos drew a knife and cut his a 5 in gash over the right kidney on his back. Borton drove into town. I was contacted, went to where the car was parked, Amos in the back seat holding his brother stated a stranger cut his brother while in the woods. Borton standing beside the car whispered that is not so, Amos cut his brother and shown me the knife laying on the back fender where he lay it. I called sheriff, also my deputies and the three were taken to Lebanon, Amos to jail. Ray to hospital, doctors stated he could see Ray's kidney when sowing him up.

Amos very mean, may have some mental trouble, must be watched all the time when in custody.

Nov 5, the father and sister contacted me, I think they had come up from Ky. We talked about the trouble and the father gave me this bill fold, stated his daughter made them. To my knowledge both brothers still live in Boone Co.

Graeme is keeping the wallet. (And thanks Graeme for letting me share this weird thrift find.)

2008-10-01T08:26:00.003-05:00

The Way We Were...

My friend Andy is cleaning out his parent's attic and has been finding a lot of photos of me from the early 90s. Here his old girlfriend Pat O'Donnell made me up from some performance as a cat...

2008-09-29T20:47:00.008-05:00

REALLY RANDOM RECORD
IMPRESSIONS IN COLOR

This album is one of my favorites. Composed, arranged and conducted by William S. Walker, 1950's New York Times jazz critic, this oddity of an album is an rare gem of ultra lounge.

"Everyone who has ever worked around printing presses knows that each press sings its own song."

The concept of this album made for the Bergstrom Papers company was to set the rhythms of the presses to music. Some of the efforts are amazing and had for a while been a feature of many a performance art piece I did in the 1990s. I have a feeling that there must be printing press enthusiasts out there, and if there are this post will make them very happy. My favorite of the songs is "Blue Line".

Per the liner notes on the featured songs:

Blue Line - is based on a heavy 4/4 rhythm overlaid by a eighth note patter which suggest that rock n' roll may really have been derived from a Harris Offset LTV 17 X 22 press. There is a strong emphasis on "bottom" sound produced by ta combination of bass trombone, bass harmonica, string bass, and bass guitar. The blend almost seems to be a natural part of the heart beat of the Harris press. Harris Press LTV 17 X 22 at 8000 impressions per hour.

Press Party - is Bill's musical impression of a hazily cloudy day. Miehle Verticle at 4000 impressions per hour.

Harpanova - which is a pressman's bossa nova, proved to be fraught with problems. At the very start, in recording the sound of the press, Bill Walker had to experiment with numerous recordings angels before he found the one that produced the precise rhythm he wanted. Then he wrote a piece so complex that the featured harpist, Eddie Druzinksi of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra practiced his part at home for two weeks with a tape recording of the rhythm section before he felt prepared to make this record. Miller 38 4-color at 4000 impressions per hour.

Opus in Offset - is built around the bass harmonica work of Johnny Thompson. It is an exercise in counterpoint in which two dissimilar melodies complement each other both rhythmically and harmonically. Harris LUB 25 x 38 at 5300 impressions per hour.

Color Me Waltz - is not just a waltz. It a jazz waltz which means that it swings. Miehle 38 2-color at 4500 impressions per hour

Printers Devil - is an example of the varied rhythmic possibles that can be heard in a press. This Heidelberg Letterpress produces a definite 3/4 rhythm but, if you listen closely, you also hear a 4/4 beat. The combination of four on three led Bill Walker to a lively samba with four drummers contributing exotic sounds from a Tahitian wood block, timbales, a jawbone and a snare drum. Over this, the string bass, bass harmonica and bass guitar combine on one melodic pattern while the brass section with clarinet lead follows another pattern. A third line is built by the regular guitar with the bass trombone lending added strengh to the whole mixture. Heidelberg Letterpress at 1800 impressions per hour.

Impressions in Color Jukebox

2008-09-28T15:57:00.014-05:00

Hey all...

A little catching up post...
Cleaning: The days are finally getting cooler, and I feel like I'm finally catching up on some household projects. I finally cleaned up the porch. I really don't take advantage of my enclosed porch. When I first moved in this apartment 13 years ago I had it set up as a tableau of a 50's living room with vintage TV playing old commercials, retro thin couch, paintings, etc...
As the years went streaming by the porch had become a place to throw stuff that I didn't want to deal with right now... Magazines, records, old clothes, etc. I've tried to turn it back into a place a comfortable place again and just purge the useless things. I wish I had a before photo you'd be more impressed with these photos...
Wasting Time: I've been swamped at work these last few weeks that when I come home the last thing I want to do is be creative; so my usual routine has been to sit and play Bubble Shooter. I have to be more conscience of my ability to focus my energies on things that are completely useless. I'm just addicted to this simple game where you try to get three of the same colors in a row. Try it... but be warned you'll not do your dishes for days.

Family Stuff: I visited my brother last week. And I'm pleased to say he's doing well. After two more incidents where he had to be rushed to the hospital because he was so dehydrated, but now he's stable and declared 'cancer free'. He's lost a lot of weight and is wobbly, but what a difference a year makes... I can't believe it has been a year since I was going through the whole stem cel transplant process.

I took my mother and father to his house. My mother continues to plug along, she's for the most part bed ridden, but she got up the strength to get into the car. My father on the other hand is at 86 becoming increasingly dotty. This time I learned a new thing he is obsessing about; Red lights where they have those new camera monitoring systems. He got a ticket going through a yellow light and he didn't get to the other side before it was red. I learned when driving him that his new plan is whenever he is driving and he comes upon an intersection with a green light, if he doesn't know how long it's been green, he pulls over and waits for it to turn red, then green again before he goes. This made for a very frustrating drive.

He also said something really strange to me. I dropped him off at the library to return a book. Getting back in the car he said, "Well, that's the last book I'll ever read..." Huh? He explained that there is so much to do around the house and he's been wasting time reading one or two books a day. I said that he should keep reading because it keeps his mind alert and he loves to read. But he said, "It's like I'm an addict with books, I can't stop, I'm not doing anything else..." I better not introduce him to Bubble Shooter.

Blog Updates: I finally got the Nat Goldstein tribute album to his daughter Sara Jane. She said she listened to part of it and remembered that she still has the pin they presented to her that night. I'm still a little blown away by the fact that she never heard this before and that I somehow got it back to her.

X-Files: It took me almost a full year, but I power cycled through all of X-Files. 9 Seasons! I guess I could have learned Russian with that time, but instead I followed the non-sexual adventures of Scully and Mulder. My feelings about the whole show: There were several outstanding episodes. But over-all it left me cold. When I watched all of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel, even though they were fluff television, I was moved by the characters. By the end of the 9th season of X-Files I could care less what happened to anyone and their boring alien conspiracies. By the end of the series I was yelling at the screen for them to shut up. The constant whispering to denote drama was infuriating. And the music was just grating. The beginning of the show was well done, but I don't remember any of it because it became so tedious and boring by the end. But I guess I'll watch the movie when it comes on DVD. Lord help the completists!

Misc: I've been listening to self-hypnosis tapes to help me fall asleep. Not that they've ever worked, but they are relaxing and usually shut off the noise in my mind and help me relax. Usually the format for these is pretty simple. I'm told to imagine a beautiful meadow, the sun is setting, on on a warm blanket, etc... But I got one the other day, and it started out: Picture yourself on the Space Shuttle, you are hurling through blackness of space.

It was hardly relaxing...

Peace...

2008-09-23T23:06:00.003-05:00

Tea Making Tips...

I've always been a tea drinker. When I was a teenager I used to drink gallons of it made in an old Mr. Coffee. Part of my quest never to sleep, I guess. But in the 70's tea was mainly seen as something you drank when you were sick. I've pissed off many a flight attendant. I've noticed that that sigma has sort of gone away and it doesn't feel weird anymore to ask for tea with my breakfast.

I didn't know that tea making was so complicated. I just boil and dunk... but this very dry, but charming little film is filled with fun tips. And as one of the youtuber comments says: Those women could cut diamonds with their accents.

h/t Thax Douglas

2008-09-21T22:46:00.003-05:00

Illustrated Men...

or Some Money Making Ideas for this Bad Economy

I've recently came across these Mechanix Illustrated magazines from the mid-1950s. Growing up my father always kept a stack of these in the basement bathroom. In the good old days everything was illustrated, I guess.

In revisiting this magazine genre I was struck less by the crazy inventions such as the air conditioned lawn mower, but by all the ads and filler.

The majority of the ads were about a myriad of ways to make money, get promotions, getting laid. Not much has change in that respect, but the options definitely have...

Yes, you too can quit your day job and investigate accidents, re-upholster furniture, sharpen saw blades or most interestingly start a plastic laminating company out of your own home.

Charles Atlas was (and still is) a legend in the world of physical fitness. Billed as the World's Most Perfectly Formed Man, he gave hope to every skinny guy who ever got sand kicked in his face. His method was based on physical resistance of pushing one muscle against another. This never worked for me, but it must work for some one because the company is still around and giving annual awards for the best body based on the system.

I'd have to check off slimmer waist for this ad...

Is there a moment in every boy/man's life when he wants to smoke a pipe. I recall that I went shopping for one just about the time I started college. I think I might have even gone with my mother. (Weird memory flashback). As years went by the only pipes I saw anyone with had pot in them.

More than 50 years ago the only way that men could look at anything slightly 'exciting' was through these offers in the back of mechanic magazines.

I'm sure this was probably one of the movies... the lovely Sandra Storm. slightly NSFW, unless you are working for yourself laminating or filing saws.

Finally, to prove that women were also represented in this world of possibilities, Joyce Myron, atomic energy expert shows that Uncle Sam also needs women scientists. Joyce looks like they surprised her as she was putting a price tag on a nuclear reactor.

Night All...

2008-09-18T11:51:00.008-05:00

Lordy, Lordy!

ht/Greame

For a larger view...
The Renewed Mind

2008-09-18T11:51:00.002-05:00

So much for wanting to post every other day...

anyway... in the meantime... here's a funny cat video. This is pretty much the same relationship I have my my cat...

2008-09-10T12:00:00.000-05:00

Housewife...

Jay Brannan was in Short Bus...

This song is cute... Language NSFW...

2008-09-10T01:04:00.004-05:00

SCI-FI JUDY

This is proof positive that this Dame could sing anything...

2008-09-07T15:22:00.009-05:00

Random Records: The Peanuts

As a new feature I am going to randomly go to my records shelves, pull an album, post it, and if I can say something interesting about it. This first week is a good choice, sort of. The Peanuts and their album Hit Parade. It was an album that I'd never listened to. I believe my friend Dave gave it to me. How he ever found an album I don't have I'll never know. At first you might think you've not heard The Peanuts, but I know you have if you ever watched any Saturday afternoon UHF Japanese monster movies. Even as a small child watching it I was fascinated by these small pixies who sang to the giant Mothra.

No one can do harmony like brothers and sisters. And The Peanuts were identical twins; their vocal harmony is perfection. Add on the cool 60's sounds and they have the Pow Factor. Per the NipPop music site: The Peanuts were one of Japan’s first pop sensations, and one of the few that has become well known internationally. The duo comprised identical twin sisters Emi and Yumi Ito, born Hideyo and Tsukiko Ito on April 1, 1941 in Aichi prefecture...The Peanuts also appeared on popular US variety TV shows, including Ed Sullivan’s and Danny Kaye’s. However, what made The Peanuts most famous internationally was singing in monster movies. They were featured in, and sang the theme songs, to three Mothra movies - Mothra (1961), Mothra vs. Godzilla (1964), and Ghidorah, the Three Headed Monster (1965). They appeared as fairies or pixies, called “shobijin” (small beauties) who had telepathic communication with Mothra, giving The Peanuts a somewhat supernatural aura. The Peanuts retired from show business with a sayonara appearance on Nihon TV on May 25, 1975. They exited while still young and popular, and remain fondly remembered show business legends.

Some great 60's music films of them in their prime.

Hit Parade Album Jukebox.

2008-09-04T20:51:00.009-05:00

Nat Goldstein's Fabulous Fortieth
or An Album Finds Its Way Home

This is one of those stories that makes me glad I'm an obsessive collector of useless stuff no one else wants. First a little back story. If you read this blog enough, you've heard me rave on and on about my huge record collection and how I'm spending the next two decades transferring everything to mp3; purging the crap, keeping the cream. Some fifteen odd years ago my collection exploded when I started to go to the ALS Mammoth Music Mart that was held every October. There were thousands of albums for sale there; reel-to-reels, 78s, 45's. There was even a box of wire recordings that I'm still kicking myself I didn't buy. Each year I would buy probably two to three hundred albums. Most of these albums I've still not played. Thankfully, this sale ended three years ago. People weren't donating as many records, and it wasn't worth it to the charity to hold the event. I was heartbroken, but I'm sure I'd be sleeping on records right now if it hadn't stopped.

So my journey continues into listening to everything I bought and moving the sound to the modern age of digital. Last Friday was no different. I didn't have anything to do, so I thought I'd catch up on my album cover photo taking. (Oh, on top of the sound, I'm photographing the album art. I will be doing this until I'm 82.) Usually when I know I'm going to get into the groove of working on the photo files I put on a double album set to transfer. I went to a shelf and saw a thick, white cardboard album poking out among the comedy albums. It was called "Nat Goldstein's Fabulous Fortieth; What Happened at the Americana the night of May 12, 1964". I remembered this album because I had paid $2.95 for it. Sometimes these ephemera home recordings can be a real find, but this was a very dry recording of an anniversary, testimonial dinner for Mr. Goldstein the head of circulation for the New York Times. I recalled playing it once before and never got through the rabbi's blessing at the beginning.

But this Friday I had work to do so I just let it play, and play, and play... Two full hours! I did some photos, cleaned dishes, mopped the floor and listened. It really was a sweet album. Nat's Goldstein's co-workers, city officials, friends one by one got up and toasted this guy who was obviously well loved by everyone. Someone even read a letter from the then governor Nelson Rockefeller. Of course, my interest was peeked and I went to The Google and looked him up. There wasn't a whole lot about him other than he was indeed in charge of circulation for the NY Times since 1924, he was on a couple boards of some Jewish organizations and he died in 1978 at the age of 78.

During the recording there was a letter that was read from his absent daughter Sara Jane. She was off at school and couldn't attend. The gist of the letter was: Sorry I can't be there, but you'll understand because you loved your work so much that I honor you by staying at school and taking exams rather than coming to your dinner. Her name stuck in my head because I had just watched "Imitation of Life" the night before. The white passing daughter of Lana Turner's black maid was named Sara Jane and I think that name was said a hundred times in that movie. So I Googled Sara Jane Goldstein. And her wedding announcement came up. I then looked up her married name. Sara Jane Drescher. And I got this sentence..."Sarah Jane and Ira Drescher, were inconsolable when they heard about the murder..." Murder?!!! I was brought to the CBS news 48 Hours Mysteries page. 13 years ago Sara Jane's daughter was murdered by her husband. Rather than recount the crime go to this link for this heartbreaking story. THE STORY

I saw that Sara Jane and her husband started Women in Distress an organization that helps victims of domestic violence. I had no idea that playing this crazy testimonial album would lead down this emotional road. I wondered if Sara Jane had a copy of this album or if she even knew that this recording of the night she missed existed. So I wrote the executive director of the organization and asked her to forward my message about this recording.
A couple days later I got this message:

Hi John,...I have so many questions to ask you. Mainly, how did you get the album? Did you know my Dad? Have we met? How did you know he was my Father and how to reach me through Women in Distress?
Thank you for offering the album to me. I would very much like to have it. Sincerely, Sara Jane

I told her this story about my record collection, looking up her father, remembering her name... She then wrote me this:

John, This is more surreal than you can imagine. Your e-mail came over the 13th anniversary of my daughter's death. She was my mother and father's first grandchild and the light of their eyes. August 29th and the days before and after are always difficult for me. Even though 13 years have passed my heart and soul have never truly healed and never will completely.

Thank being said your note brought a smile to my face. I would LOVE a copy of the album.

Women in Distress has helped me to heal. Keeping Donnah's spirit alive is so important to me. Her fund provides money to women who have completed the 3 months in the safe house (where they received therapy and all the help they need mentally, physically and emotionally) but do not have the funds to start on their own. Many times they go back to their abuser because they have no other option. In saving lives, we feel we save generations. And we do it all in Donnah's name! Yes, you may use our story on your blog.

Thank you for anything you can send. It will be wonderful for our children and grandchildren to hear.

Can you believe this? How strange is this that I pull this album to record, and actually listened to it; Then get it to it's rightful owner, the family of the man whose life was being honored! Not to mention finding her at this stressful time of the year when she needed to be reminded of happier times. I've asked Sara Jane to keep in touch and to let me know her thoughts when listening to the recording. I hope she does.

Here is the first 20 minutes of the night... because of it's length I found it was impossible to post the full record.

Nat's Fabulous Fourtieth

Amendment: I heard from Sara Jane and she said it was her sister who was away at college and who wrote the letter. I was cleaning at the time I listened, so I'm not surprised I heard that wrong.

2008-09-03T22:15:00.005-05:00

For Better or For Worse... I'm Back...

I had a nice little break... where I did nothing... more on that later... I thought I'd introduce the start of my 3rd year of blogging with a little video podcast...

After watching it again, all I can say is that I have 'crazy eyes' and that I've given up on any hope of having a real chin...

Peace all...

2008-08-19T23:16:00.002-05:00

See You in September...

I need a web-based break. I'll be back in September with some new features, fabulous tales of woe, and a weekly music podcast. Hope to see you then...

Hugs... Johnny C...

2008-08-13T06:57:00.000-05:00

Kitten Still Loves Puppy

2008-08-10T23:08:00.001-05:00

Dinah Eats a Jackie Gleason album off of my Turntable.

To my dismay, my cat has discovered the joys of record collecting. Things will never be the same again.

2008-08-10T00:41:00.001-05:00

Fabulous...

2008-08-06T08:24:00.000-05:00

Dog Napper

Some people just have a way with animals.

2008-08-05T08:30:00.002-05:00

Oh Roz...

At the Village Voice's Michael Musto's blog, La Daily Musto, he recently did a post about these YouTube postings of musical scenes from Gypsy. Seems Rosalind Russell singing was artfully dubbed by Lisa Kirk in the released version, although Roz always swore it was her own voice.

As Musto writes: At the end of each phrase, Roz veers off like Halle Berry at the wheel and sounds like she couldn't hit a note with a baseball bat. Supposedly, Merman got ahold of these recordings and played them at parties to make herself feel better about not getting the movie.

For fans of Jonathan and Darlene Edwards, here is the real thing.

2008-07-31T21:47:00.009-05:00

Stick 'em Up!

This year I'm walking in the Chicago AIDS Walk. I'm on my work team, so if you want to make me look like a superstar fundraiser, please donate a few spare dollars to me. Everyone who donates in whatever amount gets a special download of my band Bric-a-Brac's album "16 Luxury Units". Your donation will help with the new program where I work that is helping AIDS-impacted children in Haiti.

To donate and learn more about where the money is going Click HERE.

Hope you can help.

2008-07-27T22:56:00.013-05:00

RIP The Great Jo Stafford
1917 - 2008

One of my first cars was a 1975 Ford Fairlane station wagon. Top of the line with built-in 8-Track Player, which loved to eat tapes as quickly as I would put them in. By the end of the run of the car, before it was mysteriously stolen, I only had three tapes which worked. The Village People's Macho Man, The Soundtrack to A Star Is Born (Striesand) and The Greatest Hits of Jo Stafford. Of the three tapes Jo Stafford got the most continuous play. I drove people nuts with repeated playings of Shrimp Boats Are a Comin'.

Cars came and went along with audio formats, but I've still kept my deep love for the voice of Jo Stafford. If I had to choose my third favorite Female singer it would have to be Jo. I'm sad to say, last weekend, at the age of 91, she passed away. Now it seems only Margaret Whiting and Doris Day are all that is left of the big band singers. Jo, like Doris, stopped singing in the mid-70's. When asked why she stopped recording she said: " For the same reason that Lana Turner is not posing in a bathing suit anymore. People get old, and vocal cords get old... I don't mean I couldn't sing, but there's no way it could be as good." Being one of the most prolific singers of the 40's and 50's she left behind a huge library of music.

When I listen to Peggy Lee I feel the emotion of the song, Streisand, the force of nature, but Jo is vocal perfection.

I just read a story about her that said that her music could not be played in mental institutions because her lack of vibrato sent the patients into fits. I don't know the medical reason for that happening, but her lack of vibrato and low tone made my mother nuts. She'd call her the old fog horn. Jo started singing in high school as as one of the original Pied Pipers, who later toured with Tommy Dorsey. During the 40's she was best known for her romantic ballads that were tainted with a feeling of loneliness. She struck a cord with World War Two soldiers being consistently named the number one requested singer, touring with the USO for the duration of the war. Hence her nickname GI JO. It was during the Korean War that she had what would could be called her theme song, "You Belong To Me". Besides million selling singles she was, like Sinatra, the first to record albums that followed a consistent theme; They are some of the most enduring albums ever recorded. The groundbreaking and iconic American Folk Songs is breathtaking in it's beauty and ability to make simple melodies into grand emotional statements. Her Ballad of the Blues album is also a must have.

Jo Stafford always seemed to me just to be a down to earth, fun person. More than any other singer, I bet she would have been wonderful to spend an afternoon chatting with.

Her sense of humor about herself and her music is clearly seen in her Jonathan and Darlene Edwards albums. If you don't know about them, they are hilarious. It started as a joke on their friends.

During parties they were inevitably asked to perform. So Paul Weston would go to the piano and play but just slightly off pitch. Jo would join him for 'Stardust' singing off key. They did this at a record convention when one of the executives at Columbia said you've got to record this. They did four albums of songs as these characters, keeping their identifies secret for several years. One of these albums actually won a Grammy as best comedy album. They are brilliant, and as Jo said in an interview the hardest things she's ever sung.

I was sad when I heard she passed away last week, but at 91 she had lived a good long life. As she said in a recent interview: When I think of my life, I think I'm probably on of the luckiest people to come down the pike. To spend your life doing what you like, boy, it's a gift and I appreciate it to no end. I had a great life.

Thanks for the music.

To hear and download a mix of my favorite Jo Stafford songs click HERE or go to the player below.

Jo on What's My Line!