Saturday, July 30, 2022


Well, it's happy ol' me again as you can see from the photo on the left, once again presenting for youyouYOU an episode of BLOG TO COMM that I'm sure is gonna tickle your tootsies alla way to Coraopolis and back! An' this particular entry ain't one of those piddling reviews of some comic book or tee-vee series such as the kind I've been shovin' at'cha these past few months neither! Naw, its a hugie that I'll bet will make your eyes swirling and have ya kicking up yer heels more'n Kamala Harris ever did! 

Anyhoo I hope'cha dig the following spew given just how much time I hadda put into it. Especially in between alla those real-life doodies I have to tend to during these unfortunately overworked days. Just bear w/this guy a bit because, frankly I'm way outta condition and the following just might come off a bit...wonky to most of youse out there in real life land.
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Okay, you inquiring minds want to know at least some of the ugly details that have been curtailing my delivering the goods the way I should. As for one---howzabut the fact that I hadda endure getting my left eyeball worked on at Allegheny General Hospital in merry Pittsburgh Pee-YAY! due to a torn retina, and the nitrogen gas bubble that was injected into my bare eyeball in order to push the retinal wall back into place (almost thought this procedure would be a re-enactment of UN CHIEN ANDALOU!) has created a large jiggly circle in my line o' vision that kinda looks like Rover going after Patrick McGoohan right in my very head (either that or the front cover of the Quiet Sun MAINSTREAM album)! To be honest and up front about it this paerticular happening in my usually dullsville life ain't exactly a funzy thing to be enduring...in fact it's hampering even more my ever-decaying vision which is probably the reason why I'm making alla these typos that I will be too stoopid to correct once my sight returns to somewhat of a normality hopefully in the near future.

Other'n that I've been trying to amuse myself in ways quite different than I did when I was fourteen stuck alone in the house with an old NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC hidden under the mattress. Interestingly enough my current faverave time of the day anymore just hasta be six in the evening when I settle back for my nightly viewing of MANNIX on FETV, a switch from the re-re-REruns of GUNSMOKE I've seen over and over again these past few years. MANNIX usedta be a weekly staple at the ol' homestead at least until the Orson Welles/Lillian Gish anthology of silent classics entitled THE SILENT YEARS ran opposite, and watching these ubercool episodes featuring high energy action and characters you can either root for or  wish the worst calamities upon really does remind me of just how hotcha things usedta be, at least until the sensitive mollycoddled pantywaists known as "progressives" or at least "world savers" mucked things up for good with their general castration of everything they laid their grubboid hands upon. Koinda makes me wanna don a seventies sports jacket just like the kind Mannoix wore and knock a few pampered menials (including a good portion of you readers) around until you get some SENSE (regarding the affirmation of the concepts of good/evil and masculinity/femininity) into some skulls that certainly do need some heavy duty pounding into these sad 'n sorry days.

While I'm at it, a fond farewell to Big Brother Wally a.k.a. Tony Dow, who I guess really is dead after a slightly premature call akin to the false report we received regarding Tom Petty a few years back.
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I might as well ( mean---I BETTER!!!) thank a whole lotta people out there who, bless their little peen-pickin' hearts, really do care  'bout me and this particular effort I have torn asunder over the past eight or so months. To those of you who've sent in promo items thanks, though some of your understandably fine efforts (talkin' 'bout YOU Feeding Tube!) will have to wait until I can get my turntable hooked up again (It's a long story I will not bore you with since I get the feeling that you guys are bored enough already) while Paul McGarry's continual dropping off of burnt Cee-Dee offerings also helps out loads even if I have less time to settle down and write these reviews up than I had last year at this time (a situation I sure hope changes in the distantly near future). And of course there are those Cee-Dee-Ares that P.D. Fadensonnen sent past X-mas are still handy enough for me to slap on during those particularly introverted moments in my life. Of course Bill Shute should also be praised for remembering my birthday a few weeks back with a package of old comic books and comic book reprints which I will get to in earnest once I regain some semblance of what it used to be life back inna good ol' days. Anyway, hope you like 'em, and hope on I will...
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BLOG TO COMM sez: choose YOUR punk! And yeah, who in their right might woulda known that the infamous Mr .Rotten would have grown to become the profound one when it came to punkdom anyway??? To be honest about it Henry is right for once since guns are for weak people...I mean, do you really think a 98 lb. grandma can fend off a 200-pound attacker with her mere fists? As the old saying goes, "God created all men---Col. Colt made them equal"!

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Divine Horsemen-HOT RISE OF AN ICE CREAM PHOENIX CD-r burn (originally on In The Red Records)

Gotta admit that o'er the past few decades I have NOT played any of those late-eighties Divine Horsemen platters that are scattered about the collection. Dunno why because they were good enough efforts to appeal to my own sense of long-lost rock aesthetics, or something like that. Perhaps they remind me of a pretty dire time in my life which ain't really saying anything considering just how dire my life has been ever since I entered kindergarten. 

 However, this 2021 release by the new if aged group is pretty hotcha --- not over-the-top engrossing like the Flesheaters were but steady enough to appease any of you fans out there who have at least a few vivid and pleasant memories of early-seventies FM rock radio still embedded in your minds. Chris D. and Julie Christiansen still moosh well enough to please the ears and hey, even though I kinda thought the Horsemen were comparatively piddle next to the A MINUTE TO PRAY=era 'eaters this one does have more'n a few ounces of pure rockist merit to its makeup. Of course I'll never listen to it again.
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Dredd Foole and the Din-SONGS IN HEAT CD (Corbett Vs. Dempsey Records)

This guy is perhaps the last true Bostonian devotee of the long-running Velvets homage brigade dating back to the Boston Tea Party days of Jonathan Richman and Wayne McGuire. And, of course, these '82 recordings with a bulk of what at the time was Mission of Burma doing the backing do have the ring of fading seventies underground bumping into the dank miasma of the eighties with a storm clash of bared-wire intensity that one won't forget for quite awhile. Basic hard repeato riff backs Foole/Ireton's throat scrapes which evoke the best rock screamers of the past from Iggy to Roslie and, of course, alotta of your faverave sixties flashpoints can be heard and with relative ease at that! (Please be sure to check out the hidden track which even threw a heard it all before kinda guy like me for a loop!)

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The Shangs-SONNY BONO TEAR DOWN THAT WALL OF SOUND CD (
Judigee Records, Canada)

The marvelous glop slop production makes the latest Shangs effort even more of a spacious effort than one would have expected from their earlier releases. David Nelson Byers sounds more late-sixties El Lay sunshine pop than his Ontario locale would lead one to believe while the music's just about as slick pop pretend avant garde as you can find outside of, say, Sagittarius. Paens to some of the greats in the Shangs oeuvre are present...the Feminine Complex, Craig Smith (feh!), Joanie Sommers (yay!), Ash Ra Tempel with Timothy Leary (yeeesh!), the Lennon Sisters????
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Oliver-STANDING STONE CD (
Guerrsen Records, Spain)

Sorta like nasal Dylan gone English late-sixties folk. Actually this has a heavy ESP-disk loner style a la Mij, though it certainly is not as expansive as Erica Pomerance. Some Bee-Fartian blooze chooze slips in, 'n ain't that more'n just a li'l Davy Graham here/there as well? I hope that ain't Donovan I'm vibing. Man, this guy sure is an eclectic chap now, ain't he??? Overall kinda West Coast-y in a good time Marin County sorta vein but it sure ain't patchouli smellin', ifyaknowaddamean....

(Hey, note that NOT ONCE did I mention anywhere in the above paragraph the Oliver of shoo-be-doo-be-da-da fame making some lame joke about how I thought this Oliver was that one as someone so OBVIOUS as myself would be wont to do given just how in search of a bad pun or reference I tend to be. I have prided myself on this simple fact and y'know what? I get the feeling that you are happy about it too. Yeah---right...)
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The Slits-THE KEYSTONE, BERKELEY CA NOV. 23rd, 1980 CD

I really thought much of the Slits back in the maybe not so good ol' days but then again they, like a good portion of the Rough Trade/post-punk (yech!) cadre, sorta tired on me with much of that punk rock promise and spark thrown to the wayside in favor of some rather tired ethos that made me doubt my original faith in these groups in the first place. Here they are somewhere in the cusp of it all doing more of that angular music which, in some strange fashion, at times almost echoes the more abstract music heard on the first Alice Cooper album.  Ari and company can actually play some surprisingly engaging modpop before slipping into the usual faux reggae and neo-soul moves probably in order to prove to everyone that they really do like black people after all. It does sound like something you'd expect from a buncha gals who cut their musical parameters on Velvets, Stooges and krautrock records (mixed in with the usual Roxy/Bolan touchpoints) and used their influences to the max, at least until the eighties hit and it all became water under the bridge anyway.
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AN ARTHUR RHAMES COMPENDIUM 5 DISC BOX SET CD-r burn 

Funny, I only got four burns from this Fadensonnon-derived set (one of 'em musta gotten stuck in with my Paul McGarry donations), but wha' th' hey considering that the music heard on what's left is mighty decent sound and noise signifying everything! Rhames was a multi-instrumentalist who handled his various instruments with marvy aplomb as he (along with the help of such able names as Rashied Ali and some I never knew about until now) zap through various jazz highpoints of the past while fortunately enough avoiding the dismal abyss as to what jazz has become ever since the new thing was treated like old hat by the spiritual successors to Leonard Feather. Recognizable nods to Coltrane and Parker can be discerned via Rhames' tenor prowess, and believe it or not but his duos with Ali evoke not only the legendary INTERSTELLAR SPACE but Ali's Survival platter with Frank Lowe! Not only that but Rhames excels on guitar (not as flash as EMERGENCY-era John McLaughlin but rougher than many of the free jazzers steeped in electricity) and piano (again, not as flash as solo Ra or Taylor but enveloping enough). A fine sendoff to a guy whose career was cut short by a bad case of Magic Johnson's Disease. 
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Jah Wobble-METAL BOX: REBUILT IN DUB CD-r burn (originally on Cleopatra Records)

Like the Can SACRILEGE effort it's nice in an interesting kinda/sorta re-visity way, but next to the real deal it's like, why bother? Again a once-time spinner for those of you curious enough to want to hear the least-exciting member of PiL re-do a forty-plus-year-old accomplishment, but don't come complainin' to me about alla them dead cats bound to pile up at your abode due to such a curiosity as this. 
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Stare Kits-LIVE @ TIER 3 1979 CD-r burn

Can't say that I'm familiar with this act which performed all three of their live gigs at the late-seventies under-the-underground haunt Tier 3 (or Tr3 as I recall it being called way back during whatever heyday the place might have had). After giving this surprisingly hi-quality recording a try all I gotta say is---these guys ('n gals) were pretty hotcha even at a time when the underground rock inna burgh was heading into some rather ginchy areas of self-parody. Stare Kits kinda come off like Siouxsie and company only with lotsa early Blondie and no Can, or better yet the plethora of then-current up-and-coming acts that were saturating what we once knew of as "new wave"---only with less of that junk shop jewelry ethos that got kinda tiresome after awhile. I sure wish there were more underground rock acts like this throughout the eighties 'stead of the MTV glitzers that unfortunately got alla the attention and more or less ruined rock 'n roll (as that feral hard-drive form of anger-addled expression) and if you don't agree with me I'm sure there are more'n a few nude Madonna glossies for you losers to spill seed over, ifyaknowaddamean...

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The Golden Cups-LIVE ALBUM CD-r burn (originally on Eastworld Records, Japan)

Only heard these guys via their psychedelic take on "Hey Joe" that appeared on some mid-eighties Japanese sampler, so this later effort did seem somewhat appealing to me. Too bad it's taken from a 1971 performance which shows that these guys were more'n apt to take the worst aspects of "rock music" to heart just as much as they were to take the best of it a few years earlier. Contains covers of Three Dog Night, Mountain and to an extent the Moody Blues amidst other gems that'll not only remind you of just how blah FM rock coulda been at the time but of the old adage "Whites create, Asians imitate"! You might get some sorta heavy rock kick outta the thing but I sure as shootin' didn't.

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Still looking for back issues of BLACK TO COMM? Judging from the lack ot response I get from these tail end come ons I really doubt it. Wise up for once, willya?

Sunday, July 24, 2022


BOOK REVIEW! I THINK HE'S CRAZY!, THE COMICS OF B.K. TAYLOR (Fantagraphics, 2020)

Back in the ol' newsstand reading days I used to love glomming the various B.K. Taylor comics that popped up in the pre-pious issues of NATIONAL LAMPOON. Sometimes whilst reading these sarcastic stabs at domestic living (esp. at a time in life when the soon-to-rot  style of gutwrench was first and foremost in my life) I imagined these these particular comics to be the ultimo in bad taste har-de-har-hars that one could dare come up with, especially in a world where watching those NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC hula girl specials was an especially sneekerino thing to do.  Nowadays with alla the extreme grossness that I've experienced in this life since I can't say that I find these as amusing as I did during my rather cloistered teenbo days. But then again, what is?

Still I can get somewhat of a charge outta a few of them "Appletons" comics which once had me rolling on the department store floor in utter convulsions of gagdom to the point where this grizzled old lady cashier personally kicked me out into the street. Yet another spoof of the old mid-twentieth century nuclear family which is continually held in deep contempt by most of you enlightened types, these comics might deliver a few of the good natured pokes at suburban slob existence that even a lover of such ethos can enjoy, but after awhile Pop Appleton's ruination of his kids' various endeavors can get about as rote as Foxy Grandpa besting his practical joking grandkids week after week to the point for once you'd like to see them brats finally get the best of ol Foxy. Still sometimes I gotta love the way this perverto Ozzie Nelson wrecks things for the younger set with such a beautifully destructive aplomb because well, like he's the last of a long line of the clean cut white guys twith suit and ties who seem to have developed into a monster I just can't reckon with no mo'..

As for "Timberland Tales" well, I can't see any red-blooded Canadian reading these backwoods spoofs of the Saskatchewan way of life without chucking this book into the cast iron stove in utter indignation. However I get the idea that a few of the more, er, anti-authoritan people up there would chuckle at the antics of the Mark Trail lookalike not to mention the prudish but wowzer school marm who gets to show off her ample butt in a shower scene, not to mention the half-breed kid with the overactive gland as well as the "slightly brain damaged" mountie which should appeal to you Canadian readers who have had run ins with the law during certain stages of larval growth. Yer choice, eh?

The rest is---well--- rather disposable what with the Uncle Kunta satire of Joel Chandler Harris getting the best of his white kid pals not punching hard enough to make this as disturbingly brilliant as it coulda been.  For real LAMPOON laughs stick with the comical funnies one. A foreword by the extremely irritating tee-vee star Tim Allen should be a good enough tipoff.