BLOG TO COMM

Well here it is, MY blog, and for that matter the center of MY life. Really, it has all come down to an existence where I do nothing but work, more work, eat, drink and get rid of what I ate and drank a few hours later, and of course settle down in front of the old record spinner/bedside boom box/tee-vee and then write up what I think about what I just experienced if only so's you could ooze some sorta second-hand jollies outta the thing. And to tell you the truth, I think I'm finally hitting my stride forty years after I shoulda!

***

Some interesting reading material has passed mine eyes as of late, nothing that I think warrants one of those smaller book/moom pitcher/what-have-you posts that nobody reads but they should be written about because who else'd dare do it. First off, I got this nice li'l piece of rockism history that has been out for awhile but unfortunately had escaped my notice until now, none other'n a reprinted edition of the entire 4-issue run of the infamous Stooges newsletter POPPED! Often gabbed about but never actually seen, POPPED was the brainbastard of one Natalie Stoogeling, a gal who I think woulda hadda fight it out with Metchild to see who really was Iggy's #1 fan! I'll bet that woulda been an all out catfight to end alla 'em penthouse apartment scratch 'em ups you used to see advertised in the back of sleazy magazines, but no matter who the winner woulda been it's no surprise that publications like POPPED really served their purpose in getting the Iggy word out to the people who were just fed up with the snide anti-Stooge attitude that mags like ROLLING STONE fostered upon their readership in their quest for pure karmik whooziz!

Lotsa super Stooges hype is to be found within these pages which should get any real fan of the group (or fan of the early-seventies cataclysm in music phenomenon in general) roaring what with the bits'n feces of information that have been included, some of which, if you can believe it, even I have NEVER seen brought up in any Stooges fanmag or forum before! Like didja know that Iggy one met up with Tommy Smothers or that there actually was a contest to write a song for the Stooges? Sure woulda liked to have heard the entries on that 'un! Even stranger is the fact that the Stooges were covering (though to my knowledge not performing in front of a live audience) Nico's "Evening of Light" which, according to Miss Stoogeling herself, sounded better'n the original! Now where are the recordings of that stashed?

Loads of fun to be had with these straight-from-the heart writings which are packaged in a neeto plastic sleeve complete with rare photos that Stoogeling took of her fave rock group. If you were one who went for all those gal fanzines that Lillian Roxon got a buncha acolytes to crank out a few years later, mags like SLADE PARADER, ELECTRIC WARRIOR FREE PRESS and STAR SPECIAL, you're bound to like this 'un!

My other recent fave's a real strangetie that hits the target as far as satire of things NEEDED to be satirized go. It's a spoof of the early-seventies version of that previously mentioned all time hippiedippie spirit-strokeoff journal ROLLING STONE, a rag which for once was getting the kinda ribbing such a stodgy hipkid-centered magazine shoulda had comin' at it for years and I for one am glad. The Hoodoo Rhythm Devils (a group that I really didn't go whole hog for though a re-eval is in order if I can only find my Cee-Dees) had everything to do with this RULING STOOGE, a deft takeoff that renders all of the things that you hated (or perhaps liked at least back when some of the better on-the-ball writers were still allowed to be published within its pages) about these youth-culture capitalists, and their send-up is pretty cutting if I do say so myself. 

With articles and reviews by all your favorites like Ben Virgo-Taurus, Ralph J. Fleecem, Ed Word, John Meddlesohm and Lester Fangs, who can deny that this is the the kinda takeoff that more'n a few tru-blu rockers sick of all the countercultural jiz of the day had been waiting for! (OK, I believe that CRAZY did a STONE spoof 'round the same time and who could forget the phony Lester Bangs interview in BRAIN DAMAGE, both of which goes to show you the far-reaching tentacles that Jann Wenner had on the more gullible youth of the day.) Rec reviews range from the Hoodoo Rhythm Devils to the Hoodoo Rhythm Devils with sidesteps into Mister Rogers, and although you probably won't laugh at any of it the thing still reminds all of us as to why this type of hippie journalism and the audience that went with it just hadda go (but didn't, and the rot can still be smelt a good half-century later)! Still there are some fine moments like this particular entry from the "Ransom Notes" column:

Do It Long Enough And It Will Git to Ya: R. Meltzer, noted essayist on rock and things in general, was under observation last week, after friends reported that he was wandering around talking coherently and making sense...

'n although I should be even more offended than Meltzer would've been I gotta admit that it was cool knowing that someone out there at least knew and acknowledged who he and his entire rockist DNA were, are and shall remain.

***

Last autumn I printed an old FERD'NAND comic that reminded me of a track on the Charles Gayle UNTO I AM album in which Gayle played the saxophone and drums simultaneously. Today I present a 1949 strip where --- now get this --- Ferd envisions that his proudly purchased electric guitar (without an amp even --- just plug it into the wall!) is going to act just like the self-playing electric guitars of Remko Scha a good thirty-plus years later! Not to mention, which I know you were all expecting me to say, even those Joe Jones homemade instruments that popped up on Yoko Ono's FLY album as well as on their lonesome. It's funny how strange things such as this could have been predicted years in advance and in the last places you would ever think of looking:

***

A beautiful piece of sentimental slosh with Will Rogers, the Our Gang Rascals and don't miss a brief appearance by Charley Chase. A fine example of long-gone pathos and a longing for a past that never will come back, though I thought that Mom's disappointment at not getting a birthday present was pretty self-centered not to mention downright childish, almost as bad as Mike Mercury's when he thought the Supercar crew had forgotten his!:

***

THE SHITS JUST KEEP ON COMIN' DEPT.: The above snippet featuring a sly putdown of yours and mine truly was lifted from the pages of Jay Hinman's prozine DYNAMITE HEMMORHAGE #1 from quite awhile back, and I for one and downright shocked at the craven attempt not only to diminish my various contributions to the cause of music (hah!) but the extremely feeble attempt to drive a wedge between me and Bill Shute which fortunately fell flatter than Olive Oyl's chest. Well, t'is obvious that the doof who wrote the above doesn't know how to read a map considering that in no way is Sharon Pennsylvania located in the southwestern part of the state, and although his sense of direction may be dismal enough who could deny that his disrespect for me and all of the great things I've done for all you readers is also quite disgusting. Ooooh! And here I thought Hinman was oh so sorry for all the things he said about me...well, I guess its ok for him if others do the snide asides but him?...NO! (I hope he, and others out there, understand the vaguely humorous and fun-poking tongue-between-the-cheeks frivolity I'm engaging in, but knowing people the way I know them I would say probably not!)

(FREE PLUG TIME: don't get your hopes up too high, but in the near future there just might be a new issue of DYNAMITE HEMMORHAGE hitting the mag racks, and if there ain't something nasty about me or my opines or whatever included in it well...I might be a tad surprised. But anyway, if you can afford the high price tag go out and buy a copy --- it's BOUND to be a real doozy!)

***

...and although this is older'n Methuselah news, heres' a hearty Rest in Somethingorother to Donald Sutherland, one of the creepier actors of the second Golden Age of Moom Pitchers. Really, this guy seemed to be in every other film released throughout the seventies and eighties before becoming a spokesman for the Florida Orange Growers Association, an up-to-date Lyle Talbot, John Carradine or Keye Luke who never turned down a role. Here is my favorite Sutherland scene which continues to hold up view after view (unfortunately the one where he kills the cat in that Communist apologist drag-a-thon 1900 just ain't graphic enough or else it woulda been here!):

***

While I'm at it, here's a real surprise I knew nada about, mainly the Styrenes with the Styrene Dancers live at the Pirate's Cove Summer 1979:

***

Got a fair (wha' 'm I sayin'---PIDDLING) bunch of reviews this time, most of which were sent to me by Robert Forward, one by Paul McGarry and some actually purchased by me because I wanted to do my part for the war effort.

Man-THE 1999 PARTY TOUR CD-r burn (originally on Eagle Records)

What else could it be but Man doing their pretend Quicksilver thing on the US Hawkwind tour back '74 way. Considering their roots in the more lysergic aspects of late-sixties West Coast braincell exploding music they're pretty good at capturing a good portion of the aura that fried a few million brains. It ain't bad really, though at times you can get bogged down by all of those spacey jamz that don't sound the same without the proper stimulants that usually get passed around at these sorta concerts. A good enough grind on for those days when you're doing the laundry and ironing and want some backdrop that sorta weaves in and out of your daily doodies.

***

Cecil Taylor-UNIT STRUCTURES CD-r burn (originally on Blue Note Records)

I started this review out in about a gazillion ways trying to say a whole lotta to-the-point pertinent things about this '66 effort. Stuff like about how a track like "Enter, Evening" comes closer to the even baser ESP jazz ideal than Taylor ever had before, or just how, to use that worn out descriptor, angular it all sounds even when compared to his other efforts that were pretty all over the place themselves. None of 'em really were suitable enough to describe the hard edged bared wire intensity that Taylor and band (oldies like Jimmy Lyons along with newies like Alan Silva and Andrew Cyrille) ooze like pus from a pore. The bridge twixt early budding Taylor who seemed to be fully understood by Nat Hentoff and nobody else to the guy who was even edgier than all of those jazzbos who were copping all their ideas from Taylor in the first place.  Kisses any semblance of proper structure goodbye and waves as the train leaves the station, it's that worthy of your time and effort to latch onto and let creep as far down your earhole as possible.

***

Airway-LIVE AT LACE CD-r burn (get it here)

More of that late-seventies LAFMS free sound that, while not as much into the rock 'n roll realm as Smegma or the Child Molesters, still manages to rip roar into yr skull just like the rest of all those 70s/80s sound as sheets of aural metal most surely did. As an added bonus the always above and beyond Mr. Forward slipped a bit of Airway taken off of Brian Turner's WFMU radio program back 2009 way when the Potts' etc. do some interesting music that reminds me of Japanese mini robots performing a New Guinean circumcision ritual with their metal crab claws!

***

Karlheinz Stockhausen-KONTAKTE CD-r burn (originally on Ecstatic Peace Records)

Stockhausen ain't makin' the same shudder shock on me the way that Cage or Varese do, but I find the proto-krautrock energy somewhat exciting. Not as much of a work of art as the downing of the Twin Towers, but still an interesting slice of classic electronic dabble.

***

Rods and Cones-CBGB OFF THE BOARD cassette (CBGB Records)

Since I don't have any "Cassette Caga" columns planned either in the immediate or distant future and I'm really hard up for fresh to mine ears material to review I thought I'd tell you about this recent acquisition. 

 One cool thing about CBGB was that they were willing to support a whole load of the groups that needed a little push, and the string of live cassettes they issued in the mid-eighties did bring some of the lesser-known acts bumbling around on the club scene to a somewhat wider audience. Rods and Cones were part of that package, a pretty straightforward rockin' sextet that had somewhat of a seventies laid back rock swagger to 'em but weren't as irritating as Boz Scaggs, Bob Welch or a variety of mid-seventies AM snoozeroonies that I have fortunately forgotten about. 

Okay, "Come Sunday" does remind me of Scaggs' 1976 chart topper "Lowdown", but I still find it somewhat decent at least compared to much of the "hip" amerindie bilge I've had to endure throughout my "career". Then again, even "Lowdown" sounds like the Stooges next to most of the offal that the radio (and "hip" underground labels) has tossed at us these past fortysome years so maybe that ain't much of a compliment. Still a good enough straightforward collection of whiteguy play on r/b moves that ain't anything new or for that matter exceptional but it does have its appeal and excitement. 

Now if I can only locate a copy of the live tape by Toronto's Tulpa that CBGB issued at the same time. Supposedly all of those got lost somewhere down the line but who knows, maybe a Canadian fan's willing to jet a copy (or a dub/burn) my way.

***

John Peel-12/28/81 - 12/29/81

These are OBVIOUSLY a couple of year-end roundups featuring some of Peel's fave session tracks o'er the years with the noted chickenhawk rating it all according to his own personal standards (I guess). Lotsa "post-punque" dribble to be heard, but some things do have an interesting zip to 'em like the tracks from an all-gal Scottish act called Sophisticated Boom Boom who sound nothing like what their name would suggest. The rest ('cept for Stiff Little Fingers and maybe a few others) pretty much reminds me of the incredible disappointment I got combing through more'n just a few mail order catalogs throughout the eighties.

***

Fripp & Eno-LIVE IN PARIS 28.5.1975 3-CD set (Opal Records, England)

THREE whole spinners --- well, actually it all coulda been condensed into one 'n a half --- of one of those shows that former King Crimson guitarist Robert Fripp did with mid-seventies wonderboy Eno wayway back when records like NO PUSSYFOOTING and EVENING STAR were the talk of the more hip 'n with it than thou set in many-a high school throughout the land. This particular show (and I assume the rest) runs the gamut of truly jarring to proto gnu age prattle, but since these were done up in the mid-seventies it doesn't bother one so much considering all of that techno slickwhiz music wasn't yet overtaking the world. If you have a penchant for some of the more ethereal krautrock music of avgarde repeato-riff compositions of the day well, you know the rest.

***

Y'know, I coulda presented for you tons of somewhat wittily written articles and reviews cluing you in not only on the most cutting and searing music to have ever graced anyone's ears, or for that matter features introducing you to many an obscurity that deserved to be lifted from the bowels of indifference and onto your turntables. But why bother because you'd still hate not only me but the magazines I have put out from the mid-eighties until the dawn of a definitely grave new world. 'n if you wanna see why just pick up a few of 'em and you will not be disappointed I'll tell ya!