BLOG TO COMM

Once again, here's that blog which is really gonna suffer (maybe even go out of business) now that alla them USAID dollars that have been pumping it up o'er the past few years have been eliminated. Of course I won't let something as significant as that stop me from getting one of these out so soon knowing how you readers just pine away waiting for these "megaposts" to hit the screens, and since I didn't want any of you to do anything rash in the meanwhile I thought I'd hurry it up a bit. Naturally I had to tear myself away from all of those DRAGNET and RIFLEMAN reruns I repeatedly tune into (you just can't get enough drowned babies in bathtubs), and some people out there say that I just don't do enough sacrificin' for all of my dear and near readers! So like, here's one for all of you who think that I'm in this only for the fun and jamz with no care for the thoughts and needs of you people out there in etherland!

***

Maybe we should be frightened by the advent of AI and a 1950s-esque Sci Fi future where the machines slowly but surely enslave all of use organic types, but gosh darn if I just love using this brand spanking new technology in ways that really are more fun than locking oneself in the bathroom. AI's the way for any of us to fulfill our ideas by fleshing 'em out in ways that our limited craniums (well, speaking for myself that is) could never conjure up no matter how hard we slip the ol' thinking caps on, and if you're curious enough and want to see just how things might turn out, or how they would have had reality had turned out differently than it did, then going on an AI site where you can just peck a few words in and marvel at the wonders that result it just the thing for all of us!

The following pics were inspired by my father's reactions to various lines in old sitcoms from the sixties and seventies where the infamous automobile the Edsel (for you young'uns, a major humiliation for the Ford Motor Company 1958-60) would be mentioned as part of some usually lame gag. The phrase "That went out with the Edsel" (a riff on the once-oft used "That went out with the bustle") was occasionally used, as were references to the automobile in various punchlines back when memories of that particular automotive failure was still fresh in many people's minds.

But what used to get Dad really uptight was when a line about an Edsel from a model year WHEN IT WAS NOT IN PRODUCTION would be uttered! Personally I always thought such gaffes were errors on the part of the actors who couldn't remember the correct date in the script and hadda do some ad libbing, but when Gale Gordon would mention something about "a 1939 Edsel" on HERE'S LUCY boy did Dad go off on a tangent about these scriptwriters not knowing beans about automobile history! I remember a 1962 Edsel once getting namedropped (that also got Dad hot and bothered!) wondering...what would one look like? Well, all these years later AI can finally solve for us such a problem thus ending years of puzzlement and perhaps downright anxiety on my part.

The following are some of AI's ideas as what the 1961 Edsel would have been if actually "fleshed out"---pardon the slight lack of symmetry in some of these examples this being the early, virgin days of the form:

Hmmmm, these renditions, especially the final one which would have aped the Pontiac grille of the following year the same way the '60 Edsel swiped from the '59 Pontiac, seem to be somewhat close to what the reality just might have been. However, the third one does come too close to comfort to the '60 Oldsmobile. But what about 1962? (The first one reminds me a whole lot of the 1963 Prince Gloria):

 

Boy am I getting carried away! Now onto 1963:

And now, in homage to both Gale Gordon and my father, here are some 1939 Edsels!:

Now for a brief change of scenery, a rendition of another long-lost make, the 1961 Packard (I attempted to see what 1967 and '69 Studebaker Larks would have looked like but all I got were Opel Kadetts and Vauxhall Victors)!:

And here's a 1963 Packard-Ghia (was expecting a way-sportier looking model---this 'un comes off more 1958 with some 1960 Plymouth tossed in but wha' th' hey)!:

All I gotta say is Aldous Huxley just hadda've wrong all along because it's gonna be a FUNZIE New World! 

***

READING MATERIAL FROM THE AFTERNOON OF FEBRUARY 2, 2025-I cracked open a box of fanzines and whatnot while spinning records during a nice 'n snowy day and y'know what I found? THROAT CULTURE #'s 2 and 3...I really like their layout and definitely neo-CREEM feel which, for an early 'nineties rag, reminds me more of some of the late-seventies/early eighties under-the-underground efforts that were definitely influenced by that once-esteemed Detroit mag. Good 'nuff attitude especially given the sorry state of rockscribing and general lack of true punkitide that was abundant during them times. The Lester Bangs ish (#2) a work in itself as is the other 'un despite the Chuck Eddy interview and contributions from both Eddy and the equally self-important Richard Riegel, both of whom I hope are having ongoing seizures now that Trump is president. And editor Rob O'Connor had the nerve to drop my article on bootleg cassettes because the Leonard Cohen interview ran longer'n expected! These things do happen but for some strange reason I believe he was just saying this as an excuse not to run my definitely subpar contribution and didn't want to hurt my feelings. That's not what gets me...what does is the fact that O'Connor scammed a load of money for an ad of mine he was to have run in a nonexistent future issue and boy could I use that $$$ right about now! Well, his behavior does make me glad that I woke his father up some late night when Rob wasn't home and got the old coot pretty mad! THE NEW YORK ROCKER (July/August 1980)-this is the ish that sold out pronto so I hadda borrow a copy which goes to show you just how unlucky I can be. A pretty on-target sans the sentimental goo seen today tribute to the Velvet Underground appears, though most of the rest goes to remind me as to just how a good portion of this under-the-underground music was starting to get somewhat ginchy (and not in an Edd "Kookie" Byrnes way) at the time. Maybe if the editors spent more time writing up acts like Von Lmo and Sorcerers and less hyping the B-52s. PSYCHOTRONICs #39 and #40 - these are the weekly bulletins that Michael Weldon put out, not the magazine of renown that appeared a good eight years later. Nice hand-printed layout similar to Weldon's movie list that appeared in a 1977 issue of CLE. Brings back fond memories of how some people with a good enough antenna and stations worthy of tuning in could get some mighty good television entertainment w/o paying the usually exorbitant cable and dish prices. SON OF BIOHAZARD INFORMAE - Fred Mills (a guy who cut me off when his precious socio-political feelings were being bruised by my thankfully counter-the-counterculture opines ---  eh!) and his post BIOHAZARD which, this time, is mostly made up of letters from various fanzine types telling us lumps why they feel compelled to do such things as make their opinions known in the first place. Quite sparkling if I do say so myself even if Mills never would sell me the original BIOHAZARD rag (he said they were sold out---right Charlie!). EUROCK (some early-eighties or so issues) - always good to read about continental acts like Etron Fou Leloublan and the Plastic People of the Universe. The punk attitude of earlier issues when names like the Velvet Underground and Stooges were mingled amid those like Guru Guru and Amon Duul as if they were all part of the same vast conspiracy (they were) is sadly missing. Still a nice slab of music history dangled in front of my eyes. OSMOTIC TONGUE PRESSURE #3 - another fanzine with a late-seventies feel and strut in a blanded out 90s world. Could have used more of that punk spout I personally like but eh. Did I tell you that I actually felt sadness when I heard that editor Mike Kinney croaked? Probably the last time I will feel bad when finding out that any other 'zine editor has passed this veil of boo-hoos!

***

OBIT TIME: I thought Jules Feiffer had died ages ago and was totally surprised to find out that he passed away at the ripe old age of 95 a good few weeks back. Here's a guy I will say I have mixed feeling about...he does get his bonus points for having worked with Wil Eisner on THE SPIRIT as well as for writing that book on the Golden Age of superhero comics that was a pre-teenbo fave of mine. However, who can forget his self-titled comic that appeared in THE VILLAGE VOICE (won't stick any retches in between "village" and "voice" since that mag has been de-fanged long ago having about as much relevance these days as MS.) that was big with each and every wannabe NYC chi-chi snob I ever ran into. 

In case you don't recall the long-running FEIFFER comic strip well, it was one of those big anti-right/middling political rants being made by yet another off-the-rails New York liberal type who, unlike fellow NYC liberal Dave Berg, didn't seem befuddled by the way things were evolving and pretty much dove head first into the even Newer Than The New Left brigades as time passed. His knock you over the head preachy and stereotype-riddled comics were, if anything, the precursor to what most baby-boomer (and a few generations after) political strips eventually evolved into...mainly unfunny (and un-convincing since being funny doesn't always matter as long as one is trying to be snide) tirades against the usual pastiches of whatever was offending the various do-gooder types who were always on the lookout for some target they could definitely feel superior to.

I remember one incident involving Feiffer that still gets me chucklin' lo these many years later. It was during the early-eighties when, in a strip dealing with a working man type angry over the fact that the ethnic and racial slurs he uses are no longer savvy, Feiffer used that word to describe people of African heritage that rhymes with Roy Rogers' horse in an attempt to make his point or something along those pitiful lines. Naturally he included such a word in order to mock the knuckle-dragging mentalities of blue collar men who have to put in long hours for a fraction of the pay I'm sure Feiffer was earning, but the reaction the cartoonist ended up getting was...well, perhaps just what one would expect given the tight-twatted mentalities of the kind of people who read the VV for reasons other than the various arts and music writeups. It turns out that in the following ish of that esteemed fishwrap there was a somewhat large ad taken out decrying Feiffer's ill-choice of wordage that was signed by a whole slew of contributors and other hanger-onners (members of various radical left pressure groups etc.), all written up in that haughty "virtue signaling" way that you would expect from either self-anointed En Why See revolutionaries or graduates of Quaker colleges. Y'know, it sure is fun watching these people in their quest to take their altruism to new heights eat each other in their particularly backstabbing, heartless ways. And I should know all about being backstabbed in particularly heartless ways believe you me!

Eh, I'll give him the credit for his early comic book work. And who knows, maybe he was a neat guy to talk to 'n all, But somehow, given his portrayals of the working class, conservatives or whatever he thought conservatives were, anti-feminists and generally non-Feiffer types I sincerely doubt it, unless you were exactly like him that is.

Then there's that walking medicine cabinet MARIANNE FAITHFULL who also did the 86 a week or so back. Surprised she lived so long given her penchant for the powdery stuff, but her beautifully off-key version of "As Tears Go By" continues to satisfy even more than the Stones' syrupy take (never really cozied up to "Broken English" to be as honest as Brad Kohler about it). A woman who was to Mars Bars what Monika Lewinsky was to Coronas.

***

I've got a lovely bunch of coconuts this time, with quite a few that I actually purchased if you can believe it. The ones I didn't were burned by Paul McGarry and Robert Forward, and if I find 'em in the mess of my bedroom maybe a few others.

Sun Ra-DISCO 3000 2-CD set (Art Yard Records)

Bought this 'un because I wanted to hear Ra in a small group setting where he and John Gilmore, Marshall Allen and a few of the other regs were more up front and glaring. No Allen here but it turns out that this expanded edition of the old DISCO 3000 release (live in Milan 1978) is just the kind of effort I was down in the trenches for! 

Forget the obvious fact that the title that a title such as the one being used was merely an attempt to sucker the trendies in the same way Hitler called his movement "National Socialism" because socialism was hot potatoes at the time and well, it sounded up-to-date 'n all even if it had little to do with the actual socialist setup. But anyway, this sorta disco's got nothing to do with lighted dance floors and dagos in white suites one bit! Its just more of Ra during one of his thankfully less lucid moments along with Gilmore as well as two guys newer to the Ra-sphere, mainly Michael Ray on trumpet (he also did the neeto autobiographical booklet notes) and drummer Luqman Ali, someone who must've played exclusively on Ra's Eyetalian jaunt because I couldn't find anything else about him on the web. Not that I was exactly doing a thorough search.

Who cares, since these two disques are pretty hotcha Ra doing his old faves with some new interplanetary buzz thrown in. As far as my bean can recall Ra and Gilmore never let any of us down (gotta find some of those seshes with Gilmore as leader, not to mention his performance with Allen as well as Steve Lacy at the old CBGB 313 Gallery hinthinthint!). The new guys fit in swell enough---I guess they watched all of those films about various philosophical doo-dah and teaching statues how to sing...and understood them. But as you all could guess, this is more of that heavy duty Ra (as if there ever was light Ra), and although this might not be worth your getting if you're low on the moolah and there's so much of the guy's work out there to sample, splurging would be advised.

***

Ornette Coleman & Prime Time-TONE DIALING CD (Verve Records)

I approached this later-on Prime Time album with some trepidation, or at least caution considering that it was recorded during a time when even the new jazz thing was being co-opted by influences both brilliant (punk) and feh (rap). T'would figure that the latter would be utilized on track #2 "Search For Life" which woulda made your typical rock critic of the day (1995) do some major league BVD creaming, but for me it just dates the thing to a time and place I'd prefer to get out of my mind. Eh, some of it like the Bach Prelude is very pretty (the irregular drum beat sorta keeps it from being a total tip to the classical bent) before heading into a more appropriate atonal sphere. "Miguel's Fortune", "Ying Yang", "Family Reunion" and "Badal" traipse somewhat into the punk funk realm to satisfy alla you early-eighties lower Manhattan wannabe junkies. Overall it ain't what I would call top notch, but it's good enough even if it does have some of them 80s/90s hallmarks of superslick sound and production that always irritate anti-hi-fi nuts like myself.

***

Various Artists-BROWN ACID - THE SEVENTEENTH TRIP CD-r burn (originally on Riding Easy Records)

Here's some brown acid you should take! A collection of what a few of us just might call authentic late-sixties and beyond hard psych that reminds me a whole lot of Cold Sun without the autoharp or those noisy guys from down the street your mother always sneered at wond'rin why Mrs. Fafoofnik didn't march her son straight to the barber shop. You get everything from downright organ-dominated garage band romp to an ode to Smokey the Bear and (as if it would be any surprise) some lightweight pandering to the occult. This might come off a little too "get down" for my own and perhaps your tastes, but gosh-it-all if I find these tracks a whole lot more getcha down the esophagus than some of the sounds that were supposed to replace this type of music. If your idea of a local group singles compilation is more in line with the BACK FROM THE GRAVE series its best you steer clear.

***

Phuong Tam-MAGICAL NIGHTS CD-r burn (originally on Subliminal Frequencies Records)

No "Hey Joe, you got chew gum" jokes here! Mid-sixties Viet sensation doin' the pop slop for local tastes and perhaps even a few restaurants. Good sexy slush that recalls a whole load of early memories of short wave radio dial spinning, only without the static. Somehow I could just see Tam singing for a bunch of drunk and rambunctious Amerigan soldiers at some seedy dive, wond'rin why she ever decided to lower herself like this in the first place. If "Sukiyaki" had only opened the floodgates of far eastern pop maybe some of these would have made the top ten. But do be careful...listen to enough of this and you might feel like committing an atrocity!

***

THE AMERICAN DREAM LP (Ampex Records)

This late-sixties Todd Rundgren-produced platter never did snuggle itself into some nice 'n comfy place in the annals of obscurer-than-thou lost rockist efforts. Sad to say, but the American Dream just weren't as high energy as I and perhaps even you would have hoped from an obscure act of the distant past, one that had all of the hallmarks of punk promise but ended up like just any other close but no cigar group that cluttered up a flea market bin for years on end. These Dreamers really don't hit the same heights of 60s/70s cusp cataclysm music the same way their equally obscure compatriots like Black Pearl and Hackamore Brick did---quite a shame given how they seemed as if they'd come off as a nice, straight ahead rock group at least judging from the tiny bit of prior hearsay that has been goin' on 'round 'em. At times the Dream remind me of a gutsier Nazz and they had the potential to perform some outright scream-out trackage, but for some reason it seems as if someone's holding them back. Gee, I wonder who...

***

Borbetomagus-SAUTER, DIRTRICH, MILLER, DOHERTY CD; SAUTER, DIETRICH, MILLER CD (Agaric Records)

There've been so many of these Borbetomagus spinners comin' out during the group's lifespan (and after I s'pose) for me to keep up with, so when I pick what's best for me boy do I pick carefully given the sparsity of cool cash comin' my way! Decided to settle with these two which just happen to be the first two Borbetomagus albums, here re-released in digitized form. There ain't much on these v. late-seventies/early-eighties recordings that differentiate these Borbetomagus platters from most of the later ones I've heard other'n the presence of electronics player Brian Doherty on the first (and one track on #2) and well, if you are the type of he-man who likes your avgarde on the atonal free-side of things boy are these disques just right for you. Free play jazz teetering into the 'classical" with a rage that reminds me of some of the early AMM thingies I've heard in the past magnified about a thousand-fold. If you're serious about this stuff these just might be but one starting, or ending for that matter, place to go.

***

Y'know, I coulda written the Great Amerigan Novel, cured hemorrhoids and bought out the candy store and given it to the poor and STILL nobody would give me my honest to goodness just dues (as if I really could give a hoot)! But I did create a fanzine called BLACK TO COMM and although I should have gotten some notoriety for that (not that I was particularly looking for any --- having fun was the first and foremost reason I did the thing) let's just say that I got NEGATIVE dues ifyaknowaddamean. If you're curious as to why, well why not click on the highlighted link above and see what all the ruckus is about, Bucky!

Overseas readers...beware the hefty postage and duty costs and ask about purchasing only if you are extremely serious and extremely rich for that matter. And don't be rude...I go to the post office with every made-up parcel to get the honest low down on how much it all will cost you (that involves time and gasoline!) and I absolutely hate 1) people who act all serious and then fail to notify me that they can't afford their order and 2) people who won't even respond after expressing interest leaving me in the lurch! Seen there have been way too many of you types doing just this these past few years and well, the less of you that I have to put up with the better I say!