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STRANGE TRIP: ARTIST TAKES LSD IN 1955, WHILE DOCTOR The study of the psychological effects of LSD was fairly widespread in the United States and the UK during the 50’s and 60’s producing thousands of pages of research. Cary Grant, Federico Fellini and even Bill Wilson, cofounder of Alcoholics Anonymous, all took LSD under very legal psychiatric supervision in the 1950’s. The U.S. Central intelligence agency also conducted thousands of ‘WEEZY, GET ME SOME LSD’: WHEN SHERMAN HEMSLEY MET GONG Sherman Hemsley, the actor who played George Jefferson, was known to be a huge fan of prog rock, especially Gentle Giant, Nektar and Gong. Hemsley collaborated with Yes’s Jon Anderson on a funk-rock opera about the “spiritual qualities of the number 7” (never produced). Hemsley also did an interpretive dance to the Gentle Giant song “Proclamation” on Dinah Shore’s 70s talkshow THE LONG-LOST GO-GO’S: ELISSA AND MARGOT Original bass player Margot Olavarria (far left), Jane Wiedlin, Charlotte Caffey, Gina Schock, and Belinda Carlisle The Go-Go’s hit songs from the early ‘80s have been Disneyfied to death over the past decade, but that unfortunate fact doesn’t diminish their influence as one of the most important bands to emerge from L.A.’s

early punk scene.

below

RUDE & CRUDE DUDE: ISAAC ASIMOV’S LECHEROUS LIMERICKS Rude & crude dude: Isaac Asimov’s lecherous limericks. ‘No, Isaac, I don’t want to sniff your finger’. Isaac Asimov had some of the scariest sideburns in history. Not since the days of Victorian England, the Wild West or Leslie West’s Mountain has a man maintained a successful career as a writer while weighed down with

such a

FRANCIS BACON: PAINTING AND THE MYSTERIOUS AND CONTINUOUS Real painting for Francis Bacon was about a mysterious and continuous struggle with chance. ”Mysterious because the very substance of the paint can make such a direct assault on the nervous system; continuous because the medium is so fluid and subtle that every change that is made loses what is already there in the hope of making a fresh

gain.”

THAT TIME DIVINE AUDITIONED FOR ‘BLADE RUNNER,’ WHILE That time Divine auditioned for ‘Blade Runner,’ while Grace Jones turned it down. In some parallel universe, Oliver Reed replaced Sean Connery as James Bond for On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. Frank Sinatra was Dirty Harry, John Travolta played Forrest Gump and Emma Watson won the Oscar for her performance in La La Land. BARBIE AND KEN DOLLS TRANSFORMED INTO BAPHOMET, JUDAS ‘Baphomet Barbie’ by Argentinian artists Marianela Perelli and Pool Paolini. In 2014 Argentina-based artists Marianela Perelli and Pool Paolini “redesigned” 33 Barbie, Ken and Skipper dolls into various historical religious figures such as Judas, Jesus, the Virgin Mary, Buddha and Baphomet among others. The figures were a part of a show called “Barbie, the Plastic Religion” and as JOHN CLEESE: FOX NEWS VIEWERS ARE TOO STUPID TO REALIZE Earlier this year, the research of Dunning and Kruger was referenced by a relatively unlikely source: John Cleese, the brilliant comedian who famously portrayed one of the single most obtuse and supercilious characters in TV history, Basil Fawlty. Cleese believes FOX’s viewership is too unintelligent to put the proper brakes on their own STRANGE TRIP: ARTIST TAKES LSD IN 1955, WHILE DOCTOR The study of the psychological effects of LSD was fairly widespread in the United States and the UK during the 50’s and 60’s producing thousands of pages of research. Cary Grant, Federico Fellini and even Bill Wilson, cofounder of Alcoholics Anonymous, all took LSD under very legal psychiatric supervision in the 1950’s. The U.S. Central intelligence agency also conducted thousands of ‘WEEZY, GET ME SOME LSD’: WHEN SHERMAN HEMSLEY MET GONG Sherman Hemsley, the actor who played George Jefferson, was known to be a huge fan of prog rock, especially Gentle Giant, Nektar and Gong. Hemsley collaborated with Yes’s Jon Anderson on a funk-rock opera about the “spiritual qualities of the number 7” (never produced). Hemsley also did an interpretive dance to the Gentle Giant song “Proclamation” on Dinah Shore’s 70s talkshow THE LONG-LOST GO-GO’S: ELISSA AND MARGOT Original bass player Margot Olavarria (far left), Jane Wiedlin, Charlotte Caffey, Gina Schock, and Belinda Carlisle The Go-Go’s hit songs from the early ‘80s have been Disneyfied to death over the past decade, but that unfortunate fact doesn’t diminish their influence as one of the most important bands to emerge from L.A.’s

early punk scene.

below

such a

gain.”

| DANGEROUS MINDS

soundscapes.

THAT TIME HORROR VIXEN CAROLINE MUNRO RECORDED WITH CREAM A few days ago, whilst idly wasting time on the internet, I googled some images of 70s horror vixen/Bond girl Caroline Munro. As you do. Anyway an image of her with huge 80s hair (and Gary Numan!) caught my eye. That led me to a 2019 Guardian article that touched upon a musical project from the mid-1960s, from when she was just a teenager, that might be of interest to our readers. TOPICS | DANGEROUS MINDS Dangerous Minds is a compendium of the new and strange-new ideas, new art forms, new approaches to social issues and new finds from the outer reaches of pop culture. Our editorial policy, such that it is, reflects the interests, whimsies and peculiarities of the individual writers. We are your favorite distraction. MURDER, DEATH, KILL! VINTAGE HORROR PULP NOVELS FROM THE The cover of ‘Rock A Bye Baby.’ A horror novel from 1984 by prolific horror writer Stephen Gresham. A huge tip of my hat goes out to the exhaustive blog Too Much Horror Fiction (is there such a thing? I think not) for inspiring this post. Curated by the self-described “neat, clean, shaved & sober” Will Errickson, the site has been cataloging and reviewing vintage horror novels since 2010. ‘THE GENUINE IMITATION LIFE GAZETTE’: THE FOUR SEASONS Most people would probably be surprised to find that Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons recorded a musically ambitious concept album in 1969 that was inspired by Pet Sounds and Sgt. Pepper’s. The Jersey boys were all about a doo-wop meets big band Motown sound and songs about girls, so no one expected an album of bold social commentary, complex vocal arrangements, long ‘GENIUS IS PAIN!’: NATIONAL LAMPOON’S ‘MAGICAL MISERY TOUR National Lampoon editor Tony Hendra—probably best-known as Ian Faith, the irritable, incompetent manager of Spinal Tap—died yesterday. He’d been diagnosed with Lou Gehrig’s disease in 2019 and was 79. Hendra was an author, one of the creators of Spitting Image and he even opened for Lenny Bruce at the Cafe Au Go Go. He also did the fucking funniest John Lennon parody of all time. BATTLE OF THE BULGE: CLASSIC ROCK STARS AND THEIR PACKAGES Marc Bolan dressed to the left. Sometime in the 1970s, an intrepid BBC reporter posited the question What is it about today’s pop stars that appealed so much to young girls and boys? After talking to a small selection of very emotional and breathy fans, he soon discovered the answer was music. This didn’t quite satisfy our keen reporter who seemed to be hoping for an answer more akin to 1981 DOCUMENTARY ON THE CHELSEA HOTEL: THE VORTEX WHERE IT Dennis Hopper and Terry Southern, Chelsea Hotel 1981 BBC documentary on the Chelsea Hotel and its legendary inhabitants. This is good stuff. Includes footage of Quentin Crisp, Nico (backed up on guitar by my old friend Joe Bidewell), Warhol, Burroughs, Viva, Jobriath (2 years before he died of AIDS), Chelsea manager Stanley Bard and more. MORE COVER SONGS FROM THE MAN BEHIND ORKESTRA OBSOLETE’S Who are these masked men? That was the question many people were asking when a video popped up on their timeline four years ago featuring band called Orkestra Obsolete covering New Order’s “Blue Monday.” Who indeed? Little was revealed about this talented bunch of musos other than they were performing “Blue Monday” to illustrate what a classic synth song would sound like without ‘GENIUS IS PAIN!’: NATIONAL LAMPOON’S ‘MAGICAL MISERY TOUR National Lampoon editor Tony Hendra—probably best-known as Ian Faith, the irritable, incompetent manager of Spinal Tap—died yesterday. He’d been diagnosed with Lou Gehrig’s disease in 2019 and was 79. Hendra was an author, one of the creators of Spitting Image and he even opened for Lenny Bruce at the Cafe Au Go Go. He also did the fucking funniest John Lennon parody of all time. STRANGE TRIP: ARTIST TAKES LSD IN 1955, WHILE DOCTOR The study of the psychological effects of LSD was fairly widespread in the United States and the UK during the 50’s and 60’s producing thousands of pages of research. Cary Grant, Federico Fellini and even Bill Wilson, cofounder of Alcoholics Anonymous, all took LSD under very legal psychiatric supervision in the 1950’s. The U.S. Central intelligence agency also conducted thousands of PINUPS & PVC PIPES: THE VOLUPTUOUS BATHING BEAUTIES OF THE A photo of a 24-year-old Raquel Welch taken by Peter Gowland for the Ridgid Tool Company Calendar in 1964. The man who shot the bikini models featured in the Ridgid Tool Company Calendar, Peter Gowland, was referred to as “America’s No. 1 Pin-up Photographer” by the New York Times in 1954. That same year Gowland was one of the first to shoot photos of a then 21-year-old Jayne Mansfield DEAD CREEPY: FAMILY PORTRAITS WITH DECEASED RELATIVES Dead Creepy: Family portraits with deceased relatives. Whenever a relative died when I was a child, we would gather around their body, sometimes laid out on a table, a coffin or slowly cooling under the bed sheets, and say five decades of the rosary for the repose of their soul. I attended at least half a dozen funerals before I was twelve:

my

‘WEEZY, GET ME SOME LSD’: WHEN SHERMAN HEMSLEY MET GONG Sherman Hemsley, the actor who played George Jefferson, was known to be a huge fan of prog rock, especially Gentle Giant, Nektar and Gong. Hemsley collaborated with Yes’s Jon Anderson on a funk-rock opera about the “spiritual qualities of the number 7” (never produced). Hemsley also did an interpretive dance to the Gentle Giant song “Proclamation” on Dinah Shore’s 70s talkshow LUCRETIA REFLECTS: AN INTERVIEW WITH PATRICIA MORRISON Patricia Morrison could very well be considered the gothmother—she’s certainly one of them—of punk. Growing up in Los Angeles, Morrison—at the tender age of fourteen—started playing bass in The Bags. She was in the best incarnation of Gun Club—along with Kid Congo Powers and the mercurial junkie bluesman Jeffrey Lee Pierce—and this was followed by a fabled stint in The

Sisters of

HOW A PRE-FAME STEVE MARTIN AND BACHELORETTE DUPED ‘THE In this adorable 1968 clip from The Dating Game, a very young and dashing Steve Martin competes against two other (super creepy) bachelors for the affection of sweet Marsha Walker, the real-life sister of Martin’s childhood friend, Morris Walker. At this time Martin was a comedy writer for the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour and had already made a couple of appearances on The Dating Game. GRIM VINTAGE CRIME SCENE PHOTOS FROM THE LAPD ARCHIVE An image of Maila Nurmi as Vampira taken in 1955. It is a part of a huge collection of vintage LAPD crime scene pictures unearthed by photographer Merrick Morton in 2014. Fototeka is a large photo digitation service that works in conjunction with the National Film Archive to enhance historically relevant vintage photographs. Started in 2009, the photographic archive has digitized H.R. GIGER BODY PAINTS DEBBIE HARRY FOR ALBUM COVER AND In the spring of 1980, Debbie Harry and Chris Stein of Blondie met H.R. Giger at a party at the Hansen Gallery in New York City, which was showing an exhibit of Giger’s Alien paintings. Giger was actually on his way back from Los Angeles, where he had just received an Academy Award for Best Visual Effects in recognition of his groundbreaking work on the movie. MOON SHOTS: SHOWING YOUR BUTT IN PUBLIC IS THE LATEST No ifs or buts, the end is nigh, quite literally it seems for bright young things from across England (and now the world) who are taking pictures of themselves baring their buttocks in public places and uploading the resulting image to Instagram. This kind of exhibitionism or mooning it we used to call it, is not new. It has been a well-used way of showing disrespect to an enemy or scorn to ‘GENIUS IS PAIN!’: NATIONAL LAMPOON’S ‘MAGICAL MISERY TOUR National Lampoon editor Tony Hendra—probably best-known as Ian Faith, the irritable, incompetent manager of Spinal Tap—died yesterday. He’d been diagnosed with Lou Gehrig’s disease in 2019 and was 79. Hendra was an author, one of the creators of Spitting Image and he even opened for Lenny Bruce at the Cafe Au Go Go. He also did the fucking funniest John Lennon parody of all time. STRANGE TRIP: ARTIST TAKES LSD IN 1955, WHILE DOCTOR The study of the psychological effects of LSD was fairly widespread in the United States and the UK during the 50’s and 60’s producing thousands of pages of research. Cary Grant, Federico Fellini and even Bill Wilson, cofounder of Alcoholics Anonymous, all took LSD under very legal psychiatric supervision in the 1950’s. The U.S. Central intelligence agency also conducted thousands of PINUPS & PVC PIPES: THE VOLUPTUOUS BATHING BEAUTIES OF THE A photo of a 24-year-old Raquel Welch taken by Peter Gowland for the Ridgid Tool Company Calendar in 1964. The man who shot the bikini models featured in the Ridgid Tool Company Calendar, Peter Gowland, was referred to as “America’s No. 1 Pin-up Photographer” by the New York Times in 1954. That same year Gowland was one of the first to shoot photos of a then 21-year-old Jayne Mansfield DEAD CREEPY: FAMILY PORTRAITS WITH DECEASED RELATIVES Dead Creepy: Family portraits with deceased relatives. Whenever a relative died when I was a child, we would gather around their body, sometimes laid out on a table, a coffin or slowly cooling under the bed sheets, and say five decades of the rosary for the repose of their soul. I attended at least half a dozen funerals before I was twelve:

my

Sisters of

| DANGEROUS MINDS

appease his

GRIM VINTAGE CRIME SCENE PHOTOS FROM THE LAPD ARCHIVE An image of Maila Nurmi as Vampira taken in 1955. It is a part of a huge collection of vintage LAPD crime scene pictures unearthed by photographer Merrick Morton in 2014. Fototeka is a large photo digitation service that works in conjunction with the National Film Archive to enhance historically relevant vintage photographs. Started in 2009, the photographic archive has digitized UFO SLIDES FOUND IN FILES LEAKED BY EDWARD SNOWDEN A set of slides showing supposed UFOs have been found amongst the mass of documents released by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden. The three slides were included in a Powerpoint presentation prepared by the British spy agency GCHQ (aka Government Communications Headquarters) that contained 50 uncaptioned images. The images have caused considerable speculation amongst 1981 DOCUMENTARY ON THE CHELSEA HOTEL: THE VORTEX WHERE IT Dennis Hopper and Terry Southern, Chelsea Hotel 1981 BBC documentary on the Chelsea Hotel and its legendary inhabitants. This is good stuff. Includes footage of Quentin Crisp, Nico (backed up on guitar by my old friend Joe Bidewell), Warhol, Burroughs, Viva, Jobriath (2 years before he died of AIDS), Chelsea manager Stanley Bard and more. STRANGE TRIP: ARTIST TAKES LSD IN 1955, WHILE DOCTOR The study of the psychological effects of LSD was fairly widespread in the United States and the UK during the 50’s and 60’s producing thousands of pages of research. Cary Grant, Federico Fellini and even Bill Wilson, cofounder of Alcoholics Anonymous, all took LSD under very legal psychiatric supervision in the 1950’s. The U.S. Central intelligence agency also conducted thousands of CHARLES BUKOWSKI LOATHED POTHEADS: ‘I LIKE DRUNKARDS, MAN Charles Bukowski loathed potheads: ‘I like drunkards, man’. Despite being a famously proud drunkard of monumental proportions, author/brawler Charles Bukowski didn’t have a lot of nice things to say about other forms of mind-altering pursuits, especially marijuana. The inebriated bard shares his thoughts on drug use in the interview

below

THE MORBIDLY BEAUTIFUL MEDICAL ILLUSTRATIONS OF DR. FRANK An illustration by Frank Netter done for the Ciba Company during the 1930s. Dr. Frank Netter was a surgeon during the great depression, though as a child growing up in Manhattan, he aspired to be an artist. As it turns out, Netter became both a great artist as well as a doctor and selling his artwork to his professors helped pay for his college education at New York University and two HOW SAM COOKE INVENTED THE AFRO Guralnick was talking about the legendary soul singer Sam Cooke with the great Stax songwriter, singer, and producer William Bell, and of the brilliant and tragic talent behind indelible songs like “Chain Gang,” “Cupid,” and “Another Saturday Night,” Bell rather bluntly asserted that “Sam started the afro.”. YouTube. Shore

Fire.

below

Fire.

BEND ME, SHAPE ME: THE ART OF CONTORTIONISM MAKES A Contortionist ‘Ben Dover’ (born Joseph Späh) striking the ‘Hairpin Pose,’ early 1900s. Dover was one of the 62 survivors of the crash of the Hindenburg in 1937. Optional soundtrack to this post. The art of body contortion can be traced back to the 13th century BC in Greece, Egypt and Mexico until it started to decline in popularity during the Middle Ages. The start of the 20th century BARBIE AND KEN DOLLS TRANSFORMED INTO BAPHOMET, JUDAS ‘Baphomet Barbie’ by Argentinian artists Marianela Perelli and Pool Paolini. In 2014 Argentina-based artists Marianela Perelli and Pool Paolini “redesigned” 33 Barbie, Ken and Skipper dolls into various historical religious figures such as Judas, Jesus, the Virgin Mary, Buddha and Baphomet among others. The figures were a part of a show called “Barbie, the Plastic Religion” and as ‘WEEZY, GET ME SOME LSD’: WHEN SHERMAN HEMSLEY MET GONG Sherman Hemsley, the actor who played George Jefferson, was known to be a huge fan of prog rock, especially Gentle Giant, Nektar and Gong. Hemsley collaborated with Yes’s Jon Anderson on a funk-rock opera about the “spiritual qualities of the number 7” (never produced). Hemsley also did an interpretive dance to the Gentle Giant song “Proclamation” on Dinah Shore’s 70s talkshow HOW A PRE-FAME STEVE MARTIN AND BACHELORETTE DUPED ‘THE In this adorable 1968 clip from The Dating Game, a very young and dashing Steve Martin competes against two other (super creepy) bachelors for the affection of sweet Marsha Walker, the real-life sister of Martin’s childhood friend, Morris Walker. At this time Martin was a comedy writer for the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour and had already made a couple of appearances on The Dating Game. BRAIN DRAIN: JOHNNY RAMONE AND HIS BRUSH WITH DEATH AFTER The cover of the New York Post, August 15th, 1983. “I’m all for capital punishment. I think it should be televised.” —Johnny Ramone speaking about his wish for Seth Macklin of the punk band Sub Zero who attacked Ramone leaving him with a fractured skull and near death in 1983. In the year leading up to Johnny Ramone’s near-death-experience in the early hours of August 14th, 1983 JOHN CLEESE: FOX NEWS VIEWERS ARE TOO STUPID TO REALIZE Earlier this year, the research of Dunning and Kruger was referenced by a relatively unlikely source: John Cleese, the brilliant comedian who famously portrayed one of the single most obtuse and supercilious characters in TV history, Basil Fawlty. Cleese believes FOX’s viewership is too unintelligent to put the proper brakes on their own ‘MESSER’S CIRCULATING LIBRARY’: THE OCCULT SOUNDSCAPES OF The Guardian referred to artist/musician Drew Mulholland as “the putative godfather” of the psychogeographic rock movement. Mulholland’s idiosyncratic compositional techniques (for that is the right word) include “sampling” the atmosphere of a particular location and incorporating this resonance/mood/memory into his soundscapes. Formerly trading under the name Mount Vernon Arts THAT TIME HORROR VIXEN CAROLINE MUNRO RECORDED WITH CREAM A few days ago, whilst idly wasting time on the internet, I googled some images of 70s horror vixen/Bond girl Caroline Munro. As you do. Anyway an image of her with huge 80s hair (and Gary Numan!) caught my eye. That led me to a 2019 Guardian article that touched upon a musical project from the mid-1960s, from when she was just a teenager, that might be of interest to our readers. ‘GENIUS IS PAIN!’: NATIONAL LAMPOON’S ‘MAGICAL MISERY TOUR National Lampoon editor Tony Hendra—probably best-known as Ian Faith, the irritable, incompetent manager of Spinal Tap—died yesterday. He’d been diagnosed with Lou Gehrig’s disease in 2019 and was 79. Hendra was an author, one of the creators of Spitting Image and he even opened for Lenny Bruce at the Cafe Au Go Go. He also did the fucking funniest John Lennon parody of all time. TOPICS | DANGEROUS MINDS Dangerous Minds is a compendium of the new and strange-new ideas, new art forms, new approaches to social issues and new finds from the outer reaches of pop culture. Our editorial policy, such that it is, reflects the interests, whimsies and peculiarities of the individual writers. We are your favorite distraction. 100 YEARS AGO, SOME PEOPLE WERE REALLY HOSTILE TO THE 1902 Oldsmobile Model R Curved Dash Runabout As with any transformative new technology, automobiles encountered considerable resistance when they arrived on the American scene in larger numbers between 1900 and 1910. There’s no doubt that they were popular—one of the features of American life back then was the birth of dozens of automobile enthusiasts’ “clubs,” a network that BEND ME, SHAPE ME: THE ART OF CONTORTIONISM MAKES A Contortionist ‘Ben Dover’ (born Joseph Späh) striking the ‘Hairpin Pose,’ early 1900s. Dover was one of the 62 survivors of the crash of the Hindenburg in 1937. Optional soundtrack to this post. The art of body contortion can be traced back to the 13th century BC in Greece, Egypt and Mexico until it started to decline in popularity during the Middle Ages. UFO SLIDES FOUND IN FILES LEAKED BY EDWARD SNOWDEN A set of slides showing supposed UFOs have been found amongst the mass of documents released by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden. The three slides were included in a Powerpoint presentation prepared by the British spy agency GCHQ (aka Government Communications Headquarters) that contained 50 uncaptioned images. The images have caused considerable speculation amongst RUDE & CRUDE DUDE: ISAAC ASIMOV’S LECHEROUS LIMERICKS Rude & crude dude: Isaac Asimov’s lecherous limericks. ‘No, Isaac, I don’t want to sniff your finger’. Isaac Asimov had some of the scariest sideburns in history. Not since the days of Victorian England, the Wild West or Leslie West’s Mountain has a man maintained a successful career as a writer while weighed down with

such a

MORE COVER SONGS FROM THE MAN BEHIND ORKESTRA OBSOLETE’S Who are these masked men? That was the question many people were asking when a video popped up on their timeline four years ago featuring band called Orkestra Obsolete covering New Order’s “Blue Monday.” Who indeed? Little was revealed about this talented bunch of musos other than they were performing “Blue Monday” to illustrate what a classic synth song would sound like without THE SONG CO-WRITTEN BY DEVO AND JOHN HINCKLEY JR., RONALD If you look carefully at the credits for DEVO’s 1982 album Oh, No! It’s DEVO, you will spot a name that doesn’t ordinarily pop up in the DEVO universe or even the music world generally. The name is John Hinckley, Jr., and he is best known to the world as the man who tried to kill President Ronald Reagan in 1981, in a batshit-crazy attempt to win the amorous affections of Jodie Foster THE MORBIDLY BEAUTIFUL MEDICAL ILLUSTRATIONS OF DR. FRANK An illustration by Frank Netter done for the Ciba Company during the 1930s. Dr. Frank Netter was a surgeon during the great depression, though as a child growing up in Manhattan, he aspired to be an artist. As it turns out, Netter became both a great artist as well as a doctor and selling his artwork to his professors helped pay for his college education at New York University and two HOW A PRE-FAME STEVE MARTIN AND BACHELORETTE DUPED ‘THE In this adorable 1968 clip from The Dating Game, a very young and dashing Steve Martin competes against two other (super creepy) bachelors for the affection of sweet Marsha Walker, the real-life sister of Martin’s childhood friend, Morris Walker. At this time Martin was a comedy writer for the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour and had already made a couple of appearances on The Dating Game. CHARLES BUKOWSKI LOATHED POTHEADS: ‘I LIKE DRUNKARDS, MAN Charles Bukowski loathed potheads: ‘I like drunkards, man’. Despite being a famously proud drunkard of monumental proportions, author/brawler Charles Bukowski didn’t have a lot of nice things to say about other forms of mind-altering pursuits, especially marijuana. The inebriated bard shares his thoughts on drug use in the interview

below

THE LONG-LOST GO-GO’S: ELISSA AND MARGOT Original bass player Margot Olavarria (far left), Jane Wiedlin, Charlotte Caffey, Gina Schock, and Belinda Carlisle The Go-Go’s hit songs from the early ‘80s have been Disneyfied to death over the past decade, but that unfortunate fact doesn’t diminish their influence as one of the most important bands to emerge from L.A.’s

early punk scene.

WHATEVER HAPPENED TO THE DAVE CLARK FIVE? Although they were one of the top selling pop acts of the British invasion—just under the Beatles with sales of over 100 million records—The Dave Clark Five is little-remembered today. Despite a (belated) 2008 induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and the airing of a documentary about them several times on PBS, if you are much younger than say 60, then chances are that you’ve FRANK ZAPPA REALLY LOVED BLACK SABBATH’S ‘SUPERNAUT Ozzy Osbourne backstage at the 1974 California Jam Frank Zappa gave “Supernaut,” the ur-metal monster that ends the first side of Black Sabbath Vol. 4, the number one spot in his list of “faves, raves, and composers in their graves,” published in the June 1975 issue of Let It Rock: ‘Supernaut’: Black Sabbath. I think it’s

from Paranoid.

such a

PETER SELLERS AND THE ‘STARK’ TRUTH ABOUT HIS PERVY Stark was regarded in the film world as Sellers’ sycophantic sidekick, who would do anything to brown nose his famous friend. The character actor John Le Mesurier once said of their relationship: “Graham Stark is the only man in London with a flat up Peter Sellers’s arse.”. Some of the strange things Graham Stark did to

appease his

THE DICTIONARY WHERE JERRY GARCIA GOT THE PHRASE ‘GRATEFUL In 1965, Jerry Garcia and Bob Weir and Ron “Pigpen” McKernan and Phil Lesh were in a Bay Area outfit called the Warlocks. (Quite astonishingly, the band that would become the Velvet Underground was also operating as the Warlocks at that exact same juncture.) The first show where the band performed as the Grateful Dead occurred on December 4, 1965, in San Jose, at one of Ken Kesey’s THE LOOK OF LOVE: RARELY-SEEN INTIMATE PICS OF FREDDIE Jim Hutton and Freddie Mercury with Dorothy the cat, Munich 1986. The first time Jim Hutton met Freddie Mercury, he told him to “fuck off.” They were in the Copacabana, a gay club in the basement of a hotel in South Kensington, one weekend in late 1983. Jim was at the bar with his lover, John Alexander, drinking from a can of lager. When John went to the lavatory, Freddie pushed his way THE MORBIDLY BEAUTIFUL MEDICAL ILLUSTRATIONS OF DR. FRANK An illustration by Frank Netter done for the Ciba Company during the 1930s. Dr. Frank Netter was a surgeon during the great depression, though as a child growing up in Manhattan, he aspired to be an artist. As it turns out, Netter became both a great artist as well as a doctor and selling his artwork to his professors helped pay for his college education at New York University and two HOW A PRE-FAME STEVE MARTIN AND BACHELORETTE DUPED ‘THE In this adorable 1968 clip from The Dating Game, a very young and dashing Steve Martin competes against two other (super creepy) bachelors for the affection of sweet Marsha Walker, the real-life sister of Martin’s childhood friend, Morris Walker. At this time Martin was a comedy writer for the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour and had already made a couple of appearances on The Dating Game. CHARLES BUKOWSKI LOATHED POTHEADS: ‘I LIKE DRUNKARDS, MAN Charles Bukowski loathed potheads: ‘I like drunkards, man’. Despite being a famously proud drunkard of monumental proportions, author/brawler Charles Bukowski didn’t have a lot of nice things to say about other forms of mind-altering pursuits, especially marijuana. The inebriated bard shares his thoughts on drug use in the interview

below

early punk scene.

from Paranoid.

such a

appease his

DANGEROUS MINDS

Dangerous Minds is a compendium of the new and strange-new ideas, new art forms, new approaches to social issues and new finds from the outer reaches of pop culture. Our editorial policy, such that it is, reflects the interests, whimsies and peculiarities of the individual writers. We are your favorite distraction. ‘MESSER’S CIRCULATING LIBRARY’: THE OCCULT SOUNDSCAPES OF The Guardian referred to artist/musician Drew Mulholland as “the putative godfather” of the psychogeographic rock movement. Mulholland’s idiosyncratic compositional techniques (for that is the right word) include “sampling” the atmosphere of a particular location and incorporating this resonance/mood/memory into his soundscapes. Formerly trading under the name Mount Vernon Arts THE MORBIDLY BEAUTIFUL MEDICAL ILLUSTRATIONS OF DR. FRANK An illustration by Frank Netter done for the Ciba Company during the 1930s. Dr. Frank Netter was a surgeon during the great depression, though as a child growing up in Manhattan, he aspired to be an artist. As it turns out, Netter became both a great artist as well as a doctor and selling his artwork to his professors helped pay for his college education at New York University and two THAT TIME HORROR VIXEN CAROLINE MUNRO RECORDED WITH CREAM A few days ago, whilst idly wasting time on the internet, I googled some images of 70s horror vixen/Bond girl Caroline Munro. As you do. Anyway an image of her with huge 80s hair (and Gary Numan!) caught my eye. That led me to a 2019 Guardian article that touched upon a musical project from the mid-1960s, from when she was just a teenager, that might be of interest to our readers. TOPICS | DANGEROUS MINDS Dangerous Minds is a compendium of the new and strange-new ideas, new art forms, new approaches to social issues and new finds from the outer reaches of pop culture. Our editorial policy, such that it is, reflects the interests, whimsies and peculiarities of the individual writers. We are your favorite distraction. ERIC CLAPTON’S DISGUSTING RACIST TIRADE I was only made aware of this speech by Eric Clapton at a 1976 gig in Birmingham, UK, the other day, but It’s truly disgusting. Here’s a relatively short sample (quoted from Rebel Rock by J. Street (1986) and sourced from New Musical Express, Melody Maker, The Guardian and The Times): Stop Britain from becoming a black colony. Get the foreigners out. Get the wogs out. Get the coons out PETER SELLERS AND THE ‘STARK’ TRUTH ABOUT HIS PERVY You may not know the name Graham Stark, but you will certainly recognize this stony-faced comic actor from the dozens of British movies in which he appeared, such as the second Inspector Clouseau film A Shot in the Dark, Alfie, Those Magnificent Men in their Flying Machines, The Magic Christian, and Revenge of the Pink Panther. Stark also provided voices for The Goon Show, and UFO SLIDES FOUND IN FILES LEAKED BY EDWARD SNOWDEN A set of slides showing supposed UFOs have been found amongst the mass of documents released by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden. The three slides were included in a Powerpoint presentation prepared by the British spy agency GCHQ (aka Government Communications Headquarters) that contained 50 uncaptioned images. The images have caused considerable speculation amongst THE INFAMOUS HASHISH FUDGE RECIPE OF ALICE B. TOKLAS Alice B. Toklas and Gertrude Stein were supporting characters in the story of art, literature and culture during the early to mid-twentieth century. Stein was a writer, poet and playwright, who collected and promoted the artists Cezanne, Picasso, Matisse and Picabia; and the writers Hemingway, Ezra Pound and Scott Fitzgerald. Toklas was Stein’s lover, muse, editor, and confidante. WE ALL KNOW ROBERT SHAW WAS A GREAT ACTOR, BUT DID YOU Robert Shaw liked to drink. Indeed, the actor, author and playwright liked to drink a lot. And it often led to some disastrous consequences. During the making of Jaws, Robert Shaw had an alcohol-induced blackout during the filming of that famous S.S. Indianapolis speech. Shaw had convinced director Steven Spielberg that as the three characters in the scene (played by Shaw, Roy Scheider,

and

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Easy Listening Acid Trip: An Elevator Ride through Sixties Psychedelic

Pop

06.03.2021

10:20 am

Topics:

Music

easy listening

Author Joseph Lanza is an expert’s expert on some of the more enigmatic corners of popular and unpopular culture. In numerous books he’s written about Muzak®, long forgotten crooners, obsessive film directors like Ken Russell and Nicolas Roeg, bland pop songs, the history of cocktails, and _The Texas Chainsaw Massacre_. Possessing an expertise on matters from Mantovani to Leatherface, Lanza’s work is quirky and unique. His latest book, _Easy Listening Acid Trip: An Elevator Ride through Sixties Psychedelic Pop

_

(Feral House) covers a musical genre that most people have no idea

even existed.

It’s bound to send prices skyrocketing on Discogs for this kind of stuff. Like all of his books, it’s a fun read. I asked Joseph Lanza some questions over email. IN YOUR BOOKS, YOU DISPLAY AN ERUDITION ABOUT OBSCURE POPULAR CULTURE, AND YOU SEEM TO HAVE STAKED OUT A TERRITORY, WHERE OTHERS HAVE FEARED TO TREAD. HOW DID YOU BECOME INTERESTED IN, AND AN EXPERT ON, ELEVATOR MUSIC AND POP ORCHESTRAL COVER VERSIONS OF PSYCHEDELIC HITS? I’ve been curious about this kind of music since my high-school days. While listening to the garden-variety rock and pop along with my peers, I was also fascinated by the easy-listening instrumental FM station that my parents often kept on in the background. They seemed to be broadcasting phantom orchestras and choruses that covered many current songs, and I remember being amazed to hear the Ray Conniff Singers do a version of Gordon Lightfoot’s “If You Could Read My Mind.” Though their vocals were engineered to be more background than foreground, the song seemed all the more haunting with its references to old-time movies and ghosts. Its subject matter was close to the ideas and images in Roger Corman’s 1967 movie _The Trip_, which helped to introduce LSD themes to the masses. The Conniff recording has a spectral appeal that, for me, brought out this message more than the original record. In college, I would listen to recording artists like Nico by day, and at night, I’d turn on the local elevator-music station. It sounded like tunes from a parallel place, and I liked this. At the same time, I recall standing in a bank line, hearing similar music from the ceiling speakers, and seeing what looked like a thermostat dial on the wall; it was really a Muzak volume setting. CAN I ASSUME THAT YOU MAINLY LISTEN TO THIS SORT OF MUSIC? I’ve collected a lot of this music through the years and listen to it much of the time. But I also like sixties pop and folk rock by Donovan, The Searchers, and even the echo-drenched ballads produced by Joe Meek. Peer Raben’s music to the Fassbinder films is also appealing, and Raben had expressed Mantovani’s influence in some of

his work.

WHAT IS IT ABOUT THIS SORT OF FARE THAT CAPTURED YOUR ATTENTION? It played almost everywhere, in different places, and it attracted me more with the passing years. I wondered about the people and the studios that put these sessions together. This music was not the product of some indifferent machine but by reputable session players who also did backgrounds to some pop albums and Top 40 songs. Vinnie Bell is one example. He contributed to Muzak sessions but also played his “water guitar” on Ferrante & Teicher’s “Theme to Midnight Cowboy.” The term “elevator music” has accumulated pejorative connotations, but it’s ultimately a positive term. It’s music that, like an elevator, floats in the air, often between destinations: airports, hotel lobbies, and malls And it triggers sometimes-ambiguous emotions. In the late ‘40s, Muzak and the Otis Elevator Company ran an ad in Time magazine, showing happy elevator passengers, and touting how, thanks to “Music by Muzak,” “the cares of the business day are now wafted away on the notes of a lilting melody.” This gives the term an historical context. And in the late sixties, at the height of the “counterculture” and political violence, easy-listening tunes like Paul Mauriat’s “Love is Blue” played on the same Top 40 stations that also played the Doors and Jefferson Airplane. During my research for the book _Elevator Music_, Brad Miller, who’d engineered and produced the early Mystic Moods Orchestra albums, told me that they were also popular among Bay Area youth. He claimed, “the pop music at that time was trying to provide more texture as opposed to the usual electric rock bands.” The psychedelic appeal was not like a Jetsons-inspired vision of the future but a melancholic gaze into the past that often revived old sounds from the British music hall, American vaudeville, and Tin Pan Alley. This helps explain why easy-listening (with its emphasis on traditional melody) and psychedelia formed an uncanny merger. Even the Rolling Stones took the time to go back to their European roots with ditties like “She’s a Rainbow.” HAVE YOU MET MANY OTHERS WHO SHARE YOUR INTEREST IN THIS MOST SPECIFIC OF MUSICAL GENRES, OR ARE YOU A BIT OF A LONE WOLF? In 1984, when Muzak celebrated its 50th Anniversary, I contacted the company and got a folder full of information about its history. Later, as I started writing _Elevator Music_ in the early ‘90s, I was meeting and talking with several programmers who had worked at Muzak. I also had extended conversations with some who had programmed for easy-listening instrumental channels, or the so-called “Beautiful Music” stations, which were among FM’s most popular formats. Then, going into the ‘80s, the format gradually ceded to “Adult Contemporary,” which replaced Percy Faith, Ferrante & Teicher, and the Hollyridge Strings with the likes of Neil Diamond, Frank Sinatra, and Barbra Streisand. We got blasted with “foreground music” and were eventually robbed of a musical

background.

Today, I am far from being a “lone wolf” in liking this music. You can go to YouTube and type in “Muzak Stimulus Progression,” “easy-listening instrumental music,” or any particular recording artist like Paul Mauriat or Franck Pourcel, to find many fans leaving messages about how they like these recordings and miss their presence in public places or on the home hi-fi. Some reminisce about a long ago and far away time when such sounds permeated the malls, shopping plazas, and supermarkets during their childhoods. WHO DO YOU FIND ARE THE GREATEST PRACTITIONERS OF THE EASY-LISTENING ACID COVER VERSION GENRE? My favorites are the Hollyridge Strings, especially their albums of songs by the Beatles during the Sgt. Pepper years. Their versions of “A Day in the Life” and “Strawberry Fields Forever” are heavenly, and they even had the gumption to play an echo-redolent, orchestral cover of “I am the Walrus.” Both David Rose and the Johnny Arthey Orchestra did great versions of Donovan’s “Wear Your Love Like Heaven.” As early as 1965, both Rose and James Last record released their interpretations of “Mr. Tambourine Man.” ARE THERE ANY PARTICULAR NUMBERS IN THE SPOTIFY PLAYLIST YOU COMPILED THAT YOU WANTED TO COMMENT ON? Spotify did not seem to have many of the tracks I wanted, but among the ones I did find, the 101 Strings’ version of “San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Flowers in Your Hair)” is a favorite because it got released not long after Scott McKenzie’s original 1967 hit. It reinforces that fascinating contrast between background and foreground. The Percy Faith Strings provide a mellifluous take on “Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds.” A wild card in the bunch is the Shadows’ “Wonderful Land” from 1962. Its combination of spacey surf guitars with Norrie Paramor’s lush orchestra foreshadowed the easy-listening psychedelia that would emerge just three years later. The same applies to James Last’s version of “Telstar.” Into the ‘80s, the Wallis Blue Orchestra provided an intriguing tribute to David Bowie’s “Space Oddity.” Though many associate it with the early ‘70s glitter era, the song fits more in the last gasps of the psychedelic years because Bowie released it in 1969, around the time we landed on the moon. Major Tom is floating in space, but his mind is on returning to a home he’ll probably never see again. As an easy instrumental, even without the lyrics, the song’s mood seems even more wistful than on the original. That’s how I appreciate easy-listening psychedelia in general. Posted by Richard Metzger

|

06.03.2021

10:20 am

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6 Comments

1.2k Shares

1k

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Scott Lavene, the best singer-songwriter that you’ve never heard of*, gets his Lou Reed on

05.25.2021

05:08 am

Topics:

Music

Scott Lavene

_*YET_

I loudly declared

singer songwriter Scott Lavene’s 2019 album _Broke _ to be my top favorite album of that year, and even though it’s not out yet, his upcoming album is already in my top two of 2021 (the other being Cathal Coughlan’s superb _Song Of Co-Aklan_

).

The title of his new one is _Milk City Sweethearts

_, but

you can’t buy it until mid-September (pre-order vinyl HERE

.)

It’s really good. I reckon it’s even better than the first one and that’s a tall order. There have already been three new videos produced for the album and we’ve got the first two for you below. I asked Scott Lavene some questions via email. IS “NIGEL ” BASED ON A REAL PERSON THAT YOU KNOW? The song was supposed to be for a theatre show I was almost part of, but it didn’t work out so it ended up being the first song I wrote for the album. It’s based on a friend of mine who was once a very pretty man but is now lost to the deep. I often see him, thinner and more ragged each time, cycling around town. I’ve fictionalized him for the sake of the song. Really, “Nigel” is about damaged people finding comfort within each other. YOUR LOU REED TRIBUTE? I wrote the song in a different key. It was a bit more shouty. Then, after playing around with it one night I recorded the demo in a more relaxed key and spoke the vocal which felt better. And yes, a bit more Lou Reed. Also it mentions standing on corners which is very him. I mean, sub consciously I’m probably always trying to make a Lou Reed tribute and maybe this song is the closest I’ve got. Accidentally,

of course.

”LORD OF CITRUS ” STARTS OUT SOUNDING A BIT BEEFHEARTIAN. WERE YOU LISTENING TO THE GOOD CAPTAIN WHEN YOU WERE WRITING YOUR UPCOMING ALBUM? I’m never far from the Captain. I was listening to a lot of stuff. Mainly 80s alternative music but also Brain Eno’s first couple of albums and ESG. The intro to “Lord Of Citrus” was a bit of a happy accident. I played the guitar to the intro in the ‘wrong’ key but it sounded so bloody right. YOUR VIDEOS ARE ALWAYS SO WELL DONE ON AN INDIE BUDGET. WHAT’S THE STORY WITH THE EXCELLENT NEW ANIMATED VIDEO? Well, it’s a guy called Ryan Anderson . He’s a fan and we started a back and forth and a mutual admiration for each other’s work. His Instagram animation was so good, the early stuff is just very twisted and right up my alley. I asked him if he could splice a few pieces together and he just made me a video. First for last year’s “Lover” and then I knew I wanted him to do a couple more for the album even though we have virtually no budget. He’s a sport and completely wonderful. I’d get him to every video if i could but they’ll definitely still be a couple of videos of me pissing about. Luckily I like making my own videos. It’s a challenge to do them for no money and with limited equipment. Posted by Richard Metzger

|

05.25.2021

05:08 am

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3 Comments

226 Shares

106

74

Dr. Gene Scott, God’s Angry Man, live in concert

05.23.2021

03:06 pm

Topics:

Belief

Dr. Gene Scott

In 1993, I attended an extremely curious Easter Sunday “church service”—I use that term loosely—along with a motley crew of congregants assembled in downtown Los Angeles. Dr. Gene Scott , the mad minister of America’s low watt TV stations, presided over this occasion. I convinced a British friend of mine—who had never heard of him or seen his show—to go with me because I thought that it would be totally _hi-larious_, a veritable _laff riot_... but we’ll get to what _really happened_

soon enough.

Dr. Gene Scott was the utterly unhinged UHF television evangelist who grew in fame (and apparently fortune) during the Reagan era with his berserk, conspiratorial lunatic rantings that occasionally—only very occasionally—mentioned Jesus or had some sort of what most people could agree was “religious” content. Mostly he talked about UFOs, gambling on horses and his much-hated ex-wife. I first became aware of him on WPGH, a Pittsburgh market UHF station. He must have purchased late night airtime from them and from a number of other channels around the country. As the 1980s wore on, Gene Scott became very, very hard to miss on cable: If you were flipping channels, depending on the time of day, the guy might be on as many as five of them simultaneously. He continuously boasted of being broadcast in South America, South Korea, and the Caribbean and that in America, he was on, somewhere, during each hour of every day, seven days a week, 52 weeks out of the year. Now that’s a lot of TV, you might be thinking, and you’d be right, but Gene Scott could talk. And talk and talk and talk. Like a speedfreak can talk. And smoke cigars. And stare directly into the camera, refusing to “preach” unless the donations started to roll in. When Scott’s show first came on, it was extremely low budget. Often—very often—Scott’s show would consist of him sitting in a chair on a bare studio floor with a chalkboard behind him, holding a stack of index cards. He would pretend that on each of these cards was written the sum of a very large donation that had just come in over the telephone and he would rattle them off, rapid-fire, and throw the cards over his shoulder as he did so. Scott would have you believe—although it was an obvious lie—that he was getting a thousand dollars, not twenty bucks, not even $100, but a thousand dollars—if not more—from each and every caller! In a flat monotone, Scott would say “Dallas, TX—$1000. Portland, OR—another $1000. Phoenix, AZ, a donation of $3000—see they aren’t CHEAP in Phoenix like they are in Portland an’ Dallas—Scranton, PA—that’s $4000 from Scranton. Maybe I will preach after all…” and so forth and so on. He would often claim five figure donations several times an hour. To hear him claim even that a $100k donation had just come in hot off the wire was not unusual in the least. What did the IRS make of all this, I wonder? It was patently obvious that Scott was lying, but even if the threadbare set and the absurd amounts of the supposed donations he was claiming didn’t clue you in immediately, the band who “appeared” (after he’d ask for a “little tinkle on the keyboards”) were from another show entirely, like he had purchased stock footage from another low watt religious broadcaster. Or something. He would pretend they were in the studio with him, even though they _obviously weren’t_. The phone bank operators that he cut away to, they, too, were from something else entirely, but he would pretend they were in another room, or just down the hall. It was absurd. He would have no interaction with them, because, of course, no interaction was possible! Scott was crazy enough to think that no one would notice, but everyone did. I’d guess that he had no more than three or four crew members to begin with—when Scott’s show first came on, it was extremely low budget—but his operation seemed to grow pretty quickly. Eventually he hired an actual band, a bigger studio, and real phone operators. Maybe that was a real $1000 donation from Omaha? Gene Scott would berate, belittle, bully and bark at this viewers with extreme contempt and tell them that they weren’t deserving of his “teachings.” When he did deign to “preach,” he did a variant on the trick that Glenn Beck uses to browbeat his lowbrow listeners: Scott would take his blackboard and scrawl something across it that was supposedly written in Greek, or Hebrew or Arabic and then using that as a starting point he’d go off on a long-winded diatribe that most often had absolutely nothing to do with that or with anything else. He could start off going into the etymology of a word like “jubilee” and then veer off into an impassioned rant about why women should not wear pants. In one memorable program Scott asked his audience if they were any “more tired” this year than they were last year. He couldn’t exactly hear them, of course, but assumed the answer to be “yes” and concocted a ridiculous fantasy about radio waves emanating at the Tropic of Cancer that were making everyone docile, sleepy and compliant. Once night, I vividly recall him saying something along the lines of “The government wants to have me killed. Because I know too much. If you want me to LIVE so I can come back here to tell you more about this IMPORTANT INFORMATION tomorrow night that nobody else has, then you need to send me money TONIGHT so I can protect myself!” The following show, Scott appeared with two vicious-looking, growling Doberman Pinschers and the “D” volume of the Encyclopedia Britannica. He read off the various things trained Doberman attack dogs were capable of (like ripping your head off, etc) and after each one, he would nod affirmatively, look directly into the camera and say flatly “MY DOGS CAN DO THAT.” Dude was a showman, but Dr. Gene Scott was also undoubtedly the most out-of-his-mind person who had EVER been on television up to that point on a regular basis. I didn’t watch his show every night, but I did watch it frequently enough. I’d usually flip between early Letterman and Scott’s ranting and raving. He was mesmerizing. Another distinguishing characteristic of Gene Scott’s enigmatic TV preacher shtick was that he always sported different kinds of hats, like a pith helmet, a fisherman’s cap, cowboy hat or a sombrero. On more than one occasion he wore a handkerchief tied in four knots like a Monty Python “Gumby,”

with square Johnny

Rotten sunglasses. One night he would have long hair and a beard, the next night, the beard was gone and his hair short again. Soon after that, he’d have a new mustache. His glasses changed a lot, too. Sometimes he’d even wear two pairs of eyeglasses at once. Point is, every night he would look _totally different_. If you watched his show regularly, the first thing you—or anyone, really—would wonder would be _“Who would give this incoherent, incomprehensible crackpot their money?”_ The second thing you would notice, especially if you’d been gone for a while, was how rapidly his production values continued to rise over the years. Obviously people _were_ sending him money. _But who were they?_ I was about to find out. I called the RSVP number listed in an LA WEEKLY ad for Scott’s church and before I could politely inquire about tickets, I was yelled at by a woman with an accent who identified herself as “Doc’s assistant.” She GRILLED ME about WHY I wanted to attend that Sunday’s service. I wasn’t prepared for how aggressive she was but managed to (perhaps) convince her that I just wanted to check it out and that my request for entry was an

innocuous one.

It was obvious that she was trying to tamp down any potential disruption of the Easter Sunday service and that it had happened before. She was hardcore and deeply suspicious of me, it was quite

apparent.

So as I mentioned at the top of this article, I planned to go to see Gene Scott with a friend of mine, and that she had never heard of Gene Scott and had absolutely no idea what she was in for, only, as I promised, that it was going to be extremely amusing. So on Easter Sunday, at the appointed time, we showed up at the United Artists Theatre in downtown Los Angeles at 927 S. Broadway. Twenty years ago, downtown Los Angeles was only barely starting to become gentrified and the stark human horror the area was then known for has been gradually moved east since that time. The South Broadway of 1993 was strewn with trash blowing around like tumbleweeds and we had to dodge zombie-like crack heads to get there. I assumed that the United Artists Theatre would just be some shithole where Scott taped his low rent hijinks. _Au contraire!_ In fact, this was not just any old United Artists Theatre, it was THE United Artists Theatre that was built by Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks and Charlie Chaplin. It’s an incredibly opulent movie house—one of the greatest in Los Angeles—a Spanish Gothic masterpiece with marble floors and brass accents. Flanking the stage there was an amazing gold thread embroidered tapestry curtain dating from when the Theatre originally opened, depicting scenes from famous silent movies with a big UA logo when the curtains were closed. My memory of the tapestry is that it was around 50 ft tall. Even in the late 1920s, something this elaborate, and this size, would still have cost over $100k. _I couldn’t believe that Gene Scott owned this building._ Before we could poke around for more than a single minute, we were warily greeted—if that’s the right word for it—by the woman on the phone who identified herself as “Doc’s assistant.” She was a mean-faced, middle-aged Korean lady and she sternly told us not to whisper to each other, not to fidget, not to do anything that would break his concentration or disturb “Doc” in any way, not to go to the bathroom and don’t dare yell something or else we’d be in

“big trouble!”

After that stern warning, she told us that these two security guards would take us to our seats. They did and then they _sat right down on

either side of us!_

The service started soon enough. The stage was huge and a large group of musicians, the sort you might see at the Grand Ole Opry, walked on and started up on a Statler Brothers-sounding hymn. Then they started to build the suspense for “Doc” who soon arrived onstage with diamond-encrusted sun glasses, an expensive black suit, and cowboy boots. He was greeted like he was Elvis. _Exactly_ like he was Elvis. Scott immediately sat down on a chair, crossed his legs and lit up a cigar. His opening remarks had to do with marrying a couple in Saratoga, where he’d gone to watch his horses race, the day before. They were sitting in the front row and he made reference to the fact that they’d both been committing adultery behind the backs of their previous spouses and he laughed about it, like it was all a big joke to him. His congregants laughed too, but in a nervous sort of manner. Like “Doc’s assistant,” most of his congregation, more than half, were Asian and then the next largest group was a mix of what can only be described as cowboy hat-wearing rednecks and their families, a “type” that you do not get in Los Angeles, but that you would see in Texas maybe. Hispanic cowboys, too. There were also several members of the audience who didn’t fall into either of those disparate camps, Asian or cowboy, but who appeared to be people who’d come in from local homeless missions. And us. We were probably the most conspicuous people there, in a sense. She and I were the ones who

stood out.

After some decidedly _non sequitur_ preaching, the proceedings went right off the surrealism scale when “Doc” announced—by grabbing a mic, pulling it close to his lips and saying this in a way that you could tell it was a sort of anticipated catchphrase of his—that it was “Offerin’ Time!” The entire audience jumped to their feet and started waving sealed tithing envelopes around, like they were on the fucking _Price is Right_ or something. It was super tweaked. I wasn’t about to give a dime to this nut, so I merely sealed an empty envelope and stuck it in the plate when it was passed to me. When the raucous “Offerin’ Time!” settled down, Doc preached a lil’ more and then he asked for a “tinkle” on the keyboards. A tinkle, he laughed, _for “a piss ant.”_ THE AUDIENCE ROARED! _Huh? What?_ Yes, I said _A PISS ANT_. The band struck up the tune and led an enthusiastic audience singalong to a ditty called “Kill Some Piss Ants for Jesus.” You probably think I’m pulling your leg, but I’m not. Go directly to 10:13 in the below video. _“Kill Some Piss Ants for Jesus”_ After this he made another nonsensical Easter-themed point and then he announced that there would be _a SECOND_ “Offerin’ time!” This one transpired with the same _jump up and down, wave your envelope around_ mania as before! I mean, wouldn’t most people just split their entire intended donation into two envelopes? Why were they so EXCITED about it? Did he get noticeably more money with two collections than one? Perhaps he did. Perhaps his congregation simply were _that stupid_. This was—strongly—the way things appeared. All I know is that by this point, _we’d had it_. It was such an incredibly deflating encounter with a teeny-tiny segment of the human race that neither of us had known existed an hour before. These people were brainwashed by NOTHING WHATSOEVER—at least Scientology gives you a little pop psychology. Gene Scott offered his flock not a damned thing, just piss ants, supposedly biblical jabberwocky and _two_ opportunities to give him money in less than one hour! Was L. Ron Hubbard ever _that blatant?_ The entire thing was bonkers, barking mad, paranoiac, you name it, but I can’t exactly say that it was the fun, fun, fun time I’d promised my friend it would be. In fact, it was probably one of the single most _depressing_ things I have ever witnessed in real life. These people were _DEVOLVED_, the types you might see at a Trump rally but with less intellectual focus. To sit among them was not the cheeky good fun I anticipated. It was just sad, demented and frankly

horrifying.

My friend took the lead and told the security guard, “Look, we have to go. Let us out of here, I’m not feeling well, I think I’m going to throw up.” The sea parted immediately with that line, but before we were out the door, Doc’s assistant was running out of the auditorium behind us, demanding that we stop, come back and report to her immediately! Her attitude was a joke—-like she was Ilse Koch or something—and we told her to go fuck herself and left. We barely said a word in the car. We went to an outdoor café for lunch and hardly said a word to each other there either. After an experience like that one—watching cud-chewing fools being parted from their money by a megalomaniac master grifter _who didn’t even have to try_—we found that there was nothing much left to say. _The Dr. Gene Scott we meet in Werner Herzog’s 1981 film ‘God’s Angry Man’ is comparatively sane juxtaposed to the nutsoid Gene Scott of just a few years later._ _The dialogue in this mid-80s TV comedy sketch reflects exactly the sorts of things that Scott said every single night on his show. There is almost no exaggeration here, none. This is what he said and the way he acted. Nearly everyone in America would have recognized this as a parody of Gene Scott at that time._ Posted by Richard Metzger

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05.23.2021

03:06 pm

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3 Comments

969 Shares

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Ferrante & Teicher: Forgotten Gods of Easy Listening Music

05.20.2021

02:40 pm

Topics:

Music

Ferrante & Teicher

Some Dangerous Minds readers will immediately recognize the names of Ferrante & Teicher, the prodigiously talented dual piano purveyors of the _easiest_ easy listening who sold 90 million albums in their five decade career, but those readers will be _of a certain age_ or else crazed crate diggers. I asked my wife, who has deep knowledge of all kinds of zany things, what the names “Ferrante & Teicher” meant to her and she said “Nothing” (we were even listening to them at the time). Most people under 45 will draw a complete blank when that question would be posed to them. However, those of us north of that age _will_ likely recall the “grand twins of the twin grands” from various light entertainment TV programs in the 60s and 70s and our grandparents record collections. The pair was primarily known for their dexterously executed two piano mind-meld arrangements of popular classical music pieces, film themes and Broadway show tunes. They were a huge draw on the “pops” classical concert circuit. Along with the likes of Peter Nero and Arthur Fiedler, they produced the _whitest_, most inoffensive music ever made—which isn’t to say that they weren’t great, because they were really quite extraordinary musicians. Before becoming the of the biggest selling instrumental acts of all time, Arthur Ferrante and Louis Teicher were classically trained pianists who met at Juilliard. The pair started out doing John Cage-influenced “prepared piano” pieces (sticking cardboard between keys, laying metal bars across them, using glass mallets and so forth) and used a lot of studio manipulation, operating in the Joe Meek/hi-fi demonstration territory a little bit, too. Some of their early material, as heard on mid-1950s albums like _Soundproof_, _Blast Off!_ and _Soundblast_ sounds like, I dunno, an Eisenhower-era version of Tangerine Dream (Isn’t that description _intriguing?_ I’m proud

of that one…).

When the duo signed to United Artists in 1960 it was suggested to them that they might want to record some movie themes and their career instantly took off with their version of the theme from Billy Wilder’s classic comedy, _The Apartment_ and their stirring rendition of the “Theme From _Exodus_” (which made it to #2 on the singles chart). Many people might have assumed back then that Ferrante and Teicher were a gay couple because of the dressing alike “twins” nature of their two piano shtick (they were neither related nor twins), but the matching mustaches, horn-rimmed glasses, pompadour toupees and the bargain basement Liberace tuxedos were just a part of the act. Both were married at least once and had kids. I expected that Ferrante & Teicher would have had some sort of critical re-appraisal, like Esquivel did during the whole “lounge” craze—they’re awesome!—but that never happened. It’s kind of strange considering HOW LARGE of a flea market and four-for-a-dollar record store bin footprint they left behind. Imagine a warehouse with 90 million albums in it. A lot of their records are still floating around. Why haven’t young people with ironic facial hair discovered Ferrante & Teicher? Why haven’t more of their songs been sourced for obscure break beats? Why have virtually _none_ of their 150 albums ever been released on CD? To add insult to injury, there’s precious little about Ferrante & Teicher on the Internet, their website has hardly been updated since they died and they have almost no presence on the torrent trackers. At least there are several choice clips of them on YouTube, doing what they did best. A great example of their more avant-garde earlier work, the gorgeous, Martin Denny-esque “African Echoes”:

_Amazing, right?_

I have a special memory of Ferrante & Teicher because I actually went to see them in concert on my first real “date,” believe it or not, when I was in the 8th grade, with the young lady who would end up being my girlfriend throughout much of my teen years. Perhaps it’s an event recalled decades later with particular fondness because it was such an auspicious night in my young life, but I would honestly have to say that it was one of my peak concert going experiences, too, it really was. The show was held in an intimate outdoor amphitheater and I still have a strong sense memory of being there, where we were sitting relative to the stage, the humidity that night, the lightning bugs and how dazzling, virtuoso and _telepathic_ their piano playing

was.

“Midnight Cowboy:

_MORE FERRANTE & TEICHER AFTER THE JUMP…_

READ ON▸

Posted by Richard Metzger

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05.20.2021

02:40 pm

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Dangerous Toys: Dario Argento, Lucio Fulci, and other Giallo film legends are now action figures

05.18.2021

03:32 pm

Topics:

Movies

Dario Argento

Opera

Tenebre

Lucio Fulci

Jennifer Connelly

Profondo Rosso

Demonia

_Dario Argento action figure by Luca Bartole

.

_

> “Is it right to be obsessed with looking at terrible things and > sharing them with other people?”

>

> —Dario Argento I feel like these words of director Dario Argento are a part of my job description here at Dangerous Minds. Over the years pretty much every DM contributor has brought to light a vast array of car-crashy-can’t-look-away content. On more than several occasions, DM has highlighted the work of both Argento and the Godfather of Gore, Lucio Fulci. Today, the films of both directors collide with the strange, ever-expanding world of action figures. If you’re into collectibles and giallo, you know that a very creepy version of the deranged puppet from _Profondo Rosso_ (_Deep Red_) exists. Sculpted by the very talented Charlie Lonewolf

, only 25 of the

officially licensed figures were made. You may also know that Argento opened the Profondo Rosso Horror store in Rome in 1989. It’s full of every kind of Argento-related memorabilia that you could shake your favorite razor-sharp stabbing knife at. According to a person who visited the museum, there were also Argento-centric “action figures” on display. As I sadly haven’t yet been to what sounds like the happiest place on Earth (to me anyway), this mention of the existence of such action figures sent me on a quest to find them. And find them I did. Artist Luca Bartole has made all of our nightmares come true by creating a line of custom, handmade action figures based on characters in films directed by Dario Argento and Lucio Fulci. The collection includes 3.75-inch versions of Argento and Fulci as well as Fulci in character as Inspector Carter from the film _Demonia _ (1990). Others include the hatchet-wielding Marta Manganiello (played by actress Clara Calamai) from _Profondo Rosso _, Jennifer Corvina (played by actress Jennifer Connelly) from _Phenomena _ (1985), and the unfortunate Father William Thomas (played by actor Fabrizio Jovine) from Fulci’s _City of the Living Dead _ (1980). Are these the same action figures displayed at Argento’s museum? Who knows? What I do know is if you’ve always wanted to have your own pocket-sized figure of Dario Argento, _now you can_. All the figures retail for $65.59

and ship for free.

_MORE BLOODY TOYS MAYHEM AFTER THE JUMP…_

READ ON▸

Posted by Cherrybomb

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05.18.2021

03:32 pm

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Mad Dogg: Was Noël Coward history’s very first rapper?

05.16.2021

12:52 pm

Topics:

Music

Noel Coward

The great English playwright, composer, director, actor and singer, Noël Coward was one of the most celebrated wits of the 20th century. He’s what they used to call a “sophisticate.” But when Sir Noël wanted to throw down, _he could throw down_. Coward’s rapid-fire patter and clipped diction in this televised 1955 performance of his “Mad Dogs and Englishmen” could give any of today’s top rappers a run for their Benjamins. WITNESS THIS EXTRAORDINARY ELOCUTION EXECUTION: Posted by Richard Metzger

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05.16.2021

12:52 pm

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2 Comments

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135

Setting The Dogs On The Post Punk Postman: A brief interview with Luke

Haines

04.30.2021

11:10 am

Topics:

Music

Luke Haines

Out today on Cherry Red Records is _Setting The Dogs On The Post Punk Postman _, the latest installment of Luke Haines’ whimsical muse. What’s been on his mind lately you might wonder? Wonder no more, the album is filled with songs about German U-Boat captains, ex-Stasi spies, Nixon and Mao, humorous Scottish poet

Ivor Cutler , _a

nefarious pumpkin up to no good_, landscape gardening, and of course, Andrea Dworkin’s knees. In other words, it’s the new Luke Haines album! _Setting The Dogs On The Post Punk Postman _ features guest contributions from REM’s Peter Buck and Julian Barratt. It is the creation of a man who certainly knows _how to amuse himself_. I applaud this. I prefer artists who do it for themselves first. I mean, why should they do it

_for you?_

I posed a few questions to Luke over email, here’s how he responded. IS THE POST-PUNK MAILMAN AN ACTUAL REAL PERSON? Some people think it’s Vic Godard. It isn’t. Vic’s great anyway…I’d had the title for ages – and what are you gonna do with a title like that? Use it. I hate the ‘idea’ of ‘post punk.’ It didn’t exist. It went from punk, to new wave. Post punk doesn’t come into it. The notion of post punk is just another example of curator culture. ‘Waiter there’s a curator in my soup.’ In the song – the post punk post man is very much the ‘messenger.’ You should always shoot the messenger (or set the dogs on them) The messenger is invariably an idiot and up to no good; Brother number 1, or 2. Another thought: I’d been thinking about Epic Soundtracks. I didn’t know him well, but I was very sad when he died. He deserves more thought…so this song is a kind of tribute to

Epic.

WHAT DID THIS PERSON DO TO PISS YOU OFF? DID YOU ARGUE ABOUT SWELL MAPS AND THROBBING GRISTLE? WHAT HAPPENED?

(answered above)

DO YOU RECKON HE’LL KNOW THAT THE SONG IS ABOUT HIM? As explained – the song isn’t about anyone in particular. However, when you write a song about someone, then that person should always know, otherwise what’s the point. WAS THERE A PARTICULAR REASON THAT YOU WERE PHOTOGRAPHED IN FRONT OF

THE ACE CAFE?

There’s an unreconstructed element to the record. Musically and lyrically. The Ace Cafe is the most unreconstructed place I could think of. They sell posters of scantily-clad biker ‘chicks’ that are slightly tatty. It’s all very un ironic. It’s just assumed that bikers who go there might like that kind of poster on the wall of their workshop. I love everything about the Ace especially its location – in the middle of nowhere but slightly near Neasden. Jim Fry (the photographer) and I had been talking about that great Bob Marley documentary when the Wailers come to tour the UK for the first time, and they end up holed up in a terraced house in Neasden and then cutting the tour short because of the snow. Bunny Wailer and Peter Tosh took the snow as an omen of London being Babylon, and they hopped it back to Kingston JA. From there I got to the idea of the sleeve

being the Ace Cafe.

WHAT ABOUT IVOR CUTLER? DID YOU SEE HIM TAKING THE BUS ONE DAY AND YEARS LATER THIS IS WHAT INSPIRED THE SONG

?

Ivor used to live near me. I used to get on the C11 bus and Ivor would as often or not be aboard. He would often strike up conversations with strangers on the bus, not in a mad’ way, just in a curious way. The line about the ‘hat’ is an actual conversation he had with a school kid. I made a mental note of it, knowing i’d use it one day. I _WON’T_ ASK YOU ABOUT “YES, MR. PUMPKIN ,” THE INSPIRATION THERE SEEMS _FAR TOO PERSONAL_. Right. It started out as a Syd Barrett kind of singalong ditty, which I couldn’t get out of my head. When I started recording it it reminded me of a song by The Mighty Boosh. During the first lockdown the only person I kept bumping into was Julian Barratt, I figured that as I’d had Julia (Davis) on one of my albums that all the signs were telling me to get Julian on this one! FOR ME THE HIGHLIGHT OF THE NEW ALBUM IS “TWO JAPANESE FREAKS TALKING ABOUT NIXON AND MAO .” YOU SHOULD DO AN ENTIRE ALBUM OF GUITAR ROCK (I THINK). YOU’RE GOOD AT RIFFAGE! I should. Since working with Peter Buck I’ve got really into guitars again. I’ve become almost obsessive. It’s a good job I’m not wealthy otherwise I’d just blow it all on guitars. The electric guitar is the greatest invention of the 20th century. We should worship guitars (not the people who play them so much) as wooden (or

metal) gods.

ISN’T “I JUST WANT TO BE BURIED ” THE FIRST REAL LOVE SONG THAT YOU’VE EVER RELEASED? There was “Breaking Up ” towards the end of the Auteurs. I kind of hid that one away, as I thought writing love songs was kind of redundant. I was wrong on both counts. DID THE MISSUS APPROVE OF THAT ONE? I think she would have disapproved if it had been anything other than what it is. I still don’t really understand why pop songs don’t get down to the nitty gritty of carnality more often. The song is kind of funny but it’s also dead serious. It came out like _ Man Who Sold The World_-period Bowie, sung by Judge Dredd. I’m pretty happy about

that.

Posted by Richard Metzger

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04.30.2021

11:10 am

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2 Comments

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314

Lydia Lunch sells out*

04.29.2021

09:46 am

Topics:

Art

Feminism

Music

Punk

Lydia Lunch

_Photo by Jasmine Hirst_

_*AS IF._

As reported at Pitchfork and elsewhere, Lydia Lunch is selling the rights to her life’s work. According to a March 25 press release, this would transfer “all intellectual rights and copyright ownership” of “all of her written articles, compositions, the majority of her Master Recordings, books, artworks, photography and more.” This would include 61 published works, nearly 400 compositions, and Lydia’s “ownership interest” in 326 master recordings. The ultimate buyer—obviously a person of wealth and refined taste who would respect the cultural and historical significance of such a body of work—will be able to exploit the material as they see fit. Valuing transgressive art might have been a difficult thing in the past, but with a few decades of distance, what was once underground and perhaps violated cultural norms—like _Fingered_ for instance—becomes _history_. (And in this case, it also gets uploaded to PornHub.) And that’s not to say that it’s “safer”—we’re talking about Lydia Lunch, for chrissakes—but that it can be more readily turned into a more mainstream commodity than in the past. It will be interesting to see what happens here. I asked Lydia a few questions over email, her answers below, but I think it’s worth mentioning that in the past two years, I personally have purchased seven Lydia Lunch authored, or related items—vintage vinyl pressings

of _Queen of Siam

_ and _13.13

_, a newer vinyl version of _13.13_ , and three books, one by Lydia , the recent “oral history” _Lydia Lunch: The War Is Never Over _ by Nick Soulsby (which I contributed to) and a book of her interviews with RE/Search’s V. Vale that I just bought. I realize that my spending habits aren’t the same as most people’s, but I’m a good example of someone who has spent, you know, more than $100 on Lydia-related products in the past 24 months. WHAT MADE YOU DECIDE TO DO THIS? LYDIA LUNCH: I have managed to own everything I’ve done, was able to release as much material as I have in various formats over the years, produce other artists, curate spoken word shows for decades, host workshops for writers, collaborate with so many incredibly creative artists, tour extensively…it would be a great relief if someone would step in and conceive possibilities that can allow me to carry

on.

It would be extremely helpful to have support for my podcast _The Lydian Spin _ with Tim Dahl, which has over 90 episodes online available for free. I consider it an audio museum where we promote other artists, musicians, filmmakers, etc. It is a mandatory platform not only to give voice to other artists to express their vision, but a vehicle for myself and Tim to try to make sense of the almost unfathomable mess this country is trying to lift itself out of after four years of complete absurdity. I’m working on a documentary with Jasmine Hirst - _Artists-Depression/Anxiety & Rage_. We’ve interviewed over 35 artists and a few therapists and will have it finished by fall. An important subject especially now. I have an LP finished with Tim Dahl’s psycho-ambient trio GRID, and a slinky jazz-noir LP with the amazing chanteuse and songwriter Sylvia Black. I’m working on a play. RETROVIRUS is waiting for shows to open up. All of this, as usual, self produced amd self financed…even I can only do so much without some financial support especially now for fuck’s sake. HA! Or should I wait for Spotify to cough up half a cent for every song they play? HOW DO YOU PUT A DOLLAR VALUE ON YOUR LIFE’S WORK? I can’t. But I’m open to proposals. Also after 43 years it begins to feel like a humongous invisible beast of sound and vision hanging over my head, or to quote Lawrence Ferlinghetti a “Coney Island of the Mind”. It would be great if someone stepped in who wanted to run

The Cyclone.

_“My Amerikkka” by Lydia Lunch_ HOW WOULD A POTENTIAL PURCHASER DO THE SAME? They would have 100 years to figure it out! There must be someone creative enough to find methods that I don’t have the time or energy to pursue, since I continue to create in multiple formats and have no intention of slowing down. _“Collateral Damage” by Lydia Lunch_ WHAT’S THE PROCESS YOU ENVISION? Getting the word out that this material is available, targeting forward-thinking people who understand not only the future possibilities, but have an understanding of history as well. I was lucky to work with Nicholas Martin who recently acquired my archives for the Fales Library at New York University and is establishing a digital museum. But I still own the copyright on over 380 musical compositions, and partial ownership in most of the master recordings, 61 published works, my artwork and photography, etc. It’s all just really too much for me to manage as I continue to create. Selling this to the right party would also allow me to independently continue to produce and collaborate with other artists which is extremely

important to me.

_“Casualty” by Lydia Lunch_ HOW DOES A SERIOUS POSSIBLE BUYER CONTACT YOU? Through my manager Tom Garretson at tgarretson@lydia-lunch.net _The trailer for Beth B’s documentary ‘Lydia Lunch: The War is

Never Over.’_

Posted by Richard Metzger

|

04.29.2021

09:46 am

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2 Comments

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Classic horror films get the vintage comic book treatment by Spanish

artist Nache Ramos

04.23.2021

10:31 am

Topics:

Art

Movies

Pop Culture

John Carpenter

David Cronenberg

Tobe Hooper

The Omen

vintage comics

Nache Ramos

_‘Long live the new flesh!’ A digital design based on David Cronenberg’s 1983 film ‘Videodrome.’_ Outside of the fact that he is a talented artist with a deep love of classic 60s, 70s, and 80s horror, unfortunately, I do not know, nor was I able to dig much up on self-professed “comic enthusiast, music freak, horror lover, and videogame collector” Nache Ramos . But here’s what I do know. Ramos is based in Alcoli

(or

Alcoy), Spain where he has been a graphic designer and illustrator for over a decade. His art has been used to decorate snowboards made by Wi-Me Snowboards, and for Australian snowboard company Catalyst. In 2018, he won a Guns ‘N’ Roses contest which asked fans of the band (via Twitter), to create artwork based on their 1987 album _Appetite for Destruction _. Other than well-deserved accolades for his submission, I’m not sure what Ramos got as a prize, but I suppose gaining exposure to G’N'R’s 6+million Twitter followers is very much a good thing. This was also the same year Ramos moved from using traditional artistic mediums to creating his work digitally. This brings me to Nache’s nostalgic interpretations which infuse the look of old-school comic books with Ramos’ love of science fiction and horror films he grew up with. Like any horror fan worth their VHS collection, Ramos digs the films of director John Carpenter and has created several digitally designed homages to Carpenter’s films in vintage comic book style. Others include David Cronenberg’s _Videodrome _ (pictured at the top of this post), Wes Craven’s _A Nightmare on Elm Street _, Tobe Hooper’s _The Texas Chain Saw Massacre _, and Richard Donner’s bone-chilling 1976 film, _The Omen _. If this all sounds good to you (and it should), Ramos also accepts commissions

via his Instagram .

You can also pick up very reasonably-priced prints of Ramos’ super-cool fictional movie posters on his Red Bubble page. I myself picked up Nache’s take on _Videodrome_. Scroll on to see more of Ramos’ fantastic faux-vintage comics. _MUCH MORE AFTER THE JUMP…_

READ ON▸

Posted by Cherrybomb

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04.23.2021

10:31 am

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3 Comments

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Bowie: The alt version of ‘Rebel Rebel’

04.21.2021

07:41 pm

Topics:

Music

David Bowie

There is a (relatively speaking) lesser-known recording of David Bowie’s “Rebel Rebel” that was done in New York in 1974 and commonly known as the “U.S. Single Version.” Some of you will know this, some of you won’t. Even if you do, it’s fun to hear it

again.

This furious variation on the song, released only as a 7” record (backed with “Lady Grinning Soul” and attributed only to “Bowie”) was out just for a few months when it was withdrawn and replaced with the album version. It’s a more uptempo, _far more aggressive_ take on “Rebel Rebel” with Bowie himself allegedly playing all the instruments, save for the frenzied congas which were played by Geoff MacCormack. Bowie’s guitar sounds like Keith Richards playing a rusty Strat through a transistor radio and he’s added the chorus of the “li li li li li li li li li li” bits not present on the LP version. It’s heavily phase-shifted and the vocals are a bit more shouted. All in all, I think it’s actually slightly superior to the better-known album track, although I love that one, too. Just an opinion. This was (and still is) the loudest cut record I have ever heard. If you drop the needle on this baby with the stereo at a normal volume, it will blow your speakers (and ear drums) out. It always sends me diving for the volume knob before my speaker cones blow. Here’s something from a posting about “Rebel Rebel (U.S. Single Version)” from the merry audiophile maniacs at the Steve Hoffman

Forums

:

> Rebel Rebel (Bowie): three different versions exist. The familiar > version was released in edited and remixed form (4’22” instead > of 4’31” and much more echoey than the album version) as the the > first single from Diamond Dogs (RCA LPBO 5009). The Australian Rebel > Rebel EP (RCA RCA 20610) features a shorter 4’06” edit. Further > mixes of this version are found on bootlegs: a ‘dry mix’ (“BBC > Version”) was released on Absolutely Rare (no label) and The > Axeman Cometh (DB003) has a “Mix 1”, supposedly from a 1973 > acetate, but this version is very similar (if not completely > identical) to the regular single edit.

>

> The second version (often referred to as the US or “phased” > version) is rumored to be played entirely by Bowie. It was released > in May 1974, three months after the first issue, but only in the US, > Canada (both RCA APBO-0287) and Mexico (RCA SP-4049). The US single > version was re-released on several bootleg singles and albums, > before officially appearing on Sound + Vision II and the 30th > Anniversary 2CD Edition of Diamond Dogs. There are two versions that you can pick up on Discogs. It’s the

Hollywood pressing

that’s

the really crazy loud one. The performance of “Rebel Rebel” on _David Live_

has a similar

arrangement to US single version. _Lip-syncing to the more familiar album edit on Dutch television’s TopPop_ in 1974. Afterwards, Bowie is presented the Dutch Edison award for sales of Ziggy Stardust and served “an old fisherman’s drink” called Schelvispekel. Posted by Richard Metzger

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04.21.2021

07:41 pm

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2 Comments

3.4k Shares

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