Now Playing: Redheaded Woman by Wayne Worley, of course.
1st Record/1st Concert
Growing up in conservative England during the 50’s you had to listen to Radio Luxembourg to catch all the great American records. The first I ever bought was a 78 on the Brunswick label: R.O.C.K. by Bill Haley & his Comets. Never before had I heard such exciting and arcane lyrics – stuff about “six-string heaters” and “rimshot beaters” and “cats grooving” – with the exuberant Haley urging listeners to “rock! rock! rock! rock!” against a sizzling melee of honking sax, steel guitar jabs and relentless drumming. I had bought a second-hand turntable with a tin box of steel needles, and I used to plug it into a radio with a comparatively big speaker, which I turned up to the point of distortion or destruction.
I was addicted; the title spelt out my future, so I’ve been this way since May 1956 – even though, because live rock ‘n’ roll took so long to reach the hinterlands, I didn’t attend my first proper gig for another four years.
By then, my big hero was Duane Eddy. His titles alone were magical enough: Rebel Rouser, Forty Miles Of Bad Road, Some Kinda Earthquake. I played his records incessantly, learnt by heart the poetic song descriptions on the back of his album The Twang’s The Thang (more interesting and evocative than Shakespeare!), and took photos of him to the barber’s so he could replicate his cool hairstyle.
My brother and I went to see Duane and his Rebels on 9 April 1960 at the Trocadero, a big theatre at the Elephant & Castle, a bloodcurdling area of south London known to be a stronghold for Teddy boys and incipient juvenile delinquents. True to form, the audience heckled the headliner Bobby Darin, who, after monumental singles like Queen Of The Hop and Dream Lover, had plunged into Clementine-style MOR. He would tell the Melody Maker: “I have found British audiences the noisiest I have played to anywhere in the world”.
Also on the bill were Emile Ford & the Checkmates, who had become overnight stars as a result of their number one single What Do You Want To Make Those Eyes At Me For, and Clyde McPhatter, who was a revelation singing Without Love. He was all but unknown; none of his Drifters records had been issued here. Duane closed the first half. He wore a sharp, bottle-green Italian suit, while his powerhouse Rebels wore charcoal grey. Two guys from LA: Jim Horn on sax and Larry Knechtal (with exaggerated Tony Curtis quiff) standing at the piano, and two from Duane’s home town, Phoenix: Jimmy Troxel on drums and Dave Campbell on bass. Astonishing band. Jim Horn’s appendix had been removed a week before the tour – but that didn’t stop him from jumping around like an acrobat. Booming, celestial sounds showered from Duane’s guitar, loud, spine-tingling and inspirational.
The audience went nuts – as did audiences everywhere, especially when he played his upcoming single Shazam. “It was pretty heady stuff,” he told me years later. “I had to be smuggled in and out of some theatres and even saw police dogs there one night to help clear a path through the crowd to the waiting car. It was amazing!” He and his band proved so popular that his agent kept them over for another package, headlining over Kathy Kirby and Frank Ifield.
Bloody hell, the sixties had only just begun. For the next decade, every day would be an adventure.
Pete Frame
Author of ‘Rock Family Trees’ and ‘The Restless Generation’
www.roganhouse.co.uk
- John Legend. Johnny Legend has had his name since 1969, and I believe he has some sort of “arrangement” with the new guy.
- Snoop Dogg. Similar to our friend Swamp Dogg. I believe there’s an agreement here too.
- Carl Hungness. Unusual surname of my college friend, publisher of auto racing books. Is it coincidence that the porn star in “Big Lebowski” is Carl Hungus, or from a screenwriter who reads auto books? I say the latter.
Full Circle
I bought a Waylon Jennnings CD on Sony/BMG. I feared it was re-recordings, like Conway Twitty on Elektra, but then realized that BMG was actually RCA. But Elvis recordings aren’t on Sony: THAT I would have noticed. I looked at a recent Elvis acquisition, the expanded Million Dollar Quartet, and it was on Sun/RCA/BMG. Does that mean they’re branding all his recordings ”Sun” now? Cool. Comes full circle.
Speaking of branding, in 1973 I considered getting a Sun logo tattoo. If I had it’d’ve been unique and mysterious, but today would look like a smeary copy of that t-shirt everyone has.
Another circle I observed was the proliferation of soul bands led by older black guys at SXSW. Just like frat parties 50 years ago.
Word Stuff
If the nurse says ‘The doctor will see you shortly,’ object.
He should see you as long as it takes!
Likewise anyone who’ll be with you momentarily is pledging to spend no more than a moment with you.
In the book Comma Sutra, author Ph.D Laurie Rozakis says that plurals of letters and numbers get apostrophes. Like CD’s, 409’s. I concur.
More Life In The Bubble
We live in the music Bubble. We see everything through music eyes, and can’t understand anyone who doesn’t. When current and old Simon & Garfunkel tunes were put into “The Graduate” I thought, “So what? Everyone knows these.” Hardly. A S&G explosion ensued, catapulting them to permanent stardom. “Huh?” I thought.
That’s old, this is less-old. In 1991 I was annotating a Queen box set, never released, because ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ was to be used in ‘Wayne’s World.’ I thought “So what? Everyone knows that song.” No. It reached a tremendous new audience and pushed Queen sales into the stratosphere.
In the late 1970s I was awash in rockabilly and Jump reissues coming out of England and Sweden, thinking ‘Man, Brits and Swedes really know what’s cookin’!’ In time I came to learn that those records sold only a thousand or 1500 1 - much of it to Americans 2.
But gawd how we ate up that stuff as it was eyedropped out. Hearing an alternate take of Whole Lotta Shakin on a bootleg record - wow! Hearing Roy Brown for the first time. Wishing that that Sun session with Elvis and Perkins and Jerry Lee had been recorded, never dreaming that it someday would be found and released 3. (Heck, last month I saw 10 minutes of film of Elvis at the Tupelo State fair in mid-1956, the thing I’d seen only in photos, synched to a scratchy audio recording. Paradise!)
People don’t all think like me. When young rockabillies left the fold in the late 1980s, it boggled me that everyone doesn’t base their life on music. Gone were the flattops and sideburns, on came the business suits. I believe it’s called maturity, and that many people go through it.
Maybe it’s a generational thing. No new music of the past 30 years (including the rockabilly rehash), however valid, constituted an absolute revolution. We 50s kids recognized that something massive was happening, and the Pied Pipers were speaking to us - even if they weren’t! (Surely Little Richard didn’t have a 13-year-old boy in mind. Musically.) Our parents adamantly did not listen to the stations that played “music for colored people,” so when we all embraced it they wondered, legitimately, whence our taste for it came.
Of course, to say only 1956 marked a tectonic-plate shift in music sidesteps the emergence of Rap music. But it didn’t overtake and crush everything around it, despite many rappers being armed.
1 L.A. Rockabilly, which captivated many kids in L.A., sold about 1500.
2 When Billy Bremner of Rockpile moved to L.A. in 1984, he came because he thought America had a much stronger sense of rock history than his native England. Ha! He lives in Sweden now.
3 When Dave Alvin, of the Rollin’ Rock Blasters, bought a bootleg of this I went to his house in Downey and we sat on the floor of his room and listened in the dark with one lit candle.
Elvis Notes
Elvis was turned down for the lead role in The Rainmaker. But you can find Elvis references in it.
When Burt Lancaster, who’s dressed like he’s in Michael Kidd’s Billy The Kid ballet - and, also, with his red kerchief, like Elvis at the end of “Loving You” - goes to a dance, the town girl fixing on Earl Holliman (in real life this would be futile) is Yvonne Lime, an Elvis girlfriend, and the guy who tells her father where she’s gone is Kenneth Becker, the guy in “Loving You” who calls out “Hey, Sideburns” and ends up in a brawl. (Becker is not identified in Rainmaker credits.) Also, Wendell Corey, a co-star of Loving You, is in it. And it’s produced by Hal Wallis, who produced Loving You.
Here Are The Thought Police
In the 3/26/08 L.A. Times we learned that a trial-period female library aide was not hired after calling police when she saw a man looking at a picture of nude boys on a computer. She was told by her supervisor not to do it and disobeyed him. She is now hailed as righteous and wronged.
The man was looking at one photo of “naked, blonde boys.” 4 So? I might stare at such a photo, too. Or a photo of any-hair-color children, like the cherubs that Lewis Caroll photographed. I’d not be staring rigidly, it’s a curiosity, something I don’t commonly see: “It looks like my swim class at the YMCA 5 .” I could look all day without a rise in my interest.
4 An odd (and oddly, punctuated) detail. Writer Steve Chawkins seems to be saying these are the most come-hither type of boys.
5 I said it before but it bares repeating: All my swim classes, both at the YMCA and in 12 years of public schools in Chicago, were conducted in the nude. It boggled me then, and does now. Are they still doing it?
Music Notes
In the 1959 UK movie ‘I’m Alright Jack,’ a striking worker, a stutterer, is surrounded by the press and says “Why don’t you just f-f-f-f photograph us?” The source of a line in “My Generation”? I’d bet so. “Who” went to see British comedies but young British kids? I imagine they went home laughing hysterically “He almost said fuck!” Now picture little Pete Townsend among’em ... Flipping channels I see Regis & Kelly with Ray Davies. “I love the Kinks music” says Regis unconvincingly. “Your group played America even before the Beatles, didn’t it?” No, says Davies. “Well that’s what it says here on the card. Let’s hear Lola!” ... Davies, who has appeared in L.A. thrice in recent memory, headlined a 3/29 show at the 2000-seat Wiltern theater. The day before, Goldstar cheap-tix had $45 tickets on sale for $15, but those were in the nosebleed section ... Tom Jones is on youtube, 2007, doing “End of the Road,” the flipside of Crazy Arms, Jerry Lee Lewis’s first Sun record. I wonder if he chose that one so the Killer could get royalties, as it’s the only song he ever wrote. And I wonder how Jerry Lee wrote it when it was in the movie “Hallelujah” in 1929, six years before he was born ... When Aretha Franklin first emerged, I told everyone she was a tennis player. I was thinking of Althea Gibson (who, I believe, made records) ... I went March 19th to see “Rutlemania”s third performance, in Hollywood. The theater was a tenth full. Eric Idle, who’d been idling out front, made no stage appearance (contrasted with the Friday premiere’s celebrity blowout), and it left my friend and I feeling “What was this?” Beatle tribute band the Fab Four singing Rutles songs in front of scenes from the movie seemed cold and odd, - if you cheered, what exactly were you cheering? - and embellishing this with two go-go girls seemed cheap and even patronizing, as if this was “really giving you a show” for your thirty five bucks. (Hey, whadyu, a critic?)
Every Night’s A Lobster Trick At My House
The NY Times factually reported an Indian corporation’s purchase of Jaguar and Range Rover. The L.A. Times took two writers to lead with a reverie about famous people who drove Jaguars (Tony Blair left office in “what else? the back seat of a Jaguar”) and conclude that the Jaguar was the #1 symbol of British automaking. They never heard of Rolls Royce? Writers in their 20s, probably, with no sense. Of history.
Joe Mozingo’s 3/26/08 LA Times paean to a rugged handsome guy in Malibu who’s done stunt work, modeling, and owns a surfboard business tells us with a shiver of awe that the guy was “a lover of several models and actresses.” How can Mozingo write such junk? If the story’s subject ‘confided’ this to him, he’s a jagoff.
Poor Geoff Boucher. I know he’s from the L.A. Times, but do the Rolling Stones have to treat him like dirt so blatantly? In a 3/30/08 article giving them much-needed publicity for their latest moneymaking venture he wrote that, in New York, Jagger offered “a visitor” a cup of tea, and Richards greeted “the same scribe” with liquor. What was Geoff doing while they feted the more-worthy guy?
Geoff Muldaur, Art Fein, AFPP 3/21/08
Naomi Robbins, on cable radio as ‘angel baby,” Dick Blackburn, record collector and “Eating Raoul” guy, and the cake she had made for his birthday party. Taylor’s Steak House, L.A. 3/27/08
Words
On March 28, Wolf Blitzer used “buzz” and “spike” in one sentence.
Two stories on the front page of a recent NY Times business section contained the word ‘famously.’ Saying something is famous proves it isn’t, but using more words makes you sound more jiggy. And famously is especially impressive because it’s epidemically in play.
During the big February Starbucks publicity stunt (two articles in the L.A. Times), the media all referred to their coffee clerks as ‘baristas.’ Soda servers were soda jerks because their job consisted of pulling a handle, so these are coffee jerks. The other jerks are writers and editors who subserviently obey corporate wording mandates.
On April 1 Kim Murphy in the L.A. Times used “bad boy” and “morphed” in one sentence of a front page article. (“Bad boy” was misused. The airport [!] she was describing was a shambles, not a charming miscreant.)
A presidential candidate’s aide said their campaign must have people “on the ground” during the primary. This is military. People use it because to use more words makes you seem smarter. Does no newsperson ever ask “Do you mean not hovering in mid-air like the rest of us?”
How long is your shortlist?
I wanna know the frontstory!
I snapped my head so hard it nearly unscrewed April 3rd when I heard a reporter gal on KTLA morning news cite an allegation, then the “allegator.” Amos & Andy were smiling.
Burying the Lede
David Zahniser’s 3/31/08 L.A. Times article about his oft-stolen 1989 Toyota raised many questions. 6
- The first theft, he said, was when parked on a dark underpass, avoiding the parking fee while doing research at the Dept. Of Building and Safety.
If he was working for the L.A. Times, don’t they reimburse him? Or did he turn in a $2 chit and pocket it? Time for an audit! This is odd behavior for an employed person, unless he is VERY cheap.
- For each recovery, he paid around $200 at the impound yard.
Shouldn’t the city of L.A. be lambasted for this? Punishing someone for having their car stolen? My car was stolen and taken to El Monte against my will. The police there waived the tow fee 7 .
- He lives in Echo Park, and contrasts the pettiness of his car-theft problem with numerous killings there.
Echo Park sounds like a killing field! Does he live there because the Times pays poorly, or because he has a death wish? Journalism students should take note of his penurious ways. They logically think that writing for one of the nation’s biggest newspapers pays handsomely.
- He says that his copy of “Evan Almighty” was not taken in the most recent theft because it’s “the cinematic equivalent of a 1989 Camry - something no thief wants for long.”
The guy’s bucking for a film crit slot.
6 INTENTIONAL EUPHEMISM. When someone says something “was raised” they evade saying “Made me wonder.” Just like “Some say” and “Many wondered” and “said one onlooker.” Write plenty, but say nothing!
7 I had a tow fee waived in L.A., but I’m still not happy. My wife was stopped at 9:30 pm on a dark road for not having current sticker on the lic plate. The cop said “Your tag is August, this is January, that’s over 6 months so we have to tow it.” She was one block from our house. Next day I realized he was wrong: it was 5 months. We called the cops. They said it sounded like a mistake had been made. We learned that the check to the DMV had been cashed in July but not recorded. She got a tag at AAA, and the tow-yard fee was waived. But the cop who stopped her on a dark street waited a half hour before writing her up. Was he angling for a ‘trade’? Funny, nobody from the police department called and apologized or investigated him. Heck, cops kill people in L.A. on less cause than this.
YOUTUBE CONNECTOR
Allison Krauss & Union Station
Letter to L.A. Times, unpublished
Re Ann Powers 3-28-08 article protesting the rejection of a soul singer from American Idol.
Regarding Ann Powers alt.-sociology lesson, pop music has never been about middle-aged men, African-American or otherwise. Motown was the sound of YOUNG America and Otis Redding died at 26 while Little Richard and Fats Domino were selling no records, irrespective of how many people were in jail. It’s shallow thinking to equate the normal pop music attrition of aging men (and women) with a racist society.
Life’s Little Perks
I do this little column, run a tv show. It is fun and fulfilling, but there’s no physical contact with people other than at the Elvis show. Then something comes up.
* At Rockaway Records in Silver Lake they were selling an article about Frank Zappa, sealed in plastic. Looked familiar. Wait - It’s the article I wrote in Cash Box in 1975. I took the photo on the front page!
* I had SONiA from disappear fear on the tv show again. “You don’t know how many people have seen that first show you did with her in 1994” her manager said. This positively baffled me. It ran once in L.A., maybe once also in Austin and New York. Who’s showing it? Where is it playing? It’s nice to see that this stuff has a life of its own.
* When Mike Stinson showed up for my tv show his friend said “My cousin in Salinas watches your show.” I was puzzled: How’d it get there? Then he said “It runs on Monterey Cable, doesn’t it?” Of course. I send it to Monterey, didn’t know it got as far as Salinas.
Good Deal, Lucille
At Amoeba, the big record store in Hollywood, you can buy a used CD and return it within a week for 75% credit. But you don’t get the tax back, so it works out to 66%, still, a hell of a deal if you’re ripping, as the kids say.
Neighborhood News
At a function at the Junction (Beachwood), I asked a resident what impact Scientology’s local properties made on the area.
“Well, it’s different seeing white people putting up stucco.”
- 57 -
Mark On The Move
My annual trip to Austin’s South By Southwest was memorable mostly for documentary films including “The Sweet Lady With The Nasty Voice” (a well-designed bio of Wanda Jackson and her times with performance footage and tributes from Rosie Flores, Elvis Costello etc.), “The Order of Myths,” a brilliant look at the oldest Mardi Gras celebration in the country -- Mobile, Alabama, not New Orleans – and the racial drama of duelling white & black parades (it’s directed by Margaret Brown, who did the great Townes Van Zandt doc a couple years ago) and “Throw Down Your Heart,” Bela Fleck’s film of his travels in Africa, jamming with musicians mostly unaware that Bela’s banjo is an African instrument. I hope all these get a decent TV or theatrical release, they deserve it.
As for music in Austin, I saw Backdoor Slam (from the Isle of Man nicely stuck in 1966 blues-rock territory), The Cowsills at the Central Presbyterian Church (their set included “The Rain, The Park And Other Things” and “Hair,” which to my astonishment I found very moving), and, in town from Brooklyn, my son’s girlfriend’s band Scary Mansion (breathy vocals, smashing drums, twin sisters, depressing lyrics). I also enjoyed Buddy Miller’s afternoon set at the New West Records party, at least before Johnny Rivers jumped on stage to play blues guitar – what, no “Secret Agent Man”? And for the first time in many years, I failed to hear see James McMurtry or Bill Kirchen, although both were in town. Often I was elsewhere, following bad recommendations for bands not worth crossing the street for (which is all you have to do in Austin.) (Actually, some of the venues were so close together you could hear three bands at once without moving at all, not a good innovation.)
Later in the month in Santa Fe I visited the Museum of International Folk Art, which among its treasures houses the massive collection of eccentric designer Alexander Girard, including miniature cathedrals made of tin foil, Day of The Dead artifacts, and barber signs from Haiti. You’d need an entire day to soak up everything, but in two hours I got the gist of it and will go back someday. I also saw Ian Tyson playing at the Lensic Performing Arts Center. He was in fine form, with songs revolving around ranch life, the Civil War and the ups & downs of love. The audience sang along with many tunes, including “Navajo Rug,” “Four Strong Winds” and “Magpie” (but Ian didn’t do “Someday Soon”). His stories and intros were as good as the songs. A 75 he’s still making a living being himself.
In Taos I drove 15 miles out of town and 5 more miles down a dirt road to the grave of D.H. Lawrence, whose ashes are encased in a shrine on a hill. His wife Frieda is buried nearby. Though D.H. didn’t die in Taos, his connection with it was so strong that she had him disinterred five years after his death, cremated, and reburied there. Later, at a meeting of the local Friends of D.H. Lawrence, held at the La Fonda hotel I learned he and I were born on the same day 67 years apart. I bought a new copy of Sons and Lovers in celebration.
-- Mark Leviton
(Mark’s sixties-themed radio show Pet Sounds can be heard alternate Mondays 4-7am PST on KVMR-FM 89.5 in the Sacramento area and streaming at www.kvmr.org )
