Broke And Seductive

The holidays always look differently when you don't have a lot of money to play with, and I'm not talking about being homeless. I'm talking about being heavily in debt and pouring all your money into paying all the money lenders off, becoming so bad that all your credit cards have been shut down. Drat. It makes you see ridiculous things in a different way, like emails from the same vendor sent to you three times a day: "SALE!!! SAVE NOW FOR THIS HOLIDAY SEASON!"

Yeah, it's bad: I'm so skint I work two jobs, seven days a week and still not really making a dent in anything. But Best Buy and Nordstrom Rack don't care. There's this constant nagging to spend unlimited amounts of cash which you haven't got. I'm at my poorest in I don't know how many decades: maybe three? It's despairing, but I'll pay everyone off.

This constant banging on the door of our lives making us pay for crap we don't really need:
"BUT THESE SHOES LOOK REALLY COOL!"
"You already have FIVE PAIRS of shoes you barely ever wear!"
And that's me, not my wife.

Being broke allows you the insight to see that your holiday should never be defined to how much crap you get or even how much you buy. As long as you're not coughing out bloody phlegm from an acquired cold or scratching your chapped hands until they're raw then you're having a great holiday.

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Of course nobody's buying books anymore. Actors and rock groups and models and standup comedians are on talk shows every night. How often do you see an author on a talk show? How are books supposed to sell if television ignores the written word and people of letters?

Once upon a time, talk show hosts like Dick Cavett and Merv Griffin(!) had writers on their programs on a regular basis. I vividly remember seeing Henry Miller on the Merv Griffin show in the 1970's, back when people used to read and regularly buy books. He was a pretty interesting guest and I'm not even a big Miller fan.

Television is one of the best promotional tools around, and there's no better proof than when Harvey Pekar used to appear regularly on Late Night with David Letterman, which immensely goosed up sales for his books. Unfortunately, if TV insists on ignoring writers then books will never make money. Would it really kill people to see James Ellroy or Joe Lansdale on a talk show? I think they would be great.

I think the great fear is that many writers would probably punk out these lame hosts and outsmart them and out-talk them, but so what? It wouldn't be the end of the fucking world. So Harlan Ellison told you you were stupid. Control freaks! I hate them all.

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Recently I watched Cecil B. DeMille's Cleopatra, the closest thing to a Ken Russell film not made by Ken Russell. Claudette Colbert pouring on the sexy charm with aplomb, more playful than Elizabeth Taylor's strident performance; Warren William as a cool, very likeable Julius Caesar and Henry Wilcoxon as party boy Marc Antony.

The movie's a 90-minute model of decadence, like erotic entertainment for Marc Antony of leopard-skinned honeys being trapped and tied up by muscle bound brutes. Fish nets dragging more cuties from the Nile River brandishing pearls and gems by the fistful.

Colbert gives a seductive and playful performance as the great Egyptian queen. The film is every inch a spectacle: DeMille liked to take liberties with hoary Shakespeare and Bible classics, making them more erotic and surreal to add an extra dimensions. DeMille's Cleopatra is absolutely dazzling with great costumes, art direction and nutty special effects, but after all is said and done, none of this would be worthy of your attention without the outrageous, seductive charm of Claudette Colbert.

My Living Doll: Aphrodite Meets the Space Age

In the early Sixties teenage America fell under the spell of the Horror & Sci-fi movie explosion hitting drive-in theaters all across the country. It was tearing them away from their TV sets, and CBS fought back by programming an army of shows to win them back. Shows like The Munsters, My Favorite Martian and Lost in Space were hitting the airwaves harder than John Glenn’s orbit in Friendship 7. There was one show in the bunch that was the most memorable and stranger than the rest called My Living Doll.

My Living Doll starred musical actress Julie Newmar and Forties matinee idol Bob Cummings. Although it was a situation comedy it was more sophisticated that the other shows listed above; I think it simultaneously helped the show and destroyed it, too.

My Living Doll began as the tale of Dr. Bob McDonald, psychiatrist for a NASA-based agency, who gets a call in his office from the head scientists in robotics warning him of a robot on the loose rampaging around the building. Expecting a terrifying nuts and bolts cyborg to wreak havoc in the hallway, Dr. McDonald is accosted instead by a beautiful Amazon clad only in a towel!

Julie Newmar lists her training in mime as background for the role of Rhoda (formerly AF 709) and she uses it to full advantage. Her jerky robotic movements are flawless in their execution and her facial expressions as a machine processing bizarre human behavior and equally perfect. Watching her defuse lecherous men's advances with cold, mechanical responses is space age feminism at its finest.

Viewing the episodes of My Living Doll: The Official Collection DVD, are a mixed bag between sexual tension and feminine comedy (beauty contests; kleptomania at a Beverly Hills jewelers, etc.) with the feminine comedy being more fun to watch. The sexual tension business is neither funny nor sexy, due to Cummings working the camera too hard.

Speaking of Cummings, the character of Dr. McDonald was intended to create some spark of sexual tension between himself and Rhoda, but the producers shot the pooch by hiring a tired old guy to play a young, available bachelor. Just think what the show would have been like if they hired someone like, oh, Adam West to play Dr. McDonald. (Never mind).

Legend has it that Cummings was not only jealous of Newmar’s popularity but even wanted to take over her role as the robot. The poor man thought kids were tuning in to watch him!

I remember watching this show shortly before Newmar hit pay dirt as The Catwoman on Batman and liked it, but it was obvious the show was doomed. With her Amazon build and low, husky voice, Newmar was on a wavelength that wasn’t TV friendly at all. Although the producers tried to make her look wholesome there was an aggressive eroticism about this robot that definitely made the show too bizarre to be successful.

Walking a tightrope between beautiful and funny is a major risk, Thelma Todd being the most infamous example, but few pull it off as brilliantly as Julie Newmar, and if you want to see it done to perfection than seek out My Living Doll: The Official Collection, Volume One, available on MPI Home Video.

Little Johnny Jewel (Parts 1 & 2)

Everybody wants their stuff and they want it now. "We want the world and we want it now", Jim Morrison bleated almost fifty years ago and nothing has changed. If you want a song or an entire record you can get it a matter of seconds, movies, books, you name it. But it wasn't always that way.

In 1975 glam was going through its last gasp - you knew it was over when The Edgar Winter Group threw on the spackle and platform boots. Punk rock crawled its way through just like the freaks crawled under the circus wagon in the thunder storm with knives in their mouths, ready to gut Venus and Hercules.

I followed the glam scene closely in Rock Scene Magazine and there were gurgles about punk bands in New York like The Ramones, The Fast, Patti Smith, The Mumps, The Stilettos and Television. Television was the most interesting looking as they were the very antithesis of glam: short hair, no makeup, torn clothes and crappy pawn shop guitars. One particular photo by Christopher Makos of Tom Verlaine and Richard Hell made them look like Richard Speck and Charles Starkweather formed their own noise band. The only nod to glam was Richard Lloyd, who sported platinum blonde hair like Debbie Harry.

Rock Scene Magazine printed a little caption announcing an exciting new single by Television called "Little Johnny Jewel (Parts 1 & 2)" on Ork Records. It only cost $3.00 and could be purchased post paid from a P. Laughner in Cleveland, Ohio. It was the most eagerly anticipated single of its time. Yeah, back in the day we had no downloads. We had to send money across the country for a 45 RPM single. There was a quite a wait (more on that in a second) but the wait was worth it.

After sitting out for an eternity waiting for the single to arrive I received an interim postcard from Peter Laughner, the front of the postcard advertising Television with his band Rocket From The Tombs (who would later split into The Dead Boys and Pere Ubu). On the other side of the postcard was an apology from Peter Laughner for the delay.

"Dear Avram*- As regards TV all orders were forwarded to New York City as the response was fantastic they had to do a third pressing of the record to meet demands - please be patient and thank for your support.
Peter Laughner
P.S. As further correspondence should be directed to me at the above address (Cleveland Heights, Ohio)".

Well, I eventually got my single and it was so bizarre, not what I expected, it wasn't rock but it was definitely a very New York record. What does that mean? Well, I see the Museum of Modern Art when I hear the single, I hear some jazz club like The Five Spot. I feel beatnik frequencies ripping into my head, ESP-DISK nightmares, even some of The Godz and Silver Apples in their sound. Very New York.

"Little Johnny Jewel (Parts 1 & 2)" sounds like a dark, dark, dark beatnik coffee house, seductive in its intimacy. You can smell the burning candles - the record sounds ascetic for its time, avoiding the decadence of Queen or The Tubes or any other overproduced glam rock of the time.

Part 1 begins with Fred Smith playing a very simple bass line over and over while the guitars make twittering and plucking noises, like they're waking up and then Billy Ficca's drums kick in, not playing a simple 4/4 punk beat, but shock horrors (!!!) it's a disco beat.
As soon as the drums simmer a cool disco beat the guitars wail a remedial, almost naive fanfare. Tom Verlaine sings a very cool, laid back vocal like Lou Reed in "Here She Comes Now".

What's so remarkable about the recording is that it's a veritable textbook in dynamics, drums exploding one moment then simmering, guitars howling and then whispering, emitting moods of slacker cool and boiling tension equally. I like the part where Tom whispers like a hypnotist, "And he ran down to the airport...the rush, the roar...and he crouched down behind a fence...with a chest full of lights..." The guitars go impressionist, playing sparse but bright notes like winking airport lights, quiet hypnotic guitars and the drums sending us out of Part 1.

Part 2 picks up where Part 1 left off, the hypnotic part building up into a noisy palette of sounds, guitar picks banging against necks like Jackson Pollock splatters of paint, and then explodes into a perverse flamenco guitar solo punctuated by a high shrieking note. All the guitars eschewed the big fuzz Marshall stack arena sound, Richard Lloyd strumming simply behind Verlaine's freedom guitar playing.

The second side ends with Verlaine returning to the main theme, crooning cooly, "Oh Little Johnny Jewel...he's so cool...but if you see him looking lost...you ain't gotta come on so boss!
And you know that he's paid...you know that he's paid the price...all you gotta do for that guy...is wink your eye". Mysterious lyrics, mysterious music. Entranced by TV.

Rock groups weren't supposed to be mysterious or quietly sly, music was by and large loud and brash. Television made people nervous because they weren't a quick study. Personally I thought "Little Johnny Jewel" was a far more auspicious debut than Patti Smith's "Piss Factory" which had a corny Broadway musical jive to it. It could've been a show stopper in a musical like "Rent". But I digress.

Television released a single which sold out several times over and captured the mystery of New York. It was executed so well even the band had trouble living up to their promise with subsequent recordings. It wasn't punk rock but it wasn't average Joe rock, either. It was lightning in a bottle set to music. What a great five minutes it was.

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* I used to use my Hebrew name in correspondence, in this case being Avram, Abram also known as Abraham before God anointed him as Father of the Jews. In other words, as Sun Ra once said, "I have many names, names of mystery, names of splendor".

Rock & Roll Confidential Part 6

As far as I'm concerned punk rock started with this Craig Godlis photograph published in Andy Warhol's Interview in 1975 depicting Television collaborators Tom Verlaine and Richard Hell in their most raggedly ragged ramshackle glory. Their music fell short of their wild looks but this photo pretty much lit the fuse to what was to be The Sex Pistols look and what eventually would become "punk fashion".

Here's an ad for The Mercer Arts Center from The Village Voice during the summer of 1972. If you look down at The Oscar Wilde Room you'll notice a bill for "The Dolls of N.Y." (!). It doesn't mention the other acts performing like Suicide, KISS, Queen Elizabeth featuring Wayne County or The Stilettos (Deborah Harry), among others.
I didn't catch the blurb for the Dolls so I missed them (sorry), but I did catch the Off-Broadway production of "One Flew Over The Cukoo's Nest" (predating the movie, BTW) which was very good featuring Lane Smith in the role of Randall McMurphy. Lane Smith later played Perry White on the ABC-TV show "Lois and Clark".

In the late 1960's Frank Zappa extensively advertised Mothers of Invention albums in Marvel Comics. This great ad designed by Cal Schenkel was on the inner cover of a giant-sized Spider Man Special comic.

Here's an ad for Led Zeppelin playing The Rose Palace in Pasadena, California with Julie Driscoll, Brian Auger & The Trinity opening. The cost of a ticket was only $4 back then. Those were the days.


Pictured below is a press photograph of Sparks seen performing on "American Bandstand" around the era of "A Woofer In Tweeter's Clothing" (1973). While I'm not the world's most foremost authority on all things Sparks-related they're probably doing "Wonder Girl" or "Girl From Germany". Notice the cartoon sledgehammer Russell Mael is sporting.