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The Race For The Presidency: Two New Yorkers (more or less) fight for the Presidency and the country loses. I tend to agree with the four more years chorus but that ain’t happening. Really, what we have is two septuagenarians fighting over which privileged white asshole will run the country.
As badass fashion statement, really hard to beat. From many years ago.
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You knew this was coming.
Follow it most excellently with “Red Zone Barbecue.” “Everysing’s all right!”
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If you’ve been bombing them for fifteen years, playing cover tunes in toady countries isn’t spreading good will.
Our men are seriously deluded:
“Until you see what we do, it’s hard to really understand the mission impact music can have,??? Senior Master Sgt. Ryan Carson said in a phone interview from Doha, Qatar, where his Air Force rock band, Max Impact, is deployed. (They can’t even think of a band name that isn’t a grim joke to everybody else on the receiving end.)
“In recent months, he and his five band mates have played in Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait and a number of what he called “undisclosed locations,??? performing popular songs in Arabic for foreign dignitaries, troops and children, as well as globally recognized American rock anthems by groups like Journey and Bon Jovi.
“We are allowing people to relax, connect, have meaningful interactions. For a lot of these people, it leaves a really lasting, positive impression of our country and our military,??? he said.
And these are not tunes played by the public relations brigade of the American Wehrmacht. Listen, guys, you don’t rock, you never will, no way. It was never about dressing up and doing glee club in the Vichy cities of the Middle East.
Once there may have been a good and noble purpose for military bands. Heck, I saw them when I was a kid. A US Army rock band came and played my high school in Pine Grove. They did James Brown to Jimi Hendrix. But, jeezus, they’ve obliterated all that. What a disgrace, an affront to music. Hang your heads in shame.
Achtung Musikband soldiers. (Note old dude who thinks it’s bullshit and has to be ordered to sing.)
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One of Elvis Presley’s most successful movies, Blue Hawaii from ’61 was a big box office draw, its soundtrack album gold the next year.
Do you like ukuleles in your rock ‘n’ roll? Hawaii-nized styles? If so, you’ll like the show tunes more than I did. In 2016 they’re mostly embarrassing, songs for a movie backing band of natives bopping around on bongos in back of Presley. “Ito Eats,” a tune about one of the more heavy set eating half a dozen fish or more on the beach will break a cold flopsweat out on the back of your neck.
Angela Lansbury plays what must have been one of her most excruciating roles, ever, as Elvis’s (Chadwick Gates) mother, a southern woman played as a grating ninny who’s onscreen way too much. Her Chinese servant boy is named Ping Pong. Jeezus.
Having given you the crap first, it’s fair to say Blue Hawaii must have been great for tourism, the state’s Chamber of Commerce loving it all the way. It’s a good triptych, the cinematography from the last island in the line, Kauai, great.
Elvis’ love interest, Maile (pronounced “Miley”), played by Joan Blackman, is easy on the eyes as are all the girls, teenage tourists, the unstated feature of the film that’s an inoffensive story about Elvis stumbling into a travel business with his girlfriend while trying to avoid his helicopter parents. Keep your eyes open for Beverly, obviously not a teenager even though playing one, who dances up a storm for the little bit she’s onscreen.
The hit here is one of the indispensable parts of the Presley catalog, “Can’t Help Falling in Love.” The rest is a bit of lite rock ‘n’ roll, Elvis ala Perry Como, and, you know, throwaway ukulele stuff to be taken or left, mostly left.
The Elvis Presley Film Festival.
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From the archives: A tune from the 2004 musical, “Iraq ‘N’ Roll.” Came with an authentic Iraqi Freedom WMD leaflet dropped by the US Air Force, among other things, including a T-shirt. Prior to universal freetardism, actually sold in stores — Amoeba on Sunset, a shop in Pasadena, and one in Bethlehem.
Sold out and rare. Downloadable, of course.
Stumbled in here by accident? Confused? Outraged? Look up “satire,” “social criticism.”
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Timely, from 2003. Eventually, even Arnold was excommunicated by the GOP. When he made governor, the party was still half-sane.
The first recording I did in California. Got it mentioned in the Los Angeles Times, too, pre universal freetardism. Downloadable.
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It’s 1969 and Elvis has already taped his comeback special. After years of inexplicable and/or inexcusable dog crap — “Speedway,” “Clambake,” “It Happened at the World’s Fair,” “Kissin’ Cousins,” to name some — he knows it will restore his image. So The Trouble With Girls, a disjointed farce, features Elvis with confidence restored, a perpetual smile plastered across his face.
As Walter Hale, manager of a Chautauqua (think traveling omnibus show with quack lecturers, actors, musicians and supervisors ready to host a local talent show wherever the traveling group arrives), Elvis wears a white suit, smokes a cigar and jovially tries to keep his favorite dancer and piano player, Marlyn Mason, from quitting over management’s opposition to unionization.
The cast is all-star. Dabney Coleman is a sleazy town pharmacist. He sells illegal fireworks to two children to get the goods off his hands and sexually harasses his assistant, Sheree North. John Carradine and Vincent Price play Chatauqua lecturers, the latter who goes on endlessly about morality after gypping a cab-driver. Joyce van Patten has a bit part as an unbalanced long-distance swimmer brought along to tell the landlocked residents of Radford Center the finer points of crossing the English Channel.
In fact, there are two cases of sexual harassment hiding in The Trouble With Girls, one with Elvis’ on his piano player, and the second with Coleman preying on his assistant (North) which eventually results in her killing him in self-defense.
The latter is used as a comedic climax in which the Chautauqua troop tries to sober up a very intoxicated and distraught North so she can confess to a big crowd from the town. Depending on your mood, The Trouble With Girls is either awkward and occasionally tasteless, or mildly amusing. The internet informs it was paired as a double matinee paired with a Raquel Welch film. That would have made a long afternoon.
Presley looks like he’s having a good time through it all, though, and the music, which was only a few songs worth, doesn’t add or substract.
Previously, in the Pasadena Elvis Presley Film Festival.
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While things pretty much suck here and there’s no shortage of people living out of cars on the street, Tom Friedman, alarmed at the rise of Donald Trump, declares that we’re actually in a New Renaissance.
And after checking his stack of recent book press releases sent by wise people who want publicity, he’s found an expert to say so, Ian Goldin, director of the Oxford Martin School at Oxford University.
Consulting by e-mail, readers are told:
“Now, like then, new media have democratized information exchange, amplifying the voices of those who feel they have been injured in the upheaval,??? said Goldin. “Now, like then, public leaders and public institutions have failed to keep up with rapid change, and popular trust has been deeply eroded.??? Now, like then, “this is the best moment in history to be alive??? — human health, literacy, aggregate wealth and education are flourishing — and “there are more scientists alive today than in all previous generations … as in the Renaissance, key anchors in people’s lives — like the workplace and community — are being fundamentally dislocated. The pace of technological change is outstripping the average person’s ability to adapt. Now, like then, said Goldin, “sizable parts of the population found their skills were no longer needed, or they lived in places left behind, so inequality grew.???
The answer to all the turmoil is, of course, found by consulting the Internet’s Box of Crackerjack tech-spertise: “More risk-taking is required when things change more rapidly, both for workers who have to change jobs and for businesses who have to constantly innovate to stay ahead.”
They’d probably tar and feather the guy in Pennsylvania. Not necessarily a bad thing.
Check the appropriate song. You’ve heard it before, “China Toilet Blues, still timely, with me channeling Captain Beefheart, somewhere between Trout Mask Replica and Bongo Fury.
Downloadable for your device, just go to the site. Tell your friends. Share. Make me happy for a minute.
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In which I return to Nightclubbing reviewing, if it were still done today.
The joint: IPA Blues. The audience: Fifty people over sixty, enthusiastic for classic stuff and authenticity. The act: Haystacks Balloon & the Near-Sighted Lemon Bud Wilkinson Band, seen here performing “Baby Baby Baby Baby Baby” from their 2015 album, Prescription Nitroglycerin.
Although it looks like Haystacks has an oxygen tube in his mouth, don’t worry, it’s just the blues harmonica line.
In another number, Haystacks and his band sang about revolution. “Don’t look at us to bring it” seemed to be the message.
Finally, Mr. Balloon played “Got the Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease Blues” from 2016’s Fell Down, Sorry. The Lemon Bud Wilkinson Band, on life support, was right behind him every step of the way.
Otium, acriter!
If you’re confused, this is Steve Earle and the Dukes, from a 2015 tour.
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