The Other JB, But not James - or Jackson - Brown(e)

My childhood friend Mike always got to see the movies I couldn't go to. He'd tell me the next day about "Planet of the Apes", "Easy Rider", "The Godfather" or whatever. Whatever, though, was usually the latest James Bond movie.

I remember "Goldfinger", or rather Mike's retelling of it, most clearly. Something about a naked woman painted gold. Now, there were at least two things in that sentence that I'd never seen before. And the promise of vastly more.

One aspect of my childhood, and maybe yours, was that, as much as we had, there always seemed to be something else a little out of reach. Back before VCRs and DVD players, you either caught a movie in the theater or, if you were lucky, a mangled version of it on TV years later. Some obstacles to luck were the movie being on too late, your parents still not letting you see it, or your siblings wanting to watch something else. (I dimly recall such a conflict. I don't remember what everybody else wanted to see, but my choice was "I Dream of Jeannie". "Well, you can dream of her later" mom said. Dream I did, and more.) So by the time you got to see it - whatever the damned thing was - you were older, and wondered what all the fuss was about. One exception was "Night of the Living Dead", which held up to expectations once it came on late night TV, thankfully not too long after some friends raved about it.

But certain TV series, or movies that were part of a series, always fascinated me. Did you know anyone who went in at 8pm on Saturday night to watch "The Prisoner"? Well, now you do. (I still managed to miss the last episode, though.) Whenever there was more than one part to something, I became fascinated in finding all of them. "Origin" stories were of particular interest. And back then, the chances of seeing all of them were close to nil.

Such fascination recently drove me to renting the first (but only the first) "Lost in Space" DVD. I had been told about it numerous times by friends who had seen it and then gotten on with their lives. Not me. But now Netflix would be my salvation once again! But, you know, it kind of sucked. Big surprise. Well, I'm finally past it. And how.

As an avid comic reader, I was always missing one of the parts of a series (Damn you, Marvel! At least your lame competitor DC kept the stories to a single issue.) I would address this in a manner much too embarrassing to detail even here. But that's the story of my life – always missing a piece, always obsessed with finding it.

Then there were the trading cards which basically canonized a movie or TV show. Besides JB, there was "Planet of the Apes", "The Monkees" and, oh yeah, baseball. The JB cards even had trivia questions on the back.

Question: How did Goldfinger die?

Answer, from full-of-crap friend: "He swallowed a jet"

"Swallowed A JET?" I asked. "Yeah, it's a small pill that...blah, blah, blah." No wonder I was obsessed.

So, for me, James Bond was special. There was all that sex (or, to my eight year old mind, all that being cool around girls) and violence. And the fact that James did a lot of his secret agenting while wearing a suit. This gave us something fun to do on Sundays after Mass, since our parents made us stay dressed up. We could play James Bond (or Man from UNCLE)! I wonder how many father's hats were ruined by a kid who borrowed it to play "Oddjob"?

Apparently I was not alone in feeling this way. I just finished reading "The Man Who Saved Britain", by Simon Winder, which is about one (other) man's ridiculous obsession with the whole James Bond phenomenon. He, being about ten years younger than me, got sucked in by "Live and Let Die". While I find that hard to believe, I'm the last one who should talk. It's an hilarious confession, and an fascinating history of post war Britain. It goes a long way to explain JB's popularity then.

If not the abberrant behavior I'd occasionally display. Like ten years ago, back before Netflix, when one of the cable channels, as a Thanksgiving treat, ran "all" of the James Bond movies back to back. Now, I'm not a complete idiot. I wasn't expecting "Citizen Kane", but I did see this as a great opportunity to tape them and then, finally, watch and savor(?) them one by one at my leisure. This would resolve all the mysteries, fill in all the blanks, put all the puzzle pieces in place. My life would be officially complete, what with the wife and kid thing already checked off.

So I set up the basement VCR, and kicked it off at 8pm that night. Unbeknownst to me, at about 8:02pm my then six year old son Michael went down to the basement and changed the channel. Luckily(?) for me, at 8:03,he came up and asked if I was taping anything (What a great kid, huh?) But it was too late. Now my anticipated 8 or 16 hours of pure JB had been irretrievably ruined by this precious minute of over-taping. How would I even follow the plot now? What deep insights did this one minute at the start of "Dr No" hold that would strengthen my appreciation of the subsequent sixteen hour's worth of movies? IT WAS ALL…TOTALLY…RUINED!

So I might have overreacted a little.

I yelled a bit, and Michael got upset (Sorry, Mikey!). He drew a heartbreaking picture of him leaving home "so that all the problems would go away". This picture is still kept and treasured, and continues to remind me that even if Mikey were to mug an old lady or set our house on fire - with me in it - I can't yell at him.

My wife told me that I came thiiiis close to getting the "Complete James Bond" Movie Collection that Christmas - which I must tell you I definitely DID NOT want. Why not, you might ask? Well, as I explained to my wife at the time, I wasn't watching these movies to enjoy them so much as I was trying to satisfy my curiosity. By the way, I never got past "Goldfinger".

Even I began to figure out that the things that fascinate you as a kid don't hold up very well later. (Exception: Little Rascals. But I will now try to determine if there is anything here to warrant such fascination.

Let's try the movies:

Dr No

A friend from Jamaica told me that he was living there when they were filming this, and actually met Sean Connery. He described the pre-SNL Connery as "nice and friendly". Aside from the scenery, the only thing here is the basic formula: mad scientist, beautiful woman, dying minority henchmen.

From Russia With Love

If memory serves, this ended up on a double bill with Dr. No when the Goldfinger hoopla was dying down. This one holds up the best, which, sadly, isn't saying much now. It also marks the first of many occasions when JB turns a bad girl good. (How, I wondered?) And there I was wasting time trying to turn the good ones bad. It has a plot, a few henchmen and some gadgets. The latter would get totally out of hand later.

Goldfinger:

Well, there's no getting around it. This is the grail. The lodestone. The source of all the allure and mystery. The Daily News, even years later, would call it "smashing entertainment", and, okay, it's not too bad. It's also unfair of me to expect it to be much better. I'm more of a John le Carre type, so there's only so much I can like this stuff,

But to hell with it. Here goes: First, there are all the self sacrificing, yet incompetent henchmen (the benefits must have been great) another bad (and butch) girl turned good (and less butch), the numerous gadget's that are introduced and methodically checked off as the movie progresses. Really, Goldfinger couldn't have been more accommodating. And who knew there was such a large population of Asians in Virginia? Oddjob was pretty cool, though.

Overall, a prime example of the movie in my head being better than the one on the screen.

Thunderball:

This is the first one that I got to see IN THE THEATER WHEN IT WAS FIRST RELEASED. I proceeded to brag about it for weeks afterward at school. I haven't seen it in a while, and all I can remember is a lot of water. Occasionally it shows up on cable, but one look at Donald Pleasance in scuba gear is enough to make me turn this one off immediately.

You Only Live Twice

Ah cruel fate! I was home in my room when I heard my brother and friends calling me from downstairs. I decided to play hide and seek with them. So I hid, but unfortunately, no one seeked. It turned out that they were calling me because they were going to see YOLT, which they made sure to tell me "was great". And of course, the same full-of-crap friend was there later to tell me how James Bond dies in it. At the beginning. ("Dies?" "Yeah. Really!" followed by some utter nonsense I believed, and thus, became re-obsessed over. Really, he should have been a writer.)

It all starts to get hazy now. I haven't seen "On Her Majesty's Secret Service", and it may never make it to the top of my Netflix queue. "Diamonds are Forever" had the requisite explosions and Jill St. John, so it "was great".

The only thing I remember about "Live and Let Die" is how bad the grammar is in the title song ("In this ever changing world in which we live in..." Really Paul? That's the best you could do?) I tried numerous times to watch Roger Moore but just never get beyond the first five minutes. Ditto the rest of them.

Until Daniel Craig did such a great job in "Casino Royale".

This, of course, threatened to wake the monster again, and I did end up reading the book, which is the first of the JB novels. It wasn't bad, so I went onto the second book, "Live and Let Die" which was pretty good, too. But not good enough to keep me going.

I'm a mature adult now, so I think it's time to stop this nonsense and move onto something more grown up.

Like "McHale's Navy".

Bound to a Chair and Forced to Watch

Unlike a lot of high falutin' critics who like to appear above it all, and who are, after all, paid to criticize, I'm just a fan, and so don't think there's a lot of bad art out there.  I do think that there is a lot of "good but not quite compelling" art.  You might be tempted to call it "worthwhile", but I have a lot less "while" left than I used to, and it's worth more to me now than it used to be.  So please don't think me a snob for passing on almost everything that's out there.

 
I'm a bell curve kind of guy, and figure that about 5% of stuff is great, another 5% totally sucks, and the rest is in that middle range that I call Movies (or whatever) I might enjoy if you tied me to a chair, put a gun to my head and forced me to watch (Or MIMEIYTMTACPAGTMHAFMTW, for short).

 
But the principal is especially applicable to watching TV, since it's right there in your house waiting for you. There may not be a gun to your head, unless you count the spouse who thinks you should be spending more time together. It's just too easy to sit down and find something "good" to watch. But I'll bet it's something already seen. And before you know it, 30 or 60 minutes of your life are gone. And for what? A rerun? Okay, "Family Guy", maybe.

 
Friends and family will swear by any number of shows, and the movie section of the Sunday Times would have you believe that we're going through a sort of movie renaissance. Nonetheless, the latest landmark-in -cinema/change-your-life TV show will have to just sit there at the end of my Netflix queue. Tempted to pick up that $15 copy of Rush Hour II at Costco? Jeez, it's probably on cable right now.


 
I've put in too many hours on things that were…good. And good just isn't good
enough anymore. Certainly not for an hour a week. So I guess I miss out on the water cooler conversation. I'm sort of anti-social anyway.

 
The last time I was tied up with a gun to my head was at my in-laws, who were watching "16 Blocks" (Bruce Willis, Mos Def, etc.). It wasn't bad exactly, but I'd sure like those two hours back now, thank you very much. I could have been reading a book or something. Which is an odd sentiment, given how a book will take up far more of my time than a movie. And I'm a slow reader, too, with the attention span of...whatever.

 
Theoretically, one of the good things about music, is that you can do other things while listening to it. So even if you don't love it, you've not completely wasted your time. Which is why, when I'm a captive audience, I have to do something, or that bell curve just doesn't apply, and the "suck" percentage goes way up. So when I'm over at someone's house for dinner, the host gets the impression that I'm trying to be a helpful guest, when in fact I'm just trying to avoid completely wasting my time. And who knows? Maybe I'll be able to make my way over to the stereo.

 
But even when the laundry is getting folded, I'm stingy with my music listening time, and consider it a particular imposition when someone thrusts their music upon me. It's too much like how I thrust mine upon them.

 
But marriage forces some compromises, and I do make an effort for my wife if she really likes something. Back in the Eighties, she loved Men at Work. I thought they were…good, but I wasn't going to expend a lot of my limited listening time to them. I did break down and give them a try on a Walkman while taking the train to work. For some reason - standing uncomfortably in a crowded smelly train? the screeching brakes not quite drowned out by the headphones that wouldn't stay on? Reading my book? - this didn't help much.

 
Why am I like this? It probably stems from an incident when co-worker Joe, insisting that I hear this great new song, practically duct taped his headphones on me, only to subject me to Chris Rhea's "Lady in Red". I had to sit there, grinning at him as my ears and brain were ground to dust.

 
So, no thanks, Joe.
I'll see you in hell, Chris.
Good, but not great, Men at Work.

 
Next.

Stupid Moments in Rock History, Part 1:

Well, there was the time I overheard a guy in a record store asking the clerk if he knew the song about "summertime" and "rain on my face".

I kinda thought I knew that it was the Alarm, but I didn't say anything. I still wonder why. I think I just didn't want to come across as a know-it-all, which is a first. So even though it would have helped the guy out, I didn't do anything. Maybe I didn't want to be responsible for more Alarm fans in the world.

But now I feel like Peter Parker when he found out what happened to his Uncle Ben, except for the Uncle Ben part. I just kinda feel bad about it. I hope the guy found it. It was back in the day when you couldn't just look it up on allmusic.com.

So, if you're out there, reading this, it's called "Rain in the Summertime" and it appears on Eye of the Hurricane and The Best of the Alarm. It's not such a bad song. It's just that they were so obviously trying to sound like U2. You know, like Coldplay now.

My apologies for being stupid while trying to avoid being a jerk.
----------------
Now playing: The Alarm - Rain in the Summertime
via FoxyTunes

Getting Lyrical

Unlike poetry, great song lyrics don't necessarily impress on paper. As a matter of fact, the more "poetic" (poetical?) they sound when read, the less chance that I'll like them when they're sung. My favorites just look like matter of fact statements:

I made a lot of mistakes

Sufjan Stevens, from "Chicago"

I loved you, well… nevermind

Alex Chilton, from "September Gurls"

It ain't dark yet, but it's getting there.

Bob Dylan, from "Ain't Dark Yet"

Just single lines, really, whose original context gives them their power. And, by themselves, not very poetic. So let me play fair and try more than one line at a time. This is the first verse of "The Whistling Song" by the Meat Puppets (from "Meat Puppets II"):

It's the shadow in the dark,

The silhouette in the park,

It's the broken, faded bird

You've learned to call your heart.

Is that better? I don't know. They're just words. You might have to hear them sung by Chris Kirkwood to feel the pain and desperation. But because I heard the song before I heard the words, I'll never be able to just read them without hearing the music, too.

This is from the Shin's "Young Pilgrim" (from "Chutes Too Narrow").

Well I learned fast how to keep my head up

'Cause I know there is this side of me

That wants to grab the yoke from the pilot

And fly the whole mess into the sea.

James Mercer's delivery is almost matter of fact. (I'm big on this under-singing thing. When a song is good enough, it doesn't need the hard sell.) He's working with a pretty striking melody, so he just lets the rhythm of the words carry him along. And it's brilliant - so much so that the post 9/11 plane hijacking metaphor is forgivable.

Now, as much as I like the words above, I have no reason to think that you do. I've heard the songs and you may not have. So I suspect the words by themselves are not enough. (In case you don't agree, just listen to William Shatner's version of "Mr. Tambourine Man" and other such celebrity atrocities.) Ideally, the music and words share a symbiotic relationship. You'd think it would be easy to spot when this isn't the case. But when I try to think of songs with great lyrics and lousy melodies (or vice versa) I can't. They're out there but they probably don't register in the first place, and we as listeners don't care to know why. Let someone who's paid to do it explain it all to us.

I am open to the possibility that when the words are striking enough, they provide the real music instead of the actual melody. These may just be poems disguised as songs, though. And if the song is good enough, I'm not sure that it's critical that we understand the words anyway.

As a matter of fact, I'd like to propose a moratorium on "getting" lyrics. I'm not talking about the songs whose words you hear the wrong way ("Excuse me while I kiss this guy", the entire early R.E.M. catalogue, etc.). If it's good rock n roll, you probably can't make out some lyrics anyway. I'm talking about the words you can hear. Anyone care to explain "any jobber got the sack, Monday morning, turn it back" to me? I'm still trying to figure out what the hell Billie Joe threw off the Tallahachie Bridge. (Where the hell is Tallahachie, anyway? Anywhere near Tallahassee?) And "lineman for the county"? Who's that? A football player? A truck driver? A phone operator? And she's singing over the wire? Jesus. Beautiful song, though.

So, if we can agree that it's okay to totally misunderstand the lyrics, I will promise to actually read the lyrics when they're provided, as long as my glasses are handy - CD jewel cases having somehow justified the printing of lyrics in a 3 point font. This should improve the odds, but not guarantee that I'll get the words right. And so what if I don't understand the words I'm saying? It'll be like when I speak.

And I further promise to only sing them while alone in the car. That way, if I miss some notes, no one will notice. But that's a whole other posting...

More Morning Music

People are always (never) saying to me, "Hey Jaybee, thanks for those suggestions for morning music you gave last year. You've given me a reason to get out of bed! (The story of my life.) Ya got any more?"

How can I refuse?

What follows are several more records that can get you through those critical morning hours between say 6 and 9am on a Saturday or Sunday morning when you're asking yourself what the hell am I doing up this early? Don't worry, you're just turning into one of those old geezers who prowls the neighborhood in search of empty soda cans. (By the way, there is a "weeding the garden" ensemble – short-shorts, tucked in dress shirt, dress shoes and knee high white socks - in your future.) Before you get to that point, let me help you delude yourself into thinking you're still young and vital.

Frank Sinatra: In the Wee Small Hours-

As a committed Frankie skeptic, I held out quite a long time before getting this CD. And for once, I can take him. Here is Frankie the wuss. What a relief! For my money, it beats the hell out of Frankie the obnoxious tough guy who rock and roll damned near made obsolete. Yeah, you heard me. I strongly recommend it, but only for when you're feeling strong enough for the both you. Frankie's having a rough time of it.

Mississippi John Hurt: Rediscovered

If you like acoustic Hot Tuna, you will probably enjoy this. His voice is gentler than Jorma's and his guitar playing is just as good.
Now playing: Mississippi John Hurt - Candy Man
via FoxyTunes

Neil Young: Harvest Moon

I find this record somewhat over-rated, but it will appease the spouse. And hidden at the end of it is the haunting, ten minute "Natural Beauty".

Nick Drake "Pink Moon":

There isn't as much orchestration on this record as there was on his first one. Its starkness is probably due to the fact that Nick was to commit suicide not long after this. And yet, the music itself is not despairing. He's just going gently into that good night.
Now playing: Nick Drake - Pink Moon
via FoxyTunes

Bob Dylan: Time Out of Mind

Some people might place this on their Middle of the Night Music list, but I like it early in the morning. It speaks of hurt, regret and pain. Perfect for your depression. What better way to start the day?

Scott Joplin: Complete Rags

It might seem a bit jaunty for first thing in the morning, but in fact, it's very nearly perfect for it. Ok, maybe 9am instead of 7.

Now playing: Scott Joplin - The Easy Winners
via FoxyTunes

Thelonius Monk: Solo Monk

A more modern version of the above.

Django Rheinhardt: Djangology

At times you might think your listening to the soundtrack to the Little Rascals, but no, the guitar is too intricate, the violin too melodic, and the piano is giving them both a run for their money. From France, of all places.

Now playing: Django Reinhardt - I Saw Stars

Okay, now that I've got you this far, you're on your own. I can handle middle of the night and early morning, but haven't got the slightest idea what to do about daytime.

But I'm working on it.

EZ Listening

My wife informs me that the playlist I’ve titled “Easy Listening” might better be named “Kill Yourself” music. KY having a more positive connotation, I’ll have to resist my habit of acronymizing everything. “Kill Yourself”, or as I like to call it “Dark Night of the Soul” music is a favorite genre of mine, but giving it it’s own playlist hadn’t crossed my mind.

So why is my idea of Easy Listening music another person’s “Kill Yourself” music? Maybe because most other people’s idea of Easy Listening makes me want to kill myself.

During a particularly low period - which coincided with my discovery of Limewire - I tracked down several very old songs that meant a lot to me, but that I had never gotten around to buying (see the “One Great Song on a Lousy CD” post I haven’t written yet). Well, one thing led to another - I hadn’t heard these emotionally laden songs in a very long while, but now I was downloading and listening to one after the other – and I was sprinting down Desolation Row. And you never know when these mood altering songs might come in handy, so I burned a CD with the best/worst of them.

Listen to them at your peril:

Who Knows Where the Time Goes? – Judy Collins

Fairport Convention’s got the rockier version, with Richard Thompson on guitar, and Sandy Denny’s vocal, but it’s Judy Collins’s version that gets to me every time. I’m not sure why – she sounds peaceful enough. Maybe it’s because it seems like she’s out there…all alone.

Send in the Clowns – Judy Collins

Judy again (hey, I thought I was cooler than this). I’m not familiar with the other versions of this song, so I’m sure there are better ones. But there she goes again, putting me somewhere that’s just not safe to be for very long.

Philadelphia – Neil Young

From the movie, and miles better than Bruce’s “Streets of Philadelphia”, which is not bad at all. Living alone is bad enough, but dying alone?

Hallelujah - Rufus Wainwright

If you prefer the Jeff Buckley version, I understand. Either way, love’s a bitch – in a great way.

Birds – Neil Young

I can’t believe this song isn’t more famous. Okay, it’s tucked away on side two of “After the Goldrush”, but it’s an incredible kiss-off song. Whoever she was, I’m sure she was flattered.

Dying to Live – Edgar Winter’s White Trash

Just when you think there’s no reason to go on - about two thirds of the way in - he gives you one.

Jealous Guy – John Lennon

A beautiful song about being a jerk, and the harm it does. To be alive is to hurt other people.

Harvest – Neil Young

The slow pace and laid back playing could fool you into thinking it’s just an ordinary country tune. But there’s the screaming in the rain, and the uncertainty that it’s all going to be all right.

Urge for Going – Tom Rush

Alone again, naturally, because nothing lasts. Pull that coat closer when he sings “winter’s closing in”.

Streets of London – Ralph McTell

You think you got problems? Hopefully, you’ll feel some consolation, but probably not.

That’s the Way – Led Zeppelin

Young love torn apart. Their most poignant moment.

John Barleycorn - Traffic/Can’t Find My Way Home - Blind Faith

OK, thematically, they don't fit, but musically they do.

Handbags and Gladrags – Rod Stewart

Talk about guilt. This pampered rock star (well, pre-pampering) gets to play an overworked geezer lecturing a spoiled brat. And somehow you feel guilty about it.

Percy’s Song - Arlo Guthrie

This is where I just lose it. I think it’s Arlo’s delivery as much as it ‘s Dylan’s tale of injustice. It just builds and builds until you’re devastated.

Still with me? Did we lose anyone?

Do you remember when Judas Priest got sued because their music supposedly caused two young people to attempt suicide? And if you try hard, you can probably think of a few songs that refer to suicide. Some of them have even caused legal problems for the artists. But we both know that that’s a crock. There isn’t one song above that mentions it, but several that make it cross your mind.

And I do birthday parties.

Free Download of "People Got A Lotta Nerve"

Here's the new song by Neko Case, for your downloading pleasure:

http://www.anti.com/media/download/708 (MP3)

It's from her new album "Middle Cyclone".

While I haven't heard the new record, I can definitely vouch for her last one, "Fox Confessor Brings the Flood". It's a great record.

In case you'd like to know more about Neko, check out today's NY Times Magazine.