Author: Rick Ouellette

I'm a freelance writer and photographer and the author of the graphic novel in-progress "In a Dream of Strange Cities. My previous non-fiction works include "Rock Docs: A Fifty Year Cinematic Journey" and "Documentary 101: A Viewer's Guide to Non-Fiction Film," was released in 2013. My other activities, like psychogeography, bicycling, and a little urban exploring tie into the content of this blog, which is dedicated to the celebrating the rich history of rock music, film, literature and popular culture.

Placeology #9: The Rust Belt Goes for Gold

Andy Warhol Bridge, Pittsburgh

Photos and text by Rick Ouellette

A recent article mentioning that National Geographic has named Pittsburgh one of the Top 25 places to visit in the world (the only U.S. city to make the list), was posted online and made my Facebook feed. Invariably, one of the first comments was “That’s the best laugh I had all day.”

I was tempted to reply, “How so?” But I’m trying to be less judgy nowadays, so I let it slide and left a comment saying how much I enjoyed my own trip to Iron City last year. I mentioned the newly expanded Andy Warhol Museum, a great ballgame experience at the Pirates’ PNC Park with its bridge-and-skyline backdrop, the Nationality Rooms at the Cathedral of Learning and the colorful folk-art complex called Randyland. (See below)

Besides, if I asked that person why she thought it was so funny, the likely answer would be: “Really, I mean, PITTSBURGH?!” If there is one thing I’ve learned over the years, it’s that people love knowing what they already know, even when it’s wrong. This is esp. true when it comes to Rust Belt cities. If you mention Cleveland, a likely response is about the Cuyahoga River being on fire, even though that was 56 years ago. And don’t let’s get started about the state of New Jersey, which many motorists have reduced to the “smelly” stretch of I-95 opposite New York City, filled with refineries and powerlines. We want all the gasoline and electricity we can get—but are somehow offended to see where it comes from.

The AKG Museum in Buffalo. The mirrored surfaced of the institute’s modern walkway reflects both the older building and an outside sculpture.

Perceptions are gradually starting to change, and just not in Pittsburgh. Buffalo’s AKG Art Museum was named by Time magazine as one of The Greatest Places in the World in 2024. A dazzling modern addition has been added to the original 1905 Greek temple-style original, connected by a serpentine elevated walkway.

And the AKG is far from an isolated location: it sits in the middle of Buffalo’s cultural corridor near Frank Lloyd Wright’s jewel-like Martin House, the Buffalo History Museum (housed in the only remaining building from the city’s 1901 world’s fair), an outdoor Shakespeare theater and various gardens and a lake with flamingo pedal boats. All of this in the beauteous confines of the Frederick Law Olmstead-designed Delaware Park.

But my favorite part was staying at the nearby Richardson Hotel (above), which occupies the middle section of the former Buffalo State Asylum. Opened up in 1880 on grounds also designed by Olmsted, this massive architectural gem was an early commission of famed architect H.H. Richardson, fresh off his masterful Trinity Church in Boston. Underneath it’s two colossal towers, the main administration building, as well as its two matching Romanesque wings, make up the footprint of this remarkable boutique hotel. As with many such facilities, this asylum grew overcrowded and it was expanded (in brick, not the expensive Medina sandstone of the original building) to such an extent that it takes about a half-hour to walk around it.

The nighttime photo at top shows both the elegance of Richardson’s design and the great work of the restoration crew. The bottom photo gives one some idea of the scale of the former asylum, some of which is hopefully being set aside for much-needed affordable housing.

Like many other state hospitals, this one was closed in the late 20th century. But unlike others that were demolished without much opposition, Richardson’s piece de resistance sat there until the city realized what they had. Now this asylum is a point of civic pride, a lynchpin in the city’s ambition to become a design capitol, with a focus on the many significant buildings, including its magnificent City Hall (below) and Central Terminal (currently being restored), two of the region’s premier Art Deco edifices.

The effects of deindustrialization has been devastating for many U.S. cities in the Northeast and Midwest. The poverty, crime, population loss and disinvestment that followed is of historic proportions. But a potential silver lining is the fact that, at their economic peak, places like Buffalo, Pittsburgh, Cleveland and Detroit used some of that manufacturing wealth in the building of first-class (and often majestic)  museums, libraries, theaters, railway stations, hotels and monuments—all speaking to a grand sense of collective civic pride all but missing in our age of calcified socio-political divides.

A mural inside Buffalo City Hall from more optimistic times.

I’m not suggesting, or even hoping, that people will give up the default destinations like Las Vegas or Disneyworld. Yet the trend towards sub-genres of domestic travel is encouraging and should help in the nascent Rust Belt revival. These days, there is foodie tourism, historic preservation tourism, music tourism, film festival tourism, sports tourism—Pittsburgh is hosting the NFL Draft next year and it’s a BIG deal. Anything that gets us out and about on a path that leads to greater understanding of our common heritage is a welcome move in the right direction in these wrong times.

Lastly, a word about an even newer trend: abandoned steel mill tourism. In the not-too-distant past, places like the former Bethlehem Steel plant (above top) and the Carrie Furnaces (above bottom) were top-line locations for the urban explorer community. Now I’m no stranger to the wild and woolly world of urbex photography. But I have never been one of its real hardcore practitioners and I was glad when I eventually got the chance to visit such places without fear of arrest.

The gargantuan Bethlehem Steel plant (renamed Steel Stacks) is now the dramatic backdrop to an outdoor concert venue and cultural center. The elevated walkway brings one up close to this amazing structure. Placards inform the visitor of the “Hot, Loud and Dangerous” conditions that the steelworkers put up with to provide the nation with its infrastructure. It’s a “thank-you-for-your-service” moment that some risk-taking explorers would not realize or get the chance to find out.

The same goes for the formerly off-limits Carrie Furnaces, now a state heritage park. Visitors can learn that this was a big part of World War Two’s “Arsenal of Democracy.” Factories on an 8-mile stretch of the Monongahela River, starting in Pittsburgh, produced more iron and steel during the war than all the Axis Powers combined. The scale and complexity of the furnaces are mind-boggling, and the implied message of strength and national unity is haunting in an age where even the word “democracy” seems compromised. So let’s get out there and live and learn: and when someone asks, “Pittsburgh, really?” you can answer, “Yes, really.”

Books That Rock: “1965, The Most Revolutionary Year in Music” by Andrew Grant Jackson (2015)

It was 60 years ago that the music world was turned on its head, smack dab in the middle of that terrific and turbulent decade. While there is room for debate as to what was “the most revolutionary year in music,” rock scribe Andrew Grant Jackson makes a great case for ’65. Consider masterwork albums ranging from the Beatles’ Rubber Soul to John Coltrane’s A Love Supreme. How about era-defining singles like “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction,” “Eve of Destruction,” “Like a Rolling Stone,” “Papa’s Got a Brand New Bag,” “My Generation” and “The Sound of Silence?” The year also saw the rise of garage rock and psychedelia. And it all happened against the backdrop of tumultuous events like the Watts Riots and the first large-scale protests over the Vietnam War.

What makes this book so compulsively readable is Jackson’s knack for conflating musical events with related social themes of the age. One of the best examples is the advent of the Pill and the concurrent dawning of the “Free Love” era and the shattering of the age-old “Madonna/whore” complex, at least among the younger generation. (Women with the upper hand started making appearances in Beatle songs like “Day Tripper” and “Ticket to Ride”). Models such as Edie Sedgwick and Twiggy were “waifish and full of wonder” and made words like “tramp” seem suddenly outdated. Jackson writes: “An act (casual sex among unmarried people) that had always been shameful now acquired a butterfly-winged lightness.”

Edie Sedgwick and Twiggy

But it was still largely a man’s world and Bob Dylan’s “Like A Rolling Stone,” which has been praised to high heaven for six decades, is a rather harsh put-down of a poor little rich girl—supposedly inspired by Bob’s brief affair with the vulnerable Sedgwick. Brilliantly composed for sure, but I prefer the more spiritual “Mr. Tambourine Man” as my 1965 Dylan touchstone. The Byrds’ #1 hit version in June was the early high-water mark of the folk-rock movement.

Dylan was famously booed by many for “going electric” at the Newport Folk Festival that July but, inspired by the global success of the Beatles and Stones, he already had at least one foot out the door of folk-music orthodoxy and was destined for rock stardom himself.

Jackson points out that, in a year which saw the savage attacks on civil rights marchers in Selma and elsewhere, it was in the music world that pointed the way to positions of peace, solidarity and understanding. The Temptations’ “My Girl” was #1 pop hit the same week that ABC interrupted the Sunday Night Movie to show Alabama state troopers brutal attack on non-violent black demonstrators.

When the Beatles invented the big stadium rock concert at New York’s Shea Stadium in August, the opening acts were Motown singer Brenda Holloway, jazz/soul saxophonist King Curtis and the Mexican-American band Cannibal and the Headhunters. It was the type of diversity that didn’t have to announce itself. Things were bubbling up all over: in Jamacia the new reggae band Bob Marley and the Wailers released no less than 17 singles that year, including an early version of “One Love.”

Another sign of increasing cultural cross-pollination was the dawning influence of Indian culture. The first salvo was the bewitching drone ambience of the Kink’s “See My Friends.”

Ray Davies was influenced by chanting fisherman in Mumbai when coming up with this Kink Klassic.

Then there was the fateful moment when George Harrison met up with a sitar on the set of “Help!,” the Beatles’ second feature film that was shot in early ’65. By year’s end George was playing one himself on “Norwegian Wood.” More importantly, the group was gifted a copy of Swami Vishnudevananda’s “The Complete Illustrated Book of Yoga,” The more serene, inward-looking type of wisdom offered by Hindu philosophy would become hugely influential in the years to come, offering an alternative to the kind of might-is-right that brought the U.S. into the Vietnam quagmire.

While the year 1965 may not ever be considered as relevant as Summer-of-Love 1967 or Woodstock 1969, Jackson has made a very compelling case that the groundwork for all that came later is in the Big Bang year of ’65 and this brilliant page-turner will have you convinced. —Rick Ouellette

For The Records: The Cover Albums, Part Two

Well, here’s the concluding entry in my survey of recordings in that most star-crossed category, the covers album. Star-crossed in an almost literal way: here are stars performing the songs of other stars.

After listening to so many of these albums I can only conclude that placing one or two well-chosen covers on an album of your own original tunes works a lot better. The reason is a whole collection of tributes usually tends to lack coherence and make even the best artists look like a bar band.

The best way around this is for your covers album to have some sort of concept. The highest-ranking record of Part One of this survey (David Bowie’s Pin-ups) worked so well because of its tight focus. Bowie was paying homage to British bands and key songs from the 1964-67 period, just before he broke thru himself. A similar concept guides the first record reviewed here, the only one other than Pin-ups to gain an A- rating.

Songs From a Haunted Ballroom—The Skids (2021)

While not a household name, most fans of early UK punk will recall this tenacious band who moved down to London from their native Dunfermline in the late 70s. The Skids gained notoriety not just for their tough-guy rep (legend has it that they picked fights in clubs to get their names in the English music press) but also for their aggressive-but-artistic musical approach. That included at least two Brit punk classics: “Into the Valley” and “The Saints are Coming,” both of which are featured here in re-recorded versions.

The rest of Songs From a Haunted Ballroom have an association with the Kinema Ballroom, a vital but volatile music venue in their hometown. The Skids, whose guitarist was future Big Country leader Stuart Adamson, got their start here, playing live sets opening for the likes of the Clash before the place changed over to a discotheque later at night.

Both aspects of the Kinema are celebrated here. Mainstay vocalist Richard Jobson is joined here by ex-Big Country second guitarist Bruce Watson and his guitarist son Jamie Watson. The lads come charging out of the gate with Ultravox’s “Young Savage,” one of many allusions to the club’s stormy history (“Anything goes where no one knows your name”). They tip their hat to the Clash with a nice take on “Complete Control.” In light of the father-son axe duo backing him up, Jobson is obliged to use the song’s proclamation “You’re my guitar hero!” not once but twice.

Elsewhere, there are enthusiastic, high-energy tributes to the Adverts, Sex Pistols, Iggy Pop, Mott the Hoople and Magazine. Just as welcome are some of the less obvious choices like Ace Frehley’s “New York Groove” and Garland Jeffrey’s “35mm Dreams.” The key track is probably their ominous take on David Essex’s glam hit “Rock On.” As an after-hours disco, the Kinema was a magnet for the region’s various violent gangs and apparently “Rock On” was the signal for the trouble to start. Jobson describes the scene in a mid-song monologue as the AV Toi (“the most mental gang in Scotland”) get ready to rumble. Grade: A-

Acid Eaters—The Ramones (1993)

As punk-rock pioneers, the Ramones need no introduction, but once you get past their mid-to-late 70s heyday, they become a lot less examined. By the late Eighties, original bassist and key songwriter Dee Dee Ramone had left, leaving CJ Ramone to man the front line with Joey and Johnny. CJ, who took some lead vocals, was an energizing figure but the band’s run was almost over.

On this, the Ramones’ penultimate studio album, the band matter-of-factly reposition themselves as acid-rock casualties: just look at the disconcerting covert art. Of course, it’s still them so don’t expect Dead-style noodling or Floydish space jams. Opener “Journey to the Center of the Mind” (sung by CJ) may be trippy but it also rocks.

The results here are entertaining if a bit predictable. The Ramones are in a comfort zone when covering their antecedents like the Animals, Seeds and Troggs. And it’s a blast to hear Joey’s long-loved voice singing the Who’s “Substitute” with no less than Pete Townsend guesting on guitar. The same goes when ol’ Bobby Dylan gets the Ramones’ patented faster-and-louder treatment. Their buzzsaw rendition of “My Back Pages” (check out Marky’s triple-time drumming and Joey’s rare lead guitar shredding) gives the Byrds’ celebrated version a run for its money

As usual, though, the results here vary. The Credence vibe (as in “Have You Ever Seen the Rain”) doesn’t seem to suit da brothers and their take on “Somebody to Love” (despite backing vocals by porn star Traci Lords) won’t make any baby boomer forget about Grace Slick. For my money, the Ramones’ best cover came on their next (and last) album Adios Amigos. Their version of “I Don’t Wanna Grow Up,” Tom Waits’ seriocomic take on the old Peter Pan trope, is made all the more affecting by being the final bittersweet salvo of the group’s perpetual teenage rebellion. (The video’s witty animation was done by famed comic artist Daniel “Ghost Story” Clowes). Grade: B (B+ if you add in the Tom Waits tune).

12—Patti Smith (2007)

Rising up from the same Lower East Side scene that birthed the Ramones, New York punk poetess Patti Smith showed a great knack for incorporating others’ work into her own on her revolutionary debut album in 1975. Horses kicked off with her radical recasting of the Van Morrison warhorse “Gloria” with her famous opening line, “Jesus died for somebody’s sins but not mine.” On side two her group seamlessly added “Land of a Thousand Dances” to the outré 9-minute “Land.”

It wouldn’t be until 2007 that the covers-album bug would give Patti a bite. Smith is famously expansive in her fandom, so it’s no surprise that 12 is a grab-bag of songs of different eras and genres. If you want to know how to get from Jimi Hendrix to Tears for Fears to Neil Young in three easy steps, here you are. If you’ve been yearning for a slow-paced version of “Smells Like Teen Spirit” complete with banjo and fiddle, your wait is over.

This will be a pleasurable listen for Patti Smith fans like me. But the fact that her take on “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” is my favorite thing here (despite not being even close to my favorite tune covered) goes to show just how random these records are. Grade: B-

Dylan—Bob Dylan (1973)

This long-derided album can’t be blamed on the artist. A record of traditional songs and covers, they are outtakes from 1970’s lowly-rated 2-LP set Self Portrait It was released against Dylan’s wishes by Columbia Records in “revenge” after Dylan had the audacity to jump ship to Asylum (he came back two albums later).

His largely indifferent takes of various non-originals made up about two-thirds of Self Portrait, and these are the leftovers. There are lackluster tributes to contemporaries (“Big Yellow Taxi” and “Mr. Bojangles”), a few deep oldies (“Spanish is the Loving Tongue” dates to 1907) and a three-hankie Elvis ballad (see below). Bob sings in his appealing “Nashville Skyline” voice but his delivery is lazy, and the record is marred by the overuse of a shrill female chorus too high in the mix. Some have suggested that the ever-cryptic Dylan was engaged in some perverse self-sabotage during this period. I tend to believe it. In his re-issue series, a collection from the same period, called Another Self Portrait, was released in 2013 and it’s freaking great. Grade: C-

Covers—Cat Power (2022)

Chan Marshall, the Atlanta-born singer/songwriter who goes by the stage name Cat Power, has been beguiling fans since she came on the scene in 1992. Her brand of subtle intensity may not be for everyone, but her unique musical stylings make her esp. suitable for doing other people’s material (this is her third, and most recent, covers album). Not everything here sticks the landing, but when it does it’s quietly captivating.

The best to my ears are her artful renditions of two poignant slow numbers. First is the Pogues’ “A Pair of Brown Eyes,” with Marshall accompanying herself on Mellotron (see below). Second is the Replacements’ barroom ballad “Here Comes a Regular.” There are other selections that show the depth of her musical appreciations: Nick Cave’s “I Had a Dream, Joe” and Kitty Wells’ proto-feminist anthem “God Didn’t Make Honky Tonk Angels,” the first C&W #1 hit by a solo woman. On the flip side, she does a song by lesser-chanteuse Lana Del Ray, Bob Seeger’s “Against the Wind” (barely recognizable) and a number from Ryan Gosling’s short-lived group. But with cover albums, variety is the spice of life. Grade: B

Kojak Variety—Elvis Costello (1995)

More “variety.’ First off, I’m glad that this album was named after a store near where it was recorded in Barbados, and not after the charmless TV detective played by Telly Savalas. Secondly, most know that Costello, a generational songwriting talent, has a keen ear for and encyclopedic knowledge of other great tunesmiths—he did a country covers LP (Almost Blue) only a few years into his career. This one also wisely sticks to a plan (the cover touts “Rhythm & Blues, Popular Ballads”) and said tunes are delivered in Elvis’ familiar self-assured style. You get them coming and going: songs by Willie Dixon, Mose Allison, Screamin’ Jay Hawkins, Little Richard, Jesse Winchester etc. Your favorite will depend on your preference for a particular tune. I love his emotive take on Dylan’s “I Threw It All Away” and esp. his elegiac take on Ray Davies’ bittersweet “Days.” This Kinks Klassic Kover was originally from the soundtrack of the Wim Wenders’ film “Until the End of the World,” where it was also a group sing-along during a campfire scene. Grade: B

Through the Looking Glass—Siouxsie and the Banshees (1987)

The distinctive, imperious voice of goth icon Siouxsie Sioux was well known by the time she and the Banshees decided to do this tribute album of early influences a la David Bowie’s Pin-Ups. And like Bowie, she was able to put a unique stamp on many of the well-chosen covers here. Dark and delectable tunes like John Cale’s “Gun,” the Doors’ “You’re Lost Little Girl,” and Kraftwerk’s “Hall of Mirrors” are naturals for her and delivered in excellent style.

Other tracks go next level: Iggy Pop loved Siouxsie’s version of his nocturnal road-tripping “The Passenger” (which added a neat brass section) so much that he asked to do a later duet version with her. Her goth take on the Billie Holiday nightmare classic “Strange Fruit” is not afraid to sit up right up there in the pantheon. And her eerie vocal on Television’s “Little Johnny Jewel” gives that early punk gem a second life, with guitarist John Valentine Carruthers ably reproducing the song’s infamous 8-note guitar motif while wisely avoiding a go at Tom Verlaine’s nervy, virtuoso solo. Grade B+

I didn’t have time to fully review Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds 1986 covers LP Kicking Against the Pricks but was taken by its closing number. It became a signature song (along with “Georgy Girl”) for fellow Australians the Seekers. Written by Tom Springfield, it seems an appropriate place to close. Like a carnival, cover albums have plenty of fleeting pleasure before they move on to another town, while you turn back to your favorite artists doing original material.

Books that Rock: “Mainlines, Blood Feasts and Bad Taste: A Lester Bangs Reader” (2002)

“The American Dream is only a dream, and the American Reality is imperative, a powder-keg situation.” Lester Bangas, 1968.

These are soul-killing times if you are among those who believe that the affairs of the world should be handled with empathy and common decency. The Orange Puke from Hell is back and we’ve gone from the nagging but manageable general anxiety of modern life to the psychic (and sometimes literal) equivalent of having a band of greedy twisted degenerates roaming your neighborhood, out to rob you of your life savings and your medicine, while knocking your grandma to the pavement and kidnapping your neighbor. An administration that has gleefully performed every perdition short of forcing kids to eat lead paint.

While mentally barricaded thusly, I began looking for something to read that would be entertaining but intellectually fortifying. I was seeking something relevant but far removed from the current hellish news cycle and the persistent panic-filled postings of my liberal friends, I came across an unlikely hero in Lester Bangs.

Lester and Debbie Harry on Coney Island back in the day.

Unlikely in the sense that Bangs, the infamous raconteur and rock critic el supremo, died of an accidental drug overdose in1982. Multitudes of music fans of that era were familiar (if not always in agreement with) Lester’s discursive reviews and articles appearing in Rolling Stone, Creem, the Village Voice and other periodicals. Younger folks might have got to know him from the iconic 1987 collection “Psychotic Reactions and Carburetor Dung,” edited by Greil Marcus or from Philip Seymour Hoffman’s colorful portrayal of him in the 2000 film “Almost Famous.” I had been familiar with Bang’s work since his gleeful hatchet job on Paul McCartney and Wings appeared in a summer of ’76 cover story in Creem. But I was never aware of this second anthology of his work (from 2002) until chancing upon it recently at a used bookstore.

Edited by John Morthland, “Mainlines” is notable for including pieces of a more personal nature, including travelogues and a few entries of a previously unpublished manuscript he wrote at age 19 in that despairing and violent year of 1968—including the astute “Two Assassinations and a Speedy Retreat into Pastoral Nostalgia.” This gives the reader valuable insights (that still ring very true today) into Bangs as the grizzled idealist. But fear not, there’s still plenty of the crazy Lester we knew and loved, with entries like:

“Jim Morrison: Bozo Dionysus a Decade Later”

“Dandelions in Still Air: The Withering Away of the Beatles”

“Stevie Nicks: Lillith or Bimbo?”

“Grace Jones Beats Off”

“Deaf/Mute in a Telephone Booth: A Perfect Day with Lou Reed”

Bring Your Mother to the Gas Chamber!” (his epic essay extolling the virtues of Black Sabbath).

Along the way he also promotes the idea of goody-two-shoes Anne Murray as pop music’s ultimate female sex symbol (“a hypnotically compelling interpretrix with a heavy erotic vibe”) and fully embraces the feminist career move of Helen “I am Woman” Reddy. (“All men but me are spuds. What I would like to see is an all-girl band that would sing lyrics like, ‘I’ll cut your nuts off, you cretins,’ then jump into the audience and beat the shit out of the men there”).

Anne Murray at her sex-symbol peak, with male admirers John, Harry, Alice and Mickey.

You see, Mr. Bangs was in on the great Cosmic Joke. We should be too. Because even at his snarkiest, you could always tell that Lester cared a lot—about music, about culture, about his country.  The Cosmic Joke posits that despite all the meaning and purpose we try to attribute to life on earth, we are all headed to the same end (“fellow passengers to the grave” as Dickens put it) so we best embrace our common humanity, give a hoot about something other than ourselves, and have a few laughs along the way.

Bangs had himself plenty of laughs, as you might be able to tell from the titles of the above magazine articles. But the passion and seriousness of much of this collection caught me off guard, in a very good way. “Two Assassinations,” written the day after Robert Kennedy was shot dead, is remarkably astute for a kid still six months shy of his 20th birthday. He declares Kennedy “something of a final straw for me” as he predicts Richard Nixon’s upcoming election and envisions a future America seized by “monstrous social earthquakes.”  

Lester on Black Sabbath: “As close as you can get to blood-lust orgies, death, or utter degradation without having to experience them firsthand.”

Of course, music was a saving grace for Lester as it still is for so many of us. Even then, he has a strong propensity for detailing the “aural abyss” of such challenging albums as Nico’s “The Marble Index,” Velvet Underground’s “White Ligh/White Heat” and Pil’s “Second Edition,” among other personal favorites. In an age of hit-and-run social media opinions, it’s a throwback reading pleasure to see Bangs spend pages wrestling with the patchy quality of hero Miles Davis’ early 70s output or painstakingly lambasting Bob Dylan for the “Mafia Chic” misjudgment of his ill-advised paen to psychotic mobster Joey Gallo.

Many contemporary readers will be justifiably put-off by Bangs’ casual use of insensitive epithets (spade, homo, bitch) but maybe what we’ve gained in sensitivity we’ve lost in critical thinking. In his prime years, in the age of Nixon and Vietnam, he saw the cruelty of the right but also the rigidity of the New Left and took on life with endless creative drive and steely purpose, warning us way back then about the vast social chasms awaiting America and the urgent individualism needed to keep your head above the waters that would otherwise have you drowned.

No Penalties, No Substitutes, No Freedom: “Rollerball” at 50

The 1975 science-fiction drama “Rollerball” was a bit of an odd duck of a film: come for the bloodsport, stay for the philosophy.   Some weren’t buying. Though a success at the time, this movie has always split viewers and critics. While not sensationalistic enough for certain action fans, it was sometimes seen as too plodding in its thematic thrust by the smarties.

But for someone like me, who enjoys thoughtful sci-fi but also grew up watching Roller Derby on late night TV, “Rollerball” hits just right. Its stature has grown over time and is well worth a look now, esp. as the near future it predicted (the film is set in 2018) has come to pass by several years. (Please note that I’m recommending the James Caan-starring original and not the inconsequential 2002 remake, which currently has a 14% rating om Metacritic).

Directed by Norman Jewison, with a script by William Harrison based on his own short story, Caan stars as the foremost superstar of a global sport that combines elements of the old banked-track skating derbies with motorcross and barely-controlled mayhem. Jonathan E. by name, this seemingly indestructible team leader excels like no other at jamming the heavy silver ball into the goal without getting maimed for life (it’s not unusual for there to be fatalities during these “games”).

The setting is what I would call a “model dystopia,” where war has been eliminated and all material wants met in a world is run by a cabal of supposedly benevolent corporations. Rollerball is the one unifying element for regular folk to have a visceral outlet for the violence which has supposedly been eliminated otherwise. The game is tightly controlled by the corporations, who are starting to think that Jonathan E. is transcending this concept of social control.

The plot is simple: the corporation wants Jonathan to retire, Jonathan does not want to and attempts to use what leverage he has to resist. No offense to James Caan, who was at the height of his movie-star power and acquits himself well, but the real star of the show is John Houseman as head of Houston’s Energy Corp. and who runs the locally based team.

Houseman, who came up in the theater working with Orson Welles, enjoyed a late-career resurgence as a character actor, winning an Oscar for his imperious Harvard law professor in 1973’s “The Paper Chase.” He is similarly authoritative here, making perfect use of his haughty mid-Atlantic accent which he later employed in memorable TV ads.

His Mr. Bartholemew is a tough nut to crack but Jonathan E. pushes back, wanting to know how their decisions are made, and even to get to the bottom of the mysterious “corporate wars” that brought forth the “material dream world” that he apparently doesn’t appreciate enough, especially in view of the luxury lifestyle he is guaranteed even after retiring.

Aside from the fact that he loves the game and is loyal to his teammates, it is sometimes hard to understand Jonathan’s motivational end game. If he were to beat the global conglomerate, what would he do: bring back war and poverty? I’m kidding, but this does bring up a core problem with the model dystopia brand of futuristic fiction. I recently re-read Adolus Huxley’s classic “Brave New World,” which “Rollerball” resembles in its false-utopia of Pavlovian conditioning helped along by easy access to pleasure drugs and the state-sanctioned rotation of sex partners.

Yes, we have no books: James Caan as Jonathan and (left) John Beck as teammate “Moon Pie”

Bernard Marx, Huxley’s morose protagonist, does rebel against the mindless contentment of his world, chafing against the notion that “Everybody’s Happy Nowadays,” a phrase that inspired the great punk-rock single by the Buzzcocks. Bernard’s attempts to buck the system predictably leads to disaster and although Jonathan’s fate after the film’s climatic and grisly rollerball championship is left ambiguous one is left pondering: when we get the real-world dystopia we have coming to us, it probably won’t be with this government guaranteed sexual fulfillment and free Ecstasy. Just saying.

But although the expository scenes of this film may slow it down at times, Norman Jewison’s artful direction makes it a great watch. Jewison (whose credits include In the Heat of the Night, Fiddler on the Roof, Moonstruck and the original Thomas Crown Affair), was one of those versatile, populist filmmakers of his era—Sydney Pollack and Walter Hill are two others—who did consistently fine work without ever being considered an auteur.

Perhaps to counter audience desensitization, the corporations keep upping the ante, until the final match is played with “No penalties, no substitutions, and no time limits,” essentially setting up a “Hunger Games” type scenario.

Despite that his work here has a certain Kubrickian vibe. “Rollerball” has shades of “Clockwork Orange” in its ultra-violence and “Eyes Wide Shut” in its upper-class decadence—and even a bit of “2001” in the forbidding hi-tech architecture of the corporate state (provided by the then-new BMW Headquarters in Munich). It’s here that master thespian Ralph Richardson gives a humorous late-career performance as the head “librarian” whose actual job is to tend to the overtaxed super-computer called Zero. In a movie that needed a little comic relief, the befuddled caretaker explains to Jonathan that Zero (who earlier that day “lost the 13th Century”) is so smart that “his borders touch all knowledge.” But the librarian also admits that Zero, who “considers everything,” seems to not know anything at all.

This is perhaps the film’s most prophetic moment, pointing to our own superconnected/disconnected present world. It sends Jonathan E. back to the rollerball arena safe in the knowledge that: Yes, We Have No Utopias.

Place that Band: Battle of the Geo Groups

Rock and roll band names are always a fun subject and historically have fallen into specific categories. Early on, bug names were popular: Buddy Holly and the Crickets inspired the Silver Beetles (later the Beatles), and we went from Iron Butterfly to the Spiders from Mars; it all culminated in the legendary Mosquitoes, secretly rehearsing on Gilligan’s Island to escape their adoring fans.

In the psychedelic era, crazy food-related names abounded (Strawberry Alarm Clock, Chocolate Watch Band, Ultimate Spinach, Peanut Butter Conspiracy) but as we got into the 70s, the somewhat grandiose idea of naming your group after a (usually) large city, or even a country or continent, took hold. Sometimes (but certainly not always) it reflected where the group was from. This trend has continued somewhat crazily into the present, as we will find out at the bottom of the post.

But here we are mostly sticking with better-known groups from the 70s to the millennium. There is a subjective group rating and a ROBTL rating (Relation of Band to Location). Only straight-up geographic group names are considered (sorry, New York Dolls) and the locations are limited to our home planet. But in case you’re wondering, there IS a group called Uranus.

CHICAGO

This is one of the most famous, even though they were originally called Chicago Transit Authority, until transportation officials from the Windy City objected.  Many of the members from the original septet met while in college in Chicago. They were originally an adventurous, even political, jazz-rock ensemble over the course of their first three albums (all two-record sets). They gradually lost their way in the woods of MOR pop pablum after the tragic death of guitarist/guiding force Terry Kath.

Group Rating: B+ for the first five albums, after that you’re on your own. ROBTL Rating: Good, considering their roots

This track from their debut features demonstrators’ chant from the Chicago Dem Convention in 1968.

AMERICA

An interesting one, as the three members were U.S. Air Force brats living in England at the time of their formation. But their sound, influenced by the CSN&Y type sound of the day, was very un-British. They went on to great success, of course, with songs like “Ventura Highway” (inspired by a stretch of road in California) and that one about a lonesome Western desert where for some reason you can’t remember your name.

Group rating: B ROBTL: Good I guess, since it was a bit of a mission statement.

BOSTON

This Tom Scholz-invented band is a tough one, since they were from the area but were not exactly road-tested locals, like Aerosmith or J. Geils Band. Mostly a studio creation, thanks to Scholz’s whiz-kid tech knowhow, that didn’t stop them from claiming they were “just another band out of Boston” on their debut album which sold 17 million copies. Then they started touring.

Group rating: B- ROBTL: Not great, even that line about playing in Hyannis was not about them but instead was inspired by the drummer’s previous experience of playing in bar bands down on Cape Cod.

BERLIN

Crossing over the Atlantic, kind of. Berlin, fronted by icy-sultry singer Terri Nunn, was from Los Angeles. Nunn, who posed for Playboy while underage, was (and would later be) an actress, and she once auditioned for the part of Princess Leia. She had the perfect look and voice for the band’s stylish 80s synth-pop sound, which would be fair to say, drew some influence from Krautrock pioneers like Kraftwerk.

Group rating: B ROBTL: Pretty good, considering.

LINDISFARNE

This accomplished British folk-rock outfit, once led by guitarist singer Alan Hull, were from Newcastle and named themselves after the nearby monastery castle that I had the pleasure of visiting last year (see my photo!).

Lindisfarne often drew from locales known to them and it would be easy to imagine the ghostly “Lady Eleanor” from their most famous song roaming the drafty corridors of that edifice.

Group rating: A- ROBTL: First in class.

ASIA

Another very famous name and a progressive-rock supergroup made up of former (and in some cases future) members of Yes, King Crimson and ELP. I’m a huge prog fan but at the time of their big debut LP (1982) I was much more in thrall to the likes of the Replacements and the Psychedelic Furs than this machine-tooled AOR approach. Even guitarist Steve Howe, who would do much much better work in Yes) admitted that the production of said album was “Journeyesque,” not a good thing. But they fared well on middle-of-the-road rock stations and sold lots of plastic.

Group rating: C ROBTL: Nil, unless you count Roger Dean’s somewhat Oriental cover art. (see top image)

EUROPE

Staying on the continental theme, we doubt anyone ever looked to these lugs for a representation of European culture. The glam-metal Swedes did have their moment in the sun (not that I noticed) and got a recent ironic boost due to their famous Geico commercial featuring their biggest hit.

Group rating: C- ROBTL: Nothing doing.

ENGLAND

This prog-rock band was destined to be under-appreciated, seeing that their excellent debut album, “Garden Shed,” came out in 1977, the same year that the Sex Pistols and the Clash were shaking up things in their native land. England were led by keyboardist-singer Robert Webb and they hailed from Kent County, an area known as the Garden of England. Later reevaluations and rereleases of their work led to reunions (and some new work) first in 2006, including a nice 2-disc CD edition of “Garden Shed.”

Group rating: B+ ROBTL: Very high

JAPAN

This London-based group started out in 1974 as more of a glam act and evolved a synth-heavy, futuristic approach in the New Wave era. Not my cup of tea and initially their records flopped in the UK, but they found fame in the Land of the Rising Sun. Not sure how much that had to do with their name. They did release a single called “Life in Toyko” but it oddly featured the catch phrase “life can be cruel.”

Group rating: C+ ROBTL: Well, they sold out Budokan three nights running.

NEW ENGLAND

Getting back to my neck of the woods, this Boston-based group was managed by Queen impresario Don Aucion. They got a peek at the Top 40 with “Don’t Ever Wanna Lose Ya” (#40 in 1979) but their career soon stalled. Although stubbornly a product of their Asia-Journey age, New England did poke at the edges of several genres, including Art Rock. Seeking a sales lift, they came up with the multi-part “Explorer Suite.” Brimming with dramatic vocals and flashy keyboards, they were hoping the “Bohemian Rhapsody” lightning would strike twice, but to no avail.

Group Rating: B- ROBTL: Nothing you would notice.

NANTUCKET

Another New England locale, but these guys were from North Carolina and got their start as an oceanside bar band. They named themselves after the song “Nantucket Sleighride” by Mountain. There is some of that influence here, but also of arena-rock plodders like Foghat. Nothing special but I like their energy and the cheeky covert art of their first album is a 70s guilty pleasure.

Group Rating: B ROBTL: Very little.

KANSAS

I really don’t want to talk about these guys. You know them, you love them. Well, you know them anyway. Me, I always get them mixed up with Styx, another location-named band, though in this case a presumably fictional one. Anyway, I don’t dislike them, but I don’t regard them either. They did find a curious common denominator in pop history. “Carry On My Wayward Son,” is annually one of the most played song in classic-rock radio formats.

Group Rating: B- ROBTL: Well, they are from Topeka.

MANASSAS

I don’t much want to talk about Steve Stills either. He’s one of rock’s least likable characters. If you care for a taste, consult the interview of jazz drummer (and one-time Joni Mitchell squeeze) in the book “Girls Like Us” or check out Steve’s belligerent reaction to a little healthy criticism in the festival film “Celebration at Big Sur.” Having said that, Manassas (named after the Virginia town where the first great land battle of the civil war took place) were a good band for him, esp. in the case of second-billed Chris Hillman, the reliable wing man late of the Byrds and Flying Burrito Bros. Their first album was one of Stills’ stronger efforts (and a double LP no less) and I’ll be happy to post my favorite track.

Group rating: B ROBTL: Well, it is kinda country rock.

CHILIWACK

Chiliwack’s 1971 single “Lonesome Mary” was one of my favorite obscure near-hits of my early radio-listening days I remember the DJ telling listeners that the group was from Canada, and so far north there that there “drummer is a grizzly bear.” They were actually from Vancouver and named themselves after a cool-sounding town nearby. “Lonesome Mary” was one of those killer 3-minutes slabs of power rock, with Bill Henderson’s urgent vocals and blazing guitar.

Later, Chiliwack dabbled in progressive rock, which was still evident in their 1979 album “Breakdown in Paradise” which I picked up on cassette in a Quebec City shop last year. In the early Eighties, they got their commercial due with a few poppier U.S. Top 40 hits, most notably with “My Girl (Gone Gone Gone)”, and are still a going concern these days.

Grade: A (just because) ROBTL: Grizzly bear or no grizzly bear, they representing!

The geo band phenomenon continues to this day, although reading up on the subject can cause confusion. There’s an Indiana band called Brazil but formerly called themselves London. The group Spain are from California, and Jamacia are from France. That’s not even mentioning the ones named after planets and constellations, though I do want to check out Uranus, lol.

Eggs are Stupid.

Someone had to say it. That people would let their democracy slip away on such an embarrassing (and solvable) inflection point as the rise in price of a dozen eggs, is like a national pathology that is nearly impossible to reckon with.

Of course, that was not the only issue that caused the re-election (after a four-year interval) of the convicted felon, admitted sex offender and debased traitor who tried to overturn his 2020 defeat by having a mob kill his own vice president. For the hardcore MAGA crowd it is certainly easier to complain about grocery prices than to admit to being a straight-up (and potentially violent) bigot, with a head stuffed to the gills with false grievances. But what about the rest of us? (I’ll say us to be polite even though I of course voted for Kamala Harris).

Alex had the right idea in “A Clockwork Orange.” He wants to “smash ’em” and so do I.

Fuck eggs. It would be futile for me to argue that the 166 MILLION chickens that died from the recent bird flu may have had something to do with the price hike. Because that would be too normal. Complaining is more fun. I’m not suggesting that there are not real economic troubles affecting some people, but to use that to put back in office a proud psychopath who already said he wanted to be a dictator?

Didn’t anybody ever suggest boycotting those stupid eggs? If most of the country could agree to do this the price would have come down quick, maybe even quick enough to avoid a witless slide into an authoritative nightmare. Joe Biden had about as much to do with egg prices as I have in getting a Pulitzer Prize.

Fuck Eggs. They are the modern equivalent of the old canard that at least Mussolini “made the trains run on time.” No he did not. Reportedly, only the Italian tourist trains ran on schedule. This led some witless British tourists to say that things are better with an autocratic leader running the show from Rome. This then got repeated until it sounded like the truth.

Gang of Four saw thru the ruse. (Lyrics in description)

So in 2024, eggs became some sort of defining issue, much like “soccer moms” were all the demographic rage a few election cycles back. So much so that even a Democratic consultant, was quoted in the paper in January as saying that perhaps it was inevitable that his party lost because, “Just look at the price of eggs.” WTF, dude? With people like that on your side, who needs adversaries?

Also in that day’s New York Daily News there was a poll that showed that about 70% of people thought less of President Biden for pardoning his son Hunter. In the same breath, 70% said they would pardon their own child, Welcome to the USA, kids.

Kamala Harris is certainly no Winston Churchill but I was hoping for at least a little original thinking in her campaign against such an obvious threat to democratic norms. Sure, she may present as America’s “cool aunt,” but recent history has proved that many don’t mind voting for a malignant and demented uncle. If Harris could have convinced a few of them that unkie would be better suited to a padded cell, she may have even squeaked out a victory, God save us.

One little plea. Let’s try to better to learn of “overstanding.” It’s one thing to “understand” that egg prices are high, and a completely different thing to “overstand” the issue and realizing we are being sold a bill of goods much more than $9 a dozen.  You don’t even have to man the barricades. On social media, at least treat Trump, Musk et al to a smart-ass putdown, instead of looking up terrified at the sky of worst-case-scenario. We don’t need to be any more anxious than we already are.

To get back to Alex. In the penultimate scene of “A Clockwork Orange,” he has the upper hand even in a full body cast, being fed the precious eggiwegs (not to mention “steaky-wakes” and “lomsticks of toast”) knowing that he has the unscrupulous Interior Minister right where he wants him (he is obliged to feed Alex his breakfast while being subtly taunted). They both know that the barbaric technique that “cured” him of his criminality also made him defenseless and suicidal. Now Alex has been re-cured and taken to calling the Minister (“my little droogie”) knowing instinctively that thuggery can exist just as easily thrive in the halls of power as it can on the backstreets of London.

In this “horrorshow viddy” clip, Anthony Sharp plays the Interior Minister and, of course, the legendary Malcolm McDowell is Alex DeLarge.

Many readers will know that the Anthony Burgess novel had a “controversial” final chapter that was not included in American editions of the book—and also not included in Stanley Kubrick’s towering film adaptation. Too bad, as it is quite fascinating. It begins almost exactly as the first chapter: Alex is back in the Korova Milkbar with three new droogies. They are making up their “rassoodocks” about what crimes to commit that evening. But later, he runs into his old droogie Pete and is astonished to find him happily married and with a regular job. The softening begins (“Youth must go”) and he imagines himself doing the same. In the end, normalcy will (or should) reign and hopefully Alex will not be the kind of citizen who welcomes a dictatorship because of a temporary spike in the price of eggiwegs. “Alex like groweth up, oh yes,” he thinks to himself. Maybe it’s time to do the same. Righty right.

End of the Indie Century: Revisiting “120 Minutes”

By the end of the 1980s, my best nightclubbing days were behind me. Sure, I’d still go out here and there, to clubs and concerts. But the Eighties was the decade where I experience so many greats of the post-’77 musical surge: seeing everyone from the Jam to Lene Lovich, from Husker Du to the B-52s, from the Ramones to Talking Heads, not to mention the Clash six times, including at their legendary residency at Bond’s in Times Square in 1981.

Oh, what a time it was. The punk-rock movement of the late 70s, at its core, was a crucial self-actualization for the second wave of baby-boomers tired of the over-inflated arena rock that had come to define the era. Enter urgent new sounds played in the elemental confines of clubs, while stark and distinctive fashion statements and fervid fanzines joined the battle against the bloated PR machines of corporatized supergroups. Even under the later umbrella terms of alternative or indie rock, this movement continued well into the grunge-friendly early 90s.

Hey, Thom–if you’re looking for the “Fake Plastic Trees,” they are in Aisle 5. (see below).

By then, I was getting a little older and more inclined to take it easier. One way I kept up with the alternative-rock scene was by watching the MTV show “120 Minutes” on Sunday at midnight. Giving the steady diet of putrid reality shows that dominate the once-great channel, it may be hard to imagine the inspired programming they once had on at the end of the week. “120 Minutes” was preceded by the near-anarchic animation show “Liquid Television” and the starkly beautiful sci-fi series “Aeon Flux.”

Along with videos from a great variety of artists that fell under the loose alt-rock definition, there were also numerous in-studio interviews and performances. Though MTV has long given up on most music programming, MTV2 now shows “120 Minutes” (videos only) on the weekends at its old midnight time slot. So I recently revisited this 90s show and see what it might tell me about this time when I was more or less retiring from the music-community front lines. I took the first twelve viddys that came on and jotted down my hot-take reactions, rating them on a 1-10 scale.

“Sonnet” by The Verve

Funny this came on first because I had just listened to their celebrated 1997 album “Urban Hymns” and came away duly impressed. “Sonnet” is the alluring second song, following their massive hit “Bittersweet Symphony.” It’s one I really like but the dark, static video doesn’t do much to enhance it. Grade: 7

“Sing Your Life” by Morrissey

Yup, it’s him. Morrissey has become quite a divisive figure in later years and I never much got him, outside of a few songs when he fronted the Smiths. This 1991 offering may have sought to lighten up his dour, sometimes embittered image, presenting him as a slick lounge singer with the implied positive image reflected in the song title. But I didn’t buy it for a second. Grade: 5

“Eighties” by Killing Joke

This is one of those bands I never got around to listening to. Maybe the group name (analogous to “destroying humor”) was a turnoff. For sure, it was (is?) a dark and aggressive sound. This ranter and raver was from 1985 is bludgeoning slab of industrial rock where KJ’s strident vocalist Jaz Coleman rails non-specifically about the ills of the decade.  Images of Reagan, Thatcher, Brezhnev and global strife flash on the screen. Coleman delivers this supposed message of resistance in full autocratic mode from a stage where both the U.S. and Soviet flags are present. Given recent events suggesting a new cozy relationship between a certain ex-KGB man ruling Russia and a certain dictator-loving American president, that element may now seem sadly prescient. Grade: 6

After the KJ video there was a commercial break. The first one was for baby diapers, probably not the kind of ad you saw during “120 Minutes” original run.

“Down to This” by Soul Coughing

This is the point where I felt rock culture slipping away from me. But only in retrospect; I missed this band first time around and so glad I did. The guys in this group had great indie cred, some of them cutting their musical teeth with composer John Zorn. So I can only guess why they settled for that poorly-aged cut-up style of 90s indie rock, complete with shuffling beats, fake rapping, low-rent samples and repeated nonsensical tag lines. It’s all too clever by half, and while people like Beck could infuse this sub-genre with whimsy, this is just annoying. Grade: 3

“Everyday Sunshine” by Fishbone

Just by the song title alone this came along as a breath of fresh air. After some of what came before, this L.A. group brought what others lacked: infectious energy, warmth, humor, a true social consciousness and killer grooves (they were also the only band of color of the 12 videos). Fishbone have been a wild card probably since the day they formed while junior high back in 1979. They’ve played punk and funk, ska and metal and all sorts of things in between. Here, they ride the best vibes of War and Sly Stone from the inner city to the concluding scene is a field of wildflowers. Grade: 9

“Shell Shock” by New Order

These post-punk stalwarts, formed in 1980 from the ashes of the legendary Joy Division after the suicide of singer Ian Curtis, cut their own distinctive path.  For a while, at least. Distinctive early highlights like “Age of Consent, “Temptation” and “Love Vigilantes” had by 1986 given way to a more homogenized synth-rock. “Shell Shock” is decent and danceable but a lot less gripping than earlier records. Through the blue-filtered haze of the video, I spied keyboardist Gillian Gilbert, the sole woman viewed in this sampling. Grade: 6

“Fake Plastic Trees” by Radiohead

Since I had a swipe at Soul Coughing and Killing Joke earlier, you can go ahead and snigger at me for giving this one a high mark. Even casual Radiohead fans may roll their eyes at this, one of those slow mournful tunes of theirs, voiced in falsetto by Thom Yorke—all the while being pushed around in a shopping cart up and down the aisle of a futuristic store. It’s not the best song from their great 1995 breakout album The Bends but the band’s uncanny ability to suss out the artificialities of modern life, and how it leads to lives of quiet despair, is clearly on display here, even if Yorke’s persona drives you batty. Grade: 8

“Hang Onto Your Ego” by Frank Black

This raucous and righteous cover of this Beach Boys deep cut from their classic Pet Sounds album (aka “I Know There’s an Answer”) is how you do someone else’s song and make it your own. (For how not to do it, read on). The cut-and-paste-and-distort method of video production fits the subject matter (LSD discombobulation) perfectly. Grade: 8

“Prisoner of Society” by the Living End

These Australian punk rockers don’t mess about, this classic genre complaint (reference the title) is about what you would expect. A loud-and-proud three-chord chainsaw, the obvious reference points are the Clash and Green Day, but the named themselves after a Stray Cats song and kind of look the part. Yeah, it’s retro but what’s good for the 1978 goose is also good for the 1998 gander. Grade: 7

“I Love to Hate You” by Erasure

OK, so we’re back to this again. I don’t know what it is, because I liked a lot of synth pop hits in the 80s. But this is as slick as it is unimpressive. A big budget video, complete with flamenco dancers and the singer walking on water, can’t save the song’s decided inconsequence. I guess this survey kind of shows you just like what you like. Grade: 5

“Ball of Confusion” by Love and Rockets

We lower the bar even more for this know-nothing cover version of the Temptations classic protest number. Everything about this group bugs me, from their smug presentation to the fact that they cribbed their name from Gilbert Hernandez’s celebrated comic-book series of the same name, which is centered around a band called (wait for it) Love and Rockets. What is particularly galling about this is the lack of effort, the expressionless vocal and rudimentary beat. Like Frank Black above (and hundreds of others) the goal is to apply your own stamp when covering another’s song. I don’t think these yobs have any stamp to give at all. Grade: 3

“Do You Remember Rock ‘n’ Roll Radio” by the Ramones

How appropriate that this video appeared as the last of the twelve watched at random. The Ramones’ first LP, released in April of 1976, was a clarion call for a new generation of rock and rollers. Despite the pummeling riffs and song titles like “Beat on the Brat” and “I Don’t Wanna Walk Around with You,” the group was all about community. This extended from their famous home base at CBGB in their native New York to London, where their first concert (in front of 2,000 at the Roundhouse) greatly inspired the nascent punk movement there.

In a perfect world, brilliantly conceived singles like “Sheena is a Punk Rocker” (#81) and “Rockaway Beach” (#66) would have topped the American charts. But by 1980 it was pretty evident that the band was destined for cult status only. It was decided that for their fourth album End of the Century the perfect producer to broaden their appeal would be the legendary Phil Spector. Not yet the frizzy-haired convicted murderer we would later come to know, the Spector of 1980 was still plenty crazy. Classicists at heart, the boys loved his famous girl-group sound of the early Sixties. Instead, what they got was the volatile producer allegedly waving a gun at them and locking them into his house while making obsessive demands.

The Ramones reinvent the wheel at CBGB in ’77

What came out of that was a good album but not the last-chance breakthrough they desperately wanted—though at #44 it would prove to be their highest charting LP.  The anthemic opening track, “Do You Remember Rock ‘n’ Roll Radio” seemed like a prideful last hurrah, even though the Ramones would not break up until 1996.  Name dropping everyone from Murray the K to T. Rex, the band (the lyrics are by singer Joey Ramone) embraces the whole of this great American invention—rock ‘n’ roll—and warns of its endangerment:

Do you remember lying in bed
With your covers pulled up over your head?
Radio playin’ so one can see
We need change, we need it fast
Before rock’s just part of the past
‘Cause lately it all sounds the same to me.

The fact that they’re maybe jumping the gun here is covered by the refrain: “It’s the end, the end of the 70s/It’s the end, the end of the century.” It’s everything that the music should be: energetic, passionate, purposeful and witty. The coming decades would see the rise of self-centered Instagram pop in the Katy Perry, Ke$ha et al., proving them painfully correct.

Sadly, the Ramones’ front line of Johnny, Joey and Dee Dee, all died between 2001 and 2004. “End of the Century, indeed.

Back in 1976 in Creem magazine Gene Sculatti, in a review of the Ramones first album concluded: “If their successors are as one-third as good as them, we’ll be fixed for life.” Once upon a time, we held that to be true. Grade: 10

Placeology #8: Please Don’t Ruin the Ruins!

Graffiti Highway (parabolic), Centralia PA. All photos and text by Rick Ouellette except as noted.

In the late 1700s, towards the tail end of the Age of Enlightenment, the French painter Hubert Robert became well-known for his large-scale canvasses depicting ancient ruins of France and Italy. These romantic (and often semi-fictional) scenes spoke to an age where there was a strong interest in classical antiquity and preserving what remained of it. Hubert and the other artists who followed this trend were surely aware of the evocative power of decay when it came to lost societies.

A typical Hubert Rubert joint.

Flash forward to the 21st century. We may well be deep into the Age of Un-Enlightenment, where hot-takes and online trolling has replaced the philosophical imperative. Yet the “picturesque” art style embodied by Hubert Robert has been carried on into the burgeoning field of ruins photography, the depiction of urban and industrial decay. Closely tied into the subculture of urban exploring, this field of photography has divided opinion. There are commendable practitioners like Matthew Christopher (in his two “Abandoned America” books) and Christopher Payne (the haunting and humane “Asylum: Inside the Closed World of State Mental Hospitals”) that have looked long and hard into the reasons and consequences of how  and why certain American institutions have been left to die on the vine.

Trolley Graveyard #1, Photo by author.

Critics have pointedly taken aim at some aspects this “urbex” photography, namely the exploitation of people’s natural morbid fascination with the wreckage of off-limits locations, not to mention the implied insensitivity to a region’s economic decline. I have seen a lot of that online, where intrepid shutterbugs return from their trespassing adventures and post pics online to curiously adoring fans who practically gloat over the collapsed remains of defunct shopping malls and shuttered Rust Belt factories.

Which brings me to Seph Lawless. Curiously, he released two high-profile photo books in 2017 by two different publishers. “Abandoned: Hauntingly Beautiful Deserted Theme Parks” is exactly as it says, and he put in the big miles to significantly document a big urbex sub-category.

Then somewhere the same year was the boldly presented “Autopsy of America.” In case you don’t get it, you can turn to the back cover where we get in big letters, “Death of a Nation.” Really, the whole nation?? Published by a house called Carpet Bombing Culture (kind of a red flag in itself) the text for this book is so over-the-top that it can only work as self-parody.

“Is this just another recession? Or is this the beginning of the end?”

“America is a giant… mistake.”

“I want Americans to see what is happening to their country from the comfort of their suburban homes and smartphones.”

Oh gawd, spare me the edgelord/drama queen posturing! 😉. As usual, the photography is tremendous, though by this date we’ve all seen enough abandoned houses, darkened shopping centers and the odd isolated ghost town. (Lawless throws in several of his eye-catching theme park images for contrast). Yeah, there is serious income inequality. But it’s preposterous to pretend that cities like Pittsburgh and Cleveland (to name two I have personal evidence of) are hollowed-out landmarks of a country in its immediate death rattle.  Many of those cities have growing, transitional economies and don’t need this. But I get it. He’s Seph LAWLESS for heaven’s sake, and the hype (and apocalyptic rhetoric) often goes with this territory.

Graveyard Trolley #2, photo by author.

So while I may wince when Seph, like a supervillain in waiting, stands on a half-collapsed roof and gazes at a distant metropolis, you got to hand it to him. The logistics and craft it took to depict these places that so many want to know about. I’m just a part-time amateur at this game and have only been to one of the locations featured in “Autopsy of America.” I took a tour of the (now former) Trolley Graveyard outside of Johnstown, Pennsylvania with the aforementioned Matthew Christopher. He had photographed this huge collection of streetcars, owned by a super-hobbyist, many times before, including the pre-smartphone/GPS days. By the time I got around to committing to a tour, vandals had graffitied almost every car and smashed almost every window on them. It just got too easy in the Internet age to popularize and locate these spots, for good or ill.

But Rust Belt tourism is a thing and these cities often have a long-established culture in arts, cultural attractions and professional sports. As soon as we start realizing the value and vitality of such places, the better it will be for everyone, and we can all avoid the “Autopsy.”

Ranking the Rankin/Bass Christmas Specials: The Good, the Bad and the Bizarre

The prolific producing-directing team of Jules Bass and Arthur Rankin, Jr. have had a huge impact on our holiday viewing traditions. They made no less than 17 animated Christmastime special between 1964 and 1985. The duo created such iconic Yuletide characters as Rudolph, the Little Drummer Boy and Frosty the Snowman—-and memorable side players like Yukon Cornelius, BurgerMeister MeisterBurger and the Snow Miser/Heat Miser brothers.

Rankin and Bass were among the first American producers to employ Japanese animation teams and the resulting “Animagic” stop-motion puppet films (often mistaken for Claymation) are distinctly hand-crafted, often enchanting (even trippy) and sometimes unsettling. So let’s review those Christmas TV memories, both delightful and disturbing:

THE GOOD

“The Year Without a Santa Claus” (1974)

This entry has shot up the charts in many people’s holiday hit list in recent years, due in large part to the increased popularity of the irrepressible Snow Miser and Heat Miser, who do meteorological battle to control the holiday weather via a vaudeville sing-off. But overall, this is an attractive and well-written entry without the dark psychological underpinnings that lurk in other R/B productions.

Here, a very believable Santa (voiced by Mickey Rooney) is fatigued and under the weather. Suspecting that we mortals have stopped believing in him anyway, he decides on a mental health holiday just as December inconveniently rolls in. But the sensible and resourceful Mrs. Claus (Shirley Booth), showing us that it’s not only the Hubbie who knows how fly a reindeer, conspires to save the day. Features the songs “Here Comes Santa Claus” and a children’s version of “Blue Christmas.”

“Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” (1964)

This perennial favorite celebrated its 60th anniversary this month by returning to NBC from whence it first aired. That it came out so long before the “safe space” era makes it great meme fodder for those who want to imagine the magnanimous Rudolph with a different answer to Santa’s famous question. This request for help coming after ol’ Ruddie Red Nose was practically disowned by his dad and bullied and ostracized by nearly everyone at the North Pole, forcing him into a dangerous (but ultimately rewarding) exile.

In these days of everyone-gets-a-trophy, “Rudolph” can stand tall as a great example that the world can be a cruel and callous place, and that a true test of character is not the worst thing. Rudolph “finds his tribe,” first teaming up with would-be dentist elf Hermey who has fled the town’s forced-labor camp, oops, I mean Santa’s workshop. They sing the great non-conformist anthem “We’re a Couple of Misfits” before heading out for their colorfully weird adventures with Yukon, on the Island of Misfit Toys, and against the Abominable Snowman. Note that when Rudolph returns to save the day, only his father straight-up apologizes for his previous cruelty, leaving a lot of unanswered questions about Santa’s alleged kindness.

“The Little Drummer Boy” (1968)

By the late Sixties, Rankin and Bass had hit upon a good dependable working model. This usually involved building a story around a preexisting holiday song (“Drummer Boy” was first recorded in 1951 by the Von Trapp Family), getting celebrity talent to do the voice work (June Foray, Paul Frees and guest narrator Jose Ferrer) and not shying away from subject matter that was a little dark for the kiddies. I confess to traumatizing my own son at a tender age when he witnessed the house of drummer-boy Aaron being torched by bandits while his parents were still inside.

Oopsy! The orphaned and embittered Aaron wanders the Middle Eastern desert, leading on his team of three surviving farm animals, by laying down some beats on the drum he received from his parents before you-know-what. He is exploited by a shady showman, before being led to Bethlehem on the coattails of Three Wise Men. Cue the Vienna Boys’ Choir for the stately rendition of Katherine Kennicott Davis’ revered (and sometimes reviled) carol. Behind that soaring chorus, the scene at the manger with Aaron and his stricken lamb is unabashedly religious and admittedly moving.

“Santa Claus is Coming to Town” (1970)

Fred Astaire gets the “Told and Sung By” honors here, as the R/B team hits on all cylinders. House scriptwriter Romeo Muller pens a succinct origin story for the big guy, and the Animagic cinematography team, led by Kizo Nagashima, do splendid work all the way from the icy-blue Mountain of the Whispering Winds down to the Teutonic grays and browns of Sombertown. The original music by Bass and Maury Laws is Broadway-worthy stuff, especially the two “Toymaker” songs and Claus’ self-improvement tune, “Put One Foot in Front of the Other,” sung to the easily-won-over Winter Warlock.

Voice actor extraordinaire Paul “Boris Badunov” Frees, was the voice of ace villain Burgermeister Meisterburger as well as his assistant Grimley.

This is also the first appearance of Mickey Rooney voicing the part of Santa, a role he would reprise a few times over the next decade. His is a nicer Santa than the ethically dubious one we saw in Rudolph. However, I still have a bit of an issue with the title song, first sung on the radio in 1934 by Eddie Cantor. I mean, here’s a guy who “sees you when you’re sleeping/knows when you’re awake.” Stalker, much?

Jack Frost (1979)

Moving away from the Santa-centric holiday fare, here’s a tale of everyone’s favorite wintertime sprite, one of the team’s most visually appealing entries. But this special’s affecting tale, much of it taking place in a splendorous silvery-blue domain, is hamstrung by a rather odd Groundhog Day framing device, with corny ol’ Buddy Hackett as narrator as Pardon-Me-Pete explaining at length the connection between Jack and his big day on February 2nd.

Otherwise, this is a grown-up story of how lovelorn Jack, crushing hard on the pretty but flighty Elisa, asks Father Winter if he might become human in an attempt to win her hand. She was a fangirl of ol’ Frost in his invisibility mode, but as a real boy it’s more like let’s-be-friends. Nevertheless, Jack proves himself in battle against the fearsome Kubla Khan, the Cossack King, who rules January Junction atop his mechanical horse and has at his disposal a steampunk army and an iron-plated sidekick called Dummy. (Kubla is memorably voiced by Paul Frees in his Boris Badunov voice).

The voice of Elisa is Debra Clinger, of the Clingers. She and her sisters were the first all-girl rock band signed to a major label.

Ultimately though, Jack is obliged to return to his former nipping-at-your-nose occupation, making this maybe the only R/B production with a romantic heartbreak theme.

The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus (1985)

It’s back to the Santa origin story in this adaptation of the 1902 book by “Wizard of Oz” author L. Frank Baum. This is the last, and one of the best, of Rankin/Bass holiday productions, driven by the almost psychedelic visuals inspired by Baum’s ripe imagination. The grand procession of The Immortals that kicks things off in grand style.

The conclave of these pagan bigwigs is called by the Great Ak (“The Master Woodsman of the World”) to decide whether to confer Immortal status on the human orphan named Claus, who they took in after he was abandoned some 50 years previous. Of course, Ak relates the whole backstory, how he and young Claus had travelled the medieval world and got a close-up look at man’s inhumanity to man. Claus is esp. offended at the plight of neglected children and commits himself to their happiness. (But not before the Immortals have to take out the fantastical kid-hating baddies known as the Awgwas).

After a half-century of service, Santa is feeling his age so will the Immortals step up to the plate and make him an Immortal? No spoilers here. Rankin and Bass and their Animagic collaborators in Japan went out on a high note, so don’t miss out on this special special. After all, not all R/B creations we were great, and below we will look at some of their Greatest Misses.

The Bad and the Bizarre

“Frosty the Snowman” (1969)

As if the 1950 Gene Autry song wasn’t annoying enough, this cartoon is so appallingly awful that it shouldn’t appeal to anyone over the age of five with at least one working brain cell. Here is the IMDB capsule description: “A living snowman and a little girl struggle to elude a greedy magician who is after the snowman’s magic hat.” Let’s get one thing straight off the bat: the hat belongs to the magician!! He is clearly shown as the owner when he does his rather inept magic show for the school children. That it later accidentally blew unto their snowman is beside the point.

Merry Christmas, kids!

Let’s admit it, Frosty was better off as an inert snowman. As a living being he is a chucklehead always in danger of melting and thus breaking the hearts of the impressionable kids. Jimmy Durante, as the defensive narrator (“That hat DID belong to Frosty and the children, that point must be made very clear”) sees nothing wrong with Frosty taking one of the children along with him to the North Pole, even though the girl almost freezes to death in the process. But, hey, it’s a classic, I guess! Rankin and Bass always had less luck with their cel animation, though this one paid off handsomely.

“Nestor, the Long-Eared Christmas Donkey” (1977)

This well-meaning but derivative program is also based on a Gene Autry ditty, and Roger “King of the Road” Miller does the honors as narrator and singer here. Shades of “Rudolph” abounds as Nestor is discriminated against because his ground-dragging ears make him clumsy. But Mary and Joseph look kindly on him and Nestor is enlisted to help them make it to Bethlehem. Note to parents: this special is rife with savage Roman soldiers, meanie animal merchants and even Bambi-level tragedy. But it all ends well on that fateful night at the manager, so we all good?

“The Stingiest Man in Town” (1978)

In view of their prolific output, it is no surprise that Rankin/Bass would have a crack at Dickens’ timeless tale. But this operetta-style version of “A Christmas Carol” is best left forgotten. The cel animation is uninspired at best and the musical numbers are mediocre, esp. considering the lazy lyrics (Jacob Marley to Ebenezer: “My chain of wrong is very long/But yours is even longer”). And whatever Walter Matthau was paid for voicing Scrooge, it was too much.

The First Christmas: The Story of the First Christmas Snow (1975)

The unwieldy title is not the only awkward thing about this entry. I mean, Christmas at the convent? I had eight years of parochial school, so it’s a hard pass for me. However, I did like Angela Lansbury’s version of “White Christmas.”

‘Twas the Night Before the Christmas (1974)

There are mouses in the houses in this rodent-infested version of the inescapable holiday poem. And they are stirring, unfortunately. Another example of how the R/B team were seemingly indifferent with their cel animation works, this one looks like a Hanna-Barbara reject.

Rudolph and Frosty’s Christmas in July (1979)

The youngsters should love this crossover effort. It has two of Rankin and Bass’ most beloved creations, and the stop-motion work looks great. I continue have doubts about the problematic top-hatted snowman, who still insists on using tobacco products in the company of children. Put away that corncob pipe and I’ll wish even you a Merry Christmas, Frosty!

So what do you think, what’s your most and least favorite Rankin/Bass show? Let me know and have a great holiday season! –Rick Ouellette