Friday Jammed In a Corner Again

Today, I'm here at The Brick, letting in rehearsals for The Pretentious Festival.

Right now, as I'm uncomfortably jammed behind the bar/box office, John Del Signore is rehearsing his show The Mercury Manifesto, which sounds extremely good and funny. At 2.00 pm, Cole Kazdin comes in with The Cole Kazdin Amnesia Project. Then I get to go home. In the meantime, a random 10 and then I work on my lines for Ian W. Hill's Hamlet.


So, here's 10 out of the current 21,252 in the iPod:


1. "Listen to My Heart" - The Ramones - Ramones

Sweet pop music for the kids.


2. "Il Re Dei Pagliacci" - Neil Sedaka - Rato's Nostalgia Collection 25

Sedaka sings in Italian. I'm sure this is an American single of his, it sounds familiar, but I can't place it - the lyrics (what I can make of them) don't give me a clue (lots about being a "big clown" or something, I think).

There's more and more non-English-language songs on this device, which I like.


3. "Big Chief" - Professor Longhair - Big Chief

Nawlins driving-piano-and whistling-r&b gumbo. I like, but this is from Berit's collection - she's gotten me more into music like this or Dr. John. A great swing to it.

Eventually, singing -- which is in the English language . . . kinda . . . I think. Not sure it matters.


4. "All Grown Up" - The Crystals - Phil Spector - Back to Mono (1958-1969)

I used to revere Phil Spector, and "Be My Baby" may still be my favorite recording of all time, but a lot of the rest of the Wall of Sound has less appeal for me now - and not just becuse Spector's a gun-wielding psycho.

Too many of the Spector tracks now sound sludgy and dull-edged - especially his Crystals singles, there not even being a real "Crystals" by this point - it was just a catchall name for singles sung by a group of women that Spector put out (Darlene Love sang lead on many of them; Cher is in there on a few).

Eventually this led to the horrible overdone production of Ike & Tina Turner's River Deep Mountain High album, which features great songs ruined by Spector's Wall of Noise interspersed with good songs well-produced cleanly by Ike Turner. And how's that for a duo of important and unpleasant rock and roll figures producing an album?


5. "All Cried Out" - Dusty Springfield - Dusty Volume 1

Great song, great singer, great recording.


6. "Click Clack" - Dicky Doo & The Don'ts - Back to the 50s 04

Somewhere between dopey 50s novelty record and catchy insipid 60s bubblegum. Not a bad 2:25.


7. "That You Love Me" - The Impressions - A Taste of Doo Wop Vol. 1

Smooth and lovely. Not a classic, but nothing wrong with that, or it. The backing vocals on the bridge elevate it quite a bit.


8. "Can I Go" - Roger Nichols & The Small Circle of Friends - The Complete Roger Nichols & The Small Circle of Friends

I wish I'd get a little something harder in here. The iPod has a taste for the midline pop music today. I'd like a change-up.

This is also pleasant, but on the verge of something like The Fifth Dimension or something - a little harder, but also whiter. Not quite middle-of-the-road, but almost. Just edging onto the double-yellow here and there. I could use a loud guitar or something . . .


9. "The Little March" - The Mothers of Invention - You Can't Do That on Stage Anymore vol. 5

Well, not exactly rock or guitar-based, but spiky enough to do. A Zappa instrumental, late 60s, with my favorite Mothers. Scaled-down, but similar to his orchestral work. Grand and stirring.


10. "Farewell Song" - Big Brother & The Holding Company - Live at Winterland '68

Janis works it and it's great. I usually prefer the Big Brother tracks to her other bands, and this is a good illustration of why -- she's special, and leading it, but it's still a band working together.

Her voice tears me apart.


Ah, well, off to The Brick's dressing room to quietly work on lines. Rehearsals again tomorrow and Sunday. Work to do.

At the Other End of the Hall a Rhythm Was Generating

Worked on my Hamlet lines for several hours today. Pretty good, but not there yet. I have most of our Act I down, except for the Hamlet/Gertrude scene and the "Rogue and Peasant Slave" and "How All Occasions" speeches.

I'll have some time in the space tomorrow to work on them some more. We also have to shoot the images for the postcard so I can return the camera we borrowed to its owner.


I was Hamletted out for the day. Came home from The Brick and somehow wound up watching a bunch of episodes of The X Files and Millennium -- all the ones written by Darin Morgan, which are pretty much the best ones, and still all hold up.


But what first made me think of looking at those episodes was checking on YouTube if anyone had posted one of the damnedest acts of an hour-long TV drama I've ever seen, the third part of the final episode of Millennium, season two, "The Time Is Now," which is basically a dialogueless music video for a favorite song of mine.

When this episode first aired, and the show came back from a commercial break, starting the song, I turned angrily to my friend David Mcintyre and said, "No, no, no, you can't just use this song for backing music, if you use this song you have to use the whole thing!" I never imagined that that's exactly what they would do.

I'm still somewhat stunned that a quarter of an episode of a commercial network TV show was given over to a 10-minute long video for a Patti Smith song.

The episode was edited by George R. Potter, who I'm sure was delighted to find the on-set police lights used in one section synched up perfectly with the drum track.

All you need to know going in is at this point in the show's arc, the end of the world may be coming, and the character featured here, Lara Means (Kristen Cloke), who has psychic visions, has been going mad as her visions have turned to the apocalypse, and has hidden herself away in a motel. Series protagonist Frank Black needs to find her, and at the end of the previous act has gotten the information he needs.