CollisionWorks

Once again, beginning to run out of good photos - we returned the camera we borrowed from Robert Honeywell, and now I'm just going through everything we shot while we had it.


Here's Hooker and Moni in one of their temporary detentes over the currently favorited chair for each of them:





And Moni on the identical chair across the room, where she can be close to Mommy-Berit's normal position:





Meanwhile, back in the bedroom, I take a nap and my little buddy joins me to remind me who rules my sleeptime:





And congrats to our great friends, regular catsitters, and cast members of Ian W. Hill's Hamlet, Christiaan Koop and Bryan Enk on the acquisition of their new feline buddy, Dharma!

Greetings from the much chillier climes of Portland, ME. I did a whole Random Ten entry this morning, spending my usual time annotating somewhat, but then lost it in a silly computer glitch. So, I'm not going to rewrite it, but here's what was played for me with my morning coffee:


1. "Penetration" - The Stooges - Raw Power
2. "Hot One" - Shudder to Think - Velvet Goldmine soundtrack
3. "Sweet Jane (early version)" - The Velvet Underground - Loaded (fully loaded edition)
4. "Limbo" - Throwing Muses - Limbo
5. "One Rose That I Mean" - Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band - Lick My Decals Off, Baby
6. "The Grand Duel (Parte Prima)" - Luis Bacalov - Kill Bill vol. 1
7. "Everlasting Joy" - Tripsichord Music Box - Tripsichord Music Box
8. "The Continental" - Prince & The New Power Generation - O(+>
9. "Baby It's Love" - The Libarettos - Oceanic Odyssey Volume 12
10. "Boys" - The Beatles - Please Please Me


And now, with my evening (decaf) coffee, another set from out of the 21,153 in the stuffed little device, with some comments:


1. "Jump Monk" - various artists - Weird Nightmare: Meditations on Mingus

Bright jazz dissonance with a great beat.


2. "It Came Upon a Midnight Clear" - Johnny Cash - Man in Black 1963-69

I have a huge amount of Cash now, more than I need, and this is one of the ones I don't need. Will go soon.


3. "I'm a Steady Rollin' Man" - Robert Johnson - The Complete Recordings

Never gets old.


4. "Louie Louie" - The Kingsmen - The Louie Louie Files

Perfection, and even if the words are difficult to make out, the song as a whole is comprehensible at any speed.


5. "When You're Hot, You're Hot" - Jerry Reed - Wacky Favorites

Novelty record. Fun enough to keep.


6. "Trusting Mr. Jones" - The Hitmakers - Those Clasic Golden Years 07

Good god. Some kind of British snotty pop-psychedelia inspired a bit by Dylan's "Ballad of a Thin Man" (in the "Mr. Jones" characterization). Wonderfully lovely in its cheesiness.


7. "Bring Him Back" - Dusty Springfield - Dusty Volume 2

Good song, great singer, terrific recording.


8. "The Green Door" - Jim Lowe - Back to the 50s 01

More novelty, this one a bit more of a classic.


9. "Ain't Gonna Eat Out My Heart" - The Puppets - Girls in the Garage vol. 1

Oh, cool . . . great nasty all-girl garage band. Bit of a Shangri-Las toughness to them. An answer to the much more prevalent and very similar snide songs from the boys in the garage from the same time.


10. "I Told Those Little White Lies" - The Painted Ship - Back from the Grave 8

Like this one, except unlike the norm, where the guy is complaining about the girl's bad treatment of him and telling her to go away, here he's crowing about his bad treatment of her (supposedly in retaliation against her actions, but he sounds too pleased about the whole thing).


Meanwhile, back in Brooklyn:





Moni wonders why I am not her Mommy, and Hooker has his 15th nap of the day:

In a rush right now to get myself together and leave Maine, so I can get home at a reasonable mid-afternoon time, rest a bit, and get myself together again to go into Manhattan for the second reading of Ian W. Hill's Hamlet tonight with the (almost) full cast (we're down one due to a schedule error, unfortunately).


So while I have the needed cup of coffee, and before I do the last little jobs around the house I promised my mom I'd do, here's a couple of cats, and a few songs.





Hooker, and his Floppy Ear, approve. And meanwhile, back in the iPod . . .


1. "Things You Only Know If You Don't Drive" - The Amateurs - download

Nice alt-rock country-tinged pop song. Must of got this from some site where I'm downloading lots of current (?) music in a vague attempt to have some sense of surfing the zeitgeist.


2. "So Many Roads, So Many Trains" - Otis Rush - Living the Blues: Blues Masters

Beautiful, in a distant, recorded across a big empty room, way.


3. "Bumble Bee '65" - The Motions - Wavy Gravy - For Adult Enthusiasts Only

Preceded on this record (and track) with a radio ad for an exploitation film called Pickup on 101 "starring Leslie Warren, Jack Albertson, and Martin Sheen!" Gotta find that film someday. "She looks easy but she's seen and done it all!" "Going . . . my way?"

Then a nasty fast guitar instrumental, with vague "Misirlou" tendencies. I think I have the group's earlier version of this somewhere, too. Guess it was the only song of theirs to make it.


4. "Bedazzled" - Bongwater - The Power of Pussy

Ann Magnuson and Kramer cover the Dudley Moore classic from the film of the same title (yes I know Peter Cook performed it in the film, Moore wrote it).

I had dreamed of covering this on my 4-track for years when I heard this version, and decided "It's been done." Especially as Magnuson does it in the same faux-German accent I had been planning on using.


5. "Ebb Tide" - The Platters - The Magic Touch: An Anthology

Great version of the standard. Obviously late Platters - a clean, 60s-sounding, stereo recording - and almost a little syrupy in the arrangement, but not quite, but the vocals are magnificent! The Platters should be remembered for more than the one or two "big" hits they had. They were special.


6. "Death Walks in High Heels" - Jerry Van Rooyen - At 250 MPH

Slick, spy movie upbeat jazz, from a collection of European (German, specifically?) movie music of the 60s by Van Rooyen, who I don't know otherwise. Much more jazz than pop/lounge based, as most other low-budget spy movie music of the time was. Real nice drum and trumpet solos. Pretty classy, really.


7. "Year of the Parrot" - Primus - Tales from the Punchbowl

And in another universe, 1990s spiky, odd altrock from this power trio, heavily influenced by The Residents, Captain Beefheart, and King Crimson (maybe more precisely by Tony Levin) but making pop music you can groove and dance to.


8. "Shub-a-dooe" - The Peter Thomas Sound Orchestra - Raumpatrouille

What the HELL is this track? Oh, this is great! Also from a collection of a composer's 60s movie soundtracks. It's like a sweet lullaby of nonsense lyrics sung by a jazz-voiced man over a syrupy string arrangement with a roller-rink organ way up front.

Oh, I HAVE to use this somewhere!


9. "Midway Down" - The Creation - How Does It Feel To Feel?

More cool, snotty late-60s "heavy" psychedelic rock that I found in researching the music for Temptation. I used a song by these guys in the show, but I like the whole album. It's kind of typical, but better than most. The lyrics would probably get on my nerves if I bothered to really try to hear what they're saying.

Very poppy "la-la" chorus that would not be out of place, songwise, with The Archies or The Monkees. Helps leven the attempted "heaviness."


10. "Rammstein (edit)" - Rammstein - Lost Highway

A little something from a Lynch soundtrack. Heavy, Laibach-sounding German rock with intoning bass vocalist. Works to provide memories of this, a favorite film.

And also then to remind me I have to be on the highway this dreary, overcast morning myself.


But waiting at home for me . . .





As well as Berit, who would probably prefer no photo of her here. So none. So, more than worth it driving home now.

Well, we finally borrowed a camera (thanks, RH!) and got some new shots of the kitties, though none that really show off poor Hooker's new deformed (but cute) left ear.


In any case, the best of what we have thus far:





Moni wonders what I'm doing, and if she should kill the wrist-strap dangling from the camera.





At rest between crazy periods, newly crumpled ear somewhat visible.





This is a normal position for hours every morning before Berit gets up. Sometimes, this position is accompanied by kneading of the front paws. Berit is a heavy sleeper.





Yesterday, Hooker was being especially lovey and sweet with Berit for a while. They were both very happy about this.