Bollywood mega-mix featuring clips from Teesri Manzel, Bhoot Bangla, Chikubuku Chikubuku Railay, O Meri Maina, Pyar Hi Pyar, Ellam Inba Mayam.

Ann Margret, Elvis, Chubby Checker, Parliament Funkadelic, Michael Jackson, Little Richard, Ronnie Spector…Bollywood style. 30 minutes of vindaloo au-go-go: rock, funk and disco.

 
Ken, a South Korean busker, does an urgent version of Heart Of Gold. The person who uploaded this to Yuotube, Topechick, calls Ken “Elvis”, but she’s wrong - Neil Young all the way.

This was shot somewhere along the banks of the Yukon River. It looks pretty deserted. Is Ken a rock and roll hermit?

 
British deejay Grum’s ‘Through The Night’ is an 80’s inspired dance jam that reminds me of some of my favorite groups of that much maligned era: The Human League, ABC, Pet Shop Boys, Spandau Ballet… The video directed by a mysterioso group called The General Assembly is a hilarious, homo-erotic homage to ‘buddy films’ of the 80’s. Brilliant.

 
Shit!

Michael Been lead singer, songwriter and guitarist of 80’s band The Call has died of a heart attack at the age of 60. He was in Belgium acting as sound engineer for his son’s band Black Rebel Motorcycle Club.

The Call were one of the finest, smartest and most underrated bands of the 80’s. Michael wrote passionate anthems that went beyond simple bombast. His lyrics had depth, intelligence and incisive political content. He was highly regarded among musicians and collaborated with many, including Bono, Peter Gabriel and Robbie Robertson. His music was free of gimmicks and fashionable poses and, as a result, has stood the test of time.

Michael went from fronting his own band to becoming a guiding force in the development of his son Robert’s musical career. He co-produced and engineered several BRMC albums.

I was a big fan of The Call. They were the real deal. There was something about Michael that immediately appealed to me. His writing was terrific and he seemed like a decent, soulful, and genuine human being - nothing slick or phony about the guy. I listened to his songs and I know they seeped into my own writing and music. I can’t say that about many of my contemporaries in the 80’s. I respected Michael and I loved his music.

 
More goodness from Michael Been and The Call after the jump…

 
Over the past few years there have been a number of fanboys who have attempted to reconstruct Star Wars as a silent film. They convert the film to black and white, speed it up and add an old-fashioned piano score. But the ones I’ve seen have failed miserably to authentically replicate the actual look of a real silent movie…until now. This new one succeeds marvelously. It looks like something unearthed from the 1920’s - a really shitty print of a Metropolis outtake. Mark Hamill’s melodramatic facial expressions, his broad gestures and the heightened shadowing of his eyes resemble that of so many actors of the silent era.

I’m not a Star Wars fan, but this I like.

 
Italian video wizard Bante has taken classic Blue Note album covers and animated them in this totally groovy video promoting Italy’s Bellavista Social Pub.

 
Joe Franklin was the king of latenight television in New York City. I watched his show religiously during the late 70’s/early 80’s. After a few shots of Jack Daniels and half a dozen lines of Peruvian flake, there was nothing more mesmerizing than the loopy surrealism of Joe Franklin. His stream of consciousness raps, fractured and deliriously deft, coupled with his vast knowledge of TV, music and movie trivia, was like listening to the Akashic Record of 20th century pop culture being transmitted through an Elf on meth. Franklin was a character in a David Lynch movie before David Lynch had even made a movie. He was a trip. And punk rockers loved him.

Here’s a wonderful clip of Joey and Marky Ramone on The Joe Franklin Show. As you will see, Joey is somewhat in awe of the genius of Joe. This was aired in 1988.

I gotta give props to Joe’s sidekick, bug-eyed deejay Paul Cavalconte, for being ultra-hip, despite The Smiths question.

 
Spike Kinsey not only offers solid tips on getting in shape and some pretty tasty floor moves, he does so with a philosophical underpinning based on the teachings of Paula Abdul. Spike is not only a dancer, he’s a thinker. Less than a hundred views on Youtube. Show Spike some respect. He’s workin’ hard for all of us. I like this guy. He’s got a positive vibe.

“Sorry, that’s my dog Cheryl.”

 
Here’s a rarity: Elvis Presley’s down and dirty cover of Percy Mayfield’s Stranger In My Own Town. The Houndblog uploaded this raunchy and bluesy number to his website and Dangerous Minds’ Ron Nachmann brought it to my attention. I’ve heard a lot of bootleg recordings of Elvis cussin’, but this one is The King at his foulmouthed best. In addition, his singing is pretty damn soulful.

I added Stranger In My Own Town as the audio track on this video montage of Elvis clips, which includes some cool home movie footage.

 
The future of fashion as imagined in the 1960’s by André Courrèges, Pierre Cardin, Mary Quant and Paco Rabanne. Music by Mort Garson and Franck Pourcel.

3 short clips.

Thanks to Victoria from Germany

 
Behold the perplexing multi-media underground electropop darlings of Tokyo, Trippple Nippple. Their stage show sounds like a J-Pop version of out-there 70s performance artists, The Kipper Kids, and features stuff like eggs, glitter, milk, blood and rotting food. From an interview posted today at the Dazed and Confused blog:

Dazed Digital: Is there symbolism behind your costumes and performances?

Qrea Nippple: Last time we were doing some guillotine things, and we cut so many heads off balloons. The helium goes to the ceiling. Yuka was crying like, “Oh I feel so guilty for killing so many balloon heads, so I drew some really wicked, bad faces on the balloons, so she wouldn’t feel guilty for cutting their heads off. ”
Dazed Digital: What were some of your most memorable performances?

Yuka Nippple: We have a lot of stories about making a mess. We played club Asia in Tokyo and our costumes were mud, just that. And we put on some blonde hair ponytails. We were just mud and blonde hair ponytail. That was our costume. It was a lot of fun as always. But in the morning when the lights turned on, the whole club was covered in dry mud. And everyone went mad, and everyone had to clean up until about 9am in the morning. We made a lot of people really upset. We didn’t mean to of course, but my bad, but I’d like to announce that we can do “Not dirty one” too! People sometimes misunderstand what we are, but we are musicians!
Dazed Digital: So where did you acquire all this mud?

Yuka Nippple: Amazing, amazing store called Tokyu Hands in Shibuya. It’s a department store with 21 floors of DIY stuff. We get everything from there. You can spend a day just looking for things. We found rice-field mud in a packet.
 

 
Read the entire article at Dazed Digital: TOKYO’S TRIPPPLE NIPPPLES: Insane electro popstresses hailing from the fine land of Tokyo talk fake tits and their milky alcohol

 
Look At Life were a series of short documentary films produced in the 1960s by the Rank Organization. They were shown in British movie theaters before the main attraction. Shot in vibrant color, Look At Life often focused on ‘Swinging London’.

In these two clips we get a peek into the King’s Road fashion scene and hip London coffeehouses. Groovy.

Photograph by Bruce Davidson
 
Photos of old school New York before they switched over to the subway trains that couldn’t be graffitied on. New York has sadly lost a lot of its character since then (as well as many of its characters, too!)
 

Photograph by John F. Conn
 

Photograph by Bruce Davidson
 
See more photos after the jump…
 

 
Time for Timer was the overall title for a series of PSAs that ran on ABC in-between Saturday morning kids cartoons in the mid-70s. He was a yellow blob with a wristwatch, a top hat and a walking stick. Timer’s schtick was that he was telling kids about what time it was: Time for nutrition, time to learn about why you need to brush your teeth, time for a recipe for making homemade juice popsicles (my sister and I made these), how to prevent lightheadedness from eating breakfast and the merits of cheese:

“I hanker for a hunka,
A slab or slice or chunka
A snack that is a winner,
And yet won’t spoil my dinner,
I hanker for a hunka cheese… Yahoo!”

If you are aged 35 and older, you probably remember these PSAs quite well. I confess to still remembering the words for several of them and my memory is shit! The Time for Timer spots never really had the same cultural longevity or nostalgic appeal as the Schoolhouse Rock spots did. Certainly there has been no Time for Timer tribute CD with various indie rock bands singing his songs, but Timer and his advice to kids lives on, like everything else, on YouTube. Timer made a cameo appearance, playing a crack smoker, in an episode of Family Guy.
 

Nude No. 2 by John Perry
 

For friends and fans of John Lurie, there’s a disturbing article in the current issue of The New Yorker. The title of the piece is ‘Sleeping With Weapons’ and it’s a strange and sad tale. John has been in hiding for the past 18 months to avoid a former friend who is supposedly stalking him. The alleged stalker, John Perry, was Lurie’s closest friend. The two had a serious falling out and Lurie feared that Perry intended to kill him.

The above quote is from a piece I posted on Dangerous Minds August 11. Last night I spoke with John Perry, Lurie’s alleged stalker, and in conversation, Perry came across as an even-tempered and thoughtful guy who allowed a falling out with a friend to escalate into an epic battle of wills and a public airing of dirty laundry.

To hear him tell it, Perry, an artist who specializes in cityscapes and portraits, had invited his friend Lurie to participate in an instructional documentary on drawing called The Drawing Show, with Lurie serving as the subject of one of Perry’s portraits. Lurie enthusiastically agreed to do it. He liked Perry’s work.  The finished film was then going to be pitched to PBS as a concept for an ongoing television series. As Perry described it, it would be a program instructing non-artists on how to draw, just like the numerous cooking shows teach people how to cook.  In discussing the concept, Perry was at his most upbeat and energized during our talk. Clearly, it means a lot to him. At this point, the project is still up in the air and that’s where the problems with Lurie begin.

Citing illness, Lurie left the project before its conclusion. Whether he intended to complete the shoot or not is unclear, the fact is he left. What is clear is that Perry is stuck with 27 minutes of professionally shot video that was not finished as planned. The end of the piece was to have Lurie looking at the portrait that Perry had sketched of him and commenting on it. This was the agreed upon ending. But, Lurie left and never returned. No one knows why. What is known is that Lurie’s leaving the project has left Perry $6000 poorer, frustrated and initially quite angry. Perry, bewildered as to why Lurie would sabotage his project, did everything he could to communicate to Lurie the importance of finishing the video shoot. Lurie’s lack of response and evasiveness fueled Perry’s frustration and some trash talk ensued.  But, Perry’s anger never went beyond tough guy posturing and some heated e-mail exchanges between Lurie and himself. I’ve read some of the e-mails and in them both men are equally guilty of being hostile. But no threats of bodily harm were made by Lurie or Perry. At no point in my conversation with Perry did I feel he was the type of guy who would stalk someone with the intention of hurting them. It just doesn’t seem to be his style. But, I’m speaking from the gut, I don’t know all of the facts, only Perry and Lurie do. No amount of ink on the page or words on a computer screen will tie this emotionally charged mess up in an aesthetically pleasing bow. Anyone who has gone through a toxic breakup knows that tidy resolutions to deep heartbreak is rarely achievable.

When all is said and done, two friends, two artists, have had an extended personal dust-up publicly exposed in what will eventually become a major embarrassment for both of them. In John Perry’s case, it already has. 

Through it all, Perry has tried to stay focused on the things that mean the most to him, his art and a deep desire to teach people how to draw. The ultimate test of Perry’s success will not be in whether or not he proves to the world that he’s not the person Lurie has painted him to be, but whether or not the world gets to know him through his art and a film as yet unfinished. My advice to John last night was to move on and let his work speak for him. The people who really give a shit about Perry know who he is. The readers of The New Yorker and this blog will have forgotten about a fight between two New York artists (even one named Lurie) in a matter of months if not weeks. It really doesn’t matter. “Ars longa, vita brevis”

The drama is in watching a semi-celebrity like John Lurie going through hell. There hasn’t been much interest in John Perry, a man who’s life has been derailed, for the moment, by unproven allegations of being a stalker. I personally think he never intended or threatened to harm Lurie. I may be naive, I may be wrong about Perry, perhaps there’s someone out there, other than Lurie, who can back up these allegations, so far they haven’t spoken up. And until they do, Perry, to me,  is just a guy who’s been through a shitstorm magnified by an article in a magazine: the phantom stalker, perhaps just a demon in John Lurie’s head?

Watch the clip from The Drawing Show and see what really matters to John Perry.

Here’s ten minutes of unedited footage from The Drawing Show.

 
The Strange Tale Of A Lounge Lizard.

 

 
I first discovered Brit rockabilly wildman Vince Taylor when I saw him and his band in some French Scopitones. I was blown away by his over-the-top stage moves and fetishy black leather outfit. The cat was ultra-cool in a synthetic sort of way, a simulacrum composed of bits and pieces of Elvis, Gene Vincent and interstellar tonup boy. Vince had a string of hits and was a mega-star in France. But, LSD, alcohol, and being absolutely convinced he was Jesus, brought Taylor’s musical life to a loopy end.

Vince Taylor may have lost it (or found IT), but before he flamed out he managed to record two of the best rockabilly songs ever recorded, Jet Black Machine and Brand New Cadillac (later covered by The Clash). He was the inspiration for David Bowie’s Ziggy Stardust persona and provided the fashion proto-type for Elvis circa 1968. He opened for the Rolling Stones, copped his first hit of acid at a party for Bob Dylan and slept with Brigitte Bardot. Morrissey used footage of Taylor dancing as a visual backdrop during his 2007 tour.

Vince’s moment of fame may have been brief but it was action-packed and he left an indelible jet black impression.

In this fascinating BBC documentary, Taylor’s story is told by his former drummer (the wonderfully animated Bobbie Clarke), David Bowie and people who helped guide his brief but amazing career. Enjoy.

 
Rock journalist Steve Krakow (Plastic Crimewave) is blogging about forgotten musicians of Chicago. The Secret History Of Chicago Musicians sheds light on a number of bands I’ve never heard of and it’s a fascinating read.

Krakow went in search of the Windy City’s equivalent of Anvil, a band that flirted with fame but ended up in the cutout bin of history, and he found Amulance.

Amulance’s story is filled with your typical rock band nightmares. Formed in 1984, the group suffered through shady management, bad record deals, tours that fell through and even a murder. It’s another tale of speed metal gone off the rails and heavy metal heartache.

In compiling the reasons Amulance never made it, I’d put the vocalist’s and the lead guitar player’s fashion sense some place close to #1. Fortunately, the band has revamped it’s look for it’s recent re-union gigs. Good luck guys, it’s a jungle out there….but you already know that.

 
More heavy metal thunder after the jump…

 
R. Crumb’s Motor City Comics #1, “the only true workingman’s comic book,” featuring Lenore Goldberg and Her Girl Commandos. Another gem from “The Lizard Collection” over at Little Green Footballs.  I like the back cover even more than the front. From Crumb’s Marxist phase? Nicely!
 

 
Thank you Charles Johnson!

 
Epic.

 
According to XLR8R, Dangerous Minds pal Madlib has come out with his own brand of designer espresso:

OK, we know the dudes at Stones Throw like to get creative with their merchandise, but this might be a hip-hop first. Madlib and Intelligensia Coffee are teaming up to make a custom espresso blend inspired by the Beat Konducta. The limited-run blend is being debuted tonight at the cafe’s Pasadena location, and Intelligensia is calling the product “a syrupy, sweet offering that has kept (Madlib) awake long enough to average an album-per-day over the past three years.” We can’t vouch for the taste, but we’re certainly intrigued, and more importantly, we’re wondering how Diddy or Jay-Z did not come up with this first. Apparently, the hip-hop underground is leading the way in both beatmaking and brand-building.

I hear it goes well with this.

Update: Tara has had some. She describes it as “like crack.”

Via Coolhunting