A music giant has left our realm. I probably wrote about 45% of my scripts to the music of Edgar Froese and his band Tangerine Dream and use them as sonic inspiration to this day. Their groundbreaking electronic pulsing melodic ambience has been part of the soundtrack to most of my teen and adult life. Hard to pick one tribute track, but this small piece from Wolf Grimm’s cult sci-fi film with Fassbinder. KAMIKAZE 1989 (1982), might be my single favorite piece by Froese. Dream on…
Yes, it’s a big weekend for Easter, Passover, and of course, 420. But it’s also Record Store Day, started in 2007 by independent shop owners as a way to recognize and celebrate the history of vinyl, along with the importance of a physical locale where tangible culture is bound by intersecting human atoms (I told you it’s also 420, dude). Vinyl has not died despite the endless tech predictions followed by bursts of big media notice (“Records Are Still Cool!”). DJ culture is just the spine to the vinyl skeleton and LP’s still deliver an analog warmth and sound unmatched by any digital binary code — not to mention the tactile esthetic pleasure of sleeve design and weight is one of life’s cultural pleasures. What I’m getting at man, is like, records are US and we are RECORDS. Now go visit your favorite local record shoppe to spin round and round in celebration…
From Duran Duran’s terrific 1986 (minus Roger Taylor and Andy Taylor) “Notorious,” nothing sings grey silver atmospherics like “Winter Marches On”…
I have warm memories of hosting poetry readings in Long Beach under misty skies at the long gone Moonbeam Cafe, the air electric with pith and actually little pretension, as the jukebox repeatedly played tracks from the German band Enigma’s 1990 groundbreaking hit disc, MCMXC a.D. Merging Gregorian chants with techno beats was a then bold idea still in overuse today. My favorite track is of course the shortest and most melodic, “The Voice of Enigma,” a soothing cinematic spiritual welcome to the 90’s and a new age, another world of music…
Has it been 30 years since Duran Duran reached their cultural apex with the 1983 release of “Seven & The Ragged Tiger” — certainly one of the oddest titled top ten albums in pop history (and that Nick Rhodes hates). Like a lush Swatch timed to the beat of the new romantic era, this LP was more synth jangly than the smooth Euro-sylings of “Rio” and at the time, I really hated the band. For no other reason then they were way too popular and “The Reflex” annoyed me. Then I started listening to their music and realized that I actually loved them and have never stopped. The first Duran Duran song I knew would be a life keeper remains “The Seventh Stranger,” a melancholic paen to acceptance (without one rhyming word and Simon LeBon’s most pure poetry) and fittingly, the last song on the disc. Here they are at the final show of their final tour as a complete 80’s band in Oakland, California, looking through the eyes of a million strangers…
From a-ha’s second — and best — LP, Scoundrel Days, here’s one of their finest hours and the perfect autumnal pop:
In honor of the first time I’ll be viddying live my favorite sardonic synth heroes tonight at the Fox Theatre in Oakland, here’s the piece I always use to kick off the Autumn season. I’ll keep posting this clip until you all follow my lead in the Octobers to come…
To close out the month on an atmospheric wistful note, here’s the final track from a-ha’s 1986 pop masterpiece (yes) “Scoundrel Days.” On a disc brimming with melodic peaks, the howling synthesizers in the middle eight section might be my favorite piece of music by my favorite band. Songwriters Paul Waaktar and Mags always had a gift for epic soundscapes and Morten Harkett’s soaring voice provided the perfect counterpoint.
While working on my Saturday Nite Drive-In show, I’ve been putting together a section to highlight American International Pictures’ BEACH PARTY series and its iconic reign on ozoner’s everywhere circa 1963-1966. Former Mouseketeer Annette Funicello was the Katherine Hepburn to Frankie Avalon’s Cary Grant, albeit in front of a process ocean and a gorilla on surfboard. And I love them all, every dopey song and forced gag, not to mention Harvey Lembeck’s Erich Von Zipper, the one constant hilarity through all the films. But when Annette showed for in-person screenings at drive-ins across the country, thousands showed up to supplicate. She also kicked ass in HEAD. Annette Funicello was quintessential American Star Pop. RIP.
This will be the longest track I’ve posted in the history of Friday Song. And since it’s Quincy Jones’ birthday, he’ll get his cake and swing it too. Stemming from HAIR, the famous rock musical, “Walking In Space” is a paen to altered consciousness amid the backdrop of war , love and revolution, and one of my favorite tunes from the show: Jones has arranged this as the title tune into a flowing psychedelic jazz epic featuring Valerie Simpson on vocals and the great Freddie Hubbard on trumpet. The whole 1969 LP is one of the great unsung masterpieces of jazz although it’s gained in prestige over the past decade. Every tune is a mini-masterpiece of mood, soul and sound and if there was ever a soundtrack for driving through the hep mysterious nightscape of your mind, try “Walking In Space.” Happy Birthday Quincy and thanks for the eternal inspiration….
Ironically just finished reading reading “Bloody Sam” by Marshall Fine this week so in honor of the misfit film poet of the west, here’s a re-post of my experience watching JUNIOR BONNER for the first time at QT Fest 99 in Austin…
After the amiable TICK…TICK…TICK, Quentin took to the stage and shyly began to explain why JUNIOR BONNER from 1972 was such a special film to him. He made it clear he was in no way being an “egotistical asshole” or comparing himself to Peckinpah in any way, he just felt like he appreciated the film more after the mixed reception of JACKIE BROWN. He said that when Peckinpah finally made a film with no slo-mo bullet bursts or violent territorial imperatives, critics and audiences were puzzled, unable to process the film the way some couldn’t get into the mature, thoughtful JACKIE BROWN (the touching, bittersweet relationship between Pam Grier and Robert Forster still makes me cry at the end). You could see Quentin was being sincere as he spoke, even modest, and his heartfelt introducton to JUNIOR BONNER was the best of the festival.
After that preface and more drive-in trailers, I settled in to enjoy Peckinpah’s warm, subtle tribute to an aging rodeo star, expertly played by Steve McQueen in one of his very best quiet performances. Framed by Lucian Ballard’s exquisite Panavision cinematography, JUNIOR BONNER is about a day in the life of the titular hero as he returns home to try and ride one more bronco to victory. His business-savvy brother (Joe Don Baker) is buying the future with mobile home sales while his Quixotic father (a vibrant Robert Preston) and his stoic mother (the great Ida Lupino) try to hold onto their past.
Filled with many terrific character moments and a sad understanding of where men like McQueen are headed, JUNIOR BONNER is Peckinpah’s most gentle, generous film, an elegy for a vanishing cowboy in the modern age. I loved it. A cool title scene with good Jerry Fielding music too. Quentin said if anybody had a soundtrack, he’d make it worth their while.
To edit this trailer, I pretended I was Joe Dante at New World Pictures in 1976…
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Technicolor Dreams 