We culture vultures out here on the West Coast may think we’ve got it good with the opening of Ann Magnuson and Kenny Scharf’s big East Village West show opening at Royal/T (and we do!) but New Yorkers have something pretty amazing to attend this weekend also:
“IN ALL OUR DECADENCE PEOPLE DIE” is an exhibit of fanzines that were given to members of Crass between 1976 and 1984, plus original punk-era artwork by Gee Vaucher. The exhibit also features a new audio installation from Penny Rimbaud. Curated by Johann Kugelberg
As someone who was a huge Crass fan (I saw them fuckin’ live, how many Americans can claim that?) this looks like something that can’t be missed! (Except, drats, I will miss it as it closes right before I get to NYC next month! Awk! Quel bummer for me.)
The exhibit opening and talk will be held tonight but is already closed to more RSVPs. The exhibit continues daily until October 20th, hours 11am to 6pm.
Boo-Hooray, 265 Canal St. #601, New York, NY 10013
Below, Crass: There is No Authority But Yourself, a Dutch documentary about the band:
As reported on Gawker, no permit has been granted, but since they’re going to be on The Jimmy Fallon Show tonight, the rumor sounds like more than a rumor. Apparently the NYPD is aware, too, that something is being planned.
UPDATE 12:19 p.m.: A spokesperson for Occupy Wall Street confirms “Radiohead will play a surprise show today at four in the afternoon. Press conference at one in the afternoon.”
Update 12:54 p.m.: The spokesperson tells Gawker they have no permit but the police are “aware” of the event. This is going to be interesting—a band with Radiohead’s popularity can easily draw a hundred thousand for a free show in New York City. You need permits for this sort of thing, and there, obviously, there are a lot of crowd control issues that are worked out in advance. However you slice it, this will be bananas.
We’ll be looking for the embed code for the video to post here when/if it happens. Fingers crossed!
UPDATE: It was just a rumor after all. The Wall Street Journal and The New York Observer have both confirmed that Radiohead is not playing the #OccupyWallStreet protest Friday.
Icon of perversion Jack Smith, Club 57 DJ Dany Johnson and Ann Magnuson at a party on Crosby Street, 1980. Photo by Ande Whyland.
In anticipation of the opening this weekend of Ann Magnuson and Kenny Scharf’s big East Village West exhibit at the Royal/T gallery in Los Angeles, original Club 57 D.J. Dany Johnson has made an exclusive two-hour musical mix for Dangerous Minds readers:
Club 57 was a magical little club in the basement of a Polish church at 57 St. Marks Place. This mix is like a mixed salad of all the kinds of stuff I played. I spent many nights digging through my old suitcase full of the 45s I had picked up at neighborhood thrift shops, mixing them with records by my contemporary favorites such as ESG, Bush Tetras, Tom Tom Club and the like. This mix may be a little more mixed up than a typical set I would have played, but not by much. There might be some places where I waited too long for the next record or put one on too soon, just like the old days. The only way it could be more authentic is if I spilled a gin and tonic on it.
James Brown mistakes William Castle’s Homicidal for an Alfred Hitchcock film in this 1969 clip from the Mike Douglas show. Rod McKuen tries to clarify things while Joan Rivers looks on.
Homicidal was a knock-off of Psycho. Hitch saves Brown some embarrassment by not correcting him. Class act.
I recall the days when Ian McCulloch was Jesus, and girls went weak-at-the-knee for his cheekbones and pout; and the boys wore overcoats and lacquered their hair into shrubs, and sucked in their cheeks in the hope of looking just a little like him. Strange days indeed, but Lay Down Thy Raincoat and Groove…Echo and the Bunnymen at the Royal Albert Hall, will perhaps explain why this all came to pass.
Track Listing:
01. “Going Up”
02. “With a Hip”
03. “Villiers Terrace”
04. “All That Jazz”
05. “Heads Will Roll”
06. “Porcupine”
07. “All My Colours (Zimbo)”
08. “Silver”
09. “Simple Stuff”
10. “The Cutter”
11. “The Killing Moon”
12. “Rescue”
13. “Never Stop”
14. “The Back of Love”
15. “No Dark Things”
16. “Heaven up Here”
17. “Over the Wall”
18. “Crocodiles”
19. “Do It Clean”
Here’s an segment that aired in 1969 from the short-lived Vancouver Television music series Where It’s At.
Hosted by local deejay Fred Latremouille, Where It’s At had a pretty hip format for the time - a little smarter and penetrating than most music series of the time…a rock and roll 60 Minutes.
Featuring The Grass Roots, The Beach Boys, Spencer Davis, John Fogerty of Creedence Clearwater Revival, Jon Lord of Deep Purple, 1910 Fruitgum Company, Tommy James & the Shondells, The Seeds, Eric Burdon, Frank Sinatra Jr. and more.
The Grass Roots discussing Moby Grape and The Bosstown groups (Ultimate Spinach, Earth Opera, Beacon Street Union) as examples of bands killed by music hype still applies 42 years later.
MOJO: Years ago, John [Lennon] was quoted as saying that George was ‘the kid’ when the Beatles began and that John treated George as such. How long did that last?
PAUL: It probably lasted a couple of years. Just because of his age, in a group of men who’ve grown up together, particularly round about their teenage years - age matters. In John’s case, who was three years older than George - that meant a lot. John was probably a bit embarrassed at having sort of ‘a young kid’ around, just ‘cos that happens in a bunch of guys. It lasted for a little while. It was particularly noticeable when George got deported from Hamburg [in November 1960] for being underage. Otherwise, when he first joined the group, he was a very fresh-faced looking kid. I remember introducing him to John and thinking, Wow, there’s a little bit of an age difference. It wasn’t so much for me ‘cos I was kind of in the middle. But as we grew up it ceased to make a difference. And those kind of differences iron themselves out.
MOJO: I’m curious about George’s process in the studio. Do you recall any stand-out moments where George brought something in or made a song click?
PAUL: Oh yeah, sure. There were quite a few. I would think immediately of my song “And I Love Her” which I brought in pretty much as a finished song. But George put on do-do-do-do [sings the signature riff] which is very much a part of the song. Y’know, the opening riff. That, to me, made a stunning difference to the song and whenever I play the song now, I remember the moment George came up with it. That song would not be the same without it.
I think a lot of his solos were very distinctive and made the records. He didn’t sound like any other guitarist. The very early days we were really kids and we didn’t think at all professionally. We were just kids being led through this amazing wonderland of the music business. We didn’t know how it went at all - a fact that I’m kind of glad of ‘cos I think it meant that we made it up. So we ended up making things up that people then would later emulate rather than us emulating stuff that we’d been told.
In the very early days, it was pretty exciting. I remember going to auditions at Decca and each of us did pretty well, y’know. We were in a pub afterwards having a drink and kind of debriefing and coming down off the excitement, but we were still pretty high off it all. And I remember sitting at the bar with George and it became kind of a fun thing for us for years later. I would say, [adopts awed voice] When you sang [Goffin & King’s] “Take Good Care Of My Baby,” it was amazin’ man!’ I’m not sure we said ‘man’ or even ‘amazing’ in those days, but… That was a special little moment and it just became a thing between me and him: [awed voice again] ‘When you sang Take Good Care Of My Baby’...’
Part 2 is here. Below, the trailer for Martin Scorsese’s upcoming documentary George Harrison: Living In The Material World, out next month.
Here is some more of that excellent “cassette art” (as used on the Aphex Twin post just below) by the Finnish artist Sami Havia. Sami’s website is here, but these are the only other examples I could find of this style, and they’re taken from the Today And Tomorrow blog. Maybe if we ask nicely he will start making more?
These two new box sets are fairly no-frills affairs, but they’re priced pretty low, so no complaints there. Aside from every weekly episode of the series, there is the 16mm pilot episode, select audio commentaries, and the Monkees’ Saturday morning TV commercials for Kelloggs. The picture quality is pretty okay, but from time to time you’ll see a stray hair or dust. Audio-wise, the supposed 5.1 surround track is a complete waste of time and the stereo option isn’t all that much better (I recommend just making it mono). It’s really a shame that they didn’t go back and do new transfers and proper audio upgrades (the content here, menus and all, mirrors the old Rhino releases). Then again, if you’d like to own the entire series, now you can, and the price is right for these new tri-fold box sets (both with liner notes from Andrew Sandoval).
Of special interest for Monkees fans is the chance to see the ill-fated final Monkees TV special featuring all four original Monkees. 33 1/3 Revolutions Per Monkee was Peter Tork’s final outing with the group until 1986. Musical guests on that show included Julie Driscoll, Brian Auger and the Trinity, Jerry Lee Lewis, Fats Domino, Little Richard, and The Buddy Miles Express.
