|
Friday, Aug. 23, 2002 / 1:30 p.m. ~Concert Film Comparison, Etc.~ Friday, 9:42 a.m., too much energy. Coffee with sugar and milk instead of honey and ice for the first time in weeks. I shopped Publix on my lunch yesterday. Listening to the "Trainspotting" soundtrack. The song "For What You Dream Of"? Yeah. Not now, but earlier, it made me move, here in my chair. I feel springy in my athletic shoes, my jeans, my t-shirt with pocket, my acceptable Casual Friday attire. Such a great album. I brought good music today. I have Moby's "Move" and "Animal Rights", the latter which he autographed� with a little drawing. I looked at it a few minutes ago and smiled. I got so caught up in him, making him real, and meeting him was so much more than that, surreal in fact. I can't forget the way he simply walked over to us late that night, just walked right on over� and I wanted him. I still do, only now I am fully aware of the futility of that statement. The illogic. Is that a word? Last night. Hmmmm. Give me a sec. I met Branford at the FOX to see "The Last Waltz", but I was early, 20 minutes at least. As spread out as this city is, I've always said it, it's a small town. I always run into people I know, people I used to know, as I told Branford, people I left behind and would prefer they stayed there, behind. I saw Jon (I wanted to link to an entry about him, but I wrote so many I didn't know which one� so here's one of many). He saw me first, I think. I was standing, holding up a wall, watching the people, hoping Branford would be early, but he was right on time. And there was Jon. I shouldn't have been surprised, and really I don't think surprise was the problem, it was just that he was there. He was with a group of people and he looked over at me. I was wearing my most spectacular tie-dye shirt (the FOX gets cold and I wanted something with long sleeves, couldn't find my Thrashers shirt, so I grabbed the tie-dye), and surely I stood out. Surely. So he did his little double take, gave me a nod. I called Mark this morning to tell him, and I told him it wasn't the nod I described to Branford, it was more like one of those old fashioned, tip of the hat kind of chin lowering things. Gentlemanly. An acknowledgement. Traditional. In response, I gave the nod, the head up, every so slightly. Mark asks if I talked to him. Huh? Are you kidding? I wrote him a LONG email letter in response to his last one. I told him I'm not who he thinks I am, he misjudged me, it was wrong what he did. And I heard nothing in response. I expected nothing. I got the last word, and I think I wanted that last word. But I didn't want to see him again. And I imagined running into him downstairs by the ladies' 'Lounge' in the theatre, kissing him. I had really wanted something with him, once. Have I mentioned what a great album "Trainspotting" is? This is such a nice way to start the day. Sitting here typing, listening, the occasional phone call, an address update, me helping someone, then time for me, just me. I hear Lulu, but she's not overwhelming me, not today. Friday is a lift, it's automatically a good day, regardless. It cannot be bad. This song is called "Closet Romantic". It's been long enough since I've seen the film that I do not associate these songs with scenes acted out. No visuals but what's in my own head. And in there, in my head, I have so many visuals of my own stored, there, so much from which to choose. Now it's a voice reciting James Bond movie titles� love it. "The Last Waltz" was excellent. I know Branford disagrees with that assessment, but we're all entitled to our opinions. I never thought I had an interest in The Band, never thought I knew who they were, or what their music was, never wanted to see this movie, but seeing it reminded me of who they were, how much I actually know their music, all of it, how I know their names, and how I miss the late '60s, early '70s. How I miss the men, the long hair� mmmmm� Unusual for a concert film not to acknowledge the concert audience. Few shots of the crowd in attendance. No shots of any concertgoers enjoying themselves. Just stage. Just performers. And that was different, not bad, but good in that it felt like I was on stage too. Not only The Band and their immense talent and enjoyment of performing, but Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell, Van Morrison (in sparkly pant suit!), Eric Clapton, Muddy Fucking Waters!! (I actually saw him in concert across the street from the FOX, at a club that no longer exists, the Agora Ballroom, a year or so before he died), the Staples, etc., etc., and the amazing thing was that here I was getting to see these people perform, what felt like LIVE, in person. Neil Young, Neil Diamond (too funny with his huge sunglasses, kissing the microphone as he sang), all these people in their primes, singing their best music, backed by The Band. Incredible. And it was loud, the movie - the beginning of the film is white words on a black screen, something to the effect of "This movie should be played Loud", cheers all around. So, loud it was. And we cheered, people applauded after songs. It was great. Snippets of Marty Scorsese interviewing Band members between songs. Band members sounding wasted, semi-incoherent, talking of 16 years touring being more than enough for anyone, but as strange as they sounded talking it was amazing to see them play on stage. So talented. So handsome, so much hair! Beards, long hair, beautiful, handsome spaced out musicians. Captured in time. Branford left after that film, but there was another, some Rolling Stones concert film, directed by Hal Ashby I found out at the end. Hal Ashby? Isn't that who directed "Harold and Maude"? I've got to check on that. What a fucked up piece of shit concert film. The Stones at their most embarrassing. What year was it? 1982? I don't know. Mick in his football player tight leggings, fucking knee pads, visible jock strap beneath. ? Prancing around like an electrocuted rooster. Insane. Performing his little heart out in front of a stadium filled to capacity. A stadium filled with people so apparently awestruck they couldn't move. Didn't even dance. Only varied from their stupors when Mick jogged out onto the runways extended into their ranks, reached to touch him. Keith Richards, Bill Wyman, Ron Wood, all playing guitars with cigarettes dangling from their mouths. A piano player, a keyboardist, a saxophonist, all barely audible. Only sound is Mick singing whilst running around, trying not to lose his breath, Keith playing his two or three chords, and Charlie staying awake on the drums, carving out the monotonous beats. Every so often Keith walks over to the drum dais to set down his cigarette, actually STOPS PLAYING. No kidding. Mick is still singing, Charlie is still drumming, Ron and Bill are still twanging, but Keith, the only guitar we can actually hear, simply stops to fiddle about, then casually starts back up. It was so funny. Stadium show intercut with indoor arena show, same tour, same tight football player leggings. Keith in same groovy suede boots, and those tight jeans revealing an ass that can't possibly be enclosed in underwear, really nice. Mick gets hot prancing around, pulls his shirt open over and over, finally takes it off. He's so thin, but wiry and lean, and I can see him as bisexual, he just exudes sex, any kind of sex, and I see him with women, men, Bowie, maybe Iggy Pop, maybe Keith too, Jerry Hall, anyone. Two concerts from same tour produce almost every song in their catalog and I just sit waiting for it to be over. It's really loud, and few people have stayed this late. When the credits begin to roll, I read Hal Ashby directed and I take off, hoping I can still hear, thinking how glad I am I never paid to see the Stones in concert, thinking I need to pull out some of their albums because I do love their music� but seeing them perform live, in that era (in the film, we'd suddenly see old concert footage, the good stuff, the Stones on Ed Sullivan, etc. - during the song, "Time Is On My Side" - or backstage footage, no rhyme, no reason - Hal Ashby must've been tripping when he oversaw the editing!), was a huge turnoff. Wait, one more thing (there is SO much to say about both films really, and as I've been writing this I'm listening to Moby's "Move" - very strange juxtapositioning here), the stage design of both shows, the Stones stadium and arena shows, sucked. Really ugly, boring. Especially compared to the elegance of The Band's Last Waltz at Winterland, chandeliers hanging, etc. In fact, seeing "The Last Waltz" followed by "The Last Schmaltz" was perfect. If one needed a comparison, there it was. The Stones film had been advertised as "a surprise rock and roll film", so I had no idea what it would be, and I was hoping for "Woodstock", one of my all-time favorite films, or "Gimme Shelter" or something good, but that was such horrible schlock. Oh, I went home after the films and watched "Big Brother 3" on tape, got to see the teary Chiara eviction. Got to see Roddy cry when Julie Chen asked him how feels now that Chi is gone. He cried. After the previous night's conversation in which he essentially, in such a roundabout way, blew her off big time. He tells Julie that Chiara is such an "amazing person" and he is really going to miss her, and he cries. It was sweet, but it made no sense. Again, I think it's such an amazing concept to lock these 12 (initially) people in this fake house, deprive them of any physical contact besides themselves and the voices of the production staff, people behind the walls, deprive them of TV, radios, music of any kind, computers, phones, yet record their every word and movement, keep them there for 3 months, force them to 'evict' one another, one person a week. Horrible, just imagine being there. It's no wonder they cry when people leave. It's fucking with them, the game is a major mind fuck. Major. This is why I love to watch. Would I do it? Are you insane?! Oh, I just had the longest phone call. It was so tedious. Someone claims she sent us a FAX request for info and she never got a response, and we have no record of processing her request and I can't trouble shoot as I'd like, this department sucks, basically, and my co-workers are lazy slackers and someone probably got it and threw it away or something, and so she is writing a complaint letter, and good fucking luck is all I have to say. We suck. I don't, I take pride in my work, always have, always will, but they're all goofing off right now and who knows what work is being discarded or lost� What are you gonna do? This is really long, no one will read it. That's fine. I'm fine with that. This is for me, a record of sorts. I'll read it later. I'm listening to "The Rain Falls and the Sky Shudders", a second time. Lulu is not working at all, just goofing, going on and on about that "American Idol" show, blah, blah, blah. Hell, she probably lost that poor woman's FAX. No surprise here. This day will be interminable. ****Aha! We have an addendum, and yes, it always pays to read every word of every diary entry of every diary you read. JimmyUsual is a great reference tool (hee, I called him a 'tool') - he just called and I was talking about the Stones film again, and as he is sitting in front of a computer with Interweb access (as most people are whilst at work), he looked in the IMDB (InternetMovieDataBase) to find that the film I saw last night was "Let's Spend the Night Together", and the year of release was as I guessed, 1982, the concerts were from a 1981 tour, and the director, one Hal Ashby, did indeed direct one of the best movies of all time, "Harold and Maude", and some campy schlock, namely one "Shampoo". But what happened with this departure? Yikes. I love research. I should be some research librarian person. Should I go back to College, study Library Science? Because it is a Science you know. Hmmmm� Reminds me of 5th grade. I took a turn at being our class librarian. Knew the Dewey Decimal System and everything. God, I loved it. I think I briefly entertained the idea of growing up to be a Librarian. Then an English Teacher. Besides wanting to go back in time and be a hippie at Woodstock. It was always too late for that. Page 4 in MS Word. Just had to add that bit about the film. I have answers now. Still many questions, but JimmyUsual says Hal Ashby died in '88, so I can't ask him. Mr. Ashby, what the fuck? Cost of the War in Iraq
(JavaScript Error)
Recent Entries: It Was 40 Years Ago Today - 9:44 a.m. , Friday, Oct. 12, 2012 Dead Black Cat - 9:07 a.m. , Wednesday, Jan. 25, 2012 As Seen From Outer Space - 1:07 a.m. , Saturday, Dec. 05, 2009 I Survived to Tell the Tale - 7:29 a.m. , Friday, Sept. 18, 2009 Reading My Life - 12:55 p.m. , Saturday, Sept. 12, 2009 
  |