An impressive instant - ten years on

Ten years ago tonight, at the time I'm writing this very blog post, I had my first audience with The Queen, otherwise known as her Madgesty, Madonna. August 29th, 2001 was the night I attended the Drowned World Tour at the United Center in Chicago. I went with my good friend and accomplice in all things Madonna related, Jeff. Heidi went along too, but she didn't go to the concert. At the time, she was almost 7 months pregnant and, on the advice of our doctor, she sat the concert out.

I remember it like it was yesterday. We started calling in to Ticketmaster (who the hell does that anymore?) about 30 minutes prior to the on sale time. You hoped and prayed that you remained on hold until after the tickets went on sale, but not too long so that you didn't miss your shot at good seats. Heidi was on our cell phone, I was on our landline, and Jeff, living in Williamsburg at the time was on his phone. We all were trying to get tickets and the instant that someone got through, the others were to stop trying. The fact that I was the one that ultimately got through to Ticketmaster (after having connected 5 freaking minutes before the on sale time...back to the queue for me) was fortunate because I'm not sure how Jeff, who lived alone at the time, would have been able to call us and stay on the phone with Ticketmaster. In any event, I got through and amazingly, I got tickets.

We got seats in section 332. I don't remember the row number, but here's a map of the arena, which I amazingly and not surprisingly still have saved on my computer. Here it is.

Check out the prices of those seats! I remember blanching at the thought of spending $85 for a concert ticket and could not even fathom spending $250 even if I could have gotten one of those rock-star floor seats. Clearly, I didn't remember that 5 years later when I spent $265 for my Confessions Tour ticket in Las Vegas.

I took a couple days off work and we drove to Chicago. Since Heidi wasn't going to the concert, she got to pick the hotel. She chose the downtown Marriott. It ended up being okay because it was a pretty quick cab ride from there to the United Center. I had been regaled with stories of what a terrible part of town the United Center is in (it is kind of a scary part of town, as I was reminded in 2009 when we saw Sticky & Sweet there) The show had been broadcast on HBO the a couple of nights before and Jeff had taped it but not watched it. I was on total tour blackout - I knew next to nothing about it, not even the opening number. It was fairly easy in those days to avoid tour spoilers. Nowadays, I've totally given up and do just about everything but watch crappy fan shot video of tour and download audience recordings before seeing the show myself. Anyway, Jeff had brought the VHS tape of the tour with him and the idea was that Heidi would watch the show while we were at it. Only problem was the room didn't have a VCR. We walked all over downtown Chicago trying to rent a VCR, only to end up in a slightly frightening part of town, at which point we gave up. I don't think Heidi cared enough for us to have gone to all that effort, but she was a good sport, especially as she walked around downtown Chicago on a hot late summer day, pregnant and uncomfortable.

We hit Pizzeria Uno prior to the concert. I found these pictures which really blew my mind when I saw them. We were babies!!

Me, squinting into the sun or something with apparently rimless glasses.

Heidi is the only one drinking pop.

Jeff doing what he does best - being Jeff.

Heidi rode with us in the cab down to the show and dropped us off, then headed back to the hotel. We found our seats and, as I'm so fond of saying when I tell this story, there was nothing above us but ceiling. Seriously, we were as far away as you can get from the stage without being behind it. No matter though, we were in the arena!! We sat next to a nice couple from Chicago that were not real huge Madonna fans but the fact that she hadn't toured in so long drew them both in. They hadn't purchased the last couple albums but knew enough that they thought they'd enjoy it.

I bet they left wishing they'd have purchased those albums. The Drowned World Tour was many things. A hit parade it was not. There were only two bona-fide 80s hits performed on that tour - "Holiday" and "La Isla Bonita." The rest were primarily tracks from Ray of Light and Music. And many MANY album tracks at that. This was not a show for the casual fan, at least from a song selection standpoint. Sure we got some great recent hits - notably "Frozen," "Ray of Light," and, to my great delight, "Secret." But we also got the self-indulgent Madonna track "Mer Girl" not once but twice and the autotune mess of "Nobody's Perfect." She was also a bit cold with the audience, as if she was annoyed to be performing. None of that bothered us at the time because we were finally at a Madonna concert!

The crowd really came to live when the familiar keyboards of "Holiday" started. It's still my favorite performance of this old warhorse of a song. I love Donna's introduction - "you know they try to imitate her but they just can't duplicate her!" And the "I say pimp! You say ho! Pimp! Ho! Pimp! Ho!"



In the end, it was a good thing that Heidi didn't come with us. When we left the show, there wasn't a taxi to be found so we really had no way back to the hotel. So no problem, we called her at the hotel and she came down to the United Center in a cab to pick us up. This is notable because the cabbie, upon hearing that her husband was at a Madonna concert with his male friend, was apparently convinced that I had to work through my unacknowledged homosexuality, since obviously that's the only reason I would go to a Madonna concert with another guy. Whatever. We all got a good laugh out of it and it was just another in a long list of hilarious things that have happened on trips to see Madonna. That said, the gay guy contingent at every Madonna concert is, as you might expect, very heavy but not nearly as heavy as at the Kylie show. That show took the gay cake.

I would be remiss if I didn't mention our little trip to the Museum of Science & Industry the next day, where we re-enacted scenes from Superman II.

Heidi as Ursa and Jeff as the hapless astronaut. "I tore it like paper!"

Me doing my best General Zod.

We've seen Madonna three other times since - The Re-Invention Tour which found us jetting to Washington D.C., The Confessions Tour for which we traveled to Las Vegas and back in less than 24 hours (never again.) For the Sticky & Sweet Tour, we were back at the United Center in much better seats. We waved at the people in our Drowned World seats which were probably twice the price by the time Sticky & Sweet rolled around. And you can bet I'll be there with bells on again. Her live shows are never disappointing. Like pizza and sex, even when they're not so great, they're still better than most things.

And to the 10 years that have passed, why in the hell have you gone so damn quickly?

State Fair Janet

Let's get this much out of the way - there was no wardrobe malfunction.

Really, there were no malfunctions of any sort at the Janet Jackson concert last night. Even though I was there, I'm still kind of incredulous that she played the Iowa State Fair, but hey, who am I to complain. I got to scratch another name off my must-see-live bucket list and got to be in the company of some of my nearest and dearest friends. I also got to participate in the unique experience of the Iowa State Fair (unique, even though it's pretty much the same thing year after year) in a very small dose, which is about all I can handle of it. We ate all the crappy fair food, including red velvet funnel cake, breaded green peppers, polish sausage with everything on it and, of course, corn dogs. We even snapped a couple pictures of us going all Michelle Bachmann on the corn dogs, but those will never see the light of day on any social media EVER. We did, however, pass on the fried butter. Just thinking about it makes me want to hurl.

In all honesty, for as much mileage as I have gotten out of "Janet Jackson's playing the State Fair? How the mighty have fallen!" over the last few months, I was very glad to see her in a setting like this. The Grandstand has about a 10,000 seat capacity and I'd say that a good chunk of those were filled last night, although the show was not sold out. The older I get, the less I like spending tons of cash on arena shows where the performer is so far away from me you can barely make them out. And stadium shows? Forget it. Obviously, Madonna is a huge exception to this blanket statement. The day she plays the state fair will probably be the day I fall over dead.

We had pretty decent seats, although there was a pole next to us. Still, I think most everyone had a pretty decent view of the stage.

Another goddamn unnecessary apostrophe!

Despite the proclamations on Twitter of the local Top 40 radio station saying she would start promptly at 8pm, she didn't actually take the stage until around 8:30. Even with that late start, she was still earlier than Madonna ever is. This, of course, did not stop my friend Jeff and me from making a joke about how Janet had to quick run to the local Walgreens that we could see from our seats. That joke has its origins in a 1991 Whitney Houston concert that he and I attended in which we said "Whitney had to quick run to Target to get some Lee Press Ons."

Jeff (right) and me giving Janet some pre-show tips.

As for the concert itself? Well, it was a bit of a mixed bag for me. Overall, I really enjoyed it. Janet looks good and she's one of those people that's been off the pop music radar for so long that you really do forget how many bonafide hits she's had. Rhythm Nation alone had something like seven top 10 hits. And even though I didn't care much for it at the time, Janet spun off many hits as well. It wasn't until about 2003-2004 (the time of the infamous Super Bowl wardrobe malfunction) that her hit-making luck seemed to run out. She did not cheat us either on the hits. Pulling songs only from her 2-disc greatest hits record, Number Ones, she played all the fan favorites. Most of these songs were not in their full versions, but rather medleys of hits. On the surface, this might seem like a bad idea or kind of a cheat way of cramming a ton of songs into a concert. However, it really worked well and served as a bit of a sampler of the 25 years of songs she has to choose from. The only real bone I had to pick with the song selection was that there was no "Black Cat" and the shitty "Feedback" was included ("something heavy like my first day period." SERIOUSLY.)

I took about 12 pictures and only about 3 actually came out! This is the best one.

She was in good physical form and, as I said, looked good and had a lot of energy. That said, I couldn't help but notice the presence of a VERY significant backing track during the concert. This isn't surprising in shows like this. But the thing is, the backing track should be there to support the live vocals, not to be the substitute for live vocals. It was hard to pin down whether or not she was singing live of lip syncing in many places, but I would say that at least half the songs were primarily lip synced or the live vocals were drowned out by the backing track. Normally, this would bother me - it bugs me when Madonna does it, but with her, you can usually hear her very live vocals over the backing track. With Janet, she's always had kind of a paper thin voice and I've heard stories of her previous tours being primarily lip synced so I wasn't terribly surprised. Still, I wouldn't have cared if the dancing had been toned down a little bit to provide for a little bit more of a live experience. (For the record, the second part of the show, which featured several of her ballads, was very much performed live. She has some vocal chops, but I just don't think that she can dance and sing well at the same time.)

The show had a fun energy, even though the video interludes threatened to bring the show's forward momentum to a screeching halt. For someone who's been in the touring business for so long, that amateurish move surprised me. And usually those interludes provide a chance for a outfit change. Not this time - Janet never changed her clothes once. If this had been a Cher show and there were no costume changes, as Cher herself has said, drag queens everywhere would think she'd lost the will to live.

She ended with a great version of a song I had forgotten about - "Together Again" which wrapped up with pictures of her and Michael. The song has clearly taken on a new meaning for her and you could tell by her enthusiasm in performing it.

While the show was fun, let me take a minute to talk a bit about the venue. I don't know that I'll go to another Grandstand show. For one, the chance that your view is going to be obscured by a pole is just too high. Also, the seats SUCK. As Heidi mentioned, since it's an outdoor arena, the seats have to be at least a little bit industrial, but they could still be comfortable! All in all, we'd have rather sat on benches.

It's one of the first concerts I've been to that I feel I slightly overpaid for, but still. It was fun to sing along with all those songs that were a huge part of my high school and college soundtrack. I was also glad that Heidi went along with me even though Janet was only sort of her thing. She and I usually don't go to concerts together, and now we've hit two this year.

In the end, I was just glad to finally get the answer to the question posed by Janet. "Who's that eating that nasty food?" Without a doubt, it's State Fair attendees. I'm going to have to do double time at the gym this week.

Cut the cord

So for all my bitching about how I hate yardwork and don't want to do it, I finally relented and between last night and early this afternoon, I got the yard completely mowed. Although I was sweating from every pore when I was done, it is done and now I can get off my case about it. Because here's the thing. I had a real "come to Jesus" moment today when it comes to the yard.

My name is Dan. My backyard looks like holy hell. AND I DON'T CARE.

There, I said it. I remember how owning the story of eating alone in college really helped me feel better about it, like I was finally able to get rid of the shame that was dogging me about it even twenty years later. I thought that perhaps, if I write a little bit here about my relationship with yardwork, something similar might happen.

I say I don't care about how the yard looks, and that's only half true. I do care, but I also don't. I fight a losing battle with it every summer, so much so that I'm sure people are sick of me complaining about it. Yardwork seldom gets done because I am constantly tired or working weird shifts or *insert excuse here*. I have this imaginary, mildly paranoid scenario that plays in my head that involves everyone in the neighborhood saying "dear God, WHEN is he going to mow?" When I do pick a day to do it, invariably, the weather sucks or I feel like crap because I'm in my day-off funk and then it doesn't get done. Again. I'm embarrassed by the overgrowth and don't want to have people over or anything because I hate how the backyard looks and what it says about me (BAD HOMEOWNER). So then I proceed to beat myself up over it and feel bad about it, which only causes me to be in even more of a funk that then makes me less likely to have the energy to go out and do it. It's not unlike the vicious cycle that seems to crop up in a lot of areas of my life over the last nearly 4 decades.

Well, I want to be done with that shit. Yes, the backyard was starting to look like the forest moon of Endor, but there is only so much I can do. In the grand scheme of things, it's much more important that I take care of myself than the yard. When it comes to a choice between those two things, I'm going to stop sacrificing my own mental and physical health for the sake of something I honestly don't even care that much about. I think a lot of this has to do with being male. Men are supposed to care about how their yards look. For Christ's sake, I should be out there making diagonal rows and spraying pesticide all over it so that it looks like Teletubby land with nary a weed in sight. A guy that doesn't go out and mow every weekend is someone that maybe you shouldn't trust. Or at least that's what my brain tells me.

I think part of the reason I have so spectacularly burned out this summer is because I haven't been taking very good care of myself, either physically or mentally. Oh sure, I've been going to the gym and that's going pretty well. I've fallen off the wagon a time or two, but sometimes I swear the point of the wagon is to be there to fall off of. My weight is holding its own and I feel like cardiovascular-wise, I'm in much better shape than I was a few months ago. But I'm not sleeping well. And I'm doubling back at work and working long stretches. All this would be fine if I were taking care of myself, but I'm not. Mentally, I haven't been giving myself the time that I really need to recharge. This is what happens when I don't do that. I end up obsessing about something (the yard) that I really don't give one iota of shit about. I have plans to get to the bottom of this constant fatigue crap, but that's another post altogether.

In the end, I am happy that I got some of the yardwork done today. It does have to be done, but it doesn't have to rule my life. I managed to cut down most of the forest moon of Endor this afternoon (no Ewoks though) and this is what I was left with.


No, it still doesn't look great. The pavement cracks are teeming with life and I missed a few spots in the yard. I would have done more, but as per usual, I managed to slice through my extension cord with the hedge clippers.


The lack of an extension cord meant I couldn't get the weed whip out so nothing else got done. But hey, it's more than I thought I'd get done and now that I've helped (with the help of someone with the initials H and C) free myself from the guilt and shame of the yard, I'm not even that upset that I wasn't able to finish.

(Dad, can you fix my extension cord when you get back from Arizona??)

The cheese-ball is back

Anna started school on Thursday and somehow, the planets aligned and the first day of school coincided with my day off. So not only did I get to see her off to school in the morning, but I also got to spend time being a layabout around the house, in control of the TV for what seems like the first time in forever.

I had seen that Phantasm II had been added to Netflix Streaming recently. I've always enjoyed the original Phantasm, even though it's absolutely nuts and incomprehensible on so many levels. A creepy tall man undertaker that is robbing graves to turn into midgets so that he can send them back as slaves to his planet (or is it another dimension) is just too strange for words. His secret is safe until small town kid catches a glimpse of The Tall Man picking up a casket all by himself. From that point on, it's an at time creepy, other times cheesy thrill ride that works with its obviously small budget. While not as overtly dreamlike as the Nightmare on Elm Street movies, I think that part of the appeal of Phantasm is its mystery - the "what the hell is actually going on here?" quality makes it worth sitting through 90 minutes of pretty bad acting (except for The Tall Man, of course) and very bad late 70s hair.

Fast forward 10 years and Phantasm finally got the sequel that fans were clamoring for. I remember watching parts of this movie on HBO as a teenager - or maybe it was home video, I really can't recall. But at the time I watched it, I had not seen the original film, so I was interested in it from a horror movie fan standpoint, but not so much as a fan of the original movie. So how does it stack up against the original? Well, in many ways it's a bit of a remake of the original movie, only with a bigger budget while also serving as a sequel. It picks up right where the original left off. Some of the original cast is back, but the actor who played Mike in the original was not back. But obviously, Angus Scrimm had to return as The Tall Man. Just as there is no Blondie without Debbie Harry, there is no Phantasm without Angus Scrimm.

I tweeted the title of this post when I was about half way through the movie - the tag line really should have been "the cheese-ball is back." All the excesses of 80s horror cheesiness are on full display. The women all have hair that has been Aqua-Netted within an inch of its life, there are more "gotcha" moments than you can shake a stick at, and the acting, while passable, is still pretty bad. But all is saved by The Tall Man. All Angus Scrimm has to do is walk on the screen and all is forgiven. Naturally, he has the best lines of the film which is saying something because he really doesn't talk that much. My favorite line was when he was holding the Catholic priest up by his inverted crucifix necklace and he says with patented Tall Man menace "You think that when you die you go to Heaven...you come to US!" Apparently Angus Scrimm, who is still alive and kicking, has embraced his role as The Tall Man and appears at horror cons across the country. If I played the Tall Man, I totally would. *sigh* If only Faye Dunaway would embrace her role as Joan Crawfod in the same way.

The spheres are also given an 80s update. They're capable of much worse than they were in 1979. One sphere digs its way through a guy's back, spinal column and up through his internal organs, only to get stuck on its way out his mouth. I had a hard time with this - not because of the gore, but seriously, anything capable of boring through the bones of the spinal column would certainly not get stuck at something like a jaw. But I'm sure that it was so they could show the goriness that resulted from the ball getting stuck, with blades continuing to turn as it shreds more facial flesh.

Even though it was cheesy, I really enjoyed watching it again, and naturally, the end set up for another sequel. Phantasm 3: Lord of the Dead and Phantasm 4: Oblivion are already out there, but sadly, not available on Netflix Streaming (DAMN YOU SALAZAR!) and apparently, there's a fifth one on the way.

Phantasm II is a fun and cheesy 80s take on a classic 70s horror film. It's well worth your hour and 39 minutes. Long live Angus Scrimm! (even though he's assured immortality already.)

Saying "uncle"

Folks, I'm going to just go ahead and call August a wash. It is kicking my ass. Nothing specific, but just like the way the little expenses add up to one hell of a lot of money, the collective crap has finally broken me.

As I said in a previous post, the fact that I took my summer vacation in May is really starting to hurt. I am taking a 6 day vacation around Labor Day for the price of only two vacation days so there's that to look forward to. But that's September. And right now, September seems so far away.

There's Janet Jackson at the Iowa State Fair to look forward to on Sunday - as well as artery hardening foods that you can only eat once a year (and probably should eat less than once a year, but what the hell?) And I'm officially going to Blondie on Labor Day with my friend Kyl.

Apart from that, I'll be over here waiting for Mercury to turn the hell around and for life to straighten out a little bit. I think that after the summer I've had, I'd deserve a September that's a little bit easier to take.

A report from the Janet concert will be here next week. That is, if I don't have an acute coronary syndrome from fair food.

Happy 53rd, Madgedonna!

Today is Madonna's 53rd birthday. There's something surreal about saying that. It doesn't seem possible that she should be nearly mid-way through her fifties. Alas, she has been entertaining (and periodically aggravating) me for 26 years now so I guess it is possible.

I'm fond of saying that my Madonna fandom has worked its way into my DNA. No matter what she does, I will always be a fan until the day I shuffle off this mortal coil. I also don't have anything particularly profound to say about Madonna this morning as my blog is littered with many many posts about her, her music and her career in general. Everyone, it seems, knows what Madonna should do next and in the age of the internet, that kind of armchair analysis has finally been given a voice.

I honestly don't want to think about the person I would be today without the effect that following her career and being a fan has had on me. I still shock people a little bit when they find out I am such a die hard Madonna fan. It honestly doesn't fit in well with my Midwestern sensibility. But then what Madonna has done with herself definitely involved, if not breaking, at least re-inventing the Midwestern sensibility mold. I may not always love what she's doing, but I will always be a fan and I'll always feel like the 14 year old giddily holding the True Blue album in my hand at Sernett's department store every time she has a new release.

Happy Birthday Madgedonna. May you always create the kind of pop music that I can feel in my bones.

For a more inspired post than this - go here. Fans, you will eat this up with a spoon.

Then Everything Changed

I like and don't like "alternate history." On the one hand, I find it interesting to contemplate what might have happened had certain events happened or not happened. But more often than not, alternate history fiction is handled very clumsily and is usually reduced to "what would happen if someone showed up at the US Civil War with automatic weapons?" THAT kind of alternate history doesn't intrigue me in the slightest and honestly, that's probably more science fiction than anything else. But as is pointed out in Jeff Greenfield's Then Everything Changed, history is made up of series of events that, had things gone just slightly differently, we might be living in a world that is very bears little resemblance to the one we know now.

Or would we?

That's the crux of this book that takes three late 20th century events - an unsuccessful attempt on President-elect John Kennedy's life in 1960, the assassination of Robert Kennedy in 1968 and the 1976 election between Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter - and turns them on their head. In these alternate histories, there is never a President John F. Kennedy, never a President Richard Nixon and never a President Jimmy Carter (or Ronald Reagan for that matter.) The three alternate histories are interesting to me as someone who laps up late 20th century history like a cat at a bowl of milk. Crucial events of the last 50 years play out very differently with just the slightest of change. With LBJ as President, the Cuban Missile Crisis ends dramatically differently. RFK surviving his assassination attempt spares the country the agonies of Watergate - maybe. And when Ford recovers from his debate fumble of "there is no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe and there never will be under a Ford administration" and wins the 1976 election, the economic troubles attributed to Jimmy Carter are instead, blamed on a failed Republican presidency, opening the doors to a Democratic win in 1980.

These are not spoilers - most of this is detailed in the product description of the book. The book succeeds amazingly with details, names and faces and semi-imaginary quotes. I was riveted and, at times, had to remind myself that I wasn't reading actual history - that's how convincing the writing is. The only fault I could really find was that Greenfield tended to go for the cutesy ha-ha moments a few too many times. For example, in the 1976 election, Ford wins the electoral college and Carter wins the popular vote. This leads freshman Congressman Albert Gore, Jr. to champion a bill stating that the presidency would go to the winner of the popular vote. There's an even better one, but I wouldn't dream of spoiling it and depriving you of the "ugh" moment I had.

I recommend this book wholeheartedly for political junkies and anyone who loves 20th century American history. The last part of the book, which I admittedly skimmed, gives information as to how Greenfield constructed quotes and gives evidence of things that actually happened to support his version of events. A fascinating read.

Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde

I'm not sure what possessed me to read Robert Louis Stevenson's Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde. I remember reading it when I was in high school (not for a class) but I remembered next to nothing about it save the details that everyone already knows. Even then, I found that I knew less about the novella than I thought I did. The story that everyone knows is that Dr. Jekyll IS Mr. Hyde or rather, Mr. Hyde is the nefarious, evil side of the good doctor which is unleashed by a potion that Dr. Jekyll creates in his lab. Under the guise of Mr. Hyde, Jekyll is able to explore his evil side, only to find himself horrified by it.

I was intrigued by the exploration of the dual nature of man - how even an upstanding man of science with all the right friends can have another side that no one sees. This isn't surprising as this kind of thing is right up my Gemini alley. No one does dual nature quite like Geminis although they usually aren't as tortured by it as Jekyll was by his. What was most interesting to me is how Jekyll was fascinated with Hyde but after a fashion, he almost became a prisoner to him. Is this a cautionary tale about indulging in your less respectable side, that the chances of being completely consumed by it are simply too great? Is it true that once that genie is out of the bottle, it's impossible to contain it? I think it's much more subtle than that, although the broad strokes that Stevenson used in Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde make it easy to relate to and enhance the story.

I think it's not uncommon for people to experience the kind of thing that Jekyll was experiencing, to become obsessed with the side of them that doesn't follow the rules, that spits on polite society. I think it's important to have a relationship with that part of yourself, much like it's important to be in touch with all parts of yourself. I don't think that means you have to indulge in debauchery, but it's important to acknowledge and respect the part of you that doesn't want to be hemmed in by what you should do, no matter how much you might ultimately play by the rules.

The story took me about two and a half minutes to read - it was only about 70 pages long, but it was steeped in a lot of the 19th century turns of phrase that can make reading books of this type a challenge for modern audiences. Still, it was an easy read and worth the time. Also, I couldn't help but think of this song while I was reading it.

Loneliness is a cloak you wear

As I was doing dishes tonight, I was listening to my iPod and a Cher song I had completely forgotten about played. Taken from what is probably my favorite Cher album, It's A Man's World, "The Sun Ain't Gonna Shine Anymore" is one of those Cher songs that, when you think about it, is perfect for Cher. Made famous in 1966 by The Walker Brothers, it's a melancholy song that makes great use Cher's lower register. It was used to great effect in The X-Files episode "The Post-Modern Prometheus," an episode in which Cher (as well as Roseanne Barr) was asked to appear, but she declined. Cher later regretted that decision, although probably not as much as she regretted the Lori Davis informercials.

As I said, the song has a melancholy streak a half a mile wide, and it is very autumnal. As my friend Steve said, I am over this summer shit. I want cold bones and moods and rain. This song fits in very well alongside other such autumnal hits of Dan like October Project and Madonna's Erotica album. The first line alone gets me "Loneliness is a cloak you wear/A deep shade of blue is always there." Let's have a listen. This version is clearly not live, which is a shame because Cher really can sing live.



Not one to forget where her bread is buttered, Cher also commissioned a couple of dance remixes for the clubs. I have a few remixes of this song in my iTunes library, but I don't know that any of them are official remixes. They are a bit hit and miss, which is par for the course with Cher remixes. For every "Believe (Almighty Definitive Mix)" you get at least two completely unlistenable remixes. These aren't bad, but they kind of wreck the melancholy of the song, even though sometimes melancholy mixed with a driving dance beat works much better than you might imagine.

While I was listening to this song, I got to thinking about all the other people that have recorded it. Of course, you have the Walker Brothers original. Another worthy version is by Keane, who usually can nail melodic melancholy pop. They do a pretty good job on this one.



It's not quite Cher, but really, what can be? The only other version of this song I have "The Sun Ain't Gonna Shine Anymore" is the high-nrg version by Quantize from the Gay Classics series which puts together a bunch of songs that really don't go all that well together if you think about it . Anyway, I'm pretty sure I snagged this song off of Audioscrobbler back in the day. I'm not sure this works any better than Cher's attempts to rework this for the gay clubs, but you certainly can't fault them for trying. And besides, I have kind of a soft spot for those high-nrg covers of popular songs by unknown artists.



Still, for my money, Cher has the best version. Why? Because, as is pointed out on Twitter nearly daily, she's fucking Cher.

Related posts: Cher's It's A Man's World album revisited, as well as my post on "The Post-Modern Prometheus" episode of The X-Files.

People who eat people

Having survived 9 straight days of work, I came home tonight holding my brain in my hand. What I need beyond words is a day off during which nothing is planned. Sadly, that's not tomorrow as I promised to take Anna to Body Worlds at the Des Moines Science Center. It'll be fun and I'm looking forward to being with her tomorrow. We've been anticipating this all summer and since she starts school in a scant 10 days, time is running low.

So to say I was tired and a bit on the cranky side was pretty darn accurate. But it all got better when I saw what the postman delivered for me today.


That's right - hot on the heels of saying how I really needed Streisand's People album on vinyl, I went to Amazon and found a used copy for sale. $4.75 including ths shipping. It is probably my favorite of her early albums (although Simply Streisand is a close second) and having getting it on vinyl was just a matter of time. When we were on the last leg of our trip back from Texas in May, I was crabby and wanting to be home and Heidi** put on People and suddenly, I was transformed into a better mood. I think it had something to do with Barbra's diction - that always makes me so happy. There's no "chewing the yous" when it comes to Barbra. And really, the song selection is so good.

I could have spent more for a copy in better condition, but this one works just fine. The vinyl is a little more scratchy and poppy than the ones I've been listening to, but on an album this old, the crystal clear quality of the CD has always seemed a little bit wrong.

I was trying to think of my favorite moments on People, and surprisingly, it's not the song "People." Although I will always remember being in Chicago with Heidi and Jeff, trying to find our hotel and Heidi and I were getting kind of short with each other. Suddenly, from the backseat, Jeff begins to sing "People/people who need people" which then morphed into "People/people who eat people" and then, inexplicably, "Kooka/Kooka kooka maaka/Kooka maaka, kooka maaka/Kooka mo." But really, the Italian spoken part in "When In Rome (I Do As The Romans Do)", the mournful saxophone in "Suppertime" and the wicked vibes at the beginning of "I'm All Smiles" all outshine Barbra's signature song in my book.

But the song that I have the most fondness for is "How Does The Wine Taste?" Again, Barbra's incredible diction is on display as the final "t" in "taste" is accentuated more than it might be by a lesser singer. There are also timpanis and little clicky things. Well, here's a video of it from her TV special My Name Is Barbra. Heidi and I are prone to saying "How does the wine taste?" and then the other will say "Does it sting your lips?" Yes, we are made for each other.



I've been listening to this album while I typed this blog post, and now that "People" is on, I know the album is almost over. I think it's barely 35 minutes - imagine how ripped off we'd feel if an album clocked in at under 40 minutes in this day and age. I guess the trade off was that she released albums practically every year during the 60s.

Now, if only I could get my hands on THIS.

**I should point out that People is one of the only Barbra Streisand albums that Heidi can stomach. She says anything from the late 70s on sounds like someone's grandmother.

The best dancer with the worst reputation

I was saddened to read that Annette Charles passed away yesterday at age 63 of complications from cancer. Annette Charles, for those of you that don't know, is perhaps best known for her portrayal of bad girl Cha Cha DiGregorio in the film adaptation of Grease.

I think you need scientific notation to most succinctly express how many times I watched Grease as a kid. It was on HBO every other day and I swear I watched it every time it was on. Most of that was due to my intense love of Olivia Newton-John during that time, but I also loved the music and the melodrama that the movie version of Grease delivers. I've owned the soundtrack on just about every possible format and I know for a fact that we had multiple copies of the record album growing up. Simply put, it was a very influential movie for me even though now it is kind of dismissed as lightweight and "girly." WTFE.

The thing that always gets me about the movie is how watching it now, you realize that all the leads (and, to be honest, pretty much all the actors playing high schoolers) were too old for these roles. Rather than being high school students at the dance, they look like they should be chaperones for the dance. I never really noticed that during any of my umpteen viewings of Grease until I got older. I remember being a kid and wondering what my high school years would be like and if they would be anything like those in Grease. Let me assure you that they were most decidedly NOT. No one every spontaneously broke into song in my lunchroom.

The most surprising thing I read in hearing about Annette Charles' death is that she became a speech professor at California State University, Northridge. I'm always fascinated when celebrities return to the real world so-to-speak. I wonder how many of her students knew that she was Cha Cha to so many of our generation. I can't imagine that she broadcast that information. She certainly didn't need to be ashamed of it though. We loved to hate her in that role.

RIP Cha Cha. Because of that small role in a major movie musical, you will never be forgotten by anyone in my generation.

Absent minded me

For someone who can focus so intensely on life-and-death things on a day-to-day basis, I swear somedays if my head was not attached to my body, I would lose track of it. My wife always calls me her "absent-minded professor." And it's true. It's the little things in life that will ultimately trip me up. I am eternally looking for my keys, my work badge, my shoes, my headphones. The only thing I manage to keep a pretty good eye on is my phone, but that's mostly because it doesn't really leave my side. I never thought I'd become the kind of person whose cell phone is an extension of their arm, but sadly, I have. I said the other day to Anna, while I was frantically looking for my car keys as I was getting ready to walk out the door to work, "Anna, guess what I'm looking for?" Her reply was "Your keys? That's not that hard of a question, Dad."

Yeah, I'm perfectly willing to admit that I am absent-minded. The older I get, the more I'm trying to just embrace who I am, flaws and all. And believe me, there are plenty of them. A perfect example of my absent-mindedness was last night's Search For The iPod.

After work, I got all the way down to my truck before I realized that I'd left my iPod in my work mailbox. Too tired and lazy to go back up then, I went home without it and figured I'd run back later and get it as I was going to be out and about. I went back to get it when I went to pick Anna up from a friend's house because I knew I was going to take her to her horse lesson and I didn't want to be without it. As it turned out, I slept pretty much the entire time I was there - 4 hours of sleep the night before and busy day at work had completely fried my brain. I got home, zonked out on the couch some more. We ate dinner and then I assumed my normal spot in the kitchen to do the dishes. I went to look for my iPod, which I thought was in the pants I wore to work. It wasn't there. It wasn't in any of the usual spots either (the island in the kitchen, the dining room table, my desk.) I became focused on the fact that it must have fallen out of my pocket while I slept at Anna's horse lesson and dropped down into the couch cushions. In my defense, my glasses had done just that - I had to pull the couch cushions up to find them before we left.

So I drove the almost 5 miles out to the horse barn and looked all through the couch. Not there. I tried to Zen myself out about it, saying that the more likely scenario was that I'd taken it out of my pocket, set it down absentmindedly in some strange spot (helped not one bit by my dubious consciousness) and now I just couldn't remember where I'd put it down. And that's exactly what I did. I found it on my dresser - approximately 5 feet from where I'd changed into shorts after work.

When things like this happen, I've adopted the strategy of using the line from The Wizard of Oz that the Tin Man says to the Scarecrow after he's been torn apart by Flying Monkeys in the Haunted Forest - "that's you all over!" I maintain that my absentmindedness stems from the fact that I am so focused in my job. The consequences of absentmindedness in my job are severe and when I leave it, my brain disengages just enough to keep it from being in a constantly fried. This means that I can't keep track of keys and badges and yes, sometimes iPods. I get mad at myself when I do that, but I've kind of come to the conclusion that pretty much all I can do is aspire to a state of "less absentmindedness." It is as much a part of me as my brown brownish-gray hair and my height. I can make noise about how I'm going to always put my badge where I can find it so I don't have to spend the last 5 minutes frantically trying to figure out where it is, but there's really only so much I can do.

I am who I am, I am my own special creation. Absentmindedness and all.