Offline
Since I also can't claim to be the biggest fan of Kris Kristofferson's music, let's call this more of a spiritual obituary.
As an actor....never better than...
Offline
Kristofferson's music never quite measured up, because you could always smell the desperate aspiration he had for it to be better than it actually was, not to mention all the other better artists he constantly cribbed from. But I still find a lot of it vaguely effective, none more than this.
Is the only decent version of this from Fat City? And is it only presented in fragments for the sake of the film? Because I just realized the version I have on my record is shit.
Offline
Wait a second. John Amos died over a month ago?
Apparently we're just now finding out because his kids are fighting over his money amidst allegations of elder abuse.
Offline
Also wanted to add a note on Pete Rose.
I'm not a big baseball fan. It's the most boring sport, whether you're watching on TV or playing the outfield. Maybe golf is more boring on TV. I don't know, I've never watched golf on TV.
But Pete Rose was definitely in my home growing up, because my dad's team was the Cincinnati Reds, back during the "Big Red Machine" era. He even had a Johnny Bench poster. But like a lot of fans, my dad fell out with the team between the scandals of Rose getting caught betting on his own team's games while as a manager (and evidence he bet against his team) and the Marge Schott meltdown. And like a lot of old-school baseball fans, my dad eventually lost interest and faith in the sport over further scandals over the years. By the time the Astros won the World Series despite a proven cheating scandal (which was suprisingly a non-scandal), my dad just shrugged, "It hasn't been an honest game in a long time".
There's apparently a new Pete Rose documentary available, but I haven't seen it. There's still a long-standing controversy over whether or not, despite Rose's gambling scandal (and more precisely his inability to publicly admit and atone for it), Rose should be eligible for the Baseball Hall of Fame. Defenders point out that Rose has always denied betting against his own team, but that doesn't really mean much. Rose also denied betting on baseball at all...until he had a book to sell on the publicity of his confession. Gambling and hubris aside, Rose still holds a number of baseball records, including most career hits. There's not a lot of controversy about whether he is one of the greatest players of all time. Like a lot of athletes, that doesn't necessarily make him an honorable man. I don't really care about museums in small New York towns, but I know that my dad had some rather strong feelings on the subject. He never forgave Rose for what he described as unbrideled arrogance, and I'm pretty sure that a lot of that bitterness came from almost a sense of personal betrayal as a former long-term fan.
Here's Rose on Letterman, equally unfazed or troubled by remorse about having to serve a prison term for tax evasion.
Offline
If you can get into those slow rhythms of baseball, it's really a fantastic sport to watch. It's a very particular headspace. I imagine it's probably the same thing for football (Soccer) in the UK. Which for me is the most deadly of all boredoms.
Admittedly though, a bad baseball game can be an astonish slog to get through. And after having a bad team in toronto for a long stretch there, I could never really get back into it.
So it's really just hockey for me now. Even though they are barely allowed to punch eachother out on the ice anymore.
EDIT: Actually, scratch that, American football is the pinnacle of unbearable dullness. Never been able to get through a single game. Probably not even an entire quarter.
Offline
crumbsroom wrote:
EDIT: Actually, scratch that, American football is the pinnacle of unbearable dullness. Never been able to get through a single game. Probably not even an entire quarter.
Oh, I see how it is. Obviously watching bad sports is always boring, and I don't know which American football teams they show up there (Buffalo? Cleveland? The Vikings?). But if you have a really talented team, it can be more exciting (like watching Baltimore slap Buffalo around this weekend). The action does come in spurts, and the time in-between plays can get long. And all the goddamn commercials. (I tend to watch with the sound down and music - there's little of interest from the announcers.) I also imagine that all of these activities, whether baseball or football, is kinda like fishing. It's meant to be boring so you end up drinking more.
Offline
Jinnistan wrote:
It's the most boring sport, whether you're watching on TV or playing the outfield. Maybe golf is more boring on TV. I don't know, I've never watched golf on TV.
Auto racing.
OK, maybe the crashes make it a toss–up, but man, talk about watching paint dry.
My grandfather was into golf on TV. It's as dull as it sounds. I'd still take it over auto racing, if I had to choose my Hell. They're both way past the line of reasonably tolerable, though.
I think all these sports are typically only exciting if you bet money on them.
Offline
One of my favorite trivia bits about Teri Garr is that she was sultry voice repeating the word "head" for the Monkee film's soundtrack and advertisements. She was also a professional dancer, with Toni Basil, and so part of that BBS/Jack Nicholson crowd.
Offline
Jinnistan wrote:
One of my favorite trivia bits about Teri Garr is that she was sultry voice repeating the word "head" for the Monkee film's soundtrack and advertisements. She was also a professional dancer, with Toni Basil, and so part of that BBS/Jack Nicholson crowd.
This made my day, even though it got me all weepy. I don't usually get too emotional over these high–profile passings, and I can't say for sure why hers is hitting me so hard. What a beautiful send–off. Let the world see her in her youth, vivacious and adorable, unburdened by physical ailments, and let her dance her way off the world stage, dancing away the final moments before taking that last bus ride to the unknown.
Edit: I assume everyone knows I meant the video made my day, not Garr's passing, but I thought I'd clarify anyway.
Last edited by Rampop II (10/30/2024 9:07 pm)
Offline
Quincy Jones
Offline
Roy Haynes, one of the classic journeymen drummers of post-bop jazz, lasted to 99.
Some of the classic records on which he played: Charlie Parker - Bird at St. Nick's; Thelonious Monk - Misterioso; Eric Dolphy - Outward Bound & Out There; Oliver Nelson - The Blues and the Abstract Truth; Andrew Hill - Black Fire; Jackie McLean - Destination Out & It's Time; Chick Corea - Now He SIngs Now He Sobs; Leon Thomas - Spirits Known and Unknown; Pharoah Sanders - Thembi; Gato Barbieri - Under Fire, and dozens of others. He played with everybody.
Probably my favorite Coltrane version of "My Favorite Things" is the live version from Newport in 1963, which I only learned some years later was actually Roy Haynes sitting in for Elvin Jones while the latter was in rehab for a few months.
Offline
Shel Talmy, an American record producer who landed in Britain just in time for the incipient Invasion, and produced pretty much all of the classic early mod-rock records by the likes of Thw Who, The Kinks and The Creation. He was 87.
If you want to seek out the first Who LP, Sings My Generation, be sure to pick up the remastered version with all of the singles, B-sides and important outtakes like "Leaving Here", "Lubie" and their first stab at "Heatwave".
Offline
Jim Abrahams, one third of the Zuker-Abrahams-Zucker comedy powerhouse, got mauled to the bones in a freak rabid leukemia melee.
His solo output is best remembered for the Hot Shots films, but the largely unwatched Mafia! (which unfortunately was truncated from the intended title Jane Austin's Mafia because studios think you're stupid) is pretty funny too, definitely compared to all of the more recent spoof slop released since.
Offline
One of my beloved indie '90s groups, the Olivia Tremor Control, is now officially defunct following the death this past Friday of the second of its two primary songwriters, Will Cullen Hart, from multiple sclerosis. (The first, Bill Doss, passed away in 2012 from an aneurysm.) Hart was one of the three founding members of the Elephant 6 collective, along with Robert Schneider (Apples in Stereo) and Jeff Mangum (Neutral Milk Hotel) who started a small 4-track recording empire in Athens Georgia in the mid-90s, and both of the latter also appear on Olivia Tremor Control's best album, 1996's Dusk at Cubist Castle. Hart also fronted the band Circulatory System in the '00s. This year's Black Friday coincidentally saw the limited release of the soundtrack to the documentary on The Elephant 6 Recording Co. which features two new songs from a reconstituted OTC and appear to be the final work of Hart's.
A Rolling Stone tribute and interview: "It always felt magical to hear what happened when their visions and voices intertwined. That magic is more bittersweet today, but it’s still there. It will live forever, and you know it’s true."
I feel terrible. A too-young 53.
Offline
Silvia Pinal, classic Bunuel muse of Viridiana, Exterminating Angel, SImon of the Desert. Folded her hand at 93.