In the fourth season of Friends, "The One with the Embyos" (a comedy classic) reveals that although Rachel claims her favorite movie is Dangerous Liasons, it's actually Weekend at Bernie's. With that in mind, we thought we'd do a piece on the movie you like that no one would ever guess. Participating in this mini-roundtable are The Third Estate Sunday Review's Dona, Jess, Ty, Ava and, me, Jim; Rebecca of Sex and Politics and Screeds and Attitude; Betty of Thomas Friedman Is a Great Man; C.I. of The Common Ills and The Third Estate Sunday Review; Cedric of Cedric's Big Mix; Mike of Mikey Likes It!; Elaine of Like Maria Said Paz; Kat of Kat's Korner (of The Common Ills) and Wally of The Daily Jot
Dona: The Summer House. My aunt took me to see this film and it was playing at an independent theater with six screens, a coffee bar and about a dozen other things I wasn't used to at my local cineplex. I remember being so impressed. Then we saw the movie. I thought it was funny. Either it wasn't or the frou-frou crowd frowned on laughing. I was the only one laughing and there were several people hissing "SHHH!" at me throughout the movie. I found Jeanne Moreau enchanting but left with the desire never to visit another independent cinema and didn't for many years after. I was probably in first grade, maybe second, and for years I would get nervous if we even drove past an independent theater. I'm not joking about this. I've never seen the film since but when I was a little kid, it tickled me.
Elaine: I vaguely remember the movie and I believe it was billed as a comedy. I think it says something about the crowd you saw it with that they not only wouldn't laugh but would also hiss at a little child. My pick is Dumb & Dumber. It's an idiot film. It really is. I'm not a fan of Jim Carey films. Either they leave me cold or, like with Liar! Liar!, I'm thinking something like, "Yeah, I loved this film . . . when it was called All of Me and starred Lily Tomlin and Steve Martin." But there are moments in that film that crack me up. When they're singing "Mockingbird." When they do the Pretty Woman shopping spoof. In the last thirty minutes, it's just coasting but that was the most appealing Jim Carey's ever been on the big screen for me.
Jim: Interesting. I'll go with the first Austin Powers. To me that's funny. Each sequel got worse. Elizabeth Hurley was a part of the action and story. Each one after treated the female lead like the new "Bond girl." The only scene in any of the two sequels that made me laugh was in the second one where Dr. Evil and Scott go to father-son group therapy.
Rebecca: The Carrie Fisher scene. And it's Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me. I noted mine, at The Common Ills, before I ever started blogging, so some people may be disappointed, but it's Valley of the Dolls. I love that bad movie. I love the bad acting. I love the bad writing. Best-worst scene of all time, my opinion, when Neely and Tony, two Hollywood entertainers, end up in the nut house and sing a duet which leads to the other patients applauding. Sharon Tate looks lovely throughout and I love the hair styles.
Betty: I'll go with the look of a film as well. Back in "the old days," TV stations, cable and broadcast, used to show a lot of movies. I'm tempted to go with something like Godzilla vs. Mothra but the ones I really looked forward to were the sixties movies. Not the good stuff that holds up, but the silly stuff. Like, If It's Tuesday This Must Be Belgium. But my favorite, the one where everyone knew not to disturb me, was What's So Good About Feeling So Bad? It stars Mary Tyler Moore and . . . Help.
C.I.: George Peppard.
Betty: Thank you. There's this bird, a toucan, and he's spreading this disease of 'feel good.' I love the look and the hair styles. And Thelma Ritter's very funny in it. It's a film that I've looked for on DVD and never found. I mean, I see the $6.99 reduced stack of DVDs and I will dig through everyone in there thinking, "It could be here!" If the kids are with me, I'll still do it unless one of them is sick. And I mean sick where they're in pain. We were at the drug store getting medicine for my youngest son's pink eye last month and I saw one of those reduced displays of old movies. I asked, "How you holding up?" He was just excited that he got to play hookie. So I dug through them all. Before anyone panics, my hands were clean, I wasn't spreading pink eye.
Ty: I've never thought about that. I mean, at a drug store, digging through stuff, which I have done, a lot of people coming in there are sick. I'll be more careful in the future. I'm going to go with Outrageous Fortune. This is an "aunt tale" too, like Dona's. My aunt had just broken up with some guy and she was sobbing all day and that thing was playing on TV. We'd all been avoiding her and my grandmother had told her she was making a fool out of herself. She'd been sobbing all day and I mean loud, gut wrenching sobs. I was walking past the living room trying not to make eye contact but she saw me and called me over. She asked if I'd watch TV with her. I'd never seen the movie and don't think I even knew anyone in it at the time. But we watched and she was laughing and I was laughing. At first, I was just laughing because she was laughing. Then I really got into the movie. I told that story to Jim not long after we first became college roommates back in NY and he got me the DVD for my birthday that year. George Carlin cracks me up in that and so does Bette Midler. Shelly Long's a little too prissy but it works in the film. And the airport scene, where Midler and Long are pretending to be foreigners, when the woman says, "That was the biggest load of crap" always makes me laugh.
Jess: That's a movie I never saw until the three of us were roommates and it is a funny one. I'm trying to think of one like that for me but I'm really not having any luck. The closest would probably be Throw Momma From The Train. Danny DeVito's really funny in that and Billy Crystal is at times. I can do without the whole date where he and his girlfriend sit in the train. But I'm not thinking of anything else, so I'll go with that. DeVito's really funny.
Cedric: Carwash. It's a dumb movie, it's frequently a static movie. You wait for stuff to happen and most of what does happen appears to be an accident but, in those moments, it cracks me up. When I was a little kid, the theme song would get me excited.
Mike: Song. I'm going with a song too. This is supposed to be one of the really bad movies of all time. My sister recorded this off cable, one of the stations with commercials, and that's how I saw it. At Long Last Love. It's got Burt Reynolds, Cybill Shephard and Madeline Kahn. My sister, my oldest, would put it on and clear out the living room. Everyone would go running, "Ma! Dad! She's watching that movie again!" It actually became like a bonding thing between us because I was the only one who'd watch it with her and I was so young that we really didn't have a lot in common. I should probably check and see if it's available on DVD because she's still got that tape and still watches it.
Wally: Do you ever watch it with her?
Mike: Oh yeah. And she still complains that I'm the only one who will. Even her husband won't watch it with her.
Wally: Okay. Do we want to insert Kat here?
Ava:Let's do that after you go. Kat phoned and we got her input on this feature and another one.
Wally: Mine is The Jerk with Steve Martin. I thought that was the funniest thing when I was growing up. That Caddyshack and National Lampoon's Vacation. Now I watch it and I see all these holes in the story and all these other problems and there are bits that really aren't funny. But I still laugh at the movie. It must crack others up too, that guy in My Chemical Romance looks like Steve Martin in The Jerk.
Kat: Hair. The worst musical of the 70s. Even more so than the disaster that is Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club. That one just took a great album and turned into a lousy film by inventing a story. This one took a successful play and destroyed it. There was no respect for the structure and they felt they could rearrange the order of the songs. By the time Charlotte Rae shows up, you know it's laugh or cry. It's a train wreck that you can't look away from if you watch more than a second so, if you've been spared so far, avoid it at all costs. Even Treat Williams' hair is phoney.
Ava: I'm going with a musical as well but really more of a series of musicals. The Annette & Frankie beach movies. They're laughable. They're bad movies in every sense. But I can watch them and enjoy them. In one Annette sings "A Girl Needs A Boy," counter to Frankie's version, and it's probably her finest moment in the series. You also get Candy dancing around in her fringes and the character Eric von Zipper. Don Rickles shows up in Beach Blanket Bingo -- "that's the name of the, that's the name of the game." I'm embarrassed to say that I can sing along with probably every song in those movies.
Jim: That's everyone but C.I., right? Okay, this actually started because we usually watch a movie, the core six, after we finish the edition. We're all about to fall over and we usually want a comedy which we'll usually fall asleep during. One time, C.I. picked one and we were all kind of shocked. "You like this film?" we asked because it seemed so non-C.I. That's when we started teasing that it was like Rachel saying her favorite film was Dangerous Liasons but really . . . So we'll end with C.I.
C.I.: I think it's due to Bob Hope's work offscreen that shocked everyone so. Bob Hope's the star of the film and I really do love it. It's one of my earliest favorite films and I'm sure I could quote the whole thing by now. The film is My Favorite Brunette and it stars Hope and Dorothy Lamour. Hope's Ronnie Jackson, a baby photographer, whose office is next door to private detective Sam McLoud's, played by Alan Ladd. McLoud's out of town and Hope ends up posing as McLoud when Lamour's Carlotta comes knocking. It's a very funny movie, funny with dialogue, slapstick, throw away bits. On the latter, the movie opens with Hope on death row and he explains to reporters what happened. At the end, I don't think I'm giving anything away, it's a comedy from the forties, the execution is called off. When the excutioner finds out, he's upset. The excutioner is played by Bing Crosby and when Dorothy Lamour sees him, she can't take her eyes off him. Hope has to grab her chin and turn her back towards him. Hope, Crosby and Lamour starred in a series of films and it's a nod to those.
Jess: I really do like that movie. I think my favorite line is when Hope says about Lamour, "Nutty as a fruitcake, and with all that beautiful icing."
C.I.: So there's that and there's also a really strong visual for a forties comedy. It's a film noir spoof and you get that lighting and a great deal more.
Jim: So those are our picks of films you might not guess qualified for favorites. As Mike noted Tuesday, a lot of people are busy these days. For that reason, we've been avoiding a roundtable on books. After the election, we intend to do our next roundtable. One book we're hoping to cover is Cindy Sheehan's Peace Mom.
Sunday, October 29, 2006
Did war resister Kyle Snyder return to the US Saturday?
According to Mike Howell's "U.S. army deserter ready to head home" (Toronto Star, ran on Friday), war resister Kyle Snyder "will return to the United States tomorrow [Saturday] and turn himself into the military."
Did it happen? We can't find any press coverage of it. Are we now to the point (a point that the media, big and small, have been flirting with for some time) where resistance is the tree falling in the woods? If resistance happens when no one is around, did it make a sound?
Original reports (from Courage to Resist) had Kyle Snyder returning at the first of November. Possibly, Howell was mistaken? Though possible, it hardly seems likely since Howell's spent a great deal of time covering war resisters including Kyle Snyder.
Another little reported story was noted on Friday in C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot:"
Meanwhile, Citizen Soldier announces the opening, today, of "the first soldiers' coffeehouse of the current Iraq war in Watertown, NY." More information can be found at Citizen Soldier and at Different Drummer, the name of the coffeehouse. It is a movement and for those wanting more information on the importance of the GI coffeehouse to a peace movement should view David Zeiger's Sir! No Sir! documentary.
With or without coverage, the movement is alive and well. We're not so sure we can say the same about media, big and small.
Patricia Heaton's Pep Talk (parody)
Hey there, pretty girl in the mirror. Wooh-hoo, you are looking good, baby, looking good! Screw Doris Roberts, you are beautiful!
Today is your day!
The sixties are back and you are so all over them!
Three cans of hairspray this morning on that lovely hair. Screw Pantene, you were always a Suave girl.
And now you're bringing back the sixites!
The good parts.
Like the John Birch Society.
And polyester! You are so bringing back polyester!
You go, girl, you go!
You can wear stretchy polyster, white, and coo "Happy Birthday" to the Bully Boy. He's your Bully! He's a Bully just like you are!
Who has more fun than you on a set? Throwing tantrums and screaming at everyone! You rock! You rule!
You are the Anita Bryant of today!
You've taken on the Terry Schiavo issue. So what if America was against you? Rush loves you. Hannity loves you.
It got you a part in the most talked about mini-series of the year!!!!!
Now you gotta peddle the wares again and what better way than to come out against that hideous Michael J. Fox? His Alex Keaton may have fooled a lot of people, but not you, never you.
Your agent said, "Patty, you have no friends in this town, you can't act, you're pudgy and ugly, you're wrinkled and your voice is irritating."
What does he know!!! F**king moron!
You're PATRICIA GOD**MN HEATON!
You're already booked for the 2008 G.O.P. convention!
You're stylish! You're important! You're beautiful, baby!
Everybody Loves Patricia!
You'll be back on TV in your own sitcom in no time. That's what Roger Ailes says! And he never lies!
And this time, no stupid Ray Romano droning on and on, no Doris Roberts trying to upstage me. It'll be my show!
America loves me! The good parts at least!
Gold Star of the Week: The Progressive
In the new issue of The Progressive (November 2006), on page 19, they feature five photos. The first two are from the anti-war protest at the UN 9-19-06 by United for Peace and Justice. The other three are of of an August gathering. August 11, though the text doesn't tell you. The Veterans for Peace conference in Seattle, though the text doesn't tell you that either. The photos are by Jeff Paterson of Not In Our Name and they're of war resister Ricky Clousing who self-checked out of the military and, on August 11th, announced that he was turning himself in.
The issue obviously went to print before they could update. Clousing is serving three months (of an eleven months sentence), was demoted in rank, and, upon completion of the three months, will receive a dishonrable discharge.
To date, this is the only coverage the independent print media has given Clousing. (Though big media did show interest in the story.) More information on war resisters can be found at Courage to Resist.
The issue obviously went to print before they could update. Clousing is serving three months (of an eleven months sentence), was demoted in rank, and, upon completion of the three months, will receive a dishonrable discharge.
To date, this is the only coverage the independent print media has given Clousing. (Though big media did show interest in the story.) More information on war resisters can be found at Courage to Resist.
MyTV's Fascist House
This week on MyTV's Fascist House, The First Lady Is Missing! But her art exhibit goes on!
The First Lady decided to work in the visual field and came up with an exhibit entitled "The Destroyer." Shortly after, she vanished. Rumors have her vacationing in Gitmo.
Bully Boy attends the opening of the exhibit with Condi Rice. They hem and haw and the sexual tension between them will remind you of Brenda & Dylan or Pacey & Joey or
Mr. Ed & Wilbur.
Big Denny Hastert gets stood up at the last minute and considers attending stag. Instead, he calls Mark Foley who suggest he call the Congressional Page program for a hook up. So he ends up escorting the 16-year-old Roy (played by Fall Out Boy's delightful Pete Wentz)who threatens to have another Fall Out Boy moment even though no cell phones are around.
Musical guests Barbara & Jenna perform "Vogue" and demonstrate that talent is AWOL from this family.
MyTV's Fascist House airing 365 days a year, 52 weeks. All new episodes!
The First Lady decided to work in the visual field and came up with an exhibit entitled "The Destroyer." Shortly after, she vanished. Rumors have her vacationing in Gitmo.
Bully Boy attends the opening of the exhibit with Condi Rice. They hem and haw and the sexual tension between them will remind you of Brenda & Dylan or Pacey & Joey or
Mr. Ed & Wilbur.
Big Denny Hastert gets stood up at the last minute and considers attending stag. Instead, he calls Mark Foley who suggest he call the Congressional Page program for a hook up. So he ends up escorting the 16-year-old Roy (played by Fall Out Boy's delightful Pete Wentz)who threatens to have another Fall Out Boy moment even though no cell phones are around.
Musical guests Barbara & Jenna perform "Vogue" and demonstrate that talent is AWOL from this family.
MyTV's Fascist House airing 365 days a year, 52 weeks. All new episodes!
So what's up?
Quick note to clue in the people who are wondering. (And cut down on e-mails that are coming in since the highlights wen up.) We have six features completed. We have seven illustrations. Rebecca's still trying to get them all up at her site. Problems with Blogger/Blogspot (repeated) that were network wide, resulted in our decision this morning (at or around five in the morning) to go to sleep and do a late edition today.
We had six features completed. Those will be going up. While they are, we'll be working on at least two additional features. Fingers crossed, this will all be done within two hours.
We'll use the illustrations Rebecca can get up at her site. Sometimes, adding an illustration to an entry requires several attempts. Translation, patience.
We also will be pasting the majority of what we have completed into Blogger/Blogspot. Due to the problems, we lost several features when we'd attempt to save them. One of which was Ava and C.I.'s latest TV review. We were able to use "recover post" (a feature in Blogger/Blogspot) to recover most of the review. The conclusion is missing and we're of the opinion that that will just have to do. Everything we paste over here (text) will also require hunting down links. So two hours may be an unreasonable expectation but that's what we're shooting for.
We have input from Kat on two features this edition. We also got that readers are sick to death of 'horse race coverage'. That was the biggest complaint in the e-mails, that everywhere you looked or listened, you were being swamped with that. We have avoided it before and we avoided it this week. But the e-mails were asking for something extremely different so we tried to hit the arts aspect more this week.
If, like most readers who come to this site, you knew how you were going to vote a month ago and are feeling talked down to in the saturation of "It's election time!" coverage, don't worry. There won't be anything like that here. You won't hear how 'groovy' Harold Ford Jr. is. You won't be told "This guy wrote 'Still The One!'" or any of the other 'coverage' that has you so bothered.
We'll leave the puff Meet-the-Candidate!-And-Vote!-For-Him/Her! to others.
We had six features completed. Those will be going up. While they are, we'll be working on at least two additional features. Fingers crossed, this will all be done within two hours.
We'll use the illustrations Rebecca can get up at her site. Sometimes, adding an illustration to an entry requires several attempts. Translation, patience.
We also will be pasting the majority of what we have completed into Blogger/Blogspot. Due to the problems, we lost several features when we'd attempt to save them. One of which was Ava and C.I.'s latest TV review. We were able to use "recover post" (a feature in Blogger/Blogspot) to recover most of the review. The conclusion is missing and we're of the opinion that that will just have to do. Everything we paste over here (text) will also require hunting down links. So two hours may be an unreasonable expectation but that's what we're shooting for.
We have input from Kat on two features this edition. We also got that readers are sick to death of 'horse race coverage'. That was the biggest complaint in the e-mails, that everywhere you looked or listened, you were being swamped with that. We have avoided it before and we avoided it this week. But the e-mails were asking for something extremely different so we tried to hit the arts aspect more this week.
If, like most readers who come to this site, you knew how you were going to vote a month ago and are feeling talked down to in the saturation of "It's election time!" coverage, don't worry. There won't be anything like that here. You won't hear how 'groovy' Harold Ford Jr. is. You won't be told "This guy wrote 'Still The One!'" or any of the other 'coverage' that has you so bothered.
We'll leave the puff Meet-the-Candidate!-And-Vote!-For-Him/Her! to others.
Reminder, Kat's site is still active
Kat is in Ireland but her site is still active. Monday, Betty posted her thoughts on Kyle Snyder. Saturday morning, C.I. posted on students and activism. Ruth was unable to log in Wednesday (a problem for several Blogger/Blogspot sites) and wasn't able to post.
Though she's in Ireland, Kat did dictate a new review ("Kat's Korner: The death of Ani DiFranco?") over the phone to C.I. last night. In addition to that, while C.I. was on the phone with her, we (Jim, Dona, Ty, Jess and Ava) were pestering like crazy to speak to Kat. C.I. put her on speaker after she finished dictating the review. We were able to get her input on a feature we're doing on Tina Turner and she also weighed in on a roundtable we did on movies. So we've got Kat's input on two features.
She's assuming that she will be in Ireland through next week and possibly one more.
Though she's in Ireland, Kat did dictate a new review ("Kat's Korner: The death of Ani DiFranco?") over the phone to C.I. last night. In addition to that, while C.I. was on the phone with her, we (Jim, Dona, Ty, Jess and Ava) were pestering like crazy to speak to Kat. C.I. put her on speaker after she finished dictating the review. We were able to get her input on a feature we're doing on Tina Turner and she also weighed in on a roundtable we did on movies. So we've got Kat's input on two features.
She's assuming that she will be in Ireland through next week and possibly one more.
Music Spotlight: Kat ponders Ani DiFranco
Kat's still in Ireland. The plan was for C.I. to go through some notes she'd made on two CDs and assemble notes on one of them together (not adding anything) to get up a review by Oct. 31st. On Monday, Kat called C.I. to see which one had the most notes? Ani DiFranco's Reprieve. Kat offered that she had some issues with that and didn't know whether C.I. would want to put them up at The Common Ills. As Kat shared them (quickly, it was a less than five minute call), C.I. offered to go with the other CD but Kat said she thought she'd have time this weekend to call. They scheduled a call. Kat dictated the review over the phone. It's her latest and we love it. Bet you will too.
Kat's Korner: The death of Ani DiFranco?
Kat: Back before Ani DiFranco released Reprieve, I was excited, I was counting down the weeks. Then the CD came out and I thought I had a review for it. I made notes on various scraps of paper and was all set to assemble it into one review.
I never did.
That's not due to the fact that I'm in Ireland dealing with a dying family member. That's due to the news by way of Toni.
I practically grabbed her by the arm and pulled her from my front door to the living room to listen to Reprieve shortly after it came out. We all love Ani but Toni's probably been her biggest and longest fan of my small circle of friends.
I was full of "Isn't it great" and "Isn't it wonderful" talk and basically stepping on every word Toni started to say. Finally, after I shoved her on the sofa and went to the stereo, it hit me that Toni wasn't excited.
I made all the pleasantries I normally would have greeted her with but now I was listening for any indication of something seriously wrong. No indications were given and no words of distress were spoken.
Assuming it was the heat, this was still summer and these were furnace days, I ran to the kitchen for the pitcher of margaritas I'd made earlier and came back with salted glasses. Toni's face lit up like Maggie's. Since she's not quite the booze hound Maggie is, I assumed it was the weather, poured her a glass and headed towards the stereo.
"Do we have to listen?"
Okay, now I was seriously disturbed. This is the woman who drags me to Ani concerts. This is the woman who argued for fifteen minutes with a clerk at Tower over a free poster that was supposed to come with purchase of Evolve. (She got the Ani poster but only after she'd created such a scene that the manager had to intervene.) This is the woman who begged me to help her create an Ani T-shirt in 1994 because she didn't think any of the ones available (on either market) did Ani justice. What the hell was going on?
Hadn't I heard, Toni wondered, Ani was pregnant.
Oh.
I put on the Who's Tommy and turned the lights down. We listened in silence and didn't begin speaking until the next CD, around the time Janis was singing "Call On Me."
See, the thing is, women have to fight for any kind of artistic credibility. And, for women who've listened to music for any length of time, pregnancy doesn't mean "joy." It usually means soggy.
You start getting 'lullaby' CDs that the artists wouldn't normally put out until after the chart making days were over. Or you get these audio equivalents of "destiny." You get a whole lot of crap, you just don't get any art.
I was never a huge fan of Sarah McLachlan. But she was getting better with each album and, by the time of Surfacing, I was actually starting to enjoy her arc of growth. Then came the news that she was pregnant. I knew the next album would be a retreat. And it was, despite being called World On Fire.
Shawn Colvin's often used these days as an example by some of how women can't really work. The argument goes, it's not 'natural' for women, they have to really work at it. (Well the last few few Bob Dylan albums have felt phoned in -- maybe everyone needs to work a little harder?) They toss out Shawn Colvin and the soggy mush she released post-pregnancy and the overly lit commercials she did. And every woman suffers from that 'logic.'
'Logic' because Shawn Colvin wasn't a rocker before she got pregnant. She was as soggy as she is today long before she had her first bout of morning sickness. But the 'logic' dominates and there are plenty of examples to back it up.
The woman who've left a big impact tend to be childless or else they adopted a child (or gave one up for adoption). That includes Janis who died early. It includes Stevie Nicks, Joni Mitchell, Ann Wilson, and not many others.
Laura Nyro is an artist I love but when she emerged post-pregnancy, the art lost its urgency. Some argue Cass Elliot, whom I love, went into schmaltz after her pregnancy. There are too many arguments to be made to put it down just as 'getting older.' Even Chrissie Hynde who can usually be counted on to kick out the jams when everyone around her is brewing tea and reaching for a caftan began making drippy statements about women's 'nature' as she began having children.
Toni and I started talking about what women we could think of who didn't go into retreat at the first sign of pregnancy? We could name three: Etta James, Aretha Franklin and Carly Simon. We were depressed and you might be able to name more. I actually hope you can.
Lady Soul was always Lady Soul. She might get the worst producer in the world and, goodness knows, she's had some of them. But her work that goes soggy can be traced to that. Etta James? The original 'bad girl' -- the archetype before the Ronettes and the Shangri-Las ever harmonized on their first note. Carly? That keen eye for observation didn't switch to soft focus as a result of Sally and Ben.
Think Toni and I were making too much of it? Did you ever listen to Patti Smith's Dream of Life? That the album which provided one of her best songs ("People Have The Power") could be surrounded with so much corn was heart breaking. Or take the strange career of Pat Benetar who came out belting hard rocking songs in her caberet voice, traded in the tights for shoulder pads and then seemed to turn the whole career over to her husband and lose every fan who'd ever screamed along to "Treat Me Right" with the acoustic drip that was Tropico. The woman who once snarled, "You Better Run" has spent the rest of her career trying to reclaim her fans, often via the blues, but traveling the road with some sort of Cowsills act.
Benatar, the woman who won four consecutives Grammys in the women rock vocals category (all before she gave birth and none since), also provided MTV with the second video they ever played. Not even the blues could allow her to, as the Jefferson Starship once sang, "Find Your Way Back" to her fans.
The two Pats offer an interesting comparison. One was an artistic heavy hitter (Smith), the other a chart topper. Both rocked. Both went soft.
A little over a decade ago, we got another 'year of the women' in rock. The poster girl was Liz Phair. Exile in Guyville was a smart album full of angry thoughts and angry music. It rocked. She had a highly limited vocal range but she got crowned by most as the 'rocker.' Then came the days of Mommy-dom. And her career's never been the same. While her self-titled CD was so idiotic and so art-free, it made more than a few fans wish for the days of Whip Smart, the truth is that Liz Phair was already on the road to soggy.
The reality of pregnancy for many rocking women (I've gone with 'big' names because smaller artists, of any gender, have enough problems trying to break through) is not that different from the average women. It's late nights in the rocking chair, it's blurry mornings where you sit at the kitchen table watching the high chair. It's a lot of yawning, it's a lot adjustment to a new schedule. And, reality, it's still an enormous amount of work that falls mainly on women.
To be a woman in rock is to invert, subvert or spoof the stereotype and possibly there's no energy left for that in the post-birth days? Now an artist could explore these moments, and Toni and I give Carly credit for doing so. But most ignore reality. It's as though when the creative urge strikes them, they're going for a Calgon-take-me-away feel.
And it's drippy and it's sad and it hurts all women. So, for most women I know, the early days of being interested in sharing the news that ___ is pregnant quickly turns into an avoid the topic all together mood. Toni was tying it into an episode of Sex in the City which I never saw but apparently Sarah Jessica Parker and company go to a party thrown by a woman who's become a mother and it becomes a nightmare. (Sarah Jess' Carrie even loses her beloved shoes. Clearly a tragedy akin to Dorothy losing her red ruby slippers.) Even without having seen the episode, I could nod along to Toni's recap of retreat portrayed.
So what does the future hold for Ani DiFranco? The self-described "punk" (she didn't want to be called folk) has always rejected most labels. She's been lesbian, she's been bi-sexual, she's been married to a man, she's spoken of, and sang of, the 'girl police' who want her to be one thing when she wants to be another.
Long before the first wave of concern over the career from dedicated fans, Ani had declared, "I am no poster girl with a poster" ("32 Flavors"). So despite the talent that practically screams for you to say, "Okay, with Ani, with Ani there will be a difference!"; you find yourself quickly realizing that asking her to be a standard-bearer is asking for disappointment and all but inviting her to run the other way.
Now Patti Smith, unlike Pat Benatar, bounded back in the 90s and has stayed strong. Dream of Life sounds, now, like something she just had to get out of her system. Ani shares more similarities to Patti than to Pat so there may be reason to hope. But, to be honest, for too many women who've seen SoggyStock play out (the ever evolving 'happening' that's outlived Woodstock and any other 'event' in the rock era), there's not much reason to hope.
Add in that Ani's had problems in the last few years (which led to a tour cancellation) that interfered with her guitar playing and the 'news' is enough to depress the hell out of you. You might, as Toni and I did, try to find comfort in the fact that, if the sog-fest is temporary, the artist usually rebounds while, on the male end, they often seemed trapped in a cartoon version of themselves.
But that doesn't change the fact that the 'news' depresses us. We're fans of the music, not the artist. If we were fans of the personality, we could probably be as exicted for Ani as anyone who spent the summer breathless over Angelina and Brad's offsprings or Tom and Katie's.
A pitcher and a half of margaritas later, we were ready to listen. "Half-Assed" is probably the best track on the CD. But what we noticed was that this is Ani's album. She's had albums that worked before from start to finish as something more than a collection of songs. Obviously the live albums but the studio ones too (Not A Pretty Face, Little Plastic Castle, Evolve, Educated Guess). But on this one, it's not just the songs that add together for a total portrait, it's the musical accents. I honestly had missed that until C.I. pointed them out.
Reprieve is a CD for the big speakers, no question. But it's also one that you really should put on the head phones for at least once. You'll discover so much more to it if you do. In terms of the production, it's a very textured work. Which is interesting considering that last time around, Ani had surrendered production duties to Joe Henry (Knuckle Down, an album that still hasn't spoken to me). The textures are so wonderful (again, use headphones -- birds, traffic and more) that if Ani's going out, she's going out with a blaze.
"Hypnotized" opens the album softly and it may rank with "Both Hands" for Ani's most beautiful of her gentle songs. "So that's how you found me/ Rain falling around me . . . And you were no picnic/ And you were no prize/ But you had enough pathos/ To keep me hypnotized." On the second track, "Subconscious," the key line is "I know where I'm going/ And it aint' where I've been." That really sums up the album. Reprieve is looking at the world and refusing to take part in the uglier parts. The uglier parts are summed up best in "Millennium Theater:"
While out in TV nation
Under darkening skies
The resistance is just waiting
To be organized.
That's the album. She's looking at where the world is going and where it's been. Of the illustration on the cover, Ani writes in the liner notes: "the cover tree was inspired by a photgraph taken in nagasaki, japan on august 10, 1945 by yosuke yamahata, just hours after the explosion of the atomic bomb." The tree on the cover is half-destroyed, half-alive. That too goes to what she's commenting on this time around. It's a powerful album.
Still, it's hard not to hear "Millennium Theater" now (post 'news') and not worry, or at least wonder, where the 'news' will take Ani next? The fear is soggy in a New Morning retreat.
I hope that's not the case but most women into music can tell you they've pinned their hopes on a person before, "She'll be the one! She is the one!" The comedown is never pretty. While back, around Ray of Light, I can remember some of my friends talking up Madonna as the "one." She was more marketeer than muscian. But she'd had a run on the charts like no one since Olivia Newton-John. So, on the basis of that, there was some excitement even though she was doing the faux British accent, even though she was aspiring for 'respectable.' Today, she seems genuinely puzzled that her stage shows, where the most creativity has always gone, are seen as controversial in a manner that doesn't excite media debate but just brings condemnations. When you go for 'respectable,' maybe you bring that criticism on yourself? It's one thing to court controversy and try for 'edgy' when you're all but passing out snapshots of your vagina, it's quite another when you're reinvented yourself for the last mile.
Ani's no Madonna. There's never been a team of writers or musicians needed for her to produce an album. All Ani's learned, all she's observed, come together on this album. Is Reprieve the swan song?
On 1974's Hotcakes, Carly Simon observed the following in "Think I'm Gonna Have a Baby:"
Platform shoes on table tops
I think I'm going to have a baby
Opinons flying right and left
I think I'm going to tell them maybe
They're puttin' out to many photographs records
Think I'm gonna have a baby, a baby . . .
I'm sure there are many "opinions flying right and left" with regards to Ani's 'news.' And for her, it may be all annoying. (If so, don't follow your press.) But it is a real very concern. Janis Joplin was blazing a trail of exploration and, once she died, she became a cautionary note. The 'boys' can be wild and never suffer the 'afterschool special' portrayals (Jim Morrison, Jimi Hendrix, . . .). The reality is that women are the first overlooked in the histories. That's still true. They'll do their 'exception' and note a Joni Mitchell but, for instance, having just read a 'history of US rock' here in Ireland which lists only one female (Joni) but goes on and on about Jan & Dean, the Rascals, the Bee Gees, the Blues Magoos, and just about every other name of someone with a penis attached to the body, things haven't changed that much. In the late eighties, pop stations in the United States, were going out of their way to attempt to figure out how to play the hits but avoid playing a woman after another. The same 'concern,' then or now, has never been applied to male artists.
So there's a lot that women are up against. When someone manages to carve out their own space, that's cause for celebration. Maybe in forty years, there won't be a need for women to respond to the news that a favorite female artist is pregnant with fears? But that's reality as well.
Of the big name female artists who 'crossed over' (even temporarily) into the 'boys' club' (which is what it is, it's not 'the club,' it's the 'boys' club' and a lot of men in the print set work harder than Spanky of The Little Rascals to keep it that way), the only one to give birth and not cause embarrassment is Carly Simon. She did it by exploring life, what she was doing before. Maybe Ani will follow that path?
Time will tell. After a couple of hours discussing the topic, Toni and I were able to think of one more woman of 'rock' whose work didn't go soggy as a result of motherhood: Tori Amos. So we were left with four.
Right now, we have Reprieve and if you haven't checked it out yet, make a point to. Forget the 'news,' just blast "Half-Assed" out your speakers:
You start trippin
And I start slippin away
I was taught to zip it
If I got nothing nice to say
And down in the Texas of my heart
Driving a really big truck
Headed down a dirt road . . .
I never did.
That's not due to the fact that I'm in Ireland dealing with a dying family member. That's due to the news by way of Toni.
I practically grabbed her by the arm and pulled her from my front door to the living room to listen to Reprieve shortly after it came out. We all love Ani but Toni's probably been her biggest and longest fan of my small circle of friends.
I was full of "Isn't it great" and "Isn't it wonderful" talk and basically stepping on every word Toni started to say. Finally, after I shoved her on the sofa and went to the stereo, it hit me that Toni wasn't excited.
I made all the pleasantries I normally would have greeted her with but now I was listening for any indication of something seriously wrong. No indications were given and no words of distress were spoken.
Assuming it was the heat, this was still summer and these were furnace days, I ran to the kitchen for the pitcher of margaritas I'd made earlier and came back with salted glasses. Toni's face lit up like Maggie's. Since she's not quite the booze hound Maggie is, I assumed it was the weather, poured her a glass and headed towards the stereo.
"Do we have to listen?"
Okay, now I was seriously disturbed. This is the woman who drags me to Ani concerts. This is the woman who argued for fifteen minutes with a clerk at Tower over a free poster that was supposed to come with purchase of Evolve. (She got the Ani poster but only after she'd created such a scene that the manager had to intervene.) This is the woman who begged me to help her create an Ani T-shirt in 1994 because she didn't think any of the ones available (on either market) did Ani justice. What the hell was going on?
Hadn't I heard, Toni wondered, Ani was pregnant.
Oh.
I put on the Who's Tommy and turned the lights down. We listened in silence and didn't begin speaking until the next CD, around the time Janis was singing "Call On Me."
See, the thing is, women have to fight for any kind of artistic credibility. And, for women who've listened to music for any length of time, pregnancy doesn't mean "joy." It usually means soggy.
You start getting 'lullaby' CDs that the artists wouldn't normally put out until after the chart making days were over. Or you get these audio equivalents of "destiny." You get a whole lot of crap, you just don't get any art.
I was never a huge fan of Sarah McLachlan. But she was getting better with each album and, by the time of Surfacing, I was actually starting to enjoy her arc of growth. Then came the news that she was pregnant. I knew the next album would be a retreat. And it was, despite being called World On Fire.
Shawn Colvin's often used these days as an example by some of how women can't really work. The argument goes, it's not 'natural' for women, they have to really work at it. (Well the last few few Bob Dylan albums have felt phoned in -- maybe everyone needs to work a little harder?) They toss out Shawn Colvin and the soggy mush she released post-pregnancy and the overly lit commercials she did. And every woman suffers from that 'logic.'
'Logic' because Shawn Colvin wasn't a rocker before she got pregnant. She was as soggy as she is today long before she had her first bout of morning sickness. But the 'logic' dominates and there are plenty of examples to back it up.
The woman who've left a big impact tend to be childless or else they adopted a child (or gave one up for adoption). That includes Janis who died early. It includes Stevie Nicks, Joni Mitchell, Ann Wilson, and not many others.
Laura Nyro is an artist I love but when she emerged post-pregnancy, the art lost its urgency. Some argue Cass Elliot, whom I love, went into schmaltz after her pregnancy. There are too many arguments to be made to put it down just as 'getting older.' Even Chrissie Hynde who can usually be counted on to kick out the jams when everyone around her is brewing tea and reaching for a caftan began making drippy statements about women's 'nature' as she began having children.
Toni and I started talking about what women we could think of who didn't go into retreat at the first sign of pregnancy? We could name three: Etta James, Aretha Franklin and Carly Simon. We were depressed and you might be able to name more. I actually hope you can.
Lady Soul was always Lady Soul. She might get the worst producer in the world and, goodness knows, she's had some of them. But her work that goes soggy can be traced to that. Etta James? The original 'bad girl' -- the archetype before the Ronettes and the Shangri-Las ever harmonized on their first note. Carly? That keen eye for observation didn't switch to soft focus as a result of Sally and Ben.
Think Toni and I were making too much of it? Did you ever listen to Patti Smith's Dream of Life? That the album which provided one of her best songs ("People Have The Power") could be surrounded with so much corn was heart breaking. Or take the strange career of Pat Benetar who came out belting hard rocking songs in her caberet voice, traded in the tights for shoulder pads and then seemed to turn the whole career over to her husband and lose every fan who'd ever screamed along to "Treat Me Right" with the acoustic drip that was Tropico. The woman who once snarled, "You Better Run" has spent the rest of her career trying to reclaim her fans, often via the blues, but traveling the road with some sort of Cowsills act.
Benatar, the woman who won four consecutives Grammys in the women rock vocals category (all before she gave birth and none since), also provided MTV with the second video they ever played. Not even the blues could allow her to, as the Jefferson Starship once sang, "Find Your Way Back" to her fans.
The two Pats offer an interesting comparison. One was an artistic heavy hitter (Smith), the other a chart topper. Both rocked. Both went soft.
A little over a decade ago, we got another 'year of the women' in rock. The poster girl was Liz Phair. Exile in Guyville was a smart album full of angry thoughts and angry music. It rocked. She had a highly limited vocal range but she got crowned by most as the 'rocker.' Then came the days of Mommy-dom. And her career's never been the same. While her self-titled CD was so idiotic and so art-free, it made more than a few fans wish for the days of Whip Smart, the truth is that Liz Phair was already on the road to soggy.
The reality of pregnancy for many rocking women (I've gone with 'big' names because smaller artists, of any gender, have enough problems trying to break through) is not that different from the average women. It's late nights in the rocking chair, it's blurry mornings where you sit at the kitchen table watching the high chair. It's a lot of yawning, it's a lot adjustment to a new schedule. And, reality, it's still an enormous amount of work that falls mainly on women.
To be a woman in rock is to invert, subvert or spoof the stereotype and possibly there's no energy left for that in the post-birth days? Now an artist could explore these moments, and Toni and I give Carly credit for doing so. But most ignore reality. It's as though when the creative urge strikes them, they're going for a Calgon-take-me-away feel.
And it's drippy and it's sad and it hurts all women. So, for most women I know, the early days of being interested in sharing the news that ___ is pregnant quickly turns into an avoid the topic all together mood. Toni was tying it into an episode of Sex in the City which I never saw but apparently Sarah Jessica Parker and company go to a party thrown by a woman who's become a mother and it becomes a nightmare. (Sarah Jess' Carrie even loses her beloved shoes. Clearly a tragedy akin to Dorothy losing her red ruby slippers.) Even without having seen the episode, I could nod along to Toni's recap of retreat portrayed.
So what does the future hold for Ani DiFranco? The self-described "punk" (she didn't want to be called folk) has always rejected most labels. She's been lesbian, she's been bi-sexual, she's been married to a man, she's spoken of, and sang of, the 'girl police' who want her to be one thing when she wants to be another.
Long before the first wave of concern over the career from dedicated fans, Ani had declared, "I am no poster girl with a poster" ("32 Flavors"). So despite the talent that practically screams for you to say, "Okay, with Ani, with Ani there will be a difference!"; you find yourself quickly realizing that asking her to be a standard-bearer is asking for disappointment and all but inviting her to run the other way.
Now Patti Smith, unlike Pat Benatar, bounded back in the 90s and has stayed strong. Dream of Life sounds, now, like something she just had to get out of her system. Ani shares more similarities to Patti than to Pat so there may be reason to hope. But, to be honest, for too many women who've seen SoggyStock play out (the ever evolving 'happening' that's outlived Woodstock and any other 'event' in the rock era), there's not much reason to hope.
Add in that Ani's had problems in the last few years (which led to a tour cancellation) that interfered with her guitar playing and the 'news' is enough to depress the hell out of you. You might, as Toni and I did, try to find comfort in the fact that, if the sog-fest is temporary, the artist usually rebounds while, on the male end, they often seemed trapped in a cartoon version of themselves.
But that doesn't change the fact that the 'news' depresses us. We're fans of the music, not the artist. If we were fans of the personality, we could probably be as exicted for Ani as anyone who spent the summer breathless over Angelina and Brad's offsprings or Tom and Katie's.
A pitcher and a half of margaritas later, we were ready to listen. "Half-Assed" is probably the best track on the CD. But what we noticed was that this is Ani's album. She's had albums that worked before from start to finish as something more than a collection of songs. Obviously the live albums but the studio ones too (Not A Pretty Face, Little Plastic Castle, Evolve, Educated Guess). But on this one, it's not just the songs that add together for a total portrait, it's the musical accents. I honestly had missed that until C.I. pointed them out.
Reprieve is a CD for the big speakers, no question. But it's also one that you really should put on the head phones for at least once. You'll discover so much more to it if you do. In terms of the production, it's a very textured work. Which is interesting considering that last time around, Ani had surrendered production duties to Joe Henry (Knuckle Down, an album that still hasn't spoken to me). The textures are so wonderful (again, use headphones -- birds, traffic and more) that if Ani's going out, she's going out with a blaze.
"Hypnotized" opens the album softly and it may rank with "Both Hands" for Ani's most beautiful of her gentle songs. "So that's how you found me/ Rain falling around me . . . And you were no picnic/ And you were no prize/ But you had enough pathos/ To keep me hypnotized." On the second track, "Subconscious," the key line is "I know where I'm going/ And it aint' where I've been." That really sums up the album. Reprieve is looking at the world and refusing to take part in the uglier parts. The uglier parts are summed up best in "Millennium Theater:"
While out in TV nation
Under darkening skies
The resistance is just waiting
To be organized.
That's the album. She's looking at where the world is going and where it's been. Of the illustration on the cover, Ani writes in the liner notes: "the cover tree was inspired by a photgraph taken in nagasaki, japan on august 10, 1945 by yosuke yamahata, just hours after the explosion of the atomic bomb." The tree on the cover is half-destroyed, half-alive. That too goes to what she's commenting on this time around. It's a powerful album.
Still, it's hard not to hear "Millennium Theater" now (post 'news') and not worry, or at least wonder, where the 'news' will take Ani next? The fear is soggy in a New Morning retreat.
I hope that's not the case but most women into music can tell you they've pinned their hopes on a person before, "She'll be the one! She is the one!" The comedown is never pretty. While back, around Ray of Light, I can remember some of my friends talking up Madonna as the "one." She was more marketeer than muscian. But she'd had a run on the charts like no one since Olivia Newton-John. So, on the basis of that, there was some excitement even though she was doing the faux British accent, even though she was aspiring for 'respectable.' Today, she seems genuinely puzzled that her stage shows, where the most creativity has always gone, are seen as controversial in a manner that doesn't excite media debate but just brings condemnations. When you go for 'respectable,' maybe you bring that criticism on yourself? It's one thing to court controversy and try for 'edgy' when you're all but passing out snapshots of your vagina, it's quite another when you're reinvented yourself for the last mile.
Ani's no Madonna. There's never been a team of writers or musicians needed for her to produce an album. All Ani's learned, all she's observed, come together on this album. Is Reprieve the swan song?
On 1974's Hotcakes, Carly Simon observed the following in "Think I'm Gonna Have a Baby:"
Platform shoes on table tops
I think I'm going to have a baby
Opinons flying right and left
I think I'm going to tell them maybe
They're puttin' out to many photographs records
Think I'm gonna have a baby, a baby . . .
I'm sure there are many "opinions flying right and left" with regards to Ani's 'news.' And for her, it may be all annoying. (If so, don't follow your press.) But it is a real very concern. Janis Joplin was blazing a trail of exploration and, once she died, she became a cautionary note. The 'boys' can be wild and never suffer the 'afterschool special' portrayals (Jim Morrison, Jimi Hendrix, . . .). The reality is that women are the first overlooked in the histories. That's still true. They'll do their 'exception' and note a Joni Mitchell but, for instance, having just read a 'history of US rock' here in Ireland which lists only one female (Joni) but goes on and on about Jan & Dean, the Rascals, the Bee Gees, the Blues Magoos, and just about every other name of someone with a penis attached to the body, things haven't changed that much. In the late eighties, pop stations in the United States, were going out of their way to attempt to figure out how to play the hits but avoid playing a woman after another. The same 'concern,' then or now, has never been applied to male artists.
So there's a lot that women are up against. When someone manages to carve out their own space, that's cause for celebration. Maybe in forty years, there won't be a need for women to respond to the news that a favorite female artist is pregnant with fears? But that's reality as well.
Of the big name female artists who 'crossed over' (even temporarily) into the 'boys' club' (which is what it is, it's not 'the club,' it's the 'boys' club' and a lot of men in the print set work harder than Spanky of The Little Rascals to keep it that way), the only one to give birth and not cause embarrassment is Carly Simon. She did it by exploring life, what she was doing before. Maybe Ani will follow that path?
Time will tell. After a couple of hours discussing the topic, Toni and I were able to think of one more woman of 'rock' whose work didn't go soggy as a result of motherhood: Tori Amos. So we were left with four.
Right now, we have Reprieve and if you haven't checked it out yet, make a point to. Forget the 'news,' just blast "Half-Assed" out your speakers:
You start trippin
And I start slippin away
I was taught to zip it
If I got nothing nice to say
And down in the Texas of my heart
Driving a really big truck
Headed down a dirt road . . .
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