Flaming Pablum

Beasties in TriBeCa

For no massive reason other than it's entirely excellent and hilarious. Go get the book, it's great.

Wow do I miss these guys.

'Falling Out'

Photo by Sierra Urich.

Just a brief break in the political agita.

Next week, you can either celebrate the long-awaited cresting of the Blue Wave, or, conversely, suffocate your sorrows over the unyielding red-capped MAGA yoke of the GOP (in the wake of election 2016, we should take NOTHING for granted) by availing yourselves to “Falling Out,” the latest ambitious endeavor by my friends at The Phantom Limb Company.

As part of the 2018 Next Wave Festival, this production --  spawned by the creative partnership of Jessica Grindstaff and Erik Sanko (discussed most recently here) -- explores and expounds on the relationship between recent traumatic events and the parables of mythology. As the Phantom Limb team itself describes it…

[“Falling Out”] is a rippling meditation on water, heartbreak, and healing in response to the 2011 tsunami and Fukushima nuclear disaster. In collaboration with Dai Matsuoka of dance troupe Sankai Juku, the work weaves flex dance, butoh, and Phantom Limb’s unique puppet theater into a visually arresting tapestry of collective experience and artistic alchemy.

So, yeah … it's not exactly “Yo Gabba Gabba!”

In all seriousness, the multi-media/multi-disciplined work of the Phantom Limb Company always makes for a striking visual experience that will inform, emotionally resonate and haunt you long after you’ve witnessed it.

It is well worth your time. Find out more by clicking right here. Performances only run from November 7th through November 10th, so act with stealth.

As an example of some of their earlier work, check out this teaser from their production, “"69º S"

'The Boho's Lament'

Talking Heads at the Mudd Club

Talking Heads playing the intimate confines of the Mudd Club at 77 White Street in August of 1979.

This is some amazing footage I’d certainly never seen before. Not only is this a feral, pugnacious rendition of “Psycho Killer,” but a great, illuminating look inside the Mudd Club, which is usually captured in indescrinible grain and shadow (like that fabled Cramps clip or the footage of the Circle Jerks I’ve posted here before).

Also stick around for the footage of coolster Mudd Club attendees starting at around 4:03. Spot anyone you know in there?

Talking Heads • Psycho Killer • Live at the Mudd Club • August 13, 1979 from Nacho's Productions on Vimeo.

Blank City Redux

I posted a rapturous review of Celine Dahnier's excellent documentary, "Blank City" back in 2013, summing it up by suggesting that "even if you're not a smelly music dork or an esoteric cinema head, "Blank City" is entirely fascinating." I continue to stand by that review.

In any case, I recently stumbled upon this alternate trailer for the film on Vimeo, and it hits all the right notes, so to speak. Hard to believe, sometimes, that this is the same city.

Stories fron New York: No Wave Cinema from Monica Delgado on Vimeo.

'Punking Out'

My comrade Tim Broun was circulating this on Facebook, and since I promised to get back to this blog’s usual beat, so to speak, herewith a short documentary about bands that no longer exist playing in a venue that is now a prohibitively expensive haberdashery.

I can't help but think that the slightly pugnacious young lady who refutes the tag "punk" starting at 2:44 strenuously resembles forgotten SNL veteran Robin Duke. 

Prior to the Punks, Years Before the Yuppies: East Village 1967

Next month, I am to cross the perilous Rubicon of my 51st year. I’m not especially enthused about that number, but what is to be done? Arriving, as I did, if my mother is to believed, at “cocktail hour” during the early evening of October 13, 1967, following a harrowing ride in a yellow cab across congested West 14th Street en route to St. Vincent’s Hospital, I was officially born in downtown Manhattan. My family did not live downtown, at the time, which might explain why that cab ride was so fraught, but they made it to St. Vincent’s all the same. My grandfather, a doctor, has practiced at St. Vincent’s, which might be why the decision was made to have me delivered there. Decades later, both of my own children were born at St. Vincent’s. Today, despite my multiple personal connections to the place, St. Vincent’s Hospital is sadly gone, razed to accommodate a new and prohibitively expensive cluster of condominiums. `Cos ya know … those are more important to a community than having a proper hospital in the vicinity. But, I digress…

In any case, in my regular perusals around the internet, I stumbled upon the clip below and let out an audible gasp or two. From the AP Archives, the video below captures scenes from the East Village – including footage of East 9th Street, First Avenue, Tompkins Square Park, St. Marks Place, The Dom and the Electric Circus, among other locales --- circa 1967. In fact, the story accompanying the footage was evidently posted on the very day of my birth. While these hirsute hippies right out of central casting were depicted strolling -– in some instances barefoot -– around the largely-still-recognizable East Village, I was busy preparing my early entry into the world about five avenues to the west.

Anyway, enjoy the trip back in time… and please note that while some footage repeats itself, it’s worth sticking around for the whole 8:26 of it.

25 Words

I cannot say I’ve ever knowingly watched NYCTV, let alone been aware of its existence. But I’ve been spotting this new ad campaign of theirs in the subways, of late, and am both compelled and repulsed by it. On the surface, I think the concept -– “Why I Love New York In 25 Words” -– is kind of a fun, novel little exercise. It’s their execution that has depressed me.

Polling a variety of celebrities and public figures -– like, say, one Bridget Moynahan below -– the answers they’ve fielded to their little challenge have been, to my mind at least, somewhat dispiriting. I mean the notion of citing “Sex and The City” as a fundamental reason why you love New York City upsets me more than I can put into words. But, to be fair, if I’m not mistaken, Miss Moynahan was in fucking “Sex and The City,” so that contextual qualifier makes it slightly more forgivable, I suppose. Still, … hurrumph. Also, who would honestly still cite the High Line? I wonder when the last time was that she tried to walk down it.

Anyway, judgmental vitriol aside, I thought it might be fun to take a crack at this little challenge myself, given my deep well of adoration for my home town. Whilst strolling to work one morning this week, I started tallying up suitable citations to include. In typical fashion, however, I started over-thinking it, wondering if I should cut my unwieldy list in half, given the fact that so many of the words I’d chosen represent aspects of New York City that no longer exist. Then, I thought, should I make two lists, one for stuff I love and one for stuff I miss?

No. I decided to jettison the words that represent things that have vanished -– The Ritz, Rocks In Your Head, Danceteria, CBGB, SoHoZat, NoHo Star and the Cedar Tavern, to name but a small few –- and stick with what’s still current. I’m keeping the names of bands, as even if those bands no longer exist, the music lives on.

Here is why I happen to love New York in 25 words. What are yours?

Ear Inn
Beastie Boys
Central Park
Lower East Side
Yorkville
Kraut
Courtlandt Alley
Knickerbocker’s
Cop Shoot Cop
NYHC
The Strand
“After Hours”
Bowery Ballroom
Veselka

'That Ain't Stigma!'

Those in the know have spoken and consensus dictates that, while yes, that’s certainly Stephen Ielpi from the False Prophets making some odd cameos, that other figure in "Desperately Seeking Susan" is definitely NOT Sir Vincent of Stigma from Agnostic Front. Oh well.

Hey, it was just a fleeting fancy. Can’t be right all the time.

In any case, as a mea culpa, let me post this. This trailer surfaced late last year -– cannot wait to see the actual film.

Desperately Seeking Stephan & Stigma

PREAMBLE:

As a frequent liaison between vendors and executives at my office, a very big part of my job consists of “hurry up & wait.” I collect detailed directive from execs, relay those to my vendors and then wait for the ensuing work to arrive that hopefully reflects the specifications of the original directive. Sometimes it flows seamlessly, while other times, some things get lost in the translation, so to speak. Right now, I am embroiled in something of an eleventh-hour scramble to get a certain piece of content in shape in time for a work event next week (the one I first weepily cited here). While I’d been assuming we were in the home stretch, some considerable last-minute setbacks have ….er ... set us back several steps, and I’m now furiously trying to expedite the venture to get it done in time. The biggest obstacle here, however, is that in my capacity as strictly a liaison, I am fully reliant on the chops, stealth and diligence of my vendors. I can’t do what they do. I can only advise and hurry them along as emphatically-yet-diplomatically as I am able, and strenuously hope that the work they eventually deliver lives up to the oft-fickle standards of the execs. Usually we get there, but it’s sometimes pretty hectic.

Right now, I’m in that space. Last-minute revisions and changes-of-direction landed like a scud missile, but those changes have been relayed, and I’m now waiting as the vendors perform some triage on the project. As I wait nervously, I am filing the time by exhuming a post from a couple of weeks back that I’d abandoned. While no longer timely, maybe it’ll still be interesting. Or not. Let’s find out.

ACTUAL POST:

Madonna turned 60 back on August 16, and the rapturous coverage of same inspired me to re-visit her big screen breakout, Susan Seidelman’s “Desperately Seeking Susan.” I’ve posted about the film in question, here, a few times, and I’ve always had a soft spot for it (certainly more so than for Seidelman’s earlier opus, “Smithereens”). In any case, while “Desperately…” is already invaluable as a time-capsule-worthy document of mid-80’s New York City (right up there with favorites like “Downtown `81” and “After Hours”), this particular viewing revealed to me a whole new level of punk cognoscenti hidden within.

Obviously, Richard Hell, Anne Magnuson, Rockets Redglare and DNA’s Arto Lindsay all make fairly prominent cameos (although Hell’s screen time is pretty fleeting), but in this recent viewing, I also spotted Richard Edson of Sonic Youth/Konk fame (also an actor in “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” and a couple of Jarmusch films), Anne Carlisle from “Liquid Sky” and the stately silhouette of John Lurie of the Lounge Lizards, seen serenading Roberta and Dez with a saxophone from a nearby window. Shortly after starting to compose this entry, I spotted this similarly inclined article, that verifies some of the names above, but also cites Darinka’s Gary Ray and Annie Golden of the Shirts.

Although that article does not cite him -- nor is he cited on IMDB -- I also spotted Stephan Ielpi from the False Prophets in the scene wherein Roberta pursues Susan down St. Marks Place. Look at the top of the post, and that's his elbow in the leather jacket with yellow armband. Here's another shot with his face...

...and here he is again behind Rosanna Arquette's Roberta. Pardon the grainy quality. This was shot off my television, as DVD's prevent one from duplicating screen grabs.

In case you're on the fence, here's Stephan from a different bit of video entirely. Trust me. It's the same guy.

So, yeah, that’s all well and good, but there was one other spotting that I cannot verify. Now, I could be COMPLETELY MISTAKEN, but in the scene wherein Roberta’s duplcitous, tub-hawking husband Gary revisits Love Saves the Day (r.i.p.) on Second Avenue, I really want to say I see fabled NYHC punk rocker, Agnostic Front guitarist and storied Lower East Side fixture, Vinnie Stigma.

Here's the wide shot. I’m talking about the figure on the right with his back to the screen. Notice the NYHC logo on the back of his jacket?

Here’s a closer shot.

Here's a better shot..

 

Anyway, it’s certainly not unheard of that Stigma would have been recruited, probably not unlike the way his buddy Fran Powers was recruited for "After Hours." Still, neither Stephan Ielpi nor Vinnie Stigma are cited in the cast & crew on IMDB. 

What do we think? 

To refresh your memory, here's Stephan with the False Prophets...

And here's Vinnie Stigma with Agnostic Front circa 1985, when "Desperately Seeking Susan" came out ..