Works In Progress

It's been a while since I offered a sneak peak at what's coming on Boppin' (Like The Hip Folks Do). With a daily blog, a resumed interest in writing short stories, and the occasional additional writing commitment, there is never any shortage of pieces to slap, craft, or cajole into being. I usually start with a title, even if it's just as a placeholder, and then jot down a few lines here and there as spirit and motivation strike me. With that in mind, this is a preview of some of the things I have in various stages of either not quite ready yet or (in the  case of the short stories, and the introduction for my proposed book The Greatest Record Ever Made) not quite ready for public posting yet. Let's see what's cookin':



HE BUYS EVERY ROCK 'N' ROLL BOOK ON THE MAGAZINE STANDS, Part 4: The Snark And The Fury, CREEM And The Dream

Rock 'n' roll was supposed to be about rebellion!

The above quote has always bugged me. It is one of the stupidest things I've ever heard anyone say about this music I love. Rock 'n' roll was never supposed to be "about" rebellion. It was a de facto act of rebellion, sure, a loud 'n' proud celebration of dancing, partying, and having sex--and having it often--combined with an inherent disregard for racial boundaries and polite, stuffy decorum. If you wanna say that makes it about rebellion, then we just disagree on our terms. But c'mon, man; "Johnny B. Goode" is not Das Kapital, "Whole Lotta Shakin' Goin' On" for damned sure ain't Steal This Book, and "Rumble" is a freakin' instrumental. It doesn't even have any words! How can it be about rebellion? How can it be about anything...?!



BEFORE THE CRISIS! My Fascination With DC Comics

Sargon the Sorcerer?

I don't know why a minor character like Sargon the Sorcerer kept popping into my head. I was thinking about my abiding love of DC Comics, an affection that began when I was a kid in the mid '60s, and which has never really faded away. And ol' Sargon appeared before me, unbidden if not unwelcome. Must have been magic.

DREAMING DEADLY

It was a dream. Sam knew it was. Sometimes his dreams were in color, but this one was in a stark black and white, with gray tones defining its nuance and obscuring its simplicity. The image was pulp noir, suggesting choices made in haste, and consequences written in dark, dark blood...ink. It was a dream. And she was there.

THE EVERLASTING FIRST: THE SHADOW

Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men?
THE SHADOW knows!

The laughter that follows seems threatening, sinister. Its implied menace is daunting and intimidating, but only the wicked need ever fear it. The innocent will be protected. The guilty will be punished. Vengeance is swift and just. The Shadow knows.

My peripheral introduction to The Shadow came via the most incongruous means: Mad magazine and a comic book based on TV's The Partridge Family. Yeah, I'd say my path to The Shadow was unique. More conventional exposure would follow soon enough.



SWORD OF THE CHOSEN ONE

There was a dull and distant roar at dawn. Its sound did not wake Flora. She was already out of bed, as she was every day before the first light of morning, feeding her livestock, tending her field and her garden, and then pausing to relax in her contentment. She rarely thought about the empty scabbard hanging on the wall, nor the sword it no longer housed. The sword had been in her family for generation upon generation. It belonged now to her twin sister Anna. Elsewhere, not here. She heard the far-away din, and it cast her memories back. She thought of the sword for the first time in a long time.



REQUIEM

Only someone who's already been to Hell and back can show you the way out of there.


My cousin was an alcoholic. I knew him my whole life, I guess, but I have few memories of him. He was a shadow. He wasn't...there. I remember him at a wedding in the '70s, wearing a bright tuxedo that could only have existed in the '70s. Was it his wedding? Maybe. He made it to that one. He was a no-show at my wedding in 1984. I saw him sporadically. He was never really an active part of my life.



LOOK THROUGH ANY WINDOW: My 25 Favorite Hollies Tracks

I can't tell the bottom from the top!

CRUISIN' MUSIC

I listen to music while I'm driving. The car is my favorite place to listen to music; it's also frequently almost my only place to listen to music, but it's not merely my favorite by default. As a former pop journalist, I should try to propagate an image of sophistication and deliberation, retiring to my study, brandy in hand, intent to concentrate and contemplate the splendor of a virgin vinyl Pet Sounds played through a 5.1 surround stereo system that cost more than I made in twenty years of freelancing for Goldmine. And...no. To be fair, there are decent meals that cost more than I made freelancing for Goldmine, but that's irrelevant. Pop music was meant to be listened to on cheap speakers, loud and distorted, as you're movin' down the highway at 500 miles an hour. 

(This example is intended as hyperbole. Always obey posted speed limits, even when The Ramones are on.)

THE LAST RIDE OF THE COPPERHEAD KID

A gunslinger can't ride forever. The trail ends some time, even for the fastest gun in the West. Some trails end in old age. For most gunslingers, the trail ends in the grave.

Most gunslingers weren't The Copperhead Kid.

The dime novels said the Kid was the fastest there was. Anyone who challenged him learned just how fast the Kid was, and the Kid put them in the ground, every one of 'em. Those stories also said the Kid was a hero, riding from town to town on his faithful horse Rattler, helping the innocent, bringing justice to the wicked.

But the Kid was just a man. He rode whatever horse he could find or steal, always on the run, always riding, ever since he was indeed a kid. He was older now. He'd been on the run since he was sixteen, just after the war between the States. That was twenty years ago. His copper hair was starting to gray. Everyone still called him Kid.

FAKE THIS IS ROCK 'N' ROLL RADIO PLAYLIST: Music On Cassette

I hate cassettes as an audio format, and this is not an attempt to celebrate them. However, it's also true that I used to listen to cassettes a lot--a lot--and it would be disingenuous to deny that fact. Before mini-discs, CD-Rs and digital files, cassettes were the vehicle for all manner of music compilations. I discussed those in a previous post called The Mixtapes Of October; today, we look at a playlist constructed from tracks I owned on store-bought, prerecorded tapes. For kicks, I've thrown in a track apiece from The Bay City Rollers' Dedication and a pre-Columbia Paul Revere & the Raiders collection, the only two eight-track tapes I ever owned. Eight-track. Now there was a format...!

THE PICTURE OF AMONTILLADO

Dorian Gray--not the famous one--fancied himself a painter. Dorian favored still lifes; people made him nervous, and nude models made him really, really nervous. He knew his talent was modest, but he enjoyed the process, and held no illusion of his studies of fruit bowls and sunsets ever gracing the walls of a gallery.

COMIC BOOK RETROVIEW: Batman (Signet paperback 1966)

I don't think I'll ever know this for sure, but it's possible that my first Batman comic book wasn't really a comic book at all. I mean, it could have been. It could have been Batman # 184, which I plucked from the spinner rack at a grocery store in Aurora, Missouri while on vacation in the summer of 1966. Or it could have been a mini-comic given away as a promo item from Kellogg's Pop Tarts. Stretching our parameters a bit, it could have been a Batman coloring book. But no--I think my first Batman comic book was really a paperback book: a little 1966 package from Signet Books, promising "The BEST of the original BATMAN--the Caped Crusader's greatest adventures." I was six. And a new world was waiting for me.

GUILT-FREE PLEASURES (A Defense Against The Dark Arts): Milli Vanilli

First off, I have to say I'm not a fan. It's not a matter of guilty pleasures or anything of comparable silliness; I just never cared about Milli Vanilli's music. And that's okay; just as there's no reason for guilt with music you like, there's no reason for guilt with music you don't like.

But Milli Vanilla were huge, immensely popular. They must have had fans, a lot of fans. But no one admits it anymore. Milli Vanilla has been expunged from the records, stricken from the collective consciousness, the pop music equivalent of being declared a non-person by the Soviets during the Cold War. Milli Vanilli's former fans are kinda like Peter denying Jesus three times before the rooster crows. Milli Vanilli? I do not know them!



GUITARS VS. RAYGUNS

I hate to complain. No really, I do. But I tell ya, we just wanna play some rock 'n' roll on every distant planet, and a fight's gotta break out at every gig. Every. Single. Gig. Doesn't matter what planet we're playing. It's like space cowboys figure "Battle of the Bands" has to be literal. I've gone through more drummers than Spinal Tap; percussionists seem the most likely victim of stray raygun blasts. I tell these guys, "Dude, don't set your riser so freakin' high, man. You're makin' yourself a target!" They never listen. They're drummers. They wouldn't be drummers if they listened.

But that's life on the galactic rock 'n' roll circuit. Another world, another gig, another chance to duck when some punter whips out his blaster and yells, Yeeeeee-haaaaaaaaa!



THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE: An Introduction

When I was a college student in Brockport, NY in the late '70s, the coolest TV show around was Saturday Night Live. Nothing else even came close. The popularity of that show's recurring Coneheads skits prompted the local Liftbridge Bookstore to hold a Coneheads Night one Saturday evening, with prizes and frivolity galore. The festivities included a prize to be awarded to whomever could answer the featured trivia question: How many Coneheads can dance on the head of a pin?

And the answer, of course: An infinite number, as long as they take turns.

THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE: "It's My Life"

Among instruments commonly used in creating pop music, the bass guitar is uniquely suited to herald an impending apocalypse.

Boom boom. Boom boom. Boom boom boom boom boom.



And those are today's sneak peeks. I still have more on the drawing board as we speak, and always much more to come every day here at my little corner of the internet, Boppin' (Like The Hip Folks Do).

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Our new compilation CD This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio, Volume 4 is now available from Kool Kat Musik! 29 tracks of irresistible rockin' pop, starring Pop Co-Op, Ray Paul, Circe Link & Christian Nesmith, Vegas With Randolph Featuring Lannie Flowers, The Slapbacks, P. Hux, Irene Peña, Michael Oliver & the Sacred Band Featuring Dave Merritt, The Rubinoos, Stepford Knives, The Grip Weeds, Popdudes, Ronnie Dark, The Flashcubes,Chris von Sneidern, The Bottle Kids, 1.4.5., The Smithereens, Paul Collins' Beat, The Hit Squad, The Rulers, The Legal Matters, Maura & the Bright Lights, Lisa Mychols, and Mr. Encrypto & the Cyphers. You gotta have it, so order it here. A digital download version (minus The Smithereens' track) is also available from Futureman Records.