Boppin' (Like The Hip Folks Do)

My thoughts on pop music and pop culture, plus the weekly playlists from THIS IS ROCK 'N' ROLL RADIO with Dana and Carl (Sunday nights 9 to Midnight Eastern, SPARK! WSPJ 103.3 and 93.7 FM in Syracuse, sparksyracuse.org). You can support this blog on Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/user?u=2449453 Twitter @CafarelliCarl All editorial content on this blog Copyright Carl Cafarelli (except where noted). All images copyright the respective owners TIP JAR at https://www.paypal.me/CarlCafarelli

Tuesday, September 24, 2019

THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE! (Volume 1): rearranging the deck chairs while we wait

I have no news to report regarding my proposed book The Greatest Record Ever Made (Volume 1). The completed book proposal is in the hands of my agent, who will try to find a discerning, elusive someone who would be interested in publishing it. This is the long wait. It could be days, or it could be weeks, or it could be months. The odds are certainly against me, and this may never be published. But I believe in the book, and I believe in my agent. I guess we'll see what happens.

I've continued to work on the book, though it remains about 16-17 chapters shy of a finished first draft. I've tweaked the Table Of Contents, adding and rearranging the blueprint with the goal of making it all flow together (almost) as if it were a single narrative, not a collection of essays. I remember the book's mission statement: Our favorite records don't live in isolation; each one has a story to tell. And I summon the book's central mantra: An infinite number of songs can each be THE greatest record ever made, as long as they take turns.

I've added chapters on "I Fought The Law" by The Bobby Fuller Four (finished!) and "I Want You Back" by David Ruffin (not even started yet!). I haven't deleted any other songs, but I've switched "Liar, Liar" by The Castaways and "I Don't Want To Grow Up" by The Ramones to Interludes instead of GREM! entries; they're really still GREM! entries, but I call 'em "Interludes" to maintain the fragile illusion that there are only 100 GREM! chapters in the book, when there are really...um, more than that.

I have two other interludes pending: Don Henley's "The Boys Of Summer" (a terrific song that would give me an opportunity to discuss my long-time dislike of The Eagles and acknowledge how that attitude has mellowed over the years--I have three Eagles songs on my iPod) and The Dandy Warhols' "We Used To Be Friends." The former is in the current Table Of Contents for now, the latter might be added. The tweak goes on.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

FOREWORD
DISCLAIMERS AND DECLARATIONS (A User's Guide To The Greatest Record Ever Made!)
OVERTURE: A Fistful Of 45s

1. BADFINGER: Baby Blue

2. CHUCK BERRY: Promised Land
3. DUSTY SPRINGFIELD: I Only Want To Be With You
4. THE SEX PISTOLS: God Save The Queen
5. ELVIS PRESLEY: Heartbreak Hotel
6. PATTI SMITH: Gloria
7. LITTLE RICHARD: The Girl Can't Help It
*8. NEIL DIAMOND: Brother Love's Traveling Salvation Show
9. CRAZY ELEPHANT: Gimme Gimme Good Lovin'
10. WILSON PICKETT: In The Midnight Hour
11. THE HOLLIES: I Can't Let Go
12. THE SHIRELLES: Will You Love Me Tomorrow
13. BUDDY HOLLY: Peggy Sue/Everyday
14. JOHNNY NASH: I Can See Clearly Now
15. THE RUBINOOS: I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend
16. GLADYS KNIGHT & THE PIPS: Midnight Train To Georgia
17. THE RARE BREED: Beg, Borrow And Steal
18. THE 13th FLOOR ELEVATORS: You're Gonna Miss Me
19. THE ROLLING STONES: Get Off Of My Cloud
*20. PAUL REVERE & THE RAIDERS: Just Like Me
21. ARETHA FRANKLIN: Respect
INTERLUDE The Monkees Seize The Day
22. THE MONKEES: Porpoise Song (Theme From Head)
23. KISS: Shout It Out Loud
24. THE RASPBERRIES: I Wanna Be With You
25. THE FLASHCUBES: No Promise
26. THE NEW YORK DOLLS: Personality Crisis
INTERLUDE THE CASTAWAYS: Liar, Liar
27. THE BOBBY FULLER FOUR: I Fought The Law
28. THE EASYBEATS: Friday On My Mind
29. TOM PETTY & THE HEARTBREAKERS: American Girl
30. SMOKEY ROBINSON & THE MIRACLES: The Tears Of A Clown
31. BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN: Girls In Their Summer Clothes
*32. TRANSLATOR: Everywhere That I'm Not
33. LESLEY GORE: You Don't Own Me
34. THE LEFT BANKE: Walk Away, Renee
*35. P. P. ARNOLD: The First Cut Is The Deepest
36. TODD RUNDGREN: Couldn't I Just Tell You
*37. SHOES: Tomorrow Night
*38. RUFUS: Tell Me Something Good
39. BIG STAR: September Gurls
40. PRINCE: When You Were Mine
41. THE BAY CITY ROLLERS: Rock And Roll Love Letter
42. THE KNICKERBOCKERS: Lies
INTERLUDE The Tottenham Sound Of...The Beatles?!
43. THE DAVE CLARK FIVE: Any Way You Want It
44. JAMES BROWN: Please, Please, Please
45. GRAND FUNK: We're An American Band
INTERLUDE Old Time Rock & Roll
46. THE BOB SEGER SYSTEM: 2 + 2 = ?
47. SAMMY AMBROSE: This Diamond Ring
48. THE FIRST CLASS: Beach Baby
49. THE ISLEY BROTHERS: Summer Breeze
50. THE FLAMIN' GROOVIES: Shake Some Action
ENTR'ACTE THE BEATLES: Yesterday
51. MARVIN GAYE: I Heard It Through The Grapevine
52. THE SEARCHERS: Hearts In Her Eyes
53. THE FLIRTATIONS: Nothing But A Heartache
54. THE SPINNERS: I'll Be Around
55. ALICE COOPER: School's Out
56. BARON DAEMON & THE VAMPIRES: The Transylvania Twist
57. SLY AND THE FAMILY STONE: Everybody Is A Star
58. THE RAMONES: Sheena Is A Punk Rocker
INTERLUDE I Don't Want To Grow Up
59. WHAM!: Freedom
*60. DAVID RUFFIN: I Want You Back
61. LED ZEPPELIN: Communication Breakdown
62. BEN E. KING: Stand By Me
63. THE BYRDS: I'll Feel A Whole Lot Better
*64. OTIS REDDING: (Sittin' On) The Dock Of The Bay
65. THE GO-GO'S: We Got The Beat
66. THE COCKTAIL SLIPPERS: St. Valentine's Day Massacre
67. GENE PITNEY: Twenty Four Hours From Tulsa
68. THE WHO: I Can't Explain
69. THE VELVET UNDERGROUND: I'll Be Your Mirror
70. FREDDIE & THE DREAMERS: Do The Freddie
71. THE DRIFTERS: On Broadway
72. SAM & DAVE: Soul Man
73. THE SPONGETONES: (My Girl) Maryanne
74. THE TRAMMPS: Disco Inferno
75. HAROLD MELVIN AND THE BLUE NOTES: Don't Leave Me This Way
76. THE JIVE FIVE: What Time Is It?
77. PAUL COLLINS: Walking Out On Love

78. T. REX: 20th Century Boy

*79. GRANDMASTER & MELLE MEL: White Lines (Don't Don't Do It)
80. THE KINKS: You Really Got Me
81. THE KINKS: Waterloo Sunset
82. THE FOUR TOPS: Reach Out I'll Be There
83. THE SMITHEREENS: Behind The Wall Of Sleep
*84. THE COWSILLS: She Said To Me
*85. THE SUPREMES: You Keep Me Hangin' On
86. MATERIAL ISSUE: Kim The Waitress
87. ELVIS COSTELLO & THE ATTRACTIONS: (What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love And Understanding?
88. FREDA PAYNE: Band Of Gold
89. THE EVERLY BROTHERS: Gone, Gone, Gone
*INTERLUDE The Boys Of Summer
90. THE BEACH BOYS: God Only Knows
*91. LULU: To Sir, With Love (Museum Outings Montage)
*92. MANNIX: Highway Lines
93. THE SELECTER: On My Radio
94. SOLOMON BURKE: Everybody Needs Somebody To Love
*95. CHEAP TRICK Surrender
96. DAVID BOWIE: Life On Mars?
97. THE GRATEFUL DEAD: Uncle John's Band
*98. THE O'JAYS: Put Your Hands Together
*99. EDDIE & THE HOT RODS: Do Anything You Wanna Do
100. STEVIE WONDER: I Believe (When I Fall In Love It Will Be Forever)
ENCORE! EYTAN MIRSKY: This Year's Gonna Be Our Year
LAST CALL! THE JAYHAWKS: I'm Gonna Make You Love Me
An Infinite Number
Underrating The Beatles
THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE! THE BEATLES: Rain
CLOSING TIME! THE T-BONES: No Matter What Shape (Your Stomach's In)
CODA: Cruisin' Music
AFTERWORD

The asterisks denote chapters that aren't finished. Of these, the Grandmaster & Melle Mel chapter is closest to a complete first draft, and the David Ruffin and "The Boys Of Summer" placeholders are the only ones with nothing written yet. (The Dandy Warhols chapter, though not listed here, is about half done.) In the past, I've removed a few completed chapters to make room for other songs I wanted to discuss instead; this lengthens the writing process, but builds a better book in the long run.

I keep a file collecting all of the completed first drafts, in sequence, and I occasionally read through them, to check again how everything fits and flows. It reads like a book. I'm happy with what I've done so far, and I hope you have a chance to read it all someday.

But for now...we wait.

Monday, September 23, 2019

This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio # 994

Over the course of 993 shows, we've developed a reputation for making things up as we go. This rep is earned. It's not necessarily true that we don't ever plan anything; we've done theme shows and tributes that required a blueprint and some direction beforehand, we've done a handful of shows that needed extensive plotting, and even most of our regular weekly adventures involve at least some thought about what to make sure to include, what new stuff to exalt alongside established Fave Raves. But yeah, most shows are largely improvised on the fly.

This week's show? I knew two songs I was intent on playing. Dana knew just a few additional songs he wanted to play. The rest of the playlist? Well, that left the balance of three hours to fill, gloriously. Turn it up. It's time to play. This is what rock 'n' roll radio sounded like on a Sunday night in Syracuse this week. (Oh, and Happy Birthday to Irene Peña, and congratulations to newlyweds Circe Link & Christian Nesmith. See, that accounted for two of the planned songs right there!)

This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio with Dana & Carl, Sunday nights from 9 to Midnight Eastern, on the air in Syracuse on SPARK! WSPJ-LP 103.3 and 93.7 FM, and on the web at http://sparksyracuse.org/

Fans of pop music will want to check out Waterloo Sunset--Benefit For This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio, a new pop compilation benefiting SPARK! Syracuse, the home of This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio with Dana & Carl. TIR'N'RR Allstars--Steve Stoeckel, Bruce Gordon, Joel Tinnel, Stacy Carson, Eytan Mirsky, Teresa Cowles, Dan Pavelich, Irene Peña, Keith Klingensmith, and Rich Firestone--offer a fantastic new version of The Kinks' classic "Waterloo Sunset." That's supplemented by eleven more tracks (plus a hidden bonus track), including previously-unreleased gems from The Click Beetles, Eytan Mirsky, Pop Co-Op, Irene Peña, Michael Slawter (covering The Posies), and The Anderson Council (covering XTC), a new remix of "Infinite Soul" by The Grip Weeds, and familiar TIRnRR Fave Raves by Vegas With Randolph, Gretchen's Wheel, The Armoires, and Pacific Soul Ltd. Oh, and that mystery bonus track? It's exquisite. You need this. You're buying the digital download from Futureman and/or the CD from Kool Kat Musik.

(AND you can still get our previous compilation This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio, Volume 4 on CD from Kool Kat Musik and as a download from Futureman. We live in a world of plenty!)

PS: SEND MONEY!!!! We need tech upgrades like Elvis needs boats. Spark Syracuse is supported by listeners like you. Tax-deductible donations are welcome at
http://sparksyracuse.org/support/

You can follow Carl's daily blog Boppin' (Like The Hip Folks Do) at
https://carlcafarelli.blogspot.com/

Get MORE Carl! Check out the fourth and latest issue of the mighty Big Stir magazine at bigstirrecords.com/magazine

Hey, Carl's writin' a book! The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1) will contain 100 essays (and then some) about 100 songs (plus bonus tracks!), each one of 'em THE greatest record ever made. An infinite number of songs can each be the greatest record ever made, as long as they take turns. Updated initial information can be seen here.

TIRnRR # 994: 9/22/19

THE RAMONES: Do You Remember Rock 'n' Roll Radio? (Rhino, End Of The Century)
--
THE CARS: Bye Bye Love (Elektra, The Cars)
THE REPLACEMENTS: My Little Problem (Sire, All Shook Down)
DOUG POWELL: Bye Bye Magpie (The Paisley Pop Label, Four Seasons)
BLONDIE: Dreaming (Chrysalis, The Platinum Collection)
THE PARTIES: Let's Call It Love (Rainbow Quartz, Coast Garde)
SHONEN KNIFE: Top Of The World (A & M, VA: If I Were A Carpenter)
--
IRENE PEÑA: Own Sweet Time (Kool Kat Musik, VA: Waterloo Sunset--Benefit For This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio)
KIRSTY MacCOLL: A New England (Salvo, VA: Born Stiff)
THE ISLEY BROTHERS: Got To Have You Back (Motown, Greatest Hits And Rare Classics)
AL GREEN: Take Me To The River (Hi, Unchained Melody)
TIR'N'RR ALLSTARS: Waterloo Sunset (Futureman, VA: Waterloo Sunset--Benefit For This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio)
THE CLASH: Train In Vain (Epic, The Singles)
--
CIRCE LINK & CHRISTIAN NESMITH: I'm On Your Side (Kool Kat Musik, VA: This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio, Volume 4)
SWEET: Love Is Like Oxygen (RCA, Action)
UTOPIA: Take It Home (Rhino, Deface The Music)
THE MODERN LOVERS: Roadrunner [alternative version] (Castle, The Modern Lovers)
THE RAVES: Every Little Bit Hurts (Hologramophone, Past Perfect Tense)
THE CARS: Just What I Needed (Elektra, The Cars)
--
THE STALLIONS: Why (Junk, Hey Baby, It's The Stallions)
THE DAMNED: Neat Neat Neat (Salvo, VA: Born Stiff)
DIANE RENAY: Navy Blue (Mercury, VA: Growin' Up Too Fast)
HANK WILLIAMS: Your Cheatin' Heart (Polydor, 40 Greatest Hits)
PHIL SEYMOUR: Let Her Dance (The Right Stuff, Precious To Me)
THE ARCHIES: Sugar, Sugar (Varese Sarabande, VA: 25 All-Time Greatest Bubblegum Hits)
--
JOHNATHAN PUSHKAR: We Could Be Together (Jem, Straighten Up)
SHOES: The Things You Do (Black Vinyl, Double Exposure)
EYTAN MIRSKY: Lingerie Pillow Fight (M-Squared, If Not Now...Later)
ELVIS COSTELLO & THE ATTRACTIONS: (I Don't Want To Go To) Chelsea (Rhino, The Very Best Of Elvis Costello)
DEAN LANDEW: Dance All Night (deanlandew.bandcamp.com, Dean Landew 2019)
NICK LOWE: So It Goes (Yep Roc, Jesus Of Cool)
--
THE BAY CITY ROLLERS: Turn On The Radio (Arista, The Definitive Collection)
THE RAMONES: Do You Wanna Dance? (Rhino, Rocket To Russia)
JOAN JETT & THE BLACKHEARTS: Light Of Day (Blackheart, Fit To Be Tied)
CREEDENCE CLEARWATER REVIVAL: Commotion (Fantasy, Green River)
THE SPINNERS: (One Of A Kind) Love Affair (Rhino, The Very Best Of The Spinners)
GRAND FUNK RAILROAD: The Loco-Motion (Capitol, Capitol Collectors Series)
--
THE MONKEES: Terrifying (Rhino, Good Times! [digital version])
WARREN ZEVON: Lawyers, Guns And Money (Rhino, Genius)
VEGAS WITH RANDOLPH: Give In To Love (vegaswithrandolph.bandcamp.com, single)
THE REPLACEMENTS: Bent Out Of Shape (Sire, All Shook Down)
RONNIE DARK: Love Will Break Your Heart (3, Sky)
THE BEVIS FROND: And Now She's Gone (Rubric, London Stone)
--
IN DEED: What Once Was (Big Stir, Everest)
THE BROTHERS STEVE: We Got The Hits (n/a, # 1)
STAG: Pied Piper Blues (themightystag.com, Electric Mistress)
THE BEATLES: I've Just Seen A Face (Capitol, Rubber Soul)
THE BOOKENDS: Sing This Song (Nah Nah Nah Nah Yeah Yeah Yeah) (Jem, single)
BIG STAR: I'm In Love With A Girl (Ardent, # 1 Record/Radio City)
THE KINKS: All Day And All Of The Night (Sanctuary, The Ultimate Collection)
THE CARS: My Best Friend's Girl (Elektra, The Cars)
LOS STRAITJACKETS: Pop Rocks & Coke (Yep Roc, Jet Set)

Sunday, September 22, 2019

Tonight On THIS IS ROCK 'N' ROLL RADIO

TIRnRR # 994. We're wingin' it, man. I figure we've already made it through the previous 993 episodes of TIRnRR with barely enough cumulative planning to fill seven episodes; no need to start overkilling now. It's The Best Three Hours Of Radio On The Whole Friggin' Planet. Is that all you need to know? Well, it's all WE need to know anyway. Join us! Sunday night, 9 to Midnight Eastern, on the air in Syracuse at SPARK! WSPJ 103.3 and 93.7 FM, and on the web at http://sparksyracuse.org/

Saturday, September 21, 2019

Professional Liar Wins One, Loses One

One outta two.

I received word yesterday regarding the fate of my two most recent short story submissions to the good folks at AHOY Comics. AHOY purchased my story "The Copperhead Strikes!," but passed on my story "Hitcore."

A split decision wasn't a surprise. Each month, there are always a bunch of short stories vying for a finite number of spots in the AHOY publishing empire. Submitting two stories at the same time means I'm competing with myself while simultaneously competing with something like four dozen worthy entries by other talented writers. That's not a winning path, and I'm not going to make that mistake again.

Because I really like "Hitcore." It was one of my most accomplished pieces so far, and while I don't know whether or not AHOY would have taken it on its own (quite possibly not), I didn't do it any favors by offering it within the same submission window as "The Copperhead Strikes!" Ah, well. "Hitcore" and its tale of the music business might appear on the blog at some point, but I may try to find another professional home for it first.

On the other hand, I'm absolutely delighted that "The Copperhead Strikes!" sold. Delighted. That story was a labor of love, inspired in part by positive feedback from an AHOY bigwig regarding my previously-sold Western "The Last Ride Of The Copperhead Kid." It's not a sequel--different characters, set in an unnamed American city in 1939 instead of in the old West--but the two stories are connected. If "Copperhead Kid" was my love letter to Westerns, then "The Copperhead Strikes!" is my homage to '30s pulp/radio heroes like The Shadow and The Green Hornet. It repurposes a fight scene I wrote for a Batman fanfic story, and pummels its way forward. And honestly, if I had to pick between "Hitcore" and "The Copperhead Strikes!," I woulda gone with "Copperhead," too.

(But I do REALLY like "Hitcore." I'm my biggest fan.)

All told, I'm still slightly behind the eight-ball in terms of stories sold out of stories submitted in 2019, with a not-bad/not-fantastic record of four out of nine. AHOY has purchased "Guitars Vs. Rayguns," "The Picture Of Amontillado," and "The Last Ride Of The Copperhead Kid," each of which awaits further word on a publication date, but I've been paid for all of them (you can read my announcements of those sales here, here, and here); "The Copperhead Strikes!" now joins that list. AHOY declined the option for "Dreaming Deadly," "Sword Of The Chosen One," "Montie Pylon Finds His Holy Grail," "The Greatest Thud Never Heard," and "Hitcore." That's still four more short stories than I sold in the entirety of my preceding four and a half decades of trying. More to come. One at a time, but more to come.

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Fans of pop music will want to check out Waterloo Sunset--Benefit For This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio, a new pop compilation benefiting SPARK! Syracuse, the home of This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio with Dana & Carl. TIR'N'RR Allstars--Steve Stoeckel, Bruce Gordon, Joel Tinnel, Stacy Carson, Eytan Mirsky, Teresa Cowles, Dan Pavelich, Irene Peña, Keith Klingensmith, and Rich Firestone--offer a fantastic new version of The Kinks' classic "Waterloo Sunset." That's supplemented by eleven more tracks (plus a hidden bonus track), including previously-unreleased gems from The Click Beetles, Eytan Mirsky, Pop Co-Op, Irene Peña, Michael Slawter (covering The Posies), and The Anderson Council (covering XTC), a new remix of "Infinite Soul" by The Grip Weeds, and familiar TIRnRR Fave Raves by Vegas With Randolph, Gretchen's Wheel, The Armoires, and Pacific Soul Ltd. Oh, and that mystery bonus track? It's exquisite. You need this. You're buying it from Futureman.

(And you can still get our 2017 compilation This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio, Volume 4, on CD from Kool Kat Musik and as a download from Futureman Records.)

Get MORE Carl! Check out the fourth and latest issue of the mighty Big Stir magazine at bigstirrecords.com/magazine

Hey, Carl's writin' a book! The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1) will contain 100 essays (and then some) about 100 tracks, plus two bonus instrumentals, each one of 'em THE greatest record ever made. An infinite number of records can each be the greatest record ever made, as long as they take turns. Updated initial information can be seen here: THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE! (Volume 1).

Friday, September 20, 2019

The Way I Talk [brought to you by pop culture]

Catchphrases have been a part of mass popular culture for as long as there has been mass pop culture. It goes back at least as far as the golden age of radio, with things like "'Tain't funny, McGee" (from Fibber McGee And Molly), "Coming, Mother!," (from Henry Aldrich), and the whole litany--"Faster than a speeding bullet! More powerful than a locomotive! Able to leap tall buildings in a single bound! Look! Up in the sky! It's a bird! It's a plane...!"--heralding a new adventure of Superman. Hell, it probably goes back farther than that. The thread continues uninterrupted through "Bang, ZOOM!," "You bet your sweet bippie!,""Whatchoo talkin' 'bout, Willis?," and about nine dozen lines from Seinfeld, plus whatever more recent iteration I'm too curmudgeonly to notice. The devil made me do it.

I was thinking of what lines from pop culture regularly find their way into my own speech patterns. Some are more obscure than others, I guess, because my personality tends to be more obscure than others. I think the two phrases that pop into my daily discourse most often are "I'm comin', Beanie boy!" (from TV's Beanie And Cecil cartoon) and "HERE! In the SHADOWS!" (from the radio adventures of The Shadow). The former is better-known than the latter, and either is more widely recognized than my three runners-up: "I can't pronounce Baccaruda" (from a Plymouth Barracuda commercial, reprised on record by the British group The Barracudas), the seemingly non sequitur "Now CRAYON I can say!" (from an episode of The Monkees), and "I own a hundred pairs of stretch socks" (from Marvel Comics's 1960s humor title Not Brand Echh).

(I have also been known to recite the opening bits from the TV shows The Adventures Of Superman and The Green Hornet in their entirety with no discernible provocation. I also sometimes blurt out made-up intros to shows that never existed, starring comic book characters The Challengers Of The Unknown or the original Captain Marvel. I am most certainly me.)

I live inside my pop obsessions. A number of slightly-used lines from TV, movies, comics, songs, and other effervescent sources could find their own random way into my patter at any given moment. "Hey, that's O-NED-ers!," "You gotta be quick!," and "Chad? Who's Chad...?" from my favorite movie, That Thing You Do! "Some days you just can't get rid of a bomb!" from the 1966 Batman film, a line I once spoke directly to actor Adam West when one of us was in full Batman costume (I won't say which one of us that was). "Your bullets cannot harm me; my wings are like a shield of steel!" from the Batfink cartoon. "No brag, just fact" from TV's The Guns Of Will Sonnett, generally delivered in my best approximation of a Walter Brennan impression. Quotes from John F. Kennedy's speeches ("We choose to go to the moon and those other things...!") and quotes from JFK impersonator Vaughn Meader's hit comedy LP The First Family ("I should like to point out that I am standing here in my shorts dripping wet," and "The rubber swan is mine"), each spoken with my attempt at the right voice as the torch is passed to a new generation. With vigor.

The beat goes on. Lines from Casablanca and The Maltese Falcon, The Dark Knight, The Grapes Of Wrath, The Marx Brothers, audience response lines from The Rocky Horror Picture Show, and the deep tone of James Earl Jones, all jumbled together in a quotation gumbo: This could be the start of a beautiful friendship, the stuff dreams are made of. Why so serious? I'll be there. Members of the faculty, faculty members, students of Huxley and Huxley students--well, I guess that covers everything. From the freezer to your table. This is CNN.

As I recite all of these lines in my ongoing role as whatever it is I'm supposed to be, it doesn't necessarily matter whether or not folks pick up on the specific reference. It's not a trivia challenge, a round of Name That Catchphrase! From "To the Batpoles!" to speculation of what's behind the curtain Carol Merrill is standing next to, it's just the way I talk. An early clue to the new direction. Sorry about that, Chief.

I do think it's time to bring "You bet your sweet bippie!" back into the general lexicon. Save the Texas prairie chicken. I am Spartacus. Live long and prosper. And let's be careful out there.