Tales of True Adventure for Rugged Men Not Unlike Yourself
I’ve only seen the first of these, as recommended to us by Fat Elvis once upon a time. It’s great. A friend recently hipped me to Echo in the Canyon, and I noticed that there’s ANOTHER one out too.
I’m nostalgic for California, now that it’s burning up and falling into the ocean. I loved my time there. I may watch all of these. Maybe someone will tell us that Laurel Canyon gave birth to punk.
So this is it, the only material The Nerves officially released. One lousy EP in 1976, which, in mint condition, can now fetch upwards of $600 on eBay.
Chilton was an underrated guitarist. Feeling nostalgic for the late Nineties today …
From 1999 performance at Memphis’ Cooper-Young Festival. With Ron Easley – bass & background vocals, and Richard Dworkin – drums. Video by David Julian Leonard.
I have to believe this was inspired by actual events. From Wiki-wiki-wikipedia …
The Absent-Minded Waiter is a 1977 American comedy short film starring Steve Martin, Buck Henry and Teri Garr. It was written by Martin and directed by Carl Gottlieb. The film was produced by William E. McEuen, who would go on to produce Steve Martin’s next six films.
The short was screened as part of “The Best of the Shorts” program at Filmex on March 26, 1977 and was also shown at Martin’s stand-up shows before he went on. It was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Live Action Short Film.
It’s a classic. By the way, Steve Martin is 75 now.
I completely missed this one when it aired. I don’t remember hearing about it at all. A little sad, by ’79 the Ramones should have been too big for the Sha Na Na show.
But I did happen to be watching the tube in ’68 when psychedelic proto-punks The Seeds (as The Warts) mimed their biggest hit, the classic pushy-girlfriend-fuck-off song, “Pushin’ to Hard” on a now-forgotten sitcom called The Mothers-in-Law. I bought the album soon after. Oddly enough, that album had been released two years earlier, and they’d released another since, but they were still pushin’ this song on TV. The second verse and guitar break were edited out.
Vaughn Meader as JFK, the full album from 1962. Still pretty funny.
I’m not much of a Joy Division fan, as I can only take so much post-industrial Midlands desolation. But this one’s pretty good, and Ian Curtis’s stage gestures are interesting to say the least, especially when he really cuts loose at around 3:00.
You bastards might know way more about these guys, so my apologies if what follows is common knowledge. It’s pretty widely known that Ian Curtis hanged himself of the eve of what would have been their first tour of the U.S. Beyond that, I’ve picked up a few interesting facts over the years:
-They formed after seeing the Sex Pistols perform in Manchester. That same gig also inspired the formation of The Buzzcocks and The Smiths.
-Their bass player developed his style of playing in the upper register because when they started out, his amp was so shitty that it wouldn’t reproduce lower notes without sputtering.
-Ian Curtis had epilepsy and based his stage moves on his seizures, to the point that his bandmates could not tell when he was having a real one. This predictably led to some disatrous gigs.
Small Faces.
I know a certain bastard who may have watched this show.