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Happy Birthday Lola

 

”I wanted an intro similar to what we used on “Dedicated Follower Of Fashion”, which was two Fender acoustic guitars and Dave’s electric guitar; so I went down to Shaftesbury Avenue and bought a Martin guitar, and this National guitar that I got for £80, then double-tracked the Martin, and double-tracked the National – that’s what got that sound.”

 

I leave it to our designated Kinksman to comment on all things Lola vs Powerman and Moneygoround, but I enjoyed the 50th birthday article here.

The subject matter sailed over the heads of the BBC censors, who only balked at the lyrical mention of Coca-Cola, which violated its rule about commercial insertions. In reaction, Davies subbed in “cherry cola” on an alternate version.

While gay references had cropped up in pop songs before, “‘Lola’ was the first big hit with an L.G.B.T. theme,” said JD Doyle, a music historian who ran the authoritative radio show “Queer Music Heritage.” “‘Lola’ made history.”

According to Davies, “Lola” encouraged other songwriters to explore related territory. “Before he passed away, Lou Reed told me that ‘Lola’ was a big influence on him,” he said. “It was reassuring to him when he did ‘Walk on the Wild Side.’”

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I’ve Never Felt Sorry For A Guitar Before

But this one seems to be hanging on by a thread (string?). Interesting stories associated with it, too.

Willie Nelson’s guitar, “Trigger,” is in for guitar repair at Erlewine Guitars in Austin, Texas. Mark Erlewine shares a closeup look at the famous hole in the top. Mark’s been Trigger’s caretaker for ages, and he gives us the inside scoop on Trigger’s history.

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How Cool Is This?

And what kind of badass keeps his own hip bone as a conversation piece? Dahl is easily one of my top five favorite authors. For his short stories mostly, not the kids’ stuff.

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The Club Is Open

0:00 Cut-Out Witch
3:01 Wrong Turn On
4:52 I Am A Scientist
7:45 Rally Boys
9:33 Game of Pricks

I’m currently reading Closer You Are: The Story of Robert Pollard and Guided By Voices, so here’s a little GBV for you. I must say, His Bobness is looking rather healthy these days.

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Disappointing

I got really excited for this reissue last spring, but every review I’ve seen (including this one) says these watches are a letdown. $1,000 for this?!

On an unrelated-but-equally-nerdy note, I did recently find a new keyring I really like …

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Monorail!

Production-wise, the show hadn’t worked out how to achieve these bigger, more spectacular episodes. The writers loved them and the producers loved them. We all loved them. But there were people at the animation studio who were like, “We have to tell them to cut back. These are too complex.” Part of me is thinking, ‘We’re asking for a lot.’ But the artist, or even the kid, in me is thinking, ‘No, these are fucking awesome and we just have to figure out how to do them.’ I always leaned more that way, because I liked the ambitiousness of the episodes and where it took the show. From just a family comedy to these big, overwhelming animated pieces. They were like little movies.

– from An Oral History of ‘Marge Vs. The Monorail’, a great read. Season 4 is now regarded as peak Simpsons, but at the time there were already complaints that the show had lost its way.

My own town has toyed with the idea of a monorail as a solution to the mass transit problems that will only get worse.

The Virgin Hyperloop seems to have everone’s attention now.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKvbSboQ5_g

But as I learned in a fantastic article here, we are basically re-inventing technology that already exists and not doing it well. Lemme transposplain to ya:

In a vacuum (a figurative one: an alternate universe in which the rest of the post-industrial world were not absolutely goddamn bursting with operating networks of authentic high-speed rail; where high-speed rail were not already such a well-developed form of transit that the TGV system, which routinely moves huge numbers of day-to-day commuters across large distances of France at speeds well more than twice that achieved by this sad two-person billion-dollar pod going from nowhere to nowhere across a tiny patch of worthless desert, were not both infinitely better and more sophisticated than any presently available commercial rail in the United States and fairly outmoded in comparison to newer [yet still not all that new!] systems in China and Japan and elsewhere) the Virgin Hyperloop could almost look like an impressive accomplishment.