The cold weather is gone for now. We haven’t run the heater for a few days. Yay. I shudder to think what our next utility bill will be, but it won’t be like the budget-busters in unregulated Texas; at least I hope not. Freedom, man.
I’m feeling cautiously optimistic on the COVID front. But some people are already getting carried away. That’s been the pattern and it’s a lethal one. I’m keeping my guard up even after I get vaccinated, which should be in the next few weeks. Let’s be careful out there.
The featured image is by Archibald Motley who was a Jazz Age modernist active during the Harlem Renaissance. The image is of well-dressed Black ladies having cocktails. I’d call them flappers but that could cause a flap, Jack…
This week’s theme song was written by Peter Frampton for his 1973 semi-solo, semi-band album Frampton’s Camel. It’s the ultimate rock hangover song.
An edited version of a live version from the monster hit album, Frampton Comes Alive later became a hit single. How’s that for a version diversion? I hope it was diverting.
We have two versions (there’s that word again) of Do You Feel Like We Do for your listening pleasure: the studio original and a 2000 live performance.
We’ll have more about Peter Frampton after the break. We might as well go now.
First, another hangover song:
We begin our second act with a piece about fakery, self-delusion, and family stories that aren’t true. They’re better described as myths. It’s a hit and myth proposition. Time to stop punning and get on with it.
Why Do So Many People Pretend To Be Native American? That’s a question posed by Russell Cobb in a piece from an Oklahoma based publication, This Land Press. He dubs them the Tribe of the Wannabe. A term I wish I had come up with myself but shall surely steal somewhere down the road.
Cobb spends a good deal of time discussing Iron Eyes Cody who starred in this legendary PSA:
Iron Eyes Cody is the best-known member of the Tribe of the Wannabe. He was a Sicilian-American named Oscar de Corti who hailed from Houma, Louisiana. That town is named for the Houma Indian tribe but Cody/Corti was not a member. It’s believed that movie Indian Cody/Corti eventually came to believe he was the real deal. He was not.
Anyway, check out Russell Cobb’s piece, it’s a winner.
The last word of the segment goes to Jack Bruce:
Frampton Comes Alive At 45: It was the biggest selling live album ever and one of the biggest hits of its era. The album is 45, not the artist, Peter Frampton is 70. Talk about making me feel elderly.
Frampton recently sat for an interview with Vulture’s Devon Ivie. They discussed the album that transformed Peter Frampton from a respected cult artist to a super cute superstar who lost some of his artistic cred after he hit it big. Here’s the money quote from the man himself:
I’ll have to jump ahead from Frampton Comes Alive! and respond with “I’m in You.” Oh God, and the awful cover [art] with that. Maintaining the pop-y image of satin pants and not wearing shirts. Everybody else had moved on a little bit at that time but I was still stuck. Time had stopped for me at that point. I wrongly thought I should stay the same. I should’ve reinvented myself in T-shirts and jeans for the “I’m in You” cover. Even though it was my only No. 1 single, it split the men up from the girls. For the whole Comes Alive! tour, it was definitely a 50/50 audience because the music was great. If I didn’t look the way I did back then, there wouldn’t have been so much attention from the women. I really believe it didn’t start to happen until after Comes Alive!, when I was on every magazine known to man with my shirt off. That stuff was wrong to do and those people around me had pushed me into what they wanted me to be. I let them do it to me up to a certain point. When I realized what was happening, it was too late.
I was part of his cult audience. I first saw Frampton’s Camel on a bill at Winterland with Johnny Winter and Foghat. I believe several people in the crowd yelled ROCK AND ROLL that night.
Here’s a Bill Graham Presents flyer from that period that includes the Winter/Foghat/Frampton show:
Bill Graham was known for his quirky concert combinations. The strangest one on that flyer was the Eagles and King Crimson. I missed that one. I bet there was booing. I somehow doubt Eagles fans liked this numbah:
Back to Peter Frampton. I was impressed by my first brush with him and became a fan; buying his records and attending his shows. One time I saw Frampton at Winterland, pulled an all-nighter, and attended this benefit show at Kezar Stadium the former home of the 49ers:
I was indeed present at the Winterland show in June of that same year that was recorded and became part of Frampton Comes Alive. I’m old y’all.
The last word of our second act goes to (who else?) Peter Frampton with one of the tracks recorded at Winterland:
We begin our third act with our favorite stolen feature.
Separated At Birth Casting Edition: Their editors called them Woodstein. I call them an odd couple who were lucky enough to be played in All The President’s Men by two major movie stars.
I’m of course talking about Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein as played by Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman. Say no more.
Speaking of All The President’s Men, in 2016 I participated in a podcast about the movie with my friends Dave Gladow and David Lee Simmons. It was a conspiracy of Davids, and I was the lone Peter. Yikes, that sounded positively pornographic, especially since we discussed Deep Throat. It was anything but. Here’s the link.
Classic Movie List: Neil Simon is one of my comedic heroes. At his best, he was one of the funniest writers ever. Like Peter Frampton, the Seventies were his glory days.
My Top Ten Favorite Neil Simon Movies:
- The Odd Couple (1968)
- The Sunshine Boys (1975)
- Lost In Yonkers
- The Heartbreak Kid
- Brighton Beach Memoirs
- Biloxi Blues
- The Out-Of-Towners (1970)
- The Goodbye Girl (1977)
- California Suite
- Laughter On The 23rd Floor
That was a tough one to limit. I’m particularly fond of both The Cheap Detective and The Last Of The Red Hot Lovers. I’m also one of the few to prefer California Suite to Plaza Suite. Perhaps because I’m from the Golden State. Sue me.
Saturday GIF Horse: The 13th Ward Rambler used a GIF from the Lemmon-Matthau Odd Couple in his/mine latest column.
Here’s another Oscar and Felix moment.
Oscar, Oscar, Oscar.
That makes me miss this boy:
Btw, if Kitty Della Street had been a boy, she would have been Felix Unger. Might as well post a picture of her while we’re at it:
That concludes this edition of lagniappe catblogging.
Random Weekly Earworm: Looking at those two charming cats gave me this first earworm:
Here’s the original random earworm. I might as well post the Jerry Garcia version of Might As Well:
Let’s close down this virtual honky tonk with some more music.
Saturday Classic: I went on about SNACK Sunday and my all-nighter. Here’s the closing set. It was not *all* of The Band: Levon Helm, Rick Danko, and Garth Hudson performed as did two members of Neil Young’s band, Tim Drummond, and Ben Keith. It’s a miracle that I stayed awake, but I was younger than yesterday as the Byrds album would have it.
That’s it for this week. The last word goes to Jack Lemmon, Neil Simon, and Walter Matthau:
That painting, with its sparse scene, has so much goin on; lookit the husband of one of the women, shirt off, well within listening range, in the easy chair; that painting on the wall, I’m seein a rural French scene of white folks; the butler: retained for the day? The spotlessly clean fireplace. It’s as if the artist wanted to evoke convo, here.
When I found out, only after two of the three had passed away, that Neil Simon, Bob Fosse, and Paddy Chayefsky were the best of pals I thought well of course they would be, but then I grew jealous, wanting to have been at a dinner where the three of them would have battled to hold court. Sigh, the disadvantage of not being rich and famous.
On the plus side, you missed all the smoke emanating from Fosse.
From Fosse only? Got news for you, all three were heavy smokers. Two died of heart attacks (Fosse’s exacerbated by his pill, booze, and general fascination with death habits) and Simon’s first wife, the sainted Joan, died of cancer. But I would have put up with the smoke to have listened to the guy who wrote NETWORK, the guy who wrote LOST IN YONKERS, and the guy who created, I don’t know, take your choice, ALL THAT JAZZ, CABERET, LENNY, CHICAGO et al discuss the phone book for all I care. Oh and occasionally Arthur Miller might drop by though from reports Fosse never got Miller to tell him what it was like to schtup Marilyn Monroe.