It’s been a quiet week at Adrastos World HQ except when Dr. A took Perry Mason to get jabbed. He was not amused and howled like a banshee. He may have a future as a feline blues singer. Just call him Howlin’ Cat.
This week’s theme song was written by Jerry Garcia and Robert Hunter for the 1978 album of the same name. Some have derided it as “disco Dead” but I think it’s Meters influenced funk. It also sounds like a Steely Dan tune from the Aja era.
We have three versions of Shakedown Street for your listening pleasure: the studio original, the Dead live in 1987, and the Dukes Of September live in 2010 with Donald Fagen on lead vocals.
I told you it sounded like Steely Dan. Don’t have a cow if you disagree. How’s that for a segue to this Dan classic?
We might as well post this street song by Donald Fagen while we’re at it:
We begin our second act with a story about a teevee show I saw once or twice, Melrose Place.
Pranking Aaron Spelling: Aaron Spelling was a producer of trash teevee in the ’70’s and ’80’s. He even made his no-talent daughter Tory a minor star. One of Spelling’s most successful shows was Melrose Place. It was popular with the teenyboppers of that era.
A funny thing happened with Melrose Place:
“Watch enough episodes of Melrose Place and you’ll notice other very odd props and set design all over the show. A pool float in the shape of a sperm about to fertilize an egg. A golf trophy that appears to have testicles. Furniture designed to look like an endangered spotted owl.
It turns out all of these objects, and more than 100 others, were designed by an artist collective called the GALA Committee. For three years, as the denizens of the Melrose Place apartment complex loved, lost, and betrayed one another, the GALA Committee smuggled subversive leftist art onto the set, experimenting with the relationship between art, artist, and spectator. The collective hid its work in plain sight and operated in secrecy. Outside of a select few insiders, no one—including Aaron Spelling, Melrose’s legendary executive producer—knew what it was doing.”
Did anyone who watched this Spelling jam notice this or figure it out? Aaron Spelling never did. He had to be told that he was pranked.
For the details get thee to Slate.
Sounds like an art school prank to me.
Taping The Dead: I’ve never recorded a Grateful Dead show, but I’ve certainly benefited from those who do. I have a box of live Dead tapes somewhere in a closet at Adrastos World HQ.
That brings me to our second Slate article, How Cassette Tapes Granted Immortal Life To The Grateful Dead.
It’s a pity that it didn’t grant immortal life to Jerry Garcia, Pigpen, Brent Mydland or Vince Welnick. Le sigh.
The last word of our second act goes to (who else?) the good old Grateful Dead with a swell song that I’ve never posted here before:
Now that we’ve spent half our lives doing time for some other fucker’s crime, we begin our third act with our favorite stolen feature.
Separated At Birth Casting Edition: It’s another pairing from The Crown. On the left, Lydia Leonard and Bertie Carvel as Cherie and Tony Blair. On the right, Tony and Cherie Blair as themselves on election night 1997.
Here’s the de facto theme song for Blair’s winning campaign:
That’s the first time I’ve posted house music in this space; except, that is, for Crowded House.
Your Weekly Oscar: OP and fiddler extraordinaire, Stephane Grappelli. Say no more.
Have I told you lately how much I love Oscar Peterson?
The Best Of SNL: Martin Short was only a SNL cast member for one season. But he made his mark with characters like the pointy-haired nebbish Ed Grimley. Grimley was obsessed with Wheel Of Fortune and host Pat Sajak. Here’s Ed trying out for the show:
Saturday GIF Horse: Chef Gordon Ramsay getting pie-eyed on Master Chef Junior.
Anyone in the mood for pie?
Let’s close down this virtual honky tonk with some more music.
Saturday Closer: We conclude with a Tiny Desk Concert featuring The Both with Aimee Mann and Ted Leo.
That’s all for this week. The last word goes to the good old Grateful Dead circa 1978:
