Head Cold A Go Go

I got home from work yesterday shivering. My head was feeling congested and I was feverish. I stayed around the house today trying to read a little 'Old Man's War' and catching up on DVDs, Generation Kill series end, Jules Dassins 'Brute Force ', Charlie Bronson in 'The Mechanic', and 'They Lived by Night' (sorry if I got any of those wrong chalk it up to fever fingers and hot tears). 

Any way, tonight is the Oscars (Sigh!). I have kinda a love hate thing with them. Last year was so strong, No Country and Juno being at opposite sides of the spectrum, but both being flicks that I really liked. This year... aside from Wall-E and The Wrestler (liked them both) I haven't seen many of the big flicks... oh, I saw The Dark Nut and thought that Ledger was great, just for  the line "I am an Agent of Chaos" (I try to be as well... thank you Norman Spinrad)... any whooo, I just couldn't get the energy up to watch, so I watched the previously mentioned Brute Force, while my siblings took in a showing of Let the Right One In (DVD at the start of March!)..... the one thing that the morbid noir hound me really likes every year is the memorial montage. I just wish the Academy would post it on their sight after the show....

I think my fever dream story telling is running out, to bad last night I dreamed of Donald Westlake after watching The Hot Rock (So So flick from '72) which was memorable enough that I failed to note it above. After Brute Force it was a paralyzed half away half hour of Hard Case Crime type set up for a Roller Derby noir..... part of which I did get down, and which might see the light of day sometime.

Stray thought: Has anyone seen DVDs packaged with the book they are based on? Westlakes Hot Rock, Thieves Market and the Film Thieves Highway by A. I. Bezzerides are both films that I have seen recently and read the books they are based on as well (and there is the fever confusion seeping to it's fullest) 

Oscars? Ann Savage? Richard Widmark? Ron Asheton (not likely, ditto Lux)?, Betty Page? Bo Diddly? anyone, anyone, Buller?

Update: I am feeling better, and I did get to see the In Memoriam video via youtube

Now I could have done with out the song, it's a nice thought, but really let's give these people who have us so much joy a couple of moments of attention with out the big distraction. I also, like a lot of others will note those missing from this list..... Patrick McGoohan (how cool would it have been if it had started off with that closing image from the Prisoner and the sound clip, 'I'm not a number I am a free man' and then went into clips of his film work. I am glad to see that the video it's self was posted, and want to challenge the powers to be to post a longer more full one next year.

I was glad to see a lot of behind the scenes people remembered

Lux Interior

Maybe I should call this We Will Fall Pt. 2?

Lux Interior, lead singer for The Cramps... has left the building! 

Shocking! Sad! With out Warning! The fallen Voodoo Idol!

I never met the man, I saw him live once, The First Ave in Minneapolis when I lived there. He climbed the stacks and jumped around. They played this hits... ok, not hits cause I don't think they ever topped the charts, but what they did was so much more important, they helped the expand the world of punk, they brought trash and fun b-flick culture into the punk world and helped to launch the obscure 45 RPM collection addiction of many and spear headed the excavation of early primitive rock and roll and it's roots.

For the longest time the real impact of The Cramps and Lux has been obscured and unread. Where they punk? Did they invent Psychobilly? Were they a horror punk band? I think the answer is simply, yes and no to both questions. They were part of the 70's NYC Punk Scene and moved to LA to be part of that scene. They did fuse Rockabilly and Punk... by they did the same thing with country, blues, surf, hillbilly and what ever else happened to come their way. When people talk about Psychobilly these days they mostly are pointing towards the UK and European scene which was started by The Meteors in the UK.... but a loft of those bands also like, listened to and followed The Cramps. Horror Punk has always been a theme and a subject and not so much a Sound, and so yes The Cramps were a horror punk band.... but that's not all they were. I think that at this vantage point that it's safe to finally say that they were the pioneers of what we now call garage punk.

 

I can say that they have made my life more fun, more interesting, and that 3 of the best CDs that I own are the Songs the Cramps Taught Us comps. I can say that I admire their spirit, their music, and the fact that they stuck with it as long as they could. I realize that I started off talking about Lux Interior and then moved quickly into talking about The Cramps, but to me Lux, along with Ivy, was The Cramps. I think all that's left to say is thank you for the music, for the stories and for heads up on all the great tunes...

You Better Ask my Momma how to make a Monster!

RIP Lux Interior

The king is dead.... it's spinning in my head. Lux has left the building.

More to come when I can gather my thoughts.

Images from http://punkturns30.blogspot.com/ by the amazing Anna Log