Thursday, July 07, 2005

Pitiful

That's what my blogging has been of late, and I am truly sorry. I really do vow to do better, but meanwhile here's what you oughta know:

  • I have two gigs tomorrow, Friday the eighth. At 5:00 the World's Greatest Lovers play at Memorial Union Terrace, 800 Langdon St. in Madison. On a pleasant summer evening there is no finer place to be than the Terrace. And at 9:00 I sit in at Country Corners with the Back 40's, a fine classic country band featuring members of the German Art Students, Arena Venus and others. Country Corners is a real live kicker of a honkytonk at 3737 Cty. Rd. AB in McFarland.
  • War of the Worlds. Loved it. Scared the living shit out of me. And I loved it all the more because of Tom Cruise's media antics. More antics, Mr. Cruise, more antics. They give us something to think about besides our pain.
  • The death of Luther Vandross. Sad, and personally significant because thanks to my mom, I once performed with him on television. She's a choral director, and Oprah Winfrey's people asked her to help with a Yuletide show her O-ness was taping, with special guest Luther Vandross. Mom's task was to conduct Winfrey, Vandross and the studio audience in singing "The Twelve Days of Christmas." I was at the taping and watched as Mom, wearing a Christmasy red dress, divided the audience into sections, one day each; and Vandross and Winfrey each took a day. At Mom's direction we all sang lustily, and when Vandross and Winfrey had their turns it was a miasma of melisma. During a commercial break, there was an amusing moment when a makeup artist came out to work on on Vandross' face. As the makeup artist walked off the stage with a gooey Kleenex, a middle-aged woman in the audience gestured frantically at the tissue and shouted, "Let me have that!" Vandross cried, "You don't want that nasty thing!"

Wednesday, July 06, 2005

Good word

"Is he always like that?"

--J. Ereckson Jarvis, on Gilbert Gottfried