Sunday, December 28, 2008
DO NOT ADJUST YOUR SET
I'd say that my "favourite" (in other words, least bad) posts of 2008 were the Billy Joel post and the Bill Cotton post. Perhaps I should just write about blokes called Bill in future?
I wasn't aware of a Billy Joel documentary being shown over Christmas, but BBC2 gave over an evening to acknowledge the passing of Sir Bill Cotton.
We watched the documentary The Man Who Made Eric & Ernie.
As is usually the case nowadays, talking heads were drifted in to spout platitudes about Sir Bill.
In fact, there weren't any words from Bill Cotton himself. No old footage of him talking about his contribution to what's regarded as a golden age of TV, or indeed, his run ins with egotistical celebs (as mentioned in my post, hem hem).
Holy pause button, Batman! I should apologise to any Windsor Davies fans for obscuring the great man's face.
I wasn't aware of a Billy Joel documentary being shown over Christmas, but BBC2 gave over an evening to acknowledge the passing of Sir Bill Cotton.
We watched the documentary The Man Who Made Eric & Ernie.
As is usually the case nowadays, talking heads were drifted in to spout platitudes about Sir Bill.
In fact, there weren't any words from Bill Cotton himself. No old footage of him talking about his contribution to what's regarded as a golden age of TV, or indeed, his run ins with egotistical celebs (as mentioned in my post, hem hem).
Lining up to lavish praise on him were the likes of Michael Parkinson, Jimmy Perry and David Croft, Michael Grade, Eddie Braben and Ronnie Corbett (wearing a jacket with the sort of gilt buttons that only someone with Variety Club Of Great Britain and Water Rat connections could get away with).
Eddie Braben described Bill's "... wonderful smile ... his face was built for a smile. He'd got lovely chubby cheeks". I'm sure that all of the viewers shed a tear.
Bill's non-appearance gave him the aura of a friendly, avuncular ghost, presumably looking down from Heaven, remaining within or behind or beyond or above his handiwork, invisible, refined out of existence, indifferent, paring his fingernails ...
... or smiling with those lovely chubby cheeks.
We saw some TV clips that we'd seen a million times before. They were the right clips, but they weren't necessarily in the right order.
At least I was able to see Bob Swipe's point, made in a recent podcast, about the uncanny resemblance between Melvyn Hayes and Iggy Pop, which your correspondent has demonstrated here by the medium of crap photography and Sky Plus.
Holy pause button, Batman! I should apologise to any Windsor Davies fans for obscuring the great man's face.
Jimmy Perry and David Croft are starting to look very old indeed.
Ronnie Corbett's voice is getting deeper and deeper ...
... but not as deep as that of narrator Frances De La Tour, whose voice is now as woody, resonant and dark as an empty port barrel.
Michael Grade wasn't wearing any braces.
Soon, there will be nobody left from the Golden Age Of Television, and Simon Cowell will control all of our lives, whether we like it or not.
Blankety Blank.
Labels: Andre Previn, Billy Joel, Bob Swipe, Iggy Pop, James Joyce, Melvyn Hayes, Morecambe And Wise, Ronnie Corbett, Sir Bill Cotton
Sunday, October 26, 2008
WE DIDN'T START THE FIRE
At the moment I'm too busy knitting shawls for sickly children and handing out bowls of thin soup to the poor people of the parish to blog. I do a lot of work for charidee, but I don't like to talk about it.
So here's a guest blogger who has got something to get off his chest - multi award winning singer/songwriter Billy Joel.
Hi, I hear a lotta talk goin' around about the noo sound in rock 'n' roll! It's blowin' up all over the radio and TV even as I speak! All I hear is yadda yadda about the noo johnny come lately guys like Tom Petty or Huey Lewis or The Cars gettin' their young pretty ass faces on the MTV! Look, I have nothin' against these guys, but I kinda take offense to all the hype they're gettin', and all the headlines screamin' that "WHAT THEY DO IS THE NOO SOUND! IT'S THE END OF THE OLD STYLE ROCK 'N' ROLL AS WE KNOW IT!" This is all so much bullshit!
When I see those guys on the MTV, I have to smile. The way they strut about and the clothes they wear ... shit, those guys wouldna been outta place in the neighborhood I grew up in!
What these producers of music shows should do is talk to the older guys like me, or Shadow Morton, or Neil Diamond. When we were hangin' around on street corners, runnin' with gangs on the wrong side of town ...
THE GUYS WE USED TO LOOK UP TO USED TO LOOK LIKE HUEY LEWIS!!! STRAIGHT UP, NO KIDDIN'!!
All these noo guys and the way they dress ... sheez ... the drape jackets, the plaid pants, the bootlace collars...
THOSE WERE THE GUYS THAT USED TO BE THE GANGLEADERS!!!!
I'D LIKE TO SEE TOM PETTY FACE DOWN ONE OF THOSE GUYS IN HIS TIGHT ASS PANTS AND CUBAN HEEL WHITE BOOTS AND DRAPE JACKETS!!!
It was a tough upbringing, runnin' with the gangs on the wrong side of town, but you learned to look afta yourself and to have respect for others. We would get inta fights but it was small scale stuff by modern standards - flick knives and so on. None of the gun murderin' that goes on now. I hope for all our sakes that Huey Lewis isn't packin' a piece. What kind of message would that send out to young Americans?
Look, I'm not complainin', some of those guys are makin' good music and it's a goddamn sight better than all the awful English synthesized haircut bullshit you get from The Flocka Seagulls or whomever I saw assault my eyes and ears on the MTV last night. Now, if this shit takes over it really WILL be the enda rock 'n' roll!
All I'm sayin' to Huey Lewis is ...
... whether it's old wave, noo wave, schmoo wave. All hail rock 'n' roll!
Labels: Billy Joel, Neil Diamond, noo wave, old wave, rock 'n' roll, runnin' with gangs on the wrong side of town, Shadow Morton
