How do you get from the back of the train to the front?

Greetings from sunny Southern California where it isn’t. That’s right, unlike in that old Albert Hammond song, today it’s RAINING! Something seen once every decade. Which is why if you bring up board games Angelenos are flummoxed, they know not about rainy days and Mondays where you stay inside and try to entertain yourself. Then again, everybody’s staying inside these days. Because of TELEVISION!

Ah, the idiot box that’s now a flat screen, that is your window to the world, upon which you can view not only cable and network fare, but movies on demand.

That’s the new thing. Who wants to go to the theatre anyway?

Certainly not me. Because the time is never convenient, and the people keep talking and I need to study the flick, it’s my lifeblood. So when I read that you could pull up “Snowpiercer” on your cable system…

I was wavering, I was thinking about going to the multiplex. But reviews were not stellar enough to push me over. But to spend $6.99 to watch at home?

So we pulled the curtains, dropped the lights, clicked the remote, and saw an allegory about America, even though Americans don’t know it.

Americans are stupid. That’s why there will be no revolution.

Well, let me change that, they’re not stupid, they’re UNEDUCATED! They might know how to use YouTube, but they know nothing about the news, nothing about economics or the human condition other than what’s in front of their very eyes.

And the self-satisfied smarties are just as bad, especially the Republicans. They read the “Wall Street Journal” and think they know everything, when the truth is a very small sliver of people know what’s going on, and they’re running the train.

Forget all the ink about inheritances, how bozos are living on the untaxed assets of their parents. As Bob Dylan said, “he not busy being born is busy dying,” and if you think money is enough, you don’t know that Mike Tyson went broke. Sure, you’ve got to have cash, even better you’ve got to know the score. And almost nobody in America does, otherwise there’d be revolution.

Like Sam Brownback lowering taxes in Kansas but the aforementioned WSJ not mentioning the consequences, continuing to parade the fiction that lower taxes drive business development, when in this case not only did revenues go down, but jobs.

But that’s the way the rich wanted it. The rich want so much. And they convince the poor if they just play nice and follow in their footsteps, they’ll get a few crumbs.

Hogwash.

Then again, the unwashed lefties keep clamoring to bring manufacturing back, which is pure insanity, and the poor are clueless and auditioning for reality TV.

So it’s after the apocalypse, and everybody left is circling the frozen earth on a train. And the poor are afraid to speak up. But someone does…

Who’s going to speak up in America? We used to count on middle class college students, like Mark Rudd. But now all the middle class kids at good schools want to be upper class, they don’t want to rock the boat, they just want to make sure they’re not down there with the hoi polloi.

Starving artist my ass. Used to be, but now they’re just starving. Because it’s a full time job putting food on the table, you’ve got no time to be an artist.

And the poor have no awareness, they don’t know their food is made from bugs. They’ve never eaten at Chez Panisse, they think McDonald’s is good, as they get fatter and fatter and die of heart disease and the rich eat vegetables while their women become x-rays. If you think being skinny is the end all and be all, I pity you. That just means you don’t understand the game. It’s not what you look like, it’s what’s inside your brain.

That’s the mantra of Silicon Valley. Of Monsanto. Read this “BusinessWeek” article to make your head spin:

Inside Monsanto, America’s Third-Most-Hated Company

You may think Monsanto is the genetically-modified seedmaker but that’s just a tiny sliver of their business, they’re selling insurance and software and they’re so far ahead of the game that if you think labeling genetically modified food is the answer, you don’t know that most of their products come from breeding and that’s been done for a hundred years!

Yup, that’s the problem with the lefties, always speaking from their emotions, facts are irrelevant.

While the rich right wingers tilt the facts in their favor, to keep the ignorant down.

So we need a leader. But no one wants to lead. And the battle is long and the rewards aren’t clearly defined. And the truth is those at the top are not as evil as we believe them to be. They’ve got good qualities, it’s just that these people are myopic, believing they know what’s good for everybody when they know nobody other than themselves.

And this is all in “Snowpiercer,” which everyone would know about except a major studio doesn’t want to risk dollars promoting it, so it only opened in eight theatres and is now on VOD. Maybe it’ll have an impact on Netflix, when it finally reaches there. You see art lives on forever, but very little is art.

I thought “Snowpiercer” was an action flick. And it was for the first third, but then it raised the big questions, the ones the musicians used to ask in the sixties, before selling out became the mantra and the rich kept eviscerating the safety net and we saw poor on poor crime. Yup, while you’re battling each other, the rich are unreachable, behind walls, flying private.

But no one will tell you this, because otherwise you’ll lose hope.

But what we need is true hope. Leaders we can believe in.

And artists and leaders always go side by side.

But only in the movies. That’s right, a Korean director adapted “Snowpiercer” from a graphic novel and all we know about that far-away country is Samsung, as if our mobile phones will save the world.

But they won’t. We’ve got to save ourselves.

Which is why all those Ivy League graduates are not becoming ski bums, are not becoming teachers, but are going into finance so they can not only get ahead, but interact with others who understand the game.

The game? It’s rigged against you. The American Dream is kaput. You cannot get ahead, that’s just a fiction those who’ve already got theirs are spreading, having you believe if you just push a little harder, you’ll break through.

But the truth is we live in an information age. And he who knows most wins.

So surf all the porn you want, read the gossip columns. That’s exactly how the owners of this country want you, distracted. Because if you understood what was really going on, you’d rally the troops and start moving forward, start battling the resistance, move your way from the back to the front.

But you’ve got no idea where the front is.

Never mind how to get there.

P.S. “Snowpiercer” got a limited release because the director wouldn’t agree to Harvey Weinstein’s edict that twenty minutes be cut and opening and closing monologues be added. But unlike the musicians, director Bong Joon-ho said no. Art is not about compromising, that’s BUSINESS!

“Snowpiercer”

– YouTube
– wikipedia
– imdb

Who’da thunk they’d all be dead but their music would live on?

Certainly not anybody who came across their debut in the bins back in ’76. With its black and white cover and music so contrary to what was happening as to be almost incomprehensible, or a joke.

But despite having a great sense of humor, the Ramones were no joke. They were fans. They were every suburbanite’s dream. They hewed to their ethos until the very end, until the world caught up with them.

That’s right, the Ramones never had a hit. But now their music is played in stadiums, babies wear their t-shirts. Proving the greatest artists have a plan and stick to it.

Not only were the Ramones not art rock, overblown like Yes and Genesis, they never went disco, they never cut corners, they were just…originals.

Credit Hilly Kristal, for giving them a place to play.

Credit Danny Fields for guidance.

Credit Seymour Stein for giving them a deal.

It’s easy to be me-too, it’s hard to be an original.

And Tommy was an original Ramone. One can argue that by time he was gone, it was all over. Yup, Tommy coproduced “Road To Ruin” with Ed Stasium after relinquishing the drum chair to Marky, and after that the band started looking for an elusive hit as opposed to being just them.

And they were themselves from the very beginning, one can argue they emerged fully-formed, their debut opened with the legendary “Blitzkrieg Bop” and segued into “Beat on the Brat,” that’s what you do with a baseball bat, right?

“Leave Home” had the legendary “Carbona Not Glue,” featuring the pastime of the bored and misdirected.

And then came the second masterpiece, “Rocket To Russia.” How could it be that a band from Queens could do the Beach Boys better than the originals? Joey had that nasal sound and there were more hooks in “Rockaway Beach” than not only those contained in the works of the SoCal surfers, but many of those on the hit parade. Come on, an ode to a local haunt that required no pilgrimage, but was part of the DNA of the locals?

And it was on “Rocket To Russia” that we learned that Sheena was a punk rocker.

And on “Road To Ruin” was the band’s apotheosis, “I Wanna Be Sedated.”

They say that everybody who bought the first Velvet Underground album started a band. I won’t debate that, but I will say that many more bought “Ramones” and picked up instruments and formed groups. Because if the Ramones could, so could they. Especially in England, where punk flourished first, after being started in NYC by the Ramones and getting no traction in the USA. So most people in the hinterlands were first exposed to punk via the Sex Pistols, but Johnny Rotten, et al, were inspired by the Ramones.

The Ramones were a constant reinforcement that we shouldn’t take ourselves too seriously, that two minutes was enough for a song, and that first and foremost rock should be fun, you remember fun, don’t you?

And now they’re all gone.

I saw ’em. At the Whisky. Because despite their rep, the halls were never big.

I met Tommy only once, and he was surprisingly normal. He had a hip affect, most musicians do, but he was approachable, no different from the guy who sat in the back of the room in high school math.

So let’s pause for a toast to a band of originals. Who didn’t die in a plane crash, but met their demise just the same. Was there something in those vans, something that caused all of their lives to be cut short?

We’ll never know.

But they’re getting the last laugh, because with every passing year their legend grows, they only get bigger.

Only suckers switch to Samsung.

I’ve never ever been to the Genius Bar before. Because I find I can fix most problems myself. The web is a cornucopia of information, if you can’t find the answer in the Apple Support Communities, you don’t have a problem. But finally at my limit with my Mac Pro, I made the journey. And when I went to pick up my machine today, more about that later, I decided to…

Tell them about my phone.

The truth is Americans are abusers. Give ’em an inch and they’ll take more than a mile. The best example is Costco, that bastion of consumer-friendliness. They had a generous return policy they had to eliminate, because people were buying new iPods and then returning them a year later, when the new model came out, even though there was nothing wrong with the first. So unless something craps out completely, unless it’s a slam-dunk case, I don’t want to deal with customer service. Because I feel I’ve got to justify myself, since everybody who’s preceded me is a lying, cheating, scumbag.

Like that husband of an old friend who no longer liked his car so he drove it south of the border and reported it stolen.

Yup, I’m too embarrassed to speak up for myself even if I do have a problem. But today I did. You see the battery on my iPhone no longer had the juice. Oh, the device worked, I never would have scheduled a special trip, but while I was there…it’d crap out at 20% and the journey down to that number was oh-so-fast.

So Hunter hooked it up to a program, and voila! Turned out it was failing. Not gone, but borderline. So he gave me a new phone.

But it gets even better than that, the random freezing problem I was having, only in e-mail, was gone too. So this is a win-win.

But I’m still gonna get a new phone in the fall. Because this one will be paid for. And it’s not about the device anyway, but the data, and the utility. As in you need something that works, but what’s on it and what it can access is more important than how it looks.

So, if you’re getting something spiffy, ask yourself, what are you gonna do when it breaks? Call Korea?

Or if you cheap out, buy one of those knock-off Android devices, same deal.

And you know how it works, it’s never their fault. Even Apple pooh-poohs third party software. You’ve got to convince somebody that they’re responsible, and if you think that’s easy, you’re David Boies, and even he’s got a spotty track record.

Sure, I bought insurance, known as Applecare. Might be expensive, but I want no questions asked. It’s less about the money than the service. I want to be covered, the same way I pay house insurance, it’s about what if? What if I’m stuck with a lame device that’s my lifeline? And that’s what smartphones are, a lifeline. If you don’t feel this way, believe me, in a couple of years you will.

And the truth is we’ve got no time. Which is why I didn’t schedule a special trip to begin with. Which is why not only was it great to instantly get a new phone, but to have all its data instantly synch from the cloud. That’s what you get when you’ve got one stop shopping, when you buy everything from one place, i.e. Apple, it all works seamlessly.

So if all you want to do is make calls and text, you’re fine with another device, maybe. But what if you get a bum app? What if you’ve lost functionality? Who you gonna call, Ghostbusters?

What we’re all looking for is a safety net, even the 1%. Although theirs is all about health, that’s the one thing money can’t buy. But the rest of us, we don’t want to be waylaid by a problem, we don’t want the wind taken out of our sails, we want to believe someone will be there in our moment of crisis.

And the last resort should be and is the government. Which is why the uninsured go to emergency rooms and get service, because as a society we don’t want our citizens to be lame and maimed.

But the government doesn’t cover everything. It’ll give you some food, some health care, but it won’t give you a phone and service. For this you’ve got to pay.

So who are you going to pay?

Pay Apple. Because you’re paying anyway, it’s built into your contract. The phones are not free, even though you think they are.

Because someday you’re gonna want answers. And the Genius Bar is just a hop, skip and a jump away.

And you’ll be glad.

P.S. As for my Mac Pro, they tested it and said it was fine, which means…it won’t be, but I’m gonna find out. (They tested the hardware and the software, found no problem. Then they said a hard drive failed, then they tested all four and said they were fine. Then they installed a new OS on one and…I’ve got absolutely no faith the problem is gone. I’m gonna buy a new machine, hopefully this one will limp along and get me through.)

SHERRY

It was not like today, there was no Disney Channel, never mind Disney Radio. All we had were three networks, a few independents and…our transistors. They were the iPods of the day, everybody was constantly buying new ones, for a few years there they were all the rage.

And when you finally got a transistor, you listened to baseball. At least I did. I was addicted to the Yankees. Did I ever tell you I was there when Roger Maris hit his 61st?

Anyway, when it comes to popular music…

My parents played show tunes, I knew “Oklahoma!” by heart, but the rest of the Top Forty lived in the ether, you’d hear bits and pieces here and there. And that’s how I knew “Sherry.” It was all about Frankie Valli’s voice, “Sherry BAY-A-BY!” There was nothing else like it on the radio, and unique doesn’t only stand out, you remember it. And although “Sherry” sounds horribly dated, it’s just as infectious today, because it’s simple and basic, it’s got a memorable tune, great vocals and hooks galore. It was innocent, and all about the music, it encapsulated the early sixties, before Vietnam, before the riots, when the baby boomers were just coming into their own in a world where your mother didn’t have to work and you had backyard barbecues and everybody believed in the U.S.A. and everybody was happy (well, as long as you weren’t black or gay or…)

BIG GIRLS DON’T CRY

My mother bought the single.

She was a hipster, but popular music was not her thing, she was a theatre rat. But this was just so infectious, she couldn’t resist.

“Big Girls Don’t Cry” is like “Like A Virgin,” the unexpected superior follow-up to the initial hit. You had to hear it on the phonograph, those drums were big, the chorus immediately hooked you and, once again, Frankie’s falsetto enraptured you… “Big girls don’t CRY-I-I!”

This was a monster hit, not much more than a year before the Beatles invaded our consciousness and revolutionized the music business.

WALK LIKE A MAN

I heard this at the bowling alley, Nutmeg Bowl on Kings Highway (not Tom Petty’s). Not only was the PBA on every Saturday afternoon, bowling was my first love, before skiing. I’d go with school, I’d bowl with the league on Saturday morning and even if we did three strings, with french fries in between, we always ended up spending time at the jukebox. Where this was a favorite.

Forget the lyrics, forget the message, it was all about the SOUND!

DAWN (GO AWAY)

I had to own this one, I heard it and couldn’t get enough of it, to this day it’s my favorite Four Seasons track. I loved the way it started off so rich and a cappella, and then the drumbeat and then…that chorus!

Go away, I’m no good for you. Fat chance! Come closer!

If you can’t sing along with this, you didn’t live through this.

RONNIE

The second horse of the 1964 trifecta.

Sure, it once again starts off with an indelible chorus.

But what you’ve got to know is the Beatles wiped most American acts off the chart, except for…the Four Seasons and the Beach Boys. And as much as we loved the Fab Four, we had a fantasy our homegrown favorites would last. And in 1964, they did.

I bought this one too, even though it’s not quite as good as what came before and…what came after.

RAG DOLL

It was the same time of year as now, early summer, and the only thing as big as this number one record was…”I Get Around” and ultimately “A Hard Day’s Night.”

We don’t have this kind of dominance these days. A song that is positively everywhere.

This was the victory lap, as good as “Big Girls Don’t Cry,” “Rag Doll” made it seem like American music would sustain. Alas, it didn’t. Not on the Top Forty, not for years.

Sure, the Four Seasons had more hits. But not immediately. And that’s important. It was not like today, where tracks could live on the chart for the better part of a year, they were on the radio a couple of months at best. And the Beatles continued to top the chart and the Four Seasons did not.

There was a hit in ’65, but “Bye, Bye, Baby (Baby Goodbye)” was simplistic, formula, almost a cheap shot, when the Beatles were testing limits with every release, pushing us beyond our preconceptions and pleasing us all the while. Sure, “Bye, Bye, Baby (Baby Goodbye)” got airplay, but you couldn’t hold it up as a paragon of excellence, as a badge of identity.

LET’S HANG ON

This was more like it, but still an extension of the formula.

We liked hearing our old favorite on the radio in the fall of ’65, but no one believed the Four Seasons mattered anymore, unlike before the Beatles. This was a hit song. But even though it made it all the way to number 3, it was a step below what came before.

WORKING MY WAY BACK TO YOU

Ditto. Jimi Hendrix was all over FM, as well as Cream, Motown made inroads on Top Forty and in 1969 we got this cut that was very good, but dated. But don’t say there weren’t hooks. In comparison to so much of today’s music, this is a MASTERPIECE!

DECEMBER, 1963 (OH, WHAT A NIGHT)

The last hurrah, when most people were no longer paying attention. Yes, this went to number one in 1976, when anybody who cared about music was listening to FM.

Most interesting for having someone other than Frankie Valli singing lead, this is one step above a throwaway. Put it in context and you’ll squirm. Once upon a time the Four Seasons stood for something, we defended them, they MATTERED!

But no longer.

GREASE

Frankie Valli was the voice, but Bob Gaudio was the genius, his only failing was being born too early, before the album rock era when millions sat at home reading the credits.

Gaudio’s gotten credit, but he still deserves a victory lap. Despite the hoopla of “Jersey Boys,” most people still don’t know him.

But Bob Gaudio did not write and produce “Grease,” that work was done by Barry Gibb (with help from Albhy Galuten and Karl Richardson on the production side).

That’s how hot Barry was, he could bring back the dead.

Sure, Frankie had a solo hit in ’74, with “My Eyes Adored You,” but that was before most people had even heard the word “disco.”

This was a real comeback, this was relevant, not that we believed it could last, and it didn’t. But for one moment in the spring of ’78, Frankie Valli was once again a star.

And it’s not his falsetto vocal, but it’s still him. And I always loved this record. Which is why we journeyed downtown on some godforsaken stormy night to see him perform at a free show. After all, it was FRANKIE VALLI!

Rhinofy-Four Seasons Primer