He’s got a right to perform…

But it’s one thing to do two shows at SoFi and quite another to headline the Wireless Festival in the U.K.

Yes, yes, Kanye admitted he was bipolar, he gave that as an explanation of his antisemitic behavior, I gave him credit for that, but that does not mean Kanye gets away with his past behavior scot-free…no, he’s on PROB ATION!

Now some might say Mr. West has not atoned enough. It’s one thing to give an explanation for bad behavior, quite another to donate time and money to the UJA and Jewish causes, which he has not done to my knowledge.

And if he’s starting anew, he’s establishing a track record, you don’t regain our trust overnight, you earn it over time.

And speaking of earning… Supposedly his two SoFi gigs grossed $33 million. Now obviously net is less, but there’s no way Kanye took home less than double digit millions, unless somehow he blew it on production.

So, he’s not experiencing that much pain from his faux pas.

Oh yes, he lost his deal with Adidas… But he hasn’t completely lost his earning power, like some #MeToo offenders in Hollywood.

You could say this is a testament to Kanye and his music, or in the alternative you could say his audience is brain dead and doesn’t care about not only his antisemitic remarks, but his other bad behavior.

Then again, with so many denizens of Hollywood expressing pro-Palestinian sentiments, with not a peep about the plight of the Iranians, I’d say antisemitism is at an all time high. Actually, in terms of incidents, that’s what the statistics say. And if for some reason you support Israel you’ve got to STFU, even if you’re a comedian, like Jerry Seinfeld.

So the worst offender here, after Kanye himself, is the promoter, Live Nation and Melvin Benn, the managing director of Festival Republic.

I don’t want to even address Mr. Benn, who didn’t read the room and just defended Kanye, as if he’d been whitewashed clean and deserved a total pass.

But Live Nation?? No one could see this coming?

Let’s be very clear, this was a business decision. It’s not about Kanye, but getting a headliner. How do we know this? Once Kanye was excised from the bill, they shut the whole festival down. No one was concerned with how this looked, never mind location in an area of antisemitic behavior. Is that how f*cking dumb these people are? And does money trump everything? Then again, there’s no heart and soul in the music, why should the promoter have any.

No one at Live Nation said “This is a bad look.”? That’s antisemitic unto itself. God, if they wanted to book Kanye, which they shouldn’t have, they’d have gotten in front of the story, made Mr. West available for interviews, had a publicity campaign saying he’d changed. But there was none of that.

Furthermore, not only was Kanye going to appear, he was going to perform all three nights (did they really think he’d take the stage on time?) And be paid $15 million for his effort.

Yup, Kanye’s paying the price for his bad behavior… Seems to me like he’s being rewarded for it. As if Steve Perry got back with Journey or Led Zeppelin returned to the road. He’s been gone for a long time folks, but now he’s back, better than ever!

Then again, behavior like this is why Live Nation is on trial in New York.

Whatever Michael Rapino believes, let’s be clear, if you’re working for the company you want to put up numbers, and you’ll bend the rules to do so.

Now we’ve got to give Rapino credit. He’s responsible for building a colossus. But so was John D. Rockefeller, and they broke up Standard Oil. Sometimes you can do your job too well. Rapino says yes instead of no, he expands his operation on a regular basis, he keeps the stock going up, and if Live Nation was a steel or food company, there would not be a huge backlash, but being directly involved with the consumer… It’s not like there was work to make Ticketmaster appear warm and fuzzy, all that was said was it was the acts’ fault, which it is…that’s why ticket prices are so high. Ticketmaster was paid to take the heat, but the heat is now burning the company.

As for Standard Oil… They had 90% of the market. Live Nation is nowhere close.

But there will be a verdict in the trial and we’ll go from there, but the culture…

They say the music business is run by Jews? Well, unless they’re self-hating, no Jew would buy Kanye for Wireless, or sit by while it is done and say nothing.

Maybe Live Nation needs some training here… Not only as to bending the rules in pursuit of the dollar, but ethics.

Then again, how ethical is our President?

But Europe and the EU are different.

My head is truly spinning. J.D. Vance is over in Hungary singing the praises of Orban, trying to get him elected? What next, a wholesale endorsement of Vladimir Putin?

Well, Trump’s gotten close to that.

But whichever side of the political fence you are on, one thing is for sure, Trump has ushered in a more coarse America where it’s everybody for themselves and if you’re a victim it’s your fault. And there’s this constant emphasis on the stock market…and Live Nation is a public company.

So it’s not only Live Nation, it’s the entire country.

But thank god, not the entire world. Those “backward” English and the EU…they’re more concerned with what’s fair than we are. And without rules of play, there can be no game.

I’m of the belief that Kanye’s got a right to work. But let him headline his own gigs. As for the promoter…maybe it should be someone new, an independent. If Live Nation/Ticketmaster is not a monopoly, there should be plenty of people who’ll step up to take Kanye on.

But other than the more haimish AEG?

And why the f*ck is it that Pepsi has more balls, can read the landscape better than Live Nation? They’re selling sugared water, Live Nation is selling culture. But somehow Live Nation is blind and Pepsi is not?

As for antisemitism… It’s a bad time to be a Jew. This is why Israel exists in the first place, as the last, safe haven. Does this mean Netanyahu is right, that the war is right? No. But one school of thought is Netanyahu is acting now because he knows support for Israel is waning in America, and it won’t be long before the country has to go it alone.

Meanwhile, we’re glorifying Kanye West. WTF?

1

I’m kinda numb.

That’s where medical uncertainty will leave you.

Bottom line…

It’s an infection, inflammation or bladder cancer. As for discovering which it is, that’s what the following screed is about.

I went to UCLA Medical Center a week ago today, to Clark Urology. You may have doctors as good in your neck of the woods, I’m not going to say mine are better, but I am going to say this is one of the advantages of living in the city, the access to first class medical care. It’s one of the many reasons why I will never leave Los Angeles.

Now there are excellent medical facilities around the country, from Johns Hopkins and the Cleveland Clinic in the east to the Mayo Clinic in the midwest and MD Anderson in Houston. But pound for pound, you want to be in the metropolis. I’d boil that down to New York and L.A. Your mileage may vary.

Also, you want a PPO, not an HMO. Now I know some people don’t have medical insurance at all…either because they can’t afford it or they don’t think they need it. But if you have the option, go for a PPO, so you can see your own doctors, sorta. The truth is in the city so many doctors don’t take insurance at all, which the Eagles referenced in “Life in the Fast Lane,” i.e. “The doctor say he’s comin’, but you gotta pay in cash.”

However, if they work for the hospital, they do take insurance. Which is great.

And the other thing is Medicare is so damn good. But if you’re on the cusp of being 65, I must tell you, be sure to purchase a supplemental policy. ALSO, and this is very very important, sign up for a drug plan at the same time. For if you do not, you’ll be penalized when you ultimately do. You’ll be paying more for the rest of your life. ALSO, you will need medication and don’t be afraid to take it. For some reason, the Greatest Generation and the Boomers are anti-pill. And sure, there are addicts, but the bottom line is these medications keep you alive…statins, blood pressure meds… All I’ve got to tell you is I know a woman who was in her fifties, thin, and the doctor said she needed to go on blood pressure medication. She said she’d treat her high blood pressure naturally. Bottom line, SHE HAD A STROKE!

So let that be a warning to you. Then again, trying to set someone straight about their health is like trying to get them to switch political allegiances. But you’re not going to live forever, and you want a fighting chance.

You’re not gonna live forever. You think you are, but you’re not. And something is gonna come along and bite you in the ass. The average life expectancy in the U.S. is 79…but that means half of the people die before that.

So…

I mean I’ve already got cancer, what are the odds I’ve got it again?

But that’s no insurance. May feel like it, but you can get it again.

So…

Last Tuesday I went for a scope. It’s funny, the nurse lifts up your gown and prepares the area, spreading all this yellow anti-infectant on your dick while you’re talking all the while. And in this case we were discussing football…

I always talk to the people in the hospital. Not only does it assuage my anxiety, you want to let them know that you’re on the case, sharp, so they don’t punch the clock with you.

She lived in Long Beach, and I asked her how long it took her to get to the hospital, that’s a natural next question in L.A., the traffic. She said it varied between forty minutes and a bit over an hour to get there, but two hours to get home. And what did she do during this time? Listen to football podcasts!

Whereupon she waxed rhapsodic about the Chargers and started talking about individual players in the league at the level of the commentators on TV. Me? I know enough to get by. She actually thought I knew more than I did. Pay attention, read enough, and you can fake it pretty good.

And then she shot lidocaine up my penis. I’d say it was uncomfortable but it was nothing compared to what was coming.

And then the doctor came in.

He wasn’t happy. This was breaking protocol. You don’t do a scope without a prior consultation. So he was reluctant.

Then he got out what appeared to be a caulking gun, with a long tube at the end, he stuck it up my dick, it started shooting water and he said it would be painful…

You’ve got no idea.

I’ve got a very high threshold of pain. But when it breaks, when it hits the limit…

Usually if you’re going to get this far, they numb you out completely.

Believe me, I could feel it. I’m about ready to burst.

And then the doctor says to look at the screen. Which is now filled with blood. Not the deep red of the previous weekend’s piss, but red nonetheless. And then he says he’s going to shut off the water in the pistol, that the pain will decrease, which it does, but only a bit.

And when the tool is removed…

He says the bleeding is coming from a spot on the bladder and I need a biopsy, to determine if it’s cancer. As for the odds, he goes on record that they don’t believe in “might,” he will not speculate.

So walking as if I’d been kicked in the nuts, I go to scheduling and get an appointment with the biopsy doctor, I just got home from this second appointment. 

2

Now I didn’t have to wait. But the assistant remembered me as a friend from an appointment back in October, it was like we were old school buddies, and I’m working the mental rolodex, trying to remember his story and it comes to me that he’d recently been married… He said it was his one year anniversary. And didn’t he like to go to the show, wasn’t he scheduled to go to a festival? I threw that out there…no, his wife went back to school, they’re saving money now.

And I’m just scanning Instagram Reels. When you’re in the hospital you’re in suspended animation, the outside world doesn’t matter, life almost stops. And I don’t want to work and be distracted, because I want to be totally present when the doctor comes in so I can I tell my story directly and completely and listen to the feedback.

But his nurse comes in first.

And she immediately starts talking about the biopsy. That first I needed “clearance.” Did this mean I had to argue with insurance? No, my primary care doctor had to say I was okay for the procedure, which would be done in either the hospital or surgery center, they’d put out my lights. However, the odds of me staying overnight were slim, since I wasn’t physically hobbled, in a wheelchair.

So now this was totally real.

And then the doctor came in…

And he’s talking about the biopsy and then he lets slip that he didn’t do the scope, so he didn’t see what was there, and if he had…

And here’s where my personality comes in, or maybe my education. I start asking questions. I’m looking for nuance. And I’m asking some questions more than once, because sometimes they respond with different answers. I’m slicing it by hair, after all, it’s ME, and I want to do the right thing and get the best result.

Sometimes I’m buying something and a friend is along and they don’t understand the process. The salesperson has given an answer, let’s move on. But I find if I quiz further, address the subject from different angles, usually ask the same questions ultimately two or three times, I reach a definitive answer/conclusion, I’m then comfortable with what I’m going to do.

Now obviously, every purchase is not critical. But a lot, having to do with ski equipment and… You can read all you want and most salespeople are transitory and not as informed as I am on the subject, but when you get an expert, you want to hear what they have to say, cross it with what you already know.

So…

I pick up on the fact that this guy didn’t do the scope and therefore it’s unclear to him.

What exactly is unclear?

And that’s when he says if HE did the scope he’d know if it was cancer or not.

OK, so this begs the question, should we do another scope?

And this seems to appeal to him, after all, it would avoid anesthesia, and the rest of the issues of surgery. For now anyway.

But is this the right approach?

You can’t be scared, you’ve got to do what is right. Unlike all the men who are afraid of a colonoscopy. You’ve got to jump through the hoops if you want to live. I’m willing to have the biopsy, I’ll go there, but…maybe I don’t.

So we kick the ball back and forth. Why would he be different from any other urologist? Well, this is what he does all day long, look for bladder cancer, and he can tell…

So what are the odds he scopes me and misses it?

Single digits.

Well, those are not quite good enough odds for me. So I start parsing it out further, I want the guy to admit that this is the right choice, to get a scope first.

And I’m slicing and dicing and then he commits. That’s what he would do, get a scope first.

So that’s what I’m gonna do.

3

Now the wheels of medicine turn slowly. Unless you’re about to die on the table. Oh, believe me, if there’s a crisis, an emergency, they’ll address it right away. However, methodically, they don’t get as anxious and uptight as you do.

So they said they’d squeeze me in. Which is in three weeks.

But now it’s more real. I mean it could be cancer. And if it is…I asked the guy the spectrum of outcomes… Well, he could cut it out or have to remove the entire bladder, somewhere in between those two.

That made it real.

But that’s when I made him go through the possibilities once again… And that’s when he said definitively, it could be cancer, an infection or inflammation.

Well, I haven’t pissed blood since the day of  the first scope. And although the tip of my dick still hurts, my urine has been clear.

He was not too impressed with that, he didn’t consider that definitive.

So now I’m internalizing it… Well, the blood is gone, I was taking Aleve, which is an irritant…

God, I’ve got no idea what it is.

If you asked me to give an instinctual response I’d say it’s nothing serious. I have no pain, I am not bleeding, I was taking anti-inflammatories and was very active. Furthermore, my kidneys are riddled with stones, that’s been established, and a kidney stone can irritate the bladder. Then again, I had no pain, and with kidney stones you almost always do.

Then again, I’d had that episode of being cold and shivering, and that tends to go along with an infection, but that’s not definitive.

So, as Jimmy Cliff would say, I’m sitting here in limbo.

It could be worse, I’ve had it worse. I just don’t know.

But I will.

Anajak: https://www.anajakthai.com

What kind of crazy, f*cked up world do we live in where the best Thai restaurant in Los Angeles is in the San Fernando Valley?

You’ve got to know, the Valley used to be the pits. Maybe you could be from there, but you certainly didn’t want to live there in the seventies, eighties, even right up to this century.

The Valley is America. Endless boulevards, littered with strip malls.

And it’s also cheaper than the real estate over the hill.

But it ain’t so cheap anymore, except maybe over Pacoima way. Then again, I just Googled and found out the median price for a house in Pacoima is now $700,000, which might buy you a mansion in many communities.

But as the years went by, baby boomers in Los Angeles discovered that unless you struck it rich, had a big entertainment job or the like, you couldn’t afford to live on the Westside, the most desirable neighborhoods, from Santa Monica to Beverly Hills. (And the gentrification of Silver Lake and Highland Park were still decades off). So, if they wanted to own real estate and raise children, they had to move to the Valley.

But concomitant with this traffic got worse and worse to the point where the Valley became its own, almost walled-off garden. You no longer crossed the hill on a whim, in either direction.

Now ultimately some of those with more than average bank accounts moved to Calabasas, because it featured its own school system, it was not part of LA., but still…it was the Valley.

You could get your car serviced, you could buy anything you wanted, manufacturing was rampant in the Valley, they even made Camaros in Van Nuys, but you didn’t want to tell anybody you lived there.

But a funny thing happened as the years went by. The San Fernando Valley became the epicenter of sushi culture. Up and down Ventura Boulevard, in seemingly every strip mall, there was a sushi bar, some rated as good as anything on the other side of the hill, in the city.

Now Thai cuisine started to burgeon in the late seventies. Mostly on Sunset and Hollywood Boulevards, east of the 101. Which if you don’t know L.A., is east of Hollywood and not a great neighborhood. The first standout was Jitlada. This was before Thai spread nationwide, it was still an L.A. thing, like sushi, in fact. But I ultimately favored a different outlet, if for no other reason than it stayed open until 4 AM, back when it was a badge of honor how late you stayed up as opposed to how early you awoke.

Now as the years passed, Thai spread across the city. And there was even an upscale place on Sunset, Talesai, which now only exists, ironically, as an outpost on Ventura Boulevard in the Valley, but Thai food was always seen as inexpensive.

Now you’ve got to know, Thai in L.A. became what Chinese is in the east. The Chinese restaurants were historically bad in Los Angeles. Cantonese and bland at best. But Thai? It was edgy, spicy, it delivered. And as I told Harry last night, if I could only eat one cuisine for the rest of my life it would be Thai? NOT ITALIAN? I pondered the question for a few seconds, I’ve been saying Thai for decades, but after thinking about it my preference still rules.

Now every time I drive by Anajak there’s a crowd of people out front, waiting to get in. So when Harry said he could get a reservation on Saturday night at 7…

What I didn’t know was he had pull. He’d had Anajak cater this private event for his client Niall Horan in Calabasas earlier in the week. Funny how the business changes. Niall has only had one hit in America, but he can sell out arenas. So, they decided to honor the superfans, with a sit-down dinner and acoustic performance at the Bunetta compound.

Which engendered a conversation about the modern music business. You don’t play to the press, you play to those who are dedicated, who come to every show, who spread the word, who keep you alive.

Anyway, being familiar with the menu, I told Harry he could order.

Now we were sitting outside, which was a shock to me, having just spent a couple of months in Colorado. I mean it was warm in Vail, so warm that you didn’t need a jacket the past couple of weeks, so warm that all the snow melted and they’re closing the mountain early, but you could not go out in shirtsleeves at night. Yet in the San Fernando Valley? You didn’t even need a jacket.

Now everything we ate was good, and we ate plenty, but I want to single out one specific dish, the Kampachi crudo.

Have you eaten tiradito at Matsuhisa? It’s their signature dish, along with the black cod. I’m just gonna quote from Google:

“Tiradito at Matsuhisa is a signature Nobu dish blending Peruvian ceviche with Japanese sashimi techniques. It features thinly sliced raw fish (often halibut or whitefish) arranged in a Japanese style, topped with citrus sauce, yuzu, chili, and cilantro, famously omitting onions for a clean, spicy, and acidic flavor profile.”

The fish is sliced thin, the serving plate is covered in slices, there’s a tiny dot of hot sauce on top of each piece, but what makes it so good is the tang…not subtle, but not overwhelming. It’s a must-eat.

But I found it was superseded by Anajak’s Kampachi crudo.

Oh, they’re not exactly the same thing. And I don’t want to say anything negative about Matsuhisa/Nobu, whose dishes are unique and always deliver, but when it comes down to raw fish in sauce with zing, I’d rather have Anajak’s Kampachi crudo.

Now if you go to Anajak’s Instagram page, they’ve got a picture of the dish:

View this post on Instagram

To be honest, I don’t remember the sauce being that yellow, not at all. I remember it being clear, but with all that chozzerai pictured included.

So, you pick up a piece of fish and…

(No chopsticks, just regular silverware…)

You put it in your mouth and it is soft and only slightly chewy and ultimately delectable, but what puts it over the top is the sauce…which was so good when the fish was gone I ended up spooning it into my mouth again and again and again, I just couldn’t stop.

I live for that zing. But unlike with the Tiradito, it’s not just one flavor, it’s a composite…I could make a whole meal of Kampachi crudo.

Of course we ate more, and everything was great, a lot of stuff 10 on a 10 scale. But I just can’t get the Kampachi crudo out of my mind. It’s sticking there, like the after-effect of a great concert, you wake up the next morning still thinking about it, still feeling it, in this case, still tasting it…in your brain anyway.

So I did some research when I got home. Is Anajak really the best Thai restaurant in Los Angeles?

Well, there’s a debate, but many people think so. And I’ve eaten a lot of Thai, and this was definitely one step above.

As far as getting a reservation… I don’t know, go on  OpenTable, it ain’t easy, but it’s not impossible, you don’t have to know someone.

As for the mass of people out front, maybe I’ve been driving by on Tuesday, because that’s Taco Tuesday, when they feature a special menu of tacos and the restaurant doesn’t take reservations.

Scroll down on this page to see Tuesday’s offerings. If they don’t immediately appeal to you, ignore everything I’ve said above.

Menu

As for the elements of the Kampachi crudo…

You can see them here:

https://www.starchefs.com/recipes/dry-aged-kampachi-crudo

Give it a shot if you want to, but we could never recreate the Carlos ‘n Charlie’s tuna fish dip…

But that was the seventies.

This is worth a special trip. Not for a special occasion, but to tickle your taste buds.

Anajak is not glamorous, but it’s not East Hollywood down and dirty either.

It’s worth a trip to the Valley!

“I’m a long distance romancer

I keep trying ’til I get an answer

Gimme gimme one more chance

She’s a greater little operator”

I didn’t know it was written by Mickey Jupp!

So I was reading today’s “Los Angeles Times” and there was an interview with Nick Lowe. Wherein he said he never wanted to record “Cruel to Be Kind,” that his A&R guy at Columbia, Gregg Geller, made him. That he just threw off the vocal.

https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/music/story/2026-03-26/nick-lowe-biggest-hit-cruel-to-be-kind-was-almost-never-recorded

And that turned out to be Nick’s biggest hit in the U.S., assuming you can call something that was an alternative FM staple a hit. Then again, years later Curtis Stigers’s version of Nick’s “(What’s So Funny ‘Bout) Peace, Love, and Understanding” was included in “The Bodyguard” soundtrack and that sync has provided a living for Lowe all these decades later (which he claimed in a prior interview). Once again kids, when the big bad businessman tells you to sell your publishing rights, just remember, you never know when you’ll get lucky. And this luck is not built into the multiple they’re paying you today, because it’s unforeseen. Life is short, but it’s also long (of course if you’re aged, your mileage may be different).

But what I did not know was that “(What’s So Funny ‘Bout) Peace, Love, and Understanding” was originally recorded by Brinsley Schwarz, when Nick was in the band. I knew Nick’s history, but you’ve got to know that pub rock never broke in America, some of the records were ultimately released over here, but none got airplay. I actually bought Ducks Deluxe…do you remember Ducks Deluxe?

And did you see that Andrew Bodnar of the Rumour died? Back in January, but the obit was only in “The Guardian” a week ago:

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2026/mar/30/andrew-bodnar-obituary

Now the thought was that Graham Parker was going to have a renaissance after Judd Apatow included his songs in “This Is 40,” but that didn’t happen. Just like Jonathan Richman didn’t break through after he and his music were featured in “There’s Something About Mary,” which was an iconic picture of the era. But Richman never got the traction Parker did, he’s still unknown by most. But for a minute there, Graham was up front and center, with the hipsters during his Mercury tenure, and then the press when Clive Davis snatched him up and paired him with Jack Nitzsche and the album “Squeezing Out Sparks” was released. People say that’s the apotheosis, but I never agreed with that, it’s really all about the first two, “Howlin’ Wind,” produced by Nick Lowe, and “Heat Treatment,” which was produced by Mutt Lange before we knew who he was, before his breakthrough with AC/DC (along with one track, “Back Door Love,” produced by Lowe). Now all these years later, I’ve got to admit that “Howlin’ Wind” is better, but I loved, loved, LOVED, “Heat Treatment”…two songs especially, the white reggae “Something You’re Going Through” and the anthemic closer “Fool’s Gold.”

But the true breakthrough was Elvis Costello and “My Aim Is True,” which came out in 1977. Now although Nick Lowe was the producer on all of Costello’s albums from the first through “Trust” (where he shared credit with Roger Bécherian), it’s the first that stands out for me. Because it lacks the Vox organ of the later albums, the backing group was not the Attractions, but Clover…which featured John McFee, now of the Doobie Brothers, and Sean Hopper of Huey Lewis and the News (Huey was in Clover, but not on the Costello album). The backup did not detract from the lyrics, Costello’s delivery, which on subsequent albums it tended to do, the band was competing with Costello, even though I know most people don’t agree with me.

SO, Elvis Costello was the new wave breakthrough. As big as the Ramones are today, at least on t-shirts, punk didn’t triumph until Nirvana in the nineties. And sure, there was a new wave scene in New York, but Blondie didn’t really make it until 1978, after leaving Private Stock and working with Mike Chapman at Chrysalis, and even though their debut was entitled “Talking Heads: 77,” it wasn’t until the RISD band worked with Brian Eno on their second album, “More Songs About Buildings and Food” that they were taken to the river in 1978.

So, wherever it started, the new wave was seen by most people as an English thing. And after Costello broke down the door, Stiff Records followed up with Ian (“Wake Up and Make Love to Me”) Dury and Lene Lovich and Wreckless Eric and England had not been so hip since the sixties. Skinny ties, short hair, the antithesis of the bombast of the headbangers and corporate rockers.

And at the center of all this was Nick Lowe.

Like Graham Parker, his music didn’t really fit in, but his name was on all the records and when his first album came out, we bought it. But I always preferred the second, “Labour of Lust,” it was less precious, a bit more in your face.

Yes, “Labour of Lust” started with “Cruel to Be Kind,” but it truly took flight with the second track, “Cracking Up,” with its descending line and irreverent vocal. That’s one thing about Lowe, he had a sense of humor, he oftentimes delivered his tunes with the wink of an eye, and you’ve got to be smart to be funny, Lowe radiated intelligence, but unlike those before him, he didn’t lead with it, he didn’t lord it over us.

And after “Cracking Up” came “Big Kick, Plain Scrap.”

But the song I liked just as much as “Cracking Up,” they being the two best on the LP, was “Switchboard Susan.”

“Switchboard Susan, won’t you give me a line”

You’ve got to know, even back in ’79, switchboards were in the rearview mirror, they went out the window along with prefixes… Forget area codes, our home number in Connecticut started with “Forest,” you had to dial FO before the rest of the numbers. And on TV, we always were told to dial “Murray Hill”…

“I need a doctor, give me 999”

This was a regular theme back in the day, before acts were brands, when they saw themselves as the other, outcasts, with emotional problems.

“When I’m near you girl, I get an extension

And I don’t mean Alexander Graham Bell’s invention”

A good turn of the phrase, but a bit obvious for Lowe.

And then at the end:

“Hey babe, you’re number’s great

38-27-38”

This always seemed a bit base for Nick, but now that I know the song was written by Mickey Jupp, it all makes sense. You remember “Juppanese,” don’t you? Another Stiff act with a sense of humor.

Well I just learned today that Jupp’s version of the song was produced by Nick Lowe, and his band Rockpile provided the backup. But Jupp considered it “sh*t from top to bottom” and Lowe got Mickey’s permission to add his vocal to the backing track, and voila!

And it’s the instrumentation that puts Lowe’s version of “Switchboard Susan” over the top… It’s the lead guitar work that echoes, adds a coda at the end of the chorus. And repeats with a solo later in the number. It’s a thin sound, but it feels so right, it’s like the instrument is answering the lyrics, commenting on them, the guitar adds meaning.

And that solo, it’s almost like out of the circus, but it’s perfect for the whole number, because it’s FUN!

Now ultimately Mickey Jupp saw the error of his ways and recorded his own version of “Switchboard Susan,” and it’s good, but it doesn’t have those guitar tweaks:

And I knew the Searchers did a cover, but I never knew Gary Brooker did one too:

But even crazier, my old friend Per Gessle redid the lyrics in Swedish for his band Rockfile, before Roxette:

So can Mickey Jupp live off of “Switchboard Susan”?

Well, the stunning thing is Mickey Jupp is still alive, he’s 82. And he’s still making new music, when so many superstars of yore have given up.

As for Elvis Costello, he’s now respectable. However, if he used the n-word today like he did back in that bar in ’97, would he pay the same price as Morgan Wallen? Even crazier, it’s the Costello fans who have contempt for Wallen, who won’t forgive him.

As for Nick Lowe… He married and divorced Carlene Carter and then slowly faded into the woodwork. He’s made more records, for ever more indie labels, and he goes on the road now and again, but he can go to the grocery store unnoticed. He could walk the fields of Lollapalooza and I don’t think anybody under the age of 40 would recognize him.

But if you were around back then, you’ve never forgotten him.

Sure, he was behind the board on some great albums, but he also recorded some great tracks.

Like “Switchboard Susan.”