Overheard at Pride

#1: Overheard on MUNI between Castro and Civic Center on the way to the parade:

Gay tourist #1: That was when I was licking your nipple.

Gay tourist #2: I don't remember that.

Gay tourist #1: I have a picture of it somewhere.

(train gets too loud to hear for a few seconds)

Gay tourist #1 (indignant): Tell her that I do NOT want to see that turn up on YouTube. I'm running for supervisor, and I don't want any surprise Internet scandals.






#2: Overheard at Civic Center at the post-parade celebration:

Young thing #1: He is not gay!

Young thing #2: He is too!

Young thing #1: He is not!

Young thing #2: I'm telling you, I know for a fact that he is gay!

Young thing #1: Gavin?

San Francisco Pride Photos

This year I went to the parade and watched. This is probably the first time I've seen the parade from that perspective since 1991.

From 1992 until last year, I marched in the parade. For a wide variety of reasons (not the least of which is purely physical -- tendinitis in my shoulder, plus sore ankles from a rather athletic acting class I'm currently taking), I decided to sit this one out and just watch as a spectator instead.

It's a different experience just to go to the parade and watch. No getting up early, no dressing up, no checking off a "do I have everything?" list, no praying that MUNI is not so overcrowded as to be nearly useless, no schedules to keep, no pressures of any kind.

And when you march in the parade, you're pretty much just aware of the two or three entries in front of you and the two or three behind you. It becomes easy to forget that there are more than six or eight parade contingents.

The parade looks and feels very different from the outside than it does from inside.

So, yeah, if you're a habitual parade marcher, I heartily recommend taking a year off to see the whole event and get a better idea of the bigger picture.

In an odd way, seeing this parade makes me feel perhaps a little less jaded about the whole Gay Pride thing.

(P.S.: Some of these are also on the Chronicle's Pride 2008 Gallery as well.)

(P.S. again: The first photo is of Dustin Lance Black (screenwriter of "Milk") and Gus Van Sant (director of "Milk"), and that's Cleve Jones with his back to the camera. The car directly behind them carried three of the producers of "Milk," but no one seemed to be taking pictures of them.....)

(P.S. one last time: Click on the photos to view larger, more detailed views.)

SFGate Pride 2008 Gallery

I submitted three photos to the SF Chronicle's Pride 2008 Gallery. I already posted two of them here last night. The third one is this picture of Vicki and Nancy.

My three Pink Saturday pictures are here, here and here (though, frankly, since all three are right here on this page (and when you click on them, they're larger than the ones shown at the Chronicle), there's not a lot of reason to go see them at sfgate).

Submit your own Pride photos to the Chronicle here.

Anyhow, the parade starts at 10:30, so we're heading out the door soon.

Happy Gay Pride to all.

And another YouTube video

This one looks like it might have been taken with someone's phone. It's definitely not full-motion, 29.97 fps video.

Our original "official" video can still be seen at Current.com and at YouTube.

[UPDATE: Bjork's people had the YouTube video removed. But the one at Current is still up.]

Pink Saturday

For those of you who don't live in San Francisco:

For the last fifteen years or so, the night before the Pride Parade in San Francisco has been referred to as "Pink Saturday."

In the early 1990's, "Pink Saturday" was the name of an official event sponsored by the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence. The Sisters scheduled entertainment, local performers mostly, on two or three stages on or near Castro Street between Market and 19th, but otherwise it was just a huge crowd of people milling around and dancing in the street -- a lot like Halloween in the Castro, just with fewer people wearing costumes. After a year or two, it became more or less an open party without any organized activities or any scheduled stage shows -- just very, very loud sound systems booming out dance music.

The Sisters still charge $5 to get onto Castro Street, and the event is still known informally as "Pink Saturday."

They Did It Their Way - L

If you're seeing this for the first time and wondering what this "They did it their way" thing is about, read here for the background and full listing of this personal game of mine.

L

k.d. lang - After the Gold Rush
k.d. lang - Bird On a Wire
k.d. lang - Hallelujah
k.d. lang - Rose Garden
k.d. lang - Secret Love
Cyndi Lauper - Midnight Radio
Christine Lavin - Reminiscing With the Elusive Gentle Lonely Boxer Of Love
Annie Lennox - Ev'rytime We Say Goodbye
Annie Lennox - Something So Right
Annie Lennox - Take Me To the River
Annie Lennox - Train In Vain
Annie Lennox - Whiter Shade Of Pale
Lotte Lenya - Moritat vom Mackie Messer
Lotte Lenya - Surabaya-Johnny
David Lindley & El Rayo-X - Papa Was a Rolling Stone
David Lindley & El Rayo-X - Werewolves Of London
Lords Of the New Church - Like a Virgin
Lyle Lovett - Stand By Your Man
Lene Lovich - I Think We're Alone Now
Lene Lovich - I Think We're Alone Now (Japanese Version)
Low - Nowhere Man

After the Gold Rush, Bird On a Wire, Hallelujah are all from "Hymns of the 49th Parallel," which is an album of covers of Canadian songwriters. The deluxe edition of k.d.'s latest album, "Watershed," includes a nice live recording of "Hallelujah" as well. Rose Garden is from "Angel With a Lariat," and "Secret Love" is from the soundtrack of the documentary, "The Celluloid Closet."

Reminiscing With the Elusive Gentle Lonely Boxer Of Love is Christine Lavin's mashup of "Alone Again, Naturally," "The Boxer," "Those Were the Days," "Windmills of Your Mind" and "Elusive Butterfly" (I think I got them all, but not in the right order).

Cyndi Lauper's version of Midnight Radio is from the previously- mentioned album, "Wig In a Box," a tribute to the music from "Hedwig and the Angry Inch," and a fundraiser for the Harvey Milk school in New York.

Ev'rytime We Say Goodbye is from the previously mentioned, "Red Hot and Blue" AIDS fundraiser album from the early 90's. Something So Right. Take Me To the River, Train In Vain and Whiter Shade Of Pale are all from "Medusa," which is Annie's cover album.

Okay, here's the tricky one. If it was written by Kurt Weill and sung by Lotte Lenya, can it truly be called a "cover" song? Answer: I don't care. "Surabaya-Johnny, warum bist du so roh? / Surabaya-Johnny, mein Gott, und ich liebe dich so / Surabaya-Johnny, warum bin ich nicht froh? / Du hast kein Herz, Johnny, und ich liebe dich so." If you think Bette Midler can chew the scenery on this number, wait until you hear Lotte Lenya sing it. Even if you don't speak German, you have a pretty good idea of what she's singing about. Nimm doch die Pfeife aus der Maul, du Hund!

Papa Was a Rolling Stone and Werewolves Of London: Reggae-ska-blues covers of two great songs. Both from the album, "Very Greasy."

I have the Lords of the New Church's version of Like a Virgin on an IRS sampler CD from the mid-1980's. Just in case you were wondering if I ever throw anything away, here's your answer: I still have promo CDs I got over 20 years ago.

Lyle Lovett's version of Stand By Your Man is very nice. Everyone laughs at the idea of a man singing this song, but there is absolutely nothing in the lyrics that indicates that the person saying these things is a woman. And when a man sings it, it sounds kind of sexist.....

I Think We're Alone Now, both in English and in Japanese, just because. I still love Lene Lovich's music, and she didn't do very many covers.

Low's version of Nowhere Man is from the previously mentioned "This Bird Has Flown," the tribute to "Rubber Soul." Good. Not great, but good.

Gay Pride at the Onion

It looks like The Onion is doing primarily gay-themed stories this week:

Sample headlines:

Newly Out Gay Man Overdoing It (illustration, left)

Gay Couple Had Banal Sex

Where Do Homosexuals Get All Their Energy?

Even "American Voices" is going gay this week:

Straight Men, Gay Women Have Similar Brains

Abstinence Only

Via Joe.My.God.

Two parody "abstinence only" websites "produced by the US Dept. of Health & Human Services and the White House Office of Youth Purity" (from the good people who brought you White House.org).:

Sex Is For Fags (the abstinence-only site for boys) and
Iron Hymen (the abstinence-only site for girls).

Testimonials from Sex Is For Fags:

"Bert F.: 'My body is a sacred place, for holy stuff like Capri Sun juices, Lunchable Chicken Dunks, and Slim Jims (I like to snap into them!). The one thing that won't EVER go into my body? Girl slime!'

"Zach P.: 'Premarital sex isn't worth it! You can catch AIDS, or cancer, or testicle weevils, or a bad body image or rickets. You know what IS worth it? Making love to Jesus. Because you can't knock Him up and He'll never ask what you're thinking – cuz He already knows!'"

Testimonials from Iron Hymen:

"Brianna K.: 'Iron Hymen taught me how to use super-effective strategies for just abstaining from natural stuff. And it works so good, that now when I get all old, I'm going to abstain from wrinkles and dying, too!'

"Muffy P.: 'OHMIGOD, like, Iron Hymen taught me to respect myself way too much to ever let some hairy creep hock man-lugies on my Godly cervix like it's some gross subway platform!'"

Semi-hoax

Remember back at the end of May when the BBC had that big story that I repeated here about the unspoiled, uncontacted lost tribe photographed on the border of Peru? Everyone was forwarding the pictures to each other, and the story hit the news all over?

Well, today the Guardian has a follow-up article headed thus: "Secret of the 'lost' tribe that wasn't: Tribal guardian admits the Amazon Indians' existence was already known, but he hoped the publicity would lift the threat of logging"

The article continues, "...the tribe's existence has been noted since 1910 and the mission to photograph them was undertaken in order to prove that 'uncontacted' tribes still existed in an area endangered by the menace of the logging industry. . . . (T)he man behind the pictures, José Carlos Meirelles, . . . has no regrets, arguing that the pictures and video released to the world were powerful and indisputable evidence to those who say isolated tribes no longer exist."

Another convert...

World o' Jeff has linked to the YouTube video and has kindly given me a blog link as well. So thanks to Mr. Jeff for the kind words:

"It's a scene out of a musical- walking through Union square, and suddenly strangers begin to dance and sing- one voice at first, and soon a chorus line appears out of seemingly nowhere.

"Only it's not a movie, it's a San Francisco based performance art group calling them selves "Public Displays of Musical Affection". The Video itself is called 1...2...3:45 6/7/8. . . .Kudos to all who took part."

Where the Hell is Matt?

Another new viral.

"14 months in the making, 42 countries, and a cast of thousands. Thanks to everyone who danced with me."

Pretty damn groovy.

His website is here.

From his explanation of where the video came from:

A few months into his trip, a travel buddy gave Matt an idea. They were standing around taking pictures in Hanoi, and his friend said "Hey, why don't you stand over there and do that dance. I'll record it." He was referring to a particular dance Matt does. It's actually the only dance Matt does. He does it badly. Anyway, this turned out to be a very good idea.

A couple years later, someone found the video online and passed it to someone else, who passed it to someone else, and so on. Now Matt is quasi-famous as "That guy who dances on the internet. No, not that guy. The other one. No, not him either. I'll send you the link. It's funny."

The response to the first video brought Matt to the attention of the nice people at Stride gum. They asked Matt if he'd be interested in taking another trip around the world to make a new video. Matt asked if they'd be paying for it. They said yes. Matt thought this sounded like another very good idea.

Most Popular... er... I mean "Best" media of the last 25 years

Entertainment Weekly has posted several lists of "New Classics." Notice that while they can come with 100 movies, 100 albums and 100 TV shows, they can only come up with 50 plays (which means both musicals and non-musical dramatic plays). What they do not say is how they arrived at these rankings or whose input was used:

100 New Classics: Movies (best films from 1983 to 2008)
Top five:
1. Pulp Fiction (1994)
2. The Lord of the Rings trilogy (2001-03)
3. Titanic (1997)
4. Blue Velvet (1986)
5. Toy Story (1995)

100 New Classics: TV (best TV shows from 1983 to 2008)
Top five:
1. The Simpsons, Fox, 1989-present
2 The Sopranos, HBO (1999-2007)
3 Seinfeld, NBC (1989-98)
4 The X-Files, Fox (1993-2002)
5 Sex and the City, HBO (1998-2004)

100 New Classics: Music (best albums from 1983 to 2008)
Top five:
1. Purple Rain Prince and the Revolution (1984)
2. The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill Lauryn Hill (1998)
3. Achtung Baby U2 (1991)
4. The College Dropout Kanye West (2004)
5. Madonna Madonna (1983)
[Personal note: I own one of these, and I would dispute its inclusion in the top 100 albums of this time frame. Sorry, Lauryn, I love your voice, but I don't love that album. And while I think "Purple Rain" is a decent enough album, I can't imagine it being the best album of the last 25 years.]

100 New Classics: Books (best books from 1983 to 2008)
Top five:
1. The Road , Cormac McCarthy (2006)
2. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, J.K. Rowling (2000)
3. Beloved, Toni Morrison (1987)
4. The Liars' Club, Mary Karr (1995)
5. American Pastoral, Philip Roth (1997)
[Personal note: Why do they include only "Goblet of Fire" and not the full series (like they did with the "Lord of the Rings" movies)? I like "Beloved," but not that much. I tried reading "The Liars' Club," but it didn't hold my attention. I've never had a lot of patience with Philip Roth's writing. I've never read any Cormac McCarthy, so I can't comment there.]

50 New Classics: Style (Pop culture moments that "rocked the world)
Top five:
1. Madonna at the MTV Video Music Awards (1984)
2. Sarah Jessica Parker in the opening credits of Sex and the City (1998)
3. Michael Jackson in the ''Thriller'' video (1983)
4. Sharon Stone at the Oscars (1996)
5. Kurt Cobain and grunge style (1991)
[No further comment needed.]

50 New Classics: Stage (Best plays and musicals from 1983 to 2008)
Top five:
1. Angels in America (1993-94)
2. Rent (1996)
3. August: Osage County (2007)
4. Doubt (2004)
5. Jersey Boys (2005)
[Personal note: I won't argue with three of these, but I think two of them are way too high on the list. I'm surprised that "Jersey Boys" even made it into the top 50. And "Caroline, or Change" did not make the top 50 list, which says something by itself.]

If you want to see their lists of the 25 most influential gadgets and innovations or the 50 best videogames or the 25 best movie posters or the 25 new classic death scenes, etc., you can go look those up yourself.

They Did It Their Way - I, J and K

If you're seeing this for the first time and wondering what this "They did it their way" thing is about, read here for the background and full listing of this personal game of mine.

I

Indigo Girls - All Along the Watchtower
Indigo Girls - American Tune
Indigo Girls - Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee
Indigo Girls - Clampdown
Indigo Girls - Finlandia
Indigo Girls - Get Together
Indigo Girls - Love Of the Common People
Indigo Girls - Midnight Train To Georgia
Indigo Girls - Mona Lisas & Mad Hatters
Indigo Girls - Romeo And Juliet
Indigo Girls - Thin Line
Indigo Girls - Uncle John's Band


J

Joe Jackson - 'Round Midnight
Marti Jones - Follow You All Over the World
Marti Jones - Room With a View
Marti Jones - Ruby
Quincy Jones - Birdland
Quincy Jones - I'll Be Good To You
Gary Jules - Mad World


K

Chaka Khan - Signed, Sealed, Delivered (I'm Yours)
Alison Krauss - 9 To 5
Alison Krauss - When You Say Nothing At All


Yeah, it looks long, but the letter, "I," is just Indigo Girls, so I thought that was kind of cheating. And very few of their covers have videos available on YouTube. So I had to add two more letters of the alphabet in order to come up with ten non-Indigo-Girls tracks (not quite doubling the length of the list).

Finlandia was on their eponymous, self-released, vinyl EP. They have released a live version on their "Rarities" CD, but I digitized my EP because that version is, of course, the best one they've done, and all others are pale imitations. :-)

American Tune, Love Of the Common People and Mona Lisas & Mad Hatters were on "Reverse 1 - Live," a mostly-live EP that Epic issued only to radios in order to promote the Girls's first studio record (Schoolkids Records in Chapel Hill got a stack of them and sold them, which is how I have one), and these three remain some of my favorite tracks of theirs ever.

All Along the Watchtower is from "Back On the Bus, Y'all," a commercially-released live EP also issued to promote their first studio record.

Get Together was on the "Strange Fire" CD release. "Strange Fire" was their first full album, which they also self-released. Epic bought it and re-released it after "Indigo Girls" was a hit. They took off a couple of tracks and shoved in the cover of "Get Together" (recorded for the soundtrack to the TV series, "The Wonder Years").

Romeo And Juliet was recorded on "Rites of Passage." It was always one of Amy's favorite numbers to perform while Emily went off the stage and took a break.

Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee, Midnight Train To Georgia and Thin Line are all from the "1,000 Curfews" album. I don't particularly care about the first two, but the third is a song they did live very often in the mid- to late 1980's. It was written by another Atlanta artist named Gerard McHugh, and I was very glad that they finally recorded this one.

The other two tracks both come from tribute albums -- Clampdown is from the Clash tribute, "Burning London," and Uncle John's Band is from the Grateful Dead tribute album, "Deadicated." Both tracks were included on the I Girls's "Rarities" CD.

Joe Jackson's version of 'Round Midnight, as previously stated, is from a Thelonius Monk tribute album called "That's the Way I Feel Now." This is one track that I don't think has ever come off of my iPod.

It might not be 100% fair to include Marti Jones because people who are not from the Chapel Hill / Research Triangle area quite possibly aren't that familiar with her or with the original versions of two of these songs. Follow You All Over the World is a song by the dBs, which Marti recorded on her first album, "Unsophisticated Time," which has never been released on CD. Room With a View is a cover of a song by Let's Active, and was released both on Don Dixon's most recent CD, "The Entire Combustible World in One Small Room," and on the Let's Active tribute CD, "Every Word." Ruby is a cover of a Janis Ian song, and is actually quite similar to Janis's own version (on her album, "Revenge"). Even if you don't know any of these three songs, all three are terrific songs and terrific covers ("Room With a View" being the weakest link).

The two Quincy Jones numbers aren't really performed by Quincy (arranged and produced, but he's not the primary performer), but I didn't know how else to list these two tracks from "Back On the Block." Birdland is performed by Joe Zawinul, George Benson, Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis, James Moody, Ella Fitzgerald and Sarah Vaughn. I'll Be Good To You is performed by Chaka Khan & Ray Charles.

Gary Jules nearly had a hit with his cover of Tears for Fears's song, Mad World. This gives you the video he did before the song got used in the soundtrack for Donnie Darko.

Chaka Khan's version Signed, Sealed, Delivered (I'm Yours) is just as 80's electro synth-pop as was the version of "I'll Be Good To You" on "Back on the Block," but Chaka Khan has always been a happy singer, so I can still listen to this.

Alison Krauss's cover of When You Say Nothing At All is widely known, but I think it's too nice to pass up. Her cover of 9 To 5 is from the same album as Melissa Etheridge's version of "I Will Always Love You," the Dolly Parton tribute, "Just Because I'm a Woman."

OMGWTFBBQ!!1! (again)

The newest manufactured pre-teen pop sensations, The Clique Girlz.

Pitch correction for days, glamorizing vacuousness, sexualizing underage girls, a name that could imply that snubbing one's inferiors is an okay thing to do, plus a look that's kind of a cross between early Madonna, Dixie Chicks and Heather Locklear.

Yep, they'll be a smash hit, I fear. This beats even The Jonas Brothers.

And now for something completely different...

This video is making the rounds. Some people think it's the funniest thing in the world, other people think it's the scariest thing ever.

You decide.

More blogs...

The 1... 2... 3:45 6/7/8 video has been linked to in a few new blogs:

Popcultini, the personal blog of a Canadian journalist named Misty Harris ("Every time a group of people organizes online to do something silly and random, holier-than-thou scenesters -- they of American Apparel t-shirts and ironic moustaches -- twitter amongst themselves about how passe the whole thing is and what brain-dead "joiners" the participants are. Well, you know what? They can swing from their Chuck Taylor shoelaces because I think this sort of thing is badass.");

andnowwearefour ("If this doesn't make you wish you could be free, then you are far too well-adjusted and clearly don't work for the man. And if you need some impetus to watch it, here's a comment by a youtube user: "What? Why doesn't this vid have a trillion views? It's like... the new god"); and

San Francisco Love Story ("Public Art (This Gave Me The Chills)").

Keeping 1... 2... 3:45 6/7/8 up front a little longer

"Doomsday Machine"

Cinematic Titanic Episode 2, "Doomsday Machine," goes on sale tomorrow (June 19, 2008) at their website.

Another link into 1... 2... 3:45 6/7/8

Tolleson Design on Jackson has a blog where Eric Einwiller posted a link to YouTube yesterday with this description: "I think most people have come to expect these kind of shenanigans to happen in San Francisco, but this one is extra special."

Boss-speak Bingo

Found via HuffingtonPost:

The BBC site has a fun article about the most awful management-speak phrases (from reader submissions). (It is accompanied by a pdf "Boss-Speak Bingo" card (pictured, right). There is also a related and fun column by Lucy Kellaway.)

The list begins with:

#1: "When I worked for Verizon, I found the phrase going forward to be more sinister than annoying. When used by my boss - sorry, "team leader" - it was understood to mean that the topic of conversation was at an end and not be discussed again."
Nima Nassefat, Vancouver, Canada

#2 - "My employers (top half of FTSE 100) recently informed staff that we are no longer allowed to use the phrase brain storm because it might have negative connotations associated with fits. We must now take idea showers. I think that says it all really."
Anonymous, England

Read the whole article. It's worth it.

They didn't include my particular personal pet peeves, which are probably too old for anyone to care anymore:

1. Turning nouns into verbs. The BBC article includes "actioning" on their list, and I'm afraid that I'll probably be hearing more of that one in the near future. But they don't include the use of the noun, "task," as a verb. As in, "I've been tasked with dialoguing with you to directive you to stop verbing nouns going forward at this moment in time[1]."

2. "Grow" as an active verb. As in "By advertising strategically, we can grow our business." No, you can increase your business, you can expand your business, you can improve your business, but you cannot grow your business. Unless your business is a vegetable, facial hair, an African violet or mildew. Call me old-fashioned, but seeing/hearing this bad habit in others grows disgust and irritation in me.

---------------------------------------------------------------

[1] As opposed to what? "This moment in space?" "This moment in Fresno?"

"I'm Voting Republican because..."

"I'm voting Republican because..."

"I think the world should be run by one big corporation. I think it would be so much cozier."

"I just don't feel I deserve health insurance."

"All other nations are inferior to us. And we should start as many wars as we need to keep it that way."

"Sometimes the Constitution is just one big, inconvenient headache."

Website: "I'm Voting Republican: You'll Get What You Deserve." More details about the video here.

1... 2... 3:45 6/7/8 minor YouTube update

Another blog has linked to the YouTube video of 1... 2... 3:45 6/7/8 in a posting headed "The coolest video you'll see today." One comment posted in response: "Reminds me of Improv Everywhere, but that looks like it required more than average coordination to pull off. They did an awesome job though."

Traffic has slowed considerably on YouTube, but it's creeping up on 5,000 views (just 50 more to go). [UPDATE 6/17, 7 p.m.: Okay, it rolled over. It's at 5,017 views now.]

All the comments on the video are positive, and all the ratings have been 5-star.

In case you're wondering how I find the links to the video, YouTube is telling me. I get a list of all links that everyone uses to play the video. The video has also been linked to from a couple of forums, including a Bjork forum and one whose exact purpose I haven't figured out, and it has also been linked to from Twitter and Digg a couple of times, though it only had 4 Diggs last time I checked.

I don't get the same kinds of statistics from Current.com, but I think the Current.com version of the video is now getting more views per day than the YouTube version.

[FURTHER UPDATE: Bjork's people had the YouTube video taken down. Current and this blog are the only two places where it's still available.]

Onion Movie

I looked at the IMDB page for this movie and found out that it was filmed in 2003 and shelved due to bad test screenings. That comes as no surprise.

It had a handful of things that made me laugh, but almost all its jokes got run into the ground. And then pounded into the ground even farther. And then brought back at the end, because twice and three times is never enough.

This raised (again) the discussion about the weakness of Netflix's five-star rating system (1="hated it," 2="didn't like it," 3="liked it," 4="really liked it" and "5=best. movie. ever.").

Neither of us wants to go so far as to say "didn't like it," but neither of us wants to go so far as to say "liked it," either. We want a 2-1/2 star rating that means "thought it was just okay, wouldn't actually ask for my money back, but wouldn't recommend that anyone go out of their way to see it."

Which is actually how I expected it to be based on its trailer.

They Did It Their Way - G and H

If you're seeing this for the first time and wondering what this "They did it their way" thing is about, read here for the background and full listing of this personal game of mine.

G

Garbage - I Just Wanna Have Something To Do
Gnarls Barkley - Gone Daddy Gone
Joel Grey - White Room
Andy Griffith - House Of the Rising Sun
Nanci Griffith - Across the Great Divide
Nanci Griffith - From a Distance
Nanci Griffith - I Fought the Law
Nanci Griffith - If I Had a Hammer
Nanci Griffith - Speed Of the Sound Of Loneliness
Nanci Griffith - Bluer Than Blue
Nanci Griffith - When I Dream
Nanci Griffith - Ruby's Arms
Nanci Griffith - If These Walls Could Speak


H

Nina Hagen - Ave Maria
Nina Hagen - Fever
Nina Hagen - Las Vegas
Nina Hagen - Move Over
Nina Hagen - My Way
Nina Hagen - Pillow Talk
Nina Hagen - Sonntagmorgen
Nina Hagen - Spirit In the Sky
Nina Hagen - Sugar Blues
Nina Hagen - TV Glotzer (White Punks On Dope)
Nina Hagen - Wir Leben Immer...Noch (Lucky Number)
Jennifer Hudson - Easy To Be Hard


Garbage covers the Ramones. Not the best cover in the history of the world, but (a) Garbage rarely does covers, and (b) people don't cover the Ramones very often.

Gnarls Barkley covers Violent Femmes. You have to give points to anyone who covers Violent Femmes successfully.

Joel Grey and Andy Griffith dip into the "Golden Throat" collections again. This particular CD is called "The Great Celebrity Sing-Off," and apparently is not out of print.

Nanci Griffith has recorded two albums of her favorite folk songs -- "Other Voices, Other Rooms" and "Other Voices, Too (A Trip Back to Bountiful)." "Across the Great Divide" and "Speed of the Sound of Loneliness" are from the former, while "If I Had a Hammer" is from the latter. Her most recent album, "Ruby's Torch," is full of her favorite torch songs, though I might take issue with categorizing some of these songs as "torch songs." "Bluer Than Blue," "When I Dream," "Ruby's Arms" and "If These Walls Could Speak" are all from this album. Nanci Griffith also recorded "From a Distance" long before Bette Midler did, and it was a best-selling single in most countries except the US. Her US label wouldn't release the single because they thought people wouldn't like her singing voice. I included her version of "I Fought the Law" because it stands out in contrast to other versions, such as the one by The Clash. Nanci does it as a sort of a cross between Buddy Holly and Hank Williams.

Nina Hagen might be the queen of covers. I don't believe she's ever released an album that didn't include at least one cover song.(except maybe "Om Namah Shivay," which is an odd album even by Nina Hagen's standards). And, remember, Nina's cover of Sid Vicious's cover of "My Way" is where I got the name for this collection. "TV Glotzer (White Punks On Dope)" and "Wir Leben Immer...Noch (Lucky Number)" are from early in her career, first available in the US (to my memory) on a 10" EP. "My Way" and "Spirit In the Sky" were both on "Nina Hagen in Ecstasy" ("Nina Hagen en Ekstase"). :"Move Over," :"Las Vegas" and "Ave Maria" were all on "Nina Hagen" in the late 80s. Only Nina can get away with doing "Ave Maria" as a guitar ballad interpolating "Maria" from "West Side Story." "Pillow Talk" was on "Revolution Ballroom" in 1993. "Sonntagmorgen" was on "Freud Euch" (English version on "Bee Happy"). And "Fever" and "Sugar Blues" were on "Big Band Explosion," which I discussed in an early posting.

Jennifer Hudson's version of "Easy To Be Hard" is from the previously mentioned "Hair" benefit recording.

Found's "Finds of the Day"

To end the week, I had a pleasant little surprise -- something I submitted to Found Magazine last July made "Finds of the Day."

It's an 8-1/2" X 11" transparency that I found in the gutter on the corner of Sanchez and 17th Streets. After I scanned it and submitted it to Found, I hung it over my desk on my cubicle wall. To date, no one in the office has ever noticed it there.

Actually, it seems that it was one of two "Finds of the Day" yesterday, Thursday, June 12, but I didn't actually see it until this morning.

Alcohol with which to celebrate diversity

From today's SF Chronicle wine section (today, that's Section F).

There's an article today called "10 ways to drink in summer" (and, yes, it is illustrated with the photo on the right) wherein "...instead of matching wine, beer and spirits with meals, we decided to match them with the Bay Area's diverse summer events." The events include Shakespeare in the Park, Gay Pride Parade, Political Conventions, "June weddings," Baseball games, the Olympics and Burning Man.

Here's what they recommend for the Folsom Street Fair:

San Francisco's annual leather fetish festival falls on Sept. 28 (11 a.m.-6 p.m., Folsom Street, between Seventh and 12th streets). Its unique appeal demands an equally distinctive drink.

We decided to commission catering company Fork & Spoon Productions, which seems to have a flair for kinky. Jennifer Spiegel and her crew came up with the Luscious Lothario (see recipe, F4), a concoction of dark rum, citrus juice and Cock 'n Bull ginger beer (we do not make this stuff up, folks) available at Trader Joe's and Beverages & More.

"It's a really refreshing drink," says Spiegel. "It has a very outdoorsy, very summery feel. And it's not so strong that you're going to get drunk after one drink."

Luscious Lothario

Makes 1 drink

Created for the Folsom Street Fair by San Francisco's Fork & Spoon Productions catering company.

• 2 ounces dark rum
• 2 ounces fresh orange juice
• 1/2 ounce fresh lime juice
• 4 ounces ginger beer
• -- Orange wedge to garnish

Instructions: Place rum, orange and lime juice and plenty of ice in a shaker and shake vigorously. Strain into a tall glass filled with ice. Top with ginger beer and garnish with an orange wedge.

1.. 2.. 3:45 6/7/8 uploaded to Current.com

Current.com has combined my posting with Peter Stoddard's link to the YouTube video so that now my video and description show up where the YouTube video used to be, but the rest of the story including the comments are the ones from Peter's original posting.

LGBT Programming on KQED

I just got back from KQED's LGBT Local Hero presentation (Dixieland Dykes closed the program).

As part of the program, they showed clips from several shows that they will be airing during June for Gay Pride. There were several I'd already heard of or already seen part or all of, but there were a few I'd not heard of that looked extremely interesting, even to a jaded old sod like myself.

Billy Strayhorn: Lush Life - Have I heard of this one before? Or was that another documentary about Billy Strayhorn?

Anyone and Everyone - Interviews with the a wide variety of families recalling when their son or daughter or sibling came out to them.

It's Elementary: Talking About Gay Issues in Schools - Pretty self-explanatory title. Fascinating trailer intercutting footage of a Republican Congressman railing against even mentioning the word "homosexuality" to kids with footage of grade-school kids saying things like "What's the big whoop?"

Current.com news

Dirty Work (again)

I've heard from people that they missed this, so I thought I'd point it out again.

Over on the left side of the page under the designation "Additional Reading" is a link to a second blog called "Dirty Work."

This is actually a slightly fictionalized account of a few months in the mid-1980's when my job suddenly and unexpectedly required me to watch heterosexual adult videotapes. Every. Night. Of. The. Week.

Since it's not easy to talk about such things while using genteel language, the story has an "adult content" warning on it. There is no sex in the story at all, just people talking (sometimes graphically) about the content of some of the videotapes we were watching. It is not erotica, just foul language and (as Ira Glass would say) it acknowledges the existence of sex. So if you are offended by such things, I put them where you shouldn't stumble across them by accident.

It's low humor, it's entirely devoid of socially redeeming qualities, but it is (I hope) at least mildly entertaining.

Abigail (yet again)

Repeating an earlier posting:

If you've not seen it before, you should check out Abigail's "X-Rated" Teen Diary. Despite the title, it is TOTALLY safe for work. The "X-Rated," she explains, is just adult-speak for "You're not supposed to look at this, it's private."

The premise is that between the seventh and eighth grades, Abigail developed Bloomberger's Syndrome, which is this disease that, like, totally changes your DNNA 'n' stuff -- the upshot of which is that this thirteen-year-old girl happens to look exactly like a middle-aged man, though she still talks and acts like a thirteen-year-old girl..

She posts new videos every Tuesday and Thursday (recently changed from three times a week), and the videos tend to run between thirty seconds to two minutes. The entire backlog of Abigail videos is available for viewing on her site. There is also a channel on YouTube, and the whole series of videos is available as a video podcast through iTunes as well.

If you know a man in the Bay Area, preferably with some facial hair and/or bald(ing), who is willing to do some kind of semi-scripted semi-improvisation on camera for a couple of hours some weekend, let me know. I want to send a video response to Abigail, but I need someone to play my mother or whose mother I can play. In other words, I've got a couple of ideas (one of which is that Mom has adult-onset Bloomberger's syndrome), but I don't insist that we do those things specifically. We would work together to do whatever works best.

So if you know someone who would be interested in doing this or if you yourself are interested in doing this, let me know. If you don't already know my e-mail address, either leave a comment on this posting or click on my profile on the left-hand side of this page to find an e-mail link.

Another YouTube video

Someone else has posted their video of "1... 2... 3:45 6/7/8" to YouTube.

Meanwhile, our own video is fast approaching 3,000 views in the first 48 hours after it was posted on YouTube.

Flickr Photostream of 1... 2... 3:45 6/7/8

Dancing to Bjork's Oh So Quiet -12..345..678 in Union Square
Originally uploaded by Steve Rhodes

Steve Rhodes has posted some wonderful photos of the event on Flickr.

Also, there are a couple of other photos and a short cell phone video of the performance at Iced Tea & Sarcasm by someone called "Todd X." And our YouTube video has shown up on SFist in a posting headed, "Public Displays of Musical Affection Dances to Bjork's 'It's Oh So Quiet'"

[UPDATE: Karen and Margery found another link to the YouTube video at current.com in a posting headed "60 people spontaneously break into Bjork's 'Oh So Quiet' in San Francisco" with twenty or so user comments, almost entirely positive. I also stumbled across a posting headed "Group of 50+ Break into Spontaneos Dance to Bjork" on a blog called "Wilde Republic."]

Tendinitis

My left shoulder has been hurting at irregular intervals for at least four months. Over the last few weeks, it has been getting worse, to the point that it was getting unpleasant to lift my arms over my head for any reason (e.g., putting on a T-shirt). Putting a carry-on bag in the overhead compartment would have been completely out of the question.

So on Friday I went to the doctor about it. She said I have tendinitis. Until she pointed it out, I had never noticed that my shoulder has developed a clicking noise during certain motions.

Anyhow, long story short, she gave me a prescription for an NSAID, a physical therapy band and a list of stretching exercises. She also gave me a list of general stretches that don't involve the band, and it turns out that I've been doing some of them already.

So I hope to be normal again in a couple of weeks (or as close to normal as I get).

1... 2... 3:45 6/7/8 on YouTube

I added the video to YouTube as well in a higher-res version.

If you have not heard about this event, the idea was for people in Union Square to burst spontaneously into a musical number (she chose Bjork's version of "It's Oh So Quiet").

And this was the result.

Major kudos to all the dancers for a fun, fun event. And Special Major Kudos to Karen Offereins for pulling this off against the odds (including Naked Conch Shell "WAKE UP, PEOPLE!" Lady, as well as the Fellini-esque political demonstration the also burst out spontaneously at 3:35)

[UPDATE: Apparently, Bjork's people found the video and asked YouTube to take it down for copyright violations. They're welcome to have every single penny that I earned from it, in which case they owe me money....]

1... 2... 3:45 6/7/8

This is a medium-resolution version.

I just wanted to get something up ASAP, though we are still making some potential tweaks.

[Note to all the people who've been arriving from Facebook in the last couple of days: You know, you can find a much better quality version of this video by following this link to Current.com or by following this link to another article in this same blog.]

Before and After

Here's a pretty striking before and after of the Castro Theater (click to enlarge). I had forgotten how monochrome it used to be until I stumbled on the old photo on the left.

And they fixed all the lights, too.

1... 2... 3:45 6/7/8 Union Square rehearsal photos

I'm still working on the video, but here are some stills from the rehearsals.

[UPDATE: Video was posted to YouTube on Sunday afternoon.]

[UPDATED UPDATE: Bjork's people had the YouTube video taken down. But the video's still available on Current.com.]