Play It Loud!

 

From the Cloisters, our tour guide took us to the Metropolitan Museum of Art (Met) in mid-town Manhattan. By chance, the Met was featuring "Play It Loud," an exhibit of some 130 roll 'n roll instruments, including guitars, drums, and pianos from performers like the Beatles, Led Zeppelin, the Who, Prince, Elvis, and Brice Springsteen. We spent so much time ogling the instruments that we pretty much missed the rest of the museum!

 

Saxophone of Louis Jordan, early

R&B performer

 

Elvis's guitar

 

Buddy Holly's guitar

 

Ringo's "kit" and one of George Harrison's many guitars

 

John Lennon's Rickenbacker guitar

 

Originally painted in "fireglo sunburst,"

George Harrison changed the color of his

Rickenbacker to match John's

 

Eric Clapton's famous Stratocaster "Blackie"

 

Neil Young's Gibson Flying V guitar

 

Stevie Ray Vaughn

 

Bruce Springsteen

 

Jimmy Page (Led Zeppelin)

 

Keith Richards (Rolling Stones)

 

Prince

 

And Prince again

 

Rick Nielsen's (Cheap Trick) custom five-neck guitar

 

Paul McCartney's Union Jack bass (r)

 

The Who's drums

 

Organ played by Sam the Sham & the Pharaohs on "Wooly Bully"

 

Ray Manzerek's (The Doors) electric organ

 

John Sebastian's (Lovin' Spoonful) autoharp

 

Lady Gaga's piano

Santiago de Cuba

Our final stop was in Santiago de Cuba, home of "son" (salsa music), "ron" (rum) and "revolución." Santiago is also the second largest city in Cuba and was the country's capitol until the late 1500s. 

Physically closer to other Caribbean islands than it is to Havana, Santiago's African influence is especially apparent in the local music, which gave birth to what we know as salsa. Desi Arnaz and several musicians from the Buena Vista Social Club were born in Santiago. 

Fidel Castro is buried here, as is his hero José Martí, the "Apostle of Cuban Independence" and author of the poem "Guantanamera" on which the popular (and ubiquitous!) song is based. 

And if that's not enough, San Juan Hill, the site of Teddy Roosevelt's famous charge during the Spanish-American War, is also located here. We took a 3-hour bus tour of the city, but could have easily spent another day absorbing the culture and tremendous history of this fascinating place.

The balcony from which three popes--John Paul II (1998), 

Benedict XVI (2012), and Francis (2015)--all addressed the

Cuban people

Mid-century architecture right next to early European

Shrine to son musicians

And the chair Paul McCartney sat in when

he came to hear the music of Santiago in 2000

Surprise salsa dance performance!

And wonderful live music!! Taken 10 minutes before Tim 

and I got up and danced.

San Juan Hill, where Teddy Roosevelt and the

Rough Riders helped win what the Cubans, by law,

call the Spanish-American Cuban war

Our final fort, El Morro, and final view of Santiago.

Adios, Cuba, y hasta luego!

Tower Records

Grammy Museum theater

On Wednesday night, Tim and I attended a special screening of the documentary All Things Must Pass at the Grammy Museum. Directed by Colin Hanks, the film chronicles the rise of the mega-record-store-chain, Tower Records, from a small phonograph collection at the back of a Sacramento drugstore, to its sad demise in 2006. A Q&A panel followed afterward with Hanks and store founder Russ Solomon.

As a kid, I bought all my LPs and 45s at local discount stores (does anyone else remember Zodys? ) and a small record shop on Burbank’s “golden mall.” But once I became a young adult, I started shopping at the legendary Tower Records on Sunset Blvd., where I often stopped on my way home from classes at UCLA. The store was enormous. Even though I only ever bought pop and rock albums, the inventory was tremendous: everything from movie soundtracks to jazz to Top 40 to classical to world music. The staff wasn’t the friendliest bunch on the planet, but they certainly knew their music.

Favorite memory: Not knowing what else to do, I drove up to the Sunset Tower the day after John Lennon was killed. I guess I just needed to be with other people who loved John. His music was playing overhead and someone had pulled together an exhibit of his albums. Otherwise, it was business as usual--which in its own way was comforting. It was good to know the entire world hadn’t gone as crazy as I was feeling.

The film is fabulous--completely evocative of the period and the Tower Records experience. Still, Hanks hasn’t yet found a distributor and so is showing the doc at festivals and small venues, like the Grammy Museum. If you’ve ever bought anything at Tower Records—hell, if you listened music, any kind of music, during the 1960s, ‘70s or ‘80s—you must see this movie.

Colin Hanks (second from left) and

Russ Solomon (right)

Linda Ronstadt

A shared love of music was one of the things that brought Tim and me together almost thirty years ago: certainly the rock ‘n roll of our youth, but also Frank Sinatra, Tony Bennett and Linda Ronstadt, who in the mid-1980s discovered the Great American Songbook. Ronstadt’s music—especially her heart-wrenching albums Hasten Down the Wind and Prisoner in Disguise—had gotten me through many sad interludes as a young adult. Then Tim came along and suddenly we were slow-dancing to Linda’s rendition of the 1930s song “What’s New?”—one of the most romantic memories of our early courtship. Ronstadt’s music has always been there, in good times and bad.

In August, she shocked her fans by announcing that she's had Parkinson’s disease for several years and, as a result, can no longer sing. I was, therefore, very worried that last night’s Writer’s Bloc event with Ronstadt and interviewer Patt Morrison might be maudlin and filled with regret. But, happily, I was completely wrong. Linda was cheerful, intelligent and full of life as she reminisced about her bilingual childhood in Arizona (“I thought people sang in Spanish and spoke in English”) as well as her successful career as one of rock’s leading female singers. She shared how her back-up band—which went on to become the Eagles—was haphazardly pulled together and told a funny story illustrating how cheap her famous former boyfriend, California governor Jerry Brown, was. She also spoke in favor of immigrant reform and art education in schools. 

If anyone had any doubt when they walked into the theater, they now know Linda Ronstadt is a liberal Democrat, a banner she has always been proud to wave. But this is one smart woman who won’t let any single political ideology, musical style or disease define her. It was wonderful hearing her speak.

For an excellent review of the evening, I highly recommend today’s entry in Kevin Roderick’s blog L.A. Observed. And, yes, Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson were there last night, seated two rows away from us. Tom literally sat on the edge of his seat for most of the event, while Rita tweeted much of what Ronstadt said.

Linda’s book Simple Dreams is now available at a bookstore or library near you. 

Linda Ronstadt's recent interview with Diane Sawyer

'60s Rock 'n Roll

I nearly drove off the side of the road the first time I saw this billboard. There they were: the Beatles, floating above the street just three blocks from our house. Two months later, they are now ubiquitous throughout the city, inviting us to buy their music on iTunes. I love seeing them, even though they’ve become a big part of the visual noise of Los Angeles.

And speaking of the Beatles, Tim and I are in the midst of taking a (free!) five-week class called “What a Long Strange Trip It’s Been: A Review of Rock’s Greatest Decade” at the Grammy Museum downtown. I’d looked for such an opportunity for years. Still, I thought it was a risky commitment since we’ve both been students of 1960s rock-n-roll our entire lives—Tim, in fact, is currently reading Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards’ new autobiography. Would we know more about the topic than the instructor?

But not to worry. Robert Santelli, executive director of the Museum, is an excellent teacher and master storyteller. Not only is he our age, he’s also met and worked with many of the artists he talks about, making his classes extremely personal and fascinating. I knew we’d struck gold when, halfway through the first session, Tim leaned over and whispered, “I LOVE THIS!”

In the first class, Santelli highlighted music of the early 1960s, positing that this era is often forgotten because no one sound dominated. Sure, there were the “girl groups” and male teen idols we all watched on American Bandstand. These were also formative years for Motown and the Beach Boys. Still, no one great group or musician emerged like, say, the Beatles or Eric Clapton, so this period has been forgotten. At the end of the first session, Santelli promised to dedicate the entire next class to the single most influential songwriter of our generation.

“Paul Simon?” I said, daring Tim to disagree.

“Nope! Brian Wilson!" he countered.

We were, of course, both wrong. According to Santelli, Bob Dylan was the single most influential songwriter—and to hear him tell it, the single most influential human being!—of our generation. I’ve never been much of a Dylan fan (sorry Ginny!), but the lecture was illuminating, taking us through the singer’s entire career right up to last year, when Dylan joined Santelli at the White House for a concert celebrating civil rights. Exciting stuff.

Week 3 finally brought us to what Santelli calls the “1st British invasion”—the Beatles, naturally, but also early Clapton, the Animals, and groups like the Dave Clark Five. I especially liked how the instructor focused on the Beatles’ formative period in Germany—a time that I’ve always found absolutely fascinating. At one point, Santelli asked the students—some 150 of us, mostly baby-boomers—if anyone in the room had seen the Beatles in concert. A woman said she’d seen them twice: she was in the audience for their first Ed Sullivan appearance and then again at Shea Stadium. Our collective jaws dropped in pure envy.

The Beatles’ story continued in week 4 as Santelli compared the group’s (arguably) greatest album, Sgt. Pepper (1967), to the Beach Boys’ Pet Sounds (1966). Though I didn’t think so then, I now believe Pet Sounds is the far superior album and listen to its songs regularly. Sgt. Pepper, on the other hand, is fairly dated—“A Day in the Life” being the only song worth playing over and over again. Santelli then challenged us to come up with a list of the 25 most important rock songs of the ‘60s. Here are mine (in alphabetical order):

All Along the Watchtower (Jimi Hendrix)

Be My Baby (The Ronettes)

California Girls (The Beach Boys)

Crossroads (Cream)

A Day in the Life (The Beatles)

Eight Miles High (The Byrds)

For What It’s Worth (Buffalo Springfield)

God Only Knows (The Beach Boys)

Good Vibrations (The Beach Boys)

I Got You Babe (Sonny and Cher)

I Heard It Through the Grapevine (Marvin Gaye)

I Saw Her Standing There (The Beatles)

Light My Fire (The Doors)

Like a Rollin’ Stone (Bob Dylan)

Louie, Louie (The Kingsmen)

Respect (Aretha Franklin)

Satisfaction (Rolling Stones)

Something (The Beatles)

Sounds of Silence (Simon & Garfunkel)

Stop! In the Name of Love (The Supremes)

What’d I Say (Ray Charles)

White Rabbit (Jefferson Airplane)

Whole Lotta Lovin’ (Led Zeppelin)

Woodstock (Crosby, Stills and Nash)

You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling (The Righteous Brothers)


One more class to go. We’ll be discussing the 2nd “British invasion” (e.g., Led Zeppelin, et al.) on Tuesday.

Which 25 rock songs would you nominate as the best of the 1960s?

826

In my professional life I’m known as the “queen of after-school homework centers”—that is, I study homework help programs offered by public libraries after school. I am, of course, also a big fan of homework assistance provided by other agencies, including 826, a national nonprofit co-founded by author Dave Eggers eight years ago. 826 combines pop culture, celebrity (as well as non-celebrity) tutors, and fun to make homework attractive to kids who might not otherwise get the help they need. There are two 826 outlets in L.A.

Judd Apatow, one of our favorite filmmakers, is also a big fan of 826 and, in fact, held a big fundraiser a couple of years ago to help launch the Echo Park Time Travel Mart, one of 826’s wacky storefronts. He’s also donating the proceeds from his new book I Found This Funny, which was released last night at another big fundraising event. We were there.

The event was held at the Writers Guild of America theater in Beverly Hills, one block from Kate Mantilini, the single best restaurant in L.A. for spotting celebrities—plus the food is fabulous! We arrived early enough so we could eat dinner before joining the festivities. No surprise that Judd Apatow was there, too, sitting two tables away from us. We watched as people came over to pay their respects and exclaim their excitement about the night ahead. We, on the other hand, played it cool and focused our energies on eating. We then walked over to the theater.

There was no red carpet—unusual for an event that promised star wattage—but there was a gaggle of autograph-seekers standing outside the front door. They took one look at us and quickly went back to talking among themselves. Obviously we were nobodies. We then entered the theater’s lobby and were greeted by the happy din of a couple hundred people drinking and having a good time. These were the VIPs—mostly young hipsters, dressed in black—who had paid top dollar to attend. We did not pay top dollar, so were handed copies of Apatow’s book and told to find a seat in the theater. The show started 30 minutes later.

After a short film about 826’s Echo Park site, Dave Eggers got the ball rolling by introducing Apatow, who riffed a bit before introducing standup comedian Aziz Ansari (Tom on the TV show Parks and Recreation). Ansari was hilarious, talking about dating in L.A. and why men his age (27 years old) should not be parents (very funny, but unrepeatable in a PG-rated blog!). He was followed by Ryan Adams, a young country-rock singer who apparently hasn’t performed on stage in a while. I had never heard of him, but did enjoy his folksy style.

The highlight of the evening, though—and, quite frankly, one of the main reasons we went—was Garry Shandling, Apatow’s comic mentor, whom we’ve seen several times. Shandling was a riot, dispensing deadpan dating advice to Aziz Ansari and commenting on current affairs. His best line of the night: “I see Sarah Palin is thinking of running for president. I guess the Mayans were right about the world coming to an end in 2012.” He also said he didn’t care if Muslims built a mosque on the site of the World Trade Center, because there is no such thing as sacred land in Los Angeles. “Except, of course, the La Brea tarpits, but even there the buildings are a little too close to the edge.” Ahhh, L.A. humor!

The other highlight was Randy Newman, who sang a few songs, including our anthem “I Love L.A.” Afterward I grumped to Tim that the audience should have burst into spontaneously singing during “I Love L.A.,” but then decided they were probably all too young to know the lyrics.

The evening ended with former Fleetwood Mac guitarist Lindsey Buckingham singing four of his greatest hits. Why he needed a different guitar for each song was beyond me, but the audience didn’t seem to care. They gave him a rousing standing ovation when he was done.

Louis & Keely: Live at the Sahara

Like a lot of baby-boomers, Tim and I grew-up listening to American “standards” as well as rock ‘n roll. In fact, a shared love of Frank Sinatra was one of the things that drew us together. We’re also big fans of Bobby Darin (during his “Frank period”) and Louie Prima and Keely Smith, whom we remember seeing several times on the Ed Sullivan Show when we were kids.

Louie and Keely were the Sonny and Cher of their day. Not only did songwriter-singer Louie Prima marry a much younger woman (22 years his junior), he—like Sonny did with Cher—also helped make her into a legendary songstress. What was always most fascinating to me, though, was the way they interacted on stage. Louie was uncontrollable, leaping around the stage like a banshee, while Keely stood cool as a cucumber, refusing to be moved by his antics. Sonny and Cher imitated this schtick a decade later, but (even to my young eyes) never did it quite as well.

Last year, a play called Louis & Keely: Live at the Sahara opened to rave reviews at the Sacred Fools Theater in East Hollywood. We were too late to get tickets, but did see it when it moved to The Matrix on Melrose a few months later. We were totally blown away. Written and performed by Jake Broder and Vanessa Claire Smith, the play chronicles Louie and Keely’s relationship from the time they met to the end of their marriage. Smith is good as Keely; but it’s really Broder’s show as he sings, jumps and sweats his way through more than ten highly energetic songs. We were exhausted by the time we left the theater.

Though Tim isn’t much for repeat performances, he did eagerly agree to see the show again when it returned to L.A. two weeks ago. Now at the Geffen’s intimate Audrey Skirball Kenis Theater in Westwood, the play has been reworked (i.e., tightened) by Oscar-nominated director Taylor Hackford, who is also a big Louie and Keely fan. New characters have been added, including Sinatra, who plays a major role in the couple’s ultimate breakup. I didn’t think it was possible, but this revamped version is even better than the original.

So if you’re in the L.A. area and love the old Vegas singers of our youth, then I highly recommend grabbing tickets to Louis & Keely: Live at the Sahara. The play runs till April 26 and is well worth the price of admission.

Revisiting the Grammy Museum

I just got back from spending three hours at the Grammy Museum and LOVED it, despite my previous brief but negative review. Yes, it’s no Rock and Roll Hall of Fame nor is it as dramatic as The Experience Music Project, but it’s wonderful nonetheless—especially when you get there at 10:00 on Sunday morning and have the place all to yourself!

The Museum is small—just three floors of exhibits and a lobby. The top floor provides an historical overview of, say, the past 80 years of popular music. Subsequent floors focus more on the Grammys themselves: memorable performances, filming the telecasts, charity events featuring Grammy winners, etc. There’s also an interesting display on how music is made, covering the perspectives of everyone from the artists (e.g., Robert Plant and Alison Krauss) to the studio musicians (e.g., the Wrecking Crew again!) to the producers (e.g., Phil Spector and Ahmet Ertegun). Finally, a handful of permanent exhibits talking about the cultural influence of protest music.

Although the Museum is currently showing a loaner collection of Michael Jackson’s more famous musical costumes—including an assortment of gloves—most of the exhibits are audio- or video-based: historic clips of Elvis, Frank Sinatra, Marvin Gaye, et al.; interviews with contemporary artists, who reveal, among other things, which groups most profoundly influenced their musical style (guess who was mentioned the most?—the Beatles, of course!); snippets of seminal tunes from some 50+ music genres (yes, even classical and folk); and more. Most moving to me was a duet by Carole King and James Taylor, singing “You’ve Got a Friend,” one of the most important songs of my young adulthood. Plus I loved the brief videos on the now famous “No Nukes” concert held in NYC in 1979 and the Dixie Chicks’ resurgence after being ostracized for publicly criticizing George Bush’s actions in Iraq.

But the best thing of all—definitely worth the price of admission alone—was the huge screen on the third floor, showing many of the greatest Grammy moments over the years: Tina Turner singing “What’s Love Got to Do With It,” walking down an impossibly steep staircase in her trademark high heels and impossibly short mini-dress; Ella Fitzgerald and Mel Torme scat-singing to a jazz tune; a baldheaded Melissa Ethridge, channeling Janice Joplin, after surviving breast cancer; Louie Armstrong on trumpet; Count Basie on piano; and much, much more. I was hoping to see footage of George, Paul and Ringo’s reunion after John Lennon died, but decided it was time to go home after waiting an hour. Besides, I needed an excuse to return another Sunday when Tim could go with me.

If you love popular music and have a few hours to spare, I highly recommend a trip to the Grammy Museum in downtown’s new L.A. Live complex. I guarantee it will make you feel young again.