Sophisticated Boom Boom 

Nearly forgotten in the sixty years since their first hit, the Shangri-Las hit the news this past weekend when Mary Weiss, their blonde lead singer, died at age 75. 

The Shangri-Las’ musical coming of age came just as Beatlemania was crashing the shores and the Brill Building girl group sound began to falter. Four teenagers from Queens, sisters Mary and Betty Weiss and twins Marge and Mary Ann Ganser, cut “Remember (Walking in the Sand)” and it went to #5 in July, 1964. Even in a year with so many great records – “Dancing in the Street,” “House of the Rising Sun,” “She Loves You,” “Oh Pretty Woman” – “Remember,” with its doomsday piano chords, seagull sounds, finger snaps and Mary Weiss’ emotional vocal still holds up its end quite well. 

I was just a kid, so older girls were a mystery, but I’d watch the Shangri-Las lip-synching on Clay Cole’s dance show, and they seemed to have a worldliness about them, like the high school girls I’d see at the Woolworth’s downtown, shopping for make-up and wearing their boyfriend’s oversized blue and gold letter jackets. 

The Shangri-Las’ label wasted no time with a follow-up. “Remember” was still in the top five when “Leader of the Pack” was released that October. By the end of November it hit #1. 

This video tells you all you need to know about how seriously adults, especially variety show directors, took the record: 

The song starts as every parent’s bad dream – their daughter in love with a dropout from the “wrong side of town,” a J.D. who’s convinced her that he has a shy, vulnerable side (“They told me he was bad, but I knew he was sad’). But it shifts gears and becomes the teenager’s nightmare when dad tells her to dump the loser; he pulls off recklessly onto the rain-slicked road and crashes his motorcycle. Jimmy’s dead! And it’s dad’s fault! 

Shangri-La records were equal parts innocence and toughness, moody teenage melodramas. And musically adventurous: sassy vocals in “Sophisticated Boom Boom,” Iron Butterfly psychedelic overtones of  “The Sweet Sounds of Summer” or Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata playing underneath “Past, Present and Future,” they were all groundbreaking in their own way. 

Shadow Morton wrote "Remember" and co-wrote "Leader of the Pack." He produced the Shangri-Las and captured all that angsty teenage attitude before going on to produce the Vanilla Fudge, whose over-wrought vocals and arrangements squeezed every bit of drama possible from their Motown and Beatles covers, and Janis Ian. Think of  “Society’s Child” as essentially a Shangri-Las record with a wider worldview. 

Growing up, Bruce Springsteen surely internalized some of these sounds. His arrangements of “Jungleland” and “Backstreets” owed a lot to Morton. And when he sang, “I know your daddy don’t dig me, but he never did understand,” the Leader of the Pack couldn’t have said it any better.

A year of movies 

Last year, I watched 186 movies, mostly recorded off TCM, a few off lesser cable movie channels and one in an actual movie theatre. Here’s a couple of random thoughts. 

The Bowery Boys made 48 movies and I watched 21 of them last year, much more than any human should endure. If you’re looking for continuity within the Bowery Boys Cinematic Universe, forget it. What drove me crazy was the character of Gabe (Gabe Dell), whose personality and occupation changed from one movie to the next, anything to move the story along. He’s a private detective, or a washing machine salesman, a naval officer (with a French wife), muck-racking radio commentator, then he crosses over the tracks to play a hoodlum. And that’s just what comes to mind immediately. 

Bewildered

It also dawned on me that Huntz Hall plays his character Sach like the hophead Hall was in real life (he was arrested in 1948 for marijuana possession): the always-bewildered look, the stream of non-sequiturs and a fascination with the mundane. He was scoring more than just banana splits at Louie’s Sweet Shop. 

Here are the five unexpectedly best movies I saw last year: 

Stray Dog (1949) was directed by Akira Kurosawa and stars Toshiro Mifune as a detective whose service revolver is stolen and used to kill someone in a robbery. He and his partner track the killer in post-war Japan (which looks a mess, all rutted roads and shacks, people crippled with disillusionment), conducted during an oppressive heat wave that almost becomes another character. On a night when thunderstorms threaten, you know that the heat wave, and the case, are about to be cracked. 

Saw Godzilla (2023) in the theatre. You’d expect a sci-fi movie made in 2023 to have great special effects and this one doesn’t disappoint. What you wouldn’t expect is a compelling subplot about the redemption of a failed war hero, a kamikaze pilot who had second thoughts. 

The Asphalt Jungle (1950) is a heist film nor full of betrayals and bad blood, with a all-star cast of character actors -- Sterling Hayden, Sam Jaffe, Marc Lawrence, John McIntyre, James Whitmore, Louis Calhern and Jean Hagen, not to mention Marilyn Monroe in an uncredited role as lawyer Calhern's kept woman. With a perfect dream-like ending that takes place hundreds of miles from any asphalt jungle. 

On the surface, the premise of Metropolitan (1990) doesn't sound all that promising: A group of privileged white kids participate in the gala debutante season. As unsympathetic and pretentious as they sometimes seem, between earnest discussions about Jane Austen and dancing in conga lines, several of them, played by amateur actors, do a lot of growing up in the movie as the film takes several poignant turns. 

A hitman is assigned to knock off an overly ambitious crime lord during the Christmas holidays. That's the plot of Blast of Silence (1961), filmed guerilla style without permits on the Staten Island Ferry, Queens, the Village, Harlem and Rockefeller Center. It offers glimpses of a long-gone New York City: a hotel with a sign welcoming “transients” and street views of bookstores, record stores and what used to be called stationery stores that sold newspapers, magazines, cigars and candy. A good punchy story too.

Are you a mouse or a monkey?

The news that the earliest version of Mickey Mouse (silent, and in black and white) was moving into the public domain effective today, coupled with the holiday season, resurfaced my lifelong obsession/fascination with the Mickey Mouse character in March of the Wooden Soldiers (1934) going back many decades to when I first watched the movie one Thanksgiving morning on WPIX Channel 11.

For years I thought it was a puppet, before I realized, or was told, that Mickey is played by a monkey wearing what appears to be a suffocating rubber head over its own, which may account for some of its drunken stumbling:

There’s no listing for the mouse in the film’s credits, but March of the Wooden Soldiers was directed by Hal Roach, the film studio head responsible for The Little Rascals, and this scene from 1931 might reveal the monkey behind the mouse in an earlier role.

Internet research says that there was a Jocko, a Joe and a Josephine, all monkeys that appeared in dozens of film shorts and movies around this time. They may have also all worked under different stage names, trained by a former organ grinder named Tony Campanaro, who also trained The Little Rascals’ dog Petey.

Walt Disney was notoriously stingy about copyrights, but since he and Hal Roach were country club buddies, he granted Roach permission to not only use Mickey, but also snippets of music from Disney’s Three Little Pigs cartoon, released in 1933, in March of the Wooden Soldiers.

The scene where Mickey throws the brick at the cat isn’t quite copyright infringement, but “borrowed” from Krazy Kat and Ignatz the Mouse, a popular comic strip and cartoon at the time.

With the early version of Mickey Mouse now in the public domain, you can probably expect the character to appear in some horrible pornography (Minnie Mouse is joining Mickey for public use) or bloodthirsty video games; nothing as innocent as March of the Wooden Soldiers.

Christmas Number One 

The British have this peculiar tradition of coronating whatever song is at the top of the charts on Christmas as that year’s “Christmas Number One.” People used to flock to the record shops to buy it (now done online) and the anticipation was enough that bookmakers began taking bets on which song would make the top of charts Christmas day.         

Nobody would ever describe any glam band, all of whom worked very hard at looking and sounding over-the-top, as shy and unassuming, so it's no surprise that in 1973 Slade and Wizzard deliberately released holiday songs in an effort to reach the top of the charts at Christmas. Slade won. 

Wikipedia says that more recently, the Christmas Number One has been mostly holiday novelties or songs recorded by reality TV personalities in a bid to stretch their minute of fame into two. Even without hearing any of this, it just seems like the dregs of the eggnog. 

Of course, here in the U.S. we’re much too sophisticated to give any time to anything so cheap and exploitive but just for the heck of it, here are the number one singles on the U.S. Billboard charts each Christmas morning for ten years starting in 1964: 

1964: I Feel Fine – Beatles

1965: Over and Over – Dave Clark Five

1966: I’m a Believer – Monkees

1967: Hello, Goodbye – Beatles

1968: I Heard It Through the Grapevine – Marvin Gaye

1969: Someday We’ll Be Together – Supremes

1970: Tears of A Clown – Smokey Robinson & Miracles

1971: Brand New Key – Melanie

1972: Me and Mrs. Jones – Billy Paul

1973: Time In A Bottle – Jim Croce 

Not a bad group of songs overall, although it takes a downturn, predictably, after 1970. “Over and Over” had perfect timing, hitting the number one spot for just this week in 1965 by bumping the Byrds’ “Turn! Turn! Turn!” to #2. The following week, “The Sounds of Silence” would be on top. 

With a week to go until Christmas 2023, Billboard lists Brenda Lee’s “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree,” recorded 65 years ago, as #1 on its U.S. Hot 100 and streaming charts. Thanks to streaming, social media or getting licensed for television, older songs get a major bump in the charts nowadays (see “Running Up That Hill” earlier this year). Brenda Lee made a video of the song with a couple of popular country singers, then took it to TikTok, where it picked up 15 million views. 

It’s how to make a number one single in the new old-fashioned way.

Act Naturally

Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce may not be the first entertainment/pro football power couple, but they’re certainly the most boring.

In 1963, Detroit Lions defensive back Dick “Night Train” Lane married jazz singer Dinah Washington, his second marriage, her sixth. Less than six months later, Lane discovered Washington dead at their home from an apparent overdose of prescription pills.

Dallas Cowboys receiver Lance Rentzel married Joey Heatherton, a storybook wedding we were told, in 1969. Two years later he was charged with indecent exposure in the presence of an underage girl and Heatherton filed for divorce.

Atlanta Falcons receiver Andre Rison had a rocky relationship with R&B singer Lisa Lopes, complete with several domestic violence allegations. In 1994, she angrily lit a pair of his shoes on fire, and in the process burned down his house.

And what about Oakland Raider defensive lineman John Matuszak and Debra Winger?

No, that never actually happened and I’m guessing that they never even met, but Matuszak was sure enthusiastic about her.

I interviewed Matuszak in 1981 when he was promoting Caveman, a film in which he co-starred with Ringo Starr and Barbara Bach. Not only was he the largest person I’ve ever met at 6’8”, 285 – when he answered the door of his hotel suite in New York City, he just filled the entire doorway – but also someone with a single degree of separation from a Beatle.

The interview went well, even if some of his answers were canned, like quoting the lyrics to the Beatles’ Act Naturally (a Ringo-sung Buck Owens cover), about being the biggest fool that ever hit the big time and all he had to do was act naturally.

He did, however, seem genuinely pleased when I brought up this pivotal scene from his first movie, the cartoonish football film North Dallas Forty (1979) and he was more than willing to talk about its inspiration (directing his anger at a former coach of his, Hall of Famer Sid Gillman).

I really don’t remember how it came up, but it was his turn to ask a question: Had I seen Urban Cowboy yet? He saw it the night before and apparently his head was still swimming with visions of Debra Winger in this scene:

Possibly overstepping my role as interviewer, I suggested that since they were both in the movie business, he might meet her someday. He grunted something that seemed to say, yeah, I don’t think our paths are ever gonna cross, and I knew the interview was over.

Different paths? Matuszak’s next films were The Ice Pirates and The Goonies. Winger went on to be nominated three times for the Best Actress Academy Award.

Matuszak’s path also included an ex-wife trying to run him over with her car, and an accidental overdose after mixing multiple beers with Valium during which his heart stopped. He died in Hollywood in 1989 at age 38 from what was later ruled as a heart attack brought on by drugs and alcohol.

Oh spit! 

I never had a particular interest in the manly art of spitting. 

In my twenties I had friends, guys who worked in warehouses or spent their time staring at car engines, who could – seemingly out of nowhere – summon up a “loogy” and spit it out, a silvery comet of sputum that traveled for yards. My father, a fireman, was a champion spitter. An otherworldly snort from somewhere deep in his head while driving, then rolling down the car window to let her fly. Our next-door neighbor left for work every morning at 6 a.m. – my bedroom window overlooked his driveway – and like the rooster’s crow, I greeted each sunrise with the sound of him clearing out his nasal cavities. 

I mention everyone’s profession purposely, since a headful of phlegm and catarrh seemed consistent with guys whose schooling stopped at high school. Not drawing any conclusions, just an observation. 

By the way, if you’re a British rock singer, it’s a plus. Listen to the “soulful grit” of Rod Stewart, the Stories’ Brother Louie or John Lennon singing Twist and Shout. And let’s not get into the whole punk thing of spitting at performers to show appreciation. 

I’m coming down off a head cold and at least a couple of times a day I raise up a loogy that needs to be quickly addressed. Obviously, I’m not good at this, retching when the thing lands in my mouth, then running to the nearest bathroom to spit it into the toilet. It’s not pretty and sounds even worse. If I’d paid attention to this sort of thing when I was younger, it might not be such a grisly chore. 

The other day in my car, a crackling cough brought forward a loogy and for some insane reason, my immediate reaction was to spit it out the window. But wait. I could picture the thing never making the window, dripping instead down the inside of the car door. Or having it fly back into the car. Instead, I did the sensible thing, waiting until I got a red light, then opening my door and spitting. It didn’t even make it to the street, hitting the inside chassis of the car. 

What’s the rule about 10,000 hours of practice to achieve a mastery of complex skills? In this case, I’m way behind and I’d like to keep it that way.

The song remains the same

I grew up one town over from Teterboro, N.J., which was essentially then and probably now a couple of residential homes and a private airport, the second busiest in the state behind Newark Airport. 

When our Cub Scout pack got a tour of the airport, it included a ride in a plane that taxied down the runway and a look at Arthur Godfrey’s private plane. That was a bigger deal to some of the adults than us kids; he was of another generation, and one of those celebrities, like Art Linkletter or Danny Thomas, that you couldn’t quite put your finger on just why they were famous. 

Turns out one thing Godfrey was well-known for was Teterboro Airport. A longtime amateur pilot, in January 1954 he buzzed the Teterboro control tower, which got him a suspended pilot’s license for six months. According to Wikipedia, while he claimed that windy conditions forced him to turn back immediately after takeoff, in truth he was angry that the tower had not given him clearance on the runway he requested. 

Obviously used to having things go his way, he was still peeved seven years later when he recorded Teterboro Tower, a novelty song about the incident that portrayed the Teterboro flight controllers as a bunch of rubes placing our blameless hero in jeopardy. Apparently, that kind of bitterness was a Godfrey trademark. He was a true prick, someone who fired more than twenty cast and crew members of his national radio show during a two-year reign of terror, including singer Julius La Rosa right on the air. 

Godfrey was also a public champion of vasectomies as a way to control overpopulation, and he creeped me out as a teenager with a TV Guide quote about his sex life following his own vasectomy. “It’s never been better,” he cooed, or something to that effect. Jesus. I still shudder thinking about it. 

Given its proximity to downtown Manhattan (you could be on 33^rd Street by Madison Square Garden in 15 minutes if there’s no traffic), Teterboro was a popular arrival and departure site for rock bands. If none of my fellow Cub Scouts were moved by the sight of Arthur Godfrey’s parked plane, how might we have felt nine years later if we’d witnessed this July 24, 1973 photo of Led Zeppelin outside their private Boeing 720 at Teterboro Airport? 

Thank God Arthur Godfrey never posed in front of his plane looking like this: