DISQUS

The Grammys lost me the year Jethro Tull won for best heavy metal band and that moron Flava Flav hijacked someone else's award for best rap performance (as if there could be such a thing). I was still in the music business then, but I bailed out shortly afterwards to attend law school. Within six months, the top ten consisted entirely of acts that didn't exist a year previous. And believe me, those acts didn't achieve massive airplay based on their musical merit. The record biz has distributed more cocaine than the Medellin cartel. FedEx used to bring it to my door. Maybe someday I'll write my memoir on payola. I've received it and I've dispensed it, and it determined what tunes you tapped your feet to in the '80s. Watch this space

Reading a Sinclair Lewis novel always induces the same sensation in me. I feel like a kid who has discovered that he is descended from a race of aliens. He draws his characters in bold strokes, but he stops short of making them cartoonish.

Arrowsmith was on TV recently, and I watched it without realizing that John Ford had directed it. I'll have to give it another look. Elmer Gantry is another classic that was made into an excellent film, featuring Shirley Jones speaking of Burt Lancaster:

"Oh, he gave me special instructions back of the pulpit Christmas Eve. He got to howlin' "Repent! Repent!" and I got to moanin' "Save me! Save me!" and the first thing I know he rammed the fear of God into me so fast I never heard my old man's footsteps!"

The obvious - ELO "Telephone line"
The not-so-obvious - Sugarloaf - "Don't call us, we'll call you"

The ridiculous: Meri Wilson "Telephone Man"
"Hey, baby, I'm your telephone man
You just show me where you want it and I'll put it where I can
I can put it in the bedroom, I can put it in the hall
I can put it in the bathroom, I can hang it on the wall
You can have it with a buzz, you can have it with a ring
And if you really want it you can have a ding-a-ling
Because-a hey baby, I'm your telephone man"

Hell, it's often unfair to compare Cary Grant himself to Cary Grant. He didn't always live up to his own archetype. Come to think of it, that may be part of Woody Allen's problem, too.

When I was a kid, back in the '60s, I went to a summer camp in Ohio. Our swimming instructor, Hugh Murray, was a grizzled ol' cuss of at least 30 years....maybe more! And once per camp session, illuminated by a crackling campfire, he would solemnly recite "The Cremation of Sam McGee."

70 or so rambunctious boys sat and stared with rapt attention as Mr. Hugh spun the tale of the fellow sitting in the furnace. (One of those boys, by the way, was Future Congressman Bob Ney (R - Leavenworth)

Thanks for the memories, Claire!

Thanks for the memories

Cultural observations hold the possibility of a far more wide-ranging spectrum of opinion than do political observations. Because, really, political discussions come down to two points:

1.)Our opponents have screwed things up.
2.) We can do a better job if given a chance.

I participate in such discussions (as do we all) and appreciate them for their merits, but they are ultimately limited.

A round-table, free-wheeling discussion of popular culture, on the other hand, can spin off in an infinite number of directions. It can take you from poetry to music to television, to literature, to film, to sociology and psychology, to marketing and persuasion, to technology and its role in the future.... I suspect your dinner last November touched on most, if not all, of those areas, and more besides.

Popular culture is not a trifle, or an idle diversion. It is like water to a fish; it surrounds us and, to a large degree, it defines us. But unlike our finny friends, we can actively participate in evaluating and determining the quality of our environment. Which I suppose is what you have in mind.

Good luck! I'll be back.

I'd include the Addams Family and the (IMHO) highly under-appreciated Green Acres. And the Partridge Family, if for no other reason than the timeless beauty of Shirley Jones.

Interesting that the Golden Age of Situation Comedy was contemporaneous with rock and roll and the whole baby boom thing. I couldn't say whether rock or sitcoms had a greater influence on me, but I think it's a topic that might be right in the wheelhouse of your fine, new blog.

Here's my 10:
1. I Love Lucy
2. Honeymooners
3. Simpsons
4. Seinfeld
5. Dick Van Dyke
6. Good Times
7. Bob Newhart (both iterations)
8. All in the Family
9. Addams Family
10. Green Acres. (How about some love for this Kafka-esque send up of rural America?)