Dan Kennedy Blog Thing: ReallySmallTalk.com

OUR WYOMING CORRESPONDENT CHECKS IN

Introducing Peter Baumann. He'll be covering our Wyoming desk, and he filed this first report over the weekend...

Spending the early part of the evening at a "tie-recommended" charity dinner, a coworker and I decide to unwind over drinks at a local bar named after a local canyon named after a French fur trapper.

After a couple of hours, I notice a man walking around the bar, talking to people and occasionally pointing in my direction. Then I notice the scissors he's carrying. He walks up to me with two women. At this point I expect anything, including local headlines in the near future that will carry my name and the words "prostitute," "orgy" or "violent assault."

"You know we don't allow ties in the LaBonte," he says.

"Oh…"

I didn't remember seeing a list of rules when I walked through the door, but decide that pointing this out would probably help no one; certainly not myself. He explains that when someone comes in wearing a tie, it's policy to cut the tie off.

"Well a person really learns something new every day. Is it, um, okay if you just cut the thin part of the tie?"

"Yeah."

Afterwards, he buys me a drink.

I convince myself that I ended up winning financially, weighing the price of a double Jack and Coke versus the seven dollars that I paid for the tie at a thrift store, but unfortunately the math doesn't assign humiliation a dollar value.

I can't help thinking that all of this could have been avoided if I had just taken up my roommate's offer earlier that day when he said, "Just borrow one of my clip-ons."

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PARAPHRASING ADVERTISING'S MESSAGE

To The Middle Class:

You are not thin enough, your teeth are not white enough, you are not rich enough, you are not vacationing enough. Seriously, you're thin, but you need to be extremely thin.

Also, your house could be bigger...don't sweat it, loans are our specialty. Also, why aren't you driving a luxury automobile? You'd appear richer, we can guarantee it. Show your middle class peers that you have taste.

Anyway, listen, bottom line is this: If you spend your money, you'll achieve status. Never mind our logic of getting rid of your money so that you appear richer. Just buy these products. And we covered luxury vacations, right? Good. Yes, you need to be vacationing more, I mean, you work hard...you deserve it. Even if the vacation is as simple as drinking a liquer product or enjoying a luxury hair or skin care product in your own home (which could be larger).

God, we don't want to freak you out, but, well let us just come right out and say it: people don't think you're a billionaire when they look at you. Doesn't that embarrass you?

To The Upper Class:

Okay, so you've caught on. It is, indeed, not about having whiter teeth or being thinner. And yes, obviously if you were to take luxury vactions all the time or drink everytime you thought you worked hard, you wouldn't be rich, you'd be hungover and/or out of town.

You didn't spend all of your money trying to appear above your class, you worked instead of vacationing nine weeks a year, and as a result of not being prone to buying products that cater to class insecurity, you've hung onto your money. And, well, frankly, you created what we like to call a perfect storm; you worked harder, enjoyed the simple things, and didn't spend your money on dieting and whiter teeth. As a result, you actually have moved up a class. Man, we didn't see that one coming, but fine, you got us.

Hey...let's forget about the past and let us be the first to welcome you to the next class up. Look, we're not going to waste your time with middle class marketing messages that tell you to get very thin and have an oddly white smile, okay? We're on your side, smart friend. And since we're shooting straight with you, can we ask you one question? Is your money working for you as hard as it could be? I mean, how do you know you have the right line of financial products and services?

Wow, you're a smart one, you're right, that was two questions. Three, even, if you count us asking if we could ask you the first one. Look, you're savvy, we're the first to admit it. We'll leave you alone now. You call us, though, if you want a free DVD about your money working harder. We'll also give you some of those Bose® noise-cancelling headphones that you were smart enough not to spend four hundred dollars on when you were middle class. See? Shooting straight with you.

--DK

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WHAT TO DO ON, UM, WEEKENDS!

Leaving a gas station restroom somewhere near Sacramento, you'll be grimacing at a fifty-ish hippy woman with a walker after she repeatedly knocks it impatiently into the door in hopes of rushing you along as you spend a perfectly appropriate amount of time urinating after a fourteen-hour flight and three-hour drive.

"Candy Making" with a box of jello mix, scotch tape, and empty foil cards from antihistamine tablets.

Hiding behind bar in kitchen, you'll wait for Tim to come in, chuck an onion with M-80 in it right over counter and onto living room floor, it will explode.

'Nail-in-eye' hustle for free drinks.

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THE NIGHT THE MUSIC YAWNED

When you walk around the Sony Music Studios late at night, it’s a ghost town now compared to what it must've been like back in the day. Like every big studio, I guess. Sure, maybe earlier this afternoon there was a Reality TV Star’s album being mixed in one of these rooms, but as far as the rock and roll culture these walls used to see at this hour, it’s a ghost town. Walking through the halls tonight, I feel this, like, obligation to ghosts. That's the line that keeps running through my head: an obligation to ghosts. I feel lucky to see things like this place. You can feel what was -- only a short time ago -- an era in America, and how it’s almost gone without a trace.

God, I would rather take one million dollars and be David Bowie in 1976 as opposed to getting 136 billion and having to report to the offices of YouTube at nine AM in 2006, dressed in ‘Casual Friday’ clothes. How much more un-romantic can a pop cultural revolution be, that’s the question.

End of the night, we're done recording voice over and mixing the audio to a cable television pilot for a show about music that I’m producing for The Independent Film Channel. I thank to the engineer, copies of the final mixes get labeled up, and I walk down the long hallways that feel so empty and filled with a past that’s almost hitting me in the face and shoulders. I almost feel like crying, like one of those paranormal nut jobs on TV when they say a presence in a house is trying to contact them so intensely and then they just start sobbing. For the last few years, when I'm in a big studio like this, or in the offices of a major record label, I feel this obligation to recording what I, for some reason, keep getting the chance to see; this era coming to an end, fading away for good while we sit in our apartments or offices and stare at computer screens.

When I get to the front lobby, there’s a DJ in baggy pants carrying in a small road case; probably filled with a laptop, a Kaos pad or some other digital gear, maybe a favorite mic. It’s the closest thing to an instrument I’ve seen since I’ve been here.

Out front on 54th, there’s a small group of black kids hanging around a luxury SUV that blasts loud hip-hop music.

Across the street they’re making The Hit Factory into luxury condominiums. For two to five million bucks, you can have a condo in what used to be the legendary studio where Stevie Wonder booked three days of sessions that ended up running nine months -- and when he left he had finished his 1976 classic album, “Songs in The Key of Life.” Stand there looking at condominiums getting made from what used to be the studio where The Stones recorded Emotional Rescue, the studio where John Lennon finished yet another day’s recording in December 1980 without knowing it would be the last day of his life.

Allright.
It's late.
Going to sleep.

--DK

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PROSTHETIC ARMS, BUMS ON FIRE: WHEN METAL RULED

by Dan Kennedy


Steve “Nutsworth” Natsorn, Manager

“You had to get attention. There were so many bands playing on The Sunset Strip, so you had to stand out. So, whenever we had a gig at The Whiskey or The Roxy, we’d get there early with a big stack of flyers, a can of gasoline, two second-hand couches, prosthetic legs, one of those orthopedic toilets that you get from a hospital supply place – the toilets with the handles on them that you can set up anywhere, and a street bum, as we called them -- that wasn't politically incorrect at that time. And that’s just what you did. You tore the other bands flyers down if you saw any and replaced them with your flyers, then you started throwing prosthetic legs out into traffic, you set the bum on fire and shoved him out in front of the cars driving down the strip, then you snuffed out the flames on him with a blanket and you sat him down on the orthopedic toilet in the middle of the crosswalk on Sunset in front of the club. So all these cars are crashing, you got wooden legs flying everywhere, a smoldering bum sitting on a portable toilet for crippled people, right there in the middle of Sunset Strip. Then you’d start getting these people walking up, the people who had crashed their cars by swerving to try and avoid what looked like a bunch of human legs on fire or whatever, and they’d be like, “Jesus Christ! What the hell’s going on here?” And at that point, you’d hand them one of the flyers and say, “We’re playing here tonight at the club. The club right behind me here, sir.” You just made it happen like that. You got people to remember your band instead of the other band…that’s how it worked.”

DD Shevelle, Guitarist, Rat Hole

“We would have five, six, eight women each at a time. Sometimes, truth is, we'd be too tired to have sex, so instead of having group sex in the dressing room, we would just line women up on a big patch of asphalt behind the arena and run them over with second hand cars we had bought in whatever city we were playing in that night. And you always had a roadie videotaping it, that was all part of it. A roadie would tape and everyone would watch it later on the bus. So, if you were on the tour bus at any point, and you looked up at the TV, chances are you would see one of the guys from the band on tape just, you know, naked as a jaybird and driving some old crappy used Vega wagon right into a huge human pyramid of groupies. But that was what everyone was doing, it was just what you did. We were just making it up as we went along...breaking all the rules. I filled my entire urethra with plaster.”

Susan Vollis, Documentary Film Maker

“Nobody knew drugs were bad for you. We were basically just having fun. I mean, that’s just what you did. If you showed up at a party, everyone from the strip was there, and you just wanted to unwind and loosen up to have some fun, so you'd have a little cocaine, PCP, buprenorphine, gasoline, glue, lysergic acid diethylamide, heroin, weed, phencyclidine, and alcohol. It was just all about having fun, but at some point the lysergic acid diethylamide cut through all of it and started driving us poor. Started making us blind and bankrupt. Then by that time Nirvana came out and we were all poor. And, like I was saying, blind. The party was over.”

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STAB ME IN THE LUNG: Talkshow Rundown

Every so often ReallySmallTalk watches late night talk shows from 11:30PM until 3:52 AM and tells you, the reader, what's up on the late night talk show celebrity scene.


Okay, one celebrity has been making a film, but the funny thing is there were some mixups on the set and he couldn't get this one scene right, even though it was a pretty easy scene. The host of the talk show was cracking up. The host of the talk show also had a funny story about the first time he ever appeared in a movie and also couldn't do one simple thing right. On another late night talk show, a model was talking about how she eats like a pig. She eats like crazy, she even eats McDonalds, but the funny part is that she stays really thin. She said she doesn't work out. The host made this joke about all the women at home and how they must hate the model, because the women at home have to watch what they eat if they want to stay thin. The women at home would especially like to be a model who doesn't have to watch what she eats. Everyone was cracking up again because the host then said that he also doesn't work out or watch what he eats. On another show, a celebrity was saying humble things like, "I need to keeep making movies, because my wife wants to move into a bigger house." Everyone started cracking up and clapping. And then the host said it was kind of ironic because the celebrity would be so busy he'd never even see the new house. Everyone started cracking up at that and they all started clapping SUPER hard. On another show a little later, around maybe 1:20AM the host was saying all of this stuff about Los Angeles. He would talk about news headlines and then say someting to the effect that in Los Angeles that thing couldn't happen, because of some type of reason. Like, he'd go, "Well it turns out that...there...today there was a man trying to get in the White House. In Los Angeles, nobody cares about that because they're getting plastic surgery!" I did it wrong just now, but when he did it everyone started cracking up and clapping super hard. Later in that same show, maybe at 1:45AM or so, a celebrity came out, sat in one of the chairs next to the host's desk and said he was tired of being just an actor. And the host was saying that it must be hard because so many people have seen this celebrity as just one thing: an actor. And the celebrity was saying, "I know that's the funny thing, because I was into music way before I was into acting." On this one, the host simply said that he hoped things would go great with the celebrity's musical endeavor and everyone started clapping a ton. A different talk show host came out and talked to the talk show host. So it was like, well, a host talking to a host, but obviously the other host was here as a guest. And as the guest he was saying that a lot of of funny things happen behind the scenes of his talkshow. The host was saying basically, "Oh, yeah? That interests me. I'd like to know more about that." At this point the guest told a story about how his sidekick had played a handful of practical jokes on him. Everyone started cracking up when he told the stories of practical jokes happening on the set of his show. Everyone started clapping like crazy.


There were a bunch of other highlights from the talkshows and repeats of talkshows tonight, but it's 4:15AM and they'll have to be covered in a second installment at a later date.

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CERTAINLY BY NOW YOU'VE MET IRA

"In 1937, Ira Gobler was a traveling syrup salesman. America was in the midst of the Great Depression, and Gobler's future looked grim. Syrup sales were dismal, so Ira ended up in a downtown New York City bar intending to drink his worries away. Fate had other plans for him. After his second gin rickey, a terrible fight broke out between two patrons. Gobler watched as a society dandy pummeled a man of the lower class. It was a gory spectacle, but Ira was mesmerized. The one man was clearly outmatched, but would get back to his feet every time he was knocked down...

...Suddenly, the man losing the fight became a giant, wobbling egg in Gobler's mind. Stricken by this powerful vision, he wandered back to his apartment and drew a sketch of it. With a few alterations, it became a large, hollow unit that a man could sit in and wobble around. A friend who worked in the toy industry suggested to Gobler that he make it child-sized and market it as a protective plaything. Ira took the advice and began manufacturing the toys himself. The Gobler Toy Company premiered "Gobler's Wobblers" at the 1939 Toy Fair in New York City and it was an instant hit."

Steve Casino and Steve Fink are the men behind the Gobler Toys site, and they are totally brilliant.

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New Tag Lines for Budweiser Based on Their Current Print Advertising

by Dan Kennedy

Budweiser. Ready To Make More Money And Meet a Gaggle Of Extremely Horny Women?

Budweiser. Your Life is Suddenly Better.

Budweiser Makes Muscles Bigger. Period.

Drink Budweiser at Parties So That Fashion Model Types Will Touch The Long-Neck Bottle Suggestively With Their Hand and Mouth.




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IN MEMORY OF FRANZ CILENSEK

Rare, is the man who can make you laugh and think while you muster plowing through four or five hundred shifts at your job at Tower Books in a very small town way, way west of here. Mind-numbing shifts -- the shifts you work at, say, age 22 and 23. An age when your heart and head yearn for the world outside, for things you're not sure you'll ever find, when your energy is still boundless; and there you are stuck at your day job. And maybe you're stuck there stocking or working the register with somebody who not only keeps you laughing and keeps the clock moving, but who takes the time to tell you a story -- or two or three -- about the places you've got a hunch you want to go.

Franz had 32 years on me, and he was one of those guys who didn't hold his life's experience over your head. Somehow he made you feel like every place he's ever been, and every cool thing he's ever done, all of that is out there for you too. Looking back tonight, I realize that I was a young man lucky to be punching a clock with Franz. There, in a small northern California town that could feel pretty far away sometimes, was a man who had lived in New York and hung out in Greenwich Village back when you didn't have to walk so damn far east to find what had happened to counter culture. A man who moved to Berkeley and started a literary motorcycle gang a full year before Hunter S. Thompson showed up and started running with Sonny Barger in order to capture the strange and terrible saga of that other motorcycle gang, The Hell's Angels.

I went back to the aforementioned small town in 2003 on book tour. I was reading out at the big Barnes & Noble, way out by the new mall. The comparably quaint Tower Books downtown was now gone. I walk in and who has driven all the way out there and is sitting front and center, but Franz. I remember saying hello to him and having a laugh together; how funny it felt, standing in a chain bookstore together again, almost like a really long shift had never ended. I don't remember, really, even what we talked about, or what I told him. I know something I didn't tell him was that at some point along the long line of bookstore shifts that blended into one big blur of stocking, shipping, receiving, thinking, and killing time the way we all have at one point; thinking that we've got plenty of it -- anyway, at one point in there, he became a man whose example made some 23 year-old slacker open his eyes to realize that any of us on this planet who dares, can go out there into the big world and start to live a storied life.

The only goddamn catch is that it doesn't last forever.

--D.K.

FRANZ CILENSEK
AUG. 16, 1935 - OCT. 17, 2006

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Four Haikus Written While Stuck In The Holland Tunnel

by Martin Bihl

#1

Tiny water drops
Are you condensation or
Harbinger of flood?

#2

What is the test for
A driver’s license in New
Jersey? A pulse? Jeez…

#3

Carbon monoxide
Subtle traffic jam fragrance
Perfumes me with death

#4

Promised land! I see
The lights at the, no, wait, it’s
Just a truck, dammit.

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