Dear 45 Records room,

 

One more Interstate 5 story: just outside of Sacramento in a fast food joint, I got into a quick conversation with a couple of bikers from the Boozefighters Motorcycle Club, one of the oldest clubs around. They had just come back from the annual Fourth of July weekend gathering in Hollister, the site of the infamous 1947 riot which was the basis for the classic 1951 film The Wild One, starring Marlon Brando and Lee Marvin. (Marvin’s character "Chino" is said to have been based on Wino Willie, founder of the BFMC). But while we were talking I overheard this woman at a table behind me say “He's a goddamned freaking national treasure ... I heard he has, like, a closet filled with mason jars of urine.” Anyway?

 

Here is the song hopelessly stuck in my head, tormenting me as I drove over the Siskiyous Mountain Pass on our way to Ashland, Oregon. And as I drove all night, my hands wet on the wheel, I thought I heard a voice in my head. Oddly enough, at the 4310 ft. summit, around about half past four in the morning, I found myself inexplicably shifting gears ...

 

Anyway, it's pretty late, say hey to the straight edge records and the 200 or so BRMC records we have stacked in the 45 Records Room. One more thing-- give a little peace, love and understanding to the new Elvis Costello Box, and I’ll see you all Monday afternoon.

Dear 45 Records room,

 

How’s it going? Up until a couple of days ago the weather had been pretty damn nice; mid 70’s, sunny, slight sea breeze ... but a cold front came in, shelving plenty of weekend barbeques. From the edge of this five acre property you can see the whitecaps out on the waves getting ornery. Damned cantankerous Northwest climate!

 

At the local thrift store I found a goldmine -- and I use that term loosely -- of used Jackie Gleason records in mint condition. Jackie Gleason, AKA the Great One, back in the mid 1950’s when his The Honeymooners television show was at the top of its game, was contracted by Capitol Records to arrange and conduct or compose a series of records with a relaxing-romantic-late night vibe. I suspect he simply just sold his name to Capitol and hung out at the studio sessions tippling with the musicians. The best part of this “Music For” series was the packaging. The art work always stood out. One cover in particular, Lonesome Echo, was created by Salvador Dali. But this thrift store’s stash of LP’s are the more “desirable” covers, pun intended. Anyway, I found about eight Gleason albums, minty jackets all, but minus the vinyl! These album jackets are perfect, lust filled portraits of silky and laced up vixens -- femme fatales draped over sofas and beds and floors with their come hither mouths and eyes whispering “another martini, lover boy?” What I found includes Music Martinis and Memories, Music for Lovers Only, Aphrodesia, Love Embers and Flame and of course Music to Make you Misty; all the albums ready for framing and decking out your mad bachelor pad dad!

 

Well, 45’s Record Room, I’ll talk to you later. Tuck in all the Northern Soul records for me, give the R&B section a kiss goodnight and tell the Ska records that I haven’t forgotten about them, I have a little gift to give them when I get back.

Dear 45s Record room,

 

I just finished driving due north to beautiful Vashon Island off the coast of Seattle; 1200 miles of dodging Highway Patrol speed traps, over-thinking routes and stuck in hyper caffeine overdrive listening to crazy-ass tirades from loony-right-wingnut talk radio. I suspect the elitist-socialist-coast-hugging-Hollywood-sissy-leftist-yoga flexing-public radio-wingnut they’re talking about is me, except I’m just a record geek on vacation driving a Ford mini-van with my wife and kid on that silvery ribbon of highway. By the way, gas wasn’t terribly overpriced anywhere on the road.

 

We spent a couple of days at the mouth of the Russian River just north of the Bay Area; insanely gorgeous and weirdly quiet. For most of us, spending a night in John’s cabin was probably a treat. Up there on the Russian River surrounded by big blue chunks, there is no noise, just pure unadulterated silence. I woke one morning very suspicious of silence. Is silence golden? Hell, I think silence is more often than not iron pyrite. Confucius said “Silence is the true friend that never betrays.” Well, I’m always a little dubious. In Buddhism silence and allowing the mind to become silent can help lead to spiritual enlightenment. Unfortunately I doubt I’ll ever know. My hearing is shot and if the high pitch ringing in my ears doesn’t drive me mad, all the noise I use to cover my tinnitus every single frigging day will. I’d like to blame someone other than myself for this predicament; it is the true blue American, Fourth of July, consecrated right to deny personal responsibility. Could I blame some of the 5000 different bands I did sound for in my years as a live engineer? I was raised in the Catholic Church-- maybe the blame should be directed at god? Then again, what’s that going to accomplish? I’m pretty sure by the sixth chapter of the first book in the bible god was ready to kill off everybody; I doubt my tinnitus could qualify as either a concern of the almighty or the act of a vengeful god ... too simple a scheme. However, according to talk radio rationale, I could and should blame Obama, Pelosi, or Letterman and Franken or a least my college education for all my problems.

 

Anyway, I’ll write you again later, don’t forget to feed the new psychedelic record box, and take out the thrash records, thanks. Oh, and send my regards to the pop vocals clutter. PS: here are a couple of pix from along the way and an old song. One more thing, according to the great mime Marcel Marceau, “Music and silence combine strongly because music is done with silence, and silence is full of music.” I presume he wrote that down.

The original ballpark organist for Dodger Stadium and the last surviving working keyboard accompanist from the silent-film era, Bob Mitchell, has died. He was 96.

The native Angelino, born in Sierra Madre in 1912, died this past week from congestive heart failure at Hancock Park Rehabilitation Center in Los Angeles.

 

From the first Dodger game played at the Chavez Ravine Stadium in 1962 until 1966, Mitchell was the keyboardist on the Wurlitzer double-keyboard organ with a 25-note bass pedal board. Up until that time he was best known as founder of the Robert Mitchell Boys Choir and its director for over 60 years. They appeared in more than 100 motion pictures, starting with 1936’s That Girl from Paris. Other films included the classics Going My Way starring Bing Crosby from 1944 where they sang “Ave Maria” and 1947’s The Bishop’s Wife. The choir was also documented in the 1941 Academy Award nominated short Forty Boys and a Song. Over the years more than 600 kids between the ages of about 8 and 16 performed in the Mitchell choir. Alumni include members of the Modernaires, the Lettermen, and the Sandpipers.

In 1924 at the age of 12, Mitchell began playing organ at the old Strand Theater in Pasadena, improvising soundtracks to silent movies. But with the advent of talkies and The Jazz Singer in 1927, Mitchell's first career as a silent-film accompanist was about over by the time he was 16. 65 years later, in 1992, he once again sat at the organ accompanying films at LA’s Silent Movie Theatre on Fairfax Avenue. His last public performance was this past May when he opened the Last Remaining Seats film series at the Orpheum Theatre in downtown LA.

 

Bob Mitchell began taking piano lessons at four years of age. He attended the New York College of Music before returning to Los Angeles in 1934; eventually he graduated from what is now Cal State L.A. and Trinity College in London. During the Second World War Mitchell served in the Navy and played keyboards for the Armed Forces Radio Orchestra under the direction of Meredith Willson, who later wrote The Music Man.

The Minnesota Supreme Court Tuesday morning ordered that Democrat Al Franken be certified as the winner of the state's never ending Senate race and recount that was decided by only a few hundred votes. Finally, the paint has dried ...

 

The high court rejected a legal challenge from Republican Norm Coleman, whose options for regaining the Senate seat dwindled to almost nothing. Shortly after the decision was announced, Coleman accepted the loss, conceding and congratulating Franken on his victory. Coleman told reporters outside his St. Paul home, "The Supreme Court has made its decision and I will abide by the results; in these tough times we all need to focus on the future, and the future is that we have a new United States Senator."

 

Jim Manley, a spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, said the earliest Franken would be seated is next week because the Senate is out of session for the July 4th holiday.

 

The unanimous court wrote that "because the legislature established absentee voting as an optional method of voting, voters choosing to use that method are required to comply with the statutory provisions." They went on to say that "because strict compliance with the statutory requirements for absentee voting is, and always has been required, there is no basis on which voters could have reasonably believed that anything less than strict compliance would suffice."

 

The 58 year old Franken was born in New York City but was raised in St. Louis Park, Minn., a suburb near Minneapolis. He graduated cum laude in 1973 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in political science from Harvard University. Best known as a writer and performer on Saturday Night Live from 1975-1980 and 1985-1995 and as the radio talk show host for The Al Franken Show on Air America Radio from 2004-2007, Franken has also authored several books, including Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot and Other Observations (1996) and Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right (2003).