Georgia O'Keeffe: 'The Flag' (1918)

Last year in October, while checking out a First World War art exhibition at the Frist Art Museum in Nashville, I was fascinated to learn that Georgia O'Keeffe (1887-1986) had opposed intervention, that she had a brother who died as a result of the war, and that she painted The Flag early in 1918 to indicate her revulsion. 

Since then, I've come across additional details about The Flag and Georgia's brother. Alexius (Alexis) Wyckoff "Tex" O'Keeffe (1892-1930) was an officer in the 32nd Division of the US Army, stationed, along with thousands of other soldiers from his home state of Wisconsin, as well as thousands from Michigan, at Camp MacArthur, in the vicinity of Waco, Texas, starting in 1917. 

Fred A. Gildersleeve, Officers, 32nd Division, Camp MacArthur, Waco, Tex., Dec. 23, 1917. Library of Congress. 

The 32nd Division saw heavy combat on the Western Front in 1918, and Tex was badly wounded by poison gas, not enough to kill him outright (as some accounts erroneously suggest), but enough to cause him to die in his thirties, more than a decade after the war's end, finally taken out by Influenza.

When "Tex" was sent to Waco in 1917, Georgia was teaching at the West Texas State Normal School in Canyon, about twenty miles south of Amarillo in the Panhandle; she was the head of the one-person art department. By October of 1917, she "seethed with impatience over the conformity and pettiness of the Canyon community." (Hunter Drohojowska-Philp, Full Bloom: The Art and Life of Georgia O'Keeffe, New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2004, p. 144).

Georgia came down with a case of the Spanish Influenza early in 1918, and took refuge with a friend at Waring, Texas (about forty-four miles north northwest of San Antonio); she painted The Flag in San Antonio.

Not surprisingly, Georgia's teaching career at the West Texas State Normal School ended in 1918.

The Flag was not shown in public until 1968, during the American War in Vietnam, the year of the Prague Spring and the Paris uprising -- in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Its permanent home is at the Milwaukee Art Museum. For more information, here is a link.

Today's Rune: Signals. 

Donald J. Raleigh: 'Soviet Baby Boomers' (2012), Part III

Donald J. Raleigh, Soviet Baby Boomers: An Oral History of Russia's Cold War Generation (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012).

Strange phenomenon: making "primitive 78-rpm recordings on used X-ray films." (page 140)

Aleksandr Galich, Bulat Okudzhava, Vladmimir Vysotsky, the latter's songs included "And All Is Quiet in the Cemetery." (pages 142-143)

Voice of America, Deutsche Welle (German Wave) broadcasts (pages 146-147).

Beatles, Rolling Stones, Jazz Hour, etcetera (page 148)

BBC better than Voice of America, to Yelena Kolosova (pages 149-150)

Cuba as romantic inspiration: many of the interviewed Soviet Baby Boomers thought that Castro and the Cubans were cool (just like hepcats and beatniks in "the West" did). "'Cuba, my love, island of crimson dawns.'" (page 151)

Split with China over Cultural Revolution and Damansky / Chenpao Island crisis (page 153), late 1960s. Ready for war, if needed. "'[P]eople think the Chinese are strange.'" (page 155)

As in "the West," Soviet Baby Boomers mostly ignored "the Developing World."  "In 1966 Soviet citizens harbored 'unequivocal disinterest in the 'Third World,' whereas 91 percent of those surveyed were interested in America and admired its technological progress and living standards. Abraham Lincoln and John F. Kennedy were enormously popular, and many believed Americans were much like Russians." (page 158) 

The assassination of JFK was felt as a tragedy and "calamity." Yelena Kolosova: "'Since the assassination, I've had a fierce hatred of Texas. The first time I flew to Dallas, I couldn't overcome that ominous feeling that the tragedy had taken place there.'"  (page 162)

"The Baby Boomers came of age at the zenith of Soviet socialism, only to see the system crumble some three decades later. Ironically, much of this had to do with the Soviet system's very success at effecting social change, whose byproducts included rapid urbanization and a rise in the number of educated professionals." (page 169)

1968 was a turning point of sorts, after the Prague Spring was crushed; things were worsened by the Afghanistan War (1979-1989).

Interesting gender statistics. "In 1970, 86 percent of working-age women were employed (the figure was 42 percent in the United States): 71 percent of the country's teachers were women, 70 percent of its physicians . . ." (page 190). 

Also as of 1970, the divorce rate in the Soviet Union was second only to that in the USA. "Soviet women initiated divorce more than men . . ." (page 201).

Today's Rune: Fertility. 

Chapel Hill Daze: Pictures of Another Gone World: West Franklin Street, 1968-2018

Along West Franklin Street, starting at the Columbia Street intersection and heading toward Carrboro, there are still some vestiges of the Chapel Hill of 1968. There were more when I was a student at the University of North Carolina.

Of the "south" side of West Franklin, I've previously discussed University Square in another post. Next was Hardee's at 213 West Franklin (now there's a Panera at that address); Union Bus Station at 311 (the Franklin Hotel is now at that address) and the Chapel Hill Weekly newspaper at 501.

I certainly remember the Hardee's and the newspaper building, having eaten at the former and worked immediately next to the latter (at Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill).

The bus station building I remember vaguely. Having been completed in 1946, it soon thereafter became part of the history of the civil rights movement:

"On April 9, 1947, eight African American and eight white members of CORE (known as the Freedom Riders) set out from Washington, D.C. on Greyhound and Trailways buses; on April 12, both buses arrived in Chapel Hill. As the buses departed Chapel Hill for Greensboro on April 13, four of the riders were arrested. The commotion aboard the buses drew a large crowd of spectators, including several white taxi drivers. 

The men were taken to the police station, with a fifty dollar bond placed on each man. As white rider James Peck got off the bus to pay their bonds, a taxi driver struck him in the head.  

In May 1947, those members who had been arrested went on trial and were sentenced. The riders unsuccessfully appealed their sentences. On March 21, 1949, they surrendered at the courthouse in Hillsborough and were sent to segregated chain gangs." 

The bus station's food service desegregated in the early 1960s, under pressure.  Source: "Trailways Bus Station," Open Orange. Website link here.

Of the "north" side of West Franklin, an earlier post covered the first block off from Columbia Street, heading toward Carrboro. If you crossed Church Street going in the same direction in 1968, there was a Belk-Leggett department store at 206 West Franklin, Fowler's meats at 306, Carolina Grill at 312, Village Pharmacy at 318 and The Cavern at 452 1/2.  

The Bookshop (pictured above) came into being in 1985 at 400 West Franklin, a merger of Keith Martin Bookshop and Bookends (both Chapel Hill book shops). I remember all three of them, having bought books at each. The Bookshop closed in the summer of 2017, having lasted close to thirty-two years in that location.

Belk-Leggett was gone from its 206 location by the time I came to Chapel Hill. Fowler's was still at 306 for a while and then folded. There was one in Durham, too. 

I loved the Carolina Grill -- you could eat like a king on the budget of a college student. Which may be why they eventually had to close. I remember flat steaks there, excellent meat and potatoes type staples, probably requisitioned from next-door Fowler's. It was sort of like a large hall with tables, for some reason making me think of a Bavarian beer hall in memory. 

Village Pharmacy, 318 West Franklin, "Home of the Big O." This place was around for a while but must have eventually died on the vine. Browsing issues of the Daily Tar Heel, I came across an advertisement for Village Pharmacy from the September 28, 1949 issue: "Opposite Bus Station - Phone F-3966."  In "land line" telephone exchanges of the twentieth century, "F" might be named Flanders, Fleetwood, Factory, etcetera.  In any case, when I was working at Algonquin Books, I'd occasionally walk to Village Pharmacy for its soda fountain features. They served fresh lemonade, orangeade, milkshakes and grill food. No longer.

The Cave is a long-standing underground bar and music venue. Because I have detailed location notes from college journals dating to the 1980s, I'll devote more time to The Cave in a later post. It nearly folded after fifty years (1968-2018), but was saved by Melissa Swingle and Autumn Spencer in the summer of 2018 -- thank God! Here's a link to their website. Dig it!

Invaluable resource to cross-check memories, places:  OCCUPANTS AND STRUCTURES OF FRANKLIN STREET, CHAPEL HILL, NORTH CAROLINA AT 5-YEAR INTERVALS, 1793-1998, by Bernard Lee Bryant, Jr. Chapel Hill Historical Society, printed out by J.D. Eyre in 1999. Link here.

Today's Rune: Partnership. 

Ryan H. Walsh's 'Astral Weeks: A Secret History of 1968' (2018)

Ryan H. Walsh, Astral Weeks: A Secret History of 1968. New York: Penguin Press, 2018.

A kaleidoscopic time portal into trippy Boston centering around 1968, but opening out into the 1960s and 1970s. The possibilities for further study of its phenomena are wide and deep. 

The biggest revelation for me was musical, with Boston bands like Ultimate Spinach (a sort of psychedelic Doorsy head band); and interesting historical context for powerful music with which I was already quite familiar (James Brown, Velvet Underground, Van Morrison).  

And you get all sorts of crazy details about the local music scene, clubs, musicians, cultish and political activism (particularly "the Lyman family"), underground newspapers, Michelangelo Antonioni's Zabriskie Point (1970), the freaky What's Happening, Mr. Silver? show, Howard Zinn, Timothy Leary, Steve McQueen, the Boston Strangler, Tony Curtis, Aerosmith, Maria Muldaur, astral projection, Jonathan Richman & The Modern Lovers, Barney Frank -- and more! 

Astral Weeks: A Secret History of 1968 probably syncs well with an altered state, too, or so one can imagine. Can you dig? 

Today's Rune: The Self. 
   

Amy J. Berg's 'Janis: Little Girl Blue' (2015)

Amy J. Berg's Janis: Little Girl Blue (2015), a state of the art documentary biography of Janis Joplin (1943-1970), presents her life in a most compelling, sensitive and soulful manner. My first serious foray into this field was Howard Alk's Janis (1974), which I saw at the Melkweg in Amsterdam when I was twenty-two -- and I loved it, not to mention the audience's raucous response. Now I'd consider Alk's documentary as a complement or supplement to Berg's. There have been other films, and there have been excellent books on Janis, too. As anyone who knows her music can testify, Janis Joplin was intense. Amy J. Berg has done her justice here. 

Today's Rune: Signals. 

Mr. Dynamite: The Rise of James Brown (2014)

Mr. Dynamite: The Rise of James Brown (2014): Directed by Alex Gibney, produced by Mick Jagger. Aired on HBO and available with extras in DVD format. 

This one's an entertaining and insightful documentary for any and all James Brown fans. The archival footage is worth the whole package; newer interview footage is also better than the usual in such motion documentaries. 

I'm pretty well-versed in James Brown musicology and cultural impact, but even so, with Mr. Dynamite I learned a lot of new stuff, new ways of considering things. 

(In one of the more surreal scenes of Mr. Dynamite, see presidential candidate Hubert Humphrey sing along with James Brown in 1968. It's plain bizarre!) 

Alex Gibney is a trenchant documentary filmmaker -- compare with some of his other works such as Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room (2005); The [Lance] Armstrong Lie (2013); We Steal Secrets: The Story of WikiLeaks (2013); Going Clear: Scientology and the Prison of Belief (HBO, 2015); Steve Jobs: The Man in the Machine (2015).

Today's Rune: Gateway.      

  

'Best of Enemies' (2015): Buckley vs. Vidal

Best of Enemies (2015): a documentary film by Morgan Neville & Robert Gordon, centers on the 1968 televised debates between Gore Vidal ("liberal") and William F. Buckley, Jr. ("conservative"). This excellent work takes the participant-spectator to a place where the culture and history of those times as well as these times can be put in clearer perspective, regardless of one's personal or group worldview. This is done largely though the scrim of American network TV, but includes additional angles and mirrors. 

I loved this film on first look and aim to get my hands on a copy upon its November 3, 2015 DVD release, for further consideration.    

Best of Enemies: the news reporters, most gone now, good to see in action again, time regained if just for the duration of the film. And the witty antagonists, leading their factions, obsessed with each other and their zingers and their overall performances. Buckley permanently upset by his loss of control, Vidal having gotten under his skin; Vidal, upset by his ebbing influence in older age. A beautiful, funny and sad arc that leads to the always-unfolding now of continuing ideological conflicts of words, wars and colliding worlds. Wow.  

Today's Rune: Joy. 

Albert Maysles, David Maysles, Charlotte Zwerin: 'Salesman' (1968, 1969): Take Two

Albert Maysles, David Maysles, Charlotte Zwerin: Salesman (1968, 1969). The Maysles Brothers had previous experience at being door-to-door salesmen. They understood the lifestyle, and the stakes.   

Criterion Collection DVD. Chapter listing, including "Lost in Opa Locka," Florida. 

Much of the film spotlights Paul "The Badger" Brennan, who is in decline as a salesman from better years. "An orchestral version of 'This Land Is Your Land' is heard on Brennan's radio as he drives through the snow to a series of appointments with clients who are not home. The irony could not be clearer . . ."  ~ Joe McElhaney's Albert Maysles. Contemporary Film Directors series. University of Illinois Press, 2009, page 46.  

Today's Rune: Defense. 

Albert Maysles, David Maysles, Charlotte Zwerin: 'Salesman' (1968, 1969): Take One

Albert Maysles, David Maysles, Charlotte Zwerin: Salesman (1968, 1969). Thanks to The Criterion Collection, it's still circulating among interested parties in DVD format. 

This documentary in black and white, ostensibly about Irish American Catholic Bible salesman, shows us a microcosm of (any kind of) sales work. Although with Salesman we specifically see a grueling door-to-door kind of selling, peddling and hawking in their various forms date back, one suspects, thousands of years. Selling is a truly social, virtually relentless activity with a long history.  

Direct cinema style: prospective Bible buyers let Albert and David Maysles film their interactions with the salesmen, but unlike "Reality TV" today, they don't seem much concerned about appearance or action. (Charlotte Zwerin edited the raw footage into a coherent "story" with a sort of beginning, middle and end, but no intrusive narration).

Two questions for now. One: how much of an "observer effect" distorts what might have otherwise happened had there been no cameras, just salesmen and clients?

Two: How have sales techniques changed along with technology and living patterns, specifically since Salesman was made in the 1960s? Or have they?

Today's Rune: Journey.

Bill Morris: Motor City Burning (2014)

Bill Morris' Motor City Burning, a 320-page novel, (2014) immerses readers in the taut milieu of 1968 Detroit. Chronologically, it generally follows the contours of the Detroit Tigers' season from opening day -- delayed because of the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr., in Memphis -- to the Tigers' final victory in the World's Series against the St. Louis Cardinals. If one looks at a 1968 calendar, that covers from April to October. The baseball season is part of the novel's structural backdrop; the effects of the Detroit Riot during the "Summer of Love" (1967) are also prominent in the unfolding of its noirish plot. Morris focuses on two dudes -- Frank Doyle, a Detroit detective, and Willie Bledsoe, a disillusioned civil rights activist from Alabama. Willie and his brother, a veteran sniper back from the US-Vietnam War (evidently suffering from PTSD), were in Detroit together during the '67 riot; they are somehow both connected to an unsolved homicide. Much drama ensues.

Interesting details peppered throughout the novel are worth the whole shebang. Along the way, one catches the '68 Detroit vibe, race-tinged interactions, class differences and structural changes in the city and suburbs. And then there's the just cracking gender code in the age of Mad Men. 

The only hokey thing about Motor City Burning: the two main female characters, one involved with detective Doyle and the other with Bledsoe. They are fantasy figures, the kind you might expect in a James Bond tale -- only not as lethal. There's a third woman who is a spitting image of Mrs. Robinson, which may be an inside joke since The Graduate was playing in American theaters in 1968. 

Motor City Burning is much better at showing male interactions within the Detroit police department and among people facing them on home turf and in business establishments (including blind pigs and other underground facilities). The "big four" police attack squads are something right out of the harrowing FX crime series, The Shield; their activities and other dodgy practices and belief systems go a long way in shedding light on racial and class tensions in Detroit and elsewhere in the USA, then and now. 

Today's Rune: Strength.          

Häxan (1922) / Witchcraft Through the Ages (1968)

Benjamin Christensen's silent movie Häxan (1922) clocks in at 87 minutes (or is it 104?); via Antony Balch, it morphs into a 77-minute version: Witchcraft Through the Ages (1968), wickedly narrated by William S. Burroughs and accompanied by a jazz soundtrack courtesy of Jean-Luc Ponty and Daniel Humair. Both versions are weird and fascinating and come together on one DVD thanks to the Criterion Collection.

"Häxan integrates fact, fiction, objective reality, hallucination, and different levels of representation -- all within a first-person discourse. . . The mixture of narrative modes . . . is astonishing for its freedom and audacity." - Gillian Anderson, liner notes, Criterion Collection DVD, 2001. 

"At times, Häxan appears to be a literal depiction of the imaginings of people of medieval Europe . . "  Sometimes funny, sometimes scary, sometimes both (the Devil's obscenely flickering tongue, for example). Crazy cool stuff, indeed, ending with little psychiatric episodes from the 20th century.

Happy Hallowe'en!

Today's Rune: Initiation.

Diego Luna: Cesar Chavez (2014)

Diego Luna's Cesar Chavez (2014), set mostly in California in the 1960s, focuses on Chavez (aka César Chávez) and his compadres in their efforts to improve working and living conditions for migrant farm workers. Michael Peña takes the lead role -- a seemingly low-key yet tenacious and intense one -- with Rosario Dawson as Dolores Huerta.  Using a Catholic variation on the non-violent strategies and tactics of Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr., the farm workers movement slowly gains traction.  

In Cesar Chavez, the "villains" come in the form of owners and their allies -- the latter including California Governor Ronald Reagan and President Richard M. Nixon. Allies of the farm workers include Senator Bobby Kennedy and various religious and union supporters. John Malkovich, weird as always, plays an owner who helps manage the immediate opposition to reform. Some Anglos continue to treat migrant workers as sub-human -- hence one of the driving demands for change.   

Today's Rune: Partnership.

Pilgrimage to Memphis: Buildings and Food

Sun Studio (1950). Recording artists have included Ike Turner, Howlin' Wolf, Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, B. B. King, Jerry Lee Lewis and so on. 

The Eugene Magevny house (1836) at 198 Adams Avenue, one of the oldest surviving buildings in Memphis. Magevny was Catholic, born in Ireland. Memphis has had a Catholic presence since the beginning. Saint Peter's is to the left. 

The Dominican Order has served continuously at St. Peter since 1846. . .  Construction of the present church began in 1852 around the intact older original sanctuary [dating to 1842-1843] and was completed in 1855. Once built, parts of the original church were dismantled and carried out the doors, piece by piece.  

For more information, here's a link. 

Elsewhere in Memphis, there's a structure that dates back to 1832 -- the Hunt-Phelan House at 533 Beale Street.

Peabody Hotel (1925). Main lobby. Ducks were there, cavorting in the center fountain.

Kress Building (1927).  S. H. Kress & Co. 5-10-25 Cent Store. Around the USA, many such impressive Kress buildings have been sensibly preserved and "repurposed." 

Beale Street at night. Here, fashion statements have devolved into slovenly casual. That's off-the-rack global capitalism at work. Support your local tailors! Compare with the natty attire worn in a 1968 protest march here. 

Today's Rune: Fertility. 

Pilgrimage to Memphis

Pilgrimage to Memphis: National Civil Rights Museum at the Lorraine Hotel (aka Motel). Side approach. Just reopened with extensive renovations on April 5, 2014. This image was frozen in time on April 11, 2014.  

The front of the Lorraine. Wreath marks the area where Martin Luther King, Jr., was assassinated on April  4, 1968. The National Civil Rights Museum is powerful, and goes perfectly well with the International Civil Rights Center & Museum in Greensboro, North Carolina. 

Last year at this time, also with friends I checked out the Little Rock Central High School National Historic Site in Little Rock, Arkansas, equally worth the pilgrimage. They are all sobering places of universal merit.    

Here's an eccentric Catholic-themed altar-like display on Beale Street in a shop front. It includes the latest three popes and various snippets of related text such as:

PROUD 2 B

AN AMERICAN

LAND OF THE FREE

FREEDOM OF SPEECH

FREEDOM OF RELIGION

GOD BLESS AMERICA

And, quoting Pope Francis: 'WHO AM I TO JUDGE?'

Other bits include: "Francis credited with exorcism." Let's not forget this airy claim: "Memphis is the center of the spiritual universe."

Pilgrimage to Memphis. Closeup of a sign for Shirley's Beauty Salon, near Stax grounds. Can you dig?

Today's Rune: Partnership.  

Games

I saw Curtis Harrington's Games (1967) on TV when I was a kid and it scared the hell out of me. It gave a glimpse into adult life, something that could apparently be even more bizarre than childhood! Never forgot it. 

Games. All the more interesting now after seeing the correspondence in basic story idea with Les Diaboliques (1954), a flick discussed in yesterday's post. What cements the deal is the reoccurrence of actor Simone Signoret. 

Striking in Games is the atmospheric use of Pop Art (like Roy Lichtenstein), which serves as a sort of Greek Chorus. 

Hard to believe, but even James Caan was once in his twenties. That's Katharine Ross on the left and Simone Signoret on the right. 

Two other films on TV that terrorized me as a kid: The Boston Strangler (1968; confusing because Tony Curtis was usually a nice guy in movies) and Crowhaven Farm (1970), a tale of reincarnation, modern witches and flashbacks to events in colonial Salem, Massachusetts. 

Happy Hallowe'en, folks!

Today's Rune: Fertility. 

Suor Sorriso / Sister Smile

Bold is a good word for Roger Deutsch's Suor Sorriso / Sister Smile (2001), an Italian language film based on the life arc of Jeanne-Paule (Jeanine) Marie Deckers, aka Sœur Luc-Gabriel, aka Sœur Sourire.

Sister Smile takes the original "Singing Nun" (played by Ginevra Colonna) out of Belgium and moves her decades forward in time, dropping her into Italy at the turn of the latest century.  Despite a framing narrator, the film never explains why. Kind of crazy cool that way.

My initial response: Sister Smile feels in tone like some kind of almost demented blend of Rosemary's Baby (1968), The Exorcist (1973) and The Wicker Man (1973). Medievalish, something eerie suspended between an Andy Warhol and a David Lynch movie, with odd production values also looming somewhere in between, a psychological-spiritual disaster-quest played out on the astral plane. 

Trippy and memorable, just not for "family night."

Today's Rune: Strength.   

The Hardest Working Man (Take I)

I'm about halfway through The Hardest Working Man: How James Brown Saved the Soul of America (2009), a stellar little book by James Sullivan. Very exciting stuff about James Brown, well-contextualized -- where he came from, what he did and how he did it. Sullivan structures the thrust of his chapters around the immediate aftermath of the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr., when the Hardest Working Man in Show Business helped stabilize the popular situation, which had been ruled by intense anger, riot and contagion. 

In The Hardest Working Man, we learn a lot of unexpected things, like the apparent fact that 28-year old Barney Frank came up with the idea of broadcasting Brown's concert, something that quickly (and quite improbably) came to fruition as Live at the Boston Garden: April 5, 1968 (WGBH-TV).

The Hardest Working Man does a lot of other connecting of the magical dots -- even beyond the idea that anyone who puts their mind to it ought to be able to connect any point A with any point B, no matter how unrelated either may seem.

One connection to Brown's arc was none other than Sweet Daddy Grace, "a legendary charismatic figure born in 1884 in the Cape Verde Islands . . . A demonstrative preacher with a Daliesque mustache who prompted members of his congregation to speak in tongues . . . often accompanied by multiple bands 'to assure jumping dance music' . . ." (Sullivan, pages 56-57). 

Brown seized upon some of Sweet Daddy's showmanship in developing his own stage act, and the rest is history . . . (to be continued).

Today's Rune: Breakthrough.  And a Fine & Happy 60th Anniversary to my parents, Don and Barb France!  

Psychedelic Saigon

Sublime Frquencies (Seattle, Washington, USA): Saigon Rock & Soul: Vietnamese Classic Tracks 1968-1974 2-LP SF060.

This collection is a mind-blower, but as soon as you think about it, everything makes perfect sense. Of course there was a music scene "on the scene" in Saigon (now Ho Chi Minh City) during the US-Vietnam War. Of course there was more going on than that reflected in Hollywood movies about the war. Yes, there were and are Vietnamese people, too! South, North and everything in between.

I've known several Vietnamese Americans and all of them have had rich, complicated family histories. One was a stewardess who emigrated to the States in the late 1960s, having married a GI. Another, an entrepreneur in Philadelphia, was raised Catholic and brought with her two sisters by her mother -- initially to Omaha, Nebraska, in the early 1970s. Her father remained in country, fighting for the North. Texas has a large Vietnamese population, too, fanning out from eateries to goods and services businesses and into local colleges. I've worked with many Vietnamese students in Philadelphia, Detroit and in Texas, working on basic English writing skills, and am always struck by how poetic Vietnamese turns of phrase are, even when morphed into English. For these reasons and more, it's with great delight that I choose this collection for today's post. 

To quote from Sublime Frequencies' product description: Every song is a mini-masterpiece be it heavy acid rock psychedelia, horn and guitar drenched funk grooves, or gripping soul ballads reflective of life during wartime. The tracks that form this collection cut a window into a rich musical Vietnamese music scene that has long been obscured, and for the most part, forgotten. As the scope of electrified Vietnamese music from the 1960s and 1970s begins to be revealed, it becomes evident that this was among the heaviest and most eclectic musical scenes of South East Asia at the time. These songs tell of war, love and what war does to love. All of them were recorded in makeshift studios and even US army facilities while the Vietnam War raged – and were issued by a handful of Saigon record companies on vinyl 45s and reel or cassette tapes.

One of my favorite tracks so far is this one by Thành Mái: "Tóc Mai Sợi Vắn Sợi Dài (Long, Uneven Hair)." It's got a trippy tempo with strong vocal. For more from Sublime Frequencies, here's a link. I'm a big fan.



Today's Rune: Joy.                                         

Jean-Pierre Melville: Les enfants terribles (Take II)

Again while trying to absorb Jean-Pierre Melville (and Jean Cocteau's) Les enfants terribles (1950), live events keep rolling in. Today's big Supreme Court rulings in the USA were victories for the legitmacy of gay marriages, including recognition of federal benefits. This is a touchstone issue around the world and will certainly circulate in due time around the other states here. Overall, these rulings and similar developments represent a big shift since a time-marking event as recent as the 2004 presidential election, when so-and-so's pastor told people not to vote for John Kerry because he wouldn't stifle gay rights. A Pyrrhic victory for social conservatives, it turns out. One of many such in hindsight, I suspect.  

Michigan Daily, October 15, 1975

In any case, Les enfants terribles is a peculiar movie (based on the equally peculiar Cocteau novel), definitely memorable in part because it's so weird and different from more "typical" fare. It does remind me of a few other works, but of each in a different way. It utilizes classical music akin to how Stanley Kubrick later did in completing A Clockwork Orange (1971), for instance. It has social relationships in the same emotional realm as found in Flannery O'Connor's Wise Blood (1952) -- which is cool, because she may have seen the film at the time; certainly, given her interest in French literature, she would have been aware of the 1929 Cocteau novel. And there's a thematic connection taken up by Bernardo Bertolucci (Last Tango in Paris, Little Buddha) in The Dreamers (2003), a film also set in Paris, only updated to revolutionary year 1968. All in all for these comparisons and on its own merits, it's worth an extended look.

   
The image here reminds me off the top of my head of Ingmar Bergman's Det sjunde inseglet / The Seventh Seal (1957), Roman Polanski's Rosemary's Baby (1968) and Clint Eastwood's Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil (1997). What do you think?

Today's Rune: The Mystery Rune.