Sometimes I miss being a graphic designer...

Messin' My Mind Up

I was 14 in 1971 and in 9th grade. My family had moved away from my grandmother's house in Mt Pleasant, two blocks from the National Zoo to far Southeast near the Maryland line. I watched a lot of TV because I didn't have much else to do. I stayed up late on the weekends because that's when the horror movies were on and I didn't (and still don't) sleep much. One Saturday night I came across a show on one of the UHF channels that used a Jimi Hendrix song for it's opening theme. I think the show was called "Turn On" and they played the above video and I was awestruck! All my life I had been listening to what my Mom listened to: Aretha Franklin, Lou Rawls, Brook Benton. I was a casual jazz listener from being at my Dad's apartment and because my Uncle Hank used to play Coltrane really loud and scat over it.

But Dr. John was like nothing I'd ever seen or heard before. I realised there was some other kind of music "out there" in the world that was from an artistic space that I never knew existed. This was music that you couldn't find in S. Klein's (I think they're K-Mart now) or Woolworth's or any of the department stores that had a small record department.

A year later, Dr. John was still in my head and I was in high school. I used to hang out at the public library wth Mark Puryear because he was the coolest guy I knew. Mark changed my life in that he opened my ears to some of the most amazing music ever. He introduced me to the Grateful Dead, the Allman Brothers, Traffic, and Dr John the Night Tripper. We would pull records at random just to see what they were.

Thanks to Mark for my eclectic taste in music and for pointing me towards Washington, DC's hippie culture mecca (at the time), Georgetown, where I met the other huge influence on my musical mind, Rick Carlisle the owner of Orpheus Records and one of my best friends.

Currently on the Turntable in the MondoCave!
Teena Marie - Robbery
Ultravox - Lament
Danny Elfman - So-Lo
Jack Jones - The Impossible Dream
Stabbing Westward - Darker Days

Acting With Vincent Price

As most people who know me will tell you, I spend a great deal of my time alone. Some will say I spend too much time alone. Pish-tosh, I say. I've been a loner all of my life and like it that way. However, I do like being around other people occasionally. I'm not a complete sociopath. I am very adept at entertaining myself. I have lots of books, movies, comics, art supplies, Freecell and Spider Solitaire on my 'puter, and thousands of records, CDs and cassettes.

Pictured above is one of my LPs. What's cool about it is that you can act out scenes with Vincent Price by playing the record and reading from the included script. Aside from this LP's entertainment value, it's usefulness extends to using snippets on my answering machine and in some of my mixtapes. I also like to make up my own dialog...

Today on the StudioMONDO turntable:
Heaven 17 - Heaven 17
Nova - Wings of Love
The Nylons - One Size Fits All
Funkadelic - Hardcore Jollies
Nu-Shooz - Poolside

Giddy!

a big victory: better late than never: music meme

I came across this blog entry (a big victory: better late than never: music meme) while trying to find info on DC-based band Made for TV and their song "So Afraid of the Russians". There isn't, not suprisingly, much about them outside of tracklistings and wishlists. No info on the band members at all. I did, however, find that two member are living and/or working in Rappahanock County, VA. Currently waiting for requests for a bio from a guy I think may have been the guitarist, Alex Henze...

While reading through Michelle's blog I decided to play along with her music meme...