The other day reader Anonymous asked the poignant question "Speaking of great lost singles of the 80s -- what ever happened to The A's "A Woman's Got the Power?"
Well, Anon old pal -- here it is.
Funny thing is, I don't remember this song at all. Which is odd because I'm pretty sure I reviewed these guys first album -- which featured the tender ballad "Teenage Jerkoff" -- and I'm almost positive I saw them live around the same time, probably at the Mudd Club (the then tragically hip downtown joint that was documented in the appalling New Wave horror film Liquid Sky, perhaps the quintessential pretentious artifact of its era).
In any case -- I think they were from Philadelphia, which probably explains their fashion sense.
appalling New Wave horror film Liquid Sky
ReplyDeleteAppalling? I remember nothing but peals of laughter filling the midnight shows at the Orson Welles cinema upon hearing the line, "I kill with my cunt".
The Mudd club was truly immortalized by "Life During Wartime".
This ain't the Mudd Club, or CBGB
I ain't got time for that now.....
Well, I haven't seen it in years, and apparently it hasn't been available on home video since the 80s. But I remember it being about as utterly repellent a film as I'd ever seen, and if there were laughs they were totally unintentional -- a more somber and full of itself piece of shit I can't even imagine.
ReplyDeleteBut I'm almost positive there were scenes filmed in or just outside the Mudd Club.
maybe saw them at the Fast Lane in asbury park - probably played with the LAUGHING DOGS or Johnnys Dance Band! --
ReplyDeleteAh, the Laughing Dogs.
ReplyDeleteBest album title and cover of all time.
"The Laughing Dogs Meet Their Makers."
With them posed with their parents...
:-)
So... I must be really thick today. What is the connection to bad hair? What is wrong with "feathering your hair? I am just glad my sons are not teenagers now. The Neo-glam Emo haircuts of today's rebellious youth are just ridiculous. This is coming from a guy who sported spiked hair, a faux hawk and finally a mohawk when every Tom, Dick and harriet wouldn't dare go out in public with one.
ReplyDeleteThe A's are awesome though. "After last night", "Five Minutes In a Heroe's life", the aforementioned "Teenage jerkoff".
speaking of Johnnys Dance band -
ReplyDeleteearly/mid 1970s — when The Hooters were a band called Baby Grand and Springsteen was hanging at the Jersey Shore — there was Johnny’s Dance Band -lead vocal , nannette mancini --
"The Golden Age of Bad Haircuts"
ReplyDeleteI think I just found the title for my next unfinished novel.
The lead singer has a bad toupee. It is obvious. His hair is glued down!
ReplyDeleteBack in the early '90s I worked for a decorator for fabulous parties who employed a crew of people of various stripes (all of us miserable) which included for a time none other than Anne Carlisle of Liquid Sky fame. She was no longer waifish, and she was not the least bit androgynous. She seemed rather serious, a bit guarded, but I'm sure it must have sucked to have had a real moment in the sun (shitty movie or no) and then be reduced to carting flower arrangements into the Frick for a rich-person party.
ReplyDeleteDavid:
ReplyDeleteCliff DeYoung -- now a successful actor, but back in the day the lead singer of Clear Light, who had one interesting album on Elektra -- once told me that after the band broke up, he got a job as a messenger in NYC, and was frequently making deliveries over to the Village Voice, where six months earlier he was being hailed as the Next Jim Morrison.
Talk about the mighty falling , etc...
I see a book here: Rock's Most Ignominious Come-Downs.
ReplyDeleteDavid said...
ReplyDeleteI see a book here: Rock's Most Ignominious Come-Downs
Or as we used to say in the 60s --
Back to the Car Wash.