Lick Us Back!
Readers Response
My Dear Lollipop,
So we meet again, Lollipop! The last time I met you, I was in New York auditioning for Wiz On A Cousin – a sitcom about a too-closely knit extended family with a congenital bladder problem. You were going on Ricki Lake for a program about siblings who stab each other. “They stabbed me, Ricki,” said your sister. “And I’ll stab you again, bitch!” you screamed back.
I journeyed across the mystic Delaware River to the fabled land of New Jersey. From Philadelphia came I, across the bridge to the ancient city of Palmyra, and hence to the magic circle of Berlin. Onward, I pressed to the righteous Route 30 and past the utopian community of New Freedom. But tarrying not there, I pushed on, through Egg Harbor, where they cool their eggs in the river, ’til at last I reached my destination and destiny in Atlantic City. And I told the people that trod upon the boardwalk, chewing saltwater taffy, “WALL-TER and Jen are evil! I denouce them!” And I told them gambling their lives away and listening to Dixieland Jazz bands in The Showboat casino, “WALL-TER and Jen sexually abuse cows! I denounce them!” And I told the people sunning themselves on the beach and frolicking in the ocean surf, “WALL-Ter and Jen maketh tape cassettes featuring them farting on each other and burping at me! I denounce them!” And I say unto thee, that verily WALL-TER and Jen, P.O. Box 107, Geronimo, TX 78115, are evil! Denounce them!
The Beach Boys played a free concert in Philadelphia for the Fourth of July. Yeah, we were surfing to that California Sound on Benjamin Franklin Parkway! But I wonder how old you have to be before the City Fathers will hire you to play Philly on the Fourth. I mean, when Green Day are all middle-aged men, will they finally be ready for Independence Day in the city where it all started? Of course, by then all the kids will be into electrode music, with live electrodes plugged into their heads! Of course, Philadelphia owns Independence Day. We got Independence Hall, after all. Okay, so it was turned into a Burger Thing for the Babblecentennial. We also got the Liberty Bell, which is a vaginal symbol, as all bells are, representing America’s divided sexuality, but, of course, you knew that. For Bastille Day, I stormed a Peugeot. It’s a tradition! I hope you and the Mounties enjoy the latest issue of The Weird News.
I just got a letter today from something called “The Alice Berniece Warner Boardman Stevens Institute of Trio-Rhythmic Psychology” in Escondido, CA. Here is their opening sentence: “Can there be hope in these darkest days when the horders of evil and the Anti-Christ and the Barbarian are led by the U.S., Germany, Japan, England, etc., run roughshod over people?” What I want to know is, is everyone in California is like this?
Long Live The Revolution,
Don Busby
Slanted and Caffeinated: A Dispatch from the Other Coast
Greetings Fellow Lollipoppers!
Much has transpired since I last stood on the slick-with-spilled-beer floors in the smoke-filled space that is Lollipop Global Headquarters. In order to complete work on A Starr is Born: the Unauthorized Autobiography of Ringo Starr (if I move around a lot, it makes it harder for the remaining Beatles and Michael Jackson to sue me), this reporter has relocated himself and his few belongings to the other edge of the country, to, as Martin Sheen muttered in Apocalypse Now (the greatest movie ever, after Repo Man), the “end of the river.” OK, so there’s no river that runs East to West across the United States, but if there were, it would end up here, in Portland, Oregon.
That’s correct! I have taken up residence in the Pacific Northwest, where, as Mr. Kerry Joyce vaguely instructed me, I am to do a “scene report, or something.” And yes, there is a scene in this city of vast politeness, long streets, and coffee (too much coffee, if you ask me). Unfortunately, they usually charge money to enter a venue, see a band, and get drunk (so much like the East Coast!), and not being gainfully employed, well, money’s a little tight (independently wealthy readers can send donations to me, in care of Lollipop. Make your check or money order payable to: The Jon Sarre Memorial Beer Fund. With tax season just around the corner, you’ll be glad to know that all of your generous charitable contributions are tax-deductible!)
Anyway, to get back to the point, I did cough up ten bucks to see those Stockton, California/New York City indie press darlings, Pavement. I had my reservations, since their latest release, Wowee Zowee (Matador), is kinda uneven and even downright bad in parts, but hey, I’m enough of a sucker to buy their records and all, so why not check out the live experience? Much like Wowee Zowee, Pavement’s set varied in quality. Removed from the studio setting and without twenty guitar overdubs, the band gave a rather lax reading of their own material, mostly from Wowee Zowee. It kinda makes you wonder if they’d tour at all if they didn’t have to.
The high points for me were when they actually mixed the stuff up a little bit, such as Steven Malkmus’ lyrical improvisation on “Range Life,” and the all powerchord version of “Summer Babe” (they sped it up for a point there, too). Just because Pavement’s been labeled slackers by the mainstream rock press, they don’t have to come off that way. A spotty performance, indeed, but when Pavement deigned to show a little life, the show was worth checking out. Maybe they should get out of the studio more.
Jon Sarre
