Piloting The Sedan deVille

A rare but exciting experience in my house was helping my father shop for a car. It was rare because he squeezed a lot out of his cars. We bought a 58 Chevy in 1962 and a 1962 Chevy in 66. By 1972 he was shopping around again.   
It was exciting because the thought of a new car got everybody in the house excited. It must have been a torment for my dad though as each family member had their own opinion about what was cool and what he could afford.

Having read numerous Hot Rod and Car-Toons Magazine, I was an expert in cars by the age of 13. I thought a GTO or Challenger would make a great family car. Instead we bought a 1970 Chevy Impala. It turned out to be the car I learned to drive in but we came close to buying a real beast that year.

For some reason, my father had his eye on a 1969 Pontiac Bonneville. It floated down the road like an airplane and we all got excited about it. On the test drive we took it home and imagined it in our driveway on a permanent basis. Fortunately my father imagined it in our garage and was wise enough to measure it. The signature Pontiac nose wouldn’t fit in the garage unless we poked a hole in the back wall.

I was reminded of that massive Pontiac this week when I came across a 1970 Cadillac Sedan DeVille for sale in our neighborhood. The car isn’t eye catching in the classic car sense but you could say it has curb appeal if you could see the curb.

The car is not the biggest modern Cadillac– that honor goes to the 1976 model – but it is massive in every way. It is more than 6’ wide and about 19’ long. The 472 cubic inch engine could power a fleet of Hondas and the 26 gallon gas tank suggested that fuel efficiency was probably not its strongest selling point.

“The first time I saw the car I thought it would be fun to own,” said Jeffrey Criss, the car’s most recent owner. “My friend was driving it and I suggested we trade. About a year later he came back and swapped the Caddie for a small Ford pickup.” “I think I liked it because it was so long,” he added. “There weren’t many of them around and it certainly caught people’s attention."

After comparing the car’s handling to a boat, Criss let me take the behemoth for a spin. I slid onto the 6’ bench seat and under the thin steering wheel (no adjustable steering wheels here). Just like big dogs take their owners for a walk, the 1970 Sedan DeVille takes its driver for a ride. I barely touched the gas pedal and the car rumbled away.   

My short ride brought back more than a few memories of old cars where half the electrical switches didn’t work and the smell of exhaust subtly filled the car.   

Still, the 26 year-old Criss says it will be hard to see the car go. “It’s just funky and fun but not the most practical for transportation.”   

Anyone who ever pushed and jumped their old, fun and funky car would probably agree.

Sixties Hits and Misses

   Every now and then you hear a song on the radio that makes you cringe.  You’re embarrassed that you know every word and you think to yourself “how did a song like this ever become popular?”

   It might be fate or mass hysteria but now and then songs just catch on and years later they just don’t sound as good. Each decade has its moments of weakness like Achy Breaky Heart or Mambo #5 but the sixties are a goldmine of hits that could have easily been misses.

   The best example is a 7-minute epic called MacArthur Park. The song was written by famed country songwriter Jimmy Webb for a vocal group called The Association.  They passed on the opportunity and the actor Richard Harris of Camelot fame picked it up. Harris was far from a rock star at the time and the song about leaving the cake in the rain made little sense to people but something about it clicked. It reached #2 on the radio charts in June of 1968. Disco fans might also remember Donna Summer’s snappy version in the late 70’s. You might not like it, in fact it was voted among the worst songs of the 60’s, but if it comes on the radio you will know almost every word.

   That same year Herbert Khaury, a street performer from New York City, pulled out a ukulele and sang Tiptoe Through The Tulips as Tiny Tim. It was a big hit for Tiny Tim who apparently died of a heart attack in 1996 while performing the same song. If you remember it, you probably hated this song but you could also find yourself softly singing along in the privacy of your car

   One song you may not know the words but could still sing along with is Dominique, a #1 hit in 1963 sung by a Belgian named Sister Luc-Gabrielle or The Singing Nun. Even though it was sung completely in French, the song became a hit and prevented the classic song Louie Louie from reaching #1. 

   Lyrics were clearly not the lure on Sukiyaki either. The 1963 song by Kyu Sakamoto is sung in Japanese. According to Billboard Magazine, the song’s original title was Ue O Muite Aruko (I look Up When I Walk). Record producers changed the name to Sukiyaki, a title easier to pronounce but totally unrelated to the song. We have no idea what it means but we still know the words – sort of.

   When I think of bad songs I couldn’t get out of my head, the song Spill The Wine comes to mind. Like it or not, I heard it every 20 minutes on AM radio during the summer of 1970.  It wasn’t the worst song on the radio that summer. That distinction goes to a band called The Pipkins and a weird song called Gimme Dat Ding. The song defies explanation for its popularity.

   My personal torment is a song that begins with “breaker 1-9 this here’s rubber duck.”  I simply hate this song but could sing it blind in a karaoke bar.  As a country music DJ in the mid 70’s the song couldn’t be avoided. It played over and over and over again on the top forty station between Crystal Gayle and Tanya Tucker.

   So how about you? Is there a song you know too well and hate too much? If so, drop me an email at flipside@tx.rr.com and we will revisit our history of bad music later this summer.  Until then – let those truckers roll 10-4.

The Honeymoon's Not Over

   As the youngest in my house, I headed to bed long before my parents and older brother.  Each night I fell asleep to the familiar sounds of the shower water running and my parent’s casual conversations and the song “You’re My Greatest Love” rising up the stairs from the living room television.

  You may know the song by its more common name as “The Honeymooners Theme Song” but either way, it was a late night lullaby for me.

   The popular 1950’s show had been in reruns for years on New York City’s WPIX television and my parents watched it almost every night after the early news.  Because it came on late, I almost never saw the show but I heard it from my bedroom at the top of the stairs.  When I was older I learned that my parents rarely saw it either – they usually fell asleep on the coach and recliner – then went to bed when the closing music credits came on.

   Over the years I have seen many of the Honeymooner episodes and have enjoyed clips on various TV specials but I never seriously watched them – until recently.

   Last December I received a box set of the “Classic 39 Episodes” of The Honeymooners as a gift and recently finished watching them in order with my wife Ann.  We were surprised at what we saw.

   First, let’s start with a history lesson.  The first Honeymooner’s sketch aired in 1951 on a show called Cavalcade of Stars that was hosted by Jackie Gleason.  Gleason got his own show a year later and the Honeymooners bits were regularly featured as part of the show through 1954. Jackie Gleason and CBS debuted the standalone sitcom on October 1, 1955 and the series ran for 39 episodes.  Gleason supposedly pulled the show when he felt the storylines had run their course but competition from the top rated Perry Como Show probably helped.

   Honeymooner sketches were part of later Jackie Gleason television shows into the 1970’s although the Classic 39 are considered the best and most original.

    What surprised us most was how well the shows hold up.  The writing is tight, the production quality is good and the comic timing of all four main characters makes each episode a pleasure to watch.

   I admit the plots are predictable but most 1950s television was. Each episode features bus driver Ralph Cramden inserting a foot in his “Big Mouth” but the supporting characters of his wife Alice and upstairs neighbors Ed and Trixie Norton always help him pull it out.

   An interesting footnote on watching the shows was the cast of actors who appeared in episodes as different people to move the story along.  One actor, Frank Marth, was a member of Ralph’s Raccoon Lodge, a bank robber, a news photographer, a bus driver and an employee at the animal shelter. 

   Watching The Honeymooners made us realize that all of the sitcoms and cartoons (Flintstones, for example) that imitated them may have been slicker but it all started in that apartment at 328 Chauncey Street in Brooklyn.

   Back at the Carroll household, we may go back and revisit episodes 18 and 26. It seems that, like my parents, the two of us dozed through a few shows only to be awakened by the sounds of “You’re My Greatest Love.”  Some things never change.

Running Full Speed On Kid Power

Different state - same theme. The Brownrigg kids and friends
prepare for a kid-powered go cart race in Clifton Beach (Cleveland), Ohio.

   Some of the nuttiest things I ever got involved with took place during those years before girls and summer jobs filled the time. For most of those nutty activities, I had a partner named Gary Costa.

   We constructed extravagant slot car layouts, took adventurous bike rides, built car models and learned how to play Risk – sort of. One of our most memorable activities was building a homemade go cart.

   Some of the older neighborhood kids had go carts powered by upright lawn mower engines. We would see and certainly hear them in the empty church parking lot. It looked like so much fun that one day Gary and I decided to build our own cart.

   There were no sponsors for our racing team so spending money was out of the question. The cart would need to be built from materials scavenged from our own garages.

   We started with an old ¾”sheet of plywood that weighed much more than it needed to. A crude seat was built from thinner plywood and an old 2 x 4 would hold the front axle.  The wheels and axles were scavenged from an old go cart and clothesline was tied to the front axle for steering.

   We hammered it together with a box of roofing nails we found and Gary’s father offered advice and hardware for attaching the axles to the cart. We borrowed a half empty can of house paint and ruined a few of my father’s brushes as we painted the entire cart gloss black.

   Before the cart was ready for racing, we needed two more key pieces – an engine and brakes. I am sure the vehicle would have been faster and safer if we included those but unfortunately that never happened.

   Instead we ran and stopped the cart using kid power.  I would push it down the block and Gary would push it back. Stopping was avoided as much as possible. Since running the cart down the city street was not a good plan, we pushed it along the tree lined sidewalks.  If we were lucky enough not to hit a tree, the cart would usually coast to a stop on someone’s lawn.

   On those few occasions where one of us would push the other into a tree, the driver would slide across the splintered sheet of plywood like a test dummy. Later we installed a rope behind the seat that tied around the waist to ensure the driver’s complete safety.

   We knew the go cart wasn’t fast since it was almost as heavy as an SUV and we saw the flaws in an engine-less vehicle.  Still, we were proud of the cart and it filled a lot of time during the summer and fall of 1968. It also filled up Mr. Costa’s garage as he was quick to point out from time to time.

   The best and last time we ran the cart was after a heavy snowfall. The sidewalks had been shoveled but ice covered everything. The pushing was a challenge but the driving was a blast. The car spun and slid on the ice until it struck a large tree at a relatively fast speed. The front end broke and Gary was lucky not to lose a kidney to our rope seat belt system.

   A few years Gary and I would be driving real cars. Fortunately we never slammed into a tree but there was one day when the engine with on his Triumph Spitfire stalled. Just like the old days, I found myself pushing Gary and his car down the street. You know I think the Spitfire was actually lighter than that go cart.

Conducting Scholarly Stooge Research

My earliest recollection of The Three Stooges was a show on WPIX in New York City that was hosted by Officer Joe Bolton. Each afternoon Bolton’s show, The Three Stooges Funhouse, would feature several Three Stooges short films along with NYPD safety tips and guest appearances.  

Even though many of the films were over 25 years old, they were new to me and I would flip to Channel 11 each day for a dose of nyuk, nyuk, nyuk. Apparently I wasn’t alone.   

The vaudeville comedians who made their first movie in 1930 were on the brink of extinction in the early 1950’s. Their short subject films had been running in theaters before feature films and the mostly adult audiences were losing their taste for slapstick humor.   

Moe and Larry were beginning to look at other career options when their luck literally turned around. Commercial television was in its infancy and networks provided a limited amount of programming. Local stations were left to fill the gaps, especially in the late afternoon. Columbia Pictures, owners of everything Stooge, sold broadcasting rights for the black and white shorts to the new TV stations.   

Stations across the country bought the syndicated shows and then hired children’s TV personalities such as Officer Joe Bolton and Harlow Hickenlooper (Indianapolis) and Icky Twerp (Dallas) to host the shows. As a result, Moe, Larry and Curly (and Shemp, Joe and Little Joe) were introduced to a new generation of kids.   

The Three Stooges became superstars making appearances at shopping centers and movie theaters in cities that aired their old movie shorts five days a week. It was during this 15+ year surge that most baby boomer boys were exposed to the Stooges.   

Despite their advancing age and the questionable quality of their work in the 60’s, the Three Stooges released ten full length movies and their own cartoon series. These days movies like The Stooges Meet Hercules, Have Rocket Will Travel and Around The World In a Daze are hard to find for good reason. Their best work, however, has been remastered and reissued in a series of DVD sets packaged by Columbia Pictures called The Three Stooges Collection Volume 1-8.   

My interest in the trio was rekindled this year when I heard that a new Three Stooges movie would be released in April. I found an enjoyable book called “One Fine Stooge,” which viewed the Stooge’s long career through the eyes of Larry Fine.   

The book’s references to classic Stooge fare like Women Haters and Dizzy Doctors led me to start collecting the “new” DVDs. I am proud or embarrassed to say that I now own all 8 volumes or 192 short films that span from 1934 – 1959. You might say that watching hours of knucklehead television will be a waste of time. I prefer to call it research.   

I expanded my research this past weekend by sitting through the new Three Stooges movie. For this Stooge fan, the movie was a disappointment but the kids laughed at each hammer to the head and fist to the gut. If it catches on then maybe a new generation of Stooge fans will discover the wonders of those old 15 minute black and white classics once again.

Never Too Old To Rock and Roll

Jethro Tull's Ian Anderson - Then and Now

The classic rock band Jethro Tull released a prophetic song in 1976 called “Too Old To Rock and Roll, Too Young To Die.” Lead singer Ian Anderson was 27 years old at the time and already foreseeing a time when folks might hang up their rock and roll shoes.

The band’s website shows that the 65 year old Anderson is now in the middle of a 70 city tour around Europe and the United States. He’s obviously not “too old” yet. I was 19 years old when the song was released and if asked, I would have confidently stated that 40 is clearly too old to rock and roll. Jerry Lee Lewis was 41 at the time and “ancient” in my book. He played the Richardson Wildflower Festival last summer at the age of 75.

Sitting up close at the Allen Event Center’s Starship – Survivor – John Parr concert recently, I caught myself doing the math. If Mickey Thomas sang “Fooled Around and Fell In Love” in 1976 then how old is the guy? His voice was strong and he bounced around the stage like a 40 year-old. He’s actually 63 and is certainly not too old to rock and roll. Neither were the gray haired fans nearby who were more likely to know the lyrics to the song White Rabbit than their AARP membership number.

My daughter’s 19th birthday was last week. She may tolerate the music in her dad’s car but you won’t find any oldies in her Jeep. Eight months in Lubbock have turned her tastes to country music and those young cowboy stars who dominate the charts. I don’t have the heart to tell her that Jason Aldean is 35 and Dierks Bentley is 37. When she hits my age, Jason will be 70 and George Strait will be playing Billy Bob’s Saloon at age 94.

I never acknowledged the talent of Frank Sinatra when I was a teenager. My parents would argue that he was one of the greatest ever but I couldn’t see beyond his 60+ age. Kids today dismiss Paul McCartney in the same way. How can we blame them although we might argue he is one of the greatest ever.

Baby boomer rock and roll fans have a lot of practice overlooking the visual signs of age. They do it every morning in the mirror. That’s why they don’t complain if Mick Jagger is looking a little ragged at 69 but they expect him to sound close to the Mick Jagger on their IPODs. Most of the time he does and the Rolling Stones are in their 5th decade of touring.

Rock and roll music is the time machine for baby boomers and that’s why none of us will ever be too old to rock and roll. Songs can immediately transport us back to our younger days and most of us are happy to plunk down some money to see those classic rockers in concert one more time. In the future, noisy grandchildren will no longer be the biggest problem in assisted living communities. Instead, the floors will be thumping to the sounds of Aerosmith as hearing impaired residents turn up their Bose sound systems.

Million Dollar Quartet Celebrates Famous Jam Session

Some dates in rock and roll history stand out more than others. February 7, 1964, for example, is the day the Beatles played on The Ed Sullivan Show and were introduced to America audiences. August 16, 1969 is the day the Woodstock Festival opened and February 3, 1959 is known as “the day the music died” due to the tragic plane crash that killed Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and The Big Bopper among others.

 The writers of a hit Broadway musical would have you add December 4, 1956 to that list. That is the day that four future stars jammed in a small recording studio in Memphis, Tennessee.

The musical is called Million Dollar Quartet and it celebrates the true life events that led to Johnny Cash, Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins and Jerry Lee Lewis all performing one night and one night only at the Sun Records Studio. According to Phillips, the December 4th recording session was reserved for Carl Perkins and he invited Lewis to play piano. Elvis unexpectedly stopped in at the studio and Phillips called Johnny Cash to complete the one night quartet.

The Tony Award winning musical is a combination concert and history lesson as the audience is transported back to the small storefront recording studio operated by Sam Phillips.

Phillips, a popular DJ in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, moved to Memphis in 1950 and opened the Memphis Recording Service. He embraced the mix of blues and country music that musicians brought to his studio and started Sun Records in 1952. He is best known for launching the careers of the million dollar quartet members but he also is credited for recording the first rock and roll record in 1951; a number called Rocket 88 by Jackie Brenston and His Delta Cats.

The Million Dollar Quartet musical tells the story of that famous night and offers some insight into the personalities of the musicians but the storyline frequently steps aside for the music. Popular hits such as Blue Suede Shoes, Hound Dog, Whole Lot of Shakin’ and Folsom Prison Blues are incorporated into the show. In all, audiences are treated to twenty-one early hits by Cash, Perkins, Lewis and Presley.

In the style of Jersey Boys, the show’s four stars are first class vocalists and actors who keep the show from becoming just a musical revue. They are also accomplished musicians that capture the style of those early Sun Record days.

While much has been written about the four music pioneers portrayed in the musical, Sam Phillips was the man who recognized the talent and taught his artists how to make hit records. They all moved on to successful careers away from Sun Records but for one night the stars aligned over 706 Union Avenue in Memphis and the Million Dollar Quartet gives you a front row seat.

Million Dollar Quartet is playing at the Music Hall at Fair Park in Dallas as part of the Dallas Summer Musical Series. The show runs through March 18. For ticket information visit http://www.dallassummermusicals.org/ or call the DSM ticket office at 214-691-7200.