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Tag: Thomas Pynchon

Episode Thirty Five – Star Wars With Jon Bon, Ally McB, & Cliffy C

“I don’t mean to imply that Star Wars was some sort of documentary about Ms. Flockhart and Jon Bon Jovi on the set of Ally McBeal”

In which Young Southpaw ponders why the Star Wars films didn’t have theme songs a la the James Bond franchise

Taking in The Indelicates, Thomas Pynchon, Inherent Vice, The Ramones, KISS, Rocky IV, Def Leppard, Metallica, David Bowie, Cheers, Cliff Claven, Hoth, Empire Strikes Back, Shirley Bassey, and much more etc.

 

“So I’m doin another podcast, one where I interview artists I really dig, it’s called Etcetera ETC with Young Southpaw. You can find it at all the places ya know. And last week’s one was pretty eye-opening man. I interviewed The Indelicates, a band I’ve loved for a long time, and Simon Indelicate pointed something out… Now it’s weird man, like I’m not exactly sure his last name is Indelicate, I wouldn’t put money on it, especially against him. But that’s the name of the band and so the last name he uses I’m pretty sure. I mean this is the way things have gone since The Ramones, since the end of last century, or I guess the last fifth of last century, that album came in 1980 I think… But ya know, hey ho, let’s go with it…

But speaking of real names, there was that character in Tommy P’s Inherent Vice novel called Vincent Indelicato. And well I can’t say that I’m not sure that that’s his real last name cause he’s someone that Thomas Pynchon created so like… I don’t know, I mean, he’s obviously a fictional character, but it’s probably the fictional character’s real last name. There was no indication in Inherent Vice that he was, that this was an alias, or that he was even in a band. I mean I doubt he was even in The Indelicates. Man, I guess I missed a trick. That I should have asked The Indelicates have they ever had any fictional characters, by Thomas Pynchon or otherwise, in their band. And then like this guy would have been a bit of a rebel too, insisting on Indelicato while the rest of them are Indeli-cate ya know…

But anyway like Simon Indelicate ya know…aka……..Simon Indelicate… pointed out that Jovi, ya know Jon Bon… his first appearance on record was actually that Star Wars Christmas album that came out in 1980 ya know. Woah same year as The Ramones’ End Of A Century! I wonder what that’s implying. I mean centuries can be used to measure the distance ya know like for a long time ago in a etc ya know. But this got me thinking – why didn’t the Star Wars movies, ya know, like the Bond films, have theme tunes with like the popstars of the day on them? Woulda been rad! And huge for the music industry! I mean they wouldn’t have to have the Ramones do one, even though that’s probably what we all want! I mean they were on that Space Ghost Coast To Coast promoting their Acid Eaters covers album but we’d want original material, ya know! Like Rocket To Russia would be more appropriate especially if like after blowing up the Death Star the Ramones themselves – I mean I guess they’d have to be in the film now – so like they help the rebels blow up the Death Star then they take said rocket and go to the Soviet Union to fight Drago. I mean yeah it’d have to be like all four of them cause they’re like skinny guys living on junk food…

But ya know, like the Bond films, I think we’d want the theme songs to be done by a different band for each film. I mean Shirley Bassey, she’s a whole different story, can’t get enough of her. Imagine her covering Depeche Mode’s Just Can’t Get Enough, for a Bond film no less! And besides ya know you can’t be poaching people who have already done Bond films. Though if that lead to a Star Wars film where James Bond himself was playing a lead role, that’d be pretty amazing!

So like who can we get?  It’s 1977, right? And yeah the John Williams theme tune is classic enough but who’s to say it wouldn’t have been an even bigger movie ya know if like KISS had been in it?! I mean that makes total sense too ya know. Ya got StarChild and Ace as the Spaceman and like Gene Simmons’ make-up coulda easily been like another Darth Vader type character! And then like Peter Criss – don’t you find it weird that with all the different planets they visited in those films you never see one cat! And like if KISS were in Star Wars, woulda saved us all from KISS Meets the Phantom Of The Park. Though I gotta say I do like the acoustic version of Beth from that film…

Then we’ll slate The Ramones in for Empire and then we got Jedi…

I mean 1983 was a killer year for music Would Return of the Jedi have been better if it had a soundtrack of Def Leppard, something from Bowie’s ‘Let’s Dance’, and Metallica? Like the Imperial March is rad and all but imagine adding Seek & Destroy to the Empire’s theme music?!

And then of course I forgot all about why this is happening in the first place, gotta get ol’ Jon Bon himself involved!

I mean Jovi was an actor for a while, he was in Ally McBeal. In one of those high Boston office buildings too. I mean closer to space than here on Earth and ya know legal battles are kinda like wars ya know. I mean lawyers always seem so busy, I don’t know if they’d have time to go see a film called Moderately High When Compared To The Ground…Wars… And it would’ve had to have come out before Legal Eagles I think. Ya know if the Star Wars franchise stood a hope of surviving. But I mean this could be the New Hope they’re talkin about!

And like Calista Flockhart, that’s a name up there with Luke Skywalker! She was as, Jovi himself pointed out in Living On A Prayer, “halfway there”. I don’t mean to imply that Star Wars was some sort of documentary about Ms. Flockhart and Jon Bon Jovi on the set of Ally McBeal…

But wait a minute! Cliff Clavin from Cheers was in Empire Strikes Back! Makes sense too with him being a mailman and he’s in that scene on the ice planet Hoth, I mean Boston gets real cold in the winter! And ya know “neither snow nor rain not heat” etc. – snow is the very first one in the mail carrier’s motto! So like maybe he’s in the mail room at the Rebel Legal Office and he delivers some important maybe even the plans to yet another Death Star if they wanna keep harpin’ on that, delivers em to ol’ C Flock herself. Woah! Should Flock of Seagulls do her theme tune?! That’d be wild! But then like, would Jovi end up composing his own theme tune? I don’t know how I feel about that…

And like legally speaking, Simon Indelicate was the one who pointed this out to me in our interview, so it seems only appropriate that The Indelicates should soundtrack one of the films themselves…

But like they didn’t form until 2005, and I don’t even think in time for Revenge Of The Sith. Unless like, I mean if they were to remake the films now and have a subplot be about a band from the south of England time-travelling in order to get on the soundtrack of the very film we’re all watching! I mean it might be a bit more believable”

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Episode Twenty One – Panic!

In which Young Southpaw freaks out pondering edible zombie plants, conjectures it might be Paul McCartney & Hawkwind keeping us all breathing, and reveals how the inventor of anime, Swiss Mister Carl Gustav Jung, plays in to the whole NWA/Sting rivalry.

Taking in Van Halen (of course), ‘Drop Dead Legs’, Jimmy Page, JJ Fad, The Smiths, ‘Panic’, plants, breathing, David Lee Roth, The Beatles, Wings, Empire Strikes Back, Aerosmith, Steven Tyler, Pet Shop Boys, Love & Rockets, Thomas Pynchon, The Police, The Corrs, Britney Spears, carbon dioxide, oxygen, hawks, and much more etc.

“I’m in a bit of a tizzy today, man. I just don’t get it, ya know. I mean we breathe in oxygen and breathe out carbon dioxide. But ya know, when we breathe out, that breathe is still right there in front of us… to breathe right back in! So how are we not like dying of carbon dioxide overdoes within minutes? Unless you know like you’re breathing out really heavy, ya know like that line Roth sings in Drop Dead Legs ‘gettin’ ready’ etc. And then again Drop Dead is right there, in the title ya know. I mean your legs would be the first to go. Bucklin’ right under once you stop breathin’. Unless like you know you’re expelling with your mouth some kinda like jet propulsion to get the exhale far enough away while allowing new air to rush in and take its place ,and I mean it’s gotta be like oxygen-packed air. Can’t be the carbon dioxide exhales of the person standin’ next to you, even if it is David Lee Roth! And I mean there’s so many people in the world these days, all that carbon dioxide is right there just waitin’ – for your nose or your mouth, whichever way you wanna go, I’m not gonna judge – I mean there’s so many times where it’s just people, no trees or even tiny house plants in sight to absorb it all up. I mean woah I just don’t know. How does life keep goin’ on? And if everyone starts worryin’ about this they’ll be taking even shorter breaths you know, panic everywhere, I mean Morrissey prolly knew about this. Panic on the streets of London, Birmingham, all those places… Dundee? Done deal, ya know. Carlisle Ostend Ottawa, CO2 ya know… No wonder everyone’s so depressed all the time ya know with death only minutes away… Everytime you breathe it’s just a continual cycle, you know… Let The Circle Be Unbroken, that old folk song that Pentangle did. Though there are no angles in a circle. But you gotta break it, you know. Lest we all just keep breathin’ in carbon dioxide…

It’s a shame that plants don’t continue to breathe out once they’re already dead so you know like as you’re chewing they’re givin’ you the oxygen hook-up. In a very intimate fashion too. I mean that’d be cool if it worked that way – edible zombie plants ya know. But I don’t know man, I mean they say you get the most nutrients outta plants if you eat ‘em straight after pickin’ ‘em from the dirt you know. But I mean isn’t dirt just a whole bunch of decomposing dead bodies and excrement ya know? I mean I just don’t understand how life carries on you know. Even with that My Chemical Romance song to keep us goin’. Unless it’s all, I mean they talk about things just being a simulation… Or we’re all just imaginin’ this… Though why are we imaginin’ bein’ so close to death all the time? And if we’re imaginin’ this, why aren’t we imagining getting the original Van Halen back together? I mean I get it, in 1985 some prankster storyteller thought maybe we needed a little more drama in the world, something to compete with Live Aid, they thought I know, we’ll have Dave leave for a while. Without tellin’ everyone else to start imaginin’ gettin’ him back in the band a.s.a.p. I mean he couldn’t have wished to inflict us all with 22 years of that, could he have? And who was this fellow? I don’t mean to imply it was a member of The Who but ‘who’ is just really the only word I could use there to ask the question. Or why aren’t we imagining an infinite number of Van Halens? Playing an infinite number of water parks owned by Jimmy Page. Just the one Jimmy Page I think, you know. All comes together too cause Eddie said that it was seein’ Zeppelin with Page using his right hand as a sort of capo while his left hand wandered up and down the neck that gave Eddie the idea for finger tappin’. Ya know Page could be pumpin’ oxygen out into the park, ya know. Maybe get one of those negative ion distributors, orgone accumulators like that Hawkwind song, ya know. Hawkwind, maybe that’s what’s keeping us alive. All the hawks flyin’ by gettin’ the air flowin’. Maybe there are like supersonic hawks, like that JJ Fad song ya know ‘Super Sonic’ etc. That’s a jam, man… But tiny supersonic hawks who just cruise by, redistributin’ the oxygen in the jetstreams. And that’s why we’re all livin’. They got that Space Ritual, ya know. I mean if anything life is just a space ritual. Our third planet from the Sun. Suspended in all that infinite darkness, phooo! I tell you I’m gettin’ terrified just talking about it! Let’s get back to Hawkwind. Lemmy playin’ bass on my favourite album, well studio album, of theirs, Doremi Faso Latido, before goin’ on to do Motorhead, ya know. Motorhead also moving quite fast, gettin’ the air goin’, though there you got an issue with all the pollution it’s bringin’ in. But Hawkwind’s got that Warrior On The Edge of Time album, wooo-awww crazy you know. But I mean maybe by then it’ll all be electric cars. Imagine like The Cars then decidin’ to do an acoustic album. But until then ya know how are these hawks flyin’ so fast? Are they metal hawks? Is there technology involved? I mean I know nothing whatsoever of Airport Air Traffic Radar Control ya know. I start thinkin’ about it and I just start singin’ that Paul McCartney song Jet, ya know. Ya know by Wings. Ya know what’s crazy is that The Beatles… already had Wings. Was he like just parin’ it down to an essence? I mean is he responsible for these supersonic metal hawks, keepin’ us breathin’ all these years? Cause I mean I doubt they’re giant hawks, that would be crazy. I mean in order to move fast enough, and right past our noses and mouths – again I’m not gonna judge – but you know without knicking up our face they’d have to be real small hawks ya know. Like hummingbirds. You know hummingbirds flap their wings like a million times a minute like that Pet Shop Boys song One In A Million is just about one of those, like the smallest unit of time still able to be captured in song form. Like try contemplatin’ that. Get your breath real still, allow the bird to do their work, sweep up you know, in more ways than one. But like hummingbirds, I mean if you hum etc. Back In The U.S.S.R., ya know. Then you just got all that carbon dioxide stuck in your mouth and you can’t let it out cause your lips are shut! And ‘di’ is right there in the word, literally. Without the oxygen part it’s just be carbon, you know like Han Solo in ‘Empire Strikes Back’. Imagine if like every time we breathed out we were immediately frozen in carbonite! I mean that would get tedious! And someone hadda come and chip us away, ya know like that Aerosmith song Chip Away The Stone, you know. I always liked that song, got the word ‘promenade’ in it, but I mean how can you even think about promenading when you’re worried that with every exhale you’re gonna be frozen in carbonite and Boba Fett’s gonna come cart you away before Steven Tyler can show up with his chisel? And if everyone’s gettin’ frozen immediately including Aerosmith, well then how does that happen? Well I guess they’ve got that all figured out. It’s right there in their name ya know. I mean they do have that rollercoaster, ya know… And livin’ on the edge, ya know, of being seen and unseen. Amazing he had time for all this and American Idol. But is this just happening on a continuous cycle, you know like on average 10-12 times a minute for every one of our breaths. And there’s just an infinite number of incredibly fast Stephen Tylers with an infinite number of chisels…

It seems like this isn’t actually happenin’, but then again it would be happenin’ so fast that we wouldn’t be aware of it ya know? Like the little hawks that help us breathe, but then again how does that play in ya know? If the hawks are helpin’ us breathe then maybe this isn’t happenin’. Maybe before the hawks came into being this is what was goin’ on. Maybe this is what Empire Strikes Back was all about ya know. I mean who knows?! That happened a long long time ago, as it says at the beginning of the film, in a galaxy far far away, ya know. But maybe it’s a metaphor about here on Earth. Ya know like that Love & Rockets song Here On Earth, from the Earth Sun Moon album. Ya know talkin’ about galaxies again, Rockets, Rocket Juice To The Moon ya know, like Damon from Blur and Flea and well of course old Tommy P! I wonder what he has to say about this ya know? Maybe he should write some short stories about it, I mean isn’t there that Britney song Breathe On Me? Ya know there’s all that Britney stuff in Bleeding Edge… And of course she named her In The Zone album after part 3 of Gravity’s Rainbow. I wonder if that Corrs song Leave Me Breathless is precisely about all this… Coors ya know, the silver bullet, killin’ werewolves and all that ya know… And then there’s Every Breath You Take, ya know The Police. With that bumblebee guy, Sting ya know. I did think it was a bit childish for The Police to reform just to release that song F N. W. A., ya know. I did like how they they made it an acronym though to avoid the language but ya know maybe they were just doin’ that to get radio play. And I mean don’t you put an Ice Cube on a bee Sting? But I mean Every Breath You Take was Stingy takin this ya know, this wild carbonite theory, I mean he was readin’ lots of Jung at the time. Not, not this Young, ya know, Young Southpaw… but old Carl Gustav, ya know. Swiss mister, ya know, inventor of anime. Maybe this whole being unable to breathe is just a metaphor for what’s going on in our subconscious. But I mean supersonic bees, that would be rad too. I mean bees should really get in on this just cause it’s a cool thing to do. I mean anything with wings. There’s probably a whole other incredibly fast world that we’re completely unaware of. Incredibly small too. And it’s not like we can just use a microscope to see it, we’d need like a microscope for Time itself. Not that magazine. Well unless there’s a whole other level to the magazine I don’t know about ya know, with those QR codes they have nowadays. But ya know like Time, measured by clocks. Again like in Switzerland. Amazing we ever got around to inventin’ the clock with being frozen by carbonite so much of the time. But since it seems to be on a regular interval, that’s prolly where the inspiration – pun somewhat intended there – came from. I mean I’m not a scientist. But I do love that Guided By Voices song. But I mean look at us having made it thru this podcast without dyin’ of carbon dioxide poisoning.”

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Episode Seventeen – She Sells Sanctuary Down By The Seashore

In which Young Southpaw wishes The Cult would use Billy Dee Williams in their marketing campaigns, brazenly wonders about Thomas Pynchon’s footwear, and posits that the next Star Wars film may well be the sequel to Beach Blanket Bingo or at least should be

Taking in James Bond, the Singles soundtrack, Van Halen, the Pynchon in Public podcast, George Perec, palindromes, stripey socks, Mad Max, Tina Turner, etc.

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Episode Twelve – Valiant Times Tables

In which Young Southpaw wonders if Love is simply a Sonic Youth album played backwards, about Sammy Hagar and Jim Morrison’s knowledge of the question, if there are any professional Duck Duck Goose leagues and what they know about it, plus a whole lot more…

Taking in Carla Thomas, Van Halen, Thomas Pynchon, The Soul Survivors, snakes, vinyl, The Cult, Iron Maiden, Revelation Records, straight edge, hugs, kisses, x’s, o’s, tic tac toe, etc.

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Episode Ten – Surfing Infinite Chairland

Young Southpaw contemplates infinity’s affinity with boutique hotels, the fabled forests of Chairland, and surfboarding wizards with their Zeppelin & Sabbath-loving seagull entourages.

Taking in Chairmen Of The Board, Smashing Pumpkins, Elvis, Van Halen, Poseidon, Leonard Cohen, Robyn Hitchcock, The Afghan Whigs, yogurt, David Lee Roth, Fugazi, Thomas Pynchon, The Beach Boys, and more.

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Episode Four – Some Kind Of Wonderful Soup Formation

In which Young Southpaw confuses even himself wondering whether or not he is at a wedding, wrestling with the conspiracy theory behind the song ‘Some Kind Of Wonderful’ while professing his love of all things soup

Taking in soups, broths, and consommés, that crazy Freezepop band, Thomas Pynchon, ‘The Love Song Of J. Alfred Prufrock’, The Soup Diaries, Happy Mondays, The Boomtown Rats, Loudness, Randy Rhoads, Quiet Riot, Aquirax Uno, and much more.

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