LOMPOC DOG SHOW 2014

 

Our annual jaunt to scenic Lompoc, California for Western Sighthound Specialty with lots of Scottish Deerhounds courtesy of the Golden State Deerhound Club's efforts. The weather is always perfect despite it being July in Southern Calif.,and Mr. Twister chose to document same with a Polaroid camera! Above, one of his gorgeous results in black and white.  Karis definitely was ready for her close up, Mr. DeMille. Guest photogapher: Kurt Ingham.                                

Below, Mr. Twister visits Leo

Guest photographer Kurt Ingham, below: I groom, therefore I am

Below, Lyonhil Karis Eden Pedecaris, guest photographer Mary Ann Rose

 Mr. Twister far right, and canine confab

Below, Joan Garth's Scottish Deerhound puppies, plus Borzoi puppies, equally friendly. Below pups: whole lotta Borzoi

Below, Scottish Deerhounds at rest: left, Leo; right, Karis

 

R.I.P. JAMES GARNER

 

 OBITUARY LINK

Superb writing--"...adept at conveying life's little bedevilments..." about a superb actor, I could never improve on this New York Times' piece about a personal fave actor and show, "The Rockford Files." 

FYI, "Rockford" was one of the first and few tv shows with lots of female contribution, women producers and writers. Juanita Bartlett seems to have been responsible for the '70s proto-Sopranos scripts about the banal everyday doings of mafiosi encountered by the protagonist, with beleaguered dons screaming for kids to get off their lawns while their underlings furiously brown-nosed them. There also were more sympathetic female characters from all walks of life, amongst them an attorney who could spring Rockford from any incarcerated transgression whatsoever, a battle-ax office pool manager with unanticipated bravery, and (above) Lauren Bacall playing an aging glamour girl jet-setter with the on-the-mooch lifestyle of entourages of the super-rich.

BASKING IN BUGATTI BONANZA & ART DECO at Mullin Automotive Museum

    







 



  


 
 Better half Mr. Twister and I trekked to Oxnard, Calif. two weekends ago to eyeball and envy the extensive collection of vintage Bugattis and Art Deco art and artifacts at the Mullin Automotive Museum.

French by way of Italy Famille Bugatti was a fascinating one: patriarch Carlo designed upscale furniture and horse carriages, son Ettore designed and manufactured these fabulous cars first utilizing the family carriageworks, and son Rembrandt became a valid animalier sculptor. Both sons' automotive and sculpted bronze art remain acclaimed for their respective sleek Art Deco designs and fetch prices in the multiple millions of dollars, pounds, Euros, yen, what have you to this day. Engineering-wise, Bugattis raced at speed of 120 mph in the 1920s when most cars only could attain 50 mph...

Below, Mr. Twister amidst some partially or unrestored specimens of the former Schlumpf collection. This was a secret repository of 400 vintage cars that only were discovered by the outside world when the family textile factory workers rioted, burned and looted the property in Mulhouse, France while its owners fled back to Switzerland, in debt with the law on their heels. Also, pictured, a vintage Carlo Bugatti horse cart.

Above, one of six Bugatti Royales ever made, a 1928 behemoth sedan that weighed 7,000 lbs. and was 21 feet long, far too big to fit in my camera frame. Its hood ornament was a rearing elephant. In the vintage photo (photographer unkown) below provided for scale, I feel for the poor chauffeur: there was no power steering in those days. 

Of the six vehicles made, only three at the time ever were sold: the auto was too over the top even for its era's royalty. The Bugatti Royale's 12.7 litre straight-8 engine block was 4.5 feet long and 3.5 feet tall (a world record to this day) and later was used to power railway trains!  

Below, fascinating display idea with projected LCD of the in situ car behind it: a 70-year-old Bugatti Brescia retrieved of late from the bottom of a Swiss lake, right where extreme martinet officials had dumped it for non-payment of import duties, imagine...

 As Bugattis indeed ooze upscale Art Deco chic, the exhibit featured not only statues by the genuinely talented animalier Rembrandt Bugatti but also luxe objet's d'art by the finest from the 1920s and 30s.

This statuette reminded me of the wonderful retro-burlesque artist Cleo Viper (see LINK.) Newly liberated with the right to vote, the independent-minded but fun-loving flappers of the 1920s Jazz Age were the first revival of "girl power" in western cultures since the legend of  the original Amazons.

   

Another view of flapper and Borzois, plus the Rembrandt Bugatti-designed elephant mascot for the mighty Royale, plus panther at bottom of this page.

 

"The Art of Bugatti" exhibits only until the end of 2014 at the Mullin Automotive Museum located in Oxnard, Calif. It's only open two Saturdays per month and requires ticket purchase in advance. Go to LINK for ticket sales and info.

CONGRATULATIONS GRAMMY-consideration JAMES WILLIAMSON and CAROLYN WONDERLAND

Congratulations to Carolyn Wonderland and James Williamson for their consideration in a 2014 Grammy nomination Best Rock Performance Category (single). . . If you can vote for #344 on the ballot, do so, they deserve it!

 

. . . for this excellent production of impassioned singing and playing of a classic Iggy and The Stooges song to be featured on the forthcoming Re-Licked album by James Williamson and a galaxy of strong and worthy alternative singers.

You could also check the fine print on who designed the single and drew the logo...

ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE 1960s...the teen me

Screen captures of a teenaged me in a student film. This was a LONG time ago in the later 1960s -- I look nothing like this at present. 

Plot: I stride through Topanga Canyon scowling like Mimsy Farmer*, climb the stairs with Dylan saluting overhead, cue: SONG LINK even if it wasn't there, cut to "interacting" with my favorite leading man of the day and bane of my adolescence (see BANE LINK) since his casting was the only reason I consented to the softcore scenes (hey, it was the '60s,) we stroll around Westwood Village together, I again stride through Topanga Canyon and contemplate or enact suicide. Huh? Holy Nouvelle Vague, Batman! 

I now realize the background panning shots feature vintage Westwood Village, Calif. circa 1968; fr'instance, the first screen capture below shows the pretty tiled fountain in front of what was then Bank of America that attracted all the anti-Vietnam War protests (because of its primo spot across the street from everyone's favorite, large record store,) hence its removal of course.  This was a common civic government tactic of the era: rezone and remove "offending" gathering spots of 1960s youth, as with the bulldozing of favorite Sunset Strip music club Pandora's Box and turning it into a traffic island (the film Riot on Sunset Strip* incorporates much footage of it.)

      ↓ disenfranchised teenagers' 
 favorite candidate 

*BONUS MIMSY: Here's Riot on Sunset Strip, The Wild Racers Mimsy Farmer back in the day, scowling in my favorite of her wild girl roles More (with Pink Floyd's first film soundtrack): FILM LINK (Ibiza will never again look as isolated as it did here ever again.) Director Barbet Shroeder later shot one of my alltime fave films Reversal of Fortune with Jeremy Irons as Claus Von Bulow (won the Oscar for this supporting role in it!) and Ron Silver as Alan Dershowitz) plus her own current art website from her digs in Europe: MIMSY LINK
 Vintage Mimsy Farmer in the cinema:

PANDORAS UNITED! 21st CENTURY PANDORAS and RITA D'ALBERT

 

 Time was when headlines blared The Four Seasons vs. Jay and The Americans! The Beatles vs. The Dave Clark Five! Beatles vs. Stones! ad nauseum. Pure hype silliness, and music afficianados rightfully ignored same. However, concerning internecine casts of characters within the same band... compare one line up of The Rolling Stones with Brian Jones vs. the Mick Taylor version, or more ardently still, Iggy and The Stooges vs. The Stooges highlighting guitarists James Williamson vs. Ron Asheton, then your incendiary devices detonate and explode to kingdom come.

I encounter similar sparks flying about the various incarnations of The Pandoras. Not from the band: from its still loyal and highly vociferous fan base, most vocal on Facebook's The Pandoras Fan Page. There, self-professed Girl Band Geeks argue with actual Pandoras as well as one another (for history of Pandoras' bisection into two warring factions the moment its first album was released, see LINK.) Although there are flame-ups galore online, as absent at this occasion (because of her own band The Wrong Dots' gig) Pandora Karen Blankfeld Basset proclaimed, "We are all Pandoras band sisters."

But contentious schisms are 29 years worth of water gone by under whatever bridges. Assorted batches of the convoluted family tree of the late Paula Pierce's vision incarnate The Pandoras have been catching the reunion spirit of late and playing together in assorted interwoven bands. As yet to appear in public together this century: Kim Shattuck, Melanie Vammen Buscher and Sheri Kaplan Weinstein, some of the lattermost and best-sounding Pandoras. Here in the now fortunately for our immediate enjoyment: the third gig of The 21st Century Pandoras with cool lookin', hard-rockin' singer Susan Hyatt, guitarist Lisa Rae Black, Nipper Seaturtle (Gwynne Kahn,) Bambi Conway and Casey Gomez-Dobbs (the last three having been founding members of original band with Paula Pierce.) This incarnation features all new material.

The occasion was Pin Up Girl boutique's 6.27.14 event to promote Susan's and Lina Lecaro's forthcoming book Never Mind The Rules - How To Rock At Love. Seen here above: the 21st C Pandoras in full swing and its singer Susan Hyatt joining Rita D'Albert for the latter's song and spoken word set. Rita herself once was replacement for the departing Susan as second guitarist in the Pandoras, but D'Albert might be best known as the entrepreneur of and participant in the popular Lucha VaVoom Burlesque events in Hollywood, Calif. Together Susan and Rita ripped through covers of "How Does It Feel To Feel" by The Creation and "Cherry Bomb" by The Runaways.

I had neither seen nor photographed Rita D'Albert since she was in the Pandoras all that time ago. Left, pictured with  Loren Molinare of Little Caesar (they shared management) at a party in 1990. Rita today still looks fabulous in person (right.)

 Other worthy artists on hand performing were (left) Blackfeather Jane featuring singer Rebecca Jane, and (right) Caroline Mankey, onetime scenester turned high-powered entertainment attorney; i.e., Nikki Sixx actually defers to her. These women know rule breakage and rock and roll love from the get go!

 

Lastly: evidence that both Rita and Susan remain dynamic singers. Check out this video of Rita rocking a Eurythmics' tune with actual Dave Stewart: 

 

and this one of Susan at the first Pandoras' reunion at a private party with many of the batches I photographed sans, sadly, the late Paula Pierce.