The Seeds - Pushin' Too Hard

Slightly more obscure than either Michael Jackson or Farrah Fawcett, nevertheless it should be noted that the lead singer of The Seeds, Sky Saxon, also passed away on Thursday. This song is just fucking brilliant, a Top 40 hit in '67, as is Can't Seem to Make You Mine, later covered by the Ramones on Acid Eaters. Part of a wave of great garage bands captured on the terrific Nuggets series, The Seeds were punk in attitude before they were calling it such. Set volume to 11 and play often.

Back To Back Endings

SEVENTIES ICON FARRAH FAWCETT passed away this morning at age 62 after a long bout with cancer. I was just the right age to be, ahem, aroused by that famous poster of her in a red swimsuit -- her long curly blond tresses falling about her perky breasts while she cracked a dazzling smile exposing perfect white teeth. That pinup shot and the Sly Stallone Rocky poster were damn near ubiquitous in 1976 -- until that shot of John Travolta in a white leisure suit from Saturday Night Fever eclipsed both of them about a year later.

Charlie's Angels was just another cop show with a lame-ass premise except for the eye candy, but I was a mere lad of 15 when the series began and will admit to tuning in semi-regularly. But I was much more of a Kate Jackson fan if you must know. After just a single season, Fawcett would walk away from Charlie's Angels at the height of the show's popularity to pursue a film career, but contract issues forced her to return for a handful of cameo appearances as special agent Jill Munroe.

It's a shame Farrah couldn't even have a whole day to herself, because only minutes ago I heard a report of an even bigger cultural icon's demise: Michael Jackson went into cardiac arrest today and passed away. I was also the right age for the Jackson 5, and bought most of the group's early 45's like The Love You Save, I Want You Back, ABC and Rockin' Robin. To this day I still have those scratchy Jackson 5 singles I grew up with -- bought 'em way back in the day at Bobby's Beat, a record store which used to be on 31st Street off Ditmars Blvd. here in beautiful downtown Astoria; if we paid more than a buck apiece I'll take a bite out of the vinyl. I was never much of a fan of Jackson's later solo career, but it was hard to hate catchy songs like Thriller, Beat It and Billie Jean as they blasted out of radios in the 1980s. Now he's dead at age 50, only a year older than yours truly. Man, how I loved that Jackson 5 cartoon that used to run on Saturday mornings!

The website TMZ is reporting that the R&B legend is survived by three children, which I had forgotten about ... because let's be honest: "Dad" isn't the first thing that comes to mind when you hear Michael Jackson's name.

If celebrities indeed die in waves of three, then there's another big shoe to drop perhaps as soon as tomorrow. Then again maybe Sidekick Par Excellence Ed McMahon kicked off the celeb deathfest earlier this week, bowing out at age 86.

Just checked my official dusty singles bin and sure enough I've got the original blue label Motown 45's of The Love You Save b/w I Found That Girl from 1970; Got To Be There b/w Maria (You Were The Only One) from 1971; and Rockin' Robin b/w Love Is Here and Now You're Gone from '72-- timeless, almost perfect pop tunes. And actually to call these singles dusty and scratchy" doesn't do justice to their sorry condition! But I'm gonna play 'em anyway, hisses and all, after I finish this post, if only for nostalgia's sake.

Just for tonight, I'll remember Jackson as the precocious little teenager with the big voice and the nifty dance moves instead of the freak show pedophile and plastic surgery disaster he would later become. Not to make excuses for Jackson's later behavior in any way, but sometimes it's worth keeping in mind that the seeds for abhorrent adulthood are often sown in childhood.

His overbearing, abusive stage dad Joseph reportedly administered frequent beatings and punishments -- "Jackson recalled that Joseph sat in a chair with a belt in his hand as he and his siblings rehearsed and that if you didn't do it the right way, he would tear you up, really get you." -- and also cruelly nicknamed the young Jackson "Big Nose". Is there any wonder the kid later grew up with massive self-esteem issues? And who knows how much Jackson's tortured upbringing contributed to his literally never-ending search for an identity, and a face, that he could settle on.

The Los Angeles Times website just confirmed that Jackson went into a coma after his heart attack and then passed away shortly thereafter, at around 3:00 Pacific time. If you needed any more confirmation, Wikipedia just put a bow on their Michael Jackson entry with the proviso that "This article is about a person who has recently died. Some information, such as that pertaining to the circumstances of the person's death and surrounding events, may change rapidly as more facts become known."




















The Gloved One in 1984 with two of his more famous groupies.

Condemned To Repeat

ISN'T IT REASSURING to see Republicans refrain from politicizing President Obama's response to 10 days of mass demonstrations in Iran over the rigged June 12th election? While rightly celebrating the Iranians' bravery in the face of repression, they crossed the line by making it a personal referendum on Obama's willingness to meddle in another country's affairs -- a nation whose relationship to the U.S. is complicated because of a sordid history of meddling going back to the CIA's part in a 1953 coup (OPERATION AJAX) that overthrew a democratically elected government and ushered in the reign of the Shah's brutal dictatorship. That's just one event in a long string of American interventions in the region. And while the average American may be unaware that the Reagan administration sold arms to Iraq to use against Iran in that savage conflict, any Iranian can tell you all about the circumstances behind the infamous 1984 photo of Donald Rumsfeld shaking hands with Saddam Hussein -- giving at least tacit approval to the use of chemical weapons in that war.

Of course, just 11 days ago these same right-wing human rights advocates criticizing Obama for turning his back on the protesters wanted to bomb the hell out of Iran because of its alleged pursuit of nuclear weapons. The face of the reformers, one of at least 17 people killed in Iran since protests against the reelection of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad began, is Neda Agha-Soltan, a 26-year-old shot and killed over the weekend by security forces. More than one conservative website went so far as to juxtapose a photo of the young woman bleeding to death on the sidewalk with one of Obama eating ice cream with his daughters on Father's Day -- as if the president's so-called lukewarm or lackluster public endorsement of the protest had somehow caused her to be shot. Only in the current unhinged right-wing blogosphere could such a disgusting connection be made -- which in fairness I heard at least one conservative talk show host strongly condemn.

Of course, when millions of their fellow Americans took to the streets in protest of the impending Iraq invasion in February 2003, conservatives' passion for public demonstrations was a bit more muted. In reality, the only reason Republicans care about Iranians now is because they see an opportunity to make political capital out of it, sensing a chance to paint Obama in a bad light. Their simplistic approach to a complicated affair fails to take into consideration that an American leader throwing his weight behind the demonstrations could only end up being counterproductive -- witness the harsh crackdown underway and the ringing anti-American and European rhetoric being used against the thousands of protesters taken into custody. The show trials have predictably played up that "foreign interference" angle, with detainees "confessing" to acting under orders from the Voice of America, the BBC, etc.

The closest direct parallel to the Iranian reformists' demand for a recount seems to be the Tienanmen Square democratization rallies 20 years ago. I'm sure President George H.W. Bush spoke truth to Chinese power back then; I'm just not recalling it at the moment. But suffice to say China is now a human right paradise largely because Republicans controlled the White House for 20 of the last 28 years.

Instead, "news outlets" like Fox keep harping back to Ronald Reagan's "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!" moment as an example for President Obama to follow -- unconvinced that his "outraged and appalled" statement sets the right tone of bellicosity. In truth, the same contingent of bloodthirsty warhawks who painted Iran as part of a monolithic "Axis of Evil" could care less about that country's freedom movement -- their trademark selective empathy bordering as usual on rank hypocrisy.

Let's give the last word to Salon.com's Glenn Greenwald, who nailed it as usual last week in his column, The "Bomb Iran" contingent's newfound concern for the Iranian people:

Imagine how many of the people protesting this week would be dead if any of these bombing advocates had their way -- just as those who paraded around (and still parade around) under the banner of Liberating the Iraqi People caused the deaths of hundreds of thousands of them, at least. Hopefully, one of the principal benefits of the turmoil in Iran is that it humanizes whoever the latest Enemy is. Advocating a so-called "attack on Iran" or "bombing Iran" in fact means slaughtering huge numbers of the very same people who are on the streets of Tehran inspiring so many -- obliterating their homes and workplaces, destroying their communities, shattering the infrastructure of their society and their lives. The same is true every time we start mulling the prospect of attacking and bombing another country as though it's some abstract decision in a video game.

Slow Motion Soak

THEY SAY YOU SEE something new every day in baseball, and today's has-to-be-a-record 5 1/2-hour rain delay would sure qualify as something different. We got to Yankee Stadium at 12:30 amid a steady downpour, and the rain never let up for the entire afternoon, postponing indefinitely the 1:05 first pitch. Then at about 5:30 it slowed to a drizzle as the grounds crew started taking off the tarp. At 6 the rain stopped altogether, and 6:30 sharp we finally had baseball.

A day game had morphed into a night game before our very eyes.

We killed the time by going to Monument Park and the Yankee Museum, even leaving the Stadium entirely a couple of times. Finally, back at our seats, we watched the Phils-Blue Jays game on the crystal-clear big screen scoreboard.

Still doubting they were gonna get a game in, we walked around the spacious concourse some more -- marveling at the dizzying array of concession choices and the ludicrous prices attached to them. Beers were 9 bucks a pop except for lowly Schlitz at 6, I believe it was. There were steak sandwiches for 15, sushi for 12, pork pull sandwiches 10, sausage for 9, hot dogs for 6, small garlic fries 6, large fries 9, slice of pizza 5 bucks, bag of chips only $4.50. There were yearbooks for just 25 dollars, programs for a mere 10, Yankee caps going for a song at $45. There was even an art gallery where you had the opportunity to purchase Peter Max-tinged bats, balls and player portraits for but a few thou.

Sometimes it was hard to tell if you were at a mall food court, a baseball game or stuck in a long flight delay at the airport.

By the time the game started, the crowd as you can imagine had thinned out to a few thousand hardy souls (paid attendance was 45, 143; rain delay clocked at 341 minutes). Plenty of very good seats remained empty, in fact, until an announcement to the effect of anyone who wants to sit closer, go for it. Now, of course, this did not include the $1,000+ seats you may have heard about: the ones in the first 20 rows or so that come with wait service and free, unlimited dining. Those rows are gated off and accessible only via a separate entrance. But the four of us were right behind those box seats, along the 1st base-rightfield line, where the seats were wet but offered a good view of 1B Mark Teixeira, 2B Robbie Cano, and RF Nick Swisher's new faux-hawk hairdo.

We left after 7 innings and over 8 hours at the ballpark, with the Yankees looking flat and trailing the Nationals 3-0, which is where it ended. We caught the last 2 innings on the radio on the way home. I just called my brother and he said that they announced on the radio that because of the rather lengthy rain delay, ticket holders can choose another non-marquee game later in the season. That's something we will definitely take advantage of. Besides, Yanks owe us a win after this lackluster, going-through-the-motions effort tonight -- getting shut out at home by the worst team in baseball, dropping 2 out of 3 in the series. Don't look now but baseball's highest paid player Alex Rodriguez is hitting a scrub-like .212 on the season after going 0 for his last 14.

Also, this was the first time all season no home runs were hit at the Stadium -- after an astounding 119 balls had cleared the wall through the first 34 games. I like to think the soggy night air had a lot more to do with that power drought than my presence there for the first time all season.

Wash Out?

THIS CAN'T SUCK ENOUGH! After raining all night, it's 8:36am and still pouring out, so there's a very real danger that my first Yankees game this year, and thus my first shot to check out the new Stadium, is gonna be washed away. I had written YANKEES 1:00 on my wall calendar weeks and weeks ago when Jimi the Greek told me had tickets. Who knows when the makeup date will be if it gets rained out? What a drag this "spring" has been -- with literally one sunless day after another... more like global wetting if you ask me. Joba Chamberlain was scheduled to start, and I was looking forward to a nice sunny day, seeing my old buddies. It's criminal, I tell ya.

But not the kind of criminal a former Yankee got himself mixed up in. It took only about an hour yesterday for a Texas jury to sentence Mel Hall -- a decent slugger for the Cubs (1981-84), Indians (1984-88) and Yanks (1989-92) who mentally tormented a sensitive young Bernie Williams -- to 45 years yesterday for torment of a much more serious kind: the rape of a 12-year-old girl and sexual abuse of 3 other minors. Those are not the kinds of stats you want to be connected to as a ballplayer. If you're counting, barring parole, Hall will be 93 years old should he be invited to attend the Yankee Old-Timers game in 2054. So hold onto your Mel Hall memorabilia, kids.

When it comes to athletes, however, Florida justice is another matter. Earlier this week, a Cleveland Browns wide receiver received a sentence of 30 days after pleading guilty to a manslaughter charge for killing a pedestrian while driving drunk. Returning home from an all-night party celebrating a $4.5 million roster bonus, Donte Stallworth's Bentley was going 50 in a 40MPH zone when he struck a construction worker getting off his shift at around 7:15am.

The sentence mandates 1,000 hours of community service, a lifetime driver's license ban (yeah, right), eight years' probation, and drug & alcohol testing. Prosecutors cited Stallworth's clean record and cooperation -- he remained at the scene and called police -- for the light jail time; he could have faced up to 15 years in prison without a plea bargain. But you don't have to read between the lines to notice that it was the family's need for "closure" that evidently played the larger role: "a confidential financial settlement to avoid a potential lawsuit from the family of 59-year-old Mario Reyes."

Dog-killer Michael Vick becomes eligible to play again in the NFL this season after spending the last 2 years in jail, should any team want to deal with that PR nightmare. Will Stallworth end up suspended for the upcoming season after killing a man? Probably -- but he's still getting off too lightly. In fact, with time served (the day of his arrest) and an automatic state credit of 5 days for every day served, Stallworth will be in jail for a total of 24 days.

They say Justice is blind, but more likely it's just shutting its eyes so it doesn't have to see all the money changing hands in the courtroom.

Non Compos Governmentis

IT'S TIMES LIKE THIS when you throw up your hands and break out the You Can't Make This Stuff Up line. Allow me to explain.

I had about an hour to kill this morning before meeting my brother for coffee, so I decided to run out and grab the Sunday papers. I wanted to read about the Subway Series as well as the latest developments on that bush league coup up in Albany, where two Democratic senators defected to the other side on Monday. So what do I see on the cover of the Daily News? For a second I thought it might have been Photoshopped or even a clever caricature, but it was real: Under the headline SCREWBALLS, it's the two jokers at Yankee Stadium yesterday taking in the game from $650 box seats -- Pedro Espada wearing a Yankees jersey and cap, Hiram Monserrate sporting a Queens Dominica shirt and I Love NY hat. And just like that we have a new post-Spitzer low in dignity and decorum.

Following gains in last November's election, Democrats took control of the state senate for the first time in 40 years, but on Monday that majority was history after less than six months as Republicans enticed Espada and Monserrate to join their power grab. The result: a slim 32-30 Democratic advantage became a tenuous 32-30 Republican advantage -- with a court set to rule on the gridlock Monday.

Not to worry, because the two freshman senators come with impeccable credentials when it comes to holding their own in the free-for-all Albany infighting. Espada represents a Bronx district but, contrary to Senate law, may not actually live in the borough he serves. Instead he is accused of residing in an exclusive Westchester suburb, and at last check did not even have an office in the Bronx. But wait, it gets worse. He's also been fined tens of thousands of dollars for campaign violations, with more pending, and the state attorney general is investigating allegations he diverted hundreds of thousands of dollars, perhaps millions to a nonprofit healthcare organization he founded.

The other statesman in question, Hiram Monserrate, is even more scary. Last year, the same Republicans who on Monday welcomed him with open arms were calling on him to resign after he was charged with stabbing his girlfriend in the face with broken glass:

"It took more than 20 stitches to close the wound - "first in the face and muscle and then to the top layer of skin," prosecutors wrote. The heavyweight former cop was enraged because he found another man's business card in her purse, prosecutors said. Monserrate was caught on tape dumping the card into the trash chute and dragging his screaming girlfriend from the building."

That's right. This piece of work, who represents Elmhurst, a part of Queens about one district over from where I sit typing this stirring entry, was forced to "retire" from the NYPD because of a "psychological disability." He's also accused of falsifying a campaign bio, claiming he served in the Persian Gulf War although "military records indicate he never left the United States."

TAKING OF THE SENATE 1-2-3
Yesterday's Room Eight New York Politics has a possible smoking gun. The website speculates on Monserrate's motivation for joining the coup and turning control of the Senate over to the Republicans. The dots connect the dissident senators to state power broker Tom Golisano -- the Rochester billionaire and serial gubernatorial defeatee (1994, 1998, 2002). Turns out Monserrate is looking at 7 years if convicted in the assault case, and maybe just maybe Golisano is willing to help out a little in a textbook case of political quid pro quo for dummies.

The turning point for Golisano, according to the New York Times, may have come "when Golisano met with senate majority leader Smith a few months ago to demand that the new majority drop its plans for modest tax increases for the wealthy, the billionaire was not treated with sufficient deference." Golisano soon was announcing he was moving to Florida to escape New York's burdensome tax code, claiming he would save $13,800 per day in income taxes, plus more from sales taxes, gasoline taxes, utility taxes and property taxes. Golisano then let it be known that he planned to fund "worthy causes" instead of spending it to fund "Albany's bloated bureaucracy, corrupt politicians or regular handouts to the special interests."

Room Eight notes that back in early May, just as Tom Golisano, political operative Steve Pigeon, Monserrate, Espada and new majority leader Dean Skelos began plotting to overthrow the Democratic majority, Monserrate switched lawyers to high-powered Joseph Tacopino -- who represented Michael Jackson in his child abuse trial. Among the revealing questions Room Eight raises are:

-Where's Monserrate getting the money to pay Tacopino $750 per hour, and what's its provenance?

-Was Monserrate promised help with this by Golisano, Pigeon, Espada, Skelos, Libous or any other individual?

-Were Monserrate's legal problems raised during the planning or recruiting stages of the coup, and if so, in what context?

-Why was Monserrate, in particular, recruited by Espada for the coup, and no other Democrat?

Juan Gonzalez also tried to make sense of the switch Friday in his Daily News column, noting that it came with just two weeks remaining in the session. The move put on hold legislation relating to issues like mayoral control of the city's education system, same-sex marriage, ethics reform, property taxes, changes to NYC rent laws:

One of the most important bills to be voted on in the last days of this Senate session is the end of vacancy decontrol. More than 200,000 city rental apartments would be placed back under rent stabilization. That would brake skyrocketing rents and directly benefit thousands of working-class Latino tenants. That legislation is the landlords' biggest nightmare.

Espada, as the head of the Senate Housing Committee, gets huge backing from those landlords. Monserrate, on the other hand, has always had a liberal voting record. People forget he was the first cop ever to sit on the board of the New York Civil Liberties Union. He is also the main sponsor of the bill to end vacancy decontrol. So why would tenant champion Monserrate join with landlord buddy Espada? And why would both defect to Republicans on the eve of the all-important vote on vacancy decontrol?

Why indeed? Well, it's never a surprise when politicians act according to sheer opportunism, self-interest and greed -- which in this case would certainly explain why rats like Espada and Monserrate would jump ship. After all, the former is reputedly upset he didn't get enough consideration for legislative “earmarks,” money for favored projects, as well as other perks; while the latter is said to be still smarting from the "Senate leadership’s stripping him of a committee chairmanship and the $12,500 stipend that goes with it after his indictment." Also, according to the Daily News, the Bronx District Attorney is looking into "whether Espada lives within his Senate district, as required by law" and in a separate matter, "whether a nonprofit Espada controls...demanded $2 million in state funds."

The new coalition immediately showed signs of fracture, with Espada claiming more Democrats were coming over and the new majority was "growing stronger by the minute" -- at the same time Democrats were trying to lure Monserrate back into the fold as he attempted to explain, if by explain you mean shed no new light whatsoever on the subject: "I am not a Republican. I am a Democrat. My understanding and agreement to coalition government was under certain criteria. You can't have a coalition with two Democrats and 30 Republicans."

For his part, on his way to Yankee game Saturday afternoon, a defiant/delusional Espada told a reporter “We are in a war and I told Hiram to leave the load at home and come enjoy the game." However, another player in the "Albany Circus" sees it a little differently, telling The Borrero Report: “Espada has to keep Monserrate very close and guarded or the weasel will succumb to the pressure from the Democrats."

Yet there's an even uglier reading of the recent events in the Capitol: that Golisano and other Republicans exploited tensions between black Democratic politicians (Smith, Paterson) and Latinos in the so-called Gang of Four (Espada, Monserrate, Ruben Diaz Sr. and Carl Kruger). That and a reported promise of Golisano helping the two traitors fight off challengers in the 2010 Democratic primary.

But leave it to accidental governor David Patterson to put it all in perspective. Last week he pleaded with the two sides to come to their senses, imploring everyone to “think of the lobbyists” who had worked hard “to persuade legislative leaders and legislators of issues." I suspect lobbyists will do okay for themselves whichever side comes out on top. The same can't be said for Paterson -- one of the least popular governors in the nation -- and his reelection chances in 2010. How does "Governor Giuliani" sound to you?

Going Gone

WELL, THEY FINALLY tried to get to the bottom of what's causing the home runs to fly out of the new Yankee Stadium this season. A report on AccuWeather.com blames not wind patterns but the height of the outfield walls, specifically in right field. I for one ain't buying it. It's classic meteorological behavior: never blame the weather for anything. I mean, it's not like you need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows.

105 homers have been hit in 29 games at the new park, that's both teams, with the home team clubbing 59 of them. According to the report, close to 20% of those HRs would not have left the old Stadium. The notion that weather had anything to do the increase is shot down: "there has been no consistent pattern observed in the wind speed and direction that would lead to an increase in home runs so far this year." Glad to see AccuWeather's resources going to the right priorities. Maybe we can get the CIA involved after the All-Star Break if the power surge continues.

The study also notes that the new right field wall is shorter by an average of 4-5 feet, "but up to 9 feet shorter in spots." But just how do shorter walls account for the broken bat HR hit by Mark Teixeira a few weeks ago? The all-time record for a ballpark is the 303 HRs hit in the thin air of Colorado's Coors Field 10 years ago; Yankee Stadium is slightly off that pace right now.

I'll get a chance to examine the conditions firsthand in a week: I've got tickets to next Thursday's day game against the storied Washington Nationals. Quite a rivalry these two franchises have going for themselves.

The other new stadium, Citi Field, is playing quite differently for the Mets. They've only managed 21 HRs as a team through 28 games, and there are indications it may be getting into the head of some members of the Collapsin's. 3B David Wright confessed to Chipper Jones that he's losing some long balls that are being contained by the new park's spacious dimensions. Wright took it back the next day -- but the numbers don't fib: just 3 homers in 27 home games after hitting 21 in 80 games at Shea last season.

David Wright may not be smacking a ton of homers, but it's not exactly David Ortiz futility (.196, 3 HR) we're talking here; he's hitting a sizzling .354 with 35 RBI and a surprising 16 steals.

Going into tomorrow night's Subway Series opener at Yankee Stadium, Yankees have hit 95 HRs in 2009 compared to 37 for the Mets. Ace Johan Santana will pitch the Sunday night game, coming off a start where he surrendered 4 HRs to the Phils at Citi Field.

Yankees are 0-7 now against Boston this year after losing 6-5 last night at Fenway -- and 34-18 against everyone else. That's gotta be in their heads going into series finale tonight. You'd think New York would have the pitching edge with CC Sabathia matching up against a struggling Brad Penny, who's let on 96 baserunners in his 60 innings so far.

Yanks recently went MLB-record 18 straight games without an error. Then they made at least 1 error in 7 straight before the y played a clean game last night. Some Jorge Posada detractors would point out that the catcher missed most of the 18 games with an injury and returned to the lineup as the errors started.

Mets are playing with a patch on their uniform sleeve commemorating the first season at Citi Field, which would be okay if it didn't look exactly like the Domino's Pizza logo, which is lame. Maybe I'm not the first one who noticed the resemblance; someone going by No-Name247 pointed it out back in January, but he's kind of dismissive of it. I made the connection as soon as I saw the new patch in April. Just want to get that on the record.

Death By Association

IF, LIKE OCEAN WAVES, celebrity passings come in threes, then this past week made for some strange deadfellows. Shuffling off this mortal coil in rapid succession were Sam Butler, age 81, and Koko Taylor, 80, on Wednesday, followed by David Carradine, 72, Thursday. And although all three enjoyed a pretty nice run, check back with me in about 20 years: I have a feeling 72 years old is not gonna seem all that ancient or far away anymore.

I don't necessarily like when people die, but I do love to read a well-written obituary. Is that wrong? Does it say something morbid about me?? Is this seat taken???


Anyway, ladies first. Koko Taylor -- "Queen of the Blues" -- was the most highly regarded modern female blues singer after Etta James. Her version of Willie Dixon's raunchy roadhouse romp Wang Dang Doodle is absolutely the gold standard -- which is saying something considering how ferocious the Howlin' Wolf version is.

Taylor's rise was nothing less than a real-life rags to riches story. She grew up as Cora Walton on a plantation in Tennessee the daughter of a sharecropper and

"gave little thought to pursuing a career in music until she was living in Chicago, working as a cleaning woman by day and frequenting the city’s blues clubs with her husband by night. At Mr. Taylor’s urging, she began asking the performers to let her sit in.

In 1962 Willie Dixon, an influential behind-the-scenes presence in Chicago blues, heard one of her impromptu performances and said, as she later recalled, “I never heard a woman sing the blues like you sing the blues.” He took her to Chess Records, where he was a talent scout and producer, and wrote a number of songs for her, most notably “Wang Dang Doodle,” which she recorded despite her initial trepidation about its raunchy lyrics. It made her a star."

Sam Butera was best known as the wailing saxophone player and arranger on just about all of Louis Prima's classic '50s sides, as the serious record collectors say: Oh Marie, Just A Gigolo, Jump Jive an' Wail, Hey Boy Hey Girl. Butera also regularly served as a foil for Prima's in-song banter -- mostly being implored by the bandleader to keep up or blow harder or play what he just sang. And like any good sax man, you can't imagine the songs without his contribution (think Springsteen with no Clarence Clemons, or David Bowie's Changes missing the bittersweet sax coda)...

Butera formed his own band in the late '70s after Prima passed away, and he remained active until about five years ago, often playing with Keely Smith. And you have to be encouraged by Butera's ability to know crap when he sees it. According to The Times:

Among Mr. Butera’s best-known arrangements was the medley of “Just a Gigolo” and “I Ain’t Got Nobody” that was a hit for the Prima-Smith team in 1956. To Mr. Butera’s chagrin, it became an even bigger hit for the rock singer David Lee Roth three decades later. “He copied my arrangement note for note, and I didn’t get a dime for it,” Mr. Butera told The New York Times in 1997. “But there wasn’t an act in Atlantic City or Las Vegas that would do that song, out of respect for me.”

David Carradine will always be known for the hit '70s TV series Kung Fu, which has achieved almost cult status over the years -- that is, he WOULD HAVE always been known for his starring role in that Asian Western if -- and there's no real way to sugarcoat this -- the man had not been found dead with a rope tied around his private parts. Call me judgmental, but that kind of ignominious ending will tend to have an adverse effect on your reputation, on how people think of your body of work -- uh, legacy. But no, instead Mr. Fancypants Autoerotic Asphyxiation goes to Thailand and hangs himself in truly bizarre fashion instead of engaging in the more acceptable local custom of paying to have illicit sex with underage prostitutes like any normal, decent Westerner.

Actually, despite being the right age for Kung Fu when it ran from 1972-75, for whatever reason I never took to it. Instead, i got to listen to friends who did watch it reciting variations on the series' signature line "Snatch this pebble from my hand, grasshopper" whenever they could squeeze a reference in.

Bound for Glory -- the 1976 feature based on the Woody Guthrie autobiography whose title now takes on comically ironic overtones -- is the consensus critical choice as Carradine's best performance out of his more than 100 movie roles. However, as the Times dryly notes, Carradine was "a busy actor if not always the most discriminating in his choice of roles."

In the excellent Times obit, observing the more respectful graciousness of the format, habitual obituarist Bruce Weber omits mention of just what role the actor's bound genitalia may have played in his demise, while revealing that Bangkok police were treating the whole mess as a suicide -- apparently standard operating procedure even in Thailand when a dead man is found swinging from the light fixture.

I jumped off the Quentin Tarantino bandwagon pretty much for good about 10 years ago (right after Jackie Brown, which I liked) , soon after realizing what a complete, utter doofus the guy is -- so I never did see Carradine in either of the gratuitously violent Kill Bills. In me 'umble opinion, the Kill Bill franchise was Tarentino's desperate, cynical attempt to rescue his flagging career by making movies so repulsively violent that critics would have to take notice, moronic suburban teenagers would flock to the multiplex, and clueless hipsters would watch it in some downtown art house & pretentiously hail it as a masterpiece of cinema, you know the type: "Kurosawa meets Peckinpah."
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Also saw on the Daily News website yesterday a story about Tony Darrow, an actor you'd know by face, who was arrested Thursday at LaGuardia Airport and charged with good-old-fashioned extortion stemming from a 2004 incident involving known members of the bent-nose crew Joseph "Joey Boy" Orlando and Giovanni "Nothing Catchy Rhymes With My Name" Monteleone. Darrow, like just about every Italian-American actor, was in The Sopranos, but as Bamboo Lounge owner Sonny Bunz, he had some of the most quotable lines in Goodfellas as he runs afoul of the crazy Joe Pesci character, including the demented:

"But I'm worried... I mean, I'm hearin' all kinds a fuckin' bad things. I mean he's treating me like I'm a fuckin' half-a-fag or somethin'. I'm gonna wind up a lammist, I gotta go on the fuckin' lam in order to get away from this guy? This ain't right, Paulie."

So his acting career is not only on hold, but now in intensive care and on life support. It looks like the guy's gonna be doing some time here -- officially unavailable anytime soon to play those mob stooge types he had down to a science.
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Buyer's Remorse?

CAN'T HELP BUT NOTICE how testy Mike Bloomberg has been acting lately. Despite a tightly controlled, almost scripted narrative of a run for his third term, it hasn't been all smooth sailing for Bloomberg, who has recently squeezed in a full campaign season's worth of verbal blunders -- and it's still early June.

The most recent example came in the aftermath of Dategate: the First Couple jetting into New York City for dinner and a show. Asked how much the president's trip cost the City in security expenses, Billionayor Bloomberg swatted the question away while typically boiling everything down to tourism: "I can't think of anything that is better as an advertisement for our tourism industry, for Broadway, for our restaurants, for saying that this is a safe city and an affordable city."

Then, as if intentionally trying to compound the absurdity of calling New York City "affordable," he belted out the following gem: "The President doesn't get paid that much. He's on a budget, too."

Well, as you might expect, the tabloids let Bloomberg have it for that one, with one Daily News story headlined:

Get a clue, Bloomy! Mayor touts Obamas' 'affordable' night on Broadway

Even The Times couldn't resist piling on. As Michael Barbaro put it in a fairly caustic Monday column:

"It was the latest puzzling remark in a re-election campaign filled with colorful foot-in-mouth mayoral utterances. He has scolded a disabled blogger, Michael Harris, who uses a wheelchair, for accidentally turning on a tape recorder at a news conference. And, last week, he bitterly rebuked a reporter, Azi Paybarah, who asked about his decision to overturn the city’s term limits law." This kind of foot-in-mouth syndrome would have to manifest itself on almost a daily basis from now until the election in November for the 67-year-old frontrunner to be denied his third term. Toward that end, Bloomberg has already spent $20 million of a projected $60 million on radio and TV ads.

standing what is essentially an unlimited budget, Mayor Mike continues to make headlines for the wrong reasons. Last week at a press conference he again managed to veer off-message -- calling the New York Observer's Azi Paybarah "a disgrace" for having the temerity to bring up the mayor's original rationale for seeking a third term -- that the financial crisis demands a leader of his rare business acumen. Now, the question was served with a side order of sarcasm that seemed to set off Hizzoner:

Mr. Paybarah: If the economy is turning around, as you said, does that mean that the rationale for extending term limits–

Mr. Bloomberg: I don’t know why … why don’t we just get serious questions here. The rationale for extending term limits is, the City Council passed it and the public’s going to have a chance on Nov. 3 to say what they want. And I don’t think we have to keep coming back to that. When you have a serious question about the economy I will be happy to answer it. Anything else?"

After that, a fuming Bloomberg stared directly at Mr. Paybarah and said, “You are a disgrace.”

Barbaro's piece included two other examples of Bloomberg's trademark callousness:

After parents complained about dangerously hot rubber safety mats on city playgrounds, he responded: “If it’s hot, don’t sit on it.” About crowded subways, and the griping they engender, he once said: “So you stand next to people. Get real. This is New York.”

A guy would have to be awfully insecure to be this nasty this often. I mean, Bloomberg is the wealthiest New Yorker and the 17th richest guy in the whole world. But no matter how much he spends on advertisements attesting to the contrary, he shares a bullying streak with his ho unsurprisingly also sought to circumvent the term limits statute following 9/11.

It should be emphasized that the mayor's latest blunders come in the wake of much stricter ground rules for reporters lucky enough to cover his expected coronation. The new directive limits all questions to campaign matters, with policy questions off limits. Yet obviously there's little the mayor's staff can do to offset his recent propensity to say the wrong thing at the worst time.

Last week he somehow found a way offend the widow of a swine flu victim with his remark that "In some senses, if you have H1N1 [virus], you should consider yourself lucky because it so far seems to be a milder flu than the garden variety." To be fair, Bloomberg did follow up his impromptu diagnosis with an explanation that "It's very sad that those that we've lost are gone, but the good news is that so far it does seem to be a relatively mild flu" -- but the damage was done and the tabloids had their money "consider yourself lucky" quote and were busy running wih itIn short order, Bonnie Wiener, whose husband Michael was the city's first death frirus, waw one om the vfor his insensitive remarks:

"I'm not feeling very lucky. I'm sorry I can't agree with that. My children are not feeling very lucky either. It's a very puzzling comment to make." -- also revealing that, "When my husband died it was on the media before they called to tell me."

One of the free daily papers here today noted that Bloomberg has spent 10 times more than his closest challenger -- City Comptroller William Thompson, who is 15 points behind in the latest poll. Then a chart showed what the $20 million could restore to the mayor's 2010 austerity budget:

$12 million -- cuts to prekindergarten classes

$3.8 million -- afterschool programs

$561,000 -- home meals for senior citizens

$1.5 million -- literacy classes

$500,000 -- Housing Court

$1.3 million -- dropout prevention

$360,000 -- anti-predatory lending awareness

Of course, the whole premise is kind of unfair -- the campaign spending is coming out of Bloomberg's own deep pockets while the cuts are part of a $59 billion municipal budget -- but I'm not hating it. Because after all 20 million dollars is an obscene amount of money to spend on a race that is for all intents and purposes uncontested.