Cher Tour News and Beaches

Cher News and Cher World have posted pics of Cher's recent appearance at Los Angeles International airport (left).  

Cher News also posted some tour news:

http://chernews.blogspot.com/2012/03/news-round-up-chers-new-tour.html
http://chernews.blogspot.com/2012/02/cher-must-have-found-what-she-was.html
http://chernews.blogspot.com/2012/02/chers-concert-coming-to-kansas.html

No album news yet, but since the tour is officially starting in September, the album will probably be delayed until near then. Sad face. Cher says most likely the tour will start in Kansas (Cher Scholar Tyler must be very happy!)

I don't know what to feel about this tour business. Of course I love buying tour memorabilia. But my non-Cher-friends are more than mildly irritated about the KISS-like renegation of the plenitude of said farewells. My long-suffering husband will probably go again with me (even if it means traveling to Denver or Phoenix because Albuquerque only hosts has-beens and tribute bands) but I will hear plenty of shame-speech when all my peeps find out about this.

And I can't say it's undeserved. This is one of the hardships of being a Cher fan.

But who can shake a stick at another tour book? Not obsessed me!

I'm glad the opening song will change from "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" (hire a detective already) to "You Haven't Seen the Last of Me." That's somewhat of a bright spot. I hope the song list changes in other ways, too.

I never thought I'd be saying this, but a set of covers would be refreshing about now. I never thought I'd live to see the day of Cher doing one Greatest Hits tour, let alone three (Believe, Farewell, Caesars Palace). I used to pine for that.

But it would be swell if Cher sang some old catalogue tunes, as a nod to the events going on in this primary election (something like "It’s a Man’s World" or "Do Right Woman").

When I was 8, I adored Cher’s version of Aretha Franklin's "Do Right Woman, Do Right Man" (if you want a do-right woman, you gotta be a do-right man). I found the song on the first S&C album I ever bought with my own money, The Beat Goes On (a compilation unbeknownst to me). It was 1978 and I was at Record Bar with my defacto bff Krissy and her older brother. I had five dollars and the album was $7.35. Krissy’s brother spotted me the extra dough to get the record. I made my parents listen to it. I remember the night well. It was in St. Louis, the piece of furniture that was our record player taking up a whole wall of our “nice” room, my parents sitting in our “nice chairs.” Mom and Dad were not completely won over but they begrudgingly said they liked "Do Right Woman."

I say defacto bff, because Krissy had another “official” bff, albeit a bff she never played with. I was the constant day-after-day dependable stand-in, a theatrical part I’ve played over and over again in my life with bffs in high school and college. No matter what frustrations my friends have with their “official” bffs, I always feel that someday they will return to them and I will be bff-less.

I’ve tried to believe over the years that this doesn’t bother me. But when I heard about how former Cher-Show-writer Iris Rainer Dart wrote the movie Beaches with Cher in mind, I had to face a painful truth. It did bother me that I was always a stand-in-bff which is why I never wanted to see the movie Beaches. I was jealous of bffs. My bffness made me sad and I avoided the movie and its insipid popularity for decades. In fact, my high school defacto bff, Lisa, even said the movie reminded her of her "official" bff Nellie (Nellie is also my good friend and a very talented showgirl). Nellie couldn’t come to Lisa’s wedding so I was the Maid of Stand-in Honor. Which I was happy to do because I loved my friend Lisa. I wasn’t bitter about it. Just jealous.

I finally forced myself to watch the movie last weekend. And it was awful. Honestly. The performances were awful. The dialogue was awful. My husband left the room it was so awful. I didn’t even find the bff relationship plausible and Bette Midler and Barbara Hershey had no chemistry. It was sort of a relief. Now I can move on. But yeah…Barbara Hershey’s lips plump up half way through the movie. Remember all the brouhaha about that? Those were the days of lip-plumping innocence.

And which part was supposed to be for Cher? I didn’t get Cher playing C.C. Bloom at all.