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Category: Cher Product (Page 6 of 8)

What Shall We Talk About?

May 8, 2008 / / 4 Comments

Okay…so the big day arrived this week and reviews are literally pouring in on Cher’s Caesar Place show. I don’t want to read them until I see the show next week. I don’t even want to look too hard at the photos. I don’t want to discuss the new stuff until I see it. Which is extremely,  extremely hard!

In fact, for any of the other tours (there have only been three I’ve been able to see live in my lifetime – Heart of Stone, Believe, and Never Can Say Goodbye), I’ve never been able to resist. And I’m getting very, very excited about seeing the show and reading over everybody’s thoughts. I just hope I don’t get hit by a bus before I can see it! (I always think that right before new Cher product drops).

In fact, I don’t feel like talking about anything else but this thing I can’t talk about!!

But I did post my France pics and here are the Cher-centric ones:

 

Seine John on the Seine like that Sonny & Cher album back cover pic.

 

 

 

 

Cherentry2_2Cherceiling1

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Don’t these chateaux entryways look like Cher’s house??

 

Chercem Chercem2_2

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I can totally see why Cher wants to be buried at Pere LaChaise cemetery in Paris. It’s very goth. I can see her with a tomb not unlike the one above, but hopefully with some subtle half-breed design in the stained glass…hey, for the fans.

 

Cher_sign

 

 

 

 

 

Cher river, Cher valley, Cher county seat…lots of Cherness in the Loire Valley.

I can also take this time to answer a few Cher questions from the blog.

Jimmy wrote:

“AND, Mary, why haven’t you digressed about the fact that these unlikely 3 would do something together so out-of-line for their personalities???? love and kisses-jimmy”

Jimmy is right. I could easily do an essay about the old 70s-variety format and how we just don’t get miraculous celebrity combinations singing medleys apropos of nothing like we did back in the day. It’s heartbreaking because I’d watch any show that could convince Bono to sing a Madonna medley with Barney and Tiger Woods. Who wouldn’t watch that?? It’s TV Gold.

Michael asked:

“Okay, so combining “she’s overdue a juicy boxed-set” and “It’s my dream job really”…How about you tell us what you would put in the ultimate Cher box? Anything you ever wanted on CD, DVD, books, whatever. I’m totally curious what you’d put.

There’s so much I could do as curator of a Chersonian Institute. Really, I don’t know where to start. Her video collection needs a serious overhaul.  More and more we’re finding amazing gems of foreign video clips for old Cher hits on the you-tubes.

I haven’t wrapped my head around what a good box-set of CDs would be. I know the mix I normally make my friends has too many non-hits on it to ever make bank. Other than the obvious of doing notes for the four-CD Warner Bros 1975-1977 re-release collection we’re so overdue, I don’t know what other regurgitation of her greatest hits I would feel morally okay with dumping into the pile of too-many-already.

I would love to do a coffee-table book of photographs and essays compiled by various writers on Cher’s career and her cultural relevance. That would be the dreamiest.

 

The Cher Show is Coming…The Cher Show is Coming!

May 1, 2008 / / 1 Comment

Cheret Excitement is brewing for the new Cher show in Las Vegas (premiering in just 6 days). I’m very excited, speaking for myself. Although I must say gas prices have inhibited my ability to afford a plane ticket to Vegas for the weekend I’m going to see it. They’re off the charts. And I even have a $100 voucher. Big sigh. I may end up driving, which I enjoy anyway. I just want to use the damn voucher before it expires in two months. But I digress…

Also, this week Oprah filmed Tina Turner and Cher in her Las Vegas episode which is set to air on May 8. Set thee Tivos. Here’s a link to some of the gossip about the episode which was posted on Cher World.

Other links this week

Chershow1_2In light of that, there was a funny blog post last week from The Cher Show, the episode with Tina Turner and Kate Smith and it reminds us how charismatic Tina and Cher are together. The blog post is funny, too.

Moveme And two good links were posted this week on the Cher list from Tyler. There’s a new mashup!!! I love these! Cher with Snoop Dog! Here’s the MP3.

And Gregg and Cher singing "Move Me" in concert.

   

Questions to Cher Scholar

March 19, 2008 / / 2 Comments

94sanctuary_s_3 On Thursday, October 5 2006 Michael Cox wrote:

Hi, u know where I can buy Sanctuary items? Thank u J.

Mr.Cox is Referring to two catalogues from 1994 and 1995.

Unfortunatley he missed the era of her catalogue business in the mid-90s. He also  95sanctuary_sc missed her selling off some of the over-stock on her website during the Believe and Farewell Tours. And now he’s just missed her latest garage sale. So…short of stalking eBay for the catalogues, I’d suggest heading over to Europe yourself to find your own gothic tchotchkes. Well, okay…it’s not that drastic yet.

My own eBay search brought up a gothic trash can

Sanccan    

   

   

   

   

   

and towel holder.

Towlholder   

   

   

   

   

 

At first I freaked out, thinking that towl holder had been mounted askance in some sort of wood-paneled On Golden Pond cabin. But the towel holder is just eBay-posing on a hardwood floor. Everybody calm down.

Do your own search: http://search.ebay.com/cher+sanctuary

A Sanctuary artist talks about a necklace designed for Cher on the site Parrish Relics. Parrish Relics? Sounds like good times.

Here’s a New York Times article published when the catalogs came out. The article contains interesting facts I must have missed comprehending back then, including:

  • “In London, she met Clyde Wainright, a curator at the Victoria and Albert Museum, and became entranced with his recent exhibition on the work of A.W. Pugin, a 19th Century architect who popularized pointy Gothic arches for country estates.” Remember this was a common theme during the late 2006 Cher auction…all that Pugin-stuff.
  • “Cher’s public relations representative [I wonder if that was a fun job or a hair-pulling-out job] say the "image of the Sanctuary customer is a woman between 20 and 45.”

I don’t know why that’s interesting…but for some reason it is. When the catalogue came out, I was tempted to buy the incense because it was cheap. But then I realized I hate incense. My celebrity obsession hits a limit with smells I hate.

Incense1_2 Incence2

   

Outdoor Album Shots

March 19, 2008 / / 1 Comment

Withlove Remember the albums All I Really Want to Do, Look At Us, Jackson Highway, With Love with that big blue sky behind Cher – all great outdoor album photos taken beyond the suffocating-like walls of a photo studio, all out in the sparkling daylight. I miss the fresh air sometimes, I really do. Can it be that Half Breed (which looks almost like a photo stage itself) was really the last Cher album cover photographed with an outdoor setting?

Cher is a California girl! How I yearn for another album cover with some SUN! 

   

The Internet, Video and Links

November 1, 2007 / / 1 Comment

Barilan_internetthumb I don’t feel much like blogging today but here goes. Yesterday as part of a work excursion I attended part of ICANN’s (Internet Corporation of Assigned Names and Numbers) 30th public meeting. You probably don’t know ICANN (and their name isn’t very sexy for sure) but they do things like run the Internet – make sure it works and isn’t hacked into and all that sort of thing. It was fascinating – the three session I attended.

The Internet is one of those things you take for granted but is so crucial to life in the modern world. My favorite quote from the meeting was from ICANN-ite George Sadowsky who said “All forms of human behavior have moved to the net and magnified.” And he went on to say how that included both good and bad forms of human behavior, saints and thieves. Do you consider how important the Internet is to your modern life and how crucial it is that it doesn’t break down?

I definitely feel mentally exhausted today. The energy there was calm but intense and now my brain is completely fried. Just listening to the translations was exhausting but very cool.

I’ll just leave you with these links for thoughts…

Cher single "Believe" was huge. Least we forget how big it was, this Today in Music article coves the basics, how it was the dance record of the 90s and probably the biggest selling dance record of all time.

Here’s more news on Cher swearing on TV and whether or not that’s a good thing or a bad thing according to US courts. Ugh! I wish this story would just go away! I’m so friggin over it already. Grant on Ghost Hunters says "What the Frig!" all the time and I think it’s so funny. My bf said yesterday that he was suffering from a bad case of the friggits.

Here’s a clip of Sonny & Cher singing "We’re Gonna Make It." Wow! First of all, didn’t we associate that song with the Allman and Woman album. Sonny & Cher did it too? Just like "You Really Got a Hold on Me." Was Cher trying to recreate Sonny & Cher with Allman duets? It seems so beyond comprehension – how could we have considered it? Or did Sonny & Cher cover so many friggin songs it would be impossible not to re-cover her covers? Of course, Cher and Allman didn’t make it, Sonny and Cher didn’t make it either but it would be hard to top their version. Bobby Sherman, that ridiculous dance, the screaming kids, the sudden appearance and disappearance of backup singers (if it wasn’t the 60s I’d think they were CGI’d in there), Sonny going absolutely crazy at the end. Wow!

This last clip is about a Joni Mitchell impersonator. It’s tone irked me…a lot. The article begins by indicating how high class it is to be a Joni Mitchell impersonator and how that possibly elevates the act to cabaret. First of all, you could argue that a Joni Mitchell impersonator is even more ridiculous of an act than a Cher impersonator…that is if you think impersonations are ridiculous in the first place which you probably do if you’re a close-minded Joni Mitchell fan. Then there’s the implication that other impersonators are of a lower-caste, being reduced to hand out pamphlets on the streets of Provincetown to their shows because “Ms. Mitchell appeals to far more rarefied tastes.” I can personally attest that you can be both a fan of Cher and Joni Mitchell. (I have her collected lyrics in my library for frig’s sake!). This was a subtle Cher-shaft in action and I had to say something.

The picture above is Bar Ilan University‘s map of the Internet. The Internet. What an awesome thing. Just this one post has brought us a blog conversation, a youtube video, factual information on a pop song and potential opinions blossoming out of billions of brains worldwide.

      

It’s Gonna Rain and the Sun Isn’t Coming Back…Ever

October 18, 2007 / / 1 Comment

YouTube Master Tyler posted a link to Sonny & Cher singing "It’s Gonna Rain" — consider that this was going to be their first single if Ahmet Ertegun had won the first-single fight with Sonny. This video brings up these thoughts:

  • It’s interesting to me that Sonny would write a song like this living in a city where it never rains.
  • Sonny is terrible at lip syncing, worse than Britney.
  • This is the only part of the movie Wild on the Beach you ever need see.
  • You wouldn’t break a sweat dancing like Sonny & Cher. It’s a dance that says I’m groovy yet bored.
  • That woman dancing in her chair – too funny. I’m gonna try that out the next time I hit the clubs. Because I like dancing. But not as much as I like sitting.

I found these other links under related links.  I wasn’t sure what they all had in common at first and then it occurred to me: they’re all weather-related Cher songs.

The Sun Ain’t Gonna Shine Mix

The Sun Ain’t Gonna Shine from Top of the Pops
   

Danny Boy and the Thirteenth High School Confession

October 4, 2007 / / 2 Comments

Nyro I’m back from my bittersweet high school reunion. The trip was great. Gave my bf a big hometown tour of me. Don’t worry, he didn’t suffer. There were plenty of river boats, historical re-enactors and pre-historic mounds to keep him happy. Story and pics coming soon.

In the meantime, Cherworld has posted an amazingly unusual Cher interview (it’s European, of course). Give it a looksee. Something about it will relate to my high school reunion story.

For my bf’s birthday last year I gave him two Laura Nyro CDs. He had expressed interest in my Nyro/LaBelle CD which I bought because I love Patty LaBelle. Still, he didn’t like Laura Nyro at all (although since yesterday, I discovered he secretly has been listening to one of them at work) and these two CDs have been on my list of things to listen to for about a year. Two days ago I finally put on Eli and the Thirteenth Confession, her breakout album on the Columbia label with then-manager David Geffen.

First of all, I had placed Nyro in the mid 70s, not late 60s. Knowing this tid-bit unlocked a door for me. I can say I finally get it: her fluid genre-melds are pretty amazing for the time and her lyrics are poeticly playful. I’m still not very fond of her soprano voice. It’s too shrill for me most of the time. But I love “Sweet Blindness” and “Stoned Soul Picnic” and “Poverty Train” has really grown on me. And best of all, I finally see from where came Nelly McKay!

I’m a bit overwhelmed with catching up on Cher news this week but I did join my first Facebook Cher group: If You Don’t Love Cher, You Are A Dirty Dirty Communist. Good questions are not really brewing there yet but I did see a good question on the Yahoo!Chergroups list posted by daniel martinez:

What Cher song has the most meaning to you and why?

This is a particularly difficult question for me. I’m not very sentimental about Cher songs. I’m much more academic and cerebral about my love of Cher music. Her albums do notate the timeline of my life but mostly as a background soundtrack. For instance, we used to yell the chorus of “Laugh at Me” before doing belly bombs into our neighborhood pool. I also remember re-enacting the storyline of “Send the Man Over” from Cherished. However, I was only 8 years old and the major sexual innuendos in the song went over my innocent five-foot head. I guess the two songs that tug on my heart-sleeves would be "Somebody" and "Danny Boy."

"Somebody" reminds me of being five or six years old in the mid-70s, listening to Sonny & Cher on my parents phonograph in our front living room – lots of New Mexico sunlight, the jump rope as my microphone. Groovy times. I love Cher’s vocal on that song. And "Danny Boy" always makes me vaclempt. The sadness in her voice. Speaking from beyond the grave. It’s all there. You can read more about my top 10 favorite Cher songs on Cherscholar.

      

Olivia Newton John, Les Dudek and the Marijuana Video

September 24, 2007 / / 3 Comments

Thruglass I was remiss in posting last week due to being at a work retreat for three days. As a result, the other two days I was a complete zombie. The retreat was exhausting but amazing and at a fabulous venue, the posh Fess Parker’s Inn in Los Olivos. I spent my very few spare minutes ogling the funky, overpriced art at one of the many galleries nearby.

This week I head off early to my 20th high school reunion in St. Louis (hopefully I’ll have wacky photos coming soon…or photos of myself in tears like Romy and Michele ). Sadly, I did not lose many pounds these last few months but I did gain quite a few muscles in all my Tamilee workouts. Come on…I just can’t work out to Cher with that hole fit on! Besides, Tamilee is so friendly and encouraging. She reminds me of Olivia Newton John.

And I read an interesting article about ONJ by Wendy McClure in the Aug/Sept issue of Bust Magazine. Titled “Reviving Olivia,” it dealt with Wendy’s late 70s, early 80s childhood obsession with ONJ and hearkened back to a more innocent time of celebrity obsession. “They don’t make pop stars like ONJ anymore,” Wendy says as she describes her fantasies “where I got to be her best friend.” She describes ONJ as both exotic and friendly…wholesome and hot.

“The celebrity world has changed for the worse: it’s become too fast, too fickle, too irreversibly fucked-up to give us another like her…[back then it was a time] when female teen stars were still more likely to be seen as artistic ambassadors from the next generation than fresh meat with a legal-age countdown.”

So true. Which brings us to the next topic. I finally watched the Sonny Bono marijuana film again to try and find Cher’s cameo in it. Cher looks so young in her bit, I can’t help but be reminded of Paris Hilton when I see it. In fact, you can also read the film as The Lindsey Lohan Story. Cher appears early on (approx. 7:44) during discussions of alcohol abuse. She’s briefly seen careening over her boozeSlumpoverphone  and finally slumping over a phone. Her mascara’d eyes through the glass, those long fingers and cascading black hair are unmistakable. The closing credits don’t show on YouTube as they do in my cassette version, but a freeze-frame of her eyeball through the booze glass makes a reprise there. In the film someone asks, “What’s so bad about feeling good?” Sonny answers very creepily, “Nothing, baby, nothing.” Ick. Sonny says “the young people” a lot and calls everybody “Bud” (including Cher if I remember Good Times correctly). Every time I watch this thing, I see new disturbing things. The most upsetting image this time was the monkey in the lab with surgically implanted wires coming out of his skull cap. Criminal.

The video can be seen here on YouTube. YouTube poster "blackpimp4u” has interesting footage posted there…and the related file is where I found Sonny & Cher singing more anti-drug messaging in their video for “Circus.”

On an unrelated topic: last Friday night Les Dudek played a show at the Malibu Inn on Pacific Coast Highway. My most celebrity obsessed friend was pressuring me to go to the show but I chose to not be celebrity obsessed last Friday and saw 3:10 to Yuma instead. And I’m not sorry I did because that was the best western I’ve seen since…well, forever. So far I can’t find reviews of Les’s show; but here’s his MySpace page.

   

I’m in Mashup Heaven

August 24, 2007 / / 1 Comment

Geeze Louise! Pinch me!

  • REM vs. Cher by DJ Schmolli – "Losing My Believe"
       
  • Sex Pistols vs. Cher by Go Home Productions – "No Feelings 4 Cher" Allegedy this mashup "received the "full blessing" of both parties (or, in the former case, Pistols guitarist Steve Jones)." Found on the EP Pistol Whipped with  other Sex Pistols mash-ups (including the  Madonna Pistol Mash "Ray of Gob."
       
  • R.I.P. Mashup: Cher vs. Echo & the Bunnymen doing "I Believe in Killing Time" Message on the site from Mark Vidler: "Am I still allowed to mention this track? Was bloody pleased with this pairing and still listen to this one occasionally. Several months after making it available I was kindly asked by Echo & The Bunnymens people to remove it from the website. I politely obliged.  August 2002" Pansy-assed dolts.
       
  • There are so many mashups in this one…I’m dizzy. Whitney Houston vs. Madonna vs. Cher in a "Believe" "Live a Virgin" "Somebody Who Loves Me" mashup called "Believe Somebody" by DJ Earworm      
     
  • Alice Deejay vs.Cher doing "This is a Song for Those Who Are Better Off Alone" by Savvy DJ.

 

Cher Listed Among the Best Bob Dylan Covers

August 17, 2007 / / 3 Comments

Bobdylancher Now this is good news indeed! If only I understood how she made the list. Steve Meacham, a writer for the Syndey Morning Herald in Australia, recently posted a list of his favorite Bob Dylan covers. (Thank you Chergoup on Yahoo!, yet again, for the link).

Two things irk me about this article. One, his web links are wrong. He points us to dylancovers.com which is just a landing page with Google ads. The  database of Dylan covers is at http://www.bjorner.com/covers.htm. This site is actually pretty cool. At a glance you can see Dylan’s amazing influential reach. The site also correctly identifies Cher’s whopping ten Dylan covers spanning a mere five years (http://www.bjorner.com/artistc.htm#_Cher) …although technically Cher renamed "Lay Lady Lay" to "Lay Baby Lay," and "Tonight I’ll Be Staying Here with You" (one of my favorites) is listed twice erroneously due to a compilation being taken into account. If we were to count Cher compilations, all the songs would be listed about 100 times. This site has this same problem with other artists, as well.

But back to Meacham’s piece…I doubt he’s heard every single Dylan cover under the sun. Yet he still comes up with a list that is basically the most successful and high-profile of the bunch. He doesn’t come up with much rationale for why he picks the the versions he picks (for instance choosing Neil Young & Crazy Horse’s version of "Blowin in the Wind" over Marlene Dietrich’s version because it’s "the finest cover." Finest at what?) It gets worse when he gets to Cher’s version of "All I Really Want to Do." I’m amazed he picked her version over the one charting simultaneously by The Byrds. Cher’s version beat The Byrds in sales but Dylan himself liked The Byrds’ version. Critically, I’d like to know why Meacham felt Cher’s was better. Is he finally a reviewer who will defend Cher’s music? Yet he provides no real defense! So close but no cigar.

It’s interesting that Dylan made his debut in 1962, just a mere 3 years before Cher. This helps to explain why folk was still so huge in the mid-60s and yet old enough to be taken mainstream by pop acts like Sonny & Cher.

 

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