Category: Music (Page 16 of 35)

Movie Alert, Toto Bro RIP, Cherity and Cher Impersonators

March 22, 2015 / Cher Scholar / 0 Comments

Toto

Another Toto member and Porcaro brother has died. Toto's bassist, Mike Porcaro, died last week at age 59. David Hungate was their original bassist. Mike's brother, drummer Jeff Porcaro, died in 1992 at the age 39. David and Jeff were members of Sonny & Cher's band during the early 1970s, later becoming founding members of Toto with David Paich (also of Sonny & Cher's band and of "David's Song") and Steve Lukather. Many Toto members have worked with Cher over the years as studio musicians and as inspiration. Read Mike's New York Times obit or more about the history of Toto.

The Wrecking Crew Movie

Great news! The Wrecking Crew documentary is coming to an art house near you! I saw an LA screening of this movie back in 2008 and did an expensive blog post about it. Cher in not only interviewed but you learn a lot more about the musicians Sonny & Cher were working with in the 1960s. There is some good old S&C footage here and as the press for the movie states, these musicians were “the unsung heroes of the West Coast Sound."

About the movie: http://www.wreckingcrew.tv/
Screening dates near you: http://www.wreckingcrew.tv/screenings.php

Go see this movie!

Cher Offers to Help 96-Year Old Edith Harrison

In other big news this week, Cher offered to help 96-year old Edith Harrison return home in Virginia.

The Washington Post story:Cher, yes that Cher, fights to help 96-year-old keep her Virginia home
The Today Show story: Cher pledges to help 96-year-old woman with dementia return home
The Huffington Poststory: Cher Promises To Help 96-Year-Old Woman With Dementia Return Home

Cher offered to help pay for needed upgrades to Hill's family home in Alexandria and some medical expensive because Cher was inspired by the love story between Edith and her husband Eddie Harrison who died after they were forcibly separated in December. The story was picked up in at least 145 outlets as of last week.

Cher Impersonators

Stef and Johnny, Peter and Lily, and Sonny and Cher

There are a plethora of Cher impersonators. In my humble opinion, (thffffffft), the best ones don't try to sing. Maybe they can perfect the Cher twang or vibrator or her smokey contralto, but they just can't get the deadpan, cool distance of her persona, which is why our most famous Cher impersonator doesn't sing.

It's rare to find some Sonny & Cher impersonators (even harder to pull off), but there's a new Scottish pair doing a tribute play called "And the Beat Goes On." The Sonny might just be on to something with his stern Sonny stare. But the clothes need a little workup and what's with the teddy bear?

Kathy Griffin Opens Up About Her 'Fashion Police' Exit

Griffin does a very funny Cher impersonation in her act and her friend Cher expressed support last week when Griffin quit Fashion Police…and I do, too. I love how Griffin and Kelly Osbourne have stood up to bullying, especially calling it out among the LA fashionauts.

New Twitter Fight, Wu-Tang Clan, Cher Musical, Movie Premiere

March 14, 2015 / Cher Scholar / 0 Comments

Twittery Punches

Cher's Latest Twitter SmackUp Participant: Piers Morgan.

These things are starting to feel like setups, like you know when the Porter Waggoner show got really bad in the 1980s and you would have bet money the no-talent guests were paying Porter to be on the show? I wonder if somewhere there are auditions to have cat-fights with Cher on Twitter. I’m not criticizing…just saying it’s getting vaudevillian.

Stories:

http://www.billboard.com/articles/news/6487640/piers-morgan-cher-fishnet-stockings-twitter

http://www.cbc.ca/news/trending/cher-smacks-down-piers-morgan-for-tweeting-she-s-too-old-to-wear-fishnets-1.2980404

Music

Apparently, Wu-Tang Clan previewed their Once Upon a Time in Shaolin album recently at MoMA PS1 in New York City. Previously they auctioned the album online and the album wont' be made commercially available for 88 years. In this article from Art News the interviewer presses the artists about working with Cher, who replaced Ol’ Dirty Bastard on part of the project. We find out that not only is Cher singing in a small part of one song, but that clip ends the album AND that Cher appears earlier in the album in a skit!

Dammit. Will we ever hear this skit? Excerpts from the Art News interview:

Frere-Jones asked about a sample of a voice he heard at the end of the last track.

“That’s actually,” Cilvaringz said, rubbing his jaw. “Cher? That’s Cher.”

Frere-Jones followed-up about Cher, who apparently acts in a skit on the record and sings, and why she appears on the record.

“I wanna ask you a question,” RZA said. “Did you ever have a crush on Cher?”

“Yeah, of course,” Frere-Jones said.

“Well, okay then,” RZA said.

“Not to get on Cher too much,” he said a few moments later, but she truly was “the kind of woman where they only made one of her. Like who made that?” he asked, waving his hand vertically. Sade, he said, is another woman like that.

Though he didn’t draw the comparison himself, RZA said he wanted the album to be something like that and made reference to another one-of-a-kind woman, this one more related to Staten Island.

“It’s like the Statue of Liberty,” he said. It exists in only one place but belongs to everyone who experiences it.

A Springfield, Illinois, man has created a musical featuring 23 Cher songs called Dark Lady. "I discovered a story line in her songs," creator Mike Sheedy says.

I have a friend who wrote a play based solely on the lyrics of Paula Abdul. These kinds of projects fascinate me. This, however, is more like Mamma Mia! or Movin’ Out (featuring the songs of Billy Joel). I think they call these jukebox musicals. As Sheedy has found out, he can't mount his show without securing the rights to all the songs. No small boulder to roll up a hill. In the meantime, he's created a show poster with his daughter in the staring role.

Movies

Cher World is reporting that Cher attended the premiere of the film Dignity with Chaz who appears in the movie as Jerry the Hoarder. I made the mistake of reading the comments on this post. I never do that. I don’t know why I did it this time. Some fans have critiques of Cher’s look and latest concert that confound me. They want her to be something she’s not, like Katy Perry. Why do I read comments??!!

The pic at the top is from the same premiere only showing Cher's full outfit and a very stern look in her eyes that reminds me of when I met her at a bookstore all those years ago.

Chaz's IMDB page has a great pic.

Press

The Boston Herald declares Cher still in a league all her own. So don’t compare her look or her work to things kids like Katy Perry are doing! Sheesh people.

Cher Scholar Interviews June Millington from the Band Fanny

January 18, 2015 / Cher Scholar / 0 Comments

OMG! I just interviewed June Millington from the band Fanny! This is the band who unforgettably performed on The Sonny & Cher Comedy Hour in August of 1971.

Pinch me!

Read the interview on CherScholar.com.

Cher Homes, Calendars, Tour Stuff , Screen Sirens, Oscar Winning Chart Toppers

January 12, 2015 / Cher Scholar / 0 Comments

Happy New Year! I started my new job this week at Central New Mexico Community College. So far so good. Everyone is smart, interesting and involved in cool extra-curricular projects.

Over my two week break between jobs I started to go through my back log of emails. I found plenty of Cher links to keep us busy until Cher is back to selling us stuff.

It's the new year and you may be in need of some fan-made Cher Calendars. Here are some places to get some:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Cher-DESKTOP-CALENDAR-2015-NEW-Dressed-to-Kill-D2K-Tour-Closer-to-the-Truth-/261688900218?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item3ceddfba7a

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Cher-CALENDAR-2015-NEW-Dressed-to-Kill-D2K-Tour-Closer-to-the-Truth-Magazine-/251663378456?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item3a984e6818

Links

My friend Julie sent me this link, a vacation rental in Palm Springs billing itself as Sonny & Cher's love nest. Does anyone recognize this house?

The Cher Look Book – a 101 picture slide show of Cher in New York Magazine.

A short little interview in the Times Union.

Cher doesn't just like running with a younger crowd — she likes outrunning them: a long interview in The Wisconsin Gazette

Video

Cher's Caesar's Palace monologue.

Factoids

Cher scholar Jefrey noted that in the March 23rd 2012 issue of Entertainment Weekly, (I know! I can't believe that was sitting in my email still), Drew Barrymore co-hosted Turner Classic Movies with Robert Osborne for a special called "The Essentials." They played classics movies like Gilda and Diabolique. Barrymore was asked who her favorite screen sirens of all time were.

She chose Julie Christie, Faye Dunaway, Jane Fonda, Annette Bening and Cher. Wow. Awesome company there. Barrymore said about Cher, "She's strong and comedic and
incredibly brave, but shows vulnerability. I think she's the epitome of rock & roll." (Can Barrymore talk some sense into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame?) She cited Silkwood, Moonstruck, Mask, and The Witches of Eastwick as some of her favorite Cher performances.

My friend Christopher also notified me that in December of last year Jennifer Lawrence became the highest-charting Oscar-winning actress on the Hot 100 since Cher took "Believe" to #1 in 1999. Lawrence hit at #12 with a song from the latest Hunger Games movie, "The Hanging Tree."

Cher Bits Catchup

December 29, 2014 / Cher Scholar / 1 Comment

Cher History

A pretty funny recent article about how Richard Pryor once freaked out on the set of the Flip Wilson Show and fisticuffs ensued and Cher allegedly went and locked herself in her dressing room. It's an excerpt of a new biography about him. It's interesting that Bill Cosby and Richard Pryor both have new biographies out and how they were pitted against each other in the 1980s: clean comedy versus dirty comedy. And how history changes everything. As Camile O'Sullivan sings: "time's the revelator."

Cher Tweet Explosions

Cher takes the Robber Barons to task. My grandfather would love that Cher is invoking the Robber Barsons. Too bad she hadn’t done this by 1978 when I was eight and he asked me soberly over the kitchen table what her politics were:

http://twitchy.com/2014/12/12/cher-citibank-robber-barons-need-to-be-chopped-up-and-women-can-do-it/

http://www.businessinsider.com/cher-comes-out-against-the-swaps-pushout-rule-2014-12

In December Cher also tried to raise awareness for abused Pigs:

http://chernews.blogspot.com/2014/12/cher-left-shaking-with-horror-over.html

http://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/money/agriculture/2014/12/02/cher-tweet-iowa-farmers-pigs/19810913/

A few weeks ago I linked to a Sonny & Cher video taken in a record store and Cher scholar Robrt recognized the album cover in the video. I also remembered Cher plays this video in her latest show.

Robrt believes this is their second album released in Italy with the Italian-language singles added.

Hall of Fame

I think from time to time about the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’s ridiculous prejudice in denying Cher an induction. I figure she deserves to be in for at least these things:

1. Her style influence in the 1960s and 70s

2. The collected impact of these songs alone:

“Bang Bang” – figuring the amount of covers this song has had.
“I Got You Babe” – and the phenomenal fad of this song.
“The Beat Goes On” – and how a pop song title has insinuated itself so fully in our cultural conversations. I hear this phrase over and over again on TV and in publications; and how impossibly uncoverable the song remains to this day.

We've all seen the most well-known picture of Cher and Angelica Houtson:

But there’s also a Cher picture in Angelica's new book, Watch Me.

Cher Duets

December 3, 2014 / Cher Scholar / 1 Comment

Listening to Barbara Mandrell the other day, I came across one of her hits "Woman to Woman." Suddenly an idea for a Cher duet album came to me.

I remember being slightly perturbed by the story that Cher considered doing a duet on the Tony Bennett album but it didn't work out.

Isn't Cher too big to be on some man's cast of duets? Pah-leeese!

No, Cher shouldn’t be appearing on no stinkin' duet albums of some old men. She should be front-and-center on any duets album. She should be the main duet-ee. She's the legend, for Chrissake! Why are men mostly doing these things anyway?

Cher is particularly suited for doing a duets album because she has a history of dueting with an assortment of people on her TV shows and albums and, least we forget, she was part of arguably the most famous boy/girl duo. No one deserves a duet album more than Cher.

And this fantasy duet album should have an age spread. I know she's been cavorting around with a lot with young starlets: Christina Aguilera (oddly, no duet was made there…in the package of a musical no less), Lady Gaga, Pink, etc. This is all well and good. It's very generous and friendly and it keeps her in the realm of coolville. But does she really need youth-dust to stay cool? No. Besides, respect should be give to her favorite colleagues as well as her living idols: a celebration of mothers, sisters and daughters.

Or she could do songs with all men. Or she could do all-female duets of songs made for men. I recently saw a gay punk band in Madrid do a show of awesomely fierce songs they were told women couldn’t cover like Aerosmith's "Dream On."

Please just no duets with Muppets or any dead people besides Sonny. Read Talking Head front-man David Byrne's essay on Barry Manilow's latest album of duets with the dead.

Cher Postpones More Concerts, Memoir Notes, Q&A

November 16, 2014 / Cher Scholar / 0 Comments

Concert Delays

I almost made a renegade trip to Lubbock, Texas, last weekend to see Cher's concert there. But then I found out it has been cancelled anyway, along with a slew of other November dates due to Cher's recent viral illness.

This has been the most dates postponed on a Cher concert tour that I can think of, a fact that is alarming some fans. Then Daily Mail broke a story about Cher having to wear a heart-monitor and it all sounds pretty scary so I asked Mr. Cher Scholar (who rates claims for Veterans Affairs and has a head full of medical knowledge) to tell me how alarmed we all should be and he said there's a danger of virus infections spreading to the heart. Cher-camp says it's all a normal part of recovery.

I first read about the postponed tour from an Allentown paper that called her tour "ill-fated." Besides the delay to the second leg, what the hell is so ill-fated about it?

Memoirs

But it all gets you thinking about mortality. So does the fact that Angelica Houston's two-volumes of memoirs are now out. Yes, Angelica Houston has unveiled her saga already.

I came across two blurbs about celebrity biographies that seem pertinent to Cher's possible look-back at her life. Young actress Lena Dunham of the HBO show Girls has a memoir already called Not That Kind of Girl. Referencing it in The Atlantic, James Parker says:

"So there's the id, the ego, the superego, and then there's the part of the psyche that writes the memoir. The latter function, in most humans, is inadequately developed until late middle age, which is why memoirs by young people are usually terrible. It's a syndrome, rather embarrassing: premature autobiography."

In an Entertainment Weekly interview, Angelica Huston also weighs in on memoir. Keith Staskiewicz says,

Many celebrity memoris are like bags of potato chips–mostly air and a little bit of salty stuff–but Huston wanted to avoid the anodyne politesse or, worse, self-delusion that can make for boring reading. "It doesn't necessarily have to be a confessional, but it does require a certain amount of looking inward," she says. "If you're gonna write a memoir, you have to talk about yourself. You have to talk about your feelings and you have to talk about who you are. Otherwise don't do it; it's a waste of paper. The trees could have lived."

NPR on Believe

On the bright side, last week I did find something I've been looking for for years. When the song "Believe" started to hit in the United States, I was living and working in Yonkers, New York. I'd hear the song on the radio when I drove home. It was both exciting and unusual to hear Cher's song with the other hits of the day, like Madonna's "Ray of Light," Whitney Houton's "It's Not Right, But It's Okay;" at least those hits were by somewhat older women, too. But then you had Monica, Britney Spears, and TLC. (See a review of 1999 number one hits). One day I was driving home and NPR was talking about the Cher/Believe phenomenon! Like in that breathy-really-serious-NPR way. I missed half of the conversation and for years I've been waiting for it to show up online in NPR archives. Here it is. It's worth a listen.

Halloween Q & A

Cher did a fan Q&A on Facebook on Halloween. There were almost 5,000 comments made and so many pages of questions I couldn't read them all. Cher answered maybe the first 30 of them. Highlights include the following:

Mary Pat Blockel O'Donnell: Hi beautiful Cher:-) Happy Halloween! Love u tons&what is your favorite memory of Chaz&Elijah as babies/and or little children at Halloween?or even teenagers? ‪

Cher: My favorite – I have a couple of favorites. My first was Chaz's first Halloween and I sewed a cat suit, a little kitten suit and painted whiskers and it was so hard making the tail. And the other was when we all went out and Elijah wasn't old enough to walk and we had him in a devil costume and Chaz was the Fonz and we walked around the neighborhood. It was really fun. Halloween is for kids and it's fun when you have kids.

Kaylee Rudnik: Do you think there is any place that you can go without being recognized anymore???

Cher: Hell, and I'm not so sure about that. I'm pretty positive I will be recognized.

John Nicholas Ward: What is the secret behind ur eternal youth??

Cher: Makeup and childishness

Amanda Darby: If you could change one thing forever what would you choose and why? ‪

Cher: I would change how people get along. I would make people get along.

Dean Menc: What is the best thing about being Cher?

Cher: I don't know. You don't have to wait in line.

Goran Srdija: Why u love Gaga and what's ur favourite Gaga's song? Xoxo

Cher:I appreciate her whimsy. And re-creativity.

Doug Wemple: Didn't David Bowie crash one of your house parties? Did hilarity ensue?

Cher: I don't think so. Andy Warhol did, crashed Chaz's birthday party with Keith Haring and hilarity ensued. I loved him, he was so much fun.

Leonardo Esteban Lizama Órdenes: Did you ever met Frank Sinatra? And if so, What was your fist impression?

Cher: I did meet him. I actually saw him on stage. I was following him into Caesars. I thought "HMM, he's old but he can really sing. It's amazing." He was cool.

Mike Scott Uetrecht: How has Rolling Stone never put you on their cover? Not even a review for CTTT. Disrespectful.

Cher: Well, you know, obviously I'm not their cup of tea. Never thought I was cool enough, certainly missed the boat on that.

Christopher Fox Tyler: Whats the fastest way for a man to win your heart/affection? ‪

Cher: Oh – I guess being funny and cute doesn't hurt

Sara Oldani: Hi Cher have you ever thought of doing a concert in Italy? What's your favourite song inyour discography (either original or cover, whatever ) LOVE from Italy!!!!!!

Cher: I guess Song for the Lonely, if I had to be buried with something that would be it

Chad Eric: Happy Halloween Cher! What was your favorite memory of Halloween as a child & adult? ‪

Cher: My favorite memory when I was a kid was when I was 9 and it was the first time I wore makeup. I was totally decked. My mom dressed me in this peasant skirt and she tied the belt so it didn't fall off, and she put on lipstick and curled my hair. That was the BEGINNING of the BEGINNING. I didn't want it to be over, I wanted to go to school the next day in my Halloween costume.

Bob Radmore: What is it like to be famous?

Cher: It's hard for me to say it. I've been famous since I was 18, so I don't know what it's like not to be.

Brooke Bryant: What is your biggest pet peeve?

Cher: iPhones

Nick LeBlanc: Hi Cher, what is your favorite city/place that you've been at in the world whether on tour or vacation?

Cher: Bora Bora

Guillermo Issac Trevino: Do you have a favorite Stevie Nicks song?

Cher: Landslide

Mark Carder: Hey @Cher What is your favorite HORROR FILM

Cher: I'm such a gigantic chicken. I was watching Hell House last night and I was afraid to look at it. I don't do well with horror films they make me terrified. One of my closest friends made a blockbuster movie and it was the Exorcist.

(It was mildly exciting to think Mr. Cher Scholar and I were watching The Legend of Hell House on TCM at the same time Cher was. I even decided to use some of the character names for a novel I'm working on. Mr. Cher Scholar and I also watched The Excorcist again — Cher is referencing director William Friedkin there who, as we know, also directed Good Times – and Mr. Cher Scholar and I decided we were kind of burned out on the gory parts — although the special effects still hold up — but we really got into the quieter, character development of the movie this year. In fact, I don't think the movie would be quite as frightening without the quiet, ominous soundtrack.)

Annette Eland: Do you meditate?

Cher: Yes

Raymond Donahue: Is it true that you & Sonny were neighbors with Farrah Fawcett ?

Cher: I don't think so

Michele McLey: A couple of question's first what to you like to do when your not touring? And will you do a tour DVD? Oh and please say you are doing another movie, soon!

Cher: Be grubby and go to the movies. Swimming and hang out with my friends. Just nothing, the same thing everyone else likes to do. It's hard to be grubby nowadays though, it's hard to be yourself.

Jennifer Fontana: Hi Cher! What is your favorite moment from your legendary career? ‪

Cher: Ppppssshhhh. I guess winning the Oscar was pretty hard to beat.

Jason Andrew: Dear Cher, Once you are canonized as a saint, what will you be the patron of? ‪

Cher: Lost causes

Sam Durbin: If you could be any item in a walmart, what would you be and why?

Cher: I would be in Target

Sam Durbin: What CD is in your car right now?

Cher: MY CD. Because I'm singing tracks to the show, I rehearse. The CD that is in my car is boring.

Christopher Eklund: What is your favorite memory of filming Burlesque?

Cher: HMm. The song, Welcome to Burlesque. I was kind of nervous. No, it's not really my favorite. One scene I had with Stanley, and the makeup scene with Christina. I don't have any favorite ones. Maybe You Haven't Seen the Last of Me.

Lorenzo Morrison: Hi Cher. No Lady Gaga. No Madonna. I would like to know what do you you think about Annie Lennox! Is there a song by her you particularly appreciate? ‪

Cher: She's a genius. Everyday we play "Take me to the River" and do our ab exercises to it.

Amanda Jean Bedwell: Is there anything you haven't done yet but you would love to do next

Cher: A million things I want to do. So many things. I can't believe I got this OLD and there are still so many things I want to do.

Dawn Decker: Will you ever do a meet n greet? The only thing on my bucket list is to meet you!!!

Cher: Oh gosh. Elvis, James Dean. There weren't many women icons when I was young with my mom watching old movies – there was Katherine Hepburn. But I identified more with Elvis and James Dean and I identified more with that. The women were more cute and I couldn't identify with them at all

Caricatures

Finally, when we were talking about caricatures a few weeks ago, I forgot about a very famous Cher caricature done by Al Hirschfeld in 1974!

Okay, I think the height thing is a little exaggerated there.

Radio Interview, New Mix, Clips

November 3, 2014 / Cher Scholar / 2 Comments

Old Video

Cher scholar Tyler sent me this clip, the Hell & Keller Pride remix of "The Beat Goes On." Thank God somebody out there is remixing something besides "Believe." I liked the video editing job, too.

I also found the original promo video sampled in the above remix, Sonny & Cher at a record store performing "The Beat Goes On." The clip opens on the record bin at left.

What record is this? Something about "Vol. 2." Is this a compilation album I've never seen before? Does anyone out there have this record?

This is now a good time to say I've always hated that boring ATCO logo.

Comrades in Retirement

In Entertainment Weekly for October 31 there's an article called "Retired? Not So Fast" Listed are people who made big claims about retirement but came back. The list includes Garth Brooks, Ozzy Osbourne, Jay-Z and Barbara Streisand.

In the same issue, Nancy Sinatra’s version of "Bang Bang" is also listed as part of a killer playlist for Halloween.

Costumes Through the Years

As I lamented earlier, I missed the People Magazine detailing all of Cher's concert outfits. I broke down and found a copy from eBay. What's ironic about the article is Bob Mackie does brief commentary on the evolution of some of his common designs. Problem is, he didn't design the new outfits in review. The D2K Egyptian opening-fit is compared to the one Mackie designed in Cher and Other Fantasies (1979). The full-fringe disco outfit from the Farewell show (red version) and the Cher at Caesars Believe-fit are compared. This comparison is very odd. First of all, this outfit and song are not even in D2K (yet) and they could have used either the Cher at Caesars fringe-fit (blue) or the older, original version back from the Take Me Home tour in 1979 (silver).

The current gypsy outfit is compared to the Farewell Indian sari instead of maybe to the original one from The Sonny & Cher Comedy Hour. The newer hole-fit (Mackie calls it "The Swiss Cheese") could also have been compared to her 1979 Take Me Home concert tour version instead of her 1980s video version. The Half Breed photo uses the version Sonny & Cher toured with instead of the iconic TV show version from 1973. Kind of wonky choices here.

Obsessing about these things…it’s what Cher scholars do.

Radio Interview

Cher News linked to a new radio interview for Cher. In the interview Cher says she loves the movie The Incredible Mr. Limpet. I would love this movie, too, because I love Don Knotts except for the fact that I have a very bad association with it due to Mr. Cher Scholar and a disastrous birthday night with him that included this movie back in 2006.

Anyway, Cher laughs a lot in the interview and talks about the Broadway play based on her life.

(Possible) VCR Alert: Cher on Jimmy Kimmel Live Oct 30

October 27, 2014 / Cher Scholar / 7 Comments

Some Cher sites, like Cher World and cher.yuku are saying that Cher will be on Jimmy Kimmel Live this Thursday night (October 30). They're also saying that she'll close down Hollywood Boulevard for a special outdoor concert.

This is the day before the big Halloween closures on October 31 around Santa Monica Boulevard in West Hollywood. And the thing is, she's not appearing on Jimmy Kimmels guest list for this week. We’ll set the DVR and see what happens.

It's amusing that I still say "VCR alert" even though VCRs are so ancient that young kids don’t even know what the term means. I have heard myself saying such idiotic things as "It's like a cassette player for TV."

Back when I was a teen and MTV was in full-power mode, my VCR was God. I used to turn on the MTV channel every morning while I was curling my hair, putting on makeup and assembling my Molly Ringwald/Stevie Nicks-inspired outfits.

The first VCR I had, (and I only ever had two), was billed as being so modern, it didn’t have a cord attaching its remote control to its main machine. It was cordless, people! That was innovation when I was a teen.

But I didn’t trust my cordless remote. It sometimes misfired. The batteries died.

Whenever a John Waite or, later, Cher video came on (John Waite’s rare videos like "Tears" always came on in the morning), I would literally listen for the first few chords of a song and then literally dive across the room for the record button on the VCR, which would make this long, painful tinny inhale sound, as if a little tiny crane were moving the record heads from a whole other part of the machine to the tape. I’d always miss a few seconds of each video before the thing actually started recording. I cursed this technological limitation to my fan indulgences. The fact that most videos are now on youtube, all those early missing seconds especially, kinds of kills me a little inside. It’s what represents my own particular tragedy of misspent youth. On many levels.

That Cher would one day make an appearance on MTV (and not be relegated to VH1 like my man Barry Manilow) was not something I ever thought conceivable. As much as I don’t enjoy the Geffen era as much as the previous and following eras, Cher on MTV was a real turning point in Cher fan existence. You could go out into the teen world with a bit more cultural power. Cher was rockin it…on M…T…V. Everyone could suck it.

And while I was waiting for all versions of John Waite’s "Change" video to come on in the mornings (1, 2), I was now also getting alternate versions of "We All Sleep Alone" (1, 2). I couldn’t wait to get back home and play them over and over and analyze the differences.

Setting a VCR ahead of time took skill and thought. Say if you had a social life and felt risky enough to record an appearance while you were out with your friends. I missed a whole Barry Manilow special this way once. I also missed Cher on Phil Donahue and wasn't able to see if for over a decade. You could screw up while setting the time. The tape could get chewed up. Life was so precarious then. Sure, satellites fail now. But the show will turn up someday, somewhere online or on a bootleg.

It’s not quite living on the edge anymore.

In other news, USA Today marks Cher's show one of the five live shows to see this year, a list that includes Stevie Wonder and Bob Dylan. Not too shabby.

Not Busier Than Cher, But…

October 19, 2014 / Cher Scholar / 0 Comments

…I'm out of my mind busy. I had to put that comma in my blog title because without it, the title read like Cher's ass was busier than me. Probably true but still a distracting message.

Over the last few weeks, my brother and sister-in-law came to town and we tried to show them the great state of New Mexico in a week. I've got another guest coming next weekend. And if you know me, you know I only clean the house when people are coming over. So this summer, I've been cleaning a lot! Yesterday, I spent the day covering the front of our house with Halloween decorations. I've also been trying to keep up with the latest in haunted houses in my city. I've been very distracted from the Cher Universe working on my projects, including final drafts of my Goodnight-Loving Trail poems, and notes for a new novel. I've also been preparing an essay to make into an eBook. It's called "Writing in the Age of Narcissism." On top of that, I've recently been drafted by my Dad's side of the family, the Burquenos (which is local for "people from Albuquerque"), to help organize a family reunion next year to celebrate my Aunts 90th birthday. In all this, blogging gets short shrift.

Oh, and we've been busy watching Quick Draw Season 2 which had a lot more stunts, was a lot funnier and had some surprise guests. But the most recent surprise has been the great fan art people have been sending in to the facebook fan page of John Lehr, including this hilarious send up of western statue-art collecting commercial sent in by a fan. The piece is called Vernon Shank Statue Commercial. It's very funny even if you haven't been watching the show.

The strong women characters on the show have been awesome this year, including the hilarious, lusty, toothless Wanda pictured above.

But there's LOTS of Cher stuff to get to:

First, I came accross this image right in the October 10th issue of Entertainment Weekly depicting an Edith Head outfit for Ginger Rogers. You can clearly see a direct line from Edith Head to Ray Aghayan to Bob Mackie and Cher.

Secondly, breaking news!! Cher gets some respect in Entertainment Weekly. More than seeing Cher's new Bob Mackie costumes in the second leg of her current tour, THIS is what required that I get some oxygen stat! My October 24th copy came Friday night and I'm perusing through the issue (which you can do in like 15 minutes), and I see a short news item on the nominees for this year's Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees. No, Cher didn't make it. Not expecting that.

The first section describes this year's biggest surprises. I scanned that part and thought, "wouldn't it be an alternate universe if this article called the HOFers out for snubbing Cher?"

AND THEY DO!!! I couldn't believe it. Entertainment Weekly has not been 100% Cher-loving over many years of record reviews. But, clear as day, the middle section is called "BIGGEST SNUBS" and Cher's hole-fit picture is representin' with this paragraph underneath:

"For the second year of eligibility in a row, De La Soul's game-change style was over-looked. The Hall also missed an opportunity to acknowledge Cher–whose impact and longevity far exceed those of many of the men enshrined in Cleveland [my flabbergasted italics]–on the 50th anniversary of her first album. And if Joan Jett, nominated again this year, doesn't make the final cut this time, voters have black hearts indeed."

I ran into the living room and gave a lecture on Cher Snubs throughout the history of time to Poor Beleaguered Mr. Cher Scholar. I want to rip that page out and send it to my brother in Cleveland and ask that he and his wife organize a protest in front of the museum pronto, something he would never in a zillion years do.

Speaking of zillion, Cher is pissed at Zillow. See stories on GeekWire; Twitchy tracking Cher's tweet discussions; and an article on Bloomberg about Chinese buyers getting access to Zillow's U.S. properties.

"Chinese buyers spent more than $11 billion on U.S. real estate last year, with an average $425,000 purchase, Zillow said."

Zillow is saying this is only good for U.S. sellers. I'm not sure. but Cher is probably saying this is bad for U.S. buyers.

This is the satellite picture of the Owlwood house on Zillow.

Zillow has labeled this page: "Sonny Bono and Cher's Former Home – Zillow"

Here are the stories I missed in October:

According to Cher News a new version of the Norman Seeff photograph was for sale for a while (but it's sold-out now): http://cher.shop.bravadousa.com/page/SignedLithograph. What's interesting is how the store calls the photo "THE iconic 70s image of Cher."

So Cher's been sick lately as we all know. I hope it wasn't the ice bucket challenge that gave Cher the ice bucket illness. And although one of the U.S. tabloid rags had a picture of Cher on the cover last week insisting she was, in fact, dying (not the first or last time we'll see that melodramatic headline while waiting to purchase our Scooby Snacks), Cher says herself that she's on mend. Cher News tracks her tweets: she was actually in the hospital for a week; doctors say she's built to last; she's been to the gym recently; and she was humbled by the whole experience. I just hope she got some good classic movie watching in while being laid up.

http://chernews.blogspot.com/2014/10/ill-cher-im-getting-better.html

http://chernews.blogspot.com/2014/10/photos-recovering-fitness-icon-cher-at.html
(Pics of Cher at the gym taken by Paulette, see top photo)

New dates were announced for D2K, partly makeup dates for the shows cancelled: http://tour.cher.com/

Cher News reported that Cher's concert-fits were profiled in the Fall 2014 issue of People Magazine. Is People Magazine now a quarterly? Bummed I missed that.

I finally listened to the Lady Gaga version of "Bang Bang" and I do like that it's not simply a re-working of the Nancy Sinatra version, which all the latest re-makings have been. Granted, the Sinatra version is pretty great and I never do get tired of hearing more incarnations of it, I also appreciate something different now and then. Gaga's version seemed more sincere and less ironic. Which is refreshing. I still don't like that red jumpsuit or the somewhat unnatural demeanor of her performance but what can you do?

By the way, this is one of my least favorite Cher single covers. Yes, chainmail tops were cool, but the acid-washed jean-jacket and jeans, the teenybopper hair flip and the wide-eyed expression all smell too much like 80s-teen-spirit, and worse–popular-girl 80s-teen-spirit. And what's with the unbuttoned button-fly jeans? Did Cher eat too many doughnuts before the shoot? Or is the boob-view, jeans-undone look a come-hither call to Anthony Michael Hall?