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Cher-Its and Bits

June 28, 2007 / / 0 Comments

Ford Toodle-loo

My Cher Friends, you will be getting four posts this week. This is because I’m leaving Saturday for nine days of vacation bliss in Amish country, Pennsylvania. The bf and I are visiting my family there for small-towney 4th of July celebrations in Lititz, which is near Blue Ball and Intercourse. You’ve all heard the joke; now I’m living the dream. Actually, Amish country is very interesting, not just for the Amish, but for the other old, alternative religious orders that flourished there in Pennsylvania during the early American centuries. Read previous Ape Culture reviews about Amish country.

Cher Site of the Month

I have been remiss in doing my Cher site reviews for months. But someone on Chergroups found this one recently. It has a Myspace feel but a great catalog of pictures:
http://www.bebo.com/Profile.jsp?MID=367137231&MemberId=3668384741

Anniversary of an Ending

Tyler from Chergroups reminded us all that June 26, 32 years ago, was a sad day in Cher history: it was the day in 1975 that Sonny and Cher’s divorce was finalized in a courtroom in Santa Monica, California.  Happy day for Cher who was preparing to marry Gregg Allman…but what about us???

Songs Cher Should Cover

If Cher were my bf, she’d say "Don’t should on me!"

However, I’d really love to hear Cher go spiritual. Her songs of late, like "Human" and others from her last three Warner Bros albums, indicate Cher’s picking of more introspective material. She’d do a groovy gospel  (1971s "Somebody" is a testament to that). She could even give it a California twist. Two songs would easily accommodate: Allen Toussaint’s’s recent gem “We Are One” and a song from the last Norah Jones album, “Humble Me.” Not quite the wailers you’d hear in church, but contemplative little pieces about brotherhood and humility. She could still sing them in a unitard with sequins. God can get jiggy with it.
   

Patty Darcy Jones Has Died

June 22, 2007 / / 3 Comments

Thanks to Kevin for posting news on the Cher Yahoo group that long-time Cher tour and album back-up singer Patty D’Arcy (married name Jones) has died. You can read the story in the New Jersey Herald.

Cher toured so long with Believe and her Farewell tour, that fans became very attached to her bandmates, as much as they would have to television co-stars on her variety shows.

I have two strong memories of Patty, although she was practically ubiquitous in modern Cher concerts:

1. Whisking past us late one after-concert night. My friend and I were loitering on an MGM casino bench, exhausted from trying to make our way through the labyrinth of that casino to its gargantuan garage when she walked by in street clothes. She looked professional and busy, as if she was just a working gal, clocking out and going home.

2. Singing "Shoop Shoop" with Cher on stage. And as you know "Shoop Shoop" is not one of my favorite Cher bits and it just goes to show what a trooper Patty must have been.

It’s also very interesting to me that, according the the NJ Herald, Bette Midler hired Patty as well. It seems Bette and Cher still have a lot in common; they share the same back-up singer and possibly might soon share the same Vegas stage at Caesars (although I’m not packing my suitcase yet; we’ve been here before my fellow fans. Mame anyone?). I wonder if these two kids have made up…or if the infamous "Cher called Bette a nasty word" spat was just a fake feud. Wouldn’t that be funny?

Anyway, enough of that crap. Patty’s passing is really sad news. Our hearts and thoughts are with her friends, family and co-band-mates.

Thank you Patty for shoopin’ us out with your flourishes and harmonies.

    

We’ll Always Have “Hey Joe”

June 14, 2007 / / 1 Comment

Chastity What’s taken over Cher mentions on the blogosphere is the latest news from the courts on blasphemous, indecent, potty-mouthed words spoken on prime-time television.

As you might guess from my adjectives above (slight but prejudicial), I support the ruling; and yet I cringe to read over and over that Cher has again become the poster child of bad taste. Not that there’s anything wrong with swearing (I freakin’ say more than freakin’ off-blog) and not that there’s anything wrong with bad taste (it’s a hellavalot more interesting sometimes than good taste and it is surely the yin that feeds that yang of better taste); but it’s just that one image of bad taste (potty-mouthing) plus another image of bad taste (plastic surgery) plus another image of bad taste (dating younger dudes) or whatever freakin thing it is that family values hates (all arguably okay in my book…we could spend time defending them or claiming they go without defending or who really cares)…but in any case, those images reflect on the image of the product and feed the fire of those who say Cher music, movies, etc., are also examples of bad taste. And that makes me crazy.

Here’s a headline from The Boston Globe: "Swearing Cher 1, FCC 0"

I swear because I’m trying to counteract the way I look, which is like Mary Richards. It doesn’t work but I’ve never been fined for doing it.

Here is a link to one super-clueless blog speaking against the court decision. They whine: "if you can still call Cher and Nicole Richie celebrities?"

What the f^*k?

Elsewhere this week, Cher scholar gypsy90028 sent me an email about an chapter of The First Time, Cher’s auto-bio of sorts. Gypsy90028 very adeptly puts it as "written, well sort of, by Cher." He refers us to page 134: "My First Fall From Grace" and asks this question:

What if Cher had not listened to Sonny and went with the Drug Culture not just personally, but professionally???? What would the outcome have been? For her? For him? For the Pop World at large and all us "dyed-in-the-wool" fans? And I wont even get into the Gay Thing concerning Drugs, Partying, Freelove, and Miss Cher. Or should we? Please pontificate if you will.

Gypsy90028 also said:

Its TOOOO HOT in Oklahoma. May I move to CA and live with you and be your Guy Friday/Man Godfrey???(I’m a Gemini,OK???) I promise to cook, clean, fetch and tote fer ya! All I need is a small cot on a backporch, as I will be spending all my free time "smoking, coking, toking and shopping" on the BEACH.

This is very tempting for Cher Scholar because I am swamped this month with deadlines and demands and minor annoying illnesses, not to mention my impending mental-breakdown after which I will probably need fetching and toting. I even have three tote bags for this very chore.

But alas, I already live with a Gemini. Geminis never finish anything. In fact, the bf and I just made a bet that he can’t learn how to sew a pair of frontier pants by September 10 as he is now inspired to do based on our weekend in Prescott Arizona visiting frontier museums and saloons. One of my brothers was a Gemini too and I was able to observe him not finishing things he was once inspired to to. My other brother was a problem-solving Aires and finished everything. His room was full of finished airplanes hanging from the ceiling. The Gemini’s room was full of half-finished projects like make your own moccasins of which there was only ever one sitting lonely in the corner.

But what if Cher and Sonny had gone psychedelic (personally and musically)? This is a very interesting question and I enjoy pondering it. I don’t have my copy of The First Time handy so I’ll have to wing it.

My ponderings have two aspects: could Cher have done it and could Sonny have done it.

Admittedly Sonny’s heart wasn’t in it. I don’t think he could have written drug-culture material for Cher. Inner Views didn’t work out so well as it is. He could have tried to produce her material but without any great sympathy for it, I don’t see success there.

Could Cher have gone on alone without Sonny? What if S&C had ended right there. This would have helped Cher only in the sense that the backlash from Sonny’s drug film and the failure of the movie Chastity might not have happened. The TV show buffoonery and quiet backlash towards Cher as a actress might not have happened. From a rock credibility standpoint, this might have been the best time to split off, the best pre-baffooned image of Sonny to leave. But what a disaster for me! I would never have discovered the beloved TV show as a toddler.

I believe Cher could have pulled off a career in any musical idiom. Yet she’s never seemed very interested in taking in detail about her musical choices. So some people might have thought that direction to be an inauthentic or orchestrated one for her. But there are many famous legends in psychedelic, blues and current legends in rock music that come across as insincere or inauthentic when interviewed about their music. Cher seemed inauthentic often in rock music precisely because they missed the boat on that late 60s musical trend and never quite recovered in the eyes of the rock establishment. Had that not happened, she might have pulled off a groovy late-60s music career. And professionally she might have more credibility today.

A personal involvement with the drug culture might have resulted in more creditability as well, sad to say. My feeling is a drug history always buys you kudos in pop music. There’s that ridiculous idea that succumbing to any kind of decency or weakness means you’re "strong enough to survive" it. Self-reliance is significantly harder to do and yet somehow less respected.

A continued solo career might not have necessitated a TV Show come-back; and that you could argue catapulted them into a much larger fame-o-sphere.

People often ask me how I think Cher would have done on American Idol, as if to say truly original singers never do so well there. But every night of the 70s on a Cher related show WAS American Idol. Everyone tuned in to see what Cher would she sing and wear next and that’s exactly what we say on American Idol. The show is even complete with Simon/Ryan banter and car commercial sketches; it’s a modern variety hour.

Do I wish instead that we had more Jimi Hendrix covers and a cocaine habit? Not really. I’m perfectly happy with the way things are and came to be. Let’s take stock of what we do have: the Jackson Highway album by the producers of Dusty in Springfield where Cher did the last few of her 10 Bob Dylan covers (can you name them all?) after he went electric himself, Dr. John’s "Walk on Guilded Splinters," which is sorta groovy; and we even have Hendrix’s own "Hey Joe" recorded a few years earlier. And it didn’t take a shot up the arm to record that.

    

   

Cher Dolls Speak to Fan in Dreams

June 7, 2007 / / 1 Comment

Cher_doll_outfit_foxy_lady First I want to comment about news last week regarding Cher’s redecoration of her house from Goth to a Buddha style, complete with Buddhist tchotchkes and whatnot. On an unrelated project, I’ve studying Zen Buddhism. I scratch my head over this new décor because it’s not very Buddhist to have a house full of Buddhist crap. It would be more Buddhist to design a room with no crap, sit in it and meditate on having less crap.

But who am I to scratch my head? I’m far from there yet, to speak for myself. For instance, I am asking for used Cher dolls for my birthday. Lots of them for an unrelated Christmas art project.

And even my dreams are materialistic. This week I dreamt I was walking through a Target store walking in an aisle by an outside wall (isn’t it weird how you know these odd details in your dreams). I came across a shelf stocked with new Cher dolls and related stuff, all in similar pink packaging from the 70s. There was even a new makeup head; and the doll itself sold outside of a box, strangely, just on a stand (with growing hair potential I could see), and a plethora of hair extensions. I especially remember a purple extension you could slap on the doll’s head. I threw one of everything into my shopping basket with great disregard for what it would cost. My dream shopping basket was full.

I’ve had similar dreams since childhood: I’d be in a store and find Cher stuff (usually rare albums with rare songs or out-takes) and I’d feel a little skip-to-my-loo in my heart. But then the dream would abruptly turn into a nightmare where a) I’d have no money and must make Sophie’s-choices between all the new-found treasures or b) I’d misplace the treasures and spend the rest of the dream trying to find them again in a frustrated panic. I should probably tell this all to my therapist.

The aforementioned dream turned into part b. I saw a little girl with a Cher 45 record – newly released to coincide with the doll line. She told me where she found it but there were none left!

What a nightmare, huh?

Truth is with all the drama going on with poetry, my job, my summer trips and my friends, I had completely forgotten about the dolls to be released this month. It’s as if my subconscious was poking me with a stick in my dreams, telling me not to forget to buy Cher dolls! My freakin’ subconscious is so much more obsessed than me!

    

Karaoke Cher, I Got You Babe DVD and LP Covers

May 31, 2007 / / 6 Comments

Karaoke1_2 I was Cher Scholar at no charge for two of my friends this week. A high school friend of mine who now works in Las Vegas as a singer and dancer was looking for a karaoke CD with "The Way of Love" on it. I’ve only ever been to karaoke as some sort of birthday obligation. So I wasn’t well steeped in Cher karaoke CDs although I knew there must be a plethora out there. This gave me a good opportunity to peruse the amazon.com market.

You Sing The Hits Of Cher

This has nine tracks: 2 from the dance era, 4 from the Geffen era, and 2 from 70s narrative period. There’s also "Shoop Shoop" which always sounded like a lame karaoke song to me anyway.

Hit Songs of Cher [ENHANCED]

Ooh…enhanced. This one has 10 tracks: "Believe" (twice…one vocal and one karaoke version although I don’t know the difference), 4 from the Geffen era, and 4 from the 70s narrative era.

Cher’s Greatest Hits Vol. 1

This one has 16 Tracks: 3 dance era, 8 Geffen era (including "Shoop Shoop"), 3 70s narrative tracks, and the recent "Bewitched Bothered and Bewildered" (although to me that’s quintessentially a Barbra Streisand song) and "Bang Bang" (which is either the 60s or Geffen era version).

Chartbuster Karaoke: Cher [ENHANCED]

What does enhanced mean for pete’s sake? This one has 12 tracks: 6 dance era (including "Runaway" and "Believe" twice…listed as mix, guide tracks or performance track…I’m so confused!) and 6 Geffen era tracks.

Hits Songs of Cher (Audio CD)

This one has no song list. Buy at your own peril.

Chartbuster Karaoke: Cher

This one has 15 tracks: 5 dance era tracks (including "Song for the Lonely" and "Different Kind of Love Song"), 5 Geffen tracks, 3 70s narrative era, and 2 60s era.

This one spelled Gypsies as Gypsys. I hate that. I really do.

Sing Like Cher Karaoke2_2

This one has 10 tracks, all from the Geffen era.

Sing The Hits Of Cher and Donna Summer (Karaoke)

Odd combination…but okay. This one has four obscure tracks from the Believe album ("Dove L’Amore" being the only exception) and four obscure tracks from Donna’s album ("This Time I Know It’s For Real" the exception…it also has Summer’s version of the operatic "Time to Say Goodbye" except the words are "I Will Go With You.")

Pocket Songs Just Tracks Karaoke – HITS OF CHER

No list.

Radio Starz – Cher’s Karaoke Anthology

This one was sent to me by a Cher yahoo-groups member. It’s the only one with "The Way of Love" and seems the best value with 22 tracks as follows.

  1. Believe – Cher
  2. A Cowboy’s Work Is Never Done – Cher
  3. If I Could Turn Back Time – Cher
  4. We All Sleep Alone – Cher
  5. The Way Of Love – Cher
  6. After All -Cher
  7. Strong Enough – Cher
  8. You Better Sit Down Kids – Cher
  9. The Beat Goes On – Cher
  10. Dark Lady – Cher
  11. Baby Don’t Go – Cher
  12. Half Breed – Cher
  13. I Got You Babe – Cher
  14. Gypsies, Tramps & Thieves – Cher
  15. Bang Bang – Cher
  16. I Found Someone – Cher
  17. Just Like Jesse James – Cher
  18. The Shoop Shoop Song (It’s In His Kiss) – Cher
  19. All I Ever Need Is You – Cher
  20. Take Me Home – Cher
  21. Little Man – Cher
  22. All Or Nothing – Cher

This is also the only one with "Cowboys," "The Beat Goes On," "Baby Don’t Go," "I Got You Babe," "All I Ever Need Is You," "Take Me Home" and "Little Man." All but two have the four signature songs: "Believe," "Turn Back Time," "Half Breed" (all but three) and "Gypsies." I didn’t see any CDs dedicated to Sonny & Cher.

I did my primary serach on Amazon but you might Google around for the right CD at the best price.

Last week a friend and I went to see two movies from the 70s at one of Santa Monica’s art house theaters. We saw Diary of a Mad Housewife which was interesting but pointless as the Leonard Maltin book says. I say what a doormat! This was followed by The Last of Sheila, a wonderfully fun who-done-it with a great cast including Dyan Cannon, Raquel Welch, George Mason and written by Anthony Perkins and Steven Sondheim.

Both movies featured Richard Benjamin; it was like a Richard Benjamin festival. Benjamin was great in both of them but I still blame him for Mermaids. After the movie my friend gave me two Cher albums he found at used record stores.

One was Bittersweet White Light. I said I didn’t know what the title meant. We laughed about Cher’s cover photo where she’s piled with turquoise and fur as if to say "I’m rich!" On the back cover she looks way too thin and there’s another infernal essay by Sonny about how Cher makes one feel when she sings. I hate those essays. But I honestly love this album. I know some think it’s god-awful but I really don’t understand the particulars on why. These funky standards are way cool IMHO. More creative than her versions on TV.

The other LP was a Canadian Mono print of In Case You’re In Love. Another odd title. In case you’re in love what? Both my friend and boyfriend were flabbergasted over the outfits on the cover. I love the back photographs in Europe (they look so bored) but the middle photo makes me dizzy. I think they’re trying to hypnotize us.

This week I finally received my Sonny & Cher I Got You Babe DVD. This is a German production that looks like a fancy bootleg. I can’t figure out how this thing was ever made and approved. It’s very mysterious consisting mostly of some of their more mundane TV show live performances; these are not clips I would pick. Oddly the first one ("A Cowboy’s Work Is Never Done") has the album track over-playing the TV show footage. The rest are live for the most part.

The track listing was not on Amazon:

  1. A Cowboy’s Work Is Never Done – From their early 70s show.
  2. The Letter – From their early 70s show.
  3. All I Ever Need Is You – From their early 70s show.
  4. Bad Moon Rising  – From their early 70s show.
  5. Brother Love’s Traveling Salvation Show/Mr. Tambourine Man – From their early 70s show.
  6. Cry Like a Baby – From their early 70s show.
  7. I Dig Rock ‘n’ Roll Music (with Bobby Vinton, Frankie Valli, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Chuck Berry and I just realized Jerry Lee looks like that jazz pianist I used to date) – From their early 70s show.
  8. Bad Bad Leroy Brown (the very kewl cartoon) – From their early 70s show.
  9. Let Me Down Easy – From their early 70s show.
  10. Love Grows Where My Rosemary Grows – I hadn’t seen this one before and it has interesting camera shots from behind left stage (including an great audience shot) and a front tracking shot like they never did. Very disorienting because it’s so unusual. I wish they had done these kinds of shots more often.
  11. Out of Sight/Get Ready – Hadn’t seen this one.
  12. Sonny & Cher Stomp – Hadn’t seen this one either but it’s a great self-deprecating send-up of themselves and their mannerisms complete with dancers.
  13. Silly Love Songs (with Donnie & Marie) – This one is from their later 70s Show.
  14. Without Love – Late 70s Show
  15. You Make Me Feel Like Dancing – Late 70s Show
  16. Little Man – This was an awesome rough video clip from the 60s. Worth the whole DVD.
  17. I Got You Babe – Old video footage we’ve seen before.
  18. What Now My Love – More greatness…seems like old live footage. Loved it!
  19. Let the Beat Go On – This is a really odd outro to the DVD with quivering still captures from the clips above…all backed by an indecipherable song. Those Germans.
  20. Biography – This is useless, impossible to read as it scrolls by too fast.

This DVD wouldn’t play on my TV player; it said the new DVD was dirty. It played fine on my computer, however.

I’m headed to St. Louis this weekend for the funeral of my friend’s father. Very sad. Joe Wiskirchen was a recent visitor to Chez Edgar (he even tried to instill discipline in him as did my mother to no avail) and was a move review contributor to Ape Culture. Needless to say he will be missed.

 

Bad News Birthday

May 24, 2007 / / 2 Comments

Cher_birthday_flyer1_3 Cher is 61 years of lovely living now…very well done. Her birthday was last weekend. Fans rejoiced all over the globe. Drank Dr. Peppers while listening to Cher’s greatest hits compilations. By the way, I recently drank a Dr. Pepper when my office ran out of diet Coke…and this is after I went and said I wouldn’t a few posts back. Can I say I love that my office provides free soda?

Unfortunately, I’ve never been a big birthday celebrator. Once when I was thirteen I threw a dinner party on Sonny’s birthday. I remember my friends all seemed very confused. "Why are we celebrating Sonny Bono’s birthday?" But that was my last blast. Like my birthday, it’s just another day.

Unfortunately for me, Cher’s birthday is not just another day. Unfortunately, two years ago her birthday began to mark a sad historical event in my life…the night when I caught an ex-bf out with another gal at a somewhat steamy movie on a Friday night when he had previously told me he had to baby-sit is his three kids that night. I came to find out, in the span of five minutes of shock and awe, that the person I had moments earlier thought was a stand-up character and attentive parent was actually an habitual liar. Sobbing did ensue. And all this soon after an unfortunate stint with a jazz pianist who wasn’t all that into me, as that bestseller so kindly put it.

They both came around, I guess, after I had moved on and was then harder, if not impossible, to be regot; and that alleviated the pain somewhat but it was definitely a particularly rough time for me that night of May 20, 2004, when I was cursing Northern Irishman and jazz pianists the world over and getting drunk on some mysterious green concoction my room-mate made to drown our stunned sorrows.

That night also reinforced in me what I’ve been saying about LA for years: it’s is a small, small town, smallest town of any city I’ve ever lived in. I lived in NYC for four years and never once ran across anyone I knew on the street or anyone who knew anyone I knew. In LA this happens all the time. Someone walks in my office and I know them through another friend; an interviewer knows someone’s wife whose husband I used to work with. Co-workers know other past co-workers. How could it happen in all the gin joints of LA, I would walk in on my cheating date…in this outrageously sprawling metropolis?

Maybe it was a strike of good luck at the end of the day. At the time, it felt terrible…very bad-luck-Cherbdayshowad_2 like. I don’t particularly like the day May 20 any more. I tread though it very carefully now…like something bad might happen or because that old shell shock demands my respect.

And it never helps that there are always a smattering of blogs and sites out there which commemorate Cher’s birthday with cracks about plastic surgery next to photographs of her now and back the 70s with pig-tails. This is simply a 21st century annoyance we must now bear as fans of the unwitting poster-child of cosmetic enhancements.

I came across another despicable site this week, one describing ridiculous and unnecessary tabloid tactics, this one regarding Cher’s reaction to Sonny’s death. Simply gruesome in its dehumanization of celebrities. Also disturbing is the reference within the page about a celebrity who participated in trying to generate their own tabloid coverage.

Speaking of my room-mate who fed me powerful alcoholic concoctions I so needed two years ago on Cher’s birthday…she is going through a tough time this week. I was set to fly out to meet her in St. Louis this weekend. We were going to make a cross-country drive from the Gateway Arch to LA to move her ailing Dad. Sadly, his health took a turn for the worse in the last few days. All plans to move to LA were canceled. She could definitely use your thoughts and prayers at this time.

On the brighter side, Cher’s birthday did bring about two fan gatherings last weekend. One in Chicago (pic top), hosted by "Chicago’s Very Own Cher" at the Kit Kat Lounge complete with a "Turn Back Time" martini and large video screens playing "Mermaids" and "Moonstruck" all night. I would totally have gone to that if I lived in Chicago. We never get stuff like that out West.

New York City also loves Cher (pic to right). A 61st birthday party was hosted by Cher Connection on Saturday near  Madison Square Garden. Check out Cher Connection’s fan gathering photos.

And one of my poems was just published in the Spring 2007 issue of The Wisconsin Review (Vol 41 Issue 2), a poem called "At 5th and Pacific." This is a little lyric about passion in life and wanting to bust out. It’s my veritable I love a parade poem and one you may find useful if you wind up having a sad week like this.

You can order a copy for $5 at: The Wisconsin Review, University of Wisconsin Oshkosh, 800 Algoma Blvd., Oskhosh, WI  45901.

 

Sonny & Cher Scholar

May 17, 2007 / / 1 Comment

Sc Last week I was discussing Sonny’s role as a Cher peripheral. While I was taking a walk yesterday and listening to my iPod I realized this was an egregious error on my part. I was walking with my iPod in tow. S&C were singing "Something" off their 1971 Live album. The song came up on my shuffle right after Verve’s "Bittersweet Symphony."

I was thinking it would be a right neat-o thing to be able to talk to one of S&C’s pre-Toto band mates about Sonny’s tendency to punctuate his musical transitions to Cher or the band with dictations such as "Talk about it – go ahead!"

Did they think that was an effective exclamation or did they giggle behind their drum sets? Or did they think it was just plain ridiculous and eye-rolls ensued? I actually love those little blurtings, myself. They’re a circus sort of "take it away!" moment in the live songs.

And the fact that I spent 10 minutes walking and thinking about it makes me think maybe I’m a Sonny scholar? And I never call myself a Sonny Scholar. But the honest to goodness truth is that at age 5, circa 1975, I was really a bona-fide dye-in-the-polyester Sonny & Cher fan…from the beginning. It was my first aesthetic inclination as a consumer of the popular entertainment arts. So why not be a Sonny & Cher scholar, then?

Well…because it sounds very nostalgic (a) and (b) it sounds defined to just that era, as if my interest ends where that act broke up finally in 1978.

Ah…I remember my innocence back in 1979. It was all too clear we were due for Simply Cher Solo ahead. There would be no more TV shows, albums or concerts from Sonny & Cher. I harrumphed and supposed I could continue on as a Cher fan. Although I doubted she would be interesting enough. I had a hard time conceiving of her as an artist entity without Sonny. I even went cold turkey for a year in 1980.

I remember Cher lamenting how boring her show would be if she just sat there on a stool and sang. Imagine: Cher thinks she might be boring. All too much pointless worrying on her part because that seems to be genetically impossible.

And not only did Cher continue to be interesting, when I was twelve I discovered I could look up Cher albums on the card catalog computer at the library. Cher research never looked back. I subsequently learned how to use those green periodical guide books, microfilm and microfiche machines, and the Internet all by looking up Cher stuff.

But anyway, this is all to say Sonny is abused by being considered a peripheral player in the Cher story and in my celebrity obsession in total. He’s just been sort of the silent player since 1978.

   

Elton John Influenced by Cher?

May 17, 2007 / / 6 Comments

Eltonjohn1 For the last few weeks I’ve been obsessed with a VH-1 show called Classic Albums. It’s similar to my obsession with Project Runway in that I love to see a project come together. I love to learn how artists of any kind make choices and decisions along the way.

Elton John’s Goodbye Yellow Brick Road was an amazing episode of Classic Albums. Many iconic albums seem labored over. Not this one. It’s like he whipped it out and went home early. One comment he made was very interesting to me as it related indirectly to Cher.

Elton said he started out only wanting to write songs with Bernie Taupin. He didn’t want to be a lead singer or be a singer at all. But they couldn’t find anybody who would record their songs. So they decided to record their songs themselves. They decided Elton would sing; but it just as well could have been Bernie. And Elton said that by the Yellow Brick Road album in 1973 he had finally come into his own singing style. Before that, he struggled to define a style.

Which is interesting because in a few earlier recordings it always seemed to me like Elton John was trying to sing like Cher. In fact, in the mid to late 1970s when I would often hear the song "Levon" on the radio, (Levon was a hit in 1972), I didn’t yet know who Elton John was and I would always be confused. Is that Cher? I don’t think that’s a Cher song. How could there be a Cher hit on the radio and I wouldn’t know about it? (I was seven or eight and already a know-it-all Cher Scholar beeotch.) But yet it sounds just like Cher!

Later when I knew it was an Elton John song, I still thought it sounded like Cher.

Speaking of the Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, does anybody think "Bennie and the Jets" sounds like an homage to S&C-like acts? Or more specifically about a group like the Ronettes but with the fashion sense of Sonny & Cher?

…Hey kids…(something, something, something)…electric music, solid walls of sound…(blah, blah, blah)…have you seen them yet…oooh, but they’re so spaced out…they’re so weird and they’re wonderful…Bennie, she’s really keen…she’s got electric boots…a mohair suit…you know I read it in a magazine…b-b-b-Bennie and the Jets…

According to VH-1 Classic Albums, the audience sounds are all fake, complete with British peoples clapping on the off-beats as apparently they are rhythmically challenged this way.

Turns out the audience cheering is from a Jimi Hendrix show! And people give Cher drama for her fake voice box bits. Hmmm. So it’s only cool when Elton fakes it…dressed in feathers.

 

Happy Mother’s Day!

May 11, 2007 / / 0 Comments

Getting_makeup_with_kids_2For all the vampy mothers out there…

I wonder who picked up more makeup tips here: Chastity or Elijah? I never watched my mother put on makeup because my mother always puts on makeup in the car.

Best Movie Mom

Cher was listed as one of the best movie moms. Ah! That’s sweetness. She’s played one kick-ass moms. Was she technically a mom to that monkey in Good Times? No, I guess he was just a house guest. They did have that bald son chopping wood out back. In Witches she was a mom. Her teenage daughter looked put-upon…and frustrated about where to put her Richard Simmons video tapes amongst all the giant booby doll sculptures. In both Mask and Mermaids, Cher-as-mom always did a big scene of yelling, not a lot of cooking (a roast and some finger foods), and always flirted with men about town.

Does this describe your mom? My mom is unlike any of Cher’s movie moms. It’s a stretch but maybe she’s like Ben’s mom in Mask except she doesn’t ride a Harley or smoke pot. A few years ago, my mother wrote in to Ask Cher Scholar. This is a good excerpt of some of her ongoing concerns.

Which Cher Movie Mom is your mom most like?

Does Your Mom Look Like This?

http://www.dailymotion.com/relevance/search/cher%2Blalanne/video/x1wlsc_cher-jack-lalanne-health-spa-commer

Demanding Moms

Does your mom demand that you send her a physical card for Mother’s Day and not just an e-card? Mine does. I learned that the hard way last year. I call this a Mom Rider (a list of things Mom demands).

Concert riders are discussed on the site After Ellen. The comments about Cher made me laugh out loud.

Cher — If you’ve ever seen Cher live, you know she changes her costume more than she sings songs. In her rider, she requires a room just for her wigs. Cher also refuses to wear a backstage pass. I’ll give her that one: if you don’t know Cher on sight, you have no business working at an arena.

Here’s more of Cher’s rider on Smoking Gun.

I hope everyone has a good Mother’s Day: whether your mom is cool, dysfunctional, or has passed on.

   

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