Dr Frank Weakly Reader for 02.08.2019
the grooviest: news, updates, new release info, moaning about the internet, all the stuff you missed
So yes, here we are again with another roundup of all the stuff you probably missed because the Internet is one big huge make-everybody-miss-everything machine (as well as a witch hunt machine.) It’s basically a trash fire, but it’s our trash fire so I suppose we must make the most of it, which is what I’m trying to do now. Join me.
The Noir City film noir festival occupied most of my previous week and it went out with a bang over the weekend. Here’s my very brief Noir City recap. Probably the best yet Noir City program, that I’ve seen since I began attending regularly in 2012 and certainly the best clump of twenty-four films I’ve ever sat through in a week. You wouldn’t think seeing movies would be so exhausting — after all, you’re basically just sitting there — but it is somehow. Anyway, sorry it’s over and can’t wait till next year.
Anyway, let’s move on to the “content,” shall we?
FRONT BURNER
—RAD-012–7F: DR FRANK LIVE AT THE COURT TAVERN. It ain’t real till it’s on discogs. And, it’s on discogs. As you’ll note, this is a three-song flexi (with extras) set for digital release on Valentine’s Day Feb. 14. Details to follow, but it looks like we’re going to do “dibs” for the severely limited physical item starting next week. There are other items as well (including an enamel pin whose design is the banner pic above.) Stay tuned, it’s fun stuff. Happy Valentimes!
— Mtx forever: this week’s post on Medium was an Mtx forever update: Moar Mtx forever.
And, you can still vote:
And, speaking of which, sort of, I posted about my anguish about the drum sound of Our Bodies Our Selves and it was quite gratifying how many people stepped up to defend the album’s honor. You guys are the best.
WAIT, MTX IS STILL AROUND?
— The Mr T Experience — “…and I Will Be with You”, live in Anaheim, ca. 2003, and the “minor secrets” thereof. I didn’t remember this when I wrote it up, but as Johannes Schult points out, I actually wrote a little essay about that show at the time, a sort of review of how the song “Oh, Just Have Some Faith in Me” has shifted and been changed by the recording.
— Alejandra got her Starship box.
— An ego trip down memory lane, on twitter:
to which there was this reply:
I prefer to think of the former two as Kinda Kinks & Something Else and the latter as Village Green & Muswell.
— The Mr T Experience — “You Today”, live at Roma Palaeur 1996. Every so often one of my posts of old show videos is noticed by someone who happened to be there, which is pretty cool. Quote: “and then I realized that there was an hidden world just waiting for me out there… ❤”
— A band called Mercy Mercy fooling around with “She’s Coming (Over Tonight)” posted on Instagram. I tried to share this on the various platforms but for some reason Instagram doesn’t want people to share anything outside of itself or even within itself and you wind up with an incomprehensible link that no one clicks on or, as here, with a preview that looks like a player but doesn’t play. In other words, you get not the content itself, but a useless picture of the content. And by the time you figure out what’s going on the moment is gone and lost forever.
This is even the case on Facebook, which might seem odd since as the owner of Instagram you’d think they’d at least try to make sharing functional between them; until you realize, they don’t actually care whether it functions. They just want you to keep trying the useless thing it pretends to do to deflect attention from the nefarious stuff it’s really doing, like gathering personal data and selling it to Satan or whatever. Otherwise, what on earth is the point?
I bet no one actually saw it. And if anyone is seeing it now, congratulations, you’re part of an elite group.
This internet: it’s even bad at doing the stupid stuff it pretends to be doing while it does what it’s really designed for (identity theft.)
— and, your Friday morning “Deep Deep Down.” This is a good one:
More such covers of my songs found on YouTube may be found here.
FROM THE DESK OF DR FRANK
— I posted a “throwback Thursday” pic from a photo shoot at the Fat Wrecks office with some Suicide Girls. (Long story.)
Anyway, thereby I was contacted by a close friend of Tessa (to my left in the photo, “stage right” with the glasses) who is sadly no longer with us. I didn’t know they knew each other and I hadn’t expected anyone my FB friend “circle” to know her, but well, it’s a small world. It’s nice to remember people. She was a good egg, and she is certainly missed.
— bon mots:
I’m not wild about “communities” and I try not to be in any to the degree I can help it. In fact, I dream of a world in which everyone self-isolates from everyone else in mutual skepticism and suspicion, while treating others with scrupulous yet distant courtesy and kindness and hassling absolutely no one. Is that so wrong?
Things that make no sense to me: (a) clapping and going “woo” at movies; (b) wishing “happy birthday” to dead people. They can’t hear you.
There are some comments from various people plus the graphic above from Last Will here.
Fortunately it’s raining but I can already feel the air warming up. It’s gonna be a rough eight months till October.
(I typed this just to tease my North Eastern friends in the Arctic Blast or whatever, but it’s actually true: I can feel the Spring and Summer coming on and it’s not going to be very nice.)
For some reason I don’t care that don’t care was made to care and put in a pot and boiled.
OTHER PEOPLE’S MUSIC
— My first minds.com Vinyl Collector post in awhile (because, you know, life) on the Gymslips’ LP, which is one of my favorites.
(The link was initially turning up an error message outside of minds — which is a familiar problem from times past — but it seems to be working now. If you ever encounter this problem, you can always go to the main minds/frankportman page and scroll down. Or you can join up and then you’ll be able to see everything, the malfunctioning and the naughty bits as well. I generally post all my stuff on minds first and thence to various other platforms, plus additional items when I don’t feel I have the strength to argue about them elsewhere or just feel like doing it. In short, if for some reason you feel you’re not getting enough of me, that’s the way to get more of me, God help us all.)
— it was apparently “International Clash Day” on twitter on Feb. 7, and though I don’t tend to participate in such nonsense, because, you know, I basically think everything is stupid, I did post a comic.
— Lisa Marr, the Grim Deeds interview.
— Good morning, world: Wilt Chamberlain — “That’s Easy to Say”.
— Not music, but this guy, Alan Jacobs, and I are singing from the same hymnal:
“When a society rejects the Christian account of who we are, it doesn’t become less moralistic but far more so, because it retains an inchoate sense of justice but has no means of offering and receiving forgiveness. The great moral crisis of our time is not, as many of my fellow Christians believe, sexual licentiousness, but rather vindictiveness. Social media serve as crack for moralists: there’s no high like the high you get from punishing malefactors. But like every addiction, this one suffers from the inexorable law of diminishing returns. The mania for punishment will therefore get worse before it gets better.”
PICTURE PICTURE
— Just take a look: If I Kill Him; Candlemas; the devastating Miss Seberg; a St. Blaise candle for the blessing of throats; a smokin’ dame; Darling, will you marry me?; Bloodbath of the Faithless Flirt; Hot Stories; play it, blondie; Diana?; Susan Peters (via banjo).
IN THE NEWS
— Liquid-filled records: or, as this article puts it, “vinyls.” This link was sent to me by Chris from Sounds Radical so… well, draw your own conclusions.
— Albert Finney has died. I’m a big fan of the classic Albert Finney films of course, but I think his greatest performance was in the re-make of The Browning Version. It has literally brought me to tears. RIP.
