THE BEAT GOES ON

THE BEAT GOES ON

Rock 'n' Roll Couses Cancer

Hey, kids, bad news! Rock and roll gives you cancer. Well, not rock and roll per se, but the vinyl they press the records on. See, the plastic manufacturers use a gas called vinyl chloride to produce polyvinyl chloride, the plastic, and according to the National Institute for Occupational Safety, vinyl chloride gas has been causally linked with a rare form of liver cancer which has been showing up with increasing frequency in German plastic workers who were using PVC in manufacturing. Since it seems that direct exposure to" the gas itself isn’t necessary to contract the diseaase, and since the disease takes years ' to develop, it will be quite a1 while, according to authorities, before it is knowrrijjf whether vinyl chloride harm j extends to people who handled vinyl products.

Let’s see, that means re-J cord store owners will go first, then disc jockeys, and^jj let’s not forget those poorj women in the pressing plant...

Ed Ward

Cybill Does ft.

There she was, staring hungrily at me from my glossy invitation. Cybill Shepherd. The foxy, monotoned girl from The Last Picture Show. The Ingenue cover girl of the millenium. Peter Bogdonavich’s old lady. And there she was, on an invitation addressed to ME. Inviting ME to a press party to celebrate the release of her new elpee, Cybill I)oesK It.., To Cole Porter. As I stuffed the wad of glossy cardboard stock into my hip pocket and headed towards the RCA studio-party site, my mind was filled with melodious pictures of Cybill and Cole on the stage, with the blonde beauty doing it in front of a riotous audience of music lovers. Necrophilia rock. Hubba! Hubba!

-Imagine my disapgoinW ment when the party turned out to be a multi-media stifferoo populated by levels upon levels of has-beens and never-weres. There were the rock wise-asses (myself included), clad in jeans and garish tee-shirts and prone to making obscene noises with their tongues during times of stress; the avant garde rockers were there also, in their combination turtle-neck ’n’ Pointer Sisters outfits, looking like the worst of the Salvation Army. (“Let’s cruise,” I hear one Andrews Sister stereotype mutter as she entered the doorway.)

Of course there were the movie hacks and hackettes and the semi-respectable press. Gay Talese and Truman Capote were there (both used to be writers). Charles Mingus looked at his shoes a lot. Ruth Gordon, the ancient actress, stood poised for a stroke and Maureen Stapleton sat at a table and glowered. It was an event.

The lights dimmed and Frank Yablans, the president of Paramount Pictures took the stage. Yablans is the type of person who belongs on a Manhattan sidestreet at night, standing next to an abandoned truck, cracking his knuckles and saying witty things like “Hey Rocco, let’s off dis puke!” As Frank talked the side of his mouth off, his captive audience showed its appreciation by giggling, moving around a lot and consuming ten times its •weight in alcohol. Frank, Ljlightly annoyed, grasped the [podium and shouted for sipence. (Roughly translated: | “Hey Rocco, etc.”) Everyone ■froze in mid-sentence with [the exception of the rock i^ise-asses who cat-called ”“Yess teacher.”

p Then a new figure ascended the stage. It was ^Cybill Sheperd’s director, ^producer and all around nice guy, Peter Bogdonavich. By this time the audience was restless, so Peter (who, dressed in a reject Pinky Lee suit, made Ryan O’Neal seem as radical as Che Guevera) had to work hard to get their attention. Giving up after a few 'rtioments, he proudly announced the beginning of “Cybill Does It... A PRESENTATION!”

TV “Trick” Ends In Boy's Death

CALGARY, Alberta 0 (AP) — A 14-year-old Calgary boy hanged himself while attempting to imitate a mock hanging performed on television by rock music star Alice Cooper, according to a coroner’s jury. The jury, investigating the death of David Andrew Coomes, called for “definite and immediate stepiMo ban these programs of violence” from television.

The boy’s father testified that the boy told his sister after the program that the execution was just a trick and that he could do it himself. His body was found liter, hanging by a cloth belt in b|s bedroom closet.

The audience shrugged. “Vat means dis presentation?” The lights dimmed and the room’s P.A. System sputtered to life. A slide projector was activated and there, upon the stage, was a long-playing series of slides showing (taadaa) Cybill. It was hard to tell which assault on the senses was worse: hearing Cybill doing it to Cole was obscene enough, but watching ten minutes of smiles and cleverly concealed dimpled boobs framed in the same type of Kodacolor stuff your parents used on their last trip to Florida...! The crowd mobbed the open bar.

“Is this the strongest stuff you have?” an aquaintance coughed, grabbing a shot of scotch in one hand and a glass of wine in another. “What do you think of the show?” a female friend asked me. “It gets me right here,” I said pointing to my heart. Glancing at the almost-tits on the screen, the lass demurred, “Oh no, it’s obviously designed to grab you lower than there.” She flicked a finger towards my belt buckle and walked away. “Is this the STRONGEST stuff you have?” a familiar voice echoed behind me. By the time the lights came back on, all factions of the reception were united in a common bond of pain. We were all Biafran stooges in mama-san Cybill’s pagoda of two-dimensionality.

Soon, a lithe, blonde figure was seen standing on the podium. It was the guest of honor in the Helena Rubenstein flesh. “I’d like to thank you all for. . . coming,” she deadpanned. 1 “And now I think I’m going to get drunk.”

A long haired rock writer lurched towards the door., “Drinking ain’t gonna help ya at this point,” he belched. “Have you tried heroin?”

garth

'Dja ever wonder how those Fender-pickin' popstars, inundated as they are with all the pantin' honeys a paunch can bounce off, manage to restrain themselves from ODing on ooh-la? Well it ain't easy, but here we see, direct from tomorrow's Boy Scout Manual, self control in action. The moued miss is Sunshine, who also made an appearance when Grace Slick exposed herself onstage. Here she takes on Mountain, and has Felix Pappalardi set to drool all over the footlights. Leslie West, however, is made of stauncher stuff: eyes down, hands where they belong. Discipline is so rare these days.

Tube Whiz Of the Month

The scientist who gives drugs to spiders and discovers enlightening facts like they spin crooked webs was on To Tell The Truth recently and the ever vigilant Tom Posten got the real scoop out of him: Tom: Do the spiders seem to like the drugs?

Scientist: Oh yes,' they love ’em!

No mention was made of spider rehabilitation.

Steve Rosen

I Can Got It For You Televised

Holding on to the end of a line I met Lane Sarasohn one day, co-producer of The Groove Tube, a movie of 19 comic sketches whose cast includes Buzzy Linhart, National Lampoon's Chevy Chase, and director Ken Shapiro. If you were walking down 4th Street on the Lower East Side of New York sometime in 1967, you might have caught a few segments.

That was when Shapiro and Sarasohn first ran their Vi inch videotapes on three TV screens in a show they called Channel One. Or if you know about a public teevee show called The Great American Dream Machine, you may have caught some of the skits there. Do you recall being sold “Cramp Easy-Lube Vegetable Shortening,” or hearing “I’m Looking Over a Four Leaf Clover” sung to the beat of one man’s hands on another man’s head?

If you don’t, you might want to catch up with these people by seeing The Groove Tube. Ken Shapiro comes off like a failed failed Woody Allen, a little pissed that his cock and crotch jokes aren’t as good as Woody’s come and tit jokes, making some of the skits too long, forgetting to make some of them funny, seeming a little distracted by his own presence on the screen. Out for some bucks, Shapiro and Sarasohn have forfeited their interest in experimental TV for distribution in the movies. National exposure might make old Ken relax a little; he?s entitled to exposure, and he ought to relax.

Or watch for the next project: {Sarasohn wants to do a movie about — uh the late 60s, to show “what St. Mark’s Place looked like on acid early in the morning...” Watching their takeoff on the 11 o’clock news, I learned of an old North Vietnamese stronghold called Phuc Hu. Who knows what I might find out about the old strychnine and nutmeg days.

Georgia Christgau

Gomer Pyle was never like this. Thank god.

Mor Rex Nix Pix for Phophet’s Flix

Inspired by the success of Jesus Christ Superstar, Morrocco’s king Hassan has announced that he will provide the financial backing for a new rock opera film entitled That Other Superstar, based on the life of Mohammed. King Hassan has reportedly obtained for his project Tim Rice and Andrew Webber, the original writers of Jesus Christ Superstar.

One major problem confronting the filmmakers is that, under Moslem law, no representations of the prophet are allowed. Therefore, only the voice of Mohammed will be heard in the movie. At press time, Omar Sharrif is still undecided as whether or not to lend his voice for the lead role.

Robbo Houghton

Sinatra at Nassau

For a moment, it seemed that the entire white population of Carle Place, Uniondale and environs had migrated across the parkway green en masse to Nassau Colisseum. It was rather more likely, of course, that the toughest ticket in Long Island history, for the Frank Sintra show, was available to a wider cross-section through normal channels: Republican party and/or Italian-American Club patronage.

We somehow skipped the opening act, a dance group inexplicably named “The Rock and Roll Dancers.” We did see Sinatra’s jester, Pat Henry. “Any Indians in the audience? Indians. Y’know how smart they are. Took my people fifty years to get out of Alcatraz... and they moved in!” It was enough to make you grab a dime and call Henny Youngman for 60 seconds of real laughs on Dial-A-Joke, but we giggled anyway, mostly in bladderbending anticipation of The One.

Everyone held his breath in this audience of Vegas gambling jiinket lookalikes, but “The Prince of Cutty Sark,” William B. Williams announced a ten-minute intermission. Finally the moment came: Mulberry Street Madonnas, three kids later, crowded the stage with popping Instamatics. Smooth Frank dug it all, leaving the house lights up. He opened with “I Get A Kick Out of You,” an effortless nodr of the neck accenting the drumbeat.

He sang the blues convincingly (“Don’t You Worry About Me,”) and then he rocked. ,“Bad Bad Leroy Brown” was fine, as he turned Croce’s decent Staggej Lee riff into autobiography with his trademark subtleties: a crap shooting hand roll, the pointed finger, the gentle kick for rhythm, stylistic devices he could easily take credit for inventing.

By the time Sinatra finished a trio of saloon songs, during which he stared into the lights and “made every woman in the hodse feel like she was alone with him,” the presents began to arrive on stage. One girl brought a bottle of wine — and a corkscrew. Another handed up a stuffed animal, making Sinatra look like The Big Winner at the San Gennaro Festival. He toasted his friends, the Zito’s, who make the thing he misses most being away from New York: “Sicilian bread, with the seeds in it,” and he lit a cigarette. “Do you still smoke Luckies?” someone called out.

“Yeah, except when I’m on stage, cause the tobacco sticks in my teeth.” Another request came for the cigarette when he was finished with it. “What am I gonna smoke in the car on the way home?” he asked, then gave her the whole souvenir.

Oh, the perils of rock and roll stardom! Here we see young Pete "Overend'' Watts, bass player with Mott the Hoople, suffering the consequences of his stardom. Minutes before going on stage, Pete dons his fashionable thigh-high boots, but tonight there is a snag. Fortunately, Group Schedule Executive Stanley Tippins is on hand with his trusty needle-nose pliers, and a local garage mechanic contributes his know-how. Just in case, a phone call was made to a local arc welding firm, but all of a sudden. . . zzzzzip! and Pete is in. "That Stan," he says, strapping on his bass and heading for the stage, "wotta bloke!"

“01’ Blue Eyes is Back,” “I’ve Got You Under My Skin,” and a ballad that made you understand what it must have been like to be in love in an American city in the late 1940s. “Send in the Clowns,” “My Kind of Town,” and that was it. A look at the usually glum Colisseum ushers bracing for the star’s escape let you know that this week, they were the luckiest guys in town.

“Did you see his moves there?” one of Sinatra’s tuxedo’d musicians said to the other, both saluting the urinal after the show. “He did a couple of E’s mmmm, fantastic..Indeed, and I don’t care who his friends are.

Wayne Robins

Endangered Species

You wouldn t believe what a hassle just a little thing like booking a bagpipe band can turn out to be. First, I let my fingers do the walking through the Yellow Pages. I called every booking agent in Broward County and all I got were answering machines. One guy told me he’d been trying to find a bagpipe band in South Florida for 15 years, but he’d look around for me anyway. That was encouraging. Everybody else just laughed and wished me luck.

Then, I thought of trying to contact the Scottish equivalent of the Sons of Norway. That turned out to be harder than finding the bagpipers. I was just about to try the National Guard because somebody I knew casually mentioned that the National Guard Unit they used to be in back when they were dodging the draft had bagpipers as their mascots. Of course, they didn’t remember the name of their unit, but that didn’t matter because it was up in New York anyway.

It happened at Nassau Coliseum in New York. Cat Stevens, ectomorph extraordinaire, was in the entree of one of his usual hoot nights, when suddenly a lust-bitten fan hurled something at him. A grenade? Casaba? Lobworm? No, it was a Teaser-tee, and being the relatable groovester he is he ado'd right up and stripped to the waist to thunderous cheers from the mostly female audience, put the thing on, and recommenced "Oh Very Young" right in the middle of the split infinitive where he'd left off. What we want to know is,, don't any of those adoring young things ever feed that boy? If not, what about his mother?

Things were looking bleak for the kid. I tried one last hunch. I dialed the Musicians’ Union in Miami. A secretary with a cute voice answered the phone and I quickly blurted out my problem.

“We don’t have any bagpipers registered in the Union,” she explained officiously. That’s it, I thought. But suddenly, the cute voice drooled “but I do know how you can get in touch with someone who does.”

“What?” I screamed. “That’s great! How?”

“Well,” she stammered, “this is gonna sound kinda funny..

I didn’t care. I’d try anything.

“I don’t care.” I told her. “I’ll try anything.”

“Call up the Flower Shop at the McCallister Hotel,” she instructed.

This time, I was the guy who laughed. “You’ve gotta be kidding me.”

“I told you it was gonna sound funny.” she retorted. “If you want a bagpipe band, lust call up the Flower Shop, at the McCallister Hotel.”

I couldn’t believe it. Whoever heard of a flower shop acting as a front for a band of bagpipers? Not me, but I called anyway.

The Flower Shop at the McCallister Hotel put me in touch with a bagpipe band. Don’t ask.

There’s gotta be a moral in there someplace.. .

Jim Esposito

Bo Diddley Is A...Cop

We were backstage at a noted Marin night spot a few weeks back talking to the estimable Mr. Bo Diddley, who was making his first California four in two and a half years and somehow the topic turned to rock festivals and the individuals who abused the privileges outdoor concertgoing provides. “The older generation, they had their fun, and now they try and put bricks in your way,” Bo said, “and that’s wrong! Some of these cats, you give them some power and it makes ’em crazy. They can’t handle it, just like some folks can’t handle but one drink. Me, I don’t throw my weight around just because I pack a rod. I mean, I may be a cop, but if I see some young kids doin’ something that’s wrong, I don’t hide behind my badge — I go up and talk to ’em, and that usually works.”

“Wait a minute — you’re a cop?” Gulp. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a wallet. Pinned to it was a gold star with the words Valencia County, State of New Mexico, Deputy Sheriff. “I used to belong to this,” Bo said, brandishing a card reading Nevada Private Patrol, Las Vegas, “but I wasn’t around enough to use it.”

“B-b-but why did you become a cop,” we asked. “It’s my way of helping people. It helps me in situations like... like once we were coming home from a gig in New York and there was this cat who’d jumped the median and overturned his car, and he had a gas can and a lawnmower and the car was still on. Battery cable was gettin’ hot from shorting out on the car body and th6 cat was pinned to the back seat, bleeding like a hog. And right there, looking right at the cat was two New York City policemen, goin’ ‘You all right, mister?’ So I run over to the car — dressed like this, you know — and pulled out a tire iron, smashed the back window and pulled the cat out, and these police are just standing there. Course, once I got him out, they got him in the car and took him off to the hospital, actin’ like heroes. But you know, why you be drivin’ around, and you see something like that, you want to help. And this badge helps cut the bullshit. Plus, of course, folks is suspicious of uniforms. I mean, I sure am,.

You bet, Bo.

Ed Ward