THE BEAT GOES ON

THE BEAT GOES ON

DEPARTMENTS

Ian Dury Scuttles Out Of The Cuckoo's Nest

LOS ANGELES—Ian Dury was lounging in the back of Rodney Bingenheimer's old Cadillac, juggling a shopping bag full of trinkets from Frederick's of Hollywood, while reminiscing about a youth misspent behind the walls of a British cuckoo's nest.

"I saw the results of lobotomies for 4V2 years when I was locked up," he said in a thick East End accent. "Not the pretty sight. They let in old age pensioners and children half price . We English make provision for the handicapped, you see.

"Do ya remember the Battersea Dum Dums?" Ian asked his entourage, which included a pleasant chap from NME, and the ubiquitous Kosmo Vinyl, Ian's press aide-de-camp and first mate (he can be heard MCing Stiffs Live).

"The Dum Dums were quite the operation," Ian continued. "An early set of Teds, from '53. Thirteen brothers and one sister, all deaf and dumb. They used to corner one cop, kick 'im round and stick him down a manhole. They'd leave 'is hat on the cover so the other bobbies could find 'im."

Ian fiddled with a rancid blue flipper he dredged out of a trashcan outside Bela Lugosi's house. Then onto the saga of another latter-day Fagin. I bopped Ian on the head. This was our signal, to slow down for the dim-witted American reporter. Ian grinned, "Time for subtitles," he said, easing up on the Cockney drawl. We then rejoined an elaborate history of the peg-legged master criminal who eluded police for years by using different size wooden legs. "One made him 5'3"," Ian said, "another six foot. So his victims always gave different descriptions."

But how'd he ever get caught? "Now that's easy," Ian explained, tapping a be-bop solo on his own fiberglas limb. "He grew to like one leg more than the others."

Once safely on stage, Ian puts mascara-laden ponces like Rod the Mod and Mick the Lip to shame. Wearing suspenders over a Bay City Rollers t-shirt, he has the stage presence of a lunatic with a loaded shotgun in a crowded subway car. Surrounded by the Blockheads, a chaotic rabble of musical misfits and masters, Ian sticks out like a sore thumb on a thalidomide baby.

Crippled by childhood polio—"I got it swimming in the South End pool"—and festooned with a tantalizing array of scarves, badges, clothing tags and a pocketful of panties, he scuttles across the stage like a wounded land crab already dressed for a cheap, seaside dinner. He sings leaning on a handsculpted walking stick—perhaps on loan from Dr. John's kid brother—occasionally slapping the mike when it misbehaves. Perhaps the best, gravity-defying stage wrinkle of all: No matter what Ian throws up in the air during his songs, be it shot glasses or plaid panties from Frederick's, he nevfer catches it, having moved on to other diversions longs before the bauble begins its downward flight.

There is a brilliant Ray Daviesian naivete at work here, a burst of brash innocence that eludes most performers, even natural; stage hams. He projects none of the icy malevolence of Elvis Costello, the shimmeringpop charms of Nick Lowe, nor even the wobbly Charlie McCarthy antics of Wreckless Eric. But he's mastered the far more complex art of telling a story, and telling it well. Now really, you've got to let this misshapen man into your life—new boots, panties and all.

After rummaging around Arista's slick suite of offices in Century City, Ian sat down and drew a map of his childhood London, the East End. He titles it: Every Village Sings. To the northwest lies Harrow, where he was born. Traveling south we pick up the Green Line, a London tube route which heads east to the South End, past Stepney, where Kosmo , resides) through Ilford, home of the Faces; and to Upminister, where Ian grew up.

This is Blockhead turf. Ian desreibes it as "the soul of England." Dury scratched his ear, which is adorned with an earring. "My father s was a bus driver before the s war. After that J was institutionalized for almost ten | years, so we didn't see much of each other. Then onto artist's college for another seven. If I'd done med school that long, I'd be a doctor, wouldn't I?"

Ian grinned broadly, revealing a Union Jack design on his lower front teeth. "My Harley Street dentist did it as, a surprise," he said, baring his patriotic bridge work. "It's a present for my American tour. They're ceramic, though I've already chipped a bit off. You can tell the difference, can't you? They're not as rotten as the uppers."

Kosmo leaned in the door: "An hour more, then we're off," reminding Ian that the entourage is due at Ronnie Wood's home for a baked beans and tacos barbeque.

And how does Ian get on with such elder rock statesmen? "The English kids think they're boring old farts," he chuckled, "but I like 'em. Where do you think I stole all my licks from, old Faces gigs. No one played the music hall better."

Ian's fave rave is Frankie Miller. He's trying to convince the woolly Scot to record an entire album in his native tongue. "He was bom in a tenement in Glasgow," Ian said. "He'd come down to the pubs and talk to us with his chin resting on our shoulders, filled with more beer than I've ever seen in one place. Once he fell down and hit his head on an iron rail pub table. We picked him off the floor and he went on without so much as a stop." Ian waved his hand, rattling pair of dice hanging from his wrist. "He loves my rude songs."

His fondest memories are of England's lively vaudeville circuit, which died out soon after the onset of television. He frequented the Victoria Palace in the early '50s, where the Crazy Gang held forth, trading off nasty puns and insults with lightningquick sight gags.

I summoned up the courage to ask the inevitable. How does Ian, born of burlesque, hope to survive it? "The thought of being obscure doesn't scare me," he says. "I've been obscure for 34V2 years. It's not bound to bother me now."

Indeed most of Ian's honorary hall of famers, particularly jazz players, are in no danger of being asked on Top Of The Pops. .Back in Rodney's dowdy Caddy, Ian bolsters the legend of his favorite musical magician, Thelonius Monk.

Monk, it seems (for Ian provided no subtitles for this reminiscence), was gigging with Wardell Gray at the Five Spot in Boston when a bouncer was sent down from the bandstand to find him, supposedly camped in his dressing room. No Monk could be found. After a lengthy search, Monk suddenly reappeared. The bouncer insisted he'd looked all over the room. "I was there," Monk told him, walking onstage. "I was just walking on the ceiling."

And that's the secret to Ian's spidery crawl across the rock planet. Whatever's up doesn't necessarily have to come down, not when this artful dodger has one foot on the floor, the other on the ceiling. At Rodney's radio station/ a DJ asked "What kind of label are you, new wave or what?" Ian's eyes rolled skyward. "I change my label everyday," he said, "'cause I wear it on me foot." Sure enough, near the bottom of his withered leg, the music hall morning line reads: "Lies are ten pounds off." Could anyone offer better odds?

Patrick Goldstein

Siblings Of The Stars #1

Yes, indeed, it could've been a tear-jerking outtake from Joe Brooks' If Ever I See You Again. But by some quirk of fate, Elvis Costello was reunited with his long-lost twin sister, Beatrice, who had been cruelly torn from the Costello nest at the age of three and spirited off by Navajo gypsies to be sold on the American black market. Elvis found Bea selling tickets to a peep show on the outskirts of Memphis and immediately recognized the family ears.

Dickey Betts: . Firebug Or Friendly Beagle?

NEW YORK—Dickey Betts seems a rather sullen fellow these days. It showed all over his famous face as he walked through the door of New York's Warwick Hotel, a face which—with watery blue eyes and the trademark drooping 'stach—has all the canine charm of a well-bred beagle. But for the look on Dickey's face, you'd think he was a dachshund.

On the face of it (so to speak), Dickey has a few good reasons to sulk. Ya gotta figure it might irk a guitar player with Dickey's talent to split with the best rhythm section in rock (not far from cutting off the cat's legs, you understand), who then went on to become Sea Level and now even have a hit single for crissakes; or to see his creative cohort Gregg descend to the status of a Rona Barrett regular and to wade through all the bad blood over the Scooter Herring affair, when all Dickey wants to do it get on with it and play.

And then along comes his first record with a new band, Great Southern, which was not exactly a favorite with some members of the rock press who once adored the Allmans. The following tour had its difficulties, too—the indignity of playing openers, the notorious fist fights he had with one of his drummers or the time in Philadelphia where, before a stadium full of Framptonites, a peeved Dickey played soccer with his monitors, finally walking offstage after three tunes. When sulking turns to smoking, watch out!

So now .Dickey has even another thing to sulk about— a bad-ass rap he really doesn't deserve. You see the real Dickey Betts when he s smiles, like when he talks | about his new home on the | beach in Sarasota, spring u training with the Great Southern softball team, his wife Paulette and, of course, his daughter Jessica.

"She's gonna have a band of her own by the time she's twelve," said Dickey with a half-serious smile. "She's already got a name—Jessica and the Rainbow Band.®"

And if you still think Dickey's some kinda fat-fisted hard guy, listen to what he has to say on the notorious subject of Mr. Gregg Allman: "I can't hold bad blood too long," he admitted, "especially since everything is smoothing out for Scooter. Gregg, man.. .if anyone ever paid any dues for mistakes, he's damn sure paid for it. I think it's time everyone forgot about it and gave the guy a break."

Allman and Phil Walden recently visited Betts in Florida to discuss a possible Allman reunion, a subject on which Dickey keeps mum: "We talked about it and I'd like to make a record if everything is right, though I don't know about a tour or anything else. We'll just have to see."

Betts' concerns lie more with his revamped Great Southern, who have just released a second LP on Arista—Atlanta's Burning Down—produced by Jack Richardson. Retaining guitarist Dan Toler and drummer Doni Sharbono from the I original lineup, Dickey has I recruited Berklee School ed[ ucated ivory tickler Michael Workman, Dave Goldflies on bass and Dave Toler (Dan's brother) on drums. In his search for new legs, Dickey's coming close to finding them: "It was frustrating on the first part of the first tour, but now that the band has developed a lot of power and learned how to deliver music and who the people are...it's nice," he said with a grin.

As I left him, Dickey still seemed to have some moody embers glowing. But the smoke turns to fire only at the right times now, such as later that night when Dickey wowed a crowd of New York scenemakers at Trax, burning on stage until five in the morning. Or the next night at the Palladium, when the first strains of a Betts lead were met with a cheer, and where Dickey Betts and Great Southern made a musical case for his claim to rock stardom. He wasn't the opening act anymore, and it showed.

"I don't want to suck the life out of the Allmans,1' said Dickey. "It was great, but we have to let it rest.

"I found my own sound about six years ago," he concluded, "and my own career is kind of a challenge. I didn‘t expect to go into Madison Square Garden right off the bat. It's kinda nice to get back out and hustle, and prove to people that you're a legitimate musician and composer, and to see how many people believe in what you're doing."

Rob Patterson

Industry Marches On

NEW YORK—The N.Y.C. vice squad has announced that they no longer will burn the pornographic materials they seize in raids. Instead, the books are being sold to a pulp factory in Clifton, NJ, where they are processed into the cardboard used in pizza boxes.

So think twice the next time you order a pizza with everything.

Rick Johnson

Could It Be Scabies?

NEW YORK—You won't find Barry Manilow at CBGB's or similar seedy youth dives, crawling around a Bowery back alley on his hands and knees, piiking his guts out and trying to find his girlfriend's contact lens so they can drive back to Hackensack before her father wakes up.

Barry Manilow doesn't go in for self-mutilation, on stage or off. He doesn't wear wraparound sunglasses. He has never written or recorded a song dealing with euthanasia or lobotomy.

Barry Manilow frequents nice Manhattan apartments with high ceilings, wears turtleneck sweaters with spiffy blazers and owns a dog who doubles as his TV stand-in.

It should come as no great surprise, then, to find out that the Divine Mr. M doesn't like punk rock.

"I just heard of a group called Disgusting. If a band calls itself Disgusting, you know where they're coming from. I can understand where they're coming from, but personally I really.. .don't ...care."

Life isn't easy for the idol of millions. Nbt only does he have to share his label with the likes of Patti Smith and Lou Reed, he runs the risk of running into them in the hall while they're doing something weird, or accidentally drinking from the same water fountain.

"There is, I'm sure, an enormous audience for punk rock and I really hope they're having a good time," he added magnaminously.

Barry hasn't made it downtown to check out a concert yet, being too busy recording his latest million-seller and listening to Gino Vannelli albums, but he pointed out that he is well aware of the current scene. "I read about it all the time, I see those silly album covers and read those gross descriptions of their performances.

"The only thing I can relate punk rock to is the music I grew up with, which is what they're doing only they're doing it worse. I've heard it before and I've heard it better. It's not innovative."

Barry's biggest concern, though, is why people like Iggy or Stiv Bators insist upon getting all bloody onstage. "The thing I haven't seen before is people slicing themselves up on stage or blowing their noses on the microphone. If that's what they want to do, though, that's fine. I don't care."

Although the heavy album version of "Could It Be Magic" has been known to cause some listeners to r.un outside and chop up their redwood lawn furniture with axes, Barry's confident that the American masses see it his way.

"I think everybody's started to mellow out. We've all gone through the Rolling Stones and our little protest period, and now we're all ready to relax a little."

Screw Pere Ubu and XRay Spex—this is the real New Wave. If you're sitting there drowning in your own vile excretions and listening to "Sonic Reducer," be advised that you qre a RELIC, Jack. Get with the program, before it's too late.

Lee Moore

5 Years Ago

Vince Furaier Expose!

Since Newsweek spilled the beans on Alice Cooper's real name, Vince has been on a shopping spree. In addition to his "Whiplash" line of unisex cosmetics, Alice is also thinking of opening a members-only bar/club in New York called "Club Foot." And what's this about Alice wanting to buy into the Detroit Tigers?