At long last a LiveJournal by Jeri Smith-Ready

If there's any booze left in the city of Denver after the World Science Fiction Convention and the Democratic National Convention got through with it, that's about to end.

A quick aside: I need a research assistant. Someone I can turn to (virtually or for real) and say, for instance, "How much did a shot of cheap whiskey cost in 1959?"

Because looking these things up for myself usually means I end up at sites like this: Modern Drunkard Magazine's World's Best Drinking Songs.

I was going to save that link for a later post, but I thought it was important to inform you of this weekend's National Drunkard Convention, running today through Sunday in Denver.

From the website:

What to Expect: The tribe uniting. The elite inebriates finding each other. The best and the booziest. Ever go to a bar and wish there were some real goddamn boozers on board?

So what's your favorite drinking song (mine is "Streams of Whiskey" by The Pogues)? And how do I avoid massive distraction when doing online research?

And what was the price of a shot of cheap whiskey in 1959? Help!

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Now playing: Little Milton - My Baby Pleases Me
via FoxyTunes

I just had one of those, "Wow, my mom and dad were once young" moments.

I was doing research for Spencer the vampire DJ's short story and read about the plane crash that killed Buddy Holly, Richie Valens and J.P. ("The Big Bopper") Richardson on February 3, 1959.  Folk singer Don McLean later referred to this incident as "The Day the Music Died" in his song, "American Pie." 

It was the first time that rock 'n' roll had lost a young star to an untimely death, and to lose three at once--it was a tragedy of epic proportions.  So much talent wasted, so many records the world would never hear.  It's hard for us young'uns to imagine, after the parade of dead rock stars like Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Kurt Cobain, etc.--all of whom died at the age of 27. 

What made it even worse was that the stream of great hits that had flooded the radio in 1956-57 had slowed to a trickle.  Elvis was joining the Army, Chuck Berry was in jail, and Jerry Lee Lewis--well, there was that little thing about marrying his 13-year-old cousin. 

The point is, music was getting tame again--the powers that be were fighting back against the racial integration and "moral depravity" that rock 'n' roll represented.  Buddy Holly and Richie Valens were the only guys who could save America from Death by Pat Boone.  And then they were gone, and music pretty much did die until four boys from Liverpool resuscitated it.

Anyway, I always knew that my parents had named my older sister Donna after a song by the same name that was out that year, but I never knew until last night that it had been performed by Richie Valens, who died in that crash at age 17, a few months before Donna was born.  Yeah, 17--that's not a typo.  (People my age might recognize Valens as the guy Lou Diamond Phillips played in the movie La Bamba.)

It made me realize that my folks were really touched by this tragedy, as much as if not more than I was affected by the death of Kurt Cobain.  It was the equivalent of me having a kid in 1994 and naming her "Polly."  (But can you imagine her growing up and listening to that Nirvana song?  She'd think I was insane.)

I wish my dad were still around to ask about it, but I'm going to call my mom and find out what it was like to get the "bad news on the doorstep."  And one of these days I'll turn this into a blog post by Spencer for the WVMP Radio website.  His version will no doubt be more eloquent.

(Speaking of Spencer, I've redone his playlist--added some more familiar tunes and rearranged them all to flow better.  And Nitro by Dick Dale?  The earliest punk song ever.  Go listen and tell me if it doesn't sound like it.)

How about you?  Ever have one of those "Holy cow, my parents are not aliens" moments?

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Now playing: Link Wray - Rumble
via FoxyTunes   

Miscellaneous confirmed/discovered:
- prisoners in minimum security federal prison camps (FPC's) do have to wear uniforms (thanks, Martha Stewart!)
- women make 77 cents for every dollar men make
- killing in self-defense is called "justifiable homicide," not third-degree murder (which is something else)
- Janet Jackson released Control in February 1986. It became one of the bestselling albums of all time.
- the comma was added to the official title of the Rolling Stones' song "Paint It, Black" by the record company, not the Stones themselves
- in Ohio they call them 'middle schools,' not "intermediate" or "junior high"
- a Great-Horned Owl sounds like this when it's pissed. Not as creepy-sounding as the Screech Owl, but I need this owl to kick some bad-guy ass, and screech owls are the size of kittens. Whereas the Great-Horned? Wouldn't want to be on the wrong end of those talons and that beak.

While dorking around, I found a cool punk/ska band from the city where my family lives, Winchester, VA. Introducing...Anatomic Bomb. This has nothing to do with research, it was just one of those stumble-upons.

Also discovered this nice live version of Bruce Springsteen doing "Youngstown."

From the Monongahela Valley
To the Mesabi iron range
To the coal mines of Appalachia
The story's always the same.
Seven hundred tons of metal a day
Now sir you tell me the world's changed
Once I made you rich enough,
rich enough to forget my name.

Overheard in our house:

Me: Honey?
Chris: Yeah?
Me: Why did that comet explode?

Today I'm filling in all the little blanks in Bad to the Bone, all the spots I put in brackets, things to look up later. Some are easy and quick, like sunrise/sunset times and moon phases. Others involve inserting descriptions, like Youngstown at night.

Many are music-related. I had to find a band with a cool Halloween song from either the 80s or 90s that was playing a date in Baltimore in the months following October 30, 2007 (long story). It took nearly an hour to find "(Everyday Is) Halloween" by Ministry (who played Ram's Head Live in April, FWIW).

Here's a video, complete with great moments from horror films of the distant and not-so-distant past (warning: some are scary/gory--duh):



More later!