Elvis Is Everywhere

“There have been a lot of tough guys.  There have been pretenders.  And there have been contenders.  But there is only one King.” – Bruce Springsteen

ith his birthday havin’ just passed by an’ havin’ even more recently finally committed my anti-Beatles diatribe to print, I find myself contemplating The King.

What is there that can be said about Elvis Presley?  Folks worship him.  People abhor him.  People spin wild, unlearned yarns about the man.  Some are even just plain agnostic towards the whole premise.

For most of the young world today it seems that Elvis is almost sort of a cartoon.  He seems more like Mickey Mouse than a historical, real-life, flesh and blood human being.  The Dead Milkmen, at the height of their powers, even parodied Goin’ to Graceland with “… if this were Disneyworld I’d buy a pair of Elvis ears…”  But if you had to explain to someone why he is more than that, explain his importance in the big picture, what is it that you would say?  Why should anyone anymore bother taking note of Elvis Presley?

Perhaps because he was a gigantic contributor to changing the way America thinks about music.  Perhaps because, in a time blemished by racism and segregation and hatred, he unashamedly appropriated the stylings of Black American music and heralded them as an important contribution to the development of the 20^th century western world.  At a time when the Grand Ole Opry refused to acknowledge the existence of drums and Pat Boone was attempting to correct Fats Domino’s grammar in his cover of “Ain’t That a Shame”, Elvis Presley lauded the songwriting and music making of his Black influences so earnestly that he refused to be finished rendering his versions of their songs until he believed he had communicated every nuance of the originals he treasured so preciously.

Amidst the tumult of the advent of rock n roll in mid century America, Elvis Presley stood tall and never shied from the fact that he valued the vibrant, effervescent, rollicking musical stylings of Black America every bit as much as his old country European musical roots.  Elvis really saw the music as the voice of the youth.  He saw it as the soundtrack to the messages he memorized James Dean communicating from the silver screen.  He shook his hips and crooned and hammered his guitar for Sun Records and RCA, and then he seamlessly sewed it all together in his portrayal of disenfranchised young America in “King Creole” in 1958.

And then he went into the Army, and when he came back, he wasn’t the same.  You see, in mid-twentieth century America, rock n roll was dangerous.  Just as black music, despite its centuries of interweaving with Eurocentric musical stylings in the “New World”, seemed to always have been considered, in and of itself, dangerous.  Attribute to it fear of interracial commingling (or worse yet, interracial sex!), fear of moral erosion, or just plain fear of the unknown; whatever reasoning can be assigned, it still points to a fear of rebelliousness to be potentially instilled in America’s youth via the race recording.  And apparently no one recognized this rampant fear better than Elvis’ Colonel Tom Parker.  But more than recognizing that his meal-ticket was playing in hot water, Parker realized that if there truly was a would-be moral backlash coming down the road against rock n roll, and particularly its white heraldry as embodied in Elvis Presley, then he would no longer be counting his deposit receipts from the bank.  So, while Elvis cooled his heels doing his patriotic duty and punching the card for Uncle Sam, Parker hatched a detour to preserve the financial potential of the young rock n roller.

That detour was pop.  By the time Elvis got out of the army, The Colonel had prepared a yellow brick road to the financially lucrative middle ground of pop music.  And while the early 1960s moral brigade went to work full time against the ills of rock n roll as the Great Satan, Elvis was spirited away into a decade of musicals, comedy, and middle of the dial radio safety.  Gone was the edgy young man who out James Deaned James Dean in King Creole.

But this transformation was not exactly detrimental to Elvis.  While the Beatles were having the red carpet rolled out to them, four white Brits with no connection to the American South who were solving the race record issue for the record industry and burying American music in the process, Elvis Presley was solidifying his musical reputation by developing a catalog that would far outbreadth any of his contemporaries and certainly challenge many artists to come after him.  He cut his teeth in rock n roll, but he moved on to rally virtually every other musical styling into his repertoire, and the results were never failure.  His two and a half octave voice and his profound respect for the dreams and history entailed within the art brought every aspect of the musical experience under his power.

Except songwriting.  Yes, Elvis was never a songwriter.  In his quarter century career, it is pretty much accepted that Elvis Presley never wrote a song.  Somewhere there is a label that has his name on it, sharing credit with a handful of other individuals, but it is generally understood that this one credit was honorary rather than indicative of a creative contribution.  Yet it should be acknowledged that it never seemed to be Elvis’ intention to be a songwriter or lyricist.  His focus always appeared to be in the performance itself, as if the presentation of what he chose as important to communicate were more important than anything else.  Elvis holds no place on the shelves of the mighty lyricists and verbal poets and songwriters that crowd the history of American music, but as a performer he is untouchable.  From his earliest toyings at Sun Records to the rhinestoned flash and tumult of his Vegas aristocracy, it is Elvis the PERFORMER that has always been the focus.  Elvis the Renderer, not Elvis the Creator.  And the man always showed a powerful talent for choosing the material and fabric of the musical world that he knew he was best able to sew up into infallible performance.

There are few individuals in the history of American music who have caught and maintained the attention of the listening and observing populace like Elvis Presley.  His presence permeates American, and world, culture.  Whether he is being revered or he is being mocked, the fact is undeniable that he is not ignorable, even now, nearly 35 years after his death.  Elvis has left the building, but the brand he left upon us, love it or hate it, is still raw and fiery.  And history since Elvis keeps bringing us individuals to exemplify his still yawing influence.

Take Michael Jackson.  Michael Jackson apparently had such a profound enamorment with Elvis Presley that not only did he blatantly and proudly incorporate The King’s movements into his dance routines and declared himself “The King of Pop”, but he married the man’s daughter!  Michael Jackson is one of the great personas to imprint world musical culture in the latter 20^th century, a fantastic performer AND singer/songwriter, but how much of who he sought to be and who we allowed him to be was rooted in the legacy of Elvis?

I have a friend.  His name is James King… or Ghassan, depending on how well you know him.  He is Lebanese.  He immigrated to the United States illegally as a teenager in the 1990s to become an Elvis impersonator.

Yes, you read that right.  Ghassan, or James, has an interesting tale.  It is really best to hear him tell it, but I will recount it here because it is good support for my premise of the continuing significance of Elvis Presley.  Ghassan grew up in Beirut, and as a boy he was a gigantic Michael Jackson fan.  Even in the war-torn and anti-American 1980s, Michael Jackson and disreputable American culture could not be kept out of an apparently relatively worldly and cosmopolitan place like Beirut.  And Ghassan was such a Michael Jackson fan that he knew all the lyrics to his songs, although he could not speak English, and no one in Beirut could replicate the King of Pop’s dance moves with more accuracy. 

One day, however, Ghassan was walking through downtown Beirut accompanied by his elder sister.  Suddenly, Ghassan found himself staring up at the plate glass window of a music shop.  Or, more specifically, a poster that was hanging in said window.  It was a poster of Elvis Presley.  !950s Elvis Presley.  Young, virile, red jacketed, standing on the toes of his shiny black shoes, glossy hair swept back, a few stray strands caressing his forehead.

In awe, Ghassan looked up at the hypnotizing image.  “Who is that?” he inquired of his sister.

“Oh, that’s Elvis Presley, an American rock and roll star,” she responded.

“Is he better than Michael Jackson?”

As Ghassan tells it, his sister smirked down at him and said, “Oh yes, he’s the KING of rock and roll.”

And thus began the quest to find something, ANYTHING Elvis in the confines of Beirut.  Despite the availability of Michael Jackson, finding something Elvis was not such an easy task.  But eventually find it he did.  An old, worn cassette tape in a box in a second hand shop.  And Ghassan took that cassette home and poured over it, listened to it, learned it, mesmorized every word… although he did not speak English… and after achieving a level of mastery he would perform for his friends, singing along to “Tutti Frutti” and swinging a tennis ball racket in approximation of a guitar.

And then on to America.  Ghassan dodged the mandatory Lebanese draft, overstayed a student visa, became James King, and pursued the American Dream as an impersonator of the King of Rock and Roll.  Visiting family was difficult due to the fact that his dodging of the draft was a crime punishable by imprisonment if he ever returned to Lebanon, so they would rendezvous in the UAE at his sister’s home.  One such occasion coincided with 9/11, however, and he could not return to the United States without going through the legal paperwork.  But he did.  And he is still here.  James King.  Entertainer.  Elvis.

A couple summers ago, my friend Keefe (who some of you may know as The Omen O’Brien) and I made a pilgrimage across the United States via I-40.  Our ultimate destination was Nashville, but we also paid our respects in Memphis at Sun Studios and Graceland.  Troublemaker that I am, and despite my adamant respect for Elvis (which is an oddity, considering that I am not that much of an Elvis man, myself), I bragged to Keefe a great deal about how my intention was to be thrown out of Graceland.  I mean, think of the notoriety!  Being thrown out of Graceland.  Heh.

Well, as can be expected, I didn’t get too far in my scheme.  I made some off color commentary while waiting in line for the shuttle and then, while on the shuttle, the driver announced the various locales of Graceland we would be seeing on that particular tour.  One such site was Elvis’ private racquetball court.  To this, I retorted, “Awesome, we’re gonna see where the King whacked his balls!”

I don’t know how to explain it exactly, but an immense guilt came over me at that moment.  It is hard to describe, but at best, it was as if there was some kind of moral or ethic code my conscience was warning me that I was breaking, and I could not go forward.  It was almost as if I felt like I was being un-American.  And I fell quiet, all intentions of causing a security-call-grade disturbance fleeing away.

If there is one thing I came away from Graceland with it was an impression of what I can only define as the “modesty” of Elvis Presley.  Having never been to Graceland, seeing it only in pictures my whole life, and not having much for reference, ultimately I was impressed with the sheer smallness of it all.  Sure, it’s a big house by the standards of your everyday Levittown suburb, but it is not a mansion in the sense of the word developed for us by this era of MTV Cribs.  Here was this young man, with more money than he knew what to do with, and instead of commissioning some palatial structure to be built to some exacting standards of his own, he bought an antiquated, modestly large home and dwelled happily in it.  Sure, entering through the front door, you are confronted by his legendary 50 foot long couch… but it barely fits in the room.  And it is ALL there is in the room.  And opposite that is a dining room, surely elegantly (perhaps garishly to some) decorated for entertaining, yet inhabited by a table set that my own family would be hard pressed to gather around without rubbing elbows.  And likewise is the experience throughout the house.  Certainly it is evidenced that the man had an immense amount of wealth to spend, and the tacky glitz typically associated with wealth abounds, but it is all contained within a home that never elicits a feeling of being anything more than just that, a home.

Elvis is not an easy subject to tackle.  As with any human being, and magnified in complexity by fame and assumption of a larger than life identity, it is hard to sift through all the grains and know exactly where you should stand.  There can be no denial that Elvis loved America, but the excess that it brought him seems to almost have consumed him with a voracity that could equal only his own rapid amplification as a giant personality.  Bruce Springsteen put it very eloquently when he stated that Elvis “… was as big as the whole country itself, as big as the whole dream.  He just embodied the essence of it and he was in mortal combat with the thing.”

Late in his life, huge and distraught, addicted to grilled peanut butter and banana sandwiches and prescription medications, it is not hard to imagine Elvis comparing himself with the once vibrant, unpredictable young man he started out as and finding himself wanting.  Just as Elvis was the great initial experiment of drug therapy, doctors prescribing him this or that and some of those in response to his complaints of ailments, he was also America’s first great experiment with mega-stardom.  America injected itself into Elvis Presley, inflating him with all its hopes, dreams, self-perceptions, and responsibilities.  In that swelled accountability, as pointed out by Springsteen, Elvis lost sight of himself, lost sight of that truck driving mama’s boy, lost sight of his own American Dream in favor of America’s Dream.  In turn, America lost sight of Elvis the man and incarnated Elvis the deity.  No amount of valiant battle on his own part could have delivered Elvis Presley from the cross of martyrdom America has crucified him on.

Think of Elvis as kitsch.  The novel, “those were the good ole days” object of adoration.  What is the ultimate kitsch Elvis object?  The Elvis velvet painting, finally denoted as a “Velvis” in the late 20^th century.  Gary Vikan, director of the Walters Art Musuem, wrote in a series of posts that Elvis on velvet goes far beyond the apparent kitschy association and is rather a manifestation of iconography.  He points out that the velvet painting, in spite of “naked women and unicorns”, is an art form of “tears”, dominated by “charismatic martyrs” with Elvis Presley and Jesus Christ at the top of the list.  It is this “thorny crown” that Vikan declares Elvis has handed down to those who have come after him.

Many modern songwriters and musicians, standing in the ever lengthening shadow of The King and no doubt trying to decipher their place in that puzzle, have written of the complexity and confusion the topic of Elvis Presley has left the modern world with.  In the Byrom, Monty, Kimmel penned tune, Elvis on Velvet, presented to us by The Stray Cats on their final album in 1992, examines the parody of merchandising Elvis Presley has become and how it is likely he would be disappointed with the deification laid upon him.

Elvis on Velvet (Byrom, Monty, Kimmel)

All night long way, black top highway, midnight, hittin' a groove
Mustang, radio, rag-top, jukebox, Hound Dog, Don't Be Cruel
Roadside rest stop, all night truck stop, sideshow out of a van
Rhinestone lunchbox, ashtray, junk shop, key chain, hittin' the fan

Elvis on velvet - don't know why it makes me blue
Elvis on velvet - it's got a strange effect on you
Elvis on velvet - somehow it makes me mad
Elvis on velvet - and I can see him tonight up on the road ahead

Well, drift back, daydream, Memphis street scene, 1955
Street flair, flat-bed, three piece string band, shakin', man alive
Then Heartbreak Hotel, Jailhouse Rock, Love Me Tender please
I'm All Shook Up, too much, so Treat Me Nice and Wear My Ring

Elvis on velvet - don't know why it makes me blue
Elvis on velvet - it's got a strange effect on you
Elvis on velvet - somehow it makes me mad
Elvis on velvet - and I can see him tonight up on the road ahead

Well, Graceland, wasteland, right this way ma’am, one low price to pay
His life, his love, his home, his stuff, his final resting place
Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, thy records re-released
All kneel to second guess and bless him, let him rest in peace

Elvis on velvet - don't know why it makes me blue
Elvis on velvet - it's got a strange effect on you
Elvis on velvet - somehow it makes me mad
Elvis on velvet - and I can see him tonight up on the road ahead

More recently, Bono, from larger-than-life rock band U2, worked with Howie B and Brian Eno to create an eccentric album of musics under the band name The Passengers.  On this album is Bono’s exploration of the Elvis Presley question, titled Elvis Ate America.

Elvis Ate America (The Passengers)

Elvis... white trash
Elvis... the Memphis flash
Elvis... didn't smoke hash
Would've been a sissy without Johnny Cash

Elvis... didn't dodge the draft
Elvis... had his own aircraft
Elvis... having a laugh
On the Lisa Marie in a color photograph

Elvis... under the hood
Elvis... with Cadillac blood
Elvis... darling bud
Flowered and returned to the Mississippi mud

Elvis... ain't gonna rot
Elvis... in a Memphis plot
Elvis... he didn't hear the shot
And Dr. King died just across the lot from...

Elvis... vanilla ice cream
Elvis... girls of fourteen
Elvis... the Memphis spleen
Shooting TVs reading Corinthians 13

Elvis... with God on his knees
Elvis... owned three TVs
Here come the killer bees
Head full of honey potato chips and cheese

Elvis... the bumper stickers
Elvis... the white knickers
Elvis... the white nigger
Ate at king burger and just kept getting bigger

Elvis... sang to win
Elvis... the battle hymn
Elvis... the battle to be slim
Elvis ate America before America ate him

Elvis...

Elvis... stamps
Elvis... necromance
Elvis... fans
Elvis... sycophants
Elvis... the public enemy
Elvis... don't mean shit to Chuck D
Elvis... changed the center of gravity
Made it slippy

Elvis... Hitler
Elvis... Nixon
Elvis... Christ
Elvis... Mishima
Elvis... Markus
Elvis... Jackson
Elvis... the pelvis
Elvis... the psalmist
Elvis... the genius
Elvis... generous
Elvis... forgive us
Elvis... pray for us
Elvis... Aaron
Elvis... Presley

And the list goes on.  As much today as ever it seems that Elvis is still a hot topic of discussion.  While much written about him seems to lay the crime of the robbery of rock n roll from the black man at Presley’s feet, as smartly exemplified by Chuck D’s notorious commentary and In Living Color’s “Elvis is Dead”, it can be strongly argued that The Beatles are the real culprits of this heist.  The Beatles, however, in their evolution as near perfect Greek tragedy, garner much sympathy from the modern world.  But Elvis Presley, likely as a result of a serious lack of introspection on the part of America itself, is often played out as a pathetic joke rather than the complicated entity he is, permitting an easy disregard and vilification.

Regardless of stance, however, it is evident that we are likely in need of accepting the fact that Elvis is here to stay.  In the near six decades since Presley became Sam Phillips’ hot item, there has been no one to surpass or usurp the position (and responsibility) America bestowed upon the man.  As a performer with an unmatched repertoire, as a cultural icon, as phenomenon, love or hate, Elvis cannot be easily pushed aside.  The ability to do so likely indicates a lack of knowledge of or connectedness to (or both) the indelible strands of controversy that course through the American (and world) psyche.

Like it or not, Elvis has been placed in a potentially irrefutable position of power within the modern societal construct.  It is a question that has no answer, but despite its unsolvable nature, we must find ourselves continually addressing it.  In the acknowledgment of this significance are we to be okay with Elvis fanaticism?  Probably not.  Fanaticism actually obscures the true topic of importance.  Elvis fanatics hold no better place in my book than The Beatles maniacs that I so often deride.  But it is our challenge, as is the case with all daunting tasks that face us, to be able to delve through these obscurations on the part of the masses and determine our own learned conclusions.  But the starting point is to relegate Elvis to the appropriate spot in our viewpoint.  He was and is important and is not likely to be challenged anytime soon. 

Returning to the words of Bruce Springsteen: “No one will ever take the place of that guy.”

- Squeezebox Sam

TRUE GRITS

“There is no law west of St. Louis. There is no God west of Fort Smith.” – Frontier Proverb

t was my plan to see The Coen Brothers’ interpretation of True Grit on opening day, having a profound respect for Charles Portis’ novel and being an avid fan of the 1969 Henry Hathaway directed adaptation. Alas, the powers that be determined that I would not see the film in some Los Angeles guilded movie palace in the Yule days of December, but rather several weeks later in an attempting-to-be-cosmopolitan movie house in snow-accosted Spokane, Washington. Nevertheless, here is my take on the Coen Brothers offering and the debates surrounding it.

A large source of the debate, in my opinion at least, seems to stem from the idea that the Coens were somehow “remaking” the John Wayne film. I suppose that it is understandable that the common audience would be unable to shake this notion in a time when remakes of previous cinema offerings have become an occurrence of almost ignorable regularity. Paired with the fact that the number of filmgoers in today’s audiences are likely unfamiliar with the text, this has made the underlying murmur a comparison between films rather than a comparative exercise between text and the way in which different filmmakers have envisioned that text.

Admittedly, I started my love affair with the John Wayne film long before I ever sat down to delve into Portis’ book. The 1969 adaptation just intrigued me in so many ways. The film seemed to have a gothic sensibility and a surreal aesthetic that was not to be found in its contemporary western brethren. The characters were offbeat and spoke in strange assemblages of verbage, sometimes Shakespearean, sometimes crude, sometimes a poetic barbarousness that was a puzzling mix of education and incivility. There was a believability of wear and tear and dirt involved in the appearance of the film that was lacking in Hollywood westerns of the time, and the specifics of the firearm references lent a character of hardware absent in a day when every movie cowboy carried a Colt Peacemaker and a Winchester repeating rifle.
There was a nobility to the tale of True Grit that moved me, and yet a very un-American value of greed and revenge that intrigued me, and a callousness and lack of sentimentality towards life and death that I somehow abhorred, but could not shake. And the stories the characters told willed a larger reality into existence than could be contained by the opening and ending credits. Somehow those characters were real… slice-of-life-ish… and I was tempted to believe in them, possibly my first experience with film writing that could create real, living characters that an audience could believe existed outside that celluloid portrait. While obviously a star vehicle constructed around cementing Wayne’s American icon, there were just so many things operating in this film that were awry with the standard process of building a mid-century Hollywood western that I could not ignore it nor brush it aside. To this day it is still one of my desert island film selections. I don’t know that I could live not knowing that I had an access to the 1969 True Grit.

In my mid-twenties, working as administrator of a reading program in a High School library, I came across Portis’ book. There were a half-dozen dust-gathering copies sitting on the shelf in the fiction section and I passed by them innumerable times, always noting that there was the book that that John Wayne movie was based on… always noting that at some point I should read it. I did like to read, after all, and the relationship between films and the books that birth them has always been an interest of mine.

So, over a few mid-morning breaks stolen at Las Fuentes, a Mexican eatery of good repute, I read Portis’ book. And I was amazed. It didn’t take very long into the book for me to realize that everything that had made the 1969 film so undeniably unshakeable for me was actually its almost unrelenting trueness to the text. Everything was there in Portis’ novel. That King James frontier tongue, the wry and witty exchanges, the strong, vividly fleshed out characterizations, the referencing of the Henry Rifle, the Colt Dragoon, the Sharps Carbine, the gothic, Old Testament mentality, the surreal reality of being on the cusp of an uncivilized civilization. Scene for scene, plot point for plot point, conversation for conversation, wry recollections and anecdotes, almost word for word, Portis’ novel had crept onto celluloid in as near unmolested format as I had ever encountered. And it made me feel good inside. Here was a fine book that I felt had been translated into a fine film that did the work justice. I was secure in my admiration of both.

And I’ve carried my True Grit love for some time now. I’ve never encountered another person who actually read the book in my travels through life, but I have encountered a lot of people with poor perceptions of the film. Most of these are critics who first and foremost do not like westerns and therefore I feel were unlikely to appreciate in the first place what I had perceived as the very fine textures the True Grit tale carried within it, but those aside, there have always been the critiques rooted in the genre and technical aspects of the film. Nearly always at the top of the deck is the criticism of Kim Darby’s portrayal of Mattie Ross. “Gads, her acting is so irritating and cardboard,” is typically the observation. And from a point of view of the book, I think my response is that her character is SUPPOSED to be irritating and cardboard. She is a 14 year old girl in the 1877 frontier who has been forced to grow up too quickly. As the eldest child, and with a mother who is not able to step to the task, she has been forced to assume the role of family second. In doing so, she has never actually developed a personal personality. She doesn’t know much of who she is except the role as the one in the family who has to make sure that everything is appropriately taken care of. Keep in mind that a key part of the story of Mattie Ross is the audience’s inability to really feel sorry for her because she does not know how to feel sorry for herself!

Legend has it that Glenn Campbell himself was so disgusted with his acting job after watching the film that he swore he would never act again. In short, Campbell’s performance has never bothered me. I think he pulls off the incredulity and the pompousness entailed by LeBoeuf quite well, and he was a fairly good spar for Wayne while recognizing that it was not his job to attempt and outshine the Duke in his swansong role. Personally, I think there is more criticism to be laid at the droll theme song he recorded for the opening credits than his acting ability.

Anyhow, hearing a couple years ago that the Coen Brothers (filmmakers whose knack for the ironic, surreal, and offbeat has always attracted me to their work, much in the way I was attracted to True Grit in the first place) were going to do a take on True Grit intrigued me very much. It was surprising because I’ve always considered Hathaway’s True Grit as a sort of definitive work of art and it seems that, even with the rash of remakes in the past 20 years, truly definitive works of art have gone relatively untouched (except maybe with the exception of Psycho). Don’t get me wrong. I am not opposed to new takes on old masterpieces, and I have always thought that there were a few fairly definitive westerns that would be warranted with a remake. One of these is High Plains Drifter. Blasphemy, I know, but looking at the film from the point of view that Clint Eastwood is a malevolent spirit makes some of the very concrete occurrences in the film sources of detraction. Another warranted revision I feel would be John Ford’s The Searchers. While the film is fairly on target with the source text, a serial novel called The Avenging Texans, it could stand some aggressive re-touches more in accordance with the viciousness of the source writing. And I’d love to see Bruce Willis reinterpret the role John Wayne made famous.

But, as usual, I digress. Intrigued I was by the Coen Brothers proposal, so I dug into it a little bit. Early on there was not much information as to what the filmmakers were actually planning, but from what I did find it was made very clear by the Coens that their intention was NOT to remake the Hathaway film, but rather to interpret the original Portis text into their own envisioning. And the more I thought about this proposed endeavor on their part the more favorable I was towards it. You see, for all my love of the 1969 film as an adaptation of a fine book, I could see where different persons than those who produced the Hathaway movie could come away with different ideas of how to tell Mattie Ross’ story. In essence, the Hathaway film had already rendered the tale much more third person omniscient by removing the first person narrative of the text’s introduction and epilogue book-ends. The story of True Grit as written by Charles Portis truly is Mattie Ross’ recollective first-person narrative and the Coens were very implicit about their desire to create a rendition of the book where that point of view was preserved. Sounded good to me.

So, having seen the Coen’s film now, I hold fast to their promise that it was not intended to be a remake of Hathaway’s film and praise them for sticking to their intentions of creating a new interpretation of the source book. And a fine interpretation it is. And while they did disclaim comparisons to the previous filmic incarnation, it is obvious they anticipated the inevitable comparisons by casting with an understanding of who they believed could stand up to the iconic Rooster Cogburn of John Wayne. It is probably without hesitation that I can say Jeff Bridges will undoubtedly be Rooster Cogburn for a generation of moviegoers who do not know John Wayne. And for any one for whom John Wayne has always been the manifestation of the questionable Deputy U.S. Marshall, Jeff Bridges does the Duke’s imprint justice… but the comparison is unnecessary.

That being said, the real comparative analysis of this subject lies in how each of the films match up, not to each other, but rather to the book they were inspired by. As mentioned before, and as was the Coen’s intention, the only truly meaningful difference in interpretation is the presentation of Mattie Ross as the first-person narrator. The idea of the tale being told by an aged, spinster Mattie in the 1920s is blatantly absent from the Hathaway film while the Coen Brothers film begins with the voice of Mattie framing the story with an almost verbatim rendition of Portis’ introductory text and ends with a voice over narration recounting her life contemporary to the telling of the tale. This truer-to-the-text perspective overshadows the film’s occurrences with a much stronger somberness than the Hathaway film. The Hathaway version dramatizes the events prior to Mattie’s arrival in Fort Smith in order to flesh out her character without a voice over narration at the beginning. In the end it substitutes an un-textual meeting between Mattie and Cogburn at a time during her recovery from the snake bite (her arm in a sling as opposed to the Coen’s text-accurate amputation) which creates a basis for a happy ending and a foil for the potentially questionable romantic tendencies Mattie has towards Cogburn, significantly lightening the mood that the book prescribed.

Within those over arching bookends, the Hathaway interpretation of Portis’ text is almost continually, unapologetically dead-on. There is, of course, much editing of the text and we lose a lot of the Old-Testamentish-things-are-the-way-they-are perspective prescribed by Mattie’s Protestant severity because we are not privy to the first person narration Portis provides of Mattie’s outlook. The death of LeBoeuf is also a radical departure. But scene for scene, event for event, and dialogue for dialogue the Hathaway adaptation of the film is densely accurate. Beyond the framing of the story within Portis’ chosen format, the Coen’s film veers this way and that way on numerous occasions and fairly boldly. Mattie’s cornering of Cogburn in the outhouse is a brilliant, but solely Coen Brothers addition, the famed “rat writ writ for a rat” negotiations in Chin Lee’s storeroom are disappointingly absent, the boarding house dinner table sequences have been eliminated (most of the character defining conversation of LeBoeuf has been moved to a slightly disturbing moment in Mattie’s rented bedroom, but the humorously rude commentary on the part of the dinner table patrons is also absent), the entertaining banter concerning LeBoeuf’s Sharps Carbine is edited and displaced, and LeBoeuf takes two un-novelesque leaves of the party over the course of the film (one such departure severely changes the dug-out sequence). There are some accuracies the Coens focused on, including making Mattie look more like the girl depicted on the text’s original cover, Cogburn’s twin Navy Colts, an almost word-for-word rendition of the court room inquiry, and Mattie’s 1920s encounter with the elder Cole Younger and Frank James. I am also fairly certain (it’s been awhile since I’ve taken a close look at the book) that the Hanged Man / Indian Trader / Bear-clad Doctor sequence is a Coen Brothers original. Not that I am complaining about the un-textual fleshing-outs, however. I actually relished the opportunity to experience the Coens toying first-handedly with some of the language and offbeat character aspects that so endeared True Grit to me in the first place.

Ultimately, however, despite its more radical and more numerous wanderings from the text, the Coen’s film more truthfully addresses the text as the story of Mattie rather than that of Rooster Cogburn. Story goes that John Wayne himself identified with the character of the 1968 novel so strongly that he attempted to buy the rights to the text before they were appropriated by the film production company. And as such, the 1969 film, devoid of Mattie’s narration, does play out as the story of the redemption of Rooster Cogburn rather than the coming-of-age story of a 14 year old frontier girl hell bent on retribution. The man even won his only Academy Award for his portrayal of the cantankerous and questionably grey-hatted lawman, even though it is considered that his later performances in The Cowboys and The Shootist were superior. If there is evidence needed to point out just how John Wayne-centered the first film adaptation is, one need look no further than the climactic four-to-one shoot out between Rooster and the Lucky Ned Pepper gang. In this pivotal moment, The Duke wields his trademark Colt .45 and loop-levered repeater rifle, and that sequence becomes all John Wayne. The Coens have restored the textual reference to Cogburn carrying the twin Navy Colts of his Confederate wartime days on his saddle, and as does the character in the book, Jeff Bridges wields these in that final, stirring moment.

The Coens’ film is, of course, far more grey (both texturally AND morally) than its predecessor, but this is more likely the result of 40 years worth of filmmaking experience on the part of the cinematic process. It is however a selling point where the downright realism of the subject is taken into account. The attribute of period pieces made within the past twenty years has been a stronger focus on a period correct appearance, aiming for a sort of timelessness, perhaps. Period pieces during the “golden age” of cinema more often than not suffer from cosmetic indicators of the era in which they were created, and few suffer for realism in this case more than the Hollywood western. 1950s and 1960s hairstyles and make-up abound, blue denim and belt loops are rampant, and everyone has the opportunity to sit on a wired hay bale. Most post-Silverado westerns have attempted a more tactile realism in their execution and films like Unforgiven, Open Range, and The Assassination of Jesse James are possessed of an appearance that is hampered neither by contemporary fashion nor by the myth of a cleanly and fashionably clad west. While I believe that the leaning towards an aesthetic realism on the part of the Hathaway film is one of its strong points, it is assuredly still hindered by the moviemaking philosophies of its time, and the slightly more lived in and worn appearance of the Coens’ film as well as its monochromatic, earthy palette definitely put it on the shelf of realism Portis’ “gritty” book deserves in an adaptation.

Notwithstanding the voice over prologue and epilogue, the Coens’ film still struggles with communicating the viewpoint of Mattie Ross that accompanies the entire textual narrative. Both the Hathaway film and the Coens’ film seem to have approached this task with rendering Mattie a sort of blank slate (provided by her slight lack of a developed personality) that is written on by the questionable individuals she encounters. Where this sort of reactionary-ness was the only tool available to the Hathaway film, the Coens, however, have again drawn on half a century of filmmaking evolution and utilized much of the soundtrack as a communicative tool for Mattie’s viewpoint. The 1969 film sports a big, stirring score typical of the era but relatively void in standing as more than a sonic punctuation for the locales and major plot points of the film. The Coens have more fully utilized the premise of music as character and had Carter Burwell incorporate traditional hymns and spirituals into the aural web of the film. The use of these overtly religious toned themes brings in a definite aspect of Mattie Ross’ Biblical eye-for-an-eye viewpoint that is absent from the Hathaway film and supports the darker conception formulated in the Coens’ interpretation. Even the choice of Johnny Cash’s “God’s Gonna Cut You Down” to accompany the trailers signified a recognition of this retributive preoccupation, and the use of Iris DeMent’s lilting rendition of “Leaning on the Everlasting Arms” to wrap up the film further cements Mattie’s conception of righteous judgment. The irony, of course, in true Coen Brothers fashion, is that the instrument of God’s judgment has been none other than Godless, amoral Reuben J. Cogburn.

As is apparent, I could go on. But I won’t. It is enough to say that comparison between the 1969 Henry Hathaway adaptation of Charles Portis’ 1968 novel and the Coen Brothers’ 2010 adaptation of same is a moot point. The films are not versions of each other, but rather adaptations of the same text and should be approached as such. When one finds similarities between the films it is likely those similarities are unavoidable because they were both following the text. While the films have differing interpretations of the source book, neither one is detrimental to the original material. They both stand sturdily on their own envisionings of Portis’ intrepid tale and are both worthy of the place they assume in film history.

- Squeezebox Sam

I Don't Have Time For The Beatles

“Before Elvis, there was nothing.” – John Lennon




t ain’t no sekrit to most folks that know me that I ain’t much of a Beatles person. Usually my nonchalance where these fellers is concerned is misconstrued as a hatred, and I must admit that I have fueled such a perception on more than one occasion with such flagrancy as “Fuck the Beatles” and other colorfully metaphorical statements. But in reality, my feelings for the Beatles are really just summed up in a blatant disregard for them, much in opposition to the typical reverence most of the rest of the

music world treats them with.

You see, it’s not that I have some kind of unmitigated hatred for the Beatles, nor is it even that I contest their abilities as songwriters and musically creative entities. Only a fool would hold up a musical masterwork such as “Sgt. Pepper’s” and claim that it is not a credible and valid contribution to the development of music in the 20^th century western world. My problem is basically that I do not believe they deserve the kind of worship that they have received since their advent. The Beatles got their foot in the door of the music world by standing on the shoulders of others who were far more deserving of the credit, but were constrained by circumstances far beyond their control.

Look at it this way. American music, from its very beginnings, has basically been a story of two intermingling and colliding (and sometimes incestuous) musical heritages. These would be Black music, rooted in the native stylings of ancestral Africa and its Caribbean associates, and the musical traditions of old world Europe. In the birth throes of American music these two roots very quickly become hard to sharply delineate, but with the advent of recorded music one thing becomes very clear: it was difficult to market “black music” to “white audiences”.

The result, as any good student of American history knows, was the “race record” debacle. It was obvious very quickly that what was regarded as black music (as early as what can be categorically defined as blues, jazz, and swing) was popular with youthful white audiences. But the companies producing the recordings could not market the black versions directly to white audiences because of the prevailing segregative mentality of the United States. So, the record companies had to side-step the race-issue by having white artists record versions of the popular black pieces that were then acceptably marketed to the white music consumer.

Anyone who knows anything about music prior to the Beatles knows this tale, so I am likely preachin’ to the choir with this bit, but it’s an important point in my argument against Beatles deity-ship, so I am loathe to skip it. The race record bit really comes into fervent play with the rise of “rock n roll” and the drama it stirred in America’s youth and societal relations in the mid 20^th century. Drama or not, record producers were poised to sell. But even with the mass hysteria and thirst for the driving new music, they still were unable to sidestep the race record process. Legend has it that during one of the re-recording sessions, Pat Boone even tried to grammatically correct his cover of Fats Domino by testing out “Isn’t That a Shame?” Apparently it was bad enough that this music was corrupting the morals of the youth, Boone couldn’t permit it to corrupt their grammar as well (the corruption was not perceived as bad enough, however, to cause record companies to give up the opportunity to make an exploitative buck).

At this point in my diatribe, most folks see where I am headin’ and begin to point out that Elvis Presley (who I do not disregard, it should be mentioned) was guilty of crimes similar to those I am about to lay at the feet of the Beatles. My answer to that attribution is that never once during his career did Elvis Presley ever disconnect himself from the fact that he was a white musician appropriating the stylings of black music. In fact, Presley so revered the black artists he culled songs from that he admittedly attempted to preserve every nuance of the original performers in his renditions. And as the story progresses, note that The Colonel perceived the volatile nature of the rock n roll game Elvis was playing in direct relation to the music’s preconception as a vehicle of black culture inappropriate for the white youth of America. When Elvis returned from the army, The Colonel deliberately recreated his ace-in-the-hole as a pop star, eradicating the connection to the controversy of rock n roll and its undeniable “blackness”.

This said, enter the Beatles on the rock n roll music scene of America in the early 1960s. When the Beatles arrived in America, they were performing music in the stylings of American rock n roll. It wasn’t anything new or different from the controversial domestic music that had been raging for nigh on a decade. The ultimate difference was that the Beatles were NOT American. Here were four white males from England, with no connection to the American south nor the struggle of the American Black, that were playing music proven popular and marketable to an American white audience. But they were not black, nor were they white American artists covering black tunes. They were British and therefore perceived as a new phenomenon… and the record companies, beleaguered at the process of race recordings, snapped up this misconception and ran with it.

It does not need to be pointed out that the success garnered by the Beatles because of this strange twist of fate enabled them to explore and experiment and become the admirable musical phenomenon they were later in their career. But in their wake, the “British Invasion” that followed essentially squelched American music. American blues, rock n roll, AND the birthing phenomenon of garage rock were pushed to the side of the road in favor of an onslaught of bands from across the pond who were performing black American music, but did not have to go through the race record process because there were thousands of miles of ocean covering up the tracks linking them to their black American musical roots.

It could be conjectured that the movement of black music into the realm of Soul was reactionary against the denying of deserved credit to black artists in the market of rock n roll. And then it is interesting to note that when record companies conjured up their own white versions of soul exemplified by girl vocal groups and beach party nonsense, black musicians seemed to have again been forced to find some new musical voice in Funk. Funk, of course, was mimicked and repackaged for white audiences by record companies as Disco.
Looked at in this manner, American musical history can be perceived as a process of record companies trying to figure out how to most effectively and efficiently market a black musical enterprise to a white audience in an American culture plagued by racism and segregation. Ultimately it seems that the birth of hip-hop and rap coincided with positive cultural and race relation effects of the Civil Rights struggles of the 1960s and 1970s. The evolving societal climate enabled record companies to finally abandon the recreation and mimicking of the race record process and today we see the rap and hip-hop phenomenon directly marketed to youth culture regardless of racial or ethnic background.

But what about those black artists of the mid-century who never got the success, credit, and recognition warranted them for their undeniably important contributions to the evolution of American music as we know it? People laud the Beatles and their supposed creative genius, pointing fingers at the masterfully crafted studio works these British invaders were enabled to create using the revenue from their massive success as regurgitators of an already established musical styling. What if the Cab Calloways and the Muddy Waterses and the Lightnin’ Hopkinses and the Chuck Berryses and the Big Joe Turners of American music had been permitted to have such unmitigated financial success? What might those remarkably creative entities have created for us? Perhaps nothing, but it is hard not to wonder what may have come down to us were the furor of rock n roll not snatched away from these men and handed over to four mop-headed cover artists from England, simply because of the fact that they did not have a direct connection to the race struggle marring America’s musical history.  Lennon's famed quote that I began this diatribe with exemplifies this lack of exhibited connection.

Does anyone remember Ted Nugent remarking for the need to keep rock n roll “white”? What fostered such an ignorant statement? Why were the black rock n roll bands “In Living Color” and “Body Count” considered such a novelty? In my opinion it is because the event we know as the Beatles obscured for the common person the fact that rock n roll is at its core a black musical invention. Why does it seem that only such a small part of the American black populace acknowledges rock n roll or the mid 20^th century as part of their cultural and musical heritage? Because socially, that time in American history was brutal to them as a culture, so much so that they were not even allowed to take rock n roll with them as their own creation. It had to be handed over to the Beatles.

In the big scheme of things, the Beatles cannot even really be held accountable for what happened. They can be exonerated as pawns of the music industry and walk away from the whole mess with clean hands and consciences. Besides, who is to deny someone the making of a dollar when the opportunity is offered to them? And also, there is no contest to the premise that what the Beatles created later on in their career was indeed musically valid and important. But for me, the notion that the Beatles were somehow the most amazing, most incredible, most significant thing to ever occur in the history of music in the western world is a difficult pill to swallow.

This said, I will continue to disregard the Beatles. There is too much out there musically that is of equal or more importance that I would rather be focused on. In short, I just ain’t got the time fer them.

- Squeezebox Sam

So Where's Can I Get A Keyboard Like This One?

t's a little outter season, as is typical with a Johnny Come Lately such as I, and I's is prolly askin' fer trouble with this here one (from the woman), but just where do ya think I could acquire my good fer nuthin' self a keyboard like this here one fer my Accordion?  I bet it'd make me an awful better player, havin' ter learn some dexterity in fondlin' them there keys.  No wonders I tend ter write an' sing so much in G.  Har har har.

Keep squeezin' 'em out creative marketin' an' video types!  I'm seein' there might be hope fer the "damned human race" (Mark Twain) after all.

-Squeezebox Sam

Awestruck... Somethin' I Can't Complain About!

ho woulder thought?  Lederhosen, Dirndl, Accordion, Nutcrackers, Old People Types... all the elements fer somethin' ter complain about is here in this video... an' yet I is unable ter do nuthin' 'cept applaud!  Yeehaww!  Makes me wanner go ter this place in Washington.  Good thing the family lives nearby.  Free lodgin', vittles, an' libations!  Haw haw haw!  Watch it.  You'll wanner go there too!



Didja watch it?  Makes my knees sweat an' stirs that thirst fer God's gift ter humanity - BEER.  An' maybe some golf.

-Squeezebox Sam

More Volatile Observations (republished in honor of Michael Vick)

his afternoon, the first day of 2011, I logged onter facebook an' saw that GRIT's wayfarin' stranger Mike Dill done joined some sorter anti-Michael Vick fan club.  It reminded me of this here blog I done perpetrated way back on September 29, 2009 about a relevant subject (an' some other backwards fur rubbers).  So's all the power ter Finger Lickin' Pickin' Mike Dill an' here's a coughed up furball from a year an' a half ago...

Sep 29, 2009

Some More Volatile Observations

Current mood:cranky

“… one of the 18 dogs was missing half of a jaw and another suffered from about 70 open wounds. Still another had scar tissue covering about 75% of its body. At least 13 of the 18 animals were injured.  I had been to a number of murder scenes, but I was appalled." 

- David Hoovler, Federal Prosecutor

"You've got to have a pretty violent streak in you to sit and watch man's best friend rip another one to shreds so someone can make money.”....

- Sandy Christiansen, President of the Spartanburg (S.C.) Humane Society

So’s the other night… last Wednesday, actually, ter be exact, the Stringmeister an’ Mike Dill an’ our pard Ed done met up ter aurally terrorize the denizens of the local Starbucks.  Gotter make yer decisive attacks where ya kin manage these days, eh?

Wells, Stringmeister Aaron an’ I been bringin’ the dogs out fer the occasion lately since they’s don’t get enuff outside time as it is.  Aaron’s new puppy, Goldie, an’ my ‘tarded terrier mix, Rebel, done spend the time rollickin’ an’ rollin’ at leash’s length under our feet whiles we make some music throughout the evenin’.  S’good fer them.

Anyhow, as this here evenin’ wound down ter an end (which included gettin’ egged by a passin’ car, which is another story altergether, but it duz figger rightly that outter four people sittin’ there it’d be the accordion player done gets egged) an’ ever’body ‘cept the Stringmeister an’ I had faded off inter the night, there were some bro-type folks done sat down at the table next ter us.  You know bros.  They’s the white folks who’d like ter partake of black culture as it has developed in these here Americas, but is just too redneck at heart ter truly go all the way.  So’s they have found a precarious middleground where they’s kin kinder ride the fence ‘tween dirt-bikin’ an’ hip-hoppin’.  Them folks who’s consumed with bein’ Famous “Family” an’ wearin’ low backwards baseball caps an’ are always talkin’ ‘bout hittin’ “the dunes, dude”.

So these fellers done sit down at the table ‘side us an’ one of them is immediately innerested in Aaron’s pooch.  Now, Goldie is an Alapaha American Bulldog, but this feller seems ter think it’s a bull terrier of some sort an’ he’s all scratchin’ her behind the ears proclaimin’ “What a beautiful dog you are.  Oh, what a cute dog you are!  What a good lookin’ dog you are!  Oh oh!”

He’s right surprised when he finds out it ain’t no bull terrier, but he finishes pattin’ her an’ then goes an’ sits back down with his pards.  ‘Bout that time, a local feller goes walkin’ by with his dog on a leash an’ Goldie starts ter get right uptight an’ is exhibitin’ some bad behavior by strainin’ on the leash an’ barkin’ an’ snarlin’ at the passin’ dog.

Well, as Aaron is strugglin’ ter get Goldie ter behave, I overhear these fellers next ter us laughin’ an’ jokin’ an’ the one who wuz scratchin’ her just a few moments earlier, he done makes some crack ‘bout the frustrating dog interaction: “Man, I’d pay good money fer this!”

Pay good money fer what?  Ter see two dogs rip each other ter shreds fer the fulfillment of some tweaked masculine-ish entertainment?  What the Hell?  Don’t people ever think ‘bout that kinder stuff?  Would Goldie be even more beautiful, an’ cute, an’ good lookin’ ter this feller once she wuz torn up, mutilated, an’ bleedin’ in some dog-fightin’ pit somewheres?  Or worse yet, were his fondness fer the dog not rooted in an appreciation fer her elegance as a dog itself, but rather fer the imagined violence it could endure an’ dole out in a confrontation with some other dog?

What kinder people even IMAGINE that such a thing could be entertainin’, much less tolerable.  Where’s the humanity?  Is a dog simply a feeling-less plaything fer us ter pawn off fer our own cruel an’ violent (not ter mention detestable) amusements?

Alright, so’s I hope you see my point ‘bout the dog bit.  Unfortunately, however, the past week ain’t been without more aggravated observations on my part. 

This mornin’ I were sittin’ in Denny’s before I headed off ter work, watchin’ that silly closed circuit Denny’s television that done seemed ter pop up in all their locations overnight.  And there’s this Cold Play video playin’.  Well, in this here video the band members is all represented by these performin’ marionette-type puppets that are puttin’ on an act at a pre-school er somethin’ of the like an’ there are all these lil kids watchin’ their show.  Well, it’s yer typical slow, lifeless, pathetic Cold Play song, but over the course of the video these puppets crowd surf, smash their instruments inter the PA, and blow up the drum kit a la Keith Moon.

What’s this foolishness ‘sposed ter mean?  Are these fools really tryin’ ter equate their drawl with the punk and rock energy of the likes of The Who an’ The Clash?  Give me a doggone break, an’ don’t you dare fer a moment try ter tell me that they are makin’ some sorta statement er some such balderdash.  At the end of the video them marionettes done jump inter a helicopter an’ make some sorter getaway.  Cold Play as Jimi Hendrix?  Good grief.

One of my friends who I done discussed this with suggested that maybe they thought they wuz somehow satirizin’ er mockin’ the punk scene, but in all honesty, who the Hell is Cold Play ter bein’ doin’ somethin’ like satirizin’ punk rock?  On what grounds do those ding dongs think they have the right ter mock punk?  Ter quote my pard Tom:  “They are disingenuous, inauthentic idiots who make innocuous music for the vapid box populi.”

Nonetheless, don’t mind me.  My ire is up.  I dislike them fellers.

On a lighter note, today while I wuz sittin’ in Del Taco eatin’ my Taco Tuesday acquisitions, the person servin’ the drive-thru window done had the box on speaker so’s ever’one in the restaurant could hear them folks orderin’ outside.  This one lady, she done sez inter the microphone:  “I want a chicken quesadilla… with chicken in it.”

-Squeezebox Sam