The Floor Improv Night : The Virgin Commercial

The Floor takes to the skies!!

This commercial will be run exclusively on Virgin Airlines. The music is by Walter Davis (music director/sax). The Floor Improv Night is Monday, Jan 17 at King-King (6555 Hollywood Blvd).

pictured : Sascha, me, Carolina & Walter

The Floor Improv Night is the third Monday of the month (subject to change)

In February and March there will be 2 Improv Nights.

For details check The Floor website OR check out The Floor Facebook page.

Happy New Year to Carolina, Sascha, Walter and The Floor familia.

Vintage Trouble Hit The Strip Club

Girls! Girls! Girls!

I'd never been to Crazy Girls before, but the band Vintage Trouble was playing there, so I thought I would check it out. It's a bikini bar (not a strip club) which means the dancing girls are covered — barely covered — but covered. They danced while the band played and we made it "rain" $1 bills.

Here's some pix from the night.

Special shout out to Dede!!

Much love to "troublemakers" Anjali & Jenn.

Special thanks to the band - Ty Taylor, Richard Danielson, Rick Barrio Dill, Nalle Colt & Charlie Brumbly. Vintage Trouble play every Tuesday night at Harvelle's in Santa Monica. Their first album, The Bomb Shelter Sessions is available on iTunes and Amazon.

...and to Catherina from the alley behind Harvelle's : "on wheels, i roll"

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AUDACIOUS.

(a cliché in horizontal poetry)

The return of the lack

The beginning of the end

The truth in the light of day

The secrets in the dark of night

The silly

The snorted

The audacity you've shown me

The childlike version of your story

your glory

Your beauty

Love gone wrong

but still on

(at least in song)

Get it in writing

Or it doesn't exist

Ha! So you think

You don't stink

Like I do

While I stew

While I jerk

While I smile

While I work

While I die

While I fly

While I question

And wonder why.

You can't always get what u want.

You can't always know when you're acting like a jerk-ass.

You can't help who you are

And what you do

We're all animals

Sharing the sun

Missing opportunities

Frustrated rhythms

Among yet alone

No real place to go home.

Still I exist

Still I smile

Still I find time

To get on the grind

To party and joke

To complain and be quiet

Enjoy the dark and the moody.

Enjoy?

"Enjoy" she said.

The Love Parade

Nix x2.

Nick and Nick.

Two guys in their 20s with long hair.

One a musician, the other a fan.

There really isn't much more to the story than that. We met a time or two - exchanged a postcard once - and ultimately he fell to underground obscurity. One hit wonderism. But I was there to begin with.

Nick Laird-Clowes and myself at Texas Records, Santa Monica

It was Valentine's Day*. I went to Tower Records in Sherman Oaks - his band - The Dream Academy - was behind a table while a decent sized crowd waited in line for the band's autographs. Pushing kids along and keeping things moving was a woman I had met several times in different settings, all related to the music industry. She was a VP of marketing or something at Warner Bros.

Kate St. John & Nick Laird-Clowes @ Tower Records, Sherman Oaks (WB exec Cat Lincoln behind Nick)

It was pouring rain that night.

The water was coming up over the curb on Ventura Blvd because the streets were so flooded. I chose this night to venture out with my Mom's Nikon camera from the 70s and attempted to figure out the dials and stuff and take pictures. I never quite got the hang of it. None of the pictures came out - except the one above.

Cover art for The Love Parade single

Dream Academy were Nick Laird-Clowes - vocals/guitar, Kate St. John - oboe and Gilbert Gabriel - keys. Their first album was produced by David Gilmour.

Their first single "Life in a Northern Town" was a worldwide success charting at #7 on the U.S. Billboard Chart. The song also made #15 in the UK Singles Chart. The follow-up single, "The Love Parade" reached #36 on the US Billboard Chart and #68 on the UK Chart.

*It was this night I would meet my ex-wife (unfortunately).

That's a whole 'nother story.

Love Parade lyrics:

Look out your window any day

from June to September the love parade's

out on the street where you live and you know

it's just a matter of time before it takes over

They've been married for so many years

now a young love seranade blows sweet nothing in her ear

they're lonely together, when they're not apart

it feels like she's holding on to someone else in the dark.

Oh the love parade is on

even against all odds

it'll go on forever

the love parade

only matinee shows

the love parade.

But if he could put himself into a different skin

he'd be worrying about what he's let himself in for

hanging in the air apparent

a point of view almost transparent

So you sold your soul for a pocket full of sweet talk

forget-me-not kisses at the end of a slow walk

and when it's done you put your world back on

'cause she's otherwise engaged married to someone

Oh the love parade goes on

even when you're gone

it'll go on forever

the love parade

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how did you know you would save me tonight?

it was close, and i christened you keeper of my sanity.

even when others - faced with consequence -

turned away; clicked off; left me alone.

the journey out seemed long and impossible;

then you called-

then you appeared -

with phantom tea and cookies and no complaints;

just friendly staff;

and wiped away the toys and tears

with soft talk and loud music.

The Floor #31 : Hipstamatic Shots

I took some Hipstamatic™ shots to accompany the photo album posted on Facebook [click here]. The Floor #31 kicked off with a performance by Magnolia Memoir - a jazz/rock/pop group featuring the vocals of Mela Lee.

Magnolia Memoir's Mela Lee

Walter Davis is the Music Director/Saxophone player at The Floor. But you probably already knew that. He keeps his band tight and leads 'em through 2 sets of heavy dance/jazz/afro-cuban/funk which keep the people spinning on their heads and jumping around like kinetic popcorn - electric slippin and slidin' til the power's switched off.

Bjørn Fleuren - bass guitar

Maus - the best bartender in L.A. (@ King-King)

The incomparable Walter Davis on saxophone

Bjørn at the bar

Magnolia Memoir

Dancer Angel Jenkins

Magnolia Memoir's Gordon Bash on bass & Toby Karlin on sax

Dancer Kelsey McCowan

Magnolia Memoir's Gordon Bash on bass & Matt Lucich on drums

Magnolia Memoir's bassist Gordon Bash and guitarist Aron Forbes

Musician and old friend Alex Gordon

Maus!!

guitarist Tetsuya Moriguchi & keyboardist Eric Parker
The fabulous Vakisha & the awesome DJ Uniek

Maus and Alex Gordon

Me with Vakisha

drummer Asa Watkins & tapdance mistress Sarah Reich

Magnolia Memoir's keyboardist and vibraphonist Alexander Burke pictured here with DJ Uniek who spins the hot hits and the hip-hop and entertains in tandem with his group The Club Bullies.

guitarist Fuzzbee and keyboardist Eric Parker

The super-baaadddd Gabriella

Breakfast Club : Dorthea and Peter at iHop after the fact.

Happy New Year to the Floor Familia. See you all in January.

Today Is Carolina's Birthday

Carolina used to dance at Harvelle's every Tuesday as part of Bongo Fury - an amazing nu-skool burlesque triumph that was my sole impetus for coming to Harvelle's many years ago. While Bongo Fury no longer exists as it did - I made some amazing friends : Walter Davis, Asa Watkins, Bjorn Fleuren, Victor Orlando, Toledo Diamond, Adrian Govind and of course Carolina Cerisola.

Happy Birthday Carolina!!

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i'm leaking from every pore it seems these days

nothing a chilled glass of medicine couldn't fix

'til i'm waxed and dabbed and confessed out my soul

i lay in my bloody naked bed stripped to it's texture

slathered in thick sweat suffocating.

The Floor : Monday

THE FLOOR

Monday Dec 13 9pm

6555 Hollywood Blvd.

Esperanza : Video Collaborationwith K.G. Superstar

K.G. Superstar put this video together. Clocking in at 1:11 - Mr. Superstar took my poem, (Esperanza) created the visuals and wrote the music. Nice work K.G.!

Esperanza can be read here [Esperanza]

Special thanks to Kavion Griffith for hooking me up!!

*LOVE*

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i was pretty spaced out
so i watched some tv
cartoons mainly
try to follow the plot
figure the lies
separate wheat from chaff
original and now
until tomorrow
preparing
for the apocalypse
one sham-wow
at a time

UltraLove -Slow Your Roll, Sweet Peaches

Ultralove is a Venice based group that is the musical vision of frontman Michael Wagner, a Philly native who arrived in L.A., a couple of years ago - his music being the impetus. The band consists of Mike "UltraLove" Wagner (Vocals, Guitar), Seth Murphy (Drums), Douglas Showalter (Guitar), Mike Gunn (Bass), Love Logiq (Vocals), Soulstar (Vocals), Adam Berg (Keys) and Joel Van Dijk (Guitar).

They play at Harvelle's - the oldest bar on the West side (circa 1931) every Monday. People seem to come from all parts of town to spend a night with the band as they produce their wholly inventive sound. Part R&B, part funky-folk with a heavy hip-hop influence, Ultralove is a band worth checking out. [Ultralove website]

[rev-o-lu-tion] is their EP which is available at all the usual outlets -

Amazon, iTunes, etc. It's got 6 songs - the best of which is a hip-hop flavored jam called Sweet Peaches. "her best friend was a Marlboro red" - is a great line; the lyrical hook - "slow your roll, sweet peaches" is A+. The band is snare-drum-tight and super groovy.

Here's a video from a recent Monday at Harvelle's (11/29/10)

He usually closes with this one. It's called "Rich And Famous"

Its catchy as hell!!

Soul singer/producer T-Smidi joins in near the end. Get it Smidi!!

Last Leg is another track I particularly like.

It's got swinging horns and has a feel unlike anything else on the EP.

It reminds me a bit of Animal Nightlife's Love Is Just The Great Pretender. Check it out below!

(FYI : Animal Nightlife's LIJTGP spent six weeks on the UK charts, peaking at #28 in July 1985)

Animal Nightlife - Love Is Just The Great Pretender ©1985 Island Records

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african head lice
eliptical adaptation
the kinky
the oiled
the pomades
the shape of the shaft
the staff of the past

Love Love

Here's the deal with the band Pulp — somehow in the 90s they became a big Britpop band and were embraced by the masses and especially by my friend Tosh; but back in the eighties Pulp had just released a 7" single called My Lighthouse and IMHO they never wrote a better song. That song however did very little for their career. How they got to be so huge a decade later is still a mystery to me. But ask Tosh. He'll tell you.

Shortly after, Pulp put out a 6 song album called "It". On side 2 was the non-sequiter of a song called Love Love. It's message was simple and clear. It incorporated some dixieland style banjo and clarinet. Here is Love Love and below it is My Lighthouse.

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We spent most of our time high or stoned or trying to get even higher or stonier. Especially in the summer months, we'd stay up all night or nod out as necessary blasting our Funkadelic records with only the Pacific Ocean to join in on the choruses; having the ocean as a cantakerous old man of a neighbor, constantly warning to stay off of his lawn.

"Super-stupid bought a five cent bag/

thought it was dope - but it was skag*"

We smoked for days and we smaked for hours; spent weeks with dirty sheets and little to eat. If we weren't shooting - we were screwing; we were hot and bothered and nasty all the time. We climbed the walls. We body surfed through the waves at dawn. We hid from the sun until night fall. We bathed in the midst of it unafraid; diving into the world's spotlight screaming "COME AND GET ME!!"

*Super Stupid - Funkadelic

All You Need Is Love

All You Need Is Love played over the P.A. at an ice rink when I was quite young.

I couldn't yet stand up on my skates but was struggling to learn.

There was a girl called Colleen.

She went to my school, and on Saturdays she would ice skate with a trainer very early in the morning. She invited me to come join her on one of these skating lessons. I wrongly assumed that she often invited classmates to join her on these Saturdays. I accepted her invitation even though I didn't know how to skate. I sat in the stands and watched the prettiest, flashiest girl in the 3rd grade twirl around in a tiny skirt, lifting in the draft of her turns, exposing her little skater panties. I was hooked. She had a face on her that I can still see clearly in my mind. Even at 9 years old I was attracted to the prettiest, flashiest girl in the room.

I'm not sure what she was training for, but she did this every Saturday.

After her lesson ended, the rink opened and people came in to skate. She helped me rent some skates and sort of gently showed me how to stand on the ice - but I'm a stubborn student and didn't pick it up at all. I'm sure she got frustrated and had envisioned a much more romantic afternoon - perhaps skating round and round holding hands - but it didn't happen that way.

Eventually I left the rink and changed back into my socks and shoes and we went to the snack bar and had some watery powdered hot chocolate in a styrofoam cup. This also was not romantic.

I still had no clue that she might have invited me because she liked me, and missed that this had become a kind of a date. I had no idea it would be so hard to stand on the ice on thin metal blades (WTF?!?!?) and I was hyper focused on trying not to fall on my ass, because when I did it was painful and humiliating. Who can think about romance under those circumstances?

Her mother picked us up and we got in her station wagon.

Date over.

I wildly misinterpreted her one-time gesture as an open invite and tagged along - not just once, but twice or three times. My mom would drive me to her house and I would ride with her and her mom to the rink. I would sit in the bleachers and eat mini pizzas while she twirled around in her tiny skirt. When the lesson ended and the rink opened to the public I would put on my rented skates, get on the ice and drag myself around the rink holding the railing as she flew by again and again.

She grew weary of this ritual and on at least one occassion she made sure to leave her house with her mom a

few minutes early in a successful attempt to avoid me.

I guess my mom knew what was up and so the next week she drove me to the rink herself and told me she was gonna teach me to skate. My mom had been a semi-professional ice skater in her youth and knew she could teach me to stand up on my skates - which she did. (Thank you mom). The first time she let go of my arms and I successfully skated on my own, All You Need Is Love came over the murky P.A. It was a warm and fuzzy moment of realization as I skated tentatively round the rink- but by myself. I was able to skate up to Colleen as she expertly handled herself - but she was neither impressed or interested in me any longer.

She had moved on some time ago I realized.

My Mom on skates 

Colleen and I continued on similar paths graduating to junior high and then high school. I heard a rumor about her "going all the way" with a guy during a film in a biology class, but that was never verified and I took it with a LARGE grain of salt, as most things boys said about girls in Junior High were not true. 


At one point we found ourselves sitting next to each other in a math class that neither one us was smart enough to understand. We bonded over that - we even reminisced about the past, and she confessed to me about how she had left early to avoid me on those early skating Saturday mornings. She was refreshingly candid, and still looked great. She was still the prettiest and flashiest girl in the room - now dressing in Dolphin™ shorts and terry cloth tube tops - which as the fashion at the time, drove all us boys into a deep frenzy.

A few years ago, I tried to get back on the ice with some friends.

They were novices, trying to learn themselves, and had started going frequently, and they invited me. When I joined them, I confidently rented my skates and laced 'em up and proceeded to the ice which took me down almost immediately. I subsequently tried to stand again, but I was lost.

I was done.

I retired to the part of the building farthest from the ice, returned my skates and sat there waiting for my friends to finish.

Ice skating and me are done.

But today whenever I hear All You Need Is Love I think of skating on my own for the first time - my mother letting go of me and showing me the way to soar.

LoveLoveLove

Lenny Kravitz's LoveLoveLove.

Love Love Love!!!

Whole Lotta Love!!*

This song embodies the spirit of LOVE.

In it, he lists all the things he doesn't need:

Don't need no television

Don't need no movie stars

Don't need no custom private planes

Don't need no politicians

Don't need no stocks and bonds

Don't need no cars or boats or trains

Don't need no diamond jewellery

Don't need no rare cigars

Don't need no magnums of champagne

Don't need no penthouse mansion

Don't need no Paris fashion

Don't need no shiny golden chain

Don't need no plastic surgery

Don't need no country clubs

Don't need no butlers, cooks or maids

Don't need no marijuana

Don't need no ecstasy

Don't need no blow or sleeping aids

Don't need no personal trainer

Don't need no fortune teller

Don't need no job that gets me paid

Don't need no more religion

Don't need no air condition

Don't need no one to get me laid

Don't need no private island

Don't need no chandelier

Don't need no million dollar view

Don't need no helicopter

Don't need no magazine

Don't need nobody else but you

in the chorus he concludes:

There ain't nothing you can give me

I'm already there

I got love

I got love love

I got love love love

He doesn't need anything because he has LOVE!

I think Lenny should have got a hip-hop artist to do the rapping portion of the song (which kicks in right at 2 min mark); Andre 3000, Ghostface Killah, Mos Def or even Jay Z would have been cool choices.

Lenny's other great "love" song is Let Love Rule - the first song on his first album (also the title of the album). It is also a favorite of mine. I never get tired of hearing it.

As long as we're talking bout Lenny Kravitz (and quoting *Led Zeppelin); a few years back when Lenny had his big hit Are You Gonna Go My Way, it was so over-played I quickly grew tired of it. At some point in time, Lenny did a performance at some awards show and hired John Paul Jones (of Led Zeppelin) to play bass. It changed the song completely and I started loving it!

I gained a new and incredible respect for John Paul Jones and realized that in Led Zep he was the crucial link between drummer John Bonham and guitarist Jimmy Page. Those two were groundbreaking players who chewed up music and spit it out like no one had ever heard before. As the bassist/ keyboard player, John Paul Jones had to put it together and make it whole and fit for a king — which he did.

He was working twice as hard as the others in the group and contributed twice as much yet he's overlooked and overshadowed by the style and lore of Page, Bonham and Robert Plant. Plant and Page have reunited on several occasions (fyi - Bonham died back in 1980), but John Paul Jones is nowhere to be seen. At Led Zeppelin's induction at the Rock 'N' Roll Hall Of Fame in 1995, the three of them showed up and John Paul Jones said "Yes, thank you. I'd just like to add also my thanks to Peter Grant, who gave us the freedom to do what we did, and also, thank you, my friends, for finally remembering my phone number."**

Fuck those guys!!

I think Jones should join the White Stripes. They don't have a bass player and Jack White is an obvious Zeppelin fan. I think it would sound completely awesome. What you say??

Check out the aforementioned performance of Are You Gonna Go My Way in the video below (Christian whatshisname introduces the band), and listen to John Paul Jones' adaptation of the original bass line in the song. It totally rocks!!

Finally - how cool is Lenny's ultra-afro'ed drummer Cindy Blackman?!?!

**Rock N Roll Hall of Fame Site:

http://rockhall.com/inductees/led-zeppelin/transcript/john-paul-jones-accepts/

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now you'll listen-

like i listened in ernest

as you talked

within our safeship

about the future

and laughed-

reimbursing the past

but in your wisdom-

toppled the kettle and

scorned the electric—

the time has passed and

with it

my cabled emotions

dragged through depressions

packed into pastry

angered into oblivion

i see nothing-

but a red ragged blotch

where you used to be

Grandpa Ralph 8/31/1911 — 11/12/2010

Grandpa's Obituary -L.A.Times:

Aug. 31, 1911-Nov. 12, 2010

Another cherished member of the Greatest Generation has passed at age 99. Ralph Morgulis was born and raised in New York City where he attended Brooklyn College of Pharmacy. In 1936 he married Elizabeth Feinstein who was the light of his life for 63 years. They started their married life in NYC and in 1946 moved to Los Angeles where they owned and operated several drugstores. Always artistic, Ralph became an accomplished painter in his later years. Ralph was blessed with a fine family and countless wonderful friends. His positive attitude and gentle ways will be sorely missed by all who knew and loved him.

Grandpa Ralph celebrated his 99th birthday a month and a half ago.

The L.A. Times missed a few important details in his obituary, so here's a few recollections of my own about him.

He was one of those old school Grandpas.

He had a mustache.

He wore suspenders.

Back in the 70's he smoked a pipe.

He had a favorite lounge chair.

He watched the world change and he went with the flow.

He was a musician, a painter, a golfer, a swimmer, a Lakers fan, a carpenter, a pool shark, an extremely logical thinker and a dancer.

He played the accordion, the mandolin, the piano and the organ. He was in a "Mandolin Orchestra" for a time and later had his own group (with my dad) called The Geritones.

He married Elizabeth (aka Grandma) in New York and they settled down in Tarzana, CA. They had a movie star home and a beautiful backyard full of palm trees and fruit trees and a waterfall and a kidney shaped swimming pool with an extra bouncy diving board. I spent my youthful summers there, mostly with Grandma, because Grandpa worked long hours as a pharmacist/drug store owner. Grandma drove a pale yellow Cadillac nicknamed "the boat" due to it's size. They had a remote controlled automatic garage door before anybody. I broke it the first week they got it by pushing the up/down button too many times in rapid succession.

In the eighties, I always brought friends over their house - some to hang out and swim, but sometimes I would have band rehearsals or recording sessions in the house when the grandfolks were on vacation. Many of my friends knew the house, if not my actual grandparents.

In the 1990s he and my Grandma often went folk dancing in Santa Monica and I would meet them for an early dinner. Grandma died in 1999, and while things would never be the same without her, he lived a beautiful and peaceful life full of art and music, family and friendships & dancing and laughter.

At his 99th birthday party about 75 people attended. Everyone danced and sang and ate and drank. It was a real celebration of the man. People argued over who would sit next to him at dinner. He insisted I sit next to him so we could talk and catch up, which we did. He wanted to know what was going on in my life, with my writing and with some of my friends. Virtually everyone came up to me and told me how important my grandfather was in their life. At the end of the night, after the party, I spent some time with him in his room and took the photos seen here. The last photos of him I will ever take.

pix taken with the Hipstamatic™ app on the iPhone 8/31/2010 Tarzana CA

The Floor : Monday

THE FLOOR #30

Monday Nov 15

6555 Hollywood Blvd.