The Bronx Bull: I am Jake

Every time I think I know what my next few posts are going to be something comes out of nowhere and takes over this most fickle and obsession prone mind.
I went to a screening of Raging Bull Monday night. I've seen this movie many times because I'm a huge, huge Scorsese mark, but the fire this time affected me differently. I focused on different things, saw different connections etc.
I usually just get lost in the stunning black and white, the phenomenal editing, De Niro's soul-scraping performance, but this time I really started to think about who Jake LaMotta was and why De Niro felt so connected to him. I know they became close after filming began because LaMotta worked closely with De Niro to choreograph the boxing scenes to ensure their authenticity and intensity; but even before that De Niro felt a strong bond with him.
There's a famous anecdote recounted by Peter Biskind in his classic slice of cinematic history Easy Riders, Raging Bulls, where Scorsese and De Niro are meeting with studio bigwigs and one finally expresses his exasperation and dismay with the ugly, bleak characterization of Jake LaMotta, the two were pitching, by referring to him as a "Cockroach."
After this epithet was uttered-

"A suffocating silence fell over the room like a blanket. De Niro, in jeans and bare feet, slumped in an easy chair, had said nothing. He roused himself, and said quietly but distinctly, 'He is not a cockroach...He is not a cockroach.'" Biskind p.390

On the surface, though, the movie they made makes it hard to disagree with the baffled exec.
I know through interviews that Scorsese didn't feel any connection to LaMotta until years of coke benders, coupled with severe asthma, almost cost him his life in 1978.
Biskind drives that point home, rather dramatically, while depicting De Niro's visit to a hospital bedridden Scorsese urging him to make Raging Bull once and for all:

"'Are we doing it or not?' Scorsese replied, 'Yes.' He had finally found the hook: the self-destructiveness, the wanton damage to the people around him, just for its own sake. He thought: I am Jake." Biskind p. 387

This angle of Scorsese's personal connection to La Motta was emphatically driven home Monday night.
The connection works on a few different levels. I remember reading a library book on Irish and Italian Filmmakers years back that had a great section on Scorsese that has always stuck with me. I think it's this one, but I can't be 100% sure....at any rate Scorsese tells the author how he remembers reading that St. Francis of Assisi said or wrote somewhere that animals were closer to God than human beings because they act purely on instinct (designed and bestowed upon them by god) with no consciousness to evaluate, restrain or interfere with their actions, thus according them a level of purity denied to human beings. I believe that this is something else Scorsese saw in La Motta: someone acting purely on instinct and basically unable to act any other way. The curious paradox here is that even though Scorsese seems to locate that pure animal instinct in LaMotta as an explanation (I'm not ready to say justification) of his actions, he pointedly has the character, at absolute rock bottom in a jail cell, insist that he is NOT an animal. An interesting contradiction, but these types of contradictions are what create the tension inherent in great characters. The other level of Scorsese's connection to Jake that works is in the idea of Jake taking these horrible beatings in the ring to act as penance for his sins and the damage he has caused. This has resonated with me because it connects with a core, purely Catholic, tenet of Scorsese's aesthetic best articulated by Charlie (the director's thinly disguised alter ego) in Mean Streets that: you don't do penance in church saying Hail Marys...that's not good, or real, enough...you do your penance in the streets, in the world by your actions. Jake (through Scorsese) seems to adhere to this belief just as strongly as Charlie, and his way of achieving real penance is absorbing punishment in the ring. To further reinforce these connections and themes reverberating throughout Scorsese's ouevre remember that one of Charlie's heroes is: St. Francis of Assisi. I found out through IMDB that being unsure of exactly how to shoot and edit the pivotal sequence of the "St. Valentine's Day Massacre" where Jake idly absorbs an unbelievably brutal beating from Sugar Ray Robinson, Scorsese obtained a shot list of the shower scene in Psycho and used that as a blueprint. The scene takes place right after Jake beats up his brother and wife, so the connection of it being Jake's penance is made pretty explicit, but for the first time I looked at it as Scorsese's own bloodletting, which might explain the extreme violence, yet also Jake's defiant, wobbly insistence to Ray that he never went down. This is, I believe, Scorsese's vicarious self-flagellation and penance. Precursors of this masochistic self-flagellation can be detected in Scorsese's "Big Shave" documentary, even though the underlying message of the film was political not personal. I also, for the first time, saw Scorsese as Jake in his dealings with Mob boss, Tommy Como. I equated Como with the studio system telling Jake that no matter how stubbornly he insists on doing things his way, he can't/won't achieve his potential without giving them what they want. Jake has to take a dive and the scene afterwards where he just cries abjectly into his managers shoulder has always been the most brutal scene in the movie.

As a filmmaker working within the system even during the so-called "era of the director" that Biskind writes about, Scorsese has to make humiliating commercial concessions etc. to get the chance to make the movies he really wants. Much like Jake having to take a dive against Billy Fox before getting a much-deserved title shot.

Scorsese says not to read too much into the use of the “I could've been a contender" speech from On the Waterfront for various reasons. But I have to wonder is that him lashing out at the studio system? Biskind contends that deep-down, and maybe overtly at times, Scorsese wanted success and acceptance on the level of Lucas/Spielberg. Or is he lashing out at himself. He has said many times that he legitimately thought Raging Bull would be his last film. Is this him reflecting on wasted, squandered potential?

A lot of new things to think about.

I still feel that the beauty of the photography is the ultimate paradox and the true key to this film's legacy and impact. The beauty lulls you into a sense of security that calms and disarms you so that the explosions of violence are that much more stark, surprising and sad.

Gimme, Gimme some BIG dumb American RAWK vol.I

image courtesy of rateyourmusic.com

Been pawing through the bins at Plan 9 records the last few weeks, searching for underappreciated, underused examples of big ole', radio-shunned, lighters and smelly smoke-clouds, live drum solo having RAWK.
Midway through all this, while pondering a years in the making post making the case for Aerosmith as the second best American band of all time (behind the Ramones of course), I realized that all these other bands I've been checking out, recently, happen to be American as well.
This wasn't a pre-requisite or anything as I'm always searching for British stuff like Leafhound and all manners of weird, heaviness from all corners of the globe, it just happened that my recent finds and obsessions have originated here in the US and A.

I can't help but think of Dazed and Confused (number one priority of the summer: Aerosmith tickets!) when thinking of what it might have been like to catch some of these bands in their prime on a sweaty, Spring night.
One of the albums I've been listening to is Black Oak Arkansas's Raunch 'N Roll Live and I just get lost wondering, when it spins, about the sheer amount of sex and controlled substances that surely were exchanged before, during and after this show as authentic 70's sweat pours through Black Oak's triple guitar assault and out of my soggy speakers.
And I haven't even mentioned Jim Dandy yet!
His rap before "Hot Rod" should be enshrined in any sort of Hall of Fame way before Gene Simmons' wig and the team of producers, publicists, parasites and sycophants behind the product known as "Madonna."
Before Ozzy so heinously jumped the shark, I used to actually think it was a crime that anyone was in the Rock Hall of Fame before Sabbath. Now I'm just happy that Geezer, Tony and Bill got one fraction of the credit they so richly deserve for reshaping modern music infinitely for the better.
Back to Black Oak, I'd heard or read somewhere that 'Diamond' David Lee Roth modeled/stole his persona largely off of Jim Dandy. I can see that a little from a visual standpoint, but honestly when it comes to stealing from Mr. Dandy I detect way more theft and unpaid royalties emanating from, and owed by, Axl Rose.
Similarities between Black Oak and Guns n' Roses have been made explicit by sages as disparate as Chuck Eddy and Mike Prosser, but listening to jams like "Gigolo" and "Hot Rod" the connections really hit home.
There is a sort of primordial echo of the rickety, Marlboro and JD funk of "Mr. Brownstone" or "Rocket Queen" in the groove to "Gigolo." Although Chuck E. hears it more plainly in side 2's smokin' version of "Hot n' Nasty."
Tommy Aldridge lays down an almost subliminally solid, sometimes punishing foundation for all the washboard solos, preaching and fretboard firestorms.
The guitar playing on Raunch manages to strike a decent balance between flash and soul; something Slash was also usually able to achieve in his playing.
The mastermind behind one of my favorite bands in recent memory, Zeke's Blind Marky Felchtone, himself an Arkansas native and guitar dervish, is an unabashed Black Oak acolyte.
But there is a certain leering menace in the growl that Jim Dandy wielded like jester with a scythe and I definitely hear traces of it on Appetite for Destruction far more than on anything David Lee ever put his name to.
As an aside-
Let me just say that Axl Rose is the biggest sellout/poser that ever lived.
I'm not as embarrassed by my belief in the Easter Bunny, the existence of Kayfabe and all my relationship misadventures rolled into one as I am by being one of his marks in the early Appetite era.
I'm not even ashamed that I liked Bullet Boys...hell...those dudes jammed when I saw them at City Limits and their cover of "Hang on St. Christopher" is still decent.
Axl's the one I'd take back in a heartbeat.
All it took was one hit record for the Dolls/Ramones influences and bullshit Indiana street kid con to melt away into grand piano jerkoffs and Elton John pretensions involving cigarette holders, dolphins and mentally challenged supermodels.
VH-1 showed Metallica: Behind the Music last night and I started watching it again, and when James gets burned up by the pyro and Metallica couldn't finish their set in Montreal, Kirk says, referring to GNR, "they could have saved the day and been heroes by playing a blistering, triumphant 3 hour set." But, of course they didn't, though, because Rose threw some pre-meditated tantrum over his monitors and walked off the set leading to a swirling riot of pissed off canucks.
This part always kills me, and the disgust in Jason Newstead's voice when he talks about it says it all.
Newstead's pissed-off recognition/recounting of Rose's phoniness would make both Holden Caulfield and Paul Baloff proud.
Who needs rock stars?
At least it took Metallica a decade or so (depending on your perspective) to devolve into rich, out of touch assholes.
And even though I don't like their music anymore, their sonic evolution seems natural.

Damn, I meant to write about Black Oak more and then start talking about the James Gang and/or the second side of Rio Grande Mud...
More soon.
And wrestling

Who's Better...

pic via Kocosports

I continue to be way behind the curve. In hindsight it seems silly and cold-blooded to celebrate/mourn the ending of HBK's career without even mentioning the actual death of Chris Klucsaritis; better known to wrestling fans as Mortis/Chris Kanyon, on April 2nd.
He apparently took his own life at the age of 40.
I usually feel strange writing "RIP" and things like that on blogs and message boards for people I don't know because in some ways it feels selfish or something...I didn't actually know the man and I obviously can't comprehend or claim in anyway the real grief his family and friends are feeling and that's one of the reasons I choose not to write anything when I first heard the news.
I didn't have much to add other than:
It's sad how many of these men die so young (even though this situation is different from most of the other deaths in recent years).
Kanyon the wrestler was extremely underrated and fun to watch.
Hardly ground-breaking opinions.

Reading his obituary was the first time I encountered the information that he was gay and had outed himself in 2006 at an Indy show.
It's covered in more detail in this excellent Deadspin column.
Even though, as the column alludes, there have been many whispers and rumors about high-level WWE officials being openly gay, this is the first time I can recall a famous wrestler openly coming out while they were still active.
The fact that he was largely out of the limelight when he did so really doesn't make much difference.
The Masked Man (author of the Deadspin piece and fellow Parts Unknown native) writes that:
"He appeared a couple of times on The Howard Stern Show, where they played up his homosexuality and the seeming incongruity of a gay man in the pro wrestling business."

This level of publicity led Kanyon to believe he had been blacklisted by the WWE (a damn-near monopolistic entity) and had essentially ended his career.
The Wrestling Observer obituary noted cryptically that he "didn't have the look the WWE wanted." On what information they based that assertion I can only guess, but I'll never forget listening to Mark Madden's radio show on ESPN 1250 in Pittsburgh the day Eddie Guerrero died.
Double M went on a tirade about how Vince McMahon and the WWE brass had a "physique fetish" and that this fetish was having a drastic, destructive impact on the lives and health of men like Eddie. Madden, a former WCW employee, had known Guerrero personally and was speaking with raw, spur of the moment emotion that afternoon, but his words had a ring of truth to them, in my opinion, and have stayed with me ever since.
At any rate the Observer obit mentioned that Kanyon had been struggling with bipolar disorder and I can only try to fathom the anxiety of being gay in such a macho environment and the stress such anxiety might have put on his mental equilibrium.
Add to that the fact that if the Observer is right, despite having considerable in-ring talent he was suddenly cast-aside because he didn't match the invisible metrics of some inexplicable, unmeasurable "look."
To their credit, according to Deadspin many of his peers said that had they known of his sexual orientation they wouldn't have cared.

But what's more interesting and what made me want to write about this is Deadspin's mention of the lawsuit Kanyon filed with Raven and Mike Sanders against the WWE in 2009 challenging the "independent contractor" status that all wrestlers in the company must perform under.
I had absolutely no idea a suit of this nature was filed so recently.
The Masked Man characterizes the "independent contractor" arrangement as "morally suspect."
Honestly, it's hard to disagree with that characterization and there really doesn't seem to be any need for it nowadays that the WWE basically controls the entire business. Before they could and did argue, as he notes, that they couldn't offer deals and concessions to performers that competitors weren't willing to make. That argument realistically died in the rubble of WCW years ago, and maybe even before that when the AWA folded.
I think unionization may have been at the core of the the attempted suit and that has been a ruinous topic for years in pro wrestling dressing rooms.
Jesse "the Body" Ventura said in an interview that he was leading a drive to unionize performers back in the 80's when he was informed on by Hulk Hogan, which led to one of Jesse's numerous fallings out with Vince.
The "contractor" status and issue was mulled over and discussed openly by all forms of media in the aftermath of the Chris Benoit tragedy.
But just like that the genie was stuffed back in the bottle.
As a fan I'm certainly complicit in this system.
It was brought to my attention when Eddie Guerrero died and then again during the Benoit situation, but, unfortunately, it didn't remain in my thoughts long.
I'm going to try and keep it there this time.
Besides the absolutely ludicrous fact that being a "contractor" by nature precludes the WWE from supplying health insurance, the Masked Man mentions other ridiculous things inherent in this arrangement like the fact that these dudes have to file taxes in every state they work in, etc.
It's insanity.

Kanyon and company's lawsuit was rejected due to the expiration of the statute of limitations. Presumably because none of the plaintiffs had worked for the WWE in years.

I highly recommend the Deadspin column I've linked to twice in this post. It's well-written, interesting and contains some video of Kanyon.

I sound like a broken record writing things like: how sad it is that it takes a man's death to make us look deeper into the dark corridors of this business called pro-wrestling that we love so much.
It's supposed to be about fun and escapism, but I really am going to try and not get carried to far away from the damage and havoc this business can wreak on the people who make it what it is.

Rest in Peace.
Chris Klucsaritis

Eldrick Part II.

Haha...wow.
I never thought I'd ever mention him once, let alone twice. More reason to shed ESPN.
The commercial... since, even the news shoved it down my throat...
Are you kidding me? It makes that multi-million dollar, rarely shown Jerry Seinfeld/Bill Gates flop look like Raging Bull.

People of America please prove me wrong and recognize this ad for the shameless, ridiculous garbage that it truly is.

Dave Zirin positively unloaded:
"In the context of our enduring global fever-dream, a tacky ad in which Nike and Tiger conspire to exploit the memory of Earl Woods is hardly that big a deal--particularly since if Earl Woods were alive, he would have supported this exercise in grave robbing 100 percent.

he corrosively continues:
"But any joy at the discomfort of grown men with ten figure bank accounts named Hootie and Billy is outpaced by the sheer cultural rock bottom that this ad represents, not to mention what it says about Woods himself."

Yep.

I was already in a great mood, but any writing this hot, blue and righteous only makes the world a little more tolerable.

Cheers.

Thank you Shawn

Sweet Chin Music via faniq.com

This post is about 10 days late. I wasn't going to write about this, but after seeing Shawn Michaels retirement speech/video again the past few nights I decided to put down a few thoughts.
Besides being one of my favorite wrestlers ever, Shawn is the last of a dying breed.
He, along with the Undertaker, was one of the only remaining active wrestlers who had trained and performed back in the territorial era. Hulk Hogan and Ric Flair do not count, as calling them "active" is an insult to what Shawn and the Undertaker are still capable of most nights.
This insight (Shawn being the last link to the old days) is not specific to me. Many people wrote about it on wrestling websites and the excellent message board I post on that cannot be named.
It just seems that a certain level of storytelling and ring psychology might be lost forever when all links to the territorial era are severed.
Many veterans of that era, such as Ric Flair, have lamented the fact that the newfangled superstars are thrown directly into the mix of television and pay-per main events after only a year in the business before they're able to completely learn their craft; whereas in the old days you had to hone your craft and learn all aspects of the business inside and out over a period of years before you were considered ready for a prime-time push.
That period of development was crucial to developing elements of ring psychology and storytelling that could make someone with a work-ethic and talent truly great.
Shawn wrestled in Central States, Mid-South, World Class and the AWA during his development and I think the experience working with all the grizzled veterans in those territories contributed greatly to his understanding of how a match works; and perhaps more importantly how a well-worked match effects the audience emotionally.
The first really memorable Shawn Michaels moment came via his participation the feud between the Midnight Rockers and "Playboy" Buddy Rose and Doug Somers, and he says in an interview on From the Vault: Shawn Michaels that "Buddy Rose was the general of that entire situation."
Rose was a respected veteran with years in the business expected to teach these young guys how to work.
A similar quote was uttered by Marty Jannetty regarding the importance of working with a veteran like Tully Blanchard and the impact it had on his, and by extension Shawn's, development.
I can only hope that Shawn was able to effect people like Randy Orton in the same way when they worked together.

Development and dues-paying aside, Shawn Michaels possessed an undeniable athleticism.
I'd pick one of his many classics to show the ever boring "don't you know that stuffs fake?" crowd.
I notice that a lot of these "wrestling is fake...hehe" people seem to be Golf fans, and Eldrick Woods fans in particular.
And I'll just simply state: Shawn Michaels is more of an athlete than Woods or any golfer, no matter what you think about wrestling.
Locked-in results non-withstanding, it takes agility, stamina, and strength to perform at the level Michaels did for over 2 decades.
Phil Mickelson's pot belly says all you need to know about the level of conditioning, agility and stamina "pro" golf requires so spare me this garbage about Eldrick Woods being "the world's greatest athelete." He might the world's greatest game player, but he's no athlete.
Golf takes skill, no doubt, but so does surgery, yet I never hear doctors being referred to as athletes.
It might have been predetermined, but you absolutely have to acknowledge that Shawn was truly an athlete after watching the first Hell in the Cell match vs. the Undertaker, or the ladder match vs. Razor Ramon.

I largely sided with WCW and Nitro during the Monday Night Wars. I loved the NWO and the Cruiserweights and the WWE just seemed to be at a low ebb in the early phases of the battle.
Shawn singlehandedly shifted the tide back towards the WWE for me with his performance in the Hell in the Cell match in St. Louis vs. the Undertaker.
That match was flat-out incredible.
It still is the benchmark for those type of matches (my apologies to Mick Foley's brain, ribs and teeth).
My friends and I were buying WCW pay-per-views at that time and getting increasingly disgusted. This was the time when Piper and Hogan were fighting over who was the "true icon" and we'd just wasted our money on some embarrassing cage match they had to "settle" it, and just by some chance we decided to order WWE's "Badd Blood" to watch Shawn/Undertaker and I remember nothing but jaws dropping.
The quality of performance, athleticism and talent in this match was so vastly superior to what WCW was putting forth in their main events at that time.
I wasn't the only person who noticed, either. I'll never forget a sign I saw the next night on Nitro, it read simply:
Shawn is the REAL Icon

RAW got more and more time on Monday Nights all the way up until Shawn's back injury forced him into semi-retirement.

I found his retirement speech to be moving and sincere. It was brutally honest and when he said "I spent more of my adult life with you than my own family. And I don't say that with regret because I want to thank you for giving me the opportunity to come here night after night and show off for you", I couldn't help but be reminded of Randy "the Ram" Robinson's final realization at the end of The Wrestler: that the audience was his family, and that dying in front of them would be preferable to dying alone somewhere.

With all the sad endings and premature deaths that wrestling has wrought, it felt so great to see one of the all time best go out on top, healthy, happy and with a smiling family to go home to.

No one deserves it more than the Show-Stopper, the Main-Eventer, the Heart Break Kid.
Peace.

Tis' the Season

image courtesy of beergeekshop.com

...for vinyl, vinyl, vinyl!
To some of my close friends vinyl is always in season and it has become that way for me too most of the time, but the onset of Spring and Sunshine really wears my needle down.
There are a few reasons for this:
1. My turntable is on a stand right near the door leading to our tiny back porch. Porch drinks are a necessity in my world and enjoying them without proper musical accompaniment is unthinkable and downright un-American.
2. The majority of my vinyl collection consists of hard rock, metal and jazz: all genres beautifully suited to a huge glass of whatever my latest beer geek fixation mandates at the moment (Yesterday it was Maudite and side 1 of Toys in the Attic for a lazy afternoon interlude).

But continuing on this seasonal theme, a larger transition has solidified in my listening patterns over the past few years and weather is definitely the predominant factor.
In the winter I listen, almost exclusively, to black metal, doom and noise. I don't have a lot of this type of stuff on vinyl, so I mostly resort to CDs and headphones.

But as soon as the weather breaks and Spring starts seeping in...It's definitely time to break out the Aerosmith, Van Halen, Grand Funk, Mountain, ZZ Top, etc.
Don't get me wrong: a great album or song is a great album or song and will get played any time of the year when the mood is right.
Zeppelin, Sabbath, Motorhead, Ramones, AC/DC and many others are never out of season in my household, much to my wife's chagrin.
Darkthrone also gets airplay year-round, long after winter loosens it grip here in the mountains of Parts Unknown.
It's just funny that Winter has solidified into being Black Metal season, while Spring is dedicated to the glories of hard rock and not-quite as Heavy Metal.

One of the other great things about used vinyl is you can take a chance on an obscure record or band for a few dollars. You win some, you lose some; but the losses are easier to absorb when they amount to only 3 or 4 dollars at a time.
I've been trying to dig up more obscure, lesser known hard rock records the past few years.
Spun Mountain Climbing! (which I scored randomly at my one and only trip to Used Kids Records in Columbus) on Friday and was really digging its general heaviness. Not that Mountain is super obscure or anything, but I know there are lesser known groups out there in the bins who purveyed a similar heaviness and vibe.
I can do without "Theme for an Imaginary Western" (even though I like the soundtracks for many real ones). That's the sort of dated 60's style song I'm glad is mostly extinct.
"Mississippi Queen" sure is bruising.
It's one song classic rock radio righteously beat into the ground (more on this phenomenon soon).
Of course, during the winter I must have seen at least 2 or 3 copies of Mountain's other records Nantucket Sleighride and Flowers of Evil in the bins, but now when I'm ready for them...they've vanished. I remember thinking at the time that these records would in no way be heavy enough to satisfy my Winter Ears. And even though I just extolled the virtues of cheapness inherent in buying vinyl, I didn't want to buy these records and have them sit around until May when I'd had enough of Merzbow and Leviathan.

Damn you maladjusted Seasonal Listening Disorder!

More on vinyl, classic rock and wrestling very soon.