Beautiful Spring morning -- perfect for a long drive to the gutted copper mines of Southwest Montana. (More about that another day.)

Sitemeter Sez: Woodland Park, Colorado; Union, New Jersey; Hayward, California; Toronto, Ontario; Columbia Falls, Montana; Louth, Ireland (How's Roseanne and Rachelle?); Altrincham, Cheshire, UK; Salt Lake City, Utah (Punk Rock researchers); Apt, Provence-Alpes-Cote d'Azur, France; Washington, DC; Dallas, Texas; Rio de Janeiro, Brazil; Reims, France; Columbia Falls, Montana and Colorado Springs, Colorado.

ROCK against Reaganomics at: Theater X-Net

Starring: Ida Rubinstein Belle Epoch Russian/Parisian beauty.
Ida's Places in Paris -- from my first jet-lagged day by the Seine.
Read more about Ida in Sisters of Salome by Toni Bentley

Visit: Michael's Montana Web Archive
Theater, Art, Flash Gordon, Funky Music and MORE!
NEW --Launching NOW! Outre Space Cinema -- Featuring: 1930's Rocketry, Spitfires of the Spaceways and Cellulose to Celluloid, Flash Gordon in the Saturday Matinees and Sunday Comics.





Many thanks to Jim Keefe (Visit his Website) -- the LAST Flash Gordon illustrator of the 20th Century, and Flash's first illustrator of the 21st, for his recommendations -- HERE!

Charity Alert: Check into Terra Sigilata blog -- donate $$$ to cancer patients just by clicking onto the site. Keep that Resolution to click on The Hunger Site every day.

In The Community: All day in the van taking Nancy Cawdrey's American Silk Road show to Anaconda, Montana for the Hockaday Museum of Art.
Check out Fall for Glacier -- a fundraiser for several programs that make Glacier National Park even better!

Media Watch: The movie 21 wasn't bad, but it wasn't good either. There WAS a card-counting ring based at MIT that employed a number of professors and students. I can only wonder about the interesting things a movie based on an inside view of that enterprise could do. 21 was 5% beef and 95% stereotypical Hollywood Bullshit. Actors have to work too, but I can't say I enjoyed seeing talented Laurence Fishburn having to play a violent heavy again when he can do so much more.


Movie actress Kate Bosworth seemed to have more fun with disguises than the others in 21 -- this graphic refers to that flick, Superman Returns, and well-photographed, but boring, Blue Crush.

Validating my long-lasting appreciation for Comic Books, there are a half dozen flicks in line for release based upon sequential graphic stories. Alan Moore, the prolific author of V For Vendetta will see Watchmen go on the big screen with almost no input from himself. Let's just say he is less than pleased by his treatment at the hands of Corporate Media, much like the great Steve Ditko. The late Will Eisner's Spirit -- a Jewish detective who worked out of his hideout in Wildwood Cemetary during the Golden Age of Comics is being interpreted by Frank Miller, who has made the best comics-to-cinema translations so far. Jack Kirby's Incredible Hulk will tear up the screen again, as well as Marvel's second-tier cold-war hero Iron Man. The interesting Guermillo del Toro has a second Hellboy ready to go, and Angelina Jollie, who fearlessly takes on low and high concepts, is playing an action heroine whom I have never heard about. All this is OK -- Academy Award winners Anna Paquin and Halle Berry perform in the X-Men series, as well as Shakespearean aces Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart, plus the excellent Hugh Jackman and beautiful ex-model Famke Jannsen.

AS Buck Owens once sang:
They're Gonna Put Me In The Movies!


The first appearence of Iron Man in Marvel's Tales of Suspense #39 dated March 1963. Industrial billionaire Tony Stark wore an electro-magnetic breastplate to prevent schrapnel from puncturing his heart. The rest of his armor came in handy when he was beating up Communists in Viet Nam, who had taken him prisoner in the initial tale. This "Super Capitalist" character was a psychological artifact of its creators: Writers Stan and Larry Lieber, penciller Don Heck, plus my energetic friend Jack Kirby, who acted as overall art director/designer during the onslaught of Marvel Comics in the 60's.
Image from GCD -- free for non-commercial and scholarly use.

Rained yesterday afternoon, cleared up at sunset -- condensed into millimeter-thick frost on my car this morning.

Sitemeter Sez: New Windsor, New York; Winchester, Virginia; London, Ontario; Tel Aviv, Israel; Jamaica, New York and Saint Marys, Kansas.

ROCK against Reaganomics at: Theater X-Net

Starring: Ida Rubinstein Belle Epoch Russian/Parisian beauty.
Ida's Places in Paris -- from my first jet-lagged day by the Seine.
Read more about Ida in Sisters of Salome by Toni Bentley

Visit: Michael's Montana Web Archive
Theater, Art, Flash Gordon, Funky Music and MORE!
NEW --Launching NOW! Outre Space Cinema -- Featuring: 1930's Rocketry, Spitfires of the Spaceways and Cellulose to Celluloid, Flash Gordon in the Saturday Matinees and Sunday Comics.





Many thanks to Jim Keefe (Visit his Website) -- the LAST Flash Gordon illustrator of the 20th Century, and Flash's first illustrator of the 21st, for his recommendations -- HERE!

Charity Alert: Check into Terra Sigilata blog -- donate $$$ to cancer patients just by clicking onto the site. Keep that Resolution to click on The Hunger Site every day.

In The Community: Wrapping Cawdrey up at the Hockaday Museum of Art, transporting them to Anaconda on Saturday. Artist Monty Yellow Bird (Black Pinto Horse) was delightful at the Community College last night.
Check out Fall for Glacier -- a fundraiser for several programs that make Glacier National Park even better!

Media Watch: Trash A Go Go -- Whiney Shannon Elizabeth was voted off. Cristián de la Fuente suffered a painful muscle/tendon separation in his arm. Marissa Jaret Winokur (Tracy Turnblatt) did OK, but Kristi Yamaguchi was the BEST, no matter what double standards the judges may have used. Mario and Karina Smirnoff may yet reach second place. Handsome Defensive Tackle Jason and beautiful Edyta Sliwinska looked pretty damn dumb dancing to the banal pre-Hank Williams Junior Monday Night Football theme. Day-um! This is the same network which moved that game over to one of its cable subsidiaries after trying to kill it outright with Dennis Miller.

Ch-ch-changes: Swiss chemist Albert Hoffman passed away at the ripe age of 102. Among his many accomplishments was the discovery of LSD -- a natural psychedelic which was synthesized by his employer Sandoz and helped change the world in the 1960's. I have told a few sad stories of musicians' lives that were blighted and ruined by recreational use of this drug -- the late Syd Barrett comes to mind, but MANY things can ruin people's lives. Did I gain valuable insights from my own non-clinical use of LSD? YES! Was I dangerously foolish at some times when I used it? YES! Did I quit using it? YES! (A long funkin' time ago too.) Luckily for me, I never had any ill effects which a night's sleep didn't heal. Some other people weren't so lucky.


Some FABULOUS artwork came out of the so-called Psychedelic Era -- this is a digital mash-up of a Wes Wilson poster with a model from a contemporary paperback cover.

Spring was almost a month late, but it has arrived -- April showers will continue into May, and we'll likely see more snow. A big buck Whitetail Deer was grazing in Dry Bridge Park yesterday evening.

Sitemeter Sez: Impruneta, Italy (Near Florence -- looking for a dance Foundation in Bilbao, Spain); Portland, Oregon; Kildare, Ireland (Saw a nice pic of Eavan & Camille); Scranton, Pennsylvania and Anderson, Indiana.

ROCK against Reaganomics at: Theater X-Net

Starring: Ida Rubinstein Belle Epoch Russian/Parisian beauty.
Ida's Places in Paris -- from my first jet-lagged day by the Seine.
Read more about Ida in Sisters of Salome by Toni Bentley

Visit: Michael's Montana Web Archive
Theater, Art, Flash Gordon, Funky Music and MORE!
NEW --Launching NOW! Outre Space Cinema -- Featuring: 1930's Rocketry, Spitfires of the Spaceways and Cellulose to Celluloid, Flash Gordon in the Saturday Matinees and Sunday Comics.





Many thanks to Jim Keefe (Visit his Website) -- the LAST Flash Gordon illustrator of the 20th Century, and Flash's first illustrator of the 21st, for his recommendations -- HERE!

Charity Alert: Check into Terra Sigilata blog -- donate $$$ to cancer patients just by clicking onto the site. Keep that Resolution to click on The Hunger Site every day.

In The Community: More wrapping at the Hockaday Museum of Art, had to get some more packing tape. I'll be tech'ing for a presentation by artist Monty Yellow Bird (Black Pinto Horse) at the Community College tonight.
Check out Fall for Glacier -- a fundraiser for several programs that make Glacier National Park even better!

Concert Review: Fairly good news about Sylvester (Sly Stone) Stewart

LLL Nutt wrote -- Speechless.
We caught the Friday show in Anaheim.
Unreal.
I'm still in awe, can't do justice to a proper review right now,
but i'll try.
The curtain finally opened around 10:30 and there was SLY, front & center stage behind his keyboards, decked out in bondage boots, a plaid kilt with a bushy black mohawk. "Do you guys remember how to sing a simple song?" They busted into that, followed by Dance To the Music & Family Affair. Shit was so good, i got tears in my eyes. If Jerry Martini, Cynthia, & Sister Rose Stone sounded excellent, Sly's voice sounds just like the records, and seemed to be loving it up there. He joked that everybody made it to rehearsal but him "but i made to the gig, ha hahaha!" crowd went nuts. Let's see, they also did Stand, teasers of Hot Fun… and Don't Call Me… During Thank you… Sly changed it up a bit to say "thank you fallettinme B mice elf ONCE AGAIN."
At one point he said "okay, i'm going to the bathroom." I know i wasn't the only one thinking "alright then, good to see you SLY"… In his absence the band tore up Thank You…Africa. Then they (and) Sly took us Higher & strolled through the whole building shaking hands and singing. He did a little bit of his new joint "i'm the real model, not the role model" which has a hip hop influence, and had the crowd going.
The set lasted about an hour and ten minutes. I am still high from the experience. I had many chances to see JB before he left the planet, but never did. Seeing Sly in this triumphant return was mosdef one of the high marks in my 30+ years as a concert goer.

My OWN Thoughts: I wish Syl Stewart all the best, and was glad that his family and former bandmates gathered around to help him. Speaking of the bolded text above, I hope he rehearses and practices, like fellow-genius Brian Wilson gradually learned to do after his own repeated nervous breakdowns -- otherwise I fear he might turn into Funk's version of David Helfgott, the guy in the movie Shine. Mental illness may be "mental," but it's also illness.


A digital impression of Legendary Syl Stewart, who had an amazing career as a producer and performer, including collaborations with George Clinton, who gave Sly & the Family Stone's induction speech for the Rock N' Roll Hall of Fame. My friend Wanda Day jammed with him a decade before she co-founded Four Non-Blondes.

Yesterday was beautiful, I wasted it doing much-needed yardwork, though, and will do more this wonderful afternoon.

Sitemeter Sez: Kansas City, Kansas; Van Nuys, California; Los Angeles, California and beleaguered Belfast, Northern Ireland, where some of my Scottish ancestors lived on occasion.

ROCK against Reaganomics at: Theater X-Net

Starring: Ida Rubinstein Belle Epoch Russian/Parisian beauty.
Ida's Places in Paris -- from my first jet-lagged day by the Seine.
Read more about Ida in Sisters of Salome by Toni Bentley

Visit: Michael's Montana Web Archive
Theater, Art, Flash Gordon, Funky Music and MORE!
NEW --Launching NOW! Outre Space Cinema -- Featuring: 1930's Rocketry, Spitfires of the Spaceways and Cellulose to Celluloid, Flash Gordon in the Saturday Matinees and Sunday Comics -- UPDATED!





Many thanks to Jim Keefe (Visit his Website) -- the LAST Flash Gordon illustrator of the 20th Century, and Flash's first illustrator of the 21st, for his recommendations -- HERE!

Charity Alert: Check into Terra Sigilata blog -- donate $$$ to cancer patients just by clicking onto the site. Keep that Resolution to click on The Hunger Site every day.

In The Community: More packing at the Hockaday Museum of Art, getting ready for the Cawdrey tour.
Check out Fall for Glacier -- a fundraiser for several programs that make Glacier National Park even better!

Concert Review: Pfunk 4/26 Kansas City Crossroads
Funky Marque wrote:
F_cking amazing! I can't even name names here. Every single person on stage that played, sung, or rapped was incredible last night. One cohesive unit of in your face funk. It was the kind of night where you loose yourself in the groove and all sense of time is gone.
One of the best shows I've seen EVER!

The Real Joker wrote:
Man I totally agree! One of the best P-Funk shows I've ever seen or from anyone. This show went way past my expectations. I'm still amazed by it. The US Funk Mob kicked some major ass. The show was high energy from start to finish. Ricky Rouse is an awesome guitarist and entertainer.
Let me just say that they were TIGHT!!! I talking tight like I haven't seen them in years. Now mind you this is a different crew but the level of showmanship took me back to the 76' Mob. Everyone came dressed up and Rico and Frankie were on it. Frankie played like I haven't heard him play in years. And most of all it was FUNKY!!! Real funky. George's voice was clear and in good singing form as well as Garry, Steve and all the rest. Kim and Kendra danced and sang with vigor.
They played Make My Funk the P-Funk which was a treat. Pumpin It Up was off the chain. Mike Hampton murdered Maggot Brain. Trey Lewd and George busted out a funny rap called Crackheads, that was totally hilarious.
This was the second night of the tour. It's hot new arrangements , an increased level of showmanship among the crew and very high energy.
P.F. Oh yeah Garry is a strawberry blonde now. lol He's sportin a wild new hairdoo.
Don't miss it!!!


Kim Manning (L) is touring with George Clinton (R) and the P-Funk All-Stars again. My friend Michael Hampton is with them too on screaming electric guitar.

Media Watch: It's not exactly current, but Guillermo del Toro signed on to direct a two-movie version of The Hobbit. Ian McKellen is supposed to play Gandalf, with Andy Serkis doing his wonderful version of Gollum again. Peter Jackson and Saul Zaentz are still in the mix, so I am forced to be ruefully skeptical about the script. I wonder how they are going to stretch the story over two separate films and still keep the charm of There and Back Again intact. The adventure with Gollum may have been pivotal, but it was short. There is potential for some disastrous decision-making here. I didn't like the musical made-for-TV cartoon series -- they are hopefully forgotten by now. If something better comes from this project, I should be happy. Anyway, sales of the book will probably increase and a whole new generation will wander in Wilderland if anything at all goes right.


The late J.R.R. Tolkien and Guillermo del Toro (inset) have a love of sketching in common. I respect the young Mexican director for his visual sense, and I'm hoping that he respects Prof. Tolkien's vision of Middle Earth more than his executive producers did in Lord of the Rings. These two creative individuals share Catholic backgrounds too, which may be significant, or not. The strength of The Hobbit is it's simplicity. Tolkien told the original story to his numerous young children during the precious hours he spent with them outside of the male-dominated world of Oxford dons. The book had the same guile-free spirit, but benefitted greatly from the professor's diligent study of fairy stories, Dark Ages legends, and keen appreciation of 19th and 20th Century fantasy writers.