Rain and sunshine mixed up all day, with a bit of wind here and there. There were 20 plein-aire artists working around the Flathead Valley the last three days (see below), and even though they've put up with the unsettled weather since Wednesday, the wind was too much for many of them, and they went inside early.

Sitemeter Sez: Visitors from Louth, Ireland (Eavan Eavan!); Jamaica, New York; Kettering, Nottinghamshire UK; Saint Paul, Minnesota (Family of Prof. Anita Ho); Chillicothe, Ohio; Madrid, Spain (several times); Denver, Colorado; Arona, Pennsylvania; San Diego, California; Briarcliff Manor, New York; Eindhoven, Holland and Gurgaon, India.

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: The Hockaday Museum of Art is hosting 20/3 -- Twenty Artists/Three Days. We're selling the painings tomorrow at a long reception/sale, but they'll dry out a little on the walls of our museum for a couple of weeks.
Check out Fall for Glacier -- a fundraiser for several programs that make Glacier National Park even better!

Media Watch: A biography of film producer Val Lewton on Turner Classic Movies -- they have always praised his movies, and that's good, because he made some praiseworthy movies. Lewton is most famous for his series of RKO low-budget horror features which began in 1942 with director Jacques Tourneur's Cat People. One interesting detail about his life was the family connection to high-octane Russian actress Alla Nazimova, who helped raise him. Nazimova was a contemporary of Ida Rubinstein, High Patroness of this Blog, who also played fatal femmes like Salome, putting out a movie version in the early 20's, while Ida did a stage version in Paris just before WWI.

One of Aubrey Beardsley's notorious illustrations for Oscar Wilde's Salome (1894) overlapping Alla Nazimova beginning to dance in her silent movie of the same name (1924).

A collage of beautiful Simone Simon, star of the psychologically complex, wonderfully-photographed Cat People, with her enigmatic producer in the background. Read this Val Lewton Biography about a man who gave his life to make art in the back-lot sets of Hollywood.

Concert Reviews: George Clinton and the P-Funk All Stars
Chicago Josh 5/28
Got to say I was very impressed with this show. I felt a little out of my element driving to Libertyville to see this show but once I got in there and meet some of the other funkateers I knew we were going to have a special show. This band is tight!! No joke. I miss my guitar army but this new line up has got me excited about the future of the funk. The sound was a perfect blend and you could hear every guitar string and vocal clearly. It was a short but sweet show, the music was on point and the crowd was in a singing mood. And there were nothing but smiles on everyones faces. Set list was pretty consistant to shows in the past but this show felt like a special performance for the 100 people in attendance. I mean once Belita hits the mic all your shortcomings you got go "ok bye!". I could go on and on but I just want it to be know that the funk is getting stronger and getting better by the pound!

Citrus -- Ex-PFunk Road Manager & Guitarist (His band U.S. Pipe opened the show.)
Well kiddos..
I ain't gonna do a full review or nuthin..
The show at the Mish last night was VERY good!
I noticed quite a few subtle changes in the vocal section...particularly on One Nation. They have been working ya'all.
Ricky Rouse ..redeemed himself for the Dflat Red Hot Mama Solo in Keystone...
I heard some things in Maggott Brain that I have NEVER heard done live before...or at least...the tone and attack AT TIMES...was more Eddie-like than I heard Mike or Byrd go....so for that I give him much mad props.
Rico wanted me to play the arpeggios...but I had never heard Ricky play it and for that matter have only SEEN a handfull of shows without being ON POINT...so I relaxed and soaked it in..
He hit I Got a Thang You got a thang on the f**k HEad tooo...
Giving Danny (Bedrosian) a dedicated Vocal Mic was a real good thing to do.
So...overall think this was a killer set..

Talked to the good Dr. for a second to thank him for the opening slot and I got to look into his eyes real good...he looked happy and healthy and he sang his ass off last night!

GEORGE Clinton has endorsed Barack Obama already, who is trying to counteract nearly forty years of Republican degradation with sober visions and eloquent calls to the best in ALL Americans.

Election Madness: Montana's primary election plus many dozens of super-delegates chose Barack Obama as the Democratic Party's nominee for President of the United States this week. "We the people" of this country must defeat John McCain and his "100 years in Iraq" stupidity.
64 years ago today, US and Allied soldiers invaded Normandy to open a second major front against Nazi Germany. With the significant help of Stalin's ruthless Red Army, advancing from the east, Adolf Hitler's Thousand-Year Reich was defeated less than one bloody year later. Corruption and misadventures abroad fatally undermined the Soviet Union in two more generations, and can do the same to any country -- including ours.
Support our troops -- bring them home.

Rain in the morning, sunshine in the afternoon. Yearling Deer on Woodland Drive -- velvet antlers and all.

Sitemeter Sez: Visitors from Saint Paul, Minnesota; Sydney, Australia; Flushing, New York; Jamaica, New York; Plano, Texas; Salmon Arm, British Columbia; Louth, Ireland (Hello Hooray to Evan Brennan!) and Marion, Ohio (Tari DeWille, methinks).

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: The Hockaday Museum of Art has Frank Tetrault's sculptures, and Greg Siple's playful bicycle photos.
Check out Fall for Glacier -- a fundraiser for several programs that make Glacier National Park even better!

Media Watch: I've seen a few episodes of So You Think You Can Dance? I don't mind dancing on TV, or seeing my old hometown of Salt Lake, but I wish they'd stop with the tired riff of showing schlubs without talent, just for some conflict when the judges throw them out. It's video tape, so this kind of time-wasting is unnecessary. I can't say I even like this show -- I hope the young dancers get some more work out of it, though.

Ch-ch-changes: Day-um! Yves St. Laurent passed away at the age of 71 -- I wrote about him awhile back. He was an artist with sensibilities deeper than what is common in the Fashion Industry. In fact, he was an uncommonly deep and sensible artist -- period.

Yves St. Laurent, as pictured by Andy Warhol, along with a few sketches from St. Laurent's prodigious work -- all pasted over a composition by Dutch formalist Piet Mondrian, who died in 1944. Those severe windowpanes inspired St. Laurent to create playful dresses using similar patterns in the 60's.

Double Day-um! Ellis (Bo Diddley) McDaniel passed away from cardio-vascular failure. He collapsed on the road last year. I saw him in 1970 -- pure guitar-driven FUNK, backed with a band of razor-sharp players. He wrote some of my favorite rock jams: Diddy Wah Diddy; Mona; Who Do You Love, and the epynomous Bo Diddley. He deserves beatification for Love Is Strange, his cover of I'm A Man (which inspired Bad To The Bone), and the ground-breaking Bad To The Bone video itself! He toured with the young Rolling Stones, and encouraged them to persevere -- he insisted they would outlast the Beatles. Their version of Mona still challenges guitar players everywhere with Brian Jones' mastery of Bo Diddley's technique for weaving sound and rhythm together. He and Chess Records blazed the way for progressive Rock Guitar.

A redigitized image of Bo Diddley performing in England circa 2006. He once told a story to one of his staff about sharing a limo with Ray Charles after a show and falling asleep in a rear seat. When he awakened, he noticed the blind genius in the front seat was driving the car, guided by his whispering assistant. Bo Diddley decided to close his eyes again without making a fuss, according to the tale.

Election Madness: Montana's primary election tomorrow. We'll have a Democratic Party nominee this week, and then we'll campaign for some public servants, instead of GOP cronies and thieves. The people of this country must defeat John McCain and his "100 years in Iraq" stupidity.
Support the troops -- bring them home.

Rain and Shine under the Big Sky -- the old joke says if you don't like the weather, just wait ten minutes. Today it varies by the hour.

Sitemeter Sez: Visitors from Union, New Jersey; Lawrenceville, Georgia; Linden, New Jersey; Minneapolis, Minnesota; Long Beach, California; South Solon, Ohio; West Hempstead, New York; Jessup, Maryland and Omaha, Nebraska. They were actually looking at my Flash Gordon ETC. site.

Ch-ch-changes: (From my friend David Fagiolli in Hawaii)
Alton Kelley Abandons Earthly Vehicle - Died in the early hours of Sunday, June 1

I acquired a copy of this poster of my favorite musical group of the time from David in 1969 -- it is by Alton Kelley and his partner Stanley Mouse. You can buy classic posters from Dave at Postergeist

Kelley's career was long and productive. I just saw a whole gallery of his work on CBS Sunday Morning featuring his series of Journey albums -- another group originally from San Francisco:

Image by the team of Jim Welch, Stanley Mouse and Alton Kelley

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: The Hockaday Museum of Art has Frank Tetrault's sculptures, and Greg Siple's playful bicycle photos.
Check out Fall for Glacier -- a fundraiser for several programs that make Glacier National Park even better!


Media Watch: CSPAN runs too much Right Wing propaganda nowadays, and I rarely mention them any more, but the network had some interesting events on its various channels this weekend -- there was a raucus meeting of the Democratic Party's Rules Committe where a number of Hillary Clinton's suppporters made thorough asses of themselves; A live feed from Book Expo in San Diego was more fun and less irritating; There was also an Ernest Hemingway informational marathon Sunday, including short and long interviews with his famous grand-daughter Mariel, who was born about five months after the great writer's suicide.


(Left) Beautiful model and actress Mariel Hemingway can say a lot about the impacts of suicide, drug and alcohol abuse in a family. (Right) While I was growing up, Ernest Hemingway was treated like Cultural Royalty -- he led a life that was so accomplished and colorful, it seemed beyond attainment by common humanity, according to the international press. The hyperbole of that public image might have fed the despair which killed him. HOWEVER -- his writings are damn good, and hold up very well almost 50 years after his death!

Election Madness: That zoo on TV was thankfully 3000 miles away. In my neighborhood a nice pair of folks wearing Obama shirts stopped by my house as part of a get-out-the-vote campaign. They didn't ask who I was voting for, but made sure I knew my polling place on Tuesday -- there are good reasons to think that the Democratic Nominee will be decided very soon after Montana's primary election. The people of this country must defeat John McCain and his "100 years in Iraq" stupidity.
Support the troops -- bring them home.