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Odds & Ends: News/Humor (with a "Who Lost the Week?" poll)

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I post a weekly diary of historical notes, arts & science items, foreign news (often receiving little notice in the US) and whimsical pieces from the outside world that I often feature in "Cheers & Jeers".

OK, you've been warned - here is this week's tomfoolery material that I posted.

CHEERS to Bill and Michael in PWM, our Laramie, Wyoming-based friend Irish Patti and ...... well, each of you at Cheers and Jeers. Have a fabulous weekend .... and week ahead.

ART NOTES— an exhibition entitled Always New: The Posters of Jules Chéret— known as the father of the poster, bringing colorful, large-scale advertisements to Paris streets, creating what critics called a “museum in the open air” — will be at the Milwaukee, Wisconsin Art Museum through October 16th.

    Jules Chéret (1836–1932)

YOUR WEEKEND READ #1 is this essay from former ABC reporter Jeff Greenfield on how Democrats owe a debt to Kevin McCarthy for taking his ball (and running away) from the January 6th committee … although I can’t be sure this was his decision alone, if you know-what-I-mean (and I think you do).

THURSDAY's CHILD is named Pantera the Cat— a Brazilian neighborhood kitteh who became a hero cat by being able to retrieve a set of house keys from a small hole in the sidewalk … that a little boy had dropped them in.

     Pantera the Hero Cat

YOUR WEEKEND READ #2 is this essay from Harold Meyerson of The American Prospect— which I find to be the most cogent and concise analysis of what the prime-time January 6th hearing revealed.

IF THERE IS EVER music to accompany Senator Josh Hawley’s mad dash … the chorus to this 1966 song by The Who … is my recommendation.

ELECTION NOTES — after the government of former European Central Bank chief Mario Draghi collapsed, the next general election in Italy takes place in September .. where the former premier Silvio Berlusconi’s party hopes to make gains (while denying any involvement in the collapse).    

FRIDAY's CHILD is named The Cat— who has endorsed Anthony Feig, a Democratic candidate for the Michigan Legislature in a video.

                The Cat

BRAIN TEASER— try this Quiz of the Week's News from the BBC ...… and the usually easier, less UK-centered New York Times quiz.

SEPARATED at BIRTH— actor Henry Cavill… and the other night’s hearing attendee— whom TMZ has identified as a medical student from Ohio completing a fellowship at the National Institutes of Health.

  Henry Cavill (born 1983)

 About to change uniforms?

...... and finally, for a song of the week ...........................… years ago I paid little attention to the actor Hugh Grant — but found his intrepid work on the anti-tabloid campaign against phone hacking inspiring and was pleasantly surprised at his performance on the 2015 prequel film The Man from UNCLE  (as Mr. Waverly, the agency head). Now earlier this month … he completed the hat-trick.

On the day that the embattled Boris Johnson announced he would (eventually) step down, TV announcers and Tory politicians were seen speaking outside Parliament, lamenting his demise.

Grant asked the activist protestor/gatecrasher Steve Bray to play a madcap song (after his portable speakers were returned to him by police, following a previous protest) during these interviews.

Morning @snb19692 Glad you have your speakers back. Do you by any chance have the Benny Hill music to hand?

— Hugh Grant (@HackedOffHugh) July 7, 2022

The resulting montage of videos of Conservative politicians having to speak above the volume of the  song were comedy gold— as Brits were well aware of the TV comic Alfred “Benny” Hill, whose slapstick, zany (and often racy) show ran from 1962-1989. And the “Benny Hill theme” was also certain to be played during the show’s sped-up filmed chase sequences, firmly associating it in viewer’s minds with insanity.

Yet the song was not written by anyone associated with the show — instead, it was the 1963 hit single by US tenor saxophonist Homer “Boots” Randolph, who said that thanks to its television exposure, "the tune will be my trademark. I'll hang my hat on it. It's kept me alive”.In 1990 (after it went into syndication) he said, “It rejuvenated the song. So many people know it from the show."

Yet while that was not his only novelty song, he had a prolific career as a solo artist and as a first-call Nashville studio musician. Fifteen years to-the-month after his death: this occasion calls for a career retrospective.

Born in Paducah, Kentucky in 1927, he took up the saxophone and performed in the US Army Band during WW-II. After his 1946 discharge, he performed in regional bands (in the Kentucky/Indiana/Illinois area) where he was noticed by the mandolinist Jethro Burns (of Homer & Jethro) and recommended to the head of the country music division of RCA Records … Chet Atkins, who hired him after hearing tapes of his work.

Boots Randolph was an uncommon instrumentalist at that time in Nashville (which was stringed-instrument laden) and often told audiences, "You're listening to the world's greatest hillbilly saxophone player ... would you believe, the world's only hillbilly saxophonist!" At his peak, he worked on 200-300 sessions a year at Nashville studios, including at the (RCA rival) Decca Records studios of Owen Bradley. 

Yet he was not limited to country music: often recording pop, rock and jazz dates. He and Chet Atkins were scheduled to appear as part of the Nashville All-Stars at the 1960 Newport Jazz Festival with a 17 year-old jazz vibraphonist Gary Burton (who got his start in Nashville) yet were cancelled due to a crowd riot— though they released an album of material they had intended to play.

He wrote “Yakety Sax” along with guitarist James Rich, intending it as an instrumental “answer record” to the Lieber-Stoller song “Yakety-Yak” for The Coasters — and his 1963 rendition reached #35 on the pop charts. The following year, he tried another answer record “Hey Mr. Sax Man” (referring to “Mr. Bass Man”) yet only had modest success.

Boots Randolph also recorded thirteen albums under his own name, owned his own Nashville club from 1977 to 1994 and was a frequent guest on Hee-Haw (as part of its Million Dollar Band).

Yet if you suspect you may have heard him on only one song … there are many others he appears on as a sideman. The Al Hirt instrumental Java, plus Brenda Lee’s Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree and Roy Orbison’s Oh, Pretty Woman for starters. He first backed-up Elvis Presley on Return to Sender in 1962 and in Presley’s later years ... if you hear a saxophone, dollars-to-donuts it’s Boots Randolph. For a different example: when REO Speedwagon recorded a cover of Chuck Berry’s “Little Queenie” in 1972, they called upon Boots, as well.

He continued touring into the 21st Century and just weeks after the release of his first jazz album in June, 2007 he suffered a brain hemorrhage. Boots Randolph died in July, 2007 at the age of eighty. He was inducted into the Kentucky Music Hall of Fame in 2004, has a featured compilation album and said his success “Took me out of the hills of Kentucky … and put me in the hills of Tennessee!"   

Boots Randolph (1960’s) ...

…. and much later on in life

On the chance his signature song’s title is unfamiliar … well, here it is. Yakety Sax remained something of a test piece for musicians. Randolph once said, "Every sax player in the world has tried to play it: some were good, some were awful".

To illustrate his breadth: he recorded covers of Gentle on My Mind, Hey Jude, You’ve Lost that Loving Feeling, Proud Mary, King of the Road and the Jerome Kern classic Smoke Gets in Your Eyes. Here’s an example of his more contemplative side: the 1955 film tune Unchained Melody (later made famous by the Righteous Brothers in 1965 and twenty-five years later in the film Ghost).


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