This is strange. I've recently been receiving an unsolicited subscription to Playboy magazine. Through some twist of cyber fate, I figure. But that's not the strange part. So, not being one to look a gift horse in the mouth, I'm perusing the periodical this early morning while watching the movie "War Games" on TV out of one eye.
I got myself frustrated...no, not by the magazine, you perv, but by the fact that I couldn't remember the name of actress playing opposite Matthew Broderick in the old flick. I hate when that happens. But I brushed it off mentally, as I didn't want to let something like that worry me tonight, what with the war and the AIDS pandemic in Africa and all... But I digress. Anyways, it turns out that former teen pop music queen of the 80s, Tiffany, is on the cover and presumably photographed nude in the magazine. Yawn. I thumb through to the "Music" page. In the "Fast Track" section of the music page I run across a tidbit of JC among the blurbs about Alanis Morrisette's new disc and praise for Norah Jones's latest. To wit..."Joni Mitchell is the subject of a documentary directed by Allison Anders. In it, Mitchell records a new CD and talks about her paintings and her reunion with her daughter." Yeah, we all know that, but I'm suddenly consumed by an urge for knowing just when this film is gonna be released. I toss the magazine aside and hunker down at the computer, resigned to surf the web until I find the skinny. So I type "Allison Anders Joni Mitchell" and punch the "search" button in my favorite engine. I take a gander at the first hit. This is where it starts getting a little creepy. Seems that Allison Anders wrote and directed a movie called "Sugar Town," released last year, starring one Ally Sheedy, who of course is my mystery actress in "War Games." The movie "Sugar Town" has nothing to do with Joni, except that it stars "Larry Klein a Grammy-winning producer and the former Mr. Joni Mitchell." Bizarre, I'm thinking, that Sheedy's name should pop up, and interesting about Klein starring in an Anders film before Joan...but I still hunger for the documentary release date, dammit. The search continues... I hit the next link and among other things about other people named "Allison" or "Anders" get the following from a jazz site called fusemag.com: Guitar virtuoso Carl Verheyen takes on the solo acoustic mountain on his latest. With tunes ranging from "I Loves You Porgy" and "God Bless the Child" to Jerry Reed's "Mr. Lucky", Joni Mitchell's "Cactus Tree" and his own pieces, Carl plays pristinely and inventively throughout. Beautiful arrangements and fine intervallic solos complement each other throughout. Recommended. http://www.carlverheyen.com/ Hmmm, I muse, never heard of this guy, but I wonder if his "Cactus Tree" is any good and whether it has made it onto SCJoniguy's covers project. It's another sidetrack, but I decide to check out Verheyen's site. Turns out I dig the work of this finger-picker style guitarist, whose technique reminds me of Tuck Andress or Wes Montgomery (I listened to an mp3 on his site of "Goodbye Porkpie Hat" which is covered on the same disc, coincidently). I'm intrigued, so I decide to read Verheyen's bio...which is where I read this: "Carl played 2nd guitar in Robben Fords group, and in his early years as a studio guitarist he recorded with Stanley Clarke, Dave Grusin and Little Richard. Soon he was getting called to work on many pop records including Tiffany's multi-platinum selling debut." Ain't that peculiar? I'm expecting the theme from "The Twilight Zone" to be piped into my apartment at that point and I start looking over my shoulder to see if Rod Serling is standing behind me in a dark suit, cigarette in hand, saying "picture if you will..." I never did find the Joni documentary release date. But I'm reminded of one of Brian Eno's Oblique Strategies: "Once the search is started, something will be found." -Julius
