Photo Finish (Street Musicians Edition)

 

I'm sure a good many of you can identify the above photo. Obviously, it's the famous cover of the Beatles 1969 album Abbey Road, the last they ever recorded as a quartet (though not the last released; Let It Be, recorded earlier, made its debut in 1970, and, of course, there's been dozens of anthology albums, including a boxed set titled Anthology.) But look at the cover closely. Nowhere does it say the name of the album or the name of the band that made the album. How do you know it's the Beatles? Weren't you paying attention? Because it's FAMOUS, that's why! Even if you were paying attention, do you know how this cover came to be? I'm here to tell you.

Let's start with Abbey Road itself. Just so happens to be the location of EMI Studios in London. The idea of naming the album but not naming the album after the thoroughfare came from John Kosh, a man not connected to EMI but the Beatles themselves through what was originally intended as a tax shelter by their recently deceased manager Brian Epstein, the now-famous (if never all that particularly productive) Apple Records, itself a division of the larger tax shelter, Apple Corps. LTD. Kosh was Apple's creative director, but he didn't take the photo. That was a man by the name of Iain Macmillan, pictured above. Ironically, given the mood of reconciliation that surrounded the recording of the new album, Macmillan entered the Beatles world through a connection that in the very near future would come to be seen, perhaps unfairly, as the main cause of the iconic music group's eventual breakup: Yoko Ono. In 1966, Yoko had commissioned Macmillan to photograph an exhibition of her art at London's counterculture Indica Gallery. Paul McCartney was a friend of the gallery's owners, did his best to promote the gallery, and encouraged John Lennon to pay a visit, which he did just as it was showing the aforementioned exhibition by the young Japanese avant-garde artist. Little did McCartney know that John and Yoko would hit it off. If he had known, he probably would not...Hmm, this post was meant to be about Abbey Road's cover art, and now it's veering into something else. Let me get back to my original intent. Yoko eventually introduced Lennon to Macmillan, and the two of them also hit it off, if not in quite the same way. Three years later, Lennon asked Macmillan to photograph the album cover.

On August 8, 1969 at about 11:30 am, Lennon, McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr arrived at EMI records and took their walk across the street. There were actually six walks across the street, as nobody was quite sure what they wanted, while Macmillan sat on top a ten-foot stepladder with his camera, a policeman directing traffic behind him. Since there's some squinting involved, I'll do my best to describe them. Clockwise, the first photo has John, followed, left to right, by Ringo, Paul (in sandals), and George. The second photo has John, followed, right to left, by Ringo, Paul (in sandals), and George. The third photo is John, followed again left to right, by Ringo, Paul (barefoot!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) and George. There's some traffic buildup (HONK! HONK! "%#@^&*+%# longhaired freaks! Don't they know it's almost lunch time?!") If you know the physics of repeatedly crossing the street, then you'll have by now figured out that photo number four is right to left, led by John, same order. Paul's sandals are back on. Most of the traffic is now gone, though one of those London double-decker buses has stuck around to watch. Photo number five, again left to right, this time in formation, rather than everyone walking whatever the hell way they please. Paul has a cigarette dangling from his hand (I do hope a hot ash doesn't fall on his once-again bare foot.) The sixth and final photo is one last right to left, the double-decker bus now headed in the opposite direction.

It had been Paul's idea that they should all cross the street, so he got to be the one to choose which of the six photos to use. As you saw, he chose, going clockwise, photo number five. It was a fateful decision. Partly because quite a few people took it to be a fatal decision, as Paul's bare feet was taken as a sign that he had died! I've never understood this. If was Paul was laying collapsed on the road all green and bloated with bits of bone poking through decomposing flesh, then, yeah, I could see where an intelligent person might conclude he had died. But bare feet? Since when is that alone a sign of rigor mortis? Am I now to assume all those people I see on the beach this time of year are zombies? If the Abbey Road cover wasn't enough, the back cover of the Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band album of two years earlier retroactively was added to the Paul-is-dead rumor since his head is turned away as John, George, and Ringo face forward. Then there are those who think the whole thing was a publicity stunt, that McCartney just wanted people to think he was dead to sell more albums, as if that was ever much of a problem for the Beatles. Such a stunt, which I don't think it was, would have been doomed to fail. From sometime early in 1964 to the present day there's always been paparazzi waiting to snap a picture of Paul, thereby proving his continued existence. It's not like he's Andy Kaufman.

 

Aside from Paul McCartney's bare feet, there are a few other details about the cover I'd like to point out. Since the photo was taken in a public place, some members of the public inevitably ended up in the photo, such as those three little dudes just above Paul's head. Of course, that's all a matter of perspective. The three were in fact normal-sized and standing some distance away from Paul. They're Alan Flanagan, Steve Millwood, and Derek Seagrove, three interior decorators out on a lunch break. Across the street, not quite as far away but far enough, a man appears to be to the left (but in fact is to the right) of John Lennon's head. That's 57-year-old American tourist Paul Cole. Bored with museums at that point, he told his wife to go in one alone while he wandered about outside, and that wandering led him to the photo shoot. Now, it's not just people who ended up in this picture, but, as you might expect since it is a roadway, automobiles as well. In particular, a Volkswagen Beetle parked not too far from where George Harrison takes his stroll. I don't think you can quite make it out in the pictures I provide here, but had you had the album in your hand--remember, it's a vinyl LP--the license plate is clearly marked LMW 281F. Clear enough to be seen that the plate was repeatedly stolen from the car after the album was released. Oh, well, at least the hubcaps were left untouched. 

Finally, I said at the beginning of this post that the cover says neither the name of the band nor the name of the album. Well, it doesn't say those things on the front cover. Flip it over and the information is readily available. After John, Ringo, Paul, and George were finished with their multiple road crossings, Iain Macmillan set about looking for a street sign. He found one on an old wall. The Beatles name was cleverly superimposed at a later date (a crack on the wall runs through the S), but I understand that it really did say Abbey Road. However, if you happen to be in London, don't go looking for it, as the wall has since been demolished. But it was there for Macmillan's purposes. He stood in front of that wall, made sure his camera was loaded and snapped the picture, only to look up and find...

...somebody had gotten in the way! This is said to have pissed off Macmillan greatly, and he went on to take another picture, but, as you can see, the botched photo ended up being used anyway. Probably someone at EMI or Apple figured that if a photo shoot must be disrupted, there are worse disruptions than a young woman in a minidress. Her identity remains unknown.

Vital Viewing (Mammon Mechanics Edition)

Today we again take up technology. Not the kind that you find in your home, but the machines out in the public sphere that just like any store or shop asks to be paid for services rendered, only there's no salesclerk, just you and a button, or a few buttons. Increasingly these machines accept plastic or paper money, but traditionally took coinage. So check your pockets for any loose change and lets see what it will buy us. 

Lets start with that most ubiquitous of coin-operated mechanical devices, the vending machine. How do one work? According to the following video, better than ever:

Well, that was certainly an upbeat look at the latest technology, wasn't it? So, you no longer have to deal with sticking your hard-earned nickel and dimes into a snack machine only to have that bag of Doritos or Nestle Crunch bar get tantalizingly lodged between the glass and the spirally thing? That's a relief!

Must be one of the older models. And that guy better be careful, or he could end up like...

...this unfortunate chap.

Ever fantasize about having a claw? Thanks to coin-operated technology, you can have the next best thing: 

Nice, and just think, unlike Freddy's claw, no teenagers were killed in the making of this video. Heck, the stuffed rabbit wasn't even damaged.

Though there were precursors, some going all the way back to the Roman Empire, the coin-operated machine era basically begins in the early 1880s, when London railway stations introduced devices that for a small price dispensed postcards and envelopes. This was the same decade that saw the invention of the electric light bulb, but the first vending machines were more like traditional clocks, relying on gears and levers and springs for the exchange of goods and services. Eventually, the technology evolved to the point where you had to plug them into a wall, but there are still a few that do things the old-fashioned way, such as those quite-common machines that dispense unwrapped gum and candy:

Since this video was first posted on YouTube in 2015, it's received an astonishing 98,167 views. In case you were thinking of making a purchase yourself, I'm sorry to say one or more of those 98,167 viewers have beaten you to it, and the machines are no longer up for sale.

Back to the big coin-operated boys, such as washers and dryers, which have a building all their own. Often a kind of a seedy-looking building. I don't think it's age. I think laundromats are built seedy-looking. It's in the blueprints. But that just gives them a kind of transient charm. Just the thing for transient relationships:

Well, I'm not going to take my laundry there. With all that singing, I wouldn't hear that little beep that tells me the load is finished!

Machines attaining human-like emotions has been a staple of science-fiction for what seems like forever. And usually those machines with human-like emotions end up wreaking havoc on humans with human-like emotions. Really, it's much better to build a machine with dog-like emotions. Those machines would be loyal and never turn on their human masters, as long as you kept them well-fed. Still, I can't help but wonder if the machines-wreaking-havoc-on-humanity genre is really what would happen if machines had hearts. Especially, coin-operated machines. Pay phones obviously can't feel, or else they all would have ganged up and beat the hell out of a cell tower by now. And anyway, when we humans experience heartbreak, we don't always take it out on others. We only do that 90%, maybe 91%, of the time. After that, we usually take it out on ourselves. And so too, I think, would a machine:

Many of you, maybe even most of you, will recognize the late Dom DeLuise, whose birthday falls today. But what about that talking weight machine? Whose voice was that?  

That coin-operated machine didn't say "Rosebud" before it ceased operation, but it could have.

Quips and Quotations (Borsht Belt Resurrection Edition)

 

1964

1986

  It took twenty years to overcome what happened in one minute

--Jackie Mason 1931-2021

(Mason's descent into right-wing politics in recent years has turned me off to him quite a bit, but, that said, I really couldn't pass this one up. I have a great affection for Borsht Belt comedy--it's really what Mel Brooks is all about--and that Mason, the one-time Ed Sullivan Show pariah, was able to make a Broadway hit out of it during an era when it was increasingly being seen as a passé form of humor is nothing short of miraculous--Kirk)

  

(In case you're wondering why I'm not showing a clip of the notorious moment when Jackie Mason allegedly gave TV host Ed Sullivan the finger--which the comedian denied--the reason is simple: I can't find it. In fact, I can't even find a STILL photograph of him doing that. Mason certainly managed to put his past behind him--Kirk)

Road to Cleveland

 

Cleveland has a new baseball team. Actually, it's the old baseball team, but it has a new name: The Guardians. What, though, is being guarded? The galaxy? Oh, I think the Milky Way can take care of itself.

Motorists, on the other hand, can always use a little safeguarding.

This strapping, shirtless young man is one of eight Guardians of Transportation, Art Deco statues made of sandstone that stand on both sides of four 43-foot tall pylons that greet or bid adieu to drivers entering or exiting Downtown Cleveland on the former Lorain-Carnegie Bridge, completed in 1932, which since November 1983 has been called (at least officially) the Hope Memorial Bridge, named after...

 ...William Henry Hope, a member of a...

...local crew of stonemasons (I've stared at this photo for a half an hour and am still not sure which one) who helped build the statues.

Here's William Henry's son, Leslie Townes Hope. The local media often describes him as a native Clevelander, though he's not quite that as he spent his first year in England ("I left when I found out I couldn't be king.")

Anyway, the Hope Memorial Bridge is one of several ways that people living in Cleveland's West Side or in its western suburbs (as I do) can travel if they want to see the Guardians play at Progressive Field, named after an insurance company, which also looks after motorists, though, unlike the 43-foot tall pylons, one does have to pay premiums.

Play ball!

Zero Zero Zero, Zero Zero Zero, Zero Zero Zero Gravity

 

That's one way to lose your cherry.

Then there's the Amazonian...

Wrong Amazonian.

No pussy there.

I guess there's nothing left for the meek to do but inherit the Earth.

Smart Art (Model Mom Edition)

 

Take the picture of my mother, exhibited at the Royal Academy as an "Arrangement in Grey and Black." Now that is what it is. To me it is interesting as a picture of my mother; but what can or ought the public do to care about the identity of the portrait?

--James McNeill Whistler, complaining about the unwanted nickname that his painting increasingly was becoming known by (I'll let you guess what it is.) These days it hangs not in the Royal Academy but in the Musée d'Orsay in Paris, France.

Vital Viewing (Confused? You Won't Be After This Week's Episode Edition)

 

Actress Katherine Helmond was born on this day in 1929. She's best known for...well, that's an interesting question. According to the various headlines announcing her death in 2019, she seems to have been best known for playing Mona Robinson, the free-spirited, vampish mother of Judith Lights' Angela Bower on the situation comedy Who's the Boss? And make no mistake, she was good in that, but her original claim to fame was in an earlier, and in my opinion much funnier, sitcom than Who's the Boss, and that would be...  

...Soap. In it, Helmond played Jessica Tate, and Cathryn Damon played her sister Mary Campbell. Jessica, husband Chester, and their two grown daughters, one teenage son, the children's deluded grandfather, and the household's insolent butler lived in the rich part of town. Mary, husband Burt, Mary's two grown sons from another marriage, Burt's one grown son from another marriage, and the latter's ventriloquist's dummy, were all working-class. But don't get the idea things were as socioeconomic as all that. The class differences hardly made a difference on that show. The first big hit from writer-producer Susan Harris (who went on to create The Golden Girls), Soap took its' sitcom characters, and instead of the usual surprise birthday parties, reluctant visits to the dentist, and amateur talent shows put on to raise money for a new seniors center, plopped them into melodramatic situations. Being sitcom characters, they lacked the basic melodramatic social skills to deal with these situations on anything other than the level of a sharply-written burlesque sketch, and that's what made this series so damn funny. The melodrama got pretty wild as time went on it, with storylines about demonic possession and alien abduction (which reminds me, they also lacked Mulder and Scully's basic social skills), but in Soap's first season the plots dealt mainly with the kind of things you would have seen on afternoon soap operas (hence, the show's name), and, in the 1970s at least, that meant affairs of the heart, cheatin' hearts, and broken hearts. Katherine Helmond attempts to sort out all those various hearts in relation to her character in the following interview:

Here's a scene from early in Soap's first season. Along with Helmond herself, there's Robert Mandan (Chester Tate), Jimmy Baio (Billy Tate), Diane Canova (Corrine Tate), Arthur Peterson Jr. (the Major; Jessica and Mary's father), and Robert Guillaume (Benson):

If the above clip is all you've ever seen of Soap, you could easily get the impression that it's just an ordinary sitcom. Or out of the ordinary only because it's funnier than most sitcoms. But the above scene actually comes in the aftermath of a shocking revelation. So, going backwards in time by an episode or two, let's see what happens when Peter is introduced to the rest of Corrine's extended family.  In addition to the actors I've already mentioned, there's Robert Urich (Peter), Richard Mulligan (Burt Campbell, Peter's father), Ted Wass (Danny Dallas, Burt's stepson), Billy Crystal (Jodie Dallas, Burt's other stepson), and Cathryn Damon (whose name I did already mention, but now you get to see her.):

 

What this? It looks as though Peter had ongoing affairs with both the daughter and the mother! Ewwwwwww! Where are their morals? Well, I guess I shouldn't be surprised. Soap takes place in Connecticut, which is, you know, one of those blue states. I can't watch any more. I need a soap opera parody that takes place in Middle-America, in a red state, like Ohio, where I live, where there are still such things as values:  

There. That's better.