The Cotton Club from 1984 for Mod (Retro) Movie Monday at Tiki Lounge Talk

The Cotton Club, 1984

Sometimes the Mod Movie Mondays don’t come until Tuesday. Most of the time they’re not really Mod, but it sounds good in the title. This week we have a retro-tastic movie that captured the 1920s in a way they could only do in the 1980s. From Francis Ford Coppola and Robert Evens, here’s

The Cotton Club

from 1984 starring Richard Gere, Diane Lane, Gregory Hines, Bob Hoskins, James Remar, Nick Cage, Maurice Hines, Lonette McKee, Lawrence (Larry) Fishburn and Fred Gwin.

Wow! With a cast and management like that, plus a $42 million buck budget at the time, there’s no way this movie couldn’t be one of the best, most entertaining, most award-winning and amazing flicks of all time, right? Right?

Well..er..

Ok, back in 1984 the movie got panned pretty bad. People expected a lot more from the guys who brought you “The Godfather”. Well kids, this flick was plagued with problems from the start, including money troubles and an actual murder. But 26 years later no one really remembers much of that. What we remember was a movie that looked incredible, with hot flappers and Richard Gere actually playing the coronet. We remember a movie that took Duke Ellington’s music and recreated it with some of the best jazz session musicians available at the time, some playing antique instruments to get the right sound. We remember Herman Munster playing a gangster, and not one but TWO 80’s montages. And, of course, in true mid-80’s fashion, there was a music video (Ill Wind) inserted neatly into the middle of the flick. And yet not one note of the score was played on a DX-7.

What I’m getting at is The Cotton Club is really a damned good movie, not matter what the critics at the time had to say (dig this: Time Mag has the original 1984 review posted online! See it here).

Why you should watch this movie: Beautiful sets, incredible music, terrific dance sequences. Fantastic characters drawn from Lena Horne, George Raft, Bix Beiderbeck, The Nicholas Brothers and pretty much every gangster from New York to Chicago. Gregory Hines tap dancing with his brother, Maurice. Bob Hoskins trying not to look like his character from Roger Rabbit. Diane Lane looking hot as hell. Pretty good Cab Calloway impersonator. Wacky Hollywood ending which lets you in on the big secret…which is don’t take this movie too seriously. It ain’t the freakin’ Godfather.

Dinner and Drinks: For dinner, why not choose from the Cotton Club’s menu? As for drinks, if you can get your hands on some bathtub gin, go for it. If not, I’d say Manhattans and champagne cocktails are in order all around.

My Take: As a young swinger just starting to learn jazz clarinet and sax, and just recently discovering the great riffs of the masters such as Ellington and Calloway, hearing this music in stereo and seeing performers play it and dance to it on the silver screen was a really big deal for me. This movie combined all the things I liked: Hot Jazz, hot flappers, gangsters, classic cars and big-brimmed hats. I learned all the songs on the album and could play all the solos by age 15. It was one of the first movies we recorded off HBO using our new-fangled video tape recording machine (The one with the top loading tapes and the remote with the wire on it), and I watched it over and over again. I dressed like the gangsters (including the hat) and incorporated their style into my first writings. Yeah, that’s right kats, even back then I was into the scene, into the retro thing long before it was labeled ‘Retro”. Dig? Yeah man, that’s a solid five.

-Zoot Jackson filling in for Tiki Chris, reporting from a smokey basement speakeasy somewhere in Harlem.

Catch a new Mod Movie Monday every week (sometimes even on Monday) here at Tiki Lounge Talk, the hepcats’ joint for jumpin’ and jivin’.

Michael Bublé - The New Bobby Darrin?

Michael Buble

The kid from Canada, Michael Bublé (Pronounced ‘booble’ at the Tiki bar) has been swingin’ it up on the scene for a few years now…you’ve probably heard his tunes somewhere, at the mall, in Starbucks, in Canada, or on TV. He dresses vintage, looks like he stepped out of the early ’60s, can croon in the style of Dino and Frank and is just as laid back singing an R&B or corny modern pop tune. The kids like him, the grays like him, and the swingin’ kats and kittens in between like him.

Sound familiar?
Remember a kid named Bobby Darrin?

In the ’50s Bobby Darrin made a big splash with hits across the charts, from swingin’ tunes like Mack the Knife and Beyond the Sea to Rock ’n’ Roll hits like Splish Splash. One of the original “crossover” singers of pop music, anything Darrin touched (for most of his career) turned to gold.

Bobby Darrin’s Mack the Knife vs. Michael Bublé’s Mack the Knife

Bobby Darrin

Bobby had class, he had style, he knew when to throw around a joke and knew when to get serious and not goon up the act.

We retro kats are always looking for someone to fill the openings left by the Rat Packers, Jazz giants and kids like Darrin. We’ve got Harry Conick, Jr. who fits nicely into the crooner slot. We’ve got chicks like Diana Krall who can sing and swing with the best of them and show them a thing or two. Even Natalie Cole has done her part to keep the old fires burning. So what about this Booble kid?

Requirements: In order to really, truly swing with the big boys you’ve got to have the main ingredients for the swinger’s cocktail.

1. Real Talent
2. A smooth, kool style.
3. Must be a hit with the ladies.
4. Must be funny, in an easy, off-the-cuff way.
5. Gotta look the part and look good doing it.
6. Gotta live the part.
7. Have to find that perfect blend of swinging the standards while maintaining that oh-so-important originality.
8. Gotta have a hat.

I’m not so sure about the hat, but I think the kid has many of the requirements needed to be accepted into the retro crowd. I’ve seen him sing live on SNL (not lip syncing) and he sounded good. He was also in a skit and was pretty damned funny, better than I expected. The only thing that will keep this kat from attaining Sinatra-esque status is his choice in songs. For every standard he croons, he adds some new, popbage (pop+garbage=popbage) to his act. Sure, that’s what he has to do to bring in the bigger crowds, get the kids’ attention, make the big bucks. I understand completely…Hell, I’d play a few crap tunes on the tenor if it made me the clams to be able to play the stuff I want, too. But you won’t catch me at a Booble concert, ’cause I just ain’t hip to the neo-jive the kat lays down for the 13-year-olds.

Michael Booble

So the real question is, does he have the style?
Of course no one could take Bobby’s place. But some kats come close. I’ll ask you kids…yay or neigh on Booble? Can he really pull it off? Does he make the cut as a real, happinin’ retro-swinger, or is he just another pop music kid trying to be slick and falling short?

You at least have to give the kid credit for getting this famous on 60-year-old songs in the age of hip-hop fever and pop-tart mania.

Comments welcome, let’s hear what you have to say.

Getz/Gilberto - The Girl from Ipanema

Getz-Gilberto, 1964, one of my all-time favorite Jazz albums

96 Weeks on the Billboard charts, Getz/Gilberto reached the number 2 spot in 1964 - beat out only by The Beatles. Dig it.

This is the album that sealed the deal for Bossa Nova as a permanent form of Jazz. Featuring two of the original creators (and most well-known cats) of the Bossa Nova movement, Antonio Carlos Jobim and João Gilberto, this album is without doubt one of the most incredible representations of mid-century jazz at its finest.

Every song on this platter is fantastic, but the stand-outs are the ones which have stood the test of time: Corcovado, Desafinado, O Grande Amor, and of course The Girl From Ipanema, by Jobim’s account influenced by a hot young Brazilian chick named Heloísa Eneida Menezes Paes Pinto who used to stroll by the beach-side bar where he hung out.

If you want proof this album is boss, it won the 1965 Grammy Awards for Best Album of the Year, Best Jazz Instrumental Album - Individual or Group and Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical. “The Girl from Ipanema”, released as a shortened version for 45 RPM won the Grammy for Record of the Year in 1965. Dig this: It was the first time a jazz platter took Album of the Year.

Astrud Gilberto

Astrud Gilberto, João’s wife at the time had come along as an interpreter. She’d never sung professionally before this recording. The story goes Joåo liked her voice and asked her to fill in for him on a rehearsal. The rest is history.

The music on this album is equally enjoyable at your Tiki bar or mod-50’s corner bar, sitting by the pool with a Caipirinha or relaxing in the den on a rainy day. It’s available for download and on CD…but of course to really dig it retro-style, you’ve got to spin the vinyl.

Stan Getz

My take: I first heard this album’s version of The Girl from Ipanema when I was around twelve years old. Getz’s sax playing blew me away. His style is so smooth, so delicate…so much different from the strength of Coleman Hawkins or the insane vitality of John Coltrane, I couldn’t help but get hip to it. When I started playing sax a year or so later, one of the first songs I learned was TGFI, by playing along with the record. Later it would become one of my ’signature songs’ that I played at almost every gig, and in two of my murder mysteries with Stardust Productions. Of course I play it in my own style, but I did borrow a couple of Stan’s riffs

-Tiki Chris, AKA Zoot the Saxman swinging from Tiki Lounge Talk’s bandstand.
Tiki Lounge Talk - The Tiki Culture & Swingin’ Retro Blog for Hep Kats and Krazy Kittens

One last funny thing…my last name is Pinto, and my great grandfather’s last name was Gilberti…small world, huh?

Jazz Appreciation Month - This Kat’s Two Cents…

As Jazz Appreciation Month (suitably monikered “J.A.M”) comes down to the last few bars, I thought I throw in a few riffs of my own.

My take on Jazz Appreciation: Most people who don’t like jazz have two main complaints: There are no words, and a lot of it sounds all the same. Well kids, jazz does have words, as vocalists the likes of Ella Fitzgerald to Mel Torme to Billie Holiday to Dean Martin can attest to.

That's me, playing Tenor Sax

As for the sounds…Here’s the deal, in my humble opinion… you can’t really appreciate jazz until you see and  hear it live, see the musicians play,watch them pour their soul into a solo, see the sweat drip off them as they strain to push that perfect blue note out of a horn. There’s a dynamic in watching jazz live that you just don’t get from an album. Remember, this music was invented when recording was a novelty. These guys played live, and that was their life. Once you see jazz kats jam in person, then you can get hip to the recordings, because instead of hearing a bunch of notes getting thrown around, you catch the real drift the players are laying down. That’s Jazz Appreciation. Can you dig it? yeahhhh.

Now, a little bit about jazz and me, for any of you kats and kittens who might be in the mood for a little story. I added this recording of me playing Take the A-Train on the Tenor Sax just for fun. I’m a little rusty but hey, after 2 drinks I sound great!

The first jazz song I ever remember hearing was a sort of modified version of All Blues (Miles Davis). It was on Sesame Street, a goofy cartoon skit with a jazzy triangle and a square. (see it here on YouTube). Even at that early age, something clicked.

Doing a funny clarinet skit in a high school talent show

My old man was into Progressive Jazz (Modern Jazz, Traditional Jazz) and turned me onto some kool players like Miles Davis and Sonny Stitt. At around the same time, my Grandfather introduced me to the music of the Big Bands - Miller, Dorsey, Goodman, Shaw. He gave me my first Big Band record, Star Dust by Artie Shaw. That tune has followed me all my life.

When I was around 11, I decided I wanted to play an instrument. I didn’t know much about jazz other than what I was hearing on the Muppet Show, when kats like Dizzy Gillespie would star. First I wanted to play the trombone. Then I heard a Harry James record (I’ve Heard That Song Before) and decided the trumpet was for me. I sold my small coin collection and bought a King Cleavland (still have it).  I didn’t want to take lessons - wanted to figure it out myself. I couldn’t get much sound out of it, but tried like hell anyway. Then one day my old man came home with a clarinet. It was missing some keys in the low register, and the reed was held on with electrical tape.

Playing Sax in "Who Shot The Piano Player?!", a StarDust Productions murder mystery dinner show

Turned out to be a very old horn, a turn-of-the-century job. Bought a ligature and a new reed, and started getting some sound out of it. Not long after I picked up a cheap student clarinet in good shape, and started playing along with records, matching the sounds. Still couldn’t play a melody, but I was at least getting sound out of all the holes. Then, on a warm summer day in 1982, while walking around a flea market with my grandmother I came across a vintage licorice stick in great condition for 15 bucks. I convinced grandmom to lay out the dough for it, and that was the start of something big. I swear, that horn is magic. Magic in the real sense - for after fiddling around with it for just a few days, I sat down on my bed and made an attempt to play a song…first few notes…sounded wrong…changed the fingering…and just like that, I was playing Moonglow, in a way that would have made Artie Shaw and Benny Goodman proud.

Playing a party in Atlantic City with Tony Deluca, 1990

Soon after I got an alto sax, then a tenor, and taught myself how to play them just like the old-time kats did back in the 20s. I never learned to read music too well, just enough to get by in the college big band but not enough to hurt me none. I play from the heart, I play what I feel. I can play solo or with a group of kats and the better they are, the better I am. I played professionally during the 90s, and after swinging down to the Sunshine State in 2000 decided to play only for myself. I still dig the standards, bossas, latin jazz and bop. Never really got into fusion, but can appreciate what the kats were doing at the time. In the early 90’s someone turned me on to Dexter Gordon, and that got me into post-bop Modern Jazz more than ever.

Today I continue to listen, learn and play. I’m still discovering players and songs from the 70+ years of great jazz, from Louis Armstrong to Louis Prima, from Duke Ellington to Charlie Parker. I’ve been blessed to have seen a few of the greats in person; I’ve been lucky to have watched some of the legacy bands like Miller’s and Count Basie’s carry on the tradition. I saw Duke Ellington’s son, then his grandson lead the Ellington band. I sat in Atlantic City lounges and got to experience Sam Butera and the Wildest  from five feet away. And once, for just a few minutes, I got to meet and talk with Wyinton Marsalis. Man, I am one lucky son of a gun.

Sax on the bar, too much (or not enough) Bourbon

-Zoot Jackson keeping it kool at the Tiki Bar.
Tiki Lounge Talk, the Retro Blog for Swingin’ Hipsters who dig the Tiki Culture Beat.

Check out the Jazz Appreciation Month Website here.

Frank, Dean & Ella at the Cal-Neva Lodge, 1963

Ring-A-Ding Ding, Baby!

This marks the 150th Post since  I started Tiki Lounge Conversations back in April…

and I wanted to do something special. So, to commemorate our 150th post-a-versary, I’ve decided to share a drink, a story, and a very special bar napikin.

The Drink.

The first booze I ever tasted was Scotch. My old man let me try some of his Cutty Sark on the rocks at a Christmas party wen I was 12. It was a little strong for me at the time, but I knew when I was old enough to really start enjoying whiskey, Scotch would be it. I wasn’t wrong. When I was old enough to dig it, Scotch became my #1 choice.When I finally got my own joint and was able to built my first Tiki Bar, along with the rum and the Midori and the Kaluha sat a bottle of 12 year old Chivis.

The first bottle of booze I ever bought at a liquor store was Chivas Regal. This particular bottle is from 1955. The Gold nugget next to it is a chunk of fool's gold my old man dug up in the Nevada desert in 1963.

In 1991 I had the good fortune to see the Chairman of the Board himself perform at the Spectrum in Philly for his 75th Birthday Diamond Jubilee tour. Steve and Edie opened for him…and half way through his set, he said “I’d like to thank my two best friends for being with me tonight…Mr. Chivas and Mr. Regal.” He then took a drink of the 12 year old Scotch from a platform onstage, and continued the show. Chivas-Regal sponsored the tour…and got me to try their booze. Today, Chivas is in my top five favorites. If it’s good enough for Frank, it’s good enough for me.

Momentos from my old man's trip to Vegas, 1963

The Story.

In 1963, before he met my mother and while he was still free enough to do his own thing, my father took a trip on a whim to see his cousins in California. On the way he stopped in Vegas, and hit all the hot spots of the time…The Golden Nugget, The Sahara, and of course, the StarDust Hotel. He rented a Hertz and drove up to Tahoe, and made his way to the Cal-Neva Lodge, then owned by Frank Sinatra himself. He stayed a while, and continued on his trip to CA.

42 years later, a couple of years after his death, I was going through some of his photos and heirlooms. I found an envelope with a letter requesting a Hertz rental car in Nevada from 1963, and a folded up napkin with some blue smudges on it.

The Napkin.

Our Rat Pack Wall in the Dining Room

I opened it up, and immediately recognized the smudge as the name “Ella Fitzgerald”. (That opened my head to a memory of him telling me he had met some celebrities in Vegas…but I was so young when he told me, I didn’t (yet) know who these people were. ) When I flipped this napkin over, imagine my surprise when I saw very clearly two more names…’Frank’, and ‘Dean’.

Call it dumb, call it funny, but it’s better than even money that these are the quickly scrawled sigs of Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin, scribbled while having a slug at the bar in Frank’s place, the Cal-Neva, probably after a show, along with the slightly nicer sig of Ella, who was probably sitting right there with them. I don’t have any way to authenticate this, and I’m not paying anyone to do it…for all I know my old man could have gotten the bartender to autograph the napkin as a joke, but I don’t think that’s the case. I think I’ve got a little magic here, a couple of autographs from a couple of guys who loved to entertain, and loved to hang out in the bar with their fans, have a drink, and share a few laughs in the days when celebrities could get away with it without being stalked. A very special napkin, from a very special person, who met some other very special people in his long and krazy life.

So that’s post number 150. I couldn’t think of a better way to do it than with a drink at the Tiki Bar, an story from the past and a salute to the Chairman of the Board.

Mahalos to all you kats & kittens  for tuning in to Tiki Lounge Talk For 150 Posts!