music

Hello Dalai…

/ Phil Strawn / 16 Comments
Dalai “Tex” Lama

My sainted Mother’s second cousin, Elfinian Keebler, owned one of the largest cattle ranches in Texas. Located between Mineral Wells and Ranger, Texas. It took four days to cover the width and another two days or so to ride the length. By Texas standards, it was a residential lot, but 3,800 acres ain’t what it used to be in the 1950s.

Elfinian’s daughter, Cookie, wasn’t into raising cattle, although she was the proverbial FFA queen. She had gone steady with every boy in high school and most of the ranch hands and had been riding horses since she could crawl. Her older brother, Chip, was a knock off the old Keebler block; he was a cowboy to the bone, raised on Roy Rogers and Gene Autry. His mama, Piddle, fancied herself as a debutant who married low and wanted her baby boy to be a doctor of some sort, but Chip was a dunce and had the IQ of a piss-ant: riding the range was about all he was good for, and his horse did most of the thinking. Cookie was the plucky little prickly one and decided she was taking the ranch in a different direction, creating a stink between her and Daddy Elfinian. Cookie wanted to raise Llamas and Highland goats. In Texas, anything but cattle and horses is considered blasphemy, and sheep and goats aren’t welcome except on the supper menu.

A year into her Llama plan, Daddy put the brakes on. One Hundred Llamas, forty donkeys to guard the Llamas against Coyotes, and half a dozen cow dogs to keep the donkeys under control were more than Papa Keebler could swallow. The donkeys and dogs had lost interest in the Llamas and had gone back to hanging out with the cattle. The critters were pretty, but they were no better than a cow: eat, spit, and crap.

A contingent of robe-wearing folks in limousines arrived at the ranch house on a Saturday afternoon. A realtor from Mineral Wells introduced them as followers of the Dalai Lama, most recently of Tibet, a tiny country in Asia. Elfinian had never heard of this Lama guy, but he invited them in for a set down, some of Piddles’s baked cookies, and a drink of Jack Daniels. The head robe-wearing spokesperson was the Dalai Lama’s sister, Deli Lama. She wanted to buy a piece of the Keebler Ranch so the Dalai could have refuge from the Chinese who had booted him out of Tibet, and he wanted to raise a Llama or some hairy sheep, his favorite spirit animal.

Papa Keebler sold the group three hundred acres, including the existing herd of Llamas and all the donkeys and cow dogs. It was a win-win deal. Cookie volunteered to help get the ranch workable and show the tinder-foots the art of Texas ranching.

Eight weeks later, the Dalai Llama arrived in a private helicopter, touching down on the new helipad next to the ranch house an army of Monks and Hari Krishna volunteers had constructed for his holiness. His sister, Deli, her daughter Carol, and The Keebler family were there to welcome him to Texas. He stepped out of the chopper wearing a white Stetson from Leddy’s Western Store over in Fort Worth. The multi-talented Monks also played many instruments, so they broke into a rousing rendition of San Antonio Rose and then The Eyes of Texas Are Upon You. The Dalai felt right at home and immediately asked for a “coldbeer.”

After an all-nighter traditional Texas BBQ and a dozen kegs of Pearl and Tibetian Beer, The Dalai Lama surprised everyone by mounting a horse at sunrise and touring the ranch with Cookie and Elfinian. He had picked up a pair of jeans, some Justin boots, and a 44 Colt pistol in Fort Worth, and like in the movies, he was itching to plug him some Hombres. He also had purchased a twin-engine Cesena T50 airplane like Sky King flew and wanted Cookie to be his sidekick. Elfinian managed to wrangle the pistola from the Dalai before someone wound up planted, and he damned sure didn’t want his daughter flying in a plane with this loco-Lama.

The Dalai’s sister, Deli, and her daughter, Carol, were huge fans of New York musicals, especially Carol Channing. Miss Channing was in Fort Worth appearing at the Casa Manana production of “Hello Dolly,” so the Dalai Lama arranged for Carol and the entire theater company to put on an open-air show at his new Llama ranch. A cast of a hundred, the orchestra and sets were delivered by trucks, rigged, and a portable stage was built near the Llama corral. Half the ranching community was seated on the tailgate of their pickups, beer coolers stocked with Pearl and Mama’s, and babies scurried around the grassy lawn in front of the ranch house. The sun went down, the lights came up, and Carol Channing, as “Dolly,” walked up to the mike and sang, ” Hello Dalai, it’s so nice to have you back where you belong.” This kind of stuff can only happen in Texas.

Grifter Swifter

/ Phil Strawn / 12 Comments
The original Tortured Poet

After reading all the glowing, foot-kissing reviews of Swifter’s new album, “The Tortured Poet’s Department,” I take back a few of the skews I gave her, but only a few. I had no idea the poor dear had lived such a sad life. I doubt her feet touched the ground until she was five years old, and every spoon in the house was pure silver. A downtrodden, entitled little rich girl confined to her Barbie bedroom writing little kid songs on her half-size Martin guitar. She never played in a bar, a club, or anywhere for that matter, except for her doll babies. Pop’s paid millions to get her into that Nashville brotherhood, which shows us how far that once holy ground has slipped. Did the poor waif have ever have a decent relationship with a male, not counting her current knuckle dragger? Doubt it, so the tortured poet title might fit her, even though what she writes is far from good poetry.

There have been many before her who qualified for the title: Harry Nillson, John Lennon, Bobbie Gentry, James Taylor, and Willie Nelson are a few. The original Homeric tortured poet, Bob Dylan, still holds the title: Swifter is no more than a grifter.

“So You Want To Be A Rock N’Roll Star!” Part 1

/ Phil Strawn / 11 Comments

Part 1 of a series about becoming a rock n roll musician in the 1960s

Every boy fondly remembers his first; be it a gun, an armpit hair, a pimple, a girlfriend, a school dance, a beer, his first shave, a car, or his first electric guitar. Well, maybe most boys never got an electric guitar, or there would be no Beatles or Beach Boys, and there would be no one hearing or dancing to the music because all the teenage musicians would be on stage playing for each other; just an opinion. Not me; I did receive one, much like the Japanese-made instrument in the picture. I remember mine had maybe one more pickup and a few more knobs that did nothing, as well as three of the pickups. But it looked so darn cool.

I had graduated from a Gibson J 45 acoustic to needing an electric guitar and amp so I could become the American equivalent of George Harrison: thanks to Ed Sullivans having the Fabs on his variety show and tricking me into believing mere mortal teenagers could replicate the lads from Liverpool. Having been in the music biz, my father knew others who owned music stores. He procured me a nice-looking Japanese-made instrument, along with a Sears amplifier. The neck had no truss rod, so within a week, it warped; a case would have been nice, but nope, it might cost a few bucks. My pop wasn’t known as Mr. Cheap-O because he was a philanthropist. The amp was pure junk: five watts of power on a good day, a 10-inch speaker, which blew out in a few weeks, and it stopped working completely after a month, leaving me to bang away with no sound. It didn’t matter; the strings were a good 1/4 to 1/2 inch from the fretboard, so I could only play for a few minutes before my fingers spasmed and locked up. My left arm had the muscles of Popeye.

Duane Eddy I was not, nor anything near George Harrison. My father, upon examining the condition of my gear, realized his frugal ways may have bitten him and me in the butt. He apologized, sent the guitar to a shop, procured me an even worse amp and the cheesy guitar returned in the same condition. I saw the reflection in my crystal ball, accepted my defeat, and went back to the acoustic, which I couldn’t find, and was told my father had loaned it to one of his cousins for a while. The guitar was missing. It seems the cousin thought it was a gift and sold it to a friend, who sold it to another, and so on. I was now stuck with an unplayable doorstop. Some years later, I did track the J45 down and got it back, only to lose it again in an unfortunate accident involving the Gulf of Mexico. More on that later.

Easter Evening From The Cactus Patch

/ Phil Strawn / 11 Comments

It was a rather quiet Sunday here in the Cactus Patch. The church service was pretty good, the band on stage was stellar, and the Pastor gave a rousing benediction using Acts as his vehicle. We left a little early to make a late lunch engagement with Momo’s daughter’s family in Fort Worth. We were both worn out from attending the Liverpool Legends concert on Saturday night at the Granbury Opera House. Dancing in the aisles, old folks holding up their lit phones since they banned Bic lighters, and most folks don’t smoke anymore. An ambulance was waiting at the curbside in case any of the audience suffered the Rock n Roll vapors. Good time. Then…

“Are You A Boy..Or Are You A Girl?”

A catchy tune from 1965 by the band “The Barbarians,” a tongue-in-cheek poke at long-haired hippie dudes with beautiful Breck Shampoo flowing hair. Being well into my 70s, it takes a lot to surprise or tick me off, especially if it comes from Washington, D.C. Now, I find out that today, Easter Sunday, the holiest of days in our Christian faith, has been officially recognized by the white house as “Transgender Visibility Day.” Who in the Hell made this decision? I would say our president, but then he is supposedly a cafeteria Catholic and doesn’t at this time have the mental capacity to recognize what a slap in the face to Christian Americans he has delivered. Of course, the blowback is off the charts. Stay tuned for masses of pilgrims marching on Washington with torches and pitchforks.

If a teenage boy wants to dress like a teenage girl; go ahead. Same for the girls that want to wear a pair of Levis, Tocava boots, and a lumberjack shirt, do it, but shut up about it. You don’t need a special calendar day for the rest of America to see you are a nut job. At ten years old, I wanted to be Mark Twain, but I didn’t prematurely age myself and wear a white suit and wig. Thank the Lord the world didn’t have social media back then. TikTok, Facebook, and all the rest should take a huge chunk of the blame for this madness; radical teachers and Hollywood take the rest. No matter how dangerous and sick, the newest trends become the life our children grasp to follow. And now, no matter how small, the movement has its special day on the world calendar. Did someone in DC not check for conflicting dates? Was this intentional? I believe it was and it pokes a sharp stick in the eye of Christian Americans. I’ve seen it all and can stop worrying about future surprises. There, I feel better.

“So You Want To Be A Rock N’ Roll Star”

A few other great bloggers I follow, Dave of “A Sound Day,” Max of “Power Pop,” and Cincinnati Babyhead, have previously suggested that I chronicle my times in the Rock music world back in the 1960s. I have decided to give it a healthy shot; although I am timid about blowing my little tin horn, I will attempt to make it as humble and accurate as possible.

Put Those Dark Glasses On…It’s The End Of The World

Yep, I’m ready. Momo and I got our cardboard-certified Eclipse glasses and are ready for the world-changing event on April 8th. Our town, Granbury, Texas, expects an additional 100 thousand folks starting next Friday through Sunday. I may rent my extra wooded lot for camping since many pilgrims will not have accommodations. We are stocking up on canned foods, water, hootch, and ammo in case everything goes sideways.

Dispatches From The Cactus Patch March 14th 2024. Remembering The 1960s

/ Phil Strawn / 8 Comments

A shot of the crowd at Texas International Pop Festival, August 1969. The promoter, Angus Wynn, thought it would be a great idea to have a Yogi or a Swami to lead the crowd of zonked-out teenagers in an hour of Transcendental Meditation since it was the most recent in-crowd thing to do thanks to the Beatles and the Beach Boys who hung out in India with the famous Maharishi Mahesh Yogi Jr. He got a discount on a guy out of Deli, India, who was working in a sub sandwich shop in Brisbane, Australia, but was once a revered holy man in his home country. After a crazy hot night of music that lasted until after midnight, the Maharishi O Mah-ha-Ah-ha took the stage with a sitar player and three nude women beating on tablas and tambourines, all sitting crossed-legged on a rented Persian rug from AAA Furniture Rentals. The crowd, still suffering from the after-effects of too much pot and the brown acid that Wavey Gravy warned them about, eventually got into the groove. After an hour of chanting mantras, swooning and swaying, and all that middle eastern crap, the Maharishi passed hand-woven Indian baskets through the crowd asking for donations. What the good Ah-ha didn’t realize was that even though the young folks were long-haired, dope-smoking teens, they were Texans, and most of them owned shotguns and rifles and drove pickup trucks. Tithing was meant for Sunday church only, not some dude in a robe with a red dot on his forehead. The poor Maharishi was last seen tied to the front fender of a GMC pickup loaded with long-haired hippy Texans shooting their shotguns into the air while speeding down I-35. Best not to “Mess With Texas,” which is where that famous saying was born.

My late cousin, Velveteen, and her late husband, Zig Zag, came up with this idea for a hippy-only tea bag while living in a commune in the mountains of New Mexico. Since they enjoyed sitting around all day doing nothing, they figured why not let the rest of the regular folks enjoy their lifestyle, too. The tea, with its mystery ingredients, was a hot seller for a while until Lipton caught wind of it and sued them into the next galaxy.

My late cousin, Alice, was the only waitress at Woodstock in 1969. She and Wavey Gravy came up with the idea to serve all the attendees breakfast in bed, but she was the only member of the Hog Farm lucid enough to work. When asked how the gig went, she said, ” I didn’t make a cent in tips, damn Hippies don’t have no money anyway.” She met Arlo Guthrie backstage and married him the next day during a Joe Cocker set. They later opened a famous restaurant in upstate New York, where you could get anything you wanted at Alice’s restaurant.

I’m Going To Graceland,Graceland,Memphis Tennessee

/ Phil Strawn / 10 Comments

The Mississippi Delta was shining like a National guitar

I am following the river down the highway

through the cradle of the Civil War

I can’t think of a better opening lyric than the first verse of Paul Simon’s song, Graceland, from his acclaimed album of the same name. I’m a Simon fan from way back in the caveman days when he and Art Garfunkle made all the hippies and folkies stop and listen to their lyrics. Simon and Garfunkle were cerebral before it was cool or hip; holdovers from the coffee house Greenwich Village days. One guitar and two voices, no feedback, no pounding drums or wall of sound, just pure, beautiful talent. One could say that Paul and Art ” knew their groceries.” An old Beat term used by the hep-cats.

I’ve played a National Guitar, and it’s a tough hombre. Made from shining chromed steel with a resonator instead of a sound hole, the instrument is a beast that will shred your fingertips in record time. The sound, like the guitar, is unique, so I can see why Simon weaved it into the lyrics. The guitar does shine like the Delta, which I have seen from the air, and it does glow to the point of breaking out the Raybans or at least a $10.00 pair of gas station shades.

Graceland, yes, I have been there too, but it was “back in the day” while Elvis still called it home and was in and out of his kitchen making “peanut butter and nanner” sandwiches when he wasn’t shooting up color televisions or yukking it up with his entourage of buddies.

Memphis, back in the 1960s, when I used to visit, was once a happening city, and Graceland was in a good part of town. Now, you had better be packing if you visit that neighborhood. Beall Street was legendary, Sun Records was still operating, and the best rock n roll acts came to town like clockwork. Perhaps the city intrigued Simon when the boys played there in the 60s. He was biding his time, waiting for the right moment to pen a great tune about the southland. Having South African musicians on the album was the mint in the julip.

Paul and Art are old men now; aren’t we all that played music back then? I doubt there is much more left in the two of them, but man…those guys gifted us with some great music and lyrics that made us stop and think about a winter day in a deep and dark December, being an island, riding a bus while watching the moon rise over an open field, and writings on subway walls. Let’s see if anybody beats that.

Oddities In The Cactus Patch

/ Phil Strawn / 12 Comments

Things That Can Only Happen In Texas

Pictured at the Larado Railway Station, circa 1958, is my father’s uncles, brothers 15th cousin seven times removed, Little Tex Twitter, with his good buddy from across the border, Teenie Lopez, not to be confused with his older brother, Trini ( If I Had A Hammer) Lopez, a famous pop musician out of Dallas, Texas. Before Tex took him under his armpit, Teenie had been a tire scrubber at the “La Bamba Car Wash And Strip Club” in Nuevo Laredo. Cheech Chong, owner of the business, said that Teenie never missed a day of work but was a “little” late occasionally. Tex, seeing a possible Hollywood connection and possibly a movie or two, convinced Teenie to hit the road with him and his pet Coyote, Wiley. Tex had been on the rodeo circuit for a decade doing rope tricks and wrestling doggies; he had a new act planned for Teenie.

A small saddle was made to fit Wiley, and Teenie would ride the Coyote around the arena wearing a mariachi suit, singing and playing a small guitar. The act lasted only a few weeks when Wiley, doing what Coyotes do best, spotted a Roadrunner darting across the rodeo arena and gave pursuit, which ended in tragedy when Wiley and Teenie, in the heat of the chase, ran into the bullpen and were “hammered flat as a tortilla. “

Tex sent Teenie’s older brother, Trini, the small mariachi hat and what was left of the suit for remembrance’s sake. Trini, in his few moments of grief, penned his first hit tune, ” If I Had A Hammer,” as a tribute to the passing of his little brother. Bet you didn’t know any of this, did you?

Warnings From The Cactus Patch

/ Phil Strawn / 6 Comments

Don’t Do It..Don’t Press That Cute Little Button With Your Mouse!”

Who wouldn’t want to see what an AI generated Barbie Doll for each state would look like..right? Well, I was on MSN, the evil 1984 computer software owned by “Steve Jobs rip-off-boy and Mail Order Doctor, Bill Gates, and the article was there with a cute picture of a Barbie doll. She was wearing a woodchopper shirt, staring all dead-eyed with that perky little nose and luxurious plastic hair, so I clicked the read. First Barbie for the state of Alabama popped up, a chirpy little southern belle, very racist in her frilly debutant outfit, holding a mint julep; I kept looking for “the help” doll that came with her. Cute, I wouldn’t buy it for my granddaughter, who never liked Barbie anyway; she was into the American Girl high-dollar dolls. Then I hit the continue button, “Bammo…. call 800 Microsoft, and all these scanning windows come up on my screen, ” your PC is infected with a Virus of lethal origin, your information will be lost in space and your laptop will melt into a puddle of plastic unless you call this number.” Lucky for me, I have a great anti-virus called Webroot, and that caught the little basement-dwelling culprits, likely some Chinese dudes living in Shang-Hi or Bali Hi, with their mothers serving them Fung Chow tea and eating fried bats with Raman noodles all day. This is the tech-savvy security checks that MSN gives its users. I’d be safer using Alta-Vista on a dial-up modem.

Her New Album Is Coming…

The Swift One, The Anoited Ambushiness Blond, The Long-Legged Succubus, so many names, so many men to write songs about. Now, poor Neanderthal raw meat-eating Kelce is her focus. His attack on his coach told Tay-Tay that she probably shouldn’t marry this Transformer, who has no control over his testosterone-fueled madness. So, in a secret recording studio, somewhere in deep Europe, the album has begun in secret. This signals the end of her partnership with the NFL unless she can steal Patrick Mahomes from Elle May. I know my post a few days ago said no more Taylor stuff, but this is just too good to pass up. Gimme a hall pass on this one.

It Was Sixty Years Ago Today…The Beatles Taught Us All To Play

/ Phil Strawn / 21 Comments

Sixty years ago, on a Sunday night, the Beatles invaded America, and I watched in glorious black and white as they captivated every teenager in the country. The next morning, I told my mother that there would be no more haircuts and that I needed an electric guitar and amplifier. At this point, I had been playing guitar for two years on an old Gibson D 45 and was ready to take the leap into electrified instruments. I took extra vitamins and found a few special exercises to generate hair growth. It was a painstaking process.

Halfway through my school year, my family moved to Plano, Texas, and I was befriended by my good pal, Jarry Davis. He and I both had that special itch to play rock music. He knew a drummer and a sort of bass player, and I took on the lead guitar duties, playing a Japanese electric with six pickups and twenty knobs that did nothing. We called our band The Dolphins, later changing it to The Orphans, which sounded a bit tougher and fit us because of our long hair and general surely attitude; we were not the Monkees.

My rock n’ roll journey started on that February night and lasted until 2019, when my band, The American Classics Band, retired our setlist. Not a bad run of it.

That’s All I Can Stands, ‘Cause I Can’t Stands No More.

/ Phil Strawn / 13 Comments

A classic quote from an old sailor that fits my frame of mind lately. Tell me your thoughts; you can send the “Oh no, the elves went too far” emails and comments after you hear me out.

The Devil Worshiping-Narssisistic-Scum Bagging-God Hating- Ozempic Shooting Grammy Awards

Not shown for shock value..nothing shocks us these days

I didn’t watch them this year and haven’t in many. But, the articles on the websites cover the schmooze-fest quite well. The show, according to Rex Reed (I didn’t know he was still around) may have reached a new low. From the pictures on the net, most of the folks attending looked like characters from the Star Wars Bar. Swifter Girl is enough to keep many of us away, as well as all the gangster Devil-worshiping rappers carrying a 9 MM or a Uzi in their tux pockets. One poor girl actually performed a Satan Worship routine while singing about vampires sucking her blood, which at the appropriate time, she cut a vein and rubbed her own joy-juice all over her wokie body; ( it may have been Hawaiian Punch concentrate). I watched that video on YouTube and found it disgusting. The crowd loved it, stood up, and clapped, and Taylor Swifter danced and clapped. Okra Winfrey was filmed jamming it to the devil’s song while giving herself a shot of Ozempic. So, I guess digging out on that Devil’s music cancels Tay-Tay’s best-selling ” Study Bible,” which is being smuggled into the children’s section of our public libraries and on display in your neighborhood Wokie bookstores. A frail Joni Mitchell may have been the high spot of the broadcast. In her 80s and not too mobile, she sang one of her biggest “back in the day” hits. Bless Brandi Carlise for her friendship. Joni did an admirable job singing and just getting through the performance. I watched, with one eye covered, Miley Cyrus’s performance on YouTube. Good Lord, what a demonic little moron. Hopping around on stage, 95 percent naked, she sounds like Cher when she sings and like an 85-year-old whiskey-soaked five-pack-a-day smoker when she speaks. Pretty sure she’s shooting up the Ozempic, too. The music industry has gone to Hell in a Beelzebob Ozempic-loaded handbasket.

The Crisis At The River -Everyone Gets Baptized

I don’t have much left to say when it comes to the invasion on the border. I’m worn out and burned out. The Crazy Texas Wire Dealer is doing all he can, as are the Texas National Guard and The Texas Rangers. One man of the cloth, and I’m not sure which cloth he wears, or even if he is an ordained preacher, well, at least he had the TV preacher hair, said, “All those poor unfortunate sinners swimming in the river, it’s as if the good Lord is baptizing them before they reach the Texas shore.” That pretty much sums it up, folks.