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So, Did You Know--
Aug. 31st, 2009 10:23 pm--Robert Mitchum could sing? True facts. Sovay sent me four of his songs earlier today, ranging from the sublimely odd ("You Deserve Each Other") to the damn weird ("Mama, Looka Boo Boo", which is...a calypso song. Sung by Robert Mitchum). Also a couple of Gothic country songs ("Walker's Woods", which features murder, gators, cottonmouths and quicksand, and "The Ballad of Thunder Road", theme song from the movie of the same name, which features bootleggers and exploding engines--an obvious forerunner to "Copperhead Road"); Mitchum had a bleak-ass sense of humor, as befits an unrepentant hillbilly pot-smoker.
Then again, Michael Madsen writes poetry. Strange, Bukowski/Beat-inflected poetry that often reminds one of a James Ellroy monologue by way of drunk David Carradine. His latest collection is called American Bad-Ass; I found this sample on his site:
FALSE WITNESS
On the way to LAX once again,
Rene picked me up in a black town car
and we started talking the way we always have,
and I found out more about him, as I usually do.
This time it was about Dean Martin back in the day.
I guess Dean Martin came up because Rene was playing a Best of CD
starting with Return to Me, a haunting melody.
Anyway, after hearing about Frank and Sammy—
Frank apparently always sullen, and Sammy always forcing Rene to
roll a pair of dice for a tip, we agreed that Joey Bishop was probably
the best gentleman of the bunch.
Birds became the next topic, for some reason
and I remember having written a poem about birds in a cage
and Rene said he wished sometimes to free his parakeets
and I told him I had once done that with mine on a long, drunken
afternoon
and they had flown into the sea to drown.
At the time it seemed so sad and I wrote about it that way,
But today at the airport I read a long article in a Malibu magazine
about the great writer John Fante, and the memory of the birds wasn’t
sad anymore.
In fact, I think their 25 seconds of freedom were inglorious.
And drunk or sober, I’m glad I did it.
Later, Rene said he got into trouble from dispatch
for not having enough air conditioning out in Palm Springs
while driving tourists and that they didn’t care about Frank Sinatra
when told that he used to live there and the car was so hot Rene said he
was sweating like a false witness
Perhaps Brad Pitt should take a little ride with Rene and maybe he
might learn something.
—Michael Madsen, written in Kentucky 8/16/08
Sometimes, I think about the fact that in one of his first interviews, Madsen offhandedly told the reporter he'd once burnt a tattoo he didn't like anymore off his arm by holding it against an overheated car tailpipe. And then I think about Virginia Madsen, and wonder how the two of them ever came out of the same family. (Not that she isn't odd too, in her own way. Plus sexy.)
(But then, on a good day, so is he.)
Then again, Michael Madsen writes poetry. Strange, Bukowski/Beat-inflected poetry that often reminds one of a James Ellroy monologue by way of drunk David Carradine. His latest collection is called American Bad-Ass; I found this sample on his site:
FALSE WITNESS
On the way to LAX once again,
Rene picked me up in a black town car
and we started talking the way we always have,
and I found out more about him, as I usually do.
This time it was about Dean Martin back in the day.
I guess Dean Martin came up because Rene was playing a Best of CD
starting with Return to Me, a haunting melody.
Anyway, after hearing about Frank and Sammy—
Frank apparently always sullen, and Sammy always forcing Rene to
roll a pair of dice for a tip, we agreed that Joey Bishop was probably
the best gentleman of the bunch.
Birds became the next topic, for some reason
and I remember having written a poem about birds in a cage
and Rene said he wished sometimes to free his parakeets
and I told him I had once done that with mine on a long, drunken
afternoon
and they had flown into the sea to drown.
At the time it seemed so sad and I wrote about it that way,
But today at the airport I read a long article in a Malibu magazine
about the great writer John Fante, and the memory of the birds wasn’t
sad anymore.
In fact, I think their 25 seconds of freedom were inglorious.
And drunk or sober, I’m glad I did it.
Later, Rene said he got into trouble from dispatch
for not having enough air conditioning out in Palm Springs
while driving tourists and that they didn’t care about Frank Sinatra
when told that he used to live there and the car was so hot Rene said he
was sweating like a false witness
Perhaps Brad Pitt should take a little ride with Rene and maybe he
might learn something.
—Michael Madsen, written in Kentucky 8/16/08
Sometimes, I think about the fact that in one of his first interviews, Madsen offhandedly told the reporter he'd once burnt a tattoo he didn't like anymore off his arm by holding it against an overheated car tailpipe. And then I think about Virginia Madsen, and wonder how the two of them ever came out of the same family. (Not that she isn't odd too, in her own way. Plus sexy.)
(But then, on a good day, so is he.)
