7 May 2014 Dr Sketchy DJ Set List

/ Striptease icon, the cat-faced Lili St Cyr (1918-1999), aka the Anatomic Bomb. (The perfect cleft in her chin rivals Ava Gardner's). Read about her stormy life here /

In a celebration of red-headed mamas, all the performers this evening at The Royal Vauxhall Tavern were gingers: emcee Ophelia Bitz, burlesque performers / models Amelie Soleil and Sophia St Villier and even the DJ (my bad self!). In tribute, I could have played endless back-to-back tracks by ultimate atomic era auburn vixen Ann-Margret – but I didn't.

The night witnessed saucepot mistress of ceremonies Ophelia at her juiciest, most debauched and Tallulah Bankhead-esque. Barefoot in Capri pants, black sequinned beret cocked at a jaunty angle, she looked like an earthy 1950s beatnik poetess en route to an Allen Ginsberg reading. “Draw with your non-dominant hand,” Ophelia challenged the crowd. “If you’re right-handed, draw with your left hand. If you’re left-handed, draw with your right hand. If you’re ambidextrous please see me after the show. I have plans for you.” At one point she invited the audience to stub out their cigarettes on her body, James Dean human ashtray-style. Following Sophia St Villier’s stunning performance, Ophelia picked up her discarded bra from the stage floor, sniffed it, inhaled deeply and purred something about “the moist patch spreading towards my knees.” 

Ophelia introduced the first act of the night with, “Welcome to the stage my dear friend and wank fantasy, Amelie Soleil.” This time the stage fans were switched off beforehand and Amelie successfully did the same macabre carnival freak show act from last month. It incorporated some nonchalant fire-eating (Amelie shrugged like it was no big thing) and then she “ate” some razor blades as casually as if they were Pringles. (I was torn between watching Amelie and the frozen, aghast expression of one of the guys in the front table).

Happily, the night also featured the return of statuesque (5’10”) showgirl deluxe Sophia St Villier. Jessica Rabbit lookalike Sophia (New Zealand’s finest export) used to be a Dr Sketchy stalwart but these days she’s occupied with her own ventures, like Naked Girls Reading.  Anyway, her serpentine old-school burlesque performance was totally bewitching and left the audience awe-struck.

/ Children of the Damned: the ghostly harmonies of sisters Patience and Prudence /

Musically, I shook-together disparate elements like exotica, greasy rhythm and blues, grinding burlesk tittyshakers and sophistiqué Continental divas like Hildegard Knef and Juliette Greco - and then stood back to see how they landed. As the night progressed I veered toward an eerie spine-tingling David Lynch-ian noir vibe, especially when Amelie and Sophia were posing. The evocative soundtracks of both Lynch and Kenneth Anger are eternal sources of inspiration for me. Considering Sophia’s spectacular stage outfit was iridescent royal blue, playing versions of “Blue Velvet” felt apt – and of course the 1963 Bobby Vinton classic is where Lynch and Anger overlap (it features in Anger’s homoerotic experimental Scorpio Rising (1963) as well as the 1986 Lynch masterpiece). Isabella Rossellini as abused masochistic nightclub chanteuse Dorothy Vallens in the latter, crooning an endless (tuneless) Nico-like rendition of “Blue Velvet” in her bouffant wig is goose bump-inducing. The brushed drums, melancholy trumpet and prowling basslines of 1950s Cool Jazz (the sound of one finger snapping – in a morgue) is as synonymous with Twin Peaks as backward-talking midgets. (Doomed Cool Jazz icon Chet Baker’s instrumental version of the jazz standard “You’re My Thrill” from his 1965 album Baker’s Holiday: Plays and Sings Billie Holiday is one of my Dr Sketchy staples). The crystalline, ethereal voices of Julee Cruise, Francoise Hardy and The Paris Sisters (sighing and cooing about their elusive “Dream Lover” in Kenneth Anger’s 1965 film Kustom Kar Kommandos) are angelic verging-on-ghostly. Hell, even the sugary harmonies of 1950s novelty act Patience and Prudence have a blank-eyed Children of the Damned quality.

/ "She wore Bluuuuue Velvet ..." Kenneth Anger's underground homoerotic classick (sic) Scorpio Rising (1963) /

/ "I like to sing "Blue Velvet" ..." Isabella Rossellini in David Lynch's Blue Velvet (1986) /


KUSTOM KAR KOMMANDOS - KENNETH ANGER (1965) from Tanya Muzanovic on Vimeo.

/ Essential viewing /



/ I know I've posted this clip before, but screw it! Another Dr Sketchy perennial: France's Francoise Hardy crooning in German and channeling Marlene Dietrich with her top hat, cigarette and mesh hose. Haunting /

Ebb Tide - Al Anthony (Wizard of the Organ)
Love Song of The Nile - Korla Pandit
Virgene del Sol - Yma Sumac
Intoxica - The Revels
Egg Man - Edith Massey
Mamma's Place - Bing Day
Ain't That Good? George Kelly and Orchestra
Letter from Tina - Ike and Tina Turner
The Coo - Wayne Cochran
Tonight You Belong to Me - Patience and Prudence
I Learn a Merengue, Mama - Robert Mitchum
Fujiyama Mama - Annisteen Allen
Anasthasia - Bill Smith Combo
All of Me - Mae West
Jungle Drums - Earl Bostic
Tear Drops from My Eyes - Ruth Brown
The Flirt - Shirley and Lee
It- The Regal-aires
Strolling After Dark - The Shades
No Good Lover - Mickey and Sylvia
Khrushchev Twist - Melvin Gayle
Night Scene - The Rumblers
Fever - Nancy Sit
Esquerita and The Voola - Esquerita
Kiss Me Honey Honey - The Delmonas
Scorpion - The Carnations
A Cheat - The Earls of Suave
Your Love is Mine - The Ikettes
I Love How You ... Lydia Lunch
If I Should Lose You - George Shearing
Champagne Taste - Eartha Kitt
Crawlin' - The Untouchables
C'est Moi, C'est Lola - Anouk Aimee
Blues in My Heart - The John Buzon Trio
Hot Toddy - Julie London
You're My Thrill - Chet Baker (instrumental)
Give Me Love - Lena Horne
The Stripper - John Barry (Beat Girl soundtrack)
Heartbreak Hotel - Ann-Margret
Bombora - The Original Surfaris
I Walk Like Jayne Mansfield - The 5,6,7,8s
Sweet Little Pussycat - Andre Williams
Beat Party - Ritchie and The Squires
Love Potion # 9 - Nancy Sit
Revellion -The Revels
Black Tarantula - Jody Reynolds
Mon coeur n'était pas fait pour ça - Juliette Greco
Where Flamingos Fly - Linda Lawson
Blue Velvet - Bobby Vinton
Traume - Francoise Hardy
Up in Flames - Julee Cruise
L'eau à la bouche - Serge Gainsbourg
Hiasmina - Jean Seberg
Wind Up Doll - Little Peggy March
Little Darlin' - Masaaki Hirao
Dream Lover - The Paris Sisters
Kiss - Marilyn Monroe
Blue Velvet - Isabella Rossellini
Love for Sale - Hildegard Knef
Chattanooga Choo-Choo - Denise Darcel
The Girl Can't Help It - Little Richard
Hit The Road, Jack - Ray Charles
Drive Daddy Drive - Little Sylvia
Wipe-Out - The Surfaris
Little Queenie - The Bill Black Combo

Obviously I can't miss an opportunity to plug my own club! The international sin set has been waiting - and I can confirm the first Lobotomy Room of 2014 is Saturday 31 May 2014 in the subterranean basement sex dungeon of Ryan's Bar in Stoke Newington (call it "the fringes of Dalston." I do). Cram a lifetime of squalid thrills into one night - at LOBOTOMY ROOM! Full details on the Facebook events page.

19 March 2014 Dr Sketchy Set List

/ Showtime for the Rita Hayworth of Burlesque, the regal Tempest Storm /

For the 19 March 2014 Dr Sketchy at The Royal Vauxhall Tavern, eternally naughty emcee Ophelia Bitz kicked off proceedings with the musical number “Red Riding Hood” by the late Brit drag legend Danny La Rue (her spiritual show biz father).  Bad girl of cabaret Ophelia was feeling particularly juicy this night. Indicating her sparkly red showgirl dress, she declared, “I’m dressed as Mae West’s vagina.”  After featured burlesque artiste Bettsie Bon Bon departed the stage stripped down to g-string and pasties, Ophelia picked up Bettsie’s discarded bra from the floor, held it to her face and inhaled deep (think Dennis Hopper and his gas mask in Blue Velvet).

/ Ophelia's lingerie-sniffing was reminiscent of this, too: Shelley Winters in What's the Matter with Helen? (1971). Via /

The two featured guest performers and models this time were the pretty damn dazzling Bon Bon and Amelie Soeil. (I hadn't seen Ms Bon Bon since Bestival 2012). I was struck by what seasoned pros both of them are. In both of their acts, things went wrong – it was impressive how they rolled with it without breaking stride. Poor Bettsie Bon Bon suffered a wardrobe malfunction – she couldn't get her corset off. Eventually she managed to virtually wrestle herself out of it - and injure herself in the process. (“I made myself bleed trying to get my tits out for you,” she later informed the audience). Soleil, meanwhile, did an eye-watering act that involved eating razor blades. Yikes! Freaky! It was like something out of an old school carnival sideshow. I’m one squeamish mofo and I had to watch bits of it between my fingers. At one point Soleil whipped out a cigarette lighter or some matches (I forget which) to apparently do some fire-eating but they wouldn't light because of the onstage fans. She swiftly abandoned that idea and continued to blow our minds with the razor blade-eating.

/ Last month I posted a photo of Korla Pandit (1921-1998) with Yma Sumac. Here he is with Poison Ivy and Lux Interior of The Cramps, looking suitably reverent to be in his presence /

It probably sounds perverse, but my favourite part of DJ’ing at a Dr Sketchy at The Royal Vauxhall Tavern is early on, just as people start arriving, I’m am playing tinkly exotica lounge music and the venue is darkened and lit just by candles (once Dr Sketchy properly starts, the house lights come up so that people can see their drawings!). My new ritual is opening with a track by the turbaned high potentate of exotica, the enigmatic Korla Pandit.  From there, I went in a swirling Middle Eastern belly dancer direction (obviously playing “Uska Dara” by Miss Eartha Kitt was obligatory). “Taita Inty (Virgin of The Sun God)” by high priestess of exotica Yma Sumac ends with the sound of a gong being struck. Martin Denny’s “Girlfriend of the Whirling Dervish” begins with the sound of a gong – playing them back-to-back segued seamlessly! I always play the Marilyn Monroe-Jane Russell duet “A Little Girl from Little Rock” from the 1953 film Gentlemen Prefer Blondes when two women model together – maybe a bit predictable, but it always gets a laugh. Everyone loves that film.

Love Song of the Nile - Korla Pandit
Taita Inty (Virgin of the Sun God) - Yma Sumac
Girlfriend of the Whirling Dervish - Martin Denny
The Maharajah of Megador - The Blue Echoes
Uska Dara - Eartha Kitt
Kizmiaz - The Cramps
Tonight You Belong to Me - Patience and Prudence
Some of These Days - The Kordt Sisters with Swing Accompaniment
Mama's Place - Bing Day
Fever - Edith Massey
Ain't That Good? George Kelly and Orchestra
Wiped-Out - The Escorts
I'm Blue - The Ikettes
Night Walk - The Swingers
I Ain't in the Mood - Helen Humes
Long Distance - Garnell Cooper and The Kinfolk
Where's My Money? Willie Jones
Don't Blame It On Me - Ike and Tina Turner
Here Comes the Bug - The Rumblers
Uptown to Harlem - Johnny Thunders and Patti Palladin
I Live the Life I Love - Esquerita
Night Scene - The Rumblers
Handclapping Time - The Fabulous Raiders
Catwalk - Jack Constanzo
Aged and Mellow - Little Esther
Willow Weep for Me - The Whistling Artistry of Muzzy Marcellino
Basin Street Blues - Julie London
Where Flamingos Fly - Linda Lawson
Lazy - The Nuns
Beat Party - Ritchie and The Squires
Little Queenie - Bill Black's Combo
Mama Looka Boo Boo - Robert Mitchum
Rum and Coca Cola - Wanda Jackson
Go Calypso - Mamie Van Doren
Delilah Jones - The Thunderbirds
Lovin' Spree - Ann-Margret
My Pussy Belongs to Daddy - Faye Richmonde
Champagne Taste - Eartha Kitt
Give Me Love - Lena Horne
L'eau a la bouche - Serge Gainsbourg
A Little Girl from Little Rock - Marilyn Monroe and Jane Russell
Hiasmina - Jean Seberg
Hot Licks - The Rendells
Sexe - Line Renaud
Pass the Hatchet - Roger and The Gypsies
Suey - Jayne Mansfield
Lucille - Masaaki Hirao
Dragon Walk - The Noblemen
I Got Stung - Elvis Presley
Scorpion - The Carnations
The Girl Can't Help It - Little Richard
One Monkey Don't Stop No Show - Big Maybelle
Wipe Out - The Surfaris
Last Call for Whiskey - Choker Campbell
Hit The Road Jack - Ray Charles

19 February 2014 Dr Sketchy DJ Set List

/ She's a brick ... house /

The first Dr Sketchy of the New Year was quite simply one of the best ever. In fact last Wednesday night at The Royal Vauxhall Tavern felt like Dr Sketchy being plunged back to its classic golden age (or age d’or, if you prefer).

First of all, hostess with the mostest (or should that be “moistest”?), emcee Ophelia Bitz was back in charge of proceedings and on raunchy form. Think of her as the toilet-mouthed and debauched Tallulah Bankhead du nos jours. Bad girl of cabaret Ophelia and her boyfriend upped sticks and re-located to Bristol a while back, so this was a rare London appearance (I’m pretty sure I hadn't seen her since Bestival 2012).  Boy, do we miss her at Dr Sketchy. Resplendent in gold sequins, at one point she apologised to the crowd for not having washed beforehand and explained Febreeze is the patron saint of cabaret. Later, circulating through the crowd and glancing at their drawings, she stopped at one, exclaimed, “That’s disgusting!” and gave a filthy cackle.

/ Filthiest Woman Alive? Ophelia Bitz channeling Divine in Pink Flamingos /

Both of the night’s guest performers / models, Amelie Soleil and Fancy Chance, were cabaret crème de la crème and Dr Sketchy doyennes who hadn't performed for us in ages. I’d only ever seen “Britain’s Tiniest Tease” Soleil once before (at the May 2012 Dr Sketchy at The Old Queen’s Head) and didn't recognise her at first at The Royal Vauxhall Tavern: she’s since shuttled from blonde to Ann-Margret not-found-in-nature red. (Needless to say I slipped in an Ann-Margret track while Soleil modeled – not that I need much excuse).

/ Totally gratuitous cheesecake bathing suit “glamour shot” of Fancy Chance at Bestival 2012 – just for the hell of it /

Like with Ophelia, I hadn't seen maverick burlesque comedienne Fancy Chance since Dr Sketchy and Time for Tease at Bestival 2012.  Chance’s routine was certainly au courant: Prince has been causing a sensation in London lately, playing tiny intimate gigs that instantly sell out.  The savvy Chance dusted off her Prince tribute act (she howls along and strips to “Kiss”) and was probably far more entertaining than the genuine article himself these days. Perhaps unsurprisingly, I don’t have any Prince tracks in my collection. But figuring Chance in male drag (with her tousled pompadour bouffant wig and pencil-line pimp mustache) looked just as much like Little Richard, Esquerita or Masaaki Hirao as Prince, I cranked-up songs by them during her poses instead.



/ Sadly, we never seem to get people taking and submitting photos at Dr Sketchy anymore, but to give you a flavour, here is the sublime Fancy Chance doing her Prince act at the Time for Tease tent at Bestival 2012 /

Musically, as usual at Dr Sketchy I sought to induce a sleazy atomic era nightclub ambiance (DJ’ing at an old-school darkened cabaret venue with red velvet curtains and candles on the tables is certainly inspiring) via greasy rhythm and blues (Ike and Tina, Big Maybelle), bump’n’grind titty shaker instrumentals, cooing sex kittens (Eartha, Jayne, Ann-Margret) songs swiped from John Waters, Kenneth Anger and David Lynch soundtracks, discordant post-punk death-jazz skronk (Lydia Lunch) and just plain weird shit (Edith Massey slaughtering “Fever”).

Of course primitive, pagan and taboo exotica lounge music will always hold a special place in my heart. Whether it’s Dr Sketchy or my own night Lobotomy Room, I like to ease into things early on by playing atmospheric and eerie exotica by the likes of Martin Denny and Les Baxter just as people are arriving, probably making them wonder, “Where the hell am I?” I've written before about my admiration for the mesmerising and enigmatic Korla Pandit, but only just recently started incorporating his weird and wonderful music into my sets. He is the high emperor of exotica to Peruvian diva Yma Sumac’s high empress. Playing two tracks back-to-back by these two is spine-tingling and intoxicating.

/ Historic Encounter Between Exotica High Royalty: Yma Sumac (1922-2008) and Korla Pandit (1921-1998) crossing paths in the early 1980s. We are not worthy ... / 

/ Korla Pandit (and a very pretty Asian male dancer) in action in his 1950s prime. Look deep into his eyes /

Love Song of the Nile - Korla Pandit
Ataypura (High Andes) - Yma Sumac
Voodoo Dreams / Voodoo - Les Baxter
Kizmiaz - The Cramps
Cafe Bohemian - The Enchanters
Monkey Bird - The Revels
Mamma's Place - Bing Day
Fever - Edith Massey
One Monkey Don't Stop No Show - Big Maybelle
Ain't That Good? George Kelly and Orchestra
Night Scene - The Rumblers
A Cruise to the Moon - Lydia Lunch
One Mint Julep - Sarah Vaughan
Not Me - Robert Mitchum
Go Calypso - Mamie Van Doren
The Coo - Wayne Cochran
I'm a Bad, Bad Girl - Little Esther
Here Comes the Bug - The Rumblers
Mambo Baby - Ruth Brown
She Wants to Mambo - Johnny Thunders and Patti Palladin
Little Darlin' - Masaaki Hirao
Love Letters - Ike and Tina Turner
Blue Velvet - Bobby Vinton
Bombora - The Original Surfaris
Nobody Taught Me - Eartha Kitt
Where Flamingos Fly - Linda Lawson
Dream Lover - The Paris Sisters
Shangri-la - Spike Jones New Band
You're My Thrill - Dolores Gray
The Stripper - John Barry (Beat Girl soundtrack)
Heartbreak Hotel - Ann-Margret
Black Tarantula - Jody Reynolds
Slow Walk - Sil Austin
The Flirt - Shirley and Lee
Welfare Cheese - Emanuel Lanskey
You're Driving Me Crazy - Dorothy Berry
Kruschev Twist - Melvin Gayle
Margaya - The Fender Four
Jaguar - The Jaguars
Esquerita and The Voola - Esquerita
Jailhouse Rock - Masaaki Hirao
Lucille - Little Richard
My Boy Lollipop - Sakura and the Quests
I Walk Like Jayne Mansfield - The 5,6,7,8s
That Makes It - Jayne Mansfield
Hiasmina - Jean Seberg
Crazy Vibrations - The Bikinis
Sexe - Line Renaud
Je t'aime moi non plus ... Serge Gainsbourg and Brigitte Bardot
Begin the Beguine - Lynn Rockwell
Mack the Knife - Hildegard Knef
Kool Kat Walk - Julee Cruise
Intoxica - The Revels
Chicken Grabber - The Nite Hawks
Cry-baby - The Honey Sisters
Roll with Me, Henry - Etta James
Tina's Dilemma - Ike and Tina Turner
The Girl Can't Help It - Little Richard
Bossa Nova Baby - Elvis Presley
Moi je joue - Brigitte Bardot

12 May 2012 Dr Sketchy Set List

 / A strawberry blonde that's never existed in nature: Sex kitten extraordinaire Ann-Margret /

This Saturday afternoon Dr Sketchy at The Old Queen’s Head happened to coincide with my birthday. The reliably louche Dusty Limits was on emcee duties. Our burlesque performer and female model was the diminutive Amelie Soleil, who I’ve never worked with before. She has a circus school background and is a contortionist: she can do the splits as casually as most of cross our legs, and was able to hold the pose for an eye-watering length of time! She also incorporated fire-eating into her burlesque act – wow! You can read about Amelie’s pretty remarkable background in circus, cabaret and burlesque here. Our male model was the aptly-named Luscious Luke, who's recently been featured as a pin-up in Meat magazine (think of it as the UK equivalent of Butt).

   

/ Luke and Dusty topping up their fluid intake/

   

/ The ultra-bendy Amelie Soleil /

   

/ Amelie and Luke ensemble /

Because it was my birthday, I invited along some friends of mine: Angela (the sassy Scottish lassie who put the “ange” in “danger”), Paul (aka Johnny Cashpoint, formerly of art-punk band Matron – who should’ve made it big!), Derek and “Stuckist” artist and musician Ella Guru (formerly of the Voodoo Queens, currently in The Deptford Beach Babes). All of them were Dr Sketchy virgins, and really seemed to dig it.

   

/ My official birthday 2012 portrait: no photo of me is complete without my trademark sweat patch /

I’m still working in new material from CDs I bought at Amoeba Records in San Francisco in April. From Ain’t Love Grand, the much-maligned 1985 fifth album by the Los Angeles punk band X (a record that rocked my world as a teenager. It merits a whole blog to itself), I played the dramatic and bluesy torch song “My Goodness”, which seemed to make an impression. The punk-y and strange last few songs were just me clowning around because I was drunk by then and it was my birthday. I’ve also started introducing some tracks from a compilation CD entitled Good Girls Gone Bad I picked up at the wonderful Rooky Ricardo's Records in San Francisco. (God, how much do I love this store? I also bought some Ike and Tina Turner fridge magnets there. Imagine! Ike and Tina fridge magnets! I thought I’d died and gone to heaven). The compilation is a gem: I would call it an early 60s girl group anthology (it does feature some great obscure girl groups with names like The Tiaras, The Fortune Cookies and The Half-Sisters) but it mostly comprises tear-jerking laments by dimly-remembered wholesome white solo “girl singers” from that late 1950s-early 1960s post-army Elvis and pre-Beatles period that conventional baby boomer rock historians routinely condemn as some kind of cultural 

wasteland.  

/ Rooky Ricardo's Records on Haight Street /

Well, received wisdom sucks. Yes, the pop music of this era is often terminally un-hip, tame and neutered: think clean-cut teen idols like Tommy Sands, Connie Francis, Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello, think "Kookie, Kookie Lend Me Your Comb.". Yet because the music is so white bread, wholesome and square, there’s often an intriguing bat squeak of strangeness and kinkiness under its middle of the road veneer. Transgressive filmmakers like Kenneth Anger (think Scorpio Rising (1963); the Paris Sisters cooing “Dream Lover” in Kustom Kar Kommandos (1965) would comfortably fit on Good Girls Gone Bad) and David Lynch recognise this, returning again and again to the music of this period for their soundtracks. Lynch in particular: Bobby Vinton’s “Blue Velvet”, Connie Stevens’s “16 Reasons” and Linda Scott’s “I’ve Told Every Single Star” in Mulholland Drive (2001). The early 1960s is also the period John Waters came of age as a teen and which he lovingly evokes in Hairspray (1988).

   

"16 Reasons" in Mulholland Drive The Connie Stevens original (Better known as an actress, platinum blonde starlet Connie Stevens cut a few records in the early 60s, singing in a breathless little girl voice. Her "Little Miss Understood" is one of my highlights on Good Girls Gone Bad). Connie Stevens in her beehived glory When I bought the CD, the man who I assume to be Rooky Ricardo himself exclaimed, “Oh you’ll like this – it’s white girls with problems.” Corny as hell, the songs pack a fluffy kitsch period charm, but also throb with innocence and urgent teen drama. Good Girls Gone Girl Bad sketches out a soap opera realm in which tearful, passive-aggressive and needy girls next door pine for their “good-bad but not evil” leader of the pack-bad boys in heartbreak ballads. “Twenty four hours of loneliness / Twenty four hours of heartbreak / Every minute has been like this / How much more can I take?” Bonnie Lou demands, audibly at the end of her rope, while Joni Lymon’s “Happy Birthday Blue” is a variation on “It’s My Party and I’ll Cry if I Want To.” On “Call Him Back”, Donna Lewis argues with her boyfriend on the phone, hangs up on him and then goes batshit crazy regretting it. Things reach a fever pitch with “It Should Have Been Me”, in which the lead singer of the aforementioned Fortune Cookies turns deranged stalker, watching her ex’s wedding from a phone booth across the street. Her delivery makes you hope the newlyweds have taken out a restraining order. (It’s worth remembering that it was around this time (1960) that Ike Turner first unleashed on the world his tigress of a wife, the volcanic Tina. Consider her frankly sex-wracked scream on “A Fool in Love” and then consider the disparity between black rhythm and blues and white pop records of the time). The yearning lyrics and keening vocals on Good Girls Gone Bad bristle with the kind of dysfunctional "stand by your man" masochism whose DNA still pulses in the knowingly retro, noir-ish and David Lynch-ian music of ice princess Lana Del Rey today. “He can‘t be all bad / even though he’s got an awful lot of rebel in him ...” long-forgotten ingénue Cobey Carson simpers. “It’s no wonder he’s in trouble every day / No kind word ever comes his way ...And I’m glad he’s mine.” That’s precisely the kind of sentiment Del Rey (the only modern pop star who matters) explores in a more overtly troubled/troubling, potentially self-destructive way in songs like “Blue Jeans” and “Born to Die.” Of course one of the (many) things Del Rey takes so much flack for is being a poor feminist role model for her “irresponsible” lyrics (her intriguing 1950s good girl/bad girl mixed messages are older than Ann-Margret and Nancy Sinatra). Lana, oh, Lana: I understand you But masochistic themes of romantic despair are present in all great love songs – they’re the life force of pop itself. Think of the mid-century female masters of the art of heartbreak (Piaf longing for her legionnaire, the entire oeuvre of Billie Holiday, Dusty Springfield wailing “I Just Don’t Know What to Do with Myself”) and all the blues and Country & Western greats of both genders (an utterly defeated Hank Williams crying into his beer on “You Win Again”). Good Girls Gone Bad taps into this, and makes me shudder in ecstasy. Anyway, later that night I met up with Christopher and Lauren and went to The Hillbilly Hop (London’s best monthly rockabilly club; kudos to its promoter, Greaser Leo). From there, things got messy, but it was fun and worth the next day’s hangover. I quickly snapped a few drunken (brutally close-up) photos at the Hillbilly Hop. Consider them Nan Goldin-style portraits of my friends Lauren Christopher Danny Danny again Quiet Village - Martin Denny Run - Jeri Southern Laisse-moi tranquille - Serge Gainsbourg Wimoweh - Yma Sumac Mama Look A Boo Boo - Robert Mitchum Go Calypso - Mamie Van Doren De Castrow - Jaybee Wasden La Bamba - Eartha Kitt Vesuvius - The Revels I Want Your Love - The Cruisers Margaya - The Fender Four Jim Dandy - Sara Lee and The Spades You Can't Stop Her - Bobby Marchan Screwdriver - Luchi Chicken - The Spark Plugs Kruschev Twist - Melvin Gayle Chop Suey Rock - The Instrumentals Love Potion # 9 - Nancy Sit Fujiyama Mama - Annisteen Allen The Bee - The Sentinels Oo-Wee, Mr Jeff - Georgina Lane Tall Cool One - The Wailers Always True to You in My Fashion - Denise Darcel 8 Ball - The Hustlers Fever - Ann-Margret You're My Thrill - Chet Baker (instrumental) Mon coeur n'était pas fait pour ça - Juliette Greco Anasthasia - Bill Smith Combo Strolling After Dark - The Shades Womp Womp - Freddie and The Heartaches Hard Workin' Man - Captain Beefheart A Man What Takes His Time - Marlene Dietrich I Want a Boy - Connie Russell Handclapping Time - The Fabulous Raiders One Mint Julep - Sarah Vaughan Dragon Walk - The Noble Men Hurt Is All You Gave Me - Ike and Tina Turner This Thing Called Love - Esquerita That Makes It - Jayne Mansfield Beat Party - Ritchie and The Squires Boss - The Rumblers How Come You Do Me? Junior Thompson The Beast - Milt Buckner Do It Again - April Stevens Kiss - Marilyn Monroe My Goodness - X Mondo Moodo - Earls of Suave Lazy - The Nuns Crazy Vibrations - The Bikinis You're the Boss - Elvis Presley and Ann-Margret Bonnie and Clyde - Serge Gainsbourg and Brigitte Bardot Love is Strange - Johnny Thunders and Patti Paladin Begin the Beguine - Billy Fury Mack the Knife - Hildegard Knef La Javanise - Juliette Greco The Girl Can't Help It - Little Richard Witchcraft - Elvis Presley Viens danser le twist - Johnny Hallyday Beat Girl - Adam Faith Little Miss Understood - Connie Stevens Big Girls Don't Cry - Edith Massey What's Wrong with Me? X What Do You Think I Am? Ike and Tina Turner