The Golden Oldies with Vincent Vega

So I am more than aware that I have basically stopped posting in this blog, and my intentions are, as per usual, to continue posting as I originally had. Thanks to a string of strange dreams the mostly, if not always, involve people I'd rather not mention in this blog as the situations and occasions, no matter how involuntary (these are dreams, not rational products of my own design), are simply just too strange, complex, and at times, ordinary. But as my dreams continue to superpersonalize themselves, external realities provide for me other encounters which prove just as illuminating to the nature of Oddity.

Take, for instance, the Movie Star Record. Scarlett Johansson recently released her own (par) record of Tom Waits covers, and Zoey Dreschanel released Volume One with M. Ward under the monker She & Him (sehr Excellent). Then, of course, there's Eddie Murphy's "Party All The Time" single, and then every thing gets darker and murkier, and I believe at one point Bruce Willis released the Return of Bruno. Where musicians stray into the acting biz, the results, for some reason, seem to be terribly intriguing if not surprisingly good (at times) -- but when the actors take a foray into the recording world, it's less than jake. (I realize this could be a terrible band pun, something I'm not above, but I'm leaving it because I wrote it without that intention)

As a decade in love with terrible mistakes, its no wonder one can glean the 1980s for loads and loads of terrible decisions and questionable fads that are just aching to be bought up displayed for irony's sake. Hipsters are in love with this shit. It's vinyl plus irony. I'm almost tempted, personally, to start up a collection of terrible records released by professionally wayward celebrities with too much ego to match their so-called 'talents.' I'm thinking about starting with the $2 flagship of actor-turned-singer records that I found today while farming the local antique mall for records (Adam and the Ants' Kings of the Wild Frontier and Santana's Abraxas were the only decent ones I could find), pictured below.


When I saw it, I couldn't believe my eyes, if only because the glory was so blinding I had to take a moment to clarify what I was witnessing. Why did nobody tell me about this? What was the point of keeping me in the dark? John Travolta, mane-ed out, 1970s glitz, emblazoned on a one foot by one foot vinyl cover. According to wikipedia, has released or been featured on at least nine albums since 1974, one of which is titled Travolta Fever, another of which is apparently a scientology album he recorded in '86. Scientology album? Amazing! None of these albums have any pages dedicated to them, and the only pictures I can find of the record aren't bigger than 400px by 400px. Travolta even had a hit in '76 called "Let Her In," one of over twenty singles he released between the years 1969 and 1983. Now, I recognize I'm ignoring the fact that Travolta is actually culturally recognized, somewhat, for singing: he was in Grease, and Saturday Night Fever, although I reckon he doesn't sing in that one. But I can't help view this through the Pulp Fiction lens, seeing a pudgy, greasy, older and less dignified version of Travolta cooing his way through an album of 70s-era cuts. Reading these books on drugs and our so-called 'cultural amnesia,' I can see in full effect the nuggets of gold our society somehow leaves behind. Perhaps, my friends, sometime in the future, a record review of John Travolta's Can't Let You Go.

As A Side Note: While rifling through a box of more expensive records (some of which I question why they cost so much), I came across a Batman record. Seriously!? A batman record? I didn't know he was making music, either! You think Adam West was belting out some tunes in his time??