Twin Blessings

Lynette and Marie Pena, singing "God Bless America" at Dodger Stadium Friday night.

Juliette of the Spirits

This is the photograph of Juliette Lewis that I'd hoped would accompany my L.A. Times profile of the actress, rocker, and style maverick. I dunno, maybe they thought it was a bit out there, but I can *totally* see this dress in Urban Outfitters, can't you?!

Photograph by Robert Sebree
Mu & H- Cazzie Mayorga
Lead Stylist- Marina Toybina for GLAZA
Second key Stylist- Dawn Ritz

Slumber Party Tonight!

Hey L.A.! Finding little joy in the same old scene? Why not venture beyond your well-trodden turf to celebrate the first anniversary of Historic Monument 157, aka the Church of Fashion, in Lincoln Heights?

For the past year my friends Charon (Tricky Poodle) Nogues and Reid Maxwell, along with a shapeshifting band of artists and musicians in residence, have been hosting events in a ramshackle Victorian house that has shades of both Haight-Ashbury circa '66, and the Munsters. The space has seen roller skating, square dancing, bands galore, movies, medicine women, urban activists, and impromptu fashion shows. I snapped the pretty babies above (apologies for the blur...that's mistress of ceremonies Tricky in the silver) at a birthday party earlier this summer. You truly never know what you will find.

Tonight the entertainment includes hunky hobos Eben Stewart and Frank Fairfield and burlesque by Jewel of Denial. All guests are invited to bring their sleeping bags and wake up to huevos and nopales in the AM.

Hope to see you there: 3110 N. Broadway, L.A.

Sexy Sadie, What Have You Done?

Sharon Tate's killer Susan Atkins, aka Sadie Mae Glutz, died today in prison at the age of 61. During her 1969 trial, Sadie told the court that she was "stoned, man, stoned on acid" when she stabbed Sharon 16 times and wrote "Pig" with her blood. She said she felt no guilt, because she did it out of "love." The loving lady also managed to find herself not one but two husbands in the slammer. You think you've got baggage? Think again.

I Had Some Dreams, They Were Clouds in My Coffee

In October, 1976, this cloud passed over the city of Los Angeles. It was visible from the hills and from the beach, and much like the Station Fire pyrocumulus, it was also photographed repeatedly, by people who couldn't quite believe what they were seeing. My friend Jennifer, who grew up in L.A. in the '70s but missed the awesome visitation (homework, maybe?), has a poster of the cloud, caught from a dozen different angles, hanging on the wall of her Santa Monica home. These are two of them, and the pictures aren't airbrushed or enhanced; the thing really did look like a cotton candy Zeppelin floating by. What was it?! "Nuclear testing" - that's Jennifer's guess.

Grievous Angel

R.I.P. Gram Parsons: beautiful dreamer, cosmic cowboy, and hippie heartbreaker who flew off to the Great Gilded Palace of Sin in the Sky 36 years ago today, leaving his body in room 8 of the Joshua Tree Inn. He is survived by a daughter, Polly, a granddaughter, Harper Lee, and his songs.

Dress Her Up in Your Love

While we're on a little Madonna jag (and while I'm on deadline), I thought I'd post an old L.A. Weekly story I wrote about Madonna's stylist, Arianne Phillips. The L.A. lady designed the costumes for Tom Ford's directorial debut, A Single Man (based on a Christopher Isherwood novel), which premiered last week at the Venice Film Festival and is already generating Oscar talk.

Without further ado, here's "Exterior Decorator," published May 31, 2007.

“Oscar nominee” is a title you keep for life in Hollywood, and though it has served style visionary Arianne Phillips well, the honor, received for her work as costume designer of the Johnny Cash–June Carter biopic Walk the Line in 2005, was kind of like a tiara on top of furs, jewels, a couture evening gown and glitter platform shoes. In other words, Phillips’ career, which includes ongoing collaborations with Madonna and Courtney Love, was already pretty stellar.

“I plod my path pretty solidly,” says the stylist and designer, whose credits also include dressing Hedwig and Tank Girl. “A lot of people I work with are people I have long-term relationships with.”

But that hardly means things get static; Phillips mixes up her gigs from season to season. At the moment, she’s doing mostly editorial work here in L.A., after five months on the New Mexico set of 3:10 to Yuma, James Mangold’s follow-up to Walk the Line. To prepare for the “down and dirty” 1870 Western starring Christian Bale and Russell Crowe, she gave herself a crash course in Westerns, watching a lot of Sam Peckinpah and Sergio Leone films. For the actual costume “building,” Phillips worked closely with Western Costume, the “granddaddy of costume houses” — which she describes as a public archive for the industry.

Born in New York City and raised in Northern California by writer parents, Phillips is most gratified when she’s helping to tell a story — whether it’s through a narrative film, an album cover or a fashion spread. She doesn’t do red-carpet or event styling, and prefers to work with artists — like Madonna — who are forward-thinking and seeking transformation. “That, to me, offers an opportunity for clothes and costumes to help underscore change . . . I’m not attracted to films where the character starts out and ends up in the same place.”

Although she remembers seminal fashion moments like seeing Cabaret or staring at a Robert Plant poster when she was 12 or hearing the Slits for the first time, style icons, for Phillips, have been the people in her life. “My aunt was a superchic, rock & roll, thrift-store genius who used to drag me to the flea markets,” she recalls. Today she finds great inspiration just people watching on the streets of Manhattan, where she travels often for work (and, yes, she is bored with the New York–L.A. debate).

Style is simply a natural mode of expression for Phillips — be it discovering a new talent or designing, with Carlos Rosario, her own dress to wear to the Oscars, honoring the tradition of Hollywood costume designers rather than playing the game of fashion politics.

“I’ve always liked decoration, whether it’s been on my wall or on my body,” she says. “I’ve always been attracted to pretty things and glitter. I don’t think there’s a lot of evolution between the 5-year-old me and the 40-year-old me. Maybe I’m a little more sophisticated now than I was when I was 5, but sometimes I’m not at all.”

(photo by Joe Mama-Nitzberg)

And Speaking of Madonna Wannabes...

OMG, it's 12-year-old Lourdes (!), striking a pose in Mom's "Celebration" video, the first single off her new album, also called Celebration. Gotta love Madonna's homage to Warhol's Marilyn on the album cover, too. The only question is, what took her so long?

Neon Flashback

My friend Linlee was dazzled by the donuts piled high on a table at Saturday night's Kenny Scharf opening at Honor Fraser Gallery, but I was most wowed by the way Scharf's giddy, dayglo cartoon vision has come full circle since his days on the downtown art scene in late '70s-early '80s New York. His glitter-dipped space mobiles and punked out "Flinstones" stills are perfectly in sync with the current moment, and they're equally evocative of those long lost days of artistic freedom, when Madonna and Basquiat were coming into their own, living in downtown Manhattan was somewhat affordable, and dance clubs were actually FUN.

One woman, who goes by the name Maripol, captured it all with her Polaroid camera. The French-born Maripol was a stylist and scenester who helped create Madonna's "Lucky Star" look, and like a good stylist, she always had a camera at the ready to capture her friends in their youth and vintage-clad beauty. Many of her subjects would become very famous, and some of them would die young; all of them are in her beautiful book, Maripolarama, published in 2005. I interviewed Maripol for Variety's VLife back then, and she dished about her romance with a 16-year-old Vincent Gallo ("We had a nice love affair...I was such a bitch," she said), and laughed about the time Andy Warhol was egging her on to drag Tom Cruise into their limo (he ran off, terrified). Unfortunately I was just a few years too young to fully experience the electric excitement of Downtown 81 (a film starring Basquiat that Maripol produced), but you know I was rocking the rubber-and-rhinestone look that Maripol, via Madonna, introduced to the masses.

Pictured above is Debi Mazar, Keith Haring, Jaqueline Schnabel, and Tereza Scharf, Kenny's gorgeous ex-wife. Both she and Mazar were at Honor Fraser Saturday night, but, unlike another ex-downtown diva, Ann Magnuson, I didn't see either of them anywhere near the donuts.

My Day of Service

Fittingly, I spent September 11th at the Clara Shortridge Foltz Criminal Justice Center, doing my civic duty as a prospective juror. "Dread" does not even begin to capture the feeling that welled up in me when the recorded message told me to report downtown for jury duty at 7:45AM Friday morning. But I'm going to see Mark Lanegan at the Troubadour the night before! But I'm freelance, what if I get put on a case?! But I don't have an iphone, how will I check my email???

I have no idea why the whole thing threw me into such a tizzy. Sure, I was tired when the alarm went off at 6:30, but it was actually kind of nice to be strolling the grand, sunny streets of downtown with the morning workforce, and then it was actually pretty cool to see inside the building where Phil Spector stood trial. The 5th floor hallway was tiled with shiny brownish bricks - very '70s - and the benches along the walls were occupied by people of all ages and races, some chatting animatedly, others sipping coffee in silence. I felt a peculiar surge of pride and connection to my fellow Americans as we all embarked on what the administrator/comedian told us would be "one of the most boring days of your lives."

But I had the New Yorker style issue with me, and there were creaky old PCs where I checked email and was denied access to Facebook (which is probably a wise idea). Somehow it all passed rather quickly and I was never even called to a courtroom. Around 4:15 funny guy said, "I'm sorry to tell you all that you have to go home now. Your service is complete."

I felt surprisingly cheerful as I left the building, stopping to look at the above image of a woman on the glass (which reflects the abandoned building across the street), who I learned was Clara Shortridge Foltz herself, the first female lawyer in California and the founder of a magazine called The New American Woman.

And then, on my way home I decided to pop in to the Silver Lake Crossroads, and scored a bitchin' pair of tortoise shell Lanvin sunglasses. Ah, justice!

Spirit of 76!

How is it possible that Yoko Ono, pictured here in a current photograph, is almost 80 years old?! I think we must credit the deep well of originality that keeps on inspiring her to make art and keeps her connected to youth culture. She is a thoroughly vital human - whether you appreciate her eccentric bird call songs or not (I just watched the Rolling Stones Rock 'n' Roll Circus again the other night and she was in prime form). Look out for Yoko's new album, Between My Head and the Sky, recorded with a band she is calling the new Plastic Ono Band. Naturally, Sean Lennon is producer and musical director.

90210, the Next Generation

If I owned a television, I would like, totally be tuning in tonight to the new 90210, just so I could check out the handiwork of Showpony founder and artist Kime Buzzelli, who is an assistant costume designer on the show. I ran into Kime at our local coffee spot, Chango, earlier this summer, and she was telling me about the crazy long hours on the set, and about how much fun she was having creating inspiration books for every character. If you've ever read Kime's blog, The Moldy Doily, you know what a collector and curator of images she is, so I'm sure these books were something to behold.

Here's an excerpt from yesterday's blog post, in which Kime talks about her job and about her ongoing California Dreamin'. Definitely a girl after my own heart...

"So many fittings, so many trips to the stores/boutiques in L.A. so many alterations, so much FLAIR! And now the pay off is to finally get to see it all appear on the screen - with music. There are all new sets, new shooting locations (incredible views) and new cast members added to the mix. And the end result really captures the fantasy of living in California.

I have always been in love with the dreamy lighting in California, driving at sunset alongside giant palm trees backlit by a Los Angeles landscape. Something about the perpetually nice weather and access to beaches and surreal settings has always made me happy to live here. This new season is really going to be fun to watch, because the writers have finally captured the essence of high school - drama, comedy and of course tragedy. Ha."

Message of Love

"You're gonna cry; I cried," Thursday night's show opener Juliette Lewis warned me backstage at the Greek Theater before the Pretenders went on. Although I've been a fan of the band since the early '80s (the first album, Pretenders, remains a permanent fixture in my car), I've never seen them play live, so I half expected a classic rock nostalgia trip with a couple hits medleys and a few moments where the greatness shines through and we all kick ourselves for not seeing them back in '85. I definitely had no idea how FOXY Chrissie Hynde still is (an advertisement for veganism if there ever was one) or how beautifully supple her voice is, or how timeless the songs would sound. And I certainly wasn't prepared - warning aside - for the deluge of tears that soaked my cheeks as she sang "Talk of the Town" and "Back on the Chain Gang" in that rich, vulnerable vibrato, the chiming guitars bringing me back to a time when I felt so confused yet hopeful, and Chrissie spoke for all us girls when she put down her foot and declared, "I'm special, SO special...and I'm gonna make you notice."

Thank you for everything, Ms. Hynde...here's wishing you a happy and special 58th birthday on Monday.

Rock We Wrote

Yesterday the L.A. Times' Jacket Copy blog published its list of "46 Essential Rock Reads". As one would expect, this oddly numbered, arbitrary list generated its share of comments from completists and rock geeks whose favorites were excluded, or who thought that certain authors (that's you, Albert Goldman) weren't worth the paper they were printed on. Some may have had a point - I couldn't tell you if Bob Dylan's Tarantula is any good or not - but for my time, the more interesting commentary occurred on my Facebook news feed, where Pamela Des Barres and her friends discussed the fact that her iconic memoir, I'm With the Band, was one of only four books by women on the list.

In my book (ha ha) it's hard to argue with a selection that includes Legs McNeil's Please Kill Me and Patti Smith's Babel, but I have to agree that Sheila Weller's Girls Like Us, a biographic trilogy about Joni Mitchell, Carole King, and Carly Simon published last year, is both a dishy read and an insightful historic document, and it could have been on there (why not #47?). I was also glad to hear Miss Pamela's personal recommendations: Marianne Faithfull's Faithfull, Catherine James' Dandelion, and Bebe Buell's Rebel Heart (and it was sweet to see Buell herself weighing in, congratulating her old friend).

It definitely got me thinking, and I feel the need to chime in here with my own life-changing chick rock book, my personal "how could you leave out...?!", and that is 1995's anthology of female music writing, Rock She Wrote. Edited by Evelyn McDonnell and Ann Powers (now the L.A. Times Pop Critic), this anthology spans from mainstream celebrity profiles to early Lisa Robinson pieces for Creem to an excerpt from Runaway Cherie Currie's autobiography (soon to hit the screen with Dakota Fanning as Currie) to Lisa Carver's "Why I Want to Rape Olivia Newton John," which, given my admitted Xanadu fixation, I really need to take another look at. This was the era of DIY publishing and girl power, and I remember going to a reading/ book release party for Rock She Wrote at CBGB when it came out, just as I was committing to my own career as a music journalist (which eventually allowed me to talk to my heroines like Patti Smith, Stevie Nicks, Liz Phair, and Sleater-Kinney). It was at this reading that I felt, right down to the soles of my motorcycle boots, that women weren't "as good as" men, but were in fact wonderfully different yet equally - if not more - powerful, with voices that could speak our unique truths without fear or self-censorship.

15 years and a technological revolution later, I'm not sure where that leaves us, but I guess it's worth noting that this L.A. Times list was written by a woman. Rock on, ladies!

Thirteen, Death Rock, Bad Attitude...

"Thirteen, Death Rock, bad attitude" is the caption that accompanied the email from my friend Tasha, attached to which was this incredible relic from 1983. Snapped outside of Fairfax High, where Tasha, then a Brentwood Jr. High student, was hanging out with her Hollywood friends, the photograph was printed by the subject herself - "hence the funky quality." That positively dangerous puss explains a lot about this woman, who is the most ladylike badass I've ever met. Not surprisingly, today Tasha is an image consultant by profession! Try that on for size, '80s poseurs!

Soul Diva Discovery: P.P. Arnold

Wow! Thanks to Richard Metzger of Dangerous Minds for illuminating me about the heartbreaking voice and staggering genius of L.A. native and former Ikette P.P. Arnold. This spectacularly wigged-out photograph is from a session for P.P.'s second solo album, 1968's Kafunta, recorded for Andrew Loog Oldham's label, Immediate.

Born Patricia Ann Cole, P.P. was a teen mom who went from working the night shift at an egg factory in Fresno to supporting the Rolling Stones with the Ike and Tina Turner Revue. And if you read this interview between the lines, it's possible to infer that she got to know Mick Jagger quite well. She also says that Jimi Hendrix, a fellow black American living in Swinging London, was "like my brother."

Back in London since 1982 after returning to Hollywood for a while in the '70s, P.P. had a couple hit singles, mostly covers (including one of my favorite Bee Gees songs, "To Love Somebody") but never approached the great heights of her former boss. The good news is she's still performing live, and she is also a Reiki healer, without which she says she "would not be the woman she is today."

Here's hoping she comes home for a visit soon.

Cool World

Sunday afternoon refuge in Los Feliz

Sunset Sisters

Look who joined us yesterday on the sand, to watch the hot sun go down in a burning land.

Can't Stop Til We Get Enough

Does anybody else find the tenacious hold of '80s fashions utterly perplexing and even a little bit disturbing? When Michael Jackson died I jokingly said that it was only a matter of time before black penny loafers and white socks (which I wore back in '84) were cool again, but clearly I wasn't reading my fashion trade rags because I would have known about Opening Ceremony's footwear collaboration with Bass Weejuns, available NOW.

O.C., which is opening a huge new outpost in Tokyo this weekend, sent this image to my inbox yesterday with an announcement about Chloe Sevigny's latest collection for the store, which apparently is inspired by St. Marks punks as well as her preppy dad. Not only is Chloe wearing said Weejuns and white socks here, her pants, if you can't tell, are knitted fair isle sweatpants (note the fabulous fit)! And she's paired a menswear blazer with one of those low-armhole tanks that cheesy guys with braided tails used to rock back in the day, and all of it is topped with Wayfarer-esque sunglasses, a look I really thought we'd seen enough of, classic or not. It's almost as if she knew John Hughes was going to die too!

It's one thing when some 20-something hipster loads up with predictably ridiculous retro gear but it's another thing when someone whom I truly admire as a fashion original seems more interested in presenting an attitude than a good design.

What We Have Made is Real: We Are in Xanadu

I just had dinner with an old Yippie punk who'd never heard of Xanadu, the sublime roller disco flop that was Olivia Newton John's 1980 follow-up to Grease. "I didn't listen to Olivia Neutron Bomb!" he told me indignantly, and when I protested that the soundtrack was produced by ELO's Jeff Lynne, whose music is candy sonic heaven to my ears, he said he didn't like him and his 100-cello string sections, either.

It would be hard to claim that the film stands the test of time. ELO's "I'm Alive" may be ringing out joyfully, but the roller disco fantasia "grand finale" still looks like it was filmed in a gymnasium with cardboard sets, and frankly, nobody, not even Olivia, is very skilled on their skates. The presence of a legend like Gene Kelly is just embarrassing for everyone. But still, despite the myriad flaws, there is something genuinely special about this silly movie. Part of it, of course, is the combination of ONJ's wide-eyed blonde beauty and that aching, angelic voice that defies any wooden acting or clunker lines, but I think the other big factor is the brilliant Los Angeles location scouting - the Pan Pacific Auditorium being the icing on the cake.

This Streamline Moderne masterpiece, which opened its doors in 1935 and burned to the ground in 1989, was abandoned and in ruin when it was immortalized in the film, transformed into the "Xanadu" of the title with a little ingenuity, some elbow grease, and Gene Kelly's cash. Pictured here is the "album cover" on which Michael Beck's Sonny first spots Olivia's Kira before she - a muse and daughter of Zeus (hence the "Nine Sisters" title) - skates down from Mt. Olympus to bewitch him with a kiss. (Upon hearing that plot detail, the old punk declared that the writers must have been smoking pot when they came up with the story, and I have to say I think he might be right.)

But forget all that for a minute. Look at those deco spires that feel so awesomely '80s, that airbrushed rainbow sunset, those supple, slouchy white boots, Olivia's witchy stare and the dazzling neon halo around her. When I see all that I still get an electric tween thrill. You might call it nostalgia but I have to believe it's magic.

My Blue Crush

Sadly, my day looks nothing at all like this photograph. I am not at a picnic table on the beach in East Hampton, eating lobster and drinking ice-cold Coronas with Blue Crush star Sanoe Lake and other Billabong champion surfer girl cuties. Nah, I'm just here on deadline at my desk in Echo Park, remembering that summer afternoon a few years ago when I "got up" my first time ever on a surf board (the waves were barely perceptible), and decided that when I moved to California I, too, would become a surfer girl. Packed in my boxes were not one but three books about girls and surfing, two farewell gifts (apparently my New York friends had the same fantasy for me) and one a gift from Sanoe, who wrote her own, called - take a guess - Surfer Girl. I must confess I still haven't read any of them.

Number of times I've been surfing since that day: 1. I do have a pretty cute rash guard, though, so I'm ready. Can you blame a girl for dreaming?

Inner Circles

The lovely and inspiring Amely Greeven, meditation teacher, progressive thinker and author, and high fashion wordsmith (yes, one can be all these things!), took a bit of time away from her Laurel Canyon hillside home this summer to go visit family and roam around the English countryside. What she never expected was a "front row seat" on the crop circle phenomenon, as she just happened to be in Southwest England, which has a concentration of sacred sites including Stonehenge, at peak season for these massive formations. "The proximity of these forms to my kitchen table is breathtaking," she writes in a piece about the experience just published in Reality Sandwich. In the story, Amely matter-of-factly dismisses the idea that crop circles could be man made, and explains what it feels like to walk within what she believes are physical expressions of the cosmic intelligence. She also compares them to a "tattoo on the rump of a very attractive lady."

In the Realm of the Scents

I finally made it to one of the natural perfume salons that Persephenie Snyder has been hosting monthly at her charming apothecary, Blunda Aromatics in West Hollywood. Natural fragrances are nothing like your typical hippie oils; most are exquisitely crafted blends of rare botanical oils and essences that are fixed with organic oils and alcohols. Often made by traditionally (i.e. French) trained noses, they have none of the heavy qualities of so many synthetic perfumes.

Blunda carries all of the most coveted lines - Joanne Bassett, Ayala Moriel, Velvet & Sweetpea, YOSH, Mandy Aftel - as well as Persephenie’s own body care collection (try the rich, yummy body butter!), which debuted earlier this summer. This month Joanne Bassett, who lives and works in Palm Desert, was there premiering two new fragrances, the delicious spicy floral, Indulgence (which Persephenie said smelled “like candy, in a good way” on me) and Memories, a woody citrus. I chatted with Bassett, who is also an aromatherapist and a healer, and she told me that her quartet of female fragrances, Camille, Colette, Chantelle and Contessa, came to her in a vision and she blended these four very different perfumes in one afternoon. “Maybe these are people I was in a past life,” she smiled mysteriously.

These are the kinds of conversations you get into at Blunda, which also carries some incredible crystals and jewelry, addictive Japanese incense, essential oils and attars and other perfume making supplies. If you’re feeling the urge to mix up your own magic potion, Persephenie also teaches perfume classes in her studio/laboratory in back.

Vida in Venice

Baby Vida, age 3 weeks, took her first trip to the beach yesterday afternoon. When she got fussy, mommy Lee, who's been calming her with "ocean sounds" CDs, just walked down to the shore and the little love was instantly soothed. The same goes for the rest of us, who played in the surf and soaked up those glorious late summer rays. I drove back home on a traffic-less freeway with an iced coffee in my hand and a smile on my face.

As Above, So Below

Hard to believe, but the Jesus theme of last night’s Bless-ed Event art exhibition to benefit fashion designer Tara Subkoff, who was recently diagnosed with a brain tumor, was conceived of completely independent of Subkoff and her line, Imitation of Christ. But that’s not to say that there wasn’t a little bit of divine intervention going on.

Artist Petecia Le Fawnhawk, who organized the show with jewelry designer Shahla Kareen, started painting images of Jesus when a voice in a dream asked her, ‘is 144 Jesuses better than one?’ Her fascination with the relationship between Jesus and Mary Magdalene inspired a line of “religious lingerie” which includes a wine-dyed pair of rosy panties studded with a silver cross and matching pasties (pictured here, in a photo by Ryan Rickett).

Around the same time, her friend Mark Maggiori announced that he was ditching the script he’d been working on, and was starting a new film project called “Johnny Christ.” Maggiori’s large-scale Jesus paintings, “stills” from the film, show the savior looking very much like a couple of the bearded, long-haired surfer/artist types who were walking around the opening at Studio 724.

About this “blasphemistic pop art” Le Fawnhawk says, “I was a little nervous about whether I was gonna get struck by lightning or not, but I think if there is a holy spirit out there, they don’t mind.”

And in case they did, the angels from the L.A. Ladies Choir came down from heaven (or Silver Lake) in their white vintage dresses to bless the scene with tunes including Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah.” The choir was started by Lavender Diamond’s Becky Stark and Aska Matsumiya, and has around 30 members today. Simone LeBlanc, a member since March, told me that the only rule is that one must “sing joyfully”; this is also the name of their EP, coming this fall.

I’m pretty sure I saw Shahla Kareen, who was wearing a stunning human heart locket of solid gold - one of her own pieces - wipe away a tear.

The Bless-ed Event will be up for one month at Studio 724, 724 S Park View St., near MacArthur Park.

Found Altar

Location: Elysian Park between two pink pepper trees
Artist: Unknown

All in the Family

There are just a few more days to catch the Gallery 15Twenty exhibition connected to L.A. photographer Lauren Dukoff's new book, Family. She's been photographing her high school pal Devendra Banhart for the last 10 years, and the book is a beautiful document of this mystical, musical moment in Los Angeles. The photo above is Devendra and his band's homage to the Cockettes, a flamboyant, gender-bending late '60s San Francisco performance troupe who lived communally and liked to cover themselves in glitter.

I wrote a piece about the book for the L.A. Times, and Devendra told me that the whole impetus for the photo was to "lead people to the Cockettes...it’s like covering a song. You don’t cover a song to try to do it better."

Maybe not, but the boys sure look awfully purty.

Read the L.A. Times story HERE

Kustom Kar Komandette

Coming home from a walk this evening, I encountered Chuckles (pictured, holding canine friend), parallel parking her Nissan “Chuk Wagon” on Echo Park Ave. The side of the car reads “Everything is Horrible,” and was painted by a friend of hers who “knows too much about the government,” she told me. Chuckles said she hadn’t really thought about the attention this paint job might attract, “but I guess it’s kinda noticeable.” Luckily, considering her name and all, she added that she did not share the sentiment. “I’m actually pretty happy.” I believe her.

Bhagavan Das: Still Here Now

It was so good to see Bhagavan Das in the beautiful, rather astounding film/musical journey, What About Me? that screened as part of the Topanga Film Festival on Friday night. Now 64, Bhagavan Das actually coined the phrase "Be Here Now," and introduced Ram Dass, author of the famous book of the same name, to his guru, Neem Karoli Baba, on a wild mystical journey the pair took throughout India in the '60s. As if he needed any more cred, in 2002 Bhagavan Das released an album of Hindu chants, Now, produced by Mike D. from the Beastie Boys.

I've been privileged to spend some time with this legendary spiritual teacher and Laguna Beach native (!); I have interviewed him, sung kirtan with him, and spent five days at his feet in a puja workshop at the Laughing Lotus yoga center in New York. The man is a bubbling fountain of wisdom and insights about the modern world, able to guide us through our struggles with materialism and self-doubt, although he renounced all that crap decades ago and lives, essentially, to serve. For those who are acutely feeling the precariousness of these times, take these words to heart: "There's nothing like a good destruction to help you begin again. Empty your bowl so that it may be filled with flowers."

Fallen Angel: Tate by Chappell

Today is the 40th anniversary of Sharon Tate's death. In researching a story about her that ran in today's L.A. Times, I came across a rare series of photographs by Walter Chappell, taken in Big Sur in 1964. Although Tate was only 21, the dreamy, meditative images have a soulfulness and a wistfulness that feel even more poignant considering her fate. Rediscovered by Chappell's family after his death in 2000, the rarely seen series was exhibited in 2001 at the Roth Horowitz Anderson gallery in Los Angeles, which then published a 15-page portfolio that you can still find used on Amazon.

Rest in peace, beautiful Sharon.

To read the L.A. Times piece click HERE

When Dov Cries

Figures it would take New York magazine to alert me to the New York art blog, Animal, which posted a whole slew of American Apparel critiques/fake ads by New York-based graphic designer Stereo Hell. As Animal is quick to note, the text, which reads "Los Angeles. The morning after," is real American Apparel ad copy. Not surprisingly, the Animal site is now loaded with banner ads for American Apparel corduroys, African-inspired leggings, and the New York Public Library series, because Dov Charney, of course, knows that all publicity is good publicity. And how could he possibly object to some nice, stylish, dirty posters rendered in his name? My second fave was the one that urged, "Legalize ANAL."

I actually interviewed Dov wayyyy back when he was still talking about things like T-shirt quality, and hadn't begun masturbating in front of journalists. After the interview he walked me to subway, continuing to talk my ear off, but he didn't hit on me for even a second. I still take pride in that.

The Revolution Will Be Read

Yesterday I met a friend for lunch at Echo Park's super cute, new-ish book store/cafe Stories, which is the only place I know of where you can get a tuna sandwich and a Jane Austen action figure. I also picked up Mark Harris' Pictures at a Revolution, which is now in paperback. Harris traces the journeys of the five Academy Award nominees for Best Picture in the pivotal year 1967: Bonnie and Clyde, The Graduate, Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, In the Heat of the Night and Doctor Dolittle, from conception to that single acceptance speech. Of course, I've only gotten to page 50, but already I've learned that Bonnie and Clyde was written by two Esquire magazine staffers, Robert Benton and David Newman, who didn't know the first thing about screenwriting but nevertheless had their hearts set on Francois Truffaut as the director. And Truffaut seriously considered doing it and gave them extensive notes and ideas about the film, which ended up being directed by Arthur Penn.

I was also reminded about the bluegrass in the soundtrack (the pair wrote while listening to the Foggy Mountain Boys), which felt so fresh to me in Michael Mann's Public Enemies this year but now seems kinda derivative of Bonnie and Clyde. But I guess it's nearly impossible for a genre picture to not be derivative. And I'm always a sucker for a sharp-dressed rogue.

Peachy Keen

This peach tree is a mere step from my door. Last year the peaches grew to be the size of baseballs but were mealy and flavorless; this year they're the size of golf balls and are firm, sweet, and juicy (go figure). Until the figs ripen I'll be having arugula, peach, and goat cheese salads like the one I just finished. Yum!

Maybe it's the New Yorker in me, but I never cease to be amazed that you can just pick something like a peach, for free, from a tree in your very own yard, and eat it. It's not just pretty, or defiantly inedible, like the wormy crabapples in my grandparents' back yard, or the sour mulberries that used to stain my bare feet purple in the summer.
If you don't have your own personal tree, the sweet boys of Fallen Fruit have made it easy for us all to enjoy the bounty of this city, with groovy, color-coded maps of public fruit trees. Happy picking!

Welcome to Golden State!

What better image to launch with than this heavenly photograph from artist (and dear friend) Zoe Crosher's LA-Like series? It was used as the back cover of a CD on which the talented girl sings LA-themed songs, like a sweetly sinister version of Bad Religion's "Los Angeles is Burning". Zoe finds constant inspiration in the mythology of Los Angeles, and I am constantly inspired by her perspective on the city. Visit her site to hear the songs and see the entire LA-Like series, as well as some of her Michelle DuBois book/archive project, which yours truly will be writing an essay for.