YouTube - Mind Funk - Goddess

The first song from "Dropped" - and an excellent indication of the quality of the rest of the album.

YouTube - Mind Funk - Sister Blue

From the first album, one of the softer songs, but still good.

Mind Funk

Time for yet another “forgotten rock hero” entry, this time on Mind Funk (aka Mindfunk without the space), a New Jersey band loosely associated with the grunge movement, in time as well as style, despite living on the other side of the country from Seattle.  They only have three albums, Mind Funk [self-titled] (1991), Dropped (1993), and The People Who Fell From The Sky (1995), the last being an import.

 The first album was good, but mostly stock metal and not overly original.  Dropped, though, knocked my socks off.  This was one of those rare albums where you’re so stunned, you literally listen to it over and over again, nonstop, for weeks, and never get tired of it.  People was a bit of a letdown: somewhat of a bad copy of Dropped, but still quality.  Inevitably Dropped would set a standard they couldn’t hope to meet again.

 Recently the CD inserts, particularly for digitally remastered albums, have improved dramatically, offering extensive liner notes instead of the simple sheet with track listings.  Although these CDs lack these, those for other bands frequently describe the background and environment in which a particular album was made, and very often some of the best albums were made in the least auspicious circumstances. I recall a comedy sketch in which a country/western singer’s manager advises the singer’s girlfriend to leave him abruptly, because the singer writes his best material when heartbroken, but only writes trite garbage when he’s happy and in love. Likewise, Wish You Were Here was a battle to put out, Back in Black was made in the shadow of Bon Scott’s death, and Dropped was made immediately after the band had been dropped by their prior record label.  The latter album is much darker, much more twisted and unconventional than the prior album, and this strange added ingredient is what makes Dropped so much different – and better – than not only their first album, but much of metal and grunge as well.  Makes you wonder if the second album would have been nearly as good had they not been dropped – at the very least, they’d have had to find another name for it.

 The Dropped lineup was Patrick Dubar (vocals – on all 3 albums), Louis Svitek (guitar, also on all three albums), Jason Everman (guitar, formerly with Soundgarden), John Monte (bass), and Shawn Johnson (drums).  It was also recorded in Seattle, of all places -  this no less than two grunge references.  Track listing: “Goddess” >> “Closer”, “Drowning”, “In the Way Eye”, “Zootiehead”, “Wisteria”, “Mama, Moses And Me” (a tribute to male self-abuse), “11 Ton Butterfly” ,”Hogwallow”, “Billygoat”, and “Hollow”.  Not a single bad track in there. 

 I had tickets to see this tour at the Bayou in DC, only to get there and find the show cancelled.  Back then I had sent away to the band for a t-shirt, only to find they were all sold out, so they sent me a hat and a lyric sheet from Dropped instead.  The band broke up after People.  They don’t seem to have a website presence, their only fansite was last updated in 2002, and the Wikipedia entry indicates rumors, dating from 2007, of an album of unreleased material forthcoming, with no way to verify this.  So far as I can tell, the band is dead for the indefinite future.  It’s a shame, as the material was definitely quality, as much so as many bands surviving and continuing to tour.

Monty Python

This is the famous British comedy troupe most active in the 1970s.  Their humor was definitely oddball, different, over the top, surrealistic, irreverent and “out there”.  I find it MUCH more enjoyable than the excessively dry humor of Christopher Guest & co. in his “Best of Show”, “Waiting for Guffman”, and “A Mighty Wind” movies with his pals Michael McKean, Harry Shearer, Eugene Levy, Catherine O’Hara, Parker Posey, Fred Willard and Martin Mull.  It’s also commonly claimed that Monty Python serves as an inspiration to Saturday Night Live, though I don’t find any of that humor, no matter which cast, to be nearly as oddball as the Python’s, with the possible exceptions of “Landshark” and the various “samurai” roles of John Belushi. 

 John Cleese.  The tallest, Cleese was usually the choice to portray stiff, humorless, serious civilian authority figures such as bankers.  He’s a real handful as Sir Lancelot in “Holy Grail.”  He uses his impressive height to impart comic gravity to his roles.  I really liked him as the newscaster whose desk gets kidnapped, but he continues reporting the news all the way across town, through traffic, and off the dock into the sea.  In more recent years Cleese has played “Q” in the James Bond films.

 Eric Idle.  Gives Palin competition for the “smarmy” one…”nudge nudge wink wink say no more.”  He plays “brave, brave” Sir Robin in “Holy Grail.”   In “The Rutles” he plays the Paul McCartney character, Dirk.

 Graham Chapman.  He could be counted to bring life to various colonels (stiff, humorless, serious military authority figures), stopping the sketch for being too silly – e.g. “vicious gangs of KEEP LEFT signs”.   Excellent as “Arthur, King of the Britons” and Brian.

 Michael Palin.  The host of “Blackmail”, the German accented Queen Victoria, and Sir Galahad.  And of course, responsible for the “Spanish Inquisition” which Chapman was not expecting. 

 Terry Jones.  Often the straight man, but can be funny as well, e.g. nude pianist.  Sir Bedevere in “Holy Grail”. 

 Terry Gilliam.  Actually American, and mainly responsible for the bizarre animation in the serious, with the exception of a “fatal heart attack”.  He does appear in some sketches and as Sir Lancelot’s faithful squire, Concord.

 Flying Circus.  Several seasons worth of complete insanity now available in a deluxe 16 DVD set, from 1969-74 (with all the imperfections in dazzling crystal clarity).  Pink Floyd and King Crimson were big fans of the show.  It starts off with “Liberty Bell”, Sousa’s march in the public domain, with animation ending in the foot squashing down.  To this day, I think of Monty Python when I hear that tune, most often in some parade with a marching band blissfully unaware of how their beloved Sousa has been warped and corrupted in this absurd context. 

            The most popular sketch has to be “Dead Parrot”, with Cleese as an unhappy customer and Palin as the evasive pet store owner desperately trying to convince Cleese, to no avail, that the parrot is not quite dead.  Some episodes have one story which last the whole show, like when the alien blancmanges turn the world into Scotsmen in a bid to rig Wimbledon in their favor, as everyone knows Scots are useless at tennis.  My favorites include:

            the quiz show in which various Marxist leaders (Lenin, Marx, Mao, Castro) are asked soccer questions by Eric Idle (“sorry, it’s a trick question, Wolverhampton has NEVER won the FA Cup”);

            the soccer game between the Greek philosophers and the German philosophers, complete with Karl Marx (yet again, Terry Jones) doing jumping jacks on the sidelines as a substitute;

            the cricket match between pieces of furniture

            the lumberjack sketch (thank you, Michael Palin!)

            various knockoffs of BBC announcements

            “The funniest joke in the world”, a joke so funny that anyone who hears it will literally die laughing, it’s translated into German as the Allies’ secret weapon against the Nazis

            Dennis Moore, the Cleese character who takes lupins (flowers) from the rich and gives them to the poor…who aren’t particularly appreciative of the transfer

            The Ministry of Silly Walks

            Game shows such as Blackmail! And the All-England Summarize Proust Competition

            John Cleese as anti-Masonic architect (“no, I’m sorry, we’re not looking for an abattoir”)

            (“NO ONE EXPECTS”) The Spanish Inquisition      

            Crunchy Frog (spots Harry Potter’s bizarre confections by several decades)

            Hell’s Grannies (featuring the aforementioned gangs of “keep left signs”)

            “your cat needs to be confused!”, in which Graham Chapman advises a couple on how to solve their cat’s apparent ennui

            Society for Putting Things on Top of Other Things

            How Not to Be Seen (a guide to camouflage for ordinary people)

            The Hospital for Over-Actors, full of “a horse, a horse, my kingdom for a horse” actors overdramatically indulging in Richard III portrayals, although Idle, with his deadpan delivery of the line, “appears to be making some progress”

            RAF Banter – in which various RAF pilots from WWII can’t seem to understand each other’s war-jargon banter

            The dueling documentary narrators (Cleese & Idle) chasing each other across the countryside each trying to do a different documentary with only one microphone between the two of them;

 In addition to several seasons of Flying Circus, Monty Python also have several movies! 

 "And Now For Something Completely Different” and “Live at the Hollywood Bowl”.  Nothing more than the sketches redone in a different context, albeit fairly faithfully.

 “The Holy Grail” (1975).  The first real movie, subsidized by Pink Floyd, Jethro Tull, and Led Zeppelin (unfortunately, none of them appear in the film).  This is their “adaptation” of the King Arthur story, with clopping coconuts in lieu of real horses (transported to temperate England how? By swallows?  European or African?), ample animation, and hilarious misadventures.  At one point Palin portrays a local noble eager to marry his fairy prince to a girl from a family with better land, and has to tell his guard, “YOU stay ‘ere, and make sure ‘e doesn’t leave”, and “let’s not bicker about who killed who”.   There’s a killer rabbit and a Holy Hand Grenade.  “And there was much rejoicing….”

 “The Life of Brian” (1979).  The Bible story told…a little differently.  The People’s Front of Judea (“what have the Romans ever done for us?”) is worth the price of admission.  Other moments include stonings (“…even if they say ‘Jehovah’!”), haggling over a disguise in the market, “Romanus Eunt Domus” (later copied in “Canadian Bacon”), “welease WOGER!”, and the snobby Jewish couple aghast at being crucified next to Samaritans.

 “The Meaning of Life”.  A series of sketches loosely strung together going from birth – comparing Catholics and Protestants – to death (Death: “You English are so fucking pompous!”).  I could do without “The Autumn Years” featuring Mr Creosote (Jones) vomiting obscene amounts of food everywhere.   

 And now for something, not quite so completely different:

 “A Fish Called Wanda”, which features John Cleese and Michael Palin, teamed up with Jamie Lee Curtis and Kevin K-K-K-Kline.   

 Fawlty Towers.  John Cleese’s mid 70s English series about a buffoonish bead & breakfast proprietor.  My favorite was when the B&B has German guests, who he can’t help offending with countless WWII references.

 Terry Gilliam.  His movies frequently include Python members, but he’s hit or miss.  I couldn’t stand “Jabberwocky” (which featured Palin), but I loved “12 Monkeys” – which had no Python members, but had outstanding performances by Bruce Willis and Brad Pitt.  “Brazil”, “Baron Munchhausen”, “Time Bandits”, “The Fisher King” (w/Robin Williams and Jeff Bridges) and “Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas” (with Johnny Depp as Hunter S. Thompson) were so-so.

 The Rutles.  This is the humorous documentary obviously spoofing the Beatles.  As mentioned earlier, Eric Idle played the Paul McCartney character, Dirk McQuigley, as well as various narrators.  Michael Palin has a minor role, and even George Harrison has a brief role as well.  It’s sad, but “Magical Mystery Tour” was so low budget, that the Rutles version, “Tragical History Tour”, actually looks better.  “Ouch” replaces “Help!”, “All You Need is Cash” subs out for Love, and the other songs are fairly well done.  Lennon loved the movie so much he refused to return the copies given to him for his approval. 

Soft Drinks

In the last year I’ve made a concerted effort to wean myself off carbonated beverages, and have started to drink green tea – in addition to water.  But I haven’t been able to completely abandon them altogether.  Just as we used to joke that Roy Rogers’ was my “temple”, we also joked that I loved Coke so much I needed a “Coke IV” (intravenous).  Here’s my review of the various sodas out there these days.

 Coca-Cola.  Established in Atlanta, Georgia in 1886.  The cocaine is long gone – since 1903.  Variants have included Diet Coke, Coke C2 (which I liked – half the calories but 99% of the taste), Coke Zero, Coke Lemon, Coke Vanilla, Cherry Coke, and even – for a short, controversial period – New Coke.  This is by far my favorite soft drink.  I even like the Diet varieties, especially the Lemon, Lime, Cherry and Vanilla variants, anything to change the monotony of the flavor-challenged diet soda.  Clearly Coke is by far the most popular, world-wide.

 Pepsi-Cola.  Dating from 1893, from New Bern, North Carolina – also made by a pharmacist.  They hit it big in the Great Depression by fighting Coca-Cola on price (12 oz for 5 cents vs. Coke’s 6 oz. for the same price), and by marketing to blacks.  Pepsi Challenge of 1975?  Sorry, I can tell the difference with my eyes closed – and I prefer Coke.  I’ll also take Diet Coke over Diet Pepsi any day – the latter tastes like salt water.  However, regular Pepsi is close enough in taste to Coke that I won’t be offended if I’m offered it as a substitute for Coke.  Despite Pepsi’s marketing, I don’t see it as any more “youth oriented” than Coke; to me soda, per se, is a youth thing, whether it be Coke, Pepsi, or Mountain Dew.

 Royal Crown (RC) Cola.  The company dates from 1905, but the cola itself was first made in 1934.  To me it tastes like the “generic” sodas you get at Giant or Safeway.  Not bad, and an adequate substitute for Coke or Pepsi, but I can tell the difference in taste.  To me the RC Cola crowd is the cola equivalent of AMC drivers.

 Dr. Pepper.  Not to be confused with “Sgt. Pepper”.  First served in 1885 in Waco, Texas, but not marketed nationally until 1904.  Yet again, concocted by a pharmacist (today’s pharmacists are doing what – filling prescriptions?  What’s the deal?).  I don’t like the taste, but it is definitely different than Coke or Pepsi. 

            Adam Corolla asked, “I see all these prime time TV ads for collect calls, but don’t know anyone who actually makes collect calls.  Who is making collect calls?”  I have to ask a similar question about Dr. Pepper.  I’ve seen the drink around and ads for it in prime time for as long as I can remember – and it’s obviously been nationally marketed far longer than I’ve been alive.  But for all this time, 40 years, I’ve never known a single person who drinks this.  So who’s drinking all this Dr. Pepper?

 Root Beer.  Made from sassafras; “root beer” as a drink has no more than .4% alcohol, about a tenth of the content of a regular beer.  I associate root beer with kids wanting to drink it because it’s sweet and it has “beer” in the name, even though it tastes nothing like regular beer and any buzz is due to caffeine and sugar and not alcohol.  Likewise, I don’t see any adults drinking this stuff. 

 Tab.  The original “Diet Coke”, introduced by Coke in 1963.  Like Fresca (see below) this used to be flavored with saccharin until they changed the formula in the 80s.  I never really liked the taste of this, but it would suffice is nothing better was available.

 7-UP.  Originally put out in 1929, shortly before the Crash.  At that time, lemon-lime drinks were very popular, but this one managed to survive the Depression.  I’m not a big fan of lemon-lime drinks, but I’ll take them every now and then.

 Sprite.  Introduced by Coca-Cola in 1961 to compete with 7-Up.  I think it’s certainly tarter and peppier than 7-UP.  Diet Sprite was one of my favorite diet drinks, as it tasted most like its non-diet variety.

 Fresca.  This originally came out in 1963, made by Coca-Cola.  The saccharin was replaced by Nutrasweet in 1985.  It’s supposed to be low-calorie, grapefruit flavor.  According to legend, this was President Lyndon Johnson’s favorite drink.

 Mountain Dew.  Surprisingly, this Pepsi product dates from the 1940s.  What was “extreme” back then?  To me this looks like anti-freeze, and tastes like a lemon-lime drink on steroids.  As with the others, they made several different variants, including, but not limited to, Code Red, Cherry, Baja Blast (lime & pineapple, only at Taco Bell), Live Wire (orange), Voltage (blue raspberry/ginseng) – but my favorite, to the extent I like any of these, was Pitch Black.

 Pschitt.  This was a lemon-flavored drink, made in France, we could get at the high school cafeteria at the American School of Paris.  The name is pronounced “SHIT”, which produced all sorts of laughs.  “Could you pick me up a can of shit?” “I’m drinking shit!” etc. The French wouldn’t get it, unless someone overseas made a drink called MERDE (which is French for “shit”). 

 Jolt.  This probably deserves the title of first “energy drink”, and came out around 1985 – way before its time.  It claimed to have twice the caffeine.  I did notice it has a jolt to it, but nothing special in terms of flavor.  Back in January 1991, when the Gulf War was in full swing, Wayne & Garth claimed to be zoned out on full-time CNN coverage supported by Jolt Cola and Pizza Hut.

Cheerwine.  This is local to western Virginia and North Carolina, and has been around since 1917.  Basically it tastes like a cherry variant of Dr Pepper – not quite like Cherry Coke.  I picked up a bottle of this in Massanutten in December, and while it has a distinctive and unique taste, it’s not so fantastic that I’m motivated to seek out more of it.

 Nehi.   This came in various flavors, but the grape is the most well-known, with by far the most cultural references, not the least of which is RADAR’s preference in “M*A*S*H”.  It’s been around since 1924, but eventually merged with RC Cola.

 Orange Crush, Grape Crush, and SunKist.  I remember being obsessed with grape soda as a kid, despite never really caring for it once I actually tasted it.  I have no use for carbonated orange drinks.  I do like Sunny Delight.

 Fanta.  I remember this was popular in France when I lived there, in grape, lemon, and orange varieties.  Remarkbly, this was developed in Nazi Germany when import restrictions prevented the German branch of Coca-Cola from making Coke the normal way, so they had to improvise.

 Shasta.  This was a line of low-cost drinks in various flavors (cola, diet cola, lemon-lime, etc.) we’d see at the PX (Walter Reed).  I can’t recall ever drinking any of this.

 Ginger Ale.  Actually what we think of as “ginger ale” is dry ginger ale, as opposed to “golden ginger ale”, which is not as popular.  Canada Dry and Schweppes are popular brands.  I do like ginger ale as a change of pace from Coke every now and then.

Guarana.  The best known brand is Antarctica, which also makes beer.  This is very popular in Brazil.  It has a big kick to it, and tastes like a unique blend of Coke and ginger ale.  Guarana, the little red berries, have a high caffeine content and is used in may of the energy drinks in the US.

 Crème soda.  Has a vanilla flavor.  Nahh.  The Dr Pepper Berries & Crème flavor had a strange taste, almost like children’s grape flavored medicine.  Kid’s medicine has a odd taste: it has to be nice enough that a kid would willingly swallow it, but not so nice that children would really want to drink it.

 Clear colas.  Remember those?  Talk about lame.  Water is clear, so it’s healthy, so if it’s clear it’s healthy, right?  Hydrochloric acid is clear too, would you like to drink that?  I didn’t think so.  Carbon monoxide is colorless and odorless, but clearly deadly.  “Clear” is not clearly better.

 Sweeteners.  These are what make the drinks sweet, and why we enjoy drinking them.  They’ve changed over the years.

Sugar.  Better known as sucrose.  This is still used in Mexican Coke, but I can’t tell the difference between this and HFCS, see below.  It’s making a comeback, in the form of Throwback Pepsi. 

High fructose corn syrup. Replaced sugar in Coke and Pepsi in 1984.  It’s much cheaper than sugar but has the same flavor and strength. 

Saccharine.  This was in Tab and Fresca.  It definitely tastes different than sugar, giving a chemical kind of taste.  It’s been around for a long time, as I recall reading references to it in We The Living.

Aspartame (aka Nutrasweet).  One of the more modern sweeteners, making saccharine obsolete.  It tastes a little better than saccharine.

Splenda (sucralose).  I can’t tell the difference between this and Nutrasweet, or why it’s better.

Lestat vs. Twilight

I just finished watching “Twilight”, the newest “cool vampire” movie the ladies seem to be enthralled with, and the similarities to the older Lestat series, by Anne Rice, were immediately obvious, though with considerable differences.

 Lestat.  At this point I’ve read Interview With The Vampire, The Vampire Lestat, Queen of the Damned, and Tales of the Body Thief.  I gave up after that last book, as it became apparent that these were no longer the stories of a vampire who may happen to be gay, and more like the adventures of a gay man, who just so happened to be a vampire.

 Plot in 500 words or less.  Lestat comes from 18^th century France, where he was a minor nobleman who went off to Paris with his male lover.  In Paris he’s turned into a vampire.  Eventually he learns of other vampires, including a secret society of them in a theater in Paris – “pretending” to be vampires as a cover.  He meets Armand, and then Marius, and eventually the original vampire, Akasha.  He takes a lover, Louis, and settles down in 19^th century New Orleans with him and raises a vampire girl, Claudia.  Then he goes into deep sleep and reawakens in the late 20^th century and forms a rock band.  His method of dealing with his blood addiction is to kill a mugger or murderer early in the evening and spend the rest of the night cavorting around.  Most of his adventures vary from same-sex vampire relationships to larger investigations into the origins of the vampires and/or battles with various other “evil” vampires.  Because he’s basically a lover, not a killer, and only kills bad people, this is yet another one of these “evil creature who acts good” deals.  Yet again.

 Before I hear another litany of “vampires can’t be gay” objections, let’s observe the obvious.  In Anne Rice’s world, “sex” as we know it, among vampires, is not the normal biological interaction between reproductive organs (male and/or female), but the consumption of blood of vampires by other vampires, producing what passes for orgasmic pleasure.  Lestat’s relationships, both in terms of this act, and in terms of his feelings of love and romance – what would pass for romantic relationships among normal mortals – are almost exclusively with male vampires: Nicol, Armand, Louis, etc.  His relationships with female vampires are platonic: his mother, Gabrielle, and Akasha, Queen of the Damned. 

 The clincher – as if anyone couldn’t recognize Lestat and Louis as a gay couple - comes from Tales of the Body Thief, when he trades bodies with a mortal male and expresses disgust and repulsion after having sex with a mortal woman, then falls into the arms of David Talbot, who himself shares his stories of affairs with teenage boys. Anyone refusing to acknowledge all this as “gay” is either willfully ignorant or simply stubbornly insisting on meaningless semantics.

 Twilight.  I didn’t read the book, I just saw the movie.  I can understand female attraction to Zac Efron, Brad Pitt, maybe even Patrick Dempsey.  But I can’t figure why Robert Pattison (Edward Cullen), who looks like he’s just been woken up out of a deep sleep, is considered “sexy”.  Sullen and somnolent?  These aren’t attractive to me in women, I see no reason why they should be endearing in men. 

 The girl, Bella, moves from sunny Arizona to live with her father in a small town in Washington State, “Forks”, where it’s perpetually cloudy and rainy, perfect for the mysterious clan of Cullens, a trendy and attractive group who keep to themselves and somehow disappear on the rare occasions when the sun comes out.  Of course, they are vampires, but they’ve learned to only kill animals, so they’re “good” vampires (zzz).  And of course, there is a crew of “bad” vampires who don’t agree with them, the most dangerous of which is James, who is called a “tracker”. 

 Needless to say, Bella falls in love with the inexplicably irresistible Edward, who can read everyone’s mind but hers, teleport instantly, move really fast, has superhuman strength, changes eye color, all the usual vampire traits with the convenient exception of being able to survive during daylight hours.  I always thought the restriction was “sunrise to sunset”, regardless of direct sunlight, which makes this “well, they’re ok if it’s raining” BS to be a major cop-out.  Here, the only bad effect of sunlight is to make their skin appear obviously nonhuman, but no actual harm.  Sure enough, the whole crew ends up in Phoenix – where it rarely rains and the sun is fairly prominent.  “Gay” vampires notwithstanding, at least Anne Rice adhered to this traditional element of the vampire myth, and only controverted it by extreme measures and extensive explanation and justification.

 Instead of being gay, the Cullens, and the bad vampires, are just super trendy.  Apparently there are no ugly, nerdy, or fashion-challenged vampires – one of their supernatural powers is an innate sense of what’s really cool.

 Girls vs. Women.  Each of these seems to appeal to pre-teen girls, but also to post-pubescent women.  As regards the former, vampires represent a cool way of indulging romance without the stigma, risk, or complications of sex, AIDS, or pregnancy.   A super cool, handsome, magic boyfriend who won’t bug you for sex – or worse, get you pregnant and then abandon you?  No wonder the Lestat crew was gay.  

            As for the latter, especially married women, I’d have to say part of it is a longing to return to that innocent time where romance was just holding hands and kissing.  Another part of it may be a subconscious desire to indulge in a theoretical, hypothetical, imaginary romance with a supernatural being who won’t make physical demands, and with whom the woman can “be with” without abandoning her real life husband and children. 

Part of the problem with achieving the dream every woman wants – getting married and having children – is that there is really little means of escape from the dream once its reality inevitably bares its cold fangs.  Children are rambunctious, unruly, and difficult to control.  They get sick.  They have soccer practice, homework, and other extracurricular activities quite apart from being washed, fed, clothed, or packed off to school.  They’re expensive.  But unlike a car, which can be sold or donated, or ultimately abandoned if it proves to be more trouble than it’s worth, we can’t exactly “sell” children simply because parenthood was far more inconvenient than we originally imagined it would be.  Granted, children are also a source of pride and pleasure, so it’s not like it’s ALL bad.  As with most things in life, there are good and bad sides to this. 

            Getting back to “Twilight”, notice that vampires never have children.  They “create” other vampires (with the obvious exception of Claudia) who are already at least teenagers, thus their “spawn” start off already able to look after themselves.  It’s more like recruiting friends into a clique of ultra-cool teens – post-children who agreed to adopt an unconventional, supernatural lifestyle.  In the “Twilight” case, they don’t even have to sleep during the day.  How conVENient.  A vampire family is an attractive, imaginary alternative to the real-life families so many adult women have locked themelves into, not necessarily “unhappy” or “desperate”, but certainly far less satisfied than they imagined they would be.  Like Harry Potter, it’s a guilty pleasure, and as with Harry Potter, I won’t begrudge anyone their indulgences.

    Anyhow, I wasn’t very much impressed with Bella – aside from being very attractive, she wasn’t very interesting or imaginative – perhaps the reason Edward couldn’t read her mind, was that she really didn’t have much inside it to read.   As for this whole “gay” business of Anne Rice: I was hardly any more impressed with “Twilight”, which replaced exotic, pretentious gay vampires, with a group of sullen, pretentious young, trendy non-gay vampires.  Ultimately the charm is lost on me, as it’s clearly meant to appeals to gays (which I’m not) or women (also which I’m not).  I’ve certainly long ago reached my quota for this business of “force of evil working for good”, be it Faust, Spawn, or “good vampires.”

The Spanish Civil War

“Fortune is not a train which passes every day at the same time.  She is a prostitute who offers herself fleetingly and then passes on to others.”  Ciano

 The more I read about this, the more fascinated I got with it, starting with Orwell’s Homage to Catalonia.  Orwell has a fantastically mellow way of describing everything, articulating facts in an amused manner.  What he experienced and saw there in Spain gave him a perpetual WTF kind of mood.  This led me to read another book, considerably more detailed, titled simply The Spanish Civil War, by Hugh Thomas.

 Background.  Spain 1936.  The situation was majorly screwed up.  The government was nominally capitalist/democratic, with large substantial socialist and communist segments, and an anarchist movement lurking outside on the far left, mainly concentrated in Barcelona.  The right-wing elements did poorly in the elections, and a major right-winger, Jose Calvo Sotelo, was murdered.  The left-wing elements, particularly the anarchists, threatened revolution. No one was happy, but someone decided to do something about it.  In July 1936, starting in Morocco, a military rebellion broke out.  The government was republican/democratic/capitalist, whereas the rebels were fascist/nationalist. 

 The Fascists.  Led by General Francisco Franco, supported by Italy and Nazi Germany.  Franco’s rebellion started in the colonies (Morocco and Canary Islands) and quickly spread to Spain itself.  Franco had the Army and the Foreign Legion, while the Navy and Air Force (such as they were) remained loyal to the government.

            The Church supported Franco’s movement.  Although there was considerable friction and disagreement between the Falangists (fascists) and the Carlists (monarchists), ultimately Franco was able to sort everything out, “and in the darkness, bind them” – a Nationalist Spanish Sauron.

            Militarily, the fascists had several elements.  The most substantial were the Moroccan and Spanish Foreign Legion forces, which were the Spanish units of any real value and combat experience.  Initially they were stuck in Morocco due to an effective blockade by loyalist naval units.  However, soon after, the Germans provided Ju-52 transport planes which allowed most of Franco’s armies to be airlifted to mainland Spain.  Hitler remarked that Franco should build a Ju-52 memorial to recognize the value of these planes to his rebellion.

            Other elements were Falangist and Carlist volunteers, who were not regular military units.  Italy provided several Blackshirt and one regular Italian Army unit; Mussolini wanted to both give his armies some combat experience but also some glory.  Ironically, not only did these units perform poorly, they also embarrassed Mussolini AND ended up in combat against the Garibaldi Brigade, which was a unit of communist Italian volunteers fighting for the government; it seems the “volunteers” sent by Mussolini weren’t exactly volunteers, many of them were told they were being sent to Abyssinia.  Note also: there was a unit of Irish fascists fighting for the nationalists, which also – completely by accident – ended up in combat against International Brigades featuring English and Irish volunteers, in some cases against men who knew each other from WWI or the 1916 Rebellion (e.g. IRA forces).  Germany sent Panzer I’s, the Condor Legion, and various advisors, but no actual military units; Hitler was basically scheming to get maximum results from a minimal investment, hoping to tie down and distract the English, French and Russians in this backwater zone while he focused his real attention on Austria and Czechoslovakia.    

 Republican/Loyalist side.  This was considerably more confusing, as there were various forces momentarily allied with each other but working at cross purposes, sometimes with more antagonism and violence among each other than against the fascists.  The “center” bourgeois capitalist was squeezed out, really having no place on either side of the battle.  The CEDA (Confederacion Espanhola de Derechas Autonomas), under Gil Robles, was the closest to a center-right party, but this was dissolved in 1937 and Robles went into exile after the war.

 P.S.U.C. (Partido Socialista Unificado de Catalunha). This was the Socialist Party of Catalonia.

PCE (Partido Communista Espanha) Spanish Communist Party.  In Moscow it was determined that Spain was not quite ripe for a proletarian revolution, it being still in feudalism.  So what it needed was to move to capitalist democracy….so…the Communist line was to oppose revolution and support the government.  Indeed, they argued that fighting for revolution only strengthens the fascists, so any revolutionaries are in fact…fascist!  After some initial shipments of French aircraft from France – on the sly, because Leon Blum sympathized with the leftist Spanish government but didn’t want to antagonize the British, who were in favor of Franco - the major outside power supplying arms to the Loyalist/Republican side was the USSR, and it was only supporting the PSUC.  Stalin took most of Spain’s gold as “credit” for the planes, tanks, and machine guns, plus the pilots and advisors he sent.  The communists were the #1 factor on the “loyalist” side.  Indeed, the war was very much an ideological battle between the forces of fascism vs. socialism – with the bourgeois middle class almost nonexistent on the political map.

            The communists spent more time hunting down political rivals – socialists, non-Stalinist communists (aka “Trotskyists”) and anarchists – than they did fighting fascists.  They were ruthless, opportunist, and also making profits on the arms deals.  Stalin sold all the weapons to the government at full market value (as much as anything produced by a communist dictatorship has a value) and not simply at cost. 

            The communists also were trying to take over most of the military units and dictate most of the government’s policies, virtually turning Republican Spain into a Soviet puppet.  Many in the government, e.g. Azana, Negrin, Largo Caballero, and Prieto, would have liked to distance Spain from Russia and secure arms from England or the US, but Stalin had Spain’s gold supply.  Moreover, despite substantial public opinion in the US and UK in favor of the government and against the fascists, the US and UK governments were at best neutral (US) and at worst sympathetic to Franco (UK), and in any case were politically committed to nonintervention – however much of a farce “nonintervention” was, in reality, with Germany’s Condor Legion over the skies, Italian Black Shirt troops on the ground, and Russian planes, pilots, tanks, and military advisors in Spain.  Britain had substantial mining interests in Spain which could conceivably be – and often were – diverted to the Germans depending on the success of the fascists, so the British government had a substantial stake in hoping for Franco’s victory.  Texas oil companies were selling oil to Franco on credit, a deal which would be ruined if Franco lost.  Finally, FDR was concerned about alienating Catholic voters, who tended to support Franco.

 UGT (Union General de Trabaladores).  This was the socialist trade union.

CNT.  This was the anarchist trade union.  Its political side was the FAI (Federacion Anarquista Iberica).

 P.O.U.M. (Partido Obrero de Unificacion Marxista) This was the non-Stalinist Marxist party, also referred to as Trotskyist – although Trotsky himself denounced the POUM.  Opposed to the PSUC, the POUM decided that Spain was ripe for proletarian revolution and fought to achieve that.  Their concern was, “suppose we defeat the Fascists but keep capitalism anyway – why did we fight this war?  What’s the difference?  What’s the point in fighting the fascists if we aren’t going to have a worker’s society when this is all over?”  This put it at odds with the PSUC.  Orwell, along with many other volunteers who didn’t have explicit communist party backing from back home, ended up in this group.  Eventually the communists blacklisted the POUM and hunted down its members.  It reached the point of street fighting in Barcelona in May 1937, as described by Orwell.  As mentioned earlier, this side of the war had as much problem fighting among themselves as they did with the fascists, who ultimately managed to get their asses in gear under Franco.

 Anarchists.  This group was loosely allied with the POUM as it also wanted a revolution.  I always wondered why anarchists, who advocate no government – a decentralized economy where businesses are run by the workers themselves and no central authority to control, dominate, or exploit the workers – should ally themselves with socialists, who advocate even greater government (a dictatorship of the proletariat at least, if not nationalization and regulation of large parts of the economy, with the means of production in the hands of the government, ostensibly as a representative of the working class).  In essence, anarchists wish to leapfrog from capitalism to communism without going through socialism, and are true communists in the truest meaning – and the socialists were really those out for power for its own sake. 

            On the other hand the anarchists, by their nature, were difficult to control, so they basically did as they pleased, which sometimes devolved into little more than banditry.  Plus they had the perpetual dilemma of whether to acknowledge and support “the government” or to remain independent and a loose cannon, which the communists complained worked to weaken their side and play into the hands of the fascists.  Indeed, it was the unruliness of the anarchists vs. the excellent organization (if somewhat ruthless and intolerant) of the communists which persuaded many from various parts of the political spectrum to support the latter, even without understanding Marx or caring much for Stalin. 

 Catalan & Basque separatists.  It didn’t help the republican cause that in Catalonia (northeastern region near Barcelona) and in Basque territory (up near the French border) there was a substantial movement for independence from Madrid’s control and from Spain itself.  This managed to complicate matters dramatically without providing any tangible benefits for the separatists. 

 International Brigades.  Non-Spanish volunteer units fighting on the government’s side.  Exiled German and Italian communists joined these, along with French, Belgians, Americans (e.g. Abraham Lincoln Brigade) and English.  Some had WWI combat experience, others were just poets, writers, and other “fellow travelers”.  Anarchist units had, as can be imagined, difficulties with discipline issues, whereas the communists were often admired for their organization and discipline.  The Russians provided substantial advisors, even leaders, to these units and most of the tanks and weapons.  It was the International Brigades, led by General Miaja, who saved Madrid from the fascists in November 1936.

 Notables

There was actually another Spanish Civil War, in 1820-23, but one we usually think of is this one, from 1936-39.  Likewise, Spain had a military dictatorship in 1923-30 under Primo de Rivera, and his son Jose Antonio was a prominent member of the fascist elite. However, his son was imprisoned immediately after the rebellion broke out by the republicans, and was eventually executed. 

“Fifth Column”.  This expression was introduced into the language by nationalist General Mola, leading four columns of nationalist armies against the capital, Madrid, then held by the government/republicans.  He bragged that a “fifth column” of secret nationalist supporters in the city would aid their attack.  As it was, Madrid was attacked in November 1936, but General Miaja managed to rally the International Brigades into an effective defense of the city against the nationalists.  The city remained under siege and only fell when the whole war collapsed in March 1939.  With any civil war, duplicity and treachery were inevitable, so the government had a legitimate concern about such “fifth columnists”, but the communists tended to use this excuse to rid themselves of political rivals, e.g. POUM and anarchist forces with no known connection to the fascists.

“Molotov Cocktails”.  Glass bottles of gasoline with a burning rag tied around it.  Reportedly first used on October 29, 1936, by nationalist legionaires against the Russian T-26 tanks provided by Stalin to the government forces.

Guernica.  Bombed by the Condor Legion, and famously memoralized by the painting by Picasso.  Much of the civilian bombing was an experiment to see the reaction and results, but it’s unclear those results were clear enough to warrant continuing the policy in WWII against London.  Indeed, the public outcry against the bombing was so severe, that any tactical advantage on the ground was far exceeded by the political repercussions abroad.  The Germans had to backpedal and make up nonsense about trying to bomb the bridges or Basque explosives going off on their own. 

The German MG-34 machine gun and “88” anti-aircraft gun were first used in Spain.

Tanks.  The Germans provided Panzer I’s to the nationalists, of minor effectiveness due to being armed only with machine guns.  The Italians provided their own typically undersized, underarmored mini-tanks.  For the loyalist side, the Russians provided the T-26, which had stronger armor and a 40mm gun, and totally outclassed the Panzer Is and Italian “tanks”; though the nationalists were able to get their hands on some of these themselves by capturing them or offering bounties for their defection.

            The Germans, through Van Thoma, tried to experiment with massed tank attacks in Spain as a proving ground for their theories as articulated by Liddell-Hart and Guderian.  Unfortately they really didn’t have enough tanks to make this practical, but at least they realized this.  The Soviets went back convinced that the earlier “spread them out among infantry units” tactics were still valid, much to their detriment in the early days of Operation Barbarossa.

Air power.  The Spanish air force had been nothing to write about before the war, so neither side really had any meaningful air power when the rebellion broke out in July 1936.  The French provided some aircraft to the government early in the war, then the Russians took over this responsibility.  On the fascist side, the Italians and Germans supplied aircraft and many pilots, the latter being the famous Condor Legion.  The Russian planes proved to be competitive with the Italian planes, and to some extent the Me-109, which made its debut in Spain.  The Condor Legion featured such stars as the Me-109, the Ju-52, and the brand new Heinkel He-111 bomber, which participated in the Guernica bombing. 

For Whom The Bell Tolls.  This is Hemingway’s novel set in the war, in 1937, and made into a movie with Gary Cooper as the main character, Robert Jordan, and Ingrid Berman as his love interest, Maria.  Not being a big fan of Hemingway, the way I am with Orwell, I simply watched the movie.  Jordan is sort of an independent contractor working for the Republicans, and his assignment (“Mission: Impossible” theme plays here) is to blow up a bridge immediately before a Republican offensive so that the fascists are unable to send reinforcements.  He has to earn the trust of a band of irregulars, including Maria – who had her head shaved and was otherwise inconvenienced by a band of fascists who took over her town and murdered her parents – and Pilar, an older women jealous of Maria’s youth and beauty and who has an obnoxiously aggressive and cynical attitude.  The playoff character is her husband Pablo, who is now a drunken coward, resentful of the “Ingles” (English – Jordan) who comes by recruiting his own band for this bridge job.  Surely, when the bridge is blown, the fascists will come looking for the culprits, and he doesn’t want to risk his neck.   I found the movie long (3 hours) but suitably chock full of the various ingredients for a Spanish Civil War story: ragtag Republicans, some communist Republicans, and fascists with Spanish style uniforms but German helmets and weapons.  Of course the Spanish ask Jordan why he’s fighting a war far from his own country, in which he personally has nothing at stake.  Remind me how many Spanish units fought in the US Civil War.

Civil guards.  These were the hated local police in various towns, with their distinctive two-corner hats and green uniforms.  In republican sectors they often ended up lined against the wall by the irate locals.  These are not to be confused with the Assault Guards, who were the urban equivalents, and wore blue uniforms.  Most of the civil guards joined the fascists, while the assault guards mostly remained loyal to the government.  To make matters a little more confusing, the Falangists, Spain’s fascists, wore blue shirts, similar to Mussolini’s Black Shirts and Hitler’s Brown Shirts (SA). 

Progress.  In July 1936, rebellion broke out in various Spanish cities.  Depending on who chose which sides, the fascist rebels had various degrees of success across the country, which split up into rebel/fascist and loyalist/republican sectors.  For the time being, most of Franco’s forces were stuck in Morocco, with the republican navy sufficiently strong relative to the rebel naval forces to prevent a seaborne invasion of mainland Spain.  In each side’s sectors, the “wrong” people were either thrown in jail or shot.  In nationalist won sectors, these were socialists, communists, and anarchists.  In republican sectors, these were not only rebel officers, but also monarchists, Falangists, and also priests – and eventually anarchists and non-Stalinist communists (e.g. the POUM).  In republican areas, churches were burned, looted, and destroyed.  This was particularly bad wherever anarchists were prevalent.

            Eventually Franco’s reps in Germany managed to persuade the Nazis to loan them enough Ju52s to airlift the Moroccan forces to mainland Spain.  This airlifted nationalist force drove up the Portuguese border to the northern coast.  Madrid was besieged but not captured until the final collapse, thanks to a heroic defense of the city by General Miaja and the International Brigades in November 1936. In September-October 1937, the northern pocket of government resistance – in the Basque area close to France – was wiped out.

            The nationalists finally got their battleship online, the republican navy cowered in port in Cartagena, the Germans and Italians lent their own navies to assist the nationalists, while the Royal Navy – much to the embarrassment of many British politicians – avoided any kind of confrontation.  Thus what had been a republican blockade turned into a nationalist blockade.

            From March to July, 1938, the nationalists drove southeast and reached the Mediterranean, cutting off Barcelona (northeast pocket, Catalonia) from Valencia, which is where the government moved the capital once Madrid fell under siege, though the government had various expedients, by air and sea, by which to lessen the impact of this otherwise strategic defeat.  Various republican attacks initially surprised the nationalists in local sectors, but eventually Franco transferred troops from other sectors, took back the lost territory, so the republicans were left with heavy casualties they could ill afford, but no permanent gains.

            From December 1938 to February 1939, the nationalists followed up their earlier successes with a knockout blow to Catalonia, sweeping across to the French border and taking Barcelona without a fight.  By this point France and England recognized Franco’s regime as the legitimate government of Spain, and their acquiescence in 1938 with Hitler over Czechoslovakia made it clear to the republic that they could expect no real help from the democracies, who were willing to accept almost anything from Hitler and Mussolini just to avoid a war.  For his part, Stalin was also unwilling to do enough to ensure a republican victory.  Not only was he unwilling to risk a war over Spain, he was pissed that the British and French didn’t include him in the Munich peace talks and was convinced that dealing with Germany was far more worthwhile.

            Although the remaining republican forces in southeastern Spain, including Madrid, were substantial, the writing was on the wall – a threshold, tipping point was reached.  The Soviet advisors packed up and left while they still could, and the half the remaining Spanish officers either left or started making deals with Franco – or had been “Fifth Columnists” all along, most notably Colonel Casado.  By the end of March, Franco’s forces swept across the rest of Spain, with what was left of the republican army either melting away into civilian clothes or switching sides by entire units, many of their commanding officers having either been Fifth Columnists or simply persuaded by Casado to switch sides.  Large numbers of refugees had crossed over into France in huge camps, whereas the most prominent leftist politicians had fled out of Spain. 

            At this point Franco focused on rounding up his enemies who couldn’t make it out of Spain, the reprisals lasting well into the 40s.  Oddly, the leftists who went back to Russia ended up being wiped out by Stalin; having solid revolutionary credentials is often as much a liability as an asset, as it makes you a potential rival and thus a target for purges.  During WWII, Spain remained neutral, mostly out of fear of the French and British.  Franco did send troops to the Eastern Front, the Blue Division.  When it came time for Franco to pay up to the Germans what they owed, Hitler remarked that Franco made him “feel like a Jew”.

            In 1975, Franco died, and eventually Spain became a democracy for the first time since 1936.  The lasting legacies of the war were not only this regime which lasted almost 40 years, but also Germany’s blitzkrieg in the early parts of WWII.  It also served to uncover, for an earlier generation of socialists, communists, and anarchists not only the dangers of fascism but the ruthless opportunism of many on their own side, particularly in Russia – George Orwell being the most notable example to expose his discoveries not only in Homage to Catalonia, but also 1984. 

One Million Dead, by Jose Maria Girondella.  After having digested the lengthy and verbosely detailed The Spanish Civil War, by Hugh Thomas, and endured the dull and not particularly exciting movie adaptation of Hemingway’s “For Whom The Bell Tolls” (see above), I delved into this 668 page novel.  Unlike the latter, which only focuses on Jordan and a modest array of pro-Republican characters – all the Fascists are unknown extras only encountered at the very end – this gives almost equal time and sympathy to characters from both sides, as well as a wide array of historical characters, with the notable exception of Franco himself. 

            The main focus is on the Alvears, a family from Gerona, a town in Catalonia somewhere between Barcelona and the French border in northeastern Spain.  Their son Cesar, a seminarian, has been shot by the Reds at the very beginning of the story.  His brother Ignacio goes to Barcelona, then Madrid, crossing the lines there and finally joining a ski unit of the nationalist forces.  He romances Marta and Ana Maria.  His cousins in the nationalist zone end up victims of the Fascists.  Others include International Brigade characters, anarchists, communists, priests, Falangists, Russians, Germans (Nazis), Italians (a fascist delegate and a black shirt soldier), foreign journalists (Fanny and Bolen), and a few who find themselves not particularly disposed to one side or the other.  The story follows the characters throughout the war, from July 1936 through April 1939.  I found that it paralleled the non-fiction book very well, but giving a perspective from the ground, from the eyes of individual characters, so much so that perhaps someone else could forgo the non-fiction book in favor of this one alone and still come out with an excellent knowledge and understanding of the war.

            Three small portions I feel are worth reciting:

            1.  At the beginning of the story, Ignacio goes to the local cemetery in Gerona to find and identify his brother Cesar, who they believe – correctly – has been shot by the Reds.  Others are there for the same purpose.  One woman finds her husband’s body, with a note written in his handwriting in his pocket, addressed to her, “we’ll see each other in heaven.”

            2.  In Gerona, which was under communist control until the end of the war, many bourgeois and landowners were held in the prison, and occasionally “taken for a walk”, the slang word meaning taken out to be shot, almost at random.  The prisoners knew they were under a death sentence.  One landowner was taken out by car, with three communist militiamen.  When they reached a militia checkpoint, the victim – who knew exactly what was in store for him – opened the window and yelled, “Hey!  We’re Fascists!  Long live Franco!”, which led the checkpoint guards to open fire on the car, killing not only him, but also the driver, and wounding the two others. 

            3. The Alvears back in Gerona decide to adopt Eloy, a small boy who was orphaned when his parents were killed in the Condor Legion air raid on Guernica.  He seems happy enough in his new home, but when the air raid siren goes off, the poor boy panics and screams, and his new foster parents have to comfort him.