Wrestling 1959
by Bryce Martin


With only two television channels to chose from, I sometimes dug in on the couch to view the lesser of two evils. Wrestling was not my idea of entertainment. Late in the year in 1959, a regular wrestling show from Chicago was a weekly filmed feature. Individual matches were the norm, and contests included tag team, women, and midget wrestling. I had read in the Globe that KMAC-TV out of Kansas City, Mo., telecast live wrestling, attesting to its surge of popularity. The wrestlers from the Chicago Amphitheatre were the same ones who occasionally came to Joplin to perform. I did like the theatrics involved, their non de plumes, and their chief gimmicks. The Great Bolo wore a full head mask. That helped draw attention away from his soft-body and minimal physique. He head-butted regularly. His opponent would hold his forehead in pain and excitedly demand that the referee remove his mask to see what kind of foreign object hidden there was doing the damage. Fat chance. Haystack Calhoun was a mammoth hick in overalls. Danny Hodge was a clean-cut college wrestling champion from Oklahoma. Wild Red Berry was a veteran from Pittsburg in nearby Crawford County who looked too old. Lou Thesz was old. He somehow exuded class in this classless excuse for a sport. Antonio Rocca had thighs like beer barrels. If he got his man in a leg scissors it was all over. Others were Mighty Atlas, Sandor Szabo, Oni Wiki Wiki, and Gorgeous George. The latter was on the Johnny Holmes sports segment in Joplin promoting a match for that night. "I've noticed the women since I've been here," he told Holmes. "They all look like they came out of a book... a bad book." He likely received the intended response that night, a crowd of irate women yelling for his hide.

The title for the wrestling tapes from Chicago locally was, The Wrestling Show. It was a title that did not go unnoticed by some of my classmates. We often discussed something we had watched recently on television. Odds were, if you watched television at all you witnessed what everyone else did. We discussed how phony the whole thing was. "Did you notice it is called The Wrestling Show?" Someone asked, emphasizing the word Show.

THE VULGAR MASSES ARE RIPE FOR THE PLUCKING
by Bryce Martin

When I watched a well-known Pentecostal evangelist on television with a woman acquaintance a few years back in the 1980s, I said, “He’s phony. He turns it off and on too easily – the tears, the mock facial expressions.”

She pshawed that. “He wouldn’t be on television if he wasn’t aboveboard,” she said.

I could not really believe I heard that. I knew there were people who believed that if television let you bring your message, then it was on the up and up. I knew there were people who believed that but I never thought I would actually hear someone say it.

I am not about to say I am above being fooled, unless -- as it was that time -- Jimmy Swaggart was the one trying to do the fooling.

There is even a large group of people who think they actually know what they like when it comes to records, movies, and books. None of these people can tell you in an analytical way what makes a good recording, a good movie, a good book.

Press them on it and they will say, “I know what I like,” with the emphasis on the word “I.”

Sure you do.

These people bought the package when it came to John Denver, Mac Davis, Kenny Rogers, Garth Brooks, and others in between of mediocre ability, the latest hand-jobs.

There are two things at work. There is the business of country music, whereby anybody can sing any genre of music, apparently, and call it country music, and then there is actual country music. The business has to do with manipulating the charts, marketing and selling the product, which includes cash and other inducements to radio stations.

Most people cannot distinguish between what is country and what is not country. They have never thought about it. They have never studied what makes a good poem and what makes a bad poem, what the qualities and techniques are for a good or a bad movie, book, or any manner of things. All they know – or what they think they know – is what they like, which has little or nothing to do with any real merit the product might or might not have.

When someone, especially in country music, crosses over to popularity in the general population, appeals to the straights and dopers, the liberal and conservative, you can bet he or she is a popular singer masquerading as a county singer. Not only that, they will amount to a mediocre pop singer at best.

Going back as far as this phenomenon of marketing strategy has existed in my lifetime, I have tried to educate anyone who might be around to listen. It might sound something like this: “Not only is John Denver not country he is not much of a talent.”

More recently, similar words I have reserved for Garth Brooks.

Always, and I do mean always, I get the same vulgar response. And I do mean vulgar. Forty years ago or today, it is the same words.

“I wish I had the money he has made,” or “I wish I had the money she has made.”

See what I mean? It is hopeless. It is pathetic.

They even go so far as to say it in a smug way, as if they have some city street smarts or some country common sense that has just showed me up for the fool I am.

It makes me wonder how we exist as a country, how we survive day to day and why an aggressive foreign propaganda machine has not trampled us under. The culturally and economically exploited remain clueless.

“I know what I like.”

No, you like what someone else wants you to like from the choices given.

A GOOD RECORDING BEATS A GREAT SONG ANY DAY
by Bryce Martin


I do not have favorite songs; I have favorite recordings.

A longtime favorite is “Broken Hearted Melody” by Sarah Vaughn. I have to specify “by Sarah Vaughn” because it is her recording of the song I enjoy and not a version by anyone else.

“In the Mood” is a standard performed by countless bands. I like it by the Ernie Fields Orchestra, and by no one else.

The same holds true with “Nola,” done by a multitude of singers and bands and instrumentalists. More often than not, the instrumental version of this song prevails. Billy Williams singing it and accompanying himself on the piano is my preference.

My favorite of all is “Poor People of Paris,” done by Les Baxter in 1956. I still try to whistle it the way it was recorded.

I know, literally, the lyrics and melodies to hundreds of songs. I have written several dozen more. Therefore, when someone asks me what is my favorite song or songs; I really cannot answer the question in that form. My favorite recording or recordings, yes. As mentioned, it is “Poor People of Paris” by Les Baxter. I mentioned some others and I could add several more.

I do not look for messages in songs. I am not caught up in profound lyrics or in “hot licks.” I recognize a well-written song, but how it sounds – the actual recording or performance – is paramount.

“Gentle on My Mind” is an incredibly brilliant song. John Hartford may have outdone himself on that one. Glen Campbell does a credible vocal with it, but it is only a minor favorite with me. Rodney Crowell has penned some extraordinary songs, yet no one has quite done them justice to my way of listening.

It is all about the recording. In the days of vinyl, it was that something “between the grooves.”

One thing will never change, no matter what technology is in place. When people ask me what kind of songs I like, or what kind of music I listen to, I tell them, “There are only two kinds: good and bad. I like good songs.”

Truth is, I like good recordings.
…

HOW TO WRITE A LETTER
by Bryce Martin


After all these years, I now discover the colored center of indelible pencils is toxic and that you should never place the tip of one in your mouth. I have not seen such a pencil in years, but if my grandmother were still living, I would certainly pass along the information.

My grandmother always used an indelible pencil for correspondence. Since she predated the portable ink pen, I can see why. It looks and writes like a pencil but its mark is permanent.

I used it a few times myself. I did not like it because it made a light to faint impression on paper and you needed to lick the tip of the purple core to allow you to make a darker line. Either that or dip the tip in water. Grandmother moistened the tip with her tongue. After first trying the pencil I could understand why.

Grandmother wrote many letters because she received many. She considered it a near sin not to “answer” each letter.

When it came time to put pencil to paper, she would look for that indelible pencil the way someone else might look for car keys. Indelible was indispensable as far as she was concerned.

Grandmother’s letters were written on white linen stationery and mailed in matching envelopes. The letter-size linen writing paper came in a tablet. The first page of the tablet was a blue lined page. It was the only lined page in the tablet and it had a primary use. Handwritten letters tend to look better scribed on blank pages rather than on lined ones. The problem is that few people can keep the lines straight. That is where the lined page works wonders. The linen paper, though thick-looking to the eye, had some transparency. Place a sheet of it over the lined paper and, voila! That is how she kept her lines straight and wrote some beautiful letters.

DUI MIKE DRUNK ON SPEED AND HIMSELF
by Bryce Martin


DUI Mike is to drunk drivers what Johnnie Cochran is to celebrities who murder. He is there for you. If you’ve got the dough, he’s got the know.

Say you are pulled over and not only are you soused to the gills but you smell like a distillery as well. Well, it just so happens that the officer who ended up arresting you for DUI did not have probable cause to pull you over in the first place. Wouldn’t you like to see that rectified in a court of law? The injustice of such a thing. That, DUI Mike, will tell you, is what he is all about. There will be no tampering with justice, rigging balloon tests, or stomping on our rights as long as DUI Mike is around. In legal babble, he is the “is” in what is is.

I happened upon an infomercial Saturday evening on WGFX-FM (104.5) for DUI Mike called The Drunk Zone, excuse me… The Legal Zone. In case you are not aware, DUI Mike is the lawyer who has those framed ads riding at (bloodshot) eye level above Nashville’s urinals. Clever ad placement, huh?

In Tennessee, DUI is an abbreviation for a blanket term meaning driving under the influence, a common cause of death and accidents. Another term associated with it is driving while intoxicated, or DWI as it is specifically called in other states

By the tone of his voice, you knew the host of the show thought it so cool that his guest VIP was actually recently given a ticket by the police and – how cool is this – that the citation was for that macho of all road sports, speeding.

“You have to tell us about it,” the host said, giggling with anticipation.

DUI Mike was just as eager to oblige. “I was going down the highway in my jukebox on wheels and then comes these flashing blue lights. I was given a citation for doing 84 in a 70, and that was after I had decelerated.”

The pair could hardly contain themselves. You could just hear the glee in their voices.

“He was real professional,” DUI Mike said of the officer, while making no apology for his own bad behavior.

DUI Mike must do a lot of speeding. Why else would he have a radar detector in his “jukebox on wheels”? He told how he could not do without his radar detector. He must have had it turned off when he got the speeding ticket, that or the decibels distracted him. Of course, I could be wrong about the radar detector. He probably uses it for research. You know how inaccurate those things can be and how a person can get a ticket for speeding when they were not. Maybe he is just planning to branch out. DUI-VROOM Mike does not have the same ring to it though. It could be, too, that he is just a self-indulgent, me-first, screw-you type of guy who lacks the discipline to allow himself enough time to get where he is going by driving the speed limit. Think?

DUI Mike has made a name for himself over the years by specializing in defending drunk drivers. Those guilty of the offense figure enough money can find them a loophole, or a way out. Who could think otherwise with our judicial system being the joke that it is. Lawyers do not need to rationalize or justify what type of client they represent. They are, after all lawyers. When you make that kind of money, what people might think is of little or no importance. I imagine it is the latter.

…

ALL IN THE FAMILY: I watched some of Rob Reiner’s love affair with Howard Dean on C-Span. He really is Meathead.

GARTH BROOKS -- WHEN SCHLOCK COMES JINGLING IN
by Bryce Martin


Fortunate am I that my era had Bobby Darin. I feel bad for you if this is your era and you have Garth Brooks.

I heard for the first time Brooks’ “Call Me Claus,” with its pumped-up big-band sound. It is every singer who wants a Christmas standard, a recording so Christmas-y it vies for radio airplay each and every season, which, in turn, translates into album sales every year, such as Brenda Lee’s “Rockin’ Around The Christmas Tree,” Bobby Helms’ “Jingle Bell Rock,” or Nat King Cole’s “The Christmas Song.” Even if it is just once a year, it is enough to keep a singer’s name in the forefront.

Brooks came close with his previous “Santa Looks a Lot Like Daddy” (an oldie by Buck Owens that did not even make it as a Christmas staple for him). The anti-Hank and Top Hat of all the hat acts must have felt something along the lines of a classic rendition would do the trick.

“Call Me Claus” from Brooks comes across as too contrived and forced to merit any genuine sentiment. When Bobby Darin was a young whelp and in his heyday, and even with such gems as “Mack the Knife” and “Beyond the Sea,” he gave the impression of being a poor imitation to the real kings of swing and style. To such elders as Frank Sinatra he paled in comparison. For sheer gaucheness, Brooks (Mr. Obvious) stands alone.

WHEN THE RED, RED ROBIN...
by Bryce Martin


A grasshopper sat on a railroad track,
He looked at me and I looked back.
I picked up a brickbat and hit him in the shin,
He said, "Oh, Lord a'mercy, don't do that again."

Grandma quoted snippets of English nursery rhymes and songs while working the treadle on her sewing machine or baking a wild blackberry cobbler in the wood cook stove.

"My father was Johnny Bull," she said. "I get it from him, but I leave out the 'Bloody this' and the 'Bloody that' he was so fond of."

Johnny Bull is a name meant to represent England or an English person. Her father was born in England.

Grandma's most common phrase was "Lord a'mercy."

Her most vocalized non-gospel song was "Sing a Song of Sixpence."

Sing a song of sixpence
A pocket full of rye;
Four and twenty blackbirds
Baked in a pie

Blackbird pie was common in her household while growing up. She remembered the traps set in the yards for the birds by her mother and the meat pies that followed. That particular song, however, was as much a riddle as anything else. She said she no longer remembered what it all meant.

"I'm not much for remembering anything anymore," she would say. "Time takes its toll on the mind and body, and it has taken its toll on mine."

I have always been a stickler for detail, even at a young age. Grandma loved birds and flowers, and the four seasons. One of the first signs of spring was the robin. When you saw robins with their swelled chests darting across the lawn or flying in one of those haphazard group formations they deploy, you knew spring was here.

The problem I had with detail came about when Grandma would recite one of the many British poems or songs concerning their national bird, the robin redbreast. That is what I had a problem with: Robins have an orange, not a red breast. I did not understand songs that had lines such as: "When the red, red robin comes bob, bob, bobbin' along."

Much later, I discovered that American Robins do have orange breasts -- and British robins have a red breast. Most all of the songs and poems about the robin were Old World works; hence, they all mention a red breast. Therefore, the answer to my problem was the fact that people in America, including my grandmother, were essentially making mention of British robins when the specimens at hand were American robins.

One legend has it that a robin tried to pull the thorns from Christ's crown, and drops of blood fell on the Robin's light-colored chest. There is also the Christmas story about the night Christ was born and about the little brown bird that shared the stable with the Holy Family. A fire Joseph built to keep the family warm burned out during the night. The bird quickly flew down from its nest and fanned the embers with its wings. The heat from the fire turned the bird's feathers red. The breast of the robin was red from then on to remind us of its love for the baby Jesus.

Doris Day had a hit with the song about the "red robin bobbin' along" in 1953 when I was 10 years old. That was in America, of course. The songwriter, if American, was not observant or was using artistic license to its fullest. On the other hand, maybe the songwriter was aware that nothing rhymes with orange.