From: adolphso@mizar.usc.edu (adolphson)
Newsgroups: soc.motss
Subject: Re: Paul Jabara
Date: 6 Oct 1992 17:55:57 -0700
Organization: University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA
NNTP-Posting-Host: mizar.usc.edu

In article <1992Oct6.141626.13929@fig.citib.com> 
glp@fig.citib.com (Greg Parkinson) writes:
> In article <1aqdofINNo32@mizar.usc.edu>, 
> adolphso@mizar.usc.edu (adolphson) writes:

Greg wrote:
> |> > We wore Tippi Hedren wigs and false eye-lashes and
> |> > golf pants and plaid coats.

Me:
> |> Oh dear.  Glitter rock.  I used to spend all my free time at
> |> Rodney's English Discotheque on Sunset.  It was *fabulous*. 

Its name actually was Rodney Bingenheimer's English 
Discotheque.  And it was incredible.  A tiny, narrow 
little place with a dance floor about the size of my
kitchen.  What I *loved* was that they would project
movies and slides on the walls and ceilings much as
Cheetah -- *before* my time -- had done in the '60s.
The walls would be covered with sex education film
strips and surfing documentaries and home ec movies
and porn and who knows what else.  And it was a mixed
but largely GLB crowd.

> I was a maximal nerd in high school (which ended for me in
> 1974) and I lived in Southern Orange County which meant that
> any trip to LA was an expedition.

Well, the maximal nerds I knew in high school (and I 
graduated in 1974, too) normally didn't wear Tippi Hedren
wigs and false eyelashes.  But I suppose Southern Orange
County (ick) was a bit more boondocky than Van Nuys.

> I got to see Jobriath (remember her!  Those ears!) and Zolar X;
> The Alex Harvey Band, and Sylvester (at the Roxy, I think?)

Jobriath!  I'm trying to remember where I saw Sylvester.
Hmmm.  The Roxy sounds right.

> I started coming out of it in '73 and '74 and listening to
> Roxy Music/Bryan Ferry, Sparks (Kimono My House!),
> early Bruce Springsteen, and ENO (Here Come The Warm Jets - 
> should be a theme song for some people, eh?)

At the same time that I was glittering, I was also 
in a professional Balkan folk dance company *and*
going to Elisabeth Schwarzkopf and Joan Sutherland
recitals.  Where did that energy come from?

> Then Bowie went PlastiSoul (I just got the Ryko version of
> Young Americans and it's a *completely* different album)
> Bruce did Born To Run and my world became Patti Smith and
> Modern Lovers 

Oh my.  I'd forgotten all about Jonathan whatshisname.

> and Ramones and The Damned and Sex Pistols
> and Blondie and my hair turned green and blue and 
> impossible black and we started a band and I got a boyfriend.....

I lost interest around 1976, soon after a friend of mine 
moved to London and became a punk and then on a visit to LA
tried to convince me to join her in gobbing and other
disgusting things. 

> The mid-70s to early-80s were much more my period of
> scene-making.  I wasn't pretty enough to be good at
> glitter but I did suburban punk real well - I was 
> *threatening*.

My light went out around 1978.  <All together now: Aaaaaah.>
And one didn't have to pretty to be good at glitter.  Do you
remember Chuck?  (I never learned his last name.)  He was
*the* glitterboy and even appeared on the David Suskind Show
with a number of other groupies.  (He was the only male groupie
who agreed to appear on the show.)  Well, Chuck was *not*
pretty.  Vivacious.  Peppy.  A great dancer.  A show-off.
But *not* pretty.

> |> And I had a collection of peculiar thrift store clothes -- like
> |> my TV-jamas, which were a cross between a kimono and pajamas, with
> |> images of Japanese people watching TV painted all over.  And I 
> |> was a regular on The Real Don Steele Show, a local-TV American 
> |> Bandstand, for a couple of years. 
>
> Tell me it's not true!  

Yes, it's true.  I did wear TV-jamas in public.  And I was
on The Real Don Steele Show almost weekly for a year and a
half or two years.  I can hardly believe it now, but I used
to show up on Saturday mornings at the Paramount lot and we'd
shoot usually 2 shows back to back (we had to bring a change 
of clothes with us).  I imagine the shows exist somewhere on
tape.  I think I'd die of embarrassment if I were to see
myself gyrating in my 6" platform boots on one of those 
pedestals.  My goal was always to get on Soul Train.  (Doesn't
Don Cornelius send shivers up and down your spine?)  I never
did, but my friend Perla was on all the time.

> Did you know that guy who did the Egozine Series?
> Bobby BonBon or something like that?

Hmmmm.  The name sounds *really* familiar.  

> |> And look at me now.  Sigh.
>
> I couldn't live now like I did then.  I'm glad
> that I got to do it and I'm happy with my life 
> now.  I think I'm *still* catching up on my
> sleep.

Tell me about it.  Well, I guess there's nothing wrong
with being an old fart.  Or is there?

Arne

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