Remember The Cowsills? Here’s Their Movie!

Posted on March 6, 2013 at 3:59 pm

The Cowsills were the real-life 1960’s singing group that inspired “The Partridge Family,” a top recording group made up of a mother and her children, ages 8-19. Their crystal harmonies and upbeat songs like “The Rain, the Park, and Other Things” and “Hair” were some of the most popular tunes of the era.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1qBdk42S2Uc

A new documentary tells their story of triumph and tragedy. It premieres tonight on Showtime.

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Bill Harley: Win a CD!

Posted on March 3, 2013 at 4:00 pm

Here is how much my family loves the brilliant and hilarious singer/songwriter/story-teller Bill Harley. Even though we played and played and played his music until we all knew it inside out, we would still sit in the driveway until the end of a song or story. Many of our family’s most-beloved catch-phrases and in-jokes are inspired by Harley. Favorites included You’re in Trouble with “Dad Threw the TV Out the Window,” “When You Don’t Know What It Is,” the title song, and “I’m Busy,” Dinosaurs Never Say Please, with the title story about a boy who turns into a T-Rex and the very funny “Bojabi” and the classic “Master of All Masters.” We also love “You’re Not the Boss of Me,” “50 Ways to Fool Your Mother,” “Cool in School,” and many, many more.

It was a great treat to see Harley perform live at Sirius/XM’s Kid’s Place with Keith Munslow, accompanied by Harley’s son Dylan on drums. Harley has a gift for putting the biggest and most complicated and universal experiences into the most accessible terms. It is not just the simplicity of language, but the humor that he uses to make scary situations and feelings like jealousy and insecurity more manageable. The title of his new CD comes from a song named by a Kid’s Place contest: “It’s Not Fair to Me,” and the children in the audience shrieked with laughter at the familiarity and silliness of the claims. Munslow’s “My Eraser” is not just a tribute to the very useful pink spongey part of a pencil; it is an astute and reassuring observation about correcting all kinds of mistakes. Possibly the biggest hit at the performance was the very funny “Hideous Sweater,” a tribute to the articles of clothing we love beyond (and without) reason.

I am delighted to have two Harley CDs to give away, It’s Not Fair to Me (with Munslow) and the story collection High Dive & Other Things That Could Have Happened. If you’d like to enter, send me an email at moviemom@moviemom.com with Harley in the subject line and tell me your favorite silly song. Don’t forget your address! (US addresses only) I’ll pick a winner at random on March 10.

Maltin on Music: Old Songs in New Movies

Posted on March 1, 2013 at 8:00 am

One of my very favorite writers on film is Leonard Maltin so I was delighted to see his new essay on the use of classic or obscure older songs in new movies.

Classic songs and selections from what’s now called the Great American Songbook still turn up in contemporary films, either suggested by music supervisors or thought of by savvy directors. Sometimes the usage is ironic or odd, as when Andrew Dominik chose to have Cliff “Ukulele Ike” Edwards warbling “It’s Only a Paper Moon” while someone was being brutally murdered in Killing Them Softly.

More often, older music is used to evoke a particular mood or era. I anticipated hearing familiar tunes in Hyde Park on Hudson, which is set in 1939, but I was especially pleased to recognize two songs by The Ink Spots, “If I Didn’t Care” and “I Don’t Want to Set the World on Fire,” before a word was sung, as their guitar-and-piano introductions are so familiar.

I also listen for great songs and appreciate very much what they can do to enhance a movie’s mood and message.

Rob Sheffields’ Best Rock Movie Moments

Posted on February 25, 2013 at 3:59 pm

Rob Sheffield is one of my favorite writers and I love his books about popular music. For Rolling Stone, he has created a gallery of the all-time best rock moments in movies, with irresistible clips from the “Wayne’s World” rendition of “Bohemian Rhapsody” to John Cusack holding the boom box over his head to serenade Ione Skye with Peter Gabriel in “Say Anything” and “Tiny Dancer” in “Almost Famous.” It’s a great mix of covers and originals, classics and should-be-classics. But he should have included “Blackboard Jungle,” the first movie with a rock soundtrack. And I don’t know how he left out my own all-time favorite, from “The Blues Brothers:”