Everyone lies. Everyone dies.

Wednesday 10/21/26

Rehearsals have begun for my one-man holiday mounting of Aleksandr Vvedensky's 1938 avant-garde play, Christmas at the Ivanovs, to be staged in my bathtub. "Everyone lies. Everyone dies."

One year for Christmas when I was a teenager I asked for Proust's In Search of Lost Time as translated by C.K. Scott Moncrieff and Terence Kilmartin--that big, silver edition in three books. They went to the Borders to get it, remarking to the cashier it was for their son. The cashier thought this was intended as punishment and expressed incredulity that a kid would request such a thing. I find myself calling this to mind more often these days for some reason.

The newly released first show by Jimi Hendrix from Berkeley on 5/30/70 smokes. He plays fast, the band goes fast, and that's no bad thing. I've been transfixed by Hendrix's version of "Johnny B. Goode" ever since I first heard it on Hendrix in the West. I have a penchant for rating the various covers (Beatles, Grateful Dead). The second show of the day has been officially available for years. Outfit them with the soundcheck on bootleg. Also, Mitch Mitchell: give the drummer some.

A recording from Oslo of the first show of Bob Dylan's new tour on Saturday has become available and is excellent. "Tangled Up in Blue" returned to the setlist as a fluttering wisp of a ballad. There's a rare encore. I was glad three songs from the Basement Tapes were featured, believing it to represent some of Dylan's best writing, even though I think this is a world less and less able to appreciate or "get" the material of that period, as is borne out in the comments I encounter.

A fine sounding recording of Dylan's 10/19/26 Goteborg show is also already available (and was remastered by the day after). "Girl from the North Country" makes an appearance. It was The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan that hooked me. The ideas, the writing, the depth, the humor, the push-and-pull of hurt, longing, cutting up to stay sane and facilitate wellness, and wry wisdom. "North Country" sounds like the saddest song ever, but also one attesting to the transformative power of true acceptance.

I know there’s a show to do, but of all the people to mess with in North Fork, why would you pick Lucas McCain? Consider the guy’s nickname! More seriously: The Rifleman works so well—to me it’s the best TV Western—because it’s about a father parenting his son. And it had people like Joseph H. Lewis (Gun Crazy) working on it.

Spooky season radio recommendation: the program Creeps by Night, which only lasted from February to May of 1944. Most classic radio enthusiasts don't know it. The show was initially hosted by and starred Boris Karloff in his first full-time radio role. He became a titan of horror radio the same as horror cinema.

Did a quick edit today; editor wasn't sure people would know who Sam Wainwright was.

1960’s Village of the Damned. These kids suck. Smart, though. Writing about it for my horror film book. Stars the always excellent and debonair George Sanders who took his own life in 1972, calling the world a cesspool in his suicide note. He’d love it now.