It's All About The Hairdo

Talent? Overrated in my opinion. It's on every street corner. Looking for your fifteen minutes that Andy promised you? Create a look that changes everything and build it around an outrageous hairdo that no one can ignore. This is Esquerita. He was wildly talented. His hairdo caught the eye of Richard Penniman who was going by the moniker, Little Richard. Oh yeah, he was wildly talented, too. When I first read Esquerita's claims that Richard had borrowed the look I was appalled. Then I heard Mr. Penniman gushing about Esquerita and saying that he had borrowed the idea of the look from him.

Next thing you know little Bobby Zimmerman from Hibbing, Minnesota has become Bob Dylan. He had always wanted to be Little Richard. Well, up until he decided that he wanted to be Woody Guthrie. By the release of Highway 61 Revisited there was the hairdo again. This time he hit it out of the park and he was famous. No, he was a legend.

You see, originality is not the key here. We all saw Moe Howard's pudding basin coiffure long before we saw newsreel footage of the Beatles on Jack Paar. No, it has more to do with attitude and putting that look out there.

I don't need to provide any kind of complete list to make my point here. For me and lots of others rock'n'roll got a kickstart from Bill Haley. Rock Around the Clock was magic but that spit curl was other worldly. Of course Elvis threatened all western civilization with sideburns and a ducktail. 

Is this sexist? Marilyn was the blonde, right? Jayne just went blonder. It's all across the board, all over the map, all through history. Einstein, Gorgeous George, Angela Davis, Yul Brynner, Jerry Lewis, Jesus.

Yeah, my showbiz advice: get a ruthless agent. First, though: get your hairdo right.

Give us peace on earth and end this dreadful, dreadful war.

Good Guys

Hey! If the better translation of Jesus' claim is really, "I am a son of God," then he was pretty much talking the company line that the Buddha had laid down much earlier. Nothing in the bible says that he was married. Nothing says that he wasn't. He hung around with Mary Magdalene and he may have married her. Turns out that there is no evidence that she was a working girl. That was a different Mary. Popular name.

We do know that he didn't much care for the bankers of the day. He didn't think much of the rich folks who didn't take care of the poor, either. If any of the narrative attributed to him is close to accurate, then we might expect that if he showed up today that we might catch a glimpse on a local newscast of him sharing loaves and wine at a peaceful Occupy event. I truly doubt that he would have any interest in politics but I am sure that he would not approve of our infant mortality rate in this country or the profits made from war.

Be nice and help others, especially the ones who can't take proper care of themselves. It's not rocket science.

Woody Guthrie recognized the link between the historic Jesus and the social movements of his day. Things haven't changed much. Maybe they have and they've changed back. This was at the Woody Guthrie Festival in Okemah, Oklahoma, four or five years back. Let's change it again. Let's fix it.

Merry Christmas

I believe it all. Beautiful story, this Prince Of Peace fellow. I guess the literal translation is "I am a son of God." This is for the ones who need it and I suppose that's all of us.