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A big thanks to Bryan Alvarez for having me on his September 9 edition Figure-4 Radio Podcast, I had an absolute blast doing the show. Another huge thanks to those who e-mailed me and/or added me onto their Facebook Friends list. Apologies to those of you I haven’t yet answered, I’m going to try and write back everybody by tomorrow!

Several of you asked about DVD availability of subjects we chatted about on the show. Here’s the direction I can point you to as of this time:

You can find the most recent Incredibly Strange Wrestling Shows on Slambamjam.com. The most recent of these can be found on that site under the name Johnny Legend’s Rock ‘n’ Roll Wrestling (Audra Morse, who used to co-promote the shows with Johnny, trademarked Incredibly Strange Wrestling, therefore Johnny had to rename the project). I hope to get copies of the shows we did in the mid 1990s, and will keep you posted on these.

Ebay is the best source for Titanes En El Ring items. Several different folks with Ebay shops have a healthy variety of TV shows from the early 1980s, and there is usually a source that has the Titanes En El Ring 1973 movie (I personally recommend that one above the others!). One of the Ebay sources is currently selling the newly released CD of the 1972 Titanes En El Ring record (I believe this is a legit commercial release!). Cool stuff!

If you are fan of historical Lucha Libre, I highly recommend you visit Ebay, as there is currently a vendor selling DVDs of the greatest Wrestling/Lucha Libre movie of all time, La Ultima Lucha. Not only does this 1956 release star such greats as Cavernario Galindo, Wolf Ruvinskis, and Rito Romero, but the wrestling scenes shot in the film are second to none.

And those of you who asked about the music video Jumping At Johnny’s Wake, it is featured in the 1967 film Mondo Hollywood, which is available on Amazon.com. Nothing pro wrestling oriented here, but a unique look at the wild & woolly characters who lurked the Southern California scene back in the 1960s, the folks who were beyond even the underground like Gypsy Boots, Ted Charach, Michelle Angelo, Dr. Richard Alpert, Margaretta Ramsey, Jennie Lee, Vito Paulekas, Bobby Jameson, S&H Greenstamp heir Lewis Beach Marvin III, and many others. Mondo Hollywood is easily on my “top five favorite” underground movie list.

Not with the lips of skin
Nor yet with the lips of dark snow
But let the white dove sing
Of the body of life
Of the lover whose love is complete
Hold hands out to greet
Ah let not the swan be brought low

For all that is moving is moved by her hands
She is mirrored for ever in the life of the lands
In the building of thoughts in the shifting sands

—Robin Williamson -The Incredible String Band
—Three Is A Green Crown

I hold my Johnny Legend and Something Weird Video DVD releases in a very special vault in my home (well, not really, but it sounds better than “special place in my heart”). Therefore, I gave myself a bit of a shock when I looked over Ray Dennis Steckler’s Internet Movie Database resume and found that I had yet to see any of his flicks. I mean, since 1995 I have been a feature performer on The Incredibly Strange Wrestling Shows, whose moniker is an homage to Steckler’s Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living And Became Mixed Up Zombies, so imagine my dismay when I found that I have neglected the works of Ray Dennis Steckler.

So I started with his 1966 film Rat Pfink A Boo-Boo. Promising enough title, with an equally promising premise. Lonnie Lord (played by Ray Haydock) is a super-cool rock star who, when evil enters his domain, morphs into Rat Pfink, a super hero who is every bit as dorky as Lonnie Lord is groovy! His sidekick is the equally dweeby Boo-Boo (played by B-Movie icon Titus Moede).

This film holds the stereotype of a well-polished black-&-white student film of its day. If it were a student film, and if it lasted only about twenty-five minutes, I would probably rate this as one of the strangest works of genius celluloid I have ever seen. Problem is, this film lasts one hour and ten minutes; not a lengthy time for a good film, but at Steckler’s pacing, Rat Pfink A Boo-Boo goes on forever.

Where do I start? Well…the film opens with three thugs stalking a woman leaving a nightclub. They stalk her, chase her, torment her, and rob her… and they take a very long time doing it, to the point you find yourself saying “Just take her money and move on to the next scene! I’ve got a movie to watch!” I will admit, though, it was a relief to see nothing more than a robbery here… no sexual assault (frequent rape scenes are one of the few gripes I have with many B-Movie flicks of the 1960s and 70s).

The majority of the film consists of that same group of thugs stalking and making obscene phone calls to Lord’s girlfriend Cee-Cee Beaumont (played by 1960s B-Movie hottie Carolyn Brandt, who is a dish of delightful eye candy). I mean, these scenes go on … and on. Seeing as how she’s rock star Lonnie Lord’s sweetheart, they kidnap her for a hefty ransom. Upon receiving ransom instructions, Lord and Cee-Cee’s trusty gardener Titis Twimbly morph into Rat Pfink and Boo-Boo, locate the thugs, and get into a fist-fight with the thugs. They fight… and they fight… and like the stalkings, the fights go on and on and on……..

Is this film strange? Yes! Is it good? No. If you are looking for some choice “bad cinema” you can sink your teeth into, do not start here! Rat Pfink A Boo-Boo falls far short of enjoyable, even when taking into consideration that it is a “B-Movie.”

I am by no means giving up on Ray Dennis Steckler’s work. The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living And Became Mixed-Up Zombies (that title alone should have won an award) is next on my list. Here’s hoping Steckler has some brilliantly B-Work on my TV, else I might have to find work in a wrestling promotion named after a Herschel Gordon Lewis or Robert Carl Cohen film.

I can’t find my copy of World War Z, goddamit! I was about a quarter way through this fantastic zombie plague novel written by Max Brooks (son of Mel Brooks and the late, great Anne Bancroft), and I’m so fucking frustrated! Well— what I have read is awesome, and am jazzed to have heard that Brad Pitt is producing a film version slated for a 2010 release.

So am I the only person out there who couldn’t sit through Ghostrider? I tried when I couldn’t doze off last night, but gave up on it halfway through.  I dug the fancy bells & whistles when Nicholas Cage went through the Ghostrider metamorphis, but the story itself came off tepid.

After giving up on the Cage’s grinning skull, I checked for South Park on my DVR list, and watched the Awesome-O episode for the umpteenth time. Easily my favorite South Park work and easily my favorite episode involving Butters or Eric Cartman. What I love most about nearly all South Park episodes is Parker & Stone’s ability to make me belly laugh while I simultaneously try to stop laughing because I keep thinking “This is so wrong!”

One thing about being low on energy during this grudge match I’m having with Lymphoma: I’ve been getting a lot of reading a TV viewing in. I had the gusto to check out the Alternative Wrestling Show in City of Industry Saturday night, and it was a blast catching up with old friends Piloto Suicida and Los Chivos. I’ll write more about the show in greater detail soon.

Amongst the goodies I’ve been partaking in:

Zen Effects: The Life of Alan Watts by Monica Furlong : Great biography on Zen icon Alan Watts, very straightforward that while Watts possessed great expertise on the subject, he had a terrible self-destructive streak. I must say, he was brilliant enough a scholar to rationalize his self-destructive nature with the Zen precept of “letting go.” Watts may have been a man of extremes, but he did a great service of putting Zen into layman’s terms for the Western world.

Julien Clerc singing La Californie, circa the late 1960s. Drink this in, because it is truly one of the coolest things I have ever encountered on Youtube! The universe needs pop-induced Go-Go pastel-laden hallucinations like this more than ever!

I am also reading, for the second time, Kafka On The Shore by Haruki Murakami. If you’re craving some good fiction that mixes the concrete world with surrealism, this is a great book to nest in for awhile.

Sylvia Miles and Joe Dallesandro

“People would adore Mick Jagger -both male and female- for a look or an attitude, and that’s what I liked about the period I grew up in: that a man could say he liked both, that he appreciated both the look of a man and the look of a woman without being stereotyped.”

- Joe Dallesandro (Coolest cat of all the Andy Warhol icons)

ALL IN THIS TEA: An awesome 2007 documentary on tea curator and entrepeneur David Lee Hoffman. Hoffman is a great advocate for the individual tea farmers in China, and has made bringing worldwide awareness to their farm grown and hand (and foot) treated tea leaves both his living and passion. He vehemently opposes factory processed green tea, and this film does a good job sending his message: that individually processed tea is remarkably fresher than mass tea production. Hoffman also illustrates the importance of using earthworms to cultivate good soil. After seeing this, you’ll be leaving flowers and burning incense for our wiggly ‘lil friends! Click on Silk Road Teas to visit the company Hoffman founded.

GANGS OF THE DEAD: Caught part of this 2006 flick on The Movie Channel a few hours ago, and I plan to watch it in its entirety soon! Zombies attack the hood in Los Angeles, and the interesting combination of rival gangs, cops, and a stray TV weatherman (yes, that’s correct) all wind up holed up in an abandoned warehouse. Now— most zombie flicks build some tension between the protagonists, but this movie sticks out because while the rival gangs and cops try to work with each other to fend off the flesh-chewers, they still hate each other enough where they are more dangerous to each other than the zombies trying to gnaw on them. There is one really rad jaw-dislocating scene, fairly vile. Cool apocolytpic overtones too! Not in my top five zombie flick picks, but it kept me hooked! Might make my top 10 or 15!

SMARTIES: Not a movie, I’m talking about the candy. Those sour little pill-like sweets that are a perennial favorite at Halloween! I made the mistake of buying a bag. Sweeeet and not too-too healthy! Yummy though!