Lesley Gore – California Nights

An evening pause: From a very amusing 1967 Batman television episode, with the evil arch villain Catwoman, played by Julie Newmar. Lesley Gore’s lip-syncing isn’t the best, but the overall silliness of the scene, as well and the entire show, makes it is worth watching. The song is nice too. Unfortunately, I can’t find the whole episode, but this search on youtube finds a host of scenes from that classic of campy 1960s television.

Hat tip Diane Zimmerman.

T Rex – Bang A Gong (Get It On)

An evening pause: The history of this band (which I hadn’t known until I began putting this post together) is very interesting, as it mirrors the overall cultural disaster of the 1960s. The finale is especially depressing:

Marc Bolan and his girlfriend Gloria Jones spent the evening of 15 September 1977 drinking at the Speakeasy and then dining at Morton’s club on Berkeley Square, in Mayfair, Central London. While driving home early in the morning of 16 September, Jones crashed Bolan’s purple Mini 1275GT into a tree (now the site of Bolan’s Rock Shrine), after failing to negotiate a small humpback bridge near Gipsy Lane on Queens Ride, Barnes, southwest London, a few miles from his home at 142 Upper Richmond Road West in East Sheen. While Jones was severely injured, Bolan was killed in the crash, two weeks before his 30th birthday.

Bolan’s death ended the band. Steve Peregrin Took died from asphyxiation from a cocktail cherry after his throat was numbed from his use of morphine and magic mushrooms in 1980, Steve Currie also died in a car crash, in 1981; Mickey Finn succumbed to illness in 2003. Peter ‘Dino’ Dines died of a heart attack in 2004.

Regardless, they created good music, for a short time.

Hat tip Jim Mallamace.

Simon & Garfunkel – The Sounds Of Silence

An evening pause: From a recent live performance. I’ve posted this song before, sung by others, but not surprisingly, the best version is still performed by the originals.

I also think of this verse today whenever I read of the insane craziness going on in the political world:

And in the naked light I saw
Ten thousand people, maybe more
People talking without speaking
People hearing without listening
People writing songs that voices never share
No one dared
Disturb the sound of silence

Hat tip Peter Fenstermacher.

Santo & Johnny – Sleep Walk

An evening pause: The song should immediately be familiar, though I doubt most people today will know of the performers who wrote it.

Hat tip Jim Mallamace, who writes, “This performance is from 1959, an era when performers wore ties to show respect to their audience. One must wonder how performers show respect to their audience, these days–or even if it’s an issue.”

The Muffs – Don’t Pick on Me

An evening pause: What makes this music video appealing is the cartoon, which recreates the style of Hollywood’s early 1930s black & white cartoons.

Hat tip Jim Mallamace.

As always, I welcome suggestions for Evening Pauses. If you think you have something and have not emailed me any suggestions previously, mention in a comment that you want to suggest something. Do not post the link to the video. I will contact you myself.

Beethoven – Turkish March

An evening pause: Arranged for 8 (!) pianos. From the youtube webpage:

2 successive performances of Ludwig van Beethoven’s Turkish March from “Die Ruinen von Athen”, arranged by Richard Blackford for 8 pianos. Played by Gina Bachauer, Jorge Bolet, Jeanne-Marie Darré, Alicia De Larrocha, John Lill, Radu Lupu, Garrick Ohlsson and Bálint Vázsonyi at a Gargantuan Pianistic Extravaganza in London, 1974.

Please note that the 2nd performance is NOT a shredding video – these great pianists were actually playing what you hear!

Hat tip Jim Mallamace.

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