R.I.P., Captain Lou

We lost one of the greats yesterday, Captain Lou Albano.

If you followed wrestling in the 1970s or 80s, you'll remember his outrageous ringside antics. "The Guiding Light' managed no less than 15 WWF tag team champions including The Valiant Bros. ("Handsome" Jimmy and "Luscious" John), the Moondogs (Spot and Rex) and the Wild Samoans (Afa and Seka). He also managed Jimmy "Superfly" Snuka and George "The Animal" Steele among many others.

He may be best know for playing Cyndi Lauper's father in the video for Girls Just Want to Have Fun.

These were among his more famous insults:
"If you put his brain inside a parakeet it would fly backwards!"
"He's often constipated, rarely imitated."

In retrospect, Albano and his contemporary wrestling managers The Grand Wizard of Wrestling and "Classy" Freddie Blassie were performance artists by another name. This was something Andy Kaufman picked up on as he enjoyed antagonizing audiences in the mid-South back in the early '80s. The Captain could make you laugh more than 100 comedians.

Thanks for the laughs, Captain Lou.

Here's NRBQ's tribute to Albano featuring the vocal stylings of the man himself:

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Michael Jackson's New Song is an Old Song

Paul Anka has been award 50 of the publishing of the just-released Michael Jackson song, the much hyped "This Is It." It seems Anka was working with Michael back in 1983 but this song never saw the light of day until Safire recorded it in 1991 under the title "I Never Heard."

Read the full story here.

This is probably a case of lack of competance among the folks trolling thru Michael's archive unreleased material. It reminds me of the time one of Paul McCartney's PR people announced prior to the release of the Yellow Submarine Songtrack that an unreleased Fabs track had been unearthed - "a real rocker." Turns out he was referring to "Hey Bulldog," a song that had been on the original album released over thirty years earlier!

Here's the You Tube mash-up of "This Is It" and "I Never Heard":

Time for a 'Soundcheck'

I will be appearing on WNYC's always excellent excellent Soundcheck with John Schaefer on Monday 10/5 at 2 pm EDT. We'll be discussing recent cases of musical plagiarism and some technological advances that might help combat it. You can listen live or check out their amazing show archive (which includes everyone from Thurston Moore to Judy Collins) here:

http://www.wnyc.org/shows/soundcheck