Where did all this start? I guess I was watching Entertainment Tonight, which is my religion by the way, and an item came on about The Cowsills. Jesus, God, the Cowsills, who had all those wholesome hits way back, like Indian Lake, the Flower Girl one, and this (which I used to call "hey you on the ground!" after my favorite line in it). The Cowsills were the '60s in many ways, bubblegum pop that somehow made you feel better about being alive, that made you want to go to Fred Collins Park and hang out with your friends, except they weren't really your friends but your brother's friends, your cool stoned brother with all the girl friends who didn't want to talk to you and you were fat anyway and and. But back to the Cowsills.
According to ET, there's a documentary out (somewhere: not here, for sure, and it has about 67 release dates) called Family Band: The Cowsills Story, and I waaaaaaaaant to see it so badly now, I ache for it, I'm not kidding, because any documentary about a '60s band makes me roll on the floor with delight. This one, though - I don't know why this is, that misery must so doggedly, howlingly follow in the wake of success. The Cowsills, that wholesome family of seven talented kids upon whom the even-more-bubble-gummy Partridge Family was based, suffered the same kind of misery and humiliation at the hands of their father as the Jacksons. And I just now found out about Whitney Houston - my God, Whitney Houston, another one gone, and why? Where does all this wretchedness come from?
So this bubbly bright music, the kookiness of Indian Lake and that I Love the Flower Girl one, came out of fear and anguish and - What is it about show biz? Everyone seems to want to be famous, it's seen as the Ultimate for some reason, and American Idol has made it even worse. But those who get there often go insane or drown in alcohol (Amy Winehouse) or kill themselves in some other way while the rest of the world gapes at them in horrified amusement.
I want to see the Cowsills story because I'm shallow, besides being enthralled by all that sort of thing. I want to watch while all that appalling stuff happens to someone else. Apparently the band, what's left of them, still performs, and I always find it kind of embarrassing when that happens, ancient hippies with beer bellies and grey-haired women strumming on guitars and singing, usually off-key, while an elderly audience cheers madly.
Anyway, I'm geez-tired and whipped after getting involved in a sort of controversy over a local dead celebrity, and I guess I shot my mouth off about him and later thought, hm, he's not even around to whip a CD at me and cut my throat, so I better lay off. So. . .sorry, Lloyd. And, good night.
http://members.shaw.ca/margaret_gunning/betterthanlife.htm
