Purchase Paul Anka's A Steel Guitar and a Glass of Wine
Back when I was in college, early to late 90s (I stuck
around to take a few extra classes) there was a neo/retro-lounge music craze
that kicked off. For me, the whole soft bubble keys and castanets movement
started with Esquivel. Juan Garcia Esquivel was a Mexican bandleader, and his Esquivel! or Space-Age Bachelor Pad, re-released along with a lot of other
music on Bar None, was the height of easy listening. Space age pop, exotica,
lounge: it all meant the same thing.
The music goons and college DJs and bar band bums that made
up my crew got into it, thought that sleazy lounge nostalgia pop made us
sophisticates. We bought a bartender's book and learned how to mix fancy
drinks. We hit up the Goodwill and bought the snazziest polyester duds we could
and threw Lounge Lizard parties. Our first one was a smashing success. Some
tools tried playing 80s music, nostalgia for the ‘80s becoming a real fad
itself about that time. But, we insisted: lounge or nothing.
From there on it was Sinatra, Sammy Davis, Herb Alpert, Combustible Edison, Dezi Arnez, The Squirrel Nut Zippers, Southern Culture on the Skids, the very Reverend Horton Heat, Les Baxter, Elvis movie soundtracks, Ennio Morricone, Stereolab, Paul Anka, Canada’s crown prince of the languid orchestral swing. Understand, we were making our own definition of lounge. It didn’t matter if we were throwing in Big Band, Rockabilly, or Barry Manilow: sweet and easy listening meant being silly chic and suave in a way that let us push the furniture against the wall, put on our dancing socks and glide sliverswift across the floor with the few girls we had convinced to come to our one of a kind Odd Ball.
It didn’t matter that we were mixing in multiple genres—Tarantino was making great soundtracks with AM radio gems that would never have been any one single radio programmer’s play list. And we took our inspiration from him and the record bins at the local CD shops (Vinyl was making a big comeback as as fad about this time, too). We made up our own playlists and bought even better records at those same thrift stores. We were chasing a kooked up, weirded-out vibe, where sound was blatantly old, odd, but fun, without any pretension, full spectrum color that came from a time we didn’t really know, but wish we had.
From there on it was Sinatra, Sammy Davis, Herb Alpert, Combustible Edison, Dezi Arnez, The Squirrel Nut Zippers, Southern Culture on the Skids, the very Reverend Horton Heat, Les Baxter, Elvis movie soundtracks, Ennio Morricone, Stereolab, Paul Anka, Canada’s crown prince of the languid orchestral swing. Understand, we were making our own definition of lounge. It didn’t matter if we were throwing in Big Band, Rockabilly, or Barry Manilow: sweet and easy listening meant being silly chic and suave in a way that let us push the furniture against the wall, put on our dancing socks and glide sliverswift across the floor with the few girls we had convinced to come to our one of a kind Odd Ball.
It didn’t matter that we were mixing in multiple genres—Tarantino was making great soundtracks with AM radio gems that would never have been any one single radio programmer’s play list. And we took our inspiration from him and the record bins at the local CD shops (Vinyl was making a big comeback as as fad about this time, too). We made up our own playlists and bought even better records at those same thrift stores. We were chasing a kooked up, weirded-out vibe, where sound was blatantly old, odd, but fun, without any pretension, full spectrum color that came from a time we didn’t really know, but wish we had.
This was the early ‘90s, right? I said that? Nirvana was
magic, but the spell hadn’t quite taken full effect. So flannel and Doc Martens
hadn’t taken up so much room that those natty, mis-matched suits bought at the thrift store were out of our wardrobes quite yet. Eventually, those two sartorial elements would merge
together, and velvet jackets, ratty, off-labeled t’s and thick soled suede
wingtips would all somehow look good together. That, a superior hair.
I miss dressing like that. I also miss those parties, where our
social existence was an un-ironic Halloween bash every weekend, while we swilled
well-vodka martinis and cruised, strutted and cut a rug like we were some variation
of George Lazenby James Bonds, full of the kind of exuberant camp, quirk and
whimsical bliss that space-age pop music, with all those Batman and Robin zings
and zangs and zooms and booma boom booms sound effect graphics, brought to glorious,
techni-color life.
So, Paul Anka—I dubbed
him the crown prince of Lounge, with a capital “L”. Today, I ask you to pull
out your snazziest duds, get dolled up and hit the dance floor with your very
best gal, and ring a ding ding to the glorious sound of “A Steel Guitar and a Glass of Wine.” Dig it and dance on, space traveler...
