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Rita Moreno Visited My Alma Mater!!
First off, actress Rita Moreno is a National Treasure.
She is still going strong at 92 years of age.
She has won an Oscar, a Tony, two Emmy awards, a Grammy, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the National Medal of Arts, and was the first Latina woman to win the Kennedy Center Honors. That’s just some of her awards.
And of course the body of work she has done over the years: movies such as Singin’ In The Rain, The King And I, West Side Story (original and remake), Television shows such as The Electric Company, Oz, One Day at A Time, and tons of others, and in stage plays of Guys And Dolls, The Odd Couple, and so much more.
Trust me, you should go look at her list of credits. It’s amazing.
Now why am I saying all of this besides just being a fan? She came to my Alma Mater, which is Ohio University Southern Campus in Ironton, OH (which Rita called “My little “Puerto Rico”!) to speak and to raise some money for camp kids.
Her manager, who is also a member of the Rotary Club of Ironton who was one of the sponsors of this event, emceed this once in a lifetime opportunity to see and hear who I am once again calling a National Treasure.
Miss Moreno talked about growing up in Puerto Rico, then moving to New York as a very young child, getting into dancing, being discovered by a talent agent at MGM, meeting Louis B. Mayer (the founder and head of MGM), and getting a contract with them.
She talked about some of her many projects she has done, including West Side Story, The Electric Company, and even Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, in which she took her family with her to be on that show. Great stories there.
She talked about working with Mr. Norman Lear on his remake of the series One Day at a Time for four seasons and how the two of them once played a joke about her having Mr. Lear’s “love child” (Mr. Lear’s idea). Very funny story.
She talked about being present in Washington, D.C. to see Dr. Martin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream” speech and how she said that was not initially going to be his speech. Great story there too.
She talked about her great mother, and about how she had some very funny ways of saying things (calling beaches “bitches”, sheets “shits” are just two examples). Very funny.
She also talked about some of her bad times in life, and how you just need to hang on and hang in there when times are bad. She also said Psychotherapy helped her a lot too.
Those are just some of the things she talked about.
And she also sang a little bit too. She sang about dreaming and it was very heartfelt and meaningful.
Rita Moreno may be a huge star, and she definitely is, but after seeing and hearing her in person, I can say she is definitely human and a great one at that.
Thank you so much Miss Moreno for gracing us in Ironton, OH with your presence, humor, and realness.
And as I’m typing this, it’s the day before the oldest Memorial Day Parade anywhere, and I heard you say you were going to be there too. I hope that even if it rains (it almost always rains during this parade) that you still have a great time and enjoy it.
And please feel free to visit Ironton, OH again someday. You are always welcome.
All the best to you always.
Thank you.
Oh and since you said you love to play Scrabble, I welcome you to come and play Scrabble with my family anytime because they play it for hours on certain occasions.
Again, thank you Miss Moreno.
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Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes Movie Review
I’ve been a fan of the Planet of the Apes franchise since I was a teenager.
I’ve loved all of them. Even the one Tim Burton made I eventually liked.
So I was really looking forward to seeing the latest one, Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes.
It occurs generations after the last trilogy of movies, but still has all the ingredients of a Planet of the Apes story.
I’m not going to spoil anything here, but I will say that if you are a fan, I cannot imagine you not loving this movie.
I think it may be one of my favorites of the franchise. It is so well done. And the story is really good and the door has been left wide open for more. I’ve read that the hope is that this movie is the start of a new trilogy. We’ll see but I sure hope that is the case.
I love this movie.
In a word, it is Fantastic.
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Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga Movie Review
Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga is a prequel to Mad Max: Fury Road.
This movie shows the title character Furiosa’s (played in this movie by Anya-Taylor Joy) journey from being a kid being captured by a biker horde led by Dementus (Chris Hemsworth) to being taken in to the Citadel, led by Immortan Joe (Lachy Hulme), escaping from being raped by one of Joe’s sons, then posing a mute boy, working to build a “War Rig”, learning everything she can on how to fix things and fight, with the ultimate goal of gaining revenge on Dementus, who killed her Mom, and trying to find her way home.
If you love Fury Road and all the other Mad Max movies, but especially Fury Road, you should love this movie.
I sure did.
It’s a great movie.
Once again directed and co-written by George Miller, who has made all of the Mad Max movies.
It
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Diamond Head Lightning To The Nations Album Review
Wow I should have listened to this album a long time ago but am just now getting to it in 2024.
Diamond Head, a Heavy Metal band formed in the 1970s, released their first album, Lightning To The Nations, on October 3 of 1980, and wow what a debut album!!!
The band included Sean Harris on vocals, Brian Tatler on guitar, Colin Kimberley on bass, and Duncan Scott on drums.
With this album, I dare say, they influenced a lot of bands that came after them. Most notably Metallica, who have covered at least 4 songs from this album (from their Garage Inc. covers album).
After hearing this album, I can hear the influence and I think this album is one of the blueprints for a lot of Heavy Metal bands.
Diamond Head are definitely innovators.
If you are not familiar with this band, check out their music. Especially this album.
Diamond Head are still together, although guitarist Brian Tatler is the only original member still in the band.
While not working with Diamond Head, Brian is also playing guitar for Saxon, another hugely influential, innovative Heavy Metal band.
Check out Lightning To The Nations.
HOLY COW is it amazing.
I bought the deluxe edition, so it has a lot of bonus tracks. Even a bonus disc. Check it out!!!
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Kerry King From Hell I Rise Album Review
Five years since Slayer’s “Farewell Tour”, guitarist Kerry King has released his first album under his own name.
Called From Hell I Rise, released May 17 of 2024, is very much a continuation of what he did in Slayer, but with a different group of musicians.
Wow what a group Kerry has formed here. It includes singer Mark Osegueda (Death Angel), guitarist Phil Demmel (Vio-Lence, Machine Head), drummer Paul Bostaph (Slayer, Exodus, Forbidden), and bassist Kyle Sanders (Hellyeah, Nothingface).
Kerry wrote all the songs and plays all of the rhythm guitar parts (like he mostly did in Slayer), and a lot of the lead guitar, but Phil does play quite a bit of lead guitar too.
If you are a Slayer fan, you should love this album.
It’s not a complete copy of it, but it’s close enough. And I’m fine with that because I love Slayer and I love this album.
Every song is a banger, as they say.
Mark is singing/screaming as great as he ever has, Kerry’s guitar parts are always amazing, and again, just the whole group Kerry has assembled just bring it.
I know Slayer is reuniting to do at least 3 festivals in 2024, and I’m fine with it if they do more than that, but I think Kerry has a great group here and I hope there is a lot more albums to come.
Rock on guys.
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Tom Selleck You Never Know: A Memoir Book Review
Tom Selleck has been one of my favorite actors since I was a kid.
He released his memoir called You Never Know: A Memoir on May 7 of 2024.
It is a great book.
It by no means covers everything that has happened in his life, but he focuses on certain parts of his life and career throughout the book.
He talks about trying to hang on to his basketball scholarship and deciding to take a theater class because he thought it would be an easy A.
Well, when he started taking the class, his instructor told him he could get him an agent. Tom being new at this said Oh-Kay. This agent ultimately got him some jobs but also got him an appointment with the then head of 20th Century Fox, in which he was sent to their studio system program.
Tom says in this book that his career was really an accident because he never had aspirations or dreams on being an actor. But through studying, hard work, and luck, and as he says throughout the book, laying down bricks, he became an actor and eventually a very successful one.
He talks a lot about his time starring in Magnum, PI (as he just calls it Magnum).
I love the whole book, but these parts of the book are especially a big deal for me because the show Magnum PI came along at a very tough time in my life growing up. I had moved to a new state, with all new people, and had to try and get used to that.
Magnum was the one of the few shows I watched at the time (two shows a day in reruns on two different stations) and I really clung to this show. I really needed it at the time and I will be forever grateful to Tom Selleck John Hillerman (RIP), Roger E. Mosely (RIP), Larry Manetti, Donald P. Bellisario, and everyone involved in Magnum PI. Thank you so much for all of your hard work and dedication to the 8 years that show was on the air.
Tom also talks about some of his movies, including The Sacketts and The Shadow Riders (two of my favorite movies ever), High Road To China and Lassiter (two really good movies he did while filming Magnum), Three Men and a Baby, and how he ALMOST became Indiana Jones for Raiders of the Lost Ark. Read the book to find out more.
Again, I love this book and Tom Selleck will forever be a hero to me.
I wish he would have talked about some of his other work too (Such as the movies Runaway, Her Alibi, Folks, An Innocent Man, and other. He touches on Blue Bloods some too but not a lot.) but I still love the book and I especially love all the Magnum stories.
And, thanks to Premiere Collectibles, where I purchased this book from, I was able to get a signed copy. Thank you so much for that. I’ve wanted his autograph for 30 years and now I have it.
Thank you so much.
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The Last Action Heroes: The Triumphs, Flops, and Feuds of Hollywood’s Kings of Carnage by Nick De Semlyen Book Review
The Last Action Heroes: The Triumphs, Flops, and Feuds of Hollywood’s Kings of Carnage is a great book about movie action heroes of the 70s, 80s and 90s.
Released in 2023, Nick De Semlyen has written a very good book about a few of the biggest action heroes of all time.
The action heroes included in this book are Sylvester Stallone, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Chuck Norris, Jackie Chan, Dolph Lundgren, Jean Claude Van Damme, Steven Seagal, and Bruce Willis.
Each star has some of their history chronicled throughout the book, and some even overlap because some of them worked together at certain points in time.
Lots of great stories here.
If you are a fan of these stars, like I am, then I highly recommend this book.
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Randy Bachman’s Vinyl Tap Stories Book Review
Singer/songwriter/guitarist Randy Bachman has released three books.
Randy Bachman’s Vinyl Tap Stories is one of them.
This was released in 2011 and chronicles some of Randy’s stories of working with The Guess Who, Bachman-Turner Overdrive (BTO for short), and working with several other musicians and just life stories.
All of these stories and more he has told on his successful radio show/podcast Vinyl Tap, which lasted from 2005 to 2023.
Randy has tons of fun music stories, and I highly recommend reading this book.
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The Best of British Hard Rock and Metal: Uriah Heep and Saxon Live in Cincinnati!!
- Date of Concert: Friday, May 17 of 2024
- Location of Concert: Bogart's in Cincinnati, OH
Wow what a show!!!!
Uriah Heep and Saxon in concert!!!!!!
Two legendary bands that are both still making great albums.
Both bands are on a co-headline tour and have been flip-flopping each night, in terms of opening and closing the shows.
This night, Uriah Heep started the show.
Guitarist Mick Box, the last surviving original member of the band, has carried this band on since the late 1960’s and they are still going strong.
Rounding out the band is singer Bernie Shaw, who has been in the band since 1986. Amazing vocalist. On bass is Dave Rimmer, who has been there over 10 years. The drummer is Russell Gilbrook, who has been in the band since 2007. His birthday was celebrated at this show! And for this tour, the keyboardist is Adam Wakeman, who is filling in for Phil Lanzon (keyboardist since 1986).
This band is AMAZING!!!!!
Still putting out great albums (their latest two Chaos & Colour and Living The Dream are incredible) and are great live.
I’ve been wanting to see Uriah Heep for some time, but just did not have the chance or missed them. Not this time. I’m so glad I finally saw them.
Uriah Heep are just as important a British band as Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple, etc. They came out about the same time and even though they’ve had several lineup changes (sadly all the classic original members except Mick Box are dead) but this lineup is amazing. And their discography is amazing.
And like I said before, guitarist Mick Box is the last original member and has never left the band. He is a phenomenal guitarist and should be spoken in the same breath as Jimmy Page, Tony Iommi, Ritchie Blackmore, Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, etc.
Please check out Uriah Heep!!!! You will not be disappointed.
Saxon closed the show this night and this was my 3rd time seeing them.
They are always amazing.
Like Uriah Heep, they are still making amazing albums and like Uriah Heep, have a lot of albums.
Singer Biff Byford is one of my favorite singers and he has always been great.
And along with Biff, guitarists Doug Scarrett and Brian Tatler (Brian recently replacing Paul Quinn because he did not want to tour anymore), bassist Nibbs Carter, and drummer Nigel Glockler make up one of the best Metal bands around.
They’ve been a band since the mid 1970’s and like Uriah Heep have had lineup changes (Biff is the only one that has been there from the start), but even with those changes, Saxon have remained consistently great.
And they’re nice people too. Biff noticed a little girl in the front row with her Dad and asked how old she was, and she said 9. She had a sign too that said that this was her first Saxon concert and to please sign the sign otherwise Hell, Fire, and Damnation (the title track to their new album) would reign on them. Biff said they would sign it at the end of the show and they did. Very kind of them.
I can’t say enough about both of these bands. It’s after 3 AM as I type this, so I’m a little tired, so I’ll end this by saying that I love both of these bands and I appreciate them both for still making great music and doing great shows.
Thank you guys. Keep on rocking!!!!!! And as Mick Box says “Appy Days”.
Uriah Heep Set List:
- Save Me Tonight
- Grazed By Heaven
- Rainbow Demon
- Stealin’
- Hurricane
- Sweet Lorraine
- Hail The Sunrise
- Free ‘N’ Easy
- Gypsy
- Look At Yourself
- July Morning
- Encore: Sunrise
- Easy Livin’
Saxon Set List:
- Hell, Fire & Damnation
- Motorcycle Man
- Sacrifice
- This Town Rocks
- Power and the Glory
- There’s Something In Roswell
- Heavy Metal Thunder
- Madame Guillotine
- Dallas 1 PM
- Strong Arm of the Law
- 1066
- Crusader
- Ride Like The Wind (Christopher Cross cover)
- 747 (Strangers In The Night)
- Denim and Leather
- Wheels of Steel
- Princess of the Night
Photo Gallery (click on thumbnail to view larger image)
Video Gallery (click on thumbnail to play video)
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Ian Hunter Defiance Part 2 Fiction Album Review
The great Ian Hunter, singer of Mott The Hoople, has released another great solo album called Defiance Part 2 Fiction (Defiance Part 1 is great too.). This was released on April 19 of 2024.
Like Defiance Part 1, Ian assembled a lot of great talent to help make this album.
Including Jeff Beck (RIP), Johnny Depp (who painted the album cover), Joe Elliott, most of Stone Temple Pilots, Cheap Trick, and others.
This album is great. Not a bad song on it.
Highly recommend checking it and Defiance Part 1 out.
Keep it up Ian!!
