life is short

life is short filled with stuff don't know what for ain't had enough — the cramps, "new kind of kick" (1981)

when i first heard that verse, i thought they were among the best lines ever written, without qualification. twenty-eight years later, i still do.

the human experience in four lines. so deceptively simple. so compact. sheer haiku.

i'd be surprised if it took more than a minute to actually think up and i'd be doubly surprised if any of the cramps gave it half as much thought as i have.

i wonder if lux had any idea how truly awesome that little verse is.

lux interior, dead at 62.

born erick lee purkhiser, interior started the cramps in 1972 with guitarist poison ivy (born kristy wallace, later his wife) — whom, as legend has it, he picked up as a hitchhiker in california. by 1975, they had moved to new york, where they became an integral part of the burgeoning punk scene surrounding cbgbs. their music differed from most of the scene's other acts in that it was heavily steeped in camp, with interior's lyrics frequently drawing from schlocky b-movies, sexual kink and deceptively clever puns. (j.h. sasfy's liner notes to their debut ep memorably noted: "the cramps don't pummel and you won't pogo. they ooze; you'll throb.") sonically, the band drew from blues and rockabilly, and a key element of their sound was the trashy, dueling guitars of poison ivy and bryan gregory (and later kid congo powers), played with maximal scuzz and minimal drumming. because of that — not to mention interior's deranged, iggy pop-inspired onstage antics and deep, sexualized singing voice (which one reviewer described as "the psychosexual werewolf / elvis hybrid from hell") — the cramps are often cited as pioneers of "psychobilly" and "horror rock," and can count bands like the black lips, the jon spencer blues explosion, the reverend horton heat, the horrors and even the white stripes as their musical progeny. ... due to their imagery, obsession with kitsch and dogged dedication to touring — they wrapped up their latest jaunt across europe and the u.s. this past november — the cramps commanded a loyal fanbase, and even earned a spot in the rock and roll hall of fame, in the form of a shattered bass drum that interior had shoved his head through.

interior was widely rumored in 1987 to have died from a heroin overdose, and his wife received flowers and funeral wreaths. "at first i thought it was kind of funny," he told the los angeles times at the time. "but then it started to give me a creepy feeling."

aw, jeez ...

we all knew jim horne, certainly anyone in commercial design for the last half century, and most certainly anyone with an internet connection for at least the last five years, even if we never knew his name, which i learned for the first time today:

for about 15 years beginning in the late 1940s, mr. horne was ubiquitous, perhaps the most widely seen male model in the country, appearing in hundreds of advertisements in magazines and newspapers, on billboards and catalog covers, in television commercials and industrial brochures. he died on dec. 29 in manhattan, at 91. his wife of 45 years, francesca marlowe horne, said the cause was cancer, but added that he also had congestive heart failure.

i doubt many people knew he had been still alive.

mr. horne had been an actor with bit parts in hollywood movies before moving to new york city and establishing a second career. he had a chiseled jaw, a distinctively rounded hairline, a seemingly permanent pompadour, a gleaming california smile and an athlete's physique. it was an image that photographers and advertisers found easily adaptable to a number of stereotypes of the day: the dashing ladies' man, the dapper dandy, the devoted dad, the suburban husband, the businessman commuter, the country club sophisticate and the one mr. horne, an avid fisherman, preferred: the rugged outdoorsman. [snip] he learned the lesson of how evanescent celebrity could be without a famous name. few, if any, of his photographs still strike a familiar chord. well, maybe one does: a jokey shot taken in 1953 (whose rights he signed away), showing him with a sour, headachey expression of generic woe; it has been used dozens of times, even in the last decade, in ads for aspirin, tax services, hangover remedies and other stress relievers. his wife said it didn't bother him that this was the image that survived. "to him it was a job you did," mrs. horne said. "and then you went fishing."

it's nice to finally get a name to the face:

i'd say goodbye, but i have a feeling he'll still be with us for a good long time ...