I've got no defence

FORTY YEARS? Heavens...

From Out magazine:

Blondie formed on New York City’s Lower East Side in 1974, a foursome led by Harry and her boyfriend, guitarist Chris Stein, after Harry did time as a secretary and Playboy Bunny.

Their first album, Blondie, was a brilliant straddle of pop and parody, a tough, ironic update of ’60s girl groups, featuring Harry singing from the perspective of a street hooker trying to seduce the cop who busted her (on X Offender), telling a lover “I could give you some head / And shoulders to lie on” (on Look Good in Blue), and celebrating Kung Fu and monster movies. It all was arch, uncommonly smart, and incredibly catchy.

The band was aware that they had a significant gay audience “from the very beginning,” says Harry proudly, recalling how they played one of the early Gay Pride events in New York City.

Indeed, one particular budding queen languishing in out-of-the-way Wales first encountered Miss Harry on the sadly-missed The Old Grey Whistle Test thirty-six years ago - and fell truly, madly, deeply in love with her style and sassiness! I have adored her, and the band, ever since.

And, from that very same ground-breaking 1978 TV appearance, here's Debs and the boys with one of my all-time fave songs from their catalogue:

Blondie - I Am Always Touched By Your Presence Dear (The Old Grey Whistle Test)

Was it destiny?
I don't know yet
Was it just by chance? Could this be Kismet?
Something in my consciousness told me you'd appear
Now I'm always touched by your presence dear

When we play at cards you use an extra sense (it's really not cheating)
You can read my hand, I've got no defence
When you sent your messages whispered loud and clear
I am always touched by your presence dear

Floating past the evidence of possibilities
We could navigate together, psychic frequencies
Coming into contact with outer entities
We could entertain each one with our theosophies

Stay awake at night and count your R.E.M.'s
When you're talking with your super friends
Levitating lovers in the secret stratosphere
I am still in touch with your presence dear
I am still in touch with your presence dear
I am still in touch with your presence dear, dear, dear, dear, dear

To celebrate Blondie's 40th anniversary, BBC Radio 2 will broadcast a documentary dedicated to the band tonight at 10pm - and I shall be listening!

Blondie is releasing a special 40th anniversary album featuring a new collection of songs entitled Ghosts of Download and an album entitled Deluxe Redux: Greatest Hits, featuring brand new studio recordings of the band’s biggest songs. Read more on the Blondie official website.

Fierce rulin' Diva

It's Bea Arthur's birthday!

Say "cheers", or she will kill you.

Here is the magnificent lady herself, belting the hell out of Hard Hearted Hannah - go, girl!

Bea Arthur - Hard-Hearted Hannah

“No one knew what a sense of humour - real sense of humour - Bea Arthur had. They always think of her as very fierce and austere and she did give that image. She could be tough, she could be really tough, but she had a funny sense of humour and she could tell a joke like nobody else.” - Betty White

Beatrice "Bea" Arthur (13th May 1922 – 25th April 2009)

Mitzi's Wild!

After a fabulous party this weekend for Eurovision, and a well-needed day of recovery, it's all over and back to reality...

However, we can always rely upon the boundless energy of Miss Mitzi Gaynor to lift our spirits on a Tacky Music Monday.

Here she is in her inimitable tribute to the 1920s - she's Running Wild!



Have a good week...

Seeking rather than vengeance, retribution

For once, I am not shouting "we wuz robbed" after the results of the Eurovision Song Contest last night.

Unlike previous years, our gang had made very little connection with the UK's entrant Molly Smitten-Downes or her forgettable "anthem" Children of the Universe. In truth she, and it, had little charisma, and instead - unanimously - all twelve of us were rooting for the lovely Conchita Wurst and her sub-James-Bond-theme Rise Like A Phoenix.

And our girl won it! The cheering here at Dolores Delargo Towers was deafening, needless to say.



Every year we always do the full shebang - dressing up (Hils was our own "bearded lady"; Sally was our Agnetha), booze and food from countries across Eurovisionland, and fill in our scorecards (in between excessive bouts of drinking, of course).



And here are the Top 5 from our jury:

Austria
Greece
Germany
Italy
United Kingdom

Compared to the real final five:

Austria
Netherlands
Sweden
Armenia
Hungary

There were some real differences (apart from Conchita). Nobody liked the Dutch one (a direct rip-off of Every Step You Take by The Police); The Swedish entry was OK, but just not good enough for us; Armenia was a Celine Dion song in the making (and no-one likes her!); and everyone absolutely despised the Hungarian child-abuse song.

There were, inevitably, a clutch of bizarre and bewildering songs and performances (it just wouldn't be Eurovsion without them!), including the French song about growing a moustache (which came last), a man on a hamster wheel, a trapeze artist, some hunky boys on a trampoline and (from Poland) several large-breasted young "ladies" jiggling over milk churns - in an effort to detract attention from the execrable mess of a song, no doubt. Russia was booed at every opportunity (which was unfortunate for the plucky 17-year-old twins who had to represent that benighted regime); Graham Norton made bitchy comments (on San Marino: "The population is 31,000. Obviously they've clubbed together to buy her a pair of ruche curtains"); Belarus gave douze points to Russia, Moldova gave twelve to Romania, and Georgia twelve to Armenia. Business as usual...



As all such events at ours inevitably do, the melée went on - messily - into the wee small hours. I finally bagged and binned all the empty bottles, abandoned glasses and munched morsels and got to bed at 4.30am, not rising again (like a phoenix) till 2 this afternoon(!).



It was a marvellous party, indeed.

And here's our Conchita!

Conchita Wurst - Rise Like A Phoenix

Waking in the rubble
Walking over glass
Neighbours say we’re trouble
Well that time has passed

Peering from the mirror
No, that isn’t me
Stranger getting nearer
Who can this person be

You wouldn’t know me at all today
From the fading light I fly

Rise like a phoenix
Out of the ashes
Seeking rather than vengeance
Retribution
You were warned
Once I’m transformed
Once I’m reborn
You know I will rise like a phoenix
But you’re my flame

Go about your business
Act as if you’re free
No one could have witnessed
What you did to me

Cause you wouldn’t know me today
And you have got to see
To believe
From the fading light I fly

Rise like a phoenix
Out of the ashes
Seeking rather than vengeance
Retribution
You were warned
Once I’m transformed
Once I’m reborn

I rise up to the sky
You threw me down but
I’m gonna fly

And rise like a phoenix
Out of the ashes
Seeking rather than vengeance
Retribution
You were warned
Once I’m transformed
Once I’m reborn
You know I will rise like a phoenix
But you’re my flame

Post-Eurovison analysis sarcasm courtesy of Euan Ferguson in The Guardian.

She's got her lipstick on; here I come, da da dum

I have been preparing for the grand Dolores Delargo Towers Eurovision Party since first thing this morning (well, it was early for me anyway!). I am knackered, but the place looks fab, and very brightly coloured indeed (flags everywhere!).

Time for a sit down, a glass of cider, a fag... and JEDWARD!!!

Jedward - Lipstick

More than you ever need to know about this song is on Wikipedia.

Step four: Larger than life is just the right size*

Once again - even with Monday's Bank Holiday - this week has dragged. But we're almost there. Salvation is just around the corner...

It's the eve of the "Gay World Cup" aka the Eurovision Song Contest (yay!), and this evening I will be transforming Dolores Delargo Towers (a la To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar) into even more of a glitter-and-tinsel extravaganza than usual - in preparation for the Party Of The Year tomorrow night.

[We will, of course - cough, cough! - be cheering for the UK entry Molly and her - ahem - fabulous Children of the Universe, and not, of course, for Conchita Wurst. At all.]

To mark the start of the celebrations, here's the unsuccessful attempt to get nominated (at Melodifestivalen 2014) for this year's Swedish entry (typically, a cod-"power-ballad" was chosen instead) by the camp-tastic Alcazar:

Alcazar - Blame it on the Disco

Thank Disco It's Friday!

Have a particularly sparkly weekend, dears...

[* If you didn't get the reference - and if not, shame on you - it's a quote from the aforementioned "To Wong Foo".]

Espionage never looked so cool

House fave film "Another Country", a fictional account of the life of the young Guy Burgess

With Alan Bennett in the news (on the eve of his 80th birthday - more about that later, no doubt), reportedly getting right up the noses of Mein Kampf (aka the Daily Mail) again with his comments about the 60s Guy Burgess-Kim Philby-Donald Maclean spy scandal, I think it's time for an appropriately-themed musical interlude.

From the utterly groovy Soft Tempo Lounge, here's "Our Man in London"...

Soft Tempo Lounge - Our Man in London

Music: One Note Samba (Samba De Uma Nota So) by The Brass Choir Conducted By Warren Kime