27Apr 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Allee Willis Marches on Detroit! Part 9, The City By Car

27Apr 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Allee Willis Marches on Detroit! Part 9, The City By Car

Wednesday, April 6, had tremendous potential. (L-R) Mark Blackwell and Laura Grover, both of whom worked on putting the whole Detroit extravaganza together with me, and I were being driven around the city by Michael Poris, one of the architects leading the charge to rebuild Detroit. The Majestic Theater is one of his projects.

Here’s a detail of The Majestic’s majesty:

Unfortunately, the skies weeped steadily throughout the day, making decent photos next to impossible unless one was out to amplify the decay of the city, in which case the incessant downpour added just enough teardrops to slam that sentiment home. Most of my shots look like this:

Which is a shame, as to miss the details of a combo Church and car wash is a waste of excellent kitsch:

Just about the only clear shots I got was when I got out of the car,…

…or some of my car-mates did,…

…or when the rain wasn’t spitting into the car, with the window rolled down. Thankfully it stopped for a few minutes when I snapped these murals at the Eastern Market:

Sometimes the gloominess of the skies enhanced the experience of what we were looking at.

Perfect for a place that’s a Home For Funerals as opposed to merely a Funeral Home. Then again, it’s right next door to the happiest place on earth, Motown.

Growing up, I spent many a Saturday afternoon planted on this front lawn, trying to catch a bass note or background vocal seeping through the walls.

I make a pilgrimage to the front lawn every time I go home. In the early 1980s I even got into the actual recording studio when The Detroit Free Press did a story on me growing up in Detroit and how, as a songwriter, I was influenced by Motown.

But, alas, fate was not as kind this time. Had I stashed the three video cameras and four still cams away I could have marched through the studio again. But I had no interest, especially on this trip, in having any significant moment of my life pass by without being digitally preserved. So the closest I got was the hallway as no filming was allowed.

The woman at the desk was really nice. She knew who I was as soon as I walked in as she had seen me on the news the morning before. But rules are rules. Even though I’ve collaborated with some of Motown’s greatest songwriters, like Lamont Dozier…

… and Ashford & Simpson, seen here with me and Maurice White, founder and lead singer of Earth Wind & Fire, and LaChanze, the Tony-winning actress who played Celie in the musical I co-wrote, The Color Purple.

So we piled back in the car and were off to enjoy more of Detroit.

I would have enjoyed it more if the BBQ joint in front of that mural were still open:

Michael had been over to my place in LA about nine months earlier so I wasn’t worried about him showing us the usual tour suspects – The Detroit Institute Of Art, The Detroit Historical Society, The Spirit of Detroit, etc. All completely beautiful and historic but I wanted to see the spirit of the city as evidenced through how people express themselves via their homes, lawns and businesses. I’ve long believed that one’s immediate environment is a canvas for self expression. And places like this would be off the beaten track of any normal tour guide:

Talk about expressing yourself via your home…:

This is The Heidleberg Project, named for the street that artist Tyree Guyton took over 25 years ago and decorated houses, lawns and empty lots on two blocks of.  SPECTACULARLY INSPIRING:

 

One of the great promises of Detroit is that artists can live cheaply and express themselves in novel ways not possible in other cities. Like Ice House Detroit, a 2010 project where two photographers took over an abandoned house, hosed it down til it was an ice cave and then photographed it melting, symbolizing the building up and subsequent melting away of the once great Detroit.

Detroit is full of such self expression:

Artists see the future first – their way is to dream and paint that picture for everyone else. Reinvention and constantly shifting one’s perspective to stay inspired is as vital for places as it is for people. There’s a great effort in Detroit to redesign the city the artists’ way. In fact, one of my reasons for being there this particular week was to be the closing keynote speaker on that very subject at the Rust Belt To Arts Belt conference happening the next day.

But back to the streets… Rain-soaked as this photo is, I hope you can see the use of industrial materials on the facade of this otherwise traditional brick building. Up close it looks like a bunch of sawed-in-half hot water heaters. I love stuff like this.


There are so many beautiful abandoned buildings, waiting for artists to see their beauty and reinvent their once greatness.

And it’s not like artists can’t afford to live in Detroit.

Thankfully, someone bought the old Michigan Central train station. From what I understand, there are plans to renovate.

Forgotten by time, vandalized by squatters and ravers, its internal beauty still shines through.

It was getting late so we headed back as I had to go over my speech about the rejuvenation of Detroit I was giving the next day. I was pretty sure I had it down but wanted to make sure there were no crucial mistakes or  misspellings to trip me up. Sometimes even the most straight-ahead missives go awry. Like at this McDonalds, just a couple blocks from Vince’s, where we had dinner and which I’ll blog about tomorrow. I know they mean a 20 piece chicken McNugget dinner for $4.99 but if I’m to believe the sign it’s 20 P’s of cchcken uggets for four hundred ninety nine dollars.

Which makes it just slightly cheaper than some of the houses in Detroit. Calling all artists!!

26Apr 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Allee Willis Marches on Detroit! Part 8, Sights In Passing

26Apr 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Allee Willis Marches on Detroit! Part 8, Sights In Passing

One of my favorite things in life is photographing whatever I see around me, especially if I’m in a car and just happen to pass something that tickles my kitsch bone or general love of vintage or personality laden locations. Here are some of my favorites sightings that hit my eyeballs while attempting to find wherever I was going my first two days in Detroit.

Although I never made it in here I hear about this place, in existence for close to 120 years, from everyone:

I love the salute to the Oscars down in the corner of this mural on Wyoming and Seven Mile, with the Diana Ross lookalike eyeballing it:

Long since closed but gorgeous on Michigan Ave.:

It’s always an excellent sign of kitsch when the great architectural details stop as soon as you round the corner.

The real deal theater in town, the most gorgeously restored theatre I’ve ever been in, where my musical, The Color Purple, would be playing and my big Mumford extravaganza was taking place over the coming weekend:

The biggest drive-in movie screen in the country is the Ford Wyoming Drive-In:

The signage is a little anemic, but at least the Ford-Wyoming is still-standing:

If this were original 1930’s it would be great, but I suspect it’s just a cheesy 80’s repro “Deco”-like exterior on Broadway. I’d like to be wrong about that though.

I love the juxtaposition of homemade candy (and an excellent handpainted mural) and The Haunted Bus Ride:

Thankfully still-standing excellent Streamline Moderne architecture on Woodward:

You can tell this place is gonna be nuts from blocks away:

Extreme Dodge dealership (though I saw no signs of cars):

For a different mode of transportation, the old train station in Corktown:

A closer look at the majestic structure, down but definitely not forgotten:

In another part of town, mural excellence:

A closer look at the amphibious human:

Though that mural is nowhere near as excellent as this one, off of Woodward, west of Ten Mile.:

Four (great) burgers for $2.25 on Michigan Ave.:

How can you not be intrigued by a place with a name as flat and unassuming as “Nice Price”, also on Michigan Avenue?

Or this one on Michigan, so kitschiliciously basic::

A nice topless freeway entrance:

A sausage that screams “Detroit”!

A diner that screams Detroit, the Ellwood, built in 1936:

The Ellwood was moved to its present location downtown when the new Comerica ballpark was built.

I love this exterior in Hamtramck:

And just down the street:

Grab your snow cones and head down a few blocks further to Hamtramck Disneyland:

This building doesn’t look like much…

…but it’s all happening on the roof:

Evidently, Warholak is a great place to find vintage tires, which I’m always in need of as I comb the globe for original whitewalls for my baby:

And speaking of tires, here’s the famous one on I-94, once a ferris wheel at a New York World’s Fair.

And Joe Louis’ fist downtown:

I love you, Detroit! And I’m just two days in…

20Apr 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Allee Willis Marches on Detroit! Part 5, The School and The Hot Dogs

20Apr 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Allee Willis Marches on Detroit! Part 5, The School and The Hot Dogs

The first time I ever went back to my high school, Mumford, after graduating in 1965 was when my musical, The Color Purple, first came to the Fox Theatre in 2008.

I do love the color purple but growing up my two favorite colors were pink and baby blue, the colors of my high school.  And I don’t mean team colors.  I mean the high school itself.

The aesthetic impression this custom dyed baby blue limestone with maroon-faded- to-pink trim 1949 edifice made on me is immeasurable. I’m still obsessed with that color combo and carry it on in much of my daily life.  For example, the sidewalks at Willis Wonderland are baby blue.

My Corvair was pink with a baby blue interior.

And oftentimes my footwear is revving up the school spirit.

I had those exact shoes and socks on when I conducted the Mumford marching band playing a medley of my greatest hits with the cast of my musical, The Color Purple, singing along at the Fox the weekend before last (Ap. 9). I wish you could see my socks in this photo:

Back in 2008, it had been 43 years since I had walked into Mumford. I was always dying to go back but my visits home were very short and my family had long since deserted Detroit for the suburbs. But throughout the writing of The Color Purple, from 2001-2005, I felt very close to Detroit. Despite everything I had heard about the city crumbling, I still believed it could pick itself back up and be great. Be it a person or a city, believing in who or what you are is crucial. But how do you build up into something great when everyone has counted you out? That for me was close to the Color Purple storyline.

I had read how many schools were closing in Detroit so I figured Mumford would be a total mess. A few months prior to my trip I contacted then-principal Linda Spight to see if I could stop by. I also said I’d be happy to speak to the arts students if she wanted me to. I didn’t have my hopes up as there was actually no school the week I was in but Linda said she thought she could get some students there. We left it at that and I wasn’t even sure that she was going to remember I was coming when I walked in with my brother, sister and two best friends from high school. Instead, it was one of those dream sequences that happens when you conjure up your fantasy of what it’s going to be like when you go back to something so massive in your memories. Anything in the school that could have been covered in purple was, including this gift basket presented to me by Miss Spight, stuffed with Mumford pencils, t-shirts, keyrings and anything else that could be impregnated with that gorgeous baby blue and maroon/pink hue.

And all over the school there were posters like this:


Teachers and students had come in special and even did things like perform dance pageants for me…

…and sing.

The marching band even played a special medley from Beverly Hills Cop, the film that made the high school famous when Eddie Murphy wore a Mumford Phys Ed T-shirt throughout it.

I won a Grammy for Beverly Hills Cop, which happily and inextricably linked me to Mumford forever.

Though it seemed a little strange that this BH Cop band salute to me didn’t include “Neutron Dance” and “Stir It up”, my two songs in the film. But here’s where being an avid kitsch lover kicks in. The enormity of the exclusion was almost better than if The Pointer Sisters or Patti LaBelle had popped in to sing the songs with the band. And trust me, John Wilkins, the then and now band director, more than made up for it with the extravaganza at the Fox we pulled off a couple of Saturdays ago, of which I will be posting about and putting videos up on Youtube soon.

Despite my songs being left out, I made it to the yearbook in 2008.

I look much better as a full page than one of a thousand heads.

You probably want to see that photo close up…

As great as it was, I haven’t talked much about that trip to Detroit. I took a camera person with me so that every single inch of my big homecoming could be preserved. I was even getting an official commendation from the city.

As I received my award from Councilwoman Martha Reeves – MARTHA of Martha and the Vandellas, the singer whose records had had such an impact on me as a songwriter – all I could think about was how lucky I was to have this moment preserved forever on tape.

But ha ha, silly me. Never assume that just because someone is holding a camera they know what they’re doing.

I’ve never talked about this trip before because I came back with literally not one minute of usable footage. I was so excited to get a Detroit section up on my blog and to send footage and photos back to the high school, but other than shots of people’s feet, ceiling air vents and a camera that shook so much I put money down on a slow Wild Turkey drip directly into the veins, I got nothing. I even told my friends or family specifically that they didn’t have to take photos because I knew I could pull stills from the video. For example, here I am receiving my commendation:

Exactly… So to prevent a similar catastrophe this trip I took three camera people. One of them was perfect, one of them shot as if they were filming a funeral – dead-on straight shots with little sense of the oomph of the spirit of the person they were shooting – and one of them not only consistently showed up late and missed much of the action but blabbed all over the footage as if shooting his own documentary. But at least I got something. Plus, I know it’s these kinds of unforeseeable mishaps that often make for the best kitsch in retelling the story. A love of kitsch can turn trauma into opportunity!

This trip I went back to Mumford to attend an alumni meeting in the library.

I always loved the book reliefs in the hallways.

It’s architectural details like that that make me SICK the wrecking ball is slated to hit the school next year. Please save me the drinking fountain…

…and a few of these tiles that run along the walls through the entire school.

We didn’t discuss wrecking balls or keepsakes at the alumni meeting but, rather, volunteers for the big Mumford marching band event at the Fox that coming weekend. That’s Linda Spight to my right. And look, more baby blue and maroon clothes for my closet!

Which is good because the last time I fit in my letter sweater (for volleyball) was in 1974, when I mutated it into a backdrop for my fan club pin collection.

I was to return to Mumford the next day for a quick run-through of my seven songs I’d be conducting the marching band playing on Saturday – “September”, “Boogie Wonderland”, “Neutron Dance”, “Stir It Up”, “In the Stone”, “I’ll Be There for You (theme from Friends)”, and “The Color Purple”.

More about that tomorrow. But as for how I ended my Mumford day this day, I’d been dreaming about that ever since I knew I was coming back to Detroit: Lafayette Coney Dogs, THE hot dog in the city and fortunately (0r unfortunately depending on how you look at it) right around the corner from my hotel.

For anyone who’s saying that Coney Islands are from New York I would like to set the record straight. Coney Islands – Nathan’s hot dogs with mustard and chili – were indeed born at Coney Island, NY. But the chili was added in Detroit. And for the greatest chili dog I’ve ever tasted (sorry Pink’s) it’s Lafayette, the front window of which is also immortalized in the opening titles of HBO’s Hung.

Not only are the hotdogs insanely incredible – with that signature pop when you chomp down – but they’re delivered by a waiter who does (exceedingly obscure) magic tricks. Meet Ali Faisel.

That’s a fork balancing on the end of two toothpicks, one of which is shooting out of a pepper shaker. He does quite a trick balancing twelve nails on a screw too.

There’s no trick to smothering french fries with chili at Lafayette.

Thankfully, that wasn’t my order of fries. There’s nothing baby blue or maroon about them. And this post is supposed to be about school and not hot dogs and fries. So I’ll leave it at that and see you tomorrow.

17Apr 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Allee Willis Marches On Detroit! Part 4, The Telway Diner

17Apr 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Allee Willis Marches On Detroit! Part 4, The Telway Diner

You know from the front it’s got to be something. The little 1930’s castle with the 1950’s aluminum awning where you know it couldn’t possibly be, as the sign promises, the “best coffee in town”, but anyplace that still sells it for 45¢ has possibilities. The sign across the parking lot is promising too. The thin little hamburger dripping with one slice of American cheese. That’s the only way to go for me at McDonald’s, the thin original hamburger so the grease and pickle juice soak into the bun just enough for the cheese to co-star in a swirly meatified mix. 4H AMBURGERS for $2.25 is too much to resist.

Besides, my friend and frequent Sunday-afternoon-drive–looking-for-just-such-establishments partner, Charles Phoenix, told me I HAD to go there. I go when Charles issues such recommendations, so thorough is he in his examination and excavation of kitsch anywhere he goes. His first trip to Detroit was only last year. Not only did he hit The Telway but my favorite location in the city.

I’m sure those people who fled Detroit for the suburbs don’t know about The Telway or, if they do, only remember it from their youth. It’s the kind of Detroit neighborhood that scares them and fascinates me. Next trip I’m driving there straight from the airport.

I like a restaurant that tries to put their customers in a good mood, especially when that message is dispersed among the menu items.

The only thing I don’t like in The Telway is that damn clock. Too new and covering the onion rings.

I also love the close-but-no-cigar ‘W’ replacement in ‘Telway’ but I still hate that the onion rings are covered. My onion rings are always covered in ketchup.

The Telway apportions out 75¢ worth of french fries.

Scarce, but actually a perfect number for the number of bites it takes to consume two Telway hamburgers. Speaking of which, the burgers, if you love the little skinny ones like me, are fantastic and the lack of french fries is made up for by the tower of pickles.

The burgers are nice and juicy and the little patch of cheese soaks up into the bun just like you want it to.

The Telway is open 24 hours a day, everyday except Christmas. The waitress told us they serve 6000 burgers a day.

I’m not sure how many donuts they sell a day but they’re big and plump and were staring at me during the entire hamburger consumption.

At these prices, very little tastes bad.

You come to a place like this knowing that the atmosphere as is much a part of the flavor as the ketchup and meaty onion grease.

There are only seven stools in The Telway.

Most of the business is carry out.

The hamburgers are cheaper that way.

I know there must be a place equivalent to The Telway in LA but I don’t know where it is. I’ll definitely be hitting this joint again when I go back to Detroit in a couple of months to do some pickup shots for the “Allee Willis Marches On Detroit!” documentary I’m making. Until then I’ll have to satisfy myself with big juicy burgers in the double digits and pray that the onion rings taste like they’re fried in donut batter.

 

14Apr 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Allee Willis Marches on Detroit! Part 3, The House

14Apr 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Allee Willis Marches on Detroit! Part 3, The House

I know… I promised that Part 3 was going to be about finally getting into the house I grew up in on Sorrento Ave. in Detroit after trying for the last 46 years. But, as someone who’s conscious of her evolution and creative process every waking moment, this finally-going-home experience was BIG for me. Also, it’s not like I can go posting detailed photos of someone else’s stuff, which is inevitable if one is photographing a room. So this isn’t so much about documenting the actual house as it is about what I felt like being back in it.

I remember when I finally went to Disneyland for my 50th birthday, after I had only been there once when I was 14, I was shocked that everything was so small. The same thing, of course, happened when I walked into the house I lived in from 5 to 16 years old last week. It was like walking into a dollhouse. Like here’s me with the banister that in my head was a giant slide, down which I rode every morning en route to breakfast:

The house now is, of course, filled with other people’s stuff and taste, but it still had the same soulful vibe I was aware of even back then. Here’s the living room corner in 1961:

And here it is in 2011:

Thank God I finally got out of those heels and into more comfortable shoes.

My shoes were also very comfortable in this photo taken in my driveway around 1957. I remember testing my penny loafers on my pink and gray Columbia bike against other shoes I had for the firmest peddle grip.

Albeit slightly worse for wear, the driveway remains intact today.

This is the Magnolia tree that was the subject of one of my earliest songs, “I Fell Out Of The Magnolias”.

No one ever released it but it was one of those songs that impressed all of my singer and songwriter friends back in 1974 when I cowrote it with David Lasley (who I would later write “Lead Me On” with) and one of those songs that when I bump into any of them they still sing a little of. Forget about “September” or the Friends theme, “Magnolias” is the classic. Here I am back in the ‘Magnolia” days:

When I first  set eyes on the house I live in now in LA back in 1980, my realtor had heard about it at a dinner party the night before we went house hunting. I didn’t want to live in the Valley but after looking at and hating a bunch of square boxes in Hollywood I decided to drive over the hill and see the house described in the brochure as a miniature Hollywood Palladium. This was a day before it officially went on sale. There was a party going on in the backyard but the back gate was open so I just ran in and raced up the stairs into the house, with the owner chasing behind me. My realtor caught me just as I entered the living room but I remember turning my head and not only seeing a curved wall in the living room that reminded me of a curved wall in the living room on Sorrento but I was dying at the bathroom, just off the living room, because it was filled with gorgeously aged vintage maroon tile. Here’s the bathroom floor as it was that day:

I didn’t know what it was about the tile but looking at it made me dead certain this was MY home. So I almost died when I walked into the bathroom on Sorrento to see the exact same tile there. I had totally blocked it out of my memory but there it was with that deep almost orange hue that only hugs tile that old.

Another unbelievable thing is the people who live in the Sorrento house. First of all, it’s the same folks who bought the house from my father in 1965. Second, their last name is Broadnax, a name I’ve  only heard once before because it’s the name of one of the characters in my musical, The Color Purple, and one of the only characters’ names mentioned in song. As soon as I walked in, the Broadnax’s, both Reverends, told me that my mother, who passed away very suddenly when I was 16, was still in the house. They hear her walking down the steps, and growing up their kids often told them there was a white lady in the house. In my youth, I may not have believed this but when  my co-writers and I first started working on the musical, Alice Walker, author of the Pulitzer prize-winning book, told us that it was all she could do to keep her hand moving fast enough to scribble down the thoughts in her head she was certain her ancestors were dictating to her. The book was written in one quick draft. Alice told us her ancestors would be contacting us. I swear to God, there were times when I would just move my mouth and words or a melody would tumble out, as if someone else was dictating them. It happened to me, Brenda (Russell) and Stephen (Bray) throughout the four years we were writing the show. So I definitely believe that my mom could still be hanging around Sorrento. I hope she was home when I came over.

One last little bit of synchronicity, throw in that the person who sang the “Magnolias” song demo was the only old friend of mine cast in The Color Purple, Charlo Crossley, former Bette Midler Harlette and Church Lady Doris on Broadway. She’s been talking about that Magnolia tree for decades now.

Friday night, the Broadnax’s sat next to me at The Color Purple, where it was playing over the weekend at the Fox Theater.  I totally got a vibe that my mom was there.

It’s pretty overwhelming to be in spots where you have very specific memories and to see it through adult eyes. Especially for me, as I have so few photos and zero movie footage because all of it got tossed after my father remarried. Which I’m sure is why I so obsessively document now. I don’t ever want my past thrown away again. And now at least I can visit it more often.

13Apr 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Allee Willis Marches on Detroit! Part 2, The Sights

13Apr 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Allee Willis Marches on Detroit! Part 2, The Sights

So Monday, April 4, in Detroit starts off with meeting historic architecture preservationist Rebecca Binno Savage downtown in front of the Art Deco masterpiece Guardian Building. Designed by Wirt C. Rowland in the 1920’s for The Union Trust Company banking group, this 40 story skyscraper, towering over the city at the time, fell victim to the 1929 stock market crash before it even had a chance to open. Saved by the Union Guardian Trust Company it’s been a gem in the Detroit skyline ever since. If you’re an Art Deco freak, take sedation before you walk into this magnificently maintained edifice because your eyeballs have rarely been exposed to anything in this genre of this proportion.


Our tour guide was Christopher Roddy, he of eternally beckoning face made famous during this year’s crop of Super Bowl commercials in what many people deemed to be the best, the Eminem Chrysler commercial.

Here are some of the more spectacular architectural details of The Guardian Building:

As a kid I thought it was very special that I was born in a state shaped like a mitten. I still do.

From there we drove to Hamtramck, the once Polish center of Detroit and home of the sausage I grew up with.

There’s also lots of vintage architecture and signage like this:

Nothing, however, outshines this folk art destination, fondly known as “Hamtramck Disneyland”, a giant hobby project built between 1992 and 1999 by retired GM worker Dmytro Szylak in his backyard and on the roof of two garages.

I would’ve preferred to gaze upon Disneyland without rain pouring down but the excellence of the assemblage couldn’t be dampened by a little spit from the sky.

Roofing shingles as sidewalk is another excellent touch.

I love when art inspires art. At least the owner of the house at the end of the block tried to go for it if not entirely successful:

This sign a few blocks away killed me:

The cakes are ‘fancy’, the meat is ‘quality’ but the bread is just ‘good’. BTW, the roofline is REALLY ‘good’.

Right down the block is Burke’s Igloo, famous now for being in the opening titles of HBO’s Hung.

The ice cream here is ‘fancy’ and ‘quality’, way better than ‘good’.

The signage is also excellent:

It’s 4:30. We drop Rebecca off and head over to the northwest side of Detroit where I grew up. I’m going to an alumni meeting at my alma mater, Mumford High School, to discuss plans for my upcoming benefit extravaganza with the marching band playing a medley of my greatest hits with the cast of my musical, The Color Purple, leading a sing-along. We have a little time to kill so we swing by the house I grew up in from 5 to 16 years old that’s just about a mile from Mumford.

Every trip I’ve made to Detroit since leaving there in 1965 I’ve tried to get into this house, with no sucess. My memories of it are great. I loved it because despite trying to fit in with the other traditional brick houses in the neighborhood it had a hit of Moderne, with a rounded exterior wall, glass blocks, Steelcase windows (now replaced) and a round pole supporting the second floor.

I would’ve ditched the drain pipe and left the original windows but otherwise everything was as it was when we left the house after my mom passed away suddenly, my dad remarried suddenly, and I was exiled to the suburbs. To my complete surprise and delight, this time we got in and I spent one of the greatest hours I’ve ever had reliving my past. More of that and Mumford tomorrow…

11Apr 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Allee Willis Marches on Detroit! Part 1, The Exhaustion

11Apr 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Allee Willis Marches on Detroit! Part 1, The Exhaustion

We – Mark Blackwell, my ready steady videographer and “Allee Marches On Detroit!” planning partner – landed back in LA at 1 AM Sunday night after taking two planes from Detroit, the second of which was over an hour late getting out of Chicago. My body feels like it’s broken into 12,000 pieces – at least it’s down by a thousand from yesterday – because of the pace we raced at over the prior 168 hours of giving speeches, conducting marching bands and Broadway musicals, visiting family, school friends and meeting a whole load of soulful folks on the street who take great pride in the city they live in. But it’s one of those great broken feelings where you know you had a once-in-a-lifetime experience and are so grateful for fate tossing that your way, no matter how much you feel like a convoy of Mack trucks have run over you, every single ounce of oomph exerted is worth the present inertia. I feel like I have to stew in a hot bath for a week and then be pickled in a jar of lavender oil for a couple of days to feel like everything in my body is glued back together again. But the Dee-troit spirit running through me is so high I could walk on air without legs. Which is good given that my knees performed way beyond the call of duty given their relatively recent medical fate.

Everyone knows I have a love affair with my hometown.

Not only do I still see it as the Soul capital of the world, I see it as the potential model city of the 21st century. The whole world is feeling the ever-closing grip of a failing economy. I think Detroit, already on its knees because of greedy politicians and the stubbornness of the automobile industry to see the future more than a decade ago, has the potential to rise from the ashes in glorious fashion should the powers that be decide to peer out of artistic eyeballs as opposed to ones that only focus on bottom lines. That was the subject of the speech I gave last Wednesday at the Rust Belt to Arts Belt conference held in Detroit, something I’ll publish in this blog in a few days. But for now, back to my never-ending support of the underdog, or in this case, the overcow.

That exceptional roof ornament is but one of many astounding vestiges of Detroit past I saw tooling around the city this past week. Given my proclivity for photographing anything I see that’s interesting, I came back with thousands of photos. I meant to post something every day I was there but my schedule was too overwhelming and I didn’t want to break the holy spirit that melted down on me every day to the point that I would come back to my hotel room feeling like a boom box had been inserted inside me and the bass was threatening to blow my skin off.

So starting tomorrow I’m just gonna start on last Monday, the 4th, my first day in Detroit, and take you through day by day… actually, not even. I gave myself one day, yesterday, to decompress without reminding myself that if I’m to get anything done after a week that exhausting/exhilarating I have to start integrating my every day work life back into my days or it will all become too overwhelming. So I’m just going to take you through chunk by chunk over the next couple of weeks and eventually we’ll make our way through Detroit…

 

31Jan 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Kitschtastic East LA and My Saturday Ride with Charles Phoenix

31Jan 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Kitschtastic East LA and My Saturday Ride with Charles Phoenix

As many of you know, one of my favorite things in the world to do is to take rides with my BFF, Charles Phoenix, and go to places in and around LA that most people don’t know about unless they live in that part of the city. One of my absolute favorite things about LA is that there are so many different sections of the city. But the shame is that so few people who live here venture east of downtown. Charles and I, on the contrary, always venture east and, trust me, it never disappoints. If you’re heading south on the 101, make sure you drive farther than this building (and not just to get off to go the Music Center, Disney Hall, or MOCA).

In our particular case, our drive occurred in Charles’ brand new Dodge Challenger. New as in just hours old and now we were taking it on it’s virgin voyage. The new car smell added to the adventure.

One of the great things about having a friend who you share such keen interests with, coupled with the fact you’re both considered authorities of sorts on the topic – incredible vintage and/or kitsch architecture, signage, cars and the like – is that you can be fascinated almost anywhere you go. Charles and I only had a couple of hours so we headed for a quickie run down Whittier Blvd. Seriously, unless you’re blind, elitist or have absolutely zero kitschEsthetic genes in your body, Whittier Blvd. is breathtaking. So here’s our ride in the order it occurred…

We overshot our exit on the 101 so got off at Seventh St. and wormed our way back to Whittier Blvd. Which was fine as we wouldn’t wanted to have missed this spectacular hot dog roof:

Always special is this dinosaur and soda cup diorama, neither object of which has anything to do with the business underneath.

We always take First St. to get to Whittier Blvd. as one of our favorite houses in the city is there. But I’m dismayed to report that the vines have been plucked on the formerly eye-boggling ‘grapes house’ which used to look like this…

… but sadly now looks like this:

Don’t start me…

Thank God, further down the street some old movie theaters with original neon still survive.

It took all our strength not to stop and see what the Valentine’s Day decorations looked like inside Unique Dollar but we had limited time so kept driving.

I absolutely love store names like this:

Here we are at Whittier Boulevard. As soon as you turn onto the street you know you’re in for an excellent time warp experience.

Perhaps you should have the great 60’s guitar anthem, “Whittier Blvd.” by Thee Midnighters, on as a soundtrack while you tour the street with us. Press the following if so:

Charles and I were starving before we even left the house. We almost stopped here at the ‘they-don’t-resemble-Shaq-and-Kobe-other-than-they’re-big’ Bionicos food truck:

But luckily, Charles knew a “great Mexican restaurant full of pigs” just down the street.

The photorealistic food on all the windows was beautiful but all the rest of my window shots had too much glare to post.

Porky’s was definitely filled with pigs.

The menu was thrilling and pig filled too…

… though neither one of us ordered any of that particular animal.

I was especially impressed that the salad Porky’s served Charles consisted solely of radishes and lemons. I say save time in the kitschen and leave it at that.

When we left we would’ve stopped at the dress shop next door…

…but we were too excited to get across the street and go here:

There’s lots of excellent merchandise like this inside Whittier Crafts:

There’s also an abundance of carefully crafted and spelled signage:

Speaking of signage, there’s vintage overload in this part of LA:

There’s also incredible architectural detail like this 1950’s cement block facade…

… and this excellent 1960’s tile motif which I wish you could see closer than this photo I took. It’s like an explosion of vintage flooring but on a building.

Whittier Blvd. is definitely known for the automobiles that cruise it.

These were all within a two block radius of each other:

I wonder where the people who rented this limo were going?

I’m going to guess A. Torres Tuxedos as starting at :34 that’s where all the action took place when this classic car parade was shot.

Just a few blocks from A. Torres is this 1930s tamale shaped building. It used to be a Mexican restaurant.

You can see how the tamale ends twist at the sides of the building:

Whittier Boulevard has quite a few incredible old Deco buildings like this:

At the other architectural end, I love when business facades don’t quite live up to their names.

But even more, I like when a business is named one thing on one sign and something else on the other.

And even more than that I like when a store’s displays have nothing to do with what their awning says they sell.

Although this isn’t on Whittier Blvd. we passed it when we headed back to the freeway. In a city where spectacularly detailed murals abound, this is the one that makes our kitsch hearts sing:

Maybe you can appreciate it more if you see it closer:

Although we usually like to stay out past dark to catch all the neon, both Charles and I had places to go Saturday night so we headed back  early. Although I wish I could end with the penultimate kitsch shot, there’s absolutely nothing kitschy about this one other than the brains of the occupants.

12Jan 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – My Sunday Drive with Charles Phoenix

12Jan 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – My Sunday Drive with Charles Phoenix

One of my favorite things to do on a Sunday is to take a drive with my fabulous friend, Charles Phoenix, who knows the kitsch heights of Los Angeles and surrounding areas unlike anyone else on the planet. As we both adore LA and equally revere its vintage past, we regularly  tool through sections of town with unbelievable architecture and restaurants still unscathed by the wrecking ball. Usually we have a set destination but this time we just decided to get in the car and let the wheels take us where they may.

Our first stop was at Spudnuts in Inglewood, where Charles had heard there were unbelievable donuts made out of  potatoes. We had an appetizer there.

For the main course we hit Dinah’s in Culver City.

The 1950’s interior of Dinah’s is as fabulous as that massive bucket of fried chicken that hovers above the restaurant outside.

I especially like the carvings in the floor:

Charles and his fried chicken look excellent against the interior.

I got fried chicken too but it was my sides that were most impressive if one is judging on the culinary kitsch scale. First, there was my creamed spinach, which looked and tasted much more like elementary school paste:

Then there were my green beans. We were particularly fascinated by one particular bean as it was just a hollow tunnel with no bean inside. See how you can see clear down to the fork prong?

It’s just this kind of detail that makes this relaxed kind of day even better. There was also an outstanding detail at the IHOP we passed in Westchester, just outside LAX.

Most IHOP’s are known for their pancakes, not their horses:

Driving through Hawthorne we passed many modern 60s buildings like this…

…as well as fantastic signage like this:

We didn’t stop at Pizza Show as we were on our way to far more impressive vintage architecture and signage:

Each letter is mounted on a metal mesh canister that lights up.

The roofline is spectacular.

Other then the ratty white plastic chair that too many restaurants use for outdoor seating, the interior of Chips is just as fantastic as the exterior:

Also fantastic is the name of the whipped cream they squirt at Chips:

Charles had quite a lot of Affair going on inside his chocolate malt.

I had a sensible tossed salad with about 10,000 calories worth of Thousand Island dressing and a nice cup of watery vegetable soup.

Next we hit King’s Hawaiian Bakery in Torrance.

Charles, featured recently on the front page of the Wall Street Journal with his towering Chepumple pie/cake, wanted some King’s Rainbow Bread so we each bought a loaf. I think you can see why:

The only thing better at King’s than that psychedelic bread is the giant pineapple holding up the ceiling in the dining room.

We continued on through Torrance, passing many more incredible 1960s office buildings.Some people think these edifices look like crap. To us, they’re a Pantheon among Pantheons.

But by far, my  favorite architecture in Torrance is the Palos Verdes Bowl.

The curved rock wall reminds me of 1950’s Vegas.

The cut-out metal overhangs are pretty great:

The font is even greater, with a new ‘O’ getting it almost right except the color:

But even more impressive than the bowling alley exterior was the outfit on this bowler:

It’s hard to see in this photo but that’s a matching shimmery lion shirt and pants. The way the sun bounced off the lion on this guy’s butt was astounding. The jeans were very shiny too. I can only hope that he had matching bowling shoes.

We left Palos Verdes and passed a plethora of  great vintage signs like these in Lomita…

… and these in Long Beach:

We passed so many vintage motels they deserve a separate post. But this classic “Colonial” estabishment, with enough pillars to hold up a stadium, was one of my favorites. Fake facades are to motels what Liberace’s capes were to Liberace.

As the sun began to set, we passed this excellent mural saluting the working people of Long Beach. I especially love the marionette looking man or is it a woman out in front with the orange toupee.

Our last stop was at this historic Bob’s Big Boy in Downey. Originally built in 1958 as Harvey’s Broiler, it’s considered the birthplace of car culture dining. Unfortunately, some of the neon was out.

We did get these excellent photos with Big Boy though.

And we got to sit in a fabulous newly-tweaked-but-vintage-nonetheless interior:

And we ate very sensibly as Charles demonstrates with his fit-conscious cottage cheese…

… and me with my second tossed salad of the day. It seems blasphemous to be in an authentic diner and not get a lump of Thousand Island on something.

All in all a was a wonderful day, tooling around LA with a wonderful friend whose eyes absorb kitsch as fast as mine and whose stomach knows how to theme eat so that what goes in matches the staggering sites that lie outside.

15Dec 2010

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Kitschtastic Mansion and the Folks Inside

15Dec 2010

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Kitschtastic Mansion and the Folks Inside


I always love this time of year in LA because the Christmas parties really kick into high gear. There aren’t as many of them this year because all pennies are being pinched but there was a killer one last night at a house RuPaul is renting for the month for just such holiday festivities. The added bonus last night was that it was our mutual friend, Tom Trujillo’s, birthday.

There’s nothing especially kitschy about all of us – except me I guess – but we all embrace our vast love of kitsch in the way we live and entertain. In Ru’s case, the house he rented takes appreciation of the genre to staggering heights.

First, some of the attendees and then, more photos of the kitschtacular edifice itself.  Here’s a closer shot of Ru, me, birthday boy Tom, and Prudence Fenton.

Here I am with Santino Rice, of Project Runway and RuPaul’s Drag Race fame:

I love my soul sistas and sisters in real life, Scherrie Payne, formerly of The Supremes, and Freda “Band Of Gold”, “Bring The Boys Home” Payne.

Here’s me and five-time Grammy-winning composer, producer, conductor, arranger, and songwriter, Mervin Warren.

(L-R) Mito Aviles, Prudence, me, ChadMichael Morrisette and RuPaul.

Now onto the co-star of the evening, the house, mansion, palace or whatever you want to call it. First of all, it was massive. From the street it just looks like a long bush but from the back, if you put the following three photos side-by-side, it’s a hunka hunk o’ burnin’ living space:

The entire outside of the house is distressed so you constantly felt like you were whizzing through Europe.

There are three floors that I know of, possibly more, but we had already walked so much I was going to have to hire a car to take more of the tour. Most of the ceilings look something like this:

Many of the ceilings twinkled:

Most of the walls gave lots of time to the women:

The walls that weren’t giving props to the ladies had screens embedded in them with moving images of exotic places:

All of the staircases are very rustic yet ornate:

There are tons of little seating areas like these:

And lots of statues everywhere:

That statue overlooks the pool which overlooks the city of LA…

… and leads to a disco complete with a stripper pole downstairs:

I don’t know what I was thinking not taking a photo of the unbelievable pole dancer from Jumbo’s Clown Room who came to entertain Tom. I guess I was too busy running around taking photos of myself next to all the statues.

Pound for pound, it was a wonderful night with wonderful friends inside a wonderful wheel of brie house. I’m sure I’ll be back before Ru’s rental is up…