Setting Times stories to music: From Van Morrison to Queen
So this week they announced the latest crop of Rock and Roll Hall of Fame nominees. And of course one of my favorites, Nirvana, is a lock.
But our pop critic Randall Roberts gives these grim odds for a band I like even more, the Replacements: 25 to 1. Justice must be served to one of the best songwriters of the last 30 years, Paul Westerberg. Start lobbying the voting members now.
It would be cool to create our own Hall of Fame here at The Times, with the writers behind the most legendary Column Ones (the retro term for Great Reads). And if we did, Bella Stumbo would be on it.
If you’re not already aware of the L.A. Times Past blog on Tumblr, start following it now. Every week, it’s doing a Throwback Thursday to Great Reads of the past. This week, it was Stumbo’s profile of the Coors family from 1988. Read it and be in the presence of a writer with caps-lock attitude.
I love how fellow staffer and L.A. Times Past caretaker Matt Ballinger described the way the story ran in print (yes, a time when everything was only in print):
“You’ll experience the bold, traditional flavor of old-school American newspapering: This 1988 Column One jumps three times. And that’s only the first of two parts! (We’ll bring you the thrilling conclusion next Thursday.) Until then, read responsibly.”
Anyway, in these roundups of the week gone by, I’d like to offer the first paragraphs of each Great Read (or, as they’re known in print, Column One) -- maybe they’ll buy your eye and you can settle in for a good weekend read. And you’ll also get the songs that inspired me while editing the stories, or reading them later if my fellow editor Millie Quan ushered them through. A story-song combo!
If you have ideas for story-song pairings of your own, tweet the title and artist to @karihow or @LATgreatreads with the hashtag #storysongs.
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Ousted vendor is no longer a no-ware man
When Rick Lopez packed up the sodas, chips, gum and candy on his final day, he knew he was leaving a lot behind.
There was the security guard who helped him set up shop in the morning and would give him a ride home in the evening, the judicial commissioner who raved that his egg salad sandwich was the best in town, the attorneys who arrived early for the freshly brewed coffee — and even the old, dilapidated Long Beach courthouse itself.
For two decades, Lopez was a fixture there, running the cafeteria and snack bar through a state program that gives blind vendors priority in government buildings.
But when all the judges, bailiffs and clerks moved down the street to a gleaming new courthouse this fall, Lopez didn’t make the trip. State officials told Lopez there was nothing they could do to keep him in Long Beach, but they could transfer him to another location. The new courthouse was built by a public-private partnership and developers were given the right to lease out the food stalls as they pleased.
Taking his place would be a food court with chains such as Subway and Coffee Bean.
Lopez was crushed. A courthouse is often a place where some of life’s sad and dire dramas play out. But for Lopez, it was also a place where he and a regular cast of characters found ways to bond.
As he walked away from the old courthouse for the last time, he cried.
#storysongs combo: “Tears Are in Your Eyes,” Yo La Tengo. I’m trying to hold myself to a once-a-month limit on using this wonderful band in the combo.
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Cockroach farms multiplying in China
This squat concrete building was once a chicken coop, but now it’s part of a farm with an entirely different kind of livestock — millions of cockroaches.
Inside, squirming masses of the reddish-brown insects dart between sheets of corrugated metal and egg cartons that have been tied together to provide the kind of dark hiding places they favor.
Wang Fuming kneels down and pulls out one of the nests. Unaccustomed to the light, the roaches scurry about, a few heading straight up his arm toward his short-sleeve shirt.
“Nothing to be afraid of,” Wang counsels visitors who are shrinking back into the hallway, where stray cockroaches cling to a ceiling that’s perilously close overhead.
Although cockroaches evoke a visceral dread for most people, Wang looks at them fondly as his fortune — and his future.
The 43-year-old businessman is the largest cockroach producer in China (and thus probably in the world), with six farms populated by an estimated 10 million cockroaches. He sells them to producers of Asian medicine and to cosmetic companies that value the insects as a cheap source of protein as well as for the cellulose-like substance on their wings.
The favored breed for this purpose is the Periplaneta americana, or American cockroach, a reddish-brown insect that grows to about 1.6 inches long and, when mature, can fly, as opposed to the smaller, darker, wingless German cockroach.
Since Wang got into the business in 2010, the price of dried cockroaches has increased tenfold, from about $2 a pound to as much as $20, as manufacturers of traditional medicine stockpile pulverized cockroach powder.
“I thought about raising pigs, but with traditional farming, the profit margins are very low,” Wang said. “With cockroaches, you can invest 20 yuan and get back 150 yuan,” or $3.25 for a return of $11.
#storysongs combo: “Welcome to My Nightmare,” by Alice Cooper. In my memory, the song is a screamer. But it’s much jazzier and funkier than I remember.
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Dodgers’ DJ Severe keeps the hits coming
From a glass booth behind home plate, surrounded by video screens and digital equipment, Lanier Stewart can sense the anxiety in Dodger Stadium.
After pondering for a moment, he scrolls through hundreds of song titles on a computer.
“We need to pump this place,” he says.
The fans have arrived on a Monday night with mixed emotions. The Dodgers are in the National League Championship Series — cause for celebration — but are facing a tough opponent in the St. Louis Cardinals.
So Stewart, as the team DJ, clicks his mouse and starts the ballpark’s sound system throbbing with a house remix of “Alive” by Krewella.
“A game like today,” he says, “we need a lot of energy.”
If baseball has a story to tell, a drama unfolding over nine innings, then Stewart provides the soundtrack, scrambling to find a suitable vibe for the action on the field.
His computer server holds libraries of rock, hip-hop and country tunes. A keyboard to his left controls electronic cues to get fans clapping or chanting.
“To me, a game is like a wedding where you have this panicked and stressful bride who wants everything perfect,” he says. “If something doesn’t go right, you have to make a move.”
#storysongs combo: “We Will Rock You,” by Queen. Nothing controls the crowd at Dodger Stadium like this song. I’ve always said that if I were a dictator, this is the song I’d use to get my subjects thinking in lockstep.
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Out of prison and into the unknown
For the first several days of his freedom, George Souliotes kept forgetting to zip up his trousers. Prison jumpsuits don’t have zippers.
The 72-year-old left lights on at night, unaccustomed to having control over a light switch.
He stiffened whenever he accidentally brushed up against someone. Bumping into another prisoner could get him stabbed.
He had spent nearly 17 years behind bars for a triple murder conviction. A federal judge overturned the conviction after an innocence hearing, and now Souliotes was having to relearn life.
Most mornings, the Greek immigrant sat in the sunshine at a Glendale park. His son gave him a smartphone, and he labored doggedly over it. “I love the lady who helps me find my way,” he said of the GPS feature. He also signed up for a class to learn how to use a computer.
At St. Sophia Greek Orthodox Cathedral, Souliotes mingled with other Greek immigrants, many of whom had followed his case. People wanted to know about prison, but he didn’t like talking about it.
He wanted to forget the stabbings — he saw 17 in one day during a riot in the yard. He wanted to forget the spaghetti that came in a clump and had to be sliced. He wanted to forget the nights he cried into a towel so no one would hear.
“I want to quit talking about these things,” he said. “The past is gone.”
#storysongs combo: “Brand New Day,” by Van Morrison. “I see my freedom across the way.” A voice that makes me shiver no matter how many times I hear it.
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Jim Thorpe, Pa., fights to keep its namesake
When the Olympic gold medalist Jim Thorpe died in 1953, his children held a traditional Indian burial ceremony on the Sac and Fox Reservation in Oklahoma. Mourners shared a meal as the great athlete’s body lay in full view inside a lodge.
The ceremony came to an abrupt halt when Thorpe’s widow, Patsy Thorpe, barged in. Accompanied by state troopers and a funeral hearse, she seized the body and drove away.
“It was a complete shock to all of us,” recalled William Thorpe, the athlete’s 85-year-old son, who was there that day. “We are all set to bury Dad in Oklahoma and then — boom! — he was gone, never to be returned.”
Patsy Thorpe, Jim’s third wife, had cut a deal with two struggling towns in Pennsylvania: If they would merge and rename themselves Jim Thorpe and build a memorial to honor him, she would present them his remains for burial. Thorpe had never set foot in the borough; he was born in Oklahoma in 1888 and raised on the Sac and Fox Reservation.
William Thorpe says the town of Jim Thorpe has done a wonderful job caring for his father’s grave.
“But it’s time for my dad to come home,” he said.
Thorpe, along with a brother and the Sac and Fox Nation, prevailed in April in a federal lawsuit demanding that the town return his father’s body for burial on the Oklahoma reservation. A federal judge ruled that the town was subject to the 1990 Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, which governs the return of human remains and other Indian artifacts.
The town, which has appealed, is now in a defensive crouch.
#storysongs combo: “Bury Me,” by Guster. This Boston band does the purest of pop. Give the album “Easy Wonderful” (love the title) a listen!
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