Would YOU hire this man?

H*** was born in Germany & raised in Illinois. As a kid he liked horses, dogs and drawing. Later on his interests included sports, art, business & marketing. A Colorado native since the early 70’s he formed his own business…in the mid 80’s…(that) works with companies…to unravel bills and provide economic benefits to businesses…

H*** has the unique ability to talk to anyone about anything. Always the perfectionist, his best asset is the ability to make something from nothing…

1973- 1976…I was known as the “condo king” and top seller…

QUESTIONS/ANSWERS

How would you describe yourself today? Proven winner…

How do you explain that? Intense competitor. I even get serious when I play checkers with my son.

What’s your favorite toy? My Jaguar XKE Roadster. This vehicle was chief of the road show. It had stunning good looks, aircraft instrumentation, wire wheels, leather bucket seats and a convertible top. The car did not know how to go slow. Twelve cylinders and 400 hp bring it to 65 mph in 1st gear, 100 mph comes in about 10 seconds. Standing still the wicked Jag draws more attention than Paris Hilton at a church social…

When you do business with me I expect you to expect the best…

We AIN’T Got the Neutron Bomb!

I have now had my first official concert letdown of 2005. Legendary LA punks the Weirdos were scheduled to play at the Climax Lounge (a decent venue that rarely seems to get good bookings). Having never seen them before, I’ve been excited about this since it showed up in the club listings. Well, me and my pal JT got to the venue to find that the band were not going to make it – they were caught somewhere in a snowstorm. Kind of funny, as there was unbelievably nice weather here over the weekend. I’m not sure where the band was traveling from. I had a strange premonition that the show might not happen, I guess I was just too excited about it!

Compounding my disappointment was a flier I saw coming out of Gabors, one of my favorite watering holes, before we headed to the Climax. There is a club next door, the Cricket on the Hill, which I’ve never been to but is reportedly a real craphole. Posted on their future show listings was a flier for the Polysics. If you’re not familiar with the Polysics, I have two words for you: Japanese Devo. ‘Nuff said! I was thrilled, and then JT noticed that that show had happened two days earlier. There hadn’t been any ads or even a small print listing of the show in the local arts weekly. I thought that maybe it had been booked at the last minute and there wasn’t time to get the show in the paper. Nope – I checked the band’s website, and their entire tour had been booked and listed over a month ago. It was just laziness on the club’s part. Sometimes it sucks being in Denvoid.

The year has gotten off to a slow start on the show front; I’ve only been to three so far:

Visqueen – a pretty good set from this Seattle band, if no real surprises. As bassist (and former Fastback) Kim Warnick has retired from music, Ronnie Barnett from the Muffs was helping out. A friend commented that it looked as if singer/guitarist Rachel Flotard had shrunk, but then we realized it just looked like she had due to Ronnie’s height. I picked up their new CD, Sunset on Dateland, and it’s good if a bit short at only 9 songs. Local kids The Symptoms played a good opening set.

The Thermals – another PNW band, from Portland. I had never heard them before, I just went out of curiosity, and I liked them. Their new album, Fuckin A, is pretty good and has a fair bit of political (i.e. anti-Bush) content. Locals the Hot IQ’s warmed up, who every writer around here thinks will be Mootown’s big breakout group. They’re not bad, but don’t really leave much of an impression with me. Maybe it was because I was stuck in the bar – the Larimer Lounge is an awful place to see an all ages show.

Secret Machines – the li’l woman and I drove up to Boulder for this, and it was well worth the trip. The first time I saw this band, they played for a small crowd in a club (and were awesome). What a difference a few months can make. Granted, the Fox Theatre isn’t huge, but it’s a good bit bigger than the Larimer Lounge. Plus, the place was packed. The band was terrific, and really loud, and it looks like their label had laid out a little bit more tour support – they had a big light and fog show. A totally cool show, we were both blown away. The first warmup act, Autolux, were a bit slow but not too bad. The kids seemed to love the next band, Moving Units, but they didn’t do much for me (they really irritated the li’l woman). How many 80’s sounding guitar bands with a disco beat do we need? It’s time to call a moratorium!

Things should start picking up as the weather gets nicer. It’s looking like March and April are going to be much more eventful – good for my sanity, but bad for my finances!

Cool Flix with a Good Beat

Okay, not all music films are painful. I recently picked up a few cool DVD’s featuring music that is legitimately good (well, to these well worn ears anyway). So, it’s not all evil robots, Agnetha’s bottom, and milkshakes:

The Unheard Music (1985)

A pretty nifty little documentary of the band X, which I saw at the Ogden in Denver (then the coolest movie theater in town, now a so-so concert venue) when it was originally released. I hadn’t seen the film since then, and it’s been out of print for years, so I was happy to snap up the DVD when it came out. The film itself has aged pretty well, and captures the band at what was arguably their peak. There are interviews and live performances interspersed with found/stolen footage from then current television, old films, newsreels, some original animation, and whatever else the filmmakers could get their hands on. It ends up being a collage of fast editing and great music (all from the first four amazing X albums), which reflects the band’s own crossbreeding of musical styles and the punk rock DIY ethic. The tone is somewhat optimistic, as if X is actually on the verge of breaking through to mass acceptance. In reality, shortly after this film was released the Ain’t Love Grand album came out – an album which, while not awful, smoothed down the band’s raw sound in a bid for commercial success. It did get them a small amount of radio play, but Billy Zoom quit soon thereafter and the band was never the same after that. The funniest part is an interview with a label exec that passed on X, but is really excited that his label will soon be releasing the third album by (the deservedly long forgotten) Point Blank. (I actually remember one song by them, the truly awful “Mean to Your Queenie.”) Nice move, Mr. Label Exec!

Ramones Raw (2004)

Do not confuse this with the terrific recent documentary End of the Century, which is still not available on DVD. The majority of this release is home video footage taken by Marky Ramone, and it’s pretty much for hardcore fans only. Seeing as Marky didn’t start carrying a video camera until some point in the late 80’s, this isn’t even footage of the band in their prime. Still, it’s a pretty fun time for fans of the bruddahs. It’s nice to see that there were a few smiles behind the scenes during the band’s last few years (End of the Century painted a somewhat miserable picture when it came to band relations). It is also amazing to see how popular they were in other countries – playing for huge crowds, with fans outside of their hotel chanting and their car getting mobbed everywhere they went. Because I’m a goofball, my favorite part was the footage from Dee Dee’s short lived rap career as Dee Dee King (a more inept rapper you’ll never see!). There are also some cool extras, the highlight of which is a 1980 program that was originally shown on Italian television. It features songs from a great live show from when the band still really gave it their all (unlike the 90’s, when they played everything as fast as they possibly could and Joey stopped trying to sing). Whoever put together the Italian TV program manages to really mangle the titles of a few of the songs, with such amusing subtitles as “Rock & Roll School,” “Rock Way Beach,” and “Sheena is Punk.” These screw-ups just add to the fun, so Gabba Gabba Hey! (Or, as the Italian TV producers might say, Google Google Har!)

The Harder They Come (1972)

I had never seen this classic Jamaican movie before. First off, I have to state that I do not know a great deal about reggae music. I have dabbled a bit here and there, and there is a good bit of it I do like. However, a lot of my potential enjoyment of it has been tainted by the three years I attended school in Boulder. There were way too many trust fund hippies blasting their Bob Marley Legend CD’s and going on and on about reggae being the ultimate peace-and-love-and-good-vibes music. It has taken me a long time to shake off those associations and enjoy the music for what it is. The Harder They Come presents the gritty truth about reggae’s birthplace, the slums of Kingston, and it’s pretty damn bleak. With it crushing poverty, crooked police force, drug use, and corrupt music industry Kingston is a far cry from the “good vibes” the hippies associate with reggae. Jimmy Cliff dazzles in his portrayal of Ivan, a country bumpkin who moves to the city with dreams of fame. He cuts a record, for which he’s paid a mere $20 (a common practice at that time, apparently), and then gets involved in the marijuana trade. His life of crime leads to him killing several policemen, forcing him to go underground, and then his record becomes a hit. This makes Ivan a folk hero, he now has the fame he craved, and he buys into his new gangster image wholeheartedly. There is a sequence in which Ivan goes into a photography studio to have his portrait done – he wants to send his picture to the newspapers to fuel his growing fame. Dressed in ultra sharp threads and brandishing a pair of pistols, Ivan is just about the baddest looking dude ever to grace a movie screen. Needless to say, it all leads to a climatic shootout and sad ending. The film is incredibly low budget, and at times it can be really difficult to decipher what the characters are saying due to their thick Jamaican accents (there are periodic subtitles for a few actors who are impossible to understand). It also takes a while for the story to get going, but once it did I was hooked. I wouldn’t say The Harder They Come is an amazing film, but it is good and definitely worth catching. Oh, and the soundtrack is terrific.

Do the Milkshake!

Yes, I’m a glutton for punishment:

Can’t Stop the Music (1980)

How does this grab you as a recipe for disaster? Take the Village People, and throw in Valerie Perrine, Steve Guttenberg, and Bruce Jenner. Write several musical numbers that go on for way too long to spice up a nearly non-existent story, and have the whole mess directed by Nancy Walker. (Yes, Nancy Walker – mother to Rhoda, and also famous for playing Rosie the Bounty “quicker picker upper” lady.) Does it all sound too good to be true? Well, then you need to see Can’t Stop the Music – that is, if you have a strong stomach and can consume a lot of beer in 123 minutes. At the end of it all you’ll have the feeling that you’ve been assaulted by the happiest people on the planet, and wishing that you could strangle the studio exec who gave this mess the green light.

I remember when Can’t Stop the Music played at the Southglenn Theaters in Littleton; I was in the 6th grade. Riding in a car with one of my best friends, his mother commented as we drove past the marquee “Look, the Village People movie is playing – you like them, don’t you Billy?” My friend shifted uncomfortably in his seat and answered “No, Mom, I don’t like them…anymore.” Indeed, nobody really liked the Village People by the time this was released. The public avoided this film like the plague. Although the group was still popular when this film went into production, by the time it reached theaters the disco craze had ended. Still, you’d think that the inclusion of Olympic star Bruce Jenner would be enough to bring in the masses. Not to mention a young Steve Gutenberg! Surely the beautiful Valerie Perrine would bring in plenty of straight male viewers (yes, it has been theorized that this was the reason she was cast in the first place). No, apparently not. Not even a Baskin-Robbins tie in (they introduced a new flavor, Can’t Stop the Nuts, to promote the film) could save this mess from failing miserably. When ice cream can’t make something all better, you know it’s a lost cause.

The movie is about struggling songwriter Jack Morell (played by Gutenberg, and obviously a caricature of real life Village People mastermind Jacques Morali), who is looking for a way to get his songs heard. His friend Samantha (Perrine), a retired supermodel, decides to help him out by working some contacts she has in the recording industry. Oh, and somewhere along the line Jenner shows up as a jackass lawyer and love interest for Samantha. They recruit singers to create the Village People, in an effort to showcase Morell’s songs. Yes, they all show up for the auditions in those ridiculous costumes. Once the group is together, the viewer is attacked by several ridiculous musical numbers before the inevitable happy ending. Yes, there is a “YMCA” musical number showcasing all of the wonderful activities you can participate in at that fine institution. In the most unbelievable segment, the band and Samantha star in a commercial for the American Dairy Council. Decked out in white costumes, they perform the unforgettable song “Do the Milkshake” (trust me, once you get this tune in your head it’s nearly impossible to forget it). I could go on and on with more details, but then my head might explode.

If I had to choose one word to describe this movie, that word would be gay. Gay in every sense of the word – it’s very happy, it’s incredibly lame, and oh-so-very-gay (not that there's anything wrong with that...). The liner notes for the DVD make a pretty good case for Can’t Stop the Music as one of the ultimate “so bad it’s good” movies. I must admit, there is a certain perverse pleasure in making it all the way through an unintentionally hilarious mess like this film. (I've spent way too many hours of my life sitting through movies like this, I think that's apparent. I don't see myself stopping anytime soon.) Still, when the ending credits started to roll and the li’l woman asked “oh, is it over already?” I was a bit shocked. Wow, it takes all sorts, I guess…

"You're looking for someone, and it's not KISS..."

As if ABBA – The Movie wasn’t enough:

KISS Meets the Phantom of the Park (1978)

I was chatting with my coworker City Steaks not too long ago about the band KISS, and I mentioned that I was pretty sure I had a copy of this lame old curiosity (a collaboration between Hanna Barbera and the band) on VHS. She wanted to borrow it, so I dug through my box of old tapes in the basement – sure enough, it had managed to survive the purge that occurred before the big move from Seattle. I tossed the tape into the VCR to make sure it still played; I ended up sitting through the entire film. Gee, I guess I’ll never learn my lesson.

When this made-for-television film originally aired, I was a huge KISS fan. My fandom was something that irritated my parents to no end. To their credit, they never forbid me from playing their music (and I had a loud stereo!) or buying what little KISS merchandise I could afford on my tiny allowance. I knew kids whose parents forbid the music in their house, and would throw any KISS items they came across in the trash. My parents, especially my dad, preferred to take a mocking tone of derision. “What album is this?” he’d ask, “KISS Kills a Cow?” (I hafta admit, that joke really cracked me up at the time. As a matter of fact, it still does.) I can’t recall if my folks watched this with me when it was shown for the first time, but if they did it would’ve given them plenty of ammunition to tease me with. Even as a kid, I found myself thinking “I don’t know about this…” After it was shown, the next Monday me and all of my grade school pals were asking “what the hell was that??!!??” I still think that is the appropriate response to this mess.

The plot of the film is more or less the same as a Scooby-Doo episode, but starring KISS instead of that stupid dog and his stoner buddies. KISS is scheduled to play some concerts at Magic Mountain amusement park (yeah, all of the best concerts I’ve ever seen have been at amusement parks). To insane inventor Abner Devereaux (played by Anthony Zerbe, one of the kings of 1970’s made-for-tv films), these concerts are a symbol of the shift in the park’s entertainment focus that has led to his firing. He starts using robots to trash the park, including some that look like KISS in an effort to frame the rockers. He conducts all of this activity from his not-so-secret underground lair (geez, if the guy was fired, shouldn’t they have made the wacko give up his office?). Oh, and did I mention that KISS have superhero powers? Yep, they can all fly, leap great distances, and fight in slow motion. These powers are given to them by (what else?) their magical talisman. From what I can, their other super powers are as follows:

Paul Stanley, aka “Star Child”: The ability to read minds, shoot a red beam out of his eye, and speak in an incredibly annoying Noo Yawk accent.

Gene Simmons, aka “The Demon”: He can roar like a lion, breath fire, knock down cheap sets, and brag about how many groupies he’s banged and how much money he makes while wearing a really bad wig. (Okay, I made up that last part. He only does that in real life.) His voice sounds like its being put through a really cheesy synthesizer.

Ace Frehley, aka “Space Ace”: Teleporting himself and his fellow band members is his specialty. Oh, and he squawks like a parrot every 30 seconds or so.

Peter Criss, aka “Cat Man”: From what I can tell, the only unique skill Peter has is the ability to have all of his dialogue poorly dubbed by somebody else. Oh, what the hell – he has “cat like” reflexes. There, are you happy?

Sam, the former assistant to the evil scientist, is turned into a robot that Devereaux uses to carry out more misdeeds. His girlfriend Melissa tells KISS about Sam’s disappearance, and they take it upon themselves to investigate. They wander around the park at night looking for Devereaux’s lair to get some answers, and encounter all sorts of robots that they end up doing battle with (the most memorable battle is with a bunch of white haired gorillas wearing silver spacesuits). Sam manages to steal the talisman, KISS loses their powers, and the band is captured. Devereaux sends out the robot KISS to perform that evening’s concerts. The robots change the wholesome tune “Hotter Than Hell” into a new song, “Rip and Destroy,” in an attempt to get the crowd to riot and destroy the park. Needless to say, KISS escapes and get their talisman back, fly to the concert and beat up the robots. Sam is turned back into a real boy and reunited with Melissa. The evil Devereaux ends up with white hair and you can’t really tell if he’s supposed to be dead or just insane. The poor sap who sat through this mess drinks another beer and counts the ways that the last 90 minutes could have been better spent. So, it’s all happily ever after, I guess.

This movie is out of print currently, and seems to be a bit of a skeleton in the closet for the band – it wasn’t long after it aired that their popularity slid and they started to be seen as a joke kiddie band. There are plenty of people selling copies on Ebay if you’re truly curious. I would guess that it will eventually be released on DVD as there is a buck to be made, and KISS isn’t exactly discriminating when it comes to that sort of thing.

"I like their clean cut beat…"

I recently had the “pleasure” of watching a few music related films that you don’t hear too much about. Here are my observations on one of them:

ABBA – The Movie (1977)

This was shown on cable on New Year’s Eve, so I dutifully taped it and watched it a few nights later. I actually remember this playing in the theater when I was a kid and living in Houston. I showed my parents the ad in the paper, in hopes that they would take me to see it. “ABBA? Who would want to see a movie about them?” my dad responded. I was a bit disappointed as not only was ABBA the only group I liked that my parents approved of (they didn’t like my other faves KISS and the Beatles – yeah, the Beatles, go figure…), but they listened to them as well. So flash forward nearly 28 years, and I’m finally getting to see it. Not that I was holding my breath or anything…

The bulk of the movie is documentary footage of ABBA’s 1977 Australian tour. You get to see some incredibly boring backstage footage in which the band members will jump back and forth in conservation from English to their native Swedish (having visited Sweden once before, I’ve witnessed this phenomenon firsthand – it’s bizarre). Also featured are some press conferences, in which the Australian journalists seem very interested in Agnetha’s “bottom.” Apparently, her rear end was voted “the best in Europe” (“How can I tell?” she coyly comments, "I can not see it!"), so who can blame them? The bulk of the footage is from concerts, the first live film I’ve ever seen of the band. Unfortunately, this footage is a bit grainy and not all that impressive. What struck me the most is how amateurish their stage show is by today’s standards. ABBA was the biggest pop band in the world at the time this was filmed. Anyone even close to that status now would have a dozen synchronized dancers and several costume changes (not to mention lip synching). Witnessing Agnetha and Anni-Frid’s clunky dance moves, it’s quite apparent that they haven’t been anywhere near a dance instructor. A costume change for these two is putting on a goofy wig and cape. It’s rather charming when compared to the cold performances of today’s poptarts – they appear to be having as much fun onstage as anyone in the audience. Oh, and Agnetha’s bottom is featured prominently in a few shots.

There is a lame subplot in the film, in which a popular deejay is following ABBA across the continent attempting to get an interview for a radio special he’s been assigned to produce. Needless to say, he gets turned away by the group’s handlers constantly or misses his connections – if he met up with them too easily, they wouldn’t be able to drag out the subplot for 90 minutes. Okay, if this guy is such a popular deejay, couldn’t his radio station set up an interview or establish a few contacts? One of the more ridiculous parts in the film is when he is trying to find the band’s first press conference at their hotel. He’s driving around the city and he yells up at a truck driver in traffic next to him “Do you know where ABBA is staying? You know, ABBA, the Swedish pop group!” Along the way, he gets interviews from fans. The best comment is from an older gentleman who says he likes ABBA for their “clean cut beat.” A little girl says that she thinks ABBA is “sekkks-seeeeee,” to which her friend replies “I don’t think they’re sexy, I think they’re nice” (apparently she hasn’t checked out Agnetha’s bottom). A music professor says he appreciates the fact that ABBA’s lyrics “don’t concern themselves with whips and chains.” (Huh??!!??!!) At one point the deejay has a dream in which he has become best friends with the group. The dream is a montage sequence that includes him getting his interview, playing Frisbee and golf with the band, having candlelit dinners with them, alternately making out with Anna-Frid and Agnetha, getting big bear hugs from Benny and Bjorn, riding on the band’s yacht, and playing poker in an old west saloon in period costumes. You know, all of the typical stuff you do with your best friends. Will the deejay ever get his interview? By running into them in an elevator, perhaps, after he has given up all hope? I’ll never tell.

This movie was pretty rough going at first – the li’l woman and I looked at each other about 20 minutes in and I said “I don’t know if I can make it through 90 minutes of this.” Then the dream sequence came soon thereafter and hooked us in. It’s currently not in print, but a DVD is supposedly coming out by the end of the year. It’s far from a great movie, but I’d recommend it to ABBA fanatics, cheesy movie enthusiasts, and people who appreciate Agnetha’s bottom.