DC Sorrow is dead...

I got a call yesterday.

It was a voicemail from some anonymous humanoid deep within the vast super-hive of the TicketMaster Corporation... It sounded female but it could've been a computer simulation...

The show to which I had bought two tickets, as she said: "thee....... Pretty THINGS... at the Black Cat in......Worshington DEE-SEE...." had been canceled. And my credit card would be credited immediately.

Oh shit.

Well, eh, easy come, easy go. But obviously, your humble narrator was hot to see the show, as evidenced by all that slobbering weirdness a few posts back.

So I went online to see if I could suss what happened. And the Pretty Things' European booking agency's website was down.

Then I went to Arthur Brown's site, since I had been equally thrilled at the prospect of seeing the God of Hellfire himself that night. And in a post dated Feb 9th was a harsh little one-liner that read:

Arthur is not touring with the Pretty Things in the USA in April and he never was.

So, something is amiss here. The show was to be a breakthrough for us, since Mrs. Intangible expressed interest in actually going to this one. Well, I've played the Pretty Things albums SF Sorrow and Parachute around the house endlessly, so she knew that material.

And of course, the Crazy World of Arthur Brown album is one of those records that made me what I am today. For better or for (much) worse...

So this would've been our first club date since we did that duel in Tucson years ago, where she took me to see Charlie Daniels Band and I responded with Stereolab and the Olivia Tremor Control at the Rialto.

Now THERE's a good test of a relationship.

But that's all beside the point. There's some intrigue going on between the Pretties, Arthur Brown, and the tour agency. But if anyone was interested, the point is, the Black Cat date is killed. Alas.

DC Sorrow is born!

Great Vivian Prince's ghost, do my eyes deceive me?

So I was determined to take a stroll during lunch, in honor of the awesome weather (cool, gray, breezy, almost rain)...

Passing the front windows of the Black Cat, paused to scan the board for upcoming shows, and The Pretty Things jumped out at me like a stoned jack-in-the-box on fire, wrapped in glowing, squid-like tentacles...and dammit, you know I can't resist a cosmic squid-like tentacle now and then.

HOLY CRAP: The Pretty Things are coming to town. Friday 11april.


For the unaware: Absolutely essential 60s rock band. Early albums are great blues rock but more popish, and some have unfortunate producer add-ons like studio horn players (as in the Emotions lp, 1967), but with 1968's S.F. Sorrow, these cats became heroes. It was a rocking psychedelic masterpiece. One of the ten best albums of all time. Damn straight.

So this makes the surviving band members a bunch of geezers trying to grasp one last shot before being cast off to die in peace, yeh?

Not so! Their surprise comeback release Rage Before Beauty in 1999 proved they still have some life left, and while it isn't nearly their best work, it had some convincing moments.

There's also the DVD of the Pretty Things playing the SF Sorrow material live at Abbey Road, in 1998. And they did a fantastic job of it. The where-the-hell-did-he-come-from guitar solo by Dave Gilmour wasn't even too distracting: He sort of appeared and vanished like a prankster ghost. But the band was in great form.

So that's the history lesson.


I got back to the office and checked the Black Cat's schedule. And sure enough, it's real. But, what's this? Arthur Brown on the bill as well? Jumping Manatee Beans! This Intangible Head needs to sit down. Too much excitement.

CREDIT: Tour poster courtesy of IDB Booking.