UPDATE, 12.16.09: Video now working. Thanks for your patience.
I’ve written about this before, but I think it bears repeating: I was scarred for life by the news teasers I saw as a kid. There are two reasons for this.
1) I grew up in New York in the 1980s. In these post-Giuliani’s reich years, it’s hard to remember just how truly effed up NYC was in the 80s. The city was beset by all manner of horrifying things–drugs, murder, arson, poverty, Ed Koch…
2) The 1980s also marked the beginning of SCARE NEWS. Local stations couldn’t just entice you with actual news. They did SPECIAL REPORTS and INVESTIGATIONS on how everything in your house could murder you in your sleep.
The combination of these two phenomena made watching TV as a kid an exercise in terror. In my memories, the news was even worse during the holidays. Every news clip took place in a driving snowstorm, with squad car lights glinting off dirty road ice, and included at least three of the following:
A crumbling tenement stairwell
Cops draping a white sheet across a dead body
Blood spattered on wall/floor/window
A front door blackened by fire/explosion
Close up of a crack vial
Victim’s screaming relatives
Charred children’s toys
A sketch of the alleged perpetrator, making him look like maniac
If you weren’t there, it’s hard to convey just how frightening it was. But thanks to the Vast and Dusty Scratchbomb VHS Archives, I’ve compiled a bunch of these teasers into one handy-dandy YouTube clip.
Most of these are from CBS-2, but they’re pretty representative of news teasers for all local NYC stations back in the 1980s. Keep in mind, all of these teasers–all of them–aired during holiday specials intended for kids. “Manhunt in progress for the man police call The Face-Peeling Rapist. Is he in your town? We’ll tell you at 11. But now, back to A Charlie Brown Christmas!”
For a while, I was in quite a state. Luckily, I had friends and family who helped me get the help I so desperately needed. I’ve spent the last few months at a retreat in the Berkshires, where simple living, meditation, and yoga have helped me manage my anger issues.
Really? Good for you!
I even stayed away from any news of baseball, to keep unnecessary stressors out of my life. I now realize that existence is suffering, and suffering is brought on by desire. In my case, it was a desire for a championship for my favorite team. I have now eliminated that desire from inner being.
You seem so centered now. I’m truly impressed. But maybe we shouldn’t talk about the Mets.
No, no, this is all part of my healing process. I can not live in a cocoon, nor do I wish to. I can enjoy the pastoral pleasures of America’s pastime without making one team’s fortunes the sum total of my existence.
In that case, the big news is the blockbuster trade the Phillies are in the process of completing, getting Roy Halladay from the Blue Jays. That’s obviously bad news for the Mets.
I would agree, if the Phillies hadn’t also traded away Cliff Lee in the same deal. From what I have read, Mr. Halladay projects to be only 0.5 wins above replacement higher than Mr. Lee next season. One could argue that they have not improved by a measurable amount. Not to mention that Mr. Halladay is 33 years old and has subjected his formidable right arm to quite a bit of work over the year. Also, whatever extension he signs with Philadelphia may impact that club’s ability to sign some of its other players when they reach free agency.
I guess you could argue all of these things, but even if the Phillies made a lateral move here, the Mets still need to make a few moves of their own to catch up. Do you think there’s any chance they can do that, given the current free agent class?
I suppose that’s still possible, either through the signing of a Matt Holliday or a similar slugger. However, I think the Mets would be best served by employing platoons at positions such as left field and first base, perhaps look for low-risk/high-reward options on the pitching market. A Ben Sheets, for instance. In the current market, it makes no sense to overpay for mediocrity. Especially considering the the 2010 free agent class looks to be far superior.
That might mean not seriously contending next season. How do you sell that to anxious fans like yourself…I mean, like you used to be?
Perhaps the Mets’ front office should remind the fans that a team’s fortunes proceed like the seasons themselves. The bounty of fall is always followed by the fallow winter. One cannot preoccupy one’s self with but one tiny spoke on the wheel of Time.
I guess when you put it that way, it makes me feel better about the Mets in general. You’re right, things ebb and flow. One day you’re up, the next day you’re down. It’s so stupid to get upset about stuff like Bengie Molina wanting a three year deal from the Mets.
ARE YOU FUCKIN KIDDIN ME?! BENGIE MOLINA?! DAT FAT FUCK WHO CAN’T TAKE A WALK TO SAVE HIS FAT LIFE?! OMAR, LISTEN UP GOOD! IF YOU OFFER MORE THAN ONE MONTH TO THAT TUBBA FAILURE I WILL CARVE YOU LIKE A CHRISTMAS GOOSE! AND I NEVER CARVED NO CHRISTMAS GOOSE BEFORE, SO IT’S GONNA BE SLOW AND MESSY!!
Whoah, you just spent the last five minutes talking like the Dalai Lama by way of Bill James, and Bengie Molina’s name sets you off?
I DON’T WANT HIM NOWHERES NEARS MY TEAM! THE ONLY REASON DIS LAND MONSTER SHOULD GO TO QUEENS IS IF HE’S AT LAGUARDIA GETTIN SHIPPED BACK TO SEA WORLD!!
Congratulations on your short-lived serenity.
YOU BETTER RENDER MY REPONSES IN ALL CAPS, BECAUSE THAT’S HOW ANGRY I AM!
It appears today’s scheduled Holiday Horrors post is experiencing technical difficulties. In the meantime, please enjoy this pinch-hitting horror. For other Holiday Horrors posts, click here.
I hate to pick on Neil Diamond, but…Actually, scratch that. I don’t hate to pick on Neil Diamond at all. He’s kinda ridiculous, in a way not totally unlike another of my favorite giggle targets, Danzig. He has that perfect blend of theatricality and self-importance that I really admire in a figure of mockery.
Having mentioned Neil’s rendition of “The Little Drummer Boy” (and his Christmas special) in a previous post, I figured that was enough Diamond bashing for one holiday season. But then my cousin hipped me to another one of his Christmas tunes. I am so glad he did, because this is a goldmine (if goldmines contained rich veins of turd instead of gold).
It’s called “Cherry Cherry Christmas”. Perhaps you’ve heard Neil’s smash 1970s hit “Cherry Cherry”. When I first heard Neil Diamond wrote a song called “Cherry Cherry Christmas”, I thought it might just be a repurposed version of the earlier tune. You know, with the lyrics altered slightly. “She’s got the way to Yule me!”
But it’s not. And amazing as this might sound, you’ll wish it was once you hear “Cherry Cherry Christmas.”
I didn’t even know what to say the first time I listened to it, because I didn’t really know what I just heard. Did Neil Diamond just take the title of one of his biggest hits and slap it on a holiday song? One that doesn’t sound anything like the original?! One that namechecks other songs of his? And not just a few times, but constantly throughout the song?!
Seriously, can you imagine anyone else doing something like this? Of course you can’t. Only Neil Diamond has the sheer balls and lack of shame to pen and perform a song in which he wishes everyone a Neil Diamond Christmas.
To really appreciate its grandeur, you need to break it down piece by piece.
Start: Swelling music, jingle bells, flutes, glockenspiel…oh, this is going to be a soft, sentimental Christmas song. That sounds nice…
0:13:Wish you a very merry, Cherry Cherry Christmas/And a Holly Holy holiday too…That is the first line of this song. These are the first words you hear in this song. Look, this tender holiday-themed music isn’t to get you into the Christmas spirit. It’s to get you to check out the remastered Neil Diamond back catalog, currently on sale at Amazon, iTunes, and Best Buy.
If Neil had done this as a rollicking, tongue-in-cheek holiday song, it might have worked. Might have. But The Jazz Singer would have none of that. No, his song about how everyone should have a Neil Diamond Christmas is very serious and can only be appropriately expressed through the use of harp and a 40-piece string section.
0:45: After a bunch of oppressively dumb lyrics (and another shoutout to one of his own compositions, “Song Sung Blue”), Neil ends the first verse with these words: You’ll have a very merry, Cherry Cherry, Holly Holy, rock n’ roll-y Christmas this year. Just a reminder: Neil Diamond was born in 1958. He is not 6 years old, as these lyrics might indicate.
1:11:Feels like pretty amazing grace/If you know what I mean…No, Neil, I haven’t the slightest idea what you mean. Unless you’re referring to the song “Pretty Amazing Grace” off of your 27th studio album, Home Before Dark, which I’m sure can be picked up at Borders and all fine retailers at a reasonable price.
1:29:In a world of make believe, I’m a believer/And I believe in things not always understood…Did you know that Neil Diamond has a wonderful plan for your life? He’s so magical, he can even reference songs he wrote for others but never recorded himself!
2:03:Let’s raise a Christmas toast of red red wine/We’ll even sing “Sweet Caroline”/While the whole world sings along…It take a special kind of man to not only reference two of his own songs in one verse, but insist the entire world will be chanting one of them in his honor to celebrate Jesus’ birth. Is that because Jesus’ mother’s name was Caroline, or because he’s a Sox fan?
2:13: Cue the sax solo from “Just the Way You Are”!
2:44: Makes you wanna have a very merry/Holly Holy/Cherry Cherry/Christmastime the whole year long…Sorry Neil, I think in such a world, the survivors would envy the dead.
3:20: He ends by yelling out CHERRY CHRISTMAS, EVERYONE! Because if you’re gonna write a Christmas monument to yourself, the time for restraint has long since passed. You go out with a bang, not a whimper. VERY CHERRY NEIL DIAMOND-MAS IN BLUE JEANS, EVERYONE! AND A HOT AUGUST NIGHT TO YOU AS WELL!
Congrats, Neil Diamond. You’ve written the most self-serving piece of Christmas dreck ever. You may collect your prize from the bursar.
First off, I haven’t spoken with you since