Postmambo Rides, While I Do Face Splat and Then Watch 1930's Shanghai

       . . . .  Tomorrow, Thursday, August 4, 2022, at 8 pm Eastern, Postmambo Sessions presents a Zoom conversation with T.J. English about his just-published book Dangerous Rhythms: Jazz and the Underworld.

T.J.'s many books -- all of them about organized crime -- include The Westies, Paddy Whacked, The Savage City, The Corporation, and of course the best-selling Havana Nocturne, which was the basis for an unforgettable Postmambo Cuban Music Seminar live in Havana in February 2019. Collectively, they offer a vision of America as compelling as any novelist's. He's also a well-known music head: Dangerous Rhythms was previously the title of the series he curated at Manhattan's Zinc Bar. He and I can talk up a storm, and we have many times, but this is also your chance to jump in and ask him whatever you want -- within reason and the bounds of legality.

The Zoom link will go out two hours before start time on Thursday. You need to be on the [seminar] mailing list to receive it (this is [nedslist].) So if you're not on [seminar], shoot me an e-mail at ned@qbadisc.com and put [seminar] in the subject line.

Our next Postmambo Movie Night (title and guest TBA) will be August 25. In September we return to our regular schedule of the second and third Thursday of each month.

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Reading: "Soon the world will be unrecognizable," Robin McKie, Guardian: "The publication of Bill McGuire’s latest book, Hothouse Earth, could not be more timely . . . The crucial point, he argues, is that there is now no chance of us avoiding a perilous, all-pervasive climate breakdown. We have passed the point of no return and can expect a future in which lethal heatwaves and temperatures in excess of 50C (120F) are common in the tropics; where summers at temperate latitudes will invariably be baking hot, and where our oceans are destined to become warm and acidic."

Watching: Judge Maya Guerra Gamble rebukes Alex Jones: "Your beliefs do not make something true." https://twitter.com/washingtonpost/status/1554856818450612225

Watching: Reefer Madness (1936) colorized clip (musical!): https://twitter.com/SoozUK/status/1554131039496376320 The pastel smoke!

Music in NYC: Miguel Zenón Quartet, Village Vanguard, Aug. 23-28. Their concert at Columbia's Miller Theater in May was a serious contender for best of year, if there ever could be such a thing as "best." Tour schedule here: https://miguelzenon.com/schedule/

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UPCOMING POSTMAMBO MUSIC SEMINARS
Aug. 11-18: Cali and Buenaventura, Colombia.
Feb. 1-6, 2023: New Orleans: For the Funk of It.
More to come in 2023. 

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     . . . .  I have a chin so purple it could be black, same with right knee, scratched up right side of nose, smashed mouth, and a bruised right frontal bone.  Monday morning tripped on a sidewalk bump I could not see, due to color and the damaged optical nerve of my right eyes that severely impairs at best looking down. I came out of this far, far better than a woman of my age -- and my back and multiple previous injuries -- has any reason to expect, No broken teeth or bones or blood. 

Giving the credit to my constant quest to improve back strength and reduce pain via exercise, stretch, vitamins, diet and medicinal cannabis.

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     . . . . What to Watch when a mess: Miss S. (2020 China, 2022 HBO). Shanghai remake of Miss Fisher’s Mysteries, in great detail, except in Chinese, and in Shanghai, not Australia.  The clothes and jewels are equally exquisite too. Purrfect escape viewing. The principals have nailed down the elegant yet sexy sit-and-lean-into-each-other on the office desktop, such a signature move in Hollywood Tracy-Hepburn flix of the 1930’s.

The ladies in Miss S are so pretty, as pretty as their clothes, though oddly, one cannot miss, that though this is supposedly Shanghai in the 1930's, the elite women such as Miss Su dress in couture from the late 1940's - early - mid 1950's. Which strikes me, at least, as, odd.  Of course their shoes are pure 2020, not at all 1930's either.  But all are beautiful, and exquisitely fabricated. Miss S follows the Miss Fisher laudable practice of repeating the wearing of the fabulously expensive, hand-made gowns and jewelry throughout. We see new outfits created and purchased, but then they move into the rotation.  Miss Su repeats wearing her beautiful chemsongs, as well as her Western gowns.



The actress who plays Miss Su has terrific comic timing.  The whole cast is very good.

The major difference between the Australian production of Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries and the Shanghai-Netflix production of Miss S is there are chase scenes and fights of the sorts seldom, if ever, in the Australian version. Since Miss S is 2020?, and Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries is 2012-2015, which isn't that much of time difference, this seems a deliberate decision to have more 'action' than the Australian version. As the series progresses, it gets a bit more dark too, in a way that Miss Fisher did not.

Another major difference revealed as the series roll on – emphasis on not having children as a good choice that women naturally shall want to make. Early on there’s an ep in which Su’s assistant poses as a woman desperate for an abortion – it’s not the abortion that’s criminal or wrong, but the men making money from providing dangerous and toxic conditions, at great expense.

A darker dimension is with us as we realize that soon China will be invaded by Japan, and WWII comes early to Shanghai.