Broken Laughs

Thursday, January 27, 2022

I couldn't sleep last night, so I got up and watched "The Man Who Laughs" starring Conrad Veidt. It was broadcasted on the local KTLA station, and typically my TV set seems to be attached to Channel 5. Call me sentimental, but I can't watch any station except KTLA. It meant so much to me as a youngster. I am pretty sure I witnessed the shooting of Lee Harvey Oswald on this station. It was the first time I became aware of someone getting shot and dying, compared to watching Westerns on Saturday mornings where bad guys got shot, but mostly just shooting the gun out of their hands. So the fact that someone got shot, and not only did they die, but Oswald didn't have a gun in his hand when he got shot, was just odd to me. 

Sometimes KTLA would broadcast a D.W. Griffith film, but for some reason, it was hard for me to watch a silent movie on a TV set. In a movie theater, no problem. Especially when they have an organist on the bill, the first time I saw a Griffith film was in Tokyo with Mie Yanashita on the piano. "Broken Blossoms" was the film, and Ms. Yanashita's music score was very touching and beautiful. 

After I dressed, I went to Amoeba Music to locate some piano or organ silent movie music this morning. There were some titles there, but I wanted something that would fit the mood of either "Broken Blossoms" or "The Man Who Laughs." After almost an hour in their soundtrack section, I couldn't find what I was looking for. But that's life in a nutshell. You try to force a 'taste' on oneself instead of letting it naturally go to you. I should have looked for the music with no thought to my head. 

Nevertheless, I found myself in the Associates/Billy Mackenzie vinyl section in the other large room at the store. The late (and much missed) Billy always reminded me of Lord Byron, and if Byron were alive now, no doubt he would be a lead singer in some Sunset Strip band. Or maybe work in a used clothing boutique in Echo Park. 

When I got home, I felt a depression upon me. Before the dark cloud takes over, I usually can fight it off by reading the poems and writings by Francis Picabia. But this time, it didn't do the work, so I put on Malcolm McLaren's "Paris" album, which didn't exactly cheer me up but made the pain seem like a dream.