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Tuesday, June 5, 2012

Upcoming / Video Blues Control - "Love's a Rondo"

Posted by Kathy Fennessy on Tue, Jun 5, 2012 at 10:26 AM

Tara Sinn / Drag City
Allstar the MTA Mime (Tarik Davidson)

I remember a time, from the late-'60s through the mid-'70s, when mimes were a little bit cool (the key phrase here is "a little bit"). There was the mimes-playing-tennis scene that concludes Michelangelo Antonioni's Blow-Up, there was Marcel Marceau's "Non!" in Mel Brooks's Silent Movie, and then there was the Swiss pretzel-people phenomenon of Mummenschanz (an act that came all the way to my Anchorage hometown to shift some shapes, an admirable feat in and of itself).

20th Century Fox
Marcel Marceau in Silent Movie (1976)

By the late-'70s, however, nothing was less cool than a mime. They had became a joke. Their stretch pants, face paint, and "I'm stuck in a box" routine had grown old, tired, and downright pathetic. And this went on for decades. In fact, it's still going on. In their new video, however, Coopersburg, PA duo Blues Control put in a bid for mime acceptance. For all I know, it could herald the start of a revival. Or not. In any case, their psychedelic interpretation of Vince Guaraldi is pretty cool.

Listen to another new track, "Iron Pigs," here. Formerly based in Queens, Blues Control features Lea Cho (keyboards) and Russ Waterhouse (guitar, synthesizer, tapes). Drag City releases Valley Tangents, their fourth full-length in seven years (not counting cassettes, collaborations, and CD-Rs), on June 19, 2012.