Welles with Manowar

[Terry]

Welles still gigging with Beatrice's once-favourite death-metal band:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LzmnJEhL0bk

"Demon borscht called black death?" Wha?????????

You think all these German kids become Welles fans? Could be!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1depDSULUU8

[Magentarose67]

You think all these German kids become Welles fans? Could be!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1depDSULUU8

One can only hope ...

Are these kids Orson fans?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PUOq-x5gh5M

It has nothing to do with Orson except the title...

[Terry]

Nice avatar! Some decade I'll make an animated gif of Arkadin removing his mask.

That appears to be a defunct Chicago band. I heard "rosebud" mentioned a couple of times, but couldn't understand much more than that. I didn't find the lyrics when I looked online.

They could be Welles fans, or at least one of them was. I once worked with an art major who only knew Welles from F for Fake, which she liked very much, and she'd never seen "Orson Welles drunk" on Youtube, so that was refreshing and encouraging. I gave her Citizen Kane and Falstaff to watch instead.

[NoFake]

Actually, the voice even sounds like Welles, in the narration he did in his later years of the song... I can't remember the title, but it's about not being young anymore. I know somebody remembers it...

[Magentarose67]

Nice avatar! Some decade I'll make an animated gif of Arkadin removing his mask.

That appears to be a defunct Chicago band. I heard "rosebud" mentioned a couple of times, but couldn't understand much more than that. I didn't find the lyrics when I looked online.

They could be Welles fans, or at least one of them was. I once worked with an art major who only knew Welles from F for Fake, which she liked very much, and she'd never seen "Orson Welles drunk" on Youtube, so that was refreshing and encouraging. I gave her Citizen Kane and Falstaff to watch instead.

Thanks! I got so happy when I found it ! And so good that you rescued your friend from that horrid video...Kane and Falstaff were great choices to start off your introduction to Orson ...they are my favorites, along with The Third Man and Jane Eyre. If only it wasn't the first result that pops up on YouTube or Google when your search for Orson...

Please do make that gif of Mr. Arkadin if you have the chance...it would be so epic!

[Roger Ryan]

Actually, the voice even sounds like Welles, in the narration he did in his later years of the song... I can't remember the title, but it's about not being young anymore. I know somebody remembers it...

I believe this is what you are referring to...

ToBeYoung.jpg

And for those who'd like to hear it, go here...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=koGnZg2kzxY&feature=fvw

[Harvey Chartrand]

Oh God, the horror. One of those late-career low ebbs that REALLY make you wish Welles had stayed in Hollywood and finished Ambersons. I heard this crummy tune back in the day and it must have been such an embarrassment for Welles... and for Welles' fans. Wasn't The Mike Curb Congregation involved in this atrocity? Or was it The Association? At least Welles was able to work with the Alan Parsons Project on Tales of Mystery and Imagination – a project more befitting his legendary stature. Never heard the Manowar gig.

[tonyw]

The Mike Curb Congregation was also an "atrocity" and I agree with Harvey over the Alan Parsons Project. Chris Feder Welles documents many of these "bread and butter" projects in her touching biography that I'm currently reading.

[Terry]

Those were the Ray Charles Singers on the Welles single. Yes, Harv, that was one of the nadirs. It fits in well with any "Golden Throats" or "Worst of Celebrity Singers" compilations, though personally I found some of the segments from The Dinah Shore Show on TV to be much worse, such as the intoxicated duet between Gavin MacLeod and Robert Blake - or the ballad crooned by Herve Villechaize. In the 60s Welles performed on that Leonard Bersntein recording of Blitzstein's Air Symphony, and Orson was so good on that he was terrifying, IMO. Welles also recorded those audio books after he'd turned 70, so not all of his late-career activities were shite.

Hey Keats, I'd read in one of the biographies that the Manowar sessions came about because they were Beatrice's favourite band at the time. I think it's cool if they use the recordings in their current concerts. Kind of like Jeff Wayne using Richard Burton's narration in his War of the Worlds live concerts. At least Manowar doesn't use an animated CG head of Orson mouthing the words (as Wayne does with Burton.) I became a Welles fan through seeing him on the Paul Masson commercials, so becoming one after attending a rock show isn't really a stretch.

Thanks, Magentarose. My friend did like Third Man and Jane Eyre. She was disappointed by War of the Worlds, thinking it should have been scarier. And she was born on Welles' birthday, so she was destined to find out at least something about him. If someone has a spare bottle of vitality handy, perhaps I can exhume myself enough to capture the necessary frames for assembling that animated gif.

[RayKelly]

I have read the "Beatrice was a fan explanation" too, but I am not sure I buy it.
Welles appeared on Manowar's debut album, which came out in 1982. (I was a college student into Welles working at record store at the time).
Manowar had been an unsigned, largely unknown New York metal band. Was a then 27-year old Beatrice Welles a devoted metal head who heard them at clubs in the Big Apple?
There were also stories that Welles was impressed with their love of Norse mythology, which is hard to believe.
Whatever the reason, it is amazing that a new band was able to score an appearance by Welles on their debut disc.

There is a video documentary on Manowar's Asgard Saga, which includes a very brief audio bit from Welles describing Manowar's Joey DeMaio as a professional and loyal friend.

[RayKelly]

There is an Asgard Saga web site with a video documentary that is 10 minutes long. There is a VERY brief audio clip in it of Welles saying the few kind words about DeMaio as I mentioned earlier and a B/W photol of him with the band.

Thanks for the tip on the Brady book. I was surprised to read that Beatrice had written music reviews for the London Times. It is possible the story that Brady tells of Welles overhearing a tape of the band is true. (Still, we are talking about Beatrice having a demo tape of a virtually unknown band).

In a 1983 article on Manowar in People magazine, it was reported: "Welles narrated a song on last year's debut album, Battle Hymns, and can be heard again on a soon-to-be released single, Defender. Orson won't comment on his contribution."

I have given up searching for an interview where a rock jouranalists asks DeMaio or someone in the band about Welles.

[Terry]

There is a video documentary on Manowar's Asgard Saga, which includes a very brief audio bit from Welles describing Manowar's Joey DeMaio as a professional and loyal friend.

It also includes the photo of Welles with the group and interviews with Wolfgang Hohlbein and Christopher Lee:

http://www.asgard-saga.com/2009/05/the- ... w-117.html

[mido505]

Glad you mentioned Christopher Lee, Store. In March, Lee will release his "symphonic metal" album CHARLEMAGNE: BY THE SWORD AND THE CROSS. Informative Telegraph UK article here: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstop ... album.html
Snippets of tracks at CHRISTOPHER LEE WEB here: http://www.christopherleeweb.com/
Myspace page here: http://www.myspace.com/charlemagnemusical
Lee is evidently friends with Joey DiMaio, leader of MANOWAR, so it looks like at least one member of the band is a film geek. Perhaps DiMaio saw Welles doing those Goth DARK TOWER commercials in the early 80's and thought of him when it came time to record MANOWAR'S first album. MANOWAR has a contact link at their website, so I emailed them and asked about the association with Welles. If I get an answer, I'll post it.

[mido505]

Store, I am so pleased to see you state that you first discovered Welles through the Paul Masson commercials, and I love that RayKelly has chosen that incarnation of Welles as his avatar. I have never had a problem with Welles the pitchman; that endearing, avuncular commercial confidant, ubiquitous in the late 70's early 80's, is an important component of the Welles persona. It somehow made him seem an even more essential and enduring part of the culture for a younger generation at a time when many of the old giants were being marginalized, forgotten, or mummified. My friends and I used to talk about Welles's commercials, and look forward to the new ones. The man had presence, he was cool, and when I later caught up with most of his films, it just made him cooler that the guy who directed THE TRIAL could show up on TV and state with utmost authority, "if variety is the spice of life, then Preview is surely the paprika...". The commercials humanized Welles to a degree, made him more like us, and, conversely, made it seem possible that we could be more like him, that his achievement was not an Olympian impossibility destined never to be repeated.

I would like to note that I have always suspected that that infamous Paul Masson drunk outtake is not what it seems. Every biography of Welles that I have ever read agree on two things: that he was scrupulously professional during his commercial gigs, taking them very seriously and doing his utmost to make the thing work; and that his ability to imbibe and function was almost superhuman. This was a guy who could drink two or three bottles of wine at lunch, go back to work until midnight, and then stay up until four tapping out a script. For Welles to get that stupified, so that he could barely function, would require drinking how much wine, a case? While they were setting up the lights? I don't buy it. I think the thing was a gag, another Wellesian hoax, and a funny one to boot. Watch the video again without preconceptions and look at the expression on Welles's face. It's priceless. Classic comedy from a master of manipulation.

[Terry]

Thanks, mido. I thought Welles' wine ads were better than the programs on which Paul Masson were advertising, and Welles himself was more charismatic and interesting than anyone in those programs, or most anyone else on television period. I do think he was quite royally roasted in that outtake and not performing his Crazy Welles persona. Perhaps decades of legendary drinking left his liver unable to filter alcohol very well. There are hours of outtakes from Arkadin that were shown on RAI and in one sequence in particular Welles is roaring with raucous laughter at one of the actors and loudly talking over the guy's lines; I don't remember if Welles was slurring his speech, but he sounded toasted to me, and it lent credence to Louis Dolivet's complaint about Welles' drinking during the shoot. I'm not moralizing about it, but that was the era when people had martinis for lunch and smoked liked chimneys all day long. The drunk outtake commercial was the last Welles did for Masson, and for its broadcast version Welles had returned to ADR his lines. I was waiting for the next Welles Masson ad, but there never was one; instead we got a thin John Gielgud hawking Paul Masson Lite wines. I think Masson said at some point that the New Trend was that fat was out and thin was in. If Manowar were the partyers that many other rockers are, they probably would have liked a boozing old director who thought marijuana was the beer of drugs. I doubt they would have sought out Ronald and Nancy Reagan, even if they weren't otherwise preoccupied.