(EDITOR’S NOTE : from time to time, highly respected Bronx baseball executive Randy L. visits CSTB to address the major issues of the day, sporting and otherwise. After last week’s highly publicized and debated premiere of Brett Morgen’s Kurt Cobain documentary, “Montage Of Heck”, Randy requested, no, he insisted on having his say – GC).
Greetings members of the Yankee Universe, lovers of high art and the jealous, unsophisticated, dull-witted persons who find trivia night at their local chicken wing emporium to be the highlight of their week. Speaking of which, when persons like this blog’s editor spent the early 1990’s chasing “speedballs” and fleeting, sleazy encounters with persons of indeterminate gender or planetary orgin at establishments like lower Manhattan’s Pyramid Club, I was busting my ass, honing the skills that would someday see me become the crucial individual leading professional sports’ most important franchise. As such, I cannot, for instance, tell you which member of Ugly Kid Joe would someday go on to shoot Osama Bin Laden. When you try to tell me a joke like, “what’s the difference between a back issue of The Big Takeover and the bathroom at CBGB?”, I simply have no idea what you’re talking about.
That said, I do make some effort to put popular culture in some broader context, and when a plaid-clad Brian Cashman announced he’d arranged an advance screening for Yankee brass of “Montage Of Heck”, adding in his usually smug fashion, “but you wouldn’t care about that, would you, Randy?”, I was all too happy to show that sniveling, overpaid/oversexed little creep that just when you think you know Randy L., it turns out you’ve got no fucking idea.
For starters, I thought the film was a carefully crafted portrait of a sensitive young man with extraordinary talent — alright, he was no Matt Berninger — who unfortunately, fell under the influence of a more assertive, possibly destructive female companion, and resorted to drug abuse at the height of his success.
(illustration courtesy Tim Cook)
It’s an American tragedy, and the film bore an uncanny resemblance to a collection of video tapes I’ve compiled from scenes shot in a number of midtown NYC penthouses and health clubs. You see, unlike the tawdry punk rock world inhabited by the late Kurt Cobain and the sickening creeps who read & edit this blog, baseball doesn’t look kindly upon defacing rental properties or using needles without the supervision of team-approved medical personnel. While it saddens me that Mr. Cobain didn’t live long enough to reap the rewards and gold CD statuettes he earned during his artistic tenure, a young Randy L. would’ve been the first person to offer his legal skills to a Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame seeking to deny entry, much as you’ll see Shannon Hoon singing “God Bless America” at the new Yankee Stadium before I sign a six million dollar check made out to a monumental fraud like Alex Rodriguez.
And for fuck’s sake, Cashman. Get rid of the skater shorts. It’s 2015.