Music Review: Naughty Rupert Holmes & Pool-Pah Album THE FLASHER Still Naughty In All The Right Ways

Heigh Ho, dear lovely rainbow tribe, welcome back to Bobby’s CD sandbox where we offer our broken-down breakdowns of new music releases. So, strap in and get ready, as Bobby goes on the record ABOUT the record.

This week’s album entry in the BobbyFiles comes from a true man of the theatre. Rupert Holmes’ career on our stages stretches back to the early 80s when he emerged from a well-worn pop career and became one of the few Broadway musical creators in history to take home Tony® AND Drama Desk Awards® for best book and score written all on his own for the marvelous mystery musical THE MYSTERY OF EDWIN DROOD. Since then, his contributions to the theatre have included more words and music, music without words, and words without music, since he is also a gifted writer of non-musical plays such as his adaptation of Grisham’s A TIME TO KILL and the Tony Award® Best Play Nominee SAY GOODNIGHT GRACIE. With all of that, we are right to call him a man of the theatre, and it is only fitting that Bobby’s latest music review on the work of Rupert Holmes should be for his film score to a porn movie. Some 50ish years ago, the halcyon days of the sexual revolution were in full swing - singles, doubles, triples, and more were happening in homes, hotels, and a few doorways even. While all this was going on, Rupert Holmes was approached by members of a band called Pool-Bah (Bruce Handelman, Rick Stabile, Arnold Spector, Lenie Colacino, and Seth Handelman) to write and record a truly psychedelic jazz/rock/pop/electronica soundtrack to a dubiously titled X-rated feature FORBIDDEN UNDER CENSORSHIP OF THE KING which, prior to release, was mercifully re-titled THE FLASHER. While this endeavor did not gain the limelight or cachet of DEEP THROAT or BEHIND THE GREEN DOOR, what it did get was an original “far out” music track and album cover which are, really, the only things remembered about THE FLASHER. The only other place in the pantheon of porn it has is 2 early performances by legends (and DEEP THROAT coworkers) Harry Reems and Jamie Gillis (if you know, you know). However, the soundtrack to THE FLASHER is a part of the cultural zeitgeist (what? Bobby knows German words?!) of the 1970s and because of countless samplings by countless artists down through the years (though you may have never had direct knowledge) this music is woven into the fabric of our lives. How many of us, when talking about something salacious amongst friends have popped out with the old “Bow Chicka Wow Wow, “ … something you will be reminded of, once you buy and listen to this new vinyl pressing.

Now, let’s talk about a couple of tracks… Starting off with FLIGHT, we get an alarming opening on the synth… alarming because it sounds like an alarm bleet, bleet, bleeting before a quick segue into some mindblowing sounds, repetitive rhythms, vibrations, etc. - similar sounds to the electronica organs of 70’s Horror flicks from Depalma and Cronenberg. Track 3, KAHMURA, according to the liner notes, accompanies a vignette “about somebody who would only achieve org*sm with the use of a camera,” Mmmmmok... sounds too naughty, right? But, in fact, the song is a hypnotic blend of instruments and the voices of Pool-Bah singers Bruce Handelman and Lenie Colacino, with Holmes joining on background vocals for the heavy chanting of “kah-mu-ra”  - get it, my angels - camera (nudge, nudge). Track 4, SOUR SOUL, is the track that became the theme to THE FLASHER and has that classic Bow Chika Wow Wow feel associated, jokingly, with the porn industry, but this is a legendary track, and no mistake. The slow funk rhythms in the layers of instruments and electronic sounds overlap into a vocabulary that defines the decade and this genre of filmmaking in some really funky-cool ways. TWO WAY ROAD is this rainbow writer’s fave of the album. Written and principally performed by Bruce and Seth Handleman, this cut is the jazziest of the songs, with trumpets and saxes jamming along with the bass and vocals. The alto sax improv solo is a high, loud, and raucous wail that carries the last half of the song into a kind of pop-soul Blood, Sweat, and Tears feel. 
 

In all, dear Bobby Readers, THE FLASHER, with its seedy origins, was just too weird an assignment to pass up. How often does one get a chance like this, to write about something like that? Let’s face it, having never heard of the now-forgotten Pool-Bah band, it was the participation of Rupert Holms that was the real curiosity here, and we are quite pleased that we satisfied that curiosity. THE FLASHER is a wonderful time capsule of the psychedelic era of the funky electronic 70s and, since Bobby was there for that decade, it really brought back the era for us and so, we give THE FLASHER a solid…

4 Out Of 5 Rainbows

THE FLASHER Is Only Available In Its New, Pristine, Remastered Vinyl Pressing & Can Be Ordered: HERE

CREDITS & THINGS
Originally Released By Green Bottle Records
Remastered Rerelease By Real Gone Music

POOL-PAH Members
Bruce Handelman, Rick Stabile, Arnold Spector, Lenie Colacino, and Seth Handelman

Arranged By, Directed By – Rupert Holmes
Design – John Sellards
Design [Visual] – F. Edward Benko
Engineer – Steve Jerome
Executive Producer – Gordon Anderson (3)
Lacquer Cut By – Clint Holley, Dave Polster
Liner Notes – Joe Marchese
Mastered By – Al Brown (5)
Performer – Bruce Handelman, Joe Ruggiere, Lenny Colacino, Rick Stabile, Seth Handelman
Producer – Michael Wright (13)
Reissue Producer – Joe Marchese
Synthesizer [Arp Odyssey] – Jeff Mitchell (4)
Vocals – Billy Arrington, Rupert Holmes
Recorded At Groove Sound, N. Y. C. and Mastered by AL BROWN at A&R
Studios, N.Y.C.

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