Author Archives: Jon Sidel

Greetings from Laurel Canyon!

I once had a life, or rather / Life had me / I was one among many / Or at least I seemed to be / Well, I read an old quotation in a book just yesterday / Said, “gonna reap just what you sow / The debts you make you have to pay” / Can you get to that? / Can you get (I want to know)

Friday the 13th or Father’s Day—call it what you will, but it’s a weekend, and a wild one at that. The vibe in our canyon is like many June weekends: a bit of gloom in the morning and roasting by 3PM.

This weekend, however, has a dark, dark cloud hanging over us Angelenos. The feds are fucking with our Chicano community and therefore us all. I’m on top of the hill and I even feel infringed. This week has made me realize how ethnically special our city is.

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Greetings from Laurel Canyon!

The golden age of rock and roll will never die / As long as the children feel the need to laugh and cry / Don’t wanna wreck, just recreation / Don’t wanna fight but if you turn us down / We’re gonna turn you ’round / Don’t mess with the sound / The show’s gotta move everybody groove / There ain’t no trouble on the streets now / So if the going gets rough don’t you blame us

Oh oh oh gotta stay young you can never grow old / Oh oh the golden age of rock and roll

It’s no secret that I’m a highly emotional and over sentimental rock ‘n’ roller. As my 15 year old son Jonah barks at me, “Dad, you old hippie. What, you gonna cry? Fucking pussy.” He’s not far off, ha ha! It’s my DNA make-up and it’s become clear that songs have the ability to transport my emotional state to a time and a place.

These last couple of weeks I’ve been triggered by a playlist I compiled of favorite albums from 1974. It’s totally insane, surreal and frightening that I’m recounting summers past in the late 1970s, but it’s the first week in June. Final exams have been taken, books, pencils, and computers tossed to the side. There is an exhale of relief… and then joy. The joy of possibility. The freedom of youth. I feel it, like voices on the wind.

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Greetings from Laurel Canyon!

In America you get food to eat / Won’t have to run through the jungle / And scuff up your feet / You just sing about Jesus and drink wine all day / It’s great to be an American

Ain’t no lion or tiger, ain’t no mamba snake / Just the sweet watermelon and the buckwheat cake / Ev’rybody is as happy as a man can be / Climb aboard, little wog, sail away with me / Sail away, sail away

Rolling into June with Idelic muses. Ronny, my fishing buddy, sent me a photo from a trip we took a dozen years ago. We caught big fish and had such big smiles—waking up, far out at sea, carefree on a sunny morning. It’s just a special feeling. It has to be said, it’s not always calm and sunny. As I dug through crates, I came across a Morrissey song, “Seasick, Yet Still Docked,” and I thought.

Ooooo, I’ve been there too. The fact is, we encounter dilemmas that are not always cool. So with the high seas in mind, I head into June. Everything is just as it should be. In fact, yesterday I had a good “hair day.”

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Greetings from Laurel Canyon!

You give me the reason, you give me control / I gave you my purity, my purity you stole / Did you think I wouldn’t recognize this compromise? / Am I just too stupid to realize? / Stale incense, old sweat / And lies, lies, lies

It comes down to this / Your kiss, your fist / And your strain, it gets under my skin / Within, take in / The extent of my sin

I’m still on a roll with Idelic muses. This week I saw an article in The New York Times featuring photos by Clayton Patterson, who documented NYC’s Lower East Side in the ’80s. Images of “heroin-bags,” the riots in Thompson Square Park in the summer of ’88, and the front door of LES’s notorious street gang, Satan’s Sinners Nomads.

All the songs of sin and sainthood, and I almost forgot. It was twenty years ago that I ran into Susan at Target and asked her out. I had never been to a Target before, but she said yes, and we’ve been together ever since!

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Greetings from Laurel Canyon!

Blue / Songs are like tattoos / You know I’ve been to sea before / Crown and anchor me / Or let me sail away

Hey, blue / There is a song for you / Ink on a pin / Underneath the skin / An empty space to fill in

Well, there’s so many sinking now / You gotta keep thinking / You can make it through these waves / Acid, booze, and ass / Needles, guns, and grass / Lots of laughs / Lots of laughs

Everybody’s saying that / Hell’s the hippest way to go / Well, I don’t think so / But I’m gonna take a look around it, though / Blue, I love you

I guess I’m on a roll with Idelic muses. This week, it’s my enchanting daughter, Zoe Blue. Her mother always told her (and Joni) she was named after the title track from the Mitchell classic. I claim to be the first punk rocker obsessed with Joni, and honestly, the words could not be more fitting.

This said, Zoe was named after Blue, a tough, skinny kid from the schoolyards of New York City. Dude was kinda like a mini George Girvin on the asphalt playgrounds of 1970s NYC hoop lore.

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Greetings from Laurel Canyon!

Good morning, mister sunshine / You brighten up my day / Come sit beside me in your way / I see you every morning / Outside the restaurants / The music plays so nonchalant

Lonely days, lonely nights / Where would I be without my woman?

To start today’s Idelic playlist, I came up with the muse “where would I be?” I’m not sure if the Bee Gees’ classic came first or followed, but “where would I be if…” is an interesting thought.

Maybe I’m reacting to a challenging week. It feels like the Sidels are juggling a vast amount of balls. Nothing has fallen to the ground, but there’s a lot of balls in the air.

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Greetings from Laurel Canyon!

Can I sleep in your brain tonight, stranger? / Can I rest my bones in your head? / I won’t make too much noise while I stay here / I just need some kind of shelter

Anywhere I try to go / I’m still stuck in my own skull / And lately that’s no kind of place to call home / All the walls have fallen down / Garbage lying all around / Is there maybe room in your temporal lobe?

Can I sleep in your brain tonight, stranger? / Can I spend just one night on your mind? / I can’t live with this pain, with this anger / And I need some place else to go

I’m not sure there are coincidences.

Happy Friday from Laurel Canyon. Saw kid Jonah hurl a baseball, hung with groovy Zoe Blue. We rented a long red jeep and blasted her album. And somewhere out there …a dude is wearing some leather threads that have treaded many rock ‘n’ roll adventures.

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Greetings from Laurel Canyon!

Beautiful people are queuing to drown / They wait for the lifeguard to put on his crown / But he’s up at the other end of town / Trying to talk to the mirror / The scientist talks and he knows what he means / He sits on the floor and has beautiful dreams / Then he gets brought down by a woman who screams / But he knows it’s only a record¡ oh yes it is

A song for insane times? Huh? I guess whatever you say.

My grind towards spring continues. Kid Jonah made it back safely from Coachella to pitch well on Tuesday. So life is as good as it can be. Oh, and I made it out to see Bar Italia at Fonda Theatre last night.

These days I’m not used to standing with a thousand people to watch a band. From the NY Dolls to Fugazi to Led Zeppelin I’ve seen ’em all. What made me want to add Bar Italia to that list? Italia’s debut album was one of the sparks of 2023.

Happy to report that so did many cool kids made the scene. There was even a nice touch of rock ‘n’ roll fashion in the crowd. The band has room to grow live, but they finished off last night’s gig strong.

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Greetings from Laurel Canyon!

As soon as I get my head ’round you / I come around catching sparks off you / I get an electric charge from you / That second hand living, it just won’t do

And the way I feel tonight / Oh, I could die and I wouldn’t mind / And there’s something going on inside

Makes you want to feel, makes you want to try / Makes you want to blow the stars from the sky / I can’t stand up, I can’t cool down / I can’t get my head off the ground

This week had most human heads spinning. Stuck in the middle of a con game, the “time to buy,” is over. Maybe we’ll have better luck at next week’s Easter egg hunt.

Out in the desert is this year’s Coachella festival. Thanks to Goldenvoice and Circle Jerks for hooking young Sidel.

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Greetings from Laurel Canyon!

And all of my friends were there / And no one cared

Say what they may, all of my friends were there / Not just my friends but their best friends too / All of my friends were there

The fools of April continue to do their thing. All in all, my vibe has been to thank my lucky stars to have a healthy family and cool friends.

I think I’ll take a Sunday bike ride and listen to this week’s Idelic set.

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Greetings from Laurel Canyon!

I’ve been waiting for a guide to come and take me by the hand / Could these sensations make me feel the pleasures of a normal man? / New sensations bear the innocence, leave them for another day / I’ve got the spirit, lose the feeling, take the shock away

It’s getting faster, moving faster now, it’s getting out of hand / On the tenth floor, down the backstairs into no man’s land / Lights are flashing, cars are crashing, getting frequent now / I’ve got the spirit, lose the feeling, let it out somehow

Meditation is my medication. Ten to twenty minutes of “nada” really helps me get through the day.

Are you watching White Lotus? As the “head monk” said with a smile, “Hello thoughts, goodbye thoughts.”

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Greetings from Laurel Canyon!

Have you tasted the finest of trout oh no / Half-asleep in a log-burning house oh no / With your feet flopping over the couch oh no / Oh no

Like Mighty Joe Moon there is no controlling him / Drive off a bridge if he choose to swim / Mighty Joe Moon can’t prevent what is heaven sent / Joe can’t control where his money goes / He’s Mighty Joe

When asked if he hated white people, Miles Davis simply said, “Not all the time.” Dig it.

It’s springtime. Dodgers and Crespi Celts are crushing baseball and tonight I’m having dinner with some very old friends. For this “Idelic selector,” it’s a time to take in March madness with a bit of sunshine and a grin.

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Greetings from Laurel Canyon!

Bury me at sea / Where no murdered ghost can haunt me / If I rock upon the waves / And no corpse can lie upon me

Let me go, boys, let me go, boys / Let me go down in the mud, where the rivers all run dry

If I should fall from grace with God / Where no doctor can relieve me / If I’m buried in the sand / But the angels won’t receive me

Let me go, boys, let me go, boys / Let me go down in the mud, where the rivers all run dry

Did you happen to catch the blood eclipse last night? I was excited to watch it unfold as I cut this week’s Idelic Hour. In the end, the event was more “brown” than “blood” red. To be honest I woke up thinking that today was St. Patrick’s Day. Well such is 2025.

In truth, my listening has been more “cold and rainy” post Britpop and cowboy than Irish. This said, any chance to listen to Shane MacGowan—“Poguetry” takes me back. The two of us had similar taste in fashion. Leather wristbands, big rings, and leather vests. I remember him taking off his shirt at my restaurant The Olive. He wanted to trade it for my vest. It took many drinks to make him understand that I was hanging onto my leather.

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Greetings from Laurel Canyon!

Fools in love / Are there any creatures more pathetic / Fools in love / Never knowing when they’ve lost the game / Everything you do / Everywhere you go now / Everything you touch / Everything you feel / Everything you see / Everything you know now / Everything you do

This week was a bit frustrating. I don’t ever recall getting political in this column. I’m just gonna say, I’m gonna try and not be a fool and get dumped by the bullshit streaming across my Flipboard, socials, and TV.

Are we in the middle of a con game? Try and keep your head straight with a few songs that talk about fools.

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