One vibey summer evening in 1986, at the opening of R Lee White’s show at McClaren Markowitz Gallery in Boulder, I struck gold. After the briefest of flirtations, I got lucky and went home with “Phone Call For You, Sweetie.”
“Phone Call For You, Sweetie”
With its trio of one-legged human and canine figures, a semi-erect pair of wolf-gray schlongs, and an anomalous date palm exploding in vivid pastels, the vibrant 64”x48” outlier bore no resemblance to White's Native American-themed acrylics the townsfolk had flocked to see.
A typical R Lee White ledger-book-style painting depicting Native American themes.
It was hard to take my eyes off this cartoonish rendering of an aggressive wolf clawing a zoftig babe's left boob, while a passive one remains detached, perhaps waiting his turn, absorbed in an art magazine headlined “Exclusive: Very Personal Gossip.”
In 1986, “Phone Call for You, Sweetie,” was temptingly priced at a mere $1,875 per penis.
Any rhyme or reason why the three figures combined had three legs—not six—wasn’t readily apparent. The only phone present is a word in the title. If that wasn’t enigmatic enough, the formally dressed wolfmen wore shades. Previous indentations on the woman’s calf were visible; apparently, this ongoing ménage à trois left its participants marked.
On the off chance the rest of the composition was insufficiently shocking, White formed the woman's thumb and forefinger into an unmistakable hand job gesture, punctuated by her pointy blood-red nails. As incendiary as it was inspired, this epic pastel had to be the most outrageous painting I'd ever seen!
Coincidentally, earlier that same day, I'd been wracking my brain, trying in vain to rewrite someone else's lyrics to the most outrageous song I'd ever heard. Someone else was a drummer we’d get high and jam with for hours, Vince “Vinnie” Costa, as the moniker on his licensed tree surgeon card read. Before he hit the wall, the arboreal rhymester had scratched out about half a song's worth of lamentations unlikely to be taught in next semester's Troubadour and Balladeer class at The Oxford School of Poetry. The song needed work—and the next balladeer up was me. Gulp! I’m the sole lyricist on every song in The Milkmen’s vaunted Silo of Hits but one—this one—and poem doctor wasn’t a specialty I practiced.
My visionary side foresaw this raw outpouring of human emotion reimagined as a tour de force so catchy that frenzied fans couldn’t possibly resist howling along to it at sold-out South American soccer stadiums. The problem was, my rational side balked at investing time and energy to conjure up the missing lyrics and dream up a suitably massive production for any tune with a name like, ahem, “Dickheads and Fuckfaces.”
The kiss-of-death title alone spelled automatic disqualification from radio. Besides the title conundrum, it was debatable whether the hastily scribbled lyrics were bedrock a supposedly superior wordsmith could build on. I had a sneaking suspicion they were or I wouldn't have been sweating the rewrite. But circumstances had changed; now I was taking another crack at it with artwork that had run me $1,875 per penis inhabiting a formerly blank wall in my home studio.
“Phone Call” in perspective: the epic pastel measures 64"x 48"!
According to Joan Markowitz, who’d caught me staring as salespersons will and had sidled up next to me, this duplicated personage was none other than Mrs. White herself—a voluptuous Latina who also happened to be his business manager. “I think he must have been a little jealous about something or other,” she confided with a laugh, then added, “It’s her”—nodding at the missus—before flitting off.
Aha! Something or other … like discovering that his wife (ding—fuckface sighting!) was in the habit of having rough sex with two guys at once? Perhaps he confronted her about it and disbelieved her denials—which explains why none of them have a leg to stand on and a sun-colored lamp casts the light of day on the interspecies threesome's unnatural alliance?
And now, the morning after, it seemed entirely plausible that the universe had ordained White to create a rage painting that would forever dazzle and rankle people in equal measure, led me to acquire it, and was putting my feet to the fire to see if I had the nerve to forge “Dickheads and Fuckfaces” into a song as polarizing as the painting.
Reservations aside, I wasn't the worst choice. I hadn't sworn a blood oath to avoid any inkling of controversy. Who do you suppose loosed “Lolita,” a three-verse condensation of the banned Nabokov novel, on an unsuspecting public? The mischievous wordplay begins:
she’s a bouncy little number and a gymnast to boot
pouncing like a tumbler she’s as fast as she is cute
she sucked upon a popsicle, I had to play it dumb
because there was an obstacle presented by her mum
This playful pop confection topped some 6,000 entries in a highly-publicized songwriting contest held by KBCO—a blowtorch radio station that radiated out over the entire country music-crazed state of Colorado. Journalists marveled that the men of milk won the judges over with a pop tune that risqué.
Imagine accepting “Best Song in Colorado” in these get-ups!
And it wasn’t like jolting people out of their everyday lethargy via suggestive verbiage like this chorus for “Late Night Delivery” came about due to some accident in the lab:
late night delivery night delivery
milkmen man your trucks
late night chivalry
from those handsome strong young bucks
Those lyrics weren’t exactly what mountain folks were accustomed to hearing from country swing bands like Dusty Drapes and the Dusters at Peggy's Hi-Lo, but they were still squeaky clean, 100% free and clear of naughty words that simple minds might deem “satanic” or “obscene.”
And speaking of the dark prince no one’s ever seen but billions believe exists, “Phone Call” is laced with hot-button elements scorned by fundamentalist Christians as the work of the devil. Impressions like that can form when artists hear voices in their heads telling them their masterwork would be incomplete without a tandem of wolf wangs—and act on the urge. Or when demons whisper salacious song titles into the ears of reefer-mad drummers.
At least my prospective co-writer had had the good sense to heed the adage “write what you know.” As best I could tell, Vince intended his “Dickheads and Fuckfaces”—a title he’d come up with off the top of his head to designate a five-minute portion of our latest 90-minute indulgence he’d labeled Mouth Open Jam—to be about a guy jonesing for some killer weed. At this juncture, I was all-too familiar with the tale of woe: a sativa-starved workingman drives through crosstown traffic to pick up a bag of buds his dealer crows could be some of the best stuff he’s ever tasted. Our antihero gets what he came for and he goes on his way. But after the poor schmo gets home, rolls a big juicy doob, fires it up, and inhales a few huge lungfuls … well … nothing happens. Ripped off, riled up, and all by his lonesome, the protagonist compensates by wailing “dickheads and fuckfaces.”
Okay, so maybe it’s not Macbeth, but not all our fans were English Lit majors, and everyone needs to blow off steam now and then. The hotshot artist who’d signed his name and the year, “86 R Lee White,” and the best title ever, “Phone Call For You, Sweetie,” in hot pink pastel certainly had. My eyes darted from White's florid signature back to the barely legible lyric sheet.
Here’s what the stoner bard had scribed so far:
straight into traffic, you called me to taste it
I got what I came for and I’ll be on my way
you said that it could, but I’m far from wasted
I’ve seen lotsa bait that’s been taken this way
dickheads and fuckfaces
dickheads and fuckfaces
now time is a-wasting while I’m wasting myself
talk about love, it’s like a book on a shelf
I may be the dealer, but I’m still being dealt
If I mess with you, I only mess with myself
dickheads and fuckfaces
dickheads and fuckfaces
Out of who knows how many nouns in existence, Vince, the esteemed author of the autobiographical Drummers Come First, had selected the same rhyme word, “way,” not once, not twice, but thrice in a four-line verse (“wasted” is “way-stead”). He compounded the sin by doubling down on “myself” in verse two. While I never would have done that in a million years, the stilted verses weren’t entirely devoid of colorful imagery (“talk about love, it’s like a book on a shelf”). They had their lowbrow charm—just not near enough of it to leave well enough alone. The overall mood felt stark. It would have been just plain wrong for any song with a title that radioactive to take itself too seriously. If I wanted the lyrics to be irresistible to sing along to, the remedy was adding a few good punch lines to lighten things up.
Can a painting have supernatural powers? The Portrait of Dorian Gray is Exhibit A.
Meanwhile, not only was I locked in on “Phone Call,” I had the distinct sensation its figures were observing me. The longer I spent in the presence of this willing cavewoman in a clingy dress accompanied by carnivorous mammals, the more I felt myself responding to the call of the wild. At first, the subliminal pull of “Phone Call” tugged at me, gently, then this Dorian Grayish portrait was all but elbowing me in the ribs, pleading with me to override my scaredy-cat objections and go all-in already. I can't believe I'm typing this, but a painting broke down my resistance, coaxing me into action.
Finally, the missing lines materialized:
Straight into traffic, you called me to taste it
I got what I came for, and I’ll be on my way
you said that it could, but I’m far from wasted
I’ve seen lotsa bait that’s been taken this way
dickheads and fuckfaces
dickheads and fuckfaces
now time is a-wastin’ while I’m wastin’ myself
talk about love, it’s like a book on a shelf
you look for a job, you look lotsa places
but they only hire dickheads and fuckfaces
dickheads and fuckfaces
dickheads and fuckfaces
I may be the dealer but I’m still bein’ dealt
if I mess with you I only mess with myself
I never got praise or warm embraces
when I was raised by dickheads and fuckfaces
Yes! His weed sucks, his love life sucks, his job sucks, and his upbringing sucks, too. So much for lacking the common touch—“Dickheads and Fuckfaces” was a cry for everyman. The anthemic singalong closed every Milkmen show throughout the '80s, sending everyone home spent but happy.
Artist R Lee White
Nearly forty years later, through a dozen moves, that rockstar painting I initially thought of as just another pickup on Pearl Street and I are still together. Throughout the decades, R Lee White’s caricatures have remained in the background, letting me process life’s vicissitudes on my own—until lately. After some conferring amongst themselves, they're sending out smoke signals again. It’s almost as if the wanton woman and her canine consorts know I've got one more siege of recording left in me … but I’m clueless how to finance it. They’re also well aware that the framed space they’ve been trysting within has appreciated to a whopping $75,000 per penis on the secondary art market. Hint! Hint!
It's crazy to think “Phone Call For You, Sweetie” is prodding me into action again after all this time. Yet the more I think about it, the more its astute strategy makes sense. The epic pastel deserves to be sold to a private collector so that a new set of art lovers can admire it and a new bunch of haters can hate on it. I deserve to record fresh milk stuff for a new set of music lovers to adore and a new batch of industry types to ignore.
Can a painting have supernatural powers? Stay tuned.—Lory Kohn