#Thom moore

[dollarbin]

Sandy Saturdays #25:

Like an Old Fashioned Waltz

I recently chronicled a fairly formative night in my life which occurred in mid-October 31 years ago; the following, mostly true, story happened a week or two before or after that wild night of knavery and knives. It was far less formative... but still awesome!

Thom Moore and I were really hungry. We needed burritos and neither of us had any cash. I don't know if ATM cards even existed in 1993; if so, neither of us had one and no serious bank would have considered issuing us one, let alone a credit card. After all, neither of us had jobs of any kind and Thom usually sported a thrifted workman's shirt that listed his name as Bobo. Meanwhile, my favorite pair of shorts were about six sizes too big and had been cut to jagged knee length from a pair of what were probably Tom Waits' own corduroy pants in 1972. I tied them around my waist with a piece of rope.

So, there we were, tooling around Pasadena in my parents' armadillo cake (silver on the outside, maroon interior) Ford Tempo and brainstorming how to come up with the necessary $6 for two heavenly, warm and luscious veggie burritos.

We had the taqueria all picked out. The place seemed somewhat famous: they proudly displayed recent press clippings about some obscure airline which was currently serving their burritos at 5,000 feet. I kinda think it's the place in the photo above?

"Maybe we could borrow money from someone?" I suggested. We were hopeless teens: "borrow" of course meant "receive in exchange for nothing and never repay." But Thom was a Pasadena local: maybe he knew of such a generous someone. After all, he seemed to know just about everyone we bumped into. But he turned down the suggestion; most of the people he knew nodded appreciatively when they saw my makeshift shorts. They did not have $6.

"Maybe your parents...?" Thom stopped me before I got to the end of that sentence. His parents were adults with priorities. They would not be buying us burritos.

Thom sighed. "We're gonna have to sell something, dude. Let's go through my CD's."

Thom had a zillion CDs - it was, after all, 1993; and his vinyl collection was the best I'd ever seen. But we were out and about, so we just combed through what he had on him: a dozen or so jewel cases rolling around his backpack.

I, Jonathan was in there; but selling that was out of the question. Thom showed that thing to everyone he met; it was his idea of the world's greatest joke.

He also had Surfer Rosa, Queen Elvis and Henry the Human Fly on him: classics, all, and you can't sell a classic, not even for a burrito. Thom acknowledged that Respect was a largely mediocre record but it was still a Robyn Hitchcock album and therefore it was utterly off limits. Our burrito prospects were dwindling.

But then he found a candidate in the depths of his sack. And that's how I first encountered Sandy Denny's Like an Old Fashioned Waltz.

"Here we go: this album is totally bunk," quoth Thom, waiving it about. "But I don't know... you gotta love Sandy."

At that point I was just discovering Denny: I had the Fairport Convention greatest hits collection that has Stonehenge on the cover, and that was it. And Thom was right, the CD did look bunk: Denny's cover shot looked like she was auditioning for a spot on my grandmother's mantelpiece, and waltzing, whatever that was, was surely the opposite of what we did during Space at Dead shows.

"Yeah, that's the ticket," I said. "But do you think we can get six bucks for it?"

"I hope so; I'm so hungry."

We went, hats in hand, to the same place Thom had bought his copy of Like an Old Fashioned Walz for an easy $12 or more; they offered him just $5, which we took. We were still a dollar short. Curses!

What happened next was desperation lathered in genius. We found - this is all at least relatively true - somewhere around 70 cents in spare change on the floor and under the seats of the Tempo and then a miraculous quarter appeared in the gutter outside the burrito place. We begged our way, at the counter, through the missing nickel.

And, oh boy, those burritos sure tasted good. So good, in fact, that I'm not even sure we made the wrong move selling Denny's ridiculously perfect third solo album. After all, it was a CD copy, and CDs suck.

Plus, Sandy's rich, subtle and utterly magnificent songs were way the hell over our teenage heads:

[luckydiorxoxo]

Margaret Qualley, Coralie Fargeat and Demi Moore attend the premiere of "The Substance" during the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival

[simply-ivanka]

Sens. Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV), Bill Cassidy (R-LA), Susan Collins (R-ME), John Cornyn (R-TX), Joni Ernst (R-IA), Chuck Grassley (R-IA), John Kennedy (R-LA), Mitch McConnell (R-KY), Jerry Moran (R-KS), Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), Mitt Romney (R-UT), Mike Rounds (R-SD), Dan Sullivan (R-AK), John Thune (R-SD), Thom Tillis (R-NC), Roger Wicker (R-MS), and Todd Young (R-IN)

VOTE THESE PIECES OF SHIT OUT OF CONGRESS.

[weclassybouquetfun]

That's a wrap on 2024's Met Gala. What was the theme this year? Gardens of Time, in conjunction with the Costume Institute's exhibit "Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion."

My personal Met Gala Winners:

TIE: Designer Harris Reed of Nina Ricci and singer Tyla in Balmain.

Tyla has a leg up because her dress is made of sand molded to her figure coupled with an hourglass to represent the sands of time.

Runner-Up: Demi Moore in Nina Ricci x Harris Reed

As always Colman Domingo leads the fashion pack. He is wearing Willy Chavarria.

Second is Barry Keoghan in Burberry. He's wearing an espresso coloured jacket ::wink::. With girlfriend Sabrina Carpenter in Oscar de la Renta.

This year's chairs - Anna Wintour (as always), Chris Hemsworth (disappointing), Jennifer Lopez, Bad Bunny and the never disappointing Zendaya Coleman who wore two looks: Dior and Givenchy (with a Philip Treacy headdress).

What else were people wearing?

TEAMS LOEWE

TEAM LOEWE

Dan Levy

Ayo Edebiri

Ariana Grande

Jamie Dornan

Jonathan Bailey

Greta Lee, Taylor Russell and Luca Guadagnino

Josh O'Connor

Mike Faist

TEAM THOM BROWNE

Rebecca Ferguson

Cynthia Erivio

Alton Mason

Ben Simmons

Cole Escola

Gigi Hadid

Steven Yeun

Queen Latifah and partner Eboni Nichols

[williamverse]

Artwork inspired by The Smile's A Light for Attracting Attention cover art by Thom Yorke and Stanley Donwood

My OC William again! He's literally Thom Yorke. I'm still thinking if Thom Yorke exists in his universe or William is the only one

[celebritycloset]

Demi Moore Wore Thom Browne at ‘The Substance’ Toronto Film Festival Premiere

[styleovertrendanyday]

Demi Moore in Thom Browne & Tiffany & Co. jewelry for the premiere of The Substance at TIFF 2024.

[madlovenovelist]

Book Review – ‘Hero’ by Perry Moore

All the pressures and anxiety of an origin story of a superhero – who also happens to be gay. Genre: Y/A, Fantasy, LGBTQIA+, No. of pages: 428 The last thing in the world Thom Creed wants is to add to his dad, Hal’s, pain, so he keeps secrets. Like that he has special powers. And that he’s been asked to join the League–the very organization of superheroes that spurned his father. The most…

[garudabluffs]

"...a plug in for a documentary I watched last night -- it's called "Where to Invade Next", compiled by Michael Moore. He tours some European countries and one N. African one (Tunisia) to see if there's any good ideas/practices he can bring back to the U.S. While he doesn't go into religion, there's bits on education, justice (in terms of prisons and drugs), and labor practices. I was left with the impression that your country's woes are due to a philosophy of selfishness - as expressed by one Icelandic woman, "it's all about me, rather than we". If I wished to simplify the woes of the U.S., I'd boil it down to that also. There are some of your citizens who recognize the value in others, but for the large part I'd say that your Egos are way too big. This is why, as Moore discovers, the male bankers were all prosecuted -- yes, that's correct, bankers were prosecuted -- after the '08 collapse of the financial system -- and the women replaced them, because women place we over me. Anyways, some good lessons for America in this documentary." - 1 of 15 Comments

Is SCOTUS About to Put Religion Over Civil Society?

So here we are in 2023 and the real beliefs and plans of the Founding generation — slaveholders and abolitionists alike — have dissolved into a blur of BS, Qanon, and fundamentalist religion 02/01/2023

"The Court may force the state to prioritize religion above normal business and governmental concerns, in other words."

"[Or]the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, whose members, a Massachusetts court has ruled, are legally entitled to sport their unique headwear (a colander) in official government ID photos.

Or Rastafarians, who may argue that marijuana is their sacramental herb and they should be allowed to work under its influence.

After all, the IRS has acknowledged all of these groups as legitimate religions by granting them tax-exempt status. While that may deprive the government and some communities of income and property taxes, it generally doesn’t hurt anybody."

READ MORE https://hartmannreport.com/p/is-scotus-about-to-put-religion-over

[magistersomnia]

Round the Bend

Was she dead?  Was this her happy ever after-life, here at Saint Andrews Hospital on this instant in the day that seems to have her whole story in it, from the formation the big bang, dawn chorus sunrise of space-time, born out of an ever present quantum vacuum in the morning to the end of everything in the last cooling breath of an entropic sunset, just before the stars come and go out?  Is this her heaven or hell, she wonders, these elysian fields with her whole universe from start to finish somehow crystallised into each day, with every day eternal and with every day the same, reiterated endlessly down to the tiniest and most infinitesimal detail, though somehow she didn't notice the unending repetition, feasibly as a result of her premeditation?  Perhaps this is what the afterlife is like for everyone, not just for her.  Perhaps for everybody, their whole world and their whole life is one long and unusually eventful day that they will have forgotten by tomorrow morning when they wake as couldn't-care-less babies, to begin the same old timeless and beloved story all over again.

[crownedinmarigolds]

All of the VTM collaboration art so far! Sorry to re-post, I just wanted to have a big post where I can put them all one spot! I will link to the original posts and perhaps update this the more we all do! I hope we get to do more soon. <3 Hecata Family Portrait! Gangrel Fall! Thinblood Renaissance Faire! Malkavian Lupercalia Valentine's Day! Nosferatu New Year!

All of the characters and art are provided by the VTM Tumblr community who are all so gorgeous and talented! All of the artists are listed on the original posts but I will also try to list them all beneath the cut as well to make sure they get the praise they deserve!

Hecata Family: Anansi, Imogen, Aydan, Rocco, and Holly @confusedwithglitter Bryce Milliner @salubri-outcast Dr. Winston Mccaine and Bacia @morticrows Lucio @hunter-slime-660 Sabina Rico @squiretinnion Demetra "Demi" Giovanni @salubri-outcast Marcello Marchetti and Ash @superfastsquiddle Dionosio "Dio" Giovanni @salubri-outcast The Hidalgo Coterie - Crystal, Noa, Nythanel, Bravo, Cori - by myself! Amadou @holly-bearie Sasha @rattenprince Diego de Mondellis @cynical-tuba Xochi @urbanknightart Mattia Faulkner @harbingerofskulls Marcello Giovanni and Mirabella @squiretinnion Rosin @milk-crafting Deirdre and Mallory "Mal" Corvinelli @wizzsp Bernadette and Beatrix Beaumont @renaissancebadboy Gangrel Gang: Misha - @m4rloe5 Jensen - @satteredhunter Saffiya - @spell-fox Corvus - @renaissancebadboy Aidan - Spell-Fox Nixie Tube, Lexi Lyall, Darius, Hannah, and Mouse - @problemsynth Kuro - @urbanknightart Eli - Spell-Fox Dayo - @enderkriller77 Beepli Alison - @salubri-outcast Trixie - CrownedinMarigolds Damaris - @thesixthplaneteer Hugo Pitt - @squiretinnion Annette and Bones - @sheriff-shitstarter Alyssa and Lisa - @anarchswild Marcy - @confusedwithglitter JJ Slayter - @lealdog Ajax - @wizzsp Blake Moore - @vtmgremlin Fern - @lylailaeth Marina - @knuxtiger4 Wallis and Reynard - salubri-outcast Snare - TheSixthPlaneteer The Mariner - @holly-bearie Gaius - @ollieanderr Thinblood Faire: Jesse Steele - Fullblood Caitiff Scourge - @discodiablo (art by me!) John Carmichael - @emissary-of-stuff Ezra and Skye - @wizzsp Havi - @m4rloe5 Camilla - @renaissancebadboy My Stakebait Coterie! Ralph, Khloe, Kyle, and Christian! Gabbie - @del-uxie Leo - @cynical-tuba Ramona - also @renaissancebadboy!! Lucian - @squiretinnion Miles - @confusedwithglitter Cecil and Perry - @zyurp Blanche - @holly-bearie Del - @kentuckycaverats

Malkavian Valentine's: Monday - @zyurp Sophia - @holly-bearie Rigby - @themarginalthinker Emil - @morticrows Mir and Marie - @problemsynth Claire - @pretend-pretend-vampire Thom - @socialprawn Charlie - @osatokun Quinn and Sunspire - @tzimizce Niko - @shaydh Daimund - @thesixthplaneteer (art by me!) Shivers - @kmpshitposter Andrea - @bugcouncil Heleen - @m4rloe5 j and clemency - @luoniiel and @kermitted-cause Brooklyn - @svampira Wyrd - @clompe Apollo - @mountainashfae Lucas, Noelle, and Zeus - @supersquiddle Finn - @confusedwithglitter Lyla and Thirteen - @problemsynth Father Emir - @urbanknightart Monroe - @cynical-tuba

Nosferatu New Year: @its-sixxers - Elaine de la Saules, Casimmir, Briar Mary, Adam Romaniuk @themarginalthinker - Blue, Charlie, Tweak @tzimizce - Quinn @confusedwithglitter - Orpheus @the-art-block - Oginn, Atena:ti, Lamb, and Wolf Mother @holly-bearie - Angelo @problemsynth - Nere @m4rloe5 - Charlie

[dollarbin]

Shakey Sundays #36:

Trans, Part 1

She was lovely.

It was the fall of 1993, our final year of high school, and she'd already had too hard of a life: no memories of her birth mother, an altogether lackluster father and a stepmother who was all mock kindness over hard edges, the resentment covert and steady.

We had come together at the dawn of high school, two sensitive kids from opposite ends of LA who met in a summer camp glory hole. That's what you call a crumbling spot of earth in goldrush country, formed a century or more beforehand by a single stick of hopeful dynamite.

I remember the two of us scurrying down into the near darkness with a few other kids, a box of surreptitiously swiped matches in tow. A four foot high and wobbly baby pine was beginning to block off the entrance, a pine that has since devoured the glory hole in its quest for strength and water. Today that tree is well over a hundred feet tall.

But 31 years ago it gave no protest as we lit all those matches, one at a time, and talked heatedly about God knows what. Joni says it best: that's how our time began.

We were just two kids, both a bit scarred, both a bit scared. We craved reassurance mostly; we listened to Love's Forever Changes while holding hands.

Years passed. We lived far apart and her parents did all they could to block the relationship but we still managed to see one another with some regularity as ninth grade turned into tenth, then turned and turned again until suddenly it was our senior year and we'd grown up together. I validated and praised her. She did the same for me. We listened to a lot of Leonard Cohen. She sewed me a flannel shirt.

And then, after all our years of promise and worry, I was suddenly done. Everything between us was revealed to me as too grown up, too heavy and troubling. What's more, I was in love, and for real this time, and with someone else, someone who showed me an adult future that was both brilliant and steadfast.

I was 17 years old. I wanted to be more than a good boyfriend. I wanted to be happy.

And so I had to let her terribly down.

There was no point in showing her my brand new, dollar bin, version of Trans when she showed up at my parents' house on that hot fall day for our long scheduled Dylan show at the Hollywood Bowl. Santana, ridiculously, shared the bill; the only thing I knew about Santana was that Jonathan Richman told his early audiences that listening to Santana records was a general waste of one's time. I believed Jonathan, of course. I still do.

But there she was on my doorstep, flushed with excitement, her two front teeth freshly chipped from a older-step-sister-saddled-with-too-much-responsibility accident in her grandparents' pool. She had no idea whatsoever what as about to happen.

Could I have spared her from that night? Could I have written her an honest letter or made a simple phone call explaining that I was so terribly sorry but that I had fallen in love with someone else?

Yes, I could have. And yes, of course, I should have.

But the simple truth is that I craved the drama. After all, I was listening to a lot of Trans and Another Side of Bob Dylan at the time: records full of self-importance, drama and manly vibes. And, after a childhood of being chosen last with a sigh for every social and athletic event, I was ready to do something audacious, cold and rash. I'd tell her that we were done in person. In front of all my friends. At a Bob Dylan show.

"It ain't me, babe. No, no, no. It ain't me, babe. It ain't me your looking for. Babe."

Good God: this story is awful, isn't it? Happily, I came slightly to my senses and chickened out, taking her instead, pre-show, to the Mexican hole in the wall down the street from my house for tacos and truth.

Listen, I said. I'm sorry but...

She was furious. Livid. I was selfish, she declared. I was stupid. I had ruined everything.

I listened. All her assessments struck me as reasonable. My teenage fantasies about how cool the whole thing was gonna be were obviously hollow and dumb. And so I finished her taco. It was the only useful action I could come up with.

And then I introduced her to Thom Moore.

Do you know who I'm talking about? We're talking Thom Moore of Moore Brothers fame. If that doesn't mean anything to you, go listen to this:

The reckless, way-cooler-than-Beck, north LA trip hot white man music he was making at that point is not available on YouTube. Which is stupid. This song is from a few years later, after GBV had largely beat him to the punch. But Thom was, and still is, the coolest person to ever befriend me. We haven't talked in 20 years or more now but, whatever: he's so cool. Hi Thom!

It was just supposed to be the three of us that night, driving to see Dylan in my parents' armadillo cake of a Ford Tempo, which responded to heat of any kind by simply turning off. Mid-freeway? Yeah, if it got too hot the car would just stop. I figured Thom would lighten the mood between the two of us and stop her from freaking out too much. But I had a long ago buddy named Matt who always knew how to upstage me.

(We're not talking here about my best buddy Matt, whose favorite Shakey songs are Homegrown, F%^&king Up and T-Bone, in that order, but another, long ago buddy, also named Matt. He was not a Shakey guy. Rather, he was into The Rembrandts.)

Yeah, Rembradts Matt was definitely not as cool as T-Bone Matt. That's just the way it is, baby. (And for the record, I did not make myself listen to the song above while writing this; I just pasted it in so you'd get a sense of the gentleman in question. So feel free to follow my lead and take a hard pass.)

And so, anyway, Rembrandts Matt, who had caught wind of my sophomoric break up plans for the evening, decided to do me one better by dumping his own long term, also-out-of-town girlfriend immediately before the concert as well.

But Rembrandts Matt did his dumping in even more spectacular fashion. Things were thrown. Blame was cast. My famous brother remembers juvenile fisticuffs occurring between them in the small hours of the night ahead inside a donut shop. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Suffice it to say that all the men involved in this night that I'm chronicling were obviously rather childish.

And so, rather than wind up driving to the concert with just my poor, suddenly-ex, ladyfriend beside me and a surely-he'll-pick-us-all-up wit like Thom in the back seat, my long ago buddy Matt's own far less poor, but also suddenly-ex, ladyfriend wound up in my backseat as well - she absolutely refused to drive with Matt. And my own suddenly ex-lady friend joined her back there, telling Thom that if he wanted to sit beside to the world's worst person he was welcome to the passenger seat. Those two ladies' indignation filled up my parents' Tempo like hot farts after pizza in a sixth grade bunkhouse. It was going to be one hell of a drive.

"What's going on here ladies?" Thom asked, spinning around to grin into their fury as I pulled away from the curb, steering wheel gripped like a life preserver. Thom, who was a new friend to me at that point, had never met either of the ladies in question before that moment. He had no real idea what had just gone down, but he was digging the vibes.

After getting the general gist of things through clenched jaws and unprintable words, most of which began with F's, A's and Z's, Thom started riffing. He'd once spent half an hour freestyle rapping in the very same car about squeezable canned cheese; he could riff.

"Listen: ladies! Take a step back!" he declared. Whenever he spoke it seemed like someone was beatboxing in support. "These knuckleheads who let you down tonight are surely insignificant blips in what will be two very long lifetimes of romantic opportunity! We're off to a Dylan show, right? Well, there's gonna be thousands upon thousands of lonely ass, equally dumb men there for you to choose from. I mean, come on! Here, let me angle the rear view mirror a bit so you can take a look at yourselves. Uncross those angry arms and take a look: yeah, that's it! You are both, I must say, rather fetching! I know plenty of guys - hell, I am one of those guys - who'd be all too happy to take the place of either of these - or both of these! - dopes by your side."

He cackled through it all, having the time of his life.

"Shut up Thom!" they both bellowed in response. They too had never met before that night but they already spoke in perfect unison, holding each other's hands and utterly bonded in cold, dark and shimmering, feminine fury.

I won't give you every last detail of what happened next - and, I promise, Trans does winds up central to this story (just relax already: this is Part 1 of what will be a few posts dedicated to Neil's mostly cool and bizarre record) - so let's hit fast-forward:

...there we are, sitting midway back from the stage beside a guy 25 years older than us; he's describing how his life was fundamentally changed in 1974 when he saw Bob perform Ballad of a Thin Man on solo piano. (My famous brother says there is no evidence whatsoever that such a performance ever occurred)...

...and there we are, trying to have a teenage picnic post show in the parking lot. Someone's mother has sent a chocolate cake with a big butcher knife for the slicing. But Matt's ex-lady friend is whispering again in the ear of my own ex-ladyfriend and then mine is taking the knife from his and brandishing it at me in a mock-serious manner than fails to come across as mock-serious but is instead rather terrifying. I whimper and retreat. To this day I do not tend to eat cake...

... and there we are, and it's well after one in the morning, and the two of us are standing on a street corner somewhere in Hollywood, fruitlessly ringing the doorbell of some family friend of her parents at whose house she is supposed to stay the night (because staying at my own house was forever out of the question). But the damn person won't answer the bell and it's cold out and so I give her my favorite flannel - not the one she sewed for me, that one was always itchy, but my favorite flannel - because what the hell else can I offer her of any value, and then the door finally opens and in she goes, still furious, and I know we'll probably never see each other again... and, oh crap: she's still wearing my flannel!

I arrived home around two in the morning totally demoralized. The night was supposed to have been epic, the kind of thing I'd boast about and include in my congratulatory memoirs some day. But Santana had played forever like one big Joe Freakin' Lala cover band and Dylan had sung Stuck Inside of Mobile With The Memphis Blues Again so incomprehensibly that I had only realized he what he was performing during the final chorus, and I'd spent the night so scared and so embarrassed and so, so, so deeply disappointed in myself. I was being a jerk to a lovely person. I had probably ruined her life.

At that point in my adolescence I pretty much only entered and exited my parents' house through my bedroom window. Doing so seemed like the cool way to do things and it exhibited the kind of cavalier independence from tradition and family ties which I craved. So I sighed and circled around back. It was time to hurdle inside and be sad and alone.

But my room was packed. Homegrown Matt was in there, not Rembrandts Matt. Plus there were 3 or 4 other of my friends. They were all wide awake, utterly uninvited and brimming over with joy.

Plus, Thom was there, working the turntable. And he had Shakey's manly panegyric for all things troubling, goofy and danceable turned up to 11:

Yes, it was true: I'd been a jerk to her. And yes, I'd let her down.

But I'd also done the right thing. And it was over. My room was now filled with unexpected joy and Neil Young. My friends had picked me first for their team.

And that's how I knew that everything was going to work out. That's how I knew that I was going to be okay.

And so was she. So was she.

[girldickdotcom]

the fact kurt cobain, jonny greenwood, thom yorke, thurston moore, kim gordon, brian molko, j mascis, AND james dean bradford all used the same amp i just ordered. the 90s alternative amp...

[pixiegeldof]

THE DOGUE DAYS OF SUMMER

THE DOGS OF DEMI MOORE, BILLIE EILISH, SYDNEY SWEENEY, CIARA, MARIAH CAREY, THOM BROWNE, FERG, GLEN POWELL, ANNA WINTOUR, TIM WALTZ, MISSY ELLIOT & AYO EDEBIRI PHOTOGRAPHED FOR VOGUE

[unidentifiedlyingobject]

oh my goddddddddddd

^ link for if you want to sign the statement

[droughtofapathy]

"Welcome to the Theatre": Diary of a Broadway Baby

Follies in Concert

June 20, 2024 | Transport Group Theatre | Carnegie Hall | Evening | Concert | Series | 2H 20M

FOLLIES FOLLIES FOLLIES. THE HIGHLIGHT OF MY YEAR. THE HIGHLIGHT OF MY LIFE(?)

Last night, Carnegie Hall was New York's hottest gay club as every one of us turned up to weep over Sondheim's breathtaking score, played by a divine 30-piece orchestra. Fifty Broadway actors shared the roles and songs of this wonderful show, culminating in a lineup straight out of our wildest dreams.

Though we were robbed of a Donna Murphy triumph with "Could I Leave You?" due to filming schedule changes, we received the impromptu comedy show of the year as Beth Leavel grappled with a broken mic stand and brought the house down anyway.

Kate Baldwin as another eleventh-hour addition proved to be the best moment of the night. Her "Losing My Mind" will go down in history as one of the most divine we will ever hear. Not since Marin Mazzie has a theatre been so rapt, so silent, so in awe. She's always struck me as a Phyllis, but now proves she has the range.

Jennifer Holliday does what she wants, and what she wants was a smooth and seductive "I'm Still Here" full of gravitas even as she meandered far from the written notes and rhythms. She turned a five-minute showstopper into a nine-minute showstopper complete with a standing ovation to open up act two.

Karen Ziemba led six of our finest dancing Broads over sixty (or even seventy)(Mamie Duncan-Gibbs, Ruth Gottschall, JoaAnn M. Hunter, Dana Moore, Michele Pawk, and Margo Sappington) in a "Who's That Woman" original choreography to a standing ovation.

So many thrilling performances, one after the other. I am deeply in love with Barbara Walsh now, and it's honestly a crime she and Carolee Carmello were so underutilized by only having "Waiting for the Girls Upstairs" (Phyllis and Sally don't get much singing in that number, and it's a tragedy). I need to seriously contemplate the Barbara-Phyllis/Carolee-Sally dynamic immediately.

I am now dead. I have ascended. I will never come back to earth again. But the final tributes broke me. The reveal that Sondheim said in a private zoom reunion that Follies was his very favorite original score. The late Harvey Evans' epitaph. Original cast member Kurt Peterson ending the concert with "hey up there, way up there, what'd'ya say up there..." All of it underscored by Sondheim's brilliant work. I am in tears all over again.

Verdict: My Soul Transcended Space and Time

A Note on Ratings

Full set list below cut:

Opening Weissmann Monologue: Hal Linden Beautiful Girls: Christian Mark Gibbs Don't Look at Me: Katie Finneran and Marc Kudisch Waiting for the Girls Upstairs: Thom Sesma, Stephen Bogardus, Barbara Walsh, Carolee Carmello, Grey Henson, Ryan McCartan, Julie Benko, Hannah Elless Rain on the Roof: Klea Blackhurst and Jim Caruso Ah, Paris: Isabel Keating Broadway Baby: Adriane Lenox The Road You Didn't Take: Alexander Gemignani In Buddy's Eyes: Christine Ebersole Who's that Woman?: Karen Ziemba with Mamie Duncan-Gibbs, Ruth Gottschall, JoaAnn M. Hunter, Dana Moore, Michele Pawk, and Margo Sappington I'm Still Here: Jennifer Holliday Too Many Mornings: Norm Lewis and Nikki Renee Daniels The Right Girls: Michael Berresse One More Kiss: Harolyn Blackwell and Mikaela Bennett Could I Leave You?: Beth Leavel Loveland: Chorus You're Gonna Love Tomorrow/Love Will See Us Through: Fernell Hogan, Olivia Elease Hardy, Nina White, Miguel Gil Buddy's Blues: Santino Fontana with Lauren Blackman and Sarah King Losing My Mind: Kate Baldwin The Story of Lucy and Jessie: Alexandra Billings Live, Laugh, Love: Kurt Peterson (ft. John McMartin's original cane)