The Styrous® Viewfinder: 2024

December 19, 2024

45 RPMs 86: Edith Piaf ~ Milord & the Paper Doll

45 RPM front cover

artwork by Roger Anney

Today is the birthday of the woman who's song marked a pivotal moment in my life. Milord by Edith Piaf "came out" about the same time I did and I consider it the first "Gay" song I knew. At the time I frequented the Paper Doll, a bar/restaurant in the North Beach section of San Francisco and it was the song played over and over by the patrons.

There is a wonderful history of the Paper Doll and many other venues of the area and the time on the website, Found SF (link below). In 2018 the Paper Doll was named an official SF landmark (links below).

In the 1952 film noir, The Sniper, starring Marie Windsor and Arthur Franz as a serial killer, the Paper Doll is the scene of the first murder.

Arthur Franz - The Sniper

I found this album on one of my frequent "junking" tours (link below) on Turk Street in the late sixties and jumped on it.

Edith Piaf - Milord

45 RPM back cover

Milord (French: [milɔʁ]) is a term for an Englishman, especially a noble, traveling in Continental Europe. The term was used in both French and English from the 16th century. It derives ultimately from the English phrase "my lord", which was borrowed into Middle French as millourt or milor, meaning a noble or rich man.

The song tells the tale of a woman of the street who spies a gentleman accompanied by a beautiful woman. The man does not see the singer but she dreams of talking to him and what they might have been (link to complete lyrics below).

Edith Piaf - Milord

45 RPM record

Tracklist:

Side 1:

A - Milord, Lyrics By J. Moustaki*, Music By M. Monnot*

Side 2:

B - Je Sais Comment, Lyrics By, Music By J. Bouquet* & R. Chauvigny*

Companies, etc.

    Record Company – Les Industries Musicales Et Electriques Pathé Marconi
    Printed By – Imp. Carron & Fils
    Pressed By – Pathé Marconi, Chatou – 200666
    Pressed By – Pathé Marconi, Chatou – 200692

Credits:

Artwork [Cover] – Roger Anney
Conductor [Orchestre, Direction] – Robert Chauvigny

Notes:

Other similar releases:
Edith Piaf - Milord / Je Sais Comment (repressed by Pathé Marconi, Chatou cat# 265809 / 265810)
Edith Piaf - Milord and Edith Piaf - Milord, both printed by Dillard et Cie. Imp. Paris

Les Industries Musicales Et Electriques Pathé Marconi - Paris.
Imp. Carron & Fils - Villeurbanne
Record Made In France.
Sleeve Printed in France.

Barcode and Other Identifiers

    Rights Society: BIEM
    Price Code (Cover): M
    Price Code (Label): Ⓜ
    Matrix / Runout (Label side A): 7 TCL 1219
    Matrix / Runout (Label side B): 7 TCL 1221
    Matrix / Runout (Runout side A, stamped): 7 TCL 1219 21 M3 200666
    Matrix / Runout (Runout side B, stamped): 7 TCL 1221 21 M3 200692

Edith Piaf – Milord
Label: Columbia – ESRF 1245
Format: Vinyl, 7", 45 RPM, EP
Country: France
Released: Nov 1959
Genre: Pop
Style: Chanson

Viewfinder links:

Arthur Franz

Milord lyrics
Édith Piaf

Piaf at the Olympia & Milord

Turkish Delights

Marie Windsor

Net links:

Bay Area Reporter ~ SF landmark status recommended for site of North Beach LGBT eatery

Found SF ~ Before the Castro: North Beach, a Gay Mecca

NoeHill in SF ~ San Francisco Landmark #287

SF Planning Department ~ Landmark Designation Case Report

YouTube links:

Milord

Milord (live)

Styrous® ~ Thursday, December 19, 2024

45 RPMs Archive
MAIN MENU - Blog Articles
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Edith Piaf ~ Milord lyrics

English

Come on, Milord
Sit down at my table
It’s so cold outside
It’s so comfortable here
Relax, Milord
Take it easy
Your troubles on my heart
and your feet on a chair
I know you, Milord
You have never seen me
I’m just a girl from the port
Just a shadow in the street

Yet I brushed by you
When you were passing by yesterday
You weren’t proud
God! Heaven made you perfect
Your silk scarf
Floating on your shoulders
You were so beautiful
You could have been the king
You were walking as a winner
In a woman’s arms
My God! She was beautiful
My heart is cold

Come on, Milord
Sit down at my table
It’s so cold outside
It’s so comfortable here
Relax, Milord
Take it easy
Your troubles on my heart
and your feet on a chair
I know you, Milord
You have never seen me
I’m just a girl from the port
Just a shadow in the street

Saying it’s enough sometimes
That there is a ship
To make everything fall apart
When the boat goes away
It brings with him
The sweetheart so tender in his eyes
Who didn’t know to understand
That she ruined your life
Love makes you cry

Saying that life
Gives you all the opportunities
To take them back after

Come on, Milord!
You seem like a kid
Relax, Milord
Come into my kingdom
I treat the remorse
I sing romance
I sing to my lords
Who were not lucky

Look at me, Milord
You’ve never seen me
But you cry, Milord
I would have never seen that

Well, let’s see, Milord
Smile at me, Milord
Better than that! A little effort
There, that’s it!
Come on, laugh, Milord!
Come on, sing, Milord!

Best, dance, Milord!
Very good, Milord!

Again, Milord!

Pa la la la lala
Lalalala lala
Lalalala lala
Ta pa lalalalala

French

Allez, venez, Milord
Vous asseoir à ma table
Il fait si froid, dehors
Ici c'est confortable
Laissez-vous faire, Milord
Et prenez bien vos aises
Vos peines sur mon cœur
Et vos pieds sur une chaise
Je vous connais, Milord
Vous n'm'avez jamais vue
Je n'suis qu'une fille du port
Qu'une ombre de la rue

Pourtant j'vous ai frôlé
Quand vous passiez hier
Vous n'étiez pas peu fier
Dame! Le ciel vous comblait
Votre foulard de soie
Flottant sur vos épaules
Vous aviez le beau rôle
On aurait dit le roi
Vous marchiez en vainqueur
Au bras d'une demoiselle
Mon Dieu! Qu'elle était belle
J'en ai froid dans le cœur

Allez, venez, Milord
Vous asseoir à ma table
Il fait si froid, dehors
Ici c'est confortable
Laissez-vous faire, Milord
Et prenez bien vos aises
Vos peines sur mon cœur
Et vos pieds sur une chaise
Je vous connais, Milord
Vous n'm'avez jamais vue
Je n'suis qu'une fille du port
Qu'une ombre de la rue

Dire qu'il suffit parfois
Qu'il y ait un navire
Pour que tout se déchire
Quand le navire s'en va
Il emmenait avec lui
La douce aux yeux si tendres
Qui n'a pas su comprendre
Qu'elle brisait votre vie
L'amour, ça fait pleurer
Comme quoi l'existence
Ça vous donne toutes les chances
Pour les reprendre après

Allez, venez, Milord
Vous avez l'air d'un môme
Laissez-vous faire, Milord
Venez dans mon royaume
Je soigne les remords
Je chante la romance
Je chante les milords
Qui n'ont pas eu de chance
Regardez-moi, Milord
Vous n'm'avez jamais vue

Mais vous pleurez, Milord?
Ça j'l'aurais jamais cru
Eh ben, voyons, Milord
Souriez-moi, Milord
Mieux qu'ça, un petit effort
Voilà, c'est ça
Allez, riez, Milord
Allez, chantez, Milord
Mais oui, dansez, Milord
Bravo, Milord
Encore, Milord

Viewfinder link:

Edith Piaf ~ Milord

YouTube link:

Edith Piaf ~ Milord

Song lyrics
MAIN MENU - Blog Articles

Marie Windsor articles/mentions

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mentions:
Edith Piaf ~ Milord

Marie Windsor - 1956

publicity photo

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Movie Articles

Movie People

MAIN MENU - Blog Articles
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Arthur Franz articles/mentions

mentions:

Member of the Wedding

Edith Piaf ~ Milord

Arthur Franz - 1956

publicity photo

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Movie Articles

Movie People

MAIN MENU - Blog Articles
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November 11, 2024

Gray Loft Gallery ~ The New College Circle exhibition closing

photos by Styrous®

(except where noted)

Last Sunday I had the pleasure of attending the closing reception for The New College Circle exhibition at the Gray Loft Gallery (link below).

During the event I had the fantastic fortune to find and buy a 45 RPM album by Crime and have Henry S. Rosenthal, aka Hank Rank, autograph it. The album contained Hot Wire My Heart and Baby You're So Repulsive, both songs I already had on 45's, but the album had other songs I didn't have.

Crime - Live 1978

album photo by Roberto Morrison

45 RPM album

Jan Watten w/ Hank Rank

Another group in the show, Other Music, had their albums Prime Numbers and Incidents Out Of Context for sale but I'd bought both albums sometime in the early eighties . . .

. . . however, I did buy one of their t-shirts . . .

. . . which is 100% cotton AND made in the USA!

Other Music T-shirt

photo by Jan Watten

Meredith Tromble (curator) & Jessica

Viewfinder links:

Crime

Crime ~ hot wire my heart, baby you're so repulsive

Gray Loft Gallery

New College Circle

Hank Rank (Henry S. Rosenthal)

Jan Watten

Net links:

Gray Loft Gallery

Jan Watten

Styrous® ~ Monday, November 11, 2024

Art/Exhibitions
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November 8, 2024

Chinese carved pedestal table

Chinese carved rosewood & natural gray mottled marble top round table. 1920's.

Rosewood is hard, tough, strong, and dense. True rosewoods come from trees of the genus Dalbergia, but other woods are often called rosewood. Rosewood takes a high polish and is used for luxury furniture-making, flooring, musical instruments, and turnery.

Genuine rosewoods belong to the genus Dalbergia. The pre-eminent rosewood appreciated in the Western world is the wood of Dalbergia nigra. It is best known as "Brazilian rosewood", but also as "Bahia rosewood". This wood has a strong, sweet smell, which persists for many years, explaining the name rosewood.

As rosewoods are strong and heavy, taking an excellent polish, they are suitable for guitars (the fretboards on electric and acoustic guitars often being made of rosewood), marimbas and recorders. There is a site that specializes in Panama rosewood sets for guitars (link below).

In general, world stocks are poor through overexploitation. Rosewood is now protected worldwide. At a summit of the international wildlife trade in South Africa, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) moved to protect the world's most trafficked wild product by placing all 300 species of the rosewood tree under trade restrictions. At CITES meetings in 2013, 2016, and 2019, additional rosewood species were listed for protection, triggering market booms in China.

Viewfinder links:

Turkish Delights

Net links:

Panama Rosewood Sets

Wood Data Base ~ Distinguishing Brazilian, East Indian & Other Rosewoods

Woodworker's Source ~ Rosewood From Around the Globe

Styrous® ~ Friday, November 8, 2024

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Style
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November 3, 2024

New College Circle Part 2: Other Music & Crime

It is totally amazing to me how my life is a never ending parade of circles/cycles intermingling, colliding and during The New College Circle exhibition at the Gray Loft Gallery in Oakland, SEVERAL of them came washing me away to Memory Land!

Participants in the exhibition included David B. Doty, Henry S. Rosenthal and Dale S. Soules, all wonderful and excing music flashbacks for me from the seventies and eighties.

Doty, Rosenthal and Soules recorded a superb series of Avant-garde music albums under the name, Other Music. Their works were inspired by Avant-garde musicians such as Harry Partch, Lou Harrison and others of that ilk. I discovered their album, Prime Numbers, sometime in the early eighties; I have been intending to write about it on a future article on the vinyl LP section (link below); NOW I need to get on the ball and DO it.

Doty and Rosenthal (aka Hank Rank) formed one of the early San Francisco punk rock groups in the seventies, Crime (link belows). They were intense to say the least; I caught them at the Deaf Club on Valencia Street, San Francisco. I bought their 45 RPM, Hot Wire My Heart, the "B" side had Baby You're So Repulsive. How could you pass up that?

Well, back to the exhibition! It will have one more showing on Saturday, November, 9, then the closing reception will be the next day, Sunday, November, 10, from 4 to 6 PM.

Closing reception:

Sunday, November, 10, 4 to 6 PM

This exhibition is a celebration of fifty years of creative achievement launched by an experimental education at New College of California (NCOC) in San Francisco. On view in the exhibit are archival materials, costume design, film, drawing, landscape design, music, installation, sculpture, performance, and photography.

Featured Artists:

Carola Anderson, David B. Doty, Michael Patrick Lynch,

Elaine McKeen, Henry S. Rosenthal, Dale Soules

and Meredith Tromble who curated the show

In the mid-1970s, a group of young artists at New College of California fueled their creative practices with friendship and the radically experimental education offered by the school. They drew each other, recorded their own physiological data, performed plays written by their professor, invented musical instruments, and received credit for a gallimaufry of life experiences. At the time, statistics revealed that of students graduating with an art degree, only 5% were still making art ten years later. But in the ensuing decades each person in the New College Circle created their own path over, under, or around the barriers that stop young artists from becoming mature artists, pursuing creative practices and careers. This exhibition presents the New College Circle’s vibrant work in context with the unique institution that prepared them to thrive creatively throughout life.

Closing reception – November 10, 2024

Installation photos by Styrous®

Meredith Tromble