The idiosyncratic musician, best known as lead singer for the Box Tops and creative genius behind Big Star, was 59. He was scheduled to play a festival in Texas this weekend.

Big Star existed for only a few years in the ’70s (not counting occasional reunions decades later), but was one of those bands with an influence that stretched for beyond its life span. Think the Velvet Underground, only AM radio-friendly.

Unfortunately, Big Star’s timing wasn’t so hot. The music crafted by Chilton – and the late Chris Bell, who left after the band’s first album – didn’t quite fit in with prog rock, glam rock and eventually disco, the popular stylings of the day. And the group’s label, a subsidiary of Stax-Volt, had major distribution problems, meaning most potential fans had no opportunity to hear Big Star. Chilton, himself, admitted such on a radio interview included as part of the Rykodisc “Live” album.

The success of musicians who were influenced by Big Star, most notably Tom Petty and REM, led to a rediscovery in the 1980s and the first large-scale release of the original albums. And the use of the song “In the Street” as the theme song for “That ’70s Show” helped bring Big Star to new audiences, even if Cheap Trick performed the aired version for the last seven seasons.

Perhaps a new wave of interest will follow Chilton’s death. His work should appeal to a wide audience.

Here’s a link to the Associated Press story about Chilton:

http://www.observer-reporter.com/or/entertainstory/03-18-2010-alex-chilton-obit

But …

Our office building is pushing 90 years old and doesn’t quite have a state-of-the-art climate-control system. So it takes a while to catch up with what’s going on outside. Either that, or no one dares to switch on the air conditioning in mid-March.

Whatever the case, it’s about 80 degrees where I’m typing this, which might not seem that hot. But for an overweight guy in a dress shirt and tie, it’s a little much.

I’m sure I’ll be griping this time next week about how cold it is …

http://oldmomblog.blogspot.com/

By the way, I designed the header. I guess I should try to come up with something like that for V.E.N.T.

As a result, I have to use a Web interface that doesn’t quite measure up comparatively. I really miss, for example, the notifications Entourage would provide when someone sent me a new message.

The Web-based system also sets a storage quota, meaning it will retain only so much information. As such, it’s a constant battle to stay under, what with the volume of information I receive and send.

What usually puts me over quota are files with huge attachments that are e-mailed to me as an address that happens to appear on someone’s list. Many of those are jokes that are illustrated with a bunch of JPEGs. Others are advertisements, political rants or “helpful hints.” I don’t really want any of them, and thanks to the folks who send them, I have to waste time deleting them.

I have plenty of other stuff on which I can waste time, thank you.

A driver two vehicles in front of me might have had that feeling this morning. Sandwich between us was a cruiser containing one of my township’s “finest.”

Where I live, there’s hardly any crime. Perhaps that’s because we have a multimilllion-dollar police force.

Perhaps, though, we have a multimillion-dollar police force despite a lack of crime. At any rate, there are a whole lot of policemen with little to do except patrol our roads, looking to write tickets.

I watched the driver two vehicles in front proceed at the posted speed limit for about a mile before turning left. Suddenly, the lights started spinning atop the cop car.

What did the driver do? Perhaps he or she was a little slow on the draw on the turn signal. Even that looked like a stretch.

My guess is that Officer Friendly is a bit behind in making quota this month.

No wonder Crosby was paranoid.

Rock on!

Today’s headline: “ABBA joins eclectic Rock Hall of Fame batch.”

Yeah, we’re all rockin’ out to “Fernando.”

POSTSCRIPT 3/17:

Note that I changed the band’s name after this first was posted. I forgot it’s an acronym. Shame on me.

Also, I’ve learned that only half the group showed up for the induction: former spouses Benny Andersson and Anni-Frid Lyngstad. That would make the actual participants “AA.” That acronym, of course, already is in use.

We can amend it, slightly, to “ABBA Anonymous.”

By Edward Hicks (1780-1849)

The flooding turned out to be minimal, which is good.
What’s not so hot is that hyperbole seems to rule when it comes to reporting on the weather. Sure, there must be a “better safe than sorry” element involved. But I’ll be the main impetus is trying to get more people to tune in to TV stations.
The cumulative effect of bandying about terms like “severe weather” is that if you keep calling for cataclysms that don’t come to pass, your credibility is bound to suffer. And when a real emergency arises, people won’t be prepared because they don’t believe you anymore.
Well, at least some people won’t believe. I’ve come across an inordinate number of folks who still take weather reports as gospel, no matter what the track record.
If you’ll excuse me, it’s back to working on this big wooden boat here …

Apologists for the township managed to shift most of the blame for the increase to the pricing policies of Waste Management, our garbage hauler. But within the small print, so to speak, was this item: an estimated $2.5 million operating budget for the new Community & Recreation Center.

A little background on that: Against the wishes of most of the township’s residents, the commissioners voted to proceed with constructing the Taj Mahal of rec centers. Where I live, you see, it’s unthinkable for any nearby municipality to have anything approaching us on the grandeur scale. At any rate, building that thing cost us taxpayers an arm and a leg, with the cost of operating it takes away the other arm and leg.

That leaves us no limbs, financially speaking, to pay membership things to even set foot in the damn thing. By the way, membership fees are rising by 10 percent this year, too.

My youngest son graduates in June 2012. There will be a “for sale” sign in front of my house.

You did? That’s odd, because there’s no such thing as daylight savings time.

The term technically is Daylight Saving Time, and where the plural version came from, who knows. That’s like asking, “Why do people call them the Jacksonville Jag-wires?”

Thanks to DST, it’s now after noon – it also is afternoon – and I’ve gotten next to nothing accomplished so far. Yes, it will stay “light” an hour later this evening, but that’s a relative term here in the Pittsburgh area, where we’re under our perpetual spring cloud cover, even though spring still is a week away.

The fun really starts tomorrow, when we’re back to awakening in the dark, for a cold, clammy start to the work week. At least I, for one, won’t be in the middle of recovering from a green-beer hangover. When will those people learn?