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From The Desk Of John Wesley Harding: Osco’s “Alice In Wonderland”

The 25-year career of singer/songwriter John Wesley Harding has skyrocketed of late with the publication of no fewer than three critically acclaimed novels under his birth name, Wesley Stace. Equally amazing, the artist named for Bob Dylan’s misspelling of Texas gunfighter John Wesley Harden has just released the finest album of a career that’s seen him record at least 18 longplayers for labels ranging from high-profile majors to imprints so small the back catalog was stored in somebody’s garage between the cat box and the washing machine. Produced by old pal Scott McCaughey (Young Fresh Fellows) and fleshed out by no less than R.E.M.’s Peter Buck and the Decemberists, The Sound Of His Own Voice (Yep Roc) is a full-bore stunner with Wes (nobody calls him John) weaving his usual lyrical magic through knockout arrangements of extraordinary songs that revive the ghosts of the Kinks, David Lynch soundtrack guru Angelo Badalamenti and wall-of-sound maestro Phil Spector. For yet another career-topping milestone (gasp), JWH will be guest editing magnetmagazine.com all week for (yes it’s true) the second time. Read our brand new Q&A with him.

Harding: Far be it from me to recommend a piece of pornography, but this film blew my mind. And it’s freely available online from very dodgy places. Somewhere between John Waters, The Sound Of Music and South Park, Alice In Wonderland is a mini-masterpiece. It’s a porn musical, made in 1976 (“from the makers of Flesh Gordon“). The script is funny, the music, well, you’ve certainly heard worse on Broadway. Even the lead actress, whom I assume to be Kristine De Bell, is good. There’s actually precious little sex in it, and what’s there may or may not turn you on. But I declare this film worth watching for one fact alone: It is probably the weirdest movie you’ve ever seen.

It’s not disturbing like Cafe Flesh or insulting, like, you know, “porn”; it’s good-humoured and rather sweet. (I noted on its Wikipedia that the couple who play Tweedledum and Tweedledee are, or were, married. They certainly behave like it.) I imagine it to have been made during the “golden age” of porn, at a time when it seemed porn might somehow enter the mainstream. (Did it? Has it? It has, I guess, finally.) Why not therefore, in 1976, make a porn musical of Alice In Wonderland? With real show-stopping numbers? It all makes perfect sense. (For those easily shocked, I apologise. For those not easily shocked, my favourite line in the movie is: “Who do I need to fuck to get out of this movie?”)

Video after the jump.