Music Monday for December 31, 2007

The Mystic Astrological Crystal Band - posted at The Revival Blog - a nice psychedelic-pop piece from LA and the late 1960's. It sounds more Monkees than psychedelic at times but it is a great snapshot of the late 1960's psych-pop scene. October Sunshine is one of my favorites. Link (direct to music)


Kurtis Blow - Christmas Rappin' - posted at Wiel's Time Capsule - ok, it's a little late for Christmas and I had kind of made a personal vow NOT to post any more Christmas music but how could I resist this one? I remember seeing Kurtis Blow play at the beginning of an NBA game back when the NBA was struggling (the Cleveland Cavaliers if you must know!). I pretty much hate rap music but I do have a soft spot for old school rap back when it was fun and not wrapped in gangsta' nasty like it is now. Link (direct to music)

Greasy Rock and Roll - Various Artists - posted at the TwilightZone! blog - another fine collection of garage rock and roll gems. If you like garage rock you need to have this blog in your subscription list!. Link (direct to music)

Ricky Vale and His Surfers - Everybody's Surfin' - 45 posted at the Belly Bongo blog - This is somewhat of a wishful thinking post here. I don't surf and live far from any place in which I could surf but with all of the snow that most of us in the US have had dumped on us recently, I can look forward to better times... Link (to Ghost Surfin') Link (to Soul Full of Surfin')

New Year's Music (Yes, There Is Such a Thing)

I was hoping to post at least one link to some New Year's related music after posting all of those Halloween and Christmas music links earlier in the year so here is a random assortment of songs posted by Music You (Possibly) Won't Hear Anyplace Else.

Direct Link to Music


Tracklist:

Ringing in a Brand New Year--The Dominoes, 1953.
Auld Lang Syne--Roy Kral, Jackie Cain Sextet, 1949.
Auld Lang Syne--Dean Shostak, glass Armonica, 1994.
A New Year Carol (Britten)--Cathedral Singers, 1992.
Ringing the Old Year Out (Currie)--Prince's Orch., 1911.
Auld Lang Syne--Evan Williams, 1909.

The Bugs Bunny Show

The Misce-Loony-Us blog has started posting some nice video clips of the original Bugs Bunny Show. This show aired in the early 60's and was used to bring Warner Brothers' cartoons to prime-time and, later, to Saturday mornings. Sit back and enjoy these clips which are in the original black and white with commercials (yay!). According to popular web lore, this show has not seen the light of day since the original run but I do remember much of it from my early childhood as part of the Bugs Bunny and Road Runner Show so it was playing at least up until the mid 1970's.

Bugs Bunny Show- Early Intro episode
Uploaded by MatthewHunter

The Prize Movie with John Lannigan

I just stumbled upon some old horror host clips on youtube completely by accident and then found this clip from an old show I used to watch called THE PRIZE MOVIE. It was channel 43's local version of a popular format used at the time to increase viewership for daytime movies. They would show a short clip of an obscure movie and if you guessed it you got the prize dollars. I remember when they first went to greater than a thousand bucks and they had to add an extra digit... must have been playing sick from school that day! Listen for the 'boing' noise when the lady incorrectly guesses the movie title. I remember this like it was yesterday.

Superhost - The Moronic Woman

Another horror host from my childhood, SUPERHOST, did the same thing as the others but I always really got a kick out of his skits, like this one, The Moronic Woman - based very loosely on the Bionic Woman. This one was probably crammed into a commercial break in the middle of The Fly or a Three Stooges short.

Hoolihan and Big Chuck - The Six Dollar Man

When I was a kid there were lots of horror hosts on the air and I was fortunate enough to grow up in kind of a hotbed of horror hosts, Cleveland, Ohio. Friday nights (11:30 pm and on if I could somehow manage to stay up that late) were reserved for HOOLIHAN AND BIG CHUCK. They showed lots of crappy horror and science fiction movies and interspersed them with little skits like this one. They were usually really corny but that was a large part of their charm, as was the laugh at the end of each one.

ABC Saturday Morning - Fall 1980 (Thundarr the Barbarian)

In the fall of 1980 ABC dropped Plastic Man and added Thundarr. They also left room for local programming, probably due to the FCC requirements for showing 'educational' programming, a battle that the networks had for a number of years regarding most of their Saturday morning programming.

Strangely enough, this cartoon is not available on DVD. A quick search of EBAY and I can't even find a bootleg copy.

Episode 1



Episode 2

ABC Saturday Morning - Spring 1980

ABC's Saturday morning lineup for the spring of 1980 (I had just turned 13 at the time and never really got into the 'I am too old for cartoons' phase) featured the Superfriends, Plastic Man, and Scooby and Scrappy - three big favorites of mine back then. Yes, I am putting it to public record that I actually liked Scrappy. Please note the past tense though!

They also aired a show called Kid's World which, I think, was a live action show in which they showed kids doing kid's stuff. I remember the big earth ball that they played with and that is about it. If anyone has more info please do share.


The Superfriends - Opening


Plastic Man - Opening


Scooby and Scrappy Doo - Opening

Mouse Maze (Flash Game)

Here is another simple but fun flash game in which you have to guide the red dot through the pictured maze. It is too hard for me to have such fine control of my mouse....

Link


(Maybe Friday's theme should now be FLASH FRIDAY)

Make Your Own Picasso

Make your own simple (or complex) Picasso painting using the simple tools at this link. You can do color too but I kind of liked it all black.

Link

Gustav Klimt's Website

It's not really 'pop culture' but I have always thought that Klimt's artwork was hauntingly beautiful. Click the link below to travel to a lavishly illustrated flash website.

Link
(WARNING: There is some explicit anatomy on display here. Nothing pornographic in my opinion but everyone's opinion differs I guess.)

The Death Killers (a band)

Here is an amazing(ly bad but good) album that WFMU has kindly posted as part of it's 365 days thing. This one is a thirteen year old boy and his six year old sister. In many ways it is absolutely horrible but in many other ways it is truly brilliant. The thirteen year old plays all of the music and the six year old came up with the name and also pulls vocal duties. Get it!

Link

MAME - Multi Arcade Machine Emulator

This is my next project - a MAME cabinet. Don't know what MAME is? It stands for multi-arcade machine emulator and it will emulate damn near every arcade game ever created (as long as you have the arcade roms). Why spend a few hundred dollars for just one old arcade machine to put in your basement when you can build this sucker and play more than a few thousand games?

If you have never tried MAME I highly encourage you to get it now. You don't need a fancy cabinet to play it and you don't even need a fast computer to run most of the older arcade games.


Link (to MAME website)
Link (to instructions for building a cabinet)
Link (to wikipedia entry for MAME)

Origami Money

Follow the link below to an interesting set of folded bills from around the world. All of the bills follow the same theme - the head is saved and the rest of the bill is folded into some sort of headgear. The English one looks very Pythonesque.

Link

R2D2 Translator

This one was making the rounds a couple of weeks ago but I never got the chance to fit it in with all of the Christmas goings-on. Type in any phrase and hear it translated to R2D2 speak. Neat.

Link

After Christmas Radio Spots

WFMU has posted a nice after-Christmas collection of audio bits and songs. Included in this easy download you will find Henry Fonda, Jimi Hendrix, Ruth Buzzi, Jan and Dean, and many more.

Link

Merry Christmas (and look at these thrift shop santas)

Merry Christmas to all of my readers. We are around 100 steady readers every day and I appreciate you guys hanging around to see what I have to say.

Enjoy this link to thrift store santas. A few ugly beasts in here!

Link

Christmas Music -the Final Chapter

From WFMU, comes 'Christmas Album - 1978.' I don't think you will ever find a much more generic title than this. (link)

This one looks much more interesting with lots of contemporary artists - "Oh No! It's Christmas.' The link is a Russian downloading site so you will need to brush up on your cyrillic (or use babelfish to help you through it). (link)

The Mostly Ghostly Music Sharing blog has been posting lots of not-so-ghostly Christmas music lately but it has all been greatly appreciated, like this classic from Billy Vaughn and his Orchestra, 'Christmas Carols.' (link to blog, direct link to mp3's)

And we end this post with another great one from the Mostly Ghostly Music Sharing blog, his most-excellent compilation of Christmas novelty songs. If you download anything from this posting, get this one! (link)

Soviet Christmas Card Collection

Mazaika.com has a really nice collection of old Soviet Christmas cards. This does bring up a few questions?

Did they celebrate Christmas in the Soviet Union? Well, yes, I guess they did.

Is it a religious Christmas? I don't know, none of the cards seem to have a religious theme but neither do most of ours from the western protestant dominated world.

Link

Christmas With the Rat Pack (Christmas Music)

Sammy, Frank, and Dean in your house for Christmas this year...

Link (to MP3 Maniaco blog)
Link (direct link to the music)

Rankin-Bass' Non-Christmas Saturday Morning Cartoons - Part 2

The Jackson 5ive (1971) - Opening


The Osmonds (1972) - Opening


Kid Power (1972) - Opening


Festival of Family Classics (1972) - That Girl - clip


Thundercats (1985)- Opening


Silverhawks (1986) - Opening


The Comic Strip (1987) - featuring TigerSharks, Street Frogs, Mini Monsters and Karate Kat

Rankin-Bass' Non-Christmas Saturday Morning Cartoons - Part 1

I don't know how much the average person knows about Rankin-Bass but they seem to be most widely known for their very popular series of holiday specials (which I have also featured in a separate blog posting today). But the studio has also put out many Saturday morning cartoons and specials including the following:

The New Adventures of Pinochio (1960) - Opening


Tales of the Wizard of Oz (1961) - complete episode


The King Kong Show (1966) - Opening


The Smokey the Bear Show (1969) - Opening (sorry, poor quality)


Tomfoolery (1970) - complete episode


The Reluctant Dragon and Mr. Toad Show (1970)- Opening

A Rankin Bass Christmas

Pinochio's Christmas - clip


First Christmas Snow - clip


Live and Adventures of Santa Claus - clip


Frosty the Snowman




The Year Without a Santa Claus - complete
(download it here in divx format)



Rudolph's Shiny New Year - complete
(download it here in DIVX format)


Nestor the Long-Eared Christmas Donkey - complete
(download it here in DIVX format)

Mr. Bean Plays With Christmas Toys

Here is one of the funniest clips from the Mr. Bean show. This episode has sort of become a holiday tradition in our family, along with Christmas Vacation, A Christmas Story, A Charlie Brown Christmas, and the Rankin-Bass Christmas specials.


Mr. Bean Christmass - Funny blooper videos are here

I bought the boxed set of all of the episodes a few years ago from Germany and it has been, by far, the most watched set of dvd's that we own.


Mr Beans Christmas Disaster - The most popular videos are a click away

A Calypso Christmas (christmas music)

As I have said many times before in this blog: there is a huge world of Christmas music out there and there truly is something for everyone. You don't have to just sit there and listen to your local Christmas music station as they belt out the same crappy tunes year after year!

Link
Direct Link to the MP3 album
(from the I'm Learning to Share blog)

Free Comic Book - Commando #1228 - 1976

I happened upon an old British comic today that I thought would be a nice share. It's black and white and of a decidedly inferior format than what us yankees are used to but it is a fun read nonetheless.

Link

Cartrivision - a Home Video Format From 1972

Retro Thing has a nice post about the first (?) home video format - Cartrivision. From 1972, this was the precursor to the VCR but it was expensive. Being that I was five years old in 1972 I certainly probably wouldn't remember any of these systems - and they seem to have went out of business rather quickly as expected given the rather exorbitant price-tag - but do any of you readers remember this system?

Link

Labguy has a nice page dedicated to this machine as well.

Link

Original Star Wars Trailer from 1977 (!)

Has it really been that long? Thirty plus years now? At any rate, I have vague memories of seeing this thing on tv and being totally excited, begging my mother to take me to see this. Thanks, mom.

Note the absence of John Williams music. I don't know if this was made before the soundtrack was finished or if they just didn't think that the music had the clout to get people in to the theaters.

Hand Animated Paper Mario

Paper
Uploaded by reelgood0008

I would imagine that this short clip took many hours to complete but I really kind of enjoyed it. It almost made me rush home from work and start on my own masterpiece until I realized how long it would take.

Wrap Art - Christmas Gift Wrap Ideas

Here is a nice site with some different wrapping ideas. A lot of it is really kind of kooky but I liked their ideas about re-using various items to wrap gifts. I think that there could be a lot of room for growth in this area and this could become a very nice art form.

Link

Christmas Music From Wax Cylinders

(OOPS! I just noticed I had the wrong link to the music so I am reposting this today, sorry!)

I just stumbled upon this rather interesting set of old Christmas recordings taken from wax cylinders. If you don't know what a wax cylinder is, look to your right and look at that little blue cylinder. These were precursors to the 'modern' phonograph records and played much the same with a needle but they rotated in the horizontal direction instead of going around in circles. I believe that these were Thomas Edison's baby and that they eventually lost out to the 78 (as in 78 RPM, the real precursor to the modern 'album.')

Link

The Dangerous Christmas of Red Riding Hood

Does anyone remember this show? Supposedly from the ABC TV musical comedy special, here we have The Dangerous Christmas of Red Riding Hood original soundtrack. I can only imagine what the tv show was like...

Liza Minelli and Vic Damone star in this one.

Link (to blog)

Link (to music)

Christmas Music Now - Redux

EDDIE DUNSTEDTER "THE BELLS OF CHRISTMAS" (CAPITOL ST 1264) - from the Mostly Ghostly Music Sharing blog - direct link

A MERRY MANCINI CHRISTMAS (RCA VICTOR LSP-3612 1966) - form the Mostly Ghostly Music Sharing blog - direct link

Adventure in Carols by Ferrante and Teicher - from the FaLaLaLaLa blog - direct link

GAYLA PEEVEY -- "I WANT A HIPPOPOTAMUS FOR CHRISTMAS" 1958 - from the Children's Records and More blog - direct link

Yuletide 78's (Christmas Music of Old - Part II)

Music You Won't (Possibly) Hear Anyplace Else has posted a nice collection of Christmas 78's for your enjoyment.

Link (to blog)

Link (direct link to music)

Guimaraes e Seu Conunto - Papai Noel (Christmas Music)

Guimaraes e Seu Conjunto - Dancando com Papai Noel (1959)

Loronix has posted a nice Brazilian Christmas album on Rapidshare, including MP3 and FLAC files (FLAC is a lossless compression format).

Link

Davey and Goliath Christmas Episode

Saturday Morning Blog has posted the complete Davey and Goliath Christmas episode. Does anyone else remember watching this when they were kids? I certainly do. Follow the link to read my comments about the show (they are good, trust me!).

Link

Class of 1999 - a Movie Review

Class of 1999 (1990)

Here we have an interesting amalgamation of 1980's themes - sort of like a poor man's Robocop meets The Breakfast Club. Starring lots of notable B-Movie actors and character actors - Pam Grier, Malcolm McDowell, Stacy Keach - and directed by Mark Lester - 29 movies in his IMDB credentials and I don't recognize a single one but for this - and you have what may end up being a direct to video disaster in the pre-direct to video era.

The New York Times actually gave it a good review but I can't say that I am as optimistic as that writer. Overall it was a mildly enjoyable take on the Robocop theme, the sets were all well done even without considering their obviously limited budget, and the story was interesting and moved along at a rather brisk pace.

My problems were with the absolute ludicrousness of the story. Hey, let's let some deranged psychopath with funky contact lens inserts design three robotic teachers (who also happen to be from a failed military robot program) come in and restore order to this school. I enjoyed the robots gone amuck story but it would have helped if they toned down Stacy Keach's character quite a bit.





The acting is another story - lots of Keanu Reeves School of Acting graduates here, including the lead, Bradley Gregg as Cody. I kept waiting for him to say 'Whoa.' He really does take the 'too cool for school' acting bit just a bit far.

According to Joe Bob Briggs, this was a sequel to the Class of 1984 but I don't really remember that one very much either. I watched it on Monsters HD and the print quality was good, slightly better than dvd but a little soft.

The Groovie Goolies

Alternate Opening - Groovie Goolies and Friends










Closing Credits

Thomas Edison's A Christmas Carol

I know, I really should have called it CHARLES DICKENS' A Christmas Carol but this is the 1907 version of the film produced by Thomas Edison's studios. I posted Thomas Edison's Frankenstein for Halloween and it was a huge hit so here is Thomas Edison's A Christmas Carol.

(Apologies for the music, turn it all the way down because it is a horrible match to the silent film)

Frosty the Snowman (Christmas Cartoon)

Part 1

Part 2

And here is an earlier version, I have already featured this one on my blog but it is nice to have it for comparison to the newer one.

Christmas Cartoons from the Biggies

I'm not so sure that this ever played on "Saturday morning cartoons," but Tom and Jerry's The Night Before Christmas is such a nice classic toon that I thought I should share it.


Pluto's Christmas Tree (1952)

The NINE Most Unneccesary Greatest Hits Albums of All Time

Read this one and tell me you didn't laugh at least nine times! There is some good sarcastic humor here and, even though they are quite obvious targets, the wit is very deep - unlike the music.

Psst... don't tell, I saw Vanilla Ice in concert about seven years ago. Funnier than a Weird Al concert too! In a way he opened for Modern English (which was a truly awesome show!).

Link

Bob Hope Comics (#20)

Little known and even less cared but Bob Hope did have a comic book back in 'the day.' Follow the link to a Flickr set of images.

Link

Another batch of delicious Christmas Music!!!

Captain Kangaroo (from Children's Records and More blog) - Link

Line Material Christmas (from Music You Won't Hear Anyplace Else blog) - An interesting promotional giveaway from a street lamp company! - Link

Pac-Man Christmas (from Children's Records and More blog again) - Link

Christmas With the Chipmunks (from Children's Records and More blog yet again) - Can't wait for the movie.. not - Link

Tales Told in Holland and Nursery Friends From France

I just found this link at the I'm Learning To Share blog and thought that the illustrations were nice enough to share (it's a flickr set).

Link

Garfield's Christmas Special

Part 1


Part 2


Part 3

Video from 1967 Predicting 1999 and the Home Computer

1999 A.D.


Shop from home! E-Mail! They did end up getting a lot of it correct.

Soviet Propaganda Poster Art

Here is an interesting idea for a blog - A Soviet Poster a Day.

This poster's title is 'Just Smoke Cigarettes.' No brand or anything like that, just an ad to get you to smoke cigarettes. Follow the link to the website to see why they would advertise such a thing!

Well, they don't post everyday but they do post often and they do translate the posters and they do provide some insightful commentary.

Link

May the Star Wars Christmas Be With You!

If you read today's previous entry and went on that big shopping spree you may be interested in this Yoda nutcracker that I just saw on the Wonderland blog.



Link to the original story

Buy It! ($320!!!!)

Star Wars Christmas Ornaments

This one is from the 2007 Hallmark collection. Only a true geek can appreciate such a thing as this. I know I can but my wife... well that is another story! This thing will set you back $28!!! Wow!
























Rebelscum has a nice little article about Star Wars holiday items. I consider myself a collector extraordinaire but I just can't see myself starting a Star Wars Christmas collection. To me the two really don't go together that well.

Link




















Now this is just plain ridiculous! Star Wars, M&M's, and Christmas? I can just see this board meeting taking place... who greenlighted this monstrosity?

Well you can buy it here if you really must (at only $7).

Christmas Music of the Worst Kind

Let's start this week off right! Put this crap in your MP3 player whilst you brave the traffic and crowds as you finish up your Christmas shopping.

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(from the PopCereal blog)

The Rhodes Kids Christmas album. Well what more can I say that the album cover doesn't already say? How about one word - Yikes! Horribly bland 60's pop music.

Link

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(from the Ernie (Not Bert) blog)

This one really isn't fair. I am downloading it right this minute and haven't listened to it yet but just look at the cover and tell me that it is going to be good! Different, yes, but good?

Link

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(another one from the Ernie (not Bert) blog)

Ho Ho Horrible!!! Moog Christmas? For you kiddies that don't know what Moog is, count yourself lucky!

Link

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(from Xtabay's World blog)

Let's close this week off with some cocktail hour inspired Christmas madness that would make Dean and Sammy proud.

Link