WFMU's Beware of the Blog

Damned Good Eatin'

A few weeks ago, back before the Giants’ ignominious collapse, I won a football bet.  The Iowa Hawkeyes were playing the South Carolina Gamecocks in something called the “Outback Bowl.” I grew up in Iowa, and claim to be an Iowan when it suits my purposes, so even though I knew nothing about the match-up, or either team, I challenged my pal in Columbia, South Carolina, to bet on the game.

I wanted to bet typical regional food, which was easy for my friend because South Carolina has lots of delicious things to eat, but it was hard for me because, first, I’m not in Iowa, I’m in New York, and second, because Iowa food is pretty terrible. Or it was when I was growing up there. Maybe by now they’ve figured out some way to get ahold of fresh vegetables, or fish, or something. Or maybe not everyone cooks like my Grammy C., with her giant vats of boiled beef, boiled boiled boiled until it was a grey, stringy mass in a thin and tasteless broth. Don’t forget the gummy noodles! It does seem odd that Iowa has no indigenous barbecue, since it is God’s little pigpen on earth, the pork producing capital of our fine land, producing more than 25% of all American pork. And then what do we do with it? I dunno. Boil it, I guess.

But in other states, they barbecue it. They smoke it, baste it, sweet, hot, or vinegary—barbecue is one of my favorite things. And by virtue of winning my bet (Iowa 31--South Carolina 10), I was privileged to eat THE BEST BARBECUE I HAVE EVER TASTED. I have eaten vinegar-based so-called “Carolina” barbecue up here in New York a few times, and it is pretty good (and probably what I had wasn’t even the real deal), but apparently that is North Carolina style. South Carolina barbecue is based on a mustard sauce, and now I can tell you that it is scrumptious, BBQalicious, and superb.

 My South Carolina friend sent me three pounds of Maurice’s Gourmet Barbecue and a bottle of Maurice’s Southern Gold BBQ Sauce Original Flavor, the one that says “HONOR ALL HERITAGE” on the label, next to the picture of the Confederate flag. Since Maurice’s last name is Bessinger, I don’t know why he doesn’t want to honor his German heritage by putting a swastika on there, too. Plus there is a picture of the flag of the Sovereign State of South Carolina, which looks like the flag of some Caribbean banana republic. And Maurice will be happy to sell you his autobiography, which I suppose will explain his heritage-based beliefs. But I just wanna eat the food.

In spite of his shout-out to “heritage,” Maurice is all modern and up-to-date, since the instructions on the barbecue said it had to be heated in a microwave. Maurice is a lot more modern than me, actually, since I don’t own a microwave and never have. In the spirit of football wagerism, I took the barbecue over to Green Bay Packers’ Hall-of-Famer C. Kiel’s house because she has not only a microwave but also a husband who bakes killer pecan pie, and we ate while watching the Baltimore/Tennessee playoff game on Saturday. It was kind of like afternoon tea, but with pork. It was sublime.

I have been trying and trying to think of the words to describe the flavors of the tender, smoky meat and the tangy-mustard-sweet sauce, and have concluded that it is beyond my power to describe. I can only advise you to get your own and try some.
And what the heck is “colonial hash?” That’s what I want to know.

Bat Day

Baseball season is a distant memory - even more so for those of us in the NY area - it's rare that a local team isn't in contention- we've been uninterested for so long now, it seems like the schedule ended sometime in 2007.

I was at the humble abode of my brother and his family the other night. The kids were winding down and the McBoingboing residence was descending into the lull that marks the end of the weekend. A shriek, and then a stampede of people come running up the steps from the family room. There's yelping, howling and other modes of expression coming from what I knew to be humans; eyeballs nearly popping out of heads, hands clasped to mouths and a lot of  stuttering. A BAT IS DOWNSTAIRS. So the weekend hasn't yet ended, apparently.

One Day, Three Boadrums

Friday was 8/8/8, a day I and many other slaves to the freakish rhythm had been waiting for for a year and a month - the sequel to Boredoms' 77BOADRUM, 88BOADRUM.  88 drummers performing in a spiral around a psychedelic center stage: this year, Boredoms held court at the La Brea Tar Pits in Los Angeles while Brooklyn's Gang Gang Dance did their own version on the Williamsburg waterfront.

Nothing surprising to report, really: while the whole Brooklyn production was predictably spectacular, it would have been otherworldly mindblowing with an insane dreadlocked visionary from another planet leading the spiral by screaming in tongues and smacking a seven-necked guitar with a trident in front of a full-size diorama of baby mammoths sinking into lakes of oil in the middle of Los Angeles, instead of a regular ol' Williamsburg dude hitting electronic drum pads in front of the regular ol' East River.

The biggest story of the day, though, was that both versions of 88BOADRUM got they asses boadrummed hard on a very large scale by these mofos in Beijing.  Turns out China can pour more money into production than Boadrum sponsor Nike Sportswear can.

Here's hoping Boredoms can get their hands on some galaxy-sized money for 9/9/9.

Seriously, if you didn't see the opening ceremonies, you owe it to yourself to check them out.  I know you'll like it.  To watch a highlight reel, go here and install Microsoft's annoying but gorgeous new video player, Silverlight.  (All the Youtube clips have been pulled)

For photos and video of the Williamsburg version of 88BOADRUM, go here.  For photos and video of the LAX version, go here (thanks Fogindex).

Honey, have you seen the mothballs?

if you like your Euro 2008 soccer players 10 meters high, quickly hop on a plane to Zurich, or just click here.

Can on German TV 1971 (video)

This is a great German TV special from 1971, featuring Krautrock legends Can doing some avant-gardish things, playing foosball (better known under the name "table football" in Europe), jamming around, and talking about socialism and music. The clip is taken from a 1999 Can documentary (which you can order with some other goodies on DVD at Spoon Records). I don't know whether the introduction is from the same program, but it was just too good to leave out.

For slightly better quality, you can download the video (32 meg MPEG-4).

Grindin’ a Rail with Jesus

I’m not a Catholic, so the impending visit of Pope Benedict XVI to New York wasn’t especially high on the Killing Time Watch List. But then I found out about the Papal Skateboard Art Design Contest! If only I were 11-18 years of age and living in the Archdiocese of New York, I could design some artwork for the Official Papal Skateboard. No, wait—I mean THE OFFICIAL PAPAL SKATEBOARD!

There are some rules, of course. You can only use four (4—they give you the numeral, in case the word is confusing) FOUR colors: Papal Gold, Satanic Black, Holy Ghost White, and Bleeding Wounds of Christ Red. (I made up the names, except for Papal Gold—that one’s real.) And they would really, really like you to use the official motto, “Christ Our Hope” on it, and they would especially really, really like you to incorporate the official Papal Visit Logo which is a photograph of the Pope and an abstract design of the dome of St. Peter’s Basillica, and three big long lines of copy. They would really like you to get that all onto the “convex side” of the skateboard (and then they explain that’s the bottom side, like you don’t know where the art goes).

I think they must have asked a professional designer to incorporate all those elements, and when the pro told them it was impossible, they turned to the blessed, innocent children to create a Miraculous Official Papal Skateboard Design. And the Miraculous Official Papal Skateboard Design artwork is going to be put on THE OFFICIAL PAPAL SKATEBOARD and it will be presented to Pope Benedict as a gift from the Youth of the Archdiocese of New York, and the winning designer gets three (3) tickets to the Papal Youth Ralley at Saint Joseph’s Seminary in Yonkers on Saturday, April 19. 2008. (They put the year in, just in case.) And why three (3) tickets? Maybe it’s so your Mom and Dad can go with you. But if that’s the case, why not nine (9) tickets so you can take your six (6) Catholic brothers and sisters, too? Where are they gonna go while you’re off seeing the Pope with Mom and Dad?

The best thing about the Official Papal Skateboard Design contest is some of the designs ostensibly submitted already. You can see them all at the Web site. I really love the ones where you can see the graphite pencil lines. Seriously. Although some of these were allegedly drawn by, like, 15-year-olds.

And the second best thing about the Official Papal Skateboard Design contest is imagining the Pope Benedict episode of my favorite TV show, Scarred.

Thanks for reading my blog post this time, and may God bless.

StupidBowl IV

For five or six years beginning in 1996, the StupidBowl reared its ugly head on the airwaves of WFMU. The idea was simple: watch their SuperBowl video, listen to our StupidBowl audio. If memory serves, StupidBowl IV featured myself, Bob Rixon and John Hajeski helping with the mix. Here's an excerpt:

The Poodle Wins the Group

Again.

Super Bowl MVP

I’m a Giants fan, and all season I’ve been defending Eli Manning to a football-watchin’ friend of mine from Philadelphia. This has not always been easy for me. When you see some of the shots of Eli, mouth-breathing and vacant-eyed, he looks kind of like one of those special-needs kids who has to wear a helmet to keep from hurting himself. But the Giants are my team, and Eli is my quarterback, for better or for worse. I finally got tired of my friend giving me a hard time—especially after that game with Minnesota, with the 4 interceptions for 3 TDs—and I just told him, “Quarterbacks are for sissy teams!” Then the Giants started winning on the road.

Yesterday they won the Super Bowl.

Sluggo and I watched it at our friends' party, and half-way through we switched to SAP--even though none of us speaks Spanish--just so we wouldn't have to listen to stupid Joe Buck and stupider Troy Aikman kissing Tom Brady's pretty butt.

Here is a joke I made up this morning. Pretend I’m “B” (for Bronwyn) and you be “D” (for Douche of the Week Fox Sports Guy):

B:  Knock knock!
D:  Who’s there?
B:  Tom Brady.
D:  Tom Brady who?
B:  EXACTLY!

The funny thing is, I didn't even realize what a huge upset the Giants had pulled off until I read all the game coverage afterward. I always thought they could do it.

Thanks for reading my blog post this time, and may God Bless the Mannings.

Killin' Me Softly With His Song

My favorite new product at this year's Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas was the iTaser. It's just what it sounds like--an mp3 player combined with a Taser. So the next time I'm on the train, sitting across from some idiot who has his iPod TURNED UP SO LOUD I CAN HEAR IT CLEAR ACROSS THE AISLE EVEN THOUGH HE'S GOT THE EARPHONES IN, I'm for sure gonna think twice before I ask him to turn it down, 'cause I really don't need a 50,000-volt electric charge to spice up my day. If I did, I'd just go walk my dog around the Lower East Side and let Con-Ed electrocute us with some stray voltage.

The spokesman for the iTaser company says their product is aimed at women who want personal protection but usually choose to take a music player instead of a weapon with them when they go out. Now they can have both! "Personal protection can be both fashionable and functionable," he says. I'm not sure whether the leopard-print-design iTaser is supposed to be the functionable one, and I thought "personal protection" was a code word for tampons, but as far as I know they haven't come out with the iTampax yet. No way am I putting an iTaser up there, either.

Anyway, I'm all for combining weapons with traditionally nonviolent pursuits. My favorite Olympic sport is the biathlon, which combines skiing with shooting great big guns. I think it would be fun to combine shooting with other sports, too--like rhythmic gymnastics.
Just imagine some little girl running merrily across an exercise mat with a long ribbon, picking up a hoop and throwing it high over the judges' heads, and then whipping out a semi-automatic assault rifle and firing a few rounds through the center of the hoop as it spins in mid-air. THAT'S a perfect 10, for sure!

We had a guy in Brooklyn just this weekend who tried to add some explosive excitement to a sometimes tedious sport. When police arrested Ivaylo Ivanov in his Brooklyn Heights apartment, they found a pistol, a shotgun, a crossbow, a bullet-proof vest, some drilling equipment, and seven live pipebombs. Ivanov said the pipebombs were for fishing. Okay!  Maybe by this time next year we'll have the Popeil Pocket iBomb. 

Thanks for reading my blog post this time, and may God bless.

Now It Can Be Told: I Failed Terry Bradshaw

Congratulations to the New York Giants: in a nail-biter, they beat the favored Green Bay Packers 23-20 in overtime to win the NFC Conference Championship. They now head to Glendale, Arizona to take on the undefeated New England Patriots in Super Bowl XXLII on Feb. 3.

The last time the GIants earned a trip to the Super Bowl it was Sunday, January 14, 2001 and I was on the sidelines for CBS Sports as a "utility" audio person. Years earlier I'd become a member of IBEW Local 1212, Radio and Television Broadcast Engineers Union, whose members work the Meadowlands for CBS. I had previously been called to join the crew for three or four late regular-season Giants games and - even though my employment was sporadic and the pay was good (around $40 an hour) - I dreaded the gigs. First, to state the utterly obvious, it's damn cold in Giants Stadium in late fall/early winter. That wind comes whipping through the Meadowlands and buddy, no amount of layering fends off the chill. Second, it's a long day, usually 14 or more hours on your feet, constantly moving, ducking and dodging players, team personnel, photographers, security people, etc. You probably don't get a sense of it, watching a game on TV, but there are more people standing on the sidelines of an NFL game than live in some of your more quaint midwestern towns. The job's also intensely physical, involving lots of lifting and toting of heavy objects and coiling up of long runs of cable (f you knew how much of the stuff is involved in putting a sporting event on the air you'd tell your kids to forget college and go into the wire and cable business). By the time I'd head for my car I'd be mentally and physically spent, barely able to navigate the few miles home and glad I didn't have a regular job to report to the next day.

"Fuck Everything But tATu"

I now understand the divine wisdom behind Mischa Barton's premature departure from The OC. Clearly, she was called upon by a higher power to make the greatest Cheesy Euro Disco movie of all time - a film that will surely be a contender for the best terrible music flick ever - Finding t.A.T.u.

It's the tale of two teenage girls who fall in love after meeting at a t.A.T.u concert and are swept into a dangerous world of obsession, drug abuse and murder - kind of  24 Hour Party People meets Eastern Promises.

A short was leaked onto the internet today, so who am I to stand in the way of two faux Russian lesbians and their viral marketing campaign:

If the sight of Mischa Barton navigating her way among hanging slabs of meat in a livestock factory isn't enough to make you count the days till it's release, then just ponder the immortal words that one of the protagonists types into her blackberry:

"Fuck everything but t.A.T.u. They're nihilists. Beautiful nihilists."

Just think. They came this close to defeating Vladimir Putin for the presidency of Russia.

thanks Doron and Idolator!

Previously: download the tATu How Soon is Now Remix: MP3

Even That Awful "Disappointed" Song Shouldn't Warrant Being Eaten Alive

Here's one, in case you ever wanted to see how John Lydon would behave only inches away from massive, horrible teeth that weren't his own. Excerpted from Rotten TV some years ago, it's quite interesting to see the Godfather of Punk truly humbled in the presence of nature in the subaquatic wilds of South Africa. I can't say I blame him, I've also been close to some pretty nasty looking animals underwater myself, including a cage-less experience around a couple non-Great White but nonethless bastardly looking sharks in the Turks and Caicos, and once had a barracuda almost bite my watch off. When these creatures come swimming by at 60' down and they can change their course in like two seconds and come flying at you, well, you just gotta trust all the assurances that they really don't want to eat people are for real. But then again, sometimes you might want to root otherwise in the case of certain filmmakers.

365 Days #245 - Outtakes from the 2003 365 Days Project - Part II (mp3s

In 2003 on the first run of the 365 Days Project there were a lot of contributions that did not make it online.  Now in 2007 we are compiling those tracks into volumes for your download.  Here we go with volume 2 in the ongoing series.

Australian Cricket Team (1972)
01 Australian Cricket Team Song (2:32)
This was one of those 'must buy' incidents; i've spent so much time trawling thru badly stacked, random piles of discs, the same old names, the same old covers, sometimes no covers at all - so, picture my smile as i witness, gazing from a drawer on top of an old chest in a temporary, charity shop, in chiswick, W4 - (that's "chiz-ick", for anyone outside the uk), the wry, disheveled lounge-lizard looks of a mid-eighties, not-yet-serial-killing, Anthony Hopkins! Bude-iful! The thin, paper sleeve; the juice label, so low budget, it can't be true, i thought, biting my lower lip, but there was the face: unmistakable... I simply had to buy it, 50p, but it seemed strangely indulgent, i'd got my heart set on the 1972 australian cricket team single also present (stay tuned!) - yes, it was a must buy. As i listened to it at home, a slight crackle, clearly not unplayed, i consulted with the Guinness book of hit singles - had this release troubled the top 75, surely not? My god, it had - number 75, for one week, the lowest of the low!
- Contributed by Lazyeye

Unknown Artist
02 Reciting Black Flag lyrics (0:47)
- Contributed by Scott Bass

Valerie and Everett Hull (Swank 45 #HFCS-167 B-Side)
03 Foreign Policy (3:34)
- Contributed by Bob Purse

Tammy True - Funtown: Favorite 20 Selections (K-tel NC498, 1978)
04 All My Loving (2:49)
Another song from this album.
- Contributed by Gary Ouimet

Home Recordings
05 Kim's Party with her friends (1973) (0:20)
06 Moss Record Part 2 (January 13, 1941) (2:55)
- Contributed by Scott Elledge

Alta Tension
07 The Alta Tension Singers - Caramelitos De Cafe (Coffee Toffee Squares) (2:18)
08 The Buckingham Group - Dulce Viajera (Sweet Hitchhiker) (2:37)
Straight from Argentina comes Alta Tension, an American Bandstand type TV program featuring teens dancing to the latest hits. All tracks are upbeat, but these two are particularly fun. The Alta Tension singers give us "Caramelitos De Cafe" which translated, means "Coffee Toffee Squares" and The Buckingham Group perform CCR's "Sweet Hitchhiker" or "Dulce Viajera"
- Contributed by Mike Harras

Jim Turner - The Well-Tempered Saw (1971)
09 Timbermill Mountain (3:23)
- Contributed by Scott Elledge

The Smurfs (Finnish)
10 Megabailut (Mambo No. 5) (3:46)
- Contributed by Johan Birath

Marv Welch - Here's Looking Up Your Glass (drunk by Marv Welch)
11 Side One (20:19)
12 Side Two (25:31)
Raunchy drunk comic from the detroit area in the 50's.
- Contributed by Jef Stevens

Movie Trailer
13 Swinging Barmaids (1:04)
- Contributed by Pete Martin

Bedford High School Band - 1968 Spring Concert
14 Brazilian Festival (Medley) (4:01)
- Contributed by Matt Strauss

Image: Front Cover

365 Days #244 - Fred Blassie - Nothin' But A Pencil Neck Geek (mp3s)

MP3:
01 No Bout About It (3:09)
02 Blassie, King Of Men (4:07)
03 U.S. Male (2:41)
04 Pencil Neck Geek (4:31)
05 Mambo Remus Interview (1:20)

Dear Geek or Geekette,

It's about time you listened to this record,you grit-eatin idiot. You are looking at the greatest single achievement in the history of the human race. This record features the actual physical image of the Great one, the king of men, Fred Blassie, immortalized for all time on a hunk of cheap wax. Not to mention the most memorable, heartwarming and beloved music and prose ever captured in the recording studio.

Now you can sit there, in the privacy of your own dump, with yer beer gut hanging out and that blemish-ridden pot-of-oil you call an old lady, and the two of you can slop around for hours on end staring at my gorgeous likeness on the album jacket, while you listen to my golden pipes crooning away.

Sometimes it's tough to be as great as I am. When I was born that geek doctor was so taken with my beautiful voice that he kept on slappin' my butt just to hear a few more notes. I finally had to bite off one of his fingers.

And a word of advise for all you punk rock pinheads, new wave nitwits, and heavy metal meatballs trying to make a career out of imitating the great Fred Blassie, you've been sitting aroun' staring at that rotten MTV so long your brains have leaked out and now you think you can come aroun' here and stink up my wrestling arena. just remember,you can scream, punch, puke and pogo till your ass falls off, but you'll never be Blassie. Until next time good night, good luck and Good Riddance.

                  - Freddy Blassie

Images:
Look at the COVER pinhead!
Put on yer MASK nitwit!
Learn the Geek COMMANDMENTS!
Learn EM some more!
Now yer a REAL MAN like Blassie!

Media: 12" 45
Colour: Red
Album: Nothin' But A Pencil Neck Geek
Label: Rhino
Catalog: RNEP 502
Credits: 1988
Date: Produced by Johnny Legend

- Contributed by: The ToD

365 Days #226 - LAYTON-O-RAMA! - Eddie Layton (mp3s)

The organ was once universally known as the "King of Instruments", be it pipe or electronic. This was especially true in the 1950's, when organ became a significant voice in pop and 'easy listening' music. The moniker was due to the fact that the organ could serve as a one-person orchestra and simulate many different sounds, and the player could play all instrumental parts, including the bass parts with his/her feet. The organ had the ability to take many pieces of music popular in the day (e.g., film, show, and TV themes, popular orchestral pieces, etc.), and enable one person to replicate them or rearrange them. It could also alleviate the necessity to have an orchestra or full band on hand in many situations, because one player could create such a full sound.

So, in addition to becoming wildly popular in homes throughout the world, where amateur organists by the score could create miraculously full sounds with only a modicum of ability (especially when all of the 'auto-play' features came around), the organ developed its own roster of 'stars'; virtuosos who could really play, could extract the most out of this mighty instrument, and dazzle audiences and become celebrities in the process.

Among the first major organ stars in the 1950s were Jesse Crawford and Ken Griffin, who usually played in a very melodramatic and not very rhythmically propulsive style. They were big influences on the next generation, whose major stars were probably Lenny Dee and Klaus Wunderlich. The market was flooded with LPs of organists playing major pop hits of the day and orchestral adaptations, some really good, many execrable. A great many of the lesser quality ones on minor labels by no-name players were touted as "In The Style Of Ken Griffin" – buyer beware any album that has these words! This is usually hideous stuff.

Eddie Layton may not have been the biggest star, but he was a bright one, and was surely one of the most imaginative organists of all in the 1950s. After childhood study of music and subsequent study of meteorology, he enlisted in the Navy, where he met the Hammond Organ for the first time. He was drawn to it immediately, and after the war he sought out the esteemed Jesse Crawford to study with. He landed a gig playing at Radio City Music Hall frequently, and then at CBS, where he spent years playing the typical slushy musical backdrops for soap operas, most notably "The Secret Storm".

This led to his meeting a gentleman named Michael Burke, who ran the New York Yankees after CBS bought the team. Burke offered Layton a job playing the organ at Yankee Stadium starting in 1967. Layton knew nothing about baseball at the time, stating that he thought "a sacrifice fly was an insect". He nonetheless decided to give it a shot; even after Eddie's objections that he didn't drive or own a car, Burke countered with an offer of permanent limo service to and from the games from his home in Queens.

It worked out pretty well. Layton held the job for 37 years until the end of the 2003 season, and became as nearly as indelible a part of the Yankee Stadium experience as anyone. In the process, he forged new ground through his (as he put it) "cheering with my music". He claimed to invent the now de rigueur bugle-esque "Charge" (F-Bb-D-F---D-F!), although this is open to debate, as someone who frequented Shea Stadium a few years prior with a trumpet lays claim to it also.

No matter. Layton, along with Gladys Gooding, Jane Jarvis, and many others, helped put the sound of the organ in everyone's ears as part of the baseball game fabric, and it exists to his day, although not as prevalently as in the past. Layton also played for the Knicks, Rangers, and Islanders along the way, making him the answer to an oft-bantered trivia question about who 'played for' all these teams. He was not the first baseball organist, and not even the first at Yankee Stadium (a gentleman named Toby Wright apparently played there in 1965-66), but Layton is probably the most recognizable name and a true pioneer in stadium organ.

Jungle Nights & Man-Eaters with Dana Brown

Follow Dana Brown, renowned big-game hunter, in his hunt of the great man-eating tiger of Western Nepal. Awaiting the tiger's approach while patiently sitting in a tree, Dana waxes poetic into a cheap microphone in a strange stunted and blustery meter about the beauty and horrors of the jungle as birds chatter and wail in the background.

Jungle Nights & Man-Eaters with Dana Brown Side One (mp3)
Jungle Nights & Man-Eaters with Dana Brown Side Two (mp3)

I have extracted some choice bits from the record...starting with an example of Dana's blubbering verbose observations of hunting in the jungle.
Dana Brown - Jungle Poetry (mp3)

Dana lets his listeners hear a bit of violent tiger mating.
Dana Brown - Authentic Sounds Of Tigers Mating! (mp3)

Towards the end of the record, Dana starts to adopt an almost b-movie horror movie affectation.
Dana Brown - Stalking Creeping Terror (mp3)

Eventually Dana gets down out of tree to take part in the "weird music of Western Nepal" during the eight-day holiday named "Holi" when all marriage ties are dissolved! Dana gets lost in reverie as he lusts after the girls of Western Nepal..."one of the prettiest women of the world."
Dana Brown - Eight Days of Holi (mp3)

front cover - back cover - Dana Brown autograph

Special thanks to Matt Marsden for lending me this gem that I have been pestering him about for a couple years now. Also- for a very similar stunted and blustery oratory style, check out Unkie Dunkie, the worst comedian of New Jersey.

365 Days #182 - The Showbiz XI - The Showbiz Soccer Song LP (mp3s)

MP3:
01. David Easter - Sing for Me Suzanne (3:55)
02. Denis Gilmore and Lee MacDonald - Why Did They Take Heaven (3:48)
03. Jess Conrad - Jesus The Messiah (4:17)
04. Jess Conrad and Tanya Tenola - Soccer Superstar (3:30)
05. Tony Selby - Canada (3:28)
06. Steve Bent - Country and Western Cowboy (3:29)
07. Robert Scott - Indian Brave (3:28)
08. Showbiz Soccer Team - John Wayne American (3:20)
09. Lesley Vickerage - The Story of Dorothy Stratten (3:42)
10. Jess Conrad - Black Stockings (3:55)
11. Showbiz Soccer Team - Showbiz Soccer Song (3:41)

The Showbiz XI were a charity celebrity football team set up in the 1950s and over the years raised a lot money for good causes by arranging soccer matches and associated events throughout Britain. However not content with having a second career as would-be football players, the so-called celebs also opted for a third career as would-be singers - with dubious results.

There were two Showbiz XI albums issued in 1989 and 1990 with some songs appearing on both. I have chosen the 11 best songs, which, to be brutal, are pretty bad. A lot of the blame must go to team leader/manager Jess Conrad. He was a teen idol of the early 1960s and was never much of a singer, opting to sing some very wet songs. No less than three ended up on Kenny Everett's Worlds Worst Record Show on radio in 1977.  The front of the sleeve shows Jess in football gear saving a goal but musically scoring an own goal in the process. His three contributions are let down by his leaden, tuneless singing and, again, a bizarre choice of material. Jesus The Messiah is a frankly embarrassing ode to Christ, which would be rejected from the most open-minded Christian album. Black Stockings is a Lovely Rita-style ode to female traffic wardens and sees Jess attempting a rap and falling flat on his face. But the worst offender is Soccer Superstar, a plodding jazz-funk dirge to football stardom with an all-time bad opening line: "Passing, kicking, shooting, dribbling, tackling, heading and ball control" sung by Jess and fellow vocalist Tanya Tenola with flat delivery and very little enthusiasm. The first time I played this I thought the record was pressed off-centre. It isn't!

A giggle is Steve Bent's seemingly helium-enhanced Country and Western Cowboy that has about as much to do with cowboy spurs as the Showbix XI have in common with Spurs FC. But save room for Why Did They Take Heaven? by Denis Gilmore and Lee MacDonald. This is truly toe-curling. They half talk/sing as father and son with the quizzical kid asking questions about nature and the environment with dad putting him right. Lee MacDonald was a child actor who played Zammo Maguire in the hit kids drama Grange Hill. But he's no singer and even has trouble speaking in time to the music. "Is it true you drink rain water? Were there fishes in the sea? And other life in the world apart from you and me?" he says in staccato as though he were being slowly electrocuted. Denis Gilmore as 'dad' is even worse, being so wooden he's giving off splinters.

The second album was a misguided a tribute to America and Hollywood hence the dire  John Wayne song, a tuneless tribute to model/actress Dorothy Stratten and the truly bad Indian Brave by Robert Scott which boasts 'special backing vocals by Ala Cra, Glenn Ford, Geoff Galt and Brian Grant'. This must have put Anglo-American relations back by decades.

Don't worry if you're outside Britain and haven't heard of most of the names singing here, we haven't heard of them either! The front of the sleeve lists more famous names, who were seemingly supporters of the team, but wisely opted not to contribute to the project (they knew their limitations).

The main problem here is that because it was for charity it gave them an excuse to get away with such mediocrity. But why are so many charity records a by-word for crap? The small print reveals that the Patron of the Showbiz XI was one Margaret Thatcher (Britain's former Prime Minister) and suddenly it all makes sense. She spent her life inflicting pain and misery on her populate and so was more than happy to put her name to more of the same with these albums.

- Contributed by: David Noades

Images: Cover

Media: LPs
Album: The Showbiz Soccer Song LP / The Showbiz Soccer Song LP no 2
Label: Showbiz Records
Catalog: SBX 102 / SBX 104
Credits: 1989 / 1990
Date: Produced by Allen David and Jess Conrad.

The Dangers of Surfing (MP3s)

While Hollywood is peddling surfing penguins to unsuspecting kids, we here at WFMU are all too aware of the dangers of surfing. And despite the success of shills of the surfboard industry like the Beach Boys, there were a few socially conscious musicians whose voices could not be suppressed. Here are two versions of the song "Little Dead Surfer Girl" which should have been a hit back in the day. But alas, we know who controls the media...

The Original: Incredible Broadside Brass Bed Band - Little Dead Surfer Girl [MP3]
The Much Louder And Therefore Superior Cover Version: King Uszniewicz and the Uszniewicztones - Little Dead Surfer Girl [MP3]

You can read more about the Incredible Broadside Brass Bed Band here, and about King Uszniewicz and the Uszniewicztones here.

Canadian Football Fan Portraits

Portraits of visiting team fans at Vancouver's BC Lions games, via Ziza. File next to Jill Greenburg's End Times or Monkey Portraits series, or Philip Toledano's Portraits of People Playing Video Games. The photographer of these is unknown, but if anybody figures out who took them, let me know.