WFMU's Beware of the Blog

A Desperate Masterpiece: Lars Von Trier's Riget (AKA The Kingdom)

BY THOMAS MICHALSKI

Watch the first episode of Riget (The Kingdom) here.

Watch the whole series here.

By the earlier 1990s, Danish filmmaker Lars Von Trier was already an internationally well-known art-house auteur, fresh from winning a slew of awards, including the Palm d’Or at Cannes, with Europa, the final film in a trilogy of the same name. His increasing notoriety and the end of Europa had brought his career to a crossroads, but figuring out what he would do next was complicated by the fact that his personal life was falling apart all around him. There was the divorce from his first wife, the death of his father, or at least the man he thought to be his father until his mother, who passed away soon afterward, informed him otherwise, and if that wasn’t enough, he had his cash-strapped production company, Zentropa, to worry about. In an attempt to raise some money, while also keeping things low impact, Von Trier agreed to co-write and direct a miniseries, the supernatural hospital drama Riget (The Kingdom), for Danish TV in 1994. From the outside, it must have looked like a step backward, career-wise, but if it had inauspicious beginnings, Riget would turn out to be some of Von Trier’s best remembered work and have a profound effect on what came after it.

Riget borrows its title from the nickname of the real life Danish hospital where it takes place, Copenhagen’s Rigshospitalet, though if it’s anything like on the show, you probably wouldn’t want to be a patient there. For one thing, it’s haunted as fuck, with the ghastly cries of a young girl emanating from an

Solar Records: The Sound of LA

by Tony Best

Watch the whole show on Network Awesome! (updated)

SOLAR (Sound of Los Angeles Records) was THE hottest R&B label of the late 1970s and mid-‘80s. Rivaled only by NYC’s Salsoul Records, SOLAR successfully bridged the delicate gap between disco and funk during a period where both genres were struggling to find an identity in the post-Carter/pre-Reagan administrations. Buoyed by bouncy rhythm tracks and appregioed synths, SOLAR’s Jheri curl-slick music embodied L.A.’s hip (and stratified) cultural identity. From backyard boogies in Compton to roller-skating jams at WeHo’s Flippers, SOLAR kept the City of Angels – as well the world – dancing on sunshine.

SOLAR dawned in the mind of Dick Griffey. A music industry heavy with a keen interest in Black entrepreneurship, Griffey launched the label in the summer of ‘77 as an outlet to foster underrepresented talent in the record business. The early artist roster included Shalamar, The Whispers and Carrie Lucas,

Clyde Crashcup Invents Hi-Fi

"When all's said and done Leonardo, there is such a thing as too much realism in hi-fi!"

Although spoken in 1964,  the modern quest for high definition imagery leads down some thorny paths as well. Today we find our protagonist 'Clyde Crashcup', a Ross Bagdasarian creation, in the fifth book of his short five-issue run, seeking to improve his hi-fi set with mixed results.

From the John Stanley / Irving Tripp creative team that wrote and drew so many terrific 'Little Lulu' stories for Dell Comics comes this quirky series about a 'real gone' scientist and would-be inventor, adapted from his segments on the televised cartoon program The Alvin Show between October 1961 and September 1962 as voiced by Shepard Menken (in his impression of actor Richard Haydn).

Discover who really put the 'woof' in your woofers right after the jump!

Say It Ain't True: The Elvis Files

by Thomas Michalski

 

What's on Network Awesome today?

Occam’s Razor teaches us that the simplest answer is usually the correct one, but try telling that to a dedicated conspiracy theorist. It’s not that life isn’t complicated, or that crazy things don’t happen, but a simple explanation (Oswald Shot Kennedy, a weather balloon crashed at Roswell) is mathematically far more likely than one involving vast sinister cabals and little green men. The persistent tabloid-fueled belief that Elvis Presley did not in fact die on August 16, 1977 is no different. The simple explanation for what happened that day is that years of stress, health problems and raging pill addiction finally caught up with the iconic rock star in the form of a massive heart attack in his Memphis bathroom. The complicated explanation could, honestly, be just about anything (time-travelling ninjas), but the most commonly circulated is the one put forth in the amazing 1990 home video The Elvis Files, that Presley’s “death” was actually an elaborate hoax perpetrated, kind of half-assedly, by the United States government.

The hour-long special is hosted by none other than Bill Bixby, best remembered for playing Bruce Banner to Lou Ferrigno’s Incredible Hulk on the late 70s/early 80s TV series (technically, he played “David Banner”, they changed it because CBS thought “Bruce” was too gay). Bixby was a natural choice for the job since he had actually starred alongside Presley in two of his movies, 1967’s Clambake and1968’s Speedway, and

Awesome Tapes From Africa Weekend on Network Awesome

Live Music Show - Classic Sudanese Music on TV

We're thrilled to collaborate with Awesome Tapes From Africa this weekend to present the most interesting and inventive collection of African videos this side of Khartoum.  Guest curator Brian Shimkovitz culls from his deep knowledge of African music to deliver collections of African TV commercials, Pop Music of Pre-War Somalia, even the outrageous 2002 film, "Sharon Stone" - a classic Nollywood drama about an overly ambitious woman willing to do anything to make it to the top. 

Of course the mainstay of Awesome Tapes From Africa is incredible music and here's an ocean of amazing music captured on over-saturated film and video. He elaborates about the Live Music Show above:

"It doesn't get any better than this! The music of Sudan is as varied as the country is large (as Africa's largest country, it's about the size of America's Midwest). Over the years the traditional sounds have seeped into popular music, as shown by Sudan's many TV stations. Watch some classic gems from a small selection of Sudan's most revered artists. Explore the web using Google Translate to help with the Arabic names and discover tons more where this came from"

Playlist:

Zaidan Ibrahim

Al Balabil

Mustafa Sid Ahmed

Hanan Elnil

Eman & Amany (The Sudanese Twins)

Hanan

Zaidan Ibrahim

Hanan Elnil

Walter Brennan's "He's Your Uncle! Not Your Dad..." (part two) and Vick Knight and the KEY Records Story

 

"A fella in the lobby asked me if we were going to record this album in stereo. I told him absolutely not. Stereo has two loudspeakers, one on each side of the set.  The one on the right is OK, but I refuse to listen to anything coming from the left.    Seriously though, if I brought home a record machine with a speaker on the left, my wife wouldn't let me in the house.  Now there's a patriot for you!"

(from side two of "He's Your Uncle!")

Today we're presenting side two of this bizarre ultra-right-wing album from 1967, luridly written and directed by Vick Knight and voiced with gusto by Walter Brennan, in continuation of the first post on this subject two weeks ago. Since then I've tried to uncover more information about the KEY records label and its strong predilection towards hyper-conservative and inflammatory spoken-word albums. Join me after the jump for this entertaining record (via mp3) and the related facts and pictures that have turned up about this under-documented Los Angeles company.

Recent Thurl Ravenscroft Sighting - Early Cereal Pitch

With those holidays upon us, we'll be hearing from Mr. Ravenscroft more than ever, so it was with only slight surprise that I saw and latched onto this clip (as discovered by Mr. Mark Evanier over at his useful blog) recently placed online of a 1952 Kellogg's breakfast cereals commercial.  There's no question in my mind that the announcer is Ravenscroft, and he's most likely singing in the chorus as well. Oddly, there is no depiction of 'Sugar-Frosted Flakes' in the ad, which Evanier suspects may be due to the clips mis-dating, or simply that the cereal hadn't been introduced nationally yet. More information about Mr. Ravenscroft's TV commercial work can be perused here.
After early ads with voice artist Dallas McKennon  (the voice of Gumby, among many others) as Tony the Tiger, Thurl Ravenscroft went on to play the character for 53 years until his death in 2005; quite a respectable run. As a lover of anything Thurl I couldn't resist posting this here, as WFMU and Ravenscroft have a history together at this point, and any new updates should be covered here. Eat up and enjoy!

 

Their House Is A Museum, Where People Come To See 'Em

 

We live in strange times.  We are approaching the third and fourth wave of vintage retro music, particularly exotica revivals, a music style that is initially almost a mockery of traditional Polynesian music, but in itself a pretty wide open, otherworldy bastard of a music genre, among others.  I never thought that Star Trek or Dungeons and Dragons would see so many generations of enthusiasm outside of their initial flashpoint, but there are workings and reworkings.  People still think that the wing wong chong sounds in "China Girl" and "Kung Fu Fighting" are implements of traditional Asian music, even though to anyone outside of 1940, they hardly have a resemblance.   Sometimes, though, reworkings of reworkings of concepts that never really existed in real life can be captivating.  Such is the case with the marvelous people who are trying to make the half-imaginary mansions from the Addams Family and The Munsters, both TV shows filmed on generic stage sets, a reality.

It might be more than a little geeky, but I totally support these folks who are trying to settle this problem once and for all.  

For the Addams Family, it seems to be rather impossible.  An architect named Mark Bennett did an entire book speculating the floor plans of several television sitcoms, but this blogger points out the very obvious flaws in these plans, especially in the (lacking) foyer to the Addams Family house.   Both of these fellas are cross referencing scenes from every episode of the series with one single painting of a house in LA that is now demolished.  The image of the house was only ever painted from one angle, scenes from the series were never shot there.  It happened to be painted on glass, and they would simulate rain in front of this painting when necessary.  Sometimes, they would zoom the camera all the way into the window to show us more intimately what Pugsley or Wednesday were doing. 

Monster Songs and Stories from Sesame St. and Environs

"Lakes, carillons, / Pools and bells, / Fifes and freshets, / Harps and wells; / Flutes and rivers, / Streams, bassoons, / Geysers, trumpets, / Chimes, lagoons. / Hear the music, / Drink the water, / As we poor lambs / All go to slaughter. / I love you Eliot. / Good-bye. I cry. / Tears and violins. / Hearts and flowers, / Flowers and tears. / Rosewater, good-bye."                          Kurt Vonnetgut / God Bless You Mr. Rosewater

As a follow-up to one of my other puppet-monster-related posts, this week I had a hankering for some brightly-colored furry monsters and friends, they're "clumsy but not scary." The first one featuring the lovely music of Samuel Pottle, followed by some Carrol Spinney and Bob McGrath, in two cuts from Big Bird's 'Birdtime Stories' lp. We'll close this short set with a teaser cut from the beginning of Jim Henson's 'Muppet Musicians of Bremen' album. Expert voice work, music, and production all around as usual. Happy All Hallow's Eve!

Sesame St. Monsters: Games Monsters Play          Grover: Be Kind to Monsters       Oscar: The Three Billy Goats Gruff         Bob McGrath: The Emperor's New Clothes (edit)         The Muppet Musicians of Bremen, pt. 1

Deathly Stills: The Dark Dark World of Guy Bourdin

by Jessie Brown - The Films Of Guy Bourdin

Part of Network Awesome's Fashion Week, Sept 14-18th!

Flick through any glossy fashion magazine today and more-than-likely, you’ll be faced with the legacy of Guy Bourdin. This maverick French photographer was no stranger to controversy both in his work and private life, and he singlehandedly changed the face of fashion advertising due to his uncompromising and highly innovative style.

Sportsy Talk: Olympics Update!

Mitt Romney, former head of bribery-ridden Salt Lake City Olympics 2002, started off his Big World Diplomacy Tour (Three Whole Other Countries!) by pissing off his first hosts so much that the Prime Minister of England dissed him in public. Score!

Just because the London Games have involved social cleansing, Brand Police,  a ban on fish and chips without the fish, strikes, threatened strikes, security failures, rooftop rocket launchers, a battleship in the Thames, official mascots with security camera eyes that “record everything,"  a logo that looks like a sex act, the worst font ever of the 21st Century, empty seats, insulting flags, inappropriate remarks about beach volleyball, and badminton scandals, it doesn’t mean they’re not, you know, well-organized.

Then there was the Opening Ceremony. You’d think Mittens would have liked that Opening Ceremony, with its salute to the Poors Who Knew Their Place back in the England of the Industrial Revolution. The part he probably would not have liked was the part we didn’t get to see here in the US—the tribute to the victims of the 7/7 attacks. London won the right to host the 2012 Olympics on July 6, 2005, and on the next day terrorists detonated four bombs on London subways and a bus, killing 52 non-terrorists and wounding 700. The two events are linked in people’s minds, and the ceremony featured a moving version of the hymn “Abide with Me” sung by Emeli Sande, and a dance choreographed by Akram Khan. I couldn’t figure out why NBC cut this part of the program to run some stupid interview with Ryan Seacrest and Michael Phelps—which they reran the other night!— because I thought the point of American news media was to keep us in a constant state of fear about terrorism, and wouldn’t a tribute to terror victims help with that? But then the next day NBC said they cut the tribute because it “wasn’t tailored for the US audience.” So now I know that the main goal of American media isn’t to keep us frightened, it’s to keep us ignorant.

Here's the censored part of the ceremony:

 

Evel Knievel: Above and Beyond

by Casey Dewey

Dean Martin Celebrity Roast: Evel Knievel

What's on Network Awesome today?

 

Brave - 1. Willing to face danger, pain, or trouble; not afraid; having courage 2. showing to good effect; having a fine appearance 3. fine, grand, or splendid.

Daredevil - bold and reckless.

“America is a willingness of the heart” - F Scott Fitzgerald

Only in America could a man like Robert “Evel” Knievel exist. Brash, brave and bold, Evel Knievel is as American as apple pie, fireworks and the Las Vegas strip. Ceremoniously draped in his red, white and blue leather jumpsuit, he captivated the world with his jaw-dropping and death-defying motorcycle stunts. Flying over (or crashing and burning over) stacked cars, buses, semi trucks, deadly animals and deep chasms in the earth, he symbolized America’s core values and ideals: be true to yourself, don’t be afraid, suck in your gut and make it a BIG SHOW. If you succeed - great, you’ve done your job. If you don’t succeed - brush it off and and do it again, and most importantly - keep your word.

The call of the wild came early to a young Knievel kicking around in Butte, Montana. Apparently working in a copper mine is as exciting as it sounds, so the restless teenager decided to kick it up a notch. Driving

Andy Griffith and the Darlings

Having recently lost both Mr. Griffith and Doug Dillard of the Dillards, I wanted to point to some Dillards  and other Griffith-show musics. Just some wholesome folk tunes played unpretentiously.  Hopefully this will lead you down into that shady lane of pastoral memories and thoughts. These boys led some long and full lives. They did not go gentle into that good night - they went down pickin'!

  

A 1968 Civil Rights Discussion; An Off Color Fairy Tales; An Obnoxious Journalist: Some Reel to Reel Odds and Ends (Exploring My Reel-to-Reel Catacombs, Volume 30) (MP3's)

Today, three tapes which I've been saving for awhile, for just the right time. Now, instead of making each into a post of it's own, I've decided to bundle them together, into an "odds and ends" post.

First up, a very brief tape featuring someone named Oliver, a radio newsman who has been asked (in 1975) to provide a few seconds worth of introduction to a special program on Foreign Policy. He does so, giving seven nearly identical readings in about 90 seconds. What makes this tape memorable is the obnoxious version of the text he shares with his recipients after the seven intros, in giving an eighth intro, in an altered fashion. While I hope this sort of thing no longer goes on, I suspect it probably does. 

Oliver - Tease for Foreign Policy Special (8 Takes) (MP3)

Next up, an equally obnoxious tape. I knew I was in for an interesting listen when I opened this box and saw that the inside cover was labeled "Phallus in Wonderland". The resulting tape did not disappoint, although my enjoyment of it was mostly in the wonder of listening to two people who clearly thought they were being much funnier than was actually the case, rather than any humor or titillation I got out of it. For about 16 minutes, Jerry and an unnamed woman take a trip through a few different children's stories, replacing key words here and there or accenting certain syllables. If you're in the right mood, you may find it either fascinating or mind numbing, or maybe even both. 

Unknown Couple - Off Color Fairy Tales (MP3)

Finally, and on a truly different note, there is a recording of an amazing televised Civil Rights Discussion, probably from a public television station, from a some time in 1968. The last half hour of what was an hour long show is recorded here. 

I'm calling it a discussion, although for significant stretches of it, it's really more of a barely-under-control argument, to the point that at times, the microphones in one of the two studios being used are cut so that the other parties can respond without being interrupted (although you can still hear the "cut" participants continuing to talk). I think I've identified one participant as Maryland Representative Charles Mathias, and wonder if "Mr. Kilpatrick" is one-time segregationist James J. Kilpatrick. I also think one of the speakers may be Hosea Williams, who was part of Dr. King's inner circle. As to the others, I think there are mentions the names Mr. Field, Mr. Palmer and Mr. McKissick, but beyond hearing those names, I have been unable to identify these other speakers. 

At the end of the show there is over nearly 90 seconds of muffled conversation, followed by some ending voice-over comments, and I couldn't help but laugh at the song which started the commercial for an upcoming show, a song whose lyrics did not really fit with what had just gone down. I've left in a moment of that song for your enjoyment. 

Televised Civil Rights Discussion (MP3)

Don’t Say “Gorilla” if You’re Wearing a Monkey Costume: The Monkees’ 33 1/3 Revolutions Per Monkee

by Ryk McIntyre - 33 1/3 Revolutions Per Monkee

What's on Network Awesome today?

There is a little-known story from the history of The Monkees, the band that were a bunch of TV executives' answer to the overwhelming popularity of The Beatles. They were initially hired just to sing the songs and be the faces of the show. Over time, the band wanted to show they were more than pretty faces/actors and started demanding to play on their own songs, as well as perform live as a real rock ‘n’ roll band. So, out they went on tour.

Now, whoever put the tour together picked an opening act that had started to gain acclaim in England and, on the basis of that, wanted to play in America. All the promoter knew was this was Pop music too. So imagine the scene when, in front of an audience of mostly young teen girls and their parents, Jimi Hendrix is doing his opening spot, complete with guitar humping and the like.

And that’s as good an intro to the wonder that is 33 1/3 Revolutions Per Monkee.

Keep the Smooth: An Interview with Yacht Rock Creator JD Ryznar

by RJ White - Collection - Yacht Rock

What's on Network Awesome today??

In 2003, Dan Harmon and Rob Schrab founded the monthly film festival Channel101 with a simple premise: Make a five-minute pilot and if enough of the audience at the live screening in LA votes for it, you have one month to make another episode. If they vote for it again, you make another. Repeat. In 2005, JD Ryznar submitted Yacht Rock, which would go on to become one of the most successful shows in 101’s history and, over 12 episodes, create a new notch in the Internet’s heart for smooth, smooth music. We caught up with Ryznar for this interview...

The Magnificent Andersons: UFO

By Brian Correia

UFO (1970) - Episode 1

What's on Network Awesome today?

UFO might just be the grooviest television show ever produced. As in groov·y (/ˈgro͞ovē/), adj: so obviously a product of the sixties that it hurts. See: Country Joe and the Fish, Laugh-In, quaaludes. Though it technically debuted in 1970, the show so embodies the swingin' (as in swinger) sixties stereotypes that if you pulled this baby up on the old Jumbotron and told me it was something along the lines of Austin Powers: Moonfaker (by the way, if they ever make a fourth Austin Powers movie and they don't call it Thunderballs, I'm not seeing it), I would almost believe you. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

See ESP TV Episode 14 in its Entirety

Now online...the complete episode of E.S.P. TV #14 featuring a set by Brooklyn synth duo Xeno and Oaklander...

E.S.P. TV #15, taped on the same night, features a performance by E.U.C. and a screening of Performa commissioned video, "Trans-Trans", by Bradley Eros and Tim Geraghty, which satirically remixes the Michael Bey Transformers movies with the Futurist Manifesto.

It airs Tuesday, April 10th at 10pm on Channel 67 Time Warner in Manhattan. It also streams live from MNN's website (www.mnn.org) on MNN4.

More info at: www.esptvnyc.com

Where We At

Smiles of a Summer Night

Newly Uploaded Bouton Rouge TV Footage of Classic Psych Bands

Mike Sin pointed this one out to WFMU staffers a few days ago to much excitement.  This Youtube Channel posted a ton of complete live sessions on France's TV show Bouton Rouge.  15 Minute sets from the likes of Fairport Convention, Grapefruit, Procul Harem, Small Faces, etc etc etc.  God bless the internet.