WFMU's Beware of the Blog

World Cup Death Watch - Update 4

Seven more people have lost their lives to the 2006 World Cup. The death count now stands at 50.

A 25 year old South Korean college student died after suffering a suspected heart attack while watching his country play Switzerland on a giant TV screen in Seoul. Five other people died in Asia as well. In Japan, a 60 year old man hung himself after his team lost to Germany. A Chinese man collapsed and died in Malaysia while watching Argentina play Mexico, and Malaysia's Daily Express reported that the man may have made a bet on the game. Another Chinese man jumped to his death from a hotel in Baoji City after The Netherlands lost to Portugal, making the ninth World Cup related death in China, the highest total for any country. Back in Malaysia, the body of a 28 year old man was found ten days after he had disappeared. Police believe he had been killed by loan sharks after he was unable to pay back the money he borrowed to bet on World Cup games. In Thailand, one football fan stabbed another to death during an argument over the penalty kick that decided the Italy-Australia game. And in the only non-Asian death (since the last update), a Ghanaian man expired as Ronaldo scored his first goal in Brazil's win over Ghana.

BJ wrote that Sports Illustrated reported a South Korean suicide, when a man set himself on fire following Korea's loss to The Swiss. But I haven't been able to find any verification of this report.

But all is not death and despair here at the World Cup Death Watch desk. There has been much good news as well. There have been numerous World Cup related births and pregnancies, and more importantly, there have been two World Cup related resurrections. The second one happened in South Korea, when a clinically dead man got up and walked out of the hospital.

Alas, even a resurrection does not lower the official death count.

Tune in to People Like Us this Monday at 7pm when Vicki plays an hour of the best and worst football chants from around the world.

Jim Henson Gets Freaky on The Tonight Show, 1974 (video)

As a further illustration of just how much things have changed in the last thirty plus years, here's a clip of an untitled piece of psychedelic performance art from Jim Henson, who Johnny Carson introduces as "Jim Jenson" on The Tonight Show, ca 1974: [download mpeg video, 17 megs, or youtube it]

The music is Raymond Scott's Limbo, The Organized Mind, from the great 2-CD set, Manhattan Research Inc. As Parq put it, you can practically hear middle America collectively saying What the Fuck? Even Johnny shakes his head in awe. Or maybe it was regret. Thanks to Mickey Mephistopheles from the FMU Message Board.

UPDATE: Jeff of RaymondScott.com reports: Jim was performing the "mouth" and "eyes" live, but the film, including Henson's voice-over & Raymond Scott's soundtrack, was completed many years earlier, in 1967. The film's title is The Organized Mind, and the character's name is "Limbo."

This Week in Sex: In a Pickle

Porn puts our children in harm's way. Especially when it comes in the shape of a big man in a suit chasing children off rooftop billboards into traffic.

In Maury's restaurant, there are pickles. Pickles put people in harm's way, too. Especially when you are pickle-phobic and you go on Maury Povich's show. At first I thought Maury's guest Mariah was faking the whole pickles-are-destroying-my-life thing, but I got on her side when Maury sent her off to the Paterson Pickle factory to make her freak out, which she did, ending up quivering in a fetal position. Back in the studio, Maury grabbed her hand, said "Stop it! Stop shaking!," told her she had to confront her fears, and ambushed her with plates of pickles. It worked out really well. (And since about a half a million people have now seen this clip, I'm sure she won't be known as the Pickle Girl any more.)

Bigger not always better. Did you know spiders don't have penises? But they have some kind of mouth penis? And there's a kind of spider that has two massive mouth-penises? And it cuts off one with a piece of spidey silk? And did you know fish watch fish porn? And did you think I made that last one up? No, scientists made those fish do it, so unless you are part of an experiment, you can't use that excuse. In case you can't make sense of the science as well as I can, because I have a scientific mind, here's the gist:

The lesson is clear. If you live in an environment where you can afford to be slow and lazy, sexual selection can take over: the females will preferentially mate with the fish with the larger gonopodia [fish penis], driving up the average size over generations. If you have to be nimble and swift to stay alive, natural selection will cull out the males with oversized genitals.

I always thought video games were for dumbasses. But I like this video game where you shoot asses, and I'm pretty good at it, too. Yay me!

After the jump: Woman punching penis. NSFW.

The Wit and Wisdom of Jimi Hendrix (MP3)

Staring at WFMU's mouldering cassette library the other day, I noticed the Jimi Hendrix Spoken Word Tape for the very first time. There's no information on it, other than the date (1997) and the person who compiled it ("Chad G"). If you listen to the 31 minute MP3, you'll hear Hendrix dedicating songs from stage, bemoaning the constant pressure to play guitar with his teeth, reminiscing on his days in Harlem, rehearsing songs, and most importantly, wondering where the grass is at. Not being a Hendrix scholar, I can't say whether these clips are from bootlegs, films, legit LPs or a combination of all of them. Quality varies throughout the recording: Download 28 meg MP3

One More For the Gipper

Station manager Ken invited me to contribute to this Blog and I can't think of a better opening salvo than sharing this video of John Cassavetes punching Ronald Reagan in the face.

How did this happen? In 1964 Ronald Reagan, Lee Marvin, Angie Dickenson, and John Cassavetes stared in the Don Siegel film adaptation of Ernest Hemingway's "The Killers" According to the Criterion site it was a serious casting coup not lost on anyone: "Ronald Reagan, in his final screen appearance and his first-ever role as a bad guy... turns out to be the most believable of heavies: there’s nothing flamboyant or demonic about him, just a drab, businesslike demeanor and an absolute coldness in the gaze" 

The scene seems simple:  Reagan's Jack Browning wants  Cassavetes' Johnny North to keep his mind on driving for the heist and not on his girl (Dickenson's Sheila Farr) Browning slaps Farr and North punches Browning.

But none of those fake names matter anymore -  In a strange way this clip ends up capturing an epic showdown between the forces of creativity and artistic expression and the forces of evil - and for a brief second the bad guy ends up with his face bloodied!

Download or Stream it from YouTube, and here is a link to a YouTube trailer for the Killers and Criterion link

Orrin Hatch's Flag Burning Remix

As you may have heard by now, Orrin Hatch's (R-UT) proposed Constitutional amendment that would outlaw the burning of the American flag failed to gather the necessary votes in the U.S. Senate, once again shuttling this limp issue away until it becomes politically convenient again. The undeterred Hatch, sounding like the co-star in some upcoming Rocky sequel, has vowed to push blindly ever onward in his quest for unprecedented tokenism. ("For the stars and stripes, I will not give up, and I will not surrender", he dramatically declared.) He also insists that a Constitutional amendment that would outlaw flag burning IS, in fact, "the most important thing the Senate could be doing." [Link to Video]

The fact that the proposal was defeated by only one vote (no thanks to California's often bewildering Democrat Diane Feinstein) is disturbing, however, and it got me thinking of comedian Bill Hicks' infamous rant about flag burning from years back. Hicks' words resonate strongly in the current political climate, and for today's review, I've remixed the classic monologue with some strident guitar jams courtesy of the one and only Government Issue, the results of which I humbly offer to you now. [Download MP3]

Further facts to depress and enlighten: Bill Hicks died of pancreatic cancer years ago. Buy his CDs here. Government Issue broke up even longer ago. Buy their CDs here. Orrin Hatch has been in office since 1977. Want to yell at people who like him? Move here.

I Am So Cool (Video)

Maybe if you could rap and take a dump
at the same time, you'd be cool, too.

Like Tak: stream video. via parumo

WFMU's Summer Podcast Update

WFMU proudly introduces 4 additions to our growing roster of podcasts...

Aircheck: Once again, an hour of radio ghosts recaptured. Once in a lifetime occurances and remembrances (some from WFMU's own archives). Aircheck seeks out some of the more unusual and unpredictable moments and personalities in radio that probably wouldn't get attention anywhere else.

The Dusty Show with Clay Pigeon: Although Clay is taking the summer off from our on-air schedule, we're now offering archives of his show from the past year. Expect multi-sensory soundscapes, intimate monologues, street interviews from all walks of life, intensive quik-cut sound editing, social commentary, gladness/sadness, cornfields, gravel roads and urban sprawl.

Do or DIY with People Like Us: The triumphant return of all things avant retard. Found sound, field recordings, and pop culture detritus all woven into a joyous, hour-long audio collage.

Secret Museum of the Air with Citizen Kafka and Pat Conte: This program is no longer being produced but we're re-running it as a podcast. Citizen Kafka and curator Pat Conte scour the world of international 78 rpm recordings to bring you the Secret Museum of Mankind.

For a listing of all WFMU podcasts, check out this page. Hook up your MP3 player with scrumptious freeform in feed form (via iTunes) by following the instructions right here.

Sheldon Allman's Plutonium-Based Folk Songs

Sheldon Allman had a career in show biz that few have equalled As a voice actor and songwriter, he provided the singing voice for Mister Ed, and wrote the two Mr. Ed songs featured in the episode Ed The Songwriter. He also wrote the theme song to the animated TV show, Jay Ward's George of the Jungle, and had parts in numerous TV shows and movies in the 50's and 60's, from The Fugitive to In Cold Blood. His most memorable role was as one of the two aliens in The Twilight Zone episode, The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street.

In 1960, Allman released an album of demented cold war novelty songs called Folks Songs For the 21st Century. I found out about it on the tremendous Bear Family boxed set Atomic Platters (which also included a track by Janet Greene, The "Anti-Baez"). Out of the five CDs in the collection, Allman's two tracks were standouts for me: Crawl Out Through The Fallout and Radioactive Mama (MP3s).

Here's the Sheldon Allman page on the great Conelrad site, for all you fans of Ducking and Covering.

UBUWEB :: Summer 2006

__ U B U W E B __
http://ubu.com

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  UBUWEB :: Summer 2006
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--- RECENT FEATURES ---

The Films of Jack Goldstein (MP4) Ten rarely seen short films made between 1974 and 1978: "Portrait of Pere Tanguy" (1974), Shane, Butterflies, The Knife, Ballet Shoe, White Dove, The Chair, MGM (all 1975), Bone China (1976) and The Jump (1978). The long-term significance of Jack Goldstein's artistic achievement is only now becoming evident. In his life and work, Jack, who committed suicide in San Bernardino in March 2003 at the age of fifty-seven, articulated the profound anxiety dominating an era of spectacle, as the open-ended Conceptual practices that characterized the '70s gave way to an appropriation-based return to narrative imagemaking. His films, 45 rpm records, paintings, text pieces, and performances formed a hinge between the end of one decade and the beginning of another, articulating elements of both while refusing to be contained by either. You can listen to Goldstein's recordings here.

György Ligeti: Portrait, A Documentary by Michel Follin (1993). The Hungarian composer György Ligeti's biography typifies the displaced cosmopolitan, truly at home only in the international community of music. Appropriately enough, this revealing film portrait of his life and music has a train journey as its central metaphor, with Ligeti gazing through the window onto the changing middle-European landscape. His music - innovative, complex, brilliantly eclectic - accompanies his reflections and memories. (French, no subtitles). Also György Ligeti: Poème Symphonique for 100 metronomes (AVI): Video from an ARTE (France) broadcast of Poème Symphonique for 100 metronomes. Since its world premiere in the Netherlands in 1963, Poème symphonique for 100 metronomes has been very rarely performed in public. The complicated scenographic staging, the detailed preparation by hand, the need for around ten technicians to activate more or less simultaneously the 100 metronomes, makes the demand for performances limited. Also,

GreyLodge: UbuWeb's New Partner UbuWeb is pleased to announce our new alliance with the incredible avant-garde resource GreyLodge, home of the Grey Lodge Occult Review and G-Pod. Over the past year, we have shared a similar aesthetic and have mirrored each other's content. Now, with the two sites partnering, you will see an increase in new film and audio offerings on UbuWeb, as well as a great increase in bandwidth and server stability for GL users. Welcome GreyLodge!

The Cut-Up Films of William S. Burroughs (1963-1972) (AVI): Five seminal films by Burroughs in collaboration with Anthony Balch: William Buys a Parrot (1963), Towers Open Fire (1963), Ghost at n°9 (Paris) (1963-1972) Bill and Tony (1972) and The Cut-Ups (1966). You can also listen to audio by Burroughs and read his Electronic Revolution (1970).

Vienna Actionist Films 1967-1970 (MP4): Twenty-one films by Otto Muehl and Otmar Bauer. Includes Meuhl's Manopsychotisches Ballett (1970), Investmentfonds (1970), Psychotic Party (1970), Stille Nacht (1969), Kardinal (1967), Psycho-Motorische Geräuschaktion (1967), Wehrertüchtigung (1967), Scheißkerl (1969), Oh Sensibility (1967), Der Geile Wotan (1970) and Satisfaction (1968) by Muehl - Schwarzkogler - Brus; also Bauer's Zeigt (1969), Impudenz Im Grunewald (1969) and 20.September (1967); Kurt Kren's Cosinus Alpha (1966), Leda und der Schwan (1964), Mama und Papa (1964), O Tannenbaum (1964); Hermann Nitsch's 6 Tage Spiel - Das Orgien Mysterien Theater, Day 3: Day of Dionysus (Excerpt) (1998). You can also listen to Otto Muehl's Psycho Motorik & Ein Schrecklicher Gedanke, LPs (MP3) from 1971 as well as two interviews by Hermann Nitsch (MP3), one from 1975 and the other from 1999.

Dozens more after the jump

Game Watch, Not Death Watch

Hello, everybody—nice seeing you again.

If you’re stuck at your dayjob and can’t sneak out to a nearby bar for two hours without getting caught, it’s been hard to follow the World Cup games. Supposedly there are online radio broadcasts, but it seems they’re blocked from reaching the U.S. somehow. I’ve relied on so-called online “gamecasts”—no audio, no video, but with various graphics and moment-to-moment commentary typed in by anonymous reporters.

The official FIFA/Yahoo site (sponsored by Emirates Airline) had very dry play-by-play descriptions and an extremely annoying real-time “fan chat” feature.

The BBC site had the advantage of British commentators who were willing to interject a little more personality into the play-by-play. Their descriptions were very detailed and well-written, but I couldn’t see any graphics while watching the live-text feed. I like the graphics to help me imagine the play on the field.

My favorite has been the ESPN gamecasts. The graphics are good and informative and are visible along with the live commentary. The ESPN guy (guys?) is clearly British also. He called some player who took a dive “a girl’s blouse,” and he says some pretty snarky stuff sometimes. Here are some of my favorite quotes from the first round:

"Babic attempts a pass to an imaginary player. He finds him."

"Ukraine are now playing with a back three and it's safe to say 3-4-2 wasn't Blokhin's ideal formation."

“81 Mins – SAUDI SUB: Massad comes on to replace Sulimani; Sulimani looked like Saudi Arabia’s best attacking player, but he is hauled off.
82 Mins – Massad’s first contribution is to throw himself to the ground, scream in agony, and then get to his feet when he realizes the free-kick has been given his way.”

“20 mins - Barnetta is annoyed when another free-kick decision goes against him. ‘Yargh,’ he cries. That's Swiss for ‘I disagree, referee.’ “

Or, from the second round: “Australia have lined up with what seems to be a 3-1-4-1-1 formation. Possibly.”

I find this stuff hilarious, and it helps take the sting out of my favorite team (NOT the Sockeroos, by the way) getting knocked out in the second round.

Speaking of the Sockeroos, here’s a listing of the official nicknames of every 2006 World Cup team.
Unfortunately, it’s from the Big Grey Pack o’ Lies, which I guess explains why USA are supposedly known as the Amerks.

And here’s some separated-at-birth visuals courtesy of a very nice English blog called OverYourHead. There’s more where that came from.

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

Megacephaly

Eläkeläiset Video

Since giving up my weekly show for the summer, I've heard from lots of listeners about how they will cope - not from the lack of my show, but from the relative lack of Humppa on the WFMU airwaves. Humppa, as in the bouncy polka-esque stylings of the great Finnish band Eläkeläiset.

Eläkeläiset (which translates to The Retirees) have a penchant for heavy drinking, cover versions and Humppa. Here's a video of them performing in a German pub, followed by an interview in Finnish and English: [download mpeg video, 15 megs, or youtube it] And here's an MP3 of their cover of Like A Virgin from their latest album Humppasirkus: [download MP3]. Here's the official Eläkeläiset website, and a guide to their cover versions. Their wikipedia page claims that the band is very popular with Free BSD developers. Go figure. Thanks to John in Oslo for the introduction!

Adventures In Amplitude Modulation - Part 21

This the final installment of the 31 meter band scan (audio after the fold) I began two weeks ago, recorded June 2, 2006. As I said before, it was a rewarding romp thorough one of the dozen or so allotted shortwave bands and seems to portend that there will be lots of eventful DXing to come with my new little shortwave portable (the Degen 1103).

People around the station think I have a lot of radios at home. And I do, I suppose, compared to most people. Just looking about my room here, I  see over a dozen or so. And there’s certainly more than that tucked away as well. I’d guess that two thirds of them have shortwave, as well as AM and FM. To me, a radio isn’t all that special if I can’t turn in on and hear more than just local stations. Any radio does that.

But I’m not a big collector. I don’t have the space, money or time for that. In fact, it’s only been in the last few years that I’ve gotten some decent receivers. I’ve almost always had at least a couple of radios that received shortwave around, but they were typically Radio Shack portables, or boomboxes with shortwave bands. You can certainly whet your appetite for shortwave and DXing with any number of nominal receivers, but without spending a lotta dough you can graduate up to a more sensitive set or two and be assured you'll find some interesting signals from far over the horizon now and then. And I’ve had a lot of fun doing just that working on these blog posts over the last few months.

I’ll be taking a short summer hiatus from the blog for about two weeks after this. Meanwhile, I’ll be DXing out in the midwest, recording some reception to be posted here. I’m bringing a few radios and lots of batteries. And I’ll hope you can join me here again at that time. Meanwhile here’s most of the rest of that dial scan. It’s the high end of the 31 meter band, recorded the evening of June 2, starting where we left off last week. Here's the first link... 

Sensei Rebel's Archive Picks of the Week (6/19/06 - 6/25/06)

The new WFMU summer schedule is teeming with new and old favorite DJs that already show us there's plenty to look forward to this summer. Evan Muse and Tony Rettman prove solid replacements for Billy Jam and Acapulco Rodriguez on the overnights. But fear not, Billy and Acapulco have both moved to Saturday evenings.

All MP3 and RealAudio links are streaming links from the WFMU Archives.

Rock And Roll
High School Sweethearts - "Hey Ulana (Do You Wanna Go To the Beach)" RealAudio from Three Chord Monte with Joe Belock, June 20, 2006

International
Chang Loo - "The Plough Song (Ian Widgery Remix)" RealAudio from Charlie's show, June 19, 2006

Experimental
Sibling - "Animal 'a' Crossin" RealAudio from Do or DIY with People Like Us, June 19, 2006

Dance
Brick - "Dazz" RealAudio from Maria Levitsky's show, June 21, 2006

Found Sound/Field Recordings
Thrift store Annie - "Doubleplusgood" RealAudio from Bob W.'s show (filling in for Trouble), June 22, 2006

Ambient
Black Quarter - "Bird Breath" RealAudio from Tony Rettman's show, June 22, 2006

Fave Song of the Week
Magic Carpathians Project - "Distance" RealAudio from Maria Levitsky's show, June 21, 2006

Cecil Dill's Musical Hands (video)

Cecil Dill demonstrates his singular art, playing Let Me Call You Sweetheart on his hands, with piano accompaniment, ca 1935: [download video, 5 megs, mpeg format, or youtube it] via sharpeworld.

The Sound a Bridge Makes (MP3s)

One of the great lost sound effects of the New York area was the sound the Brooklyn Bridge used to make before its corrugated metallic roadway was replaced with a standard concrete surface. The bridge generated a constant multi-layered drone that rose and fell according to the speed, number and weight of the cars driving on it. Fortunately, Wendy Mae Chambers recorded the sounds and issued it on a single back in 1982: [download MP3]. Sonic Youth's Lee Ranaldo was also a fan of the Brooklyn Bridge drone and he recorded this tribute to it, which came out on the late great audio cassette magazine, Tellus, Volume 10: [download MP3].

Meanwhile, across the Atlantic, London's Millennium Bridge has temporarily become the world's longest stringed instrument, thanks to Bill Fontana's project, Harmonic Bridge. Fontana applied vibration sensors to the footbridge's suspension and handrail cables so that the movement of people and sheep moving across it are amplified into audible sounds. The page above has MP3 samples and a flash tool that lets you "play" the Millennium Bridge. Thanks Bas! (Photo by Charles Peifer)

Residents Issue Blank CD's

From Billboard:
Cult band the Residents and the Cordless e-label have teamed up to create something that is either a unique multimedia experience that will link the physical, digital and mobile worlds -- or is just plain wacky. On June 13, Cordless issued the Residents' "River of Crime" -- a 1940s-style radio serial with a band-composed musical score -- in a cardboard double-CD package with artwork that reinforces the band's trademark eyeball, all for $14.99. The catch? It contains two blank CDs so that the five episodes, which will be released sequentially during a 10-week period, can be burned after the last one becomes available. A unique code for each package allows users to unlock the subscription at riverofcrime.comexternal link. The package is exclusively available at Virgin Megastore locations in the brick-and-mortar world and at idealcopy.com in cyberspace. A prerecorded version of the project is planned for wider release next year. The episodes also can be downloaded individually as they are released at all digital music stores. Each episode is priced at $1.99.

Two Tickets to Paradox? Nah.

The inimitable Eddie Money belting out the national anthem during the Game 2 of the Eastern Conference Finals.

Actor Gary Cole in an episode of The Outer Limits.

Ice Cream Truck Music, Revisited

Embrace the summer: come to terms with your local ice cream truck chime, and admit that you crave -- nay, require -- its catchy 20 second hook on glorious infinite repeat for maximum seasonal enjoyment.

Last year, I dug up MP3s for a few of the most common ice cream truck songs heard on the sweaty streets of NYC. Be sure to visit this post, where you can grab MP3s of such summer hits as the Mister Softee (RIP) jingle, the Ghetto Ice Cream Truck song, and another tune that someone smarter than me identified as "And The Band Played On."

But we all know that three ice cream truck songs does not a summer make. Here's another scoop (all MP3 links):

Lips Stained Blue  |  Melted Drumstick Melancholy  |  Pink Panther Pops = Awesome  |  Creamsicle of My Dreamsicle  |  What the Hell is a Choco Taco  |  Torturing Swedes Since 1969 (Thanks, Marcus!)  |  Soft Serve Sleepytime  |  Push-Up Pop Malfunction

And if you're really curious about that signature tinny ice cream truck sound, read this post in the excellent Music Thing blog. Here's a big ol' article about the history and origins of ice cream truck music (via Confederacy of a Dunce).