WFMU's Beware of the Blog

A Puzzle

Yesterday I was buying lunch at Grand Central when I found a $20 bill on the floor. I picked it up, and as soon as I opened my wallet to put it away, a probably homeless man swooped down on me and asked if I could help him out. Should I have:
A.    Said “Sorry,” and turned away.
B.    Given him a dollar.
C.    Given him two dollars.
D.    Handed him the twenty.

ATC Theme Overload

Listener Erik recently discovered the blog, and graciously sent some audio gems to share with y'all. Here's what he says:

It's been about 32 years since National Public Radio launched the news program, All Things Considered. Makes me feel old. I still enjoy listening to Susan Stamberg and other long-timers on a frequent basis.

Dink... dink... dink... dink... Ah! It must be time for the news. Though the theme music to the program has changed over the years, it's always been unique, appropriate and recognizable.

There's only one mention of the theme music on the WFMU blog, and no sound clips. Your 2006 news theme blog entry inspired me to dig up an item from my cassette collection.

All Things Considered Themes (zip file)

MP3s:
ATC Theme - 1971 (Original)
ATC Theme - 1976 (Part 1)
ATC Theme - 1976 (Part 2)
ATC Theme - 1976 (Part 1 and 2)
ATC Theme - 1976 (Funky Brass Part 1)
ATC Theme - 1976 (Funky Brass Part 2)
ATC Theme - 1976 (Newsy Brass)
ATC Theme - 1976 (Long Dink Dink Headlines Bridge)
ATC Theme - 1976 (Short Dink Dink Headlines Bridge)
ATC Theme - 1976 (Xylophone Transition)
ATC Theme - 1976 (Short Transition)
ATC Theme - 1976 (Low Synth Transition)
ATC Theme - 1983
ATC Theme - Washington Saxophone Quartet Version
ATC Theme - 1995

Some are from the NPR web site and some are those I recorded while doing my TV production internship back in 1986. This was a small collection of ATC theme music and transitions on vinyl for production purposes. I don't happen to have the cover artwork, though.

A couple of the tracks, and others are found here (The 30th Anniversary of NPR's All Things Considered news program includes recordings of its theme music, from original through today).

Some weirdness...
The Leviathan Oriental Fox Trot Orchestra plays their version of NPR's All Things Considered theme.

Listener submissions for possible lyrics to the theme music.

UPDATE: Listener and ex-KSAN DJ Glenn Lambert checks in to share the opening theme music to a film called Murder, He Says (1945). A quick listen... a startling revelation?!

Opening Theme from Murder, He Says (MP3)

Here are Glenn's comments:

This is a wonderful movie that few people know. I saw it years ago in a theatre and loved it. There was a brief VHS release, no DVD ? I found a used VHS at Amoeba in Hollywood.

If you ever do see it, you'll never hear the ATC theme without putting these lyrics to it...

Flieson horsis.
Incomb beesis.
Onchest knobis.
Inknob keysis.

Voiceover Genius For Hire

My pal, Chris Reilly was recently laid off at 1010 WINS.  You've probably heard him late at night while you were riding around drunk in a cab.  Here he is with the great Henry Lewis on a recent Saturday night at WNYC.  Take a listen to his Master Reel Here (mp3) then give this man a job!

Heavy Wah, Rubber Duck Squeaks and Manic Guitar Slidage from 佐藤行衛

Although he originally hails from Japan, Sato Yukie (you know, 佐藤行衛) has been a crucial figure in a small but tight knit circle of Seoul experimentalists.  For one, he organizes one of the few regular experimental showcases in town, Bulgasari.  He also happens to be Seoul's finest exporter of whacked out noise.  His improvisations usually involve an electric guitar played with chopsticks, a rotating cast of rubber ducks, light up guns and anything else with a cheap speaker to feed through his pickups.  All this crowds a few dozen pedals and electronic devices.  The result comes out something like a zany retelling of Kagel's Acoustica plus updated electronics, psyched out wah and tape speed manipulation.

Sato Yukie - Yeoboseyo

The above track is a 2000 recording from the "Solo 1977-2000" CD on the now defunct Jabrec label.  The phone call which ends the recording was actually unplanned.  Yukie "was practicing acoustic guitar at home, and suddenly somebody called me. So I picked up the phone and said hallo!  In 2000 we had no place to play noise/experimental music in Seoul, so I usually played at home."  His earlier recordings from this CD reveal Yukie's roots in harsh noise and his unusually early fascination with experimental improvisation.  Yukie has continued to perfect his act in the live setting (often at Seoul's experimental venue Yogiga) with more visual elements added.  Below is a portion of a live set recorded in the Netherlands last year.  More clips from the same show and other shows can be found here.

P-R-A-W-D-A

From what I can tell, P-R-A-W-D-A is a duo of Russian women who create site specific performances in costume. Super-heroes, bunny costumes, plush headpieces- these are images that have been beaten to death in western hipster art...but P-R-A-W-D-A's approach seems more ritualistic, sexual and defeated. In their wonderful photo documentation, they arrange themselves symmetrically as in icon paintings, holding stoic stances even though their uniforms are bizarre concoctions seemingly picked out of the garbage.

Bird Names: For The Love of Rod Blagojevich [2005] (mp3s)

With his impeachment trial underway in Springfield, IL, Governor Rod Blagojevich ditched town for NYC to make a series of uneventful television appearances. Not exactly the most inspiring politician to come out of Illinois recently.

Chicago's David Lineal begs to differ. On the website for his avant-pop troupe Bird Names, Lineal explains, "Blagojevich fascinates me because he is not a man but rather UNADULTERATED FORM". In 2005, Lineal devoted three days to a bizarre work of auditory fan fiction, and this entirely imagined, unreciprocated relationship with the governor begat the following six songs:

FOR THE LOVE OF ROD (.zip) w/ liner notes [.txt)
1. Rod's Theme (mp3)  |  2. Ride Rod Ride (mp3)  |  3. We Toast To The Governor's Hair (mp3)  |  4. Sadie Hawkins Dance (mp3)  |  5. Rod At Leisure (mp3)  |  6. The Great Rod Inside (mp3)

When the seat-for-sale story broke, Lineal made the mp3s available at the Bird Names' music page along with this Note About FOR THE LOVE OF ROD (txt). The tracks will also be released on cassette by the Really Coastal label. You can read more about this recording in the Chicago Reader, where Lineal was interviewed by Bird Name'r Liam Warfield.

Bird Names are currently on tour, making their way towards WFMU where they'll be recording a live set for the 2/17 episode of Talk's Cheap.

A J's with Jamie Discovery (MP3s)

1. Little Me (2:13)
2. Come on Strong (2:14)

From their golden Columbia years, a previously unknown J's with Jamie single has surfaced. I'll let Jim Maroney, who was kind enough to share these tracks with us, fill in some details:

"In my two-year extensive search for their recordings, this never came up anywhere! I had no idea this recording existed. Do a Google search of "J's with Jamie" along with either song title or Columbia record # and you'll get nothing.

"All of a sudden, this appeared last week on e-Bay - nobody else bid on it, so I got it for 99 cents!

"The killer is that this is one of their very best - if not THE best - singles release, especially since they're not available anywhere else. Both songs are top-shelf and sung great!

"Both songs are the title cuts from Broadway shows of that time by well-known show composers - 'Little Me' by Cy Coleman (book by Neil Simon), and 'Come On Strong' by Sammy Cahn.

"The labels on both sides of the 45 are written on (a radio station copy) with the date 1/1/63 on one side."

I'll second Jim's enthusiasm. This is that swinging sound with smooth harmonies and Jamie's voice at the front that makes their other recordings lost gems of the early 1960s.

Diamond Dave Rules the Internet

What a month for classic Van Halen weirdness.

First The Smoking Gun uncovered an actually copy of the classic 1982 "No Brown M&Ms" rider. It's 53 pages long, and also specifies "herring in sour cream," four cases of "Schlitz Malt Liquor beer (16 ounce cans)," and "One (1) large tube KY Jelly."

Then came the highly entertaining isolated track from "Runnin' With the Devil".

Then a few weeks ago an enterprising computer savvy fellow made the David Lee Roth Runnin' With the Devil soundboard, which took the internet by storm.

Then Ptichfork presented us with incredibly weird versions of pop songs remade with Microsoft Songsmith (watch the official commercial to understand exactly how painful the program can be), including a bizarre lounge version of, what else, "Runnin With the Devil". And here's a pseudo mall organ version as played through Songsmith as well.

And now it has all came full circle, as Metafilter plopped this on me today: The David Lee Roth version of Asteroids...excuse me, "Assteroids". I am indeed highly amused. But, I think we need to put a lid on this RWTD mocking now before it starts to spread much further. Or not.

Mining the Audio Motherlode, Vol. 1

The variety and quality of free music available on the Internet is simply staggering. The motherlode of music blogs out there donating MP3 freebies of rare, out-of-print and previously unissued recordings make this historical moment the goldenest age ever for music obsessives. As anyone who's done a bit of online audio prospecting knows, the problem isn't just finding the stuff, it's finding the time to excavate the many armloads of albums you absolutely, desperately, ravenously must have.

And that's where this new venture comes in. Since I'm already spending practically every waking moment trawling for tunes (just ask my wife and kid), I thought I'd offer—on a regular basis—a dynamite list of the best of what I'm unearthing. So stash the fancy helmet with the headlight, settle into a comfy armchair, and feast your ears on this first installment of:

Give the Drummer Some's
10 Favorite Downloads from the MP3 Blogosphere
(see Comments, below, for helpful info about downloading)

Iconic Old-Timey Brother Act
Complete Allen Brothers 1927-1934
(From: Lonesome Lefty's Scratchy Attic)

 
Afrobeat Unheard Since '65
Unreleased Fela Ransome-Kuti
(From: Voice of America)

'70s Funk from the Islands
Rare Afro & Caribbean Funk,  Vol. 1 & Vol. 2
(From: Music Is So Special and Hasta Luego Baby!!!)

Last Testimony Of A Teen Age Dope Addict (MP3s)

Here are both sides of a grimly disturbing 45 made by Dexter Gardner, a deeply troubled teenaged (and self-identified) LSD addict from Kearns, Utah, a suburb of Salt Lake City.

As the record label indicates, the audio was "reproduced from (a) tape recorded message just before death by suicide."  The original recording concludes with the sound of the gunshot that ended Gardner's life, but the version that appears on this record is a bit more genteel; the sound of the gunshot was removed.

The 45, released on Atlanta's Broadcasting For Jesus record label, is entirely spoken word.  Side One features the first part of Gardner's rambling farewell.  Over on Side Two, we hear the conclusion of his message, followed by a short piece by NBC news reporter Bill Ryan.  Ryan's report includes the information that Gardner's parents chose to have the recording played at their son's funeral in the hopes that some of his friends would be persuaded not to board the drug train.

Sorry about the extreme scratchiness of this record.  No doubt the recording had lousy fidelity to begin with and this particular copy sounds as thought it must have been passed around and mishandled with  great frequency before it wound up in my hands.  In a fascinating side note, I learned that this very recording is available as a cassette tape from the National Child Safety Council, as part of their drug abuse prevention program.  The colorful artwork nearby comes from the cassette's j-card.

Dexter Gardner  -  Last Testimony Of A Teen Age Dope Addict - Part One  (6:33)

Dexter Gardner  -  Last Testimony Of A Teen Age Dope Addict - Part Two  (6:41)

Though he was not connected with this project in any way, I have a feeling Jack Webb would approve.

51 Versions of The Inaugurable Poem Remix

Thanks everybody for the amazing submissions! We can't take any more! I'll air them Wednesday Noon-3 EST on my show (or listen to the archive anytime). -- Kenny G

Here's the 50 Versions:


People Like Us "An Induction Is A Draft Is A Gust Of Air" (video version)

1. PLU + RIAA "A Golden Induction"
   
2. People Like Us "An Induction Is A Draft Is A Gust Of Air"
   
3. People Like Us "Adjournment-Poem"
   
4. Fatty Jubbo "Histrionic Inaugural Poem"
   
5. Fatty Jubbo "Elizabeth Claire Prophet Inauguration"
   
6. Fatty Jubbo "Riveting Inaugural Poem"
   
7. Fatty Jubbo "A Precious Poem"
   
8. Cy Kottick Channels Jackie Mason Channelling Elizabeth Alexander
   
9. Nick The Bard "Heavy Metal Inaugural Poem"
   
10. Volunteer Gordon "Pathetic Inaugural Poem"
    
11. Reverend Hellbound Alleee "Inauguration Poem"
    
12. Rokhausen "Praise-Song For Tomorrow"
    
13. Sick To The Back Teeth "Take Out Your Boom"
    
14. Sick To The Back Teeth "All at Once"
    
15. Jonathan Wall "Some Someone Someone Someone Something Somewhere"
    
16. Dogwater "Praise Song All About Us"
    
17. Suzie Crews "Inaugural Poem"
    
18. Big Kitty "Praise Sawng"
    
19. DJ Bidet Spret and Rokhausen "Praise Songsmith Slumber Ball Mix"
    
20. The Ubu Orchestra "Inaugural Poem Revisited"
    
21. Nat Roe "Song of a Praise"
    
22. James Urbaniak "What If"
    
23. Giant Pygmy "Inaugural Poem (This National Grievance"
    
24. Raging Horn "The Swearing in Poem (Burnt Bacon Right Remix)"
    
25. Babs Toyfish "I Need to See What's On The Other Side or Inaugural Cough"
    
26. Godxiliary "0 Cliffnote-Sum"
    
27. Godxiliary "1 Cassettegirl-Ko"
    
28. Godxiliary "2 Mikrosophst and Cassettegirl Make Love"
    
29. Godxiliary "3 Cliffnote Synopsis"
    
30. Godxiliary "4 Robot"
    
31. Godxiliary " 5 Cliffnote Selections"
    
32. Gwilly Edmondez "Inaugural Poems One"
    
33. Gwilly Edmondez "Inaugural Poems Two"
    
34. Gwilly Edmondez "Inaugural Poems Three"
    
35. Paid in Puke "Inauguration 4 The Beat Generation"
    
36. DJ Man Rich "Praise Sitting in a Room"
    
37. Tommy Mackay "Everybody's Heard About The Words"
    
38. Babs Toyfish "Reconsider A Widening Pool of Light"
    
39. Pflaphpschoen "Sparklesharp"
    
40. Pflaphpschoen "All About Us Is Noise"
    
41. norelpref "Wait A Minute"
    
42. norelpref "Someone is Trying to Make Music Somewhere"
    
43. norelpref "A Side of Ham is Love"
    
44. I Am A Robot "Poem"
    
45. Easy EW "Praise Song Praise Song"
    
46. Dogwater "Last Minute Speechwriter"
    
47. Daniel Konig "Elizabeth Alexander = Log Lady from Twin Peaks"
    
48. Brian Joseph Davis "The First Ten Words"
    
49. Webhamster Henry "Roses"
    
50. Nosnibor "Lettuce"
    
51. TriFocal "Praise Song For The Day (Cinderblock Dumbbell Mix)"
    

Recent Faves From the New Bin

With dedications to Derek Bailey and Malcolm X, the Unlistenable Years catalogues an unruly outfit called the Toy Killers biting at the ass-end of NYC No Wave in their own inimitable way. Led by free-bashers Charles K. Noyes and M.E. Miller (who cut their teeth on early Material and Zorn sessions), the Killers wrecked halls and employed a veritable who's who in 80s Downtown that included Nicky Skopelitis, Arto Lindsay, Wayne Horvitz, Elliott Sharp and Zorn (who's duck calls never sounded so at home). Primitive, brutal, banned from Folk City for almost killing audience members with a precision glasspane shattering, this is nasty stuff that churns with creative sickness and far less order than their DNA and Mars compadres, but has no less power. Nice and overdue look back courtesy Weasel Walter's UgExplode label. "I'm Embarrassed To Be An American Girl/Sex Carp" (Real Audio), "Where Do We Get the $ To Save Our Children?" (Real Audio)

Last year WFMU had its official meet-and-greet with Baltimore Artschooldropoutcore combo Lo ModA, whose excellent Gospel Store Front disc got lot of airplay, some MP3s posted on Beware of the Blog, and a live session on Liz Berg's show. It's good to see them back with Replica Watches (Creative Capitalism label/publishing imprint), which continues the trail of tense, minimalist pop that falls somewhere between the Moles and Pere Ubu. Sparse organ swells, ominously crossed rhythms and percussive, scratchy guitar and viola tango around Lo ModA's sound, with slightly Eastern European leanings that make me think of the late SF artrock combo Zmrzlina. Totally boss live (and hopefully on a somewhat sprawling stage, cuz there's a bunch of 'em.) "Happy Power Energy" (MP3).

Not sure exactly who constitutes the line-up of Cincinnati's Wild Gunmen, nor do emails back and forth with the band add much illumination besides the fact they want us to call them "Neo-Folk Post Industrial Noise", note that they're not photogenic, don't play out, probably want to quit music as soon as possible, and date back to 2005 or "as old as the Hershey Bar in your dad's back pocket." Their no-fi Volume One CD (Mad Monk) is quite a hoe-down though, somewhere between the Holy Modal Rounders, Suckdog, and Magik Markers headed straight for an episode of A&E's Intervention; one of the episodes you know ain't gonna turn out right at the end where they get on a plane with the happy music to go to rehab. One -take-or-nothing freeform string plonk, sideways metronome fiddle sawing, tons of arguing between the female and male members of the band. The gal singer is alternately begging for salvation or sex and drugs, but almost in a way that laughs at the solemnity of Spacemen 3 records (and everyone else); they're from Ohio, they cover Prince's "Darling Nikki" and Paul Simon's "50 Ways To Leave Your Lover" and they don't give a rat's ass about you, me, or your discovery of Henry Flynt. MP3's: Untitled #1, Untitled #2, Untitled #3.

Bombed-out reggae and dub reworkings are something I rarely get tired of but haven't heard a whole lot of after a big wave of them hit a couple years back, so when Strategy's new 7" on Entracte hit the deck it felt on spot immediately. Based around Portland DJ and experimentalist Paul Dickow, this one rips out of the speakers less subtly than his other recordings on Kranky though in truth less assaultive though than say, Bloodclot Gangsta Youth. "Noise Tape Reggae" falls more under the electroacoustic angle that characterizes many of this fine UK label's releases, but the formula is pure and perfect: simple manipulated tapes juxtaposed with analog glop. Do yourself a favor and dive into this label, for a while we were getting their releases in these white plastic hospital-waste looking bags. You'll find some familiar stuff in the roster (Sudden Infant, Carlos Giffoni, Big City Orchestra, Idea Fire Company) but the unfamiliar titles have all delivered some inventive noise and carried the electroacoustic ball itself a buncha yards down the field. "Noise Tape Reggae" (Real Audio)

If all the noise is making you ready to reach for your Madman Across the Water, you can do a lot worse than checking out Charlemagne's Big Thaw (Ba Da Bing label), the latest and greatest from west-coast songsmith Utrillo Kushner, who toted the skins and sweated the seat as a member of Comets On Fire. Don't expect any High Rise-style blowouts here though, Colossal Yes focuses on sublime 70's piano-driven softpop; it's pure comfort sounds and top notch songcraft with a well-informed AOR past evocation and some Bill Fay worship to boot. You can't help but get sucked in, and neither can three of his Comets bandmates on "Permafrost Drip" who mess it around like the Band backing Dave Brubeck. "They Feast On Us/We Feed On Them" (MP3)

Go Swedish! - Let the Right One In

The ground is covered with a layer of snow, under that a slippery-thick layer of ice, and North Jersey looks about as much like the suburbs of Stockholm as it's ever going to.  When I think of Sweden, I think of thrashy, amphetamine-charged Death Metal, monumental acid rock, and Liv Ullmann and Bibi Andersson in Persona.  All good things—great things even.  Now Sweden has given us a highly original, for-the-ages horror film that embraces genre, while at the same time redefining and transcending it.  Let the Right One In (2008), by director Tomas Alfredson, is based on the bestselling novel of the same name, published in 2004 by author John Ajvide Lindqvist, who also wrote the screenplay.  Already, we have a Scandophile's dream production.

I finally got around to seeing Let the Right One In, after reading the enticing coverage and receiving several personal recommendations on it.  I'm sorry on the one hand that I waited so long, though the current grim surroundings make this a perfect time to embrace such a story, dressed as it is in blood, snow and bare trees.  And though the secret is well out about this film's greatness, I couldn't resist chiming in to heap yet more praise on this landmark picture, easily one of the best I've seen in the last ten years.

Lately some of my favorite horror films are those that truly address the human condition, using horror and its fantastical possibilities as a milieu to tell "real" stories.  I've never fallen in love with a vampire, spoken with the dead or been taken aboard a UFO, though I've often wished that I had, if only as a mantle of proof that something exists beyond yearning, love, loss and bills in the mail.  When I was a victimized, outcast, adolescent monster-movie nerd, obsessed with (and equally fearful of) the darkness, much like Oskar in Let the Right One In, I didn't have an adorable, tragic female vampire living next door to nurture my spirit and calm my confusion.  So Oskar, and this film, tell that story for me.

This is about as close as I get to fully embracing any kind of heartwarming entertainment—the most touching love story anyone could tell for my singular demographic. I prefer my reaffirmation of life's value served up with mayhem, dismemberment, and tears of blood. And perhaps that's why Let the Right One In is so tremendous, and so deserving of its critical acclaim: we all want to enjoy a good horror movie and get those grisly thrills, but when a film can fascinate us in that way, shock us, but also move us in a genuine and sophisticated manner, it momentarily lifts horror out of being kooky or dismissible (Rosemary's Baby had similar impact in its day.) So with apologies to my fellow "proud horror dorks" (thanks Clayton), this is one that's just so good we'll have to share it with mainstream filmgoers, who will most certainly fall for its many charms.

Let the Right One In is also beautifully photographed, director Alfredson having a Kubrickian eye for the living spaces of working-class Swedes: the flats, apartment blocks, courtyards, hospitals and woods.  And though the film already has an English-language remake in development (reportedly to be directed by Cloverfield director Matt Reeves), it's hard to imagine removing this story from its settings and achieving anywhere near the same level of cinematic excellence.  Let the Right One In debuted on US screens in late October, and is currently showing at the Angelika Film Center in lower Manhattan.  The film will receive its much-anticipated Region 1 DVD release on March 10.

After the death of Dr. King.... (MP3's)

I wish I had discovered this tape in time to post it last week, but I only listened to it for the first time within the past three or four days. I know nothing about it, except that it is from a reel to reel tape which I bought at least a year ago (it can take me awhile to get through things....), and that all of the tapes from this purchase that I've listened to so far - maybe 12 or 14 of them - have some connection to the  University of Notre Dame in the 1960's. Most were recorded there, or at events clearly sponsored by the University.

There have been lectures to seminary students about various subjects, in-service type lectures and question and answer sessions for newly married couples and new parents, even a couple of tapes featuring a symposium on Vatican II. Each tape was marked fairly accurately, often in some detail. I was looking forward to tape featuring a lecture on the teaching of sex education, given by someone named Susan Dick, but that one turned out to be so poorly recorded as to be unlistenable. 

The tape featured today was actually mislabeled. The box reads "Father Putz: Laity Comes of Age". I was not particularly looking forward to Father Putz' lecture, and I'm glad to say that's not what was on the tape.

Instead of that lecture, what this tape held was quite a bit more interesting, and to me at least, quite stunning. Here we have a priest discussing his experiences on the day of, and days after, the death of The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., experiences which quickly led him to the decision to go to the funeral, an event which he also discusses. I can't quite put a handle on this man's accent (sometimes he sounds Swedish to me, at other times German), and I have no idea what his name might be, but I found this recording remarkable and completely irresistable. 

In particular, I'm taken with the speaker's recall of the reaction in middle America - or at least some of those who he came in contact with - within a day of Dr. King's death, which included everything from absolute lack of interest to what sounds like almost a feeling of "good riddance", but mostly a profound lack of understanding of what had just happened, on the part of the white people (including some clergy) whom he came in contact with, and the speaker's inability to and frustration with finding a way to point out the problems in their attitudes.

But rather than bring up more of the things that make this so special to me, I'll just provide the link and let you find your own meaning in it. I have provided the speaker's introduction as a short file (five minutes), in which he makes mention of some of the other events going on that day (including a lecture by Mayor Lindsey of New York). This track really doesn't add much to the story, but it might be interesting for some of you. The main track is the second one, and it runs about thirty minutes. There was a discussion on the tape, after this speech, but I found it to be not nearly as interesting as the story itself.

Please enjoy this, offered as my tribute to Dr. King, one week late:

Bob

1.) Unknown Speaker - Introduction (MP3)

2.) Unknown Speaker - After the Death of Martin Luther King (MP3)

Cassetteboy vs. Obama - We Are The World (MP3)

Who'd have thought that Rupert Murdoch-owned newspaper The Times would commission an Obama remix by none other than Cassetteboy? And yet that is exactly what happened last week, you can watch it here.

It doesn't seem to be possible to extract the video to post or embed it here, but I was at least able to get you an audio version in MP3: Cassetteboy vs. Obama - We Are The World

Jerry Lewis Awkward Moments #1

Perhaps no other performer in the 20th century made more awkward statements than Jerry Lewis. His list of hits and misses is unequaled, and I mean both professionaly and off the stage. Often when Jerry was out of his bombastic character, appearing as himself, he seemed somewhat incapable of ... well I don't know of what ... but it was always awkward. Take for instance this 1967 appaearance on the game show Password hosted by Allen Ludden. On the show a celebrity was teamed up with a non-famous contestant. Oh, that poor, poor contestant playing with Jerry Lewis. Lewis looks like he'd like to murder the guy. Watch the whole episode here.

Elton and Betty White / Folk stars of the fin de sie`cle / Part One

You've heard a song or two perhaps, but a full frontal attack of 43 songs and three announcements by wonderful and unusual folk duet Elton and Betty White is what I'd like to lay on you today.

Learn a little about them and hear 'part one'  after the bump.

Greatest video ever?

Back in the late eighties I found myself working at MusiquePlus in Montreal, the Quebec version of MTV. There, not only did we have access to the standard new video releases of the day, but also a library full of an amazing videos from Quebec, France and other Francophone sources. Many treasures indeed but, in my mind, nothing has ever come close to the majesty of Pierre Nadeau's "Girls Boys." Years from now, when civilization has crumbled and our Ape masters ask "what was the video age all about?" this will be the answer:



I know what you're thinking: all this plus Simmons drums and a Korg keytar as well? I know-it boggles the mind. My favorite part is the big chorus after the breakdown (about 3:27) where Pierre is rocking out heavily with the keytar: folks this is how it's done! There's a bit of a followup story to this video. A few years ago MusiquePlus featured it in a show called "DollarClip" where they ended up doing a re-make in the vein of the "Becoming..." shows ie: "Becoming Pierre Nadeau." They called it "Dans Le Speedo de Pierre Nadeau." They ended up tracking him down and he was very good natured about his belated recognition. There's a two-part documentary on this (in French) on Youtube which can be seen here and here.

Keep on chooglin.

Via a request to define the long debated meaning of chooglin, here is LA musician and artist Ami Tallman's essay on the matter, which recently landed in my inbox. Enjoy.

Let's begin with the train noises "choo-choo" + "chug" (and let's take a mental note of the chugging of beer while we're at it). Now say the word choogle out loud. Say it slower. Enunciate. Think about what your mouth does when you say it. Don't forget to think about all the parts: the lips, the tongue, teeth -- with that rich and full oooo sound passing through all their various configurations over the lifespan of the utterance. I'm going to throw in the words chew, ogle, bugle, boogie, fugue, and wiggle for added contextual sparkle.

For our first choogle-specific historical reference, we'll draw on the Creedence Clearwater Revival song "Keep on Chooglin" (site of the second documented usage of the term):

Here comes Mary looking for Harry
She gonna CHOOGLE tonight.

Pleasure is central to the prevalent understanding of choogle, as is propulsion. So let's say that so far we're working with a bangin' good time wrapped around the moment you've just had with both the oral and aural dimensions of the word (as an object of sorts).

Nahid Akhtar MP3

Nahid Akhtar appeared on the Pakistani film scene in 1974 and her voice pretty much ruled it until her 2000 retirement, running the gamut of every kind of style. "Toune Kaha Aa Aa Aa" (MP3) kicks out some blasted psychedelic organ/fuzzed out wah and over-the-top accompanying Yma Samac-like growls, and if anything it's worth mentioning because there's a killer collection of Lollywood sounds due in April on Andy Votel's Finders Keepers label. The Sound of Wonder, like Pakistani film music, is dominated by Akhtar (who basically appears on 11 of the 15 tracks of the collection) appearing alongside musician M. Ashraf who discovered her as a teen and catapulted her to fame. Finders Keepers offers up a few more MP3s as well here.