in search of strange instruments

the music of sound has gathered some fun cool vids found on YouTube under "strange instrument". The bowed clothes drying rack video brings to mind its low rent cousin, the ebowed toaster oven.

Also posted there is a cool video of Table Music, a piece for 3 musicians and, yep, 3 tables.

freakin' S&H Green Stamps

Many thanks to agilitynut for finding & photographing this S&H Green Stamp sign. Just one of the cool new pics posted daily from her ongoing roadtrip.

Likewise there are some great comments re this photo with yet more S&H photos referenced.

Speaking of green, check out her page of Sinclair Oil dinosaurs . . .

whose hands are these? (or: Blog Moses)

Black Velvet Moses--just an unearthed bit of thrift store arcana on uberkayness.

Speaking of invoking blogs & icons, FABULON posts Diablo Cody apologia and June Lockhart in space.

between, throughout & amongst

In lieu of stylistic or thematic coherence, strings of prepositions do my bidding on uberkayness:

out up & over--black & white & grey all over pics of barnyard and backstreet past, Taunton River recent

inside & out--light of hand and statuary

Absolut Quartet

Cool music machine vid. (Evidently a promo for Absolut, meh . . .)

Thanks to LiebermanPaluska.

And to Steev for forwarding the link.

let Shawn, heads & good times role

I'm Learning To Share! just put up a great post on Dick Shawn.

It includes a clip from Shawn performing on the Dinah Shore variety show. His closing bit is like a twisted codex of show biz.

We are as yet unable to realize Simpsons/Futurama scenarios with the living disembodied heads of Richard Nixon, Kitty Carlisle and other luminaries. But FABULON has gathered evidence that special guest stars of some kind are possible. Esp. on the exceedingly funny Playing With Dolls.

At this moment, agilitynut is blogging 'cross Texas in Roadside Architecture. And posting yet more cool stuff on Flickr.

Cashmere Jungle Lords video passes 1250 mark

That's a lot of viewings in my media grand duchy.

Meanwhile, Aunt Mimi's front yard video has passed the 650 mark. The Loved Ones' cover of "Public Bath" is around 389, the ebowed toaster oven is at 326, and the homebrew "Egypt Lane" video is past 300.

the race is on

Roadside Architecture's agilitynut is busily clicking new shots of old signs and such as she drives across the US. For a day-to-day of her current adventures, check out her blog.

Just yesterday she posted shots from Tennessee of cool Gulf Oil signage and more.

If you're not so process-oriented as all that, then def. go check out all the pics she's posting on Flickr. A big snake mouth entrance, an ex Ho-Jo's and a huge pink elephant await.

this much coolness

Je ne parle pas français mais . . . Au carrefour étrange posts images of Claudia Cardinale, Elsa Martinelli, the movie Invasion of the Bee Girls and the art of Enrico Baj.

Deadlicious posts the stylin' embroidery of Jenny Hart. Her works include stitched up images of Dolly Pardon, Marianne Faithfull and a "dream bill concert poster" of the Staples Singers and Iggy Pop playing the hospital nursery ward where Hart was born.

Speaking of Dolly, she's making hay on FABULON. Not to mention Ava Gardner smoking it up in black & white. And over the top headgear the scale & nature of which will dwarf the pyramids.

Meanwhile, I'm Learning To Share! bids us Happy Leap Day with many neat things including old Shell Oil ads full of trippy gremlins and "this much acid".

And The Boat Lullabies posts some of the new pictures added to Square America's African American series.

against aural mush & dishpan hands

Tom Whitwell of Music Thing writes for The Word to let us in on Why records DO all sound the same.

FABULON kindly aggregates clips of old Palmolive TV ads featuring the ever wise(cracking) Madge.

of past futures and Furbies past

Paleo-Future has a cool post on a portfolio of probabilities, a way cool Flickr set of a future imagined in the 1960s. Images like this and this both bring to mind and surpass long ago memories of reading Popular Science magazine.

Synthtopia posts about a cool crank-controlled bent Furby sequencer. The creator of this glitch-filled gadget calls it The Furby Gurdy. (Now there's a name you can hang your hat on.)

If Furbies kinda freak you out, this ain' gonna help . . . But any fans of circuit bent toys and crazy well-machined gizmos will be happy, happy, happy.

Founders of Computer Music @ Tulane

A cool panel discussion held at Tulane University on computer & electronic music.

Sure, the video's about 84 minutes long (courtesy tulane).

But for any of you music technology enthusiasts out there to hear what folks like John Chowning have to say, it's time well spent.

the long & short of it

Having posted ten- or twenty-minute field recordings of geese and frogs and such on audiokayness, here come lo-fi recordings not even 20 seconds long.

Meanwhile in the city: busker, bus and transit announcements keep it moving.

and the world smiles with you

PCL LinkDump's good word from Michael McKean brought to mind McKean's wife, the lovely & talented Annette O'Toole.

You may know her from her role as Martha Kent in Smallville, but in the clip above she plays a wily beauty contestant in one of my favorite movies, Smile. The 1975 satire, also starring the likes of Bruce Dern and Barbara Feldon, is too drop dead funny not to be seen.

Thanks to filmchatblog for posting the clip.

And if you like Smile, the great 90s beauty pageant satire Drop Dead Gorgeous is also recommended.

and now a belated word from our sponsors

Given all the old TV ads I've blogged about, one might be surprised to know how religiously I use my mute button in real time viewing.

But p'haps commercials are, like revenge, a dish best served cold. Like maybe 20 or 30 years later.

Or how 'bout twelve or thirteen . . . ?

Here's a collection of ad breaks culled from thrift store VHS tapes circa 1995, courtesy mst3kanita:



Another '95 clip here. Full story here on Sickmalls.

ye olde Mr. Bubble commercial

Having recently subsisted on the coolness of so many other blogs, unterkayness today scams draws from YouTube this great old Mr. Bubble commercial.

Great thing when I was viewing this was how very slowly the old memories began to come back. Thus I went from "hmmm . . ." to "woah, I remember this".

Many thanks to HansPerk for uploading this.

one minute tops

Boot Sale Sounds just put up a selection from the 1980 LP Miniatures, a cool collection of tracks each lasting no longer than one minute. It was put together by Morgan Fisher who got folks like The Residents, Robert Wyatt and Fred Frith to contribute. Check it out, fer sure.

I've mentioned somewhere before the one minute vacations at quiet american. These are one minute field recordings submitted by folks all over.

(Way longer than one minute are my own field recordings . . .)

all about the soft serve

Actually, any ice cream'll do, so long as it's from a funky old ice cream place.

If the nearest such funkiness is a creamery too far, or you're on a diet or not on good terms with dairy, check these non-caloric vicarious thrills on Flickr, Old-Fashioned Ice Cream Stands.

For a brand of drive-in you can trust, you can try The A&W Pool or Scrumpdillyishhus Dairy Queen!.

Do a search for one of my favorites, Tastee-Freez, or check out the T-F photos at agilitynut's supah terrific Roadside Architecture site.

Seek ye also the very frosty cool Tastee Treet.

For a meal as well as a snack, try The I Love Diners, Drive Ins, and Dives! pool.

'kay, enjoy--I'm gonna go eat some broccoli . . .

everyone's gone to the picture show

Once the province of the Creature From The Black Lagoon, now in a Flickr wonderland: the Theatres pool.

FABULON proclaims Viva Maria! and viva Gabor.

Attack of the Killer Insects: also on Flickr, the cool set bug of the day.

Deadlicious spaces out in the best way with cool gear used to traverse the celluloid galaxy. All that and the most excellent images from the Francophone regions of sci-fi imagining.

Meanwhile, I try not to favorite every other photo I see on Flickr.

are you ready for the country?

Already nonplussed by the Urban Decay pool on Flickr (yes, again with the Flickr), I was further humbled by a cursory glance at the Rural Decay pool.

Damn, so many good (yes, great) pictures out there, so many really good photographers.

Having arrived at this exam halfway through, I'll hide under a pile of coats [add'l Simpsonian gloss here].

Or in plain sight.

covers, colors, flicks & frames

I'm Learning To Share! has some cool book covers just posted to Flickr.

On FABULON, a fun color saturated music vid.

Deadlicious presents yet another great Flickr collection in The end. Also its own aggregation of old motorcycle photos.

Music Thing posts some selected links to the homemade musical instruments project on YouTube. My fave below (thanks to MT's link, posted by sxipshirey):



A more finessed & lo-tech version of the ebowed toaster oven?

on uberkayness--pixels aplenty

Seeing the neat stuff on Flickr, I've had the perhaps unfortunate impulse to upload some pics of my own.



As part of my experimentation with worldwide media hegemony (wheeeee!), much of this has been posted on uberkayness:

just starting to dawn on me

to Flickr into view

all yawns great & small

also the unFlickr-ing one frosty morning


If you like photos of dawn or snow or cats, you're prob. safe. Otherwise, check back later . . .

my friend Flickr

I've kinda avoided Flickr--either as a place to post photos or to browse through others'. Blogs alone are overwhelmingly vast, so I've not been too game.

The Sickmalls aligned Look In the Tunk has been pretty much the extent of any Flickr visits. The retail pics esp. cover the area where I grew up.

But after reading about el estratographico on PCL LinkDump, I thought time to take another look around.

Having not scratched the surface, I got lost in the Urban Decay pics from the Southern US. I think Urban Decay overall covers the world, but even this geotagged slice is a lot to bite into.

This may be my favorite so far, with the green and red painted brick.

And this one. And this. And, oh, yeah--this one.

No doubt, faves of your own await.

culottes in outer space

Maybe I meant culottes and outer space. Eh, works either way . . .

Each to illustrate a point: Breezy summer fashion and les aventures wiz-bang with intergalactic babes and such.

Love times three

FABULON posts no fewer than 3 video renditions of Love Will Keep Us Together.

The top 40 music wuss in me digs the Cap'n & Tenille lip sync version. The fan, the man and the ironist in me all love the Charo version. And the Lawrence Welk dance number--well, the costumes alone could power a nuclear sub.

new show @ Square America

Square America has just put up its show of African-American Portraits & Snapshots. Along with the great pictures is some cool old home movie footage of a Shriners' parade.

A fun auditory adjunct: PCL LinkDump's posting of the Crazy Rockers video. Lots of the funky finesse of 60s guitar instrumental music, plus midway through the tune, some super suave volume swells.

point & run

With Super Tuesday coming up, it's all I can do:

Swapatorium reflects on the mirror image.

Deadlicious goes to Mars.

I'm Learning to Share! bespeaks the "thrum" of many geese and other fun, tripped out stuff. (Shameless link: goose & geese & distant sounds field recording.)

PCL LinkDump presents Sputnik the mag.

these items of interest

PCL LinkDump just put out the good word about the amazing Flickr account of el estratografico. So many, MANY cool pics of funky old signs, old album art and the like. Go now.

Check out also Swapatorium's old neighborhood meat market pics.

There's a great entry on recently deceased but not forgotten character actor Allan Melvin at I'm Learning to Share!

And calling all stylin' ironists and fashionistas out there--FABULON needs you!

Cashmere Jungle Lords video passes 1000 mark

Yep, the live vid of the Cashmere Jungle Lords playing "Apache" has had more than a thousand viewings. Big numbers in my corner of the world.

And the Aunt Mimi front yard vid has past 600 viewings.



Even vids of the Loved Ones, my homebrew "Egypt Lane", or Ebowing a Toaster Oven have gathered some viewings . . .

UFO (pronounced YOO-foe)

God, I love the Gerry & Sylvia Anderson show, UFO.

Deadlicious just posted some great images from a French fanzine about UFO.

Including an image or two of Gabrielle Drake (yes, Nick's sister) as the purple wigged Moonbase commander Lt. Ellis.

learning too FAB

Catching an omnibus to fun:

From I'm Learning to Share! a neat pic of Danny Kaye and Yul Brenner conferring plus some cool stuff about the movie The Loved One.

Transmissions from FABULON: Miss Mink Stole and platform phones.

PCL LinkDump send postcards from France.

on the other kaynesses--twilight & geese

on uberkayness--photos of twilight revisited

on audiokayness--a field recording of geese & distant sounds at night

The Boat Lullabies--My Back Pages

Some really cool found photos have been posted on The Boat Lullabies, the blog adjunct to Square America.

I always feel hesitant about posting other folks' images to illustrate, but click here to view one pic I thought was really interesting. Or just check the whole thing out.

Peter Callesen's one sheet & beyond

A friend sent me a forward about a cool contest the Hirshhorn had had requiring a work be cut or otherwise fabricated from a single sheet of paper.

I really liked the works presented in the forward.

But I had some nagging doubt about the Hirshhorn's part in such a contest.

Indeed, I could find no mention of it beyond the blog entries of other people who'd received the same email (& who also couldn't find any reference to the contest).

I lucked onto someone saying that all this cool cutout work is by one Peter Callesen.

So, no contest, this Peter's a talented artist. Check it out.

UPDATE: Here's another blog, If It's Hip, It's Here, setting things straight in detail. And though I tried snopes.com early on, I only just found this.

Anyhow, thanks to my friend for sending me the cool art and to these folks in the know for clueing us in.

just some groovy things

I'm Learning To Share's entry on Sooper Hippie comics and such.

Paleo-Future's pic of a freaking rocket pack from 1964.

feeling pretty?

Check it out:

Square America has a new snapshot series, On Beauty (And Its Discontents).

on uberkayness--night wanderer

night wanderer--timed exposures from a home faraway

Gerald Manley Goldfrapp?

On uberkayness, I was getting all in the misty bits of time with Gerald Manley Hopkins. Much philosophical slogging thru my half-sprung notions of contingency & loss.

Anyway, not so much a fan of Goldfrapp as I am of dancing leaves, the following vid says it all so much better than I. And gotta love the tea whistle coda. Thanks be to planet FABULON and chrisf242.



Short of the poetics of a well-produced video, I trundle forth with ticket stubs, pics of a fave restaurant on its way out, plus on audiokayness I take two different approaches to elegy.

more on audiokayness

Added to audiokayness, a slew of recent instrumentals like Broken Starlight and Tremble Melt.

Plus older songs and stuff like Too Far, Almost Gentle and Better Set Sail.

amplitude profaned & other visions

I should just put a serious links section in here (like the sorta serious one in uberkayness). But nevermind that . . .

On Music Thing--the Eff'n Effer (I paraphrase here) is what Metasonix thinks a guitar amp should be.

PLC LinkDump demonstrates Le Kangourou and wild clay animation.

And as found on planet FABULON--the best paintings ever inspired by TV reruns. My votes for the Bewitched and the Star Trek, but they all rock.

Oh, wait, on BibliOdyssey there are great botanical illustrations of lilies and such: The Fugitive Beauties of Hexandria.

Have fun!

the kaynesses of audio & uber

More of the stuff I've uploaded to Twango has found its way to audiokayness.

And the promised retail reliquary has arrived on uberkayness.

Surely goodness & light (and entirely too many more blog entries) will follow--soon & evermore.

awe-struck & overwhelmed

Back from my family mission South, I found a pleasure overload of stuff in my Google Reader. I cannot annotate, only point you there:

PCL LinkDump rocks the country & beyond . . . fly at this or swing it over here.

Eartha Kitt and Yma Sumac enjoy dual citizenship here of course and on planet FABULON.

And BibliOdyssey does it again. And again.

I mentioned Sickmalls for now--enough already.

all the fun at the Sickmalls blog

Two cool blog posts at That Mall's Sick And That Store's Dead! (aka Sickmalls):

Some Bags--pics of those relics of retail.

Birth, death and shopping--link to article in The Economist mentioning Deadmalls.com & dead malls themselves.

I may be burying the lead to mention the Sickmalls entry on South Park Mall in Colonial Heights VA. Never been there myself, but thinking of a pilgrimage next time I'm down south. (BTW, love that clip from The Critic ["it stinks, it stinks . . ." "Yes, Mr. Sherman, everything stinks."])

May have some retail reliquary posted in uberkayness soon . . .

share & share (I like)

[slowly emerging from a deep torpor]

Thanks to the goodly folk of planet FABULON, I've added the blog I'm Learning to Share! to my already overloaded Google Reader.

Cool entry on actor Michael J. Pollard. Michael J. & Kim Darby were both in that Star Trek episode where Kirk says "no more blah blah blah". Entry includes embed of short promo about MJP and a movie he was in with Oliver Reed.

Another on Monkee/auteur Mike Nesmith in 16 magazine.

Yet another for you British Blues Revival types on The Steampacket, a band featuring Long John Baldry and Rod Stewart.

on audiokayness: the sonic bog deepens

Or widens or something . . .

tip of the iceberg--more titles on audiokayness, even more on Twango

three on the IMDb

My friend Toshi just told me he's on the Internet Movie Database. He's working with Ray Kurzweil on his film, Singularity Is Near. Looking forward to seeing that.

With my friend Jim, that makes two people I know on the IMDb.

Nope, Bob G. makes three . . .

Godspeed, y'all.

to all the blogs I've loved before . . .

Before I say Happy Holidays and enter winter torpor, I thought I'd mention some cool blogs old & new.

Sickmalls (aka That Mall's Sick And That Store's Dead!) has kept an eagle eye on the fading malls and retail spaces of Hampton Roads Virginia. Lately, old Ward's TV ads and big wayward KFC buckets have been the loss leaders. Oh, that and the new Stuckey's I couldn't believe existed.

Music Thing is too darn famous (among music geeks) to mention--'cept to say I mention it all the time.

BibliOdyssey, with its many cool images of book art and trippy bits of long ago arcana, is a wonder to behold.

ConcreteBeat posts videos of musicians & performers in the streets and subway of New York City.

The Boat Lullabies (the blog arm of the very cool found photo world of Square America) is a new acquaintance made through yet another neat blog, PLC LinkDump.

PLC also navigated this beflanneled old hick traveler to the planet FABULON (p'haps in a glamorous galaxy near the Mitzi Gaynor nebula, or somewhere between Pluto and Uranus). Indeed, I arrived just in time for a homage to Will Geer and Ellen Corby (patriarch & matriarch of The Waltons and beyond).

Likewise cascading to likes of Awesome Tapes of Africa and the Brazilian music at Forro em Vinil.

At PLC there's a great Bollywood spy caper/dance number complete with Santa.

Anyway, that should be enough to entertain (or induce vertigo) until I get out of suspended animation.

If not, there's always my wife's gnarly art blog. Or if boredom's truly abiding, audiokayness should scare that (or you) away. Or go to uberkayness to watch ice melt.

Holiday warmth and a fine '08 to all . . .

the legacies of Dan and Karlheinz

My wife found this great testimonial about singer/songwriter Dan Fogelberg, who recently passed away. Kudos to the writer, Don Hammontree of the New Bedford Standard-Times.

Recently, Music Thing made a call out to its readers to write about the legacy of avant-garde classical composer Karlheinz Stockhausen. Last I checked, there were 17 comments.

Being something of a classic rock android/folk rock wuss, I heard Dan Fogelberg's recording of "Part of the Plan" and got Souvenirs and his two albums after that. Ultimately, due to the musical mutant I later became, and p'haps because of a sea change in Dan's work ("Longer" and that period), I left off after his record with Tim Weisberg.

All the same, I'd like to think of Dan & Karlheinz as both in their lives and now in their deaths giving us a wide latitude of expression:

Permission to sing sweetly.

And permission not to . . .

Juan Matos Capote on free103point9

As I promised, here's video of Juan Matos Capote performing on DJ Mangoon's online radio show on free103point9. And as in the Thick Wisps video, he's armed with a circuit bent Omnichord, a DIY Pink Oscillator and sundry effects pedals.




Along with his work in Thick Wisps, Juan put out The Subway Aural Recordings, a CD of music created from field recordings made in the NYC subway. He's studied with circuit bender Reed Ghazala and composer Pauline Oliveros. And yep, he's a visual artist, too.




It's interesting, the subdued color in these videos. Except for a salmon colored stomp box off to the right, it looks like film noir.

Or maybe that's just because of the dark hat he's wearing in first two videos.

Thick Wisps on All Hallows' Eve

Here's a video snippet of the live online radio show Thick Wisps played this past Halloween (courtesy therealmangoon).

As you can see Thick Wisps have their black robes on and electric candles lit to raise some spooky sonic emanations.

Juan Matos Capote (on the left) has at his command a circuit bent Omnichord (remember Jolene on hers?) and his homebrew Pink Oscillator.

Giancarlo Bracchi (to the right) has what looks like a Moog/Big Briar Etherwave Theremin and numerous cool pedals & such.

Since then, Juan Matos Capote has played on DJ Mangoon's show on free103point9 online radio. Hopefully, some video from that will be coming up soon.

what kind of fool am I?

Before you answer that, check out The World Of Kane's entry on Anthony Newley, the RCA years.

a woman's life in pictures

PCL LinkDump just posted about a cool entry at The Boat Lullabies called The Way of All Flesh.

The entry's a series of photos that follows a woman from her early girlhood in the mid 1930s to about 1978. The pictures were found in cosmetics case bought at a flea market. The identity of the woman is unknown.

About as interesting as the photos are the many comments that range from something like "these pictures are fake/it's not the same woman" to "this woman's hot/beautiful" to "wow, this is so cool" to "what are a stranger's photos doing online?".

FWIW, I'm of the she's beautiful/this is cool camp. Go see for yourself . . .

And, indeed, more pics crop up later on . . .

dang ol' Hurray for Valleydale commercial!!!

Some folks want to save the world or spend a lost weekend in Vegas.

Me, I've been wanting to see the Hurray for Valleydale commercial. And now, thanks to AtomicShows and YouTube, I can . . .

With this, the Wild, Wild World of Animals credits and Shakey's Pizza ad online, I'd better find a new ambition or put my affairs in order.

There's much ado about being a Virginian (well, back in Virginia at least). When I hear that music, watch those singing, marching cartoon pigs and see that outline of my home state on the Valleydale ham package, I finally understand what the fuss is all about.

All hail it's Valleydale!

UPDATE:

Valleydale is still in business and has its own archive of TV ads.

The YouTube posting above is the best version of the classic ad most folks remember. But I like the slightly updated, shortened version you'll find at the Valleydale site. Click on the second thumbnail in the top row, the B&W image of the kinda mod looking family, to see it.

Aunt Mimi video hits the 500 mark

Acoustic duo Aunt Mimi have been staying busy playing out. They just had a gig last Thursday at the Harvest Cafe in Hudson MA.

So it's not too surprising their front yard video has hit 500 viewings.

If you want to hear them live, their website is a good place to check for their next show.

Aunt Mimi will be taking a holiday break, but Derm Whitaker (fellow on the left) is gigging with True West this coming weekend.

Dutch needle drop on Carl Douglas

"What is this shi . . .": Carl Douglas having fun on Dutch TV.

I vote this video as the one most likely to be restaged a hundred years hence by historical reenactors.

Were I around for that future day, I'd play the white jacketed host with the pink champale.

Found on PLC LinkDump, posted by ripspique.

on uberkayness--bright lights return

tripping the Xmas lights fantastic--let's do the time-lapse again

The World Of Kane on Jimmy Webb

Checking out various blogs recommended by Google Reader, I found this cool entry on songwriter Jimmy Webb on The World Of Kane.

I see also an entry on the influential 5th Dimension I'll have to check out.

Indeed, the 5th Dimension's version of Webb's "Up, Up and Away" may be the first song I consciously heard playing in my head after it was finished playing (on my dad's 8-Track, no less). Unused to this sort of aural "afterimage", I thought I was going nuts.

on uberkayness--double arcana

cassette arcana--a vaguely Warholian 15 minutes to Tape It Like It Is
(related audiokayness)

childhood arcana--when Dick Dastardly and the Banana Splits roamed the earth

better to have loved & blogged . . .

I forget which way back relative of mine my mom said "died laughing at the Fat Lady".

But given my current addiction to The Dumpster, I figure my number's about up and a spot's awaiting me in Schadenfreude Hell*.

I can't help reading the teen breakup postings there. And I can't help but laugh at, well, some of them.

I don't know jack or jill about generative art. The Generator.x blog led me hence.

Also to the equally cool We Feel Fine, where a broad spectrum of "I feel . . " & "I am feeling . ." statements are culled from blogs and arranged in various categories and graphical representations.

I really like both of these iterations of online art.

Tho' I hope The Dumpster will understand: I just wanna be friends . . .

---

[*Ungainly & Ineffectual Sidebar Apologia: As these Dumpster postings are gathered from 2005, I figure these lovelorn have since moved from romantic ruination on to brighter days.

Indeed, the posts that make me laugh so hard are the ones that go something like "my girlfriend dumped me but I was ready to dump her . . . almost finished that stupid English paper". One gets the (p'haps false) impression the moving on took all of 4 seconds.

And all the posts are so spiced with text message abbreviations (omfg! ttyl) and warmed-over gangsta slang as to make my informal prose seem like that of a very tweedy Oxford don circa 1874.

All the same, my time in Hell's assured.]

God Only Knows, Multiple SIDosis on UkeTube

Surveying the virtual lair of the very cool Ask A Ninja, I found among the favorites this fun, breezy video of God Only Knows on ukulele posted by jaaaaaaa.

Kind of a laidback Multiple SIDosis . . .


Courtesy phunnycar.

Cool article about Sid "Multiple SIDosis" Laverents.

Wild, Wild World of Animals

love2register totally rocks for posting these clips of Wild, Wild World of Animals.

The intro theme I hadn't heard since I was kid back in the 1970s watching this show on Saturday afternoons. Still the music stuck with me long enough to inspire this homage two decades later.

I had forgotten about the end credit music--very cool also (many thanks again to love2register).

Ralph Steiner rocks the water

Ralph Steiner could take a damn picture.

Even when it meant taking 24 per second.

In 1929 he shot an amazing short film called H2O. The video embedded above, handy as it is (thanks to drzewko), is but a coarse approximation of the film.

Good copies can be found in the Unseen Cinema DVD set [which also includes the amazing Glen Falls Sequence by Douglass Crockwell & works by the aforementioned Mary Ellen Bute] and in Kino Video's Avant-Garde DVD set.

I dunno if there was any originally intended music to accompany H2O, but each of the three versions I've seen thus far is set to a different piece of music.

And indeed there's two vids of live musicians having a go: one featuring the band Tangleweed (courtesy singalonginesperanto) and another with composer Philip Glass on piano (courtesy rollindust).

In 1978 Steiner put out a book, A Point of View, that features a short (and funny as hell) autobiography as well as an overview of his still photographs. Definitely worth seeking out in your local library.

Cashmere Jungle Lords video passes 600 mark

This video of the Cashmere Jungle Lords has now been seen more than 600 times. For one of my videos, that's a lot.

But there are other CJL videos:

--like this one of them playing Los Blob (courtesy bunnyholmes)

--a video of their song Slender Bed (and the Los Blob vid again) at their MySpace video channel

--and one of three vids posted of their recent show at Legend Brewery Company (courtesy Suramz)

Have a swamp surfin' good time . . .

audiokayness by title

Along the lines of rearranging folding chairs on the deck of the Titanic, I've indexed all the K music I've posted to audiokayness by title.

A through H

I through Q

R through Z

Perhaps helpful if there's something of mine you specifically want to hear or you wish to browse by title.

Anything you don't see so far may yet be posted.

ice on fur & other icons

I was online checking out the art in this year's icons + altars show held at the New Art Center in Newton MA.

My wife is one of the participating artists. Along with her entry, there's neat stuff a plenty . . .

In last year's show, I recall a playfully surreal construction box that featured a polar bear in the Arctic. If I'm not mistaken, this work is a less pictorial approach by the same artist.

Here's a collage using the security printing, window shapes and other forms found in envelopes.

And an oil of (I think) Christmas caroler candles.

It's a cool show with a squid jar and a cat princess and then some. I hope to get to see it soon. And hope you have a chance to do the same.

Archive of American Television

After having spent entirely too many hours watching TV, I can now spend even more hours watching TV about TV . . .

The Emmys Foundation has posted on Google Video half-hour segments of at-length interviews with the likes of Earl Hamner.

Not a big fan of The Waltons? How 'bout Jonathan Winters?

Or James L. Brooks?

I haven't gotten around to the Brooks interview (yet) and have only seen enough of the Earl Hamner to know it looks interesting. But I watched most of the Jonathan Winters in one sitting--the guy's a genius.

the horror that is a Shakey's Pizza ad

I was recounting to some young person polite enough to listen how truly bizarre the TV ads for Shakey's Pizza were.

So much so I couldn't believe my own memories of these ads till I saw this one . . .

Perhaps I was too tame in my description.

Many thanks to WookieCookie for posting this.

Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings

Digging deep for old Soul: Go here and you can read how this recent video was shot on old TV cameras and such.




Same folks playing live in France. All courtesy the good folks at DaptoneRecords.

I love to turn y'all on . . .

Tho' I'm a bigger fan of Vic Mizzy than I am of the Beatles, this video made my damn day.

In case you haven't pressed play yet: It's called A Day in the Life of Green Acres and features the lyrics of Green Acres sung to the tune of A Day in the Life.

Thank yous & felicitations go to rockdontrun who mished this mash together.

Might also wanna check out rock's vid of Led Zep as portrayed by the Cattanooga Cats. Or Brian Setzer stepping in behind Jet Screamer on the Jetsons.

dang that's a big chicken . . .

Above is but one of many video homages to the Big Chicken of Marietta, GA (courtesy this gentleman).

Me, I love the big chicken. And I'm indeed inclined to like any big critter statuary.

take this, muskrat love . . .

Whoa, the Captain and Tennille join forces with Gong Show contestants?

Sure, the Hudson Brothers, Shields & Yarnell . . anything's possible where Optiganally Yours is concerned. It's their video, "Mr. Wilson", posted by Mr. optigan.com himself, peahix.

You'll also find on his YouTube page many crazy vids of an OY live show in Tokyo.

If that's not cool enough for you, check out this one of the Wurlitzer SideMan tube rhythm machine (again courtesy Mr. Hix):

more Andy Partridge/XTC

No embedded videos, but YouTube links aplenty . . .

Andy P is a MTV VJ for a day or two . . .
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v46iZ-9ugMg

King For A Day vid:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=depsFULhqV8

Senses Working OT:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0invUXXsRAQ

Dis iz PHaP (ummm, This Is Pop):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uLSkC4N1BIc

Knee On ShufL (Neon Shuffle):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cEftTzuxVGo

R U Receiving Me? (well, Are You . . .):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RApvaQ0uGTw

Thanks to the likes of 23Daves, ZonkOut, and familycat.

Andy Partridge talks about playing guitar

Thanks to YouTube being creaky & not showing its videos, I had to embed the above interview with Andy Partridge of XTC so I could watch it.

Having got that far, figured may as well post it here . . .

Thanks to champangeorslimfast for uploading it and to my wife for finding it.

audiokayness--music's primordial ooze

Actually intended as a blog for any sound I've recorded, audiokayness thus far delves into my musical past.

Ultimately, I hope to upload something like 30 minutes stretches of the James River lapping on the shore. Field recordings and such.

Three minute pop songs and vague resemblances thereof will have to do for now.

If you want to go straight to the source, you can try my Twango channel.

get avant-scary with Thick Wisps

Tonight from 7 to 10 PM Eastern time, the online radio station free103point9 is presenting a live Halloween broadcast featuring Thick Wisps.

To tune in, go here:

http://www.free103point9.org/onlineradio/

And click the link to launch the online radio player.

Cashmere Jungle Lords video hits 500 mark

500 viewings, that is.

Which, for me, is a pretty high number.

the Drumatics so-o-o-o rock

Another cool group of performers on ConcreteBeat--check 'em out on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5gx2PztdNB0

Or go see 'em at ConcreteBeat.

Museum of Russian Icon, Clinton MA

http://www.russianiconmuseum.org/

My wife & I got to go here the other day. Cool museum full of, well, Russian icons like this and this.

free Baby Opaque

For those of you who knew the C'ville based band back in the mid 1980s, that's all I have to say.

Go here for MP3s of their music:

http://www.babyopaque.com/

more Mary Ellen Bute, Norman Mc Laren films

Above is Spook Sport, a Mary Ellen Bute movie done with Norman McLaren. Posted on YouTube by autochromex. Good for Halloween.

Below is part one of McLaren's extraordinary Pas de Deux. Posted by superchat9000.



Link to part two of "Pas de Deux".


Another Mc Laren, A Phantasy (posted by ypsis):



And there's yet more McLaren to be found, like Begone Dull Care, Neighbours and Synchromy.

recently on uberkayness--Stuckey's etc.

formerly known as Stuckey's, pt. 2--what used to be the Stuckey's in Thornburg VA off I-95

formerly known as Stuckey's, pt. 1--what used to be the Stuckey's in Toano VA near I-64

on & off the five mile loop--scenes from Jamestown Island and the James River

north on the Jamestown Ferry--pictures on and of the ferry

heading south on the Jamestown Ferry--brief video of the river crossing

Mary Ellen Bute, John Whitney, Harry Smith: Abstract Films

Reading Albert Glinsky's book on inventor Leon Theremin, I saw mention of a filmmaker I'd never heard of, Mary Ellen Bute. I found a couple of her works posted on YouTube by AnimArchiv.


Rhythm In Light:




and Tarantella:




Looking around for Bute, I came across John Whitney's computer graphics work, Arabesque (courtesy postingoldtapes):




And some work of Harry Smith (courtesy donjuanauxenfers):



For those of you wondering: yep, it's the same Harry Smith who helped kickstart the folk music revival in the mid 20th century with his LP compilation of old 78s, Anthology of American Folk Music.

hurdy gurdy player on Concrete Beat

The cool NYC street performance blog Concrete Beat has performance & interview footage of a hurdy gurdyist, Melissa the Loud. Very cool music and the interview includes a peek inside the hurdy gurdy's mechanism.

C'ville driveby--Nobody Home

Thanks to my brother's driving through Charlottesville, I got to play ghost for an afternoon and haunt some old locales with a digital camera.

Below is my driveby pic of what was once the TKE fraternity house.



In its basement, I saw & heard many more bands than I can reliably recall. Local bands like The Next of Kin, Continental Drift, Rude Buddha and (I think) Bad Brains from D.C.

And sometime later, a band I was in, Nobody Home, played its first show in that basement. Indeed about a year later, I think my friend Dale and I played what might've been NH's last C'ville gig (of sorts) in the living room of TKE.

For a while there, Nobody Home used an office space to practice in. Below, the low building to the right was formerly a convenience store near that space. Necessary snacks were procured there before practice.



Here's the building in the photo below. Go thru the right hand door & up the stairs to the second floor. There our space would be, behind the two windows in the upper left hand corner.



Yep, those two windows . . .



And around the corner, I think the space was four of these side windows in length.



It was an office space with wall-to-wall utility carpet, faux wood paneled walls and drop ceiling. But we were there in the evening after the other offices (and our day jobs) were done. Our only nighttime neighbor was a Karate studio down the hall.



The C&O Restaurant may be the only other place standing where Nobody Home (or any number of far better known bands) played in C'ville in mid-1980s.



I guess while the restaurant is still doing well, the sideline of booking live music is long over with.



Just as it was at TKE, before Nobody Home ever played the C&O, I saw more bands there than I can remember. This would include: The Next of Kin's famous rendition of "Hawaii Five-0"; former UVA music faculty George Starks on saxophone; an all-woman metal band called Black Sabbath's Wives (decades before The Osbournes), Martin Atkins, Alex Chilton and others that may yet jog my memory.



I was glad to see the C&O still standing. I had moved away 21 years ago & probably hadn't been near this town in well over 15.



Unlike Trax or the Mineshaft, other bars where other bands (and sometimes NH) had played, the C&O was here to make that past not quite so remote.



And I remember what a friend Jim (who worked at the C&O once upon a time) once said way back then about everyone wanting to be in a band. It was as if he were positing that, in some corner of a collective imagination, so many were converging on the same piece of real estate: a bohemian Levittown full of bands and bars to play in, tour vans loading for the next show down the road.

on uberkayness--ruins of old Smithfield

Pics of the buildings formerly known as Little's Supermarket and Angelo's Restaurant.