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Baron Dave Romm
Channukkah Grab Bag 5767
By Baron Dave Romm
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A small gift for the third day of Channukkah
These are a few leftover CDs that didn't seem to relate with anything else I wanted to talk about at the time. They've been in my stack for a while, and deserve mention.
Ancient Tones and Death Knells
The High Strange Drifters is a collaboration, and their sole produce is the marvelous Ancient Tones and Death Knells. They don't have a web site, but they do know their music. The songs on the CD originated as Broadside Ballads, and their origins go back to the British Isles of the 16th Century, if not earlier. If you're at all into Celtic Folk, or Folk in general, you'll recognize many of these songs. But The Drifters do the celtic songs with a distinctly country flavor. It works.
The Cuckoo has been covered, in one form or another, by groups ranging from Steeleye Span to Peter, Paul and Mary. The cuckoo is a symbol of conjugal love for the Greek Goddess Hera. In later mythologies, and in these songs, its as a symbol for unfaithfulness (a man raising a child not his own) and relating to the concept of a woman's parts as the cuckoo's nest and the man being a cuckold. The High Strange Drifters make it a song about a woman with older lover (I think) in a modern country style using banjo and melodica.
Similarly, Gypsy Davy is around, in one form or another, from Planxty to Koerner, Ray and Glover. It's about, usually, a lowlife commoner (gypsy referring to wanderer, black jack referring to the tar of shipbuilding; low status positions without money or hope of advancement) who sweeps a fine young girl from her rich husband (and newborn child) into the feral carnality of life on the run. The husband chases after them, and kills them both. (As opposed to some versions of The Gypsy Rover, where the daughter is unmarried and the stranger turns out turns out to be a prince). Here presented as country swing, complete with slide guitar.
Streets of Laredo is part of a long history of songs that go back to British sailors and The Unfortunate Rake (bringing back syphilis, perhaps) and up to St. James Infirmary (while the precise hospital of song hasn't been identified, it's most likely associated with the poor and dying). A good recording of related songs is The Unfortunate Rake: A Study in the Evolution of a Ballad from the Smithsonian Folkways collection. The Strange Drifters reach back to Sailor Cut Down In His Prime. In this version, the sailor is dead and the "flash girls" (prostitutes) are bemoaning his too-early death while they carry his coffin to the grave. A very country arrangement with British slang. The cut ends with a dialog from The Treasure of The Sierra Madre...
... for Buffalo Skinners about a very hard plains winter in the states. A dark country rock version of a standard. Another dark song, from 17th century British maritime lore is The Golden Vanity about the captain's betrayal of an heroic crewman. This one sounds like a sea song, yet feels more country than celtic. Folkies will recognize Mattie Groves, Barbara Allen, Sam Hall and the rest, and will appreciate the well-designed but non-traditional arrangements.
Ancient Tones and Death Knells is a brave and successful achievement. A must for any serious collector and a major addition to any library. iPw (iPod worthy) for many listenings.
World Contact Day
Sabrina and The Groovie Ghoulies was a Hanna-Barbera spinoff from characters in Archie Comics. The Groovie Ghoulies is (are?) a hard-rock band from Sacramento, CA. I tend to acquire such tv stuff, especially if it has stfnal and/or weird sounding song titles. World Contact Day is such an album, though it's obscure and a collector's item. Sure, what the heck.
The songs that would appeal to me are mostly only okay. Running With Bigfoot is decent punk, and they do a decent cover of the Billy Bragg tune A New EnglandThe World Contact Day spoken cuts, which intro and outro the CD, are appropriately alien and stfnal.
Still, for me the best cuts are a theme, a science fiction song and a cover. Ghoulies Are Go! might almost have worked on The Banana Splits. A children's ghoulish punk song:
50,000 Spaceships (Watching Over Me) is a simple but effective punk/hard rock dance with a good instrumental break. Singing The Blues was first recorded in 1956 but covered by several people, and the Ghoulies punk version works pretty well; imagine the Ramones channeling early Elvis.
World Contact Day is a good CD, and punk rockers may like it more than I did. The Groovie Ghoulies aren't Angry Punks, they're trying to be Scary Punks. The CD is from 1996, and would probably be on the edge of Goth if it were darker. Keep the cartoon cover in your mind as you go to garage sales; if anyone gets the prices listed, it will be well worth your time. And give a listen before you sell it off.
Mr. Neutron Loves You
Mr. Neutron Loves You, by Mr. Neutron, is generally pretty good but rarely really good surf rock. Danceable and tuneful, they would go well at most mixers and their subject matter is weird enough for me. Listen to some cuts here The Monty Python reference shamelessly panders to my taste.
Pyramid Scheme is an okay song about Egyptian mummies. "If you'll be my sarcopha-girl, I'll be your sarcopha-guy. Mummy Love! Dreaming I'm Driving is a fast rocker about dreaming, with some eerie laughs. Robot Arm is a love song from a robot. "See the lovely things my IQ can do for you." Whirligig is a good country instrumental that'll keep your toes tappin'. You can guess who Soledad O'Brien is about. Meanwhile, they need a girl with very strong arms, like Mrs. Neil Armstrong to romance on the moon. No, it doesn't make any sense, but you can dance to it.
Not all of Mr. Neutron Loves You works, but enough of it does that I'll put out a qualified recommendation. Several of the songs are iPw, and there are some songs I can play on Shockwave Radio.
Channukkah bonus recommendation: A Very Charlie Brown Holiday Collection
Fighting The War On Channukkah means enlisting the help of the US Post Office. Classics like the animated tv special A Charlie Brown Christmas help spread the word of peace and religious tolerance from the Judeo-Christian perspective. Being the Post Office, they can bend the rules a little. A Very Charlie Brown Holiday is a CD available only in post offices or through the USPS web site. It's not even listed on the web site printed on the album. It's a very nice album, with the best cuts being the very familiar Vince Guiraldi jazz from the 1965 tv show. Indeed, the whole CD seems to be mixed cuts from various Charlie Brown CDs. Charlie Brown Christmas CDs, I should point out. No Channukkah, Kwanzaa or Feast of St. Stephens songs here, no siree. Still, in the spirit of religious tolerance, a perfectly reasonable stocking stuffer/Channukkah gelt to pick up while you're waiting on line to mail those presents. If you have other Charlie Brown CDs, this will be redundant. If not, this is a decent compilation.
Baron Dave Romm is a conceptual artist and a noble of Ladonia who produces Shockwave Radio Theater, writes in a Live Journal demi-blog, plays with a very weird CD collection and an ever growing list of political links. Dave Romm reviews things at random for obscure web sites. You can read all his music recommendations from Bartcop-E. Podcasts of Shockwave Radio Theater. Permanent archive. More radio programs, interviews and science fiction humor plays can be accessed on the Shockwave Radio audio page.
Thanks to everyone who has sent me music to play on the air.
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Freshly Updated!
Dick Eats Bush
Hubert's Poetry Corner
DEADEYE DICK$TER CHRISTMAS
LOCKED AND REALLY, REALLY LOADED!
YEE HAH!
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Sunny, clear and crisp.
First Recordings Fail To Sell
Judy Garland
Recordings of four songs by a 12-year-old girl who later became Judy Garland did not sell at auction on Sunday when bidders failed to reach the required minimum bid.
The two acetate records have not been heard in public and are believed to be the first made by Garland, who was born Frances Gumm. She shot to fame after starring in "The Wizard of Oz" at age 16 in 1939, and was 47 when she died in 1969 of a prescription drug overdose.
Bidding at Bonhams & Butterfields in Hollywood reached $22,500, which was short of the required minimum. The recordings, including "The Good Ship Lollipop," had been expected to fetch $30,000 to $40,000.
Judy Garland
Where Money Talks
FCC
Cable television rates keep going up while prices for other communications services are going down, says the nation's chief communications regulator, and he blames local governments for blocking competition.
On Wednesday, the Federal Communications Commission is scheduled to vote on whether to make it easier for competitors to obtain cable franchises.
FCC Chairman Kevin Martin, in speeches over the past few weeks, has said local franchise authorities at times "obstruct and in some cases completely derail" new attempts to bring video competition to an area.
His proposal is backed by Verizon Communications Inc. and AT&T Inc., which have poured billions of dollars into rewiring their old telecommunications networks so they can deliver television programming and other services.
FCC
Top Viral Video
Britney
A clip of pop princess Britney Spears burping and talking incoherently about her belief in time travel was viewed over 3 million times to take top spot comfortably, said ViralVideoChart.com on Monday.
Live TV footage of Spears' estranged husband Kevin Federline apparently getting a text message informing him the pop singer had filed for divorce was second with nearly 2 million hits.
Seinfeld co-star Michael Richards' racist outburst was third in the 2006 chart with over a million hits just four weeks after it was first posted online.
Actress Lindsay Lohan talking less than generously about socialite Paris Hilton was fourth, while a video of Hilton crashing a Bentley claimed fifth place.
Britney
Rules Pop Culture In 2006
Bad Behavior
No, Jon Stewart had to emphasize this year, Stewart/Colbert will not be a presidential ticket in 2008. All in fun, of course, but there are some who get their news almost exclusively from Comedy Central's fake newscasters. Was this the year where fact and fiction tended to blur together?
In publishing, one author claimed his memoirs were valid even if they weren't literally true. In film, we laughed at the antics of a randy, offensive, anti-Semitic journalist - we knew Borat was fake, but his co-stars didn't (or did they?)
When two celebrities drew attention for truly offensive comments - anti-Semitic in one case, racist in the other - they told us it wasn't the "real them," in essence. And on YouTube, fans were crushed to learn that a lonely girl they'd come to love was just an actress playing a role.
Perhaps it's impossible to enforce a theme upon a whole year of popular culture, but it's fun to look back. Join us for a chronological journey of things that made us talk in 2006...
The breakdown: Bad Behavior
Follows His Muse
Micky Dolenz
Former Monkee Micky Dolenz, who now also writes books, has a dislike of long-term plans so he relies on his muse to tell him what to do.
"She's this five-foot-seven blond in a satin nightdress with a nine-millimeter, semi-automatic pistol and she holds it to my head and says: 'Direct this, write that, do this, do that,"' the former singer and drummer for The Monkees told Reuters in an interview.
"It's my wife," he said laughingly. "But she doesn't really have a semi-automatic."
For the interview - Micky Dolenz
Rose Parade
18 Llamas
Llamas have waited 15 years to appear in the Rose Parade. On New Year's Day, 18 of the animals and their owners will stroll down Colorado Boulevard.
Joan Selby, a member of the Llama Association of Southern California, is not sure why it took so long for parade officials to let the llamas into the parade but suggested it might have been fear of the unknown.
Paul Holman, president and chairman of the board of the Pasadena Tournament of Roses Association, said he has been told llamas had not been allowed in the parade because horses fear them and react as if the llamas were predators.
But he did his research and found a solution. The llamas will be staged in a separate area and have a spot toward the beginning of the parade, far from the equestrian units, Holman said.
18 Llamas
Paparazzi Sues Blogger
Perez Hilton
X17 Inc., a Los Angeles photo agency known for its images of stars in personal or embarrassing moments, has filed a $7.6 million federal copyright infringement lawsuit against celebrity blogger Perez Hilton.
Hilton's Los Angeles-based site, PerezHilton.com, posts tabloid photos of celebs and adds cheeky captions and rudimentary doodles.
The suit claims Hilton used 51 photographs without permission, payment or credit, including images of a pregnant Katie Holmes, Kevin Federline pumping gas and Britney Spears showing her, um, assets.
Perez Hilton
TV Competition
Yule Logs
There's a Yule duel brewing this Christmas day. Not one, but two separate versions of "The Yule Log," one of television's oddest yet most heartwarming holiday habits, will beckon families as they open their gifts.
There's the traditional log, burning brightly since filmed by New York's WPIX-TV in 1970, and another that will air uninterrupted for 24 hours on INHD, with a high-definition picture so crisp you'll be tempted to reach for a poker.
For many years a peculiarly New York tradition, both Yule logs will now glow in most of the country.
Yule Logs
What Global Warming?
Penguins
The first Adelie penguin chicks of the season -- black fluffballs small enough to hold in the hand -- started hatching this month, and the simple fact that there are more of them in the south and fewer of them further north is a sign of global warming, scientists say.
Smaller than the more majestic Emperor penguins, the Adelies have some 193 colonies that have a total population of 2.5 million breeding pairs, said researcher David Ainley in a telephone interview from his camp at the penguin rookery at Cape Royds in Antarctica.
As the northern sea ice vanishes and penguin populations decrease, southern penguin colonies flourish as the sea ice loosens, making it easier for them to dive and fish, he said.
Penguins
Collector Pays $2.3M
'Grand Watermelon'
An art collector has paid about $2.3 million for a $1,000 bill printed in 1890, according to the auction house that brokered the transaction between two anonymous private collectors.
"This $1,000 bill is one of only two known of its type; the other surviving example is in the museum at the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco," Greg Rohan, president of Dallas-based Heritage Auction Galleries, said Friday.
Rohan said that type of bank note is known to collectors as a "Grand Watermelon" because the green-striped zeros in the denomination "1,000" printed on the back of the bill look like the fruit.
The $2,255,000 price is more than double the previous record for an 1890 Grand Watermelon note. The previous record for any bank note was $2.1 million, according to the Heritage Auction Galleries.
'Grand Watermelon'
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