Archive for June, 2006
My Hero
June 11th, 2006It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s … the Max Fleischer Superman cartoons from 1941-43. Whenever Time-Warner regurgitates yet another dull version of its caped cash cow, I always go back to these original screen versions. They’re the coolest, certainly the most handsome looking, and they adhere best to the patriotic “can do” spirit of […]
Let’s Get Blotto
June 9th, 2006Nice collection of vintage Las Vegas menus from Derrick Bostrom. I liked Bostrom’s story on how he acquired this neat assemblage from the golden age of glitter and booze.
Also at Bostrom’s: check out the download of the eponymous LP by The Klowns, an obscure bubblegum group produced by Jeff Barry. Kind of an unsettling hippie-circus […]
Barefootin’
June 8th, 2006New YouTube find: a perky Mountain Dew commercial from the mid-sixties. The spot features bits with Joan Crawford (likely still a PepsiCo board member at the time) and mustachioed variety show mainstay Avery Shreiber. I still think it’s funny how the early Dew was marketed with a hayseed hillbilly theme.
We’ll Take Manhattan
June 7th, 2006A terrific read, don’t pass it up: James Wolcott’s nifty, personal history of The New Yorker magazine. This essay stemmed from a purchase of The Complete New Yorker and, like the author, I too have been using mine to get lost in the pages. Currently I’m going through the musical theatre reviews chronologically starting from […]
Gruesome Twosome: Avocado Funk Edition
June 7th, 2006Tony Hatch: “Return to the Stars”
Pye Records UK single, 1976 | BUY
Alan Hawkshaw: “Mile High Swinger”
LP: Themes: Synthesizer and Percussion, 1974
I’m getting my groove together and takin’ it on the road with these two mildly funky instrumentals from the U.K. “Return to the Stars” finds Tony Hatch mixing synths and strings with a breezy soulfulness […]
Dozens of Balls of Paper
June 6th, 2006During the last couple of hours, I’ve been wadding up pages of newsprint from the local free weekly — packing material for our physically large yet unprofitable eBay sellings. I wound up with inky black hands, but now at least I know the ads of every gentlemen’s club from Glendale to Apache Junction. And how […]
Go Fish
June 2nd, 2006I’ve created a House of Cards at flickr to showcase a set of odds-’n-ends vintage playing cards. Some of these I vaguely remember, others are a mystery. All came courtesy of snarkmistress Julie. Thanks, Julie!
