According to Arbroath, this was Guiness’ most expensive television advertisement to date, costing 10m pounds (about $2.1 million US bucks). Filmed in a village in Argentina, the whole town came out to watch. If our crack webminers can find a link to a “making of” video, we’ll update this post, but it’s more likely we’ll just tip a stout and be done with it.
Totally unrelated to the video above, our crack webminers turned up a video from 1970, from the Flip Wilson Show. This broadcast changed my life… or at least a good part of it.
The band appeared at Woodstock. Yes, that Woodstock, 1969. These guys played alongside Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Crosby Stills & Nash, Mountain, Arlo Guthrie, Country Joe & the Finch, Richie Havens, Carlos Santana, Joni Mitchell, Melanie, Joan B. Depressed, Bobby Bieber and the SlimJims, Brittney Spears, etc.
Bunk was too young to attend Woodstock, but Bunk was allowed to watch TV. This is what Bunky witnessed at his grandparents house and loved it. ShaNaNa was IT.
This was Bunk’s introduction to DooWop. ShaNaNa sent me on a mission to hear the original versions by the Marcels, the Paragons, Dion, Gene Chandler, the Isley Brothers, the Zodiacs, the Del-Vikings, the Chips, the Chords, the Channels, Harvey & the Moonglows, Shep and the Limelights, the Ronnettes, the Shirelles, Leon Redbone, Led Zeppelin, Dread Zeppelin, Bob Marley and the Wailers, the Police, the Ramones, Elvis Costello, Tom Waits, the Sensational Alex Harvey Band, the Stray Cats, Frank Zappa, the Aquabats, the Skatalites, Moms Mabley and the Beat Farmers (featuring the late Country Dick Montana)… and not necessarily in that order. Oh, and I forgot the Solid Voidz featuring Big Don P.
Fill in the band(s) I might have missed in the comments section.
Tacky Raccoons 
Nice read but, I hope you don’t mind my correcting you on a minor mistake. Joni Mitchel is a wonderful singer and painter but she didn’t make in to Woodstock 1969. She should have been there but she was stuck in a motel room in NYC. In a way, I am kind of glad she didn’t make it or we might have never heard Melanie. This was Melanies BIG break into music. She was pretty much unknown till she caught the world by storm. It was literally storming when Melanie was put on stage. They didn’t want electric instruments while it rained. Candles were passed out and lit. Thus Melanies song “Lay Down – Candles in the rain. Lighting a candle or flicking a bic at a show began with Melanie.
Please, since you forgot that Melanie was at Woodstock and thought Joni was, you might want to make visit to my little site and help support Melanie. I’m sure she would forgive you. 🙂 http://LetHerIn.org
Thanks,
Jim Baldwin
Spokane WA
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Can’t help you with the doowop groups. That ad was pretty neat, although I can think of other things I’d spend $2m on.
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Bre’r Tarbabyjim—
Thanks for correcting my embarrassing oversight. (Before anyone else jumps on my errors and omissions, I wrote “Finch” instead of “Fish” intentionally.) I’ll work on my accuracy.
Also, Tacky Raccoons has a general policy of not posting links to the poster’s own website, but because you nailed me, I’ll make an exception here. I’d forgotten about Melanie, so please accept my apologies on her behalf. Now who was that Joni girl again? Didn’t she love Chatchi or something?
Diesel– I agree… $2m would buy a lot of beer.
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