Category: Cool

Saturday Matinee – Jody Pendarvis, David C. Roy, Toby Lee, Matt “Guitar” Murphy & James Cotton

Jody Pendarvis of Bowman, South Carolina, decided that the town needed an attraction to boost the local economy and created the UFO Welcome Center adjacent to his mobile home. Caricatured as a redneck crackpot (by Steve Colbert and others) Pendarvis is nothing of the sort, but he plays along anyway.
[h/t Susan M. who was there earlier this week.]

From YouTube description:
“A self-taught artist with a background in physics, David C. Roy has been creating mesmerizing wooden kinetic sculptures for nearly 40 years. Powered solely through mechanical wind-up mechanisms, pieces can run up to 48 hours on a single wind.”
[h/t Ma S. via FB.]

Born in Oxfordshire England in 2005, Toby Lee played Zack Mooneyham in the New London Theatre production of School of Rock the Musical in 2016 and was named UK Young Blues Artist of the Year in 2018. Joe Bonamassa called Toby Lee “a future superstar of the blues.” [h/t Pam M. via FB]

This vid from 1963 features Matt “Guitar” Murphy, Willie Dixon, Memphis Slim & Billy Stepney, and is not nearly as long as it should be.

James Cotton was one of the greatest harp blowers of all time. His 1968 classic The Creeper was coopted by Richard “Magic Dick” Salwitz of the J. Geils Band and released as Whammer Jammer in 1979.

That should hold you for a bit. Have a reverent Easter, we’ll be back later.

A Starlings.

Fractals come into play with this murmuration.

[Found here.]

Stuff I Do When I’m Bored

 

[Related posts here.]

Tolfraedic Hot Links

Old Timey-Holler/Ditty, Leonard Emanuel, (1976) Rhino RecordsRecorded at Spivey’s Corner, North Carolina between 1975 and 1976. Back in my apartment days, if the neighbors got too noisy I’d slap Hollerin’ on the turntable and crank it up. Leonard Emanuel worked the best. Things would get real quiet…

Close call.

Chair pants.

Charles Kettering.

No painting in the house.

I’m easily amused. I like this.

A chameleon’s worst nightmare.

Um, this is kinda, ah… it’s just not right.

Mummified bats and sloth poop heaps.

For $5,400 in 2021 dollars you could buy this.

TSA scanners set off alarms due to an *ahem* anomaly. [NSFK]

[Top image found here.]

From the Archives: 1 year ago. 5 years ago. 10 years ago.

The .Gif Friday Post No. 673 – Building Goats, Beggar Buster & Walking Snowflake Planthopper Nymph

[Found here and here, and the last one was created from this.]

Double Knitting

“The sculpture is a part of a series where I make sculptures of people in my home town.” – Liisa Hietanen

[Found here, via here.]

Thundercycle

When you’ve got a genuine Russian tank engine lying around, how can you resist repurposing it? And really, tanks are so lumbering and oafish, and with the price of gas nowadays… something a little more sleek and maneuverable is obviously called for.

This giant motorcycle took the team of welders and mechanics at the Harzer Bike Schmiede in Zilly, Germany, almost a year to craft. It is 17′-4″ long, and 7′-6″ tall, and weighs four-and-a-half tons. 1.8 tons of that is the tank engine itself. The Guinness Book of World Records has just confirmed it is the heaviest motorcycle ever (though interestingly, there is no mention of the size dimensions breaking any records.) They are still hoping to obtain a special license to actually drive it on the road.

[Image and description found here.]

Pelicans Trying to Eat Other Animals

[All images found here, via Mme. Jujujive.]

[Update: Bonus .gif found here.]

OrismologIcal Hot Links

A Little Change, Cam Cole 2019 Demo CDThat’s not a band. He’s one guy, a street performer, with videos.

One fried egg.

Tornado omelet.

Surprised octopussy.

100 YEARS OF SLIDERS!

Historic bus stop shelter.

THIS thread is a must read.

Gelmerbahn descent in real time.

“Let’s go. You’re singing it wrong.”

Who was known as “the Boss of the Plains”?

Intestines of non-uniform stiffness mold the corners of wombat feces. Duh.

Renowned cold-case detective J. Warner Wallace discusses the credibility of New Testament eyewitnesses.

[Top image is from Animals Should Definitely Not Wear Clothing by Judi & Ron Barrett, 1988.]

From the Archives: 1 year ago. 5 years ago. 10 years ago.

Saturday Matinee – Utopia, The Nicholas Brancker Band, Bernard “Pretty” Perdie & Co., and The Cleverlys

Utopia (2019) is a short by filmmaker Kosta Nikas. A man lives in a society where citizens police each other with their mobile phones. [Found here.]

The Nicholas Brancker Band plays 60’s-70s spouge, a style that was “Barbados’ answer to ska in Jamaica and calypso in Trinidad.” I’d heard before but never knew it had a name until recently (thanks to Queen H.). Jump to 01:10 for the music.

Tighten Up (Part 1) is a cover of the classic 1969 Archie Bell & the Drells hit. Music starts at 0:40. This all-star lineup features:

Bernard “Pretty” Perdie – drums
Chuck Rainey – bass
David T. Walker – guitar
Sonny Phillips – organ
Bill Bivens – tenor sax
Virgil Jones – trumpet
Pancho Morales – percussion
Lou Donaldson – alto sax

“If Earl Scruggs, Dolly Parton, and Spinal Tap spawned a litter of puppies, it would be the Cleverlys.” – NYT

As long as we’re doing covers, The Cleverlys‘ take on The Proclaimers‘ 1988 song is a good’un. A lot of the songs they cover are parodies of a sort (I expected to hear “pterodactyl” in the refrain) but they play I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles) straight… mostly.

There’s a hunderd other things that I can think of to post, but I gotta wrap it up and ship it out. Have a great weekend, and you know what to do.