Bug a bug: Annoying a praying mantis. [Found here.]
I want this. It would make clothes dryers and salad spinners obsolete. [Found here.]
Leon Redbone is in a class all by ourselves.
Lonnie Mack and SRV with “Double Whammy,” for preview only.
Lonnie Mack with Albert Collins and Roy Buchanan, “Further On Up The Road.” Whatta classic lineup.
Woof. Yeah, that’s 10cc doing it’s best Zappadoowop attempt with “Donna.” A few days ago, “Brian” reminded me that 10cc sang what I mis-remembered as “I Wanna Be A Bus.” (See this post.)
Here are The Donnas doing their best Ramones impersonation with a puzzling and cheap video.
From The Donnas, we thought we’d find a video of Ritchie Valens singing “Donna,” but no dice. Jump search to “La Bamba” and there’s just garbage and clips of Lou Diamond Phillips limp sinking. So here’s the greatly underrated Los Lobos‘ version of the Mexican traditional song.
Since we started off with a brief reference to Zappa, here’s a double header from a 1980 concert in France. The segue line is perfect.
Be back here tomorrow for some cool stuff.
Excellent Snow Removal Strategy [Found here.]
Annoying but kinda funny vid by Liam Lynch from 2003 found at AoS. [Ace has a bonus link to a great rebuttal to last Wednesday’s State of the Union speech, by Obama himself.] Whatever.
The Late Great Country Dick Montana and the Beat Farmers’ version of Richard Hell and the Voidoids‘ “Blank Generation.” Got that?
Meet me at the bottom, get me my runnin’ shoes. [Tip o’ the tarboosh to ADAM at Table 9.]
At least one of our readers wants more giraffes, according to last week’s poll, so there you go, bro.
Sure it’s simplistic, with the 1949 cartoon stereotypes and all, but that doesn’t make the message wrong. Worth watching.
[Found by danrudy here.]
Koko and Fitz try to change the climate. Fleisher’s “Out of the Inkwell” series was nothing less than bizarre, and this is a good ‘un.
How ’bout some Flo & Eddie. Nobody got the joke, and the Turtles were fairly successful.
Neil Young’s “Powderfinger” was one of my favorites. Never stopped to wonder why.
We don’t do many polls here, but we like to hear from you quiet ones from time to time. There’s no risk, your votes are completely anonymous. Just click as many as you like. Consider it your contribution to the TR Steerage Committee.
Art Clokey passed away 9 January 2009. Here’s his (pre-Gumby) tribute to Disney’s Fantasia. [Found here.]
Whoa. Bill Wyman, Georgie Fame, Peter Frampton, Gary Brooker, Beverley Skeete, all rolled into one rock. Nice late night low key roadtrip music.
Very nice piano version of Zappa’s classic f-u song to an ex*, originally recorded by the Mothers in the mid 60’s. That final chord is awsome.
*The story I heard, Larry… Someone named Wendy was one of FZ’s early loves. There is also a story that no one was named “Wendy” until Disney’s “Peter Pan” was released in 1953. Although that may be true, “Peter Pan and Wendy” was published in 1911, according to The Wikiness, and “Wendy” may have appeared as early as 1902.
Now for our feature presentation: HOMUNCULUS
[Warning: NS for young kids.]
[Found here.]
I was looking for a song that I heard in the mid-seventies that had these lyrics:
I want to be a bus;
I want to be a big bus;
I want to bus the world around;
I want to be the biggest bus to ever bus the world around.
The google machine didn’t help; neither did the Utoobage search. Meh.
And Now For Our Feature Presentation:
Ernest Borgnine On The Bus (Part 1).
For the New Year, we thought that this Saturday Matinee might consist of top hits of decades past… that is until we looked at the list of contenders:
1890 Semper Fidelis – The U.S. Marine Band [no video]
1899 Kiss Me, Honey, Do – Arthur Collins [no video]
1909 Good Evening, Caroline – Frank Stanley & Elise Stevenson [no video]
1919 O Death, Where Is Thy Sting? – Bert Williams [no video]
1929 Sweethearts On Parade – Guy Lombardo [no live video]
1939 They Say – Artie Shaw [no video]
1949 A Little Bird Told Me – Evelyn Knight [no live video]
1959 Smoke Gets In Your Eyes – The Platters
1969 Crimson And Clover – Tommy James & The Shondells
1979 Too Much Heaven – BeeGees
1989 My Prerogative – Bobby Brown
1999 Have You Ever – Brandy
2009 Love Story – Taylor Swift
After careful consideration and review of the available videos on the Utoobage, we just couldn’t bring ourselves to post any of them, but the links are there just in case some of you are into self-flagellation. Meanwhile, let’s just back away from the pop trainwrecks for now.
The shortest Rolling Stones song you never heard. [Found here.]
As for rock commercials, try this.
Squirrel Nut Zippers’ “Ghost of Stephen Foster” with a cool cartoon.
[Update 12:50PM – Gabriel left this fine memory in Thursday’s comments. Gotta post it here.]
Cbullitt sent an email link to The Roches’ version of “The Hallelujah Chorus.” It reminded me of the first Roches’ song I ever heard, “Mr. Sellack.”
Here’s some serious retroness from 1967. From the Utoobage:
Janis Joplin with Big Brother & The Holding company perform live on San Francisco TV program called “POW” that had Rolfe Petersen as the host on KPIX.
Big Brother & The Holding Company’s guitarist James Gurley recently passed away at the age of 69.
Bunky just can’t get into the Christmas Spirit until he hears the Ronettes’ version of “Sleigh Ride.”
Unfortunately, the best vids of that song have been pulled, and we just can’t bring ourselves to post a video of a vinyl record spinning on a turntable, or worse, a picture of an album cover (losers). BUT, we’re certainly willing to post THIS version. Screw the copyright Scrooges.
So here’s a compromise, a Christmas song with Darlene Love, backed by the E-Street Band (with video splices from, um, “Home Alone“).
Tacky Raccoons 