This latest gem to be excavated from that endless trove of inscrutable weirdness known as Soviet era Ukrainian TV is a small masterpiece of people’s collective comedy. I’m sure there’s a lesson to be learned somewhere in all of this. But no matter ,I’m a sucker for peppy musical numbers that involve deconstructed instruments, factories, mimes and sausages. That’s entertainment !
Thanks Yewknee !
Swiss artist Zimoun creates spellbinding audio-based installations. This one in particular, using towers of cardboard boxes really floats my boat. Such a warm and strangely soothing sound and no computers involved. Just tons of tiny motors gently beating and scraping on the re-purposed corrugated paper products. I could listen for hours.
Much more after the jump…
They would probably sound a little like this. Hey, at least they look good while they’re doing it.
(via Das Kraftfuttermischwerk)
Marvel at the patented Jabberwocky wordplay of Pete “The Mad Daddy” Myers on “What is a Fisteris?” Myers was a rock and roll radio madman of the late 50s and 60s in Cleveland and New York. He killed himself in 1968, despondent over professional problems.
I first heard this on one of those Cramps-related “Born Bad” compilations. It’s too bad Myers didn’t record more gems like this or he’d be a cult figure today. Read the “Mad Daddy” Pete Myers biography here.
“Fisterises like pretty girls named Ingaborg with silver snoopers in their hair, sometimes moping about the snurds and limrocks they’ve loved and lost, sobbing big teedle-dools. Like everyone, they dislike artichokes for breakfast when the bumblebugger’s gone.”
Via PCL LinkDump
Songkick posted this chart on their blog and it confirms something I’ve known since I moved to Austin: it’s one rockin’ little city.
The biggest surprise: no New York City.
We analyzed rock shows per capita in 2010–where rock includes everything from emo to indie. We hope you’ll agree that the list is surprising. Austin really earns its title of live-music capital of the world. It’s also nice to see Denver, Seattle, Portland, and Nashville on the list, since our hunch was that they’re hotbeds of good live music. (If our lean start-up nerdery has taught us anything, it’s measure measure measure and validate assumptions… Pity the fool who doesn’t use metrics.) The average rock show ticket prices are surprising too. Who knew it was so expensive to see a rock concert in Las Vegas?
To compute the Rock Score, Songkick analyzed its database of more than 1.8 million concerts for rock artists’ 2010 tour dates, where rock includes alternative, indie, punk, classic rock, metal, emo, and rock. Songkick analyzed which cities have the most rock concerts per capita, giving the top city, Austin, a score of 100. All other cities are then ranked against this score—Madison has 78% as many rock concerts per capita as Austin, New Orleans 57%, and so on.
The ten most rocking cities in the U.S. by number of live rock shows per capita include:
• Austin, Texas – 100 Rock Score; average ticket price of $23.30
• Madison, Wisconsin – 78 Rock Score; average ticket price of $13.05
• New Orleans, Louisiana – 57 Rock Score; average ticket price of $16.89
• Las Vegas, Nevada – 51 Rock Score; average ticket price of $62.76
• Denver, Colorado – 44 Rock Score; average ticket price of $33.24
• Milwaukee, Wisconsin – 38 Rock Score; average ticket price of $17.66
• The Twin Cities Minneapolis – 36 Rock Score; average ticket price of $11.36
• Seattle, Washington – 35 Rock Score; average ticket price of $11.75
• Portland, Oregon – 35 Rock Score; average ticket price of $10.33
• Nashville, Tennessee – 34 Rock Score; average ticket price of $20.13
Seldom heard early recording of a recently-out-of-college Lou Reed (with some uncredited musicians performing as “The Roughnecks”) during his pre-Velvet Underground days as a staff songwriter and performer at Pickwick International Records. This and three other tracks recorded in 1964, showed up on a 1979 Velvets bootleg called “the velvet underground, etc.” Obviously that’s his voice, and it most certainly sounds like Lou on guitar, too
This particular bootleg, which came from Australia, was once a record collector holy grail, along with its companion volume, “the velvet underground & so on.” Now you can easily find both of them on audio blogs.
This is nothing too profound, in fact it’s rather goofy and quite amusing to see how giddy the two Johns are around each other, but I’ve never seen this before and have no idea as to its provenance. Anybody?
Bob Dylan’s handwritten letter of support for John Lennon and Yoko Ono during their travails with the U.S. Immigration Dept.
JUSTICE for John & Yoko!
John and Yoko add a great voice and drive to this country’s so called ART INSTITUTION / They inspire and transcend and stimulate and by doing so, only can help others to see pure light and in doing that, put an end to this mild dull taste of petty commercialism which is being passed off as Artist Art by the overpowering mass-media. Hurray for John & Yoko. Let them stay and live here and breathe. The country’s got plenty of room and space. Let John and Yoko stay!
Bob Dylan
Via Letters of Note
Here’s the classic Bad Brains video culled from 4 hours of footage shot over the course of 3 nights of performances at CBGB in December of 1982. Hardcore rock/reggae doesn’t get any better than this. While most of this footage has been available in bits and pieces of varying quality on Youtube, here’s the entire video with superb sound and visuals.
You can buy this on DVD from MVD Visual here.
More badness from Bad Brains after the jump…
