I could hear this playing in the other side of the house on my wife’s computer. “It isn’t?”

Oh, but IT IS: Mr. Dante Fontana of Mod Cinema has posted this clip of fab German bandleader James Last and his Orchestra performing an indescribably great medley of Hawkwind’s “Silver Machine,” “Children Of The Revolution” by T-Rex and Alice Cooper’s anthem to juvenile delinquency, “Schools’ Out.”

How lucky are we that this clip exists in the world: The James fucking Last Orchestra playing a decidedly UN-IRONIC (but truly incredible) big band version of Hawkwind’s greatest hit in 1973??? I mean, for that alone, sign me up, but throw in T-Rex and Alice Cooper covers in this style, too? That’s a party. A voodoo party.

Dig the fashion-forward stripey shirt and tie combo on some of the band members. That look takes “power clashing” to a whole new level. Makes it into an art form.

This is heavenly and I think you’ll think so too!
 

 
Via Mod Cinema/WFMU

 
Forget The Beatles and The Stones, the sixties was really about “Two Ton” Tessie O’Shea vs. Sing-a-Long Pianist Mrs. Mills.

These two giants of British Music Hall slugged it out during the 1960s and 1970s, each selling shed-loads of records, making top-rated TV shows and performing sell-out concerts across the globe - from Las Vegas to The Wheel-Tappers and Shunters Club - in a bid to be top Light Entertainment Star.

Celebrated ukelele and banjo-player, Tessie O’Shea debuted with The Beatles on the same legendary Ed Sullivan Show in 1964 - their appearance drew the largest audience in the history of American television at the time. It also made both international stars over-night. Though Welsh-born O’Shea was already a star of stage and screen back in Blighty (cast in plays by Noel Coward), her performance on the Sullivan Show guaranteed her a highly successful career on US TV and in Hollywood, making such films as The Russians Are Coming and Bedknobs and Broomsticks.

Mrs Mills was signed to the same label as The Beatles, Parlophone, and rubbed shoulders with the Fab Four at the Abbey Road Studios, where they both recorded. Mrs Mills was also for a time under the same management as The Stones. While Mrs Mills was arguably a bigger star in the UK, with a dedicated following across Europe and Australia, she never took off in the States as Tessie O’Shea did. However, Mrs Mills did release over 50 albums in 20 years, all of which were best-sellers. No mean feat.

I liked Mrs Mills, but preferred Tessie, who had an infectious twinkle and jolly sense of glee. Here, then, is “Two Ton” Tessie, decked out in a Dolly-Parton-wig and what looks like the living-room curtains, serenading an audience (that looks straight out of Michael Caine’s Get Carter) with a paper bag. From the bizarre Wheel-Tappers and Shunters Club.