PopCult

This week in our chronological presentation of our video episodes of Radio Free Charleston, we shockingly come across an episode that has NEVER BEEN FEATURED AS AN RFC FLASHBACK!

And it’s a killer episode, too.

From June, 2013, we have episode 185 of Radio Free Charleston, “Neverending Fight Shirt.”  This show is an absolute gem, with music from North Carolina’s Crystal Bright & The Silver Hands and Canada’s Volt 9000. We recorded Crystal at The Empty Glass, while Volt 9000 appear via an animated music video produced by my brother, and RFC Big Shot, Frank Panucci.

Frank also provides an additional animated short, as well as the short film, Cyclops Dance Party.

This was our first show off after a minor-explosion-induced production break, and it is, I think, one of our finest episodes.

My mind is a little blown by the fact that I’ve never re-run this episode of the video show before. It’s been almost thirteen years, and we run The RFC Flashback every Saturday.  I’m wondering how many more of our video shows have been languishing in the archives. I guess we’ll find out, every Saturday, going forward.

If you want to see the detailed production notes for the original publication of this show, go HERE.

The PopCulteer
May 1, 2026

Time flies when you’re having fun! It’s a big day for fans of Disco Music today on The AIR.

Mel’s show, MIRRORBALL, has now lasted pretty much as long as the classic era of Disco music did. Six years ago today, my wife, Mel Larch’s showcase of Disco Music, MIRRORBALL, made its debut on The AIR (PopCult’s sister internet radio station), and our listeners have been dancing like crazy ever since.

It’s been an amazing journey getting here with what we thought was just a throwaway music special that nobody would listen to. We were wrong, and here we are celebrating with thousands of listeners and a worldwide audience. It was during the late summer of 2019 when Mr. and Mrs. PopCulteer were careening through Eastern Pennsylvania eating chocolate and listening to The Rialto Report podcast about Andrea True, that my lovely wife, Mel, remarked on how much she loved classic Disco music, and we began to talk about doing a Disco show for The AIR. The show didn’t happen until the pandemic shut everything down and gave us more free time, and the first MIRRORBALL debuted as an AIR Music Special on May 1, 2020.

This is the first time that the anniversary also landed on Friday, so we’re doing it up big.  To mark the occasion of this sixth anniverary, The AIR will run a marathon of Mel’s hand-picked favorite episodes beginning Friday at 3 PM.  That’s right after a very “special” episode of the show premiere’s in the show’s regular timeslot.  The marathon will run until Midnight, Saturday night, and our normal Saturday marathon of the week’s new music specialty shows on The AIR will move to Sunday, for one week only.

You can celebrate May Day with a bang Friday afternoon as our radio station brings you classic Disco perofrmed live in concert on The AIR. Tune in as we serve up a new episode of MIRRORBALL right before we launch into a 33-hour marathon.  The AIR is PopCult‘s sister radio station. You can hear these shows on The AIR website, or just click on the embedded player found elsewhere on this page.

Friday at 2 PM on The AIR, Mel Larch devotes a full hour to major Disco artists performing live on Burt Sugarman’s late-night NBC program, The Midnight Special. While the Midnight Special was not soley devoted to Disco Music, they certainly had more than their fair share. In fact, while assembling this show, I noticed that could easily revisit this topic again in the future.

You will hear unique performances by The Ohio Players, The Bee Gees, KC & The Sunshine Band, Thelma Houston, Labelle, Barry White and more.  The show wraps up with an epic, nine-minute live performance by Donna Summer, with a wild arrangement of “Love To Love You Baby.” If you were around in the 1970s, this will punch a lot of nostalgia buttons. If you won’t, well kids, this is how things were back when the entire entertainment industry was doing cocaine.

Just check out this playlist…

MIRRORBALL 126

The Midnight Special Special

The Ohio Players “Love Rollercoaster”
KC & The Sunshine Band “Get Down Tonight”
Thelma Houston “Don’t Leave Me This Way”
The Bee Gees “Jive Talkin'”
Kool and the Gang “Spirit of the Boogie”
George McCrae “Rock Your Baby”
ABBA “Dancing Queen”
Earth Wind and Fire “Shining Star”
Labelle “Lady Marmalade”
Barry White “You Are The First, The Last, My Everything”
Disco Tex and the Sex O Lettes “Get Dancin'”
Donna Summer “Love To Love You Baby”

My Melanie

When we launched MIRRORBALL, Mel was concerned that we’d run out of classic Disco-era music, but the truth is, after digging in the club vaults for five years, there is no end to the countless grooves that we can bring you. For a show that was inspired by a podcast about vintage porn and was never intended to be an ongoing series, to be still going strong after six years is quite an achievement.

You will still be able to tune in to The AIR for new episodes of MIRRORBALL, Fridays at 2 PM for the foreseeable future.

The really wild, or ironic, or just remarkably amusing, thing about MIRRORBALL is that I’m producing the show.  It’s Mel’s baby, and she directs the themes and tone, but I’m the one who has to pick the music, handle the segues and write Mel’s script. She’s got some kind of day job or something that gets in the way.

Had you told me in the late 1970s that I would realize my dream of being a radio deejay, I would have been thrilled. But if you informed me that among my duties I’d be producing a Disco music show, and producing and hosting a Swing Music show, I would’ve thought you were high.

That was right when I was just getting into music, and my musical tastes were in their infancy. I was devouring a steady diet of Beatles, Zappa, Prog and New Wave, and held Jazz and Disco in utter contempt. It took a few years for my ears to mature and my tastes to evolve to the point where, by the mid 1980s I was a Big Band Music nerd, and a few years after that, working as an oldies deejay at WVNS, I realized how well-crafted a lot of the Disco hits were.

I’m sort of proof that you can have room in your musical diet for John Lennon, Keith Emerson and Mark Motherbaugh, and also appreciate Nigel Rodgers, Arif Mardin and Jellybean Benetiz.

Six years in, and The MIRRORBALL is still spinning.

You can hear MIRRORBALL every Friday at 2 PM, with replays Sunday night at 11 PM and throughout the following week Monday at 9 AM and Tuesday at 1 PM plus there’s a four-hour mini-marathon on Friday nights most weeks.

And that is our very danceable PopCulteer for this week. Check back for fresh content every day, plus all our regular features. Don’t forget, you can listen to MIRRORBALL all night Friday and all day Saturday this week.

As we plummet headlong into the month of May, let us take pause momentarily as we tell you all about some cool STUFF TO DO all over and just beyond the borders of the state, to tell you about, noted as briefly as possible.  We’re going to have a short list this week thanks to some technical issues here at PopCult, and also my lack of willingness to promote animal cruelty.

Again, I’m just scratching the surface here. Please don’t think this is all we have to offer.

As always, you should remember that THIS IS NOT A COMPLETE LIST OF EVENTS.  It’s just a starting point, so don’t expect anything comprehensive, and if you feel strongly about me leaving anything out, feel free to mention it in the comments.  Also, if you have a show that you’d like to plug in the future, even if your promotional graphic uses cruddy AI art, contact me via Social Media at Facebook, BlueSky , Spoutible, Instagram or Twitter.  I dont charge for this, so you might as well send me something if you have an event to promote.

We are very happy to remind you that Cristen Michael has created an interactive calendar that is way more comprehensive than this list of STUFF TO DO, and you can find it HERE. Just click on the day and the event and you’ll be whisked away to a page with more details about loads of area events.

Most weekends you can find live music at Taylor Books. There is no cover charge, and Friday and Saturday shows start at 7:30 PM.  Many Sunday afternoons at 2 PM they also have live music. This weekend they have music from Isiac McAllister on Friday and Monty & Fede on Saturday. Sunday afternoon Jordan Dyer performs.

You can find live music in and around town every night of the week. You just have to know where to look.  Keep in mind that all shows are subject to change or be cancelled at the last minute.

Among the notable music venues in town are The World Famous Empty Glass Cafe, Live at The Shop in Dunbar, Louie’s, at Mardi Gras Casino & Resort, In Huntington, there’s local institution, The Loud (formerly The V Club),  The Wandering Wind Meadery is on Charleston’s West Side, Plus there’s music in Charleston at The Blue Parrot, Sam’s Uptown Cafe and Fife Street Brewing.

You might also find cool musical events at Folklore Music Exchange in Charleston.

To hear music in an alcohol-free enviroment, see what’s happening at Pumzi’s, on Charleston’s West Side.

For cutting-edge independent art films, downstairs from Taylor Books you’ll find the Floralee Hark Cohen Cinema by WVIFF. Each week they program several amazing movies in their intimate viewing room that you aren’t likely to see anywhere else.

Please remember that viral illnesses are still a going concern and many people who have very good reasons are still wearing masks, and many of us, understandably, are still nervous about being in crowds, masked or not. Be kind and understanding  while you’re out. And if you’re at an outdoor event, please remember that it’s awfully inconsiderate to smoke or vape around people who become ill when exposed to that stuff. If somebody asks you to refrain, please respect their weishes and don’t be a jerk about it.

Keep in mind that all shows are subject to change or be cancelled at the last minute.

Here we go, roughly in order, it’s graphics for local events happening over the next several days that I was able to scrounge up online…

Continue reading

Wednesday afternoon, The AIR brings you new installments of Curtain Call and Beatles Blast, and they are both fine gems of expertly-crafted internet radio.  You can tune in at the website, or just stay right here and  listen to the convenient embedded radio player lurking elsewhere on this page.

At 2 PM (EDT) Beatles Blast brings you an hour of great Beatles music, with new  tracks from Paul and Ringo, solo rarities from George, John and the group, plus a mini-mixtape of great covers of Bealtes classics by some major artists.

Paul’s new song is the lead single from his upcoming album, The Boys of Dungeon Lane, while Ringo graces us with a cut from his just-released new album, Long, Long Road.

From George we get the rare cut, “Going Down To Golder’s Green, while John gives us the demo recording of “Now and Then.”  We then reconvene the boys for the unedited version of “It’s All Too Much” before diving into the covers.

Just check out the playlist…

Beatles Blast 131

Paul McCartney “Days We Left Behind”
Ringo Starr “My Baby Don’t Want Nothing”
George Harrison “Going Down To Golder’s Green”
John Lennon “Now And Then (demo)”
The Beatles “It’s All Too Much”
Bruce Springsteen and Axl Rose “Come Together”
Billy Preston “I’ve Got A Feeling”
Vanilla Fudge “Eleanor Rigby”
The Sunshine Company “Rain”
Ted Neely “Mother”
Peter Frampton “While My Guitar Gently Weeps”
The Mirage “Tomorrow Never Knows”

Beatles Blast can be heard every Wednesday at 2 PM, with replays Thursday at 11 PM, Friday at 1 PM,  and Saturday afternoon. A two-hour mini-marathon of classic episodes runs every Monday evening, starting at 11 PM.

At 3 PM (EDT) on Curtain Call, Mel Larch celebrates Spring with a mixtape of showtunes devoted to the time after the Vernal Equinox.

This collection of tunes runs the gamut from obscure off-Broadway shows to timeless classics to ancient tunes from the last 100 years of musical theatre.

Just check out the playlist…

Curtain Call 166

“After All, It’s Spring” from Seventeen
“Spring” from Bare
“I Hate The Spring” from One For The Money
“True Spring” from Bonanza Bound
“I Feel So Much Spring” from A New Brain
“Younger Than Springtime” from South Pacific
“It Might As Well Be Spring” from State Fair
“Beer and Flowers” from Wildflowers
“Flowers” from Hadestown
“Six Months Out Of Every Year” from Damn Yankees
“Spring Is Here” from I Married An angel
“Spring, Spring, Spring: from Seven Brides for Seven Brothers
“Spring In My Heart” from First Love
“Suddenly It’s Spring” from Lady In the Dark
“Spread A Little Sunshine” from Pippin
“Springtime For Hitler” from The Producers

Curtain Call can be heard on The AIR Wednesday at 3 PM, with replays Thursday at 8 AM, Friday at 10 AM, Saturday at 8 PM and Monday at 9 AM. A two-hour mini-marathon of classic episodes can be heard Monday evening starting at 9 PM, and an all-night marathon of Curtain Call episodes can be heard Wednesday nights, beginning at Midnight.

Tuesday is always a great day to tune into The AIR  and today we prove it with a new episode of Radio Free Charleston AND a new edition of The Swing Shift, too!  Both of these shows were recorded very late Monday/Early Tuesday because the leaf blower fairy decided to grace my neighborhood with its presence. To listen to The AIR, you simply have to point your cursor over and tune in at the website, or you could just stay here, and  listen to the cool embedded player found elsewhere on this page.  

You can hear Radio Free Charleston Tuesdays at 10 AM and 10 PM, with boatloads of replays throughout the week.

 This week we open with a full hour of the best local aind independent music that we can get our grubby little fingers on, and then we present two nearly ten-year-old episodes of Radio Free Charleston Voume Four that are filled to the brim with killer local and regional artists.

But back to that first hour…we open with a new release that was recorded back in the 1980s by The Tunesmiths, one of the favored bands from the original broadcast incarnation of RFC. Mark Beckner and Mark Mingrone have remastered the original 4-track recordings and you can find them on Bandcamp. This is like finding lost treasure that had been buried for decades.

The rest of our first hour is loaded with new tunes from GRPPLING (a band that includes the wrestlers, The Motor City Machine Guns), Cricketman, Thee Levianthans, Jim Lange, Samuel S.C., The Holler Hounds and Ghoulbox.

Hours two and three, both from July, 2016, bring you local and regional music back from when we were all-local, and only an hour long.

Check out this playlist, with links to the artist’s page, where available…

RFC V5 268

hour one
The Tunesmiths “Baby Can’t Be Trusted”
GRPPLNG “Hovering”
Cricketman “We Get Bigh”
Thee Leviathans “Enter the Spy Magician”
Jim Lange “Roger Zero G (And I Feel Fine)”
The Paranoid Style“DFL”
Samuel S.C. “Celestial”
The Settlement “Keeping Score”
The Moon My Twin “Tie Score”
David Synn “Sea of Tranquility”
Catherine Campbell “In My Room”
A Different Scene “Sounds”
Frenchy & The Punk “War On War”
The Holler Hounds “Cry Revolution”
Ghoulbox “Juju Bag”

hour two
Superfetch “Popcorn Time (Live)”
Jeff Ellis and 40 Days “South Charleston City Beat Blues”
Jonathan Mason “Ohio Is Killing Me”
Hybrid Soul Project “Hate On Me”
Radarhill & Nick Weckman “Spider Respects Nothing”
HARRAH “Pay The Piper”
Farnsworth “Everything Must Go”
Under Surveillance “99 Reasons”
Todd Burge “Jesus Night Light (Live)”
Michael Cerveris “Tenth Grade”
Larry Groce “When The Mist Clears Away”
The Company Stores “Dear Universe”
Mark Wolfe “A Kinda Blues”

hour three
Jonathan Mason “We Can’t Fix This”
Jeff Ellis and 40 Days “Nightshift”
Todd Burge “The Longer”
Radarhill and Nick Weckman “Petitions”
Mother Nang “Land of the Free”
Radio Cult “Hungry Like The Wolf”
Billy Matheny “Don’t Feel Guilty”
Crack The Sky “Animal Skins”
Scooter Scudieri “Mother of God”
The Renfields “Last Man On Earth”
The Big Bad “Possession”
The Jasons “Stalk and Slash Summer”
The Nanker Phelge “Scream”
Qiet “Brush Brush”

You can hear this episode of Radio Free Charleston Tuesday at 10 AM and 10 PM on The AIR, with replays Wednesday at 9 AM,  Thursday at 2 PM, Friday at 9 AM, Saturday at Noon and Midnight, Sunday at 8 PM and  Monday at 11 AM, exclusively on The AIR. Now you can also hear a different classic episode of RFC every weekday at 5 PM, and we bring you a marathon all night long Saturday night/Sunday morning.

I’m also going to  embed a low-fi, mono version of this show right in this post, right here so you can listen on demand.

After RFC, stick around for encores of last week’s episodes of  MIRRORBALL at 1 PM and Curtain Call at 2 PM.

At 3 PM get ready for a new edition of The Swing Shift. This special episode is devoted to the music of Tommy Dorsey and I don’t have a playlist because I’m typing this at 2 AM.

 You can hear The Swing Shift Tuesday at 3 PM, with replays Wednesday at 8 AM, Thursday at 9 AM,  Friday at 10 AM and 8 PM and Saturday afternoon, only on The AIR . You can also hear all-night marathons, seven hours each, starting at Midnight Thursdays and Sundays.

This week’s art is a pencil and ink depiction of the view pulling into Union Station in Chicago in the dead of Winter. It’s inspired by photos I took last December when taking Amtrak on our way to the city of wind.

With last week’s drawing, I started out doing  a pencil sketch on illustration board, but even with my trusty Blackwing Palamino, I was not happy with the level of detail and clarity.

So I reverted to my comic book artist days and “inked” much of the drawing with cheap markers from Five Below. Rather than erase the pencils, I blurred them with a tissue to give the piece some tonal qualities that I liked. I really liked the depth and texture that I got combining the pencil and ink, and this week I decided to do it again, on purpose this time.

If you want to see this image larger, click HERE.

Meanwhile, over in radioland, Monday beginning at 2 PM on The AIR,  we bring you a new episode of Psychedelic Shack, and then at 3 PM we do the same with Herman Linte’s weekly showcase of the Progressive Rock of the past half-century, Prognosis.  You can listen to The AIR at the website, or on the embedded radio player elsewhere on this page.

At 2 PM, Nigel Pye brings us a bit a departure as I suggested Mr. Pye put together a show made of psychedelic tunes from the last decade, and he topped my ida by assembling a show that, save for the opening track, is entirely comprised of trippy music released in the past six months. The opener is from 2019, but The Claypool Lennon Delirium have a new album coming out in a few weeks too. Check out this mind-expanding playlist…

Psychedelic Shack 110

The Claypool Lennon Delirium “Blood And Rockets”
Ringo Starr “Choose Love”
They Might Be Giants “What You Get”
Jope Jackson “Made God Laugh”
U2 “Easter parade”
Suzi Quatro “Choose Yourself”
Flea “A Plea”
Gorillaz “The Mountain”
Shardik “Into The Mouth of the Great Nothing”
The Protomen “The Good Doctor Pt. 2”
The Dream Machine “Night Owls”

Psychedelic Shack can be heard every Monday at 2 PM, with replays Tuesday at 9 AM, Wednesday at 10 PM, Friday at 1 PM,  and Saturday at 9 AM.

At 3 PM, Herman Linte brings you a two-hour mixtape of recordings by the band, YES, after the departure of their original lead singer, Jon Anderson. You will hear the voices of Jon Davison, Benoit David and Trever Horn, and the show kicks off with a track from the latest album by YES, which is due out in June.

PROGNOSIS 137

YES post-Anderson

“Aurora”
“Into The Storm”
“Fly From Here (complete, original)”
“One Second Is Enough”
“Subway Walls”
“The Gift Of Love”
“Hour of Need”
“Living Island”
“Sister Sleeping Soul”
“The Game”
“The Man You Always Wanted Me To Be (demo)”
“Words On A page”
“The Western Edge”
“Believe Again”
“All Connected”

You can hear Prognosis on The AIR Monday at 3 PM, with replays Tuesday at 7 AM, Wednesday at 8 PM, Thursday at Noon, and Saturday at 10 AM.

Tonight at 8 PM, tune in for a classic edition of The Comedy Vault. That’s followed by two-hour blocks of Curtain Call and Beatles Blast at 9 PM and 11 PM, and then an overnight assortment of our Haversham Recording Institute programs at 1 AM.

Our video tonight is a compilation of the first 38 entries in the skibidi toilet series.

Skibidi. It’s been one of the biggest things in pop culture the last couple of years.

If you haven’t seen Skibidi, you might be wondering, “What the hell is that?”

If you have seen Skibidi, chances are you might still be wondering, “What the hell is that?”

Well, skibidi toilet (they do it all in lower case) is a series of many, many very short video clips created by Alexey Gerasimov, a self-taught animator living in post-Soviet Georgia. He created these clips using videogame design software and unlicensed music and the end result is clunky and charming while also being hilarious and deeply disturbing. He started posting these to his YouTube channel a little over three years ago, and they have captured the imagination of the under-twenty crowd.

Basically, toilets roll into odd situations, a human head pops out doing some scat rapping (literally and figuratively) and mayhem ensues. Over time in the series, humans with cameras and speakers for heads show up to do battle with them. Eventually, society collapses amid the warfare.

On the surface, it’s just a new internet meme, a “Hamster Dance” for a sufficiently devolved generation. The shock is when you watch them in bulk.

While Gerasimov is amusingly inept as an animator, it turns out that he is a master storyteller. When viewed together, skibidi toilet is a wild geopolitical thriller that manages, with little in the way of dialogue, to raise questions and make startling observations about our current surveillance society and the implications of individuals vs. groupthink and governments. This is far more coherent than you might expect, and when you watch them all together, it’s hard to turn away. There are genuinely effective jump scares and horrific images buried among the sheer absurdity of the premise.  And the political themes parodied within are scarily astute.

Seriously, the deep stuff is a more subtle allegory than Invasion of the Body Snatchers, but just as striking. What seems to be a goofy meme about heads popping out of toilets and singing is actually a very strong political work

Of course, it’s the toilets with heads popping out that made it such a huge phenomenon, with major merchandising and toy deals, and talk of a feature film.

But now, watch the clip above, and stick your head in the skibidi toilet. You might be surprised what you fish out.

This week we go back to late April, 2013 for Radio Free Charleston 184, “Sherlock Shirt,” which was shot all over the city of Charleston and featured the RFC debuts of both The Carpenter Ants and Time and Distance. Plus we had a song from Joseph Hale (in a music video by Murfmeef) and a preview of the Alban Arts Center production of Edward Albee’s A Delicate Balance as well as animation from Frank Panucci.

The Carpenter Ants are seen performing “Blessing” at The East End Bazaar. We recorded Time And Distance doing their song, “There Is Nothing I Hate More Than The DMV,” at The Empty Glass, and the late Mr. Hale’s video for “Serene” was shot around Parkersburg.

For the original production notes, go HERE.

Next week in our chronological presentation of our video show, we will bring you an episode that, inexplicably, has NEVER been featured as an RFC Flashback before!

The PopCulteer
April 24, 2026

We have two new radio programs debuting on The AIR this afternoon, but before we get into that, we have some important news about some friends of ours who also happen to be one of the favorite bands of listeners of Radio Free Charleston.

Frenchy & The Punk have had to cancel the remaining dates of their Spring tour, and all other live events for the foreseeable future as Samantha, AKA “Frenchy,” deals with a pressing health issue. Being touring musicians who rely on touring to pay the bills, this is pretty severe, and in a moment I’ll share some ways you can pitch in and help out.

Right now I’m going to quote liberally from what Samantha wrote in a Frenchy & The Punk email…

Hello All,

Frenchy here. We are sorry to confirm that the remainder of the April tour as well as the UK tour have been cancelled. I have been diagnosed with Stage 2 breast cancer and the wheels of treatment have already begun to turn. This was a very unexpected development that arose from a routine check up.

At this time we are unsure of the duration of treatment. This week and next are appointments and further tests and I will have a better idea at that point so we’re not sure when shows will resume.

At the moment I am focused on healing. Please know I am feeling fine right now (I have no symptoms) and am in total warrior mode and ready for the fight. If you would like to follow along my journey, I have started a blog on our website, I’d rather do that than update on social media platforms. At the moment I have the intention of writing or videoing updates. Of course, I have no idea how I will be feeling during the chemo treatments so my consistency on the updates may vary. I have set it up as a public page, but you have to be signed in, in order to post a comment. This is to ensure I don’t have to deal with spam comments.

Our Patreon will continue as a way to share our music and art news. I’m hoping that I can work in my studio and share my work.

As you may know, music and art are our livelihood. If we don’t do shows, we don’t have income. Scott set up a GoFundMe campaign to help ease the stress of our living expenses. If you would like to share the campaign or to donate, please follow this link. We have been blown away by the outpouring of love and support.

So many have contacted me with stories of victory and survival with their own battles. It is truly astounding how many people are touched by cancer. I never could have imagined it would be part of my life script, but here I am.

I am so lucky to have Scott by my side and my wonderful family. The network of friends we have from our many years of touring is much more vast than I realized, we are truly grateful and deeply humbled.

We’re not doing shows for now, but we’ll be back. Don’t forget us.

with love
Samantha aka Frenchy
x

You can also support the band by purchasing merch from their website,  and music downloads from their Bandcamp page. You can also  donate via Venmo and Paypal.  “The Punk” from the band is Scott, AKA as Guitarmy of One, and you can also help out by buying the incredible Surf/Spy music he makes under that name.

We think the world of Samantha and Scott, and hope for the best for them. It’ll great to see Samantha beat this, and see the band back out on the road. They were frequent guests on the RFC video show, and are heard regularly on our current internet radio program on The AIR.

Heck, they even crashed at my house one time after playing a show at The Empty Glass.  Let’s help them through this challenging time.

Music From Cream Cheese City And The Only Band That Matters On The AIR Friday

We have some radio notes for you today as we gear up for more new shows all next week’ Friday afternoon our radio station brings you classic Disco and important punk on The AIR. Tune in as we serve up new episodes of MIRRORBALL and Sydney’s Big Electric Cat! The AIR is PopCult‘s sister radio station. You can hear these shows on The AIR website, or just click on the embedded player found elsewhere on this page.

MIRRORBALL

Friday at 2 PM on The AIR, Mel Larch devotes a full hour to deep album cuts from the Philadelpha International Records roster.

These aren’t the chart-toppers. These are the gems that were buried on the albums released by the influential Disco label. Other record labels would’ve killed to release these tunes as singles, but Philadelphia International had such a surplus of Disco awesomeness that they just issued these as album tracks.

You’ll hear criminally-overlooked songs from McFadden & Whitehead, Patti Labelle, Teddy Pendergrass, MSFB, The Jacksons and more.

It’s another classic collection of dance tunes fron the days when people turned to dance to forget the most corrupt Republican president to harm the country, up to that point.

Check out the playlist…

MIRRORBALL 125

McFadden & Whitehead “Do You Want To Dance”
Patti Labelle “I’ll Never, Never Give Up”
Edwin Birdsong “Kunta Dance”
The Jones Girls “You Made Me Love You”
Teddy Pendergrass “Get Up, Get Funky, Get Loose”
Jean Carn “Free Love”
Lou Rawls “There Will Be Love”
MFSB “Love Is The Message”
The O’Jays “People Keep Telling Me”
The Three Degrees “Can’t You See What You’re Doing To Me”
The Jacksons “Keep On Dancing”

You can hear MIRRORBALL every Friday at 2 PM, with replays most weeks  Monday at 9 AM and Tuesday at 1 PM and a four-hour mini-marathon of classic episodes Friday nights at 8 PM.

Sydney’s Big Electric Cat Salutes The Clash

While Sydney Fileen devoted an entire program to the epic Clash album, Sandanista, a few years ago, somehow she managed to never have assembled a proper career retrospective of the politically-charged Punk band that evolved into a New Wave powerhouse that filled stadiums as they expanded their musical reach into Dub Reggae, Rap, Jazz, Rockabilly, Power Pop, Dance music and more.

In this two-hour blockbuster, Sydney brings you tracks from every Clash album, save for Sandanista, and their last and worst album, Cut The Crap. Sprinkled throughout are EP tracks, Singles, B-sides and a few rare mixes.

You will hear why The Clash, despite staying together for less than a decade, were The Only Band That Mattered.

Check out the playlist…

BEC 137

The Clash

“White Riot”
“Janie Jones”
“Capitol Radio”
“Complete Control”
“Clash City Rockers”
“Remote Control”
“London’s Burning”
“Career Opportunities”
“White Man In Hammersmith Palais”
“Safe European Home”
“English Civil War”
“Tommy gun”
“Stay Free”
“The Prisoner”
“Pressure Drop”
“I Fought The Law”
“Capitol Radio”
“1977”
“London Calling”
“Rudie Can’t Fail”
“Train In Vain”
“Spanish Bombs”
“Lost In The Supermarket”
“Guns of Brixton”
“Death Or Glory”
“I’m Not Down”
“Bankrobber”
“Armagideon Time”
“This Is Radio Clash”
“Rock The Casbah”
“First Night Back In London”
“Should I Stay Or Should I Go”
“Straight To Hell”
“Ghetto Defendent”
“Know Your Rights”

Sydney’s Big Electric Cat is produced at Haversham Recording Institute in London, and can be heard every Friday at 3 PM, with replays Saturday afternoon,  Monday at 7 AM, Tuesday at 8 PM, Wednesday at Noon and Thursday at 10 AM, exclusively on The AIR. Classic episodes can be heard as part of the overnight Haversham Recording Institute marathon Tuesday mornings at 1 AM. .

That’s it for this week’s PopCulteer, check back for all our regular features, with fresh content, every day.

The last weekend of April is rapidly approaching, and since your humble blogger is busy sheltering in place instead of doing what he had planned for Wednesday, how about we tell you all about some cool STUFF TO DO all over and just beyond the borders of the state, to tell you about, noted as briefly as possible.  This ought to take you through the next week, folks.

Again, I’m just scratching the surface here. Please don’t think this is all we have to offer.

As always, you should remember that THIS IS NOT A COMPLETE LIST OF EVENTS.  It’s just a starting point, so don’t expect anything comprehensive, and if you feel strongly about me leaving anything out, feel free to mention it in the comments.  Also, if you have a show that you’d like to plug in the future, even if your promotional graphic uses cruddy AI art, contact me via Social Media at Facebook, BlueSky , Spoutible, Instagram or Twitter.  I dont charge for this, so you might as well send me something if you have an event to promote.

We have two featured event this weekend, both on Saturday. First we have a tribute to the late Daniel Boyd in the form of a wrestling show held outside A Walk In Time collectibles on Charleston’s West Side within sight of Patrick Street…

Second, we have a great event that will wrap up the WTSQ 2026 Spring Fund Drive.. Folklore music will host thirteen local and regional singer-songwriters performing 13 original songs. The evening will feature Corduroy Brown, Tai Ray, Mark Price, Holly Forbes, Andrew Adkins, Emmalea Deal, KC Shingleton, Makenna Hope, Zach Harold, Sarah Rudy, Jordan Dyer, Gracie Mae, & Sean Richarson…

We are very happy to remind you that Cristen Michael has created an interactive calendar that is way more comprehensive than this list of STUFF TO DO, and you can find it HERE. Just click on the day and the event and you’ll be whisked away to a page with more details about loads of area events.

Most weekends you can find live music at Taylor Books. There is no cover charge, and Friday and Saturday shows start at 7:30 PM.  Many Sunday afternoons at 2 PM they also have live music. This weekend they have music from Zach Elmore on Friday and Minor Swing on Saturday.

You can find live music in and around town every night of the week. You just have to know where to look.  Keep in mind that all shows are subject to change or be cancelled at the last minute.

Among the notable music venues in town are The World Famous Empty Glass Cafe, Live at The Shop in Dunbar, Louie’s, at Mardi Gras Casino & Resort, In Huntington, there’s local institution, The Loud (formerly The V Club),  The Wandering Wind Meadery is on Charleston’s West Side, Plus there’s music in Charleston at The Blue Parrot, Sam’s Uptown Cafe and Fife Street Brewing.

You might also find cool musical events at Folklore Music Exchange in Charleston.

To hear music in an alcohol-free enviroment, see what’s happening at Pumzi’s, on Charleston’s West Side.

For cutting-edge independent art films, downstairs from Taylor Books you’ll find the Floralee Hark Cohen Cinema by WVIFF. Each week they program several amazing movies in their intimate viewing room that you aren’t likely to see anywhere else.

Please remember that viral illnesses are still a going concern and many people who have very good reasons are still wearing masks, and many of us, understandably, are still nervous about being in crowds, masked or not. Be kind and understanding  while you’re out. And if you’re at an outdoor event, please remember that it’s awfully inconsiderate to smoke or vape around people who become ill when exposed to that stuff. If somebody asks you to refrain, please respect their weishes and don’t be a jerk about it.

Keep in mind that all shows are subject to change or be cancelled at the last minute.

Here we go, roughly in order, it’s graphics for local events happening over the next several days that I was able to scrounge up online…

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