PopCult

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…

Continue reading

I’ve written about this before, but that was decades ago and since today is Earth Day, I thought it might be time to retell the story.

Above you see a flyer for the Earth Day 1990 concert that Radio Free Charleston sponsored, along with the group Project Earth on the campus of West Virginia State College (before it grew up and became a University).  It was the twentieth year that Earth Day was celebrated, and we wanted to observe it with something memorable. The flyer you see is a rare example of yours truly being able to create nearly-legible lettering, back in the days before MG gave me a great excuse for my awful penmanship.

This was a high-water mark for the radio incarnation of RFC.   I had to pull off promoting and organizing a concert on short notice with absolutely no support from the station management.  By this point, the acting general manager was openly hostile towards RFC, and the program director was more interested in sacrificing the show so he could wrest the GM’s job away than he was in helping the station actually make money.

But we pulled off a huge event.  Seven bands took the stage at the Davis Fine Arts building. In between we had speakers and low-level bottom-feeding politicians, some of whom brought their own hecklers (whatever happened to those guys anyway?).  Campus security told me that, by their count, close to two thousand people drifted through the Davis building during the course of the eight-hour show.  I was interviewed by WCHS TV (by a very young Tim Irr, in fact, back in his cub reporter days).  Somehow we managed to provide free Gino’s Pizza and Pepsi products for the audience–who got in free.

I look back and wonder how we wrangled it.  It was an incredible day of music, good vibes, bad political theater and in retrospect, it was a bit of a last hurrah for that initial broadcast incarnation of RFC.  The show was cancelled two weeks later.  That wasn’t really a huge shock.  I was miserable working at the radio station by that point.  Management was so antagonistic towards RFC that they actually refused advertising for the show. The only way I was able to promote this concert on other disc jockey’s shifts was by mislabelling the promo carts.

Which I did, to excesss! I apologize once again to the innocent bystanders in the traffic department.

Anyway, the concert was a triumph.  Many of the musicians involved are still active in the local scene, and have turned up on the video version of RFC and can still be heard on our internet radio version.

Clownhole reformed in 2023/24 and recorded many of their original songs that they performed that day. The Beckner brothers from Go Van Gogh are still making music with their bands: Stephen in Speedsuit and Mark in Nixon Black. Spencer Elliott, from Some Forgotten Color has become a reknown guitar master, with international releases (and a new one in the works).  Sean Richards from Strawfyssh performs in the area regularly and is the man behind the “Sober Curious” venue, Pumzi’s. Two of The Swivels have recently been collaborating, but I’m not at liberty to discuss that project.

Some of the musicians are no longer with us, too.  That’ll happen when you’re talking about an event that transpired thirty-six years ago. We recently lost Brian Young, and I am still compiling a video tribute to him. That one really hurts. Before that we lost Gary Price and Tommy Medvick from The Swivels and Johnny Rock from Go Van Gogh, and the loss of those close friends makes this a bittersweet memory, but still a fond one.

With so many lasting friendships dating back to this special day before many of my readers were born, you can see why I wanted to take another look back. This is sort fo like me looking through a scrapbook at my days as a star high school football player…if I had ever been remotely athletic and didn’t hate going to high school. We all have triumphant memories from our youth. It’s fun to wallow in them once in a while.

Of course, the day could have been even bigger.  Had I put in my request a week earlier, the show would have been headlined by Peter Buck, of R.E.M.  I’d gotten friendly with his manager, who steered a few other acts on his roster my way during while I was doing the radio show.  This concert came together on such short notice that there was no way I was going to be able to land a big name.  I did get to hang out with Peter a year later, the night before R.E.M. appeared on Mountain Stage, but that’s another long rambling nostalgic story with details that still can’t be divulged.

Anyway, this was a great day, and it was nice to go out on a high note.  Within a month, RFC was off the air, I left Project Earth after it was taken over by agents of the Jim Humphey’s campaign (the attraction that the group held for me was that it was non-partisan, when the group was seized by people who wanted me to work the phones for a politician whom I couldn’t possibly hold in lower regard, I was out the door). I don’t even know if the group is still around.  But that night….it was worth it.  We had a huge party for the RFC crowd, raised awareness of environmental issues, and it was the 21st birthday of Little Susan, the official little sister of RFC.  Happy Birthday, Little Susan, where ever you are.

Oh, and we didn’t litter too much either. That would have been bad.

There were folks on hand to record video and audio of the event, but to this day I have not be able to track down either. It remains my great white whale of lost RFC artifacts.

Which is probably not the best anaology to use on Earth Day, now that I think about it.

Anyway, Happy Earth Day. Maybe one of these days we can actually celebrate it by not coming up with new ways to destroy the planet.

Tuesday is NEW RFC DAY on The AIR  and today, just like we copied and pasted from last week,  it most certainly is again as we bring you a brand-new first hour of Radio Free Charleston combined with an episode of RFC Volume Four that hasn’t been heard in nine years. 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.

Radio Free Charleston brings you a new show with a killer first hour that opens with a track from Cricketman, a Ska band from Huntington that I just found out about last week, and continues with new music from the likes of The Moon My Twin, Joe Jackson, Los Grainders, The Tentakills, Mega Ran, Duck City Music, The Anchoress, Foreign Kids, The Heavy Hitters, The Holler Hounds and The newly-formed Matt Berry Trio.

We cover the gamut from Ska to Rock to Surf to Prog to Rap, Soul, Jazz, Trance and more, and that’s just in the first hour.

Because I have several more routine, but time-consuming, medical things to do early this week, for our second and third hours I decided to reach into the archives and bring you a classic, two-hour, episode of Radio Free Charleston Volume Four that premiered in May, 2016.

This time it’s a really cool show that debuted exactly ten years ago this week, and, like last week,  this episode of RFC Volume Four has not been heard since late, 2016.

Check out this playlist, with links to the artist’s page in the first hour…

RFC V5 267

hour one
Cricketman “Adults”
The Moon My Twin “Backbone”
The Holler Hounds “Take Your Shot”
Los Grainders “Deep Grotto”
The Anchoress “I Had A Baby Not A Lobotomy”
Foreign Kids “Garden”
Joe Jackson “I’m Not Sorry”
Mega Ran “Pipe Bomb”
Duck City Music “Don’t Disrespect”
Gardenn“Empty Bottles”
The Heavy Hitters “Vain”
Matt Berry Trio “Everything’s Peachy”
Nothing To Protect  “Step By Step”
Best Dressed Ghost“Let’s Go Home”
The TentaKills “Daggertooth”

hour two
Michael Cerveris “Phoenix”
Larry Groce “The Boxer”
Garagecow Ensemble “I Never Slept With Allen Ginsberg”
Blue Million “Will You Think Of Me”
Company Stores “No Middle Name”
Jordan Andrew Jefferson “One Thing I Do Know”
Quick And Dirty “Super Ninja”
Ann Magnuson “Man With No Face”
The Big Bad “Maniac Mansion”
The Velvet Brothers “Savannah Moon”
Whistlepunk 2.0 “The Good”
Pepper Fandango “Wayward Girls”
David Synn “Space Gun”
Karma To Burn “Forty”
Dog Soldier “Christmas Song”

hour three
Qiet “Bring My Day”
Hybrid Soul “Chain of Fools”
Time And Distance “Hell To Pay”
The Jasons “Camp Arawak”
The Nanker Phelge “21st Century”
Mother Nang “Bully”
The Smoky Room “Sound The Alarms”
Byzantine “Agonies”
Talented “Put Ya Gloves On”
Crystal Bright and the Silver Hands “Finest of Dreams”
Tape Age “Wish I Could Have You”
Under Surveillance “Breaking Point”
Ona “Sleep Rinse Repeat”

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 two classic episodes of The Swing Shift.

 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 Museum of Ceramics, located in East Liverpool, Ohio.

I wish I could tell you more about the museum, but when we drove by there a few weeks ago, they weren’t open. Still, the photos I took inspired me to do this drawing, and we do intend to go back to East Liverpool for a visit at some point this year.

As for the drawing, I started out doing this as 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, so I may be using this technique more in the future.

It came out better than I expected, really.  And there was less paint to clean up.

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 classic 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. 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. 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.

This week we going back to December, 2009, to restore an installment of Sunday Evening Video that was reduced to semi-code gobbledygook by the progression of time and technology. (With some browsers, you’ll have to click in the corner to watch these on YouTube–I can’t figure out why)

The Dean Martin Variety Show was one of the highest-rated shows on TV in the 1960s, but people forget how progressive and subversive the comedy on the show was. Martin introduced American audiences to Monty Python and Marty Feldman, and at a time when the racial divide in this country was rarely breached, the Dean Martin show regularly featured stand-up comedy from Black comedians and performers. The show also addressed what could have been touchy social issues in the patented Rat Pack “who cares as long as nobody gets hurt” manner.

In the above clip, a recurring bit where Nipsy Russell and Dom DeLuise played the “NBC Barbers” who would be cutting the hair of that week’s guest, the guest is Peter Sellers, who discovered earlier in the day that he could reduce Martin to tears by doing a campy “gay” voice. Without any prior warning, he began the sketch, in which he was supposed to be speaking normally as himself, using that voice. You can see how it caught Russell and DeLuise off guard, but when Dino enters the sketch it really takes off.

The cool thing about The Dean Martin Show was that Martin never rehearsed. He’d walk in at the last minute and read his lines off the cue cards, often ad-libbing just to mess with his well-rehearsed co-stars. Below you can check out some more clips from The Dean Martin Show, featuring Goldie Hawn, Don Rickles, and more. This was the heyday of the show, not the last few years when the show was reduced to cranked-out celebrity “roasts.” These are examples why, in the history of comedy, Dean Martin matters.

Finally, here’s Dom DeLuise and Orson Welles on The Dean Martin Show, doing a sketch that was originally written by Marty Feldman and Barry Took for At Last, The 1948 Show for the BBC, but was not used until a later series called It’s Marty.

This week we go back to April, 2013 for Radio Free Charleston 183, “Defenders Of Bulletman Shirt,” with music from Albert Perrone, Saprogen and Radio Cult plus two trailers for local movies that were shown at the Keith-Albee Theater about a week after this show debuted. Host segments for this episode were shot at TriCon, a large comic book convention that used to be held in Huntington.

Our first trailer is for Ladybeard, an Apartment 2B Production, directed by David Smith, and featuring a cameo by yours truly.  The other trailer is for “Trace Around Your Heart” Seth Martin and Friends and Ian Nolte created a stirring motion picture, sort of “A Star Is Born” with country music…and puppets.

In the host segments, you’ll see all sorts of sights and sounds of TriCon, including your PopCulteer cavorting with local convention guests, Jason Pell and the late Daniel Boyd. It’s a little bittersweet because Danny and TriCon are no longer with us.

You can read the full production notes and see more photos from TriCon HERE.