Month: April 2017 (Page 4 of 5)

Our internet radio station, The AIR, continues its march through April with a fresh batch of shows and a tweaked schedule.  You can tune in at The AIR Website, or just hit the virtual button right here on this embedded radio player…

After a morning and afternoon of new music and encore presentations, the fun starts at 3 PM with a brand-new episode of Prognosis. Herman Linte is back with a special show that brings you part two of Mike Oldfield’s Return to Ommadawn (part one was heard last week on Radio Free Charleston International) and in the second hour of the show, all of Jon Anderson’s solo debut, Olias of Sunhillow.

At 5 PM we bring you a classic episode of Harrah’s Hard & Heavy. In a couple of weeks we’ll have new shows from this series, but until then, you can rock out with your encore out.

At 6 PM it’s another installment the New Music Show. This is exactly what the title says. It’s new music, a mix of local and non-local, presented in a rotation so that you can see the artist and song title displayed. You’ll get to hear some of the best tracks that we play on our specialty shows here every weekday at 6 PM.

At 6:30 PM it’s The (censored) Crazy Show. Now daily, by popular demand.

7 PM sees a new-to-The-AIR episode of That Conversation with Patrick Felton. This week it’s part two of Patrick’s talk with Sam Holdren, followed by a special replay of a classic Word Association with Lee & Rudy.

9 PM brings us a new-to-The-AIR episode of The Best of The Real with Mark Wolfe. This time Mark talks to his fellow Star Trek actor, Jeff Bond.

10 PM revives a lost episode of Six Degrees of Separation. This talk show, hosted at The Empty Glass, delves into the mind and music of Sean Richardson.

At midnight, settle in for an all-night parade of showtunes, as we bring you a marathon of Curtain Call, hosted by Mel Larch.

Here is your playlist for Prognosis, heard Monday at 3 PM, Tuesday at 7 AM and Wednesday at 8 PM…

Triumverat “Triangle”
Mike Oldfield  “Return To Ommadawn part two”
Brian May and Kerry Ellis  “Parisienne Walkways”
Mike and the Mechanics  “Are You Ready”
Deep Purple  “Birds of Prey”
Obssy  “Ana Dancing With fire”
Steve Hackett  “Inca Terra”
Acceptance  “Colliding by Design
Electric Guest “Glorious Warrior”

Jon Anderson  “Olias of Sunhillow”
“Ocean Song”
“Meeting (Garden of Geda)”
“Dance of Reynart”
“Qoquag en Transic”
“Flight of the Moorglade”
“Solid Space”
“Moon Ra”
“To The Runner”

Monochrome Month continues with a conglomerate of a digitally-asaulted photograph that I did years ago and a recent abstract, all taken down an austere path into black and white. It’s an exercise in extreme lighting and contrasting textures. As usual, click the image to see a larger version.

First, let me make it clear that Flash Gordon The Greatest Adventure of All is the title of the above made-for-television movie. This adaptaion of the classic Flash Gordon comic strip was made in 1979 by Filmation, the animation studio responsible for some of the absolute worst cartoons ever made for TV. However, this is by far the best thing they ever put their name on. It’s actually quite good, even with some sort of Asian subtitles.

In fact (let me get my body armor on) this is much more faithful to the source material, and is a much better movie than the 1980 live-action movie that is most famous for having a soundtrack by the rock group, Queen. Due to an unusual series of events, while this animated version was completed before shooting began on the live-action Flash Gordon, it did not debut on NBC until three years after the Dino DeLaurentis-produced abomination of a live action movie came and went on to become a mainstay of HBO.

Back in 1979, when NBC saw what an amazing job Filmation had done on the television movie, they put it on the shelf and instead arranged for Filmation to produce a Saturday morning cartoon series, which re-used many elements of the movie, but also cheapened it up a bit and watered down the action and cheesecake of the movie. The finished movie sat unaired until 1983, by which time the live action movie had sort of poisoned the well for what the audience was going to expect.

I have to admit a bias here. I am a huge fan of the original Flash Gordon comic strip, which I discovered thanks to several hardcover reprints. The Filmation adaptation is faithful and respectful to the original work, which is among the most influential material ever created in comics. I hated the live-action movie. I felt it was an insulting parody, hacked out by a producer whose only interest was cashing in on the Star Wars craze. I know that there are a lot of people who disagree with me, but they’re wrong. The live-action movie is awful.

You want to see Flash Gordon, watch this movie, then go hunt down some reprints of Alex Raymond’s comic strip.

We are back to bringing you our classic local music video shows in chronological order, after our April Fool’s Day diversion. This week, from June, 2008, comes Radio Free Charleston episode 44, “Social Distortion Shirt,” the second of two episodes that I hosted without wearing a hat.

This episode features music from Lady D and Quick and Dirty, plus footage from the Pandora’s Toy Box custom toy exhibit. Of special interest in this episode is our exclusive apology to the people of West Virginia from the Vice President of these United States.

Host segments were shot at Good News Mountaineer Gallery, which is now the home of Apartment Earth. The bittersweet part of this show is that it marks the debut of Quick and Dirty and the band’s bassist and lead singer, Randy Lee Walden, who would die of a drug overdose less than three weeks after this show debuted. It was a terrible waste of a talented life. You can get just a hint of what we’re missing by watching this show.

Original production notes are here.

The PopCulteer
April 7, 2017

This has certainly been an eventful week.Your PopCulteer promised a photo essay every day, and fate conspired to keep that from happening. All sorts of odd things are being legalized and/or outlawed in the state legislature and apparently last night the president bombed Siri or something. I’m not sure. I think I was watching cartoons, or maybe Raquel Welch fighting dinosaurs. Or maybe I just wrote that so I’d have an excuse to run the photo at the head of this post.

Anyway, the post that was to originally occupy this space, an Easter edition of the PopCult Gift Guide, will now appear on Monday. The ToyLanta photo essays will run all weekend, unless Appalachian Power decides to start playing power outage bingo again in Dunbar. Our newly-tweaked programming schedule at our internet radio station, The AIR will continue to be refined. And book, toy, CD and DVD reviews will return to PopCult soon.

In the meantime, we’ll take a brief moment to acknowledge the eighth anniversay of The PopCulteer, the weekly Friday column/post in which you are now soaking.

Having done that, we will bring you graphics of some of the cool events you can attend this weekend. As always, remember that this is just the tip of the iceberg. There’s way more things for people to do in Charleston than there are people to do them.

Friday

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Our spring clean of the schedule of The AIR continues as we welcome back DJ Betty Rock and Radio Coolsville, and Sydney Fileen with her Big Electric Cat. You can tune in at The AIR Website, or just settle down right here on this embedded radio player…

You may have noticed that, with our new schedule on The AIR, we now have three hours of specialty music programming every weekday, starting at 3 PM. Friday, as before, is where you’ll find the debut of new episodes of Sydney’s Big Electric Cat at 3 PM. Sydney is back after an extended absence due to illness (and the occasional terrorist attack, as she says), with two hours of the best music of the New Wave era, courtesy of Haverhsam Recording Institute in London, England.  Check the playlist for this week’s show at the bottom of this post, on the other side of the jump.

Joining Sydney on Friday afternoons, we are proud to welcome back DJ Betty Rock and Radio Coolsville. DJ Betty’s show, which originates out of WMUL in Huntington, has shrunk down to an hour, but is still chock-full of the coolest Alternative-inflected music you’ll find. Going forward, Radio Coolsville will debut a new episode every Friday at 5 PM, with replays throughout the week. We are thrilled to have new episodes of Radio Coolsville back on our line-up.

At 6 PM tonight, it’s another half-hour of The New Music Show, and at 6:30 PM we bring you The Crazy Show. At 7 PM, this week, we’re bringing you a special replay of Radio Coolsville, and at 8 PM we start The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy over with the first hour.

9 PM sees a full hour of The Third Shift with Jay and Jared. Check this show our for the wildest conversations about beer, babes, gadgetry and the latest news from the world of the key demographic. At 10 PM we offer up a replay of this week’s Radio Free Charleston International, which opens with new music from the late Chuck Berry. Midnight ushers in an overnight mix of mystery music. Legend has it that you may hear entire albums, from start to finish, just like back in the old days of “Album Rock” radio.

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Remember how I promised you a ToyLanta photo essay every day this week last Friday? Well, a combination of technical glitches here at the Gazette-Mail and power glitches at Stately Radio Free Charleston Manor have caused a bevy of delays.

For the sake of pleasing our new blogger interface overlords, all photo essays will now be kept under 15 photos. It’s annoying, but it’s the only way to keep them from disappearing from PopCult.

So today we’re going to make up for lost time. This is the first of three photo essays that will look at Mike Gardner’s awesome Avengers Assemble diorama, which took up one end of the custom figures and diorama room at ToyLanta. We’re going to see the work in progress and then look at close ups of the finished product. That’s Mike at the head of this post in a photo taken from within another of his dioramas..

Mike built his diorama using the very-expensive Hot Toys Marvel Cinematic Universe figures, which look photo-realistic. He also snuck in some Sideshow Collectible figures and figures from other lines as well as some custom figures that he created for previous dioramas.There’s more than five-thousand dollars worth of action figures on display here.

One of the fun parts of building dioramas on this scale is the creative repurposing of elements of previous dioramas. In this diorama you may notice of a couple of figures and at least one vehicle from Mike’s incredible “Yellow Jacket Creek” Walking Dead diorama from a few years ago. Newly-created elements include the building facade, made of industrial foamboard, which required more than three hours on a router, just to create the brick work. Much of the scenery and props were scratch-built.

A video that shows more of Mike working on this diorama is forthcoming, as soon as the power stops flickering off ever few minutes here in Dunbar. In the meantime, check out part one of Assembling Avengers.

The centerpiece was the section of a building, scratch-built by Mike out of foamboard.

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Radio Free Charleston International opens with a brand-new cut from the late father of Rock and Roll, Chuck Berry at 3 PM Thursday on The AIR. Tune in at the website, or on this handy embedded radio player…

After a morning and afternoon filled with special encores of Curtain Call, Radio Coolsville and Sydney’s Big Electric Cat (the latter two returning with new episodes on Friday), we kick out the jams on Radio Free Charleston International at 3 PM with a show that brings you a ton of new music with no regard to the artificial barriers of genre.

You will hear mostly brand new songs by Bob Dylan, Aimee Mann, Depeche Mode, The Jesus and Mary Chain, Mastadon, blink 182Jamiroquai, Body Count and more, and it all starts with “Big Boys,” the first track from the upcoming final album by Chuck Berry.

For information on how you can pre-order CHUCK, the new album by Chuck Berry, follow THIS LINK. You’ll find options for CD, vinyl and digital download. The album is due in June, but you get the track, “Big Boys” immediately.

You can hear Radio Free Charleston International on The AIR Thursday at 3 PM, with replays Friday at 9 AM and 10 PM, Saturday at 11 AM and Sunday at 1 AM and 10 PM.

Following RFC International on Thursday,you can listen to this week’s new Radio Free Charleston, with the Velvet Brothers, and The New Music Show at 6 PM , The Crazy Show at 6:30 PM, and in prime-time, it’s this week’s episodes of The Swing Shift and Curtain Call, followed at 10 PM by Live From The Empty Glass (this week with Matt McGuire, John Lancaster, Spurgie Hankins Band and The Scrap Iron Pickers). All night long after that, it’s a marathon of The Swing Shift.

Check out the playlist for this week’s Radio Free Charleston International:

Chuck Berry  “Big Boys”
Bob Dylan  “Stardust”
Jamiroquai  “Dr. Buzz”
Mastadon  “Roots Remain”
Body Count  “This Is Why We Ride”
Blink 182  “Misery”
Goldfrapp  “Everything Is Never Enough”
The Blues Swingers  “By Friday”
Aimee Mann  “Good For Me”
Postmodern Jukebox  “Roxanne”
The Jesus and Mary Chain  “Los Feliz (Blue and Green)
Depeche Mode “Going Backwards”
UK  “Carry The Cross”
The Beatles  “I’m Only Sleeping (Mono)”
The Beach Boys  “God Only Knows”
Ruby Dee and The Snakehandlers “Who Do You Think I Am”
Delta 88 “Boppin’ Little Witch”
Mike Oldfield  “Return To Ommadawn part one”
Todd Rundgren “Bang On The Drum All Day”
The B-52s “Party Out of Bounds”
DEVO “Mechanical Man”

The Spring Clean of new programming on The AIR continues with brand-new episodes of On The Road with Mel, Life Speaks with Michele Zirkle Marcum and Curtain Call lighting up our tweaked schedule. You can tune in at The AIR Website, or just settle down right here on this embedded radio player…

The Morning kicks off with a replay of The Swing Shift at 7 AM, followed by a one-hour version of The NEW MUSIC SHOW at 9 AM and a replay of last week’s Curtain Call at noon. All times, EDT, by the way.

At 1 PM Mel Larch is joined by yours truly as we devote an entire episode of On The Road with Mel to ToyLanta.

1:30 PM sees Michele Zirkle Marcum present the first part of her interview with local Bigfoot scholar, Russ Jones on Life Speaks.

The Best of The Real with Mark Wolfe presents Mark’s talk with Clay Sayre at 2 PM.

It’s a new Curtain Call at 3 PM, as Mel Larch looks into the world of dance on stage, with showtunes that had been choreographed by Tommy Tune, Bob Fosse and Susan Stroman. You’ll find the playlist at the bottom of this post.

At 5 PM Beatles Blast returns, hosted by your humble PopCulteer. New episodes will start soon.

6 PM sees The NEW MUSIC SHOW, followed at 6:30 PM by The now-daily Crazy Show.

At 7 PM we have a replay of Life Speaks with Michele Zirkle Marcum, and then at 7:30 PM Word Association with Lee and Rudy tackles the topic of dinosaurs.

We maintain our prime-time Wednesday line-up of Prognosis at 8 PM, followed by The Comedy Vault at 10 PM. Then at midnight we dive into the Radio Free Charleston archives for some classic episodes from last fall presented as an overnight marathon.

The interruption-free programming continues as The AIR freshens up all week long.

Here’s the playlist for Curtain Call:

“I Hope I Get It” from A Chorus Line
“Audition” from 42nd Street 
“That’s How You Jazz” from Jelly’s Last Jam
“Fabulous Feet” from The Tap Dance Kid
“Bring In da’ Noise, Bring In da’ Funk” from Bring In da’ Noise, Bring In da’ Funk
“We’ll Take A Glass Together” from Grand Hotel
“Doin’ The Production Code” from A Day In Hollywood, A Night In The Ukraine
“Slap That Bass” from Crazy For You
“Along Came Bialy/Act I Finale” from The Producers
“Steam Heat” from The Pajama Game
“Rich Man’s Frug” from Sweet Charity
“All That Jazz” from Chicago 
“Who’s Got The Pain?” from Damn Yankees