Month: June 2017 (Page 2 of 5)

It’s sort of Summer Vacation time here at PopCult. I’ll tell you more about our unexpected break on West Virginia Day later this week, but right now it’s time to clue you in on the marathons that we’re running in lieu of new programming on The AIR for the next few days. Tune in at the website, or on this handy embedded radio player…

With Mr. and Mrs. PopCulteer headed up North for The Marx Toy Convention and a family visit later this week, we decided that now would be a good time to let new listeners sample the awesome goodness of our programming on The AIR. We actually started yesterday, with an all-day West Virginia Day marathon of Radio Free Charleston, but internet gremlins kept us from telling you about that.

For the remainder of Wednesday and all night long, you can hear Mel Larch host the best of musical theatre on Curtain Call. You still have time to tune in and catch songs from hit musicals like Hamilton, The Book of Mormon, and many, many more. You can get your theatre jollies on all night long Wednesday.

Thursday sees Radio Free Charleston International, the show where I get to play whatever I want, take over at 7 AM and run until 1 AM, when The Swing Shift assumes its weekly position as the overnight antidote to squaresville.

On Friday, Radio Coolsville takes the stage at 9 AM for a 12-hour marathon that will be followed immediately by an hour of The Third Shift, with Jay and Jarod. On Radio Coolsville, DJ Betty Rock brings you the best of college radio, with a healthy dash of quality surprises, all hosted from WMUL in Huntington. The guys on The Third Shift bring you Beer, Babes and Beyond every week on The AIR.  At midnight, settle in for an all-night Ska party, with Dexter Checkers and Ska Madness in an after-dark marathon.

Saturday, spend the day with legendary London disc jockey Sydney Fileen as she brings you Sydney’s Big Electric Cat all day long, filling the airwaves with crunchy New Wave goodness!

Spend Sunday afternoon with Michele Zirkle Marcum as a five-hour marathon of the most recent episodes of Life Speaks to Michele Zirkle Marcum kicks off at noon. Learn all about the spirtual side of the different forces affecting every day life.

Then at 6 PM, after this week’s episode of Marking Out, it’s six hours of The (BS) Crazy Show. At Midnight we have our second weekly overnight marathon of The Swing Shift. For some reason, folks like to swing all night long before starting the work week.

Monday it’s Prognosis, hosted by Herman Linte, all day long bringing you the best of the last half-century of progressive rock. If YES, ELP, Genesis, Pink Floyd, King Crimson and their fellow travelers are your bag, you’ll want to soak in this marathon all day long and into the next morning.

And then Tuesday we get back to what passes for normal on The AIR. I promise.

The streak was broken. Here’s to the new streak!

This week’s art stuff on Monday is a digital painting that mixes many virtual media into a sort-of self portrait. It’s something I knocked out on Saturday evening because it was too hot outside to bother doing much of anything else.

As always, click on the image to see it bigger.

Today is Father’s Day, and in honor of that fine manufactured holiday, we pay tribute to Ed, “Big Daddy” Roth, a master car customizer, designer and the creator of none other than RAT FINK!

As it says on the Wikipedia, “Ed “Big Daddy” Roth (March 4, 1932 – April 4, 2001) was an artist, cartoonist, illustrator, pinstriper and custom car designer and builder who created the hot rod icon Rat Fink and other characters. Roth was a key figure in Southern California‘s Kustom Kulture and hot rod movement of the late 1950s and 1960s.”

There is an official website that preserves the legacy of this influential man. On it you can find toys, decals, T-Shirts, posters and tons of information on his life and work.

Above you see coverage of last year’s Ratfink Reunion in Manti, Utah. Below you’ll find a two-hour discussion about pinstriping between Roth and Von Dutch. On the other side of the jump there’s even more Big Daddy Roth video goodness.

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Now combined into one show, it’s the 2008 Radio Free Charleston Horror Theater Halloween Specials! Episodes 54 and 55 of Radio Free Charleston were an ambitious attempt at recreating the cheesy horror movie-host vibe, only with short films and music videos instead of actual movies. Host segments were shot at the late, lamented LiveMix Studio.

This remastered version combines them both into one 37-minute show. The sequel episode from the following April Fool’s Day will be posted in the order it was first released in a few weeks.

Part one of RADIO FREE CHARLESTON HORROR THEATER features music from Doctor Senator and The Hellblinki Sextet, plus a short film about Jack The Ripper, vintage animation from Wladislaw Starewicz, excerpts from a film by Spike Nesmith, and loads and loads of extra-creepy-coolness.

Part Two of RADIO FREE CHARLESTON HORROR THEATER continues our tribute to old-time-TV horror movie hosts. We’ve got music videos from Under The Radar and Go Van Gogh, a short ghost film by Rich Allen, scary-freaky animation from Wladislaw Starewicz, plus a studio full of Zombies.

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Despite the technical difficulties that PopCult has been experiencing, we can see a light at the end of the tunnel of our WonderFest USA photo essays. Your Popculteer is going to attempt to show you the best of the rest of the model contest room in this huge photo essay that will test the limits of what PopCult’s blogging template can handle.

As you can see in the photos below and at the right, WonderFest was a hotbed of creativity and craft. These models were eye-popping, and in many cases, photos do not do them justice. This is an amazing event and anybody even remotely interested in model-building would be well-advised to make the trip to Louisville at least once to see this astounding collection of pure works of art.

We have a couple of smaller photo essays from WonderFest that we will attempt to squeeze in over the weekend so that we can clear the decks for our coverage of the Marx Toy Convention, which begins next Friday.

For now, just bask in these cool models.

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The PopCulteer
June 16 , 2017

We are in the midst of the summer convention season, and next weekend, June 23 and 24, your PopCulteer will make his annual pilgrimage up to Wheeling for The Marx Toy Convention, which takes place every June at Kruger Street Toy & Train Museum.

This is such a fun convention that it will pull your humble correspondent away from the second weekend of Charleston’s FestivALL, but for the last couple of years it seems that the city has managed to become a work of art perfectly well without me.  So Charleston will have to forgive me as we have the rich history of The Marx Toy Company to celebrate up North.

The festivities include tons of vendors selling all manner of Marx Toy Company products. There will be a special section of the dealers area devoted to “JohnnyCon”, the toy convention-within-a-toy convention that famously marked the 50th anniversary of Johnny West a couple of years ago.

My main reason for going is JohnnyCon, which is devoted to my collecting passion, Johnny West and the Marx Action Figures. Marx made tons of fantastic collectible toys, like trains, playsets, boardgames, Big Wheels and more, but it’s Johnny West and friends that draw me in.

The Marx Action Figure collecting community is a big, friendly group that is very welcoming and supportive, and is now thriving because of the recent production of new items using original molds and also brand-new custom creations.

For years I’d make the drive up to Wheeling and back and just attend one day of the convention, but a couple of years ago Mrs. PopCulteer and I decided to grab a hotel room and stay for both days, and it was so much fun that we decided to keep doing it, even though we don’t have a holiday weekend to glom onto this year.

If you’re wondering what’s so great about The Marx Toy Company, you need to check out some of my previous posts on the subject.  You can find my coverage of Marx Toy Conventions from years past HERE, HERE, and HERE.  For a huge five-part photo essay on The Marx Toy Museum, go HERE. We even shot a Christmas episode of Radio Free Charleston at the late, lamented Marx Toy Museum, which you can see HERE. For a photo essay on Kruger Street Toy & Train Museum, go HERE.As you can see, The Marx Toy Company has been a huge part of Popcult.

A pleasant bonus on this trip is that Francis Turner, the owner of the now-closed Marx Toy Museum in Moundsville, will be opening the doors to the shuttered facility for a private sale of rarities from his collection. We will be going to this special event on Friday night.

But the big event on Friday and Saturday happens at Kruger Street Toy and Train Museum in Wheeling, which is very much still an ongoing concern.  Admission is ten dollars per day for adults, five dollars for students.

This year’s schedule:

Friday, June 23

8:00 AM: Registration Desk Opens/SET-UP ONLY.
9:00 AM – 4:00 PM: Marx Toy & Train Collectors Show
11:00 AM: Speaker – TBA (GAME ROOM)
12:00 NOON : Commemorative Group Photo Session (Immediately following 11 AM speaker)
1:00 PM: Speaker – TBA (GAME ROOM)
3:30 PM – 4:30 PM: Toy & Train CUSTOM’s Contest (GAME ROOM)
5:30 PM – 7:00 PM: Marx Pizza Social at the Museum – A great chance to kick back and have an evening of fun with fellow Marx Collectors

Saturday, June 24th

8:00 AM: Registration Desk Opens/SET-UP ONLY.
9:00 AM – 3:00 PM: Marx Toy & Train Collectors Show
12:00 PM: SHOW & TELL – Unusual or Rare Marx Discussion (Bring along your favorite Marx Toy or Train to show off to fellow collectors! Some rather interesting items have been showing up at these sessions!) (GAME ROOM)
3:00 PM – 5:00: PM Pack-up tables/Final Tours of the Museum
5:00 PM: Official Closing of the Marx Show at the Museum

The Marx Toy Convention is one of the two big toy events I look forward to each year, (JoeLanta/ToyLanta being the other) and I hope some of my readers will enjoy hearing about this year’s trip. As for FestivALL, I’m happy to say that the event has grown so large that they don’t really need me to be here to cover it.

That is this week’s PopCulteer. Keep checking back because we have at least two more posts dedicated to WonderFest USA, plus our regular features before we head out next week.

Okay, I have to admit. I’m a bit frustrated at the slow pace that I’ve been rolling out these photo essays from WonderFest USA, which was almost two weeks ago.

Since ongoing technical issues are making it really complicated to post graphics here in PopCult, I’m going for an all-out assault.

This post will include images from the WonderFest Dealer’s Room. Next I’m going to try to round up the best of the model contest entrants that we haven’t seen yet. Then I’ll present one last post with some extra goodies.

I’m not going to caption these images because they’ve already crashed and burned this post three times, and I really want to get these out to you, post-haste.

Tom Servo, at the head of this post, was not in the dealer’s room, but I wanted to give him a spotlight. You’ll see a larger photo of him in our next post.

On to the pretty pictures…

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Thursday, as you may know, is usually when we drop a new Radio Free Charleston International on an unsuspecting public at 3 PM on The AIR. This week is no different in that regard. Tune in at the website, or on this handy embedded radio player…

Having taken the first part of the week off, your PopCulteer is back to the RFC International grind, with a show that is filled to the brim with great music, both new and old.

After another morning and afternoon filled with great new music plus special replays of Curtain Call and Sydney’s Big Electric Cat, we drop a megaton bomb of  music on Radio Free Charleston International at 3 PM with yet another show that harkens back to the glory days of free-format radio.

Listeners will get to hear fantastic music by Muse, YES, The Surfaris, Paul McCartney, Chuck Berry, Buckingham/McVie, Todd Rundgren and Daryl Hall, Gong and more. It’s another of our trademark gobbeldygook episodes that shouldn’t work, but on RFC International, we somehow find a way to make it all flow into a cohesive musical experience.

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.

Preceding RFC International on Thursday,you can listen to this week’s Radio Free Charleston at 2 PM, with another recent episode of our local music showcase at 5 PM. Then it’s The New Music Show at 6 PM , and The Crazy Show at 6:30 PM. 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 loads of surprises). All night long after that, it’s a marathon of The Swing Shift.

Here is your RFC International playlist:

Magna Carta Cartel  “Sway”
Buckingham/McVie  “Carnival Begin”
Yes  “Future Times”
Avenged Sevenfold  “Malagueña Salerosa (La Malagueña)”
Samurai of Prog  “The Perfect Black”
The Stranglers  “Dutchess”
Duncan MacKay and Georg Voros  “The One With The Child In Her Eyes”
Paul McCartney  “Oue est le Soleil”
Emerson Lake and Palmer  “Taste of My Love”
Nad Sylvan  “The Quartermaster”
Rita Ora  “Your Song”
Brain May Kerry Ellis  “Roll With You”
Chuck Berry  “Dutchman”
The Surfaris  “Wipe Out”
Crazy World of Arthur Brown  “Fire”
Hughes-Turner Project  “Death Alley Driver”
Strangers  “Money Is Just Paper”
Cheap Trick  “Gonna Raise Hell”
Raygun Cowboys  “It’s Coming Down”
The Naturals  “I Don’t Need A Car”
Todd Rundgren with Daryl Hall  “Chance For Us”
Muse  “Dig Down”
Gong  “Oily Way”
Mew “Ay Ay Ay”

A new episode of Life Speaks To Michele Zirkle, part two of a bizarre collection of Beatles covers takes over Beatles Blast, an acclaimed musical is showcased on  Curtain Call, a new program of radio drama debuts and the third episode of our new show about Professional Wrestling headline a full day of great new programming on The AIR. You can tune in at the website, or on this embedded radio player…

In this week’s brand-new episode of Life Speaks To Michele Zirkle, Michele recounts her adventures at the West Virginia Writers Retreat last weekend, and how she overcame her fears to lead a seminar there. In her words, “What’s your story and how would you like to change it? We are all story-tellers. We all tell ours in different ways. Some write, some sing, some rap, but we all have to re-create when it’s not working.” Tune in Wednesday at 1:30 PM on The AIR, with a replay at 7 PM. Don’t forget you can learn more about Michele’s views on life and how the spiritual and physical worlds coexist at her website, where you can also find out about her book, Rain No Evil.

Then at 2 PM It’s a new Beatles Blast, presenting the second part of a show dedicated to the soundtrack to All This And World War II, one of the most messed-up projects to ever involved music by the Beatles. This week it gets really odd with Beatle tunes covered by the likes of Helen Reddy, Leo Sayer, Frankie Laine Peter Gabriel, The Four Seasons, Tina Turner and others, all backed up by The London Symphony Orchestra. These songs were recorded to accompany stock footage from the second World War. It’s goofier than it sounds.

At 3 PM  Mel Larch brings you a special presentation of the original cast recording of Dear Evan Hansen on an episode of Curtain Call that applauds the Tony Award Winner for best musical.

At 5 PM, It’s a new show, The AIR Audio Playhouse, bringing radio drama back. This week it’s a BBC production of The Wild Asses Skin (Reloaded).

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, followed at 7:30 PM by Word Association with Lee & Rudy. Prognosis airs at 8 PM.

Then at 10 PM it’s the third edition of Marking Out, our new hour-long show devoted to Professional Wrestling, which comes to us from WMUL radio in Huntington. Hosted by Matt BelVillain and Betty Rock, this weekly show will fill you in on everything you need to know about WWE, NXT, ROH, Impact Wrestling and even the local indy scene.

That’s followed by The Comedy Vault at 11 PM. Then at midnight listeners can settle in for an all-night marathon of the best of Broadway on Curtain Call.  All part of the unique programming on The AIR.