Month: November 2020 (Page 7 of 10)

Tuesday on The AIR we deliver brand-new episodes of Radio Free Charleston, NOISE BRIGADE and The Swing Shift plus we replay last Friday’s MIRRORBALL special. While you recover from the extended election results, you can still support the local scene here on The AIR.  You simply have to move your cursor over and tune in at the website, or you could just stay on this page, and  listen to this excitable little embedded radio player…

We have a special Radio Free Charleston at 10 AM and 10 PM Tuesday.  This week we open with the new single from Boldly Go!, our local Star Trek Punk Band, and the first hour is filled with a mix of new and old and local and international music. We have new tunes from AC/DC and Sierra Ferrell (not working together), plus we have some classic glam-rock from T. Rex and Roxy Music. Our second and third hours revive an episode of RFC, filled with local music, that hasn’t been heard for nearly four years.

Check out the playlist to see all the goodies we bring you this week…

RFC V5 036

hour one
Boldly Go! “No Win Scenario”
Rockwell’s Ghost “Heckler’s Last Stand”
IDKHOW “RAZZMATAZZ”
The Dollyrots “Time Will Stop”
T. Rex “Dandy In The Underworld”
Roxy Music “Do The Strand”
AC/DC “Rejection”
Sierra Ferrell “Why’d Ya Do It”
Take Vibe “Walking On The Moon”
Crystal Bright and the Silver Hands “Fall of the Seraph”
The Fall “Strangetown”
The Bounty “Watershed”
Bon Air “Western Skies”
Andy Partridge “Apples and Oranges”

hour two
Kenneth Brian Band “Goodbye, West Virginia”
HarraH “Blood Moon”
The Big Bad “See You In The Shadows”
Tofujitsu “Winged Cyclops”
Doctor Curmudgeon
Spencer Elliott “Battle of Wonderland”
Eduardo Canelón y su Comparsa “La Nueva Comparsa”
Stark Raven “Irrational People”
A Story Told “Fall Back”
Crack The Sky “Maybe I Can Fool Everybody”
Bongwater “Mystery Hole”
The Tom McGees “Country Roads”
Weedhaven Laughing Academy “Glue”
Astromoth “Son of a Vampire”
Ona “World At War”

hour three
World Without Fear “Here’s To You (I Love You)”
Highway Jones “Another Man”
Hitchcock Circus “Jealousy Pill”
Underdog Blues Review “Come Back Baby”
Cherry Poppin’ Daddies “You Wiped Your Ass With My Heart”
Foz Rotten “Ordinary Guy”
The Science Fair Explosion “Kornchipz”
Time And Distance “That Girl”
Bobaflex “Mama (Don’t Take My Drugs Away)”
Superfetch “28 Punks”
The Company Stores “Street Corner Blues”
Linnfinity “Holy Rain”
DEVO “Satisfaction”
The Renfields “Invisible Man”

Radio Free Charleston can be heard Tuesday at 10 AM and 10 PM, with replays Thursday at 3 PM, Friday at 9 AM and 7 PM, Saturday at 11 AM and Midnight, Sunday at 11 AM and the next Monday at 8 PM, exclusively on The AIR.

At 1 PM we’ll replay the latested edition of Mel Larch’s Disco showcase, MIRRORBALL.

At 2 PM Steven Allen Adams, fresh from a grueling tour of duty covering the local political races, graces us with a new edition of NOISE BRIGADE that’s chock full o’ punk/ska crunchy goodness. Check out the playlist to see what Steve’s got up his sleeves…

NOISE BRIGADE 013

Billie Joel Armstrong “That’s Rock ’n’ Roll”
The Inevitables “The Weight of Worry”
Less Than Jake “Dear Me”
Less Than Jake “Lie to Me”
We Are The Union “You’re Dead/Vampire Ska”
Millington w/ Emily Mitchell “The Ghost of You”
Millington w/ Half Past Two “Look What Happened (Cover)”
Half Past Two “Love Me Dead (Cover)”
Bite Me Bambi “Carried Away”
Bad Operation “Bagel Rooks”
Millie Manders and the Shutup “Silent Screams”
Skatune Network w/ Max Boiko “Determination”
Mad Caddies “Strange Days”
Goldfinger “Wallflower”
Big D and the Kids Table “Doctor D”
Dancehall Crashers “Enough”
The Bombpops “Notre Dame”
The Donnas “40 Boys in 40 Nights”

NOISE BRIGADE alternates weeks with Psychedelic Shack Tuesdays at 2 PM, with replays Wednesday at 10 PM, Thursday at 9 AM, Friday at 1 PM, Saturday at 8 AM, Sunday at 9 AM and Monday at 7 PM.

At 3 PM it’s a new mixtape edition of The Swing Shift on The AIR. This compillation of classic Cab Calloway tunes pays tribute to the master maestro, who we inexplicably left out of our recent “100 Years of Swing” series. We do our penance in the sweetest way possible with nearly a solid hour of incredible Cab Calloway music. Check this playlist, Jack…

The Swing Shift 105

All Songs by Cab Calloway and his Orchestra

“Minnie The Moocher”
“Kickin’ The Gong Around”
“Minnie The Moocher’s Wedding Day”
“(Hep Hep) The Jumpin’ Jive”
“Hey Now”
“Jitterbug”
“I Ain’t Got Nobody”
“Hoy Hoy”
“Nagasaki”
“Some of These Days”
“St. James Infimary”
“Three Swings And Out”
“Hard Times (Topsy Turvy)”
“Paradiddle”
“”Do You Wanna Jump, Children”
“Floogie Walk”
“San Francisco Fan”
“I Want To Rock”
“Hi De Ho Man”
“You Rascal You”

You can hear The Swing Shift Tuesdays at 3 PM, with replays Wednesday at 7 AM and 6 PM, Thursday at 2 PM,  Saturday at 5 PM and Sunday at 10 AM, only on The AIR. You can also hear all-night marathons, seven hours each, starting at Midnight Thursday and Sunday evenings.

Be sure to check back for The 2020 PopCult Gift Guide, beginning around 11 AM.

Rick Wakeman & The English Rock Ensemble “The Red Planet”
CD/Vinyl

Our final entry in The 2020 PopCult Gift Guide today is something that you can sample at 3 PM EST Monday on Prognosis on The AIR. Earlier this year legendary keyboardist Rick Wakeman released a sprawling, epic, instrumental Prog-Rock masterpiece, The Red Planet.

We go to the PR:

Keyboard Legend Rick Wakeman & The English Rock Ensemble has released “The Red Planet” on June 19, 2020. The album features 8 newly composed pieces, especially for this project, and harks back to Wakeman’s critically acclaimed debut album “The Six Wives of Henry VIII” where there were 6 heavy keyboard pieces based around a central subject matter. It is a serious return to “Wakeman Prog”…

Rick has blown the dust off his favourite analogue keyboards and along with his with the latest keyboards, has used the same formula he devised when making his legendary albums The Six Wive’s of Henry VII and Criminal Record.

Upon being asked about the expectations of his Prog Fans, that they are hoping he will have shoved the “Prog Fader” up to 11, he replied, “That could be a problem…. as it’s already at 14!!!”

This is pure Prog-Rock manna from heaven. It’s a return to Wakeman’s glory days in the 1970s when he released albums like The Six Wives of Henry VIII, Journey To The Center of The Earth and The Myths And Legends Of King Arthur And The Knights Of The Round Table. Wakeman is backed by a full band, with no vocals, and cuts loose on several vintage synths from his collection. The eight pieces on this nearly-hour-long album are all named after physical features of the planet Mars, and it’s pure ear candy for any fan of Wakeman’s virtuosity.

You can order The Red Planet from Amazon, or if the person on your gift list is a huge fan, you can visit Rick Wakeman’s webstore for a variety of signed editions on vinyl or CD. You’ll also find a ton of gems from his vast back catalog there, too. Amazon has a very limted number of the short-run of CDs with the pop-up Astronaut.

Check out this preview track from The Red Planet…

And remember that at 3 PM EST Monday you can hear another track from The Red Planet opening this week’s episode of Prognosis, which is devoted to music by former members of YES. You can listen to Prognosis at The AIR website, or on this embedded player…

You can hear replays of Prognosis Tuesdays at 7 AM, Wednesdays at 8 PM, Thursday at Noon, and Saturday at 9 AM.  As a bonus for fans of Mr. Wakeman, we will be running an overnight marathon of Prognosis episodes that feature his music Monday night, beginning at 11 PM.

Next up in The 2020 PopCult Gift Guide is a new catagory: WEBSITE.

Rather than single out one item at a reailer, and since we are still in a pandemic and I don’t feel right sending people to brick-and-mortar stores, I’m going to suggest an online store you can visit where you can shop for gift ideas among dozens of cool things. These are reliable websites that you can count on for timely delivery for gift items.

And first up for that, we’re going to let you shop local while you shop online, with cool apparel, accessories, home goods and other neat stuff at Kin Ship Goods.

You can order and pay online through their secure webstore, and have your order shipped directly to you, or schedule a time for curbside pickup at their (temporarily closed due to COVID) storefront on Charleston’s West Side.

You’ve probably heard of Kin Ship Goods, a brand of apparel, accessories, and home goods designed by Dan Davis & Hillary Harrison. They are based in Charleston, returning to their roots after having started their business in Louisville.

Once you find that perfect gift, be it a mug, a shirt, a hoodie, a hat or someting else cool, Kin Ship Goods offers reasonable shipping options, or you can pick up your order curbside, four days a week.

This is a cool way to support a local business during a very rough time for retailers, and also find an excellent gift for the folks you love.

Their webshop is filled with clothing and mugs and other cool things of their own design. In their words, “Our goods are inspired by starry nights, peeling paint, vintage keepsakes, imperfections, labors of love, and early mornings.” Recently they started making and selling stuff based on Stay F. Homekins: A Quarantine Podcast, which is hosted by comedian,Paul F. Tompkins and his wife, Charleson native Jane Haddad Tompkins.

Their products have been featured in major magazines, and have been seen in television shows and movies. Just a couple of weeks ago one of their shirts turned up on Saturday Night Live.

If you want to do curbside pickup, their brick and mortar shop is located at 613 Tennessee Avenue, in Charleston, just around the corner from Gonzoburger and Fountain Hobby. Check their website for hours and scheduling details.

You’ll find dozens of great gift ideas at Kin Ship Goods’ website.

Our first pick in The 2020 PopCult Gift Guide today is actually a double-shot of Shazam!. I’m talking about the 1970s adventures of The Original Captain Marvel, not that goofball version they made the movie about. These two books are perfect gifts for any young, or young-at-heart, fan of superhero comics, and are also a treat for fans who are already of the best-selling superhero of the 1940s, Captain Marvel.

Shazam: The World’s Mightiest Mortal Vol. 1
by Denny O’Neil, Elliot Maggin, C.C. Beck, Kurt Schaffenberger and more
DC Comics
ISBN-13 : 978-1401288396
$49.99 (discounted at Amazon)

Shazam! The World’s Mightiest Mortal Vol. 2
by E. Nelson Bridwell, Kurt Schaffenberger, Elliot S. Maggin and others
DC Comics
ISBN-13: 978-1779501172
$49.99 (discounted at many booksellers)

I have mentioned many times in PopCult that The Original Captain Marvel is my all-time favorite superhero. I got hooked on the comics in the 1970s when I lucked into a giant tabloid-sized reprint of classic Captain Marvel stories from the 1940s and 50s.

I started buying the “Shazam” comic book (they couldn’t use “Captain Marvel” in the title because Marvel comics had claimed the name, and I’ve probably written about the situation a dozen or so times in this blog), and it was a mix of classic reprints and new stories that attempted to capture the magic of the original stories, which had mostly been written by Otto Binder.

Shazam! The World’s Mightiest Mortal Vol. 1 collects the newly-created material from first 18 issues of DC’s Shazam! comic of the 1970s.  Shazam! The World’s Mightiest Mortal Vol. 2 collects the newly-created material from issues 19 to 35 (completing the original run) and also the tabloid sized Superman vs. Shazam comic book.

All of these were published from 1973 to 1978. Some of these books were reprinted in black and white in a Showcase Edition a few years ago, but we get to see them in full color in these collection. This is just a terrific collection of fun superhero stories that show what comics were like back before they got all grim and gritty.

The second volume picks up at a curious point in the run of the Shazam comic. By 1975, the Shazam Saturday morning live-action show had debuted and DC Comics (then National Periodical Publications) found themselves in a quandry. Captain Marvel had become one of their top merchandise sellers, but the comic books were lagging far behind.

It’s often said that DC did not understand the characters, and during the run of comics collected in the first volume Captain Marvel’s co-creator, C.C. Beck, who had come out of retirement to launch the new book, had left it in a dispute over the quality of the writing. Even with the character being a merchandising powerhouse under the “Shazam” brand, the comic book was selling so poorly that it briefly went to an all-reprint format and was dropped to quarterly publication status while the Shazam TV show was at the top of the Saturday morning ratings.

These collections sort of put the lie to the idea that DC didn’t understand the characters. Volume one has many fun stories (along with a few minor misfires) and Volume two includes one of my all-time favorite Marvel Family stories. After a year of reprints in 1975/76, the title came back with new material featuring E. Nelson Bridwell, a DC editor with a deep love of the characters, as the writer. Volume two also includes the first comic book story of The Mighty Isis, the companion TV show to Shazam, which is unlikely to be revived by that name any time soon.

These are, for the most part, family-friendly superhero stories aimed at a younger audience, but they are highly entertaining and address more complicated and adult topics than you might expect. Much of the art is handled by Beck or Kurt Schaffenberger, both veterans of the original Captain Marvel and Marvel Family comics, and there are some interesting interludes with other artists as well.

DC has pencilled in a third volume, which would cover all the stories written by Bridwell and drawn by Don Newton, which ran in World’s Finest and Adventure Comics, and which have never been reprinted before. COVID-19 and a major reorganization at DC Comics will likely delay that volume, but these two books will give the superhero fan in your life a great head start. Available from booksellers, comic book shops, or at a discount from Amazon.

During the month of November, PopCult’s Monday Morning Art will present pieces of art created using MAX Build More bricks. You can read all about them HERE.

Today’s piece is an abstract tower with a prominent Sawtooth motif. The Sawtooth feature was the first part of this I built, then I tinkered with presenting a contrasting background, with accents and the employment of some of the more specialized parts in the MAX Build More toolbox.

This being an abstract, assembled with no small amount of chance and trial and error, I hesitate to graft a post-partum theme on it. Essentially, I hope it looks cool. I’m still a bit of a novice as using building bricks for art, and I know that there are absolute wizards who do amazing work in this medium. I offer up my humble efforts to give you an idea of what you can create on a budget.

If you want to see it bigger, just click on the image. Below you see three alternate views. You can also see this montage bigger by clicking on it, but not as big.

Remember to check back with PopCult starting Monday around 10:15 AM EST for the start of today’s installments of The 2020 PopCult Gift Guide. Today we’ll bring you three picks, with about an hour between each.

Meanwhile, Monday at 9 AM on The AIR, the Monday Marathon brings you six hours of The Swing Shift, collecting the most recent episodes.  The marathon follows the regularly-scheduled repeat of last weeks Big Electric Cat at 7 AM.

At 3 PM on Prognosis, Herman Linte brings us a show devoted to the solo works, side projects and other bands featuring members of YES, and it opens with new music from Rick Wakeman, which will figure into one of today’s picks for The 2020 PopCult Gift Guide.  That’s followed by a classic Prognosis and an evening with one more NOISE BRIGADE plus Radio Free Charleston. You can hear replays of Prognosis Tuesdays at 7 AM, Wednesdays at 8 PM, Thursday at Noon, and Saturday at 9 AM. 

You can listen to The AIR at the website, or on this embedded radio player…

Nick Mason’s Saucerful of Secrets Live At The Roundhouse
Blu-ray

Our final pick for today in The 2020 PopCult Gift Guide is a must-have item for any true Pink Floyd fan. I’m talking about the folks who have an appreciation of the band’s early days, when Syd Barrett was the major creative force.

“Live at the Roundhouse” is unlike any other concert film connected with Pink Floyd. It s the nearest thing you can get to a time machine, transporting you back to the very earliest days of the band. Nick Mason, the only band member to have played on all of Pink Floyd’s studio albums, returns to the group’s earliest records, joined in the line-up by Gary Kemp, Guy Pratt, Lee Harris and Dom Beken.

Nick Mason’s Saucerful of Secrets took the drummer back to clubs for the first time in 1967, then to theatres, across the UK, North America and Europe, playing only music his old band had recorded before The Dark Side of the Moon.

Captured from the band’s celebrated shows at London’s Roundhouse, where Pink Floyd played some of their most revered early shows in the 1960s, the film features a uniquely thrilling setlist including songs hailing from Syd Barrett’s time with the band. Only four songs from this eclectic roster have ever previously appeared on official live releases by Pink Floyd or its members. Everything else is being experienced for the first time since their original live performances.

This is also available as a CD or vinyl record, but there’s something about seeing the band perform these tunes live that completes the experience. You can find Nick Mason’s Saucerful of Secrets Live At The Roundhouse at Amazon for under twenty bucks.

Here’s a sample…

All In The Family: The Complete Series

Next up in The 2020 PopCult Gift Guide we have a complete collection of the entire run of one of the sitcoms that changed the face of television in the early 1970s. All In The Family: The Complete Series includes all 208 Original Episodes as well as the Three-Part Retrospective From 1979.

This is the perfect gift for the die-hard fan of the series (which is not being show unedited anywhere at the moment) and is also great for folks who like intelligent and well-acted comedy that addresses the issues of the day fifty years ago, which haven’t really changed much since.

Few television shows have left as substantial and enduring a footprint on American popular culture as Norman Lear’s masterpiece All In The Family. This groundbreaking comedy series looked at the state of the world through the eyes of an argumentative but loving family and gave us some of the most fully dimensional characters in television history. The jokes had a million targets, aiming at race, politics, sex and human foibles, but the humor was firmly rooted in the characters of Archie, Edith, Mike and Gloria.

Bonus Features include a new Interview With Norman Lear; Those Were The Days: The Birth Of “All In The Family” – Documentary; The Television Revolution Begins: “All In The Family” Is On The Air – Documentary; “Justice For All,” the original All In The Family Pilot; “Those Were The Days,” the second All In The Family Pilot; Gloria Spin-Off Pilot Episode; Archie Bunker’s Place Pilot Episode; 704 Hauser Pilot Episode (1994 Spin-Off); 40-Page Collectible Book With Essays By Television Critic Tom Shales And Media Professor Marty Kaplan.

All In The Family: The Complete Series is a great gift for any hardcore TV historian, or fan of the show. You can find it at Amazon for just over eighty bucks.

Our first pick today in The 2020 PopCult Gift Guide is a cool new space toy/building set toy that I told you about in September. Playmonster has released a new series of building toy space ships called Snap Ships, and they’re pretty darned cool. They come in a variety of sizes and price points. There are tons of them to collect. Each set allows kids to reconfigure the ships in several different ways. And there is a YouTube series that tells the story behind these cool ships that do battle in the stars. I have a feeling that a lot of adult collectors are going to want to get there hands on these.

This is the perfect gift for your intrepid young fan of outer space, science fiction and building toys. It’s also good for intrepid old fans.

Snap Ships is a collectible, durable and versatile modular building system that stands up to action play. Snap Ships invite kids to build, battle and display an exciting array of cool spacecrafts, merging two of the biggest play patterns for boys—action-play and construction.

Designed for kids ages 8 and up, the exciting new Snap Ships fleet launches with eleven ships at a suggested retail price of $9.99–$39.99, each coming with a mysterious UJU tech piece that holds special value hidden inside the box. Snap Ships come with multiple build options and are available at Amazon, Target and other retailers.

To tell the epic story of the Snap Ships universe, PlayMonster joined forces with award-winning content studio Wind Sun Sky to produce a fast-paced and edgy animated series. Season one of the series, Snap Ships Dawn of Battle launched in August on YouTube, with new episodes releasing each week. Check out the first episode here…

The epic storyline introduces viewers to The Forge, an elite team assembled to pilot a fleet of versatile and specialized Snap Ships defense attack craft, and The Komplex, an alien species determined to annihilate all life, that has invaded with no warning. Along the way, The Forge discovers mysterious UJU tech, left behind by an ancient civilization, that can be added to their Snap Ships to give them unheard-of abilities.

Each Snap Ship set comes with at least one buildable figure, plus a tool to help assemble and disassemble the ships. All ships can fire projectiles. The top of the box converts into a cool base so that the ships can be displayed in flight. These are also great for collectors who don’t have a lot of room. A full collection might take up one decent-sized shelf.

With a huge ad campaign behind, plus inherently cool toys and a nifty animated series, Snap Ships has the potential to be a breakout hit this holiday season, and could rank up there with the evergreen space toys of the past.

These are available from most online toy retailers, and we’ve seen them locally at Target, Walmart and Menards.

Our final entry in today’s 2020 PopCult Gift Guide revisits our review in May of The Svengoolie Studio Set, a combo action figure/playset that is the perfect gift for fans of the legendary monster movie maven from Berwyn Illlinois, for just under fifty bucks (plus extra for shipping) you can wrap and shove under the tree the deluxe Svengoolie Studio Set, from ME TV and Figures Toy Company.

This limited edition set is the third action figure version of Svengoolie from FTC, and this time they pulled out all the stops, including a ReMEGO 8″ figure fully-dressed in Svengoolie’s trademark outfit-Red shirt, Black suit complete with detail on the lapel and a removeable top hat and shoes– and his casket, plus a backdrop of his set, and even a miniature Archie McPhee rubber chicken.

The casket is impressive. It is not hinged, nor is the lid in two pieces, but it is velvet-lined– even the lid, and it captures the look of Svengoolie’s newly-refurbished casket (which is probably eight years old by now). This piece looks great and the figure fits into it perfectly. It also looks terrific displayed in front of the backdrop from the package.

The figure itself has a great headsculpt with paint detail of Rich Koz in his Svengoolie warpaint, with rooted hair. The body is a typical Figures Toy Company MEGO copy (this time of the heftier style used for figures like The Penguin, back in the day). It’s got the pitfalls of most of FTC’s imitation MEGO bodies, but is still poseable and can hold his chicken. It’s vitally important that one can hold his chicken.

The set comes packaged in a deluxe clamshell–something FTC is very good about–and looks great in the package, or set up on your desktop.

All in all, The Svengoolie Studio Set is a great collectible for fans of the show. It’s a limited edition,but they do still have them in stock at the link above. And it’s not exactly cheap. It’s a reasonably-priced $49.95 (plus about thirteen bucks shipping), but considering the limited number of these sets being made, the deluxe packaging and all the extras, it’s pretty much a bargain. The sold-out earlier editions of the Svengoolie action figure, which didn’t come with the cool accessories are now selling for upwards of a billion dollars and your firstborn on eBay (disclaimer: slight exaggeration there).

You can order this directly from the Svengoolie Store at ME TV. If you order now, you’ll get it in plenty of time for holiday giftery.

Eureka – The Complete Series [Blu-ray]

Next up in The 2020 PopCult Gift Guide is a new Blu-ray collection of the entire run of a series that I really enjoyed. Eureka-The Complete Series is a great gift for any fan of enjoyable science fiction with a heaping dose of time-travel paradoxes included.

Eureka was an American science fiction television series that premiered on Sci-Fi Channel on July 18, 2006. The fifth and final season ended on July 16, 2012. The show was set in the fictional town of Eureka, Oregon. Most residents of Eureka are scientific geniuses who work for Global Dynamics – an advanced research facility responsible for the development of nearly all major technological breakthroughs since its inception. Each episode featured a mysterious accidental or intentional misuse of technology, which the town sheriff, Jack Carter, solved with the help of town scientists. Each season also featured a larger story arc that concerned a particular major event or item.

The wild part of this series was that, oftentimes the season-ending cliffhanger would be resolved with a semi-reboot due to somebody messing with the rules of time-travel. It kept the show fresh and unpredictable.

A great caste included Colin Ferguson, Salli Richardson-Whitfield and Joe Morton and the clever writing and direction made this show stand out among the low-budget also-rans that you usually found on The Sci-Fi Channel/SyFy. In fact, it was the higher production costs that caused SyFy to cancel this show, even though it was the highest-rated show they had.

Buyers should be aware that while this is a decent set with all 77 episodes, and costs less than fifty bucks at Amazon, there have been reports of technical problems and a couple of extended episodes from earlier sets are absent here.

This set is not perfect, but it will scratch the itch for fans of the show who don’t have access to the streaming services Peacock or Amazon Prime.