Month: January 2022 (Page 1 of 4)

Because of the way the calendar falls, it’s our last day of Edward Hopper homage month here at PopCult We’re taking advantage of our superfluous fifth Monday to bring you one more of my small-scale acrylic studies wherein I try to mimic some of the composition, color and shadowplay of the late Mr. Hopper.

This one might get enlarged for a bigger canvas with more detail sometime when I have all the time in the world.

This one was done smaller than the others with acrylics on thick board (which I’m running out of) and it’s inspired by a series of photos I took of Hale Street (as it meets Lee Street) from 2006 to 2014. I think I might’ve gotten close to the shadowplay I wanted here. When I enlarge it, I’ll either change the season, or eliminate the trees completely. I didn’t like the way they looked after I scanned this into the computer.  I may “turn on” the streetlights, too and make it a dusk scene.

If you want to see this one a bit bigger, just click on it.

Meanwhile, Monday at 2 PM on The AIR, we bring you a  brand new edition of  Psychedelic Shack, followed at 3 PM by a new episode of 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 at the top of the right-hand column of this blog.

Nigel Pye dipped into his archives for another primo stash of amazing psychedelic rock, expanding your minds as he always does.

Check out the playlist for all the trippy music man…

Psychedelic Shack 057

Heavy Metal Kids “It’s The Same”
Jimi Hendrix “Voodoo Child (Slight Return)”
Lost Legend “Love Flight”
Crystal Rain “Hey Ma Ma”
Hawkwind “Master of The Universe”
Deep Purple “Mandrake Root”
Funkadelic “Hit It and Quit It”
Bare Sole “Let’s Communicate”
Raw Meat “Stand By Girl”
Josefus “Hard Luck”
Sweet Crystal “Warlords”
Spiny Norman “Bell Park Loon”
Janis Joplin “Summertime”

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. Classic episodes can be heard Sunday at 9 AM as part of our Sunday Haversham Recording Institute collection.

Following that hour of Psychedelic sweetmeats, Herman Linte’s Prognosis will bring us two hours of great progrossive rock, including three tracks off of the new Jethro Tull album, The Zealot Gene, plus newly released music by Big Big Train, Steve Vai and The Art of Noise, mixed in with recent reissues and classic prog-rock tracks.

Check out the playlist…

Prognosis 085

Jethro Tull “The Zealot Gene”
Big Big Train “Welcome To The Planet”
Steve Vai “Greenish Blues”
Gavin Harrison “Dog Day”
The Art of Noise/David’s Daughters “Dreaming In Colour”
Roxy Music “Mother of Pearl”
Dream Theater “A Vision (demo)”
Diablo Swing Orchestra ‘Les Invulneable”
The Anchoress “All Farewells Should Be Sudden”
Jethro Tull “Mrs. Tibbets”
Tangerine Dream and Brian May “Bells of Accra”
The Far Meadow “Himalaya Flashmob”
Marillion “Script For A Jester’s Tear”
Dragon “Universal Radio”
King Crimson “Moonchild”
Jethro Tull “Where Did Saturday Go”

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. You can hear two classic episodes of the show Sunday at 2 PM.

At 8 PM, we bring you an overnight marathon of Radio Free Charleston, just for the heck of it.

On January 30, 1969, The Beatles famously staged their final live performance on the rooftop of their Apple Corps headquarters in London’s Savile Row. As a bit of a tribute last month, Norah Jones and her band recorded versions of two of the songs from the Let It Be album on the observation deck of New York’s Empire State Building (although the Beatles nerd in me must point out that the Fab Four did not perform “Let It Be” on the roof at Apple, but recorded it in the studio the next day).

It’s worth pointing out that The Empire State Building is considerably taller that the Apple Corps building in London.

Jones posted her two rooftop tribute performance videos of Beatles’ songs from the Let It Be album (“I’ve Got A Feeling” and “Let It Be”), last Friday to mark today’s anniversary of the actual rooftop concert, and we’re sharing those videos, above and below this text, for you to enjoy!

From September, 2009, we have the 83rd episode of Radio Free Charleston. In this episode you’ll find then-new music by Mother Nang as well as footage from a Tuesday Open Mic at Sam’s Uptown Cafe by James Vernon Brown, Sierra Ferrell and Patrick Stephens. We also have a Plant Ro Duction Mini Movie. This newly-restored episode has been offline for close to a decade.

This is one of the earliest videos that was posted featuring Chareston’s own Sierra Ferrell, who has gone on to great acclaim, signed to Rounder Records and touring all over the world. In fact, earlier this week she was onstage with Lana Del Rey, singing Del Rey’s newest song, in Austin, Texas.  Recently Sierra’s become the crown princess of traditional country music. It’s a kick, going back to this old video (even before Sierra’s stint with 600 lbs of Sin) to hear her and James doing a Citizen Cope tune.

This show also has a plug for our Great Guitar Giveaway, a contest (now long over with) that we did in conjunction with Route 60 Music. Coincidentally, new music from Paul Calicoat, one of the owners of Route 60 Music, will open next Tuesday’s new episode of Radio Free Charleston Volume 5 (our current internet radio incarnation).

Headlining the show is Mother Nang, old friends of mine, seen here in a psychedelic video for their song “The Painter.” We recorded this at the much-missed LiveMix Studio, where I got to direct using LiveMix’s Video Toaster. I handled the post-production and inserted the painterly psychedelica back here at Stately Radio Free Charleston Manor. I’ve gotten much better at doing that sort of thing over the last dozen years.

You can find the original production notes HERE.

The PopCulteer
January 28, 2022

I was a bad boy.

Last week on Twitter I made a joke that is the type of joke I normally keep to myself. It was slightly political, but mainly was poking fun at Twitter algorithms and the way their trending stories work.

But it was a joke in questionable taste.

It was funny as hell, but I knew it would gravely upset some emotionally fragile people of a particular political stripe. I do feel a twinge of guilt about that. I spent the first twenty years of my online life getting into political arguments, and in that time I discovered that folks who lean to the right politically tend to have hair triggers for their outrage, and they combine that with an obliviousness to when they, themselves, have said or done something incredibly beyond the pale. Having fun at their expense is almost cruel.  Sometimes, however, a guy just has to crack a joke.

First, let me explain the joke (never a good idea, but I want to set the scene)…

It was last Friday morning. I woke up, took care of the morning routine, and logged into Twitter. I saw “Meat Loaf” trending, and as almost anyone does when they see a celebrity’s name trending on Twitter, I thought “Gee, I hope he didn’t die.”

Unfortunately, he had.

About an hour later, I saw “Louie Anderson” trending. Again, I thought, “Gee, I hope he didn’t die,” and again, was saddened to see that he had, indeed, passed away.

Another fifteen minutes goes by and I see “Jon Voight” trending. For those of you who don’t know, Voight is an actor, primarily known for his role in Midnight Cowboy 53 years ago, but far more famous as the estranged father of Angelina Jolie. More recently he has also been in such movies as Anaconda, Superbabies: Baby Genius 2, The Karate Dog and Holes. 

By this point, numbed by the two earlier deaths, I clicked on the trending topic, only to see that Mr. Voight was alive and well, and was only trending because he had posted a video rant online, screaming that President Biden was not really the president, that Trump was, and that the disgraced former president was, in fact, really running this country, guided by God and the spirit of Abraham Lincoln.

This is actually pretty typical of the kind of stuff Voight posts, and explains a lot about why he’s estranged from his daughter.

A joke immediately sprung to mind, and in this rare instance, I did not resist the urge to post it.

“Not a good day on Twitter.

Meat Loaf is trending. Turns out, sadly, he has passed away.
Louie Anderson trending, also, sadly, he has passed away.

Jon Voight trending…no such luck”

Little did I realize the Twitstorm that would provoke. About forty people took me to task, saying I was an evil liberal scumbag who was wishing a great American hero dead.

Which I wasn’t. I was merely expressing disappointment that, after the morning’s other deaths, Voight was still alive. There is a difference there, you know.

Given how many of the offended people (seen right) wish death on President Obama or President Biden with every drawn breath, you’d think they’d be able to take it when somebody dishes it out to their side. But no, their pearls were clutched and their panties all awad, and they had to lash out.

I could tell by the hateful bile that these folks spouted that they didn’t really care about Jon Voight. They just wanted to yell at a “librul.”

I only got six death threats (all reported to Twitter), three from people who, in their screen names, actually wish death on other people (two to our justly-elected president, and one to “all libs”). Irony died a long time ago, in case you missed it.

I found the whole experience amusing, if a little tiring. I avoid posting political comments these days primarily because, while it can be exhilarating, it can also be exhausting, and a couple of decades of arguing politics online has taught me that, even if you are right all of the time, you will rarely get the satisfaction of hearing the people who are wrong admit it.

But I figured, what the heck? One little semi-political post could’t hurt.

I did get some good out of it. I blocked every single person who objected to what I wrote, mostly without even reading their garbage. It’s a win-win. I don’t get exposed to their stupidity, and they are deprived of my genius. They don’t deserve to read what I write anyway.

If that seems arrogant, rest assured that it’s just shtick to piss off the easily-triggered snowflakes on the right even more. However, I do block jerks on a regular basis on Twitter. Life’s to short to be reminded that folks like that exist. I carefully curate Twitter, because I can get enough right-wing buffoonery on Facebook. I want at least one social media outlet that doesn’t make me lose faith in humanity.

Besides the 40 or so people who were deeply offended, over 750 people liked my Tweet (which is more than twice as many people who follow me on Twitter) and 112 people re-Tweeted it.

I wish my Tweets plugging PopCult would get that kind of reach.

Actually, I really don’t care about social media numbers. I have my loyal readers. One person that I blocked tried to ridicule me for not having many followers on Twitter. Like I care about such things.

The funniest thing was, my Tweet was getting likes and reactions for about twelve hours. Voight only trended for an hour or two. My joke lasted longer than his relevance that day. And I didn’t have to soil myself and stand screaming in the middle of the road like he did (metaphorically).

It does make you wonder how Twitter’s trending topics really work. There’s something like 70 million Twitter users in the US. I’m sure the vast majority don’t spend more than five minutes a week on the service, but still, at any given time there ought to be at least five million people using Twitter in the US at any time.

Yet, some of the trending topics are pretty obscure. I’m fully aware that, perhaps, Twitter is using algorithms to feed me targeted topics, but if that’s really the case, why is half of my trending stories feed filled with British soccer scores? I couldn’t give half a crap about soccer (no offense to those who do). I used to click “not interested” on every sports story, but I gave up doing that because it took too much time and did nothing to improve my news feed.

Another reason I wonder about Twitter’s “trending stories” is because last week “Green Lantern” was trending, and being a longtime comic book nerd I clicked on it because I thought it might be news about the new HBO Max series, or the 2011 animated series that was cancelled too soon. However, the entire reason “Green Lantern” was trending was because of one silly Twitter thread where somebody got an obscure detail about the comic book wrong.

There were maybe ten people involved in that thread, tops. And it was trending. It was the only thing trending under “Green Lantern.”

Are we expected to accept that, out of five million people online, less than a dozen people talking about a comic book character is enough to make him land in the top five trending stories?

I can believe it when something newsworthy, like extreme weather, COVID information, or even Eddie Van Halen’s birthday is trending. It makes sense that thousands of people might be Tweeting about stuff like that….but Jon Voight and Green Lantern are both fairly obscure pop culture relics whose most memorable work happened over fifty years ago. It’s like seeing folks Tweet about Gilbert O’Sullivan or Dan Blocker.

But I did have a goofy little Twitter adventure. A few dozen folks started following me, and I hope they find their way to PopCult. I also think I might have filled my arguing politics on social media quota for the year too.

{Editorial note: I am well aware that Meat Loaf was also pretty conservative, and was an anti-vaxxer that died of COVID. However, he did not go out of his way to pollute the internet with his toxic views, and was far less obnoxious than Voight has been. That I mourned him and was sad that a talented singer had died should have proved that I was not playing political sides with my little joke. It’s a subtle distinction that the chronically butthurt right wing was not able to pick up on.}

MIRRORBALL Returns To 1976

MIRRORBALL takes its second trip to the Bicenntennial year of 1976 on a great new hour of Disco classics courtesy of my lovely wife, Mel Larch, debuting Friday afternoon.  Please enjoy this red, white and blue new episode of MIRRORBALL which will be followed by a very cool recent edition of 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 at the top right column of this blog.

At 2 PM, Mel Larch revisits the topic of her fifth episode on a new MIRRORBALL! The AIR’s showcase of classic Disco music presents a wild collection of classic dance tunes from 1976, with no repeats from our first 1976 show.

Check out the playlist…

Rose Royce “Car Wash”
Lou Rawls “You’ll Never Find”
Candi Staton “Young Hearts Run Free”
Rhythm Heritage “Theme From S.W.A.T.”
Billy Ocean “Love Really Hurts Without You”
Andrea True Connection “More, More, More”
Donna Summer “Love To Love You Baby”
Maxine Nightengale “Right Back To Where We Started From”
Barry White “You See The Trouble With Me”
The Brothers Johnson “I’ll Be Good To You”
Tina Charles “Dance Little Lady, Dance”
The Bee Gees “You Should Be Dancing”

You can hear MIRRORBALL every Friday at 2 PM, with replays this Saturday at  8 PM (kicking off a mini-marathon), Sunday at 11 PM, Monday at 9 AM, and Tuesday at 1 PM  exclusively on The AIR.

At 3 PM, Sydney Fileen graces us with an encore episode of Sydney’s Big Electric Cat that  brings you two full hours of The Go Gos. You can find the playlist HERE.

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.

That’s what’s on The AIR Friday, and that is this week’s PopCulteer. Check back because we have a fresh post every day and next week I plan to catch up on more stuff I didn’t have time to tell you about this week.

The PopCult Toybox

It’s been a while since we’ve checked in with our friends at MEGO. The reborn action figure company hasn’t let up since their relaunch in 2018, and managed to plow through the pandemic with a steady stream of great new product.

Following the end of their exclusive distribution deal with Target, MEGO has branched out with new figures showing up in Walmart, Gamestop,  Entertainment Earth, Target and a network of very reliable small online toy dealers. They’ve also partnered with Hasbro and Topps for special projects.  Along the way MEGO has forged new licence agreements that have seen them create figures from Planet of The Apes, Hammer Horror Films, Universal Monsters, Troma Pictures and more.

And now they have a promotional deal with Walmart called “New Fears Day” that has a selection of their coolest horror-based figures available in selected Entertainment Departments in Walmart stores, and online.  Locally these have hit at the Southridge Walmart, and they have a few left (I think I may have bought the last Toxic Avenger and Mole People, though). Restocked figures, along with a second wave should be hitting in the next week or three (hopefully), so let’s look at what’s new.

The assortment includes seven single eight-inch figures, packaged in old school boxes, like MEGO used to use back in the 1970s (as opposed to the blister-carded way most action figures are sold today). Also in this promotion are four two-packs that include carded figures, in a commemorative anniversary MEGO slipcover box with a presentation coin.

There are a mix of previously-released figures, pending releases, and variants in this batch of horrific goodies, and we’ll break them down for you:

In stores now

A Young Frankenstein 2-pack–this includes Dr. Frankenstein (Gene Wilder) and the Monster (Peter Boyle). Both are dressed in their “Puttin’ On The Ritz” outfits, and are in full color. The Doctor has previously only been released with his lab coat, and the Monster, released with his tuxedo, was in black-and-white. This set is just under $45. The likenesses are among the best MEGO has produced.

A second 2-pack includes flocked versions of The Fly and The Were Wolf. These both appear to be previous releases, from 2021 and 2019, with no major changes, but this may be their mass-market debut (our local Target has not carried most of the recent MEGO releases, so I’m not sure. This set is just under $45.

Single figures are all sold in a unique box. It looks like most of these are the same as the already-announced carded versions, but these have shown up at Walmart before the carded versions have arrived.

The Toxic Avenger–Troma’s mutated superhero looks exactly like he did on the big (and small) screen. Under $16 at Walmart, when you can find him (sold out online).

The Nun–Based on the 2018 prequel to The Conjuring 2, this scary sister has a reversible head, so you can switch from slighly possed to extremely possessed. Also under $16.

Universal’s Invisible Man–This is the bandaged Dr. Jack Griffin, in glorious black and white, perfect to add to your classic movie monsters collection. Under $16.

Universal’s The Mole People–This subterranean slave to the Sumerian Albinos is just frightening enough on his own, never mind that he’s from a movie that turned up on MST3K. For some reason, he’s more expensive than the other figures, perhaps because they had to mine deeper to get him (or Walmart had a pricing glitch). He’s just under $20.

These figures are in some stores now (locally these are supposed to hit Southridge, Ripley, Barboursville, Vienna, Fairmont and Huntington). You can also order them online.

Some of the figures from this promotion have not yet arrived, but are due in stores very soon. Sets coming soon include 2-packs of Chucky and The Bride of Chucky and Hammer’s Dracula and Van Helsing (Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing). Also we’re expecting single boxed figures of Slim, from Killer Klowns From Outer Space, the Creature From The Black Lagoon (in black-and-white) and Hammer’s The Reptile.

As to how good these figures are…they are pretty excellent. They have the new version of the standard MEGO bodies that have been used since the 2018 revival. The sculpting and tailoring is very impressive and for the most part, these are the very latest assortment of MEGO figures, so at the moment, this is the only way to get most of these figures.

The only drawback I can see is that the 2-pack figures are not exactly a bargain. The outer box, with its history of MEGO, and the presentation coin are nice, but they don’t seem to justify the high retail price (which was most likely requested by Walmart to test the waters for high-ticket collectibles in their “Collectors Corner” section of their Entertainment Department). The Young Frankenstein set is a must-have for fans of the movie. This may be the only color release of either of these figures. The remaining 2 packs don’t seem to offer anything that can’t be purchased on a separate card for a little more than a third of the price. Anothe rproblem is that the outer boxes are a bit fragile.

The boxed figures are all fantastic. Some collectors might prefer to have these as carded figures, to go with the rest of their collections, but all of these figures will show up in that form soon. The price is right (except for the strange case of the Mole People) and these are just really cool to see. For me, I love the boxes. They just remind me of the glory days of MEGO, back in the 70s. Plus the graphics on the back of the boxes is terrific.

I hope this program leads to more promotions between MEGO and Walmart. If they could land something like this chain-wide, it’d be a great way to draw in new collectors and put a smile on the faces of us old-timers. Keep up with MEGO at their MEGO Ambassadors Facebook page.

If you’re interested in what’s on the outer boxes, here’s a look at the back…

Wednesday afternoon The AIR brings you brand-new episodes of Beatles Blast and Curtain Call!  You can tune in at the website, or if you’re on a laptop or desktop, you could just stay on this page, and  listen to the convenient embedded radio player lurking over in the right-hand column of this blog.

At 2 PM,  we serve up a collection of covers of songs by the Beatles, and also from the Fab Four’s solo careers.

You’ll hear mini-sets by Joe Cocker, Billy Preston and Bryan Ferry/Roxy Music, as well as vintage takes from Jimi Hendrix, The Hollies and Peter Gabriel, and new covers from Dhruv Ghanekar and Blid Faith Collective. It’s an hour different takes on classic Beatles songs, ranging from “Day Tripper” to “She Came In Through The Bathroom Window,” and many more.

Beatles Blast can be heard every Wednesday at 2 PM, with replays Thursday at 10 PM, Friday at 1 PM,  and Saturday afternoon.

At 3 PM on Curtain Call, Mel Larch marks the recent passing of both Jim Steinman and Meat Loaf with an hour of highlights from Bat Out of Hell: The Musical. It was no surprise that Jim Steinman’s music would eventually end up on the stage. His songs always seemed more appropriate to Broadway than they did the Hot 100, but it was a long trip to get his signature work in front of audiences.

It took 40 years from the release of Bat Out of Hell, Meat Loaf’s debut album, to the debut of the musical, but along the way Steinman had written lyrics for Andrew Lloyd Webber, and composed music for other stage productions. With both of the creators of the Bat Out of Hell albums now gone, Mel felt it was a good time to take another look at the musical.

Curtain Call can be heard on The AIR Wednesday at 3 PM, with replays Thursday at 8 AM, Friday at 10 AM, Saturday at 8 PM and Monday at 9 AM. A six-hour marathon of classic episodes can be heard Sunday evening starting at 6 PM, and an all-night marathon of Curtain Call episodes can be heard Wednesday nights, beginning at Midnight.

It’s Tuesday on The AIR  and you know what that means. Today we deliver unto you yet another one-third-new, three-hour  episode of Radio Free Charleston.  You simply have to poke your cursor over and tune in at the website, or you could just stay on this page, and  listen to the cool embedded player over at the top of the right column (If you’re reading PopCult on a desktop, that is. Phone readers have to go to the website).

Yes, it’s one more hybrid edition of Radio Free Charleston at 10 AM and 10 PM Tuesday.   Unlike the last time we did this, a couple of weeks ago, this week we open with a full hour of  local music, and then we hit you with two hours of classic Radio Free Charleston International from 2017.

Our first hour, in addition to being mostly local, is also mostly Americana. I’ve been lax in covering the more rural music on RFC lately, so I figured I’d make up for it here. Hours two and three go back four-and-a-half years to an episode of RFC International that was comprised almost entirely of then-new music. So now it’s a bit of a quaint time capsule.

Check out the playlist below to see all the goodies we have in store (live links will take you to the artist’s pages where possible)…

RFCV5 076

hour one
Dave McLanahan “Banjo Man”
Sierra Ferrall “Hey Me, Hey Mama” (Ray LaMantange)
Cannon Sodaro Band “The Gorge”
Annie Neely “Hero”
Mike Pushkin “Wrecking Ball”
The New Relics “The Only Vice That Ever Left Me”
Heavy Set Paw Paws “Waters”
Baked Shrimp “Super Human Mutant”
Blue Million “How Long Must I Wait”
Crazy Jane “Out Of Nowhere”
Jeff Ellis “If He’s So Good To You”
Ona “Pipestem”
Matt Mullins and The Bringdowns “I Wish You Well”

hour two
Gary Numan “If I Said”
Ringo Starr “Back Off Boogaloo”
Foo Fighters “Dirty Water”
Yusef “The Laughing Apple”
St. Vincent “Los Angeles”
Greg Howe “Push It On”
The Contortionist “Reimagined”
Weezer “Beach Boys”
The Foxholes “Andromeda Blues”
The Used “Over and Over Again”
Living Colour “Preachin’ Blues”
El Goodo “It Makes Me Wonder”
Dinner “Don’t Belong”

hour two
Sparks “Scandanavian Design”
DYGL “Boys On TV”
88 Fingers Louie “All The Right Words”
The Preatures “Yananda”
The Woggles “Tally Ho”
Johnny Lang “Signs”
Thirty Seconds To Mars “Walk On Water”
Mosquitos “Mexican Dust”
Tori Amos “Chocolate Song”
Secure Escape “Obsession Addiction”
The Waterboys “Morning Came Too Soon”
Brendon Small “The Agenda”
Gogol Bordello “Did It All”

You can hear this episode of Radio Free Charleston Tuesday at 10 AM and 10 PM on The AIR, with replays Thursday at 3 PM, Friday at 9 AM, Saturday at Noon and Midnight,  and  Monday at 11 AM, exclusively on The AIR. Now you can also hear a different 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 MIRRORBALL at 1 PM, and Ska Madness at 2 PM. At 3 PM we have two recent episodes of The Swing Shift.

January is still Edward Hopper month here at Monday Morning Art.  All month long I’ve been posting some recent works that are inspired by the man who gave us “Nighthawks.”

Today we have a Hopperesque painting of a rooftop swiming pool at night, inspired by sights I saw in Chicago a few years back. From our hotel we could see this cool rooftop swimming pool, and it was odd because, even on insanely hot days, we never saw anybody using it.

As with all of the paintings I’ve been posting here for the last year or so, this is not a finished product, but rather a small-scale study, that I fully intended to blow up and render on canvas more fully at a larger size at some point in the future when they’ve added an extra twelve hours to the day.

This one is acrylic on thick board, with the sloppy borders cropped after it was scanned.  It’s not as detailed as my other recent Hopper-inspired works, but I plan to remedy that when I do the final version on canvas. This was mainly to get the lighting, composition and color in place, since I was not working with photos this time.

If you want to see this painting larger, just click on it.

Meanwhile, Monday at 2 PM on The AIR, we bring you a recent episode of  Psychedelic Shack, followed at 3 PM by a recent edition of 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 at the top of the right-hand column of this blog.

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. Classic episodes can be heard Sunday at 9 AM as part of our Sunday Haversham Recording Institute collection.

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. You can hear two classic episodes of the show Sunday at 2 PM.

Our Monday Marathon, beginning at 8 PM, brings you eleven hours of the most recent episodes of Mel Larch’s Disco Music showcase, MIRRORBALL, so you can do the bump all night, then show up at work the next day completely exhausted.

Sixty-five years ago today, the Wham-O corporation purchased the rights to a flying disc called “The Pluto Platter,”  a toy patented by Walter Frederick Morrison,. Wham-O re-named it “Frisbee,” and the rest is history.

And if you want to see a brief version of that history of the Frisbee, watch the above video lecture (sorry about the audio). It should tell you everything you want to know about America’s favorite flying plastic disc, which shows no signs of slowing down, even now that it’s hit retirement age.

Above you see the 82nd episode of Radio Free Charleston. This one was called “I Love NY Shirt” and featured a sweet country tune by Jonathan Glen Wood, two songs from the CYAC musical, “The Blob” and some very disturbing short films.

We also had a plug for the Great Guitar Giveaway, which we did in conjunction with Route 60 Music (thanks again to Paul Calicoat for making that happen). The contest is long over, so don’t bother entering.  This show debuted in September, 2009, and has not been online for close to a decade.

You can find the full production notes HERE.