Rudy Panucci On Pop Culture

Month: June 2025 (Page 1 of 4)

Monday Morning Art: Stuck In A Pagoda

This week’s art is a small pastel crayon study, finished in acrylics, and to be honest, still incomplete. It’s based on photos I took at the large mall in Chinatown in Chicago, and the colors are not accurate.

There was too much red in the photos, and I was playing around with changing some of those colors, and this is sort of half-way through the process. As a study, it captures a lot of what I wanted to, but it needs more work on the color.

Eventually, anyway.

And yes, the title is a nod to The Dickies.

When I do the larger version, I suspect I’ll be including more detail and using more contrast in the non-sun parts.

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 an also classic 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 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.

Next week Prognosis and Psychedelic Shack will return with new episodes. We almost had them this week, but stuff came up.

At 8 PM you can hear a classic episode of The Comedy Vault devoted to the soon to retire, Dr. Demento.

Tonight at 9 PM for the Monday Marathon we bring you ten hours of episodes of Herman Linte’s Prognosis that focus on lesser-know Prog Rock bands.

Sunday Evening Video: Betty, We Hardly Knew Ye

The musical, BOOP!, for which I have acted as a bit of a cheerleader since I saw it in Chicago in December, 2023, announced that it will end its Broadway run on July 13. If you are anywhere near New York City in the next two weeks, I implore you to get to The Broadhurst Theater so you can experience the best and most fun Broadway musical in the last several years.

This closing is very sad, but not unexpected news. Launching against an unprecedented slate of high-profile shows with gigantic marketing campaigns and big stars, and facing what seemed to be some kind of grudge against it by the Broadway elite, BOOP! faced an uphill battle.

A nonsensical review in the NY Times, that both praised the stars, music, lyrics and choreography and also said that the show shouldn’t exist, certainly stunted the show’s momentum (which was nearly universally praised, otherwise).

The outrageous snubs by the Theatre Wing (the folks who manage the marketing event known as The Tony Awards) fed conspiracy theories about how the established producers wanted to make an example of BOOP! as a warning to outsider producers who don’t play their games. Or maybe it was just snobbishness because the show is based on the classic cartoon character, Betty Boop, and since Broadway had their ass kicked by Disney so many times, they’ve grown to  hate animation.

I don’t know about all that nonsense. I do know that I think BOOP! is the most entertaining show to hit Broadway in years, and I say that as the producer of Mel Larch’s Curtain Call.  I heard the cast recordings of all the nominated shows and they ranged from pretty decent to downright awful. That BOOP! was not nominated for Best Musical will forever taint the credibility of the Tony Awards in my eyes.

They did nominate Jasmine Amy Rogers for best actress in a musical, because even they could not deny how her Broadway debut is the beginning of what will be a legendary career, but even then they gave the award to someone whose performance on the awards show left me completely unimpressed. They also gave token nominations to the brilliant choreography and amazing costume design, but the show did not win either of those catagories, either.

And let’s face it, the only hope BOOP! had for an extended run would have been for Tony Awards viewers to be exposed to it. Sadly they wouldn’t even let the cast perform during the ceremony. More fuel for the conspiracy theories, I guess.

There are rumors that the show may live on as a touring entity. I know it would certainly thrive in cities like Boston, Philadelphia, Los Angeles and Las Vegas, and I would imagine people would flock to see it again in Chicago. I don’t know if the show would be able to keep Jasmine Amy Rogers on board for a tour.  Her rocketship to stardom is already taking off, and it might be time for her to branch out into other endeavors. I know she’s recording a Pop album for later in the year, and any Broadway show would be extremely lucky to land her as their lead.

Above you will find a playlist of some videos that will give you a taste of BOOP! the Musical.

 

The RFC Flashback: Episode One Hundred Forty-One

With our two-month excursion into the depths of our FestivALL 2011 archives concluded, we now continue our chronological presentation of classic episodes of Radio Free Charleston, picking up with our massive fifth anniversary show, from July, 2011. This behemoth of a show debuted just five days after the eighth, and final installment of our FestivALL coverage. That means that, in the span of 17 days, I posted over four hours of original, multi-camera, content, 90% of which was shot by me and Melanie in less than a month.

For our fifth birthday in 2011, Radio Free Charleston attempted the impossible. We recorded 12 performances in two days, combined them with animation and film, and had the show posted two days later. Clocking in at an hour, ten minutes, RFC 141 brings you music from Mother Nang, HarraH, 600 lbs of SIN, Linework, Andy Park and The Kountry Katz, Holy Cow, Jeff Ellis and Sasha Colette, Disturbing The Peace, Stacee Lawson and Remains Un Named. You’ll also get to see a music video for Pepper Fandango, directed by Eamon Hardiman. Dumpstar Productions brings us “Celebritol.” We have a trailer for Diana Curry’s film, “Creature Of The Night.” Frank Panucci provides us with the short film, “Magical Car Keys” and two pieces of animation, “No Running” and “Blue Dome.”

Of special note, this episode was filmed almost entirely outdoors, in severe heat, years before I had been diagnosed with Myasthenia Gravis, but years after it had first manifested itself. That disorder leaves me extremely susceptible to getting sick when I’m in the heat for a prolonged time. At the time, I wondered why I felt so bad for the week after shooting all this stuff. Now I realize how much I was putting my health in danger to produce this show. So enjoy it here on video. I’m never doing this again.

Still, it was a pretty epic show. The original production notes can be found HERE.

Dance Like The World Is On Fire On The AIR! (‘Cause, it sort of is)

The PopCulteer
June 27, 2025

Roughly once a year we have a harmonic (and rhythmic) convergence as both of our Friday music specialty shows devote themselves to the music that makes you dance.  Just when the heat and humidity make you feel dead, music helps you feel alive on The AIR Friday afternoon as Mel Larch’s MIRRORBALL and Sydney Fileen’s Sydney’s Big Electric Cat return with new episodes. MIRRORBALL is always all about dancing, but this week Sydney’s Big Electric Cat presents part eight of the New Wave Dance Mix Mixtape and gets into the dance-instigating act as well.

The AIR is PopCult‘s sister radio station. You can hear our shows on The AIR website, or just click on the embedded player found elsewhere on this page.

Rejoice and prepare to feel four or five decades younger (where applicable).

Friday at 2 PM on The AIR, we have a new episode of MIRRORBALL where Mel Larch once again presents a selection of the best and brightest of the classic Disco era. This time it’s a new batch of rare club mixes with a Disco stew of huge hits and underground classics.

Don’t believe us? Check out the playlist. It’s got filled to the rim with Disco…

MIRRORBALL 117

Rose Royce “Do Your Dance”
Foxy “The Way You Do The Things You Do”
Donald Byrd “Love Has Come Around”
Five Special “Why Leave Us Alone”
Gino Soccio “I Wanna Take You There (Now)”
Slave “Feel My Love”
C.L. Blast “I Wanna Get Down”
Frankie Valli “Swearin’ To God”

You can hear MIRRORBALL every Friday at 2 PM, with replays Sunday night at 11 PM and throughout the following week Monday at 9 AM and Tuesday at 1 PM plus there’s a mini-marathon that includes the latest episode Saturday nights at 9 PM

At 3 PM, Sydney Fileen graces us with a terrific new episode of Sydney’s Big Electric Cat that coincidentally turns out to be the eighth Big Electric Cat mixtape of New Wave 12″ extended remixes.

Combined with MIRRORBALL, that makes three solid hours of decades-old dance music, so if you see folks approaching retirement age getting their boogie down, you know why.

This time Sydney decided to dig out some more bizarre mixes from some of the bigger names in New Wave, so you might recognize some of the songs, but not the way you’ll hear them here.

Check out the playlist (all extended remixes)…

BEC 129

Yazz & The Plastic Population “The Only Way Is Up”
DEVO “Disco Dancer”
Billy Idol “Flesh For Fantasy”
Bananarama “Only Your Love”
INXS “I Need You Tonight”
808 State “Pacific 707”
Men At Work “Down Under”
Toyah “Moon Migration”
Malcolm McLaren & The Bootzilla Orchestra “Waltz, Darling”
The Beloved “The Sun Rising”
The B 52s “Love Shack”
B-Movies “Nowhere Girl”
Sisters of Mercy “Lucretia My Reflection”
Pete Shelley “Homosapien”
Bronski Beat with Marc Almond “I Feel Love/Johnny Remember Me”
Kate Bush “The Big Sky”
New Order “Blue Monday”

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 Sunday morning at 10 AM.

That’s what’s new on The AIR Friday, and that is this week’s PopCulteer.  As your humble blogger has been bravely fighting off a sinus infection of the most nastiest variety this week, the promised photos from The Marx Toy Show will be delayed until the week after July 4th, when the plan is to bring you a bonus photo essay every weekday as we play catch-up from our recent travels. Check back for our regular features every day.

Hot STUFF TO DO

We start our trek through STUFF TO DO this week with a weather advisory. As I write this, it’s hot…unbearably hot and humid. And I’m writing this at 4:30 AM. This weekend we are expected to get a very small amount of relief from the heat due to spotty and potentially fierce thunderstorms. It might be a good idea to plan for indoor events. At least stay hydrated,

We have a few unusual items this week. The first of those is a graphic for a great toy show…in the Dallas Fort-Worth area. It’s not exactly in or around Charleston, but a lot of regular PopCult readers will be interested, and your PopCulteer is pencilling in a trip to this show next year…

Also of note: Saturday at 9:45 PM at the Floralee Hark Cohen Cinema, below Taylor Books, there will be a 50th anniversary screening of Monthy Python and the Holy Grail.

And our local recommended show this week is at Pumzi’s. To hear music in an alcohol-free enviroment, see what’s happening at Pumzi’s, on Charleston’s West Side. This Friday starting at 7 PM Pumzi’s plays host to a special benefit show as several bands come together to raise money to help repair the damages that The Blue Parrot, a beloved local music venue, sustained back in March. Jerks, Friendly Fire and GLDN (doing an acoustic set) will perform, with 100% of the proceeds going to help restore The Blue Parrot.

Oh…and as for being indoors…you can’t get more indoors than staying home and watching YouTube. Our old friends, Frenchy and the Punk, premiere a new live video taken at Dark Force Fest on May 2nd, 2025 of the song “Midnight Garden!” Join them at 7:30 PM this Friday June 27th on the Frenchy and the Punk Youtube Channel!

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, contact me via Social Media at Facebook, BlueSky , Spoutible, Instagram or Smoke signals.  I dont charge for this, so you might as well send me something if you have an event to promote. Note that some links look like they shouldn’t work because they have lines through them, but that’s just a WordPress glitch, so click on them anyway. They should still work.

We are also 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.

City Center Live at Slack Plaza in Charleston has announced their schedule for the summer. You can find it HERE.

You can find live music in and around town every night of the week. You just have to know where to look.

Most Fridays and Saturdays you can find live music at Taylor Books. There is no cover charge, and shows start at 7:30 PM. This weekend Matthew Malinoski is listed for Friday, and Saturday Luke Molina entertains the crowd at the air-conditioned bookstore/cafe/art gallery.

You can find live music every night at The World Famous Empty Glass Cafe. Mondays feature open mic night. The first Tuesday of every month sees the legendary Spurgie Hankins Band perform. There’s both Happy Hour music and local or touring bands on Thursday and Friday, and live bands Saturday nights. On Sundays when there’s a new Mountain Stage, musicians from the legendary WV Public Radio show migrate to The Glass for the Post-Mountain Stage jam. I hear that last week’s jam was epic.

Live at The Shop in Dunbar hosts local and touring bands on most weekends, and is a nice break away from the downtown bar scene.

Louie’s, at Mardi Gras Casino & Resort, regularly brings in local bands on weekends.

In Huntington, local institution, The Loud (formerly The V Club), brings in great touring and local acts three or four nights a week.

The Wandering Wind Meadery holds several events each week, from live piano karaoke to bands to comedy to burlesque.

The multitude of breweries and distilleries that have popped up in Charleston of late bring in live musical acts as well. I tend to miss a lot of these because, being a non-drinker, they fly under my radar.

Clendenin Brewing Co is a microbrewery with 4 themed lodging rooms in a 1920s bank building on Main St Clendenin, WV. They’ve been host a lot of musical acts lately.

Roger Rablais hosts Songwriter’s stage at different venues around the area, often at 813 Penn, next door to Fret ‘n’ Fiddle in Saint Albans and also at The Empty Glass many Tuesday evenings. You might also find cool musical events at Route 60 Music in Barboursville and Folklore Music Exchange in Charleston.

You can also visit Coal River Coffee in Saint Albans for live music in an alcohol-free environment. This Friday at 7 PM  Coal River Coffee features Minor SwingI am looking to expand this list, so please contact me through the social media sites above if you know about more alcohol-free performance venues. The Huntington Music Collective has recently started hosting all ages shows at Event Horizon.

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 illlnesses 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.

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 that I was able to scrounge up online…

Continue reading

Tune In To The AIR Wednesday For An Hour Of Weird Beatles

It’s the last week of a blisteringly hot June and Wednesday afternoon on The AIR , we bring you a fresh new episode of Beatles Blast filled with the Fab Four being…weird. You can tune in at the website, or just stay right here and  listen to the convenient embedded radio player lurking elsewhere on this page.

At 2 PM (EDT) Beatles Blast takes an hour to confuse and astound you with a collage mixtape collection of The Beatles at their weirdest.

Of course, I mean “weird” in a good way. You know, it’s weird people who change the world.

Some folks would call this music “experimental” or “avante-garde,” but I think The Beatles would cheerfully admit that they enjoyed being weird much of the time.

Of the course of the hour, you will hear three of the weirdest tracks recorded by the band, plus some wildly bizarre recordings by the solo members.  You will hear obscure b-sides, tracks from experimental albums excerpts from multimedia events and home recordings of the lads just screwing about.

Being a weird show, we do not have a playlist. You’ll just have to tune in to see how weird the Beatles could get. Who knows? We might even do this again in a few weeks.

Beatles Blast can be heard every Wednesday at 2 PM (EDT), with replays Thursday at 11 PM, Friday at 1 PM,  and Saturday afternoon.

At 3 PM (EDT) on Curtain Call, Mel Larch serves up  a couple of recent encore episodes, just to keep you on your twinkle-toes.

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 marathon of classic episodes can be heard Sunday morning starting at 9 AM, and an all-night marathon of Curtain Call episodes can be heard Wednesday nights, beginning at Midnight.

Also on The AIR, Wednesday at 11 PM,  The Comedy Vault brings you a classic episode that presents a collection of novelty gems from the soon to retire Dr. Demento.

RFC IS Crammed With New Music from Golden, Brian Diller, June Swoon, Novelty Island, The Settlement and More!

Get ready for three hours of largely brand-new music and a creepily low-pitched announcer on a new Radio Free Charleston  that you can hear today on The AIR.  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, (all times EDT) with boatloads of replays throughout the week.

It’s another free-format extravaganza as we present three hours of incredible music, along with an announcer (that’s me) who has too much fun with his unnaturally low voice that he got from a summer cold.

In this show you will hear brand new music from Golden, Brian Diller, Gloria Gaynor, J Marinelli, Novelty Island, The M.F.B., The Settlement, Byzantine, Madness,  Sparks, Mr. Romance, Roger Waters and more.

You will also get mini-sets of different styles of music like Ska, Spookiness, Long songs and music with the word “June” somehow involved.

Plus you get the RFC debut of June Swoon, who I got to see last Thursday at The Shop in Dunbar (on the bill with Hello June and Nolan Ellis Collins). It was a great night out and we made it home before 11 PM. I talk a lot about that in the show.

I also talk a lot about having an unfamiliar voice come out of my mouth due to a narsty summer cold. Expect the jokes to get tired quickly.

Check out this playlist, and follow the links to the artist’s pages (where possible).

RFC V5 229

hour one
Golden “Gotta Let It Go”
Brian Diller “The Finding”
Novelty Island “Foam Animals”
Gloria Gaynor “Happy Tears”
The M.F.B “Suga Boogie”
Garbage “Have We Met (The Void)”
The Settlement “The One That Got Away”
June Swoon “Working Dog”
Hello June “Dance (M. Walker Remix)”
Lady June “Tunion”
Middle of June “Dancing In The Moonlight”
The B 52s “Junebug”
China Crisis “June Bride”

hour two
Byzantine “Harbinger”
J. Marinelli “Hillbilly Effigy”
Matt Berry “Stay on The Ground”
Madness “in the Hall of The Mountain King”
Sari Ska Band “Robota”
No Doubt “Total Hate ’95”
Max Headroom & The Car Parks “Don’t Panic”
Ghoulbox “Rats In The Morgue”
June Swoon “Water Baby”
Clownhole “Heads On Fire”
Frenchy And The Punk “Like In A Dream”
Messer Chups “Kiss of the Night”
The Heavy Editors “Same Ole Way”
Dice Johnson“Spachik”
Mr. Romantic “What’ll I Do?”

hour three
Brian Diller“The Last Train”
The Settlement“Shakedown Street (live)”
Roger Waters “Us and Them (live)”
Causa Sui “Moledo”
Sparks “My Devotion”

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 the most recent episodes of  MIRRORBALL at 1 PM and Curtain Call at 2 PM.

At 3 PM we give you an encore of two recent episodes of The Swing Shift. I had planned to do a new episode, but my voice wouldn’t hold up.

 You can hear The Swing Shift Tuesday at 3 PM, with replays Wednesday at 8 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 Thursday and Sunday evenings.

Monday Morning Art: Indiana Sky

This week’s art is a quick ‘n’ sloppy acrylic study based on a series of photos I took out the window of an Amtrak sleeper car as we were making our way through Indiana on our way to Chicago a few weeks ago.

It was about 5 AM and we had just pulled out of the long stop at the Indy Amtrak station.  I was awake because I don’t really sleep too well on the train, and the skies had a wild orange glow due to the smoke from the Canadian wildfires that had been blowing our way. On this trip, Mel and I were sharing images with our friend Pixie, in Liverpool, and I sent her this with a comment that I was thinking about doing a painting based on it. She was very supportive of the idea.

In fact, she sort or ordered me to do it.

In the photos the sun is pretty consistent, but the backgrounds changed, so I took elements of several of them and then ignored the way the sun lit up all the dirt on the outside of the window. This is acrylic on illustration board. At some point I will revisit this and do a larger version on canvas. I actually toned down the orange here. The sky was shockingly orange, but as I progressed, I wasn’t happy with the color balance, so I cheated a little and let some blue sky peek through.

When I do the larger version, I suspect I’ll be including more detail and using more contrast in the non-sun parts.

If you want to see this here art bigger for some reason, look 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 an also classic 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 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.

At 8 PM you can hear a classic episode of The Comedy Vault.

Tonight at 9 PM for the Monday Marathon we bring you ten hours of what was supposed to run Saturday morning, recapping the previous week’s shows on The AIR. A technical SNAFU screwed up the order of shows and left some out, so I decided to have a do-over.

Sunday Evening Video: The 2025 Marx Toy Show

Above you see this year’s PopCult video for The Marx Toy Show.  It’s a little shorter than usual because we had some technical issues with some of the footage, but it’s still a fun little look at a wonderful toy show.

The Marx Toy & Train Show, a great collector’s convetion held every year at the The Kruger Street Toy & Train Museum in Wheeling, West Virginia, has become a tradition for PopCult over the last fifteen years or so.  Videography is by your humble blogger, along with Mrs. PopCulteer, Mel Larch. I handled the editing and narration (which was ad-libbed after guzzling enough Chloroseptic to make me sound somewhat normal, so don’t judge it too harshly).

Because of the technical issues we won’t have a “raw footage” video this year, but I think it’s still a fun video souvenir of the show.

As I mentioned, yours truly was able to croak out a bit of narration and you can get a quick look at the toys and people who make The Marx Toy Show such a cool event. You’re going to get another batch of photos below, but with your PopCulteer still under the weather from whatever bug it is that lowered my voice five octaves, I may have to save a few for later in the week. As I write this, it’s almost time to drug myself to sleep.

Check out these fine photos, in the meantime…

Registration time!

Dave and Donna Roth

Not-so-Secret Toy Agent, Jay Horowitz, with his collectible James Bond set

Wheeling and dealing in Wheeling

Mark Hegeman, who always has an incredible array of vintage toys

Tom Heaton of The Vintage Toy Room, and author of many great Johnny West and Marx action figure books

Scott Stewart (left) the star of last week’s Sunday Evening Video, and one of the stars of the show with his Heroes of the West and Chuckwagon Addition 3D printed sets

The Johnny West room was always abuzz

There were playsets as far as the eye could see

A Marx Classic

We leave you with a really cool Hotel Playset (don’t tell anybody, but it’s not by Marx).

With that your humble blogger is off to medicate himself to sleep. We will bring you another batch of photos from The Marx Toy Show sometime in the next week.

 

The RFC flashback: Episode One Hundred Forty

For the past two months The RFC Flashback has gone back to the most ambitious run of episodes in Radio Free Charleston history. In June, 2011 I decided to try and do something sort of crazy. I’d managed to crank out Radio Free Charleston on a weekly basis before, which was no mean feat since the show was basically produced by me alone, with camera help from my now-wife Mel Larch and occasional help from other friends. For FestivALL 2011, I managed to produce eight episodes of Radio Free Charleston in under two weeks. This week we bring you the big finish.

This is the longest of our 2011 FestivALL shows, clocking in at over 33 minutes, and it has the most footage mixed in with the music and theater clips. Our performers include Joseph Hale, T.J. King and The Kingfish Five, Charleston Stage Company, Kathleen Coffee, Contemporary Youth Arts Company, The Velvet Nomads, WATT 4, Christopher Nelson and Albert Perrone. Intercut with the musical performances you will find scenes from The Art Parade, The Art Fair, The Antique Fair, Dizzy Doc’s Balloon Sculpture, Eamon Hardiman’s silent film, The Peer to Pier project and a few other surprises.

Production of these shows was a bit of a marathon for your PopCulteer. I could not have done this without the invaluable help, support and assistance of Melanie Larch, who was by my side running camera for most of the production of these episodes. I also want to thank our additional camerpeople, Steven Allen Adams and Liz McCormick, who pitched in to help record The Derick Kirk Memorial Concert, and Lee Harrah who was our still photographer on the final Saturday of FestivALL.

Next week in this space you’ll see our fifth anniversary special.

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