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The PopCulteer
December 12, 2025

Your PopCulteer is back from his annual trip to Chicago to celebrate his beautiful wife’s birthday. Even though she absolutely hates having her picture taken, I’m including a couple of shots of her in this post because she’s the reason we went in the first place. That’s us at right, back at the place where we got married in 2014.

We had a great trip, actually including two different shows at Steppenwolf, plus visits to other cool places, all crammed into a too-short visit.

Actually, we got back Wednesday morning, but we’re still sort of exhausted. I had a few fires to put out when we got home, plus we needed to get the trees (yes, plural) up, and recover from having our Amtrak tickets downgraded both ways, which really messed with our ability to sleep and then function the next day.

What this means for you is, it’s time for a short PHOTO ESSAY!

So here’s some of the images from our trip. I’ll write more about it later, when I’m more awake.

And that is this week’s PopCulteer. Check back every day for fresh content and all of our regular features. With any luck, we’ll be back to writing form by next week.  And yes, I wore the Fedora and the Picasso shirt to the gym.

So your humble blogger is back from Chicago, still somewhat worn out from all the epic fun, but since yesterday’s STUFF TO DO was so skimpy, how about we do a bonus round today?

Keep in mind that Winter weather may make going out a very poor life choice, so be careful out there.

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. Especially this week when I have been very seriously half-assing this collection of things you can get into, if you are so inclined.

We are 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.

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

Most weekends you can find live music at Taylor Books. There is no cover charge, and Friday and Saturday shows start at 7:30 PM. This weekend they have Steve Himes on Friday, and The String Chiefs on Saturday.

Now let’s go check out the stuff I didn’t cover yesterday…

Continue reading

I’m writing this a week before you’ll see it, so, after a two-week absence due to The 2025 PopCult Gift Guide, today we’re going to give you a scaled down version of STUFF TO DO, without the lengthy boilerplate (you can find an example HERE). Thursday I’ll post an extra STUFF TO DO, to get all the stuff that I didn’t know about when I wrote this. Next week we’ll try to be back to some kind of normal.

Until we get back to normal in December, more than ever, 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.

We very happily 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.

You can find live music in and around town every night of the week. You just have to know where to look.  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 happening over the next couple of weeks that I was able to scrounge up online…

 

Where were we before we were so tragically interrupted?

Oh yes.  Because of my work on The 2025 PopCult Gift Guide, which ran an extra week but is now in our rear-view mirror, I decided to tinker with the format for the episodes of Radio Free Charleston  that you heard two weeks ago, and 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, with boatloads of replays throughout the week.

Today’s show is the second of what will now be two “Best of 2025” episodes. I open the show with a new song from the Heavy Hitters Band, plus bring you a new set of four more new tunes, and then we go back to earlier this year for chunks of previous shows–the best chunks–I’m talking USDA Grade A chunks of internet radio–so you can revisit the vital and thriving local and independent music scene that our free-format show brings you each week. Last week’s show was turned into a memorial for Lee Harrah, and this week’s show is basically me covering my ass because I’m in Chicago for my lovely wife’s birthday, and won’t be back until tomorrow.

Our new music this week is from the aforementioned Heavy Hitters Band, Corduroy Brown (with a Charlie Brown Superstar remix), Gardenn, Moron Police and Jim And The Sea Dragons.

And then we check out some of the best segments from Radio Free Charleston from the middle of 2025. We don’t do the hourly breaks clean at the top of the hour, so the playlist is just one long stream.

Check out the playlist. Links will take you to pages for the artists…

RFC V5 251

The Heavy Hitters Band “No Mask”
Corduroy Brown “Doin’ My Best (EDM Remix by Charlie Brown Superstar)”
Gardenn “MailMan”
Moron Police “King Among Kittens”
Jim And The Sea Dragons “Happy Go Lucky”
Ligature “Breathe”
Masser Chups “Kiss of the Night”
Falling Stars “Do Your Thing”
The Heavy Editors “Bleed”
Massing “Stay Inside”
Lady Gaga “Killah”
AJ Rosales “Wait”
Tucker Riggleman & The Cheap Dates “Void”
Matt Mullins and The Bringdowns “Big Sky”
Sierra Ferrell “American Dreaming”
Hello June “Honey I Promise”
Catherine Campbell “Long Hair”
The Settlement “The One That Got Away”
Electric Pets “Kowtow”
Jim Lange “Departure”
SPACE FREQ “Strut”
Dark Entities “Undertow”
Djabe & Steve Hackett “A Storm Is Brewing”
Tori Amos “Insect Ballet”
ABC “Brighter Than The Sun”
A Tale of Two “Renegade”
Novelty Island “Northern Nowhere”
Matching Outfits “Everybody Drives”
Erik Woods “My Turtle”
Masser Chups “Insomnia of the Mummies”
Corduroy Brown “4th Avenue”
Speedsuit “Paroled”
Tyler Childers “Bitin’ List”
Joy Viver “Precious Stones”
June Swoon “What Ever After”
M Robin Scott “God Knows Why”
A Tale of Two “Once Upon A Summer’s Day”
Brian Diller “Drive”
Sheldon Vance “Tonight We Sing”
The M.F.B. “Karaoke Casualty”

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 last week’s episodes of  MIRRORBALL at 1 PM and Curtain Call at 2 PM.

At 3 PM  The Swing Shift is an encore of two recent episodes.

 You can hear The Swing Shift Tuesday at 3 PM, with replays Wednesday at 8 AM, Thursday at 9 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 Thursdays and Sundays.

This week’s art is a quick ‘n’ sloppy acrylic painting I did of a tiny Christmas tree that I put up in the corner of my living room twelve or fifteen years ago. I found a bunch of old digital photos, most of them out of focus, and used them for inspiration.

One reason for this is because I needed a quick piece of art for this space because I’m working ahead on the blog. Your humble blogger is actually in Chicago at the moment, celebrating his lovely wife’s birthday. Also, this tiny tree came back out of the attic this year…to join two other trees in our festive forest of a living room. You’ll get to see what they look like decorated once we get back into town…and decorate them.

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 we do the same with 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.

Tonight at 9 PM we bring you our newish Monday night line-up featuring two hours each of Curtain Call and Beatles Blast, plus six hours overnight with an assortment of our programming from Haversham Recording Institute.

After taking yet another a year off, and for no reason other than I need to write more than a week’s worth of this blog because I’m going to Chicago for Mel’s birthday (which is today, Happy Birthday my love), we once again bring you a collection of Christmas-themed short films that are, shall we say, “less traditional” than those you might normally watch to get into the holiday spirit. Against all common sense this has become a new bi-annual tradition! Some of these you may have seen before here in PopCult, while some are new to our readers. All of them, are pretty messed up, in their own ways. These are our olive branch to those of us who have more of a “Bah, Humbug” attitude toward the holiday on this Christmas season.

Our opening video this year is a heartwarming cartoon about ways to die at Christmas…

Returning from 2020, it’s a music video by The Dollyrots, conveniently called “Messed Up Christmas,” and it was written using contest entries from their fans that asked “What messed up thing do you want for Christmas?”

We continue with a short film from 2017 called “Sleigh,” starring Matt Berry and Nigel Planer…

Next up we bring you a parody of the 30th Anniversary of “Do They Know It’s Christmas” by the comedy crew of 22 Minutes…

Finally we bring you Ken Russell’s heartwarming holiday classic, “A Kitten For Hitler”…

In the spirit of the holiday season, I say, “There, that oughtta hold the little buggers.”

This week we travel back to July, 2012 for a show that featured music from Mother Nang, recorded at Haddad Riverfront Park, and two numbers from the Charleston Light Opera Guild production of Legally Blonde.  This episode was called “Fighting English Shirt,” named after my T-shirt, which was a mash-up of The Black Knight from Monty Python and the Holy Grail, and the logo for Notre Dame’s sportsball team.

Host segments were shot at the Charleston Civic Center, which just goes to show you what might happen if you leave your podium just sitting around.

The CLOG production of Legally Blonde starred Micah Atkinson as Elle Woods, along with a large talented cast that included Matthew Bryant, Allison Plants, Michael D. Gore, Cameron Vance, Toni Pilato, and Rudi Raynes-Kidder along with many others. The RFC cameras were allowed in for the first dress rehearsal, and we witnessed a show that is coming together quickly was a lot of fun. We brought you two numbers from Legally Blonde” in ths episode, “Serious” and “What You Want.”

This episode of the show also features the song “Buying The Farm” by Mother Nang, recorded in the summer of 2011 at Haddad Riverfront Park. Mother Nang is a legendary band on the Charleston Scene, and the various members are all still active, musically, whether together or apart.

We also have animation this week, but I’m still not allowed to talk about it.

The original production notes can be found HERE.

The PopCulteer
December 5, 2025

It took the entire month of November plus nearly an extra week, but we have finally arrived at The Master List of every single thing I recommended in The 2025 PopCult Gift Guide. We are running The Master List a week later than I planned, but that makes up for last year when I ran it a week early

For the most part, I stick with  last year’s format changes to The Gift Guide. Like last year I did two posts a day, only on weekdays, with some containing multiple items. All of them have some kind of pop culture angle, and I hope all of them help to inspire somebody’s gift giving. This year our readership has exceeded any previous year’s PopCult Gift Guide by a ridiculous amount, even with fewer entries.  For that, I thank you folks for sharing the links and spreading the word.

One change I made this year was that I tried to shine the spotlight on more small retailers. In a “best laid plans” drawback, I did not get to write the planned “Small Business Saturday” post that I had planned for last Friday. The passing of Lee Harrah knocked me off my game and I just couldn’t crank that out.

For the most part, like last year, I didn’t have to wake up early and crank out that day’s Gift Guide entries except for a couple of times.

Because of the nature of how I did the gift guide this year, some of the links will take you to the post that includes the items listed, but you may have to scroll down a bit to find the exact item you’re looking for.  Like I did last year, I will incorporate the Turkey Day gag gifts into the regular list.

With that said, let’s dive into the Master List…

TOYS

Bullseye’s Highway Hauler Truck Set

Jenga: Godzilla Edition

Super7 Godzilla Figures

DEVO Booji Boy Action Figure

Gargon: King of the Terrons

Zuru Mini Brands Fill The Fridge

The White Stipes Action Figures

Lionel Santa Fe Flyer Battery Operated Train Set

LEGO Luxo Jr. 

Peanuts action figures from Super7

LEGO Keith Haring Dancing Figures

Scalextric Speed Supreme Race Set

Corgi Beatles Die Cast Vehicles

John Waters Action figure

Lenny Bruce Action Figure

Corgi Chitty Chitty Bang Bang Die Cast Replica

SpongeBob’s Flying Dutchman’s Ship Playset

Wicked The Wizard Doll

Mini Verse Real Brands

Hot Wheels

BOOKS

Godzilla: The Official Cookbook

Jay Ward’s Animated Cereal Capers

Amtrak’s History Through It’s Equipment

Dip My Brain In Joy: Neil Innes

Aurora Plastic Model Catalogs Volumes 1 &2

The Art of George Wilson

TCM Pre-Code Essentials

The Essential Peanuts

The Complete Peanuts

TCM Rewinding The 80s

Hirschfeld’s Sondheim

Matching Minds With Sondheim

100 Ways To Eat Cock

Beyond the Mark: Ashes of The Hero

Broadway Nation

It Seemed Like A Bad Idea At The Time/ Bruce Vilanch

DC compact Editions

MUSIC

The Bonzo Dog Band: Still Barking boxset

Power To The People: John & Yoko In NYC boxset

WINGS

Let It Roll: Songs by George Harrison

Ringo Starr Vinyl LP Reissues

The Who: Who Are You Deluxe boxset

BEAT “Neon Heat Disease Live In L.A.”

LOCAL AND INDEPENDENT MUSIC VIA RFC

Stranger Things WSQK Collection LP

The Beatles Anthology

Boop! The Musical Original Cast Recording

RETAILERS

Kin Ship Goods

Volume Bookshop & Studio

Eclectic Goods Market

Kentucky 4 Kentucky Fun Mall

Transit Tees

Cotswold Collectibles

EVERYTHING ELSE

Godzilla The Showa Era Films Boxset

The Classic Svengoolie T Shirt

JAWS Lunchbox and Thermos

The Peanuts Collection at Kruger Street Toy & Train Museum

Opera Corn

Uranus Liquors T Shirt

Kellogg’s Demogorgon Crunch

Lights of Broadway Show Cards

And with that we wrap up The 2025 PopCult Gift Guide and also give you this week’s PopCulteer.  It is truly a relief to have this behind me. Even though your humble blogger is in Chicago for a few more days, once I’m back I will  hit the ground running with special holiday photo essays and video, and the return of STUFF TO DO.  You can expect all that and fresh content every day!

For the final entry in The 2025 PopCult Gift Guide we bring you five stocking stuffer ideas. These are gifts that cost ten bucks or less.

With the Gift Guide extended by a week, the loss of a close friend and a pending train trip, we really came down to the wire, but I think it’s a pretty damned good batch of pop culture gift ideas at a variety of price points.

I’d say many of my readers agree, and you seem to have brought some new friends along. Readership of PopCult in November was up almost 500% from the previous month, and compared to last year’s Gift Guide, we have more than three times as many unique views.

Tomorrow you will find The Master List in The PopCulteer, and then the blog will be on autopilot for a few days.

Let’s get to stuffing those stockings…

Kellogg’s Stranger Things Demogorgon Crunch Cereal

Under five bucks at most grocers

Okay, you got a Stranger Things fan who has a stocking big enough to fit a box of cereal?  This is the gift for you to give them.

It’s a cereal based on the hit Netflix series, which just began its final season, and I will be posting a detailed review of the cereal sometime after I get back from Chicago.

Aparently people like it when I write about candy cereals.

From what I hear, this is basically Maple-flavored Eggo Waffle cereal, with added marshmallows that are supposed to look like stuff from the show.

I guess it stays crunchy, even in the Upside Down.

We found it at Walmart.

DC Compact Editions

by DC comics

Available at many booksellers and comic book shops for $9.99 or less.

DC compact Editions are exactly what the title implies, compact-sized (smaller than a regular comic book, dimension-wise) but thick collections of some of DC’s best-selling comics. Some of these are over 300 pages and many of them are primo stuff.  I mean, there are xamples of of some of the finest comic books ever published in this line.

Some, I don’t care for, but there’s a great variety. These have been coming out since last year, and they’re a terrific bargain, especially for people who have eyes better equipped for reading smaller print.

You can find some all-time classics like Darwyn Cooke’s The New Frontier, Alan Moore and David Lloyd’s V For Vendetta (the great comic book, not the lousy movie), Mark Waid and Alex Ross’ Kingdom Come and Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely’s All Star Superman.

There are nearly forty titles from which to choose, and you can tailor your pick to the person on your shopping list.

It’s a great way to introduce a new comics reader to some of the all-time great DC classics.

MGA Mini Verse Real Brands

Under ten bucks at most retailers who carry toys

I have written extensively about Zuru Toys’ Mini Brands in the past, but now their main competitor has really upped the game and come out with their own line of brand-name miniatures that have a level of detail that’s mind-blowing.

I’m talking about a miniature box of ice cream bars that can be opened, with individual ice cream bars inside, which are each individually wrapped. It’s both crazed and brilliant!

Seriously these minis can be opened and you can pour out tiny (not edible) peanuts, crackers and potato chips.

Here’s what they say about them…

New minis have entered the Miniverse! Collect all your favorite foods from all your favorite brands!

Scoop out Breyers® “Ice Cream” from the tub, unwrap your mini Pop-Tart®, and scrape out Smucker’s® Strawberry Jam straight out the jar! Each mini has hyper realistic features!

50+ Minis: There are 50+ minis to collect in this series!

Collect across iconic brands such as Babybel®, HORMEL® SPAM®, PLANTERS®, Pringles®, Hostess®, and more!

These are selling like crazy, but if you have a fan of minatures on your shopping list, this is the best stocking fodder you can find.

Hot Wheels

Around a dollar (or just a bit more post-tarrifs), sold almost everywhere.

Everybody loves Hot Wheels. They’ve been around almost sixty years, and multiple generations have grown up collecting them without ever growing out of collecting them.

And they are cheap. Even costing under a dollar-thirty, the level of clever design and imagination behind these cars are incredible.

Artists use them for inspiration. Kids roll them all over the place.  Men and Women pick them up just because they look cool and cost a buck or so.

And you can fill a stocking with them, and unless your giftee is a soulless toy-hating monster, their face will light up with happiness.

And seriously, some of these are really, really cool.

Lights of Broadway Show Cards

Five dollars per pack

Available from Lights of Broadway (or at two cool stores in NYC).

Our final pick this year in The 2025 PopCult Gift Guide is a returning favorite.

I first told you about Lights of Broadway Show Cards several years ago in The PopCult Gift Guide, and I even wrote about them for Non Sport Update, but we’re going to remind you of that gift idea today because they have just released a new series of cards and they have several exciting projects on tap, plus there is no better stocking stuffer for the fan of the theatre on your shopping list than these little gems.

The Lights of Broadway Show Cards feature the artwork of Broadway’s reigning caricaturist, Squiggs, and present the stars, theaters and shows of The Great White Way in trading card form. This is the absolutely perfect gift for the theatre fanatic on your holiday shopping list.

The Lights of Broadway Show Cards celebrate Broadway theatre. The stories and the storytellers, the art and the artisans, those who make it all possible and the community embracing it. Shows, actors, directors, writers, designers, and all else in the spotlight or behind the scenes who keep the theatrical world spinning.

Over at The Lights of Broadway website, you’ll find special deals where you can get packs of their latest edition, with dozens of new faces showing up in the series for the first time. You’ll also find deals on binders and starter kits (which include an illustrated binder and several packs of cards).

Single packs are only five dollars, and you can be a little more generious and get your giftee multiple packs. They’ll fit in a stocking, trust me.

And with your stockings full stocked, we bid our goodbyes to The 2025 PopCult Gift Guide. Come back tomorrow for The Master List.

 

It Seemed Like a Bad Idea at the Time: The Worst TV Shows in History and Other Things I Wrote
by Bruce Vilanch
Chicago Review Press
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0914091929
$28.99 (heavily discounted at Amazon)

The first entry on this last day of The 2025 PopCult Gift Guide is a last-minute addition, swiped from Mark Evanier’s blog. It’s a book by famed comedy writer, Bruce Vilanch, about his involvement in some of the absolutely mind-boggling worst things that ever happened on television.

It Seemed Like A Bad Idea At The Time is the perfect gift for anybody who loves cheesy TV and also likes to laugh their ass off.

Let’s have the publisher explain…

Bruce Vilanch is known as a go-to comedy writer for award shows, sitcoms, and over-the-top variety specials, but he has also been responsible for quite a few of the most legendary disasters ever made.

Some of his work lives in infamy—The Star Wars Holiday Special, The Paul Lynde Halloween Special, Rob Lowe dancing with Snow White at the Oscars, and The Brady Bunch Variety Hour. How did these ever seem like a good idea?

Well, everyone has screwed up a few times, or had their work screwed up by others. It Seemed Like a Bad Idea at the Time is a lifetime reflection of what Vilanch has experienced, learned, and forgotten in decades of working in show business, specifically the south forty acres known as comedy. It involves very famous people and people who were not very famous but should have been.

It explains to the people in the audience who say to themselves, once they have gotten their jaw off the floor, “’How did this ever get made?”

I have to admit, I haven’t read this yet. I’ve ordered it (it’s way cheap at Amazon as I write this), but you can probably order it from any bookseller. It’s perfect for anyone who ever looked at awful television and asked, “How the hell did that get made?”