So...here's where we were 40 years ago, celebrating Thanksgiving 1976: Back then, PBS used to show a variety of children's programs created by their affiliates across the US. Here's a Thanksgiving contribution from St. Louis' KETC, a little show called Celebrate. Notice that the cat-like puppet's name is Doodle, preceding Sprout's Noodle & Doodle by 35-odd years, except their Noodle doesn't have crooked eyes and an odd sideways overbite. Or a chef that burns the sweet potato. However, Sprout doesn't have any attractive blondes in tight turtlenecks, either. Here's Celebrate. Happy Thanksgiving!
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Today marks the 55th anniversary of the 1961 date when Liverpool record store owner Brian Epstein visited the Cavern Club during lunchtime to hear a rock band performing there called The Beatles. Epstein ran NEMS (North End Music Store) in Liverpool, and had been alerted to the band's existence after two separate incidents in the two weeks preceding when a man, followed by two girls three days later, asked for a recording of the Beatles' performance of "My Bonnie" that was recorded in Hamburg. Epstein, who prided himself on keeping his record store well stocked with unusual releases, was astonished he did not know of the group's existence and tracked them down at the club. Here's his remembrance of the event from a 1964 interview: "They were rather scruffily dressed - in the nicest possible way or, I should say, in the most attractive way: black leather jackets and jeans, long hair of course. And they had a rather untidy stage presentation, not terribly aware, and not caring very much, what they looked like. I think they cared more even then for what they sounded like. I immediately liked what I heard. They were fresh and they were honest, and they had what I thought was a sort of presence and, this is a terribly vague term, star quality. Whatever that is, they had it, or I sensed that they had it." After catching a few more performances throughout the month, he would eventually meet The Beatles for the first time on Dec. 3, and a contract was eventually signed on Jan. 24, 1962. Here's a sample of what Epstein might have heard that day.
This week marks the 35th anniversary of the debut of one of the oddest singles ever to chart: a medley of classical snippets set to a disco beat titled "Hooked on Classics." The Royal Philharmonic's single came in the middle of a craze for medleys containing snippets of well-known tunes that began in the summer of 1981 when the Dutch act Stars on 45's medley of cover versions of 1960s oldies - mostly by the Beatles - interrupted the chart-topping run of Kim Carnes' "Bette Davis Eyes" for one week in June. This was followed by a medley of Beach Boys hits performed by the act themselves titled - what else? - "The Beach Boys Medley" that placed in the Top 20. That collection was slipping down the Top 100 when the Royal Philharmonic's "Hooked on Classics" debuted at a lowly #90. However, the single would eventually reach a crescendo peak of #10 in January 1982, while the album of the same name placing in the Top 5, wedged between the Rolling Stones and Foreigner. It would eventually sell 1 million copies, but its pop instincts were probably assured seeing that the orchestra's leader Louis Clark had already crafted string arrangement for t Electric Light Orchestra. The single medley craze would last a little while longer, with Larry Elgart's swing medley and a movie theme medley created by Meco (of the disco Star Wars theme fame) reaching the bottom of the Top 40 in 1982. The last one to make any decent chart showing was by The Beatles themselves, with the hastily edited "The Beatles Movie Medley" reaching #12 despite a sloppy inability to even match the songs' beats. By the end of summer 1982, the medley craze had drifted away to be largely forgotten, although the Royal Philharmonic's single and accompanying album does contain a degree of craftsmanship and fun that still makes it listenable today. Here, then, is the original single version of "Hooked on Classics" with a video made for the UK TV show Top of the Pops. For comparison, here's the dance mix which is closer to the longer, uncut version on the album.
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Walburgh's BlogMostly retro, mainly music, but generally whatever's on my mind. Archives
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