Click through this slide show below –
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
Meet Ferron – A Canadian-born Folksinger
My favorite song of hers:
"Ferron writes of love with the relentless introspection of Leonard Cohen, and, as with classic Bob Dylan, her songs' tough, questioning attitude sometimes gives way to an unexpected." - Rolling Stone Magazine
When Canadian singer-songwriter Ferron was 15, she hit the road alone. She had a single shopping bag with a change of clothes, a toothbrush, a waitress uniform, and a Leonard Cohen LP. Little did she know then, but one day her own songs would be compared to Cohen's for their depth of word-craft, intimacy, and wisdom. (NPR)
Thursday, August 12, 2010
Wild And Free
Vedran Vidak, Photographer
From: Imotski, Croatia
The photographer's Narrative:
On the vast pastures of untouched nature Livno field, only ten kilometers away from the town of Livno, relaxing peace that rules the area impairs gallop over two hundred wild horses! That way they inflict on the area has been circulating since Koritine to Pine head, impress the stunning scenery herds of wild horses, in search of good grass, salt and water a day and go to the tenth kilometers. Wild horses on these pastures, almost fifty years of living under the open sky, left to themselves, weather conditions, strong winters and attacking wild animals in the surrounding woods is a lot. Survive only thanks to regions that are rich grass.
Wild Horses
Peace
Winter Comes
Friday, August 6, 2010
A Lynching 91 Years Ago, August 7, 1930 in Marion, Indiana
The photograph below was cited by the songwriter as the inspiration for the song: "Strange Fruit" which began as a poem written by Abel Meeropol, a Jewish high-school teacher from the Bronx, about the lynching of the two black men.
The song, "Strange Fruit" has been covered by Nina Simone, Jeff Buckley and others.
The song, "Strange Fruit" has been covered by Nina Simone, Jeff Buckley and others.
Thomas Shipp and Abram Smith were two African-American men who were lynched on August 7, 1930 in Marion, Indiana. They had been arrested the night before, charged with robbing and murdering a white factory worker and raping his girlfriend. A large crowd broke into the jail with sledgehammers, beat the two men, and hanged them. Police officers in the crowd cooperated in the lynching. A third person, 16 year old James Cameron, narrowly escaped lynching thanks to an unidentified participant who announced that he had nothing to do with the rape or murder. A studio photographer, Lawrence Beitler, took a photograph of the dead bodies hanging from a tree surrounded by a large crowd.
Cameron, the third person, stated in interviews that Shipp and Smith had, in fact, started to rob a white man, who was later found shot. He says that he fled when he realized what was going on. The police accused all three men of murder and rape.
Much more info in an NPR article, Linked here.
Cameron, the third person, stated in interviews that Shipp and Smith had, in fact, started to rob a white man, who was later found shot. He says that he fled when he realized what was going on. The police accused all three men of murder and rape.
Much more info in an NPR article, Linked here.
Monday, July 26, 2010
Trepagnier House – St. Charles, Louisiana
The Trepagnier Plantation was expropriated, along with several others, by the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers to build the Bonnet Carre' Spillway.
Per Frances E. Johnson, the Photographer – 1938
"St. Charles Parish, Louisiana. 'The Rookery', Trepagnier House. Norco vicinity. Abandoned plantation house now occupied by Negroes."
Photo courtesy of Shorpy.com.
From the front porch view, it looks like the home of a laundress.
Additional Photos of the Trepagnier House by Lee Russell in the Library of Congress archives. FSA and WPA Photography
Friday, July 16, 2010
Blues in the South – Photos and Music
Brief Bio of photographer, George Mitchell
George Mitchell was born in Coral Gables, Florida in 1944. He was raised in Atlanta, Georgia and in 1958 discovered by accident the two radio stations in Atlanta that played black music, WAOK, and WERD, the first black-owned station in the US. Mitchell was drawn to black music, and as a teenager listened intently to Samuel B. Charters’ anthology The Country Blues. He also went to blues and R&B shows and saw Bo Diddley, Jimmy Reed, Ray Charles, John Lee Hooker, and the Staple Singers with his grandmother in tow; they were the only white people at that performance. George's obsession with photographing and recording country blues players in the Southeast has allowed their tradition to survive.George Mitchell resides in Atlanta with his wife Cathy.
Pulling up to a Stuckey's in Senatobia, Miss., in 1967, Mitchell was looking for well-known bluesman Fred McDowell, who had recorded extensively and toured Europe. He asked the attendant pumping gas where to find McDowell. "You're looking at him," the attendant said. GEORGE MITCHELL
William Grant, seen here at his home in Pittsview, Ala., was adept as a solo harmonica player, alternating singing and harp-playing with great agility. GEORGE MITCHELL
More Snapshots of Blues in the South
By George Mitchell
Some of the music? OK. Hang on!:
John Lee Hooker – Tupelo
Bo Diddley, Muddy Waters, Little Walter — My Babe
Saturday, July 10, 2010
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
So Long, Drive-In Movies
At their peak, which most experts agree was in 1958, there were almost 5000 drive-ins. Today, there are only 372 drive-in theaters still open in the US.Friday, May 7, 2010
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Sunday, April 11, 2010
Model T Ford Postcard – 1928
Offering Mechanic Services.
Click on:
Notice the sophisticated addressing scheme! This was sent on a penny postcard. Of course, it's all relative. A dollar was hard to come by in 1928.
Click on:
Notice the sophisticated addressing scheme! This was sent on a penny postcard. Of course, it's all relative. A dollar was hard to come by in 1928.
Monday, April 5, 2010
Roadrunner Cartoon
By Seth MacFarlane, creator of TVs Family Guy and other comedy. I think his stuff is hilarious.
Monday, March 29, 2010
Thursday, March 18, 2010
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
More from Brad Watson
The below Narrative Magazine story, In the Prime of Their Lives is but part of Brad's novella which is in his excellent new book of stories:
"Aliens in the Prime of Their Lives"
Want to learn more about Brad? This is an excellent 2002 interview that really draws him out.
"Aliens in the Prime of Their Lives"
“SHE WAS A GOOD Baptist girl, but she wasn’t a prude, and she liked to drink a beer here and there, and go to parties, and she generally liked my rowdy crowd. She was a virgin, though, and determined to stay one until she married.”
Biographical Information
Brad Watson was born and grew up in Meridian, Miss. He became interested in theater in high school, and, after graduation, went to California to look for work in Hollywood as a set-builder. Unable to find a movie job due to a strike, Watson worked as a garbage collector. After about a year, he returned to Meridian and worked in a variety of jobs, including carpentry and bartending. He also attended Meridian Junior College, where he became interested in writing. Watson earned a BA in English at Mississippi State University in Starkville in 1978. He then enrolled at the University of Alabama, earning an MFA in creative writing and American literature in 1985. In the mid-1980s, Watson also worked for a weekly newspaper on the Gulf Coast. He later wrote for the Montgomery Advertiser and for an advertising agency in Montgomery.
From 1988 to 1997, Watson was employed by the University of Alabama as an instructor and as a writer in the public relations office. During this time, he was also writing short stories. Several were published in literary journals such as The Greensboro Review and Story. A collection, Last Days of the Dog-Men, was published in 1996. The following year, Watson moved to Massachusetts where he held a five-year appointment as a Briggs-Copeland Lecturer at Harvard University. He published a novel, The Heaven of Mercury, in 2002. Watson then moved to Pensacola, where he was writer-in-residence for a year at the University of West Florida. He spent a semester teaching at the University of Alabama at Birmingham before being appointed the John and Renee Grisham Writer in Residence at the University of Mississippi in Oxford. In 2005, Watson became a member of the English faculty of the University of Wyoming and moved to Laramie.
Interests and Themes
Brad Watson’s fiction is set in the South and frequently involves failed interpersonal relationships. Last Days of the Dog-Men is a collection of short stories about dogs and people. The Heaven of Mercury is set in a fictional town that is based partly on his hometown of Meridian, Miss., and partly on Alabama Gulf Coast towns like Foley and Gulf Shores.
Want to learn more about Brad? This is an excellent 2002 interview that really draws him out.
Monday, March 15, 2010
Saturday, February 20, 2010
Two Romanian Photographers
Michaela Cojocariu – Her Blog
"Frida is Back" –
George Gradinanaru – signs his work, "Horhhe"
Both of these talented photographers are from
"Wrong Written Life"
"Frida is Back" –
A photographic portrayal of Mexican painter and wife of painter, Diego Rivera, Frida Kahlo.
George Gradinanaru – signs his work, "Horhhe"
"Night traveller III"
Both of these talented photographers are from
Brasov, Transsilvania, Romania
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
Listen to Caroline Herring
I think she's terrific!
About Her:
Caroline Herring is a Canton, Mississippi-born artist whose music has been hailed for combining traditional folk and bluegrass sounds with striking, original observations of modern life and love. Thoroughly steeped in southern culture, Herring began her music career in Austin, TX, where she released her first album, “Twilight,” and won Best New Artist in both the Austin American Statesman and Austin Chronicle in 2002. Since that time, Herring has built an international following and released three more albums, including the masterpiece “Golden Apples of the Sun.” The critical acclaim for “Golden Apples of the Sun” firmly supports Herring’s status as one of the top musical artists of her generation. The Oxford American says, “Golden Apples is the album of a woman who has come into her powers as a singer-songwriter, claiming as her stomping ground the territory where folk meets alt-country.” NPR’s All Things Considered interviewed Caroline in January 2010 about the making of the record, and Jim Allen of All Music Guide said the following: “It's not easy being a great folksinger -- Kate Wolf, Linda Thompson, and Iris DeMent are some of the names on the short list, but ‘Golden Apples of the Sun’ makes a strong case for the addition of Caroline Herring.” Herring’s album “Lantana” (2008) received widespread acclaim as an alt-country masterpiece. The Austin Chronicle proclaimed it to be “the best modern Southern Gothic album since Lucinda Williams’ Sweet Old World,” and NPR named it one of the “ten best folk albums of 2008.” On “Lantana,” Herring writes and sings about a myriad of southern topics, from a character in a Larry Brown novel to the infanticide and racism exposed by the dark and troubled life of Susan Smith. With “Golden Apples of the Sun” Herring stakes out new terrain, exchanging the country-influenced resonance of her previous albums for a sound inspired by the iconic female folk singers and songwriters of the 1960s and 70s. Caroline Herring lives in Atlanta, with her husband and two young children.
Monday, February 15, 2010
Friday, February 12, 2010
"Bloodroot" by Amy Greene - NYT review
Cold Mountains
BLOODROOT
By Amy Greene
291 pp. Alfred A. Knopf. $24.95
By Amy Greene
291 pp. Alfred A. Knopf. $24.95
$15.97 on Amazon ( per DNJ )
New York Times
By LISA FUGARD
By LISA FUGARD
Published: February 12, 2010
Don’t be misled by the dreamy pastoral image on the dust jacket of Amy Greene’s first novel. “Bloodroot” takes place in Appalachia, and, yes, Greene lovingly describes its mountains and hollows, its waters filled with bluegills. There’s also much talk of healing and magic and backwoods folk wisdom. But this story is really about the fraught, sometimes dangerous, bonds between children and their mothers, and the appalling spillover of violence from one generation to the next.
A scene about halfway through, when a pregnant Laura Odom Blevins is being harassed by her wildly possessive, drink-addled mother-in-law, captures this dark legacy with wrenching clarity. “I ain’t never had nobody,” the older woman sobs, after she’s finished hurling insults. “When I was little they was always passing me around. Didn’t none of them want me.” But the pity Laura momentarily feels is banished when her mother-in-law grabs a jack handle and begins smashing Laura’s husband’s car. “I was sorry,” a shaken Laura confesses after another tussle sends the woman limping away, “but most of all I was worried about my baby. I thought something had broke inside me, the way it broke in Mama.”
Laura’s mother, black-haired, blue-eyed Myra Lamb, is one of the characters the novel follows through three generations of domestic strife. She’s first encountered through the recollections of Byrdie, the grandmother who raises her on Bloodroot Mountain, and Doug Cotter, a shy young neighbor who falls in love with her — both of whom feel her slipping away, lured by an ominously attractive man named John Odom. Although Greene strains a bit in these passages, using the awkward symbolism of Wild Rose, a horse that can’t be tamed, to echo Myra’s free spirit, she succeeds in capturing the intimate relationships many of her characters have with the natural world. “The whole mountain belonged to us,” Doug declares, “and we knew its terrain like our own bodies, every scar and cleft and fold.”
In unadorned but assured prose, Greene then takes her readers to the hardscrabble world of foster homes and juvenile detention centers, of life in a blue-collar Appalachian town as experienced by Myra’s children, the twins Laura and Johnny. While Laura struggles to move beyond the traumas of their childhood — when social workers removed them from their mother’s home — Johnny can’t forget the years they spent with the reclusive Myra. At one point, he hikes up Bloodroot Mountain with a friend who has promised to show him a witch’s house. Dilapidated, hidden among the trees, it looks “like a toy I could hold in both hands, a dirty white box with black window holes and the roof a flake of blood.” It’s his childhood home, and the witch in question is his mother.
When, in the novel’s last section, Myra’s voice is finally heard — searching back for the first “whispers of fear” she felt after meeting John Odom — the effect is chilling. Here Greene uses gothic overtones (sometimes too heavily) to capture the crippling atmosphere of Myra’s marriage. The smell of sulphur and dead rats permeates the air outside the Odom house; her sisters-in-law are “tired and colorless”; her husband looks “almost foreign, hair and eyes black as soot.” She captures well the electric emotional snap of a woman about to break free from an abusive marriage, the charge of adrenaline in that “exhilarating moment when I knew it would end for me one way or another.”
Greene layers the novel with references to Myra’s incredible magnetism, and it’s said she has “the touch,” a kind of ESP. There’s also mention of a family curse. But this somehow detracts from the tragedy of her life. Myra is most compelling as an all too ordinary woman trying to escape an inheritance of violence and poverty. “It’s not right, what we’ve put on her,” one character remarks. “She’s made out of flesh and blood, just like anybody else.”
Lisa Fugard is the author of a novel, “Skinner’s Drift.”
Don’t be misled by the dreamy pastoral image on the dust jacket of Amy Greene’s first novel. “Bloodroot” takes place in Appalachia, and, yes, Greene lovingly describes its mountains and hollows, its waters filled with bluegills. There’s also much talk of healing and magic and backwoods folk wisdom. But this story is really about the fraught, sometimes dangerous, bonds between children and their mothers, and the appalling spillover of violence from one generation to the next.
A scene about halfway through, when a pregnant Laura Odom Blevins is being harassed by her wildly possessive, drink-addled mother-in-law, captures this dark legacy with wrenching clarity. “I ain’t never had nobody,” the older woman sobs, after she’s finished hurling insults. “When I was little they was always passing me around. Didn’t none of them want me.” But the pity Laura momentarily feels is banished when her mother-in-law grabs a jack handle and begins smashing Laura’s husband’s car. “I was sorry,” a shaken Laura confesses after another tussle sends the woman limping away, “but most of all I was worried about my baby. I thought something had broke inside me, the way it broke in Mama.”
Laura’s mother, black-haired, blue-eyed Myra Lamb, is one of the characters the novel follows through three generations of domestic strife. She’s first encountered through the recollections of Byrdie, the grandmother who raises her on Bloodroot Mountain, and Doug Cotter, a shy young neighbor who falls in love with her — both of whom feel her slipping away, lured by an ominously attractive man named John Odom. Although Greene strains a bit in these passages, using the awkward symbolism of Wild Rose, a horse that can’t be tamed, to echo Myra’s free spirit, she succeeds in capturing the intimate relationships many of her characters have with the natural world. “The whole mountain belonged to us,” Doug declares, “and we knew its terrain like our own bodies, every scar and cleft and fold.”
In unadorned but assured prose, Greene then takes her readers to the hardscrabble world of foster homes and juvenile detention centers, of life in a blue-collar Appalachian town as experienced by Myra’s children, the twins Laura and Johnny. While Laura struggles to move beyond the traumas of their childhood — when social workers removed them from their mother’s home — Johnny can’t forget the years they spent with the reclusive Myra. At one point, he hikes up Bloodroot Mountain with a friend who has promised to show him a witch’s house. Dilapidated, hidden among the trees, it looks “like a toy I could hold in both hands, a dirty white box with black window holes and the roof a flake of blood.” It’s his childhood home, and the witch in question is his mother.
When, in the novel’s last section, Myra’s voice is finally heard — searching back for the first “whispers of fear” she felt after meeting John Odom — the effect is chilling. Here Greene uses gothic overtones (sometimes too heavily) to capture the crippling atmosphere of Myra’s marriage. The smell of sulphur and dead rats permeates the air outside the Odom house; her sisters-in-law are “tired and colorless”; her husband looks “almost foreign, hair and eyes black as soot.” She captures well the electric emotional snap of a woman about to break free from an abusive marriage, the charge of adrenaline in that “exhilarating moment when I knew it would end for me one way or another.”
Greene layers the novel with references to Myra’s incredible magnetism, and it’s said she has “the touch,” a kind of ESP. There’s also mention of a family curse. But this somehow detracts from the tragedy of her life. Myra is most compelling as an all too ordinary woman trying to escape an inheritance of violence and poverty. “It’s not right, what we’ve put on her,” one character remarks. “She’s made out of flesh and blood, just like anybody else.”
Lisa Fugard is the author of a novel, “Skinner’s Drift.”
Sunday, February 7, 2010
Opera While Shopping
|
Saturday, January 30, 2010
Hallelujah
Covered here by Jeff Buckley (1966 – 1997) It sometimes seems only the good die young. He drowned in Memphis... perhaps on purpose.
This is probably my favorite song. It was written by Leonard Cohen and released on his 1984 album (CD) Various Positions. It's been covered by K.D.Lang, John Cale, Kate Voegle, Alison Crowe and many others including Bob Dylan, Bon Jovi and Willie Nelson
Hallelujah Lyrics by Leonard Cohen
Another good cover version sung by Rufus Wainwrght
Hallelujah Lyrics by Leonard Cohen
If you like the song, check out these other two renditions. I like them all.
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
The Photography of Ruadh DeLone
Photographer DeLone, working in Rheden, Netherlands, shoots a wide variety of subjects. Those in which he achieves the look and feel of 17th century paintings in the style of the Dutch Masters are far and away my favorites. Nota Bene: The whimsical milk mustache on the first photo.
Click on for an enlarged look.
Click on for an enlarged look.
Friday, January 8, 2010
Meet Seasick Steve
Steven Gene Wold, aka Seasick Steve, is knocking them out in the UK and much of Europe. The music videos of him at the bottom of this post are at the Rock Werchter Festival in Belgium which, since 1974, has been called the world's premier music fest, lasting 4 days each year. In the UK, he's thought to be the world's coolest pensioner.
Click on and move your cursor over the screen to check him out:
Born in Oakland, California in 1941 (68 years old), Wold left home at 13 to avoid abuse at the hands of his stepfather, and lived rough and on the road in Tennessee, Mississippi and elsewhere, until 1973. He would travel long distances by hopping freight trains, looking for work as a farm labourer or in other seasonal jobs, often living as a hobo. At various times, Wold worked as a carnie, cowboy and a migrant worker. Of this time he once said: "Hobos are people who move around looking for work, tramps are people who move around but don't look for work, and bums are people who don't move and don't work. I've been all three."
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
Even More Bloodroot by Amy Greene
Bloodroot by Amy Greene
Bloodroot is that rare sort of family saga that feels intimate instead of epic. Set in Tennessee’s Smoky Mountains, it’s told largely in tandem voices that keep watchful eyes on Myra Lamb. She is a child of the mountain, tied to the land in ways that mystify and enchant those around her. There’s magic to Myra--perhaps because she has the remarkable blue eyes foretold by a nearly-forgotten family curse--but little fantasy to her life. Bloodroot is as much about the Lambs as it is about a place, one that becomes ever more vivid as generations form, break free, and knit back together. Its characters speak plainly but true, they are resilient and flawed and beautiful, and there's a near-instant empathy in reading their stories, which--even in their most visceral moments--are alluring and wonderful. --Anne BartholomewBloodroot to publish on Tuesday, January 12th, 2010.
Amazon price: Hardcover, Deckle Edge $14.97
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
"Crazy Heart" movie
Don't miss this one:
I'm am a sucker for movies about redemption.
The movie's full theme song: "The Weary Kind".
I think this one will compete for best picture in 2010.
The movie's full theme song: "The Weary Kind".
I think this one will compete for best picture in 2010.
Thursday, December 31, 2009
The Painter's Apprentice
Click on:
Title: The Painter's Apprentice. (Rotterdam, 1627)
A current photo that captures the style of 17th Century painters.
by Edd Carlile - from his "Faces Of The Past" series.
Title: The Painter's Apprentice. (Rotterdam, 1627)
A current photo that captures the style of 17th Century painters.
by Edd Carlile - from his "Faces Of The Past" series.
Simulating the Camera Obscura technique (Latin for "dark room"; "darkened chamber") popular with 17th century painters.
Tuesday, December 29, 2009
WLAC Radio - Nashville
Back in the 1950s, when white teenagers were just beginning to discover that Pat Boone's version of "Ain't That A Shame" was not the original, a radio station in Nashville, Tennessee, was beaming rhythm and blues and gospel music to millions of young listeners, each discretely tuning his dial to 1510 on the AM dial late into the evening hours.
It was 10:00 pm in the East, bed time for many a schoolkid. But, if the weather was cooperative and the tuner sensitive enough, wonderful sounds soon began to issue forth. Not Perry Como, not the Chordettes, certainly not Pat Boone. No, here streaming directly into our bedrooms were the strange, new, and wonderful tones of Chuck Berry, Jimmy Reed, Fats Domino, Lightning Hopkins, Muddy Waters, Little Junior Parker, The Spaniels, Sonny Boy Williamson, Howling Wolf, and Etta James.
Jimmy Reed-"Baby What You Want Me To Do?"
Here was something special, something to be shared only with your very best friends, not with those jerks at school who didn't know about it and couldn't understand it if they did. Here was something that made you wish you could soundproof the door to your room or, perhaps, buy a pair of headphones, all to insure that listening bliss might continue into the wee hours when your mother assumed that you had long been asleep.
(Who didn't know what this song was about?)
Gene Nobles was on WLAC for Randy's Record Shop. Nothing characterized the WLAC listening experience more than the nightly program sponsored by "The World's Largest Mail Order Phonograph Record Shop" -- Randy's Record Shop in Gallatin, Tennessee. They must have done a heck of a business. No street address, no post office box ... just "Gallatin, Tennessee."
During the mid-'50s, Randy's sponsored what may have been the most listened to disc jockey show in the country. Introduced by the nostalgic tones of "Suwannee River Boogie" by Albert Ammons, "Randy's Record Hi-Lights" was broadcast on clear-channel WLAC at 10:15 pm Central Time, six nights a week--and at 11:00 pm on Sunday. And 50,000 watts of power insured that it could be heard all over the East, South, and Mid-West, probably in Canada and Mexico as well.
Gene Nobles has as much claim as anyone to being the first to play rhythm and blues records for a racially mixed audience and developing a distinctive deejay "patter." Gene called it "Slanguage" and it included such phrases as "from the heart of my bottom." Mr. Nobles passed away in 1989.
Commercials by regular sponsors: Click on to listen.
Live Baby Chicks
Royal Crown Hair Dressing
Ernie's Record Mart
Randy's Record Shop
"Randy" was Randy Wood, a successful entrepreneur whose catalog boasted that his shop was "The Home of the World's Largest Stock of Recorded Music. Randy was patriotic too, offering a "10% discount to all men and women now serving in the Armed Forces." Lest we forget, these records were "also available in 45 r.p.m."
Giving Randy's show a run for the money was the program sponsored by the venerable Ernie's Record Mart, at 179 3rd Avenue North, Nashville, Tennessee. "Ernie's Record Parade" could also be heard every night. It was a one-hour show broadcast Monday through Friday at 9:00 pm Central Time and on Saturday from 8:00 until 9:45 pm. On Sunday night the "all spiritual" show began at 8:30.
The host on Ernie's show was the steadfast "John R." His full name was John Richbourg and he began working at WLAC in 1942. His distinct, deep, and sometimes gravelly voice, together with his "hep-cat" patter combined to confuse many listeners into believing that he was a black man. Actually, he was a white man who had come to WLAC following stints at other stations and a youthful attempt to pursue a career on the musical stage. John R. signed off for the last time on June 28, 1973. As late as the 1980s, Mr. Richbourg was answering letters from his fans, sending out autographed photos, and selling tapes of his programs.
Herman Grizzard
Youthful insomniacs and dedicated listener's could stay up past midnight in the East and listen to the third in the nightly series of record-shop-sponsored shows, this one brought to us courtesy of Buckley's Record Shop. Buckley's show, entitled "After Hours," was introduced by the theme song "After Hours" by Erskine Hawkins. The host disc jockey was a gentleman who seemed to be older than Gene Nobles or John R (and was). That gentleman was Herman Grizzard, who had been with the station since the '30s. Each of these record shops offered "special" packages of records available by mail order at a group price. As I recall, each 5-record special from Ernie's was offered for a period of a couple months and was called something like Ernie's "Bullseye" Special or some similar name that would distinguish it from, say, Ernie's "Blue Ribbon" Special. Five records for three dollars or so was a great deal too, as long as you didn't mind having a ringer or two in the group--some title that you probably wouldn't have otherwise purchased. I mean ... did someone really want a copy of "Gumbo Mombo" by Guitar Gable?
Bill "Hoss" Allen was yet another popular dee-jay at WLAC. After graduating from Vanderbilt in 1948, Allen began his radio career at WHIN in his hometown of Gallatin, Tennessee, hosting "Harlem Hop." Allen soon moved to WLAC, initially filling in where needed, ultimately taking over the 10:15 to midnight spot, when Gene Nobles retired.
The "Hossman" also hosted many gospel programs. Indeed, in 1981, Savoy Records released an LP (SL 14627) entitled: Bill "Hoss" Allen Presents "Let's Go To The Program." Subtitled "Twelve of America's Greatest Gospel Groups," the record includes recordings by such groups as The Swan Silvertones, The Soul Stirrers, and The Original Blind Boys of Alabama, introduced by Allen and altered to include applause, as though the performances were actually live, in concert.
Atttribution: Jim Lowe's recollections (edited for length)
I have awfully fond memories of lying in bed late at night with that faint, tiny red light glow on my radio, turned down low... just listening away to WLAC. (DNJ)
Gene Nobles was on WLAC for Randy's Record Shop. Nothing characterized the WLAC listening experience more than the nightly program sponsored by "The World's Largest Mail Order Phonograph Record Shop" -- Randy's Record Shop in Gallatin, Tennessee. They must have done a heck of a business. No street address, no post office box ... just "Gallatin, Tennessee."
During the mid-'50s, Randy's sponsored what may have been the most listened to disc jockey show in the country. Introduced by the nostalgic tones of "Suwannee River Boogie" by Albert Ammons, "Randy's Record Hi-Lights" was broadcast on clear-channel WLAC at 10:15 pm Central Time, six nights a week--and at 11:00 pm on Sunday. And 50,000 watts of power insured that it could be heard all over the East, South, and Mid-West, probably in Canada and Mexico as well.
Gene Nobles has as much claim as anyone to being the first to play rhythm and blues records for a racially mixed audience and developing a distinctive deejay "patter." Gene called it "Slanguage" and it included such phrases as "from the heart of my bottom." Mr. Nobles passed away in 1989.
Commercials by regular sponsors: Click on to listen.
Live Baby Chicks
Royal Crown Hair Dressing
Ernie's Record Mart
Randy's Record Shop
"Randy" was Randy Wood, a successful entrepreneur whose catalog boasted that his shop was "The Home of the World's Largest Stock of Recorded Music. Randy was patriotic too, offering a "10% discount to all men and women now serving in the Armed Forces." Lest we forget, these records were "also available in 45 r.p.m."
Giving Randy's show a run for the money was the program sponsored by the venerable Ernie's Record Mart, at 179 3rd Avenue North, Nashville, Tennessee. "Ernie's Record Parade" could also be heard every night. It was a one-hour show broadcast Monday through Friday at 9:00 pm Central Time and on Saturday from 8:00 until 9:45 pm. On Sunday night the "all spiritual" show began at 8:30.
The host on Ernie's show was the steadfast "John R." His full name was John Richbourg and he began working at WLAC in 1942. His distinct, deep, and sometimes gravelly voice, together with his "hep-cat" patter combined to confuse many listeners into believing that he was a black man. Actually, he was a white man who had come to WLAC following stints at other stations and a youthful attempt to pursue a career on the musical stage. John R. signed off for the last time on June 28, 1973. As late as the 1980s, Mr. Richbourg was answering letters from his fans, sending out autographed photos, and selling tapes of his programs.
Herman Grizzard
Youthful insomniacs and dedicated listener's could stay up past midnight in the East and listen to the third in the nightly series of record-shop-sponsored shows, this one brought to us courtesy of Buckley's Record Shop. Buckley's show, entitled "After Hours," was introduced by the theme song "After Hours" by Erskine Hawkins. The host disc jockey was a gentleman who seemed to be older than Gene Nobles or John R (and was). That gentleman was Herman Grizzard, who had been with the station since the '30s. Each of these record shops offered "special" packages of records available by mail order at a group price. As I recall, each 5-record special from Ernie's was offered for a period of a couple months and was called something like Ernie's "Bullseye" Special or some similar name that would distinguish it from, say, Ernie's "Blue Ribbon" Special. Five records for three dollars or so was a great deal too, as long as you didn't mind having a ringer or two in the group--some title that you probably wouldn't have otherwise purchased. I mean ... did someone really want a copy of "Gumbo Mombo" by Guitar Gable?
Bill "Hoss" Allen was yet another popular dee-jay at WLAC. After graduating from Vanderbilt in 1948, Allen began his radio career at WHIN in his hometown of Gallatin, Tennessee, hosting "Harlem Hop." Allen soon moved to WLAC, initially filling in where needed, ultimately taking over the 10:15 to midnight spot, when Gene Nobles retired.
The "Hossman" also hosted many gospel programs. Indeed, in 1981, Savoy Records released an LP (SL 14627) entitled: Bill "Hoss" Allen Presents "Let's Go To The Program." Subtitled "Twelve of America's Greatest Gospel Groups," the record includes recordings by such groups as The Swan Silvertones, The Soul Stirrers, and The Original Blind Boys of Alabama, introduced by Allen and altered to include applause, as though the performances were actually live, in concert.
Atttribution: Jim Lowe's recollections (edited for length)
I have awfully fond memories of lying in bed late at night with that faint, tiny red light glow on my radio, turned down low... just listening away to WLAC. (DNJ)
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
Talley Ho! – a new blog.
|
Friday, December 11, 2009
Lady Lisa
Every Picture Tells a Story
by Sandy Powers
Lady Lisa. I saw her and had to photograph her so I got up my nerve and went and asked to take her photo. She was delighted, and talked to me for a long time about how she used to be a model. I showed her the picture and she really liked it !
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
Poetry by Beth Ann Fennelly
Beth Ann Fennelly, an OA contributor, reads at The Oxford American magazine's 10th anniversary Southern Music Issue release party at Ground Zero Blues Club in Clarksdale, Miss.
In my opinion, Beth Ann Fennelly who teaches at Ole Miss — along with her husband, novelist, short story writer, Tom Franklin — is the best US poet of this decade. Her poem, The Kudzu Chronicles, is the best contemporary Southern poem (and I have read a lot of them) out there.
First Warm Day in a College Town
Today is the day the first bare-chested
runners appear, coursing down College Hill
as I drive to campus to teach, hard
not to stare because it’s only February 15,
and though I now live in the South,
I spent my girlhood in frigid Illinois
hunting Easter eggs in snow,
or trick-or-treating in the snow,
an umbrella protecting my cardboard wings,
so now it’s hard not to see these taut colts
as my reward, these yearlings testing the pasture,
hard as they come toward my Nissan
not to turn my head as they pound past,
hard not to angle the mirror
to watch them cruise down my shoulder,
too hard, really, when I await them like crocuses,
search for their shadows
as others do the grounghog’s, and suddenly
here they are, the boys without shirts,
how fleet of foot, how cute their buns, I have made it
again, it is spring.
Hard to recall just now
that these are the torsos of my students,
or my past or future students, who every year
grow one year younger, get one year fewer
of my funny jokes and hip references
to Fletch and Nirvana, which means
some year if they catch me admiring
the hair downing their chests, centering
between their goalposts of hipbones,
then going undercover beneath their shorts,
the thin red or blue nylon shorts, the fabric
of flapping American flags or the rigid sails of boats —
some year, if they catch me admiring, they won’t
grin grins that make me, busted,
grin back — hard to know a spring will come
when I’ll have to train my eyes
on the dash, the fuel gauge nearing empty,
hard to think of that spring, that
distant spring, that very very very
(please God) distant
spring.
This poem opens her 2008 book of poems:
UNMENTIONABLES
Friday, November 6, 2009
Original Civil War Photographs
Variously referred to as The Civil War by most everyone, but in the South you'll hear it often called as The War Between The States. Oh, and for those "unreconstructed" Southern souls, it's sometimes called The War of Northern Aggression. Your call.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
