yesteryear

First broadcast on this day in 1973 in most markets as Season 1, Episode 2 of Star Trek: The Animated Series—with the exception being Los Angles where George Takei was running for public office and this programme which did not feature his voice-acting was substituted so as not to run afoul of equal-air-time clauses—this classic was authored by D. C. Fontana and for its elegant handling of fractured time-lines is considered among the best episodes of the series. Captain Kirk and First Officer Spock return to the Enterprise after conducting a series of time travel excursions with only to find that they have somehow altered the past where Spock never joins the crew and must repair the time-line.

oh boy!

Conceived and produced by Jack Good (*1931 - †2017) for ITV and first airing on this day in 1958, this weekly programme was the premier teenage all-music and dance show. Each episode featured an artist in resident with a number of special guests, including repeat appearances by Cliff Richard, Tommy Steele, Marty Wilde, Billy Fury and the Dallas Boys, many performers whom Good also managed. After a two year-run, Good experimented with the format and made Shindig!—which directly influenced Ready Steady Go and other similar shows.

kuba komet

Only associating Wolfenbüttel with the digestif Jägermeister, we were grateful for friend of the blog Nag on the Lake for letting us also know about the town’s console furniture (Tonmöbel) factory that specialised in housing and cabinets for radio, record players and televisions. In operation from 1948 to 1972, the pieces often integrated into one luxury home entertainment unit, founded by inventor and entrepreneur Gerhard Kubetschek (*1909 - †1976), like the pictured model, a true status-symbol and epitome of Mid-Century Modern. More to explore at the links above.

7x7

terrorstorm: the garbage documentaries that fulled the cult of conspiracy theorist, fragility and New Age Paranoia  

chestbursters and facehuggers:an official Alien xenomorph cookbook to liven up the dinner table  

en hobbits äventyr: Moomins’ creator Tove Jansson illustrates Tolkien’s work 

skeuomorphs: vestigial, hidden parts of consumer electronics  

docudrama: a guide to making a Netflix style serial on the topic of one’s choosing  

next sunday a.d.: a neglected remix, compilation of the MST3K Satellite of Love theme  

white rabbit: redpilling (previously) and the regime

season 1, episode 1

Though first broadcast in Canada two days before and being the sixth filmed instalment in the line-up, “The Man Trap” airing on this day for US audiences on this day in 1966 is considered the franchise’s premiere, picked among the other more establishing plots due to its theme and inclusion of alien monsters.
Informing The Next Generation’s Season 3, Episode 3 (“The Survivors”) with the homesteading Kevin and Rishon Uxbridge who want nothing to do with the Enterprise’s offers of assistance or rescue, the inhabitants of M-113 operating an archaeological research operation shun visitors. The last members of a dead civilisation hungered for salt which they extracted from several red shirt ensigns with deadly consequence and roamed the corridors of the ship for more. Several mid-twenty-third-century salt-shakers were designed and intended as props but fearing that twentieth century viewers would be confused, the vials and containers instead became regular items in Doctor McCoy’s sick bay, his decade-old history with one of the interlopers forwarding the plot.

6x6

circumhorizon arc: a rare Fire Rainbow photographed—via TYWKIWDBI 

mars & beyond: Walt Disney’s robot pal Garco takes us on a speculative journey in search of extraterrestrial life 

rip: legendary NBC weather man Willard Scott has passed away, aged eighty-seven  

escape artist: immersive exhibits speak to our communal sensory experience  

valley of the dolls: Peerless Playthings pretend pills  

cloudspotting: the World Meteorological Organisation added aspertias as a supplementary feature in 2017 Cloud Atlas—see also

most sensational, inspirational, celebrational

Originally airing on the British ITV network before being picked up in syndication for American audiences, Jim Henson’s Muppet Show was first broadcast on this day in 1976—the characters and premise previewed with two pilots the previous two years, the first subtitled the Valentine Show with guest star Mia Farrow and Sex and Violence with an all Muppet cast.  

The first episode featured Joel Grey, the Master of Ceremonies from Cabaret, with the guest act being “Wilkommen” and father of Jennifer of Dirty Dancing fame. Musical numbers, guest interviews are interspersed with Fozzie Bear’s comedy routines, Gonzo’s random act of destruction and Muppet News flashes. The Swedish Chef’s cooking segments appeared in episode two.  Coincidentally on the same date five years earlier, the BBC was offered Sesame Street but rejected to add it to their programming schedule, framing the show as “indoctrination and a dangerous extension of the use of television” and having “authoritarian aims.” Independent broadcasters eventually brought the educational programme to the UK.

i never had one myself, enough to remember. i was torn from the thigh of zeus.

Airing for the first time on this day in 1993, Sam Newfield’s 1944 juvenile delinquency exploitation flick was rediscovered through its MST3K lampoon (from the same director as Lost Continent and RADAR Secret Service) and elevated to the status of a cult classic, when defendant and mild-mannered teen Jimmy Wilson indicts his absent and alcoholic parents and lays the blame for his charge of manslaughter squarely on his substandard upbringing. Wilson is unwittingly recruited into a ring fencing stolen jewellery whose activity eventually results in the killing of a security guard and fearing reprisal and the consequences of associating with these criminal elements becomes a fugitive from justice for an indeterminate length of time. Jimmy is convinced to return to stand in court for his involvement.

modes, jerry, modes!

Via Waxy, we find this rather arrestingly brilliant version of the Miles Davis’ classic “A Kind of Blue” by Zach Lapidus in the style of the theme from Seinfeld, which tracks as the opening was improvised and freshly recorded for each episode.

space: 1999

Though only running for two seasons, the titular BBC programme (renewed the second year by ITC Entertainment) that premiered on this day in 1975 was quite ahead of its time and established among many other tropes the “cold open” scene that preceded the credit sequence, itself boldly a spin-off of a narrative in the Supermarionation production Thunderbirds by the same creative duo Sylvia and Gerry Anderson in non-puppet form. A radioactive waste dump on the far side of the Moon, detected by the research staff at Lunar Base Alpha, experiences a magnetic anomaly, which causes the material to reach critical mass and triggers a thermonuclear explosion 13 September 1999 and propels the Earth’s satellite into deep space. This spaceship Moon wanders into a black hole and several “space warps” to continue its exploration of the Cosmos.

gumbasia

Released on this day in 1955 and with jazz accompaniment by Mel Powell, this short—named in homage to Disney’s Fantasia, was Art Clokey’s first stop-motion animation in the medium (Claymation is something else and proprietary and believe it only applies narrowly to the studio that made the California Raisins), produced while attending the University of Southern California under cinematic studies professor Slavko Vorkapić (see previously). The surreal short with abstract figures pulsing to the rhythm was filmed on a ping-pong table and informs the later franchises of Davey and Goliath and Gumby and Friends.

live at five

This 1979 industrial (as in in the trade) theme music anthology really revs one up for the network news, coming in strong with the familiar-sounding opening track by Craig Palmer Energy, a masterpiece of the genre. There are multiple volumes of Palmer’s works, both for syndication and for one-off events, though we were unable to find out more about this rather prolific and pervasive composer unfortunately—though not everyone wants a biopic and we can appreciate letting one’s works speak for themselves—that formed the soundscape of televised reporting and sports coverage (see also) in the 1980s. More bracing openings and interstitials coming up in the panel below.

i never did anything out of the blue

Coming in at number one of the UK charts on this day in 1980, David Bowie’s following-up on the narrative for Major Tom, a darker bookmarking of the intervening decade, is described as a nuanced retelling of a nursery rhyme with its attendant cautionary tale. Co-directed by Bowie and David Mallet (also collaborating on “Boys Keep Swinging,” “DJ,” and “Look Back in Anger” and Boomtown Rats’ “I Don’t Like Mondays”), the music video, costing a quarter million pounds to produce, was the most expensive at the time and features the performer dressed as pantomime, commedia dell’arte stock character Pierrot, the sad, introspective clown.

7x7

wait for the beep: a growing collection of found-sounds in the form of answering machine narratives—via Memo of the Air  

potatopoty: superlative tubers  

yaxety sax: string ensemble performs the 1968 instrumental from Spider Rich and Boots Randolph 

the metz address: Philip K. Dick (previously) speaks to an audience in 1977 at a sci-fi convention in France 

say taliban, move your minivans: November 2001 Saturday Night Live sketch “Kandahar Dance Party” recirculating to mixed responses 

dateline: Merv Griffin’s short-lived 1985 game show Headline Chasers  

dear friends of mine, please write a line in this little wash tubbs book of mine—help me keep you in my mind: a comic scrapbook chronicling the Great Depression, via Nag on the Lake’s Sunday Links (lots more to see there)

ewtn

Founded in 1980 by Mother Angelica (Rita Antoinette Rizzo, *1923 - †2016) of the Poor Clares (appropriately) of Perpetual Adoration and first beginning broadcasting on this day, the Feast of the Assumption, in 1981 from a studio in a converted garage of a monastery in Irondale, Alabama, the Eternal Word Television Network grew to become a global media empire, providing round the clock devotional and catechetical programming, daily mass and papal news.

there ain’t no hill or mountain we can’t climb

Beginning a three-week streak at the top of the US charts on this in 1965, the ballad by Sonny Bono written for and performed with his then-wife Cher (previously) was inspired by Bob Dylan’s folk rock hit for the Turtles “It Ain’t Me Babe” with Bono expressing the opposite sentiment. In 1993, Cher recorded a cover-version with the animated characters Beavis and Butt-Head as a single from their comedy album The Beavis and Butt-Head Experience. That song also rated highly on international music rankings. In 2016, Cher performed a parody of it called “I Got you Bae” with commentary on relationships in the era of social media. Personally, we thought the best version—other than the performance on their variety hour in 1976—was Dorothy and Sophia as the duo on The Golden Girls.

6x6

clink clink: a snappy little animated short of guests at cocktail hour 

samarkand: an East German couple’s tour of Uzbekistan fifty years ago with photography from 1971 and 2021  

expectation management: a comprehensive look into how the Delta variant changes the pandemic endgame—via Kottke  

noah’s violin: the twelve metre long wooden stringed instrument is a floating stage, inaugurated along with Project Moses to protect Venice from flooding  

the rural juror: a spoof streaming service (see also)—via JWZ  

the effect is shattering: a vodka advertising campaign that became a snow clone

mst3k s10e13

Airing first on this day in 1999, lampooning the 1968 cinematic adaptation of the long-running Italian comic Diabolik, this episode marked the series finale marked the end of a decade-long experiment subjecting the crew of the Satellite of Love to bad movies. The super villain of the film wreaks havoc along with his girlfriend Eva and sidekick Ginko across Europe for his own amusement and financial gain but also fights wrong-doing with wrong-doing, sadistically punishing criminal activity not aligned with his own. Generally panned outside of Italy as the creators assume familiarity with the characters, the direction of Mario Bava with score by Ennio Morricone later was recognised for its cinematography and became regarded as a cult classic, re-evaluated after the Mystery Science Theater 3000 treatment, a year prior scenes featuring in the Beastie Boys music video for Body Movin’. Over the course of the episode, the satellite is inadvertently deorbited and returned to Earth with the mad scientist and her henchmen in the lair Castle Forrester liquidating assets and lining up new employment.  There is a touching final farewell.  The show was happily rebooted in 2017 though never fully out of production in the interim.

the nomi song

Born Klaus Sperber in Swäbish Immenstadt in 1944, aspiring counter tenor who adopted the stage persona Klaus Nomi, worked as an usher in the opera houses of West Berlin, entertaining the crew during set breakdowns with arias and studied music yet was unable to secure a steady position and so switched to the confectionary business which later became somewhat of a trademark. Moving to New York City in 1973, Nomi received more professional training and took various gigs performing and developing his presence. His breakthrough moment came in 1979 when David Bowie engaged Nomi as a background singer during performances on Saturday Night Live as musical guest. Being discovered afforded more venues for his unique shows whose robotic demeanour and elaborate costuming both anticipating and reflected the stage presence of acts like Bowie’s and Peter Gabriel and reinterpreted songs like Marlene Dietrich’s “Falling in Love Again” and Chubby Checker’s “Twist” as well as classical, operatic numbers in an abstract, highly synthesised fashion. The black and white palette complemented by cubist clothes and hair-styles that referenced both the Bauhaus theatre movement, kabuki and the retro-future vision of the 1920s—particularly the film Metropolis. A decade after coming to New York, Nomi was diagnosed with AIDS and though growing sick and weak already embarked on a European tour and the talk show circuit, anticipating it would be his last, Nomi dying of complications of the disease on this day in 1983. One of the first figures from the arts community to publically die from the relatively then unknown illness, Nomi became posthumously the subject of many tributes and homages, acknowledging his stylistic influence.

billing block

With a portfolio to match any one in the industry, creating the iconic movie posters for all sorts of films in the seventies and eighties from Chinatown to Flash Gordon to the documentary of Woodstock, we appreciated the introduction to the graphic designer Richard Amsel (*1947 - †1985) from Reagan Ray and the artist’s distinctive soft, decorative signature style. Prolific and stellar, Amsel’s career was cut short after a diagnosis of AIDS and dying three months later—prompting many tributes and memorials that sustain his indelible legacy. Peruse a whole gallery of Amsel’s work at the link above.