heavy petting (12. 785)

Despite (or because of) its ban by the BBC and refusal to air the chanson on the radio or on Top of the Pops for its overtly sexual content, the song whose title translates to “I love you … me neither”—originally composed by Gainsbourg for Brigitte Bardot in 1967—the Serge Gainsbourg and Jane Birkin duet rose to number one on the UK and Irish charts on this day in 1969, the first foreign language one to do so. Prolific and iconic songwriter Gainsbourg (previously) was ordered after a particularly bad date by his then-girlfriend Bardot (see also) to write the ultimate love song as penance—which the two later recorded in a studio together. After the session Bardot begged Gainsbourg to never release it—he complied but was upset that his singular attempt at writing a love song would go unheard. Breaking up with Bardot the next year, Gainsbourg’s on-screen tryst with English actress Birkin during the filming of the romantic comedy Slogan turned into a real-life affair—at first for the sake of the project—with Gainsbourg latter seducing her with the private recording made with his ex. For admittedly selfish reasons, motivated by the fact she wanted no one else to record it, Birkin agreed to perform the track. The title «Je t'aime... moi non plus» was inspired by a quotation of Salvador Dalí that “Picasso is Spanish, me too. Picasso is a genius, me too. Picasso is a communist, me neither.” Despite Birkin’s lasting imprint (Gainsbourg directed her in an erotic film of the same name in 1976), it was revealed later that Gainsbourg also approached Marianne Faithfull to do the duet and by 1986, Bardot had reconsidered her position and persuaded Gainbourg to release their original recording. An instrumental version was played during the opening ceremony of the 2024 Paris Paralympics.

*    *    *    *    *

synchronoptica

one year ago: Texas Chainsaw Massacre (with synchronopticæ) plus a last day on the Havel

sixteen years ago: an awful trollish post on Obama winning the Nobel Peace prize that we’re ashamed we made and feel very differently now

seventeen years ago: fleeing interconnections to a new Dark Age 

an irwin allen production (12. 744)

Very much enjoying these tales of recycled props and sets (see previously here and here), we were thrilled that not only did the author get to see his namesake disaster flick on the big screen for the first time, that cinematic experience allowed him pinpoint the provenance of elements of the decor.  The golden panels that clad the walls of the cruise ship’s mess were repurposed from Cleopatra, and feature Egyptians and hieroglyphics although the boat is named the SS Poseidon after the Greek sea god for a bit of mixed mythology. The skylight “ceiling” of the ballroom is also the backdrop of the Harmonia Gardens number featured in Hello Dolly!—both the Taylor and Streisand films being a huge expense for the studios, it made sense to do some double-dipping. Much more from Poseidon’s Underworld at the link above.

fly towards those dreams you’ve left so very, so very far behind (12. 516)

Released on this day in 1969, Empty Sky is Elton John’s debut studio album, and the harpsichord track (later remastered with piano and orchestra for Don’t Shoot Me—I’m Only the Piano Player) below, which became the most famous and enduring song from the record still occasionally performed at live shows and in 1990 for the funeral service of young HIV/AIDS victim Ryan White, has been described by the duo of John and Taupin as their first collaboration that they were genuinely excited about putting out. Although the premier work never topped the charts, critics roundly agreed that it deserved a deep listen and demonstrated John’s potential. The hymn’s lyrics give the account of a pigeon flying high and free after being released from its metal coop by a sympathetic hand.

turnabout intruder (12. 506)

Courtesy of our faithful chronicler we are reminded that on this day in 1969, the originally scheduled broadcast preempted more than two months due to special network coverage following the death of former president Dwight Eisenhower (see also here and here), the original run of Star Trek came to a rather ignominious end with its final episode (previously), two years short of its five year mission. Responding to a cry for help from an archaeological team on an Alpha Quadrant planet, (Captain’s log, Stardate 5928.5: The Enterprise has received a distress call from a group of scientists on Camus II, who are exploring the ruins of a dead civilisation. Their situation is desperate. Two of the survivors are the expedition’s surgeon, Dr Coleman and the leader of the expedition Dr Janice Lester) Kirk is reunited with a former romantic interest from his Academy days, the latter being attended by the former who claims that she is suffering from acute radiation poisoning which killed the others. Lester and Kirk reminisce about their shared time in training, Lester blaming Starfleet’s patriarchal culture and sexism for halting her career progression and activating an alien technology to Freaky Friday their life-entities and switch bodies, with Lester as Kirk taking command of the ship and remanding Kirk as Lester to sick bay. In a course of events that are a carefully constructed indictment against Lester’s ambitious takeover and a tribunal ensues to declare Lester unfit for command with the imposter Kirk pushing back against this mutiny. Eventually the crew realises that the captain is not himself and the two personalities are once again swapped with the alien artefact. Dismissive of Lester’s hysteria, the final lines of dialogue, spoken by Kirk restored in his own body are “Her life could have been as rich as any woman’s—if only… if only…” Poorly received by audiences and considered one of the worst episodes of the original series—though in fairness, the the show was cancelled prematurely and did not have the chance to complete its story arc as planned, critics found it to be misogynistic and playing into the prejudices and sexism that Dr Lester had sought to overcome.

nederbeat (12. 213)

Topping the singles charts on the Billboard Top 100 on this day in 1970—repeating the accomplishment on several other markets internationally, as our faithful chronicler informs—the song by Shocking Blue, covered many times including by Bananarama in 1986 (though the studio discouraging a release as a dance tune) and also reaching number one shares lyrical etymology with the nineteenth century standard “Oh! Susanna.” The band’s lead vocalist, not fluent in English Mariska Veres—whom later released an album of jazz and lounge renditions of 60s and 70s pop hits—recorded and performed the song as written, typo included, as “A godness [sic] on a mountain top,” which was corrected in tribute releases.

dioecesis selenis (11. 725)

Delving the depths of Wikipedia, we learn via Neatorama that the bishop of the diocese of Orlando, Florida established in 1968, citing the 1917 Code of Canon Law (Iuris Codex Canonici) which extended pastoral jurisdiction over newly discovered territories to the episcopal authority of the diocese from which the expedition was launched, claimed the Moon in the name of the Church, his appointment coinciding with the Apollo missions to the lunar surface. With a counter-claimant in the archbishop of New York as vicar of the Military Ordinariate as chaplain to all military bases, including Cape Canaveral, the matter was never resolved as it was ultimately a papal decision and Pope Paul VI was bemused by the question, not issuing an official response.

your good and your evil use the same methods, achieve the same results (11. 674)

Bob Canada presents a highlight reel of some of the more bizarre images that the crew of the Enterprise saw on the ship’s viewscreen during the course of the original run of Star Trek: TOS, with their encounter with Space Lincoln in “The Savage Curtain” (S3:E22) with the super-intelligent rock-like Excliaban having created the presidential look-alike (along with a facsimile of the renowned Vulcan philosopher Surak) to better explore the concepts of good and evil, pitting these two upstanding figures against a cast of villains, including Genghis Khan and Klingon warlord Kahless with Kirk and Spock as seconds in the duel. Despite knowing that the great statesman is an artifice of matter-energy conversion, the Captain accords his personal hero with full honours upon boarding the ship.

synchronoptica

one year ago: assorted links worth revisiting (with synchronoptica)

seven years ago: neutral facial posture plus the fall of Constantinople

eight years ago: Stephen Hawking’s stalker plus a short hiatus

nine years ago: absquatulate, cartoon tropes plus Freedomland, USA

ten years ago: peace vigils in Germany

space cowboy (11. 529)

Before Star Wars or even the failed vision of Alejandro Jodorowsky’s Dune—see also, a writer-director called Tony Foutz, who was also friends to the planned main cast, conceived of a sci-fi, fantasy project called Saturation 70, a retelling of Alice in Wonderland, in which a Victorian child falls through a wormhole and discovers himself in a dystopian Los Angeles after the climate collapse and his befriended by a group of time-travelling aliens to save the Earth from pollution—the extra-terrestrials are outfitted in hazmat suits against the toxic atmosphere, the title referencing the tolerance for carbon monoxide in blood. To star the then five-year-old son of Rolling Stone Brian Jones, country singer Gram Parsons, Michelle Phillips of The Mamas and the Papas and Nudie Cohn, much of the principal footage had already been shot before funding fell through and the production called off, many scenes filmed without a permit during a 1969 convention of alien abductees at Giant Rock near Joshua Tree in the Mojave Desert. Douglas Trumbull who created the special effects for 2001 and later The Andromeda Strain was also involved. Aside from a brief showreel and a few stills, the film has been lost and regarded by cinephiles and Parsons’ fans as a rumour, nearly undocumented for nearly four decades, only a gallery showing in 2014 at London’s Horse Hospital but the story is being told in book form, featuring some never before published on-set photographs and scripts. More from Dangerous Minds at the link up above.

8x8 (11. 358)

compound interest: Trump’s accumulated lawsuits amount to over half a billion dollars  

vivi o preferibilmente morti: Poseidon’s Underworld reviews a 1969 Spaghetti Western  

epistolary doll: Kafka, a little girl and her beloved, lost toy—via the New Shelton wet/dry 

the wonderful night of hercules brown: a 1968 short film guiding a young boy through his dreams with the help of muppets and puppets 

millions of cats: Wanda Hazel Gág’s 1928 children’s book—the oldest American title still in print  

leaning toward more grasshopper, less ant: raising children on the eve of the AI revolution—via tmn  

hero’s journey: a video poking fun at the tropes and archetypes of found in every epic quest—see previously  

never surrender high-tops: Trump launches gold trainers line, goes public with his social network in order to earn cash to pay for his legal judgments—see previously

turned off (11. 326)

Via our faithful chronicler, we learn that on this day in 1969, one of the shortest-lived television programmes (see also), cut during its first and only broadcast with the time slot by some network affiliates filled by organ music, an emergency protocol that hadn’t been used in decades, Turn-On was summarily rejected for its language, quick-cuts and general poor taste. Conceived by writer-director Digby Wolfe (Bewitched, I Dream of Jeannie, That Was the Week That Was) and George Schlatter, the premise for the surreal sketch comedy series was, slotted as the replacement for Peyton Place, was as the first computerised television show with no sets except for a white backdrop and the troupe of actors to stage improv prompts generated by an artificial intelligence. Viewers were especially disturbed by the rapid-fire sensory assault consisting of experimental split-screens, puppets, computer graphics and stop-motion effects on the blank slate, as well as the Moog-synthesised laugh-track (the computer’s laughter) and the random appearance of production credits throughout the half-hour programme—rather than as an intro or outro. Not much different than than Laugh-In except in tone, Turn-On would probably sit well with today’s audiences.

strange paradise (11. 201)

Via the Abecedarian, we are introduced to the occult-supernatural soap opera that was Canada’s answer to Dark Shadows, capitalising on the unexpectedly phenomenal success of the American day-time gothic drama series. Originally syndicated in the US, it aired in three thirteen-week story arcs from October 1969 to July 1970 and was shot in Ottawa with the acting talents of Colin Fox and Tudi Wiggins. The show narrates the tragic account of a billionaire left inconsolable after the death of his wife on a remote Caribbean island, whom with the help of a local mystic, enters into a cursed contract with the spirit of a mysterious ancestor. The entire run is available below.

thread and throughline (10. 567)

Premiering on BBC2 on this day in 1969, the mini-series with the very self-aware subtitle (see previously) conceived by David Attenborough whilst overseeing the transition to colour broadcasting and thought programming about great paintings would be a good showcase and presented by art historian Kenneth Clark was the first documentary of its kind and was regarded as edifying and enlightening for general audiences, if not admittedly from a limited perspective and subject to Western chauvinism. Disclaiming comprehensiveness, the series—through the lens of Western European artists—outlined the course of history from the end of the Dark Ages through the Renaissance to early modernity. A nine part sequel, Civilisations with presenters David Olusoga, Mary Beard and Simon Schama, was produced and streamed on Netflix in March of 2018. The first five installments of the original are below.

world postal day (10.207)

The Universal Postal Union (see previously here and here) has designated this day for the annualcelebration on the anniversary of the establishment of the UPU in 1874 in Bern—the first commemorative congress called in 1969 in Tokyo. Since then, themed campaigns have been held under the auspices of this UN agency to underscore the civic importance of a reliable and accessible mail system and recognises the best postal services in a global competition.

the new people (10. 183)

Produced for a single season and clocking in at forty-five minutes per episode (a rarity for regularly-scheduled programming), the 1969 Aaron Spelling and Larry Gordon collaboration for the ABC network was developed by Rod Serling (under the pseudonym John Phillips—see previously) and centres around the struggle for survival of a group of American college freshman returning from a trip in Southeast Asia (to present as goodwill ambassadors during Vietnam) whose plane crashes on a deserted island in the Pacific, which had been slated and provisioned for a nuclear-test that never took place. Foreshadowing the later ABC series Lost, it explores rather melodramatically the premise of Lord of the Flies, killing off all of the adults and letting the young fend for themselves—plus the counterculture adage of the time not to trust anyone over thirty—and is echoed in Logan’s Run and the Star Trek episode “Miri.” Here is the pilot with the full series available online:

7x7 (10. 112)

all the news that’s fit to print: a curated collection of kiosks from around the world from Trevor Traynor—via Present /&/ Correct  

tomato cain: an anthology of the short fiction of Nigel Kneale—perhaps better known for his screenplays, like The Stone Tape Theory  

national defensive design strategy revisited: another look at the style book (see also) of the US government  

finding out that you accidentally wrote five pages in cursive: our AI wrangler Janelle Shane (previously) charges a neural network to explain human behaviour quirks  

flareup: a 1969 Raquel Welch vehicle  

wild palms: a 1993 cyberpunk soap opera that aired on US network television  

movable-type: the Ruckwanderer innovation and how the Chinese incorporated the keyboard—see previously

the moonwalk (10. 005)

To commemorate the lunar landing on this day in 1969, head barman at the Hotel Savoy’s American Bar Joe Gilmore created a champagne cocktail that ought to be revived, equal parts Grand Marnier and grapefruit juice with a dash of rosewater and topped with champagne. During Gilmore’s long tenure, spanning from when he came in as a trainee at the swanky London establishment in 1940 until his retirement in 1976, he invented many more cocktails for royalty, politicians and other celebrities—including the My Fair Lady to celebrate Julie Andrews’ opening night in the musical (equal parts gin, lemon juice, orange juice and sirop de fraise with a dash of egg white, shaken and strained) and the Link Up for the joint Apollo-Soyuz mission in 1975 (Southern Comfort and vodka, tempered with lime juice). More to explore at the links above.

helter skelter

Recorded and released on this day in 1970 in extremely poor taste by Manson himself and members of the Family in support of the cult leader’s legal defence fund by the infamous record producer Phil Kaufman (notorious for stealing the body of singer Gram Parsons and—ostensibly in accordance with Parsons’ wishes, burned his moral remains in Joshua Tree nature reserve), the cover was designed to parody the LIFE magazine cover of December 1969 with an expose of the series of murders cult members perpetrated. Though thankfully not a commercial success, several tracks were covered or sampled by several groups including The Beach Boys, Guns ‘N Roses and The Lemonheads. A second album was produced a quarter of a century later in the 1997 Family Jams. One theory proposed by the prosecution offered that along with the Book of Revelations, Manson believed he was attuned to messages revealed in the tracks and lyrics of the Beatles’ White Album. Subsequent re-releases of the recordings have raised funds to benefit crime victims.

amen corner

Hailing from Cardiff, this rock group, which was quite more than a one-hit wonder with their hits “Bend Me, Shape Me” and popular cover of “Gin House Blues” if not a bit overshadowed by contemporary bands, had their first and only chart-topping success beginning on this day in 1969, holding the number one spot for weeks with “(If Paradise Is) Half as Nice.” The song was a translated version of a popular Italio-Pop standard “Il paradiso della vita.”

fife and snare

Via the always brilliant Things Magazine, we are directed towards a digitisation of the complete—short but impactful—run of Avant Garde magazine, a project by Ralph Ginzburg and Herb Lubalin (previously here and here) that lived up to its title with articles on radical, pacifist politics and erotica.

The monogram included the nude lithographs of John Lennon and Yoko Ono plus a phantasmagorical version of Marilyn Monroe’s last photo session. The March 1969 cover featured here is the photographic composition of the award-winning professor and director Carl T. Fischer called The Spirit of 1976, the artist also known for his iconic celebrity portraits including Andy Warhol, Barbara Streisand, attorney F. Lee Bailey and boxer Muhammad Ali as Saint Sebastian.

exordium and terminus

Charting first at the number one spot in the US and UK on this day in 1969 for a run of several weeks, Zager and Evans’ song with the above parenthetical title was the duo’s only hit. The single was recorded in a single take at a studio in Odessa, Texas in a cattle pasture with members of the city’s symphony orchestra providing backup accompaniment. As the lyrical narrative advances over each successive millennia, the time and key steps up as well. Ain’t gonna need to tell the truth—tell no lies—everything you think, do and say is in the pill you took today.