Thursday 17 February 2022

chess ‘72

Via Weird Universe we are treated to this over-the-top piece of presidential memorabilia touted as the invitation to invest in America history through art in this rather ghoulish game board commemorating the year in politics with Republicans versus Democrats and portraying personages (by internationally famous sculptor Alexander Silveri for the low price of $32.45) such as Richard Nixon, Spiro Agnew, Henry Kissinger (as Queen) pitted against Hubert Humphrey, George McGovern, Edward Kennedy and Sam Yorty. There was a second version released the following year dedicated to the Watergate scandal. More at the link up top.

Saturday 12 February 2022

bib

Founded on this day in 1973 under the executive agencies of the West German Federal Ministry of the Interior (with this boss door which we can all appreciate) in Wiesbaden, the Institute for Population Research (Bundesinstitut fรผr Bevรถlkerrungsforschung) was originally charged with investigating perceived declining fertility rates in the country but has since taken on more enlightened and enlightening studies, working closely with Destatis (see previously here and here), in demographics including longevity, migration and economic mobility.

Thursday 6 January 2022

soylent green is people!

With the environment ravaged by dead oceans, pollution, poverty and scarcity, the 1973 film with Charlton Heston, Joseph Cotten based on Make Room! Make Room! the science-fiction novel on resource-hoarding and over-population by Harry Harrison is set in the milieu of 2022. The titular foodstuff is reportedly harvested from plankton and in short-supply due to popularity. During investigations, however, it is determined that the seas are no longer viable and the protein is sourced to human remains gathered during protests by “scoops” and state-sanctioned euthanasia.

Sunday 2 January 2022

7x7

2020—too…: the moment it hits you 

the colours of motion: spectral analysis of contemporary film classics  

the timekeepers of eternity: a printed, pagination interpretation of Steven King’s novella The Langoliers  

forefather time: on the trial of the masqueraded, marauding Jukace that herald the New Year for one Polish city  

visual vernacular: Jayme Odgers—one of the montage artists behind California’s New Wave aesthetic, creates a legacy repository of his works 

ham and banana hollandaise: a cursed collection of dishes from McCall’s Great American Recipe Card Collection 

those we’ve lost: a more comprehensive compilation of celebrity obituaries from the past year from Bob Canada’s Blogworld

Saturday 1 January 2022

space music

Begun a decade earlier as a three-hour-long radio programme featuring contemplative, ambient music with a selection of classical, Celtic, electronic and experimental genres airing late nights in the Berkley-area hosted by “Timotheo” (Stephen Hill) and “Annamystic” (Anna Turner), Hearts of Space entered syndication of National Public Radio on this day in 1983 and is still going strong, with over thirteen hundred transmissions (episodes) in their archives. The longest-running show of its type, each instalment signs-off with “Safe journeys, space fans—wherever you are.”

Sunday 21 November 2021

8x8

turnspit: eccentric, utilitarian canine breeds that have passed out of fashion but could be revived—via Nag on the Lake’s Sunday Links (lots more to see there) 

ball-and-chain: this leashless ankle weight system to control one’s toddler will only make baby invincible—via Super Punch  

miss spirit world 1960: a pageant sourced in spectral photography of the departed  

something—that if true, you couldn’t handle it: a close reading of the recently indicted QANon Shaman’s manifesto  

on รฉcrit aussi ielle: the authoritative French language Petit Robert adds a third, gender-neutral personal pronoun—a concatenation of the masculine and feminine forms (see also)  

the midnight special: eight hours of footage from David Bowie’s television programme the “The 1980 Floor Show,” an episode guest-curated by the artist  

hocus-pocus: the hidden overhauls happening the faรงades of Russian construction sites (see also)  

yes, this is dog: a video phone that allows apartment-bound dogs to call their humans

Wednesday 20 October 2021

bennelong point

Occupying the titular headland, known as Tubowgule by the indigenous Gadigal people, the Sydney Opera House on the harbor, originally designed by Jรธrn Utzon, and considered one of the more distinguishing structures and venues of the past century, had its official grand opening on this day in 1973. Under construction since 1959, the formal ceremony was conducted by Queen Elizabeth II before a large crowd with the inaugural orchestral performance of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, Ode to Joy. Of note, the first actual musical number took place in 1960 when baritone Paul Robeson regaled the construction crew from the stage during their lunch break with one of his signature tunes, “Old Man River.”

Monday 4 October 2021

the final programme

Adapted from the eponymous Michael Moorcock novel and premiering in UK cinemas on this day in 1973, the Robert Fuest sci-fi, action production (thanks to the introduction from The Flop House), the plot centring around the quest for post-humanism beings—perfect and self-propagating—is a post-modern Prometheus story that shares a lot of energy and aesthetics with the roughly contemporary Abominable Doctor Phibes. Bent on carrying out the taboo and contro-versial plan of a recently deceased mad scientist and bring human kind into a new age and out of an existence condemned to near post-apocalyptic wasteland, Miss Brunner—a sado-masochistic techno-magician—instigates the epiphanical sequence, causing her to merge with the protagonist, a suave playboy physicist and son of the man scientist called Jerry Cornelius and dispatching with the henchman named Dmitri who had helped bring their plot to fruition—briefly manifesting as some sort of messianic figure to herald a new age before devolving into a caveman (see also). The creature, as it escapes the secret lair, observes that it is indeed “a very tasty world.”

Wednesday 15 September 2021

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.

Wednesday 18 August 2021

little twelvetoes

Having considered myself pretty familiar with the entire Schoolhouse Rock! catalogue (see previously here and here) and enjoying them as a kid, I was taken aback to be introduced to this segment that not only teaches one the twelves multiplication table but also about the duodecimal system and other bases—plus acceptance of actual polydactyly. Including My Hero, Zero and Three is a Magic Number, Bob Dorough performed and produced a dozen (the number one not given an episode) maths shorts during the course of 1973.

Friday 11 June 2021

6x6

lp: an over-sized mural of well-used record sleeves adorns a corner of a Reno brewery


it’s impolite to point
: helpfully finding one’s cursor with an array of candid photos—via Things Magazine

kokedama: an installation of a floating forest (ๆ นๆด—ใ„, root wash—no pot) by Nomad Studio 

zeckenalarm: Ze Frank (previously) delivers true facts on the dangerous little tick 

the amusement park: a long-lost 1973 public service announcement from Dawn of the Dead creator George Romero about the nightmare of ageing in America  

bierdeckel: various graphic designers create coasters capturing historic moments from the UEFA European Football Championship

Wednesday 19 May 2021

so mama don’t take my kodachrome away

Eventually making it to the number two place on the US charts but not ranked in the UK as the BBC refused airplay for the trademarked name, the lead single, released on this day in 1973, from his third studio album There Goes Rhymin’ Simon, the song was originally to be called “Goin’ Home” and was critically praised for its upbeat and cheery (exaggerated, over-saturated colours akin to filters and face-tuning) anti-social lyrics.

Sunday 2 May 2021

franking privilege

Via the always engaging Present /&/ Correct (check out their sundries and notions), we learn that the postal authority in the Kingdom of Bhutan in 1973 issued commemorative stamps that were tiny vinyl records that could be played on a full-sized turn-table with a stylus, most featuring traditional folk music and acoustic samples of the country. More at the links above including a rendition of the Bhutanese national anthem replayed from phonographic postage.

Wednesday 21 April 2021

another one rides the bus

Hosted by news anchor and television personality Tom Snyder, the late night programme The Tomorrow Show, airing on NBC from 1973 to 1982, had several prominent guests including John Lennon, Ken Kesey, The Grateful Dead, Ayn Rand and Charles Manson—giving national exposure and their first televised performance to U2 and Weird Al Yankovic, who appeared on this day in 1981. The network often used the show to plug holes in late night scheduling, including conducting an impromptu ninety minute interview with Jerry Lewis in October of 1975 to cover over technical delays until Snyder could interrupt the conversation to introduce the “Not Ready for Primetime Players”—later to be recognised as the first cast of Saturday Night Live.

Wednesday 17 March 2021

lost horizon

Not only a surpassing financial failure like the first attempt to adapt the story by James Hilton for the big screen just as Frank Capra’s 1937 try, the 1973 fantasy musical edition by Charles Jarrott and Bruce Bacharach was nearly career-ending for all involved.  Released for general audiences on this day and initially panned, excoriated by critics, it has not improved with age nor attained the status of a cult classic. The 1933 novel by the same author of Goodbye, Mister Chips was propelled in the cultural consciousness not by the adaptations but in part by dint of the media format its publishing house, Simon & Schuster, issued it in—printed as Pocket Book #1 and of course gave the language Shangri-La, which was the original name of the presidential retreat in Maryland, later designated Camp David.

Sunday 23 August 2020

norrmalmstorgin pankkiryรถstรถ

On this day in 1973, a bank robbery and ensuing hostage crisis unfolded in Norrmalmstorg Square (also the equivalent of Park Place in the Swedish version of Monopoly) in Stockholm, covered live on television, and documented the counter-intuitive actions of the hostages towards their captors—empathizing with them and working to protect them during a five-day stand-off with authorities. The novelty and sensation also fueled academic interest, with one criminologist coining the term the Norrmalmstorgssyndromet to describe the captives’ bond and sympathies, later becoming known internationally as the Stockholm Syndrome.

Tuesday 17 March 2020

reintegration

Captured by Pulitzer Prize winning Associated Press photographer Slava “Sal” Veder on this day in 1973, the moment of reunion on the tarmac at Travis Air Force Base in California between a just released US prisoner of war, held for five and half years in Hanoi, and his family—captioned Burst of Joy—came to symbolize the beginning of the end of the US aggression in Vietnam and signaled the time for healing and reconciliation to start.
Among the first soldiers to be redeployed in Operation Homecoming, the spontaneous, happy image belies a grim reality, like the war itself (see previously)—there being nothing redemptive to the latter tragedy even in terms of good optics, with the marriage on the verge of collapse due to the stress of the soldier’s confinement and infidelities and reflects its opposite side as well with all the lives of Vietnamese and Americans that were beyond restoration. The couple reunited under orders, it was later revealed.

Monday 2 March 2020

matrix

We’re familiar with Plato’s Allegory of the Cave but our thanks to Fancy Notions for referring us to this 1973 animated short illustrated by Dick Oden and narrated by Orson Welles that we had not encountered beforehand. The dialogue of Socrates and his interlocutor, portrayed as Plato’s brother Glaucon, that puts forth this archetypal thought-experiment contrasts the power of education and enlightenment and wilful ignorance and how shadows can limn our reality.

Saturday 20 October 2018

whether ours shall continue to be a government of laws and not of men is now for congress and ultimately the american people

Tonight forty-five years ago, the Saturday Night Massacre occurred in the Nixon White House when US Attorney General Elliot Richardson refused the direct order to dismiss special prosecutor Archibald Cox, charged with investigating the Watergate scandal. Richardson resigned rather than interfere in the proceedings of the probe which advanced the deputy to the top lawyer position, William Ruckelshaus, who also refused to concede to the president’s wishes and was fired. Turning to the person in the fourth highest post in the Justice Department, Solicitor General Robert Bork, Nixon with some reluctance had his command obeyed. This display accrued for the first time a majority (though still very polarised) in favour of impeachment and Nixon two weeks later announced his intention to resign in lieu of being fired the following August

Thursday 11 October 2018

biosemiotics

Messy Nessy Chic lures us down a strange rabbit hole with a topic of discussion that I can vaguely recall regarding the perception of plant life with a documentary adaption (six years hence) of the 1973 The Secret Life of Plants (see previously) by authors Christopher Bird—whose previous works include the authoritative tome on the art of dowsing—and former war-time intelligence officer, journalist Peter Tompkins.
Profiling the careers of nineteenth and twentieth century botanists in a sympathetic manner, the book presented a battery of experiments based on pioneering polygraph tests developed by a Central Intelligence Agency interrogation specialist. Those results which have thus far resisted replication is generally discounted by the fact that plants do not have brains or nervous systems and instead invoke supramaterial, supernatural accounts of plant telepathy and calls to condemn the ideas presented as pseudo-science. What do you think? The notional sense, communication, symbiosis and memory are however found to pan out in the biochemistry and signalling of plants amongst themselves as well as the support network communities establish, so while attributing or recognising sentience might be problematic plants are surely not worth our disdain and abuse and ought to be appreciated for what they provide. Just as appreciation for thought and feelings in animals faced set-backs over hyperbolic claims, we are probably underestimating the complex lives of our vegetative friends in ways we cannot begin to imagine—especially considering the soundtrack by Stevie Wonder.