October 9, 2010 marks what would have been the 70th birthday of legend, lover, artist and activist, John Lennon. In celebration of the musician’s illustrious life and career, East Village Radio is hosting an all day special tribute starting at 12pm ET this Saturday. Over the course of 8 hours, you can listen live to exclusive interviews with Lennon, tribute programs highlighting The Beatles’ era songs, covers, classics and more. Continue Reading…
“It suddenly struck me that that tiny pea, pretty and blue, was the Earth. I put up my thumb and shut one eye, and my thumb blotted out the planet Earth. I didn’t feel like a giant. I felt very, very small.” — Neil Armstrong
In Tribute to the Beatle’s White Album 40th anniversary, PopMatters is celebrating the milestone with a five day, song-by-song, side-by-LP side breakdown of what Tony Palmer, in The Observer, summed up at the time of its release by stating: “if there is still any doubt that Lennon and McCartney are the greatest songwriters since Schubert, then…[The White Album]…should surely see the last vestiges of cultural snobbery and bourgeois prejudice swept away in a deluge of joyful music making. . . .”
“”With this faith, we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith, we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith, we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.”
“It’s the answer that led those who’ve been told for so long by so many to be cynical and fearful and doubtful about what we can achieve to put their hands on the arc of history and bend it once more toward the hope of a better day.
It’s been a long time coming, but tonight, because of what we did on this date in this election at this defining moment change has come to America.”
Mark Simonson’s critical analysis of Mad Men typography.
Mad Men illustrated by Dyna Moe.
The Mad Men Guide to New York.
I’m being followed by Betty Draper: Mad Men on Twitter.
Real Mad Men at Wired, Business Week, and the New York Post.
Imaginary Forces’ Mark Gardner and Steve Fuller on the title sequence design and its homage to Saul Bass.
The drinks…
and the Draper’s kitchen.
Currently showing at the San Francisco Art Exchange is Beggars to Exiles: The Photography of Michael Cooper and Dominique Tarle, that documents the Rolling Stones between 1967 and 1971, a period during which the band singlehandedly defined the archetype of the rock n roll star –the fashion, the drug busts, the groupies, the villa in the south of France — for all who followed.
Though somewhat of a pain to navigate, the online version of the exhibit is quite comprehensive and includes such insights as:
To record “Exile on Main Street” Keith Richards rented Villa Nellcôte, the “Gestapo headquarters during the Second World War,” complete with swastikas on the floor vents. The basic band for these sessions is believed to have consisted of Richards, Bobby Keys, Mick Taylor, Charlie Watts, Jimmy Miller, and Jagger when he was available. Bassist Bill Wyman did not like the ambiance of the Richards’ villa and sat out many of the French sessions.
Brilliant.
The Black Panther Logo by Ruth Howard and Dorothy Zellner.
“Alabama was notorious for using the so-called “literacy test” to deny Blacks the right to vote. In truth, the state’s “education system” was so abysmal that many Blacks and poor whites were illiterate or semi-literate. But the white power structure made sure that illiterate whites were allowed to register and vote regardless.
Because so many illiterate whites were unable to read the names of the political parties or candidates on the ballot, Alabama law allowed each party to have a picture symbol, and all candidates were listed on the ballot in a column underneath their party’s symbol. You could vote the straight party ticket by simply marking your “X” underneath the symbol without bothering to puzzle out the names or offices of the actual candidates. The symbol of the whites-only Democratic party was a rooster, so illiterate white voters were instructed to “Vote for the rooster.”
Thus, when the Lowndes County Freedom Organization got their independent political party on the ballot, they had to chose a symbol. They chose a black panther.”
The Steal Your Face logo by Bob Thomas and the infamous LSD chemist Augustus Owsley Stanley.
From Rolling Stone’s 40th Anniversary Summer of Love Special Edition (July 12 – 26 2007), Robert Greenfield* writes:
“While driving to work one day in his MG, Owsley saw an orange and blue logo with a white bar across it on a building. He thought it would look cool if the logo was red and blue with a white lightning bolt through it, so he had someone spray-paint a basic version of it on the Dead’s equipment. He then talked to Bob Thomas about putting the lightning bolt through the words “Grateful Dead” in lettering, which from a distance would look like a skull. Together, they devised the “Steal Your Face” logo (a.k.a. “the stealie”). Thomas, who died in 1993, sold it to the band as a letterhead for $250, meaning that neither he nor Owsley ever saw a dime from all those Deadhead stickers on the rear bumpers of Volkswagen buses.”
If you can stand the minute and a half lead in by Paul Reiser –it is amazing to think that he actually had a career after the eighties– this is a rare and beautiful performance of what might be one of the most perfect songs ever written: Brian Wilson singing God Only Knows.
The warped and uncalibrated state of the first 20 seconds of this video seems a fitting start to the contents that follow as though serving to open a portal into an entirely different reality, one hosting the clash of two titans of the sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll ethic.
It really does not get much more legendary than this. Amusingly, as one of the comments points out, it is Keith Richards that comes out seeming the most sober. But despite a good few moments of drug addled babble on both sides, exchanges on such topics as the events of Altamont, and the second life of J Edgar Hoover are truly priceless moments.
