Stream the new single by Squeeze

One of my fave groups of the 1980s. Good to hear new stuff from them.

Rare pics: James Bond Dr. No - Sean Connery and Ursula Andress















Pop culture roundup: Adam West; Paul McCartney; David Tennant; Sean Lennon and Yoko Ono; David Lynch and Vincent Price; Al Feldstein and Harvey Kurtzman!!

Via Geeky Tyrant: Sun Valley, Idaho, resident and former TV Batman Adam West is a funny guy. Check out these listings in his local Yellow Pages:

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Via Meet the Beatles For Real: Paul McCartney wins Beatles trivia contest.

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Former Doctor Who actor David Tennant is voicing a droid on this Saturday's episode of "Star Wars: The Clone Wars" this Saturday.



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In the spirit of the John and Yoko "War is Over!" billboards, Sean Lennon and his mom have put up a billboard voicing their opposition to fracking.


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Via Dangerous Minds: Here's a pic of 11-year-old David Lynch meeting Vincent Price.


UPDATE: According to one of our regular readers, the kid in the pic is not THE David Lynch. Oh well, it's a cute pic, regardless!
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According to the Comics Journal, Al Feldstein and the Estate of Harvey Kurtman are suing to gain copyright over the classic EC Comics works produced by the two artist/writers.
The claims filed by Feldstein and the Kurtzman estate are based on the Copyright Law of 1976, the same law that allowed Jerry Siegel’s estate to reclaim its share of the Superman copyrights. The law was intended to address the fact that, over the years, the terms of copyrights have been extended again and again, giving them a value far beyond the compensation originally paid to authors. The extensions have kept properties like Mickey Mouse from falling into the public domain. When Siegel and Shuster sold their rights to Superman, the initial term of a copyright was 28 years. When that term expired, the copyrights could be renewed for another 28 years. The Copyright Law of 1976 and the 1992 Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act allowed copyright terms to be further extended, but provided that authors could reclaim their copyrights whenever they came up for renewal by the corporate owner.

BBC Radio this week: Stream music documentaries, comedy and drama

Click the links to stream the following programs:

Bond and Beyond - Profile of Bond soundtrack composer John Barry.

History of Music Radio - Paul Gambaccini traces the history of music on the radio in the U.S. and U.K.

Madness at the BBC - A compilation of studio performances and interviews by the ska/pop band.

Kinks at the BBC - A compilation of performances and interviews the Kinks did for the Beeb over the years.

Shout Sister Shout - Profile of Sister Rosetta Tharpe.

Doctor Who - Sci-fi drama.

The Goon Show - Comedy.

Leslie Charteris: The Saint - Mystery drama.

Pete Townshend - Before I Get Old - Documentary of the Who's songwriter/guitarist.

Vintage DC Comics house ad: Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen


Vintage comic book ad: Schwinn bikes


Pop stuff: What I'm reading, watching, hearing, etc.

Mojo, November 2012 issue. I regularly pick up Mojo, if just for the record reviews. They cover such a huge breadth of releases and the mag has many times tipped me off to new music I enjoy. But the features are generally interesting, too. even if the story is about a band I don't follow, or don't care for. Like Z.Z. Top.

These guys, featured on the cover of the U.S. edition of the November issue, never did much for me, though I found their 1980s videos amusing. The Texas boogie blues thing just never caught my musical interest. But the story is interesting, highlighting the band's past brushes with Jimi Hendrix and Roky Erickson and their various career struggles.

There's also a good story about the last days of the Jam, a band I really do like. This punk/mod revival band turned out many great singles and was huge in the UK. Their disbandment was a huge disappointment to many, but something that needed to happen.

The companion CD that comes with this issue is a good one: Featuring mod-scene pop, soul and reggae tunes and a couple of Jam rarities.

Record Collector, October 2012 issue. This is a mag I only rarely pick up, as I'm more interested in just listening to music, not in collecting rare 45s and LPs, etc. (although, you'd be hard-pressed to recognize that, with all the LPs, 45s and CDs around this place). But there's a great cover feature on the Kinks in this issue and a long interview with Ray Davies focusing on his work in the mid-60s, my favorite Kinks era.

It's definitely one to pick up if you're a fan of the Kinks circa 1964-68.






The Skeleton Key. This past weekend, I figured we'd watch one of the half-dozen or so horror classics I DVRed off TCM recently during their Halloween programming. But my son wanted to watch this one off Netflix. He'd seen it with friends before, but my wife and I hadn't even heard of it.

Released in 2005 and starring Kate Hudson, Gena Rowlands and John Hurt, it's not too bad, with some suspenseful, yet predictable scenes, and a couple of neat twists. I still want to watch those old horror films off TCM, though.


This Land is Your Land: The Folk Years. I found this 2002 box set on Time-Life/Rhino for $7.99 a a used record store recently and it's a major score.

Some of the tunes (Byrds, Dylan, etc.) I had before on other records, but it's still a great way to gather other songs not in my collection.

The set features folk revival and folk rock tunes from the early to mid 60s by the Limeliters, Brothers Four, Kingston Trio, Peter, Paul and Mary, Arlo Guthrie, Tim Hardin, etc., and even some stuff I wouldn't necessarily put in the category, such as Chad and Jeremy, the Seekers, Van Morrison, etc.

But it's all in the great sound typical of Rhino at an unbeatable price. Worth cruising the used bins for.