Blowout Post # 3!!!

Well, it's time for me to have no time to blather on again, so today, we'll have episode three of the "Blowout Post" series, which I started under similar circumstances a few months ago. In summary, I'm going to unload ten files about which I have relatively little to say, some of them quite lengthy and fairly esoteric (107 minutes of discussions of how to entertain a visiting honoree, anyone???), and others perhaps more generally entertaining. About none of them, except the first one, do I have very much to say. 

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We'll start off with an sample from a bunch of tapes I listened to over the last several weeks, all from various members of the same group of amateur musicians. Across the tapes, variously, are heard accordion, guitar, ukulele, drums, piano and probably a few other instruments, as well as vocals at times. Not all of them at the same time, or even on the same tape, but clearly, people who enjoyed playing pop hits, folk tunes and dance music together. This particular tape starts with a few seconds of music off of TV or radio, and ends with one of the participants reading the names of some of the songs that were played. 

If this is appealing to you, let me know - there's a bunch more, including some with more variety of song styles and instruments. And, intriguingly, these tapes seem to feature at least some family members who were heard on the "Gaggle of Giggling 12 Year Olds" / "Noisy Birdy" tape which was the very first reel I shared on this blog. Clearly, I obtained far more tapes from that family than I previously knew I had. 

Download: Music at Home - Marlene, Bill and Vernene, 1-17-58

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By the way, some of these tapes come with extensive notations. Here is what was in this tape's box. As you can see, the file shared above is actually from two different recordings, one on 1/17/58 and one on 1/21/58: 

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From a considerably more accomplished musician, and certainly a more celebrated (and ridiculed) showman, here is a tape of an episode of Liberace's 1950's television show: 

Download: An Episode of the Liberace Television Show

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Next up, here's a guy who is giving a speech - to whom, when and where I do not know - that I find more and more disagreeable as it goes on. But I'm a lefty if there ever was one. I'm sure he'd find my ideas just as cockamamie as I do some of his. 

Download: Unknown - A Chamber-of-Commerce Type Speech

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And now, the aforementioned 107 minute tape of preparations. Someone named Richard Holden (presumably not the Richard Holden I knew at my church in the 1970's, who was a dwarf) was to be honored (along with his family), during the last few days of 1955 at the first days of 1956, in the Los Angeles area. He was to be "The Airman of the Year". The gentlemen heard here go over the minutia buried within the minutia of this visit. And believe it or not, the start of this conversation was actually erased - it originally went on even longer than this!

Download: Making Plans for the Visit of Airman of the Year Richard T Holden, Late 1955

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Christmas is coming. Did you know? Is this too soon? 

Here is my first Christmas offering. I don't know anything about this little performance, but I called it "A Rather Homely Christmas Carol Concert", not "homely" in the way it's mostly been used in the last several decades (meaning plain, or unattractive), but rather - as I found in one online dictionary - "free from affectation, unaffectedly natural, simple". I rather enjoy it in its guilelessness. I hope you will, too. 

Download: Unknown - A Rather Homely Christmas Carol Concert

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Somewhere between the limited skills of our accordion band and Liberace, you might find the sort of band or duo who played at small meeting houses, supper clubs, Holiday Inns and the like. It would appear, from the paper taped to the box for this reel, that two fellows named Heinz and Parker teamed up and, calling themselves "Padded Cell", appeared locally (wherever "locally" was, for as many as, oh, four people, if the applause here is any indication. There are only the two names on the box, but there are obviously at least three people here, four if the vocalist was not playing an instrument. Anyway, here they are on the first of April, 1961. 

Download: Padded Cell (Heinz and Parker) - Live, 4-1-61

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Here's that paper from the tape box cover: 

Or - and I just thought of this - maybe the name of the nearly empty club was "Padded Cell"

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Here's another of those lovely hodgepodge tapes I enjoy so much. This one is particularly varied, even though it very strongly appears to have been recorded by the same family at various points within a relatively short period of years. The title provides all the explanation I hope you'll need. 

Download: Hodgepodge - WLS Polka Show, Conversations Around the House, Choral Song, Audio Letter - Late 1950's

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And here's a short excerpt from a syndicated Album Rock Countdown from May of 1978, as heard on the late, great, WMET, Chicago. This was all there was of the show, on the tape in question. If this had been simply the songs from the countdown, I doubt it would have been very interesting or worth sharing, although God, do I love "Still the Same" - one of my favorite 50 hit singles ever, I'd say, and from an artist I otherwise have almost no interest in, save for that one and "Fire Lake". 

But.... one third of this tape a commercial break, and it provides a nice little pair of radio ads from that moment. And as much as I hate McDonald's, the moment with the little child at the 2:00 mark cracks me up - very effective.

Download: Album Rock Countdown, May, 1978, Short Segment

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And here is the "Very Short Reel" for this post. Not a lot of explanation needed here, just someone reading a bit of a classic novel, "Great Expectations": 

Download: A Brief Reading from "Great Expectations"

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And we'll finish with our "Acetate of the Month". I will let you discover the nature of this little audio letter from the 1940's by listening to it. I will only say that 1.) I included both sides of a small acetate in one file, 2.) I cannot find this record to share a scan of it (I may have sold it...), and 3.) it is as utterly charming as anything I've shared on this site all year. 

Download: Merry Xmas to Willie - 12-12-48 (Knight Acetate)

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