A couple days back I posted an article introducing a kitten that the wife and I have taken in. I mentioned that we were keeping the boy and socializing the girl to give away. I also said that I would be posting a photo of the pair of them.
The black kitty on the right, the girl, is the one up for adoption. The tiger kitty is very friendly and both are pretty tame, but the black one is not as bold. She will fall asleep if you hold her, but she does not come up to you like the tiger will. We are working on that.
There is still one other kitten to catch, not sure how I will get that done.
The Beatles dominated the singles chart in the early 1960's. In April of 1964, the Beatles released a song that is, arguably, their most significant hit. Can't Buy Me Love, and the group, set many milestones: Greatest dominance in the top five; greatest dominance in the top 100; biggest jump to #1, from #27; most consecutive #1 singles; largest advance sales. Four of those accomplishments still hold today. Can't Buy Me Love is not as well-known, or as highly-touted today, as some of their other tunes but it was a monumental success.
So what knocked that song out of the #1 slot after a five week run? It was a song by an old guy. Sixty-three year old Louis Armstrong, who hadn't been in the top 10 for eight years, nudged the fab four out of their exalted top slot. Can't Buy Me Love fell to #5 and Satchmo became the oldest artist in history to have a number one song. If you are about my age, you have to remember this song.
My understanding is that the Beatles loved it, that Satchmo bumped them off the top, because they looked up to him and his music. Nearly six months later, the same thing happened yet again. The Beatles were riding high with a big hit. It had been #1 for two weeks and it was August 1963. Remember this theme song from the movie?
A Hard Day's Night -- a title based on an expression used by Ringo, after a hard day on the movie set -- was riding high. Then another older guy came along to knock them off the apple cart. Dean Martin had not had a hit in six years. But he had switched to a new label (Reprise owned by his friend Frankie), he had a new style and arrangement on a 15 year-old song that had been previously recorded by several artists, and he saw success coming. He told his son that he was gonna release a record that would blow the Beatles right off the charts. A few months later, Dino -- the King of Cool -- did just that.
For more "Stories Behind the Music" click on the guitar
I think Thanksgiving is a good day to make this post. Those of you who go back aways here at Active Rain will remember I had a cat that "worked" at my office. That was pre-Nutsy. His name was Mr. Topolino Stromboli. I wrote a few posts about him. You can read one of the posts here. Topo was the offspring of a feral (untamed) cat that hangs-out in our yard. She got sick, after having three kittens and we found out that she could not nurse them. Two died, and my wife and I rescued the one we found and raised him from when he was the size of a mouse. We fed him by bottle. Then he grew up, he moved in and for two years he was the greatest cat we ever had. A mystery illness took his life on Halloween a year ago. Topo was just two years old. The vets still do not know just what went wrong but it involved his spine.
That same feral mama cat, whom we feed but we have been unable to catch -- we have caught and neutered or spayed several other feral cats in the neighborhood-- just had kittens again this fall. There are three. I have managed to catch two of them.
Of those I have caught, one is a male and the other is female. The female is totally black, not a spot of white or any other color. The male, who has a personality kind of like Topo (his half brother), is a fireball. I plan to keep him. The other one we are socializing and I plan to have it spayed, get it shots and give it away to someone who would take care of it. I hope to catch the third one too, but it is hard to do.
These are the first photos of the one I plan to keep. This is Mr. Tigrotto Tartufo. All of our cats have Italian names. Literally that is tiger cub-mushroom or truffle. Rolls off the tongue better than it reads literally. I was going to name the cat Tartufo, then the wife told me what he would, in fact, be called. So I put my choice of a first name as a middle name. Topo was the same situation, where I got to give him a middle name only. His name would have translated as little mouse-volcano.
The photos below, including the lunch break, are part of the rigorous on-the job-training last weekend. This cat is also learning to get along with Nutsy, who is at this point still assistant manager and CFO of King of the House, Inc.
This kitten looks like an angel, but he is a hellion. I think he is about eight weeks old.
Almost everybody has heard of Motown Records. Motown was a legend in the 1960's. Berry Gordy, Jr, the founder, was an innovator in R&B, soul and pop music. When you think of Motown and girl groups, you probably think of the mighty Supremes.
Fact is, the Supremes were a hard act to get off the ground. Of course, once they got going, the girls were a hit machine. The first girl group to have a number one single for the Motown label was a group called the Marvelettes.
The Marvelettes consisted, in the beginning, of four girls from a Detroit suburb. They began singing together in high school and, not long after that, the teens were at the top of the pop charts. The song was composed by a crack Motown team of songwriters, but part of the story is that a real mail carrier helped write it. Here is a tidbit of trivia: Marvin Gaye played drums on the original version. This song was at the top of the charts in December 1961. You will see that, at least when the video was made, the girls were down to three.
The pivotal song was a favorite of the Beatles. They performed it often in concert and put it on an album in the early years.
What a comeback! The Carpenters brought it back to life in 1971. You got it, they had a #1 hit with the postman. The song had legs.
A week ago I wrote about the first song from England to go to the top of the American charts. That song was a couple years before the Beatles and when the British Invasion officially got underway. Those of you who read the post know that that first song was by Mr. Acker Bilk and it was called Stranger on the Shore. That was an instrumental. Honestly, it is not that common for instrumentals to make it to the top of the charts -- ever.
That makes it doubly interesting that the next song from the UK to hit the top of the US charts, pre-British Invasion, was also an instrumental. This one was, in my view, a more exciting and innovative creation than the one featured last week and it was in tune with the times. The musicians hit on the excitement of the era.
In July 1962, the USA launched Telstar. It was the first communications satellite. The purpose was to relay television signals between the USA and Europe. I was alive and this was a big deal:Call it the dawning of the space age.
Joe Meek was an innovative electronics technician and musician in Great Britain. His band of guys, the Tornadoes, put together this really spacey song called Telstar. It was huge. I remember, as a kid, a local deejay barricaded himself in the studio and played the song over and over and over and over again. Finally the management took him away. Years later I would work at that radio station but I did not do anything that weird.
Here it is, number one from December 1962, the Tornados and Telstar.
For more "Stories Behind the Music" click on the guitar
Below is a photo that shows yet another reason to have a home inspection at a new home. In this case, the builder, or his subs, had forgotten to connect the downspouts to the drains. This seemed to be kind of obvious, but it was not unless one peaked behind the brush. We have here, yet again, another example of a good reason to have a full home inspection at new construction. Certain problems are found over and over again at these inspections. The problems include caps left on plumbing vents, insulation packed around B-vents, no insulation installed at all and a host of other unwelcome surprises to the homeowner who does not expect there to be any problems with a new house.
The British Invasion hit like a guided missile on February 1, 1964 when the Beatles shot to the top of the American charts with I Want To Hold Your Hand. Billboard looked upon that monumental event as the beginning of the British Invasion.
Actually, there were two British artists, who made it to the top of the American charts, prior to that wave of young UK artists that has since been termed the British Invasion.
This time, I am telling you about the first British artist to ever attain the #1 position on the Billboard chart. I will write about the second such song, and the group that performed it, in yet another post. That first artist and song, to hit #1, was released almost two years before the Beatles became the first wave of the British invasion.
This first artist, when I identify him, might be a surprise to you. You have probably heard the song, or heard of it at least. It was a mellow instrumental.
The groundbreaking song was written and recorded by a 33 year-old clarinetist from Somerset, England. When the artist first wrote the tune, it was called Jenny. But the BBC had a new kid's TV show called "Stranger on the Shore" and they needed a theme song. The clarinetist renamed his song, to fit the show, and that theme went to #2 in the UK. Over here it topped the charts at #1 for one week in May 1962.
I remember first hearing the song in 1966. I was visiting my uncle, who must have been 70 at the time. He knew I was into the Beatles, the Stones and radio. He took me aside and said "here listen to this one, this is real music and it comes from England too." I found it interesting but it did not change my tastes in music.
Here is Mr. Acker Bilk, a few years later, hitting all the right notes for Stranger on the Shore. When you think about music from England, just remember he was #1 before the Beatles.
This is a fun contest for me, being an old radio guy. I have been annoyed by many annoying songs over the years in my previously annoying radio career.
On the air, early 1970's, click to hear Steve in the summer of 1974
There is an old saying in the radio business that explains annoying songs quite nicely. It goes along these lines:
3 stages of annoyance for the deejay
1. As a deejay, when you first play a song, even if you like it, nobody in the listening audience will notice it.
2. When you are getting really tired of that song, people in the listening audience will start paying attention to the tune.
3. When you are so sick of the song that you want to break the disc and ban the performer for life, the radio audience will decide they really like the song and make it a big hit.
Fact is, people like familiar tunes and, as a song grows on them, it usually becomes more popular. I give you this story to better justify my explanation below.
It was 1974 and I was a rock n' roll jock. One of the songs that we were playing over and over again in the top forty rotation was really long (around five minutes) and, redundant as all get out, and it had become a big hit. Other than the opening riffs, which I kind of liked, the song bored me silly.
My annoying song entry has since been featured in movie soundtracks and commercials. There is, and it is hard to believe, even a Christmas version.
I am going to route you to the offending member. I will be curious to hear your comments. Do you like it and consider it a classic? Or, are you sick of it and you too would like to break the disc and ban Randy Bachman from your auditory space? Us old radio guys want to know.
This is sort of related to the book meme. Not directly, but it is in that Charles Buell insisted that I get some books on the great artists. I did so and this blog is the result of that.
Let's talk great art. Have you ever noticed how some model in a painting or photo is supposed to be a young girl or a boy but the image or vision just does not cut it? The girl or boy is long in the tooth. It is as bad as watching a movie where the 14 year old is played by a 28 year old. It is hard to suspend disbelief to that degree.
I did not realize it, until a few weeks ago, but even some of the great artists have had trouble getting models that are age appropriate. Again, Charlie Buell, being an artist, told me I needed to look at more great art. So I got this coffee table sized book and I am doing so begrudgingly -- art is not my cup of tea maybe. Or just maybe I am too much the cynic.
But this phenomenon of age inappropriate models even follows the great art. That much I have discovered. Have you ever really, really looked at "Blue Boy"? This is about as famous as it gets. But, please, the so-called youth, young man or boy looks like he is about five years away from drawing social security. Of course, they did not have social security back then so that is not something they could check on when the kid/guy applied to be a model. The ruddy red face is a clue that some tippling has been going on too. The official description of the painting is below. Then you will see the actual painting below that and, if you take a close look, you will see what I mean about the age inappropriate model. Times must have been tough back then -- good help hard to find.
Thomas Gainsborough (1727-88) oil on canvas, 70 5/8 x 48 3/4 inches
Gainsborough's The Blue Boy, portrays the son of a successful hardware merchant, who was a close friend of the artist. The work was executed during Gainsborough's extended stay in Bath before he finally settled in London in 1774.
The artist has dressed the young man in a costume dating from about 140 years before the portrait was painted. This type of costume was familiar through the portraits of the great Flemish painter, Anthony van Dyck. Gainsborough greatly admired the work of Van Dyck and seems to have conceived The Blue Boy as an act of homage to that master.
I may not be the right temperament to study all this great art. Charlie tells me to do something and it always ends up being something silly. I either end up seeing red or seeing Charlie. Maybe I should stick to writing about old records and rock stars. Later,
If you were a child from the 1950's, a boy for sure, you will remember the World of Disney's Davy Crockett series. The shows starred Fess Parker, who later in life became a famous vintner. He also played Daniel Boone for Disney, but the Crockett shows were what I remember. These Davy Crockett shows, using a term from the era, were really the cat's meow.
You remember the theme song?
Youngsters who were my age, and I will prove it with a photo, were into the coonskin caps. They were the rage of the age.
If you think I made all of this up, a big story just to have a blog topic, then look at the photo below. I found it the other day at my mom's house. I am on the right. It is dated as having been taken in Stanley Park, Vancouver BC in 1955. That would have made me 3 years old. I have no clue as to the identity of the hot babes.
