(Roughly) Daily

Thanks to the folks at YearBookYourSelf, one can recall the pictorial (and sartorial) glories of bygone academic seasons…  one simply uploads a picture (as current as one wishes), follows the elementary instructions… and is then transported back to the pages of memory-books past…

As we re-gauge our nostalgia, we might recall that in was on this date in 1930 that the first Technicolor sound cartoon, Fiddlesticks (starring the already-well-known Flip The Frog) was made by Ub Iwerks (who went on to anchor Disney’s animation team… indeed, check out the mouse in the still below…).

a still from Fiddlesticks, 1930

And on a sad note (in a week that’s been bad for the icons of rhythm and blues/soul), from Billboard:

Music industry legend Jerry Wexler, who kick-started his career as a
Billboard journalist in the late 1940s and went on to cultivate the
careers of Ray Charles, Aretha Franklin and Led Zeppelin while a
partner at Atlantic Records, has died at the age of 91 at his home in
Siesta Key, Fla.

Wexler was born on Jan. 10, 1917, into a Jewish family in the Bronx.
After graduating from the school now known as Kansas State University
and spending a stint in the Army, he was hired in 1947 at BMI, writing
continuity copy for radio stations and plugging the organization’s
songs.

Later that year a friend recommended him to Billboard, where he was
hired with a starting pay of $75 a week. At Billboard, Wexler invented
the term “rhythm & blues” to replace the name “race records,” which
was then the name of the chart tracking such music.

He stayed at Billboard until 1951, when he went to work for Big Three,
the music publishing arm of MGM Records. The following year, Atlantic
Records tried to recruit him, but Wexler said he would only join if he
was made a partner, and nothing happened. A year later, when
co-founder Herb Abramson joined the Army, Atlantic came back with
another offer and this time agreed to take him in as a partner.

Atlantic had already established itself as an up-and-coming R&B label
thanks to hits from artists like Ruth Brown, Joe Turner, Stick McGhee
and the Clovers, with the just-signed Ray Charles waiting in the
wings. If Atlantic founders Abramson and Ahmet and Nesuhi Ertegun led
the way into exploring rhythm and blues, it would be Wexler who
ultimately led the label deep into Southern soul.

In 1965, he signed a distribution deal for Memphis-based Satellite
Records, which was putting out songs by Carla Thomas. That label would
later become known as Stax. Before long, Stax began a golden era of
hits from Wilson Pickett, Sam & Dave, Otis Redding, Eddie Floyd and
William Bell, among others.

Before long, Wexler had begun using FAME Studios in Muscle Shoals,
Ala., as a home base for sessions. “More than any other locale or
individual, Muscle Shoals changed my life — musically and every which
way,” Wexler wrote in his 1994 autobiography, “Rhythm & the Blues: A
Life in American Music.”

The first artist he brought to Muscle Shoals was Aretha Franklin,
whose 1967 debut, “I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You,” redefined
soul music.

As the ’60s wore on, Wexler grew more involved with producing and much
less with running Atlantic, although he was still closely involved in
signing Led Zeppelin, the J. Geils Band and Donnie Hathaway. He left
Atlantic for good in 1975, but resurfaced two years later returned as
VP of A&R for Warner Bros. Records.

In his autobiography, Wexler says that with the help of Karen Berg,
they signed the B-52’s, Dire Straits and Gang Of Four. During the
latter half of the 1970s, Wexler produced Etta James’ “Deep in the
Night,” Bob Dylan’s Christian album, “Slow Train Coming,” Kim Carnes
“Sailin'” [with you correspondent’s old band-mate on lead], and Dire Straits
“Communique,” among others.

Later in life, Wexler was involved with “The Wiz” soundtrack, the
Dylan album “Saved” and recordings by a young George Michael, Bill
Vera, Lou Ann Barton and Kenny Drew Jr.

Finally, contact lenses that give one anime eyes…

Get ’em here.

As we just say no to Lasix, we might recall that it was on this date in 1057– Napoleon’s birthday, in 1769– that King Macbeth I of Scotland, the last Celtic king of Scotland, was killed by Malcolm, the son of Duncan whom Macbeth had killed in 1040… and the scene was set for “The Scottish Play.”*

* It is considered bad luck to refer to refer to Shakespeare’s tragedy by name unless the play is actually being produced.  While “The Scottish Play” is the most common euphemism, “That Play” and “The Unmentionable” are also recognized alternatives.

Any actor using the “M” word in a dressing room should immediately leave the room, turn around three times, break wind or spit, knock on the door and ask permission to re-enter. Alternatively, (and less cumbersomely) the line “Angels and ministers of grace defend us” (Hamlet 1.iv) can be quoted.

– Cassell’s Companion To Theatre, 1997

The wages of Truthiness:

Democratic politicians receive a 40% increase in contributions in the 30 days after appearing on the comedy cable show The Colbert Report.  In contrast, their Republican counterparts essentially gain nothing.  These findings appear to validate anecdotal evidence regarding the political impact of the program, such as the assertions by host Stephen Colbert that appearing on his program provides candidates with a “Colbert bump” or a rise in support for their election campaigns.

This analysis of one of America’s most well-known pop icons of recent years is conducted by political scientist James H. Fowler (University of California, San Diego), who is also a self-identified fan of the show.  The research appears in the July issue of PS: Political Science and Politics, a journal of the American Political Science Association.

Read the entire American Political Science Association article here.  The paper is here.

The apex of MTV’s pre-Real World foray into game shows, in your correspondent’s humble opinion, was the frisky Remote Control; and the best category, “Dead or Canadian?”  a blissfully simple premise:  contestants earned points by correctly responding to a name offered by the emcee, “dead” (if person named had passed away) or “Canadian” (if said person hails from north of the 49th parallel).  For example:  “Alan Young– Dead?  or Canadian?”

Now, thanks to the folks at “Who’s Alive and Who’s Dead,” readers can play at home…  all else one needs is an open connection to Wikipedia for a birthplace triangulation…

As we memento mori, we might use the pistols we drew yesterday in Annie Oakley’s honor to fire a birthday salute to John Henry “Doc” Holliday, the dentist, gambler, and gunfighter who is best remembered for his friendship with Wyatt Earp and his role in the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, and who was born this date in 1851 in Griffin, Georgia.  Holliday’s story is a genuinely fascinating one, and sad.  In an 1896 article, Wyatt Earp summed it up thusly:  “Doc was a dentist whom necessity had made a gambler; a gentleman whom disease had made a frontier vagabond; a philosopher whom life had made a caustic wit; a long lean ash-blond fellow nearly dead with consumption, and at the same time the most skillful gambler and the nerviest, speediest, deadliest man with a gun that I ever knew.”

Doc Holliday’s Dental School Graduation Picture

Who doesn’t love a mad scientist?  The renegade intelligence, the hubristic plans, the disheveled attraction…

The good folks at LiveScience have compiled a helpful list of the top ten real mad scientists of the modern era.  Consider, e.g., Jack Parsons:

When Jack Parsons wasn’t busy co-founding the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, he was practicing magic and calling himself the Antichrist. This mysterious bad boy of the space program had no formal education, yet still managed to develop a rocket fuel that would guide the United States through WWII and into space. Tragically yet appropriately dramatic, Parsons blew himself up during a lab experiment at his home in 1952.

See them all here.

As we launder our lab coats, we might fire a two-gun birthday salute for Phoebe Anne Oakley Moses (or Mozee)– better known by her stage name, Annie Oakley– who was born on this date in 1860 in Drake County, Ohio.  An extraordinary sharpshooter, Ms. Oakley performed feats of marksmanship in Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show from 1885; she was partially paralyzed in a train wreck in 1901, but continued in the show for another 20 years.  As a measure of her fame, readers might consider that she was the inspiration for Irving Berlin’s hit 1946 musical, Annie Get Your Gun.

Annie Oakley

Happy International Left-Handers Day!