WACKY WEDNESDAY: Happy Birthday Yuri Gagarin

Gagarin: Space is the place

America won the Space Race. We got to the moon before anyone else did.

So there.

U.S.A! U.S.A!

But back in 1961, that outcome didn't seem so clear. That was especially true on April 12 of that year when a Soviet cosmonaut became the first person to orbit the Earth.

His name was Yuri Gagarin. And today is his birthday. He would have been 82.

Gagarin joined the Soviet Air Force in 1955. Four years later he was training to become a cosmonaut.

On April 12, 1961 in spacecraft called Vostok 1 Gagarin circled the planet at a speed of 27,400 kilometers per hour. The flight lasted 108 minutes. Unlike the American space flights that followed, Gagarin didn't land back on Earth in his spacecraft. He ejected from Vostok and parachuted to the ground.

Godless communist or not, that was pretty bitchen!

Gagarin was killed in a plane crash on March 27, 1968 -- more than a year before the U.S. moon landing. Gagarin never got to take a second trip to space.

Astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin left medals on the moon honoring Gagarin and cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov, who also had been killed in a plane crash. A crater on the far side of the moon was named in honor of Gagarin.

Back when I was in college, some older friends of mine in El Paso honored Gagarin by inventing a drink named after him. I don't remember what was in it. Vodka I presume. A couple of bartenders down in Juarez would serve it when you asked.

In Russia, he was honored with this song. (Sung by Eduard Labkovskiy in 1975).



A website devoted to Soviet music provided the music. (Turned into English by Google Translate --  thus the Mad Libs / song poem quality of this rendition.)

We're leaving space to work,                    
Stykuya ships in orbit,                        
And all originates from the first flight,             
Gagarin first turn around the Earth.          

The commander of the ship, bright-eyed Russian guy,      
He smile his whole universe presented.            
No, not for nothing that went first in space Yuri Gagarin,     
It is a new road has opened for us.                   


Space miracle machines                         
Explore Venus and the Moon,                          
And if it is necessary, and we take off, guys,          
Climb into outer space any new ground.          

The commander, fighting a brave man,         
With the crew will go to Mercury and Mars.          
No, not for nothing that went first in space Yuri Gagarin,     
He opened a new road for us.                   

Floats Land expanses of the universe,                
Around the Sun holds its usual path,           
And we live, humans, daring dream          
Across the Solar System to walk someday.   

The commander, son of Earth, a great guy,     
Astronauts, scientists will deliver at Pluto.           
No, not for nothing that went first in space Yuri Gagarin,     
For the future they committed feat.

I have no idea what "For the future they committed feat" means.

Whatever ... Here is a more recent Gagarin song:

TERRELL'S SOUND WORLD PLAYLIST

Sunday, March 6, 2016
KSFR, Santa Fe, N.M.
10 p.m. to midnight Sundays Mountain Time
Host: Steve Terrell
Webcasting!
101.1 FM
email me during the show! terrell(at)ksfr.org

Here's the playlist

OPENING THEME: Let It Out (Let it All Hang Out) by The Hombres

Burn, Baby Burn by Stud Cole

Changing Colors by The BellRays

The Witch by Los Peyotes

I'm the One by BBQ

Anala by The King Khan & BBQ Show

Smoked All My Bud by King Mud

Startin' to Slip by Sons of Hercules

Cadillac Hips by Soledad Brothers

Must Be Desire by Mojo Juju

 

Springtime for Hitler / Don't Cry For Me Argentina by Billy Joe Winghead

Shortnin' Bread by The Cramps

Jenny Take a Ride by Mitch Ryder & The Detroit Wheels

Buzz Buzz Buzz by The Blasters

Red Hot by Sam the Sham & The Pharoahs

What's the Matter Now by The Oblivions with Mr. Quintron

Shoplifter by Quintron & Miss Pussycat

Golden Surf II by Pere Ubu

 

Almost Ready by Dinosaur Jr.

Silver Monkey by Copper Gamins

Busted by The Black Keys

Betti Moretti by King Salami & The Cumberland 3

Green Sin Bags by Alex Maiorano & The Black Tales

Broken Bones & Pocket Change by St. Paul & The Broken Bones

Red Cadillac by Johnny Rawls

Wild Wild Lover by The A-Bones

Feeling Great Now She's Gone by Lynx Lynx

No Control by The Manxx

 

Albuquerque Freakout by Holy Wave

Searchin' for You by Javier Escovedo

The Hole by The Soul of John Black

My Life by Harlan T. Bobo

Bang Bang by The Gaunga Dyns

As Time Goes By by Jimmy Durante

CLOSING THEME: Over the Rainbow by Jerry Lee Lewis

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THE SANTA FE OPRY PLAYLIST

Friday, March 4, 2016
KSFR, Santa Fe, NM
Webcasting!
10 p.m. to midnight Fridays Mountain Time
Host: Steve Terrell 101.1 FM
Email me during the show! terrel(at)ksfr.org
Here's my playlist :
OPENING THEME: Buckaroo by Buck Owens
Back in the Saddle Again by Charlie Daniels
Mud by Legendary Shack Shakers
My Frijoles Ain't Free Anymore by Augie Meyers
Man of the Road by Wayne Hancock
The Race is On by George Jones
There Ought to Be a Law Against Sunny California by Terry Allen
Boomtown Boogie by Butch Hancock, Terry Allen, Jo Carol Pierce & Joe Ely
Fools Fall in Love by Butch Hancock with Marce LaCouture
Heaven is the Other Way by Big Sandy & His Fly-Rite Boys
Whispering Sea by Loretta Lynn

Poor Don't Vote by Paul Burch
Pretty Girl by Miss Leslie
DIYBYOB by The Waco Brothers
Rats in My Amp by Salty Pajamas
America is a Hard Religion by Robbie Fulks
The Cold Hard Facts of Life by T. Tex Edwards & Out on Parole
Monkey Rag by Asylum Street Spankers

Beautiful Blue Eyes by Red Allen & The Kentuckians
Pick Me Up on Your Way Down by Jimmie Dale Gilmore
God Don't Never Change by Lucinda Williams
7 Devils by Goddamn Gallows
Let's Bounce by Supersuckers
Hillbilly Highway by Reagan Boggs
Need Somebody Bad by Rhonda Vincent
Chattanooga Shoeshine Boy by Red Foley

Velvet ine Matador by Freakwater
Touch of Evil by Tom Russell with Eliza Gilkyson
Blue is My Heart by Holly Williams
When I Was a Cowboy by Odetta
A Beautiful Thing by The Handsome Family
Tiny Island by Leo Kottke
CLOSING THEME: Comin' Down by The Meat Puppets

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NPR Loves a Terry Allen Song

Terry Allen at Plaza Bandstand, Aug. 19, 2009

Artist, musician and Santa Fe resident Terry Allen was honored this week when NPR featured one of his tunes on the Songs We Love segment.

The song is "Cortez Sails" from Terry's 1975 debut album Juarez. Jewly Hight of NPR writes:

 The album's longest track and gravitational center, "Cortez Sail" is a rickety waltz which pivots between whimsical road ballad and ominous war song, between Jabo's keenness to get back across the border into Mexico (homesick and ducking a double murder he'd committed in Cortez, Colorado) and 16th century conquistador Hernan Cortes's drive to brutally colonize the Aztecs. It's a dialogue between the freedom to move, to flee, to choose one's destination, and the power to dominate — or the powerlessness of being dominated.

I never can get the dadgum NPR embeds to work on this blog, so I'll just post a Youtube of the song:



No denying the majesty of "Cortez Sail." But if I were choosing the song that I love most from Juarez, it would have been this one:



Juarez is being re-released again in May, this time on a label called Paradise of Bachelors. You can pre-order HERE. The label also plans to re-release Terry's second album, Lubbock (On Everything).

THROWBACK THURSDAY: The Sexsational World of Scopitones

Long before cable television, back in the early to mid '60s, dozens of pop and rock stars were filming hundreds of music clips for what amounted to a proto-MTV.

It was centered around a contraption, manufactured in France, called the Scopitone 450, which basically was a jukebox hooked up to a 26-inch TV set that played 16mm film clips.

The technology had been around since at least the 1940s when "Soundies" -- black and white clips played on coin-operated machines -- were briefly the next big thing in show biz.

The Scopitone machine was a huge improvement over the old Soundies model, For one thing, a customer could chose among a wide array of film clips. The clips were in color.

And best of all, as the art form evolved, most the Scopitone clips were filled with scantily-clad go-go girls whose shimmying put Sister Kate to shame! 

As this article in Broadly, a feminist section of Vice says:

... the message in these videos is clear: T&A! The in-your-face sexiness of the images is a stark contrast to the rather unsexy, often downright lame songs. To see more explicit non-static imagery, one would have had to go to the trouble of attending a peep show or tracking down a stag film. The Scopitones' absurdly enthusiastic buxom women were chosen to attract the male gaze on a small screen across a smoky bar, with the promise of a peek at more skin...in the next video.

But let's start with one of the milder ones. Debbie Reynolds' production company was responsible for many of the Scopitones. But the bump and grinding is kept to a minimum here -- though wholesome Debbie sure could work her pretty pink petticoats in this Golden Throat take on "If I Had a Hammer."


But wait, it gets wilder. Check out the bikinis and beehives in this " Pussycat a Go-Go medley by Stacy Adams & The Rockabilly Boys (no, they ain't rockabilly)



Jody Miller was best know for "Queen of the House," and answer song to Roger Miller's "King og the Road." Here she sings a George Jones song. But I don't think Possum done it this way ...



Joi Lansing, one of the queens of the Scopitones, sings one of my favorite songs from a Matt Helm movie.



And here's one in which i actually like the music. It's a song I first heard by The Searchers done by a group called George & Teddy & The Condors. And oh, yeah, there are go-go girls ...

Something was always cooking at Scopitone

(Hat tip to my friend Deborah and our mutual friend Tim for sending me down the Scopitone path.)