Bostworld

I’ve gotten good use out of the “Activity and Funny Songs” album over the years. It was volume eleven of “My First Golden Record Library,” a twelve record set that I got shortly after it was released in 1962. I had the whole thing committed to memory before I was five years old. Later, as a pot-smoking punk rocker, I used to party with it at 45 RPM speed. Now in my later years, it serves as the perfect fodder for a blog post. Listening to it all these years later, it evokes as many memories of intoxicated adolescence as it does early childhood. As you can imagine, this makes for a potent combination.

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A month into 2008, I’ve finally settled on my so-called “new years resolution” — to take better pictures. Time to set aside the automatic modes of my point-and-shoot. Instead of composing quirky sentences to delight the Bostworld visitor, I find myself trying to memorize the various formulas of f-stop, focal length, ISO and depth of field. I’ll need to brush up on my math as well. (What’s the reciprocal of x times 1.6?) The whole thing reminds me of balancing the chemicals in my swimming pool. If the black algae spots in my plaster are any indication, 2008 should be a banner year.

Continue reading ‘Only Exhibit Your Best Work’

Here’s another obscure but not-undistinguished album of electronic retro-pop. This one has the double distinction of not only being synthesizer driven, but also leaning heavily on songs from the Beatles’ “White Album. Named after its primary instrument, Wurlitzer’s popular synth/organ combo (your church probably had one), Orbit III is actually producers Jerry Styner and Larry Brown. The back cover says that much. Little else is available on either this album or its players. The label, Beverly Hills, is still in operation, but they are much more interested in shilling for their own current product than shedding light on the obscurities in the dark, best-forgotten corners of their back catalog.

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Why would anyone want to take a vacation right in the middle of the holiday season? A confluence of factors — coinciding free time availability, expiring vacation days, overwork and its attendant unstoppable urge to flee — caused my wife and I to travel cross country to visit the Florida Keys three weeks before Christmas this year. Encamped at an ocean-facing getaway that could also provide animal-free meals, we spent a lovely handful of days sightseeing, indulging in water sport, watching satellite television, getting eaten alive by invisible sand fleas, and generally trying to get some rest before the onslaught of year’s-end celebration.

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We’re big fans of the Les Humphries Singers here at the Bostworld. Listening to the LHS is like mounting a helium-filled inner tube and sailing back in time, right over the the last 35 years of musical disappointment to a time when young singers would don funky futuristic costumes to sing in unison at their highest registers to up-tempo arrangements full of loud drums and frenetic full orchestras. If the original LHS canon ever comes out on CD, I’ll be queing up for my copies on day of release.

Continue reading ‘Les Humphires - Piano Concerto’

Nobody will ever accuse me of being overly festive this time of year. In fact, I don’t think I’ve been much of a Christmas fan since the beginning of my second decade. Sure: I like gift-giving and all that, but I can’t find it within myself to — as one commercial I saw recently put it — “slow down and take the time to reflect on the things that really matter.” The things that really matter to me are at the front and center of my consciousness all year ’round, and believe me: slowing down is the last thing that comes to mind when I reflect upon them. For me, this time of year is anything but relaxed. I’m sure I’m not the only person who feels that the end of the calendar year is far and away the most hectic. And this year, events have seemed to converge upon me to create a perfect storm of busyness.

Continue reading ‘Your Favorite Little Podcast: Episode Nine’

In this installment of of presidential children’s book illustrations, comic book legend Jack Davis presents the life of America’s 26th president, Theodore Roosevelt. Despite their ample brown and orange hued delights, these drawings offer nothing close to the lovingly rendered detail of the ones he did depicting the life of Abraham Lincoln. While some of the full-page drawings feature the careful cross-hatching and stylized realism found in the best of Davis’ commercial work, many of them appear to have been handed over to an assistant for hasty finishing.

It is unknown if this is the result of tight deadlines, an overbooked client card, or just lack of interest on Davis’ part. Perhaps turn of the century America didn’t resonate as deeply with him as did the civil war era. Or perhaps he was simply drawn less to Roosevelt than Lincoln. Certainly, he is not alone. Despite his central place in the presidential pantheon, Roosevelt remains a controversial figure. One of the architects of the modern presidency — larger than life, media-friendly, and the central figure in his own bona fide cult of personality — Roosevelt is both lionized as a “trust busting” conservationist and pilloried as a jingoistic war monger.

Continue reading ‘Jack Davis Meets Theodore Roosevelt’