Self Help Radio 112114: The World Of Self Help Radio

(Original image here)

Today's Self Help Radio was an exceedingly ridiculous affair which embarrasses us all.  Still, there was a great deal of good music shared, as well as a poem by Sir Archibald Von Poesy & an interview with Mr. Professor, whose show World Of Science delighted & confused me as a child.  But such things hardly make up for a show with the theme "world of Self Help Radio" in which there's very little about that world & a plethora of material about other words, from a world of one's own to a world of liars.  Which actually might also be a world of one's own.

The songs that were played are below.  The show is available wherever in the world you are at the Self Help Radio website.  Please pay attention to password information.  This is a world of cyberdouches, & they like to pick on dumb websites like my own.

As always, thanks for listening!  To me you are a world of joy.

(part one)

"World Of Glass" Neil MacArthur _She's Not There_
"I'm In A World Of Trouble" Sweet Things _Best Of Soul Time: A Selection Of Northern Soul Classics From The Archives_
"My World Of Dreams" Mary Wells _Looking Back: 1961-1964_

"Wonderful World Of Children" J.P. Rags _Wonderful World Of Children_
"A World Of Our Own" The Seekers _All Bound For Morningtown (EMI Recordings 1964-1968)_
"A World Of My Own" TV Smith's Explorers _The Last Words Of The Great Explorer_
"World Of Your Own" The Skeptics _Snallygaster_

"In A World Of Pretty Faces" The Models _Bend Me, Shape Me_
"Questions In A World Of Blue" Julee Cruise _The Voice Of Love_
"World Of Love" Gentle People _Soundtracks For Living_
"World Of" Tania & Dave MH _World Of_

"Wonderful World Of Sound" Monty Python _Monty Python's Previous Record_
"World Of Whisky" Robin Laing _One For The Road_

(part two)

"World Of Trouble" Big Joe Turner _The Rhythm & Blues Years_
"World Of Trouble" Lou Rawls _Anthology_
"World Of Darkness" David Ruffin _My Whole World Ended_

"The World Of Broken Hearts" Elvis Costello _Imperial Bedroom_
"Rosemary Davis World Of Sound" The Jazz Butcher _Waiting For The Love Bus_
"World Of Your Own" The Mayfields _World Of Your Own_
"The World Of Professional Golf 1994" The Lucksmiths _Get-To-Bed Birds_

"World Of Her Own" The Wake _Here Comes Everybody_
"You Do My World A World Of Good" Harvest Ministers _You Do My World A World Of Good_
"World Of Light" Ivy Green _Dreaming Of You_
"World Of Crime" Cinnamon _Vertigo_

"World Of Liars" The Apartments _Apart_

Whither The World Of Self Help Radio?

It's nearly six o'clock & I'm not done with my show.  What does "done with my show" mean?  It means gathering all the component parts (songs, background music, stupid "comedy" bits I make) & putting them in a rough running order for the show tomorrow.  Why a "rough" running order?  Because inevitably I make changes.  & sometimes people call with requests.  & sometimes I remember something that would fit perfectly & try to find it to play it.  The show's really not finished until it's finished, around 9am on a Friday morning.  As much as I wish differently.

This week's show kind of reveals a flaw in my method of finding themes for the show.  I'm a contrary sort, & I know there are many radio shows that are theme-based (there appear to be at least two more on the WRFL schedule right now, for example).  So I tend not to opt for "easy" themes.  I've never done a show about cars, or women, or rain, & I confess I tended to be a little snooty when I looked at the (to me) generic themes on Bob Dylan's old themes show.  I want my shows to be odd, & somewhat challenging, & they tend to be, whatever you might think of the results.  It nearly broke me, for example, finding enough songs about mummies to do a mummy show for Halloween!

So: I am listening to music, I am noticing a pattern, I start collecting songs.  I probably heard three or four songs a few months back that had the phrase "world of" in the title.  I thought, "Ha! "A World Of Self Help Radio!"  & then started collecting songs.

But there's nothing really to discuss about this theme.  What sort of interviews do you do with people about that theme?  It's downright silly, is what it is.

I think I've been dragging my heels with this show because I'm pretty certain it won't be that good.  I'm sorry about that.  I should've probably ditched this theme like I do so many others.  I could probably put a show about "rain" together pretty quickly.  If I had a mind to.

But no.  The show will go on.  At 7am, lasting till 9am, tomorrow.  On 88.1 fm in Lexington, online at wrfl dot fm.  & later on the website.

"The World Of Self Help Radio."  What a dumb theme!

Preface To The World Of Self Help Radio: Really?

The World Of Self Help Radio.  What world is that?  It's obviously a very small fraction of the World Of Radio, which is, of course, the terminally sick member of the World Of Media.  So why would anyone make a radio show called "the World Of Self Help Radio"?  Is it just that it's on a show called "Self Help Radio"?  Isn't that - nepotism?

According to the Wikipedia, nepotism is "favoritism granted in politics or business to relatives. The term originated with the assignment of nephews to cardinal positions by Catholic popes & bishops. Nepotism is found in the fields of politics, entertainment, business, & religion."

Can I add - radio?

But wait!  Is it nepotism if a radio show is promoting itself?  Isn't a radio show its own promotion?  Do I have to coin a new word: autonepotism?

Perhaps.  But probably not.  One person (perhaps the only person ever) who has listened to Self Help Radio has commented (one imagines), "At least 50% of the show is music I think, which means it's not always the Gary show.  Which could also be called 'the World Of Self Help Radio'!"

Indeed, this seems to be a naked ploy to make the show entirely about Self Help Radio.  It's a scandal & it's a disgrace.

& I am writing this as someone - indeed, the only one - involved in the show.  If I am offended, who is to blame?  Who made the decision, if not me, to have a show entirely about itself?  & if there is no one to whom I answer, who besides me exists to stop me from promoting Self Help Radio inside an episode of Self Help Radio?

Tomorrow, in the blog, I talk to a radio show lawyer about what options I can take against myself & my show to stop this travesty from happening.

(P.S. Is a radio show lawyer a lawyer who appears on a radio show or, as I am beginning to suspect, a person who pretends to be a lawyer on the radio?)

Snow Day

Can a blog take a snow day?  It's fricking cold out there.

Plus I'm doing a late night show tonight.  From 2 to 5 am.  Gotta gather stuff.

Gather music like firewood to keep the airwaves warm.

I should probably nap too.

Is it cold where you are?  The low tonight is supposed to be 12.

The low tonight is a "tweenage."

The wife was complaining that we had no autumn.  She may be right.

It Was Cold Today

I took that picture, of our backyard, this morning.  It's been very cold today & continues to snow, although it probably won't stick or stick around much.  But it has very much affected my mood.  Snow in the middle of November?  Where do I live, Siberia?

Self Help Radio 111414: Seasons

(Original image here.

I feel like I've done a couple of shows about summer, & at least one about spring.  A guest deejay a couple of years ago did a show about autumn, but I've never done one, nor a show about winter.  But who cares?  I did a show about all the seasons!  & I did it on two hours sleep!

It was fun, because in addition to playing lots of music, I got to talk to my Spiritual Advisor, the Reverend Dr. Howard Gently, & to Our Man In Hollywood, Mark Miller.  Plus, Tania called in & sang a song!  All that & tons of great music!  Look at all these exclamation marks!  I need to get some sleep!

The show is available for you to listen at your leisure at Self Help Radio Dot Net.  Please pay attention to the login information.  The songs I played are listed below.

Thanks so much for listening!

(part one)

"Let's Wander Thru The Seasons" Marais & Miranda _More Nature Songs_
"Each Season Changes You" Bob Ensign & The Stump Jumpers _Pickin', Grinnin', & Singin'_
"Queen Of The Seasons" Gordon Terry _Lotta, Lotta Women_

"Turn! Turn! Turn!" Pete Seeger _The Bitter & The Sweet_
"Like The Seasons" Lyme & Cybelle _Follow Me_
"Four Seasons" The Carnival _Fading Yellow: Timeless Pop-Sike & Other Delights 1965-1969, Vol. 6_
"I Love You For All Seasons" The Fuzz _Soul Hits Of The '70s - Didn't It Blow Your Mind? Vol. 4_

"Time Of The Season" Ippu-Do _Radio Fantasy_
"Seasons" Hearts On Fire _Dreams Of Leaving_
"Season Cycle" XTC _Skylarking_
"Girl For All Seasons" The Orange Peels _So Far_

"In Every Season" Pullover _Holiday_
"Seasons" The Ettes _Do You Want Power?_

(part two)

"A Reason For Every Season" Girlfrendo _Surprise, Surprise It's Girlfrendo_
"Whatever Season" Sambassadeur _Sambassadeur_
"High Hawk Season" The Mountain Goats _All Eternals Deck_

"Seasons In The Sun" Black Box Recorder _England Made Me_
"In A City Without Seasons" The One A.M. Radio _Heaven Is Attached By A Slender Thread_
"Seasons" Ian McCulloch _Slideling_

"Seasons" Earth & Fire _Earth & Fire_
"Seasons Change" The Proctors _Everlasting Light_
"When Seasons Change" Curtis Mayfield _There's No Place Like America Today_

"The Seasons Of Love" Ed Ames _When The Snow Is On The Roses_
"Seasons Of My Heart" George Jones _Country Song Hits_

Whither Seasons?

I think I say this too often: I grew up in a place without seasons.

I grew up in a suburb of Dallas, & occasionally it got cold & snowed, but in general, it was hot.  It got hot around the middle of March & stayed hot until the middle of October.  There were no promises that you wouldn't be experiencing 90 degree weather in December.

It was worse in Austin.  I used to joke that Austin had two seasons: hot, & not so hot.  The truth was, the winter was mostly mild (there might be some bitter cold for a week or two, & god help the town if there were ice), & there were always a couple of weeks of spring & fall - those were the times I loved Austin the best.  It was a beautiful city those times, & then it would grow oppressively hot, oppressively humid, with the leaves on the trees always the darkest green.

Moving to Kentucky was a strange revelation.  I tell this story a lot, too:

At a planning meeting at WRFL, the discussion was about perhaps doing an outdoor show in late September, at night.  It was nixed immediately - "It would be too cold" was the immediate concern.

Too cold!  In late September!  I believe that that's when ACL Fest happens in Austin & it's still hot as a furnace around that time!  What a difference a few lines of latitude make.

So I pay attention to seasons.  It got cold today.  It's going to be a long winter.

Self Help Radio's show about seasons will air tomorrow morning (when it'll be 25 degrees out) from 7 to 9am on 88.1 fm in Lexington.  It will also stream live on wrfl dot fm.  & later on I'll stick it up on the website.  You know how it is.

Preface To Seasons: Garage Door Replacement

This is something I never thought I'd ever say: we're having our garage door replaced.

Who has garage doors that belong to them?  Who thinks to themselves, "When I grow up, among the things that I will own will be a garage door"?  I guess when I was a kid, I might have imagined that I might one day own a house, or at the very least a car I slept in as I kept a few steps ahead of the law, but a garage door?

The home we currently live in, my wife, my beagles, my cats, & myself, this house which we can say "we own" even though we owe way too much money on it to use the word "own," this house we live in was once owned by a person who was apparently a "slumlord."  We have discovered, piece by piece, the corners he cut to get the cheapest possible things to keep the house warm, dry, not on fire, up to code (but just up to code).  One of those corners was a (possibly self-installed) garage door opener that had been, in its years of use, so poorly & cheaply put together that it was curving & about to split.  It made a horrible racket whenever it opened.  When its innards went bad & we had to get someone in to fix it, the garage door specialists (because there are such things) said that it needed replacing pronto.

Luckily, I was in no way involved in the purchasing of a new garage door.  Frankly, anything having to do with the house, I let the wife choose.  I have no aesthetic opinion about the color of walls or the arrangement of furniture or whatever choice one has to make about garage doors.  (For the record, she chose sandstone.)

Why don't I care?  Because there are far more important things to argue about.  I save my energy for those arguments, not ones about the color of garage doors.  In high school & in college, I put things on the wall - mainly music-related posters - as a way to inform the rare visitor that these were my interests.  I don't care to do that anymore.  It's probably a relief to the wife.

We also have no photos, professionally made or otherwise, of us or the animals on the wall.  I find those weird, like you need to remind yourself that these people are, in fact, related or married to you.  We put pictures on the fridge, but really, if we didn't have them, I wouldn't care.  Time already buries us; one doesn't need peripherals like photos & mail & stickers & magnets to weigh down the already suffocating memories.

As I write this, & listen to music for Friday's show, there's all kinds of knocking & banging noises.  They're almost done.  I'm a little worried, myself - the old, falling-apart garage door was noisy as hell.  This one probably won't be.  & while I'm not a guilty person, & I can't imagine what I'd be doing that the wife can "catch me" at, I did like the noise that indicated she was returning.  That will probably be gone.

Maybe I should make her wear a bell around her neck.

Update: it's a pretty quiet garage door.  Damn.

The Croup

Before the internet, & with no dictionary handy, one had to guess what the hell people were talking about by trying to understand the context.  I guess one could interrupt & ask, but they didn't always seem to be proper or polite, no matter what kind of annoying child or person you were.  When I was a teenager, I would keep a dictionary handy to look up words I didn't know, but often I was so caught up in the reading that I just let it pass - again, trusting in context.

Naturally, many words I thought I knew I didn't really know.

Just now, lost in my dumb thoughts, I remembered being told that a schoolfellow had "the croup."  I must've been very young but also impressionable, because it stayed with me - I think I recall that word in a strange, familiar way.  My childhood reasoning went something like: "Croup sounds horrible.  It sounds like a horrible soup.  A horrible hot soup that burns your insides."

Come to think of it, maybe I had the croup.  I should ask my mother.

Today - as I was saying - I was thinking about "the croup."  Immediately my brain said, "That's a made-up thing if I ever heard one!"  It did sound like something someone would say in fun.  My high school history teacher characterized all colds as "the epizootic."  As in, "Hey, Paul's not here today."  "No, bet he's got the epizootic!"

But croup is for real.  As it says in the Wikipedia,

Croup (or laryngotracheobronchitis) is a respiratory condition usually triggered by an acute viral infection of the upper airway. The infection leads to swelling inside the throat, which interferes with normal breathing and produces the classical symptoms of a "barking" cough, stridor, & hoarseness. It may produce mild, moderate, or severe symptoms, which often worsen at night. It is often treated with a single dose of oral steroids; occasionally inhaled epinephrine is used in more severe cases. Hospitalization is rarely required.

Croup is a relatively common condition that affects about 15% of children at some point, most commonly between 6 months & 5–6 years of age. It is almost never seen in teenagers or adults.

Before the advent of vaccination, croup was frequently caused by diphtheria, & was often fatal. This cause is now a historical one in the Western world due to the success of the diphtheria vaccine & improved hygiene and living standards.

Yay vaccines!

So there's a fifteen percent chance I had the croup when I was a kid.  Sorry - that I had laryngotracheobronchitis.  That doesn't sound like bad soup.

As a postscript: if I had read that definition above in an encyclopedia, I would've had to go get a dictionary to look up the word "stridor."  Never heard it before.  But luckily I just had to click on it.  & I discovered:

Stridor (Latin for "creaking or grating noise") is a high-pitched breath sound resulting from turbulent air flow in the larynx or lower in the bronchial tree.

Though I still wish I had a giant set of encyclopedias.

Autumn Sweater

Do you have a problem with excessive sweating?  Why do people sweat anyway?  The internet says (here):

Sweating is an essential & natural biological process that starts soon after we are born. Sweating, or perspiring, is the body’s mechanism of keeping us cool & preventing us from overheating in a warm environment or during exercise or exertion. Our body also produces sweat when we experience strong emotions or stressful situations, during hormonal changes, & it helps to play a role in fighting infections.

Normally our bodies produce almost 1 liter of sweat per day; however most of this evaporates as soon as it is produced, so we don't notice it. The body produces more sweat during exercise or in warmer environments in order to help cool us down. If a person exercised very hard in the heat they could produce up to 10 liters of sweat in a day.

10 liters of sweat a day?!?  If I knew the metric system I might be horrified!

Oh yeah, so then why do I sweat so much?

Sweat's pretty gross.  Speaking of gross, why do men sweat more than women?  Why do I sweat more than men & women combined?

Checking the Self Help Radio "kind of a table of contents page", one will discover that Self Help Radio has never done a show about sweat.  & this week's show isn't about sweat.  I was just thinking of the song "Autumn Sweater" by Yo La Tengo & my brain, in its dumbass way, imagined for a second that the song wasn't about a piece of clothing but rather about someone perspiring in the fall.

But if there were a show about sweating what songs might we hear?  Of course "Cold Sweat" by James Brown.  "Coldsweat" by the Sugarcubes, sure.  "Sweatbox" by the Wolfgang Press, yes.  Maybe that Jonathan Richman song with the awkward title "The Lovers Are Here & They're Full Of Sweat"?  Not "The Lovers Are Here & They're Covered In Sweat," Jonathan?  "Full Of Sweat"?  Really?

No, I'm not ready to tackle a show about sweat just yet.  It gives me the sweats thinking about it.  I'm not going to sweat it, though - & even if I did, & I was too sweaty, it doesn't matter!  It's cold out!  I just sweat inside my sweater & no one notices.  Except maybe the smell.

Self Help Radio 110714: Saws

I know, right?  A radio show about saws?  I'm not even a crafty guy!  Ask my wife.  She wishes I would take up carpentry or something like that.  The most sawyer I am, alas, is Tom.  & I have a fence to paint.

Still, I managed to rustle up a couple hours worth of saw songs.  The show only aired ninety minutes, because I gave the last half hour to my trainee, Ethan, who did wonderfully.  At home, later, I added thirty minutes of music, to bring it to the full two hours.  So if you heard the show this morning - there's bonus content!  Suddenly I feel like a Blu-Ray Video Disc!

The show is listenable (arguably listenable) at the Self Help Radio website.  Please pay attention to passwords & such, available on the page.  The sawsy songs I played are listed below.

As always, thanks for listening!

(part one)

"Cross Cut Saw Blues" Tommy McClennan _Big Joe Williams & The Stars Of Mississippi Blues_
"The Great Big Saw Came Nearer & Nearer" Spike Jones & His City Slickers _...And The Great Big Saw Came Nearer & Nearer & Nearer & Nearer & Nearer!_
"Saw Funny Rug" Hajime Sakita _Musical Saw Songs "S"_

"Chainsaws" Drew Hastings _Farmageddon_
"Chainsaw" The Cut-Outs _'No More Of Your Fairy Stories': An Indiepop Loveletter To The Ramones_
"Chainsaw" Fat Tulips _Starfish_
"Chainsaw" Miss Alex White & The Red Orchestra _Miss Alex White & The Red Orchestra_
"Chainsaw Charlie" Angry Johnny & The Killbillies _Hankenstein_

"Buzzsaw" The Turtles _The Turtles Present The Battle Of The Bands_
"God's Buzzsaw" Ya Ya Choral _Can't Stop It! II : Australian Post-Punk 1979-1984_
"Radial Arm Saws" The Styrenes _It's Still Artastic_
"Pavement Saw" Big Black _Songs About Fucking_

"Saw Mill" Buck Owens _On The Bandstand_
"Son Of A Sawmill Man" Osborne Brothers _Up To Date & Down To Earth_
"The Day The Saw Mill Closed Down" Bobby Bare _A Bird Named Yesterday_

(part two)

"Saw Mill River Road" Chet Atkins _Mr. Guitar: The Complete Recordings 1955-1960_
"Sawmill" Miles Davis & John Lee Hooker _The Hot Spot_
"Sawmill Holler" Watermelon Slim & The Workers _The Wheel Man_

"I Broke My Saw" Love Tractor _Themes From Venus_
"My Buzzsaw Baby (Really Cut Me Up)" Johnnys _My Buzzsaw Baby (Really Cut Me Up)_
"Not Track Five, Not Chainsaw Juggler" Mitch Hedberg _Mitch All Together_
"The Saw-Playing Musician" Utah Phillips _Fellow Workers_
"Saw & Calliope Organ On Wire" The Music Tapes _Mary's Voice_

"Sawing On The Strings" The Mayfield Brothers _Vintage Recordings 1948-1956_
"Saw Fiddle Saw" Red Steagall _It's Our Life_
"Chainsaw" Little Gold _Weird Freedom_
"The Black Country Chainsaw Massacreee" Pop Will Eat Itself _CD86: 48 Tracks From The Birth Of Indie Pop_
"Bury The Hatchet, The Chainsaw, & Whatever Else You Got" Hair _The Magic's Gone_

"Buzz Saw" Xiu Xiu _The Air Force_
"Sawed Off" Dub Narcotic Sound System _Out Of Your Mind_
"Chainsaw The Horse" The Dentists _Dressed_

Whither Saws?

In the beginning, there was a song.  Or two.  Both of them had the word "buzz saw" in them.  It seemed promising.  An idea had begun.

An idea that got lonesome.  Because there were so few "saw" songs forthcoming.  Maybe a song about a chainsaw here.  A song about a sawmill there.  More often there were the temptation songs.

The songs about "see-saws."  There are a lot of us see-saw songs, they's see-sing in a sing-song voice.  & they were right.  There were a lot of see-saw songs.

But in the back of your head, you said to yourself, The saw in see-saw is just the past tense of 'see.'  It refers to the experience on the playground toy.  It's not a saw like a buzzsaw or a chainsaw!

The songs about "jigsaws" were next.  We're actually named after a type of saw, they said in rumbly-mumbly way, like pieces of a puzzle poured out of a box.  There are loads of us, boxes full of us!

But in the back of your head, you told yourself, The jigsaw may be what is used to cut the puzzle pieces but the songs are about the puzzle itself.  They aren't really songs about an actual jigsaw.

& many weeks passed, & you would think about the saw show, & the songs that inspired it.  & one day, in a fit of pique, you said out loud, to the universe, I will do a show about saws!  & I will find songs about saws to fill an entire show!  & if there are not enough saw songs, I shall write & perform enough for the show!

The universe is indifferent, but thankfully it turns out there are plenty of songs about saws, enough to fill an entire show.  Anyone interested will be able to hear them tomorrow morning on Self Help Radio.

It's on from 7 to 9am on 88.1 fm WRFL in Lexington.  It'll stream simultaneously on wrfl dot fm.  Later in the day, it'll come to rest on self help radio dot net.  Where it shall sleep, & dream of a log being sawed, which will emulate its snoring.

Preface To Saws: Call Of Duty

I asked the wife if we'd seen more than the first "Saw" movie, which was very successful & spawned seven or so sequels (including one called "The Final Chapter," although I'm sure there'll be more of that cash cow, even though there are diminishing returns which each Roman numeral after the title), & she assures me we saw at least the first two.  I have no memory of them - even reading the summary on the IMDb, it doesn't sound familiar to me.  IFC did a marathon over Halloween & I'd swear in court I never saw any Saw movie.

That's just age, though.  I've forgotten more movies, perhaps, than I'll see in the rest of my life.

I had to sub a show on RFL tonight so I am a little discombobulated.  Also, I want to watch Arrow but the wife wants to finish last night's Sons Of Anarchy & then watch American Horror Story.  But I want to watch Arrow!  & drink a lot of wine.  But I don't have any wine & I don't get to watch Arrow.  Unhappy face.

Musical Saws

On this depressing election night, I am retreating into my show, which this week is about saws.  One of the things I plan to play are people using the saw as a musical instrument.  So here's a fellow playing my favorite Beethoven piece, the Moonlight Sonata.  Enjoy!

Something I Like

I spend a lot of time bouncing around nonsense on the internets, most of it being amused, some of it educating myself, & a few times I find stuff that really knocks my socks off.  Today, I discovered these paintings by Gill Rocca, a sample of which is above.  Socks were knocked off.  Why?  I like the fogginess, the blurriness, the way the absence or lack of light is so impressionistically captured.  The link has more of this artist's moving paintings.

Self Help Radio 103114: Halloween 2014 - Mummies!

Original image here

It was hard but rewarding to find two hours worth of songs about mummies but find them I did & that was today's show.  I did have to break into a pharaoh's tomb to get some of the music, but you & I know that those curses are a bunch of hooey, right?  Right?  Oh no.

The show can be listened to at the Self Help Radio web page now & well past Halloween.  Hey, & if you want to hear some of my previous Halloween shows, they're at the top of my Self Help Radio archive page for today - shows about hell, haunted houses, graveyards, nightmares, & zombies are there - in addition to the mummy show I did today.  Maybe perfect for your Halloween party?  Probably not.

Have a safe one & thanks for listening - the mummy songs I played are below.

(part one)

"The Mummy" Bob McFadden & Dor _Songs Our Mummy Taught Us_
"The Mummy" Marshmallow Overcoat _The Very Best Of Marshmallow Overcoat_
"The Mummy's Bracelet" Lee Ross _Bomp In The Night_
"The Mummy" Uncle Vin _Boo_

"The Mummy" The Naturals _The Mummy_
"Homemade Mummy" Aesop Rock _Skelethon_
"The Mummy's Ball" The Verdicts _These Ghoulish Things: Horror Hits For Halloween_
"When I See Mommy I Feel Like A Mummy" Captain Beefheart & The Magic Band _Shiny Beast (Bat Chain Puller)_

"Me & My Mummy" Bobby 'Boris' Pickett & The Crypt Kickers _The Original Monster Mash_
"Mummy Beach" Hot Lava _Lavalogy_
"My Mummy" Mel Calvin & The Kokonuts _My Mummy_
"My Daddy Is A Mummy" Richard Thompson _RT: The Life & Music Of Richard Thompson_
"The Mummy" Benji Hughes _A Love Extreme_

"The Mummy Piece" William S. Burroughs _Best Of William S. Burroughs: From Giorno Poetry Systems_
"Sarcophagus" Telephone Company _The King's Surprise?_

(part two)

"Mummies" Toyah _The Blue Meaning_
"The Mummy" Jad & David Fair _26 Monster Songs For Children (A-Z)_
"Mummy Walk" Bo Diddley _Hey! Bo Diddley_
"The Mummy's Monkey" The Eastsiders _Halloween Oldies But Goodies Of The '50s & '60s_

"The Mummy" The Slackers _The Question_
"The Way Out Mummy" Bob Ridgely _Lost Treasures! Rarities From The Vaults Of Del-Fi_
"The Mummy" Black Time _Midnight World_
"Mummy's Curse" Luna Vegas _Second Shot_

"The Mummy" 4Corners Crew _Show Me The Lighta EP_
"Bad News" Spooklight _Spooklight_
"Mummified" Future Clouds & Radar _Peoria_

"King Tut" Steve Martin _A Wild & Crazy Guy_
"Tutankhamun" Dynasty _The Electric Asylum, Vol. 3_
"The Mummy's Revenge" Wade Denning & Frank Daniels _Monster Mash (Sounds Of Terror!)_

Whither Mummies?

I have a hell of a thing going with these Halloween shows.  I don't like to repeat myself (well, except for anniversary shows); even the shows I do every year that are about the same - like the Christmas show - I try to play stuff I have never played before.  So if I'm going to do a different Halloween show every year, at some point, I'm going to run out of Halloween icons, right?

Here's what I've done so far in my twelve long years on this show:

2002: general Halloween songs
2003: ghosts
2004: (no Halloween show)
2005: vampires
2006: monsters
2007: zombies
2008: witches
2009: werewolves
2010: haunted houses
2011: graveyards
2012: nightmares
2013: hell

I've complained about this before - I'm running out of scary things!  With mummies, I believe, I've finished off the golden age pantheon of movie monsters.  What can I do next year?  I don't know!

Please listen to my ridiculous mummy show tomorrow from 7 to 9am on 88.1 fm WRFL in Lexington, & online at wrfl dot fm.  & I'll put it up in time for Halloween if you so desire at the Self Help Radio website.

Preface To Mummies: Run For Your Life, Charlie Brown!

User CitizenWolfie has created a fabulous collection of Schulz-inspired Halloween creatures which he calls Run For Your Life, Charlie Brown!  I have included above, appropriately, his "Linus as the Mummy" drawing above for your pleasure.

Visit the link!  They're all great!

Is It Cater-Corner Or Kitty-Corner?

This might not be a question they ask in England or Australia - I've heard people with accents pronounce the "cater" in "cater-corner" like the word "cater" as in "I want to have a vegetarian restaurant cater my Thanksgiving" or "I won't cater to your whims, human" (which is something my cats say to me all the time).

But in the States, we say "cater-corner" as if we're saying "cat" in the "corner."  Which is why I think some people say "kitty-corner," since "cat" & "kitty" are both names for those fickle beasts to whom we give our love, only to watch most of them treat our hearts like crippled mice, & play with them.

Sob!

The great Word Detective, who you can read at word-detective.com, & who'll get you addicted to etymology, tells the story of this weird word here, which I will reproduce below:

"Cattycorner" does not actually have anything to do with cats, although cats are notoriously fond of sitting in corners and staring at the wall (at least mine are). The proper word, in fact, is "catercorner" or "catercornered." The "cater" is an Anglicization of the French "quatre," or "four," and "catercornered" originally just meant "four-cornered." To specify that something is "catercorner across" from something else is to stress the diagonal axis of an imaginary box, as opposed to saying "directly across" or just "across."

According to the Dictionary of American Regional English, our great national repository of English as real folks speak it, "catercorner" first appeared around 1883 in the South, and originally meant "askew" or "out of line." The "diagonally across" meaning soon took over, however, as did the transition from "cater" to "catty." Linguists call this process "folk etymology" -- people replacing an unfamiliar element in a word or phrase ("cater") with a familiar one ("catty" or "kitty"). "Cattycorner" has remained purely an Americanism, so don't expect folks to understand the word if you use it on your next trip to London.

Now, I know other countries are familiar with this word, or at least the brainiacs in the Lucksmiths do, since they use it (pronouncing it with a long a) in the song Midweek Midmorning.  Nyah.

I miss the Lucksmiths.  That's a brilliant song.  I remember when I bought the single way back when.

Why am I thinking of this?  Because as I sit here working on my next show (the Halloween show, about mummies, this Friday), I can hear the sounds of children screaming.  That's a daunting sentence, implying horrors, with the words "Halloween" & "scream" so close together, but actually, I live with a daycare-in-a-church catercorner from my house, & children scream when they're playing, mainly to annoy me.  My dogs & cats, who doubtless have more excellent hearing than I do, seem unfazed, but it alarms me every time one of them lets out a particularly screechy shriek.  I think the people hired to watch over them (who, I found out, have the inflated title "teachers") wear earplugs while the kinders play.

Anyway, I answered my own question by going to the Word Detective: it's catercorner.  Not even a dash!

Forget I said anything.

A Comedy Of Terrors

You think you're so clever, making a pun on a Shakespeare play (& referencing something your wife has taken to saying when the pets do something funny) & then you check on it.  You discover (naturally) that this simple-to-make pun has been used probably since the first critic of the play.

"Master Shakespeare's new play is not so funny; indeed, one might call it a comedy of terrors!" - The Stratford-On-Avon Times

Check it out: it's a horror film with Peter Lorre, Boris Karloff, & Vincent Price (using the article "the" instead of "a"), & also a Bollywood film that has a little infamy because it was sued by Warner Brothers for apparently ripping off Harry Potter (although it seems to have mostly ripped off Home Alone).  Plus it's an eBook & also someone wants to make it a role playing game.  Now it's the title of one of my dumb blog posts!

Shakespeare's play is about two twins separated at birth that end up in the same city & hilarity ensues.  The Comedy Of Terrors is about an undertaker who kills people to get more clients.  Wouldn't it have been more fun to have Karloff & Price be two killers who were separated at birth?  A real opportunity was missed there.

I can't imagine there'll be much comedy in my show this week, or do I mean terror?  There are quite a few songs about mummies (it's my Halloween show!) & a lot of them are novelty tunes.  I suppose I'll talk about that a bit more as the week wears on.